Why Obama's Gay Rights Strategy Is The Right One

Check out the video below to see liberals heckle President Obama at a fundraiser for Senator Barbara Boxer (D - California) for his administration's sluggishness on ending the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.



And click the jump below for my ridiculously obscene analogy for why slow and steady progress is the right course of action.  This post beyond the jump is definitely TV-MA.  You have been warned! 

Treading water ctd...

Finally, The Cato Institute, a well-respected conservative/libertarian think tank has called Mitt Romney on his bluff that RomneyCare is any different from ObamaCare.

The Long Game

It's time for Europe and NATO to step up

NATO and I agree with General McChrystal that perhaps the only winnable strategy in Afghanistan is one that involves a major counterinsurgency effort. I also agree that President Obama should approve General McChrystal's troop request of 40,000. However, I do NOT agree that all of those troops should be American.

NATO defense ministers comprising leaders from many of our allies have apparently voiced their support. Here's my message to them:

If you believe this mission is the right one and needs to be resourced more fully, then by all means send in the troops. But nicey nice Barack doesn't come for free. He comes at a price to you, to NATO, to Europe and the rest of the world. If you don't want the U.S. to be a bully single-handedly going around the world telling other countries what to do, then it's time to step up and become a part of the solution - and that includes military help.

The left in Europe agonized over the genocide in Darfur and Rwanda, yet most European countries wouldn't ante up the troops to stop the violence. The U.S. was just as bad on the genocide front but we made the right call in Bosnia and in Somalia (just because we had trouble in Somalia doesn't mean it wasn't the right thing to do).

In his address to Congress in November of 2007, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France said, "Let me tell you solemnly today: France will remain engaged in Afghanistan as long as it takes, because what's at stake in that country is the future of our values and that of the Atlantic Alliance. For me, failure is not an option. Terrorism will not win because democracies are not weak, because we are not afraid of this barbarism. America can count on France."

If the election of President Obama means the era of the unilateral superpower is over, then it's time for Europe to step up and embrace its new role and act on its words.

Democratic Senators need to fall in line

Honestly, this is why people vote Republican. If a popular President with strong majorities in both houses of Congress can't get through his own proposal then what's the point?

Republicans fight for what they believe in and they stick together, even if it will cost them personal political capital. Do you think all of the congressional Republicans wanted to vote for Bush's tax cuts? No. Do you think all Republicans wanted to vote for the creation of Medicare Part D, one of the largest -- and unfunded, I might add -- parts of the welfare state? No. Do you think that Rep. Joe Wilson wanted to apologize for his "You LIE!!!" outburst? No, but Boehner and McConnell made him do it anyway. Sometimes you gotta take one for the team and Republicans do that when they've got one of theirs in the White House. And politically, I respect them for that.

But the Senate Dems don't believe in team. They believe in holding onto their jobs and lining their campaign coffers, so they can be ultra cautious for the 2010 elections. That's why you do things in the first year of a cycle, so you have a year to recover and distance yourself!!!

Look, I believe in democracy, I really do. But I believe every president, regardless of party, should get roughly one year of a gimme. Heck, I'll only give the President 10 months to November, but he should receive a rubber stamp from at least his own party to try out his proposals. Obama's policies were voted on by the public and those policies won by a significant margin. Everything that this debate has brought up was talked about in the campaign and Obama's proposals are similar to Mitt Romney's (creating an online insurance exchange for individuals to purchase) and include ideas from John McCain (taxing healthcare benefits above a certain threshold as income). These ideas are hardly radical or revolutionary.

Bush won in 2000, I'll give Repubs that. But he won by a margin of -0.49 percent. Obama won by 7.3% with a majority of the votes. Give him until November of this year, if the ideas don't work that's why we have November 2012.

And if some Republicans and moderate Democrats really think that the public option is socialism then I suggest they start protesting outside of UMass or UDel, because it's the same damn thing. Just sayin'.

Time Interviews Obama on Healthcare Reform

Karen Tumulty of Time, talks to Obama about healthcare reform in a pretty extensive interview.

A careful read illustrates how non-radical President Obama really is. Here he is responding to whether we can afford reform during this recession:

"But I disagree with this idea that because of the financial crisis somehow we can afford to put this off. In some ways I think it's just made it more urgent for some of the reasons you just said: A lot more people are losing their jobs,are vulnerable to losing their health care; our deficits are even bigger, which means the load on Medicare and Medicaid is just going to get worse. If we don't do this now we are going to be in a world of hurt later."

Obama elegantly attempts to ratchet back racial heat

Whether or not you agree with his policies, our President is a class act.

Listen to the President take over today's press conference below.