And obviously 2012 is a ways off but I think if the Republicans go back to business as usual a Tea Party candidate... Rubio, Palin (yuck), Gary Johnson, Ron Paul could get as much as 10-15% of the vote. It is a nice thing to hold the GOP somewhat in check before they sign off on other massive spending bill.

Big news on replacing No Child Left Behind.

Obama's doing pretty good in this SotU.

I don't think anyone's ever accused him of being a crappy speaker

SI

He hasn't been doing so well for a few months until lately. Sounding more boring than inspiring.

Speech is pretty blah overall, but I do like having the two parties mixed together in the audience. Always thought the old arrangement was pretty ridiculous.

Earmarks!

*sigh* Earmarks are such a lame boogeyman

SI

Half of them probably don't know when to clap anymore.

I imagine weeks of planning have gone into the politics of when to clap and when to not.

Very disappointing to see him give in to the easy politics there.

One of the "analysts " mentioned this as well, that people were confused as far as when to clap.
I didn't realize there was rules.

I think they have an applause sign in each section that goes on and off for when to clap and not to clap. :)

Wouldn't it be great if the Applause sign was set with a background color to match whoever is supposed to clap and the strength of the color let's everyone know how hard to clap? Like a deep blue gets Dems clapping, a deep red for the Pubs, and then a pinkish mix for everyone?

Preschool fail.

Red and blue make...

Anybody catch Michelle Bachmann's Tea Party response?

Fox News has a video link.

Anyone know who this woman is shaking Obama's hand?

Looks like Penny Flame.

Looks like Penny's nipples.

She kind of has that wild eyed "I'm a clueless moron" like Michelle Bachman. But I doubt Bachman would know how to shake hands.

She doesn't know her history, so I think you might be right.

Not that I really care but you spelled her name wrong...

I think that's because she went to Glenn Beck U. :)



You are correct. I don't really make much of an effort to get her name spelled correctly. She doesn't even come close to deserving that kind of respect.

But it is kinda funny when you are pointing her out as some "clueless moron" to misspell her name :D.

I see your point, but, it's more about a complete lack of respect for her than trying to be correct. If that makes sense. :)

Oh and this is the person you are talking about, it's not the person I asked about.

I'm not sure who the person is you were asking about. I was just saying she had that crazy eyed look like Mrs. Loony Toons has. :)

I get that the US has to tread cautiously since Egypt is a relatively peaceful and pro-western, strategically aligned semi-partner, and we don't know who/what would be replacing Mubarak but we seem to be falling short of our democratic ideals -- reminds me of the Latin and South America dictators that we had to do business. The devil you know ...

Haven't seen anything from Hillary yet.

U.S. to Egypt: Don't 'stand pat' need 'real reform' - Politics - More politics - msnbc.com

Spoke too soon.

FoxNews.com - Clinton Heads to Haiti to Mediate Political Crisis

Ever wonder why we just don't "fix the situation" here? I think this, unlike other situations, is a function of money and troops. The crises is somali-like -why don't we send US troops (they'll be welcomed) leading a bunch of UN troops for the visual effect, collect money from Western powers and really start to coordinate the operations here.

I don't think anyone will really think we are trying to take over Haiti and protest.

When McCain's right, he deserves credit:

Well we occupied Haiti during the early part of the 20th century, so there's a precedent. It'd be hard to spin globally in any real way, even if there's a logical reason for doing it and I doubt Haiti's powerbrokers would ever accept any kind of third-party intervention instead arguing for a "give us your money and we'll deal with it" thing.

But no matter what, that place isn't going to get any better anytime soon and our policy towards them has never been as good as it ought to be given the fact that it just wouldn't cost very much to help them develop the infrastructure to be at least somewhat sufficient enough for the large Haitian diaspora to eventually come back and lead the country out of the doldrums of the past er...200 years or pretty much since they paid France reparations. I think they owe a debt of some kind here, but that'll never happen.

Not that there haven't been lots of mistakes since then by one regime or another.

I guess senators Lieberman and Collins liked how it worked so well in Egypt, they think it's a good idea for America to have it:

Internet 'kill switch' bill will return | Privacy Inc. - CNET News

Obama sure has been religiousy lately. Pretty much a full-fledged Christian sermon this morning. I don't think he's going to convince anyone who thinks he's Muslim, or Satan, to vote for him. But I'm surprised he doesn't get more praise from the religious portion of the right, and criticisms from the part of the left that had a problem with the last president being "guided by faith".

I didn't hear the thing this morning, but my guess is that it's because of where they were guided.

As an example:
Guided to help other countries=good
Guided to invade other countries=bad

It's less about the faith itself and more about the end goal.

Any country whose government doesn't either have one or isn't working on one has an extremely short-sighted government barely worth the name. Well, either that or the internet simply isn't remotely a factor in their country (I'm sure there are still a few of those out there).

The tricky part is making sure the "switch" remains in the hands of the right people.

I really don't like the specifics of the bill, especially the no judicial review bit, but the basic idea that we need a legal avenue for defense of act of war level cyberattacks on critical industries seems a no-brainer to me.

Totally understand that. Unfortunately, the exercise of that power seems to be too much for people in command/control to resist and will use it beyond what it was intended. I'd rather have it how it currently is than anything that is proposed in the bill.

That's where judicial review comes in. Status quo is fine as long as nothing happens, but there is a major vulnerability to a cyberattack on a critical industry. Right now each individual company would be responsible for defense and a coordinated defense couldn't happen at a reasonable speed.

How exactly would this bill fully restrict access in the case of such a critical 'cyber attack' though? - surely if its attacking a specific installation then removing that installation from the grid should be possible (indeed I'd query why it should be connected online at all if its that critical tbh).

If its taking down ISP's to control the internet then that will prevent access to main websites and connections - ie. prevent people surfing the web, but if its to protect hacking style access to specific computers unless there is no routing to that computer available (ie. its disconnected) this won't prevent 'cyber attacks' totally as you could still potentially connect to it .... unless of course this bill involves taking out the entire telephonic/satellite structure of the US in one go.

(and if it does then the biggest concern for me would be the chance some hacker finds a way to simply start this process to disable the net ....)

Isn't that the gist of the problem with this bill and other bills like the Patriot Act that are supposed to keep us "safe"? If there was a cyber-attack (and personally I don't think that is the real intent of the bill but I will go with it here) how hard would it be for Obama (or a future President) to get a judge to sign off on the shutdown? IMO, all this shit is trying to do is circumvent the system of checks and balances we already have in place. Sorry but I don't want one of Jon's guys or one of the guys Jon hates having that much authority.

Call me a cynic but if this passes I definitely can see a place down the road where the internet is being shut down for our own good. And just like the TSA, the Patriot Act, the endless Middle East wars, the war on drugs, the war on poverty... people will defend it saying they don't mind a partial internet shutdown if it is fighting fill in the blank (terror, child porn, extremism, pirating, online gambling, the Chinese...) just don't take away facebook and online shopping!!!

:+1:

The whole turn off the internet is being overplayed IMO. Imagine a coordinated attack on the power grid. Right now there is no legal authority for the government to coordinate a defense. Each power company would decide for themselves how to best handle the attack. That's clearly a terrible way to defend an act of war.

Like I said initially, the details on this specific bill are bad, but the need for a cyberdefense bill is long overdue.

So you trust a generic judge more than you trust a generic President? Not sure what that says about the role of chief executive.


I wouldn't disagree about the existence of that possibility. Pretty sure I'm not nearly as bothered by it as you are though ;)

I'm fine with it as long as people don't lose posts.

Well, much as I hate to do it, I'm going to have to agree with you on this one

SI

The key is that I trust neither. Which is why I want them checking and balancing each other.

Obama big donor appointee, Ambassador to Luxembourg ...

The Associated Press: Big Obama donor quits envoy job amid criticism

She raised $500K for Obama, got a plum assignment and screwed it up. I bet her side of the story will be interesting.

Health care law constitutionality questioned this past week. MSNBC had a nice writeup on the for/against.

Is the health care law constitutional? - Politics - More politics - msnbc.com


I'm not a legal person, there seems to be good arguments for either side. I guess this is why the Supremes get paid the big bucks. I'm rooting for constitutionality.