Sunday, October 22, 2006
'Not Voting'?
"NOT VOTING"!?
..."Not Voting"?!! --that's insane.
Finally; John Derbyshire agrees with Andrew Sullivan!
And terrorists agree with them both:
'Conservatives should stay home and not vote'!
Derbyshire:
"Look, we're not ever likely to get a govt. that follows a purely conservative line on all issues. We are an influence, that's all, and that's all we can reasonably hope to be. But when faced with a GOP government intent on massively expanding the welfare state, on open borders, and on "nation-building" in remote places, we should acknowledge that we are being no influence at all. We have gone from being an influence for good policies to being an enabler of bad policies.
The only thing we can usefully do then is to assert our existence as a voting bloc in the one way that's available to us: by not voting. That lays down a warning to any future GOP administration that might be tempted to go as badly wrong on important conservative issues as this one has.
This nation survived Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton; it will survive Nancy Pelosi and Charlie Rangel. Ten, fifteen, twenty years from now, when our kids are voters, some GOP administration and Congress might be tempted to violate core conservative principles as egregiously as this one has. But they will hear key voices, the voices of party elders and wise commentators, warning: "Remember the Great Congressional Massacre of '06! Let's not risk that happening again!" And Congress and the admin. will then turn the wheel to the right."
To anyone gullible enough to swallow this defeatist drivel, let me offer a few points.
1.) Anyone who cares anything about our troops--and especially conservatives who supported placing them in harm's way--have a MORAL DUTY not to empower Democrats, who would have our soldiers, sailors and airmen flee in defeat in the-last-helicopter-off-the-embassy, have them hide in their barracks in Okinawa and subject them to war-crimes prosecutions in international courts.
This alone should cause any decent person to crawl on their hands and knees to get to the polls.
2.) Our system rewards participation, not pouting. It may not always reward participation perfectly, but it rewards temper tantrums not at all.
3.) Derb's pet issue is immigration. 95% of House Republicans and 3/5ths of Senate Republicans voted for tough enforcement--and this is how he rewards his friends?
4.) "This nation survived Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton; it will survive Nancy Pelosi and Charlie Rangel." --Todd Beamer didn't survive those policies. Nor did the Twin Towers. And if Democrats are ever successful in passing their beloved Terrorist Bill of Rights, certain American cities may not either.
5.) "But they will hear key voices, the voices of party elders and wise commentators, warning: "Remember the Great Congressional Massacre of '06! Let's not risk that happening again!""--Perhaps.
Or perhaps they would hear the voices of those who would say "Republicans lost because they were just TOO conservative!"
Or worse, the voices of those who say "Conservatives are fickle. They can't be depended upon. Better to ignore them. They're fair-weather friends, mere summer soldiers and sunshine patriots."
6.) We are one vote away from returning the Supreme Court to Constitutionalism. If we go wobbly now, especially in the Senate, it could set back the cause of the Constitution for yet another generation.
7.) A conservative can't really not vote anyway.
As Orwell said, "Pacifism is objectively pro-fascist. This is elementary common sense. If you hamper the war effort of one side, you automatically help out that of the other. Nor is there any real way of remaining outside such a war as the present one. In practice, 'he that is not with me is against me.'"
If a conservative stays home on Election Day, he is objectively voting for liberal Democrats. He is hampering the efforts of those who agree with him, however imperfectly. He is automatically helping those whose policies he claims to detest. He is not remaining outside the contest nor "sending a message".
He is, in fact, championing those who would see his country defeated, his Constitution rended, his liberties ended, his children stolen and his property plundered. One way or another, you're GOING to vote.
The entire thrust of Western political systems have been based on the struggle to empower the individual and recognize the individual's right--and duty--to have a say in his own governance. And on one appointed day, every other year, the individual has a vote that is the equal of any. Yet now we're told that this individual should sit mute in hopes of somehow gaining influence in the future?
In a representative democracy, if you do not present yourself, how can you possibly hope to be re-"presented"?
And did you ever notice how it is only conservatives who are told not to participate? Democrats like voting so much that they sometimes do it two or three times. Indeed, when it is suggested that voters present an ID, we're told that Jim Crow is being re-imposed. And even now, while you're contemplating abandoning your franchise, Democrats are working to extend voting rights to criminals and even foreign citizens.
There are some people who won't get to vote this year. Some of them had to choose between jumping from the top floors of the World Trade Center or dying where they stood. Others, like Spec. Casey Sheehan or Petty Officer Second Class Michael A. Monsoor won't be voting this year...because they already voted with their very lives.
They voted for you, by the way.
They gave their lives to preserve our rights and in an effort to extend these rights to others. Do we honor them by abdicating our duty? By staying at home? By giving power to those who ban ROTC and military recruiters from campuses--while welcoming cop-killers, professional perverts, even terrorists and dictators to those same Democrat-run campuses?
No. Never. Never, never, never, never.
Terrorists also want you to remain at home on Election Day. They are laboring mightily to maximize the number of American combat deaths in hopes of demoralizing you. They realize we're having an election, and they know what the stakes are.
Democrats may not support the terrorists...but terrorists are supporting the Democrats--and openly so.
Think about that.
But think about it while you're standing in the polling booth, voting on Nov. 7th.
..."Not Voting"?!! --that's insane.
Finally; John Derbyshire agrees with Andrew Sullivan!
And terrorists agree with them both:
'Conservatives should stay home and not vote'!
Derbyshire:
"Look, we're not ever likely to get a govt. that follows a purely conservative line on all issues. We are an influence, that's all, and that's all we can reasonably hope to be. But when faced with a GOP government intent on massively expanding the welfare state, on open borders, and on "nation-building" in remote places, we should acknowledge that we are being no influence at all. We have gone from being an influence for good policies to being an enabler of bad policies.
The only thing we can usefully do then is to assert our existence as a voting bloc in the one way that's available to us: by not voting. That lays down a warning to any future GOP administration that might be tempted to go as badly wrong on important conservative issues as this one has.
This nation survived Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton; it will survive Nancy Pelosi and Charlie Rangel. Ten, fifteen, twenty years from now, when our kids are voters, some GOP administration and Congress might be tempted to violate core conservative principles as egregiously as this one has. But they will hear key voices, the voices of party elders and wise commentators, warning: "Remember the Great Congressional Massacre of '06! Let's not risk that happening again!" And Congress and the admin. will then turn the wheel to the right."
To anyone gullible enough to swallow this defeatist drivel, let me offer a few points.
1.) Anyone who cares anything about our troops--and especially conservatives who supported placing them in harm's way--have a MORAL DUTY not to empower Democrats, who would have our soldiers, sailors and airmen flee in defeat in the-last-helicopter-off-the-embassy, have them hide in their barracks in Okinawa and subject them to war-crimes prosecutions in international courts.
This alone should cause any decent person to crawl on their hands and knees to get to the polls.
2.) Our system rewards participation, not pouting. It may not always reward participation perfectly, but it rewards temper tantrums not at all.
3.) Derb's pet issue is immigration. 95% of House Republicans and 3/5ths of Senate Republicans voted for tough enforcement--and this is how he rewards his friends?
4.) "This nation survived Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton; it will survive Nancy Pelosi and Charlie Rangel." --Todd Beamer didn't survive those policies. Nor did the Twin Towers. And if Democrats are ever successful in passing their beloved Terrorist Bill of Rights, certain American cities may not either.
5.) "But they will hear key voices, the voices of party elders and wise commentators, warning: "Remember the Great Congressional Massacre of '06! Let's not risk that happening again!""--Perhaps.
Or perhaps they would hear the voices of those who would say "Republicans lost because they were just TOO conservative!"
Or worse, the voices of those who say "Conservatives are fickle. They can't be depended upon. Better to ignore them. They're fair-weather friends, mere summer soldiers and sunshine patriots."
6.) We are one vote away from returning the Supreme Court to Constitutionalism. If we go wobbly now, especially in the Senate, it could set back the cause of the Constitution for yet another generation.
7.) A conservative can't really not vote anyway.
As Orwell said, "Pacifism is objectively pro-fascist. This is elementary common sense. If you hamper the war effort of one side, you automatically help out that of the other. Nor is there any real way of remaining outside such a war as the present one. In practice, 'he that is not with me is against me.'"
If a conservative stays home on Election Day, he is objectively voting for liberal Democrats. He is hampering the efforts of those who agree with him, however imperfectly. He is automatically helping those whose policies he claims to detest. He is not remaining outside the contest nor "sending a message".
He is, in fact, championing those who would see his country defeated, his Constitution rended, his liberties ended, his children stolen and his property plundered. One way or another, you're GOING to vote.
The entire thrust of Western political systems have been based on the struggle to empower the individual and recognize the individual's right--and duty--to have a say in his own governance. And on one appointed day, every other year, the individual has a vote that is the equal of any. Yet now we're told that this individual should sit mute in hopes of somehow gaining influence in the future?
In a representative democracy, if you do not present yourself, how can you possibly hope to be re-"presented"?
And did you ever notice how it is only conservatives who are told not to participate? Democrats like voting so much that they sometimes do it two or three times. Indeed, when it is suggested that voters present an ID, we're told that Jim Crow is being re-imposed. And even now, while you're contemplating abandoning your franchise, Democrats are working to extend voting rights to criminals and even foreign citizens.
There are some people who won't get to vote this year. Some of them had to choose between jumping from the top floors of the World Trade Center or dying where they stood. Others, like Spec. Casey Sheehan or Petty Officer Second Class Michael A. Monsoor won't be voting this year...because they already voted with their very lives.
They voted for you, by the way.
They gave their lives to preserve our rights and in an effort to extend these rights to others. Do we honor them by abdicating our duty? By staying at home? By giving power to those who ban ROTC and military recruiters from campuses--while welcoming cop-killers, professional perverts, even terrorists and dictators to those same Democrat-run campuses?
No. Never. Never, never, never, never.
Terrorists also want you to remain at home on Election Day. They are laboring mightily to maximize the number of American combat deaths in hopes of demoralizing you. They realize we're having an election, and they know what the stakes are.
Democrats may not support the terrorists...but terrorists are supporting the Democrats--and openly so.
Think about that.
But think about it while you're standing in the polling booth, voting on Nov. 7th.
Sunday, October 15, 2006
Mom & Pop Stories
"The family is essentially a protective force, and not least against the claims of the state. It is an area of private custom, as opposed to public law. It is an alternative to the state as a focus of loyalty, and thus a humanizing force in society. Unlike the state, it upholds non-material values--makes them paramount, indeed. It repudiates the exclusive claims of realpolitik. [...]
The family, in fact, is a gentle ideology in itself, because it is inconcievable without a system of morality based on altruism. The family embraces tradition rather than fashionable dogma. It upholds a balance of rights and responsibilities, and not merely within generations: it insists on respect for the past, and concern for the future."--Paul Johnson, Statesman and Nation, 1971
The family, in fact, is a gentle ideology in itself, because it is inconcievable without a system of morality based on altruism. The family embraces tradition rather than fashionable dogma. It upholds a balance of rights and responsibilities, and not merely within generations: it insists on respect for the past, and concern for the future."--Paul Johnson, Statesman and Nation, 1971
Tolstoy v. Putin
"EVERLASTING FIRE"
"The Jew is that sacred being who has brought down from heaven the everlasting fire, and has illuminated with it the entire world. He is the religious source, spring and fountain out of which all the rest of the peoples have drawn their beliefs and their religions. The Jew is the emblem of eternity. He, who neither slaughter nor torture of thousands of years could destroy, he who neither fire, nor sword, nor Inquisition was able to wipe off the face of the earth. He, who was the first to produce the Oracles of God. He, who has been for so long the Guardian of Prophecy and has transmitted it to the rest of the world. Such a nation cannot be destroyed. The Jew is as everlasting as Eternity itself."--Leo Nikolaivitch Tolstoy, 1908
"The Jew is that sacred being who has brought down from heaven the everlasting fire, and has illuminated with it the entire world. He is the religious source, spring and fountain out of which all the rest of the peoples have drawn their beliefs and their religions. The Jew is the emblem of eternity. He, who neither slaughter nor torture of thousands of years could destroy, he who neither fire, nor sword, nor Inquisition was able to wipe off the face of the earth. He, who was the first to produce the Oracles of God. He, who has been for so long the Guardian of Prophecy and has transmitted it to the rest of the world. Such a nation cannot be destroyed. The Jew is as everlasting as Eternity itself."--Leo Nikolaivitch Tolstoy, 1908
The Circumstances of Victims
WHEN NO ONE IS LEFT TO TROD UPON THE DOWN-TRODDEN
via Zee at Spiced Sass:
"The ranks of those given special rights because of their victimhood have now swelled so that they outnumber their alleged oppressors. [...]
Official victims, all with their own state apparatus to advance their claims and prosecute their enemies, include all women, all ethnic minority members, and all disabled people. They are represented by the Equal Opportunities Commission, the Commission for Racial Equality, and the Disability Rights Commission.
However, from next year two more big groups will be added to the list of victims.
The new Commission for Equality and Human Rights will have powers to act for pensioners and for homosexuals, bringing the numbers of official victims to more than seven out of ten of the population.
But Dr. Green said victim culture had now become so popular that, if the claims of some victim groups are taken seriously, there are more victims than people in the country."
As David Pryce-Jones notes, there is now one more class of the Oppressed: traitors.
George Blake was a MI-6 agent whose treason resulted in the torture and deaths of hundreds of anti-Communists. Caught, he escaped prison and fled to Moscow.
Mr. Pryce-Jones:
"In 1990 he wrote his autobiography, for which his British publishers proposed to pay him £60,000, or about $120,000 in today’s values. Mrs Thatcher’s government took legal action to prevent him profiting from his treason. The British courts ruled that this was only right, and the publishers paid the money to charity. Now the European Court of Human Rights, a European body that sits in Strasbourg and makes up its law as it goes along, has ruled that the Thatcher government breached Blake’s human rights. Disgracefully, this court found no "causal link" between Blake’s treason and the government’s violation of his human rights. In the opinion of the judges, he had suffered "distress and frustration." Blake is to receive compensation to the tune of £4,690, including costs. [...]
This whole travesty arises because the present Blair government incorporated lock, stock and barrel into British law the European Convention on Human Rights, a monument to political correctness at its zenith. The Strasbourg Court is thus in a position to go against British law, to trump it, dictating to British citizens who have no possible recourse or appeal in their own courts. [...]
Americans, free people everywhere, be warned! Have nothing to do with international courts."
We may well owe Benedict Arnold reparations.
One yearns for the clarity of Mrs. Thatcher:
"I want to start by disposing of some myths about my country, Britain, and its relationship with Europe and to do that, I must say something about the identity of Europe itself.
Europe is not the creation of the Treaty of Rome.
Nor is the European idea the property of any group or institution.
We British are as much heirs to the legacy of European culture as any other nation. Our links to the rest of Europe, the continent of Europe, have been the dominant factor in our history.
For three hundred years, we were part of the Roman Empire and our maps still trace the straight lines of the roads the Romans built.
Our ancestors—Celts, Saxons, Danes—came from the Continent.
Our nation was—in that favourite Community word—"restructured" under the Norman and Angevin rule in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
This year, we celebrate the three hundredth anniversary of the glorious revolution in which the British crown passed to Prince William of Orange and Queen Mary .
Visit the great churches and cathedrals of Britain, read our literature and listen to our language: all bear witness to the cultural riches which we have drawn from Europe and other Europeans from us.
We in Britain are rightly proud of the way in which, since Magna Carta in the year 1215, we have pioneered and developed representative institutions to stand as bastions of freedom.
And proud too of the way in which for centuries Britain was a home for people from the rest of Europe who sought sanctuary from tyranny.
But we know that without the European legacy of political ideas we could not have achieved as much as we did.
From classical and mediaeval thought we have borrowed that concept of the rule of law which marks out a civilised society from barbarism.
And on that idea of Christendom, to which the Rector referred—Christendom for long synonymous with Europe—with its recognition of the unique and spiritual nature of the individual, on that idea, we still base our belief in personal liberty and other human rights.
Too often, the history of Europe is described as a series of interminable wars and quarrels.
Yet from our perspective today surely what strikes us most is our common experience. For instance, the story of how Europeans explored and colonised—and yes, without apology—civilised much of the world is an extraordinary tale of talent, skill and courage.
But we British have in a very special way contributed to Europe.
Over the centuries we have fought to prevent Europe from falling under the dominance of a single power.
We have fought and we have died for her freedom.
Only miles from here, in Belgium, lie the bodies of 120,000 British soldiers who died in the First World War.
Had it not been for that willingness to fight and to die, Europe would have been united long before now—but not in liberty, not in justice.
It was British support to resistance movements throughout the last War that helped to keep alive the flame of liberty in so many countries until the day of liberation.
Tomorrow, King Baudouin will attend a service in Brussels to commemorate the many brave Belgians who gave their lives in service with the Royal Air Force—a sacrifice which we shall never forget.
And it was from our island fortress that the liberation of Europe itself was mounted.
And still, today, we stand together.
Nearly 70,000 British servicemen are stationed on the mainland of Europe.
All these things alone are proof of our commitment to Europe's future.
The European Community is one manifestation of that European identity, but it is not the only one.
We must never forget that east of the Iron Curtain, people who once enjoyed a full share of European culture, freedom and identity have been cut off from their roots.
We shall always look on Warsaw, Prague and Budapest as great European cities.
Nor should we forget that European values have helped to make the United States of America into the valiant defender of freedom which she has become.[...]
The Community is not an end in itself.
Nor is it an institutional device to be constantly modified according to the dictates of some abstract intellectual concept.
Nor must it be ossified by endless regulation. [...]
But working more closely together does not require power to be centralised in Brussels or decisions to be taken by an appointed bureaucracy.
Indeed, it is ironic that just when those countries such as the Soviet Union, which have tried to run everything from the centre, are learning that success depends on dispersing power and decisions away from the centre, there are some in the Community who seem to want to move in the opposite direction.
We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them re-imposed at a European level with a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels."
And this:
"There is no such thing as society. There is living tapestry of men and women and people and the beauty of that tapestry and the quality of our lives will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves and each of us prepared to turn round and help by our own efforts those who are unfortunate. And the worst things we have in life, in my view, are where children who are a great privilege and a trust—they are the fundamental great trust, but they do not ask to come into the world, we bring them into the world, they are a miracle, there is nothing like the miracle of life—we have these little innocents and the worst crime in life is when those children, who would naturally have the right to look to their parents for help, for comfort, not only just for the food and shelter but for the time, for the understanding, turn round and not only is that help not forthcoming, but they get either neglect or worse than that, cruelty.
How do you set about teaching a child religion at school, God is like a father, and she thinks "like someone who has been cruel to them?" [...]—you are left with what? You are left with the problems of human nature, and a child who has not had what we and many of your readers would regard as their birthright—a good home—it is those that we have to get out and help, and you know, it is not only a question of money as everyone will tell you; not your background in society. It is a question of human nature and for those children it is difficult to say: "You are responsible for your behaviour!" because they just have not had a chance and so I think that is one of the biggest problems and I think it is the greatest sin."
When adults choose to be Professional Victims, the children become victims of victims.
Nor will the Islamist Terrorist-Sympathizing Community ever allow any other group to "out-victim" them. They have a dozen centuries of practice and more grievances than Carter has liver spots and light-water reactors.
So choose today:
Manhood
...or Victimhood?
via Zee at Spiced Sass:
"The ranks of those given special rights because of their victimhood have now swelled so that they outnumber their alleged oppressors. [...]
Official victims, all with their own state apparatus to advance their claims and prosecute their enemies, include all women, all ethnic minority members, and all disabled people. They are represented by the Equal Opportunities Commission, the Commission for Racial Equality, and the Disability Rights Commission.
However, from next year two more big groups will be added to the list of victims.
The new Commission for Equality and Human Rights will have powers to act for pensioners and for homosexuals, bringing the numbers of official victims to more than seven out of ten of the population.
But Dr. Green said victim culture had now become so popular that, if the claims of some victim groups are taken seriously, there are more victims than people in the country."
As David Pryce-Jones notes, there is now one more class of the Oppressed: traitors.
George Blake was a MI-6 agent whose treason resulted in the torture and deaths of hundreds of anti-Communists. Caught, he escaped prison and fled to Moscow.
Mr. Pryce-Jones:
"In 1990 he wrote his autobiography, for which his British publishers proposed to pay him £60,000, or about $120,000 in today’s values. Mrs Thatcher’s government took legal action to prevent him profiting from his treason. The British courts ruled that this was only right, and the publishers paid the money to charity. Now the European Court of Human Rights, a European body that sits in Strasbourg and makes up its law as it goes along, has ruled that the Thatcher government breached Blake’s human rights. Disgracefully, this court found no "causal link" between Blake’s treason and the government’s violation of his human rights. In the opinion of the judges, he had suffered "distress and frustration." Blake is to receive compensation to the tune of £4,690, including costs. [...]
This whole travesty arises because the present Blair government incorporated lock, stock and barrel into British law the European Convention on Human Rights, a monument to political correctness at its zenith. The Strasbourg Court is thus in a position to go against British law, to trump it, dictating to British citizens who have no possible recourse or appeal in their own courts. [...]
Americans, free people everywhere, be warned! Have nothing to do with international courts."
We may well owe Benedict Arnold reparations.
One yearns for the clarity of Mrs. Thatcher:
"I want to start by disposing of some myths about my country, Britain, and its relationship with Europe and to do that, I must say something about the identity of Europe itself.
Europe is not the creation of the Treaty of Rome.
Nor is the European idea the property of any group or institution.
We British are as much heirs to the legacy of European culture as any other nation. Our links to the rest of Europe, the continent of Europe, have been the dominant factor in our history.
For three hundred years, we were part of the Roman Empire and our maps still trace the straight lines of the roads the Romans built.
Our ancestors—Celts, Saxons, Danes—came from the Continent.
Our nation was—in that favourite Community word—"restructured" under the Norman and Angevin rule in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
This year, we celebrate the three hundredth anniversary of the glorious revolution in which the British crown passed to Prince William of Orange and Queen Mary .
Visit the great churches and cathedrals of Britain, read our literature and listen to our language: all bear witness to the cultural riches which we have drawn from Europe and other Europeans from us.
We in Britain are rightly proud of the way in which, since Magna Carta in the year 1215, we have pioneered and developed representative institutions to stand as bastions of freedom.
And proud too of the way in which for centuries Britain was a home for people from the rest of Europe who sought sanctuary from tyranny.
But we know that without the European legacy of political ideas we could not have achieved as much as we did.
From classical and mediaeval thought we have borrowed that concept of the rule of law which marks out a civilised society from barbarism.
And on that idea of Christendom, to which the Rector referred—Christendom for long synonymous with Europe—with its recognition of the unique and spiritual nature of the individual, on that idea, we still base our belief in personal liberty and other human rights.
Too often, the history of Europe is described as a series of interminable wars and quarrels.
Yet from our perspective today surely what strikes us most is our common experience. For instance, the story of how Europeans explored and colonised—and yes, without apology—civilised much of the world is an extraordinary tale of talent, skill and courage.
But we British have in a very special way contributed to Europe.
Over the centuries we have fought to prevent Europe from falling under the dominance of a single power.
We have fought and we have died for her freedom.
Only miles from here, in Belgium, lie the bodies of 120,000 British soldiers who died in the First World War.
Had it not been for that willingness to fight and to die, Europe would have been united long before now—but not in liberty, not in justice.
It was British support to resistance movements throughout the last War that helped to keep alive the flame of liberty in so many countries until the day of liberation.
Tomorrow, King Baudouin will attend a service in Brussels to commemorate the many brave Belgians who gave their lives in service with the Royal Air Force—a sacrifice which we shall never forget.
And it was from our island fortress that the liberation of Europe itself was mounted.
And still, today, we stand together.
Nearly 70,000 British servicemen are stationed on the mainland of Europe.
All these things alone are proof of our commitment to Europe's future.
The European Community is one manifestation of that European identity, but it is not the only one.
We must never forget that east of the Iron Curtain, people who once enjoyed a full share of European culture, freedom and identity have been cut off from their roots.
We shall always look on Warsaw, Prague and Budapest as great European cities.
Nor should we forget that European values have helped to make the United States of America into the valiant defender of freedom which she has become.[...]
The Community is not an end in itself.
Nor is it an institutional device to be constantly modified according to the dictates of some abstract intellectual concept.
Nor must it be ossified by endless regulation. [...]
But working more closely together does not require power to be centralised in Brussels or decisions to be taken by an appointed bureaucracy.
Indeed, it is ironic that just when those countries such as the Soviet Union, which have tried to run everything from the centre, are learning that success depends on dispersing power and decisions away from the centre, there are some in the Community who seem to want to move in the opposite direction.
We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them re-imposed at a European level with a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels."
And this:
"There is no such thing as society. There is living tapestry of men and women and people and the beauty of that tapestry and the quality of our lives will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves and each of us prepared to turn round and help by our own efforts those who are unfortunate. And the worst things we have in life, in my view, are where children who are a great privilege and a trust—they are the fundamental great trust, but they do not ask to come into the world, we bring them into the world, they are a miracle, there is nothing like the miracle of life—we have these little innocents and the worst crime in life is when those children, who would naturally have the right to look to their parents for help, for comfort, not only just for the food and shelter but for the time, for the understanding, turn round and not only is that help not forthcoming, but they get either neglect or worse than that, cruelty.
How do you set about teaching a child religion at school, God is like a father, and she thinks "like someone who has been cruel to them?" [...]—you are left with what? You are left with the problems of human nature, and a child who has not had what we and many of your readers would regard as their birthright—a good home—it is those that we have to get out and help, and you know, it is not only a question of money as everyone will tell you; not your background in society. It is a question of human nature and for those children it is difficult to say: "You are responsible for your behaviour!" because they just have not had a chance and so I think that is one of the biggest problems and I think it is the greatest sin."
When adults choose to be Professional Victims, the children become victims of victims.
Nor will the Islamist Terrorist-Sympathizing Community ever allow any other group to "out-victim" them. They have a dozen centuries of practice and more grievances than Carter has liver spots and light-water reactors.
So choose today:
Manhood
...or Victimhood?
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Did I say "Thanks" Today?
THANKS, GUYS
"Wherein lies our security?
It is the American man at arms.
From personal experience I know how well he guards us. I have seen him die at Verdun, at St. Mihiel, at Guadalcanal; in the foxholes of Bataan, in the batteries of Corregidor, in the battle areas of Korea; on land, on sea, and in the air; amidst jungle and swamp, hot sands and frozen reaches, in the smoldering mud of shell pocked roads and dripping trenches.
He was gaunt and he was ghostly; he was grieved and he was loused; he was filthy and he stank; and I loved him.
He died hard, that American fighting man. Not like a dove which when hit, folds its wings gently and comes down quietly. But like a wounded wolf at bay, with lips curled back in a snarl.
He left me with an abiding faith in the future of this nation; a faith that our beloved land will once more know the serenity of hope without fear; a faith in the course of our destiny as a free, prosperous, and happy people." --Gen. Douglas MacArthur
"Wherein lies our security?
It is the American man at arms.
From personal experience I know how well he guards us. I have seen him die at Verdun, at St. Mihiel, at Guadalcanal; in the foxholes of Bataan, in the batteries of Corregidor, in the battle areas of Korea; on land, on sea, and in the air; amidst jungle and swamp, hot sands and frozen reaches, in the smoldering mud of shell pocked roads and dripping trenches.
He was gaunt and he was ghostly; he was grieved and he was loused; he was filthy and he stank; and I loved him.
He died hard, that American fighting man. Not like a dove which when hit, folds its wings gently and comes down quietly. But like a wounded wolf at bay, with lips curled back in a snarl.
He left me with an abiding faith in the future of this nation; a faith that our beloved land will once more know the serenity of hope without fear; a faith in the course of our destiny as a free, prosperous, and happy people." --Gen. Douglas MacArthur
Sunday, October 08, 2006
The Party of Perversion
I, FOR ONE, WELCOME OUR NEW DEMOCRAT MORAL OVERLORDS
My truth is I'm a Republican-American.
But 'twas not always thus. Once upon a time, my truth was Democratic...until I realized that just as Democrats coddle terrorists and dictators abroad, they coddle criminals and predators at home.
The real danger for Democrats in pimping this Foley "Surprise" beyond all measure is not that it will point out that individual Democrats also have some baggage, such as Nancy Pelosi marching with a boy-raping NAMBLA Communist.
The danger for Democrats is this; sooner or later, someone--someone like me--is going to start pointing out that institutionally, Democrats are the Party of Perversion.
No, not that the Democrat parents next door want their children harmed; they don't.
But, as a group, every time liberals and Democrats assume and exercise power, whether in politics, the arts, media, academia or in legal circles, they protect and promote predators and perversion. Unfair, you say?
Well, there's a record there, so let's examine it.
***Cathy Seipps:
"Did you know that in California, child molesters and rapists are a protected class? It’s true. Not only are California landlords banned from using the state’s Megan’s Law database to decline renting their properties to sex offenders, they’re not even allowed to warn other tenants that these paroled criminals are now their neighbors. If they do the first, they can be fined $25,000 for housing discrimination. But if they don’t do the second, they can be sued for failing to protect tenants against a known danger.
Landlords are caught between a rock, a hard place and the California State Assembly’s Public Safety Committee, which last April stalled a bill designed to fix the Catch-22...
...a reform measure meant to correct the Megan’s Law housing glitch died last year because assembly members Mervyn Dymally (D., Compton), Jackie Goldberg (D., L.A.) and committee Mark Leno (D., San Francisco) all voted no. For representatives serving on a public-safety committee, these three seem oddly unconcerned with public safety."
Set aside for a moment the fact that these Democrats stay awake at night worrying about the "Rights" of rapists. Set aside their callous disregard for women and children. These Democrats won't even pass a law to protect landlords from the lawsuits resulting from their Pervert Protection Act. Why? It would point out their predator-rights fetish.
Worse, these offenders were convicted in open court and their offenses are a matter of public record. Yet landlords may not even quote the court record? What happened to Free Speech? If a landlord lived on the same property, would he even be allowed to warn his own children?
For these Democrats, Free Speech is optional---but the many "Rights" of child-molesters aren't.
***And what of Free Association? Which party believes militant gay activists have an Iron-Clad Constitutional Right to their own Boy Scout troop? And even though the Scouts won their case (by one vote), which party is still legally harassing them and driving them from public lands and the public square?
Which party believes in using the public schools to indoctrinate other peoples' children?
Whether it's using cartoons and puppets to teach Queer Theory to kindergartners or teaching middle-schoolers to put condoms on bananas or mandatory Vagina-Day (V-Day) celebrations for college students, it is Democrats who use public education to force their personal sexual morality on all.
In a hilarious story about what happens when some college students finally say "Enough!", Christina Hoff Summers writes:
"The high point of [V-Day] is a performance of Ensler’s raunchy play [The Vagina Monologues], which consists of various women talking in graphic, and I mean graphic, terms about their intimate anatomy. The play is poisonously anti-male. Its only romantic scene, if you can call it that, takes place when a 24-year-old woman seduces a young girl (in the original version she was 13 years old, but in a more recent version is played as a 16-year-old.) The woman invites the girl into her car, takes her to her house, plies her with vodka, and seduces her. What might seem like a scene from a public-service kidnapping-prevention video shown to schoolchildren becomes, in Ensler’s play "a kind of heaven.""
What is it about liberals and The Vagina Monologues? Like Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland in the old musicals, they'll stage this play at the drop of a 16 yr.-olds' panties:
Ann Drojeni: "Oh...that's terrible!"
Kwes Channing: "What is it, Ann?"
Ann: "I just heard on NPR that Bulgarian sugar-beet yeilds are down due to Global Warming. And the child harvesters have no unemployment coverage!"
Kwes: "That's awful. But what can we do?"
Ann: "I know--we'll put on a show!"
Kwes: 'Oh, no--you can't mean..."
Ann: "Yes! The Vagina Monologues!"
Kwes: "Again?"
Ann: "Sure. Nothing says 'concern for the environment' and 'protect the children' like a play about supplying liquor to minors to facilitate a lesbian child-rape."
Kwes: "Yes, I suppose you're right. But we're Democrats; shoudn't it be a 'dialogue', and not a 'monologue'?"
Ann: "Let's not be radical. We've already changed it from a "13 yr.-old" to a "16 yr.-old'. Anyway, call Nancy Pelosi's office. I'm sure she'll want to come as usual."
Kwes: "Uhh...I don't think she can attend this week..." .............................
(I love this: One reviewer: "Most women leave the show feeling proud and excited about having a vagina." A lady responds: "One would have thought it would have ceased to be a novelty by college.")
***And what of the Hollywood Democrats, known far and wide for their tender solicitude for the morals of youth. Could they even film 'Captain Kangaroo-The Movie' without the now-obligatory strip-club scene?
***Did you know that those lovely Democrats at the Planned Parenthood Camps consider themselves above the law, refusing to report rapes on minors and children? Because absolutely nothing must impede the Dead Baby Industry. NOTHING!
***Or the case of the taxpayer-funded fisting seminar held by Democrats on campus for 14 yr.-old boys? Concerned parents filmed the proceedings and presented it to a judge and, boy, was that judge mad--at the parents! Oh, wait; he was a Democrat--nevermind.
***And what of the Democrats at the radical American Library Association? Somehow, between passing resolutions to leave Iraq, helping terrorists send e-mails and quashing dissent from conservative or simply non-political librarians, they found the time to fight tooth-and-nail against the Child Internet Protection Act. Evidently, the Founding Fathers wanted 9 yr.-olds to be able to access midgit porn--or none of us are free!
***'Harmful to Minors; The Perils of Protecting Children from Sex'.
What is it? It is a 296-page apologia for pedophilia, child molestation and the hyper-sexualization of children. Including infants. It was written by a Democrat professor, published by Democrats at a University press, with the forward written by a former Democrat Surgeon General. And it was lauded and defended by every Democrat reviewer, magazine, interest group and newspaper out there.
Here's where it gets rich; the LA Times has an editorial up demanding that Hastert step down for failing to protect pages. Yet 'Harmful to Minors' is the Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize!
Hey, LA Times: maybe Mark Foley just took your advice!
In fact, almost every Democrat paper that promoted this trash is now doing the same. ........................................
I'd write more, but my personal "ick factor" has kicked in. I haven't even touched on how ACLU Democrats hurt children with their radical and dangerous policies, but I've made my point. And I need a shower.
Democrats now tell us that they alone will protect our children. Well, that's a welcome change. I'm glad Democrats have finally found a pervert they don't support. Of course, I'd be a little more convinced if they hadn't sat on these emails for months and months until election time.
You see, some of us take these issues seriously all year long, not just four weeks before an election.
My party, the REPUBLICAN party, has a good record on these issues. If someone is serious about protecting children, there is only one real choice. And it's sure as hell isn't the Party of Perverts, Pedophilia chic, Pedastry, Planned Parenthood, Predator Rights and Pelosi. Period.
Hey, Democrats: Leave those kids alone!
My truth is I'm a Republican-American.
But 'twas not always thus. Once upon a time, my truth was Democratic...until I realized that just as Democrats coddle terrorists and dictators abroad, they coddle criminals and predators at home.
The real danger for Democrats in pimping this Foley "Surprise" beyond all measure is not that it will point out that individual Democrats also have some baggage, such as Nancy Pelosi marching with a boy-raping NAMBLA Communist.
The danger for Democrats is this; sooner or later, someone--someone like me--is going to start pointing out that institutionally, Democrats are the Party of Perversion.
No, not that the Democrat parents next door want their children harmed; they don't.
But, as a group, every time liberals and Democrats assume and exercise power, whether in politics, the arts, media, academia or in legal circles, they protect and promote predators and perversion. Unfair, you say?
Well, there's a record there, so let's examine it.
***Cathy Seipps:
"Did you know that in California, child molesters and rapists are a protected class? It’s true. Not only are California landlords banned from using the state’s Megan’s Law database to decline renting their properties to sex offenders, they’re not even allowed to warn other tenants that these paroled criminals are now their neighbors. If they do the first, they can be fined $25,000 for housing discrimination. But if they don’t do the second, they can be sued for failing to protect tenants against a known danger.
Landlords are caught between a rock, a hard place and the California State Assembly’s Public Safety Committee, which last April stalled a bill designed to fix the Catch-22...
...a reform measure meant to correct the Megan’s Law housing glitch died last year because assembly members Mervyn Dymally (D., Compton), Jackie Goldberg (D., L.A.) and committee Mark Leno (D., San Francisco) all voted no. For representatives serving on a public-safety committee, these three seem oddly unconcerned with public safety."
Set aside for a moment the fact that these Democrats stay awake at night worrying about the "Rights" of rapists. Set aside their callous disregard for women and children. These Democrats won't even pass a law to protect landlords from the lawsuits resulting from their Pervert Protection Act. Why? It would point out their predator-rights fetish.
Worse, these offenders were convicted in open court and their offenses are a matter of public record. Yet landlords may not even quote the court record? What happened to Free Speech? If a landlord lived on the same property, would he even be allowed to warn his own children?
For these Democrats, Free Speech is optional---but the many "Rights" of child-molesters aren't.
***And what of Free Association? Which party believes militant gay activists have an Iron-Clad Constitutional Right to their own Boy Scout troop? And even though the Scouts won their case (by one vote), which party is still legally harassing them and driving them from public lands and the public square?
Which party believes in using the public schools to indoctrinate other peoples' children?
Whether it's using cartoons and puppets to teach Queer Theory to kindergartners or teaching middle-schoolers to put condoms on bananas or mandatory Vagina-Day (V-Day) celebrations for college students, it is Democrats who use public education to force their personal sexual morality on all.
In a hilarious story about what happens when some college students finally say "Enough!", Christina Hoff Summers writes:
"The high point of [V-Day] is a performance of Ensler’s raunchy play [The Vagina Monologues], which consists of various women talking in graphic, and I mean graphic, terms about their intimate anatomy. The play is poisonously anti-male. Its only romantic scene, if you can call it that, takes place when a 24-year-old woman seduces a young girl (in the original version she was 13 years old, but in a more recent version is played as a 16-year-old.) The woman invites the girl into her car, takes her to her house, plies her with vodka, and seduces her. What might seem like a scene from a public-service kidnapping-prevention video shown to schoolchildren becomes, in Ensler’s play "a kind of heaven.""
What is it about liberals and The Vagina Monologues? Like Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland in the old musicals, they'll stage this play at the drop of a 16 yr.-olds' panties:
Ann Drojeni: "Oh...that's terrible!"
Kwes Channing: "What is it, Ann?"
Ann: "I just heard on NPR that Bulgarian sugar-beet yeilds are down due to Global Warming. And the child harvesters have no unemployment coverage!"
Kwes: "That's awful. But what can we do?"
Ann: "I know--we'll put on a show!"
Kwes: 'Oh, no--you can't mean..."
Ann: "Yes! The Vagina Monologues!"
Kwes: "Again?"
Ann: "Sure. Nothing says 'concern for the environment' and 'protect the children' like a play about supplying liquor to minors to facilitate a lesbian child-rape."
Kwes: "Yes, I suppose you're right. But we're Democrats; shoudn't it be a 'dialogue', and not a 'monologue'?"
Ann: "Let's not be radical. We've already changed it from a "13 yr.-old" to a "16 yr.-old'. Anyway, call Nancy Pelosi's office. I'm sure she'll want to come as usual."
Kwes: "Uhh...I don't think she can attend this week..." .............................
(I love this: One reviewer: "Most women leave the show feeling proud and excited about having a vagina." A lady responds: "One would have thought it would have ceased to be a novelty by college.")
***And what of the Hollywood Democrats, known far and wide for their tender solicitude for the morals of youth. Could they even film 'Captain Kangaroo-The Movie' without the now-obligatory strip-club scene?
***Did you know that those lovely Democrats at the Planned Parenthood Camps consider themselves above the law, refusing to report rapes on minors and children? Because absolutely nothing must impede the Dead Baby Industry. NOTHING!
***Or the case of the taxpayer-funded fisting seminar held by Democrats on campus for 14 yr.-old boys? Concerned parents filmed the proceedings and presented it to a judge and, boy, was that judge mad--at the parents! Oh, wait; he was a Democrat--nevermind.
***And what of the Democrats at the radical American Library Association? Somehow, between passing resolutions to leave Iraq, helping terrorists send e-mails and quashing dissent from conservative or simply non-political librarians, they found the time to fight tooth-and-nail against the Child Internet Protection Act. Evidently, the Founding Fathers wanted 9 yr.-olds to be able to access midgit porn--or none of us are free!
***'Harmful to Minors; The Perils of Protecting Children from Sex'.
What is it? It is a 296-page apologia for pedophilia, child molestation and the hyper-sexualization of children. Including infants. It was written by a Democrat professor, published by Democrats at a University press, with the forward written by a former Democrat Surgeon General. And it was lauded and defended by every Democrat reviewer, magazine, interest group and newspaper out there.
Here's where it gets rich; the LA Times has an editorial up demanding that Hastert step down for failing to protect pages. Yet 'Harmful to Minors' is the Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize!
Hey, LA Times: maybe Mark Foley just took your advice!
In fact, almost every Democrat paper that promoted this trash is now doing the same. ........................................
I'd write more, but my personal "ick factor" has kicked in. I haven't even touched on how ACLU Democrats hurt children with their radical and dangerous policies, but I've made my point. And I need a shower.
Democrats now tell us that they alone will protect our children. Well, that's a welcome change. I'm glad Democrats have finally found a pervert they don't support. Of course, I'd be a little more convinced if they hadn't sat on these emails for months and months until election time.
You see, some of us take these issues seriously all year long, not just four weeks before an election.
My party, the REPUBLICAN party, has a good record on these issues. If someone is serious about protecting children, there is only one real choice. And it's sure as hell isn't the Party of Perverts, Pedophilia chic, Pedastry, Planned Parenthood, Predator Rights and Pelosi. Period.
Hey, Democrats: Leave those kids alone!
Saturday, October 07, 2006
Random Thoughts
ON THE LATE AND DECIDEDLY NON-RANDOM UNPLEASANTNESS
*Cheer up. A party that must rely on Manufactured News Networks and Regularly-Scheduled Scandal to obtain power has by definition already lost the Battle of Ideas.
For example, I was listening to the Imus Show recently because I'm an idiot. And if I wasn't, I am after listening. Anyway, Paul Begala was the guest.
If I'm not mistaken, The Forehead, along with James "Snakehead" Carville and George "Pinhead" Stephanopolous, are all now gainfully employed as Dick Tracy villains. Among other things, Begala claimed that Clinton had a record of "peace", as if "not fighting back" constituted "peace".
But he summed up the Big Democrat Idea perfectly:
'I agree with those who say it will be a disaster if we stay in Iraq. I agree with those who say it will be a disaster if we leave Iraq. I don't have the answers, but I sure as hell want to punish those who got us here.'
In other words, "We're all doomed, Democrats have no solutions, Bush Sucks--and, oh, yeah; Vote Democrat!"
Somehow, that succotash of shinola is not made more appetizing by the addition of a force-fed sex scandal.
More recently, Begala has said it doesn't matter if Democrats are found out to have been stage-managing the Foley scandal. In Clinton-speak, that's an admission of guilt.
To be forced into desperately relying upon the moral rot of others as the only possible way of regaining power is in itself an admission of moral and intellectual rot.
* Jonah Goldberg:
"But let me make a prediction: Despite the Crucible-like moral panic sweeping Washington right now, this will backfire on Democrats, liberals, and the gay Left."
It has already started. This scandal, for example, calls into doubt the dubious "trump-card" of the Gay Left; the 'Born that Way' argument.
Why so much panic...unless at least some impressionable teen-agers can, in fact, be "recruited" into homosexuality? This is, after all, the historical experience of ancient Sparta (and of the '70's--Steely Dan: "You tell yourself you're not my kind, but you don't even know your mind. And you could have a change of heart... Rikki, (*wink*wink*) Don't Lose That Number...").
Foley's claim that he was molested also tends to imply that he was "made that way", not "born that way".
The "Out Them NOW!"-crowd also has learned a very bad lesson; that 'outing' closeted public officials makes them vote "better". But Foley will not be there to vote "better". And while a Democrat victory would generally help their cause, who can possibly think that this scandal will help with, say, the marriage and civil union referenda on this year's ballot?
* Part of the inchoate anger (mis)directed at Hastert results from the fact that people have no mental image of who to blame, as Mark Foley never stood before the cameras to accept responsibility like a man.
Instead, he tendered his resignation on paper and ran away and hid in a Scientology rehab clinic, where he is couch-jumping his way back to mental health, while facelessly issuing self-serving and unchallengable statements. Clearly Foley is mentally, emotionally and morally unfit for any position of authority and while I disdain the pure political manipulation also involved, forcing him from office was right and good.
* Rich Lowry:
"The great divide in our cultural politics continues to be sex. The cultural left considers sex all-important and not important at all. All-important because it is a crucial means of self-expression; not important because the when, where and how don’t matter so much (sex is sex so long as it’s consensual). The cultural right considers sex wonderful and dangerous. Wonderful because it is the ultimate consummation of love; dangerous because if it is not carefully circumscribed, it destroys individuals and cultures."
Put another way, conservatives believe in standards, even though we know that no one is able to live up to them at all times. This is what caused noted French hypocrite Francois de La Rochefoucauld to say "Hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue."
On the other hand, Liberals have been "defining deviancy down" for decades.
Or in the words of that other noted French hypocrite, John de la Kerry-Heinz au pair de Cabana du Jour Double Decaf Mocha Au Lait Vente:
"At worst, [Bill Clinton] lied about his private, consensual affair and tried wrongfully, but on a human level--understandable to most Americans, at least as to the Paula Jones case--to cover it up. I think, in fact, that most Americans in this country understood there was in that inquiry a violation of a zone of privacy that is as precious to Americans as the Constitution itself. ...If you want to find perjury because you believe Monica about where the President touched her...and you can reach into the President's mind to determine his intent, then that is your right."
Wow. When you put it like that, John, I get all patriotic and choked-up.
And, you know, kind of excited.
* What would liberals do if, instead of proposing gay cyber-sex to a page, Foley had proposed marriage?
* The first time I recall hearing the phrase "October Surprise", it was leveled at the Reagan/Bush campaign in 1980. It was said--seriously!--that Bush Sr. went to Paris and cut a deal with the Iranians to release the hostages , thus cheating Jimmy Carter out of his rightful re-election. The evidence?-- Carter lost!
No, it couldn't have been that the voters fired Carter for his appeasement, his dithering and his dangerously naive incompetence--he wuz robbed!
Another Foley, Democrat Tom Foley, the Speaker of the House, solemnly asserted "Precisely because there's no evidence but because the seriousness of the charge, we are duty-bound to hold a hearing."
Ever since, Democrats have themselves become addicted to October Surprises. Real ones, such as Special Persecutor Lawrence Walsh's indictment of Cap Weinberger a few days before the '92 election.
*David Frum:
""It should come as no surprise if the Bush administration undertakes a pre-emptive war against Iran sometime before the November election." So blogged former U.S. Senator Gary Hart at HuffingtonPost.com on Sept. 23.
No, replied a Democratic congressional candidate on another left-wing Web site four days later, the Bush administration is not plotting to attack Iran. It is plotting to produce a fake capture of bin Laden.
Other Democrats hypothesize that the administration will somehow contrive to lower gasoline prices.
But all Democrats are buzzing with one angry certitude: Karl Rove is planning an "October surprise" to cheat the Democrats out of victory in the November elections.
Democratic partisans buzz with this certainty on the eve of every election. When Osama bin Laden released a videotaped diatribe on the eve of the 2004 vote, Walter Cronkite (Walter Cronkite!) emerged from retirement to tell Larry King that the thing had somehow been engineered by Rove:"I'm a little inclined to think that Karl Rove, the political manager at the White House, who is a very clever man, he probably set up bin Laden to this thing."
For Republicans and conservatives, there is an amazing audacity about these Democratic suspicions. The fact is that the most successful October surprise in any recent U.S. national election was carried off by Democrats, not Republicans.
Early in the summer of 2000, Williams Childs, a Maine judge, issued an order requisitioning any arrest records involving George W. Bush. This was an odd order for him to make. He was a probate judge, so his official activities extended only to wills and testaments. But he got what he was looking for: a document showing Bush had been arrested in 1976 for driving under the influence of alcohol. Childs, a prominent local Democrat, then held the document tight for four months.
Childs released his scoop on Nov. 2, four days before the 2000 vote. Within seconds of the story's broadcast, a massive anonymous fax campaign delivered the details to every news outlet in the country.The story hurt Bush badly. A week before election day, most polls showed Bush narrowly ahead of Gore. On Nov. 6, he finished 500,000 votes behind.The trick so nearly worked in 2000 that some Democrats were understandably tempted to try again in 2004.
This time, the source of the story was a Texas Democrat, Bill Burkett. He provided CBS News with documents purporting to show that Bush had received special favours during his service in the Texas Air National Guard. This time, the documents were almost immediately exposed as forgeries. The backlash destroyed the careers of Dan Rather and Mary Mapes of CBS—and by the way silenced any lingering questions about Bush's Guard duty.
The Burkett/Mapes story reveals the dangers of attempting an [Iranian invasion] "October surprise." So much can go wrong! And how much more can go wrong with a war or a bombing campaign? Planes can be shot down, pilots lost, targets missed, civilians killed. To time a war to coincide with an election would not only be a desperately cynical act; it would also be recklessly risky.
In actual fact, Rove has run his campaigns for George W. Bush on the most simple and obvious principles. Rove thinks that the number of "swing" voters—voters who truly might vote for either party—has been shrinking for decades and now numbers only about 9% of the electorate. He likewise thinks that Republicans win not by swaying undecideds, but by exciting their own large base. And so he runs campaigns that rely not on clever gimmicks but on strong, clear conservative messages. The only surprise about a Rove campaign is how few surprises they contain.
Democrats should know this strategy. After all, they have been on its receiving end for three elections in a row: 2000, 2002 and 2004. And yet they persist in believing that next time Rove will junk the methods of a lifetime and resort to sneaky maneuvers and complicated stratagems. That so many Democrats have come to believe that dirty tricks win elections tells us very little about elections. But it reveals something important—and ugly—about those Democrats themselves."
*There is one more mortal danger for Democrats in pursuing this reckless and dishonest October Surprise meme. An Achilles Heel that could wreck the party's chances permanently.
And that will be the subject of my next post.
*Cheer up. A party that must rely on Manufactured News Networks and Regularly-Scheduled Scandal to obtain power has by definition already lost the Battle of Ideas.
For example, I was listening to the Imus Show recently because I'm an idiot. And if I wasn't, I am after listening. Anyway, Paul Begala was the guest.
If I'm not mistaken, The Forehead, along with James "Snakehead" Carville and George "Pinhead" Stephanopolous, are all now gainfully employed as Dick Tracy villains. Among other things, Begala claimed that Clinton had a record of "peace", as if "not fighting back" constituted "peace".
But he summed up the Big Democrat Idea perfectly:
'I agree with those who say it will be a disaster if we stay in Iraq. I agree with those who say it will be a disaster if we leave Iraq. I don't have the answers, but I sure as hell want to punish those who got us here.'
In other words, "We're all doomed, Democrats have no solutions, Bush Sucks--and, oh, yeah; Vote Democrat!"
Somehow, that succotash of shinola is not made more appetizing by the addition of a force-fed sex scandal.
More recently, Begala has said it doesn't matter if Democrats are found out to have been stage-managing the Foley scandal. In Clinton-speak, that's an admission of guilt.
To be forced into desperately relying upon the moral rot of others as the only possible way of regaining power is in itself an admission of moral and intellectual rot.
* Jonah Goldberg:
"But let me make a prediction: Despite the Crucible-like moral panic sweeping Washington right now, this will backfire on Democrats, liberals, and the gay Left."
It has already started. This scandal, for example, calls into doubt the dubious "trump-card" of the Gay Left; the 'Born that Way' argument.
Why so much panic...unless at least some impressionable teen-agers can, in fact, be "recruited" into homosexuality? This is, after all, the historical experience of ancient Sparta (and of the '70's--Steely Dan: "You tell yourself you're not my kind, but you don't even know your mind. And you could have a change of heart... Rikki, (*wink*wink*) Don't Lose That Number...").
Foley's claim that he was molested also tends to imply that he was "made that way", not "born that way".
The "Out Them NOW!"-crowd also has learned a very bad lesson; that 'outing' closeted public officials makes them vote "better". But Foley will not be there to vote "better". And while a Democrat victory would generally help their cause, who can possibly think that this scandal will help with, say, the marriage and civil union referenda on this year's ballot?
* Part of the inchoate anger (mis)directed at Hastert results from the fact that people have no mental image of who to blame, as Mark Foley never stood before the cameras to accept responsibility like a man.
Instead, he tendered his resignation on paper and ran away and hid in a Scientology rehab clinic, where he is couch-jumping his way back to mental health, while facelessly issuing self-serving and unchallengable statements. Clearly Foley is mentally, emotionally and morally unfit for any position of authority and while I disdain the pure political manipulation also involved, forcing him from office was right and good.
* Rich Lowry:
"The great divide in our cultural politics continues to be sex. The cultural left considers sex all-important and not important at all. All-important because it is a crucial means of self-expression; not important because the when, where and how don’t matter so much (sex is sex so long as it’s consensual). The cultural right considers sex wonderful and dangerous. Wonderful because it is the ultimate consummation of love; dangerous because if it is not carefully circumscribed, it destroys individuals and cultures."
Put another way, conservatives believe in standards, even though we know that no one is able to live up to them at all times. This is what caused noted French hypocrite Francois de La Rochefoucauld to say "Hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue."
On the other hand, Liberals have been "defining deviancy down" for decades.
Or in the words of that other noted French hypocrite, John de la Kerry-Heinz au pair de Cabana du Jour Double Decaf Mocha Au Lait Vente:
"At worst, [Bill Clinton] lied about his private, consensual affair and tried wrongfully, but on a human level--understandable to most Americans, at least as to the Paula Jones case--to cover it up. I think, in fact, that most Americans in this country understood there was in that inquiry a violation of a zone of privacy that is as precious to Americans as the Constitution itself. ...If you want to find perjury because you believe Monica about where the President touched her...and you can reach into the President's mind to determine his intent, then that is your right."
Wow. When you put it like that, John, I get all patriotic and choked-up.
And, you know, kind of excited.
* What would liberals do if, instead of proposing gay cyber-sex to a page, Foley had proposed marriage?
* The first time I recall hearing the phrase "October Surprise", it was leveled at the Reagan/Bush campaign in 1980. It was said--seriously!--that Bush Sr. went to Paris and cut a deal with the Iranians to release the hostages , thus cheating Jimmy Carter out of his rightful re-election. The evidence?-- Carter lost!
No, it couldn't have been that the voters fired Carter for his appeasement, his dithering and his dangerously naive incompetence--he wuz robbed!
Another Foley, Democrat Tom Foley, the Speaker of the House, solemnly asserted "Precisely because there's no evidence but because the seriousness of the charge, we are duty-bound to hold a hearing."
Ever since, Democrats have themselves become addicted to October Surprises. Real ones, such as Special Persecutor Lawrence Walsh's indictment of Cap Weinberger a few days before the '92 election.
*David Frum:
""It should come as no surprise if the Bush administration undertakes a pre-emptive war against Iran sometime before the November election." So blogged former U.S. Senator Gary Hart at HuffingtonPost.com on Sept. 23.
No, replied a Democratic congressional candidate on another left-wing Web site four days later, the Bush administration is not plotting to attack Iran. It is plotting to produce a fake capture of bin Laden.
Other Democrats hypothesize that the administration will somehow contrive to lower gasoline prices.
But all Democrats are buzzing with one angry certitude: Karl Rove is planning an "October surprise" to cheat the Democrats out of victory in the November elections.
Democratic partisans buzz with this certainty on the eve of every election. When Osama bin Laden released a videotaped diatribe on the eve of the 2004 vote, Walter Cronkite (Walter Cronkite!) emerged from retirement to tell Larry King that the thing had somehow been engineered by Rove:"I'm a little inclined to think that Karl Rove, the political manager at the White House, who is a very clever man, he probably set up bin Laden to this thing."
For Republicans and conservatives, there is an amazing audacity about these Democratic suspicions. The fact is that the most successful October surprise in any recent U.S. national election was carried off by Democrats, not Republicans.
Early in the summer of 2000, Williams Childs, a Maine judge, issued an order requisitioning any arrest records involving George W. Bush. This was an odd order for him to make. He was a probate judge, so his official activities extended only to wills and testaments. But he got what he was looking for: a document showing Bush had been arrested in 1976 for driving under the influence of alcohol. Childs, a prominent local Democrat, then held the document tight for four months.
Childs released his scoop on Nov. 2, four days before the 2000 vote. Within seconds of the story's broadcast, a massive anonymous fax campaign delivered the details to every news outlet in the country.The story hurt Bush badly. A week before election day, most polls showed Bush narrowly ahead of Gore. On Nov. 6, he finished 500,000 votes behind.The trick so nearly worked in 2000 that some Democrats were understandably tempted to try again in 2004.
This time, the source of the story was a Texas Democrat, Bill Burkett. He provided CBS News with documents purporting to show that Bush had received special favours during his service in the Texas Air National Guard. This time, the documents were almost immediately exposed as forgeries. The backlash destroyed the careers of Dan Rather and Mary Mapes of CBS—and by the way silenced any lingering questions about Bush's Guard duty.
The Burkett/Mapes story reveals the dangers of attempting an [Iranian invasion] "October surprise." So much can go wrong! And how much more can go wrong with a war or a bombing campaign? Planes can be shot down, pilots lost, targets missed, civilians killed. To time a war to coincide with an election would not only be a desperately cynical act; it would also be recklessly risky.
In actual fact, Rove has run his campaigns for George W. Bush on the most simple and obvious principles. Rove thinks that the number of "swing" voters—voters who truly might vote for either party—has been shrinking for decades and now numbers only about 9% of the electorate. He likewise thinks that Republicans win not by swaying undecideds, but by exciting their own large base. And so he runs campaigns that rely not on clever gimmicks but on strong, clear conservative messages. The only surprise about a Rove campaign is how few surprises they contain.
Democrats should know this strategy. After all, they have been on its receiving end for three elections in a row: 2000, 2002 and 2004. And yet they persist in believing that next time Rove will junk the methods of a lifetime and resort to sneaky maneuvers and complicated stratagems. That so many Democrats have come to believe that dirty tricks win elections tells us very little about elections. But it reveals something important—and ugly—about those Democrats themselves."
*There is one more mortal danger for Democrats in pursuing this reckless and dishonest October Surprise meme. An Achilles Heel that could wreck the party's chances permanently.
And that will be the subject of my next post.
Thursday, October 05, 2006
"Resign", Hell!
STAND AND FIGHT, MR. SPEAKER
How was Denny Hastert supposed to conduct a thorough investigation when Democrats were obstructing justice by hiding the most damning evidence?
The Gomer Pyle Media--"Sur-prise, Sur-prise, Sur-prise!"--tells us that Speaker Hastert covered for Foley for political purposes, thus endangering children, when, as usual, the exact opposite is true;
Democrats had this information for months, if not years, and held it and hid it until the last day of Congress before the election, thus allowing Foley to remain in place. They sand-bagged the Speaker's investigation--and now demand he step down for the failure of that investigation!
The FBI, the St. Petersburg Times and ABCNews all had the same e-mail since at least this summer. They all concluded the same thing; it was questionable, but certainly no crime was committed and it was unworthy of publication. Indeed, the only one who took action on it was...Denny Hastert!
Brian Ross of ABC allegedly thought it so unimportant, he refused to leave his beloved Katrina Anniversary Celebration coverage...until October. Imagine my Surprise.
This is the politcal version of Ross' exploding gas-tank story. Then as now, he wanted the result he wanted when he wanted it, so in collusion with Democrat activists, he resorted to hot-wiring this story to make it explode on demand. This is your Regularly-Scheduled Scandal, folks.
And you'll notice how the temperature has already been lowered considerably in recent days, now that Nancy Pelosi, Rahm Emmanuel and other Democrats have been "invited" to testify--under oath.
Those who have called for Denny Hastert's resignation are wrong, both on first principles and strategically.
Accepting responsibility is a conservative principle. Speaker Hastert tried, if imperfectly in our now-perfect hindsight, to get to the truth of the matter. But he was thwarted by an active, yet secret opposition, a power beyond his control. Power and responsibility come hand-in-hand--and he had no power over these forces.
If we demand his hide simply for an imperfect prosecution, then on the same principle, a Grant should have resigned after Shiloh.
However, 'political expediency', 'rush to judgement', 'appeasement', and 'rule-by-mob'--even a mob of conservative pundits--are not conservative principles.
And strategically, even if we disloyally feed Mr. Hastert to the crocodile in hopes that the crocodile will eat us last, this would be taken as an admission of guilt and complicity in the public mind--guilt, which on Denny Hastert's part at least, does not exist.
Convicting the innocent while the guilty are rewarded is a conservative principle with which I am entirely unfamiliar.
Stand and fight, Mr. Speaker; this Republican stands with you.
And let the guilty tremble for a change.
How was Denny Hastert supposed to conduct a thorough investigation when Democrats were obstructing justice by hiding the most damning evidence?
The Gomer Pyle Media--"Sur-prise, Sur-prise, Sur-prise!"--tells us that Speaker Hastert covered for Foley for political purposes, thus endangering children, when, as usual, the exact opposite is true;
Democrats had this information for months, if not years, and held it and hid it until the last day of Congress before the election, thus allowing Foley to remain in place. They sand-bagged the Speaker's investigation--and now demand he step down for the failure of that investigation!
The FBI, the St. Petersburg Times and ABCNews all had the same e-mail since at least this summer. They all concluded the same thing; it was questionable, but certainly no crime was committed and it was unworthy of publication. Indeed, the only one who took action on it was...Denny Hastert!
Brian Ross of ABC allegedly thought it so unimportant, he refused to leave his beloved Katrina Anniversary Celebration coverage...until October. Imagine my Surprise.
This is the politcal version of Ross' exploding gas-tank story. Then as now, he wanted the result he wanted when he wanted it, so in collusion with Democrat activists, he resorted to hot-wiring this story to make it explode on demand. This is your Regularly-Scheduled Scandal, folks.
And you'll notice how the temperature has already been lowered considerably in recent days, now that Nancy Pelosi, Rahm Emmanuel and other Democrats have been "invited" to testify--under oath.
Those who have called for Denny Hastert's resignation are wrong, both on first principles and strategically.
Accepting responsibility is a conservative principle. Speaker Hastert tried, if imperfectly in our now-perfect hindsight, to get to the truth of the matter. But he was thwarted by an active, yet secret opposition, a power beyond his control. Power and responsibility come hand-in-hand--and he had no power over these forces.
If we demand his hide simply for an imperfect prosecution, then on the same principle, a Grant should have resigned after Shiloh.
However, 'political expediency', 'rush to judgement', 'appeasement', and 'rule-by-mob'--even a mob of conservative pundits--are not conservative principles.
And strategically, even if we disloyally feed Mr. Hastert to the crocodile in hopes that the crocodile will eat us last, this would be taken as an admission of guilt and complicity in the public mind--guilt, which on Denny Hastert's part at least, does not exist.
Convicting the innocent while the guilty are rewarded is a conservative principle with which I am entirely unfamiliar.
Stand and fight, Mr. Speaker; this Republican stands with you.
And let the guilty tremble for a change.
