Boundless Arrogance - NYT Update II (Heh)

I blogged below on the Drudge Report's story about the NYT editor, David Shipley's decision not to run a McCain opinion piece that responded to Obama's "My Plan for Iraq" editorial that the NYT published last week. I updated that with Mr. Shipley's incredibly arrogant e-mail reposnse to the McCain Camp in which he, in essence, only would agree to publish a McCain response if it was substantailly reworked to mirror Mr. Obama's call for timetables for withdraw. It was a display of arrogance and bias writ large. I thought that the matter ended there, but that is not the case. TNOY has obtained the notes of David Shipley wherein he has helpfully edited the McCain editorial to show them what he would find acceptable

In January 2007, when General David Petraeus took command of the dismal situation in Iraq, he called the situation “hard”, but not bordering on “hopeless.” Today, 18 months later, violence has fallen by up to only 80% to the lowest levels in four years leaving much work to be done to eliminate the final 20%. Sunni and Shiite terrorists freedom fighters, battling valiantly to protect their homeland, are reeling from a string of defeats minor set-backs. The situation now is full of hope uncertain, but and considerable hard work remains to consolidate our fragile gains. rebuild the country we destroyed.

Progress has been due primarily to an increase in the number of troops and a change in their strategy recent polls showing Senator Obama as the clear front runner for the presidency, as well as fears of a Hillary Clinton victory. I was an early a bloodthirsty advocate of the surge at a time when it had few supporters in Washington most rational people were questioning my ability to make toast, let alone run the country. Senator Barack Obama was an equally eloquently vocal opponent. “I am not persuaded that 20,000 additional troops in Iraq is going to completely solve the sectarian violence there,” he said on January 10, 2007. “In fact, I think it will do the reverse predict only an 80% reduction in violence, leaving 1 in 5 Iraqis sadly disenfranchised by the surge.” . . .

Read the entirity of Mr. Shipley's proposed edit. There is much more.

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Boundless Arrogance - A NYT Update

I blogged below on the Drudge Report's story about the NYT editor, David Shipley's decision not to run a McCain opinion piece that responded to Obama's "My Plan for Iraq" editorial that the NYT published last week. Hot Air now has the entire e-mail sent by Shipley to the McCain camp, outlining what Shipley expected to be in McCain's piece before he would publish it. Here is the meat of the e-mail:
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Thank you for sending me Senator McCain’s essay.

I’d be very eager to publish the Senator on the Op-Ed page.

However, I’m not going to be able to accept this piece as currently written.

I’d be pleased, though, to look at another draft.

Let me suggest an approach.

The Obama piece worked for me because it offered new information (it appeared before his speech); while Senator Obama discussed Senator McCain, he also went into detail about his own plans.

It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain that mirrors Senator Obama’s piece. To that end, the article would have to articulate, in concrete terms, how Senator McCain defines victory in Iraq. It would also have to lay out a clear plan for achieving victory — with troops levels, timetables and measures for compelling the Iraqis to cooperate. And it would need to describe the Senator’s Afghanistan strategy, spelling out how it meshes with his Iraq plan. . . .

Sincerely,

David Shipley

See the whole e-mail at Hot Air (emphasis added)

Mr. Shipley's arrogance and his incredible bias could not be more clearly shown than in this e-mail. A timetable for withdraw? Pressuring the Iraqi govenment to cooperate? He wants McCain to adopt the Obama plan for surrender, predicated as it is on a complete fabrication of today's truth on the ground. Did this idiot stop reading his own newspaper in 2006? One wonders just what passes for reality amongst the leftist elites and just whether there is any limit to their arrogance.

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Arrogance, Entitlement & Obama's Anti-War Stance

The days of fawning press for Barack Obama may be waning. When the liberal AP starts tossing bombs, its time to start worrying in the Obama camp.




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This today from the AP:

[T]here's a line smart politicians don't cross — somewhere between "I'm qualified to be president" and "I'm born to be president." Wherever it lies, Barack Obama better watch his step.

He's bordering on arrogance.

The dictionary defines the word as an "offensive display of superiority or self-importance; overbearing pride." Obama may not be offensive or overbearing, but he can be a bit too cocky for his own good.

The freshman senator told reporters in July that he would overcome Hillary Rodham Clinton's lead in the polls because "to know me is to love me."

A few months later, he said, "Every place is Barack Obama country once Barack Obama's been there."

True, there's a certain amount of tongue-in-cheekiness to such remarks — almost as if Obama doesn't want to take his adoring crowds and political ascent too seriously. He was surely kidding when he told supporters in January that by the time he was done speaking "a light will shine down from somewhere."

"It will light upon you," he continued. "You will experience an epiphany. And you will say to yourself, I have to vote for Barack. I have to do it."

But both Obama and his wife, Michelle, ooze a sense of entitlement.

"Barack is one of the smartest people you will ever encounter who will deign to enter this messy thing called politics," his wife said a few weeks ago, adding that Americans will get only one chance to elect him.

. . . If arrogance is a display of self-importance and superiority, Obama earns the pejorative every time he calls his pre-invasion opposition to the war in Iraq an act of courage.

While he deserves credit for forecasting the complications of war in 2002, Obama's opposition carried scant political risk because he was a little-known state lawmaker courting liberal voters in Illinois. In 2004, when denouncing the war and war-enabling Democrats would have jeopardized his prized speaking role at the Democratic National Convention, Obama ducked the issue.

. . . Voters won't cut Obama as much slack on the humility test because he's sold himself as something different. While rejecting the "me"-centric status quo and promising a new era of post-partisan reform, Obama has said the movement he has created is not about him; it's about what Americans can do together if their faith in government is restored.

The power of his message lies in its humility. As he told 7,000 supporters at a rally last month, "I am an imperfect vessel for your hopes and dreams."

Nobody expects Obama to be perfect. But he better never forget that he isn't.

Read the entire article.

(H/T Bookworm Room)

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Adam Smith & The EU's Global Warming Arrogance

The socialists at the EU really are an arrogant bunch. Knowing as they do what is best for Europe without need of consulting their electorate, they of course know what is best for the rest of the world also, including the U.S. For example, the EU partially fund the ABA to conduct its propaganda offensive against the death penalty in the U.S. Does that seem like a gross imposition into our internal affairs?

And indeed, just within the past year we have witnessed the unelected EU President send a letter to the popularly elected Texas governor instructing the governor that the it is a settled issue that the death penalty is not a deterrent and should be eradicated. It must be nice to go through life without having to examine any facts that challenge one’s deeply held belief. Such is the modern left.

The European socialists in Brussels see no problem with their attempt to make an end run around the electorate in Texas – the same people who could easily vote for a candidate who wishes to abolish the death penalty should they desire. But "democracy" has no worth as a concept in Brussels; its only use is as an Orwellian label. The EU is making sure that their own electorate have no say in the creation of the EU socialist super-state that, with the "Reform Treaty" of Lisbon, has just come into being. Indeed, to complain about the lack of democratic vote is to "show contempt for dignity of Parliament." This gives you some flavor of the incredible hubris of the EU.

But all of that pales in comparison to the damage the EU socialists, in their arrogance, are poised to inflict both internally and on the world.

The EU, which has taken global warming out of the realm of science and debate and made it a shibboleth of their constitutional law, is gearing "up to produce its much-heralded strategy on "climate change" – expected on 23 January." According to EU Referendum:

The core of this strategy will be the 20 percent reduction in emissions by 2020 and the 10 percent biofuel quota, the combination of which – with the other measures the commission is considering – will have a profound effect on our economy, our own personal lifestyles and global politics in general.

This is a program that will take billions out of the EU economy while making no contribution to efficiency, only adding to the cost of the production of goods and services. So as the EU shackles the economies of its member provinces with changes to combat global warming, how will the EU remain competitive in the global market?

It was completely predictable to anyone who watches the EU that their first thought would be to transfer their economic costs and use taxation as a type of global social policy to enforce EU beliefs on the global heretics. Thus it is no surprise at all that this today should appear in The Times:

A row has erupted in Brussels over proposals to introduce a carbon tax on goods entering the European Union from countries that fail to take measures to curb carbon dioxide emissions.

The tax would hit powerful emerging market exporters, such as China, which do not comply with the Kyoto treaty on climate change. The proposal is opposed by Peter Mandelson, the EU Trade Commissioner, who fears that it would fall foul of World Trade Organisation rules.

Sources at Mr Mandelson’s office said the proposal was "dead", while a spokesman for Stavros Dimas, the Environment Commissioner, said several drafts of the proposal were being discussed and debated. "It’s at the beginning of the process," he said.

The Trade Commissioner’s spokesman argued that the proposed tax was "too complicated" and would create problems with the United States, which has not signed the Kyoto treaty. . .

Do read the entire article. One does not need a PhD in economics to see that such taxes would have a depressive effect on the world economy and would, if imposed, likely set off a trade war. But such is the arrogance and the insanity to be found amongst our friendly, unelected socialist allies. It’s the Goracle versus Adam Smith. Smith will win in the end, but the Goracle and his EU acolytes can do incredible damage in the short run.

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