Is anybody at NSA spying on our enemies?

(My new American Thinker post)

I hope that they didn't tell President Obama this one:  

"The National Security Agency spied on the future Pope Francis before and during the Vatican conclave at which he was chosen to succeed Benedict XVI, it was claimed on Wednesday.   
The American spy agency monitored telephone calls made to and from the residence in Rome where the then Archbishop Jorge Mario Bergoglio stayed during the conclave, the secret election at which cardinals chose him as pontiff on March 13.  The claims were made by Panorama, an Italian weekly news magazine, which said that the NSA monitored the telephone calls of many bishops and cardinals at the Vatican in the lead-up to the conclave, which was held amid tight security in the Sistine Chapel.   
The information gleaned was then reportedly divided into four categories -- "leadership intentions", "threats to financial system", "foreign policy objectives" and "human rights".   At that time, Benedict XVI was Pope, suggesting that the Vatican may also have been monitored during the last few weeks of his papacy."

So we were spying on President Pena-Nieto of Mexico before he became president.   And now we were listening to Archbishop Jorge Mario before he became Pope Francis. 

I really don't get this!  Are we doing one leader a day over at NSA?  Are we just checking boxes from A to Z? 

I have a question:  Were they listening to our enemies  - such as Castro in Cuba and Maduro in Venezuela or Morales in Bolivia?  All I hear is that we were spying on our allies.   

Don't get me wrong.  Spying is part of the game and that's OK with me.   

I repeat my question:  Were we listening to our enemies?  I would feel a lot better about the NSA if I hear that they were listening to our enemies as much as friends.    
P. S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.

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President Obama should do a 'Bay of Pigs' on ObamaCare

(My new American Thinker post)

Here is a bit of presidential history that they should review in the White House:

1961-- President Kennedy borrowed a play from the Truman playbook and took responsibility for The Bay of Pigs.

We need something similar from President Obama in a couple of fronts; ObamaCare & the NSA. 

He needs to take the blame for the website and say that spying on Europeans is part of protecting us from people who blow up buildings.

Instead, we are getting "excuses" and 'word games":

1) Valerie Jarret is now "tweeting" and blaming insurance companies for people losing their insurance:  

"FACT: Nothing in #Obamacare forces people out of their health plans. No change is required unless insurance companies change existing plans."

2) Jay Carney painfully admitted that some will lose their insurance. 

3) The NSA people are furious that they are getting thrown under the bus for carrying out orders, according to The LA Times.

Here is the problem.  It makes President Obama look bad to have his staff running around playing word games.

Taking ownership and responsibility won't make "the Captain Renault of Casablanca Europeans" happy or solve all of ObamaCare's problems but it will establish that someone is in charge.

We desperately need to know that someone is in charge. The plane is flying through a nasty storm and some of us don't know if the pilot is in the cockpit or sharing next year's March Madness predictions online. 

P. S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.

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Babalu: “Las monjas se van a enojar con Obama” for spying on Pope Francis

(My new Babalu post)   

I hope that they didn't tell President Obama about this one:

"The National Security Agency spied on the future Pope Francis before and during the Vatican conclave at which he was chosen to succeed Benedict XVI, it was claimed on Wednesday.
The American spy agency monitored telephone calls made to and from the residence in Rome where the then Archbishop Jorge Mario Bergoglio stayed during the conclave, the secret election at which cardinals chose him as pontiff on March 13.
The claims were made by Panorama, an Italian weekly news magazine, which said that the NSA monitored the telephone calls of many bishops and cardinals at the Vatican in the lead-up to the conclave, which was held amid tight security in the Sistine Chapel.
The information gleaned was then reportedly divided into four categories — “leadership intentions”, “threats to financial system”, “foreign policy objectives” and “human rights”.
At that time, Benedict XVI was Pope, suggesting that the Vatican may also have been monitored during the last few weeks of his papacy."  

My guess is that the White House will distance President Obama from this.

It's one thing to get the Germans or the Europeans angry.  It's quite another thing to spy on the Pope before he became Pope.

This is not going to go down well with Catholic nuns!  Watch for the nuns to lineup outside the White House ready to slap President Obama's hands.

Let me tell you something from personal experience.  There is nothing more scary in the planet than an angry nun with a ruler!

P.S. By the way, I miss Alvarez-Guedes on days like this one!  Can you imagine what he would say about the President of the US spying on a bishop waiting to become Pope?

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Babalu: Communist Cuba “no se puede arreglar” and that is why change is near

(My new Babalu post)

It must be tough being Raul Castro these days. He tries this or that but Cuba is still a disaster. He yells at the younger generation but they are not paying attention. He wants people to be more productive but they are not.

Cuba can not be fixed. There is no version of a "Perestroika cubano" around the corner. It won't work in Cuba anymore than it did in the USSR.

It's over in Cuba. We're just waiting for the referee to blow the whistle and say that the game is officially over.      

Carlos Alberto Montaner discussed Cuba's currency problems in his recent article.  He wrote this:

"What can Raúl Castro do to really straighten up Cuba's economy?Unquestionably, he must bury that asinine way to produce and organize society.The system cannot be fixed.Mikhail Gorbachev, who also tried to save communism, ended up admitting that such a goal was impossible, as happened in practically all of eastern Europe.Why doesn't Raúl Castro do this?For three reasons at least, I suppose: for muddled ideological convictions that he has never shaken off; for clinging to power, and - the weightiest - for being emotionally incapable of accepting that he has spent 80 years defending wrong ideas.It must be very hard to admit that the work of one's whole life was a perfect blunder that generated massive damage."

We will continue to watch Cuba and Cubans suffer more and more. There is no happy ending to this tragedy that the Castro brothers started in 1959.

The only good news is that the end is near.  It is a lot closer that you think.

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Obama just got used to saying things that were never challenged

(My new American Thinker post)

President, and before, candidate Obama had the benefit of saying things that the media never challenged.  It's true that they were challenged by the GOP but that is partisan.  What we did not have was an aggressive, but respectful media.   

He was going to close GITMO was one of the early promises.  He even signed an executive order to close it within a year. 

But GITMO is still open and will likely stay open the day that President Obama flies home to Chicago in early 2017. I'm not good at predictions but I can predict today that #45 will inherit GITMO.  

He said that you could keep your own health care plan or doctor.  I'm sure that you've seen all of the "video loops" of President Obama making the statement. It looks like millions won't keep their insurance.  

Where was the media on both of these?  They weren't doing their job.This is why he got away with making these statements.  

On GITMO, no one in the media asked a simple question:  "What are you going to do with the 200-plus people there?  What country is going to take them?  What jail in the US are they going to?"  

On health care, no one forced President Obama to explain how people with individual policies were going to transfer to newly designed requirements such as maternity or mental health coverage.    

I'm not bashing the media, a popular pastime among many conservatives. I'm simply saying that they did not challenge candidate and President Obama.  

To be fair, some in the media are asking questions now.  Perhaps they are finally "out of the tank."    Millions of people getting premium increases will do that to you.   

P. S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.

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Tuesday's show: Military defeats from Napoleon to Hitler to Midway and others

We discussed militray defeats on Tuesday's show with Leslie Eastman and Barry Jacobsen:

TUESDAY: Military history with Leslie Eastman & Barry Jacobsen....... 

Listen in now at http://t.co/24xwflYALe. #BlogTalkRadio
— Silvio Canto, Jr. (@SCantojr) October 30, 2013

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Mexico enforces immigration laws against 'undocumented' Cubans

(My new American Thinker post)

We are not sure if Mexico refers to them as "indocumentados" or "illegales" but they are being detained for walking around without papers, according to The Miami Herald:

"The number of undocumented Cubans intercepted in Mexico on their way to the U.S. border has more than doubled in the eight months since Havana eased its migration controls, according to Mexican government figures. 
The Interior Ministry numbers were the latest indication of the greatly increased flow of Cubans, both undocumented and legal, through Mexico, Central and South America and the Caribbean over the past year. 
Most, if not all of the Cubans, are heading to the United States, where they are protected from deportation to Cuba, can receive benefits as refugees and qualify for permanent U.S. residency after one year and one day. 
Interdictions in Mexico of undocumented Cubans totaled 2,300 from January to August of this year, compared to 994 in the same period in 2012, according to the Interior Ministry. 
The number does not include those who make it to the border undetected by Mexican authorities. That figure has been estimated at well over 13,000 for the 12-month period that ended Sept. 30."

To be fair, I support Mexico here. I understand that Cubans want to leave Cuba but immigration laws have to be respected. Mexico already has a problem with Central Americans who travel north to cross the US-Mexico border. 

Also, don't be surprised if Mexico is doing this with the full consent of the US, i.e. national security concerns.

At the same time, it's hard to read this article and not think about all of the nonsense that we've heard from Mexico about the US securing its border or enforcing immigration laws.   

P. S. We discussed the Cuba-Mexico connection with Orestes Matacena, a Cuban filmmaker who came to the US through Mexico & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.

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Babalu: The problem is that Obama “se ahoga en un vaso de agua”

(My new Babalu post)

"Obama the manager" is suddenly a topic for discussion.  Put me down as one who thinks that President Obama does not like "the managerial duties" of the presidency.  He loves Air Force One, the ceremonial tasks and White House Chef but not the often hard work of governing and dealing with difficult problems.

He is also "in over his head".  In cubano, we say "se ahoga en un vaso de agua".    

My friend Frank Burke described Obama the manager like this:

"In classic management theory, Barack Obama would have to be described as an abdicative manager.

The abdicative manager evidences a tendency to flee from responsibility and is frequently encountered in situations where he or she never wanted the job in the first place (for instance, a son or daughter who inherits a company or the individual who discovers that they are incapable of adequate performance).  Abdication can be exhibited in a variety of ways, ranging from physically removing oneself through travel (the confusion of movement with action), to obsessing about personal interests or a limited range of controllable subjects.
Obama's frequent vacations and absences, especially in times of crisis, coupled with his unwillingness to personally invest himself in key initiatives, are demonstrative of this style.
An excellent example occurred after passage of the healthcare initiative.
Having ceded authority in what would later be described as his key achievement to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, he watched as they forced the bill through under a manufactured emergency that precluded lawmakers from having time to read it.
He then went on a four-day vacation before signing it."

I think that Frank got it right back in 2011!   

Today, Edward Luce added this to the picture of Obama the manager:

"The simple explanation is that Mr Obama’s White House is dominated by a coterie of insiders who have learnt that their boss does not like to hear bad news. Nor are friendly whistleblowers made to feel welcome. Whether on Syria, spying revelations or the White House’s preferred candidate to head the Federal Reserve, the president has been caught off guard by recent crises. "

My concern is that we have a man overwhelmed by events and surrounded by people who won't give him the straight stuff.   The word around this White House is that "the boss" does not like conflict or people telling him that the website won't be operational on time.

My bigger concern is that our enemies are also watching this president incapable of leading or running a minimally competent administration.

The world is watching Obama and that should worry everyone.  We are talking about the president of the US not some leader of a small nation with no leadership role.

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Explosions shake up Mexico

(My new American Thinker post)

We've praised Mexican President Pena-Nieto's efforts to reform PEMEX and the out of control teachers' union. But President Pena-Nieto was reminded this weekend that criminal elements can punch and punch very hard.   

Mexico had a rather violent weekend in Michoacan, ground zero for cartel violence. We posted about Michoacan a few weeks ago.  Most Americans don't know much about Michoacan but it is where the action is in the war south of the border.   

This is from The LA Times:   

"Assailants early Sunday blew up at least nine electrical power plants in one of Mexico's largest states, triggering blackouts that gunmen then used as cover to torch gasoline stations, residents and authorities said.  

The attacks in Michoacan state, west of the capital, did not cause deaths or serious injuries, authorities said.  

But they served as a pointed reminder of the strength of drug gangs and other criminals.   

Shortly after midnight, attackers armed with Molotov cocktails almost simultaneously disabled electrical substations in at least nine cities and towns in Michoacan, plunging an estimated 1 million people into darkness. 

The power was out for 15 hours.  Gunmen then torched four gasoline stations, including two in the state capital of Morelia, a popular tourist destination.   

Michoacan for years has been controlled either by the Knights Templar or its predecessor La Familia, cartels that specialize in methamphetamine exported to the United States and that have controlled many city halls and police departments.  

More recently, groups of citizens have taken up weapons to form self-defense squads against the traffickers.   

It may have been one of these groups that briefly seized the city hall in the large town of Apatzingan, residents said.   

Federal authorities said they were sending hundreds of police and military troops to reinforce security in the region. The attacks came barely two days after the state's governor, Fausto Vallejo, resumed duties after a long illness.   

"The only thing we can conclude ... is that the organized criminals are winning the battle against federal and state authorities," Miguel Angel Chavez, head of the opposition National Action Party, told the Quadratin news agency, adding that the violence of the last 24 hours was a terrorist attack.   

Organized criminals were suspected of unleashing a series of attacks on government forces in Michoacan in July that resulted in the deaths of 20 criminals and two federal police officers, according to the federal government."   

I checked the Mexican press and found very extensive coverage of the bombs.  

President Pena-Nieto is apparently sending more military forces to tackle the deteriorating situation in Michoacan. 

A friend in Mexico City told me Sunday night that people are very concerned that Michoacan may require a major military intervention.  He told me that Michoacan is a lot worse than Juarez because the gangs are all spread out rather than in one city.    

P. S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantoj

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Read my lips: You can keep your insurance

(My new American Thinker post)

At some point, people will discover two things:   

1) You can not keep your insurance;  and,

2) Your premiums will not be affordable.

So far, it does not look that the Affordable Health Care Act has a lot of affordable features.  The LA Times has a front page story of Californians getting a little bit of "premium shock":

"Thousands of Californians are discovering what Obamacare will cost them -- and many don't like what they see.   

These middle-class consumers are staring at hefty increases on their insurance bills as the overhaul remakes the healthcare market. Their rates are rising in large part to help offset the higher costs of covering sicker, poorer people who have been shut out of the system for years. 

Although recent criticism of the healthcare law has focused on website glitches and early enrollment snags, experts say sharp price increases for individual policies have the greatest potential to erode public support for President Obama's signature legislation."  

The front pages are full of similar stories in other states, like Florida.  

My message to the GOP is simple:  Get busy in a fantasy football league and make lots of trades, look for old high school buddies in Facebook and leave President Obama & Democrats all alone to explain ObamaCare.   

This is a good time for the GOP to go mute and let ObamaCare do all of the talking.   

P. S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.

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The Spanish language version of healthcare.gov has a bad case of 'no se puede"!

(My new American Thinker post)

President Obama told us that the ObamaCare website, and call center, would service 150 languages.

Let's confirm right now that "la version en espanol no sirve."    This is from CBS Philly:

"An indefinite delay of the Spanish language version of the Affordable Care Act website threatens the viability of the program as a whole, according to area experts.  CuidadoSalud.gov was supposed to roll out this month, but although the website exists, the option to enroll electronically doesn't.   

That option does exist on Healthcare.gov, although the system has been plagues with problems."   

ObamaCare will need a lot of young people to sign up to fund the program. Hispanics will be a very big part of that younger population, as my good friend Israel Ortega of The Heritage Foundation reported a few weeks ago:  

"What's more, considering that 65 percent of Hispanics are millennials, they can expect to pay more to cover costs for wealthier Americans. Rates will likely increase by an average of 169 percent for the young, while older people will pay about 22 percent less, according to Generation Opportunity, a national organization committed to promoting liberty to young Americans."  

That does not sound like the 'affordable" insurance that we were promised at the "si se puede" rally!   

We can tell you again that English and Spanish are not working as planned  Wonder how the other 148 language interfaces are doing?

P.S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.


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Are the Obamas this 'tone deaf?'

(My new American Thinker post)

We are very happy that Michelle Obama made a lot of friends in college.  We are also glad that some of her friends are now enjoying successful careers in the private sector.

However, didn't it occur to anybody in The White House that a report like this would raise a few eyebrows?

Let's check this news report:  

"Toni Townes-Whitley, Princeton class of '85, is senior vice president at CGI Federal, which earned the no-bid contract to build the $678 million Obamacare enrollment website at Healthcare.gov. CGI Federal is the U.S. arm of a Canadian company."

Maybe this is just a silly coincidence.  Maybe we wouldn't be talking about it the web site was working perfectly.   However, the web site is a mess and taxpayers paid top dollar to get something done.

The Obama White House has a bad case of "tone deafness"  Or, maybe they just don't think that the media will look into these contractual arrangements.

This smells bad, really bad!

Wonder if anyone in the media will follow up on this connection?  or what about the company's past?  

P. S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.  

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A few lessons for ObamaCare

(My new American Thinker post)

We used to do great things in the US. Families crossed North America on wagons and settled the West.  We fought and won World War II. We put a man on the moon. 

And the government used to build canals, such as The Erie Canal in 1825:

"New York legislators became interested in the possibility of building a canal across New York in the first decade of the 19th century. Shipping goods west from Albany was a costly and tedious affair; there was no railroad yet, and to cover the distance from Buffalo to New York City by stagecoach took two weeks. Governor Clinton enthusiastically took up the proposal to build a canal from Buffalo, on the eastern point of Lake Erie, to Albany, on the upper Hudson, passing through the gap in the mountains in the Mohawk Valley region. By 1817, he had convinced the legislature to authorize the expenditure of $7 million for the construction of a canal that he proposed would be 363 miles long, 40 feet wide, and four feet deep.  

Work began on "Clinton's Ditch" in August 1823. Teams of oxen plowed the ground, but for the most part the work was done by Irish diggers who had to rely on primitive tools. They were paid $10 a month, and barrels of whisky were placed along the canal route as encouragement. West of Troy, 83 canal locks were built to accommodate the 500-foot rise in elevation. After more than two years of digging, the 425-mile Erie Canal was opened on October 26, 1825, by Governor Clinton.  

As Clinton left Buffalo in the Seneca Chief, an ingenious method of communication was used to inform New York City of the historic occasion. Cannons were arranged along the length of the canal and the river, each within hearing distance of the next cannon. As the governor began his trip, the first cannon was fired, signaling the next to fire. Within 81 minutes, the word was relayed to New York--it was the fastest communication the world had ever known. After arriving in New York on September 4, Clinton ceremoniously emptied a barrel of Lake Erie water in the Atlantic Ocean, consummating the "Marriage of the Waters" of the Great Lakes and the Atlantic.  

The effect of the canal was immediate and dramatic. Settlers poured into western New York, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin. Goods were transported at one-tenth the previous fee in less than half the previous time. Barge loads of farm produce and raw materials traveled east as manufactured goods and supplies flowed west. In nine years, tolls had paid back the cost of construction. Later enlarged and deepened, the canal survived competition from the railroads in the latter part of the 19th century.

Today, the Erie Canal is used mostly by pleasure boaters, but it is still capable of accommodating heavy barges."

I am not suggesting that everything was perfect in the past.  At the same time, we used to get things done.  

My guess is these prior success stories had two things that the ObamaCare web site did not have:

1) A clear objective and timetable; and,

2) Someone in charge or accountable, such as the aforementioned Governor Clinton of New York who was committed to getting it done.

The building of The Erie Canal did not suffer from mindless political correctness, either.  We have too much of that PC nonsense too!

P. S. You can hear my chat with George Rodriguez who worked for Secretary Jack Kemp in the Bush administration & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.

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The President has a 'Valerie' problem

(My new American Thinker post)

Maybe President Obama walks around the Oval Office singing the old Monkees' tune: 

"There's a girl I know who makes me feel so good.  And I wouldn't live without her, even if I could.
They call her Valeri. I love her Valeri."

We understand President Obama's desire to have a loyal subordinate, a White Sox fan and someone close to Mrs Obama.  However, it may be time to look for someone who is more qualified and who understands that the federal government is a very complex enterprise and not a one-party town like Chicago.

John Fund has a good post about Lady Valerie:

"Jarrett, an old Chicago friend of both Barack and Michelle Obama, appears to exercise such extraordinary influence she is sometimes quietly referred to as "Rasputin" on Capitol Hill, a reference to the mystical monk who held sway over Russia's Czar Nicholas as he increasingly lost touch with reality during World War I.    

Darrell Delamaide, a columnist for Dow Jones's MarketWatch, says that "what has baffled many observers is how Jarrett, a former cog in the Chicago political machine and a real-estate executive, can exert such influence on policy despite her lack of qualifications in national security, foreign policy, economics, legislation or any of the other myriad specialties the president needs in an adviser."  

Delamaide believes the term "vacuous cipher" that was applied to Jarrett stung so much because it could be used as a metaphor for the administration in general.

He writes that what "has remained consistent about the Obama administration is that vacuity - the slow response in a crisis, the hesitant and contradictory communication, a lack of conviction and engagement amid constant political calculation."

The stunning revelation that President Obama wasn't kept properly apprised of problems with Obamacare's website is just the latest example of how dysfunctional Obama World can be. 

Whether Jarrett's influence is all too real or exaggerated is unknowable. What is known is the extent to which she has long been a peerless enabler of Barack Obama's inflated opinion of himself. "

At the end of the day, President Obama is responsible for his managerial style.  However, a president has to surround himself with very strong people who are competent as well as loyal.

Jarrett may be very loyal and willing to give her life for President Obama.  Unfortunately, President Obama needs a different kind of "gate keeper." 

He needs one who lets "bad news" walk into the Oval Office. 

For example, was Valerie Jarrett aware of that the website was not properly tested?  Or that the problems were a lot deeper than a "glitch" here or there?

Even today, does Valerie Jarrett know the full extent of the mess, as Ezra Klein reported.

Why is President Obama always the last one to know?  My good guess is Valerie.

P. S. You can hear CANTO TALK here & follow me on Twitter @ scantojr.

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Babalu: The ObamaCare roll-out is officially designated “un arroz con mango”

(My new Babalu Blog)

One of my favorite Cuban expressions is "arroz con mango",  or a very sticky or messy situation.  Frankly, everything about "the roll out" has the look of a disaster, or "un arroz con mango" as we say in "cubano".

ObamaCare was destined for disaster because it was never openly discussed in Congress, i.e. no open hearings.

No experts were brought in to argue for this and that.  Instead, it was rushed through Congress and passed in the Senate by offering special arrangements to Senators.

Remember The Louisiana Purchase?  or that special "Cornhusker kickback"?  The Obama administration had to use these tactics to pass the bill.  They passed the bill in the House by 4 or 5 votes despite having a 40-plus majority!

Today, we can tell you that the roll out has been a disaster, from "glitches" to so called "isolated" problems.   

According to insurance industry sources, the problems are not "isolated" at all:  

"An executive of the largest contractor working on the federal health insurance exchange web site told Congress Thursday that problems with erroneous enrollment information being transferred to insurance companies were “isolated” - a claim later echoed by an Obama administration official.   

But insurance industry officials have told the Washington Examiner that this is simply not true. The problems – such as duplicate enrollments being sent from the federal system to insurers, incorrect cancellations, and spouses being mixed up as children – were in fact being widely encountered across the insurance industry."

Furthermore, we hear of a "tech surge", or an additional commitment of technical personnel to make the web site work.  

The jury is still out:  Will the surge work or are we just throwing more money away:  

"President Obama's "tech surge" to turn around the failing HealthCare.gov is running into concerns that the administration could be throwing "good money after bad" while complicating an already complicated situation.  

Tech experts who spoke with FoxNews.com say that, like any good military strategy, this "surge" is not just about the number of soldiers, but how they're used. The administration's plan to enlist a team of experts and specialists from both the private and public sector could be a big waste of money if they aren't used correctly.  

"If you start throwing people in and start having them just fixing bugs it could be a recipe for disaster where you end up with more bugs than when you started," explained James Turner, a member of the technical staff at software company Beeonics and contributing editor at O'Reilly.com."    

Last, but not least, we hear that the website may not be ready until the end of November:  

"The Obama administration said Friday it will take until the end of November for the new federal health insurance Web site to be fully fixed, and that a private contracting firm would be managing the effort."

Let's officially call the ObamaCare rollout one nasty "arroz con mango".

My question is very simple:  Who cooked this "arroz con mango"?

Who is going to be held responsible for this very expensive and embarassing "arroz con mango"?

P.S.   Click here for our discussion with James Yardley, contributor to American Thinker.

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Red State Democrats singing 'There's a tear in my beer'

(My new American Thinker post)

We've posted about Red State Democrats several times.  They are the ones running in places like Arkansas, North Carolina, West Virginia, Alaska and so on.  

It appears that ObamaCare has these Democrats singing Hank Williams tunes like "Lovesick blues" and "Tear in my beer". 

There is a lot of screaming between San Francisco and New York City and it ain't "yes we can":

"After 16 long days of vowing to Republicans that they would not cave in any way, shape or form on ObamaCare, Democrats spent their first post-shutdown week caving in every way, shape and form. With the GOP's antics now over, the only story now is the unrivaled disaster that is the president's health-care law.  

Hundreds of thousands of health-insurance policies canceled. Companies dumping coverage and cutting employees' hours. Premiums skyrocketing. And a website that reprises the experience of a Commodore 64.

As recently as May, Democratic consultants were advising members of Congress that their best ObamaCare strategy for 2014 was to "own" the law. ""     (Kimberly Strassel, WSJ)

Hundreds of thousands of health-insurance policies canceled. Companies dumping coverage and cutting employees' hours. Premiums skyrocketing. And a website that reprises the experience of a Commodore 64.

As recently as May, Democratic consultants were advising members of Congress that their best ObamaCare strategy for 2014 was to "own" the law. ""

Maybe it's "the roll out" or the aforementioned cancellations but ObamaCare has hit the iceberg and lots of Democrats are rushing to the lifeboats.

You can hear CANTO TALK here.

New Politics Podcasts with Silvio Canto Jr on BlogTalkRadio

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Aren't you glad we have a 'smart' foreign policy these days?

(My new American Thinker post)

"And the hits just keep on coming", like DJ Ron Britain used to say on WCFL, the top 40 station that we listened to walking home from school in our days in Wisconsin.

We just learned that the US was listening to telephone conversations from sea to shining sea and beyond, according to news reports;

"German and French accusations that the United States has run spying operations in their countries, including possibly bugging Chancellor Angela Merkel's mobile phone, are likely to dominate a meeting of EU leaders starting on Thursday."

The Europeans are so mad that they may act against the US. Some want to delay the free trade agreement under negotiation. Don't bet on that. 

To be fair, there is a little bit of "shocked Captain Renualt" in these reactions. It's hard to believe that these foreign leaders did not know that we'd be interested in what they did behind the curtains.

President Obama faces a unique satiation in these cases.  He ran for president as "the different man," "the 'change we've been waiting for" and how he was going to work with our allies unlike his predecessor.   In other words, a lot of leaders, and especially their constituents, never expected this Obama.

Are you starting to feel sorry for President Obama?  I am.  This is going to be one "hellish" of a second term!

You can hear CANTO TALK here.

New Politics Podcasts with Silvio Canto Jr on BlogTalkRadio

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Tags: NSA and Europeans  To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the My View by Silvio Canto, Jr. Thanks!