Everyone should read this.
Archives for November 2003
That Explains It
This helps to xplain why Austin Bay and I usually see eye to ey on a lot of issues- he was a tanker, too, and he served on the old border.
Another Pressing Issue
Via Drudge, I see some Democrats have seized upon another pressing issue for the 2004 elections:
Nevada memo to George Bush: When making a first presidential visit to a state, use the right pronounciation of its name.
Bush, in Las Vegas on Tuesday, repeatedly said Ne-vah-da. To properly pronounce Nevada, the middle syllable should rhyme with gamble.
Mispronouncing the state’s name “sets people’s teeth on edge,” said state Archivist Guy Rocha. “He’s the president, and he ought to get it right. Nothing personal.”
State Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, said the mispronunciation shows Bush, who won the state in the 2000 election, doesn’t care much about the state.
By this logic, Arnold Schwarzanalphabet absolutely hates Caleeeeeeefornia, and both Jimmy Carter and the Current President Bush must have unprintable opinions about nucular weapons.
Cynicism Shortage in California
I like Bush’s speeches about democracy
The Loony Left
This is just unbelievable.
How Dumb Are the Democrats in Congress?
Fresh after rolling over and playing dead over the Prescription Drug Benefit while simultaneously failing to recognize the long-term implications of their new jihad against the AARP, I don’t think this is an unfair question to ask:
“Exactly how stupid are the Democrats in Congress?”
The answer, it seems, is just as dumb as the people who vote for them. Check out these responses to the revelations that a Republican staffer stole secret internal Democratic Senate Judiciary Committee member memos.
Atrios calls this ‘Watergate II,” the Daily Kos notes that “Republicans are Thieves” and that “it shouldn’t be too surprising,” while chief muckraker and lead memeufacturer for the silly left Josh Marshall (fresh off being wrong about everything in North Korea) has this to say:
Caught red-handed. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch has placed one of his committee staffers on administrative leave for what the media reports are agreeing to call, with some delicacy, “improperly obtaining data from the secure computer networks of two Democratic senators.”
(Reminds me of my pals who used to get kicks by improperly obtaining Snickers bars from the local drug store when we were in grade school.)
Keep in mind, Democratic Senators raised questions about how an unsent memo from the Democratic staff on the Intel Committee ended up in the hands of radio chatmeister Sean Hannity three weeks ago.
Now that it seems the Judiciary Committee memo was in fact stolen, the Democrats’ demands that the other incident be investigated sounds a lot more compelling. Was that one ‘improperly obtained’ too?
Josh then links to a transcript that shows that Orrin Hatch is not only cooperating willingly with the investigation, but actually launched it at the behest of three Democrats (Kennedy, Leahy and Durbin). I don’t want there to be any confusion- if this staffer did indeed break the law, I think he should be punished, and I think that at the very least he should not work on Capitol Hill again, but how does this in any way excuse the disgusting behavior that is reflected by the actual memos?
How stupid, shortsighted, and myopic must this party be that they think this is going to sell well with the American public:
“Sure, we had secret internal memos detailing how our judicial selection process is beholden to special interests and explaining how we were conspiring to play race politics with certain minority nominees, but those MEMOS WERE ILLEGALLY OBTAINED FROM OUR SERVERS!”
Since Josh already made the leap of faith that if the memos from the Judiciary Committee were pilfered, the Rockefeller Intelligence Committee memos might be stolen as well, let’s do another thought experiment:
“Sure you caught us trying to politicize the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee. We were going to bully the Chair, obfuscate evidence we found to our distaste, distort and leak out of context intelligence to the press, and then wait until the election cycle to launch our own partisan investigation for maximum political gain, BUT YOU WERE NOT SUPPOSED TO KNOW THAT. Those were private memos.”
Can you ever imagine yourself, while standing ina court of law, saying “Sure I e-mailed my mistress about my plans to kill my wife- but you weren’t supposed to read it” (and before the wingnuts claim I am equating the memos to murder, back off, fools)? Essentially, this is the sort of statement the Democrats are now willing to make loudly in the Court of Public Opinion, and the funniest thing is, they think it is going to help them.
This really is the party of Clinton- same tactics, same atttitudes, same short-sightedness. The problem is that Clinton had brains, style, charm, and could talk his way out of a heart attack. The current party is a ghoulish Frankenstein- one part Pelosi, one part Kennedy, one part Leahy, one part McAulliffe. By my read, that is one part West Coast liberal, one part eastern establishment elite, one part snarling condescension, and one part amoral big money- this ain’t your Daddy’s DNC.
I don’t have to remind you how the populace reacted to Shelly’s Frankenstein.
*** Update ***
Matt Stinson discusses the issue.
Medicare Quip of the Night
I am glad to report that somebody managed tofind something mildly amusing about the completely unfunny GOP Vote Buying Scheme of 2003 Prescription Drug Benefit. Craig Kilborn quipped tonight:
Experts claim that over the next two decades, the Prescription Drug Benefit could cost as much as $2 trillion. And that’s just for Rush Limbaugh…
I chuckled.