Is Obama correct to think that Republicans don’t know what to cut?

From David Freddoso, in the Washington Examiner.(H/T Nice Deb)

Excerpt:

He finished speaking in Cleveland by urging his audience to “choose the future over the past.” A good thing — we should move on to 2011 instead of repeating the year 2009. Anyway, here were his “they-have-no-ideas” remarks, in part:

Just this year, these same Republicans voted against a bipartisan fiscal commission that they themselves proposed.  And when you ask them what programs they’d actually cut, they usually don’t have an answer.

House Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., replies:

“President Obama must have misspoken today, because I have personally sat across the table from him and suggested specific ways to cut spending. Furthermore, House Republican Leader John Boehner and I urged President Obama to work with Republicans to cut spending by using his authority to send Congress a “rescissions” package.  In fact, we sent President Obama a letter twice pledging to work together with him on that effort. We still have not heard back – seven months later. It doesn’t end there, through the YouCut program House Republicans have offered over $120 billion in spending cuts, only to be voted down by Democrats in the House. Finally, House Republicans Jeb Hensarling and Paul Ryan have introduced a “Cut Spending Now” package of specific cuts that would save taxpayers $1.3 trillion.

“President Obama is entitled to his opinion, but he’s not entitled to his own facts, and with that in mind I am asking him to either clarify or withdraw the accusation that he made earlier today.”

If you want to cut spending, you vote for Republicans. If you want 3 trillion in deficits over two years, vote Democrat.

Christians stabbed and beaten in Muslim-dominated Indonesia

Story here on Fox News. (H/T Drudge Report)

Excerpt:

Assailants stabbed a Christian worshipper in the stomach and pounded a minister in the head with a wooden plank as they headed to morning prayers Sunday outside Indonesia’s capital.

Neither of the injuries appeared to be life-threatening.

No one claimed responsibility for the attacks. But suspicion immediately fell on Islamic hard-liners who have repeatedly warned members of the Batak Christian Protestant Church against worshipping on a field housing their now-shuttered church.

In recent months, they have thrown shoes and water bottles at the church members, interrupted sermons with chants of “Infidels!” and “Leave Now!” and dumped piles of feces on the land.

Local police Chief Imam Sugianto said Asia Sihombing, a worshipper, was on his way to the field when assailants jumped off a motorcycle and stabbed him in the stomach.

The Rev. Luspida Simanjuntak was smashed in the head as she tried to come to his aid.

“I was trying to help get him onto a motorcycle so we could get him to a hospital,” she told reporters in the industrial city of Bekasi, 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Jakarta.

[…]Leading the charge against the Batak Christians has been the Islamic Defenders Front, which is pushing for the implementation of Islamic-based laws in Bekasi and other parts of the nation.

They are known for smashing bars, attacking transvestites and going after those considered blasphemous with bamboo clubs and stones. They also pressured the local government early this year to shutter the Batak church.

Perpetrators are rarely punished or even questioned by police.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who relies heavily on Islamic parties in parliament, has been widely criticized in the media for failing to crack down on hard-liners.

I presented this story to Mr. Atheist-Man-In-The-Street, and he growled, “Mr. Atheist-Man-In-The-Street don’t stick his neck out for nobody! You hear me, morality-boy? Nooooo-body!”.

US poverty rate rises record amount under Obama’s leadership

Story here from the NY Daily News. (H/T Wes Widner)

Excerpt:

The U.S. poverty rate has skyrocketed by a record amount under the Obama administration, with one out of seven Americans considered poor last year, according to a report Saturday.

The disturbing trend is an estimate of 2009 census data set for release on Thursday, The Associated Press reported.

Underscoring the depth of the recession, a projected 45 million people – or about 15% of the population – were poor last year. In 2008, 13.2% of the country lived in poverty.

The estimated 1.8 percentage-point increase in 2009 is the largest year-to-year uptick since the U.S. started calculating poverty figures in 1959. The previous high came during the 1980 national energy crisis, when the rate soared 1.3 percentage points to 13%.

More from Fox News.  (H/T Dad)

Excerpt:

Demographers also are confident the report will show:

  • Child poverty increased from 19 percent to more than 20 percent.
  • Blacks and Latinos were disproportionately hit, based on their higher rates of unemployment.
  • Metropolitan areas that posted the largest gains in poverty included Modesto, Calif.; Detroit; Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla.; Los Angeles and Las Vegas.

Numbers don’t lie – he’s the worst President ever.