Obama administration hearts high gas prices

Inflate your tires, America, and learn to love Euro-priced gasoline. DOE chief  Stephen Chu tells the truth to Congress:

“We agree there is great suffering when the price of gasoline increases in the United States, and so we are very concerned about this,” said Chu, speaking to the House Appropriations energy and water subcommittee. “As I have repeatedly said, in the Department of Energy, what we’re trying to do is diversify our energy supply for transportation so that we have cost-effective means.”

Chu specifically cited a reported breakthrough announced Monday by Envia Systems, which received funding from DOE’s ARPA-E, that could help slash the price of electric vehicle batteries.

He also touted natural gas as “great” and said DOE is researching how to reduce the cost of compressed natural gas tanks for vehicles.

High gasoline prices will make research into such alternatives more urgent, Chu said.

“But is the overall goal to get our price” of gasoline down, asked Nunnelee.

“No, the overall goal is to decrease our dependency on oil, to build and strengthen our economy,” Chu replied. “We think that if you consider all these energy policies, including energy efficiency, we think that we can go a long way to becoming less dependent on oil and [diversifying] our supply and we’ll help the American economy and the American consumers.”

See HotAir and Heritage:

Meanwhile, the Obama Administration is seemingly doing everything it can to make paying for energy even more painful by refusing to open access to the country’s oil and gas reserves and blocking new projects that would lead to the development of more energy in America. Case in point: the president’s decision to say “no” to the Keystone XL pipeline, a project that would have delivered hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil from Canada to Texas refineries, while bringing thousands of jobs along with it.

Sensing impending political fallout from the high cost of gas, President Obama last week spoke on the subject and attempted to deflect blame for the pain. He said that there is no quick fix to high gas prices and the nation cannot drill its way out of the problem, but as Heritage’s Nicolas Loris writes, the president ignored reality and dished out a series of half-truths. Among them, the president claimed oil production is its highest in eight years, that increasing oil production takes too long, and that oil is not enough. Loris writes that while production is up on private lands, unrealized production on federal lands and offshore could have yielded even more output, increasing supply and driving down costs. If the president had said “yes” to Keystone, oil could have reach the market quickly. And as for the president’s push for alternative energy, those sources simply cannot stand the test of the market.

There are steps the president and Congress can and should take today to bring down the cost of energy. Namely, end the de facto moratorium on drilling, open offshore areas that are off-limits to drilling, place a 270-day limit on environmental reviews for energy projects on federal lands, remove regulatory delays, and approve Keystone.

Gasoline in my neighborhood in northern Virginia has gone up to $3.83 a gallon, a 4 cent rise since the day before yesterday.

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Free love costs too much at Georgetown [updated]

At a Congressional hearing on a woman's unalienable right to free contraceptives, a representative of Generation-sex enlightens us on the high cost of copulation:

“Forty percent of the female students at Georgetown Law reported to us that they struggled financially as a result of this policy (Georgetown student insurance not covering contraception),” Fluke reported.

It costs a female student $3,000 to have protected sex over the course of her three-year stint in law school, according to her calculations.

“Without insurance coverage, contraception, as you know, can cost a woman over $3,000 during law school,” Fluke told the hearing.

"As you know"? Well, maybe they do, seeing as they're probably all lawyers. But I had no idea. Ms. Sandra Fluke goes on:

“We refuse to pick between a quality education and our health and we resent that, in the 21st Century, anyone thinks it’s acceptable to ask us to make that choice simply because we are women,” Fluke said.

"Resent" being the key word. (And either the young ladies at the high-priced  Catholic law school are phenomenally 'active' or Ms. Fluke's numbers are off. Also, the Pill costs just $9.00 a month at Target.)

(I guess it's too much to expect men to contribute to the glorious cause of "women's health"?)

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Afterthought: Via this classic Steyn post from 2010, a reminder that condoms are already free in DC. The Obama administration's pretense that women "lack access" to "reproductive health" accessories is a complete crock.

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Via a Twitter DM, Backyard Conservative Anne Leary pointed out another important point: These law students don't seem to know or care much about the 1st Amendment. Perhaps they should study more and pursue the joys of "women's health" a bit less. Anne's post on the subject is here.

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From the comments below, some added info from just a conservative girl:

I have friend who is an attorney and a Georgetown grad. He tells me the real issue that they have is that you cannot purchase it on campus even with third party vendors.

He says it is a big topic of contention there. So my guess would be they don't really care about the costs so much as the fact that they have to go to CVS that is three blocks away to get what they need. Heaven forbid.

See jacg's post on the subject here.

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The Anchoress has an amusing take.

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These poor silly girls who sell themselves so cheaply in the cause of feminism and empowerment make me sad.

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Free condoms in NYC? They're virtually everywhere, and there's an app for that. 

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Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the link.

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Romney's interesting strategy: Don't get the base excited

Oh dear. Mitt on the conservative base:

It’s very easy to excite the base with incendiary comments. We’ve seen throughout the campaign if you’re willing to say really outrageous things that are accusative, attacking of President Obama, that you’re going to jump up in the polls. I’m not willing to light my hair on fire to try and get support. I am who I am. I’m a person with extensive experience in the private sector, in the economy.

And he'd better not; his hair seems to be his greatest asset.

Doesn't he sound exactly like John McCain, lecturing us all to play nice with Obama? That was a winning strategy, eh?

As for the base, they just aren't that smart, are they? James Antle:

Without trying to read too much into a single quote, this is a good example of why Romney is having trouble gaining (or at least keeping) traction: many Republican voters feel that Romney has a low opinion of their intelligence, that he thinks the base is dumb, that he believes conservative rhetoric is just boob bait for the bubbas. This perception is why a critical mass of conservatives don't trust Romney and are reluctant to support him.

Romney is just not a conservative. Therein lies the problem.

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Liberal media pours it on: Santorum is a "mullah," a "theocrat," and a "clown"

Liberals are screaming and running around in circles at the prospect of a Rick Santorum candidacy.

Richard Cohen panics and jumps the shark: Rick Santorum, American Mullah

He wants religion returned to “the public square,” is opposed to contraception, premarital sex and abortion under any circumstances, wants children educated in what amounts to little red schoolhouses and called President Obama a “snob” for extolling college or some other kind of post-high school education. This is not a political platform. It’s a fatwa.

Et cetera.

Two great minds, one great thought from Chris Matthews and Eugene Robinson: Theocrat!

"Yes. I think he is a theocrat. I think that's what he believes deep down inside of him. And I think that's obviously dangerous for this country," Eugene Robinson said.

"I think he is too," Chris Matthews said.

And Robinson has a Pulitzer, so you know he's right.

Eliot Spitzer grabs the moral high ground: Absolutely terrified for his daughters!



And I was thinking my daughters should be afraid of Spitzer. Go figure.

Lastly, from Morning Joe, feel the shock, horror, and dripping contempt:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Creeping Christian sharia!

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Who's up for another debt ceiling battle before the election?

As Instapundit said, OOPS. Debt ceiling limit looms months sooner than expected, during fall campaign

How could that happen?

A new study released on Friday now suggests that slimmer federal tax receipts than anticipated from the sluggish Obama economy along with continued abundant spending by the Obama administration will likely move the date of the next debt deadline considerably forward so that it comes during this fall's presidential election, with political debate beginning even earlier. 

Oh. Yeah. That "continued abundant spending" thing.

But don't get excited, conservatives. This may strike you as a liability for our spendaholic president. But think for a second about the GOP's unlimited capacity to let things blow up in their faces.

Another interesting bit from Andrew Malcolm's story:

Much of the timing depends on the federal government's tax harvest come April 15 and beyond, including business taxes. They could be severely affected if, as expected, this year's prematurely rising gasoline prices slow consumer and business spending, as well as confidence.

What's it up to in your area? I saw $3.79 in my neighborhood this morning.

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Oscar dresses

Via Twitter, Oscars, 1956:

I didn't watch last night but after seeing that gorgeous vintage photo this morning I took a quick peek at the current crop and found one actress who compares well: Penelope Cruz.

Lovely. We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

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Video: Tribute to Sgt. TJ Conrad

These families need our prayers.

Cpl. T.J. Conrad of Roanoke, Va., who was promoted posthumously to sergeant, was one of two U.S. military police officers killed Thursday by an Afghan soldier amid rising anti-American sentiment over the Koran burnings, which resulted in two more American deaths on Saturday.

The bodies of Conrad and Sgt. Joshua Born, 25, of Niceville, Fla., both assigned to the Army's Fort Stewart in Georgia, were returned to the military mortuary at Dover Air Force Base on Saturday.

Conrad's oldest sister, Amanda Meland, told The Associated Press he was in good spirits when she and other relatives chatted with him via Skype on Wednesday.

"He was doing good. He had his chin up," she said. "... He did say that things were starting to get crazy from the backlash."

Conrad, the father of a 7-month-old baby, deployed to Afghanistan in January. He would have celebrated his 23rd birthday on March 6.

Here's a video tribute put together by Sgt. Conrad's bereaved family:



Two more American officers were killed inside the Afghan Interior Ministry on Saturday. 

Charles Krauthammer contends that the Obama administration's multiple apologies for the Koran burnings merely "whet the appetites" of our enemies. It's hard to argue with that.

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Dick Cavett's extended sneer at Rick Santorum and homeschoolers

Who's Dick Cavett, you ask? In the 60's and 70's he was a pseudo-intellectual talk show host. Beyond that, I can't say what he's done. But he's written a nasty New York Times opinion piece on Rick Santorum, his Catholic faith, and the dark, backward world of homeschooling. His inquiring mind wants to know:

Who knows what sorts of fears haunt the minds of home-schooling parents?

I can think of one: that our children might end up as breathtakingly ignorant as Dick Cavett. Or as bigoted:

We learn from him that contraception is a sin. Giving birth (sorry) to the possibly rude question of how the Santori as a couple and as obedient Catholics managed to have only eight children over all those years if they didn’t … well, never mind.

Remember the “rhythm” method, humorously called “Vatican Roulette”? A friend of mine says he knows full well that he and his sister “owe our existence to it.” An apt name, roulette being the worst-odds sucker game in the casino: Let’s do it, dear. The odds are only 37 to 1 against us.

Maybe they cheated now and then. The thought might not have arisen were I not typing this shortly after one of the most soundly defeated incumbent senators in recent history spent part of his time at the — one dearly hopes — final “debate” reeling off the number of times he was forced to vote contrary to his beliefs!

Follow the logic: Because Santorum owns up to having compromised on some votes in his senatorial career, he's a fraud, politically and personally. Cavett cleverly deduces that any "obedient" (his word) Catholic couple with fewer than, I dunno, a dozen kids, must be "cheating."

You'd think, with his superior, non-homeschooled education, and at his advanced age, Mr. Cavett would have learned all about the birds and bees by now. But along with a dominant contraceptive culture comes an ignorance of normal human biology. Fertility varies from couple to couple, and women who breastfeed ... well, never mind. He'd probably view that with contempt, too. As for ye olde "rhythm method," it, like Cavett, is a dusty relic of a bygone era. (My condolences to his tackily unplanned friend and sister. Perhaps they've found life worth living anyway?)

When Cavett is finished mocking Rick Santorum's religion he makes fun of his looks. Then he moves on to homeschooling. I'll give Cavett credit for thoroughness: he hits all the cliches.

But what's most impressive is his utter ignorance of the homeschool experience and his palpable snobbery:

My soul similarly rolls over and groans whenever Santorum uses the phrase “home-schooling.” I first heard about it in the dim days when the John Birch Society was a going thing. (Young folks, I don’t blame you for not believing that this organization held that President Dwight Eisenhower was a “conscious, dedicated agent” of the Soviet Union.) Some benighted McCarthy-admiring parents decided to pluck their children from the clutches of “commies” teaching our kiddies their godless doctrine.

I have lost track of distant relatives of mine, parents who also snatched their young kids from school and, for their remaining school years, stuffed them mainly with the Bible. (I’d love to know how they did on their SATs.)

Odds are they did pretty well. (You've got to wonder who lost track of whom.)

Besides, aren’t you arguably a better person for having gone to school rather than having it funneled into you by dreary old Ma or Pa in their faded bathrobes at home?

(Note to self: Gotta git me 'n' Paw some fancy new duds next time we ride into town.)

I feel sorry for the poor kids whose parents feel they’re qualified to teach them at home. Of course, some parents are smarter than some teachers, but in the main I see home-schooling as misguided foolishness.

Teaching is an art and a profession requiring years of training. Where did the idea come from that anybody can do it? How many parents can intuit how to do it? (Pardon unconscious rhyme there.) My parents were teachers and the thought of home-schooling sent them rolling before they were in their graves. Especially when parents, complaining of their kids’ schooling, wrote in report card responses things like “I am loathe to critacize…”; “my childs consantration”; “normalicy”; “my daughter’s abillaties”; “her examatian grades”; “she should of done better”; “greater supervizion,” etc., into the night.

I guess all those ignorant parents were homeschooled? If you'd like to see some sad, real-life examples of poor spelling and usage, check out this post from November of last year: Getting know where: Public school kids explain why it's better than homeschooling

Back to the tolerant Mr. Cavett:

And what is the argument for it? For some, is it to protect their innocent ones from hearing words like, oh, “sex” and “contraception”? From forced association with those less desirable ethnically? Maybe it’s to keep them safe from radical notions like the idea that fossils and carbon-dating aren’t put there by the Devil to fool the scientists, but prove the world has billions, not thousands, of years on it. [. . .]

Who knows what sorts of fears haunt the minds of home-schooling parents? I guess it’s always possible, when Sally or Billy is walking to school, that a dark figure might leap out of the shrubbery, maniacally shrieking, “There’s climate change!”

Again, teaching takes skill and education and dedication. Home schooling as an idea is on a par with home dentistry.

It's all good, but I think I liked the accusation of racism best.

Read the whole thing if you can stand it. In Cavett's world, homeschooling for religious reasons is simply not valid. And enlightened as he is, he somehow missed the memos on the academic failures of the public school system, the down side of "socialization," the academic achievement of homeschooled students, the movement away from mass instruction, and the spread of homeschooling to every demographic, not just knuckle-dragging Bible thumpers.

Mr. Cavett needs to get out and mix more.

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Updated to add a link to an excellent, substantive response: Schooling Dick Cavett

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Thanks to Pew Sitter for the link.

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Music break: Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys

Awkward religious content alert:



One thing I've learned from Mark Steyn is to give credit to the song writers. So I looked this up and found that it was written by Fred Rose. And I also found out that he wrote two other favorites of mine:

'Deed I Do


Deep Water


(That's from this.)

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No social-issues truce for Rush

From yesterday's show:

RUSH: It is amazing to me. It is, even though it shouldn't be, but it's amazing to me -- how Jeb Bush and Rudy and Chris Christie, all these people... Jeb Bush, we quoted him earlier today. He's nervous. He says (paraphrased), "Ah, don't start talking about fear and emotion. This is not what I want to hear our nominees talking about." Christie and a lot of these people say: You gotta stop talking about social issues.

Republicans are say, "We've got to stop talking about this abortion stuff. We gotta stop talking about contraception." It is the Democrats who are obsessed with this stuff! Why can't our people go on offense? Why can't our people say, "It's the Democrats who are obsessed with all of these social issues"? Look: "Maryland Gay Marriage Bill to Governor's Desk." That's not a social issue, gay marriage? We have a federal judge this week in San Francisco who ruled that the Defense of Marriage Act, signed by Bill Clinton, is unconstitutional. He just took it upon himself to say that a piece of legislation is unconstitutional. Defending traditional values is not modern? It's off topic? Attacking them is modern and good politics?

That's what we're to believe here? All we're doing is defending traditional values. All we're doing is defending the institutions and the traditions that have made this country great, and apparently that's what you're not supposed to do? "No, no, don't do that! Mr. Limbaugh, you're just gonna make people nervous. Women aren't going to understand." You wouldn't believe the e-mails. "Rush, women's brains can't compute this way. You're making a big mistake here just by bringing this up." Oh, so we can't defend all these great traditions, but the left can attack them? The left can attack them and rip them apart and tear them down, and that's good politics? Is that what we're to believe?

We're supposed to sit by while great traditions and institutions like marriage are ripped to shreds. Obama just, as a dictator would, demands that contraception be free and paid for. He can't do that! We're supposed to not say a word because "Obama's on the right side, here. That's good politics" We conservatives are on defense on these matters. We're not trying to change the world. We're trying to preserve it! I'm just gonna tell you: For all of you friends and not who are telling me to leave this stuff alone, please take it somewhere else. If you don't have the desire to defend this stuff, then don't get mad at me, because I do. Because I am not gonna join the side of this that says, "The good politics, the smart politics, the side of this you want to be on politically is to tear down these traditions and institutions."

I am not going there. I'm not gonna go there to attract a larger audience. I'm not gonna go there to avoid criticism. We're not the ones that issued the rule violating the First Amendment. They did! We didn't go to federal court to impose our will and to claim that the will of the people is unconstitutional. They did! We are not the ones doing social experiments with the US military. They are! And yet we're divisive? We're anti-modern? We're unfocused? We're old-fashioned? We're racist, sexist, bigot homophobes? I'm sorry, I am not gutless. And, by the way, I discussed economic issues and every other aspect of Obama long before anybody else got to the table. While everybody else was afraid to be critical of Obama, I was not.

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Video: Megyn Kelly interviews Rick Santorum

Worth watching:



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Mr. Electable hones his message: "Ann drives a couple of Cadillacs"

The latest in a series from our Man of the People:



Gosh, he's a great candidate, isn't he? Inevitable and all that. (And I still don't get that line about the trees.)

Previously:

• Mr. Electable hones his message: "I'm not concerned about the very poor"
• "I like being able to fire people"
• $10,000 bet?
• “I’m running for office, for Pete’s sake, I can’t have illegals.”

Thank goodness we got rid of that dumb Rick Perry. 

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Linked to a great Steyn post on the Corner -- thanks!

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Also linked by Allahpundit (thanks!), who has mixed feelings.

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Romney did require Catholic hospitals to provide morning-after pills

The Boston Catholic Insider provides a detailed timeline that refutes Romney's assertions about a Massachusetts morning-after pill mandate:

No, absolutely not. Of course not.
There was no requirement in Massachusetts for the Catholic Church to provide morning-after pills to rape victims. That was entirely voluntary on their part. There was no such requirement.

BCI finds the opposite to be true. Their synopsis:

In 2005 Romney vetoed a bill to provide access to the so-called “morning-after-pill,” knowing his veto would be overridden, but months later, he decided Catholic hospitals did have to give the morning-after pill to rape victims. Key points to note:

1. Romney had publicly claimed the bill did not apply to private religious hospitals
2. He reversed his own July 2005 veto against abortifacients by signing an October bill seeking a federal waiver to expand distribution of Plan B abortifacients.
3. On December 7, 2005, Romney’s Department of Public Health said that Catholic and other privately-run hospitals could opt out of giving the morning-after pill to rape victims because of religious or moral objections
4. On December 8, 2005 Romney reversed the legal opinion of his own State Department of Public Health, instructing all Catholic hospitals and others to provide the chemical Plan B “morning after pill” to rape victims.  He was quoted as saying, ““I think, in my personal view, it’s the right thing for hospitals to provide  information and access to emergency contraception to anyone who is a  victim of rape.”

Please note the principled leadership shown by Romney here. For it, against it, rinse, repeat.

BCI's conclusion:

When Romney was asked in the debate if he had required Catholic hospitals to provide emergency contraception to rape victims and had infringed on Catholics’ rights, he responded, “No, absolutely not. Of course not.” That was untrue.

When Romney said “for the Catholic Church to provide morning-after pills to rape victims…was entirely voluntary on their part”, that was also untrue.

For him to suggest to the citizens of the United States on national television that Cardinal O’Malley and the Catholic Church would “voluntarily” provide morning-after pills is an egregious misrepresentation of Catholic Church teachings and an egregious misrepresentation of what actually happened in this situation.

BCI hopes that the media and other candidates call him out on this.

It's a matter of public record. Not only did Romney destroy conscience protections, a la the Obama administration, but he lied outright about it as recently as two days ago. This should disqualify him as a serious candidate.

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What are Romney's principles?

This sounds pretty strange coming from a full-fledged, flip-flopping RINO like Romney:

"I wonder which team [Santorum] was taking it for," Romney quipped, drawing cackles of laughter from the audience.

Hey, that's my line. To quote myself from yesterday (sorry):

But while we're speculating, how would Romney have behaved as a US Senator during the Bush years? I've no doubt he would have been a team player, but I'm not sure which team he would have been playing for.

Byron York on Twitter:

Wasn't Santorum taking it for George W. Bush, a president Romney supported, for NCLB, legislation Romney supported?

Back to Romney:

"I don't know if I've ever seen a politician explain in so many ways why he voted against his principles," Romney also told the Phoenix crowd.

Hang on there: Romney has principles? You wouldn't know it from this or this, pieces of the tangled web he has woven over the years around his "stand" on abortion. William Saletan:

Looking at the 1994 and 2007 videos, it’s hard to know which Romney to believe. The transformation they convey is more than a change of mind. It’s a rewriting of emotional experience, or at least what was advertised as emotional experience. Was Romney telling the truth in 1994 when he described how Ann Keenan’s death had shaken his family? Or was he telling the truth in 2007 when he told Tim Russert that abortion was only theoretical to him until he became governor? How can you forget or minimize something you portrayed as so wrenching? How can one man be real unless the other is acting?

So -- what exactly are Romney's principles? There's no way of knowing at this point, and it doesn't really matter. His record only makes sense if you see him as a political opportunist. Back in 2002 he was selling himself as a moderate who would work as a liberal change agent from within the GOP. Now he's selling himself as something else. Why should we believe him?

Why, again, would a conservative vote for this guy?

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Dear Nancy: Time to review your catechism

Oh, Nancy, Nancy, Nancy. What are we going to do with you? You are such a constant source of disinformation on Catholicism:

"I've come from an era when (Catholic) women were deprived of receiving absolution if they confessed that they used birth control," Pelosi complained, "It is good to get it out on the table."

Oops. I'm not sure where, or how, you got that information. But it's completely wrong. There is no sin God won't forgive. But there are a couple of catches. Looks like it's time to brush up on the sacrament of confession.

Here's a handy PDF. As you were surely taught as a little girl, in order to make a good confession, you must:

1. Examine your conscience.
2. Be sincerely sorry for your sins.
3. Confess your sins to a priest.
4. Resolve to amend your life.
5. After your confession, do the penance the priest assigns.

Hmm. It's clear right off the bat that step #1 is going to be a problem, since you aren't a big fan of that conscience thing. Steps 2 and 4 are also tricky if you don't believe you've done anything wrong. (Not sure why you'd confess it in that case, but it's all such a muddle, isn't it?) You might not care to tell your sins to a priest, either, seeing that he's a man and all, and has no business sitting in judgment on wimmin. I'm beginning to see why you're a little rusty on this.

Madame Leader has more to say here. She starts off with a word salad of girl power:

"I think that really showed their hand," Pelosi said of the opposition to the mandate-with-accomodation that Obama announced. "It wasn't about church and state, it was about an ideological point of view that flies in the face, again, of the respect that we need to  have to have for women, the God-given free will that we have to have responsibility for the role that women's health plays in the lives of their families and in our country, and the strength of women," she said.

Pelosi characterized the religious opponents of the mandate as saying "we don't want anybody -- any insurance for any employer -- giving insurance to any employee for contraception."

She also suggested that Roman Catholics lack the moral authority to oppose the contraception mandate given the use of contraception by Catholic laity. "If an overwhelming number of catholic women of childbearing age . . . are practicing birth control," she argued, "then there has to be some message to the church that -- please don't expect employers and insurance companies to enforce an attitude that you have that isn't even accepted by the laity churchgoing people themselves."

My kids tell me that lightning bolts are so Old Testament. But I can dream, can't I?

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Linked at IOTW -- thanks!
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Romneycare, Specter, and the Pill. Oh my.

I missed the debate so I'm playing catch-up here. Right now I'm watching the chunk in the middle where they all go after Santorum's position on birth control from every direction. Starting somewhere around the 52 minute mark Ron Paul points out, quite rightly, that the Pill can act as an abortifacient, and that any support for Planned Parenthood amounts to support for abortions. Hard truths. Santorum is playing defense throughout, but sincerely and quite nimbly:



What enormous nerve for Romney, a calculating equivocator on the issue, to criticize Santorum on his position on abortion. And to attack him for endorsing him in 2008 (57:00) seems a rather shabby way to go after an opponent. This exchange (starting at 58:00) is pretty fascinating:

SANTORUM: So I -- you know, Governor Romney, I can just say that -- that, you know, we were talking about this issue before of, you know, religious conscience and protections. But this is -- the whole reason this issue is alive is because of the bill that you drafted in Massachusetts, Romneycare, which was the model for Obamacare and the government takeover of health care.

But there -- there's a -- and even the drafter of your bill, when they were working on Obama's bill, said in fact it was the model. So here we have, as Newt said, the real fundamental issue here is government coercion and government coercion when you give governments the right to be able to take your responsibility to provide for your own health and -- and -- and care, and give it to the government.

That's what Governor Romney did in Massachusetts. It would be a very -- very, let say it would be a difficult task for someone who had the model for Obama Care, which is the biggest issue in this race of government in control of your lives, to be the nominee of our party. It would take that issue completely off... [. . .]

ROMNEY: Number three, I don't think the federal government should raise taxes by $500 billion and, therefore, I will repeat Obama Care. And let me -- let me -- let me mention one more -- the reason we have Obama Care -- the reason we have Obama Care is because the Senator you supported over Pat Toomey in Pennsylvania, Arlen Specter, the pro- choice Senator of Pennsylvania that you supported and endorsed in a race over Pat Toomey, he voted for Obama Care. If you had not supported him, if we had said, no to Arlen Specter, we would not have Obama Care. So don't look at me. Take a look in the mirror.

(APPLAUSE)

KING: Senator please, quickly?

(APPLAUSE)

SANTORUM: So, okay Governor, let's -- let's get this straight. First off number one, you funded Romney Care through federal tax dollars through Medicaid. I know it well, it's called disproportionate share provider tax. About $400 million that you got from the federal taxpayers to underwrite Romney Care to make sure you didn't have to raise taxes right away. But of course you had to. Ask your governor, of the $8 billion of tax increases he had to put in place.

Yes governor, you balanced the budget for four years. You have a constitutional requirement to balance the budget for four years. No great shakes. I'm all for -- I'd like to see it federally. But don't go around bragging about something you have to do. Michael Dukakis balanced the budget for 10 years, does that make him qualified to be president of the United States? I don't think so. [my emphasis :)]

(APPLAUSE)

SANTORUM: The bottom line is, what you did was you used federal dollars to fund the government takeover of health care in Massachusetts, used it as -- and -- and Barack Obama...

(CROSSTALK)

ROMNEY: ...Arlen Specter.

SANTORUM: Well, I'll get to that in a minute.

(APPLAUSE) SANTORUM: But -- and then Barack Obama used it as a model for taking over this health care system in America. Why I supported Arlen Specter, number one because -- because Arlen Specter was a -- a Senator who was going to be the chairman of the Judiciary Committee at a time when the most important issue that was coming up in the next session of Congress was two to three Supreme Court nominees that were going to be available. And one, and maybe two of them, or maybe all three were going to be out of the conservative block. And Arlen Specter as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, we had a conversation.

He asked me to support him. I said will you support the president's nominees? We had a 51/49 majority in the Senate. He said I'll support the president's nominees as chairman. Every nominee Arlen Specter supported from the time he -- he took on Judge Forks and saved Justice Thomas. Every nominee he supported, passed. Why? Because it gave Democrats cover to vote for it and it gave Republican moderates cover to vote for it.

(CROSSTALK)

SANTORUM: And just -- no because he wouldn't have been able to give the moderate Republicans and the conservative Democrats the -- the leeway to then support that nominee, which is exactly what Arlen Specter did. He defended Roberts, defended Alito. We have a 5/4 majority on the court that struck down that case that you just talked about and is there as a guardian of liberty. And I did the right thing for our country.

(CROSSTALK)

(APPLAUSE)

ROMNEY: ...Arlen Specter...

(CROSSTALK)

(APPLAUSE)

ROMNEY: ...supporting Arlen Specter -- supporting Arlen Specter over Pat Toomey, that was a -- that was a very torturous route...

(CROSSTALK)

SANTORUM: Just about as torturous as six years later blaming me for Obamacare.

(CROSSTALK)

Too bad John King didn't let them go on. Santorum's endorsement of Specter over Toomey still rankles but Romney has absolutely no standing to call him on that.

See also: 
How do you think Romney would have voted on NCLB?
Debate video: Birth control question

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Debate video: Birth control question

Wow. Newt nails it:



Even Mitt gave a good answer.

See also:
Romneycare, Specter, and the Pill. Oh my.
How do you think Romney would have voted on NCLB?

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How do you think Romney would have voted on NCLB?

I probably shouldn't comment on last night's debate since I've only seen Santorum's No Child Left Behind answer and the final question about misconceptions, in which Romney was apparently so afraid to bring up anything that might be construed as a weakness on his part that he awkwardly refused to answer it. But anyway.

Philip Klein writes that Santorum "stumbled badly" and explains the problem with "taking one for the team" in the Bush years:

The very problem with the Bush era was precisely that too many Republicans decided to be team players rather than push back against the president when he was violating conservative principles. It's this very "team player" mentality that the Tea Party movement, in part, was created to combat. Santorum spent the early part of his debate touting his opposition to the Wall Street bailout, but his argument tonight about taking one for the team leaves little doubt that he would have voted for the bailout had he still been in the Senate in 2008. It was much easier for him to sit back and criticize the policy when he was out of office. Santorum's comment about his unwillingness to stand up for his principles when they clashed with Bush on NCLB was especially ironic, because it came moments after he used the word "courage" when he was asked to describe himself with one word.

I think that last point is a bit harsh. It's not always cowardly to "take one for the team." But while we're speculating, how would Romney have behaved as a US Senator during the Bush years? I've no doubt he would have been a team player, but I'm not sure which team he would have been playing for. (And when has courage entered into his political calculations?)

How should Santorum have answered differently? He was honest. He said he made a huge mistake on that vote. I'm glad he didn't try to employ some phony spin to defend the policy. Again, compare and contrast: Romney's huge mistake is one he not only continues to defend (lamely and deceptively) but touts as the greatest achievement of his term as governor of Massachusetts.

(Doesn't that guy on the right look exactly like Harvey Korman? Oh, sorry. Back to the point.)

This might sound like excuse-making and maybe it is, but: Things are a little different now in 2012; the reign of Obama has educated some conservatives on the truly disastrous effects of big government, and his pedal-to-the-metal acceleration toward the cliff's edge has increased the urgency to turn things around. As a nation, our consciousness has been raised (though not enough) on monster spending, debt, borrowing, and government intrusiveness. When Santorum says he'd do things differently as president and argues for giving parents and localities more control over their kids' education, I'm willing to believe he means it. Whereas with Romney, I have trouble believing anything he says at all. Here he is having it both ways on Obama's Race to the Top policy.

I haven't seen Santorum's answer on Specter and I'm not sure I want to. Santorum is not perfect. But again -- compare him to Romney. Or compare Romney to Specter. See what I mean?

PS: A friend, in an email:

Santorum, asked to use one word to describe himself and he said, "courage." Terrible answer. Couldn't say "conservative?"

Yeah. What was Romney's answer?

*Just saw the clip. It was "resolute." He must mean in his pursuit of the office.
 
See also:
Debate video: Birth control question
Romneycare, Specter, and the Pill. Oh my.

Linked at Michelle Malkin -- many thanks.
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Where the candidates stand on Satan

I'm looking forward to John King quizzing all the candidates tonight on their positions on Satan. I tweeted something about that last night and a friend tweeted back with a question CNN might want to use:

Could the states make Satan illegal if they wanted to?

Because Satan might be right for some states but not for others.

I wish I could watch the debate live but I'll be at Mass, receiving those ashes we'll all be forced to sport daily under the coming repressive sweater-vested Santorum theocracy, in which women will be "prevented from having birth control" and forced to "stay home and homeschool their children!" (That's about 1:50 into the video. Note that neither Ari Fleischer nor Erick Erickson called Hillary Whoever on those falsehoods, at least not within the clip provided. I would have asked her how exactly a President Santorum would effect his barefoot-and-pregnant agenda.)

Anyway, when asked about Satan tonight, Newt might want to use that old "I was for him before I was against him" line.

As for Romney, I don't think the liberal media is quite ready to play the Mormon card, so he won't be asked about his church's take on Satan. And despite the very active role Romney has played in his church over the decades, there seems to exist no incriminating footage of him speaking as a Mormon to other Mormons, at least not any that Romney-booster Matt Drudge has seen fit to feature on his site. Go figure.

I suppose Romney's stand on Lucifer would depend on which way the wind was blowing, but he can always go with declaring himself personally opposed to the Father of Lies.

Obama has shown a certain sympathy for the devil but normally he defines evil as that which gets in his way.

Like a rock, Rick Santorum is standing by his strong opposition to the Devil:

"I’m a person of faith. I believe in good and evil,” Santorum said in response to questions from CNN.

“If somehow or another because you’re a person of faith and you believe in good and evil is a disqualifier for president, we’re going to have a very small pool of candidates who can run for president,” Santorum said.

Excerpts of Santorum’s speech were splashed across the conservative leaning Drudge Report for much of Tuesday.

Santorum dismissed the Drudge article as “absurd.”

"If they want to go ahead and dig up old speeches to a religious group they can go right ahead and do so. I'm going to stay on message. I'm going to talk about the things Americans want to talk about," Santorum said to CNN.

When pressed further if he believed Satan was attacking America, as he said in his 2008 speech, Santorum insisted the subject is not on the minds of voters.

“Guys these are questions that are not relevant to what’s being discussed in America today,” Santorum said.

“What we’re talking about in America today is trying to get America growing. That’s what my speeches are about. That’s we’re going to talk about in this campaign,” he added.

Please note: Rick Santorum didn't bring this up. Someone else found the Ave Maria speech from 2008 and passed it on to Drudge. It wasn't the candidate's stump speech but rather a talk given to fellow believers during a period when he was out of politics. So try not to panic.

Judging by his response above, Santorum is following the narrow path described here by William McGurn:

The answer is that when Mr. Santorum discusses these issues, he needs to fold them into his larger narrative about the free society. That narrative has to do with pointing out the dependency that comes with an expanding federal government, the importance of family, and the threat to freedom when, say, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals or a Health and Human Services secretary can substitute their own opinions on these issues for the judgment of the American people.

And he must neither compromise his values nor get lost in "the weeds of theological debate."

Stay tuned.

***

Byron York: America believes in the devil. And hey, why isn't anyone grilling Romney on his religious beliefs? 

***

Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the Buzzworthy link. See her column on the the framing of Rick Santorum. A bit:

And as my column pointed out today, Santorum has been hitting the Democrats’ anti-science green cult hard on everything from Keystone to fracking and oil exploration. Along with Obamacare, this is a key policy issue where Santorum’s record rises above the Romney/Gingrich troublesome flirtations with eco-nitwittery.

This, not the hyperventilating of Beltway bigots, is resonating with voters in the heartland. . . .

Read the whole thing.

***

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Obama sings the blues

Hey, you think you've got it rough, what with unemployment, impossibly high gas prices, rising health insurance premiums, skyrocketing grocery prices, etc. Just think about what it's like for President Obama! Last night at a star-studded White House musical gala, he quipped:

One of the things about being President -- I've talked about this before -- is that some nights when you want to go out and just take a walk, clear your head, or jump into a car just to take a drive, you can't do it. Secret Service won't let you. And that's frustrating. But then there are other nights where B.B. King and Mick Jagger come over to your house to play for a concert. So I guess that things even out a little bit.

Cuz if Obama ain't happy ain't nobody happy, and if it weren't for the occasional White House schmooze-n-groove session with the glittering stars of the music world, past and present, the "frustrations" and confinements of the job might bring him down.

Not that it's all about him or anything.

Oh well. You and I may be feeling a bit frustrated as we pay $3.75 a gallon for gas to get us back and forth to our puny jobs (if we have one), but at least President Obama is having a good time, albeit only once in a while. So take it away, Barry --



Thank you, Mr. President, for allowing us the privilege of watching you have fun. It does brighten our bleak little lives, however briefly. All that's missing is the conga line. (Perhaps the first lady would be so gracious as to share some video highlights of her weekend jaunt to Aspen.)

By the way, Chicagoans, don't hold your breath waiting for Obama to come "home." Chicago was a handy place from which to launch himself as a progressive but I imagine he'll end up somewhere a lot warmer, and ritzier.

Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the Buzzworthy link.
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Liberal media's "scrutiny" of Santorum begins in earnest

Busy this morning so I'll just throw a few things your way without much comment:

Rich Lowry on the Left's opening salvo against Rick Santorum:

The media has unleashed the hounds on Rick Santorum.

He was last seen a step ahead of the braying pack, trying to explain that he hadn’t accused President Barack Obama of being a crypto-Muslim. The former Pennsylvania senator criticized the president’s environmentalism as representative of a “phony theology.” The press snipped the remark out of the context and played it as Santorum donning his finest Grand Inquisitor garb and reading the president of the United States out of the Christian faith. [. . .]

Santorum is a standing affront to the sensibilities and assumptions of the media and political elite. That elite is constantly writing the obituary for social conservatism, which is supposed to wither away and leave a polite, undisturbed consensus in favor of social liberalism. Santorum not only defends beliefs that are looked down upon as dated and unrealistic; he does it with a passionate sincerity that opens him to mockery and attack.

If Santorum had the social views of a Barbara Boxer, he would be hailed in all the glossy magazines as a political virtuoso. He has fought a front-runner with all the advantages to a jump ball in Michigan. His aides can’t provide advance texts of his speeches because he always extemporizes and speaks from a few notes. He is indefatigable, willing to lose on behalf of what he believes and committed to trying to convince others of his positions.

And he's well-acquainted with the tactics of the Left. Santorum on Hannity last night:

Well, it’s perfectly clear. I mean, let’s be honest. This is standard fare. I mean I’m not saying anything particularly new here. I mean, what we’ve been talking about, the radical environmental agenda that puts the earth over the needs of man, that doesn’t understand that the best way to create a sound environment is for people to be doing well and to have prosperity. Because you go to countries where in fact mankind is not doing well and let me assure you, the last thing they worry about is the environment. It depends on America’s growth and prosperity so we can in fact be good, husband[ing] the environment as the way we should. And that’s all I was talking about.

And for them to continually distort – this is the kind of stuff that I think is, is actually I think one of the reasons we’re doing well in the polls, because people see it for what it is. They see the national media trying to destroy conservatives.

No, no. The liberal media are merely "scrutinizing" him:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

It's tedious to point out that the liberal media never applied any scrutiny whatsoever to Barack Obama, but it must be said.

The Right Scoop has full video of the Hannity interview (which I haven't seen yet).

One thing we know for sure: The Left and their media hounds instinctively know their enemy. Santorum is everything they despise and fear. Fortunately, he's no newbie to this fight.

Have a great morning.

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Crazy or just conservative? [updated]

This interview was included in my previous post but I think it deserves more attention. Watch the whole thing and pass it on.



You'll notice the video's header: "Santorum confirms his craziness." Obviously, the calcified Bob Schieffer, with all his head-shaking, blurred distinctions, and mischaracterizations of the candidate's points, wants us to believe that Santorum is nuts. Mr. Schieffer thinks that any one of those points, all of which spring from the view that smaller, less intrusive government is better than big, coercive government, is enough to disqualify Santorum as a presidential contender.

But if Americans actually listen to more than a twenty-second sound bite, will they think Santorum is crazy? I don't know the answer.

No one else has shown any interest in wresting power from the government school leviathan and giving it back to parents. No one else has pointed out that Obamacare will mandate coverage for risky, aggressive prenatal tests that diagnose conditions that can only be "treated" with abortions. I think Santorum articulates these conservative positions beautifully.

If that doesn't work for you, King Shamus suggests another way to look at it:

How could Rick Santorum–even if all of the Pennsylvanian’s haters are right about his most fevered sexually repressed sweater-vestified Opus Dei-fueled fetus-empowering right-to-lifer fantasies–do any worse than the last four years?

Look, it isn’t February 2011. There aren’t 10 boutique GOP candidates left to pick and choose from. Nobody is waiting with bated breath for the results of the Ames straw poll.

Real votes have been cast. Actual primaries and caucuses have winnowed the field. Gingrich, Paul, Romney and Santorum are the choices the GOP has left. Make your peace with that admittedly depressing reality and move on.

In the meantime, Obama still wants to give the US Constitution the business.

***

Update: Rush was all over this in his show today: Rick is Right About Obama's Political Theology, but Poor Old Bob Schieffer Thinks He's Talking to Somebody from Mars:

So Santorum shows up on Slay the Nation yesterday, Bob Schieffer, he's 74; I said 92. He's 74 years old. And Schieffer actually seemed like he was talking to somebody from Mars. He looked at Santorum and he literally could not fathom that a living, breathing human being believes -- much less would say -- these things. So he asked Santorum about his remarks that Obama's agenda is about some phony theology. "Senator, I've got to ask you, what in the world were you talking about, sir?"

Read the rest.

***

James Pethokoukis agrees with Rick (and me): Santorum is right about U.S. ‘factory schools’

***

Quin Hillyer thinks what I think:

Unless I missed something, I agree with EVERY.... SINGLE.... WORD uttered by Rick Santorum in his interview on Face the Nation yesterday. Bob Schieffer was remarkably hostile, but Santorum kept his equanimity, kept smiling, didn't back down, but never got peevish (although he did, rightly, insist on correcting a misstatement by Bob Schieffer about his child being "stillborn"). Santorum is right that mandated amnio tests are a horrible idea; right that federal intervention in education is a bad idea; and right that some environmental extremism amounts (in a CLEAR attempt at metaphor rather than direct meaning) to a kind of "theology." Indeed, he took time in his Ohio speech (at issue on Face the Nation) to explain that he was NOT talking about Obama's theology of "the Bible," in other words not talking about his actual religious faith, but instead saying that the belief system in extreme environmentalism was a sort of theology.

Read the rest, in which Mr. Hillyer offers RS some good advice.

One more from Rich Lowry: In Vicious, Personal Attack, Rick Santorum Questions the President’s….Environmental Views

***

Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the Buzzworthy link.

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Context clarifies the "phony theology" sound bite

Below is the entire Rick Santorum speech from which was mined the 19-second "phony theology" sound bite. If you want to know what the candidate really meant, start listening at about 3:00 in when he starts talking about the skyrocketing cost of gasoline and Obama's destructive energy policies. Clearly, the "phony ideal" he's referring to here is radical environmentalism, the fraudulent basis on which Obama justifies his liberty- and job-killing environmental agenda:



Bob Schieffer, all aghast below, tries to scold Santorum for "suggesting the president is not a Christian." For obvious reasons, it was a political mistake for Santorum to use the word "theology," regardless of the facts that for some, radical environmentalism is something of a religion, and that, well, Obama started it.   

But Mr. Schieffer really needs to get out more. Watch as Santorum blows his walled-in liberal mind on search-and-destroy prenatal testing and the failure of the public school system:



I love what he's saying about education (8 minutes in). And the benighted Mr. Schieffer thinks only the wealthy homeschool? Ooookay.

Also interesting are Paul Ryan's thoughts on what Santorum meant, starting at 1:30 here. A partial transcript from The Hill:

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Sunday blasted the Obama administration’s moves to mandate religious affiliated groups to provide contraception coverage as “paternalistic” and “arrogant.”

“What we’re getting from the White House on this conscience issue, it’s not an issue about contraception, it’s an issue that reveals a political philosophy the president is showing that basically treats our constitutional rights as if they were revocable privileges from our government, not inalienable rights from our creator.” said Ryan on NBC’s Meet the Press.

“We’re seeing this new government activism, paternalistic, arrogant, political philosophy that puts new government-granted rights in the way of our constitutional rights.”

“That’s really not about contraception,” said Ryan of the mandate. “It’s about violating our first amendment rights to religious freedom and conscience.”

Ryan was asked by host David Gregory to respond to GOP presidential hopeful Rick Santorum’s comments Saturday, saying that President Obama’s political agenda was based on “some phony theology. Not a theology based on the Bible, a different theology.”

“I wouldn’t characterize it that way,” said Ryan. “I would simply say that he has a political philosophy that believes he can mandate certain benefits and activities of the American people that conflicts with their constitutional rights. He believes that these new government-granted rights trump our constitutional rights such as our first amendment right to conscience, to freedom of religion.”

“I would go after him on his political philosophy which violates our founding principles.”

Another point from Ryan:

If the president is willing to trample on our constitutional rights in a difficult election year, imagine what will he do in implementing the rest of this law after he doesn't have to face the voters again if he gets re-elected.

Keep watching, if you can bear David Gregory and Chris Van Hollen, to hear Ryan's comments on Obama's criminally irresponsible budget.

Back to Santorum's speech; I didn't listen to the whole thing but the last 5 or 6 minutes or so, in which Santorum talks about our foundational freedoms being threatened by coercive big government, are worth watching.

***
Update: Via The Right Scoop, Santorum's spokesman clarifies further.

***
Follow-up post here.

***
Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the Buzzworthy link.
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Music break: I Can't Give You Anything But Love

This is great, too.

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Aspirin, et cetera

I'm really tired of this topic, and I more or less agree with K-Lo, that the sooner we move beyond this, the better. But . . . the crux of that politically incorrect aspirin joke (which wasn't actually funny, but that's beside the point) is that once upon a time society understood that if a young lady didn't care to risk conceiving a child, she could choose to refrain from the activity that caused it. In a thousand ways, the culture supported her in that choice. Now the Obama administration hopes to install "free love" as a permanent state-sponsored entitlement.
 
The Hyacinth Girl expresses it more colorfully:

I’ve been listening to the coverage of Santorum’s big donor’s Aspirin statement. Since when has it been controversial to suggest that women used to value chastity? I mean, we don’t have a universal human right to be whores. Or do we? I can never remember. I’m not calling sexually active women whores, by the way. It just isn’t a big deal that Foster Friess makes a reference to the days when sexual promiscuity wasn’t celebrated or considered inevitable.

When women act as sexually, ah, indiscriminate as men, it doesn’t make us equal. It just leaves us empty. The message pushed by our sexual “liberators” is a lie and it damages us. I’ve heard it’s no good for men either, this conflation of promiscuity and masculinity, but I hear lots of crazy rumors.

Heh. But we've moved way past virtue or even marriage as the default option. The latter is fast becoming as quaint an anachronism as the former. From yesterday's New York Times: For Women Under 30, Most Births Occur Outside Marriage:

Meanwhile, children happen.

Amber Strader, 27, was in an on-and-off relationship with a clerk at Sears a few years ago when she found herself pregnant. A former nursing student who now tends bar, Ms. Strader said her boyfriend was so dependent that she had to buy his cigarettes. Marrying him never entered her mind. “It was like living with another kid,” she said.

When a second child, with a new boyfriend, followed three years later — her birth control failed, she said — her boyfriend, a part-time house painter, was reluctant to wed.

Ms. Strader likes the idea of marriage; she keeps her parents’ wedding photo on her kitchen wall and says her boyfriend is a good father. But for now marriage is beyond her reach.

“I’d like to do it, but I just don’t see it happening right now,” she said. “Most of my friends say it’s just a piece of paper, and it doesn’t work out anyway.” [. . .]

Today, neither of Ms. Strader’s pregnancies left her thinking she should marry to avoid stigma. Like other women interviewed here, she described her children as largely unplanned, a byproduct of uncommitted relationships.

A "byproduct." Sigh. For some single mothers, it's "No fathers need apply":

“Women used to rely on men, but we don’t need to anymore,” said Teresa Fragoso, 25, a single mother in Lorain. “We support ourselves. We support our kids.” 

Girl power! The men who fathered those kids are apparently seen as more trouble than they're worth. So the kids will grow up without fathers and they'll be the poorer for it, economically and emotionally.

And do the empowered, man-free women alluded to above really support their kids on their own, or do they get some help from Big Daddy?

Mary Grasso, who owned a sweets shop in Lorain, said men had stopped taking responsibility for their children because the state had stepped in with safety net programs. Ms. Grasso, 70, experienced the decline in weddings directly: wedding cake orders fell by half over the more than 30 years she was in business.

Compared with a real daddy, the daddy-state is a poor provider that's bound to get poorer as it runs into certain inexorable realities. Mark Steyn:

. . . the Baby Boomers did not have enough children to maintain mid-20th-century social programs. As a result, the children they did have will end their lives in a poorer, uglier, sicker, more divided, and more violent society. How to avert this fate? In 2009 Nancy Pelosi called for free contraceptives as a form of economic stimulus. Ten thousand Americans retire every day, and leave insufficient progeny to pick up the slack. In effect, Nancy has rolled a giant condom over the entire American economy.

Testifying before Congress, Timmy Geithner referred only to “demographic challenges” — an oblique allusion to the fact that the U.S. economy is about to be terminally clobbered by $100 trillion of entitlement obligations it can never meet. And, as Chart 5-1 on page 58 of the official Obama budget “Analytical Perspectives” makes plain, your feckless, decadent rulers have no plans to do anything about it. Instead, the Democrats shriek, Ooh, Republican prudes who can’t get any action want to shut down your sex life! According to CBO projections, by mid-century mere interest payments on the debt will exceed federal revenues. For purposes of comparison, by 1788 Louis XVI’s government in France was spending a mere 60 percent of revenues on debt service, and we know how that worked out for His Majesty shortly thereafter. Not to worry, says Barry Antoinette. Let them eat condoms.

This is a very curious priority for a dying republic.

Read the whole thing.

Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the Buzzworthy link.

***

Many thanks to Mark Steyn for his link and insights at the Corner. He gets American culture like nobody else.

***

Thanks also to Pew Sitter for the front page link. The same to Doug Ross and CMR.

***

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Calling Obama on his assault on the Constitution

Charles Krauthammer on Obama's attack on the Constitution:

This constitutional trifecta — the state invading the autonomy of religious institutions, private companies and the individual citizen — should not surprise. It is what happens when the state takes over one-sixth of the economy.

In 2010, when all this lay hazily in the future, the sheer arrogance of Obamacare energized a popular resistance powerful enough to deliver an electoral shellacking to Obama. Yet two years later, as the consequences of that overreach materialize before our eyes, the issue is fading. This constitutes a huge failing of the opposition party whose responsibility it is to make the opposition argument.

Every presidential challenger says he will repeal Obamacare on Day One. Well, yes. But is any of them making the case for why?

I think so. Rick Santorum at CPAC:

Are we going to be a country that believes, as our Founders did, that our rights don’t come from the government, they come from a much higher authority? Well there are those in our country and those in the Oval Office who believe that’s not the case. They believe that rights do, in fact, come from the government, and that they have gone around convincing the American people that they can in fact give you rights. . . . And we see what happens when government gives you rights. When government gives you rights, government can take away those rights. When government gives you rights, government can coerce you into doing things in exercising the right that they gave you. . . . . As a result, government will own you because you will have to pay tribute to Washington in order to get the care you need for your children. One of the reasons I'm in this race, in fact the major reason I'm in this race, is because I think Obamacare is a game changer for America. . . . This is the kind of coercion we can expect. It's not about contraception. It's about economic liberty; it's about freedom of speech; it's about freedom of religion. It's about government control of your lives and it's got to stop.

***

Many thanks to The Other McCain for the link.

***

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Geithner: "We have no solution"

Via James Pethokoukis, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner explains the posish to Rep. Paul Ryan:

We're not coming before you today to say we have a definitive solution to that long term problem. What we do know is we don't like yours.

Because blah blah blah. They have no plan.



But take comfort: at least Geithner hasn't lost his sense of humor --

And here was the exchange between Geithner and Ryan, after Ryan pointed the terrifying baseline (in red):

GEITHNER: You could have taken [the chart] out [to the year] 3000 or to 4000. [Laughs]

RYAN: Yeah, right. We cut it off at the end of the century because the economy, according to the CBO, shuts down in 2027 on this path.

And that’s no joke, Mr. Geithner.

Que sera, sera!

***

PS: Rick Santorum should hit the Obama administration over the head with this. Repeatedly. Americans would love to know why the Secretary of the Treasury is laughing. If the GOP needs an issue to campaign on, here it is. Wake up, everybody.

***
Linked at MichelleMalkin.com -- thanks!
Thanks also to Larwyn for linking!

***
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Another Santorum on contraceptives post

Matthew Archbold asks, Can a Faithful Catholic Run for President? 

Newsflash! Rick Santorum is Catholic! No, really Catholic. What? Who knew?

It’s come to light that Santorum, in a number of interviews, has said he agrees with the Church and that contraception is “harmful to women.”

Insert gasp here. In fact the comments were so gasp worthy that it took months for people to realize how offended they were. [. . .]

As Santorum made abundantly clear in the interview he’s not talking about outlawing contraceptives. He’s talking about his personal beliefs.

The Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin has called these comments “mind numbing” and says it’ll kill Santorum’s election chances.

Well, lots of minds are pretty numb when it comes to thinking honestly about "women's issues," so Ms. Rubin certainly isn't alone.

While it may or may not turn out to be politically smart for the candidate to talk about this stuff, it's undeniably pertinent to our societal ills. Santorum has a pretty coherent world view from which his faith can't be extracted, and he's not willing to pretend it can be. So let's give the guy some credit for his honesty, as well as his courage; he knows first-hand what happens to those who swim against the progressive tide on sexual issues.

Archbold refers to the Matt Lewis piece I linked to yesterday:

Matt Lewis says simply that the American people don’t want their politicians talking about contraception. What?! It’s all the Democrat party ever talks about. In the Democratic playbook there’s one solution to all the ills facing America today. Global warming? Contraception. Poverty? Contraception. Abortion? Contraception? The debt? Contraception.

What’s really meant is that you’re not allowed to discuss the negative consequences of a high percentage of the female population ingesting carcinogens and feeling able to jump into bed with men they don’t trust or love.

Santorum said he thinks birth control is harmful to women. Notice nobody’s taking on the issue itself. They want him silenced. It’s off limits. Anti-women.

But hey -- look who's daring to step out of line:

BRZEZINSKI: I don't think there's anything wrong with believing that, I really don't. I don't think that means he's going to ban birth control across the board.  Those are his personal beliefs. And I think that as a father, and a man who's held public office, he's lived up to them, it appears. Which makes it interesting for the conversation, and it's a conversation probably every family should have, about birth control and its role in society with their own kids.  He's got his own, and he stands by them, and I think he's an interesting part of the national conversation in terms of where our society is going. And there is a lot of risky behavior out there that happens to be connected to birth control. So there's a whole other side to this conversation.  And not once did I say should it be banned, or should it not be covered by health insurance. But I think it's OK to have those beliefs or those concerns.

Go Mika! I never watch your show but that surprised me.

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