Rove/Hattie List

Karl Rove recently stated that this is his normal daily reading list. Rove described it like this:

I get Mike Allen's overnight summary from Politico, I cruise RealClearPolitics.com, I get Taranto from the Wall Street Journal, I visit the Corner. I check Drudge, I check Fox News, I have a list of favorites that I sort of thumb through if I've got the time. I obviously read papers, the New York Times; the Wall Street Journal; when in Washington, the Washington Post if not, I get it online. I check out, most days, Instapundit, Power Line, Hugh Hewitt. Occasionally I'll dip into Just One Minute or visit the Captain's Quarters, I check out Michael Barone's blog, and I look forward to getting Opinion Journal, and I get the NCPA summary. And I also get a news summary, a news clip early in the morning of all the clips.

This list is almost exactly what this old dog reads daily, as well, and finds most of the articles that are posted here from these sources.

I'm out of town for most of the week, and my old sister may or may not weigh in. However, Rove's list above should sate your appetite quite nicely.

Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid

Liberal fascism really does exist!

American Thinker: Some Wicked Friends of Public Schools

Fitna: The Video

The world community has decided to censor this video. As a public service, we are giving our readers a chance to see what you are not supposed to watch. It comes to us from the Dutch. This a ten minute film describing the violence inherent in Islam and some parts of it are extemely graphic:

View Fitna here in English. If this site is disabled go to this link to find a new viewing location.

Play Ball !!!

Did we mention that I am quite a baseball fan? In my day, I could run circles around Snoopy. The major league season opens today, and here are a few appropriate words from the great George Will to begin it with:

As the philosopher Dave Barry has noted, "If a woman has to choose between catching a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will choose to save the infant's life without even considering if there are men on base."

Bill Veeck, who did more for America in one night than most of us do in a lifetime (the night in September 1937 he planted the ivy along Wrigley Field's outfield walls), said that the great thing about baseball -- aside from the fact that you do not need to be 7 feet wide or 7 feet tall in order to play it -- is: Three strikes and you're out, and the best lawyer can't help you.

Baseball, which provides satisfying finality and then does it again the next day, is a severe meritocracy that illustrates the axiom that there is very little difference between men but that difference makes a big difference.

Should This Be on the Front Pages?

If our economy is getting ready to add $14 trillion in new oil production, then this is big news. If it is true, then now is the time to "BUY."

Massive Oil Deposit Could Increase US reserves by 10x

Another Weekend Steyn

Mark Steyn makes fun of the Clintons. (It's just too damned easy.) But it sure is fun, and his wit is as charming as ever. Enjoy.

Mark Steyn on Hillary Clinton & 2008 on National Review Online

No Wonder that We are at War

Here is another damning report from Miss Hillary's White House past. It appears that in 1996, while getting shot at it in Bosnia ( yea right), Hillary was meeting in the White House map room with an intelligence agent of Saddam Hussein's. This old dog, reading about the two Democrats running for president, is beginning to ask himself just what was really wrong with what Benedict Arnold did?


Accused Saddam Agent Says He Met With Hillary at White House The New York Sun

More Fun to Come?

Posted on Powerline this morning!

Floor Fight, Here We Come

Last night, Greta van Susteren interviewed Hillary Clinton on Fox News. This was the most interesting exchange:
VAN SUSTEREN: And if he says, no, I won't do it, that leaves Michigan and Florida out. And does that leave you out?
CLINTON: No. Not at all, because we are going to make sure those votes get counted, one way or another.
VAN SUSTEREN: How?
CLINTON: Well, you know, you can always go to the convention. That is what credential fights are for. You know, let's have the Democratic Party go on record against seating the Michigan and Florida delegations three months before the general election? I don't think that will happen. I think they will be seated. So that is where we are headed if we don't get this worked out.

A credentials battle in Denver! Every Republican's dream! If Hillary is to be believed--always a big "if" where the Clintons are concerned--it may become a reality.

Across the Pond

"There'll always be an England,

And England shall be free,

If England means as much to you

As England means to me."

Tony Blankley has a very disturbing article on what is happening these days in England. Most likely, this unbelievable ( just a generation ago) turn of events is heading toward our shores very soon!

Please read the who thing.

RealClearPolitics - Articles - More Than Bluebirds in the Sky

It's in the Blood

Chelsea Clinton was asked today to comment on the newest flap over her mother having said ( and written) that she was under sniper fire in Bosnia while traveling there during her husband's presidency. CBS broke the story that it did not happen. However, Chelsea was there with her mom on that trip and when she was asked today what she remembered, she stated:

"Well sir, I think that my mother’s on record as having talked about this and I support what she said. I mean, I was there as well and I’m so honored that I was there."

But I'm being unfair. What else could the young woman say? (I'm sure this line was pre-approved by her mother's campaign people.)

This Is Interesting

The Power of Cook County, Illinois

In the race for the most popular votes in the Democratic Party's presidential primary contests, Sen. Barack Obama's lead over Sen. Hillary Clinton is about 711,000 votes -- not including Florida or Michigan -- according to Real Clear Politics.

Of Sen. Obama's 711,000 popular-vote lead, 650,000 -- or more than 90% of the total margin -- comes from Sen. Obama's home state of Illinois, with 429,000 of that lead coming from his home base of Cook County.

That margin in Cook County represents almost 60% of Obama's total lead nationwide. Interestingly,

Sen. Obama's 429,000-vote margin in Cook County alone is larger than the winning margin of either candidate in any state. Chicago Dems still know how to support their candidates better than anyone else in the country...

Received in an e-mail

While the e-mail credits Jay Leno with writing this, I do not want to go that far. Quite often a message like this comes with the name of an entertainer on it, when in fact that person never wrote or said what his name is attached to.

However, with that disclaimer, let me say that it is a good message, and one that I wished to pass on to my readers.


"The other day I was reading Newsweek magazine and came across some poll data I found rather hard to believe. It must be true, given the source, right? The Newsweek poll alleges that 67 percent of Americans are unhappy with the direction the country is headed, and 69 percent of the country is unhappy with the performance of the President.

In essence, 2/3's of the citizenry just ain't happy and want a change. So being the knuckle dragger I am, I started thinking, ''What are we so un happy about?''Is it that we have electricity and running water 24 hours a day, 7 days a week?

Is our unhappiness the result of having air conditioning in the summer and heating in the winter? Could it be that 95.4 percent of these unhappy folks have a job?Maybe it is the ability to walk into a grocery store at any time, and see more food in moments than Darfur has seen in the last year?Maybe it is the ability to drive from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean without having to present identification papers as we move through each state?Or possibly the hundreds of clean and safe motels we would find along the way that can provide temporary shelter?

I guess having thousands of restaurants with varying cuisine from around the world is just not good enough.Or could it be that when we wreck our car, emergency workers show up and Provide services to help all, and even send a helicopter to take you to the hospital. Perhaps you are one of the 70 percent of Americans who own a home. You may be upset with knowing that in the unfortunate case of a fire, a group of trained firefighters will appear in moments and use top notch equipment to extinguish the flames thus saving you, your family and your belongings. Or if, while at home watching one of your many flat screen TVs, a burglar or prowler intrudes , an officer equipped with a gun and a bullet-proof vest will come to defend you and your family against att ack or loss.

This all in the backdrop of a neighborhood free of bombs or militias raping and pillaging the residents. Neighborhoods where 90 percent of teenagers own cell phones and computers.

How about the complete religious, social and political freedoms we enjoy that are the envy of everyone in the world? Maybe that is what has 67 percent of you folks unhappy.Fact is, we are the largest group of ungrateful, spoiled brats the world has ever seen.

No wonder the world loves the U.S. , yet has a great disdain for its citizens. They see us for what we are. The most blessed people in the world who do nothing but complain about what we don't have , and what we hate about the country instead of thanking the good Lord we live here. I know, I know.

What about the President who took us into war and has no plan to get us out? The President who has a measly 31 percent approval rating? Is this the same President who guided the nation in the dark days after 9/11? The President that cut taxes to bring an economy out of recession? Could this be the same guy who has been called every name in the book for succeeding in keeping all the spoiled ungrateful brats safe from terrorist attacks?

The Commander-In Chief of an all-volunteer army that is out there defending you and me? Did you hear how bad the President is on the news or talk show? Did this news affect you so much, make you so unhappy you couldn't take a look around for yourself and see all the good things and be glad?

Think about it...are you upset at the President because he actually caused you personal pain OR is it because the "Media" told you he was failing to kiss your sorry ungrateful behind every day .

Make no mistake about it. The troops in Iraq and Afghanistan have volunteered to serve, and in many cases may have died for your freedom. There is currently no draft in this country. They didn't have to go. They are able to refuse to go and end up with either a ''general'' discharge, an ''other than honorable'' discharge or, worst case scenario, a ''dishonorable'' discharge after a few days in the brig.

So why then the flat-out discontentment in the minds of 69 percent of Americans? Say what you want, but I blame it on the media. If it bleeds, it leads; and they specialize in bad news. Everybody will watch a car crash with blood and guts. How many will watch kids selling lemonade at the corner?

The media knows this and media outlets are for-profit corporations. They offer what sells , and when criticized, try to defend their actions by "justifying" them in one way or another. Just ask why they tried to allow a murderer like O.J. Simpson to write a book about "how he didn't kill his wife, but if he did he would have done it this way"...Insane!

Stop buying the negativism you are fed everyday by the media. Shut off the TV, burn Newsweek, and use the New York Times for the bottom of your bird cage Then start being grateful for all we have as a country. There is exponentially more good than bad. We are among the most blessed people on Earth, and should thank God several times a day, or at least be thankful and appreciative.

"With hurricanes, tornadoes, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, "Are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?"

Quote of the Day

"I heard they found out from McCain's passport file that as a young man, he spent several years in a Communist capitol. And with no entry stamp!"

Your Weekly Steyn

Mark Steyn on Barack Obama & Jeremiah Wright on National Review Online

You're welcome.

Here Is What We Will NOT Have

A National Conversation on Race. From NRO this morning:

Obama's Pandora Box: The Maladies Continue to Fly Out [Victor Davis Hanson]

Did he really want to open the lid off and evoke a national conversation on race, or to suggest the problem might have been just occasional Wright's errant remarks rather than the ideology of the Trinity church?

Obama should have kept the lid shut by simply apologizing for Wright, severing the relationship, and leaving the church. But suddenly after calling for a national conversation on race, and having a media chorus applaud that opportunity—silence?

And don't expect Obama or his admirers to take up the challenge and continue on this path that leads to exactly where they don't wish to go—revelation of the desire to mandate an equality of result rather than ensure one of opportunity.So why the post-speech deafening silence?

Because Obama and the punditry know that we cannot have such an honest conversation, given that any "new" dialogue 43 years after civil-rights legislation would touch on inordinate crime, illegitimacy, drug use, imprisonment, and black racism in addition to white racism—and thus logically lead to emasculation of the present privileged traffickers in grievance and reparations.

Who would wish to put a soothing Obama et al. out of business?And by Obama remaining in the church, its entire theology and its new pastor Moss (cf. his recent interviews) likewise jump out—and its neo-Marxist philosophy of black liberationism, resentment and anger at whites, and easy anti-Americanism will continue to be problematic for the next would-be President of the United States of America.

If elected, would Obama continue to support the Trinity ideology (consider the photo-ops and sound-bites at Sunday service)? And continue to have to explain embarrassing contradictions between what he professed and what he attended and subsidized that inevitably will on occasion lead to "typical white person" lapses?

Rev. Wright may well be the most theatrically unhinged representative of Trinity doctrine, but there is no reason to believe that anything he preached was at odds with either the church's written texts, or the sentiments of his ancillary preachers or his successors. And that problem won't go away. All summer long, "snippets" and "loops" from the church's well-publicized politics and ideology will come out—unless he shuts the lid shut on the Pandora's box he opened.

The box also contains the politically explosive idea of "Liberation Theology! We Americans certainly won't be given the right to weigh in on this disruptive subject!!!

If one has the time and wishes to delve into this ideology, our current Pope produced a document back in 1984 addressing this particular malady.

Preliminary Notes on Liberation Theology by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger

Happy Easter

To send a chill down your spine on this Easter weekend, please click on this wonderful video:

YouTube - The Cactus Cuties sing The National Anthem

However, this one will always be the best rendition this old dog had the privilege of hearing:

YouTube - Whitney Houston - Star Spangled Banner

40%.....wow!

An article in Slate Magazine by Emily Yoffe reports the following:

We still think of the archetypal unwed mother as a Jamie Lynn Spears—a dopey teenager who dropped her panties and got in over her head. A generation and more ago, that's who most unwed mothers were. But according to the most recent statistics from the Centers for Disease Control, teenagers account for only 23 percent of current out-of-wedlock births. That means the vast majority of unwed mothers are old enough to know what they're doing: Unwed births are surging among women ages 25 to 29.

In the last 50 years, there has been an extraordinary decoupling of marriage and procreation. In 1960 about 5 percent of births were to unwed mothers; that figure is now a record high of nearly 40 percent. Out-of-wedlock births used to be such a source of shame that families tried to hide them: Singer Bobby Darin was born to a teen mother and raised to believe she was his sister. But now out-of-wedlock births are greeted with a shrug.

Some say they're an understandable response to economic realities. Others say they're a liberating change from the shotgun-wedding ethic that shackled two unsuitable people together for life.

Sadly, we are never shocked that there are plenty of people who look at such data and think that it is "good."

Hillary! Releases Her Schedule...yea right

Hillary Clinton supposedly has released her White House schedule to her fawning minions. Newsweek ( of all publications) has written an article describing the amount of censuring that went on, and how embarrassing episodes were deleted from the release. We can only imagine what would happen in the NEXT Clinton administration. Here is an excerpt:

The schedule is considerably less revealing when it comes to more awkward episodes of the Clinton presidency. Consider the afternoon of March 9, 1995, when Johnny Chung, a businessman and soon-to-be-notorious Democratic Party fund-raiser, made a fateful trip to the White House carrying a campaign check for $50,000. For many critics, Chung later became a symbol of the campaign-finance abuses of the Clinton presidency, a mysterious Chinese businessman who managed to be cleared into the White House on 49 occasions. (He also later pleaded guilty to campaign-finance violations and testified that a sizeable chunk of his illegal campaign cash came from a Chinese military-intelligence operative.) Hillary Clinton made a special trip to the Map Room that day so she could have her picture taken with Chung. "We handshake, and then she [Hillary Clinton] said, 'Welcome to the White House, my good friend'," Chung later testified, describing the encounter with Hillary Clinton. Right after that, Chung hand-delivered his $50,000 to Maggie Williams, who was the First Lady's chief of staff at the time and now manages her presidential campaign.

Go to Clinton’s Schedules Are Bare Newsweek Politics: Campaign 2008 Newsweek.com and read the whole thing.

Throw Grandma Under the Bus

Yesterday, one of my sisters called and while listening to Barack Obama's speech, became particularly outraged at how he had "used" his grandmother. Scott Johnson at Powerline seems to have felt the same way and writes succinctly:

When seeking to extricate himself from the tight spot in which he has been placed by his long association with the spiritual leadership of Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama hauled in his (living) maternal grandmother, Madelyn Dunham. Obama has previously characterized Mrs. Dunham as a "trailblazer of sorts, the first woman vice-president of a local bank." She had a direct hand in his upbringing when Obama chose to live with his maternal grandparents rather than his mother, who was then in Indonesia. Today Obama brought Mrs. Dunham into his speech for a cameo appearance as a white counterpart to the fulsome Reverend Wright:

I can no more disown [Jeremiah Wright] than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

Even amid the false equivalencies and obvious evasions of his speech today, Obama's misuse of his grandmother seems to me a striking sign of poor character.

A Few Critiques of Obama Speech

Paul Mirengoff at Powerline sums up his views of the speech:

Although Obama's speech is not without its evasions, I consider it a courageous one by usual political standards. He has refused to walk away from Wright's black liberation theology when it might well have been expedient to do so. The rest of us now should have the courage to take Obama at his word and decide whether it is acceptable to elect as president of the United States someone who carries Rev. Wright around as part of him, and who takes his ranting seriously.

Kathryn Lopez at NRO sums it up in much the same way:

Damn straight, Rev. Wright is angry. That's how I wound up at his church. That's why I stay there. I'm mad too, I just control it better. Now let's get [on with] electing me president so we can all feel good.

Black Liberation Theology

Peter Wehner warns Obama not to try to introduce this postmodern message into his speech today. The American people are not yet ready to move this far left even if our colleges and universities have been there for a number of years now. Certainly, liberation theology has been around long enough to have an impact on our youngest generation of voters.

Peter Wehner on Barack Obama & Jeremiah Wright on National Review Online

John Adams

Last evening HBO began its seven part series based on David McCullough's best selling biography of John Adams. Adams was one of the greatest of the founding fathers and has been mostly overlooked in the 20th century. He was definitely part of the "A" team who are most responsible for the creation the United States.

The first episode takes us through his early activism in Boston and, of course, his very special relationship with his wife, Abigail. ( Look for Laura Linney to win an Emmy )

The second episode takes us through the early part of the war in New England and finally to the adoption of the Declaration of independence in Philadelphia. Character actors who portray Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin seem to get their roles just right.

This is one of heck of a theatrical production and so please curl up on the couch next to your own master and enjoy.

"We are the ones we have been waiting for"

You have certainly heard this phrase in the months just past. Andrew Ferguson tries to get to the bottom of it in an article in the Weekly Standard. Below is an excerpt:

Two years ago, before Obama even said he wanted to be president, the left-wing-radical-feminist-lesbian novelist Alice Walker published a book of essays and called it We are the Ones We've Been Waiting For. Believe me: If the line had come from the Tribal Elders of the Hopi nation, Alice Walker would have been more than happy to say so. Instead she said it came from a poem published in 1980 by the left-wing-radical-feminist-bisexual poet June Jordan. Neither Walker nor Jordan has said what the sentence means. But Walker did offer this hint in the introduction to her book of essays: "We are the ones we've been waiting for because we are able to see what is happening with a much greater awareness than our parents or grandparents, our ancestors, could see."

That's a clue, anyway. The sentence may not have any positive content, Walker seems to be saying, but it does have an indirect meaning, an implication, as a kind of self-referential gesture for the people who claim it. When Obama's supporters say "We are the ones we've been waiting for," what they mean is that in the long roll call of history, from Aristotle and Heraclitus down through Augustine and Maimonides and Immanuel Kant and the fellows who wrote the Federalist Papers, we're number one! We're the smartest yet! Everybody--Mom, Dad, Gramps and Grandma, Great Grandpa and Great Grandma, maybe even the Tribal Elders--they've all been waiting for people as clued-in as us!

Sunday Morning Funny

*Little Suzy had a box of very small kittens that she was trying to give away, so she had them out on the street corner with a sign "FREE KITTENS" next to them.

Suddenly a big line of big black cars came up with a policeman on a motorcycle in front. The cars all stopped and Sen. Obama stepped out from the biggest car. "Hi, little girl, what do you have there in the box?" he asked.

"Kittens" Little Suzy says. "They're so small, their eyes are not even open yet."

"What kind of kittens are they?" he asked. "Democrats" says Little Suzy.

The Senator smiled, returned to his car and they drove away. Sensing a good photo opportunity, Sen. Obama called his campaign manager and told him about the little girl and the kittens. It was planned that they would return the next day, have all the media there and tell everyone about these great kittens.

The next day, Little Suzy is standing out on the corner with her box of kittens with the "FREE KITTENS" sign and the big motorcade of black cars pulled up with all the vans and trucks from ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN. Everyone had their cameras ready and then, Sen. Obama got out of his limo and walked up to Little Suzy.

"Now, don't be frightened," he said, "I just want you to tell all these nice news people just what kind of kittens you're giving away today."

"Yes sir," Suzy said, "The are all REPUBLICAN kittens.

"Taken by surprise, Sen. Obama said, "But yesterday, you told me that they were DEMOCRATS."

Little Suzy says, "Yes, I know. But today, they have their eyes open."

Can't be said much better

The final paragraphs of David Limbaugh's article today on Townhall.com pretty much state the case for this blog's existence!

Should we conservatives, for example, place such a high priority on Republican and Democratic politicians making nice with each other that we agree to adopt growth-smothering tax increases? Socialized health care? Retreat-and-defeat in Iraq? Payoffs to trial lawyers instead of monitoring terrorist communications? Civil rights for terrorists? Abandonment of protection for the unborn? Acquiescence to the ongoing assault on Christians in the public square? Continued surrender of academia to America-bashing, atheistic, feminist-preoccupied, history revisionist, liberal indoctrinators? Unbridled open borders with a guaranteed transformation of our culture? The appointment of appellate judges who will continue to make, rather than interpret, laws and amend the Constitution by judicial fiat? Selective suppression of free speech? Imposition of the Fairness Doctrine to eradicate conservative talk radio and restore monolithic media dominance? The surrendering of American sovereignty to the United Nations or to other foreign bodies? Deferential reverence to the false gods of global warming with the guaranteed destruction of capitalism that would ensue? The refusal, for political reasons, to address our entitlement crisis that will otherwise inevitably bankrupt this nation?

We can, if we choose to, delude ourselves into being swept up in false promises of hope and change and in the idolatry of today's politically correct but grossly distorted notions of tolerance and bipartisanship. But if we do, we ignore at our peril the inescapable reality that we are engaged in a war of worldviews whose outcome will determine the future of this nation.
We should all be civil toward one another, including our political opponents, but we must never forget that getting along and feel-goodism should not be purchased at the expense of our liberties, our security and our culture. Be extremely wary of and vigilant against those who promise or imply otherwise.

Just in Time for the Tourist Season

From a post this morning in the Corner of NRO.

The famously tolerant Dutch, whose nation has the highest emmigration of any European country as the native born flee the effects of multi-culturalism, Islamization, and the after effects of legalizing everything, have come up with a new line to cross. Public sex in Amsterdam's city parks will now be legal. But only for gays. And henceforth dogs will no longer be allowed off their leashes. Read about it here. But I am wondering why the government won't let the poor dogs run free while the gays are "having uncomplicated relations." What are they afraid of?

With Friends Like This...

Obama's Pastor After 9/11: 'America's chickens are coming home to roost.'

Samantha Power left the Obama campaign for calling Hillary Clinton a "monster."

Geraldine Ferraro left the Hillary campaign for saying Barack Obama would not be where he is today if he weren't black. (Mickey Kaus accurately notes that it's difficult to embody post-racial hopes when you're white.)

Rev. Jeremiah Wright has no official position with the Obama campaign, and it's almost a shame, because that means he can't resign to distance himself from the candidate.

If you had heard that your pastor had said the following....

"The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three-strike law and then wants us to sing 'God Bless America.' No, no, no, God damn America, that's in the Bible for killing innocent people," he said in a 2003 sermon. "God damn America for treating our citizens as less than human. God damn America for as long as she acts like she is God and she is supreme."

In addition to damning America, he told his congregation on the Sunday after Sept. 11, 2001 that the United States had brought on al Qaeda's attacks because of its own terrorism.

"We bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon, and we never batted an eye," Rev. Wright said in a sermon on Sept. 16, 2001.

"We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff we have done overseas is now brought right back to our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost," he told his congregation.

Quote of the Day

"Saying that Hillary has Executive Branch experience is like saying Yoko Ono was a Beatle."

Works for Me

Tip of the hat to American Thinker.

I was running an errand on Capitol Hill when this letter flew out a window and landed at my feet.

Howard Dean, Chairman
Democratic National Committee
430 S. Capitol Street, S .E.
Washington, D. C. 20003

Dear Mr. Dean:
At first I was taken aback when I heard through mutual friends that you were seeking advice from me on your present substantial dilemma, but for old times' sake I'm happy to offer my advice for what it's worth to you.

I've been watching the state Democratic primary election returns with considerable interest, but I share your stated concern that your party is heading inexorably in one direction -- a contentious and brokered convention, one notable for violent street protests and bitter credential committee fights.

The eleven weeks between the June 7 Puerto Rico primary and the August 25 convention will be the high point of a brutal battle by Obama and Clinton to secure the votes of the super-delegates while hanging on to the votes of the regular delegates. This promises to be at least as bloody a battlefield as the brokered convention. In the meantime long knives are being whetted for credentials fights over Florida and Michigan. (And how do you ascertain the caucus winners in Texas when 40% of the polling places refused to report?)

Even before this point, the constant stirring up of identity politics grievances threatens to alienate any number of branches of those presently taking shelter in your big unity tent -- and I'm not even getting into the split between the SEIU and the AFL-CIO . You, sir, have a major and growing headache facing you.

I'd pass on my friend Jeff Dobbs' suggestion that you nominate both Obama and Clinton, one each for each of John Edwards' two Americas, but I don't think that'll fly really. Even if you could sell it to the public, it is hard to imagine this working, given the already manifested great acrimony between them.

I figure you have to be bold, and that you have to act no later than June 7 to keep your party from totally disintegrating. Here's my suggestion : Put Jimmy Carter in charge of the entire nomination mess.

You and I both know that the Democratic Party rules have created exactly the kind of atmosphere best suited for Carter's magic touch: utter chaos. Infinite fiddling state-by-state with the rules to achieve minutely-calibrated "proportional representation" by delegates not even bound to follow the voters' wishes, topped by potentially nullifying, appointed super-delegates, accountable to no one but themselves.

Fantastic! Mugabe could not have set this up better

By the way, it's a good idea for you to keep floating the notion to the punditry that the Florida and Michigan voters aren't "disenfranchised" if their votes are not counted. Keep saying they are simply paying for their arrogant disregard of the rules. (None of them seem to have caught on that the officials who okayed the early primaries knowing that would nullify the votes are super-delegates whose votes will count anyway, even if they fixed it so the ordinary party members in their states will lose their votes. Way to go!)

This approach completely distracts people from realizing what an absolute joke the position is that Florida was stolen in 2000.

In any event Obama doesn't think he wants to trust a party-run mail-in re-vote for Florida and Michigan, and the Florida Congressional delegation (all super-delegates) say no to the notion , too.

Have Carter rerun the entire damn primary before June 7. Really, Carter can do this.
I suppose right now you're saying," Where did he get this idea?" I'll tell you, friend. it came to me listening to Carl Levin who asked, "How can you make sure that hundreds of thousands , perhaps a million or more ballots can be properly counted and that duplicate ballots can be avoided?"

See, I read that and remembered that Carter does this all the time. He's the election certifier extraordinaire. From his supervision of the 1990 election in the Dominican Republic to his oversight of the Chavez recall collection in Venezuela he's become the one man in the world who can, with the acquiescence of the entire world, put a gold stamp of approval and purity on a completely unfair and corrupt election. Fraud in counting votes? In registering voters? Discrepancies between the number of cast ballots and voter registration lists? Jiggered machines? Doesn't matter. The guy will keep his eyes and ears closed and stamp the entire thing kosher.

See, what I'm saying, is that there's no way you can resolve the present contretemps without at least half your party claiming the result is unfair. They will always believe the nomination was "stolen" from their candidate and given the players and so-called rules of your party's nomination process, they will have a point. So why not go whole hog. Have the process planned, overseen and supervised by the man who's given his stamp of approval to crooked elections everywhere else on earth. He was YOUR president, after all. He's good enough for East Timor and not for his own party?

As soon as he's done, the winner can get to work on the general election campaign where the Dem frontrunners have wisely set the central issue as experience on national security. How great is that?

Hope this helps.
Your friend,
Bill Z. Bub

Clarice Feldman is an attorney in Washington, DC.

Everyday More and More of our Liberty Disappears

What never ceases to impress me is that one can find articles like this every day of the week in any media format one chooses to look. "We have met the enemy and he is us."

Google could be superseded, says web inventor - Times Online
"It's about creating a seamless web of all the data in your life."





wcbstv.com - Conn. Student Suspended For Buying Candy In School
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) ― Contraband candy has led to big trouble for an eighth-grade honors student. Michael Sheridan was stripped of his title as class vice president, barred from attending an honors student dinner and suspended for a day after buying a bag of Skittles from a classmate.



cbs4.com - Proposed Law Looks to Wipe Out Problem
The only problem is the bill doesn't dictate how much toilet paper is "enough."

Smoker in court For dropping ash Case thrown out The Sun HomePageNews

This poor guy didn't even litter and ended up in court!

My Sister

My sister has become a laughingstock. She is being ridiculed in e-mails all over the world. Hope you don't think that I would ever act like this?


A guy is driving around the back woods of Tennessee and he sees a sign in front of a broken down shanty-style house: 'Talking Dog for Sale'

He rings the bell and the owner appears and tells him the dog is in the backyard. The guy goes into the back yard and sees a nice looking Labrador retriever sitting there.

'You talk?' he asks. 'Yep,' the lab replies.

After the guy recovers from the shock of hearing a dog talk, he says 'So, what's your story?'
The Lab looks up and says, 'Well, I discovered that I could talk when I was pretty young. I wanted to help the government, so I told the CIA and they had me sworn into the toughest branch of the armed services...the United States Marines. You know one of their nicknames is 'The Devil Dogs.'

In no time at all they had me jetting from country to country, sitting in rooms with spies and world leaders; because no one figured a dog would be eavesdropping. I was one of their most valuable spies for eight years running, but the jetting around really tired me out, and I knew I wasn't getting any younger. So, I decided to settle down.

I retired from the Corps (8 dog years is 56 Corps years) and signed up for a job at the airport to do some undercover security, wandering near suspicious characters and listening in. I uncovered some incredible dealings and was awarded a batch of medals. I got married, had a mess of puppies, and now I'm just retired.'

The guy is amazed. He goes back in and asks the owner what he wants for the dog.
'Ten dollars,' the guy says.

'Ten dollars? This dog is amazing! Why on earth are you selling her so cheap?'

'Because she's such a bullshitter ... She never did any of that stuff. She was in the Navy!

Steyn Comments on Princess Michelle

Hello, faddah, hello, mama, here I am at Camp Obama

There are, as it turns out, three Americas: one where John Edwards is livin' it up on a gazillion dollars a year; one where you're rubbing along on much less; and one where downtrodden hardworking folks are struggling to make ends meet on half-a-million a year. Byron quoted this heartreaking vignette from Obamaland a week or so back:
“We spend between the two kids, on extracurriculars outside the classroom, we’re spending about $10,000 a year on piano and dance and sports supplements. And summer programs… Do you know what summer camp costs?”
Don Surber responds to Princess Michelle:
Well, actually I don’t. None of my kids went. I spent a week once at Camp Wanakee...
In 2005, Mrs. O’s salary was $316,962 at the University of Chicago Hospital. She’s a lawyer, not a doctor.
Hubby’s pay as a U.S. senator topped $160 K that year.
If you are struggling to make ends meet on a half-million a year — a 1040 that puts you in the top 2% of Americans — then the problem is you, not the country.
Still this woman, who was never proud of America when her husband was elected to the state legislature or even the United States Senate, whines and whines and whines.
America is, she said, “just downright mean.”
"Yes, we can!" says Obama. But not on a mere 500 grand a year

Got To Love Watching These Folks

While I feel quite confident that all of our readers could give a damn what these fools do next, this is further evidence that Democrats don't have a clue what a democracy really is? Interesting questions to a party who never seem to have any answers!

Question for the Obamaniacs

Here's Tom Daschle expressing the new Obamaniac line:
With Obama holding an advantage of about 140 pledged convention delegates over Clinton, his allies argued strenuously that the outcome of the contest should be determined by delegates awarded to winners of primaries or caucuses, and not by the 796 Democratic superdelegates. Former Senate majority leader Thomas A. Daschle (S.D.), a co-chair of the Obama campaign, said it would be a "travesty" if Obama maintains his lead among pledged delegates but an advantage among superdelegates allows Clinton to win the nomination."I don't see how we could possibly do anything other than respect the will of the people who have voted in caucus and primary states all over the country," he said on NBC's "Meet the Press." "And what it would say to the world, to the country, that we'd overturn the verdict of those . . . elections would be travesty for . . . the party and for the country."
Question: why is a super-delegate less expressive of "the will of the people" than a delegate chosen by caucus? Isn't, say, a state governor more likely to express "the will of the people" than a delegate chosen by that tiny minority of a state population willing to spend hours and hours at a caucus meeting?
In fact, didn't the Democratic party invent super-delegates precisely because it was afraid that caucus delegates would skew the party way too far to the left - by going all weak at the knees for somebody exactly like Obama? And wasn't it the job of the super-delegates to stop them? If the super-delegates allow themselves to be intimidated by Daschle into yielding to the party's caucus-attending ideological militants, aren't they shirking the responsibility entrusted to them?

A Mark Steyn Instant Classic

As a good dog should, I've been sniffing around and waiting for several weeks to give my readers a taste of one of the best political commentators around. This weekend he published an article on "white guilt" that all of you should really enjoy!

Well, we will have Hillary Clinton to kick around some more, at least for another few weeks. The Mummy (as my radio pal Hugh Hewitt calls her) kicked open the sarcophagus door and, despite the rotting bandages dating back to Iowa, began staggering around, terrorizing folks all over again.
"She is a monster," Barack Obama adviser Samantha Power told a reporter from The Scotsman – and not a monster in a cute Loch Ness blurry, long-distance kind of way. "You just look at her and think, 'Ergh,'" continued Ms. Power, who subsequently resigned from the campaign.
The New York Times took a different line. The monster is you – yes, you, the American people. Surveying the Hillary-Barack death match, Maureen Dowd wrote: "People will have to choose which of America's sins are greater, and which stain will have to be removed first. Is misogyny worse than racism, or is racism worse than misogyny?"
Do even Democrats really talk like this? Apparently so. As Ali Gallagher, a white female (sorry, this identity-politics labeling is contagious) from Texas, told the Washington Post: "A friend of mine, a black man, said to me, 'My ancestors came to this country in chains; I'm voting for Barack.' I told him, 'Well, my sisters came here in chains and on their periods; I'm voting for Hillary.'"
When everybody's a victim, nobody's a victim. Poor Ms. Gallagher can't appreciate the distinction between purely metaphorical chains and real ones, or even how offensive it might be to assume blithely that there's no difference whatsoever.
On the other hand, Barack's ancestors didn't come here in chains, either: His mother was a white Kansan, so was presumably undergoing menstrual hell with the Gallagher gals, and his dad was a black man a long way away in colonial Kenya. Indeed, Obama would be the first son of a British subject to serve as president since those slaveholding types elected in the early days of the republic. As some aggrieved black activist sniffed snootily on TV, Barack isn't really an "African American" – unless by "African American," you mean somebody whose parentage is half-American and half-African, and let's face it, no one would come up with so cockamamie a definition as that.
As for victims, you have to feel sorry for John Edwards. He was born in a mill. He weighed 1.6 pounds and what did his dad get? Another day older and deeper in debt. John spent most of the 19th century as a spindly 7-year-old sweep with rickets, cleaning chimneys in Dickensian London until Fagin spotted him and trained him up as a trial lawyer. And it worked swell in the 2004 primary but it counted for nothing this time round because, even with all that soot on his face, he's still a white boy.
Bill Richardson was the first Hispanic candidate but nobody needs a Hispanic called "Bill Richardson." Hillary assumed she'd be the last identity-politician standing in a field of bouffant poseurs like Joe Biden, only to discover that by the time she got to the final round the Democratic primary process had descended to near-parody – or, as The New York Times headline put it, a "Duel Of Historical Guilts."
That's one "historical guilt" too many. If it's Historical Guilt vs. Joe Biden and John Edwards, bet on Historical Guilt, and the Democratic base uniting around Hillary and baying "I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar." Instead, it's "I Am Woman, Hear Me Whine About The Unfairness Of It All," as the Clintonites go nuclear and accuse Obama, the ultimate cool black dude, of "imitating Ken Starr," the ultimate uptight squaresville honky.
Which may be a marginally less ineffective line of attack than Gloria Steinem complaining to the New York Observer that way too many Americans want "redemption for racism" but not enough want "redemption for the gynocide." Which may, in turn, be a marginally less fatal shot in the foot than former Carter administration honcho Andrew Young's perplexing boast that Bill Clinton has slept with more black women than Obama.
The Democratic primary season seems to have dwindled down into a psycho remake of "Driving Miss Daisy." The fading matriarch Mizz Hill'ry (Jessica Tandy) doesn't want to give up the keys to the Democratic Party vehicle but the dignified black chauffeur Hokey (Morgan Freeman) insists it'll be a much smoother ride with him in the driver's seat. Yet, just as he thinks the old biddy's resigned to a nomination as Best Supporting Actress, the backseat driver plunges her hat pin into his spine, wrests the wheel away and lurches across the median.
Is the Democratic presidential process a Karl Rove plot? Right now, neither Mizz Hill'ry nor Hokey can win without the votes of the superdelegates, whose disposition is apparently in flux. The gay superdelegates are apparently sticking to Hillary like the "Hello, Dolly!" waiters to Carol Channing. But others are said to be moving Barackwards.
Are they jumping to a stalled bandwagon? One Historical Guilt gives upscale white liberals a chance to demonstrate their progressive bona fides in unison. Two Historical Guilts shrivels from transformative feel-good fluffiness into sour tribalism. Like Hillary's "I Am Woman" routine, Obama's cult of narcissism – "We are the change we have been waiting for" – would have been a shoo-in against Biden, Dodd and Edwards. But the gaseous platitudes wafting up to Cloud Nine are suddenly very earthbound. "Yes, we can!" is an effective pitch if you're the new messiah, not so much when you're pulling in a very humdrum fortysomething percent against a divisive and strikingly inept campaigner.
Go back to that Maureen Dowd line: "People will have to choose which of America's sins are greater."
"People won't, Democrats will," the blogger Orrin Judd responded. "People will elect John McCain in November, demonstrating that we don't share their guilt."
Maybe. But a Democrat nominating process that's a self-torturing satire of upscale liberal guilt confusions will at least give us a laugh along the way.

They've lost their mind!

By violating party rules and scheduling their primaries too early, the Democratic National Committee denied Florida and Michigan their delegates at the national convention. Michigan and Florida did hold Democratic primaries, but the candidates agreed in advance not to campaign in either state. Thus, many democrats chose not to vote in Florida and Michigan because they knew their state's delegates weren't going to count. But now, the voters in the two states are feeling disenfranchised, and are insisting that their votes be counted. Democrats agree that a re-vote is needed to determine convention delegates for Florida and Michigan, but the question is how. With Clinton and Obama running such a tight race that it looks like neither candidate will get the 2,024 delegates needed to clinch the nomination, letting Florida and Michigan count could be the way to put either candidate over the top. With 366 pledged delegates and superdelegates between the two states, both governors have said it would be "intolerable" not to let their residents' votes count. But Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, has argued that the states knew the rules before they scheduled their contests.
Today, Dean took a new stand and said a mail-in ballot is "not a bad way to do this."
Can you imagine the mess - no the total chaos - that will result if Florida decides to conduct a mail-in election, something they have never done before. The press (and thousands of lawyers) might as well book their hotel rooms in Palm Beach now - the hanging chads will seem insignificant compared to the impending mail fraud.

"Is" a monster?

Samantha Power, a key foreign policy advisor to Barack Obama, quit today after she was caught calling Hillary Clinton a "monster" during a book tour in Britain.
"We f***d up in Ohio," Power told the Scotsman newspaper. "In Ohio, they are obsessed and Hillary is going to town on it, because she knows Ohio's the only place they can win," Power was quoted as saying.
"She is a monster, too -- that is off the record -- she is stooping to anything," Power said.
In addition to calling Clinton a monster, Power made other unflattering comments about the former First Lady.
"Interestingly, the people in her innermost circle seem to not mind her; I think they really love her," she said.
Power said Clinton has looked desperate in her recent TV appearances.
"You just look at her and think: Ergh. But if you are poor and she is telling you some story about how Obama is going to take your job away, maybe it will be more effective. The amount of deceit she has put forward is really unattractive," she said.
Power afterward issued a statement through the Obama campaign saying she was sorry, but Clinton's backers pounced in a conference call, and her resignation came within two hours.
"I made inexcusable remarks that are at marked variance from my oft-stated admiration for Senator Clinton and from the spirit, tenor, and purpose of the Obama campaign," Power said when she resigned.

I may just be an old watchdog, but I've met a few female dogs. As for Hillary's innermost circle...well, let's see. Her NH campaign chair accused Obama of selling drugs; her drug-using husband Bill has repeatedly used race baiting comments about Obama; and she herself has used fear mongering (remember the picture of Obama in Muslim garb?) for gain. It's about time someone said it. Yes, she IS a monster. But wait, I guess it all depends on the meaning of "is" a monster.

Sharia Continues to Grow and Grow

Taken off the Powerline web site this morning. Do you ever get the idea that we are just completely giving in?

As of January 28, according to Abbie Ruzicka's Boston University Daily Free Press report, Harvard has imposed women-only swimming hours at its Quadrangle Recreational Athletic Center. Harvard adopted the women-only hours after members of the Harvard Islamic Society and the Harvard Women's Center petitioned the university for a more comfortable environment for women. Ruzicka's account makes clear the Muslim impetus of the policy:
Harvard Islamic Society's Islamic Knowledge Committee officer Ola Aljawhary, a junior, said the women-only hours are being tested on a trial basis. The special gym hours will be analyzed over Spring Break to determine if they will continue, she said.
Aljawhary said that she does not believe that the women-only gym hours discriminate against men.
"These hours are necessary because there is a segment of the Harvard female population that is not found in gyms not because they don't want to work out, but because for them working out in a co-ed gym is uncomfortable, awkward or problematic in some way," she said. Michael Graham's Boston Herald column comments:
In the old days, Harvard would have laughed if some Catholic or evangelical mother urged “girls-only” campus workouts in the name of modesty. Today, Harvard happily implements Sharia swim times in the name of Mohammed.
At Harvard, that’s called progress. Graham tracked a Harvard spokesman down and elicited the usual obfuscatory blather:
When I asked Harvard spokesman Bob Mitchell about this new Sharia-friendly policy, he denied that they were banning anyone. “No, no,” he told me, “we’re permitting women to work out in an environment that accommodates their religion.”
By banning all men from the facility, right?
“It’s not ‘banning,’” he insisted. “We’re allowing, we’re accommodating people.” Graham is unfortunately, to borrow a phrase, a voice crying in the wilderness.

A Different Take

The following is a clip from Maureen Dowd's column this morning in the New York Times. I won't link to the site, but I will cut and paste this portion. Of course, one must always take anything from Ms Dowd with a grain of salt. However, this is the different take I was looking for this morning!

With Obama saying the hour is upon us to elect a black man and Hillary saying the hour is upon us to elect a woman, the Democratic primary has become the ultimate nightmare of liberal identity politics. All the victimizations go tripping over each other and colliding, a competition of historical guilts.
People will have to choose which of America’s sins are greater, and which stain will have to be removed first. Is misogyny worse than racism, or is racism worse than misogyny?
As it turns out, making history is actually a way of being imprisoned by history. It’s all about the past. Will America’s racial past be expunged or America’s sexist past be expunged?
As Ali Gallagher, a white Hillary volunteer in Austin told The Washington Post’s Krissah Williams: “A friend of mine, a black man, said to me, ‘My ancestors came to this country in chains; I’m voting for Barack.’ I told him, ‘Well, my sisters came here in chains and on their periods; I’m voting for Hillary.’ ”
And meanwhile, the conventional white man sits on the Republican side and enjoys the spectacle of the Democrats’ identity pileup and victim lock.

Public Service Announcement

While sniffing around to try to find a slightly different take on what happened last night with the Democratic race ( and having a difficult time finding one), this old dog did find this interesting note from a blogger in Australia. I figure the only reason he let the cat out of the bag is he didn't have the money to participate in the bidding. But, you never know, perhaps one of our gentle readers has the wherewithall to make a run at it, so since my master won't be getting into the bidding war, he will pass on this tidbit as a public service announcement.

Scarlett Johansson will totally date you - if the price is right. The bodacious blonde is auctioning off a chance to be her special guest at the premiere of her upcoming film “He’s Just Not That Into You” to benefit Oxfam, the international relief organization. The lucky winner of the eBay auction will get two tickets to the event. “One-hundred percent of the proceeds go directly to supporting Oxfam’s work,” the star of “The Other Boleyn Girl” said in a video on the auction site. “So please bid high.” The film, based on the best-selling book and co-starring Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore and Ben Affleck, is slated to premiere in July in either New York or Los Angeles. The auction runs though March 12

1924

The Washington Post this morning has a really cool article about the 1924 Democratic Convention. When linking to the site, you may have to sign up first. But the Washington Post is free and the sign up is short.
The Ballot Brawl of 1924 - washingtonpost.com

Cutting to the Quick

Now this may be a little over the top, but it is still a very interesting read.

What do y'all think?

Obama-mania and cult of self-esteem Jerusalem Post

The Importance of Western Values

The City Journal has a great piece from the brilliant Ibn Warraq, describing his side of a debate with Tariq Ramadan and others on the question whether we should be reluctant to assert the superiority of Western Values. It's all worth reading, but I most enjoyed these passages:
The great ideas of the West—rationalism, self-criticism, the disinterested search for truth, the separation of church and state, the rule of law and equality under the law, freedom of thought and expression, human rights, and liberal democracy—are superior to any others devised by humankind. It was the West that took steps to abolish slavery; the calls for abolition did not resonate even in Africa, where rival tribes sold black prisoners into slavery. The West has secured freedoms for women and racial and other minorities to an extent unimaginable 60 years ago. The West recognizes and defends the rights of the individual: we are free to think what we want, to read what we want, to practice our religion, to live lives of our choosing....
A culture that gave the world the novel; the music of Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert; and the paintings of Michelangelo, da Vinci, and Rembrandt does not need lessons from societies whose idea of heaven, peopled with female virgins, resembles a cosmic brothel. Nor does the West need lectures on the superior virtue of societies in which women are kept in subjection under sharia, endure genital mutilation, are stoned to death for alleged adultery, and are married off against their will at the age of nine; societies that deny the rights of supposedly lower castes; societies that execute homosexuals and apostates. The West has no use for sanctimonious homilies from societies that cannot provide clean drinking water or sewage systems, that make no provisions for the handicapped, and that leave 40 to 50 percent of their citizens illiterate.

Mc Cain Recalls His Imprisonment

A reader alerted me to an article found today in a British newspaper, The Daily Mail. The article should evoke quite an emotional response.

My six years of hell: John McCain recalls life a prisoner of war in Vietnam

Duke Lawsuit

Duke University is going to court to try to shut down this web site. It should be fun ( and instructive) to watch the Duke lacrosse team, and their parents, take on this institution which so grievously abused their students.

Duke Lawsuit: Duke files motion to take down this website

Food for Thought

From William Katz, writing at Urgent Agenda:


Unity is an enticing goal. It is also the siren song of the dictator and demagogue.

In our universities today there's a code word going around. It's "collegiality." Surely you students want a "collegial" atmosphere, don't you? Surely you don't want to "offend," do you? Surely we want to have mutual respect, don't we? If you're 18, you know how to answer those questions. The problem is, each "correct" answer erodes your freedom. Instead of challenging someone, you shut up, especially if that someone is a member of an "oppressed" group. Instead of debating, you withdraw, fearful of being accused of spreading "hate."

I've always believed that Americans won't lose their freedoms. They'll give them up to some noble-sounding appeal. Now we are being sold "unity." We're being sold it by a man who is hypnotizing many in our country, in part because of his identity. Some feel better about themselves simply by listening to him. But, when the time comes, will these same people rise to disagree with him, especially if he's endangering the nation? That is the question.

When someone preaches "unity," watch out. Unity comes at us on a coating of snake oil.