It has been 64 days since President Obama's last press conference. During the last year he has had one press conference. Yet, he did have time to be "grilled" by the tough questions that he got on "The View."

On Thursday, for the first time in 308 days, President Obama will confront the White House press corps in a full-blown news conference, taking the best shots that reporters have to offer on the topics of their choosing.

Obama's lengthy absence from reporters' crosshairs has exceeded President George W. Bush's longest gap of 204 days.

As a candidate two years ago, Obama, then a senator, mused aloud about holding a news conference every month. . . .

Obama, however, has stood for fewer news conferences in which reporters were free to ask him questions on the topic of their choosing. . . .

Last year it was the prediction that unemployment would not get above 8 percent. This year it was promises of massive job growth.

Usually the Obama administration downplays expectations for job growth, but apparently Vice President Joe Biden didn’t get the memo – or he did, but just blew it off.

“Some time in the next couple of months we’re going to be creating between 250,000 jobs a month and 500,000 jobs a month,” Biden said at a fundraiser today in Pittsburgh.

Next month, Biden predicted, the nation’s employers will add between 100,000 to 200,000 jobs to their payrolls.

If employers were to increase their payrolls by half a million jobs at some point in the next few months, that would mark a massive turnaround for a country that was hemorrhaging hundreds of thousands of jobs a month just one year ago. But with the big boost expected from the government’s 2010 census, on top of an improving employment picture as evidenced by the 162,000 jobs created in March, such future job growth is a distinct possibility, analysts say. . . .

From yesterday's WH press briefing.

one that is adding rather than shedding jobs, and a decision in and of itself that likely saved a million jobs and communities -- certainly saved communities from economic devastation. . . .

1) General Motors would have gone into bankruptcy. Bankruptcy is not the same thing as eliminating the company. Viable operations that could make a profit would continue.
2) Where did the government bailout money come from? The government "creates" some jobs only by taking money away from where other jobs would have existed.

This is not the first of the taxpayer paid ads pushing Obamacare.

WASHINGTON (AP) - Actor Andy Griffith has a new role: pitching President Barack Obama's health care law to seniors in a cable television ad paid for by Medicare.
The TV star - whose role as sheriff of Mayberry made him an enduring symbol of small-town American values - tells seniors that "good things are coming" under the health care overhaul, including free preventive checkups and lower-cost prescriptions for Medicare recipients.
Polls show that seniors are more skeptical of the health care law than younger people because Medicare cuts provide much of the financing to expand coverage for the uninsured.
Medicare says the national ad is not political, but part of its outreach to educate seniors about new benefits available next year. Griffith is 84.

A copy of the ad is here.

Any bets on whether crime rates in city parks will rise as gun control proponents claim?

Does this union (the largest union in the AFL-CIO) realize that forcing people to stay in a country against their will and having a legal process for people to enter a country are really quite different positions? Apparently they don't understand the difference.

My newest piece starts this way:

Arizona's immigration law supposedly "would impose a 'distinct, unusual and extraordinary' burden on legal resident aliens that only the federal government has the authority to impose.” So asserted Federal District Judge Susan Bolton in her injunction of the new Arizona immigration law on Wednesday. “Given the large number of people who are technically ‘arrested’ but never booked into jail or perhaps even transported to a law enforcement facility, detention time for this category of arrestee will certainly be extended during an immigration status verification,” Ms. Bolton wrote in her decision.


But this reasoning makes little sense. Anyone -- no matter what their accent or looks -- who is "technically ‘arrested’" by police is required to show some type of ID. The minor exception is when the arrestee happens to be known to the police already. If unable to provide a basic ID, the police officer has no choice but to detain the individual until identification can be made. This is very basic. Police can't issue a ticket, even for a minor speeding offense, without being able to properly identify the person.

Despite the picture painted by Bolton, an immigration check for someone "technically ‘arrested’" imposes no more of a burden than the individual already faces. . . .

Even the very liberal Margaret Carlson thinks that Nancy Pelosi has had a problem enforcing Congressional ethics rules.

If Democrats, in charge of the House since 2007, had proven themselves significantly more ethical than Republicans, Rangel would be better off. Instead, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who famously promised to “drain the swamp” -- the blue one as well as the red -- got off to a shaky start.

She protected her good friend, Pennsylvania Democrat John Murtha, who died before a raft of serious charges, including sending a defense contract to a company employing his nephew, could catch up to him. Shockingly, she tried to give Louisiana Democrat William Jefferson a seat on the Homeland Security Committee even after the release of photos of $90,000 in cash tucked inside containers of Pillsbury Pie Crust and Boca Burger in his house. He would later be convicted of 11 counts of racketeering and bribery. . . .

But probably the most shocking revelation from reading her piece is that she offers part of Congressman Charlie Rangel's defense.

He acknowledged “bookkeeping” errors and put his staff to work getting straight his financial disclosures and paying taxes on rental incomes from his villa in the Dominican Republic.

He has his excuses on other charges, not the least of which is that everybody does it:

Other members were also on the corporate-sponsored trip to the Caribbean, and his staff handled his paperwork. He would have supported preserving a tax loophole for oil driller Nabors Industries even if its chief executive hadn’t contributed $1 million to the Charles B. Rangel Public Service Center at City College. As for having to report the savings from a rent- stabilized apartment, since when is gaming the high rents in Manhattan a reportable gift? . . .

The president could be on "The View" television show any time he wants, but the Boy Scout Jamboree occurs only once every four years. So what is President Obama to do? Why he decided to skip speaking to the 45,000 Boy Scouts who attend. The White House claims that there were political fundraisers that were really preventing him from speaking to the Boy Scouts, but couldn't someone have set those up on a different day? The Boy Scout Jamboree is set up years in advance. Not everyone is thrilled by him going on "The View."

But Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a fellow Democrat, scoffed at the idea of a president appearing on such a show.

“I think the president should be accessible, should answer questions that aren't pre-screened, but I think there should be a little bit of dignity to the presidency,” Rendell told MSNBC, at one point comparing "The View" to "The Jerry Springer Show."

Presidents who have spoken before a Boy Scout Jamboree.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1934
President Harry Truman in 1950
future President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1950
Kennedy died in office before the event
President Lyndon Johnson in 1964
Nixon -- No
Ford -- No, but there was no Jamboree during his presidency (one in 1973 and another in 1977)
Carter -- No
Nancy Reagan spoke in place of Ronald Reagan in 1985
President George HW Bush in 1989
President Bill Clinton in 1998
President George W Bush in 2001 via video and 2005 in-person.
Obama -- no

A copy of the Judge's decision is here. A copy of the original law is here.

Michael Barone's prediction this election year.

These metrics -- the generic ballot results and polls in individual districts -- suggest that House Democrats are headed toward historic losses. Quite a swing in 18 months.

Charlie Rangel's legal defense is being paid for my lobbyists and unions. Tim Carney claims:

Two of the three firms providing legal counsel to Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., in his pending ethics cases are lobbying firms. In fact, one firm, Oldaker, Belair & Wittie, conducts much of Rangel's political fundraising, while operating four different lobby shops.
But who's ultimately paying Rangel's legal bills? Mostly corporate and union political action committees along with individual lobbyists. Over the past six months, PACs and lobbyists have accounted for a majority of the money Rangel's campaign has raised this year, not counting transfers from Rangel's other fundraising operations (more on them below). . . .

Buying these cars is the same thing as throwing out almost $20,000 dollars (the price of a Chevrolet Malibu starts at $21,800). The Malibu is actually a somewhat bigger car. The Malibu has a width of 70.3", a length of 191.8", and a height of 57.1". By contrast, the Volt's dimensions are: width of 70.8", a length of 177", and a height of 56.3". The Malibu holds 15.1 cu. ft. of luggage versus 10.6 for the Volt. The Volt also weighs slightly more. If you really want to buy a GM car and are willing to pay $41,000, you can get a new Cadillac CTS starting at MSRP of $35,165. You can even get very close to a 2010 Mercedes-Benz E-class invoice price of $44,686.

From the Washington Post:

The long-anticipated Chevrolet Volt, General Motors' electric car, will cost $41,000, the company announced Tuesday, leaving consumers to decide whether its environmental appeal is worth a price far above that of similarly sized conventional autos.

Electric-car technology has been around for years, but the high cost to make the vehicles has prevented automakers from producing them for the mass market. The price announcements for the Volt and its electric rival, the Nissan Leaf, have been highly anticipated as a result. Nissan, the only other major manufacturer expected to bring such a vehicle to market this year, said the Leaf will cost $32,780.

GM and Nissan are relying on a $7,500 federal tax credit for buyers of electric vehicles to offset some of the added cost, and they're hoping that the allure of their novel power source will make up the rest. . . .

UPDATE: This does not look very promising.

For the price of the Volt, you could buy almost two hybrids from competitors. But in these early days of electric vehicles, a cold economic analysis doesn't really apply. . . .

GM figures that if you drive within the Volt's 40-mile battery range, it will cost $1.50 a day to drive, compared to about $3.50 per day for a 30 mpg sedan. . . .

So let's take those numbers, that I assume are picked by GM to make the car look at its best. At $2 for a whole year that comes to $730. Even assuming a zero interest rate, over ten years that comes to $7,300. That doesn't come remotely close to make up the cost difference, even when you add on the $7,500 tax credit.

GM's warranty covers the batteries for up to 100,000 miles, just as it covers gas engines and transmissions. I can't find the cost of the batteries versus that of a transmission.

If true, I won't be surprised, though I still find this disturbing. No matter what one's views are on the issue of homosexuality, getting a degree shouldn't be contingent on those views. In fact, I am amazed that someone who thinks that homosexuality is immoral can make it through a graduate program where the issue is discussed.

A graduate student in Georgia is suing her university after she was told she must undergo a remediation program due to her beliefs on homosexuality and transgendered persons.

The student, Jennifer Keeton, 24, has been pursuing a master's degree in school counseling at Augusta State University since 2009, but school officials have informed her that she'll be dismissed from the program unless she alters her "central religious beliefs on human nature and conduct," according to a civil complaint filed last week.

"[Augusta State University] faculty have promised to expel Miss Keeton from the graduate Counselor Education Program not because of poor academic showing or demonstrated deficiencies in clinical performance, but simply because she has communicated both inside and outside the classroom that she holds to Christian ethical convictions on matters of human sexuality and gender identity," the 43-page lawsuit reads. . . .

What looks to be a very similar case in Michigan was just decided. It looks as if students at public universities who are taking classes to be counselors must first agree to counsel homosexual and then must believe that homosexuality is good or they can't be allowed to be counselors. It seems to me that they should be able to at least recuse themselves from counseling certain people.

This just shows how important it is who appoints judges.

A federal judge on Wednesday blocked the most controversial parts of Arizona's immigration law from taking effect, delivering a last-minute victory to opponents of the crackdown. . . .

We can mandate that people have to have proof of health insurance, but they can't ask for any of the wide range of IDs (among such are a driver's license).

So massive new spending is driving the deficit, so the solution, according President Obama, is more taxes? Senator Judd Gregg says that it is a spending problem.

A big surprise from USA Today.

One of the major myths attached to the new health reform law is that it will lead to fewer emergency room visits. Instead of having to go to the ER, the claim goes, more efficient care will be administered to the newly insured in doctors offices by primary care physicians like me.
President Obama himself perpetuated this claim. A year ago at a town hall meeting on health care reform, he said, "We know that when somebody doesn't have health insurance, they're forced to get treatment at the ER, and all of us end up paying for it. ... You'd be better off subsidizing to make sure they were getting regular checkups." In late May, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wrote in Roll Call that "the uninsured will get coverage, no longer left to the emergency room for medical care."
Now we know better.
It's not terribly surprising that real data from Massachusetts, which has had universal health coverage since 2006, show otherwise. From 2004 to 2008, ER visits in the Bay State rose by 9%, with no discernable improvement after 2006. Why? At least part of the reason has been the inability of patients to find primary care physicians for last-minute visits. Let's face it: The ER won't turn you away, but individual and overburdened doctors can and will. The Massachusetts Medical Society has reported that new patients wait for a primary care doctor visit up to two months. . . .

So much for this "little-noticed" provision. Hiring won't be based on who is best for the job. It would have been nice if there were evidence of racism and discrimination, it would have been openly provided in the debate. From the Politico:

A little-noticed section of the Wall Street reform law grants the federal government broad new powers to compel financial firms to hire more women and minorities — an effort at promoting diversity that’s drawing fire from Republicans who say it could lead to de facto hiring quotas.

Deep inside the massive overhaul bill, Congress gives the federal government authority to terminate contracts with any financial firm that fails to ensure the “fair inclusion” of women and minorities, forcing every kind of company from a Wall Street giant to a mom-and-pop law office to account for the composition of its work force.

Employment law experts say the language goes further than any previous attempt by the U.S. government to promote diversity in the financial sector — putting muscle behind federal efforts to help minority- and women-owned firms gain access to billions in federal contracts. . . .

I am not sure whether this is a net plus or not. Apparently, it is pretty hard to delete some information from the iPhone. In this case, the person accused of the crime was pretty lucky that the text messages were saved in the cell phone cache. What this might mean is that law-abiding citizens want to get iPhones, but criminals who have something to hide will want to stay away from them.

Robert*, in his 60s, was a property manager to the rich and famous and a dog breeder.

Jessica* was the 18-year-old daughter of a friend, who never knew her father and dreamed of working with animals.

Their friendship blossomed as they spent mornings training his prize German shepherds. He gave her a $20,000 dog. For three months, they had sex repeatedly en route to dog shows and at a Whale Beach mansion where Elle Macpherson has stayed.


In August last year she accused him of rape. It was - and remains - a case of his word against hers.

Robert lost a job with the Catholic Church, from which he had earned more than $100,000 over the past three years, and was told he could no longer worship there.

The investigating officer, Detective Senior Constable Karen Hennessy, seized the $20,000 dog, saying it was relevant to the investigation.

The only thing standing between Robert and five sentences of up to 14 years were the messages from her on his iPhone, which he had deleted to conceal the relationship.

Robert's lawyer, John Gooley from Collins & Thompson solicitors, commissioned Gary Coulthart, a former covert operations policeman and ICAC surveillance expert, to plumb the depths of Robert's iPhone.

Mr Coulthart retrieved more than 300 deleted texts and phone calls from the alleged victim, some of which appeared to undermine the allegations.

Prosecutors later withdrew the charges and have been ordered to pay $30,056 of Robert's legal costs.

''Without the ability of Coulthart to drag the content out, a man's life may have been ruined,'' Mr Gooley said. ''[iPhone evidence is] a bit like DNA. It can work both ways.'' . . .

The keyboard logging cache means an expert can retrieve anything typed on it for up to 12 months. . . . .

Seizing the $20,000 dog seems overdoing it. I understand the issue of evidence and the fact that evidence can be destroyed, but if the police really thought that the woman had been raped, is it necessary to seize her dog? Aren't there penalties for the destruction of evidence?

The last major campaign finance bill passed when the Republicans controlled both house of Congress as well as the presidency. It is pretty amazing that the Democrats couldn't get a single Republican to support this bill, and the way that it is being rammed through so quickly makes me wonder whether they really want it passed. Personally, I don't see why someone loses their right to express themselves when they join a group of like minded individuals whether it be a union or a business or some other group such as Citizens United. President Obama has continually incorrectly described this bill in terms of just helping corporations. Donations are still not allowed directly to political campaigns, but the organizations are allowed to spend their own money to support positions that they defend. The position that the Obama administration wanted to defend would have resulted in banning of books (excuse me in their finally arguments they just said books shorter than say 100 pages). From the NY Times:

But even some Republicans who have made efforts to work collaboratively with the Democrats said there was not sufficient cooperation on the bill to generate bipartisan support.

“I know that the new routine for legislating these days is to ram and jam, but these issues deserve time,” said Senator Olympia J. Snowe, Republican of Maine, who Democrats had hoped would support the bill.

Calling a vote on the bill premature, she said, “We have no had hearings, no vetting, no attempt, I think, to bring people together to work on an issue that responds to the Supreme Court’s decision.”

The American Civil Liberties Union applauded the blocking of the bill.

“We can only truly bring positive change to our elections if we continue to respect our cherished free speech rights and, unfortunately, the Disclose Act does not do that,” said Laura W. Murphy, director of the civil liberties union’s Washington legislative office, said in a statement. . . .

From Monday's WSJ.com's Political Diary:

New Mexico Senator Tom Udall: "I remember asking about it, and was told not to worry about it because we'd have 60 votes once Al Franken got seated. Well, we found out what 60 votes got us."

I have one question: why were the Democrats so certain in December 2009 that Franken would be declared the winner. Wasn't Senator Norm Coleman still in the lead at that time?

U.N. threatens Second and First Amendments

This article here points out how meaningless are the ways a lot of countries account for their debt.

Clearly, Greece is in terrible fiscal shape. To get its books in order it would have to pull in its belt each year by another 11.5 per cent of GDP. This provides new meaning to the word draconian. But the US is in much worse shape, because the CBO’s projections that reveal the 12.2 per cent fiscal gap already assume a 7.2 per cent of GDP belt-tightening by 2020.

But the assumptions underlying this 7.2 per cent adjustment are highly speculative, including a substantial rise in the share of taxpayers facing the Alternative Minimum Tax, once called the “millionaires tax” for targeting only the rich. The CBO also assumes that real wage growth will push all workers into much higher tax brackets, and that Congress will slash discretionary spending as well as greatly limit growth in Medicare and Medicaid benefits. Each supposition runs counter to recent experience.

Wishing won’t fix America’s fiscal mess. The US is one foot away from a deep and permanent economic grave. It is far past time to do meaningful long-term fiscal planning, level with the public, and implement radical reforms that permanently put America’s fiscal house in order.

If the government kept its books like companies are required to do so, they would have to record promised payments as liabilities. By that measure the "unfunded liability [for Social Security and Medicare] has reached nearly $107 trillion in today's dollars."

The administration’s budget projections were released last Friday afternoon. Remind you these are the administration's estimates. This is what a $862 billion stimulus, supplemental spending bills, a massive health care bill, government taking over the student loan industry (after all government is so efficient and getting rid of those nasty incentive inducing profits will lower costs (sure)), etc.. E21 has gone through some of the numbers here:

The budget deficit in 2010 is expected to set a record at $1.471 trillion – or 10% of GDP. In 2011, the administration projects the deficit will again top $1.4 trillion. From 2010 to 2020, the Obama budget plan would run up a cumulative deficit of nearly $10 trillion, and the nation’s debt would reach $18.5 trillion in 2020, up from $5.8 trillion at the end of 2008. . . .

The primary problem is quite plainly out of control federal spending. In 2008, total federal outlays were about $2.9 trillion. President Obama wants to add $1 trillion to that total in 2011, or about a 33% expansion of governmental activity in just three years. And that’s just the beginning of it. By the end of the decade, federal outlays would reach $5.6 trillion, nearly double what they were a little more than a decade earlier, and that’s assuming a massive and speculative peace dividend after 2011 and cuts in domestic discretionary programs that the president has yet to identify. . . .

In that report, CBO found that a massive tax hike is already in the offing. Historically, federal taxes have hovered at around 18 to 19% of GDP. CBO expects that number to rise to 23% of GDP by 2035, even if nothing is done to change current law. Income taxes will begin to rise automatically next year if Congress lets tax rates revert to their pre-Bush levels. . . .

NBC has a copy of the video here.

Here is the key:

-- David Brooks doesn't seem to understand that the question isn't whether the government has created "some" jobs. The question is whether it has created a net increase in jobs. Moving money from where you and I would have spent it moves jobs from where the companies that would have gotten our money to the companies or government agencies that the government favors. The churning created by moving these jobs increases unemployment because people don't instantly move from one job to another.
-- EJ Dionne doesn't seem to understand that the people he is going after have already paid high income taxes when they originally earned the money. The question is whether this income should be taxed twice.
-- Anita Dunn, who the former Obama White House Communications Director, just did political talking points.
-- I have no problem with Rick Santelli's points, though if it had been possible, I would have briefly made the above point that I made in responding to Brooks.

This is hardly a balanced panel. Rick Santelli made a conservative argument. David Brooks is a liberal Republican who likes Obama. EJ Dionne, Anita Dunn, the guy who commented on Congressman Rangel are all liberal Democrats.