Ruminations of a Christian Conservative Geek and Friends

Was Jesus a community organizer?

2008-09-13T09:14:00.000-07:00

In recent weeks I have heard at least 3 people, which includes Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN), Former Algore campaign chair Donna Brazile, and pseudo actress/political agitator Susan Sarandon make the statement that “Jesus was a community organizer and Pontius Pilate was a governor.” By this statement they are suggesting at least one of three things, if not all:
1. The role of Jesus being demeaned down to that of a local political activist,
2. Painting Gov. Sarah Palin as nothing more than an uncaring politician who would go as far as killing the Messiah, or…
3. Elevating Barack Obama to the level of the Savior

My first question is what is a community organizer. According to Wikipedia a community organizer is someone who does the work of bringing people who live in close proximity to each other “together to act in their common self-interest. Community organizers act as area-wide coordinators of programs for different agencies in an attempt to meet community needs for various services.” While I can see that this is a valuable tool in inner cities, small towns, or where ever people feel like the government has forgotten about them…to suggest that Jesus was nothing more than a community organizer is nothing short of heresy. Even more so when you consider that modern community organizing is the brain child of Saul Alinsky, the author of the book Rules for Radicals that he dedicated to Lucifer, who he called the “very first radical”

When I look at Scripture and search out the reason Jesus came, I seem to overlook this new idea of Jesus being a community organizer.
• In Luke 19:10 Jesus says, “For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.” (NASB)
• In 1 Peter 2:24 the Apostle writes about Jesus, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.”
• And in 2 Corinthian 5:21 the Apostle Paul said of Jesus, “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him”

Did Jesus come to pay the price for the sins of sinful man, or did He come to organize a few members of society who political activists felt were overlooked? To lessen the mission of Christ to that of a political activist is not Biblical, wrong and teetering, if not crossing the line on heresy.

Let’s consider a little more of what Scripture says about Jesus…
• He is the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last, the final Amen
• He is the Ancient of Days, the Author of Life and the Author of Salvation
• He is the Bread of Life
• He is the Chief Cornerstone, Christ our Creator, Our Deliverer
• Our Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace
• He is God
• He is the Good Shepherd and the Great Shepherd
• He is the Great High Priest
• He is the Holy One, the Hope of Glory
• He is the Image of the Invisible God, the Great I Am
• He is the Judge of the living and the dead
• He is King of kings and Lord of lords, Majestic and Mighty
• And NO ONE COMPARES TO HIM!
• The Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and full of truth
• He is the Power of God
• He is the Resurrection and the Life
• He is the Supreme Sacrifice
• He is the Way, the Truth and the Life
And He cannot be reduced to a political activist seeking a “revolution” at the local government level!

I realize when it is all said and done this is nothing more than a political stunt to glorify one candidate and to put down another…but I refuse to have it done in the name of my Lord and Savior. Jesus is the one who paid the price for my sins, as well as those who are demeaning His name and His mission.

Was Jesus a community organizer? The Scripture gives us a very clear and a very certain NO!
But Jesus is the one who came and lived the life we could never live (sinless) and died the death we deserved to die (for our sins) so that by grace through faith alone we can be saved (Ephesians 2:8-9).

(Cross post at Liberal Implosion)

Dear Mr. Obama

2008-09-05T17:53:00.000-07:00

Who Needs OPEC?

2008-03-28T13:36:00.000-07:00

If this is even half true, it's going to completely change US relations with the Middle East.

America is sitting on top of a super massive 200 billion barrel Oil Field that could potentially make America Energy Independent and until now has largely gone unnoticed. Thanks to new technology the Bakken Formation in North Dakota could boost America’s Oil reserves by an incredible 10 times, giving western economies the trump card against OPEC’s short squeeze on oil supply and making Iranian and Venezuelan threats of disrupted supply irrelevant.

Whatcha wanna bet the Party of the Donkey will try to block drilling, preferring to cozy up to people like Bashar al-Assad and Ahmadinnerjacket?

The Sound of Lefty Heads Exploding

2008-03-25T16:22:00.000-07:00

Gotta love it!

The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS to us political junkies) handed the Bush administration, and the President himself, a resounding defeat today.

BDS sufferers, rejoice! Bushitler got smacked down by the Courts!

But, wait... the case dealt with the International Court of Justice (ICJ), long the darling of the left. And the SCOTUS ruling was that Bush could not, I say again, could not order the state of Texas to obey an ICJ order.

So a defeat of Bush is also a defeat for the legality of ICJ orders within the US.

In other words, to say that SCOTUS was wrong is to say that President Bush was right.

I can hear BDS sufferers crying into their pillows now.

Happy Easter!

2008-03-23T06:54:00.000-07:00

He Is Risen
1 Now after the Sabbath, as the first day of the week began to dawn, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to see the tomb. 2 And behold, there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door,^[a] and sat on it. 3 His countenance was like lightning, and his clothing as white as snow. 4 And the guards shook for fear of him, and became like dead men.
5 But the angel answered and said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. 6 He is not here; for He is risen, as He said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay. 7 And go quickly and tell His disciples that He is risen from the dead, and indeed He is going before you into Galilee; there you will see Him. Behold, I have told you.”
8 So they went out quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to bring His disciples word.
The Women Worship the Risen Lord

9 And as they went to tell His disciples,^[b] behold, Jesus met them, saying, “Rejoice!” So they came and held Him by the feet and worshiped Him. 10 Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell My brethren to go to Galilee, and there they will see Me.”

(Matthew 28:1-10, NKJV)

VDH on Obama

2008-03-20T16:37:00.000-07:00

Mr. Victor Davis Hanson, whose use of language and intellectual capacity remind me strongly of the late great William F. Buckley, explains Obama's larger problem:

The problem is instead the environment that he heretofore has navigated in — prep school, the Ivy League, the regional identity politics of Chicago, or Illinois liberalism — is hardly representative of his own country. So what he can say among sympathizers and friends will not be excused or contextualized by average others who don't know him and won't give him the latitude he is accustomed to and apparently has counted on.

The problem is similar to one that plagued the elder Bush's re-election campaign, when he was apparently fascinated by a supermarket bar-code scanner, something which the public was by that time very familiar with. The problem is that Bush, and now Obama, are shown to be largely out of touch with everyday Americans.

Obama probably thought that his pretty little speech, which would have--and indeed did--impress his friends in the media and rank-and-file lefties would also impress Joe Average, who didn't go to Harvard, has never lived overseas, and drives a pick-up to work... drives it himself, of course, because he doesn't have a chauffeur.

Obama thought wrong. And therein lies his problem.

Obama Blew It

2008-03-20T16:27:00.000-07:00

That's the summary from an LA Times author:

In fact, I'd say that considering the nation's undivided attention to this all-important speech, which gave him an unrivaled opportunity to lift us out of racial and racist thinking, Obama blew it.

I am sure that lots of folks expect these to be the words of some white conservative, but no. The article was penned by Michael Meyers, who identifies himself as black in the article, and who is listed at the bottom of the article as "executive director of the New York Civil Rights Coalition and a former assistant national director of the NAACP."

I think Obama better not give up his Senate seat.

Mainstreaming the Fringe

2008-03-20T06:11:00.000-07:00

Sorry I haven't been around for a while, an injury to my hand (which even required a late-night trip to the ER) has made typing problematic.

However, it's given me time to ruminate on Obama, Wright, and the future of the Party of the Donkey. And what I decided is, it ain't good.

The Democrats have always had their fringe elements--think Michael Moore, MoveOn, Cindy Sheehan, and Cynthia McKinney--just as the Republicans have--such as the John Birch Society. However, the Democrats have always done a fair-to-good job of keeping these elements more or less at arm's length; close enough to gain support from them and their supporters, but far enough away that the Party itself isn't truly "identified" with these fringes, at least not in the minds of the swing voter (political junkies like myself are a different matter).

However, with the revelations (no pun intended) about Wright, the Party of the Donkey is in a real bind. If they do end up nominating Obama, they will be drawing the fringe elements so close to the "mainstream" of the party that in the minds of many of the all-important swing voters, they will become the Party that represents the most odious and obnoxious of Wright's views. That label will then drive a large number of swing voters away.

On the other hand, if they choose to nominate Hillary--which is still numerically possible--they'll anger the very fringe elements that Wright stands for, possibly even causing them to leave the party. While that would keep the Democrats from being labeled as embracing the fringe elements, that would doom the Democrats' chances in the general election.

A party of principle would repudiate the fringe, as the GOP did years ago under the prodding of the late great WFB, pushing away the support of the John Birch Society. However, the amount of ink, both physical and electronic, spilled in defending Obama and Wright leads me to believe that such principle does not exist in today's Democratic party. The pursuit of power is all, principle is unimportant, it seems.

Unfortunately for the Donkeys, the pursuit of power will, in this case, likely lead to a bad end for the Party.

Democratic Congress Leads Foreign Diplomat to Conclude"America Is An Unreliable Ally"

2008-03-07T18:42:00.000-08:00

So much for the Party of the Donkey making everyone love America:

Cyclical slowdowns are one thing. What depresses politicians in both countries is their biggest trading partner's protectionist mood. A Mexican minister who is a strong supporter of NAFTA and who has been dealing with Washington for the past two decades says that on a recent visit to the United States' Congress he found an “almost xenophobic” mood of a kind that he had never before encountered.

That chimes with the frustrations of Colombia's government, which having negotiated a free-trade agreement with the United States has found it blocked by the Democrats in Congress. The message from the Democratic campaign is that “America is an unreliable ally”, says a veteran Latin American diplomat who spent many years working closely with the United States' government.

I don't think much more needs to be added to that (except the colored emphasis which I already added).

The Audacity of Hope: A Second-Generational Query (An open letter to Senator Obama)

2008-03-07T11:49:00.000-08:00

Dr. Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University, has been one of the great defenders of the sanctity of life and traditional marriage in our time. One of his students, Sherif Gergis, a 2008 Princeton Graduate and Rhodes Scholar, has written a powerful letter to U.S. Senator Barack Obama on the subject of the protection of unborn human life. Professor George has asked that the following letter be read carefully and distributed widely.

Dear Senator Obama:

As an immigrant from Kenya, your father found new hope in America’s noble principles and vast opportunities. The same promise brought my parents here from Egypt when I was still too young to thank them. Now you have inspired my generation with your vision of a country united around the same ideals of liberty and justice, “filled with hope and possibility for all Americans.”

But do you mean it?

As a legislator, you have opposed every effort to protect unborn human life. Shockingly, you even opposed a bill to protect the lives of babies who, having survived an attempted abortion, are born alive. Despite your party’s broad support for legal abortion and its public funding, most Democrats (including Senator Clinton) did not oppose the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act. You, however, opposed it. Your vision of America seems to eliminate “hope and possibility” for a whole class of Americans: the youngest and most vulnerable. You would deny them the most basic protection of justice, the most elementary equality of opportunity: the right to be born.

As a prerequisite for any other right, the right to life is the great civil-rights issue of our time. It is what slavery and segregation were to generations past. Our response to this issue is the measure of our fidelity to a defining American principle: “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life.”

You have asked me to vote for you. In turn, may I ask you three simple questions? They are straightforward questions of fact about abortion. They are at the heart of the debate. In fairness, I believe that you owe the people you would lead a good-faith answer to each:

1. The heart whose beating is stilled in every abortion — is it a human heart?

2. The tiny limbs torn by the abortionist’s scalpel — are they human limbs?

3. The blood that flows from the fetus’s veins — is it human blood?

If the stopped heart is a human heart, if the torn limbs are human limbs, if the spilled blood is human blood, can there be any denying that what is killed in an abortion is a human being? In your vision for America, the license to kill that human being is a right. You have worked to protect that “right” at every turn. But can there be a right to deny some human beings life or the equal protection of the law?

Of course, some do deny that every human being has a right to life. They say that size or degree of development or dependence can make a difference. But the same was once said of color. Some say that abortion is a “necessary evil.” But the same was once said of slavery. Some say that prohibiting abortion would only harm women by driving it underground. But to assume so is truly to play the politics of fear. A compassionate society would never accept these false alternatives. A compassionate society would protect both mother and child, coming to the aid of women in need rather than calling violence against their children the answer to their problems.

Can we become a society that does not sacrifice some people to help others? Or is that hope too audacious? You have said that abortion is necessary to protect women’s equality. But surely we can do better. Surely we can build an America where the equality of some is not purchased with the blood of others. Or would that mean too much change from politics as usual?

Can we provide every member of the human family equal protection under the law? Your record as a legislator gives a resounding answer: No, we can’t. That is the answer the Confederacy gave the Union, the answer segregationists gave young children, the answer a complacent bus driver once gave a defiant Rosa Parks. But a different answer brought your father from Kenya so many years ago; a different answer brought my family from Egypt some years later. Now is your chance, Senator Obama, to make good on the spontaneous slogan of your campaign, to adopt the more American and more humane answer to the question of whether we can secure liberty and justice for all: Yes, we can.

(Crosspost at Liberal Implosion)

South American Terrorists May Have Uranium

2008-03-03T18:39:00.001-08:00

Just what we need, terrorists in our own hemisphere, supported by totalitarian dictator Hugo Chavez, with the makings of a nuclear device.

(CNN) -- Evidence found in computers seized in a raid over the weekend suggests that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez recently gave the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia $300 million, Colombia's national police chief said Monday.

Speaking at a news conference, Gen. Oscar Naranjo also said evidence in the computers suggests FARC had given Chavez 100 million pesos when he was a jailed rebel leader.
FARC has fought to overthrow the Colombian government for 40 years.
Chavez had no immediate response to the allegations involving him.
Naranjo said other evidence in the computers suggests FARC purchased 50 kilograms of uranium this month.

But we can rest easy... President Obama plans to bomb Pakistan.

General Wes Clark Endorses Laura Bush for President

2008-03-02T18:31:00.000-08:00

Okay, that's not exactly what Wes Clark said, but it still works:

If you look at what Hillary Clinton has done during her time as the First Lady of the United States, her travel to 80 countries, her representing the U.S. abroad, plus her years in the Senate, I think she's the most experienced and capable person in the race, not only for representing am abroad, but for dealing with the tough issues of national security.

By that reasoning, Laura Bush, Barbara Bush, or Nancy Reagan should have been elected Commander-In-Chief.

In short, it's full of holes, and I expect McCain's campaign to rip it to shreds very soon.

Cross-posted at Liberal Implosion.

No More Buckley

2008-02-27T17:49:00.000-08:00

The intellectual father of conservatism, Mr. William F. Buckley, Jr., passed away this morning, appropriately, at his desk.

In a way, this is a sadder day than when Mr. Reagan died, because the argument can be made that without Buckley, there never would have been a Reagan Revolution. At the very least, it would not have looked the same.

National Review Online, naturally, has much more.

Godspeed, Mr. Buckley.

Oops! Guess the Planet isn't Warming After All

2008-02-26T16:51:00.000-08:00

This just in, global warming is proven wrong once again:

Over the past year, anecdotal evidence for a cooling planet has exploded. China has its coldest winter in 100 years. Baghdad sees its first snow in all recorded history. North America has the most snowcover in 50 years, with places like Wisconsin the highest since record-keeping began. Record levels of Antarctic sea ice, record cold in Minnesota, Texas, Florida, Mexico, Australia, Iran, Greece, South Africa, Greenland, Argentina, Chile -- the list goes on and on.
No more than anecdotal evidence, to be sure. But now, that evidence has been supplanted by hard scientific fact. All four major global temperature tracking outlets (Hadley, NASA's GISS, UAH, RSS) have released updated data. All show that over the past year, global temperatures have dropped precipitously.

Meteorologist Anthony Watts compiled the results of all the sources. The total amount of cooling ranges from 0.65C up to 0.75C -- a value large enough to erase nearly all the global warming recorded over the past 100 years. All in one year time. For all sources, it's the single fastest temperature change ever recorded, either up or down.

Admittedly, one year's data is not a trend, but given that this past year has reversed all the cooling claimed thus far, it puts yet another nail in the coffin of man-made global warming.

Of course, that's why they stopped calling it "global warming" and started using "global climate change." Just one problem with that... if the planet is cooling, we want more greenhouse gases, not less, and all the proposals from the Goreacle and his followers are aimed at reducing them.

In other words, their policies would make the global cooling trend worse. But, don't worry, they'll have a solution for that problem... one that involves even more government intrusion into your life.

To a lefty, it matters not what the problem is, the answer is always more government. Even if government has caused or exacerbated the problem.

Breaking: Nancy Reagan Hospitalized

2008-02-17T19:27:00.000-08:00

Still developing, here's what we know right now:

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (AP) - Nancy Reagan's spokeswoman says the former first lady is staying overnight in the hospital after falling in her home in Bel-Air.
Spokeswoman Joanne Drake says the 87-year-old Reagan was taken to St. John's Health Center in Santa Monica for examination Sunday. Doctors determined she did not break a hip as feared.
Drake says Reagan is staying in the same room where former President Ronald Reagan stayed after he broke his hip at home in 2001.

Everyone please pray for the former First Lady.

Rep. Lantos Passes Away

2008-02-11T16:35:00.000-08:00

Courtesy Fox News:

WASHINGTON — Rep. Tom Lantos, who as a teenager twice escaped from a Nazi-run forced labor camp in Hungary and became the only Holocaust survivor to win a seat in Congress, has died. He was 80.

Spokeswoman Lynne Weil said Lantos, a Californian, died early Monday at the Bethesda Naval Medical Center in suburban Maryland. He was surrounded by his wife, Annette, two daughters, and many of his 17 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Annette Lantos said in a statement that her husband's life was "defined by courage, optimism, and unwavering dedication to his principles and to his family."

Lantos, a Democrat who chaired the House Foreign Affairs Committee, disclosed last month that he had been diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus. He said at the time that he would serve out his 14th term but would not seek re-election in his Northern California district, which takes in the southwest portion of San Francisco and suburbs to the south including Lantos' home of San Mateo.

President Bush praised Lantos in a statement as "a man of character and a champion of human rights."

"After immigrating to America more than six decades ago, he worked to help oppressed people around the world have the opportunity to live in freedom," Bush said. "As the only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress, Tom was a living reminder that we must never turn a blind eye to the suffering of the innocent at the hands of evil men."

Flags were lowered to half-staff at the White House and U.S. Capitol.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said, "Tom Lantos was a true American hero. He was the embodiment of what it meant to have one's freedom denied and then to find it and to insist that America stand for spreading freedom and prosperity to others."

Speaking to reporters at the State Department, she said, "He was also a dear, dear friend and I am personally quite devastated by his loss."

Godspeed, Congressman.

Enforcing Liberal Orthodoxy

2008-02-11T06:40:00.000-08:00

Open mouth, insert donkey's hoof seems to be the reasoning behind the latest move made by the Democratic National Committee.

A bit of background is needed. The Party of the Donkey doesn't choose a nominee the way the GOP does... not only to the voters get to vote, but, in a move straight out of Mao or Lenin's Communist Party, the Party Members get two votes... one in their state primary, like all good citizens, and another one at the Convention; they're called "superdelegates." I guess the Donkeys don't want to leave the choice of the direction of the party up to, you know, the "little people."

Now comes the insert hoof part. Senator Joe Lieberman, who is a reliable lefty on basically every domestic policy, has been stripped of "superdelegate" status for the awful crime of (gasp) endorsing a Republican! And of course, this comes after the same Party of the Donkey kicked him out because he (gasp) supported the war in Iraq!

Just more evidence that the lefties support free speech only when it agrees with the Party Line.

(Cross-posted at Liberal Implosion)

Why Congress is Critical This Year

2008-02-08T06:47:00.000-08:00

From CQ:

Between now and November, John McCain can make all the speeches and do all the reaching out he deems necessary to assuage the concerns of the conservative base of the Republican Party. He can even turn his considerable skills at political combat against the Democrats. It might help get him elected, or it might not. If it does, come next January he still will have to begin governing in the face of wider Democratic majorities in Congress, and he still will have to choose between success and failure.

In that instance, he will choose success. And it will be an easy choice for him to make because on a whole range of issues, both substantively and stylistically, he and the Democrats will measure success in the same way.

That, neighbors, is why we need to get as many conservatives in Congress as we can. No matter who wins, we'll have someone in the Oval Office who is just fine "working with" lefties, and that is bad news for the country.

Read the whole article... link, as usual, in the title.

New Thoughts on McCain

2008-02-07T17:31:00.000-08:00

I have just finished reading the text of McCain's speech, and some commentary from those I trust, and I've come to a conclusion.

He hasn't sold me on voting for him. But I am now open to being sold. A lot of it will depend on who McCain picks to surround himself with. I am still concerned with the former Mexican official that is in his campaign.

However, in his speech today, he did acknowledge that he needs conservatives to win, and made some concessions, especially on immigration, that would be hard to weasel out of without everyone realizing that's what he is doing... and, thus, destroying his chances for re-election. So at least in a prospective first term for President McCain, we shouldn't have any amnesty bills signed.

We will see how things go.

Even If You Don't Vote for McCain, PLEASE VOTE!

2008-02-06T19:51:00.000-08:00

As has been pointed out by two excellent posts on NRO's Corner today, even for those like me who cringe at the thought of marking our ballot next to "John McCain," it is critically important that you still vote. Perhaps even more so for those of us who don't want to vote for the McRINO.

Simply put, if we can install a conservative enough Congress, even President Hillary would have a hard time getting her socialist programs through... and even if we don't take a majority, every conservative voice added will help that.

So, my advice... write in Fred Thompson (or your favored candidate), and then vote for the most conservative people in each of the other races. I have a feeling we'll need them.

Why McCain Cannot Win

2008-02-06T19:44:00.000-08:00

Okay, so he's now the official frontrunner. Senator John McCain still cannot possibly win the Oval Office.

First of all, he has devoted far too much time and energy into attacking--yes, attacking--the values of those whose votes he now needs. From deriding opponents of his immigration bill as racists to his embrace of socialist rhetoric (i.e. using "managed for profit" as an insult), McCain has done his level best to push the base of the GOP away from him.

Second, he currently enjoys favorable media coverage, because out of the GOP candidates, he is the one closest to the media's own views... something which should open any true conservative's eyes. However, once it comes down to him vs. Obama or Hillary, the media will turn against him. If McCain thinks Romney's "attack" ads are bad, wait till he sees what the media will dig up on him once the conventions are over.

Third, a large portion of his support comes from Democrats and "independents" voting in open primaries. The idea that these people would vote for him over Obama or Hillary fails the laugh test... one-on-one against a real Democrat, McCain's support among Democrats will disappear faster than an ice cream cone in a Phoenix summer.

Simply put, nominating McCain is a recipe for defeat, just like nominating Bob Dole was. It seems that every few elections, we need to remind the GOP what happens to those who stray too far from the conservative base, and it looks like it's gonna be this election.

A Prophet or Profit?

2008-01-31T19:52:00.001-08:00

Oh, it think the blood is going to shoot out of my eye balls over this one. This weekend in Atlanta, GA is the first ever "New Baptist Covenant Celebration" conference. It is the brain child of Southern Baptist rejects/former US Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Their goal is to unite the many baptists through out the United States who apparently have lost faith in the continued growth of the Southern Baptist Convention as it remains one of the most conservative denominational groups today. The elder former President said in his opening remarks, "For the first time in more than 160 years, we're convening a major convocation of Baptists throughout an entire continent without any threat to our unity or to our freedom brought by differences of race, politics, geography or the legalistic interpretation of Scriptures," according to Baptist Press.

Now, as bad as this is...various apostate and liberal so called "baptist" groups gathering to bash the SBC; that isn't even the worst thing. The high light of the day (and someone had to be high to decide on this one) was the awarding of former Vice President and Presidential Election Sore-Loser Algore with the "Baptist of the Year Award". Yes, i said "Baptist of the Year"...which apparently was not something that the vast majority of baptists had a say so in since i never got a ballot.

Robert Parhman, the Executive Director of the Baptist Center of Ethics (another SBC reject who left on his own accord) went as far as to refer to Algore as a...and this is where the head gets ready to explode a "baptist prophet" according to Baptist Press. No, really, i didn't stutter and i'm not making it up, Algore was called a "baptist prophet".

In Parham's introduction of the Profit maker, he said, "We have with us today a Baptist prophet who is so unacceptable that the Baptist establishment in his hometown of Nashville neither acknowledged his winning the Nobel Peace Prize nor honored with coverage his notable Nobel lecture...Prophets are unacceptable because their truth is inconvenient." Obviously, this was a slam on the Southern Baptist Convention which is based largely out of the great city of Nashville.

The Profit Algore went on to say in his speech that some Baptist spokesmen deny the reality of global warming because they are locked in a coalition with rich and powerful people who take advantage of the poor for economic profit. Yeah, that's right...i'm in a coalition with rich and powerful people to take advantage of the poor for economic profit. I'm just rolling in the dough here in my 3 bedroom home where i can just build up my carbon footprint!

If i was only the Profit maker like Algore, i could simply fly private jets across country, have someone drive me around in an SUV, and rest comfortably in my 10,000 square foot house when i finally get time to rest. No, instead i'm too busy trying to take advantate of the poor for my own profit according to the bitter ex-VP!

Just for the record Mr. Parham, a prophet is one who declares the truth of God to point people toward God. A prophet of God preaches to save the soul...not to "save the earth". If Algore is your idea of what "Baptist of the Year" is, i'm thankful that you have decided to abandon my Southern Baptist Convention...and i'm glad we were not invited.

1996 All Over Again

2008-01-30T06:19:00.000-08:00

It's kind of surprising, when you look at it, how much the McCain candidacy of 2008 matches up with the Bob Dole candidacy of 1996.

War hero, running largely on war record? Check.

Has run for President before? Check. (Dole tried in 1980 and 1988.)

Has been in the Senate long enough to grow moss? Check.

So-called "compromise" candidate coming out of a crowded field? Check. Dole's '96 run was against such notable Republicans as Lamar Alexander, Phil Gramm, Alan Keyes, Dick Lugar, and Dan Quayle.

Was considered to be the "electable" candidate? Check. See my earlier article on this.

Did not excite economic or social conservatives? You betcha! Check!

It didn't work for Dole, why the heck does McRINO think it will work for him?

I think we are heading for a November where many conservatives sit at home, and another Clinton gets elected.

McCain's Latest Endorsement

2008-01-27T18:14:00.000-08:00

Fellow conservatives, do you want your next President to have been officially endorsed by the New York Times?

No?

Then don't vote for John McRINO McCain.

It would be hard to imagine a worse thing for Sen. John McCain as he tries to convince the Republican grass roots he's not a liberal. The Times, which for decades has attacked virtually all the policies of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, on Friday endorsed McCain as "the best choice for the party's presidential nomination," calling its decision "an easy one."

-snip-

The paper also cited McCain's liberal stances on government regulation to combat climate change and amnesty for illegal aliens, as well as his willingness to co-write major legislation with far-left colleagues such as Sen. Ted Kennedy.

-snip-

Other positions also make McCain Times-friendly. He supported the heavy-handed Sarbanes-Oxley regulatory regime now making it a nightmare to operate a publicly traded company. He voted to increase CAFE fuel regulations. He opposed a repeal of the "death tax." And he expressed support for raising Social Security payroll taxes on the middle class.

Moreover, while McCain may claim he opposed Bush's across-the-board tax cuts because they weren't paired with spending reductions, his arguments then were classic class-warfare rhetoric about "the most fortunate among us" not getting taxed enough. As Senate Commerce Committee chairman a decade ago, McCain even sponsored and voted for a near-tripling of cigarette taxes.

And the best part of this IBD article:

Heading toward Tuesday's Florida primary, the GOP nomination increasingly looks like a two-man race between Sen. McCain and Gov. Mitt Romney. Now Romney has a weapon that will resonate deeply with Republican voters who resent the establishment media's longtime crusade against Reagan Republicanism:

"Vote for me, not the candidate of the New York Times."

Indeed.

Let's see McRINO's supporters spin this one.

UPDATE: Looks like Rudy's already using it.

Voice Over: “Rudy Giuliani is not endorsed by The Tampa Tribune. Not endorsed by the Orlando Sentinel. Not endorsed by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. In fact, he’s not endorsed by any of the liberal newspapers. When you’re responsible for cutting people’s taxes by an incredible seventeen percent …”

And, near the end...

Voice Over: “… you’re the last person on earth to be endorsed by the liberal New York Times. Rudy Giuliani. Tested. Ready. Now.”

Bad news for McRINO, I think.

Free Health Care for Everyone Doesn't Really Include EVERYONE

2008-01-26T17:19:00.000-08:00

Before you get all excited about HillaryCare or ObamaCare providing free health care to "everyone," take a look at who the British (whose system Hillary and Obama wish to copy) are considering excluding:

Doctors are calling for NHS treatment to be withheld from patients who are too old or who lead unhealthy lives.
Smokers, heavy drinkers, the obese and the elderly should be barred from receiving some operations, according to doctors, with most saying the health service cannot afford to provide free care to everyone.

(red emphasis mine)

Gee, here I thought the government could really provide free care to everyone.

Moral of the story: Never believe it when a politician says they can give you something for free... unless it's hot air.

Hillary: The Rules Don't Matter, I am a Clinton!

2008-01-26T08:23:00.001-08:00

Once again, Hillary is making the claim that rules don't apply to her:

In a bit of political theater, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and the Florida Democratic Party clamored to restore convention delegates that had been stripped by the national party.

At stake: 185 delegates in a state where Clinton leads almost 2-to-1.

The presidential candidate said Friday — just four days before Florida's primary — that she wants the convention delegates from Florida and Michigan reinstated. The national party eliminated all the delegates from those states — more than 350 in all — because they broke party rules against holding their primaries before Feb. 5. All the major Democratic candidates also made pledges not to campaign in those states before their primaries.

Uh, excuse me, Hillary, if you're campaigning for the nomination of a given party, don't the party's rules kind of apply to you?

What's interesting here, tho, is that a couple of left-leaning commentators are taking issue with Hillary's stand, here and here.

Congratulations, guys, you're finally figuring out what the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy has known about the Clintons for over a decade.

(cross-posted at Liberal Implosion)

Just For Fun!

2008-01-25T16:56:00.000-08:00

A quick trip down classic TV memory lane, and some more here.

Check out some of the earlier posts from today on that same blog, there's more of the same, but I'm too lazy to put links to all of them.

Something New Has Been Added

2008-01-24T18:01:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone is seeing the 5 little stars at the bottom of each post... that's a new rating system I installed, thanks to the nice folks at HaloScan, who also handle my commenting and trackbacks.

Feel free to use it, that's what it's there for. Of course, we all know that lefties will try spamming it, but we won't let them spoil things.

Maybe Trees Aren't Such a Good Idea

2008-01-24T17:38:00.000-08:00

Hmmm... greens against trees? Well, in one case they are:

In a case with statewide significance, the Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office is pursuing a Sunnyvale couple under a little-known California law because redwood trees in their backyard cast a shadow over their neighbor's solar panels.

Wonder which side Algore will come down on.

McCain and Mexico

2008-01-24T17:34:00.000-08:00

Okay, this speaks volumes about McCain's illegal immigration stand right here:

McCain's "Hispanic Outreach Director" is the same guy who held that job for Mexico's President Vicente Fox! U.S.-born dual citizen Juan Hernandez was in Fox's cabinet as Director of the Office for Mexicans Living Abroad and is notorious for having said of Mexican Americans on Nightline on June 7, 2001, "I want the third generation, the seventh generation, I want them all to think 'Mexico first.'"

Now, can anyone reading that truly believe that McCain has decided to actually secure the southern border?

If he truly has, as he claims, let's see him offer a bill to do that--and only that--in the Senate during the next session.

Don't hold your breath, tho.

On War Heroes

2008-01-24T06:43:00.000-08:00

I want to begin by stating, for the record, that Senator John McCain's service to this nation and sacrifice for it is both laudable and honorable. He is certainly a Genuine American War Hero.

But, I wish to take issue with those who apparently think that somehow qualifies him for the Presidency. And I can do it in two words, with explanation to follow: Max Cleland.

Like McCain, Cleland was in Vietnam. Cleland was also grievously wounded in Vietnam. To be sure, the circumstances differ (Cleland was injured by an accidental grenade activation), but Cleland's sacrifice of two legs and part of an arm in service to America would also seem to qualify him as a Genuine American War Hero.

So, here's the question... would all you self-proclaimed "conservatives" who are supporting McCain based on his war record also support Cleland?

1995 Redux

2008-01-23T17:26:00.000-08:00

Here's a blast from the past to think about... from Time, 13 Nov 1995:

It certainly isn't enough to protect Dole's status as heir apparent. Polls last week were indicating that while Dole would narrowly beat Powell for the Republican nomination, only Powell could beat Clinton in the general election. That scenario leaves a gaping hole in Dole's game plan, which depends, among other things, on his being able to argue that he's the most electable Republican candidate in a field of unknowns and extremists. If Powell doesn't run, Newt Gingrich has often said he just might. Last week in an interview with TIME, he repeatedly hinted that Dole may not be comfortable as the leader of the revolution. "I think he's effective at it,'' Gingrich said. "Whether he's comfortable, you'd have to ask him, but he's certainly effective...There seems to be a relaxed, comfortable effectiveness, which is very real. Now whether or not, inside himself, that fits his zeitgeist, I haven't a clue.''

My, my, don't we hear a lot about who is the "most electable" these days? And wasn't Senator John Kerry (D-Christmas in Cambodia) picked by the Party of the Donkey last time based on "electablity"?

Hmmm... food for thought, methinks.

A Dilemma

2008-01-22T17:28:00.001-08:00

Okay, I got a small problem.

I just got my first shipment from the Conservative Book Club (no link, cause I am not intending to plug them), and it contains the following four books:

The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam and the Crusades
The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Middle East
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Capitalism
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design

The problem is simple... which do I read first?

Sad News

2008-01-22T16:42:00.000-08:00

A statement issued today by Fred Thompson:

Today I have withdrawn my candidacy for President of the United States. I hope that my country and my party have benefited from our having made this effort. Jeri and I will always be grateful for the encouragement and friendship of so many wonderful people.

I kind of doubt we've seen the end of Fred. If some GOP candidate doesn't offer him a cabinet position--or maybe Veep--they're all idiots.

For the time being, the Blogs for Fred Thompson links will remain on the sidebar, for two reasons:

They provide links to some really good blogs.
I haven't completely decided who I am going to support yet. I am leaning Romney, but not 100% sure yet.

More Number Crunching

2008-01-21T06:49:00.001-08:00

This time, Jed Babbin of Human Events takes a good long look at some numbers:

According to a Fox News exit poll, 32% of the Michigan Republican primary voters identified themselves as independents or Democrats. Another Fox exit poll showed 20% of the South Carolina Republican primary voters said they were either Democrats or independents. In Michigan, Gov. Romney won with 39%, Sen. McCain was second at 30% and Gov. Huckabee third at 16%. In South Carolina, John McCain won with 33% of the vote, Mike Huckabee had 30% and Fred Thompson had 16%. Given those margins, it’s pretty clear that the Dems and independents controlled the result in both states.

Now, why would so many Donkeys vote for McRINO? Maybe because he follows their philosophy?

The Case For Sitting Out

2008-01-21T06:40:00.000-08:00

Professor Bainbridge makes a case for staying home this November:

God made the people of Israel wander in the desert 40 years so as to remake the Israelis into a people fit for the tasks ahead. The GOP seriously needs a time out so that it can rethink its role in American democracy. There are a lot of legitimate questions facing the GOP. Do you adhere to the limited government principles of Reagan and Thatcher or do you follow the lead of UK Tory leader David Cameron? As the Economist recently opined, “it seems likely that the Republican Party, as a number of its members are already urging, will have to embrace environmentalism and cuddly economics as the Tories were forced to.”

[snip]

If the choice is between choosing the lesser of 4 evils and teeing up a process by which the GOP reinvents itself for the 21st Century, I’m inclined to opt for the latter. Coupled with losing Congress in 2006, losing the presidency in 2008 will provide a pair of defeats that surely will prompt “attentiveness” on the part of the GOP leadership and the intellectual base of think tanks and academics who helped lay the foundation for the Reagan and Gingrich revolutions. Just as the Israelis had to be punished for listening to the 10 fearful spies, the GOP needs to be punished for having been seduced by Bush and DeLay. Just as the Israelis came back stronger and fitter for the tasks ahead, so might a chastened GOP.

He has a point, and more than just the Biblical one. Losing the White House to Slick Willie set the stage for the GOP comeback of 1994.

I'm not prepared to say that I won't vote for anyone except Fred, but if the nominee is The Huckster or McRINO, there's a very good chance I will write in Charlie Brown for President.

Doing Some Number Crunching

2008-01-20T18:31:00.000-08:00

I've been looking over the results of the primaries and caucuses (caucii?) so far, and I've discovered something about media darling McCain. First, the data:

Of the six contests held so far, Romney has come in 1st in three, 2nd in two, and 4th in only one (South Carolina). McCain, on the other hand, has been 1st only twice, 2nd once, 3rd once, and 4th twice... and one of those was a tie (at zero) with Rudy, The Huckster, and Paul in Wyoming--so that might as well be counted a last place finish.

Now, the analysis of the data. What this tells me is that Mitt has appeal to people across the country, from New Hampshire to Nevada. McCain does not.

So why is the media so enthusiastic to anoint McCain? Simple: he hates tax cuts, wants to impose Algore-like environmental restrictions on business, quashes free speech, and wants to let illegal immigrants into the country and give them official status within 24 hours! McCain is loved by the media because he agrees with them on so many issues.

McCain is really McRINO. He should have switched to the Party of the Donkey when he had the chance after the 2000 election.

Conservative Enough?

2008-01-20T12:46:00.000-08:00

So, McCain is now the media-anointed front-runner for the nomination. His supporters are saying that he is conservative enough to lead the GOP.

I beg to differ.

We thought Mr. Bush the elder was conservative enough. Then he went and broke his "no new taxes" pledge, and nominated the liberal David Souter to the Supreme Court. In his defense, he also nominated Clarence Thomas, and stood with him throughout the Anita Hill kerfuffle, and Gulf War I was run relatively well, except that he didn't take care of Saddam once and for all.

We also thought Bush the younger was conservative enough. That was, however, until No Child Left Behind, which Ted Kennedy (D-Chappaquiddick) sponsored in the Senate. Any bill that Teddy sponsors is hardly a conservative bill. Then there were the--fortunately stymied--proposals to put Harriet Miers on the Supreme Court and grant literally millions of lawbreakers amnesty--I refer, of course, to illegal immigrants. And don't get me started on the huge expansion of the federal government. Again, in his defense, I must admit he did push through tax cuts, and has so far prosecuted the Iraq War with relatively few mistakes.

However, we need to get past this idea that "conservative enough" is enough. Each of the post-Reagan Republican Presidents has been considered "conservative enough," yet has pushed through some very liberal programs... and not, as President Reagan did, only when they had no choice. No one was pressuring Bush 43 to ram No Child Left Behind through; there was no huge public outcry for amnesty for illegal immigrants--in fact, quite the opposite!

For those who think that rock-solid conservatism cannot win, I point you back to The Gipper. He won, and won easily, in his re-election bid carrying 49 states. Democrat-Lite he was most assuredly not, yet he won with no problem.

Be warned, McCain supporters... history shows that conservative enough isn't.

First Returns from South Carolina

2008-01-19T09:09:00.000-08:00

It's probably too early to tell if this is the start of a trend, but I offer it For What It's Worth:

Four votes for Fred Thompson from a family of evangelicals, which is interesting because, when I spoke to these same folks two weeks ago, none of them were Thompson supporters. In fact, they were barely aware of his candidacy. One was a Giuliani supporter and the others were looking fondly upon Huckabee, but hadn't made a decision.

Proving...? Nothing, of course. But this is a storyline I've been hearing from South Carolina all week: "Values voters" drifting away from Huckabee. This might explain why he decided to play the Robert E. Lee card in the final days of the campaign. Can't get the religion vote? Go for the rednecks.

Fifty-One Fred Quotes

2008-01-18T17:25:00.000-08:00

A contributor at RedState has compiled fifty-one comments from both leading conservatives and everyday bloggers about Fred.

It's well worth a read.

Are ya listening, South Carolina?

With Fred On The Campaign Trail

2008-01-18T06:39:00.000-08:00

Erick Erickson is with Fred in South Carolina, and provides an interesting and enlightening report:

Traveling through snowy South Carolina with Fred Thompson, I’m struck by the sense that finally, the man has arrived. The candidate so many conservatives were excited by early in 2007 is finally walking the land.

The Fred Thompson in South Carolina this week is the one America saw knock into Mike Huckabee as a pro-life liberal with “blame America first” beliefs whose economic policies would destroy the economy. And the crowds love it.

Though barely mentioned in the national media, Senator Fred Thompson has been on a barn storming tour crisscrossing South Carolina for more than a week. In a unique approach, he is not just going to major media markets, but to rural areas of South Carolina. On my first day on the trail with Senator Thompson, he drew a crowd of 180 people to a small Mennonite restaurant in Abbeville, South Carolina — population 26,000 with a median income of $15,370. He capped off the day at the Orangeburg-Calhoun County Technical College in Orangeburg, South Carolina with over 200 people braving a rare snow shower to hear him. The day before I joined him on the campaign trail, Senator Thompson’s campaign saw large capacity auditoriums overflowing with people standing outside the buildings waiting to get in.

It's really no wonder that Fred doesn't get much coverage from the leftymedia... they always ignore the conservative candidate as much as they can. We tend to forget that because in the last few election cycles the GOP candidate has also already been a high government official--President or Vice President--and thus a lot harder for the leftymedia to ignore. This time, however, with neither Mr. Bush nor Mr. Cheney in the race, they feel safe in ignoring the true conservatives and focusing on the RINOs, namely McCain and The Huckster.

Don't, I say again, DO NOT let the lack of coverage make you think Fred is dead. He's out there, the leftymedia are just showing their true colors by not reporting on him.

Fred can win... he has just as good a shot as any of the others right now, and with The Huckster imploding, it's entirely possible that Fred could pick up a large block of the Christian Evangelical vote--I really can't see them going to Romney, Giuliani, or McCain in large numbers. Fred is also heading into the area of the country where his style really shines--just read the article linked in the title. If he can pick up a lot of support there, he can increase his visibility and make a real run for it.

I've said it before and I will say it again... this one is far from over.

Limbaugh on Fred

2008-01-18T06:28:00.001-08:00

The lesser known Limbaugh, David (Rush's brother), has a great piece on Fred today:

There is simply too much herd mentality among us about electability. We tell ourselves a candidate is not inspiring, then pretty soon we're convinced he's unelectable, and, voila, he almost becomes so. Yet, at that very moment, he's proving to us that he is quite presidential, quite electable and quite motivated for the job -- if we can only shed our predispositions against his "electability." Since electability is often a matter of collective perception, it can turn on a dime, as with the reversal of the respective fortunes of screaming Howard Dean and somniferous John Kerry in 2004.

This primary season, relatively speaking, has just begun. But Fred is now up against the wall. How can we expect him to have done much better than he has to date with everyone prattling on about the overwhelming odds against him? The "experts" continue to be wrong at almost every turn, so why can't they be wrong about Fred, too? It's time to quit empowering them by following their dictatorial doom-prophecies. It's encouraging that John Zogby's latest South Carolina poll shows that while levels of support for McCain and Huckabee "have remained static," Fred is starting to move up.

Supporters have asked Fred to step up, and he has -- he has shone brilliantly in the last month, setting himself head and shoulders above the pack in many cases. Now it's time for conservative voters to step up and quit placing artificial limitations on Fred, and on themselves.

Fred has answered the conservatives' call. Shouldn't we answer his?

Indeed.

Fred is, as Limbaugh points out, not perfect, but he is the most Reaganite of the current crop of candidates. If you, like me, are a Reagan conservative, you really need to take a close look at Fred.

Another Preview of HillaryCare (or ObamaCare)

2008-01-17T20:15:00.000-08:00

I guess the UK's National Health Service is staffed with fans of Invasion of the Body Snatchers:

The UK Nanny State just revealed its latest agenda item and it is decidedly ghoulish. Last week, British (but really Scottish) Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, announced his support of a Labour government plan to snatch the body parts of any citizen. The good news is that this policy only applies to dead people. The bad news is obvious. This is the ultimate death tax, surgically extracted.
Without any apparent squeamishness, Gordon Brown backed the Presumed Consent Scheme (they often call programs “schemes” in England) to redress the demand for transplanted organs by fiat. Here’s the deal. Rather than go looking for those bothersome donor cards on a fresh cadaver, the British populace is now fair game. If you don’t specifically carry a card saying “leave my corpse alone” -- known as “the opt out option”, or unless one’s family is on hand to object, one’s remains are considered fair game for an organ harvest festival.
The justification for adopting Presumed Consent is a function of a recognized market deficit. The Government has noticed that 1000 patients die annually while waiting for a critically-needed transplant. Another 8000 are on various organ waiting lists hoping to get lucky when they go critical or for just the right replacement part to turn up in the chop shop.
According to the NHS Organ Donor Registry, there are more than 14 million Brits who have voluntarily listed themselves as donors, however, one third of all families refuse consent for organ donation when a loved one dies, usually in unexpected circumstances. In typical fashion, the government plans to overcome this donor reluctance by setting up -- you guessed it -- a new Task Force to enlighten the populace about the importance of giving this gift of life.

Read the whole thing... as usual, the link is in the title of this post.

Like McCain-Feingold? You'll LOVE The Huckster's Plan!

2008-01-17T17:19:00.000-08:00

More evidence of the implosion (I'll explain after the quote):

I think that every candidates should speak for themselves, and that every thing that involves the candidate's name or another candidate's name should be authorized and approved by that candidate, otherwise it shouldn't be spoken....

Okay, first off, this is basically slicing the First Amendment out of the Constitution and stuffing it in the shredder. Essentially, if this law were passed, I would have to get Mr. Huckabee's permission before I could even include his name in this sentence (no idea if nicknames like "The Huckster" would also require permission).

However, this is also evidence of his campaign imploding. There's a pattern here, and it is reminiscent of another politician. See if you can guess who:

The Huckster raises taxes while in office. Realizing that this is bad news in a Republican primary, he immediately latches onto a plan that many conservatives like, the FairTax.
The Huckster pushes for a federal smoking ban. When he discovers that such a ban doesn't sell well among the GOP base, he dumps it.
Now, The Huckster gets caught push-polling, so he immediately calls for lots and lots of restrictions.

This is worse than campaigning by polls, this is knee-jerk campaigning, folks. Something jabs The Huckster, he immediately responds in a way that is not only painfully obvious, but at times is greatly excessive.

In short, there is no core set of political beliefs in The Huckster (I won't comment on his religious beliefs except to say that many of his policy positions fly in the face of my understanding of Southern Baptist theology--but I am not a Southern Baptist so I may be misunderstanding their positions on some issues). There simply is no "there" there. I may have policy disagreements with Mr. Giuliani, but at least he is open and honest about them, and I respect him for that. Rudy is not my first choice, nor my second, but if he gets the nomination I would vote for him (First and second choices are Mr. Thompson and Mr. Romney, in that order, in case anyone is curious). Anyway, getting back to The Huckster, he has not shown us the kind of honesty that Mr. Giuliani has, and as such, he reminds me powerfully of another Arkansas governor who had the same lack of core beliefs.

The Huckster is Slick Willie with less polish. That's about all there is to it.

The Huckster Push-Polls - UPDATED AND BUMPED

2008-01-17T17:00:00.000-08:00

Because I frequently comment on Confederate Yankee's blog (yes, I am that C-C-G), I generally try to stay away from stuff he is covering... it just doesn't seem right to me for some reason.

This time, however, I am gonna make an exception.

The obvious suspect here is the campaign of the man who wants to rewrite the Constitution to match his personal idea of God's will... and has even said so!

Okay, enough channeling CY... I just had to share that one, tho.

UPDATE: More, from Reason Magazine:

Ah, the joys of the primary season. South Carolina Attorney General Henry McMaster has been asked to prosecute pro-Mike Huckabee push polling now underway in the state. State law bans such automated calls.

McMaster is a major John McCain supporter in the state, but the prime target of the calls -- at the moment -- seems to be Fred Thompson. In a call partially recorded last night by one South Carolina resident and sent to McMaster, Thompson's record on abortion and taxes was attacked.

This mirrors similar recent efforts in Michigan against Mitt Romney, where the same firm placed calls to voters blasting Romney's record on guns and immigration. One report pegged the number of such calls into Michigan at five million while South Carolina is on tap to receive one million calls.

As I commented to a friend earlier today, The Huckster is imploding, and it's about time. This sort of Bravo-Sierra is not Christian at all.

UPDATE II (and bump): The Palmetto Scoop has uncovered more about the firm actually making the calls, and it's not pretty:

The firm that’s been doing the calls on Common Sense Issues’ behalf is ccAdvertising (also known as FreeEats.com). And their legal record isn’t encouraging. That company has already lost twice in federal court. In 2004, they challenged North Dakota’s do-not-call law and lost (they’d made approximately 235,000 calls polling a range of GOP hot-button issues). The company was fined $20,000. And in 2006, they challenged Indiana’s do-not-call law and lost (the group made 400,000 calls attacking Rep. Byron Hill (D-IN)). [PAUL KIEL - TPMmuckraker]

Also, The Huckster's campaign has issued a sort of a call for it to stop:

Huckabee's campaign quickly disavowed the push polling. "We know nothing about that and don't condone it. Anyone who is doing that in an effort to help us needs to stop. This does not reflect the positive spirit of the campaign," said spokeswoman Alice Stewart.

Oh, where to start with this one.

First, why is a spokeswoman saying this and not The Huckster himself?

Second, why not name the companies--and the leaders of those companies--that are doing this by name and demand that they stop? The "we know nothing" Sgt. Schultz defense ain't gonna fly, the name of Common Sense Issues has been out there since soon after this story broke.

Third, I nearly spewed my morning beverage all over my laptop when I read "positive spirit of the campaign." Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight! That "positive spirit" that had The Huckster claim that a crying baby was a Romney supporter, perhaps? How about the "positive spirit" that had The Huckster openly questioning Romney's religion, while at the same time not permitting any questions about how The Huckster's own actions square with his own religion? Maybe they're referring to the "positive spirit" that had The Huckster call an organization dedicated to prosperity for all Americans "The Club For Greed," just because they pointed out The Huckster's real economic track record? "Positive spirit," indeed.

Just more evidence of The Huckster imploding, folks.

Update III: It ain't just SC:

Nevada Republican voters are receiving automated phone calls that appear to be a poll, but end up criticizing candidates with the exception of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee.
Also known as "push polls," the phone calls are intended to present negative information about candidates and have caused hostile reaction in Nevada.
"I got it myself," said Heidi Smith, chairwoman of the Washoe County Republican Central Committee. "I can testify to it. I was so mad.
"They were pretending they were doing a poll. It was horrible. At the end, they said this was not paid for by any political party, but you'd have to be an absolute moron to know it's not Huckabee (this group is supporting)."
The calls, which also targeted voters in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, are sponsored by Common Sense Issues, a nonprofit organization that backs Huckabee.

The more this story gets around, the worse The Huckster looks... which is why I am doing my small part to spread the word.

New Fred Ad for SC

2008-01-16T21:00:00.001-08:00

Now this is what I call Fred at his best... explaining things clearly, but in 60 seconds.

According to NRO's Corner, this will start running tomorrow in every media market in South Carolina. And I expect that it will help Fred to victory.

Time for a Change

2008-01-16T20:38:00.000-08:00

Do not adjust your computer monitor. I changed the look of the blog. To be honest, I kinda got tired of the light-text-on-dark-background thing, and I do like red, so here we go. :)

Some posts with color highlighting may be hard to read... if you spot one that is particularly difficult, I'd appreciate if you'd drop me a line, or comment on it.

Class Act, that Huckster

2008-01-16T06:41:00.000-08:00

WARREN, Mich.: Confronted by crying toddler on Tuesday, Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee quipped the child must be for his rival Mitt Romney.

"He's not the happiest boy today," Huckabee said, smiling for a picture with the boy and his brother and sister. "I think he must be a Romney voter. Look at him. He's so sad."

Real classy, Pastor Huck.

Fred on Religion

2008-01-16T06:35:00.000-08:00

Gotta love it:

LADY'S ISLAND, S.C. -- Mixing theology and social issues on the campaign trail is rare for Fred Thompson, but he discussed it today answering a question from a member of the audience.

A woman asked him if he would “as a Christian, as a conservative” continue President Bush’s programs to combat global AIDS.

“Christ didn’t tell us to go to the government and pass a bill to get some of these social problems dealt with. He told us to do it,” Thompson said.

“The government has its role, but we need to keep firmly in mind the role of the government, and the role of us as individuals and as Christians on the other.”

Huckabee's campaign and supporters claiming this is an attack on the Huckster in 3... 2...

Hillary Won?

2008-01-16T06:16:00.000-08:00

It's not being widely reported as far as I can see online (Yahoo! News, for example, has not one wire story about it), but Hillary "won" the Michigan primary on the D side.

So why is it not being reported? Because even though she was running essentially unopposed (there were three also-rans in the field--Kucinich, Dodd, and Gravel--none of whom has a snowball's chance in Hades to ever make it to the Oval Office), she still "won" only 55% of the vote.

That's what the leftymedia doesn't want to report... "uncommitted" got 40% of the votes cast for Democrats in Michigan. Let me rephrase that: 40% of those voting in the Democratic primary in Michigan would rather vote for nobody than vote for Hillary!

Sure, it's a "victory," but it's also a huge embarrassment to the Hillary campaign. That's why there's not much coverage of it.

Ruminations on Neo-Isolationism and its Dangers

2008-01-15T06:26:00.000-08:00

Once again, been doing some ruminating, this time on the Ron Paul brand of neo-isolationism. I've decided that it's a fundamentally flawed policy for several reasons:

The central premise itself is fatally flawed. The idea is that if we ignore the world, the world will ignore us. Sorry, folks, but putting our collective hands over our ears, closing our eyes, and singing "lalalalalala" at the top of our lungs won't stop other nations from knocking on our door--or knocking over our skyscrapers either. History shows this clearly; the last time isolationism was seriously tried in this nation was during the 1920s and 1930s. It ended rather suddenly on one Sunday morning in December, 1941.
There is also an idea that if we stop "meddling" in the Middle East, that things will calm down. Again, this is not in line with reality. Like a cop standing on a corner keeps neighborhood kids from causing too much trouble, America's presence in the Mideast has helped keep the violence from getting worse. Just imagine what the turbulent Mideast would look like if those bent on violence weren't afraid of American planes, bombs, tanks, and troops showing up if they went too far.

A corollary to this is that America is primarily responsible for the restraint shown by Israel. If we stopped asking Israel to hold back on their responses to Arab violence, it doesn't take a lot of imagination to understand what would happen... just look at the Six-Day War, for example, and Israel's bombing of Iraqi nuclear facilities in the 1970s.

There's also, among at least some proponents of neo-isolationism, a concept that the people of the Middle East are not worth shedding American blood to help. This one doesn't need a lot of comment from me, so I will just say that people are people, they all bleed red, and to single out one group as unworthy of our help is distasteful in the extreme.

Bottom line, neo-isolationism quite simply won't work. It will not deliver what it promises, because the entire idea is screwy. Maybe that's why the wackos that follow Ron Paul like the idea.

More Bad Iraq News for the Democrats

2008-01-12T07:45:00.000-08:00

Ya know how the Democrats like to demean the surge by claiming that it hasn't brought political progress? Well, that claim just got a lot harder to support--not that that will stop the lefties.

BAGHDAD - Iraq's parliament adopted legislation Saturday on the reinstatement of thousands of former supporters of Saddam Hussein's Baath party to government jobs, a key benchmark sought by the United States as a step toward easing sectarian tensions.

The bill, approved by a unanimous show of hands on each of its 30 clauses, is the first piece of major U.S.-backed legislation approved by the 275-seat parliament. Other benchmarks languish, including legislation to divide the country's vast oil wealth, constitutional amendments demanded by minority Sunni Arabs and a bill spelling out rules for local elections.

Oops... there really is political progress happening, folks. It may be slow, but the Iraqi Parliament has still passed more substantive laws than the US Congress has managed. Reid, Pelosi, et al are apparently more interested in beating the dead horse of pulling out of Iraq (what is it now, 40+ failed attempts?) than actually doing what they're supposed to do, like pass spending authorization bills.

Human Events Endorses Fred

2008-01-11T06:18:00.000-08:00

Here's an excerpt:

We make this endorsement on the basis of much research, having interviewed Sen. Thompson and some of his opponents, as well as examining what they have all said and done. We conclude that Thompson is a solid conservative whose judgment is grounded in our principles.

In his Senate years, Mr. Thompson compiled an American Conservative Union lifetime rating of 86.1, which is higher than both Sen. John McCain (82.3) and Rep. Ron Paul (82.3). The Club for Growth has praised Thompson as someone who has a strong commitment to limited government, free enterprise and federalist principles.

On the issues that matter most to conservatives, Sen. Thompson’s positions benefit from their clarity. He is solidly pro-life. He said that he was in favor overturning Roe v. Wade because it was “bad law and bad medical science.” As the National Right to Life Committee said in its endorsement of him Nov. 13, 2007, “The majority of this country is opposed to the vast majority of abortions, and Fred Thompson has shown in his consistent pro-life voting record in the U.S. Senate that he is part of the pro-life majority.”

Thompson’s record is solid on voting to preserve gun owners’ rights, cut taxes, reduce government spending and drill for oil in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He has voted consistently against gay marriage. Thompson is by no means perfect. He strongly supported the McCain-Feingold bill, did not support the impeachment of Bill Clinton on perjury and more than once voted with the trial lawyers against limitations on liability in defective product and medical malpractice cases.

We like the way Thompson unhesitatingly attacks the liberal ideologues and their activists such as MoveOn.org and the ACLU, and the way he reaches out to those we knew as the Reagan Democrats.

Maybe Fred is starting to turn things around?

Fred Catches Fire

2008-01-10T20:47:00.000-08:00

Ya gotta know that Fred's had a stupendous night when the editors and contributors to an online publication that endorsed Romney say with no dissension that Fred won tonight's SC debate.

I guess when Fred says he's "all in," he means it.

UPDATE: Okay, we have some dissension in the ranks of that online publication. There's one Ron Paul supporter who, of course, claims that Paul won the debate. This illustrates, again, the alternate reality that Paulites inhabit.

Anbar Ready For Transfer of Security

2008-01-10T16:38:00.001-08:00

More on the victory over the terrorists:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Iraq's western province of Anbar, hotbed of the Sunni Arab insurgency for the first four years of the war, will be returned to Iraqi control in March, a senior U.S. general said Thursday.

In a telephone interview from Iraq, Marine Maj. Gen. Walter E. Gaskin, commander of the roughly 35,000 Marine and Army forces in Anbar, said levels of violence have dropped so significantly - coupled with the growth and development of Iraqi security forces in the province - that Anbar is ready to be handed back to the Iraqis.

Thus far, nine of 18 Iraqi provinces have reverted to Iraqi control, most recently the southern province of Basra in December. The process has gone substantially slower than the Bush administration once hoped, mainly because of obstacles to developing sufficient Iraqi police and army forces. But Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Thursday that he expects the process to continue.

And yet Harry Reid is still trashing the surge.

I begin to believe that Democrats don't live in the same time-space continuum as the rest of us.

Voter ID Opponents Make A Big Mistake

2008-01-10T06:47:00.000-08:00

Those opposing the simple requirement to show photo ID in order to vote have made a huge error in choosing their "poster child." Turns out she'd be a better example of why we need laws that make it mandatory to show photo ID to vote:

On the eve of a hearing before the U.S. Supreme Court, the Indiana Voter ID law has become a story with a twist: One of the individuals used by opponents to the law as an example of how the law hurts older Hoosiers is registered to vote in two states.

Faye Buis-Ewing, 72, who has been telling the media she is a 50-year resident of Indiana, at one point in the past few years also claimed two states as her primary residence and received a homestead exemption on her property taxes in both states.

Monday night from her Florida home, Ewing said she and her husband Kenneth “winter in Florida and summer in Indiana.” She admitted to registering to vote in both states, but stressed that she's never voted in Florida. She also has a Florida driver’s license, but when she tried to use it as her photo ID in the Indiana elections in November 2006, poll workers wouldn’t accept it.

Subsequently, Ewing became a sort-of poster child for the opposition when the Indiana League of Women Voters (ILWV) told media that the problems Ewing had voting that day shows why the high court should strike it down.

But Indiana Republican Secretary of State Todd Rokita said Monday that Ewing’s tale illustrates exactly why Indiana needs the law. “This shows that the Indiana ID law worked here, which also calls into question why the critics are so vehemently against this law, especially with persons like this, who may not have a legal right to vote in this election,” Rokita said.

It really doesn't take a lot of rumination to figure out why the Party of the Donkey opposes voter ID laws so vehemently--if they believe that they are the beneficiaries of the votes of people like Mrs. Ewing, then naturally they'd fight tooth and nail against any law that stops such fraud.

Their error in picking their "injured party," however, makes it a lot less likely that they'll win this one.

Chavez Embarrassed Again

2008-01-09T17:50:00.001-08:00

File this one under "oops."

Acting as freelance "mediator," last week Hugo Chavez let the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as FARC, make a fool of him by offering to release three hostages and then failing to show up as Chavez's traveling circus of 150 journalists, 15 international observers, the Red Cross and Hollywood film director Oliver Stone waited.

They had come to toast the Venezuelan dictator as "the only" solution to Colombia's 46-year conflict and introduce his hand as a player in Colombia's U.S.-backed war. Instead they swatted mosquitoes in the jungle, and as the Colombian government revealed the real truth of a baby hostage's whereabouts, they blamed the government.

Heck of a negotiator, hmmm? Can't even get a hostage turnover to work right.

Yet Another Reason I Don't Trust Polls

2008-01-09T17:33:00.000-08:00

It's quite simple.

Here's the RealClearPolitics poll averages for the NH Democratic Primary:

New Hampshire Democratic Primary
Tuesday, January 8 \| Delegates at Stake: 22
Poll	Date	Spread
RCP Average	01/05 to 01/07	Obama +8.3
Suffolk/WHDH	01/06 - 01/07	Obama +5.0
American Res. Group	01/06 - 01/07	Obama +9.0
ReutersC-Span/Zogby	01/05 - 01/07	Obama +13.0
Rasmussen	01/05 - 01/07	Obama +7.0
CNN/WMUR/UNH	01/05 - 01/06	Obama +9.0
Marist	01/05 - 01/06	Obama +8.0
CBS News	01/05 - 01/06	Obama +7.0

Here's the actual results:

Democrats (100% reporting)

Candidate	Raw #	%
Hillary Clinton	112,251	39
Barack Obama	104,772	36
John Edwards	48,681	17
Bill Richardson	13,249	5
Dennis Kucinich	3,919	1
Total Write In	2,502	1
Joe Biden	628	0
Mike Gravel	402	0
Others	918	0

Any questions?

Ruminations on the Nomination

2008-01-09T06:55:00.000-08:00

Okay, here's the results of my ruminating so far. I reserve the right to change my mind at a later time... say, any time more than 30 seconds after posting this.

Fred has to bring his "A" game to South Carolina. Fortunately, South Carolina's culture is a lot more similar to Tennessee's than Iowa's or New Hampshire's, so if Fred is going to shine anywhere, it will be in SC. I am cautiously optimistic that Fred will do well there, especially if he and others start really pointing out Huckabee's dismal record on taxes and other issues.

Giuliani also has to bring his "A" game, but to Florida, not SC. That's the first state where Rudy has a halfway decent chance of winning, IMHO. Fred could do well there, but so could Romney or McCain... Huckabee probably wouldn't sell well in Florida.

Others have suggested this and been pooh-poohed, but if Fred takes SC and Rudy wins Florida, a brokered convention is a real possibility. Note that there's a lot of ifs in that statement, but the chances are better than in any election since I've been watching elections.

I think a brokered convention could be a good thing. With the popularity of "reality" TV, a brokered convention might just draw more eyes to the TV than a convention usually gets, and give the GOP a real opportunity to explain who they are and what they stand for. Of course, if the GOP screws it up, they could end up turning off a lot of prospective voters, so it would have to be handled with care... and rule number one should be to remember that the media (with the possible exception of Fox News) is not their friend.

Well, that's my take on it. Your mileage may vary, past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results, coffee is hot, and all the rest of the usual disclaimers apply.

Stupid Headline of the Day

2008-01-07T17:03:00.000-08:00

I kid you not.

MSNBC: "College Drinking Games Lead to Higher Blood Alcohol Levels."

Up next, "Turning Lights On Improves Visibility at Night."

More on Mitt's Dirty Trick

2008-01-07T06:41:00.000-08:00

Here's some more thoughts on Mitt's recent anti-Fred rumor-mongering:

All evidence points to the Politico story being the result of a dirty trick. As Bob Novak reports today the rumors of Thompson’s supposed plan to drop out after Iowa were apparently being pushed by Mitt Romney’s campaign. One political consultant who appears on the news as unaffiliated with any campaign was apparently at the center of the trick. His involvement is something we are investigating. Why isn’t anyone else tracking him down? Who was he working for, and how? Do any of the grand guardians of journalism even care? Perhaps after today they will.

Politico’s coverage broke several basic rules. Most importantly, it was reported on the day of the caucuses at about 11 am Eastern time, when Iowans were making last minute decisions to go to the caucuses that evening. Several other media outlets apparently had the same story, possibly from the same sources. Yet they declined to cover it because they recognized the red flags that waved all around it. Politico chose to go with it.

I asked Politico editor John Harris why. In an e-mail response to several questions I’d e-mailed him, Harris said, “The Politico story that you and others focused on was based on reporting within Thompson’s political circle. It was not based on information from rival campaigns. The writers were passing on newsworthy reporting about the state of thinking within Thompson’s operation.” Harris also wrote, “Thompson spokeswoman Karen Henretty did not deny our reporting when we contacted her. She told Politico, and was quoted in the story saying, ‘Doing well in Iowa means exceeding expectations, and Fred has been exceeding expectations for more than 40 years, Thursday’s results aren’t likely to close any chapters.’” And, “I do not have any knowledge about your assertion that the Thompson story was being promoted by other campaigns. It did not influence our reporting.”

Politico -- either willfully or by being duped -- was party to a dirty trick. But Politico’s coverage broke another basic rule of campaign reporting. Though Thompson’s campaign denied the rumors, the denials were buried in the story rather than properly written into the lede. There was no attempt at balance. The editors didn’t do their jobs.

Politico’s coverage -- despite the obvious problems -- got worse, not better. The following morning, a second story quoted a Thompson volunteer reacting to Thompson’s post-caucus speech: “‘Michael Murphy, a Thompson volunteer who drove down from Cleveland, shouted exuberantly after the speech, ‘You hear that? No dropping out!’ Not just yet anyway.” The broad sneer in that last line couldn’t have been missed by any editor who had read the story. Leaving it in removed any doubt about Politico’s bias.

It was only after my questions reached Harris that they published a piece saying Thompson was staying in the race. But the damage had already been done. How many voters didn’t go to the caucus for Thompson because they believed their cause was lost? How many donors didn’t write checks that day -- or since -- because they believed Thompson would soon drop out?

The issue here isn’t only the fate of Fred Thompson’s campaign. The issue is how the campaigns and the press will do their jobs this year. There are huge undercurrents of nastiness among the candidates and distrust of government among voters. Negative advertising seem to have crowded out all other ads. If that isn’t leavened by skepticism in the media to what the campaigns say privately, the dirty trick that befell Thompson will this year beget many more.

Note to Howard Kurtz: why aren’t you investigating this one?

Yeah, where are the big investigators on this one?

Probably fawning all over Obama.

Fred Blasts NBC News

2008-01-06T12:56:00.000-08:00

Gotta love it!

LESTER HOLT: We saw on the Democratic side Iowa became kind of a viability test. We saw some of the lower-tier candidates drop out after seeing the results in Iowa. What is your gut check right now in terms of your own viability? will it be South Carolina, will it be Super Tuesday?

FRED THOMPSON: I'm not going to engage in that -- further beating the process issue to death. We're talking about the future of our country here and the fact that our worst enemies are trying to get their hands on nuclear weapons and we're bankrupting the next generation. That's what I'm talking about. The rest is all speculation and I don't engage in it.

HOLT: It's a fair point you make; you don't engage in it. But you were the victim of some rumors on this subject of your viability and questions if you would drop out. How much did that hurt you?

THOMPSON: Well let's think about that. It did hurt me, and the media lapped it up. It was put out by another campaign; made no sense at all.

HOLT: Which campaign?

THOMPSON: A few days before the election and made no sense at all, and I was coming strong, and the media took it up, and spread the rumor, and probably cost me two or three points in Iowa. So the lesson there is not, you know, politicians being politicians. The lesson there is that the news media really ought to check these stories out and come to me, and ask me, and take my word for it.

HOLT: Senator, fair shot against the news media, but what candidate were you mentioning that put that out there?

THOMPSON: I'm not gonna. I owe you nothing, frankly, in that regard and I'm not going to say anything more about it right now.

Of course, I posted earlier about which campaign started that rumor, but if Fred had mentioned the name, I'm sure someone would have lambasted him for smearing another campaigner. So, Fred stays above that fray, and instead smacks the leftymedia a good one.

Bravo, Fred!

Romney, Huckabee, Thompson, McCain

2008-01-05T20:30:00.000-08:00

That's the current running order in the only "poll" that really matters... the results from the states that have already chosen their delegates... and did you know that there's more delegates pledged than just the ones from Iowa?

Anyway, here's the breakdown as of right now (subject, of course, to change)

Romney: 26 delegates.
Huckabee: 20 delegates.
Thompson: 6 delegates.
McCain: 3 delegates.

Since 1,191 delegates are needed for a majority, you can see that everyone still has at least a statistical chance of making it.

This one is still way too early to call, folks.

Mitt's Dirty Tricks

2008-01-05T16:23:00.000-08:00

I can't say I care much for this report from Robert Novak:

Published reports that Fred Thompson soon will withdraw from the Republican presidential contest and endorse Sen. John McCain have been traced in part to Mitt Romney's campaign, trying to stir up strife between McCain and Thompson.

That is, I think even Mitt supporters would agree, hitting below the belt.

I just lost a lot of respect for the man from Massachusetts.

Fred's Lazy Campaign

2008-01-03T06:22:00.000-08:00

Courtesy Jim Geraghty over at NRO's Campaign Spot, here is Fred's schedule for today:

WHAT: Fred Thompson Interviewed Live by John Roberts and Kiran Chetry on CNN's American Morning.
WHEN: 6:15 am CT
WHERE: CNN, Check your local listings.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Interviewed Live by Harry Smith on CBS's The Early Show.
WHEN: 7:00 am CT
WHERE: CBS, Check your local listings.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Interviewed Live by Brian Kilmeade, Steve Doocy, and Gretchen Carlson FOX's FOX & Friends.
WHEN: 7:35 am CT
WHERE: FOX News, Check your local listings.

WHAT: Fred Thompson Live Interview on Morning Report with Dan Kennedy.
WHEN: 8:20 am CT
WHERE: WOC 1420, Davenport
NOTE: Listen live at http://www.woc1420.com/main.html.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Live Interview on Schulte & Swann Morning Show.
WHEN: 8:35 am CT
WHERE: KZIA 102.9, Cedar Rapids
NOTE: Listen live at http://www.kzia.com/HOME/tabid/36/Default.aspx.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Interviewed Live by Tim Russert on MSNBC.
WHEN: 9:45 am CT
WHERE: MSNBC, Check your local listings.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Participates in Radio Town Hall with KFAB's Tom Becka
WHEN: 12:30 pm CT
WHERE: Quality Inn & Suites
3537 West Broadway (Hwy 6)
Council Bluffs, IA
NOTE: Doors open at 12:00 pm CT. Please pre-set all equipment by 12:10 pm.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Participates in Press Availability
WHEN: 1:15 pm CT
WHERE: Quality Inn & Suites
3537 West Broadway
Council Bluffs, IA
WHAT: Fred Thompson Live Interview on Mac's World
WHEN: 2:40 pm CT
WHERE: WOW 98.3, Des Moines
NOTE: Listen live at http://www.983wowfm.com/default.asp.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Live Interview on The Sean Hannity Show
WHEN: 3:05 pm CT
WHERE: Check Your Local Listings.
NOTE: Listen live at http://www.wabcradio.com/.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Interviewed Live by Wolf Blitzer on CNN's The Situation Room.
WHEN: 4:20 pm CT
WHERE: CNN, Check your local listings.
WHAT: Fred Thompson Live Interview on The Bob Bruce Radio Experience
WHEN: 4:40 pm CT
WHERE: WOW 98.3, Des Moines
NOTE: Listen live at http://www.983wowfm.com/default.asp.

With a schedule like that, how can anyone call anyone lazy?

Lefty Think-Tank: Fox News Channel "Most Balanced"

2008-01-02T19:05:00.000-08:00

You can tell they're lefties from the subhead of their press release... it includes "not a typo."

Who’s Fair and Balanced?: Fox News Channel’s coverage was more balanced toward both parties than the broadcast networks were. On FOX, evaluations of all Democratic candidates combined were split almost evenly – 51% positive vs. 49% negative, as were all evaluations of GOP candidates – 49% positive vs. 51% negative, producing a perfectly balanced 50-50 split for all candidates of both parties.

On the three broadcast networks, opinion on Democratic candidates split 47% positive vs. 53% negative, while evaluations of Republicans were more negative – 40% positive vs. 60% negative. For both parties combined, network evaluations were almost 3 to 2 negative in tone, i.e. 41% positive vs. 59% negative.

That popping you hear is the sound of lefty heads exploding.

The Wildest Bhutto Conspiracy Theory Yet

2008-01-02T06:34:00.000-08:00

This one takes the cake:

ISLAMABAD: The controversy over former premier Benazir Bhutto's assassination has taken another turn with a section of her Pakistan People's Party (PPP) claiming she was targeted with sophisticated "laser beam technology".

Bhutto's wounds were caused not by bullets but by some sort of laser weapon, 'The Nation' newspaper said quoting sources in the PPP.

When Bhutto was admitted to Rawalpindi General Hospital shortly after the fatal attack on her on December 27, doctor Musaddiq Khan, who treated her, told a PPP leader that he had seen "such a case for the first time in his life", sources said.

Bhutto's wounds were not caused by bullets and she had died before reaching the hospital. A part of her brain and blood had spilled out from her head, they quoted the doctor as saying.

The sources also claimed both the gunshots and the bomb blast in the attack on Bhutto "were a decoy to hide the real shooters".

The paper further quoted the sources as saying that the militant leader Baitullah Mehsud and the Taliban, blamed for her assassination by the government, did not have such technology.

Perhaps Dr. Khan has a reason for not wanting the militants or the Taliban to be thought responsible?

Fred is Too Sane to be President

2008-01-02T06:19:00.000-08:00

That's what this blogger says:

Fred Thompson is in the middle of a 40 town Iowa tour - so he is hardly lazy. And he does go on television shows - thus dealing with critics, such as myself, who attacked him for not going on enough shows. But what sort of person would enjoy all this?

A lunatic. Someone who was interested in office for its own sake - not as a means to reduce the size and scope of government.

What the media, including Fox News (the only non-leftist news station and, therefore, of vital importance in the Republican nomination process), are saying is that Fred Thompson is too sane to be President. It is not enough to produce detailed policies for dealing with the entitlement program Welfare State (a cancer that is destroying the United States and the rest of the Western World), or producing a new optional flat tax (individuals could continue to use the existing system if they wished to) to deal with the nightmare of complexity that the income tax has become.

It is not even enough to have a long record of service, going back to Watergate and taking down a corrupt Governor of Tennessee in the 1970's. And having one of the most Conservative voting records in the United States Senate - before leaving it in disgust at how the system did not allow real reform.

No - someone has to enjoy the prospect for office for its own sake, not to reduce the size and scope of government and restore a Federal Republic. One must enjoy the whole process of politics - i.e. be crazy. Or one must pretend to enjoy it - i.e. be a liar.

And then people complain that politicians are either crazy or corrupt. When they shoo away anyone who comes along who is neither crazy or corrupt.

Glenn "Instapundit" Reynolds appears to concur. And, for what it's worth, so do I.

I think P. J. O'Rourke said, "anyone who wants elected office should be permanently barred on the grounds of mental instability." That's part of why I like Fred. He will serve honorably, but he doesn't make the Oval Office the be-all and end-all of his existence.

Hat Tip: NRO's Corner.

Iowa Caucuses for Non-Wonks

2008-01-01T19:49:00.000-08:00

If you want to know how the Iowa caucuses work--and if you care about who our next President is, you should--ya just gotta read the article linked in the title above. Here's a quick sample:

The trouble with the Iowa caucuses isn't that there's anything wrong with Iowans. It's the bizarre rules of the process. Caucuses are touted as authentic neighborhood meetings where voters gather in their precincts and make democracy come alive. In truth, they are anything but.

Caucuses occur only at a fixed time at night, so that many people working odd hours can't participate. They can easily exceed two hours. There are no absentee ballots, which means the process disfranchises the sick, shut-ins and people who are out of town on the day of the caucus. The Democratic caucuses require participants to stand in a corner with other supporters of their candidate. That eliminates the secret ballot.

There are reasons for all this. The caucuses are run by the state parties, and unlike primary or general elections aren't regulated by the government. They were designed as an insiders' game to attract party activists, donors and political junkies and give them a disproportionate influence in the process. In other words, they are designed not to be overly democratic. Primaries aren't perfect. but at least they make it fairly easy for everyone to vote, since polls are open all day and it takes only a few minutes to cast a ballot.

Little wonder that voter turnout for the Iowa caucuses is extremely low--in recent years about 6% of registered voters. Many potential voters will proclaim their civic virtue to pollsters and others and say they will show up at the caucus--and then find something else to do Thursday night.

And that's just the start.

Welcome to 2008!

2008-01-01T10:23:00.000-08:00

Jed Babbin issues a call to arms:

Forget the holiday. All leaves are cancelled. As we set sail into the election year, sound general quarters. The USS Conservatism is at battle stations from now until the smoke clears on the morning after the election. Sharpen the cutlasses, issue a brace of pistols to all hands, and load with chain shot, for I mean to grapple and board.
All of us, especially those in the media, have to be fast and accurate. Let no media-contrived story go unchallenged, no Democrat allowed to speak untruths without being slapped with the facts. This is the fight we were born for, folks. Play the deguello: quarter will not be asked or given. This is one we have to win, and we will. All hands on deck.

I'm ready... bring 'em on.

Fred Speaks For Himself

2007-12-30T19:56:00.000-08:00

Fred's had some recent troubles getting his words through the lefty media, so he does what he's done before--slips right past them and speaks out for himself, directly to the voters. I, who came of political age in the era of Reagan, think he sounds quite Reaganesque, and not just because he invokes the Gipper in his speech.

Uh-oh, Part II

2007-12-30T14:21:00.000-08:00

This report can't be very good for Musharraf:

Benazir Bhutto was so fearful for her life that she tried to hire British and American security experts to protect her, The Sunday Telegraph can reveal.
But the plans collapsed because President Pervez Musharraf refused to allow the foreign contractors to operate in Pakistan, according to senior aides.
"She asked to bring in trained security personnel from abroad," said Mark Siegel, her US representative. "In fact she and her husband repeatedly tried to get visas for such protection, but they were denied by the government of Pakistan."

Did Musharraf deliberately deny the visas in order to keep Bhutto vulnerable? Inquiring minds want to know.

More on Pakistan

2007-12-30T12:19:00.000-08:00

Mark Steyn lays his finger on one of the biggest problems in Pakistan:

It’s easy to tell Musharraf what he should do. Over one thousand Pakistani soldiers have been killed fighting Islamists in Waziristan and other tribal lands. That would be a lot even for an army solidly behind Musharraf. But in Pakistan every institution charged with “relentlessly hunting down terrorists” has, to one degree or another, been subverted by them: Pakistan’s military – the least corrupt agency in the country – and its intelligence service, the ISI, are both riddled with Islamist sympathizers. As Churchill noted, the British had a fondness for the more bloodcurdling Pushtun warriors: In 1939, for example, Lieutenant-Colonel Peter Sanders accepted an invitation to tikala (lunch) from the tribesman who’d blown him up. The Pushtun apologized for costing the Colonel his right arm, and the Colonel accepted the apology and raised his glass in a presumably left-handed toast, and they got on splendidly and had a whale of a time. But a mutual respect between combatants is very different from the ties that bind Taliban leaders in Waziristan with elements of the Pakistani military and intelligence service: Two groups, nominally at war with each other, nevertheless share indistinguishable views on the joys of hardline sharia and the wickedness of the United States.

Read the whole thing--link, as usual, in the title. Really.

Double Standards 'R' Us

2007-12-30T07:54:00.000-08:00

NASHUA, N.H. -- Former president Bill Clinton yesterday delivered in stark terms a version of his wife's central campaign message: that her experience in Washington better prepares her to "deal with the unexpected."

Addressing more than 100 supporters at a VFW hall here Saturday, Clinton used the strongest language he has so far in the campaign to describe the threats facing the nation, making an oblique reference to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and saying that the "most important thing of all" in selecting a nominee is the question of who could best manage unforeseen catastrophes.

"You have to have a leader who is strong and commanding and convincing enough . . . to deal with the unexpected," he said. "There is a better than 50 percent chance that sometime in the first year or 18 months of the next presidency, something will happen that is not being discussed in this campaign. President Bush never talked about Osama bin Laden and didn't foresee Hurricane Katrina. And if you're not ready for that, then everything else you do can be undermined. You need a president that you trust to deal with something that we will not discuss in this campaign. . . . And I think, on this score, she's the best of all."

Hmmm... I thought even hinting at 9/11 was off-limits for someone like Giuliani or McCain... but let a Clinton do it, and that's just fine with the lefties.

Must be hard to keep those two sets of standards straight.

Uh-oh

2007-12-27T06:23:00.000-08:00

This can't be good:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States condemned an attack that killed Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, a U.S. State Department official said on Thursday.

"The attack shows that there are still those in Pakistan trying to undermine reconciliation and democratic development in Pakistan," the official said.

Bhutto was killed in a gun and bomb attack after a rally in the city of Rawalpindi on Thursday.

Still ruminating on what the outcome(s) might be, but I figured I'd get this out there for comment.

Iraqi Woman Walks Again

2007-12-26T17:38:00.000-08:00

Fair warning: If you think that the American Armed Forces are made up of people that are barely one step above Neanderthals, you might not want to read this article... the crushing of a stereotype can be very painful, and I want to save you the agony.

FORWARD OPERATING BASE HAMMER, Iraq – Standing upright and walking on her own is something 20-year-old Soham Hassan Ka-Naan, a young woman from Khargulia, never thought she would be able to do again.

After receiving her second prosthetic leg Dec. 20 at the 28th Combat Support Hospital in Baghdad, Soham was able to walk upright with the assistance of crutches.

Soldiers of Troop A, 3rd Squadron, 1st Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division found Soham in July, after an insurgent rocket attack hit her house, amputating both of her legs. Since then, she has undergone multiple trips to the 28th CSH for surgery, prosthetic fittings and physical therapy.

The journey was a painful one according to Soham; however, her final fitting leaves her pain free with two prosthetic legs. One of the legs fills in the missing calf and foot on her left leg, and the other extends from the beginning of her right hip.

“I am very happy, I have no pain,” she said through a translator. “I feel normal again.”

The Blackfive article (link in the title) includes a picture, and her smile says it all. A job well done, ladies and gentlemen. Give yourselves a pat on the back.

Peace March in Baghdad

2007-12-26T06:18:00.000-08:00

Got bad news for all those nattering nabobs of negativism who say that there is no hope for Iraqi Sunnis and Shiites to live together in peace:

BAGHDAD — Approximately 1,000 Iraqi citizens, of both Shia and Sunni religions, joined together on the sectarian fault line in Rawaniyah, the Karkh District of Baghdad, to march with one another in what they called a “Peace March”, Dec. 19.

It was an Iraqi initiative to ease sectarian tensions, solely driven by Iraqi Neighborhood Council (NAC) and District Advisory Council (DAC) leaders and Sheiks from both religious sects in the area, said Capt. Marcus Melton, commander of Pale Horse Troop, 4th Squadron, 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment, attached to the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault).

With Iraqi Army and Iraqi policemen maintaining the security on the streets and within the crowd during the event, they were able to successfully complete the march for united peace among all Iraqis.

Drums beat, children ran, silly string littered the air and one man nearly wept. It was an exciting, yet emotional day for the Iraqis who participated.

Just one more way the lefties have been wrong about Iraq.

Merry Christmas, lefties!

Christmas in America

2007-12-25T08:23:00.000-08:00

General George Washington--the first George W.--gave us a Christmas gift that many people don't know about. It's too good to excerpt, so just read it at the link in the title.

Christmas Blessings

2007-12-25T00:01:00.000-08:00

Now there were in the same country shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid. Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.

Luke 2:8-11, NKJV.

Yes, Virginia, There Really Was a Scrooge

2007-12-24T19:24:00.000-08:00

Fascinating stuff--to me at least:

He is synonymous with the traditional image of the Victorian English Christmas but Ebenezer Scrooge may have his roots much further afield.
According to Sjef de Jong, a Dutch academic, the Charles Dickens character may have been inspired by the real life of Gabriel de Graaf, a 19th century gravedigger who lived in Holland.
De Graaf, a drunken curmudgeon obsessed with money, was said to have disappeared one Christmas Eve, only to emerge years later as a reformed character.

Read the whole thing at the link in the title.

And as Tiny Tim said, God bless us--everyone.

It's Christmas Eve!

2007-12-24T07:42:00.000-08:00

And that means it's time for Norad's Santa Tracker!

While you're there, don't forget to stop by the Why We Track Santa page for the story on how it all got started.

The Jihad Is Over

2007-12-23T11:27:00.000-08:00

At least according to one Al Qaeda imam:

WASHINGTON — One of Al Qaeda's senior theologians is calling on his followers to end their military jihad and saying the attacks of September 11, 2001, were a "catastrophe for all Muslims."

In a serialized manifesto written from prison in Egypt, Sayyed Imam al-Sharif is blasting Osama bin Laden for deceiving the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, and for insulting the Prophet Muhammad by comparing the September 11 attacks to the early raids of the Ansar warriors. The lapsed jihadist even calls for the formation of a special Islamic court to try Osama bin Laden and his old comrade Ayman al-Zawahri.

The disclosures from Mr. Sharif, also known as Dr. Fadl and Abd al-Qadir ibn Abd al-Aziz, have already opened a rift at the highest levels of Al Qaeda. The group's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, a former associate of the defecting theologian in Egypt, personally mocked him last month in a video, remarking that he was unaware Egyptian prisons had fax machines. Meanwhile, leading Western analysts are saying the defection of Mr. Sharif indicates the beginning of the end for Al Qaeda.

So who is this guy?

Mr. Sharif, currently serving a life sentence in an undisclosed Egyptian prison, wrote in the 1980s two of the modern seminal texts for Sunni jihadism and in particular Al Qaeda, in "Fundamental Concepts Regarding Jihad" and "The Five Ground Rules for the Achieving of Victory or Its Absence." Those books are scholarly justifications, citing the Koran and Hadiths, for joining a war against Muslim apostates such as the Egyptian ruling class and for a broader jihad against the far enemy of America.

Oh, Senator Reid... do you still think the war is lost? Senator Edwards, is the war on terror still a bumper sticker?

Hillary's Donors

2007-12-20T17:11:00.000-08:00

More is coming out about people who've given money to Hillary:

The New York Times, which has discovered the identity of 97 donors who together gave or pledged $69 million early on, reports some of the million-dollar donors sought changes in policies and two of them were under Justice Department probes.

With the presidential election approaching, Clinton Foundation donations skyrocketed last year to $135 million, 70% more than the year before, with two-thirds of the booty from only 11 donors.

So much for Bill and Hil's populist image.

The former president steadfastly refused to reveal the donors' identities — including one super-rich donor giving $31.3 million.

We can certainly now see why. The $31-million-dollar man turned out to be Canadian mining mogul and founder of Lionsgate Entertainment (distributor of Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11") Frank Giustra, who plans to give another $100 million, plus half his future earnings.

Foreign contributions to presidential campaigns are illegal, but foreigners such as Giustra can anonymously give as much as they like to presidential foundations. So can the Saudi royal family, the king of Morocco, a United Arab Emirates foundation, and the governments of Kuwait and Qatar, all of whom reportedly gave undisclosed amounts to the Clinton Foundation.

That should make for interesting Mideast policy under Hillary.

Here at home, Anheuser-Busch gave $1 million after the Clinton administration's Federal Trade Commission agreed not to regulate beer, wine and liquor ads.

Chicago bankruptcy lawyer William A. Brandt Jr. pledged $1 million in 1999 as the Justice Department investigated whether he lied about using a big-money fundraiser for Clinton's 1996 re-election to lobby a top bankruptcy official. Later that year, Clinton's Justice Department cleared Brandt, who has since given big to Hil-lary's (sic) campaign.

When Loral Space and Communications' then-chairman, Bernard Schwartz, agreed to give $1 million in 2000, the firm was being investigated over whether it gave satellite technology to China. Under the Bush administration, Loral agreed to a $14 million fine.

Other million-dollar contributors got themselves deals on things like Medicare reimbursements for hospitals in Puerto Rico and special treatment on cell phone licenses from the Federal Communications Commission. One is an Iranian-born aviation executive who provided military equipment to Tehran during Iran-Contra.

Then there's the notorious income tax fugitive Marc Rich, pardoned by Bill after his ex-wife, Denise, gave $450,000 to the Clinton Library.

Corruption, thy name is Clinton.

More Alleged Push Polling

2007-12-20T06:11:00.000-08:00

Here we go again...

Presidential candidate John McCain asked yesterday for an investigation of thousands of calls to New Hampshire voters disparaging the Republican senator and supporting rival Mike Huckabee.
In a letter to the New Hampshire attorney general's office, McCain's campaign accused a Colorado-based nonprofit, Common Sense Issues, of illegally conducting push polling, which is asking questions intended to influence voters while pretending to take a poll.
"This push poll disparages John McCain, while, at the same time, urging support for Governor Huckabee," McCain adviser Chuck Douglas wrote. "We demand a full inquiry into these distressing and illegal calls."
Common Sense Issues responded that New Hampshire law doesn't apply to presidential primaries, only to other elections.
"This law isn't applicable to us," said Patrick Davis, the group's executive director. "This is a headline-grabbing release. I'm not surprised this is coming from the McCain campaign. . . . This is pretty straightforward. They didn't read the law."
The state law regulating push-polling says the caller must identify the candidate he is working for or against. Deputy Attorney General Bud Fitch said the law specifically exempts primary campaigns.
Common Sense Issues favors Huckabee but does not explicitly say so in the calls, which are similar to ones being made in Iowa, South Carolina and Florida.
Voters are asked if they know that McCain was part of a group "that derailed the nominations of 14 conservative judicial nominees." The callers also ask voters if they know McCain limited the free-speech rights of anti-abortion groups and pushed for campaign finance legislation.

First it was anti-Romney calls, now anti-McCain calls... Huckabee has been all over Romney for his religion (which is interesting when one considers how Huckabee responds to questions about his own record), which raises a suspicion in my mind... is it truly the Huckabee campaign behind this, and if it is, was it also Huckabee behind the anti-Romney push-polls?

This one is far from over, folks, and could really destroy the Huckabee campaign. Unfortunately, the failure of Huckabee could cause future problems for Christian candidates... I'm still ruminating on those effects, so more on that later.

Novak Sees Hope For Fred

2007-12-19T20:54:00.001-08:00

The latest Evans-Novak Political Report has some interesting tidbits about Fred (bold in original):

Thompson has far more upside potential than any other Republican, and he is spending the entire final stretch in the Hawkeye State. Thompson has perhaps the most broadly conservative record of any candidate besides the three congressmen (see below). Many conservative Iowans currently settling for Romney, Giuliani or Huckabee (or planning a protest vote of sorts for one of the congressmen) could certainly jump on board with Thompson. If he defies his reputation as a lazy worker, he could make a spectacular surge here.

Huckabee's high poll numbers and big leads do not guarantee a victory. He has nowhere near the campaign team, organization or money of runner-up Romney. As media scrutiny is finally arriving, he could be in trouble. Still, he is likable, and his openness about his Christianity plays very well among some blocs in the GOP.

Many Iowa Republicans like Huckabee because he comes across as genuine, especially in comparison to Romney. This is soft support that could bail to Thompson if he rises or to another candidate if Huckabee's negatives continue to surface.

Immigration is a big issue for Iowa Republicans, and Huckabee's support of state-subsidized education for illegal immigrants hurts him. His big-government record turns off some voters but is not a factor for some of his core supporters.

Huckabee's dig at Mormons in Sunday's New York Times magazine has turned off some Republican voters as dirty, bigoted or just politically dumb. This is the sort of thing that could bring him down.

--snip--

This battle will hinge on Thompson's performance down the stretch. If he excels, he could draw down Huckabee's support significantly, and maybe Romney's, too. If Thompson is as uninspired as he has been to date, Huckabee will probably win.

The most likely result at this point appears to be a slight Thompson surge at Huckabee's expense, leaving Romney in first place and either Thompson or Huckabee in second. Leaning Romney.

In other words, don't count Fred out yet.

I Couldn't Have Taken Ron Paul Apart Better Myself

2007-12-18T17:25:00.000-08:00

Professor Bainbridge takes apart Ron Paul's candidacy in a way I wish I'd done myself. It's one of those hard articles to excerpt, so just click the link in the title and read it for yourself.

By the way, Bainbridge points out his blog's comment policy, in part (or in toto) because of the well-documented online antics of the Ronulans. Therefore, permit me to remind everyone that my comment policy is posted here, and that it includes my right to delete or edit any post for any reason... and it's a sad thing when I have to remind the followers of any candidate about policies like that.

Huck's Christmas Ad

2007-12-18T06:27:00.000-08:00

Opinions seem to be mixed--even within one online publication--among conservatives about whether Mike Huckabee's Christmas ad will prove a net gain for his campaign, or a loss.

I, personally, come down on the latter side. Jim Geraghty explains it thus:

But it's worth noting that too much talk about Jesus in a political context can make folks look skeptically even on utterly innocuous uses of His name.

I would phrase it a bit differently... it seems to this lay preacher that Reverend Huckabee is turning what should be one of the holiest days in the year into a campaign sound bite. And, honestly, I agree it is likely to increase the skepticism overall, and that can't be good for Huck.

Bottom line, Huck is talking too much Jesus and not enough policy for a political election, and I think it will backfire on him. If he were running for, say, Archbishop of Washington or High Priest of America, it would be different, but the office of the Presidency is a secular, not religious, office.

Someone needs to remind Huck about that.

THE Quote of the Week

2007-12-16T18:51:00.000-08:00

From the pen--or is it keyboard these days?--of Mark Steyn:

This is the time of year, as Hillary Clinton once put it, when Christians celebrate “the birth of a homeless child” — or, in Al Gore’s words, “a homeless woman gave birth to a homeless child.”

Just for the record, Jesus wasn’t “homeless.” He had a perfectly nice home back in Nazareth. But he happened to be born in Bethlehem. It was census time and Joseph was obliged to schlep halfway across the country to register in the town of his birth. Which is such an absurdly bureaucratic over-regulatory cockamamie Big Government nightmare it’s surely only a matter of time before Massachusetts or California reintroduce it.

The sad part is, he's got a point.

Huckabee's Pardongate

2007-12-15T19:00:00.000-08:00

It's not just Wayne Dumond... there appears to really be something there:

Over the course of more than a decade as governor, Huckabee granted over 1,000 commutations and pardons, and they’re currently being examined closely by journalists. The latest to draw national attention is a commutation of Eugene Fields, who had multiple drunk-driving convictions.

The question is if there was there a connection between his wife Glenda Fields’s five-figure political donations and Huckabee’s action. On April 14, 2004, then-Gov. Huckabee commuted the sentence of Mr. Fields — then a four-time driving-while-intoxicated offender — granting him early release from prison. Fields, a resident of the western Arkansas town of Van Buren, was a habitual offender. He had already been convicted of DWIs in 1996, 1998, and 2000, but his 2001 felony-DWI conviction resulted in the maximum six-year prison sentence and a $5,000 fine.

Read the whole thing... link is in the title, as usual.

What is it about Arkansas governors?

VDH Debunks Conventional Wisdom on Iraq

2007-12-14T06:38:00.000-08:00

Military historian Victor Davis Hanson takes on several of the more common canards about Iraq and the broader war on terror, and tears them to shreds.

Washington is an echo chamber. One pundit, one senator, one reporter proclaim a snazzy “truth” and almost immediately it reverberates as gospel. Conventional wisdom about Iraq is rarely questioned. A notion seems to find validity not on its logic or through empirical evidence, but simply by the degree to which it is repeated and felt to resonate.

Read the whole thing--link is in the title, as usual--and bookmark it for quick reference when debating a lefty.

Victory a Non-Story

2007-12-13T18:16:00.000-08:00

Did you see this story in the news today?

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan and NATO-led troops killed, wounded and detained hundreds of insurgents during fighting in the Taliban's biggest stronghold, the Defence Ministry said on Thursday.
Musa Qala, in the southern province of Helmand, took on a symbolic importance after the Taliban seized it in February following the breakdown of a much-criticized local truce that allowed besieged British troops to pull out of the town in October last year.
Thousands of Afghan and NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) troops captured the town on Tuesday after one of the biggest operations the Afghan army has carried out.

"During the successful operation by ISAF and Afghan troops in Musa Qala, hundreds of insurgents including several commanders and tens of foreign fighters have been either killed, wounded or detained," Defence Ministry spokesman Zahir Azimi told a news conference.

I bet you didn't. I had to go digging for it, tipped off by an item in Investor's Business Daily.

Seems that victory in the war against Islamofascism isn't newsworthy.

And the leftymedia wonder why people aren't trusting them for news any more.

Good Ol' Arkansas Ethics

2007-12-12T17:40:00.000-08:00

Looks like the former governor of the great state of Arkansas has had questions raised about some gifts that he received while in office.

"there are reports that Huckabee received hundreds of gifts as governor the value of which exceeded $100,000 in one year. One of the donors apparently was appointed to a state commission. Huckabee and his wife also registered for gifts as they were planning to leave the governor's mansion and move into a home they had recently purchased. In a related matter, Huckabee removed the drapes from the governor's mansion when he left.
There was no violation here; the drapes had been one of the many gifts. As a friend from Arkansas told me, Huckabee wasn't a corrupt governor; just a tacky one."

You can take the politician out of Arkansas...

Columbian Trade Deal Gets a Boost

2007-12-12T17:30:00.000-08:00

Even though some Congressional Democrats are still opposing a trade deal with Columbia, there are signs that it may be coming to an end:

It matters little to them that Colombian trade unionists arrived this week from Colombia to urge passage of the pact that will beef up Colombia's unions. They want to punish an ally to show they still matter. Many obedient Democrats may still be in their pocket.

But two events this week may change that.

First, the captains of American industry stepped forward, urging Congress with one voice to extend the pact to Colombia. "Congress' vote on the U.S.-Colombia (pact) will shape the next decade of America's engagement with our hemisphere," the 19 chief executives wrote in a Dec. 11 letter. It was sponsored by the Emergency Committee for American Trade, representing CEOs from Microsoft, Citibank, McGraw-Hill, GM, Oracle, Intel, Coca-Cola, 3M, Procter & Gamble, Target, Wal-Mart and Exxon Mobil, companies that together employ six million Americans.

Hopefully, that might just focus minds in Congress.

In fact, some of these companies — such as Citibank, Oracle, Target, and Microsoft — have leaders associated with Democratic causes and campaigns.

But it's not just about big business or big labor. As the Office of the U.S Trade Representative has noted, the U.S. now has about $16 billion in trade with Colombia, $6.7 billion of that in exports. More than 8,000 U.S. businesses sell to that country. Those businesses aren't the big boys: 84% are small and midsize firms.

Latin America is a fast-growing market. With businesses of all sizes speaking up for the Colombia pact, change may be in the offing.

Peru is the other helpful factor.

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe made a spectacular state visit to Peru on Dec. 11. Not only did the leader get the red-carpet welcome, he got a big pledge from Peruvian President Alan Garcia to help his old ally get free trade.

"I want to say to everyone, Peruvians and especially to Colombians: This treaty of free trade that Peru has signed with the U.S. will not be complete until Colombia has signed the free trade treaty with the United States," Garcia declared.

Because Garcia is headed to Washington to sign the free trade agreement on Friday, it is likely he will urge congress to sign off on the Colombia pact, too.

Since the two trade pacts are essentially identical, it doesn't make much sense to agree to one and not the other... and if the Congressional Republicans are smart, they'll point this out loudly and often, to raise domestic support for the bill.

A Muslim You Need To Meet

2007-12-11T06:24:00.000-08:00

National Review has posted an interview--part one of three--with an American Muslim who has some interesting things to say:

A native of Wisconsin and the son of Syrian immigrants, joining the United States military was natural. I was raised to appreciate American freedom which guaranteed my right to life, liberty, and the practice of my personal faith of Islam, like in no so-called Muslim country. My grandfather used to talk about how the devastation of Syria brought by the military coups and the Baathists, and ultimately by Hafez Assad, was allowed to happen because moderate freedom-loving Syrians abandoned the military to the thugs, who ultimately repeatedly savaged the country, before entrenching the Assad family despots for generations.

I have always been a devout practicing Muslim maintaining a central personal spiritual relationship with God in my life. I have also held true to the importance of spiritual practices in my life including fasting, daily prayer, scriptural recitation, charity, community worship, and personal integrity. As a result, I have often been asked by the local communities in which I have lived, to speak about Islam, its role in my life, and my understanding of its history. Well, before 9/11, in the 1980s, as I found myself frustrated by the politicization of many but not all of the Muslim communities in which I participated, I began to focus on the main problem I experienced — the harmful impact of political Islam upon the practice of Islam in America. I slowly began to absorb as much information as I could about Salafism, Wahhabism, and its associated extremist ideology. I looked into the history and workings of the Muslim Brotherhood in America and realized that at some point anti-Islamists were going to need to take them on to rescue our faith from their clutches.

While I have never heard violence preached in any mosque I attended, I did hear conspiracy theories, anti-Semitism, anti-Americanism, and radical politics which often predominated instead of a focus on spirituality, humility, and moral courage. This led to a regular struggle with many, but not all, of the clerical leadership in many of the Muslim communities in which I have lived and participated. My refrain for decades has been to them, “why do you impose your Islamist agenda upon the congregants of your mosque who come to worship God, atone, and learn God’s scripture. Most of us don’t come to mosque to blame the world for our own maladies or to listen to your own political agenda.” I tried to intellectually counter them from within the community, but did so to no avail. For who was I to question clerical authority and interpretations? Who was I to take away their bully pulpit for Islamism?

Read the whole thing... the link, as usual, is in the title of this post.

NBC: No "Thank You" for the Troops - Updated and Bumped

2007-12-09T11:29:00.000-08:00

It's truly sad that this story has to appear on Pearl Harbor Day:

WASHINGTON — NBC has nixed holiday advertisements meant to thank troops for serving overseas in opposition to the inclusion of a non-profit's Web address.

The ads, paid for by the non-profit Freedom's Watch, are a simple thank you, the group says, with people shown paying gratitude to members of the military and the final frame showing the group's Web address, www.freedomswatch.org.

Click here and here to view the ads that NBC won't air.

NBC is refusing to air the ads as long as the address is included, according to an e-mail exchange between NBC and the group, which Freedom's Watch provided to FOX News.

"Per my previous email, the www.freedomswatch.org website will have to be redacted from the commercials for approval. This comes from Alan Wurtzel and Rick Cotton," according to one of the notes.

Wurtzel is president of research at NBC. Rick Cotton is general counsel for NBC Universal.

Well, I don't have any NBC censors here, so I will say it:

To all our vets, past and present, Democrat or Republican or Third-Party, Christian or Jewish, Hindu or Buddhist, atheist or Other... THANK YOU.

Update and BUMP: NBC blinks.

WASHINGTON (AP) — NBC reversed course Saturday and decided to air a conservative group's television ad thanking U.S. troops.
The ad, by the group Freedom's Watch, asks viewers to remember the troops during the holiday season. NBC had refused to air the ad because it guides viewers to the Freedom's Watch Web site, which NBC said was too political.
But in a statement issued Saturday evening, NBC said:
"We have reviewed and changed our ad standards guidelines and made the decision that our policy will apply to content only and not to a referenced Web site. Based on these amended standards the Freedom's Watch ad will begin to run as early as Sunday."
NBC' head of standards and practices, Alan Wurtzel, notified Freedom's Watch's media consultant Saturday by e-mail, writing: "This will confirm that the Freedom's Watch spot is approved for air."
Freedom's Watch President Bradley A. Blakeman welcomed the decision. "We're actually very happy that NBC has agreed to change its position because it will only help the troops be properly thanked," he said.

Score one for the good guys.

Of Course You Know, This Means War!

2007-12-08T15:10:00.000-08:00

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Press Secretary

________________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release December 8, 2007
STATEMENT BY WHITE HOUSE OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET
DIRECTOR JIM NUSSLE
According to news reports today, House and Senate Democratic leaders are nearing agreement among themselves on a mammoth omnibus spending bill, two-and-a-half months after the end of the last fiscal year.
Although the Administration has not seen the legislation, according to press reports it would include 18 billion in additional domestic and emergency spending above the President’s budget. When added to emergency domestic spending Congress already included in the Defense Appropriations bill, this so-called compromise would result in more excess spending than even the Democrats’ original budget included.
This is not fiscally responsible. Our economic growth and job creation cannot be taken for granted, and Congress should not burden taxpayers with billions of dollars in additional wasteful spending.
Press reports also suggest that the Democrats in Congress believe this excessive spending is the price for providing a fraction of the funding requested for our troops in the field. Instead of trying to leverage troop-funding for more pork-barrel spending, Congress ought to pass responsible appropriations bills and the funding for the troops our commanders say they need to build on their battlefield successes.
If presented a bill like the one described in today’s press reports, the President would veto it. If Congress insists on sending the President a budget-busting bill they know he will veto and that will not become law, they should also pass a continuing resolution that keeps the government running and provides the troops in the field the funds they need without disrupting the operations of the Department of Defense and the lives of hundreds of thousands of its employees and men and women in uniform.

Fred Gambles

2007-12-08T07:56:00.000-08:00

Fred, for good or for ill, has decided to risk everything on Iowa:

Des Moines, Iowa
FORMER TENNESSEE SENATOR Fred Thompson has decided to take his campaign and virtually all of its resources to Iowa in an all-or-nothing attempt to register a strong showing in the caucuses here on January 3. "We're getting ready to make this not only our second home, but our first home," he told a small gathering of supporters at the Polk County Convention Center on Friday night. Thompson and his wife Jeri chatted with the crowd before making their way through the exhibits at the Iowa Farm Bureau's annual meeting in downtown Des Moines.
Beginning Monday, December 17, Thompson will launch a bus tour that will take him throughout the state. From the beginning of that trip through caucus night, Thompson will essentially live in Iowa, taking only a one-day trip out of the state to celebrate Christmas at his home in Virginia.

This is kind of reminiscent of the way he first won his Senate seat, by hopping in an old pickup truck and touring Tennessee in it.

Let's hope his gamble pays off this time.

Five Still Serve

2007-12-07T21:26:00.000-08:00

Not much I can add to this:

PEARL HARBOR — They are the ironmen of their generation, living through Dec. 7, 1941, and the World War that followed, and defying the pitfalls of age and health into their 80s and 90s.

The five Pearl Harbor survivors who regularly volunteer at the USS Arizona Memorial Visitor Center here, talking and joking with tourists and signing autographs, may have lost a step or two, but not their wit.

"He's the old man right here," Alfred Rodrigues, 87, said while cocking his head toward Herb Weatherwax. "How old are you, Dad?"

Weatherwax, sitting at the same table, stated that he's 90.

"It's been 90 beautiful years. Beautiful," Weatherwax said. That excludes some dark times, though, such as witnessing the destruction of Pearl Harbor and Wheeler Army Airfield.

When a 55-year-old woman from New Jersey swoops over, plants a kiss on Rodrigues' cheek and says "Thank you" and starts to walk away, Weatherwax chimes in, "Hey, come back!" widening his ever-present smile.

That's how it goes when the aging survivors are holding court. They are a dwindling resource whose presence has become that much more precious as their ranks have thinned.
-snip-
The five regular volunteers come from both Navy and Army ranks. According to a National Park Service brochure:

•Robert Kinzler was in the 25th Infantry Division. During the attack, his company was ordered to take up a position at Roosevelt High School, and Kinzler saw the Pearl Harbor destruction.

•Weatherwax, who was born in Honolulu in 1917, received the instruction to report to his duty station at Schofield Barracks that morning.

•Sterling Cale, a Navy corpsman on Dec. 7, 1941, was in charge of the burial party removing bodies from the Arizona.

•Everett Hyland was serving aboard the USS Pennsylvania, which was in dry dock No. 1 on that morning, and was seriously wounded when a Japanese bomb exploded near his battle station.

•Rodrigues, who was born in Kapaa, Kauai, was at Bishop's Point at Pearl Harbor. He was issued a .30-caliber rifle and started shooting at the Japanese planes that passed overhead.

God bless all those who serve, and have served.

A Radical Idea For Dealing With Mass Murderers

2007-12-07T21:18:00.000-08:00

Ya know, I kinda like this idea:

The "gunman" in the Omaha episode was actually a teenager who desperately wanted the kind of publicity that the 24/7 media establishment could give him. He reportedly left behind a note proclaiming, "Now I'll be famous."

How did he know he'd be immortalized? Simple. He knew he could count on his enablers: The media would inevitably spread his fame by identifying him in reports in Omaha, across the U.S. and throughout the world.

We in the communications world practically enabled the kid by giving him, posthumously, what he wanted all along. Shame on us.

It doesn't have to be this way, though. What if the media covered all the nuances of the story but ceased naming the vicious and disturbed murderers who kill for the kicks of getting their names on the evening news and on the front pages of newspapers, magazines and Web sites?

I'm not saying it would stop all of them... but it might just stop some, and that would mean saving lives.

Democrats "Frustrated" They Can't Raise Taxes

2007-12-07T20:12:00.000-08:00

I kid you not...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Cracks are emerging in congressional Democrats' solidarity, as frustrated lawmakers concede their majority status is not enough to overcome Republican resistance on taxes, spending, Iraq and a host of other issues.

The fissures, which became obvious this week, are undermining Democrats' hopes for several key achievements this year. They also point to a bruising 2008 election in which Democrats will say Republicans blocked prudent tax and spending plans to score political points on immigration and other hot-button issues.

Republicans say they simply want to prevent higher taxes of any kind, even if the targets are not-so-sympathetic groups such as oil companies and hedge fund managers.

Let's see if I can't help the Party of the Donkey script those ads. How about, "We wanted to take more money from you, Mr. and Mrs. America, but the Republicans wouldn't work with us. Please vote for more tax-raising Democrats in the upcoming election."

Anyone else got any ideas?