Clueless Joe: 'Who's Van Jones?'

Is he playing dumb or does this just come naturally?

Tuesday morning on AM Tampa Bay on 970 WFLA, Vice President Joe Biden was asked by Jack Harris about the Occupy Wall Street Movement. The VP said "I really don't know about the Van Jones group, except what I read in the press." The group is currently protesting in New York City against the social and economic inequality, corporate greed and the influence of corporate money and lobbyists on government.

Later in his response in talking about the frustration seen in the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street Group, Biden said "you have on the one end Van Jones' guys, whoever he is, talking about Wall Street." Jack Harris and Tedd Webb stopped him to tell him he had previously been "Green Czar" in the administration. The VP responded, "Oh is that... alright"

All those Communists look alike to Joe.

Listen here:

'We’re Going to Pay a Lot More Attention to Social Media'

It's not as if the high-tech wonderboys at the White House aren't utilizing social media. Problem is it's all focused toward one goal: Getting their clueless boss re-elected.

As the 2012 presidential campaign kicks into gear, President Obama's White House media operation is demonstrating an unprecedented ability to broadcast its message through social media and the Internet, at times doing an end-run around the traditional press.

The White House Press Office now not only produces a website, blog, YouTube channel, Flickr photo stream, and Facebook and Twitter profiles, but also a mix of daily video programming, including live coverage of the president's appearances and news-like shows that highlight his accomplishments.

Kim Jong-Il would be green with envy if he were still alive.

Yet when it comes to picayune matters like foreign affairs, utilizing social media has apparently been an afterthought.

A senate hearing Wednesday revealed that top US intelligence agencies are largely ignorant about the current situation in Egypt and unfamiliar with the agenda of the country’s radical Islamists.


"It's hard to at this point to point to a specific agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood as a group," National Intelligence Director James Clapper told senators. When asked about the group’s attitude to Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel, he said this was a difficult question before assessing “they are not in favor of the treaty.”

However, he then noted that the Muslim Brotherhood was “only one voice in the emerging political milieu," adding that the group is “a large, heterogeneous global organization whose agenda and impact differ from country to country.”

A week ago Clapper basically had no idea what the Muslim Brotherhood was all about. Today, he tells us they're a global organization. A quick study, that Clapper.

Intelligence officials also conceded in the hearing that they did not pay enough attention to social media networks, and that they were not closely monitoring Tunisia, where the wave of ongoing regional unrest started.

“Frankly, Tunisia was probably not up there in our top 10 countries we were watching closely,” Clapper said. “So there is the aspect of the spread, the balance of our collection priorities. Obviously, we’re going to work on that. ... We’re going to pay a lot more attention to social media and what we can do to extract warning."

Now they'll pay attention to social media? What, a website, blog, YouTube channel, Flickr photo stream, Facebook and Twitter profiles, a mix of daily video programming, and live coverage of Obama's every move isn't paying attention?

Clueless Pelosi To Host Reception Celebrating Democrat Achievements

As vanquished Democrats plead with her to step aside gracefully, Nancy Pelosi not only is completely out of touch with the political reality, she's now so far gone she's planning to "celebrate" the accomplishments of the disastrous 111th Congress she led off the cliff.

Amazing.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) will host a reception Wednesday afternoon on Capitol Hill to celebrate "The accomplishments of the 111th Congress," according to an invitation sent out Monday.

The event will offer congressional Democrats, many of whom will not be returning to Congress next January, an opportunity to reflect on the party's legislative victories over the past two years. These have included the passage of major healthcare reform, financial regulatory reform, and climate and energy legislation.

Not likely to be lost on attendees, however, is that the unpopularity of many of these "accomplishments" among voters went far to contribute to a wave of Democratic losses in last week's mid-term elections, in which Democrats lost control of the House and their majority in the Senate was weakened.

I hope it's televised. Seeing Pelosi hoisting a champagne toast to her magnificent accomplishments should be a special moment.

Here's the invite.

AP Laments Impending Tsunami: 'Hello to Gridlock ... and Goodbye to Recovery?'

Recovery? What recovery? If there was a recovery Democrats wouldn't be facing a massive bloodbath today. It's difficult to distinguish who's more out of touch: the Democrats or their media hand-maidens. Today will be a repudiation of both, although it's doubtful either will get the message. They'll blame anyone and anything other than themselves.

Clueless Rendell 'Embarrassed' and 'Appalled' Pennsylvania Is Tracking Protesters

Actually, what Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell should be embarrassed and appalled by is the fact he's so out of touch he doesn't even have the slightest idea what his state's Homeland Security office is spending money on.

Gov. Ed Rendell said Tuesday evening that he was “embarrassed” and “appalled” that a contractor hired by the state has been tracking all sorts of “legitimate protest groups,” and that the Pennsylvania Office of Homeland Security then disseminated that information to law enforcement around the state in its tri-weekly intelligence bulletins.

Rendell said the contract with the Institute of Terrorism Research and Response, based in Philadelphia, would be not be renewed when it expires at the end of October, and until then the state would not disseminate information they supplied.

The state is charged by the federal government with determining and alerting local officials to “credible real threats to critical infrastructure.”

Instead, the Office of Homeland Security was notifying law enforcement of gay pride parades, taxpayer rallies and protests in support of the Governor’s own education policies, said Rendell.

Just imagine if a Republican governor was monitoring gay pride parades.

He said he first learned of the issue and ordered a review “this morning when I read the story in the Patriot-News.”

“Let me make this as clear as I can possibly make it,” he said. “Protesting against an idea, a principle, a process, protesting is not a real threat... Protesting is a God-given American right, a right that’s in our constitution.”

Rendell called the items included in the intelligence bulletins “absolutely ludicrous,” and he said distributing it to gas drilling companies “was against the guidelines set up for this program to begin with.”

But James Powers, the director of Homeland Security, will remain employed.

“He thought he was carrying out the federal mandate,” said Rendell. “He was wrong. He made a significant mistake.”

The governor said, “It’s easy to kick one person, but I think there’s shared responsibility here. I’m most interested in why I didn’t know... I would have stopped this on day one... Ultimately the responsibility is mine, and I’m deeply embarrassed.”

Update: For some reason the PennLive link is down. Here's an AP story.

Wizard of Uhhhs Discusses North Korea Without TOTUS

A remarkably clueless Barack Obama discusses the situation in North Korea without the aid of any visual devices. You can sense Nicolas Sarkozy is ashamed to be in the same room with him. I'm wondering if Obama could find North Korea on a map after this dreadful performance.

H/T Seafood Gumbo.