Charles Krauthammer: Obama Should Curtail His Traveling To Help Fund The White House Tours (Video)

On tonight’s Special Report with Bret Baier, the panel discussed Obama’s “change in strategy” now that his sequester demagoguery has fallen flat, and he’s taking a hit in the polls. They expressed doubts that his new-found interest in “aggressively reaching out” to Republicans was anything but more than theatrics but A.B. Stoddard for one hoped that it would be otherwise.

The Hammer noted that Obama doesn’t have to worry about his base, as a second term president. His concern was to neuter the Republicans, and beat them in 2014. Obama tried the class warfare demagoguery during the election and it worked, he did it on the fiscal cliff and it worked, but when it came to the sequester, it crashed, Charles maintained. “The apocalypse he predicted made him look ridiculous and cynical and when you close the White House, and you keep out these Iowa kids, everybody understands that you’re not leading, you’re playing games. That’s really hurt him in the polls.”

Baier proceeded to run a clip of the Iowa kids Facebook video and then Jay Carney’s comments on the canceled White House tours.

Jason Riley of the Wall Street Journal decried all of the stunts the president has pulled to demagogue the sequester, and made a point that should still shock us, even though we already know it:  “the president is trying to inflict the maximum amount of pain as a result of these sequester cuts in order for the public to help pressure Republicans into into agreeing to more tax hikes. We know that is his goal, and we know that every effort that the Republicans have made to try to ease the pain of these cuts, the White House has rejected.”

Krauthammer saved his best stuff for last, as usual. After A.B. criticized Republicans for bungling their sequester messaging, he said, “yeah, but that Carney explanation was truly jumping the shark.... He’s talking about kids in the White House, and then all of a sudden he ends with throwing orphans in the snow – ‘we don’t really want to, but we have to – ’cause Republicans forced us.’ I have an idea if you want to have kids in the White House and support it with funds….the president’s travel expenses alone for the golfing outing with Tiger Woods would pay for a year of White House visits. So I  suggest that perhaps he curtail the travel or perhaps auction off a set of the clubs and that would allow the tots to come to the White House.”

Beautiful.

Perhaps Charles had caught wind of this: Report: Obama Planning Yet Another Martha’s Vineyard Vacation…

To summarize: No money for White House tours because of the sequester, but more than enough for another vacation.

Via Politico:

President Obama and his family are likely headed to Martha’s Vineyard for a summer sojourn again this year.

It doesn’t look like King Barack I plans on curtailing his vaycay travel expenses, but maybe, at least he’ll hit the breaks on the permanent campaign outings for now. Since it was backfiring.

SEE ALSO

Kimberly Stassel, WSJ: Jumping the Sequester:

The phrase “jumping the shark” describes that gimmicky moment when something once considered significant is exposed as ludicrous. This is the week the White House jumped the sequester.

The precise moment came Tuesday, when the administration announced that it was canceling public tours of the White House, blaming budget cuts. The Sequesterer in Chief has insisted that cutting even $44 billion from this fiscal year will cause agonizing pain—airport security snarls, uninspected meat, uneducated children. Since none of those things has come to pass, the White House decided it needed an immediate and high-profile way of making its point. Ergo, it would deny the nation’s school kids a chance to view a symbol of America.

The act was designed to spark outrage against Republicans, yet the sheer pettiness of it instead provided a moment of clarity. Americans might not understand the technicalities of sequester, but this was something else entirely. Was the president actually claiming there was not a single other government item—not one—that could be cut instead of the White House tours? Really?

The cancellations were an open invitation for the nation to dive into the gory depths of the federal budget—and re-emerge with a debate over waste and priorities. Over the past week, an entire cottage industry has sprung up of journalists, watchdog groups and average citizens reporting on the absurdities of federal spending. Republicans have lit up Twitter with examples of indefensible projects (#SequesterThis).

Rand Paul Fires Back at McCain and Graham: “They Think The Whole World’s A Battlefield – Including America” (Video)

Earlier today, Senators McCain and Graham criticized Rand Paul’s position of drone strikes inside American borders.

McCain took to the Senate floor to make it abundantly clear that he does not “stand with Paul”:

 Reading from the critical Wall Street Journal editorial urging Paul to “calm down,” McCain tore into Paul’s arguments.

“I saw colleagues who know better come to the floor and voice some of this same concern, which is totally unfounded,” McCain asserted, pointing to Paul’s Jane Fonda hypothetical, deeming it ridiculous. To “somehow say that someone who disagrees with American policy and even may demonstrate against it is somehow a member of an organization which makes that individual an enemy combatant is simply false,” he added.

“I don’t think we should have any doubt that there are people, both within the United States of America and outside of it, who are members of terrorist organizations that want to repeat 9/11,” McCain continued — but “to somehow allege or infer that the president of the United States is going to kill somebody like Jane Fonda, or somebody who disagrees with the policies, is a stretch of imagination which is, frankly, ridiculous.”He went on to contend that we are in danger, but that danger is from the enemy “hellbent on our destruction.” Bringing up Anwar al-Awlaki, McCain said he should not have been protected anywhere in the world.

Then why not spell it out in the law, Senator? You have more trust in this Regime than some of us do. (Pssss: Jane Fonda is safe, it’s the bitter clingers fitting DHS’s broad description of a domestic terrorists we’re worried about.)

Lindsey Graham, who has been so strong on Benghazi, said this after having dinner with Barack Obama.

“This idea that we’re going to use a drone to attack a citizen in a cafe in America is ridiculous.”

Via The Hill, Rand Paul blasted the two on Thursday, saying the they “think the whole world is a battlefield.”

Paul criticized the hawkish senators for thinking the laws of war should take precedence over the Bill of Rights. The two had criticized Paul’s statements about drone policy during the Kentucky Republican’s nearly 13-hour filibuster on Thursday.

“They think the whole world is a battlefield, including America, and that the laws of war should apply,” Paul said in an interview on Fox News about McCain and Graham, who had described Paul’s comments about drones as “ridiculous.”

“They think the whole world is a battlefield, including America, and that the laws of war should apply,” Paul said in an interview on Fox News about McCain and Graham, who had described Paul’s comments about drones as “ridiculous.”

“The laws of war don’t involve due process, so when they ask you for an attorney you tell them to shut up. That’s not my understanding of the way America works,” Paul told Fox. “I don’t think the laws of war apply to America, I think the Bill of Rights do and I think it’s a disservice to our soldiers that our senators up there arguing that the Bill of Rights aren’t important.”

I don’t know which interview the Hill was referring to on Fox, but Paul made many of the same points in his interview with Megyn Kelly, this afternoon without mentioning them by name.

After Kelly read the letter from Holder conceding that it would be unlawful to target American citizens with drone strikes in America, Paul said, “under duress, and under public humiliation, the White House will relent and do the right thing.”

Tellingly, they released the letter to the media before sending it to the Senator.

SEE ALSO:

Gateway Pundit: Rush Limbaugh to Rand Paul: “You Are, in Certain Ways, a Hero to a Lot of People Today” (Video)

Hat tip: Weasel Zippers

KS Sec. of State, Kris Kobach: DHS Release of Illegal Immigrants “a Brazen Abuse of Power”, “Impeachment Stuff” (Audio)

KS Sec. of State, Kris Kobach began his Sunday night talk show on 710 KCMO with civil defense sirens wailing in the background, “still broadcasting after the collapse of civilization” following the sequester..  It had been in effect for two days, and Kobach was hunkering down in the KCMO bunker….having a little fun at the Regime’s expense.

One of the effects of sequestration that Kobach wanted to discuss on Sunday’s show – not surprisingly, because he’s known as an anti-illegal immigrant hawk – was the decision of DHS to release illegal immigrant detainees. Kobach was astounded. Speaking as someone who was involved with making illegal immigration policy under the Bush administration, he wanted to clarify just what kind of people the Regime was releasing to the public.

“We detain a very tiny percentage of illegal aliens who are in removal proceedings – roughly 10%”, he began.  “Between 30 and 40,000 are in detention….the rest of the hundreds of thousands who are in deportation proceedings, are not detained. They’re on their honor to come to court. On their honor. And guess what? Many of them don’t show, and if the judge says, “you’re outta here – they ignore their removal letter….  oh, you thought removal meant that someone came with handcuffs and took the illegal alien to the border immediately? Nah. We have an honor system in America.” He continued,  “but about 10%… ARE detained and those are the ones with serious criminal records or extraordinary indicia in their records indicating that they are a huge flight risk. They are a problem. They are not your illegal aliens who just came here for a better life.”

Driving the point home, he explained, “these are illegal alien robbers, arsonists, drug dealers. These are bad guys. These are not illegal aliens who just want a chance at a better life. These are illegal immigrations who are the worst of the worst and the Obama administration decided to turn them loose to make a point about sequesters.”

He noted that it was not necessary to turn them loose.  “There is so much fat in DHS and ICE”, he argued, “it would be easy to cut 2-3% of the budget.”

He suggested they could start with getting rid of executive travel and conferences, and vehicles, making the point  that during the government shut down in 1996, certain emergency services were not shut down including deportation and detention facilities. So the highest levels of government services. But the ” extraordinary, bizarre, extreme” Obama administration decided that to make a political point that they would shut down what couldn’t get shut down during the government shut down in the nineties.

Scaring us by releasing illegal immigrant criminals — “REALLY, Mr. President? Really?!” Kobach thundered.

“This is a brazen abuse of power”, he said. “They crossed the line.”

“This is impeachment stuff!”

“You do not release dangerous criminals to make a point…”

WHOOPS:

Someone who will remain nameless made a booboo. (Not me.) The audio below is hour two of the program. You can listen listen to the first hour, (part of which is described above), here.