Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) plans to resign his seat by year's end, a senior Republican official told Politico.
The announcement took Capitol Hill by surprise because Lott, the former majority leader, seemed to be relishing his job as minority whip, the second-ranking GOP leadership job. He had regained a post in leadership after he resigned following racially insensitive remarks at a birthday party for the late Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.).
A Lott friend said part of the reason, and a factor in the timing, is a new lobbying regulation, signed by President Bush in September, extending the existing lobbying ban for former members of Congress from one to two years. The lobbying ban takes effect at the beginning of the year.
Michelle Malkin is glad to see Lott leave: "We start off our Monday morning with a nice, big DLTDHYOTWO. The Politico reports that Trent (Vacant) Lott–you know, the goat-talking, anti-porkbusting Republican leader who thinks conservative talk radio is a “problem” –is going to resign by year’s end."
RedState'sErick Erickson reminds us why so many righty bloggers aren't fans of Lott: "Trent Lott long ago stopped being useful and started being bitter. He hates the Porkbusters. He hates conservatives. He hates most anything other than establishment Republican ideals of entrenched power and earmarks. That's sad because he was always a good brass-knuckles fighter."
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey adds:
History may treat Lott more kindly than contemporaneous accounts. He served most of four terms as an effective party leader. After his departure from the Majority Leader seat, many felt that Bill Frist could not match Lott's infighting ability, which was sorely missed when judicial nominations bogged down in 2005.
Still, Lott will most likely be remembered for his arrogance and his inability to adapt to the paradigms of open government in the Internet/blogosphere era. He staunchly defended an old tradition of trading power and influence at a time when America finally started to see the costs inherent in those mechanisms. Lott could have led the Republicans to adapt to the new reality and become the vanguard of ethics reform and smaller government, but instead remained entrenched in the trappings of a vanishing era. When challenged, he lashed out instead of listened, and now he walks away with little credibility left.
Hit and Run'sDavid Weigel notes that, "...before anyone starts beaming about the exit of a big government conservative, keep in mind: The Democratic frontrunner for Lott's open seat is Mike Moore, the ex-state attorney general and godfather of the class action lawsuits against Big Tobacco."
The Corner'sDavid Freddoso hopes this is a chance for new, conservative leadership in the Senate and speculates about who may take Lott's position: "Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), the steering committee chairman whose bomb-throwing reform proposals made him a nemesis of Lott, is reportedly interested, but the appropriators might move to stop that from happening. Another potential is John Thune (R-S.D.), but he has avoided such party posts thus far — recall his refusal to compete last year for the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee."
John McCain: Tree Hugger?
Green Mountain Politics, a pro-McCain blog, scanned this McCain mailer which is being sent to New Hampshire independents.
Examine these mail pieces sent to New Hampshire households, and you'll see that McCain is not only pushing his environmental credentials -- he's positioning himself to the left on the issue. The piece quotes the Natural Resources Defense Council singing the Arizonan's praises, along with Republicans for Environmental Protection -- a group that -- let's not kid ourselves -- borrows straight from the Ann Stone/Main Street playbook.
The piece also implies that McCain has been alone among the Presidential candidates, Democrat or Republican, in leading the way on climate change legislation.
This is McCain 1.0, going back to the well of New Hampshire independents who were so generous with their votes last time. The 2000 primary showed how it could work. This time, McCain only needs a fraction of the independents he got last time to make the same dramatic impact.
Beating Up On Huckabee
This morning, a video is making the rounds in the blogosphere which shows former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee supporting scholarships for illegal immigrants:
. . . Mr Huckabee calls himself a free-trader, but on the stump he does not sound like one. He rouses nativist crowds by fretting that America cannot be secure unless it is self-sufficient in food, energy and military hardware. "I don't want to see our food come from China, our oil come from Saudi Arabia and our manufacturing come from Europe and Asia," he says. "There is so much foolishness in that one sentence it is hard to unpack," comments Rich Lowry, a conservative columnist. America hardly imports any food from China. Mr Huckabee's promise of energy independence within 10 years is impossible. And cheap imports benefit precisely the cash-strapped folk Mr Huckabee purports to champion.[...]
. . . The Club for Growth, a lobby for economic conservatives, assails him for hiking sales and petrol taxes in Arkansas, and for his attacks on industries he accused of "price-gouging". The Club says that nominating him would be "an abject rejection" of the free-market, limited-government principles for which the Republican Party stands. The Cato Institute, a libertarian think-tank, gave him a "D" grade for fiscal policy.
RedState'sPejman Yousefzadeh opines, "The Republican Party is supposed to be the party of free markets, capitalism, free trade and private enterprise. It is supposed to be the party that takes seriously the views of Adam Smith, Friedrich Hayek, Frédéric Bastiat and Milton Friedman. When it comes to economics, I trust the ideas of Smith, Hayek, Bastiat and Friedman more than I trust those of their diametrically opposed counterparts. Pity that Mike Huckabee chose to identify with this latter group of people."
Right Wing News'Jimmie, after noting that Mike Huckabee was endorsed by legendary wrestler "The Nature Boy" Rick Flair, adds, "It's really bad Huckabee wants to make fatty foods, smoking, and other similar pleasurable vices off-limits. If not for the mile-wide nanny state streak in him, he'd be a great candidate."
The Corner'sMark Hemmingway opines, "Hillary won, as she's still the only one who seems trustworthy one on national security issues. Obama generally acquitted himself well, but didn't do well enough to make inroads solely based on his performance. Edwards' angry populism is wearing out its welcome."
And The Corner'sRamesh Ponnuru congratulates Senaor Joe Biden for correctly explaining, contrary to the question asked, that the PATRIOT Act does not include provisions about profiling.
Townhall.com'sHugh Hewitt is tired of Hillary's dodging of specific questions: "Variations on the theme of 'I have been in public life for 35 years' is clearly her way of dodging any demand that she be specific about any issue on which she wants to avoid specificity. It is a sham answer that she uses to skip over tough questions by pretending that her positions on every issue are well known.
Hotair'sBryan posts a video clip where Hillary Clinton denies she is playing the gender card.... then immediately plays the gender card.
And Barack Obama kinda, sorta supports licenses for illegal aliens:
Ian Schwartz adds, "Hillary’s answer wasn’t good enough for Campbell and she followed it up asking her to elaborate on the term “boys club.” Hillary gave one of those “Oh, Campbell, you silly girl, why whatever could you mean” type of responses. And then she played the gender card. Here’s what Hillary learned at Wellesley “I think it is clear from woman’s experiences from time to time there may be some impediments.” Gender card, schmender card."
Hit and Run'sDavid Weigel believes Obama and Hillary both won, "Clinton and Obama both won. If the opening of the debate and the Social Security section set the tone of the race, it's one of the more substantive frontrunner-insurgent match-ups in a while. Neither's attacking the other one personally, both have subtly different domestic policies and slightly more disparite foreign policies, and all of that stuff gets hashed out. Clinton's still got the better spinners, though: No one with a regular command of English could confuse her incoherent answer on drivers licenses with Obama's "Yes, here's why" answer."
Little Green Football'sCharles Johnson opines, "I’m always disappointed when cranky crazy guy Mike Gravel is fascistically excluded, but he does, after all, have more important things on his mind.":
The American Spectator'sWlady snarks, "Partisanship stops at the water's edge, he says -- and then uses the examples of Lugar and Hagel, two critics of the Bush Iraq policy, to buttress his argument. So accepting the Democratic anti-Bush view is proof of bipartisanship? Even Bill Clinton never tried something that slick..."
10,000 ttack by Islamic terrorists and militants since 9/11/01
Front Page Magazine'sPatrick Poole reminds us notes that a grim milestone of 10,000 attacks by Islamic terrorists since the September 11th attacks is quickly approaching:
The establishment media is seemingly obsessed with “grim milestones” in the War on Terror, as the Associated Press reminds us this past weekend. But in the next week those same establishment media outlets will probably stand mute when yet another “grim milestone” is reached – the10,000th attack by Islamic terrorists and militants since 9/11, which is responsible for approximately 60,000 dead and 90,000 injured.
The chronicler of this bloody tally is Glen Reinsford, editor of TheReligionofPeace.com, who began compiling and updating daily a detailed list of reported incidents of violence and terrorism around the world targeting non-Muslims and Muslims alike. Because of space limitations he only posts the past two months worth of attacks on his websites main page, though he has archived all of the incidents from past years (2001-2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007). He also maintains a banner graphic with the updated number of attacks, which people can post on their own websites.
When asked what prompted him to begin such a labor-intensive undertaking, Reinsford identifies the tepid response to Islamic terrorism by otherwise outspoken Muslim groups, with one organization particularly in mind:
The Council on American-Islamic Relations.
Boy Scouts Are Too "Pro War"?
From Fox Boston:
Black Five opines, "Supporting the troops who really do keep bad guys from hurting your worthless behinds and pay blood price so you can freely show your ignorance and shortcomings to the world (and basic lack of commitment to free speech) does NOT equal supporting the war. They are, in fact, two separate things and only a mind operating in non-Euclidean space rather than reality could possibly find an intersection between the two. Since it is obvious that you failed basic logic (and probably most science courses as well I bet), they are exclusive of one another. The Boy Scouts in this case should get not only an apology (the effort having been approved twice by the appropriate commission), but I further feel that Marsha Weinerman should personally, repeat, personally, repay the Scouts the roughly $1,500.00 they spent on the effort to support the troops. Never happen, just following orders I’m sure, but I can dream."
Weasel Zippers adds, "Hands down, the best example I've ever seen that dispels the often cited liberal load of sh*t, "we support the troops, but not the war." No, you DO NOT support the troops, if you have a problem with sending them toiletries, then you DO NOT support them. Give it a rest."
Fox News' Bill O'Reilly has been leading the charge to encourage people to boycott and protest against the Dallas Maverick's Mark Cuban's despicable anti-American film. A boycott website has already popped up at BoycottRedacted.com, which is supported by the Gathering of Eagles, Vets for Freedom, and Free Republic. Check it out!
An Excellent Question Asked to Senator McCain
The Campaign Spot'sJim Geraghty opines, "The funny thing is, I'm not sure the liberal blogs can keep a straight face when complaining about how rude and caustic the use of the B-word is. (Don't many liberal bloggers use the F-word as a comma?) After putting Lieberman in blackface, Kos' "screw them" comment about the four contractors killed in Iraq, the comments about Mary's sexual activities by the bloggers that resigned the Edwards campaign, the folks who posted Michelle Malkin's home address and the names of her children... In a perfect world, nobody would call opposing lawmakers the B-word. But McCain took the time to say that he respected Hillary, which is about as much of a rebuke as we can expect in today's political world."
Newsbusters'Brent Barker reports that CNN reporter Rick Sanchez lead into this hilarious video as if it was somehow catastrophic enough to end his presidential campaign.
Ann Althouse retorts, "The Democrats often criticize Bush for having an overbroad theory of executive power, but at least when Bush grasps for power, it's for things the President can do on his own, leaving Congress and the courts hard pressed to stop him. But Edwards it promising to do something that a President can't possibly do on his own."
Red State'sMoe Lang laughs: "[P]lease be advised that any future uses of the phrase "unitary executive" by you or any Edwards campaign staffer (or, indeed any Edwards supporter at all) will be met with gales of sarcastic, mocking laughter."
Blogs are Hillary's Worst Nightmare Townhall.com'sPatrick Ruffini makes the case that, just like Matt Drudge helped damaged the Clinton I presidency, Clinton II's worst nightmare are blogs, which are a "thousand mini-Drudges you can’t fully track or demonize."
Ron Paul Accepts $500 from Notorious Neo-Nazi Don Black
Lone Star Times'David Benzion was able to get the Ron Paul campaign to go on the record about a $500 donation they accepted from a notorious neo-nazi.
The America Thinker'sAndrew Walden has some other serious questions about Paul supporters and opines, "Paul supporters complain endlessly that the "mainstream media" is censoring or ignoring their candidate. They should be careful what they ask for. If Paul wants to be taken seriously, he must stop cowering behind the internet and face these questions. Until then it is only reasonable to presume that Paul is happy to wallow in well-financed obscurity accepting the support of some of the worst enemies of freedom and liberty within American society."
Wait a Second... I Thought There Were No Gays in Iran?
Little Green Football'sCharles Johnson reports that Mohsen Yahyavi, a high ranking Iranian public official, has announced that Iran's policy to deal with homosexuals is to hang them.
Spitzer Pulls His Plan to Give Licenses to Illegals
With his poll numbers collapsing, Gov. Spitzer pullled the plug today on his controversial plan to allow illegal immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses.
“New York state can not handle [the immigration issue] on our own,” Spitzer said. “I am withdrawing my proposal.”
“The federal government lost control of its borders. … and has no solution to deal with it,” Spitzer said.
“States, towns and villages still have to deal with the practical reality of that failure. In New York, that means 1 million [un]documented workers,” he said.
The embattled governor made the announcement after he met with the state’s heavily Democratic congressional delegation, which had grown increasingly critical of the plan.
Michelle Malkin opines, "Spitzer’s retreat is a significant victory and a symbolic victory, but a small one in the continuing struggle between Sanctuary Nation and Sovereign Nation."
The Corner'sJohn Derbyshire adds, "New York Governor Spitzer's back-down on drivers' licenses for illegal immigrants just cements illegal immigration as the Great Elite Back-Down Issue."
Hotair'sAllahpundit reports that, now that Attorney General Spitzer has dropped this plan, he is turning up the heat on efforts to enforce internet sales taxes: "So Amazon will drop its affiliate program, leaving thousands of New Yorkers who count on their commissions for beer money pissed off and wanting to know what Spitz has against small businesses."
Democrats' Theology
The Volokh Conspiracy'sEugene Volokh explains and dissects the DNC's new, official theology.
Presidential hopeful Ron Paul hasn't been doing very well with the print media, and offline, his name recognition isn't that high. But online, the libertarian candidate seems to have an almost cult-like following. But how much of that is real? Much of Ron Paul's online support may be at least partially manufactured by overenthusiastic supporters, as some researchers say that spammers have recently stepped up their efforts to gain support for their favorite candidate.
The University of Alabama-Birmingham's computer forensics research department, which collects spam messages as part of its Spam Data Mining for Law Enforcement Applications project, analyzes hundreds of thousands of e-mail messages per month. When it began getting bombarded with e-mails about Ron Paul immediately following a Republican debate on TV, the lab began to examine their origin and saw consistent patterns that it described as "disturbing."
The e-mails originated from IPs all over the world, but researchers' suspicions were aroused when they found that the e-mails purported to come from different countries than their IPs indicated. Messages claiming to come from the US were actually coming from Korea, for example, and messages claiming to come from Italy were actually coming from the US. The pattern showed that the messages were clearly not coming from Ron Paul's official campaign, but rather illegitimate spam operations and botnets.
And, as Little Green Football'sCharles Johnson reports, Mel Gibson's Holocaust-denying father has proudly endorsed Ron Paul:
Glenn Reynolds vs. Andrew Sullivan
First, Instapundit'sGlenn Reynolds notes that he is no longer a card carrying member of the Libertarian Party.
Glenn Reynolds comes out of the closet and says he's no longer a libertarian. After four years of his defending or ignoring every abuse of government power under the Bushies, this is hardly a surprise. But the caricature of many freedom-lovers offered by Stephen Green is silly. Yes, the more doctrinaire libertarians are too wedded to ideology and unable or unwilling to look at the empirical world and make adjustments. No sane freedom-lover would, in my view, believe that 9/11 changed nothing. Of course, it required sacrifices of liberty. What it did not require was the permanent suspension of habeas corpus, the transformation of the executive branch into a de facto extra-legal protectorate, the breaking of laws by the president, the authorization of torture, warrantless wiretapping, a war based on intelligence that simply wasn't there, and a ramping up of the drug war. Those are the policies that Glenn Reynolds, by silence or active support, has enabled. I'm relieved that he no longer even identifies as a libertarian. It helps clear the air.
[L]et me repeat what I said before: "But note that no longer being a member of the Libertarian Party is hardly the same thing as not being a libertarian. If it were, there would be precious few libertarians left." Anyone who can't understand the difference between libertarian ideas and the Libertarian Party probably isn't smart enough to be blogging, and certainly shouldn't have his page topped with the words "Of no party or clique."
Conservative Bloggers File FEC Complaint Against Hillary Clinton
GOP Bloggers'Matt Margolis and Mark Noonan posted their FEC complaint against the Hillary Clinton for President Committee in response to the reports of donors who felt pressure to give money for fear for retribution and a number of poor donors who donated thousands of dollars each to her campaign.
On the heels of the Norman Hsu scandal, the Clinton campaign was rocked by questions of even more Hsu-like shakedowns in connection with a $380,000 fundraiser in New York which saw contributions ranging from $1,000 to $2,500 from cooks and dishwashers. At least one donor admitted to being an illegal immigrant. Another said she was illegally reimbursed for her contributions. Others said they felt pressured to give.
Unlike the Hsu cash, Hillary's campaign has yet to return the bulk of this tainted money.
This complaint brings these charges into a formal FEC process. The Clinton campaign will have 15 days to respond and publicly defend itself from charges of illegal campaign fundraising.
The Corner'sDavid Freddoso notes that one of Hillary's pretend donor's names, "Shin K. Cheng", sounds like "Ching! Ka-ching!"
Wake Up America'sSpree adds, "I have seen comments elsewhere asking why they did not wait until after she was already officially named the Democratic presidential candidate after the primaries but as we all know, investigations take time and this is the perfect time for this."
Michelle Malkin thinks this story has legs: "Over the weekend, Fox News Channel’s Bret Baier asked me if the Chinatown story had traction. If conservatives stay on the story and liberal MSM outlets like the LA Times don’t cower before the p.c. police, the answer is yes."
Say Anything Blog'sRob questions the timing, and wishes this issue was saved for the general election campaign. Wizbang'sJay Tea disagrees with Rob.
The Campaign Spot'sJim Geraghty posts a interesting response from Allison Hayward, a former FEC staffer for Bradley Smith. Hayward argues that, "If they had as a policy the intent to obscure straw donors, they could. It would be criminal, but doable. Here, their reports are sufficient to track down the story. So I would suspect the problem with the campaign is nonfeasance, rather than an intentional effort to accept illegal contributions."
Biased MSM in Columbus, Ohio
Over at RightAngleBlog.com, I provided extensives details about The (Ohio) Columbus Dispatch's efforts to hide possibly career-ending news about Columbus Mayor Mike Coleman because of the Dispatch's publisher's extensive business ties with the Mayor.
The American Thinker'sPatrick Poole opines, "Mike Coleman is in a tight race against a determined challenger, and he has suffered from damaging stories in recent months about his wife's no-show state job (for which she is currently facing criminal charges), her drunk driving convictions, and his association with CAIR national vice-chairman Ahmad Al-Akhras, one of the most outspoken extremist Islamic leaders in the country, who Coleman has appointed to several city boards and commissions."
Billionaire Belinda Stronach insists there is nothing true about the rumors she and former President Clinton are having an affair, adding that it's all a Republican plot.
The ultra-wealthy member of Canada's parliament, who switched from the Conservative to the Liberal party, told the Montreal Gazette that the rumors upset her and she doesn't know whether to laugh or cry about the global hullabaloo over her alleged role as Cinton's latest squeeze.
Echoing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's famous allegation of a "vast right-wing conspiracy," Stronach told the Gazette she suspects the rumors have been spread by Republicans.
But it wasn't Republicans who reported last year that she was spotted all over New York with Clinton last year - it was the media.
New York Daily News columnist Ben Widdicombe told ExtraTV.com: "She's blonde, she's ambitious and she's in politics, but she's not Bill Clinton's wife. It's Belinda Stronach, his friend from Canada who's been visiting Bill in New York this week.
...
Wrote ExtraTV.com: "And Belinda is no stranger to the limelight either. She's divorced from Olympic champion speed skater Johan Olaf Lass and currently has romantic ties to another politician. Still, there have been rumors of a romance between Belinda and Bill since they met five years ago at a charity event."
Ace of Spades HQ adds, "It should also be noted Clinton has been linked to socialite Lisa Belzberg. Against this rumor: It seems to have been over for a while. In favor of this rumor: She's reportedly "busty.""
A Democrat Presidential Candidate's Sex Scandal?
Mickey Kaus reports:
Do you sense there is some large mass of dark matter, an unseen Scandal Star, the gravitational pull of which is warping the coverage of what seems, on the surface, a pretty dull presidential race? I do. So does Ron Rosenbaum. I thought the Dark Star was the Edwards affair allegation. But Rosenbaum says "everyone in the elite Mainstream media" knows about another juicy scandal that the LAT is supposedly sitting on. I guess this is proof that I’m not in the elite, because I don’t know what he’s talking about. … My vestigial Limbaugh gland tells me it must involve a Democrat, or else the Times would have found a reason to print it. … P.S.: If it’s just Richardson, that will be very disappointing.
Luke Ford opines, "I’m placing my money on the lesbian-Hillary angle."
And the story could still be true, but Patterico reports that the LA Times' editor told him that he has not heard of this story.
America's Sovereignty: Lost at Sea?
Robert Bluey reports that the Law of the Sea Treaty, which would turn over much of America's control of oceans and turn over the job of setting the rules governing the oceans to a United Nations bureaucracy, passed in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Bluey opines, "So where do we go from here? The good news is that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is standing firmly against the treaty. With four Republicans now also on the record opposing LOST — Coleman and Isakson were key votes today — there’s clearly a tide turning against this U.N. power grab."
The National Center for Public Policy Research'sDavid Ridenour adds, "Although the Committee voted to send the treaty to the full Senate for consideration, there was a marked increase in opposition to it from just three years ago. In 2004, it was approved 19-0. This morning there were four nay votes. The tide is turning against the Law of the Sea Treaty. The full Republican Senate leadership opposes it as well as presidential candidates Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, Senator Fred Thompson, Governor Mike Huckabee, Rep. Tom Tancredo, Rep. Ron Paul and Rep. Duncan Hunter."
Nickelodeon: Supporters of Communism?
Hotair'sAllahpundit reports that Nickelodeon shills for World Can't Wait, a communist front group.
This video from ABC's 20/20, with John Stossel reporting about so-called "global warming" has been posted all over the blogosphere:
Newsbusters'Brad Wilmouth gives us a summary of this excellent report: "On Friday's "20/20," ABC's John Stossel presented the views of scientists who dissent from the Al Gore view of global warming, including two former members of the IPCC – the committee which shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Gore. These scientists disagreed with the selection process of the committee's members and some of its conclusions."
Republican Rep. Bobby Jindal, a pro-life, pro-gun, anti-tax Rhodes scholar, won a landslide victory to become governor of Louisiana on Saturday. An Indian-American, he is the first person of color to be elected governor of Louisiana since Reconstruction.
"Today, we begin a new chapter in the history of Louisiana," Jindal said in his victory speech. He promised to root out "corruption" and "incompetence," and he said he'd be the kind of governor "who travels the state relentlessly" in an effort to turn things around.
"As I promised in the campaign, right after I'm sworn in, I'm going to notify the legislature that I will be calling them in for a special session to pass real ethics reform with real teeth," Jindal said.
Jindal took 54 percent of the vote in Louisiana's unique election system in which all candidates of all parties run in a single October primary. If no candidate wins 50 percent of the vote in the primary, the top two candidates face each other in a November runoff.
Jindal's 54 percent obviated the need for a runoff. His nearest competitor, Democrat Walter Boasso, won only 18 percent of the vote.
Redstate's corbusier opines, "My beloved home state has truly turned a new leaf. Having spent my formative years in the Pelican State, I am extremely pleased that the voters of Louisiana have decided to break tradition and vote for a new breed of leadership and imagination as embodied by Bobby Jindal."
Newsbusters'Ken Sheppard is not surprised that the MSM doesn't mention the Democrats' smear on Jindal's faith: "Louisiana Democratic Party cynically attempted to sour enthusiasm for Jindal among conservative Protestant voters by twisting out of context a column by Jindal about his conversion to Roman Catholicism into a slam of Protestant Christians, when in fact it was anything but disrespectful to Christians outside communion with Rome."
Professor Stephen Bainbridge offers kudos, and adds, "At only age 36, he’s now positioned to move onto the national stage in a big way."
Townhall.com'sPatrick Ruffini notes the major significance of this victory against corruption and liberalism:
A generation ago, New Orleans was the capital of the South, its strategic position at the mouth of the Mississippi delivering real wealth to the state. Ever since, Louisiana has fallen further and further behind, as places like Atlanta and Charlotte took the lead. Taxes went up. Corruption continued unabated. There was a revolving door between jail and public office.
Old orders like this always seem to die hard. Think of liberalism in 1979, the Democratic majority in Congress in 1994, unlimited welfare in 1996. They all went on for decades, and seemed indestructible.
Until one day they weren't. Inevitably, they fail so spectacularly that the people are compelled to rebel through democratic means. Yesterday was that day in Louisiana, the last enclave of welfare state liberalism and corruption in the South.
The Corner'sDavid Freddoso explains in detail that if "Katrina was part of Rove's plan, he didn't plan too well."
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey opines, "Now Jindal takes his place in an important executive position at a critical time for Louisiana. New Orleans needs leadership and action, sorely missing from local and state government since Katrina hit. The state itself still suffers from the endemic corruption left behind by the Democrats who still dominate the state bureaucracies. If he can clean up Louisiana and return New Orleans to health and safety, Jindal may get a lot more attention in eight years as a Republican candidate for the White House -- and at 44, he could electrify conservative politics in 2015. The stage is set. If Jindal performs, this could be the start of a long run."
Fox News GOP Debate: Hillary Had Quite a Presence
Hotair'sAllahpundit put together this clip which shows how focused the Republicans are about defeating Hillary Clinton:
Townhall.com'sMatt Lewis thought Senator John McCain's performance was classy and rather Churchillian.
The Campaign Spot'sJim Geraghty thought that all the candidates were good, while Fred, Rudy, and Huck were the best. Geraghty also asks Duncan Hunter, Tom Tancredo, and Ron Paul to leave and then come back when they at 10% in one of the early primary states or in a national poll.
Rep. Pete Stark's DailyKOS Moment
Little Green Football'sCharles Johnson reports that the kooks at the Crooks and Liars blog are clearly supportive of such disgusting rhetoric.
House Republicans are threatening to launch a discharge petition on legislation that would ensure the future prosperity of conservative radio talk-show hosts but is expected to face opposition from Democratic leaders. On Monday evening, Republicans filed a rule with the House Rules Committee laying the groundwork for a petition that would force action on protecting radio from government regulation later this fall.
The move comes at a time when Democrats have launched a coordinated attack on conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, accusing him of disparaging American troops critical of the Iraq war as “phony soldiers.”
Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) has said broadcasters should be required to give listeners both sides of political issues so voters can make informed decisions.
Conservatives fear that forcing stations to make equal time for liberal talk radio would cut into profits so severely that radio executives would choose to scale back on conservative programming to avoid rising costs and interference from the government.
Republicans’ concern has grown as Democrats have waged a battle against Limbaugh in recent days. On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) sent a letter to the chief executive of Clear Channel Communications, Mark Mays, calling on him to denounce Limbaugh’s remarks.
National Review'sByron York offers the full details of this "phony solders" controversy.
Hotair'sAllahpundit salutes the 10 Democrat Senators who refused to sign onto Majority Leader Harry Reid's stunt, which was letter to Clear Channel demanding that they condemn Rush Limbaugh.
Right Wing News'John Hawkins opines that the Democrats actions are worse than anything the left accuses Joe McCarthy of, and adds, "Even after Limbaugh clearly, beyond a shadow of a doubt, presented a transcript that confirmed that his comments had been deliberately taken out of context, liberal journalists and bloggers deliberately lied to the public about what Limbaugh said and Democratic politicians have publicly denounced Limbaugh for comments that they knew he never made. Now, many of Limbaugh's political enemies are calling for him to be removed from Armed Forces Radio over comments that he never made."
Newsbuster'sNoel Sheppard reports that the MSM is quietly stopping their coverage of this issue, which may be a sign that they understand that Media Matters did cherry-pick and misrepresent Limbaugh's statements.
And speaking of Media Matters, Hillary Clinton, at the DailyKOS tin foil convention, claimed that he started that smear machine. JammieWearingFool posted the video:
Riehl World View encourages the left to compete in the arena of ideas: "Let them vote - a show by you, or Limbaugh's program. It won't be the first time you were humiliated when people had a say in the matter."
House Democratic leaders still had not decided Tuesday whether they would bring up the resolution denouncing Mr. Limbaugh’s comments, which is likely to spark a partisan free-for-all on the floor.
Mr. Hoyer, despite his goose and gander view, was not so sure that House members should get into the business of unleashing a resolution of disapproval each time they encounter something of which they disapprove.
“I think, frankly, I would like to see us restrain ourselves in condemning through resolutions all of that with which we disagree,” Mr. Hoyer said. “I have a zillion resolutions that I could think of pursuing that objective.”
Clarence Thomas
Townhall.com'sMary Kathrine Ham has a fascinating summary of Supreme Court Justice Clarance Thomas' discussion of his new autobiography, “My Grandfather’s Son.”
Having established an honesty and self-deprecation in the first 200 pages, his defense of the Anita Hill allegations come through as very credible. Although he claims to have released the anger over this betrayal and the obvious hostility and duplicity of the Senate Judiciary Committee, especially Joe Biden and another Senator "against whom allegations of sexual impropriety had been made" -- a rather clear reference to Ted Kennedy -- he clearly relishes giving his side of the story. He does not mince words, either, using the same blunt approach that he uses for his own introspection earlier in the memoir.
As I said, the honesty of the book is its most compelling quality. I think Captains Quarters readers will find it enlightening, and find Clarence Thomas the man something very different than Clarence Thomas the media-narrative persona.
WASHINGTON – Some of the top leaders in Christian pro-family activism – including James Dobson of Focus on the Family – met in Salt Lake City yesterday to plot a strategy should Rudy Giuliani or another supporter of legalized abortion be nominated by the Republican Party as its presidential candidate.
Not only was there a consensus among activists to withhold support for the Republican nominee, there was even discussion about supporting the entry of a new candidate to challenge the frontrunners.[...]
Dobson reportedly drove from his headquarters Colorado Springs to the private meeting, held between sessions of the Council for National Policy in Salt Lake City this weekend, just to weigh in with other leaders of family groups, including the Family Research Council, Bott Broadcasting, Capitol Resource Institute, Salem Communications, Eagle Forum and Concerned Women for America.
"The signal is out there that you nominate him and we walk," Paul Weyrich said in a separate interview Sunday. The founder of the Free Congress Foundation and one of the first members of the CNP, Weyrich didn't attend the meeting but said he wasn't surprised by the decision.
"There is a great deal of anxiety that some in the Christian community have put security and the fight against Islamo-fascism ahead of the pro-life movement."
Hotair'sAllahpundit opines, "In fact, if I were Dobson, I’d almost hope Giuliani wins the nomination just so I can play my trump. That sort of power play will inevitably and irretrievably alienate a few centrist conservatives like me but the GOP can afford to shed us. They can’t afford to shed Christians."
Paxalles agrees with Allahpundit and adds: "Needless to say, Democrats will be licking their chops at the prospect and egging on any division in the GOP."
Power Line'sJohn Hinderaker knows why Salon was breathlessly reporting this story and thinks it is being blown way out of proportion: "Contrary to the assumption of many liberals, religious conservatives (a group in which I include myself) are not stupid. As President, Rudy Giuliani would nominate judges who will support rather than usurp the Constitution. That's the only significant role the President plays with respect to social issues. James Dobson et al. wish that they controlled the Republican Party, and Salon wishes they controlled it, too. But they don't."
Right Wing News'John Hawkins thinks Rudy can not motivate the same Republican base which is already disgruntled because the party and it's candidates haven't been true to conservative principles: "In the end, if Rudy were to capture the nomination, he would not be able to hold and turn out a high enough percentage of Republican voters to win the election -- especially after he began running back towards the middle for the general election."
Townhall.com'sMatt Lewis has a fascinating scoop from a veteran social conservative strategist who told Matt: "This is a huge step ... of ending the Rudy myth that he is more electable in the general. He is less electable because he guarantees a Ralph Nader 2000 like election result."
That painfully irritating laugh reminds RedState'sCalifornia Yankee of Howard Dean's yowl.
Phony Soldiers, Phony Scandal
Rush Limbaugh responds to the latest Media Matters' smear against him:
National Review'sPeter Wehner of the Ethics and Public Policy Center opines, "This effort to manufacture outrage does not sustain even minimal scrutiny — which doesn’t mean this story won’t be picked up by some news outlets. But in the end, the truth will out. The Left in America clearly wants to take Limbaugh out, and for obvious reasons: he is a deeply influential conservative voice and during the last 20 years he has changed American politics and the American media in profound ways. The Left hates him — but they have found no way to stop him. Like the Mississippi, he just keeps rolling along. And one gets the feeling that (as Churchill said in another context) he will continue to roll on full flood, to broad lands and bright days."
Michelle Malkin reports that the Democrats in the US House are working to pass a resolution today to condemn Rush Limbaugh. Instapundit'sGlenn Reynolds knows exactly what's going on here: "the intent is to limit the ability of people like Limbaugh or O’Reilly to drive stories in the mainstream news as we get closer to the election. Expect more of this, with more targets.”"
Radio Equalizer's Brian Maloney notes that 2 DAYS BEFORE this phony scandal broke, ABC News had this "Phony Soldiers" news report (What does that say about the viewership, or lack thereof, of ABC News compared to the EIB Network?):
Newsbusters'Noel Sheppard sarcastically wonders if Media Matters will also go after ABC News. Noel shouldn't hold his breath.
Hamming it Up And Mocking PETA
Townhall.com's Mary Katherine Ham is the star of a hilarious spoof on a recent ad from PETA. Click here to watch it.
When Ahmadinejad was ushered to the podium of the General Assembly to speak, the U.S. delegation walked out, leaving only a low-ranking note-taker to listen to his speech, which indirectly accused the United States and Israel of major human rights violations. The Iranian president spoke hours after French President Nicolas Sarkozy warned the assembly that allowing Iran to arm itself with nuclear weapons would be an “unacceptable risk to stability in the region and in the world.” Earlier, German Chancellor Angela Merkel threatened tougher sanctions against Iran if the country remained intractable on the dispute over its nuclear program. Iran insists the program is purely peaceful, aimed solely at using nuclear reactors to generate electricity. But the United States and key European nations believe the program is a cover for an Iranian attempt to produce nuclear weapons.
Michelle Malkin is doing her best to show how Ahmadinejad is lying about his commitment to "human rights." Here is her interview from this week with Iranian activist Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi:
Riehl World View believes that war with Iran is inevitable: "Everyone has and continues to go through the motions - Columbia, the UN and its various members. And so we'll go on until one day most likely in late Spring when Matt Drudge gets to haul out his flashing light and announce that someone, America, Israel, a coalition? has begun bombing Iran."
Hotair'sAllahpundit is outraged that members of the MSM dined with this "tiny terrorist" on his last night in town. Guests at the Intercontinental Hoel included Brian Williams, Christiane Amanpour, and many others.
Hofstra Law School, Hempstead, NY: Hofstra Law School is pleased to announce its upcoming 2007 Legal Ethics Conference, Lawyering at the Edge: Unpopular Clients, Difficult Cases, Zealous Advocates, scheduled for October 14 to 16, 2007 in the Sidney R. Siben and Walter Siben Moot Courtroom (room 308) of Hofstra Law School. Conference Director Roy D. Simon has lined up more than 20 dynamic speakers who will weigh in on controversial issues such as prosecutorial abuse, the challenges of representing prisoners at Guantanamo, and attacks on lawyers who represent unpopular clients and causes.
As usual, Hofstra Law School's Legal Ethics Conference will feature many additional prominent experts in the field of ethics, as well as preeminent criminal defense and civil rights practitioners, including Hofstra Law's own Professor Monroe Freedman; Hofstra Law Professor Leon Friedman; Professor Stephen Gillers from New York University School of Law; Adam Liptak, the national legal correspondent for The New York Times; Professor Abbe Smith from Georgetown University Law Center; Lynne Stewart, who has defended many unpopular clients over the years; and Ronald Kuby, the well known defense attorney and co-host of the WABC morning show, Curtis & Kuby, and guest-anchor on Court TV, who will deliver the last address of the conference on Tuesday afternoon.
As Federal Review'sHank reminds us, Lynne Stewert is a disbarred lawyer convicted of aiding terrorist, including conspiring with terrorist Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman and passing on his messages to his followers. Because of the convictions, Stewart was disbarred from practicing law.
Stop the ACLU'sJay opines, "This woman is a traitor. She shouldn’t be given the time of day, much less a teaching job….of ETHICS for goodness sakes!"
Ace of Spades HQ adds, "Stewart was not “Lawyering at the Edge” or simply representing an unsavory client, she was an active and willing participant in a scheme to assist a convicted terrorist further his murderous plots. The idea that she is someone a respectable law school would want anywhere near its campus is unimaginable. One can only deduce Hofstra Law School is not a respectable institution."
Opinion Journal'sJames Taranto is not impressed: "Stewart's own Web site makes clear that she is totally unrepentant. So Hoftstra's law school regards a disbarred criminal as an expert on legal ethics and someone who has been convicted of giving material support to mass murder as a champion of human rights. If we ever have to hire a lawyer, we think we'll steer clear of Hofstra grads."
Disgraced fund-raiser Norman Hsu did a lot more than just pump $850,000 into Hillary Clinton's campaign bank account: He also raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for local, state, and federal candidates who have endorsed Clinton or whose support she courted. . . .
In at least some cases, Clinton or her aides directly channeled contributions from Hsu and his network to other politicians supportive of her presidential campaign, according to interviews and campaign finance records. There is nothing illegal about one politician steering wealthy contributors to another, but the New York senator's close ties to Hsu have become an embarrassment for her and her campaign.
Instapundit'sGlenn Reynolds opines, "Obviously there was a closer connection than mere check-writing. It sounds like he was an integral part of the campaign."
Captain's Quarters' Ed Morrissey adds, "This revelation shows that Hillary and her campaign didn't just passively receive funds from Hsu. The campaign actively worked with Hsu to distribute the funds to other campaigns, and in return, Hillary bought endorsements with the stolen money. And since the Boston Globe did the reporting, this can't be chalked up to some conservative hit piece, either."
PayGO Nonsense
Green Eyeshade's Congressman John Campbell explains why the Democrat's PayGO rule is a total gimmick.
Here is the University of Florida journalism student, Andrew Meyer, who was resisting arrest during a speech by Senator John Kerry (D-MA). Kerry claims that he had no idea about the serverity of the matter:
(CNN) -- Two University of Florida police officers were placed on leave with pay after using an electronic stun gun to subdue a student who was questioning Sen. John Kerry at a campus forum, the school's president said Tuesday.
Student Andrew Meyer is surrounded by university police in Gainesville, Florida, on Monday.
But the student's behavior and past activities are prompting questions about whether the incident was part of a stunt.
The Florida Division of Law Enforcement will investigate Monday's arrest of Andrew Meyer, said University of Florida President J. Bernard Machen. Machen called the incident "regretful for us."
Liberty Pundit opines, "Did you get that? It was the guy running the event (or so I assume) who told the cops to “get him out of here”. Typical liberal censorship, eh? Yet at conservative events, there’s hardly ever any security, at least not enough to prevent libtards from charging the stage with cream pies and condiments. And Lord help someone at those events who dares to shush a raving lunatic from the left."
Townhall.com'sDean Barnett adds, "Why are our enlightened bastions of learning such dead zones for courteous and edifying dialogue? Kids like the one in the video not only don’t respect others’ opinions, but also don’t recognize the right of others to even express their opinions. They’re learning from their professors. The professoriate has long admired group-think and shouting down opposing views. This generation of students is generally unimpressed by their professors and their 1960’s nostalgia. But some outliers are learning their teachers’ lessons only too well."
Rep. Jack Murtha Cuts and Runs when Asked About Haditha
Michelle Malkin, who has been following this story closely, opines, "You can just hear Rep. John Murtha’s relief as the elevator doors close. Note, also, how Murtha quickly pulls the chickenhawk card to avoid answering the question."
Second Circuit to Yale: No Military recruiters? Then, No Federal funding.
As reported by the TaxProf's Professor Paul L. Caron of the Univ. of Cincinnati College of Law: "The Second Circuit on Monday reversed the district court and held that Yale Law School could be denied federal funding under the Solomon Amendment (10 U.S.C. § 983(b)) for barring military recruiters from its campus. Burt v. Gates, No. 05- 1732 (2d Cir. 9/17/07). The Second Circuit cited Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, Inc., 547 U.S. 47 (2006), in concluding that the government's policy of withholding money to schools that bar military recruiters does not violate the First Amendment."
Powerline Blog'sScott Johnson adds, "While decent military officers like Brian Whitaker suffer the rudeness of their purported betters at Yale Law School and elsewhere in silence, the armed services of the United States are actively defending these schools from mortal peril. The rank ingratitude of those who should know better is a disgrace; it deserves to be widely recognized as such."
(CNSNews.com) - Today, Cybercast News Service, the online news division of the Media Research Center, is pleased to announce the hiring of Terence P. Jeffrey as its new editor-in-chief.
Jeffrey joins CNSNews.com after serving as editor of Human Events, the national conservative newsweekly, for more than a decade.
"I've known Terry for many years. He's a man of keen insight and extraordinary vision, and we're delighted to have him join us," said L. Brent Bozell III, president and founder of Cybercast News Service and its parent organization, the Media Research Center.
"CNSNews.com had a record-setting year in 2006 with more than 40 million readers. Terry is the type of 'franchise player' whose experience, talent and drive can help turn the Cybercast News Service from a winning team into a dynasty."
"I am honored to join CNSNews.com," said Jeffrey. "Its ability to debunk liberal bias by delivering legitimate news is unsurpassed. I look forward to seizing new opportunities to perpetuate the mission of Cybercast News Service and the Media Research Center."
Jeffrey was born in San Francisco, Calif., and raised in the San Francisco Bay area. Both his parents were physicians, and he is the seventh of their 11 children.
He graduated from Princeton University with a degree in English literature in 1981 and subsequently studied in the Arabic Language Institute at American University in Cairo. Jeffrey also studied in the Master of Arts in Arab Studies program at Georgetown University, but did not earn a degree there.
While enrolled at Georgetown, he took a summer internship on the editorial page of the Washington Times. He was soon hired as a full-time editorial writer by then-Editorial Page Editor Tony Snow. The Times eventually nominated Jeffrey for a Pulitzer Prize in editorial writing for his investigative editorials on then-House Speaker Jim Wright.
After serving in senior positions in Pat Buchanan's 1992 and 1996 presidential campaigns, he became editor of Human Events in September 1996, serving in that role for more than a decade.
Jeffrey writes a weekly column for the Creators syndicate and is currently a regular weekly guest on CNN's The Situation Room.
He and his wife, Julie, live with their five children in the Virginia suburbs outside Washington, D.C.
Robert Bluey, who used to work for Jeffrey, knows he is the right man for the job: "Terry replaces David Thibault, who passed away in July after a battle with cancer. It would be difficult for anyone to replace David, but Terry brings to Cybercast News Service the background in journalism and enthusiasm for investigative reporting that’s desperately needed on the right."
Division of Labour's Professor Lawrence H. White provides this transcript of the Daily Show's interview with former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, who is busy promoting his new book. (And the video, for the time being, is available here under "latest videos.")
Jon Stewart: Many people are free-market capitalists, and they always talk about free-market capitalism, and that is our economic theory. So why do we have a Fed? Is the free market – wouldn’t the market take care of interest rates and all that? Why do we have someone adjusting the rates if we are a free-market society?
Alan Greenspan: You’re raising a very fundamental question. … You didn’t need central bank when we were on the gold standard, which was back in the nineteenth century. And all of the automatic things occurred because people would buy and sell gold, and the market would do what the Fed does now. But: most everybody in the world by the 1930s decided that the gold standard was strangling the economy. And universally this gold standard was abandoned. But: you need somebody to determine –or some mechanism – how much money is out there, because remember, the amount of money relates to the amount of inflation in the economy. … In any event the more money you have, relative to the amount of goods, the more inflation you have, and that’s not good. So:
Stewart: So we’re not a free market then.
Greenspan: No. No.
Stewart: There’s a visible – there’s a benevolent hand that touches us.
Greenspan: Absolutely. You’re quite correct. To the extent that there is a central bank governing the amount of money in the system, that is not a free market. Most people call it regulation.
In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation. There is no safe store of value. If there were, the government would have to make its holding illegal, as was done in the case of gold. If everyone decided, for example, to convert all his bank deposits to silver or copper or any other good, and thereafter declined to accept checks as payment for goods, bank deposits would lose their purchasing power and government-created bank credit would be worthless as a claim on goods. The financial policy of the welfare state requires that there be no way for the owners of wealth to protect themselves.
This is the shabby secret of the welfare statists' tirades against gold. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists' antagonism toward the gold standard.
Their will never be a serious effort to return America to the gold standard, but it's disappointing to see Greenspan avoid making such arguments, which would lead to some fascinating academic discussions. Instead, he tip-toes around such issues, but still gave the liberal MSM an opening to distort his views on the Iraq War.
You might wonder whether the President of the United States pays any attention to blogs supporting the war effort. Is he aware of the contribution that milblogs and new media more generally are making to the effort to educate the American public on the war and convince them of the necessity of victory?
You can stop wondering. I am here today to happily report that he is indeed aware, and does indeed appreciate the work bloggers are doing.
This morning, I had the privledge of being among a small group of eight bloggers invited to the White House for a personal meeting with the President. We spent a full hour in the Roosevelt Room with President Bush and a few senior staff, including both outgoing press secretary Tony Snow and incoming press secretary Dana Perino. In addition to the folks in the room, we had two embedded bloggers videoconferenced in from Baghdad. After the discussion, the President showed us into the Oval Office, did some quick photos which each of us, and then led us out to the patio where he continued out to Marine One and we watched him take off while the assembled press watched us, clearly wondering "who the heck are those people?".
Blackfive'sMatt Burden was also there, and notes that in addition to the President, LTG Doug Lute, Tony Snow, Dana Perino, Stephen Hadley, and others were in the room. Matt opines, "The President was very intelligent, razor sharp, warm, focused, emotional (especially about his dad), and genuine. Even more so than this cynical Chicago Boy expected. I was overwhelmed by the sincerity - it wasn't staged."
Argghhh!'sThe Armorer was also there, and quotes President Bush as saying, "I looked at my schedule today, and I found it interesting that I would be sitting down with bloggers."
Also, Long War Journal'sBill Roggio and INDC Journal'sBill Ardolino were the two milbloggers who linked into the conference directly from Iraq. Click here and here to read the reports they filed about the conference with the President. Reportedly, the president kidded both of them for not wearing ties.
National Review's The Tank'sSteve Schippert was deeply honored to be at the meeting: "It is hard to write without tearing, so forgive the brevity. It is surreal to me that an Illinois farm kid finds himself - with absolutely no traditional pedigree beyond sweat, focus and self-study - seated in the Roosevelt Room with the President of the United States discussing the direction, progress and challenges as we see them in a conflict that history will reflect defines this generation."
And the Mudville Gazette'sMrs. Greyhawk was also there, and details her visit to the bathroom. Yikes!
Gathering of Eagles III
This weekend with the third Gathering of Eagles, where thousands of patriotic Americans gathered in Washington, D.C. to support our troops and America. CSpan covered the event here. The speakers in the video are National Director of Operations for GOE Chris Hill and Executive Director Lt. Pete Hesgeth.
Michelle Malkin interviewed N.Z. Bear right before the Gathering of Eagles:
At the anti-war rally, The Age of Hooper spotted Ron Paul supporters and Ramsey Clark there.
Bush's Safe Pick for AG
Townhall.com'sMatt Lewis, an expert of political message shaping, thinks the safe pick of retired federal judge Michael Mukasey, instead of former solicitor general Theodore Olson, for Attorney General is a mistake. "So if Olson is clearly a respectable nominee, why not use this as an opportunity to pick a fight with the liberals who are blocking him for political purposes? I can't help but think that presidents like Clinton and Reagan would see this sort of thing as an opportunity to score political points -- not as a crisis."
RedState'sErick Erickson agrees with Matt: The pick of Michael Mukasey "is craptacular in it's excitement in the base-building generation abilities."
The Corner'sMark Levin opines, "There was a candidate who was both a top legal mind and well-established conservative with years of experience at the Justice Department, and his name is Ted Olson. He was passed over for apparently practical and political reasons, including the fact that Schumer and Aron would oppose him (not to mention Reid). So, I am not prepared to delude myself into believing that Mukasey was the best choice. He may be acceptable, but that's different."
Three front-runners have emerged in the nearly two weeks since Sen. John Warner (R-Va.) announced his retirement, but there is no shortage of potential candidates quietly weighing their options on the state’s first open seat in 20 years.
Former Gov. Mark Warner (D) will announce his 2008 Senate plans on Thursday, according to a spokeswoman, while Rep. Tom Davis (R) and former Gov. Jim Gilmore (R) are expected to make their intentions official in the coming months.[...]
Another name making the rounds is former GOP presidential candidate Pat Buchanan, who last week had a newspaper column urging him to run posted to his website. Calls to Buchanan were not returned by press time.
Republican Senate opines, "Unlike the other two likely candidates, Rep. Tom Davis and former Gov. Jim Gilmore, Buchanan is both an outspoken conservative and an aggressive campaigner. His candidacy would be a welcome addition to the Republican field." "His charisma and energy could make him a force to be reckoned with in what will likely be a competitive Senate primary."
Soft Hsu Out on Bail, Again?
Despite running out on his sentencing and subsequently captured by authorities, Norman Hsu, a major donor and bundler for Hillary Clinton, is out on bail, again!:
A judge ordered a cash bond of $5 million for Norman Hsu, the shadowy Democratic fund-raiser, after Colorado authorities told the court here that Mr. Hsu might have been involved in another multimillion-dollar fraud investigation involving dozens of investors in Orange County, Calif.
The revelation that Mr. Hsu, a fugitive for 15 years in a California fraud case, might be implicated in another fraud investigation came after New York investors learned this week that $40 million they had invested with Mr. Hsu might be in jeopardy.
Mr. Hsu’s lawyer, Eric Elliff, said Mr. Hsu was willing to waive extradition and would probably be taken to California after a hearing here on Sept. 19.
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey adds, "Judge Bruce R. Raaum told Hsu's attorney that 'Two million wasn't enough to keep him from absconding.' Given the amount of money to which he had access -- including $40 million from Woodstock founder Joel Rosenman -- $5 million won't give him that much difficulty either. The prosecutor noted that police found a checkbook on Hsu that listed a $6 million balance."
Don Singleton notes that Hsu, before being captured, wrote and FedEx-ed a suicide note, where he apologized to the candidate he donated to, and blames Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) for the entire situation. Singleton snarks, "He tried taking pills. He should have shot himself like Vincent Foster supposedly did."
Flip Pidot asks, "Here’s what I don’t get - if Hsu was indeed suicidal over the 'wave of press in recent weeks that raised questions about his political fund-raising and business activities,' and he FedExed the suicide note before getting on the train with a fistful of pills, why the coordinated attempts at suicide and unlawful flight? Was one backup, in case the other didn’t work?"
John Kerry's Ex-Squeeze Runs for Congress, Worried about Wizbang
Michelle Malkin posts details of this weekend's third Gathering of Eagles. If you will be in the Washington, D.C. area, why not stop by and support our troops?
…as General David Petraeus provides his Iraq assessment to Congress–the antiwar group MoveOn.org is running a full-page advertisement in the New York Times under the headline: “General Petraeus or General Betray us? Cooking the books for the White House.”
Let’s be clear: MoveOn.org is suggesting that General Petraeus has ‘betrayed’ his country. This is disgusting. To attack as a traitor an American general commanding forces in war because his ‘on the ground’ experience does not align with MoveOn.org’s political objectives is utterly shameful. It shows contempt for America’s military leadership, as well as for the troops who have confidence in him, as our fellow soldiers in Iraq certainly do.
General Petraeus has served this country for over 35 years with honor, distinction, and integrity. And this is not just about General Petraeus. After all, if General Petraeus is “cooking the books,” then the entire military chain of command in Baghdad, and all the staff, military and civilian, who have been working with General Petraeus are complicit, since Petraeus did not write his report in isolation. They are all, apparently, ‘betray[ing] us.’
MoveOn.org has been working closely with the Democratic congressional leadership –as an article in today’s Sunday New York Times Magazine makes clear. And consider this comment by a Democratic senator from Friday’s Politico: “‘No one wants to call [Petraeus] a liar on national TV,’ noted one Democratic senator, who spoke on the condition on anonymity. ‘The expectation is that the outside groups will do this for us.’
So, veterans who served in Iraq ask the Democratic leaders in Congress: Does MoveOn.org speak for you? Do you agree with MoveOn.org? Or do you repudiate this despicable charge?
Gateway Pundit reminds us that it was General Petraeus that was confirmed in the US Senate, 81-0. Wizbang'sLorie Byrd notes the same, and adds, "So, MoveOn.org, in effect, calls a highly respected general who was confirmed 81-0 by the U.S. Senate a traitor, but we can't question their patriotism?"
National Review'sByron York wonders if Democrats will also surrender to MoveOn.org, too.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Connecticut independent who caucuses with Democrats, denounced a MoveOn.org ad in Monday's New York Times questioning the credibility of Army Gen. David Petraeus, calling on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to distance themselves from the attack as well.
“The personal attack on Gen. David Petraeus launched today by MoveOn.org is an outrageous and despicable act of slander that every member of the Congress -- Democrat and Republican -- has a solemn responsibility to condemn," Lieberman said in the statement.
“As a member of the Senate Democratic caucus, I therefore call on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to denounce Moveon.org in no uncertain terms for its vile attack on Gen. Petraeus," Lieberman said. "General Petraeus deserves no less."
Cadillac Tight reports that Andrew Sullivan is working hard to discredit David Petraeus.
Townhall.com'sHugh Hewitt opines, "The Democratic Party, through its conspiracy with Moveon.Org to slander the man leading 160,000 American troops in harm’s way, has shown its true colors. Characteristically idiotic, they’ve chosen to do so at a time when the country is watching."
Weapons of Mass Discussion'sMatt Hurley adds, "This ad is horrible and an outrage. There is room for dissent in this country, but these liberals have gone off the deepend and slandered a real American patriot. I am disgusted by this ad beyond words...Democrats ought to denounce the ad and MoveOn.org, but most won't...because this is who they really are."
Don Surber remembers Sen. Joe Biden who is quoted on January 18, 2007 saying, "Mr. President, please change course. Listen to your generals. Listen to former generals. Listen to the Iraq Study Group.”
Riehl World View adds that the term "General Betray Us" started on Daily KOS, back in June.
Lear Jet Liberals
Ace of Spades' HQ posts this hilarious video of Al Gore from Sean Hannity's America.
42% of Democrats Think Bush caused 9/11 or Let it Happen
Truthers at 911truth.org are excited to report that a new Zogby International poll shows that almost a majority of Democrats think President Bush caused 9/11 or allowed it to happen.
Hotair'sAllahpundit provides the cross-tabs from Zogby, and analayizes them: "The left has been downright giddy about its stranglehold on the youth vote, but note well the caliber of voter they’re attracting there. Note the result for Hispanics, too. I suspect there’s a fair amount of disgruntlement over unrelated issues, i.e. immigration, bleeding over into perceptions of 9/11 here, maybe not unlike many on the right extrapolating from the Clintons’ general loathsomeness that they must have had Vince Foster whacked. As for the data on Asians, though, I’m at a loss as to how to explain it. Is that immigration backlash too? Are they including south Asians, like Pakistanis, in the group? Hmm."
Protein Wisdom'sJeff G. wants a question about this poll asked to Democrat presidential candidates during their next debate.
Flopping Aces'Curt adds, "The one thing we can take away from this poll is that 42% of the Democrats are so gullible, so filled with hate, they will believe anything that portrays Bush in a bad light."
My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy'sBeth opines, "All that says to me is that the democrats are being taken over by the far left progressives who have more than a few screws loose."
Ron Paul Supporters Harass Matt Margolis & His Web Host
Let's make this clear. Yes, Ron Paul was deliberately excluded from the [GOPBloggers.org] poll for reasons stated more than once in the past. However, his exclusion has nothing to do with him, his candidacy, or his positions. Ron Paul's exclusion has everything to do with the actions of his supporters, and in one instance, a member of his campaign. I've received emails from Paul's supporters which are not only insulting, but harassing. Some have gone so far as to contact my web host by phone ... at his house. This is unacceptable and ridiculously inappropriate conduct.
Interview with Bill Ardolino
Blackfive'sUncle Jimbo conducting a fascinating interview with Bill Ardolino of INDC Journal who is currently in Fallujah, embedded with a Marine unit:
Ardolino also dissects Senator Chuck Schumer's (D-NY) lies about the troop surge in Iraq.
Are you still fans of Matt Hasselbeck and Mack Strong after they visited President Bush last week in Bellevue? Or have their political leanings turned you against them?
The Seahawks quarterback and fullback gave the 43rd president a No. 43 jersey with his name on it at a $1,000-a-plate fundraiser for Rep. Dave Reichert at the Hyatt.
At the time, Hasselbeck called it a thrill and said it was a win-win, this opportunity to meet the president and get out of a team meeting.
But as soon as he saw the picture of the two players with Bush, Gary Wright, the team’s vice president of administration, said he was concerned about negative reaction.
Maybe in really red Republican states, it would not have been a big deal. But Washington is a blue state, and deep, deep Democratic blue in King County. So objections were raised, and Hasselbeck heard them and read them. He got nasty voice mails, e-mails and text messages.
“I had no idea,” Hasselbeck said.
One guy told him: “I hate you, I’ll never wear your jersey, I’ll never like the Seahawks again.”
“Huh?” Hasselbeck thought. “Seriously?”
“Politics can be very mean and dirty,” he said. “The things politicians say about each other, and what activists say, I had a brief glimpse of that for a couple of days.
“If I ever had any questions about whether I wanted to run for office, I now know the answer — I don’t.”
Q and O'sBruce McQuain asks, "Where have the freaking adults in this country gone?"
Michelle Malkin notes how angry the Bush-haters are in the comments section of that Seattle PI article.
Rush Limbaugh opines, "So I wonder, for you little mental midgets, you Seahawks fans, I knew there was a reason your team lost to the Steelers in the Super Bowl a couple years ago. This is outrageous. You may be have created a head case out of your quarterback. He's going to be worried if violence is going to happen to him because he's a Bush supporter when he goes out and takes the field and tries to lead the team to victory. You leftists are just literally brain dead. You are insane. You are poison. A Bush derangement virus is eating your brains alive before our very eyes. To get all worked up over the fact the QB goes to a dinner, a fundraiser for a local congressman. So it's a good question. What do they do with flyovers? I wonder if they even have 'em. They're probably not allowed. Boeing has buildings out there where they make war planes. How does Seattle deal with this?"
MSA Harassment at the University of Texas at San Antonio
Little Green Football'sCharles Johnson provides this disturbing video from the Muslim Student Association at the University of Texas at San Antonio:
Hillary Fundraiser Norman Hsu is Caught by Authorities
Fugitive political fundraiser Norman Hsu, who skipped out on San Mateo County authorities this week rather than face sentencing in a fraud scheme, was apprehended tonight by federal and local lawmen in Grand Junction, Colo.
Authorities said Hsu was taken into custody at St. Mary's Hospital in Grand Junction at 7 p.m. local time. He had been on the lam for almost two days after failing to appear in a Redwood City courtroom Wednesday to surrender his passport.
Hsu's attorney told state prosecutors that he had been on a charter flight that arrived at Oakland International Airport at about 5:30 a.m. Wednesday and then dropped out of sight, said Gareth Lacy, a spokesman for the state Attorney General's office.
Blogs of War opines, "I’m not a conspiracy theorist but you have to wonder about this guy’s sudden illness given the number of powerful people who’d like to see him vanish. Then again he was probably eating Amtrak food. I guess we’re lucky to have him alive."
Newsbusters'William Todd Huston does the research, and finds that the Larry Craig sex scandal has been mentioned much more by the MSM than news of the Democrats' criminal fundraiser.
Why did the United Steelworkers Endorse John Edwards? And is Ohio Governor Ted Strickland a Racist?
According to radio talkshow host Jim Quinn, John Edwards has enjoyed more support from unions because Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) refused to promise to not have Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) as her running mate. Quinn goes on to argue that Democrat Ohio Governor Ted Strickland is trying to be Hillary's runninmate, and Strickland told the Hillary camp that [Obama] is “a face that Democrat Union voters wouldn’t want at their dinner table.” (Here is the relevant audio clip from 9/4/07.)
Nixguy.com'sDave Stacy opines, "On the face of it (har!) it certainly sounds racist and considering what happens to Republicans, I think an explanation is in order."
John Edwards' official campaign blog points out a poll that Rasmussen poll that a majority of Democrats would rather support a white, male candidate.
Larry Craig to Senate Colleagues: “I Can’t Quit You”
The top-tapping Senator with a wide stance may not leave the US Senate.
In a stunning turn of events, Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho) is reconsidering his decision to resign after the revelation of his June arrest in an airport sex sting, his spokesman said late Tuesday night.
While Craig’s aides still are preparing as if he will leave office at month’s end, the senator is examining a challenge to his guilty plea in Minnesota court that could alter his plans to step down, Craig spokesman Sidney Smith told the Associated Press. Craig has hired a top-flight legal team to handle his Minnesota legal case as well as a looming Senate ethics investigation.
Should Craig choose to remain in the Senate, his continued presence would be a major distraction to Republican leaders, who sought a quick resignation announcement in response to the avalanche of coverage that Craig’s arrest received. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said as recently as Tuesday afternoon that he believed Craig’s decision to step down was final, although Sen. Arlen Specter’s (R-Pa.) support for the Idahoan is believed to be a leading factor behind the reconsidered resignation.
Red State'sMark Kilmer thinks he may be able to win this, as long as he truly is innocent: "If Larry Craig is innocent -- and although the "wide stance" jokes have been a gas – this will be a battle he can win and a black eye for jaundiced and intellectually mediocre media and a sock to the jaw of Chuckie Schumer and the American lefties."
Professor John Lott reminds us that this case is about foot tapping and possibly having one's shoe briefly touch another person's shoe. Lott doesn't believe either act, if they actually happened, should be a criminal offense.
Senator Craig also left this audio message for his lawyer, Billy Martin (He was also Michael Vick’s lawyer):
“Yes, Billy, this is Larry Craig calling. You can reach me on my cell. Arlen Specter is now willing to come out in my defense, arguing that it appears by all that he knows that I have been railroaded and all that.
“Having all of that, we have reshaped my statement a little bit to say it is my intent to resign on Sept. 30. I think it is important for you to make as bold a statement as you are comfortable with this afternoon, and I would hope you could make it in front of the cameras.
“I think it would help drive the story that I’m willing to fight, that I’ve got quality people out there fighting in my defense, and that this thing could take a new turn or a new shape, it has that potential. Anyway, give me a buzz or give Mike a buzz on that. We’re headed to my press conference now.
“Thank you. Bye.”
Dan Riehl thinks someone in the GOP got Martin or one of his staffers to torpedo Craig’s credibility by putting this out there.
But Hotair's resident deity, Allahpundit disagrees with Riehl: "I think he put it out there because he thinks it helps Craig by showing that he didn’t really flip flop on the resignation, that he meant all along to specify that he only intended to resign and might change his mind." But Allah adds that if this is true, it would have made more sense for Craig to say all of this at the press conference.
Michelle Malkin adds, "Now, just pause and reflect: It is Arlen Specter egging Larry Craig on to help sabotage what’s left of the Republican Party’s credibility. Arlen Specter. You know, the liberal Republican horse the Bush White House backed instead of conservative stalwart Pat Toomey."
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey reminds us that Craig pled guilty, and Ed is tired of the Senator's nonsense: "Now he wants to rescind the resignation, maybe, depending on how the Ethics Committee views the case and whether he can withdraw his guilty plea. Why didn't Craig consider those possibilities before announcing his resignation? Does this man think through the consequences of his actions at all, or does he just pinball from event to event in everything he does? If he wanted to fight the charges and remain in the Senate, then he should have just announced that instead of his performance last Saturday with his family. If he decides to actually resign, will we see a repeat of that performance, too?"
Scrappleface'sScott Ott hilariously mocks Senator Craig:
A spokesman, who insisted that Mr. Craig is not gay and was not trying to solicit a police officer in a men’s room stall, said that the Idaho lawmaker had initially announced his resignation from the Senate in hopes of avoiding publicity, and “to make the whole thing go away,” after he discovered that pleading guilty to a crime failed to make it go away.
“Essentially, Sen. Craig is still experimenting with ways to make previous mistakes vanish,” the unnamed source said. “If backing out of his resignation and revoking his guilty plea doesn’t work, he may apply for a refund on the airline ticket that took him to Minneapolis in the first place.”
Townhall.com'sDean Barnett can't wait to see the Senator leave: "The fact that Craig, facing the kind of embarrassment that would shame most men into private life in about three seconds, is now scheming to hold on to his office is most informative about his true nature. Obviously he doesn’t confine his immoral narcissism to smelly men’s rooms."
A Victory for the Kos Kids and the Entire Blogosphere
In two determinations handed down yesterday, the US Federal Election Commission (FEC) found that political blogs and bloggers are media for the purposes of US Electoral Law.
The first case was a complaint against the well known left wing blog The Daily Kos. Conservative blogger John C.A. Bambenek claimed that the site should comply with campaign finance laws because it charges a fee to place advertising on its website and it provides “a gift of free advertising and candidate media services” by posting blog entries that support candidates. The FEC determined that the website falls “squarely” within the media exemption and is therefore not subject to federal regulation under the Act; ipso facto: under US law blogs are formally recognized as media organizations.[...]
Essentially it reaffirmed the right of American bloggers to exercise their free speech rights without being subject to US electoral law, in the same way that media organizations are able to.
Little Green Football'sCharles Johnson applauds Kos' efforts to fight back: "It may surprise Markos “Screw Them” Moulitsas, but I congratulate him on this victory—because I did not support the original complaint, and I see this as a victory for all bloggers."
In the Hell Hath No Fury sweepstakes, groups like MoveOn.org are gearing up to take on a new set of perceived traitors in their midst--Democrats who have acknowledged some success from the troop surge in Iraq.
Chief among the targets is Washington Congressman Brian Baird, whose indiscretion was recognizing progress on the ground, despite having initially opposed the surge and having opposed the war in the first place. After a recent trip to Iraq, Mr. Baird said: "One of the things that gets very little attention is that virtually every other country I visited says it would be a mistake to pull out now."
We hope he took his flak jacket home from Baghdad. MoveOn is rolling out an ad this week in Mr. Baird's Washington district, in which a former soldier tells of being shot at in 2003 by the Iraqis he had fought to liberate and calls America's continued presence in the country "wrong, immoral and irresponsible." What does this have to do with the wisdom--or lack thereof--of the current strategy? Nada, which tells you something about MoveOn's honesty.
In response, Freedoms Watch launched this new ad today, which is making the rounds in the blogosphere:
A Conservative Version of Kos?
RedState.com'sRobert Bluey dissects Dean Barnett's column in the Weekly Standard, which asks "Why is there no conservative Kos?" Bluey urges bloggers like Barnett to stop complaining and start acting.
Hit and Run'sDavid Weigel explains why he believes RedState.com is not the conservative Kos: "Cesar asks if RedState is like Daily Kos. It is, although it was founded by a board of established conservo-blogger/activists in response to dKos. And it's got that sort of Plastic.com-style discussion system. But its owners have acted like, well, owners and haven't allowed the site to mutate out of their control like Kos did."
Editor's Note
The Rightometer will now be posted 3-4 times a week, depending on what is going in the news. If you have any stories I missed, please do not hesitate to email me at matthewnaugle@gmail.com. Your input is greatly appreciated.
America's first Muslim congressman has provoked outrage by apparently comparing President George W Bush to Adolf Hitler and hinting that he might have been responsible for the September 11 attacks.
Addressing a gathering of atheists in his home state of Minnesota, Keith Ellison, a Democrat, compared the 9/11 atrocities to the destruction of the Reichstag, the German parliament, in 1933. This was probably burned down by the Nazis in order to justify Hitler's later seizure of emergency powers.
"It's almost like the Reichstag fire, kind of reminds me of that," Mr Ellison said. "After the Reichstag was burned, they blamed the Communists for it, and it put the leader [Hitler] of that country in a position where he could basically have authority to do whatever he wanted."
To applause from his audience of 300 members of Atheists for Human Rights, Mr Ellison said he would not accuse the Bush administration of planning 9/11 because "you know, that's how they put you in the nut-ball box - dismiss you".
Vice-President Dick Cheney's stance of refusing to answer some questions from Congress was "the very definition of totalitarianism, authoritarianism and dictatorship", he added.
Right Wing News' John Hawkins opines, "I'm sure Muslims all across America are hiding their faces in embarrassment -- or at least, you'd like to think so. Here they have the first Muslim ever elected to Congress, after more than 200 years, and he's one of the most embarrassing flakes in Congress -- and that's saying something."
Power Line'sScott Johnson discussed Ellison's despicable comments on Mark Levin's radio show. The audio is posted here.
Hit and Runs'David Weigel is indifferent to Ellison's comments: "Commenters argue that you could rephrase Ellison's statement as 'I think Bush planned 9/11 but I won't say so, wink wink!' For the prosecution: He compared 9/11 to the Reichstag fire, which most people now believe was planned by the Nazis to solidify their power. For the defense: It also sounds like he realized the full meaning of his allegory and clarified that Bush didn't plan 9/11, he just took advantage of it."
Jihad Watch'sRobert Spencer continues to keep the heat on Ellison to return contributions from the Council on American Islamic Relations because of their ties to terror.
Free Republic'sJohn Jorsett adds, "George Bush = Hitler PLUS he’s engaged in a conspiracy to subvert the US political system. Twofer! Ellison is really impressive: it usually takes Democrats several terms in office before they make themselves look like tinfoil-pated nutlogs."
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey, who picked up on this story a week ago, opines, "Ellison knows that the 9/11 attacks were carried about by al-Qaeda and 19 radical Muslims. He just can't bring himself to admit it, and instead likes to flirt with paranoid conspiracy theorists who believe that the entire attack was a BushCo plot to grab power in the US. Well, if so, where is the power grab? We've held elections on schedule ever since 9/11; the only one to be delayed was the New York City municipal elections, for obvious reasons, and then only for a few weeks. Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, and might have won the Presidency in 2004 had they not nominated a total stiff to run against George Bush."
Red State'sMark Kilmer opines, "Senator Dick Durbin is no longer the only famed Nazi hunter amongst Democrats."
Newsbusters'Noel Sheppards wonders why American emdia outlets have been so quick to give Elison a pass on his comments.
What kinds of things do you think of when you hear "communications consulting"?
Speechwriting? Message strategy?
Well, "communications consulting" is how presidential candidate Mitt Romney recorded $300 in payments to a California company that describes itself as "a mobile beauty team for hair, makeup and men's grooming and spa services."
Romney spokesman Kevin Madden confirmed that the payments -- actually two separate $150 charges -- were for makeup, though he said the former Massachusetts governor had only one session with Hidden Beauty of West Hills, Calif. That was before the May 3 Republican presidential debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., co-sponsored by MSNBC and The Politico.
Townhall.com'sMatt Lewis adds, "The truth is that it's not uncommon for candidates to pay for hair and makeup. In fact, it's probably smart. But it sure doesn't sound good (which is no doubt why it was reported as 'communications consulting.') Moreover, it's also hard to criticize John Edwards for this sort of stuff, when we may have our own 'Brett boy.'"
Sen. Hillary Clinton's legal team denies a "smoking gun video" captures the New York Democrat and her campaign in the act of committing a felony, calling the assertion "pure fantasy" and "much ado about nothing."
As WND reported, the tape of a July 17, 2000, phone call was submitted as evidence to a California appeals court last month in a civil fraud suit by business mogul Peter Franklin Paul against the New York Democrat and her husband, former President Bill Clinton. WND reported in April that Paul charged the tape shows Sen. Clinton – despite denials throughout six years of investigation – taking an active role in the production of a lavish Hollywood fundraiser in August 2000 that eventually cost him nearly $2 million.
It is some kind of commentary on the state of American politics that as Edwards has campaigned for president, vice president and now president again, his hair seems to have attracted as much attention as, say, his position on health care. But when his campaign reported in April that it had paid for two of his haircuts at $400 each, the political damage was immediate. With each punch line on late night TV his image as a self-styled populist making poverty his signature issue was further eroded.
Edwards said that he was embarrassed by the cost and that he "didn't know it would be that expensive," suggesting the haircuts were some kind of aberration given by "that guy" his staff had arranged. His wife, Elizabeth, made lots of jokes at her husband's expense and the campaign wished the whole issue would go away.
But Torrenueva's account of his long relationship with Edwards -- the first he's given -- probably guarantees that won't happen quite yet. And if $400 seemed a lot for a haircut, how about one for three times that? ....
Torrenueva said one haircut during the 2004 presidential race cost $1,250 because he traveled to Atlanta and lost two days of work.
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey opines, "For the record, the issue on this point isn't the cost of the haircuts, but the fact that Edwards paid for them with campaign contributions. When the story broke in mid-April, that was the real scandal -- that a rich lawyer and hedge-fund manager would eat up money sent by his contributors to get him elected on Hollywood-level hairdos. He has plenty of his own money for hair stylists and spa days. The Washington Post apparently didn't ask who footed the bill for that $1250 haircut, but I'd suspect that came from campaign coffers as well."
Wizbang's Paul finds this to be an excellent example of the so-called "two Americas."
The son of former Vice President Al Gore was arrested early Wednesday in Orange County on suspicion of possessing marijuana and prescription drugs, the latest in a series of incidents with law enforcement agencies in recent years.
Albert Gore III was taken into custody about 2:15 a.m. after Orange County sheriff's deputies stopped him for driving about 100 mph on the southbound Interstate 5 in Laguna Niguel.
When deputies approached the Toyota Prius at the Crown Valley Parkway exit, they detected the "strong odor of marijuana," said Jim Amormino, a spokesman for the Sheriff's Department. A search of the car found marijuana and prescription drugs Vicodin, Valium, Xanax and Adderall, an amphetamine used to treat attention deficit disorder, Amormino said.
Ace of Spaces' HQ adds, "A Gore family spokesman said the spirited lad was 'attempting to raise awareness of the green lifestyle' by alerting the public to the little-known fact that Prius can hit 100mph at all."
Right World View opines, "This can happen to anyone's children, but Gore might want to start spending less time lecturing the world with junk science and more time with his family. Perhaps they need him more than we do right now. Quite a rap sheet on the kid I wasn't aware of. It's a shame, really, but it happens."
Residual Forces knows what Al Gore is really upset about: "What his father is really upset with is not the drugs, I’m sure. It is that his son was increasing his carbon footprint by speeding."
Bloggers at the Continental Congress Right Wing Nuthouse'sRick Moran does an excellent job of liveblogging the Continental Congress in 1776, which took place years before Al Gore invented the internet!
Ron Paul Update
Hotair'sAllahpundit posts this great hilarious video of Ron Paul from the Morton Downey Jr. show:
In other Paul news, Iaocblog'sRon Sansone proves that Ron Paul's campaign is doing its best to manipulate Digg.
WASHINGTON — President Bush spared former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby from a 2 1/2-year prison term in the CIA leak case Monday, stepping into a criminal case with heavy political overtones on grounds that the sentence was just too harsh.
Bush's move came hours after a federal appeals panel ruled Libby could not delay his prison term in the CIA leak case. That meant Libby was likely to have to report to prison soon and put new pressure on the president, who had been sidestepping calls by Libby's allies to pardon the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney.
"I respect the jury's verdict," Bush said in a statement. "But I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr. Libby is excessive. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Mr. Libby's sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison."
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey opines, "If Bush wanted to take any action -- and I would have advised against it -- this is as far as he should go. It allows Libby to remain free while he pursues his appeal, but it makes it clear that the White House won't undo convictions for official misconduct. It strikes a balance that few will appreciate now, but later will accept as wise, as far as it goes. If Libby has a good case for reversal, let the courts make that decision."
Ed Driscoll encourages emergency paramedics to stand by at MSNBC just in case Keith Olberman needs CPR.
RedState'sDan McLaughlin is looking forward to hearing Hillary Clinton's opinion about the proper uses of the pardon power.
However, The Volokh Conspiracy'sOrin Kerr is not pleased: "I find Bush's action very troubling because of the obvious special treatment Libby received. President Bush has set a remarkable record in the last 6+ years for essentially never exercising his powers to commute sentences or pardon those in jail. His handful of pardons have been almost all symbolic gestures involving cases decades old, sometimes for people who are long dead. Come to think of it, I don't know if Bush has ever actually used his powers to get one single person out of jail even one day early. If there are such cases, they are certainly few and far between. So Libby's treatment was very special indeed."
Patterico's Pontifications is also not happy: "You do the crime, you do the time. The jury said Scooter Libby did the crime. He should do the time."
Powerline'sJohn Hinderaker adds, "I also think the President's commutation of Libby's sentence will go over well with the party's conservative base and will contribute, to some degree, to a restoration of Bush's standing with conservatives." Instapundit'sGlenn Reynolds agrees.
Robert Bluey opines, "As could be expected, Bush is taking a drubbing from the left for his decision, but at this point, does it really matter? Bush made the right move. “One of his finest moments,” remarked one friend. I hope conservatives recognize it."
Right Wing News' guest blogger Matt Margolis adds, "But Democrat grandstanding on this issue doesn't change the fact that they seem more interested in Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief-of-staff than they are in the actual leaker of Valerie Plame's name to the media, Richard Armitage. In fact, the Democrats' complete lack of interest in Armitage proves that they care less about the actual leak of Plame's name (which they seemed to believe was a major threat to our national security) and cared more about using this so-called scandal to attack the Bush administration.:
The Corner'sJonah Goldberg is enjoying watching Joe Wilson on television: "On the merits I think Bush probably got it about right. On the politics, I think Bush would have been smarter to give Libby an outright pardon. But, having just watched Joe Wilson sputter in pompous rage on the Today Show, I'm tempted to argue that Bush should have used eminent domain to take Wilson's convertible Jaguar and give it to Scooter Libby."
Suggestion: Bush should have reduced the fine to a more reasonable $50,000, which just so happens to be how much Sandy Berger was fined for stealing and destroying classified documents and lying about it to investigators (he wasn't charged for the latter, but subsequent revelations has made it clear he did just that).
Making the fine $50,000 would have been more in line with Libby's transgressions, and it would have made it harder for Democrats to argue against it. The penalty -- no jail time, $50,000, probation -- would have been so similar to Berger's that one could scarcely mention it without also mentioning Berger.
Robert Botsch, a University of South Carolina-Aiken professor, said if Graham has a problem it’s likely to be in the GOP primary with its hard-core conservative base.
The general election is safe for Graham, Botsch maintains. “He is the closest thing we’ve had to a Democratic senator in a long time,” Botsch noted.
Even Democrats agree.
Last year, Joe Erwin of Greenville, immediate past chairman of the S.C. Democratic Party, was asked what Democrat might challenge Graham in 2008. Erwin doubted anyone would.
“We already have our best Democrat up there in Lindsey,” Erwin quipped.
Graham has raised nearly $4 million for his re-election bid, enough to discourage many opponents.
Save the GOP'sSam opines, "How many more reasons do we need to get a credible challenger for Graham?"
The Death of the McCain Campaign
Sun News' political blog'sRyan Sager reports that Senator John McCain has $2 million on hand, and are considering taking public money.
Townhall.com'sPatrick Ruffini adds, "Friends, this campaign is officially over. There is no way we are going to nominate someone who has to take public funding to take on Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama ($90M COH between them)."
Michelle Malkin starts the "McCain Campaign Death Watch", and takes much pleasure in taking bets on the end of his campaign.
The Corner'sMark Steyn reports: "By the way, also from the mailbag, I've had a couple of ostensibly well-informed e-mails suggesting that John McCain will quit the race in the next few days. He's supposed to be in Iraq this week, and presumably, whether he does call it quits or decides to press on, the second-quarter fundraising numbers are somewhere between bad and disastrous. (I forget whether, in the longrunning Lowry/JPod dispute, Rich still regards the Senator as the 'frontrunner'.) "
Eye on 08'sSoren Dayton predicts that the campaign staffers McCain is firing will probably be hired by former Senator Fred Thompson.
Hotair'sAllahpundit sums up the interview perfectly: "A travesty. He’s the personification of the bill’s ills: ignorant of and incurious about its weaknesses, confused as to what’s in it and what isn’t (per his comments about Kay Bailey Hutchison’s amendment), and worst of all brimming with arrogance at the nerve of conservative proles to be angry about this issue. This clip ought to push those confidence-in-Congress poll numbers into single digits, assuming they’re not there already."
Pain Dealer'sMark McNally, an Ohio blogger, adds, "We may have just heard the beginning of the end of Voinovich's career on live radio."
Michelle Malkin opines, "Speaking of lack of confidence in our lawmakers, get a load of blubbering, clueless George Voinovich on Hannity. Good gawd. Keep talking, George. You’re the best help we have in killing the bill out there."
Nasty, Brutish, and Short, another Ohio blogger, can't believe Voinovich's arrogance: "The Senator then says he has been threatened by people calling his office, telling him this is the end of his political career. 'YOU DO NOT INTIMIDATE GEORGE VOINOVICH' he yells. It is the fault of talk radio, he says. But then he says if you don’t like how he votes, you should take it into consideration the next time he’s up for re-election. Sure will, Senator!"
Bizzyblog's Tom Blumer, another blogger from the Buckeye State, opines:
Here is where I boil. On Monday, George Voinovich was so dismissive of his constituents’ time, talents and energies that he was perfectly willing to have thousands of people waste their time, talents, and energies making their feelings known to him when he had NO intention of changing his vote. As important (but not more important), he wasted the time, talents, and energies of dozens of bloggers, Sean Hannity and surely other talk-show hosts, National Review and surely other leading conservative outfits.
It’s one thing to disagree politically, and it’s quite another to be insufferably inconsiderate. George Voinovich doesn’t give a rip about how how rude he was to everyone on Monday.
I’m a never-say-never type of person, but I can tell you that I have no current plans to waste any more of my time on George Voinovich, except to defeat him. All the money in the world wouldn’t have saved Mike DeWine. George is a very slow learner.
Laura's Miscellaneous Musings adds, "Voinovich was, plain and simple, arrogant, uninformed, and angry about being questioned by the American people. It's quite embarrassing to me as a Republican that he is a representative of my party."
Ankle Biting Pundit'sBull Dog Pundit offers Voinovich the dubious award of "Buffoon of the Week."
Jammie Wearing Fool wants Voinovich to be "drummed out of office for sheer stupidity."
FReepers are not impressed that Senator Voinovich had no idea what the Fairness Doctrine is.
FrontPageMag.com'sBen Johnson opines, "The senator’s words were noteworthy, because they were as contemptuous as they were imperious. He placed his 11 million constituents on par with loan sharks because they dared express their opinions to their elected representative. In the same breath, he characterized his public service as a “business” and asserted his superiority to talk radio hosts. It’s no secret that most, if not all, Congressmen consider themselves above their representatives; however, few see the virtue in giving the majority of their state’s voters a chest-thumping, collective order to sit down, shut up, and leave the governing to the elites."
Democrats have for weeks been privately wringing their hands over whether to accept an automatic 2.5 percent pay increase, fretting that the raise may appear inconsistent with their campaign promises.
But last night, the House made its peace with it, rejecting a bid to block the automatic cost-of-living raise of about $4,400 on a 244 to 181 vote.
Townhall.com's Matt Lewis opines, "Clearly, things are going so well that they deserved a raise, right? I mean their approval ratings are so high ..."
Ann Coulter on Fred Thompson
Human Events Legal Affairs Correspondent has this to say on Fred Thompson, which has been making the rounds in the blogosphere:
"I think [Fred Thompson's] kind of our Obama. Which is to say it just show how unhappy we are with McCain, Giuliani and Romney that Thompson steps in -- people know very little about him -- and oh he's our guy. And it's sort of like that with Obama. That the Democrats aren't happy with their leading candidate -- Hillary -- so they gravitate to Obama knowing nothing about him and him being -- you know -- 14 years old."
This video about Senator Lindsay Graham (R- South Carolina) has been making the rounds in the blogosphere:
NZ Bear posts the entire Senate immigration bill on his site, in hopes that bloggers can dig through it before Thursday and the second vote for cloture.
Michelle Malkin is not pleased at how little time bloggers have to read the immigration bill: "While I wait for my printer to churn out this piece of clay pigeon poop, let me reiterate just how crummy this process is. The Grand Schemers drop this thing in on a Tuesday evening and expect they’ll be ramming it through–in as little as 48 hours–on Thursday or Friday with severely limited debate again."
Hotair'sBryan Preston created this hilarious attack ad of Senator Ted Kennedy (D- Massachusetts), with the senator's audio from his interview on a popular hispanic radio show:
The City Journal'sJohn Leo publishes this interesting discovery about the negative effects of mass immigration and diversity:
Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam, author of Bowling Alone, is very nervous about releasing his new research, and understandably so. His five-year study shows that immigration and ethnic diversity have a devastating short- and medium-term influence on the social capital, fabric of associations, trust, and neighborliness that create and sustain communities. He fears that his work on the surprisingly negative effects of diversity will become part of the immigration debate, even though he finds that in the long run, people do forge new communities and new ties.
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey is breaking down the immigration bill and listing interesting points as he reads it. Here is one of the more important points: "POINT 4: Page 48, lines 8-14: Interesting method here to ensure that Z-visa non-immigrants don't get preferential treatment. The regulations set up a timing mechanism so that no Z-visa immigrants can file for permanent residency until 30 days after eligibility for those who applied for normal immigration on May 1, 2005. That means that illegals can't "cut in line" ahead of anyone who applied on that date or before, but can be put ahead of legal immigrants who applied in the last two years."
Powerline'sScott Johnson believes the fix may already be in on the immigration bill:
Virtually everything important that is happening with respect to the immigration bill seems to be happening under the surface, away from the eyes of prying journalists and concerned citizens. The procedural maneuvering is incomprehensible. The substance of the amendments before the Senate is extraordinarily difficult if not overwhelming given the limited time allowed for their consideration.
I have only my intuition to go on. My intuition tells me that it is impossible to be cynical enough about what is transpiring here, that the second cloture vote is the last chance to kill the bill in the Senate if the fix is not already in, and that the bill's passage is assured in the House if it makes it out of the Senate. If some version of the bill passes in the Senate as a result of the procedural short-cuts that have greased the skids for it, every Republican who lent an assist should be held accountable.
RedState'sErick Erickson reports that with a vote of 114-23, the House GOP Conference has already voted to reject thee Senate's immigration bill. Erickson snarks, "It looks like, in fact, the House will . . . dare we say it . . . have committee hearings on the bill."
Townhall.com'sDean Barnett is furious: "What the Republican Senate and the Bush administration have done is hardly forgivable, even if the House Republicans save them from their stupidity."
Polipundit posts eight senators that he wants his readers to call today and encourage them to vote against tomorrow's vote for cloture.
Riehl World View is fed up and is probably going to stop voting Republican: "Democrats aren't an option for me, neither is Bloomberg, but I sense a serious protest vote, or lack of any vote in my future. At the risk of being politically incorrect, is it really worth voting in an election when D stands for Dumb-ass and R stands for retarded? Perhaps not. I could always do something constructive like go fishing on election day. I can't think of a time when I have been more disenchanted with America's political class and that is saying something, as I basically distrust them to start."
Oh That Nutty Ron Paul
Views from Within posts video of Ron Paul supporting Ed and Elaine Brown, tax protesters who are preparing for a confrontation with law enforcment.
American Specatator blog'sShawn Macomber opines, "Does Paul really wanted to be associated with someone who is currently stockpiling weapons for a confrontation with law enforcement, threatening another Waco should anyone attempt to make him do the time he was tried, convicted and sentenced to serve for tax evasion? Does he really want to endorse a man who hopes this conflict will spread and become a revolutionary war against a global cabal of Zionists, Illuminati and Free Masons?"
Rosie O'Donnell Distrubing Photo
On her blog, Rosie O'Donnell posted a disturbing picture of her daughter wearing a bullet belt.
Sister Toldjah opines, "It’s a sick reminder of just how far some people will go to try and prove a point about guns and violence and war."
Confederate Yankee'sBob Owens wonders what it all means: "But what, precisely, is the message is she trying to send? Based upon the reaction of her readers, it seems to be either “I’m willing to pimp my child for a cheap political stunt,” or, “I’m so nutty, even my own demented fans are disturbed over how I’d use my child.” Whatever her point, few seem to understand it, and I wonder if that cluelessness extends to O’Donnell herself."
Newsbusters'Warner Todd Huston adds, "But, I have to say, the hypocrisy is hilarious. She will most likely fall back on the it's-just-a-kid-at-play argument, but that really makes the lie to her all too common hyperbole on the issues surrounding the issues of guns. So, what does this say of her anti-gun rants if she so easily allows her child to play at being a terrorist? That it doesn't matter if it's 'just' playing?"
Wordpress Hosting Pro-Jihad Blogs?
Weasel Zippers posts of lists of disturbing Jihadist Propaganda blogs that are hosted by one of the most popular blogging platforms and hosting services, Wordpress.
"Republican support for the Iraq war is slipping by the day. After four years of combat and more than 3,560 U.S. deaths, two Republican senators previously reluctant to challenge President Bush on the war announced they could no longer support the deployment of 157,000 troops and asked the president to begin bringing them home.
"We must not abandon our mission, but we must begin a transition where the Iraqi government and its neighbors play a larger role in stabilizing Iraq," Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, wrote in a letter to Bush.
Voinovich, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, released his letter Tuesday—one day after Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, the panel's top Republican, said in a floor speech that Bush's strategy was not working.
"The longer we delay the planning for a redeployment, the less likely it is to be successful," said Lugar, who plans to meet later this week with Stephen Hadley, Bush's national security adviser.
Lugar and Voinovich are not the first GOP members to call for U.S. troops to leave Iraq. Sens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, Olympia Snowe of Maine and Gordon Smith of Oregon made similar remarks earlier this year. But their public break is significant because it raises the possibility that Senate Democrats could muster the 60 votes needed to pass legislation that would call for Bush to bring troops home."
Right Wing News' John Hawkins opines, "I think the political tide has irrevocably turned against Iraq, even amongst Republicans."
Weapons of Mass Discussion'sMatt Hurley is not impressed with his Senator: "The Ohio GOP should throw this guy out of the party immediately... We have two Democrats serving us in the United States Senate; unfortunately, one of them has an 'R' after his name. A situation that I hope is rectified as quickly as humanly possible."
Irony Alert: "Cold Cash" Jefferson Must Surrender His Firearms
Newsbusters'Noel Sheppard notes the irony of Jefferson having an "F" rating from the NRA: "Rep. William Jefferson (D-Louisiana) was ordered by a U.S. district judge to surrender his firearms Friday. Yet, media outlets that reported this ignored the delicious irony inherent in the Congressman’s anti-gun positions throughout his career."
You might ask yourself, what does a man who, in 2005, voted against a bill to protect law-abiding gun dealers and manufacturers from litigation blaming them for criminal misuse of their products by others, need with rifles? Did he own them when he voted against similar law in 2003?
Why would a legislator with an anti-Second-Amendment voting record that earned him an NRA rating identical to that of Chuckie Schumer and Nancy Pelosi own multiple shotguns?
When asked about the Jefferson mini-armory by U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis III, the congressman responded that the guns were for -- what else? Why, hunting, of course:
"I've been hunting since I was 10 years old"
Naturally, had the camo-clothed Liberal been involved in an accidental discharge while stalking gallinules on the Bayou one hot summer's morn', there'd have been no one to blame but Remington.
Hillary Appoints Corrupt ex-Judge Hastings as Co-Chair of Her Campaign
U.S. Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, of Weston, and Alcee Hastings, of Miramar, were appointed national campaign co-chairs on Thursday for U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's Democratic presidential effort.
"We need a leader with a clear vision and sound judgment, who can work with a Democratic Congress to renew the promise of America. Hillary is that leader," Wasserman Schultz said in a statement.
Hastings said a second Clinton in the White House would make the country "a much better place for the African-American community, Floridians and all Americans."
Red State'sCalifornia Yankee reminds us of Hastings record:
In 1988, the Democratic-controlled U.S. House of Representatives considered the case, and impeached Hastings for bribery and perjury by a vote of 413-3. Hastings was then convicted in 1989 by the United States Senate, becoming only the sixth federal judge in the history of the United States to be removed from office by the Senate.
Alleged Hastings co-conspirator, William Borders, went to jail again for refusing to testify in the impeachment proceedings, but was later given a full pardon by Bill Clinton on his last day in office.
Texas Rainmaker snarks, "I guess it's only fitting that someone who's been impeached would head up a Clinton campaign."
Lincoln Logs'Matt Dole adds, "I guess I will take solace in the fact that at least Alcee Hasting’s robe was only metaphorically stained with the taint of his illegal actions."
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey adds, "Now Hillary has embraced Hastings, and indeed has made the former perjurer and corrupt judge as her campaign's national representative. She says that with Hastings' help, her "message of change" will get rolled across the country. The message is that the Clinton campaign has its own idea about the culture of corruption -- they want to pursue it."
The Jawa Report is enjoying this story: "Ride that fat, corrupt hog all the way to the White House, Hildabeast!"
Senate Democrats opened the door to reviving the stalled immigration measure on Sunday, calling on Republicans to resolve their internal divisions and produce an agreement on how to move the legislation forward.
With Bush administration officials and Republican authors of the overhaul saying they had not given up on the bill, the spokesman for Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, said Mr. Reid would be willing to try again if Republicans agreed to a defined number of amendments and a time limit on debate.
“If and when Republicans can agree on a limited number of amendments and agree on the need to get this bill passed, Senator Reid is committed to finding room on the Senate schedule as soon as possible,” said Jim Manley, the spokesman, who said President Bush needed to play a role as well. “The hope is that he can apply enough pressure to provide the votes we need to get the bill out of the Senate.”
Mr. Bush is scheduled to visit the Capitol on Tuesday for a lunch with Senate Republicans. That meeting will come just days after the immigration proposal, one of his chief domestic priorities, was derailed when an effort to bring a two-week debate to a close came up far short of the votes needed.
On Sunday, Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez said the administration was “more determined than ever” to push the measure, which has drawn strong opposition from conservatives.
Michelle Malkin opines, "The 'Grand Bargainers' will be toiling behind closed doors again. As I've warned many times, if they can't get what they want in one "comprehensive" package, they will do what they've done for years under the radar--break off their favorite enforcement-undermining provisions and pass amnesty piecemeal."
Hotair'sBryan Preston posts Hot Air's "First Annual Open Borders Oscar Awards"
Pro-Terrorist Rally on US Capitol Lawn
Age of Hooper'sCharlesR recorded this video of what he considers the "lamest protest rally... ever."
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Senate divisions that derailed a White House-backed immigration bill - for now, at least - tect jobs for U.S.-born workers.
The split in the Republican Party was more obvious. The issue pitted social conservatives, who insisted that illegal immigrants not be granted "amnesty" for entering the country unlawfully, against business groups hungry for willing workers in hotels, restaurants, construction sites and other comparatively low-wage, low-skilled workplaces.
A bipartisan group of senators tried for weeks to bridge the chasms, but fell glaringly short Thursday night. Needing 60 votes to end debate and schedule a final vote on the bill itself, they won only 45. Senate leaders set aside the legislation until further notice.
Right Angle'sEricka Andersen opines, "This is our country -- and we still decide who gets to come in. I write in hope that we finally decide to enforce the laws and keep America held to the standards on which she was founded. We welcome those who want to be here and do it the right way. The right way has prevailed and today, we are happy for it."
Red State'sLeon Wold reminds immigration bill opponents that their work is far from over: "But the job is not done. While Senators don't like hundreds of angry phone calls, necessarily, they can read polls like the ABC/Washington Post poll which indicated that even within the Republican party, there were roughly as many supporters of the bill as there were opponents. And insofar as they are cognizant that a lot of these angry phone calls are coming from out of state, what they really like is knowing why they should care if out-of-state activists are angry. Which is why, after Miers was withdrawn, I sent donations to a couple of key Senators who were up for re-election who had done the right thing."
As annoying as Reid's refrain was, he is right: This was the president's bill. This was the monstrous sham that President Bush tried to ram through the Senate with his pal Teddy Kennedy--subverting the committee process, attempting to cram it in before the Memorial Day holiday, rushing to limit debate, and then complaining about delays. This was the bill President Bush sent conservative-bashing bureaucrats like DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff to peddle on CNN. This was the bill President Bush championed while deriding critics as fearful bigots and running away from building the fence he promised to build.
If the White House thinks conservatives are going to forget whose bill this was and the tactics the White House used in its failed attempt to ram it through Congress, they better think again.
If Lindsay Graham and John McCain think their abominable behavior is going to be forgotten, they better think again.
Right Wing News'John Hawkins thinks the bill is dead, forever: "A source in the Senate says this bill is as dead as Stalin and it won't be becoming back no matter what McConnell is saying on the floor." But Slate'sMickey Kaus disagrees, "Of course, the bill isn't dead. Just resting. There will be an instinctive, goo goo guilt-tripping MSM effort to induce its revival. ('The system isn't working ... bipartisanship,' etc. )** It could well come back."
Townhall.com'sHugh Hewitt adds they are crying in Harry Reid's office, " The Majority Leader just said so, which tells me that we dodged a huge bullet today. The bill is off the floor and back to the drawing board. Good. It could not be salvaged with the process that was built on the premise of a jam down, but perhaps it can be made to work if the working group reconvenes and addresses the serious objections made by people willing to see a reform bill, but only one that puts security first."
Robert Bluey explains why Senators Jim Bunning (Ky.) Jim DeMint (S.C.), Elizabeth Dole (N.C.) and Mike Enzi (Wyo.) especially deserve our thanks.
The Washington Time's Fishwrap blog'sRobert Stacy McCain reports, "Despite Mr. Reid's claim that Republicans killed the bill, 11 Democrats as well as Vermont's independent socialist Sen. Bernard Sanders were among those whose "no" votes Thusday sustained the filibuster. Among the Democrats voting "no" were three members of the 2006 Democratic freshman class -- Sens. Claire McCaskill of Missouri, Jon Tester on Montana and Jim Webb of Virginia -- all elected with the staunch support of DailyKos."
The Corner'sStanley Kurtz wonders why the lefty blogosphere has been so quiet on this issue: "Have liberal pundits and bloggers stayed relatively quiet simply because they’re more interested in Iraq and other issues? Or do they sense that arguing for amnesty and against enforcement is a losing political game? If the latter, what does that say about the presidential politics of immigration? Many argue that Republicans will suffer if immigration becomes a big part of the presidential campaign, given the importance of the Hispanic vote. But immigration seems like the sort of issue that could drive a lot of independent and sometime Democratic voters in a Republican direction–and spike Republican turnout. I guess we’ll see. Or will immigration fade away as a presidential issue, precisely because it’s such a hot potato?"
Truth Caucus' "quote of the day" is John McCain, who was quoted after the defeat of the immigration bill, and said "I don’t have anything to say."
Free Ronald Reagan Poster
A number of bloggers have reported that to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Ronald Reagan's "Tear Down This Wall" speech (June 12), Young America's Foundation is giving out this free Ronald Reagan poster. Click here to request one.
WASHINGTON (AP) - A fragile compromise that would legalize millions of unlawful immigrants risks coming unraveled after the Senate voted early Thursday to place a five-year limit on a program meant to provide U.S. employers with 200,000 temporary foreign workers annually.
The 49-48 vote came two weeks after the Senate, also by a one-vote margin, rejected the same amendment by Sen. Byron Dorgan. The North Dakota Democrat says immigrants take many jobs Americans could fill.
The reversal dismayed backers of the immigration bill, which is supported by President Bush but loathed by many conservatives. Business interests and their congressional allies were already angry that the temporary worker program had been cut in half from its original 400,000-person-a-year target.
Townhall.com'sHugh Hewitt opines, "The Beltway's elites badly bungled the bill. It is hardly the first time or the last that the Congress misjudged completely the mood of the public. The real error is in refusing to listen after the people have taken the time to announce their disapproval."
Robert Bluey lists those Senators who are on the fence:
Spirits among conservative critics of the immigration bill have brightened today following several Senate votes that indicate at least 40 senators could block the bill during a cloture vote tomorrow.
Well-placed sources tell me that activists are focusing their attention on the following list of senators: Sam Brownback (R.-Kan.), Richard Burr (R.-N.C.), Saxby Chambliss (R.-Ga.), Larry Craig (R.-Idaho), Pete Domenici (R.-N.M.), Byron Dorgan (D.-N.D.), John Ensign (R.-Nev.), Mike Enzi (R.-Wyo.), Judd Gregg (R.-N.H.), Johnny Isakson (R.-Ga.), Jon Kyl (R.-Ariz.), Mary Landrieu (D.-La.), Trent Lott (R.-Miss.), Mitch McConnell (R.-Ky.), Claire McCaskill (D.-Mo.), Ben Nelson (D.-Neb.), Mark Pryor (D.-Ark.), Debbie Stabenow (D.-Mich.), John Sununu (R.-N.H.), Jon Tester (D.-Mont.), George Voinovich (R.-Ohio), Jim Webb (D.-Va.), and John Warner (R.-Va.).
Captain's Quarters'Ed Morrissey reports Senator Lindsay Graham, on the floor of the US Senate, threw a hissy-fit over an Obama amendment, which would have capped the points-based entry system. Hotair'sAllahpundit provides the truly embarrassing video.
RedState'sErick Erickson is disappointed at the defeat of Senator John Cornyn's amendment, which would have stopped those convicted of rape, assult, terrorism, and theft frome ver being eligible for legislation: "Look folks, I'm to the left of a great many of you on immigration. I have leaned toward support of this legislation. But it is blocking amendments like this and showing no willingness to fix the Z-visa issue that keep me from supporting the immigration reform effort."
Q&O'sJon Henke, who spent 6 months as the New Media advisor to the Senate Republicans, has signed up as Fred Thompson's campaign. John posted more details at his blog.
Matt Lewis on WNBC ritus and Townhall.com blogger Matt Lewis was interviewed on WNBC after the CNN GOP Debate:
Dems See Senator's Death as a Political Opportunity
Right Angle's Ericka Andersen reports that Democrats are eying political gains from the unfortunate death of Senator Craig Thomas.
“The party of course sees this as a big opportunity, but it’s too early to know how it’s going to play out,” said one Democratic operative based in Wyoming.
No Agenda'sMatt Margolis adds, "It is disgusting to think that Democrats see Senator Thomas's death as a political opportunity for the their party, but sadly this seems to be just another reflection of how they view the entire world. Everything they do is in the interests of their party. No matter what the situation or issue, even the safety of our country, their only concern is political gain."
Romney: Gay Couples Raising Kids is the American Way
“There are other ways to raise kids that’s fine: single moms, grandparents raising kids, gay couples raising kids. That’s the American way, to have people have their freedom of choice,” (Mitt Romney) said.
Palmetto Scoop opines, "Umm… what? We’ve lost track now, but we thought Romney opposed gay adoption and gay marriage. We have stopped being surprised by his all-too-often position changes - even from one month to the next - but we certainly never expected him to say 'gay couples raising kids' is 'the American way.'"
Townhall.com'sJonathan Garthwaite posts the funniest movement from last night:
Townhall.com'sMary Katharine Ham believes Rudy Giuliani won the debate: "From his first answer on Iraq, in which he notably outdid Romney who answered the same question right before him, Rudy seemed on point tonight. He's back to speaking straight-up about abortion, and I think, even if that doesn't earn him points, it doesn't lose him that many. I think it's a better tack than pandering, which he did a little of in the first debate."
Townhall.com'sPatrick Ruffini is shocked that John McCain can't support the boarder fence, which would help calm the concerns of many conservatives: "Senator McCain is choosing the wrong hill to die on. As someone who's considered myself pro-immigrant, it's baffling to me why the pro-immigration forces demonstrate a tin ear on something so basic, a minuscule part of the debate that if addressed gets them the mileage to do the big things they want to do anyway."
Rush Limbaugh, guest blogging on The Corner, didn't like a number of the questions: "These questions are driven by the fears and biases of the liberal agenda. Note also how the screen graphics immediately match Wolf's line of questioning, which means this whole thing was pre-produced by the producers at CNN. This is not a debate so much as a modified inquisition."
The Corner'sJohn Derbyshire, NRO's resident mathematician, poked fun at Mitt Romney: "A null set! I'd like to congratulate Mitt Romney on being the first to introduce a term from mathematical set theory into a presidential campaign... except that he plainly has no clue what "null set" actually means. If he DID have any clue, he'd know to say "THE null set," not "A null set."
Right Wing News'John Hawkins adds, "Huckabee and Brownback are competing for the same social conservative demographic, but Huckabee is so much more charismatic than Brownback, it's not a fair fight. On the other hand, Huckabee really doesn't have much to offer beyond charisma, but the likability factor is big."
Power Line'sJohn Hinderaker noticed the distinct differences between the GOP and the Democrats: "I should emphasize that this was a great night for the Republican Party. The contrast between these candidates and what the Dems have to offer was laughable. And they didn't take the bait to attack one another. They disagreed, but in an adult, substantive way, while expressing respect for the other candidates. Mitt Romney, John McCain and Rudy Giuliani were all exemplary in this respect. It was good, too, that immigration didn't crowd out everything else. And when CNN went off on a rather weird evolution/gays in the military/would you pardon Scooter Libby sequence, the candidates rose above it and didn't allow themselves to be stereotyped. All in all, an excellent night for the Republicans."
Michelle Malkin doesn't think anyone won: "No knock-out punches, no fireworks. None of the candidates have changed their mind on anything since the last debate. And they probably didn't change any viewers' minds about them tonight."
RedState'sErick Erickson takes Ron Paul to task, "Ron Paul is an irrelevant fool with his notion that our willingness to launch a pre-emptive war is the single biggest moral issue of our times."
The New York Sun'sRyan Sager latest politics blog's Ryan Sager believe last night was a big win for Rudy Giuliani.
Captain's Quarters' Ed Morrissey argues that McCain suffered the worst last night: "How did the candidates do? No one did badly, but McCain suffered the most. He actually had moments of high eloquence, especially when responding to Tancredo, but he blew it big time at the end. He called the US a shining city on the hill, evoking Reagan, and then asserted that he 'would not build fences and barriers' around it. Rhetorically, it's a great flourish -- but politically, it's suicide. He just reinforced the notion that he won't actually follow through on border security, which most Republicans believe involves building fences and barriers. All the work he did over the last two weeks to push back on immigration reform went up in a puff of smoke in New Hampshire."
Little Green Football'sCharles Johnson, posted a Ron Paul-less poll for his readers, and Rudy Giuliani won with 47% of the vote.
First, MSNBC tv show host Joe Scarborough asked if Fred Thompson's wife "works the poll?"
Palmetto Scoop, which was the first blog to pick up on this story, adds, "We’re not exactly sure what Scarborough is suggesting - there are a few interpretations and we’ll leave those to you - but we are sure that MSNBC doesn’t need another Don Imus-like mess on their hands."
Anyone who has watched Scarborough for any length of time knows that Scarborough can be an ass. What we didn't know was that he could also be tacky enough to attack someone's wife in the most personal of terms. Thompson's wife is beautiful, but that doesn't make her a whore or a stripper. Perhaps it speaks to Scarborough's view of women that he immediately associates one with the other.
The counterbuzz around Thompson has started to center on his supposed "trophy wife", as if he somehow should be blamed for dating beautiful women after his divorce. Thompson remained single for several years before marrying his current wife; he had also dated country singer Lorrie Morgan for a while as well. It's hardly a scandal, it hardly makes Jeri Thompson a homewrecker or a whore, and it hardly qualifies as unusual.
This is nothing more than character assassination, and especially egregious as it targets someone who isn't even a political player. Scarborough should be ashamed of himself.
Michelle Malkin thinks that Joe owes Fred Thompson and apology.
MSNBC spokesman Jeremy Gaines says that pretty much explains what happened. “A female triathlete had been discussing her exercise routine with Joe,” he said, and that routine includes a stripper’s pole. “That is the context in which the issue was discussed. To suggest otherwise is irresponsible.” When asked whether Jeri Kehn Thompson is owed an apology, Gaines declined to comment further.
Hotair'sAllahpundit asks, "So he meant to imply that she … exercises a lot? Here’s an experiment for you, fellas. Approach some woman you know at work today and say, “Hey, you look great. Do you work the pole?” If she takes it as a compliment, Scarborough’s off the hook."
Red State'sErick Erickson is furious: "Where is the conservative outrage? Where is it? Where is Mitt Romney condemning Joe Scarborough? Where is Rudy Giuliani condemning Joe Scarborough? Where is John McCain condemning Joe Scarborough? Where is Hugh Hewitt condemning Joe Scarborough? And what of Craig Crawford diminishing the reputation of Congressional Quarterly with on air fantasies and perversions about Republican candidates' wives?"
Extreme Mortman adds, "The reputation of this once great news network — and its corporate owners – I proudly worked for gets covered with more and more slop every time they let their hosts get away with saying these incredible things. This time, NBC should do the right thing and fire Scarborough on its own — before outsiders tell it to."
Matt Lewis is worried that some righty bloggers are becoming too politically correct: "Again, I am not defending what Scarborough said. But what I am concerned about is that conservatives are now joining the hand-wringing politically-correct crowd. Do we want to create an environment where we do away with all edgy political and social content, in favor of hackneyed conversation? I hope not."
WASHINGTON — A federal grand jury on Monday indicted Louisiana Democratic Rep. William Jefferson on 16 charges relating to a long-running investigation into bribery, racketeering, obstruction of justice and money laundering.
Calling it a "broad range of serious crimes," federal prosecutors called the case one about "greed, power and arrogance."
"The 16-count indictment alleges a pervasive pattern of self dealings, bribery and corruption by Mr. Jefferson, in violation of his oath of office, of his duty to the United States Congress in which he served, and of the duty to the citizens of the United States," said Chuck Rosenberg, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.
The officials said the investigation spanned from the United States to Africa and alleged it involved a number of occasions of criminal conduct by Jefferson, including bribing businessmen in a congressional building and promising a businessman that he would bribe a Nigerian official.
GOP Bloggers'Matt Margolis notices the hilarious difference between Nancy Pelosi's rhetoric towards Tom Delay's indictment, compared to Jefferson.
QandO'sBruce McQuain opines, "Yes, I understand Jefferson has just been indicted and not convicted. But then we're talking about a leadership group which has unashamedly pushed the meme that a hint or whiff or perception of corruption was enough when indicting the other side in the press. Isn't it time that Jefferson at least be removed from any committee assignments he has? I realize the leadership can't make him resign and go away. But they can take his committee slots away."
The Jawa ReportsGood Lt. adds, "Make sure to read leftwing blogs for their reactions. You'll get a lot of 'big deal,' or 'the Rethuglikkkans did it first!' or 'Bush doesn't like Black People.'"
Power Line'sJohn Hinderaker opines, "I always thought that the Jefferson scandal hurt Republicans, ironically, more than Democrats. Jefferson's malfeasance came to light at the height of the "culture of corruption" attacks on the GOP, and I don't think it sank in with most voters that Jefferson is a Democrat. Mostly, it was just seen as more confirmation that Congress is corrupt, and that hurt the party in power. Now, of course, things are different, and the mud will land where it belongs."
Newsbusters'Lynn Davidson notes that the Associated Press did their best to not identify William Jefferson as a Democrat.
