October 19, 2007
The presidential campaign season is underway, so be careful what you do and say in the federal workplace -- especially in an e-mail.That was the key warning at a Senate hearing yesterday on the Hatch Act, which prohibits certain political activities in the federal workplace.
Sending or even forwarding an e-mail on your government computer that advocates the election or defeat of a political candidate can put you in violation of the law and possibly get you fired, federal officials said.
The Hatch Act, passed in 1939, restricts the political activities of federal employees, giving them a shield to ward off pressure from their supervisors or political bosses. Yesterday's hearing examined the law, how it is enforced and whether it may be too rigid in the age of the Internet.
Federal employees still cannot engage in political activity while on duty, in a government office, using a government vehicle or wearing an official uniform. They cannot run for office in a partisan election. They also cannot use their official authority to interfere with an election, and they cannot solicit or receive political contributions.
In 1993, Congress eased some of the restrictions to permit federal employees to take an active role in political campaigns. The changes have allowed federal employees outside of office hours to manage political campaigns, serve as delegates to political conventions, organize fundraisers and distribute brochures for a political party on Election Day outside polling places.
Too bad it didn’t look at the issue of federal employees soliciting campaign contributions on their blogs. I’ve seen a number of such incidents in recent weeks – despite the fact that the OSC indicates that federal employees may not “solicit or receive political contributions (may be done in certain limited situations by federal labor or other employee organizations).”
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Something remarkable happened at 44 Henry St., a grimy Chinatown tenement with peeling walls. It also happened nearby at a dimly lighted apartment building with trash bins clustered by the front door.And again not too far away, at 88 E. Broadway beneath the Manhattan bridge, where vendors chatter in Mandarin and Fujianese as they hawk rubber sandals and bargain-basement clothes.
All three locations, along with scores of others scattered throughout some of the poorest Chinese neighborhoods in Queens, Brooklyn and the Bronx, have been swept by an extraordinary impulse to shower money on one particular presidential candidate -- Democratic front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Dishwashers, waiters and others whose jobs and dilapidated home addresses seem to make them unpromising targets for political fundraisers are pouring $1,000 and $2,000 contributions into Clinton's campaign treasury. In April, a single fundraiser in an area long known for its gritty urban poverty yielded a whopping $380,000. When Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) ran for president in 2004, he received $24,000 from Chinatown.
At this point in the presidential campaign cycle, Clinton has raised more money than any candidate in history. Those dishwashers, waiters and street stall hawkers are part of the reason. And Clinton's success in gathering money from Chinatown's least-affluent residents stems from a two-pronged strategy: mutually beneficial alliances with powerful groups, and appeals to the hopes and dreams of people now consigned to the margins.
Interestingly enough, about one-third of these folks cannot be located using conventional means like property, telephone or business records. Some are unknown at the address they gave under campaign finance laws. Some indicate they gave contributions because they were ordered to, in a manner almost akin to a protection racket. And a few cannot even legally give to a campaign, as they lack a green card.
Did I just hear the other Hsu drop?
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October 18, 2007
A failed veto override on a major children's health insurance program yesterday prompted House Democratic leaders to promise to push a new version of the bill, daring Republicans to oppose them.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said the new proposal will contain only minor changes. Just before the vote, she had declared: "This is a banner issue for the Congress of the United States."
The vetoed bill would have expanded the $5 billion-a-year program by an average of $7 billion a year over the next five years, for total funding of $60 billion over that period. That would have been enough to boost enrollment to 10 million children, up from 6.6 million, and to dramatically reduce the number of uninsured children in the country, currently about 9 million, supporters say.
While Pelosi is willing to talk to Bush, she stressed that Democrats will accept nothing less than an expansion to 10 million children. "That's not negotiable," she said.
And therein lies the problem. Speaker 11% and Senate Majority Leader 11% and the rest of the 11% Party are so beholden to the Far Left "center" of their party that they are unwilling to consider substantive changes to the bill that could get it near unanimous support.
George W. Bush rightly vetoed the Democrat expansion of the GOP created and supported program, and now he and congressional Republicans are offering a somewhat larger expansion than initially proposed by the GOP -- I've heard figures around $11 billion, as well as the exclusion of illegal alien children and limits on those covered to "only" 300% of the poverty level. These are reasonable changes which Americans support. Will Speaker 11% quit playing politics with children's health and make sure that the children of the poor continue to receive medical coverage?
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Americans do not agree on the basic meaning of the last seven years. If you drive around an Ivy League college town -- home to the nation's best and brightest, allegedly -- you notice a wide range of bumper stickers, from the anticipatory ("01/20/09" -- the day of liberation from the Bush tyranny) to the profane ("Buck Fush") to the myopically self-indulgent ("Regime Change Begins At Home") to the exhibitionist paranoid ("9/11 Was An Inside Job"). Let's assume, as polls suggest, that next year's presidential election is pretty open: might be a Democrat, might be a Republican. Suppose it's another 50/50 election with a narrow GOP victory dependent on the electoral college votes of one closely divided state. It's not hard to foresee those stickered Dems concluding that the system has now been entirely delegitimized.
The problem, it seems, is not that the two sides are unwilling to talk. The problem is instead that one side has determined that any outcome other than one favoring them and their preferred policy outcomes is illegitimate. However, the American people have rejected those outcomes on a consistent basis in every presidential election since 1968. All but three of those races have been won by moderate-to-conservative Republicans – and the three victories by Democrats have been won by individuals who ran as centrist Democrats. New Deal liberalism – not to mention great Society liberalism – has been rejected by the American people at every opportunity. And since the more extreme liberals have been rejected nationally at every opportunity, these same liberals insist that it must be chicanery and fraud that has been at the heart of the defeats. After all, they have embraced the Marxist paradigm that their desired ends are “progress” (hence the adoption of the term “progressive”).
But if the Left rejects the legitimacy of the Right and the success of its ideas and policies (if not always its candidates), where is there room for dialogue? Wherein is the ground for compromise and collaboration when the most vocal elements of that Left coalition insist that their opponents are not merely wrong, but actually are evil and must be crushed? How can we achieve consensus when the starting point of one side is that the other is no different than Hitler and that compromise is collaboration of the sort engaged in by NorwayÂ’s Quisling or the Vichy government in France?
If politics is, as has oft been said, the art of the possible, does the intransigence and denunciation of deviation from the ideologically pure platform demanded by the most vocal element of the Left constitute the death-knell of the politics of consensus-building in America? And if one side becomes so invested in its ideology that the defeat of the American military by a foreign foe is seen as a net positive or its agenda, does there remain any hope for the future of American politics as we once knew it?
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"Where are you going to get that money? Are you going to tell us lies like you're telling us today? Is that how you're going to fund the war? You don't have money to fund the war or children. But you're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get enough kids to grow old, enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement," Stark said."President Bush's statements about children's health shouldn't be taken any more seriously than his lies about the war in Iraq. The truth is that Bush just likes to blow things up in Iraq, in the United States, and in Congress. I urge my colleagues to vote to override his veto," he continued.
The fact that this piece of filth feels safe enough to make such statements if proof that the President is not the dictator or violator of rights that the insane Left claims he is – if he were, then Stark would be hustled off to a prison or gunned down in the streets.
Instead he will be applauded by the rest of the pathologically dishonest Left as a hero – again, proving that the liberties of Americans are safe and sound.
Once upon a time, in a more civilized age, the President and Stark would appoint seconds to determine the date and place where the two men would settle this matter with pistols or sabers at dawn – though the content of his remarks prove that Stark is no gentleman, and he would therefore be unworthy of an affair of honor.
![S000810[1].jpg](http://rhymeswithright.mu.nu/archives/images/S000810[1].jpg)
![MrHankey[1].jpg](http://rhymeswithright.mu.nu/archives/images/MrHankey[1].jpg)
Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA) and Mr. Hankey (D-South Park)
Separated At Birth?
Michelle Malkin, Flopping Aces, Stop the ACLU and Right Voices remind us of Stark’s “greatest hits”, including harassing phone calls to constituents and homophobic insults directed at colleagues.
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((, 
D, oyvrgplm, 6837, avkmccdn, 685, October 17, 2007
Over the years, as it became Exhibit A for critics of shareholdersÂ’ class action lawsuits, the law firm of Milberg Weiss often enjoyed the support of Democrats who called the suits an invaluable weapon in the universal conflict between big business and the little guy.The Democrats, in turn, enjoyed the support of Milberg Weiss and its partners, who together have contributed more than $7 million to the partyÂ’s candidates since the 1980s.
Last year, the firm was indicted on federal charges of fraud and bribery. But the political partnership has not been entirely severed. Since the indictment, 26 Democrats around the country, including four presidential candidates, have accepted $150,000 in campaign contributions from people connected to Milberg Weiss, according to state and federal campaign finance records. And some Democrats have taken public actions that potentially helped the firm or its former partners.
The recent contributors include current and former Milberg partners who had either been indicted or were widely reported to be facing potential criminal problems when they wrote their checks. One, William S. Lerach, was a fund-raiser for John EdwardsÂ’s presidential campaign until his guilty plea last month. Melvyn I. Weiss, a founder of the firm, gave the maximum $4,600 to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York in June. Other firm members contributed to the presidential campaigns of Senators Barack Obama of Illinois and Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware.
I guess than Pelosi and Reid not only failed to drain the swamp, but they an their party's candidates are giving support to the alligators instead. But then again, corruption is a fine old Democrat tradition!
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In an interview with MSNBC's Norah O'Donnell this afternoon, Lynne Cheney revealed that while researching the Cheney family tree for her new book "Blue Skies, No Fences," she discovered that the Vice President Cheney and Barack Obama are related -- albeit distantly. According to Mrs. Cheney, the two politicians are eighth cousins.
*** Update *** The Obama campaign emails NBC/NJ's Aswini Anburajan that the Chicago Sun-Times actually wrote about this relation back in September, although the article notes that Obama and Cheney are 11th cousins -- not 8th cousins.
*** Update II *** Our mistake: The Sun-Times says that Obama and George Bush are 11th cousins, and Obama and Cheney are ninth cousins once removed. It seems we're all related....
What does it prove? Nothing.
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But some of the comments from RhodesÂ’ fellow lefties just deserve comment.
Adolph Hitler's right wing thugs regularly 'mugged' opponents and members of unpopular groups even before he came to power....Given Randi Rhodes courageous outspokenness about the sinister intentions of the right wing, it is not unreasonable to suspect that this non-robbery assault is an attempt by Neo-conservative thugs to silence her views.
Hitler was a National SOCIALIST – by definition, a left-winger. If you doubt me, look at his economic and political program and tell me which party it more generally tracks with. One hint – it begins with a D.
Have you ever noticed that when one of ours shoots one of theirs (Reagan, Ford, Wallace), it's always an amateurish lunatic like Squeaky Fromme or John Hinkley [sic] acting alone and without a plan or a mind, and that little or no blood spills, but that when they come after one of ours (Malcolm, JFK, MLK, RFK), it is a flawlessly executed surgical strike from triangulated professional snipers who leave no witnesses or other loose ends behind, just the corpse of a formerly great liberal leader and an unwitting patsy to take the fall (Oswald, Bremer, Sirhan)?
LetÂ’s look at this, can we.
JFK was shot by a Communist. That makes him one of yours.
RFK was shot by a Palestinian terrorist because RFK supported Israel. Again, that makes the perpetrator one of yours.
Malcolm was shot by his fellow Black Muslims. Again, that would make the assassins part of the leftoid coalition.
Dr. King was murdered by a racist criminal – I believe that would make him a part of the Democrat constituency as well (after all, the KKK was a Democrat paramilitary terrorist adjunct).
I could go on, but I wonÂ’t. Fortunately, this article does.
And by the way -- I hope Rhodes is doing better, and that she s fully recovered in time for her radio show today.
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This is the story of a defeated senator, his crying daughter, a Nashville songwriter and Martina McBride, the country music star.It begins in Pittsburgh on election night 2006. Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.), losing to Democrat Robert P. Casey Jr. by a wide margin, gathered his wife and six children around a hotel ballroom microphone and conceded.
The little girl at his side, Sarah Maria Santorum, then 8, wept. She squeezed her eyes and wiped her tears. She buried her face in her father’s arm, pulled away and cried some more — all on live, national television.
The image became an instant Internet sensation, fueled by snarky blogs like Wonkette, which declared it the “official screenshot of the 2006 congressional midterm elections,” and was debated for weeks on comment boards.
Now it’s a country music single.McBride released the song, “For These Times,” on Monday — a social commentary inspired, in part, by Sarah Maria Santorum.
* * * Hundreds of miles away from the Pittsburgh hotel, where the Santorum children took their pre-marked positions on stage — their names were scribbled on masking tape pressed to the floor — Leslie Satcher watched the election returns on a big-screen TV in her Nashville home.
The songwriter already had one hit with McBride (“When God-Fearin’ Women Get the Blues” in 2002), and was trying for a second.
Inspiration struck on election night.
Satcher and her husband — “big Fox News junkies” — were riveted by the scene.
“I saw the cameras zoom in on that little girl,” Satcher said.“That’s awful. They are not even showing Rick. They are showing her crying. She is hurting, and she knows her dad is hurting.”
As blogs parsed and parodied the image — some gleefully made fun of it, others questioned the wisdom of putting a distraught child in front of the camera — Satcher went to church. Her pastor held up the Bible.
“For these times in which we live, you are going to need this book,” he said. Satcher scribbled the words into the back of her book.
At 3 a.m., she wrote the song.
It is a song of love, of compassion, and of faith – things which are highly valued by most Americans, including Satcher, McBride, and the Santorum family.
The song pans the picture.
In these times in which we live
Where the worst of what we live
Is laid out for all the world on the front page
And the sound of someoneÂ’s heartbreak
Is a sound bite at the news break
With a close shot of the tears rollinÂ’ down their face
Blessed be the child who turns a loving eye
And stops to pray
For these times in which we live
One can think what one likes of Rick Santorum, but the exploitation of the image of that hurting child by the many of the same lefty bloggers who later decried even asking questions about Graeme Frost and his family is more than a little bit hypocritical. And their level of compassion is revealed in some of the comments connected to the Politico story IÂ’ve quoted above proves that compassion and decency are not concepts that they truly understand.
And let me add a note of full disclosure – my opinions of Rick Santorum go back significantly longer than most Americans. You see, we graduated from the same high school, though our school careers did not overlap (he’s class of 1976, I’m class of 1981). More than once during my high school years, I was compared to the future senator by teachers we were blessed to have shared. And I look forward to his eventual comeback, because I know that he is too good a man to be kept down by the results of the 2006 election.
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I have my candidate.
Bobby Jindal, the wiry and wired Republican son of Indian immigrants, doesn't look like a Louisiana good ol' boy and he doesn't talk like one either.At 36, he has a resume that should place him closer to retirement than to yet another career. A Rhodes Scholar, Jindal was accepted to the medical and law schools of both Harvard and Yale (though he attended neither). While still in his 20s, he served as president of the University of Louisiana System and as assistant secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He successfully reformed Louisiana's Medicaid program and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2004.
* * * St. Bernard Parish Sheriff Jack Stephens told me that many voters have "buyer's remorse," and, "we've come to place a high value on intellect."
Also, in the days after Katrina when state and local leaders were tangled up in red tape, Jindal materialized with his sleeves rolled up -- without cameras or fanfare -- and said, "What do you need?"
Shortly thereafter, trucks, food and medicine began arriving in St. Bernard, where most of the parish's 27,000 residential units were damaged or destroyed.
Dems are troubled by Jindal because he is too Catholic and too non-white for them. Speaking as a Republican, I could not care less about his ethnicity, and I find his strong faith (combined with his incredible intellect) to be appealing. After all, he and I are both members of the party that has always opposed racism.
Heck – I wonder if he might be a good fit as the VP candidate in 2008?
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tÂ’s the middle of October and Rudy Giuliani is still leading the race for the Republican nomination. His old enemies in New York canÂ’t understand it.
“It’s totally unbelievable,” said Charles Rangel, the dean of the New York Congressional delegation and a longtime adversary of Mr. Giuliani. “I refuse to believe that this could possibly happen to our country. I have too much confidence in our country to believe that this could really happen.”
On the other hand, I don’t have nearly as much confidence in our country – after all, two Bill Clinton terms proved how low the bar can be. And the fact that Hillary Clinton is the leading Dem candidate makes it even more obvious.
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October 16, 2007
In a phrase from the mouth of Bob Jones III:"This is all about beating Hillary."
Rudy is already using her to win the nomination as well. They all will. Just mention her name in a conservative direct-mail pitch and the money is yours. Will they also unload on any Democrat? Sure. But only one Democrat can raise the money for the GOP like she can - and already is. And only one brings (almost) everybody back into the big tent. There's a reason they're already bashing her. Because they know it works.
Given Mrs. Clinton's negatives, it is a strategy that could work.
That said, I wish it wasn't Bob Jones III, head of an institution with a rather sickening history (and theology) that was saying it. Just as I wish it was someone else making this important point.
"As a Christian I am completely opposed to the doctrines of Mormonism," he said. "But IÂ’m not voting for a preacher. IÂ’m voting for a president. It boils down to who can best represent conservative American beliefs, not religious beliefs."
I've said in the past, I'm voting for a president, not a theologian. I fundamentally disagree with many distinctly Mormon beliefs. But I'm voting for a political leader based upon political principles -- and if the best candidate is a Mormon (or a Buddhist, or a Hindu, or even a Muslim) I'll cast my vote for that individual with pride and joy, knowing that I have done my duty for my country.
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October 15, 2007
What is it about South Carolina, anyway?
Answer -- it is early. A crappy showing by Obama in the early states will derail his campaign, like happened with McCain in 2000 and Dean in 2004. The issue, therefore, is not the state, but is instead the calendar.
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Republican presidential hopeful John McCain is back, two months after he was given up for dead.For most of 2007, McCain was the prohibitive favorite among GOP voters. No one else came close.
Then, suddenly, his campaign — swollen with overhead and consultants — began to come apart at the seams.
It wasnÂ’t long before it reported a financial crisis: It was broke.
Roughly half of McCainÂ’s staff left or was let go. His longtime political soul mate, John Weaver, split, leaving McCain alone to run his campaign.
Meanwhile, the national media began to write McCainÂ’s political obituary. You almost could feel the one-time leaderÂ’s polling numbers dropping toward the single digits.
Today, amazingly, the campaign of the U.S. senator from Arizona is very much alive.
How?
McCain was helped by progress in Iraq and a strong showing in a recent New Hampshire debate.
Also, the John McCain of old is back, saying what he means and letting the chips fall where they may. He is much more comfortable campaigning as an insurgent than as an insider.
Sorry, but I won't be signing onto McCain's campaign any time soon. Other than Ron Paul and Sam Brownback, McCain is the last individual in the GOP race i would vote for. His hostility to the First Amendment is shocking, and i will not be a party to the destruction of that most precious part of the Bill of Rights by supporting his candidacy for the GOP nomination.
Indeed, I'm not sure that I could support the GOP ticket if he is on it in either spot -- though I think he would be a great Secretary of Defense or Homeland Security.
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In Olso Friday, the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize was not awarded to the Burmese monks whose defiance against, and brutalization at the hands of, the country's military junta in recent weeks captured the attention of the Free World.The prize was also not awarded to Morgan Tsvangirai, Arthur Mutambara and other Zimbabwe opposition leaders who were arrested and in some cases beaten by police earlier this year while protesting peacefully against dictator Robert Mugabe.
Or to Father Nguyen Van Ly, a Catholic priest in Vietnam arrested this year and sentenced to eight years in prison for helping the pro-democracy group Block 8406.
Or to Wajeha al-Huwaider and Fawzia al-Uyyouni, co-founders of the League of Demanders of Women's Right to Drive Cars in Saudi Arabia, who are waging a modest struggle with grand ambitions to secure basic rights for women in that Muslim country.
Or to Colombian President Àlvaro Uribe, who has fought tirelessly to end the violence wrought by left-wing terrorists and drug lords in his country.
Or to Garry Kasparov and the several hundred Russians who were arrested in April, and are continually harassed, for resisting President Vladimir Putin's slide toward authoritarian rule.
Or to the people of Iraq, who bravely work to rebuild and reunite their country amid constant threats to themselves and their families from terrorists who deliberately target civilians.
Or to Presidents Viktor Yushchenko and Mikheil Saakashvili who, despite the efforts of the Kremlin to undermine their young states, stayed true to the spirit of the peaceful "color" revolutions they led in Ukraine and Georgia and showed that democracy can put down deep roots in Russia's backyard.
Or to Britain's Tony Blair, Ireland's Bertie Ahern and the voters of Northern Ireland, who in March were able to set aside decades of hatred to establish joint Catholic-Protestant rule in Northern Ireland.
Or to thousands of Chinese bloggers who run the risk of arrest by trying to bring uncensored information to their countrymen.
Or to scholar and activist Saad Eddin Ibrahim, jailed presidential candidate Ayman Nour and other democracy campaigners in Egypt.
Or, posthumously, to lawmakers Walid Eido, Pierre Gemayel, Antoine Ghanem, Rafik Hariri, George Hawi and Gibran Tueni; journalist Samir Kassir; and other Lebanese citizens who've been assassinated since 2005 for their efforts to free their country from Syrian control.
Or to the Reverend Phillip Buck; Pastor Chun Ki Won and his organization, Durihana; Tim Peters and his Helping Hands Korea; and Liberty in North Korea, who help North Korean refugees escape to safety in free nations.
But I can understand the decision of the Swedish politicians who make up the selection committee. Faced with the possibility of giving the award to some individual or group that had engaged in real humanitarian work, often at great personal risk or cost, they instead made the courageous choice to give it to a washed-up politician who made an error-riddled film and who hypocritically lives a lifestyle with a sasquatch-sized carbon footprint while demanding that the rest of us cout back on our environmental impact -- or face government mandates that we do so.
After all, it was a morally superior move to try to embarrass the American president and seek to influence the American election. I mean, having previously given it to a terrorist, a communist dictator, and a lying novelist, why sully the Nobel Peace Prize by giving it to true workers for peace and human rights?
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October 14, 2007
On the day after Al Gore shared the Nobel Peace Prize, The Wall Street JournalÂ’s editors couldnÂ’t even bring themselves to mention Mr. GoreÂ’s name. Instead, they devoted their editorial to a long list of people they thought deserved the prize more.
Yeah, that some of us might argue that a bunch of human rights campaigners and courageous opponents of dictatorship are a wee bit more deserving of a Nobel Peace Prize than the Gore is obviously a sign of psychological problems -- NOT. After all, that is who the WSJ list includes, not Rush Limbaugh or a who's who of right-wing pundits.
Krugman then goes on to list other folks opposing the hypocritical carbon sasquatch who demands that everyone except him cut back on their "carbon footprint" while selling latter day indulgences to violators.
And given that there is not a clear scientific consensus in favor of man-made global warming (whatever the political or pop-culture consensus), opposition to the Gore agenda is not a sign of mental illness -- it is a sign of critical thinking.
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Our humanity has been compromised by those who use Gestapo tactics in our war. The longer we stand idly by while they do so, the more we resemble those “good Germans” who professed ignorance of their own Gestapo. It’s up to us to wake up our somnambulant Congress to challenge administration policy every day. Let the war’s last supporters filibuster all night if they want to. There is nothing left to lose except whatever remains of our country’s good name.
Rich earlier notes that a term in an American document on interrogation techniques is the same as one used in a Nazi document on the same subject, thereby constituting proof that the Bush Administration is no different that the Nazi regime, and the US has become Nazi Germany.
This is the classic reductio ad Hitlerum intended to cut off all debate or discussion -- and as such, as per common application of Godwin's Law, Mr. Rich loses.
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That is why this smear, which I condemned nearly a year ago, deserves repeated condemnation.
When Fox News aired a report in January claiming that Sen. Barack Obama had been educated at a radical Muslim madrassa, his campaign beat the story back — hard — with the candidate himself going on television to call it “ludicrous” and a “smear.”And his aggressive defense worked, or so it seemed at the time: The notion that Obama has secret Muslim roots faded from the mainstream media, and even from most conservative blogs and magazines.
But rather than vanish, the whispered smear campaign appears to have gone underground, and in its purest form: Obama himself, according to a pair of widely circulated anonymous e-mails, is a Muslim.
“Barack Hussein Obama has joined the United Church of Christ in an attempt to downplay his Muslim background,” warns an e-mail titled “Who Is Barack Obama,” that was circulating in South Carolina political circles this summer and sent to Politico by a South Carolina Democrat.
“The Muslims have said they plan on destroying the U.S. from the inside out; what better way to start than at the highest level?”
“Please forward to everyone you know,” it ended.
The other widely forwarded e-mail is titled “Can a good Muslim become a good American” and answers that question in the negative, before concluding: “And Barack Hussein Obama, a Muslim, wants to be our president!!!”
Why does the claim still have some credence? Because Obama himself indicates that he attended a Muslim school and studied the Quran as a child. This does not indicate that he was ever a practicing Muslim, but does show that there was at least a veneer of Islamic upbringing in his life. But how he was educated over 30 years ago does not indicate that he embraces Islam today -- and I accept him at his word that he does not.
Slightly more problematic is the perception of Barack Obama by Muslims abroad. As I pointed out earlier this year, there is reason to believe that some extremist elements might well view the son of a Muslim with a Muslim name and a Muslim education as a Muslim -- and, more importantly, as a Muslim apostate given his very public embrace of Christianity. I wish he would use that status to speak out forcefully for religious freedom in the Muslim world.
But regardless, none of the questions of religion and upbringing are a legitimate basis for opposing Barack Obama as a presidential candidate. There are much better reasons for doing so -- both the policies he proposes, and his lack of appropriate experience. I urge my fellow conservatives -- and any liberals involved as well -- to drop this line of attack.
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October 13, 2007
For Mr. Gore, it was winning the popular vote and having the election taken away from him by a Republican-dominated Supreme Court.
* * * Mr. Gore lost the presidency, but in the dignity and grace with which he gave up his legal fight, he united America.
What a load of crap. Al Gore sent people out into every county in Florida, seeking to invalidate GOP votes (especially those of our troops) while getting invalid Democrat votes counted. When he still lost under the laws in place on election day, he repeatedly sought to have them overturned and a court (any court) declare him victor. After he lost, Gore and his minions sought to overturn the results of the election in the Electoral College and then in Congress. We have spent the last seven years with Gore's acolytes insisting that he won the election when the US Constitution says otherwise -- and his actions following the 2000 election fostered the division and political acrimony that have followed for the last 7 years.
So I'm sorry, but Thomas Friedman is clearly trying to pass off fantasy as reality -- or he comes from a bizarro universe where black is white and up is down. Or he needs psychiatric medication.
More At The Van Der Galiën Gazette, Matt Ortega
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The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Gen. Michael V. Hayden, has ordered an unusual internal inquiry into the work of the agencyÂ’s inspector general, whose aggressive investigations of the C.I.A.Â’s detention and interrogation programs and other matters have created resentment among agency operatives.A small team working for General Hayden is looking into the conduct of the agencyÂ’s watchdog office, which is led by Inspector General John L. Helgerson. Current and former government officials said the review had caused anxiety and anger in Mr. HelgersonÂ’s office and aroused concern on Capitol Hill that it posed a conflict of interest.
The review is particularly focused on complaints that Mr. HelgersonÂ’s office has not acted as a fair and impartial judge of agency operations but instead has begun a crusade against those who have participated in controversial detention programs.
Any move by the agencyÂ’s director to examine the work of the inspector general would be unusual, if not unprecedented, and would threaten to undermine the independence of the office, some current and former officials say.
Now this is dangerous ground, I'll concede that. But if you have a supposedly neutral party that isn't neutral, isn't it reasonable that there be an investigation launched? Especially given the number of possible leaks and one-sided assessments that have come out of the IG's office.
Some don't see it that way.
Members of the House and Senate intelligence committees expressed concern today about an unusual inquiry into the work of the Central Intelligence Agency’s inspector general, John L. Helgerson, saying that it could undermine his role as independent watchdog.The inquiry was ordered by General Michael V. Hayden, the C.I.A. director. Representative Silvestre Reyes, the Texas Democrat who is chairman of the House committee, called news of the inquiry “troubling,” noting that the inspector general’s independence is written into law.
“It is this independence that Congress established and will very aggressively preserve,” Mr. Reyes said in a statement.
Senator Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon, said he was sending a letter to Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, asking him to instruct General Hayden to drop the inquiry.
“I just don’t want to see I.G.’s intimidated,” said Mr. Wyden, using the abbreviation for inspector general. “People who know they’re doing the right thing are not afraid of oversight.”
Interestingly enough, Reyes and Wyden are both partisans that like the fact that the Inspector General's office has operated as it has, consistently taking positions supported by the Democrats rather than the administration. They certainly don't want that to stop -- even if it is the result of ideology, not impartial investigation. But it begs the question -- what should be done if the IG is not being impartial and independent?
Well, there are two routs.
Under federal procedures, agency heads who are unhappy with the conduct of their inspectors general have at least two places to file complaints. One is the Integrity Committee of the PresidentÂ’s Council on Integrity and Efficiency, which oversees all the inspectors general. The aggrieved agency head can also go directly to the White House.If serious accusations against an inspector general are sustained by evidence, the president can dismiss him.
Both those routes avoid the awkward situation officials describe at the C.I.A. and preserve the independence of the inspector general.
Which, of course, would result in all sorts of political problems, given that the issue is whether or not the Inspector General's office is operating with a bias against the President's own policies. It would appear, even if it were not true, that there was an attempt to undermine the office's independence.
And besides -- where do you get the evidence that could sustain the accusations of wrongdoing unless you conduct an investigation.
Catch-22.
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I can't say I read him very often but I came across this chilling post of his from last week. It's an attack on any independent thought outside of the situational demands of a political coalition. It is a full-throated and not-even-regretful support for the subjugation of free inquiry and free ideas to the demands of political organization. It makes Sidney Blumenthal seem intellectually honest. Money quote:Roger Cohen may feel like he is a liberal hawk, and thus distinct. But what Roger Cohen feels does not matter, because Roger Cohen does not control any branch of the American military. Who he empowers, and which actors in American politics find their ideas legitimized by his columns, is all that matters. And in that, he is worse than a neoconservative. He's a liberal hawk who knows better, but whose interest in writing about his own virtue overwhelms his judgments concerning the actual actions of those who wield power. He is not a neoconservative. He is a narcissist.
Klein slips in a bogus word here: feels. Cohen doesn't feel he is a liberal hawk; he believes he is. He has arguments to make, arguments that can be agreed with or disagreed with, but that have merits of their own that should be addressed regardless of the arrangement of political power at the time. This isn't narcissism; it is the duty of any writer and thinker to state his own views as best he can without concern for how the world might greet them, who might use them unfairly, or who might expropriate them for insincere purposes. Without this independence, a writer is merely a hack. Or, worse for a writer, an activist.
Now I'll be honest -- I am not always a fan of Sullivan, and I view him as being completely wrong-headed on a number of issues, especially as regards his comments on people of faith daring to participate in the political process. But here he points to a really dangerous notion swirling on the Left -- that the needs and ideology of the Party must take precedence over the free and forthright expression of one's own views.
The Washington Post reported on such demands for ideological purity yesterday.
Sounds more like these folks have taken the CPUSA from the 1930s to the 1950s as their model. But then again, we should have known that from watching their treatment of Joe Lieberman last year.
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October 11, 2007
Former Vice President Al Gore and the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize Friday for their efforts to spread awareness of man-made climate change and lay the foundations for counteracting it.''I am deeply honored to receive the Nobel Peace Prize,'' Gore said. ''We face a true planetary emergency. The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity.''
Gore's film ''An Inconvenient Truth,'' a documentary on global warming, won an Academy Award this year and he had been widely expected to win the prize.
That would be the same film that was just ruled to be so highly inaccurate that it must be labeled with disclaimers before it can be shown in British schools.
Given that the Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to terrorists and liars in the past, I guess I should not be surprised or alarmed that it goes to a hypocritical fraud this year. The award has long since lost the credibility it has when it was given to truly heroic figures like Martin Luther King, the Dalai Lama and Mother Teresa.
To paraphrase another former Democrat Vice President, today's announcement proves that the Nobel Peace Prize isn't worth a bucket of warm piss.
More at Malkin
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October 10, 2007
Fred Thompson’s radio, television and movie career gave him a high profile that has helped his fledgling presidential campaign.It also made him rich — and that could provide fodder for opponents who have worked to cast the Republican as more style than substance.
Thompson, a former Tennessee senator who is perhaps best known for his role in NBC crime drama “Law & Order,” earned as much as $12.1 million since Jan. 1, 2006, from his various entertainment-related gigs, according to a report released Wednesday by the Federal Election Commission.
The report, which is mandatory for presidential candidates, lists only wide value ranges for income, assets and debts.
But it shows entertainment likely accounted for significantly more than half — and possibly as much as 75 percent — of Thompson’s income of as much as $16.5 million between Jan. 1, 2006, and last month, according to a Politico analysis.
Equally relevant is this National Enquirer report of an affair between John Edwards and a campaign staffer.
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No sooner did Alberto Gonzales resign as attorney general last month than he retained a high-powered Washington criminal-defense lawyer to represent him in continuing inquiries by Congress and the Justice Department.
Now that strikes me as a prudent move -- and one certainly contemplated by our Constitution, which enshrines the right to an attorney in the Bill of Rights. Why, then, does the subtitle of the article, which says Gonzales wants to "beat the rap", make it sound like the exercise of that right is somehow suspicious, or an admission of guilt?
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He does not look well. His slogan should be 'tanned, rested and in remission.' And I'm not making fun of his health problems.
Notice the lie at the end of his statement. Yes, Mr. Maher, you are making fun of his cancer.
I’m curious – when will you make Elizabeth Edwards’ cancer a subject of your humor?
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October 09, 2007
Rep. Henry Waxman has asked his investigative staff to begin compiling reports on Limbaugh, and fellow radio hosts Sean Hannity and Mark Levin based on transcripts from their shows, and to call in Federal Communications Commission chairman Kevin Martin to discuss the so-called "Fairness Doctrine.""Limbaugh isn't the only one who needs to be made uncomfortable about what he says on the radio," says a House leadership source. "We don't have as big a megaphone as these guys, but this all political, and we'll do what we can to gain the advantage. If we can take them off their game for a while, it will help our folks out there on the campaign trail."
Using public funds to conduct political witch hunts to silence media critics for partisan gains.
When Nixon did it, he kept it secret and was roundly condemned for his “enemies list”.
When Democrats do it, they proclaim it proudly to the world and call it “congressional oversight”.
I call it what it is – a step towards tyranny and censorship.
I can already hear the question asked of witnesses at the hearings:
"Are you now, or have you ever been, the host of a conservative talk radio show, or a listener or caller to such a show?
Others outraged at Wizbang, 186 KPS, Freedom Eden, Mark Levin Fan, Radio Equalizer, UCV, Second Hand Conjecture, Riehl World View, Violence Worker, QandO
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October 08, 2007
The ethics law bars lobbyists from giving gifts to lawmakers or their aides. What happens, then, if a lobbyist wants to give a staffer a very special gift -- an engagement ring? Is that allowed?No, it's not, Nirenberg says. But that's not the end of the story. A senator can grant a waiver of the gift ban, subject to review by the ethics committee. In the House, the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct can waive the rule, and does so routinely.
"So, if you want to give your girlfriend who works in the Senate an engagement ring, you are going to have to ask permission from not only her father, but also from her senator, and maybe from the ethics committee, too," Nirenberg says.
Given the cycle of staffers from Legislative branch to Executive branch to lobbying firms and back again, these relationships are inevitable. Banning them is neither practical nor desirable. Hopefully they can get a technical fix made to the legislation in the name of allowing human beings to be human beings.
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AL'S NOBEL PRIZE....Will Al Gore win the Nobel Peace Prize this Friday, as the London Times speculates? I certainly hope so.
This isn't because I think it will prompt him to run for president. It won't. It's not even because I think he's necessarily done the most for world peace in the past year. Rather, it's because this would be a huge prospective triumph. If Gore does win, I expect it to cause a massive collective seizure among the conservative crackpot brigade, and that would do more to advance the cause of world peace than anything else I can think of. So I'm rooting for you, Al.....
Of course, that comes from a liberal, so we certainly can't accuse him of being hateful, can we.
Too bad Kevin Drum is unwilling to come out in favor of someowne pushing for freedom in the face of a real threat to the world -- someone who has put her life on the line. You know, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, whose words on behalf of women's rights and against the oppressive practices of traditional Islam have painted a target on her back. Someone who has experienced the horrors of female genital mutilation and forced marriage only to fight back against the misogyny they represent.
But then again, what is her experience when compared to that of the guy who did the voice-over narration on a biased film and put his name on a ghost-written book of junk science?
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Republican lawmakers blasted Sen. Hillary Clinton Monday after learning that the campaign is taking advice from Sandy Berger, a former top aide to President Bill Clinton who admitted stealing classified documents and disposing them.
* * * Berger was Clinton's national security adviser from 1997 until 2001. In 2003, while preparing for the 9/11 commission hearings, he took copies of secret documents from the National Archives and later destroyed them. He was caught a few days after absconding with papers from the archive's College Park, Md., facility, and lied to investigators.
The New York Democrat's campaign downplayed the fact, saying Monday that Berger is an informal, unpaid adviser to the campaign, something ascribed to many people associated with the campaign. Berger has been a longtime friend of both Clintons.
"He has no official role in the campaign," spokesman Blake Zeff said.
Will the Democrats be so forgiving if Tom DeLay becomes an unpaid adviser to a GOP candidate -- especially since he has not been found guilty of anything, and certainly not of obstructing an investigation into how the Clinton Administration left America unprepared for 9/11 when it slithered out of Washington.
I'd be outraged at the lapse of judgment on Senator Clinton's part, were it not for the fact that we already were aware how poor her judgment really is. After all, she married -- and remains married to -- Bill Clinton.
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October 07, 2007
Geoffrey Wheatcroft compares the nepotistic path used by Hillary Rodham Clinton to achieve power with the meritocratic efforts of a Thatcher or a Meir or a Merkel, actual rather than phony feminists, who never tried to wield power by marrying it. He also points out the lack of experience that Clinton has in governing anything:
Seven years ago, she turned up in New York, a state with which she had a somewhat tenuous connection, expecting to be made senator by acclamation (particularly once Rudy Giuliani decided not to run against her). Until that point, she had never won or even sought any elective office, not in the House or in a state legislature. Nor had she held any executive-branch position. The only political task with which she had ever been entrusted was her husband's health-care reforms, and she made a complete hash of that.She got that job through pure nepotism and cronyism. And her use of a man's power to fuel her own was a major setback for American feminism. But she continues, deploying her husband's presidency as a reason to vote for her.
Bravo, Andrew, for pointing out what many on the right wish to say but fear saying because of the possibility of being labeled misogynistic -- Hillary Clinton has no real qualifications for the presidency other than being a member of the non-exclusive club composed of women who have had sex with Bill Clinton. And while she does have the distinction of being the only one to be married to the former Gonad-in-Chief, that tells us of nothing other than her lack of judgment.
There are women on both sides of the political divide who ought to be given serious consideration for the presidency. These include Condi Rice, Kay Baily Hutchison, Nancy Pelosi, and both senators from California, to name a few who spring to my mind. Each has a record of accomplishment and has achieved office based upon her own merits. That cannot be said of the Democrat front-runner.
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October 06, 2007
Under federal investigation for embellishing his Army service in Vietnam, a groggy-sounding Mayor Robert Levy called in sick at City Hall, climbed into his city-issued Dodge Durango and seemingly dropped off the face of the Earth.A spokesman issued a 36-word statement saying the mayor was going on indefinite medical leave. That was a week and a half ago. Aides say he is in a hospital, but they won't say where, why or for how long.
The mystery and the gathering scandal over Levy's military record have worried civic leaders in this seaside casino resort, which has a long history of corruption, with four of the last eight mayors busted on graft charges and one-third of last year's nine-member City Council in prison or under house arrest.
Given the charges and the admission from the mayor of the inaccurate information that Levy has been putting out about his military service, I wonder if the Democrats will permit us to call him a "phony soldier".
Interestingly enough, in this story the mayor's party affiliation is as MIA as the Mayor Levy himself. You know that wouldn't happen if he were a Republican, either.
But I do wonder one thing -- is there any chance of making Larry Craig do the same thing?
MORE AT STACLU
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The fugitive couple had been waiting on their porch for nearly eight months for law enforcement officials to make their move. "The word is 'poised,' " Ed Brown said recently, handgun wedged in his jeans, AK-47 assault rifle behind the door, as he stared at a yard of cut grass and bags of explosives hanging from trees. His wife, Elaine, kept her pistol inside a pouch with her reading glasses.Ed Brown, 65, a retired exterminator who was involved in the "patriot" militia in the 1990s, and Elaine, 67, a dentist, do not believe that the federal government has the authority to tax income. In January, after a decade of not paying tax on nearly $1.9 million in earnings, a judge found them guilty of tax evasion and, four months later, they were sentenced in absentia to 63 months in prison.
Refusing to "surrender," in February they barricaded themselves in their estate in this New Hampshire town of 2,200, warning that any attempts to arrest them would end in bloodshed. They said they could sustain themselves "indefinitely" with solar and wind electricity generators, after federal agents cut their power and phone lines.
But, in the end the authorities got them, not by a full frontal assault but by trickery.
Late Thursday, U.S. marshals posing as supporters entered the Browns' property and arrested them on their porch without incident. "They invited us in, and we escorted them out," U.S. Marshal Stephen Monier told the Associated Press.
Just remember what the lunatic fringe think about these folks.
"I compare them to people like Gandhi, who's willing to speak out and try to bring about change in a peaceful manner; Martin Luther King fought laws that were unfair and unjust, and he suffered, too." -- Congressman Ron Paul
One more reason that Ron Paul is unfit for any office.
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October 05, 2007
Most conservatives are more careful than Mr. Kristol. They try to preserve the appearance that they really do care about those less fortunate than themselves. But the truth is that they arenÂ’t bothered by the fact that almost nine million children in America lack health insurance. They donÂ’t think itÂ’s a problem.
Actually, Paul, most of us do think it is a problem. Indeed, I’d argue that all of us agree that it is a problem. Where we depart company with you and your fellow socialists is on the solution to the problem. You think that government is the one-size-fits-all solution to this and every other “crisis” that you and your fellow left-wingers discover in the world. We recognize that the private sector, either through business or private charity, can solve these problems easier and more efficiently – and often has in the past.
As one example, consider the fact that most of the hospitals in most communities around the country have (or had) religious ties. They were, at their outset, hospitals designed to provide care to both paying customers and to charity cases who could not afford treatment. What happened? Government happened, and with the advent of Medicare and Medicaid these hospitals were relegated to government contractor status that undercut that charitable mission. After all, government imposed regulations imposed great limits on free and reduced-price care for private individuals – because that discount given to a poor family would become the benchmark from which all payments from government would be determined. As the 800-pound gorilla in the room, Big Government is able to demand – and legislatively enforce – the most favorable terms on its own behalf, and if that means that St. Miscellaneous Hospital is no longer able to engage in the sort of charity it used to, that is just too bad. And if the cost in red-tape and paperwork increases the cost of medical care for all of us, to the liberal that just proves how badly government needs to be involved in a field where it had no business in the first place.
Krugman, of course, isnÂ’t content to merely disagree with his opponents, or even to misrepresent their ideology. Instead, he ascribes moral and psychological deficits.
What’s happening, presumably, is that modern movement conservatism attracts a certain personality type. If you identify with the downtrodden, even a little, you don’t belong. If you think ridicule is an appropriate response to other peoples’ woes, you fit right in.And Republican disillusionment with Mr. Bush does not appear to signal any change in that regard. On the contrary, the leading candidates for the Republican nomination have gone out of their way to condemn “socialism,” which is G.O.P.-speak for any attempt to help the less fortunate.
So once again, if youÂ’re poor or youÂ’re sick or you donÂ’t have health insurance, remember this: these people think your problems are funny.
As, opposed, to the Left, which tends to attract megalomaniacs who believe they should control the lives and destinies of others, and weak, dependent personalities who are psychologically inclined to accept such domination. So if you are poor, or sick, or without insurance, remember this: these people think you are children to be coddled and slaves to be controlled.
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October 04, 2007
Would conservatives and Republicans support the war in Iraq if they had to pay for it?That is the immensely useful question that Rep. David Obey (D-Wis.), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, put on the table this week by calling for a temporary war tax to cover President Bush's request for $145 billion in supplemental spending for Iraq.
Uh, Mr. Dionne, we already are paying for it. Unlike large parts of the Democrat constituency, we actually do pay taxes.
The proposal is a magnificent way to test the seriousness of those who claim that the Iraq war is an essential part of the "global war on terror." If the war's backers believe in it so much, it should be easy for them to ask taxpayers to put up the money for such an important endeavor.
See the point above -- we are already paying taxes to support the military and to fight the war in Iraq.
Obey makes the case pointedly. "Some people are being asked to pay with their lives or their faces or their hands or their arms or their legs," he said in an interview this week. "If you're going to ask for that, it doesn't seem too much to ask an average taxpayer to pay 30 bucks for the cost of the war so we don't have to shove it off on our kids."Or as Obey said in a statement, "I'm tired of seeing that only military families are asked to sacrifice in this war."
Senator -- some people volunteered to be a member of the military. It isn't like they were shanghaied off the streets of America, only to wake up with a drug-induced hangover to find themselves in desert camos in the middle of a desert with a weapon in their hand. Using your argument, though, we should actually be adopting THAT as policy as well -- or a draft, which morally amounts to the same thing. You ready to advocate for the draft, Senator? Or better yet, mandatory military service for every adult, no exceptions permitted?
And i remind you, Senator, we taxpayers are already paying for the war. Maybe you could cover the cost of the war by undoing the Bush tax cut that took the percentage of Americans paying income taxes to under 50%. But you won't do that -- after all, those net consumers of government largesse are more likely to be Democrats, and you certainly wouldn't want to expect them to shoulder any of the citizenship obligation to pay for national defense.
And as one who grew up as a part of one of those military families, I find your statements of concern for military families today to be uninspiring. After all, I remember being told my father was a war criminal when I was a kid because he was off in Vietnam -- and your side of the debate on the war continues to make such claims today.
Unfortunately, the Democratic leadership ran away from this idea as fast as you can say the words "Republican majority." That, of course, is what Democrats are afraid of. "Just as I have opposed the war from the outset," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, "I am opposed to a war surtax."Obey doesn't hold this against his leadership. "They don't want to be demagogued by the White House when they have other fish to fry," he said.
Well that was a wise decision on their part. It would be really bad to argue that we need to impose an extra tax to pay for national security and defense -- a core function of the federal government under the US Constitution -- so we don't have to scrimp on entitlement programs and transfer payments that would cause the authors of that document to whirl dervishly in their mausoleums.
I mean it does seem rather freakish to argue that we need to pay an extra tax for the military so that we can continue farm subsidies that jack up food prices and create an entitlement program for middle class and wealthy children out of general revenues. Why not impose a surtax for those programs instead -- how many Americans would be prepare to pay extra for those programs?
But it's a shame that Democrats remain so defensive on the tax issue that they aren't willing to bring this proposal to the floor. What if the price for passing President Bush's supplemental appropriation were a tax to cover its costs? What if opponents of the war voted no because they are against Bush's policy and Republicans voted no because they think low taxes are more important than national security as they define it?That's an aggressive way to frame any such antitax "no" votes, but it's also accurate. If a war appropriations bill with a tax included went down to overwhelming defeat, wouldn't that tell us something about the depth of commitment to this war?
Again, this could be argues with any social program. Why not a surtax for AFDC or WIC? Why not a surtax to pay for the subprime mortgage bailout program Democrats want? Why not one for Medicaid? Why not one for the Earned Income Credit that gives a refund to Americans of withholding taxes they never paid? And since you folks now oppose the Bush tax cuts, why not recover that money by repealing the elements of those cuts that took Americans off the tax rolls, on the grounds that national defense and national security mandate that more Americans begin paying taxes. Indeed, why not require every American earning above the poverty line begin paying taxes -- especially since they are the net consumers of the social services that you want to pay for with general revenue instead of defense and national security?
The Obey surtax, co-sponsored by Reps. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and John Murtha (D-Pa.), envisions a sliding scale running from roughly 2 percent on the taxes paid by lower-income Americans to 15 percent on upper-income Americans. Since wars are waged, in principle, on behalf of the entire country, this is the rare Democratic tax proposal that does not put the entire burden on the rich.
But yes it does, EJ -- it puts the burden on less than 50% of Americans. Why not advocate placing that burden of taxes upon every single American?
The plan does not ask for a tax to cover the $45 billion in Bush's supplemental request to pay for the war in Afghanistan. "There are legitimate expenditures on which we don't mind sharing the costs with future generations," Obey says, noting that there is a broad consensus that the fight in Afghanistan is in the long-term interest of the country. It might be less gimmicky to pay for both wars now, but some revenue is better than none.
Well let's pay for it now -- tax the untaxed now!
Ah, you say, but this is just symbolic politics. I don't think so, but let's assume it is. This idea is far more serious than the utterly empty fight Bush is about to pick with Congress over a $21 billion to $23 billion difference in spending in a federal budget that totals some $2.7 trillion.
But EJ -- are you and the Democrats saying that we have money for additional discretionary spending in all these other areas, but not for national security and national defense? And why are you trying to shift the burden for these unnecessary programs on to future generations? Why not a surcharge to pay for them? Could it be that this plan to treat the core federal function of national security and defense as the equivalent of supersizing a fast food value meal is simply a gimmick intended to abandon our troops in the field or snatch defeat from the jaws of victory for political purposes?
Here is a president who signed one bloated spending bill after another -- as long as they were passed by a Republican Congress -- posing as a fiscal conservative now that Democrats are in the majority. He's so tough and determined that he's also drawn the line on . . . children's health care.Bush has often let it be known that he hates "small ball" politics. But there is nothing smaller or more trivial than a budget fight over a difference that any responsible president could easily resolve in negotiations with Congress. War spending aside, Obey says it would take no more than a week to reach a reasonable compromise on the overall budget if the White House would just engage.
And if the president believes in this war so much and doesn't want to raise taxes, let him propose the deep spending cuts it would take to cover the costs. Then Bush would show how much of a priority he believes this war is -- and he wouldn't be playing small ball.
Hey, I'm all for big cuts in spending -- and I find it interesting that you and the Demcrats don't find a single dollar to trim anywhere, but instead propose a new surtax.
But then again, we know from experience what happens to such surtaxes. Americans were paying one imposed to cover the costs of the Spanish-American War, which occurred at the end of the 19th century, into the early years of the 1st century. This is really a stealth permanent increase in taxes, disguised as an anti-war measure. I'm sure that you already have your column written offering proposals on how to spend the money it raises once the Democrats have forced a withdrawal after the surtax has been collected.
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Idaho Sen. Larry Craig defiantly vowed to serve out his term in office on Thursday despite losing a court attempt to rescind his guilty plea in a men's room sex sting."I have seen that it is possible for me to work here effectively," Craig said in a written statement certain to disappoint fellow Republicans who have long urged him to step down.
Craig had earlier announced he would resign his seat by Sept. 30, but had wavered when he went to court in hopes of withdrawing his plea.
The third-term lawmaker issued his statement not long after Idaho Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter relayed word he has selected a replacement for Craig in the event of a resignation.
"He is ready to act should we receive a letter of resignation," said Jon Hanian, Otter's spokesman in Boise, in what seemed like a calculated signal that home-state Republicans want Craig to surrender the seat he has held for 17 years.
In his statement, Craig said he will not run for a new term next year.
But in the meantime, he said: "I will continue my effort to clear my name in the Senate Ethics Committee — something that is not possible if I am not serving in the Senate."
Now I still contend that the charges in Craig's case were legally insufficient -- but that guilty plea made the issue irrelevant and led to the court taking the action it did. And given Craig's announcement of his plans to resign, he ought to go now -- if he really has the contrition he claimed.
And I will point out a stark difference here.
Democrats such as Patrick Kennedy can commit more serious offenses which endanger others and still be embraced by their party. Republicans set a higher bar.
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October 03, 2007
Having abandoned for now their effort to force President Bush to withdraw troops from Iraq, Democrats are not giving ground against a lesser nemesis: Rush Limbaugh.With the help of liberal advocacy groups, the Democrats in Congress are turning Mr. Limbaugh’s insinuation that members of the military who question the Iraq war are “phony soldiers” into the latest war of words over the war.
A resolution introduced by 20 Democrats urges the House to condemn the “unwarranted slur” made by Mr. Limbaugh, though it does not condemn the broadcaster himself.
Right there is the problem. Nowhere in this article is there any indication that the reporter, Carl Hulse, has even gone back and examined the unedited transcripts and audio of the show in question. Indeed, he takes at face value the partisan claims of Media Matters and the Democrats that Limbaugh did, in fact, call any anti-war veteran a “phony soldier”. The only problem, of course, is that Rush Limbaugh did not say that, and one would assume that journalistic ethics, not to mention common decency would require that this be noted somewhere in the article. It isn’t – and indeed, the article dismisses Limbaugh’s defense of himself.
There is even an interesting spin by Media Matters included in the article, one that is contradicted by the transcript itself.
After the liberal media watchdog organization Media Matters sounded the alarm about his comments, Mr. Limbaugh said on subsequent shows that he was talking about only one discredited man who claimed to be a wounded veteran. “I was not talking about antiwar, active duty troops,” he insisted.Yet analysts for Media Matters noted that Mr. Limbaugh’s first reference to the discredited man came nearly two minutes after his plural reference to phony soldiers. That group and like-minded Democrats have refused to back off. More than 40 Democratic senators signed a letter sent Tuesday to the company that syndicates the radio show, asking that Mr. Limbaugh’s remarks be repudiated.
That is true – almost. In that transcript, it is clearly about two minutes before Limbaugh explains the reference to “phony soldiers”. And while he does only talk about one, Jesse Macbeth, though his case is one of a number in which fake vets have lied about serving, or actual vets have been documented to have lied about events. I'd argue that both groups qualify as phonies, wouldn't you?
But look at what Limbaugh said.
Here is a Morning Update that we did recently, talking about fake soldiers. This is a story of who the left props up as heroes. They have their celebrities and one of them was Army Ranger Jesse Macbeth. Now, he was a "corporal." I say in quotes. Twenty-three years old. What made Jesse Macbeth a hero to the anti-war crowd wasn't his Purple Heart; it wasn't his being affiliated with post-traumatic stress disorder from tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. No. What made Jesse Macbeth, Army Ranger, a hero to the left was his courage, in their view, off the battlefield, without regard to consequences. He told the world the abuses he had witnessed in Iraq, American soldiers killing unarmed civilians, hundreds of men, women, even children. In one gruesome account, translated into Arabic and spread widely across the Internet, Army Ranger Jesse Macbeth describes the horrors this way: "We would burn their bodies. We would hang their bodies from the rafters in the mosque."Now, recently, Jesse Macbeth, poster boy for the anti-war left, had his day in court. And you know what? He was sentenced to five months in jail and three years probation for falsifying a Department of Veterans Affairs claim and his Army discharge record. He was in the Army. Jesse Macbeth was in the Army, folks, briefly. Forty-four days before he washed out of boot camp. Jesse Macbeth isn't an Army Ranger, never was. He isn't a corporal, never was. He never won the Purple Heart, and he was never in combat to witness the horrors he claimed to have seen. You probably haven't even heard about this. And, if you have, you haven't heard much about it. This doesn't fit the narrative and the template in the Drive-By Media and the Democrat Party as to who is a genuine war hero. Don't look for any retractions, by the way. Not from the anti-war left, the anti-military Drive-By Media, or the Arabic websites that spread Jesse Macbeth's lies about our troops, because the truth for the left is fiction that serves their purpose. They have to lie about such atrocities because they can't find any that fit the template of the way they see the US military. In other words, for the American anti-war left, the greatest inconvenience they face is the truth.
So it is clear that Rush is referring back to a previous show on another day to make a reference. Given that much of LimbaughÂ’s audience listens daily, it is likely that they knew what he was referring to. In addition, the Jesse Macbeth story had been in the news only days before, and a reasonably well-informed audience like LimbaughÂ’s would have been aware of it. But even setting all that aside, the article is so slanted that it is not even funny.
But while we are on the topic of LimbaughÂ’s comments and the controversy surrounding them, let me note a few things.
1) I find it very interesting that Harry Reid and company will not come off the Senate floor to make these comments. Could it be that they know their statements are false – and so recklessly false as to enable Limbaugh to meet the standard for succeeding in a suit for defamation? Are they, in fact, hiding behind the Speech or Debate Clause of Article I to engage in speech that would be legally actionable if engaged in outside the Senate Chamber?
2) Why wouldn’t many of these same individuals condemn the infamous MoveOn.Org “Betray Us” ad, which accused General Petraeus of treason?
3) Is it only conservative broadcasters that these Senators are prepared to condemn? Will these same individuals condemn these comments from their fellow Democrat politicians (including signers of the Reid letter about Limbaugh)?
While Limbaugh exposed the left's exploitation of a phony, the likes of Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., are free to slander the Marines who defended themselves against a jihadist ambush in the Iraqi town of Haditha, claiming they had "killed innocent civilians in cold blood." Sounds like the phony charges Macbeth made, doesn't it?No one has been found guilty in the Haditha incident, and there has been no proof of innocent civilians being murdered. Several of the Marines have been found innocent as the case has unraveled. But is Murtha condemned by his colleagues or asked to apologize?
Sen. John Kerry once told Bob Schieffer on CBS' "Face the Nation" that "there is no reason that young American soldiers need to be going into the homes of Iraqis in the dead of night, terrorizing kids and children, you know, women . . . ." This was a more modest reprise of his post-Vietnam charges that U.S. troops had raped, tortured and pillaged in the tradition of Genghis Khan.
Then there's the famous utterance by Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., after the incident at Saddam's Abu Ghraib prison: "We now learn that Saddam's torture chamber (has) reopened under new management."
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., once said of our prisoner of war camp at Guantanamo that "describing what Americans had done to prisoners under our control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by the Nazis, Soviets in their gulags or some mad regime — Pol Pot or others — that had no concern for human beings."
I guess, of course, that attacks on our soldiers, their patriotism, and their decency are just fine – as long as they come from liberals and are aimed at ensuring our defeat in Iraq and the swift implementation of a cut-and-run strategy. So while it is impossible to call our servicemen and women in Iraq "phony soldiers", it is clear that the signers of this letter (along with Media Matters and NY Times reporter Carl Hulse) are phony patriots.
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October 02, 2007
H/T Gary McCoy, via Townhall.com
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Signaling an indefinite halt to executions in Texas, the stateÂ’s highest criminal appeals court late Tuesday stayed the lethal injection of a 28-year-old Honduran man who was scheduled to be put to death Wednesday.The reprieve by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals was granted a week after the United States Supreme Court agreed to consider whether a form of lethal injection constituted cruel and unusual punishment barred under the Eighth Amendment. On Thursday, the Supreme Court stepped in to halt a planned execution in Texas at the last minute, and though many legal experts interpreted that as a signal for all states to wait for a final ruling on lethal injection before any further executions, Texas officials said they planned to move ahead with more.
As a result, TuesdayÂ’s ruling by the Texas court was seen as a sign that judges in the nationÂ’s leading death penalty state were taking guidance from the Supreme Court and putting off imminent executions.
The Texas court order gave state authorities up to 30 days to explain in legal papers why the execution of the inmate, Heliberto Chi, should proceed. With responses then certain from defense lawyers, the effect of the order was to put off the execution for months, lawyers said.
Some want the governor to implement such a moratorium. Under state law and the state constitution, he cannot do so. His powers to delay or prevent an execution are incredibly limited (as I have been pointing out since George W. Bush ran for President in 2000, the Texas governor has weakest pardon and reprieve power in the 50 states). That puts the ball into the hands of the courts.
But I also urge Rick Perry to take another action that is within his power, one that would settle the question of lethal injection here in Texas.
Rick Perry is correct in not acting in this case. If a moratorium is truly necessary, he ought to call the legislature back into session to consider one -- and perhaps also legislation restoring either hanging or the firing squad as the form of execution in Texas, rendering moot the need for a moratorium at all.
After all, those two methods are unquestionably acceptable under the Eighth Amendment -- for they were in use when the Amendment was adopted, and clearly contemplated as acceptable by the Founders.
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Fred Thompson has a folksy, good old boy persona on the stump, but it may not last much longer.When I asked him if he is an 11th Commandment man — Never speak ill of a fellow Republican — he responded, “I am more of a 12th Commandment man: Don’t speak ill of them until they speak ill of me. And then really speak ill of them.”
Now that seems reasonable, on its face. however, I hope that is tempered with the realization that too harsh an attack on his GOP rivals could damage the eventual nominee fatally, exposing weaknesses that will resonate with the electorate and give an opening to the eventual Democrat nominee.
After all, there was this Democrat named Al Gore in 1988 -- he raised challenged Michael Dukakis on a furlough program for state inmates and a prisoner named Willie Horton.
And the rest is history.
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You know -- actually appealing to facts.
In the battle of sound bites over President Bush’s expected veto of the children’s health insurance bill, the White House position boils down to this: Beware, beware — it’s the first step toward federalized health care.Nonsense, say supporters from both sides of the aisle , who swear they would never vote for a bill that was the proverbial camel’s nose under a tent on government-run health care.
But a look back at the fine print of the 1993 “Hillarycare” debacle shows there may be a grain of truth in the Republican suspicions — and also demonstrates that the GOP believes there is still significant political power to be mined from one of the Clinton administration’s greatest political and tactical failures.
Back in 1993, according to an internal White House staff memo, then-first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton’s staff saw federal coverage of children as a “precursor” to universal coverage.
In a section of the memo titled “Kids First,” Clinton’s staff laid out backup plans in the event the universal coverage idea failed.
And one of the key options was creating a state-run health plan for children who didnÂ’t qualify for Medicaid but were uninsured.
In principle, I don't have a problem with a plan for state insurance for low-income children without insurance -- though I dislike the federal involvement. But given the continuous efforts to expand it, with an obvious goal of making the government the insurer of all children, I see the dangers of such programs expanding well-beyond their stated goal. After all -- since when has $83,000 been "low-income"?
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