"ALL CAPS IN DEFENSE OF LIBERTY IS NO VICE."

Saturday, February 09, 2008

OBAMA IS POPULAR BECAUSE HE MAKES HIS FOLLOWERS FEEL GOOD

Obama did well tonight - he SWEPT, beating Hillary 3-1.

Why is he doing so well?

He's connecting with a large segment of the electorate.

WHY?

It's about them.

It's all about them.

It's always all about them, and how they feel.

It's not about policy.

It's not about experience.

It's not about values.

It's not about Iraq.

It's not about Bush - or Hillary.

IT'S ABOUT THEM.

Obama
makes THEM feel good.

Which reminds me... Obama's feel-good campaign-theme "the audacity of hope" is very much like another campaign theme - a fictional one, from the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical by the Gershwins: OF THEE I SING.

The presidential candidate and leading role in the musical, John Wintergreen, ran on a campaign theme of "LOVE."

A vapid feel-good theme.

Like Obama's.

And yes: Wintergreen won.

Sigh.

(I wish people saw Obama's paucity of experience and his paucity of honesty. I hope once the REAL election campaign start they do)

*******UPDATE: MUST SEE MUSIC VIDEO.

NHS DOCTORS TAKE LUXURIOUS SKI HOLIDAY ON THE BRITISH TAXPAYER

I love this story - it exposes the socialist doctors AND the global warming eco-nutsies!!

DAILY MAIL:
Nearly 500 senior NHS doctors have spent the past week enjoying a taxpayer-funded break at one of the world's most exclusive ski resorts at a cost of up to £400,000.

The specialists – many of them key workers including anaesthetists, radiologists and urologists – attended a seminar every morning and evening and spent the rest of their days enjoying the well-groomed pistes and stunning Alpine views.

They are each allowed to charge hundreds of pounds of expenses to NHS Trusts on the grounds that the trip “continued their medical education”.
These would be the same doctors who said recently that maybe the NHS should start denying fat patients and smokers healthcare - in order to save precious healthcare dollars.

What sickeningly disgusting hypocrisy.

There's not enough money to treat people, but there's enough to pay for their junkets.

DISGUSTING LEFTIST HYPOCRITICAL AS**OLES! And stupid, too:
  • SKIING!?
  • IN WINTER!?
  • IN EUROPE!?
  • WHODDATHUNK THAT WAS STILL POSSIBLE!?
  • IT'S SO UN-PC. IT REMINDS PEOPLE THAT THE WORLD AIN'T WARMING.
  • THEY SHOULD HAVE GONE SOMEWHERE WARM - LIKE THE UN'S GLOBAL WARMING EXPERTS!

TURKEY IS HAVING ITS WORST WINTER IN DECADES

The New Anatolian (Ankara): Cold freeze continues to paralyze eastern Turkey, one dead
Freezing weather conditions continue to paralyze life in Eastern Anatolia.

A person froze to death in Hizan town of eastern province of Bitlis.

Gendarme forces found the body of a 25-year-old person who froze to death near Hacimehmet village due to feezing weather.

Flights were cancelled in Van due to heavy snowfall.

Temperatures in provinces of Erzurum and Ardahan dropped to -31 degrees Celsius on Thursday night, the meteorology department said.

On the other hand, roads to 215 villages are still closed to traffic in the region due to heavy snow and blizzard.

Meteorology authorities say there will be some relief next week as temperatures will start to rising by 5-10 degrees Celsius as of Monday.
THIS IS HARDLY THE STUFF GLOBAL WARMING IS MADE OF!

MOST OF THE WORLD IS HAVING THE WORST WINTER (2007-2008) IN SEVERAL DECADES!

BREAKING: NEW BHUTTO ASSASSINATION VIDEO


IT REINFORCES MY INTERPRETATION OF THE PREVIOUS VIDEOS: IT SHOWS THE BULLETS MISSED HER AND SHE WAS KILLED BY THE BLAST.

OMAR AND BINLADEN IN QUETTA, PAKISTAN

UPI:
U.S. intelligence officials say al-Qaida's Osama Bin Laden and the Taliban's Mullah Omar are planning their attack strategies from within Pakistan.

Speaking with reporters in Washington, a senior U.S. intelligence official said Bin Laden and Omar both are living in Pakistan, despite denials to the contrary from Pakistani leaders, the BBC reported.

Omar, and other senior Taliban leaders, are coordinating attacks and fueling the insurgency in Afghanistan from Quetta in Pakistan's Balochistan Province, said the official, who provided no details about how western intelligence sources came by their information.


WIKI: Quetta Demography
In the 1998 census Quetta was the ninth largest city of Pakistan with a population of 565,137. However, the population has risen sharply since then. The city in general is dominated by a Pashtun majority, a Balochi and Hazara minority with an eclectic smattering of smaller groups. However the city is also a home to millions of Afghan immigrants. The Pushto, Balochi, Persian (Hazaragi dialect), Brahui, Sindhi, Punjabi and Urdu languages are spoken in Quetta.
THESE JIHADO-SCU*BAGS ARE HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT... WHAT SHOULD WE DO?
  • WE NEED TO QUIETLY THREATEN PAKISTAN WITH A QUARANTINE IF THEY DON'T QUARANTINE QUETTA.
  • WE TELL THEM TO SURROUND QUETTA WITHIN A DATE CERTAIN. AND THEN "GET" OMAR AND OSAMA.
  • IF THEY FAIL TO DO THE QUARANTINE, THEN WE USE DRONES TO ATTACK ANY AND ALL SUSPECTED AL QAEDA HIDEOUTS. DAMN THE COLLATERAL DAMAGE.
  • I HAVE LONG MAINTAINED MUSHARRAF IS A GOOD ALLY.
  • BUT IF THIS INTEL' IS TRUE, THEN MUSHARRAF MUST PROVE IT ONCE AGAIN.

SEVERE WINTER WEATHER KILLS DOZENS IN KASHMIR

BBC: Twenty killed in Kashmir snowfall
Trucks waiting along highway in Indian-administered Kashmir At least 20 people have been killed and 10 are missing after heavy snowfall in Indian-administered Kashmir, police in the state say.

The road link between the valley of Kashmir and the rest of India has also been cut for the last five days.

Avalanches triggered by the heavy snow hit several homes.

Police and the army have rescued more than 30 people in a village south of the summer capital, Srinagar, where eight houses were hit by an avalanche.

The dead include two entire families, each comprising six members.

The authorities have evacuated several villages as more avalanches are feared after an improvement in the weather.

The 300km highway linking Srinagar with the winter capital, Jammu, has been closed for the past five days.

Thousands of lorries and buses are stranded on the road, which is the only surface link between the valley of Kashmir and the rest of India.
Hmmm ......Record cold around the world this winter - with record snows. WHAT DOES THIS TELL US ABOUT MAN-MADE GLOBAL WARMING?
AGW IS A HOAX PERPETUATED BY THE LEFT TO RAISE TAXES AND INCREASE THEIR LONG-HELD SOCIALIST REGULATORY SCHEMES.

ANOTHER DISASTER CAUSED BY ISRAEL'S INCOMPETANT GOVERNMENT

Forty rockets rained on Sderot, an 8-year-old was seriously wounded. But no convincing action taken by government.

Note to government spokesperson David Baker: government for which you work needs to actually perform a raid on Gaza in order to convince.

UNDERMINING HYGIENE

Right now, the outcry of outrage over the archbishop's remarks has British citizens all fired up. One can only hope that they hold onto that anger. Maybe then the politicians will understand that the people, including many Muslim immigrants, want British law in the UK — not shari'a law.

On February 3rd - six days ago - Punditarian of THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS posted on another facet of CREEPING SHARIA IN THE UK, one which threatens the health of the everyday person in the UK. His source was the UK Telegraph; here's an article from another source also from February 3, 2008:
Muslim women working at U.K. medical facilities are increasingly refusing to comply with the basic hygiene standard of rolling up their sleeves when their washing hands, it was reported.

According to the U.K.'s Daily Telegraph, female workers are ignoring Britain's Department of Health rules requiring medics to be "bare below the elbow" because they consider showing any skin — outside the hands and face — immodest.

The guidelines were put into place to stave off the spread of infectious killer bugs like MRSA and Clostridium difficile, which have been implicated in the deaths of hundreds of hospital patients, according to the paper.

Hygiene experts said the standard should hold for all workers— even if it goes against their religion.

"I don't think it would be right to make an exemption for people on any grounds. The policy of bare below the elbows has to be applied universally," Dr. Mark Enright, professor of microbiology at Imperial College London told the Telegraph.

Some fear the enforcing the rules will open the door to lawsuits charging discrimination against female Muslims working within the medical professions.

The Islamic Medical Association, for one, has issued a statement that "no practicing Muslim woman — doctor, medical student, nurse or patient — should be forced to bare her arms below the elbow," according to paper.
Western countries are going to have to make some unnegotiable decisions and stick to them if all of us are not to be endangered even further. Otherwise, we are headed for a New Dark Age, just as Mark Alexander has been warning.

AMERICA'S CHAVEZ: BARACK HUSSEIN SOETERO OBAMA JUNIOR

Heroin packaged as a book

Book Review - Robert Ferrigno's Sins of the Assassin

Seldom does an eagerly anticipated sequel meet the hype. Even less frequently does it exceed the original, especially when the latter received numerous awards and hit all of the bestseller lists. Such an anomaly is Robert Ferrigno's Sins of the Assassins, the second volume in the Assassin Trilogy.

Epic in scope, cinematic in its plotting, startling in its violence and ultimately realistic despite its futuristic setting, Sins features the return of Rakkim Epps in a post-nuclear U.S. In Prayers for the Assassin, Epps uncovered the true backdrop behind a so-called "Zionist" attack on Washington, New York and Mecca. The attacks triggered a second U.S. Civil War that eventually split the country into a moderate Islamic Republic and a Christian-oriented Bible Belt. With help from his long-time friend Sarah, Epps exposed "the Old One" as the instigator of the nuclear attacks. The Old One, bent on establishing a global Islamic empire with North America as its cornerstone, was stopped dead in his tracks by Epps and Sarah but escaped to live another day.

In "Sins", another, darker day has arrived. The United States is more fragmented than ever as the Christian Bible Belt is racked by warring factions; the Islamic Republic has become increasingly radicalized as Sharia law spreads; and the Aztlan Empire (Mexico) and Canada are encroaching on the old southern and northern borders.

Worse, word of a legendary super-weapon buried in a remote mountain area -- a highly-classified DoD project in the old U.S. regime -- threatens to unravel the fragile truce that exists between the Islamic Republic and the Bible Belt. Epps is tagged for a secret mission by the president of the moderate Islamic Republic to retrieve the weapon. Any hope for a "re-United States" hangs in the balance as a variety of international players -- including China, the modern global superpower -- race to control the weapon.

Epps is one of the Islamic Republic's elite "shadow warriors," a tiny cadre of special operatives groomed for commando activity behind enemy lines and genetically enhanced for night vision, fighting skills and agility. Compounding Epps' troubles, however, he's ordered to bring Leo -- an unathletic, unworldly nineteen year-old scientific genius -- with him on his nerve-wracking mission into the Bible Belt. Leo's job will be to quickly interpret the weapon's technology and to perform other classified tasks to which even Epps is not privy.

Along the way, Epps grapples with his own religious beliefs. As the violence escalates, he becomes convinced that somehow, some way, the spirit of Darwin -- the ultimate assassin controlled by the Old One -- has entered his being. Epps struggles to maintain control over his own schizophrenic existence as he and Leo weave their way through the Bible Belt's fragmented terroritories of religious cults, militias and corrupt officials.

As Rakkim and Leo wend their way to the mountain and the weapon within, they face not only the combined forces of the Old One, but a formidable militia led by "the Colonel", a military legend in the Bible Belt. Foremost among the Colonel's troops is Gravenholtz, a mechanically enhanced super-soldier capable of unbelievable savagery.

If Hollywood hasn't optioned the Assassin series, it's high time some Porsche-driving, mousse-laden genius arranged a meeting with Ferrigno's representatives.

The only downside of the book? You'll need the literary equivalent of methadone to overcome withdrawal once the story ends. And you'll be marking the calendar for the final chapter of the triad.

WILL MCCAIN PICK A DEMOCRAT AS HIS VEEP?

AFTER ALL, THAT'S WHAT USUALLY FOLLOWS HIS NAME!
  • MCCAIN-KENNEDY.
  • MCCAIN-FEINGOLD.
  • MCCAIN-LIEBERMAN.
I want.... McCain-Demint. Or Romney. (With the one NOT getting the Veep slot getting to Chair the GOP). Or maybe McCain-Rice if Obama is on the enemy's ticket.

Either way, it'll sure be odd to see a REPUBLICAN or a CONSERVATIVE'S NAME FOLLOW MCCAIN'S!

Odd and good - or at least better than the prior three!

ONCE AGAIN, COLIN POWELL PROVES HE IS A JERK

Powell is one of the most over-rated personalities ever on the national stage:
  • Powell prevented GHW Bush and Schwartzkopf from finishing the job in the Gulf War.
  • Powell made a most RIDICULOUS presentation to the UNSC on Saddam's WMD and the reasons to use force against Saddam (over-emphasizing the wrong data, and ignoring better data) - AND HE GOT COMPLETELY SNOOKERED BY CHIRAC AND VILLEPIN. (Powell should have emphasized a more comprehensive list of all violations of the 17 UNSC's which comprised the de facto Armistice for the Gulf War, and not just the illegal arms aspects.)
  • Powell repeatedly kowtowed to Arafat and Fatah.
Now, Powell is publicly saying he might vote Democrat in 2008, and that he likes Obama.

What a freakin' embarrassment and a jerk. How he ever got respect is beyond me; he's always been a freakin' FAILURE.

(I KNOW WHAT IT IS: He's been gliding on the Reagan glow all these years.)

MORE HERE.

Leftists Cannot be "Pimped out"

Chelsea Clinton has been taking an active part in her mother's campaign. And some people wonder if that is all her own idea. As a result MSNBC TV host David Shuster referred to her as being "pimped out" by her mother's campaign. The remark created a lot of criticism and he later apologized for it. He has however been temporarily suspended from further appearances.

"Pimped out" could nean "highly ornamented" or "flashily dressed" but that does not seem to have been the intended meaning in this case. Rather the implication seems to have been that her mother's campaign staff were "pimps" by pressing Chelsea into service and that Chelsea was a prostitute for consenting to be used that way.

It would have been a REAL uproar if a conservative had said that! But in any case it is surely a legitimate criticism to suggest that some pressure had been placed on the young woman to act as she has done. But nasty words like "pimp" cannot be used for Leftists, of course. But you can say anything you like about Christians and conservatives.

Details here. There is a big discussion of the meaning of "pimp" here.

Posted by John Ray

What is an "intellectual"?

Further to my post yesterday:

In his usual memorable way, the delightful Dr. Spooner once said: "I have in my breast a half-warmed fish". I suspect that the definition I am about to offer is little better than a half-warmed fish but here goes: I think an intellectual is someone who defends popular ideas in a particularly persuasive way -- which is why the label is usually attached only to people who are much in the public eye. There are many scholars and scientists labouring away at making a contribution to knowledge and understanding but it is only when they get into the public eye that they become "intellectuals". And if the ideas they espouse are complex or difficult to follow they will simply not get into the public eye. The ideas concerned have to be readily comprehended by the intelligent layman.

And one reason why most intellectuals seem to be Left-leaning is that Leftist ideas are the ones most in need of defending. Some Leftist ideas -- such as the belief that you can provide more and better accommodation for the poor by instituting government rent-control -- are so obviously mad that not even an intellectual could defend them (except in NYC of course). But other ideas -- such as the desirability of universal government healthcare -- are attractive enough to warrant defending. And if you have been to a government hospital lately, you will very likely feel that only an intellectual could defend that idea. I am sure that Hillary Clinton goes to private hospitals.

So I think I can safely say that I am not an intellectual. I get no mainstream media exposure at all. Since I would much prefer to be regarded as a scientist or a scholar, however, I feel rather pleased about that. Most "intellectuals" seem to me to be very poor scientists and scholars -- Noam Chomsky, for instance.

Posted by John Ray

Friday, February 08, 2008

The hysteria formerly known as global warming

Unremarked upon by the media -- especially as they are co-conspirators in the scam -- is the rebranding of global warming as Climate Change™.

I guess that's what's required as China, South America, central Asia and Antarctica are all experiencing record-setting deep freezes.

Of course, Barack Obama and John McCain are now battling over who can dampen the economy more in order to control the climate.

Meanwhile, the world's scientists are now turning their attention to the issue of global cooling. Anyone need a used copy of An Inconvenient Truth?

MARK STEYN AT CPAC - MUST SEE TV

HERE. 28 MINUTES. WATCH IT. NOW.

WE HAVEN'T HAD A CONSERVATIVE PRESIDENT SINCE 1988

Reagan was our last conservative president.

And our last GREAT president.

COINCIDENCE?

Nope.

He also won HUGE electoral victories.

You'd think the GOP would've learned from this.

NOPE.

Sigh.

REPRISE: THAT MCCAIN LETTER TO OBAMA

Many hive posted on the SCATHING and SARCASTIC attack letter McCain sent to Obama a few years back - because it may very well be an omen of things to come -- if the race comes down to McCain versus Obama.

THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS posted on this letter AT THE TIME (February 2006 - A TIME FEW OTHERS WERE STILL PAYING CLOSE ATTENTION TO OBAMA) - and AGAIN in a post in December 2, 2006 - EXCERPT:
EXACTLY WHAT KIND OF MAN IS BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, JR?

Barack Hussein Obama Jr. - the junior, 1st-term Senator from Illinois is a dishonorable and untrustworthy man. Here's why:
After graduating from Harvard Law, the then utterly unknown Obama was contacted by a bright aggressive NYC literary agent who thought - because of Obama's mixed heritage and modest background - BHO Jr might have an interesting story to tell. They signed a contract. After much work, the agent sold Obama Jr's book. It was Obama Jr's first.

After Obama Jr's pretty and pretty well-received convention speech in 2004 - (and before he was elected to the Senate) - he broke this contract with this agent, (the one who picked him up out of nowhere and got him his first book deal), in order to sign with a bigger agent, (to whom he was introduced by perjurer Bill Clinton).

Instead of being loyal to the agent who helped put him on the map, he dumped her the first chance he got, and jumped on to the roster of a bigger bigshot - who didn't have to break a sweat in order to sell Obama Jr's SECOND book! (Barack Hussein Obama Jr. eventually agreed to a settlement for breaking his contract with his first agent.)
Personal behavior like this reveals a lot; it reveals that in Barack Hussein Obama Jr's world, trust and honor mean NOTHING.

Which is exactly what McCain's wrote of Barack Hussein Obama Jr, not too long ago.

SURE: Barack Hussein Obama Jr. does have a nice voice, and he's very loquacious. He may even seem charming to some. Nice qualities all. Essential, too, if you want a career as a singer or a game show host. But being president requires more. More than Barack Hussein Obama Junior has. It matters not what his name is; it matters only that he possess the right stuff. Obama does not.
Obama is unfit for the office based on his poor character.

HERE'S THAT LETTER:
Dear Senator Obama:

I would like to apologize to you for assuming that your private assurances to me regarding your desire to cooperate in our efforts to negotiate bipartisan lobbying reform legislation were sincere. When you approached me and insisted that despite your leadership’s preference to use the issue to gain a political advantage in the 2006 elections, you were personally committed to achieving a result that would reflect credit on the entire Senate and offer the country a better example of political leadership, I concluded your professed concern for the institution and the public interest was genuine and admirable.

Thank you for disabusing me of such notions with your letter to me dated February 2, 2006, which explained your decision to withdraw from our bipartisan discussions.

I’m embarrassed to admit that after all these years in politics I failed to interpret your previous assurances as typical rhetorical gloss routinely used in politics to make self-interested partisan posturing appear more noble.

Again, sorry for the confusion, but please be assured I won’t make the same mistake again. [...]

As I noted, I initially believed you shared that goal. But I understand how important the opportunity to lead your party’s effort to exploit this issue must seem to a freshman Senator, and I hold no hard feelings over your earlier disingenuousness.

Again, I have been around long enough to appreciate that in politics the public interest isn’t always a priority for every one of us. Good luck to you, Senator.

Sincerely, John McCain United States Senate

WHAT IF WE'D LISTENED TO OBAMA OR HILLARY ON IRAQ?

If we'd listened to Obama - and NOT attacked Iraq, then Saddam would still be in power, still be sending money to jihado-terrorist, still be sending payola to get under-the-table deals within the CORRUPT oil-for-food program, and using to money for his own aggrandizement, and tens of thousands of Shias would have been murdered by his regime - every year. And in all likelihood Russia and France would have scuttled the UN Sanctions and inspections and Saddam would have then been able to restart his WMD program WHICH EVERYONE SAYS HE INTENDED TO DO THE MOMENT W LEFT HIM ALONE. As Obama wanted us to do.

This instead of overthrowing a genocidal tyrant and fighting to establish a democracy within the Middle East - and killing TENS OF THOUSANDS OF JIHADO-TERRORISTS along the way.

Obama, and his followers, seem to think that the world would be a better place if Saddam was alive, in power and killing tens of thousands of Shias, RATHER THAN Saddam .... DEAD and tens of thousands of JIHADISTS KILLED.

WOW. Whose side are they on!?

Hillary's position is NOT MUCH BETTER: she'd just have had us RETREAT instead of SURGE; she'd have had us SURRENDER IRAQ TO AL QAEDA, RATHER THAN HELP OUR NEW ALLIES DEFEAT THEM. As we are.

By their I oft repeated Iraq War policies ALONE, Obama and Hillary PROVE themselves UNFIT FOR THE OFFICE.

DID BUSH AND MCCAIN MAKE A DEAL IN 2004?

After turning down Kerry's VP offer , McCain wholeheartedly embraced GW Bush, and campaigned his ass off for Dubya; they even hugged in public numerous times.

I think they made a deal: in exchange for McCain's support in 2004, Bush promised he'd do whatever he could BEHIND THE SCENES to help McCain - and the Bush Machine came through in FLORIDA, where McCain essentially clinched the nomination.

McCain and Dubya are both liberals: they both favored amnesty, for example - AND BUSH SIGNED MCCAIN-FEINGOLD. McCain may be tougher on the spending side, and Bush a better tax-cutter. But they're essentially BOTH libs, with McCain being the more liberal of the two.

Anyhow it just seems to me that the GOP machine always wanted McCain and, well er um.... now we got 'em.

Obama and Hilary are worse - though my final decision will come down to who McCain picks.

I have posted before that I think he MUST pick a YOUNG and VERY CONSERVATIVE Southerner. Fred is WAY too old. Demint or Frist or Coburn. Or non-southerner... MITT! (Though I agree with a commenter here, that Mitt would maker GREAT Chairman for the GOP!)

If McCain doesn't pick a true conservative, then I will vote "present" on the presidential line come this Fall.

Trade Flourishes Under Hegemony

Hyperpower is sometimes good. It might sound like a phrase coined by Gordon Gekko, but there is some wisdom to be learned here. Al Fin:

Trade flourishes under hegemony. That is the lesson I took from Power and Plenty, a dense, arduous survey of economic history written by Ronald Findlay and Kevin H. O'Rourke.

In addition to the Mongol empire, they describe the increased trade under the hegemonies of the Romans, the Muslim Caliphate, and various dynasties in China and Latin America during the first millenium. Of course, the most recent example of trade under hegemony has been what Walter Russell Mead in God and Gold calls the maritime powers of Great Britain and the United States.


It makes sense once you think about it.

Disparate peoples can coexist in three ways: in isolation, under hegemony, or at war. In the absence of hegemony, peaceful intercourse is an elusive ideal.
TCS

The current world hegemony--Pax Americana--is often demonised, but is not likely to be improved upon for centuries.

The two current serious alternatives: Chinese hegemony or the global caliphate, leave much to be desired.


China is quickly converting its portion of Asia into a vast wasteland, with poisoned land, water, and air. As China's economic influence and control spreads to other nations of East Asia, Africa, and South America, ecological devastation follows. In the area of human rights, China's record at home and abroad is likewise dismal.

A Chinese world hegemony would be a nightmare for everyone.


What about a world Islamic Caliphate?

Sharia for everyone, dhimmitude for all non-muslims. The streets running with the blood of infidels, apostates, heretics, homosexuals and adulterers. Makes you want to pull all US troops inside US borders, right?


Face it, the world is much better off under Pax Americana than it was during the European wars of the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries.

CAST YOUR VOTE FOR JERUSALEM ON NEW WORLD MONOPOLY BOARD

One Jerusalem encourages everyone who cares about Jerusalem to vote on Hasbro's special voting contest for what countries/cities to add to their new international-based version of Monopoly. So, if you're interested, you can register for voting (see instructions at One Jerusalem for how to manage it) and vote to add Jerusalem as one of the locations.

To have Jerusalem as one of the locations on the Monopoly board is a very interesting idea, and could be a sign of solidarity with the city that became important to the world through Jewish history.

THERE IS NO GLOBAL WARMING: 2008 COLDER THAN 20TH CENTURY AVERAGE

WUWT (VIA TIGERHAWK - VIA GLENN):

Let us give NOAA credit for making this release:

“The average temperature in January 2008 was 30.5 F. This was -0.3 F cooler than the 1901-2000 (20th century) average, the 49th coolest January in 114 years. The temperature trend for the period of record (1895 to present) is 0.1 degrees Fahrenheit per decade.”

For those that have been harping about my “2nd coldest in 15 years” headline, it appears that NCDC has that one beat with “the 49th coolest January in 114 years”.

  • RWTW.
  • AND READ THIS EARLIER POST: 2008 WAS THE SECOND COLDEST YEAR IN THE LAST 15.
  • AND THIS WINTER MIGHT BE WORSE: MUCH OF THE WORLD IS HAVING SEVERE WINTER WEATHER - THE UK; EUROPE; THE MIDDLE EAST; CENTRAL ASIA; CHINA ARE ALL HAVING THE MOST SNOW IN SEVERAL DECADES.
BOTTOM-LINE: ANTHROPOGENIC GLOBAL WARMING IS BULLSHIT.

  • AGW IS A LEFTIST HOAX PERPETUATED BY THE LEFT TO ACHIOEV THEIR LONG-HELD GOALS: TO RAISE TAXES, INCREASE REGULATIONS, PREVENT THE EXPANSION OF OUR INDUSTRIAL ECONOMY AND THE FREEMARKET.

  • BY SCARE-MONGERING THE PUBLIC INTO SHYING AWAY FROM INCREASED INDUSTRIALIZATION, THE LEFTIST AGW CROWD HAS DIRECTLY ELEVATED THE PRICE OF OIL AND - (BY PREVENTING US FROM BUILDING REFINERIES, POWER PLANTS AND EXPLOITING FOR OIL IN THE USA) - FORCED THE WEST TO SEND MORE MONEY TO THE JIHADO-TERROR FINANCIERS IN OPEC THAN WE REALLY NEEDED TO, OR SHOULD HAVE BEEN. \\
  • (WE SHOULD BE DRILLING FOR OIL IN ANWR AND OFF THE COASTS OF CA AND FL - AND WE SHOULD BE BUILDING DOZENS OF COAL-BURNING POWER PLANTS. THESE EFFORTS WOULD INCREASE SUPPLIES AND LOWER PRICES.
  • AND THEY ARE DOMESTIC, WHICH MEANS WE'D BE SENDING LESS MONEY TO OPEC.)

  • AND THESE SCARFE-MONGERGERS ARE ALSO RESPONSIBLE FOR KEEPING AFRICA AND THE THIRD WORLD IN UNDERDEVELOPED POVERTY: WHAT THE THIRD WORLD NEEDS TO END THEIR POVERTY IS EXACLTY WHAT WE USED TO END OURS: INDUSTRIALIZATION

More Muslim death threats

Woman Artist gets Death Threats over Homosexuals in Mohammed Masks



This is from a month ago but I have just found a pic of the wicked artwork:

"The Dutch were debating the limits of freedom of expression last week after an artist who photographed gay men wearing masks of the prophet Muhammad was forced into hiding and her work removed from a museum exhibit.

Speaking on the telephone from an unspecified location in the Netherlands last week, the artist, an Iranian exile who goes by the pseudonym of Sooreh Hera, said she had been threatened with "execution". She accused the director of the municipal museum in The Hague of cowardice for caving in to Muslim extremists.

Source






Homosexual Jesus no good to Muslims either

We read:

"An Islamic group based in the UK has issued a death fatwa against a playwright whose London stage production depicts Jesus Christ as a homosexual. Terrence McNally was sentenced to death by the Shari'ah Court of the UK as his play, Corpus Christi, opened in London on Thursday night.

The play depicts Jesus Christ and his followers as a group of homosexuals. He is seduced by Judas Iscariot, but is later crucified as "king of the queers". It caused an outcry among Christians when it was staged during the Edinburgh Fringe festival during the summer.

Muslims regard Jesus as a messenger of God, and revere his mother, the Virgin Mary. The play was declared blasphemous by the Al-Muhajiroun - The Defenders of The Messenger Jesus.

Source

I wonder when the Archbishop of Canterbury will be issuing HIS fatwa?



Posted by John Ray

Appeals to authority

It is the nature of intellectuals to think that they know better than anyone else. So they rarely defend the status quo. They mostly want to change it in some way that would suit themselves -- mostly to get the money away from those dumb capitalists and channel it in a direction that will be better for intellectuals. In short, intellectuals usually lean Left to at least some degree. Conservatives can take the status quo or leave it, depending on what the particular status quo happens to be. But a loathing of the status quo is intrinsic to Leftism -- so much so that they may often oppose a status quo that they themselves have been instrumental in creating -- with the now-common Green/Left opposition to windfarms (a shout-out to Ted Kennedy here) being one rather amusing example.

One outcome of all that it that Leftists generally find much comfort in the outpourings of intellectuals -- with G.W.F. Hegel and Karl Marx being early players in that field. So an appeal to authority often suits Leftists. They say, in effect: "All these wise men say we need to change the way we do things so that must be right." The most notable tendency of that today is of course the constant Greenie claim that there is a "consensus" among scientists about the human origin of the slight degree of global warming observed in the late 20th century (but which has been conspicuously absent since 1998). The Greenies luxuriate in having so many authorities on their side and they do their best to discredit the many experts who reject the Warmist view.

Sadly, of course, authorities can often be wrong. Even the smartest of intellectuals can make big mistakes when speaking outside their own field of expertise. Albert Einsten had clearly Marxist views on the economy, for instance. You can read his now mostly archaic thoughts on the matter in the old Marxist publication Monthly Review. And the greatest philosopher of the 20th century, Ludwig Wittgenstein, admired Communism so much that he actually emigrated to Russia. He lasted three weeks there and came back with distinctly modified views. Albert at least was wise enough not to put his money where his mouth was.

And experts can even go wrong when speaking WITHIN their field of expertise. Almost all of my academic career was devoted to exposing the flaws in the Leftist theories conventional among political psychologists. I was repeatedly able to show that the reigning consensus was contradicted by the facts. I don't believe I changed anybody's views, however. Ideology is not easily knocked off its perch by mere facts. But for anybody willing to look, I think I was able to show very clearly that the consensus within my own field of expertise was just plain wrong. You can see therefore why I regard ALL appeals to authority as very third-rate thinking -- as a rather pathetic substitute for looking at the actual evidence.

Given that the Green/Left have so conspicuously hitched their wagon to appeals to authority, however, it does on occasion become necessary to reply in kind. If a Leftist says: "All the experts say... " one needs to reply: "But THESE experts deny ..." if one is to have any hope of making a persuasive case. In other words, although appeals to authortity have little objective merit, they do have considerable persuasive power for many people and one has to recognize that and fight back by questioning the authority concerned -- and an easy way to do that is to quote OTHER authorities with different opinions. And I do that often on my Greenie Watch blog.

It is is also because of the Leftist authority-orentation (an orientation which makes it all the more amusing that Leftist psychologists constantly brand conservatives as "authoritarian") that I occasionally make mention of my academic background and the fields wherein I can speak with some authority. I would much rather discuss ANY issue on the basis of the facts but if a Leftist insists on personalized arguments in a field where I happen to be an authority, then I feel that I might as well take the easy way out and squash the Leftist using his own hammer. It might just conceivably teach him something about the inherent inconclusiveness of relying on arguments about persons rather than on arguments about the facts. I do however draw the line at claiming any GENERAL authority. Leftist academics very often do implicitly claim that. They get credit for pronouncements made outside their own field of expertise. A linguist like Chomsky, for instance speaks on all sorts of topics outside of his field and Leftists seem to get great comfort from his "authoritative" misrepresentations. They are fools do do so. Arguing from an irrelevant authority is in fact what logicians refer to as one of the informal fallacies.

I was rather amused recently, however, when a very skeptical reader asked for my list of academic publications. He evidently thought that I must be the sort of fraud one so often finds on the Left. When he was referred to a full list of the relevant citations, he lost that battle but as a comeback complained that many of my publications were quite short. He seemed to think that you could judge the worth of a research article by its length! I am sure that a lot of acadenics wish that were true. Writing reams of waffle seems to come very easily to many of them. If there is any criteriality in the length of a research article, I would tend to think that merit is more likely to lie with short articles. If you know what you are talking about and your results are clear, you don't need to ramble on.

I certainly do strive for succinctness in all that I write. People are more likely to read and understand what one has to say that way. But there are of course some topics that NEED to be discussed at great length -- histories and literature reviews, for instance -- and for my sins I do sometimes write at length in those areas. Most notably so here and here and here.

With my academic background I suppose I could be said to be an intellectual but I sedulously avoid that label. Intellectuals generally seem to me to be a rather miserable bunch who are puffed up with oversimplified theories and who are prone to parasitizing others. By contrast I have always been happy with my lot in life. I have the gift of contentment and "just the facts" will do me fine. And when I do splash out big with money (usually by giving it away. My own needs have always been small), I do it with money honestly earned in business -- not with money ripped off the taxpayer under some pretext. But being someone who has been successful in business as well as in academe does make me an odd bod, I guess.

Posted by John Ray

Thursday, February 07, 2008

GUESS THE PARTY - part 2867

FOX/AP:
BOSTON — A top official in Gov. Deval Patrick's administration is accused of sexually assaulting a boy in the steam room of a Florida resort and has been placed on unpaid leave.

Carl Stanley McGee, the assistant secretary for policy and planning, was arrested Dec. 28 after the suspected assault at the Gasparilla Inn and Club in Boca Grande, according to the Lee County Sheriff's Office.

McGee, 38, met the boy, who police said is between 12 and 16 years old, in a bathroom at the resort a day earlier where they engaged in small talk, according to the police report.

The boy told police he ran into McGee again the next day in the resort's steam room. McGee sat next to him, removed his towel, rubbed the boy's back and shoulders and performed oral sex on him, according to the police report.

The boy's father contacted police, who spotted McGee at the resort using a description from the boy.

McGee was freed on $300,000 bond on Dec. 30 and is to be arraigned Monday on a charge of sexual assault on a victim over 12 using physical force, according to authorities.

  • IN CASE YOU FORGOT THE RULES OF THE GAME, THEY'RE SIMPLE: WHEN A DEMOCRAT POLITICIAN COMMIT A CRIME YOU HAVE TO "GUESS THE PARTY."
  • YOU CAN'T PLAY THIS GAME WHEN IT'S A REPUBLICAN - THE MSM SPOILS OUR FUN BY ALWAYS NAMING THE PARTY IN THESE CASES.

WHO IS CLOBBERING THE DICTATORIAL LEFTIST CHAVEZ?

Not the US State Department.

Not the UN.

Not The Dems

BIG OIL! EXCERPT (REUTERS):
Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N) has won court orders freezing up to $12 billion in Venezuelan assets around the world as it fights for compensation for operations lost to President Hugo Chavez's nationalization drive.

The largest U.S. company sought the asset freeze to guarantee repayment should it win arbitration over the Cerro Negro heavy oil project.

The move is the boldest challenge yet by an international oil major against any of the governments around the world that have moved to increase their holds on natural resources as energy and commodity prices have soared.

... The news comes as a tough blow to Chavez, who suffered a stinging defeat in a December referendum that would have let him run indefinitely for reelection and enshrine socialism as the OPEC nation's economic system.
Right on!

Those who deny you your private property deny your basic human rights and your humanity.

When the state can steal your property and the fruits of your labor, then you are a slave.

THOUGH THE LEFT WOULD TELL YOU THE OPPOSITE: Chavez is a tyrant and our enemy; Big Oil is the friend of enterprise, prosperity and liberty. Big Oil is o0ur friend.

MORE PROOF THAT REAL MEN DON'T TALK ON THE PHONE ENDLESSLY

Men who like to spend a lot of time on their cell phones have appreciably lower sperm counts, a study finds:
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Spending hours on a cell phone each day may affect the quality of a man's sperm, preliminary research suggests.

In a study of 361 men seen at their infertility clinic, researchers at the Cleveland Clinic found an association between the patients' cell phone use and their sperm quality.

On average, the more hours the men spent on their cell phones each day, the lower their sperm count and the greater their percentage of abnormal sperm.

The findings, published in the journal Fertility and Sterility, add to questions about the potential health effects of cell phones and other wireless devices. Some studies, for example, have linked long-term cell phone use to a higher risk of brain tumors, though many other studies have found no such connection.

The concern is that, over time, the electromagnetic energy emitted from mobile phones could theoretically harm body tissue -- by damaging DNA, for example.

However, the new findings do not prove that cell phones somehow damage sperm, according to the researchers.

"Our results show a strong association of cell phone use with decreased semen quality. However, they do not prove a cause-and-effect relationship," lead researcher Dr. Ashok Agarwal told Reuters Health.
That's right; no cause-and-effect relationship is proved. There could be a number of other reasons for the correlation between high cell phone usage and bad sperm.

It could be that men who have high sperm counts don't tend to work jobs where cell phones are required. It could be that men who use their cell phones a lot are more prone to wearing tight bun-huggers. It could be that men who use cell phones a lot are more likely to masturbate ten times a day.

Or, it could be that men with high sperm counts tend to talk less.

Note that there is no related study which has found lower quality eggs in women with high cell phone usage. In fact, I'll bet the more women use their cell phones, the higher quality their eggs.

UPDATE: Another new study has found that the more time a man spends on his computer, the more likely he is to write dumb posts on blogs.

Double standard? What double standard?

Yesterday, a prominent U.S. Cardinal pilloried federal officials for permitting Iran's president Ahmadinejad to visit New York City last year.

We should have executed the dictator. Everyone in the West knows that Iran's president must die. And we could have easily made it appear he died of natural causes.

Oh. My mistake. Did I say a U.S. Cardinal?

I meant that a prominent Iranian cleric called for the beheading of George W. Bush; he expressed disgust with Arab leaders for not taking advantage of Bush's visit by assassinating the U.S. president.

Stepping back for a moment, what does it say about religious authorities who call for executions? And what does it say about a mainstream media that can't be bothered reporting this news. Of course, had a real Catholic official called for Mahmoud to be killed, we can be sure the New York Times would have erupted in righteous liberal progressive outrage.

Double standard? What double standard?

SCOTLAND YARD'S "BHUTTO INVESTIGATION" VINDICATES MUSHARRAF - AND THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS

NYTIMES: SCOTLAND YARD AGREES WITH MUSHARRAF - BHUTTO KILLED BY BLAST FORCE, NOT BULLETS

EXCERPT:
Investigators from Scotland Yard have concluded that Benazir Bhutto, the Pakistani opposition leader, died after hitting her head as she was tossed by the force of a suicide blast, not from an assassin’s bullet, officials who have been briefed on the inquiry said Thursday.

The findings support the Pakistani government’s explanation of Ms. Bhutto’s death in December, an account that had been greeted with disbelief by Ms. Bhutto’s supporters, other Pakistanis and medical experts.
When the video of the Bhutto assassination came out EVERYBODY in the MSM and the blogosphere rushed to judgment and BLAMED MUSHARRAF - for the assassination or a cover up.


I compared this video to the Zapruder film: JFK head exploded from the exiting bullet; Bhutto exhibited NO effect from any bullet entry or exit, and her voluntary movement after the shots and before the blast indicated to me that she had definitely NOT been hit.

I was right. I alone in the MSM and the blogosphere.

I am glad to be vindicated by Scotland yard.

I am ALWAYS skeptical of CW and the MSM. CW is most often wring; the MSM is BLATANTLY BIASED.

The MSM JUMPED at the chance to smear a good ally in the GWOT: MUSHARRAF.

And most of the blogosphere fell for it.

Shame on you all.

You should know by know: most of what the MSM has to say about the GWOT is WRONG - and deliberately so.

On the Bhutto assassination the MSM LEAPED at the chance to smear Musharraf - and ever since then they and the leftie Dems have been promoting Zardari, Sharif and Khan - three despicable anti-American pro-Taliban you-know-whats.

Next time: look before you leap and follow the MSM!
CHECK WITH THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS FIRST!

Spread the word.

Blogroll us.

I BLAME MARK LEVIN!

HOW'D WE END UP WITH LIBERAL MCCAIN!?

It's Mark's fault:
Just kidding. Sort of.

WHAT MIGHT A MCCAIN ADMINSITRATION LOOK LIKE?

Here's an acceptable conservative GOP administration:
  • MCCAIN - POTUS
  • DEMINT - VPOTUS
  • HUNTER - SEC DEF
  • NEGROPONTE - SEC STATE
  • GIULIANI - SEC DHS
  • MUKASEY - USAG
  • GRAMM/ROMNEY - SEC TREAS
  • ROMNEY/WH CHIEF OF STAFF
  • COBURN - DIRECTOR OF THE BUDGET
  • FRIST - SEC HHS
  • PETRAEUS - NS ADVISOR
JUST HOPING...

RETAILING ACTUALLY IMPROVED IN JANUARY

HTT:
January same-store retail sales were up 0.3% in January, following a 0.6% drop in December, which came after a 4.2% gain in November, the Johnson Redbook reported today.
JANUARY WAS BETTER THAN DECEMBER.
  • THE OVERALL RESULTS FOR RETAIL WAS VERY ERTY MIXED.
  • BUT THE WORLD IS NOT ENDING.
  • DON'T BELIEVE ALL THE DOOM & GLOOM THE LEFT-WING MSM IS SPEWING OUT: IT'S ALL A BUNCH OF ANTI-GOP PROPAGANDA DESIGNED TO MAKE YOU FEEL THE ECONOMY IS WORSE THAN IT REALLY IS.
  • IT WORKED ON 1992; THEY THINK IT CAN WORK AGAIN.
DON'T BE FOOLED.
  • THEY LIED ABOUT THE IRAQ WAR.
  • THEY LIE ABOUT AGW.
  • THEY LIE ABOUT THE HEALTHCARE INSURANCE "CRISIS.
  • AND THEY LIE ABOUT THE ECONOMY.
DON'T BE FOOLED.

2008: THE GAS MASK ELECTION

For over a decade American conservatives have had "hold your nose elections" - not so much voting FOR GHW Bush (in 1988 and 1992) or GW Bush (in 2000 and 2004) as voting AGAINST BJ Clinton and Al Gore and John Kerry.

John McCain is WELL to the Left of the Bushes. So, conservative voters won't be able to even get into the voting booths - let alone PULL THE LEVER for the liberal McCain - without wearing a GAS MASK!

JUST IMAGINING THE NAMES MCCAIN AND CLINTON AND OBAMA ON THE BALLOT MAKES ME NAUSEOUS.

But, NOW MORE THAN EVER - as Mark Levin has recently urged us - we MUST go into the booths and vote for conservative Senators and Congressmen. We need to have as large a team of conservatives as possible in the Congress in order to block the tax increases and increased regulation and the socialism that McCain and the two Democrats are ALL promising us: carbon taxes; higher taxes on the wealthy; carbon caps, more government control of the healthcare industry; an so on. And, they all promise us a weakening of our non-military counter-efforts in the GWOT; (McCain and the Dems want to close Gitmo, for example).

WE NEED AS MANY CONSERVATIVES IN CONGRESS IN ORDER TO STOP AS MANY OF THESE LEFT-WING POLICIES AS POSSIBLE.

That means we have to go into those booths in the Fall. Which is why we'll need gas masks.

And maybe maybe, maybe (once we're in the voting-booth) we MIGHT possibly even vote for McCain - IF AND ONLY IF he requests the nomination of a SOLID, GREAT and VERY CONSERVATIVE VP.

This would NOT JUST BE an important signal to send to us conservatives - (that we WILL be on the very inside of a McCain Administration).

But appointing a conservative Veep would be also be VITAL: because (if elected) John McCain will be 72 years OLD when he takes the oath. AND, he has had MALIGNANT CANCER TWICE. Therefore, a YOUNG HEALTHY CONSERVATIVE VEEP MIGHT VERY WELL BECOME PRESIDENT BEFORE MCCAIN'S FIRST TERM IS UP.

SO.... throw away your clothes-pins. Get a GAS MASK, and prepare to vote for the best options available.

Like we did in 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, and 2004.

SIGH....

[WARNING: IF MCCAIN REQUESTS THE NOMINATION OF A LIB FOR VEEP - LIKE GRAHAM, OR HUCKABEE, OR OF AN OLD FELLA LIKE FRED - THEN I WILL NOT VOTE FOR HIM.]

ADAM GADAHN IS DEAD?

If the terrorist-treasonist from Oregon is really dead as a doornail, as Rusty is reporting (via Snapped Shot), that'll be good news indeed. Let him take the next prison flight to hell.

'Don't mention Islamic extremists': British government phrasebook tries to avoid upsetting Muslims

We read:

"The Government has drawn up a controversial phrasebook on the language of terrorism and is insisting civil servants no longer blame fanatical extremism on Islam, for fear of upsetting the Muslim community.

The new counter-terrorism guidelines suggest that phrases such as "Islamic terrorist" and "jihadi fundamentalism" are too inflammatory and imply that all Muslims explicitly are responsible for extremism. Instead the leaked Home Office document advises Whitehall bosses that they refer to violent extremism and criminal murderers or thugs to avoid any link between Islam and terrorism.

However, the war on terror handbook has provoked an unfavourable response from people claiming the Government are bowing under the pressure of political correctness.

Source


Posted by John Ray

America's so-called "decline"

The Left fervently hope for it and sometimes claim that it is happening but reality is pesky for them -- as usual. Excerpt:

American "decline" is the foreign-policy equivalent of homelessness: The media only take note of it when a Republican is in the White House. Broadly speaking, declinists divide between those who merely accept America's supposed diminishment as a fact of life, and those who celebrate it as long overdue. As for the causes of decline, however, they tend to agree: declining (relative) economic muscle, due in large part to the rise of China; an overextended military bogged down needlessly in Iraq and endlessly in Afghanistan; the declining value of America's "brand" on account of Bush administration policies on detention, pre-emption, terrorism, global warming -- you name it.

Yet each of these assumptions collapses on a moment's inspection. In his 2006 book "Uberpower," German writer Josef Joffe makes the following back-of-the-envelope calculation: "Assume that the Chinese economy keeps growing indefinitely at a rate of seven percent, the average of the past decade (for which history knows of no example). . . . At that rate, China's GDP would double every decade, reaching parity with today's United States ($12 trillion) in thirty years. But the U.S. economy is not frozen into immobility. By then, the United States, growing at its long-term rate of 2.5 percent, would stand at $25 trillion."

Now take military expenditures. Yesterday, the administration released its budget proposal for 2009, which includes $515.4 billion for the regular defense budget. In inflation-adjusted dollars, this would be the largest defense appropriation since World War II. Yet it amounts to about 4% of GDP, as compared to 14% during the Korean War, 9.5% during the Vietnam War and 6% in the Reagan administration. Throw in the Iraq and Afghanistan supplementals, and total projected defense spending is still only 4.5% of GDP -- an easily afforded sum even by Prof. Kennedy's terms.

Finally there is the issue of our allegedly squandered prestige in the world. There is no doubt America's "popularity," as measured by various global opinion surveys, has fallen in recent years. What's striking, however, is how little of this has mattered in terms of the domestic political choices of other countries or the consequences for the U.S.

In the immediate aftermath of the Iraq War, nearly every government that joined President Bush's "coalition of the willing" -- Australia, Great Britain, Denmark and Japan -- was returned to power. France's Jacques Chirac and Germany's Gerhard Schroeder, the war's two most vocal opponents, were cashiered for two candidates who campaigned explicitly on a pro-American agenda. The same happened in South Korea, where the unapologetically anti-American President Roh Moo-hyun has been replaced by the unapologetically pro-American Lee Myung-bak. Italy's equally unapologetic pro-American Silvio Berlusconi seems set to return to office after a brief holiday.

Meanwhile, McDonald's -- the icon of everything anti-Americans detest about the U.S. -- is doing a booming business overseas even as sales in the U.S. flatlined last year. Another icon, Boeing, is having no trouble booking orders (meeting them is another matter) for its new 787 Dreamliner to such customers as Spain's AirEuropa and Bahrain's Gulf Air. The quintessentially American film, "National Treasure," has earned nearly half its gross revenue -- about $160 million -- in foreign ticket sales since its release in late December. So much for America's loss of "soft power."

More here

Posted by John Ray

Deja vu: Republican Party on the ropes?

I like The Hugh Hewitt Show, it is always interesting and Hugh's form of Conservatism takes on a particularly intellectual and pragmatic tone, which I appreciate. Hugh has always been a "a party man", but it is no secret that Hewitt has been cheerleading for Mitt Romney; so when you see Hewitt writing things like this, the writing is indeed on the wall:
There are seven reasons for anyone to support the eventual nominee no matter who it is: The war and six Supreme Court justices over the age of 68.

Folks who want to take their ball and go home have to realize that even three SCOTUS appointments could revolutionize the way elections are handled in this country in a stroke, mandating the submission of redistricting lines to court scrutiny for "fairness."

"It is undeniable that political sophisticates understand such fairness and how to go about destroying it," Justice Souter announced in his diseent in Veith v. Jubilerer, the Pennsylvania redistricting case in which the Court declined by a vote of 5 to 4 to immerse itself in the details of the partisan redistricting of Pennsylvania.

If Democrats control the White House and gain even one of the five seats held by the center-right majority of current justices, this and many other crucial issues are up for legal grabs. When activist judges are more than willing to rewrite rules of long-standing, periods of exile should never be self-imposed "for the good of the party." Exiles can go on a very long time indeed. Ask the Whigs.

They can go on indefinitely when enforced by courts.

The GOP as well is the party committed to victory in Iraq and the wider war. A four year time-out would be a disaster, a period of time in which al Qaeda and its jihadist off-shoots would regroup in some places and continue to spread in others. Iran, even if punished in the months before November, would certainly continue and accelerate its plans under the soft pleadings of a President Obama or Clinton 2.0.

These aren't the years to wish a pox on your primary opponents' heads beyond June.

The GOP as well is the party committed to victory in Iraq and the wider war. A four year time-out would be a disaster, a period of time in which al Qaeda and its jihadist off-shoots would regroup in some places and continue to spread in others. Iran, even if punished in the months before November, would certainly continue and accelerate its plans under the soft pleadings of a President Obama or Clinton 2.0.

These aren't the years to wish a pox on your primary opponents' heads beyond June.

I don't expect the principals to let up on each other in the two months ahead, and I am especially looking forward to the Ohio and Texas votes.

But it is very possible to play full contact politics without the threat of going home if your team loses. The stakes in the fall are far too high for that.
The man has a point.

Still, with all of those facts being what they are, I am not feeling good about our winning the Presidency this fall.

Yes, I will vote for whoever the nominee is. In all likelihood that will be McCain, and if so my vote will not have enthusiasm behind it--other than enthusiasm against Hillary or Obama. And that is the problem; in elections this big, enthusiasm is vital--especially when the media is stacked so solidly against any Republican.

With McCain, the base of the Republican party will have very little to be "for", only a lot to be "against". The GOP's best chance at getting out the vote this fall will be to go heavily negative against the Democrats. And that is not a position of strength.

Sadly, this set of circumstances reminds me very much of 1976. And we all know what happened then.

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

MCCAIN'S ADVANCED AGE AND POOR HEALTH MAKE HIM VERY RISKY: MCCAIN'S OWN CAMPAIGN THOUGHT HE MIGHT NOT LIVE TO PAYBACK A LOAN

WASHINGTON POST:
By last November, John McCain's presidential campaign was broke. To survive, he offered his fundraising lists as collateral for a $3 million line of credit from a local bank. But obtaining the loan required an unusual extra step: He had to take out a special life insurance policy in case he did not survive the campaign.

... Because McCain would have to be alive to give the fundraising lists their value, Potter said, the campaign took out the insurance policy on him.
BOTTOM-LINE: IF MCCAIN'S OWN CAMPAIGN AND THE BANK FELT THAT MCCAIN'S ADVANCED AGE AND ILL-HEALTH MADE HIM TOO RISKY FOR A BANK LOAN, THEN HE'S TOO RISKY FOR THE WHITE HOUSE.

GOP DELEGATE COUNT IS MISLEADING: MCCAIN'S ACTUAL NUMBERS ARE NOT SO STRONG OR NATIONAL; MITT'S ARE!

Huckabee is strictly a regional favorite - largely among evangelicals and conservatives skeptical of Mitt and of Mitt's Mormonism.

McCain isn't really doing much better. (All statistics in this post are based on this page at the NYTIMES.)

Sure, he has a high overall delegate count - but let's look at it more closely:

TO DATE, McCain has carried a MAJORITY ONLY in the NE -- where the Rockefeller-wing of the GOP and the left-wing dominated MSM still rule the day: ONLY CT; NY; NJ.

TOTAL: THREE STATES. ALL IN THE NE. ALL DEM STATES IN THE FALL.

McCain did even NOT carry a MAJORITY IN HIS OWN HOME STATE.

Nor did McCain carry a majority in any southern state.

Nor did McCain carry a PLURALITY of GOP or CONSERVATIVE voters in the states he did win by pluralites.

McCain has come out on top in most primaries NOT because he's the most popular candidate in the GOP, but because Democrats and Independents have voted for him.

ALSO: "Nine of the Republican contests were winner take all, and that was where McCain piled up his lead." If the delegates from these states had been proportionately allocated, then the overall delegate count would MORE ACCURATELY reflect McCain's weaknesses and Mitt's strengths. McCain was able to WIN ALL the delegates from a few states IN WHICH HE DID NOT EVEN WIN BY A MAJORITY

NOW LET'S LOOK AT MITT'S PRIMARY RECORD:

Mitt Romney has carried a MAJORITY in 6 (six) states - that's TWICE as many as McCain, and these states are all across the USA: Wyoming; Nevada, Maine; Utah; Massachusetts and Colorado.

And in states where Mitt finished second, he carried a PLURALITY of conservatives and a plurality of Republicans. And these states are ALL ACROSS THE USA: Michigan; Florida; NH, etc.

Additionally, Mitt came in second place in 11 states! (McCain came in second only 9 times.)

What makes McCain's majority-wins even less indicative of any electoral strength in the Fall, is the fact that McCain is strongest where the GOP is LEAST LIKELY to be able to win in the Fall: NJ, CT; NY; CA - these are Dem/lib strongholds.

IOW: McCain might do much better than Bush or Mitt in these states, but LOSE several KEY GOP states because the base won't come out and vote for him. Since we elect presidents with electoral votes and NOT a popular vote, McCain's strength in Dem strongholds DO NOT MAKE IT MORE LIKELY HE WILL WIN THE ELECTION.

McCain might win the GOP nomination, but it is a recipe for defeat in the Fall.

Of the candidates left, Mitt is best positioned to carry the base, keep the GOP states in our column, and even add a few.

As Mark Levin says: when a RINO runs against a Dem lib, the real Dem will win every time. Which is why Lincoln Chafee is a FORMER Senator - and now a registered Dem.

Nominating McCain guarantees a huge GOP loss.

Which would be GREAT for Dems, socialists, greenies and jihadists.

it would as if the GOP nominated the Dem Copperhead McClellan - in 1860!

We must fight to prevent McCain from winning the nomination.

DO WHATEVER IT TAKES.

I have faith we can pull it off.

By "we" I mean conservative and GOP voters - a MAJORITY of whom have NOT voted for McCain.

Despite what the delegate count now looks like. The delegate count is a result of arcane state GOP rules - some states are winner take all, others caucuses, etc.

If you look at the vote count of REPUBLICAN VOTERS, MITT IS IT!

UPTURN IN ISLAMISM IN CHECHNYA

The slaughter of teachers and students in Beslan isn't enough to deter the growth of Islamic extremism, according to this article in the Washington Post:
[M]ilitant Islamic ideology is gaining currency in the Russian separatist region of Chechnya and broadening its appeal elsewhere in the tense North Caucasus.

Ousam Baysaev, 43, an author and former journalist who has made a career of chronicling human rights abuses in Chechnya and surrounding republics, presented his conclusions in a lecture in Washington last month at the National Endowment for Democracy. Such findings are likely to cause new anxiety among U.S. and European policymakers already concerned by the unrest in a region strategically important to the United States because of its proximity to Iran, Turkey and Afghanistan.

[...]

In his lecture, Baysaev showed a slide of a wall to illustrate the shift from secular to Islamic influence within the separatist movement. One slogan that had been sprayed on the wall graffiti-style read: "Freedom or Death." Beneath it was a more recent one declaring: "Chechnya is the Province of Allah."...
Baysaev puts the blame on poverty and limited opportunities instead of where the blame belongs--on Wahhabist ideology.

The article also notes that being an Islamic terrorist allows for participants to gain status:
"In those republics, there are metastasizing rebel movements," said Miriam Lanskoy, a senior program officer for Central Asia and the Caucasus at the National Endowment for Democracy, who moderated Baysaev's talk. "They come to Chechnya, fight for a week or two, and go home having more credibility and status."
Credibility and status? I guess that would be credibility and status garnered as maimers and murderers of children:


Just how perverted can an ideology be?

MUSLIM POLYGAMY

Just how far in the UK willing to go in appeasing Muslims? According to this article in the Telegraph, Muslim polygamy will be recognized, with all "wives" getting full benefit:
Husbands with multiple wives have been given the go-ahead to claim extra welfare benefits following a year-long Government review...

Even though bigamy is a crime in Britain, the decision by ministers means that polygamous marriages can now be recognised formally by the state, so long as the weddings took place in countries where the arrangement is legal.

[...]

New guidelines on income support from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) state: "Where there is a valid polygamous marriage the claimant and one spouse will be paid the couple rate ... The amount payable for each additional spouse is presently £33.65."

Income support for all of the wives may be paid directly into the husband's bank account, if the family so choose. Under the deal agreed by ministers, a husband with multiple wives may also be eligible for additional housing benefit and council tax benefit to reflect the larger property needed for his family.

The ruling could cost taxpayers millions of pounds....
Shari'a law allows for Muslim men to have a harem of up to four.

So, the UK is going to allow for and fund its own Islmamification by demographics? Not to mention that bigamy has been against UK and Western law for centuries!

As noted by Punditarian here at THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS on Sunday, February 3, in "Britain Capitulates to Polygamists":
[T]he British will surrender the sovereignty of British law within the borders of Britain, and grant cultural extra-territoriality to Muslims. With Muslim areas no-go for infidels, including the police, and the Labour government falling over itself to allow Muslims to govern their lives according to shariah, Britain is rapidly becoming a colonia of the Ummah. How long will it be until British law no longer even holds for infidels?
For well over two years, I have been attempting to catalogue, at least in part, the Islamification of the West. But never in my wildest imagination approaching paranoia did I ever dream that the UK, a country firmly rooted in Judeo-Christianity for the past several centuries, would recognize Muslim polygamy and fund it as well.

Some days, I dread turning on my computer!

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HILLARY'S PAST

As we enter the final swing of the primaries and as Hillary stacks up the count of delegates, the following details about Hillary Clinton should be kept in mind (Hat-tip to the individual who sent me the link via email):
Hillary Hopes You've Forgotten - Have You?
From Diane Rigali
2-6-8

Hillary Clinton has been telling America that she is the most qualified candidate for president based on her "record," which she says includes her eight years in the White House as First Lady - or "co-president" - and her seven years in the Senate. Here is a reminder of what that record includes:

HILLARY, As First Lady, assumed authority over Health Care Reform, a process that cost the taxpayers over $13 million. She told both Bill Bradley and Pat Moynahan, key votes were needed to pass her legislation, that she would "demonize "anyone who opposed it. But it was opposed; she couldn't even get it to a vote in a Congress controlled by her own party. (And in the next election, her party lost control of both the House and Senate.)

HILLARY assumed authority over selecting a female Attorney General. Her first two recommendations (Zoe Baird and Kimba Wood) were forced to withdraw their names from consideration, and then she chose Janet Reno. Janet Reno has since been described by Bill himself as "my worst mistake."

HILLARY recommended Lani Guanier for head of the Civil Rights Commission. When Guanier's radical views became known, her name had to be withdrawn.

HILLARY recommended her former law partners, Web Hubbell, Vince Foster, and William Kennedy for positions in the Justice Department, White House staff, and the Treasury, respectively. Hubbell was later imprisoned, Foster committed suicide, and Kennedy was forced to resign.

HILLARY also recommended a close friend of the Clintons, Craig Livingstone, for the position of director of White House security. When Livingstone was investigated for the improper access of up to 900 FBI files of Clinton enemies (Filegate) and the widespread use of drugs by White House staff, both Hillary and her husband denied knowing him. (FBI agent Dennis Sculimbrene confirmed in a Senate Judiciary Committee in 1996 both the drug use and Hillary's involvement in hiring Livingstone. After that, the FBI closed its White House Liaison Office, after serving seven presidents for over thirty years.)

HILLARY, in order to open "slots" in the White House for her friends the Harry Thomasons (to whom millions of dollars in travel contracts could be awarded), had the entire staff of the White House Travel Office fired. They were reported to the FBI for "gross mismanagement" and their reputations ruined. After a thirty-month investigation, only one, Billy Dale, was charged with a crime - mixing personal money with White House funds when he cashed checks. The jury acquitted him in less than two hours.

HILLARY also assumed the duty of directing the "bimbo eruption squad" and scandal defense:

...She urged her husband not to settle the Paula Jones lawsuit.

...She refused to release the Whitewater documents, which led to the appointment of Ken Starr as Special Prosecutor. After $80 million dollars of taxpayer money was spent, Starr's investigation led to Monica Lewinsky, which led to Bill lying about and later admitting his affairs.

...Then they had to settle with Paula Jones after all.

...And Bill lost his law license for lying to the grand jury.

...And Bill was impeached by the House.

...And Hillary almost got herself indicted for perjury and obstruction of justice (she avoided it mostly because she repeated, "I do not recall," "I have no recollection," and "I don't know" 56 times under oath).

HILLARY accepted the traditional First Lady's role of decorator of the White House at Christmas, but in a unique Hillary way. In 1994, for example, The First Lady's Tree in the Blue Room (the focal point each year) was Decorated with drug paraphernalia, sex toys, and pornographic ornaments, all personally approved by Hillary as the invited artists' depictions of the theme, "The Twelve Days of Christmas."

HILLARY wrote "It Takes a Village," demonstrating her socialist viewpoint.

HILLARY decided to seek election to the Senate in a state she had never lived in. Her husband pardoned FALN terrorists in order to get Latino support and the New Square Hassidim to get Jewish support. Hillary also had Bill pardon her brother's clients, for a small fee, to get financial support.

HILLARY then left the White House, but later had to return $200,000 in White House furniture, china, and artwork she had stolen.

HILLARY played the "woman card" in the campaign for the Senate, by portraying her opponent (Lazio) as a bully picking on her.

HILLARY'S husband further protected her by asking the National Archives to withhold from the public until 2012 many records of their time in the White House, including much of Hillary's correspondence and her calendars. (There are ongoing lawsuits to force the release of those records.)

HILLARY, as the junior Senator from New York , passed no major legislation. She has deferred to the senior Senator (Schumer) to tend to the needs of New Yorkers, even on the hot issue of medical problems of workers involved in the cleanup of Ground Zero after 9/11.

Quite a resume, isn't it? Sounds more like an organized crime family.
American voters suffer from short memories, or so prove some studies along those lines. Or maybe voters just don't care about Hillary's past. Your call.

(Crossposted to THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS)

I MUST DISAGREE WITH DANIEL PIPES

Pipes seems to think that Egypt should be made to take control of Gaza, and has more on the idea here.

I seriously disagree simply because - Egypt, despite some claims to the contrary, is otherwise an enemy of Israel, there's still considerable anti-semitism in Egypt, and "peace" with them is growing colder every day.

To let them have control of Gaza again would only be a victory for any anti-semites who'd want to deny Jews the right to live on the strip, and certainly wouldn't be helping any of those who lost their homes there.

Plus, isn't it Jewish land by a national right?

Hillary's "Shared Prosperity" scam

Excerpt from Tibor Machan

When I was about 12 years old, I was taking a class in my Hungarian elementary school on Marxist economics. One day we were being told about Marx's famous goal for the communist paradise he envisioned for us all: "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." As with most kids back in Budapest, I didn't pay much attention to these lessons since they were nothing but pure propaganda for the ruling communists who ran the country. But I did happen to be listening to this particular presentation and once the "teacher" was done, I didn't have the good sense to resist raising my hand to ask a question: "What if my pal here next to me and I both start the week with a fixed amount of money but he purchases some wood and builds a nice table while I buy some wine and drink myself under a table? Will he have to share with me whatever he can earn when he sells his product?" As I recall, I was severely rebuked for my counter-revolutionary remark...

One of the most prominent presidential hopefuls has penned an article for The Wall Street Journal, titled, "My Plan for Shared Prosperity." Its author, Mrs. Hillary Clinton, makes no secret of her plan for massive wealth redistribution should she get the chance to implement her ideas. As she puts it, "My measure of economic success will never be a single, dry statistic. Rather, success means an economy that allows those at the bottom to work their way into the middle class, without pushing anyone out. It means leaving people better off when I finish than when I start. In short, success means an economy that shares its prosperity with all." ...

Of course, Mrs. Clinton isn't much interested in freedom, only in regimentation for the country to meet her standards of economic success. This is revealed in how she talks of "an economy that shares its prosperity." She doesn't appear to grasp that it is not economies that are prosperous, nor engage in sharing anything with anyone. That is what people are and do. And for Mrs. Clinton to get her way, she will have to order the level of prosperity that people will be allowed to attain and force people to share their resources with others, like it or not.

More here

Posted by John Ray