Some Things Speak For Themselves

    Posted today on the Washington state blog of the Obama campaign website:

Who’s In Wednesday - Bernard ABy OFA Washington on August 8, 2012 

It’s Who’s in Wednesday, Young Americans for Obama edition, and this week we’re joined by 11-year old Bernard A. 

Hailing from Vancouver, Bernard helps his mom phone bank every week, and has been a steadfast volunteer. At local phone banks, he makes calls like an old pro and he absolutely knows why he’s in for 2012. 

President Obama has made education a national priority. By investing in K-12 education, President Obama has worked to better prepare kids like Bernard for competing in the global workplace, and by doubling funding for Pell Grants, he has ensured Bernard can get the education he deserves. 

But that's not the only reason why he supports the President this election. 

“I like him because he can get everything he says done,” Bernard said. “I can look forward to the future and going to college [...] I like him because he’s modest.” 

If you, too, like the President and his modesty, then join Bernard in making phone calls, in volunteering, and learn why President Obama stands for and with the youth of this nation.

    I titled my post "Some Things Speak For Themselves," and as difficult as it is, I'm going to stick with that.  For now.

Passport to a Brave New World

    In a recent post, I wrote about how the Obama campaign has been touting the strides it has made on behalf of the "transgendered", the "T" in LGBT.  One such stride dates back to June 2010, and receives not one, but two mentions on the LGBT page of the campaign website under the heading "Trans Equality" [emphasis mine]:

• Ended the Social Security Administration’s gender “no-match” letters and allowed for true gender passports
• Ensured that transgender Americans can receive true gender passports without surgery

    It is unclear why this accomplishment is listed twice.  But even though the repetition would seem to indicate its level of significance, at the time the White House ignored this development.  There's no press release or statement about it on the White House website in June 2010 or since.  Even when President Obama addressed an LGBT Pride Month reception in the East Room at the White House on June 22, 2010, just 13 days after the State Department announced the rule change in a "Media Note," he made no mention of the new passport rule.  However, the change was reported more heavily in the media than the SSA's dropping of gender "no-match" letters that I noted in my previous post.  Time and CNN, for example, both covered this story.  So why the initial soft-sell from the administration?
    I believe it is part of an overall strategy (though not an organized conspiracy) to move the country leftward on social issues.  Conservatives and Christians must recognize that this slow but relentless push for amorality is not a slippery slope, but a carefully planned and staked out rainbow path to virtually complete sexual license.  Pioneers like Gore Vidal (as Albert Mohler wrote about the other day) are sometimes brash and confrontational, but the broader movement often follows a slow Obama-like"evolution", trudging down the path, dragging American culture and social mores behind them.  Unfortunately, the weak moral principles of much of American society and even American churches often do not even require dragging.  We simply lollygag back further on the path until fear of being completely left behind and labeled as intolerant haters goads us into reluctantly catching up.
    The increasing profile of transgendered issues follows President Obama's and Vice President Biden's switch on same-sex marriage.  Now that that bomb was dropped, it's time to deepen inroads in other areas.  The emphasis on the passport rule is a good example of the strategy.  The LGBTer have borrowed a page from the pro-choice handbook by couching transgender issues as "medical" matters best left to the individual and his/her doctor.  The State Department rule change says:

It is also possible to obtain a limited-validity passport if the physician’s statement shows the applicant is in the process of gender transition. No additional medical records are required. Sexual reassignment surgery is no longer a prerequisite for passport issuance.

Every type of abortion, from the earliest abortificents such as RU-486 to post-birth/partial-birth abortions, has been justified by a "health of the mother" exception.  "Health" has, of course, been expanded to cover mental, emotional, physical and any other type of "health" abortion advocates can squeeze in.  So labeling transgender as a medical/health issue says, "Hands off.  It's my body.  It's between me and my doctor."  As the faux religious compromise on the HHS insurance mandate shows, "medical" needs (birth control, abortifacients, sterilization) trump religious liberty in the Obama administration.  How long will it be before religiously affiliated institutions or even churches are barred from discriminating against the "medical" needs of the transgendered?
    While it was encouraging to see free speech and freedom of religion largely defended, even by some on the left, in the recent Chick-Fil-A dust-up, note this:  Chick-Fil-A and many of its defenders were quick to point out that Chick-Fil-A does not discriminate against customers on the basis of "sexual orientation," and regarding employment, Chick-Fil-A is "an equal opportunity employer and does not discriminate in employment decisions based on any factor protected by federal, state or local law."  But how far can those laws be pushed?  When will the North American Man-Boy Love Association break through and receive acceptance from the experts in the medical community?  Will we kick and scream for a few decades before falling into line?
    And does anyone think that "LGBT" is really the end of the line?  Try Googling "LGBTQIA".  That's right, 119,000 results as of today.  "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, Intersex, and Asexual."  And there are still 19 more letters in the alphabet.  Brave New World indeed.  But who will be the brave?

If You Wrote a Letter to the Editor, You Didn't Write That

    President Obama continues to push back against the idea that he believes that small businesses are incapable of making it on their own without government help.  This is of course part of the fallout from the president's now legendary "If you own a business, you didn't build that" remark.  In what could easily be seen as doubling down on that dubious concept, the Obama campaign has launched a new page on their website, Letter to the Editor, which provides a sample letter to the editor, a checklist of desired recipients (LA Times, Miami Herald, Wall Street Journal, etc.,) talking points, and even writing tips!  The subject of the sample email is even helpfully filled in: "A Romney presidency will hurt small business."  The sample letter reads as follows:

I worked hard to build my small business. Though it took time, investment, and a lot of hard work, I've built a business I'm proud of.
The American economy is built on businesses like mine - that hire American workers and promote American innovation. If we are going to create an economy built to last, we have to support our small businesses.
But Mitt Romney's plan for the American economy would put business like mine at risk. His plan would gut investments that benefit small businesses - like education and infrastructure -  so he can give more tax breaks to millionaires like himself and to companies that ship jobs overseas. His top-down philosophy won't grow our economy for the long run - we already tried it for the past decade, and it crashed our economy and hurt the middle class. If Romney thinks his plan is the best way to grow our economy and help small businesses, then he must have forgotten how we got into this mess in the first place.
Mitt Romney believes we can afford to shower the wealthiest Americans with tax cuts, but that it's a bridge too far to rebuild the roads, runways and ports our businesses rely on to ship goods across the country and around the world. He believes we can afford to cut taxes for companies that ship our jobs overseas, but that we can't afford to invest in the training and education that American workers need to compete for those jobs in the global economy.
Small business owners can't afford the failed policies of the past. And Americans can't afford a Romney presidency.

    The page includes the wise counsel: "Revising the letter and making it your own greatly increases the chance that a newspaper will publish it." So never again let it be said that Barack Obama doubts the ability of the American business owner to build his own business.  But, hey, letters can be tricky.

Give Me an "L"! Give Me a "G"! Give Me a "B"! Give Me a "T"! What Have You Got? Evolution

    Recently Newsweek, in what may turn out to be one of its print edition's last spasms of rigor mortis, famously declared President Obama to be America's "first gay president."  If the publishers wish to go out with a bang, they could plan the final edition to declare Obama to be America's "first transgendered president."  Last week, the Obama campaign blog published the following post written by Kyle Albert, an "LGBT Vote Intern" for the campaign:

President Obama’s record on transgender equality in the workplace

Did you know that President Obama has taken pivotal actions to advance equality for transgender Americans in the workplace?
In addition to naming one of the first openly transgender Presidential appointees, President Obama banned discrimination in Federal workplaces based on gender identity, and his administration released guidance to help ensure safe work environments for transgender federal employees.
Nationally, the President ended the Social Security Administration’s gender “no-match” letters, stopping the practice of notifying employers about differences between gender markers on employees’ W-2 forms and Social Security records—a step toward ensuring that transgender Americans are not accidentally outed at work.
Barbra Casbar Siperstein, the first transgender member of the DNC Executive Committee, said:

"It's an understatement to say that Barack Obama has already done more for Transgender Americans than all other Presidents combined. It's time for ‘us’ to step up and help President Obama help us!"

If you support President Obama’s commitment to respect and dignity for transgender Americans in the workplace, join Obama Pride.

    So in the name of "equality for transgender Americans in the workplace," President Obama ended (in September 2011) what must be one the most common sense lines of defense against fraud, matching a person's sex on a W-2 with Social Security records.  To avoid "outing" the transgendered, we have doubled the resources for someone committing fraud since the fraudster need not even assume the identity of someone of the same sex. What a bonanza!  This is reminiscent of the recent decision by Argentina to allow anyone to choose his? her? (are the days of pronouns numbered?) own sex to list on official government ID cards without the bother of consulting a doctor, a judge or even basic anatomy.  Are we not on that same path now ourselves?
    As Barbra Siperstein said above, "Barack Obama has already done more for Transgender Americans than all other Presidents combined." Similar sentiments were heard regarding "gay Americans" after the president evolved on his same-sex marriage stance.   Keep a sharp eye on the campaign's blog: the "L" and the "B" of the LGBT community may be the next beneficiaries of the evolution of Barack Obama.

When is Not-a-Tax-Cut a Tax Cut? When It's President Obama's!

    On July 9th, President Obama made the following statement regarding the much-discussed Bush tax cuts:

[M]ost people agree that we should not raise taxes on middle-class families or small businesses -- not when so many folks are just trying to get by... And that’s why I’m calling on Congress to extend the tax cuts for the 98 percent of Americans who make less than $250,000 for another year...  If Congress doesn’t do this, millions of American families... could see their taxes go up by $2,200 starting on January 1st of next year. 

The statement was repeated on the White House blog later that day, and now appears dozens of times on the website and continues to pop up in Obama's speeches as well.  Today, continuing a pattern I have noted before, the Obama campaign extracted a dollar figure from a policy proposal (what $40 means, $1,000 increase on student loans) and began to reshape and distort it to maximize its impact without regard for honesty:

Use the hashtag #2200dollars to share how the President’s middle-class tax cut would help your family next year.
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 2, 2012

Note the wording: "the President’s middle-class tax cut".  This is the same administration that has balked at referring to the current rates as "the Bush tax cuts," and now has appropriated that label for the President himself.  And it's not even a new cut, simply a continuation of current tax policy.  The only answers the president should have received via Twitter should read: "I will spend the $2,200 on the same expenses I used it for in 2012 because my taxes are not being cut."  However, the president's followers on Twitter were much more creative in their replies:

@barackobama a #2200dollars would help my fiancé and myself get married (something we've been saving for a year and a half)
— Kristopher Wazaney (@therealwuz) August 2, 2012

@barackobama#2200dollars is a house payment, a car payment and groceries and a couple of relaxing weekends out!
— BobbiKing (@BobbiKing) August 2, 2012

#2200dollars can help me start my daughters college fund.
— Edwin Gomez (@ego_32) August 2, 2012

@barackobama #2200dollars could help my parents pay for the three kids they are helping to put through college!
— Abby Cowan (@abbencowey) August 2, 2012

Was the creativity of the tweeters just an effort to make the president look good?  Or do these people, based on the president's own words, believe they've got a new $2,200 windfall headed their way in 2013?  One could hardly blame them for believing the latter.  But if they manage to get him reelected, it'll be too late in 2013 when Net Pay on their paychecks stays the same.  Unless the Social Security tax holiday is allowed to expire and Net Pay actually gets lower.  The president has been silent about that tax matter.  Could it be that the Social Security tax holiday issue is being reserved by the Democrats as a homemade October Surprise issue?  If so, look for a repeat of the pattern I detailed above.  Who knows, maybe they'll even resurrect What $40 Means.

Update:  Thanks to Ed Morrissey (Obamateurism of the Day on 8/8/12)

The Obama Tax Calculator - Warren Buffett, Call Your Office [Updated]

    OK, can someone explain this?  The Obama campaign has a new tax calculator to let you see what your taxes will look like under Obama versus Romney.  I plugged in several different income levels to see what would happen (for now, I ignored the Romney side of things.)  Last I heard, the president wanted to "continue tax cuts for the middle class" and have the rich "pay a little more" so they are paying their "fair share."  So what gives?

There is an generic explanation given when clicking on the "Learn More" link:

So someone earning $1 short of a billion dollars will see a savings of $8,295 under Obama's plan?  Warren Buffett isn't going to be happy about this.

UPDATE:  Someone explained to me that the "savings" is in contrast to allowing ALL the "Bush tax cuts" to expire (which of course, no one is suggesting.)  But this allows the president to claim "savings" even for someone earning $999,999,999 because if the current marginal tax rates on the first $200,000 of income are renewed for 2013, everyone would "save" taxes on their first $200,000, whereas if the Bush tax cuts expire completely, everyone's marginal rates on all income would increase.  So even though the wealthy would be required by Obama's plan to pay their "fair share," he's graciously "saving" them $8,295 that they can apply to the enormous new amounts they will owe on income exceeding $200,000.  This is like the Godfather telling someone that he saved one of their kneecaps because he only broke one instead of both like he'd originally planned.  The "rich" don't appreciate how good the president is being to them.

First Amendment-Fil-A

    How ironic.

As of today, health insurance plans will begin to cover contraception as part of women's preventive care without copay: OFA.BO/o8t6dy
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 1, 2012

On the same day conservatives (and from the sound of it, many of other political stripes) are celebrating the First Amendment and religious freedom in response to Chicago's and Boston's attacks on Chick-Fil-A and its founder Dan Cathy, the Obama campaign tweets out a reminder of the administration's filleting of religious freedom via the "contraceptive" insurance mandate.  Nice juxtaposition.