The Weekly Hardon (Inauguration Edition)

Cherry-picked brazenly from the lovely and gracious Amanda Carpenter's Townhall Washington Beat:

REVEREND WRIGHT RETURNS: You didn't think Rev'rund Jeremiah Wright was going to miss the inauguration, did you? He was doing what he does best at DC's all-black Howard University on Sunday, where he delivered yet another sermon full of complaints about racism in America. He called ABC, CNN and NBC "haters" and cried out "No more segregation! No more segregation! No more white supremacy!" days before the first black president was to be sworn into office. Wright also called the U.S. government an "egregious ménage a trois of racism, militarism and capitalism" and said now Obama's been elected "Michelle Obama is the first African American sleeping in the White House legally."

Uncle Jeremiah is kind of a Darth Sidious to Red Barry's Count Dooko, isn't he?  Maybe President Hussein will make him the Dems' Chief Party Ideologist.

GIBBS TELLS: Barack Obama's top spokesman Robert Gibbs is being crystal clear about the Obama administration's position on gays in the military. A Michigan resident submitted a question to Obama's transition team asking if Obama would repeal "don't ask, don't tell" and Gibbs was blunt in his response. "You don't hear politicians give a one-word answer much," Gibbs said in a video posted on change.gov. "But it's 'Yes.'"

This appears to be the means Red Barry will use to gut the U.S. military:

The Military Times, a liberal Gannett publication favoring inclusion of professed homosexuals in the military, has just released an astonishing poll of active-duty subscribers.  Results of the 2008 annual survey indicate that success for that cause essentially would destroy the volunteer force....

 

The 2008 Military Times Poll asked a new question that produced jaw-dropping results: “If the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy is overturned and gays are allowed to serve openly, how would you respond?” The article emphasized that 71% of respondents said they would continue to serve.  But almost 10% said “I would not re-enlist or extend my service,” and 14% said “I would consider not re-enlisting or extending my service.” Only 6% expressed “No Opinion.”  Before voting to repeal the law, Section 654, Title 10, members of Congress, and President-elect Barack Obama, ought to do the math.

If the opinions of Reserve and National Guard troops are similar to those of active-duty personnel surveyed in the Military Times Poll, and if the poll’s findings approximate the number of military people who would leave or consider leaving if the 1993 law is repealed, combined losses (including Guard and Reserve forces) would be huge.

—A rough estimate using Defense Department numbers for all service branches and components, totaling more than 2 million, indicates that a loss of one in ten (almost 10%) would cost the military approximately 228,600 people — more than the active-duty Marine Corps (200,000).

—If an additional 14% decided to leave, the voluntary exodus would translate into a loss of almost 527,000 — a figure approaching the size of today’s active-duty Army (more than 545,000).

—Estimates of losses in active-duty forces alone would range between 141,000 (10%) and 323,000 (23%)....

If that legislation succeeds, the Defense Department’s new policy would be forced cohabitation with homosexuals, 24/7, in all military communities, to include Army and Marine infantry, Special Operations Forces, Navy SEALS, and submarines.

Corollary programs to make the new policy “work” would include professional “diversity training” to enforce acceptance, and “zero tolerance” of anyone who disagrees.  Dissenters would face discipline and be denied promotions, which would end their military careers. Incidents of misconduct would increase threefold, to include male/male and female/female misconduct that undermines discipline and demoralizes the troops.  These results would harm recruiting and retention, and effectively destroy the volunteer force. [emphasis added]

And isn't the consensus that our conventional force manpower is already stretched to the limit?

Diabolical, isn't it?  Almost an act of policy jiu-jitsu; rather than announcing that his administration is quitting the War on Terror and slashing the American armed forces to levels of weakness and unreadiness not seen since before World War II, and having to take responsibility for the inevitable strategic disasters that would directly trigger all over the globe, President Hussein shows his grasp of supply side economics concepts by instead providing a huge incentive for service men and women to leave the military of their own accord.  The Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard all shrink accordingly, we lose our ability to project military power overseas, and when Red China invades Taiwan or Russia invades Poland or Iran nukes Israel, Lucifer can blame it all on the "insipient homophobia of the military culture".

Just one more of B.O.'s true "top priorities" that is directly at odds with the majority opinion of the American public that idiotically elected him.

PELOSI: REPEAL BUSH TAX CUTS NOW: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) once again emphasized her willingness to repeal the Bush tax cuts before they expire on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace. "I don't want them to wait two years to expire," she said. "Because they have to prove their worth to me as to how they grow the economy, how they create jobs." [emphasis added] 

What, the past twenty-five fricking years of the greatest global economic expansion in the history of the planet in three successive tax-cut-fueled booms (1983-1990, 1997-2000, 2003-2007, interrupted only by the last round of tax-raising and the 9/11 attacks) isn't proof enough?  Raising taxes in the middle of what everybody keeps calling the "worst recession since the Great Depression" (a moniker I might be more inclined to tolerate if that's not what was said about EVERY recession), sucking more money out of a collapsing economy, is going to turn that economy around and create jobs?  And you wonder why I call her Crazy Nancy?

Wallace should have asked Granny Rictus McBotox if she actually thinks it's possible for the economy to grow without anybody getting wealthy, or even wealthier.  Then he could have asked her if she thinks it's possible to make it rain without anything getting wet, or eat a lot without getting full, and hit her with the coup de grace of what's wrong with being full, wet, or wealthy.

Come to think of it, what was she doing going on Fox in the first place?  Getting in face time on a network that actually HAS viewers before her Fairness Doctrine reimposition shuts it down?

Holy smokes, maybe a 2010 reprise of 1994 isn't so far-fetched after all.

DRUDGE'S BLAZING HEADLINE: "WHAT RECESSION? THE $170 MILLION INAUGURATION.": The Internet titan links to an ABC News story that opens with: "The country is in the middle of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, which isn't stopping rich donors and the government from spending $170 million, or more, on the inauguration of Barack Obama."

Ah, but ABC and Drudge are missing the point: gods don't make sacrifices, sacrifices are made to gods.

Perhaps this should be remembered as the "Let them eat shit" inaugural.  That certainly describes the vindictive, risibly hypocritical spirit with which the Left carried it out.

Thus do "gods" sew the seeds of their own downfall.