Occupy Canada

The Occupy [Insert Location] movement is coming to Canada.  Now, why can't the tea party movement come here?  It's not fair, dammit.  I guess Canada's conservatives are just too busy with their jobs and families (except for me).

Canadian organizers of the so-called Occupy movement are ramping up efforts to rally "against spiritual wickedness in high places" during a global day of action Saturday that now has the backing of at least a couple of major unions [unsurprisingly], and has put police and businesses on alert.

Thousands in at least 15 Canadian cities — from Vancouver to St. John's — were holding meetings Friday to complete plans for the weekend marches, sit-ins and other efforts to decry what the movement says is an uneven distribution of wealth caused by government policies favouring big business.

 So its communism they're demanding.

"I'm encouraged to see citizens rightfully stand up and take action against what are gross injustices in our economic and social structures," said CAW national president Ken Lewenza in a release Friday.

I thought that's what the tea party was for.

"It's time for people to take ownership of their streets, their economy and fight back against corporations and governments championing right-wing, neo-liberal policies that support a select few, at the expense of the majority."

I thought that's what left-wing policies did.

Canadian police units, notably in Toronto and Vancouver where the G20 protests in June 2010 and hockey riots this past June, respectively, have led to violence and arrests, have for days been planning their strategies for handling the Occupy protests. 

Police officials have been as tight-lipped about how they'll handle Saturday's mass events as the Occupy Canada organizers, who keep a low profile and let their Facebook, Twitter and other social networking efforts drive their planning.

No matter what happens, I predict there will be complaints of police brutality.  There always seem to be when left-wing protests are concerned.  However, when a large, unruly crowd is threatening the safety of people and businesses, the police should be able to do whatever they have to (with reasonable limits, of course), to contain that crowd and prevent any further escalation of violence.  If the Stanley Cup riots in Vancouver are any indication, hooligans will use any excuse to create further disorder.

Tom Caldwell, chairman and CEO of Caldwell Securities Ltd., which has offices in Toronto and New York City, also isn't exactly sure about the Occupy movement's goals.

"The medium is the protest but what is the message?" he said.

I think the goal of the movement is communism, or at least socialism.  At the very least, it is an excuse for professional protesters to protest over nothing in particular.  I see this movement basically as a manifestation of an emotion-driven desire to turn North America into a left-wing "utopia".  But, with powerful American politicians that are sympathetic to the movement, such as Barack Obama, who knows how much influence this movement will have.  Perhaps Obama will take the movement as America wanting socialism, and I believe he is delusional enough to think that.  Maybe he will enact far-left policies in an attempt to appease the participants of this movement, thinking it will gain him votes.  Or maybe he will simply use this movement as an excuse to enact far-left policies.  Fortunately the Republicans control the House of Representatives.  I wonder what creative (/sarc) ad hominems Obama, the Democrats, and other liberals will use for the Republicans in this hypothetical situation.        

The Omniscent Obama Passively Impugns Those Destructive Republicans

What follows are some excerpts from this article detailing President Obama's first day on the campaign trial his bus tour to "flyover country" (h/t GayPatriot).

"If your voices are heard, then sooner or later these guys have to start paying attention," Obama said in Iowa on Monday. "And if they don't start paying attention, then they're not going to be in office and we will have a new Congress in there that will start paying attention to what is going on all across America."

...

While the White House insisted in the lead up to the tour that the trip was about official business because Obama was talking to Americans, the president was clearly talking to voters. With his sleeves rolled up, tie missing and campaign cadence on full display, Obama appeared to be in total campaign mode.

... 

"And if they don’t get it done, then we’ll be running against a Congress that’s not doing anything for the American people, and the choice will be very stark and will be very clear," Obama warned.
The president also sought to make peace with his liberal supporters, explaining and defending some of the compromises he has made on healthcare and tax cuts and blasting Republicans in the process.
"Look, the bottom line is we’re moving in the right direction," Obama told one questioner. "But I know it’s frustrating, because the other side is unreasonable.  And you don’t want to reward unreasonableness.  Look, I get that.  But sometimes you’ve got to make choices in order to do what’s best for the country at that particular moment, and that’s what I’ve tried to do."

I wonder if anyone else is made as speechless as I after reading that.  This is the president?  He sounds like a liberal troll commenting on a conservative website.  First, Obama accuses Republican congresspeople of "not paying attention."  Then, he accuses Republican congresspeople of "not doing anything for the American people."  Then, he accuses "the other side" of being "unreasonable."  Do I sense projection going on here?  I mean, replace "Congress" with "President" in the following quote*, 

"And if they don't start paying attention, then they're not going to be in office and we will have a new Congress in there that will start paying attention to what is going on all across America."

and I concur (with it).  I really, really hope Obama will receive a sober awakening on November 6, not only for the schadenfreude I will experience, but also so the economies of the US and the rest of the world will be able to get back to normal.  Obama sure is lucky he has the media to obfuscate his incompetence.  Here is a stunning misrepresentation of reality courtesy of Maureen Dowd (h/t GayPatriot):

Three years ago, Barack Obama’s unlikely presidential dream was given wings by rapturous Iowans — young, old and in-between — who saw in the fresh-faced, silky-voiced black senator a chance to leap past the bellicose, rancorous Bush years [courtesy of liberals] into a modern, competitive future where we once more had luster in the world. 

“We are choosing hope over fear,” Senator Obama told a delirious crowd of 3,000 here the night he won the Iowa caucuses. 

But fear has garroted hope, as America reels from the latest humiliating blows on the economy and in Afghanistan. The politician who came across as a redeemer in 2008 is now in need of redemption himself.

...

“We just wish he’d be more of a fighter,” said one influential Democrat with a grimace. Another agreed: “You can’t blame him for everything. I just wish he would come across more forceful at times, but that is not the dude’s style. Detached hurts you when things are sour. You need some of Clinton’s ‘I feel your pain’ compassion.”

The president has been so spectacularly unable to fill the leadership void in Washington that the high-spirited Michele Bachmann feels free to purloin Obama’s old mantra. 

“The power behind our campaign is hope and a future,” she chirped to a sparse crowd Monday in Atlantic, Iowa [what do you expect in a town of 7,112 people?]. “That’s all I believe in.” That and making America safe for old-fashioned light bulbs and not those weird curly ones.

...

Obama has spent a lifetime creating his persona — superior, wise, above all parties and interests, all-seeing, calm, unflappable. 

But as Drew Westen, a liberal psychology professor at Emory University wrote in The Times on Sunday, puzzling about what has happened to his former hero’s passion, the president never identifies the villains who cause our epic problems [does he mean Obama himself?]. It’s unclear, Westen wrote, whether that reflects his aversion to conflict or a fear of offending donors, or both. 

Obama’s assumption that you can rise above ascribing villainous motives has caused him to waste huge chunks of his first term seeking bipartisanship from Republicans who were playing him for a dupe. And it has led to Americans regarding the nation’s capital as a place of all villains and no heroes.

(Emphasis added)

Granted, there are a lot of criticisms (of Obama) in that article.  In fact, I was surprised to find this apt summary (of Obama):

His withholding and reactive nature has made him seem strangely irrelevant in Washington, trapped by his own temperament. He doesn’t lead, and he doesn’t understand why we don’t feel led.

There appears to be a disconnect between what Obama says and what these liberal columnists think he says.
My hypothesis is that (some) liberals have constructed this idealized image of Obama (as a brilliant, cerebral, eloquent, post-partisan, pragmatic professor whose only imperfection is being too smart and virtuous), and that is how they see him, regardless of reality.  Similarly, they have constructed an idealized image of Republicans (as idiotic, uneducated, backwards, evil, racist, homophobic, warmongering villains who wish to eat kittens, kill elderly people, and destroy the environment and who wish to enforce their evil Christian morals on everyone and to destroy the economy (i.e. the public sector) so black people in the inner-city are unfairly forced to contribute something to society) and that is how they see them, again, regardless of reality.  That is their perception of reality, and they won't be persuaded otherwise.  And those in the media will obfuscate the facts so as to report reality so it is in accord with their perception of it.  I will say that, if my hypothesis is correct, there surely must be liberals that don't adhere to this lack of reason.  Keep in mind that that is simply a hypothesis.

In summary, methinks Maureen Dowd (and some other people) should pay attention to what the "detached, passive, unflappable" Obama says.  Because he certainly doesn't come off that way.  

*and pronouns and verbs (so they are in agreement with the pronouns)

I Think Obama is Skipping

Every time President Obama makes a speech, he seems to say the same thing.

We need Democrats and Republicans to work together to help grow this economy.  We’ve got to put politics aside to get some things done.  That’s what the American people expect of us.

Blah, blah, blah.  How many times have I heard this before?  What will telling the public this accomplish?  What Obama is saying seems pretty obvious.  Furthermore, surely Obama has some sort of influence in Washington.  Maybe, instead of making speeches, and telling Americans something they already know, he should being doing something himself.  Why is he just complaining?  Why doesn't he introduce a concrete plan that entails the steps he mentioned in his address, instead of lecturing Congress?

My conclusion is that Obama is campaigning, and that is all he is doing.  I hope the average American isn't dumb enough to buy Obama's rhetoric.  That is all he offers.  He offers no plan, only rhetoric.

Cut, Cap and Balance

Conservatives in the house have proposed a plan called “Cut, Cap and Balance” that would consist of “substantial spending cuts, ...a statutory spending cap, and Congressional passage of a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution.” 

Senators McConnell (R-KY) and Reid (D-NV) and Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) have proposed a plan that the conservatives who have proposed the “Cut, Cap, and Balance Act” have deemed the “Cut, Run, and Hide Plan.”

This plan consists of a debt ceiling increase of $2.5 trillion “without any guaranteed spending cuts or reforms.” 

According to Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), the real problem isn’t the debt ceiling, it is the debt.  If the disaster is to be averted, then whatever plan is adopted must have a realistic, long-term solution to the debt problem. 

In my opinion, the only real solution would be harsh budget cuts.  Because of President Obama, the US has immense debt and the best solution would be to cut spending harshly, which would stimulate the economy, which would provide government revenue.  

This Isn't Bush's Fault

Whatever the results of the debt talks in  the United States are, and whatever happens to the US economy as a result of its debt, it is important to remember that it was President Obama and his stimulus that are what got the US in this situation.  Sure, this economic crisis started while George W. Bush was president, but it was Obama's stimulus that caused the US's current debt problem.  He failed to deal with the economic situation, and, if the US does default, and even if it does so because Republicans refuse to raise the debt limit, Obama is ultimately responsible.

Furthermore, since it is Obama's fault that the US is in this situation, I will say that is it Obama who has the responsibility to compromise.

I hope people can see through Obama's rhetoric and fear mongering:

 Let's "set politics aside" and "do some tough stuff," Obama told reporters at a White House news conference. But "if Washington operates as usual and can't get anything done, let's at least avert [uh] Armageddon."

If Obama is so hell bent on averting "Armageddon," then why doesn't he listen to Republicans?  Surely he recognizes the roll he played in the US's debt problem, so, if he's reasonable, he will do what is necessary to prevent "Armageddon."  In addition, he could have raised the debt ceiling when Democrats controlled congress.  Like I said, it Obama's responsibility to compromise here.  He caused the problem, he failed to act when he could have, and he is the one claiming how terrible things will be when the US defaults.

I hope the Republicans don't compromise and demonstrate that they actually have metaphorical spines.

The Person Who Points Out Racism Where There Isn’t Any Is Usually the One Who Is Racist

Representative Shiela Jackson Lee says that the disagreement over the debt limit is because President Obama is black. 

"I am particularly sensitive to the fact that only this president, only this president, only this one has received the kind attacks and disagreements and inability to work. Only this one," Jackson Lee said on the House floor this afternoon. 
"Read between the lines." 
"What is different about this president that should put him in a position that he should not receive the same kind of respectful treatment of when it is necessary to raise the debt limit in order to pay our bills, something required by both statute and the 14th amendment?"

I am pretty sure that whatever disagreements exist between the Republicans and Obama and the Democrats exist because the Republicans refuse to agree to a deal that involves tax increases and the Democrats refuse to agree to a deal that doesn't involve tax increases.   

What is different about this president is that he is an incompetent socialist.  Race doesn't have anything to do with anything.  Any person with the ability to see past their prejudice should be able to recognize that.  

A Riddle Wrapped in an Enigma

The fact that President Obama failed to raise the debt ceiling when he had the opportunity and is now saying how vital it is to do so is confusing.  My hypothesis is either he was expecting the Democrats to keep control of the house in 2010, or that he didn’t think that he would ever have to raise the debt ceiling because he thought his stimulus would have worked and that the revenue the government would have gained because of that would have allowed them to reduce the debt.  Or, maybe Obama has some sort of ulterior motive, or maybe he is just clueless.  

What is even more confusing is Obama's attitude:

When Democrats were in power, they ran up the tab, acting as if they [sic] would never be no consequences to their spendthrift policies.  And now they’ve left the Republicans to clean up the mess they left behind and is now faulting them for not doing it the way the Democrats (claim they) would have done it when they had the chance.  They had the chance but didn’t take it.

Is it just me, or is Obama really, really confusing?  Maybe, in order to understand him, you need to let go of any sense of reason.  Kind of like analyzing abstract art.

Debt Talks Continue

The negotiations between the Republicans and the Democrats have resumed.

 House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said afterward that Democrats are "still hopeful for a large bipartisan agreement," one that will do "no harm to the middle class or to economic growth (and) protect Medicare and Social Security beneficiaries."

Is Nancy Pelosi supporting Paul Ryan's proposed budget?

"What is really appalling is to see our Republican colleagues essentially providing a form of extortion -- if you don't agree to deficit reduction the way we want it, we'll put all the jobs at risk, because we will allow the United States to default on its debt," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Maryland, on the CNN show "State of the Union." "That's irresponsible."

Wait... what?  The Democrats have been putting jobs at risk since they gained power.  But, I guess it wasn't irresponsible of them because they're Democrats. 


My question is which scenario is more desirable:  the United States defaulting on its debt now, and all the repercussions; or having this economic crisis dragged out indefinitely.  Look how the Democrats have handled the economy thus far.  Their leftist economic policies have failed.  However, the Republicans may have a way to avoid both scenarios.  The leftist approach has proven not to work, so why not try something that has proven to work in the past (see Reaganomics)?  To me, to allow the Democrats to enact their proposals is what is irresponsible.

Debt Talks Stalled

House speaker John Boehner walked out on talks to reduce the US debt and prevent the US from defaulting.  It appears that the Democrats want to raise the debt ceiling (so they can spend more money, presumably) and raise taxes in an attempt to reduce the deficit, while the Republicans want to cut the budget:

The Treasury Department has warned that failure to do so by August 2 could lead to a possible default, which could push interest rates to skyrocket and cause the dollar to plummet. But Republicans, including those controlling the House, have insisted on large-scale budget cuts before raising the ceiling.

Both parties have thus far been unable to reconcile their radically divergent strategies to solve the nation's economic crisis, as Republicans refuse to raise taxes in a weak economy and Democrats denounce proposed cuts to entitlement programs as draconian and unacceptable.

The Democrats want to continue using their Keynesian approach, which so far, has worked out very well.  Or, at least, according to “experts,” has shown unexpectedly poor results.  So, if the poor results were unexpected, then it means that good results were expected, so it follows that the best approach would be to continue using the same approach that failed in the past (what is that called again? Insanity?).  The Republicans want to do something, that according to basic economics, might actually solve the debt crisis and stimulate the economy at the same time.  But, of course, doing so would entail performing unspeakable, evil acts such as pushing grandma off a cliff and not stealing so much money from people who actually deserve it.  How evil and “draconian.”  I mean, they use draconian as if it were a bad thing.  If they weren’t so blinded by their compassion they might actually realize that most people who deserve it would actually benefit from entitlement cuts because of the aforementioned economic stimulation that budget cuts would provide.  People might actually be able to find a job so they would not need to rely on the government to babysit them.

However, it does seem that maybe President Obama is not completely insane:

President Barack Obama had signaled a willingness to include reforms to popular entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare as part of a broad agreement for $3 trillion to $4 trillion in deficit cuts over the next decade, said Democratic officials familiar with the negotiations.

I will reserve judgement until the president actually acts.

But Boehner's announcement Saturday appears to diminish the chances for such a sweeping deal, although he kept open the door for some sort of less grand agreement.

A spokesman for House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said the group, spearheaded by Biden, has identified "between $2 trillion and $2.5 trillion in spending cuts that could represent the framework of the agreement." But he said that any tax hike cannot, and will not, be part of any deal."A tax increase cannot pass the House, and it is the last thing Congress should be doing with so many people out of work," said Brad Dayspring, the Virginia Republican's spokesman.A House GOP leadership aide said earlier this week that both Cantor and the No. 2 Senate Republican, John Kyl, voiced reservations at a White House meeting Thursday about the prospects for getting a $4 trillion package if it included $1 trillion in new tax revenues. Republicans were hesitant, the aide notes, to agree on any proposals that go much farther than simply closing loopholes.

The republicans should be resolute during these negotiations, given that they seem to have some grasp on reality.  And, if the United States does default, perhaps that would be an opportunity to get things over with so prosperity may resume sooner, rather than later.

While he didn't specify what tax hikes, if any, the president had proposed, Pfeiffer said it was important to spread the burden of any deal."We cannot ask the middle class and seniors to bear all the burden of higher costs and budget cuts," he said. "We need a balanced approach that asks the very wealthiest and special interests to pay their fair share as well, and we believe the American people agree."

Yes, because the evil rich people (some of whom actually earned their money) are always the ones responsible for destroying the country.  If the Democrats really wanted to be fair, they would end the redistribution of money and enact a flat tax across all income brackets or a sales-based tax.  Oh, and since when do budget cuts cost money?  I would think that they would actually save money.  I mean, that is the whole point of cutting the budget.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, meanwhile, said he was "disappointed that Republicans are unable to work with us to take a dramatic step forward that would have dramatically reduced our deficit."

"We asked Republicans to consider a balanced approach that would have required shared sacrifice, but they would not," said Reid, D-Nevada. "We still need to make sure we avert the economic catastrophe that would occur if we were to let America fail to pay its bills for the first time in our history, and I am confident that we will."

Harry Reid is always reliable to offer some sort of twisted logic.  They want to raise taxes to close the deficit, while increasing the debt ceiling?  And they are disappointed in Republicans, whose proposal is much more viable?  And Reid wants the shift the burden from the people who are living off the government to the people who are actually suffering?  Am I not understanding this properly?