Barack's Conversations with Dimitry, Jindahl Spanked

Dimitry Medvedev
Dana Millbank

"If you buy a car from Chrysler or General Motors, you will be able to get your car serviced and repaired, just like always," - Barack Obama

"The dirty little secret of conservative talk radio is that the average age of listeners is 67 and rising... What's more, it's the Internet that is the fast-growing and arguably more powerful political medium -- and it is the province of the young and liberal. The only sensible market view of conservative talk is that it will contract and be reduced, in the coming years, to a much more rarefied format." - Michael Wolff


President Barack Obama is in Europe for the G20 conference, with speculation on how well he will be received. His stimulus plan has come under a lot of criticism, notably from Germany and the Czech Republic, but everyone is keeping their fingers crossed that it will work, or else the whole world's economy will be dragged down with us. Of course, last time he went to Europe, he drew large crowds, so it may be that he will get a warmer reception from regular people than from the politicians.

TMP reports: "A new ABC/Washington Post poll finds the public agreeing with the Obama administration that it has inherited the problems it has to deal with. Only 26% of Americans think the Obama administration deserves blame for the current economic problems, compared to 80% who blame banks and businesses, 70% who blame the Bush administration, and 72% who blame consumers. President Obama's approval rating remains high at 66%, with 60% approval on the economy specifically." 

One of the more important meetings will be with Dimitry Medvedev, the President of the Russian Federation, who is now being let out on his own, but maybe hard-wired so that Putin can see and hear everything... They will be talking about renewing the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, which ends this coming December. This from Medvedev's Washington Post opinion editorial: "I believe that removing such obstacles to good relations would be beneficial to our countries -- essentially removing "toxic assets" to make good a negative balance sheet -- and beneficial to the world.

This will require joint efforts. The exchange of letters between myself and President Obama this year showed mutual readiness to build mature bilateral relations in a pragmatic and businesslike manner. For that we have a "road map" -- the Strategic Framework Declaration our countries signed in Sochi in 2008. It is essential that the positive ideas in that declaration be brought to life. We are ready for that."

The Russians are trying to gain the primacy they had under Communist control, want to be considered a major player in the world's political chess game. They have established economic ties with India, China, Iran, Brazil, Venezuela, and Cuba, to name a few. They also are trying to do what we like to do, put military air bases in friendly countries, Cuba included. It seems like a modern version of The Great Game...

Elizabeth Warren has been appointed as overseer on the bailout and TARP funds, finding out where it all goes. She had problems with Hank Paulson because he didn't keep track of where it went, just out to his friends... Now this report from Politico's Glenn Thrush: "Elizabeth Warren, the law professor appointed as Congress's oversight czar on bank bailouts, blasted the Treasury Department -- saying new legislation might be needed to give the House and Senate more access to details of the $700 billion rescue program.

Warren, testifying before the Senate Finance Committee Tuesday morning, said keeping Congress in the loop isn't a "priority" of Secretary Tim Geithner -- and suggested a possible "next step" would be to pass legislation that would "require [Treasury] to consult" with her.
Warren, who was sharply critical of Geithner's predecessor Hank Paulson for allegedly underestimating public exposure to bank losses, said he office has "substantial questions about AIG, TALF... how many acronyms can we do here?"

"While some of the projects in the bill make sense, their legislation is larded with wasteful spending. It includes $300 million to buy new cars for the government, $8 billion for high-speed rail projects, such as a 'magnetic levitation' line from Las Vegas to Disneyland, and $140 million for something called 'volcano monitoring.' "  - Bobby Jindahl

Ahhhh, how can we forget Bobby Jindal's denunciations of federal spending to monitor volcanoes? It was the speech that wasn't, put egg on the face of the GOP, and solidified opinion that they had become irrelevant in today's political dialogue. He is now attracting some serious critcism from a Republican Senator -- namely Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, whose state has been recently disrupted by a series of eruptions from Mount Redoubt.

Politico reports: "Recently there were some comments made about federal spending for volcano monitoring being wasteful," Murkowski said from the Senate floor, without naming Jindal directly. "I can assure you that monitoring volcanoes is critically important to the nation and especially to my home state of Alaska."

The massive eruptions from Mount Redoubt were serious enough to cancel all airport service in and out of Anchorage for several hours -- even though the city is about 100 miles away from the volcano. Memo to Bobby Jindal: "Volcano monitoring" in some parts of the country is not all that dissimilar from "hurricane monitoring" on the Gulf Coast." This may develop into a Deathmatch, with or without claymation figures to stand in for the real people.

By the way, I predict that the octo-mom will have been able to pay for her house by stripping and working as a fetish prostitute...

Late night jokes:

"The Republicans released their budget counter-proposal this week. It plans to address the deficit, global warming, healthcare, energy, massive tax cuts for the rich. I'm not kidding. Also, there are no numbers in this budget. It's a budget plan without any math in it. You know, Obama should have saved that Special Olympics joke for these retards." --Bill Maher

"Unemployment is at record levels. Of course, no one is buying anything. Consumer spending is at a standstill. The Octomom switched to a generic brand of semen." --Bill Maher

"People are pissed off. Did you hear this? This is not a joke. Melissa Etheridge says she will not pay taxes in California until they legalize gay marriage. Let's see. A high-profile liberal who won't pay taxes. Sounds like someone who wants to be in the Obama Cabinet!" --Bill Maher

"North Korea is planning to launch what they're calling a rocket, but what the rest of the world calls a missile. And Hillary had to warn Kim Jong Il today, 'do not fire your missile.' Is it me, or is this a running theme in her life? --Bill Maher

"Looking back at his presidential run this week, John McCain said that he got a lot of votes because of Sarah Palin. And weirdly enough, that's the same thing President Obama said." --Jimmy Fallon

"President Obama said yesterday that he believes that Osama bin Laden is plotting new attacks against the United States. Obama came up with this theory when he picked up any newspaper from the last eight years." --Jimmy Fallon

"President Obama said this week that things will get worse before they get better. That's something you never hear before the election. 'Let me tell you, if I'm elected it's going to get a lot worse.'" --Jay Leno

"President Obama has announced a task force to review the tax codes. He's concerned there are too many loopholes and too many people manipulating the system to avoid paying taxes. And that's just in his administration." --Jay Leno

"The postmaster general of the United States said that the post office lost $2.8 billion last year. Here's the worst part, do you know where it got lost? In the mail." --Jay Leno

"In an unusual move for a sitting secretary of state, Hillary Clinton was given Planned Parenthood's highest award. In her speech, she revealed her number one recommended method of birth control: Pantsuits." --Jay Leno

"Today at the White House, President Obama met with the CEOs of all the major U.S. banks. A lot of these big bonus guys. The CEOs looked around the White House and said, 'You live in this dump?'." --Jay Leno

"I want to say welcome back to Matt Lauer, our good friend from the 'Today' show. He's back at work. He got injured on Long Island riding his bicycle. He almost hit a deer. He said he was going down the road, saw the deer, and the deer froze. Said the deer had that 'Nancy Pelosi-in-the-headlights' look.'" --Jay Leno

"President Obama gave the first official online town hall meeting over the internet. Apparently, there must have been an online mix-up, because two guys from 'Dateline: Predator' showed up with a six pack of Mike's hard lemonade." --Jay Leno