From The Maas

Looks like I picked the right week to go on vacation...

nospam@example.com (marc) — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 18:21:58 -0400

Time to haul out the old standby...

Fernando Freakin' Rodney

Dalit

nospam@example.com (marc) — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 23:37:57 -0400

My friend Aaron is looking for funds to finish his documentary:

Dalit Documentary Trailer from Aaron B. Smith on Vimeo.

Hell Yeah!!!

nospam@example.com (marc) — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 15:04:35 -0400

Awesome:

House Dems Turn Out The Lights But GOP Keeps Talking

Screw Pelosi. It's nice to see the GOP refusing to play nice with the dunces who rule the House chamber.

Awesomely Awesome:

Democratic aides were furious at the GOP stunt, and reporters were kicked out of the Speaker's Lobby, the space next to the House floor where they normally interview lawmakers.

"You're not covering this, are you?" complaing [sic] one senior Democratic aide. Another called the Republicans "morons" for staying on the floor.

Update - The Capitol Police are now trying to kick reporters out of the press gallery above the floor, meaning we can't watch the Republicans anymore. But Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) is now in the gallery talking to reporters, so the cops have held off for a minute. Clearly, Democrats don't want Republicans getting any press for this episode. GOP leaders are trying to find other Republicans to rotate in for Blunt so reporters aren't kicked out.

Screw you, you little tyrant. God forbid the press cover some actual interesting news from DC...

This just keeps getting better:

Update 3 - Democrats just turned out the lights again. Republicans cheered.

Update 4 - Republican leaders just sent out a notice looking for a bullhorn and leadership aides are trying to corral all the members who are still in town to come speak on the floor and sustain this one-sided debate.

Also, Republicans can thank Shadegg for turning on the microphones the first time. Apparently, the fiesty Arizona conservative started typing random codes into the chamber's public address system and accidentally typed the correct code, allowing Republicans brief access to the microphone before it was turned off again.

Oh this burns...

nospam@example.com (marc) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 23:15:34 -0400

A closer look at the Church of Obama

nospam@example.com (marc) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 15:47:51 -0400

Know your denominations:

As Obama has become a symbol for all that is good, it has become important to differentiate between the denominations that constitute the Church of Obama...

Culture of Death

nospam@example.com (marc) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 13:55:27 -0400

Sad and disturbing, and well worth heeding:

Golda Meir once said that the Middle East would have peace when Israel’s enemies learned to love their children more than they loved death. Masab plainly tells the Israelis that not only has that time not yet come, but that the death-worship has gained steam. The same warning applies to all forms of radical Islam. There simply is no room to negotiate with people in love with death.

oh, this is awesome

nospam@example.com (marc) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 11:46:22 -0400

A lawsuit against Scientology that names Tom Cruise as a defendant? Yes Please!

Tom Cruise is named in a $250 million federal lawsuit that is using the RICO statute against the Church of Scientology. Ex-Scientologist Peter Letterese, a longtime critic of the church, filed suit in Southern District Court in Florida on July 15 alleging, among other things, that members of the church harassed him after he left.

In court papers provided to The News by investigator Paul Barresi, Letterese claims a member of the church phoned his lawyer at home, and when the lawyer's wife answered, said he was her husband's homosexual lover.
Barresi, who has done investigative work on behalf of Cruise, tells us: "[Letterese] is just including a celebrity name to get attention."

Letterese calls the church a "crime syndicate" and wants it broken up under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization law, just as the feds have broken up Mafia families.

He singles out Cruise, who's made no secret of his religion, saying that Scientology head David Miscavage is "aided and abetted by the actions of Tom Cruise, his right-hand man for foreign and domestic promotion, as well as for foreign and domestic lobbying. He has assisted the syndicate in acquiring funds and [made] his own donations of money believed to be in the multiple tens of millions of dollars."

Now that's nice

nospam@example.com (marc) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 11:29:20 -0400

Nice story:

President George W. Bush made a pit stop on his way back to the Cleveland Hopkins International Airport Tuesday evening.
After leaving a fundraiser in Gates Mills, his motorcade passed a home with a sign asking the president to stop by -- so he did.

From the hot air headlines

Remember when the left was all up in arms about how Bush never admitted a mistake?

nospam@example.com (marc) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 11:26:13 -0400

If W ever said this, we'd never hear the end of it:

Logan: Do you have any doubts?

Obama: Never.

Via PW

Bush and Truman

nospam@example.com (marc) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 16:27:12 -0400

I've been of the opinion for some time that history's verdict on George W. Bush will be much different than the current political verdict. I believe that he'll be seen as a disaster (by conservatives, anyway) on the domestic end of the ledger, but as a visionary on foreign policy. It appears that as relates to foreign policy, I'm not alone:

For Bush to be recognised as a great president in the Truman mould, the Iraq war too must become half forgotten. The swift removal of the murderous Saddam Hussein was followed by years of expensive violence instead of the instant democracy that had been promised. To confuse the imam-ridden Iraqis with Danes or Norwegians under German occupation, ready to return to democracy as soon as they were liberated, was not a forgivable error: before invading a country, a US president is supposed to know if it is in the middle east or Scandinavia.

Yet the costly Iraq war must also be recognised as a sideshow in the Bush global counteroffensive against Islamist militancy, just as the far more costly Korean war was a sideshow to global cold war containment. For the Bush response to 9/11 was precisely that—a global attack against the ideology of Islamic militancy. While anti-terrorist operations have been successful here and there in a patchy way, and the fate of Afghanistan remains in doubt, the far more important ideological war has ended with a spectacular global victory for President Bush.

Of course, the analogy with Truman is far from perfect: the Soviet Union was a state, not a state of mind. But even so, once Bush's victory is recognised, the errors of Iraq will be forgiven, just as nobody now blames Truman for having sent mixed signals on whether Korea would be defended. Of course, the Bush victory has not yet been recognised, which is very odd indeed because it has all happened in full view.

All Hope Is Lost...

nospam@example.com (marc) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 16:11:24 -0400

...for us, but not for the inhabitants of the lucky planet where Al Gore's infant son lands:

"I tried to warn them, but the Elders of this planet would not listen," said Gore, who in 2000 was nearly banished to a featureless realm of nonexistence for promoting his unpopular message. "They called me foolish and laughed at my predictions. Yet even now, the Midwest is flooded, the ice caps are melting, and the cities are rocked with tremors, just as I foretold. Fools! Why didn't they heed me before it was too late?"

Al Gore—or, as he is known in his own language, Gore-Al—placed his son, Kal-Al, gently in the one-passenger rocket ship, his brow furrowed by the great weight he carried in preserving the sole survivor of humanity's hubristic folly.

This is how bad things have gotten in Motown

nospam@example.com (marc) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 09:46:39 -0400

Fans hope Lions can help give city of Detroit a much-needed boost

Yikes! Talk about misplaced hope...

Creepy, Messianic Obama Alert

nospam@example.com (marc) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 09:03:26 -0400

"I have become a symbol of the possibility of America returning to our best traditions," he said.

Socialism, abortion on demand without question or twinge of conscience, dismantling the traditional family and social structure - yup, all of the best traditions of America!

This about sums it up: Slublog, over at Ace's place

Yea, we have long waited for an inexperienced legislator with no significant accomplishments and former community organizer to lead us out of the wilderness.
VERO POSSUMUS!

Good questions from Peter Kirsanow at The Corner:

Simple assignment for the press corps: ask the senator to name three specific traditions to which America will return upon his election and why his election will prompt their return. No teleprompters allowed.

Judgement to Lead?

nospam@example.com (marc) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:56:32 -0400

Obama constantly touts his judgement as one of the prime qualities that he would bring to the office of President. But on the most important issue of the time, at the time that it was most important to make a good judgement, he made a terribly, terribly bad judgement:

Ed Morrisey details how bad Obama's judgement was in the run-up to the Surge:

“To reach such a solution, we must communicate clearly and effectively to the factions in Iraq that the days of asking, urging, and waiting for them to take control of their own country are coming to an end.” This is the most absurd point of all. The Iraqis didn’t have enough trained and seasoned security forces to bring stability. Retreat would not have forced them to work together — it would have forced the factions to arm themselves and go to war to protect themselves. The central government needed more time to develop the means to “take control of their own country”, and in 2008 we have seen the results.

McCain and Bush made the right call in supporting the Surge. The irony of the situation now is that the gains that we have made through the Surge have made Obama's withdrawal plans feasible, instead of crazy - as they were when he started advocating them - in other words, the rightness of McCain and Bush ultimately allow Obama to seem more reasonable, and thus, electable. That's a shame.

Stevens Indicted

nospam@example.com (marc) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 13:01:18 -0400

Republican Senator and governmental ATM machine Ted Stevens of Alaska has been indicted on corruption charges. Perhaps now Alaskans can get down to the business of electing someone who knows the meaning of the word "restraint."