Many of us on the right have long pointed out the echo chamber on the left. The highly coordinated internet astroturfing championed by folks like David Axelrod and Markos “Daily Kos” Moulitsas. Even the media is taking notice. The Politico reports on the newest left wing conspiracy – even calling it by that name.
The vast new left-wing conspiracy sets its tone every morning at 8:45 a.m., when officials from more than 20 labor, environmental and other Democratic-leaning groups dial into a private conference call hosted by two left-leaning Washington organizations.
The “8:45 A.M. call,” as it’s referred to by members, began three weeks ago, and it marks a new level in coordination by the White House’s allies at a time when the conservative opposition is struggling for a toe-hold and major agenda items like health care reform appear closer than ever to passage.
The call has helped attempts to link the Republican Party to radio host Rush Limbaugh, and has served as the launching ground for attacks on critics of Obama’s policy proposals. It springs from a recognition of what was lacking in the Clinton years, said Jennifer Palmieri, the senior vice president for communications at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, one of the groups hosting the call.
The Politico reports, repeatedly, that the White House is not involved in any of this. So much so that it would appear that they “protest too much”. Given Axelrod’s propensity for this sort of thing, it seems a bit glib to dismiss the ties so lightly.
How nice it must be for the people on that call to take their orders and march out to do their master’s bidding. How nice it must be for the participants loyal followers to be fed the diet of “truth” that is passed through from on high.
One is reminded of the way in which baby birds are fed… Or Metropolis drones.
Under the unfortunate headline “Chas Freeman pulls out“, The Politico reports that Chas Freeman has withdrawn his name from consideration for the position of chair of the National Intelligence Council. Under fire from both the left and the right, one presumes that the administration asked for and got Freeman’s withdrawal.
The controversial appointee to chair President Barack Obama’s National Intelligence Council walked away from the job Tuesday as criticism on Capitol Hill escalated.
Charles W. Freeman Jr., the former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, had been praised by allies and by the director of national intelligence, Dennis Blair, as a brilliant, iconoclastic analyst. Critics said he was too hard on Israel and too soft on China, and blasted him for taking funding from Saudi royals.
Freeman “requested that his selection to be Chairman of the National Intelligence Council not proceed,” Blair’s office said in a statement. “Director Blair accepted Ambassador Freeman’s decision with regret.”
The fawning media has repeatedly informed us, in awed tones – how “smooth” the Obama transition has been. I have been a political and news junkie for a lot of years and I do not recall seeing this much trouble with nominees before in my lifetime. I don’t know of anything like it in the history of this country. There have been a string of very, very messy nomination failures in an administration that is not yet past its first two months in office.
Some “smooth”.
Yep, a living room 12 feet deep in ice is exactly what the true believers promised us. Isn’t it?
And raging blizzards sweeping across the northern tier of the country and heading east with a vengeance.
And record breaking cold due to hit the northwest by tomorrow morning.
A remarkable mass of arctic air, cold even by January standards, will have an indirect bearing upon the Pacific Northwest weather Tuesday night into Wednesday. The outcome will be record and near-record cold as of daybreak on Wednesday.
At Seattle, lows in the mid-20s will put at risk the daily record low of 23 degrees.
In Bellingham, a record low of 19 degrees could be broken as the mercury slips below 20 degrees.
Where I live in the Midwest, out temperatures plummeted 15 degrees in a few hours and howling northwest winds are blowing making being outside for even a few minutes a real joy. We are down to 15 degrees and still falling. And tomorrow night is predicted to be even colder.
It’s been a long winter. It is not over yet.
By the way, the South Polar icecap? About a half a million square kilometers
above the 40 year mean. At the end of summer down there.
Backlash to the proposed Obama spending spree budget proposal is building in surprising quarters. Or maybe not-so-surprising quarters if you have been paying attention. Very well heeled, left-leaning foundations and charities are becoming very upset at being targeted.
Among those shocked by President Obama’s 2010 budget, the most surprising are the true-blue liberals who run most of America’s nonprofits, universities and charities. How dare he limit tax deductions for charitable giving! They’re afraid they’ll get fewer donations, but they should be more concerned that Mr. Obama’s policies will shove them aside in favor of the New Charity State.
What did these nonprofit liberals expect, anyway? Mr. Obama is proposing a vast expansion of the entitlement state, and he has to find some way to pay for it. So logically enough, one of his ideas for funding public welfare is to reduce the tax benefit for private charity. His budget proposes to raise the top personal income tax rate to 39.6% in 2011 from 35%, and the 33% rate to 36% while reducing the tax benefit from itemized deductions for the top two brackets to 28% from 35% and 33%, respectively. The White House estimates the deduction reduction will yield $318 billion in revenue over 10 years.
From the Ivy League to the United Jewish Appeal, petitions and manifestos are in the works. The Independent Sector, otherwise eager to praise the Obama budget, worries the tax change “could be a disincentive to some donors.” According to the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University, total itemized contributions from the highest income households would have dropped 4.8% — or $3.87 billion — in 2006 if the Obama policy had been in place. That year, Americans gave $186.6 billion to charity, more than 40% from those in the highest tax bracket. A back of the envelope calculation by the Tax Policy Center, a left-of-center think tank, estimates the Obama plan will reduce annual giving by 2%, or some $9 billion.
Should this proposal pass, it, along with the taking away of mortgage interest deductions for the “rich”, will do a lot worse damage to the non-profits. Charities will see an astonishing drop in contributions. They may never regain the ground lost. Many of those who now contribute may figure that they already “gave at the office” after Obama gets done picking their pockets. Look for more and more people looking to shelter income rather than get fleeced.
