Charlie's Chatter

I give up. After spending months hearing about Obama and reading and hearing his speeches and comments, I have to conclude that he is a demagogue. He has his own agenda, which includes the promotion of what are often called “progressive” ideas, ideas in which the government will get more involved in the control of our lives and in the economy. In his attempt to promote this, his rhetoric often appeals to the passions and the prejudices of the people, with many misleading words and sentences. That makes him a demagogue.
    The latest example is provided in his weekly radio address during which he spoke almost entirely about health care reform or “health insurance reform”. He said things like the following:

• “The history is clear: for decades rising health care costs have unleashed havoc on families, businesses, and the economy. And for decades, whenever we have tried to reform the system, the insurance companies have done everything in their considerable power to stop us. We know that this inaction has carried a terrible toll“. (Wow !   Unleashed havoc !   A terrible toll !   Those are very strong words, clearly implying huge damage to families and businesses. It’s almost as though hundreds of rabid gunmen with automatic weapons are traversing our towns and cities wounding and killing many thousands of Americans with automatic fire from their weapons !)
• “The insurance industry is rolling out the big guns and breaking open their massive war chest – to marshal their forces for one last fight to save the status quo. They’re filling the airwaves with ads. They’re flooding Capitol Hill with lobbyists and campaign contributions. And they’re funding studies designed to mislead the American people. (Yeh, right. All the while Obama himself often misleads the American people with his rhetoric. And the expression “massive war chest” is demagogic and misleading; when it comes to a “chest filled with money”, Obama believes that the government has such a large chest, which of course he as our Dear Leader will use wisely. I don’t know who is worse – Obama or the many millions of Americans who like him.)

(A complete transcript of Obama’s radio address can be found under www.whitehouse.gov.)
    Last Thursday Obama visited San Francisco and gave a speech. Among other things, he said, “We are closer than we have ever been to passing health insurance reform. Health insurance reform that will finally make quality care affordable for people who don’t have it, and bring stability and security to people who do, and slow the skyrocketing health care costs that are crushing our families and businesses and our state and our federal government.”   Wow !   I’ve always known that the cost of health care has been going up a lot over the years, but I did not know that it was skyrocketing ! “Skyrocketing” costs mean that they are going up so fast that most American people will soon be in big, big trouble, with many probably going bankrupt! I did not know that! I also did not know that these costs are crushing our families and businesses. I only thought that these were causing some additional financial problems for many families and businesses; I did not know that they were being crushed !   Good gosh, if they are being crushed, then they do not have long to live, or, if they are lucky, they will not die but just continue to suffer badly, only losing their homes at worst, or perhaps no longer able to pay their rent. Gosh, I sure hope more businesses do not go bankrupt. We do not need that. In fact we need our businesses to grow so that our unemployment rate will go down!

For those who are unaware of it, you should know that more and more Mustlims are immigrating into Western European countries. Although the majority of these Muslim immigrants are generally law-abiding and peaceful people, many of them are definitely not, especially young men. However, whether peaceful or not, almost none of these immigrants are integrating into the society of Western Civilization. Instead they are clinging to their Islamic “culture”, to include not only obedience to their Islamic precepts (which dictate much of what they must and must not do in their lives, to include how they dress and treat women), but also passive acceptance of what their extremist and even violent “brothers” do in Western Europe. With disgust I note that the Western European governments are doing little about this. In fact, they sometimes act so as to increase the influence of Islam in their countries.
    The latest example of the latter is provided by the government of Great Britain. A Dutch lawmaker named Geert Wilders was refused entry into Great Britain in February when he flew there to screen his film “Fitna” at the House of Lords. This film, said to be a “much-criticized” film about Islam, features “disturbing” images of terrorist acts superimposed over verses from Islam’s holy book, the Quran, in order to paint Islam as a threat to Western society. Well, Islam is a threat to Western society !   How could any thinking, knowledgeable person deny this? (I myself have seen the film on the Internet a few months ago.) But NO said the authorities in Great Britain; they consider Geert Wilders to be a threat! Absolutely disgusting.
    Well, according to some latest news, Geert Wilders has now been allowed to enter Great Britain because the original decision to deny him entry has been overturned by Britain’s Asylum and Immigration Tribunal. That’s fine. But that is not enough. For one thing, despite the Tribunal’s action, Britain’s Home Office expressed disappointment in the tribunal’s ruling. “The decision to refuse Wilders admission was taken on the basis that his presence could have inflamed tensions between our communities and have led to inter-faith violence. We still maintain this view,” a Home Office spokesman said. The Home Office said in February that barring Wilders was allowed under European Union law, which permits states to refuse entry on the grounds of public policy, public security or public health.   Hey !   I’ve got news for you guys !   If you are so concerned about public security and public health, then ban or severely limit the immigration of Muslims !   Muslims are clearly the ones who threaten the security of Western European countries, to include the culture of Western Civilization !   Heck, you have only to read the referenced news article to see what the reaction of Muslims has been to Geert Wilders being in Britain. One Muslim called Geert Wilders an “enemy of Islam, and an enemy of Allah which means he’s an enemy of us and we will speak out against him, against the evil he is doing.” This Muslim also said that Wilders should not have been let into Britain, blaming it on the “contradictions and hypocrisy” of “man-made law.” Oh ? What kind of law do you want, Mister Muslim? Sharia-law of course !
    I suspect that many Christians will object to my comments. They would say, “All religions should be respected. If a country bans Muslims, or puts limits on their immigration, then the next thing that will happen is that countries will ban Christians or limit their immigration“. Hey, I’ve got news for you ! Christians are already banned from some parts of Saudia Arabia, to include Mecca and its surroundings. In addition, Christians are already treated as second-class citizens in many Muslim countries, and that treatment is generally getting worse and not better !

According to this recent news article, an attempt is being made to have a law passed which will reimburse pet owners up to $3,500 in taxes for care of their precious little darling pets. Well, why not? The federal government is getting more and more involved in “helping us out”, so why not help us out with our pets? After all, as Nancy Perry said, “It’s a human health issue to ensure that pets are provided with better care because of the role they play in our families.” So apparently that would help improve our health, which is supposedly a major goal of all this health care “reform” legislation. But since many people have much less money due to the recession, they are clearly having trouble taking care of their pets.
    Have we forgotten everything about personal responsibility? If for financial reasons you are having trouble feeding your pet and taking care of it, well then get rid of the pet and take it to the local humane society or dog pound. Good God Almighty! I recently considered getting a cat, since I really love cats, but I finally decided not to do that mostly because it would mean added work for me. Also, I am retired, and although I am not poor I am not well-off either. So I need to be careful with my money. Hey, come to think of it, why not give a tax break for those who own home computers? I own a home computer and I depend heavily on it. In fact, recently I had major problems with this computer, and that was causing me grief, most probably even affecting my health !   Give me a tax break !!
    Well, at least tax break legislation for pet owners has very little chance of passing, at least according to the referenced news article. After all, Obama and his administration already have enough problems with all this health care “reform” business, not to mention problems with Iraq, Afghanistan and Iran. Hey, bring on Cap-and-Trade !   After all, we must protect the planet !

Your job, Obama, is not to “work for world peace”, as many would have you do. (President Obama’s Kenyan step-grandmother reportedly advised this year’s Nobel Peace Prize winner “to be of good character and continue to work for peace“.) Your job, Obama, is to first adhere to your oath of office, which states, perhaps too simply, that “I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” This oath implies that some of your duties as president are to protect the citizens of the United States, and if this sometimes requires the threat of military action, or even actual military action, then do it !     This idiotic puff piece by an intellectually-challenged, Obama-loving woman from Detroit says it all. Among other things, she writes:

People outside of America believed that the Iraq invasion and subsequent war were wrong, and that America was becoming increasingly isolated. As a country, we didn’t seem to care what they thought. Our mantra during Bush’s two terms was “Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead.” But the world has spoken again. And the Nobel committee was its conduit, awarding the prize to Obama not so much for what he has done but for what he has made possible. Thorbjørn Jagland, chairman of the five-member committee, said Obama has “created a new climate in international politics.”

Obama, part of your job is create a “climate” in international politics which protects the interests of the United States and protects its citizens. If this requires military action, or the threat of military action, then do it! Just do it wisely. Bush often did not. But this Nobel Peace Prize does not mean that you are now to “Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead in order to provide world peace“.

There is really no need for me to comment on president Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize, except for one thing which I mention further below. This article points to many comments that have already been made about this, especially on the Web. Of course this does mean that Obama now joins such other luminaries who have won this “Peace” prize, to include Yasser Arafat, Anwar Al-Sadat, Le Duc Tho, Yitzhak Rabin, Nelson Mandela, and Menachem Begin.
    Perhaps the only significant thing that troubles me about this is something that I have not yet found mentioned. Having now won the Nobel “Peace” prize, Obama may very well find himself more constrained when he supervises the foreign affairs of the United States. As stated on this web site, « Obama so far has made little tangible headway as he grapples with challenges ranging from the war in Afghanistan and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to nuclear standoffs with Iran and North Korea ». But as the president of the most powerful country in the world, Obama has much control and much influence over any possible military options that might be “on the table” when the United States has to deal with other countries. But would the winner of the Nobel Peace prize now seriously consider, let alone order, military action? If he were to actually order military action, that would degrade the value of the Nobel Peace Prize. Of course I myself consider that particular Prize to be of no value given some of those who were awarded this prize in the past. As Michelle Malkin stated, this is “the final nail in the Nobel Peace Prize Committee’s coffin“. But Obama seems to be the type of person who would consider this award a high honor, and now that he has it, our foreign enemies and potential enemies are no doubt happy about this. This prize is nothing but an additional ball and chain now attached to Obama. Of course Obama might sometimes use the Nobel Peace Prize as just another “jewel” in his smooth-tongued rhetoric.
    After I wrote the above, I did find a post by David Frum which expresses the same concern that I have. Mr. Frum writes:

That Nobel was not a gesture of Obama-worship by left-leaning Norwegians. It was the very opposite: It was a pre-emptive strike against Obama, an attempt to neutralize him. How can a Peace Nobelist strike Iranian nuclear plants? Or wage a protracted war in Afghanistan? Or tell the Palestinians, “Sorry, that’s the best offer, take it or leave it”? The hope of course is that he cannot. We’ve heard a lot over the past few years about radicals trying to achieve their aims through “lawfare.” Here’s a new concept in asymmetric conflict: “prizefare.” The Nobel Committee was not rewarding Obama. It was attempting to geld him.