Filed under: Art, History, The United States | Tags: Barack Obama and Michelle, George W. Bush and Laura, The Official Portraits
Today, the Obamas invited President George W. Bush and Laura Bush to the White House for the unveiling of the official presidential portraits. The ceremony was warm and friendly, more so on the video, which is here, than in the transcript, which is here. You will enjoy watching the video. George W. is charming, funny, and very gracious. I really miss that man.
The photos of the portraits below, are cropped, but you can get an idea. Mrs. Bush’s portrait is full length, and from the pictures, her dress may have been navy blue, or black, or possibly something else. The portraits are skilled, and it was charming of Mrs. Bush to thank the artist and mention his family.
These ceremonies are always more awkward when the portraits are of a previous president of a different party who you’ve just been blaming for everything for three years. But they mind their manners and do it nicely. Jonathan Horn at Ricochet dug up the speech that President Bush gave when unveiling the portraits of the Clintons. It’s short, but gracious, and a model to follow.
These portraits will be there for the ages, barring some awful incident, and Michelle has promised to save George W’s portrait, as Dolley Madison saved the other George W.’s.
Filed under: Foreign Policy, History, The United States | Tags: Poland, Presidential Medal of Freedom, White House Gaffe
America’s highest civilian award is the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In the ceremony last Tuesday, while presenting World War II Polish resistance hero Jan Karski with a posthumous medal, President Obama made a reference to” Polish death camps.” It was Jan Karski who brought evidence of the existence of Nazi Death Camps to America.
You can’t go stumbling along in foreign relations without an understanding of history. Europeans have long memories, and Poland was a Nazi-occupied country, and a great many Poles were executed at Auschwitz and Birkenau. The presence of the Nazi concentration camps in Poland was a deep affront. To suggest that the camps were Polish when awarding a medal, posthumously, to a resistance hero is more than tasteless. To assign the task — not of apologizing — but of saying oh, the President just misspoke, is a greater insult.
But then Obama is the one who notified the Poles with a midnight phone call on September 17, 2009, the 70th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland, that we were pulling the plug on our missile defense base they had stuck out their necks to host.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk responded: “I am certain that our American friends are capable of a more explicit reaction than issuing a correction and the spokesperson of the White House expressing regret. When someone says “Polish death camps,” it’s as if there was no Hitler. That is why our Polish sensitivity in these situations is so much more than just simply a feeling of national pride.”
Embarrassing incidents can be smoothed with a real apology.
ADDENDUM:Lo and behold. “The issue hasn’t gone away just because he wants it to,” and, as Jim Treacher at the Daily Caller reports, “in an undoubtedly ego-bruising development, he’s been forced to publicly apologize.” The Hill reported:
President Obama has penned a letter of apology expressing “regret” over using the phrase “Polish death camps” in a ceremony earlier this week, which has drawn heavy criticism from Polish officials.
“In referring to ‘a Polish death camp’ rather than ‘a Nazi death camp in German-occupied Poland,’ I inadvertently used a phrase that has caused many Poles anguish over the years and that Poland has rightly campaigned to eliminate from public discourse around the world,” Obama wrote in a letter released by the Polish government. “I regret the error and agree that this moment is an opportunity to ensure that this and future generations know the truth.”
Filed under: Freedom, History, Military, The Constitution, The United States | Tags: Photographic Essays, The American Civil War, The Origins of Memorial Day
It was after the worst war in our history that we began to officially celebrate Decoration Day, when the graves of the fallen were decorated with flowers, and ceremonies of remembrance were held. It was three years after the Civil War ended on May 5, 1868 that Major General John A. Logan, head of the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR), declared that Decoration Day should be Observed, and the last Monday in May was chosen because flowers would be in bloom all across the country.
The first national observance was held that year at Arlington National Cemetery, just across the Potomac River from Washington D.C.. The Arlington Mansion, the former home of General Robert E. Lee, was draped in mourning. Mrs. Ulysses S. Grant presided over the ceremonies, and after the speeches, children from the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Orphan Home and members of the GAR made their way through the cemetery strewing flowers on both Union and Confederate graves, reciting prayers and singing hymns.
There were so many fallen, the traditional numbers were 618,222 — 360,000 from the North, 258,000 from the South. Demographic historian J.David Hacker combed through newly digitized census data from the 19th century, and recalculated the death toll and increased it by more than 20 percent — to 750,000. At that, Dr.Hacker made assumptions and the numbers are only an educated estimate. The data suggested that 650,000 to 850,000 died as a result of the war. He chose 750,00 as the midpoint. That meant 37,000 more widows and 90,000 more orphans.
Here is a fascinating photographic essay about the places of the Civil War 150 years ago, with 48 images. Photography was still in its infancy, but war correspondents produced thousands of images bringing the harsh realities of the frontlines to those at home in a new way. Remember that the United States was only 85 years old at the time. Here are some of the people of the War, the generals and the ordinary soldiers, the slaves, the President, the heroes and the dead.
I lost four great, great uncles in the Civil War, two on each side. One in the battle around Richmond where he was badly wounded and died from his wounds. His older brother and brother-in-law drove a wagon up from South Carolina, near the Georgia border, across South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia to bring his body home. His brother was killed at Snickers’ Gap, the only Confederate to die in that exchange. Their younger brother was in the South Carolina Calvary and survived the war.
On the Union side, the Ohio soldiers fought in the war down the Mississippi valley. One, I know only as “Uncle Frank who was killed in the war” for I have a tintype portrait. The other, I believe from the dates, was wounded at Chickamauga and died from his wounds.
War is terrible, and none was ever more terrible than the War between the States. but the nation healed slowly, and remained a strong union. “As we here highly resolve, these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
Filed under: Art, History | Tags: The West 150 Years Ago, Timothy O'Sullivan, Utah Colorado Arizona Idaho
Pah-Ute (Paiute) Indian group, near Cedar, Utah in 1872
The Atlantic has done another of their wonderful photo essays: in the 1860s and 70s, photographer Timothy O’Sullivan created some of the best-known images in American History. He covered the U.S. Civil War, and afterwards joined a number of expeditions organized by the federal government to help document the new frontiers in the American West. The teams were comprised of soldiers, scientists, artists and photographers. Their task was to discover the best ways to take advantage of the untapped resources of the region. O’Sullivan had an outstanding eye, and strong work ethic, and returned with beautiful photographs that captured the vastness and beauty of the American West in a way that would later influence Ansel Adams and thousands of photographers who admired O’Sullivan’s work.
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Filed under: Capitalism, Economy, Freedom, History, The Constitution, The United States | Tags: "Profit" is Not a Dirty Word, Job Retraining, Misunderstanding
Forgive me, but this is so embarrassing. Barack Obama has just carefully explained that he has no understanding whatsoever of business. Like many leftists, he regards profit as something rather distasteful. The good things are when government retrains all those who have lost jobs due to private enterprise laying people off. Government investing money to encourage investment, encourage innovation, those are good things, aren’t they?
The only reason for a business to exist is to earn a profit, whether for the sole businessman or for huge groups of investors. If there is no profit, the business cannot operate. You have to earn enough to pay expenses, and have a little left over to live on, and to keep the business going until the next day when the process begins again.
Without a profit, a business cannot pay the wages of the workers. Without wages, the workers cannot pay taxes. Without taxes, there in nothing with which to enable a government to exist.
All those wise bureaucrats in government are there because of the profit in private business. Their comfortable offices, fancy buildings, government cars and hefty salaries come from business profits distributed in wages to workers who pay taxes to support the government. The government has no money of its own. The whole caboodle is supported by a vast array of taxes and fees and payments and charges, regulations and mandates that come from the profits of ordinary people making voluntary exchanges in the hopes of making a profit. Profit is not a dirty word. It is the essential driving force.
Mr. Obama also misunderstands the job of a president. It is not his job to figure out how to retrain people who lose their jobs. Most of the job losses have been caused by government in the first place. The government does not care to admit it, but this recession was caused by government’s good intentions to get everybody into owning their own homes — whether they could afford it or not. That was the vast gasbag that puffed-up a vast housing bubble that the banks and mortgage industry and Wall Street tried to swallow, but in the end, couldn’t.
The government is remarkably unsuccessful at job training. There are currently 47 duplicative, or overlapping job programs that are mot particularly successful. It is not a president’s job to retrain people, nor to pick companies to favor with taxpayer money, nor is it his job to pick winners and losers among businesses. It is not the president’s job to decide what form of energy the country needs or should have. The market will decide. If the marketplace will not willingly pay for a newer or cleaner form of energy, then its time has not come. It is not a president’s job to decide what kind of cars we should drive nor if we should abandon our cars for some other form of transportation.
Our government is divided into three equal branches, for good and historically careful reasons. The powers of each branch are delineated in the Constitution. There are limits to the expansion of government allowed under the commerce clause. The Supreme Court is going to be kept very busy. It would be wise to read the fusty old document. that will be 275 years old this September. I know that the left believes that it should be a “living document” so they can adjust it to their very own tastes, but it is meant for all generations — not just the current temporary one. It has survived good generations and less good ones as well, and it will, with our help, survive this one.
Filed under: Environment, History, News, Science/Technology | Tags: Eruption, Mount St. Helens, Natural Disasters, Volcano
[Ed. note: the following was originally posted in 2008 on this infamous day]
Chances are, if you’re not from Washington or Oregon, the date May 18th has little meaning to you. Heck, even around here many don’t think of it unless someone reminds them. But I remember — every year. It’s one of the only world events I remember from back then — I was very young after all; but the eruption of Mt. St. Helens on May 18, 1980 was just the kind of event that little boys remember forever.
We were very fortunate; the mountain exploded northwards, but the winds carried the ash-cloud away to the southeast. I remember being somewhat disappointed that the ash wasn’t turning day into night for us like it was for all the people on the television. In fact, we didn’t seem to get any ash-fall at all, much to my chagrin; while people on the other side of the mountain were measuring it in inches, like snow.
So much excitement! …and so little pay off.
About the most exciting thing I personally experienced was standing on my father’s roof to see the enormous plume looking fairly small and unimpressive so many miles away. I’m not sure if we heard the explosion or not. They say people heard it as far as 700 miles away, and we were certainly much closer than that. I think we did — but that could just be my memory playing tricks on me.
So close, and yet so far. But I still remember it every year.
Where were you?
Update: Michael Rubin at the Corner links to an excellent photo montage on the eruption and the aftermath.
Filed under: Capitalism, Economy, Election 2012, History, Progressivism | Tags: Another Economic Stimulus, big government, Ignorance of History
I didn’t expect to use the same image again so soon, but it fits this story even better. Obama believes in government spending (Boy, do we have evidence of that!) so much so that he refers to it as “investment.” Last Thursday, here in Seattle, reported the Wall Street Journal, he once again displayed his unfamiliarity with history — at least the parts that he has not inserted himself into.
“When I hear people talk about the free enterprise system and entrepreneurship, I try to remind them, you know, all of us made that investment in Darpa [the Department of Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] that helped to get the Internet started,” said Mr. Obama. “So there’s no Facebook, there’s no Microsoft, there’s no Google if we hadn’t made this common investment in our future.”
Microsoft—a product of the Internet? That may surprise Bill Gates and Paul Allen, who founded the software company in 1975. The company didn’t introduce its first Internet browser for another 20 years, and in the meantime it became the dominant computer software company long before the Internet became economically important. The irony of Mr. Obama’s error is that for much of Microsoft’s history the Internet was seen as a threat to its desktop dominance.
Darpa is engaged in funding research. This can be a proper role for government. But Darpa does not attempt to commercialize products. Facebook and Google, like Apple and Microsoft, were founded by private investors. In his State of the Union speech in January, Mr. Obama suggested that federal research spending “led to the computer chip.” Credit for the first integrated circuit has generally been awarded to Jack Kilby at a company called Texas Instruments back in 1958. Other innovations came from Bell Labs, Fairchild Semiconductor and Intel.
Mr. Obama’s error in his assumption that all prosperity flows from government, demonstrates why he keeps trying to solve problems by throwing money at them. Notably, he is putting pressure on Congress to approve another economic stimulus plan. “Each of the ideas on this list will help create jobs and build a stronger economy right now,” Mr. Obama said. Well, no they won’t.
He wants to give small businesses tax breaks for hiring more workers, but that’s not how it works. He wants to help homeowners to refinance their mortgages, he wants to help veterans find jobs. And he wants to spend up to $34.7 billion for those proposals — but that’s just a part of a more comprehensive $447 billion jobs program that Congress has mostly resisted, for good reason. And he really doesn’t want to cut spending at all— because he believes that spending is how you fix things. Calling spending “investment” leads you into strange pathways.
You would think that at this point one would learn from experience, but the One doesn’t. And that’s the real problem.
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Filed under: Europe, Freedom, Heartwarming, History, Military, National Security, The United States | Tags: General Mark Welsh III, U.S Military, U.S. Air Force Academy
If you can manage the time tonight, watch this speech by General Mark Welsh III, Commander U.S. Air Forces Europe, speaking to the cadets at the Air Force Academy last November. You will quickly see why he is such a respected leader, and the speech is moving, inspiring, and worth every minute of your time.
This week, General Mark Welsh III was nominated to be the next chief of staff of the U.S. Air Force. By all accounts, General Welsh is perhaps the most respected leader in the Air Force today, and for months both active and retired Air Force personnel were rooting for him to occupy the top slot. Currently serving as Commander, U.S. Air Forces Europe, Welsh will take over a service whose mission is more vital than ever, but one that has flown through lots of turbulence in recent years, from severe budget cuts to program mismanagement and security failures. It would be hard to find an American military leader as inspiring as General Welsh, now that David Petraeus has retired, and the Air Force will have a formidable leader in the coming years.
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Filed under: Democrat Corruption, Election 2012, History, Humor, Politics, The United States | Tags: A Place in History, Remarkably Crass, Self-Aggrandizement
The White House maintains official biographies of the presidents at the White House website. The website not only has the president’s speeches and remarks, but his daily schedule, the latest pictures of the president, his executive orders, passed bills, a White House tour, and some history of the presidency, and much more. Many of Obama’s voters were young enough that they had little memory of events before Obama’s arrival in office. Seth Mandel reported at Contentions:
The Heritage Foundation’s Rory Cooper tweeted that Obama had casually dropped his own name into Ronald Reagan’s official biography on www.whitehouse.gov, claiming credit for taking up the mantle of Reagan’s tax reform with his advocacy of “the Buffet Rule” gimmick. My first thought was, he must be joking. But he wasn’t—it turns out Obama has added bullet points bragging about his own accomplishments to the biographical sketches of every single U.S. president since Calvin Coolidge (except, for some reason, Gerald Ford). Here are s few examples:
- On Feb. 22, 1924 Calvin Coolidge became the first president to make a public radio address to the American people. President Coolidge later helped create the Federal Radio Commission, which has now evolved to become the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). President Obama became the first president to hold virtual gatherings and town halls using Twitter, Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, etc.
- In a 1946 letter to the National Urban League, President Truman wrote that the government has “an obligation to see that the civil rights of every citizen are fully and equally protected.” He ended racial segregation in civil service and the armed forces in 1948. Today the Obama administration continues to strive toward upholding the civil rights of its citizens, repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, allowing people of all sexual orientations to serve openly in our armed forces.
- President Lyndon Johnson signed Medicare signed (sic) into law in 1965—providing millions of elderly healthcare stability. President Obama’s historic health care reform law, the Affordable Care Act, strengthens Medicare, offers eligible seniors a range of preventive services with no cost-sharing, and provides discounts on drugs when in the coverage gap known as the “donut hole.”
- On August 14, 1935, President Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act. Today the Obama administration continues to protect seniors and ensure Social Security will be there for future generations.
- In a June 28, 1985 speech Reagan called for a fairer tax code, one where a multi-millionaire did not have a lower tax rate than his secretary. Today, President Obama is calling for the same with the Buffett Rule.
Team Obama keeps clumsily doing things that are remarkably ripe for mockery, and conservative bloggers are happily willing to oblige.
There are lots more, and it proves that conservatives can respond promptly. The website is here. Even when times are bad, Americans can always respond with a good laugh.
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Filed under: Economy, Education, History, News the Media Doesn't Want You to Hear, Progressivism | Tags: "Racial Justice", How to Play the 'Race Card', Securing the Minority Vote
House Democrats received formal training this last week in how to address the issue of race to defend government programs. Race has long been the number one issue for Democrats. Way back in 1998, the left-leaning New World Foundation commissioned a survey by Zogby International that asked 1,800 rank-and-file members of nine progressive groups what it was that could galvanize them, what a progressive agenda should look like. They wanted to unite progressive groups in a coherent base and win elections. The results of the poll were reported in The Nation magazine.
Respondents ranked Racism as the country’s single most important social problem, followed by poverty, corporate power, jobs/economy, environment, moral decline and education.
The prominence of racism as an issue for Democrats is understandable. They have a long and abysmal record on race to overcome, and they count on government programs for the poor to bind the black and minority vote to the Democrat party. House Democrats fear that the minority vote is slipping away.
Maya Wiley of the Center for Social Inclusion told the House Democratic Caucus and staff that “conservative messages are racially ‘coded’ and had images of people of color that we commonly see used” and proposed tactics for countering the Republicans (presumably) racially-coded rhetoric. “Right-wing rhetoric.” according to Wiley’s group website.”has dominated debates of racial justice —undermining efforts to create a more equal society, and tearing apart the social safety net in the process” for over 25 years.
As examples of race-coded rhetoric, Wiley reminded the Democrats of Newt Gingrich’s famous comment about President Obama. “Calling a black man ‘the food stamp president” is not a race-neutral statement, even if Newt Gingrich did not intend racism.”
The website of the Center for Social Inclusion includes the following statement:
The right has a strategy to turn us away from racial justice. They claim that racial justice means blinding ourselves to race. They attack programs that right the wrongs of racism or help people of color by calling those very programs racist. Sometimes they pretend that they are not talking about race when they are. Sometimes they use stereotypical images of people of color to suggest that we shouldn’t support policies, implying that “these” people would benefit, without coming out and saying that. The right has been effective in keeping those who want reforms on the defensive, constantly in the position of justifying existing policies rather than advancing new ones that would further our goals. The conservative movement has delayed and rolled back our progress toward a fair and just society under the mantle of a “colorblind” American ideal.
Ms. Wiley and the Center she founded depend on racial justice issues for their livelihood. Preferring government handouts to good jobs, seems an odd definition of “social justice,” but the center’s website also declares their opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline, claiming that those jobs are only temporary, (some are, but many are permanent) and we don’t need the oil because solar energy and wind energy provide a cleaner future.
The Democrat Party depends on notions of “racial justice” — and accusations of racism will not go away. They make a lot of money on racism, and they will keep it alive. They have a long history to overcome.
Filed under: Architecture, Art, Cool Site of the Day, History, The United States | Tags: Early 20th Century, Municipal Archives, New York City Photographs
New York City’s Municipal Archives have just released over 870,000 images from its photographic collection. It is, as the Atlantic describes it,”a visual coming-of-age story, documenting its maturation into one of the world’s most influential cities.”
The Atlantic’s Alan Taylor has sifted through the images, and come up with 53 early and mid-20th century images for their magazine. The Atlantic has done a number of these spectacular photo essays, and they are always worth your time. There is a link to the whole collection, but they warn the website is swamped, and you may have difficulty reaching it. I loved this early street sweeper. Click on the image to enlarge.
Filed under: Democrat Corruption, Election 2012, History, Law, The Constitution | Tags: HHS Secretary Sebelius, ObamaCare Contraception Mandate, Youngstown Steel & Tube
When Obama spoke warmly about hope and bipartisanship and cooperation in Congress, both houses of Congress were controlled by the Democrats. When the 2010 election put Republicans firmly in control of the House of Representatives, Obama lost interest in cooperation.
Instead he determined to accomplish what he wanted done by executive orders, presidential memoranda and proclamations, and of course, regulations and mandates from the various agencies that were more or less authorized by some legislation. He just wouldn’t bother with Congress anymore.
Ruling by decree was just the way Obama wanted it. In February, President Obama announced his intention to order private insurance companies to provide contraception and abortion drug coverage free, as his way of accommodating religious institutions’ conscientious objections to being forced to provide coverage of those items for their employees, under the terms of ObamaCare.
The president just doesn’t get to rule by decree, taking over private industry, installing his own people to carry out his wishes. Oh, wait….
Back in 1952, during the Korean War, Harry Truman, an unpopular president, conducting an unpopular war, was faced with a political problem in a presidential election year. A looming steelworker’s strike could shut down the country’s steel production for months. The industry was under wartime price controls and could not raise their prices, yet could not meet the demands of labor without raising steel prices. The federal Wage Stabilization Board recommended a wage increase, but the federal Office of Price Stabilization denied the companies’ request for a price increase. Nobody would budge, and a strike was imminent.
Steel production was important to the war effort. Congress had rejected the idea of direct government interference in labor disputes. Truman ordered his secretary of commerce to seize and take over operation of the nation’s steel companies, in order to give steelworkers a wage increase and avoid a strike threatening steel production in the middle of a war. This became one of the most famous and most important of all modern Supreme Court decisions: Youngstown Steel & Tube Co.v. Sawyer. The Supreme Court held that the president may not rule by decree, conscripting private industry to carry out his commands. The chief executive may only execute laws passed by Congress, according to their terms. He may not make up laws of his own and then enforce them.
The presidents of three evangelical colleges have filed suit with the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and the Alliance Defense Fund against the mandate, which is clearly in violation of the religious clause of the First Amendment.
In addition, it appears that HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius did not consult Supreme Court decisions on religious liberty, nor have a legal memo prepared before she drafted the mandate. On Thursday Secretary Sebelius appeared before the House and was questioned by Congressman Gowdy (R-SC) a former federal prosecutor.
I suspect that Obama’s overreaching mandate may be in trouble.
