Archive for August, 2009

31
Aug

National Geographic takes on the truthers

I just got finished watching the National Geographic channel’s “9/11: Science and Conspiracy” special.

Personally, I enjoyed the Popular Mechanics special more, but the Nat Geo show wasn’t so much about the science of the 9/11 attacks as it was the reaction of “truthers” to evidence that undermines their theories.

If it wasn’t obvious by now, there is no way to prove to the truthers that their theories are nuts. The simplest argument is, of course, to challenge them to count all of the co-conspirators who had to have been bought off for the conspiracy to work – the number easily reaches into the thousands or tens of thousands.

Yet, to this day no one has come forward to confess and reveal the conspiracy?

It was also amusing to hear some of the narration from the conspirators’ “bible” – the fauxumentary “Loose Change.” In one of the brief snippets played, the narrator ominously warns about the tyrants using 9/11 to take over the country and control the people.

You’d think that if those evil Republicans could’ve managed a conspiracy along the lines of 9/11, then they could’ve managed to stuff a enough ballot boxes in 2006 and 2008 to hold onto power.

27
Aug

Unbelievable

Sen. Ted Kennedy died earlier this week after serving for 47 years in his family’s apparently hereditary Senate seat. Normally, I subscribe to the admonition to not speak ill of the dead, which is why this blog made no note of Kennedy’s passing earlier.

However, sometimes people write things so jaw-droppingly outrageous that I am forced to break my rule, which is more of a guideline anyway.

We don’t know how much Kennedy was affected by [Mary Jo Kopechne’s] death, or what she’d have thought about arguably being a catalyst for the most successful Senate career in history. What we don’t know, as always, could fill a Metrodome.

Still, ignorance doesn’t preclude a right to wonder. So it doesn’t automatically make someone (aka, me) a Limbaugh-loving, aerial-wolf-hunting NRA troll for asking what Mary Jo Kopechne would have had to say about Ted’s death, and what she’d have thought of the life and career that are being (rightfully) heralded.

Who knows — maybe she’d feel it was worth it.

Really?

Just how would this offer have been presented to Ms. Kopechne?

“Mary Jo, if you’d just die then this rich Kennedy scion will live for another 40 years, drinking, womanizing and enjoying the privileged life of a Senator. He will run unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination for president in 1980 against an incumbent Democrat president. He won’t really pass any memorable legislation over those 47 years in congress. His most memorable moment will be slandering a Supreme Court nominee whom he disagrees with on judicial philosophy. So, Mary Jo, what do you think? Is that worth your life?”

27
Aug

Hoystory goes to a town hall

The Twitter feed in the sidebar isn’t updating, but I’ve been tweeting from a Town Hall in SLO.

The crowd is about 70-30 anti-Obamacare. But unlike what you see on YouTube the debate is very respectful. Maybe that’s because the Congresscritter isn’t here to catch flak.

25
Aug

The pussification of the United States

Over the last few days, the mainstream media, the talking-head shows on cable news, the left side of the blogosphere and the Obama Justice Department have been going ape over a 5-year-old CIA inspector general’s report that outlined some of the outrageous lengths CIA interrogators went to to try and get information to save American lives.

Among the “crimes” that the Holder-led “Justice” Department will apparently investigate is:

  • The intentional infliction of secondhand smoke on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks.

Seriously, I can’t make that up. Apparently we can expect a lawsuit sometime soon against the manufacturer of the cigar in question – hopefully it was a Cuban cigar.

  • That an interrogator threatened to do really mean things to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s family if he didn’t talk.

This is possibly the most troubling of the charges. Didn’t the CIA officer know who he was talking to? What’s the likelihood of a man who exulted in the murder of 3,000 innocents – including women and children – would give a damn about what you did to his “family.”

  • An interrogator threatened to use a power drill on a terrorist.

Not that he actually used the power drill on the terrorist. He just threatened to use it on the prisoner. The only thing I can imagine that is worse is if he’d threatened to throw a football at the terrorist – it being a “pigskin” after all.

  • An interrogator lied to a terrorist, telling him that day was “shoot a terrorist day” and then went into the next cell and fired his gun into the air – leaving the terrorist with the impression that his buddy was now face-to-face with Allah.

This one is serious. Why would he fire into the air? That’s dangerous. He should’ve found a terrorist and shot him, it’s safer that way – no innocent person gets hurt.

If all of these rather tame incidents are far beyond the pale and prosecutable offenses, then what does that say about this country?

It says we’re being led by a bunch of pussies. Seriously, Attorney General Eric “Coward” Holder who promised he wouldn’t go back and criminalize policy differences, has gone back on his word – either to appease the rabid left-wing pussy base or to distract from the big failure of a government takeover of the health care industry.

Either way, Eric Holder is a pussy.

Of course, if Holder’s being a pussy, it’s only because his boss is allowing his pussiness. Barack “Big Pussy” Obama appears to actually believe that the U.S. is the bad guy in this whole conflict.

I can remember back in 2004 calling into Michael Medved’s radio show when he was asking callers to name one thing that President George W. Bush and Sen. John Kerry had in common. I got on the line and stated that both men loved their country. Medved snarked: “Yeah, France.” But I believe that was true.

I can’t say the same for Obama. I don’t think he loves this country at all. I think Obama’s perfectly fine with letting hundreds or thousands more Americans die at the hands of terrorists so long as his buddies in the college faculty lounges and salons of Europe think he’s a nice guy with the way he treats those poor misguided souls who were picked up because they just happened to be in the wrong terrorist training camp at the wrong time.

Really, what does one expect when Obama hasn’t found a single country in the world that he won’t apologize to on behalf of the United States for some perceived historical wrong. Just don’t blame Obama personally.

In the midst of a war and a prolific spending binge, the only thing the Obama administration is cutting is the military.

Of course, the kicker is that with all of this hand-wringing over waterboarding and the like, it turns out it worked. Actionable intelligence was gained and plots were foiled.

Americans are going to die because of what Big Pussy and his pussycats are doing this week. Who in their right mind would volunteer for the obviously unpleasant duty of interrogating one of these evil terrorists when their likely reward will be prosecution and bankrupting legal bills.

For now, all interrogations of terrorists will be handled by the FBI according to the Army Field Manual. The Field Manual basically limits interrogations to what you saw in the old WW II movies – name, rank, serial number. Because terrorists don’t really have formal ranks nor serial numbers, I guess we’ll just ask them for their names – nicely.

Give it a year before Hollywood – which gave us such blockbusters  like “Lions for Lambs” and “Stop-Loss” – comes out with a film showing the new, more understanding interrogation procedures. The interrogation where the terrorist reveals a plot to blow up LA because the nice interrogator converted to Islam and provided the terrorist with a goat for companionship.

And imagine their surprise when that film bombs too – because hateful terrorists don’t reveal their evil just because you’re nice to them.

Obama and Holder are turning the intelligence community into a neutered, impotent and broken guard dog.

Unfortunately, it’s the American people that will end up paying the bill.

20
Aug

Pharisee Obama

President Obama appeared before some religious leaders yesterday and apparently turned in a performance that, had it been done by former President George W. Bush, would’ve sent the left into paroxysms of “theocrat” and “Christianist.”

Repeatedly invoking the Bible, President Obama yesterday told religious leaders that health-care critics are "bearing false witness" against his plan.

The fire-and-brimstone president declared holy war in a telephone call with thousands of religious leaders around the country as he sought to breathe life into his plan for a system overhaul.

Without naming anyone specifically in the 10-minute conference call, Obama said opponents had been spreading lies.

"I know that there’s been a lot of misinformation in this debate and there are some folks out there who are, frankly, bearing false witness," Obama said.

"I need you to spread the facts and speak the truth."

When he says “the truth,” he means “my truth.”

I particularly liked this bit:

"I am my brother’s keeper. I am my sister’s keeper," Obama said.

No, not this brother.

20
Aug

Bad journalism

MSNBC wanted to use one of the recent town halls as a jumping off point to paint Obamacare protesters, as Janeane Garafalo puts it, people who “hate that a black man is president.” Take a look at the first part of the video – you don’t need to watch the roundtable discussion.

Notice anything odd about the shots of this guy carrying an AR-15 – a weapon that’s legal to openly carry in Arizona? There’s close-up shots of the gun, but what’s missing?

That’s right, MSNBC doesn’t show a single wider shot of this guy. Why don’t they get a shot of this guy’s face? Here’s why:

That’s the culprit on the right. Yes, the example MSNBC uses to talk about racists hating on President Obama because of his skin color is … a black man.

Journalism. Wound. Self-inflicted.

18
Aug

Move on already

Law professor John Yoo returned to classes at UC Berkeley yesterday, and the loons came out.

Anti-war activists protested Monday at the University of California, Berkeley to call for the firing of a law professor who co-wrote legal memos that critics say were used to justify the torture of suspected terrorists.

Campus police arrested at least four people who refused to leave the university’s law school building.

The demonstrators said John Yoo should be dismissed, disbarred and prosecuted for war crimes for his work as a Bush administration attorney from 2001 to 2003, when he helped craft legal theories for waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques.

“Helped craft legal theories for” is journalese for “analyzed the state of the law and put strict limits on the use of.”

The sad thing is that these barking moonbats may get their wish and the Obama administration may seek to criminalize policy differences for the first time in U.S. history.

P.S. Of course, these “disruptors” probably aren’t “astroturfed,” “evil-mongers” but we should probably check with Nancy Pelosi.

16
Aug

Nothing for clunkers

Apparently the initial underfunding of the so-called “Cash for Clunkers” program wasn’t the only screw-up.

The federal government has only reimbursed auto dealers for 2 percent of the claims they’ve submitted through the popular "cash for clunkers" program, a Pennsylvania congressman said, calling on the Obama administration to help speed up the process.

Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa., called for "immediate action" to address the problem in a statement Sunday, after writing a letter to President Obama Saturday expressing his concerns.

In the letter, Sestak said only 2 percent of claims have been paid and that four of every five applications have been "rejected for minor oversight."

In recent days, auto dealers across the country have been complaining that the reimbursement payments are slow to process. And they said some of their applications were being rejected because of apparent procedural issues. The statistics Sestak cited suggest those complaints are not based on isolated incidents.

Staffing could be one problem. According to sales data summarized by Transportation Department officials, dealers have submitted requests for rebates on 338,659 vehicles sold.

But while Congress just expanded the $1 billion program by $2 billion, the Department of Transportation says a staff of just 225 people is reviewing those claims.

And they want to run the nation’s health care system?

14
Aug

Ivory tower cowards

When a bunch of mullahs manufactured outrage a few years back over some largely innocuous cartoon depictions of the "prophet" Muhammed, hundreds died as rioting followed. In covering the violence, most American newspapers and magazines declined to publish even the most tame of the cartoons out of what they said was a desire not to disrespect the "religion of peace."

The truth is that most media outlets didn’t want to have their offices picketed by "outraged" mobs — or worse, bombed. This real explanation was understandable, but if you’re going to be a coward, then fess up to being a coward.

In that spirit, this week Yale University Press announced this week that they are the biggest bunch of cowards among university imprints.

It’s not all that surprising that Yale University Press would be wary of reprinting notoriously controversial cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in a forthcoming book. After all, when the 12 caricatures were first published by a Danish newspaper a few years ago and reprinted by other European publications, Muslims all over the world angrily protested, calling the images — which included one in which Muhammad wore a turban in the shape of a bomb — blasphemous. In the Middle East and Africa some rioted, burning and vandalizing embassies; others demanded a boycott of Danish goods; a few nations recalled their ambassadors from Denmark. In the end at least 200 people were killed.

So Yale University and Yale University Press consulted two dozen authorities, including diplomats and experts on Islam and counterterrorism, and the recommendation was unanimous: The book, “The Cartoons That Shook the World,” should not include the 12 Danish drawings that originally appeared in September 2005. What’s more, they suggested that the Yale press also refrain from publishing any other illustrations of the prophet that were to be included, specifically, a drawing for a children’s book; an Ottoman print; and a sketch by the 19th-century artist Gustave Doré of Muhammad being tormented in Hell, an episode from Dante’s “Inferno” that has been depicted by Botticelli, Blake, Rodin and Dalí.

The book’s author, Jytte Klausen, a Danish-born professor of politics at Brandeis University, in Waltham, Mass., reluctantly accepted Yale University Press’s decision not to publish the cartoons. But she was disturbed by the withdrawal of the other representations of Muhammad. All of those images are widely available, Ms. Klausen said by telephone, adding that “Muslim friends, leaders and activists thought that the incident was misunderstood, so the cartoons needed to be reprinted so we could have a discussion about it.” The book is due out in November.

It’s laughable that a scholarly book on the incident lacks the images that prompted the the writing of the book in the first place. Instead, readers will have to go to the Internet to find the images that sparked the manufactured outrage from publishers braver than Yale University Press.

13
Aug

Question for President Obama

It’s highly unlikely that I’ll find myself in the audience for one of President Obama’s town hall meetings, and even less likely that I would be called on to ask a question. But, if I did have that opportunity, this is what I would ask.

Mr. President, I would like to assure you that your personal approval ratings in the polls will not fall below 60 percent between now and 2012. Of course, you and I both know that I don’t have the power to fulfill that promise.

For the past several months, you’ve appeared at other town halls and on nationally televised press conferences repeatedly assuring the public that if we like the insurance coverage we have, we’ll be able to keep it. As many independent fact-checkers have noted, that’s not a promise you can keep. Nothing in any of the legislation before congress would prohibit an employer from selecting the so-called public option, or even a different private option. Depending on the source, the inclusion of a public option in the plan would cause somewhere 11 and 103 million to have their insurance coverage changed whether they like it or not – and in direct contradiction to your oft-stated promise.

Mr. President, would you kindly stop making promises that you know you do not have the power to keep?

If any of you end up going to a town hall, you have my permission to use this “astroturfed” question.





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