Category: Europe

Have Years Of Exposure To Biden Left Obama Totally Potted?

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by Smitty

Via Ace comes another OPRA* moment:

Maybe this is a deliberate chaser insult to follow the under-bus toss exemplified in canceling Theater Ballistic Missile efforts:

Two recent editorials from Heritage fellows have criticized the Obama administration for abandoning Eastern European allies. According to the editorials, Obama has given up proposed missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic (sometimes called the “third site”). They argue that this will will serve to embolden Russia and increase our vulnerability to Iran’s missile capabilities. The first problem with their arguments is that Obama has not yet abandoned the proposed missile defense sites in Poland and the Czech Republic. In fact, after a report released in a Polish newspaper said that the sites had been abandoned, administration officials were quick to point out that all options were still on the table.

Yeah, Barack’s position is ‘evolving’.

God preserve us until we can send this incompetent boob packing. More at Hot Air and Twitchy. And look at this summary from Nile Gardiner in The Telegraph:

. . .these were carefully scripted remarks by the president reading off a teleprompter. Six millions Poles died at the hands of Nazi Germany during World War Two, including three million Polish Jews during the Holocaust. The president’s use of the term “Polish death camp” is hugely insulting to the Polish people, and will reinforce the growing image across Eastern and Central Europe of an American presidency that cares little for key US allies, especially against the backdrop of its controversial and weak-kneed “reset” policy towards Russia. For a US administration that likes to boast of “smart power,” this was an act of staggering historical ignorance as well as crass insensitivity.

Who knew Rutherford was an NWA fan?
(NSFW reference for pic)

Via Insty, the White House attempts a ‘clown nose off‘**:

National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said: “The president misspoke. He was referring to Nazi death camps in Poland. We regret this misstatement, which should not detract from the clear intention to honor Mr. Karski and those brave citizens who stood on the side of human dignity in the face of tyranny.”
Anxious to quell the controversy, the White House also noted that the president had visited the Warsaw Ghetto Memorial while in Poland and that he has repeatedly discussed the bravery of Poles during World War II.
The Polish Embassy in Washington, on its website, has a “how-to guide” on concentration camps that states that references to Polish death camps are “factually incorrect slurs” that should be corrected.

*Only Problematic in Republican Administrations

**Props to Treacher.

Perfect Bailout Metaphor Achieved

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by Smitty

Daniel Hannan on Twitter points to The Telegraph with a story of classical, titanic impact:

Maiden voyage of Bronze Age boat founders
The crew of a half-sized replica of a 3,500-year-old Bronze Age boat had to abort the vessel’s maiden voyage after it sank as soon as it entered the water.

Hannan relates an oversight in the Telegraph story within the Tweet:

Ah, so the Muscles in Brussels are blowing money from the rest of Europe on perhaps interesting, but ill-fated, projects. Vasa up with that?

Sarkozy Discovers His Open Right Flank

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Because it is my habit to ignore smelly foreigners (and let’s face it, they all stink), I pay little heed to the troubles of French politicians.

Nevertheless, Nicholas Sarkozy is the most pro-American French politician since . . . Well, he’s pro-American, and so his difficulties are kind of relevant. In order to retain power, Sarkozy finds himself forced to reach out to Le Front National, whom the press generally describe as “far right” or even “fringe.”

Can we be brutally honest here? Your typical Republican voter in Iowa or Alabama would probably qualify as “far right” or “fringe” by the descriptive standards the media applies to any European who is anywhere rightward of the most tame British Tory.

Hell’s bells, it would probably be illegal for any French newspaper to publish a Michelle Malkin or Charles Krauthammer column.

The history of European nationalism is such a heavy burden that anyone in Europe who criticizes the EU or complains about immigration or multiculturalism tends to get instantly classified as a dangerous extremist, so that mainstream “conservative” parties in Europe won’t even go near such issues. Thus, we see the persistence of “far right” parties with disreputable associations, parties that might dwindle in significance if “conservative” parties weren’t such scaredy-cats.

We in America are used to the two-party system, which tends to channel any genuinely widespread sentiment into one or the other of the major parties. Some Republicans, alas, have the same scaredy-cat impulses as European “conservatives,” so that if it were up to such pantywaists, the GOP would be as liberal on immigration as the Democrats.

If a pro-American French politician has to make a deal with the “far right” in order to keep the American-hating socialists out of power, this is perhaps in some sense unfortunate, but let’s not pretend that this makes Sarkozy a crypto-Nazi. I’m noticing that the Memeorandum thread doesn’t show any conservative bloggers offering comments, so I guess the liberals are having fits of hysteria.

Good. Liberal hysteria makes me smile. Continue reading Sarkozy Discovers His Open Right Flank →

Daniel Hannan CPAC12 AECR European Debt Crisis Panel Introduction

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by Smitty

I didn’t see any other cameras in the Tyler room for the European Debt Crisis panel. This may be an exclusive. The battery was spent after Daniel, so his intro was all I could capture.

My argument is that if the British don’t make Hannan the Prime Minister really soon, somebody (say, Fox) should make him An Offer He Can’t Refuse to have a show in the U.S.

Update: linked by Tom Lewis.

Two Wrongs Don’t Make A Right. Two Thousand Wrongs? A Right Jolly Commie Start.

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by Smitty

IoawHawk called it a “Last minute entry sweeps Stupidest F’ing Thing You Will Read This Year awards”.

Neil Clark blazes beyond beclownment bounds:

No one questions that Havel, who went to prison twice, was a brave man who had the courage to stand up for his views. Yet the question which needs to be asked is whether his political campaigning made his country, and the world, a better place.
Havel’s anti-communist critique contained little if any acknowledgement of the positive achievements of the regimes of eastern Europe in the fields of employment, welfare provision, education and women’s rights. Or the fact that communism, for all its faults, was still a system which put the economic needs of the majority first.

Really, Eastern European realms?

  • employment So long as the bosses pretend to pay us, we will pretend to work.
  • welfare provision The Eastern European death toll stands at 1 million, according to the Black Book of Communism.
  • education All the political indoctrination you can stand, no?
  • women’s rights The right for young girls to be exploited by Olympic teams?

Read the whole thing. Just another fact-free, purely emotional appeal. Do remember: China and North Korea are still Communist. You can go there and get your Marxism totally on, baby.

The Economy: How Bad Does It Suck?

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The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 236.17 points Wednesday, closing at 11,257.5. Since Nov. 11, the Dow has lost 896.13 points (7.4%), and the forecast is ominous:

Stocks suffered a sixth straight day of losses on Wednesday as frustration over the euro zone’s debt crisis, coupled with weak Chinese factory data, further dented investor sentiment.
A weak German bond sale sparked fears the debt crisis was even beginning to threaten Berlin, with the leaders of France and Germany still at odds over a longer-term structural solution.
The poor demand for German government bonds showed that investors viewed investing in the euro zone as being too risky.

Here’s a cheerful headline:

“Disastrous” bond sale shakes
confidence in Germany

Megan McArdle explains at the Atlantic:

A year ago, Germany and France could probably have saved the euro–at least for a time–by stepping in to guarantee all the debts of the peripheral euro zone nations. To be sure, this would have created quite a lot of other problems, but it would have saved their banks and their currency union.
However, a year ago, governments were nowhere near ready to take such drastic action: the French and German governments didn’t want to put their credit rating behind Greek profligacy, and their voters wouldn’t have stood for it if they’d tried.
At this point, however, with the panic in full flight, it’s not entirely clear to me that even a 100% guarantee would staunch the bleeding for more than a short time. Do the Germans really have enough to guarantee the debts of most of the rest of the euro zone?

After two “recovery summers,” it’s all gloom and doom this fall:

Dexia Bailout On Verge Of Collapse, Threatens
To Take France AAA Rating Down With It

Euro on ‘Death Watch’ After
Investors Spurn German Bonds

Sarkozy: Europe’s “Liquidity Run” Has Begun
Because There Is An Unsolvable $30 Trillion Problem

So: Stocks suck and bonds look shaky. Which means . . . gold?

Gold and silver futures declined for the second time in three days as the dollar’s rally muted demand for precious metals as an alternative investment.

Wait — what?

Gold fell further on Thursday as declines in equities blamed on the euro zone crisis prompted investors to sell bullion to cover losses, while a firmer U.S. dollar also put pressure on prices. 

In other words, the economy sucks so bad right now, rich people are being forced to sell gold in order to make up for money they’re losing in every other area of investment. But perhaps there are financial opportunities in international catastrophe.

Egypt Slips Deeper Into Crisis on Sixth Day of Protests
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Unrest stirs fears inside Israel
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Kuwait arrests activists for storming parliament  
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MILITIA GROUPS RUN WILD IN LIBYA

Investing in oil futures might work, but maybe it’s time to panic?

Survival Shop Reports Jump
In Sales To People Preparing
For “Possible Collapse”

Let’s face it, folks: The economy sucks real bad, and it’s only going to get worse. And you know what that means? It’s time for you to start shopping our Amazon’s “Black Friday Deals Week” specials: Great savings for you, commissions for me, and that way we’ll have enough money to stock up on freeze-dried food, Coleman lantern fuel and ammunition. Lots and lots of ammunition.