The Downing Street Memo & The Tin Foil Hatter's Tea Party
The Democrats haven't just gone "round the bend," they've gone round the bend, down the street, and off to fairy land, where the moonbats dance and play in the dappled moonlight and everyone capers around in their pretty tinfoil hats.
It starts with the Democratic equivalent of a little girl's tea party with her imaginary friends, a mock impeachment hearing for Bush. Now, you'd think that no one but the "Michael Moore crowd" would attend something that ridiculous and you'd be right. But unfortunately, the "Michael Moore crowd" now includes plemty of Democratic Congressmen and Senators.
Here's how things started off in cuckoo crazy land:
"Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) banged a large wooden gavel and got the other lawmakers to call him "Mr. Chairman." He liked that so much that he started calling himself "the chairman" and spouted other chairmanly phrases, such as "unanimous consent" and "without objection so ordered." The dress-up game looked realistic enough on C-SPAN, so two dozen more Democrats came downstairs to play along.
The session was a mock impeachment inquiry over the Iraq war. As luck would have it, all four of the witnesses agreed that President Bush lied to the nation and was guilty of high crimes -- and that a British memo on "fixed" intelligence that surfaced last month was the smoking gun equivalent to the Watergate tapes. Conyers was having so much fun that he ignored aides' entreaties to end the session."
Setting aside the ridiculous image of a US Senator acting like a small child with a gavel, the British memo referred to is The Downing Street Memo.
For those of you unfamiliar with the DSM, it's a run-of-the-mill British memo from 2002 that basically says the Brits thought America was going to go to war with Iraq and that the Bush administration was working to compile the intelligence information they had to make their case. Here's the part of the DSM that the loony left has primarily focused upon:
"C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."
So basically, we have a third hand account of what the perception was in Washington and the word "fixed," which the lefty kooks have seized upon to mean that evidence of WMD's was being forged, instead of what it obviously means, that Washington was trying to justify it's policy.
As a matter of fact, if you want proof that the Brits and Americans believed Saddam had WMD, you need look no further than -- the DSM. Check out this paragraph:
"For instance, what were the consequences, if Saddam used WMD on day one, or if Baghdad did not collapse and urban warfighting began? You said that Saddam could also use his WMD on Kuwait. Or on Israel, added the Defence Secretary."
Yes, the same memo that the left is using in an attempt to claim that Bush tried to mislead the American people about Saddam's WMDs, confirms that the Coalition believed the Iraqis had them. You just can't make this stuff up.
In any case, the DSM is the left side-of-the blogosphere's new "Jeff Gannon". It's not a big story, it's not a big deal, but the lefty bloggers are absolutely obsessed with the story and have been going on about it for months.
Which leads us back to the Democrats imaginary impeachment tea party that's designed to show the kooks in the Democratic base that the Dems up on Capitol Hill are listening to them. You won't believe how bizarre things got before it was over -- or maybe you will:
"The session took an awkward turn when witness Ray McGovern, a former intelligence analyst, declared that the United States went to war in Iraq for oil, Israel and military bases craved by administration "neocons" so "the United States and Israel could dominate that part of the world." He said that Israel should not be considered an ally and that Bush was doing the bidding of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
"Israel is not allowed to be brought up in polite conversation," McGovern said. "The last time I did this, the previous director of Central Intelligence called me anti-Semitic."
Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.), who prompted the question by wondering whether the true war motive was Iraq's threat to Israel, thanked McGovern for his "candid answer."
At Democratic headquarters, where an overflow crowd watched the hearing on television, activists handed out documents repeating two accusations -- that an Israeli company had warning of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and that there was an "insider trading scam" on 9/11 -- that previously has been used to suggest Israel was behind the attacks.
The event organizer, Democrats.com, distributed stickers saying "Bush lied/100,000 people died." One man's T-shirt proclaimed, "Whether you like Bush or not, he's still an incompetent liar," while a large poster of Uncle Sam announced: "Got kids? I want yours for cannon fodder."
Conyers's firm hand on the gavel could not prevent something of a free-for-all; at one point, a former State Department worker rose from the audience to propose criminal charges against Bush officials. Early in the hearing, somebody accidentally turned off the lights; later, a witness knocked down a flag. Matters were even worse at Democratic headquarters, where the C-SPAN feed ended after just an hour, causing the activists to groan and one to shout "Conspiracy!"
It's almost hard for me to believe that there are actually Democratic Senators and Congressmen getting involved in this sort of farce. In fact, if it were April 1st, I'd suspect the Washington Post was pulling our legs.
But, maybe it's not so strange.
Hunter Thompson once said, "When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro." Well if you paraphrased that to say: "When the going gets weird, the pros turn weird," you'd have a pretty good description of John Conyers, James Moran, and a lot of other heavies in the Democratic Party. Maybe someone in the Democratic Party will start calling a "weirdo" a "weirdo," and it will help pull these Democrats back to reality.
Saddam Requests Jackson's Jury -- Satire By Andy Borowitz
Asks Accuser’s Mom to Testify Against Him
Former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein startled the international legal community today by requesting that the jury in the Michael Jackson child molestation trial be empanelled to sit in judgment of him when his trial gets underway in Baghdad.
The Iraqi dictator made the extraordinary request in a special hearing today, telling the judge in his case, “There is no jury in the world better qualified to hear my case than those twelve people who just let Michael Jackson walk.”
In addition to requesting the Jackson jury, Saddam also requested that the mother of Mr. Jackson’s accuser be called upon to testify against him in his trial.
The Iraqi madman, who had been gloomy and depressed in recent months, reportedly “perked up” when the Jackson verdict was announced earlier this week, sources inside his prison said.
“When the verdict was read and it was not guilty on all counts, Saddam practically jumped out of his chair,” one source said. “He was like, ‘I’ve got to get that jury – they’re awesome!’”
While international human rights groups scrambled to examine the legal and ethical issues involved in bringing the entire Jackson jury to Iraq, a spokesperson for the jury said that the twelve men and women might not be willing to make the journey from Santa Maria, California to Baghdad.
“These are twelve very busy people,” said the spokesperson, Stacy DeLone. “They all have book and movie deals – plus, Milosevic asked first.”
Elsewhere, coach Phil Jackson called his return to the Los Angeles Lakers “a story of redemption, reconciliation, and 10 million dollars a year.”
A List Of Some Of The Most Embarrassing Quotes To The MSM
It's no secret that the public's confidence in the mainstream media has been steadily dropping over the past few years. Just to give you an idea of how bad it has gotten, according to a Gallup Poll in May, only 28% of the general public had either "A Great Deal" or "Quite A Lot" of confidence in Television News and Newspapers.
There are a myriad of good reasons to be suspicious of the mainstream media, starting with things said by members of the MSM over the last few years. Here are just a few examples that help explain why the public is losing faith in the press:
A Robber Vs. 20 Angry Women Armed With Curling Irons & Chairs
I love this story, I love this story, I love this story!
"An armed robber brandishing a revolver and some tough talk entered Blalock's Beauty College demanding money Tuesday afternoon.
He left crying, bleeding and under arrest, after Dianne Mitchell, her students and employees attacked the suspect, beating him into submission.
Mitchell tripped the robber as he tried to leave and cried aloud "get that sucker" as the group of about 20, nearly all women, some wielding curling irons, bludgeoned him until police arrived.
"You can tell the world don't mess with the women here," said the 53-year-old who manages the Shreveport beauty school in the 5400 block of Mansfield Road.
Jared Gipson, 24, of Shreveport was charged with armed robbery, Shreveport police said. He will be booked into the City Jail once he is released from the hospital.
"He received several lacerations to the head and was taken to LSU Hospital in Shreveport," spokeswoman Kacee Hargrave said. "Nobody else was seriously injured besides the suspect."
About 3 p.m., the workers and students sat around the beauty salon, recounting their tale, like warriors after a great battle.
A little before noon the students and workers were cleaning up when the robber walked up quietly behind Mitchell and said, "This is a holdup," she recalled.
"I thought it was someone just playing, but then I saw that big old gun. He said 'get down big momma.'"
The robber, a tall, thin man wearing a handkerchief over his face and a skull cap, barked out orders to the other people in the school to get down on the floor, Mitchell said.
As the group complied, some of the women began to cry. The robber didn't react kindly, telling one of the women she would "be the first to go," Mitchell said.
After collecting any money the people had on them, the robber pushed one of the employees, Abram Bishop, into the back of the room.
"I thought 'Oh my God, he's going to shoot him,'" Mitchell said.
But instead the robber ran toward the front door to escape.
That's when Mitchell raised her leg.
It was enough to trip the robber, who dropped the gun and tumbled into a wall.
Bishop jumped on the man's back, driving him into the ground. Seizing the opportunity, Mitchell rallied her students.
"We moved some furniture after that," she yelped with joy as she retold the tale.
Arming themselves with curling irons, chairs, a wooden table leg and clenched fists, the women attacked.
Blood and urine splattered from the victim; stains adorned the white paints worn by many of the beauty school students.
Crying in pain, the robber tried to crawl away from the students, Mitchell said.
"I grabbed his legs and wouldn't let him go. I pulled him back. He wasn't going to get up out of here and tell everyone he robbed us. When he came in here, he knocked down a beehive and sent the bees flying all over.
...The gun, police learned later, was not loaded. But there was no remorse from the students.
"He got what he deserved," Renae Collier, 26, said. Collier's engagement ring was broken at some point during the melee."
These women beat the robber "with curling irons, chairs, a wooden table leg," and Renae Collier actually broke her engagement ring, probably pounding the guy in the head. That crook got exactly what he deserved and it's just a beautiful thing...although I will say that those women were lucky that the guy was dumb enough to go in with an unloaded gun.
Still, it's nice to see the good guys win one for a change. Kudos to everyone at Blalock's Beauty College for a job well done!
*** Update #1 ***: From oblomov in the comments section of this post:
We need to immediately close down the Beauty College Gulags of our nation, where basic human rights are ignored and people are subjected to beatings or torture. If the man was carrying a Holy Koran, some blood, urine, hairspray, or even exfoliating cream might have touched the book, thus desecrating it. Our hair may be bouncy and shiny, our clothes may match our skintone, but we can hardly call ourselves a civilized people.
*** Update #2 ***: In the post, I changed the word "unarmed" to "with an unloaded gun" to avoid confusion.
One the most fascinating things about TiVo is the way that it allows you to absolutely consume a TV series. Take a 30 minute show that runs 4 or 5 seasons for instance. TiVo records multiple versions of each show, each day and if you regularly watch the show, you can easily go through the whole series in a couple of months. Because of that, shows like "Futurama, "Family Guy," & "The Simpsons" are old news for me now.
Anyway, here are my current 10 faves on the tube:
1) Samurai Champloo
2) Sealab 2021
3) The Venture Brothers
4) House
5) South Park
6) WWE Raw
7) WWE Smackdown
8) CSI
9) The Shield
10) Angel
I'm cheating a bit there because I've started watching the "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" series from the beginning using Netflix, which I'd highly recommend by the way.
Typically, I receive a movie in the mail on Monday, watch it, put it in the self-addressed stamped envelope Netflix sent and mail it off Tuesday, then on Wednesday Netflix receives it, and on Thursday I have another movie in hand.
Furthermore, not only do they have Buffy as well as other TV series that aren't syndicated anymore like Highlander, Hercules, & Xena, that have lots of movies you can't go pick up at the local Blockbuster (which is 20 minutes away each way for me now). For example, I've got The Street Fighter on the way, which is a killer movie -- well, if you like seventies chop socky flicks (and I do). Here's a short review:
"The Street Fighter is a classic '70s exploitation film that first introduced American audiences to Sonny Chiba, earned the first X-rating (equivalent to NC-17) for violence and established Chiba as the most charismatic martial arts star since Bruce Lee. Clearly inspired by the gritty yakuza films of the day, it features Chiba as an unrepentant antihero who ends up doing the right thing, but the wrong way by leaving behind a bloody trail of cracked skulls, gouged eyes and castrated rapists."
To begin with, the fact that Terri Schiavo was confirmed to have brain damage & was blind is being trumpeted as proof that she was in a persistent vegetative state. But, that's completely incorrect.
No one was questioning the fact that Terri Schiavo had brain damage before she died, the question was whether or not she was in a persistent vegetative state. That's not the same thing. A person can have severe, irreversible brain damage, and still not be in a persistent vegetative state. That's why a PVS diagnosis makes all the difference in the world.
A person with PVS can't feel agony as they're being slowly dehydrated to death. A person with brain damage may very well suffer horribly in the situation and be unable to call out for mercy, which is why, in part, a PVS diagnosis is required to kill a patient by withholding nourishment.
Even after the autopsy, we don't know which condition Terri Schiavo was in and we never will, because the further tests and examination that could have confirmed a PVS diagnosis had to be done while she was alive, and despite the desperate pleas of her parents, her husband wouldn't allow further testing.
As far as the blindness goes, there's been nothing in any report I've seen that speculates on WHEN she went blind. The assumption -- quite possibly an incorrect assumption -- is being made that she was blind all along. Again, from the reports I've read, that isn't being asserted by the people who did the autopsy, nor do we deny people food and water in this country for being blind and brain damaged.
The reality here is that although the autopsy did add some new information (What caused Terri's problem is unknown, she doesn't appear to have been abused, she went blind at some point, she lost the ability to drink water and eat food at some point), it sheds no light on the two central questions of the Terri Schiavo case: what Terri Schiavo's wishes were and whether she was in a persistent vegetative state.
So the fundamental issues remain unchanged, as does the fact that killing Terri Schiavo by denying her sustenance, without verifying that PVS diagnosis, was callous, inhumane, and cruel.
Further links on this issue: From Michelle Malkin's take, a link to the autopsy report (This is a .PDF file and it appears to be swamped. I haven't been able to get it to open yet), and my Terri Schiavo FAQ, which was written before she was killed.
"I thought about it before I got over here, and feel even stronger about it now that it may be my reality. God forbid, if something happens to me over here, I do not want to be used by the likes of Phil Hansen in Seattle, Michael Moore, Gary Trudeau, or Ted Koppel, to make their political points against the war, the President, and finally the country, all the while saying "they support the troops". I have no doubt in my mind that Michael Moore would rather hear a report that 600 soldiers were killed last month in Iraq rather than 60 — but he 'supports the troops'". -- Capt. William Guenther in Baghdad
Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney looks likely to throw his hat in the ring in 2008 and over at Betsy's Page, Betsy is speculating that the media would try to undercut Romney by trying to make the public uncomfortable with the idea of a Mormon President.
The idea of having a Mormon candidate in 2008 doesn't bother me. However, the idea of having a pro-abortion Republican nominee from Massachusetts bothers me a lot. No to Romney!
The New Democratic Party Motto: Vote For The Party That's Obsessed With Terrorist Rights!
In order to help out our pals in the Democratic Party -- like Dick Durbin -- who can hardly sleep at night because they're so concerned about how those poor terrorists are being treated at Gitmo, I've put together this handy dandy new motto for the Democratic Party:
Now, this is a cheery little graphic -- well, if you're a Republican. If you're a Democrat, it's pretty scary:
A few quick thoughts inspired by this graph...
#1) The Democratic decline in the Senate is not a fluke. It has been a long, slow, steady slide that started during the Vietnam years, was masked for a short period in the post-Watergate years, and has sped up since the early nineties. So this is not a "band-aid" problem for the Dems, it's serious business.
#2) Also, notice that although there are peaks and valleys, the height of the peaks is getting progressively lower. Furthermore, now that the Dems have almost completely lost the South, they may not even have the capacity to get more than a seat or two above 50 for the foreseeable future.
#3) How low will the Dems go? Well, given the polarization of the country, that Bush took 31 states in 2004 and Kerry took 19, and the political die-off of "conservative" Southern Dems at the national level, it's entirely possible we could see the GOP reach the magical "60 number" sometime between 2008-2016, unless something changes. Of course, it goes without saying that's speculative....
#4) Here's a scary thought for Dems: the two biggest troughs on this graph occurred when Democrats took over the White House. If Hillary Clinton were to take the White House in 2008, that could be the very event that would help the GOP to finally go over the 60 seat mark.
"Let's also pause to ponder the image of the middle-of-the-road, "centrist" jihadist who could be "recruited" to jihad by reports about abuse at Guantanamo. You know – the kind of guy who just watches al-Jazeera for the sports and hits the "mute" button whenever they start in about the Jews again, already.
Liberals want us to believe such a person exists and that he is perusing newspaper articles about Guantanamo trying to decide whether to finish his coffee and head off to work or to place a backpack filled with dynamite near a preschool.
Note to liberals: That doesn't happen.
What happens is this: There are thousands of Muslim extremists literally dying to slaughter Americans, and only three proven ways to stop them: (1) Kill them (the recommended method), (2) capture them and keep them locked up, or (3) convince them that their cause is lost. Guantanamo is useless for No. 1, but really pulls ahead on No. 2 and No. 3 (i.e., a "purpose").
Let's just hope aspiring jihadists are not reading past the headlines and discovering that what Amnesty International means by "the gulag of our time" is: No Twinkie rewards for detainees!" -- Ann Coulter
Today on my other blog, Conservative Grapevine, you can find a link to a Mark Steyn interview, Terri Schiavo, Weight Watchers & Gitmo, Wonkette's Hustler experience, & the Vietnam record of all the potential candidates for President in 2008
Make sure to check it out, Conservative Grapevine, bookmark it, and check it every day right after you hit RWN.
It's bad enough that the Democratic Party has been nothing but a hindrance in the fight against terrorism, but their ridiculous hand wringing, over-the-top rhetoric, and seemingly endless concern for the well being of members of Al-Qaeda are actually starting to get more than a bit disturbing. Just look at this mind-blowing quote from Democratic Senator Dick Durbin about the conditions Al-Qaeda terrorists face at Gitmo:
"On one occasion, the air conditioning had been turned down so far and the temperature was so cold in the room, that the barefooted detainee was shaking with cold. ..... On another occasion, the [air conditioner] had been turned off, making the temperature in the unventilated room well over 100 degrees. The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his hair out throughout the night. On another occasion, not only was the temperature unbearably hot, but extremely loud rap music was being played in the room, and had been since the day before, with the detainee chained hand and foot in the fetal position on the tile floor.
If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime--Pol Pot or others--that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their prisoners."
So we're Nazis, we're Pol Pot, we're the Soviets because we chained up a terrorist, made him hot, cold, and played rap music? Is Dick Durbin out of his mind? Does Durbin understand there's a war on? Does he get that this guy could have info that might prevent another 9/11?
You know what Democrats like Dick Durbin need to do? They need to start getting just a little bit concerned about winning the war on terrorism -- just a little bit -- and they need to stop getting so worried about the welfare of terrorists who live to murder Americans.
Both parties understood that back in WW2. You didn't have any Dick Durbins or Ted Kennedys who spent all their time fretting over how the Nazis were being treated and comparing their own country to every evil regime that came to mind. Sure, there were sharp political differences back then, but political gain wasn't put above winning the war or saving American lives, like it is today.
Oh...yeah, I meant that last line -- because outrageous and irresponsible comments like the ones Dick Durbin made are used as propaganda by our enemies. As a matter of fact, Al-Jazeera, Al-Qaeda, Hamas, you name it, they're not half as good at convincing the world America is a rotten place as liberals like Dick Durbin who run around comparing us to some of the worst totalitarian regimes this planet has ever seen.
May I also add that since we have a United States Senator acting as if making some Al-Qaeda terrorist chilly is the equivalent of torturing the guy to death, that it may lead to our interrogators backing off instead of prodding these terrorists for info. How would you like to find out after some horrific terrorist attack that a terrorist at Gitmo knew what was going to happen, but didn't say anything because we didn't push him hard enough? Americans could die by the thousands as a direct result of an incident like that, as a direct result of the sort of comments made by soft-on-terrorism hacks like Dick Durbin.
Dick Durbin's comments were a disgrace and they should be condemned not just by Republicans, but by all Democrats who are serious about protecting this country from terrorism.
*** Update #1 ***: From Mike_M in the comments section of this post -- just because it's funny:
Dick Durbin recently uncovered this alternate scene for Star Wars: A New Hope:
Obi Wan: "I feel a great disturbance in the Force. As if a million of voices suddenly cried out in terror, and then, suddenly, silence."
Luke: "Alderan was destroyed by the Death Star?"
Obi Wan: "No...they turned the air conditioner off at Gitmo! Ah...AHHHHHRRRRGHHH!"
Luke: "Ben! What's wrong?"
Obi Wan: "They...they...TURNED THE AIR CONDITIONING BACK ON!!! Such suffering!!!"
More Liberals Behaving Badly: This Time At A College Graduation
The sort of mentality displayed by the commenters at the Democratic Underground in the post directly below this one, was on display at Santa Monica College yesterday when they were lucky enough to have Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger come up and give the commencement address.
"Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's return to his alma mater turned into an exercise in perseverance when virtually his every word was accompanied by catcalls, howls and piercing whistles from the crowd.
Schwarzenegger's face appeared to redden during his 15-minute commencement address Tuesday to 600 graduates at Santa Monica College, but he ignored the shouting as he recalled his days as a student and, later, his work as a bodybuilder and actor.
"Always go all out and overcome your fears," he told the graduates. "Work, work, work. Study, study, study."
Inside the stadium, the drone from hundreds of rowdy protesters threatened to drown out the governor's voice at times. Many in the crowd erupted in boos when a police officer pulled down a banner criticizing the estimated $45 million cost of the Nov. 8 special election that Schwarzenegger proposed Monday.
The governor is backing three ballot initiatives that call for imposing a cap on state spending, stripping lawmakers of the power to draw their own districts and increasing the time it takes teachers to gain tenure.
At times during Schwarzenegger's speech, cheers and boos mingled, and the graduates themselves appeared eager to hear the governor. Many applauded at one point when the noise from the bleachers briefly subsided.
"It didn't matter. I just ignored them," graduate Ray Lewis, 21, of Los Angeles, said when asked about the racket from protesters. Schwarzenegger's "political views and all that had nothing to do with the graduation," Lewis said."
How ridiculous the American left is becoming. These liberals couldn't even pretend to be civilized human beings for 15 minutes and let Schwarzenegger talk. No, instead they shouted, they screamed, they whistled, they did everything they could to shut Arnold up and spoil the event for everybody else.
But, that's the sort of idiocy that is celebrated on the left today. Ya know, throwing pies at conservatives, trying to shout down people who disagree with you, insulting Republicans at grocery stores, talking publicly about how much you hate Republicans -- in other words, acting like a complete cretin in public.
Liberals wonder why the American people don't trust them to be in power? If you can't even trust liberals to go to a college graduation without making fools of themselves, how can you trust them up on Capitol Hill?
The Democratic Underground Thread Of Day: It's Good To Be Rude To Republicans You See At The Grocery Store
This thread at the Democratic Underground was just fascinating. It started with a liberal called "NoSheep" bragging about harassing some poor woman at the grocery store because she was a Republican and went from there. While not everyone agreed, the number of people at the DU who are so eaten up with hatred for Republicans -- any Republicans -- that they can barely stand to be in the same room with them was a bit surprising -- or maybe not. Maybe this explains why Howard Dean thinks he's appealing to his base when he publicly rants about Republicans. Take a look at some of the replies and you'll see what I mean:
NoSheep: "Last night I tried to do a good deed. Just a simple nicety. I was on my way to check out at the grocery store. A woman and I approached the check out ALMOST about the same time-if I'd gone in at a normal pace I'd have beaten her for first in line. But I don't "race" in the grocery store, y'know? I'd rather let some jack*ss in front of me than be reduced to that social darwinist sh*t. Besides, I was turning left and she was turning right and I thought I should give her the right-of-way. She had about the same amount of items as me-7 or so. No big deal. I said: "You go ahead." "Well, Thank You!" she said and she "went right ahead".(like they do) So I start checking her out and she's carrying a pocketbook she probably paid 3 thousand bucks for. Really nice shoes, she was tan, trophy wife type (sorry, trophy wives) and had the "hairdo" that sugests weekly visits to the salon for the "works". I'm thinking: 'f*ckin' republican'. SO I couldn't help myself (I'd had a coupla Bass Ales) As she was leaving she said "Thanks for letting me in front of you" and I said "You're welcome...I hope you voted for a democrat" and she said "OH-NEVER!!!" then I said "I guess your tax cut is too important for you to think about all those folks dying in Iraq?" The cashier and the people behind me BUSTED out laughing. The lady practically ran to the door to get out. SHAME 'EM I say!!! SHAME 'EM in PUBLIC"
Warpy: "Sometimes that works but more often it just makes that type that you described so nicely cling to her position even harder. I mean, how TACKY to bring up politics in a checkout line! How terribly UNMANNERLY! No wonder her people loathe the working class.
Don't worry, though, the cognitive dissonance is getting to them, and you'll be a hero to all the folks in that market who work to keep it running."
FizzFuzz: "I have no need for "politeness". Politeness is what keeps us silent, so many times. (And I'm not against all politeness, for the record. But when the truth is being suppressed, the powermongers really appreciate the power of manners to keep people quiet.)
And, I WISH I could come up with these perfect lines, like you and the OP did."
LeftHander "What it shows is that the undercurrent of anger in America is beginning to grow. That anger and frustration is starting to manifest itself as behavior that is striking out at the symbols of our decadant, selfish society.
The "trophy" wife described above represents a very visible symbol of "McMansion" TV-Culture that many are seeing as the reason a *ss-clown like Bush was elected.
I say go with your gut. Nice playtime is over. People are dying because of the needs of shallow empty shells that pose as human beings.
Dehumanizing? Demonizing...?
Why not turn the tables on these f*cking puke sacks and try to shock some humanity back into them....tell them to stop watching TV and get a REAL life. I say start framing the debate by exposing the immorality of selfishness, greed and comsumption.
Ridicule them for stinking up the checkout line with foul smelling cologne, make up and hair spray. Tell them to take the cell phone outside and that you don't want to hear about hyper parenting, American Idle crap.
He may not have her as a friend...she could care less if he was kind to her. But she sure as hell will remember when someone calls her on being a black hearted Republican.
End rant..."
in_cog_ni_to: EVERYTHING with me is about politics. If they vote repuke, that is not anyone I would EVER want as a friend. They're disgusting human beings. They hate anyone who isn't white, Christian, heterosexual, rich, and they are the most SELFISH, hateful, GREEDY group of people I've ever seen. AND they are ANTI-CHOICE! WHY the hell would I want to be friends with someone who stands for everything I hate? That just doesn't make sense. I have NO repuke friends and never will. I can't stand the very ground they walk on and they are all a waste of oxygen."
malmapus: "My life was practically ruined because of Republicans, and I'm still in recovery financially. Being out of work for just under 2 years off and on out of the first 4 that Chimp was in office, and having to hear bullshit from the TV and freakin repugs on the street that the economy is getting better???
The fact that they so blindly followed in line behind this f*ck that got us into this war thats sending good soldiers home in flag draped coffins. I'm still waiting for the day that a name I know comes up.
I haven't even spoken to my family members who voted for * in 2004, and barely tolerate my fiancee's (her sister was staying with us the other night, I think I spoke maybe 3 words to her, and refused to see her other sister and her family when they drove out here from TN).
Anyone who proudly calls themselves a Republican and proudly stands behind Bush / Cheney can all go f*ck themselves for all I care. Personally I'd rather see them in Iraq."
steve2470: I understand why you did what you did. When I was 16, I was a very liberal Democrat and gutsy enough to support the most liberal Democrat in the primaries for the '76 election. Of course, most of my classmates laughed at me. I tried to stay away from Republicans. Maybe I'm hopelessly naiive, but I'd like to think, as txlib does, that with reasoned political discourse in a good forum that some of them can be won over. Let's save the hardball tactics for the scum in Washington, and in the statehouses. The typical Republican (not all of them) probably has no real clue what is going on in Washington and how it really affects us. I'd like to give them that much benefit of the doubt. If I get to the point where I think all Republicans are out to f*ck me over, then I will seriously consider moving to Canada or Australia. I just think most of the Republicans are sheep being led to the slaughter as we are, and the rich Republicans will laugh their *sses off until the neo-Nazis come for them.
NYPagan: She was just a REPUgnant whore. They always are, real women don't have time for beauty parlors and such, we are to BUSY earning a living for our family.
This Story Is Brought To You By The Payback's A You Know What Division Of Conservatism
Ohio Senator Mike DeWine was one of the 7 Republicans who popped a middle-finger off to conservatives by signing on to John McCain's sell-out deal with the Democrats on judges. Wonder if he would have done it had he known it would cost his son a chance to be a Congressman?
"Pat DeWine, son of U.S. Sen. Mike DeWine, was considered an easy favorite to succeed newly named U.S. Trade Representative Rob Portman as the Republican congressman from Ohio's 2nd District — until the younger DeWine ran afoul of the Christian right.
Now he won't even be on the ballot in the Aug. 2 special election.
In Tuesday's primary, 35-year-old DeWine finished a distant fourth behind Jean Schmidt, a former state representative who ran a traditional-values campaign that motivated conservative voters by staying above the vitriolic campaign fray and using techniques honed by supporters of President Bush in 2004.
...Although he raised more than $1 million for his campaign, DeWine saw a commanding lead vanish over the last three months, due to objections from Christian conservatives who have become increasingly active politically.
Observers cite two factors: First, DeWine divorced three years ago, and news of the split spread on the Internet and in radio ads. Second, he suffered the wrath of conservative Christian activists after his father helped forge the recent compromise agreement in the Senate to preserve the filibuster for judicial nominations while guaranteeing confirmation of some but not all of Bush's nominees.
...Tim Rudd, chairman of the Clermont County Republican Committee, said the feelings against the DeWines were palpable after the senator helped forge the filibuster compromise.
"The reaction was, 'We've got one DeWine; we sure don't want another,' " Rudd said. Schmidt won with about 31% of the vote. DeWine received 12%."
The LA Times -- being the LA Times -- tries to play this off like only the "Christian right" was angry about the sell-out on judges. The truth is that the fury at the deal ran wide and deep throughout the whole base and it's great that Mike DeWine's kid got caught up in the backlash.
Now, I know some of you are probably thinking: "But it's not Pat DeWine's fault his pops sold out the party, so why should he be punished for it?"
Pat DeWine's a big boy, he's an adult running for Congress, so he can take it -- and it's a fantastic way to send a needed message to the RINOs in the Senate who think they can do anything they want because the base will forget about it by the time they're up for election. Yep, they're "made men," they're impervious to political harm and so if they stick it to the base, well, the "little people" will just have to learn to live with it because there is nothing they can do about it.
Excerpt Of The Day: The Foolishness Of Closing Gitmo
"Senator Joe Biden said that while we should close Gitmo and release the occupants, we should also "keep those we have reason to keep." Huh? This is the logical equivalent of Solomon saying, "Hey, let's cut the baby in half after all." Imagine if, instead of Gitmo, the issue was the death penalty. "The death penalty should be abolished, but let's execute the folks there's a reason to execute."
If we kept the ones "we have reason to keep" - which would probably mean all 500 or so current detainees - but closed Gitmo, we could bring them to the United States. But this would be a legal quagmire, as it isn't clear what their rights would be on U.S. soil. And it would be a disaster to treat them like common criminals with all of the usual constitutional rights. Nobody read these murderers their rights when they were seized in Afghanistan, and it's not like the cast of "CSI: Kabul" or "Kandahar PD Blue" collected all the necessary forensic evidence to build a case against them. Does that mean we should just let them go? We certainly can't set them free on American soil. And if we send them back to Afghanistan or Pakistan, it would be like giving them a do-over.
Any new Gitmo would quickly gain the same reputation as the old one because a) al-Qaida is under strict orders to allege all manner of abuses for propaganda purposes, especially now that such tactics have proved so useful, and b) because the "international community" and other lovers of runny cheese desperately want such allegations to be true, regardless of the evidence. That the head of Amnesty International could call Gitmo, where we spend more money on the care and feeding of detainees than we do on our own troops, the "Gulag of our time" is all the evidence we need for that. Caving into such bullying would send the unmistakable message that American can be rolled." -- Jonah Goldberg
I'm putting together a list of embarrassing quotes made by members of the MSM over the last few years. I'm looking for quotes made that show bias, incompetence, and that justify the public's deep distrust of the mainstream media. This includes quotes made by news anchors, reporters, media execs, editors, etc, etc, etc. Editorial columnists aren't so much the target of what I'm putting together. A couple of good examples of what I'm looking for include:
"We have lost touch with the essence of war. Following our defeat in Vietnam we became a better nation. We were humbled, even humiliated. We asked questions about ourselves we had not asked before.
We were forced to see ourselves as others saw us and the sight was not always a pretty one. We were forced to confront our own capacity for a atrocity -- for evil -- and in this we understood not only war but more about ourselves. But that humility is gone." -- New York Times reporter Chris Hedges, who "was booed off the stage Saturday at Rockford College’s graduation because he gave an antiwar speech"
"There is, Hugh, I agree with you, a deep anti-military bias in the media. One that begins from the premise that the military must be lying, and that American projection of power around the world must be wrong. I think that is a hangover from Vietnam, and I think it's very dangerous. That's different from the media doing it's job of challenging the exercise of power without fear or favor." -- ABC's Terry Moran
Add your quotes in the comments section and if they're good, they may appear in the article tomorrow.
"If leaders of the other party have innovative ideas, let's hear them. But if they have no ideas or policies except obstruction, they should step aside and let others lead." -- George W. Bush
It's nice to see the big guy fire off a salvo at the Dems once in a while, especially when it's so spot-on. Besides, Cheney shouldn't get to have all the fun...
Of Course We Should Raise The Age Limit For Social Security
Usually, I don't bother to write about Social Security because I think Bush should have given up on it long ago. Chances are, nothing is going to get passed and given the character of the Bush administration and the Republican Senate on domestic issues, even if something is done, it'll probably be little more than a total capitulation to the Democrats (a tax cut and nothing else of significance) that a few sycophantic Republican cheerleaders will call a "Great Victory" for political purposes (See the deal cut by the 7 RINOS on judges).
Yet and still, John Tierney wrote a common sense column in the New York Times today pointing out the obvious: given the fact that life expectancies have gone up significantly, the age limit for Social Security needs to be raised. For this, he has been relentlessly demagogued by the left side of the blogosphere. Here are few examples:
"John Tieney: "Stop Slackin' Off Grandma or No Alpo for You!" -- Rising Hegemon
"Geriatric marathoners are the new welfare queens" -- "John Tierney rails against the sloth of America's elderly" -- Majikthise
"Eat The Old. You know what? I want to work forever. I do. No, I mean it. I want to be 93, with big coke-bottle glasses and an out of style suit (because, come age 93, I don't expect to give a f*ck), striding into my office. Okay -- at 93, I probably won't stride much, but I'll do the best I can. And I want to greet my many young colleagues, make old Jewish guy jokes as I wind my way to my desk, sit down at my holographic laptop (which will now be a hopeless relic compared to the Cornea Computers others will use), and blog for a bit....Those malingerers and loiterers who're checking out at 62, collecting reduced Social Security benefits, and hanging out with the grandkids. And John Tierney, as with all the columnists who offer this suggestion, is tough for doing it. He's taking on a sacred cow, saying what pols fear to say, going where lesser men wilt, speaking the hard truths to AARP's power." -- Ezra Klein
Social Security, as anyone who understands it realizes, is really nothing but a big Ponzi scheme. The money isn't saved or put into some sort of trust fund, it's immediately spent and then in essence, an IOU in the form of a government bond is filed away in place of that money. That IOU is essentially a negotiable promise that one day, other American taxpayers will in turn pay the Social Security expenses of the people chipping in today.
The problem with that whole concept is the same problem you see with a Ponzi scheme -- if the payouts get too big or the number of people coming in isn't large enough, there won't be enough dough in the pipeline to keep everything in the black. In about a decade or so, we're going to reach that point with Social Security -- and no wonder given our demographics. From the Wall Street Journal:
"Demography made the whole arrangement work for a long time. In the 1930s there were 41 workers for every retiree; the payroll tax could thus be set at a low rate--about 2% for the first $3,000 of earnings. It was quite a deal for the beneficiaries--the average rate of return for people retiring in 1940 was 114%.
And like all income redistribution programs, Social Security presented politicians with lots of incentives for sweetening. In the 1950s, Congress started increasing both benefits and the number of people covered. At the same time, however, the demographics were turning sour. Life expectancy was rising to the 78 years it is today, from 69 for men born in 1940. And fertility rates were declining, from 2.2 children per woman in 1940, to a peak of 3.7 in 1957, to two per woman right now.
No surprise, then, that the ratio of workers to retirees began to fall--in 1950, it had dropped to 16 workers to one retiree and now it is just three to one. Payroll taxes have had to rise accordingly--they are now 12.4%. And real rates of return have gone into a free-fall; real returns for workers born in 1960 and retiring in 2025 are less than 2%.
Bad enough, but it is all about to get much worse. Over the next 20 years, as the Baby Boomers start retiring, the number of retirees will jump to around 77 million from 47 million today. The worker-to-retiree ratio will drop to two to one, and real returns for some could be negative."
If people are living longer, it makes perfect sense to raise the age limit on Social Security. In fact, if they'd been smart (unfortunately, our government is never all that smart), FDR's administration would have tied Social Security to life expectancy from the get-go.
Now while that may be water under the bridge, it's not too late to edge-up the eligibility age for Social Security. Why not do it on a sliding scale based on age? If you're 50, you have to be a year older to collect. If you're 40, two years older. At 30, 3 years older.
In and of itself, that wouldn't close the entire funding gap, but it should make a nice dent in it, help keep the program solvent, and also help ease the enormous Social Security tax burden that is going to be dumped on younger Americans in coming years.
That would be much more responsible than the left's hypocritical and delusional claim that "All is well" with Social Security and that anyone who says otherwise wants to "eat the old" or make grandma eat Alpo. Because of the recalcitrance of Democrats who have chosen to put short-term political gains ahead of actually looking out for the American people on this issue, we may be put in a position a decade or so from now where we have to choose between massive tax hikes or draconian cuts in Social Security just to make sure the books stay balanced.
That's probably what's going to happen in the coming years and it's too bad because if the Democrats were willing to do something besides shriek, "no, no, no," at the top of their lungs on this issue today, we probably could avert the full-blown crisis we're going to face down the road. That's a real shame...
A story that has been getting a lot of play today is titled "Diet sodas linked to obesity." Here's the crux of the piece:
"Just when you thought the news about losing weight couldn't get any worse, try this: A review of 26 years of patient data found that people who drink diet soft drinks were more likely to become overweight.
Not only that, but the more diet sodas they drank, the higher their risk of later becoming overweight or obese - 65 percent more likely for each diet drink per day.
The findings, the latest from the long-term San Antonio Heart Study, took even the researchers by surprise.
"I was baffled," said Sharon Fowler, a faculty associate at the University of Texas Health Science Center, who presented the data Saturday at the American Diabetes Association's 65th Annual Scientific Sessions in San Diego, Calif.
Researchers looked at questionnaires and medical records for 1,177 patients who began enrolling in the study in 1979. All had weights considered either normal or overweight, but not obese."
Know what this reminds me of? Ice cream and rape. Why so? Let me explain...I was a psych major in college and one of the things we studied was how to determine cause and effect in a study. You would think that would be easy, but it isn't as simple as it sounds.
Which brings us back to ice cream and rape. Did you know that there is a high correlation between ice cream sales and reported rapes? So, does eating ice cream cause rape? No, there's actually a third factor, temperature, which correlates with both. In the summer, when it gets hot, ice cream sales go up and the number of rapes increases as well.
It doesn't take a genius to figure that people who are overweight or gaining weight will likely switch from regular soft drinks to diet soft drinks in order to cut calories. But, that doesn't mean the diet soda is CAUSING the weight gain. My guess is that you'd find a correlation between the percentage of body fat a person has and how likely they are to buy slim fast or diet food as well, but that doesn't mean that the weight loss products in turn cause a person's weight to rise.
Even the people working on the study admit this may be the case:
"Fowler is quick to note that a study of this kind does not prove that diet soda causes obesity. More likely, she says, it shows that something linked to diet soda drinking is also linked to obesity."
These sort of headlines could cost soda companies tens of millions of dollars -- and even force companies to lay workers off -- because dieters may errantly conclude that drinking a zero calorie beverage may make them gain weight.
So shouldn't the press be more responsible in the way they handle these sorts of stories?
What They Don't Want To Tell You About Kyoto By Betsy Newmark
Poor Bjorn Lomborg. He is engaged in what is probably a fruitless task - trying to use logic and a knowledge of tradeoffs to examine whether the Kyoto Treaty should be put into effect. First he looks at what scientists advocating action on Kyoto don't tell us.
They do not tell us that even if all the industrial nations agreed to the cuts (about 30pc from what would otherwise have been by 2010), and stuck to them all through the century, the impact would simply be to postpone warming by about six years beyond 2100. The unfortunate peasant in Bangladesh will find that his house floods in 2106 instead.
Moreover, they should also tell what they expect the cost of the Kyoto Protocol to be. That may not come easy to natural scientists, but there is plenty of literature on the subject, and the best guess is that the cost of doing a very little good for the third world 100 years from now would be $150 billion per year for the rest of this century.
Even after the Brown/Blair exertions to extract more aid for Africa, the West spends about $60 billion helping the third world. One has to consider whether the proportions are right here.
This brings us to the question of tradeoffs. my husband recently reviewed a book, Trade-Offs: An Introduction to Economic Reasoning and Social Issues which should be required reading for all politicians and scientists before they take a move on Kyoto. They would learn an essential lesson: we can't have everything in this world. If we spend $150 billion a year for the rest of the century, that is money that won't be spent on other projects. And Lomborg, along with many prestigious economists, tried to figure out what are the most crucial needs that the world is facing today. And global warming is at the bottom of the list.
This brings us to the strongest evidence that the national academies are acting in a political rather than scientific and informational manner. Why do they only talk about climate politics? Surely this is not the only important issue with a considerable science component? What about the challenge of HIV/Aids? What about malaria, malnutrition, agricultural research, water, sanitation, education, civil conflicts, financial instability, trade and subsidies? The list goes on.
Lomborg's group, the Copenhagen Consensus, recognize that the countries like the United States and Britain, which have the admirable desire to help the poor in the world, do not have unlimited means. They must make choices or trade-offs. And their list seeks to prioritize solutions for the needs facing the world. They rank the list of 17 possible projects from very good to bad. And fighting climate change ranks at the bottom. At the top are efforts to fight the spread of diseases like HIV/AIDS and malaria, malnutrition, and to increase free trade. I really wish that more in the world of science, politics, and the media would pay attention to the Coopenhagen Consensus. Let's channel our limited resources into the solutions most likely to achieve favorable resources.
This content was used with the permission of Betsy's Page.
My Favorite 30 Opinion Columnists For The 2nd Quarter Of 2005
It has been almost 3 months since I last ranked the best opinion columnists in the business, so I figured it was time to do it again. So here's my current faves in order...
It's kind of late, I'm exhausted, and that top 100 Americans list right below this post is pretty spiffy. So, no morning content today. The next update should be around noon.
*** Update #1 ***: Since I've updated now, consider this an open thread.
The 100 Greatest Americans Of All-Time According To RWN
After putting together a list of the 40 greatest Americans of all-time last Friday in response to the awful list of the 100 greatest Americans compiled by readers at the The Discovery Channel, I felt compelled to finish the job.
So, I put together a 100 greatest Americans list for RWN. You'll notice that it's very thin on actors, singers, & athletes and that's primarily because I don't think what they do is terribly important when it's compared to the accomplishments of the Founding Fathers, great military leaders, Presidents of note, titans of industry, and leading scientists.
So, here's the revised, unranked list, broken out into 3 groups -- the top 25, the next 25, and the bottom 50.
Top 25
John Adams
Alexander Graham Bell
Thomas Edison
Albert Einstein
Henry Ford
Ben Franklin
Ulysses S. Grant
Alexander Hamilton
Sam Houston
Andrew Jackson
Thomas Jefferson
Martin Luther King
Abe Lincoln
Douglas MacArthur
James Madison
James Monroe
Gouverneur Morris
Tom Paine
George S. Patton
Ronald Reagan
Teddy Roosevelt
Jonas Salk
William Tecumseh Sherman
George Washington
Orville And Wilbur Wright
Selections 25-50
Samuel Adams
Susan B. Anthony
Norman Borlaug
Andrew Carnegie
Willis Haviland Carrier
Vinton Cerf & Robet Kahn
Samuel Colt
Frederick Douglass
Dwight Eisenhower
Tommy Franks
Bill Gates
John Jay
John Hancock
Patrick Henry
Lewis & Clark
George Marshall
John Marshall
George Mason
Samuel Morse
Robert Oppenheimer
"Black Jack" Pershing
James Polk
Nikola Tesla
Harry Truman
Mark Twain
Selections 50-100
John Quincy Adams
Ethan Allen
Stephen Austin
Clara Barton
Stephen Bechtel
Omar Bradley
Werner Von Braun
John Moses Browning
Henry Clay
Davy Crockett
Stephen Decatur
Walt Disney
Dorothea Dix
Philo Farnsworth
Charles Grandison Finney
Robert Goddard
Billy Graham
Nathanael Greene
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Stonewall Jackson
John Paul Jones
Robert E. Lee
John F. Kennedy
Ray Kroc
Dwight L. Moody
J. Pierpont Morgan
James Naismith
Chester Nimitz
James Otis
Edgar Allan Poe
Elvis Presley
John Rockerfeller
Franklin Roosevelt
Jackie Robinson
Babe Ruth
Winfield Scott
B. F. Skinner
Elizabeth Stanton
Harriet Tubman
Sam Walton
Booker T. Washington
Anthony Wayne
John Wayne
James Watson
Thomas Watson
Daniel Webster
Eli Whitney
Woodrow Wilson
Cornelius Vanderbilt
Brigham Young
Furthermore, as an extra added bonus, if there are any bloggers out there who'd like to post their own lists, link back to this post, and then let me know about it in the comment section, via email, or via trackback, -- I'll link to your list. The blogs that have already done so (on Friday's post), are listed below...
*** Update #1 ***: James Watson was dropped down to the bottom 50 (I always seem to forget that his partner Francis Crick was a Brit), Ulysses S. Grant was moved up to the top 25 in his place, & Samuel Morse moved up to the 2nd group of 25 to replace Grant. Also, Robert Kennedy, who was accidentally included, was dropped, and Clara Barton was added to the list.
*** Update #2 ***: On 6/27/05, I decided to dump Steve Jobs and Charles Lindbergh and add Ethan Allen and James Otis to the 51-100 list.
Should Republicans Really Be Taking Advice From Eleanor Clift?
Democratic flack Eleanor Clift offers some "helpful" advice to Republicans (Shouldn't we be the ones giving them advice since they keep losing elections?):
"Conservatives will have to decide who they hate more in 2008, Hillary Clinton or John McCain. That’s how a veteran of the Reagan White House sizes up the current field. The religious right loathes Hillary, the presumptive Democratic nominee, and they love Virginia Sen. George Allen, an amiable, Reagan-like figure whose father once coached the Redskins.
Allen will do well in the Republican primaries, but polls will show him losing by 7 percentage points to Hillary at the same time they show McCain handily beating her. That will be the moment of truth for evangelical Christians. What they do depends on how hungry they are to win. If they go with McCain, he could ease their anxieties by choosing Florida Gov. Jeb Bush as his running mate.
Improbable, you say, but this comes from a savvy observer of the political scene. Brother Jeb is beloved among the Christian right for shepherding the case of the brain-damaged Terri Schiavo into the national spotlight, and the Bush dynasty is yearning to be established. Tucked in a New Yorker article last month on McCain was the revelation that he assured conservative activist Gary Bauer that if elected president he would nominate pro-life judges. Bush refused to make such an explicit promise, which is why Bauer endorsed McCain in the 2000 primaries.
McCain broke with the religious right over the gay-marriage amendment, but he is pro-life and has a 100 percent voting record in Congress to prove it."
There are several things worth commenting on here, so let me start at the beginning:
1) A poll of the American public done in 2005 on who would beat whom in 2008 is essentially worthless to begin with given how far out we are and that the real campaign hasn't even started yet.
Moreover, a poll pitting a candidate like Hillary who is essentially a known quantity vs. George Allen who has very low name ID is even more pointless than usual. 80% of America probably couldn't pick George Allen out of a line-up at this point, so the poll means nothing.
2) Despite the fact that McCain has a small Republican fan club and he's beloved by the MSM, he would be as disastrous a candidate for the GOP in 2008 as George McGovern was for the Democrats in 1972.
In part, that's because the mainstream media that dotes on McCain today because he's a "maverick" who irritates other Republicans would turn on him with a vengeance if he went head to head with Hillary. Once McCain becomes the Republican standard bearer, the free ride the press gives him today would end in a hurry.
Moreover, for every Republican who really likes John McCain, there are probably 3 who hate his guts because of his stance on judges, illegal immigration, gay marriage, McCain-Feingold, and most of all, his endless catering to the MSM at the expense of other Republicans.
Personally, I think John McCain is an egomaniacal, grandstanding blowhard who would make a terrible President and while I would prefer him over Hillary, I could not recommend that any conservative contribute money to his campaign or volunteer to help him out. Furthermore, I can assure you that the number of people on the right who feel that way about McCain is legion.
3) Despite what some people would like you to think, Hillary Clinton is just a smarter version of John Kerry in a skirt. Like Kerry, Hillary is a liberal, with a liberal voting record, from a liberal state who's going to have to try to convince the voters that she's really moderate while spinning away the considerable amount of baggage she has. While chances are it's not going to work very well, in today's polarized environment, it's likely that Hill will at least be in the hunt.
However, that works the other way as well. Unless the Republicans put up a candidate like McCain or Giuliani who'll split the base, our candidate should be in the hunt, too. As long as the nominee passes the smell test on immigration and isn't a total dog, he/she's going to be able to raise money, appeal to the base and the American people, probably sweep the South just like Bush did in 2000 and 2004, and will likely beat Hillary who -- like most MSM favorites from liberal states -- is wildly over-hyped.
Has Republican Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham Been Bribed?
I can't say that I know a whole lot about California Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-CA) -- well, other than the fact that he looks to be about as crooked as a dog's hindleg. Take a look at this sweet deal Cunningham got and tell me it doesn't look just as sleazy as Hillary Clinton's cattle futures pay-off:
"A defense contractor with ties to Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham took a $700,000 loss on the purchase of the congressman's Del Mar house while the congressman, a member of the influential defense appropriations subcommittee, was supporting the contractor's efforts to get tens of millions of dollars in contracts from the Pentagon.
Mitchell Wade bought the San Diego Republican's house for $1,675,000 in November 2003 and put it back on the market almost immediately for roughly the same price. But the Del Mar house languished unsold and vacant for 261 days before selling for $975,000.
Meanwhile, Cunningham used the proceeds of the $1,675,000 sale to buy a $2.55 million house in Rancho Santa Fe. And Wade, who had been suffering through a flat period in winning Pentagon contracts, was on a tear – reeling in tens of millions of dollars in defense and intelligence-related contracts.
In an interview Wednesday, Cunningham conceded that the circumstances surrounding the transaction could raise "fair" questions, but he insisted that the real estate deal was legitimate and independent of his efforts to help Wade win contracts.
...Wade was traveling without access to a telephone last week, according to Scotty Brumett, an official of Wade's company, MZM Inc. Brumett said Wade purchased the two-story, four-bedroom, three-and-a-half-bath residence to raise MZM's corporate profile in San Diego.
"We were looking at expanding our company presence in San Diego," Brumett said. "We looked at the property and thought it would work for us. But after we bought it, we realized that it did not meet our security or our corporate needs."
So the company placed it back on the market within one month of purchasing it, where it stayed for more than eight months, selling eventually for $700,000 less than the price Wade gave Cunningham."
Good grief, it looks like they were so confident they could get away with it that they hardly even bothered to hide what they were doing.
The defense contractor does Cunningham a favor by buying the house at a price that was obviously way too high. Then the contractor doesn't move into the house, it's almost immediately put back on the market, and they take a big loss on their "investment" -- well, if you don't count all the money MZM made in government contracts. Just take a look at how MZM's fortunes changed after they did a little favor for their buddy "Duke:"
"But MZM's corporate Web site boasts that during 2004, "MZM Inc. experienced significant growth, tripling revenues since the beginning of the year and increasing staff by 285 percent. We look forward to continued growth in 2005."
If Cunningham is honest (which I sincerely doubt), then he's too dumb to be in Congress because even a nitwit should have been able to see the huge ethical morass lying dead ahead. However, if Cunningham is not honest, then he's a crook who deserves to be tarred and feathered and then run out of Washington on a rail.
Either way, Randy "Duke" Cunningham deserves to lose his job.
"In 2003 and 2004, MZM's business picked up. In fiscal 2003, it won $41 million in defense contracts. Since then, MZM has added tens of millions of dollars in additional contracts, including a $5 million contract to provide interpreters in Iraq. In 2004, MZM had $66 million in revenues, according to Washington Technology magazine, which put the relative corporate newcomer on its 2005 list of "Top 100 Federal Prime Contractors."
How is this possible? The deficit is shrinking. We've seen 24 straight months of economic growth and the unemployment rate is down to 5.1%. The trade deficit is down. Housing starts are up. The economy of 2004 was the best in five years... just to name a few things. There are so many different indicators telling us that the economy is doing very well, yet only a third of Americans can see it? I just don't get it.
Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan is also upbeat about the economy. i remember when Bush was running for President in 2000, and he was warning the country that the economy was about to go in decline. The Democrats accused him of talking down the economy. Well, Bush was right, the economy went into recession... But guess what? We got tax relief, and the economy turned around. Now what do we see happening? The Democrats talking down the economy. Unfortunately, it appears to be working.
This post was used with the permission of Blogs For Bush.
Lefty Howard Fineman explains the real problem with Howard Dean's (the Republicans are) "pretty much a white, Christian party" comments -- if the Republicans are the party for Christians, what does that make the Democrats?
"But Dean's real problem may not be his mouth but his mind-set. He and his aides seemed genuinely mystified at the idea that his characterization of the GOP was a political mistake. But by labeling the other party a bastion of Christianity, he implied that his own was something else—something determinedly secular—at a time when Dean's stated aim is to win the hearts of middle-class white Southerners, many of whom are evangelicals. In a slide-show presentation at the DNC conference last weekend, polltaker Cornell Belcher focused on why those voters aren't responding to the Democrats' economic message. One reason, he said, is that too many of them see the Democrats as "anti-religion." And why was that? No one asked Dean, who wasn't taking questions from the press."
Translated, that means how are we ever going to trick these Christian evangelicals into voting for a party full of people who are hostile to them if you're saying things like this in public? Be more careful or you'll never fool those rubes!
Today on my other blog, Conservative Grapevine, you can find a tribute to real men, an explanation of why the Euro is bad for Europe, A call for Reparations for the victims of Gitmo, and a post on patriotism and the press -- among other posts.
Make sure to check it out Conservative Grapevine, bookmark it, and learn to love it, because CG is the best thing going today in the blogosphere, right after RWN.
