American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture
As if the country wasn’t hapless enough already, Jimmy Carter’s on his way: Former President Plans on Visiting Country Amid Riots
Daniel Duquenal posts his Open letter to Jimmy Carter: Don’t you have any shame?
I can assure you that half of the country has no respect nor credibility for you and the other half thinks you are a mere fool that they can use and discard as needed.
Go read it all.
UPDATE:
Linked to by Pirate’s Cove. Thank you!
The Economist sizes it up:
Venezuela’s government
A circus without a ringmaster
Radicals, former soldiers and Cuban spies jostle for control of the Venezuelan ring
During the presidential election campaign, Mr Maduro was seen as the favoured candidate not just of his predecessor but also of Cuba, Venezuela’s closest ally. A month ago, however, Mr Cabello made a three-day visit to Havana, holding meetings with President Raúl Castro and his brother, Fidel. The trip came shortly after the leaking of the Silva recording. No one knows what sort of deal the Cubans may have struck with Mr Cabello. For the moment, he and Mr Maduro are locked in a macho Latin embrace, of the kind some say was devised as a way for each man to frisk the other for weapons.
Maduro was in Havana reviewing the promotions of military officers of the Venezuelan Armed Forces (h/t Babalu). Cuban intelligence officers are tracking Venezuela’s opposition. If there is a ringmaster, he’s most likely Cuban.
I mentioned a while ago that Maduro may not last long in power, and his successor may be Cabello, not Capriles. Only time will tell.
Over at the Carter Center, they’re having qualms over the quality of the voting conditions and whether every registered voter is able to vote one time, and only one time.
But fret not, unctuous Jimmy had already given his Seal of Approval to the Venezuela Election.
Remember that Jimmy Carter was heading to Cuba? He was invited by the Cuban government, and supposedly was going to get Alan Gross released.
Well, he got there, dressed like the natives, kissed up to the Castro brothers, called Fidel “an old friend”,
asked the US to release five convicts,
Bypassing ancillary issues such as the lack of freedom on the island and the enslavement of 11-million Cubans, Carter instead demanded that the U.S. release the Cuban 5. Those are the same five convicted Cuban spies who are serving prison time for espionage and the murder of four innocent American pilots who were shot down over international waters by Castro MiGs.
met with Yoani Sanchez, her husband, Claudia Cadelo and Laritza Diversent, and Alan Gross remains in jail
when the 86-year-old ex-president flew off in the afternoon without Alan Gross on board, it dashed the hopes of Washington officials and relatives who had hoped Carter would be able to bring the Maryland native home.
The Obama administration missed the opportunity months ago when it eased restrictions on Cuba without demanding Gross’s released.
As Instapundit puts it,
And we probably have decades of similar stuff to look forward to once Barack Obama is an ex-president.
Indeed.
Cross-posted at The Green Room and Real Clear World.
It’ll be like a school reunion. I bet they might even play dominoes and drink beer, like old men do all over the Caribbean,
Jimmy Carter To Visit His Favorite Communist Dictators
Jimmy’s heading there to get Alan Gross released, but don’t expect much anything else – aside from the usual kissing-up to Communists.
Jimmy Carter’s drunk brother’s gas station won’t be added to the historic site on our dime YET; $17 million for 30 acres and a gas station in the Georgia boondocks is a pile of money:
Barrasso stops Billy Carter Service Station Museum from becoming national park
The gas station of former President Jimmy Carter’s beer drinking brother will not become a national historic site paid for by taxpayers — at least, not yet.
Legislation that would expand the former president’s national historic site by 30 acres at a cost of $17 million over five years was pulled from consideration during a Senate committee meeting Thursday. Republican Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming offered an amendment preventing the Billy Carter Service Station Museum from being included in the expansion, making the Georgia museum a national park. The House has already passed similar legislation.
“The Los Angeles Times posed the question best: ‘In the age of the $787-billion stimulus package, it is, perhaps, a modest question: Should the American taxpayer foot the bill to enshrine the gas station run by the late Billy Carter?’’ Barrasso said during the meeting. “I believe the answer is no.”
Thank you, John Barrasso.
CNN Money/Fortune have an interesting article on the jobs bill, where they directly compare Obama’s plan with that of Jimmy Carter, which by now many of us remember with a sense of deja vu,
Obama’s disco-era jobs bill
The article points out
– the potential for waste,
It’s estimated that of the companies that claimed the tax credit under Carter’s plan, two-thirds would have hired those employees regardless of the tax break.
“It’s a windfall for companies that want to expand anyway,” says Rea Hederman, a senior policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation. Should the bill pass, Hederman says the big beneficiaries of the tax credit this time around would be companies in the big-growth areas of health care and education.
– lack of useful information for businesses who may not know about the tax credit, particularly small businesses
– the bill won’t do much,
Bartik estimates that with its $13 billion price tag, the law would create 350,000 jobs at best — a drop in the bucket compared with the over eight million jobs lost since the end of 2007.
On this, may I point out that the government would be taking tax money from businesses to come up with 350,000 jobs at best, at a cost of at least $37,143 each, so the business can deduct how much? from their taxes. It’s a scam with the government at the center.
– in order to qualify for the tax break, an employer has to hire someone who has been out of work for at least 60 days. What became of hiring the best qualified candidate?
And, the article doesn’t mention it directly, but any business that can wait to hire would not hire them immediately but rather postpone until the tax credit goes into effect.
Why not cut taxes on businesses instead?
Larry Kudlow explains (emphasis added),
The future of the U.S. economy — including jobs, growth and the stock market — hangs in the balance. Government-controlled health care, with Senate vote-purchasing and union special-interest loopholes, is not the answer. Nor is a $2 trillion tax hike on banks, multinational corporations, capital gains, inheritance and successful upper-income earners. Nor is a doubling of the publicly held federal debt to $19 trillion, or nearly 80 percent of gross domestic product. Nor is a federal spending ratio of 25 percent of the economy. Nor is a budget deficit at a 10 percent share of GDP for as far as the eye can see.
Again, Washington doesn’t get it. Politicians are delivering a fiscal product that no one in America wants. It’s no wonder small businesses aren’t hiring. Yes, there is a cyclical recovery going on, but it is incomplete without the jobs.
The so-called $85 billion jobs program is not a jobs program at all. It is a spending bill. Temporary tax credits to hire new workers have virtually no permanent job-creating effect. In budget terms, these kinds of temporary tax credits are scored as tax expenditures — i.e., spending. Only a permanent reduction in the marginal business tax rate has the incentive effect for long-run job creation. Reducing the business tax rate makes firms more profitable after-tax. And it gives them more cash flow. Those incentives will work to expand investment and jobs.
And taxing capital is the worst idea of all. That’s why the capital-gains tax must not be increased. Plus, raising the top two income tax brackets from 33 percent to 35 percent, and then from 35 percent to 40 percent, thereby penalizing those who own about half of the small-business income, is a job-destroyer.
But, to the Obama administration, it’s back to the dying days of disco.
Der Speigel’s harsh assessment of Obama’s trip to China:
Obama’s Nice Guy Act Gets Him Nowhere on the World Stage
When he entered office, US President Barack Obama promised to inject US foreign policy with a new tone of respect and diplomacy. His recent trip to Asia, however, showed that it’s not working. A shift to Bush-style bluntness may be coming.
Upon taking office, Obama said that he wanted to listen to the world, promising respect instead of arrogance. But Obama’s currency isn’t as strong as he had believed. Everyone wants respect, but hardly anyone is willing to pay for it. Interests, not emotions, dominate the world of realpolitik. The Asia trip revealed the limits of Washington’s new foreign policy: Although Obama did not lose face in China and Japan, he did appear to have lost some of his initial stature.
In Tokyo, the new center-left government even pulled out of its participation in a mission which saw the Japanese navy refueling US warships in the Indian Ocean as part of the Afghanistan campaign. In Beijing, Obama failed to achieve any important concessions whatsoever. There will be no binding commitments from China to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. A revaluation of the Chinese currency, which is kept artificially weak, has been postponed. Sanctions against Iran? Not a chance. Nuclear disarmament? Not an issue for the Chinese.
The White House did not even stand up for itself when it came to the question of human rights in China. The president, who had said only a few days earlier that freedom of expression is a universal right, was coerced into attending a joint press conference with Chinese President Hu Jintao, at which questions were forbidden. Former US President George W. Bush had always managed to avoid such press conferences.
Spiegel even ends the article by quoting Newt Gingrich and saying Obama’s “a lot like Jimmy Carter.”
Even harsher than Spiegel, via Taylor Marsh, the Saturday Night Live skit:
UPDATE
Whoa. MoDo starting to wake up? Chris Matthews saying Obama’s making “Carteresque” mistakes?
A memo, released late on a Friday night, Obama Drops Key Clause in Jerusalem Embassy Memo
Late on Friday The Washington Times’ Christian Bourge obtained a copy of Presidential Determination 2009-19, latest in a series of pro forma memos to the Secretary of State entitled “Suspension of Limitations Under the Jerusalem Embassy Act.” This determination is a legally required waiver under said act to continue to delay the May 31, 1999 deadline for moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Nearly identical memos like this have been issued every six months for the last decade. Standard procedure, no big deal, right? Well in the Bush years the memo contained the sentence,
“My Administration remains committed to beginning the process of moving our embassy to Jerusalem.”
The Obama team has edited that passage out. This explains the Friday evening release. Congress should revisit the Jerusalem Embassy Act and remove the loophole that has allowed this charade to continue for ten years. Meanwhile the president should explain exactly what his policy is on this issue, and why he is not committed to beginning the process of moving the embassy.
Jimmy Carter, for one, is delighted over Obama’s Israel policy:
Ex-President Carter praises Obama Mideast policy Do read the article, but the main points are:
Carter, a vile little man, will stand forever against Israel.