Hurricane-O-Crats

Keepin' it classy. The former chairman of the DNC, Don Fowler, speaking with Rep. John Spratt (D-SC) on flight from Denver to Charlotte following the 2008 Democrat Woodstock convention.



Mike

Quick! Choose a Narrative

The Left, in typical clown-car fashion, seems to be having difficulty grasping a coherent narrative for countering Senator McCain's choice of Governor Palin as his running mate.

As for the so-called "experience" meme that's going around the electronic ghettos of Missoula and Bozeman comes this piece of advice, from of all places, another little chunk of the Sinestrasphere.

I would add that Obama does not need to be arguing how important experience is. Let me also add that when Tim Kaine, who has exactly the same experience as Palin, was treated by the Media and the Dems as a serious and acceptable potential pick, it opens up charges of a double standard.

The conventional "wisdom" also seems to be forming around the narrative that Governor Palin will not attract the disillusioned PUMA's from Hillary Clinton's camp. Enter PUMA Central, otherwise known as hillaryclintonforum.net. Enjoy!

Finally, Allahpundit weighs in on a story by Ben Smith at The Politico concerning Palin allegedly "dissing" the "veep job."

Well, no, she didn’t, and I should know: I’m the one who uploaded the YouTube clip back in June that people are circulating today as evidence. Politico accuses her of “distaste for the office” but at least provides the full quote of what she said; Taegan Goddard, who was last seen hyperventilating over Obama’s speech, goes the full Think Progress route and excises the part that proves the lie. Skip ahead to 2:50:

“[A]s for that VP talk all the time, I’ll tell you, I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the VP does every day? I’m used to being very productive and working real hard in an administration. We want to make sure that that VP slot would be a fruitful type of position, especially for Alaskans and for the things that we’re trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the U.S. before I can even start addressing that question.”

She’s making a point that should appeal to feminists especially: It’s not that she has distaste for the job, it’s that she’d have distaste for the job if it meant nothing more than serving as window dressing for McCain. A job with “fruitful,” meaningful responsibilities, especially with respect to energy policy, is a different ballgame. Stand by for plenty of distortions of what she actually said, though, starting no doubt with the “Worst Person in the World Segment” of tonight’s episode of “Keith’s Enemies List.”

O.K. fellas, or in the case of Rachel Maddow, fellettes (it only goes downhill from there!), choose a narrative and at least stick with it for longer than it takes to get a new batch of talking points.

Mike

Thoughts on Palin

I have to admit, McCain's choice of Governor Palin caught me off-guard. Last night all indications pointed in the direction of Governor Pawlenty from Minnesota, a boring and formuliac choice which might have been delicious news for those anti-Romney (née anti-Mormon) former Huckabee supporters, but who among us hasn't suffered from dreams-deferred?

Governor Palin seems to have a compelling story, both personally and politically. The personal stuff is for others to parse but politically she actually has a record of reaching across the aisle, appointing both Democrats and Independents to various positions in Alaska. You'd also be hard-pressed to find a more pragmatic conservative out there these days...having signed into law same-sex domestic partner benefits for Alaska state employees, and offering to exchange state-owned land to the Federal government in exchange for oil exploration in ANWR. Palin also seems to know something about going head-to-head against government corruption and ethics violations, a subject which a presidential nominee coming from the Chicago political machine of Bill Ayers, Rev. Wright, and the Daley family, and a Vice-Presidential nominee having spent a literal lifetime in the Senate might be hard-pressed to contrast. It's also refreshing to see someone with actual executive and small business experience on a ticket...any ticket!

Of interest is that a number of socialist progressive Democrats, fresh from their own Hopey- Changey™ Jonestown 2008 convention are already dissing Palin as "inexperienced," even though she already more experienced than their nominee, and under the cloud of investigation for Juneau's version of what they're calling "Trooper-Gate," for firing a state trooper who is divorcing Governor Palin's sister. You'd think they'd collectively have more inspiring Hopeyness™ to report. There is nothing to suggest that Palin had any direct involvement with pressure brought against her former brother-in-law, and it was her aides that were accused of wanting the state trooper fired.

And perhaps part of the reason the governor's aides wanted this trooper fired wasn't because he was part of a divorce, but because he shot a cow moose... out of season.

It could also have been because he was caught driving drunk... in a patrol car.

It might even have had something to do with the fact he tasered his 11-year-old-son.

Remember, Senator Obama HAD to choose someone like Senator Biden (D-Hair-Plug) to give him credibility on the foreign policy front. For those inclined to vote for Senator McCain, he already possesses those qualities. Now, in a running mate, John McCain has proved that he's willing to take a chance on a talented and experienced agent of real and verifiable change, someone just about as far from the conventional wisdom of the beltway as possible, rather than someone who transects the beltway on his nightly train-ride home.

Mike

Beijing 2008

An incredible opening ceremony, as expected. While I'm anxiously awaiting the Olympic quadrennial family reunion in Vancouver in 2 years time I can't help but think that if these billions of Chinese ever wake up from their relative geopolitical slumber, we're all fucked.

Better to keep them in the smog and filth of the larger cities, where their obviously diminished life expectancy means I won't need to purchase the Rosetta Stone Mandarin edition, or write my checks in a language that kept the order of the parade of nations something only a schizophrenic could appreciate.

Then again...maybe I could help them grow some corn and other crops in large enough quantities that they wouldn't consider putting an apple in my mouth and serving me to a group of hungry factory workers.

Decisions, decisions.

USA! USA!

Mike

For my friends in Beijing:


令人難以置信的開幕典禮，符合市場預期。而我
焦急地等待四年一度的奧運家庭團聚
在溫哥華，在二年的時間，我不能幫助，但認為
如果這些億萬中國以往任何時候都醒來，從他們的
相對地緣政治的沉睡，我們都 。



更好地使他們在煙霧和骯髒的較大
城市，他們顯然 預期壽命
意味著我將不會需要購買的羅塞塔石碑國語
版，或寫我的檢查，在一個語言，保持了
秩序巡遊的只是一個
精神分裂症能理解。


然後再...也許我可以幫助他們成長的一些玉米和
其他作物在足夠大的 他們不會
考慮把一個蘋果在我嘴裡和服務，我一
集團工廠工人。


決定，決定的。

美國！美國！

Worst Person In The World...Today

I don't have much to offer in the way of commentary following the not-so-stunning admission that the Prancin'Pony™ John Edwards had trouble keeping it behind the business end of his zipper, that Jack hasn't already offered. On a certain level I'm not sure why such dalliances even matter in the greater scheme of things, but they do in the political milieu we find ourselves in, and besides, I have a blog, so what-the-hell?

Let's just say it's refreshing to know that we won't be dealing with the possibility of a Vice President or Attorney General John Edwards. I guess I'm glad I didn't proudly submit my first donation of the election cycle to his failed campaign, though we might now expect our own Governor Schweitzer to take a page from the Obama campaign playbook and throw Edwards under the bus?

The thing that bothers me most about this epidose is how the mainstream media refused to follow the story because it originally came from the National Enquirer AND because they simply took the word of Edward's campaign associates who naively claimed there was no "there, there."

The last time I checked journalists are not supposed to digest campaign press releases and statements and excrete them as, if you'll pardon the unintentional pun, "hard news." How about askin' some hard questions, fellas? Would a little follow-up be too much to ask? It's really no wonder that the readership and subscriptions to mainstream newspapers and magazines are dropping faster than Vicodin tablets when Mary-Kate Olson hears sirens outside. The Edwards story has been a case-study on the sad state of jornalism in this country... when we have to get our news from the National Enquirer rather than the common and trusted legacy sources of the past.

Perhaps the only schadenfreude coming out of this can be directed at the usual suspects, many of whom were pimping for Edwards long before Obama became a household name:

Oh, apparently the wingnutosphere is in a tizzy because the traditional media won't cover the latest tripe from the National Enquirer. On that front, Richard Blair makes a good point...

Seriously, I can't believe this is even subject to debate, but for the crazies, no source is too disreputable if it validates their warped world view. Although in a perverse sense, the more energy they spend on b.s. like this (and Obama's supposedly forged birth certificate), the less energy they're spending on smearing Obama.

As the song goes..."It's Hard Out Here For A Pimp"....

Greg Ransom said it best:

JOHN EDWARDS -- THE BIG QUESTION of course is why so many women feel so compelled to vote for such men. Without millions of women voting for such frauds only GOP candidates would have been in the White House for the last three decades. Without hundreds of thousands of such votes John Edwards would never have become a national political figure. But polling results establish that women are disproportionately attracted to these fraudulent Democrat males, and by overwhelming numbers.

Lord help us if women put Barack Obama in the White House -- a man whose whole identity is a fraud.

Indeed. Next up on the Enquirer's website....

Fact or fiction?


Mike

Line of the Week

Best line of the week...

"Your problem is not global warming. Your problem is that you're nuts."

Somewhere along the line, global warming became the explanation for everything. Right-thinking people are not supposed to discuss any meteorological or geophysical event -- a hurricane, a wildfire, a heat wave, a drought, a flood, a blizzard, a tornado, a lightning strike, an unfamiliar breeze, a strange tingling on the neck -- without immediately invoking the climate crisis. It causes earthquakes, plagues and backyard gardening disappointments. Weird fungus on your tomato plants? Classic sign of global warming.

Read the entire thing...

Mike