"We leave nobody behind"? [updated]

Yes, he really said those words:

This is a tough time for a lot of people, millions of folks all across the eastern seaboard, but America's tougher, and we're tougher because we pull together, we leave nobody behind, we make sure that we respond as a nation and remind ourselves that whenever an American is in need all of us stand together to make sure that we're providing the help that's necessary.

"Tough time"? "Americans in need"? "Providing the help that's necessary"? Reminds you of some other recent event, doesn't it? Steyn:

We also learned that, in those first moments of the attack, a request for military back-up was made by U.S. staff on the ground but was denied by Washington. It had planes and Special Forces less than 500 miles away in southern Italy – or about the same distance as Washington to Boston. They could have been there in less than two hours. Yet the commander-in-chief declined to give the order. So Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods fought all night against overwhelming odds, and died on a rooftop in a benighted jihadist hell hole while Obama retired early to rest up before his big Vegas campaign stop. "Within minutes of the first bullet being fired, the White House knew these heroes would be slaughtered if immediate air support was denied," said Ty Woods' father, Charles. "In less than an hour, the perimeters could have been secured, and American lives could have been saved. After seven hours fighting numerically superior forces, my son's life was sacrificed because of the White House's decision." 

In light of President Obama's abandonment of Americans literally fighting for their lives, this statement strikes many as "clueless," but I don't think so. I'm sure he's acutely aware of the criticism he's getting for standing by, doing nothing, and then heading up to the residence to get his beauty sleep, while the siege against the American consulate was raging. Those words were his cowardly, tangential attempt to refute those criticisms. Weak, yes, but he can't afford to engage in an honest discussion of what happened that night, so he'll try to lay claim to the qualities of a real leader, one who is tough, competent, and loyal to his own, this way. Anyone buying it?
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Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the Buzzworthy link.
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Update: The alert Nice Deb noticed that "leaving nobody behind" is a favorite Obama talking point. So perhaps he is clueless after all, and this graphic from Pseud O'Nym hits the bullseye:

Barbara Curtis, RIP

Barbara Curtis, mother to many and mentor to many mothers through her blog MommyLife.net, died yesterday. To say she will be sorely missed is a gross understatement. Please pray for her family.

I only met Barbara in person once, over coffee at Panera, where we talked as quickly as we could, exchanging our "stories" (we're both Catholic converts) in the limited time we had free. As the note on her site today says, "She was a testimony to God's grace and transforming power." Exactly right. I admired her humility and honesty, rare enough qualities today and virtues which allowed her to connect to so well with all the moms who read her blog and benefited through her experience and wisdom.

This recent piece by Barbara about her son Johnny captures much of her perspective on life and wouldn't be a bad way to get to know her a little if you never got the chance:

My son Jonathan has a little extra. A little extra enthusiasm, a little extra innocence, a little extra charm. Oh, and did I mention an extra chromosome? The one on the 21st pair that inspires so much fear in parents-to-be.

I suppose at one time I was fearful about Down syndrome. But in 1992 when they placed the blue-blanketed bundle in my arms and I could see he looked -- well, just a little different -- I actually felt a sense of awe. Here will be a challenge -- so many things to learn.

In this culture, for a parent without one to see something positive in a child with Down syndrome requires a paradigm shift, I know. But if my counterculture years taught me anything, it was to question prevailing attitudes. I'd really never liked the dread surrounding Down syndrome, clouding the horizon for still-waiting-for-test-results expectant parents.

In years since, I've met many parents whose prenatal diagnosis was accompanied by pressure to terminate the pregnancy and "try again." Professionals are quick to point out the burdens of having a child with trisomy 21 -- possible medical problems, heavier emotional demands, a child who is "less than."

Which makes it hardly surprising that 90 percent of prenatal diagnoses today end in abortion.

Parents who search to learn more -- as well as those surprised with a postnatal diagnosis -- must be surprised by the hope they find when they connect with the real professionals: parents of kids with Down syndrome. For no matter how devastated they may have been to receive the news, parents almost invariably come to treasure the gift that they've received, as in Emily Kingsley's famous essay "Welcome to Holland": So you planned to go to Italy and landed in unexpected territory. At first you're disappointed. Then you notice the windmills and the tulips -- beauty you never expected to find. You discover it's not a bad place after all.

My own son Jonny is a hip and clever guy with a gift for acting, dancing, humor and making friends. At home or school he is the first to offer help, to comfort someone who's down and to laugh uproariously at the punch lines.

For 20 years he's taught me -- and others around him with hearts willing to learn -- how much more there is to life than intelligence, beauty and "perfection."

Read more at Catholic Herald

Read the rest. May she rest in peace.

If you'd like to help her family, Elizabeth Foss has made it easy to donate.

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What's Obama doing for Halloween? [updated]

Impersonating a Real President by occupying the empty chair and taking a strong stand against the enemy. No, no, not the terrorists who destroyed the consulate in Benghazi and killed four Americans while Obama sat by and did nothing to help them. He's having a Situation Room confab on Hurricane Sandy with his advisors (Jay-Z not pictured). 

This photo was tweeted by Mark Knoller and elicited a host of brutally on-point replies. I would have posted them here but for some reason I can't access them anymore. (Perhaps Twitter truncates replies when they run into double digits, or maybe it's my browser. If you're able to view them kindly paste them into an email and send them to me.)

Related post on Obama's storm response here.

Update: Speaking of brutally on-point, here's Molly Powell, "Obama is the Go-To President We Need in an Emergency":

If you need a reminder to buy bottled water and tape the widows before a hurricane, Obama is your man. If you’re running a machine gun, soon to be covered in your own blood, on the roof of a building under fire in Libya at 3 a.m., if you’ve called three times over a period of almost seven hours for air cover that is within a couple of hours away (or, as we might learn, in the armed drone directly above) — well, you’re on your own. The president will get back to you.

November 6th is a week from today, America.

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Krauthammer agrees: Obama plays president.

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A way to help the Curtis family

I don't have anything new on Barbara's condition but please read this post from Elizabeth Foss, who suggests a way we can help the family. Saddest words: "Barbara is not conscious and will not regain consciousness." Thanks for your continued prayers.

The Washington Post did a story featuring the Curtis family back in 2008. Worth reading.

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No honor

In case you missed him, Pat Caddell:



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Storm

The wind is starting to howl and roar here in northern Virginia. If anything dramatic happens (oak tree crashes through roof, neighbor's trampoline takes flight) I'll try to post pictures (God willing).

Dear Leader, lucking into an issue which allows him to act tough and in charge with no awkward political downside, has a predictable message for the little people: ". . . right now the key is to make sure that the public is following instructions." Isn't that always the key with him and his ilk?

See my recommended reads and Twitter feed (on right) for links to stories on the president's decision to let Americans in Benghazi fend for themselves (and die) and the media's non-coverage of this national disgrace. In particular, see Steyn: Benhoozi?

Please don't forget to pray for Barbara Curtis. I've only met her once but consider her a friend and kindred spirit.

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Linked in this Steyn post -- many thanks.

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Pray for Barbara Curtis

Elizabeth Foss tells us that Barbara Curtis, Mommy Life blogger and mother of twelve, has suffered a very serious stroke. Please pray for Barbara and her family. Thanks very much.

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Such liars

I have to excerpt a bit more from Mark Steyn's weekend column on the Obama administration's refusal to send military help to Americans under siege in Benghazi and the ongoing cover-up:

And, in the weeks that followed, the government of the United States lied to its own citizens as thoroughly and energetically as any totalitarian state, complete with the midnight knock on the door from not-so-secret policemen sent to haul the designated fall-guy into custody.

This goes far beyond the instinctive secretiveness to which even democratic governments are prone. The Obama administration created a wholly fictional story line, and devoted its full resources to maintaining it. I understand why Mitt Romney chose not to pursue this line of argument in the final debate. The voters who will determine this election are those who voted for Obama four years ago and this time round either switch to the other fellow or sit on their hands. In electoral terms, it’s probably prudent of Mitt not to rub their faces in their 2008 votes. Nevertheless, when the president and other prominent officials stand by as four Americans die and then abuse their sacrifice as contemptuously as this administration did, decency requires that they be voted out of office as an act of urgent political hygiene.

November 6th. Be there. Latex gloves optional. (RTR.)

Also this: Denver TV reporter Kyle Clark asked Obama the question that needed asking but the president ducked it, weakly pleading ignorance (!) as a defense. Shame on him and his cowardly administration.

Related posts:
Question for the President: Why no military rescue for Americans under siege in Benghazi?
9/11/12 emails from Benghazi to White House
Embarrassed for my country

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What women wanted

Please read Stanley Kurtz's Campaign Ads for Women: How Far We've Fallen. It's his response to the Obama campaign's "do it with a great guy" ad aimed at young women. Here's the the 1956 Eisenhower ad Kurtz links to. The women below liked Ike, but not in the way the Obama campaign wants young women to, er, like President Obama:


.
When you're done laughing and perhaps sneering at the June Cleaver stereotype of a woman devoted first and last to the care of her family, please note that the issues women cared about then remain important to women today, namely the well-being of their families and the health of the economy:

"the cost of living"
"the family budget"
"you want to be as sure as you can that you will all go on living together in our present happiness and prosperity, in an America at peace"
"your children's future"
"schools, health, general welfare"

After the testimonials from various women (including one liberal who wants more from the government), the ad goes on to make the argument that mothers are the conduits of culture:

So much of our future rests with the women of our country. They're the homemakers. The whole family unit revolves around them. Everything that affects the family's welfare affects them first and everything in the family's life benefits from their influence. They do the family buying. They see that everybody in the family circle is well clothed and well fed. But beyond this, they are the custodian of its values and aspirations for the future. In their hands lies the training of our young people, to whom they pass on the rich heritage of our nation, its love of peace and justice and its passion for freedom.

Culture is passed on through the family. When the family breaks down, so does the culture. It's an obvious point but one worth repeating every so often. (See this post from last spring.)

Mark Steyn on Obama's failed overtures toward women and his desperate "have sex with me" ad:

At the second presidential debate, [Pres. Obama] name-checked Planned Parenthood, the General Motors of the American abortion industry, half a dozen times, desperate to preserve his so-called gender gap. Yet oddly enough, the more furiously Obama and Biden have waved their binders and talked up Sandra Fluke, the more his supposed lead among women has withered away. So now he needs to enthuse the young, who turned out in such numbers for him last time. Hence, the official campaign video (plagiarized from Vladimir Putin of all people) explaining that voting for Obama is like having sex. The saddest thing about that claim is that, for liberals, it may well be true.

Read the rest. Brilliant in style and content, as usual.

(Note to self: Purchase fancy soup tureen at resale shop, make soup, put on pearls and classy casual dress, serve soup to family.)

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Ad: Vote for Obama and "do it with a great guy"

It's now okay for the official campaign of the president of the United States to sell the idea of voting to young people by likening it to losing their virginity, portrayed as an objectively good thing, of course, as long as you "do it with a great guy," namely, Barack Obama. The astonishingly inappropriate OFA ad is not only creepy and weird but speaks volumes about the bubble inhabited by the campaign faithful, who apparently see their guy as a teen heartthrob, and by the president himself, who, to put it gently, has some maturity issues. Any normal adult male would be mortified by the ad, no? (A truly pathetic aside is that the ad is a knock-off of one produced for Vladimir Putin. What won't the Obama campaign do to get votes?) A book could be written about the cultural implications of "Your First Time" and this short piece from Erick Erickson would get it off to a good start:

If you needed further proof about just how much the President has cheapened the Presidency, consider his latest ad, which not only compares voting for him for the first time to losing virginity, but also ridicules those who might not want to lose their virginity to just any politician. This is the peer group peer pressure people across the political aisle have complained about in high schools for years. [. . .]

The reason Barack Obama is running this ad is because he is done trying to get independent voters. He’s given up. Despite campaign rhetoric about fighting for evangelicals, he’s given up there. He’s given up on Catholic voters. He’s given up on the South. He’s given up on men who have daughters. He’s given up on moms. He’s given up on everyone expect his core base of singles, gays, and minorities, including college kids he is desperate to get back to the polls.

The sad irony is that the president himself is a father of young daughters. Wouldn't it be nice if he remembered that and put it ahead of his ego and ambitions? More Erickson:

About the only honest bit of innuendo in the ad is that the people who voted for Barack Obama in 2008 have been screwed — economically. The problem for Barack Obama is that many of those people believe their vote for him was a one night stand that they’d prefer to forget. Additionally, we know now that Barack Obama, like that one night stand, probably won’t call you back. Just ask the American Consulate in Benghazi.

Read the rest.

Speaking of Benghazi, stay tuned for some tough questions for the president today from . . . uh, well, Sway Calloway of MTV, who'll be hosting "Ask Obama LIVE" from the White House:

<

I've got a couple of questions that Sway might squeeze in between embarrassing displays of presidential hipness and talking points about free contraceptives and tuition: Why no security for the embassy in Benghazi, and why no military help for the Americans under attack? A grown-up president would skip the preening and pandering and take those questions seriously.

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Jim Geraghty calls it "layers upon layers of creepy."

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Many thanks to Michelle Malkin and Bad Blue for linking.

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Embarrassed for my country [Updated]

This strikes me as a new low, even for Joe "National Embarrassment" Biden. The father of Tyrone Woods, former SEAL killed in Benghazi, describes his encounter with the President and Vice President as his son's body arrived back in the US:

The father of one of the former Navy SEALs killed in the terrorist attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya says President Barack Obama wouldn’t even look him in the eye and Vice President Joe Biden was disrespectful during the ceremony when his son’s body returned to America. He also says the White House’s story on the attack doesn’t pass the smell test.

Charles Woods, father of Tyrone Woods, called into “The Glenn Beck Program” on TheBlazeTV Thursday and recounted his interactions with the president, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Biden at the ceremony for the Libya victims at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. He told host Glenn Beck that what they told him, coupled with new reports that indicate the Obama administration knew very good and well, almost immediately, that a terrorist attack was occurring in Benghazi, make him certain that the American people are not getting the whole truth.

Vice President Biden, as he has become known to do, reportedly made a wildly inappropriate comment to the father who had just lost his hero son. Woods said Biden came over to his family and asked in a “loud and boisterous” voice, “Did your son always have balls the size of cue balls?”

“Are these the words of someone who is sorry?” said Woods. 

People who think Biden is a moderately deranged but harmless buffoon are wrong. "Creep" doesn't begin to cover it. Read the rest. Just sickening.

Then there's Obama, who also missed the memo on propriety.

And this is really a real ad from the real Obama campaign. For real.



No words.

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Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the link.

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Update: Post on "Your First Time" here. Also, Biden in two words: evil clown. The men I've spoken to since seeing The Blaze article last night both expressed a devout wish that Mr. Woods had gotten physical with Joey B.

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I should have included this what Mr. Woods says Hillary Clinton said:

After apologizing for his loss, Woods said Clinton told him that the U.S. would “make sure that the person who made that film is arrested and prosecuted.” 

Unreal.

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9/11/12 emails from Benghazi to White House

The mainstream media, showing signs of life, does some actual reporting on the Benghazi massacre. Reuters:

MISSIVES FROM LIBYA

The records obtained by Reuters consist of three emails dispatched by the State Department's Operations Center to multiple government offices, including addresses at the White House, Pentagon, intelligence community and FBI, on the afternoon of September 11.

The first email, timed at 4:05 p.m. Washington time - or 10:05 p.m. Benghazi time, 20-30 minutes after the attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission allegedly began - carried the subject line "U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Benghazi Under Attack" and the notation "SBU", meaning "Sensitive But Unclassified."

The text said the State Department's regional security office had reported that the diplomatic mission in Benghazi was "under attack. Embassy in Tripoli reports approximately 20 armed people fired shots; explosions have been heard as well."

The message continued: "Ambassador Stevens, who is currently in Benghazi, and four ... personnel are in the compound safe haven. The 17th of February militia is providing security support."

A second email, headed "Update 1: U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Benghazi" and timed 4:54 p.m. Washington time, said that the Embassy in Tripoli had reported that "the firing at the U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Benghazi had stopped and the compound had been cleared." It said a "response team" was at the site attempting to locate missing personnel.

A third email, also marked SBU and sent at 6:07 p.m. Washington time, carried the subject line: "Update 2: Ansar al-Sharia Claims Responsibility for Benghazi Attack."

The message reported: "Embassy Tripoli reports the group claimed responsibility on Facebook and Twitter and has called for an attack on Embassy Tripoli."

While some information identifying recipients of this message was redacted from copies of the messages obtained by Reuters, a government source said that one of the addresses to which the message was sent was the White House Situation Room, the president's secure command post.

Read the rest. Next question for watchdog media: What did Jay-Z know and when did he know it?

The Preezy of the United Steezy will be chatting with Jay Leno tonight. Maybe Jay will ask him why no rescue was attempted? If not, it's all up to you, Sway Calloway.

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Linked at MichelleMalkin.com -- thanks!

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Obama, hoist on his own bayonet

Or something. Close enough. TMZ:

We spoke with Dan Riker from Bayonet Inc. -- a leading military surplus outlet that specializes in bayonets -- who tells us he believes Obama's comment was "ignorant ... because our soldiers still use bayonets."

He adds, “[Bayonets] are still distributed to the military all the time -- he should get educated on it” 

A person who already knows everything is not going to be open to "getting educated" on anything.

But along those lines, have a graphic, via Pseud O'Nym:

Related post: Question for the President: Why no military rescue of Americans under siege in Benghazi?

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Update: Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell is not amused.

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Steyn: Cold Steel

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Charles C. W. Cooke on bayonets and submarines: CCWC 1, BO 0.

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Linked at MichelleMalkin.com -- many thanks!

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"Shockingly small"

Krauthammer said it:

Romney went large; Obama went very, very, small, shockingly small.

Exactly right. It looked like the roles of president and challenger were reversed, with all the defensiveness (mixed with generous measures of condescension, pettiness, and peevishness) on Obama's side. Romney was confidant, calm, and level throughout, and it worked.

One low-light for me: Obama's horribly failed attempt to show Romney up as a behind-the-curve ignoramus on military matters. Sarcasm and condescension are what Obama uses as substitutes for wit, and what they reveal about his character isn't attractive. But that's who he is, and he apparently thought this would be effective:


(Does anyone believe Obama knows how our military works? Me neither.)

I wish I could describe husband's reaction to that part (short version here), which I replayed for him a few times, just for fun. It involved some serious head-slapping and sputtering, including something about how many ships are needed to protect a single aircraft carrier. So, a lot, I guess, but surely our uber-competent Commander-in-Chief knows all about that? And he must also know that bayonets (see Steyn: Cold Steel) and horses (scroll down) are still in use, right? His comprehensive knowledge is just another reason to be #ProudofObama:

Jim Messina: "Tonight America saw its commander in chief and someone who’s not ready to be commander in chief." #ProudOfObama
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) October 23, 2012

Wishing won't make it so.

Michael Walsh on Obama's instructive little lecture:

First, speaking as the son of a Marine Corps officer and the brother of a Navy officer, I think Obama’s “horses and bayonets” wisecrack wasn’t his biggest miscalculation. All that did was lose him the military vote in the Norfolk area and thus, most likely, the state of Virginia. 

I suspect Virginia was already lost, but yeah, Team Obama most likely sealed that deal. Oopsie!

More from Walsh:

Rather, it was the weird way he kept conflating the war-fighting purpose of the military with “taking care” of the veterans after they come home. Military personnel deeply resent the implication, so earnestly peddled by the bed-wetting civilians at the New York Times, among others, that returning vets are just a PTSD psycho hair-trigger away from going postal. They’re soldiers, Mr. President, not crybabies.

My friend PoliticaljunkieMom took exception to that, too:

So you'll give that Vet a pick axe to rebuild roads? WTH!
— politicaljunkieMom (@pjMomblog) October 23, 2012

Another low point was this big fat lie, aptly illustrated below by reader Pseud O'Nym:

 

The big highlight for me was Romney's condemnation of Obama's apology tour. Watch the longer version here. Romney excels when, instead of dropping it, he gets specific ("derisive" and "dismissive") after Obama's lame denial (about 4 minutes in). Obama's second rebuttal, in which he tries to apply a tiny bandaid to his festering relationship with Jewish voters, was as ineffectual as his first.

As Krauthammer noted above, Romney deliberately steered clear of the Benghazi debacle. Perhaps it was wise to do so, but that doesn't let the liberal media or the president off the hook. The Commander-in-Chief still needs to explain why nothing was done to try to save American lives during the siege of Benghazi.

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Question for the President: Why no military rescue for Americans under siege in Benghazi?

Today's must-read: Bing West: First, Aid the Living

Our diplomats fought for seven hours without any aid from outside the country. Four Americans died while the Obama national-security team and our military passively watched and listened. The administration is being criticized for ignoring security needs before the attack and for falsely attributing the assault to a mob. But the most severe failure has gone unnoticed: namely, a failure to aid the living.

By 4:30 p.m. Washington time, the main consulate building was on fire and Ambassador Stevens was missing. In response, the embassy in Tripoli launched an aircraft carrying 22 men. Benghazi was 400 miles away.

At 5 p.m., President Obama met with Vice President Biden and Secretary of Defense Panetta in the Oval Office. The U.S. military base in Sigonella, Sicily, was 480 miles away from Benghazi. Stationed at Sigonella were Special Operations Forces, transport aircraft, and attack aircraft — a much more formidable force than 22 men from the embassy.

In the past, presidents had taken immediate actions to protect Americans. In 1984, President Reagan had ordered U.S. pilots to force an airliner carrying terrorists to land at Sigonella. Reagan had acted inside a 90-minute window while the aircraft with the terrorists was in the air. The Obama national-security team had several hours in which to move forces from Sigonella to Benghazi.

Fighter jets could have been at Benghazi in an hour; the commandos inside three hours. If the attackers were a mob, as intelligence reported, then an F18 in afterburner, roaring like a lion, would unnerve them. This procedure was applied often in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Conversely, if the attackers were terrorists, then the U.S. commandos would eliminate them. But no forces were dispatched from Sigonella. [. . .]

It is bewildering that no U.S. aircraft ever came to the aid of the defenders. If even one F18 had been on station, it would have detected the location of hostiles firing at night and deterred and attacked the mortar sites. For our top leadership, with all the technological and military tools at their disposal, to have done nothing for seven hours was a joint civilian and military failure of initiative and nerve.

Read the rest. If, at the debate tonight, neither Bob Schieffer nor Mitt Romney choose to ask any questions about Obama's shameful failure to act, all we'll have left (since the president declines to answer questions even from his own fawning liberal media) is Jay Leno. He'll be interviewing President Empty Chair on Wednesday. Not that it will do any good, but I suggest we bombard Leno's Twitter account with requests for him to ask the Commander-in-Chief why he went to bed that night without authorizing the US military to engage in a rescue of Amb. Stevens and company. That he didn't bother is a national disgrace, and it's being compounded by those in the liberal media who decline to dig and demand answers. To bore you all with the obvious, try to imagine the media firestorm had a debacle like this occurred under George Bush. 

See also Sharyl Attkisson: Could US military have helped during Libya attack?

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Steyn comments:

On 9/11/12, America had technological capability and military superiority, but no leadership. Instead, for eight hours, the most powerful men in Washington sat and watched but declined to act. And so in Benghazi as elsewhere in the Obama era, America is a spectator in its own fate. 

Read the rest.

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Christie on Obama's "leadership": "Blindly walking around the White House, looking for a clue"

Red meat for breakfast:

He doesn't know anything about leading. He's never led anything in his life. . . . The president doesn't know how to lead. . . . He's like a man wandering around a dark room, hands up against the wall, clutching for the light switch of leadership, and he just can't find it, and he won't find it in the next 18 days. Blindly walking around the White House, looking for a clue.

Amen.

Hat tip: Charlie Spiering

Many thanks to BadBlue for the link.

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Music break: Sinatra

I could look up some other versions by different singers but why bother?



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Saturday various & sundry

A few items of interest:

- Jake Tapper on the latest Benghazi fallout

If Obama has a shred of sense or humility he is dreading Monday's debate on foreign policy.

- Steyn: The Great Binder Blunder

Yes, indeed. Romney wants to return us to the 1950s, when a woman’s place was in the binder, when every predatory male had his little black binder, and condescending misogynists would interview applicants for lieutenant governor of Massachusetts and smirk, “Why, Miss Jones, you’re beautiful without your binder . . . ” It was the age of patriarchal sitcoms when the little lady would greet her man at the front door with his pipe and binders, where girls were told they could aspire no further than to ace Home Ec and thereby persuade some eligible young man to put a ring file on their finger.

Read the rest.

- Joe Biden is now (literally!) waving physical binders around at campaign appearances. (His presence on the stump is in itself a sign of desperation, no? He must offend at least twice as many people as he charms, right?)

- A must-read from Mark Kirsanow: What's Not Optimal

- Ouch:


What a falling off was there.

- A couple of fascinating pieces on the phenomenon known as the preference cascade. First, Jim Geraghty:

When campaign strategists and political analysts go out on camping trips — they do, you know — they end the night by gathering around the campfire and telling stories of a terrifying, unstoppable, voracious and mysterious force that preys on vulnerable political campaigns: the Preference Cascade. [. . .]

“An old-timer I know said he had the Preference Cascade gobble up one of his candidates once,” he said quietly. “He said it was like a nightmare. You think you’re doing fine, you have enough folks whose default setting is to vote for your guy, and then . . . BOOM. Suddenly, day by day, things get worse. The undecideds start jumping onto the bandwagon of the other guy, and they just won’t stop. They tune out your guy and just about everything he says. Attack ads that normally would be called ‘tough’ or ‘hard-hitting’ start getting mocked as ‘desperate’ or ‘flailing.’ Volunteers stop showing up. Your early voters taper off. It used to be nobody mocked your guy, and suddenly he’s the butt of the jokes of the comics.”

A shiver ran down the spines of the younger campaign strategists. “Does the Preference Cascade give any warnings?”

Bruce McQuain thinks so. Read them both.

- Polls: RCP has Obama and Romney at a dead heat nationally but I'm feeling optimistic. How about you?


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Bring on the binders!

Just so you know, I really can't get enough of this binders thing:

And there's a video! Please pass it on. We need to encourage these courageous ladies to carry on with their important work.

Husband wonders, why no vagina-costumed wimmin in binders?

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Oh boy. Steyn: Democrats find their issue, in a binder

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"Not optimal"

Let's start off with the remark in context, because Obama wasn't the first one to use the word. He was filling a chair on Comedy Central yesterday when Jon Stewart asked the following:

Stewart asked: 'Is part of the investigation helping the communication between these divisions? 'Not just what happened in Benghazi, but what happened within.

'Because I would say, even you would admit, it was not the optimal response, at least to the American people, as far as all of us being on the same page.'

Obama responded: 'Here's what I’ll say. If four Americans get killed, it’s not optimal.'

The problem is that, even in context, Obama's choice of words meshes perfectly with the detached, defensive, self-obsessed "leader" we've become accustomed to over the past four years. And he doesn't help himself as he goes on:

'We’re going to fix it. All of it. And what happens, during the course of a presidency, is that the government is a big operation and any given time something screws up.

Not "someone," but "something." While I agree that the government is so big it's impossible to run it properly, the disaster in Benghazi was preventable; people saw it coming and asked for more security, repeatedly. And does anyone take seriously Obama's promise to "fix it"? Given his record, there's no proof he knows how to fix anything, or even cares to try. But he certainly can't "fix it all" in Benghazi. This "screw up" resulted in the deaths of actual human beings.

Image courtesy of reader Pseud O'Nym. Click to enlarge. Steyn quote here.

More spin from our increasingly desperate Campaigner in Chief:

'Whatever else I have done throughout the course of my presidency the one thing that I’ve been absolutely clear about is that America’s security comes, and the American people need to know exactly how I make decisions when it comes to war, peace, security, and protecting Americans.

'And they will continue to get that over the next four years of my presidency.

Just words. President Obama's actions speak a lot louder. His response to the Benghazi massacre made his priorities crystal clear: 1) After learning that our embassy was under siege and our ambassador missing, he went to bed, and 2) he opted to fly off to Vegas to raise money for his reelection rather than meeting with national security advisers. And, oh yeah, 3) He lied repeatedly to the American people about the nature and cause of the lethal attack to protect his pathetic failure of a Middle East foreign policy. As to that, Ben Shapiro:

To reiterate: deaths of Americans are “not optimal,” and “bumps in the road.” A YouTube video is “bigotry,” “blasphemy,” “crude and disgusting,” an “insult,” and inhuman.

Okay, I see that Mark Steyn has commented. So let's cut to the chase:

But in this case, I think it gets to the heart of his callousness over the Benghazi incident. Four real people are dead. He staged a photo op over their caskets, which some of us thought was actually in the most ghastly bad taste apart from anything else. He peddled enough of these false narratives while at the same time claiming close, personal friendship with the slain ambassador. And I think he went off to Vegas and compared the dead ambassador’s sacrifice to the hard work of Obama 2012 campaign workers. And however he managed to gloss this and his apologists, the massed ranks of Candy Crowleys out there will find a way to spin it. But it gets to the heart of something cold and callous in the opportunism of this president.

Exactly right. And yes, President Eye-candy did in fact make that comparison in Vegas. Again, he makes his priorities clear, absolutely.

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Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for linking.
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Jeremy's bright future

This tweet from Jim Geraghty just reminded me of this hilarious answer from Obama to a college student worried about getting a job when he graduates:

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Jeremy, first of all, your future is bright, and the fact that you’re making investment in higher education is critical, not just to you but to the entire nation.

Now, the most important thing we can do is to make sure that we are creating jobs in this country, but not just jobs, good-paying jobs, ones that can support a family. And what I want to do is build on the 5 million jobs that we’ve created over the last 30 months in the private sector alone. And there are a bunch of things that we can do to make sure your future is bright.

Number one, I want to build manufacturing jobs in this country again. You know, when Governor Romney said we should let Detroit go bankrupt, I said, we’re going to bet on American workers and the American auto industry, and it’s come surging back. I want to do that in industries, not just in Detroit but all across the country. And that means we change our tax code so we’re giving incentives to companies that are investing here in the United States and creating jobs here. It also means we’re helping them and small businesses to export all around the world in new markets.

Number two, we’ve got to make sure that we have the best education system in the world. And the fact that you’re going to college is great, but I want everybody to get a great education. And we worked hard to make sure that student loans are available for folks like you, but I also want to make sure that community colleges are offering slots for workers to get retrained for the jobs that are out there right now and the jobs of the future.

Jeremy and his parents must be thrilled at the prospect of the young scholar requiring a year or two of retraining after acquiring his expensive 4-year degree in order to get him up to speed for the hypothetical factory jobs that will blossom under Obama's best-case employment scenario. Hope and Change!

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Post-debate murmurings

Much of the commentary this morning is on moderator Candy Crowley's intrusive mid-debate "fact-check" of Mitt Romney. (Video here.) Charles Krauthammer rightly observes that Crowley contaminated the issue with her inappropriate and misleading interference (which she partially clarifies here). See Jim Geraghty for a good discussion of that whole mess.

Romney certainly could have done better there, though it's tough when, as is so often the case in these debates, it's two against one. Along those lines, here's a graphic sent to me from reader Pseud O'Nym:

But there was more to the debate, and after reading the following excerpt (full disclosure: I fell asleep last night, not long after the "fist fight" segment), it's no wonder Romney is polling so much better than Obama on the economy. Via John Nolte:

Romney beat him senseless on all the important individual issues like the economy, health care, deficit, and taxes.

And via Ben Shapiro, here's how:

I think you know better. I think you know that these last four years haven't been so good as the president just described and that you don't feel like you’re confident that the next four years are going to be much better either. I can tell you that if you were to elect President Obama, you know what you're going to get. You're going to get a repeat of the last four years. We just can't afford four more years like the last four years.

He said that by now we'd have unemployment at 5.4 percent. The difference between where it is and 5.4 percent is 9 million Americans without work. I wasn't the one that said 5.4 percent. This was the president's plan. Didn't get there.

He said he would have by now put forward a plan to reform Medicare and Social Security, because he pointed out they're on the road to bankruptcy. He would reform them. He'd get that done. He hasn't even made a proposal on either one.

He said in his first year he'd put out an immigration plan that would deal with our immigration challenges. Didn't even file it.

This is a president who has not been able to do what he said he'd do. He said that he'd cut in half the deficit. He hasn't done that either. In fact, he doubled it. He said that by now middle-income families would have a reduction in their health insurance premiums by $2,500 a year. It's gone up by $2,500 a year. And if Obamacare is passed, or implemented -- it's already been passed -- if it's implemented fully, it'll be another $2,500 on top.

The middle class is getting crushed under the policies of a president who has not understood what it takes to get the economy working again. He keeps saying, "Look, I've created 5 million jobs." That's after losing 5 million jobs. The entire record is such that the unemployment has not been reduced in this country. The unemployment, the number of people who are still looking for work, is still 23 million Americans. There are more people in poverty, one out of six people in poverty.

How about food stamps? When he took office, 32 million people were on food stamps. Today, 47 million people are on food stamps. How about the growth of the economy? It's growing more slowly this year than last year, and more slowly last year than the year before.

The president wants to do well. I understand. But the policies he's put in place from Obamacare to Dodd-Frank to his tax policies to his regulatory policies, these policies combined have not let this economy take off and grow like it could have.

You might say, "Well, you got an example of one that worked better?" Yeah, in the Reagan recession where unemployment hit 10.8 percent, between that period -- the end of that recession and the equivalent of time to today, Ronald Reagan's recovery created twice as many jobs as this president's recovery. Five million jobs doesn't even keep up with our population growth. And the only reason the unemployment rate seems a little lower today is because of all the people that have dropped out of the workforce.

The president has tried, but his policies haven't worked. He's great as a -- as a -- as a speaker and describing his plans and his vision. That's wonderful, except we have a record to look at. And that record shows he just hasn't been able to cut the deficit, to put in place reforms for Medicare and Social Security to preserve them, to get us the rising incomes we need. Median income is down $4,300 a family and 23 million Americans out of work. That's what this election is about. It's about who can get the middle class in this country a bright and prosperous future and assure our kids the kind of hope and optimism they deserve.

It's the failed record, stupid. The RNC has wisely put much of that into an ad.

One more thing. I was awake for this part but I must have been groggier than I thought because Obama's "reasoning" on why gasoline is so painfully expensive made absolutely no sense to me:

PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, think about what the governor — think about what the governor just said. He said when I took office, the price of gasoline was 1.80 (dollars), 1.86 (dollars). Why is that? Because the economy was on the verge of collapse; because we were about to go through the worst recession since the Great Depression as a consequence of some of the same policies that Governor Romney is now promoting. So it’s conceivable that Governor Romney could bring down gas prices, because with his policies we might be back in that same mess. (Audience murmurs.)

Yeah, we murmured at home, too. Let's all murmur our way to the polls on November 6th.

Entire debate transcript here.

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Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for linking.
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The chair really is empty

Really and truly. Nothing like this should surprise us at this point. We already knew that President Eye-candy believes himself too brilliant for daily national security briefings, even on the day after our ambassador and three other Americans were murdered in Benghazi, but it appears he didn't manage to touch base with any members of his national security team on Sept. 12. His Vegas fundraiser took priority.

Axelrod Refuses to Say Whether Obama Met with Nat’l Security Team Before Heading to Las Vegas

Wallace followed up on Axelrod’s non-answer by asking whether the President managed to squeeze in a meeting with the National Security Council before jetting off to Las Vegas for a campaign rally.  Given Axelrod’s inability to produce a straightforward answer to the questions, it’s pretty clear the answer is “no.” 

Wow. Empty Chair can't even be bothered to go through the motions. He went to bed on September 11, 2012, knowing our ambassador to Libya was missing, and chose a campaign event over his real responsibilities the next day. (Video of Chris Wallace's interview with Axelrod at link above.)

Other Libya-related posts worth reading:

Powerline: What Happened in Benghazi This is a transcript of a State Department briefing given to reporters on October 9.

Andy McCarthy: If They’re Moving Their Lips, the Obama White House Is Lying About the Benghazi Massacre

Recommended by McCarthy, this from Stephen Hayes:

There are two possibilities. Either the intelligence community had a detailed picture of what happened in Benghazi that night and failed to share it with other administration officials and the White House. Or the intelligence community provided that detailed intelligence picture to others in the administration, and Obama, Biden, Clinton, Susan Rice, and others ignored and manipulated the intelligence to tell a politically convenient—but highly inaccurate—story.

If it’s the former, DNI James Clapper should be fired. If it’s the latter, what happened in Benghazi—and what happened afterwards—will go down as one of the worst scandals in recent memory.

Audio from Mark Steyn talking with Hugh Hewitt: Hillary Clinton used Libyan ambassador’s dead body ‘as prop to peddle a false narrative’

“If I were a Democrat — I don’t care what party this is,” Steyn said. “It doesn’t matter if they’re Republicans, if they’re Democrats or the Socialist Workers’ Party or the Raving Green Looney Party, if you support that party, you should be ashamed of a shriveled definition of politics, that it consumes even those who you claim are your friends, like Chris Stevens. He’s a real person. Sean Smith is a real person. Tyrone Woods is a real person. Glen Doherty — these are real people, not just props in Obama’s attempt to swing 1,200 soccer moms in southern Ohio.”

Listen to the rest.

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Linked by MichelleMalkin.com -- many thanks!
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Joe Biden's inappropriate affect

As in "a display of emotion that is out of harmony with reality or with the verbal or intellectual content that accompanies." It's all I could think of last night while watching VP Biden display rudeness, contempt, and yes, inappropriate mirth throughout his debate with Rep. Paul Ryan. The video below gives just a taste of his frequent broad, teeth-flashing grins and occasional body-shaking laughter as he reacted to Ryan making dead-serious points about the economy and our national security. A video that included every blinding, wildly out of place veneer-flash would be much, much longer.

Ha ha ha. That one about the dead-in-the-water economy gets me every time! And a nuclear Iran -- hilarious! By the way, his repeated line about Iran having "nothing to put it in" was pure nonsense. Biden was also 100% wrong in asserting that our embassies in Libya did not want more security. That line was jaw-dropping.

Later in the debate the man who is a heartbeat away from the presidency switched from dismissively giddy to bullying, and finally to whisperingly sincere and serious as he once again threw his Catholic faith under the bus in favor of legalized abortion.

Chris Wallace found Biden to be the most openly disrespectful, contemptuous presidential or vice presidential debater he's ever seen. But the liberal base adored Biden's air-sawing performance. Abe Greenwald nailed it with this tweet:

Progressives really think manic aggression equals a conclusive debate win. Weird. 

They seem to gravitate toward bullies, and prefer emotion (however phony or canned) over reason. 

See also John Hayward's Angry Joe and Martha vs That Nice Ryan Fellow from Accounting. 

Since I'm far from objective when it comes to Joe Biden, I can't guess whether he did himself or the ticket real harm here. But women in particular, they say, were especially offended by his rude behavior and impressed by the contrasting Ryan, who didn't lose his cool in the face of open disrespect. One tweet from Salina Zito:

Dem swing voter from Biden hometown "No mother in Scranton ever taught her son to behave that way and wipe that smrik off your face"
— SalenaZito (@SalenaZitoTrib) October 12, 2012

This mom agrees. He acted like a jerk throughout. But that's just Biden being Biden.

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Edited to add Mark Steyn's take: Laughing All the Way to the Bank Collapse 

Watch the OC Register this afternoon for Mark's weekly column. I'll be otherwise engaged this weekend and may not have a chance to link it here.

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Outrage located

Yesterday I asked where the outrage was over the debacle in Benghazi. Found it:



See also Peter Kirsanow: Return of the Weak Horse:

As Mark Steyn notes, almost every sentient being outside of the Obama administration and mainstream media suspected it was a terrorist attack within days of the event. Yet to this point, a full month after the attack, the commander-in-chief of the most powerful nation on earth has said nothing about what our response to the terrorists should be or will be. Not even a range of options. Apparently, that would be too provocative, insufficiently nuanced.

Instead, the Obama administration’s response to the brazen assault upon America has been to misrepresent its very nature to the American people, perpetuate that misrepresentation before the United Nations, buy air time on Pakistani television to grovel about the misrepresentation, and make further misrepresentations about the misrepresentation. 

Speaking of which: Jay Carney lies about previous lies about Benghazi. What a way to make a living, huh?

The truth matters: Mother of Slain State Dept. Official Tired of Being Lied To and Stonewalled by Obama Administration

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Video: Lara Logan on the Obama administration's "major lie" about Afghanistan and terrorism [updated]

"They want to destroy the United States, the West, and our way of life."

Related posts:
Lara Logan: ". . . there is a major lie being propagated"
Why the decrease in security in Libya?

And speaking of big lies, read this from Mark Steyn: Disgrace in Benghazi (cont'd):

The State Department has now conceded that there was no movie protest at all, and that it was, in fact, one of the most sophisticated military attacks ever launched at a diplomatic facility.

Both these very obvious points were surely known to Washington by 6 a.m. Eastern on Wednesday September 12, by which time the surviving consulate staff had been evacuated to Tripoli. Yet Ambassador Rice, President Obama, et al., were still blaming the video days later. Obama and Secretary Clinton always refer to Ambassador Stevens as “Chris” — Chris this, Chris that — as if he were a treasured friend or intimate. Yet they and the sad hollow men around them dishonor their “friend” in death.

Given the conflicting reports on the manner of his demise, any chance of an autopsy? Or is that also politically inconvenient?

And this: U.S. Security Official in Libya Tells Congressional Investigators About ‘Inappropriately Low’ Security at Benghazi Post: 

Nordstrom and the commander of a 16-member Security Support Team, Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Wood, heard that foreign fighters were flowing across the Egyptian border and were making their way across the border to the Libyan city of Derna – which is to the east of Benghazi — and from there were making their way to Benghazi. But State Department officials seemed oblivious to their Benghazi post’s vulnerability.

Nordstrom was worried -he did not know how much the Americans could rely on members of a local Libyan militia in Benghazi that provided security — the “17th of February Martyrs Brigade.” Mostly merchants and shopkeepers before the war, they seemed eager, but they hadn’t much experience and other than a daily $30 stipend for food from the U.S. Embassy, they hadn’t been paid in months.

Nordstrom had “no idea if they would respond to an attack,” he told investigators.

No one has been held remotely accountable, there have been no firings, and we still don't know how Amb. Stevens was killed, or what he went through during all those missing hours on Sept. 11. Where's the outrage, America?

Oh, but everything's hunky-dory if you listen to President Eye-candy. He actually said the following at a recent fundraiser:

"Now, four years ago, I made a few commitments to you. I told you I’d end the war in Iraq, and I did. I said I’d end the war in Afghanistan, and we are," said Obama. "I said we’d refocus on the people who actually attacked us on 9/11 -- and today, al Qaeda is on its heels and Osama bin Laden is no more."

Tell that to the families of Amb. Stevens, Sean Smith, Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty. 

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Why the decrease in security in Libya?

More questions on the debacle in Benghazi, but still no real answers:



(What, no questions about the War on Big Bird? And this Attkisson calls herself a journalist?)

See Allahpundit for much more on this terrible mess. It's incredible to me that no one has been fired over this; Americans, including the US ambassador, were killed. Why the decreased security? Someone has to answer that. Was it just bureaucratic stupidity and negligence, or part of the administration's effort to minimize the threat of terrorism? Lara Logan's recent remarks bear repeating:

“I chose this subject because, one, I can’t stand, that there is a major lie being propagated . . .” Logan declared in her native South African accent.

The lie is that America’s military might has tamed the Taliban.

“There is this narrative coming out of Washington for the last two years,” Logan said. It is driven in part by “Taliban apologists,” who claim “they are just the poor moderate, gentler, kinder Taliban,” she added sarcastically. “It’s such nonsense!”

Logan stepped way out of the “objective,” journalistic role. The audience was riveted as she told of plowing through reams of documents, and interviewing John Allen, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan; Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and a Taliban commander trained by al-Qaida. The Taliban and al-Qaida are teaming up and recruiting new terrorists to do us deadly harm, she reports.

She made a passionate case that our government is downplaying the strength of our enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as a rationale of getting us out of the longest war. We have been lulled into believing that the perils are in the past: “You’re not listening to what the people who are fighting you say about this fight. In your arrogance, you think you write the script.”

Our enemies are writing the story, she suggests, and there’s no happy ending for us.

Certainly, there was no happy ending for Amb. Stevens and the other three Americans who died at the hands of terrorists in Benghazi. It didn't have to happen.

What does President Eye-candy have to say about it? Well, not much of anything, I'm afraid. He's been awfully busy lately:

About 6,000 people were on hand for the concert, and general admission tickets started at $250. The president was also to deliver remarks at a fundraising dinner with 150 guests at celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck's WP24 restaurant. The price of admission there was steeper:  A cool $25,000 per person.

Before the concert, Obama's motorcade ran a gauntlet of gawkers and smartphone-camera wielders on the Avenue of the Stars, Wilshire Boulevard, and Sunset Boulevard, on the way to Hollywood power-player Jeffrey Katzenberg's home on Loma Vista Drive. Twelve high-dollar donors — they've maxed out in the 2012 campaign — were on hand to get a remarkable chance to talk to Obama and former president Bill Clinton behind closed doors.

"Remarkable"! Anyone have Katzenberger's number? Maybe Obama shared some thoughts on Libya with him.

Oh, hang on -- President Obama did have some words for the little people yesterday:

Sí, se puede. Sí, se puede. Sí, se puede! 

The election is four weeks from today. Here's hoping American voters decide to fill the empty chair.

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Ha! See Steyn: L is for Loser

“Vote Obama: He didn’t cancel Big Bird, just the Benghazi consulate security.”

“Vote Obama: He knows how small the PBS subsidy is, but he can’t get the national debt correct to the nearest six trillion – even when he’s the guy who spent it.”

I left out the punchline so click and read the rest.


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Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for linking.

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Lara Logan: ". . . there is a major lie being propagated"

Wow. Lara Logan, who in 2011 was brutally beaten, raped, and almost killed by a mob of animals as she covered the "Arab spring" in Cairo for CBS News, recently spoke very bluntly about the status of what we once called the war on terror and the Obama administration's white-washing of the dangers:

“I chose this subject because, one, I can’t stand, that there is a major lie being propagated . . .” Logan declared in her native South African accent.

The lie is that America’s military might has tamed the Taliban.

“There is this narrative coming out of Washington for the last two years,” Logan said. It is driven in part by “Taliban apologists,” who claim “they are just the poor moderate, gentler, kinder Taliban,” she added sarcastically. “It’s such nonsense!”

Logan stepped way out of the “objective,” journalistic role. The audience was riveted as she told of plowing through reams of documents, and interviewing John Allen, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan; Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and a Taliban commander trained by al-Qaida. The Taliban and al-Qaida are teaming up and recruiting new terrorists to do us deadly harm, she reports.

She made a passionate case that our government is downplaying the strength of our enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as a rationale of getting us out of the longest war. We have been lulled into believing that the perils are in the past: “You’re not listening to what the people who are fighting you say about this fight. In your arrogance, you think you write the script.”

Our enemies are writing the story, she suggests, and there’s no happy ending for us.

That sounds more like Mark Steyn than it does the watered-down, barely-there "reporting" we've been getting from the liberal media since Obama took office.

I imagine the murder of Ambassador Stevens and three other Americans in Libya struck a painful chord with Ms. Logan:

Logan even called for retribution for the recent terrorist killings of Christopher Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, and three other officials. The event is a harbinger of our vulnerability, she said. Logan hopes that America will “exact revenge and let the world know that the United States will not be attacked on its own soil. That its ambassadors will not be murdered, and that the United States will not stand by and do nothing about it.”

But "standing by and doing nothing about it" is precisely what President Obama is doing and no one expects anything different from him. By the way, are we ever going to find out what happened that night, and how Amb. Stevens really died? As far as I know, no one is even asking the questions.

If you come across a transcript of the entire speech, kindly pass it on.

Hat tip: Lonely Conservative

Many thanks to Michelle Malkin for the Buzzworthy link.

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Mea culpa: I omitted the link to the SunTimes story, which I've now added above.
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Bye bye Big Birdie?

Only in your dreams. Via Twitchy, the stuff nightmares are made of:

And he can't even move into his parents' basement, because he never had any! Perhaps he'll have to join the growing ranks of the disabled. Everybody's doing it. Maybe he can room with this guy, also on the government dole.

Oh, wait. Sesame Street is rolling in dough. Cutting government funding to Big Bird and company wouldn't come close to putting them out of business. That's just another falsehood liberals use to scare people into voting for them.

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Music break: Autumn Leaves

Music time. A video of Frank S. singing That's Life would tie in to Steyn's great (as usual) weekend column but it happens to be one of my least-favorite Sinatra songs. So I'll go with something seasonal. You can't go far wrong with Johnny Mercer.



This is very nice, too:


Another guitar version I'd embed if I could but I can't is this gem by Chet Atkins.

See also Willie Nelson's classic version. (Try to ignore the misspelling of "autumn." Unless it's a live version, I usually post the videos for the audio only.)

Frank's serious version is here, silly version here:



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After debate failure, Obama consults most trusted adviser

Himself! Because isolation and insularity have worked out so well for him thus far, right? Politico quotes an unnamed Obama confidant on President Eye-candy's post-debate demeanor. Having that famous first-rate temperament, he was just the right level of angry:

Nobody had to tell President Barack Obama he had whiffed when he walked off the stage in Denver Wednesday night — nor was he in the mood for a lot of advice.

“You could tell he was pissed,” said a person close to the president, “But it wasn’t like the end of the world. It was like, ‘That wasn’t good. The next one has to better.’ No apologies. No hand-wringing.”

That night, after a brief, terse chat with his advisers backstage at the University of Denver arena — “He had real clarity about what had happened,” one of them told POLITICO with a chuckle — Obama hopped in his limo, “The Beast,” and sped off to a nearby DoubleTree with wife Michelle.

He had had enough of politics for the night.

Like he does almost every time something goes wrong, Obama eschewed the mea culpas — he’s not big on apologies in front of his staff — and shut down to think things over with the adviser whose company he values most in times of trouble: himself.

LOL. And he's getting an inkling, perhaps (no, not really), of the way much of America has come to view his presidency:

At first, Obama didn’t think his performance was a complete disaster.

But he began Thursday morning by watching excerpts of his own performance and was especially struck by his own tentative, grim demeanor — especially when he and a more relaxed Mitt Romney were broadcast in split-screen. It was worse than he thought, according to one person close to the situation. He was subdued but positive on a conference call with staff.

We are assured that he didn't scream or break things, which makes me suspect his reaction was a trifle uglier than this leaked account.

The Politico account goes on to celebrate the "new narrative" of the Obama campaign, the subject of which is now reportedly "buoyant" after undergoing a "whipsaw transformation." Blah blah blah.

The polls are beginning to come in. A "whipsaw transformation" may indeed be underway, but not for Empty Chair, or at least not in a good way.

So the listless sourpuss who thought it would be enough to show up is a universally acknowledged failure. What strategy will he try in the next debate? Bigger, better lies and ramped-up nastiness are fine for campaign rallies but likely to backfire in a debate with a sharp, non-nasty opponent. "Buoyancy" and feigned hope that things will miraculously improve by trudging FORWARD down the same grim path can't appeal to anyone but true believers and those, er, let's call them low-information voters (who often lack the wherewithal to get themselves to the polls and figure out how to cast a vote).

Any other suggested approaches for a lousy speaker with a four-year record of failure who prefers not to study much?

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Many thanks to Mark Steyn, Michelle Malkin, and Bad Blue for linking.

Also linked by Larwyn -- thanks!
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