Freedom Line Blog

Below is one of the latest cartoons from two-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Michael Ramirez.

View more of Michael Ramirez’s cartoons on CFIF’s website here.

The Obama Administration continues its bizarre behavior in selecting targets for its wrath.

For reasons unknown, the Administration has ostentatiously and histrionically escalated its condemnation of Israel, our most loyal Middle East ally.  Why?  Merely because Israel announced preliminary approval (the fourth stage of a seven-stage bureaucratic planning process) to build housing units within its own municipal boundaries in Jerusalem.  Meanwhile, as The Wall Street Journal reminds us, the Obama Administration continues to treat such anti-American rogues as Libya, Iran, Venezuela and Syria with kid gloves.

Then yesterday, chief White House heavy David Axelrod characterized our First Amendment free speech and petition rights as “a threat to our democracy.” The First Amendment explicitly states that “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech … or of the right of the people … to petition the Government for redress of grievances.”  Despite those protections, federal laws like McCain/Feingold literally prohibited, under penalty of imprisonment, political speech within 30 and 60 days of an election.  Fortunately, the United States Supreme Court struck a blow for First Amendment rights in January by overturning some of those restrictions in Citizens United v. FEC.

The Founding Fathers would not have taken kindly to McCain/Feingold’s unconstitutional restrictions on free speech and the right to petition Congress.  To them, abridgment of free speech was a threat to democracy.  In contrast, that towering intellectual and philosophical sage David Axelrod considers free speech itself “a threat to our democracy.”

Talk about mixed messages. Yesterday, top White House advisor David Axelrod warned Goldman Sachs for having the audacity to link pay for performance during a recession. The end-of-year compensation is apparently “offensive” in a time of recession. Moreover, Wall Street needs to “stand down” its opposition to further regulation of the financial industry because the government needs to “move forward” on “reforms.”

Today, President Barack Obama announces a “shift” in policy towards the government of Sudan. In the past, the President described Omar al-Bashir’s administration as genocidal. Now, in an effort to ransom better treatment for the millions terrorized by al-Bashir’s partisans, Obama offers “incentives” (i.e. money) hoping it will spur a change of behavior.

How curious. On the one hand, the Obama foreign policy team thinks money is a better motivator than economic coercion or military force. On the other hand, the Obama domestic policy team thinks coercive regulatory policies and voluntary denial of bonuses are better ways to incentivize performance than offering big pay-days to top flight financial talent. Hmmm…

One searches for the critical distinction to make sense of these seemingly contradictory approaches. Could the best explanation be that with Sudan the White House determines the who, what, when, where, and why of using money as an incentive, while in the case of Goldman Sachs someone other than the government is making the decisions?  If you could pick only one instance to use money as an enticement, should it be for the people that systematically rape, maim, and murder their neighbors?

This video, an interview with White House Senior Adviser David Axelrod, demonstrates how health care “choice” is fine for the White House, as long as the government chooses.  People can choose the Public Option, but people cannot choose to purchase health insurance across state lines because the government makes it illegal. HT: Andy Roth.