New footage has been released showing a staff member of Planned Parenthood deliberately ignoring the statutory rape of a 13-year-old during an undercover sting operation. "Planned Parenthood offers no solutions for the victim of statutory rape - they give her an abortion and a bag of condoms and send her straight back into the arms of the abuser," states [undercover journalist Lila] Rose.
"Prime Minister Stephen Harper appealed to his opposition rivals for economic advice in an attempt to defuse their outrage over the unprecedented shutdown of Parliament.Though "doing something" for the economy was the political football, the petty special concerns of the Left were the real rub in the matter. Ol' Heartless Harper wants to decrease the amount of public monies given to political parties and is not interested in preserving the ability of (ostensibly essential) public employees to strike.
. . . .
Harper yesterday adopted a more conciliatory tone than he had since the crisis erupted over his government's economic statement on Nov. 27.
Liberals, NDP and the Bloc had united in opposition over its lack of measures to kick-start the sluggish economy. Moreover, proposed cuts to public subsidies for political parties and the suspension of public servants' right to strike were political dynamite.
The Prime Minister called on the opposition parties to 'engage with the government,' and cited Canadians' 'frustration' at all political parties for their failure to work together on the economic crisis.
'We are all responsible,' he said yesterday. 'The public is clear. They want us to discuss specific proposals and that we propose things, especially on things where we are able to find consensus.'"
Recent polls showed support for the death penalty surging to as much as two-thirds of the surveyed population.
When I first became a wife and mother, I was determined to have the perfect family holiday experience — the kind of thing I knew existed because I’d seen it on Hallmark commercials.
Dressed in a vintage hostess apron, I’d stand nonchalantly behind a polished mahogany table laden with gourmet delicacies and festive sugared treats. Dozens of family members would cross our cheery threshold wearing their Lands’ End best and carrying professionally wrapped gifts and bottles of wine. The whole scene would be bathed in the warm glow of candlelight, with twinkling lights and real pine garlands in the fuzzy background.
While I'll admit that it's likely that on many of our more prestigious college campuses, Democrat-voting profs outnumber GOP-voting academics, that's certainly not true on every campus. I can tell you that it definitely was not the case during my tenure as a student at UT, where the collegiate culture I experienced strongly reflected the politics of the state and the region. My professors and fellow students were, on the whole, center-right to far-right in their political views.(emphasis mine) "Likely"? "Center-right to far-right"?
"It turns out that Barack Obama's donors may not have been quite as different as we had thought. Throughout the election season, this organization and others have been reporting that Obama received about half of his discrete contributions in amounts of $200 or less. The Campaign Finance Institute (CFI) noted in past releases that donations are not the same as donors, since many people give more than once. After a more thorough analysis of data from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), it has become clear that repeaters and large donors were even more important for Obama than we or other analysts had fully appreciated.
'The myth is that money from small donors dominated Barack Obama's finances,' said CFI's executive director Michael J. Malbin. 'The reality of Obama's fundraising was impressive, but the reality does not match the myth.'"
A government report that found old-fashioned reusable nappies damage the environment more than disposables has been hushed up because ministers are embarrassed by its findings.
One question surfaces repeatedly as the pundits obsess over the exit polls. Have Americans lurched to the Left in any meaningful way? If so, are they likely to sign long-term leases in Hotel Obama, or are they simply on loan until they experience the consequences of modern-day liberalism?
Behold the cultural contradictions of progressivism.Goldberg goes on to emphasize a point that I often think of as an inherent weakness of the Democratic Party (inherent inasmuch as the Democratic Party is based on Liberalism): that the Dems are a coalition party rather than a consensus party like the GOP.
Barack Obama’s victory was a huge win for self-described progressives. Arguably the most liberal presidential nominee in American history, Obama has given some very old ideas an aura of new coolness. Congrats on all that. Hope it works out for you.
. . . .
But something interesting happened on Election Day that didn’t get much attention. Bans on gay marriage were on ballots in several states, and they all won. In fact, gay marriage bans have ultimately passed in all 30 of the states in which they were on the ballot.
. . . .
In other words, Obama had some major un-progressive coattails. The tidal wave of black and Hispanic voters who came out to support Obama voted in enormous numbers against what most white liberals consider to be the foremost civil rights issue of the day.
Put aside the substance of the gay marriage debate; what’s fascinating is how these returns expose the underlying weakness, or at least vulnerability, of progressivism.
Let Christians Vote As Though They Were Not Voting
October 22, 2008
By John Piper
Voting is like marrying and crying and laughing and buying. We should do it, but only as if we were not doing it. That’s because “the present form of this world is passing away” and, in God’s eyes, “the time has grown very short.” Here’s the way Paul puts it:
The appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none, and those who mourn as though they were not mourning, and those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing, and those who buy as though they had no goods, and those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the present form of this world is passing away. (1 Corinthians 7:29-31)
Let’s take these one at a time and compare them to voting.
1. “Let those who have wives live as though they had none.”
This doesn’t mean move out of the house, don’t have sex, and don’t call Honey. Earlier in this chapter Paul says, “The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights” (1 Corinthians 7:3). He also says to love her the way Christ loved the church, leading and providing and protecting (Ephesians 5:25-30). It means this: Marriage is momentary. It’s over at death, and there is no marriage in the resurrection. Wives and husbands are second priorities, not first. Christ is first. Marriage is for making much of him.
It means: If she is exquisitely desirable, beware of desiring her more than Christ. And if she is deeply disappointing, beware of being hurt too much. This is temporary—only a brief lifetime. Then comes the never-disappointing life which is life indeed.
So it is with voting. We should do it. But only as if we were not doing it. Its outcomes do not give us the greatest joy when they go our way, and they do not demoralize us when they don’t. Political life is for making much of Christ whether the world falls apart or holds together.
2. “Let those who mourn [do so] as though they were not mourning.”
Christians mourn with real, deep, painful mourning, especially over losses—loss of those we love, loss of health, loss of a dream. These losses hurt. We cry when we are hurt. But we cry as though not crying. We mourn knowing we have not lost something so valuable we cannot rejoice in our mourning. Our losses do not incapacitate us. They do not blind us to the possibility of a fruitful future serving Christ. The Lord gives and takes away. But he remains blessed. And we remain hopeful in our mourning.
So it is with voting. There are losses. We mourn. But not as those who have no hope. We vote and we lose, or we vote and we win. In either case, we win or lose as if we were not winning or losing. Our expectations and frustrations are modest. The best this world can offer is short and small. The worst it can offer has been predicted in the book of Revelation. And no vote will hold it back. In the short run, Christians lose (Revelation 13:7). In the long run, we win (21:4).
3. “Let those who rejoice [do so] as though they were not rejoicing.”
Christians rejoice in health (James 5:13) and in sickness (James 1:2). There are a thousand good and perfect things that come down from God that call forth the feeling of happiness. Beautiful weather. Good friends who want to spend time with us. Delicious food and someone to share it with. A successful plan. A person helped by our efforts.
But none of these good and beautiful things can satisfy our soul. Even the best cannot replace what we were made for, namely, the full experience of the risen Christ (John 17:24). Even fellowship with him here is not the final and best gift. There is more of him to have after we die (Philippians 1:21-23)—and even more after the resurrection. The best experiences here are foretastes. The best sights of glory are through a mirror dimly. The joy that rises from these previews does not and should not rise to the level of the hope of glory. These pleasures will one day be as though they were not. So we rejoice remembering this joy is a foretaste, and will be replaced by a vastly better joy.
So it is with voting. There are joys. The very act of voting is a joyful statement that we are not under a tyrant. And there may be happy victories. But the best government we get is a foreshadowing. Peace and justice are approximated now. They will be perfect when Christ comes. So our joy is modest. Our triumphs are short-lived—and shot through with imperfection. So we vote as though not voting.
4. “Let those who buy [do so] as though they had no goods.”
Let Christians keep on buying while this age lasts. Christianity is not withdrawal from business. We are involved, but as though not involved. Business simply does not have the weight in our hearts that it has for many. All our getting and all our having in this world is getting and having things that are not ultimately important. Our car, our house, our books, our computers, our heirlooms—we possess them with a loose grip. If they are taken away, we say that in a sense we did not have them. We are not here to possess. We are here to lay up treasures in heaven.
This world matters. But it is not ultimate. It is the stage for living in such a way to show that this world is not our God, but that Christ is our God. It is the stage for using the world to show that Christ is more precious than the world.
So it is with voting. We do not withdraw. We are involved—but as if not involved. Politics does not have ultimate weight for us. It is one more stage for acting out the truth that Christ, and not politics, is supreme.
5. “Let those who deal with the world [do so] as though they had no dealings with it.”
Christians should deal with the world. This world is here to be used. Dealt with. There is no avoiding it. Not to deal with it is to deal with it that way. Not to weed your garden is to cultivate a weedy garden. Not to wear a coat in Minnesota is to freeze—to deal with the cold that way. Not to stop when the light is red is to spend your money on fines or hospital bills and deal with the world that way. We must deal with the world.
But as we deal with it, we don’t give it our fullest attention. We don’t ascribe to the world the greatest status. There are unseen things that are vastly more precious than the world. We use the world without offering it our whole soul. We may work with all our might when dealing with the world, but the full passions of our heart will be attached to something higher—Godward purposes. We use the world, but not as an end in itself. It is a means. We deal with the world in order to make much of Christ.
So it is with voting. We deal with the system. We deal with the news. We deal with the candidates. We deal with the issues. But we deal with it all as if not dealing with it. It does not have our fullest attention. It is not the great thing in our lives. Christ is. And Christ will be ruling over his people with perfect supremacy no matter who is elected and no matter what government stands or falls. So we vote as though not voting.
By all means vote. But remember: “The world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever” (1 John 2:17).
Voting with you, as though not voting,
Pastor John
"A state agency has revealed that its checks of computer systems for potential information on 'Joe the Plumber' were more extensive than it first acknowledged.
Helen Jones-Kelley, director of the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, disclosed today that computer inquiries on Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher were not restricted to a child-support system.
The agency also checked Wurzelbacher in its computer systems to determine whether he was receiving welfare assistance or owed unemployment compensation taxes, she wrote."
“He's called me a socialist for wanting to roll back the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans so we can finally give tax relief to the middle class. I don't know what's next,” Obama said at a rally at the Halifax mall here.Forget about getting a look at Obama's actual birth certificate . . . from what I've heard about his charitable giving and stories about his flesh and blood living in slums and shacks, I want to see proof that Obama ever shared his toys.
“By the end of the week, he'll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten. I shared my peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”
Q.23 For each statement that has been made about the candidates, please tell me if you agree or disagree with it:Sorry, but that sounds like a push poll to me . . . which might explain the results.
a. Barack Obama would do too much for African Americans
b. John McCain would do too much for wealthy Americans
§ 2-19-129. Betting; on election
A person commits a Class C misdemeanor if such person makes any bet or wager of money or other valuable thing upon any election.
A trillion here, a trillion there, and pretty soon you're talking about real money. Altogether, Mr. Obama is promising at least $4.3 trillion of increased spending and reduced tax revenue from 2009 to 2018 -- roughly an extra $430 billion a year by 2012-2013.The reality is that any promises by Obama to "cut taxes" (actually, Obama is disingenuously labeling "tax credits" as "tax cuts"--newsflash: Democrat doesn't know the meaning of a tax cut) are swallowed up by the INEVITABLE growing tax burden that will be necessitated by his agenda.
How is he going to pay for it?
Raising the tax rates on the salaries, dividends and capital gains of those making more than $200,000-$250,000, and phasing out their exemptions and deductions, can raise only a small fraction of the amount. Even if we have a strong economy, Mr. Obama's proposed tax hikes on the dwindling ranks of high earners would be unlikely to raise much more than $30 billion-$35 billion a year by 2012.
The case for McCain is straightforward. The financial crisis has made us forget, or just blindly deny, how dangerous the world out there is. We have a generations-long struggle with Islamic jihadism. An apocalyptic soon-to-be-nuclear Iran. A nuclear-armed Pakistan in danger of fragmentation. A rising Russia pushing the limits of revanchism. Plus the sure-to-come Falklands-like surprise popping out of nowhere.
Who do you want answering that phone at 3 a.m.? A man who's been cramming on these issues for the past year, who's never had to make an executive decision affecting so much as a city, let alone the world? A foreign policy novice instinctively inclined to the flabbiest, most vaporous multilateralism (e.g., the Berlin Wall came down because of 'a world that stands as one'), and who refers to the most deliberate act of war since Pearl Harbor as 'the tragedy of 9/11,' a term more appropriate for a bus accident?
Or do you want a man who is the most prepared, most knowledgeable, most serious foreign policy thinker in the United States Senate? A man who not only has the best instincts but has the honor and the courage to, yes, put country first, as when he carried the lonely fight for the surge that turned Iraq from catastrophic defeat into achievable strategic victory?
BUSH'S RESIGNATION SPEECH
The following 'speech' was written recently by an ordinary Maine-iac [a resident of the People's Republic of Maine ]. While satirical in nature, all satire must have a basis in fact to be effective. This is an excellent piece by a person who does not write for a living.
The speech George W. Bush might give:
Normally, I start these things out by saying 'My Fellow Americans.' Not doing it this time. If the polls are any indication, I don't know who more than half of you are anymore. I do know something terrible has happened, and that you're really not fellow Americans any longer.
I'll cut right to the chase here: I quit. Now before anyone gets all in a lather about me quitting to avoid impeachment, or to avoid prosecution or something, let me assure you: There's been no breaking of laws or impeachable offenses in this office.
The reason I'm quitting is simple. I'm fed up with you people. I'm fed up because you have no understanding of what's really going on in the world. Or of what's going on in this once-great nation of ours. And the majority of you are too damned lazy to do your homework and figure it out.
Let's start local. You've been sold a bill of goods by politicians and the news media.
Meanwhile, all you can do is whine about gas prices, and most of you are too damn stupid to realize that gas prices are high because there's increased demand in other parts of the world, and because a small handful of noisy idiots are more worried about polar bears and beachfront property than your economic security.
We face real threats in the world. Don't give me this 'blood for oil' thing. If I were trading blood for oil I would've already seized Iraq's oil fields and let the rest of the country go to hell. And don't give me this 'Bush Lied...People Died' crap either. If I were the liar you morons take me for, I could've easily had chemical weapons planted in Iraq so they could be 'discovered.' In stead, I owned up to the fact that the intelligence was faulty.< /I>
Let me remind you that the rest of the world thought Saddam had the goods, same as me. Let me also remind you that regime change in Iraq was official US policy before I came into office. Some guy named ' Clinton ' established that policy. Bet you didn't know that, did you?
Now some of you morons want to be led by a junior senator with no understanding of foreign policy or economics, and this nitwit says we should attack Pakistan , a nuclear ally. And then he wants to go to Iran and make peace with a terrorist who says he's going to destroy us. While he's doing that, he wants to give Iraq to al Qaeda, Afghanistan to the Taliban, Israel to the Palestinians, and your money to the IRS so the government can give welfare to illegal aliens, who he will make into citizens, so they can vote to re-elect him. He also thinks it's okay for Iran to have nuclear weapons, and we should stop our foreign aid to Israel . Did you sleep through high school?
You idiots need to understand that we face a unique enemy. Back during the cold war, there were two major competing political and economic models squaring off. We won that war, but we did so because fundamentally, the Communists wanted to survive, just as we do. We were simply able to out spend and out-tech them.
That's not the case this time. The soldiers of our new enemy don't care if they survive. In fact, they want to die. That'd be fine, as long as they weren't also committed to taking as many of you with them as they can. But they are. They want to kill you, and the bastards are all over the globe.
You should be grateful that they haven't gotten any more of us here in the United States since September 11. But you're not. That's because you've got no idea how hard a small number of intelligence, military, law enforcement, and homeland security people have worked to make sure of that. When this whole mess started, I warned you that this would be a long and difficult fight. I'm disappointed how many of you people think a long and difficult fight amounts to a single season of 'Survivor.'
Instead, you've grown impatient. You're incapable of seeing things through the long lens of history, the way our enemies do. You think that wars should last a few months, a few years, tops.
Making matters worse, you actively support those who help the enemy. Every time you buy the New York Times, every time you send a donation to a cut-and-run Democrat's political campaign, well, dang it, you might just as well Fed Ex a grenade launcher to a Jihadist. It amounts to the same thing.
In this day and age, it's easy enough to find the truth. It's all over the Internet. It just isn't on the pages of the New York Times, USA Today, or on NBC News. But even if it were, I doubt you'd be any smarter. Most of you would rather watch American Idol or Dancing with Stars.
I could say more about your expectations that the government will always be there to bail you out, even if you're too stupid to leave a city that's below sea level and has a hurricane approaching.
I could say more about your insane belief that government, not your own wallet, is where the money comes from. But I've come to the conclusion that were I to do so, it would sail right over your heads.
So I quit. I'm going back to Crawford. I've got an energy-efficient house down there (Al Gore could only dream) and the capability to be fully self-sufficient for years. No one ever heard of Crawford before I got elected, and as soon as I'm done here pretty much no one will ever hear of it again. Maybe I'll be lucky enough to die of old age before the last pillars of America fall.
Oh, and by the way, Cheney's quitting too. That means Pelosi is your new President. You asked for it. Watch what she does carefully, because I still have a glimmer of hope that there are just enough of you remaining who are smart enough to turn this thing around in 2008.
So that's it. God bless what's left of America .
Some of you know what I mean. The rest of you, kiss off.
So, I have been effectively fatwahed (is that how you spell it?) by the conservative movement, and the magazine that my father founded must now distance itself from me. But then, conservatives have always had a bit of trouble with the concept of diversity. The GOP likes to say it’s a big-tent. Looks more like a yurt to me.
[Joe] brought out of Obama what years of campaigning and 3 debates could not. One phrase, 'we need to spread the wealth around to give the people below you a fair shake.' Sounds great, unless you actually think about it. Fairness? It's the government's job to make things fair eh?And speaking of Capitalism . . . my friend also has some nice t-shirt designs for sale. I like the "Senator Government" one.
Let's look at it like this. I work my butt off to get a good grade in one of my several colligiate classes, sacrificing some television, socialization, and entertainment to attain my grade. However some of my classmates 'were busy' playing video games, partying, sleeping, etc. which 'prohibited' them from working as hard on the class. Mid-terms come by, I get an A, my 'busy' (slacker) classmate gets a D. Now, getting a better grade will usually open more doors for opportunity than getting a poor grade. So, to give people below me a 'fair shake' why don't we give some of my points to the other guy and give us both a C+. Wouldn't that be fair?
Screw fairness.
We all started at the same point, I worked harder, I got a better grade.
That's justice.
If I received only the mean grade from any of my classes I would never score higher than a C, why work hard? If a university did this to any of us, we would all be up in arms!
HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. -- "We are going to cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans," Barack Obama's campaign manager, David Plouffe, said in the spin room here at Hofstra University following the final debate of the 2008 presidential election.
Plouffe was repeating one of the boldest claims made by the Obama campaign. It's a claim that the Wall Street Journal editorial board dubbed 'Obama's 95% Illusion,' noting that more than a third of Americans don't pay any income taxes, and that what Obama's plan does do is offer a raft of subsidies and government payments to individuals and families that he redefines as "tax cuts." His proposal looks more like a redistribution scheme than an honest effort to reduce taxes -- as he revealed on Monday when he told a now famous Ohio plumber that his plan aimed to "spread the wealth around."
"Ayers' office door is decorated with pictures of Mumia Abu-Jamal, Che Guevara and Malcolm X. It is also home to pictures of children, bills of rights for students and parents, and a rainbow-hued greeting card advising 'How to Be Really Alive.' A place of prominence is given to a New Yorker cartoon of a man interviewing for a job. The interviewer says, 'I'm trying to find a way to balance your strengths against your felonies.'"Ayers is almost a Lefty cliche . . . people need to know that Obama's mainstream-ish rhetoric while running for President is "just words, just speeches."
That agreement included a $61,000 severance payment, a $60,000 payment for legal fees and an agreement by Ms. Allen not to join any other campaign for at least a year, the staff members said. They said the agreement also involved a promise to Ms. Allen of a job at Fletcher Rowley Chao Riddle, a Nashville firm that handled Mr. Mahoney’s advertising.Yikes, what a "culture of corruption"!?!?!?!
On Monday, the company said that it was severing all ties with Mr. Mahoney’s campaign and that it had no knowledge of the promises to Ms. Allen for employment.
On Thursday we revealed the connection between Barack Obama and Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), and uncovered a 2004 article that discussed his involvement with the organization which had recently been removed from the web. Today, the cover-ups continue and language on Obama's fightthesmears.com website has been altered in order to make it look like he has been telling the truth about his ACORN associations all along.
Shortly before the annual celebration of Police Memorial Day on May 15, 2008, Commissioner Monegan had dropped off a color photograph at Governor Palin's Anchorage office with a request that she sign and present it at the ceremony. The photograph was of an Alaska State Trooper who was dressed in a formal uniform, saluting. He was standing in front of the police memorial located in front of the crime lab at AST headquarters in Anchorage, partially obscured by a flagpole. The picture to be signed by the Governor was to be used as a poster to be displayed in various Trooper Detachments around the state.I don't care who you are, that's funny.
Shortly after he returned to his office from dropping off the photograph, he received a call from Kris Perry, Governor Palin's Director of her Anchorage office who asked [according to Walt Monegan's testimony] "Why did you send a poster over here that has a picture of Mike Wooten on it?"[] Until that moment, Commissioner Monegan never realized it was indeed a photograph of Trooper Wooten. Governor Palin cancelled her appearance and sent Lieutenant Governor Parnell in her place.
MC: Tennessee governor Phil Bredesen has advised Barack to head to Wal-Mart to connect with the “Wal-Mart women” who supported Hillary. What do you say to people who think your husband is too slick or elite for working-class voters?Ed Morrissey does a pretty good job of defining "elitism" here:.
Obama: I find it funny that people have tried to label Barack as an elitist. This is the man who grew up not knowing his father, with a young, single mother who he watched struggle to make ends meet — even going on food stamps at one point. And despite the economic struggles that his family went through, Barack turned down lucrative careers on Wall Street and went to work in communities to help folks in need on the South Side of Chicago, helping families who’d been devastated when the local steel plants shut down.
Elitism is a sense that the hoi polloi are simply incapable of governing themselves, let alone a nation, and that a small group of “experts” have to take control of everything they do. That goes far beyond mere matters of state. Elitists see people getting more obese and believe that government has to intervene to remove food choices from individuals, as one rather timely example, as in New York City. They believe that removing personal choices will keep people from making bad decisions, because they — in all their wisdom — will make the right choices for them.As relates to Barack Obama in particular, elitism is reflected more in his reference to hayseed voters clinging to "god or guns or antipathy toward people who aren't like them" than it is reflected in his reference to the price of "arugula".
This describes perfectly the policy direction of the Democratic Party, and perhaps even a part of the Republican Party as well. That’s why the charge of elitism sticks so well to Democratic candidates in national elections. Their humble origins are immaterial to the concept of elitism. Candidates who want to grow the federal government in order to increase its nanny-state power are by definition elitists, because they believe individuals cannot make choices for themselves.
The positive component is pretty straightforward: McCain and Palin are common sense conservatives and proven reformers. The record of reform can be emphasized and contrasted with Obama's and Biden's record of conventional, go-along, get-along liberalism. And implicitly: If McCain and Palin are reformers and outsiders, it's not Bush's third term. More important is the negative message. The McCain campaign has to convince 51 percent of the voters they can't trust Barack Obama to be our next president. This has an ideological component and a character component.I encourage you to read the rest of the article . . .
“They are trying to throw out these codes,” said Representative Gregory Meeks, a Democrat from New York.Since when is it "code" to call someone with a high-Marxism tolerance (as manifested in Obama's church and "community organizing" ties) "not one of us"? And since when is it "code" to point out that the core of Obama's ideology--which is socialism, is "different" than the ideology that made America great. Give me a break. Even CNN acknowledges that Obama is disingenuously claiming there was no significant relationship between Obama and unrepentant domestic terrorist Bill Ayers.
“He’s ‘not one of us?’” Mr. Meeks said, referring to a comment Sarah Palin made at a campaign rally on Oct. 6 in Floridahttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.quote.gif. “That’s racial. That’s fear. They know they can’t win on the issues, so the last resort they have is race and fear.”
. . . .
[State Rep. Yvette] Clarke [(NY)] also found a racial subtext in Ms. Palin’s repeated appeals to “Joe Six-Pack” and “hockey moms.”
“Who exactly is Joe Six-Pack and who are these hockey moms? That’s what I’d like to know,” she said. “Is that supposed to be terminology that is of common ground to all Americans? I don’t find that. It leaves a lot of people out.”
[Jim] Burdett is a former brother-in-law of Hanson’s estranged wife Carolyn's brother, Craig Batton, and still speaks with many family membersI know it is difficult to follow, but read it again slowly (heck, you might be better off trying to diagram the relationship).
Over the weekend Sarah Palin accused Barack Obama of "palling around" with terrorists--a reference to his longstanding friendship and professional association with Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, husband-and-wife Chicago college professors who are unrepentant about their activities in the Weather Underground gang.
According to an "analysis" by Douglass Daniel of the Associated Press, "[Palin's] attack was unsubstantiated." Palin said she got her information from the New York Times, and we suppose it says something that this isn't good enough for the AP. Odder still is Daniel's claim that Palin's statement "carried a racially tinged subtext that John McCain himself may come to regret."
Reader, Mr. and Mrs. Ayers are persons of pallor. What could possibly be racist about Palin's criticizing Obama for associating with a couple of despicable characters who are white? This question brings us into the weird world of Douglass Daniel's imagination:Palin's words avoid repulsing voters with overt racism. But is there another subtext for creating the false image of a black presidential nominee "palling around" with terrorists while assuring a predominantly white audience that he doesn't see their America?Daniel does no reporting to back this up. He accuses Palin of racism because in his mind, terrorist implies Muslim, Muslim implies dark-skinned, and dark-skinned implies black.
In a post-Sept. 11 America, terrorists are envisioned as dark-skinned radical Muslims, not the homegrown anarchists of Ayers' day 40 years ago. With Obama a relative unknown when he began his campaign, the Internet hummed with false e-mails about ties to radical Islam of a foreign-born candidate.
This exercise in free association scarcely qualifies as analysis. Nonetheless, let us consider it step by step:
Terrorist implies Muslim. It is certainly true that America's terrorist enemies today are Muslims who justify their actions in Islamic terms. The terrorist fringe of the 1960s far left, by contrast, has withered away (or "sold out," in the parlance of the times). But there is nothing distinctively Islamic about tactics like bombing and kidnapping, which were used by outfits like the Weather Underground in their time and are employed by al Qaeda and its ilk today.
Moreover, as we have noted, the AP is sometimes at pains to avoid drawing a connection between terrorism and Islam when reporting stories about Islamic terrorism. Why does Daniel make the connection so casually here, when it is not even relevant?
Muslim implies dark-skinned. In fact, "Muslim" is a religious identifier, not a racial or ethnic one. Muslims are of all races and ethnicities. Daniel must be conflating Muslims with Arabs, the ethnic group to which the Sept. 11 terrorists belonged. Arabs do generally have darker complexions than people of Northern European origin.
Dark-skinned implies black. The racial identity of Arabs was a matter of some legal controversy in the U.S. early in the last century, but the courts generally concluded that they were white and thus eligible for naturalization under the racially discriminatory immigration laws in effect at the time. Arabs also are classified as white under the Census Bureau's racial taxonomy.
So Daniel seems to be saying that it is racist of Palin to note a nonracial commonality between Obama's white pals and the white men who attacked America seven years ago. Can you make any sense at all of this?
Neither can Daniel, so he changes the subject:Whether intended or not by the McCain campaign, portraying Obama as "not like us" is another potential appeal to racism. It suggests that the Hawaiian-born Christian is, at heart, un-American.
Most troubling, however, is how allowing racism to creep into the discussion serves McCain's purpose so well. As the fallout from [Jeremiah] Wright's sermons showed earlier this year, forcing Obama to abandon issues to talk about race leads to unresolved arguments about America's promise to treat all people equally.
Wait, didn't the Jeremiah Wright controversy prompt Obama to give the most magnificently brilliant speech on the subject of race since Martin Luther King, or at least Abraham Lincoln? That's what it said in the papers, anyway.
Getting back to Daniel and Palin, it seems his claim is that her speech was racist because it somehow called attention to Obama's race. To be sure, there are people who are prejudiced against Obama because he is black. Shame on them. People like them used to have a lot more influence on elections than they do now, both because they were more numerous and because in many parts of the country they disfranchised blacks (including through terrorism!).
Yet we'd venture that there are voters who are troubled by Obama's palling around with terrorists irrespective of his, or anyone else's race. Does the public not have a right to know because some part of the public may be racist?
Furthermore, let's assume for the sake of argument that an actual racist has the brainpower to puzzle through the complex twists and turns that led Douglass Daniel from the information that Obama pals around with terrorists to the conclusion that Obama is black.
Isn't it a good bet that he already knew?
to cause evacuation from (as the bowels) b (1): to make free of something unwantedIt would be more accurate (though less powerful as a political club) to use phrases like database purging or election roll purging or ineligible voter purging. Indeed, you will find little resistance from me about most of the Brennan Center's suggestions for purging best-practices. But I have to cry foul when Lefties claim that the Republican Party "stole" the 2000 election, or persists in trying to steal elections, by means of "voter purging."(2): to free (as a boiler) of sediment or relieve (as a steam pipe) of trapped air by bleeding c (1): to rid (as a nation or party) by a purge (2): to get rid of
The problem was that [Biden's performance] sounded drearily senatorial. Mention any global crisis — civil war in Bosnia, genocide in Darfur, Russian aggression in Georgia, the lack of five-star restaurants in Wales — and Biden has been there, usually within the last two weeks, and always at public expense. What the American taxpayer gets for the Emir of Delaware’s frequent-flyer miles is harder to discern. Biden was doing his best to turn in a decent karaoke version of Lloyd Bentsen, but, unfortunately, Governor Palin declined to play Dan Quayle. That left Joe sounding like an ancient pol being generically vice-presidential. Sarah, at her best, sounded like the citizen-politician this country’s Founders intended. She hasn’t voted 397 times against this or that in the U.S. Senate, because she’s been running a state, and a town, and a commercial fishing operation. She’s a doer, not a talker, which is why so many of my fellow professional talkers disdain her.
It’s funny. The left has been whining about having their patriotism questioned for so long it feels like they started griping in the Mesozoic era. Feminists have argued for decades that womanhood is an existential and metaphysical state of enlightenment. But they have no problem questioning whether women they hate are really women at all.
Since we know from basic science that Palin is a woman — she’s had five kids, for starters — it’s clear that these ideological thugs aren’t talking about actual, you know, facts. They’re doing what people of totalitarian mind-sets always do: bully heretics, demonize enemies, whip the troops into line.
Biden offered several criticisms of John McCain’s health-care plan which tracked precisely with the line of attack the Obama campaign has taken up against the plan in recent days, and which are flatly untrue and deceptive.Aw heck, you ought to read the whole thing. It is the BEST articulation of McCain's healthcare proposal that I've seen.
The Deregulation Canard
The approach involved two basic elements. First, after (somehow) implicitly attributing the current financial crisis to deregulation, Biden argued that McCain wants to do the same thing to the health care sector and so presumably send it into a similar crisis. “As a matter of fact,” Biden said, “John recently wrote an article in a major magazine saying that he wants to do for the health-care industry deregulate it and let the free market move like he did for the banking industry.” The same argument is advanced in a new Obama campaign commercial. Over images of Fannie and Freddie logos, the ad asserts that McCain wants to do to health care what “Bush/McCain policies have done to our economy,” by which they mean deregulation. The ad says:
McCain just published an article praising Wall Street deregulation; said he'd reduce oversight of the health insurance industry too, "just as we have done over the last decade in banking.”
The line they quote comes from an article by John McCain (i.e by his campaign) about the McCain health plan in the latest issue of Contingencies magazine. In a passage arguing for more competition to lower the cost of health insurance, McCain writes:
I would also allow individuals to choose to purchase health insurance across state lines, when they can find more affordable and attractive products elsewhere that they prefer. Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation. Consumer-friendly insurance policies will be more available and affordable when there is greater competition among insurers on a level playing field.
The Obama ad of course doesn’t quote all of that, but merely suggests McCain is endorsing some supposed deregulation of Wall Street. In fact, McCain is very plainly talking about the Riegle-Neal Interstate Banking Act, passed in 1994, which permitted banks to establish branches nationwide by eliminating the requirement for separate subsidiaries in each state and the prohibition against banks accepting deposits from customers out of their home states. This very sensible reform updated a 1956 law to modernize American banking, and there is simply no question it has been successful and useful. It passed the Senate 94 to 4, and Sen. Biden voted for it.
That important act of deregulation had exactly nothing whatsoever to do with the economic crisis we now face, and on the contrary has contributed to American prosperity and competitiveness. The Obama campaign could raise questions about how close an analogy there might be to that law in allowing health insurers, like banks, to work across state lines. But the tack they have actually taken — accepting the analogy and asserting it reflects poorly on McCain’s plan — is either dishonest or ignorant. Either way, it makes no sense.
For all Biden’s twaddle about doctrines and concepts, there is a simple technique for divining this foreign-policy solon’s bobs and weaves: Consult the polls and the calendar.We'll have to wait and see if any "foreign policy" questions during the debate go beyond, "how many years have you been sitting in on foreign policy discussions?"
[Biden] has had a front-row seat as an observer of foreign policy. But Senator Biden has never had any real experience of making foreign policy and taking the consequences of the results.You ought to read the whole article. And feel free to attempt a rebuttal.
The difference between being a spectator and being a participant, with responsibility for the consequences of what you say and do, is fundamental.
