This week's edition of Look. Right! continues to serve up the best of Montana's conservative bloggers. As usual, blogs not updated during the past week will not be included.
Since the Cowgirls didn't post anything new, served up first is a steaming portion of the eponymous Dave Budge, defender of free markets and reality-based economics, and purveyor of Montana's best place for epicures to meet and share.
It's hard to know where to start with David this week. First, he took a walk in the snake pit but for some reason only found tadpoles. Next up he discusses the "beauty" of market intervention in healthcare by highlighting the mess Japan finds itself in. BTW, for those that think socialized medicine is the cure-all for free market market healthcare one should look no further than PJM Calgary's take on how a liberal Canadian MP found it necessary to travel to the US for quality and lifesaving care.
I doubt anything Dave wrote this week sparked as much controversy as highlighting Cato's review of Wolfgang Schivelbusch’s new book Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt’s America, Mussolini’s Italy, and Hitler’s Germany, 1933–1939. The hand-wringers really got themselves in a lather over this one...perhaps hitting just a little too close to home for comfort. You know, despite the scorn many on the Left had for the article, and Dave's comments, many seem to conveniently forget that Roosevelt interred thousands of Japanese-Americans in prison camps over the fear of having dual-loyalty in time of war, and essentially created the Civilian Conservation Corps to keep thousands more of unemployed and disaffected youth off the street and incapable of socialist agitation. Compare and contrast this to the outrage many on the Left have for the supposed dismantling of civil liberties under the Bush administration and suspension of Habeas. Last time I checked, the US is not operating prison camps for Muslim-Americans, nor drafting disaffected and underemployed leftist bloggers into national service...perish the thought they could contribute anything other than the occasional dirty nappy.
Next up, we're lucky enough to have Gregg over at Electric City continuing to highlight the debacle that is Electric City Power. More disgusting, however, is the contempt many Great Falls politicos have for public input and accountability (a burgeoning issue in Missoula, too) in their decision-making process. The great thing about Gregg and other Great Falls bloggers, is that they not only take the time to highlight the problems, but more importantly they offer solutions that will effect the long-term viability of Montana's phoenix on the Mighty 'Mo. If only the politicians cared enough to listen...
Carol over at Missoulapolis offers up her take on the Missoula City Council's e-mail kerfuffle, again highlighting the disdain and contempt in which Missoula's so-called progressive politicians hold their constituents. Carol also takes time out of her busy schedule to live-blog Council meetings and goes slumming at a Forward Montana event. Who would have guessed that more than one attendee of Wednesday's soiree found the event "light on substance." Shocking!
Montana Headlines continues to be a tour de force this week, continuing to debunk the liberal myth that Representative Rehberg was against S-CHIP before he was for it. Headlines also zeroes in on Montana political reporter Charles Johnson, and how he failed to discuss the gamesmanship surrounding the facockda quarrel over the schedules of Montana's congressional representatives. Also on the front burner, how Montana failed to come up with money for the Brucellosis slaughter that affected the blogmother of this and many other Montana bloggers.
Montana Main Street also took time away from attending the Wheeler Center conference in Helena to promote the idea to mainstream Montanans of the need for reform when it comes to term limits and reapportionment, both of which are sure to be on the agenda during the next legislative session. Another good place to check for more background on this issue is some in-depth analysis from a now-defunct blog Dirt Between Light Bulbs that used that data from 2004 (the first election year after the redistricting) to get a sense of what happened. Check out the "MT04 Deconstructed" series.
I'm still not quite sure how Craig at Montana Politics finds the time to blog between naps but luckily for us he does. In addition to continuing to produce the Small Towns, Long Streets podcast (this weeks edition decidedly non-placenta centric!), Craig provides some background on his activities during the past week, and embeds a "fatwa-worthy" British vloggers opinion on the permanent outrage evident among Britain's Muslim population.
Rabid Sanity's Steve Eschenbacher is back from a brief hiatus, mentioning how Montana's senior senator is more like a weatherman than a leader, and providing his take on Doing It For the Children™. Smoke 'em if you got 'em Steve!
Scoop Montana remains one of my favorite new bloggers, and not just because the adorable Mr. Googles is a frequent reader of TLBP. Because of my concern for Mr. Googles ophthalmologic health, I promise to be more open to Elmo than the Michelin Man in the future. Scoop has been all over the Missoula council e-mail story in not one but two posts that continue to underline the contempt Missoula's progressive council members have for public input, and provides a glimpse of Bob Hope's best movie line ever.
Andy Hammond at The Hammond Report reminds us that there is some competition for Microsoft Office, exposes the hypocrisy of the major Democratic presidential candidates and their refusal to commit to an early defeat, I mean, withdrawal of American forces from Iraq, and produces another podcast on the faux-outrage over Rush Limbaugh's comments on American soldiers.
The Montana Misanthrope proves he's anything but: by focusing on the student loan "crisis" in a post which could be subtitled, "Dude, where's my latte, vacation voucher and subprime mortgage?" and by giving blog-esteem to the perseverance of a Billings thief.
The final course in this weeks buffet of Montana's conservative bloggers is Jack at The Western Word. Jack provides a recap of the week in sports, (Hockey! Jack. Hockey!) and informs us that Monarch's loss is South Carolina's gain. Of special note, Jack focuses on how Montana's senior senator is using the S-CHIP bill more for political gain than in any effort to help the children™. Also on the platter, why Great Falls should focus on keeping the runways open and the proposed CTL plant off the drawing board...it's the jobs, stupid. And finally, Jack lets us know that Senator Craig is not going anywhere, for the time being anyway.
Mike
6 comments:
Wonderful job again, Mike!
Looking forward to volume 3.
This is excellent stuff! You should submit a link on StudentUP.com to share your content, get it rated and reach a larger audience. Thanks for sharing.
Also go an rate other news entries you think are worthwhile... Cheers!
Once again an excellent job. Your selection of the high points is spot on in my opinion.
Just like I seem to be inadvertently aping you (without the artfulness, I fear) we do seem to be hitting the same concerns.
If you ever get to Missoula, I would love to buy you a beer.
You'll have to travel out of state to catch Mike. It's impossible to meet him in Montana.
The Civilian Conservation Corps was VOLUNTARY. If it kept young men off the streets and prevented them from falling prey to socialist agitators, it did so on a VOLUNTARY basis. The CCC is largely responsible for our success in the war that followed the Depression. The internment camps are a whole different issue and a stain on our great national history certainly, but you shouldn't twist the history of the CCC to make it prove some unrelated point.
I appreciate the comments, Michael, and should point out that I never indicated the CCC was mandatory, just that it provided a way to get young, but more importantly, unemployed people off the streets and into hard physical labor. You're certainly no stranger to the larger historical context of a burgeoning communist/socialist political presence in the country at the same time. The CCC was simply, as I've indicated, a quite brilliant method to get folks who may have been open to certain political ideologies into the position of 1) having a job, and 2) too tired to care about politics.
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