Open Threads

Sheesh…

Ted Barlow is back and blogging ferociously, and he is willing to ignore Roger Ailes’s charge that Bush is engaging in mail fraud by having Christmas Cards stamped from Crawford but mailed from Austin because of logistical difficulties (I know- yawn). However, in order to preserve his lefty credentials, Ted notes:

Roger argues that this is mail fraud, while a commentator disagrees. I don’t know. But logically, it makes about as much sense as postmarking your Christmas cards from your time-share condo.

C’mon, Ted. That is the best you can do? I might note that unlike some previous occupants of the White House, when Bush says he is going home for the Holidays, at least he has an idea of which state he is referring to, and that he actually owns a house and property in said state. I won’t mention who those previous homeless occupants were, though, because I would hate to be a right-wing wingnut or whatever the ad hominem of the day is.

Sheesh… Ted Barlow is backPost + Comments

Go download Mozilla.

**Update**

Fixed the link- thanks Bill Quick.

Go download Mozilla. **Update** FixedPost + Comments (1)

Not much to post about this weekend. Other than causing quite a stir for attacking the faux civil rights leaders in previous posts, not much has been happening. I have found out that it does not matter what your actual political positions are, if you disagree with the left on ANY issue you are a conservative. Period. Nothing, it seems, is more sacred than the hallowed ground of moral outrage on race issues that Democrats seem to believe that they have a stranglehold on, so questioning them will open you to charges of racism, mean-spiritedness, being a hack, a Dixiecrat, an unreconstructed redneck, a fascist, etc. And then there are the four letter words. Kind of amusing, actually. Bob Novak may act and look like the Prince of Darkness, and Ann Coulter may be shrill and irritating at times, but it becomes clearer and clearer that the true left is the real home of name-calling, ugliness, and unhappiness. I just can not believe how miserable most of these people are, and how awful they really think the world is. It is also amusing how they assign the worst intentions and motives to ANYTHING anyone does or says. Quite odd, really. And the guilt by association thing they seem to base everything on is really rather odd and inconsistent with what they claim their beliefs really are.

At any rate, a slow week-end for news (Yglesias has some worthwhile links to the elections in Kenya), and there were a number of important NFL and College Bowl games to watch. The Steelers won, which is nice, but it did not earn them a BYE as the Titans beat the Texans. Oh well.

Not much to post aboutPost + Comments

The Price is Right

The race pimps have made their demands and named their price (link via Atrios). Because Trent Lott was a bigot, Republicans should now cave in on a bunch of really stupid ideas. Here are the demands:

* Oppose five of President Bush (news – web sites)’s 15 federal judicial nominees who were left in limbo when Congress adjourned in November: Charles Pickering of Mississippi, Priscilla Owen of Texas, Carolyn Kuhl of California, Terrence Boyle of North Carolina and Jeffrey Sutton of Ohio. They have ”records of deep hostility to core civil rights principles,” the Leadership Conference contended. Supporters of the five say they are being opposed because they are conservative.

* Support legislation that would encourage federal investigations and prosecutions of hate crimes — acts believed to have been prompted by race, religion, nationality, gender, sexual orientation or disability. Most Senate Republicans have opposed the hate-crimes legislation on the grounds that all violent crimes are heinous, regardless of the motivation.

* Support funds for election reform. In October, Bush signed legislation that requires states to improve their voting procedures. So far, however, none of the $3.8 billion needed has been approved. ”That’s a real betrayal of a commitment,” Henderson said.

The election reforms I am in favor of. The rest is just the tired old laundry of the now morally vacant civil rights movement. Just ignore them. I mean, what are they going to do? Stop voting Republican? Call every GOP member a racist? Claim that if you don’t support them on every issue you are a bigot? Pay for commercials all but accusing Republicans of hate crimes and church burnings?

Gee- We wouldn’t want any of that to happen.

*** Update ***

I really regret calling the aforementioned civil rights leaders race pimps. I am just so sick and tired being called a racist because I don’t agree with everything they say. Calling someone a racist for no reason is a bully tactic- and that is why I stated what I did. It remains, however, an unfair statement on my part. I would get rid of it, but that would be dishonest. Leave it up, and suffer the consequences.

The Price is Right ThePost + Comments

No Kidding?

Atrios probably thinks he has had an original thought or at the very least is being clever when he states the following:

In addition, I wonder if those dispensing the advice really have a clue what, say, the NAACP’s agenda is. One of the big myths in politics – widely disseminated and believed by those on the left and right – is that all organizations such as the NAACP are concerned with are affirmative action type programs. This is the story our media peddles. In fact, if one looks at the NAACP legislative scorecard, the one referred to in the Washington Post article, to see why Senators such as Lott and First receive an ‘F,’ one realizes that the NAACP agenda is pretty much the agenda of most in the Democratic party. Votes the NAACP used to make the scorecard included the Ashcroft confirmation, Title I funding for poor schools, reducing class sizes by providing federal money to hire teachers, school construction money, forcing full Pell grant and Head Start funding, the Senate Patients Bill of Rights, the confirmation of Robert Gregory, the extension of unemployment benefits, various election reform proposals, and increases in global AIDS funding.

You mean the NAACP is pretty much a wholly owned subsidary of the Democrat Party? Well, no shit. I am glad Atrios has finally seen the light, but there is a large group of people who for years have been saying that the NAACP was nothing but a tax-exempt member ofthe activist wing of the Democrat party. Those people who have been saying this for all these years are called REPUBLICANS.

Now that Atrios and Co. have now admitted the NAACP and the Democrat party are one and the same, could you please quit calling us racist when we have policy disagreements?

No Kidding? Atrios probably thinksPost + Comments

The Real Test

The real test to whether or not the Democrats are being intentionally obtuse on the Patty Murray quote is to do this:

Take the quote, and every time the words ‘Sen. Patty Murray” are used, replace them with the words “Vice-President Dan Quayle.”

I can hear Atrios guffawing from here.

The Real Test The realPost + Comments

The Left is Making Me Crazy

They can not and will not even admit that Sen. Patty Murray said something stupid. For them to admit that, it would be to invalidate their entire belief structure.

“She was just asking a hypothetical question?”

‘She was just trying to stimulate discussion.”

Look- I am a teacher. I ask hypothetical questions all the time- but I am careful to make sure that my PREMISE IS CORRECT.

She shouldn’t step down. She doesn’t even need to apologize. She didn’t say something subversive- just stupid, both factually and politically. Just re-state what she meant accurately, and move on. But the left won’t even admit that is necessary. Go read the Daily Kos– it is maddening the defenses that are being constructed. They range from the ‘show me the US spends more money’ to ‘this is just a right wing attack job’ to ‘they are s stupid they don’t even understand hypothetical questions.’

It is like the Democrats have some perversion of the Hyppocratic Oath (The Hypocrite’s Oath?)-

‘First, admit no wrong.”

The Left is Making MePost + Comments