Right Wing Nut House

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A villainous and most evil bird.

From out of nowhere he comes, descending like a black plague upon unsuspecting travelers, squawking a threat and challenge to any and all who displease him. Attacking innocents for the pure joy of knowing his presence strikes stark, stupefying fear into the hearts of his targets, this Cthulhuian apparition haunts the nightmares of many a Midwesterner who has had the misfortune of coming face to beak with him - and lived to tell the tale.

Like something out of an H.P. Lovecraft story, this nameless horror is apt to drive one insane if they were to grasp the true, evil nature of its presence here on earth. For it is nothing less than a journey into the mind of the devil - a reflection seen in its lifeless, beady eyes - that drives the creature in its hate and bloodlust to ambush and terrorize its victims.

I am referring, of course, to the Red Winged Blackbird.

There’s a predator lurking in Chicago-area bushes these days. He strikes from behind, when victims are least aware. And the worst part, says ornithologist Doug Stotz: He could be almost anywhere.

Nesting season is in full swing for the red-winged blackbird, making the males extremely aggressive. Walk or bike too close to one’s nest and expect to hear its high, menacing squawk overhead. Then comes the peck-peck-peck on your head, victims say, or claws rustling your hair.

It happened to Holly Grosso. The businesswoman was on her cell phone, walking along West Grand Avenue near Rockwell Street on Wednesday, when the bird—dubbed “Hitchcock” by area workers—made its move.

“Something just came down, pecked me in the head, took my hair and started flying away,” she said. “It’s so bizarre. It’s this little bird.”

From Ghoulies, and Ghosties, and Long-Legged Beasties, and Things that Go Bump! in the Night, Oh Lord Deliver us. (Old Scottish prayer).

This “little bird” is a demon, a harbinger of hell whose attacks on human beings out for a walk or bike ride foreshadow a time when all the non-human entities that inhabit the earth will turn on their erstwhile masters and sweep the planet of our presence.

Alfred Hitchcock may have been having some fun at our expense when he made the film The Birds. But after a couple of run ins with this avian Satan, you will start believing the great director was a prophet rather than an entertainer.

It isn’t just that these birds swoop down and annoy you. Seagulls have been known to do this. And a few other birds - Blue Jays come to mind - don’t like humans very much and will dive bomb an unsuspecting walker now and again.

But when the Red Winged Blackbird attacks, he is out for blood. He will sit on his perch and may - not always - give a couple of warning honks as you approach. Woe betide the luckless walker or rider who ignores the message. The second you pass his nest and your back is to him, the cowardly creature will alight from his perch and make a beeline straight for your head. Just before you feel his beak nipping at your ear, a bloodcurdling sqauwk pierces your eardrum and the “fight or flee” reflex is automatically triggered. And since you cannot fight a beast circling and diving 20 feet over your head, you begin to run.

It is the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen in the animal kingdom. Despite the fact that you are 50 yards from its nest, the Devil Bird continues its attacks, enjoying the fact that he is terrorizing you, gleaning great satisfaction no doubt as he hears your whimpering entreaties to the Almighty, begging for relief.

You can scream at it, wave your hands, shake your fist, even throw a rock at it and the damn thing just keeps coming - a pitiless, relentless force of pure avian evil. What is so disconcerting about the attack is that at one point, you realize you are about 150 times bigger than the little sh*t and that if the wretched, filthy thing stood still for just a second you’d punch its lights out - permanently - and feed the remains to your cat.

I used to walk to work years ago and every day was like enduring a Native American gauntlet. There were at least a half dozen places along my route where I had to be on constant guard against these sudden, brutal attacks. I would cross the highway to avoid the Blackbird hot spots when I could but there were a couple of places where that simply wasn’t pracitical. I took to carrying a rolled up newspaper but it did little good. The gargoyles easily evaded my pitiful attempts to ward them off.

Anyone who says birds aren’t intelligent need only observe the behavior of these maleovolant entities in order to grasp the diabolical way their peanut sized brains work. I figured out that if you look at them while you pass (sometimes you couldn’t see them as they would be hidden by the trees or bushes), all they do is squawk irritably at you. Of course, this means you have to walk backwards once you pass them - a practice that caused more than one motorist on the highway I’m sure to question what insane asylum I had escaped from.

More than once, I would walk backwards 20 or 30 yards past their perch. But the second I turned around it was party time for the bird as his gonzo attack would be more vicious than ever. The damn thing was probably annoyed I had gotten so far away from his clutches.

Now I’m all for conservation and everything. Save the whales, don’t club baby seals (unless they truly deserve it), only cut down first growth timber if you’re going to make my oak dining room table and please, whatever you do, leave a few large mouth bass in the stream for the rest of us.

But even my love of nature can’t stop the evil thoughts about what I think should be done with every Red Winged Blackbird in North America.

The 2008 Presidential race finally got underway yesterday as Barack Obama used his race to try and innoculate himself against criticism:

Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama said on Friday he expects Republicans to highlight the fact that he is black as part of an effort to make voters afraid of him.

“It is going to be very difficult for Republicans to run on their stewardship of the economy or their outstanding foreign policy,” Obama told a fundraiser in Jacksonville, Florida. “We know what kind of campaign they’re going to run. They’re going to try to make you afraid.

“They’re going to try to make you afraid of me. He’s young and inexperienced and he’s got a funny name. And did I mention he’s black?”

He said he was also set for Republicans to say “he’s got a feisty wife,” in trying to attack his wife Michelle.

We expected it, of course. It is his greatest political weapon and he will use it again and again, shamelessly accusing the GOP of bringing up his race (even, as this proves, when they don’t) in order to deflect criticism away from he and his wife for anything they say or any associations in their past.

The press will let him get away with it because they are terrified of being accused of racism themselves.

What makes Obama’s race card such an effective weapon is that it is virtually impossible to accuse him of using it. He is the oppressed minority. You don’t question oppressed minorities in this country. Anything they define as racism is accepted almost without question. To do so is to prove your racism. Ergo, the perfect “Catch 22:” If the GOP denies Obama’s charges of “racism” and accuses him of using the race card, the blowback on the GOP will be “Who are you to question a black man when he says he’s been slimed by a racist smear?” - the subtext being that you are racist for questioning him.

The flip side of that is if the GOP says nothing, the charge goes unanswered and they are convicted in the court of public opinion as racist pigs.

Bee-utiful.

Let me just say to those doubters who may believe otherwise, take a walk through the comments section of this blog and others. See how many Obama advocates simply dismiss any opposition to their candidate as “racism.” It is this simple minded sophistry that the candidate will use in order to quiet opposition to his programs once he is elected as well.

It has been asked “Is America ready for a black president?” Maybe a more relevant question would be “Can America see through a racial charlatan who will shamlessly use the color of his skin to avoid debating the tough issues and call his opponents “racists” for disagreeing with him?”

This piece appeared in slightly different form at The American Thinker

UPDATE:

Karl at Protein Wisdom and I are on the same page today:

Make no mistake: the man who admits he looks like Urkel is sounding about as post-racial as the Rev. Al Sharpton. Or about as post-racial as someone who spent the last 20 years under the spiritual tutelage of the race-baiting Rev. Jeremiah Wright and Fr. Michael Pfleger. Someone with that background ought to have some humility when it comes to dealing the race card, but he has chosen it as his opening gambit. If John McCain and the GOP allows someone who increasingly sounds like someone struggling to suppress his own prejudice to frame the general election in this manner, they will deserve to lose the election even more than they already do.

UPDATE II:

Getting more comments than normal on this one (Thanks, Glenn!) so I have removed comment moderation for the time being.

Everyone behave themselves. No jumping on the furntiture and please don’t put your little hands in the garbage disposal unless you’re sure it’s off. Daddy will be back in the morning.

UPDATE: 6/23

Comment moderation back on.

Is all this talk about Obama being the savior of America - the man who can bridge the gap between the races, heal the sick, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and return America to the good old days of grovelling at the feet of the UN and other tyrants going to the candidate’s head?

I swear to God this is one the creepier things I’ve ever seen in politics.

Obama was at a meeting with Democratic governors yesterday here in Chicago. John Broder of the Caucus Blog gives us the details:

At a discussion with a dozen Democratic governors in Chicago on Friday morning, each of the governors was identified with a small name plate but Senator Barack Obama sat behind a low rostrum to which was attached an official-looking seal no one had seen before.

It is emblazoned with a fierce-looking eagle clutching an olive branch in one claw and arrows in the other and is deliberately reminiscent of the official seal of the president of the United States. Around the top border are the words “Obama for America;” across the bottom is the campaign’s Web address. It also contains the logo of the Obama campaign, variously interpreted as a sunrise or a view down an open road.

Just above the eagle’s head are the words “Vero Possumus,” roughly translated “Yes we can.” Not exactly E Pluribus Unum (Out of Many, One), the motto on the presidential seal and the dollar bill. Then again, Mr. Obama is not the president.

You’re right, John. Mr. Obama is not the president. And while the US Senate has their own seal, I don’t recall individual senators adopting personal seals for their own use.

Now there are several different ways we can interpret this. Is Obama pulling our leg a little about this messiah crap? Is this kind of an inside joke in the campaign? Did some overzealous, true believing staffer stick this on the podium and Obama never saw it?

Or does Obama believe that he has achieved a special status in America and is deserving of his very own seal to proclaim such?

Broder mentioned the seal’s similarity to the Presidential Seal. Courtesy of CNN, here they are side by side:

Would someone (and I’m sure one of my polite, erudite trolls will oblige me) tell me I’m full of crap and me getting creeped out over this - seeing it as a sign of megalomania - is just a product of my intense dislike of the candidate and nothing to get my panties in a twist over?

Some of my righty friends are taking this very seriously. My buddy Mac:

As I noted before the seal shows what appears to be an eagle in retreat with it’s back turned on the Flag. Couple this with Obama’s desire to “Remake” and “Disarm” America and we have all the reason in the world to be alarmed and ask questions.

Frankly, I don’t see that. It appears the eagle is facing the same way on both the Presidential Seal and Obama’s seal. You might note that the Obama seal’s eagle is missing the ribbon in its beak found on the Presidential Sea. The writing on the ribbon is “E Pluribus Unum” or “Out of Many, One” which is a fine motto for a republic. On the other hand, “Yes we can” - found in Latin above the Obama eagle - is the kind of motto geeky kids in Latin class would have put on a parody seal - the kind of inside joke that only the geeky kids who knew Latin would get.

Definitely creepy - and pretentious. The motto is so banal and saccharine sweet that translating it into Latin and sticking it on a faux presidential seal can only be seen as an attempt to attach more gravitas to a candidate than he deserves. And perhaps that’s the ultimate reason for the entire exercise.

Interestingly, Mac has a screen shot of the seal as the background template for Obama’s website so this thing didn’t just drop out of the blue.

Now, admittedly, on the Moran  Distraction to Nuclear Detonation Scale© of 1-10 where the lower the number, the closer to a true campaign distraction (rather than a distraction the candidate claims any incident to be) this one registers about a 3. I just find it interesting that Obama would feel the need or think it would boost his campaign, or otherwise advance his candidacy to have his very own “Obamaland Seal.”

It still creeps me out.

One can hardly blame Barack Obama for opting out of publicly financing his campaign for President of the United States. After all, Jesus was only tempted with all the kingdoms of the earth if he would worship Satan. Obama ’s temptation was winning the presidency at the expense of his image as a truthtelling agent of change and new political messiah.

I think Obama is getting much the better of the deal.

Look at it this way. The Obamabots could care less what their candidate says or does. He could be caught tomorrow in a bathtub, naked, with Larry Sinclair, puffing away on a crack pipe while getting serviced by 3 Boy Scouts and 2 altar boys and they’d still think he was the bee’s knees. And while his political foes have gone ballistic over the flip flop on public financing, most of us would hit the ceiling if he walked on a crack on a sidewalk, hysterically accusing him of wanting to break his mother’s back.

It is the 30% or so of voters in the middle that matter as far as this imbroglio is concerned. And the American people, being eminently practical (and recognizing a good thing when they see it) will probably not think much of Obama breaking his promise to accept public financing. First and foremost, the voter today is a pretty cynical creature and they don’t believe too many promises from any politician - even if he claims to be the human manifestation of goodness and truthfulness. But beyond that, I don’t think that 30% would trust anyone who turned down what Obama is getting by eschewing federal financing; somewhere around $250 million. They would look strangely indeed at anyone stupid enough to keep a promise made months ago at the expense of winning the presidency.

This, after all, is the real reason Obama is going for his own little Fort Knox rather than sticking to his principles and taking his money from government. It would be the biggest mistake in the history of American politics if Obama had stuck by his guns and taken the federal funding route. Imagine if he had taken the public financing and then lost. The Democrats would be beside themselves and Obama’s name would be mud.

Going the private funding route is the safe play, the easy play, and dare I say it, the winning play. John McCain is going to hardly know what hit him. He will be outspent 3-1 at every level. Already Obama is flexing his muscles by running ads in Alaska, Montana, and Georgia - three states, not coincidentally, that Libertarian candidate Bob Barr expects to make his best showings. The thinking is that Barr can siphon enough votes away from McCain to make Obama more than competitive in a three way race. Personally, I think they’re wasting their time with Alaska and Montana - probably even Barr’s home state of Georgia as well. But the point isn’t so much to win those states as to force McCain to defend them - with the limited resources he will have available to him because McCain will indeed find it necessary to accept public financing of his campaign.

Every red state they force McCain to defend means less money the Republican candidate can spend in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Ohio. Eventually, the McCain camp will be faced with the horrible strategy of writing off states like New Mexico and Nevada while pouring his limited resources into just a few battleground states, hoping against hope that the rest of his base can remain relatively solid.

There is already talk in the McCain camp of an election day scenario in which their candidate wins enough electoral votes but loses badly in the popular vote - perhaps by as much as 3 million votes. By September, that may be the official strategy.

Despite the obvious advantages for Obama in taking private money for the campaign - advantages that any half wit can see - the candidate decided to give the most bizarre and certainly the most dishonest explanation for turning down federal funds:

“We’ve made the decision not to participate in the public financing system for the general election,” Obama says in the video, blaming it on the need to combat Republicans, saying “we face opponents who’ve become masters at gaming this broken system. John McCain’s campaign and the Republican National Committee are fueled by contributions from Washington lobbyists and special interest PACs. And we’ve already seen that he’s not going to stop the smears and attacks from his allies running so-called 527 groups, who will spend millions and millions of dollars in unlimited donations.”

Amazing. Obama is really getting the hang of this lying thing. Of course, he’s had a lot of practice lately so perhaps it shouldn’t surprise us.

It is disingenuous in the extreme for Obama to complain about the RNC getting PAC and “special interest” money when his own campaign will raise $50 million from big donors:

Michael Coles, a former Clinton fund-raiser from Atlanta, said in an interview that he was one of 20 to 30 Clinton supporters who joined Mr. Obama’s national finance committee at a meeting on Thursday in Chicago. Members of the committee have each pledged to raise $250,000 for Mr. Obama.

People from both camps said they expected most of Mrs. Clinton’s top fund-raisers to align behind Mr. Obama, and that they could raise at least $50 million for him.

That $50 million will be about 25% of his total haul. Who does Obama think these fat cats and heavy hitters who will be raising this cash are? They are hardly Joe Blow Democrat who worship at the altar of Obama. These gimlet eyed men and women are giving money not out the goodness of their hearts but because they expect something in return. If there is another definition of “special interest” I haven’t heard it.

But the real whopper in Obama’s statement - the real nose grower is that he must refuse to take federal financing because Republican 527 groups will raise “millions and millions” of dollars to smear him.

I know Obama has been busy lately and perhaps has not had time to catch up with the news, but it’s been known for months that the GOP 527 effort is a shadow of what the Democrats are going to throw at McCain:

Obama’s alarmist prophecy — a bit of typical campaign rhetoric meant to scare his own donors into reaching for their credit cards — is wildly at odds with the flatlined state of conservative third-party efforts.

The truth is that, less than five months before Election Day, there are no serious anti-Obama 527s in existence nor are there any immediate plans to create such a group.

Conversations with more than a dozen Republican strategists find near unanimity in the belief that, at some point, there will be a real third-party effort aimed at Obama.

But not one knows who will run it, who will pay for it, what shape it will eventually take or when such a group may form.

More worrisome for Republicans who believe such an outside attack apparatus is essential to defeating Obama, some key individuals and groups who were being looked to for help say they won’t be involved.

Obama’s 527 worries are a mirage - or more likely - an out and out lie that he had no reason to tell. Why not just say “Look folks, I want to win. It would be stupid to forgo the opportunity my brilliant fundraising has given me. And you don’t want a stupid president, do you?”

I daresay Obama would have impressed a helluva lot of people if he had said something like that rather than raise the canard of evil Republicans plotting to smear him.

One amusing sidelight to this story is the way the New York Times reported it. It’s almost as if the left hand didn’t know what the far-left hand was doing.

Here’s a snippet from the Times editorial on the matter:

Public financing, which Mr. McCain has indicated he would accept, limits spending to $84.1 million in the general election. Mr. Obama expects he can raise three or four times that. He insists he needs the larger flow to hold off unscrupulous Republican “masters at gaming this broken system” via separate party funds and Swift Boat-style smear campaigns.

Mr. Obama’s power to excite average donations of less than $100 also is admirable, and his concerns about his opponent are understandable. The Republican Party is raising a great deal of money, and shadow groups known as 527s have tens of millions to spend. Mr. McCain knows the power of these groups since they slimed him out of the 2000 Republican primaries. Now that he’s the presumptive nominee, however, he is inviting them into the fray on his behalf.

Meanwhile, the news story covering Obama’s decision contains this little goody:

Mr. McCain has been highly critical in the past of 527s and other independent groups, but he seems to have softened his rhetoric lately, saying his campaign could not be expected to “referee” such groups.

Nevertheless, Republican strategists said many affluent donors who might be in a position to finance 527 groups were wary this time because of the legal headaches that bedeviled many of these groups after the 2004 election, as well as the possibility they might incur the wrath of Mr. McCain.

And I always thought there was no difference between the Times editorial page and its news reports. Guess I was wrong.

When all is said and done, this issue - like all issues that reflect badly on Obama - will quietly die, Obama’s falsehoods and hypocrisy just a distant memory. And the press can go back to its non-stop, full court Obamamania that is turning this election into a farce.

Meanwhile, Obama will have more money than God and will win this election in a walk.

If I were you, I would go immediately to my favorite gas station and get in line now. Because if, as some (Many? Most?) Democrats desire, there is a government take over of the refinery business in America, we can be sure of only one thing; a lot less gas will be manufactured and at a higher price.

I would ask my lefty friends the following; name one - just one - government enterprise that was ever run so efficiently that it could compete with market driven companies? And what makes you think the government will suddenly acquire the wisdom found in the markets and be able to adequately supply 300 million people with enough refined petroleum products so that the economy doesn’t collapse in a heap at your feet?

I’ll say this, the Democrats sure are ambitious in implementing a plan to socialize America. You’d think they would have started with something easier - like, say, the banking industry. Banks don’t make anything tangible, they just have a lot of money.

If not banking, maybe the fast food industry. Now there’s a group of companies crying out to be taken over by government. Their products already suck so the government couldn’t ruin them. And anyone who has been to a Burger King around dinner time can attest to the gross inefficiency with which they deliver a meal to the customer. I have been going to Burger King for 40 years and have yet to get exactly what I ordered. Besides, with government in control at McDonalds, maybe they could finally lose the clown and get a decent mascot - like maybe a greasy french fry or frozen beef patty.

But no, the Democrats had to get ambitious and want to take over an industry where the margin for error is less than zero and the consequences for screwing up are life and death. Sorry everyone in the Northeast but we goofed ever so slightly and you are going to run out of heating oil about half way through the winter. Might we suggest having a lot of sex to keep warm? Great fun and very educational for the kiddies.

Mess up at a bank and it’s just a few million in taxpayer dollars. Screw the pooch at a fast food restaurant and someone doesn’t get their order of fries with their Happy Meal. But make a mistake in the refining industry about how much gas or heating oil will be needed down the road and you have something approaching catastrophe on your hands. One must possess breathtaking arrogance to believe that government could do as good or better than profit driven companies in determining the needs of the market at any given time.

But to our Democratic Socialist friends (Can we start calling them that now? Can we?), the point is not supplying the American people with gasoline or heating oil but rather control - control of the industry so that it functions for “the benefit of the people.”

How often have we heard that battle cry in history? And oh how miserably those who have uttered it have failed to deliver promised benefits. From Lenin to Castro to Mugabe, the nationalization of industry to benefit “the people” has been a spectacular economic disaster. In the end, production in nationalized industry always declines. In the end, the industry has always fallen into ruins.

Why Democrats want to experiment with nationalizing the most efficient, the most successful market based industry in the history of the world - the oil and gas industry - is beyond comprehension. It is almost magical that tens of billions of barrels of oil taken from the ground or the sea every year can be transported in a few days to refineries here in the US and through a complex process turned into gasoline and other products which are then whisked around a continental nation of 300 million people to fill up automobiles or trucks not to mention supply raw material for the tens of thousands of products from chemicals to plastics without which our economy would grind to an ignominious halt.

And Democrats want the government to take over this process? Sheer idiocy.

Goldstein draws the frightening - and depressing - conclusion:

The question then, is this: have the American people, either through progressive bromides or an educational system that has been battling to turn government into a secular godhead, become so dumbed down that they will fail to recognize explicit calls for communism when they see them? I honestly don’t know. But I will say that the fact that they’ve managed to pit Obama against McCain — two nannystatists with progressive tendencies — in the presidential election, makes me fear the worst.

For more than 100 years, a titanic struggle has been going on between those who worship at the altar of collectivism and those who wish to make freedom of the individual paramount. Even a cursory look around the western world today would tell you that collectivism is winning, that forced altruism, nationalization, and a retreat on individual freedoms has now taken hold in Europe.

Meanwhile, conservatives in this country have been fighting a rear guard action against the creep of socialism, promoted shamelessly now by both parties to the point, as Goldstein states, we now have two major party candidates for president who are enamored of the nanny state. Despite Goldwater, despite Reagan, despite a supposedly conservative takeover of the House and Senate, and despite 8 years of a “compassionate conservative” president, the slide toward collectivism has continued - aided and abetted by a Supreme Court that seems to be making things up as they go along rather than using the Constitution of the United States as a guide.

This open call for nationalizing a vital industry - something that if done at the height of liberalism’s power back in the 1960’s and early 70’s would have been laughed off even by most Democrats - sickens me.

I despair for the future. In 10 years time, will we be able to recognize anything of the United States after the Democrats have transformed it?

I had a dream the other night.

In my dream, I was standing on the curb of a street watching a parade go by. There was something about this parade, though, that wasn’t quite right. The marching bands, the drum and bugle corps, the floats - even the pretty girls twirling batons - all looked pretty much the same. They were vaguely familiar; like you’ve met them in your dreams before but never in real life.

Then it hit me. That high stepping drum major looked just like George Bush. The little girl twirling the baton? George Bush. The beauty queen on the float? Ditto. Even the trained dog looked like Bush.

Everywhere you looked, George Bush looked back. Then I noticed the crowd around me. OmiGod! Those beady eyes. That smirk!

At that point, I woke up in a cold sweat. Thank God. I puttered into my office and turned on the internets, going immediately to Memorandum to see what people were writing about. An article caught my eye and after reading the headline, my blood froze, my mouth opened in a silent scream of anguish and despair.

It can’t be, I told myself. But there it was in black and white - my metaphorical dream come to life:

President Bush was asked by a SkyNews correspondent whether the end of his term marked the end of the Bush presidential dynasty that began with his father’s Oval Office tenure 20 years ago.

In response, Bush singled out his brother, who has often been mentioned as a possible Republican presidential contender. “Well, we’ve got another one out there who did a fabulous job as governor of Florida, and that’s Jeb,” he said. “But you know, you better ask him whether or not he’s thinking of running. But he’d be a great president.”

There had been wide speculation in 2000 that Jeb Bush would enter the Republican primary race that was won by his brother.

During the SkyNews interview, first lady Laura Bush added that public service was an “unbelievable” life.

“One of the reasons George and his brother, Jeb, served in office is because they admired their father [Presient George H.W. Bush] so much,” she said.

Asked whether that meant her husband was not “the last Bush,” she responded: “Well, who knows. We’ll see.”

No, no, and I say no again. I cannot - will not - accept this affront tothe sancity of our republic. Bad enough that Hillary ran this year. But three presidents from one family? Makes us look like a goddamn banana republic. I don’t care how competent Jeb is. I don’t care if people think he’d be the best president to come along since Michael Douglas played that guy who got to do the slap and tickle with Annette Benning (”I’m going to get the guns.”). I will pray to the political gods that they spare us the prospect of another Bush - Jesus I don’t believe I’m saying it - ANOTHER BUSH IN THE WHITE HOUSE!

We have suffered through rah rah Bush and now compassionate conservative Bush with a guy possesing the morals of an alley cat and the hormones of a teenager in between. No wonder people are going crazy over Obama. The guy seems almost normal by comparison. Who cares if he hangs around with bigots, crooks, radicals, and terrorists? At least his name doesn’t conjure up nightmares of dynastic wars as one branch of the Bush family eventually splits off and we have our very own “War of the Roses.” Imagine the horror! Legions of Bushbots ravaging the countryside, raping and pillaging in the name of one Bush or another.

Some may bring up the Kennedy’s as a example of true dynastic American politics. They would be right to a point. Many expected Bobby Kennedy to win in 1968, serve for 8 years to be followed by Ted Kennedy for another 8 years. From there, any one of a half dozen of the 2nd generation Kennedy children could have vied for the presidency.

This nightmare never came to pass thank God. But the political success of the Kennedy family nevertheless shows a disconcerting eagerness by the American people to embrace this kind of “royalty in all but name” that we get from the Bush’s and Kennedys.

Witness the goo goo eyes the American people made at that little waif of a princess Diana. I found it creepy that her death would have elicited such an outpouring of grief in this country. The “People’s Princess” indeed. Spoiled, rich, bratty, a shameless publicity hound, the fact that she actually believed that because she was porked by some Duke or other and her resulting whelp was deserving of being King of England just because of who his father was is so un-American that I thought I heard John Adams crying out in pain and anguish from the grave. Diana did absolutely nothing in the entire span of her privileged, sheltered existence to warrant anything except our contempt. She shamelessly used her children in her war with her philandering Dumbo of a husband while jumping from bed to bed herself. The antics of the super-rich may make for interesting tabloid reading but should hardly interest good republicans such as ourselves.

Speaking of Adams, his son became president of course. But not until a decent interval had passed - nearly 25 years. Now we are looking at the nauseating prospect of three Bush’s as president in about a generation. And God knows how many lord and lady Bushes are waiting in the wings out there, just waiting for their chance.

True nightmare scenario; Jenna is eligible to run in 2020.

It used to be that children of privilege either spent their lives in dissolute hedonism, burning through the family fortune as fast as their self-destructive behavoir would let them. Or, they were groomed to enter the family business in order to protect the assets of those who came before them.

The Kennedys and Bushes enter politics and run for president for exactly the same reason. And from my point of view, it’s no way to run a republic.

You won’t want to miss tonight’s Rick Moran Show,, one of the most popular conservative talk shows on Blog Talk Radio. Tonight’s show will be co-hosted by American Thinker’s Political Correspondent Rich Baehr.

Tonight, Rich and I will take a look at the presidential race as it now stands. We’ll have the latest state polls, analysis of both candidate’s strategy, and our usual scintillating commentary

Almost like the “Algonquin Round Table” except I don’t live in Algonquin anymore and Dorothy Parker died years ago.

The show will air from 7:00 - 8:00 PM Central time. You can access the live stream here. A podcast will be available for streaming or download shortly after the end of the broadcast.

For the best in political analysis, click on the stream below and join in on what one wag called a “Wayne’s World for adults.” A podcast will be available for streaming or download around 15 minutes after the show ends.

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I don’t think Barack Obama would be a good president and am not voting for him. But his speech on the responsibilities of parenthood before the 20,000 member Apostolic Church of God - an almost all-black church near the loop in Chicago - revealed something about the man that I didn’t know was there; a basically conservative outlook on personal responsibility and the importance of family.

Too often, the left dismisses the family as the anchor on which our civilization rests. They are much too busy trying to stretch, twist, or otherwise mutilate the definition of “family” to pay much attention to the impact it has on society and its members.

Far be for me to deny that there may be many definitions of “family” and that some of those definitions includes people of the same sex raising children. The only requirement I’ve ever heard of for a family is that there are loving, caring relationships irrespective of the gender or sexual orientation of the parents or children.

But in seeking to expand the definition of family, the left has chosen to denigrate the traditional nuclear family and traditional family values as somehow poisonous to society rather than embracing them as the central fact of life in any culture. By promoting a culture of permissiveness - which is at odds with the traditional role of the family as a bulwark against chaos and the major force for discipline and prudence in society - the left sacrifices the meaning of family for the abstract and superficial changes in definition that would include gays and gay couples.

Obama didn’t mention gays in his talk on the family yesterday. He didn’t mention alternative lifestyles or that “it takes a village” to raise a child. He eschewed every liberal talking point on the family to ram home the notion that families need fathers to be whole and that those who refuse to take responsibility for fatherhood aren’t real men:

Of all the rocks upon which we build our lives, we are reminded today that family is the most important. And we are called to recognize and honor how critical every father is to that foundation. They are teachers and coaches. They are mentors and role models. They are examples of success and the men who constantly push us toward it.

But if we are honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that what too many fathers also are is missing - missing from too many lives and too many homes. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it.

You and I know how true this is in the African-American community. We know that more than half of all black children live in single-parent households, a number that has doubled - doubled - since we were children. We know the statistics - that children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and twenty times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems, or run away from home, or become teenage parents themselves. And the foundations of our community are weaker because of it.

One commenter at Balloon Juice had an interesting take:

I do think that this is an interesting piece of dog whistle politics. The tough truth is that ninety percent of all male humans can knock a girl up, and that doing your part to raise the kids is what makes you a real man. That’s a message which applies no matter what color your skin is. It’s a dog-whistle to intimate that African Americans or Latinos or other beige folks need to hear it more than the rest of us do.

Do I think that Barack Obama is acutely aware of this? Oh, yes, indeed. Do I think the reporters who are dealing in stereotypes in reporting his sermon are? Not so much.

The question of whether African Americans and Hispanics “need” to hear the message of responsible fatherhood is moot. A few figures courtesy of Presto-Pundit:

The nation’s out-of-wedlock birth rate is 38%. Among white children, 28% are now born to a single mother; among Hispanic children it is 50% and reaches a chilling, disorienting peak of 71% for black children. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, nearly a quarter of America’s white children (22%) do not have any male in their homes; nearly a third (31%) of Hispanic children and over half of black children (56%) are fatherless.

This represents a dramatic shift in American life. In the early 1960s, only 2.3% of white children and 24% of black children were born to a single mom. Having a dad, in short, is now a privilege, a ticket to middle-class status on par with getting into a good college.

[snip]

A study of black families 10 years ago, when the out-of-wedlock birthrate was not as high as today, found that single moms reported only 20% of the “baby’s daddy” spent time with the child or took a “lot” of interest in the baby ..

Clearly all races have a percentage of deadbeat dads. But it is equally clear that Obama was targeting African American men in his speech if only because when confronted with a choice of treating a couple of cases of the flu or an epidemic, the good physician triages the situation and treats those most in need. In this case, Obama’s own background with an absent father resonated deeply with his audience:

I know what it means to have an absent father, although my circumstances weren’t as tough as they are for many young people today. Even though my father left us when I was two years old, and I only knew him from the letters he wrote and the stories that my family told, I was luckier than most. I grew up in Hawaii, and had two wonderful grandparents from Kansas who poured everything they had into helping my mother raise my sister and me - who worked with her to teach us about love and respect and the obligations we have to one another. I screwed up more often than I should’ve, but I got plenty of second chances. And even though we didn’t have a lot of money, scholarships gave me the opportunity to go to some of the best schools in the country. A lot of kids don’t get these chances today. There is no margin for error in their lives. So my own story is different in that way.

Still, I know the toll that being a single parent took on my mother - how she struggled at times to the pay bills; to give us the things that other kids had; to play all the roles that both parents are supposed to play. And I know the toll it took on me. So I resolved many years ago that it was my obligation to break the cycle - that if I could be anything in life, I would be a good father to my girls; that if I could give them anything, I would give them that rock - that foundation - on which to build their lives. And that would be the greatest gift I could offer.

So what do we make of this clear break with liberal orthodoxy on the family? It appears to me to be heartfelt and something that has come to the surface as a result of his own personal experience. The fact that much of what he says reflects conservative orthodoxy regarding the family, African American culture, and personal responsibility will probably raise some grumblings on the left and within the African American leadership which is terrified that any talk of responsibility that does not include white racism as a cause will diminish their roles in the black community.

In fact, this thoughtful rumination on the left and personal responsibility raises many interesting questions:

The big myth lurking around out there in our highly charged partisan war of ideas is that liberals don’t believe in personal responsibility. That we want government to take care of everything while everyone gets to do whatever the hell we want.

Of course this is more caricature than characterization.

One of the things that I was impressed with in regards to Senator Obama early on is his approach to the status of the American family, and we’re not just talking about deadbeat dads either, but the whole deal, from making sure your kids sit down and do their homework, to knowing when to turn the television off, to providing a healthy diet. In his book The Audacity of Hope, Obama wrote passionately and honestly about the responsibilities of parenthood, and how too many parents aren’t meeting those responsibilities.

And it was these themes that took center stage in Obama’s father’s day address yesterday. I’m sure there’s a way to twist this, but here’s the thing, and perhaps it’s a key difference. Republicans, I believe, too often hide behind a cloak of personal responsibility; a shadow of the small government theme they claim to be so steadfastly for.

But sometimes, and this necessity is apolitical, it takes a leader to stand up and demand from the people that they actually adhere to those precepts of personal responsibility. That Obama is black will likely dominate the coverage from many corners much along the vein of; he’s black, so he can tell this to black people when non-black people can’t.

But the familial problems that face this country are not strictly held within the confines of the African American community, and I don’t think it is the color of Obama’s skin that makes him the best equipped to speak on these issues.

For all the discussion of who is the elitist, and who isn’t, what gives Obama the authority to speak on these topics is not the color of his skin, but instead the nature of his youth. He was not born into a rich family, and his father wasn’t an Admiral. He grew up, like many of us, in a broken home, and worked his way up from humble beginnings. As a boy whose own father in many ways abandoned him, Obama knows exactly the kind of world many children are coming in today, and yet he stands as an example of not only what can be accomplished, but also, well, how to be a father and a man of a strong family.

I would say amen to most of that except the author ducks and dodges the question of where personal responsibility fits in with liberal ideology. He seems to be making the case that Obama has the cred to talk about responsibility because of his life story. Okay, I’ll buy that. But aside from accusing conservatives of “hiding behind” personal responsibility, he is silent on whether Obama’s call for taking responsibility for one’s actions is ultimately a liberal or conservative notion. An ideology that promotes permissiveness almost to the exclusion of everything else can hardly make claim to be promoting personal responsibility when telling males (of all races) “if it feels good, do it” and don’t worry about the consequences.

Nor can an ideology responsible for creating a welfare state that is directly responsible for many of these same ills Obama spoke about yesterday suddenly turn around and embrace Obama’s message unless adherents are willing to alter fundamental precepts regarding personal responsibility and ultimately, the family. What Obama was saying is that poverty and hopelessness are only part of the problem and government solutions, while important, are only part of the answer. Obama has correctly identified the family - with both parents intimately involved in their children’s lives - as the fundamental life preserver for the African American and other disadvantaged communities.

Will the left listen? Or will they simply see this speech by Obama as a political “dog whistle?” If they wish to make the 2008 election a “hinge” election where the political realities are altered and a new, liberal era is ushered in for the next quarter century or so, they best heed Obama’s words and make them their own.

Tiger Woods celebrates after sinking an impossible 66 foot eagle putt at #13 during the US Open at Torrey Pines.

He’s 32 now and not a kid anymore. The boyish face is still there, unlined but revealing a heaviness that comes with age and experience. His still lithe frame now features a suit of armor - rock hard, sinewy muscle that is fully in evidence only when he swings the club. Not muscle bound but hugely muscled up -both strength and flexibility giving him an advantage over almost all of his competitors.

The frightening intensity has, if anything, become even more a dominant factor in his game. His ability to tune out all the myriad distractions - the huge, raucous galleries, the hordes of photographers, the unbelievable pressure to perform up to expectations bespeak a discipline and mental toughness unheard of in golf or any other sport.

And then there is the final edge, the one part of him that above all others, separates him from other golfers and indeed, other athletes; his fierce, unbending will to win. Only one other athlete in my lifetime came close to possessing such a high level of competitiveness; Michael Jordan’s “refuse to lose” mindset was an astonishing thing to watch when the game was on the line and the ball was in his hands.

For Tiger Woods, it is this competitiveness that drives him to excel, to practice the game more than most, to constantly prepare his body and mind for the rigors of the tour while taking extra time to consciously elevate the level of his game for each of golf’s 4 major tests; The Masters, the US Open, the Open Championship (British Open), and the PGA Championship.

This week at the US Open Championship held at Torrey Pines golf club in San Diego, Tiger Woods is demonstrating once again - as if we ever need reminding - that he is not only the best golfer who ever lived but also the most remarkable figure in sports who ever competed. And he is doing while playing on one leg - barely 8 short weeks removed from knee surgery and without a competitive round of golf since the Masters in April.

The rust was evident that first round on Thursday as Woods struggled with a wayward driver and finicky putter to finish 1 over par. The second round didn’t start out much better as Woods bogeyed 2 of the first 4 holes and ballooned to +3. It seemed as if the rust and the sore knee would be just too much to overcome for Tiger.

But then, lightening struck on Tiger’s seventh hole as he sank a 25 footer for eagle. But once again, Torrey Pines reached up and bit him as Woods bogeyed his 8 and 9 holes putting him right back at +3 and 5 shots off the pace at that point. It seemed that Tiger’s driver accuracy had deserted him. His errant shots were finding the Torrey Pines super rough, making it nearly impossible to get a good approach shot into the green.

But all that changed starting on #1 (Woods began his day playing #10). Tiger ran off a strong of 3’s that gave him 4 birdies on the first 5 holes and finished his scintillating back nine on Friday shooting an eye-popping 5 under par 30 giving him an aggregate score of -2, just one shot off the lead.

Such a round would be enough for any superstar’s resume. Tiger, however, isn’t just “any superstar.” He is a phenomenon. At times he is nearly a force of nature - terrifyingly unstoppable. And like any storm or disturbance in nature, the only thing you can do is get out of his way.

It is Tiger’s Saturday round that will etch itself forever in the memory of the sport and those who witnessed it. You know you have seen something special when sportscasters simply give up trying to explain what was just seen and drop all efforts to describe it, to cover it in cliches or superlatives. Woods’ back nine on Saturday will simply stand on its own with no hyperbole possible or necessary - a testament to talent and courage that will live as long as sport itself.

Once again Woods started off a round poorly, finding himself 3 over par after 4 holes and dropping back in the pack to +1. He got back to even par with a nice birdie on #7 but fell back a stroke once again on 12. Woods was beginning to grimace after some swings. Obviously his surgically repaired knee was giving him some trouble.

On the par 5 13th, Woods drive went way to the right ending up near a concession tent. Given relief because of a TV tower that was in the way, Woods made the most of his break, smacking a 5-iron 240 yards on to the green. It appeared that with a two putt, Woods would get a stroke back with the birdie. Tiger had other ideas.

Standing over his putt 66 feet away from the hole, Tiger gently stroked the treacherous triple breaking downhill putt and watched as it snaked one way, came back another way, and finally broke again heading right toward the center of the hole, disappearing into the cup with a satisfying rattle for an eagle. The crowd went wild and Tiger fist-pumped his way to the next tee.

Unfortunately, the next hole saw Tiger give a stroke back to the field as his knee, now obviously hindering his swing, caused two wayward shots. The look on Woods face every time he prepared to shoot was not dissimilar to a man preparing to walk on hot coals. At that point, it was a question whether Woods would be able to make it through the last three holes.

After a par on the 16th, Tiger’s tee shot on 17 went wildly to the right. The pain in his knee almost caused Woods to collapse on the tee and he walked gingerly down the fairway. His second shot from 220 yards found the rough on the downslope of the green on the left side with a tricky downhill pitch to come.

By his own admission, Woods hit the ball too hard. It came out of the rough “hot” but took one bounce, hit the flag stick, and dove into the hole as if a magnet pulled it there. The improbable birdie had Woods smiling in embarrassment. He was fully aware that if the ball had not hit the flag, it would have been 10 feet past the cup.

That miracle shot gave him an aggregate score for the tournament of -1, just one shot off the lead. But his second shot from the 17th had proved costly. The knee was a constant source of discomfort due to the tremendous torque Woods initiated on his lower body when swinging.

So Woods adapted to the pain. On the 18th tee, he slightly altered his stance, opening his hips so that they now were at a 45 degree angle to the target rather than 90 degrees. This allowed his upper body to do most of the heavy lifting on his swing but also caused the ball to “cut” or veer hard to the right when struck. Woods compensated his aim perfectly, driving a ball 300 yards to the perfect spot on the fairway. His knee still bothered him but evidently, the pain was bearable if he swung the club this way.

His second shot was an absolute thing of beauty. Using the same technique, he powered a 5-wood 260 yards - a real moon shot that went over the water hazard and landed on the green about 40 feet from the cup leaving another treacherous, multi-breaking downhill putt for eagle.

Woods started his putt about 6 feet to the left of the hole, barely striking the ball because the garage floor-like greens at Torrey Pines make it impossible to hit the putt aggressively. The ball took nearly 8 seconds to curl right, veer left, and then straighten out, once again disappearing into the hole for an eagle which not only gave Tiger the lead in the tournament but gave sports fans everywhere a day to remember for all time.

Those days are special. Aaron’s 715th. Jack’s last Masters win at age 45. Mac’s last US Open run. Petty at Daytona. Gibbie’s homer on a gimpy leg. We remember these days because they featured athletes who inspired us and demonstrated an almost otherworldly talent, courage, and grace under the most trying of competitive circumstances. Tiger’s back nine at Torrey Pines is there now, safely put away in memory to be pulled out and admired again and again when we wish to be reminded of the meaning of greatness.

Thanks for the memories, Tiger…