Cracker Squire

• Al-Qaeda in Iraq regaining strength

  From The Washington Post:
  
  The Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq has rebounded in strength in recent months and appears to be launching a concerted effort to cripple the Iraqi government as U.S. troops withdraw, Iraqi and American officials say. [...]
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  Posted: November 22, 2009, 9:58am EST
  

• The gerrymandering of political districts means politicians of each party can now choose their own voters and never have to appeal to the center.

  Tom Friedman writes in The New York Times:
  
  President Obama’s visit to China this week inevitably invites comparisons between the world’s two leading powers. You know what they say: Britain owned the 19th century, America owned the 20th century, and, it’s all but certain that China will own [...]
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  Posted: November 22, 2009, 9:56am EST
  

• Based on what is currently going on with regard to settlements on the West Bank, I truthfully could not believe Palin gave this response.

  From a column by Frank Rich in The New York Times:
  
  After the Palin-McCain ticket lost, conservative pundits admonished her to start studying the issues. If “Going Rogue” and its promotional interviews are any indication, she has ignored their entreaties during her months at liberty. Last week, Greta [...]
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  Posted: November 22, 2009, 9:52am EST
  

• Stay tuned for Part II: Wall Street Finds Profits Again, Now by Reducing Mortgages

  From The New York Times:
  
  As millions of Americans struggle to hold on to their homes, Wall Street has found a way to make money from the mortgage mess.
  
  Investment funds are buying billions of dollars’ worth of home loans, discounted from the loans’ original value. Then, [...]
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  Posted: November 22, 2009, 9:41am EST
  

• (1) Timing is so, so important. (2) The Democratic Party is experiencing a little intraparty stress.

  A 11-8-09 post entitled "The White House has gotten bad at listening, and now it's paying the price" provided in part:
  
  In 2009, the Democrats who run the White House and Congress chose to go down one path at the exact moment voters went down a different one.[...]
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  Posted: November 21, 2009, 12:44pm EST
  

• Hospital Falters as Refuge for Illegal Immigrants

  This topic was the subject of an earlier 9-24-09 post entitled "Ground zero Grady clinic: An illegal immigrant from Honduras said she could only hope to make it “back to my country to die.” -- Start packing."
  
  Today there is a follow-up article in The New York [...]
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  Posted: November 21, 2009, 11:32am EST
  

• Business Sours on Overhaul as Legislation Veers to Left

  From The Wall Street Journal:
  
  Chances of business supporting the Obama administration's health overhaul are fading fast, after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's bill took a liberal turn.
  
  The Obama administration has courted small businesses from the start, and at times executives have shown favor toward Democratic [...]
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  Posted: November 21, 2009, 11:04am EST
  

• Christian Leaders Unite on Political Issues

  From The New York Times:
  
  Citing the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s call to civil disobedience, 145 evangelical, Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christian leaders have signed a declaration saying they will not cooperate with laws that they say could be used to compel their institutions to participate [...]
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  Posted: November 20, 2009, 7:08am EST
  

• Air Defense Push Inspired by 9/11 Gets a 2nd Look

  From The New York Times:
  
  The commander of military forces protecting North America has ordered a review of the costly air defenses intended to prevent another Sept. 11-style terrorism attack, an assessment aimed at determining whether the commitment of jet fighters, other aircraft and crews remains justified.
  [...]
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  Posted: November 20, 2009, 7:01am EST
  

• Sen. Lindsey Graham has a dern good point: Holder Defends Decision to Use U.S. Court for 9/11 Trial

  From The New York Times:
  
  Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, . . . argued that Mr. Holder’s decision was a mistake [because] in the future, he said, interrogators facing a freshly captured terrorist would fear jeopardizing a later prosecution.
  
  “If you’re going to prosecute anybody [...]
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  Posted: November 19, 2009, 7:01am EST
  

• Charge him something, anything. Send him to Yemen: Born in U.S., a Radical Cleric Inspires Terror

  
  From The New York Times:
  
  In nearly a dozen recent terrorism cases in the United States, Britain and Canada, investigators discovered the suspects had something in common: a devotion to the message of Anwar al-Awlaki, an eloquent Muslim cleric who has turned the Web [...]
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  Posted: November 19, 2009, 6:50am EST
  

• First Iraq won't do business with the West; now Afghanistan: Afghan minister accused of taking bribe -- Massive mining project awarded to Chinese firm

  From The Washington Post:
  
  The Afghan minister of mines accepted a roughly $30 million bribe to award the country's largest development project to a Chinese mining firm, according to a U.S. official who is familiar with military intelligence reports.
  
  The allegation, if proved true, would mark [...]
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  Posted: November 18, 2009, 7:33am EST
  

• I wish they would think about America & not Europe: Democrats reject ban on using funds for U.S. facilities to house Guantanamo prisoners

  From The Washington Post:
  
  The Senate on Tuesday rejected an attempt to bar using funds from a defense spending bill to build or modify prisons in the United States to hold detainees from Guantanamo Bay, a move that suggested congressional Democrats may be lining up behind President Obama's' [...]
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  Posted: November 18, 2009, 7:27am EST
  

• Let's keep our eyes on this one to see if President Obama stands tough: U.S. Attorney Nominee Criticized Over Raids

  From The New York Times:
  
  Eleventh-hour criticism is arising over President Obama’s nomination for United States attorney in northern Iowa of a prosecutor who had a leading role in the criminal cases against hundreds of illegal immigrants arrested in a May 2008 raid at a meatpacking plant in [...]
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  Posted: November 17, 2009, 7:25am EST
  

• Peggy Noonan advises President Obama on Afghanistan: Just the Facts, Mr. President

  
  Jack Webb as Joe Friday in "Dragnet," circa 1955
  
  Peggy Noonan writes in The Wall Street Journal:
  
  The president has been taking time thinking about Afghanistan. I cannot see why this is bad. If he's really thinking, he's not dithering—thought can be harder [...]
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  Posted: November 17, 2009, 6:46am EST
  

• Can't pass a 2nd stimulus bill (& thus continue to increase federal spending)? No problem. Put it in something called health care reform legislation.

  From The Washington Post:
  
  Wedged in the House health-care bill is $23.5 billion that looks a lot more like new federal stimulus spending than anything to do with national health-care reform.
  
  The barely debated pot of money would allow Congress to continue pumping billions in new [...]
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  Posted: November 16, 2009, 7:09am EST
  

• So much for the power of incumbency -- Anti-Washington, throw-the-bums-out feelings held by many.

  From The Washington Post:
  
  In Pew Research Center's polling, just over half of Americans said they would like to see their members of Congress reelected next fall. Only 34 percent said they want most incumbents to be reelected in the midterms.
  
  Pew describes those numbers as [...]
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  Posted: November 16, 2009, 6:58am EST
  

• GOP Post II: Meet John Thune

  David Brooks writes in The New York Times:
  
  Some days the Republican Party seems to be going crazy. Its public image is often shaped by people who appear to have gone into government because they saw it as a steppingstone to talk radio.
  
  But deep in the [...]
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  Posted: November 16, 2009, 5:58am EST
  

• GOP Post I: Pawlenty hasn't learned from Romney's mistakes

  From The Washington Post:
  
  Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty is widely regarded as one of the Republican Party's rising national leaders. The runner-up to Sarah Palin to be John McCain's vice presidential running mate, he is a conservative whose blue-collar roots, amiable personality and two terms as governor of [...]
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  Posted: November 16, 2009, 5:58am EST
  

• "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." The next two posts will serve as an introduction to two possible GOP presidential contenders.

  [...]
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  Posted: November 16, 2009, 5:47am EST
  

• Voter discontent is key in Atlanta's mayoral election -- Disaffected residents could be deciding factor

  Eric Stirgus writes in the ajc:
  
  The Rev. Timothy McDonald looked around the Park Tavern stage Wednesday and saw several familiar faces.
  
  In 1989, many of them supported Maynard Jackson’s third successful bid for Atlanta mayor. A generation later, here they were again, united behind the mayoral [...]
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  Posted: November 15, 2009, 1:25pm EST
  

• Report: Bill would reduce senior care -- Medicare cuts approved by House may affect access to providers

  You would think that you get your financial data before, not after, passing legislation. But when you schedule a vote, and then debate what will be in the legislation, anything can happen.
  
  From The Washington Post:
  
  A plan to slash more than $500 billion from future Medicare [...]
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  Posted: November 15, 2009, 9:52am EST
  

• Congress Has History of Reversing Cuts

  From The Wall Street Journal:
  
  In 1997, Congress passed a budget law that mandated tough curbs on Medicare spending, setting up formulas to reduce doctor payments if broad spending targets were exceeded. But when the formula began taking a serious bite out of doctor reimbursements in 2002, Congress [...]
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  Posted: November 15, 2009, 9:24am EST
  

• GOP Senate Challengers Attack Rivals Recruited by National Republican Party, in Some Cases Pushing Candidates Rightward

  From The Wall Street Journal:
  
  Underdogs trying to ride a wave of anti-establishment fervor are mounting challenges to the Republican Party's hand-picked Senate candidates in several states.
  
  The trend suggests that conservative surges in a New York House race and a Senate primary in Florida were not' [...]
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  Posted: November 15, 2009, 9:11am EST
  

• Returning Workers Face Steep Pay Cuts -- Wage Erosion Threatens to Slow Economic Recovery

  From The Wall Street Journal:
  
  Nearly a year after losing his job at a Vermont plywood maker, 40-year-old Robert Hudson is back at work. Here is the catch: His paycheck is half that of his old job -- and the same as when he was 18 years old.
  [...]
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  Posted: November 15, 2009, 9:01am EST
  

• 2010 is election year; unemployment will be 10.5%; many will still be mad about health law, et al.; & Obama to tackle illegal immigration? No way.

  Believe it. A divisive debate during an election year is just around the corner when Congress finishes passing a trillion dollar plus health reform bill during what, for Main Street, remains a recession.
  
  A 6-24-07 post entitled "Senator Kennedy and President Reagan on the Immigration Reform and Control" [...]
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  Posted: November 14, 2009, 8:09pm EST
  

• That'll work: Ex-Rep. Jefferson (D-La.) gets 13 years in freezer cash case

  The Washington Post reports that former congressman William J. Jefferson was sentenced to 13 years in prison Friday for accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes, the longest prison term ever handed down to a member of Congress convicted of corruption charges. [...]
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  Posted: November 14, 2009, 3:41pm EST
  

• Mr. Speaker, keep you head up high Sir.

  
  In countless posts in different times I have described House Speaker Glenn Richardson as a tyrant and referred to him with such monikers as the "Czar" and the "Head Hawk."
  
  Late today I literally shed tears for him upon reading about a recent event, and [...]
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  Posted: November 13, 2009, 7:57pm EST
  

• The ingrats: Rebuilding Its Economy, Iraq Shuns U.S. Businesses

  From The New York Times:
  
  Iraq’s Baghdad Trade Fair ended Tuesday, six years and a trillion dollars after the American invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, and one country was conspicuously absent.
  
  That would be the country that spent a trillion dollars — on the invasion and occupation, [...]
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  Posted: November 13, 2009, 6:47am EST
  

• U.S. envoy resists increase in troops -- Concerns voiced about Karzai

  From The Washington Post:
  
  The U.S. ambassador in Kabul sent two classified cables to Washington in the past week expressing deep concerns about sending more U.S. troops to Afghanistan until President Hamid Karzai's government demonstrates that it is willing to tackle the corruption and mismanagement that has fueled' [...]
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  Posted: November 12, 2009, 7:14am EST
  

• Despite this breakdown, I feel relieved Army did not know before. I could not comprehend. -- Pentagon Only Learned of Hasan's Emails After Killings

  From The Wall Street Journal:
  
  The Pentagon said it was never notified by U.S. intelligence agencies that they had intercepted emails between the alleged Fort Hood shooter and an extremist imam until after last week's bloody assaults, raising new questions about whether the government could have helped prevent' [...]
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  Posted: November 11, 2009, 12:50pm EST
  

• Muhammad, the sniper who kept the D.C. region paralyzed by fear for 3 weeks, was executed. Good riddance for mankind. Another one is on the horizon.

  The Washington Post reports that John Allen Muhammad, the sniper who kept the Washington region paralyzed by fear for three weeks as he and a young accomplice gunned down people at random, was executed Tuesday night by lethal injection.
  
  Hopefully it won't be too long before Army' [...]
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  Posted: November 11, 2009, 7:33am EST
  

• Maine Finds a Health Care Fix Elusive

  From The New York Times:
  
  Maine is the Charlie Brown of health care. The state’s legislators have tried for decades to fix its system, but their efforts have always fallen short: health insurance premiums are still among the least affordable in the nation, health care spending per person [...]
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  Posted: November 11, 2009, 7:23am EST
  

• Health economists say it is impossible to know whether the bill would meet cost-cutting goals, and many are skeptical that they even come close.

  From The New York Times:
  
  As health care legislation moves toward a crucial airing in the Senate, the White House is facing a growing revolt from some Democrats and analysts who say the bills Congress is considering do not fulfill President Obama’s promise to slow the runaway rise [...]
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  Posted: November 10, 2009, 6:44am EST
  

• No one understands the Middle East better than T. Friedman -- Until Palestinians & Israelis are serious about peace, we should get out of the picture.

  Tom Friedman writes in The New York Times:
  
  The fact is, the only time America has been able to advance peace — post-Yom Kippur War, Camp David, post-Lebanon war, Madrid and Oslo — has been when the parties felt enough pain for different reasons that they invited our [...]
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  Posted: November 08, 2009, 9:23am EST
  

• The White House has gotten bad at listening, and now it's paying the price.

  Peggy Noonan writes in The Wall Street Journal:
  
  In 2009, the Democrats who run the White House and Congress chose to go down one path at the exact moment voters went down a different one. The voters, frustrated and then alarmed, waited to fire the first available Democrat, [...]
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  Posted: November 08, 2009, 9:13am EST
  

• The swinging pendulum -- Have we come full circle? White mayor in office; whites play the race card. Black mayor in office; blacks play the race card.

  In a 10-28-09 post entitled "'We have met the enemy . . . and he is us'" I wrote:
  
  I don't have a dog in the current Atlanta mayor’s race, but like most matters involving Georgia politics and races, I try to keep my finger on the pulse' [...]
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  Posted: November 07, 2009, 10:06am EST
  

• Mighty Mouse runs to gunfire and ends it, engaging in some impressive active shooting protocol. Thanks Sergeant Kimberly Munley!!

  
  From The New York Times:
  
  The police officer who brought down a gunman after he went on a shooting rampage at the Fort Hood Army base here was on the way to have her car repaired when she responded to a police radio report [...]
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  Posted: November 07, 2009, 8:26am EST
  

• And God Bless Mama, God Bless Daddy, and God Bless Republican Dierdre K. Scozzafava

  Jim Galloway of the ajc's Political Insider makes my day by quoting from a local newspaper in upstate New York on some follow-up on last Tuesday's 23rd Congressional District race in New York:
  
  Republican Dierdre K. Scozzafava faces an uncertain future in state politics after aborting her [...]
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  Posted: November 06, 2009, 8:30pm EST
  

• Democrats ought to read and consider this David Brooks's column. Every word of it is accurate.

  David Brooks writes in The New York Times:
  
  Liberals and conservatives each have their own intellectual food chains. They have their own think tanks to provide arguments, politicians and pundits to amplify them, and news media outlets to deliver streams of prejudice-affirming stories.
  
  Independents, who are [...]
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  Posted: November 06, 2009, 5:20pm EST
  

• This kind of stuff just breaks my heart: Next Hurdle for Democrats on Health Bill -- Democrats (make that buying Democrats)

  From The Wall Street Journal:
  
  Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu says she generally backs President Barack Obama's health-care overhaul efforts. But she'd like to see a few items in the bill before voting for it, including bigger federal Medicaid payments for her home state of Louisiana, extended health coverage [...]
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  Posted: November 05, 2009, 10:04pm EST
  

• Lessons from a big win in Virginia

  From The Washington Post:
  
  Robert. F. McDonnell's crushing victory in Virginia's gubernatorial election Tuesday testified to his skills as a politician and to his disciplined, focused and generally positive, issues-based campaign. Mr. McDonnell, the Republican former state attorney general, rose above the toxic partisanship that suffuses electoral politics [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 7:06am EST
  

• Omaba, please return to the middle where you ran! Contests serve as warning to Democrats: It's not 2008 anymore

  From The Washington Post:
  
  Republicans have the more energized constituency heading into next year's midterm elections.
  
  The most significant change came among independent voters, who solidly backed Democrats in 2006 and 2008 but moved decisively to the Republicans on Tuesday, according to exit polls.
  
  For [...]
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  Posted: November 04, 2009, 6:51am EST
  

• In Iowa, Second Thoughts on Obama -- His standing has fallen in the state that jump-started his campaign, especially among independents & Republicans.

  From The New York Times:
  
  One year after winning the election, Mr. Obama has seen his pledge to transcend partisanship in Washington give way to the hardened realities of office. A campaign for the history books, filled with a sky-high sense of possibility for Mr. Obama not just [...]
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  Posted: November 03, 2009, 6:58am EST
  

• Is this the pot calling the kettle black, the law of unexpected (or hoped for) consequences, or what? -- Progeny of accusation of being "duplicitous."

  A couple of centuries ago Scottish novelist and poet Sir Walter Scott penned one of my favorite lines :
  
  "Oh what a tangled web we weave,
  When first we practise to deceive!”
  
  (Sir Walter Scott's Marmion.)
  
  Duplicitous and such word's first cousins deceive and deception were the" [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 1:56pm EST
  

• Finally. Do something: Sen. Bayh: “Dem. Party wants to spend more than we can afford; Rep. Party tends to want to cut taxes more than we can afford."

  From The Washington Post in a headline reading "Democrats Push for Plan to Cut Deficit:"
  
  Faced with anxiety in financial markets about the huge federal deficit and the potential for it to become an electoral liability for Democrats, the White House and Congressional leaders are weighing options for [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 8:26am EST
  

• If you are a moderate Republican, this episode has to concern you: GOP Moderate, Pressed by the Right, Abandons Race (the flip side of Kidd's ploy?)

  I first did my first post on the head-vs.-heart dynamic in this 10-26-09 post entitled "Ideology trumps party for Palin. Her allegiance is to her conservative principles rather than the party's edicts. -- The head-vs.-heart dynamic."
  
  That post also provides the background for this post on the special' [...]
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  Posted: November 01, 2009, 7:00am EST
  

• Union Votes Down Ford Concessions -- Good move UAW, real good move.

  A 10-28-09 post was entitled "Not good, not good at all: Union Votes Go Against Cuts at Ford (no good deed -- Ford's not having to file bankruptcy -- goes unpunished by the union)."
  
  The Wall Street Journal reports that Ford's rank-and-file union members have rejected a [...]
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  Posted: October 31, 2009, 7:56pm EDT
  

• Is it the GOP or Dems who eat their own? Tom Crawford: "Norwood could just as easily be a moderate Republican or a conservative Democrat."

  History will note two unusual occurrences in Atlanta's current race for mayor.
  
  The first last month involved Clark Atlanta University political scientists Keith Jennings and William Boone. They wrote in a memo and then held a news conference to say that they said but did not intend to suggest' [...]
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  Posted: October 31, 2009, 2:12pm EDT
  

• Norwood responds to Jane "Lee Atwater" Kidd in a dignified way, unlike the unfair hatchet job she has received. Take your elephant ads & shove 'em.

  
  
  And at the end of the day, rather than the attack ads and hit pieces advancing our party's cause, the party will be perceived as even more irrelevant. Good job folks!
  
  And as a postscript, the state Democratic party's current leadership has forever forfeited its right to [...]
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  Posted: October 31, 2009, 10:15am EDT