Chip Bok's Bokbluster

But Mr. Obama really believes the stars will fall from the sky if spending declines. – Daniel Henninger WSJ 2/28/13

“That’s a kind of madness I haven’t seen in a long time”, said Bob Woodward referring to the president’s refusal to deploy the U.S.S. Harry Truman to the Persian Gulf because of “sequestration“. The sequestration cuts represent a 4% decrease in spending growth. Obama has been on the campaign trail promoting hysteria and blaming Republicans for the automatic budget cuts.

In a February 22 Washington Post story, Woodward showed, from reporting for his book “The Price of Politics”, that sequestration was the president’s idea.

Update: Bob Woodward has been told he will “regret” doing this by a senior White House official. Here’s a Daily Caller account of Wolf Blitzer’s interview with Woodward on CNN.

BLITZER: Was it a senior person at the White House?
WOODWARD: A very senior person. And just as a matter — I mean, it makes me very uncomfortable to have the White House telling reporters, you’re going to regret doing something that you believe in, and even though we don’t look at it that way, we do look at it that way. and it’s, I think if Barack Obama knew that was part of the communication’s strategy — let’s hope it’s not a strategy, but it’s a tactic that somebody’s employed, and said, look, we don’t go around trying to say to reporters, if you, in an honest way, present something we don’t like, that, you know, you’re regret this. It’s Mickey Mouse.

Politico says the threat came from Obama economic adviser, Gene Sperling. Politico also has a copy of Sperling’s email to Woodward. Here’s an excerpt. You can read the whole email here.

“…But I do truly believe you should rethink your comment about saying saying that Potus asking for revenues is moving the goal post. I know you may not believe this, but as a friend, I think you will regret staking out that claim…”

The reference to moving the goal posts is that Republicans agreed to a tax hike as part of the fiscal cliff deal in exchange for future tax cuts. The president now wants more tax hikes.

Update to the Update: Now Lanny Davis, former Clinton attorney, says he was threatened by they White House. Here’s a link to WMAL via Drudge.

“…Davis told WMAL that his editor, John Solomon, “received a phone call from a senior Obama White House official who didn’t like some of my columns, even though I’m a supporter of Obama. I couldn’t imagine why this call was made.” Davis says the Obama aide told Solomon, “that if he continued to run my columns, he would lose, or his reporters would lose their White House credentials….”

The King’s Court has had a Ministry of Truth attitude from the beginning. Go here for my 2010 cartoon about HHS Secretary Sebalius threatening insurance companies for blaming rate hikes on Obamacare. And go here for my 2009 cartoon about the White House asking you to inform on your fellow citizens if you see “something fishy”. And here’s my cartoon about Justice Department intimidation of CBS reporter Sheryl Attkinsson for her reporting on Fast and Furious.