And as this involves Dianne Feinstein, its doubly disappointing – she’s one of the few adults in the Democrat Senate caucus:

Sen. Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation early this year to channel $25 billion in taxpayer funds to a federal agency that had just awarded her husband’s firm a lucrative contract to sell foreclosed properties.

The California senator sought the additional funds for the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to boost the agency’s efforts to avert home foreclosures – a huge issue in her home state.

But as the Washington Times first reported Tuesday, Feinstein’s intervention came around the same time the FDIC was awarding a multimillion-dollar contract to CB Richard Ellis Group (CBRE) – the commercial real-estate firm chaired by her husband, Richard Blum.

People are hurting and need help – but a Democrat smells the chance to make some money on the side and just can’t resist it.

So very sad – and there’s only one cure for it: beat the Democrats very badly in November.

This clueless:

Let’s go through the president’s fascinating logic here, shall we? The Republican nobility has completely misrepresented the king’s intentions, thereby creating a most unfortunate situation where the peasants don’t trust him and his Democratic court anymore. And what’s more, these common folk are in such a tizzy that they have left the Republican noblemen in Congress with absolutely no wiggle room; for if these Republicans concede anything now in an effort to improve the lot for all, they will be in hot water back home.

Earth to Barack Obama: It isn’t the Republicans on Capitol Hill that have blocked your attempts to put America on the path towards government-run health care. It was the American people — the same people that punished your party in 1994 when they tried to pull this stunt the last time. And it wasn’t because they were told that it was “some wild-eyed plot to impose huge government in every aspect of [their] lives,” or that “this guy is doing all kinds of crazy stuff that’s going to destroy America.” They figured that stuff out on their own.

Obama – and the rest of the Democrats – do seem to be laboring under the assumption that the TEA Party was created and controlled by the GOP. The believe this because they know that no one on the left is permitted to form a grass roots organization without the specific permission of leftist leaders. Not understanding how the people can self-organize, our Community Organizer in Chief is all at sea about what is happening.

Obama seems to have gone to that GOP retreat in the hopes of getting the GOP to call of the dogs. To get our side to calm down the TEA Party people and allow some version of Obamacare to go through. Sorry, Barry, it can’t be done. Two reasons:

1. We don’t want to do it – or, at least, those in the GOP who want real reform rather than “bi-partisanship” don’t want to do it.

2. Couldn’t do it, even if we wanted to. If you’ve got a phone number to the Grand Poo-Bah of the TEA Party movement, you let us know…as far as we can tell, its a disparate group of patriots working independently on a common cause. If it has a leader, its Sarah Palin – but even she doesn’t call the shots.

The American people are in revolt against the government – Rasmussen’s latest polling for Presidential job approval shows a marked improvement for Obama on the “Strongly Approve” metric since the SOTU. The problem is that all he’s done is win over Democrats – Independents are less supportive now than they were before the SOTU. No one is buying the liberal line any more – and no one is fooled by MSM attempts to paint the TEA Party as some sort of extremist fringe.

The times, they are a-changing. Get used to it, liberals.

And it’ll work, I bet:

Jonathan Martin reports:

A tactic that would have seemed far-fetched a year ago, when the new president was sworn in with a 67 percent job approval rating, is now emerging as a key component of the GOP strategy: Tie Democratic opponents to Obama and make them answer for some of the unpopular policies associated with the chief executive.

This is, of course, the mirror image of what occurred in 2006, when Democrats ran against George W. Bush. Martin adds: “The challenge will be to link Democrats with the administration on such issues as spending, bailouts, healthcare and cap-and-trade while not personally attacking Obama, who remains personally well-liked even as his standing erodes.” It’s not much of a challenge, really; all Republicans need to do is look at the campaigns of Bob McDonnell and Scott Brown, who ran against Obama policies but made no personal attacks on the president.

Heck, even if Obama were personally unpopular, I’d still eschew attacks on him, personally – its Obama policies which are driving people away from the Democrats. Obama can be all puppies and butterflies in the public mind, but as long as Democrats are identified with the health care debacle, “cap and trade” and bank bailouts, it won’t matter. We need to hammer it home that a vote for a Democrat is a vote for Obama policies – and we should hammer it home in all 435 districts. No Democrat should go unchallenged.

Of course, this won’t completely do the trick. We also need a clear plan of our own, vigorously presented to the American people. And it can’t just be tax cuts and such – it has to be a revolutionary pledge to clean up government from top to bottom. If we do that and, even more, if we fully carry it out, we’ll secure a generation of power for conservatism, and thus the means to restore America to the Founder’s vision.

The absurdity grows:

The United Nations’ expert panel on climate change based claims about ice disappearing from the world’s mountain tops on a student’s dissertation and an article in a mountaineering magazine…

…In its most recent report, it stated that observed reductions in mountain ice in the Andes, Alps and Africa was being caused by global warming, citing two papers as the source of the information.

However, it can be revealed that one of the sources quoted was a feature article published in a popular magazine for climbers which was based on anecdotal evidence from mountaineers about the changes they were witnessing on the mountainsides around them.

The other was a dissertation written by a geography student, studying for the equivalent of a master’s degree, at the University of Berne in Switzerland that quoted interviews with mountain guides in the Alps.

The revelations, uncovered by The Sunday Telegraph, have raised fresh questions about the quality of the information contained in the report, which was published in 2007.

The data has been fake, at times and now it seems that some of the “data” was akin to “stuff I overheard at a party”.

As I’ve said before – people need to go to jail over this. Vast sums of money have been spent and a few con artists have made out like bandits – and all for a completely idiotic theory ginned up by people who wanted to scare us in to socialism. Enough is enough.

UPDATE: And now the global warming claims about damage to the rain forest are coming up bogus.

This is the must read economic article of the month. Read it, and know what is going on – fail to read it, and be ignorant. Its as simple as that.

Sorry, guys and gals, I’ve just got nothing in the brain worth writing about at the moment…have fun with this open thread and I promise something good for you in the evening (as long as “good” is defined by me, ok?). :o)

Oh, I know – we can do Super Bowl predictions! I’m rooting for the Saints…odd for an AFC man, like me, but I just love a Cinderella story…

UPDATE: Here’s something to talk about – the TEA Party moves to take over the GOP at the grassroots level.

Hey, its not just me saying it:

New York University Professor Nouriel Roubini, who anticipated the financial crisis, called the fourth quarter surge in U.S. economic growth “very dismal and poor” because it relied on temporary factors.

Roubini said more than half of the 5.7 percent expansion reported yesterday by the government was related to a replenishing of inventories and that consumption depended on monetary and fiscal stimulus. As these forces ebb, growth will slow to just 1.5 percent in the second half of 2010, he said.

“The headline number will look large and big, but actually when you dissect it, it’s very dismal and poor,” Roubini told Bloomberg Television in an interview at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. “I think we are in trouble.”

Roubini said while the world’s largest economy won’t relapse into recession, unemployment will rise from the current 10 percent, posing social and political challenges.

“It’s going to feel like a recession even if technically we’re not going to be in a recession,” he said.

Me: I think it will not just feel like a recession, but it will be one. My bet is that 3rd quarter GDP will show a contraction unless Obama and Co can find some other temporary things to put some lipstick on our economic pig. Might even contract in the 2nd quarter – but I’m betting the bogus stuff they’re feeding in to the GDP numbers will carry them at least until June.

We paid for $101,000 for Pelosi’s booze and food?

Now we’re up to 15 banks shut down in 2010, and that is it for January. 15 times 12 equals 180 – we’re on track to exceed last year’s bank failures. But the economy is all better, now.

Climate guy knew all about the glacier lies.

China is upset we’re selling arms to Taiwan. I approve of upsetting China in this manner.

In the battle between Christian Orthodoxy and Christianity Lite, Orthodoxy wins.

California researchers switching from pointless embryonic stem cells to worthwhile adult stem cells.

Reid has $8.7 million in the bank to lie about his record.

As Republicans gear up for the battles of 2010, we must remember that the enemy is on the left.

Feeling bad? Worried that we won’t be able to win and restore our nation? Well, quit whining and get to work.

The troubles in the Eurozone grow.

Ever wonder what a capitalist fat cat looks like?

The MSM gets it wrong, again. This time about O’Keefe – he of the famed ACORN expose’ – and his efforts to investigate Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-Reid’s Back Pocket):

…American journalists once cheered for those among their own who were brave enough to risk jail in the quest of exposing corruption and malfeasance. Yet when O’Keefe and his band of whippersnapper journalists went undercover, disguised as telephone repairmen in the hopes of exposing Senator Landrieu’s denying her own constituents phone access to her, the MSM fell all over themselves denouncing the young men.

Rush to judgment? No. It was a stampede.

From MSNBC, CBS, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, Talking Points Memo and others came shrill, utterly false headlines about “attempted bugging” and the “new Watergate,” which are now being corrected or retracted with but a faint whisper. MSM “journalists” in high-and-mighty places haven’t had this much egg on their faces since their coffee-klatch therapy sessions over the misunderstood, “non-jihadist” Ft. Hood terror attack.

Bravo Mr. O’Keefe, honey!

Writing as a boomer conservative, who was in my youth a raging leftist, I know well the forces at work against you now, and can only salute your willingness to go to the mat to expose liberal corruption, wherever you find it. Although, as an old mom, I would discourage you from carrying through with, perhaps, not-thought-all-the-way-through plans in the future, I still must commend not only your intentions, but also your guts.

Though you may pay personal consequences for your actions in the Senator’s office, you have succeeded in bringing two important items to light.

One, you brought necessary scrutiny to the charge that Senator Landrieu may have been, on purpose, blocking phone calls from her own constituents. You learned firsthand, evidently, that her phone system was not unable to receive calls as she was apparently telling her constituents…

Second, you have demonstrated in full public view – once again – why the MSM is literally drowning itself in its own leftist ideology.

ACORN leaped upon this story when it broke – when the MSM was immediately trumpeting it as “Watergate II – as a means of rehabilitating itself. While the MSM, itself, was gleeful over the prospect of O’Keefe – who scooped all of them – getting in trouble. But the story seemed odd, right out the gate. Why bug Landrieu? What did he hope to find out? That Harry Reid was bribing her with taxpayer money in return for her Senate vote?

As the days have gone on since the story broke, it has become clear that it wasn’t some nefarious plot but, once again, just O’Keefe trying to get at truth the MSM refuses to uncover. Now, it could still be that O’Keefe violated a law – if so, then he’s going to have to pay the piper; there are no free rides on the right side of the aisle. But the most important thing is that Landrieu was broadcasting what appears to be a flat out lie, and the MSM never made a move to uncover it. It takes a gutsy, independent journalist to go where MSMers fear to tread.

So, if O’Keefe sets up a legal defense fund, I’ll donate to it. God bless this young man and best of luck in the future.

Yeah, if you want to believe it. Mish’s has an excellent run down on the underlying weakness in the numbers (a real “must read”) and concludes thusly:

Digging beneath the surface there is nothing to cheer about in the GDP numbers. Moreover, this weakness is in the face of the largest stimulus measures the world has ever seen, not just in the US, but globally. Money supply in China is growing at 30% and housing bubbles are likely to pop in Australia, Canada, and the UK. Problems in Greece, Spain, and Iceland continue to mount.

GDP is a mirage of sand blowing in the wind. So is global growth. It is a mistake to believe government spending can possibly provide a solid foundation for a lasting recovery.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: this “recovery” is all smoke and mirrors. 5.7% growth is consistent with a massive economic boom. What is booming in our economy? Someone tell me the sectors which are having a banner year? Outside of lobbying and government, no one is -and that tells the tale. We – and the rest of the world – are printing money and using it to put a false glow of health in the economic body.

Back last year, shortly before my father passed away, he was given a blood transfusion – and for a few days, he was in the pink…looked fabulous and he felt great. But it was a false spring…the internal bleeding and other issues where still there. Thus it is with our economy – we’ve given a blood transfusion to a dying man, but we have not the capability – while liberals run the show – of taking the steps which might actually cure the patient.

We need to start allowing Americans to make, mine and grow things – massive amounts of taxes and regulations have to be set aside so that we, the people, can get to work without government interference. Unless and until we do this, we won’t get any better – and if we keep printing and borrowing money to finance government deficits, we’ll actually be getting worse off, day by day. It is my contention that actual wealth continues to contract in the Untied States – that we are in a daily net loss as long as we are printing and borrowing like mad.

All of this will come home to roost – Obama and his Democrats hope it won’t happen until after November and they will do everything they can – including manipulate the data – to make it seem like things are getting better. But the day of reckoning comes – and I’m actually more convinced now, with these new GDP numbers, that they can’t keep the ball in the air past March. I could be wrong – in fact, they could by some chance keep this rolling even for a year or two more…but the time will come when it can’t be sustained. Not here and not anywhere else, either. Then the piper will have to be paid – and the longer we delay good policies, the more he’s going to demand of us.