Headlines

All from Internet news sites ... including Politico.

Madrid unveils plan to take direct control of Catalonia

Trump to cover staff legal fees as Russian probe unfurls

9.7-million-year-old teeth discovery could re-write human history ...

Donald Trump: Without social media, I may not be president

Grassley won't force Sessions to answer Trump-Comey questions

Duerte now says he'll execute criminals himself

American nuke bombers buzz NKorea ...

Five injured, one arrested after knife rampage in Munich

Czech voters hand Euroskeptic Babis big victory

Survivor wonders why feminists won't fight female genital mutilation

Serial killer in Tampa?

Iraqi invasion: Looting, arson trigger mass exodus of 100,000 in Kurdish Kirkuk

The Audacity of Hope

Lemmings

The Barry recently said that "The question is not whether things will get better; they always do." (See: Live Statement).  I hate to burst your bubble Mr. President but hope is never a substitute for good planning and coordinated actions.  I suspect that those people who plan for their retirement by buying lottery tickets will swallow such claptrap, but this is not the kind of wispy, Pollyannaish rhetoric that should be being uttered by the President of the United States.

Mr. Obama, if you think things will get better by themselves, I suggest that you talk to anyone on the streets of Athens, or Madrid, or Darfur, or even Detroit for that matter. (I will treat my expected longer-term ramifications of the President's auto bailout in a subsequent blog posting.)  I realize that you like to "lead from behind," but, to me, this suggests that you have your head somewhat proximate to your gluteus maximus ... and you view of the road ahead is somewhat brindle-colored.

And, as for your current run to secure four more years of yuks and soirees at your Pennsylvania Ave. palace, you have chosen the motto, "Forward", an auspicious yelp from a leader who doesn't really like to lead.  This somehow congers up to me the image of a piper urging his following lemmings to brave the freezing waters of the North Sea in the "hope" they might reach Greenland.