JASON “CRASH THE TEA PARTY” LEVIN still blaming “Teabaggers” for the Times Square bomb.



“Seriously, this guy is the poster boy for the argument that liberalism is a mental disorder.”

NOT TOO SMART. Dumb, really. Last Navy SEAL acquitted of abusing Iraqi terrorist. “They were betting on Navy SEALs wimping out.”

THE ‘MS’ IN MSNBC stands for Morally Superior. James Lileks explains.

Link from Instapundit.

SOMEONE LEFT THE IRONY ON (AGAIN). MSNBC’s Contessa Brewer is ... really unhappy that she couldn’t use the Times Square bombing attempt to prove Tea Party “bigotry.”

Big Journalism’s Michael Walsh responds:

It used to be that reporters asked skeptical questions, kept an open mind, tried to fit the facts into a historical context and then did their best to present the information in an intelligible, even-handed way. That was called ‘reporting.’

But when you leap to conclusions, emote, identify,worry, fret, and empathize all based on a complete fantasy about a world that only exists inside your head … that’s called ‘journalism’.

More reporting, please.

ABOUT TIME: Sara Palin on the Gulf oil spill:

All responsible energy development must be accompanied by strict oversight, but even with the strictest oversight in the world, accidents still happen. No human endeavor is ever without risk – whether it’s sending a man to the moon or extracting the necessary resources to fuel our civilization. I repeat the slogan “drill here, drill now” not out of naiveté or disregard for the tragic consequences of oil spills – my family and my state and I know firsthand those consequences. How could I still believe in drilling America’s domestic supply of energy after having seen the devastation of the Exxon-Valdez spill? I continue to believe in it because increased domestic oil production will make us a more secure, prosperous, and peaceful nation.

Via Don Surber, where you can find her complete Facebook statement.

SMART GRID NONSENSE. No sooner than I post on the 'smart grid', Pajamas Media comes out with this beauty (Myths Associated with the ‘Smart’ Electrical Grid). Read and enjoy.

MARK STEYN takes on the Arizona Gestapo.

A STORY OF TWO PROTESTS. Both took place on the Boston Common on beautiful days, [and] both were part of larger nationwide events.

I had exactly the same experience in Washington, D.C. on March 20. Here’s the first protest; and here’s the second.

KUDOS TO A WASHINGTON POST EDITOR for (belatedly) recognizing that the original title (“A Fiery Plea for Civility”) of their coverage of President Obama’s commencement address at the University of Michigan was an obvious oxymoron.

The online version has been retitled “Obama defends priorities, makes plea for civility.”

KENT STATE REVISITED. ”Previously undisclosed FBI documents suggest that the Kent State antiwar protests were more meticulously planned than originally thought and that one or more gunshots may have been fired at embattled Ohio National Guardsmen ...”

ARIZONA’S IMMIGRATION LAW: what’s the problem?

The problem, we are told, is that the people of Arizona, acting through their state legislators, have had the cheek to ask their state’s police officers to enforce federal laws that the federal government has chosen not to, a choice borne heavily by the state’s taxpayers. And rather than being thanked for their willingness to pick up the slack, Arizonans instead see scorn heaped upon them by their sophisticated betters along both coasts, including the president, the speaker of the House, and even the archbishop of Los Angeles.

You just know the B-rolls are already being shot, the stories are already being written with the details to be filled in later. Someone will be found, some doe-eyed victim will peer out from behind the bars of a jail cell and become the face of the resistance when he is detained on his way either to school, church, or the hospital bedside of his ailing mother who, having been denied a last visit with her cherished son, passes away a broken woman.

I see a 3,000-word tear-jerker starting above the fold on page A-1.

In the Washington Post, New York Times, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times, ....

THE DEMOCRATS’ WORST FEAR is about to come true:

Among the many reverberations of President Obama’s election, here is one he probably never anticipated: at least 32 African-Americans are running for Congress this year as Republicans, the biggest surge since Reconstruction, according to party officials.

One candidate, Corrogan R. Vaughn attended the Tax Day tea party in Washington, D.C, and was greeted enthusiastically.

Democrats should also worry about Warriors for Congress, a non-partisan group seeking and supporting former military personnel interested in running for Congress. The military services have been fully integrated for years, and in my experience, their Warrior Ethos isn’t particularly consistent with the Democrats’ 'Class Warrior' philosophy.

THREE VIEWS ON IMMIGRATION.

George Will: ”Once Americans are satisfied that the borders are secure, the immigration policies they will favor will reflect their -- and the law enforcement profession's -- healthy aversion to the measures that would be necessary to remove from the nation the nearly 11 million illegal immigrants, 60 percent of whom have been here for more than five years.”

Peggy Noonan: ”I have argued in this space that nothing can or should be done, no new federal law passed, until the border itself is secure. That is the predicate, the common sense first step. Once existing laws are enforced and the border made peaceful, everyone in the country will be able to breathe easier and consider, without an air of clamor and crisis, what should be done next. What might that be? How about relax, see where we are, and absorb. Pass a small, clear law—say, one granting citizenship to all who serve two years in the armed forces—and then go have a Coke.”

Eugene Robinsion: ”The notion that the first thing to do is ‘secure the border’ between the United States and Mexico -- and only then worry about comprehensive immigration reform -- falls somewhere between hopeful fantasy and cynical cop-out. It's a good sound bite but would be a ridiculous policy. Fact-based analysis is increasingly out of fashion, however, and so the border-first hallucination has become popular among politicians and pundits reacting to Arizona's new ‘breathing while Latino’ law.”

Will and Noonan are thoughtful analysts of the immigration conundrum; ‘fact-based’ analyst Robinson is just a hack hewing to the usual racist trope.

RICHARD COHEN proves his elitist bona fides in attacking Newt Gingrich.

He has a doctorate in the social sciences and taught briefly at the college level. He has been married three times, divorced twice and confessed to an extramarital affair. He has never worked for a profit-making organization, never served in the military and lives in one of Washington's poshest suburbs. He is the very personification of his much-reviled "cultural elite."

And what does this have to do with his political opinions?

The most obvious repellent characteristic of the cultural elite is that it is out of step with the views of most Americans -- or, as Gingrich put it, "Americans oppose the views of academic elites."

Of course, Cohen is just ‘ordinary folk’.

This business about socialism has become a conservative trope -- as loony on the right as is some of the left's admiration for Venezuela's Hugo Chávez. The current issue of Commentary, a magazine that virtually created the neoconservative movement, devotes about 4,500 words to the subject. It asks: "What Kind of Socialist Is Barack Obama?" To which any sane person would have to reply: "Not a Very Good One."

But not for lack of trying.

Gingrich [is a] luftmensch. This is a wonderfully descriptive Yiddish word for a fellow who has no visible means of support -- who lives off the air itself.

And of course it doesn’t apply to a columnist whose only means of support is hot air.

Read the whole thing and pay attention to the subtext: “I am Richard Cohen. I am unbiased, squarely in the center of the political spectrum. I am fact-based and secular, free of odious superstition. My opinions are solid, based on extensive research and verified fact. Everyone I know is like me. Etc., etc. Therefore anyone who disagrees with me is a raving lunatic.”

Q.E.D