Holy crap, man. Not that I'm defending Rick Wagoner, but should ANY politician have this kind of power over the private sector?

-- General Motors Corp. Chief Executive Officer Rick Wagoner was forced out after President Barack Obama’s task force decided he was unable to craft a plan to save the automaker he ran for more than eight years.

Wagoner, 56, said he agreed to an administration request to leave. Chief Operating Officer Fritz Henderson will become CEO and director Kent Kresa will succeed Wagoner as chairman. GM had been seeking as much as $16.6 billion in new U.S. loans after an initial installment of $13.4 billion.

Pay attention, fellow free marketers. Just because we're paranoid, that doesn't mean that they ain't really out to get us.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

I don't really buy any of this. I don't buy into conspiracy theories in general because I tend to believe that people are stupid ... people in large groups are EXTREMELY stupid ... and large groups of stupid people can't manage the kind of secrecy and organized deception that would be necessary to pull off a global conspiracy.

Conspiracy theories are goofy.

Having said that, I get a kick out of the fact that there are conspiracy theorists out there who're already targeting Obama:

HT: Pasadena Closet Conservative.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

I hadn't seen this before. Now that I have, I almost wish I hadn't. It's like having seen too much of a car accident and wishing you hadn't rubber-necked.

Tell us again, Obama supporters, how this isn't a cult.

Labels: Obama Watch, Politics

Given the shocking disaster that is the failed Obama administration, we might as well have elected Spongebob last November.

Sure, we wouldn't have been able to pat ourselves on the back and congratulate ourselves on electing our nation's first black PotUS ... but we could have made a big to-do about having put our second yellow, invertebrate cartoon character in the Oval Office (Bill Clinton, of course, was the first).

Even the Washington Post is fretting over the...

...massive deficits and tax increases (that) President Obama unveiled last week in his first budget request, a 10-year spending plan thick with political friction points.

HT: Patterico.

Of course, President Dipshit continues to try to impress with grand distractions, saying:

"The system we have now might work for the powerful and well-connected interests that have run Washington for far too long, but I don't."

I wonder who he thinks he does work for. The Chinese? Consider the hole he's digging:

...his plan would produce annual deficits far larger in dollar terms than any recorded before the recession. As a percentage of the overall economy, the budget gap is projected to settle down to a more manageable 3 percent by the end of Obama's term. But Washington would continue to borrow heavily, and the national debt would double over the next five years...

"If you think with this kind of incredible growth in government that they're going to only tax wealthy people, then I have some old lottery tickets I want to sell you," said Rep. Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.), the senior Republican on the House Budget Committee.

I keep hearing about how, for the past eight years, Dubya did nothing but cut taxes for the rich. Well, I don't know about you, but over the past eight years my income and stability have only gotten better and better. Seems to me that cutting taxes on the rich must be a damn good idea.

Of course, I've actually worked for my money and tried not to make stupid decisions. I haven't bought a house I can't afford, I don't have any big-ticket luxury items, I avoid debt like the plague. But that's just me, I'm silly that way.

Obama says that his loony plans to tax and spend us into oblivion are part of...

"..the sweeping change that this country demanded when it went to the polls in November."

What scares me is that I'm sure he actually believes that.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

I've asked before, I'll ask again: Feeling stupid yet, Obama voters?

The Obama administration on Friday told a federal judge it would not deviate from the Bush administration's position that detainees held at a U.S. air base in Afghanistan have no right to sue in U.S. courts.

HT: Pasadena Closet Conservative.

Since this is one of the areas where Dubya had it right, I'm pretty happy about it.

But, uh ... change we can believe in?

Hardy. Har. Har.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Hey, look, it's Obama's Spendulus Package in action!

Toilet paper was a dollar-twelve, now it's SEVEN BUCKS!

This time next year we'll be standing in line for two hours to buy that seven-dollar toilet paper!

Thank you, Comrade Obama!

(This post has five exclamation points!)

Labels: Humor, News, Obama Watch

This moron we elected last November is entertaining, at least. At most, really. I propose a new nickname for him: D'OH-Bama.

Remember how slick he seemed while campaigning? How did he maintain that illusion for so long? Turns out that, in reality, he has the physical grace of Homer Simpson ... the integrity of Caligula ... the same grasp of economics as a bag of rocks ... the hypocracy of, well, any liberal, really ... and, most comically of all, his stimulus package now has the endorsement of Jimmy Carter.

Jimmy Carter has full confidence in Obama's "stimulus" bill? Man, that's a riot.

I'm sure I don't need to tell you that having Jimmy Carter endorse your economic policy is like having Dina Lohan endorse your parenting skills.

Hey, Obama voters ... feeling dumb yet?

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Attention, pro-lifers: Be careful about voicing your opposition to the Obama administration's abortion policies. Especially if you live in Oklahoma.

Last week an Oklahoma City police officer pulled over Chip Harrison because of a sign in his car window reading, "Abort Obama Not the Unborn". The officer took the sign away, saying Harrison was entitled to his beliefs but that the US secret service "could construe this as a threat against President Obama".

Harrison got a visit from the Secret Service before this debacle was over:

Secret Service agents determined Harrison was no threat to the president after conducting a walk-through of his southeast Oklahoma City home. Agents conducted a field interview on his patio, Harrison said...
Harrison admitted some concern once the Secret Service was contacted. Agents called him at work, advising that he needed to return home so they could search his house.

Citing stereotypes of agents kicking down doors and rummaging through personal belongings, Harrison told them that he wanted to get the advice of an attorney.

"I (thought), 'Boy, I'm in deep trouble because of a simple sign,'" he said.

I think it's interesting that the officer who confiscated Harrison's sign did so because he felt that the word "abort" constituted a threat:

"My description of the word meant termination or remove, and one of the police officers said no it means to kill, so you're basically saying you want to kill Obama," said Harrison.

At least the cop seems to associate the concept of abortion with killing. Because, of course, abortion is killing. But I digress.

Can you imagine the outcry if someone had been pulled over due to a bumpersticker or sign critical of a Republican? Can you imagine if that hypothetical person had received a visit from the Secret Service? The lefties would have gone all to pieces.

Of course, those of us who aren't liberals have enough common sense to recognize that this just amounts to an Oklahoma cop with poor judgment. Simply voicing criticism of President Daffy isn't illegal.

Yet.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Cube mentioned that President Obama has had a bust of Winston Churchill removed from the Oval Office.

Cube says she wonders with whom the President will replace Winston. I'd imagine he'll commission a bust of Neville Chamberlain ... maybe include a caption along the lines of "The Unclinched Iranian Fist In Our Time."

What a putz.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

President Obama says it would be a "catastrophe" for congress to fail to pass his demanded trillion dollars in "stimulus" spending.

If you've swallowed that even for a second, you really need to read Charles Krauthammer in today's Washington Post:

Catastrophe, mind you. So much for the president who in his inaugural address two weeks earlier declared "we have chosen hope over fear." Until, that is, you need fear to pass a bill...

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

I don't think that even those of us who opposed the Obama campaign had any idea he'd wreck things so thoroughly, and so soon after inauguration.

He seems to be flailing around, ranting, desperate. It's as though we've elected Daffy Duck.

Obama has turned out to be something of a parody of the classic liberal; the kind of politician who really seems to believe that you can solve all the problems in the world if you just do two things:

• spend money...


• and talk.

Have you heard the latest about the War on Terror? The Failed Obama Administration seems to think that the best way to win it is to change it's name:

...the Obama administration is searching for alternatives to the term "war on terror."

What's being sought is a more precise phrase that can recast the U.S. government's counterterrorism fight in ideological as well as military terms. Obama publicly signaled the new approach this week. When asked about the "war on terror" phrase by CNN's Anderson Cooper, Obama said, "Well you know, I think it is very important for us to recognize that we have a battle or a war against some terrorist organizations … Words matter in this situation..."

Oh, yeah. I've always taken it as a given that when Bin Ladin's guys flew those planes into the World Trade Center on 9/11, they were thinking "This will teach them not to chose their words so esoterically!"

On the money spending front, President Daffy is warning us it will be "catastrophe" if the House and Senate fail to pass his demanded trillion dollar spending bill. Fewer and fewer Americans really believe that this so-called stimulus bill is really going to solve anything.

If only this many Americans had felt such reasonable doubt about Barack Obama in November.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

For two weeks now, the United States has been neck-deep in the failed Obama administration, and no one seems to have an exit strategy.

I blame Colin Powell. In February of 2003 Powell appeared before the UN and argued for the invasion of Iraq. In October of last year, Powell endorsed Barack Obama for President of the United States. How many more times will we allow this man to lead the US into a quagmire?

At least this time Powell can say that our nation's security really was compromised by a real WMD (Washington Media Darling).

America will eventually have time to catch our collective breath and figure out just what went wrong. When we do, here are some of the issues we'll have to address:

• How did 'Bama manage to screw things up so badly in North Korea?
  

  ...dark warnings of "unavoidable" war are spilling out of North Korea almost daily. On Tuesday, news media reports here and in Japan said North Korea is preparing to test-launch a long-range missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead.

  
  Is this the international crisis that Joe Biden tried to warn us about? Has the President been so busy courting tax evaders that he has left one or more of our national loins thoroughly ungirded?



• On the occasion of the President's inauguration it seemed that the entire world embraced this once great nation. I'm amazed that in relatively little time 'Bama has squandered all of that international good will:
  

  The European Union (EU) says it will lodge a formal complaint with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) about new US President Barack Obama's economic stimulus package.
  
  Mr Obama's plan, which is currently being debated in the US Senate, includes a 'Buy American' clause that seeks to ensure that only US iron, steel and manufactured goods are used in infrastructure projects.

  
  It's a source of terrible shame that our President's "go it alone" cowboy attitude has alienated us from our allies abroad.



• And then there's 'Bama's penchant for obvious, flagrant cronyism. Consider the people he's surrounded himself with since he's been in DC:
  
  Nancy Killefer:
  

  President Barack Obama's choice to oversee budget and spending reform, Nancy Killefer, withdrew her nomination on Tuesday because of tax problems, she said in a letter released by the White House.

  
  
  Tom Daschle:
  

  In a stunning setback for President Obama, Tom Daschle abruptly withdrew his nomination to become secretary of Health and Human Services today, following an admission that he failed to pay about $140,000 in back taxes.

  
  
  Timothy Geithner:
  

  Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner survived his tax controversy -- not paying taxes on income earned while he worked at the International Monetary Fund, despite receiving written notification saying he needed to.
  
  "These are not rocket-science kinds of tax issues," said University of Cincinnati law professor Paul Caron...




• And finally, there's the President's stubborn habit of simply ignoring the will of the people:
  

  Americans strongly oppose the commander-in-chief's first two executive orders -- allowing federal funding for overseas abortions and closing Guantanamo -- according to a Gallup poll released Tuesday.

The way out won't be easy. We still have somewhere around three years, eleven months and two weeks of the failed Obama administration to endure. But let's hope that 2012 will finally bring America change we can believe in.

Maybe in the form of Jeb Bush.

Labels: Humor, News, Obama Watch, Politics

We all know that the New Messiah, President Obama, is all about human rights. That's why he's closed Gitmo and instructed the CIA to close all it's "secret prison" locations all over the world.

But you might be curious to know that he's kept the practice of "extraordinary rendition" as his go-to tactic when it comes to dealing with the bad guys.

"Extraordinary rendition" is when our guys grab one of the bad guys and, rather than torture him themselves (because we don't do that, right?) they take the bad guy to another country... one where torturing terrorists in order to save innocent lives is seen as a necessary evil.

So the bad guy gets tortured and, hopefully, spills the beans ... and innocent lives are saved when the bomb is defused, the plane is grounded, yadda yadda yadda, all that gnarly Jack Bauer stuff.

I'm not mocking that Jack Bauer stuff. I think it's awesome. Especially when it's done in real life. You real life Jack Bauer's out there, you guys kick ass.

Anyway, Obama wants to make it clear that his administration isn't going to engage in torture. They'll just engage in a little kidnapping from time to time, and if the countries we turn the bad guys over to engage in a little torture, well, The One's hands are still clean, right?

Classic liberal thinking.

And it gets better. Even the leftists DC organization called Human Rights Watch is on board with "extraordinary rendition," at least as per the Obama administration:

“Under limited circumstances, there is a legitimate place" for renditions, said Tom Malinowski, the Washington advocacy director for Human Rights Watch.

But, of course, Human Rights Watch is really just a human rights themed arm of the Democratic Party ... and they were singing a different tune during the Dubya administration. This is from their own website, March 2005:

The current practice of so-called “extraordinary rendition” is an affront to the fundamental human right not to be subjected to torture. This prohibition is absolute. Just as governments cannot torture people, they cannot send people to countries where they are likely to be tortured. Rendition to torture is the legal and moral equivalent of engaging in torture directly.

So to put it all together, according to Human Rights Watch, "extraordinary rendition" is an affront to human rights and is the legal and moral equivalent of engaging in torture directly, the need to ban it is absolute... aaaaaaand there is a legitimate place for it in the Obama administration.

You Obama supporters, you think the rest of the world is swallowing this crap, right? Like we don't know hypocrites when we see 'em?

Human rights? Bullshit. Human Rights Watch has no interest in preserving the fundamental rights of humanity. The group is just another Democratic extra-curricular activity. Don't believe the hype.

And just in case you're curious, Dubya's boys didn't invent the concept of "extraordinary rendition." It's a practice that goes back to Clinton, and some say further. According to Richard Clark, Al Gore loved the concept of "extraordinary rendition", saying:

"That's a no-brainer. Of course it's a violation of international law, that's why it's a covert action..."

And of one terrorist suspect in particular:

"The guy is a terrorist. Go grab his ass."

What's that? The Clintons, you say? Al Gore? More Democrats with blood on their hands? Why, it can't be! The Democrats are the good guys, they protect people from those bad old Neocons! Right? And Al Gore protects us from the sun! The Leftists are the nice ones, right??!? That's why we elected Obama! So he'd change things from the way the Neocons ran things, right? And there would be no more wars and no more bad stuff and everyone would hold hands and sing. right? RIGHT??

Wake up, dummy.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

I may never get the visual out of my head, no matter how hard I try:

But at least I now know why Michelle always looks so uptight.

Labels: Humor, Obama Watch, You Tube

Isn't our new President just dreeeeeamy?

Then, with a wave of that very same hand, he turned the National Reflecting Pool into wine. And oh, how they danced, the little children of DC.

Gimme a f----ng break.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

I can't think of a better way to mark the inauguration of the Savior Elect, President Tila Tequila, than with one of my favorite songs from Faith No More:

You have a winning way, so keep it,
Your future! Your future! Your future!

You are an angel heading for the land of sunshine!
And fortune is smiling upon you!

Prepare for a series of a comfortable miracles,
From fasting to feasting!
And life to you is a dashing, bold adventure!
So sing, and rejoice! Sing, and rejoice!

Pat yourself on the back and give yourself a handshake,
'Cause everything is not yet lost!

Does life seem worthwhile to you?

HERE'S HOW TO ORDER!

HERE'S HOW TO ORDER!

Labels: Music, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

We are going to have to live with him for at least four years, so I've been looking for things to like about Obama.

I could mope and get spiteful and bitter, but that's not going to do me any good. I walked around mad for the last six years of Bill Clinton's administration simply because I thought he was an awful president. Even worse than Dubya. I don't want to do that with this guy. I want to find things to like about him, even if only for my own positive mental health and to prevent ulcers.

I'm not going to put on any rose-colored glasses, but I am going to look for the good in the guy. Here's what I've got so far:

• "Change you can believe in" turned out to really mean "more of the same." That's not necessarily a good thing, but at least it isn't radical risk-taking.
  
  Pete Townshend said it best: "Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss."
  
  So hopefully all the young liberals who voted for Obama to bring about "change" will take note. Nothing substantial ever changes in Washington. The only change Obama has brought to the White House is superficial.
  
  Some people are wondering if Obama might be a "closet conservative." It's too soon to conclude that ... but at least he's not quite as naive as I thought he was. So that's good.
  
  Why do politicians always mean the exact opposite of what they say? George W. Bush's "compassionate conservatism" was actually a code phrase for "irresponsible liberalism." And it looks like "change we can believe in" actually meant "stick with the people you're sick of."
  
  
• Turns out he's not the sleaziest politician in Illinois. And the Blago scandal hasn't turned up any dirt on Obama at all. Good for the President-Elect.
  
  You know, I like the idea that maybe the Obama team was working with the Feds on the Blagojevich bust. Maybe they squealed on the guy. If so, they did the right thing.



• I think Barack is more honest and less smarmy than Bill Clinton. Obviously he's a much better speaker and a less muddled thinker than George W. Bush, and he's far prettier than the first President Bush. So for the first time since Reagan, when I watch the President give speeches, I won't be squirming for aesthetic reasons. I will likely squirm for other reasons (policy), but not because of the presentation.

Yeah, these are mostly superficial things. My policy problems with Barack Obama still far outweigh my trivial compliments. Still, it's nice that there are a few good things apparent about the guy.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

You have GOT to watch this video ... shot in secret, under cover, at Planned Parenthood in Indiana. The girl seeking an abortion tells the Planned Parenthood employee that she's thirteen and that the baby's father is thirty-one.

The Planned Parenthood employee INSISTS that she doesn't want to know the age of the baby's father so she won't have to notify Child Protective Services.

She even comes up with a lie for the girl about the father being a 14 year old.

Then the Planned Parenthood employee instructs the girl about getting an abortion out of state so her parents won't have to be notified.

Parents need to face the reality of what Planned Parenthood really is: It's simply an abortion provider that preys on young girls for political purposes.

So tell me again, liberals, about how abortion on demand is a "women's rights" issue. Go ahead, try to sell me that line of insulting bullshit again. And tell yourself what you need to believe so you can sleep at night.

Tell yourself what you need to believe about this guy, too:

Babies murdered in the womb, young mothers emotionally scarred for life, and Planned Parenthood is complicit in all of it.

And their biggest supporter takes the Oval Office next month.

So, go ahead, liberals ... tell me again how this is about "freedom of choice."

More here.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

• Just a reminder that I really do believe that, nowadays, the best reason to visit this blog is to see the awesome stuff I share from my Google Reader. The box o' links is at the top of the column to the left.



• Keith Roy Weatherley was sitting in his car when the police tried to arrest him.
  
  He was pleasuring himself with a jar of spaghetti sauce.
  
  It took four officers to remove him from his car. While wrestling with those officers, Weatherley continued trying to pleasure himself.
  
  Afterwards, when the police searched his car, they found pornography, a home-made sex aid, women's stockings and a Jack Russell terrier.
  
  I DID NOT make any of that up.
  
  You know, I think that the best thing about having a physical relationship with spaghetti sauce is that you can't get it PREGO! HA!
  
  I also want to say that it's high time these simple, small-minded Republican bigots stop preventing marriages between people and pasta toppings.



• Yep, that's about it:

  

  HT: The Ol' Broad.




• It's turkey! It's food! Darn near all of you will be eating turkey next week, and that turkey will have been slaughtered in the exact same way! Get over it, geeeez, ya friggin' crybabies!



• The movie I now officially want to see more than any other movie is Darren Aronofsky's Mickey Rourke vehicle, The Wrestler:




• Hey, whattaya know! George Dubya ChimpHitler somehow managed during his administration to end global warming! Now, I know that it would just be FAAAAR too much to ask for you leftists to give him credit for his amazing feat, but can you at least quell the alarmist crap for now?
  
  HT: Instapundit.



• My non-blogging friend The Governor brought my attention to the following:
  

  Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif,), who chairs the House Armed Services Committee strategic forces subcommittee, with oversight of missile defense programs, said missile defense programs will receive hard and long scrutiny next year.
  
  No rogue nations have been dissuaded by formation of the U.S. missile defense shield from continuing to develop long-range missiles and nuclear weapons, she commented.
  
  "The truth is, is that it hasn't caused anybody to stop doing what they're doing," she said. "And if it hasn't done that, then holy moly, what's the point" of developing missile defenses?"

  
  Rogue nations are still developing long range missiles and nuclear weapons ... therefore, US missile defense programs are useless. Yep, makes PERFECT F&%$%NG SENSE to me.

Labels: Blogs, Links, Media, Movies, News, Obama Watch, Politics

You may have heard it said about someone who has unquestioningly swallowed some line of inexorable, uncompromising propaganda ... that the person in question has "drank the KoolAid."

It's possible that younger bloggers might not know about the origins of that phrase.

This week marks the thirtieth anniversary of the Jonestown Massacre. In the mid '70's, self-proclaimed messiah, socialist leader and clergyman Jim Jones brought his more than 900 followers, people of mixed ages, races, nationalities and abilities, to his compound in Guyana. Jones followers embraced him as their new Messiah, the one man who could save them from America's wickedness and intolerance. On November 18th, 1978, Jones convinced over 900 of his expatriate followers in Guyana to commit suicide by drinking a flavored drink mix spiked with cyanide.

First the children (over 300 of them) at Jonestown were poisoned, then the adults poisoned themselves. Over 900 people died on that November day because they chose to believe what they'd been told. They saw Jones as "The One," and they were ready to give the whole of their lives to their savior, leader and teacher:

Thankfully, the lessons of Jonestown are seared into our collective memory, to paraphrase John Kerry.

Never again will Americans look for someone to believe in, just to get caught up in the empty glitz of some charismatic new "messiah-figure."

Never again will we fall for the hustle when some flashy young man with a bright smile promises that yes, we can have the happiness we deserve if we just give him the power to create it for us.

If this new "messiah" condescends to us, just as Jim Jones did, by challenging the religious beliefs that we "cling to," we'll recognize him as a charlatan.

And we'll never again accept some self-styled savior's personal new vision of socialism as the secret to happy, productive lives.

Right? Never again, right?

Hello?

Oh, I'm sorry, 52% of America ... I didn't mean to interrupt you while you were enjoying that fruity, mixed beverage. Who mixed that up for you? Your friends over at NBC? How nice of them.

Looks tasty. I bet it goes down smooth.

You'll have to let me know if you notice any aftertaste.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

...kicks ass, as always:

A lot of this one is aimed at Zo's fellow black people, so some of it doesn't speak specifically to me.

But most of it is just classic Zo. That same awesome, creative, fresh perspective on common sense that his fans love.

Common sense is pretty rare these days. And when it's presented with the authority, sense of humor and warmth that Zo Rachel musters, common sense can give you a head rush.

By the way, Zo finally has his own domain. One day we'll be able to brag that we discovered this guy when he was just getting started.

Labels: Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube, Zo

This is from How Obama Got Elected . Com:

Who voted for Barack Obama ... and just how much do those voters really grasp about the issues of the day? John Ziegler spent some time with some of Obama's supporters and got some interesting answers:

They can't tell you who Harry Reid is, they don't know who Barney Frank is ... but they by God know which candidate has a pregnant teenage daughter.

Congratulations, America, you've elected your first Reality TV Show President.

And he won the immunity challenge, so he doesn't have to leave the house for at least four years.

Ziegler has some interesting data from a Zogby Poll to back up his assertions:

512 Obama Voters 11/13/08-11/15/08 MOE +/- 4.4 points

97.1% High School Graduate or higher, 55% College Graduates

Results to 12 simple Multiple Choice Questions

57.4% could NOT correctly say which party controls congress (50/50 shot just by guessing)

81.8% could NOT correctly say Joe Biden quit a previous campaign because of plagiarism (25% chance by guessing)

82.6% could NOT correctly say that Barack Obama won his first election by getting opponents kicked off the ballot (25% chance by guessing)

88.4% could NOT correctly say that Obama said his policies would likely bankrupt the coal industry and make energy rates skyrocket (25% chance by guessing)

56.1% could NOT correctly say Obama started his political career at the home of two former members of the Weather Underground (25% chance by guessing).

And yet.....

Only 13.7% failed to identify Sarah Palin as the person on which their party spent $150,000 in clothes

Only 6.2% failed to identify Palin as the one with a pregnant teenage daughter

And 86.9 % thought that Palin said that she could see Russia from her "house," even though that was Tina Fey who said that!!

Only 2.4% got at least 11 correct.

Only .5% got all of them correct. (And we "gave" one answer that was technically not Palin, but actually Tina Fey)

Emphasis above is mine. Palin gossip is entirely the MSMs.

In the words of Albert Camus, "Stupidity has a knack for getting its way."

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Now that we've handed the reigns over to the Savior-Elect, the world is perfect:

Labels: Humor, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Tom Adkins wrote an extremely angry piece for the Philadelphia Inquirer about how Obama's election should signify the end of liberal white guilt. Some of it is too acerbic for me, but I did enjoy this bit:

Obama's ascension also creates another gargantuan irony. How can liberals sell American racism, class envy and unfairness when our new black president and his wife went to Ivy League schools, got high-paying jobs, became millionaires, bought a mansion, and are now moving to the White House? How unfair is that? Now, like a delicious O. Henry tale, Obama's spread-the-wealth campaign rendered itself moot by its own victory! America is officially a meritocracy. Obama's election has validated American conservatism.

That's awesome. How did Obama win? By deserving to win. Which indicates that in America, merit and character trump race and politics.

Wanna tell me I'm wrong, liberals? I'll gladly entertain any arguments that Obama didn't win based on merit.

HT: Bob Parks.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

I didn't feel that there was any need for me to watch all three Presidential debates this year. So I only watched the last one ... but I saw all three of them. This video is both funny and frustrating:

One more illustration of some of the reasons that I'm disgusted and disillusioned with American politics.

More so than ever, that is.

HT: Hot Air.

Labels: Humor, Media, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

• A month or so ago (I think?) Rhodester suggested I check out Google Reader, a very handy tool for coordinating, organizing and reading blogs. I filed the advice away in the back of my mind, but I never bothered to really set it up for myself until last night. (I'm never the first to check out something new.)
  
  Well, I've ended up really grateful that Dave suggested Google Reader. I have 40 or 50 blogs that I try to check once a day, and Google Reader makes checking them much easier, much quicker and maybe more fun. So take Dave's advice, I'm glad I finally did. Google Reader is awesome.
  
  If you want to see how Google Reader looks, you can check this out: One option once you set up your reader account is to share things that catch your eye with ... well, with whomever. My shared page is right here.



• A couple of people have told me that they're surprised that I'm in relatively good spirits, considering how things went Tuesday. And here's the truth of it: Tuesday night wasn't a loss for me.
  
  Tuesday night was not a loss for conservatives.
  
  Tuesday night was a loss for liberal Republicans. Why should I give two s#!ts about liberal Republicans? Why should I care that they lost elections? They don't represent my views. Screw 'em.
  
  Richard Viguerie sums it up to my satisfaction:
  

  "Conservatism did not lose – big government Republicanism lost..."

  
  Let's hope that the GOP is paying attention now and that Tuesday's drubbing will yank their asses back into gear. Give us conservative choices and conservatives will put them in office.



• I can't get over this silly crap:

  

  The OFFICE of the PRESIDENT-ELECT??
  
  Have you ever heard any elected candidate refer to himself as the "President Elect?" It's just killing him to have to wait until mid-January to be sworn in, isn't it?
  
  This goes beyond affectation or pretension. This is just silly. This is just childish.
  
  Oh, and what did he do while standing there at his snazzy, all-official-looking new "President-Elect" podium? He mocked a sickly, 87 year old widow.
  
  You stay classy, now, Mr. Big Shot.




• DJ Drummond at WizBang shoots holes in the talk about Obama's election being historic:
  

  "...let's start with the notion that a black man winning election makes that election 'historic'. Really now, by that logic we have had a lot of 'historic' elections. George Washington was the first president, John Adams the first president not named Washington, various presidents were the first to be elected of their party, Thomas Jefferson was the first president to be elected in a contest decided by the House of Representatives, Martin Van Buren was the first natural-born American to be elected president, John Quincy Adams was the first president elected in an election where citizens voted for their states' electors, James Buchanan was the first and so far only bachelor to be elected president, John Kennedy was the first Catholic president, and so on and so on...
  
  What is strange about Obama's focus on being the first black president, is that he started his campaign claiming to be beyond that."

  
  I see where he's going with that. I won't say that I agree with him, not completely, but I concede the point that simply being an "historic" President isn't good enough.

Labels: Blogs, Links, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

• Apparently the Obama campaign has stiffed some of it's employees in Indianapolis. Stop complaining, Obama campaign workers. All that's happening is they're taking your money and spreading it around elsewhere, right? What's wrong with that?

  
  HT to Bob Parks for the story.
  
  By the way, Fairly Conservative points out that the Obama campaign spent about eleven bucks per vote.




• Rush Limbaugh has bought a new car for one of his listeners to cheer her up after the election.
  
  I know there were times in the past when I wrote at this blog that I think that Limbaugh is an a-hole. Well, I'd like to take this opportunity to assert that I must have misquoted myself. At the very least I took my remarks out of context. What I was trying to say is that Limbaugh is a hero of mine and probably the greatest and most generous radio personality who's ever lived. There's nothing that I'd rather do than listen to the EIB while driving around in my brand new Dodge truck. You know, if I had a new Dodge truck. Which would really cheer me up.



• John McCain showed himself to be graceful in defeat Tuesday night. Not everyone who's worked for him can do the same. Sarah Palin has responded briefly to the McCain campaigners who've been smearing her since the election:

  Look, here's where I stand on Palin. I like her. I am still a little reluctant to call myself a Palin supporter in any political sense, but I agree with her on a great number of things and I really like her.
  
  And as these disgruntled, bitter, failed, anonymous McCain campaign staffers continue to prove the quality of their characters with this sniping, it makes me want to defend Palin. The conservative blog Red State is behind an effort to identify and out these people who're attacking Palin anonymously. I like that. I hope they are able to ID some of these people and I hope that future political campaigns remember what they've done and think twice about hiring them.




• Scott Ott at Scrappleface usually writes hilarious political satire. But he occasionally posts something serious, such as this video about Reagan's response to losing the GOP nomination in '75.

  Dutch would NOT give up and he never lost his focus. Stay hungry, my fellow conservatives.




• A McCain supporter writes to CNN that he or she is gonna do everything he or she can to trip up Obama:
  

  "We have to watch this guy and not give him an inch," one McCain supporter wrote. "The same way he criticized every move of President Bush. We have to make things as difficult for him as he did for Bush."

  
  That's the wrong approach. That's the kind of thing the liberals have done to Dubya for eight years. And I admit that I've not always been above that kind of personal stuff when it comes to politicians. But we're stuck with this guy for four years, so we should probably focus on trying to help the next President do the right things and trying to discourage or prevent him from doing the wrong things. The man himself isn't important. Policy is what matters.
  
  And, no, liberals. Right and wrong are not subjective concepts. We're not going down that relativism road.



• This cartoon from Town Hall hits the nail on the head:

  

  It's really that simple. Look, if you call yourself pro-life and you voted for the most dedicated abortion booster to ever run for President, you are completely full of shit. Period. You can't be both pro-life and an Obama supporter. But then, you already knew that, didn't you?




• Little Green Footballs reports that Seattle radicals are waving the flag this week. I'm not surprised by that.
  
  One way to interpret this is that these radicals are suddenly patriotic because they think they've gotten what they want. My understanding of this issue is a bit more ... well, nuanced.
  
  In his book The Enemy At Home, Dinesh D'Souza argued convincingly that radical leftists really are patriotic, as they understand patriotism. They do love America in their own way.
  
  The thing is, Conservatives love America for what it really is, warts and all. We're honest with ourselves about our country, it's flaws, what's good here, what's great here, and what needs improvement.
  
  Radical leftist Americans love a hypothetical America. They love what this country might be, if only people would do things their way. So when they say that they love America, they aren't telling a lie. They love America by their own understanding of that concept.
  
  The problem with leftists isn't that they're unpatriotic. The problem is that they're irrational, incapable of empathy, and spend most of their time with their heads in the clouds. They don't love the real America, not even the one that elected Barck Obama. They love the hypothetical America that they think Obama is going to create for him. And when he doesn't, they'll be more bitter than ever.



• Here are two articles worth reading:
  
  I've been saying that the GOP needs to return to the policies of Reagan. George Will gets even more old school, asking what would Goldwater do?
  
  And Joan Vennochi ponders closing the door on victimhood.
  
  Vennochi concludes:
  

  With Obama's victory, the torch is passing to a new generation of black leaders. But they still face some of the same old challenges.

  
  
  I'd agree. But I'd assert that many of those "same old challenges" are presented by the lingering, backward-thinking anger of many of the previous generation's "racial leaders."

Labels: Links, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

• Judging by the venom and spite they continue to throw her way, it looks like some of the leftists are still all to hell about Sarah Palin. Might they be bracing themselves for 2012 already?



• If you were one of those who suffered from the delusion that the "Arab Street" would drool all over itself with affection for the US after the election of Barack Obama, it's time to wake up:
  

  The Saudi daily Al-Watan stated in an editorial: “There is no significant difference between Obama and McCain. They disagree only on the means to achieve America’s chief goal, which is to rule for another hundred years.”

  
  And this is from a fatwa from Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi, issued right before the election:
  

  “The Democrats kill you slowly without you noticing it - and therein lies the danger. They are like a snake whose touch is not felt until its poison enters your body.
  
  “Therefore, I hope that McCain comes to power, so that the motivation for jihad remains in our hearts, and so that we do not [begin to] rely on the infidels - [which will cause us] to be struck by the fire [of Hell].”

  
  Hey, it looks like Islamic Extremists hate the Newly Anointed One as much as they ever hated Bush! Gosh, how'd that happen?



• Look, I don't begrudge Obama's supporters their celebrations. God knows the campaign was hard-fought and they deserve to be happy that things went their way. But what in hell were some young Obama supporters doing waving a USSR flag out in front of the White House last night?

  I'd like to be able to attribute this to the fact that most young people are stupid, drunk and confused. But who knows?




• John Kerry has admitted that he'd consider a position in the Obama cabinet.
  
  Some insiders claim that he's practically begging to be Secretary of State.
  
  That's pretty funny. It must be really interesting to see John Kerry from his own perspective. I'd like to buy him for what he's actually worth and sell him for what he thinks he's worth.



• The Sun tabloid in London usually runs a photo of a topless young woman on page three of every issue. Thus the famous Page 3 Girls. This morning, however, they dropped the cheesecake in favor of a photo of Barack Obama.
  
  I think we can all agree that the preemption of boobies is simply taking the media bias too far.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Time to spread the wealth and slaughter the goats! Election 2008 is in the books.

So, for starters, what is there to be happy about? I can think of something:

I never thought I'd be able to say it, but I lived to see the first non-white guy elected President of the US. If I put aside all of his policies and all the things about him that I dislike, I have to admit ... this one aspect of his election is pretty darn cool. Racism will probably never totally disappear from the human mind ... but America's specific and unique style of racism took a major kick in the stones just now. I gotta admit, that makes me happy.

If I were still working in radio I'd play my favorite Fishbone song and dedicate it to Barack Obama tonight.

Oprah says she hasn't seen this kind of unity since 9/11. Come, now, Oprah, the Obama election isn't a disaster on quite that level, is it? Ha ha.

And there's this: Guys like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have made careers of talking about how racist American society is. What are they going to say now? That in America a black man can never possibly rise any higher than ... President? Time to look for new jobs, Al and Jesse.

I also want to say that you're not going to hear too much doom and gloom from me. We elected a President who's policies I oppose. OK, fine. My fellow conservatives, it's time to regroup, think about what we did wrong, think about what we can do from here, and get on with it. I've never had any respect for all the left-wing crybabies who threatened to leave the country after Bush was elected in 2000 and 2004. What is that crap? "Play my way or I'll take my toys and leave?" Conservatives, now is our chance to really demonstrate the differences between us and them. Liberals can't even be gracious in victory, much less defeat. We hold ourselves to a higher standard. Don't forget it.

This is still a great country. We survived the Presidencies of Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, Herbert Hoover and Woodrow Wilson. We can survive this guy, too. Remember, conservatives, we're the optimists. We talk about how strong, generous and free our country is, right? We gotta mean that. We're proud of our country, right? Don't forget that ... even when things don't go our way.

And the thing is, Barack Obama seems pretty optimistic, too. He's just optimistic for the wrong reasons. We're gonna have to out-optimistic the guy. ;)

Now don't get me wrong ... there are things to worry about. I think the real problem here is that the Democrats have picked up a bunch of legislative seats. My biggest fear is that President Obama will manage to get one or two extreme leftists appointed to the Supreme Court, and with little resistance from Congress. Hopefully we can swing both houses of Congress back the other way in 2010. And then elect a real President (black, white or otherwise) in 2012.

So what are the lessons we can take away from Election 2008?

Here's my list:

• Republicans Can't Beat Democrats At Their Own Games ... Part 1
  
  George W. Bush's "compassionate conservatism" turned out to be a code word for "liberalism." His second term was especially disappointing. Bush's 2004 pronouncements about working toward an "ownership society" proved to be empty promises. Instead, he's increased the size of the government, he's created new entitlement programs and he's spent money like John Edwards at a beauty salon.
  
  Bush's push to get the recent bail-out bill passed was probably the last straw. That bill was unpopular with the vast majority of Americans, and it remains so. If it looks like corporate welfare, walks like corporate welfare and talks like corporate welfare, dammit, it probably is corporate welfare.
  
  Bush had only two conservative successes in his second term, and those were the appointments of Judges Roberts and Alito to the SCotUS. And even the Alito selection was a last-minute save after the disastrous Harriet Miers washout.
  
  When Republicans govern like Democrats they give us very little reason to keep electing them.



• Republicans Can't Beat Democrats At Their Own Games ... Part 2
  
  Hey, let's face it, John McCain hasn't really been any better. We all knew he was too liberal from the get-go. And towards the end he got even more liberal. I think his proposal to have the Treasury Department buy up all the crap mortgages was probably the death nell for his campaign.
  
  Why should voters elect a pseudo-socialist when they had a real one available?
  
  So I hope that the lesson the GOP learns is that they have to "dance with who brung 'em," as they say. Clearly Mitt Romney would have been a better choice. And if we'd still lost with Romney, at least we'd have known that we retained our principles in the process.



• What Would Reagan Do?
  
  Look, the neocons have had their shot. And they've cost us an awful lot. You know, eight years ago I didn't even really know what "neoconservative" meant. After the past eight years I've come to believe that a "neocon" is basically a liberal who's pro-Israel and believes in the preemptive strike.
  
  Nothing wrong with loving Israel ... but it ain't enough.
  
  It's time for the GOP to get back to real conservatism. To heck with "compassion." I don't look to the government for "compassion." That's what our families, friends and churches are for. Our government, dammit, is supposed to LEAD US, KEEP US SAVE AND SERVE OUR INTERESTS.
  
  The GOP should, in all things, reference Reaganism. When it comes to policies, candidates, positions and ideology, Reagan is the touchstone. It's not enough to just talk about how awesome Reagan was. The Republican party has to go back to promoting his kind of governance.
  
  And that means decreasing the size of Government, not increasing it.
  
  That means a return to good-old-by-God Trickle Down Economics. The American people won't need the government to take care of them if you free up the marketplace to do what it naturally does, and that's create prosperity.
  
  That means being ready to strike fear in the hearts of those who'd even kill a couple of Americans in a disco in Germany ... much less actually attack us on our own soil.
  
  What would Reagan do? That's what we should do.



• Don't Let The Democrats Co-Opt Conservatism
  
  I saw it in '96 and to a large extent I feel like I've seen it again.
  
  Bill Clinton got elected to a second term by coming to the middle, as the phrase goes. Obama has gotten elected by doing much of the same.
  
  In 2006 Obama was saying that he wanted us out of Iraq immediately. RIGHT NOW. His policy now isn't significantly different from the current administration's policy. He even admitted that the surge worked "beyond our wildest dreams" in September.
  
  He also ran as a tax-cutter, promising lower taxes for "95% of Americans." Look, you know and I know that the math on that doesn't work. It's nonsense. The point, though, is that he ran as a tax-cutter. In spite of his occasional, candid admissions of his socialist ideology, Obama ran ads promising to cut taxes.
  
  He even posed as strong on national defense when he talked about invading Pakistan.
  
  What's that all about?
  
  Clearly the guy said what he had to say to get conservatives to vote for him. Maybe the GOP spent a little too much time focusing on Bill Ayers, ACORN and Joe Biden's gaffes and too little time focusing on Obama's policy inconsistencies.
  
  Yeah, I knew he was inconsistent and you knew he was inconsistent ... but it doesn't look like the message was significantly delivered to "Joe Six-Pack."

So there are my ideas, you can take them for what they're worth. The ramblings of a fat ol' conservative redneck from newly blue Virginia probably don't mean a whole heck of a lot at this point.

I'm gonna wrap this up now. Obama is giving his victory speech and I don't want to miss it. It is, after all, history. And the good Lord knows that the guy gives amazing speeches.

So congratulations to President Elect Barack Obama. Enjoy your first term ... I'll be doing what I can to make sure it's your only one! ;)

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

The Black Panthers are practicing a little bit of good ol' fashioned voter intimidation in Pennsylvania. On the off chance that someone reading this doesn't know what the Black Panthers are, the explanation is simple: The Black Panthers is a terrorist organization. They're analogous to the KKK or skinhead nazis. Subhuman shit, in other words.

An army vet had this to say about his experience while trying to vote at a Philadelphia polling place:

"As I walked up to the door, the two gentlemen in Black Panther garb, one of them brandishing a night stick, standing immediately in front of the door... As I walked up they closed ranks next to each other. You know, I'm an army veteran. That doesn't scare me. So I walked directly in between them, went inside and found one of the poll watchers. They said they'd been here about an hour. And they told us not to come outside because a black man is going to win this election no matter what."

Watch the Fox News story, complete with the quote above, right here:

Here's some cellphone video another person shot:

My favorite part is when the guy with the camera phone says that brandishing a night stick is intimidating and the moron with the night stick says "Who are you to decide that?"

Apparently you don't have to be all that smart to join the Black Panthers. There's a shock.

From what I've seen, this is a fairly good representation of the mentality that's about to put an unqualified, shady socialist in the White House.

But of course those of us who aren't voting for Obama ... We're the real racists, right?

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Well, we'll see what happens today I guess. Either we'll elect a liberal who's changed his positions with the polls and wants the government to solve everything from home foreclosures to "climate change" ...

OR...

We'll elect someone who's actually far worse than that liberal: His opponent, Senator Barack Obama.

Yeah, McCain is too damn liberal for me. But let's be honest about this new Messiah that so many people seem thrilled about and ready to put in the Oval Office:

• Obama has no leadership experience AT ALL. He's spent his life in the leftist closed circuits of academia and law practice. This is what we're electing? A lawyer and college professor? Have you ever spent much time talking with either a lawyer or a professor? If so, did EITHER of them strike you as people who were in touch with the average American perspective? Obama is both a lawyer AND a college professor. You can't get any more caught up in the dark side than that.


• His record on abortion is the most radical of any Democratic Presidential candidate ever. And, given the opportunity, he'll load the courts with extreme leftists who share his radical perspective.


• The money you work for is yours. No one else's. YOURS. Obama wants to take it from you and spread it around. He's been honest about that. If that doesn't outrage you, you just aren't thinking.


• Obama's ideas are bad. That's why he disavows them and accuses those who call him out on his ideas of "smearing" him. Obama's associates are questionable at best, reprehensible at worst. Obama's experience is negligible. And Obama's colleagues in the Senate, including fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton and others, have made no secret of their doubts about him.
  
  Are we really going to elect our next president based on novelty?

Sadly, I think we are.

Just watch this video, that's all I ask ... and then vote your conscious.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

I'm fighting another godawful post-surgery infection. I was supposed to start back to work today, but it didn't happen. Passing blood and having spasms, etc. The usual bladder cancer joy ride.

I'm gonna do a little less blogging for a little while. Part of it is that I don't want to blog while I'm sick. That leads to self-pity, etc. No need for that. But I'll be back at some point, as usual. I'm just gonna take a few days off.

Another part is ... well, you know how it is with blogging. It's like a bungee cord. There's a tendency to stretch down deep into it for a while, then pull back.

If I don't talk to you guys again between now and November 4th, PLEASE VOTE! Even if you vote for the wrong guy! ;) And I'll get this out of the way while I'm at it, since I might not be back until after the 4th: Congratulations to President Elect Barack Obama for getting past one of our country's last major hurdles. Of course, I'm talking about him becoming our first openly socialist President. Ha ha.

I'll wrap on the topic of politics with this. Just watch this clip. If this doesn't sum up Obama and the coming four years sufficiently for anyone, then I don't know what it would take:

The one good thing about the next four years (I really believe this) is that it's going to be a grand education for those young people who actually are paying attention. More new conservatives will be born of the Obama administration than any time since the Carter administration.

It'll almost be worth it.

Oh, I do want to mention this friggin' whacko story, before I wrap for a while, though:

Skinheads held over plot to kill Obama

Two white supremacist skinheads were arrested in Tennessee over plans to go on a killing spree and eventually shoot Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, court documents showed on Monday...

The plot did not appear to be very advanced or sophisticated, the court documents showed...

"The individuals began discussing going on a 'killing spree' that included killing 88 people and beheading 14 African Americans," (ATF Agent Brian) Weaks said in the affidavit...

The men planned to wear white tuxedos and top hats during the assassination attempt, which would have involved driving as fast as they could toward Obama and shooting him from the windows of the car.

It sucks that I feel compelled to mention ... to even provide a link proving ... that I've always hated skinhead Nazi dipshits. God KNOWS I don't want Obama to be elected, but I've resigned myself to his Presidency and I'm gonna make the best of it. Still, regardless of my opposition to most of his policies, I really hope it's apparent that I'm not a racist, not a skinhead, not the devil, etc.

And I want to make it clear that I think these two skinheads who've just been arrested for "plotting" to kill Obama and other people are evil and repugnant and etc, etc.

Having said all that, I'll also say this: Their "plan," if you want to call it that, is so pathetic it's laughable. Driving a car as fast as they could and shooting from the windows while wearing white tux's? Who do they think they are, the formal skinhead Starsky and Hutch? I'm wracking my brain trying to think of what moronic movie these dolts were watching when they came up with that idea and I just can't guess. Has anyone ever actually made a movie that stupid? Has Jerry Friggin' Bruckheimer ever even made a movie featuring a scene anywhere near that stupid?

I realize that anyone who makes a threat against a public official has to be arrested, and all of these threats have to be taken seriously. And on general principle my gut reaction to skinhead nazis is that they should simply be taken out behind a barn and put down. But, honestly ... white tuxedos? You just gotta laugh at these idiots.

And I hope it's clear that I'm laughing out of bewilderment, frustration and disgust.

So, anyway, that's enough for now. I'll be back later.

In the meantime, a little bladder cancer music ...

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Obama Watch, Personal, You Tube

Prophet Yahweh, self-described "UFO summoner," says by way of official press release and YouTube video that space aliens are going to present themselves to the people of the earth as a show of support for the campaign of Barack Obama on or about October 31.

That settles it. Up until now I hadn't been swayed by all the endorsements that Obama has received. Colin Powell's recent endorsement didn't effect me. Oprah's endorsement? Oprah Schmoprah. I hadn't even been swayed by the Opie, Andy and the Fonz video endorsement, and I actually really enjoyed that video.

But if space aliens are going to endorse Obama, then I guess I gotta get on board. I'll be voting for Obama, I'll be voting early and I'm sending in my vote by way of flying monkey. The monkey, of course, will fly out of my butt.

From the press release:

(Prophet Yahweh) claims that these space beings are the Angels of Yahweh, the Creator of all things. And, they are talking to him, on a daily basis, via a sophisticated form of telepathic, non-verbal, none-talk, brain-to-brain communication. Most of the time, when they contact him, he is sleep. At that time, he hears a voice speaking to him inside his head...

"YAHWEH wants people to know that if Barak Obama does not become President, America will quickly be led into a war with Russia via Iran that will result in: a cut off of oil from the Persian Gulf, a great depression, stock market crash, runaway inflation, devaluation of the dollar, food shortages, riots, famine, race wars, out breaks of disease, etc."

Here's the video:

Highlights from the video include:

Prophet Yahwah: "I will be going live with my own channel from inside the broadcast studio ... we're going live to the world, via some channel. I don't know."

Shortly after that quote a dog starts barking in the background.

Toward the end: "Spaceships are preparing to fill, appear, right up there. Right up there. We don't have but a few days, I'm going to end this broadcast, but you just know one thing: There is no possible way it's not going to happen. But those of you all, just listen, don't be going out and betting money to your friends and all of this and betting it in Las Vegas on this, 'cause what if something happens? What if I got it wrong and it's next year during the same time? Which I doubt. Then you'll lose your money and you'll want to kill me."

So just remember: Space aliens definitely endorse Obama for President and there is no possible way that they won't show that support for Obama on October 31. Unless they don't.

Labels: Humor, News, Obama Watch

Not your father's Democratic Party...

Maybe the problem isn't Obama ... maybe the problem is the modern electorate:

HT: Ol' Broad ... the cartoon is from Chuck Asay.

---

Pretty Lady, Fancy Clothes

Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid:

The Republican Party has spent $150,000 in upmarket designer stores on dressing Sarah Palin for the part of vice-president...

The party also spent nearly $5,000 on hair and makeup.

It would have been easier, cheaper and quicker to let the Obama campaign make "Out Of Touch" signs for the Palins to wear on their foreheads.

Who authorized this spending and what the hell were they thinking?

---

Tightening up?

Polls are all different, and none of them are really a solid indication of exactly what's going to happen ... but the AP reports that Obama and McCain are virtually tied in Virginia ... and everywhere else, too, for that matter.

Your guess is as good as mine.

---

Good Ol' Joe (The Plumber)

The new McCain web ad is really a good one:

---

Good Ol' Joe (The Senator)

Blogger Jim Treacher has Joe Biden's "clarification" of his remarks about the "international incident" that's sure to follow Obama's first days in office:

"Ya know, I kinda put my foot in my mouth the other day... [chuckle] You folks know how I can get, with the words and the talking and the babbling and the yammering and so forth. But I just wanted to clarify those remarks. I know I speak for Obama when I say that we are ready to lead. Come what may, we are gonna be out there in front. Because I gotta tell ya, when this great man, this fantastic young African-American kid who I'm proud to call my closest friend, when he becomes president, the American people need to know that you are all gonna be grabbin' your ankles every April 15 for the rest of your probably-shortened lives.

Yeah, it's satire. The whole thing is funny. go read it.

Labels: Humor, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Update: I'll apparently be blogging a lot today, I keep finding stuff I want to post. So I'll just update this post occasionally rather than throwing together a heap of little posts.

Update 2: Post surgical pain has just kicked in, pretty damn hard, and mostly out of the blue. The pills ain't touching it right now. The only thing that doesn't hurt at the moment is standing, leaning against a wall. So I'm gonna go do that for a while ... I'm done adding to this post.

---

Speaking In Tongues

So now we can't say that socialism is socialism without being racist??

The "socialist" label that Sen. John McCain and his GOP presidential running mate Sarah Palin are trying to attach to Sen. Barack Obama actually has long and very ugly historical roots.

J. Edgar Hoover, director of the FBI from 1924 to 1972, used the term liberally to describe African Americans who spent their lives fighting for equality...

McCain and Palin have simply reached back in history to use an old code word for black.

AAAAGGHHH! I'm ready to start pulling my hair out.

Do me a favor, leftists. Shut the f%$# up. For ten minutes, please, if you can't come up with something useful to say, just shut the f$%# up.

(HT: Ace.)

---

Mike Steele on Values

Man, I love Mike Steele. This guy ROCKS. Even when I'm good and pissed off about politics, Mike chills me out by putting it all in perspective:

"Become the blueprint for those who are trying to find their way to the American dream."

I'm telling you, this guy is the new Reagan. I just wish he'd get back into politics and leave the cushy job at Fox News behind. We NEED you, Mike!

---

The Emperor's New Smears

Batton Lash gets it right:

---

Riot!

Paul the Regular Guy contemplates the threat of "urban unrest" if Obama loses the election ... and remembers the horrific violence that we experienced in our inner cities and metro areas following other recent Presidential elections. (Snicker, snicker.) It's good stuff, go read it.

---

Joy Behar calls Limbaugh a "terrorist"

If you don't know, Behar is one of the hysterical old biddies who makes up the panel at The View. I don't watch the show (unless clips on The Soup count), but from what I've read, there's one sane woman on the program (the young hot one, Elizabeth Hasselbeck) and three neurotic old hens.

Apparently one of the hens has proclaimed that Rush Limbaugh is a terrorist.

Like Joy Behar, I'm no fan of Rush Limbaugh.

Unlike Behar, I'm not a stark-raving, confused old loon. Calm down, Mrs. Behar. Limbaugh isn't a terrorist. He's just one more blowhard with his own personal soapbox who likes to spew his weirdo opinions all over the place. Like you.

Like me, too.

Labels: Media, Michael Steele, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Hey, I think I found my costume for this Halloween:

Hope they make it in fat-guy size.

Labels: Humor, Obama Watch, Politics

... presented, admittedly, from a voter who opposes most of Obama's policies adamantly.

But don't just take my word on these issues. I've rounded up some resources. People who argue for the things I believe with much more clarity, style, good humor and optimism than I'm capable of.

Especially this guy:

Obama: Wrong On Healthcare...

Zo Rachel has a new video up , featuring his usual spot-on analysis (this time he looks at the last PotUS debate.) Zo also presents some ideas about where we are and where we're goin' in terms of ObamaCare. Listen carefully, take notes if you need to. Use your pause button. As usual, Zo seems to have damn near everything down to a science:

A message to the "undecideds" out there, if such things really exist: When in doubt, go Zo.

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Obama: Wrong (And Radical) On Abortion...

Gloria.tv has a great capsulization of of the John McCain and the Barack Obama positions on the abortion issue. This video absolutely sums it up. There's just nothing else to say beyond this:

I know a few people who say that they agree with me that abortion on demand is murder, but are planning to vote for Obama. Well, it's time to put up or shut up. Make your choice: It's either Obama or protection for the unborn. You can't have both.

And when all is said and done and you've voted for Obama, the most radically pro-abortion candidate ever nominated by the Democrats, don't be telling me about how pro-life you are. I'll shut that shit down right quick. If you vote for Obama, you have supported abortion-on-demand. You have used the political power allotted to you, the power of your vote, to advance the cause of those who believe in unrestricted abortion, no questions asked. Period. That's what you've done, that's who you are, and that's all there is to say about it. So don't try to explain your reasoning to me. You don't owe me an explanation. You know when you'll have to account for that act, and to Whom you'll make that accounting.

So pick one. Babies or Barack. If you've got love for one, you've got no love for the other.

---

Obama: Wrong On Everything Else...

Some folks at Hot Air have put together a comprehensive argument against Barack Obama. In fact, they're billing it as THE Comprehensive Argument Against Barack Obama, and it's really pretty thorough.

Packed with quotes, news stories, videos and all kinds of valuable information, if you want to know why the Obama presidency is going to be bad for America, go to Hot Air now and read that post. At least you'll have some opportunity to brace yourself for the coming problems by being well informed.

---

Meanwhile, the Moonbats at the Daily Kos seem to have surrendered that one last working braincell to the Kool-Ade. They're contemplating the possibility that Obama really is the savior. I kid you not.

I really don't see any way we can stop the Obama Juggernaut at this point. And McCain is too busy playing the nice guy to try. But if we keep trying to get the information out there, I guess there's some hope. Maybe.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube, Zo

Permalink -- Posted by Darrell at 09:32 --  0 Comments -- Links to this post

---

This is from the same YouTube user who's video I embedded on Monday:

It's hard to decide what part of that video is my favorite. There are so many classically liberal moments:

• There's the guy who keeps yelling "Joke the Plumber!" at the mention of Joe the Plumber. He seems to be under the impression that Joe himself is the reason for Joe's celebrity. I think most people would agree that Obama's unguarded confession of his socialist world view was the real focus of that incident.


• Then there's the guy who shoves a sign in the questioner's face rather than try to somehow coherently defend the socialized health care he supports.


• Then there's the woman in the red sweatshirt and glasses. The questioner asks her if Obama's health care plan is socialism and she responds "Pretty much. I don't know ... we're done here." And then walks off waving her Obama sign. Classy AND smart.


• Then there's the genius who calls himself a scientist ... and who says that one or even five babies left to die after they've been born is acceptable. Oh, sure, there's a line that shouldn't be crossed somewhere ... he just doesn't know where it is. (Hint: Allowing even one person to die needlessly is not OK, Einstein.)

This is a good cross section of the people who'll be putting Obama in office. Obama's philosophical predecessor, Vladimir Lenin, is said to have called them "useful idiots."

I understand why P.T. Barnum supposedly said that nobody ever went broke by overestimating the stupidity of the public.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Barack Obama told his supporters to "get in their faces." His campaign encourages Obama voters to "be absolutely ruthless."

And the Obamabots are doing what they've been told:

If you can't lie your way into the White House ... if you can't promise your way in and if you can't guilt your way in ... I guess you can always bully your way into the White House.

Stay classy, Democrats.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

This is the first of the presidential debates I've watched. I didn't see any need to watch the last two, I've already made up my mind who I'm voting for ... and I'm already convinced that the other guy is gonna win.

Nonetheless, tonight was McCain's last chance to really shine ... and I think he has. I'm turning in, I've got a big day tomorrow ... but as of 10:15 I think McCain has won the debate thus far. He's beat Obama on substance, hands down.

The best line of the night: "If you wanted to run against President Bush, you should have done it four years ago." Boo-Yah!

I think the "Joe The Plumber" stuff is working in McCain's favor, too. I don't think it'll make a lot of difference in three weeks. Too many people will vote based on infatuation.

But don't blame me ... I'm voting for McCain.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

First of all, I'm not a Stern fan.

But this clip from Stern's program, which I found by way of Bob Parks, is REQUIRED LISTENING regarding the 2008 election:

Look, I know a few whites who're gonna vote for Obama simply because "it's time to have a black president."

I guess the black people interviewed in the clip above must feel the same way.

Throw in the "youth vote" (as capsulized yesterday) and we're really getting ready to elect our first pure-celebrity president ... and for all the wrong reasons.

Have you seen Mike Judge's film Idocracy? We're getting ready to elect President Camacho ... except in real life:

And if we're stupid enough to put this guy in the White House, then he's the President we deserve.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

You know, I thought I knew how I'd be voting this November ... but when I really listen to the opinions of today's bright young American minds, I have to admit: They make a really good case for Obama.

Labels: Humor, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

I'm increasingly finding it difficult to support John McCain. Too much evidence has come to light to indicate that he simply isn't fit to lead our country:

• A link has been exposed between McCain and Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh. In the '90's, McVeigh chose McCain to distribute money for a group formed to "raise political awareness" in public schools. McCain has defended his relationship with McVeigh, saying "I assumed he had been rehabilitated." In contrast, McVeigh himself has said of his bombing efforts that he "didn't do enough."



• It would appear that McCain has been in the pocket of the horribly mismanaged and failed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac corporations. He has received the second-highest amount of campaign contribution money from Fannie and Freddie employees, right between John Kerry and Chris Dodd.
  
  Meanwhile, Barack Obama was trying to reform Fannie and Freddie even back in 2006.



• Speaking of the mortgage debacle, McCain has been actively involved in ACORN, an organization that specialized in intimidating and blackmailing banks into making the notorious sub-prime loans that created the crisis.



• McCain has been embraced as "The Messiah" by hate-merchant and race-baiter David Duke. This isn't the first odd, peripheral connection between McCain and David Duke. For years McCain attended a church that honored David Duke in spite of his notorious antisemitism and racism.



• McCain's newly exposed connection to The New Party, a radical, National Socialist activist group, reveals him to be a National Socialist at worst ... or a vapid opportunist at best.



• McCain has taken a shockingly radical position on abortion, and the mainstream media seems to be complicit in covering it up.

Given his radical history, questionable associations and empty rhetoric, I don't see how anyone could rationalize supporting John McCain. Granted, he is a great public speaker, he's charming; he's good looking and inspiring ... but McCain is simply the wrong choice for President in 2008.

Labels: Obama Watch, Politics

Although, to be honest, he had me at the Pryor shirt:

My new favorite term: "Ballot Cattle."

Check out this absolutely awesome video about abortion, too:

Basically all the same stuff I've been saying about abortion since I started this blog ... except he says it much cooler and funnier. This guy just rules.

I don't agree with every single thing he says (death penalty), but damn if he don't say it really well.

And check out his Obama/A-Team video ... so much good information and so much humor thrown at you so fast that it'll have your head spinning. You'll laugh, you'll cry ... you might even learn something.

Labels: Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube, Zo

My post about the YouTube video of children being made to sing for Obama has inspired some good conversation in the comments. And, for once, I think I've actually presented my position fairly well.

Please stop by, if you haven't already, and contribute your opinion.

And while I'm recycling past content, I'll post my Obama Zombie video again:

I posted it yesterday ... and I'm posting it again because, hey, I think it's funny.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Palin did fairly well. I'm still not convinced that she's exactly what we need on the ticket. But I'm still convinced that she's got a great personality, which is more important than it ought to be. She did no better, nor any worse, than I'd thought she would.

Biden was polished, an old hand at this kind of thing. I was really surprised, though, at the number of flat-out lies that he told. I caught him in quite a few myself. He misrepresented his votes on the war and McCain's stance on funding the war, and he got fast and loose on Obama's tax policy. I noticed that, during some of Biden's most blatant lies, Palin would kinda grit her teeth and shake her head. She knew that he was lying, too. But she never called him on any of it. I think she was mostly focusing on getting the McCain talking points out there.

I'd call it a tie. Most liberals aren't going to do the research to find out that Biden was lying about so many things. They'll take him at his word and think that he's strengthened their positions. And I don't imagine that anyone who wasn't already predisposed to vote for McCain/Palin would be swayed toward the ticket by Governor Palin's performance.

Did you notice Gwen Ifill telling Biden afterwards how well he'd done?

I just looked around before hitting the "publish post" button and found this: Ace lists fourteen lies that Joe Biden told during the debate.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

Only about a month to go ... better start preparing for the coming Zombie Apocalypse:

Labels: Humor, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Oh, no, this isn't creepy at all:

Nah, not remotely creepy. Because indoctrinating your kids with political ideology before they're old enough to understand it is the most natural thing in the world:

When it's done in the name of Pol Pot or Mussolini, it's called brainwashing. When it's done in the name of Obama, though, I suppose they call it "church."

Labels: Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

So I stumbled across this website, Make Me Babies, where you can upload pictures of any man and any woman and see what the couple's theoretical child would look like.

The website claims to use some sort of high tech computerfied programming thing. Probably has something to do with lasers.

Neat.

I couldn't resist messing around with it a little bit. But I didn't want to upload my own picture, of course. If the babies turned out ugly I'd have nobody but myself to blame. So I decided on an easy target, Senator Obama.

I couldn't decide on a woman for the Senator to hypothetically reproduce with, though ... so I just narrowed it down to three of the world's most famous ladies.

First, I generated the theoretical offspring of Barack and Madonna. I named the little baby Baradonna. Make Me Babies came up with this:

I dunno. Doesn't look much like Obama or Madonna if you ask me.

But the website says it's all technical and stuff, so I'll take their word for it.

Then I uploaded a picture of one of Barack's best known and most beloved supporters, Oprah Winfrey. I named the baby Obarah.

Again, I don't see it. You'd think two people as attractive as Oprah and Barack would turn out a prettier baby than that. That child is hideous.

Last but not least I couldn't resist uploading a picture of Hillary Clinton. According to the high tech computerfied technological stuff at the website, this is what the hypothetical love-child of Barack and Hillary would look like:

Oh, crap. I hope I haven't opened up a can of worms with that one.

Labels: Humor, News, Obama Watch, Politics

The other day I mentioned an ad featuring Gianna Jessen, a young woman who survived a botched abortion 31 years ago. As a survivor of abortion, Gianna's perspective regarding Barak Obama's stance on the issue is unique. Here, Gianna talks more about her remarkable life and her efforts to shine a light on Barak Obama's reprehensible positions on infants born alive after abortion:

You may have read here about Obama's shameful legislative record regarding proposals to protect infants born alive after botched abortions. Put simply, Obama has voted repeatedly to have those babies killed rather than pass a law to protect them. Obama's position is that such a law might hypothetically present a legal challenge to Roe. V. Wade.

I've quoted his staggeringly mind-numbing legalize on the topic before. Here it is again. This is verbatim; the very pearls of wisdom from the lips of the Chosen One:

"There was some suggestion that we might be able to craft something that might meet constitutional muster with respect to caring for fetuses or children who were delivered in this fashion. Unfortunately, this bill goes a little bit further, and so … this is probably not going to survive constitutional scrutiny. Number one, whenever we define a pre-viable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or other elements in the Constitution, what we’re really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a — a child, a nine-month-old — child that was delivered to term. That determination, then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place. I mean, it — it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an antiabortion statute."

Um.... WTF? You Chicago lawyers can speak at least a little English, right?

If abortion matters to you, and if you have a hard time supporting a candidate like Obama who's stance on this issue is the most radical of any Democratic party candidate ever, you should visit BornAliveTruth.org for more information.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Senator Tila Tequila is really worried about November. His most recent attack ads and stump speeches are among his most deceitful ever. When the going got tough, the Chosen One revealed himself to be just another politician.

Even some notoriously liberal "news" sources feel compelled to speak out about Obama's current low-blow tactics.

All of the emphasis below is mine.

Newsweek calls Obama out on his lies about social security:

In Daytona Beach, Obama said that "if my opponent had his way, the millions of Floridians who rely on it would've had their Social Security tied up in the stock market this week." He referred to "elderly women" at risk of poverty, and said families would be scrambling to support "grandmothers and grandfathers."

That's not true. The plan proposed by President Bush and supported by McCain in 2005 would not have allowed anyone born before 1950 to invest any part of their Social Security taxes in private accounts. All current retirees would be covered by the same benefits they are now.

The Washington Post must have felt that Obama's lies about health care, immigration and racism are too contemptible to ignore:

On immigration, Obama is running a Spanish-language ad that unfairly lumps McCain together with Rush Limbaugh -- and quotes Limbaugh out of context. On health care, Obama misleadingly accuses McCain of wanting to impose a $3.6 trillion tax hike on employer-provided insurance...

To Democrats who worry about whether their nominee is willing to do whatever it takes to win: You can calm down.

New Hampshire's UnionLeader has gone after Obama, too, over his lies about John McCain's economic policies:

On Thursday, Obama said of McCain, "He has consistently opposed the sorts of common-sense regulations that might have lessened the current crisis." That's entirely untrue.

As The Washington Post pointed out in an editorial on Friday, McCain in fact has supported many new regulations of financial institutions, including some that Obama opposed. "In 2006, he pushed for stronger regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- while Mr. Obama was notably silent," The Post wrote.

Obama has gone so far as to accuse those of us who've quoted his record on abortion of lying. Sorry, Barak, but your legislative voting record speaks for itself, as does your history of shockingly radical public statements in defense of your votes.

Paul, the Regular Guy has pointed out that some Daily Kos style leftists defend lying, cheating and stealing in the name of Obama's campaign, saying that "...times are too tough, and Palin/Cheney's view of gov. is too extreme to play by the rules."

It's a genuine comfort to see that there are liberals who don't feel that way.

You know, maybe Obama actually is capable of bringing Americans together.

Nothing unites like a common enemy.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

(With apologies to Disposable.)

I don't listen to Rush Limbaugh much because the guy is an asshole. I do agree with a number of his opinions, but he always makes people who believe the things I believe look bad. I can't stand the guy.

Yesterday, though, I decided to turn on Limbaugh's show on the way home from work because, you know, it's close to election day and news stories break every couple of hours.

Anyway, Limbaugh mentioned that the Grateful Dead are going to be doing a reunion show as an Obama benefit and that their guest musicians at the show will include Gregg Allman, Butch Trucks, Jaimoe, Warren Haynes, Derek Trucks, Marc Quinones, Oteil Burbridge and Jeff Chimenti.

Limbaugh couldn't even properly pronounce Oteil's last name. Oteil, by the way, is a great bass player. And you might already know how I feel about Warren Haynes and his band Gov't Mule.

Limbaugh dismissed the concert and called everyone involved a bunch of "has-beens."

I'm not sure how Limbaugh defines "has-been," but musicians in the prime of their creativity don't qualify as "has-beens" in my opinion.

I guess you can get away with dismissing the surviving members of the Grateful Dead as "has-beens" because, well, Garcia was the only member of that band with any real talent, anyway. The rest of the band was only good for grating vocals and seven hour drum solos.

But Warren Haynes, Derek Trucks and Oteil Burbridge are at the absolute TOP of their game. Those guys are amazing. Dismissing them as "has-beens" is just another instance of Limbaugh running his mouth about something he doesn't know anything about. I've noticed that he almost always does that when he talks about music or movies ... or anything other than sports or politics.

Besides, 99.999% of the rock musicians in the world are liberals. That's just how it works for some reason. And how much Ted Nugent can a conservative guy listen to before you just never want to hear Stranglehold again? If I wanted to listen to music by reliably conservative musicians I'd be stuck with modern country radio. I'd rather gouge my eyes out.

Oh, and about that bumper-music clip from the Pretenders that Limbaugh has used for years ... I'd bet you anything that Chrissie Hynde is an Obama gal.

I never really liked My City Was Gone, but now it's worse because every time I hear it, about fifteen seconds in I expect to hear some douchebag start ranting about having half his brain tied behind his back.

So I turned off Limbaugh out of disgust and heard on the news how Michelle Obama is urging people not to vote for a candidate just because "she's cute."

A clear swipe at Sarah Palin. Mrs. O tried to say that she was actually referring to "herself," but that means that she's either a transparent liar OR she actually thinks she's on the ticket.

Either way, Michelle Obama is vacuous and obnoxious. I've disliked her for a year and a half now and every time she opens her mouth publicly she gives me yet another reason to dislike her.

Boy, I just can't friggin' wait to hear four years of news stories about this biddy's shenanigans while she's the First Lady.

So then I get home and log onto the net and find out that R. Kelly has been acquitted of the charges against him. HOW DOES THAT HAPPEN? The guy VIDEO TAPED HIMSELF having sex with underage girls. That video tape WAS EVIDENCE IN THE TRIAL, and he was ACQUITTED? Who was on the jury? Michael Jackson and Jerry Lee Lewis? I guess that would be a jury of his peers, wouldn't it?

Somebody wake me when it's 1986.

Labels: Media, Music, News, Obama Watch, Politics

Snopes will neither confirm nor deny, but I get the BIGGEST kick out of this:

On or about October 5th, Biden will excuse himself from the ticket, citing health problems, and he will be replaced by Hillary. This is timed to occur after the VP debate on 10/2.

I love it! I absolutely LOVE it!

If this turns out to be true I'd almost have to consider voting for Obama. If he's really sold his soul to the Clintons He'd DESERVE to spend four years in the White House with them breathing down his neck. Oh, that'd be SOOOO funny.

How hilarious would it be to watch President Obama develop facial ticks and twitches? Wouldn't you love to see him with huge bags under his eyes every day from losing sleep over the prospect of being Vince-Fostered? Imagine him having to explain and excuse Bill Clinton's constant public outbursts? Oh, so funny. So funny.

The potential for comedy is tremendous! As a conservative it'd be awful, but as a blogger who tries to be funny, I feel soooo conflicted.

Labels: Humor, News, Obama Watch, Politics

I still think that Obama is gonna win the election. 2008 can't give me everything I want, can it? This year has already handed me this and this. There's no way things can go my way in November, too.

Still, I'm enjoying watching the Obama campaign's scramble to get back on top.

"Change isn't about slogans. It's about substance," Obama told a crowd in Grand Junction, Colorado. I wonder if he realizes how funny that is, coming from him, to those of us who realize that his "substance" is slogans. And empty bluster. And faulty thinking.

This, from the most prompter-dependent candidate to ever grab his party's nomination. Geez, those big, impressive speeches aren't really so impressive when you realize that he's just reading. I mean, damn. Even Slick Willie memorized most of his speeches, didn't he?

This from a guy who went to Germany and announced that he was a "citizen of the world." . Apparently this Ivy League lawyer doesn't know what the word "citizen" means:

Cit-i-zen: Noun. a native or naturalized member of a state or nation who owes allegiance to its government and is entitled to its protection.

So, see, right there ... you can't be a citizen of the world. You can only be a citizen of a nation, state, city, etc.

This, from a guy who's most recent campaign ads are vacuous and dishonest.

I have to love being hectored about "substance" by a guy who gave his very symbolic acceptance speech on the anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's speech. Especially considering how some of Dr. King's family feels about this less than remarkable politician:

“Senator Obama’s answer to the ills of society, of higher government spending, weaker national defense, continued tax dollars to Planned Parenthood, and support of gay marriage, are diametrically opposed to everything African Americans truly believe and an anathema to the dream of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr."

So says Dr. Alveda King.

Substance? We're talking here about a guy who promises to bring sweeping change to DC. But when you read the fine print, Obama's promised foreign policy is essentially the same as the policies of George W. Bush.

I think that the panic is setting in because the Senator's campaign realizes that having the Olbermann-watching far left slobbering over their guy isn't going to be enough. Having the MSM ready to cover up your every misdeed isn't enough, either. In the end, it has to "play in Peoria," as they say.

Really, it's pretty funny. The far left has spent the past six months strutting around like roosters, absolutely convinced that their guy was going to win. Now they've hit the panic button. They're already accusing McCain of stealing the election. More than a month early!

And as far as the MSM goes, you'd think that Sarah Palin were running unopposed for PotUS. It's gotta be killing Senator Tila Tequila not to be in the spotlight anymore.

And what's with those polls? A month ago Obama was up by a zillion points. Now McCain is pulling ahead in some places and running in a dead heat elsewhere.

And Barack's campaign barely has time to figure out how to spin one slip when they're hit out of the blue with something they simply can't respond to. And that would be Obama's support for having babies killed if they survive abortion:

HT on that clip to The Ace Of Spades.

Yeah, I still think Obama is going to win in November. People love the guy for some reason. But he's not going to skate into the White House unscathed. And that's enough to put a big grin on my face and a song in my conservative heart.

They're scrambling on the left. I'm diggin' it.

Labels: Links, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

You can expect this to continue until the election. I promise that as soon as it's all over I'll write something innocuous about my dog pooping on the rug or something. But for now:

• Can we stop it with the pig-lipstick bullshit?
  
  I said it before, I'll say it again ... I don't have a dog in this fight. I'm a conservative and there ain't a conservative running in '08.
  
  But I would like to see the liberal Senator John McCain win the election, rather than the far left Senator Tila Tequila (or whatever his name is). Recent polls have given me the impression that there actually is a ghost of a chance ...
  
  the REASON that McCain has done well in the polls is because SARAH PALIN THREW A LITTLE GENUINE CONSERVATISM INTO THE MIX. Don't lose track of that. Sarah Palin was like a breath of fresh air and she got people paying attention again. USE THAT TO YOUR ADVANTAGE, McCAIN!
  
  If you McCain supporters keep ranting and raving because Senator Tila said "lipstick on a pig" you're gonna eff it all up. You're playing the Democrats game. Get back to playing the GOP's game.
  
  McCain can (maybe, possibly) win if he sticks to the issues. The GOP position is superior to the Democratic position on the issues that rule the day. And people know that.
  
  In spite of his liberalism on Gitmo, global warming, campaign finance, torturing friggin' TERRORISTS that we've caught RED HANDED, etc ... McCain actually HAS put forth fairly conservative positions on the major issues.
  
  You remember those issues, right?
  
  01 ... Drill here, drill now. That's what voters want. McCain has warmed up on that issue, Obama continues to lose support because of his rigid far-left position.
  
  02 ... Use the free market to improve health insurance. That's McCain's plan and it kicks the snot out of his opponent's weak-ass plan.
  
  03 ... The surge in Iraq worked and McCain knew it would all along. McCain is stronger than ANYONE on this issue. Senator Tila still won't even admit that he blew the call.
  
  04 ... And then there's abortion, an issue that McCain owns over his opponent.
  
  Hammer those issues, McCain campaign. Hammer 'em, hammer 'em, hammer 'em. Leave the reality TV type he-said-she-said crap to the Democrats. Or you are going to lose.
  
  McCain will not win if he runs on style. He has to run on substance. Otherwise, the McCain campaign is wasting all of our time.
  
  So don't say I didn't tell you.



• Charlie Gibson to Sarah Palin: "Get your fat ass in the kitchen and make me a pie."
  
  Well, no, not really ... but he might as well have gone for it. During the course of his interview with Palin on ABC Gibson hardly held back:
  
  
  • He accused her of "hubris." Classic. Has anyone in the media dared broach the topic of "hubris" in an interview with Chicago law professor, Senator Tila Hussein Tequila? Nope. But let some woman from Alaska suggest that she might have some ideas worth considering and, POW! It's all about the hubris.
    
    Not for nothing ... but can ANYONE, Republican, Democrat, man, woman, black, white or otherwise, think themselves good PotUS material without being guilty of a bit of hubris?
    
    Not that Gibson and his cohorts in the MSM have time for banalities like common sense.
  
  
  
  • Gibson distorted and misrepresented Palin's words in prayer about the troops being sent to war in Iraq. Gibson quoted Palin as having said "Our national leaders are sending U.S. soldiers on a task that is from God." What she actually said was that we should Pray that our leaders are sending US soldiers on a task that is from God. Get rid of that first bit and you totally change the context, huh?
    
    Palin gently protest this mangling of context, but she didn't push it too far. Maybe because at that point she was concerned that Gibson might smack her.
  
  
  
  • My favorite bit from the interview was when he hit her with "Do you support the Bush doctrine?" Man, I just LOVE those damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don't questions:

    Palin seemed to know what Gibson was trying to get her to step into ... and she kinda hemmed and hawed and didn't really do well with this question other than the standard GOP responses.
    
    I wish she had said "If I say yes you'll edit this interview to create the appearance that I support a narrow, ugly interpretation of the 'Bush doctrine.' If I say no you'll play it up as a difference between myself and Senator McCain. So just to be clear, here is where our campaign stands on terrorism here and abroad..."

  
  Overall I'd give her a B minus. Like most politicians she's better at giving speeches than interviews.
  
  Except, of course, for Senator Tila Tequila, the Chosen One. Every word that ever drips from his lips is good and pure and holy and sacred.
  
  That's why his admirers in the mainstream media listen intently to his pronunciations ... and why they experience simultaneous climax every time he uses the word "change."



• Congressman Steve Cohen: "Vote for Barack. He's just like Jesus!"
  
  What cabinet position is this nobody bucking for?

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

The McCain campaign has taken the bait. Their new ad goes after Obama for the lipstick on a pig remark:

This is a mistake. This reminds me of the ads that George Allen ran here in Virginia, during his last Senate campaign. He attacked Jim Webb over trivial things, like the perceived sexism in some of Webb's novels.

Allen ended up losing that race. Badly. Partly because his own base (and I'm part of it) perceived him as having lost the ability to stick to the real issues.

I didn't actually watch video of Obama's remarks until this morning. Here's the one thing about his remarks that genuinely is offensive:

He was speaking here in Virginia and he feigned this insulting, childish "southern accent" that just makes me want to smack the guy. Since when does a Chicago lawyer pronounce the word "policy" as "Paul-a-seh"??? Come on, Barack. I've heard you use that word a thousand times and you've never done a damn Foghorn Leghorn impression before.

Honestly, I'd like to punch Obama. He just makes me sick with his affected bullshit.

But here's a clip of Barack's remarks ... complete with his faux-southern shuck and jive ... juxtaposed with Dick Cheney using the same "lipstick on a pig" expression. This is going to come back to haunt the McCain campaign:

Not only that, but do you think that Katie Couric is gonna be happy about her guest-starring role in a McCain ad? Come on. Watch for her to custom-craft a soundbite for Obama's response in the next day or two.

Like I said before, McCain is not going to win a bullshitting contest with the world's champion bullshitter. Bad move, John.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

I think I should apologize to the handful of people who do the the honor of checking this blog out fairly frequently. I know that you guys mostly stop by for my "Dave Barry Wannabe" stuff, like when I write about my dogs or tell old drinking stories or embed good stuff from YouTube.

But you had to know from the very name of the blog that I'm a politics addict. Politics is to me what sports is to normal guys. And an election year, especially the last couple of months of an election year, is Superbowl time. Right now I'm having a blast.

Some of the folks who stop by here are in the same boat as me. Like Cube and Unseen and Paul. They're conservative political junkies, too, and I know they can relate.

But most of the folks who're kind enough to read some of my junk and leave comments are looking forward to me getting back to adolescent jokes. I promise, mid November is coming. The anti-Obama bumpersticker (and link) in my header will be gone shortly after the election and I'll get back to writing about Metallica and movies and such. You know, doing what I do best: the blog equivalent of funny armpit noises.

I think that part of the reason I'm having so much fun with politics this year is that I don't have a dog in this fight. I'm a conservative and there isn't a conservative running this year. (Hell, the last time there was a conservative running was in '96 ... but that's a whole nuther.) No matter who wins, I'll be stuck trying to make the best of a crappy (or crappier) choice ... so it's nothing personal.

I have developed some affection for Sarah Palin ... and that could translate into political loyalty if she walks the line. But right now I'm just not that vested, personally.

Anyway, once this thing is wrapped up and either the unsatisfactory candidate or the utterly inept candidate get in there, I'll get back to my usual mundane irresponsibility. I promise.

Meanwhile:

• I've been trying to get up to date about the situation in the Caucasus. The more I read, the more I wish I hadn't read anything. This is some scary shit, man. And Georgia is just the tip of the iceberg. This is from the current issue of the only news source I trust, the National Review. The emphasis is mine:
  

  As with Georgia, Putin did everything he could to derail Ukraine’s democratic revolution: Ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko Suffered dioxin poisoning, possibly at the hands of Russian agents. The agreement that the Russian fleet may use the Black Sea port of Sevastopol runs out in 2017, and senior Russian officers have already declared that this is an interest they will never give up.
  
  In a dramatic display of solidarity—and alarm—Yushchenko, President Lech Kaczynski of Poland, and the three Baltic presidents flew to Tbilisi for a joint press conference. Determined to defend their independence, Ukraine seeks NATO membership while Poland has hastily concluded an agreement to have an American missile-defense system on its soil. Russian spokesmen threaten both countries with nuclear strikes. Marxist ideology may be missing, but the intimidation hews to the familiar Soviet style.




• I spent some time thinking about all of that tonight and pondering the next few years. Given Iraq, Afghanistan, the Caucasus, etc ... I asked myself if there was really anyone I trusted to lead the US over the next few years. Only one name came to mind: Thomas Sowell. You may be aware that my opinion of Thomas Sowell is damn near worshipful.
  
  So I reminded myself to google the phrase "draft Thomas Sowell" when I got home and see if there were many other like minded people out there. I was a little surprised to see that there isn't that much of a "draft Sowell" movement on the net. I did discover one like-minded blogger (I see another addition to the blogroll coming up) and I found some "draft Sowell" comments here and there, but there really isn't much noise being made about the idea of a Sowell presidency. Pity. The guy is a genius. And he's not a politician.
  
  Of course he'd never run, but it would be cool if there were a draft Sowell source out there for his fans to use for social networking. Or whatever.



• Oh, yeah, speaking of Russia and Georgia, this bit from an item in the National Review put a smile on my face:

  Vesti FM, an outlet of Russian state radio, has been broadcasting that Vice President Cheney set these events (in Georgia) in motion in order to prevent the election of Senator Obama.

  I had to chuckle. Pity the poor neocons, I thought. They're so crippled by democracy that they have to arrange an international crisis in order to influence an election. It's bound to be simpler to do it the Putin way and simply rig the thing from the get-go.



• A great many of the blogs I read are upset about Obama's pig in lipstick remark. My take: we're wasting our time with this. If anyone ever asks Obama about it he'll simply say that he was being colloquial and that he'd never stoop to calling Governor Palin a pig. It's beneath him, he'll assert, and the right-wing blogs who called him on it are just being paranoid. He'll come out smelling like a rose and make the right-wingers look childish.
  
  He didn't make the phrase up, after all. Google it.
  
  We've got to pick our fights better than this, people. You can't win a bullshit contest against the world's champion bullshitter.
  
  Besides, he probably really didn't intend it as a veiled reference to Governor Palin. Could this the kind of hysterical over-reaction that we've come to expect from the left-wingers? We're better than that. Right?



• I tried to leave a comment to that effect at Newsbusters, a conservative blog dedicated to following the leftist media. But first I had to register and then I had to log in and change my password, and the log-in page wouldn't load and yadda yadda yadda.
  
  It reminds me of Little Green Footballs, a conservative blog that I absolutely love ... but that requires a vetting process for potential commenters that's probably tougher than the screening process to join The Avengers. It just ain't worth it.
  
  Come on, people! It's just the internet! When did we start taking ourselves so damn seriously? 90% of the people using this particular medium are just looking for porn and MP3s. None of us are crafting Plato's Republic, here.



• One of the reasons I love LGF, by the way, is that Charles occasionally turns up tidbits I might have missed from some of my favorite writers. Like this one from P.J. O'Rourke:

  Ann Coulter to me is someone who says things that I say all the time, but I say them at three in the morning when I’m drunk as a monkey. She says them at three in the afternoon stone sober in bright daylight.

  That's just awesome. P.J. Rules.
  
  By the way, Fox News doesn't do itself any favors by allowing Coulter on in prime time. That woman is the right-wing version of Keith Olbermann. Can't we all do a little better than that?

Labels: Blogs, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

There are a great many reasons, of course, not to elect Barack Obama president. One of them is that the guy hasn't spent much time actually governing. The same left-wingers who love to point out Sarah Palin's inexperience conveniently ignore the amount of time that Obama has spent not doing the job(s) he was elected to do. He'd rather be writing books about himself. Or voting "present" in the legislature in order to avoid making a commitment that might haunt him later. Or simply not voting at all.

To be honest, I hadn't thought about the amount of time Obama has spent on the stump until the National Review pointed it out. The emphasis below is mine:

By Election Day, Obama will have spent 59 of the preceding 112 months campaigning for higher office. That total excludes any perfunctory campaigning to retain his seat in the Illinois legislature, but includes seven months of a failed bid for Bobby Rush’s House seat, an astounding 29 months running for the U.S. Senate, and his current marathon for the presidency. Put another way, Obama spent more of the past decade asking voters to promote him than did any other American—even more than John Edwards, who has invested 48 months in a Senate race and two presidential bids since 1997.

That 59 months of campaigning doesn’t include any hours spent stumping in 2005 or 2006, even though some of his biggest time commitments those years could easily be mistaken for a presidential campaign. He completed a two-week, 20-city book tour, made dozens of appearances for House and Senate candidates, raised $6 million for the party, spoke to New Hampshire Democrats, and appeared at Sen. Tom Harkin’s steak fry in Iowa.

We do not have a deep sense of how a President Obama would govern—because he hasn’t governed much at all. One thing is certain, however. If elected, he would begin his 2012 re-election campaign very, very early.

Wow. I knew Obama was driven entirely by personal ambition, but I'd have never guessed that he was worse about it than John Friggin' Edwards.

John McCain's recent bounce in the polls not withstanding, I still think that Senator McCheese is probably going to be elected PotUS in November. But, hey ... the previous generation needed Jimmy Carter in order to learn it's lesson. Maybe my generation needs this guy.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Classic. He thinks he's already President:

Labels: Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Language warning: The closer I follow the news, the crankier I get.

• Barack Obama: Elitist Douchebag
  
  Obama seems to have forgotten who he's running against. I thought McCain was his opponent in the general election ... but he's campaigning against Sarah Palin. Quoth the Chosen One:

  “My understanding is that Gov. Palin’s town, Wassilla, has I think 50 employees. We've got 2500 in this campaign. I think their budget is maybe 12 million dollars a year – we have a budget of about three times that just for the month,” Obama responded.
  
  Our ability to manage large systems and to execute I think has been made clear over the past couple of years and certainly in terms of the legislation I’ve passed in the past couple of years, post-Katrina.”

  OK, one sentence at a time ...

  "Wassilla has I think 50 employees..."

  Yadda yadda yadda, we all know the contempt you feel for small-town America, Barry. Spare me your bullshit.
  

  "I think their budget is maybe 12 million dollars a year – we have a budget of about three times that just for the month..."

  Oooooh! Look at Mr. Big Political Man strut around! Just like a big ol' banty rooster! Does this guy have any clue how his pronouncements play in the heartland?
  
  Sarah Palin, as governor of Alaska, has been responsible for at least fifteen thousand state employees. That's well over three times the size of Obama's campaign. And Alaska's fiscal year budget for 2008 is more than eleven billion dollars. So let's do the math: Twelve million dollars for Wassilla's budget, times three for one month of Obama's campaign, divided into eleven billion dollars, equals shut the f@#& up, Barack.

  "Our ability to manage large systems and to execute I think has been made clear over the past couple of years..."

  Oh, absolutely. In terms of manufacturing a successful brand-name you've left Coca Cola and McDonnalds in the dust. But you ain't no leader. You spent twelve years in the Illinois state legislature voting "present" and you've spent most of your time in the US senate out campaigning for President. So, once again, shut the f@#& up.



• Steele on Obama...
  
  My longtime personal pick for PotUS, Michael Steele, says that the media coverage of the Obama campaign is "a joke" and calls it an example of "white liberal guilt."

  The money quote: "If (Obama) wins, he's a media creation. He's a brand. America doesn't need a president who's a brand. America needs a president who can lead."
  
  America needs you to run for President, Mike. Quit screwing around on Fox News and get back out there into the political arena. Please?




• Google Chrome
  
  A few days ago Microsoft debuted IE 8. I downloaded it and it sucks. Now Google has debuted their own browser, called Chrome, which you can download at this link.
  
  I downloaded it and tried it today for an hour or so. Miraculously, it actually runs in Vista. It runs much better in Vista than Microsoft's own sorry browser does.
  
  I won't be switching from Firefox to Chrome, but I'll use Chrome before I'll use IE whenever possible.
  
  Kick ass, Google.



• Firearm Education
  
  There are two things you need to know about McKenzie: One, she's eleven years old. Two, she's awesome:

  This is one child who'll never be involved in a tragic accident because she "finds her father's gun." And I bet you that she has more self confidence and better self discipline than most people twice her age.
  
  HT: Geekologie.





• Scott Ott rules
  
  From Scrappleface:
  

  As news broke of the pregnancy of Sarah Palin’s eldest daughter, Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama pleaded with the GOP vice presidential candidate...
  
  “Gov. Palin ... you tried to teach your daughter about morals and values, but she made a mistake, and she shouldn’t be punished with a baby.”
  
  As a goodwill gesture, Sen. Obama offered to pay for Bristol Palin’s abortion “at any time between now and the scheduled moment of birth.”

  
  
  And, hey: If the child manages to be born in spite of an attempted abortion, good ol' Barry will still arrange to have it rubbed out.
  
  After all, nobody should have to deal with the cruel and unusual punishment of accountability.



• Please just stop...
  
  I liked Jamie Lee Curtis a whole lot more before she became obsessed with bowel movements:

  This commercial runs at least twice an hour on the news channels. Game Show Network is popular in this house and, I swear, I hear Jamie Lee telling me how much this yogurt will help me poop about twenty times a day. Please, just stop. Just stop.

Labels: Links, Media, Michael Steele, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Cause and effect: Living your life without any sense of moral imperative whatsoever leads to severe character erosion. That's the best explanation I can produce for the vicious, debasing attacks from the secular leftists against Sarah Palin and her family.

If a leftist can't find any solid grounds to impugn a person's political positions, they eventually move along to personal attacks. You've experienced that if you ever argued with a liberal. You prove them wrong on the issues so they attack you on a personal level. It's always a leftist's last resort. (And, I must admit, I've been guilty of jumping right down in the mud with them lately. It's been a tough year, my patience is at an all time low.)

Here's the standard liberal tack. Just follow this plan and you can avoid actually admitting the weakness of your position on any number of subjects:

• First you defend your irrational ideas with hypotheticals: "But the world would be so much better if everyone would just ..."



• Then you move along to relativism: "Yeah, well maybe Liberal Politician X has done what you said, but what about the conservative politician who..."



• When that fails, try a little Bulverism: "Yeah, well, you only say that because..." You're white, you're male, you're a gun-nut, you're a Christian fanatic, etc, etc.



• Then you get nasty, personal and depraved. Attack people's families, tell lies, etc. That's the liberal "dumb bomb." It's a "dumb bomb," not a "smart bomb" because it dumbs down the conversation to the point that the initial subject isn't relevant anymore.

I gotta admit, I'm surprised by the way the leftists have immediately gone for the dumb-bomb with regard to Sarah Palin. They must really be worried about the effect she'll have on the general election if they're resorting to their ultimate modus operandi already.

I don't watch Hannity and Colmes very often because I think that Sean Hannity is an asshole and I don't like it when people I agree with make everyone who believes what I believe look bad. I've always kinda liked Alan Colmes, though. He's the liberal on the show, the Yin to Sean Hannity's Yang, and I'd often thought him to be disarming and charmingly self-deprecating. So I was sickened and disgusted to see that he'd implied at his blog that Sarah Palin is at fault for her youngest child having Down Syndrome:

Colmes has since tucked his tail and retreated. He's trying as hard as he can to dig out from the avalanche of criticism that he invited with such a shameful, repulsive implication. He's already deleted the post, in fact. But you can click my graphic above to see a slightly larger screen-grab of the post in question ... and you can click here to read Alan's original post in the Google cache. I was glad to see that so many of Alan's readers called him out on his terrible taste.

You probably saw the news stories today about the pregnancy of Sarah Palin's teenage daughter. And you may have gotten the sense, as I did, that turning that situation into political cannon fodder would be beneath just about anyone. Not so.

Now, I have to give Obama credit. Even a guy who thinks that newborns should be killed to protect Roe V. Wade says that his media supporters should leave the Palins alone. But come on. Does Obama really expect simple human decency from the kind of people who make up his base?

After all, we're talking about the kind of conspiracy-crazy nutroots who can't decide of Sarah Palin neglected her child in the womb or if her youngest child isn't really even hers.

We're talking about people who post ads on Craig's List hoping to track down photos of a scantily clad Sarah Palin to use as political weapons.

These are people who post a video on YouTube and allege that it depicts Todd Palin trashing his wife behind her back when he found out that she'd been elected Mayor of Wasilla, Alaska.

That video, by the way, is offered with a straight face. It's not supposed to be a parody, it's supposed to be real.

Meanwhile, conservatives continue to go after Barack Obama because of his legislative voting record and his public statements. Hell, I don't know. Maybe we're just totally out of the loop.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Glassbooth.org is a very useful website with regard to the 2008 election. It seems to be totally neutral, it contains (and links to) a wealth of information, and it's just plain fun.

We've all seen those internet quizzes designed to assess your political leanings in twenty questions or less. Most of them, in my opinion, are unreliable. The thing that sets Glassbooth.org apart is that it assesses your political priorities and then compares them to the articulated positions of the political candidates, complete with quotes, congressional vote information and links to outside sources.

Here's how Glassbooth compares me to McCain, Obama and Nader on the issues:

If you click that graphic you'll see the detailed analysis of my positions vis a vis the presidential candidates.

At Glassbooth you can also see how you compare to the candidates who've dropped out of the race. I wasn't surprised to see that I line up with Fred Thompson on more issues than I do with any other candidate. He was the guy I initially supported.

I wasn't surprised to see that I compare least favorably with John Edwards. I've considered him the most liberal Presidential candidate in the last two Presidential elections.

I wish that Maryland's former Lieutenant Governor Mike Steele was on the list of politicians you can compare/contrast yourself with at Glassbooth. I've been saying for some time now that I'd like to see him run for President. From what I can tell, he and I agree on literally every issue. I'd enjoy seeing if Glasshouse supports my hypothesis.

And I was surprised to see that I apparently somewhat agree with Obama on more issues than I realized.

The real shock, though, was learning that Ron Paul and I aren't that different. For a while now I've considered Paul and his supporters to be very flaky. Maybe I should have learned more about him before I disregarded his candidacy.

Of course, each of us, no matter what we consider ourselves, is a hodgepodge of political opinion. I call myself a conservative, but if you were to meet me and if you and I were to only discuss the death penalty, immigration and marijuana legalization, you'd think me to be a left winger.

Fun. Interesting and informative, too. And I may have even learned a little bit about myself. I'm actually more liberal than Ralph Nader in at least one area!

If you use Glassbooth for a personal assessment, please share your opinion with me ... in the comments here, or in your own blog if you keep one.

Labels: Links, News, Obama Watch, Politics, Thompson 08

If I lived in Mandeville, Louisiana, I'd be buying my insurance from the no-nonsense State Farm agent Bud Gregg:

I gotta like a guy who risks offending a few folks and maybe losing a customer or two in the interest of conveying a message he really believes in.

The fact that I happen to agree with Mr. Gregg's message might influence my opinion, of course.

Snopes verifies that the signs were real, although Bud has taken them down at the behest of State Farm.

It's doubtful that Obama actually said the quote attributed to him about changing the greatest nation in the world. At least, it's doubtful that he said it in so many words. But it does seem to sum up the tenor of his whole campaign.

Obama's lead in the polls is slipping away and he's panicking about it.

Part of the problem is that he knows he won't win unless he convinces some pro-lifers to vote for him. He's made some efforts in that direction, but he really crapped in his hat when he tried to pass off a soundbyte as a serious answer when Rick Warren asked him about abortion:

Obama ... told Pastor Rick Warren during a nationally televised forum that deciding when the rights of personhood should be extended to the unborn was "above my pay grade." Even Doug Kmiec, a conservative Pepperdine University lawyer who has become one of Mr. Obama's most prominent pro-life backers, was unsettled. He called the candidate's answer "much too glib for something this serious."

Well, that's the thing, though. Abortion is "something this serious" to those of us who see it for what it is. To people like Obama it's just a political token to be played with hopefully the best possible results.

Oh, but it gets deeper:

Mr. Obama compounded his problems after the forum when in an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network, he accused pro-life groups of "lying" about his record in the Illinois State Senate on legislation that would have protected viable babies born after botched abortions. Mr. Obama acknowledged voting against the bill but said he would have voted "yes" if the bill had contained language similar to a federal bill's language making clear that the intention wasn't to diminish overall abortion rights. But, as recently revealed, the Illinois bill had indeed included such language and Mr. Obama still voted against it...

...Mr. Obama is now in the difficult position of trying to explain why he voted against a bill that the legislative record shows addressed infanticide rather than abortion.

Emphasis above is mine.

Obama voted against the bill, knowing full well that it contained essentially the same wording as the federal bill, because he did not believe that protecting living, born infants is as important as shoring up Roe v. Wade. This is how Obama explained his vote in Illinois at the time:

"Number one, whenever we define a pre-viable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or other elements in the Constitution, what we’re really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a — a child, a nine-month-old — child that was delivered to term. That determination, then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place. I mean, it — it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an antiabortion statute."

This is all easy to explain: Barack Obama is lying to try to win votes. He is lying to pro-lifers because he believes that we're stupid people. He knows that the majority of pro-lifers have a mindset steeped in religious tradition, and we all know what he thinks of religious conservatives. He's been clear. He looks down on us as bitter, scared little people who cling to religion and guns. His words, not mine.

He thinks we're small minded, bitter, silly. He thinks we're too dumb to know when we're being lied to and that we can't or won't do the research and find out the truth. The rest of the world seems vulnerable to the slick charm and good looks of "The Chosen One." He thinks that he can get that crucial slice of the pro-life vote by turning on the charm and looking in our eyes and lying to us.

He's wrong about that.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Who won last night's somewhat odd, informal Presidential debate at Saddleback Church? That's easy enough to answer.

The clear winner was Rick Warren. Last night's proceedings kept Warren in the spotlight at all times and will certainly help move even more copies of his books off the shelves at your local Wal-Mart.

People simply don't want to read real theology anymore. Real theology is challenging. It's demanding. It usually robs the reader of his or her sense of comfort. People don't want that. They want simple, feel-good Hallmark Card messages. They don't want to be challenged. They want to be comforted with neat little button-down books. Today's "Christian reader" wants Rick Warren, Max Lucado, Rob Bell and Joel Olsteen. Those guys grind out books that are safe, easy to digest and nonthreatening to the modern lifestyle. Today's "Christian reader" has probably never even heard of Thomas a Kempis, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Thomas Aquinas, Augustine of Hippo ... and if they know anything at all about C.S. Lewis, it's only that he wrote a few children's stories.

So I'm sure that last night's televised festivities will help Rick Warren move a few more copies of The Purpose Driven Life and The Purpose Driven Cook Book and The Purpose Driven Do It Yourself Home Repair Guide and whatever else he has jam-packed into those free-standing cardboard displays at your local Wal-Mart.

Congratulations, Pastor Rick Warren, on your big marketing victory last night.

Oh, and, by the way, both of the men who are running for President were there, too.

Nobody should be surprised by this, but John McCain answered Warren's questions with short, clear, direct answers. Whereas Barack "The Chosen One" Obama relied on his usual ability to talk himself around a question, say a lot of things that sound really cute but don't mean anything, and generally hem and haw.

For instance, here's John McCain on abortion:

And here's Obama on abortion:

So if you want a President who believes that abortion on demand is wrong and is willing to say so, you can plan to vote for John McCain. In fact, the National Review believes that McCain carried the night.

Or, if you want a President who doesn't really say anything important at all, doesn't risk offending anyone, but instead just kinda paints with words, ending up with an abstract that doesn't really tell you anything but sure makes you feel good, you can vote for Obama. Or, I suppose, you could vote for Rick Warren.

Labels: Faith, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

OK, here's a hypothetical:

Let's say a premature baby is born, that the baby is alive and is struggling to hold on to life. Let's say the baby has a serious handicap; for instance, Down Syndrome. And lets say that, because of the handicap, the parents don't want the baby. Should the hospital try to save the baby's life, as they would with any other birth, or should they allow the baby to die because the parents don't want it?

I'd say that 99% of the people in the world are capable of the humanity and the compassion to say that the baby's life should be saved. Most, I'd guess, would agree with me that for the hospital to do anything other than try to save the baby's life would be the equivalent of infanticide.

But, see, here's the thing: That hypothetical I described above is not a hypothetical. That case really happened, just as I described it, in Illinois some years ago.

And Barack Obama has worked very hard to make sure that hospitals in that situation not only can kill the baby, but that they're actually required to kill him or her.

David Freddoso writes about the actual case I described above at the National Review:

(Jill) Stanek is the nurse who found herself cradling this baby in her hands for all of his 45-minute lifetime. He was close to ten inches long and weighed perhaps half a pound. It’s just a guess — no one had weighed or measured him at birth. No happy family had been there to welcome him into the world...

That family had wanted a baby, but when they learned that theirs would be born with Down syndrome, they wanted an abortion. For that, they went to Christ Hospital in the southwestern suburbs of Chicago, which is affiliated with the United Church of Christ.

In “induced labor” or “prostaglandin” abortion — a common procedure at the hospital — the doctor administers drugs that dilate the mother’s cervix and induce contractions, forcing a small baby out of the mother’s uterus. Most of the time, the baby dies in utero, killed by the force of the violent contractions. But it does not always work. Such abortions sometimes result in a premature baby being born alive. Sometimes the survivors live for just a few minutes, but sometimes for several hours. No one tried to save or treat them — it is hard to save someone you just mauled trying to kill. But something had to be done with them for the minutes and hours during which they struggled for air.

Stanek says her friend had been told to take this baby and leave him in a soiled utility closet.

After that experience, Jill Stanek became involved in an effort to have a law passed in Illinois that would recognize all human beings who'd been born alive as human beings. Sounds simple enough, right? Even most abortion-on-demand advocates recognize that a person is a person after they've been born. Right?

Not if you're Barack Obama:

On March 30, 2001, Obama was the only senator to speak in opposition to a bill that would have banned the practice of leaving premature abortion survivors to die. The bill, SB 1095, was carefully limited, its language unambiguous. It applied only to premature babies, already born alive. It stated simply that under Illinois law, “the words ‘person,’ ‘human being,’ ‘child,’ and ‘individual’ include every infant member of the species homo sapiens who is born alive at any stage of development.”

Obama defended his stance with a diatrab of rambling leagalese that would make Bill Clinton blush. He had this to say at the time:

There was some suggestion that we might be able to craft something that might meet constitutional muster with respect to caring for fetuses or children who were delivered in this fashion. Unfortunately, this bill goes a little bit further, and so … this is probably not going to survive constitutional scrutiny. Number one, whenever we define a pre-viable fetus as a person that is protected by the equal protection clause or other elements in the Constitution, what we’re really saying is, in fact, that they are persons that are entitled to the kinds of protections that would be provided to a — a child, a nine-month-old — child that was delivered to term. That determination, then, essentially, if it was accepted by a court, would forbid abortions to take place. I mean, it — it would essentially bar abortions, because the equal protection clause does not allow somebody to kill a child, and if this is a child, then this would be an antiabortion statute.

In a nutshell, Obama is so dedicated to protecting abortion on demand that he'd rather have babies who've been born killed than pass a law to protect them if it might result in a challenge to legalized abortion.

Remember that this November. Barack Obama isn't "pro choice." He's an avid proponent of abortion at any cost.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

I don't do an extreme amount of bitching here at the blog, but I do get a good whine on from time to time.

This is one of those posts, so you should stop reading it now.

Really, you'll wish you had. So stop reading it now. You have better things to do.

Anyway...

I am SICK TO DEATH of having tubes coming out of my body. Latex, plastic, etc, etc. Catheters, IV lines, etc, etc, etc. Ever since the first surgery for bladder cancer last month I've been hooked up to one device or another. And I'm sick of it.

I'm trying to stay positive, trying to focus on the fact that this isn't lung cancer or prostate cancer or pancreatic cancer ... one of the really ugly ones ... but it's hard to stay positive 24/7. I'm not really positive right now and haven't been for a few days. I'm sure I'll regret posting this shortly after I post it, but f%&@! it. This is what I feel like writing right now. And it won't be the first time I posted something I later regretted ... this blog is riddled with four years worth of regrettable writing.

I want a cigarette SO DAMN BAD that I think I'd KILL for one. I haven't had a cigarette since July 9, but it was a 25 or 26 year addiction, and it's going to take a while to get over it. Going back to work is going to be the real challenge. I don't smoke around the kids (as far as I know, they didn't know I smoked) and I don't smoke in the house ... but at work I have always smoked constantly. So going back to work and not lighting up is going to take a lot of focus.

Chantix, by the way, sucks. It's no better than the patches, the gums, etc. The only way to quit smoking is to just quit. I think it's like that with any addiction.

Hopefully, from now on, every time I see a cigarette I'll think about bladder cancer, and that'll be enough to keep me from smoking.

I'm sick of missing work, too. Not that my job is anybody's idea of a dream job. My job pretty much sucks. But I do miss the paycheck. (Boy, do I EVER miss the paycheck.) And I miss the regular routine. And I miss the friends I have at work.

What else to bitch about while I'm on a roll? OK, there's this: I'm sick of Barack Obama acting like he's the Second Coming of Christ and I'm sick to my stomach of his supporters swooning over him. This McCain ad says it all:

Also, I'm sick of Ubisoft CONTINUING to push back the release date for the new Splinter Cell game. Splinter Cell is the one video game series that I enjoy. I can live without the TV otherwise. I really don't like TV, I don't watch any specific shows, I don't buy or play other video games, I generally don't think any game is worth the price. Except for the Splinter Cell games. Boy, I love those games. And God only knows when the new one will actually come out.

What else? Let's see, I'm sick to death of seeing this crazy skank pop up on every news source imaginable. I think it's pretty obvious that Casey Anthony has caused the death of her daughter, either through neglect or abuse, and she's just leading everyone on a wild goose chase, trying to hold out another day before there's something solid to pin on her. Man, I hope they find something soon. It'd be great if the little girl turned up alive, but I don't see that happening, and I'm sick of every news outlet in the world passing on the lunatic mother's latest outrageous lie.

And I guess that's all I'm going to bitch about now. And that's by far enough.

Labels: Bladder Cancer, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, Video Games, You Tube

Good stuff I found at Granddaddy Long Legs:

I love the way BHO has been spinning like a top lately:

Barack Obama called "active faith" an obligation of religious Americans and a chief agent of societal change in a speech yesterday at the national meeting of a black church group.

Uh ... wouldn't active faith involve "clinging to religion," though?

Then there's this tidbit:

He preached individual responsibility, saying he knew he risked criticism for "blaming the victim" by talking about the need for parents to help children with homework and turn off the television to pass on a healthy self-image to daughters, and teach boys both to respect women and "realize that responsibility does not end at conception."

But, of course, those boys shouldn't be too worried about their responsibilities, since Obama also supports abortion on demand, right? So there's always that option. And keep in mind that Obama also believes (and has voted three times to mandate) that doctors should kill babies who survive abortion. So don't worry too much about your responsibilities, boys. Barack is doing all he can to make sure that you won't really get stuck attending to a baby you've conceived.

Oh, and hope, too. And change. Hope, hope, hopity hope, changie changie change.

A leftist as extreme as Barack Obama shouldn't bother with these missives to the right. Conservatives see right through this kind of BS and the ultra-liberals who make up Obama's base are just turned off by it.

Well, OK, I really shouldn't say that. Ultra-liberals really do support Obama, but they aren't his base. I have too much respect for ultra-liberals to lump them in with Obama's idiot base. I mean, I disagree with ultra-lefties, but they do at least try to keep up with the news. No, Obama's base ... his real core of support ... is made up of people who don't really want to be bothered with learning about the issues. Obama's real base is the slack-jawed, glass-eyed mass of people who trumpet catch-phrases like "Bush lied" and "it's time for a change" without any friggin' idea what they're talking about.

Those are the idiots who'll decide the next election. Wheeeeeeeeee!!

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Can this guy lie with a straight face or what? I mean, my Lord, I'm almost impressed with him! It's no wonder so many people swallow everything he says ... because he says it all really well, even when he's contradicting himself.

I kept waiting for him to say that it depends on what your definition of "is" is.

Of course, most of his followers don't really care about trivial things like consistency, honesty and reliability. It all comes down to "hope." "Hope" and "Change" and "Hopeful Change" and "A Change to Hopefulness" and "Hopeful Changiness," etc, etc, etc.

Wake up, people! This guy is a hair's breath from the White House!

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

As a conservative, I do find some humor in the hubris as the Democrats spin towards the upcoming disaster in Denver.

It's hard to know ... in fact, it's hard to care ... what impact Pastorgate has had on Barack Obama in the polls. You can pretty much search Google News with any result in mind and find date from some source to support your own beliefs about how the controversy has effected the Senator.

USA Today has Obama slightly ahead of Hillary, other sources call the same numbers a tie. Jim Geraghty at NR looks at some of the poll numbers and scratches his head:

First, 82 percent of respondents are aware of "the situation regarding Sen. Barack Obama's church pastor and the past public remarks he has made," and somehow, 83 percent are aware of "Obama's speech on Tuesday, in which he addressed the issue of his pastor." (Okay, who's the one percent who knew about the speech but not the 'situation'?)

Asked of all voters, "taking all this into account, are you more likely or less likely to support Obama for president" — 20 percent more likely, 49 percent less likely, 27 percent about the same.

Among those who answered that they were "aware" to the first two questions, 19 percent said they were more likely to support Obama, 52 percent said they were less likely, and 27 percent the same.

Among whites, the "less likely" answer came from 51.3 percent. Among blacks, it was 56.2 percent. (!) Among Hispanics, 54.5 percent. (The sub-sample sizes for blacks and Hispanics were 85 and 46, so it's possible that maybe it's too small a sample to get a really good reading on these demographics)...

Is it possible that some folks don't want to admit to a pollster that Obama's speech made them less likely to support him?

Emphasis in the last paragraph was mine. And it's a very good question. As Victor David Hanson points out, Obama's supposed recovery speech actually made things worse in the eyes of many people:

The more the pundits gushed about the speech, the more the average Americans thought, “Wait a minute — did he just say what I thought he said?” It’s not lost on Joe Q. Public that Obama justified Wright’s racism by offering us a “landmark” speech on race that:

(1) Compared Wright’s felony to the misdemeanors of his grandmother, Geraldine Ferraro, the Reagan Coalition, corporate culture, and the kitchen sink.

(2) Established the precedent that context excuses everything, in the sense that what good a Wright did (or an Imus did) in the past outweighs any racist outburst of the present.

(3) Claimed that the voice of the oppressed is not to be judged by the same rules of censure as the dominant majority that has no similar claim on victim status.

What is happening, ever so slowly, is that the public is beginning to realize that it knows even less after the speech than it did before about what exactly Obama knew (and when) about Wright’s racism and hatred.

And the more we learn about Obama's "church," the harder it is to see it as a church. This is, after all, an organization that printed an Israel-bashing article from Hamas in it's bulletin. Of course, Obama says he didn't know about that, either.

Is there anything that goes on at Trinity United that Barack Obama does know about? And if not, why does he call it his church?

Not that anyone in the MSM is gonna put that question to him. The MSM is, by and large, doing everything they can to help Obama spin his way out of this mess.

I thought that passportgate would provide the distraction that Obama needed to try to get past the Jeremiah Wright controversy, but it's hard to deny that the passport scandal was a political fart in a wind tunnel. Oddly, the CEO of the company that employees the contractor who peeked at Obama's passport is an Obama consultant. It still strikes me as dumb to allow contractors access to that kind of information, but seems undeniable that the guy was just a snoop and not a GOP black-opps agent.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Democratic divide, Hillary Clinton finds herself trying to spin her way out of one more lie:

Hillary Clinton's campaign acknowledged today that she may have misspoken when she described a harrowing visit to Bosnia while first lady.

"I remember landing under sniper fire," she said last week as she sought to burnish her commander-in-chief credentials. "There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base."

Really? Landing under sniper fire? Running with your head down? Let's see, does any video exist of your visit to Bosnia? Oh, there is video? Let's look at it, shall we?

What is it with Democrats and lying? Can they breathe without lying? And do they have to do so much of it while campaigning (remember Christmas in Cambodia?), making it all so transparent?

Jeez, what a national embarrassment the Democratic party is ... and has always been. I agree with Bob Parks that America is more than ready for a black and/or female President. But I also agree with him that there's no way that President will be a Democrat. The Democratic party's history precludes that possibility:

Labels: Links, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

So the passport files of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain have been breached by a state-department employee and/or employees:

There were three breaches in recent weeks involving the files of Sen. Barack Obama, at least one involving Arizona Sen. John McCain, the presumptive GOP nominee, and one involving Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, he said.

The breaches involving Obama and McCain were by three contractors, two of whom were dismissed and the other disciplined. The incident involving Clinton was a training mistake, McCormack said.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice today apologized to Obama for three State Department contractors who delved into his passport file in recent weeks.

Somebody screwed up.

It looks like at least one incident here was frivolous, a trainee was allowed to wander beyond the limits that should be imposed on a new hire. The others, involving contractors, were probably simple matters of snooping for the sake of snooping. Corrections need to be made.

Of course, the leftists are spinning like crazy, focusing on the passport files of Obama and Hillary and, of course, not noticing that somebody peeked at McCain's passport files, too. And there are plenty of reminders of how the first Bush administration peeked at Bill Clinton's passport files back in the early '90's, and insinuations that this kind of peeking must be a Bush family thing.

And, of course, it's all BS.

Democrats need to remember that the real champ of file pilfering and record plundering is Billary Clinton.

Lest we forget this story from 1996:

TO hear President Clinton tell it, it was "all an innocent bureaucratic snafu," this seamy saga of the White House gaining access to confidential Federal Bureau of Investigation files on prominent Republicans -- files it had no business seeing. "I'm sorry that it occurred," Mr. Clinton said.

Or this one from 1993:

The State Department has begun an internal investigation into why a Clinton Administration official ordered the retrieval of sensitive personnel files of Bush Administration appointees and how that material was given to The Washington Post.

And, oh, yeah ... Billary's Whitewater mess, which was never resolved but just seemed to somehow fall down the memory hole:

My favorite two quotes from that YouTube clip are when Bill says that his administration is the most ethical ever (and he said it with a straight face, no less) ... and when he slips up and says how he really feels; that people shouldn't be allowed to raise questions and erode his authority. Classic Clinton.

So who stands to gain from Passportgate? Oh, clearly Obama. Nobody else. Billary can't successfully spin this because everyone knows how corrupt, dishonest and flat-out incompetent they are. Besides, their supporters have been abandoning them like rats from a sinking ship. McCain doesn't stand to gain anything; he'll do the responsible thing, I bet. He'll say something like "Somebody screwed up. I hope this is corrected so it can't happen again."

That leaves Obama.

The only person with a political dog in this fight is Obama. And he'll use this distraction as his way out of the Jeremiah Wright mess. Just you wait and see.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

God, I'm loving this.

You know how Obama is always saying that if he were President he'd reject the kind of hardline tactics that George Bush has used and, instead, sit down and talk with the foreign leaders that oppose us?

Well, we're getting a taste of his sit down and talk policy as his campaign takes a hardline stance regarding Michigan's disputed early primary:

If Michigan lawmakers don't pass a plan for a new Democratic primary by Thursday, then the state's 157 delegates might not have a say in selecting their party's presidential nominee...

A top Michigan Democrat expressed frustration Wednesday with Obama for not embracing the state's proposal.

"The Obama people are blocking it in the Legislature," said the Democratic source, who has not backed either candidate.

The source also said negotiators repeatedly and unsuccessfully have reached out to the campaign for input and cooperation.

The source said that Obama's campaign has been asked to craft an alternative or to meet with the Clinton camp to work out an acceptable compromise, but that those requests have been met with silence.

Wake up, Obama-Zombies. Your candidate is just one more politician.

I also like how he's taking the poor-little-me position now regarding Jeremiah Wright:

"In some ways, this controversy has actually shaken me up a little bit and gotten me back into remembering that the odds of me getting elected have always been lower than some of the other conventional candidates," the Illinois senator told CNN's Anderson Cooper in an exclusive one-on-one interview.

Is it just me or is that a subtle play of the race card?

God, I feel so stupid! Little more than two months ago I was blogging about how much I liked the guy! What was I thinking?? He's just one more politician, one more been-there-done-that-liberal, just one more fake.

In short, he's just one more Clinton.

Speaking of Clintons, Hillary really wants control of those early primary votes, but there's no reason to believe that re-votes will help her:

As the Democratic imbroglio continues over what to do about the out-of-bounds Michigan and Florida primaries, a recent poll offers a reminder of how tantalizing a true, fully engaged faceoff between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in those two states would be.

The survey, sponsored in part by the St. Petersburg Times, asked Floridians a number of questions -- some strictly local -- on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. But the one that caught our interest focused on the two Democratic presidential candidates. It found Clinton ahead, with 46%, but Obama within shouting distance, at 37%.

Even more intriguing, 16% said they were undecided -- meaning an aggressive, persuasive campaign could make all the difference in determining a victor.

Also, the figures represent slippage for Clinton since she won Florida's Jan. 29 primary -- the one the Democratic National Committee ruled wouldn't count and the one that, as a result, preceded without the candidates actually pitching for support. In that contest, she received 50% of the vote, to 33% for Obama and 14% for John Edwards (still an active candidate at the time).

If nothing else, this whole debacle is really giving the nation a a chance to see what these two are all about.

Meanwhile, John McCain is behaving like ... well, like a President:

Republican John McCain spent Wednesday in Israel, where he toured a war-battered town.

McCain said he understands Israel’s tough response to Palestinian rocket fire, adding that there is no point in negotiating with the Gaza Strip’s Islamic Hamas regime.

His visit is billed as routine congressional business, although the trip appeared aimed at burnishing McCain’s leadership credentials and courting Jewish voters for the November election. McCain told reporters that because he was on a congressional fact-finding tour, it was not the time to discuss his campaign.

Still, in an interview in the Jerusalem Post, McCain said he would “personally be engaged” in peace talks if elected and “give it my highest priority.”

It's all pretty funny; and the punchline is that no matter how irresponsible, transparent and empty both Clinton and Obama clearly are at this point, there are still enough stupid people in America to give either of them a damn good shot at the White House.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

The other day I posted a link to the NewsMax website, referencing Ronald Kessler's claim that Obama was, in fact, in the pews at Trinity United when Jeremiah Wright gave one of his hate speeches about America. Apparently the Obama campaign has been able to prove that Obama was not there on the date in question. The NewsMax story now contains a clarification to the effect that Kessler got the date wrong, but that he is certain he remembers seeing Obama at the church during one of Wright's hateful "sermons." Nonetheless, Kessler's credibility on the issue is severely damaged.

It appears that Kessler printed his account of the sermon without sufficient research and without being sure of his own memory. What we're left with now is a writer claiming "I'm sure I saw Obama there on SOME occasion," which is something else altogether. Kessler has made himself, NewsMax, and each of us who linked to his story look bad. I'm glad I tried to qualify my link slightly by writing that evidence had come to light to indicate that Obama was lying, rather than dogmatically proclaiming Obama to certainly be a big liar.

In a fairly funny sidenote, Scott at Spitball Politics chose to link to my post, only to have Patrick (apparently the guy in charge of the blog) strike out the entry and post details about Kessler's gaffe. Patrick went on to write:

...and yes, Scott used a CONSERVATIVE BLOG as his ht on this. Something akin to placing an anti-environment lobby-monger like Dirk Kempthorne to head the Dept of Interior.

So apparently all conservative blogs are unreliable, simply based on the conservative perspective of the author. I'm glad I hadn't gotten around to blogrolling Spitball, I'd intended to as a courtesy to Scott. I do, however, encourage you to read Patrick's stuff if you're in the market for unequivocal generalities about conservative blogs. Meanwhile, this is my second and last reference to that particular blog (although the comments section at SouthCon remains fair game for anyone).

More opinion on the issue: it's rare that I agree with Pat Buchanan, his brand of conservatism always strikes me as rather unconservative. He usually seems like an extremist to me. But I do agree with much of his take on the Obama/Wright flap:

What is exceptional is that Wright is the spiritual father of Barack Obama, the pastor, teacher and mentor who brought Barack into the church, married him and Michelle, baptized their children and has been a confidant to the man who would be America's president.

For 20 years, Barack has attended Wright's church, listened to his weekly sermons, entertained him in his home. Yet, says Barack, he never heard any racist rants at church, nor was he aware that Wright held so poisoned a view of his country.

Sorry, that is not credible. Wright is a famous preacher in black America, and Barack's denial he was aware of his views marks him down either as a dissembler or a man so obtuse he ought not be a security guard at Wal-Mart, let alone president of the United States.

It is easy now to understand why Michelle Obama, before Barack began to win, had never once been proud of her country. Who could be proud of the America that lives in the malignant imagination of the Rev. Wright?

Exactly. And speaking of Michelle Obama, it occurred to me when I heard the recording of her own clarification of her remarks about America ... one of the things that she said was that opportunities were available to her when she was a child that aren't available to kids today, and she was now proud to see America working to get those opportunities back.

Hmmm. Michelle Obama and I are about the same age. Which means that she, like me, grew up in Ronald Reagan's America. So I agree with her, we really did have more opportunities when she was a child. You know, I do have to admit that I like it when the Obamas directly or indirectly praise Reagan.

Labels: Blogs, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics

Just a video-recap from What's-His-Name's show, in case you haven't heard any of Jeremiah Wright's controversial remarks:

That's Jeremiah Wright, the "preacher" who has been a close adviser of Barack Obama's. This is the "preacher" who presided at Obama's church, who married Barack and his wife, who baptized their children. I'm qualifying the word "preacher" because it sounds to me like he's more of a politician and a troublemaker than an actual "preacher." He sounds like the flaming-leftist version of Pat Robertson.

Obama has claimed to denounce "Reverend" Wright's ugliest examples of hate-speech, and he's claimed that he wasn't in the pews when those remarks were made. But evidence is coming to light that indicates that Obama is lying about that:

Contrary to Senator Barack Obama’s claim that he never heard his pastor Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr. preach hatred of America, Obama was in the pews last July 22 when the minister blamed the “white arrogance” of America’s Caucasian majority for the world’s suffering, especially the oppression of blacks...

If Obama’s claims are true that he was completely unaware that Wright’s trademark preaching style at the Trinity United Church of Christ has targeted “white” America and Israel, he would have been one of the few people in Chicago to be so uninformed. Wright’s reputation for spewing hate is well known.

In fact, Obama was present in the South Side Chicago church on July 22 last year when Jim Davis, a freelance correspondent for Newsmax, attended services along with Obama.

Oprah Winfrey is often sited as another member of Wright's congregation... but it turns out that Oprah had sense enough to get out of that scene some years ago:

Obama’s most famous celebrity backer, Oprah Winfrey began attending Wright’s church in 1984. Last year, Newsmax magazine reported that Winfrey abruptly stopped attending years ago, and suggested that she did so to distance herself from Wright’s inflammatory rhetoric. She soon found herself a target of Wright, who excoriated her for having broken with “traditional faith.”

It's not surprising that Obama lied about sitting in the pews and quietly taking in Wright's hate-speech. But it was a mistake. He could have said something like "Reverend Wright has often made me uncomfortable and I'm glad for this chance to do what I should have done long ago..." It would have been a great opportunity to make a clean public break from this hate-monger. Obama chose not to take it.

It's no wonder that this scandal has really been the first thing to damage Obama's standing in the polls. Obama has even gone as far as claiming that Wright's views don't even fairly represent the views of the average church member. As though we can't see all those people screaming with excitement in those videos.

And, hey, God knows I'm conservative when it comes to Church services. I'm Catholic. I like classic liturgy, classical music, restraint, submission, contemplation. So maybe it's simply a matter of personal taste that makes me wonder how in the world you can call that romper-room scene a "church service" anyway. You got a preacher screaming and cursing and a bunch of people jumping around like lunatics? Come on. That's church? And don't tell me it's a race thing, either, because I've sat in Mass with blacks, whites, Latinos, Asians, etc, and I've never once seen anyone jumping around like a crackhead. It's a matter of reverence. Reverence just isn't a factor when "Reverend" Wright "preaches."

Obama keeps referring to Wright as something like an "old uncle" who often says things that he doesn't agree with. That makes sense, too. We all know what it's like to have family members that say crazy stuff. But we're stuck with them; they're family. Obama wants us to feel some empathy for his situation. There's a problem here, though: Wright is not a member of Obama's family. He is not an old uncle. He's an associate, a guy Obama chose to have a close relationship with. That doesn't display very good judgment on the candidate's part.

Obama is planning to deal with this crisis by doing what he does best: making a speech. I'll be interested to see how well he can talk his way out of this. This is a PR nightmare. His whole campaign is about PR and nothing else. Wow, what a mess.

---

I suppose Hillary is sick of being out of the headlines. These past few days of Obama/Wright mania have to have been hard on her. So she's back to saying dogmatic stuff like that the Iraq war is a war that America "cannot win."

Meanwhile, Bill Clinton is going out of his way to make it clear that he hasn't said anything bad about Barack Obama. And of course he hasn't. The only person Bill Clinton ever talks about is himself:

Meanwhile, John McCain hasn't been in the news much lately. Which is fine. With Jeremiah Wright and Bill Clinton out there giving us all reasons to vote for the Arizona Senator, McCain can afford to lay low for a while.

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

Obama has fairly forcefully rejected Jeremiah Wright's most hateful remarks:

"I categorically denounce any statement that disparages our great country or serves to divide us from our allies," Obama said. "I also believe that words that degrade individuals have no place in our public dialogue, whether it's on the campaign stump or in the pulpit. In sum, I reject outright the statements by Reverend Wright that are at issue."

Good. That's what I thought he should do, and he's done it and I give him credit for it.

I stumbled across this today ... and if Wright had me scratching my head, this guy has my head spinning while I scratch it:

Various bits and pieces of what that guy had to say just keep swirling in my head: "Your health is in my mouth! Egg shell soup! Big breasts! Obama is a long-legged mack daddy! Piss in a boot!"

WTF???!?

Labels: Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

OK, I ought not have done it, simply because I was better off not knowing ... but I looked into Obama's church a little more, mostly just by watching videos from Hot Air. (I'd already learned some about the topic yesterday.)

The "preacher" at Obama's Church, the Trinity United Church Of Christ, is Jeremiah Wright ... and Jeremiah Wright is a raving nutcase:

This is a guy who thinks that America is ruled by the KKK, who blames America for 9/11, and who has shouted "God damn America" during his sermons. Sermons? Call 'em sermons if you want, I call them venomous tirades.

As of right now, Reverend Wright is apparently out and Trinity United has a new senior minister, a guy named Otis Moss. Moss seems, based on this one video, to be much saner than the "Reverend Doctor" Jeremiah Wright:

Of course, it probably isn't very hard to come off as saner than Jeremiah Wright.

Obama named his book, The Audacity Of Home, after a phrase from one of Wright's "sermons." Nonetheless, Obama has dismissed his connection to Jeremiah Wright and says that he thinks of Wright as an old uncle who sometimes says things that he doesn't agree with.

But here's the thing: With his radical ideas and his hatred of America, Jeremiah Wright is darn-near as bad as Fred Phelps and his infamous band of lunatics at the Westboro Baptist "Church.".

If John McCain ... or any other politician, for that matter ... turned out to be a member of the Fred Phelps congregation, how would most Americans react if he simply called Phelps an old uncle who sometimes says things he doesn't agree with?

Get real.

Phelps is a nutcase. Jeremiah Wright is, too. Anyone who wants to be President of the United States ought to have the balls to strongly denounce this kind of hate-speech. Instead, Obama defends Wright and is inspired to title his book after one of Wright's phrases.

What's wrong with this picture? Is it a race thing? Why are we giving Obama a pass on this?? Damn, people, pay attention! Going around saying the words "hope" and "change" over and over again doesn't constitute leadership. You gotta look deeper than that.

I think I'll start a new feature here at SouthCon: Obama Watch. The more I learn about this slick, smooth-talking "hope" peddler, the more he scares me.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

I made this clip partly as an opportunity to learn the video editing software that comes built into Vista ... and I have to say, it ain't all that.

I also made this clip partly because I feel strongly about this. This is just a five minute video version of the post directly below, including news clips and evidence that I believe supports my point of view:

Update: Read more here.

Labels: Microsoft, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

I've started keeping an eye on Barrack Obama now that I've actually done some research and realize that I strongly disagree with him on a number of issues.

Yesterday, John McCain poked at Obama a bit, referencing Obama's insistence that we should be fighting al Queda instead of fighting a war in Iraq. McCain said

"I have news for Senator Obama. Al Qaeda is in Iraq. And that's why we're fighting in Iraq, and that's why we're succeeding in Iraq."

Obama responded ... but I don't think his response was particularly strong:

"I have some news for John McCain. And that is that there was no such thing as al-Qaida in Iraq until George Bush and John McCain decided to invade Iraq..."

Of course a line like that is going to draw huge applause from a Democratic audience, and it did. But the argument is debatable at best. In fact, from what I've read, what Obama implies with his argument is simply untrue. I'll concede that the specific entity known as al Queda in Iraq didn't exist prior to the war ... but there is ample evidence that Saddam and al Queda shared goals and worked together. Click here and hereto read a more thorough examination of Saddam's regime and it's connections to al Queda.

Iraq's first post-Saddam Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi, certainly disagrees with Obama:

"I believe very strongly that Saddam had relations with al-Qaida. And these relations started in Sudan. We know Saddam had relationships with a lot of terrorists and international terrorism. Now, whether he is directly connected to the September — atrocities or not, I can’t — vouch for this. But definitely I know he has connections with extremism and terrorists."

Obama continued:

"I've got news for John McCain. He took us into a war along with George Bush that should never have been authorized and never should have been waged."

I just have to sigh when Obama says this kind of thing. As I've posted before, Obama admits that he held the same beliefs about Iraq as practically everyone else in the world prior to the invasion. Obama wrote:

"Like most analysts, I assumed that Saddam had chemical and biological weapons and coveted nuclear arms... I believed that he had repeatedly flouted UN resolutions and weapons inspectors and that such behavior had to have consequences."

To believe that Saddam posed that kind of threat and still oppose the war is simply irresponsible.

Obama has been generating a lot of fawning applause with his liberal base as he stumps for the Democratic nomination. But his positions are often reckless and sometimes simply indefensible. He hasn't had to defend those positions in debate yet because Hillary Clinton holds essentially the same positions. He won't have it that easy when he debates John McCain. If McCain comes to those debates prepared, he should win them easily.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Clear Thinking About Obama

• I started saying that Hillary's PotUS campaign was coming apart back in July, 2005. As of now that's pretty much the consensus. Everybody has abandoned the Clintons. The Kennedy clan. The unions. The left-wing celebrities. The Democratic Party rank and file. They've all dropped Hillary like yesterday's leftovers and made the Obama switch.
  
  I've generally been happy with this since I despise the Clintons and I've thought for some time now that Obama seemed like a decent guy. But since it's become clear that he really is going to get the nomination, I've decided that I better take some time and learn a little more about him.
  
  Here's some of what I've learned:
  
  
  • When a baby actually survives a late term abortion and ends up alive and crying in the operating room, Obama wants the baby to be murdered. As a legislator he's cast three votes to have physicians kill children who survive abortion.
    
    Even Barbara Boxer thinks that goes too far.
    
    It's no wonder that Planned Parenthood loves the guy.
  
  
  
  • His image as a moderate who's tough on crime is … well, a crock:
    

    He voted against a bill that would add penalties for crimes committed as a part of gang activity and against a bill that would make it a criminal offense for accused gang members, free on bond or probation, to associate with other gang members. In 1999, he was the only state senator to oppose a bill that prohibited early prison release for criminal sexual offenders.

  
  
  • Obama has become the darling of the anti-war crowd by reminding us over and over again that he opposed the war in Iraq from the very start. But his opposition to the war wasn't because he saw things more clearly than the Bush administration. This is a passage from his book The Audacity Of Hope:
    

    "Like most analysts, I assumed that Saddam had chemical and biological weapons and coveted nuclear arms," Obama wrote. "I believed that he had repeatedly flouted UN resolutions and weapons inspectors and that such behavior had to have consequences. That Saddam butchered his own people was undisputed; I had no doubt that the world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him."

    
    Before the war, Obama believed the same things about Saddam as everyone else, and yet he still opposed taking action. What the hell would it take for this guy to be willing to take military action against someone? I think he'd actually be a more limp-wristed leader than Bill Clinton was.
    
    Is this the guy you want in office if Iraq and/or Pakistan fall to al Qaeda?
  
  
  Some of the rumors going around on the net about Obama are simply untrue:
  

  
  Thankfully, his voting record as a legislator is easy to verify. And the more I learn about him, the more I find out what his principles really are, the more I realize I've been naïve to simply see him as a nice guy. This is a man who stands for a great many things I disagree with adamantly.
  
  Even his most loyal supporters sometimes have to admit that they don't really know what kind of man he is.
  
  I guess I better start getting more energized about McCain.

In Other News

• My friend The Governor hails from Wichita, Kansas. So he keeps me up to date on all the news in that part of the country. The Governor was the first person who ever mentioned BTK to me, and today he filled me in on the latest big story from the Air Capital Of The World:
  

  WICHITA, Kansas, Feb. 20, 2008 -- Wichita police say they’re working a case they don't often see: a man accused of having sex with a dog. And it’s not the first time the man’s been in this type of trouble.
  
  Twenty-year-old Joshua Coman is now in jail accused of having sex with a Rottweiler.
  
  “We don't see any cases like this,” said Lt. Sam Hanley with the Wichita Police Department. “I’d never seen any cases like this and I hope we don't see any more.”
  
  Justen Tracy says Coman lived with his family for a short time.
  
  Tracy says Coman called Wednesday night to say he was coming over to kidnap the dog. Shortly after that, the family caught him in the garage.
  
  "He's doing foul things with the dog and my mom flips on the garage light and he stops,” said Tracy.
  
  Coman was already on probation for similar charges in Reno County. Last September he pleaded no contest in a case involving a Rottweiler in Pretty Prairie.

  
  
  The first thing I thought while reading that story was "He did WHAT to a dog?" Then I read further and found myself thinking "It was a friggin' ROTTWEILER?"
  
  Like somehow that makes it worse. Like, sure, I can see sodomizing a Poodle or a Shar Pei, but not a Rottweiler, man.
  
  Then I read that he'd been in trouble with another Rottie before and I thought "This guy is really specific about what he's doing."
  
  And then I realized how much time I was spending thinking about this and I got a cold chill and felt nauseous.



• Earl Simmons goes by the nom-de-hip-hop DMX, and he's well known for being a pet lover and responsible citizen. Now comes news that he's working on a gospel record:
  
  

  Swizz Beatz recently revealed that DMX has linked up with Neptunes producer Pharrell to work on the gospel portion of his upcoming album.
  
  As reported earlier, DMX's upcoming album will be a double CD titled Walk With Me Now and You'll Fly With Me Later.
  
  Walk With Me Now will be his typical street themed album while Fly With Me Later will be a gospel album with no cursing.
  
  Swizz, who made the revelation to MTV News, will also be a part of X’s double project.

  
  
  Personally, I can't wait to hear DMX soliciting for Jesus. I've thought that he'd make a great gospel vocalist ever since I heard his song X Is Coming, in which he intimates the following:
  
  

  If you got a daughter older then 15, ima rape her
  Take her on the living room floor, right there in front of you
  Then ask you seriously, whatchu wanna do?
  Frustratin, isnt it? when they kill me, but ima kill you
  Now watch me f--k just a lil while longer, please, will you?

  
  
  Earl Simmons …. this generation's Mahalia Jackson.

Labels: Entertainment, Links, Media, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube

I've been trying to follow the campaigns of a few of the Republican candidates for President, and I've mentioned Fred Thompson and Mitt Romeney a couple of times. But I realized today that I haven't really taken any time yet to irresponsibly trash and browbeat the Democrats. I must remedy that.

There are only three Democrats worth mentioning at all, of course... and here's my take on all three of them:

• John Edwards, for some reason, is still campaigning. I suppose his campaign feels bolstered when he gets endorsements like the one from Rolling Stone magazine, touting him as the "real liberal" in the race. What's surprising to me is that Edwards and his supporters don't seem to realize that the reason his campaign isn't going anywhere is because American's realize that he is a real liberal. Didn't anyone pay attention to the way things shook out in November, 2004? The liberal votes are on the two coasts and in the big cities, and they aren't enough to win an election. Edwards is beating a dead horse, and beating it hypocritically. It's hard to swallow a campaign based on "two Americas," with Edwards claiming that he's working for the poor guy while parading around in a $400 haircut and living in a 28,000 square foot mansion.



• Boy, who wouldn't Hillary Clinton kill to be as slick as Barack Obama? This guy is the real Clinton in the race. He's the total package, rolling up all of Bill Clinton's charm, popularity, bad ideas and posturing into one neat ball. Obama has nothing more to offer than the same old leftist agenda, but his campaign presents it in a much more attractive wrapper, and he's definitely the Hollywood candidate. But lately, the most interesting thing about his campaign is his feud with Hillary. Of course, the clear winner in the feud will be the Republican candidate in '08, as both Hillary and Obama are so desperate to one-up each other that whichever one carries the day will have left plenty of great sound bytes to be used against them. In the meantime, some of Obama's political red meat has had real-world effects. His promise to invade Pakistan if he thinks it's necessary has lead to violent anti-America protesting in Pakastan. You hadn't heard about that? Of course not. After all, the MSM's policy is that only George W. Bush is capable of the kind of divisive "cowboy attitude" that turns the world agaist the US, right?



• I'd almost feel bad for Hillary Clinton if it weren't obvious that she is evil incarnate. Honestly, I can't remember the last time a major American politician chased her own tail as badly as Hillary has been doing. Even John Kerry didn't look as desperate, as transparent and as plainly unqualified as Hillary does now. For one thing, she's absolutely terrified of Obama, and their feud has exposed her for a shrill, hateful harpy. And Hillary doesn't play both sides of a political issue nearly as well as her husband used to. Her remarks about how the troop surge in Iraq is working but it won't help has just about everyone scratching their heads. And while Obama attracts celebrity endorsements from the likes of Oprah and Jennifer Aniston, Hillary's been attracting the affection of people like "the Hollywood Madam" Heidi Fleiss the conflicted, confused Anne Rice. My question is, how long until Chelsea and Bill endorse Obama? At this point, the best thing that could happen for the GOP would be for the Democrats to actually run Hillary. Remember when the National Review begged the Democrats to run Howard Dean in '04? It's getting that way with the Junior Senator from New York. Please throw us that easy meat.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

Watching the Democrat Party's candidates scratch and claw at each other is really becoming a great source of entertainment:

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama exchanged barbs over foreign policy Wednesday, amping up the once-cordial rhetoric between the two camps.

Obama tried to turn rival Clinton's words back on her, saying her vote to authorize the Iraq war was "irresponsible and naive." Clinton had used the same language a day earlier to criticize Obama for saying he would be willing to meet with leaders of nations such as Cuba, North Korea and Iran without conditions within the first year of his presidency.

In a carefully crafted response, Hillary said "I'm rubber and you're glue!"

Is "naiver" a word? I can't wait until one of these two actually uses it.

It'll be even more fun watching them try to spin this stuff the other way 'round again when one of them is the other's vice presidential candidate.

Oh, wait, what am I thinking? They won't have to do the reverse spin. The mainstream American media will never hit either of them with the hard questions that make that kind of spinning necessary.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

The Great Satan has made it official. She wants our souls. Of course, it was only a matter of time. Unlike many of my conservative friends, I don't think Hillary is a real threat. I don't think she has a chance of winning the presidency. Just do the math. Even in a worst case scenario, even if she wins the Democratic nomination and wins every state that Kerry won in '08, I can't imagine that there's a single red state that would swing her way. No red states means not enough electoral votes, which means no President Satan.

The Democratic party knows this. Even they don't want to contend with all the junk in Hil's trunk. She'll never get the nod.

Which leaves who? Between the two parties, who's the safe bet?

Here are my thoughts on the subject … but keep in mind that only a few months ago I was sure that George Allen would be the next president. My two cents worth is currently worth maybe a quarter of that asking price.

Barack Obama

Hey, what's not to like? I'm not asking that rhetorically. I'm seriously asking, what's not to like about this guy? What's to like about him? Who the hell knows? Barack Obama is a self-proclaimed snot-nosed rookie, and nobody really knows anything about him yet. Still, the guy does have a buttload of charm. Just look at him, would ya? Ever seen a friendlier smile? Heck, I'd probably buy a car from the guy. Apparently, the worst thing anyone has had to say about him so far is that he smokes cigarettes. From my perspective, that's almost an endearing flaw. And Obama is a marketing dream, what with his melting pot family and his dulcet speaking voice. He's the "sexy" candidate. He's bringing sexy back. With the right handlers this guy could find himself in the Oval Office before America wakes up and realizes that … know what? We still don't know anything about him yet.

Mitt Romney

Mitt might be the closest thing that the Republicans have to the marketability of a Barack Obama. This governor of Massachusetts is largely unknown nationally, although he's been spending a lot of time in key primary states lately. Like Obama, Mitt Romney is smooth and charming, but pro-lifers like myself have some concerns about his back-and-forth on abortion. In state elections in the past, Romney has campaigned as a pro-choice candidate, although he's always claimed that he was personally opposed to abortion as birth control. Recently, Romney seems to have undergone a political rebirth on the subject. He identifies himself as politically pro-life now, and seems to mean it: He's vetoed important legislation in Massachusetts that would have been seriously threatening to the unborn. And here's the thing; even if Romney's recent pro-life awakening is a calculated political move, pro-lifers should be comforted by the fact that Romney knows he can't win without us. Besides, I don't think he's ever switch back to the other position on abortion. To do so would be to lose credibility on both sides of the issue, and he's smart enough to know that.

John Edwards

Just typing the name makes me feel ill. The more I hear from John Edwards, the more I like Ted Kennedy … and I don't like Ted Kennedy at all. But at least Kennedy knows that he's full of crap. John Edwards is the smarmiest snake-oil salesman in American politics right now. He reminds me of Greg Stillson, the corrupt and evil political opportunist in Stephen King's novel The Dead Zone. Maybe it's the way he positions himself as a smiling, preening populist. Maybe it's his creepy smile, or his history of making reprehensibly irresponsible remarks. And it's not just that he's a trial lawyer, he's a creepy trial lawyer, having even claimed to evoke the spirit of a dead girl during a trial. Honestly, I can't think of a single good thing to say about this reptile. To paraphrase the Dixie Chicks, I'm ashamed that John Edwards is from the south.

John McCain

I was a big John McCain fan in 2000, but I'm no longer sure why. Even back then he was pretty power mad. Nowadays he seems to have gone completely over to the dark side. McCain has carefully cultivated an image as the Senate's "Maverick." Of course, a "Maverick" is a wild horse that doesn't care where it poops and sometimes starts stampedes. McCain has picked fights with the President and with Barack Obama and just about everybody in between. He has a reputation for being hotheaded and difficult. He's always the guy who jumps left when everyone else jumps right … who says up when everyone else says down. So it amazes me that the media is so clearly in love with the guy. I mean, this is the same media who despise George W. Bush for being a "cowboy" with a "go-it-alone attitude." What the hell do they expect Darth McCain to be? Caspar Milquetoast?

John Kerry

Oh, PLEASE, Senator Kerry, PLEASE run for President again. Please, please, please, please, PLEASE. I'm begging you to run for President again. I'm typically not a fan of performance art, but your material from the '04 campaign was BRILLIANT. Sacha Baron Cohen never came up with a funnier character than you. And your wife, as portrayed by Zsa Zsa Gabor? Faghedaboudit! HILARIOUS! There was so much good material from you in '04. Remember that comic salute when you accepted your party's nomination for the Presidency? Remember those wonderful football pictures? OOOOOH, man. GOOD times! I'm BEGGING you to run again. We all know you still have lots of good material in you. "Now I would like to do impression of President of United State. Hello, I am John Kerry. I am President of United State." WHOOO!

Newt Gingrich

Apparently, Newt Gingrich really has considered a run for the Presidency. I have no idea why. It's not that Newt is a dumb guy. He's not. A lot of his ideas as architect of the Contract for America were good ideas. It's just that he was a ham-fisted legislator and he made a lot of enemies in Washington. Many people still think of him as a "get Clinton at any cost" kind of guy, and see him as a big reason for the impeachment debacle. Plus, the main thing that Newt really managed to do during his time in power was draw Slick Willie back to the center, politically. Well, at least he managed to get Slick Willie to pretend to be in the political center … long enough to BS his way through the '96 election. That's Newt's real legacy: the second term of the Bill Clinton Presidency. I guess you could say that I still hold a grudge.

Al Gore

Al Gore is certifiable. He's just whacked out of his mind. He says he's not going to run again, but I wouldn't put anything past him. In a way, Al Gore is the Oliver Stone of American politics: He's a movie maker for whom truth is a relative concept. Of course, Al is VERY popular with conspiracy theorists and ecology nuts. If you believe that the US Government finished their attempt to frame OJ just in time to rig the 2000 Presidential election, then he's your guy. Or, if you believe that polar bears are bursting into flames all over the frozen north, then Al represents what you believe. Meanwhile, those of us who don't drop acid spend a lot of time scratching our heads and wondering what the hell Al Gore is talking about.

Sam Brownback

I like Senator Brownback from Kansas. Still, I wish he weren't running for President. As a pro-lifer, I was a huge fan of Rick Santorum, the Pennsylvania wonder boy. I call him that because it's a wonder that he was ever elected in the state of Pittsburgh, Philly and Allentown. Santorum was a Stellar conservative and a reliable pro-lifer. And he wasn't just reliable to vote the right way; Santorum could be counted on to introduce important legislation, too. Now that he's gone, there are few in the Senate who can replace him. One of the closest is Sam Brownback. If there's going to be another pro-life go-to guy along the lines of Santorum in the Senate, it's gotta be Brownback. And that's exactly where I want him, too. If America's pro-lifers are going to win the fight to outlaw abortion as birth-control, it's going to be won in the legislature, where judges are appointed and laws are made. As a pro-lifer, I think we need Sam Brownback right where he is now.

There are, of course, other candidates I could mention. Condi Rice might be the smartest, savviest natural-born-leader in Washington right now, but she doesn't want to run. Santorum would be great, but that's not gonna happen. Jeb Bush would have to have stones the size of grapefruit to consider running after all his family has been through this decade. Of course, the SouthCon dream candidate is Michael Steele, but that ain't gonna happen, either.

Anyway, as long as the Great Satan doesn't perch in the White House again, I'm sure we'll be fine.

Labels: News, Obama Watch, Politics

I suppose I should offer something of an apology to my left-leaning blog friends… and to my blog friends who just hate politics in general… and to my blog buddies who're just a little slow… but there is an election little more than a month away and I'm currently obsessed with politics.

Yes, that means the irresponsible, ignorant, baseless, fanatically extreme and grossly misleading right wing rants will continue for a while. I'll go back to writing about Metallica and The Simpsons and religion and popular culture about mid-November.

Anyhow...

Nationally, I don't think this is going to be a good year for conservatives. We're going to lose seats in both houses of congress. The question now is how many. My precise prediction is a bit odd, but I correctly predicted that Bush would beat Kerry in '04 by two points ... and that here in Virginia, Tim McCain (D) would beat Jerry Kilgore (R) in the Governor's race by at least six points. So I'm feeling a little confident with the prognostications and I'll throw this out there: I think that the Republicans will narrowly retain the Senate and that the Democrats will get the House. Yes, I'm predicting that rarest of rare birds, a congressional split.

I also predict that the subsequent gridlock will do more to damage the liberals than the conservatives, and that, in the end, it will be beneficial to the Republican Presidential candidate in 2008.

Now here's where my predictions get a little hazier. I'm less confident of these predictions, but I'll throw them out there because they just "feel right," right here, right now.

The presidential race in 2008 will come down to Barak Obama Vs. George Allen, and Allen will win decisively.

Read that again. I know, you think I'm crazy, but read it again and think about it.

Both parties will run their mass appeal candidates, and that's Allen for the Republicans and Obama for the Democrats (Hell, even I like Barak Obama, and I disagree with him about almost everything).

John McCain has made far too many enemies to have a serious chance of being the GOP's guy. Hillary Clinton isn't a serious candidate, and once the heartland has a good look at her, the Democrats will drop her like a hot potato. Jeb Bush might want to run, but he won't try so close to the second term of his unpopular brother. Colin Powell is perceived as having the wrong stance on Iraq by both sides. Condi Rice simply doesn't want to run. My personal pick, Michael Steele of Maryland, is bogged down in an ugly Senate race and I don't see him making a Presidential bid in '08. Charles Rangel and Nancy Pelosi both want to be President, but they're both unmarketable outside of their decidedly liberal home bases.

All that's left for 2008, baring something unforeseen, is an Allen / Obama race. Fortunately, for conservatives, Allen is an outstanding choice.

George Allen will win in '08 because his policies are simply better than the unified, blind stubbornness of the Democrats.

The Democrats realize that even now, which is why they have nothing to attack him on during the current Virginia Senate race. Nothing other than trumped up, phony bologna charges of racism. Honestly, the current debacle is just funny. This is, after all, Geraldo level stuff. Not serious politics at all. The libs are desperate; can't attack Allen's stance on the actual issues because they realize that his stance on the issues makes more sense than theirs.

In case you're unaware, here's the deal: George Allen called one of his opponent's campaign workers a "Macaca," a nickname he apparently had in the back of his mind because he'd heard someone on his staff apply it to the same guy. (I wrote about that in the last entry of this news roundup.) Allen used the word "Macaca" in a taped, public setting… so it's obvious that he didn't realize that the word is a racial slur in some parts of the world. Nobody with half a brain would think he'd intentionally use a racial slur in public. Only Democrats are allowed to do that and get away with it.

Would Allen use a racial slur knowingly in private? I don't know and I don't care. I don't expect the guy to be perfect, I just want a President with a good head on his shoulders.

Besides, I'm sick of the double standards. Black liberals are allowed... even encouraged... to attack white conservatives simply because they're white. It's just silly, and it's a non-issue in my opinion. I just do NOT care.

Now, Allen stands accused by others of having used the word "nigger" at some point in the past. Others accuse his Democratic opponent of having done the same thing, and the issue has turned into a joke. This is the way Democrats campaign. It's a desperate attempt to get blacks and other minorities to vote based on a negative gut reaction rather than considering the issues themselves and voting for the best candidate. It's insulting, and I'm sure that I'd feel all the more insulted if I were black.

And, if you're wondering how the racism charges against Allen are playing here in Virginia, here's the deal: We Virginians aren't stupid, we know a bait-and-switch racket when we see one. Allen will win the senate race decisively, with only the Tidewater and Northern Virginia areas leaning away from him.

Bet on it.

The libs will abandon the racism charge after this November when they see how disastrously it failed them in the Senate race. They'll then be forced to attack Allen on his actual voting record and leadership abilities, all of which are rock solid. Allen will come out smelling like a rose. He is consistent with the same common-sense policy POV that kept Dubya in the White House in 2004, but he has a much better ability to convey it. George Allen is downright Reganesque, and he'll win 2008 decisively.

I mean, after all, we reelected Dubya in spite of his difficulties "working a room." We reelected him because we realized that his administration's stance on foreign and domestic issues simply made more sense than the Democratic party's muddled meanderings. That hasn't changed since 2004. The Democrats are still miles away from any actual ideas in '06… and they'll still be a mess in '08. Obama, likable as he is, will lose the election because his initiatives simply aren't as good as Allen's are.

I'll credit Obama this, though: he's a serious candidate. He's no dummy, he comes as close to common sense as anyone in the Democratic party is capable of, and he'll run a damn good race.

I don't think he'll allow personal attacks of Allen as a racist to muddle the waters, either. I get the impression that he's going to be above that. Obama's has campaigned on race relatively few times, and mostly in relevant ways. One of the few areas where I'm familiar with him having made charges of racism, off the top of my head, is the death penalty. I happen to agree with him on that matter. Not only is the death penalty morally wrong, it really is applied to blacks far more frequently than to whites who are convicted of the same charges. Just look at the numbers.

Obama may disappoint me and run a campaign based entirely on the color of his skin, but I honestly think the guy is beyond that. I may be a fool. It may be that, from my perspective, he's simply rose colored.

Anyway, just felt like ruminating on politics a bit today.

I'll wrap with a slight change of topic from Jay Leno. I got a real kick out of this:

Labels: Michael Steele, News, Obama Watch, Politics, You Tube