War on Sugar in Schools Not Achieving Results

Despite bans on drinks containing sugar in schools, children are still drinking them.

health experts who would like to reverse the rise in childhood obesity. But a new study has some discouraging news: Students in schools that limited sales of soda and other sugary beverages on campus consumed just as many of the drinks, overall, as students in schools without any such restrictions.

Naturally, for anyone that seeks to control the lives of others by deciding what they consume, the problem as they see it is that we have a free society.

“in the contemporary ‘obesogenic’ environment, youth have countless ways to obtain SSBs through convenience stores, fast-food restaurants, and other food outlets in their community.”

We can't have that. Expect more calls for higher taxes on sugary drinks, which are apparently defined as just about anything containing sugar. Even with draconian policies in seven states which ban "all manner of sugar-sweetened beverages" in school, the bottom line is that these restrictions are achieving nothing -- aside from probably annoying kids.

[According to]all researchers from the University of Illinois at Chicago who have been studying these issues for years. “The public health impact of these policies may be minimal.”

Don't worry, that won't stop them from coming up with new ones.

Gilad Shalit Prisoner Swap

Israel's deal with Palestinians to release kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit, held for five years by Hamas, demonstrates the lengths the Jewish state will go to take care of its service members.

His release by the militant Palestinian group Hamas launched a prisoner swap that ultimately will include the release of 1,027 Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails. A total of 477 prisoners were freed Tuesday, after Shalit was returned to Israel.

Over a thousand prisoners released to free one soldier, including hundreds of terrorists who will probably kill more Israelis. Not everyone in Israel is happy.

Shalit’s father, Noam, appeared Monday before the Israeli Supreme Court, where he came face to face with relatives of victims of terrorist attacks who oppose the deal. Several relatives filed motions urging the court to annul the deal, and according to Israeli news reports, some angrily confronted the soldier’s father.

I understand how they feel. I'd have a pretty hard time supporting such a one-sided deal. According to the article, Hamas is celebrating the agreement as a great victory, for good reason. Kidnapping Shalit worked out really well for them. Plus, they now know that if they need to spring a bunch of their people from Israeli jails, they just need to kidnap another Israeli soldier.

The Latest in Our Ongoing War With Iran

The revelation of an Iranian plot to kill a Saudi diplomat on American soil was not particularly surprising. The U.S. has been engaged in a low-level war with Iran for years, although the war appears to be pretty one-sided, with Iran actively working to kill American soldiers, and doing everything possible to create anti-American proxies in Iraq -- among other things. Iran has been allowed to get away with this, despite its military weakness compared to the United States. Now it is true that there have been covert actions against Iran too, such as the killing and kidnapping of nuclear scientists, and cyberattacks aimed at its nuclear program. The level of U.S. involvement is unclear, but it is likely that U.S. allies such as Israel or Saudi Arabia might be behind them. Overall though, the U.S. has tolerated open hostility and acts of war from a third-rate power.

Some experts are surprised and skeptical about this plot's links to the Iranian government, because it seems reckless and somewhat amateurish. They could be right, and it might have been some sort of rogue operation. But I doubt it. I find it unsurprising that Iran might engage in what seems like a reckless escalation of the war, because it has little reason to fear any sort of significant response. It is well aware that the U.S. is preoccupied with various major issues, and that it is led by an extremely weak president, who has been nothing but spineless toward all enemies other than Al Qaeda and its affiliates. You have only to look at Obama's weak response to this situation. The U.S. government openly accuses Iran of trying to assassinate an allied diplomat on American soil, but then does nothing other than run to the UN and try to get more useless sanctions. Why should the Iranian rulers fear that sort of toothless action?

This situation demonstrates yet again that the Obama administration is incompetent when it comes to foreign policy. You don't accuse a hostile country of an act of war unless you are prepared to respond with force. A strong accusation combined with a weak response does nothing other than increase hostility while making you appear weak. One thing Obama is very good at is making the U.S. look weak.

Foreign Policy Incompetence - Pakistani Edition

The Obama administration gets much well-deserved criticism for its incompetent and ineffective domestic policies. But it is always worth pointing out that administration incompetence also extends to foreign policy. Today we had another reminder.

Last Thursday Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, touched off a major diplomatic crisis with Pakistan when he said the following things:

[He] told the Senate Armed Services Committee that Pakistan’s spy agency was tied to the attack on the U.S. embassy last week as well as the truck bombing on Sept. 10 that wounded 77 American soldiers. ... Mullen told the committee the Haqqani network “acts as a veritable arm” of Pakistan’s intelligence agency.“In choosing to use violent extremism as an instrument of policy, the government of Pakistan, and most especially the Pakistani army and ISI, jeopardizes not only the prospect of our strategic partnership but Pakistan’s opportunity to be a respected nation with legitimate regional influence,” Mullen said. “They may believe that by using these proxies, they are hedging their bets or redressing what they feel is an imbalance in regional power. But in reality, they have already lost that bet.”

These are things that should never have been said unless A) we meant them, and B) we were prepared for the obvious Pakistani reaction and felt that somehow they would produce positive results. Apparently the Obama administration was too clueless to figure that out. Now that the damage has been done, it is trying to backtrack. From the first NYT link,

Asked on Wednesday whether he agreed that the Haqqani network was “a veritable arm” of the ISI, Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, told reporters, “It’s not language I would use.”

He pivoted quickly to say the Obama administration is united in its assessment that “links” exist between the Haqqani network and the ISI, “and that Pakistan needs to take action to address that.”

If that wasn't the language they wanted used, it shouldn't have been used by the senior military leader of the United States. The damage is already done.

Obama's Latest Anti-Business Proposal

I wrote about the president's new massive government spending proposal, misnamed as a job's bill, a couple of weeks ago. Now we find that it includes an idea that would encourage frivolous lawsuits against employers.

Mr. Obama’s jobs bill would prohibit employers from discriminating against job applicants because they are unemployed.

Under the proposal, it would be “an unlawful employment practice” if a business with 15 or more employees refused to hire a person “because of the individual’s status as unemployed.”

Unsuccessful job applicants could sue and recover damages for violations, just as when an employer discriminates on the basis of a person’s race, color, religion, sex or national origin.

Naturally this idea also involves giving more power to the government to scrutinize business hiring practices.

Under Mr. Obama’s proposal, the employment commission would be given new power to enforce the proposed ban on discrimination against the jobless.

What a great idea. If unemployed people fail to get a particular job, why not give them the ability to allege that they were discriminated against because they are unemployed? I'm sure greater government involvement and the threat of lawsuits if they turn someone down will do wonders to make businesses more interested in hiring instead of just deciding to do without that extra worker. Businesses love attention from government agencies and the threat of lawsuits.

Church or Jail

Bay Minette, Alabama is letting non-violent misdemeanor offenders decide between jail & fines or going to church for a year. That's right, you can avoid jail time and fines by agreeing to attend church for a year.

If offenders select church, they'll be allowed to pick the place of worship but must check in weekly with the pastor and police. ... If the one-year church attendance program is completed, the offender's case will be dismissed.

I had two main thoughts when I read this story. First, I found it pretty funny that this city judge is giving the impression that going to church every week is roughly equivalent to jail time. But after my initial amusement, came the reality that this is a ridiculous punishment that lets criminals off easy. I'm all for alternative sentencing for non-violent offenders. But how is attending church once a week for a few hours in any way equivalent to serving jail time and paying fines? I'm an atheist and I'd take that deal in a second. You can just sit in the back and take nap during the service, daydream, or whatever. It's not a punishment. Amazing as it may seem, many people actually like going to church. Depending on the church you pick, it might have good music, food and other benefits. You can steal things, get DUIs, and commit various other misdemeanors and get off with just going to church weekly?

Taxing the Rich

Once again President Obama is engaging in standard class warfare tactics by proposing new taxes on the rich in general -- as defined by him -- and on millionaires in particular, pretending that the people who already provide the vast majority of U.S. tax money are somehow not paying their fair share. It's such a transparent political ploy that you might think such demagoguery wouldn't get any traction at all. Yet it does. Why?

Demonizing the rich and proposing to forcibly extract more money from them appeals to at least two powerful human motivators: envy and self-interest. And it has the virtue of simplicity. Many people are envious of those who make more money than them, even though the relative difference doesn't affect their lives in the least. They are reflexively suspicious of rich people, and tend to see them as cheating somehow, people who are gaming the system to get more than their fair share. Class warfare naturally appeals to those with that attitude. It's a lot easier to believe bad things about the rich than to accept that in most cases they are just smarter and harder-working. Envy helps explain how it is possible to believe that people who pay more in taxes than you'll earn in your lifetime are in some way not paying enough.

Even those less envious and hostile to the rich can be taken in by class warfare schemes out of self-interest. Here you have those who think that if the government raises taxes on the rich, they won't need to tax ordinary people any more. Why should those of us who aren't rich care about people with tons of money? They've got more money than they'll ever spend, why not get more tax money from them? Just leave us alone. In my experience this is a common attitude among those who don't really follow politics closely, and know little about economics. Raising taxes on the rich sounds like a nice simple solution. It's clear and easy to understand.

Envy, self-interest, and simplicity to the point of simple mindedness, those things are the underlie the appeal of raising taxes on the rich. This latest attempt by Obama is no different. Fortunately the GOP controls the House. Thanks to all those who voted Republican in 2010 and have helped prevent Obama from inflicting even more damage on the U.S. economy.

Rumsfeld and the New York Times

Donald Rumsfeld canceled his subscription to the New York Times in response to Paul Krugman's outburst of Bush Derangement Syndrome on September 11. I find Rumsfeld's reaction silly. Krugman has been writing columns for the Times for quite awhile, and he's been a member of the leftist fringe since he started. No one, including Rumsfeld, should have been surprised or shocked that Krugman put up a BDS-influenced post on 9/11. You can find the same sort of attitudes on various leftist sites.

When you read the New York Times you know what you are getting: one of the world's most prestigious newspapers that delivers the news through the lens of a liberal worldview. But despite the editorial bias, it delivers a huge volume of news, including much high-quality reporting. Like most papers, it has various columnists, some good, some bad, and some whose quality differs depending on the day and/or topic. When you read Paul Krugman on economic issues, you also know what you are getting. His largely one-note economic perspective can be educational as a contrast to approaches that are more likely to be in favor on the right. But when he writes about political topics, Krugman is nothing more than a typical, garden-variety leftist, rarely capable of making a serious argument, and useful only as an object of ridicule. I'm not sure why someone like Rumsfeld would even take him seriously. Canceling your subscription to the Times because of one idiotic post by Krugman is a silly overreaction that makes Rumsfeld look petty and thin-skinned, and inadvertently gives Krugman more stature than he deserves.

More of the Same from Obama

President Obama unveiled his new $447 billion government spending package, falsely labeled as a "jobs" program. In Obama-world there is no problem that can't be fixed by more government spending. It doesn't matter that it didn't work before, we need more of the same. Here are the actual proposals.

1. Cutting the 6.2% payroll tax paid by both employees and employers to 3.1% next year. Wow, a temporary payroll tax cut. I'm sure that will do a whole lot.

2. Spending $140 billion to save the jobs of state and local teachers and first responders, repair deteriorating schools and rebuild roads, railways and airports. If federal money is required to "save" these jobs because the states are unwilling or unable to pay for them, then maybe those jobs aren't really that necessary. The infrastructure spending will most likely be political payouts to buy votes in various areas.

3. Extending jobless benefits to the unemployed, with special emphasis on those out of work at least six months and those in low-income neighborhoods. Let's see if I have this straight. As part of a supposed jobs package, we are going to pay people who don't have jobs. Yeah, that makes sense.

In summary, for our $447 billion in new spending we get a temporary payroll tax cut, money for some government jobs, money to repair some government buildings, some work on various infrastructure projects, and a bunch more money paid to the long-term unemployed.

UPDATE

Here is a good summary of the actual speech.

"Smart Power" Isn't Smart or Powerful

Hillary Clinton made the laughable claim that the U.S. is employing "smart power" with regard to Libya and Syria. With all the focus on President Obama's miserable handling of domestic policy, it's always worth reminding people that this administration is almost as clueless when it comes to foreign affairs. Here's Clinton on what she thinks we are doing in Libya.

Libya was a study in the use of "strategic patience," whereby the United States resisted the impulse for immediate intervention and instead helped to build support for the country's nascent opposition, which the U.S. now recognizes as Libya's legitimate government. She said the unprecedented NATO-Arab alliance protecting civilians on the ground was a key result of the tactics of smart power.

Here's what we are actually doing in Libya. Despite already being involved in two wars, fighting Islamist terrorists across the globe, and mired in an economic mess, we decided to intervene in the Libyan civil war. This intervention was completely unnecessary, particularly given that Britain and France were already going to intervene. Not only did we do so anyway, but we created a terrible precedent at the UN by signing on to a resolution that could easily be directed against America in the future. In addition, once in the war, we refused to win it by taking the obvious action of trying to eliminate Gaddafi. We are basically helping prolong a civil war, wasting money, and keeping forces tied down in yet another open-ended commitment. If that's a smart use of American power, I'd hate to see a dumb one.

In Syria, we are doing essentially nothing. In my opinion that's actually pretty smart. But it has nothing to do with exercising some sort of power. We are refusing to employ our power at all. Hillary Clinton even thinks it would be going too far if we called for Assad to step down. And then there's this gem from the Secretary of State that demonstrates yet again how Obama's foreign policy is based primarily on naivete and wishful thinking.

"I think this is smart power, where it is not just brute force, it is not just unilateralism," she said. "It is being smart enough to say you know what we want a bunch of people signing out of the same hymn book and we want them singing a song of universal freedom, human rights, democracy, everything that we have stood for and pioneered over 235 years."

Brute force is an actual application of power. It can be smart or it can be dumb. It depends how and why it is employed. Doing things unilaterally is sometimes necessary and can also be smart, and in American interests -- which aren't exactly a priority for the Obama administration. What is "universal freedom" supposed to be? Maybe it's the same thing as "a universal set of values and interests."

"The United States stands for our values, our interests and our security, but we have a very clear view that others need to be taking the same steps to enforce a universal set of values and interests,"

There is obviously no such thing as universal values or interests. But Clinton wants to "enforce" them somehow. Hopefully we can replace the Obama administration with one that at least grasps the basic fact that different states have different interests, and that values vary wildly across the globe.

$350 Million for Malawi?

According to the New York Times, yesterday the U.S. froze a $350 million dollar "grant" to Malawi.

A senior American official, Sheila Herrling, said Tuesday that the Millennium Challenge Corporation, a federal agency, was “deeply disturbed” by accusations that the police had fired live rounds on unarmed people last week, and by claims that press coverage of the two-day demonstrations had been suppressed. The $350 million grant from the corporation, which was announced only in April and was to be disbursed over five years for electricity generation, is a large amount of money for Malawi, whose annual budget is about $2 billion.

I'd be willing to bet that many Americans would be very surprised to hear, especially given our own fiscal situation, that until this hold we were going to give $350 million dollars of U.S. taxpayer money to Malawi. Even I was surprised at the amount, although I know that we just hand out cash like candy to pretty much anyone, even to hostile populations like the Palestinians and the Pakistanis.

Nashiri Cole Bombing Trial

Abd al Rahim al Nashiri faces a military trial accused of bombing the U.S.S. Cole back in 2008. This case illustrates the difficulty inherent in trying to use normal legal rules -- even military court -- to deal with foreign terrorist enemies. Nashiri was waterboarded, held in a secret prison, and subjected to other harsh interrogation techniques, so naturally his lawyers say the case is "tainted." They know he isn't going free, but they argue to spare him the death penalty. Under normal legal rules the case is definitely tainted, as long as you forget that this man isn't an American citizen or a legal resident, but a foreign enemy that attacked a U.S. warship that wasn't even engaging in any warfare at the time. I give him credit for striking a military target instead of the usual preferred soft targets, but summary execution was still warranted for what he did.

Ideally Nashiri should have been quietly executed years ago, after we extracted all useful information, preferably by using rendition to send him someplace that would do it for us. But now, years later, putting him on trial is a farce.. After three years we are going to charge him with crimes and ask for the death penalty? There's no purpose to this trial. He's been sitting in jail since we captured him, and should continue to sit until he dies. The trial gives a veneer of legalism to our continued confinement of a dangerous Al Qaeda member. But it fools no one. People like me see it as unnecessary, and people who think Nashiri has rights are going to view it as a kangaroo court rubber-stamping a preordained outcome.

Mitch McConnell: Typical Weasel Politician

The GOP establishment is not more much interested in tackling the nation's financial problems than Democrats, who are totally uninterested. This is particularly true in the Senate, where Republican minority leader Mitch McConnell and other GOP senators are considering a new plan to weasel out of any responsibility, purely in the interests of political expediency.

the debt ceiling would grow in three increments over the remainder of this Congress unless lawmakers approve a veto-proof resolution of disapproval.

In effect lawmakers would be surrendering the very power of approval that the GOP has used to force the debt crisis now. But by taking the disapproval route, Republicans can shift the onus more onto the White House and Democrats since a two-thirds majority would be needed to stop any increase that President Barack Obama requests.

McConnell and his cohorts are well aware that Obama and the Democrats don't want to make any sort of serious cuts, and that the only reason cuts are even under consideration is because of the threat of the debt ceiling. The party of big government isn't about to cut government in any substantial way. But rather than forcing the president to make cuts, they'd rather just give up -- as long as they can do it in such away as to place the blame solely on Obama.

Bad Ideas from American Atheists

American Atheists is not doing atheists in the U.S. any favors. I wrote about one of their particularly stupid protests earlier. Now they will be flying banners over public events on the Fourth of July.

The banners will read either “God-LESS America” or “Atheism is Patriotic,” as a part of a campaign to defend civil rights of atheists and dispel the mentality that it’s un-American to be a non-believer.

How do these banners accomplish either of those goals? "God-LESS America" is just stupid and will serve no purpose other than to irritate people who already don't like atheists and think we are all pushy jerks. And how about "Atheism is Patriotic"? It is? Atheism has nothing to do with patriotism either for or against. Why not do a banner saying "Atheists are patriots too -- Happy 4th!" or something similar?

“This campaign is not about pushing the ‘atheist agenda’ or shoving our views down people’s throats,”

Really? That's exactly how it is going to be received. The people running American Atheists must be totally clueless.

Contrast American Atheists clumsy, ill-advised banners with the Freedom From Religion Foundation's billboard campaign. I've had some criticism for this group too, but at least their messages are well-thought out. For example, they have used the theme "I can be good without God," which is not only true, but might actually make someone think. There are more examples here, from their Tulsa campaign. I'm skeptical about the usefulness of this type of advertising in general, but if you are going to do it, the FFRF beats AA hands down.

War Powers Act Lawsuit

The big political news of the day is that a bi-partisan group of ten congressmen have filed a lawsuit against president Obama over the Libyan intervention, claiming that his actions violate the War Powers Act. In response, the administration claims that the War Powers Act doesn't apply because U.S. involvement isn't serious enough to even warrant being covered.

We are saying the limited nature of this particular mission is not the kind of ‘hostilities’ envisioned by the War Powers Resolution.

Although I'm strongly opposed to the Libyan intervention because I don't think it is in the U.S. interest, I also oppose this lawsuit for the following reasons.

1. The War Powers Act itself is constitutionally dubious at best. As a general rule, I oppose its use.

2. I believe that as Commander in Chief the president should have wide latitude in the use of U.S. forces, even though I am against this particular operation. I'm not in favor of tying the president's hands when it comes to whether or not to employ the military in foreign policy situations.

3. Whether or not the president can commit troops to a foreign intervention without Congressional approval is not something that should be the subject of a lawsuit, or that a federal judge should have any authority to rule on. If Congress wants to block the Libyan operation they can just cut off funding. And if they think the president is actually breaking the law, or violating the Constitution, they can impeach him.

4. Because Congress as a whole is not willing to exercise the above remedies, this action by only 10 of its members amounts to a stunt. It is a typical minority attempt to circumvent the normal functioning of our democracy by looking for a judicial fiat.

Obama's Mideast Speech

I found nothing particularly surprising in the president's speech. It was the sort of thing I would expect from someone whose foreign policy ideas are based largely on an exaggerated notion of the power of talking and on wishful thinking. Like some freedom agenda promoters on the right, Obama seems oblivious to the fact that democracy in other states is not necessarily in the U.S. interest. He dismisses such concerns as temporary, and exhibits a sort of childlike faith in democracy. As usual he shows no understanding of the difference between the collapse of regimes favorable to the U.S., and of those who are hostile.

Obama's remark about using the 1967 borders as a basis for negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians has stirred up a hornets' nest. Jeffrey Goldberg at the Atlantic points out that this idea is nothing new to U.S. policy.

This has been the basic idea for at least 12 years. This is what Bill Clinton, Ehud Barak and Yasser Arafat were talking about at Camp David, and later, at Taba. This is what George W. Bush was talking about with Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert. So what's the huge deal here? Is there any non-delusional Israeli who doesn't think that the 1967 border won't serve as the rough outline of the new Palestinian state?

As I wrote in the previous post, I think a Palestinian state is a very bad idea and should not be U.S. policy. But I agree with Goldberg that there has been an overreaction to this particular comment by Obama. The whole so-called "peace process" has been a bad joke for a long time.

Much more disturbing than the comment about the 1967 borders, is Obama's call to spend even more U.S. money in the region -- as if we aren't spending enough already. In Obama's world, there is nothing that can't be improved by more government spending, and this applies externally as well as internally.

We will continue to make good on the commitments that I made in Cairo – to build networks of entrepreneurs, and expand exchanges in education; to foster cooperation in science and technology, and combat disease. Across the region, we intend to provide assistance to civil society

He goes on to give a laundry list of things we are going to be wasting money on, no doubt in many cases to the benefit of people who despise us.

Least Deserving of Statehood

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas wrote an article in the New York Times called, "The Long Overdue Palestinian State." It's about what you'd expect. There's an excellent rewrite at Elder of Ziyon that makes it into something more truthful. One of the stupidest U.S. foreign policy positions is our support for the so-called "two state solution." It is difficult to think of any people that deserve a state less than the Palestinians. What have Palestinians ever done that makes supporting their statehood a good idea? Is a legacy of international terrorism, virulent anti-Semitism, celebration of murders and murderers, endemic violence, corruption, repression, irrational demands and complete intransigence when it comes to peace negotiations a good recipe for statehood? How about rule by murderous factions that are distinguished only by one being more openly murderous and anti-Semitic than the other?

A Palestinian state is not and has never been in the interests of the United States. We have no interest in creating another hostile state. No matter how much we help the Palestinians, we will never get any credit for it, because we support their great enemy Israel -- which makes us ultimately their enemy too. Oh they'll gladly take our money as long as we are stupid enough to give it to them, but it won't make them like us. I have little doubt that many Palestinians probably laugh privately at our foolishness.

Terrible Supreme Court Decision

If you hadn't noticed, the Supreme Court just gave police wide-latitude to break into homes without search warrants. Why? In the service of the drug war, of course. And this wasn't just a conservative reflexive pro-police decision, it was an 8-1 majority.

Ruling in a Kentucky case Monday, the justices said that officers who smell marijuana and loudly knock on the door may break in if they hear sounds that suggest the residents are scurrying to hide the drugs.

Yeah, there's no possibility for abuse there is there? Smell and hearing are extremely subjective. If the police want to go in badly enough, what's to stop them from saying they thought they smelled drugs, or they believed they heard someone doing something to destroy evidence? The Supreme Court has given them a ready excuse for violating the Fourth Amendment. Only one justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg of all people, seems to understand that.

she feared the ruling gave police an easy way to ignore 4th Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures. She said the amendment's "core requirement" is that officers have probable cause and a search warrant before they break into a house.

"How 'secure' do our homes remain if police, armed with no warrant, can pound on doors at will and …forcibly enter?" Ginsburg asked.

Regardless of the merits of the original case in question, this decision sets a really bad precedent.

Obama's Christian Pandering

President Obama has never been known for his religiosity. But recently he turned into an effusive Christian, quoting the Bible, and speaking the sort of religious language that was familiar to me growing up in a conservative Christian household.

Using the kind of personal religious language that he had once shied away from in public, Obama spoke of "the pain and the scorn and the shame of the cross" in an Easter prayer breakfast for about 150 guests and staff.

"And we're reminded that in that moment, (Jesus) took on the sins of the world -- past, present and future -- and he extended to us that unfathomable gift of grace and salvation through his death and resurrection,"... Obama quoted from the Book of Isaiah -- "he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities," ... "This magnificent grace, this expansive grace, this `Amazing Grace' calls me to reflect," Obama said. "And it calls me to pray. It calls me to ask God for forgiveness for the times that I've not shown grace to others, those times that I've fallen short."

Am I being unfair to Obama when I call this pandering? I don't think so. People don't suddenly start talking this way unless they undergo some sort of conversion. The president was meeting with various Christian leaders for Easter, and in my opinion went way overboard in trying to sound as Christian as possible. As the article indicates, he's trying still to convince those who don't believe he's a Christian. It's too bad he has to try, but in my opinion he's trying way too hard.

Quick Summary of Obama's Speech

If you are masochist, you can read the whole thing. Clive Crook at the the Atlantic summed it up accurately as a "waste of breath."

The speech was more notable for its militant--though ineffectual--hostility to Republican proposals than for any fresh thinking of its own. It was a waste of breath.

I'd summarize the speech as follows.

Government is what makes America great.
Blame Bush
Republican ideas are bad
Raise taxes
Make minor budgetary changes and pretend they'll solve our problems

When you are a government worshiper like the president, the very idea of slashing big government is anathema. Obama is a living, breathing reason to vote Republican if you care in the slightest about the financial future of this country. The GOP has many problems, but it is a solid lesser of two evils and has been for a long time.