OOPS!

Here's MSNBC hyperventilating about an ObamaCare protestor who appeared at a health care rally outside of President Obama’s speech to the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Phoenix, Arizona who "wore a semiautomatic assault rifle on his shoulder and a pistol on his hip."



There was only one little, teeny problem that the "news"-casters from MSNBC missed - the man carrying the weapons is black!

Here he is, in a news photo from the Arizona Republic newspaper.



Read the whole article at NewsBusters.

UNIQUE BONDS

Till Death Do Us Part

"Any man in combat who lacks comrades who will die for him, or for whom he is willing to die," William Manchester wrote of his time as a Marine in World War II, "is not a man at all. He is truly damned." A century earlier, Robert E. Lee famously remarked that it was good that war "is so terrible. We should grow too fond of it." Neither was glorifying war -- they hated its carnage. They were, rather, paying homage to the unique bonds forged in war, especially the one that enables so many to risk their lives, not only for friends but also for those they might have just met or have nothing in common with back home.

I was at a military retirement ceremony last week. Truer words have never been spoken.

CRAZY IS A PREEXISTING CONDITION

Birthers, Town Hall Hecklers and the Return of Right-Wing Rage. Rick Perlstein in the Washington Post August 16: "The lockstep strangeness of the mad lies on the protesters' signs -- too uniform to be spontaneous. They are both. If you don't understand that any moment of genuine political change always produces both, you can't understand America, where the crazy tree blooms in every moment of liberal ascendancy, and where elites exploit the crazy for their own narrow interests."

I'll let Professor Bainbridge respond to Perlstein's nuttiness, and simply add the following picture which was part of the Perlstein diatribe in the print edition, but not available online.



Note the "crazies" in the picture - the signs in the background are all pro-Obama. The "Obama as a Nazi" poster in front is being held by an Obama supporter, and the poster itself was found to be from "LaRouchePAC.com," the political action committee website for Communist and perpetual [Democratic] Presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche. No right-winger he. The poster can be found here.

Perlstein's right, of course. Crazy is a preexisting condition; he's just wrong about which side is crazy.

HOW TO TELL THAT OBAMA IS FAILING

The Washington Post is attacking the Bush administration.


(Cartoon appeared Sunday, August 16)

OBAMA'S APPROVAL STILL FALLING

President Obama's approval index in the Rasmussen daily tracking poll continues to fall.


This chart differs from earlier ones (here and here) in that I've extended the scale through December 2009, changed the trend lines from linear to a first-order polynomial fit, and projected the trends forward 90 days.

Based on the trend lines, Obama's base (strong approvals) appears to be leveling ever so slightly, but the "undecideds" (no strong feelings) appear to be moving much more strongly toward disapproval as compared to the earlier charts I posted, where the trend was for strong approvals to migrate to approvals, approvals to disapprovals, disapprovals to strong disapprovals.

Gallup is showing roughly the same trends as the Rasmussen tracking poll when strong approvals are combined with approvals, strong disapprovals with disapprovals (via Instapundit).

The Obama administration is in trouble.

WHAT’S SAUCE FOR THE SENATOR ...

In an editorial titled "More Quitters (R-Fla., R-Tex.)," the Washington Post complains about (Republican) elected officials who quit posts to which they were elected.

Donald J. Boudreaux asks a very good question: “So why no mention of Barack Obama? Not only did he quit the Senate seat to which he was elected, but during much of the time he held that seat, he was away from Washington campaigning for higher office.”

SIGN OF THE TIMES

Or something. In Maryland, traveling down a two-lane highway, we came across this sign: "Two-way traffic use headlights."

So ... if we're not returning on that highway, are we not supposed to use our headlights? Or perhaps only one?

FREEDOM ISN'T FREE

Seen on a bumper sticker today.

Rather a ubiquitous bumper sticker; even in the Washington DC metro area.

But it needs updating. Given what we know about the Obama administration plans (nationalize banks; nationalize the auto industry; nationalize health care) and cost (now estimated at $17,000,000,000,000 over 10 years), a better one would be

FREEDOM ISN'T FREE
But it's a darned sight cheaper than slavery.

A reminder:

CAP AND RAGE

From a Washington Post editorial extolling the virtues of passing the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation:

Or they can entertain a carbon-based tax designed to reduce emissions and give the money back to taxpayers in an equitable manner.

Did I really read that correctly? Why, yes. Yes I did.

THE POST MISSES AGAIN

Richard Cohen, editorial writer for the Washington Post, is on the attack again. As usual, his aim is off by a country mile.

However ...

With a universal replacement of "Barack Obama" for "Sarah Palin" he'd be a lot closer to the target.

BREWSTER ROCKIT ON OBAMACARE

From the pen of Tim Rickard.

FROM THE EMAIL

Obama's health care plan will be written by a committee whose head says he doesn't understand it, passed by a Congress that hasn't read it, signed by a president who smokes, funded by a treasury chief who did not pay his taxes, overseen by a surgeon general who is obese, and financed by a country that is nearly broke.

What possibly could go wrong?

PHOTO ID REQUIRED - BUT NOT TO VOTE

Congressman Eugene Green, Democrat from the 29th District, Houston, Texas, telling the world that if you're not from his District, you're not welcome at his future town hall meetings.


OK. Here's where it gets interesting - Congressman Green has voted (twice)against requiring photo ID to vote in elections.

So - you don't need to prove your eligibility to vote for me, but you do have to prove your ID to come to my townhall meetings. I assume it's more important to control his meetings than to control the voting process? (Or does he already control the voting process?)

From Newsbusters.

MY WAY OR THE HIGHWAY

This from the "reality-based" community.

"One cannot develop cultural competency if the conversation is encouraged, but not taken in by those who need to listen and absorb the information to break down barriers."

So if I listen carefully, understand, and still choose to disagree, it's my fault?

WHERE'S MY BAILOUT?

Everyone else is getting one ...




Why can't I have one, too?

Kudos to Scott Santis.

MAINSTREAM? MEDIA

From Instapundit: "CNN decides to further alienate a large segment of America."

CNN? What's a CNN?

RANDOM THOUGHT

From Thomas Sowell: "Perhaps the scariest aspect of our times is how many people think in talking points, rather than in terms of real world consequences."

FROM THE RADIO

Clinical trials? We don’t need no stinking clinical trials: “It's possible the government will begin a public [swine flu] vaccination campaign before all of the work of the trials is complete, Dr. Anne Schuchat has said. She oversees the flu vaccination programs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”

On one hand, the government doesn’t need to complete clinical trials to inject you with an unproven H1N1 (swine) flu vaccine. On the other hand, the government can prevent you from an alternative (i.e., unapproved) treatment even in the face of debilitating pain or certain death.

Makes all kinds of sense, doesn’t it?

MORE CASH FOR CLUNKERS

The first round spent a billion dollars in a week - at $4,000/car, that’s equivalent to 250,000 cars, or roughly a sales rate of 13 million cars/year.

Since US sales have averaged 16.8 million cars/year over the last decade, it follows that 77% of all car sales (roughly 324,000 sales/week) in the first round were clunkers.

Ask yourself: “How many of those so-called clunkers would have been traded in without “Cash for Clunkers?”

Correct answer: most of them.

So now as Round Two (billion) gets underway, take Brian Douglas’s advice: “Benefit from our government's largesse. It's your tax money, might as well try to recoup some of it .... Then you can buy that foreclosed house with an $8,000 new buyers credit [to] park your new government-subsidized car.”

MORE: Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. Via Don Surber.

ABORTION RIGHTS – A HYPOTHETICAL QUESTION

Now that Sarah Palin is back in the news with her Facebook statement on ObamaCare, a new round of Palin hatred from the Left seems to be inevitable. Much of this hatred seems to be directly coupled to her obvious love for her newborn son Trig, born with Down syndrome.

Some examples from the past-

At Talking Points Memo, an article sarcastically suggested that Palin resigned because “she wants to spread Down syndrome ... because Down syndrome is just too cute to be reserved for one in 800 births.”

A Paliban Daily article titled “Sarah Palin’s Retarded Platform: More Trigs!” interpreted Palin’s outspokenness on disability rights as a political ploy to win votes. Other articles contained subtle but unmistakable eugenic overtones. More here.

Nicholas Provenzo of the Libertarian Center for the Advancement of Capitalism discussed being “troubled” by Trig’s existence because “it is crucial to reaffirm the morality of aborting a fetus diagnosed with Down syndrome.” More here.

Here’s a question I have for the left.

If, as Provenzo claims, “it is crucial to reaffirm the morality of aborting a fetus diagnosed with Down syndrome,” and if homosexuality is genetically determined as some on the Left believe, and if that “gay gene” is easily detectable in utero by some procedure similar to amniocentesis for detection of Down syndrome, will the Left continue to support abortion on demand?