A Divided Country Under Incompetent Leadership

It truly baffles me that there are millions of Americans who seem to live in an alternative information universe. They voted for Trump, somehow convinced beyond all human understanding he would make a good president. If you read their comments on Facebook and other sites, they believe Obama was a horrible president who did nothing for eight years. They believe the lies of Trump’s surrogates without requiring any facts or verification.

Of course, racism, misogyny, ignorance, etc., all play a part in this, but I am still stunned that people who live in my country, live in my city and neighborhood, can be convinced that Santa and the Easter Bunny are real and the earth is only six thousand years old.

How is it that as a country, we voted for Obama twice, and then turned around and handed the presidency to an imbecile like Trump? Can a country be schizophrenic? There certainly is no national consensus on what the “common good” is or how to interpret the Constitution, so how can we possibly mover forward with any kind of national agenda? Millions of Americans can’t even agree on the most basic facts and because of that, Donald Trump sits in the White House.

A big part of the blame has to go to the growth of the conservative media over the last 35 years. FOX News, conservative radio loudmouths like Limbaugh and Imus, and online whack jobs Brietbart, Alex Jones and Matt Drudge, among many others, provide safe places for bigots and religious fanatics, confirming their worst fears and stoking their anger. And the mainstream media must also share blame for failing to challenge the status quo in its thirst for profits and audience share.

How is it possible to change minds when the two sides cannot agree on what is a fact and what isn’t? Our divisiveness is destroying this nation, just as it almost did when Abraham Lincoln was president. Unfortunately for all of us, we don’t have a Lincoln at the helm of state, but a self-centered, mentally ill man/child. The odds of unification in this day and age are not good.

I say Goodbye To Obama With Mixed Emotions

President Barack Obama has given his farewell address to the nation after eight years at America’s helm. As I’ve said in the past, I truly like Obama as a person and there is no other living President that I’d rather have a beer with than Barack. He is intelligent, articulate, compassionate and has a great sense of humor. And I stand in awe of his family and his relationship with Michelle, which has been so loving and true through very difficult times as they endured years of vilification and racist attacks from hateful conservatives.

All of that said, my assessment of Obama’s tenure as POTUS is mixed, and I cringe when I hear supporters trying to elevate his status to one of America’s greatest leaders. The highest praise I have for Obama is that he had the strength to accomplish what he did in office in the face of a hostile, obstructionist Republican congress. Getting the Affordable Care Act passed, his success in keeping the economy growing consistently, his dedication to dealing with climate change and his positive steps toward normalizing relations with Cuba are wonderful accomplishments, especially when you consider the ceaseless opposition of Obama-deranged congress-people.

The biggest disappointment I’ve experienced with Obama revolves around his early promise of “change.” When Barack first campaigned for the presidency in 2007-08, his rallying cry was “change,” and many of his speeches reminded us of the myriad failures of the two-term Bush administration, from 9/11 to the invasion of Iraq to an economy in the tank. Myself and other progressives were inspired by this rhetoric, believing that the Senator from Illinois meant that he was going change course from the horrid policies of George Bush and take us in a new direction. Unfortunately, this did not happen in some very important areas.

The undemocratic, unconstitutional security state set up by the Bush administration after 9/11 remains intact under Obama. The Patriot Act, Homeland Security and other excuses for invading privacy in the name of fighting terrorism continue to hum along undeterred despite the revelations of criminality and overreach by Edward Snowden. And it is reprehensible that the Obama administration has cared far more about intelligence leaks and how to stop them than it has about the intelligence abuses revealed by the leaks. The drone program was expanded under Obama and he has authorized more secret military operations in countries around the globe than any of his predecessors.

While his rhetoric makes him sound like one of the common folk, his actions have often been aligned with the interests of corporate America over what’s best for the rest of us. Despite the devastating effects of the 2007-08 financial crisis on this country’s economy, Obama’s corporate friendly administration refused to bring criminal bankers to justice, and he failed to support any substantive measures to rein in Wall Street. And his support of the horrid Trans-Pacific Partnership has been inexcusable. This secretive multinational agreement is a disaster for the environment and workers, allowing corporations to put profits above all else.

There is more — the Obama administration’s lackluster response to the failed war on drugs, allowing hundreds of thousands of prisoners to rot in jails for non-violent drug-related offenses, his wrong-headed, weak-kneed support of public education, his deportation of more immigrants than any president in history — and it doesn’t paint a picture of the progressive reformer many of us had hoped for.

The question is whether Obama was a good guy who was simply overwhelmed by the entrenched Washington elites or that there is a darker side to the man than his public personae lets on. I want to believe it’s the former, but either way, this is not a president who I would rank among America’s greatest.

Obama, Sanders and the Shadow Government

I just watched an interesting interview of NSA whistleblower Russ Tice. His name is not well known, but he was one of the very first whistleblowers to reveal that the NSA was illegally spying on everyone, including politicians, media outlets and private citizens. He brought this to the public’s attention back in 2005, but was literally ignored by everyone because he had no verification of his allegations. It was only after Snowden’s documented revelations about the NSA that Tice’s claims were substantiated.

Now one of the most interesting parts of the interview was when Tice said that the NSA had been tracking and watching Barack Obama since as far back as 2004, before he took office as a senator from Illinois. He had given a powerful speech at the Democratic National Convention, and this was apparently the incident that caught the eye of the NSA.

To me, this information is a very important piece of the puzzle that is Barack Obama. Why has so little been done to rein in the illegal and unconstitutional activities of the American Surveillance State? Why have the President and Congress failed to take any meaningful measures to assure our privacy, but have instead defended the NSA and CIA at every opportunity? Why did Obama campaign so passionately about change, but then leave in place almost every security measure Bush and Cheney created?

To me, the answer becomes more and more apparent. Our spy agencies know everything there is to know about Obama, his administration and members of Congress. You pick a fight with the spy masters at your peril, because if you do, you might find your past indiscretions suddenly becoming media headlines if you’re lucky, and if you’re not, you may end up having an unfortunate car or plane accident.

There is a shadow government in America, and it is run by unelected officials at the highest levels of the security, military and industrial complex. They set policies and priorities and they tell Congress and the President what to do. I have been hard on Obama over the years, but I also understand that there have probably been many things that he wanted to do, but was prevented from doing them by his secret overlords. 

The criminal Bush family and Dick Cheney helped create this nightmare scenario, and now it controls everyone who comes into contact with it. My greatest fear right now is for Bernie Sanders. He is the one candidate that is actually a threat to the shadow government, and I worry because I am certain they will never let him enter the White House. It will all go away if he loses the primary to Hillary, but should he win the Democratic nomination, the Eye of Sauron will quickly be focused on him and every effort will be made to stop him from becoming President.

More Facts to Shut Up Your Ignorant Uncle Al This Holiday Season

In a recent poll of historians, 61% agreed that George W. Bush was the worst President the United States has ever had. So as you try to enjoy your eggnog at the Christmas family gathering, but a drunk Uncle Al starts yapping about how bad a President Obama is, use your phone to pull up this handy chart, and tell Uncle Al to shut his pie hole. You're welcome.

It’s Hard to Believe, But America is Using Drones to Perpetuate the War on Terror

In the concluding paragraph of an excellent piece in Counterpunch titled, “Reaper Madness: Obama’s Whack-A-Mole Killing Machine,” Doug Noble writes,

“What I’ve tried to show here is something more:  that these military miscreants have also known all along that their drone technology and targeting strategy are militarily bankrupt. They could not but be aware from military history and doctrine that these approaches have absolutely no possibility of defeating terrorist groups or keeping America safe. They must know that in fact the opposite is true, that their nefarious enterprise only further endangers us all. And yet they will continue ever more brazenly their Reaper madness, the scholars here all agree, until we find some way to stop them.”

This begs the question: Why, if the military knows drone strikes are counterproductive, de we keep using drones? I believe there’s only one plausible answer. America must have an enemy. In order to sustain our bloated, massively expensive military/industrial/media complex, we must have an evil “other” to do battle with, to justify the obscene amounts of taxpayer dollars being sucked into the black hole of “national security.”

The end of the Cold War and the communist empire ushered in a vacuum that was quickly filled with a new enemy, international terrorism. The 1990s saw the rise of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, organizations the U.S. helped create and arm, but it wasn’t until the new Pearl Harbor of 9/11 that the war on terror shifted into high gear.

From the American perspective, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were just what the military ordered, but after well over a decade of fighting, it became obvious to even the most hawkish cheerleaders (except Dick Cheney) that the wars were a debacle that did far more harm than good. But we couldn’t just pick up our marbles and go home without somehow continuing the war on terrorists and unfriendly regimes in the region, so we sent in the drones.

Although many experts outside of Washington D.C. agree that the use of drones is ineffective and even counterproductive, Obama is enlarging the program, which for me, means that by the government’s reasoning, that’s exactly the point. Killing civilians means keeping the populace stirred up and angry at America which means more terrorists that we need to fight and the cycle continues ad nauseam. As horrible as it sounds, what other explanation can there be? 

The war on terror is a self-perpetuating farce designed to focus Americans away from the issues we face at home and keep the military/industrial/media complex fat and well-funded.

Crazy, Creepy Cruz Wants to Arrest Obama

We certainly have to present Ted Cruz the “Republican-Presidential-Candidates-Saying-Stupid-Shit” award for this week.  Speaking to an equally vile crowd of cretins at something called the Values Voter Summit this morning, Cruz said Obama was “The world’s most powerful communist,” and called for the President’s arrest. And he didn’t stop there. He said that if he were elected President, he would tear the Iran Nuclear deal to shreds and would consider assassinating Iran’s leading ayatollah. And, of course, he got standing ovations.

Anyone who thinks Ted Cruz is presidential material (or any of the Republicans running for office) needs to be given a lobotomy and a box of crayons. They should under no circumstances be allowed to vote. They are not capable of reasoning or thinking rationally and are a true threat to what’s left of our democracy. Cruz is a crazy Christian tool of the elites who wants to help turn this country into Mordor for his masters’ sick enjoyment.

Where’s the mainstream media’s outrage at such traitorous talk? If the media is as liberal as people like Cruz claim it is, where’s the blistering take down of his mind-numbing stupidity? In reality, the media loves the traveling circus of Republican presidential candidates. Public figures making idiotic statements apparently has huge entertainment value in America, and the Republicans never disappoint.

Creepy Cruz is an ugly, hateful piece of work who apparently feels that the citizens of this country hate democracy and the Constitution as much as he does. The irony is that he yearns for the same type of theocracy that exists in Iran, where religious dogma overrules reason and freedom.

The FISA Court Revives the All-Seeing Eye

As if anyone needed any additional evidence that America is no longer a democracy, and no one really should, the FISA court, with the support of Obama, just gave the NSA authority to crank back up its massive surveillance program that the 2^nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled, and Congress agreed, was illegal.

How can an administration simply reject the court’s ruling and the will of Congress? Because there’s no one to stop it. Not the law, not the other branches of government, not the American people. Bush and Cheney built a monster after 9/11 that rules with Sauron like powers from Ft. Mordor, Maryland. For reasons that we can only guess at, Obama has bent over backwards to give the NSA what it wants — access to everyone and everything.

In some areas, such as healthcare and civil rights, Obama has pushed America forward despite massive resistance, but when it comes to the post-9/11 surveillance state, he has been a public and private cheerleader of the Orwellian overreach of our government spies. How can anyone take Obama seriously when he talks about the rule of law or what an example American democracy is to the rest of the world? He’s willing, even eager, to give our spooks carte blanche when it comes to invading our Constitutional rights to privacy.

And the future looks no brighter. If anyone, Republican or Democrat, other than Bernie Sanders wins the White House, and he’s a very, very long shot, the surveillance state will continue humming along, collecting data on you, me and everyone else on the planet.  September 11, 2001 will be remembered for many things, not the least of which is the creation of an all-seeing monster with the ability to reach into everyone’s private lives, and no brave Frodo to stop it.

Fantastic Friday

Yeah, Friday was fantastic. The same Supreme Court that crowned George Bush President in 2000 and declared corporations were people came through in a very big way on Friday.  In one day, this Court with a conservative majority declared same-sex marriage legal in all states, knocked down another challenge to the Affordable Care Act and helped strengthen fair housing discrimination protections. It’s like the Mississippi River changed course for a day. Unbelievable.

Of course, the heads of Scalia, Thomas and everyone at FOX News are still exploding and it’s a beautiful sight to see. After fifteen years of Bush and Bush’s legacy under Obama, those of us on the Left finally have something to cheer about.  And on top of everything else, Bernie Sanders is proving to be a viable candidate for President.

We have to savor the taste of victory while we can, because the Supreme Court still has a conservative majority, Obama is getting his way on TPP and we are still following a failed Middle East policy. But for a day or two, we can cheer our successes and thank all of those Americans who actively pushed, agitated and demonstrated for these major steps forward.

The Tea Party is a corporate scam, but members won’t care

No surprise here. A study funded by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institute of Health provides conclusive evidence that the founding of the Tea Party was not a grassroots effort by tax protestors and small government conservatives, but an organization formed and funded by groups with ties to the tobacco industry and the billionaire Koch brothers.

Liberals and Progressives have long asserted that the Tea Party was an AstroTurf movement created to push a corporate-friendly agenda, and now we know that is the case. And the effort has been extremely successful. Since its inception in 2002, the Tea Party has successfully pushed Republican candidates farther and farther to the right, confused the public on climate change, muscled its way into state legislatures to promote its agenda, and all but abolished bipartisanship in Washington, D.C.

You might think that rank and file members of the Tea Party would be a bit miffed to learn they belonged to an organization created by billionaires to advance a corporate agenda, but I doubt that will be the case. First of all, if you are a member of the Tea Party, you’re not too bright to begin with and are probably used to being taken advantage of by those smarter than you. Second, you’ve convinced yourself that it doesn’t matter, because, hey, maybe someday you’ll be a billionaire too. Or finally, you’ve been brainwashed into believing that what’s good for RJ Reynolds and the Koch brothers is good for America.

Interestingly, the Tea Party would probably not have grown into the political powerhouse it is today if anyone other than Obama was President. Because he’s black, smart and the boss of everybody, he has become an icon representing everything Tea Partier’s despise about America in 2015, and he has served to bring racist whites together in common cause and shared hatred.

Money can’t buy love, but it can buy hundreds of thousands of gullible citizens willing to crusade for America’s beleaguered billionaires.

Another Bush legacy: Endless war

Since 9/11 and the freakout of the Bush administration, the President has been granted far more powers than he previously had to wage war through a variety of Authorizations to Use Military Force (AUMF) passed by Congress over the years. Obama is introducing a new AUMF that, as an article in today’s Salon points out, is problematic, but whether it passes or not, “…we still end up with claims to fairly unlimited Presidential authority to wage war.”

Fourteen years after the attack on the World Trade Center, we find ourselves embroiled in an endless war with an elusive enemy that is not bound by geography. When I say endless, I mean exactly that. Every bomb that falls from a drone or bullet fired by a rifle breeds a new radical willing to pick up the cause for which his comrade died.

A state legislature from Arkansas has offered a brilliant solution: Nuke ‘em. That’s right. He thinks we can end this fight quickly with a few well-place nukes in the Mideast. This is the kind of lunacy frustration breeds. We will never defeat terrorism with violence. It only breeds more. However the great American war machine must be fed, and we can’t just leave all of that oil in the hands of our enemies.

The AUMF is yet one more indication of how off kilter our system of checks and balances has become. We have a completely incompetent Congress, an activist judiciary at the beck and call of this country’s elites, and an executive branch that believes it has the authority to take America to war anytime anywhere for any reason it chooses.

Thank you, George Bush and Dick Cheney, for all that you’ve done for your country.

We tortured some folks

“We tortured some folks.” This was Obama’s glib, tone-deaf response at a news conference held this past summer related to the Senate’s report on the CIA treatment of detainees. He did follow that up by saying, “We did some things contrary to our values,” but the general tone of his remarks was to excuse some overzealous behavior in the aftermath of 9/11 because we weren’t in their shoes.

As we await the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation of the Bush-era interrogation tactics, which could come today, it’s time to reflect on just how “contrary to our values” torture is. It’s one of the benchmarks we have historically used when characterizing the worst regimes on the planet. It’s universally condemned in the developed world. The United States signed the United Nations Convention Against Torture treaty in 1988. And finally, experts in the area of interrogation methods have been telling us for years that torture simply doesn’t work. Victims will tell interrogators anything to make it stop.

So with the release of the Senate’s report, our hypocrisy and lawlessness will be laid bare for the world to see. The question is, will those responsible for acts violating international law be held accountable? Will Bush and Cheney and others who authorized the use of torture pay any price for their actions? Unfortunately, I highly doubt it. As much as I would like to see Dick Cheney led out of a courtroom in shackles, all indications are that they will be spared any punishment. “Mistakes were made,” Obama will say, “but let’s not dwell on the past."

We used to hold ourselves up as an example of a country that lived by the rule of law, but since 9/11, we have descended into a rogue state that feels it can write its own rules as it goes, both here at home and abroad.

A Dismal Performance by Democrats

This is a continuation of my post-mortem of the 2014 mid-term massacre. As a commenter rightly pointed out, the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates bear a large amount of responsibility for Tuesday’s debacle.

Democratic candidates had two simple messages to deliver to voters during the campaign. The first is that, as Paul Krugman has pointed out, Obama has been an effective President on many fronts. The second; if you don’t like the economy, your anger should be directed at the Republican obstructionists in Congress, not the President.

Despite my own feelings about Obama’s performance, as a strategy, Democrats should have trumpeted his successes. Instead they ran away from the president as if he was an Ebola carrier, and we now see how successful that strategy was. Just as a side note, the Republican candidate who ran against Al Franken for a Minnesota senate seat, spent truckloads of money on television ads highlighting Franken’s many votes for Obama’s policies. He lost the race.

The second message should have been a no-brainer. Obstructionist Congressional Republicans are to blame for our current economic situation. Was that so hard? They shut down the government, and held the economy hostage for their own political gain. This message should have been a focal point of all Democratic arguments and been driven into the voter’s minds over and over again. Obviously it wasn’t.

Democrats have learned nothing over the past twenty years. They are still allowing Republicans to dictate the debate and playing by their rules. They seem to have already forgotten that Barack Obama won two presidential campaigns on a relatively liberal platform of hope and change. Despite his subsequent performance, voters are yearning for positive change in Washington, for someone to say, we can do better than this. Whether that’s possible or not is debatable, but Obama’s message of hope and change struck a chord with voters, and Democrats should make note of that in future election and stop wallowing around in the Republican muck.

Anatomy of a deception: How Obama got away with bombing Syria

1. The Obama administration wants to bomb Syria. The American public and general world opinion is heavily against the idea. Congress very skeptical.
2. ISIS threat is scary, but not scary enough. Suddenly, a new super-terrorist organization is identified that makes ISIS look like a Girl Scout troop: Khorasan!
3. Within days, stories start popping up at major news outlets about the danger Khorasan presents to the West. It’s reported that they are operating in…Syria.
4. Tension builds, and CNN breathlessly reports that an “official” claims there is an imminent threat to America from Khorasan. The official says the group is building “improved explosive devices” that are much harder to detect.
5. On September 23, without Congressional or UN approval, Obama claims self-defense and announces air strikes against Syria.
6. Days later, news reports start questioning the Khorasan threat. Further investigation leads to accusations that there isn’t even a group called Khorasan operating in Syria, with some former intelligence agents claiming they’d never heard of the group.
7. Obama administration pats itself on the back.

 

In the crosshairs of the surveillance state

An article in the most recent issue of The Atlantic titled, “Does John Brennan know too much for Obama to fire him?” looks at an issue that I have brought up a number of times before. I think it is very possible that we are in a situation where the CIA, NSA and other spy agencies are allowed to virtually write their own playbook because they have potentially damaging information on top officials in Washington, including Obama.

The author of the article guesses that the information in CIA Director Brennan’s case might be related to illegal drone attacks that violated international law. Very possible, I agree, but it could be any number of things in Obama’s past that Brennan might hang over the President’s head. As I’ve said before, the extortion of those in the executive and legislative branches does not have to be explicit at all. No threats have to be made. You can assume that if you made an embarrassing misstep in your past, the CIA and NSA know about it too.

It will take a future President with a whole lot of courage (if there is such a thing) to truly rein in America’s bloated surveillance state.

Republican hypocrisy and Obama hatred know no bounds

Mass surveillance is illegal and unconstitutional. Period.

There’s an important article today at the Electronic Frontier Foundation that examines the five main arguments made in defense of the NSA mass surveillance by the President and others, with a detailed debunking of each one. What the article makes obvious is that there really is no good argument to justify this type of untargeted mass spying. It exists and it is continuing to be used, but no one has a credible legal justification for the gathering of private communications where no suspicion of wrongdoing exists. Not Obama, not Feinstein, not Clapper. It is illegal and unconstitutional. Period.

There’s a crisis somewhere in the world. Time to attack Obama.

As predictable as a sunrise, Congressional Republicans started harping on Obama the minute Russian troops set foot in Ukraine. “He’s weak.” “It’s time to stand up to Putin.” “Putin is playing chess while Obama is playing marbles.” The partisan criticism is one more blatant display of Obama hate from the low IQ crowd in D.C.

They criticized him for wanting to jump into war in Syria too quickly and again for not wanting to jump into a war with Russia. Their jabs are, of course, more for the media than anything else and are intended for the red meat racists in their home states. I wish we could replay reality, because if we could, you would see Congressional conservatives going negative on Obama no matter what course he chose.

It’s clear with every situation like this that Republicans hate Obama far more than they love America. From Benghazi to Iran to Syria, his conservative detractors have spent considerable time and energy attacking Obama instead of dealing with the pressing issues that are important to the American people.

Obama, the privacy board, and the NSA

According to yesterday’s edition of The Guardian, “The US government’s privacy board has sharply rebuked President Barack Obama over the National Security Agency’s mass collection of American phone data, saying the program defended by Obama last week was illegal and ought to be shut down.”

What is interesting about this is that the White House handpicked the members of the privacy board from the Washington establishment. They couldn’t even stack the deck in their favor on this issue. Of course, the administration immediately issued a response saying that it totally disagreed with the report.

As I’ve noted before, Obama taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago. Unlike the NSA’s supporters in congress, who all have their own agendas, there is no way he doesn’t understand the illegality of warrantless searches. And he also has to be aware that this type of indiscriminate surveillance has been very ineffective. Can he possibly be intellectually convinced that this mass collection of phone data is legal? I find that hard to believe. However, alternative explanations are unsettling. He knows it’s wrong but he’s being pressured to give it his okay. Or he’s being blackmailed.

Could it be possible that the White House chose the members of privacy board knowing what the outcome would be, in order to send a message not to Obama, but to further undermine the NSA? It’s Washington. Anything is possible.

Obama's hypocritical remarks at Mandela tribute

A memorial for Nelson Mandela was held on Tuesday in Johannesburg, South Africa. Dignitaries from around the world came to honor South Africa’s first black president, the man who spent almost three-decades in jail and then helped his country throw off the shackles of apartheid.

During the four-hour service, President Obama gave a speech honoring Mandela. In it, he asked, "With honesty, regardless of our station or our circumstance, we must ask: How well have I applied his lessons in my own life?" 

That’s a good question, Mr. President. If we’re going to be honest, the answer is, not very well.

Would Nelson Mandela approve of drone strikes on foreign soil that kill innocent civilians?

Would he approve of eavesdropping on tens of millions of people who are not suspected of any crime?

Would he have been as eager to start wars with other nations as you were to start a war with Syria?

Would he keep Gitmo open and continue to imprison people not convicted of any crime?

With honesty, I think not.

Leaked audio transcript: President Obama meets with congressional leaders on Syria

September 4, 2013

Oval Office

Cantor: I’m on board with you, Mr. President. Let’s face it, bombing shit is cool.

Obama: Every other president got to bomb something. Bush got to start a couple of wars. I want to bomb something. Okay?

Pelosi: We want video.

Obama: Are you kidding? We’ll have camera’s all over that shit.

Clyburn: What about civilians? These targets are in highly populated areas of Damascus.

Obama: Jimmy, come on, man. Bring it down a notch. There’ll be a few casualties, but it’s all for the bigger good. Right?

Boehner: Can we get one of those cool “situation room” photos with us watching the whole thing go down live?

Obama: Hell yeah. Just don’t start crying, John. [laughs]

Clyburn: But Sir, the American people are not behind this. Shouldn’t we listen to our citizens?

[Silence for several seconds and then uproarious laughter.]

Obama: That’s good. Whoa. Someone get Jimmy a drink. I didn’t know you were such a funny guy. Let’s go golfing one of these days.

McCarthy: Speaking of golf, I’ve got a tee time in 45 minutes. We about done here?

Obama: We all on the same page? Jimbo? Good. Okay. Peace out.