Mr. Obama Needn’t Worry About the Tax and Spend Label, Republicans Want Their 10 Year Budget Plan to be Unconstitutional, Rudy Running? . .

.And Comments on Other News That is News

According to a Report in the Wall Street Journal, one reason why the President’s advisers want a large deficit reduction deal is

it would allow Mr. Obama to enter the 2012 election season with a defense against Republican efforts to label him a tax-and-spend liberal

Well it is true that Federal spending has increased under Mr. Obama, it had to in order to avert a complete economic meltdown, but on the tax side about the only thing Mr. Obama has done is to accede to extending the Bush tax cuts and add a bunch of his own.

This makes Mr. Obama a “cut tax and spend and borrow” President, exactly like that fellow he replaced.  Didn’t work out for that guy on the economic front so well either.

There is a vote scheduled this week in the House on a Balanced Budget Amendment.  Republicans are expected to support the Amendment.

The debate in the coming days is likely to be dominated by the Republicans’ “cap, cut and balance” proposal, even though Mr. Durbin said it had no chance of getting through the Senate.

 The Repuiblican Balanced Budget Amendment would make their recently passed 10 year budget plan with its trillions of dollars of deficits, uh, what’s the word, “unconstitutional”.  Do they have any idea what they are doing?  (Don't answer that, it's a trick question.)

Last August groundbreaking took place on a $1.5 billion Terminal in San Francisco for California’s High Speed rail service, which of course has yet to be built.  In fact, there are now questions whether or not it will ever be built, which means San Francisco will have a nice, new, $1.5 billion bus station.  Good luck with that San Franciscans.

Under construction: The downtown Transbay Transit Center is being built,

 but it’s uncertain whether it will one day house high-speed rail. (Examiner file photo)

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani is still looking at running in the Republican race for the nomination.  His rationale,

“I look at the other candidates. They’ve all done some very impressive things, but none of them really had to take over a city — one of the largest economies in the country, one of the most complex — when it was in terrible trouble and turn it around, have definable results that I can point to.”

What really seems to be going on is that Rudy wants a cabinet job in a Rick Perry administration if there is one.

Giuliani also praised another potential GOP presidential candidate, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, saying he has “got a great record, probably one of the strongest records of any governor in America, one of the longest-running governorships.”

Scotland Yard, the famous British police department was heavily involved in the British press scandal.  For almost five years

Scotland Yard officials assured Parliament, judges, lawyers, potential hacking victims, the news media and the public that there was no evidence of widespread hacking by the tabloid.

And now what?

that assertion has been reduced to tatters, torn apart by a spectacular avalanche of contradictory evidence, admissions by News International executives that hacking was more widespread, and a reversal by police officials who now admit to mishandling the case.

So what is the best face that Scotland Yard can put on this.

At best, former Scotland Yard senior officers acknowledged in interviews, the police have been lazy, incompetent and too cozy with the people they should have regarded as suspects

(An unnamed official at the Yard did say it was not entirely their fault, that they had brought in famed French police detective Jacques Clouseau to head up their investigation.)




Well if that’s the best they can say, then out of deep respect for Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Watson and Inspector Lestrade, The Dismal Political Economist will not speculate on the worst.