WaPo Accuses Capital Hill of Hypocrisy on Gitmo


Here is part of a Washington Post Editorial entitled, "Hypocrisy on the [Capitol] Hill"

"FOR YEARS, Democrats clamored for the closing of the detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, using the prison to pummel President George W. Bush for abusing his authority, violating domestic and international law, and tarnishing the reputation of the United States. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) felt so strongly about the issue that she sponsored legislation in 2007 to force Mr. Bush to shutter the facility.

Now lawmakers are making it nearly impossible for President Obama to close the notorious prison by year's end, as he promised to do...."Ms. Feinstein, Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) and 88 other senators -- including every Republican -- voted to attach to a must-pass, supplemental war spending bill several provisions that tie the president's hands. Ms. Feinstein complained that the president lacked a detailed plan to deal with detainees...."

It seems to me there are two parts to what Congress did.

The first part concerns bringing of detainees into the US. I'll agree here that anyone (Senator, Representative or otherwise) who pre 2009 said, "we must close Gitmo" and now says, "Detainees must not be brought to the US" is a hypocrite. I don't think it is a very serious hypocrisy for reasons I'll get into later.

However, there is another part to this. President Obama has issued an executive order to close the Gitmo detention center but has not submitted a plan for how to do this. It seems to me reasonable to deny an appropriation to close the detention center without such a plan (although, it also seems to me that it would be unreasonable to deny an appropriation to develop such a plan).

With respect to the seriousness of the hypocrisy, I think the WaPo is missing an important point (and I can't find it specifically addressed anywhere). This point is that there is no assurance that Gitmo Detainees brought into the US will not be released by courts. Some people may consider this an unreasonable fear but without some assurance in statute (which the Congress is free to develop but which, IMO, the Administration, specifically DOJ should develop) that the detainees will remain in maximum security, it seems to me a reasonable fear.

The WaPo Editorial is here.

Sarah Palin Threatens Lawsuit

(from an article in CBS news) "Palin attorney Thomas Van Flein on Saturday warned legal action may be taken against bloggers and publications that reprint what he calls fraudulent claims.

"To the extent several websites, most notably liberal Alaska blogger Shannyn Moore, are now claiming as 'fact' that Governor Palin resigned because she is 'under federal investigation' for embezzlement or other criminal wrongdoing, we will be exploring legal options this week to address such defamation," Van Flein said in a statement. "This is to provide notice to Ms. Moore, and those who re-publish the defamation, such as Huffington Post, MSNBC, the New York Times and The Washington Post, that the Palins will not allow them to propagate defamatory material without answering to this in a court of law."

This follows an announcement by the FBI that Governor Palin is not under FBI investigation nor has she been under investigation.

The issue of the alleged FBI investigation is apparently the funding of a sports arena in Wasilla, Alaska. That's it in the image.

But, my brother Irwin reports that Palin spoke against frivolous lawsuits in the 2008 campaign (we can't find any specific speech on the subject on the internet but the 2008 Repulican Platform is clearly 'pro-legal reform'). Let's suppose for argument, Palin made general statements such as 'we need to reform laws to discourage frivolous lawsuits.

If that were true, I see no hypocrisy. The Palin attorney who is threatening a lawsuit is only threatening people who spread manifestly untrue matter, and that, on only one issue.

This is the article about the threatened law suit

This is an article noting that Palin is not under FBI investigation.

A list of 3 ethics complaints aginast Palin in 2008. I'm not sure if this is correct, but the people who posted it think Palin is the victim of frivalous lawsuits and complaints.

The 2008 Republican Party statement on "Reforming the Civil Justice System..." is here. I couldn't find any statement on the subject in the 2008 Democratic Platform.

President Obama is a smoker. He signed a cigarette regulation bill. Does that make him a hypocrite?

As near as I can figure, some people actually think this hypocrisy charge is logical.

It is certainly true that Obama smokes cigarettes (he admitted as much in a press conference today). Obama smoked much more frequently when he was in the Illinois legislature (the image is from that period).

It is also certainly true that he signed a cigarette regulation bill.

However, I simply am unable to understand what the hypocrisy is. Obama never said he would not sign a cigarette regulation bill. Obama doesn't maintain that the cigarette regulation bill bans smoking cigarettes (neither would anyone else who understands the meaning of regulation).

This may also be a case where Obama is more aware of the evil of smoking than most people and wants to protect people because of personal experience.

No hypocrisy. Not even close.

Report of Press conference smoking issue is here

A typical accusation of hypocrisy is here

Evan Thomas 2007 and 2009

Here are two transcripts from Mr. Thomas who has been assistant managing editor of Newsweek since 1991 (and is the grandson of Norman Thomas who ran for President a half a dozen times on the Socialist Party of America ticket).

This is from 2007 when George W. Bush was President
---------------------------------------------------

Gordon Peterson: "What do you think, Evan? Are the mainstream media bashing the president unfairly?"

Evan Thomas: "Well, our job is to bash the president, that's what we do almost --"

Peterson: "But unfairly?"

Thomas: "Mmmm -- I think when he rebuffed, I think when he just kissed off the Iraq Study Group, the Baker-Hamilton Commission, there was a sense then that he was decoupling himself from public opinion and Congress and the mainstream media, going his own way. At that moment he lost whatever support he had."

-------------------------------------------------------

This is Mr. Thomas in 2009 when Barack H Obama is President.

------------------------

"...I mean in a way Obama’s standing above the country, above – above the world, he’s sort of God...I think the President's speech yesterday was the reason we Americans elected him. It was grand. It was positive. Hopeful...But what I liked about the President's speech in Cairo was that it showed a complete humility...The question now is whether the President we elected and spoke for us so grandly yesterday can carry out the great vision he gave us and to the world."
----------------

Well there are a number of ways of reading this:
1. Thomas is a partisan democrat and the 'bash the President' is the job of Newsweek when a Republican is President
2. Thomas changed his mind from 2007 to 2009
3. Thomas was lying in 2007 and is a hypocrite.

there are more ways of reading this but I don't know enough about Mr. Thomas to distinguish between them.

Wikipedia site on Mr. Thomas is here
2007 Quote from this site
2009 Quote from this site

Are Anti Abortion advocates hypocrites for condemning the murder of George Tiller?

If I understand him correctly, William Saletan, of Slate Webzine, thinks they are. He maintains that people such as Troy Newman, who, in the various publications of Operation Rescue, comes very close to equating the killing of a fetus with the killing of a living person.

From the Saletan opinion piece,

"...Is it wrong to defend the life of an unborn child as you would defend the life of a born child? Because that's the question this murder poses. Peaceful pro-lifers have already tried to prosecute Tiller for doing late-term abortions they claimed were against the law. They failed to convict him. If unborn children are morally equal to born children, then Tiller's assassin has just succeeded where the legal system failed: He has stopped a mass murderer from killing again.

So is Roeder getting support from the nation's leading pro-life groups? Not a bit. They have roundly denounced the murder. The National Right to Life Committee says it opposes "any form of violence to fight the violence of abortion," preferring instead "to work through educational and legislative activities to ensure the right to life for unborn children, people with disabilities and older people." Americans United for Life agrees that it was wrong to kill Tiller because "the foundational right to life that our work is dedicated to extends to everyone...If a doctor in Kansas were butchering hundreds of old or disabled people, and legal authorities failed to intervene, I doubt most members of the National Right to Life Committee would stand by waiting for "educational and legislative activities" to stop him. Somebody would use force...."

There are two problems with Saletan's statement. Saletan is making several assumptions about the anti abortion organizations. First, he says that they equate the value of a fetus with the value of a living person. This is clearly not the case. The anti abortion organizations have placed great emphasis on restricting late term abortion. This seems to show that such groups recognize a continuum of 'humaness'. Second, Saletan says that one organization in particular would not use only "educational and legislative" means to stop a person butchering old people. Actually, there is no record of any anti abortion organizations attempting to use deadly force to close Dr. Kervorkian's clinic nor any record of similar attempts in regard to the few US States that have assisted suicide laws.

No hypocrisy.

Saletan opinion piece here.

Image on the left is the murdered abortion provider, George Tiller.

Lobbying Policy

Here is the Obama-Biden Policy during the transition period (Nov 2008-Jan 2009)

• Federal Lobbyists cannot contribute financially to the transition.
• Federal lobbyists are prohibited from any lobbying during their work with the transition.
• If someone has lobbied in the last 12 months, they are prohibited from working in the fields of policy on which they lobbied.
• If someone becomes a lobbyist after working on the Transition, they are prohibited from lobbying the Administration for 12 months on matters on which they worked.
• A gift ban that is aggressive in reducing the influence of special interests.

and here is a news story from a 'late in the day on Friday' announcement in a trade journal

May 29, 2009, 6:55 p.m.

The White House moved Friday evening to loosen lobbying restrictions related to stimulus funds, lifting the ban on federal lobbyists communicating with agency officials on specific projects for American Recovery and Reinvestment Act Funds.

I actually sympathize with the May 29 change because without it, agency officials wouldn't know what projects they are supposed to be implementing with the ARRA funds (before I retired there were many times I couldn't figure out what the project was supposed to be because I wasn't allowed to make calls to lobbyists).

So, was it hypocrisy when the original policy was stated or was the Obama-Biden team merely ignorant of the way legislation works. Sadly, I think it was the latter. It would have been better if they were hypocrites but knowledgeable about government.




Obama-Biden Transition website is Here

News on Obama lobbying policy in May 2009 is here.

Polar Bears and the NY Times

Back in October 2008, the New York Times was very worried about Polar Bears. Here is a quote from an editorial (not an op-ed),

"In its closing months, the Bush administration is pulling out all the stops in its eight-year effort to undermine the Endangered Species Act. In mid-August, the administration proposed two dangerous regulatory changes. One would free the government from considering the effects of greenhouse gas emissions on polar bears and other imperiled wildlife...."

and here is a quote from the New York Times in an editorial today,

"Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has upheld a Bush administration finding that the Endangered Species Act is not a suitable tool for restricting carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases threatening the polar bear and its habitat. We agree, with this codicil: There are steps Mr. Salazar can and must take under the act..."

The 2008 editorial doesn't mention "other steps" and the 2009 editorial doesn't mention that they had a different opinion back in 2008.

Now it is possible that the newspaper had a different person writing the 2008 and 2009 editorials. It is also possible that they had changed their mind or that they gained new understanding of the situation. However, if either of these was the case, the NY Times should have made clear which is was. They most obvious conclusion to make is that the over arching explanation is that the NYTimes is simply a biased organization. It doesn't really care about polar bears, it cares about who is President.

NY Times editorial in Oct 2008
NY Times editorial in May 2009

Follow Up to the Miss California Post

Perez Hilton - Hypocrisy on Fair Use

Subsequent to the events described below in the Miss California post, Perez Hilton demanded that Youtube.com remove a youtube post that had him saying Miss California was a bitch. This was on the basis of copyright infringement.

Perez Hilton is somewhat famous (or infamous) for posting images of celebrities with uncomplimentary features (warning - obscenity if you get to into the details) drawn on the outside of their clothes and claiming 'fair use' of common property.

This is explained in unpleasent detail at:

Perez Hilton puts the 'hippo' in hypocrite.

As it turns out, I don't understand copyright law enough to analyze whether hypocrisy has taken place. It certainly does seem as if Perez Hilton is not a nice person however.

Senator Arlan Specter formerly R-PA, now D-PA


Here is what Arlan Specter said back on March 18 (per the Philadephia newspaper)

"To eliminate any doubt, I am a Republican, and I am running for reelection in 2010 as a Republican on the Republican ticket," Specter said in a statement released by his campaign manager.

Here is what Arlan Specter said on April 28 (per the NY Times),

“I’m not prepared to have my 29-year record in the United States Senate decided by the Pennsylvania Republican primary electorate, not prepared to have that record decided by that jury,”

he also said this,

“I now find my political philosophy more in line with Democrats than Republicans"

Here is a case where the first statement evidently had a parenthesis that no one knew about. When he said, "... I am running in 2010 as a Republican..." he evidently meant to add "assuming I win the Republican primary which I'm sure I will win". As it turned out, in the 4 weeks between the two statements it became evident to Senator Spector that he would not win the primary (in fact as of the time he made the April 28 statement he was behind by 10 points among self described moderate Republicans in PA. The declaration about political philosophy. I'll give him a break on the hypocrisy charge. I'll also say that based on my discussions with the Pennsylvania DOT, he is, to be kind, a difficult person to deal with. If I was just using the political philosophy statement, it would be so stupid as to be laughable since the Republican philosophy hasn't changed in the month between the statements and no body even alleges this.

Philadelphia Inquirer article
NYTimes article (also the image is from the NYTimes)

Miss California and the Gay Marriage issue

That's Miss California on the left. Her name is Carrie Prejean.

She was asked by the gossip columnist Perez Hilton (who I think is gay) what she thought of gay marriage. Here is what she said,

“We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite. And you know what, I think in my country, in my family, I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that’s how I was raised.”

and here is what Perez then said, "The way Miss California answered her question lost her the crown, without a doubt! Never before that I'm aware of has a contestant been booed at Miss USA." Later he made a video blog calling her a "..dumb bitch.." and subsequently he removed the video and sort-or-apologized.

Many others in the Gay Community reacted even more strongly.

"It's ugly," said Scott Ihrig, a gay man, who attended the pageant with his partner. "I think it's ridiculous that she got first runner-up. That is not the value of 95 percent of the people in this audience. Look around this audience and tell me how many gay men there are."

Interestly, here is what then candidate (now President) Obama said on gay marriage,

"I'm a Christian. And so, although I try not to have my religious beliefs dominate or determine my political views on this issue, I do believe that tradition, and my religious beliefs say that marriage is something sanctified between a man and a woman."

So the question is, given that Miss California and Obama have approximately the same position on gay marriage (Miss California seems to actually be more 'pro' gay marriage and more nuanced than Obama), why isn't the gay community criticizing Obama.

I think the answer is that they assume Obama was disingenuous when he gave his position. They assume he actually wants to legalize gay marriage and will do what he can to get that done but that he has to oppose gay marriage to be elected. More simply put, they assume he is a hypocrite (I do not know whether they are correct on this and don't have a good guess).


Sources:
here
here
here
here
here

Armenian Genocide:
Obama Finds A Loophole

The image is from a collection of photos taken in the early part of the 1900s in Turkey/Armenia in a collection. The caption on this reads, "Turkish hangmen and their victims in Aleppo, 1915". Many of the other images at this site are far, far more gruesome.

The Washington Post today reported on President Obama's remarks while visiting Turkey. While a Senator, Obama signed a letter (as did then Senator Biden and then Senator Clinton) calling on then President Bush to recognize the Armenian massacres of the early 19th century as a genocide. He had on several occasions made the recognition of this genocide part of his presidential campaign. On this trip to Turkey, he did not mention the word "genocide" and was had among other things to say this,

"...'while there's been a good deal of commentary about my views, it's really about how the Turkish and Armenian people deal with the past."

Unfortunately that phrasing makes the victims and the victimizers equal.

Notwithstanding this all, the interesting thing from a technical study of "hypocrisy" is that, based on my definition, Obama can only be charged with hypocrisy for what he says or does, not for what he doesn't say or doesn't do. In effect, he found a loophole in my definition. Thus he would be innocent of the charge of hypocrisy on this issue (although perhaps guilty of 'hedging' or being 'dodgy' or being 'morally corrupt' or something along this line).

By the way, the Obama-Biden campaign post on this issue, has the following< " As a U.S. Senator, I have stood with the Armenian American community in calling for Turkey's acknowledgement of the Armenian Genocide. Two years ago [in 2006], I criticized the Secretary of State for the firing of U.S. Ambassador to Armenia, John Evans, after he properly used the term "genocide" to describe Turkey's slaughter of thousands of Armenians starting in 1915. I shared with Secretary Rice my firmly held conviction that the Armenian Genocide is not an allegation, a personal opinion, or a point of view, but rather a widely documented fact supported by an overwhelming body of historical evidence. The facts are undeniable. An official policy that calls on diplomats to distort the historical facts is an untenable policy. As a senator, I strongly support passage of the Armenian Genocide Resolution (H.Res.106 and S.Res.106), and as President I will recognize the Armenian Genocide."


April 24 is Armenian Remembrance Day in the US. Perhaps I will post script something then if I can decide if there is a general response to this 'dodginess' by the Armenian-American community.

Postscript April 24: The Armenian Weekly had an article quoting the President of the Armenian National Committee of America. He said,

“I join with all Armenian Americans in voicing our sharp disappointment with President Obama’s failure to honor his solemn pledge to recognize the Armenian Genocide.

In falling short of his repeated and crystal clear promises, which reflected a thorough knowledge of the facts, the practical implications, and the profound moral dimension of Armenian Genocide recognition, the President chose, as a matter of policy, to allow our nation’s stand against genocide to remain a hostage to Turkey’s threats.

The President’s statement today represents a retreat from his pledge and a setback to the vital change he promised to bring about in how America confronts the crime of genocide.

Genocide must be confronted unconditionally at the level of American values and our common humanity. As Americans, we should never allow the prevention or recognition of this crime to be reduced to a political issue that can be traded away, retreated from under pressure, or used to advance a political agenda, of any kind."

Republicans and Filibustering Hypocrisy

Dahlia Lithwick, a liberal columnists at Slate has a longish article there entitled, "How many ways can Senate Republicans Show Breathless Hypocrisy".

Part of the article is on the issue of filibustering in the Senate. Part of the article is on the issue of claiming that the nominee hasn't been forthcoming on answers.

The second issue is impossible to address because I would need to do a legitimate statistical analysis of questions before nominees by party by type of nominee, etc.

The first issue is, at least at first take, easier to understand. The Lithwick hypothesis is that some Republicans accused Democrats of unethically (or unconstitutionally) filibustering judicial nominees and now Republicans threaten to filibuster judicial nominees.

This would be a reasonable hypothesis but for the fact that: Lithwick does not identify a single Republican who made that claim (she cites a newspaper article in the LATimes which says that both sides are changing their filibustering tactics). Similarly, she doesn't say the Republicans have filibustered anyone (they haven't) and she doesn't identify a single Senator who says he (or she) will filibuster.

I'm presuming that Lithwick is not so lazy or stupid as to be incapable of these citations. Thus I'm going to conclude she just likes the word 'hypocrisy' and the phrase 'breathless hypocrisy" (and they she herself is blinded by ideology).

The Imus Apology; The Obama Apology

Then Senator Obama wanted Don Imus (radio and TV commentator) fired for a comment that members of a women's basket team were "nappy headed hos". This was several days after Imus had apologized. Imus was eventually fired and after about a year he was rehired (Imus and Obama on the left).

A few days ago on the Jay Leno show, President Obama compared his own bowling ability to a "special olympics" level. Obama apologized. Nobody that I can find is calling for Obama's resignation or any punishment at all. The special olympics committee seems to have accepted Obama's apology.

Is Obama a hypocrite for not resigning when he called for Imus's firing over a similar insulting comment.

Well, one defense that Obama could make was that in his comment, Obma was making fun of Obama. Imus was making fun of other people. Its not a strong defense but probably is enough to avoid the hypocrite label.

Still there is a double standard here and what's more interesting is that none of the big media people pointed out Obama call for firing Imus during the 'special olympics' apology. In addition, given the way Obama is briefed and the way he prepares for interviews, there is a strong chance the 'special olympics' comment was pre-scripted.


A Politico report on Obama's special olympic comment is here.

An ABC report (from 2007) on the Obama call for firing Imus is here.

Below is the timeline for the 2007 events courtesy of blackjusticeblog:

4/4/07 Imus says "nappy headed hos."
4/6/07 Imus apologizes.
4/7/07 Sharpton calls for Imus to be fired.
4/11/07 The Boston Globe writes a piece about Obama's silence on the issue thus far. Sharpton, who has not endorsed any Presidential candidate, is interviewed.
4/11/07 Obama is interviewed by ABC and is the first presidential candidate to demand Imus' firing.
4/11/07 Obama appears on Wolf Blitzer's The Situation Room. He condemns Imus without mentioning rap (subsequently he condemned both Imus and rap music).
4/11/07 Imus is fired from MSNBC.
4/12/07 Imus is fired from CBS.

Service Employees International Union is anti Union

As reported in an article in today's Washington Post, the SEIU (their logo is in the image) is engaged in a labor dispute with the Union representing its own workers. This Union hasfiled charges with the National Labor Relations Board.

As explained in the article,

"...The Service Employees International Union... has notified the union that represents about 220 of its national field staff and organizers that 75 of them are being laid off. In return, the workers' union, which goes by the somewhat postmodern name of the Union of Union Representatives, has filed unfair labor practices charges against SEIU with the National Labor Relations Board. The staff union's leaders say that SEIU is engaging in the same kind of practices that some businesses use -- laying off workers without proper notice, contracting out work to temp firms, banning union activities and reclassifying workers to reduce union numbers.

"It's completely hypocritical," said staff union President Malcolm Harris...

SEIU officials say the layoffs are part of a long-running plan to reallocate resources...."

I'm not familiar enough with the actual policy of the SEIU and the actual facts of the layoffs, contracting out, etc. to say whether this is a case of hypocrisy. But it is amusing.

Hypocrisy Contest

Over at Deceiver Madness they have a tournament, modeled on the NCAA Division I Basketball tournament.

People can go to the site and vote for winners of Hypocrisy runoffs.

The image to the left was done after the first round of winners.

I'm not going to comment on their definition of hypocrisy because they don't define it. They simply state that there is hypocrisy. Personally, I don't think the fact bear them out.

However, I like the idea of a contest done in this playoff format.

Big Nate:
Cartoon Hypocrite

The artist didn't use the word "hypocrite" here but its clear that he is making fun of Nate (dark spike hair guy) for criticizing people for doing what he himself is doing. This theme has been running for a couple of days now.

Dilbert on Hypocrisy

This is the first time I can remember that hypocrisy was mentioned in one of the comic strips I follow regularly. Below is the Dilbert published in the newspaper and on, Feb 25, 2009 on the Dilbert website.

The claim that corporate and Congressional executives flew together to a Congressional hearing isn't credible nor do I know of any case where the same plane was used for Congressional travel (Congressional delegations usually use either 1st class commercial or military aircraft) and Corporate travel (G pointed out that the expression 'same jet' is ambiguous). So, the 'same jet' may simply mean "a Gulfstream 3" or even "a Gulfstream".

The general claim that Congressional people are pompous is credible. Also if the general charge were that Congressional people says "don't use expensive perks" that would be hypocrisy because Congressional people do use expensive perks.

Let's Look at Some Ethics Promises of Obama/Biden

There was, as of today, a website used by the Obama/Biden campaign which made a number of commitments on ethics.

Here were some of the commitments (from at website):

• Close the revolving door on former and future employers:

  No political appointees in an Obama-Biden administration will be permitted to work on regulations or contracts directly and substantially related to their prior employer for two years. And no political appointee will be able to lobby the executive branch after leaving government service during the remainder of the administration.

• Sunlight Before Signing: Too often bills are rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them. As president, Obama will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days.
• Shine Light on Earmarks and Pork Barrel Spending: Obama's Transparency and Integrity in Earmarks Act will shed light on all earmarks by disclosing the name of the legislator who asked for each earmark, along with a written justification, 72 hours before they can be approved by the full Senate.

Regarding the first bullet, there are, as of today, about two dozen known former lobbyists (depending on the definition) who have been appointed. The Obama/Biden Administration has said that these are exceptions. There are also an unknown number (at least a dozen have been specifically announced) of people who went from the Obama/Biden campaign directly to lobbying companies. This, of course, is not covered by the ethics promise.

Regarding the second bullet, President Obama signed two bills, the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act and the State Children Health Insurance Program within two days (the second within hours) after it passed Congress. The Obama/Biden Administration has not said whether these were exceptions (hard to believe they could be called 'emergencies').

Regarding the third bullet, there were many egregious clauses in the Simulus Bill (one for an $8 billion maglev program, another $30M for habitat protection for a mouse that lives in the SF Bay area). Obama signed it 4 days after the Congress passed it (The President did say was an emergency - unlike the Ledbetter or S-Chips legislation which took less time to sign).

Here is a problem. I faced it when I was in government. The problem is "what is an earmark?". It may be that the common sense definition of 'earmark' is not used by President Obama. Here is one definition by the OMB (which is part of the executive branch),

"... funds provided by Congress for projects or programs where the congressional direction (in bill or report language) circumvents Executive Branch merit-based or competitive allocation processes, or specifies the location or recipient, or otherwise curtails the ability of the Executive Branch to manage critical aspects of the funds allocation process."

Here is the Congressional Research Service definition,

"Provisions associated with legislation (appropriations or general legislation) that specify certain congressional spending priorities or in revenue bills that apply to a very limited number of individuals or entities. Earmarks may appear in either the legislative text or report language (committee reports accompanying reported bills and joint explanatory statement accompanying a conference report)"

We don't know what Obama's definition is.

In this case, it seems to me that the Obama campaign promise itself was clearly an example of an overpromise because bringing the sunlight to earmarks is a congressional responsibility which is difficult for the executive to fill unless they have spies among the staffers in the drafting and conference committees.

Let's see if the President has anything to say about any of these issues in the coming weeks before completing the analysis.

Postscript: It is now (Writing on March 15) several weeks later. Obama seems to have the position, "well I said I would curtail earmarks, I didn't say when". Yuck.

Also, here is an interesting except from Obama's second memoir, "The Audacity of Hope"

"..."Genuine bipartisanship assumes an honest process of give-and-take, and that the quality of the compromise is measured by how well it serves some agreed-upon goal, whether better schools or lower deficits. This in turn assumes that the majority will be constrained -- by an exacting press corps and ultimately an informed electorate -- to negotiate in good faith....

If these conditions do not hold -- if nobody outside Washington is really paying attention to the substance of the bill, if the true costs . . . are buried in phony accounting and understated by a trillion dollars or so -- the majority party can begin every negotiation by asking for 100% of what it wants, go on to concede 10%, and then accuse any member of the minority party who fails to support this 'compromise' of being 'obstructionist.'...

"For the minority party in such circumstances, 'bipartisanship' comes to mean getting chronically steamrolled, although individual senators may enjoy certain political rewards by consistently going along with the majority and hence gaining a reputation for being 'moderate' or 'centrist.'

More Hypocrisy From Celebrity Greens

- or is it

The London (England) Times has obtained (it didn't say how) an infrared image of several neighborhoods in London with homes owned by celebrity 'anti-Global Warming' advocates (the image is from the article and the bright red - very 'leaky' home is owned by singer Chris Martin and actress Gwyneth Paltrow- both anti GW advocates). The Times says it provided the images to a company that analyzes the images for wasted heat. It found that a number of celebrities have homes that are leaking heat, presumably because of poor insulation, over design with windows, etc. It also had estimates for lost energy for other homes:

Lost energy

Sir David Attenborough, broadcaster: 288kg

Lord Smith of Finsbury, chairman of the Environment Agency: 186kg

John Sauven, director of Greenpeace: 158kg

Richard Chartres, Bishop of London: 135kg

Hilary Benn, environment secretary: 126kg

Ed Miliband, energy and climate change secretary: 121kg

David Cameron, Tory leader: 21kg

There are several issues here. First, is the data accurate? Second, is the data analysis accurate? Third is the interpretation of the analysis appropriate (for example, if some of these homes are used for multiperson offices, the 'excess heat/person' may be much less).

Above all is the issue of knowledge. Does, for example, Lord Smith realize his home is poorly insulated and has leaky windows? If he does know and does nothing about it and advocates other people should insulate and fix leaky windows, that does make him a hypocrite. But really, what if he doesn't realize his house is an energy waster? That would just make him a fool (or an ignoramus or even a pompous ignoramus) which seems actually worse that being a hypocrite.

Did Obama Break A Campaign Promise and then "Disappear" the Promise

The fellow in the image is Lloyd Chapman. He blogs for the American Small Business League. He maintains that Senator Obama promised during his campaign,

"....Small businesses are the backbone of our nation's economy and we must protect this great resource. It is time to end the diversion of federal small business contracts to corporate giants."

He then states that President Obama has not done anything yet to implement this and has, in fact, made the situation worse. He also notes that some websites which featured Senator Obama's promise to small business have disappeared (but he had screen saves of them I gather).

As to hypocrisy, it is far too early to tell. Three weeks into an administration isn't time to implement pro small business practices (full disclosure: I think, based on my experience as a federal govt employee, a lot of the federal govt.'s small business practices are wasteful; I think it is almost indisputable that the regulation in this area drives up the cost of certain highway items, e.g., guardrail, line painting, etc.). Let's see what this fellow says this time next year.


The Wikipedia site on Mr. Chapman is here. He apparently sued the Bush administration a number of times so it doesn't seem he is a partisan Republican.

Mr. Chapman's blog was put out as a PR piece by the American Small Business League.

The Obama campaign website had a promise on the small business issue.