As good a place as any to cut out completely worthless government spending:

…Bachmann says she will press for the new Republican-controlled House of Representatives to pass a bill sponsored by fellow conservative luminary Mike Pence, an Indiana congressman, to de-fund Planned Parenthood when it convenes in January.

“Well, I think one thing that we can do, quite simply, is to withhold funding from Planned Parenthood,” Bachmann said when asked by CNS News about what Congress can do to protect unborn children…

The dirty, little secret of the left is that it is largely taxpayer funded. Not too many people are really willing to pass their own cash to groups like Planned Parenthood. They rely on government subsidies to carry on – the whole super structure of the left depends on government funding of one sort or another (not too many leftists actually work in the private sector, ya dig?). By cutting out government funding, we’ll cripple the left’s ability to advance their causes.

So, let’s cut away – not only will it be a good thing to do, it’ll be fun. The shrieks from the left about it will be endlessly entertaining.

From the New York Post:

For all of President Obama’s rhetoric about “fat cat” investment bankers who gambled the country into economic decay, he sure seems to have a larger soft spot for big Wall Street than for average Americans.

After all, his latest push to “remedy” 9.8 percent unemployment for the masses is an extension of unemployment benefits. Meanwhile, his policies aren’t just making Wall Streeters rich, as bonuses are expected to hit record highs this year. They’re also likely (according to some insiders) to spark a hiring spree among bankers in the new year…

I don’t know if all that new hiring will come about in 2011 – things teeter on the edge of a financial abyss and if we tip in to it, that’s all she wrote. But there is no doubt that the banksters have done well in 2010 – what with Treasury and Fed shoveling money through the financial system and taking bad assets of the banks’ hands, they’ve had a banner year. And indicators are that not only are they are cashing out their stocks in record amounts but, presumptively, putting all that money we gave them in to bonds (so, Americans, the money we gave them is being lent by them back to us…so we can pay interest on the money we handed out. Cool, huh?).

I don’t blame Obama for this except in the sense that he put himself forward as a Presidential candidate in 2008 even though he lacked any sort of political or real world experience which would allow him to judge properly when people were trying to rip America off. Re-appointing Bernanke after he had already looted us for trillions just shows that Obama doesn’t know what he’s doing.

We can hope he’ll wise up, but I doubt it – the Ruling Class, of which Obama is head, has closed ranks….they are determined to help themselves, people get stuffed. We’ll see how long it takes before the piper demands payment.

From Hugh Hewitt:

Senator JimDeMint just announced on my program that he will oppose the deal as well as a vote for cloture on the deal. He is reluctant to criticize GOP Senate leadership, but believes the deal at a minimum has to be paid for, and that we need “a permanent economy” not a temporary one as well as permanent tax cuts, not temporary tax cuts…

DeMint doesn’t like the fact that the deal increases the debt – he, I guess, has thought the matter all the way through. I doubt he’ll be able to stop it – but, then again, no one can say for sure. Lot of strange cross-currents in this Congress, at this moment.

From WRAL:

Elizabeth Edwards, the political wife whose public battle with breast cancer, coping with marital infidelity and continued advocacy for the downtrodden raised her profile above that of her husband, died Tuesday, WRAL News has learned…

Our prayers for her and her family.

Charles Hurt thinks the tax deal has finished Obama’s chances of being re-elected:

…At first glance, last night’s compromise decision puts Obama on firmer ground for his re-election bid two years from now because it moves him toward the middle.

But in truth, he may have sealed his fate as a one-term president.

In recent days as the White House and Democrats signaled that the compromise to extend the Bush tax cuts was in the offing, the liberal coalition that carried Obama into the White House began falling apart.

The left is apoplectic that their savior would turn around on them and adopt Bush’s most “draconian” tax policies that “only favor the rich.”

If they were frustrated before, now they are palpably angry and publicly voicing their disillusionment with Obama…

We might get a couple liberals going on the ranch over this but I don’t think this, long term, jeopardizes Obama’s support in the liberal base. One must keep in mind how utterly servile most liberals are.

Remember how forceful the gay rights activists were? Nothing could stop them – they were queer and here and weren’t going away. But when Bill Clinton betrayed them on gays in the military, what did they do? They backed his re-election effort and have remained loyal lap dogs of the Democrat party.

Remember how strong the feminists were? They weren’t going to take any sexist guff from anyone. When even the mildest accusation of sexual impropriety was leveled against a powerful man, they were all over him and hounded him until he was out of office. But when people like Ted Kennedy and Bill Clinton used and abused women on a regular basis, what did they do? Back them to the hilt – and they, too, remain loyal lap dogs for the Democrat party.

There is no independent thought on the left – there are talking points, endlessly parroted. There is no grass roots on the left – just paid and organized pressure groups. There is no fearless going where ever conviction leads – just a supine desire to be “in” with the leadership, where ever it goes.

No, Obama isn’t losing his base. Come 2012, they’ll all come home – because that is what they’ll be told to do. One or two might break off, but the overwhelming bulk will be “baa” upon command. This doesn’t mean Obama will win – just having the liberal base won’t be enough – but it does mean that we can’t take it for granted that Obama will have any problem locking down his core supporters. He won’t – a united left will confront us in 2012 and that is what we should plan for.

The Revolution spreads – from Fox News:

Adding insult to injury for their party, at least 13 Democratic state lawmakers have joined the Republican ranks since Election Day — deepening GOP gains and in one case handing the party the state House majority.

Democrats in five states have switched parties since Nov. 2, citing concerns about the economy and the political leanings of their constituents. The defections are a troubling sign for state Democratic operations clinging to life following their election drubbing. Though Republicans’ congressional gains drew more attention, the party picked up more than 675 seats at the state level last month and in some cases took over entire state capitals…

There will be, I bet, more to come on this – including the possibility of some House Democrats switching (and I bet we’ve got a 50/50 shot at poaching Manchin from the Democrats as 2012 approaches – he’s got to run again that year, his State is increasingly GOP and there at very strong chance the GOP will take the Senate in 2012, even if Obama is re-elected…unless he wants to be an unpopular-with-the-caucus, center/right Democrat back-bencher, he’s going to have to make a move). Outside of the liberal bastions, there is just not much to say for being a Democrat – I mean, come on, if you’re a House Democrat, you have to carry the albatross of Pelosi in to 2012…what’s your promise going to be? Vote for me, and I’ll help Nancy back in to the Speaker’s chair?

We’ve been talking of realignment to the center/right since 1980 – and we’re finally at the point where we can make it happen. If we don’t blow it, that is. And let’s remember that we are Republicans – and not called “the stupid party”, for nothing. Vigilance and force are going to be needed to keep our leaders from botching the job.

What can I say? Awesome.

George W. Bush’s job approval rating as president has spiked to 47 percent, according to a Gallup poll released Monday.

That’s 1 point higher than President Barack Obama’s job approval rating in a poll taken the same week.

This is the first time Gallup asked Americans to retrospectively rate Bush’s job performance. And it was a stunning turnaround from his low point of 25 percent in November 2008. The 47 percent number is 13 points higher than the last Gallup poll taken before Bush left office in 2009 and the highest rating for him since before Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Obama has been doing wonders for Bush’s legacy. While the media conspired to take down Bush during his eight years as President, the truth has a longer shelf  life than spin.

From Zero Hedge:

The inevitable moment for the Wikileaks founder has arrived: the Telegraph is reporting that Julian Assange will hand himself in to police – possibly as early as Tuesday – after a fresh European Arrest Warrant was issued by the Swedish authorities. “Mr Assange is expected to voluntarily attend a police station within the next 24 hours, and will then appear in a magistrates’ court. He is wanted over allegations of sexual assault in Sweden.”…

Some are calling Assange a hero. Others a terrorist. Many seem pretty indifferent. My view: he’s a man who did a dumb thing, and likely did it for fame and money.

Its like this – governments, believe it or not, don’t just keep secrets in order to screw the people (though, of course, they do a lot of that, too). Some times things are secret because they actually need to be. It is hard to sift out when government is keeping proper confidences, and when it is just covering up embarrassing facts. The way we differentiate is by an MSM which actually investigates (and, unfortunately, most of the MSM doesn’t do that – and not just because a Democrat is President…even when they were hammering President Bush, they were doing it essentially via press releases from kook leftist, hate-Bush groups) and a Congress which conducts genuine oversight (also pretty absent of late). I know that we have a weakness here – but, even so, the way to correct the weakness is not to allow some darned fool of a Pfc to hand over our nation’s secrets to a man on the make.

Everything seems to be out there, now. We can’t really place a limit and say, “well, they got all this, but all that is still secure”. Our assumption has to be that our enemies – all of them, everywhere – know our deepest secrets. Now, we’ve presumptively plugged the leak and so from this point forward we can have a bit of safety – but everything we’ve been up to and are currently doing is now known, in whole or in part, by everyone. This is gigantically damaging to the United States and the world – for each bit of “got you, ya SOB” we’ve learned from Wikileaks about our government there is at least one bit of “wow, we didn’t want the enemy to know that”, as well. We’ll be years recovering from this – compared to this, the Rosenberg’s giving Stalin the atomic bomb was small beans. And we executed the Rosenbergs for that, you’ll want to recall.

We cannot allow that a person who has no responsibility for events to release data. It is time to rally ’round the President and the country on this one, boys and girls – we must crush the people who did this and ensure strongly against a repeat. Death, once upon a time, was the usual fate of the traitor (Manning) and the spy (Assange) – we might not want to go that far (though a strong case can be made for shooting the former and hanging the latter), but we definitely want them to feel so much heat that the next couple cretins who think along these lines will think again.

My dad, some time before he died, told me that he was actually sent out – as a teenage boy – rifle in hand to guard the beaches of Los Angeles. It really seemed that bad at the time – the attack was so sudden and so devastating that the Japanese seemed capable of anything.

That entire generation is now passing away – the youngest of them are in their 80’s; soon, they will all be gone. Take time to remember them, this day.