Obama's Strategy: Putting The Golf Cart Before The Horse

I don't always have a strategy, but when I do it's for fundraising...David Burge Tweet

As many of you already know by now, Pres. Obama proclaimed for all the world to hear that, "We don't have a strategy yet" in dealing with the Islamist State.  He added, "I don't want to put the cart before the horse." (By the way, I borrowed my headline from a caller to the Chris Stigall radio show in Philly this morning, The Big Talker, 1210 AM).

As you can imagine, Obama is taking a lot of heat for his feckless statement considering ISIS has been around for several years, and we've been fighting terrorism now for decades.

So I want to take a moment of your time to imagine if you will...

• If our Founding Fathers had so strategy in dealing with the British
• If Abe Lincoln had no strategy in fighting the Confederacy
• If  America and its allies had no strategy in stopping Germany's incursions in WWI
• If FDR and Churchill had no strategy in combating the the Nazi plague
• If JFK had not stopped the Soviets placing nuclear missiles on Cuban soil
• If Reagan had not told the Soviets to "tear down this wall.'
• If Bush 1 had not intervened into Iraq's incursion into Kuwait
• If George W. Bush has not retaliated for the attack on the World Trade Center

Throughout these events and more, the progressives laughed. Yet, those leaders in history showed the strength and courage needed to take on pure evil---to take on homicidal maniacs who didn't hesitate for a moment to take the lives of innocents. 

Perhaps Charles Krauthammer said it best (as he always does): " I was shocked {by Obama's statement}...The President of the United States, in the middle of a real crisis, a few days after the beheading of an American. Deliberately sort of spitting in the face of the country and demonstrating his cruelty...says, 'I don't have a strategy.'" He added, "Why do you announce you don't have a strategy?"

Of course, while many in the media took Obama to task for his statement, the progressives in the media tried to spin it as they always do. In addition to focusing on the color of the suit Obama wore utilizing yet another diversion, Politico referred to it as an "inartful phrase." Please---if any of the leaders I referenced above had said what Obama admitted yesterday, they would have been hammered by the press and the opposing political parties. 

Allow me to give the President and his administration some advice on how to deal with the Islamist---rain missiles, bombs and rockets on their heads until every one of them is dead and all of their armaments are destroyed. That will work. History shows it works.

But then again, the only strategy Obama uses---and it's brilliant considering the stupids in the press always fall for it---is to just wait every crisis and scandal out. He knows news cycles are quick in the era of social media. He also knows many Americans have short memories, e.g. Benghazi, Fast and Furious, IRS, etc. etc. And others, like his base, don't care.

All I can add is this: Obama picked a fine time to finally be transparent.

On This Labor Day, Many Americans Are Still Not Feeling the Love

Report: The Economy Is Just One Speech Away From A Recovery...The Onion

On this Labor Day, there's actually some good news about the economy--but, there's also some bad news. And the bad news appears to be overshadowing the good.

• While the stock market keeps breaking records and as the economy grew last quarter, the number of Americans who are out of the work force remains at approximately 92 million out of a nation of 316 million.
• While the unemployment rate hovers around 6.2%, unemployment among black Americans rose from 10.7% last month to 11.4% in July. Hispanic unemployment remained at 7.8%, the same as the previous month and down from 9.5% one year ago. Dept of Labor
• While the government touts a "rebounding" economy, most American families still feel economy stress and feel increasingly poor (CBS Money Watch).
• While more Americans are working today, more Americans have also fallen into poverty---from 12% in 2009 to 15% of the population today.
• While more Americans are working, more are only working part-time. Private non-farm payrolls remain at 34.5 hours per week.
• While more Americans are working, wages still remain "stagnant" rising only 2% from this time last year (average approximately $24.45/per hour). In other words, as the economy improves to some degree, most Americans are still losing buying power. According to CBS Money Watch, real median hourly wages fell 3.4% since 2009.
• While there were increases in employment in manufacturing, retail, construction and mining, there was little or no change in leisure, hospitality, transportation, warehousing, information and financial activities. In addition, there are now 2.3 million more low-paid workers than before the recession started.
• While there appears to be improvement in employment (even if only in the part-time sector), 35 major companies announced they will be cutting jobs. According to Getty, some of these include Target, Hewlett-Packard, Texas Instruments, Nike, Coca-Cola, GE, Microsoft, GM, Ford, Wal-Mart and Intel. Note: anytime Wal-Mart plans jobs cuts or restructuring, it does not bode well for the economy.

Has The Republican Party Surrendered?

GOP Maintains Solid Hold On Youth That Already Look Like Old Men...The Onion

My regular readers know that I've taken Republicans to task over the last six years (I'm an independent conservative).  For example, in 2013 I asked: Is the Republican Party A Mirage? I later followed that up with a piece entitled, "Republicans: A Spineless and Feckless Party of Chumps." And then earlier this year with this article, "Republicans: Still Tip-Toeing Through The Tulips."

In all of these articles, the same themes keeps coming to focus: 

• How did this political party lose two elections to an incumbent president who had one of the worst records in national political history?
• How does a political party fail to connect with a knockout punch against another political party that has a glass jaw?
• How did (does) a political party keep appearing spineless in the face of an administration that is so incompetent?
• How does it fail to take advantage of an opposition party that's embraced a warped political ideology like progressivism?  The evidence of progressive policy failures is now undeniable. Any casual political observer would come to this conclusion whether observing local municipal politics (e.g. Detroit, Chicago and now even New York City) to the long list of what I like to describe as "cluster f*cks" on the national (federal) level.
• With few exceptions like Ted Cruz, when was the last time the Republican Party addressed the issues of the still faltering economy, the unsustainable national debt, Obamacare and the repeated failures in foreign policy?

There's a belief among pundits that the Republicans are just too overconfident. They look at the polls and see Obama's numbers in free-fall. They see the same things many of us do as outlined above. And while that may be true, they're failing miserably in their messaging. 

America: How Did We Get To This Point?

Whenever I ask for a day of racial peace for a funeral, I have Al Sharpton deliver the eulogy, don't you? WH Press Secretary Tweet

America, how did we get to this point..

• When a major network (CNN) does pretentious international coverage of the funeral of a young man who robbed a convenience store over the 100 and more children killed in Chicago each year due to violence...
• When a major network covers this funeral and not the same coverage of the funerals of our troops killed in combat...
• When a eulogy is given by a known race-baiting thug...
• When an anti-police march (in this case, against the NYPD) is led by the same race-baiting, hoaxer thug on the same day seven people are shot and given aid by the NYPD. Point of Fact: The NYPD has 35,000 officers in a city of almost 9 million people. It has over 23 million interactions with the public each year. It's a police department that has lost almost 700 police officers in the line of duty, more than any department in the United States. Nationally, over 100 officers lose their lives in the line of duty in the last decade. Each year, there have been almost 60,000 assaults against officers resulting in more than 15,000 injuries to those officers.
• When a major network fails to cover the funerals of those 100 or more officers killed in the line of duty each year...
• When the president and Commander in Chief failed to attend the funeral of Major General Harold Greene---killed in a terrorist attack in Afghanistan---but sends three White House officials to the funeral of Michael Brown...(Now being reported the WH sent more officials to this funeral than to Thatchers).
• When we have millions of African-Americans who've forgotten the overall message of Martin Luther King, Jr...
• When a president delivers a five minute presser regarding the beheading of an American by vicious, homicidal maniacs and returns to the golf course within 10 minutes of that news conference...
• When Americans show support for Hamas that uses their own children as human shields (why don't they send their children to Gaza to serve as human shields?)...
• When we have a media who would make Joseph Goebbels proud of their coverage of Israel...
• When we have a president who is a bully at home but a Chamberlain abroad when it comes to dealing with our enemies and known threats to our nation...
• When we have an administration that believes releasing known terrorists is good for the nation...
• When a nation has the likes of Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and others of their ilk unfit to hold any public office...
• When we have a former Secretary of State---Hillary Clinton---whose total accomplishments in foreign policy are conspicuous by their absence yet she's still considered a serious contender for the U.S. presidency...
• When we have a current Secretary of State---J.F.Kerry---who managed to malign two generations of our military and veterans and has a knack for turning anything he touches into crap...
• When we have about 40% of the American people who still support the failed policies of this administration as it continues to spread misery across the nation...
• When we have an administration and Congress in Washington D.C. that provides nothing inspirational and nothing hopeful...
• When we now have a political class (progressive) that relies solely on identity politics, lies, intolerance, bigotry and arrogance...
• When we have another political party (Republicans) who appear to only be a mirage...
• When we have a political class that actually believes a nation's borders should remain porous...?
• When we have a political class (progressives) whose ideology trumps the welfare of the nation...
• When we have an administration openly hostile to Israel...
• When we have an administration who appears to cradle our enemies but bashes our allies...
• And when we have a president who appears to only care about HIMSELF?

Postscript: When we have an administration whose own consultant, Gruber, vindicated all the Obamacare critics proving it's based on lies. And when we have an administration that circumvented Congress again with immigration.