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Mac the Knife

Posted by beltway girl on Friday, September 05, 2008 3:04:50 PM
Last night, in a speech accepting his party's nomination, John McCain may have secured a win in November. 
 
At the beginning of these conventions, the candidates were running even in the polls.  Their vice presidential selections and their acceptance speeches attained significance of mammoth proportions.
 
And Obama did everything wrong.  First, he not only chose Joe Biden, but he chose him after fanfare worthy only of a Hillary Clinton. 
 
So not only did Obama take a pass on a tested, vetted co-runner who guaranteed instant bounce at the polls with real votes, but he did it in an insulting manner.  As Jennifer Anniston once said of Brad, there was a senstivity chip missing there.
 
To make matters worse, his much-anticipated text message came at 3 a.m..  This makes him look like the smart-alecky kid in high school who ultimately goes on to burn down a garage or break into a gas station, and you read about him in the neighborhood paper.
 
Next, Obama goes on to give his acceptance speech that is simultaneously magnificent and ridiculous.  A long shot of the scene is reminiscent of a coliseum.
 
And the speech itself?  Other than the line about change coming to Washington rather than from it, it was the usual laundry list of demands we hear from the Dems every year, although delivered in a superior manner.
 
But it was not just that Obama did everything wrong; it's that McCain did everything right.
 
First, he picked Sarah Palin as a running mate.  Sarah Palin, who wields her tongue like a blade in a verbal knife fight, placed in Head Attack Dog position.  Sarah Palin, who has touched off mass hysteria amongst the angry, entrenched, and up-to-now comfortable Frothed Estate.  Sarah Palin, referred to by one writer as a hand grenade in the culture war. 
 
Sarah Palin, who drew a nod for women this year from the Republicans while 18-million-vote Hillary claimed her nay.
 
Sarah Palin, whose choice emphasizes Obama's passing over of Hillary so sharply that pundits muse over whether McCain did it for that very reason.
 
Ah, the left.  They imagine everyone swims in the same goldfish bowl of thought that they do, and the idea that one maverick simply gravitated to another never occurs to them.
 
And then, McCain delivered his speech.  It, too was something of a laundry list, prompting the left to wag their index fingers in the air and exclaim, "Aha!"...
 
Except McCain's lauandry list was a list of the ways he has suffered for this country in its service and how he has loved it.  How he still loves it, how he has fought for it in his senatorial career and how he will fight for it again.  How he will deliver as a president for peace, attempting to heal the breach between the left and right in this nation, and attempting to find peace abroad, saving lives and the lifeblood of our men and women in the armed forces.
 
He notably spoke of the day a car pulled up outside his house to call his father to war, and how his father went away for a very long time.  He spoke of his grandfather, also called away.  And how when his grandfather finally came home, he died the next day.
 
His most powerful statement of the night was that he has the scars to show from his battles for this country, and Senator Obama does not.  We should add that these scars would not just come from a bayonet.  They would be from his prominent role in the culture war, the war of ideas in this country.
 
Back-to-back conventions, along with the choice of Palin and McCain's speech last night, have made the difference between the two presidential candidates so pronounced that the most mindless voter in America couldn't help but see it.  It's the experience, stupid.  And experience at the forefront is a scenario vastly favorable to McCain.
 
McCain's political brilliance in making all of this unfold as it has cannot be underestimated.  Last night, as he accepted his party's nomination, he was not only a great soldier; he was a giant on the sociopolitical landscape.  He cut through the jungle of political machination as if he were hacking through with a machete. 
 
John McCain, as he stood on that stage last night, was Mac the Knife.
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Our Town

Posted by beltway girl on Thursday, September 04, 2008 1:53:14 AM
 
 
So—people a thousand years from now—this is the way we were in the provinces north of New York at the beginning of the twentieth century.—This is the way we were: in our growing up and in our marrying and in our living and in our dying.  --Stage Manager, Our Town, Thornton Wilder
 

 
Do barracudas go for the jugular?
 
This one did.
 
And tonight, she was so effective, she looked far more worthy of the nickname "Jaws." 
 
The curtain went up on Sarah Palin and she came out swinging.  She talked about life in a small town, noting that these are the people who make this nation, who work for this nation, who fight for this nation, and who die for this nation.  She noted that she knew small town people well, and she quoted a writer on this topic.  But her own words were far more eloquent.  "They are the ones who do some of the hardest work in America... who grow our food, run our factories, and fight our wars."
 
She stated that these are the people who are always proud of their country, a stinging rebuke of the celebrated Michelle Obama comment. 
 
Then, Jaws entered Barack Obama's receding ocean.  She said that, you know, being the mayor of a small town was a lot like being a community organizer.
 
Except with responsibility.
 
Ouch.
 
She bashed Obama on his bitter comments.  She talked about cleaning up Juneau and auctioning off its luxury jet on eBay.
 
And she sang her own praises a tad, giving us an idea of the scope of her work as governor of Alaska.
 
Oil is a huge issue in our nation today, and Palin's speech, something of a tour of duty unto itself, stopped there next.  Palin's state is vital to America's quest for oil independence.
 
She blasted the dependence on oil supplied by nations who hate our own.  She mapped out the Mc-Palin road for our energy future, albeit vaguely.  This is appropriate for a speech of this kind, and actually necessary by virtue of its breadth.
 
This woman made clear she is a champion for the cause of life, not so much by talking about it, but by showing it to us.  A picture of her special needs baby in the cradling arms of Cindy McCain.
 
But the one thing throughout this speech, like a constant drumbeat, was her steady support for John McCain.  Sarah Palin clearly admires this man.  And it's genuine.
 
It was a big night for the party, and for the country.  We had wonderful speeches from Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, and (notably) Rudy Giuliani.
 
But at no time was this night bigger than when Sarah Palin forced it to become small.  When Sarah Palin reminded America of little places that dot the map until they swallow it.  Until she reminded us of the growing, the working, the drive, the sacrifice, the living, the wars, and the dying.
 
Conjuring up images of Thornton Wilder's "Our Town," Sarah Palin was a strange reminder of Emily.  A woman who, on the surface, appears no deeper.  But, like Wilder's great work itself, she is far more complex than any simple mind would like to make her.
 
Tonight, Sarah Palin's town became our town, the United States of America.  She made it so herself, tonight, with her words and her sincerity.  And it cannot do this nation anything but good that she succeeded in doing it.
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Change

Posted by beltway girl on Wednesday, September 03, 2008 3:40:04 PM
During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.   --George Orwell
 
In August of 1864, Abraham Lincoln called a cabinet meeting.  A spring campaign in Virginia had just ended badly, and Lincoln had a memo he wanted some officials to sign.  It began in a rather interesting manner.  "This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceedingly probable that this Administration will not be re-elected."http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jala/27.2/monroe.html  

President Lincoln knew he was not revered among the masses.  And he knew it even though Gallup did not yet exist.
 
One might write this off as a transitory moment for Lincoln's administration, owing only to a low ebb in the morale of the citizenry riding the tides of  war.  But Abraham Lincoln was never particularly popular while he was in office.  One writer attributes this to "Confederate sympathizers in the border states and lower Midwest; and the peace wing of the Democratic Party, often referred to as 'Copperheads.'  The latter group believed that the Civil War was undermining the Northern economy, civil liberties, and states' rights.  Particularly objectionable to the Northern Democrats were two Lincoln administration policies: emancipation and the military draft." http://elections.harpweek.com/1864/bio-1864-Full.asp?UniqueID=17&Year=1864
 
Tonight, on televisions we would never have had in the time of Lincoln, we saw another president, also not terribly popular at the moment.  George Bush made references to an angry left in his speech. 
 
It seems like history truly may repeat itself, whether the writers at Salon want to believe it or not.  http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2006/08/23/bush_lincoln/ 

Lincoln was not a beloved president.  He was not adored by those actually living his administration's policies.  The average person walking down the street had little time for Abe Lincoln, and the peaceniks of his time, well, even less.
 
And so it has been with George Bush.  Mocked and despised by the left and its incredibly objective Fourth Estate, he has been beset upon.  Once again, it was the same with Lincoln. "Lincoln was called just about every name imaginable, including 'a grotesque baboon,' 'a third-rate country lawyer who once split rails and now splits the Union,' 'a coarse, vulgar joker,' a dictator, an ape, and a buffoon.  The Illinois State Register [published in his adopted home state] labeled him "the craftiest and most dishonest politician that ever disgraced an [American political] office."http://mistersnitch.blogspot.com/2005/08/bad-press-for-president.html
 
Bush has also been besieged by haters of his nation (who actually exist in ready suppoly outside of his own nation as well) and natural disasters.  With 9/11, Iraq, Katrina, Gustav, and a host of other storm names to boot, this president has run the gamut of catastrophe.
 
Has he run it well? 
 
Although Gallup won't reflect it now, history books and the children of our time may someday do so.  Should George Bush's Iraq produce a more temperate and just Middle East, with a strong foothold for the west to better protect its ally, Israel, George Bush will go down in history as one of the greatest presidents in it.
 
He will have brought change as Lincoln did, as Kennedy did, and as Reagan did.  It will be change of such a magnitude as to alter the world as we have known it in todays long gone by, and in the todays before us, which will themselves be discarded.  And like the dying leaves of the autumn now just ahead, they will one day be cracked and brittle, the pages of a decades-old history text.    George Bush will quite possibly find his place in this book.  His opponents now say they are on the right side of history, and they are the ones fighting for change.  But Lincoln's legacy shows its own bright-line rule, and that is that the vast majority of people often don't at all care for the right kind of change while they themselves are the living history. 
 
As the discarded warrior prepares to vacate his office, one has to realize that the battles he has fought have not been just those abroad.  George Bush has known the angry left, indeed.  And they have revelled in his every faltering.  But the right kind of change owns the future. 
 
Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past. This is another quote by George Orwell.
 
 In the end, this man will have been like an ensign on a hill.  Having owned the present, past, and future for his string of moments, he will have delivered his nation into a new global landscape. 
 
It is a little-discussed fact that Winston Churchill lost the 1945 election in Britain in a landslide to the Labour Party.   That May, his approval ratings were at eighty-three percent.  Popularity is not always a reliable measure of either just or unjust result.  That result, being history itself, will endure to speak for itself. 
 
Pundits today saracastically note that You, George Bush, are no Lincoln. 
 
And by the way pundits of Lincoln's own time responded, we would have to note that today's pundits are no different.  No, they are more of the same. 
 
You, the members of the Fourth Estate, are no change.  And in the end, you'll be no judge, either.
 
 
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ATTENTION: A STATEMENT FROM N.O.W.

Posted by beltway girl on Monday, September 01, 2008 1:24:58 AM
It has come to our attention that certain individuals are advocating against a woman and her right to choose.  Now, when we say, 'a woman' like that, we know it sounds like it's not anyone actually speaking.  We only say it that way because we're also thinking of the right to privacy.  It's none of your business if it was one of us.  Never mind that it emphasizes the fact that no one ever wants to lay claim on actually having done the thing we're advocating.  That's not the point.  And that's certainly not why we say it that way.
 
So these individuals are advocating against a woman and her right to choose.  This is nothing new in our war against men.  Notice that I don't say our war against mankind.  The fact that the word "mankind" is the word we would use in such a reference is itself a product of men, made by men.  But not by mankind, which obviously includes women.  But returning to the point, the individuals advocating against the woman and her right to choose are, in this case, claiming to be women.
 
N.O.W., in cooperation with the Democratic Party of this nation, has always fought to make the general population aware that no individual that advocates against a woman's right to choose is a woman.  Regardless of what you may initially think, please remember that the individual advocating against the right to choose is not a woman.  N.O.W. does not appreciate such charades, and knows that you don't, either. 
 
So if someone should enter into the current presidential election wearing a skirt, and cute shoes, be aware that this individual is not a woman. 
 
The woman was there, but she was wearing a pantsuit.
 
And the guy at the top of the ticket refused to put her on as vice president, even though she, herself, should have been the nominee.  The reprecussions for such an act will be felt, but returning to the matter at hand.  Please be aware that any individual advocating against the right to choose who claims to be a woman is perhaps attempting to engage in voter fraud.  Know that your rights can, and will, be protected. 
 
Thank you.  We hope we've been as clear on the issues as we have always been.
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The Turning Of The Page For The Maverick

Posted by beltway girl on Sunday, August 31, 2008 3:08:39 AM
"When the soldiers came home from Vietnam, there were no parades, no celebrations.  So they built the Vietnam Memorial for themselves."  --William Westmoreland
 
Who is John McCain?
 
John McCain was crushed when his plane was shot down over Hanoi in October of 1967.  His body broken, he nearly drowned.
 
When the Vietnamese recovered this twisted and fractured, but certainly animated and alert remnant of a human being, a crowd attacked him.  He felt the bayonet and the butt of a rifle.  His body absorbed the hatred of his country, and of western civiliztion.
 
The soldier, now a prisoner, was taken to the Hanoi Hilton.  What life was like in this place can only be imagined from the details available.  That was Hoa Lo, which means "Fiery Furnace," or "Hell's Hole."  "Stove."  Another nearby prison was known as the Zoo.
 
Why did they call it the Zoo?
 
Well, all the windows had been bricked off, and the doors had padlocks.  But there was a small crack where the prisoners could look out, and livestock could look in.  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/honor/sfeature/sf_prisons.html  Perhaps the most important note to this aside is that the North Vietnamese truly did view creatures of the west as no better than animals; but the Zoo was not the Hilton.
 
The Hanoi Hilton was built by the French, who were not very popular with many of the locals.  It became a hot point for what was to come.  Men destined to lead the North Vietnamese communists were no strangers to it.  When they got their chance, they decided to make John McCain familiar with its hospitality, which somehow hadn't changed all that much, except, perhaps, to have become more savage.
 
Rusted shackles.  Rats.  Lt. Ronald Bliss reflected, "You could look at this place and...  just hear the screams of about fifty years because it was-- it is-- a hard place."  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/honor/sfeature/sf_prisons.html
 
The article goes on.  "Some of the most brutal torture of Americans took place here in specially equipped rooms."
 
Our servicemen, mostly pilots at this place, were tortured and interrogated.  There were "rope bindings, irons, beatings, and prolonged solitary confinement."  (Wikipedia)  The North Vietnamese wanted good press.  They wanted U.S. policy denounced by these men. 
 
"In 1968, he was offered early release, and when he refused, because others had been there longer, his captors went at him again: he suffered cracked ribs, teeth broken off at the gum line, and torture that lashed his arms behind his back and that were progressively tightened all the way through the night."  (http://hotair.com/archives/2008/03/25/he-left-his-teeth-in-the-hanoi-hilton/, quoting Vanity Fair)
 
The piece continues that he suffered from dysentery in solitary confinement and attempted suicide.
 
"I took one look at him, and my brain said, 'They dropped this guy off on me to claim that we let him die.'"  ((http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/05/08/mccains-former-hanoi-cell-mate-describes-character-in-deplorable-conditions/)
 
These were the words of Col. George "Bud" Day, a celebrated soldier also being housed at the Hanoi Hilton at the time, as quoted in CNN.
 
Watery soup and bread were the least of their worries.  Starvation, beatings, tortured for hours and hours.  Hate America, my brother.  Some did at home without any torture.  The Hilton uniforms are eerily reminiscent of Adolf Hitler's concentration camp uniforms.
 
John McCain lived there for five years.  Atrocities.  Many in the quest for good press for the North Vietnmanese. 
 
This man is clearly someone to be considered for the White House this year.  He should not be denied that if he is shown to be the clearly superior candidate.  Many on the left don't like to remember Vietnam; it doesn't sit well with their "world view."
 
As our own press has already launched an attack on his running mate's "inexperience," let's try to make sure that the quest for good press doesn't once again besiege this soldier.
 
A good leader, even in our nation, isn't easy to come by.  We have many presidents in our history, the names of whom escape the memories of school children and investment bankers alike. 
 
But the competition is stiff.  Barack Obama offers a whole gamut of gifts, including a brilliant mind, beautifully crafted speeches, and an enhanced opportunity for racial healing.
 
But please remember that this man has a story, too.  Some among the left like to make light of this story, knowing how powerful it truly is.  John McCain came home from his "Vietnam experience" like many others.  Many in the nation didn't embrace these men, didn't love these men, didn't cherish these men, and did not celebrate these men.
 
Men like him built their own building, and, like McCain, they built their own legacy.  The good press the North Vietnmanese craved wasn't in Vietnam; it was here.  There was a very receptive audience for them.
 
McCain came home and turned the page in his life, and he chose the life of a public servant.  More recently, he has turned the page by making Sarah Palin his running mate.  It's a page worth turning.  Because the audience the North Vietnamese sought out in this country is to be found on the far left. 
 
They in this flank of the American political landscape say this vice presidential candidate is light, but their own presidential candidate floats like a duck feather. 
 
America, don't turn back.  Heed Barack Obama's advice and know that you cannot turn back.  This was a good man you had in John McCain, and he still is.  He is the same man that survived America's lost war, and the brutality that followed that loss.
 
For once, show the left that the quest for good press has gone too far.  Saying that this man's building is the White House is not partisan, it is just.  Give this man, and the men who served with him, the building they really deserved.
 
It is, seriously, the right kind of change.
 
His opponents in his own party say he's a "maverick," and doesn't do as he is told.
 
It's the turning page for "The Maverick."  Let's ask, if you had been through what this man had, would you be anything else?
 
 
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Welcome to Dogtown

Posted by beltway girl on Saturday, August 30, 2008 1:18:25 AM
Dogtown.  A place where dogs were brought to lick their physical and emotional wounds.  Little animals subject to tremendous abuse at the hands of the curiously interested Michael Vick.  Michael Vick, himself a perverse and bizarre type of victim of his times.  Had it been a hundred years or so ago down south, he would have attracted people to his theater of the uncaring, completely unacceptable, and arguably insane.  As it is, though, he was skewered and his career went down in flames.
 
Dogs in our culture are loved.  They are revered.  They are cherished.
 
But imagine a different world.
 
Imagine a world where dogs are not really considered...  human!  Imagine a world where dogs are considered to be non-viable life forms, incapable of actual survival, in many cases, without their owners. 
 
Imagine a viability test for dogs.  Imagine the Supreme Court noting that some dogs are able to survive outside their homes, without the life-giving support of their owners.  But others, well...
 
You know, the cut, it's gotta be made somewhere.  Some of the owners, well, they just don't want their pets.  Now did they choose to make their pets in the first place?
 
Yes, They, Did!
 
Right.  But do they want them now?
 
No, They, Don't!
 
What if these owners are teens?
 
If your daughter...  made a mistake.  Would you want her punished...  with a puppy?
 
Once the pet is a pet, it is a pet.  Is it possible for it to be anything else?
 
Well, the Supreme Court might devise a test.  A horse is a course, of course, of course.  But what about this problematic dog?
 
The statement with the horse might leave this open to a discussion about equal protection under the laws.  But that aside for the moment, the Supreme Court might devise a test to see if the pet's viable.  Imagine this viability test for dogs.  Again, is the pet capable of survival outside the home without the support of its owner?
 
And is there a compelling interest on the part of the state to step in and prevent a Vick from hurting this non-viable pit bull?
 
You know, it's a necessary evil.  Pets happen.  Sometimes, owners are in a comfortable position to accept them.  But sometimes not.
 
What if this owner has no money?  What if this owner is on welfare?  What if this owner is a senior, and eating dog food herself?  A living testament to the Reagan legacy.
 
What if the pet is unwanted?  What then?  Can we actually force the owner to sustain the life of the pet?
 
Such a thing could never happen in the United States of America.  Were it to happen, and someone asked you whether you could live in such a society, how would you respond?
 
Yes, We Can!  That's Senator Obama's response.
 
No, We, Can't, answers Senator John McCain, and Sarah Palin seconds the nomination.
 
Conservatives!  Welcome to Dogtown!
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Obama's Spectacle

Posted by beltway girl on Friday, August 29, 2008 2:13:43 AM
Senator Obama made a lot of promises tonight.  And, for the moment, for this big, Obama moment, held in a venue worthy of either Madonna or the Pope, those rhetorical gifts delivered, and delivered big.
 
They couldn't get enough of Senator Obama tonight.  He could have told that audience that his real choice for veep would be Socks the cat, or a convicted murderer, and they would all have cheered the same way.  He could have told many there they would have to provide a year of community service working at the local Pizza Hut or White Castle just to cast their votes for him, and they'd all have cheered the same way.
 
He could have told them infanticide was a woman's right to choose.  And they'd all have cheered the same way.
 
In fact, he did tell them that. 
 
And they all cheered just the same way.
 
He gave them every carrot to the Republican stick.  Free health care, tax relief for everyone but the rich, more money for education, etc. 
 
John McCain was, of course, maligned.  Not really gutsy.  A wimp who refused to go get Bin Laden in his cave.  Or was that Bush?  Does it matter?
 
Former president Jimmy Carter earlier had said McCain had "milked" his POW status for everything it was worth in this election.
 
Perhaps President Carter should be asked if he also feels that Senator Obama has also "milked" his biracial status for everything it is worth at this point.  Or whether Obama has "milked" his mother's death from cancer for everything it's worth in his crusade for universal health care.
 
It wasn't very nice to read President Carter's wrong-headed words today.  Nor was it easy to listen to Senator Obama's words.
 
The ears of many liberals will prick up after that statement.  If you don't like his words, they will note, it's because you fear them.
 
Correct.
 
And you fear them because they challenge your own antiquated and ill-founded beliefs.
 
Incorrect.
 
You see, Senator Obama says from one side of his mouth that we are all our brother's keeper, and our sister's keeper.  But out of the other side of his mouth, he says he is pro-choice where his sister is concerned.
 
It seems like there's a failure to communicate in terms of one side of Senator Obama's brain with the other side.  Will the real Barack Obama please stand up?
 
Because we do fear your words, Senator Obama.  They're a crystal-clear indication of how truly inexperienced you are in foreign policy, and also what an either completely misguided person you are, or what a hypocrite you are.  You owned America tonight.  And you said, "America, you cannot go back."
 
Right you are.  Let's hope America doesn't turn back from rejecting you in November, and electing John McCain.  Because Barack Obama should not be elected America's "keeper" in 2008. 
 
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Today on "Barack and Friends"

Posted by beltway girl on Thursday, August 28, 2008 4:13:48 PM
(CNN, closed captioned, ALL DAY)  season finale.  bill skips barack's big speech to meet someone he found on match.com.  the workman who supplies the doric columns somehow misunderstands when barack says he wants them made of alabaster, and thinks barack is telling him he thinks someone is such a bas--rd.  so the columns are spray-painted cardboard, and keep flying off the stage the entire time he tries to give his speech.  not only that, but a racoon, nested beneath the stage, somehow ends up on stage for the speech.  barack chases the racoon with a boom mike, accidentally striking the animal, putting nancy pelosi into a rage.  britney spears shows up in a fury, noting that no one received permission to use anything from her set.  people of faith wonder how barack mysteriously knew it wasn't going to rain that night.  joe biden rankles barack and others when he begins throwing around a football with bill richardson directly beneath the stage about halfway through the speech.  a dope ring is found to be operated by none other than MSNBC anchors!
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Put on a Happy Face

Posted by beltway girl on Thursday, August 28, 2008 2:26:27 AM
Tonight's convention festivities seemed especially marked by good will.  Anyone unaware of the various strains of soap opera lurking beneath the surface would have received all of this as being completely authentic; but such a person, unaware of the intrigues at this point, would be very difficult to find, indeed.  Bill Clinton was his usual chipper, average guy, happy-go-lucky self.  Joe Biden seemed positively tickled to be on that stage, the arguably unlikely recipient of so much confidence from another, a vast reservoir of confidence himself.  The Democrats put on a happy face today.  The problem is that so much of the audience knows it's put on.
 
If you had to look at any single speech or event thus far in this spectacle to get a handle on what really is the story here, it would have to be the roll call vote.  It showed a steady rhythm, with Hillary Clinton garnering about a quarter of the vote so long as it endured, which was until it reached New York.  Then, it fell squarely in Mrs. Clinton's lap. 
 
It was obviously fully choreographed, a gratuity for Clinton, one that actually was more of an insult to her campaign than a compliment.  But she appeared gracious at the end of it all, and waved her fairy godmother wand over the name of Barack Obama.
 
In the meantime, interviews with furious Clinton supporters were letting pundits know they'd be walking to the McCain camp come this fall. 
 
Leaving The Reservation.
 
Could it be happening?  Is the Democratic Party falling apart?
 
The Democratic Party will never "fall apart."  There will always be a Democratic Party in the United States of America.  However, the party may finally have been forced to come to grips with the price of its radicalism.
 
Democrats like to look at themselves as dreamers and utopians.  They care.  And this, more than anything else one could imagine, is what they think they do better than anyone else.  They care.
 
What types of things do they care about?
 
Wars.  Wars are bad.  They kill people.  So no more wars.  (Wars=Bad)
 
Ask a Democrat if WWII was "bad."  Wailing results, and, with the more shrewd Dem, the response is that you are a demagogue and a warmongerer, trying to justify all escalation of conflict on the spine of the only justified war, ever.  Okay, and maybe WWI.  But only maybe. 
 
What other types of things do Democrats care about?
 
Trans-fats.  And cigarettes (particularly cigarettes).  Cigarettes kill people.  (Cigarettes=Bad)
 
Okay, but shouldn't adults be allowed to smoke a cigarette if they like to do so?  There is wailing again, and people just don't know what's good for them.
 
Okay.
 
So do Democrats care about premarital sex?
 
Oh, yes, of course.
 
Well, since people don't know what's good for them, do you tell them not to have it?
 
"No.  We give them condoms."
 
Why condoms?
 
"Well, we know they're just going to do it anyway."
 
But they won't just smoke cigarettes anyway, or join the military in peace, evidently.
 
And of course, where all this merry discourse always leads back to is abortion.
 
If a tree falls in a forest, but no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?
 
If a pregnant woman smokes a cigarette, does it matter?
 
Guess it depends on whether she's on her way to Wal-Mart to pick up a crib or on her way to Planned Parenthood.
 
The Dems' embrace of radicalism may prove rather expensive, as every presidential election since 1973 has proven.  And you'll find the most eerie reflection of this embrace in the McCain ad, "Tiny."  Just this little country that means no harm.
 
"The greatest destroyer of peace is abortion, because if a mother can kill her own child, what is left for me to kill you and you to kill me?  There is nothing between."  -Mother Theresa. 
 
 
 
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Hillary's Moment

Posted by beltway girl on Wednesday, August 27, 2008 2:44:05 AM
Hillary Clinton delivered what may have been the best and most important speech of her life tonight.  Looking confident and well-rested, she showed the party why she won all those votes and took all those states.
 
The reason why Hillary is not on this ticket remains a mystery.  Some sources have suggested that the veep vetting process would have involved releasing damaging documents regarding Bill's donors to the Presidential Library.  This is ridiculous.  This woman was herself competing for the presidency.  Any such damaging documents should either already have been exposed in her own candidacy or would ultimately have been exposed had Obama not amassed enough delegates to put her out of the running. 
 
The logic is ridiculous.  The UK Telegraph noted in a story in July that a Dem strategist had said the Obama camp would have to see records for the Clinton Foundation and Clinton Library in order to be sure there were no "ticking timebombs in there."  This was, interestingly, something Obama had questioned her about during the primaries.
 
Some might argue that oh, well, this makes it very clear.  Obama would look like a complete hypocrite if he took Hillary on the ticket without a complete vetting.
 
Bunkum.  As if taking Joe Biden, the ultimate Washington insider, Iraq War-voting Joe Biden, wouldn't be vastly more hypocritical?
 
Had Senator Obama really wanted to take Hillary Clinton on as a running mate, he could have done so.  None in the dog-eat-dog, eager-beaver press had already followed up on his suggestions to make Bill Clinton's donors into an issue.  And there's no indication that they would have done so in the future.  Even had something broken, could it possibly top Obama's own "issues" at this point?  Highly unlikely.
 
Either Barack Obama didn't want Hillary Clinton at the bottom of his ticket, or she herself didn't want to be Obama's Number Two.
 
Which is it?
 
Let's explore the first option.
 
By the time we'd reached the stage of the fateful Obama capaign text message, things were already on a downhill slide for Barack Obama.  He was not doing well in the polls, was coming off a poor performance at Saddleback, and was imbued in a bitter battle over his official position on infanticide.  Etc.
 
Hillary Clinton would've provided just the jolt he needed to turn his flailing candidacy into a formidable force.  Hillary Clinton would've packed instantaneous power into the ticket and added immediate bounce at the polls.
 
So why wouldn't he add Hillary?
 
Theories abound.  Ego.  The overpowering Bill.  A frosty relationship with Hillary herself.
 
On the other side of this is the hypothesis that Hillary may have taken her own veep possibilities out of play.
 
Why would she do it?
 
Ego again.  It would be something to be considered here, too.  "It's going to be me."  This was the inevitable nominee for a long, long time.  Hillary Clinton felt she had worked, scratched, and clawed to be at the top of that ticket.
 
It's quite possible that Hillary might pay polite lip service to an Obama veep post, but would reject it outright if it ever became a reality.  Not all that long ago, such a scenario would have been viewed as a joke by the Clintons.
 
Next, we have the idea that Hillary may have been protecting her own interests and political survival.  Obama is, by no means, an unencumbered candidate, and, at this point, he is not looking like an inevitable president.  We have issues and stories swirling around his head in great numbers.  At this very moment, the same press that hasn't bitten at Clinton donor scandals is chewing at the bit for Annenberg documents, which involve the Obama-Ayers connection.  We've got Wright, infanticide, Ludacris, and so much more.
 
And the very same factors that would have spurred an Obama to run to Hillary, the poll numbers, Saddleback, Obama's upcoming separation from the teleprompter, all of these same facts of life would put Hillary running from Obama's veep tap like it was a rat carrying bubonic plague.
 
What makes this mystery all the more interesting is that we may never know what actually happened.  Right now, pundits are musing over this, and the general concensus is that Obama took a pass.
 
Don't be too sure.  Had Hillary actually been the one to take the pass, would Obama's campaign want this leaked?
 
And would Hillary want to suffer the reprecussions from her party had this been the case?
 
Even in the event that party higher-ups had known, would they want this made public?
 
As Hillary Clinton stood on the stage tonight, she looked relaxed, she looked powerful, and she looked natural.  She delivered a phenomenal speech under the circumstances.  And Barack Obama, now fighting along without her, looks extremely vulnerable and weak.  The Obiden "bounce" is speaking for itself, and when Barack Obama loses in November, this woman will have won.
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Tomorrow/Preview: "Barack and Friends"

Posted by beltway girl on Tuesday, August 26, 2008 3:36:41 PM

Barack wonders how they're going to cover up Joe Biden's nervous breakdown on the stump.  The archdiocese of Denver threatens to perform an exorcism on Nancy Pelosi, and says they may expand it to the entire Dem party, if necessary.  Bill secretly decides to forego a speech on the assigned topic of foreign policy, and decides he'll give one on the history of baseball instead.  Hillary finally releases her delegates-- to John McCain!  McCain frostily declines an invitation to speak on Thursday, noting he's not really a Democrat.  The Dems face fierce reprisals for serving Coke in the Pepsi Center.

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Today: A Very Special "Barack and Friends"

Posted by beltway girl on Tuesday, August 26, 2008 3:14:49 PM
(CNN, closed captioned, ALL DAY) Joe Biden sees the polls and bursts into tears while speaking before a crowd, but conceals the true reason for his anxiety.  When Hillary goes to take the stage for her big speech, the music from "Jaws" somehow begins to play.  Miffed, Hillary dons a "Hillary in '12" cap and gives a speech about Bill, which lasts about five hours.  By the time Obama takes the stage, the entire audience has fallen asleep.  Barack begins to wonder if he perhaps shouldn't have taken Hillary on the ticket after all.  (Special musical guest: Ludacris)
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Tonight on "Barack and Friends"

Posted by beltway girl on Monday, August 25, 2008 5:09:10 PM
 
(CNN, 5 p.m., closed captioned, ALL NIGHT) Bill continues making trouble for Barack by demanding to speak about something other than foreign policy during his speech.  Michelle wonders how she'll be able to look nonchalant while she continues to worry that Hillary supporters might rock the boat during the roll call vote.  One of the Barack and Friends crew accidentally calls a Hillary bud an "Uncle Tom," rankling things on the national scene.  Joe Biden repeatedly sticks his foot in his mouth before even being permitted to speak, and Howard Dean is pelted with crumpled-up Obiden signs by enraged Hillary fans.  Jeremiah Wright leaves angry voice mails after he finally comes to grips with the fact that he couldn't do the invocation.
 
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Is It The Ideas, Stupid?

Posted by beltway girl on Monday, August 25, 2008 2:03:38 AM
Bill Clinton, the only Dem in the presidential winning column since single-termer Jimmy Carter.  According to analysis of polling data, is Obama following in his footsteps?
 
It does not appear this way.  In August of 1992, Bill Clinton had a monstrous lead of about 26 points at one point.  This tightened to about nine points after the Republican National Convention. 
 
Clinton also enjoyed juggernaut-scale leads at this time of year, particularly in August, over opponent Bob Dole in 1996.
 
Now, granted, Ross Perot was an enormous factor in the 1992 election, and even led in polls in the spring.  He ultimately garnered about 19% of the vote in the general election.  Clinton received only a plurality in that election with 43% of the total vote, while George H. W. Bush received about 37%.
 
However, Perot was not a significant factor in the 1996 race, but we should note that Clinton would at that time have been the incumbent.  And although Clinton still did not break the 50% mark in terms of the total vote, he won very handily over Dole, and those August polling numbers would have presaged that victory.
 
So excluding, for now, the 1992 race because of the Perot factor, we can still at least reliably consider the data for the 1996 race, and also put the numbers for 1992 on the table.
 
In 1996, Dems would have been confident, even in August, that they had a winner.  Now, the premise of this article is that a very hefty lead is necessary at this time of year, specifically in August, to score an ultimate Dem victory.  Some might refute this by noting the data in the Michael Dukakis bid in 1988.  But in this case, we should note that the pre-convention numbers for Dukakis in that year, with a late July convention, showed him with a six-point lead before the convention.  This cannot possibly compare to Clinton's comparable numbers in 1996, but we have to consider he was an incumbent that year.  In 1992, we have the Perot factor, and we'd note that Clinton's pre-convention numbers might have sometimes been close to Dukakis's numbers, at various points.  But it is also to be figured into this that once Clinton gained a lead over Bush in July of that year, he never ceded it. 
 
So let's also look at the year 2000, and we'd have Gore, who went on to lose the election (remember Florida) in the electoral college, but who did win the popular vote by a razor-thin margin.  Gallup recorded notoriously erratic results in that election, but a four-point lead held by Gore in August was-- indeed-- something of a precursor of the actual outcome.  Gore nearly took the presidency.  And another poll in August even showed a statistical tie, another very, very reliable indication of what was to come.
 
Now let's look at Kerry.  Kerry led the polls in July by eight points at one point, enjoying something of a bounce with his veep selection, John Edwards.
 
By the end of August, Bush had caught up with Kerry, however. 
 
And looking at this from another angle, in terms of enjoying a bounce from veep selections, this has also been shown to make a difference when you look at the polling data.
 
Dole, in 1996, had an electrifying vice presidential selection in Jack Kemp, and he enjoyed a nine-point bounce after naming him.  Bush enjoyed a three-point bounce after naming Cheney, a (granted) less than jolting choice.  Gore gained five points after tapping Lieberman, now a name being bandied about by the McCain campaign.  And Kerry moved four points ahead with Edwards. 
 
Returning to the contest at hand, Gallup showed the race in a very dead heat in its poll released today.  So far, no Biden bounce is apparent.
 
And even if it were, the one thing that the doomed Dole bid of '96 can show us is that voters cast their votes for a president, not a vice president. 
 
If you look at the polling numbers, they seem to be foreshadowing yet another doomed Dem ticket.  And the numbers show us even more than that.
 
Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter are the only Dems in the winning column since Kennedy & LBJ.  And even when we look at these winners, Carter served only one term and Clinton couldn't break the 50% mark for his second term.  On top of that, Clinton may have arguably owed his first term to the Perot factor.
 
One has to wonder about this very long list of losses and whether it means something.
 
Could it be the Dem platform?
 
Perhaps so.  If it is, don't look for a landslide Obama win this year.  And if it's close, it might not go for the Dems, either.  When it's that close, the map doesn't seem to favor the Dems, as the Bush-Gore contest of 2000 showed us.  And another tell-tale sign-- also tied to that 2000 race-- that it won't go Obama's way if it's that close is that Lieberman, the veep for the Gore ticket that year, is now under consideration by McCain.  The broader point to be gleamed from this, though, is that when the voters don't like your ideas, no pocket of votes anywhere-- including Florida or Ohio-- is going to help you pull this one out. 
 
Is it the ideas, stupid?
 
Maybe.  And if it is, no election is going to show this in more stark contrast than the one now in the hands of the American voters.
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Obama Lotto

Posted by beltway girl on Sunday, August 24, 2008 1:56:25 AM
This was the moment.
 
This was the moment when the highly presumptive Democratic Party's nominee subordinated millions of voters to his own "view."
 
This was the moment when his supporters got a 3 a.m. text message naming Joe Biden as his losing mate.
 
This was the moment that the schism in the Democratic Party manifested itself in a very prominent and convincingly alarming manner for the average voter.  And this was the moment that Rush Limbaugh prayed for.  This was the moment when an Obama, tied in the polls with a McCain, just didn't seem to have that same, electrifying spark with the teleprompter outside the Old State Capitol in Springfield. 
 
This was the moment that the Democratic Party Family got to tour the house that Barack built.  Hillary and Bill are outside in the guesthouse, while Barack and Joe are in the living room with their feet propped up on the coffee table.  The "alleged" rift in the Dem family is being blamed on Republican spin by MSNBC, but Bill and Hillary are watching it all from a different television set than the new power couple.  Oh, sure, it suits the Dems to blame this on the Republicans, but the Democratic Party woman, who won about half as many Dem votes cast in the contest this year, is being discarded in all of this like she was last year's sweater. 
 
This was the moment when an awful lot of people looked at their cell phones in a state of complete indifference and said, "Oh."
 
This is the moment when breathtaking pandemonium may overtake the Democratic National Convention.  This is the moment when Mad Mac stakes out said convention to study its developments for himself.  But whatever else happens, remember that this was the moment when Barack Obama lost the general election for the Democrats.
 
Speaking of Mad Mac, John McCain, the Dems love to think a guy with seven, eight, ten...  Oh, what the hell, let's say fifteen?  Well, a guy with  that many houses, a guy who can't possibly relate to the average American.  And boy, they're having a great time with this, and with joking about how this guy, with all these houses, is just so out of touch.
 
Maybe they should count in the twenty or so houses he lived in during his youth, when he was following his father around as his father served his country.  And were they going to count all the houses this guy lived in when he served the country himself?  Will that include the one in Hanoi?
 
Probably not because this won't make for such an effective commercial. 
 
The Dems are not going to find it easy to beat a McCain without soiling themselves in the process.  But that won't stop them because they have such a very, very hard time seeing anything in a big picture other than what they themselves want to see.
 
And so now, in this case, has it gone with this Biden moment.  Except now the big picture is, unfortunately for them, their own party, and some of the bricks are missing from the house Barack built. 
 
Barack Obama really needed Hillary Clinton for this moment, for this house he's built.  And yet, Hillary Clinton was nowhere to be found.  Why is that?
 
Perhaps Mrs. Clinton realized that Obama is going to lose this election without her.  And perhaps she likes that idea just enough to let him lose and try another bid herself in 2012.  Perhaps she was offered the veep post and declined.  This would explain the lack of a paper trail for her in the vetting process better than anything else.  Because had Obama simply always had his mind set against her, a paper trail--just for show-- would almost certainly have been created. 
 
The true nature of this, which the average viewer will perhaps never know, will arguably decide the nature of the upcoming convention in Denver.  If it was really an omission from even consideration of the woman with all those votes, look for a convention that looks like it was being held at the Bronx Zoo; if not, look for your usual infomercial. 
 
Did a rejected Barack Obama find refuge with a receptive Joe Biden?  Or did he, singlehandedly, throw away the surest shot at the White House for the Democratic Party just because of his ego, and, you know, the Bill and Hillary Show? 
 
He was always an avid viewer himself. 
 
 
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