In a scathing article, Pravda (yes that Pravda: mouthpiece of the former USSR) has declared that Barack Obama is a Marxist and that his election marks the end of capitalism.

It’s truly weird, reading  of the collapse of the United States and being unable to disagree.  Stranger still is the fact that such an editorial would come from the pages of Pravda, which for years stood as the antithesis to truth: a rag of lies and propaganda perpetrated by an iron-fisted ruling class.  Sadly, though, this time they’ve gotten it mostly right.

Their claim that the American people are a bunch of pop-culture addled sheep who have thrown away their rights might sting, but it’s hard to refute.  They attack our dumbed down public schools as the first step in creating an idiot populace that has rejected its values and turns a blind eye to the out-of-control antics of its elected officials. 

While their attack on Barney Frank as a “social pervert basking in his homosexuality” may cross a line, at least they’ve got him pegged politically, calling him out as a Marxist thug, desperately trying to set salary controls for all Americans.

Pravda sums up our situation in just a few sentences:

“Prime Minister Putin, less then two months ago, warned Obama and UK’s Blair, not to follow the path to Marxism, it only leads to disaster.  Apparently, even though we suffered 70 years of this Western sponsored horror show, we know nothing, as foolish, drunken Russians, so let our “wise” Anglo-Saxon fools find out the folly of their own pride. ”

“The proud American will go down into his slavery with out a fight, beating his chest and proclaiming to the world, how free he really is. The world will only snicker. ”

Hopefully they underestimate this country’s ability to repair itself, but time will tell….

-Robert Laurie

Original Pravda Article:  http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/107459-1/

That’s right, the federal deficit is now almost $64 Trillion Dollars.  $63.8, to be exact.  That’s up almost 15% percent this year.

Think about what you owe on your car loan, your credit cards, even your mortgage.  Now add $55,000.00 to that number, because Uncle Sam, and president Obama owe fifty-five grand per US household.  Once you wrap your mind around that, realize that Barack wants to throw another couple TRILLION in health care costs on top of it!

The best part of all this is the fact that people like Obama, Reid, and Pelosi actually intend to send you that $55,000.00 bill.  All three of them have stated that in order to pay for the debt, not to mention all their new programs, we need “comprehensive tax reform.”  Believe me, when Dems say reform, it’s always a synonym for “Increase.” 

It’s perfect timing too.  This month, under Obama’s steady hand, the US dollar’s value  posted its biggest monthly drop since 1985, while China continues to position the Yuan as the world’s currency of choice.   The United States’ overall economy has fallen 6% since the president took office and economist Nouriel Roubini, one of only a handful to correctly predict the current economic crisis, has projected a similar drop for next year.

The good news?  Well, Obama got a great deal in his hostile takeover of General Motors - a company that will be filing for bankruptcy on Monday.  The government now OWNS 72% of the automaker, and the president has become quite enamoured with the vehicle below.  It’s going to be all the rage once he forces us all to buy one.  Apparently, when the joint project between GM and Segway begins churning these out, everything will start getting better.

Can’t Wait.

-Robert Laurie

http://www.segway.com/puma/

Obama promised an across the board tax cut for all middle class Americans.  He swore up and down that the low-level tax payer would see relief.  Now that he’s in office, however, with an astronomical deficit and a trillion dollar health care project in the pipeline, it’s becoming apparent that he’s changed his mind.  More and more, it looks like every American, regardless of their income, is staring down the barrel of a 10% tax increase.

How’s he doing it?  Well, he’s assigned former fed chairman Paul Vocker to head up a task force aimed at rethinking the tax code.  Vocker has shown tentative support for a 10% sales tax on everything you buy.  It’s called a VAT, or Value-added Tax, and it’s common in other countries, particularly those with mild to mid-level socialist governments.   Here in the States, Vocker is not the only VAT proponent.

A bigger Vat-fan is chairman of the Senate Budget Committee Kent Conrad (D – ND), who said recently  “There is a growing awareness of the need for fundamental tax reform.  I think a VAT and a high-end income tax have got to be on the table.”  

Kenneth Baer, spokesman for White House Budget Director Peter Orszag, said he believes the VAT is “unlikely to be in the mix.”  Of course, Orszag then turned around and hired one of the nation’s most prominent VAT supporters to advise him on health care - none other than White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel’s brother, Ezekiel Emanuel.

For his part, Treasury secretary Timothy Geithner has remained quiet on the subject.  It’s a surprising silence, since this may be the one tax Geithner would have trouble dodging.

At the center of it all is Barack Obama – a man who’s given new meaning to the phrase “tax and spend.”  He has promised Health Care reform in a way that no president has before.  Many pundits say his administration will be a failure if he doesn’t get it.  The government is already borrowing 46 cents of every dollar it spends, mostly from China, and he’s acknowledged that he can’t pay for his new medical system solely with tax increases on the wealthy.  He’s surrounded himself with advisors who believe a VAT is the best way to dig us out of the massive hole he’s created.  Gee, I wonder what will happen… 

Amazingly, the hardest hit victims of a VAT will be the very people Obama swore to protect: the poor.  Is it possible that Obama’s decided to go after them next?  Maybe the administration thinks it’s finally squeezed all the blood from the big stones, and it’s time to start rounding up the little ones.  Whatever the case may be, one thing is for sure: If Obama wants to squash productivity, kill manufacturing jobs, decimate small business, and increase the burden on those living below the poverty line, he’s found the perfect way.

-Robert Laurie

Yesterday was Memorial day, a day when Americans are used to seeing their president move around Washington (sometimes the country) as he attends a host of ceremonies dedicated to our veterans.  For a while, this year seemed no different than most.  Obama held a breakfast for families who had lost loved ones in the service, went to Arlington, laid a wreath, and gave a nice speech.  Then, he…well…instead of making the usual Memorial Day rounds, he cleared his schedule, and spent the day on a golf course.

This alone wouldn’t be that big of a deal.  Presidents golf.  There’s no reason he shouldn’t be allowed to hit the links.  After all, George Bush was out there all the time, Obama obviously enjoys the same perks.  The problem is that while he’s out there, the rest of the world seems to be coming unglued.

North Korea has kept up its nuclear program, and has been test firing missiles again.

Despite Obama’s efforts, Iran has similarly continued its nuclear program, and is flexing its naval muscle by sending a contingent of warships into international waters.

Early in March, Chinese military vessels began harassing a US Navy mapping ship, and they are in the process of rapidly expanding their aircraft carrier fleet.

Benjamin Netanyahu has defied Obama’s push for a freeze on settlement activity in the West Bank, and his defense minister has told Israelis that they should be prepared for “all-out war.”

So what does Obama do in the face of all these many problems?  He takes a day devoted to this nation’s veterans and squanders it on a round of golf.  

This shouldn’t be surprising.  He’s not exactly a fan of the armed forces.  He made his feelings famously clear in his July 2, 2008 “civilian security force” speech when he claimed we could no longer rely on the military to protect us.  Later, he floated a plan that would have wounded soldiers who return from war paying for their own health care.   However, you would think that for just one day, while staring down a runaway train full of possible of global nuclear war, he might see Memorial Day as way to at least pretend he cares about the sacrifices our veterans make.

Apparently, he doesn’t think they’re worth the effort.

-Robert Laurie

After a three year campaign that was rife with whining, crying, and hand-ringing about the evils of preemptive war, Obama has again shown his true colors. 

Now hear this:  Preemptive war is out.  Preemptive incarceration is in.

According to a May 20th report in the New York Times, Obama held a meeting in the White House cabinet room attended by Attorney General Eric Holder, top administration officials, and  a pair of  high level human rights advocates who leaked the story after being promised anonymity.  He told the assembly that he is seeking the power of “preemptive detention,”  a way of locking up people who he suspects  might be planning terrorist activity, but can’t be tried due to lack of evidence.  

You read that right.  If Obama thinks that somewhere down the road you might commit a crime, he wants the power to lock you up now, regardless of his lack of actionable proof.

According to the Post: “He was almost ruminating over the need for statutory change to the laws so that we can deal with individuals who we can’t charge and detain,” one participant said. “We’ve known this is on the horizon for many years, but we were able to hold it off with George Bush. The idea that we might find ourselves fighting with the Obama administration over these powers is really stunning”

Given that we live in a country where Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security, feels that any conservative, christian, or returning war veteran is a potential terror threat, the implications of such power are simply staggering.   Perhaps equally impressive is the gaul it must have taken to, just a few days later, stand in the US archives -home of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence - and give a speech deriding the previous administration’s supposed trampling of human rights. 

Is he trying to close the Guantanamo Bay facility, or turn every prison in the country into a miniature replica of it? 

Once again, we have evidence of a president who views the constitutionally guaranteed rights and freedoms of US citizens as mere obstacles – simple annoyances to be swatted aside lest they impede his march towards total control over American life.

-Robert Laurie 

The original, completely terrifying, New York Times article can be found here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/21/us/politics/21obama.html?_r=2&hpw

I was all set to write a recap of these two speeches, to give my opinions, etc, but I think they can just stand on their own. They’re long, and Barack is as tedious as ever, but they’re important, so check ‘em out.

First up is Barack, who makes the argument that the US court and prison system is strong enough to handle the detainees from Guantanamo Bay. Please keep in mind, that while he was saying this, police in New York were processing for would-be terrorists who were trying to blow up synagogues in the city.

They were recruited and converted to the cause of radical Islam while inmates in that very same prison system.

Next Up is Dick Cheney, who comes out swinging, and keeps up one of the most intense, eviscerating attacks I’ve ever seen from a Vice President. It is truly spectacular, filled with fact and logic. Great stuff, and nice to hear someone finally start fighting back.

This exchange is going to be tough for the president to ignore. His usual, arrogant, “how dare you question me” attitude isn’t going to fly here. Cheney’s refutations are well thought out, and it ’s going to be interesting to watch what the president does in response. Already, his liberal TV surrogates at CNN and MSNBC are foaming at the outh over the former VP’s speech. Bob Beckel, on Fox News, looked like a man about to have a stroke. If Obama thinks he can just ignore all of this, and it’ll die down, I think he’s in for a rude awakening.

Oh, and before you ask, I used MSNBC links because they were the only site with the full speeches. I strongly reccomend never watching anything on the Olbermann channel again.

-Robert Laurie

It starts today at 10:45.   The participants square off, take ten paces, turn, and shoot.  Obama pulls the trigger first, then Cheney returns fire.  We haven’t seen anything like this in a long time – an honest to God duel.

It used to be that a previous administration criticizing a sitting president was considered crass.  It looked petty, and the squabbling was percieved as something that damaged the nation’s credibility in the eyes of the world. 

Internet inventor and science fiction filmmaker Al Gore changed all that.   He began attacking Bush a little over a year into his first term.   That was followed by a steady stream of harrangues from Bill and Hillary Clinton.  That, however, was small potatoes.  This is the big leagues. 

Today, Obama wil give a speech claiming that the Guantanamo Bay facility trampled all over the law,  weakened our national security, and in the end just didn’t work.  Twenty minutes later Cheney will fire back, claiming that prison’s closure is just another of Obama’s poorly thought out schemes, designed to make the rest of the world like him at the expense of US security.

Obama’s problem is that aside from the global bad press Gitmo has generated, all the facts support Cheney’s argument.  Obama ordered Gitmo closed with no idea how to do it.  In the last two weeks, a couple of his own security advisors have commented positively on how the prison functions, and how it has served it’s purpose well.   Democrats in congress have withdrawn funding for it’s closure, while at the same time, it’s been rumored that the Obama administration was scouting locations in Montana for the constrcuction of a nearly identical facility.  Add to that Obama’s recent reversal regarding the elimination of military tribunals, and you have one impressive quagmire of indecision and doubletalk.

Cheney, on the other hand has two facts at his disposal that render almost any Obama claim moot. 

1:   The recitivism rate of Guantanamo inmates who have been released is very high.  Two in seven return to terrorist organizations once they’re out.
2:   Despite several well known attempts, there has not been a second 9/11 style attack.

Cheney is a man who can hold his own.  The facts are there to back him up.  Obama’s own people are fighting him on his goals, and polls say the American people are start to drift away from the issue as well.

Barack’s press conferences are basically parades of sycophants lobbing softballs, where he refususes to call on any news organiztion that  might challenge him.  People are growing extremely tired of it.  Today, Dick Cheney is going to call him out, asking difficult questions, making tough accusations, and backing them up with fact.  It’s something Obama rarely has to face.

I can’t wait.

-Robert Laurie

It looks like Barack is headed for his first big policy showdown, and it’s not coming from the right.  Congressional democrats have suspended funding for the closing of Guantanamo bay until the president comes up with a plan about where he’ll send the inmates.

This doesn’t mean the facility won’t close, it just means that the president is going to have to come up with a plan of action before it does.  Given Obama’s cart-before-the-horse track record, this may be easier said than done.   For its part, the executive branch says the facility is on track to close in January – however, they still have no idea where the detainees will go.

When asked to explain the Dems reversal, Dick Durban said “The feeling was at this point we were defending the unknown. We were being asked to defend a plan that hasn’t been announced. ”

Better get used to it, Dick.

As of today, 25 states have passed legislation stating that no inmates from Guantanamo will be given sanctuary, and more are expected to follow.  If Obama doesn’t come up with a concrete plan soon, there may be no options left on his rapidly shrinking table.