Barack Obama went out on his scare people into supporting the “stimulus” package tour and the questions asked of him were about his nominees who were tax challenged. Obama responded to questions about his nominees who failed to pay their taxes by saying they had made “honest mistakes.”

Obama then went on to say they did not want to give the impression that there were “‘two sets of rules’—one for his administration, and one for everyone else.” Brietbart

All but one of his challenged choices have withdrawn. Timothy Geithner was confirmed to run the Treasury even though he failed to pay tens of thousands of dollars in taxes. Sure he paid them but only after he was nominated. Yes, there are two standards. Geithner KNEW he had to pay the taxes because he signed a document stating he understood that when he received money to pay them. He deliberately did not pay his taxes and he was confirmed. Joe the Plumber was delinquent by a fraction of the amount of Geithner and he was attacked by the left and its media wing. Joe was held to a different standard than Geithner.

Obama’s claim to have the highest standards is a farce. This claim is made all the time after some official writes strong rules. The reality is, there are already standards that government employees are held to and they are pretty tough ones. The regular employees must follow them or they get fired. The elected people are held to that “other” standard.

Let me be clear, writing rules on a piece of paper only means that there are tough standards written down. Failure to follow them means that the administration does not adhere to the tough standards. Obama has already granted waivers for some of his appointees because they could not meet the written standards. Obama has broken his own rules on at least 14 occasions by letting lobbyists serve in his administration.

He can talk the talk but he cannot walk the walk.

Obama said that these were honest mistakes though Geithner’s was anything but and it is unlikely that Daschle’s was either. When Democrats are caught doing something wrong they made an honest mistake. If a Republican does something wrong then it was deliberate and part of a culture of corruption.

Case in point, the War on Terror in Iraq. Nearly every credible intelligence agency in the world agreed with the assessment about WMD in Iraq. Our intelligence agencies gave the same report. George Bush presented it and used it as part of the justification to invade Iraq (only 3 or 4 reasons dealt with WMD).

The left, to this day, says that George Bush lied about Iraq. Never once did any of them entertain the idea that maybe mistakes were made. No, Bush lied and people died. That was the mantra then and it is the mantra now. He is a Republican so he MUST have lied. He and all the intelligence agencies could not possibly have made a mistake so they must have been lying.

Geithner and Daschle, paragons of virtue, well they just made honest mistakes.

Funny thing is Obama remained loyal to Daschle even though he was aware of the tax problems a fortnight before it was made public. Obama was with Daschle up to the bitter end and still pledged support for him even after he withdrew.

When George Bush was loyal he was playing ole boy politics.

Good job Brownie.

Good job Daschie.

No difference at all.

Change indeed.

The report is out and the intelligence community has weighed in on Iran and it has determined that Iran has no nukes and that while they might acquire the capability to build them, they are not yet at that state. Basically, according to the intelligence community, Iran does not pose a threat. Never mind the fact that this is the same intelligence community that said Iran was working on nukes and never mind the fact that Israel has a vastly different opinion. We should also ignore the fact that Iran stopped working on its nuclear program and then started back up without anyone knowing and that they deliberately took actions to keep from being detected. We should also forget that the people telling us Iran is not a threat is the same community that missed 9/11 completely.

I think we should just leave them alone and let them do whatever they want because if we try to stop them now then everyone and their brother will scream that they had no nukes or no WMD. We will be looked at as aggressors rather than the liberators that we have been throughout history. People have used the “we found no WMD” mantra to question the validity of the war in Iraq despite the fact that WMD constituted a very small portion of the resolution for going in there and people seem to forget that Hussein actually used WMD on his enemies as well as his own people. Iran has shown that it cannot be trusted but that should really be none of our business. No matter what they build it is unlikely it can reach the US or that they can get it here so we should be safe.

Let the Russians and the Europeans worry about the fallout from a nuclear blast, should Iran develop a nuke. If they never develop one then it was prudent not to go after them and if they do build one then those who said they would were right and those affected can pay the consequences for not listening. However, any person (or nation) who opposes interfering with Iran and its nuclear ambitions now will have no right to blame their development of nuclear weapons on George Bush. Any member of the US Congress that does should be immediately taken to Gitmo and left there until they die. Any nation that has the audacity to blame it on him should be cut off from the world. This scenario is not beyond belief. Bill Clinton gave nuclear technology to the North Koreans and then Bush was blamed for “taking his eye off them” when they ended up testing a nuclear device.

I say the hell with Iran and let’s just ignore them. We will have proof of their nuclear ambitions when they announce they have the weapon (they wouldn’t lie, now would they) or when they launch one. In any event, we will then have the provocation we need to send about a hundred thousand Tomahawks toward their country and wipe that miserable place off the map. I bet then the naysayers will want action.

Of course, this all assumes that Israel is going to play the wussy games that the US is playing and sit idly by while Iran develops a weapon that will be used to destroy that country. If Israel gets fed up Iran might not exist too much longer.

Tough sanctions are needed right now and without them the world will be getting what it asked for. We need members of the UN Security Council to sanction Iran and we need the damned Russians and Chinese to get on board with the program instead of selling the Iranians what they need to make war.

I believe we should try diplomacy first but sine the diplomats are cowards and will not go practice diplomacy we are left with few choices should things get dicey.

The old Goodwrench commercial used to say; “You can pay me now or you can pay me later.” If we don’t do something now (like sanction Iran) then someone will pay for it later. It will be harder, of course, because Iran looks at the latest intelligence report as a declaration of surrender.

The only way to deal with Muslims is to be tough and to never back down. Thanks to the spineless people in our intelligence community and the greedy rulers of Russia and China, we will have a tougher road to travel from this point forward.