There was a girl named Phoenix Woman who imagined that everything would be right in the world if only the Democrats won every election. But jealous forces have conspired to keep Phoenix Woman from her dream world, and she was very unhappy. And so she retreated into her own world, where Al Gore had won in 2000.
May 5, 2001: National Security chief Sandy Berger, at the urging of his staffers John O'Neill and Richard Clarke, presents President Gore with a PDB (Presidential Daily Briefing) warning of imminent plans by bin Laden to attack New York, America's financial center, with hijacked commercial jets used as flying bombs. The suspicion is that Al-Qaeda will try to succeed where they had failed eight years earlier and attack the World Trade Center. Gore consults with former Senators Gary Hart (D-CO) and Warren Rudman (R-NH), who chaired a terrorism commission formed by President Clinton in the late 1990s; they concur with the PDB's findings.
May 6, 2001: In response to the May 5 PDB, Gore orders the FAA to implement the proposals made by his 1996 commission on airport security, but which the Democratic party had backed away from after the airlines had protested. Northwest and Delta Airlines further weaken their precarious financial states by buying millions of dollars of radio ads depicting the new procedures as wasteful and costly to the air traveler. Gore, per O'Neill's and Clarke's recommendations, also orders the FAA to watch for Middle Eastern students at flight schools who are interested only in steering planes, not in performing takeoffs or landings. On his syndicated radio program, Rush Limbaugh proclaims that "Crazy Al Gore is out to kill off the airline industry!"
June 1, 2001: Republican Senators James Jeffords and Lincoln Chaffee, disgusted with the demagoguery of the GOP, switch parties and become Independents who inhabit the Democratic Senate Caucus. This throws control of the Senate into Democratic hands.
June 5, 2001: Jobless numbers for the month of April fall by 300,000, continuing a strong pattern of job growth that Gore inherited from Clinton. New numbers from the Office of Management and Budget indicate that Gore's fiscal policies are paying down the Federal debt faster than predicted. Federal Reserve Chair Alan Greenspan, noting that the soft economic landing of 1999 and 2000 had been followed by the dramatic rise of the stock market in the first months of the Gore term, warns yet again to beware of "irrational exuberance".
It gets every more pathetic, with Al Gore saving New Orleans from Katrina, and even nominating a hack prosecutor named Ronnie Earle to the Supreme Court. Just a hideous batch of nonsense. I'd call it a masturbation fantasy, but most masturbation fantasies have more resemblance to reality.
I don't think there is any doubt that the first half of that description fits the bill; Hizzoner is pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-gun control. And, I hasten to add, these are positions that should not disqualify one from being the Republican presidential nominee. My objection to Mitt Romney was not that he was a social liberal, but that he was trying to pass himself off as a social conservative.
But we do have to look closely at the second half of that billing. Is Rudy a good steward of the people's finances? Does he put on the green eyeshades, sharpen his pencil and carefully mind the bottom line?
Perhaps the biggest difference [between Giuliani and his successor, Michael Bloomberg] is on fiscal issues. Giuliani, who lost interest in curtailing the growth of city government in his latter years, left behind a fiscal catastrophe—a $6.4 billion deficit proportionately bigger than the hole that caused the 1975 fiscal shortfall.
That's pretty bad, but of course the question is whether it's 9-11 related. A Business Week article from 2002 indicates that much of it is not:
It's not just because of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. Bloomberg has also been forced to confront two dismaying facts: First, New York's economy is more cyclical than the nation's because it depends heavily on Wall Street, whose profits are highly volatile. Second, New York has high fixed costs, including more debt per dollar of property value than any major city except long-suffering Philadelphia and perhaps Detroit. That combination--a cyclical economy and high fixed costs--virtually guarantees a fiscal crisis during an economic slowdown
Translation: You've got to manage spending during the good years. So the question becomes, how well did Rudy manage spending during his tenure?
Answer: Not all that well. According to New York's Independent Budget Office, total budgeted expenditures grew from $31.8 billion in 1995 (Rudy's first budget year) to $44.6 billion in 2003, an increase of 40.3%. By comparison, the inflation rate from January 1995 to January 2003 was 20.89% according to this inflation rate calculator. Thus, New York City's spending under Rudy grew at a rate twice that of inflation.
Now, in fairness, some of this was 9-11 related, but the Manhattan Institute notes that even if 9-11 had not occured, the city was facing a sharp budget shortfall caused by overspending during the good years:
But even if the events of September 11 had never occurred, the next mayor was destined to confront hard fiscal times. Recurring expenditures were on track to exceed recurring revenues by at least $2 billion in Mayor Rudolph Giuliani’s last budget—an operating deficit he temporarily covered with prior year surpluses. Sooner or later, something was going to have to give: spending, or taxes.
Why is the city’s fiscal condition deteriorating again after eight years of a mayor who initially embraced such a fiscally conservative agenda? After a promising start, where and how did his policies go wrong? And what should Mayor Bloomberg learn from Giuliani’s experience?
Answer:
The scope of government was not reduced at all. The mayor abandoned his most visible initiative in this sphere—the proposed sale of the city hospital system—after a struggle with the unions and defeats in the courts. He did cut costs in social services; even before the new federal welfare reforms took effect in 1997, the city had begun to significantly reduce caseloads. But money saved on social services has only helped to subsidize big increases in other categories. Today the array of social services sponsored and partially funded by the city—from day care to virtually guaranteed housing—is as wide as ever.
And:
In 1995–96, the city entered into a series of collective bargaining agreements with its public-employee unions. In addition to granting pay increases that ended up roughly equaling inflation, the city promised not to lay off any workers for the life of the contracts. These agreements were expected to add $2.2 billion to the budget by fiscal 2001. But that estimate didn’t reckon with renewed growth in the number of city employees. After dipping in Giuliani’s first two years, the full-time headcount rose from 235,069, in June 1996 to over 253,000 by November 2000. Thanks largely to this growth in the workforce, the total increase in personnel service costs since 1995 has been $4 billion.
Over the past quarter-century, New York City has experienced two periods of steep economic decline accompanied by fiscal crisis or stress, followed by two extended periods of growth. In both economic crisis periods (1970-77 and 1989-93) the city's fiscal problems were compounded by rising debt burdens which forced the city to set aside larger shares of shrinking or stagnant budgets for debt service payments. During the two economic expansion periods, however, the city has taken different paths in terms of debt management. Over the 1978-88 recovery and growth period, New York City sharply reduced the mountain of debt it had inherited from the fiscal crisis. In the current recovery and growth period (dating from 1994), the city's debt burden has become heavier relative to ability-to-pay.
The New York Times noted in 2003 that the city's debt per capita was very high compared to other cities:
New York City's debt burden is twice that of other large cities in the United States, and the cost of repaying it accounts for 15 cents of every dollar the city collects, according to a report released yesterday by Comptroller William C. Thompson Jr. Nonetheless, the report said that the city's level of indebtedness, although high, is still $8.5 billion below the legal limit of $40 billion. Municipal debt in New York, which pays for capital projects like school construction and bridge repairs, totaled $5,645 per resident in the fiscal year that ended in June, a 127 percent increase since 1990, the report said. By comparison, per capita debt was $3,600 in Chicago, $1,700 in Los Angeles and $1,400 in Boston.
“The 1997 Local Tax Effort In New York City ($7.99 Per $100 Of City Taxable Resources) Was 79 Percent Greater Than The Average Local Tax Effort For The Next Nine Largest U.S. Cities ($4.47).”
How's he on tax cuts? Steve Forbes recently endorsed him, apparently forgetting that Rudy opposed his flat-tax plan back in 1996.
Back in 1996 when he was mayor, Giuliani dismissed Forbes' notion of a flat-tax as a "mistake," saying "the flat tax is not for me" because it would give states and cities more authority but less resources.
Indeed, although Rudy did cut some taxes, he has been extremely resistant to any serious tax-cutting. Consider his 1994 endorsement of Mario Cuomo:
Why did he endorse Cuomo? Because he opposed Pataki's platform of tax cuts for New York State.
The most spectacular maneuver was executed by New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani when he crossed party lines to endorse Mario Cuomo over George Pataki - "giving artificial respiration," as Bill Buckley put it, "to a political corpse far gone in decomposition" - on the grounds that the corpse would aid the city more generously. In so doing, Mayor Giuliani jettisoned one of the chief rationales for his own campaign last year. By pinning the city's hopes on government largesse rather than on reformist tax policies, he embraced the timid, static analysis of former Mayor David Dinkins. If Giuliani is right now, Dinkins was right then; so why should Giuliani be mayor? Mr. Giuliani also dimmed his future in Republican politics at the state or national level. Instead of urging conservative Democrats to join the Republican coalition - the strategy of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan - he broke Republican ranks to bolster a liberal Democrat.
Indeed, resistance to tax cuts seems to be a habit with Giuliani. In the late 1990s, Giuliani fought hard against the repeal of a commuter tax on people who work in New York City but live elsewhere.
Over the objections of a furious Mayor Giuliani and city legislators from both parties, the New York state legislature has abolished the New York City commuter tax. The action, done to apparently affect a local legislative race in suburban Rockland County, could cost New York City $360 million.
Commuter taxes are particularly pernicious, precisely because they follow the old gag of "Don't tax you, don't tax me, tax the man behind the tree." Giuliani continued to lobby for reinstatement of the tax over the years, even after leaving office as mayor.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) was close to leaving the Republican Party in 2001, weeks before then-Sen. Jim Jeffords (Vt.) famously announced his decision to become an Independent, according to former Democratic lawmakers who say they were involved in the discussions.
In interviews with The Hill this month, former Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) and ex-Rep. Tom Downey (D-N.Y.) said there were nearly two months of talks with the maverick lawmaker following an approach by John Weaver, McCain’s chief political strategist.
Democrats had contacted Jeffords and then-Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-R.I.) in the early months of 2001 about switching parties, but in McCain’s case, they said, it was McCain’s top strategist who came to them.
At the end of their March 31, 2001 lunch at a Chinese restaurant in Bethesda, Md., Downey said Weaver asked why Democrats hadn’t asked McCain to switch parties.
This is an attempt by the Democrats to sabotage a Republican presidential candidate, and nothing more. Get this bit:
Daschle said that throughout April and May of 2001, he and McCain “had meetings and conversations on the floor and in his office, I think in mine as well, about how we would do it, what the conditions would be. We talked about committees and his seniority … [A lot of issues] were on the table.”
Absolutely not so, according to McCain. In a statement released by his campaign, McCain said, “As I said in 2001, I never considered leaving the Republican Party, period.”
Some of the meetings Daschle referred to are detailed in the former senator’s 2003 book.
Let me go out on a limb here and guess that the book does not talk about the meetings being over McCain leaving the GOP.
The media are pushing this story because they are fully invested in the notion that McCain was angry over his supposedly shabby treatment by the Bush campaign.
It’s hard to see how the already floundering McCain can survive the revelation that not only did he consider switching to the Democratic caucus in 2001, his people approached the Democrats to begin conversations on the matter. By way of comparison, Lincoln Chafee and ultimate turncoat Jim Jeffords only began to mull treason after entreaties from the Democrats to do so. When you come out looking like a worse Republican than Lincoln Chafee and Jim Jeffords, it can’t be good.
Of course, the campaign that's floundering is the one that Hewitt is pushing with his book, A Mormon In the White House? Mitt Romney is doing so poorly that some polls have him within the margin of error of having ZERO percent support.
With hindsight, the thought of McCain in the Democratic Party is ludicrous. Imagine a pro-life Joe Lieberman, and you're still only part way there. Given the way the Democrats have abandoned the war effort both in Iraq and globally, whatever grievances McCain has had against the Bush administration over the years are relatiely insignificant.
I'm embarrassed to admit that I missed the opportunity to participate in a blogger conference call with Senator John McCain because of email problems (I have about 1400 unanswered emails from the last week or so due to extreme time constraints on some business transactions), and have not sifted through all the V1agra and C1alis offers.
Having had a chance now to meet and engage in firsthand conversations with Senator McCain is certainly eroding some of the distrust I've long held for him, politically. There's no question you know that you're speaking with a genuine American hero and icon. I stand in awe and appreciation for what he sacrificed for our Country some thirty years ago. What is even more compelling in the present, however, is that he is so much more than just that. I find myself warming up to the notion of a President McCain, if it turns out that way. I'm convinced he'd do right by America. Beyond that, given the present state of mind of Americans, it's my belief he is on the short list of Republicans that actually stands a chance at winning in '08 at all...
:26 Skip Murphy from GraniteGrok… Question about Iran. :27 McCain: I hope that our pro-Israel friends understand. This is a radical group of very dangerous people. If they required nuclear weapons they would handle them recklessly. They’ve gotta understand that their actions… :29 Murphy follow-up: Does sending somebody in to talk, will that really help? :29 McCain: First of all, it wouldn’t be a negotiation. It would be a message from me as POTUS telling them what would happen. I would do it quietly. Don’t get me wrong… I’m not saying we’re going to war, I’m saying that we will not allow Iran to destroy Israel.
Overall, McCain seemed very chipper and actually extended the call a couple of times when the facilitator, Patrick Hynes, was trying to get him off to other appointments. He clearly enjoys bandying with people, including many who opposed him. Indeed, this is the first conference call with a major politician I’ve been on where people from the other party were invited to participate. He’s got a weird sense of humor, calling some people “jerks” and the like, but he made a good impression on the group, I think.
Let's remember that McCain charmed the pants off the media in 2000; if he can do the same to the bloggers over the next year, we could be looking at our 44th president:
Yep, as we remarked endlessly during the 2004 campaign, the Democrats seem stuck in the past, wanting to recreate that magic moment in the early 1970s when it seemed like the far left was taking over the party.
Just before they got crushed in the 1972 election. It may be somewhat forgotten, but the Democrats at that point had been running the country with only minor interruptions. Oh, sure, they had lost the presidency in 1968, but it was a tumultuous year and a very close election, and they still controlled the House and Senate by sizeable majorities. So they went out on a limb and nominated George McGovern, and suffered one of the worst defeats in American history.
But one of the problems liberals have is that they refuse to learn from the lessons of the past, and hence they seem to be steaming full speed ahead into the same shoals that wrecked them 35 years ago.
The return of the ERA (renamed WEA, for Women's Equality Amendment) is just a symptom of this trend.
The ERA, originally introduced in Congress in 1923, gained popularity in the mid-1960s. In March 1972, it cleared the first of two hurdles: passing both chambers of Congress by the required two-thirds vote.
Thirty state legislatures ratified it the next year. Congress extended by three years its seven-year deadline for ratification, but the decade passed without approval by the required 38 states. ERA backers have since introduced the resolution in every Congress, but only now do they believe they have a realistic chance of success.
It is an open question as to whether the states that ratified it still count for the amendment, made murkier by the fact that several states later rescinded their ratification. It's probably going nowhere, but it will give Hillary Clinton a chance to push for something during her 2008 run that may buffer her support among single women. It will also give Phyllis Schlafly a chance to reprise her role from the 1970s as the chief opponent.
Rosie comes under fire from Stephen Spruell for her inane comments about how the standoff over the 15 British Navy men being held by Iran is another "Gulf of Tonkin" incident.
I agree with him, but this is wrong:
This latest conspiracy theory follows hot on the heels of Rosie's recent, unsurprising experimentation with 9/11-trutherism.
Actually it's part and parcel of her 9-11 Denial. These folks all talk about the Gulf of Tonkin incident being a "false-flag" attack, just as they claim 9-11 was the same thing. In fact, a lot of them believe that every incident that sparks a war is a "false-flag" incident, from Pearl Harbor to the Maine to 9-11.
The Washington Post reports that NYC Mayor Bloomberg is thinking of running for president.
The answer? For the Bloomberg party:
Bloomberg, 65, has told confidants that he will not decide until early next year, when it has become clear whom Democrats and Republicans will nominate.
If he runs for president as a self-financed independent, New York could find itself home to a trio of presidential candidates, an oddity for a state and city often portrayed as far outside the mainstream of American political and social life.
And with endorsements like this, how can he fail?
"He would be a very compelling candidate," said civil rights activist Al Sharpton, himself a once and potentially future presidential hopeful from the Big Apple, and a friend of the mayor's. Sharpton called Bloomberg "Ross Perot with a resume" and predicted that "if he operates as he's done in other parts of his life, he will put both feet in."
They do mention one issue in passing:
Bloomberg could help fulfill that goal. But in conversations with friends, he has been realistic about his chances for success: "How can a 5-foot-7, divorced billionaire Jew running as an independent from New York possibly have a chance?" he has asked.
I suspect that far more important will be his political views:
He supports gun control, has raised taxes, backs same-sex marriage and signed a law banning the use of trans fats in fast-food restaurants. The mayor once filed suit on behalf of the city against two dozen gun dealers.
(This post will remain pinned to the top until Sunday night. Scroll down for newer content.)
I will be on the radio Sunday night with my good friend Andrea Shea-King on her eponymous show out of Orlando. If you're not fortunate enough to live in the WDBO area, you can listen in live on the internet. You can also participate in the live chatroom for the show by going here and typing in your nickname, city & state and clicking "Submit Query". Our segment will be broadcast at about 9:30 PM Eastern Time, 6:30 on the West Coast. We will be discussing the recent disclosures that a new version of Loose Change may be marketed by Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban with narration by Charlie Sheen. We hope to be joined by Earl Johnson, a WTC 9-11 survivor who has recently lectured at the University of Wisconsin on the nuttery of Kevin Barrett.
THE jobless would be hardest hit by carbon pricing, with new research showing low-income households would have to pay about $600 a year to fight climate change. The research by academic Peter Brain found carbon pricing would disproportionately affect people on low incomes, especially the unemployed.
The Brotherhood of St Laurence commissioned Dr Brain to analyse the impact of increasing the price of carbon for various types of Victorian households. He costed carbon as a component of all consumer goods, not just direct energy costs, with calculations based on household disposable income, including government subsidies and tax.
This illustrates something that hit me the other day. Al Gore's purchase of carbon credits (from his own company, no less) is reasonably painless for him. He's got a ton of money from his Google stock options, and makes something like $175,000 per speech. If he's gotta pay, say $20,000 to offset his carbon bigfootprint, well, that's just chump change.
Moron Rosie O'Donnell's Fascination With the 9-11 Denial Crowd
As I mentioned yesterday on the Andrea Shea-King Show, the first person to bring up 9-11 Denial on The View was not Rosie O'Donnell, it was Mr Barbra Streisand himself, James Brolin:
Note as well that after decrying how partisan everybody is, Brolin brings up www.911weknow.com, a website that pushes the ridiculous 9-11 Mysteries video. The movie claims controlled demolition of the World Trade Center buildings. Oddly enough, Brolin is married to Barbra Streisand, who's Jewish, and 9-11 Mysteries promotes the work of Eric Hufschmid, a Holocaust Denier. This is a pattern we will see repeated.
The next time 9-11 Denial was discussed on the View, Broadway singer Christine Ebersole brought it up, this time while discussing YouTube videos:
Note that Rosie appears to recognize the website and its proprietor John Conner (now going by the name of Mark Dice, BTW). She mimicks Conner and shouts out "9-11 Was an Inside Job!" twice, thrilling the kooks to no end.
But guess what? Rosie's famously a lesbian, right? Remember when she got "married" to her partner in San Francisco?
I'm not homophobic, I’m a pervert-o-phobic. I’m afraid of perverts. I’m afraid of perverts destroying decency in society and in the media. I’m afraid of perverts being able to get married and ruining the meaning of marriage.
As noted in the Page 6 item yesterday, Rosie cribbed her World Trade Center 7 fantasies from a website known as What Really Happened.
But guess what? Rosie's rather famously a big liberal and a fan of the Clintons, right? Let's see what else we can find on What Really Happened:
Iranian naval vessels on Friday seized 15 British sailors and marines who had boarded a merchant ship in Iraqi waters of the Persian Gulf, British and U.S. officials said. Britain immediately protested the detentions, which come at a time of high tension between the West and Iran.
The Iranians said they had captured the sailors and marines because they were operating inside Iranian territorial waters.
"The Royal Navy replied that they were well inside Iraqi territorial waters (and) that was the end of the conversation," Aandahl said.
If you study history, you know that sometimes wars are touched off over apparently minor issues. This is a major issue, and so odds are that it will be resolved. But if Iran draws a line in the sand, this could be the flashpoint.
The Democrats are beginning to see the problem with being dependent on a very few, very wealthy donors to the party.
Leading Democrats, including Senator Obama of Illinois, are distancing themselves from an essay published this week by one of their party's leading financiers that called for the Democratic Party to "liberate" itself from the influence of the pro-Israel lobby.
You know, it used to be kooks on the right wing who talked about the Israel lobby; now it's the kooks on the left wing.
The Soros article puts Democrats in the awkward position of choosing between Mr. Soros, a major funder of their causes, and the pro- Israel lobby, whose members are also active in campaign fund-raising. Pressed by The New York Sun, some Democrats aired their differences with Mr. Soros.
One day after 21 people were arrested during a demonstration that vandalized a U.S. Army recruiting office on Milwaukee's east side, Wisconsin peace activist groups on Tuesday said some protesters might increasingly turn to destruction as their frustrations mount.
The good news is that the "Peace" movement seems to be attracting a younger demographic, according to the rap sheets:
Arrested were: Kelsey M. Kazik, 20, Sara Keiza, 17, Jillian Duckwitz, 21, Richard A. Ketcham, 22, Thomas P. Buckholt, 17, Andrew L. Ortlieb, 24, Kathryn E. Jacobs, 20, Keith Crum, 20, and Andrew Smart, 19, all of Milwaukee; Craig R. Barringer, 20, of Waukesha; Jonathon W. Wilson, 17, of Wauwatosa; Amy M. Barger, 19, Jessica L. Brooks, 18, Derek W. Johnson, 17, Nathan J. Bartelt, 20, Jeffrey G. Lavato, 18, and Kyle Sawson, 21, all of West Bend; and David W. Clerkin, 21, of Madison.
As the world’s warmest winter on record drew to an end with a weekend snow storm, a group of religious leaders started walking across the state Friday to bring attention to global warming.
“People have been asking me what happens if it snows,” said the Rev. Fred Small of the First Church Unitarian in Littleton. “I tell them: ‘We walk.’ ”
The nine-day haul from downtown Northampton, Mass., to Copley Square in Boston was planned far before forecasts called for a weekend of snow and sleet just a few days before the start of spring.
“It was windy and cold. I was walking on the front of the line and I felt like I was bow of a ship with the wind just coming into my face,” said the Rev. Margaret Bullitt-Johns of the Grace Episcopal Church in Amherst, where the group warmed up on bowls of lentil and minestrone soup after walking eight miles in deep snow from Northampton to Amherst.
Bullitt-Johns said the walkers kept their spirits strong by singing “Keep on walking forward, never turning back,” a hymn they had chanted in prayer services before the march to Boston.
The Rev. Andrea Ayvazian of the Haydenville Congregational Church said the snow was so deep, it felt like she was breaking trail.
You know, I used to think that I was complimenting Pam when I said that her blogging style reminded me of my own. Now I realize that I was complimenting myself.
The songwriter, labor organizer and folk hero Joe Hill has been the subject of poems, songs, an opera, books and movies. His will, written in verse the night before a Utah firing squad executed him in 1915 and later put to music, became part of the labor movement’s soundtrack. Now the original copy of that penciled will is among the unexpected historical gems unearthed from a vast collection of papers and photographs never before seen publicly that the Communist Party USA has donated to New York University.
I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night, alive as you or me...
No word on whether there are any bombshells in there, like correspondence between Earl Browder and Alger Hiss.
The good news is that the reason this stuff is being given over is that the CP-USA is a spent force:
The Communist Party USA contacted Tamiment, which is devoted to the study of labor history and progressive politics, a year ago. Mr. Nash said he was surprised when he got the call. “I didn’t really realize it still existed,” he admitted.
During the summer, Mr. Nash said, he and a group of students scoured the party’s offices on West 23rd Street in Manhattan. They frantically packed up papers before contractors came in to renovate the space, which was being rented out. The donation includes 20,000 books, journals and pamphlets and a million photographs from The Daily Worker’s archives.
I don't always look at the magazines right away; they make great reading material on a plane. But this one, from last week is quite annoying, and will result in the cancellation of my SI subcription. As you can imagine, despite the attempt at humor on the cover, there is no similar levity inside the magazine. The attempts to tie it to sports are tenuous at best; for example, they speculate that Willie Mays might never have caught Vic Wertz's fly ball if the temperature had just been a degree warmer that day.
They also show that all the major league ballparks in Florida would be under water, showing what the Sunshine State would look like with a "six meter sea level rise". But of course nobody outside of Al Gore is projecting that increase; they mention that by 2100 the rise is projected at "up to a meter".
That the planet is getting warmer seems self-evident, although those digging out from the latest snowstorm might have trouble believing it. The question is whether it's the sun heating up or the earth not radiating as much heat back into space. And there's plenty of evidence that the sun itself is heating up, making it somewhat ridiculous for us to try to combat.
As usual for the doomsayers, there is no discussion of any positive effects of global warming; we're all losers. With no apparent sense of irony, they present a good amount of charts showing how many fewer ski resorts there will be in Europe based on some projections handily provided to SI by uninterested third parties like the Natural Resources Defense Council. Oh, jeez, you mean I won't be able to fly over to the Alps for a week? Qu'elle dommage!
Where does this default assumption come from? And why is it so prevalent among our affluent educated class (which, after all, would seem to overlap considerably with the people being complained about?). It comes, I think, from our schools and, especially, from our colleges and universities. The first are staffed by liberals long accustomed to see America as full of problems needing solving; the latter have been packed full of the people cultural critic Roger Kimball calls "tenured radicals," people who see this country and its people as the source of all evil in the world.
As Barone notes, these theories don't get accepted explicitly, but the underlying spite for the US and its values gets absorbed into the implicit worldview. Which is a shame, since the US is a force for good in the world:
What they have been denied in their higher education is an accurate view of history and America's place in it. Many adults actively seek what they have been missing: witness the robust sales of books on the Founding Fathers. Witness, also, the robust sales of British historian Andrew Roberts's splendid "History of the English-Speaking Peoples Since 1900."
Roberts points out almost all the advances of freedom in the 20th century have been made by the English-speaking peoples -- Americans especially, but British, as well, and also (here his account will be unfamiliar to most American readers) Canadians, Australians and New Zealanders. And he recalls what held and holds them together by quoting a speech Winston Churchill gave in 1943 at Harvard: "Law, language, literature -- these are considerable factors. Common conceptions of what is right and decent, a marked regard for fair play, especially to the weak and poor, a stern sentiment of impartial justice and above all a love of personal freedom ... these are the common conceptions on both sides of the ocean among the English-speaking peoples."
The US has its flaws; even conservatives agree with liberals on that point (although they certainly disagree on what the flaws are). But it also has systems in place to correct those flaws, and anyway the flaws are minor compared to most other countries.
I'll put up my thoughts about the latest episode here, once the show airs. I'm going to repeat my prediction from last week, that Charla and Myrna, aka One and a Half Women, will be Phil-Liminated tonight. Winners? I'll go with Joyce and Uchenna, who I believe are the only prior season winners on "All-Stars".
Update: Well, another wonderful night for my quite logical predictions.
Teams leave for a ski area where there's apparently a glacier left what with all the global warming going on, and where they can then destroy part of that glacier to find a clue. The interesting thing is that this task uses some sort of satellite technology with directional beacons, and teams must realize that there are multiple sources.
As it works out, the chairlift starts at 8:00 AM, which means that there is an effective bunching of the teams; IIRC one of the few so far in the race. The Beauty Queens miss picking up backpacks at the end of the chairlift and so they must return.
Young gay, who arrive first, go straight to worst, apparently unable to cope with the technology, while Old Gay seemingly ace the challenge, and get the clue to go to Mozambique. Despite some apparent drama, all teams up on the same set of flights, so we've got another bunching in one episode.
Eric is wearing his funny "Colege" tee-shirt. This appears to be a not-so-subtle way of telling us that he's a dope.
In Mozambique, teams get a mine-sweeping exercise with rats. Now I have to admit, having never really encountered rats in my life I have to wonder what the big deal is--big mice, little hamsters is what they look like to me. Granted, I would not want to deal with them if they were not trained, but these were, so it would not bother me in the slightest.
One and a Half Women fall behind here, despite the obvious "low to the ground" advantage that Charla would appear to have. Is it trouble for them as predicted?
Next task is to go to Maputo. As it happens there are two exits, but the one to the left turns out to be the wrong way. The folks who see that there are two screw up, while ironically, the ones who missed seeing the second sign come out ahead at the Cluebox. The clue is a Detour: Pamper or Porter. This was a dividing line; the teams that chose Pamper won and the teams that chose Porter lost. They had to raise some 30 local currency units by providing manicures, or fill ten bags with coal and carry one of them to a particular address.
Well, Charla and Myrna, aka One and a Half Women managed to sell enough manicures (apparently to men) that they suddenly move from last to first, while all the teams taking the Porter route are in trouble. The other two teams to take that option are the Beauty Queens and the French Foreign Legion, and sure enough they are now in second and third.
Charla and Myrna make it to the mat first! Wow, way to call it, Brainster! They win a trip to Aruba. The BQs finish next, while the FFL take third.
The coal turns out to be a horrendous task, while the FFL manage to get enough from two (ridiculously two) manicures to move into third. Uchenna & Joyce, who are the last to arrive at the coal sack event look to be in severe trouble.
The Young Gays arrive and one announces that he's going to hug Phil with his coal-dust-covered hands. Phil shows those shifty moves that earned him all-eighth-grade honors. I had to laugh at this bit, because it was so un-PC for Phil to duck a gay embrace even if they can laugh it off as avoiding a coal-dust-on-his-clothes embrace.
And now, it looks like Joyce & Uchenna are doomed. As they run up towards Phil, do we notice a little, ummm, surgical enhancement to Joyce? Indeed we do, as Phil solemnly tells them that they are the last team to arrive. But, after a moment, he is pleased to inform them that they have gotten one of the bye-weeks. Still they must finish first next leg or face a 30-minute penalty.
It was a breath-taking, historic, and emotional day in Washington, D.C. You won't know it if you tune in to the usual MSM channels. But new media--bloggers, conservative documentarians, Internet activists, FReepers (giant thread here), citizen journalists, photojournalists, and talk radio hosts--turned out in full force to participate and cover the Gathering of Eagles counter-protest. Thousands upon thousands turned out despite freezing temperatures and hairy travel conditions. We met bikers who drove up all night from Huntsville, Alabama; a retired NYC firefighter who arrived here at 2am; college students who traveled from Massachusetts; a Vietnam veteran's wife who bought plane tickets at the last minute from San Francisco; and countless participants who arrived as part of Move America Forward's cross-country caravan.
The woman who accused three members of the Duke University men's lacrosse team of sexual assault is not being forthcoming with special prosecutors, law enforcement sources close to the case tell ABC News.
The accuser has met at least twice with prosecutors from the North Carolina attorney general's office, which took over the case from Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong in January.
Gee, you don't think they might be protecting themselves from perjury charges for their testimony before the Grand Jury?
The 15-year-old freshman volunteered with a few other students to wear traditional Muslim clothing to school for an entire day in February after a Middle Eastern Studies teacher at Bacon Academy announced that she was looking for students to promote her class by wearing the garb. Caitlin covered her slender frame and short brown hair with a periwinkle burqa, which concealed her face.
The hateful and abusive comments she endured that day horrified teachers, the teen and many of her classmates. The remarks underscored a persistent animosity toward American Muslims that is driven largely by the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. But they also opened up an important dialogue that could help teenagers in Colchester and across the state view the Muslim culture differently.
Shockingly, this academy seems to be otherwise a haven of tolerance:
In the days that followed, teachers and students at Bacon Academy discussed tolerance of other cultures. There was already a Gay-Straight Alliance at the school with some openly gay members, a save Darfur group and a diversity committee.
Okay, I may have mentioned that I support John McCain?
Well, I love this article; it's another one of those that the campaign staff might as well have written:
In the seven years since John McCain and his "Straight Talk Express" nearly derailed George W. Bush's White House ambitions, the blunt-spoken senator from Arizona has become the very picture of the highly managed presidential candidate he once scorned.
And along the way, he lost Stuart Hume and Mike Moffett.
The New Hampshire GOP activists counted themselves among McCain's loyalists in 2000, admiring his rejection of party dogma. But both men have turned elsewhere this time around.
"That had a real appeal, the maverick thing," said Moffett, a college professor from Concord and a Marine reservist. "He wasn't tied in, necessarily, with any conventional way of thinking. . . . His decades in Washington don't help him right now, with me or with many others."
Hume, a retired investor from New Castle, agrees: "I don't think people have the same impression of him now that they did then."
Translation: McCain doesn't criticize George Bush anymore. He's no fun, because we (the media) liked that criticism of George Bush.
Meanwhile over at the Screw Loose Change blog that I run with JamesB, there's been some excitement as somebody created a fake blog that claims I've left the 9-11 Debunking camp in disgust with the tactics we use. Reflecting the level of interest the 9-11 Deniers have in our blog, Alex Jones mentioned us on the air today and his assistant wrote an article on the supposed "split".
The New York Times (of all places!) publishes an article calling Al Gore to task for his enviro-wackism:
Criticisms of Mr. Gore have come not only from conservative groups and prominent skeptics of catastrophic warming, but also from rank-and-file scientists like Dr. Easterbook, who told his peers that he had no political ax to grind. A few see natural variation as more central to global warming than heat-trapping gases. Many appear to occupy a middle ground in the climate debate, seeing human activity as a serious threat but challenging what they call the extremism of both skeptics and zealots.
Kevin Vranes, a climatologist at the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado, said he sensed a growing backlash against exaggeration. While praising Mr. Gore for “getting the message out,” Dr. Vranes questioned whether his presentations were “overselling our certainty about knowing the future.”
The medieval warm period which resulted in English wineries gets a mention:
So too, a report last June by the National Academies seemed to contradict Mr. Gore’s portrayal of recent temperatures as the highest in the past millennium. Instead, the report said, current highs appeared unrivaled since only 1600, the tail end of a temperature rise known as the medieval warm period.
As does the general variability of climate:
Geologists have documented age upon age of climate swings, and some charge Mr. Gore with ignoring such rhythms.
“Nowhere does Mr. Gore tell his audience that all of the phenomena that he describes fall within the natural range of environmental change on our planet,” Robert M. Carter, a marine geologist at James Cook University in Australia, said in a September blog. “Nor does he present any evidence that climate during the 20th century departed discernibly from its historical pattern of constant change.”
In October, Dr. Easterbrook made similar points at the geological society meeting in Philadelphia. He hotly disputed Mr. Gore’s claim that “our civilization has never experienced any environmental shift remotely similar to this” threatened change.
"This Moment on Earth: Today's New Environmentalists and Their Vision for the Future" by Kerry and his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, will be released on March 26.
"As a society, we are sliding dangerously backwards in almost every sector of environmental concern," Kerry said in a statement about the book. "Even caring about the environment has been marginalized in recent years by a calculated assault from special interests.
"Teresa and I are writing this book because we share a sense of urgency about the need to reinvigorate grassroots action which takes these concerns into the ballot box," he said. "This book shows what a lot of individuals are doing in common sense, practical and yet visionary ways, in the hope that their example can once again galvanize Americans into action."
Anybody seen Kerry's utility bills for his five mansions?
As always I go by the Sagarin Ratings, which you can find here. Pay attention to "Predictor" and not to "Rating". Look hard at what teams get a break playing near their home court. For example, Texas A&M will get to play in San Antonio in the regionals, if they get past Louisville, who play in Lexington in the first two rounds. North Carolina's first two games are in Winston-Salem. Wisconsin plays in Chicago in the early rounds which is a very short drive for their fans.
My Final Four picks are as follows: Florida, Kansas, North Carolina and Texas A&M. That's three #1 seeds, which makes me a tad uncomfortable. UCLA seems to be the only team with a real good shot at breaking through among the rest; they're 8-1 against Top 25 teams this year. North Carolina appears to me to be the team to beat; their predictor rating of 97.96 is over four points higher than their nearest competitor.
Here's a terrific movie about Global Warming that puts a major smackdown on Al Gore's little cottage industry. I'm a skeptic on this stuff, but I also watch with a critical eye, and this movie really impressed the heck out of me, despite the occasional silly music.
Here's a good article from Fox News on the GW story that points out evidence from other planets in our solar system that the warming is coming from the sun, despite apparently agreeing with the "consensus" on man-made causes:
While evidence suggests fluctuations in solar activity can affect climate on Earth, and that it has done so in the past, the majority of climate scientists and astrophysicists agree that the sun is not to blame for the current and historically sudden uptick in global temperatures on Earth, which seems to be mostly a mess created by our own species.
Sea levels, rising at 1 millimetre a year before the industrial revolution, are now rising by 3 millimetres a year because of a combination of global warming, polar ice-melting and long natural cycles of sea level change.
"All indications are that it's going to get faster," said Eric Lindstrom, head of oceanography at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), told Reuters on the sidelines of a global oceans conference in Hobart.
And on the humor front, a trek intended to draw attention to global warming has had to be called off because of frostbite.
A North Pole expedition meant to bring attention to global warming was called off after one of the explorers got frostbite. The explorers, Ann Bancroft and Liv Arnesen, on Saturday called off what was intended to be a 530-mile trek across the Arctic Ocean after Arnesen suffered frostbite in three of her toes, and extreme cold temperatures drained the batteries in some of their electronic equipment.
Okay, so that's not exactly shocking. What is odd is that he was busted in Sweden:
US rapper Snoop Dogg was arrested in Stockholm in the early hours of Monday suspected of drug use, police said.
The 35-year-old, whose real name is Calvin Broadus, was arrested in a car in central Stockholm after performing at a concert with P Diddy at the city's Globe arena.
"He was showing visible signs of drug use," Stockholm police officer Mats Braennlund told AFP.
I'm going to guess that One and a Half Women (aka Myrna and Smyrna) will get the axe today. Rob & Ambuh are clearly the class of the field, and should win it all, but all it takes is for them to make one big mistake and they'll be the ones arriving after dark at the mat.
Update: Hah, can I call it or what? (Covering up red face).
First task is to find a famous shipwreck in Punta Arenas, Chile. Rob & Ambuh do some searching on the internet and at first think it might be a painting, but in fact it's a bit of overanalysis and the shipwreck itself seems to be trivial to locate. All the teams except Old Gay and One and a Half Women make it to the airport in time for the first flight. There is a 1 hour difference between the flights.
At the shipwreck, teams get a Detour. They must choose between Navigate it or Sight It. In Navigate it, they must figure out the order of cities Magellan visited during his trip around the world. Rob apparently does well by noticing that he started and ended in Seville, but then he misspells Phillipines as Philippeans, and Ambuh misses it as well. In Sight It, they must follow compass directions from a particular spot in the city.
Sight It turns out to be the right option, at least for most of the teams. Young Gay takes the lead as the first team to choose this option. The clue is another flight, this time a charter to Argentina. From appearances there is a three hour difference in arrival times, which seems obviously to immunize those on the first flight, barring some bunching maneuver.
Joyce & Uchenna are the only team to get the Navigate it part right. Rob & Ambuh finally decide to bail on the task although they would have easily won if they'd just gotten "the spelling thing" right. As they and the BQs dash off to do the other task, the Old Gays, who had been on the second flight, zip past them. Rob is convinced he knows where they're going and yep, he ain't Jesus, because that's the wrong place. One and a Half Women, after wasting a bit of time at the Navigate it part with some memorable moments on the climb up with Smyrna trying to carry a huge log, also bail for the Sight It challenge.
Things are definitely looking bad for them, but they're actually even with Rob & Ambuh as they search for the next clue at a parking lot. As One and a Half Women dash after them Rob & Ambuh realize they're going the wrong way, and double back while apparently claiming they had found the Cluebox. Myrna suddenly tells us that she's a Lawyer and used to tellling when people are lying, but her lawyer sense is apparently as slow as her sister's legs, as they continue on for awhile before doubling back.
The next clue leads people to a boat dock at (apparently) the southern tip of South America. There are 8 spots, but as it works out, team #3 goes it alone, and so Team #8 seems obviously hosed. And of course, Team #8 is One and a Half Women, with Rob & Ambuh's acting apparently hosing them out of a chance tonight.
The finale is a roadblock. One member of the team must sort through 1600 pieces of mail to find one of two letters that is addressed to their team. Young Gay is finishing about the time the rest of the teams discover this. Rob decides to take this challenge and he is still working at it when One and a Half Women arrive, supposedly 20 minutes later.
But Myrna somehow finds the letter faster than Rob and suddenly things are not looking good for Team Survivor. There is the usual supposed dramatic run up the hill, and One and a Half Women have beaten Rob & Ambuh, stunningly. Team Survivor is Phil-Liminated! After three consecutive firsts and looking like the team to beat, they're out.
Comments: Perhaps a little heavy-handed on the bad karma coming back to haunt one front. One and a Half Women are going to have to use Charla (aka Smyrna) at some point by the rules of the game; this actually would have been a good one to do it at even though it worked out well for them.
Michael Fumento continues his gripping reporting from Iraq with a portrait of a military family:
Rob's brother, Douglas, also joined the military but went the National Guard route notwithstanding that he knew he'd end up in Iraq just like Rob would. Doug is 27, Rob 21. Having one child in the military is rare enough these days; two all the more so. But here's the kicker: their father, Rick.
Rick Killion had been a cadet in the Civil Air Patrol from 1972-1976, whereupon he then enlisted in the Air Force in 1976. That's where he met Cheryl Newcomb, who was also in the Air Force, and soon married. She gave him his two children. Rick was an avionics technician, which keeps you about as far from combat as you can get, until exiting the service in 1980 at the rank of sergeant (E-5).
Some thrilling action described as well:
In that same video clip a sniper nearly beans Rob, the round ricocheting off the top of the wall over which he'd been leaning. He utters a few unprintable epithets, then yells: "That hit right in front of me!" But seconds later he whoops "Whew! Yeah!" thus reflecting Winston Churchill's observation that "nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result." Then he fires at another jihadist and I get the shot I was waiting for, his SAW pounding away while the ejected cases bounced off my body armor chest plate.
After we left the building and scrambled through an ambush that had us looking like the soldiers at the end of "Black Hawk Down," I kept snapping photos and shooting video and darned if time and again Rob wasn't right there in the thick of it – perhaps in half my photos of the fight.
Although the media have been trying to sell the idea of a McCain collapse, this poll suggests strongly otherwise:
The candidates can be grouped as follows:
I. Very well-liked candidates with high favorable to unfavorable ratios of more than two to one:
* Rudy Giuliani * Barack Obama * John McCain
In fact McCain has a huge net positive rating compared to (say) Hillary Clinton. I happen to be one of those folks who think that Giuliani and Obama's high positives represent a ceiling, while McCain's represent a floor.
The better news for McCain lies in the other ratings. Mitt Romney barely comes out a positive (23-19) among those who are familiar with him, while Newt Gingrich gets a horrific -20 (29-49). If you want to know why he's not in the race, that's your answer.
"Some" Scientists Say Traveling Back In Time Impossible?
This shoots a big hole in my plan to go back to 2000 and invest in Google.
The urge to hug a departed loved one again or prevent atrocities are among the compelling reasons that keep the notion of time travel alive in the minds of many.
While the idea makes for great fiction, some scientists now say traveling to the past is impossible.
Of course, we all know from comic books that even if you could travel back in the past you could not change events.
Baptists and other evangelicals may have a tough time supporting him due to the circumstances of his second divorce/third marriage.
“I mean, this is divorce on steroids,” Land said. “To publicly humiliate your wife in that way, and your children. That's rough. I think that's going to be an awfully hard sell, even if he weren't pro-choice and pro-gun control.”
Americans like New York City, as officials in both parties are quick to say. Most find it vibrant, entertaining and an object of sympathy and pride since the terrorist attacks five and a half years ago that made Mr. Giuliani the national contender he is today.
But the city, with all its tumult and rough edges, is not for everyone. And few people embody all the complicated facets of New York City as much as Mr. Giuliani.
He is swaggering, brash and opinionated and loves to stick his thumb in the eye of conventional political norms. Those traits won him some acclaim in New York, not to mention a lot of tabloid headlines. But he can also be temperamental, controlling, capricious, volatile and, in the words of Edward I. Koch, a former Democratic mayor who supported Mr. Giuliani in his successful bid for a second term, “mean-spirited.”
In an article on the supposed troubles of John McCain, the Wall Street Journal notes hints that Rudy's support may ebb:
The senator's top political strategist, John Weaver, calls himself "quite serene" about the campaign's predicament, reflecting the McCain team's judgment that the Giuliani boomlet will fade. The Journal/NBC poll itself suggests that may well happen, as voters learn more about the New Yorker.
The venerable superhero is killed in the issue of his namesake comic that hit stands Wednesday, the New York Daily News reported. On the new edition's pages, a sniper shoots down the shield-wielding hero as he leaves a courthouse.
As the article notes, "resurrections" are not unknown in comics, and Cap's been resurrected more than most. He disappeared at the end of the Golden Age of Comics, the returned in the 1960s after being discovered frozen in a block of ice. They killed him off briefly in 1969:
Captain America began during World War II, prior to America's entry into the war. Steve Rogers was one of the weakest men in the Army, but was chosen to try a special serum that would turn him into a "supersoldier".
Cap actually entered the war before the country he represented, with his first appearance coming in March 1941:
His creators were the legendary Simon and Kirby. Cap (along with his sidekick Bucky Barnes) battled the Nazis and the Japanese in World War II, then gangsters and crooks after 1945. Along with many other superheroes, he was "retired" in the early 1950s as those features came under pressure from the horror comics fad. He was briefly resurrected in 1954 for three issues by Atlas (forerunner to today's Marvel Comics), but the series didn't take.
Skip forward to 1964. Atlas had begun a tremendous resurgence as Marvel Comics with a new style of superhero--ones with problems and bickering between characters. Their sales soared with the Fantastic Four, Amazing Spiderman, Thor, Iron Man and others seemingly popping up monthly. Marvel had resurrected two of its famed GA characters, the Human Torch, and the Submariner. In Avengers #4 (March 1964), they brought back Cap. He had been frozen in a block of ice. When the ice melted, Cap returned to life, but now was a man tormented by the death of his former partner, Bucky.
Marvel gave him a spot in Tales of Suspense with Iron Man. There were many classic stories during that run, including the Sleeper Saga, which I blogged about at Silver Age Comics. With issue #100, the title was changed to Captain America.
Captain America has not always been a patriot. In the mid-1970s he changed his name to Nomad for awhile in disgust at the Watergate revelations. And in recent years the comics he has appeared in have often been suffused with anti-American sentiment as Michael Medved noted:
The indictment of the United States becomes even more explicit in issue #6 (December, 2002) in which Captain America listens to yet another sympathetic rant from a terrorist mastermind. “Guerillas gunned my father down while he was at work in the fields — With American bullets,” the militant helpfully explains. “You know your history, Captain America...You played that game in too many places... The sun never set on your political chessboard- your empire of blood.”
To this verbal assault, The Sentinel of Liberty responds meekly, “We’ve changed. We’ve learned...My people never knew. We know now. And those days are over.
To those who remember when Captain America bled red white and blue, that's a shocking change. So perhaps we should not mourn for Cap, but for ourselves.
But his last comment was left on RedState.com, after the wretched conditions at the Walter Reed Army hospital were revealed last week:
I can’t take it any longer. This country … it’s … it’s all just SH*T. I thought we DEFEATED the Nazis.
He was immediately banned, and hours later he was dead. Cops say a “sniper” fired the gun, but everybody knows Captain America shot himself, in the bathroom, with his blood and brains sprayed all over his Declaration of Independence bath towel.
These were exhilarating times. But between Beijing in 1995 and New York in September 2001 the unity was lost. Somewhere along the line it happened that only one part of that curious Beijing alliance could be seen as the enemy. While a US administration that refused to fund programs against AIDS unless they taught about chastity instead of condoms could rightly be criticised, the mullahs whose abuses of women's rights were very many degrees worse could not.
Was it before or after September 11 that thinkers of the Left - for feminism was a movement of the Left - decided that racism was a far more serious crime than sexism? When did cultural sensitivity trump women's rights? Was it about the time that Australian feminist Germaine Greer defended the practice of female genital mutilation because, as she pointed out, Western women put studs through their nipples and labia?
Actually, it was when feminism allied itself too closely with the Left. Among the Left there is always competition among grievance groups, and, quite reasonably, the grievances of "Western" women are not seen as quite grievous as those who are "suffering" from Western imperialism.
If I told you that a Republican Senator has brought it up, you'd probably be able to guess which one, right?
"The president says, 'I don't care.' He's not accountable anymore," Hagel says, measuring his words by the syllable and his syllables almost by the letter. "He's not accountable anymore, which isn't totally true. You can impeach him, and before this is over, you might see calls for his impeachment. I don't know. It depends how this goes."
The conversation beaches itself for a moment on that word -- impeachment -- spoken by a conservative Republican from a safe Senate seat in a reddish state. It's barely even whispered among the serious set in Washington, and it rings like a gong in the middle of the sentence, even though it flowed quite naturally out of the conversation he was having about how everybody had abandoned their responsibility to the country, and now there was a war going bad because of it.
"Congress abdicated its oversight responsibility," he says. "The press abdicated its responsibility, and the American people abdicated their responsibilities. Terror was on the minds of everyone, and nobody questioned anything, quite frankly."
If I didn't know better, I'd swear this piece was put together by John McCain's staff:
John McCain's Obama- esque remarks about our "wasted" resources in Iraq weren't the only comments that landed him in hot water after a recent appearance on Late Night with David Letterman. Many of his staff were blindsided by his campaign announcement. And several aides were so outraged that they've quit, say Republican insiders.
"They're imploding—he had a game plan that had him announcing much later in the year," one top Republican aide tells Radar, adding that the campaign is "in serious trouble ... Romney's plan and Rudy's jump in the polls caused him to scrap his plans completely. When you do that, and you're not prepared for it, the staff goes crazy. Some of his coordinators in different states were pulling their hair out!"
Romney's "plan"? Is that the plan to get about 8-10% in polling?
Another insider, a guru to the conservative movement, says that McCain himself is growing increasingly desperate in the wake of his downward slide in the polls—a slip hastened by his steadfast support of the very man who savaged him and his family during the 2000 election, George W. Bush, and the president's unpopular plan for troop surge in Iraq. "One of the top aides to the Republican leadership told me that McCain has lost so much support, he's simply beside himself. He's wringing his hands. Things are sinking fast—in two or three weeks, we'll know if there is any recovery."
Snicker, chortle. A "guru" to the conservative movement thinks that McCain's support of the president is hurting him in the polls? Certainly not in the primaries, which are the only polls that will matter prior to the middle of next year.
And the idea that McCain's announcement on Letterman was unscripted is naive. It was not a formal announcement; rather it was an announcement of an intent to announce. But it was widely speculated that McCain would announce on the show.
Very juicy. I love it. But is it true? Did McCain really make the Letterman announcement on the fly? Would McCain's aides really have gone bananas over this? (It's not like everyone in the world didn't already know he was running, after all.) Did "several aides" really quit recently? And who is the "top Republican aide" who was Radar's source for this? Somebody close to McCain or somebody close to another candidate?
Just asking. But it sure sounds true. Though that's more because it tickles me to think so than because there's any real evidence for it.
In any event, what this should tell us is McCain is unfocused. That’s a BIG problem. It’s okay if he goes off the script every now and again, but to not tell your staff that you’re going to announce something on national television…that’s crazy. So yeah, McCain deserves to sweat a little bit.
I wonder what, if anything, can put him back on track…
Oh, you know, little things like social conservatives suddenly realizing they have more in common with John McCain than with Rudy Giuliani or Mitt Romney?
Aaron asks, what movies make men cry? Speaking for myself only, I'm more likely to cry not at sad parts but at happy ones, at moments of triumph and redemption; when Ralphie gets his BB gun, when Scrooge becomes a good man, when Rudy is accepted to Notre Dame.
Kitty points out that the correct term for Edwards is prissy. Yes, I think Ann mistook metrosexual for homosexual.
Andrea Shea-King checks out Rudy Giuliani's record of appointments to the courts in Manhattan and finds he nominated Democrats over Republicans by a factor of 8-1. In fairness to Rudy, you ever try to find a Republican lawyer in New York? But I certainly agree that social conservatives will have to think long and hard before casting a primary ballot for Rudy G.
Third Wave Dave has an interesting post up about Fred Thompson's possible run. Andrea suggested he'd make a good candidate on yesterday's show. I like Thompson, but doubt he'll get very far; InTrade has him at 0.2 to 0.5 cents (to win a dollar if he's the nominee). McCain's in the high 20s and Rudy's in the low 30s. If you really like Thompson, a $20 wager could net $4,000.
Hillary Needs a Vacation has coverage of PIAPS' ire at Eliot Spitzer for not endorsing her (yet).
Does Coulter Think Every Democrat is Secretly Gay?
I thought I'd check around the liberal blogosphere for some "Man Coulter" posts to show the liberals' hypocrisy on her most recent outburst. They're certainly out there, but what I found more interesting was that one of the posts about "Man Coulter" notes that Ann had previously asserted that Bill Clinton was secretly gay.
Ann Coulter repeated on Hardball her insinuation that Bill Clinton is gay, then went on to joke that "may not be gay, but Al Gore: total fag".
Not that there's anything wrong with that, but jeez, Bill Clinton is pretty transparently not gay. And Al Gore? Hey, he did have that unfortunate lisp after getting some dental work done before the convention in 2000, but I'm confident that's what happened--the dental work confused his tongue (which, by the way, spent an ungodly amount of time down his wife's throat when the speech was over).
So now we've got Ann calling men who were on the last four tickets the Democratic party came up with "fags" or "faggots" or "gay". Very curious, to say the least, and I am sure that Hillary will not be spared if her turn comes.
What will she do if Barney Franks gets nominated? Insinuate that he must be a straight?
Ramesh Ponnuru writes in the current National Review that the stars are starting to align for John McCain, basically making the case I did last week, that if the race boils down to McCain versus Giuliani, as it appears to be, that McCain will be the conservative in the race. As McCain's problem is that he's not perceived as conservative enough, this is a very good sign. The article itself is apparently not available online, but the link will take you to an interview with Senator McCain:
Ponnuru (reading headline): “McCain firm on Iraq war. . .” (McCain flips the paper over.) “Despite cost to candidacy”: even better. . .
Sen. McCain: (Laughs) Yep. They’ve got a poll that says 33 percent are much less likely, and 11 percent somewhat less likely to [vote for me]
Ponnuru: So do you think that’s already been costing you? That that’s behind some of the slides in the polls?
Sen. McCain: First of all, I don’t know. But second of all, I can’t worry about it. You just can’t, with something like this you just can’t let it concern you. The issue is too important. The sacrifice that so many young Americans have made already pales in significance to any cost that it may mean to me. You’ve seen these wounded kids, you know how much they’ve given.
Despite the claims of Dick Morris, McCain is in excellent shape.
Rob & Ambuh leave first. Drive to the church of San Pedro de Atacama. This is just a clue stop. Next task is to fly to Puerto Montt, and find something called the Metri. The Old Gays get in a little dustup with the Frat Boy and his girlfriend. They're upset that the latter pulled ahead of them when they stopped for directions, so they block their vehicle while they read the clue. Kinda petty IMHO, and making enemies is never a good idea in TAR.
Rob & Ambuh find an all-night travel agency and book their tickets first. The other teams go directly to the airport, where, of course, they must sleep in a line. Uchenna and Joyce think of going to a hotel where they will book tickets for several teams. But in a crucial mistake, only the Old Gays have given them the security code for their credit cards, so only two teams get their tickets early. There is a one-hour difference between the first and second flight, with only four teams on the former. There's a big row between Teri & Ian and One and a Half Women. Tempers are really flaring on this episode!
On the way to the Metri, somebody makes the comment that Rob is not Jesus. Right on cue, Rob makes the wrong turn. The next clue is a Roadblock. One member must pull something like 80 flat and ugly fish out of a tank into a box, then carry the fish to another tank. Lots of "I hate fish" at this point, including, surprisingly, Dave. Country boys don't fish?
This task seems ill suited for Smyrna, and Myrna ain't enjoying it either, so they fall behind as she wails about how many fish there are and how hard it is. Uchenna and Joyce take the lead at this point. Next task: Find a place called La Maquina on the way to a town called Petrohue. Rob & Ambuh get there first. Detour: Either rock climb 40 feet (sheesh, TAR always has a rock climb) or go whitewater rafting. Every single team opts for the rafting adventure.
Along in here, Dave & Mary miss the turn off for Petrohue. Rob says something about "Wait a minute, did that sign say Petro--?" but Mary says, "Keep going". The BQs miss the cluebox, but somehow still come upon the whitewater rafting, so they take the ride on the assumption that the clue will be along the river. Will this save Team Coal Miner?
Meanwhile, One and a Half Women have teamed up with the Old Gays. But this turns out to be something of a mistake for the former, as the Old Gays missed half the clue and would have been completely hosed without Myrna and Smyrna.
Teams are starting to arrive at the Pit Stop. Rob & Ambuh win yet again, getting a pair of home gyms. At some point the Frat Boy & his girlfriend arrive, treating us to a view of the former's chest. Has he got his nipples pierced or what? I only got a quick glimpse, but it was a definite gross-out moment.
The BQs arrive fourth, but they must go back and find their clue. As it happens, it doesn't cost them any position, just a little time. David and Mary are looking doomed, especially when we see the other two teams jockeying for position on the water, but no sign of Team Coal Miner. Myrna has lost the keys and must run back to the tent to get them. Smyrna gripes that the Old Gays don't wait for them, but at that point they're all racing to avoid finishing last. In an oddball moment, the guy with Phil at the mat is a dwarf, like Smyrna, and we get the inevitable shot of them hugging.
In the end, David and Mary arrive last. Will they be saved for the third time in their TAR career by a non-elimination leg? Nope, they are Phil-Liminated at the mat.
Note: I had assumed that Eric at Viking Pundit was skipping All-Stars, but he's got his recap up.
Hit the big 5-2 today. Thanks to all who wished me a happy birthday, especially Kitty, who put the word around. I don't deserve such great friends, but I ain't complaining!
He takes on the Goron's massive energy bill and delivers a romp:
Two hundred twenty-one thousand kilowatt-hours? What's he doing in there? Clamping Tipper to the electrodes and zapping her across the rec room every night? No, no, don't worry. Al's massive energy consumption is due entirely to his concern about the way we're depleting the Earth's resources. When I say "we," I don't mean Al, of course. I mean you -- yes, you, Earl Schlub, in the basement apartment at 29 Elm St. You're irresponsibly depleting the Earth's resources by using that electric washer when you could be down by the river with the native women beating your loin cloth dry on the rock while singing traditional village work chants all morning long. But up at the Gore mansion -- the Nashville Electric Service's own personal gold mine, the shining Cathedral of St. Al, Tennessee's very own Palace of Versal -- the Reverend Al is being far more environmentally responsible. As his spokesperson attempted to argue, his high energy usage derives from his brave calls for low energy usage. He's burning up all that electricity by sending out faxes every couple of minutes urging you to use less electricity.
