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From The Cafferty File:

President Obama has the chance to use tomorrow's State of the Union address to reset his agenda and refocus the attention of the American people.

It's been a rough week for the president and his party - since the Democrats lost control of Ted Kennedy's Senate seat in Massachusetts. Without their filibuster-proof majority, the president's signature issue of health care reform is on life support.

And the public doesn't appear too disappointed about that. A new poll shows 70 percent of Americans think the Democrats' loss of their super-majority is a good thing.

Meanwhile the president is expected to announce a three-year freeze on all non-security federal discretionary spending. He claims this could save $250 billion over 10 years - which is a start, but still just a drop in the bucket considering the country's $12.5 trillion debt.

And, expect some liberals - you know, the president's base - to push back hard. Already critics on the left are calling the proposed spending freeze a mistake of historic proportions. Some compare Mr. Obama to Republican Herbert Hoover, who failed to pull the U.S. out of the great depression.

Others liken this to Democrat FDR's move to cut back on government spending in 1937 - the economy tanked and so did the Democrats in the following midterm election.

There's lots more on the president's plate too, like the jobs situation - which doesn't show many signs of turning around. Unemployment is at 10 percent… up from seven percent when Mr. Obama took office.

Here’s my question to you: What should Pres. Obama emphasize in his State of the Union address tomorrow?

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From The Cafferty File:

CAFFERTY: The Republicans' victory in Massachusetts could very well be the final nail in the coffin for the Democrats' health care reform.

Exit poll data from one Republican firm shows the health care bill was the single most important issue to Massachusetts voters. This poll found 52 percent of those surveyed are opposed to health care reform; and 42 percent say they cast their ballot to help stop the overhaul.

Without the 60 vote filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, the Democrats are left with a few options - none of them all that good... and most involving complicated legislative procedures.

The house could pass the bill that cleared the Senate as is - but several House Democrats are suggesting they won't go for that.

The House could also pass the current Senate bill and then try to fix it with a procedure that only needs 51 votes to pass the Senate.

Or the Democrats could scrap what they have and just try to pass a bare-bones bill that includes some of the most popular initiatives.

Several senators - including democrat Jim Webb - are calling for health care reform to be suspended until Scott Brown is sworn in.

And it appears President Obama may be getting the message... he says that the Senate shouldn't jam health care through before Brown is seated: "People in Massachusetts spoke. He's got to be part of that process."

Here's my question to you: How should the Democrats proceed on health care now that they no longer have the votes to pass it in the Senate?

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Jack Cafferty asks if Harry Reid's career is over because of his statement that "Obama could succeed as a black candidate in part because of his light-skinned appearance"... and speaking without a "Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one. Jack Cafferty and his commenters for the most part he read on the air seemed to have it right. This was a tone deaf and antiquated choice of words that the Republicans are more than willing to make hay of. Why the party of the Southern Strategy thinks this ends well for them with this recent attack is beyond me.

What the media has failed to let everyone know for the most part is it was not the Democrats who forced Trent Lott out. As our own Jon Perr has noted, it was the Republicans.

Targeting Reid, Republicans Forget Bush Forced Lott Out:

The preposterous Republican campaign to equate Harry Reid's off-the-record "dialect" comment with neo-Confederate Trent Lott's lavish public praise of Strom Thurmond has shifted into overdrive. But even as Michael Steele, Jon Kyl and other leading lights of the Party of Hate press Reid like Lott before him to surrender his Senate leadership post, they conveniently omit President George W' Bush's essential role in forcing Lott's resignation. Just as important, the GOP is silent as to why Bush, desperate to improve the Party's image with minority voters, threw Lott under the bus.

Just days after Lott's infamous rebel yell in support of the legendary racist Dixiecrat Thurmond, the New York Times detailed the skullduggery by the Bush White House and leading Republicans to oust the Mississippi Senator. In an article titled, "Bush Orchestrates an Ouster," the Times reported.

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Transcript below the fold.

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Although I'm loathe to agree with Pat Buchanan or give Human Events any publicity, even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in a while, so I agree with Jack Cafferty. Buchanan is right on this one and how badly our rotten trade laws have hurt the United States. From The Cafferty File:

The past decade of self-delusion and self-indulgence has damaged the U.S. severely... and we may not be able to fix it.

In a column for the web site "Human Events," Pat Buchanan points to some staggering statistics about how far this country has fallen... including:

•The U.S. produced 32-percent of the world's gross domestic product back in 2000... it's now 24 percent - the sharpest decline by any country in modern history - except for the late Soviet Union

•The U.S. started the decade with a budget surplus... but ended with a deficit equal to 10-percent of GDP

•The economy was at full employment in 2000... now we have 10 percent unemployed... and another seven-percent that's underemployed or has given up looking for work...

•As many as one-third of all U.S. manufacturing jobs disappeared in the past 10 years, our national debt doubled... and China practically holds the mortgage on us

•Add in two wars, tax cuts under Bush, astronomical deficit spending, the housing crisis - and we have a real mess on our hands
Buchanan writes we did this all to ourselves believing we were "the greatest empire since Rome" and "the indispensable nation"... while buying into the global economy and free trade.

Meanwhile - prospects for robust and sustained economic growth in this new decade appear bleak. Top economists predict U.S. GDP will expand less than 2-percent per year for the next 10-years. They point to factors like a poor job market, a weak real estate sector and the banks.

Here’s my question to you: What’s to blame for America’s economic demise?

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December 01, 2009 CNN

From The Cafferty File:

It seems the Republicans can't agree on the party's proposed "purity test" which would bar financial support for candidates who don't meet 8 of 10 tests on social and fiscal issues...

These include:

•Supporting smaller debt and lower taxes, opposing President Obama's so-called "government run" health care plan, opposing amnesty for illegal aliens, opposing government restriction on gun ownership and supporting the Defense of Marriage Act.
Many Republicans - even some who claim they'd pass the purity test - say it's a bad idea because the party should offer a larger tent. With a Democratic White House that's growing more unpopular, and with Republicans hoping to pick up congressional seats next year, they say this purity test could just cause more inter-party fighting.

Plus it seems pretty hypocritical. Here are a few examples of Republican "purity":

•Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich admitted to cheating on his wife around the same time Congress was impeaching Bill Clinton for his affair with Monica Lewinsky.
•Former Congressman Mark Foley resigned after reports he sent sexually explicit instant messages to a male Congressional page.
•Idaho senator Larry Craig was arrested in an airport bathroom where an undercover cop accused him of soliciting sex.
•Or Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina who went MIA for several days over the summer, lied to his staff about his whereabouts - when he was really visiting his mistress in Argentina. His wife and kids left him, but he's still in office - although probably not for much longer.
These guys define Republican purity.

Of course - Democrats do this stuff too, but they're not the ones trying to sell political purity to the public.

Here’s my question to you: Do Republicans suffer a credibility problem trying to sell the idea of "purity"?

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September 30, 2009 CNN-- From The Cafferty File:

It’s been almost six months since the Obama administration lifted the ban on media coverage of the returning caskets of war dead… and the press mostly seems to have lost interest.

“The Examiner” reports how back in April, media outlets rushed to cover the first arrival of a fallen U.S. serviceman… 35 members of the press were at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware.

For the next returning casket — 17 media outlets showed up… that soon dropped to a dozen. The numbers kept shrinking until this month when only one news outlet was on hand to document the return of a casket bearing the body of a fallen Marine. That was the Associated Press.

In fact, the A-P has made it a point to be there at every arrival of a military casket where the family has granted permission — which is more than half of the time. The AP says it’s their responsibility to cover these returns:

“It’s our belief that this is important, that surely somewhere there is a paper, an audience, a readership, a family and a community for whom this homecoming is indeed news.”

But where are the rest of the media outlets who protested President Bush’s continued ban on showing flag-draped coffins returning to the U.S.?

This is especially troubling in light of what’s going on in Afghanistan. Nearly eight years into that war, 2009 will record the highest death toll.

Conventional wisdom suggests if the American people aren’t seeing the returning war dead — it’s difficult to comprehend the real cost of war.

Here’s my question to you: What does it mean when media coverage of fallen troops’ returning caskets has all but disappeared?

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I agree with Jack Cafferty on DeLay's appearance on Dancing With the Stars.

Cafferty: Did you show that Tom DeLay video yet. That's just disturbing...

Blitzer: If you haven't seen it...

Cafferty: It's just disturbing. It's very disturbing.

Blitzer: It takes guts to do that.

Cafferty: It takes something. I'm not sure guts is it.

Blitzer: Wild thing, you make my heart sing.

Cafferty: When he goes to prison they can show that, like the dances and stuff to the general inmate population.

h/t TPM Muckraker

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From The Cafferty File:

Tens of thousands of protesters marched on Washington Saturday — in the largest demonstration against Pres. Obama since he took office. The march leading to the Capitol was loud and animated and stretched on for blocks.

It seemed like the culmination of what started out as Tea Parties in the spring against the president’s economic stimulus package — and turned into health care protests over the summer.

These protesters have managed to give a voice to an opposition — something that Republicans have been trying mostly unsuccessfully to do.

The crowd was protesting a whole range of things — there were opponents of Mr. Obama’s tax, spending and health care plans, as well as those who are concerned about the government’s possible encroachment on their right to bear arms.

There were accusations of socialism and shouts of “liar.” Protests like this also attract the lunatic fringe — who questioned the president’s citizenship, compared his administration to Nazi Germany and even those who likened the president himself to an African witch doctor.

The White House says the protesters are “wrong” about health care and that the president does not think the protests and the growing conservative movement against him are motivated by racism.

Whatever the cause it’s worth noting that tens of thousands of people gave up their Saturday to march on Washington, D.C. against a man who has only been in office eight months.

Here’s my question to you: What message do tens of thousands of protesters marching on Washington send to Pres. Obama?

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From The Cafferty File:

Attorney General Eric Holder has named a federal prosecutor to investigate allegations of torture by the CIA. This coincides with the release of the 2004 Inspector General’s report of CIA interrogation tactics including waterboarding, staging mock executions, and threatening suspects with guns, power drills, and the safety of their family members.

It also mentions moving detainees to prisons in countries where torture is practiced. A redacted version of the report was first released after the ACLU sued last year but clearly the details were in the redacted sections.

This is all happening as the President announced a change in intelligence gathering — shifting the responsibility for terrorism interrogations to the FBI and away from the CIA.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney has said all along the Inspector General’s report would prove that interrogation tactics were successful in obtaining useful information from detainees that prevented additional attacks on the U.S. He says we should be praising the people responsible for conducting these interrogations. Cheney is also raising questions about the Obama Administration’s ability to protect Americans.

Nine Republican lawmakers have sent a letter to the Attorney General urging him not to launch a criminal investigation because it would jeopardize “security for all Americans, chill future intelligence activities,” and could “leave us more vulnerable to attack.”

The point of the investigation is to determine if laws were broken. For most people, when a law is broken there are consequences. The question remains whether the people who authorized all this stuff will ever be held accountable.

Here’s my question to you: Is naming a special prosecutor to investigate torture a good idea?

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August 24, 2009 CNN--From The Cafferty File:

More good news from our government. Friday the White House said deficits would climb to $9 trillion over the next ten years bringing the total national debt to $20 trillion a decade from now.

The government also announced Social Security recipients will get no cost of living adjustments during the next two years. That hasn’t happened since automatic increases were put into place in 1975. We can find hundreds of billions of dollars for AIG and Wall Street, but we can’t give our senior citizens a small cost of living increase in their social security. When does the revolution start?

We’re in the midst of a recession not seen since the great depression. Millions of Americans are out of work, unemployment has soared to 9.4 percent. Millions of good paying jobs have been have been shipped overseas never to return. And the manufacturing base that was once the engine of our economy is on life support. We simply don’t make “things” anymore.

We are in debt up to our eyeballs to China and other foreign countries as we increasingly look to them to finance out deficit spending. And through it all have you noticed? There’s no talk in Washington of cutting expenses or reducing the size of government.

There are unfunded liabilities in the tens of trillions of dollars for Medicare and Social Security; and no plan for how to pay for health care reform. Add in the drain of millions of illegal aliens and the fact that many states are bankrupt. We’re in serious trouble here.

Here’s my question to you: How is the American dream changing?

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From The Cafferty File:

The increasingly bitter battle over health care reform is making some people question President Obama’s leadership.

Critics suggest that when it comes to governing on issues like health care, the president is missing the smooth confidence and “Yes we can” charisma that got him elected.

New York Times Columnist Maureen Dowd writes of this debate that seems to be spinning out of control:

“President Obama has proven quicksilver instincts, but not in this case. You would think that a politician schooled in community organizing and the foul balls of a presidential campaign would be ready to squash this kind of nuttiness.” Dowd adds that Mr. Obama knows how to rise to the occasion, but he may be running out of time to do so.

On Salon.com, Camille Paglia criticizes the president for proposing only “vague and slippery promises” when it comes to health care. Paglia, who supports the president, faults him for handing over much of the debate to congressional leaders and also seeming to be in an unexplained rush to get something – anything – passed.
She compares it to the “massive boondoggle” of the economic stimulus package, which the president pretty much gave Congress free rein to turn into one big pork project.

And it’s not just health care. The list of issues this president faces is mind-boggling and probably unprecedented: from the economy and healthcare to immigration reform (which Mr. Obama now says won’t happen until next year) on the home front… to Afghanistan, Iran, and North Korea overseas.

Critics say on a lot of this stuff, the president is talking, not leading.

So here's the question: Is Barack Obama meeting your expectations as president?

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August 11, 2009 CNN from The Cafferty File:

First she called Pres. Obama’s health care plan “evil” and said it would create “death panels.” Now Sarah Palin is urging restraint at town hall meetings.

In comments on her Facebook page, the former governor of Alaska (who quit in the middle of her first term) says there are many “disturbing details” in the health care bill, but that “we must stick to a discussion of the issues and not get sidetracked by tactics that can be accused of leading to intimidation or harassment.”

Palin suggests the disruptive protests “diminish our nation’s civil discourse”, and says opponents shouldn’t give supporters of health care reform any reason to criticize them.

This is the same woman who a few days ago was spreading a false claim that Pres. Obama would force the elderly and disabled to appear before a “death panel.” She said a group of bureaucrats would get to decide whether people like her parents and her son, who has Down Syndrome, could get health care.

There’s no such provision in the bill. Gee, do you suppose she didn’t read it? Rather, a House committee passed a provision that would let Medicare reimburse seniors who want counseling on end-of-life issues. Once again, Sarah Palin’s version of reality is at odds with reality.

Whatever the reason, Palin backed down. See, she wasn’t getting much support. Several Republican governors distanced themselves from her, either refusing to comment or saying Palin could “speak for herself.” Not exactly the way to build that right-of-center coalition she keeps talking about.

SO HERE’S THE QUESTION: Are you interested in Sarah Palin’s views on health care reform?

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From The Cafferty File:

The news media are fighting to survive — and Dan Rather thinks the government should help rescue them. The former CBS anchorman is calling on President Obama to create a White House commission to help save the press.

Rather says such a commission could make recommendations on saving journalism jobs and creating new business models to help the industry survive. He says there are precedents for this kind of national commission — which have helped other failing industries.

Rather says the stakes couldn’t be any higher. He told the Aspen Daily News: “A truly free and independent press is the red beating heart of democracy and freedom.” And he says it’s not just journalists who should worry about the fate of the press; but rather every citizen.

He also talked about “the dumbing down and sleazing up” of what we see on the news; and blames that on the blurry line between news and entertainment — along with corporate and political influence on newsrooms. He claims about 80-percent of the media is controlled by a handful of corporations.

Rather also talks about the decline in investigative and international reporting; and says the loss of reporters covering the two ongoing wars hurts our nation.

The bottom line as he sees it: If somebody doesn’t step in and take action… the nation will lose its independent media.

Here’s my question to you: Should the federal government be involved in saving the news media?

Jack misses the mark here. It's not a matter of opinion whether 80 percent of the media is controlled by a handful of corporations. It's simply a fact. A better question would have been should these companies be broken up, but of course Jack would never be allowed to ask that question. His responses below the fold.

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From The Cafferty File:

Tomorrow marks an historic day for Iraq — the deadline for U.S. combat troops to pull out of its cities — and Iraqis are reacting with mixed feelings. The government has declared it a national holiday, with celebrations and military parades planned.

Many Iraqis say they’re glad to see Americans gone… that they will feel freedom and liberation. But, others aren’t so sure… One Baghdad resident says she feels “fear and horror”… and says many Iraqis will be “afraid of each other.” Others say they have come to depend on U.S. troops.

More than six-years after the invasion — the U-S says Iraqi forces are ready to take control of security in the cities. We’ll see soon enough. The last 10 days have seen several bomb attacks and assorted violence which has left more than 200 Iraqis dead and hundreds more wounded. Iraqi and U.S. officials had warned of an expected rise in attacks around this withdrawal date.

After the handover — U.S. forces will have to get permission from Iraq to go into cities or carry out operations in urban areas. There will be a small number of U.S. troops remaining in cities to train and advise Iraqi forces — but most of them will be in bases outside city limits.

There are about 131,000 U.S. troops still in Iraq. Most are supposed to leave the country by next summer, with all forces gone by the end of 2011.

Here’s my question to you: What is life likely to be like in Iraq without the presence of U.S. combat forces in its cities?

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From the Cafferty File:

Goldman Sachs is on track to make the biggest bonus payouts in the company’s 140-year history — according to a report in the British newspaper ‘The Guardian’. Goldman staff in London were reportedly told that they could expect record bonuses if the company — as predicted — has its most profitable year ever.The investment bank’s earnings are up for several reasons — including a lack of competition, along with increased revenue from trading foreign currency, bonds and fixed income products.

Just last week Goldman Sachs repaid the government the $10 billion in TARP money it had received — which would leave it free to do whatever it wants. Yet the company is denying these reports about record bonuses, calling them “pure speculation.” They say they won’t know what bonuses will be until the end of December.

But the company’s CEO told lawmakers recently that the firm is obligated to “ensure that compensation reflects the true performance of the firm and motivates proper behavior.”

Critics say the culture of excessive risk and excessive bonuses is what brought down the financial system in the first place. Also, in light of the ongoing recession, record unemployment, foreclosures and a whole range of economic woes… some might wonder if this would be the best time for Goldman to pay out record bonuses.

It’s believed the firm paid $1 million or more to nearly 1,000 bankers last year.

Here’s my question to you: What message would it send if Goldman Sachs makes the biggest bonus payouts in its 140-year history?

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