Energizer Bunny Obama Abandons Fox News Boycott

The ends must justify the means, or Obama is desperate. A majority of Americans do not like his health care overhaul plans. He has done everything imaginable (many times over) to persuade us that he knows best. His plethora of town hall meetings devoted to the topic of health care reform haven't swayed us. His excessive speeches to the nation have fallen on deaf ears. His address to the joint session of congress was unconvincing.

Nevertheless, he is undaunted. And like the iconic Energizer Bunny, when it comes to his signature issue of health care reform, Obama just keeps going and going and going.

But there is one thing he has not done - yet. He has not courted the audience of the nation's largest news network - the network his administration has demonized and boycotted since last fall. Today Obama's stubborn resistance will end, at least temporarily, and he will sit down for an interview with Fox News anchor, Bret Baier.

Maybe he has come to realize that shunning a cable news network whose ratings are higher than all its competitors combined was a mistake. Perhaps he thinks one more interview will be enough to push his precious plan over the edge.

It will be interesting, if not entertaining, to see what sad stories and fanciful facts he asserts tonight. The same stories and facts are not typically used twice. Particularly because they are later "fact checked" to be categorically false.

My favorite whopper, which I personally hope to hear again tonight, is Obama's claim that his health care bill will lower our insurance premiums by 3,000 percent. How could any reasonable person vote against that? While he's at it, maybe he'll promise to put root beer in all the drinking fountains.

Buh-Bayh

There's a new strain of Potomac Fever spreading through Washington. Democrats seem to be most susceptible to the disease. Senator Evan Bayh (D-IN) is the latest victim to succumb in a string of illnesses.

Potomac Fever is usually associated with the love of Washington; the love of power and politics. This new strain of the bug, however, has had quite the opposite effect. As Josh Kraushaar from Politico puts it, "even the politicians are sick of Washington."

In his speech yesterday, Bayh said:

I love working for the people of Indiana, I love helping our citizens make the most of their lives, but I do not love Congress.”

Other retiring Democrats such as Sen. Byron Dorgan (N.D.), Rep. Bart Gordon (TN), Rep. Marion Berry (AR), and Rep. Dennis Moore (KA) have also complained about Washington partisanship in their retirement announcements.

Berry even blasted the President's reaction to the possibility of a 1994 Republican revolution redux this fall. He told his local newspaper:

The president himself, when that was brought up in one group, said, ‘Well, the big difference here and in ’94 was you’ve got me.’ We’re going to see how much difference that makes now.

Bayh is the fifth Democratic Senator to announce that he will not seek reelection this year. His retirement is sending the Democrats scrambling to look for a replacement. The filing deadline for the Indiana state Democrat primary election was today.

As time passes it looks increasingly possible for Republicans to gain majority status in both the House and the Senate this fall.

My biggest concern is: are they ready?

Republicans blew it before because they were more concerned about hanging onto their power than they were about governing as Republicans should. In other words, they got the other strain of Potomac Fever and began acting like Democrats -- growing the federal government and spending money like drunken, well, congressmen.

Let's hope the Republicans have learned from their mistakes, and work hard to replace those who have not.

Another One Bites the Dust

Today Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI), son of the late Ted Kennedy, will join thirty-one of his House colleagues on the crowded retirement bandwagon. But that's the little picture. The big picture is this: What will the United States do without a Kennedy in Congress?

Besides a two year vacancy from the time John F. Kennedy was elected President in 1960 until his little brother, Teddy, was elected to fill his vacant Senate seat 1962, there has been a Kennedy in Congress since 1946. With the retirement of Patrick, the Kennedy Dynasty has officially gone the way of the Whigs, so to speak.

Since Ted Kennedy's illustrious career began in 1962 we've seen many changes in the size and scope of the federal government. In a nutshell, it's gotten ginormous.

A few fun facts:

• In 1962 government spending was around 18% of the GDP
• In 2009 government spending reached 25% of the GDP
• In 1962 the federal budget was $107 billion
• In 2009 the federal budget was $3.5 trillion
• In 1962 the national debt was $390 billion
• We are now more than $12 trillion in debt (and climbing rapidly)
• During the sixteen years Patrick Kennedy has served in Congress federal spending has nearly tripled and the national debt has more than doubled.

The federal programs both Kennedys championed were the essence of the nanny state. In the name of compassion they have worked to saddle us and future generations with debt that cannot be repaid.

They were also loud proponents programs like No Child Left Behind, SCHIP, Medicare prescription drugs and other bloated, inefficient government boondoggles that will not be easy to fix (not to mention that the younger Kennedy, as a member of the House Appropriations Committee, was well known for his ability to bring home lots and lots of pork to his tiny state).

And I'm not even going to mention the many scandals.

So I ask the question again: What will the United States do without a Kennedy in Congress? Answer: A heck of a lot better.

Supreme Court is Attacked from the Bully's Pulpit

In an unprecedented act of bad manners the POTUS used the SOTU to blast the SCOTUS -- while they sat only a few feet in front of him. It appears that Justice Alito mouthed the words "not true" after Obama pronounced that last week's Supreme Court decision would "open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our elections."

In fact, the limits on foreign nationals and foreign corporations remain in place. Bradley A. Smith, law professor at Capitol University Law School says:

Foreign nationals, specifically defined to include foreign corporations, are prohibited from making "a contribution or donation of money or other thing of value, or to make an express or implied promise to make a contribution or donation, in connection with a Federal, State or local election" under 2 U.S.C. Section 441e, which was not at issue in the case. Foreign corporations are also prohibited, under 2 U.S.C. 441e, from making any contribution or donation to any committee of any political party, and they prohibited from making any "expenditure, independent expenditure, or disbursement for an electioneering communication."

He concludes by saying:

This is either blithering ignorance of the law, or demagoguery of the worst kind.

I concur.

Democrats Actually Admit to a Mistake

Democrats admit they "need a new game plan" for the 2010 elections. Their Blame-Bush strategy has clearly failed. It worked great in '06 and '08, but Americans are now ready for a little accountability. That's bad news for liberals who hold a sneering distain for accountability. It's also bad news for their mystified campaign consultants who are scratching their heads in confusion. Back to the drawing boards for them. They will actually have to come up with a plan that doesn't include the words "previous eight years."

This will be no small task for those poor strategerists who've banked on wringing a few more elections out of the Blame-Bush approach. After all, Democrats successfully ran against Herbert Hoover for 30 years.

Steve Hildebrand, who worked on Obama's presidential campaign openly admits:

“Voters are pretty tired of the blame game…[w]hat a stupid strategy that was.”

It's a bit amusing to hear these sputtering concessions. To them, one year of peddling unpopular healthcare reform, stimulus packages that didn't stimulate, broken promises of transparency, and back room bribery are not the problem. It must be that the American people are just too stupid, ill-informed or amnesic to "get" the message that all problems in the world are the fault of George W. Bush and the eeevil Republicans.

I can't wait to see what new tactics they trot out this year. If they can no longer effectively run against Bush, I bet they'll try the old "party of no" routine. But considering the unpopularity of all recent Democrat policies, I don't think that line will help them much.