Obama Watch... 11/3/09
A Chronicle of the Socialization of America
The American People: Mugged!
Headlines …
House Health Care Bill Neither ‘Durable’ Nor ‘Desirable’ Says Former CBO Director
Tuesday, November 03, 2009
By Penny Starr, Senior Staff Writer
(CNSNews.com) – Former Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin said the House Democrats' health care overhaul is neither durable nor desirable because it would raise insurance premiums, ration care, and fail to bring down the cost of health care in America.
Speaking Monday on a conference call with reporters, Holtz-Eakin said that House Democrats had failed to draft a bill that would deliver meaningful health care reform without breaking the budget. House Democrats unveiled their 1,990-page health care bill last Thursday. [Alleged] President Obama called it a “critical milestone.”
Holtz-Eakin, however, said: “We are going to generally raise the cost of existing insurance to those who already have it – and that’s a majority of Americans – and then put in place a fiscally rickety way to get insurance to those who do not have insurance.”
“As a result I think that these are reforms which are not durable in any deep sense and are not desirable from the point of view of policy,” he said.
Read more <http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56508>
111 New Federal Bureaucracies Created in Democrats’ Health Care Bill
Tuesday, November 03, 2009
By House Republican Conference
(CNSNews.com) - The House Republican Conference has compiled a list of all the new boards, bureaucracies, commissions, and programs created in the House health care bill.
The Republican conference describes H.R. 3962 as “Speaker Pelosi’s government takeover of health care.”
The list of 111 new bureaucracies is reprinted here:
1. Retiree Reserve Trust Fund (Section 111(d), p. 61)
2. Grant program for wellness programs to small employers (Section 112, p. 62)
3. Grant program for State health access programs (Section 114, p. 72)
4. Program of administrative simplification (Section 115, p. 76)
5. Health Benefits Advisory Committee (Section 223, p. 111)
Read more <http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56532>
GOP Rep: Health Reform Scarier Than Terrorism
| Monday, November 2, 2009 3:10 PM | |
WASHINGTON -- A Republican congresswoman says people have more to fear from Democratic health care legislation than from terrorists.
Rep. Virginia Foxx of North Carolina made the comments in a speech on the House floor Monday.
She said that the greatest threat to freedom is the Democrats' health care overhaul bill, which she called a tax increase bill.
Foxx said that she believe "we have more to fear from the potential of that bill passing than we do from any terrorist right now in any country."
Read more <http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/us_health_care_terrorism/2009/11/02/280514.html>
Related Stories
Gibbs Says He Doesn’t Know if White House Has Reviewed Constitutionality of Forcing People to Buy Health Insurance
<http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56491>
Planned Parenthood Leader Resigns After Watching Ultrasound of Abortion Procedure
See Video: <http://www.breitbart.tv/planned-parenthood-leader-resigns-after-watching-ultrasound-of-abortion-procedure/>
Time for Liberals To Give Up On the Public Option
<http://www.newsmax.com/lanny_davis/public_option_davis_obama/2009/11/01/280162.html>
Largest Business Groups Slam Pelosi Health Plan
<http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/business_health_pelosi/2009/11/02/280658.html>
AP sources: House health bill totals $1.2 trillion
<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091102/ap_on_bi_ge/us_health_care_overhaul>
Healthcare provision seeks to embrace prayer treatments
<http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-na-health-religion3-2009nov03,0,2239900.story>
Domestic ...
Administration
Judicial Watch: ‘NEA Propaganda Effort Grew Out of Obama Campaign’
by Big Hollywood
“(Washington, DC) — Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it obtained more documents from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) in response to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests related to the NEA’s controversial August 10 conference call encouraging artists to create work that promotes the Obama agenda. The documents consist of internal NEA emails indicating the idea for the NEA propaganda effort grew out the Obama campaign while also providing new details regarding White House involvement. The Corporation for National and Community Service, which runs the AmeriCorps program, was represented during the call. The agencies and the White House were supposedly promoting the administration’s United We Serve political initiative. The emails include the actual conference call invitation, which details the controversial policy agenda that was being promoted. (The controversial call was first uncovered by www.BigGovernment.com. Other documents about the call were first released last week by Judicial Watch.)
“The following are email excerpts:
- July 28, 2009, 4:47 pm, Email from unknown Obama campaign activist to Yosi Sergant, former NEA Communications Director: “It was good to see you a few weeks ago in Washington. After our conversation, I thought it would be a really good idea to convene via a conference call some significant tastemakers/producers who can support United We Serve. As many of us contributed our services to the campaign, I would love to gather some of those folks to use their enthusiasm to get behind the President’s very important service initiative. Here are some people who I think should be part of the call. [Names redacted.]
Read more <http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/bighollywood/2009/11/02/judicial-watch-nea-propaganda-effort-grew-out-of-obama-campaign/>
Related Stories
Obamamania Cools to Luke Warm
<http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/obamamania_cools/2009/11/02/280255.html>
Europe Still Likes Obama, but Doubts Creep In
<http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/02/world/europe/02europe.html?_r=1&hpw>
Obamas updating first family's image
<http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2009-11-02-obama-culture_N.htm>
Michelle Obama launches mentoring program
<http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29042.html>
Economy
Fed’s Greenlee Says U.S. Banks’ Condition Is ‘Far From Robust’
By Scott Lanman
Nov. 2 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. banking system is still “far from robust,” hurt by a decline in commercial real estate values and threatened by rising prospects for defaults on such loans, a Federal Reserve official said.
“Although conditions and sentiment in financial markets have improved in recent months, significant stress and weaknesses persist,” Jon Greenlee, associate director of the Fed’s Division of Banking Supervision and Regulation in Washington, said today in testimony to a House Oversight subcommittee hearing in Atlanta.
The Fed and other U.S. regulators last week urged commercial real estate lenders to “work constructively” to arrange modifications with borrowers who show a willingness to repay debt that poses the biggest threat to the U.S. banking industry. Central bank policy makers plan to begin a two-day meeting in Washington tomorrow.
“The condition of the banking system is far from robust,” Greenlee said in prepared remarks. “Higher loan losses are depleting loan-loss reserves at many banking organizations, necessitating large new provisions that are producing net losses or low earnings.”
Losses will keep pressuring bank earnings, especially at smaller regional and community banks with “high concentrations” of commercial real estate loans, he said.
Read more <http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=agdRtftmgtqc>
Related Stories
Bernanke Housing Gamble May Bring Pressure to Extend Fed Aid
<http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601068&sid=aVCMmIqrxkKs>
Romney: Obama Stimulus Plan Is a Failure
<http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/us_economy_romney/2009/11/02/280257.html>
CIT Files Bankruptcy; U.S. Unlikely to Recoup Money
<http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a3.t_GrxbL2U>
Abortion, Life & Family Issues
Planned Parenthood Director Leaves, Has Change of Heart
Planned Parenthood has been a part of Abby Johnson's life for the past eight years; that is until last month, when Abby resigned.
Posted: 11:23 PM Nov 1, 2009
Reporter: Ashlea Sigman
Planned Parenthood has been a part of Abby Johnson's life for the past eight years; that is until last month, when Abby resigned. Johnson said she realized she wanted to leave, after watching an ultrasound of an abortion procedure.
'I just thought I can't do this anymore, and it was just like a flash that hit me and I thought that's it," said Jonhson.
She handed in her resignation October 6. Johnson worked as the Bryan Planned Parenthood Director for two years.
According to Johnson, the non-profit was struggling under the weight of a tough economy, and changing it's business model from one that pushed prevention, to one that focused on abortion.
"It seemed like maybe that's not what a lot of people were believing any more because that's not where the money was. The money wasn't in family planning, the money wasn't in prevention, the money was in abortion and so I had a problem with that," said Johnson.
Johnson said she was told to bring in more women who wanted abortions, something the Episcopalian church goer recently became convicted about.
"I feel so pure in heart (since leaving). I don't have this guilt, I don't have this burden on me anymore that's how I know this conversion was a spiritual conversion."
Johnson now supports the Coalition For Life, the pro-life group with a building down the street from Planned Parenthood. Coalition volunteers can regularly be seen praying on the sidewalk in front of Planned Parenthood. Johnson has been meeting with the coalition's executive director, Shawn Carney, and has prayed with volunteers outside Planned Parenthood
Read more <http://www.kbtx.com/local/headlines/68441827.html>
Planned Parenthood Leader Resigns After Watching Ultrasound of Abortion Procedure
See Video: <http://www.breitbart.tv/planned-parenthood-leader-resigns-after-watching-ultrasound-of-abortion-procedure/>
Worshiping the Idol of 'Woman's Experience'
October 2009By Anne Barbeau Gardiner
Anne Barbeau Gardiner, a Contributing Editor of the NOR, is Professor Emerita of English at John Jay College of the City University of New York. She has published on Dryden, Milton, and Swift, as well as on Catholics of the 17th century.
This month marks the 25th anniversary of the notorious full-page advertisement in the October 7, 1984, New York Times, in which nearly a hundred Catholics, including some two dozen nuns, tried to boost the presidential campaign of Democrats Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro by claiming that there is a "diversity" of lawful opinion about abortion inside the Catholic Church. When the Vatican objected, many of these nuns played a cat-and-mouse game with Rome for nearly two years. In A Just and True Love, a collection of essays published earlier this year by the University of Notre Dame, Sr. Anne Patrick, S.N.J.M., states that twenty-two of the sisters held out until they were able to "clarify" their views "in a way that both their consciences and Rome could accept." She adds that they managed to "retain community membership without backing down from their claim that signing the statement had been appropriate in view of the situation in the United States at the time."
But two nuns, Barbara Ferraro and Patricia Hussey, grew more radical as time went on and ended up resigning from the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur to help found new pro-abortion groups. They even wrote a book about their descent into the Culture of Death entitled No Turning Back: Two Nuns' Battle with the Vatican over Women's Right to Choose (1990). Their work reveals the grave danger that "Catholic feminism" poses today.
The Fall into 'Experience'
Barbara and Pat (this is what they call themselves in the book) began their descent by putting far more value on a woman's experience than on the infallible moral teaching of the Catholic Church. In this they followed feminist praxis, for in an essay in A Just and True Love, Maura Ryan, a professor of ethics at Notre Dame, asserts that feminists call moral absolutes into question by insisting on the "significance of woman's experience as a source for interpreting moral value." Indeed, she says feminists "give methodological priority" to women's "distinctive religious and moral experience." According to theologian Sr. Margaret Farley, such "experience" is the measure of morality because it is "revelatory of the divine."
Read more <http://www.newoxfordreview.org/article.jsp?did=1009-gardiner>
Down Syndrome Births Are Down in U.S.
More Than 90 Percent of Women Carrying a Child With Down Syndrome Choose to End Their Pregnancies, but Parents Raising These Kids Say They're a 'Gift'
By SUSAN DONALDSON JAMES
Nov. 2, 2009
After prenatal testing, Boston filmmaker Melanie McLaughlin faced the likelihood that her 12-week-old fetus had Down syndrome, or a heart defect.
Melanie McLaughlin, a Boston documentary filmmaker, decided to continue with her pregnancy after...
She prayed for the heart defect.
Grace, now 2, was born with both: trisomy 21, or Down syndrome, and holes in all four chambers of her heart, which were repaired shortly after birth.
"I fell in love with her and handed her over to the doctor for surgery not knowing if I would get her back," McLaughlin said. "I was swearing to the powers to be that I didn't mean it, I was OK with the Down syndrome."
McLaughlin said she realized what a "horrible wish" she had made for her child.
"I was so naive, with no experience with anyone with Down syndrome," she said. "I got a huge education about that later."
"An estimated 92 percent of all women who receive a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome choose to terminate their pregnancies, according to research reviewed by Dr. Brian Skotko, a pediatric geneticist at Children's Hospital Boston.
Read more <http://abcnews.go.com/Health/w_ParentingResource/down-syndrome-births-drop-us-women-abort/story?id=8960803>
Court rejects abortion clinic buffers
Associated Press / November 3, 2009
PITTSBURGH - A federal appeals court has struck down an ordinance that created two types of buffer zones around medical facilities after a Christian legal group challenged the law on behalf of a nurse who protests abortions.
The US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit found the 2005 Pittsburgh ordinance unduly restricted protesters from passing out leaflets and participating in other forms of free speech. The Pittsburgh law bans protesters from standing within 15 feet of entrances but also makes them stand 8 feet from clients in a 100-foot buffer around entrances.
The court found that either zone by itself could be legal. The US Supreme Court has upheld a Colorado law setting a similar 100-foot zone, and affirmed decisions by courts in Florida and New York to ban protesters from within several feet of medical facility entrances. But combined, the appeals court found, the zones violate free-speech rights of protesters, who find it difficult to hand out leaflets.
“This is an extremely important victory for pro-life speech. The court drew a well-needed line in sand,’’ David Cortman, the Alliance Defense Fund attorney who challenged the ordinance, said yesterday.
Read more <http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2009/11/03/court_rejects_abortion_clinic_buffers/>
Related Stories
Since April, 114 Children Have Died from H1N1 -- but 700,000 Have Died from Abortion
<http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56511>
An addiction that only motherhood could cure
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/29/AR2009102904474.html?hpid=topnews>
Aborted fetus cells used in beauty products
<http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/nov/03/aborted-fetus-cells-used-in-anti-aging-products/>
Environment
U.S. Tops in Energy Resources
by Human Events
11/02/2009
The United States has largest energy reserves on Earth, according to a report from the Congressional Research Service.
As shown in the charts below, the U.S. has 1,321 billion barrels of oil (or barrels of oil equivalent for other sources of energy) when combining its recoverable natural gas, oil and coal reserves.
While Russia is a close second with 1,248 billion barrels, other energy producing nations are far behind. No. 3 is Saudi Arabia (543 billion barrels), followed by China (494 billion barrels), Iran (426 billion barrels) and Canada (221 billion barrels.)
"Our overwhelming coal, natural gas, and oil resources represent tens of trillions of dollars in wealth and millions of American jobs,” said Sen. James Inhofe (R.-Ok.), who, along with Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R.-Alaska), released the report last week. “Whether through decree or purposeful inaction, government policies that unnecessarily restrict or prevent our ability to responsibly produce these domestic resources are threatening, and could eventually undermine, our nation's economic and national security. We should pursue an all-of-the-above strategy that advances new energy technologies but also prioritizes developing the resources we have today."
The report also noted that the United States has 28% of all the world’s coal reserves, with Russia again coming in second with 19%.
Read more <http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=34233>
Gore’s Dual Role in Spotlight: Advocate and Investor
By JOHN M. BRODER
Published: November 2, 2009
WASHINGTON — Former Vice President Al Gore thought he had spotted a winner last year when a small California firm sought financing for an energy-saving technology from the venture capital firm where Mr. Gore is a partner.
The company, Silver Spring Networks, produces hardware and software to make the electricity grid more efficient. It came to Mr. Gore’s firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, one of Silicon Valley’s top venture capital providers, looking for $75 million to expand its partnerships with utilities seeking to install millions of so-called smart meters in homes and businesses.
Mr. Gore and his partners decided to back the company, and in gratitude Silver Spring retained him and John Doerr, another Kleiner Perkins partner, as unpaid corporate advisers.
The deal appeared to pay off in a big way last week, when the Energy Department announced $3.4 billion in smart grid grants. Of the total, more than $560 million went to utilities with which Silver Spring has contracts. Kleiner Perkins and its partners, including Mr. Gore, could recoup their investment many times over in coming years.
Read more <http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/03/business/energy-environment/03gore.html>
Congress
Senate GOP Plans Boycott of Climate Bill
| Monday, November 2, 2009 2:59 PM | |
WASHINGTON – A key US Senate committee crafting sweeping legislation to combat climate change will keep working with or without its Republican members, who have threatened a boycott, its chairwoman said Monday.
Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer, who leads the Senate's Environment and Public Works Committee, urged Republicans to attend a critical Tuesday hearing on the bill but warned their absence would not freeze progress on the measure.
"We look forward to working with them if they decide to participate, but if they do not, we will move forward in accordance with the rules of the Senate and of this committee," she said in a statement.
Boxer, a key ally of [Alleged] President Barack Obama, urged the committee's top Republican, Senator James Inhofe "to bring the committee Republicans back to work on this issue."
Inhofe had no immediate reply, but Republicans have said they plan to shun the meeting because they lack a full review of the legislation from the US Environmental Protection Agency and the Congressional Budget Office.
They have also reportedly said that the committee's rules forbid Boxer from holding a work hearing on the legislation without at least two Republicans present, a claim challenged by Democrats.
Pasted from <http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/boxer_inhofe_climate_bill/2009/11/02/280511.html>
Congress Extends Benefits to Military Spouses
| Monday, November 2, 2009 3:25 PM | |
WASHINGTON -- Congress is sending to the president a bill that allows military spouses to claim residency in the same state as their wives or husbands.
Military spouses lobbied for the change.
Under current law, service members can choose to keep their original residency as they relocate. Spouses say having that same right would prevent hassles associated with every move such as obtaining a new driver's license and reregistering to vote.
Moving is a ritual repeated nearly every three years on average for military families.
The legislation has passed the House on a voice vote, where it was sponsored by Texas Rep. John Carter. It previously passed the Senate.
Read more <http://www.newsmax.com/us/us_military_spouses/2009/11/02/280526.html>
Cybersecurity
NSA To Build $1.5 Billion Cybersecurity Data Center
By J. Nicholas Hoover
InformationWeek
October 29, 2009 01:07 PM
The National Security Agency, whose job it is to protect national security systems, will soon break ground on a data center in Utah that's budgeted to cost $1.5 billion.
The NSA is building the facility to provide intelligence and warnings related to cybersecurity threats, cybersecurity support to defense and civilian agency networks, and technical assistance to the Department of Homeland Security, according to a transcript of remarks by Glenn Gaffney, deputy director of national intelligence for collection, who is responsible for oversight of cyber intelligence activities in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
"Our country must continue to advance its national security efforts and that includes improvements in cybersecurity," Sen. Robert Bennett, R-Utah, said in a statement. "As we rely more and more on our communications networks for business, government and everyday use, we must be vigilant and provide agencies with the necessary resources to protect our country from a cyber attack."
The data center will be built at Camp Williams, a National Guard training center 26 miles south of Salt Lake City, which was chosen for its access to cheap power, communications infrastructure, and availability of space, Gaffney said. The complex will comprise up to 1.5 million square feet of building space on 120 to 200 acres, according to the NBC affiliate in Salt Lake City.
Read more <http://www.informationweek.com/news/government/security/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=221100260>
Politics
ACORN Aims to Tip New Jersey Election in Corzine's Favor
| Monday, November 2, 2009 6:36 PM By: David A. Patten | |
Fearing a potentially devastating Democratic loss, the highly controversial Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) group and its affiliated organizations are gearing up to tip the scales and re-elect embattled incumbent in the hard-fought New Jersey gubernatorial race, sources tell Newsmax.
"Acorn is heavily involved in Gov. Jon Corzine's get-out-the-vote operation, but is maintaining a low profile at the insistence of the Corzine campaign," Matthew Vadum, senior editor of the conservative Capitol Research Center think tank, tells Newsmax. "If Corzine manages to win reelection, he doesn't want the victory tainted by his close association with Acorn."
Wall Street Journal columnist and author John Fund wrote Tuesday that "Plenty of reasons exist for suspecting absentee fraud may play a significant role in tomorrow's Garden State contests."
According to Fund, Acorn-linked groups from neighboring Pennsylvania and New York "appear to have moved into the state."
Read more <http://www.newsmax.com/headlines/corzine_new_jersey_acorn/2009/11/02/280632.html>
Report: W.H. Engineered NY-23 Endorsement
| Monday, November 2, 2009 1:17 PM By: David A. Patten | |
The Washington Post reports the Obama White House played a critical, behind-the-scenes role in persuading former GOP District 23 congressional candidate Dede Scozzafava to endorse Democrat Bill Owens over Conservative Doug Hoffman.
If true, the Post report reveals a striking example of the administration's penchant for tinkering in regional politics.
Read more <http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/scozzafava_obama_endorse/2009/11/02/280451.html>
Uncivil War: Conservatives to challenge a dozen GOP candidates
In what could be a nightmare scenario for Republican Party officials, conservative activists are gearing up to challenge leading GOP candidates in more than a dozen key House and Senate races in 2010.
Conservatives and tea party activists had already set their sights on some of the GOP’s top Senate recruits — a list that includes Gov. Charlie Crist in Florida, former Rep. Rob Simmons in Connecticut and Rep. Mark Kirk in Illinois, among others.
But their success in Tuesday’s upstate New York special election, where grass-roots efforts pushed GOP nominee Dede Scozzafava to drop out of the race and helped Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman surge into the lead on the eve of Election Day, has generated more money and enthusiasm than organizers ever imagined.
Activists predict a wave that could roll from California to Kentucky to New Hampshire and that could leave even some GOP incumbents — Utah Sen. Bob Bennett is one — facing unexpectedly fierce challenges from their right flank.
“I would say it’s the tip of the spear,” said Dick Armey, the former GOP House majority leader who now serves as chairman of FreedomWorks, an organization that has been closely aligned with the tea party movement. “We are the biggest source of energy in American politics today.”
“What you’re going to see,” said Armey, “is moderates and conservatives across the country in primaries.”
Read more <http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29057.html>
Related Stories
District 23 Race Up for Grabs; Hoffman Leads 41% to 36%
<http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/hoffman_poll_district_23/2009/11/02/280423.html>
Biden, Giuliani Jump in to NY's D-23 Race
<http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/us_ny_special_election/2009/11/02/280560.html>
Roll Call: 9 of 10 Vulnerable Reps are Democrats
<http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/US_house_seats/2009/11/02/280354.html>
Boehner Regrets Backing Scozzafava in NY Race
<http://www.newsmax.com/insidecover/us_ny_special_election_boehner/2009/11/02/280645.html>
Hoffman Leads Big in N.Y. House Race
<http://www.newsmax.com/politics/hoffman_New_York_House_/2009/11/02/280332.html>
BREAKING: New Jersey Dems Paying for Independent Candidate’s RoboCalls
<http://biggovernment.com/2009/11/02/breaking-new-jersey-dems-paying-for-independent-candidates-robocalls/>
Chris Christie's Next Case: Who Stole My Election?
Absentee voter fraud may play a significant role in New Jersey's gubernatorial election.
<http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703932904574511612622116146.html>
Republicans Are Poised for Gains in Key Elections
<http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125720723841924171.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_LEFTTopStories>
Tuesday’s Races an Early Test of Obama's Political Influence
<http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56520>
Houston Tea Party rally draws more than 10,000
<http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/6699950.html>
International ...
Iran
Clinton Says Nuke Offer to Iran Won't Be Changed
| Monday, November 2, 2009 4:55 PM | |
MARRAKECH, Morocco -- U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says the offer to Iran to exchange its low-enriched uranium by having it shipped to Russia will not be altered, despite Iranian efforts to seek a modified deal.
Clinton addressed the issue at a news conference in which she called this a pivotal moment for Iran.
Read more <http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/af_clinton_iran/2009/11/02/280575.html>
Iran’s Military Power Subject to New U.S. Study Used for China
By Viola Gienger
Nov. 3 (Bloomberg) -- Iran’s military will be subject for the first time to the kind of U.S. assessment reserved for China’s expanding forces as lawmakers seek a more accurate analysis of the Persian Gulf oil power’s strengths and strategy.
Congress ordered an annual report on Iranian military goals and capabilities, including the country’s missile and nuclear programs, in a provision tucked into a 1,200-page measure authorizing defense spending. President Barack Obama signed the bill into law last week.
The demand for the analysis reflects lawmakers’ concerns that periodic U.S. intelligence estimates focusing on Iran’s nuclear efforts are too limited in scope. The U.S. and nations in Europe and the Middle East see current and potential threats from Iran, including its support of designated terrorist groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah, interference in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a push to dominate the Gulf.
Read more <http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601070&sid=a9llyoTKyef0>
Related Stories
Iran Hints at Acceptance of Nuclear Deal
<http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/iran_nuclear_deal/2009/10/26/277070.html>
Iran seeks slower pace on uranium plan
<http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091027/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_iran_nuclear>
Opinion …
The President We Can't Trust
Posted on November 03, 2009, 7:19 AM | Deal W. Hudson
I knew when Barack Obama was elected president he was a man with whom I had many serious disagreements. I didn't know he was a man I couldn't trust to tell the truth about his intentions.
On September 9th, Obama gave his speech to Congress on health care reform. He knew when he gave the speech that one of the central issues on the minds of Americans was whether or not the health care bill would contain funding for abortion.
Obama addressed the issue of abortion coverage under this rubric: "Some people’s concerns have grown out of bogus claims spread by those whose only agenda is to kill reform at any cost."
Thus, our president said to a live national television audience: "Under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place."
It is a fact, however, that Obama has not lifted a finger to remove the abortion funding from the health care legislation moving through the Congress. It is also a fact he has done nothing to support the various amendments put forth, including one from Democratic Congressman Bart Stupak (MI), removing abortion funding from any bill that goes to the White House for signing into law.
What other conclusion can we come to than our president was telling, what my grandfather would call, a bald-faced lie? What other conclusion can we draw from that lie than our president is not a man we can trust to tell us the truth.
Read more <http://insidecatholic.com/Joomla/index.php?option=com_myblog&Itemid=127>
On Answering Questions
[Note: Have you given your college age children a copy of Shall's "Another Sort of Learning" and/or Schumacher's "A Guide for the Perplexed" yet?- hm]
| by Rev. James V. Schall, SJ |
| 11/02/09 |
We never know what curiosities former students will come up with. Eric Wind, an ex-student long interested in the history of Georgetown College, found for sale on eBay an old examination given at Georgetown in January 1929. (Let me note that this test was not Schall's, as in January of 1929, he was but one year old.) The student taking the test was Lawrence Mehren; it was given by Rev. John J. Murphy, S.J., a name I had not run across before. On the test are twelve questions; the students were asked to do ten. I do not know how much time they were given.
The questions of 1929 are brief and to the point:
- What is Faith? What are the two elements of Faith?
- Prove that Faith is necessary for salvation.
- What is the motive of Faith?
- Why is Tradition superior to Holy Scripture?
- What is the historical argument for the existence of God?
- Prove the unicity of God.
- Why is God in no sense responsible for moral evil?
- What is the history and significance of the words, Homoousious, Homoiousious, and Filioque?
- Why does creation require an infinite being?
- Why could not God have created forces in the beginning capable of producing the human soul?
- What principle of truth do the Evolutionists neglect?
- What scientific evidence is against the evolution of the body of man?
Evidently, Mehren skipped questions 2 and 6. We do not know what grade he received; nor, alas, do we have his answers. Actually, this little test-sheet should go for a lot of chips; I hope the good folks at eBay know what it is. Some wry philanthropist should perhaps give a copy to each of the bishops.
Several things might interest us on reading these "mid-year examination" questions. The first would be that such a list, however interesting, could be found in no examination in any of today's Catholic institutions, probably including seminaries. The second is that the students are not asked their "opinion" or, even worse, their "feelings" on any of these issues. Nor is it asked if they believe in any of the answers they give. They are simply asked to answer the questions in a coherent and intelligent way. No doubt, the professor probably found numerous "wrong" answers among the erstwhile Georgetown students of 1929.
Obviously, evolution was a hot topic at the time. The students must have known that the relation of tradition to Scripture was based on the awareness that Scripture itself depended on some tradition that pre-existed its being written. The students were appraised of the arguments about the meaning of Christ as true God and true man, with its origin within the Trinity.
This course is billed as "apologetics," a word with Socratic overtones. Its presupposition is that any intelligent young man should know many things, whether he likes it or not. (In 1929, the young ladies were attending their own colleges, where they surely were asked similar questions by some perceptive Madame of the Sacred Heart or Dominican nun.)
We seldom teach apologetics any more. We teach theology or religious studies. The first is usually considered a science, though not exactly the same science that Aquinas called it. The second is a sort of survey. The religion requirement has been steadily decreasing in most schools; often there are but two required courses, one a sort of general overview of God and His doings taught by most anyone, the second usually fulfilled by studying what some other religion besides Christianity said about it all. The buzz words are pluralism, tolerance, peace, justice, "let's just get along."
Read more <http://insidecatholic.com/Joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=7144&Itemid=48>
War of the Worlds, The Early Years
By John Batchelor on November 2, 2009 3:26 PM
Russian Defeat.
The facts of the end of the Cold War support the short and astonishing version that Ronald Reagan's imagination and style won out over American and Allied doubt and the sadistic and stupid Soviet empire. I learned from Martin and Annalise Anderson, Hoover, that Ronald Reagan carried his entire Cabinet and National Security team across the threshold and into the house of Star Wars just because he believed that Star Wars -- a theoretical extravagance against incoming ballistic missiles, never proved at the time -- would demoralize and defeat the Soviet hawks. Ronald Reagan was correct. The Soviets started to crumble when Stalin died. There was no coherent plan for succession, and the regime staggered through Khurshchev and hit the status quo ante of Patriotic War thugs with Brezhnev and Kosygin. Brezhnev's slow, ignorant death left the state to the KGB, which shoved in its grotesque apparatchik Andropov, who prompltly died of kidney failure and ignorance. Reagan's presidency confronted Andropov's sinister paranoia (a thrilling version of this tension in David Hoffman's "Dead Hand)", a state so rotten and blind that the senior apparatus convinced itself that Reagan was going to launch a first strike and piously prepared for Armageddon for the nomenklatura. Chernenko inherited a failed state, and then Gorbachev was handed the keys to an empty state. Reagan challenged the ill-educated Gorbachev to give up his nukes at Iceland. Star Wars overwhelmed the Soviets as a threat they could not to counter. One year after Iceland, Ronald Reagan spoke at the Brandenburg Gate and the Berlin Wall, delivering the ringing 20th Century verdict on the Soviet novelty, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" One year later, Gorbachev tore down the Soviet Empire by shaking Reagan's hand in Moscow and standing idle, in 1989, while the client states abandoned Moscow in a rush of resentment, the clients collapsing from the top as the Soviets would not send troops to prop up the hollow regimes -- Eastern Europe, the Baltic States, the Caucuses and the Stans and then Ukraine all quitting in a helter-skelter of drunken nihilism. Iceland beat the Soviets. Star Wars beat the Soviets. Reagan beat the Soviets. Berlin beat the Soviets. The War of the Worlds, the early years, ended with American World success and Russian World dejection.
Twenty Years Later.
Ronald Reagan's speech is a critical moment in the old war of the worlds, yet it has no place or utility in the new war of the worlds. The defeated Soviet Union is a museum piece that is rarely discussed outside of the academies. The ambitious Russia is an energy superpower that now commands attention and financial obedience in Western Europe, especially Berlin, and also spans Asia as a military superpower. Russia is master of the energy supply to the EU and that means there is no Euro unless Russia continues to deliver. At the same time, Russia wants investment from Europe and Asia, and right now has started bargaining for investors without strings, such as demands for transparency. There is a new Russia that is fresh and savvy, called the civiliki, and it aims to ease out the old and clumsy KGB crowd that came in with Putin, called the siloviki. Medvedev is the center of civiliki, but the brains of the operation is said to be Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin. Long struggle to follow, the uniforms and spooks and thugs vs the technocrats and managed oligarchs. What this means for the US is that the Obama administration is not well positioned to deal with the strength and aggression of Moscow. National Security Adviser Jim Jones was in Moscow last week, negotiating about sanctions and Iran. He played a weak hand. Moscow knows that Tehran has nukes. Moscow wants Tehran to remain a wedge between the Stans and the defeatist jihadist luddites of the Gulf. Moscow also wants to grow to outshine the United States in the 21st Century. In sum, the war of the worlds, the later years, is now rejoined, and Moscow has the advantage of geography and resources and alliances.
Read more <http://johnbatchelorshow.com/jb/2009/11/war-of-the-worlds-the-early-years/>
Related Stories
The American Way of Abandonment
<http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56515>
