Focus on the Family buys pre-game ad time for Super Bowl Updated 3h 47m ago

The evangelical group that bought ad time in the CBS game telecast will announce today that it has bought time in the pregame show to air a second ad four times.

http://www.usatoday.com/money/advertising/2010-02-05-family05_ST_N.htm

I don't read the Huffington Post, so I obviously got the link from someplace else. h/t Allahpundit at the blog Hot Air:

Paterson Sex Scandal In The Works? Media Abuzz About Possible 'Bombshell' Story

Huffington Post   |  David Weiner

Rumors are flying that the New York Times is set to publish a bombshell scandal regarding New York Governor David Paterson.

Members of the media are abuzz about the alleged story on blogs and twitter, portending that it could be the final nail in Paterson's campaign coffin.

But just what is said scandal?

Nobody seems to know.

The Daily News's Elizabeth Benjamin says it's "far worse than his acknowledged extramarital affair with a former state employee."

New York Magazine, who just ran a lengthy profile on the governor, couldn't get a peep out of the Times, but writes that they hear the paper is "coming up with something big about the Paterson administration."

Many believe the scandal is linked to a story that appeared in the New York Post this past weekend that further detailed Paterson's recent decision to ban state troopers from the Governor's Mansion.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/05/paterson-sex-scandal-in-t_n_451681.html

Yesterday, President Obama said in a speech corpsemen, instead of corpsman three times, and now today he had this to say:

Obama: 'She insisted she's going to be buried in an Obama t-shirt'

By: Byron York
Chief Political Correspondent
02/05/10 11:42 AM EST

Yes, those are the words of the president, last night at the Democratic National Committee fundraiser in Washington. After listing his administration's accomplishments and vowing that "our most urgent task is job creation," Obama pledged to keep fighting for a national health care system. "We knew this was hard," Obama said. And then he described a letter he received from a campaign worker who suffered from breast cancer and has since died:

I got a letter -- I got a note today from one of my staff -- they forwarded it to me -- from a woman in St. Louis who had been part of our campaign, very active, who had passed away from breast cancer. She didn't have insurance. She couldn't afford it, so she had put off having the kind of exams that she needed. And she had fought a tough battle for four years. All through the campaign she was fighting it, but finally she succumbed to it. And she insisted she's going to be buried in an Obama t-shirt.

Many observers have noted that the president often seems extraordinarily self-referential. It's all about him, they say. But even those critics might be a little taken aback by the "buried in an Obama t-shirt" remark. Is it really that much about him?

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Obama-She-insisted-shes-going-to-be-buried-in-an-Obama-t-shirt-83645132.html

Al Franken lays into David Axelrod over health care bill

By MANU RAJU & ANDY BARR | 2/4/10 7:47 PM EST

Sen. Al Franken ripped into White House senior adviser David Axelrod this week during a tense, closed-door session with Senate Democrats.

Five sources who were in the room tell POLITICO that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration’s failure to provide clarity or direction on health care and the other big bills it wants Congress to enact.

The sources said Franken was the most outspoken senator in the meeting, which followed President Barack Obama’s question-and-answer session with Senate Democrats at the Newseum on Wednesday. But they also said the Minnesotan wasn’t the only angry Democrat in the room.

“There was a lot of frustration in there,” said a Democratic senator who declined to be identified.

“People were hot,” another Democratic senator said.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/32561.html

Obama admits health care overhaul may die on Hill

WASHINGTON – No, maybe he can't. President Barack Obama, who insisted he would succeed where other presidents had failed to fix the nation's health care system, now concedes the effort may die in Congress.

The president's newly conflicting signals could frustrate Democratic lawmakers who are hungry for guidance from the White House as they try to salvage the effort to extend coverage to millions of uninsured Americans and hold down spiraling medical costs. Obama's comments Thursday night came hours after Republican Scott Brown was sworn in to replace the late Edward M. Kennedy, leaving Democrats without their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, and Obama's signature health legislation with no clear path forward.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100205/ap_on_bi_ge/us_health_care_overhaul

Obama hosts Super Bowl Sunday at White House

...

Our Gannett colleague Maureen Groppe writes that the Hoosier State delegation includes Democratic Reps. Andre Carson, Brad Ellsworth and Baron Hill. Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao, a Louisiana Republican, is also on the guest list.

• Members of Congress
• Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-CA)
• Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA)
• Rep. Joseph Cao (R-LA)
• Rep. Andre Carson (D-IN)
• Rep. Brad Ellsworth (D-IN)
• Rep. Baron Hill (D-IN)
• Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA)
• Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT)
• Cabinet members:
• Secretary Shaun Donovan
• Secretary Arne Duncan
• Attorney General Eric Holder
• Administrator Lisa Jackson
• Secretary Janet Napolitano
• Ambassador Susan Rice
• Secretary Kathleen Sebelius
• Secretary Eric Shinseki
• Secretary Tom Vilsack

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/theoval/post/2010/02/obama-welcomes-guests-for-super-bowl-sunday/1

China could block sanctions against Iran

By Glenn Kessler

Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 5, 2010

China on Thursday threw a roadblock in the path of a U.S.-led push for sanctions against Iran, saying that it is important to continue negotiations as long as Iran appears willing to consider a deal to give up some of its enriched uranium.

"To talk about sanctions at the moment will complicate the situation and might stand in the way of finding a diplomatic solution," Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said at a conference in Paris.

After months of spurning the proposed deal, which would provide Iran with fuel for a medical reactor, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad showed a suddenly renewed interest in it this week just as France, a strong advocate of sanctions, assumed the rotating presidency of the U.N. Security Council. French Prime Minister François Fillon said Wednesday that he would ask the United Nations to adopt a resolution imposing "strong sanctions" against Iran because of its nuclear program.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/04/AR2010020404792.html

Harry Reid may soon have one more Republican opponent in Nevada’s race for the U.S. Senate, and his numbers remain in troublesome territory for an incumbent. Reid, like a number of Democratic Senate incumbents, appears to be suffering from voter unhappiness over the national health care plan and the continuing bad state of the economy.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters in the state finds Reid earning 39% to 41% of the vote against any of four GOP challengers. Still, that’s an improvement from last month when he picked up just 36% against his top two opponents. But Reid had 43% support against those two Republicans in December.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections2/election_2010/election_2010_senate_elections/nevada/election_2010_nevada_senate

Via Victor Davis Hanson on The Corner blog on National Review Online:

Is Greece Our Future?   [Victor Davis Hanson]

I lived in Greece for more than two years, and one of my best memories is of a small hotelier at a seaside resort. He checked you in; he cooked; he did the landscaping at night; he did all the maintenance during the day. I asked him why he didn't hire more help, since his hotel wasn't all that small and he seemed to be going 24/7. What followed was a harangue about the cost of hiring a permanent worker in Greece, the difficulty of ever firing him if he proved worthless, and why he preferred to do everything himself rather than fill out all sorts of forms and hire unmotivated but tenured employees. Besides, he said, almost everyone was on some sort of pension, disability, or government benefit, and was unwilling to work, so his choices were either illegal immigrants or broke foreign students. Then he launched into a blast against socialism, and explained how he was forced to become an expert tax dodger, how he would barter for all the transactions he could, and why he hated the government. He finished by sighing that in Greece, the people spend their time either devising ways to get government money or scheming to avoid the tax collectors — or, preferably, both.

I think the medicine for Greece's current crisis will prove more unpalatable than the wasting disease.

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZWI4N2M4ZjNhMjY4NjE3NTE3NzBmNjVhNjQ2ZThmY2Q=

Americans Reject Keynesian Economics

Richard Nixon once said, “We’re all Keynesians now.” But that was a long time ago, and it’s certainly not the case anymore (if it ever was).

While influential 20th Century economist John Maynard Keynes would say it’s best to increase deficit spending in tough economic times, only 11% of American adults agree and think the nation needs to increase its deficit spending at this time. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 70% disagree and say it would be better to cut the deficit.

In fact, 59% think Keynes had it backwards and that increasing the deficit at this time would hurt the economy rather than help.

To help the economy, most Americans (56%) believe that cutting the deficit is the way to go.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/business/general_business/february_2010/americans_reject_keynesian_economics

February 5, 2010 12:00 P.M.

Two Cheers for the Maine Ladies
Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe poke President Obama’s “blind spot” on terrorism.

When Obamacare sailed into rough waters near Christmas, most Republicans jumped ship. But two GOP senators, Maine’s Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, clung to the battered vessel right until Ben Nelson cut the rope.

 

This week, the Maine ladies redeemed themselves with their handling of the Republican riposte to President Obama’s foundering anti-terror policy. It was a welcome surprise. As northeast moderates, Snowe and Collins could have easily continued to glide through Senate life, secure in their belief that the GOP is lucky to have them on its side. Yet, refreshingly, in both tone and substance, they snapped this week — irking everyone from Robert Gibbs and Eric Holder to Rachel Maddow and the Huffington Post — coming down hard on the Obama administration’s handling of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the failed Christmas bomber.

Maybe, after months of patiently listening to a logorrheic swirl of health-care arguments from liberals, Collins and Snowe have had enough of Team Obama’s talk-talk ways. Maybe the success of their new Senate neighbor, Scott Brown, shook them awake. Whatever the reason, the duo showed real verve in taking a scalpel to the administration’s excuses and the incoherent bureaucracy otherwise known as our national-security apparatus.

http://article.nationalreview.com/424083/two-cheers-for-the-maine-ladies/robert-costa

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) on Thursday placed a blanket hold on all of President Barack Obama's nominees before the Senate, according to the office of Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Shelby's holds mean that the Senate cannot vote on a nominee unless the hold is broken using a cloture vote that requires 60 senators or if the senator lifts the hold.

A spokeswoman for Reid's (D-Nev.) office said that regardless of his concern, Shelby should not put a hold on more than 70 nominees over a parochial issue.

But Shelby's spokesman only said that the holds have been placed on "several pending nominees."

Shelby applied the holds because of a dispute over a contract to build Air Force refueling tankers. The original deal was awarded to Northrop Grumman, which would have constructed the planes in Mobile, Ala.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/79923-reports-shelby-places-blanket-hold-on-obama-nominees

Sarko goes negative

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who sought during the 2008 presidential campaign to associate himself with Barack Obama, has become sharply critical of the American president, often comparing Obama unfavorably to himself, according to an article published this week in the authoritative French daily Le Monde.

The article quotes Sarkozy twice recently criticizing Obama in public, and says he's twice gone on the record criticizing Obama in recent weeks. Asked last Monday in a television interview of his sweeping attempt to reform several sectors of French government simultaneously, Sarkozy pointed to Obama's made health care reform his sole focus.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0210/Sarko_goes_negative.html?showall