Democrats have tried and failed to pass "comprehensive" federal oceans management legislation five years in a row. The so-called "Oceans 21" bill, sponsored by Democratic Rep. Sam Farr of California, went nowhere fast. Among the top reasons: bipartisan concerns about the economic impact of closing off widespread access to recreational fishing. The bill also would have handed environmentalists another punitive litigation weapon under the guise of "ecosystem management." Instead of accepting defeat, the green lobby simply circumvented the legislative process altogether.
In late July, President Obama established a behemoth 27-member "National Ocean Council" with the stroke of a pen. Farr gloated: "We already have a Clean Air Act and a Clean Water Act. With today's executive order, President Obama in effect creates a Clean Ocean Act." And not a single hearing needed to be held. Not a single amendment considered. Not a single vote cast. Who gives a flying fish about transparency and the deliberative process? The oceans are dying!
The panel will have the power to implement "coastal and marine spatial plans" and to ensure that all executive agencies, departments and offices abide by their determinations. The panel has also been granted authority to establish regional advisory committees that overlap with existing regional and local authorities governing marine and coastal planning. http://townhall.com/columnists/MichelleMalkin/2010/08/20/and_now_the_stealth_obama_ocean_grab
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Politico reports: Key White House allies are dramatically shifting their attempts to defend health care legislation, abandoning claims that it will reduce costs and deficit and instead stressing a promise to "improve it."The messaging shift was circulated this afternoon on a conference call and PowerPoint presentation organized by Families USA — one of the central groups in the push for the initial legislation. The call was led by a staffer for the Herndon Alliance, which includes leading labor groups and other health care allies. It was based on polling from three top Democratic pollsters: John Anzalone, Celinda Lake and Stan Greenberg.
The confidential presentation, available in full here and provided to POLITICO by a source on the call, suggests that Democrats are acknowledging the failure of their predictions that the health care legislation would grow more popular after its passage, as its benefits became clear and rhetoric cooled. Instead, the presentation is designed to win over a skeptical public, and to defend the legislation — and in particular the individual mandate — from a push for repeal.
The presentation concedes that groups typically supportive of Democratic causes — people under 40, non-college-educated women and Hispanic voters — have not been won over by the plan. Indeed, it stresses repeatedly that many are unaware that the legislation has passed, an astonishing shortcoming in the White House's all-out communications effort.
And now, as more is being learned about the particulars of health care, we are finding that it is not at all what Democrats have said it is. After all, we passed the bill and now have actually read it... For instance, I'll mention the 3.8% sales tax on taxable profits on home sales - over and above the capital gains tax. What on earth does this have to do with healthcare, we ask.... The Democrats have now presented a slide show of talking points for Democrats during this election.] season.... http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0810/The_new_message_Improve_health_care_dont_talk_cost.html
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[The Obama administration has decided to track one more group of people (in addition to jobs lost, jobs saved, ect.). They will now be tracking "lives touched". Well, you can be sure that they can report several hundred million people- as no one living in America will be untouched.]
From Daily Caller: It isn’t simply the absurdity of a recent Government Accountability Report (GAO), finding that each job ‘created’ by the stimulus bill costs an average of $194,213. It’s the fundamental shell game that the administration is playing with the public regarding the numbers, a game that can only be interpreted one of two ways – either the administration itself is inept in their reporting, or they assume the American people are too inept to catch on.
In fact, the jobs reporting has been such a muddled mess, that even liberal media stalwart, MSNBC, couldn’t keep track of their stories earlier in the year. On January 13th, they ran two stimulus related stories, one which touted the White House claim that the stimulus had saved two million jobs, and another which explained why calculating such a number is impossible.
Now however, the GAO report shows that the phrase ‘jobs created’ or ‘jobs saved’ is no longer the term of choice. They have decided to go with – wait for it – ‘lives touched’.
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Have you been hearing that our President and Hillary Clinton are successful in being able to get Palestine and Israel back to the bargaining table very soon? Don't believe it. Palestine has just said NO! So I guess that great ability of Obama to communicate and sway minds has once again been shown to be a hope - not a fact. After hundreds of years of warring, why do we even think a peaceful solution is possible?]
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Daily Caller writes: “I hope by next year we’ll have abolished Fannie and Freddie,” he said. Remarkable. And he went on to say that “it was a great mistake to push lower-income people into housing they couldn’t afford and couldn’t really handle once they had it.” He then added, “I had been too sanguine about Fannie and Freddie.”
In fact, these failed government agencies are in such bad shape that they can’t even pay Uncle Sam the dividends owed under the conservatorship deal reached two years ago. That’s right. In order to pay a $1.8 billion dividend on Treasury department stock, Fan and Fred had to borrow $1.5 billion from — you guessed it — the Treasury.
Then there’s this head-scratching detail [head-scratching? How about infuriating?]: In an absolutely outrageous move last Christmas Eve, President Obama signed off on $42 million in bonuses for the top twelve Fannie and Freddie executives, including $6 million apiece for the two CEOs. (Hat tip to attorney Stephen B. Meister.)
From Yahoo News: The deepwater drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico costs at least 23,000 jobs, according to a federal document that weighed the economic impact and alternatives to the drilling ban. [That costs American taxpayers nothing, right?] http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100821/ap_on_bi_ge/us_gulf_oil_spill_moratorium;_ylt=AsmW3r7yVqPsbnAvYdxdV_NI2ocA;_ylu=X3oDMTMzZGdkdDFuBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwODIxL3VzX2d1bGZfb2lsX3NwaWxsX21vcmF0b3JpdW0EcG9zAzEzBHNlYwN5bl9wYWdpbmF0ZV9zdW1tYXJ5X2xpc3QEc2xrA2dvdnQyM2t3b3JrZQ
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