Times Are Hard

… you're afraid to pay the fee:

  • It seems like only yesterday (um, because it was only yesterday) that we proposed a Barackrobatic rule: when the President explicitly says that he's about to "be clear", what follows immediately thereafter will not be clear.

    The President obligingly provided another bit of confirmation of that thesis:

    "What's clear," Obama continued, "is that we are heading in the right direction. Just a year and a half ago, the economy was shrinking rapidly. Now the economy is growing. We were bleeding 750,000 jobs each month. Now the economy has added private-sector jobs for seven months in a row."
    Gosh, then this article from just a few days ago (in that notoriously right-wing outlet, the New York Times) must be lies, all lies:
    The number of workers filing new claims for jobless benefits unexpectedly rose last week to the highest level in close to six months, the latest evidence the economy's recovery was faltering. […]

    Economic data for the United States has been decidedly weak over the last couple of months, with private sector job growth lagging expectations and the unemployment rate stuck at 9.5 percent. That has fed concerns that the economy could be at risk of a renewed recession or could face a debilitating bout of deflation as the bleak job market pressures incomes and prices.

  • For another data point in support, this 2008 post at American Thinker explores quotes about Jerusalem, most notably:
    Let me be clear. […] Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided.
    The article describes how that "clear" position has been obfuscated and fudged since then.

    Probably most worrisome to Israel: another thing then-candidate Obama prefaced with "Let me be clear" was: "Israel's security is sacrosanct." Oh oh.

  • Lou Gehrig may not have had Lou Gehrig's disease. Next they'll tell us that Tommy John didn't have Tommy John surgery.