Brutally Honest

Wesley Clark's a buffoon

Here's why:

The latest dustup began on CBS's "Face the Nation." Clark, the former supreme commander of NATO under Bill Clinton, said McCain's military service was not the same as executive experience.

"In the matters of national security policy making, it's a matter of understanding risk," Clark said "It's a matter of gauging your opponents, and it's a matter of being held accountable. John McCain's never done any of that in his official positions. I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in the armed forces, as a prisoner of war.

"He has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee and he has traveled all over the world, but he hasn't held executive responsibility," Clark said. "That large squadron in the Navy that he
commanded - that wasn't a wartime squadron."

Clark has said as much before, but drew little notice. CBS moderator Bob Schieffer cited Clark's earlier remarks and noted that Obama hadn't had those experiences either nor had he ridden in a fighter plane and been shot down. "Well, I don't think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president," Clark replied.

At least five Republican senators and retired military officers - four on a conference call arranged by the McCain campaign - cried foul Monday, particularly over Clark's last line.

"I was utterly shocked," Sen. John Warner, R-Va., told the conference call, " ... that he would in such a disrespectful way attack one of his fellow career military officers."

"Beyond comprehension ... further erosion of our nation's political discourse," said former Sen. Bob Dole, R-Kan., in a written statement.

"Complete silliness," retired Navy Lt. Cmdr. Carl Smith said on the call.

Retired Marine Lt. Col. Orson Swindle said Clark was "denigrating the character and the experience and the integrity and the performance" of McCain.

"A very indecent thing," said retired Air Force Col. Bud Day.

Obama has yet to come out and state that this is not the Wesley Clark he's known for years but hang tight, given history, it ought to be coming any minute now.

Local Harley dealer comes through

Not just any local dealer but my own:

As they walked down the fairway, they didn't see a darn thing near the hole, so 45-year-old [Allen] Underwood began to get excited. He called back to the official monitor on site to tell him there's something he might want to check out.

"Sure enough," Underwood says, "we went up there and it was in the hole and everybody went nuts for about 10 minutes."

Tourney organizers announced his coup, and Underwood spent the rest of the afternoon buying drinks, shaking hands and calling his family. Friends took pictures of him and the bike, and the Harley rep who had just arrived to drive the bike back to the dealership congratulated him, too.

He was told to come by Hampton Roads Harley-Davidson off Route 17 in Grafton on Monday to fill out paperwork and collect his prize.

Then came the hitch.

At the dealership, Underwood noticed that the affidavit for the insurance company covering the prize awards indicated that the Harley was offered for acing hole 17, not 14. An employee assured him it wasn't a problem.

But it was.

By Wednesday, a Harley representative phoned Underwood to say its insurance company wouldn't cover a hole-in-one for the 14th hole.

Sorry, and take it up with the tourney sponsor, the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association, or AFCEA, a global, nonprofit membership association that raises funds for charity and education.

How did the holes get switched?

"It was all my fault," tournament organizer Bob Ingram said Friday. "My deja vu was a mess."

It was all a matter of logistics: Ingram said he wanted to keep the Mercedes and the Harley on nearby holes to make it easier on the two hole monitors. That meant moving the Harley to the 14th.

AFCEA doesn't have the funds to simply buy the bike for Underwood — tourney pledges amounted to $7,500, or less than the value of the bike. And besides, those pledges are intended for college scholarships to local ROTC students.

 

For a while, it looked like Underwood was out of luck.

Then on Thursday, he learned that the issue was suddenly resolved.

Basically, he says, the dealership decided, "Let's just give him the bike."

That same day, they did.

"They just treated me like a king when I went to pick it up," Underwood said Friday. "They were totally gracious and happy with me."

They even picked up the cost of tax, title and registration and threw in a free annual membership to their Harley Owners Group.

"We have to thank Harley for that," says Ingram. "They really came through in our hour of need. My hat's off to them."

He says he's even thinking of buying a bike, himself, now.

The dealership owner didn't return phone calls Friday for comment.

And she likely won't. 

I've had my Road King now for 4 years and Mrs. BH has bought two bikes from this dealer, her first a Sportster 883 and and last year in May she traded that in for her Fat Boy.  For each purchase, this dealer went out of their way to make us comfortable, to work with us on accessories, and each time we go back for one thing or another, we literally are treated like family.  So when this story came across the wires, we weren't surprised. 

Hampton Roads Harley Davidson is a special place run by special people.  Time and again they shatter the stereotypical mythology that paints the biker as something most of them are not.  Hats off to 'em. 

And to Mr. Underwood...  welcome to the club sir and remember... only bikers know why dogs like to stick their heads out windows.

Hope and change

Obama's glass ceiling:

While Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has vowed to make pay equity for women a top priority if elected president, an analysis of his Senate staff shows that women are outnumbered and out-paid by men.

That is in contrast to Republican presidential candidate John McCain's Senate office, where women, for the most part, out-rank and are paid more than men.

Obama spoke in Albuquerque, N.M. last week about his commitment to the issue and his support of a Senate bill to make it easier to sue an employer for pay discrimination.

"Mr. McCain is an honorable man, we respect his service. But when you look at our records and our plans on issues that matter to working women, the choice could not be clearer," Obama told the audience in New Mexico, a voter-swing state. "It starts with equal pay. Sixty-two percent of working women in America earn half or more than of their family's income. But women still earn 77 cents for every dollar earned by men in 2008. You'd think that Washington would be united it its determination to fight for equal pay."

...

On average, women working in Obama's Senate office were paid at least $6,000 below the average man working for the Illinois senator. That's according to data calculated from the Report of the Secretary of the Senate, which covered the six-month period ending Sept. 30, 2007. Of the five people in Obama's Senate office who were paid $100,000 or more on an annual basis, only one -- Obama's administrative manager -- was a woman.

The average pay for the 33 men on Obama's staff (who earned more than $23,000, the lowest annual salary paid for non-intern employees) was $59,207. The average pay for the 31 women on Obama's staff who earned more than $23,000 per year was $48,729.91. (The average pay for all 36 male employees on Obama's staff was $55,962; and the average pay for all 31 female employees was $48,729. The report indicated that Obama had only one paid intern during the period, who was a male.)

McCain, an Arizona senator, employed a total of 69 people during the reporting period ending in the fall of 2007, but 23 of them were interns. Of his non-intern employees, 30 were women and 16 were men. After excluding interns, the average pay for the 30 women on McCain's staff was $59,104.51. The 16 non-intern males in McCain's office, by comparison, were paid an average of $56,628.83.

The new kind of politician smells a lot like the old kind of hypocrite.

Putrid.

But hey, he's all about hope and change.

"And please, please try to wake the hell up."

Via Insty comes Arthur Silber's hard look at the "woozily sentimental, intellectually reprehensible remarks" of your average Obama supporter:

I have several complicated essays in the works concerning the nature of the attraction that Barack Obama holds for many of his supporters. Once I complete some other articles, I will turn my full attention to them.

I want to mention the following, only because I am still so gobsmacked by it. A little while ago, in a fleeting moment of distraction, I turned my radio to the Stephanie Miller show. No more links for her; I gave her a link some months ago in connection with her grotesquely awful comments about the tasering of Andrew Meyer (she was Commentary Four). Miller is on vacation this week, so a couple of guest hosts are filling in.

The subject was Obama, and the comments in general were fairly horrifying, but in the way that has been typical for several months now. "Oh, his message is so wonderful!" What's that message? "Hope! Change!" And what's the nature of that hope and change?

So much for specifics.

Then another caller came on the line.  She began by announcing that, of course, in general she doesn't believe any of that nonsense about God controlling our national destiny, and she certainly doesn't believe that God chose that awful George Bush to be our president.

BUT, she burbled on, she absolutely believes that Barack Obama has been ordained by God to lead the United States of America.  AND, she  further oozed, look at the physical effect he has on people!  This, she portentously announced, IS.  NOT.  A.  COINCIDENCE.

THIS.  IS.  SIGNIFICANT.

Reactions of this kind to Obama are fairly common. No, they are not this extreme much of the time, but such statements are far from unusual. And many of Obama's less obviously deluded supporters fall along the same continuum.

Take a look at the woozily sentimental, intellectually reprehensible remarks collected at the beginning of "Obama's Whitewash," the third excerpt here, and the comments here. Moreover, this kind of reaction -- an emotion-driven response utterly devoid of coherent ideational content, a response that leads far too many people to be enthusiastically willing to believe virtually anything that Obama might proclaim and to follow him anywhere -- is one that Obama and his campaign explicitly seek to elicit.

People had better wake the hell up, and they had better study some history very damned fast. I have sometimes remarked, and I repeat the warning here, that the twentieth century was a nonstop train of horrors -- yet in one sense, the most terrible and horrifying aspect of the twentieth century is that we learned absolutely nothing from it.

There's more, all of it noteworthy and repeatable and in fact worthy of passing on to an Obama supporter near you who's elevator still goes to the top.  I say still because frankly, there's no hope (or change) to be found for the true Obamaniac.

If only the Republicans would walk this talk...

... especially John McCain:

Nicely done Fred... now use your influence to hold the NRSC and NRCC and John McCain to these words.

Please...

H/T to St. Blogustine.

Unity

Larwyn points us to Gateway Pundit and the latest episode of As the Democrat Party Turns:

Bill Clinton says Barack Obama must 'kiss my a**' for his support

The Telegraph reported:

Bill Clinton is so bitter about Barack Obama's victory over his wife Hillary that he has told friends the Democratic nominee will have to beg for his wholehearted support...

The Telegraph has learned that the former president's rage is still so great that even loyal allies are shocked by his patronising attitude to Mr Obama, and believe that he risks damaging his own reputation by his intransigence.

A senior Democrat who worked for Mr Clinton has revealed that he recently told friends Mr Obama could "kiss my a**" in return for his support.

Of course, this will all hinge on what the definition of "a**" is. 

 

"We are all Hussein"

Emily Nordling has never met a Muslim, at least not to her knowledge. But this spring, Ms. Nordling, a 19-year-old student from Fort Thomas, Ky., gave herself a new middle name on Facebook.com, mimicking her boyfriend and shocking her father.

“Emily Hussein Nordling,” her entry now reads.

With her decision, she joined a growing band of supporters of Senator Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, who are expressing solidarity with him by informally adopting his middle name.

The result is a group of unlikely-sounding Husseins: Jewish and Catholic, Hispanic and Asian and Italian-American, from Jaime Hussein Alvarez of Washington, D.C., to Kelly Hussein Crowley of Norman, Okla., to Sarah Beth Hussein Frumkin of Chicago.

Jeff Strabone of Brooklyn now signs credit card receipts with his newly assumed middle name, while Dan O’Maley of Washington, D.C., jiggered his e-mail account so his name would appear as “D. Hussein O’Maley.” Alex Enderle made the switch online along with several other Obama volunteers from Columbus, Ohio, and now friends greet him that way in person, too.

Mr. Obama is a Christian, not a Muslim. Hussein is a family name inherited from a Kenyan father he barely knew, who was born a Muslim and died an atheist. But the name has become a political liability. Some critics on cable television talk shows dwell on it, while others, on blogs or in e-mail messages, use it to falsely assert that Mr. Obama is a Muslim or, more fantastically, a terrorist.

“I am sick of Republicans pronouncing Barack Obama’s name like it was some sort of cuss word,” Mr. Strabone wrote in a manifesto titled “We Are All Hussein” that he posted on his own blog and on dailykos.com.

So like the residents of Billings, Mont., who reacted to a series of anti-Semitic incidents in 1993 with a townwide display of menorahs in their front windows, these supporters are brandishing the name themselves.

“My name is such a vanilla, white-girl American name,” said Ashley Holmes of Indianapolis, who changed her name online “to show how little meaning ‘Hussein’ really has.”

-NYTimes.

In that spirit, and in response to ReliaPundit's question here, I've modified my Presidential campaign accordingly:

All nuance, all the time

Glenn Greenwald highlights Keith Olbermann's flip flopping on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) now that Obama has come out in support of it:

On January 31 of this year, Keith Olbermann donned his most serious face and most indignant voice tone to rail against George Bush for supporting telecom immunity and revisions to FISA. In a 10-minute "Special Comment," the MSNBC star condemned Bush for wanting to "retroactively immunize corporate criminals," and said that telecom immnity is "an ex post facto law, which would clear the phone giants from responsibility for their systematic, aggressive and blatant collaboration with [Bush's] illegal and unjustified spying on Americans under this flimsy guise of looking for any terrorists who are stupid enough to make a collect call or send a mass email."

Olbermann added that telecom amnesty was a "shameless, breathless, literally textbook example of Fascism -- the merged efforts of government and corporations that answer to no government." Noting the numerous telecom lobbyists connected to the Bush administration, Olbermann said:

This is no longer just a farce in which protecting telecoms is dressed up as protecting us from terrorists conference cells. Now it begins to look like the bureaucrats of the Third Reich, trying to protect the Krupp family, the industrial giants, re-writing the laws of Germany for their benefit.

Olbermann closed by scoffing at the idea that telecom amnesty or revisions to FISA were necessary to help National Security:

There is not a choice of protecting the telecoms from prosecution or protecting the people from terrorism, Sir. This is a choice of protecting the telecoms from prosecution or pretending to protect the people from terrorists. Sorry, Mr. Bush, the eavesdropping provisions of FISA have obviously had no impact on counter-terrorism, and there is no current or perceived terrorist threat the thwarting of which could hinge on an email or phone call that is going through Room 641 of AT&T in San Francisco.

Strong and righteous words indeed. But that was five whole months ago, when George Bush was urging enactment of a law with retroactive immunity and a lessening of FISA protections. Now that Barack Obama supports a law that does the same thing -- and now that Obama justifies that support by claiming that this bill is necessary to keep us Safe from the Terrorists -- everything has changed.

Greenwald, no fan of FISA, goes on to chronicle Olberman's reversal including a a tell-tale interview with Newsweek's Jonathan Alter.

In summary, from the perspective of Keith Olbermann, who speaks for many a moonbat across this great land, Bush=Nazi when it comes to his support of FISA but Obama=Strength when he supports the exact same legislation.

Nuance.  It's a beautiful thing.

Kate gets the H/T.

I've got your hope and change right here (UPDATED)

With props and thanks to Pastor Chuckels.

UPDATE: I've already decided to make changes in the campaign, they are detailed here.

Nuanced anti-semitism

I'm sure the Presbyterians mean well:

An unusually broad array of American Jewish groups is sounding an alarm about proposals the Presbyterian Church is set take up here tomorrow addressing the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs.

At least 19 Jewish organizations, ranging from Americans for Peace Now to the Zionist Organization of America, have spoken out against some of the so-called overtures to be debated at the weeklong biennial meeting of Presbyterians in America.

Jewish leaders contend that some of the resolutions and a new church statement on anti-Semitism threaten to reopen the wounds caused in 2004 when the Presbyterian general assembly approved a measure threatening divestment in companies that do business with the Israeli government.

In a blunt letter this month, leaders of three Jewish denominations said they felt betrayed by Presbyterian Church officials who reached out after the 2004 imbroglio. "Friends, or even dialogue partners, do not engage in actions that can so easily and plausibly be seen as bait-and-switch tactics," Rabbi Jerome Epstein of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, Dr. Carl Sheingold of the Jewish Reconstructionist Federation, and Rabbi Eric Yoffie of the Union for Reform Judaism wrote to the Reverend Clifton Kirkpatrick, who is stepping down this week after 12 years as the head of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

The church's statement on anti-Semitism "marks a new low-point in Presbyterian-Jewish relations," the Jewish leaders said. "Indeed, this document reads as a blueprint for how to engage in anti-Israel activity without being accused of anti-Semitism."

It's all about the nuance. 

My new favorite word.

When flip-flopping is virtuous

I guess we can call this a nuanced hope and change campaign:

Barack Obama has taken a stroll this week away from traditional liberal political positions, his path toward the political center marked by artful leaps and turns.

Senator Barack Obama appears to have moved toward the political center in the last week judging by his comments on guns and the death penalty. Mr. Obama visited Pittsburgh on Thursday.

On Thursday, he seemed to embrace a Supreme Court decision, written by the court’s premiere conservative and upheld 5-to-4, striking down Washington, D.C.’s ban on handguns.

Mr. Obama seemed to voice support for the ban as recently as February. On Thursday, however, he issued a Delphic news release that seemed to support the Supreme Court, although staff members later insisted that might not be the case.

“I have always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms, but I also identify with the need for crime-ravaged communities to save their children from the violence that plagues our streets through common-sense, effective safety measures,” Mr. Obama said. “The Supreme Court has now endorsed that view.”

He added, “Today’s decision reinforces that if we act responsibly, we can both protect the constitutional right to bear arms and keep our communities and our children safe.”

In the last week, Mr. Obama has taken calibrated positions on issues that include electronic surveillance, campaign finance and the death penalty for child rapists, suggesting a presidential candidate in hot pursuit of what Bill Clinton once lovingly described as “the vital center.”

"Artful leaps and turns"

"Calibrated positions"

Nuance baby... it's all about the nuance.

Hope and change can mean any damned thing you want hope and change to mean and if you don't agree, well... you should die.

Embrace your inner nuance.

The timelessness of Chesterton

With humility, wonder, and genius, Chesterton taught us, in the words of Father Brown, that often it isn't that we can't see the solution; it's that we can't see the problem.

In his disarming manner, such that even his opponents regarded him with affection, Chesterton exposed the inconsistencies of the modern mindset, the unfounded and unnoticed dogmatism of the unbeliever, and the misguided guidance of the cults of comfort and progress. He marveled that religious liberty now meant that we were no longer allowed to mention the subject, and that "there are those who hate Christianity and call their hatred an all-embracing love for all religions." To the convicted agnostic he said, "We don't know enough about the unknown to know that it is unknowable." To the social Darwinist he said, "It is absurd for the Evolutionist to complain that it is unthinkable for an admittedly unthinkable God to make everything out of nothing, and then pretend that it is more thinkable that nothing should turn itself into everything."

-Jill Carattini.

Read it all, take it to heart.  Chesterton rocks.  Jill ain't so bad either.

Idiocy illustrated...

... by the talented RedPlanetCartoons:

The Wall Street Journal: $4 Gasbags.

Anyone wondering why U.S. energy policy is so dysfunctional need only review Congress’s recent antics. Members have debated ideas ranging from suing OPEC to the Senate’s carbon tax-and-regulation monstrosity, to a windfall profits tax on oil companies, to new punishments for “price gouging” – everything except expanding domestic energy supplies.

Amid $135 oil, it ought to be an easy, bipartisan victory to lift the political restrictions on energy exploration and production. Record-high fuel costs are hitting consumers and business like a huge tax increase. Yet the U.S. remains one of the only countries in the world that chooses as a matter of policy to lock up its natural resources. The Chinese think we’re insane and self-destructive, while the Saudis laugh all the way to the bank…

While energy “independence” is an impossible dream, there’s no doubt the U.S. has vast undeveloped fossil-fuel deposits. A tiny corner of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge contains an estimated 10.4 billion barrels of oil and would be the largest producing oil field in the Northern Hemisphere. Yet the Senate blocked that development as recently as last month. The Outer Continental Shelf is estimated to contain some 86 billion barrels of oil, plus 420 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Yet of the shelf’s 1.76 billion acres, 85% is off-limits and 97% is undeveloped.

Engineers recently perfected refining solid shale rock into diesel or gas, which may amount to the largest oil supply in the world – perhaps as much as 1.8 trillion barrels in the American West. That’s enough to meet current U.S. oil demand for more than two centuries.

There's more, with links.  Go and educate yourself, then pass it on.

 

Screw it, let's ride - continued

I'm hoping that you folks are following the exchange taking place here if only so that I can smoothly bring in Morgan's brilliance on the subject at hand:

I was checking out Brutally Honest, Rick’s site to follow up on a mildly interesting and explosively-expanding thread underneath the Harley Davidson “Screw It, Let’s Ride” commercial. I have found it to be a dialog worth following, because it has morphed into a deliberation of manhood; an inspection of what, exactly, it is. We can always use more of that, and I’ve noticed both sides are putting a lot of thought into it. Rick (and Gerard too, evidently) sympathized with the ad and the attitude it sought to promote. Guest blogger and frequent commenter BroKen did not. It would seem at first blush that such an exchange wouldn’t have much place to go, since it’s a battle between pet peeves and therefore between emotions. Rick is sick and tired of being told the planet is in danger and we all need to buy some carbon credits and unplug our cell phones; Ken is sick and tired of apathetic, irresponsible people.

I think Ken’s crime, here, is one of overanalysis. He’s rather like the guy who’s told the urban legend about the late-night pedestrian who sees two headlights coming toward him, assumes they’re motorcycles, and goes between them…is DRT (Died Right There)…and upon hearing the story, the guy asks “but how do they know what he was thinking if he died?” Sometimes logical questions can open up entire sub-arguments that, when all’s said & done, aren’t worth pursuing. It’s possible.

Also possible, is the Panic For Sake Of Panic, and although I’m sure Rick has other examples in mind besides global warming, the environmental movement is certainly central to his inspiration. We’re being called-upon to panic over things quite a lot lately. Panic is not constructive thinking. Masculinity, Ken’s comments about it notwithstanding, can have a lot to do with letting it pass by with little action, or even no action at all. This would be the “keep your head together” aspect of manliness. In the case of the gas that costs almost five bucks a gallon, our error is in forgetting supply-and-demand, being too quick to blame cartoonish stereotypes like “Oil Executives”…presuming that our destruction is desired by people who are engaged in trade with us, and not by the people who seek re-election to Congress periodically through messages that resonate with our suffering. In the case of global warming, we’re confronted by a boogeyman that exists in the mind. Buzzwords, a few “scientists” funded with George Soros’ money, the allure of knowing massive bureaucracies and orthodox fellowships are already mobilized into motion around the boogeyman. The ambition to be part of something huge, nevermind having no impact at all on what it does based on one’s individual participation in it. Like the Barack Obama campaign, modern radical environmentalism has become a tantalizing pastime for those among us who lack intellectual masculinity. Those who desire to clamber on board a massive ship so they can be seen being on it, to grab an oar and help row it so they can be seen rowing it…and have nothing to do with steering it. Steering entails decision-making, and decision-making involves far too much responsibility for the gelded mind.

The four-word tagline “Screw it, let’s ride” is a joke that’s gone over Ken’s head, I’m afraid. In some situations, it can be a healthy and mature attitude. Like, anytime panic is the point. When someone nameless and faceless wants you to lose your bearings, and whispers scary campfire stories into your ear so you’ll fearfully listen to whatever comes next. The headstrong, able-minded manly man says “screw it, let’s ride.”

Through the kernel of truth that was involved in the scary story to make the remaining 99% of the panic digestible, this may entail risk. But we tend to forget that life is all about risk, and it is only through the elimination of life that you completely eliminate all risk.

You folks know how Obama thinks we can talk terrorists into giving up the jihad, that somehow through sheer artful and articulate eloquence, those purposed in killing the infidel would simply give up the ghost?

I'm telling you that you combine Morgan's abilities with that of Tony Woodlief's and I think it might just be possible.

Seriously.

Masterful

Oh how I wish I could string words together like Tony Woodlief:

In an emotion-laden account, NPR's Terry Gross exposed the brutality of partial-birth abortion today. She interviewed photojournalist Brent Stirton, who "took a photograph that shocked the world," as NPR explains, the victims "murdered, execution-style...simply slaughtered."

Just kidding. They're up in arms about some gorillas that got killed in the Congo. Not to belittle the atrocity. I mean, they're sentient beings, and in many ways they resemble humans. The gorillas, I mean. Not those fetus thingys.

Sheez... what's that... 75 words and with it a complete annihilation of any mindset that attempts to defend the horrifically minimized procedure we call partial birth abortion.

And we could include you Barack Obama.

Yes we can.

Dahlia Lithwick on the Supreme Court: "All the judges are white and/or old"

Heard moments ago on Rush, referenced by a listener who was beside himself wondering how in hell the following can be published in a national news magazine:

Anybody who believes the current Supreme Court looks like America needs to take a few more trips on a Greyhound bus. All the judges are white and/or old; most are both.

I guess all the judges are male too... and they're all left-handed...  and they don't take baths...  and they're gay...

Hey, I'm as correct as Ms. Lithwick on these things... you'll simply have to believe me.
 

Picking and choosing your NIEs

Via The Corner on National Review Online:

Today marked a new low for the way congressional Democrats deal with national security. This morning, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Permanent Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming held a joint hearing on a "National Intelligence Assessment" on global climate change. This analysis was ordered by the Democratic Congress last year and was issued a few weeks ago. Some highlights (or low-lights) from the hearing:

1) In response to a question by Global Warming Committee member Greg Walden (R-OR), the Intelligence Community admitted they had "low to medium confidence" in the accuracy of this estimate because intelligence officers lack the expertise to write such an estimate (it was mostly contracted out to other organizations) and climate change science is so uncertain. As Walden started to ask about why an analysis of such low reliability was issued, Congressman Ed Markey (D-MA), the Global Warming Committee Chairman, cut him off and told him he was out of time even though Markey let all the previous Democrats speak substantially past their time limits.

2) Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Peter Hoekstra asked what intelligence was used for this estimate and whether intelligence collection requirements were prepared. National Intelligence Council Chairman Thomas Fingar said no clandestine intelligence was used and that intelligence officers extrapolated what would happen if the "mid-level estimates" by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change were correct. When Hoekstra asked why the U.S. Intelligence Community would write an major analysis of low to medium confidence that contained no intelligence, Fingar answered, "because you [Congress] told us to."

3) Hoekstra noted that intelligence assessments of high confidence have proven to be wrong and he wondered why an intelligence assessment of low to medium confidence would even be published. In an attempt to dispel the debate over confidence, Intelligence Committee member Congresswoman Anna Eshoo (D-CA) responded by noting that the 2002 Iraq WMD NIE had high confidence in its findings. Some Republicans thought Rep. Eshoo's statement actually made their case about the futility of issuing an intelligence assessment that intelligence officers cannot fully back.

Obama or die

Via Michelle Malkin, a picture that may not be all that satirical given Obama's association with ex-terrorists:

Riding the short bus...

... or more accurately under it:

For those of you keeping score at home:

Under the Bus

Clinging to the Bumper

Grandma Dunham Rev. Jeremiah Wright Fr. Michael Pleger NEW!Michael Klonsky Muslim supporters babies that survive abortion attempts 8,000 Members of Trinity Church of Christ Samatha Power Obama advisor/Hamas friend Rob Malley

Marilyn Katz (former SDS radical, Obama campaign PR professional) Carl Davidson (former SDS radical, Fidel Castro Fan, webmaster of Progressives for Obama) Michelle Obama half-brother Abongo Obama, a militant Muslim "Uncle Frank" Frank Marshall Davis, role model/mentor and member of the Communist Party USA, poet who authored "Smash-on, victory-eating Red Army" Bill Ayers, domestic terrorist and long-time friend Bernadine Dorhn, Ayer's wife, fellow domestic terrorist. and Manson Family admirer.

The lists is off the top of my head and is no doubt incomplete, and doesn't include the various countries and/or regions the freshman Senator from Illinois has irritated or infuriated with his gaffe-a-matic pandering to his left-wing domestic base and woefully inadequate foreign policy inexperience.

Still it illustrates just how bloody the undercarriage of the Obama bus is, as the candidate who promised a new kind of campaign shows he's lied to the media and his supporters when he promised something other than politics as usual.

Hope and change my rear-end...

"From The Frontlines"

Via e-mail from our good friend and guest blogger tim aka The Godless Heathen comes a cause I think we can all get behind and support today:

A team of patriotic leaders are working together in a historic undertaking with the goal of sending the largest single shipment of care packages to U.S. troops in American history.  The care package drive will result in the shipment of not just 1,000 care packages—a feat accomplished by the Grand Ole Opry in October 2007 (Source Link). Organizers similarly won’t settle for just the 10,000 packages shipped as part of an impressive effort undertaken by the Nevada Girl Scouts (Source Link). And they plan to surpass the efforts of the terrific organization, Operation Gratitude, which undertook a multi-day effort to pack and ship 50,000 care packages last year (Source Link).

The grand finale for the push will take place on June 26th when a Jerry Lewis style 8-hour Internet Telethon ("From the Frontlines") will take place.  This cutting edge production “From The Frontlines” will be broadcast live online by UStream.tv and hosted by Melanie Morgan & Michelle Malkin.  Live and taped reports will be broadcast from our troops serving in Iraq & Afghanistan during the historic 8-hour event.

Americans can sponsor the care packages from Move America Forward’s by ordering via this link from MAF’s online webstore partner: TheCampaignStore.com

An endeavor worthy of your time and talents... please consider tangibly supporting the troops no matter what your political leanings might be.

Bush Derangement Syndrome Ilustrated

Yes We Can, Is Really No We Can't

Posted by guest blogger Locutisprime.

On a conference call organized by the McCain campaign this morning, Arizona Republican Sen. Jon Kyl and McCain senior policy advisor Doug Holtz-Eakin took aim at Barack Obama over energy policy.

Kyl told reporters that back in the Senate they are referring to Obama with the phrase “No We Can’t,” as opposed to “Yes We Can.” McCain spokesman Brian Rogers yesterday called Obama the “Dr. No” of energy security for opposing a gas tax holiday, offshore drilling, and expanded investment in nuclear power.

The reference, for the record, is to the James Bond film from 1962 starring Sean Connery. (Dr. No was the bad guy.) Obama yesterday called those policy suggestions, which McCain backs, "not serious."

On the conference call this morning, CBS News' Allison O'Keefe reports, Kyl said that McCain takes a more balanced approach than his rival. “He recognizes that we need more production,” Kyl said, but that there also need to be “environmental check and balances.”

By contrast, Kyl said, Obama doesn't offer solutions, opting instead to just say no to every proposal. “No we can’t drill off shore; not a proponent of nuclear so we can’t do that either,” he said.

-CBS News

We have all heard the battle cry of the liberal left of late. Barack Obama's "Yes We Can!" rally cry represented as a supposed platform of change. Which is nothing more than this season's recooked phraseology of the liberal left and their "vote for us, we are the party of change" mentality of empty promises and dangerous proposals.

When they are not hustling change, they are attempting to remake their liberal ideology into something that represents their most favored term, which is envisioning themselves as a progressive alternative. Yet even the smallest scrutiny of what they are selling, points directly to the lack of either new or progressive ideas. As many have come to realize and the McCain campaign is now beginning to seize upon, Barack Obama is a yes man and front man for the socialist left and not a man who can change anything other than to revise definitions of accomplishment.

He tells the dumb masses that he has plans, and that he has a path to change, and that he is not part of the establishment, but rather someone with new and fresh ideas. A new perspective. Yet over the past few weeks, when Americans  were forced to confront the realities of rising gas prices at the pump? Barack Obama's ideas of change began to reveal themselves and come unraveled at the seams.

The man represented as a "change that we can live with" said that he is against drilling for more oil in Alaska or along the gulf coast. The man of change claims that he wants to explore all alternative energy sources. Yet when questioned about expanded development of nuclear power? Once again Americans got a resounding no, as opposed to a "yes we can."  Barack Obama is for punitive profit taxes against major oil companies. He says he will use that money taken through taxation, to redistribute to those Americans having trouble paying their gas and heating bills. And the best part of his plan for change this week, is that "he" wants to provide Americans with "another stimulus package," to ease the impact of the falling economy and to give back more to Americans. He wants to send out more stimulus checks to the American people.

There is nothing new about that proposal senator. As a matter of fact, that idea and program was put forth by President Bush months ago and you soundly condemned it and declared that economic stimulus, via putting more of Americans money back into their own pockets, was a bad plan and further demonstrated President Bush's failed policies. But now it sounds like a great plan and something new according to you. Another example one of "your plans of change" senator?

Barack Obama's plans for America, come right out of the socialist liberal democrat play book of the extremist in the democrat party. A party of excuses, blame, apologies, appeasement and empty promises of change. they always have the promise of change. Barack Obama didn't invent the democratic concept of change, Jimmy Carter did. The only change that Barack Obama has to offer, are the words, phrases and speeches that he has been coached on and plagerized from other activist liberals, in an attempt to hustle his candidacy past the American people before they wise up to the realities of his empty suit.

The republican leadership rightly tagged this imposter Obama this week for precisely what he is. "Dr. No." Barack Obama and his political and social ideologies are not only not new, they are dangerous rationalizations of a poorly experienced and new idea bankrupt socialist form of the supposed democrat party for change.

The greening of the automotive industry

With gas approaching $5 a gallon, a barrel of oil at $140, and OPEC seeing it rise to $170 by summer's end, can there be any surprise that hybrid vehicles are becoming all the rage, especially from our most caring and completely green Hollywood heroes and heroines.

Yet, as I look deeper, I'm finding that hybrid cars come now in all sizes, shapes and horsepower production:

I've been test-driving cars for about 10 years now, including my share of hybrids: the infamous Toyota Prius; some of the first Ford Escapes; Honda Civics, Accords, and Fits. With hybrids, there have always been excuses to make and myths to bust in response to queries from curious drivers of traditional gas-guzzlers. And so I've compiled what I call the Hybrid Handbook to counter people who think that a) hybrids get 135 miles per gallon (they don't); b) hybrids need to be plugged in at night (they don't); or c) hybrids go only 35 miles per hour (they don't). Still, I confess, I've always believed that d) hybrids come only in small, boring, not-designed-for-hair-raising packages.

As did I frankly but lo and behold, the article goes on to describe a hybrid car that seems to defy the stereotype:

In a world where gas is being treated like dry land in Waterworld, the Lexus 450h is an island of its own. For $55,800—$2,780 more than the GS460—you will get a car that's just as quick as the 460, with more equipment, greater fuel savings, and, seriously, more fun than the regular Lexus.* And it does get 20 percent better fuel economy than the GS460 (22 mpg city/25 mpg highway in the hybrid versus 17 mpg city/24 mpg highway in the nonhybrid).

Savings aside, the fun quotient was the biggest X factor for me. My previous experience with gas pedals and hybrids was a lesson in disconnection. Step on the gas, and they don't go. They hesitate, whirl up like a hand-held electric mixer, then sort of go. This was the superfast, deluxe KitchenAid mixer of cars. Step hard with your right foot, and the kilowatt needle (a cool white display that shows the maximum output of electric power) jumps to life, the rear wheels spin, and you are up to speed faster than you can say, "Thank God for Thomas Edison's parents getting together."(Or about 5.55 seconds to 60 mph.)

Stop at a light, and the whole system does its hybrid trick and shuts down. Restart, and you awaken a re-engineered version of Toyota's Hybrid Synergy Drive—the system that made the Prius into the poster child for the green movement and turned every Hollywood actor into an expert on cars. How does it work? The system teams up with three main parts: one electric motor/generator that powers the rear wheels, a second electric motor/generator that acts as a primary generator and starter and controls engine speed, and a direct-injection, 292-horsepower, 3.5-liter V6. At low speeds, the first electric motor moves the car. A battery pack recharges itself with energy recovered from braking. When all systems move as one, it is the equivalent of 340 horsepower. It is all mated to a gearless, continuously variable transmission. Get stuck in four-lane bumper-to-bumper traffic and you are suddenly driving, in terms of your carbon footprint, an ultraluxurious golf cart.

I've gagged quite frankly at those Toyota Priuses I drive by on the highway, usually driven by either balding but pony-tailed pale looking guys or older overweight women with lipstick on their teeth, either one looking down their noses at me as I rumble by them on the road on my carbon spewing Harley.

Though there's no way I'd trade my Harley for one, I think it'd be pretty neat to slip behind the wheel of a hybrid Lexus 450h if only to leave a haughty Prius owner high and dry at a red light while matching his or her carbon footprint.

The Corny solution that's now a real problem

Posted by guest blogger Locutisprime.

New Ethanol Studies: Little Effect on Gas Prices, Significant Pressure on Food

WASHINGTON, June 23 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Two studies released
today show that federal ethanol mandates have placed significant pressure
on food prices, while any effect on gasoline prices has been "almost too
small to measure."

Dr. Thomas Elam of FarmEcon LLC, and Keith Collins, former chief
economist of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, submitted their new
analyses to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Today is the end of
EPA's public comment period on a request from Texas Gov. Rick Perry to
partially suspend the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) in light of serious
economic harm caused by the current policy.

"The 2008/2009 increase in fuel production made possible by the RFS is
almost too small to measure against the global energy market, but the
effects on food prices and security are huge," Elam notes. "The U.S.
government should re-examine and reduce the RFS in light of the damage it
can do to our food production capacity and the overall welfare of the
country."

Read the Entire Article

 

Knee jerk reactions, usually result in banged and bruised shins and the very real potential for long term injury. Such is the case with the politically correct march of American energy policy and reactionary government induced programs that attempt to prevent the sky from falling. Chicken Little's unsubstantiated fears of global warming has revealed what truly happens, when the realities of political driven policies come to roost with the facts.

Ethanol is at best a feel good supplemental fuel, that provides little benefit aside for the appearance of having done something to reduce the use of fossil fuels. And the results of pursuing partisan bias as it concerns science, has now revealed itself for the real danger that has been created for America's economic future.

At a time when real weather problems such as 100 year floods in the mid west and an increased demand on corn crops globally has severely impacted America's corn crop, we now see the reality of failed feel good policies on the over all picture of our economy, artificially increased inflation and our food supply. Not only has the now revealed unmeasurable benefit of the addition of ethanol to America's fuel crisis been revealed by this sideshow waste of effort, but we have also jeopardized our supply of a mainstay crop and put ourselves into a position of competitive global inflation on something that we have traditionally had a bounty of.

The only thing worse in my opinion than questionable and unproven science, is questionable and unproven public policy. Especially when it is driven by politically correct fear mongering and Utopian socialist ideologies. The only tangible benefit that the mad rush to produce ethanol as an alternative fuel has really produced, is in actuality a case study in the definition of failed efficacy and government forced perspective once again revealed as folly.

They just don't get it

Mike, my blogroll's perennial Religious Leftist, continues his cluelessness:

Huh?

Just taking a quick time-out from writing to share something with you. In my reading this morning I came across one of those "uh-oh" verses:

He who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth     and he who gives gifts to the rich—both come to poverty. (Proverbs 22:16)

Anyone want to guess what came into my mind when I read that? Anyone? (Hint: look at the tags for this post...)

His tags include the words tax-cut.

Go figure.

To which I replied (or tried to... forgetting that Mike has me blacklisted... you know... all that tolerance and diversity bullsh*t they talk lots about... but as is the wont of most Religious Leftists I know, it's all about the talk, less about the walk... at least when it comes to allowing alternative viewpoints):

A tax cut isn't a gift to the rich Mike... a gift is defined as something bestowed or acquired without any particular effort by the recipient or without its being earned...  a tax cut is about allowing me to keep what I've earned, that which I've acquired through lots of effort...

Your ideology is showing.

Tagged

By Morgan.

Though I rarely do these things, I'll play given who the tagger is:

The rules:
1. Post the rules at the beginning.
2. Answer the questions only about yourself.
3. At the end of the post, tag five people and post their names, then go to their blogs and leave them a comment so they know they’ve been tagged. Ask them to read the sender’s blog.
4. Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.

What were you doing five years ago?
June 2003 — Working as a Naval Contractor making more money than I'm making today... sadly.

What are five things on your to-do list for today?
1. Talk to my niece who's been sick and whose parents (my sister and her husband) are out of town.
2. Schedule an oil change and an inspection for the Tundra.
3. Post this piece.
4. Walk the dog with my lovely and bodacious wife.
5. Some afternoon evening delight.

What are five snacks you enjoy?
1. Chips and cheese at Plaza Azteca with a Margarita
2. Tropical Smoothie
3. Almond pudding pie (I think that's the name of it).
4. Peanut Butter on toasted English Muffins.
5. Kit Kat bar though rarely these days.

What are five things you would do if you were a billionaire?
1. Ensure that my family was taken care of.
2. Give millions of it away to sound charities.
3. Buy a beach house in the OBX, probably in Duck or Corolla.
4. An idea I stole from guest blogger Tom Flake in conversation with him some months ago... set up a trust fund to help disadvantaged youth get a decent education.
5. Travel with my bride.  Lots and lots of traveling with my bride.

What are five of your bad habits?
1. Some would say all the time I spend blogging.
2. Speaking before thinking.
3. Taking things for granted.
4. I don't listen well.
5. Wandering eyes while in conversation with others.  Mrs. BH gets on me all the time about that... though I do well with her cuz I can't take my eyes off of her.

What are five places where you have lived?
1.  Madrid, Spain
2.  Seville, Spain
3.  Misawa, Japan
4.  Alexandria, Virginia
5.  Warner Robins, Georgia

What are five jobs you’ve had?
1.  Bag Boy
2.  Cashier
3.  Assistant Produce Manager
4.  Computer Programmer
5.  IT Manager

Five people I tag:
1. tim aka The Godless Heathen
2. Locutisprime
3. Leslie
4. Mommynator
5. Tom Flake

On the cusp

The dude sez he's a Democrat... now... but something tells me he's awakening from this stupor:

He's making the blogospheric rounds... let's hope he wakes more people up.

Had you heard about this? (UPDATED)

I'm a news junkie and MSNBC.Com is actually my default home page and yet, I missed this piece that aired in April (See UPDATE below):

Preliminary tests conducted by MSNBC.com indicate that the deadly toxins ricin and botulinum were present on two items found at a camp in a remote mountain region of northern Iraq allegedly used as a terrorist training center by Islamic militants with ties to the al-Qaida terrorist network. The field tests used by MSNBC.com are only a first step in the evidentiary process and are typically followed by more precise laboratory testing that MSNBC.com has not conducted. U.S. intelligence agents were conducting their own tests in the same area and had not yet released their results, according to officials in northern Iraq.

MSNBC.COM CONDUCTED the tests over a two-day period at Sargat, an alleged terrorist training camp a mile from the Iraq-Iran border. MSNBC.com purchased the test kits commercially. The field tests, developed by Osborn Scientific Group in Lakeside, Ariz., are regarded by some experts as very effective and have been used by U.N. weapons inspectors and federal government agents around the Sept. 11, 2001, attack site in New York City.          

The Sargat camp, set back in an isolated valley and surrounded by snow-capped peaks, was home to the radical Islamic militant group Ansar al-Islam, which counts among its some 700 followers scores of al-Qaida fighters.

Interesting stuff.  Thankfully, Obama will talk them out of any nefarious intentions once President and we can rest easy.

Right?

Right.

With thanks to Flopping Aces.

UPDATE:  tim aka The Godless Heathen has noted that this was actually reported much earlier:

Rick,

I believe that's April of 2003.

http://thomasjoscelyn.blogspot.com/2006/01/sargat-training-camp-toxins.html

And on a related note, via The Anchoress comes news we could use (but liberals can't) from Gateway Pundit:

Finally... The New York Times admits that Bush was right and the surge was a massive success.

The cocksure war supporters learned this humbling lesson during the dark days of 2006. And now the cocksure surge opponents, drunk on their own vindication, will get to enjoy their season of humility. They have already gone through the stages of intellectual denial. First, they simply disbelieved that the surge and the Petraeus strategy was doing any good. Then they accused people who noticed progress in Iraq of duplicity and derangement. Then they acknowledged military, but not political, progress. Lately they have skipped over to the argument that Iraq is progressing so well that the U.S. forces can quickly come home.

Gina Cobb adds, "The Americans who elected George W. Bush as their commander in chief, or who at least gave him the benefit of the doubt in wartime, were right."