BloggeRhythms

Yesterday’s posting centered on there being no successes in the “signature issues” prioritized by the POTUS to date. Which is perhaps the reason for his current strategy regarding the bulk surveillance techniques employed by the NSA.   

 

An article by Spencer Ackerman @FoxNews.com relates that, “The Obama administration has asked a secret surveillance court to ignore a federal court that found bulk surveillance illegal and to once again grant the National Security Agency the power to collect the phone records of millions of Americans for six months.”

 

However, the legal request was filed “nearly four hours after Barack Obama vowed to sign a new law banning precisely the bulk collection he asks the secret court to approve, [which] also suggests that the administration may not necessarily comply with any potential court order demanding that the collection stop.”

 

Therefore, it seems the administration’s finally figured out that since they’re almost never correct when taking sides, regardless of the issue at hand, taking both sides has got to be far better for them in the long run. Especially since their base rarely understands the issues at all, blindly blaming Bush for failures exactly as they’ve been taught all along.

 

In a similar situation where the administration has no real solution to a major problem, FoxNews.com reports that, “President Obama took heat Monday for admitting he doesn't yet have a "complete strategy" in hand for training Iraqis to fight the Islamic State -- months into the coordinated campaign to defeat the deadly terrorist network. 

 

"When a finalized plan is presented to me by the Pentagon, then I will share it with the American people," Obama said, adding, "We don't yet have a complete strategy."

 

What’s tragic here is that when the president took office, there was a “strategy” in place that was working well. But, politics outweighed the reality of the situation and fulfilling faulty campaign rhetoric overrode effective foreign policy. As a result, the US has not only lost all its former gains in Iraq, but will likely have to turn to Iran for help. Thereby handing significant regional control to a rogue nation, that will soon have nuclear weaponry for the very same reasons: for this administration, political pandering always trumps basic common sense.

 

Which brings us to today’s update on Bill Clinton’s wife.

 

In item 1, FoxNews.com’s Chris Stirewalt wrote yesterday that, “The Clinton Family Foundation, a smaller, charitable entity separate from the Clinton Global Initiative, donated $100,000 to a New York Times charitable fund in 2008, the same year the paper endorsed Hillary Clinton, according to documents obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. The endorsement surprised many due to reports the paper was leaning towards backing then-Sen. Barack Obama.”

 

Which seems to indicate that the long known “paper of record,” The New York Times, has more than one purchase price. $2.50 at the newsstand for one copy, or $100,000 for their presidential endorsement  -take your pick.

 

On the same subject, Bill’s wife, Chris Stirewalt also wrote: “While organizers say that “controversies about the propriety and reporting of foreign government donations to the Clinton Foundation aren’t having an impact,” other evidence indicates otherwise.

 

According to San Francisco Sun Times: “Hillary Clinton may have won the Wisconsin straw poll over the weekend, but her margin of victory was much closer than her lead in any of the national polls. At the Wisconsin Democratic Party convention on Saturday, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders had an impressive second place showing, finishing with 41 percent of the votes. Clinton won with 49 percent, but failed to get the majority. Out of the 511 delegate votes, Clinton received 252, while Sanders had 208.”

 

So, the sliding poll results appear to be proving, at least in Bill’s wife’s case, that familiarity truly does breed contempt. Which leads to closing today’s entry with the same question asked here often in the past few months: Mayor Bloomberg, are you reading this?

 

That's it for today folks.

 

Adios.