Saturday, November 22, 2014

The Executive Order Speech

I saw yesterday's speech, the one President Obama gave trying to justify the executive order he intended to sign today (Friday). One part particularly struck me.

President Obama said "And to those members of Congress who question my authority to make our immigration system work better or question the wisdom of me acting where Congress has failed, I have one answer: Pass a bill." But that's not what he meant. He didn't mean "Pass a bill." — he meant "Pass the bill that I want." That's made even more clear just another sentence later when he said "And the day I sign that bill into law, the actions I take will no longer be necessary."

So, if Congress will pass the bill he wants, then he will deign to enforce the (new) law as written. In the meantime, he will explicitly not enforce the law currently in force.

But if Obama won't enforce the law now, how can we have any confidence he will enforce another law passed by Congress, or any other law now in force?

That sounds like a violation of the requirement that the president faithfully execute the laws that is contained in the Constitution and President's oath of office contained there. No, it's not just me saying so. That's the same thing said by a former Constitutional law instructor who is now President Barack Obama. That makes Obama's executive order unconstitutional even according to the man who has now issued it. In other words,

What's next? Nothing. They say. For now. But the continuing Obama campaign machine is already advertising.

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

Sunday, November 9, 2014

Two Key Political Points

Key political point number 1:

I heard President Barack Obama this morning on Face the Nation saying the message he took from this week's election was that people want Washington to work. He said that's what the voters have shown they wanted in several elections now. He implied, as others in his Administration have said explicitly, that the election's message was for Republicans to work with the President to accomplish things.

Yeah, NO! If voters wanted Congressmen and Senators to work with Obama, they would have voted for Democrats. Instead, they voted for people who would stop a lot of the things the President wants to do.

Key political point number 2:

Charles Krauthammer published a political insight back in 2002 that is still absolutely true.

"To understand the workings of American politics, you have to understand this fundamental law:
      Conservatives think liberals are stupid.
      Liberals think conservatives are evil."

Saturday, November 8, 2014

The Elections of 2014 (Additional)

PowerLine has an item, "The Week In Pictures", that has some appropriate images. A number are focused on reactions of President Obama, like this one and this one

Maybe the best image picturing President Obama's true personal reaction to — and feeling about — this week's election results is this.

The election also put a new face (several, actually) on the Left's picture of the GOP — at least the picture it keeps trying to sell the rest of us. That's the Left — wrong again!

Friday, November 7, 2014

Best Election Analysis

The best analysis I've seen of this week's elections came in a Twitter tweet. Paraphrasing ('cause I didn't capture it at the time) it said

This election was not a mandate for the Republicans.
It was a restraining order on the Democrats.

The Elections of 2014

Republicans are celebrating election victories all across the country. How big was the Republicans' victory? Beyond control of the U.S. Senate, which was by a larger margin than projected by nearly all analysts, this map shows the way each Congressional district went in this election (with current projections in the few races still uncalled). Despite how this looks, as John Hinderaker notes,

In a sense, maps like this one are misleading because the small blue areas are basically the cities, where lots of people live. But what this map does reveal is that the Democrats are no longer competitive in rural and small-town America. It is now rare for a district dominated by small towns not to be Republican.
It looks like — once again — the Republicans are America's Party.

In looking at this map and its underlying data, Hinderaker talks about Minnesota as an anomalous area. Another such is northern New Mexico. The way that district goes — still — is exemplified by this story from 1974.

The governor's race was very close on election night. As usual, the results were slow coming in from the northern part of the state, expecially from Rio Arriba County. The broadcast news people got more impatient as the night wore on. Finally, the folks at KOB, an Albuquerque radio station (now 770 KKOB AM), got tired of waiting and decided to take matters into their own hands. Their announcer called the location in Rio Arriba County where the votes were being counted. The announcer asked “How many votes does (candidate) have?” The answer came back quickly, and was broadcast live throughout the state: “How many does he need?”
Change may be slow in coming to regions like this.

Given these election results, however, Democrats can be forgiven for feeling their future electoral landscape looks like this.

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Much Needed Smiles

We're approaching the end of a long and extremely rancorous political campaign, with major diseases and barbarians thrown in for "good measure" — and we could really use some smiles. So here are a few things that brought me a chuckle.

First, the Islamist vs. the non-believer (what they call a kafir).

Second is a commentary on the political nature of one of this Administration's many politics-based policies. Good for a smile, at least. Think this concern is misplaced? It's already been verified in Maryland and nationwide.

And then there's the response of President Obama and his Administration to the rise of yet another extreme Islamist barbarian group. That cartoon seems to lead directly to this one. Yes, for smiles, this site is definitely worth visiting. Frequently.

It's not a cartoon or a picture, but here's an interesting take on the same Administration folks.

This is what we get for electing an affirmative action president with forged credentials, schooled in Islam in his youth, tutored in his teen years by a revolutionary Marxist and convicted pedophile, an adoring student of a black supremacy cult in adulthood, whose political career was kick started by a violent extremist with Final Solution ambitions for tens of millions of us, and whose administration features suspiciously large numbers of covert jihadists, race warriors and other deranged extremists. These enterovirus D68 outbreaks aren't accidental, they're the equivalent of a broad front biological attack, coordinated and carried out by agencies in DC best equipped to predict the results of what they've done. DC is taking multiculturalism to insane, homicidal levels. If there's an explanation that better fits the facts than intentional ethnic attrition, it hasn't appeared yet.
The facts are there. Only the characterization is in dispute.

In closing, it would be hard to beat this for sheer cluelessness. Definitely good for a smile.

Now that you've smiled, make sure you go vote. It's important.