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April 2008

April 30, 2008

Latest Casualty Of Feminization

Gdp

With today's GDP announcement, everyone's spinning about the definition of "recession" again.

While commonly defined by the financial press and economics textbooks as "two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth," recessions are officially designated by the National Bureau of Economic Research. The NBER goes beyond the two-quarter rule, adding an additional layer of hard data points to reach its recession designation:

A recession is a significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales. A recession begins just after the economy reaches a peak of activity and ends as the economy reaches its trough.

Which brings us to these two yapping chicks. According to their feelings, recession is already here:

And it's watching crap like that every other morning that freaks my wife out. Now she wants to cancel our vacations, stop eating out, give up dry cleaning, vote Democrat, stop giving h---, etc.

Self. Fulfilling. Prophecy.

All because of emotional wimmins. Thanks!

UPDATE: Welcome, Don Surber folks. I didn't really mean all of that about my wife; we still eat out.

April 29, 2008

That's. IT.

The final straw... Obama plays with tarheels.

Obamauncbasketball_2 

I could not be more proud to be a Dukie.

Dukelogo

NAW, NAW, NAW!

Obamaspeed

Behold the glory of my very first photoshop! Awesome, I know.

Continue reading "NAW, NAW, NAW!" »

Obama Is Toast

Obamatoast

Gov. Bobby Jindal On Leno

No bombshell regarding the GOP veepstakes --- he wants to remain governor of Louisiana and run for reelection.

The high point for me? It is so refreshing to see a New Orleans Katrina victim on TV expressing sincere gratitude instead of the usual "You suck and probably bombed the levies. Gimme." Gov. Jindal is a class act:

Hillary Clinton Calls Obama Gay?

Pansy_2

Not really. But there is quite a bit of prickly conclusion-jumping going on:

As Hillary wages a kind of culture war inside the Democratic Party, Mike Easley used something that sounded to John Aravosis like an anti-gay slur as she stood beside him this morning, saying that Hillary "makes Rocky Balboa look like a pansy".

Aravosis: "In case anyone has been living under a rock, pansy is slang for 'fag.'"

That's how I heard it too.

Here's Merriam-Webster: a usually disparaging : a weak or effeminate man or boy b usually disparaging: a male homosexual

So, just cut out all the middlemen here --- Hillary Endorser = Hillary and Rocky Balboa = Baracky Obama and Pansy = Gay. Voila! Headline magic.

Besides, I think Gov. Easley really just wanted to say "pussy."

Schuldige Schadenfreude

The schadenfreude over Rev. Wright's carpet-bombing of the Obama campaign has reached the point where I'm starting to feel ... guilty ... about it. Not about the popcorn-passing thrill of it all, but what it now means for the country.

I readily admit. For a desperate moment last winter during Huckabee's ascendancy and Obama's own holiday from scrutiny, I was one of those shell-shocked conservatives who saw in an Obama presidency the chance to finally say "Paid In Full, STFU" to all the professional race hustlers and liberal white guilt mongers out there. After all, it was either him or Rev. Huckabee at that point and an equally crappy four years to come, so why not punch that magic ticket and close a sad chapter in American history once and for all? Silly, silly Cuffy.

And then Obama finally started to get analyzed. His voting records, positions, associations. His character. (Oh yeah, and Huckabee imploded.)

Ever since, I have been a gleeful, eager participant in the methodical unwrapping of Obama's meticulously fabricated marketing package. Traffic has ramped and my old fixation on posting quirky Odd News stories and goofy viral videos has temporarily been replaced with an earnest duty to prevent a dangerous man from reaching the White House. I have even taken my first bite of the turd burger.

But still, that elusive "Paid In Full" dream, however ephemeral and false, popped up again today when I read Victor David Hanson:

If conservatives at first thought the Obama/Wright catastrophe was ironic, given Obama’s liberal sermons, or in a political sense timely in helping the McCain candidacy, I think by now they and most other Americans instead see the mess as tragic for the country, and a radical setback in our collective racial relations. Everyone of good conscience should deplore Wright in the strongest terms, and implore Obama once and for all to disown this extremist.

Obama's candidacy has been the ultimate bait-and-switch.

When he was the unvetted hopey-changey guy, I was almost ready to to get all post-racial with the rest of the herd (we were gonna lose with Huckabee anyway). Now with Wright, we're back to where we started --- no, worse --- with some of the ugliest racial theories spouting from Obama's spiritual advisor and pastor of 20 years.

Congratulations, Obama. Take a bow and take a step back with the rest of us.

April 28, 2008

Please Help

A fellow moron blogger, Stashiu, is entangled in some expensive legal wrangling regarding his two adopted daughters (short version: his first adoption lawyer messed up big time, and his current lawyer ($$) is trying to fix it).

Please visit Doubleplusundead for some background and how we can help.

Much Bigger Than Sister Souljah

Earlier, Geraghty posited the theory that maybe Rev. Wright's new flurry of racial vitriol would give Barack Obama one last chance to launch the Mother of All Repudiations against his pastor.

Unfortunately, it has become much, much more difficult for Obama now:

Wright also argued, at least four times over the course of the hour, that he was speaking not for himself but for the black church.

"This is not an attack on Jeremiah Wright," the minister said. "It is an attack on the black church." He positioned himself as a mainstream voice of African American religious traditions. "Why am I speaking out now?" he asked. "If you think I'm going to let you talk about my mama and her religious tradition, and my daddy and his religious tradition and my grandma, you got another thing coming."

That significantly complicates Obama's job as he contemplates how to extinguish Wright's latest incendiary device. Now, he needs to do more than express disagreement with his former pastor's view; he needs to refute his former pastor's suggestion that Obama privately agrees with him.

In other words, Obama now has to denounce not just the words of one man, but an entire religious sect. His own.

Finally: Rev. Wright In Context

From Rev. Wright's speech yesterday at the NAACP, Jake Tapper reports:

The bulk of his remarks addressed, however, different groups seeing each other as deficient. He acted out the differences between marching bands at predominantly black and predominantly white colleges. “Africans have a different meter, and Africans have a different tonality,” he said. Europeans have seven tones, Africans have five. White people clap differently than black people. “Africans and African-Americans are right-brained, subject-oriented in their learning style,” he said. “They have a different way of learning.” And so on.

From another document:

Just as plants and animals are of different types, so, too, are people. Each of these types inherits certain characteristics, which distinguish it from all other types, from all other races. Racial differences are physical, spiritual, and intellectual. The most important differences are in the spiritual and intellectual areas, in life styles.

It continues:

Genetics tells us that characteristics are passed unaltered from generation to generation, and that spiritual and other characteristics are inherited along with physical ones. The environment can only influence what is already present in the genes. Unlike animals, a person does not have a single environment, but also lives in the cultural world of his race and people. This too determines the development of his inherited traits. His culture comes from his inheritance.

Please forgive me --- did you think those last two quotes were from Wright?

Continue reading "Finally: Rev. Wright In Context" »

April 26, 2008

Morgan Spurlock: CAIR Free

Spurlockcamel2

In an Arab caricature that would normally get labeled as some kind of ugly, racist stereotype by CAIR, reliably liberal Morgan Spurlock is untouchable (full image of his new movie poster here).

Indeed, CAIR already gave him a get-out-of-sharia-free card in 2005 for an episode of his TV show "30 Days" when he filmed white, Christian, probably bitter & clingy, West Virginian Dave Stacy living as a Muslim for the proscribed period. A nice quote from Stacy when the show aired:

“I have a whole new appreciation for what it’s like to be discriminated against...We’re not as tolerant as we should be. ... You can’t stereotype one and a half billion people..."

Unless you're Morgan Spurlock, of course.

Fellow moron blogger bmac finds something even more offensive about Spurlock.

UPDATE: Welcome, Little Green Footballs (thanks, Charles).

Pissant Newsletter Publisher Cum Fringe Kingmaker

Ron_paul_over

After yesterday's Sturm und Drang over McCain's latest maverictus, a timely reality check. Remember the Bircher alternative to McShitsandwich?:

“I’ll be very cautious about what I do,” he said, noting his effort to encourage his supporters to get involved with their local Republican committee. “If I just endorse somebody from another party and walk away, that probably wouldn’t go over too well.”

But while keeping to the same mantra — “I have no plan, no intention to do so” — Paul is also not completely slamming the door shut on a third-party run. And, perhaps more worrisome for Republicans should they have a tight race with the eventual Democratic nominee, he’s also not ruling out supporting a third-party candidate.

Asked what he would do if his supporters approached him this fall and asked him whom to support, Paul replied, “I’ll respond when I think I should — when we know where the ducks are lining up.”

“It’s a little bit early for that. Who are the candidates going to be? Not only on top of the two parties, but who will be the bottom four or five?”

Who cares about the "bottom four or five" candidates? RON PAUL! that's who:

“I have a lot of friends in the Green Party,” he said. “Some [of my backers] may vote for Ralph Nader.”

So what is Ron Paul going to do while we wait for him to endorse an even fringier candidate? Hell, it's time to horde some gold! Following up on his wild success as an attention-to-detail publisher of newsletters, Ron Paul has a new book coming out next week, “The Revolution: A Manifesto."

The Politico piece wraps up with this trip down memory lane:

Recalling the May of 2007 GOP debate when he and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani scrapped in South Carolina over the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and national security, Paul crowed that “Giuliani made me a celebrity.”

“I’m still doing this," Paul said, "and he’s paying back his debt.”

I leave you with Ron Paul's historic star turn:

RON PAUL 2008!

April 25, 2008

Rush Is Going Apeshit

McCain goes into full-on Maverick mode and Limbaugh is having a conniption right now. I hate to break it to the big guy, but it's probably necessary:

3.  Bash Bush: It's no secret that Democrats will paint McCain as the heir to the presidency of George W. Bush -- particularly when it comes to the war in Iraq. (Liberal groups are already hard at work tying Bush's unpopularity around McCain's ankles.) McCain needs badly to convince voters that while he may support the President on some issues, he is not a Bush Republican. While remaking the Republican brand before November may be too high a bar even for McCain, he must convince voters that the outgoing president doesn't define the party. McCain may have already gotten the message: His outspoken criticism of the President's handling of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina drew massive press coverage on Thursday.

Yeah, Maverick pisses me off when he does this, but it is what it is.

While it would be nice to completely rely on the Democrats slitting their own throats, happily traipsing down the Bush Love trail is radioactive this year. McCain has to put some a shitload of daylight between himself and George. I'd rather him wield the easy, popular, already-urban-mythologized Katrina club than something more important like, say, surrendering in Iraq.

Equal Opportunity Critic

Yesterday, I gagged over the picture of silver-platter-cladded canoes that Colson Whitehead painted. Today, I grit my stomach acid coated teeth over Peggy Noonan's tortuous and, er, interminable airport metaphor. Please kill me:

America is in line at the airport. America has its shoes off, is carrying a rubberized bin, is going through a magnetometer. America is worried there is fungus on the floor after a million stockinged feet have walked on it. But America knows not to ask. America is guilty until proved innocent, and no one wants to draw undue attention. America left its ticket and passport in the jacket in the bin in the X-ray machine, and is admonished. America is embarrassed to have put one one-ounce moisturizer too many in the see-through bag. America is irritated that the TSA agent removed its mascara, opened it, put it to her nose, and smelled it. Why don't you put it up your nose and see if it explodes? America thinks.

It goes on. And on. No, really --- five more paragraphs of this pundit version of Seinfeldian peeves wrapped in Serious Political Analysis, including this random jewel:

Another thing: It reduces the status of that ancestral arbiter and leader of society, the middle-aged woman.

WTF? That would be...Peggy Noonan. OK. We get it --- you got hassled at the airport this week. Get over it.

She finally gets to some point about Obama's patriotism and how Texas now hates Bush. You don't need to read the whole thing. Trust me.

April 24, 2008

Boo. Freaking. Hoo.

When not not questioning Obama's patriotism, Joe Klein wails about unfair Democrat stereotypes:

It is the transcendent irony of this campaign that Obama, who entered the race intent on getting past the "dorm fights of the '60s," has now become deeply entangled in them. Each of the ABC moderators' questions were about controversies that erupted in the '60s. The Rev. Jeremiah Wright's black-nationalist sermons had their roots in the black-power movement that corrupted Martin Luther King Jr.'s "beloved community." The sprouting of flag pins on the lapels of politicians was a response to the flag-burning of antiwar protesters; the violence of Weather Underground members like William Ayers, with whom Obama was said to be "friendly," was a corruption of the peace movements as well. All of these occurred before Obama reached puberty — and they helped define the social atmosphere in academic communities like Chicago's Hyde Park, where Obama now lives. For 40 years, the Republican Party has feasted on the secular humanism, feminism, distrust of the military and permissiveness that caricature such communities. For 40 years, the Democratic Party has been burdened by its inability to break free of those stereotypes.

Uh, yeah. Snug shoe.

Snarky, Ironic Lib Vs. Conservative Mastermind

Today's Dueling Op-Ed's --- Colson Whitehead in the New York Times versus Karl Rove in the Wall Street Journal.

Here's Whitehead, aka "The Guy Who’s Where He Is Only Because He’s Black" making the case that criticism of Obama is centered exclusively on the perception of him being the Affirmative Action Candidate --- a charge that has only been obliquely made, I remind you, by fellow Democrats (Geraldine Ferraro, Ed Rendell), not eeevil Republicans:

Most folks don’t know much about me, apart from the feeling of injustice that hits when I walk into the room with my easy charisma and air of entitlement. I understand. It’s weird when your government passes legislation, like equal opportunity laws, that benefits one single person in the country — me, The Guy Who Got Where He Is Only Because He’s Black.

Whitehead phones in his conclusion with horribly painful metaphors. Ugh:

Some people say Barack Obama and I get everything handed to us on a silver platter. But we don’t let it bother us. We’re taking those silver platters and making them our canoes. Then we’ll grab our silver spoons and paddle to a place where people get us. North Carolina, maybe. Or Indiana. I hear Oregon is nice this time of year. We’ll paddle on, brother, paddle all the way to the top.

So let's see what the grownups have to say. Eviscerating Obama's Senate record on purely meritocratic grounds, Rove puts the klieg lights on Obama's weakness --- and it's not race:

Mr. Obama's call for postpartisanship looks unconvincing, when he is unable to point to a single important instance in his Senate career when he demonstrated bipartisanship. And his repeated calls to remember Dr. Martin Luther King's "fierce urgency of now" in tackling big issues falls flat as voters discover that he has not provided leadership on any major legislative battle.

Mr. Obama has not been a leader on big causes in Congress. He has been manifestly unwilling to expend his political capital on urgent issues. He has been only an observer, watching the action from a distance, thinking wry and sardonic and cynical thoughts to himself about his colleagues, mildly amused at their too-ing and fro-ing. He has held his energy and talent in reserve for the more important task of advancing his own political career, which means running for president.

Demonstrating the fundamental laws of political attraction, Obama's cheerleaders are as empty and unserious as Obama himself.

April 23, 2008

Gaydar Tripped

Obamapostpenn

Whereas Christopher Hitchens notices the severe melanin deficiency in the crowd behind Obama at his post-Penn speech, I think the three Abercrombie & Fitch fellows behind him target another voting block. (full video here)

UPDATE: I have no idea if these guys are gay, NTTAWWT. If they're not, they're probably (as Ace sez) the callow hyperhetero A&F types who would be petrified to be called gay. And that's why I posted the pic/headline. Really --- how cool are you if you coordinate your T's? Obama Douches.

She's In His Head

Meanobama

Elderly schoolgirl Maureen Dowd on Hillary and Barack:

He knew he tanked in the Philadelphia debate, but he was so irritated by the moderators — and by having to stand next to Hillary again — that he couldn’t summon a single merry dart.

Is he skittish around her because he knows that she detests him and he’s used to charming everyone? Or does he feel guilty that he cut in line ahead of her? As the husband of Michelle, does he know better than to defy the will of a strong woman? Or is he simply scared of Hillary because she’s scary?

The Big Stick

Tr

Instapundit points us to P.J. O'Rourke's report from the USS Theodore Roosevelt, aka the "Big Stick", and while he ostensibly went aboard to marvel at the sheer supremacy of modern American naval power, O'Rourke makes an important observation:

Some say John McCain's character was formed in a North Vietnamese prison. I say those people should take a gander at what John chose to do--voluntarily. Being a carrier pilot requires aptitude, intelligence, skill, knowledge, discernment, and courage of a kind rarely found anywhere but in a poem of Homer's or a half gallon of Dewar's.

Some people say John McCain isn't conservative enough. But there's more to conservatism than low taxes, Jesus, and waterboarding at Gitmo. Conservatism is also a matter of honor, duty, valor, patriotism, self-discipline, responsibility, good order, respect for our national institutions, reverence for the traditions of civilization, and adherence to the political honesty upon which all principles of democracy are based. Given what screw-ups we humans are in these respects, conservatism is also a matter of sense of humor. Heard any good quips lately from Hillary or Barack?

O'Rourke's conclusions are even more powerful in context of the controlled chaos of the carrier launches and landings he describes --- read it all.

April 22, 2008

Awaiting Moderation...

Big surprise --- comments on Bill Ayers' blog are moderated:

Cuffyayerscomment_2 

Yes, my spelling is quite competent...without late night beer.

UPDATE: Welcome, Michelle Malkin readers (thanks, see-dubya). Be sure to go to Doubleplusundead for even more Ayers gems --- Bill's dense, plodding prose and craptacular formatting terrorized my intellect so much that I handed it off to DPUD.

First Black President Claims Race Card Played Against Him

So much for keeping Bill Clinton in his box:

Clearly, Clinton seems clearly frustrated by the question or the suggestion by anyone - either the reporter or the Philadelphia official whom she quoted - that he was somehow making a negative statement about Obama (or Jesse Jackson) based on their race. His frustration comes through towards the end of the recording when, apparently unaware that he was still on the line, Clinton asks whoever is with him, “I don’t think I should take any shit from anybody on that, do you?"

Bill Clinton cannot handle having his legacy blow up in his face.

(h/t: Jake Tapper)

UPDATE: Some reporters confront Clinton with questions about his "race card" comments:

NBC/NJ: “Sir, what did you mean yesterday when you said that the Obama campaign was playing the race card on you?”

CLINTON: “When did I say that, and to whom did I say that?”

NBC/NJ: “On WHYY radio yesterday”

Watch it unfold. Wagging finger and all:

WTF, Guvnah?

This American's terrible pidgin of Australian and Cockney sounds worse than my drunkest Monty Python recitals:

MiG-29 Shoots Down Georgian Drone

No, Jimmy Carter is safe and sound:

Where Obama Got His "Tell"

Remember Obama's "tell" --- the rightward headcock that signals severe subconscious distress? That's Obama from his very first hotseat interview with Fox News when the Rev. Wright tapes first hit and Unrepentant American Terrorist™ Bill Ayers' mugshot.

Obamastell Billayersmugshot

April 21, 2008

Taking A Break From Ayers

Working forward from his first blog entry, I got to June '07 and had to stop --- my brain is getting mushy. There's plenty of notable quotables left for other enterprising bloggers...

Bill Ayers In Chavez's Venezuela (Nov. 2006)

Headliner for Chavez's "World Education Forum":

President Hugo Chavez, Vice-President Vicente Rangel, Ministers Moncada and Isturiz, invited guests, comrades. I’m honored and humbled to be here with you this morning. I bring greetings and support from your brothers and sisters throughout North America. Welcome to the World Education Forum! Amamos la revolucion Bolivariana!

This is my fourth visit to Venezuela, each time at the invitation of my comrade and friend Luis Bonilla, a brilliant educator and inspiring fighter for justice. Luis has taught me a great deal about the Bolivarian Revolution and about the profound educational reforms underway here in Venezuela under the leadership of President Chavez. We share the belief that education is the motor-force of revolution, and I’ve come to appreciate Luis as a major asset in both the Venezuelan and the international struggle—I look forward to seeing how he and all of you continue to overcome the failings of capitalist education as you seek to create something truly new and deeply humane. Thank you, Luis, for everything you’ve done.

You're welcome, comrade.

Bill Ayers On Aftermath Of 9-11 (Sept. 2006)

We were hijacked:

I’m writing these words on September 12, 2006— the fifth anniversary of the spectacular hijacking of the monstrous crimes of September 11. That’s right, the hijacking of the hijackings, carried out in plain sight by a different band of right-wing zealots just as determined to impose their arid ideology on America and the world as the thugs of 9-11. It’s a hijacking still  underway, a work-in-progress whose disastrous consequences are only partly apparent.

I especially like how this poster boy for the failure of the criminal justice system would have preferred to respond to 9-11:

The so-called war on terror was simply accepted on all sides, no one qualifying with the necessary, “so-called.” No one asked whether a crime didn’t require a criminal justice response and solution—perhaps a massive response, but within the field of criminal justice nonetheless.

Bill Ayers On Patriotism (July 2006)

Obamaflag

Remarkable:

On this July 4, we would do well to renounce nationalism and all its symbols: its flags, its pledges of allegiance, its anthems, its insistence in song that God must single out America to be blessed.

Is not nationalism—that devotion to a flag, an anthem, a boundary so fierce it engenders mass murder—one of the great evils of our time, along with racism, along with religious hatred?

Patriotism is perhaps the single concept in greatest need of being subjected to intense scrutiny and questioning in our country today.

A reader asks if we should be screen-capping these Ayers quotes. If Ayers is so unapologetic about his terrorism, I think we can safely bet he won't scrub his site. Ego.

UPDATE: Hello again, morons and Driscoll readers. Should the urge hit, be advised comments on Ayers' narcissistic shrine to Unrepentancy are, of course, moderated.

Reading Bill Ayers' Blog (June 2006)

He's not a terrorist --- just ask him:

We went underground after an explosion killed my girl-friend and two other close friends, and we decided to stay free rather get entangled in the criminal justice nightmare. We wanted to survive what we saw as an impending American fascism in order to fight the empire. We wanted to organize the armed struggle.

We were (and are) radicals, which means we wanted fundamental, not superficial change. Radical means going to the root, connecting issues, analyzing deep causes of war, racism, exploitation and oppression.

We were never “terrorists,” never attacking people to frighten or coerce them. The US forces in Viet Nam were terrorists. I’m not a tactician, however, and I think tactics always have to flow from the conditions you find, and the goals you have. When we destroyed property, symbolic targets of war and racism, an overwhelming majority of Americans opposed the war as thousands of Vietnamese were being slaughtered every week in our name. We were the anti-terrorists.

I don’t know what we accomplished, but I’m sure we didn’t do enough. My biggest regret: my dogmatic, inflexible thinking, my intolerance of and impatience with potential allies. I don’t regret hurling myself against the war-mongers.

Reading Bill Ayers' Blog (April 2006)

Doing the job Obama won't do --- due diligence:

Bill Ayers on post 9-11 patriotism:

The civil-rhetorical patriotism evident everywhere—the flags and signs proliferating, the elaborate story and the stock slogans, the giving of blood and the trips to “Ground Zero”—allows, perhaps, a shared grief and a shared incredulity at the start. Given the narrow American palette reaching for the flag might have meant sympathy and unity at the start. But from the start powerful forces were busy using the moment to promote a narrow, repressive patriotism—dissent is unpatriotic, un-American—in the service of horrifying goals and purposes.

On who did not execute the 9-11 attacks:

How many Afghans were involved in the September 11 attacks?

On joining Cindy Sheehan at Camp Casey:

Toward the end of the summer of 2005, outside President Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, I joined the encampment known as Camp Casey. Crawford is a town divided: the brightly decorated Peace House faces banners reading, “All the way Mr. President” and “Smoke ‘Em Out, 43”; one side of the road has lawn signs with the iconic image of Marines planting the flag on Iwo Jima and the slogan “Support Our Troops,”—somewhat desperate, I thought, to have to reach so far back for a picture of putative pride in war—the other side answers “Bring Them Home.”

On how volunteering for the Armed Services is like joining a gang:

Military recruiting in high schools has been a mainstay of the so-called all-volunteer armed forces from the start. High school kids are at an age when being a member of an identifiable group with a grand mission and a shared spirit—and never underestimate a distinctive uniform—is of exaggerated importance, something gang recruiters in big cities also note with interest and exploit with skill.

On being labeled a terrorist:

I thought of myself immodestly as a freedom fighter, but I knew that “terrorist” was tattooed over every inch of me—it was an electrifying label, even then. I imagined a pale figure dressed in an oily overcoat, feverish, eyes blazing, beard and hair wild and unkempt, sitting in the back of a theater with a black bomb in his pocket. Nothing at all like me. No, I said to myself at the time, I’m no terrorist.

On apologies:

Still I’m disinclined to apologize because I hear the demand for a general apology as a howling mob with an impossibly broad demand, and on top of that I’m not sure what exactly I’d apologize for. The ’68 Convention? The Days of Rage? Bombing the Pentagon? Every one of these can be unpacked and found to be a complicated mix of good and bad choices, noble and low motives.

Even when true, the words are mortifying. They are the end not only of a dream, but of a life. The apology in general is uttered, and suddenly you die.

More to come...

UPDATE: Welcome, AOSHQ and Ed Driscoll. Be sure to read all the other Ayers gems (left sidebar) and go over to Doubleplusundead's for even more. DPUD valiantly picked up the shovel when I stopped digging through Ayers' crap last night. Besides America hatred, it appears Obama may have picked up something else from Ayers.

Harsh Critic Of Wasteful Spending To Suck Hard On Public Teat

Porkbuster extraordinaire McCain opts for taxpayer funded election bucks:

John McCain is abandoning any hope of catching the Democrats in fundraising.

Based on new financial disclosure reports released Sunday, and interviews with his finance team, the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee will instead accept taxpayer money to finance his general election and share other costs with the Republican National Committee.

And we thank all of you idiots out there that check the "$1 for election campaigns" boxes on your 1040.

Disenfranchised Propagandist Endorses Obama, Chili-Cheese Fries

Fatbastardmichaelmoore

Behold the dimness, as disenfranchised Michigan voter Michael Moore describes his brilliantly incisive voting strategy.

Step 1: Vote Democrat, regardless of candidate:

I haven't spoken publicly 'til now as to who I would vote for, primarily for two reasons: 1) Who cares?; and 2) I (and most people I know) don't give a rat's ass whose name is on the ballot in November, as long as there's a picture of JFK and FDR riding a donkey at the top of the ballot, and the word "Democratic" next to the candidate's name.

Step 2: Unless the Democrat is Hillary Clinton:

Well, that sounded good last year, but over the past two months, the actions and words of Hillary Clinton have gone from being merely disappointing to downright disgusting. I guess the debate last week was the final straw.

Step 3: No, really, just do Step 1 --- Vote Democrat:

I know some of you will say, 'Mike, what have the Democrats done to deserve our vote?' That's a damn good question. In November of '06, the country loudly sent a message that we wanted the war to end. Yet the Democrats have done nothing. So why should we be so eager to line up happily behind them?

Step 4: I'm serious, guys --- Step Freaking One, vote for the party which can't surrender fast enough and incompetantly took away my own vote:

Just as long as their name ain't "Bush" and the word "Republican" is not beside theirs on the ballot, then that's good enough for me.

I, like the majority of Americans, have been pummeled senseless for 8 long years. That's why I will join millions of citizens and stagger into the voting booth come November, like a boxer in the 12th round, all bloodied and bruised with one eye swollen shut, looking for the only thing that matters -- that big "D" on the ballot.

Step 5: (unless it's You-Know-Who):

Mrs. Clinton continues to throw the Rev. Wright up in his face as part of her mission to keep stoking the fears of White America.

Step 6: Finally, avoid Republican Nazis and (did I mention this?) that racist Hillary Clinton --- otherwise Big D all the way:

In the distance we hear the siren of the death train called the Straight Talk Express. We know it's possible to hear the words "President McCain" on January 20th. We know there are still many Americans who will never vote for a black man. Hillary knows it, too. She's counting on it.

He wraps it up:

Pennsylvania, the state that gave birth to this great country, has a chance to set things right. It has not had a moment to shine like this since 1787 when our Constitu --- IS SOMEONE FRYING BALONEY?!? {stampedes from room}

April 19, 2008

"Ballistic" Reentry For Returning Space Station Crew

Soyuzreentry

Some teeth surely got rattled:

Three crew members of the International Space Station (ISS) returned safely to earth on Saturday after experiencing a hard "ballistic landing," 400 kilometres off-target the Interfax agency reported.

Russian news agency Interfax reported that they had experienced a hard ballistic landing, which would have subjected the crew to a major impact.

"The main thing is that the crew is alive and well," he said.

(Note: that's not a pic of this particular Soyuz capsule hard landing, just the best representative photo I could find. Will replace if I find one of this landing...Come to think of it, no picture of this landing exists since they landed in Bumkazakh and it took the search choppers 45 minutes to find them.)

UPDATE: Me SMRT! It takes my pal Doubleplusundead to remind me of a special piece of equipment in the Soyuz return capsule I wrote about a while back. Check out his weekend edition of links, and learn something new...like I did!

Dems' Response To "Gotcha!" Questions

Shameless lying about Bosnian snipers. Trucking with corrupt fundraisers, racist, anti-American pastors and unrepentant terrorists. Emphatically spurning important symbols of patriotism. Condescension coupled with transparent, awkward pandering. These are the "gotcha!" non-issues that have the Dems hoppin' mad.

And the target of their return fire?

Cindy. McCain's. Freaking. Recipes. --- GOTCHA!

This past Sunday, Lauren Handel, an eagle-eyed attorney from New York, was searching for a specific recipe from Giada DeLaurentis, a chef on the Food Network. Yet whenever she Googled the different ingredients in the recipe, the oddest thing happened: not only did the Food Network's site come up, as expected, but so did John McCain's campaign site.

These sleuths even have pre-scrub screenshots of the gastronomical plagiarism from McCain's website and everything! Quick! Assign a ghey "-gate" suffix to this scandal, STAT!

Listen, until McCain has to start scrubbing his campaign site of racists and terrorist sympathizers (like Obama did), you guys ought to go back to yapping about McCain's positions on the war and the economy. Wait --- you can't even do that right.

FAIL.

What's In Rove's Briefcase?

Rovesbriefcase

Eleanor Clift has the answer:

Karl Rove, sitting on the same panel, said Clinton had run a poor campaign and should have responded sooner and more forcefully that Wright "wouldn't be my pastor." Rove chortled over how vulnerable he thinks Obama will be once the Republicans get hold of him. He said that the speech on race that the media slobbered over was the most cynical exercise he's ever seen. He carries a copy of it in his briefcase just to keep him on his game.

April 18, 2008

Perfunction: Changing The World...

...one tyrannical liberal at a time. Fighting with a progressive free thinker in the comments of an NPR blog, Perfunction reader "deek" inserts a link to my previous post:

i  say revoke ABC affiliate licenses. and henceforth let's have only adult organizations manage debates (npr, womens league of voters, common cause).

no more mickey giving us the mickey.

Sent by tim in exile | 11:16 AM ET | 04-18-2008

deek responds:

A little link for you tim.

http://perfunction.typepad.com/perfunction/2008/04/little-tyrants.html

Sent by deek | 2:36 PM ET | 04-18-2008

Faced with the thuggish company he sought to emulate, tim retreats:

@deek: while the collection in the link makes some abstruse connections to the point of tendentiousness, i will concede the point. my comment about revoking the license was over the top. so, i now disown and apologize for this part "i say revoke ABC affiliate licenses" . fair is fair.

Sent by tim in exile | 3:44 PM ET | 04-18-2008

One down, a gazillion to go. Thanks, deek --- whoever you are.

Pot, Kettle, ohcrapthatmakesmeracist

A splendid Obama campaign memo dug up by Jake Tapper from last fall:

The “politics of hope” doesn’t mean hoping you don’t have to answer tough questions.

And a contemporaneous video from back then. Ironically, from the last time they debated in Philly:

Allahpundit has background on the current "you're a wuss, no, you're a wuss" flap here.

"Memory Is A Motherf*cker"

So writes Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers in the first line of his memoir Fugitive Days, which he was inconveniently pimping to the New York Times on September 11, 2001.

Today, as Barack Obama tries to furiously spin his way out of yet another mess, he's just pathetic. He falls back on some routine "Campaign Reality Check!" bullshit maneuver as if an opponent has charged he supported a 3% indexed tax hike when it was really a 2% unidexed tax hike. Please:

He winds up being an apologist for Ayers, most laughably in this passage:

REALITY: AYERS COMMENTS WERE PUBLISHED ON SEPTEMBER 11; THE INTERVIEW OCCURRED PRIOR TO PUBLICATION

On September 11, 2001, A Story About William Ayers’ Memoir Was Published In The New York Times; The Interview Occurred Prior To Publication. “‘I don’t regret setting bombs,’ Bill Ayers said. ‘I feel we didn’t do enough.’ Mr. Ayers, who spent the 1970’s as a fugitive in the Weather Underground, was sitting in the kitchen of his big turn-of-the-19th-century stone house in the Hyde Park district of Chicago.” [New York Times, 9/11/01]

I think almost everyone sophisticated enough to hold a newspaper right-side-up understands that an interview gets conducted before publication. No one claims that Ayers said this at the moment the towers fell. The point is that after a decade of terrorist attacks against American interests, Ayers still hadn’t reconsidered his own terrorism after 30 years, and the publication of that fact on 9/11 had its own twisted sense of irony.

Irony, Obama. Ugly, inconvenient irony:

911pentagoncrash

‘‘Everything was absolutely ideal on the day I bombed the Pentagon. The sky was blue. The birds were singing. And the bastards were finally going to get what was coming to them." [William Ayers, Fugitive Days, 2001]

And:

Wtc2collapse

"Night after night, day after day, each majestic scene I witnessed was so terrible and so unexpected that no city would ever stand innocently fixed in my mind. Big buildings and wide streets, cement and steel were no longer permanent. They, too, were fragile and destructible. A torch, a bomb … and they, too, would come undone or get knocked down." [William Ayers, Fugitive Days, 2001]

Memory is a motherfucker, Barack.

April 17, 2008

Mad. Libs.

Madlibs

Today is, appropriately, the 50th anniversary of Mad Libs. HA!

Little Tyrants Upset Over Debate

Liberal outrage over the ABC News debate last night is at a fever pitch, with a familiar call to arms going out across the land --- shutting down free speech is a common, recurring wish of these free thinkers when challenged:

Daily Kos (yesterday)

President Barack should pull their [ABC's] Broadcasting License.

Code Pink (2005):

Clear Channel wants a new 8-year license to control our public airwaves, promote war, and use our music against us...Pull the plug on corporate radio and tell the FCC to hold Clear Channel accountable, or revoke their broadcast license.

Think Progress (2007)

It’s time to shut FOX news network down, revoke their broadcast license, force them into bankruptcy, and deport Rupert Murdoch back to Australia.

Democratic Underground (2004)

Fox News is a 24/7 campaign commercial for the Repukes...It should be banned from broadcasting within 60 days of the General Election...When Kerry wins he should pull their broadcast license ASAP.

Kazakhstan (2002)

The authorities continue to persecute the Almaty-based independent television TAN-TV. The Transport and Communication Ministry had said that it intends to revoke its broadcast license. The official explanation is that the company had failed "to remedy offenses and shortcomings."

Russia (2002)

"We were told: This your last chance. Take it or we in the Press Ministry will take you [broadcaster TV6] off the air," Kiselyov told The Moscow Times. "We trembled and lost our composure."

Venezuela (2007)

Venezuela's most-watched television station -- and outlet for the political opposition -- went off the air after the government refused to renew its broadcast license.

Kenya (2006)

Masked police with automatic rifles stormed a leading Kenyan media firm yesterday, kicking down doors, burning newspapers and forcing its television station off the air. Staff were forced on to the ground as officers ransacked the headquarters of Kenya Television Network and the printing press of The Standard, the country's oldest newspaper.

United States Senate (2006)

We therefore urge you to cancel this broadcast [The Path to 9/11] to cease Disney’s plans to use it as a teaching tool in schools across America through Scholastic. Presenting such deeply flawed and factually inaccurate misinformation to the American public and to children would be a gross miscarriage of your corporate and civic responsibility to the law, to your shareholders, and to the nation.

The Communications Act of 1934 provides your network with a free broadcast license predicated on the fundamental understanding of your principle obligation to act as a trustee of the public airwaves in serving the public interest.

Cross-posted at Ace of Spades HQ

UPDATE: Welcome back, HotAir and Instapundit. If you missed this obviously unconstitutional debate, here's some representative live-blogging of it. Also, Doubleplusundead reports on a Philly columnist's unhinged reaction; be sure to check DPUD's always entertaining linkfest as well.

UPDATE: Cool --- the better half of last night's live-blog duel,