Aren’t you glad the stimulus worked?

U.S. private employers chopped more than half a million jobs in May, signaling job conditions remain tough and dashing some hopes the economy was not deteriorating as rapidly as thought, a report on Wednesday showed.

U.S. companies axed 532,000 jobs last month, though this was fewer than the revised 545,000 jobs lost in April, according to the ADP National Employment Report.

The April figure was originally a decline of 491,000.

The median forecast of economists surveyed by Reuters for the ADP Employer Services report, jointly developed with Macroeconomic Advisers LLC, was for a loss of 520,000 private-sector jobs in May.

Obama said the stimulus would prevent the unemployment rate from going over 8 percent. It hit 8.9% according to the last jobs report… So, once again, we spent a whole lot of money that did a whole lot of nothing… But hey, don’t blame me… I voted for McCain.

Nicholas Guariglia thinks so:

Things on the Korean peninsula are heating up by the hour. This latest round of nuclear and missile tests should come as no surprise, given President Obama’s non-response to North Korea’s missile provocations several weeks ago. This time, however, Pyongyang detonated a 20-kiloton device — the ground shook 130 miles away — which is an estimated 20 times more powerful than the nuclear bomb North Korea tested in 2006.

Predictably, the international community bemoaned with platitudinous reprimands — Obama: “gravely concerned”; the United Nations: “deeply worried” — and even more predictably, North Korea responded by threatening war against South Korea, disavowing the 1953 armistice, and swearing to continue production of nuclear weapons. Surprise, surprise…

…Having spent way more time in “diplomacy school” than anyone’s mental health should allow, I can personally attest: active diplomats, retired diplomats-turned-professors, and aspiring would-be diplomats refuse to recognize that some things in this world fall outside of their professional purview. Could we imagine any other profession — say, anesthesiology or lumberjacking — making that same bold claim about itself?

Kim has made a mockery of our diplomacy with him for nearly two decades. He soaked President Clinton for all he was worth, clicking champagne glasses with Madeleine Albright all the while perfecting the art of plutonium production. During the Bush administration, Kim reneged on every preliminary agreement before the preliminary agreement could get its trousers off. And now he’s manhandling Mr. Obama to the point of embarrassment…

…Enough is enough. Kim Jong Il has proven he will stop at nothing to produce and proliferate nuclear weapons, and that is a no-no. Diplomacy has failed. Talking for the sake of talking is not working. Serious powers ought to be emphasizing results, not process. “Soft power” is a problem cured by Cialis — not a national security strategy for North Korea. It’s time we started working to bring that twisted, Lilliputian, Chia Pet miscreant down.

Within the linked article are suggestions on ways and means of bringing Kim down – including allowing Japan to build nuclear weapons, a course of action which does not commend itself to me (call me paranoid, but I like a rich, powerful Japan which lacks nuclear weapons and aircraft carriers…just makes certain there’s no desire in Tokyo for a re-match). My view is that Kim’s regime is moribund already and we don’t need to push it to extinction – it totters that way, already. With Kim’s apparent selection of his youngest son as successor, we see the opportunity for a change…will the third Kim be able to exercise the ruthless power necessary to keep a starving population under subjection? I’m betting he won’t be able to do it – the sort of sick inhumanity required to maintain a Stalinist regime is very hard to transmit from one generation to another, and I’m figuring it can’t be done to a third generation in North Korea.

While I don’t expect the NK regime to collapse immediately upon the elder Kim’s demise, I do believe that the NK leadership will take stock and try to figure out a way to feather their nests, and then allow the regime to fall. It will be a complicated dance which will require the cooperation of China (and, likely, a complete US withdrawal from Korea), but the thing can be managed – once the elder Kim is dead. We hope, of course, that Kim will be sent for final judgment in a short span of time – but that might still be years away. Meanwhile, our job is to ensure against NK exporting nuclear capability or thinking that it can blackmail us with nuclear and ballistic missile tests.

This does call for diplomacy – but not the way Obama and Co view diplomacy. Diplomacy isn’t just talking and making nice. At the Congress of Berlin in 1878, Russia and England were at loggerheads and war was imminent. England had various demands which Russia had to accept or war would result. Russia was thinking that England was bluffing. The German Chancellor, Bismarck, wanted to find out if England really was – and so Bismarck went to meet with the British Prime Minister – Benjamin Disraeli – and talked and talked for hours…just relentlessly pressing Disraeli to come clean and admit that it was all a bluff, that England wouldn’t go to war…over and over again, Disraeli carefully and patiently kept re-stating the British position – Russia backs down, or there will be war. After a long while, Bismarck was 100% convinced that England wasn’t bluffing and advised the Russians – who couldn’t sustain a war against Britian – to back down. Peace secured – but only at the forthright and stout assurance that if one side didn’t back down, there would be war. We must tell NK to back down, at the threat of war, and make China understand that we are serious – NK gives up the nukes, or we fight. Once China is convinced we are deadly serious, they’ll get NK to cool it. End of crisis – and then we just wait for Kim to kick the bucket.

We’ll find out swiftly if Obama has any real sense of diplomacy – or whether he’s just another Chamberlain who thinks you can shake hands with barbarians and get them to love you.

As we all need a bit of repairs to our souls and courage in adversity:

O my God, in thee I trust, let me not be put to shame; let not my enemies exult over me.

Yea, let none that wait for thee be put to shame; let them be ashamed who are wantonly treacherous.

Make me to know thy ways, O LORD; teach me thy paths. Lead me in thy truth, and teach me, for thou art the God of my salvation; for thee I wait all the day long.

Be mindful of thy mercy, O LORD, and of thy steadfast love, for they have been from of old.

Remember not the sins of my youth, or my transgressions; according to thy steadfast love remember me, for thy goodness’ sake, O LORD!

Good and upright is the LORD; therefore he instructs sinners in the way.He leads the humble in what is right, and teaches the humble his way. – Psalm 25:2-9

Not in Cairo:

…I now propose to Obama in good faith: change the venue to New Delhi. After all, India’s Muslim population is the world’s third-largest at 158 million, just under Pakistan’s 175 million and Indonesia’s 200 million. Speaking from an Indian podium, Obama could say something like this:

I have come hear to address the Muslims of the world on Indian soil to emphasize that there is life after the end of Islam’s status as a state religion. As a minority, Indian Muslims have had to maintain their communal life without a link between mosque and state, and by and large they have succeeded. It has not been easy. On occasion Indian Muslims have been provoked to violence against their more numerous Hindu neighbors, as in the state of Gujarat in 2002, and the Hindu response was horrendous. India’s Muslims have learned that extremists in their ranks will call vengeance down upon their communities. They demonstrated sagacity in their refusal to bury in consecrated ground the Muslim terrorists killed last year in Mumbai.

Muslims around the world should look to India as an example of moderation and co-existence. Whether they like it or not, Muslims will remain a minority in the world, a minority that cannot defend itself against the superior technology and military culture of other countries. Its legitimate aspirations must lead it to moderation and compromise. The alternative could be quite nasty.

That sort of speech would get the undivided attention of the Muslim world. Anything else will lend credibility to the Islamists and foster triumphalism.

Obama believes that the “Moslem World” (so-called) will change its tune on the theory that the “Moslem World” was mad at us because of President Bush and other heinous American crimes. Obama is being taught that his belief is wrong – thus far, however, Obama hasn’t picked up the clues (you know, like Iran going bonkers with nuclear programs and the Palestinians assuming Obama will help turn out the current Israeli government), but if Obama were to change the venue and see the reaction, he’d understand.

He’d get a good reaction among our friends among the Moslems – ie, those who have bled along side us in Iraq and Afghanistan – while he’d get a bad reaction from just the sort of people who think he’s a patsy…the Islamo-fascist terrorist we’ve been fighting against for years now…in a war, not in an “overseas contingency operation”. Let us hope that Obama finally opens his eyes.

Otherwise known as Obama’s program to have government run GM:

Only 21% of voters nationwide support a plan for the government to bail out General Motors as part of a structured bankruptcy plan to keep the troubled auto giant in business.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 67% are opposed to a plan that would provide GM with $50 billion in funding and give the government a 70% ownership interest in the company.

Even when presented with the stark choice between providing government funding or letting GM go out of business, only 32% of voters support the bailout. Most voters (56%) say it would be better to let GM go out of business.

All we’re doing is providing sinecures for liberal Democrats and keeping afloat that huge source of Democrat funding and support, the United Auto Workers. Obama’s plan isn’t just one of those mistaken things, it’s downright stupid. For America, that is. For Democrats, it will work out pretty well – they’ll be able to insert surplus liberals into the GM corporate structure while at the same time ensuring a continuing flow of political donations. The only people getting screwed in this are the American people – and we know what Democrats think of them (hint: they think that those Americans who return from war should be considered potential terrorists).

I love my Chevy Malibu, but I won’t buy another GM vehicle as long as I live – just can’t trust that any money I spend on GM products won’t merely be used to support politicians I oppose.

Nevada’s other Senator – the good one – John Ensign is showing up in Iowa:

As the Des Moines Register pointed out, it barely mattered that Sen. John Ensign (R., Nev.), visiting Iowa yesterday, said flatly, “I’m not running for president in 2012.” It barely mattered that he failed to contact or meet with the state GOP chairman. His appearance in Iowa nonetheless set off a wave of 2012 speculation.

If Ensign is indeed running-by-not-running (which is not unprecedented — Barack Obama did the same thing beginning in November 2004), then he needs to show his face early on in Iowa.

“I think he’s doing the right thing,” says Matt Leonardo, an Iowa campaigner from last year, of Ensign’s (R., Nev.) trip to the heartland. Leonardo’s firm, Revolution Media Group, hasn’t taken a side yet for 2012, but he says that his 2008 client, Fred Thompson, learned the hard way what Ensign (perhaps), Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R), Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R), and other early Iowa visitors seem to grasp.

“You have to be there, to make the positive connection,” he said. “You can’t just drop in around election time with a huge media campaign. People in Iowa expect you to meet them, to shake their hands.”

Senator Ensign is a good man and has ably represented the people of Nevada in the United States Senate, but I don’t know of any grand theme he would have for a Presidential run – other than not being part of the power structure in the public mind, which might be the whole point. After all, I know of at least one other guy who is planning a political campaign partially on the theme of not being one of “them” who have screwed up the whole country. We’ll have to see where this leads.

As the pro-abortion fanatics attempt to use the murder of Tiller to label the Culture of Life “terrorist”, it is good to remind one and all what we’re fighting against – its not just abortion, but the whole Culture of Death:

Lionel Roosemont told his story at the Second International Symposium on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide, held May 29-30…

…Roosemont says he came face-to-face with the euthanasia culture in Belgium upon learning that his unborn daughter Tikvah, now 13 years old, would suffer severe disabilities related to hydrocephalus. Encouraged to abort Tikvah, Roosemont says he and his wife Renate decided to “swim against the current,” and gave birth to their daughter.

Despite lacking most of her brain, the girl proved capable of movement, sight, and hearing, contrary to her doctors’ dire forecasts. Though harrowed by the fight to preserve Tikvah’s life from ending in abortion, said Roosemont, “it was some of the training we needed to [fight] the equally horrible monster called euthanasia.”

In 2002, Belgium passed a law allowing euthanasia as requested by a patient under “constant and unbearable physical or psychological pain” who has issued written consent. A third doctor’s opinion must be sought if the illness is not terminal, and a one-month waiting period is mandatory for patients suffering from depression.

Roosemont described the prejudice Tikvah received in a society that, he says, “changed dramatically since [the] euthanasia law was adopted.”

“Life is more and more losing its value,” said Roosemont. “Can you understand why our daughter is never left alone in a hospital?”

In an interview with LifeSiteNews.com, Roosemont insisted that the actual practice of euthanasia in Belgium disregards the “safeguards” attached to the law. “We have a huge problem with lawlessness,” he said. Roosemont claimed that the law is commonly transgressed “without there being any consequences.”…

…”The problem with us is that it’s almost become a law [to disregard the safeguards],” said Roosemont.

In his speech to the conference, Roosemont showed a video interview of one of his elder daughters describing an encounter with a teacher concerning Tikvah. Upon seeing Tikvah for the first time, the teacher said that she ought to be euthanized.

“The actual words: ‘She’s just a euthanasia child,'” Roosemont told LSN. He said he has heard the sentiment twice.

While the loose application of euthanasia restrictions is widely known among Belgians, said Roosemont, the true depth of abuse is little understood. One such abuse he claimed occurs routinely is the administration of lethal drugs at one Belgian hospital to elderly, seriously ill patients – known as the “weekend cleanup” – as described to him by a nurse who worked there.

“It is logical,” he said. “It is very logical. We live in the time of instant coffee. What that means is that nobody wants to suffer.” Most of the time, he said, elderly victims of euthanasia are not themselves suffering from great pain, but are killed at the request of family burdened with their care.

Death never takes a holiday – and once you sign on to the concept that human life is not inherently valuable regardless of its condition, you’ll eventually have a “weekend cleanup”. Or does anyone out there want to assert that if we get socialized medicine that pressure won’t be applied to ensure that end-of-life costs are kept down? Take care of the geezer for six more months, or just off her this afternoon with an overdose…and have a doctor sign the death certificate and no one will ever be the wiser…

Abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, infanticide – we’re doing all of these things, and there are those among us who are asserting that they are morally equally to someone devotedly caring for the suffering. Dr. Kevorkian and Mother Theresa are just doing it different ways, and Mother’s way is actually not the best: so goes our modern, liberal thinking.

As times grow worse and you start pondering why you have to go through them:

To the servant of God . . . every place is the right place, and every time is the right time. – St. Catherine of Siena

She doesn’t intend to, but she does, all the same:

I would love to have a sophisticated national dialogue about Legal Realism (which is much-discussed here at the University of Wisconsin Law School), but so far it looks as though the discussion will not be too sophisticated. It’s pretty much: she talked about Legal Realism, Legal Realism is judicial activism, and judicial activism is judges imposing their own political preferences, so Sonia Sotomayor is unfit for the Supreme Court. But, as University of Chicago lawprof Brian Leiter said:

“Everybody who knows anything knows that Legal Realism is a description of what judges really do… I give [Sotomayor] a lot of credit, frankly, for talking about it openly. It’s unusual for a sitting judge to say it openly, because judges don’t want to attract the political heat from acknowledging what everyone already knows, which is that appellate judges especially have to make new law – that they can’t just apply the law as written.”

I would love to have more Supreme Court Justices who say what they really think. Imagine if, when reading a “decision,” we were actually reading the decision.

Here is an excellent run-down on legal realism – well worth reading. But “legal realism”, “judicial activism” and such catch-phrases are really just a dodge, and a good part of the reason why the judicial system – and, especially, the lawyers who man it – are held in contempt. In the case of legal realism, what we have is a body of thought which refuses to say “I don’t know” – rather than admit that, at times, the law doesn’t cover the exact case before the Court, the Court simply decides to “get real” about it and make up legal feces as they go along. The underlying concept behind such things is a conviction that lawyers and judges know better – after all, they went to law school and have a book case full of law books, right? Must be smarter than the rest of us. They’re also rich, and we know that money is the measure of the man.

What do the people want? Well, the people want to know who did it – who did the murder/rape/robbery/con, and then impose the appropriate punishment on whomever did it, taking into consideration any mitigating circumstances. The people never were much interested in whether or not a crook caught red-handed knew precisely what his 5th Amendment rights were and the people certainly never felt it was the cops’ duty to tell the criminal about it…if you’re going in to crime as a career, its upon you to learn the ins and outs of criminal law, ya know? It took lawyers – once again, smarter than the people – to figure out that not only should a cop have to tell a criminal exactly what he can do, but that the way to punish the cops for getting it wrong was to release the criminal back into the public, to prey upon the people some more until the cops could dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s before bringing the miscreant back to the judge. It also took lawyers to figure out that someone who smokes for 50 years, and for decades after its found to be cancer-causing, are the innocent victims of tobacco growers…

We all know, in a moment, a hundred examples of lawyers and judges doing weird, inexplicable things – things which are so clearly in contravention of common sense and the law that it seems their goal is to see what they can get away with. Like the lawyers get together with the judge in the back room and say “hey, do you think they’ll buy a million dollar judgment for someone spilling coffee on themselves”? What we don’t need is another judge who thinks she’s so clever that she can figure out, all on her own, what is what. All we want out of our judges is the laws – as written – enforced, with due consideration given to the hierarchy of laws – ie, the US Constitution trumps the county ordinance. If the law turns out to be idiotic, then we’ll fix it, ourselves, via the legislative process…or, perhaps, we won’t…maybe we, the people, like idiotic laws. Its not for judges to decide.

Sotomayor is just another one in a long line of lawyers and judges who believes her own press releases. She’s unfit for the Court by virtue of her racist statement – but even if that is not to be considered dispositive, the fact that she wants to use “legal realism” rather than the law indicates that a judge is the last thing she should be. If she wants to make law, let her run for Congress…if she wants to be a judge, let her shut her trap on what the law should be, and just concentrate on what it is.

The murder of abortionist George Tiller is, indeed, a tragedy though not, as pro- and anti-abortion people are painting it. For the pro-abortion forces, the murder of Tiller is a horrific crime showing how bad the anti-abortion mindset can be. For the anti-abortion forced, the murder of Tiller is feared to cause a pro-abortion backlash, at least in law, at a time when the Culture of Life is rapidly winning the debate. It is a horrific crime, and it will cause a backlash – but there is a larger issue at stake.

In Tiller we had a man who gathered vast resources, public and private, to provide protection for his business – which was, after all, the killing of unborn children even long after they were viable outside the womb. In his murderer we have a man who turned reason on its head and proposed to murder in the name of life. Both men thought they were doing good – and managed to convince themselves of this while they were planning murder. As a commentary on just how depraved our society has become, there is no better (or worse) example.

Tiller has now gone before the judgment seat of God and, in the by and by, we’ll all know how he fared there. His murderer will likely be sent there at taxpayer expense, either via execution or life imprisonment. And there, too, we’ll all eventually find out how he fares. I don’t presume to speak for God, but I do wonder if Tiller will be confronted with the children he killed, and whether his murderer will be asked about the children he could have saved, had he opened up a crisis pregnancy center rather than plotting cold blooded murder? It is said in the linked news story that Tiller once wore a button stating “Trust Women”; the irony was apparently lost on him who worked diligently to relieve women of the children entrusted to them. I wonder what pro-life things we’ll find among his murderer’s effects?

As Our Lord was being nailed to the cross, he asked God to forgive his tormentors, as they did not know what they were doing – so, too, I think, with Tiller and his murderer. Both men were trapped in a confusion of loyalties wrought by a century of moral relativism; neither could see the humanity in their victim, neither could remember that what one does to the least of these, he does to Our Lord. I pray God will forgive both men and I pray that those who are now attempting to paint Tiller or his murderer a some sort of hero will come to an understanding of what Life is, and what it is for.