Hugh’s show prep. 09/04

Gates: AP’s Use of Photo of Dying Marine ‘Appalling’

NATO Plans Inquiry After Afghan Strike Kills Scores

North Korea in Final Uranium Phase

Obama’s School Speech Backlash Builds

Reversing Course, White House Will Release Visitor Logs

Dem: Obama Hasn’t Led on Healthcare

Job Losses Moderate, but Unemployment Rate Hits 9.7%

Van Jones a Ticking Time Bomb for Obama

Obama’s Approval at 59% in Illinois

Boehner Urges Rep. Rangel to Step Down as Chairman of Ways & Means Committee

2 Radio Towers in Washington Toppled by Radical Environmentalists

“Without Tort Reform, It Isn’t Health Care Reform –It’s A Lawyers’ Protection Act.”

My new Townhall.com column is up.

Talk about it at The Hughniverse, and have a great Labor Day Weekend.

“His wax wings having melted, he is the man who fell to earth.”

Charles Krauthammer’s new column is on the president’s approval ratings tumble.

Too much can be made of President Obama’s many mistakes to date.  He’s a basketball player, and he and his team are down 10 in the middle of the first quarter, and he has a deep bench.

It wouldn’t be fair to compare the DC GOP to the Washington Generals, but all it will take is a jam down of a slimmed down “health insurance reform” bill for the president to declare he’s got his game back.

Still, the unemployment numbers today make it harder and harder for even the devout Democrats to pretend the stimulus worked or that the massive expense of Obamacare or the looming tax hikes make sense.  Distraction after distraction —Michelle Malkin writes today on the “Dear Leader” speech blowback and Van Jones will no doubt generate a few more stories over the long weekend (the White House has got to be wondering whether Mr. Jones will end up defining the president for another slice of the public)– keeps the president off of his agenda, and when he’s on his agenda, the public rejects it.

Still, the president will almost certainly turn the school kids’ speech into a bland “what was all the fuss about” lecture on doing homework, and he’ll almost certainly lookand sound good when he delivers his “eat your liver” speech to Congress next Wednesday.  Van Jones will either stop generating headlines or he’ll be looking for work.  The president can show up at the Ohio State-USC game or somewhere else and get a new deposit of points in the regular account.  Presidents bounce back.  Remember Time’s “Incredible Shrinking President” cover from June, 1993 as Bill Clinton struggled to figure out the presidency?

Clinton did pretty well with the comeback thing.  Perhaps President Obama should ring up David Gergen?

Or perhaps he should shelve Obamacare as a needlessly and deeply divisive and unpopular attempt to radically change what the vast majority of Americans like –their medical care.

And instead concentrate on winning in Afghanistan, which is the front line in a war that goes on and which continues to threaten Americans even if they are forgetting that threat.

There’s a genuine bipartisan cause behind which many if not most conservatives and independents will rally.

H3: 09/03/09 Mark Steyn, Jude

09030903 Hugh Hewitt: Hour 3 – After a replay of the Mark Steyn interview, guest hosts Duane Patterson and Jude take calls and play audio of Democratics continuing to get chastised at health care town hall meetings.

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H2: 09/03/09 Robert George, Mary Katharine Ham, Guy Benson, Frank Gaffney, James Lileks

09030902 Hugh Hewitt: Hour 2 – Hugh talks about the Lockerbie bomber release with Princeton ethicist Robert George, politics with the Young Guns, foreign policy with Frank Gaffney, and Obama’s speech next week to the children with James Lileks.

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H1: 09/03/09 Mark Steyn, Michael Rubin, Jude, John Hinderaker

09030901 Hugh Hewitt: Hour 1 – Hugh talks politics with Columnist to the World, Mark Steyn, the Lockerbie bomber release with AEI scholar Michael Rubin, Special K breakast cereal with Jude the musician, and Dear Leader Obama’s address to the children with Powerline blogger John Hinderaker.

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