WASHINGTON – The government watchdog overseeing economic stimulus spending said Thursday that, in its rush to take credit for saving hundreds of thousands of jobs, the Obama administration was overly confident in its job-counting and did not acknowledge significant errors in the figures.

Numbers released last month identified more than 640,000 jobs linked to stimulus projects around the country. Despite warning signs that the numbers were flawed, the White House said the public could have confidence in them and they proved the administration was on track save or create 3.5 million jobs by the end of next year.

Since then, tens of thousands of problems have been documented, from the substantive to the clerical. Republicans have been able to use those flaws to attack what so far is the signature domestic policy of Obama’s presidency.

The criticism has resonated, even though economic data shows that overall government efforts, from President George W. Bush’s bank bailout to President Barak Obama’s stimulus, have improved the economy. Fewer than 1 in 10 Americans think the stimulus has created any jobs so far, according to a CBS News poll this week.

Earl Devaney, the watchdog whose group compiled and released the job data, said he could not certify the numbers were correct. Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., asked whether the administration should have been more conservative and acknowledged it had “no idea” whether the jobs were being counted correctly.

“Wouldn’t that be a fairer way to put it?” Issa said.

“I like that statement,” DeSeve replied.

The White House said Thursday that it had been up front about the errors. Spokeswoman Elizabeth Oxhorn noted that, on the day the figures were released, Vice President Joe Biden said, “This is an unprecedented undertaking. And we know – we know that it’s not 100 percent accurate.”

The Obama administration has expressed varying degrees of confidence in the numbers, depending on who was talking and when:

-Sept. 23, White House communications director Anita Dunn: “It is not going to be a perfect process here at the beginning.”
-Oct. 29, White House press release: “These reports have been reviewed for weeks, errors have been spotted and corrected, and additional layers of review by state and local governments have further improved the data quality.”

-Oct. 30, Biden, in a White House press release: “These reports are strong confirmation that the Recovery Act is responsible for over one million jobs so far.”

-Oct. 30, White House economic adviser Jared Bernstein, in a report: “Focusing on (mistakes in the reports) risks obscuring a key point: Real-time reporting about job creation, with reports coming from thousands of projects all across the country, has never even been attempted before.”

-Oct. 31, Obama: “It is clear that the recovery act has now created and saved more than a million jobs.”

-Nov. 1, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, when asked by NBC News whether the 640,000 figure was fact or spin: “This is a fact.”

-Nov. 6, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, in remarks to the Chamber of Commerce: “We know for a fact that Recovery Act investments have created or saved more than 640,000 direct jobs so far. These are real, identifiable jobs directly funded by the Act.”

-Thursday, Oxhorn, in a statement: “We have been clear from the beginning that the data would not be 100 percent perfect, but would provide a meaningful indication of Recovery Act job impact.”

STONEVILLE, N.C.  – A North Carolina man has pleaded guilty to saying he was going to assassinate President Barack Obama.

The Rockingham County sheriff’s office says Steve Lee Stone pleaded to charges Wednesday of communicating threats, resisting a public officer and misusing the 911 system. He was sentenced to two 45-day jail terms, which were suspended, and 18 months probation.

Police say the 44-year-old man called a 911 dispatcher twice from his trailer about five miles south of the Virginia border in late July and said he was going to assassinate the president. He did not identify himself.

Sheriff’s deputies and a Secret Service agent investigated the caller’s identity. Stone was interviewed by deputies at his trailer in Stoneville.

Deputies say Stone became combative during the interview and they were forced to use a stun gun and arrest him.

WEIMAR, Germany (AP) – President Barack Obama toured a World War II concentration camp Friday after prodding the international community to redouble efforts toward separate Israeli and Palestinian states in hopes of resolving a conflict fueled by the Jewish nation’s post-Holocaust creation.

“The moment is now for us to act” to achieve Mideast peace, the new U.S. president declared earlier in Dresden, alongside German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

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U.S. Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic candidate for president in 2004, will speak today at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The free public talk will be at 2:30 p.m. in Hill Hall, on campus roughly across East Franklin Street from the post office.

Kerry will deliver this year’s Weil Lecture on American Citizenship at UNC, presented by the Institute for the Arts and Humanities, a part of the College of Arts and Sciences.

In the 2004 election, the Massachusetts senator won more than 59 million votes, or 48.3 of the ballots cast, to then-President George W. Bush’s total of more than 62 million votes, or 50.8 percent.

Since then, Kerry has continued in the Senate, where he advocates for health insurance for low-income children, improvements to public education and protecting the environment.

Kerry chairs the Senate foreign relations committee, on which he has served for 19 years. He also chairs subcommittees of the finance committee and the commerce, science and transportation committee.

After graduating from Yale University, Kerry volunteered for the U.S. Navy and served two tours of duty in Vietnam. He won a Silver Star, a Bronze Star with Combat V and three Purple Hearts.

Kerry became convinced that the war was a mistake and spoke out against it upon returning to the United States, testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at the age of 27. He helped found Vietnam Veterans of America to fight for veterans’ benefits and treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Kerry graduated from Boston College Law School in 1976 and became a prosecutor in Middlesex County, Mass. He was elected lieutenant governor in 1982 and to the U.S. Senate in 1984. Since then he has won re-election three times. He is now serving his fourth term.

UNC’s biennial Weil Lecture seeks to widen discussion of issues and concerns in the United States. Founded in 1915 by brothers Henry and Solomon Weil of Goldsboro, the lecture has been given by speakers including presidents Taft and Carter, U.S. Senators J. William Fulbright and Nancy Kassebaum, Eleanor Roosevelt and CBS and NPR correspondent Daniel Schorr.

Each succeeding Weil generation has continued a tradition of philanthropy and community involvement, leading in causes including women’s suffrage and civil rights and serving as UNC trustees. The Weil lecture is one of many contributions to the University by the Weil family.

WASHINGTON – Reversing Bush policy, President Barack Obama on Monday cleared the way for a significant increase in federal dollars for embryonic stem cell research and promised no scientific data will be “distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda.”

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WASHINGTON, D.C. – President Barack Obama is making his first visit to North Carolina since his election last November.

The White House announced on Wednesday that the president will deliver an address at Camp Lejeune. His visit is scheduled for Friday.

Obama’s visit comes following word from administration officials that he is expected to order all U.S. combat troops to leave Iraq by August of next year.

PPP found that Barack Obama has the highest approval ever found for the President in North Carolina.

(Richmond Times-Dispatch, 02-01-09)
Donald Nuechterlein, a political scientist, is the author of “America Recommitted: A Superpower Assesses Its Role in a Turbulent World.” Contact him at nuechtd@cstone.net.
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The United States has fought four costly wars since 1945 and none of them ended as World War II did, with complete victory.

In Korea, after nearly three years of huge American troop casualties, the war ended in 1953 in a draw with North and South Korea divided along roughly the same border they had at the start of the war.

The Vietnam war, begun in 1965, was an even costlier one for U.S. troops. And it ended in defeat when North Vietnam’s army took control of the south after Congress cut off funding for U.S. operations in 1975.

The third and fourth wars, in Iraq and Afghanistan, are still in progress. Although the outcome in Afghanistan is not clear, Iraq appears to be on track to become a stable but fragile democratic state.

In Afghanistan, U.S. and allied forces that ousted the Taliban regime in 2001 now find a resurgent Taliban that threatens security in large parts of the country. Many experts conclude that Afghanistan is a fractured country, threatened by Taliban forces in the south and east, and by warlords elsewhere. Unlike Iraq,
Afghanistan has never had a government that controlled the entire country.

In all of these wars, the presidents made difficult choices: Agree to an unsatisfactory outcome (Korea), accept a stalemate and eventual defeat (Vietnam), persevere to achieve success (Iraq), and, until recently, neglect the enemy’s resurgence (Afghanistan).

LET’S EXAMINE the choices made on Vietnam and Iraq by presidents Richard Nixon and George W. Bush and consider the alternatives President Obama has as he deals with Iraq and Afghanistan in the coming years.
A noted historian, Margaret MacMillan, authored an excellent book two years ago titled Nixon and Mao: The Week That Changed the World. She recounts how Nixon and his national security adviser, Henry Kissinger, secretly planned a presidential trip to China in 1972 to end a 23-year freeze on U.S. relations with Communist China. Here, according to MacMillan, is the situation that Nixon faced when he entered the White House in 1969:

“The Soviet Union and its allies had watched with pleasure as American power failed to crush North Vietnam. American allies had watched uneasily as their superpower showed its weakness. Their publics had increasingly turned sour on the United States; in Canada and Western Europe, huge demonstrations demanded that the United States get out of Vietnam. Much of the criticism, and not just from the left, was disturbingly anti-American. The United States was portrayed as an international bully.”

Nixon believed that opening relations with China would persuade both China and the Soviet Union to support a negotiated settlement in Vietnam that preserved the south as a viable state. Although he succeeded in withdrawing American ground troops in 1973, he failed in Vietnam when North Vietnamese forces took over the south in 1975 and forced a humiliating evacuation of all Americans.

In Iraq in 2007, George Bush faced this difficult choice: whether to withdraw American forces, as domestic and international opinion was demanding, or order a surge of forces in an effort to reverse the downward trend in security that threatened to turn into full-scale civil war. He chose a surge. After a year of sustained operations, it brought security to nearly all of Iraq’s cities as well as countryside.

WHAT ARE Barack Obama’s options in Afghanistan and Iraq?

U.S. commanders in Afghanistan have asked for 30,000 more troops to fight the Taliban and to strengthen the Kabul government. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said last week that he has recommended about 12,000 additional troops. Yet, none of our NATO allies, with the exception of Britain, Canada, and the Netherlands, is willing to add to current forces. Germany doesn’t currently permit its troops to engage in combat.

If the president adds troops in Afghanistan, he will need to decide soon whether to seek a negotiated settlement of the war, one that doesn’t result in a withdrawal of American forces. Secretary Gates has stated that the United States will continue to pursue al-Qaida leaders hiding in neighboring Pakistan. The alternative to a negotiated settlement is adding many more combat troops in an effort to stabilize the entire country.

The president’s choice in Iraq is far easier. He will be able to withdraw the troops within 16 to 18 months and be reasonably confident that the new government, which assumes power this month, will take responsibility for policing the country. Washington will continue to provide logistic, intelligence, and training support.

If things go well in Iraq in the next two years, Barack Obama will see the country’s successful transition to a stable, democratic government. And if so, part of the credit will go to George Bush, who was not willing to accept a defeat.

(The Richmond Times-Dispatch, 1/21/09, Editorial)
History and circumstance ensured yesterday’s drama. President Barack Obama’s presence and oratory met expectations. Every Inauguration celebrates the American experiment. In sentiment and tone, Obama delivered.

Hail to the chief.

Rituals convey majesty. They assert the traditions that nurture individual talent. Yesterday offered ruffles and flourishes, as well as manifest goodwill. Obama cited sacrifice and called for renewed responsibility. If his speech lacked phrases as arresting as John Kennedy’s “ask not,” then it captured its audience — which in this instance was not only the nation but the world.

Obama’s reliance on cadence reflected artistry. His voice would accelerate at precisely the right moment. His sentences grew into paragraphs. Paragraphs echoed as though they originated deep in the rich veins of liturgy. Style can indicate substance — and regarding presidential leadership often is substance; yesterday gave Americans a glimpse of what will be. Style cannot foretell judgment, however, and the quality of judgment is not known until it is required. Tests are inevitable.

Commentators parsed Obama’s speech for partisan implications with the scrutiny sullen scholars apply when analyzing the works of Herman Melville. Some discerned conservative generalities and liberal specifics; others detected centrism, post-partisanship, and 100 additional clichés. The blather was as futile as it was amusing. It is time, the new president reminded a young country built on ancient truths, to cast away childish things. From him, citizens heard mystic chords.

The first African-American president is also the 44th president. The ceremonies — solemn yet elated — suggested continuity. America has a lovely face; yesterday its countenance radiated joy. “Defend our liberties,” says a prayer for our country, “and fashion into one united people the multitudes brought hither out of many kindreds and tongues.” E pluribus unum. Let everyone sing the song.

The Inaugural Address offered hints of policy but few details. Those will come, as will disputation. The debate will grow bitter. It would be sweet indeed if every four years the United States could bottle the atmosphere of the quadrennial Jan. 20, yet humans probably should be grateful they heed their better natures as often as they do. Save us, believers pray, from violence, discord, and confusion, from pride and arrogance. The supplication would not be made if it were unnecessary.

When George Bush took the oath of office eight years ago, few, if any, predicted the event that would define his presidency. Obama arrives amid clear and present danger. The outlook has changed considerably since he opened his campaign. It could be his fate to serve during one of those periods history identifies as an era. Lincoln said, “The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew.” Many are the gods that have failed.

Americans salute their president and wish him well (which does not signal automatic acquiescence with each and every proposal). They also remain ever mindful of Obama’s call to renewed recognition of personal and social responsibility. America proves itself when its people prove themselves. There were giants in the earth in those days; let there be again.