The Seventh Sense

Bill Kristol On Sarah Palin (with updates)

He writes:

I like Sarah Palin (though I don't know her well). I respect her (though I'm aware of some of her limitations). I wish her well (though I'm not convinced she should be the 2012 Republican presidential nominee).

I am convinced, though, that she should have a chance to compete and make her case.

Um, she made her case to be vice-president, which is itself a litmus test of whether or not she could be president (the vice-president really having no other role than to be the pres-in-waiting).  And people were generally not pleased -- including the majority of Republicans.

In this, I seem to differ from many of my friends in the mainstream media and the Republican establishment. They tend not only to dislike and disdain Palin, they also want to bury her chances now as a presidential possibility. What are they so scared of?

Oh, Mr. Kotter, Mr. Kotter.  Two things they're scared of:  (1) a Palin presidency and/or (2) the further demise of the GOP.  Seems rather obvious to me.

It's silly to claim Palin has no chance to win the nomination or the presidency. The fact is, despite a rough campaign in 2008, Palin has been (for what it's worth at this stage) a co-front-runner in polls of GOP primary voters for 2012, along with Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee. In a recent Pew survey, she had the strongest favorable-unfavorable numbers of the likely candidates among Republicans.

Yeah, but who ARE those candidates?  Newt?  Huckabee?

She has fervent supporters, which would presumably help her in primaries and caucuses. Among the general public, she has a not-great but not-unmanageable 45-44 favorability rating.

Thats, uh, not good.

Will her poll numbers fall because she has opted to step down early from the Alaska governorship? Perhaps. But the short-term effect of that decision will soon be swamped by judgments people make as they see her out and about, speaking and opining on the issues of the day.

Late night comedian jokes?  Dude, she's been in the public spotlight for a year.  We ALL saw her in the debates, when she really avoided answering questions of policy and decided to flirt with the camera.  That's how she opines -- by whining about the press and telling everyone she's "not your usual politician".  That's old now; it's going to be an even BIGGER joke by 2012.

Kristol ends his column by saying that Palin may run, but then again she may not.

Thanks for the info, Bill.

MORE OF THE SAME via Ezra Klein:

The Weekly Standard's Jim Prevor thinks Sarah Palin's critics have spoken too soon. Much too soon:

We don’t know what she will do in the private sector. Will she write a thoughtful book? Become a syndicated columnist whose ideas make her a “must read” for everyone? Will she found an important new think tank? An important journal? Spearhead an effort to help the unemployed? Decide to launch a business? Or maybe she will start a new political party?

Will she cure cancer? Perfect cold fusion? Translate ancient Sumerian texts? Restore sight to the blind through the power of her touch? It's hard to say. But it's just like those coastal elites to relentlessly criticize Sarah Palin for healing the blind. It's honorable for countless others to heal the sick. But there's of course a different standard for the decisions she makes.

BONUS PALIN:  In an interview with ABC News,

Palin said she was surprised by the media storm that followed her announcement to leave office, saying she thought it would not have been "such a darn big deal."

Right.  She only sent out a press release to every media outlet in the country.  Or perhaps she doesn't realize how unusual it is for a governor to resign absent a scandal.  Perhaps she thinks it happens all the time.

Palin conceded many people are still confused about why she made the decision to leave office.

"You know why they're confused? I guess they cannot take something nowadays at face value," Palin said.

Well, you didn't really give a reason, Sarah.

But then she did hint at one.

But she said a major factor in the decision was the mounting legal bills she and the state have had to incur to fight ethics charges from her political adversaries. None of the accusations has been proven but, she said, the costs of fighting them have been enormous.

Well, there were accusations which were true, and which she did not fight.

And now, the best part:

Palin said there is a difference between the White House and what she has experienced in Alaska. If she were in the White House, she said, the "department of law" would protect her from baseless ethical allegations.

"I think on a national level, your department of law there in the White House would look at some of the things that we've been charged with and automatically throw them out," she said.

There is no "Department of Law" at the White House.

I honestly don't know what planet this "politician" lives on.  Aside from the fact there is no White House "Department of Law", there is nothing that protects the President from ethical allegations, "baseless" or otherwise.  Not the Justice Department (which isn't in the White House) nor the Office of General Counsel.

By the way, The state of Alaska does have a Department of Law, but it apparently wasn’t able to keep Palin safe from some of the things she's been charged with, either.

Finally, another conservative pundit's take seems pretty spot-on:

If Palin simply had announced Friday that she was done with politics because she didn't want to bankrupt her family defending against baseless charges, you could applaud. But in leaving the door open for a run-up, Palin blew that.

Instead, the rambling remarks served to reinforce the suspicion that Palin was not up to the No. 2 slot. She's stuck in the victim gear. On the heels of her orgy of indignation over David Letterman's jokes, there's too much "poor me." Palin's attorney told CNN Monday that Palin deliberately chose to resign on July 3 as a "declaration of independence from politics as usual." You would never guess Palin campaigned for the office that she now finds so confining. "If I've learned one thing," Palin said Friday, "life is about choices." Good, because in cleaving to the victim role, Palin chose her path. Americans don't elect victims to the White House.

Of course, this entire post can be summed up with one Tom Tomorrow cartoon:

Fox News Wants Bin Laden To Strike America Again

Why?

Because that's the only way to protect America from those librul tree-hugging hippies in Washington DC who are letting America's guard down against the evil ones.  We can't let our guard down because it is sure to result in another terrorist attack on American soil, which is bad, so therefore Osama needs to attack us like he did on 9/11 so that we'll wake up and not ever be attacked again like we were on 9/11.

Wait, what??

But in all seriousness, it says something about the depravity of the right wing media when Americans getting killed is small price to pay... so long as it gives them a chance to crow about how terrible at governing liberals are. 

Sigh.  Priorities, you know.

Great Moments In Pundtiry

Joe "the Plumber" Wurzelbacher, on the Constitution and Founding Fathers:

 "They knew socialism doesn't work. They knew communism doesn't work."

The Constitution predates socialism by about 100 years.

Who's To Blame For The Sanford Affair?

Who is responsible for Sanford flying down to Buenos Aires to spend five days with his paramour?

Sanford, right?  Seems like a good candidate for "the blame game".

Nope, you silly person.  Rush Limbaugh once again sets us straight.  It's Obama's fault.

Click here for the vid.

"This is almost like, 'I don't give a damn, the country's going to Hell in a handbasket, I just want out of here,'" said Limbaugh. "He had just tried to fight the stimulus money coming to South Carolina. He didn't want any part of it. He lost the battle. He said, 'What the Hell. I mean, I'm -- the federal government's taking over -- what the Hell, I want to enjoy life.'"

"The point is," he added, "there are a lot of people whose spirit is just -- they're fed up, saying to Hell with it, I don't even want to fight this anymore, I just want to get away from it."

Pat Boone Cannot Tell The Truth

Lot of really good over-the-top anti-Obama wingnuttery these days. 

Over at Renew America, Marie Jon No-More-Apostrophe has penned her solution to deal with Obama in a piece entitled "How do we stop Communism? Pray!"

And Sher "It Appears That" Zieve is still using her favorite rhetorical devices -- capital letters and the phrase "it appears that" -- to gin up the coming ObamaArmageddon.  Here's an example:

By the way, ObamaCare will also him to control virtually all of the actions — what we can and cannot eat, do, say, think etc. — of American citizens. It will also allow him and his adherents to ultimately decide who will live and who will die. This will be called ObamaTotalControl.

But I'm kind of partial to Pat Boone's brand of earnest lunacy, which is found in his latest Newsmax column, "Obama Should Emulate George Washington's Truthfulness".  He starts out:

I doubt that it’s ever taught in school today, because it seems that the National Education Association has different ideas about what our kids need to know.

What is "it"?  Pat's going to tell us:

But most adults over 40 surely are familiar with the story about young George Washington, who had been given a small hatchet for his birthday.

Yes, Pat.  The kids NEED to know made-up stories about the founding fathers instead of this shit.

Eager to try it out, the boy looked for something to hack (the word had a different meaning in our forefathers' days). And he found it — a little cherry tree. When his father found that a perfectly good cherry tree had been destroyed, he asked George whether he knew what had happened.

“Father, I cannot tell a lie,” said the future first president of the United States of America. “I did it.”

Yeah, I think it is important to teach kids not to tell a lie, too.  But we kind of undercut the lesson when we use a story which is itself a lie, don't we?

An insignificant story, perhaps, just a little morality tale for kids. No one today can verify whether it actually happened. I, for one, believe it did, mainly because if its apparent insignificance.

In other words, if it has significance, it really happened.  Really, that's all it takes. 

If there weren’t a factual basis for the story, who would make it up?

Um, this guy maybe?

Mason Locke Weems (October 11, 1756 – May 23, 1825), generally known as Parson Weems, was an American printer and author. He is best known as the source of some of the apocryphal stories about George Washington, including the famous tale of the cherry tree ("I cannot tell a lie, I did it with my little hatchet"). The Life of Washington, Weems' most famous work, contained the story. Creating a moral tale to emphasize a character trait was a commonly used literary device in 18th century biographies.

Emphasis mine.  But back to Pat:

Surely a fableist would conjure up something more dramatic than a little boy cutting down a cherry tree with his new hatchet.

Surely.  After all, is there a book more gripping and dramatic than Aesop's Fables?

But what makes it significant is that it underscores, from a very early age, the character of the man who became our first president — and a role model for all who would follow him into that office. His honesty never was questioned throughout his distinguished military career, his political leadership, and his virtually unanimously elected two terms as president of the United States.

His slaves also never questioned his honesty.  Oh, sorry.  Why did I have to bring that up?

In fact, his admiring friend Thomas Jefferson wrote about Washington: “His integrity was the most pure, his justice the most inflexible I have ever known. He was, in every sense of the word, a wise, a good, and a great man.”

That was just before Jefferson wrote about how "naturally irritable" Washington was.  No, really.

Is it any wonder, then, that parents and teachers have pointed to the man we call “the father of our country” for nearly 200 years as an example for our kids to emulate? That, too, makes the story of the apple tree meaningful and important: Children can understand the moral and learn a valuable lesson from their earliest years.

Oh, so now it's an apple tree?

Pat then compares Obama to George Washington -- not the real George Washington, of course (which is an unfair comparison anyway) -- but the fake hatchet-breaing, cherry-and-or-apple-tree-chopping George Washington.

I'm not exactly sure that Pat is any position to criticize the NEA or extol the virtues of truth in a column so riddled with inaccuracies.

The Obama Syndicate

I'm increasingly becoming a fan of Sher Zieve of Renew America and her over-the-top columns.  This week's gem is:

Obama and his syndicate operating outside of US law

by Sher Zieve

I was wondering why the scarcity of capital letters in her op-ed title, and then I realized she used them all up in her opening sentence:

ObamaLaw (and increasingly the following of ONLY ObamaLaw) is now the official decree of DIC (Dictator in Chief) Obama in and for Obama-Land — formerly known as the United States of America.

Wow, that's a grabber.

Think that statement is an exaggeration?

ObamaLaw is now the official decree of the dictator Obama?  Why, yes, Sher.  That does strike me as a bit of an exaggeration.

Really?

Really.

Well — let's take a look, shall we?

Ok-a-lee-doke-a-lee.

The Obama Thugocracy has commandeered the largest banks in the USA for its personal use. Although the Obama Syndicate's monetary resources are not yet — completely — unlimited, they soon will be.

Obama Thugocracy?  Or Obama Syndicate?  Which is it?

By the way, where has this money gone? The definition of Obama Transparency is to hide from any and all for as long as possible.

And now it's "Obama Transparency"?  You know, it's kind of like McDonalds, where they stick the prefix "Mc" in front of every noun.

And bear in mind, he is using OUR money to both extort the banks and rule more powerfully over We-the-People. Behind closed doors, the banks were told by President George W. Bush's former US Treasury Secretary and Obama supporter Henry Paulson that they must agree to take government bailout money "or else."

"Extort the banks"?  I'm not a lawyer but -- oh, wait -- yes, I am.... and I'm pretty sure that you don't commit extortion by forcing people to take money.  That said, one wonders what the Obama Consequences are for those many many banks which didn't take government bailout money.  Probably Obama Torture.

This has come to be known as "an offer they couldn't refuse."

That phrase comes, of course, from The Godfather, when Don Corleone went around bailing out industries.

This "offer" was followed by DIC Obama's comment to the bank CEOs: "My administration is the only thing between you and the pitchforks!" Note: This is a Jesse Jackson-type shakedown that has been taken to previously untried monumental levels. See Ken Timmerman's book "Shakedown" for complete information.

Actually, Obama's comment regarding pitchforks was in reference to the anger that the general public feels for bailed-out banks giving excessive bonuses to managers who created the financial mess in the first place.

And I'm not sure what the Jesse Jackson reference is about, but I'm pretty sure it can be ignnored.

Threatening private enterprise — if it does not submit and allow ObamaTheft — with the weight of the US Government is not only unconstitutional it veritably screams and shouts that the US government has now become a massive criminal enterprise — increasingly run by Obama and his accountable-to-no-one-but-Obama Czars.

It's not unconstitutional in the Obama Constitution.

Using similar gangster-tactics that worked with the cowering bank CEOs, Obama has taken over two of the US' car companies. One of them, Government Motors (formerly known as General Motors), was seized by the Obama Syndicate and its spoils split between it and the United Auto Workers union leadership.

I'm picking up a theme...

Again, the Obama dictatorship used We-the-People's money to finance its deal that places OUR money and power into the pockets of the Obama political elite — and only those political elite.

Aaahh!  So it's a profit deal!

Unconstitutional? Of course. Criminal? Of course. So — is anyone trying to stop Obama's unconstitutional and criminal seizure of US power? Of course — NOT.

Oh, she fooled me.  I thought the third one was going to be another "of course" and then she threw that "NOT" in.

It appears the former "loyal opposition" is also cowering in fear of and from the US dictator.

Not Sher though.  She tells it like it is.... without exaggeration.

Additional information on Obama's confiscation of 2/3 of the US Auto Industry is that his new "Car Czar" Steven Rattner — who has thus far avoided any and all interviews from the press and any and all questions from Congress — is a 31 year old lawyer whose only experience with cars is that of having driven them or having been driven while in them. Obama — in his unswerving despotic "wisdom" — has also appointed another 'I know nothing about the auto industry' guys — former AT&T Chief Edward E. Whitacre, Jr. as Chairman of GM.

Sher, honey.  It's not about cars.  It's about business.  It's about corporate structuring.  Oh, and by the way, you think GM's management has done a bang-up job?

In other words, GM is neither expected nor planned to be successful. Instead — like both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — the new Government Motors appears to be no more than a new giant slush fund for Democrats.

"Appears"? 

A smiling Obama has already admitted that the US is out of money. It's amazing that by Obama having placed his mind and adherents to the task he was able to successfully bankrupt the country in no time at all! Sadly, I predicted this almost a year ago.

Isn't that amazing?  What Sher believed would come true has actually come true!  I can't find any reasonable explanation for this, other than the fact that she is the smartest person in the world.

However, Obama also states that he has no intention of slowing his spending. Instead, he will simply authorize the printing of more increasingly worthless US money. Then, he will tax...tax...tax the American people to death as he works toward his next arena for destruction — the US Energy industry; which will increase yearly/family energy costs by at least $4,000.

You mean the Obama Energy Industry.  Please get your names right.

All the while, Obama remains smiling at the stupid masses who allowed the "election" of a non-citizen usurper to the presidency of the United States.

Hey.  You're insulting your audience, Sher.

And, in order to further ensure the subservience of the former American people (soon to be called Obamaites) the US Dictator in Chief plans to control the US Health System. In this way, Obama, his "Health Czar" and his soon-to-be-established Department of Health Police will be able to dictate who receives medical care and who does not (therefore ultimately who lives and who dies), what We-the-People can eat and not eat, what actions we can engage in and those in which we are not allowed to engage etc. etc. etc. After seizing heathcare from the private sector and placing it firmly in Obama's governmental hands his power over us will be unlimited. And with no one having the testosterone or internal fortitude to stand up to him, Obama's position of US Dictator for Life is only a moment or two away.

I'm sure we'll someday read an article where Sher exclaims that her prediction regarding health care has come true.

Once the US was a government of laws — not men. Now, however, it has degraded into a government of one man; a man who does not even appear to be a natural-born US citizen as required by the US Constitution.

Plus, he's black.

But, until and unless anyone decides to fight for its preservation, the US Constitution is now null and void. Then, to add more insult to more injury, the Obama Administration is now requiring that "high value terrorist detainees" INSIDE OF AFGHANISTAN be given US Miranda Rights. Folks, sanity has not only left the building it has left the country. The totalitarian insane are now firmly and unequivocally in charge and running the country — into the abyss.

Not that she's exaggerating or anything.

Pat Buchanan On Sotomayor

In Human Events:

Having lost the Congress in 2006 and the White House in 2008, Republicans are looking to redefine themselves for a nation that still leans conservative but is less Republican that it has been in decades.

"Leans conservative" based on....? 

The nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court presents just such an opportunity. For, even if the party loses the battle and Sotomayor sits on the court, it can win the war, as Ronald Reagan won the Panama Canal debate, even as Senate Republicans committed collective suicide by voting to give away the canal.

We all remember that, right?

What are the grounds for rejecting Sonia Sotomayor?

Pat would like to reject her on the grounds of being Latina, but he can't just come out and say that. So....

No one has brought forth the slightest evidence she has the intellectual candlepower to sit on the Roberts court. By her own admission, Sotomayor is an "affirmative action baby."

Though the Obama media have been ballyhooing her brilliance -- No. 1 in high school, No. 1 at Princeton, editor of Yale Law Review -- her academic career appears to have been a fraud from beginning to end, a testament to Ivy League corruption.

Let's see -- #1 in high school, #1 at Princeton, editor of Yale Law Review -- I think those say something about her "intellectual candlepower", yes?

Two weeks ago, The New York Times reported that, to get up to speed on her English skills at Princeton, Sotomayor was advised to read children's classics and study basic grammar books during her summers. How do you graduate first in your class at Princeton if your summer reading consists of "Chicken Little" and "The Troll Under the Bridge"?

Um, by doing those things to improve your English and then excelling academically?

In video clips dating back 25 years, and now provided to the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sotomayor, according to the Times, even calls herself an "affirmative action product."

"The clips include lengthy remarks about her experiences as an 'affirmative action baby,' whose lower test scores were overlooked by admissions committees at Princeton University and Yale Law School because, she said, she is Hispanic and had grown up in poor circumstance."

"If we had gone through the traditional numbers route of those institutions," says Sotomayor, "it would have been highly questionable if I would have been accepted. ... My test scores were not comparable to that of my classmates."

Thus, Sotomayor got into Princeton, got her No. 1 ranking, was whisked into Yale Law School and made editor of the Yale Law Review -- all because she was a Hispanic woman. And those two Ivy League institutions cheated more deserving students of what they had worked a lifetime to achieve, for reasons of race, gender or ethnicity.

Astute readers here will wonder as I did.  Perhaps her LSAT test scores were not the asbolute best, but being #1 at Princeton probably ushered into Yale Law School.  And you don't get top class ranking by virtue of your ethnicity, even in an "affirmative action" world.  That comes solely from academic excellance.  Same with Yale Law Review membership.

This is bigotry pure and simple.

You got that right, Pat.

To salve their consciences for past societal sins, the Ivy League is deep into discrimination again, this time with white males as victims rather than as beneficiaries.

One prefers the old bigotry. At least it was honest, and not, as Abraham Lincoln observed, adulterated "with the base alloy of hypocrisy."

Lincoln was, of course, talking about the bigotry against white men, as we all recall from history.

As the Times reports, on the tapes, Sotomayor rejects "the proposition that minorities must become advocates of 'selection by merit alone.' She said diversity improved the legal system."

"'Since I have difficultly defining merit and what merit alone means, and ... whether it's judicial or otherwise, I accept that different experiences, in and of itself, bring merit to the system,' she said, adding, 'I think it brings to the system more of a sense of fairness when these litigants see people like myself on the bench."

What does the latest Times revelation tell us?

That were it not for Ivy League dishonesty, Sotomayor would not have gotten into Princeton, would never have been ranked first in her class, would not have gotten into Yale Law, nor been named editor of Yale Law Review, and thus would not be a U.S. appellate court judge today or a nominee to the Supreme Court.

No.  Again, affirmative action does not give anyone heightened class ranking.  It may have given her access to Princeton, but once she was there, her first-in-class ranking was all her own.  If anything, this shows the rightness of affirmative action, and how it allows qualified people in.

Indeed, the White House itself leaked that the final four court candidates were all women and Sotomayor was picked because she was a Latina. One wonders how many superior students and judges have been passed over to advance Sonia Sotomayor's career?

To Pat, "superior" = "white male"

From college days to court days, that career reflects, in word and deed, a determination to use any power she achieves to create a society where the demands of diversity triumph over the ideal of equal justice under law. For Sotomayor, the advancement of people of color over white males is justice.

Like she did in all those discrimination cases she rejected?

Republican senators should use this Sotomayor nomination to put affirmative action in the dock for what it is -- race-based bigotry against white males so that persons of color can receive the rewards of society that they could not win in free and fair competition.

Lay out the Sotomayor record -- SAT scores, LSAT scores, bar exam score, law review articles and her opinions -- so that we can see up close what those who eviscerated Robert Bork regard as academic and judicial excellence.

Interesting how he doesn't mention her grades. 

No need for name-calling.

No, that would be too obvious.

Just lay out the lady's opinions and record, so that, if she is elevated, Americans can say: Barack Obama voted against Chief Justice Roberts because Roberts could not measure up to Sonia Sotomayor, his ideal of what a justice ought to be.

Roberts went to Harvard, which has 40% legacy admissions.  "Free and fair competition"?

The Dumbest Thing Written (So Far) About The Holocaust Museum Shooting

From Debbie Schlussel, in a post entitled "So What If The Holocaust Museum Shooter Is A White Christian.....?":

Make no mistake. Muslims created this atmosphere where hatred of the Jews is okay and must be "tolerated" as a legitimate point of view. The shooting today is just yet another manifestation emanating from that viewpoint--another manifestation of the welcome mat that Muslims rolled out for fellow anti-Semites of all stripes to no longer be afraid to come out of the closet.

Right.  So it's still the fault of Muslims and 9/11.  Because anti-Semites would just be sitting there quietly had those brown-skinned people not "opened the door".

I guess that whole Nazi thing back in the 30's and 40's was also Muslim-inspired.

Punditry Of The Day

The Corner's Victor Davis Hanson:

A disinterested observer would conclude that Justice Sotomayor is race-obsessed. In her now much quoted 2001 UC Berkeley speech she invoked “Latina/Latino” no less than 38 times, in addition to a variety of other racial-identifying synonyms. When one reads the speech over, the obsession with race become almost overwhelming, and I think the public has legitimate worries (more than the Obama threshold of 5% of cases) over whether a judge so cognizant of race could be race-blind in her decision making.

Race-obsessed?  Yes, well.  Perhaps her invoking "Latina" was justified, seeing as how she was speaking at a UC Berkeley School of Law symposium entitled "Raising the Bar: Latino and Latina Presence in the Judiciary and the Struggle for Representation".

Shockers!  One wonder what Justice Alito spoke about here.

Seriously, Hanson's observations are kind of like pointing out that Obama must be a Muslim because he made all kinds of Muslim references in a speech to the Muslim world.  But nobody is stupid enough to make that argument.... oh, wait.

Rush's Unique Colorblindness

Rush, on Hannity, June 5, 2009, on what makes the GOP so great:

We don't look at a group of people and pick out the number of blacks in it and the number of whites and the number of women.

Colorblind Rush, today, on his show:

Colorblind Rush, also today:

"It is offensive to the sensibilities of millions of people to hear a member of the state-run media refer to a half-black, half-white human being with no experience running anything of substance referred to as a god. He may be president of the United States, but he's not a god."

For someone who claims the GOP is great because it doesn't notice race, Rush sure seems to notice race a lot.

Q: When Is It Time To Start Ignoring George Will Columns Attempting To Debunk Global Warming?

(1)  When you read something like this...

and/or

(2) When George Will starts citing cartoons to support his position.

Dumbhat Op-ed

Ross Douthat in NY Times ("Justices Gone Wild"):

The right tends to blame the left for the Supreme Court’s expanded ambit, and not unjustly. The modern Court’s most enduringly controversial power grabs — with Roe v. Wade leading the way — were usually the work of liberal justices, and even the more modest liberal theories of jurisprudence tend to depict the Justices as soldiers in the progressive cause, constrained primarily by what the political climate allows them to get away with.

Can someone explain to me how Roe v Wade, which limited state government's control over what a liberated woman could do with her body, constitutes a "power grab" by liberals?  That case may be a lot of things, but it certainly didn't expand liberals' hold on power.

And while we're at it, can someone explain to me how someone can write about "power grabs" by the Supreme Court without mentioning the power-grabbiest Supreme Court case of all time: Bush v. Gore?

Remember That DHS Report?

Michelle Malkin apparently doesn't think the killer of Dr. Tiller is a "terrorist".  He's an "extremist".  She adds:

Interesting how the t-word has been rediscovered.

She has the memory of a moth.  It was only back in April when the Department of Homeland Security issued a report equating right-wing extremism as a possible breeding ground for terrorist acts.  The right wing reacted to the report with manufactured outrage, and even called for the resignation of DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano.  Michelle was on the forefront of the outrage.  Here's what she wrote:

DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano has turned her attention away from acts of Islamic jihad on American soil (which she now refers to as “man-caused disasters”). Instead, her department is sounding the alarm over an un-quantified “resurgence” in “rightwing extremism activity.” On April 7, DHS sent a nine-page warning memo to law enforcement offices across the country titled “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment.”

The report includes a sweeping definition of the threat:

“Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.”

Hmmmm.  In retrospect, it certainly appears like the DHS was on to something....

Michelle went on:

The report offers zero data, but states with an almost resentful attitude toward protected free speech: “Debates over appropriate immigration levels and enforcement policy generally fall within the realm of protected political speech under the First Amendment, but in some cases, anti-immigration or strident pro-enforcement fervor has been directed against specific groups and has the potential to turn violent.”

The same, naturally, goes for anti-abortion fervor.

“Potential to turn violent?” So did the hysterical fervor whipped up by Capitol Hill over the AIG bonuses, which prompted ugly death threats from across the country. No mention here, though. Not “rightwing” enough. Nor will you see Obama DHS warnings to police and sheriff’s departments about self-proclaimed bank terrorists such as Bruce Marks of the aggressive Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America or the mob activists of ACORN who have committed burglary, stormed corporate executives’ homes, and vowed to conduct “civil disobedience” by “any means necessary” in response to the “current economic and political climate.”

Michelle, I think your attempts at obfuscation failed.  Epic fail.  The left wing -- even the fringe -- typically does not react to political frustration with acts of violence.  There's no evidence of that (not, at least, since the 60's). 

But just in case you really believed all the garbage you wrote, Michelle, I hope you found yesterday's events educational (although, this isn't the first time something like this has happened).

[UPDATE: The New York Times is reporting that Tiller's killer subscribed to a newsletter called "Prayer and Action News", which advocates justifiable homicide for abortion doctors]

Mark Kleiman reminds us of the DHS report's relevance.

Remember how Republicans in Congress were all in a dither about the DHS report on right-wing extremist organizations as potential terrorist threats? The Tiller gunman was affiliated with at least two of those organizations. In addition to his connection with Operation Rescue, he was a tax protester, a "sovereign citizen," and a member of the Freemen. Maybe someone should ask Rep. Peter King of New York (ranking Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee) and John Hinderaker of PowerLine whether they still consider the threat of right-wing terrorism to be mere Obama Administration fantasy. (That's beside the fact that the report was ordered up during the Bush Administration.)

Greg Sargent added this morning, "[T]he general intent of the report, which was chock full of warnings about 'lone wolf extremists' capable of violence, now looks perfectly defensible, even reasonable."

Steve Benen:

This really should have been apparent to the administration's detractors in the midst of the "controversy." There are some Americans on the fringes of society who are both radical and potentially dangerous. It only makes sense for the Department of Homeland Security to be cognizant of these threats, and communicate with state and local law enforcement agencies about the possibility of violence.

Yesterday was a painful reminder of this.

Will Malkin connect the dots between the DHS report and Scott Roeder (the murderer)?  Don't hold your breath.

But violent right wing extremists are out there.  Llike the Tiller killer, another member of the "sovereign citizen" movement was arrested yesterday, in a little-publicized story:

Federal authorities in Seattle have filed gun and drug charges against an alleged member of a secessionist movement after agents seized a weapons cache that included four silencers, body armor and a fully automatic rifle.

Filings in the case, currently before the U.S. District Court in Seattle, offer glimpses into the "sovereign citizen" movement and, prosecutors contend, militia groups loosely affiliated with it.

But Malkin and others on the right didn't get it.  Here's the Christian Broadcast Network's David Brody, April 15, 2009:

Abortion Groups Labeled as Right Wing Extremists by Department of Homeland Security

Watch out! The pro-life right wing nuts are on the loose! Be very careful....They could be lurking around any corner!

Oy-vey.

Hey, that’s basically the message coming from the Department of Homeland Security. In a new report, here’s how DHS defines right wing extremism in America:

Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups, and those that are mainly anti-government, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.

Read the DHS report here.

The American Center for Law and Justice is outraged to say the least. Read a statement below from the group:

This is an outrageous characterization that raises serious questions about the leadership and direction of the agency charged with protecting Americans in the ongoing battle against terrorism,” said Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel of the ACLJ.  “Why would the Department of Homeland Security single out groups like pro-life supporters when they should be focusing on identifying and apprehending the real terrorists – like al-Qaeda – groups that have vowed to destroy America? This characterization is not only offensive to millions of Americans who hold constitutionally-protected views opposing abortion – but also raises serious concerns about the political agenda of an agency with a mandate to protect America.”

Now let me just say there are plenty of “nuts” out there to be sure...on both sides. It’s not JUST on the right. Racism of any kind is just plain wrong and hatred with accompanying violence is unacceptable. But to invoke “abortion” into the language of the document can definitely come across as a disservice to all the law abiding pro-life groups out there. Abortion clinic violence is wrong. Don’t get my wrong but why not be more specific about that rather than generically lump it all together under the abortion umbrella?

P.S.  By the way, it is "terrorism".  Terrorism is defined as politically-motivated violence, against a law-abiding American on American soil, intended to scare, intimidate, and change U.S. policy.  Certainly one of the tacit sub-motives of Tiller's killing was not only to stop Tiller, but to discourage others from doing the kind of late-term abortion work (rare as it is) that Tiller did.

Finally, returning to Malkin's post today, she writes:

Unfortunately, some are not content to leave it at that for now. They fail to respect that there is a proper time and place to indulge in political battle.

You can go here, here, and here for all that. Another round-up here.

Tiller’s family is grieving. Those who have jumped to score political points before Tiller is even buried are no better than the Phelps family thugs of the “Westboro Baptist Church” who respect no bounds of civility.

Unfortunately, it’s too much to ask the cable news networks and hyper-partisan snipers on the Internet to have the decency to restrain themselves.

Prepare for a wall-to-wall onslaught of gleeful finger-pointing on the Left and heated responses on the Right.

Prepare for whitewashed hagiographies of Tiller’s career as an abortionist.

Prepare for DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano’s defenders to gloat about vindication.

Prepare for collective demonization of pro-lifers and Christians — and more gratuitous attempts to tar talk radio, Fox News, and the Tea Party movement as responsible for the heinous crime.

Prepare for the continuing redefinition of any and all sharp political disagreement as “hate” — a ruinous trend that inevitably comes back to haunt the hysterical accusers decrying “hate” the loudest.

How unhinged has the discourse gotten already? Here’s the left-wing Daily Kos going after the left-wing John Aravosis for going after Barack Obama because he didn’t go after “right-wing extremism” hard enough.

Cognitive dissonance much. Michelle?  I'm surprised the part of your brain that calls for no political sniping doesn't throttle the other part of your brain that can't help but engage in political sniping.

Sadly, No responds to Malkin's time-and-a-place-for-thee-but-not-for-me:

We concur. This is not the time for partisan sniping and name-calling. Also, Michelle Malkin is a manipulative sack of shit.

Time For A Career Change?

From NY Craigslist:

Reply to: job-hqkb5-1169741827@craigslist.org
Date: 2009-05-13, 9:01PM EDT

Mercury Radio Arts is the New York based production company owned by Radio and TV host Glenn Beck.

Mercury seeks a writer for contributions to Glenn’s radio program, magazine, and web site. The ideal candidate will have a strong interest in news, current events, and politics.

Key responsibilities will include contributing original content to GlennBeck.com and to Glenn’s radio program and magazine. Writing will include a mix of short pieces and long articles, fact-based commentary on the news of the day, etc.

Requirements:

• Strong written and verbal communication skills
• Research skills
• At least 2 years of journalism experience


Interested candidates, please send resume, cover letter, and at least 3 writing samples. Cover letters must include salary requirements to be eligible for consideration.

Location: New York, NY

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer.

• Principals only. Recruiters, please don't contact this job poster.
• Please, no phone calls about this job!
• Please do not contact job poster about other services, products or commercial interests.

PostingID: 1169741827

My favorite part: "fact-based commentary".  Yeah, because that's what Glenn does soooo well.....

Best Self-Defeating Opening Paragraph By A Columnist Evah

Carey "Get Off My Lawn" Roberts is always a howl to read over at Renew America.  A good 75% of his columns are meandering screeds against women, although of course, he refers to them generically as feminists. 

He is one of the few brave conservative columnists to take a stand against those seeking to end domestic violence.  It's hard to tell why this particular bee is in his bonnet, but it is.  Something untoward from his past I suspect.

Anyway, in his latest screed in which he calls out domestic violence as being a hyped -up issue, Roberts begins with this unintentionally hilarious and devoid-of-irony paragraph:

Imagine a world where ideology takes the place of truth and laws are rooted in dubious factoids from nowhere. That pretty much sums up the fact-challenged, hysteria-mongering domestic violence industry that is propped up by $1 billion of federal money each year.

That's right -- there's a domestic violence industry out there creating false myths about domestic violence because doing so is profitable!  And they are the ones who are fact-challenged.

I'll leave it to you to read the entire article (it's typical Roberts anti-feminism), but I also wanted to point out his closing paragraphs:

Curious to know what are the leading causes of injury to women? Here they are: unintentional falls, car accidents, and overexertion. Domestic violence did not even make the list: http://mchb.hrsa.gov/whusa08/hstat/hi/pages/226i.html

So relax ladies, everything you've heard about the "epidemic" of domestic violence is mostly hype calculated to stampede you into divorcing your husband and voting for yet another taxpayer-funded, ideologically-charged abuse reduction program.

That's an interesting link you got there, Mr. Roberts.

If you follow it, it takes you to the U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services website, to the section on Women's Health.

Specifically, it takes you to the subsection on women's injuries.  And there you see this graph (click to embiggen):

  

Why, Carey is right!  The injury section doesn't even mention domestic violence.

Oh, wait.  What's that on the left hand column?

    

Ah.  Looks like Carey overlooked something.  Like the basic fact that domestic violence isn't an accidental "injury" at all, but an act of violence.  It's kind of like making the point that cheetahs aren't fast by linking to the Guinness Book of World Records site for the fastest land speed records for cars.  (See, cheetahs aren't even mentioned!)

The fact is that while more women suffer from injuries (falls, car accidents, etc.) the rate of domestic violence is alarmingly high.  In fact, for women between the ages of 20-34, the domestic violence rate is about 9.7 per thousand women, higher than the number of women who injure themselves with a cut.

So Carey -- who is fact-challenged?

Great Moments In Punditry: Swine Flu Edition

Pat Buchanan:

Because of the peril of swine flu, Joe Biden said yesterday, he would urge his family to stay out of "confined places" like airplanes and subways here in the United States.

Yet, the Obama administration will not consider closing the United States to airplanes and buses coming in from the epicenter of the epidemic, Mexico City.

Does this contradiction make sense?

Pat, you get swine flu from exposure to the virus, not from Mexicans.  The virus is already here.

Closing the borders would be like installing Norton Utilities after your computer has been infected and spread the Trojan Horse to other computers.  Or running off to Target to buy a fire extinguisher when the entire first floor of your house is ablaze.  In other words, that horse has already left the barn.

This is a very infectious strain.  And symptoms show up long after infection.  So you're not going to prevent it from coming.  It's here.  The thing to do now is take precautions to prevent its spread.

On the other side of the coin, you will be doing harm to the economy of both countries by closing the border.

But thanks for sharing your xenophobia.

The Future of Marriage

I know I am harping on this a lot lately, but the rightwing fear of gay marriages is at once both hilarious and disturbing.  To many of these wingers, the fact that some guy they don't know will marry some other guy they don't know represents an infringement on the freedom of the wingers.  And the end of mankind.  Take a look at this anti-gay-marriage ad, and its not-so-subtle "be afraid, be very afraid" undertones:

Some quotes:

"My freedom will be taken away from me".  How, honey?  Please tell us.

"I'm a California doctor who must choose between my faith and my job".  Huh??  Does gay marriage mean you must medically treat people that you don't treat today?  Oh, and about your job, doctor -- aren't you ethically bound to treat whoever comes to you for treatment?

"I'm a Massachusetts attorney helplessly watching public schools teach my son that gay marriage is okay."  No, the public schools in Massachusetts aren't teaching that.  What course is that in?  At best, they're teaching your son that gay marriage in Massachusetts is legal.  Which, by the way, is fact.

"Those [gay marriage] advocates want to change the way I think." followed by "I will have no choice".  Well, I'm not sure who these nameless advocates are (why can't these people ever name them?), but I think they've long given up on change the minds of bigots.  And you "have no choice"?  How exactly will the gay marriage advocates force you to change your mind?  About anything?  And, by the way, is changing your mind something to fear?

The ad is obviously tailored to send the message that gay marriage will impinge on the lives of those who do not support it.  It fails, as these things are typically won to do, to explain how such a thing is even possible.  In short, it's scaremongering.

[UPDATE: See the post above].

Well, that's what the far right does.

But I wanted to address a more thoughtful rightwing response to gay marriage by the editors of the National Review.  It's not blatant scaremongering like the ad above, but it is devoid of factual support and even common sense:

One of the great coups of the movement for same-sex marriage has been to plant the premise that it represents the inevitable future. This sense has inhibited even some who know perfectly well that marriage is by nature the union of a man and a woman. They fear that throwing themselves into the cause of opposing it is futile — worse, that it will call down the judgment of history that they were bigots.

Well, compare today with 2004, where George Bush elevated the issue of gay marriage to a predominant campaign theme.  Number of states recognizing gay marriage then?  Zero.  Now?  Three, with more on the way.  Objectively, doesn't the change at least suggest that gay marriage is inevitable?

I'm in no position to guess how the judgment of history will play out.  I do suspect, however, that the editors are correct: those who oppose gay marriage now will likely be viewed by future generations -- rightly or wrongly -- as bigots.  Too bad, so sad.  But that's the price one pays for being on the losing side of history.

Contrary to common perception, however, the public is not becoming markedly more favorable toward same-sex marriage. Support for same-sex marriage rose during the 1990s but seems to have frozen in place (at least according to Gallup) since the high court of Massachusetts invented a right to same-sex marriage earlier this decade.

The high court of Massachusetts didn't "invent" the right.  That's just snarkiness and stupidity rolled up in a big ball of inanity.

First, let's look at the data the editors refer to, i.e.,, the cherry-picked Gallup poll that state the proposition that support for same-sex marriage has frozen in place since the MA court recognized same-sex marriage (in 2004):

   

Meh.  Maybe.  But let's not just look at the trends of one poll.  Let's look at all the polls, as Nate Silver does here where he pulls this combined poll graph from Pollster data).  This chart includes an average of all surveys, except when the respondent was given a three-pronged choice between gay marriage, civil unions and nothing:

 

Looks like an rather continuous upward trend to me.

But of course, those are nationwide polls.  When you look at the most recent polls broken down by region, a different story emerges:

 

In the east and west, the majority supports gay marriage.  And I don't think that was the case ten years ago.

And you want to talk trends?  Nationwide trends?  Check this out, also from Gallup:

 

Now, this poll question doesn't ask specifically about same-sex marriage, but it certainly follows that as more and more people accept homosexuality as an acceptable alternative lifestyle, more and more (though not necessarily all) will eventually recognize the rightfulness of gay marriage.  Eventually.  There's just a bit of lag time.

By the way, let's look at some historical perspective.  In 1967, when the U.S. Supreme Court recognized the right for interracial couples to marry, 72% were opposed to it.  It wasn't until 1991 when the majority of Americans approved of interracial marriages.

72 percent.  Nowhere on the charts above has opposition to gay marriage been that high.

But back to the editors:

Our guess is that if the federal judiciary does not intervene to impose same-sex marriage on the entire country, we are not going to see it triumph from coast to coast. Rather, we will for some time have a patchwork of laws. The division will not be so much between socially liberal and conservative states as between those states where voters can amend their state constitutions easily and those where they cannot. Thus same-sex marriage is likely to stay the law of the land in Massachusetts, Iowa, and Vermont, and perhaps also in New Hampshire.

In two of those states, at least, democratic procedure is now being respected. Vermont has chosen to recognize same-sex marriages legislatively, and New Hampshire may do so. Other states, such as Connecticut, have legislated recognition of civil unions for same-sex couples.

So far, so good.  I don't necessarily agree with the way the editors think this will play out, but I'll pass on commenting.

Because now we get to the meat....

While free from the taint of lawlessness, these decisions seem to us unwise.

Ah.  Here we go.  "Unwise".  Of course, what about "unjust"?

Few social goods will come from recognizing same-sex couples as married. Some practical benefits may accrue to the couples, but most of them could easily be realized without changing marriage laws.

The first sentence begs the question: "What social goods come from states recognizing opposite-sex couples as married?"  I can think of many, but those same "goods" could apply to same-sex as well.

The second sentence bears close reading, i.e., "most of the practical benefits could easily be recognized without changing marriage laws". 

Two points: first, the editors seem to be acknowledging that some of the practical benefits of marriage can't be easily inured to gay unions without "changing" marriage laws.  That alone is enough reason for states to recognize gay marriage.

Secondly, the marriage laws aren't really "changing".  They're just being applied to more people.  It's no different than when the age of consent to marry is lowered (or raised) by a state.  You're not changing the "practical benefits" of marriage; just expanding the number of people to whom those benefits can apply,

By the way, if you are not aware of the "practical benefits" of marriage are -- the benefits that are denied to gay couples by virtue of the fact that they can't marry -- here's a list(pdf) compiled by the U.S General Accounting Office in 1997.  It's 75 pages long, and lists over 1,000 federal laws that would need to be changed in order to give the same practical benefits to gay couples.  That doesn't include all the state laws.  So this so-called "easy change" would require thousands of new pieces of legislation at the federal and state level.

Same-sex couples will also receive the symbolic affirmation of being treated by the state as equivalent to a traditional married couple — but this spurious equality is a cost of the new laws, not a benefit.

The editors would be hard-pressed to explain how a symbolic affirmation of equivalent treatment is a COST.

One still sometimes hears people make the allegedly “conservative” case for same-sex marriage that it will reduce promiscuity and encourage commitment among homosexuals. This prospect seems improbable, and in any case these do not strike us as important governmental goals.

Put another way: Marriage won't work with gays because we all know how promiscuous and uncommitted to relationships they are. 

Oh, that's not bigotted?

It also flies in the face of the counterargument given in favor of recognizing traditional marriages.  When asked, most conservatives will say that gay marriages should not be recognized because the point of present-day marriage laws is to encourage heterosexual marriage (as if the populace needs government encouragement to get married?  It seems the most people don't need that incentive, as they are inclined to do so anyway).

So what is the "value" of traditional laws where the state recognizes opposite-sex (and only opposite-sex) marriages, according to the editors?

Both as a social institution and as a public policy, marriage exists to foster connections between heterosexual sex and the rearing of children within stable households.

With a (heterosexual) divorce rate at over 50%, with domestic violence (in heterosexual parented families) at an all-time high, and with deadbeat dads reaching an epidemic proportion, how's that "public policy" working out for ya?

It is a non-coercive way to channel (heterosexual) desire into civilized patterns of living.

Translated: Heterosexual sex outside of marriage is uncivilized, and so is gay sex whether in the confines of marriage or not.

And they wonder why they get tagged with the "bigot" label.

State recognition of the marital relationship does not imply devaluation of any other type of relationship, whether friendship or brotherhood. State recognition of those other types of relationships is unnecessary. So too is the governmental recognition of same-sex sexual relationships, committed or otherwise, in a deep sense pointless.

State recognition of straight marriages doesn't devalue the relationship of gay relationships?

What the editors fail to notice is failure of the state to recognize certain marital relationships and not others does devalue the marriages which are not recognized.  It is, in essence, the state saying (to the gay union), "Look, we hold you on a par with a 'freindship' or a 'brotherhood'.  Or a 'sexual hookup'.  There is no way that you can make a commitment to each other in a way that government will recognize, we we do with straight couple marriages.  In fact, doing so would be 'unnecessary' and 'pointless'."

Geez.  How can passing laws NOT to recognize gay marriages be viewed as something other than an overt devaluation of gay marriages?  State legislatures are going out of their way to make sure that gay marriages get stuck with a "less than" status.

No, we do not expect marriage rates to plummet and illegitimacy rates to skyrocket in these jurisdictions over the next decade. But to the extent same-sex marriage is normalized here, it will be harder for American culture and law to connect marriage and parenthood.

That was where I broke out laughing.  There are lots of single parents who have and raise children.  Sometimes intentionally.  Sometimes not (Bristol Palin, I'm looking at you).  If the editors were concerned about this, they would outlaw or fail to recognize or civilly fine the parent of bastard children.

But this is a red herring.  If gays mararied, are we, as a people, going to somehow forget that it takes a man and a woman to procreate?  That it is ideal for a child to be raised by married parents?

And by the way, parenthood is not the province of heterosexual couples.  This is even less controversial than gay marriage, and most state permit gay couples to adopt children. That horse has already left the barn.  So allowing gay adoptive parents to marry at this point won't damage the cultural connection of marriage and parenthood, it actually strengthens it.

That it has already gotten harder over the last few decades is no answer to this concern. In foisting same-sex marriage on Iowa, the state’s supreme court opined in a footnote that the idea that it is best for children to have mothers and fathers married to each other is merely based on “stereotype.”

No, that's not what the Iowa court said.  First of all, it wasn't even addressing marriage of the mother and father at all.  Secondly, it wasn't "merely based on stereotype", but on overwhelming scientific studies.  Here's the full text of the footnote in question:

"The research appears to strongly support the conclusion that same-sex couples foster the same wholesome environment as opposite-sex couples and suggests that the traditional notion that children need a mother and a father to be raised into healthy, well-nurtured adults is based more on a stereotype than anything else."

So it's not based on "stereotype", but on research.  The editors of National Review are simply lying here.

If worse comes to worst, and the federal courts sweep aside the marriage laws that most Americans still want, then decades from now traditionalists should be ready to brandish that footnote and explain to generations yet unborn: That is why we resisted.

The problem with this argument that "most Americans still want" the marriage laws as they are now... even if true... is that it neglects to consider precisely why we have a Constitution in the first place: to protect minorities against the tyrannies of the majority.  "Tyranny of the majority" is an old phrase, and the concept was adopted by James Madison (you know, the founding father and author of the Constitution) in Federalist 10.  (Why do the editors hate the founding fathers?)

Suppose, for example, that most people in the 1950's South wanted their segregation laws (I don't know if that is true or not, but let's assume so).  And then a court comes along and says the Constitution -- the equal protection clause -- says that segregation laws are illegal, and the Southern state governments have to treat everybody equally and can't have separate public accommodations, seats on buses, etc. for blacks.  Would the editors of the National Review argue this could not be done?

If they are not outright bigots, then they are woefully ignorant of the country that they purport to love.  This is a constitutional democracy.  It is not, and never has been, a pure democracy, where the majority rules (heck, a majority of the electorate doesn't even choose the president!). 

I suspect that the editors of the National Review (the same people, mind you, who had no problem when a court, using constitutional principles, decided who the President in 2000 should be) are educated people and have been exposed to this point many many many times in their career.  It is irrefutable.  And yet, they simply pretend it doesn't exist.  And why?

Well, if they're not stupid, perhaps they are bigots.  No, not the sheet-wearing cross-burning kind.  Perhaps they even have no problem with homosexuality in general (so long as it's kept hidden and doesn't have any public recognition or legal legitimacy).  But bigotry is bigotry, even if it is soft.   (And bigots rarely are self-aware of their bigotry). 

On some level, the reason they oppose state recognition of gay marriage is because... they simply think homosexuality is something "less than" when compared to heterosexuality.  That's at the root of their thinly-veiled arguments that there is "no point" to recognize gay marriage.  No point for them, maybe.  When you couple that reasoning with their other absurd arguments that adding gay marriage to society will take something away from what presently exists, you have a pile of nothing.  Their "arguments" simply defy logic, fact and history (that's why they are so vulnerable to the "bigot" tag).  But almost more offensively, their arguments defy or ignore the principles upon which this nation is based. 

Roger Ebert Pwns Bill O'Reilly

Best line:

Bill, I am concerned that you have been losing touch with reality recently. Did you really say you are more powerful than any politician?

Read the whole thing.

Pitchforks And Armed Insurrection

Right-wing blogger Eric Erickson at Redstate:

At what point do the people tell the politicians to go to hell? At what point do they get off the couch, march down to their state legislator's house, pull him outside, and beat him to a bloody pulp for being an idiot?

At some point soon, it will happen. It'll be over an innocuous issue. But the rage is building. [...]

Were I in Washington State, I'd be cleaning my gun right about now waiting to protect my property from the coming riots or the government apparatchiks coming to enforce nonsensical legislation.

Pause for a moment.  Here is one of the most popularly-visited right-wing blogs, written by a prominent blogger whose posts were read in the Bush White House.

And he's advocating violence against the government.

And what got his knickers in such a twist?

This:

"In the interest of reducing water pollution, Washington state, among other states, has instituted a ban on phosphates, making dishes much harder to clean if you clean your dishes in a dishwasher. While phosphates were banned from laundry detergent years ago -- similar complaints followed then -- states have only recently begun banning them from dishwasher detergent."

Yes, Erick Erickson is recommending residents of Washington state prepare for mob violence in the streets because state lawmakers are prohibiting dishwasher detergents that contribute to water pollution.

Why Michelle Malkin Should Never Be Listened To

From her site:

The soul-fixer-in-chief is here to dry your tears

By Michelle Malkin  •  March 31, 2009 12:44 AM

Reuters is running a story on the Obama administration’s new federally subsidized counseling services/referrals for those suffering from depression related to the economy. As usual, the government’s prescription for pain is…more government. The economic psychology guide was developed with help from the Departments of Labor, HUD, Treasury, and GSA.

Let's unpack this, shall we?

1.  "Reuters is running a story on the Obama administration's new federally subsidized counseling services/referrals...."

Here's the Reuter's story that Malkin links to.

Is there anything in the story which suggest the counselling services/referrals are "new"?  Nope.  And why not?  Because Malkin, to put it charitably, made it up.

In fact, the Substance Abuse & Mental Health Administration has been around for quite some time.  And they have been making referrals and providing consumer information for quite some time as well, long before Obama came along.

And is this referral service "federally subsidized"?  Well, yes, I suppose.  The website, like all government (.gov) websites, is paid through taxpayer dollars.  Presumably the research and information done on this site was done with public dollars as well.

But again, this is nothing new.  This government agency is only doing what it is supposed to be doing pursuant to the rules and regulations.... not to mention executive orders signed by people like George W. Bush.

2.  "As usual, the government’s prescription for pain is…more government."

Uh, no.  Again, Malkin is pulling this out of her ass.  The SAMHA government website to which she links actually says something else:

Even with these coping techniques, however, sometimes these problems can seem overwhelming and you may need additional help to get through "rough patches." Fortunately, there are many people and services that can provide help. These include your:

• Healthcare provider
• Spiritual leader
• School counselor
• Community health clinic

So the prescription for pain includes private institutions, including religious ones, as well as a variety of public and private mental health centers.

******

While Malkin and Matt Drudge snicker and snark at the suggestion that tough economic times lead to emotional and mental difficulties, we all know otherwise.

Losing one's job is no joking matter and it does lead to suicide, murders, and other issues.  It's no laughing matter.  And certainly not a matter to be lied about in order to score cheap political points.

Oliver Twisted

Big Hollywood's S.T. Karnick:

The latest PBS adaptation  of Charles Dickens’s classic novel Oliver Twist demonstrates the urgent need for reform of the taxpayer-supported broadcasting service–or an end to taxpayer funding for it.

Among PBS's crimes, according to Karnick?  Casting a black woman as Nancy:

Clearly the producers are imposing an ideal of a colorblind society on a story where it adds nothing, is unnecessary, and is quite a distraction for those who know the original novel. The character, however, is as complex and benevolent as in the original story, which is all to the good.

Yes, clearly that was their intention.

Conservative Punditry "WTF?" Statement Of The Day

National Review's Mark Krikorian -- who, believe it or not, is executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies -- drops in this little gem at the Corner:

During slavery and Jim Crow, a number of blacks moved abroad, to Europe or Africa or the USSR, but again, these movements never gained much traction....

Actually, I think very few slaves got the opportunity to move abroad -- like, about zero.  Because there were, you know, slaves.

And Liberia?  Yeah, that was an African colony formed by ex-slaves, with the encouragement of whites, although typically free blacks didn't elect on their own voliation to emigrate there; rather, the one-way ticket to Liberia was offered to them in exchange for freedom from the bonds of slavery.

But there really really wasn't a significant number of black who moved to Europe during slavery or Jim Crow.  There just wasn't.

Pictured below: A black family contemplates their upcoming move to Paris, hoping to trade their forty acres and a mule for frequent flyer miles

 

UPDATE:  National Review's Mark Krikorian responds in the comments below, providing cites.

From what I gather, Krikorian's assertion that there was black emigration during slavery and Jim Crow eras rests upon the fact that some blacks, after serving in Europe during WWI, decided to stay there, mainly in Paris.  The actual number of black emigres amounted to "several hundred", out of over 200,000 black Americans who served in the Army (according to Krikorian's sources).

Oh, and then there was a handful of prominent black artists -- like James Baldwin and Josephine Baker -- who found havens in various European cities.

Still, to suggest that these rare examples represent a "movement" that "never gained traction" certainly overstates the factual truth.  Rank-and-file African-Americans -- those without benefit of military service or fame -- certainly were not in a financial position to move abroad during the eras of Jim Crow and slavery.  Especially slavery.

Shorter Ann Coulter

Shorter Ann Coulter: Democrats want to tax the rich, thereby proving that Democrats hate the little guy.  Also, since Democrats are rich, they are only taxing themselves.  Ha ha!  Which makes them socialists!

Seriously, Ann Coulter is just plain bizarre.

BONUS WINGNUTTERY FROM MARIE JON:

On Nov. 5, 2008, Americans woke up to a very real Marxist coup — although most didn't realize it. I sat down and cried while a huge crowd gathered and were cheering. I intuitively knew something was very wrong. After watching Barack Hussein Obama aggressively pursue his agenda as president, I now understand why.

Most Marxist coups rely on deception — and that was certainly true of this one. Just about everything Obama said during the campaign was a calculated lie. His handlers and key supporters were equally willing to lie and deceive to gain advantage.

Once Marxists seize power through deception, manipulation, exploitation, and corrupt interference with the political process, they never give it up. It is entirely possible that we will never see the end of the current regime of Marxists in America. In 20 years, the President of the United States might still be a man named Barack Obama. At the very least, we can expect Obama and his fellow conspirators to do everything in their power to ensure that outcome.

She seems a little confused as to whether the "real Marxist coup" took place on November 5, or if it will come about in the next 20 years of the Obama administration.  In fact, she doesn't seem to know what Marxism is, except that it is bad.

By the way, I enjoy the links she uses to support her proposition.

Punditry At The Corner

Ramesh Ponnuru:

The other day I commented on the poor quality of polling on stem-cell research. I'm afraid that the Rasmussen poll, cited in today's web briefing, is no exception. Here's the question they use: "President Obama has decided to lift the ban on federal funding of embryonic stem cell research. Do you agree or disagree with President Obama’s decision?"

What is wrong with that question, Ramesh?  Slanted?  Hardly.  Perhaps your problem is that it is not slanted.  Perhaps you think the polling question ought to be: "Do you agree or disagree with killing babies in their extreme infancy?" [UPDATE:  Well, I was right.  The preferred question is: "An embryo is a developing human life, therefore it should not be destroyed for scientific or research purposes.  Agree or Disagree?"] [ANOTHER UPDATE:  Kevin Drum agrees with me].

Then, as if to outdo himself, Ramesh writes:

Rasmussen also reports that 40 percent of those surveyed say they have followed the debate "very closely." No estimate is given for the percentage of those respondents who are lying.

Seriously???  When has any pollster provided an estimate of how many respondents are lying?  And how would a pollster even have the basis for making such an estimate?  Maybe they should ask a follow-up to respondents: "Are you lying?"

This, of course, is yet another example of right-wing pundits and their inability to accept reality.  The majority of the nation supports Obama.  The majority of the nation supports stem cell research.  Poll after poll shows this.  Deal with it, Ramesh, and stop blaming the pollsters.  You and your party are not going to get out of the woods until you stop denying that you are in the woods.

UPDATE:  Now, this is an example of a poorly-worded poll question (click to enlarge):

 

Fortunately, CNN changed it an hour or so ago....

 

Da Debate Bait

El Rushbo, today:

But I have an idea. If these guys are so impressed with themselves, and if they are so sure of their correctness, why doesn't President Obama come on my show?

***

Let's go ahead and have a debate on this show. No limits.  Now that your handlers are praising themselves for promoting me as the head of a political party -- they think that's a great thing -- then it should be a no-brainer for you to further advance this strategy by debating me on the issues and on the merits, and wipe me out once and for all!
 
Just come on this program. Let's have a little debate. You tell me how wrong I am and you can convince the rest of the Americans that don't agree with you how wrong we all are.  You're a smart guy, Mr. President.  You don't need these hacks to front for you.  You've debated the best! You've debated Hillary Clinton.  You've debated John Edwards.  You've debated Joe Biden. You've debated Dennis Kucinich. You've debated the best out there.  You are one of the most gifted public speakers of our age.  I would think, Mr. President, you would jump at this opportunity.  Don't send lightweights like Begala and Carville to do your bidding -- and forget about the ballerina, Emanuel.  He's got things to do in his office.  These people, compared to you, Mr. President, are rhetorical chum.

It would be entertaining for Obama to take the bait -- or de-bait, I guess -- and wipe the floor with Limbaugh.

Of course, Obama won't and shouldn't.  The whole point of Rush being the de facto leader of the GOP is that he is small.  Not in size, but in stature.  Rush is an entertainer and a loudmouth.  That is the best the party has to offer.  So for Obama to actually debate Rush is to suggest that he is something more.

Rush instinctively knows this.  He will soon crow that Obama was "chicken" to debate him.  For Rush, this is about ratings.  He is an entertainer.  And his call to debate Obama will keep the media circus running for (yes, sorry to say) another 24 hours.  Tomorrow, he will say something else, which will (he hopes) propel his place in the spotlight well into the Sunday talk shows.

Besides, there was a debate about Obama's policies versus conservatism.  It happened last November.  Obama won, as did a majority of House and Senate Democrats.  Perhaps Rush missed that.

By the way, Rush also said today:

Let's talk about your stock market. By the way, Mr. President, I want to help. Yesterday you said you looked at the stock market as no different than a tracking poll that goes up and down.

There's no "up and down" here. We have a plunge.

The Dow was up almost 150 points today.  At one point, it almost broke 7,000 (up 280 from today's open).

RELATED:  The DCCC is having some fun with all the Republicans rushing to Rush's feet to apologize.

FURTHER THOUGHT:  The Politico reports that this whole "Rush As GOP Leader" is an Obama/Democratic "plan". 

Bullshit, I say.  Did Carville or Begala force Rush at gunpoint to claim that he "hopes Obama fails"?  Did Rahm Emmanuel create the media circus that resulted from Rush's comment?  Did any Democrat operative or Obama advisor prepare the text for Rush's speech at CPAC earlier this week?

At best (or worst, depending on your point of view), Democrats have seized on an opportunity.  But Rush himself created that opportunity.

Selected Five-Star Reviews of "Joe The Plumber"'s New Book (From Amazon)

"This is a good book for those with no training, education, or experience in political science, economics, or probably anything else, and wish to read the opinions of an unlicensed plumber who also has no training or experience in anything relevant."

"I could not put the book down. Seriously, something really sticky was on the cover"

"In this book and in real life, he graces us with precise wisdom after wisdom. His words may at first appear to violate all rules of logic, common sense and basic education. However, they are not nausiating and narcissitic hemorrhaging of willful ignorance they first appear to be, and his book is definitely not a shameless attempt to cash in on a quick media-driven fame. Mr. Wurzelbacher would never resort to such things! Rather, this magnificant ghostwritten tome of 200 pages is densely filled with nuclear-grade insights disguised as H-bomb grade idiocy, where every statement he throws and every question he asks blindsides us to challenge our own knowledge and assumptions. For example, when he pretends to be completely ignorant of the difference of revenue and income, he challenges us to examine our own understanding of the Internal Revenue Code: he has issued a somber reminder of the complexities of the U.S. tax system that bewilder and befuddle even the trained professionals. He then even went so far as to prove the exact point himself by not paying taxes for a while."

"The jury is still out on whether it was ghostwritten by a chimp or a fawning Public Relations grad student, but the message is as powerful as ever: even an incompetent dullard has feelings and thoughts. And, in America, even the simplest incompetent dullard among us has the potential to make some money by rejecting all critics, foisting himself before the camera, and, with a wink and a wry smile, inform us all that he is not ashamed to earn his pay on his back, one citizen at a time."

"This is a great book, one every true conservative should buy, and more importantly, read. Yes, I know that sounds like a tall order, but it's an easy read. Joe uses one and two syllable words (many of them, written forms of various grunts) almost exclusively. If I have one complaint, it's that the publisher, Pearlgate, printed it in ink rather than crayon like the original manuscript. Other than that, I think it truly is the perfect book for the average conservative."

Read them all.

Rush, She's Just Not That Into You

Rush Limbaugh can't figure out why women don't like him:

Women don’t really like Rush Limbaugh. On Feb. 23, Public Policy Polling released findings showing that only 37 percent of women hold a favorable opinion of the hate radio host, compared to 56 percent of men.

As Jill Zimon notes, Limbaugh brought up this poll yesterday on his radio show, noting that it was one of the largest gender gaps Public Policy Polling has seen on any issue it has polled in the past year. His solution? To convene a summit of women to find out why they dislike him:

RUSH: We’ll have a summit of all the women in this audience — or as many of them as we can get into breakout groups — and perhaps devote an hour in an upcoming program to calls only from women who genuinely want to talk to me. They can be liberal, conservative. They could be non-audience members, could be audience members. But I want some of these women to start telling me what it is I must do to close the gender gap — or, if not what it is I must do to close the gender gap, what it is I’ve done that has caused the gender gap; assuming the gender gap is true and that the poll is true. […]

I own the men, and what must I do now to own women? And who better to ask than women? Including some of those who may agree that that I’m unfavorable. So stand by for that.

Well, for starters, Rush, perhaps women are turned off by your misogyny.  For example, holding a summit so that you can "own women" is itself indicative of your problem. 

And this habit of repeatedly calling women who call for the advancement of women "feminazis"?  I'm going out on a limb and suggest that is a bit of a turnoff, too.

Or some of your quotes, most notably:

Rush's marriage advice: "If you want a successful marriage, let your husband do what he wants to do."
Source: Palmbeachpost.com

Or...

“I love the women’s movement. Especially when I’m walking behind it.”

Or...

"You have to understand the mindset of a lot of these feminists and women...These women have paid their dues. They've been married two or three times; they've had two or three abortions; they've done everything that feminism asked them to do. They have cut men out of their lives; they have devoted themselves to causes and careers. And this — the candidacy of Hillary Clinton — is the culmination of all of these women's efforts."

Or...

So the question is this: Will this country want to actually watch a woman get older before their eyes on a daily basis?

Or (from your book)...

One of my fabulous routines concerns a San Francisco men's club which lost its battle to exclude women from membership. The courts ruled that they had to admit women on the basis that businesswomen were being unfairly denied opportunities to do business. This is specious. How much business did women think they were going to get as a result of forcing their way in?

Anyway, after one year, the female members demanded their own exercise room. They were probably tired of being ogled by a bunch of slobbering men while they pumped iron in leotards and spandex. The men offered to install the first three exercise machines in the women's new workout room. The ladies were thrilled. When they arrived on that first exciting day they found, to their stunned amazement, a washing machine, an ironing board, and a vacuum cleaner. Heh, heh, heh. (The Way Things Ought To Be, p.142-45 Jul 2, 1992)

Or any of these quotes.

Mystery solved, Rush.

UPDATE:  Or maybe it has nothing to do with women's issues at all.  Maybe it's just a turnoff when Rush says things like "I hope Obama fails".  And in case you didn't get his gist, he reitterated it today, saying "We want something to blow up here politically. We want something to not go right."  And Rush says "here", he's talking about the economy and the stimulus as he's saying this.

Can you imagine if a liberal pundit had said in, say, 2004, that he hoped Bush failed in his war on terrorism?  That we, the opposition, want something to blow up?  That we, the opposition, want another terrorist attack?

Malkin, Idiot

I really should let this go, but I can't.  Michelle Malkin today writes:

On Nov. 4, after Barack Obama clinched the White House, the market closed at 9,625.28.

In mid-morning trading today, the day President Obama signs his massive Generational Theft Act into law and a day before he unveils a massive new mortgage entitlement, the Dow dropped to to 7,606.53.

Now, imagine if President Bush had presided over a 2,000-point stock market tumble in the same time period — during the first few months of his presidency.

Great start, O.

This is, of course, beyond stupid.  For one thing (and this should be obvious), Obama wasn't president starting on November 4.  When Obam took office on January 20, the Dow was at 7,949.  Right now (as I write this) it's at 7,588 -- that's not even a 400 point drop.  Here's the chart:

And Malkin asks "what if" there was such a precipitous drop during the time Bush presided? Uh, Michelle?

John Cole has the last word:

Everyone knew they would attempt to blame the Bush administration’s failings on the Democrats and the Obama administration, and the facts really are stacked against them so they have a tough job, but quite honestly, I thought they would be a little bit better at it than this. The crazy people ranting about black helicopters have more credibility, and at least try to make a coherent argument. The nut of her argument is “If you pretend Obama was President two months and a few weeks before he took office, he is to blame for the market declines during that time period.” Really, it is that stupid.

What Hath Rush, Hannity And O'Reilly Wrought?

James Adkisson has been sentenced to life behind bars for the deaths of Greg McKendry and Linda Kraeger, the Unitarian Universalist church-goers who died during his assault on their church in Knoxville, TN last July.

What Adkisson left behind is his four-page handwritten manifesto, which can be read here (PDF format).  It's a reiteration of the talking points of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter and the whole hateful bunch.  This guy actually absorbed their eliminationist rhetoric and turned into action -- a killing spree in a "progressive" church. 

Some excerpts:

"Know this if nothing else: This was a hate crime. I hate the damn left-wing liberals. There is a vast left-wing conspiracy in this country & these liberals are working together to attack every decent & honorable institution in the nation, trying to turn this country into a communist state. Shame on them....

"This was a symbolic killing. Who I wanted to kill was every Democrat in the Senate & House, the 100 people in Bernard Goldberg's book. I'd like to kill everyone in the mainstream media. But I know those people were inaccessible to me. I couldn't get to the generals & high ranking officers of the Marxist movement so I went after the foot soldiers, the chickenshit liberals that vote in these traitorous people. Someone had to get the ball rolling. I volunteered. I hope others do the same. It's the only way we can rid America of this cancerous pestilence."

"I thought I'd do something good for this Country Kill Democrats til the cops kill me....Liberals are a pest like termites. Millions of them Each little bite contributes to the downfall of this great nation. The only way we can rid ourselves of this evil is to kill them in the streets. Kill them where they gather. I'd like to encourage other like minded people to do what I've done. If life aint worth living anymore don't just kill yourself. do something for your Country before you go. Go Kill Liberals."

Adkisson also admits this: "This was an act of political protest."  Therefore, by his own admission, he was committing an act of domestic terrorism.

That's right.  Let history record that the right-wing talking heads incited an act of domestic terrorism.  Reflect on that.

O'Reilly Dumber Than Supermodel Jessica Alba

Heh:

Jessica Alba is setting the record straight: Sweden was neutral during World War II.

Alba and Fox TV show host Bill O’Reilly traded punches last week after the presidential inauguration. After Alba told a Fox reporter that O’Reilly was “kind of an a-hole;” he retaliated by calling her a “pinhead” for telling a reporter to “be Sweden about it,” assuming she meant Switzerland.

“I want to clear some things up that have been bothering me lately,” Alba blogged on MySpace Celebrity. “Last week, Mr. Bill O'Reilly and some really classy sites (i.e.TMZ) insinuated I was dumb by claiming Sweden was a neutral country. I appreciate the fact that he is a news anchor and that gossip sites are inundated with intelligent reporting, but seriously people... it's so sad to me that you think the only neutral country during WWII was Switzerland.”

Although Switzerland is more frequently cited as an example of neutrality, Sweden did indeed follow a policy of neutrality during World War II. History point to Alba.

And Sweden (like Switzerland) has refused to join NATO, too.  Neutral.

How To Deal With Rush Limbaugh

The wrong way:

In a bid to capitalize on Rush Limbaugh's recent comment that he hopes President Obama "fails," national Democrats launched a petition drive Wednesday taking direct aim at the conservative radio host.

"Jobs, health care, our place in the world — the stakes for our nation are high and every American needs President Obama to succeed," says the petition, sponsored by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. "Stand strong against Rush Limbaugh's Attacks — sign our petition, telling Rush what you think of his attacks on President Obama."

The right way:

Ignore him.

Nathan Tabor On Evolution and Gays

Our locally-living nationally-syndicated columnist, Nathan Tabor, is a howl today. 

After trying to make the argument that Obama's policies will effectively result in genocide of African-Americans (yes, he really makes that argument), Tabor writes:

But blacks are not the only minority group which could suffer under the Democratic regime in Washington. Democratic leaders believe that children must be taught evolution, and they cringe at the common-sense notion of intelligent design. The evolutionary theory promoted by Charles Darwin teaches survival of the fittest. That would place homosexuals at the bottom of the chain, since they cannot procreate. Under evolution, they are destined to die out, forced out of existence by the heterosexuals who can procreate.

Ummmm.... boy.  Stuck on stupid. 

Nathan apparently believes that homosexuals are the offspring of homosexuals and therefore, that demographic is genetically destined to die out under an evolutionary theory.

And, as a corollary, apparently this can be twarted by teaching intelligent design to children.

This of course leads Nathan to his ultimate conclusion:

The idea that our nation's Democratic leaders are anti-black, anti-minority, and anti-homosexual is an inconvenient truth. It is uncomfortable to read because it is uncomfortable to write. But, as an old adage goes, the truth will make you free. Only when Democrats confront their own bigoted demons can true progress begin, can we finally heal as a nation.

I see.  By electing Obama, Democrats have revealed themselves to be bigots.  Thanks for the insight, Nathan.

One wonders if Nathan really believes anyone -- including conservatives -- would actually swallow his crap.

The Brilliance of Pat Buchanan

Pat bemoans the fate of the GOP:

What has been happening to the GOP? Three fatal contractions.

Demographically, the GOP is a party of white Americans, who in 1972 were perhaps 90 percent of the national vote. Nixon and Reagan rolled up almost two-thirds of that vote in 1972 and 1984. But because of abortion and aging, the white vote is shrinking as a share of the national vote and the population.

[Emphasis mine]

Rrrrright, Pat.  Because minorities don't get abortions and never die.

A Conservative On "Rent"

By the conservative pundit, Stage Right:

And then, I made the same mistake I made with most of the actresses I was foolish enough to date.  I made a seemingly innocuous remark which unveiled me as insensitive, mean, unfeeling and….  a conservative!.  I said:  “Why are these punks spending all their time playing with their camera and guitar.  They should get a job and pay the poor guy who owns the building.  They owe him rent for the past year for God’s sake!”

Silence.

She stared at me in stunned disbelief.  I realized that I was staring back at yet another Broadway Chorus Dancer who I would have to refer to as my “Former girlfriend”. 

She's better off....

BONUS STAGE RIGHT:  Andrew Lloyd-Webber is an awesome composer because he's conservative.

Swank-ified

Oh, how I love the columns of the Rev. Grant Swank. 

What will God do with Rick Warren's inaugural invocation?

Isn't that the real question?

Um, not really.  But if you need a premise for a column, I'll let you run with it.

What will God do with the prayer offered by pro-life Rick Warren, pastor?

You talking to me?  I'm not a pastor, but I appreciate the gesture....

Warren has been picked by B. Hussein Obama to deliver the inaugural invocation.

Grant Swank wants y'all to know Obama's middle name is Hussein.  In case you weren't aware yet.

Liberals are in a snit.

I would characterize it more as a tizzy.....

Who cares what liberals or conservatives think about a prayer offered to the eternal throne of the Almighty God?

Not me.

What should concern us as a nation is what will the Creator God think of the words presented him in January?

I am not sure that is a question?

Will the words matter?

Will the position of the heart of the pray-er matter?

Will heaven make any changes regarding this country because of that invocation?

Will a pro-life, pro-family, pro-marriage God decide to listen to the prayer, let alone act upon it?

And....[insert dramatic organ chord]... what about Naomi?

All this fuss about the mortal speaking the prayer at the podium.

Obama tried to get a deity to speak, but the fees were just too high.

Well, if it were a Muslim, we all should be quite concerned. Allah is not the deity of America's Judeo-Christian heritage.

Right.  Can't have that.

If it were an atheist offering a "prayer," we should likewise be most concerned.

Right.  Can't have that.

And if it were a Unitarian-Universalist, likewise. Most of them are atheists who belong to a Society that has stated it does not want to be included within Christendom, hence its official name not including the word "Church."

Right.  Um, whatever.

But with California minister Warren standing there in the freezing cold of Washington winter, what should concern the genuine believers of this continent is what the divine response will be.

...when Warren goes "brrrrrrrrr"?

Further, what will the divine response be to the left-of-left B. Hussein's reign from the White House? And what will be the Lord's action following a theologically liberal-stacked US Congress?

Send a hurricane to wipe out New Orleans maybe?

I have a feeling that no matter what Warren says or does not say, the Almighty is going to have His act together.

He's got new material, a better back-up band, and an adaptable set that will play well in arena theatres as well as smaller venues.

And only the genuine believers can wait with faith and patience to witness the unfolding of the divine reactions to much that has gone on in this nation lately.

And we'll have Pastor Swank to point them out as they come along.  "You see that tornado wiping out that Kansas town?  That was because of B. Hussein's decision to keep gays in the military."

God is not circumscribed by Warren or any other human being. Mortals write the minor lines. Deity writes the major lines. That's why history is finally His-story. Check the biblical record for the substantiation of that premise.

Couldn't find it, but my googling skills are perhaps sub-par.

Anyhow, the media is up to its usual frantic over Rick Warren this and Rick Warren that, B. Hussein's constituents' mad responses to a Warren talking to the Lord God in public, the homosexuals especially having a fit over the whole scene.

And linguists are now having a fit over your decription of the scene.

That said, I think the controversy is not about Warren (a mortal) talking to God, but about Obama's selection of a homophobe to speak at the inauguration.

Interesting, isn't it, how the liberal media can get so caught up in what is totally insignificant.

Right.  More Sarah Palin stories please!

Genuine believers know that mad media has no clue as to how to focus in on what is reality importance when it comes to God and Earth, Creator and America, our past and our future.

Right.  Like the lede article at World News Daily -- Chuck Norris weighs in on "Jesus jacking".

The Inciteful Mind Of Limbaugh

Rush Limbaugh, on why the U.S. auto industry is in trouble:

But you, you just illustrated the greatest single downfall of the domestic automobile industry, and nobody is talking about it...

Back in the days when I bought my first car and then my second car and my third car, and they were all General -- they were Pontiacs, and a Buick. They all broke down in three years, had to get a new one. Then all of a sudden they got quality minded, started making cars that get 250,000 miles, you didn't need to trade it in after three years, and so they didn't have to be as innovative because people were keeping cars longer. If they would have kept making cars that fell apart after three years, none of this would have happened.

Thanks for the input, Rush.  Hope Detriot takes your advice and start making crappy cars again.

SCOTUS Rejects Obama Birth Case

First Read reports:

The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to take up a case that questioned whether President-elect Obama met the Constitution's requirement that only a natural-born citizen is eligible to be president.

As is the court's usual custom, the request to take up the case was denied with no explanation.

I blogged about the petition here.

David Horowitz is now urging his conservative brethren to "shut up about the birth certificate", but the Freepers are in a tizzy.  Apparen

It is CLEAR that the SCOTUS is more interested in politics, than it is upholding the LAW OF THE CONSTITUTION. We continue to enter a very sad time in American history whereby the example of the SCOTUS and Obama, et al, is encouraging the people to avoid and break the law to accomplish their objectives, good or bad.

A complete travesty of justice, if there really is any left in America.

***************

once again, judges decide whether or not to enforce law. in this case, constitutional law.

and anyone that thinks it makes sense for 0bama to go through all this trouble to avoid showing a simple birth certificate, really needs to stop drinking the kool-aid

***************

As said on another thread... country as we know it, is slowly coming to an end... how a fraud and empty suit like this gets all this way is beyond comprehension.

***************

I hope nobody here seriously thought the Supreme Court would uphold the Constitution in a case involving the black messiah! Goodness, what would you be thinking....

***************

I have to admit there was still some small part of me that believed truth would conquer lies, good would conquer evil, right would conquer wrong. I know... I know, I should have forgotten all those silly ideas when more than half our country voted for Obama, but there you go.

I guess, now, all a Presidential candidate has to do to prove they’re eligible is to say they’re eligible, act huffy, and lawyer up when asked to prove it by citizens (those puny little people who obviously no longer matter AT ALL in what used to be America). Of course, this only goes for Socialist, politically correct candidates. Republicans have to have lived spotless, blameless lives, documented to the Nth degree.

***************

The SCOTUS has just pulled the life support on our Republic.

The actual case that SCOTUS rejected has nothing to do with Obama's birth certificate, but a rather strange argument that Obama isn't a "natural born citizen" because his father was Kenyan -- i.e., a British subject.

I especially enjoy the Freeper comments that deride Obama for "lawyering up", as if HE was the one who brought the lawsuit.

The bottom line is that Obama is a "natural born citizen" as that term has ALWAYS been defined.  He was born in America, and has produced a certified copy of his birth certificate.  He has no control over the original; that belongs to the State of Hawaii.  And the State of Hawaii has officially stated (three times, by my counting) that it has the original birth certificate.  It has shown it in pictures.

What more do these people want???

The Jig Is Up

The Obama-isn't-a-U.S.-citizen story is still in high gear.

I think it is time we face facts.

This birth announcement which appeared in the Honolulu Advertiser  on August 13, 1961 (Obama was born on August 4) clearly was put there by Obama's maternal grandparents, who knew full well that 47 years later, there would be an issue about Obama's citizenship when he ran for president.

Busted.

Seriously though, debunking of this silly conspiracy theory is at its best here and here.  Politico adds:

It is possible that Obama conspired his way to the precipice of the world’s biggest job, involving a vast network of people and government agencies over decades of lies. Anything’s possible.

But step back and look at the overwhelming evidence to the contrary and your sense of what’s reasonable has to take over.

Sense of what's reasonable takes over?  Well, not for some.

UPDATE:  And another conspiracy theory comes back to the surface.  The Palin-ain't-the-baby-mama-of-Trig theory.

Andrew Sullivan has unearthed a rare photo of Palin pregnant, which he claims as proof that she was not pregnant.

The problem with this picture, according to Sullivan?  It was taken on March 26, 2008, only three weeks before Palin delivered a "full-term, 6 pound" Trig.  Furthermore, there are (according to Sullivan) no birth records or medical records which indicate that Sarah (as opposed to her daughter) were pregnant.

I'm going to plead ignorance on this.  Maybe when Palin get pregnant, she doesn't show that much.

 

Oh....

But seriously -- and I can't believe I'm writing this -- I think Michelle Malkin is right (god forgive me):  there are "Truthers" on the right and left, and they're all nuts.

Challenge To Obama's Presidency In The Supreme Court

This is wingnuttery at its wing-nuttiness.  Even most right wing blogs think this is stupid.

But it is out there.

I'm talking about the claim that Obama isn't qualified to be President, because he is not a U.S. citizen.  Some desparate people believe it, like Shiv Zieve, who writes a column entitled "Obama Too Important For The Supreme Court":

President-elect Barack Obama's refusal to produce an original and viable birth certificate indicating that he truly and indisputably is a natural born US citizen — as is required by the US Constitution — is continuing to take unusual tacks and turns. In fact, as it is appearing more and more that Barack Obama is not qualified for the US presidency, his and his minions' machinations may just take the country off course entirely. Now, not only is Mr. Obama refusing to provide proof that he is even eligible to be the President of the United States but, he has decided to thumb his nose at members of our highest court in the land.

This is how off-the-wall stupid this is:

First of all, nobody has their original birth certificate.  Nor do they have control over it.  The states possess the original.  So it's not like Obama has the original birth certificate in his hot little hands, and refuses to turn it over.

That said, Obama produced a certified copy of his Hawaii birth certificate.  It's at the right [click to embiggen].

And furthermore, Hawaiian officials have confirmed that he was born in Hawaii (why would they lie?)

But that wasn't good enough for the tinfoil hat-wearing conspiracy theorist wingnuts like Shiv:

Note: The copy of the Hawaiian document (now sealed away from US citizens by the Governor of Hawaii) that appeared for a time on Obama's website was not a certified birth certificate. Instead, it was a "certificate of live birth" stating that Obama was born alive.

Uh, a "certificate of live birth" IS a "birth certificate", idiot.  What does she think?  They complete a certificate stating that a baby was born alive, and another document entitled "birth certificate" stating that a baby was born?

Even that document's authenticity has been debunked by multiple sources.

Yes.  The kerner's folly.

Obama's rise to fame — with no vetting from the media or the Democrat Party — is nothing less than phenomenal. It causes any thinking person — apparently not too many of those left — to wonder what forces are behind him.

Could it be..... Satan?

With regards to Donofrio v Wells — one of a growing number of lawsuits filed nationwide that question the eligibility of Barack Obama to be POTUS —...

Yes, and the other lawsuits, from other tinfoil hat wearing goofs, were all dismissed.  Five of those suits, by the way, were filed in Hawaii by a person who is currently suing the "Peoples Association of Human, Animals Conceived God/s and Religions, John McCain [and] USA Govt."  Shows you the kind of company Shiv keeps.

...the full US Supreme Court has agreed to conference on the suit 5 December 2008. Obama and the DNC (also named in the suit) were advised by the high court to respond to Donofrio v Wells by 1 December. To date, neither Mr. Obama nor the DNC have responded. With this lack of response, the president-elect has now flatly stated that he is above — if not beyond and outside of — the law and reports and is responsible only to himself. This is what — not who — was elected to the presidency of the United States.

According to Shiv, the Supreme Court "advised" Obama to respond. Not "order", but "advise".  Therefore, even under her own facts, he's not acting like he's "above the law".

But she's right" he doesn't have to respond.  In fact, there is nothing to respond to. 

You see, the person filing the suit is the "petitioner" and the person being sued is the "respondent".  But there is nothing on the Supreme Court docket which requires Obama to "respond" and/or produce his original birth certificate.  This is just an internet rumor from people who don't know what they are talking about.

The primary qualification for any US President is articulated in the US Constitution's Article II and reads: "No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States."

Yay!  She got something right!

Obama's paternal grandmother still maintains that her grandson — Barack Hussein Obama (AKA Barry Sotero) — was born in Kenya and that she attended his birth. Obama's half-brother and half-sister have confirmed the grandmother's statement.

Actually, granny is unsure, and the half-brother, half-sister "confirmation" is simply made up.  They THINK it was Obama.

Kenyan officials have worked tirelessly in their attempts to cover up Mr. Obama's true birthplace and even held Obama-critic Jerome Corsi, PhD in custody (jail) for visiting that country and working to elicit the truth.

"True" birthplace.  See, now it's no longer a question of where he was born.  It's an answer and a cover-up.  Here's why Kenya can't produce Kenyan documents -- ready?  Because there aren't any.

And Corsi, the man behind "swiftboating"?  The 9/11 conspiracy nut?  He was never in "jail" in Kenya.  He was detained (briefly) and then deported because he was didn't have work papers.

Still, Obama was allowed and apparently continues to be allowed to refuse to produce a number of documents, including the one which would qualify or disqualify him to hold the office of President of the United States — his true and official birth certificate.

A number of documents?  Like what?

In an outstanding column from Joan Swirsky, "Obama the Trojan Horse," she cites legal Dr. Edwin Vieira, Jr. as stating "America is facing potentially the gravest constitutional crisis in her history" and "If Obama fails to prove his citizenship but the voters, the Electors, or the Members of the House purport to "elect" him. He will be nothing but a usurper, because the Constitution defines him as such. And he can never become anything else, because a usurper cannot gain legitimacy if even all of the country aid, abets, accedes to, or acquiesces in his usurpation."

Another alleged by Swirsky in that article: "A graphic designer suggested that George Soros dipped into his billions and "treated" major media people to a cool $5 million each."  That's the kind of evidence we're talking about -- "a guy on the Internet says..."

But now we get to the best part....

This may be the toughest test that our US Constitution has ever faced. If the qualifications for POTUS are suspended for Obama, the entire document will be null and void — as will, inevitably, our country.

Hmmmmm.  When the writ of habeus corpus (also in the Constitution) gets suspended, does the ENTIRE DOCUMENT become null and void?

And now, Mr. Obama has essentially told the United States Supreme Court to "go pound sand" — or worse.

"Go fuck themselves".  We get it.

If allowed to assume the presidency and he is NOT a natural born US citizen he will be emboldened to no longer respect — let alone follow — any law that he doesn't like. And his National Civilian Police Force (AKA "The American Gestapo") will — along with other democracy-busting programs — be quickly put into place. With all of these insanities being fomented by Democrats — including the worldwide economic crisis — I have to wonder how many actually realize how much jeopardy we and the country are in. The fact is that this current pending Constitutional crisis places all of us in the gravest of positions.

Cats and dogs marrying!  A rain of toads!  OMG!!!!1!!!!

Look, here's the bottom line.  This petition to the Supreme Court seeks to "stay" (legalese for "halt") the inauguration of Obama on the grounds that he is not a citizen.  Now, the Supreme Court is petitioned to stay something hundreds of times every term.  There are so many of these petitions that the judges divvy them up.  Individually, they reject most of them.  It's not a rejection on the merits of the case; it's just a rejection for considering the merits. 

Occasionally, a judge might pass a "stay" petition to the other judges to see what they think.  This case is just one of them.  The Supreme Court still hasn't decided to even hear the case, much less decide it. 

It should be noted that in the past eight years, 842 petitions seeking stays were distributed to the entire court.  782 were denied; only 60 were heard.  And most of those 60 weren't successful.

I have no doubt that the Supreme Court will decline to hear the case.  But I kind of wish they would hear it.  Have one of the justices fly to Hawaii, and look at the original birth certificate.  Then tell the wingnuts to shut up.

Linking The War On Christmas To The Economic Crisis

I would call this "overreaching".  From the Wall Street Journal, columnist Daniel Henninger writes:

This year we celebrate the desacralized "holidays" amid what is for many unprecedented economic ruin -- fortunes halved, jobs lost, homes foreclosed. People wonder, What happened? One man's theory: A nation whose people can't say "Merry Christmas" is a nation capable of ruining its own economy.

Uh... come again?

One had better explain that.

Yes, one better had, sir.

Now, I will spare you the forest into which that Mr. Henninger drags his readers.  Basically, he talks about the economic crisis and its roots, which he lays at the feet of borrowers, lenders and "secularized shamans" operating in a moral-free, greed-above-all-else environment.

Except for the "secularized shamen" (on which I'll plead ignorance), I'll grant Mr. Henninger's premise with regard to the moral-free world of high finance.

Finally, he brings it home:

What really went missing through the subprime mortgage years were the three Rs: responsibility, restraint and remorse. They are the ballast that stabilizes two better-known Rs from the world of free markets: risk and reward.

Yes, I'm with you....

Responsibility and restraint are moral sentiments. Remorse is a product of conscience. None of these grow on trees. Each must be learned, taught, passed down.

Okay, still with you....

And so we come back to the disappearance of "Merry Christmas."

Bam!  You lost me.  Come at me again.

It has been my view that the steady secularizing and insistent effort at dereligioning America has been dangerous. That danger flashed red in the fall into subprime personal behavior by borrowers and bankers, who after all are just people. Northerners and atheists who vilify Southern evangelicals are throwing out nurturers of useful virtue with the bathwater of obnoxious political opinions.

Wow.  So borrowers and bankers are Northerners and atheists who vilify Southern evangelicals?  Any data on that?  (And isn't that kind of an "obnoxious political opinion"?)

And assuming that's true... that relates to saying/not saying "Merry Christmas" how?

The point for a healthy society of commerce and politics is not that religion saves, but that it keeps most of the players inside the chalk lines. We are erasing the chalk lines.

Look, pal.  Religion isn't the ONLY thing that keeps players "inside the chalk lines".  Believe it or not, one CAN be an atheist AND a moral person.  By the same token, one can be religious AND corrupt as hell.

But even granting that premise, is failure to say "Merry Christmas" really "erasing the chalk lines"?   Is this man suggesting that had the checkout girl at K-Mart been allowed to say "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays", greedy Wall Street bastards would have shown responsiblity and remorse and not been so get-rich-quick?  Seriously?

I wondered if Mr. Henniniger had gone off the deep end, and then the final sentence of his editorial came along:

Feel free: Banish Merry Christmas. Get ready for Mad Max.

Yes, he means that Mad Max.  In his view, that's what will happen to the world if we stop saying "Merry Christmas" (which, by the way, isn't remotely likely to happen).

Oogedy-boogedy.

Renew America Roundup

Michael Bresciani in "The True Christian Approach To The Obama Presidency":

What's the best way for a true Christian to respond to Obama's election?  Why, suing him as an illegal immigrant -- that's how!

Selwyn Duke in "Obama: Fear And Security Force":

These people who say Obama is going to be a dictator just like Hitler are silly and paranoid, aren't they?  But seriously, Obama is going to be a dictator just like Hitler.

Mary Mostert in "Prop. 8, homosexuals, attacks on LDS churches, freedom, and Gadianton Robbers":

The Mormons using then pulpit trying to discriminate against gays and Martin Luther King using the pulpit to end discrimination: what's the difference? 

Sher Zieve in "Rep. Paul Broun apologizes for telling the truth":

If Obama doesn't want to be called Marxist and Hitlerian, then he shouldn't go around being Marxist and Hitlerian.

Chris Adamo in "The grim significance of the 2008 elections":

Pffft.  Alan Keyes broke the racial glass ceiling before Obama did!

Michael Bates in "A Nation of Peter Pans":

Health care and education is for pussies.

A Quick Message To Wingnuts

Guys, Obama isn't going to touch your guns.  And he's not going to take away right wing talk radio.

He's really not.

You want to know how I know that?

Because Obama is a constitutional scholar.  Unlike you wingnuts, or the Bush Administration, he's actually read the document.  He's studied it.  He taught it for several years.

So he knows -- really knows -- what the First and Second Amendment mean.

And he respects it, too.

You see, I'm no fan of guns myself.  But I've researched the Second Amendment -- its historical origins, etc. -- and I come away with same conclusion that the U.S. Supreme Court finally did last year: it's an individual right.  Obama thinks that, too.

Obama, above all, is a man of principle, and much of that principle is embodied in the Constitution.  Unlike the people you elect to office, he stands by that principle, that document.

So you can buy up your guns and display other silly, yet insulting, manifestations of fear about what will happen in the next four years....

...but you're really going to look like jackasses when none of your predictions of an Obama-driven apocalypse come true.

Punditry Of The Day

Shorter Mary Mostert:

Hitler wrote a book before he became leader; Obama wrote a book before he became leader.  Hitler called for national unity and coming together; Obama called for national unity and coming together.  Jeez, people.  Do I have to spell it out for you?

What's Kristol Smoking?

Honestly.  Just when I think he can't write a more inane column, well dammit, there he goes and does it.

Barack Obama will probably win the 2008 presidential election. If he does, we conservatives will greet the news with our usual resolute stoicism or cheerful fatalism.

Right.  I'm sure that's how Rush will be on Wednesday.  Although, I'm not so concerned about Rush as I am the really nutbad conservative fringe, who, inspired by Rush, will greet the news with their usual assassination plots.

Being conservative means never being too surprised by disappointment.

Dead black people after Katrina, financial crisis brought on by conservatives' years of deregulation -- yeah, what a disappointment.

But what if John McCain pulls off an upset?

I’m worried about my compatriots on the left. Michael Powell reports in Saturday’s New York Times that even the possibility of an Obama defeat has driven many liberals into in a state of high anxiety. And then there’s a young woman from Denver who “told her boyfriend that their love life was on hold while she sweated out Mr. Obama’s performance in Colorado.” Well, what if Obama loses Colorado? Or the presidency? As a compassionate conservative, I’m concerned about the well-being of that boyfriend — and of others who might be similarly situated. I feel an obligation to help.

Ah, the concern troll.  Perhaps Kristol et al should be focussing on the fate of their

So let me tell liberals why they should be cheerful if McCain happens to win.

Oh, please don't.

1. It would be a victory for an underdog. Liberals are supposed to like underdogs. McCain is a lonely guy standing up against an unprecedentedly well-financed, superorganized, ExxonMobil-like Obama juggernaut. A McCain upset victory would be a classic liberal happy ending.

McCain's was never the underdog.  He's always been wildly popular with the electorate and the media.  He ran a successful campaign against Bush, and nearly won.  He'a war hero, and he's running against a young black man.  Since when is the white popular guy and underdog to the unknown black guy?

2. It would be a defeat for the establishment. Obama’s most recent high-profile Republican endorser was D.C. insider Kenneth Duberstein. Liberals should be on the side of hard-working plumbers, not big-shot lobbyists — oops, sorry, big-shot strategic advisers and consultants. And Duberstein said that Colin Powell’s endorsement was “the Good Housekeeping seal of approval on Barack Obama.” Doesn’t that comment embody everything that liberals (and many conservatives, including me) find creepy about smug establishment back-scratching and gatekeeping in America?

Wait a second.  Obama is the "establishment"?  McCain's campaign is run by lobbyists, D.C. insiders, and Rove protogees.  So if McCain wins, it's a defeat for the establishment?  And since when does Colin Powell represent the "establishment"?

3. It would be a victory for the future. With President Bush’s approval rating at about 25 percent, a McCain triumph would mean Americans were making a judgment on two future alternatives, not merely voting on the basis of their resentment at the past performance of George W. Bush. It would mean voters were looking ahead, not back. Liberals should therefore welcome a McCain win as a triumph of hope over fear, of the future over the past.

Well, gee, Bill.  Thanks for the meaningless pablum.  Can't that also be said about an Obama victory?  Or even a Bob Barr victory?

4. It would be a victory for freedom. Obama supporter Leon Wieseltier of The New Republic writes that “tyrants and génocidaires would sleep less soundly during a McCain presidency.” Liberals should be opposed to tyranny and genocide. Wieseltier also acknowledges that McCain “was splendidly right about the surge, which is not a small thing; and the grudging way Obama treats the reversal in Iraq, when he treats it at all, is disgraceful.” The surge advanced not only our national security but the cause of freedom in the world. Liberals should be votaries of freedom.

I don't know what "victory for freedom" means. I suspect Bill doesn't either; he just llikes the sound of that phrase.  In any evevnt, he seems to tie it to Iraq.  Because nothing says "freedom" to Iraqis more than keeping Americans in their country indefinitely.

5. A McCain victory would be good for liberalism. Look at recent history. Jimmy Carter and a Democratic Congress begat Ronald Reagan. Bill Clinton and a Democratic Congress produced Newt Gingrich. Who knows what would follow a President Obama and a Democratic Congress? Here’s one possibility: President Sarah Palin.

Oh, I get it.  Liberals should be glad that McCain-Palin wins, because that makes a Palin presidency less likely -- and an Obama win makes a Palin presidency more likely.

Bill, have you looked at McCain lately?  He's got one foot-in-the-grave.

In any event, perhaps Kristol hasn't got the memo: Obama is the real conservative.

So liberals shouldn’t be too upset at the idea of McCain winning. Could it happen?

It’s possible. What if the polls, for various reasons, are overstating Obama’s support by a couple points? And what if the late deciders break overwhelmingly against Obama, as they did in the Democratic primaries? McCain could then thread the Electoral College needle.

McCain would have to win every state where he now leads or is effectively even in the polls (including North Carolina, Indiana and Missouri). He’d have to take Florida and Ohio, where he’s about four points down but where operatives on the ground give him a pretty good shot. That gets him to 247 of the 270 votes needed.

McCain’s path to victory is then to snatch Pennsylvania (which gets him to 268), and win either Virginia, Colorado, Nevada or New Mexico (states where he trails by about four to seven points) — or New Hampshire, where he’s 10 points behind but twice won dramatic primary victories.

And then, and then, and then, McCain has to win the Electoral Votes of the MOON, if there is some way between now and tomorrow that we could make the Moon a 51st state, because we should because because because there's an American flag on it, and.....

To give Bill some credit, he's pretty accurately pegged what McCain has to to do in order to win.  Let's read what Bill wrote... slowly. 

First, McCain has to win EVERY state in which he has had a lead (and some of those states, like his home state of Arizona, McCain's lead is only a couple of points).   

THEN he must win North Carolina AND win Indiana AND win Missouri AND win Florida AND win Ohio (i.e., all the "battleground states" which all show slight Obama leads or ties) and even then he's only at 247 of the 270 votes he needs.

And he even if he manages to do ALL THAT, he still has to pull off a miracle win in Pennsylvania (where he is down 8-13 points in the latest polls) AND one of several other states where he is down by 6-7 points.

In other words, to win, McCain can't have ANY upsets, and pull out SEVERAL miracles.

It’s an inside straight. But I’ve seen gamblers draw them.

Yeah, but how many times has a gambler drawn that many inside straights in a row?

If McCain wins, think of this column as a modest contribution to cheering up distraught liberals. If Obama prevails, I’m confident there are some compassionate liberals out there who will do the same for hapless conservatives as they hobble out to the wilderness.

Or maybe we'll just spend the next four years questioning conservatives' patriotism.  That's what winners get to do, right, Bill?

From The "Wishful Thinking" School Of Political Analysis

Shorter Ed Whalen (NRO's The Corner):  "Obama supporters are clearly more enthused about their candidate than McCain supporters are about McCain.  This means the polls are wrong and McCain will win."

More Great Moments In Conservative Punditry

Radio show Bob Grant is alarmed that Obama is being a meglomanic, as evidenced by the fact that Obama is standing in front of an "O for Obama" flag.  Have a listen:

An excerpt:

But really folks, did you notice Obama is not content with just having several American flags, plain old American flags with the 50 states represented by 50 stars? He has the "O" flag. And that's what that "O" is. That's what that "O" is. Just like he did with the plane he was using. He had the flag painted over, and the "O" for Obama. Now, these are symptom -- these things are symptomatic of a person who would like to be a potentate -- a dictator. And I really see this in this man.

Here's a picture of the flag in question:

 

Ooooh!  Look at that.  He's got his own flag!  And he obviously equates that with the American flag!  Can you believe --

Huh?

What's that?

 

The state flag of Ohio?  Where Obama was speaking when that picture was taken?

Is conservative radio host Bob Grant smarter than a fifth grader?

No.

Shorter David Brooks

Shorter David Brooks: "Obama unquestionably posseses a steady hand, a reassuring demeanor, and the rare ability to see reality unfiltered.  This can only mean one thing: he will be the worst president evah."

Why I Love Reading TBogg

This

P.S.  Also because I learned from TBogg the actual lyrics to "Waterloo"

Reality Check With Grant Swank

The Reverand Pastor Grant Swank had a great column yesterday.  A totally incomprehensible column full of ten dollar words....

Obama's Cult

"'As you may know, not long ago a couple hundred thousand Berliners made a lot of noise for my opponent. I'll take the roar of 50,000 Harleys any day,' McCain said, referring to Democrat Barack Obama's recent visit to the German capital" per AP.

John McCain was addressing the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. His speech was reality-based, far different than the fantasy-celebrity-Islamic B. Hussein Obama base.

Obama's base is full of fantasy-celebrity Islamics?  What is that?  Like Sacha Baron Cohen's Borat?  No, was he Islamic?

Reality. It's becoming increasinly a strange virtue.

And Milk.  It's not just for breakfast anymore.

Yet it is the power behind reality that guarantees its ultimate success with those genuinely seeking truth.

Yeah, I don't know what that means either.  I guess reality runs on those batteries used by Energizer bunnies.

Cultures have been easily steared by the unreal. It does not take thought or perception to go that route. When cultures persist in that journey, they disintegrate.

Unreal?  You mean like an unseen God who sits on a throne up in the clouds, which you can visit after you die because he's got your name scrolled in a book, and you can play with all your longlost dead pets?

Reality means sacrificing one's own wishes for what is.

And virtual reality means sacrificing some of one's own wishes for what is.  I think.

Reality dictates that self submit to the actual milieu rather than carve out a more convenient travel.

In other words, traveolocity.com is a ripoff.

Cults are built on fantasies. They wrap into their warp the thoughtless and weak. If reality tries to break through, there is unbelievable resistance for cults are structured on the extreme opposite of reality.

I need graphics to help me understand this.

There is a B. Hussein cult already formed. It is given to the craze. Its members don't read, don't heed. They simply cheer, stomp, cry, fall at their messiah's feet and clamor for more. B. Hussein is most adept at providing them with the unreal.

Well, since more than half of polled Americans favor Obama, can it really be called a cult?

"Change." "Unite." Phrases like that don't actually say anything when coming from a manipulative, controlling personage like B. Hussein.

Riiiiiight.  And calling him "B. Hussein", by the way, isn't at all being manipulative.  Because in reality, that's his name, right?

When McCain spoke to the bikers, he was more than in his element.

Yes, because McCain owns six houses, flies his own private jet, etc.  He's a real Hell Angel, that John McCain.  Especially when he offered up his wife to appear in a topless beuaty pageant.

They would not tolerate for a second the contrived. McCain gave them reality. He spoke simply the facts. He became one of them.

He's even getting a tat on his ass.

There were no suspicions. There was no hesitancy, no heckling, no madness.

Probably because most of them were getting a beer before the main attraction, Kid Rock, took the stage (it's true!)

Interestingly and importantly, Cindy McCain brought about the same chemistry when taking the microphone. While quite the wealthy female, she stayed with the reality quotient and matched her audience in splendor.

Ah, yes.  The splendor of hundreds of drunk bikers in the summer heat, knocking back the beers and talking about their Harleys.  It's kind of like an F. Scott Fitzgerald novel.

If America wants to remain on track, it must keep to the reality gear.

Not second or third gear, but the reality gear.

If America concludes to lose its way, it chooses the likes of B. Hussein. His cadre is already in place to usher in the throes of division and depression. That is what "Change" and "Unite" really mean in the B. Hussein lexicon.

Swank has obtained the secret B. Hussein decoder ring.

McCain's reality is at America's core.

With Stanley Tucci and Angeline Jolie.

It is what America has always held to when at the Republic's best. It is what makes this democracy like none other, no matter the detractors' derisions.

McCain's reality speech to the bikers was clear and crisp. It was honorable because it was honest. Reality knows nothing but honesty.

True.  I especially like the "honest" part where McCain mocked Obama for suggesting that we can improve energy efficiency by keeping our tires inflated.... and then later (outside the rally) said he agreed with Obama about that.

It's that kind of reality and honesty which is rare these days.

That is why the B. Hussein's doctrine is the Loser Maximum.

Which sounds like a badly named power drink.

It is dishonest on so many multi-dimensional levels as to be frightening to the real-thinking citizens of this country.

Well, maybe not as dishonest as constantly mis-stating his name, huh>

B. Hussein has belonged to a dishonest political plant known as Jeremiah Wright's church. B. Hussein has tied up with dishonest Muslims in Illinois via the Nation of Islam. B. Hussein's biography is fraught with untruths. His birth certificate is dishonest — a fake. And so forth and so forth.

That's all honest reality, my friends.  It's honest.  And so forth and so forth.

The decision before this nation is to empower reality from Atlantic to Pacific or wed to the death wish. It is that stark a choice.

For real, Pastor Swank?  If we vote for Obama, we die?  C'mon.  Reeeeeally?

Kiss The Girl

I'm still vaguely aware of popular songs on the charts, although typically, I'm not in that demographic anymore.  When I heard of a song called "I Kissed A Girl", sung by a woman (Katy Perry), I knew it was only a matter of time before the moral majority heads would spin.  And now that it is #1 on the Billboard charts, we have a winner.

Okay.... let's just see what we're talking about, before we go on...

From the blog of OneNewsNow (the media arm of the National Family Association), columnist Johnnie Moore has some (incoherent) things to say.

HEY!  LET'S MAKE MIDDLE SCHOOL LESBIANS!

by Johnnie Moore

Interesting title.  Nice phraseology.

Billboard Magazine just deemed Katy Perry’s debut single to be the “Song of Summer” after maintaining six straight weeks in the number one slot on their Hot 100’s chart.

What’s interesting is the song is anything, but “straight.”

Explanation of the joke:  See the song spent six straight weeks on the chart, but the song isn't "straight", because it deals with girls kissing girls.  See, "straight" has multiple meanings.  Hahahaha!  Oh, that Johnnie Moore.  Such verbal wit.  Like Oscar Wilde.... although (presumably) not as gay.

It is, in fact, the next episode in the never-ending media agenda to make homosexual experimentation a kind of adolescent right of passage.

[UPDATE inspired by Bill's comment:  Yeah, he wrote "right of passage".  Don't worry.  It gets worse.]

I would like to know what if Johnnie really believes this.  How does this "agenda" come about?  Do people sit a room and plan this?  Do we have a bunch of media moguls, all dressed in feather boas and really nice shoes, sitting around a very stylish conference room table, asking each other, "Dammit!  We're not doing enough to get teens to become gay!  What can we do?  Come on!  Think outside the box, people!"

To which one impeccably dressed executive named Steve says (in a faux foreign accent): "Why don't we put a song out there, sung by a woman, about kissing another woman?" 

"No!" chimes in another.  "We've got to get the teens.  How about a girl kissing a girl?!?"

And so on....

This time, through lyrics like:
“drink in hand, lost my discretion…just wanna try you…I kissed a girl and I liked it, the taste of her cherry chap stick, I kissed a girl just to try it, I hope my boyfriend don’t mind it, it felt so wrong, it felt so right, Don’t mean I’m in love tonight, I kissed a girl and I liked it…No, I don’t even know your name, it doesn’t matter, You’re my experimental game…”

In a July 23^rd Chicago Sun-Times article entitled, “Even Mild Girls go Wild for ‘I Kissed a Girl’” the music director of a Chicago station said, “I think it’s just a fluffy, light novelty pop song that has a slightly edgy lyric.” He also said he’d only received about two complaints about the song. The Sun-Times says this new song is “capitalizing on the casual kissing epidemic sweeping a generation.”

Kissing epidemic?  Oh damn.  I wasn't even aware.  Shoot, I miss all the good stuff....

In order to get the full picture of the implications of this number one hit you might consider following around an average middle school or high school student this weekend. No doubt, the song will be blaring in every tween or teen store in your local mall, and you’ll most definitely hear its lyrics incoherently sung through the lips of plenty of teenagers.

And when I'm arrested for stalking, I'm sure the police will understand.

"No, you see, officer... I was following that teenage girl around the mall because I wanted to see if she was going to kiss another girl like the song says.  Surely you can understand that.  It was totally innocent, I swear!"

Now, I’m no legalistic.

You're no grammatical either.

My iTunes library has its share of secular music intermingled among the latest Christian tunes, and Podcasts of every shape and size, but I just can’t handle this one.

I wasn't aware that Podcasts have shapes.  See, the things you learn from the Christian right....

How long will all these media moguls be allowed to sit around board room tables and make decisions that alter the healthy development of our nation’s kids?

Hey, he does think they sit around boardroom tables and concoct this stuff.

This weekend there will be many thousands of young girls who will “playfully” choose to “kiss a girl to try it” after they are nonchalantly coaxed by this “fluffy” hit.

"And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth."

Seriously, Johnnie.  Get a grip.  The song isn't about lesbianism.  Nor does it promote it.  It's merely about a girl kissing a girl to see what it is like.  And I respectfully suggest that if a kiss is enough to make a girl bat for the other team, she probably had those tendancies in the first place.

And by the way, girls kissing girls isn't exactly new or novel.  I know many grown women, all of them straight, who "practiced" kissing as a teenager with a girlfriend on one occasion.  It happens.  There's nothing titillating about it; there's nothing condemnable about it either.

From the California Supreme Court’s decisions regarding marriage, to the skyrocketing popularity of this song, to the nearly non-stop introduction of the homosexual agenda into almost every facet of our culture, we are facing the rise of the most homosexually friendly generation in history.

How Johnnie longs for the good ol' old days when gay-hating was the norm, and you could lynch people like Matthew Sheppard and nobody cared.

Homosexual experimentation is also an epidemic. This is the fruit of years of marketing that has literally altered the worldviews of our nation’s 80 million millenials.

You gotta sympathize with Johnnie.  Christianity and the moral values folks have engaged in centuries of marketing, and then along comes this upstart "gay agenda" with its cleverly placed GAP ads and #1 songs, totally undoing everything Christianity set out to do, and making girls kiss other girls.

Oh, by the way, Katy Perry’s real name is Katy Hudson. You might remember her from the 2001 album bearing her name on Red Hill records; it was a Christian album.

True.  And both her parents are preachers, too.  But still, they were no match for those evil media executives and their devious scheme to turn innocent god-fearing Katy Hudson into girl-kissing harlot Katy Perry.  NOW just look at her...

The vixon.

I have half a mind to follow her around the mall....

** BONUS **  Prediction of the decade, from ChristianMusic.com, on Katy Hudson's debut album:

Katy Hudson's debut easily could have been just another teen songwriter mimicking mainstream music trends with Christian lyrics. Instead, I hear a remarkable young talent emerging, a gifted songwriter in her own right who will almost certainly go far in this business. That name again is Katy Hudson. Trust me, you'll be hearing it more and more in the next year.

Well, yeah....