End of the beginning or beginning of the end?

Obama's approval is below 50%.

http://www.pollster.com/polls/us/jobapproval-obama.php?xml=http://www.pollster.com/flashcharts/content/xml/Obama44JobApproval.xml&choices=Approve,Disapprove&phone=&ivr=&internet=&mail=&smoothing=more&from_date=2009-08-01&to_date=&min_pct=35&max_pct=60&grid=&points=1&lines=1&colors=Disapprove-BF0014,Approve-000000,Undecided-68228B

If the Democrats lose today in New Jersey, Virginia and upstate New York, moderate Democrats in Congress up for reelection in 2010 will start abandoning him in droves.

Castro complains

"Fidel Castro has found something to sneeze at in Washington's decision to ease visits by Cuban-Americans to his island: He says more Americans mean more swine flu. The 83-year-old ex-president wrote in state-controlled newspapers on Saturday that many of Cuba's early cases of the virus were visitors from the United States and he used the occasion to take a jab at the U.S. embargo."

http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/health/67965447.html?elr=KArks7PYDiaK7DUvDE7aL_V_BD77:DiiUiacyKUUr

As payback for Soviet financial aid in the '70's and '80's, Castro sent Cuban troops to Angola. Cuban troops working with Communist guerillas in the Angolan back country picked up the HIV/AIDS virus. The Cuban troops in Angola took the HIV/AIDS virus back home with them when they returned to Cuba from Africa. From Cuba, the HIV/AIDS virus spread to Haiti. From Haiti, tourists spread HIV/AIDS around the world.

Castro's military intervention in Africa inadvertently created the world wide plague of HIV/AIDS. It will be remembered by history as his most enduring legacy.

Castro needs to shut up about swine flu.

Public option healthcare for 2% . . . in 2019

"After all the noise over Democrats' push for a government insurance plan to compete with private carriers, coverage numbers are finally in: Two percent. . . . The budget office estimated that about 6 million people would sign up for the public option in 2019, when the House bill is fully phased in. That represents about 2 percent of a total of 282 million Americans under age 65. (Older people are covered through Medicare.)"

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33564275/ns/politics-health_care_reform

We're told there's a "healthcare crisis" affecting "over 45 million Americans". Yet, their solution is a public plan for only 6 million people, phased in over 10 years. Does that make any sense?

And another promise broken

"Celebrities George Clooney and Oprah Winfrey and prominent lobbyists, corporate executives and Democratic fundraisers were among the first to score visits with President Barack Obama, his wife Michelle or top aides at the White House, newly released records show. . . . despite a campaign pledge to reduce special-interest influence on policymaking, lobbyists are getting face time with him and his aides."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091031/ap_on_en_tv/us_white_house_visitors

Tim Geithner

Remember Tim Geithner?

He's the super genius we needed to run the treasury department, even though it turned out he was a tax cheat, because only he was brilliant enough to help turn the economy around.

Geithner's latest:

"Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner says the U.S. economy has suffered a lot of damage in the current downturn and it's going to take time before it fully recovers."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2009-11-01-geithner-economic-recovery_N.htm

Anyone else, of any intelligence, would reach the same conclusion. Geithner has shown no additional or unique insights or prescriptions. Of course, everyone else up for the job except Geithner paid their taxes. I fail to see any proof so far that we had to give the treasury secretary job to a tax cheat because of Geithner's brilliant insights and talents.

U.N. condemns U.S.

That's right, the U.N. - - with nothing to say about North Korea, or Iran, or any number of rogue states and crazy dictators - - condemned the U.S.

"The United States found itself up against virtually the entire world Wednesday as country after country at the United Nations denounced the nearly 50-year-old trade embargo against Cuba, which the island government says is as strong as ever under President Barack Obama. It was the 18th time the U.N. General Assembly voted to condemn the embargo, and the first time since Obama took office in January. In a near unanimous vote -- 187 to 3 -- the only nations to side with the United States were Israel and Palau, a country of 21,000 people in the Pacific."

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/cuba/story/1305759.html

And, notice which countries - - the only countries - - had our back.

Why does the media keep insisting that everyone loves us now that Obama's president?

Goldman Sachs

"In 2006 and 2007, Goldman Sachs Group peddled more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never told the buyers it was secretly betting that a sharp drop in U.S. housing prices would send the value of those securities plummeting. Goldman's sales and its clandestine wagers, completed at the brink of the housing market meltdown, enabled the nation's premier investment bank to pass most of its potential losses to others before a flood of mortgage defaults staggered the U.S. and global economies. Only later did investors discover that what Goldman had promoted as triple-A rated investments were closer to junk."

http://www.miamiherald.com/509/story/1310367.html

Rather than appoint Goldman's highest level former executives to big jobs running the "recovery", shouldn't Obama have prosecuted a few of them for causing the recession?