When you don't have any idea what to do next, stick with what you know. Obama knows how to campaign, so he's off to Denver to sign the spendulus. Meanwhile, his staff handlers just unveiled their latest campaign tool: the spendulus website, "Recovery.gov".

Front and center is this misleading graphic purporting to describe the spendulus act, which I have amended below the fold:

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 09:38 AM | Comments (230)
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With no end in sight to the budget impasse, Governor Schwarzenegger has announced that layoff notices will be put in the mail today for the first group of up to 10,000 state employees to be laid off. He has also suspended the last 275 state-funded public works projects still in operation since he has no way to pay for them.

Schwarzenegger had delayed sending out pink slips since Friday, hoping that lawmakers would soon approve a budget. But they failed Monday to find a third GOP vote in the state Senate to achieve the two-thirds majority needed to pass a budget -- a requirement that essentially gives the minority Republicans veto power. A spokesman for Schwarzenegger said layoff notices would go out today.

Late Monday evening, both houses of the Legislature adjourned and Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) ordered senators back to the chamber at 10 a.m. today, saying they would stay until a budget passed.

"Bring a toothbrush," he said. "I will not allow anyone to go home to resume their lives or any kind of normal business."

Most Republican legislators are standing firm on their anti-tax pledge. The proposed budget includes a $14.4 billion tax hike, spending cuts of $16 billion, and loans of around $10 billion.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 08:50 AM | Comments (87)
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In the waning days of his Administration, President Bush finally enacted a rule allowing loaded firearms in national parks and wildlife refuges. The usual suspects freaked out and sued. Now, Obama's Justice Department is defending the rule.

The three groups seeking to overturn the rule -- the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, the National Parks Conservation Association and the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees -- have argued that the Bush administration violated several laws in issuing the rule, such as failing to conduct an adequate environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act. They also argue that the new policy could deter some visitors, such as school groups, from visiting national landmarks.

In its reply, the Justice Department wrote that the new rule "does not alter the environmental status quo, and will not have any significant impacts on public health and safety."

It looks like this one is headed for the courts.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 08:23 AM | Comments (40)
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Secretary Geithner and the President set an artificial deadline for developing a plan to deal with toxic assets dragging down the financial sector. Then after pondering the problem for months, Geithner made a radical last minute change in the proposal. Rather than setting a new deadline to go public, since his new plan was undeveloped, he went ahead and held that press conference sans details.

According to several sources involved in the deliberations, Geithner had come to the conclusion that the strategies he and his team had spent weeks working on were too expensive, too complex and too risky for taxpayers. [...]

The sharp course change was one of the key reasons why Geithner's plan -- his first major policy initiative as Treasury secretary -- landed with such a thud last Tuesday. Lawmakers, investors and analysts expressed dismay over the lack of specifics. Markets tanked, and fresh doubts arose about the hand now steering the country's financial policy. [...]

Meanwhile, the sources said, Obama's senior economic advisers were hobbled in crafting the plan by a shortage of personnel. To date, the president has not nominated any assistant secretaries or undersecretaries at the Treasury, and the handful of mid-level staffers who have started work were still finding their offices and getting their building passes and BlackBerrys.

Yes, we know how dependent the Obamatons are on their BlackBerries. So they spent weeks working on a plan without determining its feasibility and without consulting with the industry. The Secretary had a last-minute crisis of confidence and then...what? Too proud to tell the President he needs more time to develop a rescue plan? Too wedded to his artificial deadline? These decisions have real-world consequences now.

I can see why Geithner was the only man for the job. /sarc

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 07:27 AM | Comments (55)
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This is one brave woman. You couldn't get me on national tv talking about this stuff when I was 18.

There's video at the link, but here's a partial transcript courtesy of Ed:

GRETA: I don’t want to pry too personally, but obviously contraception is an issue here. Is that something that you were lazy about or not interested in, or do you have a philosophical or religious opposition to it, or –

BRISTOL: No, I donÂ’t want to get into detail about that. But I think abstinence is like Â… I donÂ’t know how to put it, like Â… the main Â… Everyone should be abstinent, but itÂ’s not realistic at all.

GRETA: Why?

BRISTOL: Because — I don’t want to get into detail about it.

GRETA: [crosstalk] Just big picture, not about you –

BRISTOL: Because itÂ’s more and more accepted.

I think the "it" in that last sentence is meant to be "extramarital sex."

Here's Ed:

Of course, acceptance is why many people want abstinence taught. The entire idea is to push back against the acceptance of sexual activity among those who are ill-equipped to handle the emotional, health, and financial consequences of sexual activity. That doesn’t mean that we don’t teach about contraception as well — it always amazes me when people consider the two mutually exclusive — but that explaining that only abstinence gives one complete protection against pregnancy and STDs in ways that condoms do not, as well as the risks of exploitation.

I'm not certain that Bristol meant her mention of abstinence to imply anything about contraception, especially since her mom self-reports as "pro-contraceptives." But Ed can rest easy on the teaching abstinence or teaching abstinence and contraceptives issue. Obama is infamously in favor of "comprehensive sex education" including both abstinence and contraceptive education.

And Debbie Schlussel from the comments was too good to pass up:

Not only does she not believe in abstinence, but she doesn’t believe in marriage either, apparently, since it’s been almost a year since she learned she was pregnant and almost two months since she had the kid. And yet, she’s still a baby mama. Hilarious that people call her mother–who enabled this baby mamahood and continues to put a roof over it–the “conservative of the year.” Simply hilarious. Not only has America become socialist under Obama, but conservatives have abandoned any sense of family values. In this one family–the new template for America’s conservative movement–you have a Mr. Mom, teenage pregnancy, single motherhood, and opposition to abstinence teaching. Awesome.

Discuss.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 07:05 AM | Comments (209)
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So, who said the following, quoted in this Wall St. Journal op-ed?

"Genuine bipartisanship assumes an honest process of give-and-take, and that the quality of the compromise is measured by how well it serves some agreed-upon goal, whether better schools or lower deficits. This in turn assumes that the majority will be constrained -- by an exacting press corps and ultimately an informed electorate -- to negotiate in good faith.

"If these conditions do not hold -- if nobody outside Washington is really paying attention to the substance of the bill, if the true costs . . . are buried in phony accounting and understated by a trillion dollars or so -- the majority party can begin every negotiation by asking for 100% of what it wants, go on to concede 10%, and then accuse any member of the minority party who fails to support this 'compromise' of being 'obstructionist.'

"For the minority party in such circumstances, 'bipartisanship' comes to mean getting chronically steamrolled, although individual senators may enjoy certain political rewards by consistently going along with the majority and hence gaining a reputation for being 'moderate' or 'centrist.'"

Posted by: Slublog at 06:40 AM | Comments (46)
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Oh, hell. Maybe just one more.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 06:32 AM | Comments (28)
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I'm so confused.

LOGAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan – Close to 3,000 American soldiers who recently arrived in Afghanistan to secure two violent provinces near Kabul have begun operations in the field and already are seeing combat, the unit's spokesman said Monday.

The new troops are the first wave of an expected surge of reinforcements this year. The process began to take shape under President George Bush but has been given impetus by President Barack Obama's call for an increased focus on Afghanistan.

U.S. commanders have been contemplating sending up to 30,000 more soldiers to bolster the 33,000 already here, but the new administration is expected to initially approve only a portion of that amount. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Monday the president would decide soon.

The new unit — the 1st Platoon of Hillary Clinton - Madeline Albright - Helen Thomas Slow Strip Tease Pole Dancers has already caused Al Qaeda to surrender, according to suddenly blind unnamed sources.

Okay, I once again made the part in bold up.

But seriously, it isn't hasn't even been a month but I'm seriously thinking of suing the Obama administration for injuries concurrent with whiplash. Can you help me out with that, Gabe?

Update Okay, I was being funny, but the part I put in bold originally read:

The new unit — the 3rd Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division — moved into Logar and Wardak provinces last month, and the soldiers from Fort Drum, N.Y., are now stationed in combat outposts throughout the provinces.

All joking aside, let's all pray for these brave people who defend us, no matter who the president is.

Posted by: Open Blog at 09:41 PM | Comments (39)
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Yes, Drudge had this up earlier today, but last time I checked you donÂ’t really have an option of commenting there, no?

In the great state of Oregon (Motto: “State Named After a Trail”) a group of five lawmakers have fashioned the perfect solution to help solve the state budget’s financial crisis: A 1900% increase in beer taxes.

”PORTLAND - Five Oregon state lawmakers want to impose a hefty tax on beer and have introduced a bill that brewers say would cripple them.”

“Four Portland legislators joined a Springfield senator to introduce Oregon House Bill 2461, which would impose a $49.61 tax on each barrel of beer produced by Oregon brewers.”

“House Bill 2461 has been introduced by Portland Reps. Ben Cannon and Michael Dembrow, Portland Sens. Jackie Dingfelder and Diane Rosenbaum, and Springfield Sen. William Morrisette.”

Apparently that information is classified, but the Overnight Open Thread staff is on the job, doing the hard investigative journalism that no one else will. After a five month week day hour minute second search through the dank and seedy back alleyways of downtown Google, our investigators came up with this:

List of Oregon State Senators.
List of Oregon State Representatives

But the most shocking thing our investigators uncovered, we canÂ’t show you on the front page of this family-friendly blog. So itÂ’s tucked safely below the fold. ItÂ’s the picture that the sponsors of the bill have attached on the cover of their proposed legislation. (NSFW unless you work in Germany)
more...

Posted by: Open Blog at 08:43 PM | Comments (94)
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Instapundit links to a speech by Dmitry Orlov, author of the book 'Reinventing Collapse'.

Orlov predicts that US society will collapse just like the Soviet Union. He does not pin down a specific timeframe, but he is talking about next few years, not decades.

The speech is largely about how to survive after the US economy and social structure collapses completely.

Too pessimistic? On target? Discuss among yourself.

Posted by: Open Blog at 06:57 PM | Comments (225)
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