Federal Budget Deficit to Reach Record $1.5 trillion in 2011

At WSJ, "Deficit Outlook Darkens: Stark Warning for 2011 Fuels Battle Over Government Spending and Taxation":

WASHINGTON—The federal budget deficit will reach a record of nearly $1.5 trillion in 2011 due to the weak economy, higher spending and fresh tax cuts, congressional budget analysts said, in a stark warning that will drive the growing battle over government spending and taxation.

At that size, the deficit—up from $1.29 trillion in 2010—would be roughly $60 billion more than the White House projected last summer, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. Last year's tax-cut package alone will add roughly $400 billion to the deficit, the CBO said. As a percentage of the nation's economic output, the 9.8% deficit would be the second-largest since World War II, behind only the 10% level in 2009.

The grim outlook landed a day after President Barack Obama outlined plans to push for new spending that he said would help keep the U.S. globally competitive in his State of the Union speech, and the data could complicate that effort. Republicans have dismissed the president's plans as ignoring the more pressing need to reduce the deficit.

Wednesday, the battle lines sharpened. "This report is a reflection of the gross mismanagement of our nation's finances," said Rep. Tom Price (R., Ga.). "It should make every American think twice about the latest calls by the president to increase spending at a time when Washington can clearly not afford to pay its bills."

More at the link.

RELATED: At Fox News, "CBO Director: Trillion-Dollar Deficits Risk 'Fiscal Crisis' in U.S."

Lego Guns

Badass LEGO Guns, to be exact.

No doubt my 9 year-old son can relate. He loves Legos. Hopefully the administration won't ban these Badass toys. See, "White House to Push Gun Control":

Obama intentionally did not mention gun control in his State of the Union, but aides say that in the next two weeks the administration will unveil a campaign to get Congress to toughen existing laws.

At the beginning of his State of the Union address, President Obama tipped his hat to Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who’s now recuperating in a Houston medical facility. But throughout the hourlong speech, he never addressed the issue at the core of the Giffords tragedy—gun control—and what lawmakers would, or should, do to reform American firearm-access laws.

That was intentional, according to the White House. An administration official says Obama didn’t mention guns in his speech because of the omnipresent controversy surrounding the Second Amendment and gun control. Tuesday’s speech was designed to be more about the economy and how, as Obama repeated nine times, the U.S. could “win the future.”

But in the next two weeks, the White House will unveil a new gun-control effort in which it will urge Congress to strengthen current laws, which now allow some mentally unstable people, such as alleged Arizona shooter Jared Loughner, to obtain certain assault weapons, in some cases without even a background check.

Tuesday night after the speech, Obama adviser David Plouffe said to NBC News that the president would not let the moment after the Arizona shootings pass without pushing for some change in the law, to prevent another similar incident. “It’s a very important issue, and one I know there’s going to be debate about on the Hill.”

Right.

Never let a crisis go to waste. Brilliant. That's really going to wrap up the flyover vote for the Dems. Ironically, Gabrielle Giffords was a Second Amendment advocate.

Progressive. Democrats. Fail.

Professor Ted Honderich Letter Published at The Guardian: Palestinians Have Moral Right to Terrorism

Ted Honderich, the Grote Professor Emeritus of the Philosophy of Mind and Logic, University College, London, has a published letter in The Guardian calling on the moral right of Palestinians to terrorism.

Melanie Phillips has it, "Moral Depravity," and the link to The Guardian:

The revelations in detail (Report, 25 January) of the intransigent greed, the escape from decency, of Israeli governments in negotiation with our selected leaders of the Palestinians, serve one purpose among others. They provide a further part of what is now an overwhelming argument for a certain proposition. It is that the Palestinians have a moral right to their terrorism within historic Palestine against neo-Zionism. The latter, neither Zionism nor of course Jewishness, is the taking from the Palestinians of at least their autonomy in the last one-fifth of their historic homeland. Terrorism, as in this case, can as exactly be self-defence, a freedom struggle, martyrdom, the conclusion of an argument based on true humanity, etc.

The guy's a well-known terror sympathizer, it turns out.

Gay Group Sparks Boycott of Conference

At New York Times (where else?), "Some Conservatives Boycott Conference Over Gay Group’s Role":

A bitter dispute over whether a gay conservative group should co-sponsor the conservative movement’s largest gathering of the year has led some prominent supporters to withdraw from the event next month.

Riding the winds of success in November’s midterm elections, this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference, which is set to begin Feb. 10 in Washington, is expected to draw Republican presidential aspirants like Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul as well as thousands of activists.

But some conservative pillars, including church-based groups like the Family Research Council, Concerned Women for America and Liberty University, and others, like the Heritage Foundation, are refusing to participate. They are angry that the gay organization, GOProud, has been given a seat at the planning table. These groups are implacable opponents of same-sex marriage, which they say GOProud implicitly endorses by saying that the question should be left to the states.

At least one reputed presidential hopeful, Senator Jim DeMint, Republican of South Carolina, has also declined to attend, expressing support for the boycotters.

“GOProud is working to undermine one of our core values,” said Mathew D. Staver, dean of the Liberty University School of Law. Letting gay men and lesbians attend the conference is one thing, he said, “but they shouldn’t be allowed to be co-sponsors.”

Lots more at the link.

I'm about as conservative as they come on gay marriage, and I never once seriously considered boycotting. I'll be at CPAC, and I'm excited. But I doubt same-sex marriage will be all that pressing. Things are working their way to the Supreme Court, whether Prop. 8 from California or another eventual challenge from elsewhere around the country. Fiscal policy will likely be the dominant theme at the convention, and while social issues are obviously important, I'd be surprised if a new Ryan Sorba-style outburst gained much sympathy.

In any case, see Robert Stacy McCain's essay on this from December: "Ready for the Best. CPAC. Evah?"

What's Your Constitution IQ?

At ABC News, "Inside the Constitution: Your Government IQ."

I was going to be embarrassed if I blew this, LOL! But actually, I'm thinking about how well my students would do. That, and how well the progressives would do? They're all so smart and all. Not. Especially JBW. And butt-freak Thers.

Protests Escalate in Egypt — U.S. Stands by in Realpolitik Mode

At Foreign Policy, "Egypt's Struggle for Freedom: Egyptians are taking to the streets to demand their rights. Shame on America if it stands in the way." Yeah. Shame. But typical of this administration's foreign policy. See Christian Science Monitor, "Joe Biden says Egypt's Mubarak no dictator, he shouldn't step down..." (Via Memeorandum.) And at New York Times, "Cables Show Delicate U.S. Dealings With Egypt’s Leaders":

It was Hillary Rodham Clinton’s first meeting as secretary of state with President Hosni Mubarak, in March 2009, and the Egyptians had an odd request: Mrs. Clinton should not thank Mr. Mubarak for releasing an opposition leader from prison because he was ill.

In fact, a confidential diplomatic cable signed by the American ambassador to Egypt, Margaret Scobey, advised Mrs. Clinton to avoid even mentioning the name of the man, Ayman Nour, even though his imprisonment in 2005 had been condemned worldwide, not least by the Bush administration.

The cable is among a trove of dispatches made public by the antisecrecy group WikiLeaks that paint a vivid picture of the delicate dealings between the United States and Egypt, its staunchest Arab ally. They show in detail how diplomats repeatedly raised concerns with Egyptian officials about jailed dissidents and bloggers, and kept tabs on reports of torture by the police.

But they also reveal that relations with Mr. Mubarak warmed up because President Obama played down the public “name and shame” approach of the Bush administration. A cable prepared for a visit by Gen. David H. Petraeus in 2009 said the United States, while blunt in private, now avoided “the public confrontations that had become routine over the past several years.”

This balancing of private pressure with strong public support for Mr. Mubarak has become increasingly tenuous in recent days. Throngs of angry Egyptians have taken to the streets and the White House, worried about being identified with a reviled regime, has challenged the president publicly.

It's a delicate business all around, but it's particularly interesting that this administration is the unrivaled champion of reactionary forces in the Middle East. Notice the various lines of Obama's FUBAR foreign policy. The administration has dropped "name and shame" against Arab dictatorships while browbeating Israel, the only democracy in the region (notwithstanding Iraq). Amazing. We help keep in power authoritarian regimes in Egypt and Iran, while strengthening the same forces of reaction against the one state standing as the West's bulwark against Islamist fanaticism. I'm shaking my head at this, but again, international affairs is a nasty business. And the Obama team's obviously working against a steep learning curve.

And check The Lede for excellent coverage.

Gunman Kills Clerk at Long Beach Liquor Store

This is just three blocks from my college's downtown campus.

And at Long Beach Post, "VIDEO: Long Beach Police Release Chilling Footage Of Deadly Gunpoint Robbery."

Long Beach Police have released chilling photos and surveillance video of the two male suspects who robbed, shot and killed the clerk of a convenience store at 4th and Cherry on Saturday evening.

The images show two Hispanic males in their late 20's or early 30's using a chrome revolver and holding 53-year old Sor Phouam at gunpoint. Only a small portion of the incident is available in the video, but authorities are calling for the community's help in identifying and finding both suspects.

One bystander attempted to leave the store when he saw the robbery but was stopped by the armed suspect. Detectives are asking the bystander to come forward because he may have information about the murder suspects.

The suspects fled east on Cherry Avenue after killing Phouam.

Updates at the link, as well as LBPD tip line contact info.

I'm wondering what Phouam could have done differently. He continues to serve the bystander, and his waving hand motions don't reflect the response of someone taking the gunman's threat very seriously.

Taliban Stone Couple to Death for Alleged Adultery in Northern Afghanistan

Blazing Cat Fur has the story, with the link to London's Daily Mail, "Stoned to death with her lover: Horrific video of execution of girl, 19, killed by Afghan Taliban for running away from arranged marriage":

Also, at BBC, "Afghan police pledge justice for Taliban stoning."

Burying Vladimir Lenin

I saw this at The People's Cube, "Goodbye Lenin? United Russia Considers Burial."

But it's no joke, "Russians Voting On Whether to Bury Vladimir Lenin":

And from the quote at The People's Cube:

In Soviet times, lines snaked around Red Square as the faithful waited to file past the mummified body under the walls of the Kremlin. Few make the effort today. And maintaining the corpse is a constant and growing headache for the embalmers. Communist supporters gathered at the mausoleum on Friday to commemorate the 87th anniversary of Lenin's death.

Hey, don't bury Lenin!

American progressives can set up a Lenin Mausoleum in San Francisco. No doubt the lines will beat those from Disneyland's Matterhorn back in the day!

The Aim of Blood Libels

From Caroline Glick (via Glenn Reynolds):

For Israelis, the American Left's assault on Sarah Palin and the conservative movement in the wake of Jared Loughner's murderous attack in Tucson was disturbingly familiar.

Just as the American leftist media and political leadership immediately sought to blame Palin, the Tea Party and conservative media personalities for Loughner's actions, so in 1995 their Israeli counterparts accused the Right - from then-opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu to various rabbis to the two million Israelis who protested against the so-called peace process with the PLO - of being responsible for Yitzhak Rabin's assassination.

Just as Palin and her fellow conservatives are accused of inciting the schizophrenic shooter to pull the trigger, so Netanyahu and his fellow rightists were accused of inciting the sociopathic Yigal Amir to plot and carry out his crime.

And just as it doesn't matter to the American media elites that Americans conservatives engaged in no such incitement, and that Loughner himself seemed motivated to act by a mad obsession with grammar, it didn't matter to their Israeli counterparts that Amir's closest associate and the man responsible for the most incendiary anti-Rabin propaganda was Avishai Raviv - a government agent.

Palin's characterization of the Left's appalling assault on her and her fellow conservatives as a "blood libel" was entirely accurate. Moreover, as her previous use of the term "death panels" in the healthcare debate brought clarity to an issue the Left sought to obscure, so her use of the term "blood libel" exposed the nature of the Left's behavior and highlighted its intentions.

RELATED: More blood libel, "Marxist Barbara Ehrenreich Exploits Arizona Shooting in Latest Smear on Glenn Beck."

Banned Jessica Simpson Workout Video Release

And now for some celebrity news, "Jessica Simpson's Controversial Workout Video May See Light of Day." (Via WeSmirch.") More at Toronto Sun, "Simpson Fights Fitness Vid Release."

I haven't written about Jessica for some time. I hope she's doing well, or at least better than she appears in this gossipy story.

Anyway, at Gawker (FWIW), "Jessica Simpson's Forbidden Workout Video."

Also, thanks to Bob Belvedere for the link up yesterday, and for this: "A Little Hump Day Rule 5: Manuela Arcuri."

The Left is Running Scared?

That's Stanley Kurtz's take on Barbara Ehrenreich's commentary yesterday at Los Angeles Times. See Kurtz, at National Review, "America: A Tyranny of the Heavily Armed."

I'm going to disagree just a bit.

The Nation's editors might be regretting the Frances Fox Piven essay they published, but the progressive politics of 2011 has abandoned any regard for truth and moral decency. And frankly, by the looks of the hardline leftist blogs, it's double-down and business as usual. For example, No More Mr. Nice Blog perfectly captures the left's depravity, suggesting that conservative tea partiers are essentially armed fascist mobs. Steve M. is too simple to deserve a more detailed rebuttal, but see, in any case, "Marxist Barbara Ehrenreich Exploits Arizona Shooting in Latest Smear on Glenn Beck."

Republicans Say it's Business as Usual

At LAT:

Republicans dismissed President Obama's State of the Union address as more of the same, saying his call for renewed investment in American education, infrastructure and technology was simply a push for another round of federal spending that shows little commitment to reducing the deficit.

"Whether sold as 'stimulus' or repackaged as 'investment,' their actions show they want a federal government that controls too much, taxes too much, and spends too much in order to do too much," said Rep. Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, in the GOP's official address after Obama's speech.

"We believe the days of business-as-usual must come to an end," Ryan said. "We hold to a couple of simple convictions: Endless borrowing is not a strategy; spending cuts have to come first."

Ryan's address was part of an unusual two-pronged retort to the president's speech. Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota also delivered a response — on behalf, she said, of the "tea party." Bachmann chairs the House Tea Party Caucus.

"For two years President Obama made promises just like the ones we heard him make tonight," Bachmann said, according to prepared remarks. "Yet we still have high unemployment, devalued housing prices, and the cost of gasoline is skyrocketing."

Not every prominent Republican ripped the president. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Senate minority leader, welcomed Obama's support for a five-year freeze on federal discretionary spending.

"I like the fact that he wants to do something about spending," McConnell said. "However, freezing government spending for five years at the increased levels of the last two years is really not enough. We need to reduce domestic spending substantially. And I hope the president will work with us to achieve that."

More at the link.

RELATED: From Jennifer Rubin, "Rep. Paul Ryan 1, ObamaCare 0" (via Memeorandum).

Bankers to Lobby Against New Rules at World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland — And Police Special Forces Gear Up Against Anarchists

The main story's at WSJ, "Banks Return With a Goal: Pushing Back."

But what really caught my attention about this piece is the accompanying photograph, seen at left: "A marksman from Switzerland's special police forces sets up security on the roof of the Congress Center in Davos on Tuesday."

The World Economic Forum has been a frequent target of the left's violent anti-globalization movement. Amy Goodman's Democracy Now! has a feature from 2002, which captures the nature of the leftist opposition: "Is Another World Possible? Power and Protest As the World Economic Forum Comes to New York." And considering the scale of European protests over the last year, in Britain, Greece, and Italy, for example, it makes sense for the Swiss authorities to put what are essentially military marksmen at strategic spots in preparation against the violent anarchy and potential loss of life.

Click on the image above to enlarge. That dude is decked out with an additional automatic rifle and loads of ammunition and equipment. It's the price we pay in democratic societies, I guess. Folks who help keep the peace are essentially urban commandos, and they deploy with tremendous protection capacities against the unruly massed mobs. The fact that these are left-wing anarcho-socialists and domestic terrorists doesn't get that much play in the MFM press. But marksmen like that guy above are on guard against the kind of violence currently advocated by Marxist Francis Fox Piven (and given a pass by Marxist Barbara Ehrenreich).

Yeah, stuff is kinda messed up like that, but you go to (political) war with the media you have.

Alternative Newsweek Covers

At Moonbattery:

ALSO from MOONBATTERY: "Yet Another New Level of Shamelessness for Newsweek."

Glenn Beck on Obama's State of the Union

From yesterday's show:

RELATED: From William Tucker, at American Spectator, "Won't Somebody Please Help Frances Fox Piven?" Also, from Liberty Chick, at Big Journalism, "The Curious Case of the Martyrdom of Frances Fox Piven."

Obama's WTF Moment in SOTU

The full clip is at Right Scoop, "Sarah Palin Talks Obama’s WTF Moments in SOTU."

And see Gateway Pundit, "Whoa!… Sarah Palin on Obama’s SOTU Speech: “WTF Was Spot-On… There Were a Lot of WTF Moments In That Speech”."

RELATED: A killer lead editorial from Wall Street Journal, "The Great Misallocators: What Barack Obama and General Electric Have in Common":

President Obama on Tuesday night stressed U.S. economic competitiveness as a new policy theme, accentuating the point he made last week by naming General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt to lead his new jobs council. This is welcome, though not solely because it may signal less Administration hostility to business. The pairing is also instructive because both Mr. Obama and GE symbolize a major reason the U.S. has become less competitive—the misallocation of resources.

***

Step back for a minute from the day to day policy fights and consider how an economy can grow faster. One way is to get people to work harder or longer. The government can contribute here with policies that reward work and investment, such as lower taxes.

A second route to faster growth is innovation, which means inventions or new processes that increase productivity. Government can help with money for basic research, but private investment, human ingenuity and luck are the main drivers.

The third way is through the more efficient use of capital, both human and monetary. These resources are scarce in any economy, and growth will be fastest if they are allowed to find their highest return. If resources are allocated to less productive uses or create asset bubbles due to bad policy, then overall growth will be slower than it should be.

In our view, this third point has been the largest but least appreciated problem in the U.S. economy in recent years. First the Federal Reserve's subsidy for credit and other policies pushed resources into the financial industry, and especially into real estate. When that bubble burst, triggering the 2008 financial panic and recession, the U.S. responded over two years with a huge expansion of the federal government.

Both periods were marked by the misallocation of trillions of dollars into wasted investments. One reason the current recovery has been so lackluster is that it takes time for an economy to retool from these mistakes. Money that went to build now-empty condos on the Vegas Strip—or to government transfer payments—can't be reclaimed to rebuild American manufacturing and technology.

***

No company illustrates this great misallocation better than the General Electric Co. For decades it was a symbol of U.S. manufacturing and export prowess, building jet engines, gas turbines, consumer appliances and more ...

More at the link.

Folks can't stop laughing at American Glob, iOWNTHEWORLD, and Protein Wisdom (via Memeorandum).

Marxist Barbara Ehrenreich Exploits Arizona Shooting in Latest Smear on Glenn Beck

It's more Arizona blood libel, from Barbara Ehrenreich, at the Los Angeles Times, "A Call to Protest Ignites a Call to Arms."

Ehrenreich commits a classic ecological fallacy by highlighting what she admits is but "dozens" of abusive comments from Glenn Beck's The Blaze website --- comments that have not only been removed, but also repudiated by Beck repeatedly --- to smear the right as gun-addled "Americans" on the verge of committing massacre:

Why are Americans such wusses? Threaten the Greeks with job losses and benefit cuts and they tie up Athens, but take away Americans' jobs, 401(k)s, even their homes, and they pretty much roll over. Tell British students that their tuition is about to go up and they take to the streets; American students just amp up their doses of Prozac.

The question has been raised many times in the last few years, by a variety of scholars and commentators -- this one included -- but when the eminent social scientist Frances Fox Piven brought it up at the end of December in an essay titled "Mobilizing the Jobless," all hell broke loose. An editor of Glenn Beck's website, theblaze.com, posted a piece sporting the specious headline "Frances Fox Piven Rings in the New Year by Calling for Violent Revolution," and, just two weeks before the Tucson shootings, the death threats started flying. Many of the most provocative comments have been removed from the site's comment section, but at one time they included such charming posts as: "Bring it on biotch [sic]. we're armed to the teeth." Or: "We're all for violence and change, Francis [sic]. Where do your loved ones live?"

If the dozens of Beck fans rhetorically brandishing their weapons at Piven were all CEOs, bankers, hedge fund operators and so forth -- i.e., the kind of people who have the most to lose from mass protests by the unemployed -- all this might make more sense. But somehow, and I may be naive about these things, it's hard to imagine a multimillionaire suggesting that "folks buy battle carbines with folding or collapseable [sic] stocks and 16[-inch] barrels so they can be more easily hidden under jackets and such. Also, buy in NATO-approved calibers (5.56/.223, 7.62/.308) so you can resupply ammo from the bodies of your enemies too." One of Piven's would-be assassins even admits to being out of work, a condition he or she blames, oddly enough, on Piven herself, adding that "we should blowup [her] office and home."

So perhaps economically hard-pressed Americans aren't wusses after all. They may not have the courage or the know-how to organize a protest at the local unemployment office, which is the kind of action Piven urged in her December essay, but they stand ready to shoot the first 78-year-old social scientist who suggests that they do so.

It goes on like this for a while. Erhenreich focuses on guns. Beck's commenters are allegedly obsessed with guns, and for Erhenreich, that logically takes us to the most obviously conclusion: Yep, the Giffords shooting. You guessed it. Here's this from the conclusion:

Never mind that there are only a few ways you can use a gun to improve your economic situation: You can hock it. You can deploy it in an armed robbery. Or you can use it to shoot raccoons for dinner.

But there is one thing you can accomplish with guns and coarse threats about using them: You can make people think twice before disagreeing with you. When a congresswoman can be shot in a parking lot and a professor who falls short of Glenn Beck's standards of political correctness can be, however anonymously, targeted for execution, we have moved well beyond democracy -- to a tyranny of the heavily armed.

Where to begin?

Going back to the essay we find that Ehreneich's basically rewriting the storyline. Frances Fox Piven didn't just call for protests against the "the local unemployment office," as Ehrenreich suggests. No, Piven called for "Greek-style" protests in response to the austerity measures adopted by European governments. These are protests that got people killed, most notably bank clerk Angeliki Papathanasopoulou, who was murdered along with her unborn baby and two other colleagues when protesters attacked with firebombs (see, "Greek tragedy: how last phone call by murdered bank clerk touched off backlash").

Ehrenreich is a Marxist and Honorary Chairwoman of the Democratic Socialists of America. It makes perfect sense that she'd offer a blatantly dishonest defense of fellow Marxist Frances Fox Piven. We've had this debate for weeks now. The progressives crossed a moral line with Arizona, in the words of James Taranto, and with the Glenn Beck backlash as well.

Glenn Reynolds cites Ehreneich's article, and then clarifies about Piven's advocacy:

Hooded protesters. Molotov cocktails. Three dead by fire, four hospitalized. This is Piven’s idea of a proper “people’s movement.” This is the kind of violence she was advocating. This is what she’d like to see happening in America, to Americans. And this is what her allies are trying to minimize, or distract attention from, by making false accusations aimed at innocent parties. Just for the record.

Exactly.

Progressives Slobber Over Obama's SOTU Address

Look, I only watched parts of it, but I'm agreeing with Krauthammer: The president "phoned it in."

Here's the full video clip: "State of the Union, 2011."

A bare majority at CNN's poll (52 percent) report a positive reaction to the address, and a third said "they had a somewhat positive response and 15 percent with a negative response."

More at Memeorandum.

I'll be reading over some of the left's reactions and will have more in an update.

Michele Bachmann Response to SOTU

Via Nice Deb:

And Bachmann's eliciting a heavy response from the deathly progressives. At Politico, "Michele Bachmann's Turn" and all the commentary at Memeorandum.