Right Wing Nut House

It’s Friday at the House which can mean only one thing: The weekly visit of Marvin Moonbat!

LIBERTARIANS AND PROGRESSIVES UNITE! (By Marvin Moonbat)

I’ve got a pretty good friend here at EIU named George Weaselhead. George considers himself a libertarian and I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how much we agree on many of the more important political issues of the day. So much so, that I recently made a suggestion that we sit down and compare our positions just to see how much we have in common. Believe you me, I was pretty shocked. I always thought that libertarians were just wingnuts without the courage of their convictions. Now I see that they’re actually liberals without the courage of their convictions.

This makes a big difference.

First of all, for me personally, there’s the issue of the legalization of certain drugs. I was amazed that libertarians agree I should be able to ingest, smoke, shoot, snort, or pop any old controlled substance to my heart’s content. At first, it kinda worried me that even some wingnuts were in favor of this. That is, until I realized the winguts were only worried about our overburdened court system. True progressives are for getting high because it’s the right thing to do and the consequences be damned. I mean, I’m not for allowing kids or anything to drop acid or smoke crack. But if someone, say over 15 years of age, wants to get high and have a little fun, why should the government want to put us in jail?

Then there’s the fact that both us progressives and libertarians can’t stand the religious nutcases in this country. For myself, I just don’t understand these Christians. All of this kneeling and praying…and in public no less! I mean, if you’re going to do all that kowtowing to an imaginary Supreme Being, at least have the common courtesy to do it behind closed doors. Preferably in basements and cellars where there’s no possibility their superstitious nonsense can be seen by anybody. Imagine my surprise in finding out that libertarians mostly agree with that. We’re both very concerned about a religious takeover of government in this country. I mean look what happened to that country that’s right next to Iraq…sounds just like Iraq except it’s not. Um…oh yeah, it’s Iran! They got those relginuts over there too. And libertarians are on the progressive’s side when it comes to keeping the Christians down and bottled up.

And what about saving the First Amendment. A lot of those Jesus freaks go ape whenever someone’s naked tush is shown on TV or when someone says “shit” or something. Libertarians believe that you should be able to say or do anything over the air on TV or radio. Personally (and don’t tell Chloe) but I’d like to see a lot more of Terri Hatcher. She’s the bomb, if you know what I mean.

There are all sorts of issues libertarians and liberals agree on. We agree that a woman should be able to get an abortion anywhere and for any reason. We agree that the ACLU has got to protect us from religinuts wanting to pollute our culture with the symbols of their god, like at Christmas. In short, it’s truly amazing how much liberals and libertarians agree on.

I suggested to George that he come to a demonstration against this repugnut columnist who’s going to speak on campus this week. It’s going to be great! We plan on throwing a pie right in the a-hole’s face. Isn’t that a scream? George, however was pretty wishy-washy about the idea. Come to think of it, George is pretty wishy-washy about a lot of things. He says he’s “an objectivist” whatever the hell that is. He says he has to think really, really hard about an issue before he decides whether he’s for it or against it. And he says that even after thinking really, really hard about something, he sometimes just can’t make up his mind. He says it’s too hard. He thinks there are too many points of view to consider.

He’s actually kind of a whiner…reminds me of my little sister sometimes.

So after thinking about it a little bit, I decided that George just isn’t cut out for the progressive lifestyle. He just won’t commit to anything.

Come to think of it, Chloe says the same thing about me all the time. I wonder what she means by that?

The most satisfying thing about writing is enjoying the appreciation of of your readers. I know, I know…I watch Charlie Rose too. And all those New York writers who toiled in obscurity for years when asked “what’s the most satisfying thing about writing?” will always say something stupid and insipid like “the recognition of my peers” or “satisfying my artistic cravings…”

Bull.

We writers are a vainglorious lot, needing the approbation and approval of our readers on a daily, even hourly basis. So it’s with a great deal of pride that I relate the news that my little blog got not one but two mentions on national cable TV today. Both CNN’s blog roundup on “Inside Politics” as well as the blog report on MSNBC’s “Connected” programs mentioned my post on the Schiavo memo. Couple that with my link from the Canadian news blog “Politics Watch” and it’s been almost as good a day as I had last week when Instapundit, Hugh Hewitt, Powerline, and Michelle Malkin all linked to me in the same day.

The CNN piece can be found at Jackson’s Junction. LaShawn Barber’s update on MSNBC can be found at The Political Teen.

Politics Watch bills itself as “Canada’s Political Portal. It looks like a very nice news site with dozens of useful links to stories in major Canadian publications as well as some really nice photos and a slick, professional layout.

That’s why I’m kind of at a loss to explain how, amidst all of these links to major publications and all, there’s a link to to little old me! Rightwing Nuthouse!

If you follow the link above and go down the left side of the page, 2nd column, you’ll see a box headed “Politics Watch: Morning Briefing” And there it is…7 links down is my post describing the Adscam scandal entitled: “Adscam: Truly Elegant Sleaze.”

There are no other blog posts in this box, only links to newspapers and magazines.

Now believe me, I’m flattered to have such a professional looking publication link to me. Being a tiny website with no more than 400-500 hits a day, I’ll take any exposure I can get. But doesn’t this, um, violate the Publication Ban imposed on Adscam testimony? If not, then I’m very happy to have the exposure for my writing that such a professional looking website can offer (if they need an American correspondent, I work for peanuts).

On the other hand, if the information in my post violates the ban, won’t these people get in trouble? I realize there are dozens of brave Canadians who are ignoring the ban and blogging like crazy about the scandal, but these guys might be a little too conspicuous to avoid detection. Should I email them and point out what they’re doing? Should I save them from being held in contempt? Should I do the right thing?

Nah…I need the traffic.

UPDATE:

The publication in Politics Watch of a link to my post that gives details of the Adscam mess may not violate the Publication Ban after all…at least if Judge Gomery decides to lift it:

In another update, CTV confirms that Justice Gomery will decide this morning whether to continue the publication ban now that Jean Brault’s testimony has been completed, and of course reported through this site and others. As I mentioned before, an end to the ban would be the best possible result, as Canadians would get first-hand reporting on the courtroom testimony and all the information they want on the scandal.

However, if Justice Gomery does not lift the ban, my source has prepared an update which will be sent later today to me. I assume that will cover the testimony from Monday and Tuesday, and possibly the cross-examination yesterday. If it comes through — which is completely at the discretion of my source — I will post it as soon as I’m able.

I hope that won’t be necessary, Capn’. If it is though, we’ll know where to go to get information that peoples in a free country like Canada have a right to.

Brian H. Darling is a legal counsel for freshly minted Florida Senator Mel Martinez. He’s also a certifiable idiot:

The legal counsel to Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) admitted yesterday that he was the author of a memo citing the political advantage to Republicans of intervening in the case of Terri Schiavo, the senator said in an interview last night.

Martinez, the GOP’s Senate point man on the issue, said he earlier had been assured by aides that his office had nothing to do with producing the memo. “I never did an investigation, as such,” he said. “I just took it for granted that we wouldn’t be that stupid. It was never my intention to in any way politicize this issue.

Harkin said in an interview that Martinez handed him the memo on the Senate floor, in hopes of gaining his support for the bill giving federal courts jurisdiction in the Florida case in an effort to restore the brain-damaged Florida woman’s feeding tube. “He said these were talking points — something that we’re working on here,” Harkin said.

(Courtesy: Yahoo News)

Darling is a former lobbyist for The Alexander Group. One interesting point that’s mentioned in the linked AP story is that The Alexander Strategy Group is a conservative lobbying company. What the AP fails to mention is that they’re in business with The Harbor Group, a liberal lobbying organization.

Why do you suppose they’d leave that out?

At any rate, Darling is a fool. And it may not be entirely his fault. Martinez may not be giving us the whole story here.

Darling may have fallen on his sword to protect his boss. Senator Harkin’s quote - that Martinez handed him the memo and said they were “talking points” sounds plausible. It’s very possible that Senator Martinez asked Darling to come up with such a document and that he never read it. It’s equally possible Darling had no clue that the memo was for bi-partisan consumption.

Both men should know better. The first thing you learn on Capitol Hill as a senior staffer is to assume that every word you write may eventually see the light of day. That’s why most political strategy memo’s are done outside the legislative office of the lawmaker. It was always plausible to me that the memo could have originated with a GOP staffer because it was clearly written to delineate political advantages for the Senator. Some of it was grandiose, amateurish posturing - especially the bit about giving the party an advantage with the Christian right. A pro wouldn’t point out something so patently obvious. Such documents are never done on “letterhead” and are usually composed by the senior staffer himself, thus accounting for errors in spelling and such.

It very well could be that Martinez handed the memo to Harkin after not having read the darn thing. This will teach him. Admittedly, it takes a while for a freshman lawmaker to figure out what he should be reading and what he can safely trust his staff on. But one glance at that memo and it seems clear that Martinez is either a Democratic party plant or he never read the contents of the memo.

There are still questions as the Powerline guys point out; the way the story was reported originally be ABC and WAPO made it seem as if this was some widely circulated action plan from senior Republican Senators. This is obviously not the case. And then there’s the little matter of the second draft of the memo where the spelling and factual errors are cleaned up. It’s entirely possible that a Democratic staffer made the memo all nice and neat so that they could give it to the press and skewer the Republicans with it.

All this being said, the unspoken (so far) issue is that Powerline, Michelle Malkin, Anklebiting Pundits, and a host of larger blogs may have let their enthusiasm to nail another scalp to the wall get in the way of their better judgment.

Powerline, which led the charge in investigating the memo’s origins and the way it was reported by the MSM, was, I thought, pretty circumspect in it’s claims that the memo was a Democratic dirty trick. Others weren’t so subtle. There’s a lesson here for all of us.

There are some things the blogosphere does very well. And then there’s journalism. Being so large, the sphere is eventually going to sort itself out and those who wish to practice journalism will have a chance to do so, probably as an adjunct to a mainstream media outlet. Those who wish to offer opinions and rant about events like myself will also have a place although I suspect most people will tire of this one dimensional aspect of the sphere and, unless one is a really excellent writer, those sites will fall by the wayside.

The point is, I guess, is that in this case we offered analysis and opinion that, for the most part turned out to be wrong. And the MSM is going to jump all over this faux pas and cite it as “proof” that people in pajamas should stay out of the news collecting business and go back to reporting what they had for dinner, how hard it is to toilet train their kid, and whether or not Aunt Martha’s gallstones will keep her from visiting during the holidays.

The looks of smug satisfaction on the faces of our critics over the next few days will be hard to take. Just remember it’s something we brought upon ourselves. And don’t worry, our critics will get over it. If they’re dumb enough to believe that this one slip will send bloggers scurrying for cover, let them indulge their myopia. Their laziness and hubris will continue to supply the blogosphere with plenty of ammunition. And as their declining readership could tell them, they still just don’t get it.

UPDATE: FALLOUT AND BACKTRACKING

Michelle Malkin, whose journalistic hide was exposed a little more than some others, is all over the story this morning, sparing no one (including herself) and asking all the right questions. A sample from Post #1:

After John Hinderaker at Power Line first started asking necessary questions about the reporting on the memo, many on the Right jumped to conclusions that the memo was “fake” or a “dirty trick.” I concur that those who made such claims should issue clear retractions and corrections. And I urge those bloggers and pundits to do so.

But contrary to what the left-wing gloaters who have not bothered to follow the story until last night are writing, I have never made such claims, a point I stressed yesterday afternoon in an e-mail exchange with Post reporter Mike Allen.

Malkin’s real exposure occurred when she reported that Josh Claybourn of “The Agora” had tipped her about seeing the memo passed by a staffer for Senator Reid. Michelle dug hard to try and corroborate that story and was never able to pin it down, eventually deciding that Claybourn was being misled. She covers this in Post #2:

To date, Claybourn has not responded to my suggestion that he divulge the phone numbers of his sources. Will he continue to play nicey-nice with his sources now that they have been shown to be manipulative, lying smear merchants?

The story’s not over. Sen. Martinez and his former legal counsel may still have plenty of ’splainin’ to do.

I doubt whether we’ll hear more from the Senator as he’ll try and hunker down and weather the storm. And it’s doubful we’ll hear anything from Darling who’s probably on his way back to The Alexander Group as I write this.

I’ll try and keep an eye on both Michelle’s site and Powerline today to see if they get any cooperation from WAPO reporter Mike Allen who orginially broke the story.

UPDATE: FALLOUT AND BACKTRACKING II

Here’s a quick round up of sites blogging this morning about the memo:

Myopic Zeal has an excellent round-up himself and has been tracking the story since it broke last night.

Outside the Beltway has been asking the right questions from the beginning:

While some on the Right have made claims that the memo was a Democratic forgery, that’s not what the story was about. Rather, the argument was that the source of the memo was unknown but was played in such a way by ABC News and others as to give the impression that it came from the Republican leadership and was widely circulated. Neither of those seems to be true.

Lawshawn Barber like other larger blogs, are really hearing it from liberal trolls:

My liberal readers are such sweet folks, in their own way. A couple of them made haste and posted a link and story blurb in comments last night, bless their hearts. One fan prefaced the blurb with this comment: “[I]n case you really cared…” He assumes I don’t care because a conservative wrote the memo. The implication is that I don’t criticize conservatives.

Kobayashi Maru is also troubled by trolls and wonders what the big deal was about the memo in the first place. Answer? One more club for the Democrats to use on conservatives.

Captain Ed wonders how Darling ever got a job on Capitol Hill in the first place. Darling’s old boss is Ed Buckham, former Chief of Staff to Representative Tom Delay. Nuff said?

Perhaps most courageously, Pat Hynes at Anklebiting Pundits admits error:

We’ve been tough on the Democrats for floating fake memos in the past. So when the Schiavo-Quiddick scandal hit, we were tough on ‘em again. But we were wrong.

Finally, what would a round-up be if we didn’t get the gloating from the other side? Here’s Kos with the gloat…and a threat:

The wingnutosphere spent the last few weeks screaming bloody murder about the memo (which frankly I had forgotten about), claiming it was some sinister Democratic plot. They wanted to make a big deal about it, so let’s make sure we oblige.

I’ve got to hand it to our neighbors to the north. They may not be known as one of the cultural centers of the universe, (Gordon Lightfoot, Anne Murray, hockey, and Canadian Bacon excluded) but they sure know how to make art out of scandal.

We Americans could learn a thing or two from our northern brethren, and not only when it comes to the manly arts of hunting and fishing. Our political scandals here are either sordid little sexcapades that are fun but involve little in the way of intellectual challenge or simple, boring, one dimensional illustrations of human greed where the specimens on display are revealed for the grubby little lowlifes they truly are.

And while it’s doubtful many American politicians involved in scandal would make it much past Dante’s 8th level of hell, Canada’s Liberal Party may have devised such an elegant defamation of democracy as to make it all the way to Senor Alighieri’s “Outer Depths” reserved for traitors to party and country.

Adscam is, to put it simply, the most beautifully constructed, elegantly conceived, political scandal I’ve ever seen.

It should make all of us political junkies in this country weep for joy at the simplicity of its workings. The government, controlled by the Liberal Party, funds a well-meaning program, a goal of which is to keep restless Quebecers from jumping the Canadian ship. A substantial part of the monies appropriated end up going to ad agencies friendly to the Liberal Party. So far so good. “To the winner belongs the spoils” is as good a slogan north of the border as it is here. But here’s where the truly elegant betrayal comes in.

The ad agencies, in exchange for the contracts, hired friends, neighbors, relatives, and activists associated with the Liberal Party. And to sweeten the scandal, the agencies then kicked back money into Liberal Party coffers in the form of campaign contributions!

Is Canada a great country or what?

In effect, the liberals were having the government of Canada fund their party’s elections. Now that’s what I call “public financing.”

But why stop there? Since one of the major purposes of the Sponsorship Program is to keep the French speaking Quebecers from bolting, why not get the separatists involved? Captain Ed explains:

In other words, a good part of the $250 million that Canadians spent out of their tax money to hold onto Quebec went not only to the Liberal Party for their re-election efforts and personal gain — it also went to the separatists that the government wanted to rebut.

Turns out the French-speaking purists weren’t above taking a little of the largess so generously doled out by the Liberal Party.

Maybe they promised to spend it on improving the manners of French speaking waiters in Montreal’s restaurants.

I have to admit I doubt very much whether any of our politicians would be able to be this subtle in their malfeasance. The only thing to rival it wasn’t so much a scandal as it was a political argument; the Iran Contra affair. Ollie North came up with something equally as elegant but ran afoul of the stupidity and greed of some of his associates; they couldn’t keep their damn mouths shut. And yes, Ollie lied to Congress. The fact that any Congressman from either party was able to look a TV camera in the eye and say that with a straight face, given that politicians have learned to lie for a living, explains why people giggled when that charge was leveled against Mr. North.

So, I say “hats off” to our friends to the north. Your politicians may have turned into a bunch of America-hating, quasi-socialist, islamofascist sympathizing euro trash wannabes. But when it comes to ripping off the people, you’ve got us beat hands down…or should I say hands up?

Cross Posted at Blogger News Network

You’d think by reading the title of Byron York’s new book “The Vast Left Wing Conspiracy” that the author, NRO’s White House correspondent, would be delving into some kind of evil, secret society with vast numbers of minions scurrying around the country to undermine democracy and overthrow George Bush.

Not hardly. Reading this review by Opinion Journal’s Jacob Laskin we find what most of us have suspected all along; the left is just plain dumb:

It was several months before Election Day. George W. Bush and John Kerry had pulled to a statistical dead heat, and the pundits were poring over the polls in an effort to divine the reasons for the latest shift in public opinion. But MoveOn.org had more pressing concerns. It was moved to ask its network of true believers: “Why aren’t we talking about a landslide in November?”

Such groundless conviction “was not at all unusual in the world of MoveOn,” writes Byron York in “The Vast Left Wing Conspiracy.” The triumphalism flowed, he notes, from a deceptively simple rationale. Feeling a passionate contempt for the president and his policies, the MoveOn rank-and-file labored under the illusion that they represented the majority of the American people.

This insularity and plain old hubris is, of course, not confined to the denizens of the left. Conservatives of a certain stripe have been known to sip the kool aid from time to time. But the left has a history and tradition of rationalism that should keep this kind of battiness from taking over its institutions. Philosophers like John Stuart Mill and T. H. Green preached an open-mindedness and reflective intellectual discipline that seems to have been lost on their modern day inheritors.

What passes for rationality on the left today has more to do with updating the latest conspiracy theory on 9/11 or flagging some kind of dead horse like Jeff Gannon rather than attempting to learn from their mistakes and trying to do better next time.

Laskin, in reviewing Mr. York’s book, shows how the Emperor not only doesn’t have any clothes on, but also doesn’t have a clue about where to buy any:

Beneath the patina of confidence, however, the left-wing conspiracy often seems pitiable, as desperate as it is determined. Above all, its members are angry–at the perceived injustice of the 2000 presidential election, at the prospect of long-term Republican governance, at John Kerry’s inept campaigning. Even, it appears, at being called angry.

It is the anger that does them in. Resting his case on much original reporting, Mr. York convincingly shows that the activist left mistook its base–2.5 million strong and anti-Bush to the (mostly white) man–for the mainstream electorate, as if fury and contempt were the only logical responses to the Bush presidency. Reciting the mantra that it was “too big to fail,” the left wing bought into the conspiracy of its own vastness. An inability to connect with swing voters followed, and electoral defeat.

What Mr. Laskin points out is that “The Vast Left Wing Conspiracy” isn’t very vast and by nature, not very conspiratorial. It is, however, filthy rich. And the Soros Circle (which includes some of the wealthiest human beings on the planet), five members of whom gave more than $78 million dollars to various “527″ groups all to defeat George Bush, do in fact have a shadowy agenda not readily discernible. It can’t be that they see a threat to their immense wealth. Surely, it must be something else, something beyond altruism that drives these donors to spend the time and money to destroy the President.

Soros is the key. Mr. York lists the contributions by Soros to the various 527’s”:

Malcolm told me that she and Rosenthal walked away with commitments for a total of $23 million from Soros, Lewis, and a few others at the meeting. Within weeks, Soros began writing checks to ACT. First came $1 million on August 19. Then $2 million on September 12. Then another $2 million on December 23. And then $4.55 million to the Joint Victory Fund, an umbrella organization that then distributed the money to ACT, on April 15, 2004. In the beginning, Soros had pledged $10 million to ACT and other Democratic 527s. Then the number became $15 million. Then $20 million. Then $25 million. And then more. The 527s had never seen that amount of money come in from one person at one time. Soros would become the biggest donor in history.

What then does Mr. Soros want? Control of a political party through Moveon.org would be gratifying but an empty gesture given that much of the Democratic party in the person of labor unions is anti-globalist. Here are some thoughts from “Sartre,” a commenter at Frontpage Magazine:

While it is reported widely that Soros funded groups that support increased government spending, tax increases, oppose the death penalty and President Bush’s judicial nominees; there is a far more sinister scheme. In report by Neil Hrab - George Soros’ Social Agenda for America - drug legalization, euthanasia, immigration entitlements and feminism are examined. Mr. Hrab points out that in the book Open Society: “Reforming Global Capitalism”, Soros wrote that he is: “rather leery of self-appointment, self righteous” international NGOs. From his own site Soros proudly claims that his foundations are dedicated to building and maintaining the infrastructure and institutions of an open society. They work closely with OSI to develop and implement a range of programs focusing on civil society, education, media, public health, and human rights as well as social, legal, and economic reform. In recent years, OSI and the Soros foundations network have spent more than $400 million annually to support projects in these and other focus areas.

It sounds as if Soros is like one of those later James Bond villains; fabulously wealthy men whose ambitions are fueled by a combination of insecurity and a Napoleonic complex. The mystery to me is why this secretive man has chosen the Democratic party to be the vessel for his ideas on “open societies” and globalization.

It could be that the proprietors of the party are just plain dumb. And Soros, like a lion lying down with lambs, has decided he can take advantage.

Mark Noonan from Blogs for Bush takes the questioning one step further:

The only question which remains with me today about it all is: where did we get such people? Where in the overwhelmingly rich, powerful and peaceful United States did we create a political species which looks upon us all as crass, evil and stupid? It is one thing to say that you like Social Security as is or that you think that war is just not the answer…it is quite another to actually say that you believe Social Security reform and the war are both mere devices of President Bush to enrich his corporate buddies. This isn’t just a different take on events, its a sick fantasy at odds with easily ascertainable fact. After dealing with the left all through 2004 (and we got comments from them of a much stronger and stranger variety than we actually allowed on the blogs; think of the worst leftwing comment you saw last year, magnify it a dozen times and you’ll start to approximate the worst of the deleted comments) it still makes my jaw drop a little when I think of what they say and do

.

Mark, you’re not the only one.

Watching the Canadien press twist themselves into gordian knots trying to avoid violating the publication ban surrounding testimony in the Adscam scandal currently roiling the political landscape in that country would be comical if not for the deadly serious issue the ban raises for bloggers worldwide.

Captain Ed seems to be as puzzled as the rest of us about the idiocy of it all:

In order for a citizenry to remain at liberty, they have to know what their government is doing, and the press needs to report it without fear of government reprisal. The notion that Brault’s rights had to be protected over the rights of all Canadian citizens is not only ludicrous but a false choice at its heart.

Despite the efforts of both regulators and their allies in various reform movements to downplay the issue, it’s becoming increasingly clear that bloggers in America and other “free” countries have a great big bullseye painted on their back; and governments are starting to take aim.

In San Francisco, two laws were just passed to regulate campaigns; one of them put truly draconian restrictions on bloggers including requiring registration if the site experienced more than 500 hits a day and/or contributed in-kind contributions of more than $1000 to any candidate. I posted on the subject here, but was almost immediately put off by a commenter at the linked site who pooh-poohed the idea:

Could someone provide a source for that City Attorney comment? Because there’s nothing remotely like that in the bill.

Nor is there anything about “electronic communications” in that bill — just a lot about “electioneering communications”.

And news stories, commentaries, and editorials from any “recognized news medium” are exempt.

So, like, someone needs to do some fact-checking here, or at least source the allegations, because the bill doesn’t on its face do anything that’s been alleged.

Unfortunately, as with most legislation, the law of unintended consequences takes effect as soon as human beings get into the act. Whatever a piece of paper says pales in comparison with the capacity of the human imagination to come up with novel ways to interpret its meaning. Thus, we learn from Chris Nolan that while blogging did indeed receive an exemption (perhaps “reprieve” would be a better word) the fact that the idea of regulating blogs in this manner was even on the table is indicitive of much worse things to come.

The publication ban in the Adscam mess is causing our Canadien blogging friends numerous headaches while also revealing a spunky rebelliousness that should gladden the heart of American pajamahadeen everywhere. Despite threats from Canada’s Attorney General, some of our northern bretheren are not only ignoring the ban by linking to Captains Quarters for updates on the story, some are going so far as to post on the scandal themselves complete with scathing opinions of the shenannigans in general and the Liberal Party specifically.

In the wake of the FEC’s attempt to regulate blogs in the United States, we yanks should be well disposed to learn from our neighbors to the north the meaning of defiance. It may come in handy if the FEC goes off the reservation and begins to come after bloggers here.

Jimmy Carter is a sanctimonious, self-serving, self promoting, anti-American zealot whose trips abroad in the last 4 years have been marked by his harsh, unreasoning criticism of President Bush’s foreign policy. His speech at the Democratic convention was dripping with hatred and venom toward the President. And to top it all of, he entertained in his personal box at that conclave a man who accused George Bush and his family of caring more about the Saudi royal family and oil than about America.

How sweet is it that the President has humiliated this mountebank in public by refusing to include him in the official delegation to the Pope’s funeral:

President Bush selected his father and Bill Clinton over Jimmy Carter for the official delegation attending the funeral of Pope John Paul II, the Carter Center claimed Late Tuesday.

“President Carter expressed to the White House a desire to attend the Pope’s funeral,” an official said.

Carter “was informed that the official delegation would be limited to just five people, and there were also others who were eager to attend.”

“The Carters always relish the memories of Pope John Paul II being a delightful personal guest at the White House in 1979, on a pope’s only visit to our nation’s capital city. Subsequently, they visited with His Holiness in the Vatican.”

Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.

Wouldn’t you have loved to have been privy to that phone conversation when peanut brain was told that his presence would not be required?

PEANUT: Heloo George. I’m just about packed for the trip to Rome all I need to know is when do we leave?

BUSH: Hold the phone here, just hold the phone. What are you talking about?

PEANUT: The funeral George, the funeral. What’s the weather like in Rome during April? Should I bring an umbrella?

BUSH: What…do I look like Willard Scott? How the hell should I know. Besides, you’re not going.

PEANUT: Whaddya mean I’m not going? George, this is no time for jokes, the pope is dead.

BUSH: I’m not joking, moonbat. The Pope would roll over on the bier if he saw you there. After all, he was one of those people who “had an inordinate fear of communism” as you so elegantly put it.

PEANUT: How was I supposed to know that the Soviets were a menace? After all, how could they not like me? I charmed the hell out ‘em. I was so charming I was sure that the force of my personality and the depth of my holiness would overwhelm them. Anyway, what does that have to do with me not going to this funeral? Jesus Christ George! Everyone’s going to be there!

BUSH: Yeah, you’re not. Only loyal Americans need apply. That let’s you and your good buddy Michael Moore out.

PEANUT: C’mon, I hardly know the guy. It was the only way they’d let me speak at the convention, having him in my box. You’re not going to hold that against me are you?

BUSH: Take care, Jimmy. Don’t call us, we’ll call you. Maybe when your good buddy Chavez kicks the bucket or your hero Castro passes on, we’ll send you over to represent us…with a one way ticket. (Click)

PEANUT: George? You still there George? You can’t do this to me! I’m the President…er, was the President. I’m important! Millions of people around the world love me! George?

UPDATE

The Captain has similar thoughts:

After a long and well-established track record as a pain in the ass, Carter can hardly expect us to sympathize with him for being left off of a state visit to anywhere, let alone the funeral of a Pope who, as the Prowler also notes, didn’t think too highly of the former President himself.

Perhaps Carter can sit around the house this week and contemplate how much better off he and the rest of us would be if he had just focused on building houses for the poor after he got rejected for a second term in the White House.

As the Klingon’s say: “Revenge is a dish best served cold…” Or was it Shakepseare?

See also Blogs for Bush that links to an al Reuters report on the Carter snub:

“He was quite willing to withdraw his request when he was subsequently informed that the official delegation would be limited to just five people, and there were also others who were eager to attend,” Moor said Tuesday.

Yeah…I’ll just bet that Jimmah was quite eager to “withdraw his request” after he realized that, like the rest of us, the Bush White House has long memories…

You know we’re in trouble when Jack says “Oh my God” twice in one episode.

Not only Jack, but Chloe and Michelle also took the name of the Lord in vain. Let’s face it; they had good reason to.

SUMMARY

Jack arrives at the warehouse where he was being held that’s serving as Marwan’s headquarters. This time, he’s got two CTU tactical units with him, armed to the teeth and loaded for bear. But, of course, before he can save the country, Jack’s got to find out where he stands with Audrey:

Jack: Audrey, I know we have to talk about the way I handled Paul.

Audrey: Yeah…we do.

Indeed. And as I predicted last week, Paul is indeed paralyzed from the waist down. And it appears that Audrey has already made her decision, given her coldness toward Jack and the way she was when she was with Paul.

Actually, Paul is a lot like Jack…without the murderous, thuggish tendencies. He’s strong willed, determined, brave, and selfless. In short, Paul is Jack-lite. No wonder Audrey is going to stay with him.

Storming the warehouse, guns blazing, terrorists dropping like flies, Jack misses Marwan who slips out the back way and evades CTU’s perimeter. Before he goes, he blows up his computers to keep CTU from finding anything useful. What he can’t destroy is the counterfeiting materials he used to give Anderson the ID’s he needed to penetrate our Air Force’s security. When CTU discovers that Anderson is on the FBI watch list, Jack heads over to Anderson’s apartment to investigate.

Meanwhile back at CTU, a soap opera threatens to take over the show as Tony discovers that Michelle is playing “hide the Polska” with Bill Buchanan from Division. And with the nation on the verge of being plunged into a crisis of unimaginable proportions, Tony confronts her and asks her if she slept with him “while they were married.”

Question: Can’t this wait until after we save the world? Michelle thinks so and tells Tony to buzz off.

And that CD containing the flagged police report about the dead pilot’s family? It still lies undiscovered on fat geek Edgar’s desk, waiting to nail either Chloe or the geek with the blame for not finding out about Anderson before he took off. I still think Chloe should get the blame, but since she covered for the geek when he made a mistake in formatting an important update, fat geek Edgar will probably insist on taking responsibility. Chloe is such a bitch about being nice.

At Anderson’s apartment, the female merc who set up the real pilot to be murdered by Anderson, is desperately searching for a back-up hard drive that contains files that could compromise Marwan’s carefully laid plans. And when the female FBI agent shows up for a routine check on Anderson, she kills the Fed and assumes her identity when Jack and his back-up show up at Anderson’s apartment.

As Jack searches the apartment, his unsuspecting partner finds that portable hard drive of Andersons which leads to his immediate and rather gory demise. Jack, hearing a strange noise, goes into battle mode and kills the female merc. He plugs in the hard drive only to find the files locked.

No problem! Fat geek Edgar pulls some of his geeky magic and Presto! Jack accesses the drive to find schematics and a flight simulator program for the Stealth. Jack puts two and two together and confirms our speculation about Anderson’s target:

It is indeed Air Force I.

On the doomed plane, President Keeler has a heart to heart with his son Kevin, a fine, upstanding youth who, when asked by his father what he should say in his speech to the nation, says “the truth.” After filling him in on what the “truth” is, Kevin changes his mind and agrees to help his dad spin the situation, ostensibly so that people won’t be panicked.

Just once I’d like politicians to treat the American people as the intelligent, astute, and rational human beings we are rather than the sheep that they want us to be.

With time running out, Jack gets in contact with Anderson aboard the Stealth and tries to appeal to the better angels of his nature. For a moment - just a moment - it looks as if Jack may be getting through to the lad.

No such luck. In one of the most chilling and suspenseful moments in the history of the series, we see Anderson fire the missile. We see the missile tracking the target. We see CTU and Jack hanging on the edge of unbearable suspense. And then we see the President and his son embracing as the missile strikes the plane which erupts into flames.

Jack: Was Air Force One just hit? WAS AIR FORCE ONE JUST HIT?

Chloe: Escort pilots report Air Force One suffered an indirect hit by an air-to air missile. Pieces are falling to the ground over the desert.

BODY COUNT

Jack entered the terrorist warehouse like an avenging angel, taking out 8 terrorists, one with a knife. CTU Tacticals take out at least two additional targets. It’s impossible to say at this point exactly how many terrorists or CTU personnel were killed. It’s not uncommon to find out in a later episode the exact body count. The FBI agent never knew what hit her.

Jack: 36

Show: 135

LOOSE END

When told that Anderson was targeting his plane, the President seemed pretty confidant that his fighter escort could protect him…until Michelle had to remind him of the F-117’s ability to evade radar. I find it ludicrous that the President of the United States would be so ill-informed. If the writers wanted to remind us of the Stealth’s capabilities, they could have done a better job.

A little more than two weeks ago, I wrote a post about China’s stepped-up preparations for war with Taiwan. This was immediately after the puppet legislature, the National People’s Congress, had passed an “Anti-Secession Law” that was aimed directly at Taiwan’s aspirations to remain independent of the mainland:

“If possibilities for a peaceful reunification should be completely exhausted, the state shall employ nonpeaceful means and other necessary measures to protect China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Wang Zhaoguo, deputy chairman of the congress’ Standing Committee, told the nearly 3,000 members gathered in the Great Hall of the People.

Now we hear that Chinese tactics may include a so-called “Out-of-the-Blue” (OOTB) attack on the tiny island where Chinese troops already on “maneuvers” would suddenly turn and pounce on their unsuspecting neighbor.

The exact details are kept secret, but the plan involves using over 600 ballistic missiles, and several hundred warplanes, which China has stationed within range of Taiwan. Within an hour, the missiles could hit Taiwanese anti-aircraft missile launchers, radars, airbases, ships in harbor and army barracks and combat vehicles. Launch the attack in the pre-dawn hours, and you catch most of the troops in their barracks, and the ships, warplanes and tanks lined up and vulnerable. Amphibious troops would already be on their ships, for an amphibious exercises, escorted by numerous warships. As the amphibious fleet headed for Taiwan, hundreds of Chinese warplanes would return to hit whatever targets had been missed.

The tactic was part of the Soviet Union’s military planning for years; something NATO didn’t find out until the defection of Yuri Nosenko, a high ranking KGB Officer:

They prepared for it by holding large scale training exercises twice a year, near the border with West Germany. The Russian troops were all ready to practice, or go to war. An OOTB attack could be ordered by having the troops to cross the border and attack NATO forces, who would have insufficient warning to deal with the sudden offensive. NATO finally caught on to this plan, and put the troops on alert during the Russian field exercises. The OOTB was most noticeably used, and successfully at that, when the Russian trained Egyptian army surprised the Israelis and recaptured the Suez canal in 1973.

While Taiwan is doing its best to prepare for this kind of attack - dispersing units and parts of their fleet to keep them from being destroyed in the missile barrage - the real headache for the tiny island’s military planners is how to coordinate a defense with the United States.

Current American doctrine does not specifically call for US military assistance to Taiwan if she’s attacked by China. However, it’s believed that every President since Richard Nixon announced the “One China” policy (which recognizes Beijing’s claim that Taiwan is a runaway province) has privately assured Taiwanese leaders of American support if China attempts reunification by force.

To that end, we could have at least two and perhaps three Carrier Battle Groups near the straits of Taiwan in a matter of 10 days to 2 weeks. The thought being that any crisis involving the two nations would occur over an extended period of time. The three carrier groups would be able to deploy about 300 of the best high performance, all weather fighters and fighter bombers in the world; the F-14 Tomcats and F-18 Hornets. With several Aegis-class Missile Cruisers capable of not only protecting the carriers but also launching several dozen cruise missiles of their own, it was thought that this force would be able to overwhelm any Chinese attempt at conquering the island nation.

That thinking may be out the window now as China’s military could be steeling itself for battle. There’s no doubt that China’s ability to project it’s military power has improved in the last decade. The big question is would China risk it? Would it risk at the very least, certain sanctions from the west? And even if they caught the US flatfooted, would that stop us from coming to Taiwan’s assistance?

No doubt China has thought of the consequences of any invasion of Taiwan. And that’s what makes this current posturing so worrisome. They may be prepared to be isolated diplomatically for a short time until the world and the Europeans especially become inured to the idea of forced reunification.

Do they want a war with the United States? If they believe they can get away without becoming involved in a large scale conflict with the United States, they may go for it. From their point of view, if they can conquer Taiwan before we’re fully engaged they know we’ll have a decision to make: do we start a conflict that could drag the world into a war over the independence of tiny Taiwan? Do we attack China which could invite some kind of nuclear exchange?

The Chinese are an enormously patient people. You can pretty much count on them waiting until all their “stones” are set. Then and only then will they play Go…and the world will hold its breath waiting for the outcome.