November 13, 2013

On This Date

November 13th:

1789 - Ben Franklin wrote 'In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes'.

1974 -  Karen Silkwood  was killed in a car crash under suspicious circumstances  

1982 - The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, containing the names of more than 13,000 Marines who lost their lives in Vietnam, was dedicated in Washington, DC



1995 - A bomb in a minivan at a US training center in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, killed 5 Americans and injured 60; President Bubba Clinton's response was to send an FBI anti-terrorism team to "investigate"

1999 -  Bubba Clinton agrees to pay Paula Jones $850,000 to drop her sexual harassment lawsuit (Bubba did not apologize or admit guilt)  

November 11, 2013

Veterans' Day 2013



It is the VETERAN,
  not the preacher,
    who has given us freedom of religion.

It is the
VETERAN,
  not the reporter,
    
who has given us freedom of the press.

It is the VETERAN,

  not the poet,
    who has given us freedom of speech.


It is the VETERAN,
  not the campus organizer,
    who has given us freedom to assemble.


It is the VETERAN,
  not the lawyer,
    who has given us the right to a fair trial.


It is the
VETERAN,
  not the politician,
    who has given us the right to vote.






November 10, 2013

Presidential Priorities

No worries!  Obama golfs 150th round as a real superstorm devastates the Philippines ....  and Obamacare devastates the American people!


President Obama’s approval ratings may be stuck in a sand trap, but that has not deterred him from sticking to his weekly round of golf. 
 
After teeing off on Saturday at the private course in Florida where the film “Caddy Shack” was filmed, Mr. Obama hit the milestone number of 150 golf rounds in less than five years in the White House. 

Mr. Obama wasn’t much of a duffer before he ran for president. His regularity on the green started on April 26, 2009. He played 27 times that first year in office, seven of which were during his vacations on Martha’s Vineyard and Hawaii.

During his second year as president, Mr. Obama played a little more — 30 rounds. He included a woman for only the second time when Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius joined on Oct. 10, 2010. 
 
Perhaps time on the links gave them time to discuss all the people they knew would lose their insurance when Obamacare was implemented. 
 
Ms Sebelius also joined the president on the golf course on May 18 this year. 

... The president played even more in his third year in office — a total of 34 rounds. 
 
... Mr. Obama put aside his weekly golf outings for several periods while running for re-election in 2012. His annual total fell to 19 rounds, seven of which were in the two months after he won a second term.

Never having to run for office again has given Mr. Obama a free pass to spend every weekend on the golf course.
 
 So far in 2013, he has already passed his 2011 record with a total of 39 rounds of golf, as of today. This includes his whopping 27 holes played in one day at The Courses at Andrews AFB on Sept. 14. 

Mr. Obama’s supporters get enraged whenever I tweet or write about my tracking his golf games. They defend him by either saying everyone needs a break or comparing the golf outings to President George W. Bush's time at his Texas ranch. 

However, Mr. Bush stopped playing golf in Aug. 2003 out of respect for the families of servicemen in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr. Obama has shown no such feeling of inappropriateness.

Even if you compare number of rounds up to that point in the first term, Mr. Obama had played three times the number of times as Mr. Bush — 76 to 29 rounds.

The difference in cutting brush in Texas and Mr. Obama’s form of relaxation is that golf is an elitist pastime that few can afford in expense or time, especially in this prolonged economic downturn. 

Mr. Obama is fully aware of the optics of his favorite hobby since he always stops the weekly foursome when he is engaged in a budget battle with Congress or nearing an election. Once those moments pass, he goes right back to his nine iron. 

_Emily Miller is senior editor of opinion for The Washington Times and author of “Emily Gets Her Gun … But Obama Wants to Take Yours” (Regnery 2013)


Some of my favorites of the 2428 comments:

Aerodoctyl:
Kudos to America's most recreational president. At least Obama has improved his game. Comforting, no doubt, to the 3 million people who just lost healthcare coverage, and the 10 million no longer employed since he started his transformation project.

 DisgustedwithElitism:
 We are all incrementally safer when he is on the 12th hole than we are when he is back in the big chair behind the big desk in the Oval Office. Is there any chance we could get a government shutdown for, say, just over three years? Do you think an offer of unlimited golf holidays would get his attention?

Allegra:
 The man will take credit for when things go right but don't look for him to take the blame when things go down the toilet.

DisgustedwithElitism:
* As to "post partisan," he has proven to be the most partisan, most divisive national political figure in the memory of any living American.
* On gun control, he was sure his rhetoric would trump the Second Amendment.
* On the NSA, he campaigned (twice) on the most "open and transparent" administration in modern history; the BHO administration is the most closed, most controlling, and most paranoid since RMN.
* As to Benghazi and the deaths of four Americans he has been clearly shown to be deficient in leadership and responsibility.
*The IRS has lost enormous credibility in the eyes of America under BHO.
* On the Syria Crisis, he brought us closer to WWIII than at any time since the Cuban Missile Crisis (and that includes war games in 1983).
* On the Middle East, as we watch the Mediterranean Sea is becoming a Russian lake as our enemies and allies look to Putin for stability and leadership.
* On health care reform he has looked straight into the camera lens (over the top of his teleprompter) and repeatedly lied - it is not reform at all, it is a thinly disguised power grab by government.
* On immigration reform he is gearing up to offer Motor Voter to 12M undocumented Democrats.




Happy Birthday #238



 
"Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they made a difference. 
The Marines don't have that problem". 
Ronald Reagan, 1985


 

"I've always been proud of being a Marine. 
I won't hesitate to defend the Corps."
Jonathan Winters, comic and Marine


 
"They told (us) to open up the Embassy, or "we'll blow you away." And then they looked up and saw the Marines on the roof with these really big guns, and they said in Somali, "Igaralli ahow," which means "Excuse me, I didn't mean it, my mistake".
_Karen Aquilar, in the U.S. Embassy; Mogadishu, Somalia, 1991 



Now drop and give me 238!