Obama's Unthinkable Position On Babies Who Survive Abortions

I had heard rumblings about this, but hadn't read the facts until now.

Barack Obama is actually to the left of NARAL (National Abortion Rights Alliance) on an issue that should bother even the most hardened liberals.

While in the Illinois Senate Obama voted against and then killed a vote on a bill that would have made it a crime to leave a live baby to die OUTSIDE of the womb after being delivered.

The Induced Infant Liability Act was introduced to protect babies that survived late-term abortions and were born alive. Some doctors were actually just leaving them on the table to die over time.

Jill Stanek, a registered delivery-ward nurse who was the prime mover behind the legislation after she witnessed aborted babies' being born alive and left to die, testified twice before Obama in support of the Induced Infant Liability Act bills. She also testified before the U.S. Congress in support of the Born Alive Infant Protection Act.

Stanek told me her testimony "did not faze" Obama.

In the second hearing, Stanek said, "I brought pictures in and presented them to the committee of very premature babies from my neonatal resuscitation book from the American Pediatric Association, trying to show them unwanted babies were being cast aside. Babies the same age were being treated if they were wanted!"

"And those pictures didn't faze him [Obama] at all," she said.

If that doesn't animate some conservatives on the fence about being able to support a very moderate McCain then I don't know what will.

New McCain Ad

Now the whole idea of flip-flopping doesn't necessarily bother me as much as some people. Having been generally liberal as a teen and college student I necessarily flip-flopped on a whole host of issues in becoming a conservative. If John McCain cares to flip-flop on his destructive stance against drilling in ANWR then I'll cheer that awakening wholeheartedly.

The issue of Barack Obama breaking his pledge to take public financing however, is a different story. This is something he pledged on principle (that money corrupts politicians), a principle that is as important as any other in his message of bringing "change" to Washington.

By doing this Barack Obama showed the true believers what conservatives have seen all along: that he is simply another in a long line of dishonest politicians who will say whatever it takes to advance themselves and that he has no core principles.

This McCain ad hits Obama on this point and I'm pleasantly surprised. Perhaps they fired the guy who conceived his first "I'm John McCain and I hate war" ad and actually have some talented people ready to make this interesting. We can only hope.

Global Warming Hype Threatens A New Cost In Wisconsin

I came across this story on the Wisconsin Realtors Association website.

Our governor Jim Doyle, apparently batshit nuts, is considering the recommendation of his Climate Change Committee that any house being sold has to be completely upgraded to "green" appliances and fixtures before the transaction can be completed. This includes large ticket items like boilers/furnaces and central air units as well as refrigerators/freezers, washers, dryers, dishwashers, etc..

On an older house this could easily tack over $10,000 dollars onto the sale price.

Despite the lip service they pay to folks in lower income brackets the Democrats sure have no qualms about putting home ownership ever further out of their reach.

Just How Bad Are the Democrats On the Energy Issue?

Here's Jonah Goldberg's spot on summary of the Democrats schizophrenic energy position:

We need to be energy independent, but we can't use the energy sources we have. We need to switch to ethanol fast, but we can't import cheaper ethanol from Brazil. We must increase gas taxes to wean ourselves from fossil fuels, but when gas prices go up for any other reason, it's a crisis, even a crime. We're told we'll get nowhere drilling our way to independence or lower prices, as if windmills will do the job (stop laughing).

We shouldn't fight "wars for oil," but the self-imposed embargo on our own oil makes us even more dependent on the foreign oil we're allegedly going to war over. And, of course: We're told to reject the failed policies of the past, when the policies that have failed are the real old ones merely being sold as new.

Bush's Approval Rating More Than Double That of Democrat Led Congress

According to the latest Gallup Poll George Bush's approval rating is at a pathetic 13%, but the Democrat led Congress is at a near rock bottom 6%.

The Congress's 6% is the lowest ever approval rating for any U.S. institution.

If people are even more disgusted with the Democrat led Congress than they were the Republican Congress that led to the 2006 blowout then wouldn't it serve to reason that the Republicans would have an advantage in November? It would seem that way, but my guess is that a full 30-40% of those people polled would probably still tell you the Republicans controlled Congress.

How is that? I think that our civic knowledge being what it is that a good amount of people simply lump the president's administration in with congress. And with the news media certainly in no hurry to point out such distinctions, it's up to the Republican marketing team and their candidate to push the issue. So in other words nothing's gonna change.

Universal Healthcare. It's Really About the Children.

A woman in the UK was forced to give birth on the floor in a hospital hallway. Why? Because with universal healthcare there's only so much of everything to go around and on this particular day the beds of three local hospitals were all full.

This sort of reminds me of the scores of pregnant Canadian women shooed to the U.S. by unprepared Canadian hospitals.

Still want universal healthcare?

WI Democrats Vote To Expel Delegate Who Dared Disagree

Neil Boortz has said "Democracy is three wolves and one sheep voting on what's for dinner." This story in yesterday's Journal Sentinal highlights that reality.

Apparently one of the Wisconsin Democratic Party delegates to the national convention expressed her dissatisfaction with Barack Obama and announced her plan to vote for John McCain. Of course such insolance cannot be tolerated in the machine. So rather than letting this woman - whom it would appear payed her dues to reach her position - cast one lone and inconsequential vote against the orthodoxy, they voted unanimously to request the national party expel her from the convention.

Democrats don't like Fox News so their candidates boycott any Fox News debates.
Democrats don't like conservative radio exposing their failures so they start threatening the Fairness Doctrine again.
Barack Obama can't speak without his teleprompter so he ignores McCains suggestion of ten townhall meetings and agrees to one.
Now one lone delegate disagrees with them and they throw her out.

This is the party of open-mindedness and reconciliation?

On The Bright Side...

Many of you may have seen this week's On the Bright Side as it's from NBC, but it was new to me and very fitting for this Father's Day weekend.

Dem's Think Trashy Videos Will Help Them?

I had heard about this website/initiative before, but only happened across their website yesterday. The site is http://truththroughaction.org/

Here's their mission statement:

TruthThroughAction.org brings independent filmmakers together to create edgy online film and video content to support the Democratic Party, its issues and candidates.

Somebody should tell these guys there's been a group of folks making "film and video content to support the Democratic Party" for years. They're called Hollywood.

Anyways it says a lot about the Democratic Party if it's supporters think this video portrays them in a good light:



So a girl approaches and jumps into bed with a guy she's never met, finds out he's a Republican, says "Just like the last one" and runs away like a hysterical...okay like a liberal, bumps into a fellow Democrat on the street and he picks up her "I Only Sleep With Democrats" pin for her. Top of the world Mom! Go hyper-aggressive female promiscuity!

And if you didn't pay attention to the music in the background, the lyrics are rather fitting. Here's what I caught:

Patience is a virtue
But sex is so f*@$ing good
So let's stand here disrobing

Democrats..........

Oh, and they're also selling "I only sleep with Democrats" t-shirts and have included some classy pictures to support their party, raise awareness, act out, etc..

Naturally.

Isn't that the dude from Napoleon Dynamite? Still rockin the tighties I see.

If this doesn't make you think "Hey, these guys really should be running the country." then I don't know what could.

Cheese With That Whine?

Liberals might do well to refuse further participation in any surveys where ideological persuasion is noted. It seems every time a study of attitudes or habits comes out it leaves lefties with egg on their faces.

A few years ago it was the study of charitable giving that showed 24 of the top 25 most charitable states were Red States. There's also been the ongoing General Social Survey where conservatives have reported being happier than liberals in every year since the survey started in the 70's. Very recently, after Barack Obama's comments in Pennsylvania about people "bitter" about their economic situation clinging to guns and religion, it was revealed that both gun owners and self-identifying religious folks were happier, just as educated, and wealthier than those who weren't.

Today on National Review Online Peter Schweizer added a number of other comparisons where liberals come out looking like a mighty sad lot.:

Many observers believe that Barack Obama secured the liberal base of the Democratic party because he was antiwar from the beginning. But I think it’s because he mastered the art of complaining and won over the Whine Caucus. Today the Democratic party is dominated by groups making claims of victim status — blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Native Americans, unwed mothers, artists, pampered academics, environmental activists, the poor, the unemployed, animal rights activists, women, homosexuals. As Michael Crowley openly admits on Slate: “What does define and unify the [Democratic] party is a sense of victimhood.”

A wide body of research shows that modern liberals are much more likely to complain about things in their lives. Conservatives are more content with their lives. When asked “How satisfied are you with life these days? Sixty-six percent of conservatives said “very satisfied” compared with only 46 percent of liberals. Conservatives are more likely to say they love their jobs (53 percent vs. 41 percent) and even enjoy their hobbies more (63 percent vs. 51 percent). When asked by the Social Capital Survey whether they were satisfied with their income, liberals were more than three times as likely to say “not at all satisfied” — even when they earned the same as conservatives.

I think Michael Savage is guilty of going overboard a lot, but the premise of his book "Liberalism is A Mental Disorder" doesn't sound completely crazy after noting such consistent diaparities. While I wouldn't go so far as to call liberalism a mental disorder, I would call it a symptom of a seriously self-defeating mindset.

Schweizer goes on:

When it comes to something like housework, Democrats are much more likely to complain that the division of work in their home “is unfair to me” than Republicans. In fact, they are five times as likely to whine about it. Another study in The Journal of Applied Psychology found that feminist women do less housework than traditional women — but complain more about it.

On a more serious note, researchers writing in The American Journal of Psychiatry and The Journal of Marriage and Family found that liberals are more likely to attempt suicide than conservatives.

Liberals are also more likely to whine that they are unhappy in their marriages and declare that their health is “fair or poor” than conservatives. Even when you control for income, these gaps exist. Unless you are willing to believe that certain illnesses afflict only certain political groups, something else is at work here.

If only we had a balanced media we could sit back and watch red faced liberals try their hardest to explain this all away. Oh to dream...

Those Union-Busting Democrats

This is such a classic story. The Washington Post reveals that the Democrat led Senate voted to privatize their cafeteria service because the public, union run cafeteria has lost money for 37 out of 44 years it's been running. Dianne Feinstein called the food and service "noticeably subpar"

Even funnier is that the House turned their cafeteria over to a private company back in 1980 and has since received $1.2 million in commission as well as food and service that draws many from the Senate.

If only the RNC was savvy enough to use this stuff in commercials.

UPDATE: Jonah Goldberg has written a great article about this ironic turn as well as a few other notable government failures.

Obama Phenomenon Reinforces Liberal Stereotypes

If progressive minded people have tired of being branded hopelessly naive souls held hostage to their emotions then Obamamania certainly comes at a bad time.

300 million people in the United States and the Democrats choose one with next to no experience and a host of formidable skeletons in his closet. Why? Because he sounds good (though the unspoken offer to forever absolve one's white liberal guilt helps).

Here's a 15 second, simple, and straightforward commercial I'd love to hear from the inept marketing wing of the RNC:

At one time liberals thought Welfare sounded good.

They also thought public housing projects sounded good.

Many liberals still think New Age music sounds good.

And now they want Barack Obama to be the most powerful man in the world. Why? Because he sounds good.

Back here on Earth that's not going to cut it.

Don't vote Jackass this November.


Yesterday Mark Steyn had a great article that I'd suggest to everybody.

After quoting Obama's comment that people should remember this day as the day America began caring for it's sick Steyn noted that 47 people in the audience for Obama's speech were taken to the hospital for nausea, fainting, etc..

Not only does it highlight how pathetically hyper-emotional these people can be , but it raises a great point about "universal" healthcare. If Barack Obama works 47 people up into a frenzy of self-congratulation so intense they're hospitalized, should we as taxpayers have to foot the bill for that? Should genuinely sick people have to wait in line behind these space cadets while simultaneously chipping in for their care?

I would think the answer would be obvious, but then again it doesn't sound as good..

Self-Explanatory Video On Immigration Costs

Dem's Letting Men Into Women's Locker Rooms

I keep saying it, but it doesn't always sink in: You don't have to be a rabid, hardly housebroken liberal to advance radical liberal causes. If you vote for Democrats and aren't actively working to marginalize their whacked out base then the radicals will be making the policies. Why? Because they care more about it than you. Activists find their reason for living in their pet causes, hence they spend ridiculous amounts of time and money in lobbying efforts to scare spineless politicians into caving to them.

That's how we get a story like this one in Colorado where their Democratic governor just signed a bill mandating "equal access" to all public facilities, including bathrooms and locker rooms. This means ladies, that if you're at the bar with your girlfriends and some creepy guy won't stop hitting on you, forget about heading to the bathroom to get away from him, he might just come with. If that strikes you as ridiculous there's more than enough people ready to call you "insensitive", "non-inclusive", and even "intolerant".

There's no way the majority of Democratic legislators who passed this bill actually believe it's a good thing, they are just operationally sissified by the dictates of a liberal worldview that forbids passing any judgements exept those against anti-non-judgementalists.

On the Bright Side...

How "Chad Davis" Celebrated Memorial Day

This Memorial Day, while people across the country were paying their respects to our fallen soldiers, liberal troll "Chad Davis" found time to visit my blog and remind us all why "liberal" is still a dirty word.

In response to my posting on soldiers being harassed on D.C. public transit "Chad" wrote:

Oh no. Thugs who murdered innocent civilians are being verbally abused while riding a train. Too bad they can't make them pose in shameful ways and strip them of their civil rights.

May 26, 2008 9:50 AM

While Chad is to be commended for getting out of bed before noon, his sentiments are obviously repulsive.

Of course there's always a chorus ready to whine: "But that's just one person. He's not indicative of the rest of us!" Perhaps your everyday liberal shouldn't have to answer for somebody like "Chad's" particular hissy fits, but they still need to answer for this fact: While most liberals don't hate America or our troops, most people who hate America or our troops are liberals.

How many negative correlations do you suppose it takes before decent everyday liberals and Democrats begin to question how they could have so many allies who also happen to be adversaries of civil society.

As a liberal or Democrat today you know that:

-Nearly everytime you see somebody on the news rioting with a bandana over their face (or rioting period), they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime somebody is caught illegally soliciting votes from incarcerated felons, they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime somebody physically assaults or shouts down a speaker on a college campus, they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime someone's "political speech" entails a public sex act, they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime a Hollywood star enters rehab, or otherwise sets a new low for human behavior, they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime someone burns a political figure in effigy, they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime someone files a nuisance lawsuit against Christmas displays, they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime somebody defaces a military recruiting office, they're on your side.

-Nearly everytime a foreign dictator expresses their preference in an American presidential race, they're on your side.

-Most of the time (70%) when military personnel and their families step into the voting box, they're not voting for your side (Based on '04 presidential race).

I don't know about you, but any one of those would make me think twice about such an association.

On the Bright Side...

This week's On the Bright Side... is a real quick, but beautiful video (as always let it download a few seconds first):



Past On the Bright Sides...:

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More of the Left Supporting The Troops

Via Little Green Footballs below I've got a letter sent to military personnel in the D.C. area from the DOT's Transit Administration regarding the harassment of members of the military on D.C. transit.

How pathetic that this happens in our nation's capitol. Even more pathetic though is that fellow passengers would let something like this go on without responding in such a way as to make national news. I'd like to see a headline like: LOCAL ACTIVIST THREATENS SOLDIER, IS STRIPPED NAKED AND BEATEN WITH NEWSPAPERS BY SUBWAY MOB

One of the incidents involved a female member who was berated on the train and again on the platform by an activist. Assuming it was a man who did this I wouldn't think twice about putting him down. As for the repercussions of that, do you really think a jury wouldn't understand?

Here's the letter:

Washington D.C.
Dept of Transportation Federal Transit Administration sends:

Recently, there have been local incidents in which military personnel have been verbally assaulted while commuting on the Metro. Uniformed members have been approached by individuals expressing themselves as anti-government, shouting anti-war sentiments, and using racial slurs against minorities.

In one instance, a member was followed onto the platform by an individual who continued to berate her as she exited the metro station. Thus far, these incidents have occurred in the vicinity of the Reagan National Airport and Eisenhower Ave metro stations on the yellow line, however, military members should be vigilant and aware of their surroundings at all times while in mass transit.

Should you be approached by any individuals expressing anti-government/anti-war sentiments, or any other types of direct verbal assault, immediately notify your local police jurisdiction. If riding metro, exit the train at the next stop, distance yourself from the individual, and notify the Metro Transit Police Department. ...

Here are a few friendly reminders of personal protective measures that can help you to stay safe:

- If possible, do not commute in uniform (military members)

- Do not display DoD building passes, “hot cards”, or personal identification in open view outside of the workplace

- Do not discuss specifics about your occupation to outside solicitors

- Always try to remain in well lit, well populated train cars if traveling via metro

- Be vigilant at all times!

V/R,
National Operations Center

A Dynamite Rebuke of the Democrats by One of Their Own

Check out Joe Lieberman's round denunciation of his former party's foreign policy in today's Wall Street Journal.

He puts the evolution of their current defeatism in a timeline that begins with the strong stances of Roosevelt, Truman, and Kennedy, then ends with the appeasment mentality of Barack Obama.

That he called out Obama by name in the Wall Street Journal is no small sidenote. That he then went on to praise McCain drives the nail further.

Let's See How Much Press This Press Release Gets

ADVISORY: Dr. Arthur Robinson (OISM) to Release Names of over 30,000 Scientists Rejecting Global Warming Hypothesis


May 15, 2008 12:39 PM EDT


Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine (OISM)


Who: Dr. Arthur Robinson of the OISM


What: release of names in OISM "Petition Project"


When: 10 AM, Monday May 19


Where: Holeman Lounge at the National Press Club, 529 14th St., NW, Washington, DC


Why: the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine (OISM) will announce that more than 31,000 scientists have signed a petition rejecting claims of human-caused global warming. The purpose of OISM's Petition Project is to demonstrate that the claim of "settled science" and an overwhelming "consensus" in favor of the hypothesis of human-caused global warming and consequent climate damage is wrong. No such consensus or settled science exists. As indicated by the petition text and signatory list, a very large number of American scientists reject this hypothesis.


It is evident that 31,072 Americans with university degrees in science - including 9,021 PhDs, are not "a few." Moreover, from the clear and strong petition statement that they have signed, it is evident that these 31,072 American scientists are not "skeptics."


CONTACT: Audrey Mullen, +1-703-548-1160, for the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine


/PRNewswire-USNewswire -- May 15/


SOURCE Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine

Ridiculous Abuse of Power by Child Protective Services

I realize that Child Protective Services are necessary to protect children from parents who are chronically irresponsible and perhaps criminally minded. However I also realize that sometimes the providers of such services can get so caught up in the righteousness of their intentions that they actually make things worse.

Here is one instance where it sounds like that was the case:

In April a University of Michigan archaelogy professor took his seven year old son to a Detroit Tigers game and ended up forcibly removed from his chid, wife, and home. If it sounds strange, that's because it is.

During the game the man made the honest mistake of buying his son a Mike's Hard Lemondade from the refreshment stand. He said he had never heard of the brand before and had no idea it contained 5 percent alcohol.

After a security guard spotted the boy with the bottle and notified the father, the two were rushed to the hospital via ambulance. If that sounds like overkill, that's because it is. Still the boy was cleared as being in normal health.

Unfortunately a police supervisor recommended the case be turned over to the Child Protective Services. The CPS came to the hospital and took the child, keeping him in their custody for three days before a judge ordered him returned home to his mother (also a U of M professor) against CPS's requests.

Still the judge set the condition that the father must leave the house. He was forced to live in a hotel and not allowed to see his family until things were finally settled five days later.


I call gross misuse of power on the police supervisor, the CPS, and the judge here.

Obama Caught Fibbin

One News Story, About Ten Arguments Against Liberalism

Sometimes a story comes along where you don't even need to say anything to make your point. This is one of those stories.

You can read all the details here, but here's the short version:
Afghan guys hijack a plane. They fly it to England and threaten to kill passengers unless granted asylum. England jails them then releases them. English government gives them roughly $300,000 a year to live on. British Airways hires one of the men to work at Heathrow Airport.


"Thank you for choosing British Airways"

On the Bright Side...

This week's On the Bright Side... brings you to sunny Florida where the Marlins have found themselves with the poorest fan attendance in major league baseball.

Their latest attempt to turn that around has also turned a lot of heads.
Check it out:


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Yesterday Was Perfect

George Will had a great article yesterday which made a great point.

His point is that those who drink the global warming Kool-Aid and those who are screaming bloody murder about the housing "crisis" both make one huge assumption. The huge assumption is that they can identify when things were perfect.

Temperatures around the globe have been in constant flux since the beginning of time, but the rabid environmentalists are of the opinion that the temperature we just passed was perfect. People in Siberia might not agree.

There's pluses and minuses of any climate change. Higher rates of tropical disease may come with rising temps, but cold weather also stresses the immune system as people stay indoors more.

Some coastal areas might have to retreat from rising tides, but usable land will emerge from beneath ice sheets in places like Canada or Greenland where melting ice has revealed signs of former civilization.

Likewise, those people reporting lower housing prices with ever more grave expressions completely rule out the possibility that home prices were too high to begin with.

The Economist reported back in '05 that worldwide home prices had been growing faster than they ever had in history and that we should prepare for

Will asks whether a young couple looking for their first house would consider the lower prices to be a "crisis".

It's slightly ironic that the left has made such hay from falling home prices while simultaneously proclaiming themselves the champions of the poor. Every dollar the average home price drops is -to borrow their terminology- one step closer we come to universal "access" to home ownership.

Tom Wolfe On Bush and Reagan

Here's an interesting clip of iconic author Tom Wolfe being interviewed about his opinions on America and Presidents Bush and Reagan.

He makes some rather obvious points that you're unlikely to hear many other people of his prestige in the literary world (though there might not be any of those living) making.

Watch it here

More of the Wright Stuff

Here's some more Reverend Jeremiah Wright quotes from the past via The Weekly Standard. Considering that Wright warned Obama his church might be too perceived as too radical and now that it's public knowledge Oprah left because of such rhetoric, it's going to be hard for Obama to weasel out of the horrible judgement charge:

--"White supremacy is the bed rock of the philosophical, ideological and theological foundations of this country."

--"Some analysts would go so far as to even call what [the United States, the G-8, and multinational corporations] are doing [in Africa] genocide!"

--He referred to the "sick and myopic arrogance called Western History."


--"We need to educate our children to the reality of white supremacy.

We need to educate our children about the white supremacist's foundations of the educational system.

When the levees in Louisiana broke alligators, crocodiles and piranha swam freely through what used to be the streets of New Orleans. That is an analogy that we need to drum into the heads of our African American children (and indeed all children!).

In the flood waters of white supremacy ... there are also crocodiles, alligators and piranha!

The policies with which we live now and against which our children will have to struggle in order to bring about "the beloved community," are policies shaped by predators.

We lay a foundation, deconstructing the household of white supremacy with tools that are not the master's tools. We lay the foundation with hope. We deconstruct the vicious and demonic ideology of white supremacy with hope. Our hope is not built on faith-based dollars, empty liberal promises or veiled hate-filled preachments of the so-called conservatives. Our hope is built on Him who came in the flesh to set us free."

Hey, at least he said "empty liberal promises". Maybe he's only 90% crazy.

On the Bright Side...

This week's On the Bright Side... is a video journal shot and narrated by the father of a baby born with serious health problems. What will strike you is the amazingly positive outlook the parents maintain in the face of such trying circumstances:


Past On the Bright Sides...:

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What Say the Environmentalists About This?

Here's some pictures from the Arizona desert after a group of immigrants moved through:

Former Gitmo Detainee Commits Suicide Attack in Iraq

A former Guantanamo Bay detainee recently released by the Kuwaiti government was found to have committed a recent suicide bombing in Iraq.

Apparently 36 other released detainees have been found to be fighting against us already. I just read that a few more than 200 prisoners have been released so far making it almost a 20% "recidivism" rate. 20% is pretty bad when you're dealing with terrorists rather than petty criminals.

Did Farrakhan Admit Nation of Islam's Responsibility for Malcolm X's Death?

Please forgive me for being about 13 years late on this point, but if I'd never heard such a thing before then I suppose there's a good chance many of you didn't either.

This came to my attention via this Christopher Hitchens article in Slate today. The article primarily asks how sure we are that Michelle Obama isn't a rather radical influence on her husband. He cites her college thesis announcing how influenced she was by the definition of black "separationism" put forth by Stokely Carmichael and Charles Hamilton.

What jumped out at me though was his reference to a 1995 film called Brother Minister in which a secretly taped Louis Farrakhan says to a group at the Nation of Islam Temple in Chicago: "Did you teach Malcolm? . . . Did you clean up Malcolm? . . . Was Malcolm your traitor or ours? And if we dealt with him like a nation deals with a traitor, what the hell business is it of yours?"

This seems to me like something so explosive that it would have become common knowledge immediately, much less after 13 years. Half of America knows who uttered "Hymietown", but few seem to know about this?

This also turns Reverend Jeremiah Wright from a loudmouth idiot into a much darker character once his close affiliation with Farrakhan is considered.

Was anybody else aware of this?

Some of the More Hysterical Reactions To Hillary's New Ad

Hillary recently sent out a mailer raising questions about Barack Obama's anti-gun rhetoric. You can't help but laugh at some of the responses.

Click on this link to read a couple Obama supporters unbelievably petty comments on the ad.

Gitmo The "Worst In History"?

So I was glancing through my Yahoo homepage when I saw a headline saying a freed Sudanese cameraman declared Gitmo the worst jail in history.

My first thought was why in the world would Yahoo make such an obviously egregious exaggeration one of their five or six headlines? Though in retrospect I suppose I know the answer. The second thought I had flashed back to "Midnight Express".

Let's get this straight: This man is from one of if not the lowliest country in the world; a country in which slavery still exists and in which a full fledged mass genocide has been going now for years. Still it is "news" when he decides to denounce the Taj Mahal of prisons as history's worst.

I decided to do a search for info on Sudanese prisons for comparison's sake and here is what I found from the BBC:

-Firstly the Sudanese govt. has long refused any international inspection of their prisons, which is certainly not a good sign.

-The Sudan co-ordinator of Justice Africa states that "inmates are treated like slaves".

-There are no beds and no clean drinking water while many prisons lack showers or toilets.

-On top of all that there are no roofs on the prisons, so inmates are exposed to the African sun with the only relief coming from sheets.

It appears there really is nothing so ridiculous that it can't be overlooked by liberals when making America look bad is at stake.

Yahoo should really think a little harder about the intelligence of their readers before trying to pass this stuff off.

**Thanks to Weasel Zippers for linking to this post.**

Who's More Generous, Liberals or Conservatives?

Check out this ABC News video on charitable giving patterns. Would you think the compassionate liberals or the cold-hearted conservatives give more of their income to charity? How's about donating blood?
Watch and find out:

On the Bright Side....

For this week's "On the Bright Side..." I've got three cases of autistic individuals who will blow you away. You've just got to see them to believe it.

While these are uplifting stories, the sad part is that there's still people who think even the possibility of an autistic or otherwise disabled child is cause for an abortion (Heck, many of them think you shouldn't even have to have a reason). Even worse some of these people think that's a compassionate stance and that they're somehow "saving" them the pain of their existence.

Luckily the tide of public opinion has been turning against abortion as people's eyes are opened up to more and more stories like this about human resiliance.

Here's Derek Paravicini, a blind and severly autistic piano player who can perfectly play any song by ear that he's ever heard:


You'll be amazed by Stephen Wiltshire, an autistic man who can draw anything he sees from memory in amazing complexity:


And there's no way I can go without adding the story of the now infamous J-Mac, the autistic high-school basketball manager who the coach decided to put in in the last quarter of the last game of the season:

Immigration Tensions Rise Around The World

Turns out it's not just "bitter" gunslingers and bible thumpers that are uneasy with generally unrestricted immigration from third-world countries.

This past month has seen several stories in international papers about growing frustrations with lax immigration policies. Americans would be smart to pay attention as these countries are are the "progressive" models that stateside liberals strive so much to emulate.

From the UK's Daily Mail we read:

Almost two-thirds of British residents fear race relations are so poor that tensions are likely to spill over into violence, the BBC has found.
Of 1,000 men and women polled, 59 per cent said the UK had too many immigrants and almost half - 49 per cent - wanted foreigners to be encouraged to leave.

and:

The findings are very close to those of other recent polls. Earlier this month, a YouGov survey found four-fifths of the population - 83 per cent - considers there is an "immigration crisis".

That poll, carried out for Channel Four's Dispatches, found 69 per cent of the population thinks special treatment of immigrants causes British people to "lose out".

Another Daily Mail article states:

One in every five murders or manslaughters in England and Wales is committed by a foreigner, police figures revealed.

In one area of London, the figure is one in three.

This is despite the fact that foreigners represent only around one in 16 of the general population.

Among the most high-profile cases was that of Roberto Malasi, an 18-year-old Angolan asylum seeker who shot dead a 33-year-old woman as she cradled her baby niece at a christening in south London.

Malasi went on the run and two weeks later stabbed to death an 18-year-old pastor's daughter who he felt had "disrespected" him.

From Canada's Globe and Mail we read:

A majority of Canadians say their country bends too much in trying to make visible minorities feel at home, even as voters pat themselves on the back for being a welcoming society.

According to the poll, 61 per cent of those surveyed believe that Canada makes too many accommodations for visible minorities. In Quebec, 72 per cent of those surveyed feel that way.

So there's nothing uniquely American about our hesitancy to open our doors and entitlement rolls to just anybody. On the contrary we take in more immigrants every year than the rest of the world combined.

Conservatives Are Happier Than Liberals

As I've noted before, conservatives have reported being happier than liberals in each of the past 35 years that such data has been collected by the General Social Survey. If it was just "most" years then there might be room for argument on the merits, but 35 straight years? Nope. Sorry, there's no arguing here.

Today this article in the Economist goes into detail about why this is the case.

They question Arthur Brooks, a Syracuse professor, regarding his book "Gross National Happiness". He finds that parenthood and religiosity are both strongly correlated to happiness and are more likely among conservatives.

He also goes on to hypothesize that conservatives are more likely to be optimistic about the future and feel more in control of their lives. Liberals on the other hand tend to associate themselves with one victim group or another and are depressed as such.

These findings were also recently reinforced by the finding that gun-owners were happier than their unarmed peers. Gun-owners are also more likely to consider themselves self-sufficient and in control of their own destinies.

This all makes perfect sense to me, but some people still can't get over the idea of conservatives as "bigoted", "intolerant", "angry", etc.. Projection anybody?

Professor Brooks also found that liberals are quite a bit more likely than conservatives to say that they not only don't like opposite points of view, but that they don't like the PEOPLE who hold those views.

This also makes sense as you don't read about liberal speakers being hit with pies, shouted down, or physically attacked. Last week an unhinged Bush basher actually punched a wheelchair bound girl during a protest. These stories are rather familiar to conservatives, but don't often make it into the mass media.

Think we're going to see any marches against liberal intolerance anytime soon?

What's the funniest about all of this though has been the comments by liberals on the Economist website and sites like Digg regarding this article.

One reader brought up the "fact" that people in Mexico and El Salvador are happier than American. That seems highly unlikely considering how many of them are trying to move here. This happy liberal reader's handle was "jeff666". Go figure.

Another happy liberal reader writes: The verdict is in and you're guilty as charged: Conservatives are happier for two reasons: 1. Because secretly they don't give a shit about America and 2.) You're just too stupid to see when something is wrong. You know. Like Iraq. All you motherfuckers thought that was a great idea. And look how well that went.

Another compassionate, happy liberal writes: So are Down's Syndrome people(happy)

More: "I don't have to be married and go to Church to be happier..
I'm quite fine with the occasional Vegas trip and hooker motif!",

"This could just as easily have been titled "Why stupid people are happier than smart people."

"Bottom line, conservatives are more likely to lie and imitate a happy person."

Roseanne Barr Calls For Rioting At Democratic Convention

It's unlikely anybody noticed, but Roseanne Barr has joined Air America Radio Network. Well she's wasted no time in reminding us all why liberal radio is doomed to failure (All emotion, no reason).

In a recent segment she opined that Democrats should recreate the Chicago riot of 1968 at this year's convention in Denver. She said she would participate and would also spend some of her own money to make it happen.

Here's her words: I mean I think somebody’s profiting by keeping us all divided and making us feel like oh my God we don’t even know what to believe what we’re reading what’s true. But you know, we have a lot of power and there is a Democratic Convention in Denver in just a short time and we should a bunch of us go there and repeat the Democratic Convention from Chicago. Like, let’s just cause a bunch of trouble. Let's wrest back our government from what, six or seven you know guys like McCain and Romney and Bush from the top. Let’s just go take it. It’s ours. Nobody gives it to you, you just go take it. Let’s meet in Denver and let’s do it.


Soooo... her reasoning for the rioting was to "take back" the country from Bush, Cheney, Romney, etc.. How flaunting your lunacy - and at a Democratic convention nonetheless- would further that goal though is beyond me.

And we thought they couldn't go any lower than adding Jerry Springer to the rotation. Gooooooooo Dems!

Democrats and Islamic Fundamentalists Make the Same Error

Here's a little parody video called "Arab Girls Gone Wild" that should serve to remind people how we can bend and make concessions to Muslim sensibilities until we're blue in the face, but still never meet in the middle.

The reason I say in the title that Democrats and Islamic fundamentalists make the same mistake is this: They both favor "compulsory virtue", an oxymoron if I've ever heard one. Of course virtue by definition cannot be forced, yet we're constantly bombarded from the Left with instance that welfare is a necessity for a "moral society", that reducing carbon emissions is a "moral imperative", "diversity" trumps fairness in the classroom and the workplace, etc..

It's not enough for Islamic fundamentalists to preach the virtue of female modesty. Instead they pass laws REQUIRING it and often punishing the disobeyers with violence or even death. Even in Europe we have seen women beaten or killed by family members for their immodesty.

I'm all for virtue in environmental issues, treatment of the less fortunate, female modesty, etc., but all that goes out the window when you decide you're going to impose that on somebody.

Congratulations! You Can Keep Your Money Now.

Whether you were aware of it or not, until the middle of last week you weren't working for yourself, but instead the federal government. The nearly four months worth of wages prior were what it took to pay your cumulative taxes.

April 23rd was this year's National Tax Freedom Day. Depending on what state you live in your specific date may be earlier or later.

Below is a graph of Tax Freedom Days over the past 26 years. Notice the very clear incline during the Clinton years(1992-2000) and a very dramatic decline after the Bush tax cuts took effect. (Click on the picture for a closer look)

The 60's Are Over and They Were a Disaster. You're Not Saving the World, You're Just A Mess.

In trying to dismiss the fact that Barack Obama launched his political career at the home of an ultra-radical domestic terrorist, I've heard it said several times that this was simply a "right of passage" and not reflective of him.

Just how depraved does an organization have to be to have a "rite of passage" that runs through the home of a couple that saluted Charles Manson, told hippies "kill your parents", and still waxes nostalgic over it all?

They're elite Democrats, that's what they do...seriously.

In a somewhat related vein you might remember gonzo journalist extraordinaire Hunter Thompson's incredibly twisted earthly exit back in 2005. He shot himself while on the phone with his wife and while his son and grandson were in the house with him. A real stand-up guy.

Anyways, something stuck out to me about his bizarre funeral. It wasn't just that Johnny Depp threw a $2.5 million funeral complete with blow-up sex dolls and a 15 story tower (made to look like a fist clenching a peyote button) to shoot Thompson's ashes into the sky before an invite-only crowd, but that John Kerry was there. John Kerry? As in the Democrats' last idea of leadership material?

You have to wonder, if Kerry had won would he still have attended? A "Mission Accomplished" banner was a little much, but how would a picture of an American president look with Blow Up Betty floating in the background?

Historian Doug Brinkley spoke of Thompson:

"He's got more friends than anyone else I know," Brinkley (Historian Doug) continues, counting off names like George McGovern, Sandy Berger and former president Jimmy Carter and his family. Thompson introduced Billy Carter to Heineken, according to Brinkley.

Last summer, Thompson also became friends with then-presidential candidate John Kerry. At a campaign stop in Colorado, Brinkley recalls, Kerry said, "I'm here to announce today my candidate for vice-president is Hunter S. Thompson." "

Unfortunately for millions of everyday Democrats across the country the elites of their party are still so helplessly lovestruck with 60's nostalgia that they refuse to grow up and recognize depravity as depravity.

Let's take a few Democrats from the absolute top of the heap and see if we can't find a pattern:

BARACK OBAMA-
*His former "mentor", Frank Marshall Davis, was an avowed Marxist and member of the Communist Party of the United States.

*For the past 20 years he has attended and given significant financial support to a church in which the pastor - a former muslim and black nationalist - has now been heard to have denounced "Amerikkka" in the harshest of ways.

*His wife, an Ivy League graduate making over $350,000 a year, languished for twenty some years before pride in her country surfaced.

*He has a cordial relationship with a man who once bombed our Pentagon and regrets that he "didn't do enough".

*Some of his enthusiastic volunteers were seen on the news with a flag bearing the likeness of the murderous Che Guevara hanging in their office.

*His campaign's official blogger flies the Communist Party flag at his apartment and publishes his work in a "revolutionary Marxist journal".

*His campaign's technology advisor recently created a video with a gay Jesus getting hit by a bus. He also hopes to advance the idea of "digital communism".

JOHN KERRY-
*Met with Vietcong officials in Paris while American troops were still fighting in Vietnam.

*Accepted donations from the designated Albanian terrorist group the KLA. (The leader of the KLA, know as "Snake", was later a guest at the Democratic National Convention)

BILL CLINTON-
*Pardoned 16 Marxist Puerto Rican terrorists who organized over 100 bombings in the U.S., killing six and injuring 130. Some of the terrorists even threatened the judge in their trial.

*Pardoned two domestic terrorists associated with the subversive Weather Underground. One participated in a string of bombings and the other aided a bank robbery that left one guard and two police officers dead.

*Invited terrorist sympathizer and unlikely billionaire Yasser Arafat to the White House.

*His wife did pro-bono work defending two Black Panthers in their trial for torturing and murdering one of their members for "disloyalty".

JIMMY CARTER-
*Has met with on friendly terms with socialist dictator Hugo Chavez.

*Invited genocidal dictator Robert Mugabe to the White House.

*Met North Korean leader Kim il Sung and assured the U.S. that North Korea didn't have weaponized nuclear ambitions (Oops)

*Met with communist dictator Fidel Castro.

*Met with Yasser Arafat.

*Recently traveled to Syria and embraced leaders of the terrorist regime Hamas against strong warnings by the State Department.

*Will surely have done something else despicable by the time I finish typing this.


There is an undoubtable pattern here of association with, sympathy for, or at the very least a lack reasonable animosity towards the most anti-American of sentiments. How this pattern either doesn't register with or doesn't bother the majority of Democrats who vote for these people escapes my comprehension.

Sure Republicans can be seen with the like of Chinese leaders and Saudi princes who are surely not good guys. The difference here -and it's a huge one- is that in the case of a Saudia Arabia or a China there's an unquestionable economic advantage for all Americans when such relationships are normalized and cordial. There are few if any benefits to friendliness with Castro for instance or Robert Mugabe.

I've heard it said that a liberal is one so open minded that their brain falls out. I think we can make a case.

On the Bright Side....

“We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.” Viktor Frankl


For those of you who haven't already seen it, this week's shot of positvity comes from a 25 year-old girl from Ireland named Sophie Merry. Now electronic/dance music isn't really my thing, but no matter what your musical tastes you can't help but be impressed by the show she puts on here. It's a refreshingly happy dance that matches the music wonderfully. Watch the whole thing (3:42) because it gets better as it goes. This is what someone doing something almost perfectly looks like.

Too Perfect: Gun Owners Have More Money and Are Happier Than Non-Gun Owners

It's almost become a law of the universe that any time there's a nugget of liberal "common sense" everybody thinks they know, it turns out to be wrong.

Unemployment for the disabled rose after the American's With Disabilities Act, we had an export surplus during the Great Depression, mandatory bike helmet laws rang in an increase in bicycle-related head injuries,the top 25 most charitable states turned out to ALL be "red" states, etc...(Click here for an exhaustive list)

Now, after Barack Obama let slip what every liberal is thinking about those "bitter", gun owning, churchgoing, know-nothings; that too has met it's factual refutation.

The Wall Street Journal had a precious article yesterday citing the massive data collected by the General Social Survey. As liberal luck would have it gun owners are just as educated as non-gun owners and actually have 32% higher incomes than their un-armed counterparts.

The Journal went on to point out that they're happier as well: "In 2006, 36% of gun owners said they were "very happy," while 9% were "not too happy." Meanwhile, only 30% of people without guns were very happy, and 16% were not too happy."
They suggest that perhaps part of the reason gun owners are happier is because they have a greater sense of self-reliance.

They made a point to stress that gun-owners don't simply care about themselves though. Gun owners were more likely to donate to charity, donate blood, and more likely to strongly agree that they would "endure all things" for the one they loved.

You would think liberals would be demoralized after consistently seeing their preconceptions go up in smoke- oh that's right they are.

Sex Changes For Kids Now

Via Conservative Grapevine, in this almost unbelivable story you'll read about a doctor at Children's Hospital in Boston who is, with the help of horomone injections, intentionally delaying the onset of puberty in children until they can definitively choose what gender they want to be.

It seems almost every day you get another little peek at the brave new world that progressives envision, or at the very least necessarily have no rationale for stopping.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a star athlete when I grew up. Does this mean I got screwed out of steroid and growth horomone therapy? Where's John Edwards when I need him?

PETA Wants You To Grow Your Meat

No that's not another tasteless junk-mail headline for insecure men, but instead the literal aim of a new PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) initiative.

They are offering a $1 million prize to whoever can create a meat product grown in a laboratory and indistinguishable from it's naturally derived counterpart. The product can only use starter cells taken from an animal and no more.

Apparently this has caused an uproar in the PETA ranks particularly among the food purists who abhor messing with nature. These are the same people who push organic foods and shun genetically/hormonally enhanced meat.

While the PETA campaign might draw some attention I don't think it's going to be the catalyst in any development. I would imagine that while a million bucks is nothing to sniff at, such a product would be worth hundreds of times that. If it can be made then I assume somebody is already on their way to making it.

So what do you think? Do you have a problem with lab produced meat or does it turn your stomach?

Or do you wanna wrap yourself in it like this girl just to spite PETA?

Think Somebody Is Trying To Send Them A Message?

I guess Earth Day festivities took a bit of a hit yesterday in Edmonton, where the cold weather kept people home. Naturally the main thrust of the event was to combat supposed man-made global warming.

This is not the first time a global warming event was got a chilly reception.

In '04 Gore gave a much ballyhooed speech in New York City on one of the coldest days in the city's history. And in February of last year a House hearing on global warming was canceled due to a blizzard.

Then there was also the story last year where a pair that set out for the North Pole to "bring attention to global warming" had to turn back after encountering temperatures as low as 100 degrees below zero. One of the pair had to have three toes amputated due to frostbite. Not surprisingly she blamed the cold weather on the "unpredictability" wrought by global warming.

Perhaps the big man upstairs wants to send a message that misleading people for political power and self-aggrandizement doesn't sit so well.

Here's a nice little clip about the hype:

On the Bright Side...

“We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.” -Viktor Frankl


Last weekend I also had a post called "On the Bright Side.." with a couple impressive stories of perserverance and achievement. I think I'm going to make it an every Saturday thing because as I said before, people are way too negative about way too much lately.

So enjoy three great ones from Britain's Got Talent:








I guess this last guy, Paul Potts, won the whole thing last year and got to perform for the Queen. The first guy, Andrew Johnston, is in this years season presently.

John Wayne Doesn't Play That "Progressive" Crap

Some of you might have heard clips of this before, but it's worth hearing again.

Listen as a tipsy John Wayne reacts to liberal student shenanigans at Columbia University. He saw way back then that the left was squelching debate and called on decent men to stand up to them.

How do you think he'd react today upon hearing that conservative speakers around the country are shouted down, dis-invited, and several times have been assaulted at college campuses just because liberal students can't bear to have their worldview challenged?

Did Obama Flip Hillary Off?

You obviously can't say for sure whether it was intentional, but it looks, in this video, like Obama purposely scratches his face with his middle finger during a pause in remarks about Hillary.

Whether he meant it or not it sounds like the crowd thought he did.

Turns Out Bill Clinton Pardoned Two Members of the Weather Underground

Barack Obama got hit pretty hard in the debate Wednesday night over his relationship with former radical Leftist and Weather Underground member Bill Ayers- and rightfully so.

There's no reason to have any cordial association with such a man regardless if he's your neighbor or even your in-law. Obama has shown himself to be at best a push-over who can't muster the courage to assert himself if for no other reason than to improve his prospects or at worst a radical sixties retread with an extreme agenda.

What didn't come up Wednesday was the fact that Bill Clinton pardoned two members of the Weather Underground in his final hours in office.

He pardoned Linda Evans, imprisoned for her participation in several bombings and Susan Rosenberg who participated in a bank robbery that left two police officers and a guard dead.

How's about next election the Democrats just don't even consider nominating anybody with sympathetic ties to radical terrorists? Is it really that hard? It speaks volumes about the elite of the Democratic Party that they can't come up with any candidates with semi-clean records.

You will recall that their last candidate, John Kerry, met with North Vietnamese communists in France while American soldiers were still dying. During his campaign in 2004 he also met with a member of the known Albanian terrorist group the KLA and gladly took his campaign contributions.

And of course there's former Democratic President embracing Hamas leaders this weekend in Syria against strong objections from the State Department.

This has to really eat away at everyday Democrats who still hold some semblance of patriotic sentiment.

The Man Who Made Me a Conservative

About six-and-a-half years ago I was just out of college and pretty much politically ambivalent. If anything I leaned Democrat just because my family and community did. I even voted for our abysmal, current Democratic governor in 2002 over what I then saw as his correct position in opposition to school vouchers.

Though my years in the school district might have eventually done the job without him, I can credit my conversion to conservatism largely to one man: Thomas Sowell.

I recall I was flipping through our local newspaper and came across the uncharted territory of the "Opinion" section. I must have been bored because I set in to an article by Dr. Sowell.

I don't recall the topic, I just remember that it made so much sense I read it several times. To make a long story short I've read every article since, as well as the majority of his books. He is, in my opinion, the most formidable living American intellectual and a national treasure.

Read today's Thomas Sowell article and you'll see how his no-nonsense style and knack for attacking politically incorrect issues with common sense can open eyes.

Then I strongly urge you to watch this series of short (5 min.) "Uncommon Knowledge" interviews with Dr. Sowell called "Facts and Fallacies". You won't be disappointed:

Part 1: Feminist Rhetoric vs. Reality

Part 2: Lying With Income Statistics

Part 3: Problems With College Professors

Part 4: Soaring Tuition

Part 5: Black Crime Rates

Does This Cancel Al Gore Out?

Check out the graph below and notice the total absence of correlation between levels of carbon in the atmosphere and temperatures over the past nine years.


The violet line is the observed temperature change from the UK's Hadley Climate Research Unit. The blue line is the observed temperature change from NASA's MSU satellite. The green line is the observed CO2 level.

CLICK ON IT FOR A CLOSER LOOK


This graph was included in a letter to the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change from a group that includes a Nobel Peace Prize recipient. The letter challenged the panel to acknowledge that there "is no observational evidence in measured data going back 22,000 years or even millions of years that CO2 levels (whether from man or nature) have driven or are driving world temperatures or climate change."

You can read the letter here, because you know you won't hear about it on the news.

Kick the Butt, Pass the Bong

In sort of a follow up to the last post about government issued medical marijuana below, I looked into California's marijuana program.

I came across a "Frequently Asked Questions" section on their official site and found that they allow minors to receive and smoke medical marijuana with parental consent.

Now were these same minors to receive and smoke cigarettes (usually filtered by the way) from their parents a misdemeanor would have been committed.

Anybody else find this kind of surprising given California's stridency in anti-smoking legislation? In some municipalities they've even banned smoking in public parks and homes.

Uh-oh, I foresee another advocate standoff brewing.

Surprise Surprise, Pot Smokers Not Paying Their Debts

In a story that could just as easily be from The Onion, Canadian news is reporting that two-thirds of citizens receiving government issued marijuana are delinquent in their payments for it. One would imagine the checks they did get had Cheeto fingerprints and smelled of patchouli.

Really? Nobody foresaw this?

Even your local, corner drug dealer, working with a 6th grade education, knows better than to take IOU's from a user.

But such is the inevitable progression of socialism. Once people begin to expect cradle-to-grave support from the government, you're gonna have a hard time getting them to take any responsibility whatsoever, even for their weed.

Viva socialized medicine!

On The Bright Side...

One of my all-time favorite quotes/passages is this one from Viktor Frankl:

“We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.”

I wish kids memorized this one in school like the Gettysburg Address or the Kama Sutra... whatever they're teaching these days.

Too many people today are getting caught up in the gloom and doom alarmism about the economy and such, while forgetting they're in control of their own lives, not to mention already in the greatest country in the world.

Here's two clips of people that beautifully illustrate that life is what you make of it:




The second clip you're going to have to click on, but it's well worth it.
Watch this very inspiring clip of a rock 'n' roll group made up of senior citizens here.



....................................................................................

Liberals Tripping Over Each Other

Among today's progressives no designation warrants more self-righteousness than "advocate" (though "green" is gaining ground).

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "If you would lift me up you must be on higher ground." That truism certainly isn't lost on today's progressives.

Riding the gravy train of dispersed costs and concentrated benefits, advocates have found themselves wielding a surprising amount of power and influence. So what happens when progressive advocates' interests collide?

Two recent stories give us a preview of things to come as one area of advocacy (environmentalism) splinters into smaller sects with bigger illusions of self-importance.

In California it's the tree-huggers versus the solar power advocates. Here in Wisconsin it's the wind power advocates versus the Audobon Society.

This story from the left coast tells of a conundrum where a hybrid driving environmentalist is being forced to cut down his long established trees because they'll block 15% of the sun to his neighbor's proposed solar panels.

Apparently California was already so nutty back in 1978 that they put a law on the books saying solar panels trump trees.

Back here in Wisconsin super clean wind farms are meeting harsh opposition because they claim the lives of too many birds. It's unlikely that the birds will win this one though as global warming concerns supercede all others ("You're just helping some birds while I'm saving the world.")

Who knows, maybe if the global warming fanatics step on enough toes we'll see a backlash of critical analysis of the costs and the facts. We can only hope.

Pssst Barack...Your Liberalism's Showing

I've always known that Barack Obama was teeming with elitist liberalism just under the surface. Up until now however, the closest glimpse we got came not from him, but via his wife in her "first time in my adult life I'm truly proud of my country" line.

No longer. On Friday, Obama told a group of elite San Francisco liberals that small town residents in the Midwest "cling to guns or religion" because they are "bitter" about their lot in life.

This is big news and will hopefully sour independent voters on him. As for the self-described Obamaniacs, I doubt this makes even a blip. What he said is classic liberal boilerplate and they're no doubt wondering what the fuss is all about.

There's several layers of stupid in Obama's gaffe, but what sticks out most for me is the way in which he referenced religion. We already know Obama's stance on guns: he doesn't like them and thinks there should be less of them. So by using "guns" and "religion" interchangeably it's almost impossible to deny an implied negative connotation for both.

For someone who has talked and written extensively about his "faith" doesn't it seem unlikely that he'd feel the need to explain it in others? It sounded less like religion was a part his life and more like it was a peculiarity. Call me crazy, but I think Obama's religiosity has been at least partially strategic.

For a more in depth take I suggest checking out this well done article on Politico that lists 12 reasons why this was such a huge mistake.

Lottery Jackpot Winner On Welfare 3 Years Later

There's a t-shirt out there that says: "We’ll solve poverty the day after we solve laziness and stupidity."

That's obviously oversimplifying, but read this story and tell me it doesn't reinforce that sentiment a bit.

I guess a man in the UK won a 5 million pound (roughly $10 million) lottery only three years ago and is already on SKINT and BENEFITS; two of Britain's welfare plans.

Stories like these should give pause to those who think all the chronically poor need is more money thrown their way. Different people have different priorities and do different things with their money, therefore it should not surprise anyone that they end up with differing degrees of wealth.

"If you always do what you've always done you'll always get what you always got." Hence the rich keep getting richer and the chronically poor stay poor. Good habits are why over 80% of all the millionaires in America made their money during their lifetime as opposed to inheriting it. So don't envy them, emulate them.

Who's Supposed To Be Watching Jimmy Carter?

Note to our liberal friends: Whoever was supposed to make sure Jimmy Carter didn't do something mind-numbingly retarded is in big trouble.

He got out of the country again and he's making a huge mess.

WORST. PRESIDENT. EVER.

"Organic" Food Not All It's Cracked Up To Be

Just when I thought "green" was becoming a religion they go and do something reasonable.

I was very surprised to come across this article today in the "green content" section on MSN.

The article lists 6 myths about organic foods along with explanations. I simply assumed the article would be glowing with praise for the organic movement, but was taken aback to find a somewhat pessimistic take on it all.

Here are the 6 myths with my own cliff-notes explanations:

MYTH #1 ORGANIC FOOD IS ALWAYS BETTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT
Inefficient methods use twice the resources.

MYTH #2: IT'S MORE NUTRITIOUS
Studies go both ways. No proof found.

MYTH #3: IT TASTES BETTER
Taste tests show only organic apples to score better.

MYTH #4: YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE AS CAREFUL ABOUT WASHING IT.
E. coli - the worst culprit, is equally present on any produce.

MYTH #5: YOU'RE SUPPORTING SMALL FARMS OR ECO-COMPANIES
Industry largely owned by mega-companies and produce is often imported adding to eco-impact.

MYTH #6: IT'S BETTER FOR YOU
Ingredients are ingredients, regardless of how they were grown.

They did go on at the end to say that organic livestock may be treated better and that your chances of getting Mad Cow Disease, although already infinitesimal, are nil with organic beef.

Personally I've never sought out any foods because they were "organic" and have generally thought the phenomenon to be as much about the vanity of the consumer as about the environment. Nonetheless it's heartening to see that some in the media are not above critical thinking on environmental issues.

Democrats Are Blocking Their Own Border Control Bill

In a move that's almost hard to believe, Democrats in Congress are now refusing to vote on a border security bill that they themselves wrote. A whopping 49 Democrats were co-sponsors of a bill (called SAVE) beefing up the number of border patrols, outfitting them with better body armor,and expanding the social security verification system.

Now it comes time to actually put the bill to a vote and 33 of those same Democrats that co-sponsored the bill are refusing to sign off on it. Nancy Pelosi is spearheading the effort to bury this bill.

Democrat voters should hang their heads in shame, because this is about as low as they can sink.

Here is the full article at Investor's Business Daily


..

McCain Voters Have Better Musical Taste

Okay, maybe that's a tad bit subjective, but a new poll of 27,000 likely voters and radio listeners has found John McCain to have a definitive edge among those considering themselves classic rock fans.

Obama had the edge among fans of 80's and 90's rock and alternative music.

Making McCain's popularity among classic rock fans more impressive is the fact that 30% of respondents identified themselves as Democrats versus only 22% Republicans.

Makes sense to me. If a general theme could be drawn from 90's and alternative rock it would be: "Everything sucks." This, coincidentally, is the general theme of the modern Democratic party.

I left 80's rock out of that equation because it's quite a bit more upbeat (the Reagan effect naturally). Still, when compared to the classic rock of say Led Zeppelin, 80's rock may sound good, but ultimately lacks substance. This, coincidentally, is the general theme of Barack Obama's campaign.

Obama's Pastor Also Former Muslim and Black Nationalist

While I would imagine that not much more damage can be done by Obama's church affiliation, there's still some juicy side-notes popping up.

It turns out,according to the New Republic, that Reverend Jeremiah Wright was formerly a Muslim and black nationalist. This obviously makes his marching with Louis Farrakhan and meeting with Mohmar Qadaffi slightly more interesting.

Here's an excerpt from the article:

"After many lectures like this, Obama decided to take a second look at Wright's church. Older pastors warned him that Trinity was for "Buppies"--black urban professionals--and didn't have enough street cred. But Wright was a former Muslim and black nationalist who had studied at Howard and Chicago, and Trinity's guiding principles--what the church calls the "Black Value System"--included a "Disavowal of the Pursuit of Middleclassness.'"

The way it is worded almost makes it sound as like "former Muslim and black nationalist" was a part of the selling point for Obama. Do you agree?

Didn't Know About Planned Parenthood's Parentage? What else don't you know?

I imagine most politically engaged people have at one time or another thought to themselves: "If only everybody was as familiar with the things I know, then they'd all be liberal/conservative/libertarian etc.."

I'll admit I largely feel the same and think I've done a pretty good job of putting it into practice via successful debate. Whether I nudge someone over towards the conservative side or not I'm almost always guaranteed to pull out a fact that my counterpart "can't believe" until the point where I produce proof.

The difference for those on the liberal side is that whether they believe it or not nearly every card (or fact in this case) in the argument for contemporary liberalism is already on the table. There's little a liberal can tell you that you haven't heard a hundred times before. There's a reason of course.

For starters most Americans have spent 17 or more years in schools where the teachers are generally more liberal than their parents, the textbooks and curriculum are almost exclusively written by liberal academics, and even the books in the library are chosen by librarians who happen to belong to one of the most radical unions in America.

Then it's off to college to instructors even more radically liberal, and a student culture where the only thing less cool than being a conservative is being a virgin.

Apart from all this (and family of course) the main sources of information about the outside world are newspapers, television, and to a degree movies - all mediums largely delivered through a liberal filter.

So basically there's no excuse for any of the "inconvenient truths" that animate liberals NOT being widely disseminated in the public domain.

Anyways, I bring this up in response to the story about numerous Planned Parenthoods accepting donations with the specific goal of aborting black babies. The story's serious enough in itself, but the political junkie in me can't help but wonder how many outspoken liberals are even aware of Planned Parenthood's parentage - in particular that it's founder Margaret Sanger referred to blacks as "human weeds" and saw abortion as a way to cleanse the population of it's lesser members (She would have preferred wholesale sterilization, but settled for abortion).

Honestly, how many people today do you think know about the eugenics movement and it's link to abortion? Do you think if the word "eugenics" was as often associated with abortion as "back alley" and "coat hanger" that it might take a few folks down a notch?

Likewise I'd venture a guess that 9 out of 10 college students today could tell you that JFK was a Democrat, but less than 1 in 10 know MLK was a Republican.

I'd also bet that if asked who "outed" Valerie Plame the majority response would be "Scooter Libby" not the confirmed culprit and Bush critic Dick Armitage. Don't even bother asking about Sandy Berger.

Well read conservatives are filled with all these little tidbits so I decided to make a quick list of "Did you know?" questions guaranteed to burst a few liberal bubbles:

Did you know that...

-Americans spend more money on taxes than on housing and health care combined?

-The polar bear population is not facing extinction and is actually growing?

---More than twice as many people move from Canada to the U.S. as move from the U.S. to Canada every year? This despite the fact that WE HAVE ALMOST TEN TIMES AS MANY PEOPLE and they have "free" healthcare.

--Four times more people have been killed by their own governments in the past century than have died in all international wars combined ?

--Ann Coulter has been to roughly 67 Greatful Dead shows?

-The unemployment rate was 5.4% in Nov. '96 when Bill Clinton was re-elected largely on his handling of the economy. Today the unemployment rate under Bush is only 5.1% yet it's all doom and gloom? (Can you say media bias?)

-Universal Healthcare in New Zealand actually requires banning immigrants who are too fat (They cost too much you see)?

-Less than 50 of the roughly 200 countries in the United Nations are democracies?

-The global polar bear population has grown five times larger than it was in the
1970's.

-The United States already admits more legal immigrants each year than all other countries in the world combined.

-In '06 Democrats in Congress had over six times more money personally invested in military-related companies than their Republican counterparts?

-Despite what Michael Moore may have you believe, regular Cubans go to hospitals that look like this?

-Hardly discriminated against, 140 women graduate from college today for every 100 men?

-The editorial boards of both the New York Times and the Washington Post wrote in favor of drilling in ANWR all the way back in the late 80's.

-In the unregulated U.S., carbon output fell 1.3% in '06 while it rose .4% in progressive Europe?

-There is much more forest coverage in the United States today than there was in 1920?

-Handgun crime rose %40 after handguns were banned in the UK?

-Multi-national companies (or "sweatshops" to some) on average pay twice the average local wage?

-The government never injected blacks with syphilis during the Tuskegee Experiment.

-Only 1.5% of oil company stocks are held by corporate directors and officers, while 43% are held by mutual funds and 27% of that by institutional funds (teachers,police officers,firefighters).

--A person could live for a whole year on the corn it takes to make enough ethanol to fill one SUV tank?

-The Pilgrims tried collectivism for their first two years here and only abandonded it after they nearly starved to death?

-Under their universal healthcare system the average wait for surgery or theraputic services in Canada was 18.3 weeks in '07?

-George Bush fired only 8 U.S. attorneys while Bill Clinton fired 93?

-Minorities are more likely to be rejected for home loans by minority-owned banks than traditionally white banks?

-The federal government spends over $23,000 per household? (Did you pay your "fair share"?)

-Whites do not have the highest household income in the United States? (Asians do)

-Palestinians have more rights in Israel than in any Arab country?

-More people were killed in Southeast Asia during the first three years of communist "peace" than were killed in the 13 years of war prior?

-Contrary to the "rich get richer, poor get poorer" narrative, from '96-'05 people in the bottome fifth of income earners saw a 91% increase in income while the top 1% had an income decline of 26% ?

-Man of the people Fidel Castro controls a fortune estimated at $900 million while the average Cuban makes less than $20 a month ?

-In '04 the average earnings of the top 10 athletes and entertainers was almost double the average earnings of the top 10 earning CEO's?

-Hurricane Carter was never exonerated, wasn't anywhere close to being the champion at the time of his arrest, and is still in all likelihood guilty of murder?

-Since the General Social Survey began in 1972 Republicans have reported being happier than Democrats of equal income levels EVERY SINGLE YEAR? (Where's the hatred and bigotry?)

-The "rich" carry more of the tax load now under Bush than they did under Clinton?

-The infamous Katherine Harris of the Florida 2000 election fame actually ordered a statewide recount, but Al Gore fought against it.

-PETA kills thousands of animals every year?

-Every one of the top 10 individual donors to 527 groups in the '04 election supported Anti-Bush or Democratic-allied groups? (Party of the rich anybody?)

-Slavery existed among the American Indians long before Europeans settled here?

-That dirty looking Che Guevera guy on your shirt personally executed dozens if not hundreds of people ?

-Contrary to reports of "disenfranchisement" and a stolen election blacks in Florida voted in greater numbers than ever before during the 2000 election?

-There has been no observable global warming for the last nine years despite growing carbon output?


And that's a short list....