Right Wing Nut House

This is getting annoying as hell.

Conservatives trying to make the case that the Holocaust Museum shooter James von Brunn is some kind of liberal or leftist sympathizer are tilting at windmills:

So I guess the obvious question is this: if von Brunn were looking for a mainstream political activism site on which to broadcast his views to the largest number of likeminded individuals (or individuals susceptible to coming around to his point of view), would he find a warmer reception at RedState, or DailyKos? I submit that the answer to this question might be a far more useful metric of von Brunn’s political leanings than the baseless assumption propounded by unthinking leftists that because von Brunn is a racist, he must be a right-winger.

That’s just one of a series of blog posts that is raising questions about von Brunn’s ideology and trying frantically to transfer the killer’s core beliefs to the left.

Von Brunn is indeed a right winger - a far, far, out in the boondocks, beyond belief, wild eyed, drooling extremist of a right winger - but a right winger nonetheless. My post yesterday that briefly questioned his “right wing Christian” credentials was silly in retrospect, although identifying him as a “Christianist” is incorrect. And if you read the post, you will notice that this meme was a very small part of my overall criticism of the left’s politically motivated attack on conservatives.

Anti-Semitism may be a disease that afflicts liberals as well as conservatives. And racism on the left is not unknown as anyone who has ever read the brutal and nauseating racial attacks on Michelle Malkin can testify.

But this guy was identified by the FBI two decades ago as a far right whacko. The idea that he’s changed his stripes in the intervening years is ridiculous and only makes those who are trying to hit back against leftist smears of all conservatives by trying to mis-identify where this guy is coming from ideologically do no service to the truth or to conservatives.

I will freely grant this this guy is a man of the extreme right. To posit the notion, as many on the left have been doing the last few days, that this guy has any connection whatsoever either in his philosophy or ideology with mainstream conservatism is ludicrous. It is equally fanciful to blame “right wing hate speech” emanating supposedly from mainstream conservative media outlets for this guy’s actions. The idea that von Brunn needed any motivation at all beyond his sick, twisted, personal extremist ideology and whatever demons possessed him ignores reality - about what we’ve come to expect from the “reality based community.”

By the same token, desperately seeking a way to disown von Brunn because the left has seen fit to smear all conservatives with his racist, anti-Semitic stench is equally ludicrous. We don’t have to disown him. It is self evident to any rational, semi-fair minded person that this guy had as much to do with mainstream politics as a member of the Black Panther party or some other far out, whacko leftist group. To think otherwise is to believe nonsense. To think that anything said by a mainstream conservative set this guy off and contributed to his rampage is equally bogus. The only people who believe that are those who are pre-disposed to believe the worst about conservatives. And nothing anyone says will change their idiotic, exaggerated, hysterical notions about the mainstream right.

So give it a rest - both sides. This is one of these issues where liberals and conservatives are only looking silly by bandying about ridiculous ideas that don’t convince anyone except those who already harbor the same views. Taking a dump into a water well just to hear the turds echo when they hit bottom is a pastime for village idiots, not supposedly rational political opponents.

Your government has just taken a gigantic step toward regulating your life in ways that today, can only dimly be understood.

The senate passed a bill yesterday giving the Food and Drug Administration the power to “limit nicotine in the cigarettes that kill nearly a half-million people a year, to drastically curtail ads that glorify tobacco and to ban flavored products aimed at spreading the habit to young people.”

Sounds great, eh? The New York Times thinks so:

After more than a decade of struggle — and countless smoking-related deaths — the Senate overwhelmingly approved a bill on Thursday that gives the Food and Drug Administration the power to regulate tobacco products. The House approved a similar bill in April, also by an overwhelming margin. The days when this rogue industry could inflict its harmful products on Americans with impunity are drawing to a close.

This is an enormous victory for public health. For that, we owe thanks to tireless advocacy by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, a nonprofit organization, and strong endorsements from medical groups.

A “rogue industry?” An “enormous victory for public health?” All this just to keep tobacco products out of the hands of our children?

Not exactly:

It still might not have passed without the decision by Philip Morris, the industry leader, to accept regulation. The company apparently believes it can thrive better under regulation than its competitors, who complain that it will now be much harder for them to introduce new products to challenge Philip Morris’s dominance.

The bill is not perfect. It will not allow the F.D.A. to ban cigarettes or nicotine — a concession made years ago to avoid drawing intense opposition from smokers and free-market advocates. But the agency will still have far-reaching powers.

Yes, the New York Times likes nothing better than granting any government agency “far reaching powers.” And cheering on the monopolistic practices of Philip Morris and their cynical acceptance of regulation so that they have a leg up on their competitors is truly public spirited legislation, don’t ya think?

It’s just too bad that the cowardly bastards didn’t have the guts to do what their weeping, wailing, emotionally charged rhetoric about the dangers of cigarettes to kids would lead one to believe they support; a total ban on the growing, manufacture, sale, and use of tobacco products. Even the Times admits they are cowards, terrified of facing the wrath of smokers and free market supporters. But if the product is that dangerous - and it is - by allowing this hypocrisy to continue, Congress and the feds are complicit in the deaths of half a million smokers a year, at least by their reasoning. If they can regulate the product in ways that almost no other product in America is regulated, they can certainly ban it. If nicotine is going to be classifed as a “dangerous drug,” then why not ban it the same way that crack cocaine or heroin is banned?

The fact is, the government cares more about the tax money they are getting from smokers than the citizens who are dying as a result of using the products. And every time they make a move like this and say “it’s for the kids” I am going to call them out on their hypocrisy.

It’s not about “the kids.” It’s about power; the power to regulate, control, and influence the lives of private citizens. And it’s only the beginning.

You might be nodding in satisfaction at the fact that the government can tax smokers who have freely chosen to light up into penury. Many of you may even find satisfaction in the way local municipalities have violated the property rights of smokers by banning smoking in their own condos or apartments. Perhaps many of you think nothing of banning smoking in one’s personal auto. And who cares if a municipality wants to ban smokers from lighting up in their own back yard?

Not my ox being gored, right? Wrong. What the Obama has in store for you smug, self righteous, anti-smoking zealots will make what the government has done to smokers pale in comparison.

Man, I am going to do a sack dance when the health Nazis Obama has hired start coming after you:

Don’t be fooled by the presidential burger runs. Obama and Congress are moving across several fronts to give government a central role in making America healthier — raising expectations among public health experts of a new era of activism unlike any before.

Any health care reform plan that Obama signs is almost certain to call for nutrition counseling, obesity screenings and wellness programs at workplaces and community centers. He wants more time in the school day for physical fitness, more nutritious school lunches and more bike paths, walking paths and grocery stores in underserved areas.

The president is filling top posts at Health and Human Services with officials who, in their previous jobs, outlawed trans fats, banned public smoking or required restaurants to provide a calorie count with that slice of banana cream pie.

Even Congress is getting into the act, giving serious consideration to taxing sugary drinks and alcohol to help pay for the overhaul.

To some, it smacks of a “nanny state on steroids” — but for others who fret that America is turning into one big Overeaters Anonymous meeting, Obama’s prescription is like a low-fat dream come true.

Sounds great, doesn’t it? Obama is welcoming into his administration the exact same fanatics we have been calling “health Nazis” or “health nannies” for the last 25 years. He is enabling an assault on personal freedom the likes of which have never been seen in America.

Granting the FDA power to regulate tobacco companies is only the beginning. While HHS will handle the administration of the national health care program, the FDA will become the strong right arm of the government, clubbing the food industry into changing what we eat, and bullying consumers into eating “healthy.” Why? Because the government will see this as one of the primary ways to bring down the cost of health care. Cramming “healthy” food down the throats of citizens will be an easy way to reduce the use of health services - so the thinking goes.

How far will they go? Well, certainly taxing “inappropriate” food products will be first on the list. The government needs money obviously, and what better way to get it than to make a soda as expensive as cigarettes? How about $5 for a Twinkie?” Ice cream will be a luxury item. Gone from parties will be chips and dip, foie gras (already banned in Chicago restuarants), crackers and cheese. Otherwise, hostesses will have to take out a second mortgage just to get the money to fund their soirees.

After the taxes will come the minute examination of ingredients. Trans fat will be out, of course. Most preservatives will be a thing of the past (eat quickly). Food dyes? Uh-uh. A trip to the grocery store will become a regimented activity.

Exaggerations? I think mostly yes. At least in the near future. But who knows what justifications the government will use 10 years from now? Or 20? This is a classic slippery slope and to believe that people who have advocated the most draconian measures to control the lives of individuals when it comes to their idea of “health” won’t take advantage of the enormous power the Obama administration is granting them, is a pipe dream. Given the frightening deficits over the next 10 years, who knows how high the taxes will go on products the government deems aren’t “good for you?”

If nothing else, as bureaucrats, they will follow the long standing dictum that in order to continue to receive increases in funding, they have to prove they are needed. This leads to all sorts of bureaucratic mischief as we have seen in the past with other agencies, other departments.

Yes, it is petty and childish of me to look forward to the day when those who have approved of government restrictions on the individual freedom of smokers get their comeuppance. But if you would have been forced to put up with the crap I have had to just to enjoy a perfectly legal product that I choose to use, you might be a little more understanding.

Note: A word about the false premise that smokers drive up the cost of health care and therefore, increased taxes are necessary. Actuarial figures show that smokers live almost 20 years less than non smokers. Because of that, health care dollars spent on non smokers during their lifetime far exceed the amount spent during a smoker’s lifetime.

And if that were justification, why not tax and regulate alcohol the same way - a drug even more addictive than crack cocaine, heroin, or nicotine? The social problems caused by alcohol alone far exceed the amount of money that the state spends on the effects of smoking. Broken families, battered wives, child abuse, crime, homelessness - the list goes on and on. But the government will never tax alcohol as high as cigarettes because distributors are huge contributors to political campaigns of both parties.

This is about power and hypocrisy - not health or the kids.

James von Brunn, an 88 year old Holocaust denying, Jew baiting, racist crazy shot and killed a security guard yesterday at the Holocaust Museum in Washington while wounding another.

Debbie Wilgoren of the Washington Post has the details:

The suspect, identified by law enforcement sources as James W. von Brunn, 88, of Annapolis, was said to be a longtime, “hard-core” supremacist whose Internet writings contain extensive, poisonous ravings against Jews and African Americans. The slain guard, Stephen T. Johns, 39, of Temple Hills, worked for the Wackenhut security company and had been employed at the museum for six years, the museum said.

Officials at George Washington University Hospital, where von Brunn, Johns and an unidentified victim with less serious injuries were taken, said Johns suffered a gunshot wound to the chest and died there. Von Brunn was shot in the face, and the bullet exited his neck, according to a high-ranking police source. He underwent surgery and was in critical condition last night.

Police recovered a notebook in the suspect’s possession that apparently contained a list of District locations, including Washington National Cathedral. Police bomb squads were sent to at least 10 sites.

Evidently, even though von Brunn is identified as a “right wing Christian,” he didn’t have much use for them either. Or Neocons. Or Bush.

Some “right wing” Christian.

According to the left, it’s the right’s fault - specifically, the tea party movement. Or “hate speech.” Or Christian fundamentalism. Or simply because conservatives enjoy killing people.

I don’t know about you but I am getting good and gol’ durned sick and tired of the left playing armchair psychiatrist after every political-type shooting. They way they tell it, von Brunn had a vision of the tea parties in his mind when he pulled the trigger.

They come to the dubious conclusion that it is the fault of conservatives by reading a story in a newspaper. They then diagnose the crazy’s actions as being influenced or even encouraged by conservative “hate speech.” That’s right, they come to a psychological conclusion of what was going on in this lunatic’s mind by reading about the killer in a newspaper story or two.

Reality based community? Give me a break.

They come to this brilliant psychological conclusion by “connecting the dots.” Shooter is “obviously” a conservative. Conservatives are “anti-govrenment.” Hence, the reason the shooter opened fire was because he was influenced by conservative harangues against government.

This kind of dot connecting is simple minded idiocy. If life was about connecting dots, we’d be born with pencils for fingers and a child’s puzzle book for brains. It is an abducto ad absurdum argument where the conclusion is pre-determined - conservatives are at fault - and “logic” is churned and churned, reducing an enormously complex thing like the motivations of a killer to a much too simple, biased, equation that any professional psychologist would dismiss as nonsense.

What was happening in this guy’s life that finally set him off? Was he clinically insane? Did he hear voices? Was he clinically depressed? What was the basis for his unreasoning hatred of Jews and blacks? How was his overall health? Did he recently lose someone close to him? (At age 88, the chances of that happening are pretty good.)

We must remember that when the left goes off on this track, it is not to illuminate reasons for the crime but rather it is done for the political purpose of trashing the opposition. That kind of biased thinking alone should discredit any attempt they make to seriously analyze the motivations of the killer.

Here’s the liberal Southern Poverty Law Center on the possible motivations of von Brunn:

“This is a longtime white supremacist and anti-Semite approaching the end of his life who may have decided to go out shooting,” said Mark Potok, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center, a nonprofit group in Alabama that tracks right-wing extremists.

No mention of conservative hate speech or the tea party, or any anti-government rhetoric by the right. Why? Because it may very well be - and this is at least equally as plausible a reason von Brunn opened fire - that the killer wanted to kill himself by forcing the guards to defend themselves.

“Suicide by cop” is actually much more common than many people think. Unable to pull the trigger themselves, the unbalanced killer actively seeks out a confrontation with the police in order to have them help him commit suicide. This study (10 years old) discovered that as many as 1 in 10 shootings by LA county sheriffs alone were the result of suspects wanting the police to end his life.

In the absence of any evidence or psychological profile that could guide a rational analysis of this tragedy, it makes sense that the above motivation has equal - perhaps superior merit to the nonsense spouted by the left. But rational analysis does not take into account the political motivations of those who would stand on the backs of tragedy for the mundane purpose of scoring points against their political enemies.

Of course, rationality makes little difference to the left. Everything they can use as a tool to bash the opposition - even scurrilous, nonsensical memes like this - are fair game. So let them make idiots of themselves by playing armchair psychiatrist. Serious people don’t pay any attention anyway.

This blog post originally appeared in The American Thinker.

I don’t quite know where I’m going with this so let’s just start a free form, free association post on ass-hat conservatives and childish Republicans.

Yes, here I go again. And again. I don’t care if the left “does the same thing” or that criticizing and riding conservatives whose appalling antics make me cringe in embarrassment for even being associated with such schlock artists causes some of you to explode with indignation that I won’t play ball with “the team” and spout idiocies about how wonderful the public face of the GOP and conservatism is. I am not in the business of excusing the stupidity of anyone - right or left.

If you take the time to peruse the nearly 3,000 posts on this blog you will note that my criticism of the left for their tactics and behavior is, if anything, more hyperbolic, more sarcastically bombastic than almost anything I say about righties. My liberal-bashing credentials are as sound as anyone’s and I defy anyone on the right to say otherwise.

In short, I am an equal opportunity purveyor of snarky goodness. Right, left, center - doesn’t matter. Do something or say something idiotic and I have no qualms of calling you out for it. If you guys haven’t realized that by now, I don’t know what else I can do to convince you.

Be that as it may, Jon Henke, as levelheaded a politico (and conservative) that you’ll find anywhere, wrote last Friday at Next Right:

Many of the most prominent voices in the Republican Party appear determined to behave like children.

At some point, Republicans have got to start demanding their leaders behave like adults instead of demagogues and buffoons.  We need at least one grownup party.

Those links lead to (in order):

* a Steve Benen blog post on Hannity telling his viewers that the president “decided to give 9/11 sympathizers a voice on the world stage,” by saying during his Cairo address “I am aware that there are still some that would question or even justify the events of 9/11.”

*Senator Inhofe calling Obama’s Cairo address “un-American.”

* Michael Steele, guest hosting for Bill Bennett had this to say about “Sotomayor: “God Help You If You’re A White Male Coming Before Her Bench.”

First, how Obama making mention of the wide-spread belief (especially in Egypt) in the Arab world that the 9/11 attacks were carried out by Israel or the CIA could possibly be construed as “giving 9/11 sympathizers a voice” is just plain stupid. In fact, in one of the few strong parts of the speech, Obama said belief in such conspiracy theories about 9/11 was an Arab fantasy:

But let us be clear: Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 people on that day. The victims were innocent men, women and children from America and many other nations who had done nothing to harm anybody. And yet al Qaeda chose to ruthlessly murder these people, claimed credit for the attack, and even now states their determination to kill on a massive scale. They have affiliates in many countries and are trying to expand their reach. These are not opinions to be debated; these are facts to be dealt with.”

A sincere thank you to the president for standing up and saying what needed to be said to those ignorant, conspiracy mongering anti-Semites in the region.

Hannity is as bad as any Media Matters flunkie who consistently takes what conservatives say out of context in order to make it appear that the right eats babies in the morning, rapes virgins in the afternoon, and tops off the day by lynching black people at night.

I’m supposed to be proud to be associated with someone who utters such monstrously misconstrued, patently false statements as Hannity - a true cotton candy conservative with about as much intellectual heft as helium balloon? The fact that he does it on a regular basis and is cheered on by many on the right is even more depressing.

And what about Senator Inhofe? Here’s a conservative who is standing athwart history yelling “stop” at the sun, demanding it not rise. His campaign to promote conspiracy theories about global warming is an embarrassment to anyone who values open debate and respect for the scientific process. I can understand the desire to push back against those whose climate sensibilities are informed by a left wing political agenda. But spouting ignorant nonsense about climate change doesn’t advance the cause and, in fact, has set back the campaign by skeptics to get at least some of the science re-evaluated. He is reckless in that he constantly gets his facts wrong. Advocates for sanity on Climate Change like him, we don’t need.

It is one thing for some internet hack to accuse the president of being “un-American.” It is quite another when a United States senator says the same thing. I tire of trying to explain that Obama’s liberalism demands that he bring America down, airing our dirty laundry to the world, exposing America’s “sins” (as he sees it).

He loves America in a different way than conservatives. Does that delegitimize it? I can’t find the words to describe how idiotic it is to believe that one’s patriotism is more heartfelt than another’s, as if love of country is something that can be quantified or measured. Criticizing America is not the same as hating it - period. Anyone who has ever taken a high school freshman course in history could tell you there is plenty to criticize in our past and anyone who is aware of the post World War II activities of the CIA can also find much fault with the actions of our country. Does that mean we should love it any less? Does that mean that someone who sees these transgressions, these black marks against us, and talks about them is necessarily “un-American?”

I personally find it offensive that Obama feels the need to run around the world talking about our mistakes without, at the same time, extolling our many virtues with equal fervor. By doing so, he plays into the hands of the anti-Americans who like nothing better than to have their nonsensical views of America validated. Obama is wrong - not un-American. And Inhofe is a cretin for saying otherwise.

Finally, what to say about GOP chairman Steele and his ignorant statement that white males will need God’s help if they are luckless enough to appear before Judge Sotomayor after she is confirmed as a Supreme Court Justice? Yes, it’s over the top. Yes, it’s idiotic based on her record (Ricci aside which, as many have already pointed out, denied a couple of Hispanics promotion in the fire department as well). And yes, the statement by Steele is an insult - just like when a liberal calls a conservative a racist.

I oppose Sotomayor’s nomination because I believe she is undistinguished as a judge, her selection was identity politics played to the hilt, and her beliefs about federal judges making law is contrary to the constitutional principles on which America was founded.

But she is not a racist - although she appears to dwell on the issue of race quite a bit. And there is no evidence whatsoever in her 10 year career on the federal bench that white people are treated any differently than people of color. If Steele had bothered to read anything about her instead of spouting talking points, he would certainly find much to criticize without intimating that she’s some Hispanic version of Al Sharpton or David Duke.

Finally, for some real Blowhardiness, Jay Severin wins the cuckoo prize. The Boston area talk show host has just returned from “indefinite” suspension for some remarks he made on air about Mexicans:

The proximate cause of Severin’s latest banishment was a fusillade of intemperate remarks that he made about Mexican immigrants, whom he labeled “leeches,” “primitives” and “criminaliens.” Hospital emergency rooms, he said, have become “essentially condos for Mexicans.” He also blamed, in the midst of the national hysteria over swine flu, our neighbors south of the Border for bringing disease into the United States. “In addition to venereal disease and the other leading exports of Mexico — women with mustaches and VD — now we have swine flu.”

But this was not the first time that Severin, a former political consultant to Pat Buchanan, had made disgusting comments about a whole group of people on his WTKK radio show. In a 2004 conversation with a caller about whether the United States should “befriend Muslims,” Severin retorted, “You think we should befriend them; I think we should kill them.” How’s that for a foreign policy!

Yeah, but liberals say worse stuff, ya know.

Hard to imagine, that. Liberals only say that kind of stuff about Republicans - usually. Letterman’s poisonous hatred of Sarah Palin (and the rest of the media’s apparent belief that you can say any kind of vileness about the Alaska governor and not have to make a trip to the penalty box because whatever you can come up with, Democrats have already said worse) is certainly worthy of stern disapprobation. But Severin’s rants against entire ethnic groups and religions are sublime in their utter disregard for rational discourse and revealing of a petty, small minded, ignorant worldview.

One of my favorite movie quotes is from Gettysburg where the “tough old Mick” sargeant Buster Killrain is talking to Colonel Chamberlain about black sufferage and whether it’s a good idea.

“Only a peawit judges by the group.”

Thank you Buster.

We knew this sort of thing was possible the moment we laid eyes on him. The strong chin, thrust upward with a serene confidence that melted our hearts. The eyes - so open and honest that we could see into his soul (as he could see into ours). The smile with impossibly white teeth that lifts one up whenever his steady gaze meets our unworthy eyes - and suddenly, you feel almost worthy, as if granted a gift from on high.

And what about those pecs, eh? It’s not enough our God-thing be the smartest, the most gentle, the most courageous being in the universe. He’s also sexy as hell and causes men to contemplate same sex marriage and women to dream of bearing his children after torrid, sweaty, multi-orgasmic lovemaking under a waterfall or on a deserted beach.

All this pales in comparison to what The Lightworker can do when he opens his mouth, expelling a fresh air that smells like peppermint (except after he’s eaten garlic and then it smells like daffodils), and his beautiful mouth forms words that can cause the sun to rise and set, move mountains, cause the tide to recede heal the sick, raise the dead (even the gooey ones who have been deceased a while), and melt the hearts of the wicked.

His recent speech to our brothers and sisters who worship Allah and sadly, have no Lightworker to guide them, is a beautiful example of how the planet has changed since Barack Obama (PBUH) alighted from his chariot in Washington to save us. Our Barack generously offered to share himself with the Mohammedans and heal their hearts of hatred by uttering soothing words of brotherhood and love.

The result? An amazing transformation in Lebanon! A miracle! Oh ye of little faith who doubt the Lightworker’s power, look upon his work in the Levant and be amazed!

With idiot conservatives questioning the point of making a stirring, beautiful speech to win over the hearts and minds in the Muslim world, it looks like those efforts to nudge public opinion are already bearing fruit:

An American-backed alliance appeared to retain control of the Lebanese Parliament on Sunday in a hotly contested election that had been billed as a showdown between Tehran and Washington for influence in the Middle East.

Preliminary results reported on Lebanese television showed the alliance, known as the March 14 coalition, had managed to preserve its majority in Parliament. If those results are confirmed, they would represent a significant and unexpected defeat for Hezbollah and its allies, Iran and Syria. Most polls had showed a tight race, but one in which the Hezbollah-led group would win.

So wooing minds in the Muslim world has helped tip an election towards a pro-western coalition in a notoriously divided Lebanon.

When I try to sometimes wrap my head around what about conservative thinking bothers me so much, it comes down to this:

conservatives care more about means than ends.

This case is the perfect example. The end in this particular foreign policy issue is weaken the strength of violent extremest forces in islamic countries. Obama thinks that by opening up dialogue with the region and improving America’s image in those countries is the best way to achieve that end.

But conservatives aren’t really interested if that end is achieved. They are more interested in having means that look cool on TV and that satisfy a gut emotional craving to just do something, goddamit, like making the Bagdad sky light up with the force of American airpower. Anything short of that just isn’t getting the job done, because something in their minds lacks the capacity to make the cognitive leap that soft power can sometimes be much better at achieving the end they profess to care about.

Obama just achieved a significant end, and conservative heads are exploding because they just cannot compute how. I can’t wait to see their reaction when the Iranians toss out Ahmadinejad in a week.

Ho-Ho! Soon, another target for our Lightworker’s incredible, miraculous powers will be revealed as the Persian hordes will transmogrify into lambs before our eyes and turn their faces away from the temptations of building map wiping weapons to use against the Hebrews. We can be sure that the 7th century peasants who know no better, will vote to to displace the angry elf Ahmadinejad not because he has destroyed the economy but because the calm visage of our Lightworker will magically appear before their eyes while they are casting their vote and they will experience the light of truth, justice, and the way of the Great Soul who guides us and tells us what to do.

Our Lightworker’s magic voice - so mellifluous, so achingly seductive, it can cause the Sirens to throw themselves into the sea, frantic and desperate to reach HIM - placed a spell on the well meaning but ignorant cave dwellers and goat herders in the Lebanese electorate and, without them even being aware of any internal political considerations whatsoever, wondrously caused them to vote for the American backed forces while forgetting all about the Hezzies.

For all of my misgivings about President Obama’s Thursday speech in Cairo, I have to admit that the first mass response from an Arab body politic was more than I had hoped for…and more than I expected.

[...]

Had Hezbollah won the balloting, the results it would have heaped scorn on the president’s address. It the court of measurable Arab public opinion the tally is 1-0, our side wins.

It’s the same trick he used on us and it worked fantastically.

Is there nothing he can’t do? Might it be possible that he is - dare I say it - more than a man?

Reagan was all about America, and you talked about it. Obama is ‘we are above that now.’ We’re not just parochial, we’re not just chauvinistic, we’re not just provincial. We stand for something – I mean in a way Obama’s standing above the country, above – above the world, he’s sort of God.

And lest there be any doubt that this is an opinion formed by a partisan, the words of this Frenchmen ring equally true:

When dining out Saturday night at a no-star bistro, La Fontaine de Mars, the presidential party was served water, Coke and table wine to accompany foie gras, lamb and steak with shallots, and paid for meals “like any client,” said owner Jacques Boudon. “It’s just what they wanted.”

“And I think they were very happy since they stayed three-quarters of an hour after dining,” he said by telephone.

Boudon was over the moon.

The table had been reserved 10 days earlier but he only knew his guests were the Obamas that morning.

“I saw God before me,” he said, “because I saw this smile that a million people have seen around the world. I saw her (Michelle) radiant.

Another God sighting, this time in the Land of the Frogs. And his saintly companion and partner, whose rap can bring down the thunder or tame the savage beast, watches over us with a benign presence and bare armed beauty. She is mother to us all. Wife, lover, mistress, same sex partner, and harlot - Ambassador to the Masses. She is Gaia’s secret agent. She is All. And she completes our Lightworker so completely that while it might seem impossible he needs completing she nevertheless is completely complete in her ability to, well, complete him.

First Lebanon, then Iran. What other historic, extraordinary feats of love and statecraft can our Lighworker achieve? Will he magically remove the scales from the eyes of the One Whose Name We Always Get Mixed Up With His, causing a transformation so profound that he Whose Name We Always Get Mixed Up With His will order his construction companies to rebuild the towers - for free? With Barack, anything is possible, any dream can come true. We live in an age where miracles are mundane and feats of legerdemain commonplace. They will look back on this time 10 million years from now in awestruck wonder that such a one as HE, of flesh and bone, actually walked the earth.

Now if he can only figure out how to fix the economy…

UPDATE

Hey! Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe Obama’s speech did indeed affect the election in Lebanon.

Of course, not quite the way the Lightworker’s drooling sycophants would have us believe:

Michael Ledeen:

Second, I cannot help thinking that the Lebanese learned something from Obama’s Cairo speech (and Bush’s second term), namely that they cannot rely on the United States to confront terrorists like Hezbollah. They, and others all over the area, are going to have to do a lot of their own fighting, and take their own chances, even though they know they cannot count on American support.

We already abandoned Lebanon once. When Saddam invaded Kuwait, RealPolitik demanded that we entice President Assad to join us by giving Syria a free hand in Lebanon. The rape, theft, murder, and domination of Lebanon that followed wasn’t entirely our fault but we had a big hand in letting it happen.

No doubt, Obama’s “pragmatism” in Cairo brought back painful memories for some Lebanese.

I am writing an in-depth piece for Pajamas Media on the speech but I wanted to get some thoughts down while some of them were fresh in my mind.

I saw the speech this morning and just finished reading the transcript. My initial impression from watching it was, I believe, correct; it was a very good speech with some eye popping assumptions that were just plain false, a glossing over of some points that needed to be hit harder, and a troubling lack of candor about the Muslim world regarding extremism that he either believes or deliberately failed to address.

Positive parts of the speech were that he did indeed tell the Muslim world some things they needed to hear: Denial that al-Qaeda carried out the attacks of 9/11 and the reality of the Holocaust are two subjects that are absolutely essential for the Muslim world to accept before any progress can be made. I think he also said some things that we in the west needed to hear about Islam although that part of his speech will fall on deaf ears in this country. Those predisposed to believe the worst about Islam and Muslims will not change (and that goes double for the other side).

I also thought Obama gave a good defense of our invasion of Afghanistan - something we should be reminding Pakistan of every day. And while I wish he would have hit the Iranian nuclear problem much harder, he laid out the consequences of an Iranian bomb realistically and without bombast. What he can do about it is another story.

He said some nice things about religious freedom and the democratic aspirations of all people on the planet. But Bush had been saying basically the same thing for years. And as far as religious freedom, his dubious claim of tolerance for other religions by Islam either proves his naivete or he has been misinformed about Christian persecution in Islamic lands.

His suggestive rhetoric that we are “imposing” democracy on Iraq or Afghanistan was pretty strange. While the Iraqi constitution borrowed some western concepts, it is much more beholden to Arab and Islamic practices than western-style government. I don’t recall anywhere in the US Constitution where it says the Koran inspires the law as it does in the Iraqi document.

Besides, should we have “imposed” another dictatorship on the Iraqis instead? I see no evidence that we were seeking to impose our values or culture on the Iraqis either. Just where this “imposing democracy” line came from would be a mystery except that is standard leftist tripe going back to Viet Nam.

He said almost nothing about government corruption (”stealing from the people”) when most citizens in the Middle East view the issue as one of the major problems in their countries. And he was virtually silent about separation of church from state. This was understandable but a truly brave speech would have addressed the issue head on. Islam is not incompatible with modernity but when governments use its traditions and teachings to control the people, impede economic development, stifle free speech, and maintain power, it becomes a dead weight on realizing progress toward a free, open, and prosperous society.

Stylistically, I thought the speech was near brilliant. It was extremely well organized, and the segues from topic to topic were rhetorically smooth and logical. It was both easy to follow if you were watching and easy to read.

The rhetoric was flowery without being obnoxious. Obama’s speeches have a tendency to take rhetorical flight and have trouble coming in for a landing sometimes. He avoided that pitfall by carefully crafting imagery that was substantive and somewhat subdued. The tone was at times hectoring - almost like a teacher scolding a class. But there was much beauty in the language and he mostly succeeded in walking the line between preaching and conversation.

There were many specific passages that will be taken out of context to attack the speech - many of them justified in my opinion. His belief that no one country should dominate in this brave new world is nonsense - unless he intends to deliberately subsume American interests to please other countries and the United Nations. You can bet the Russians and the Chinese were laughing at that passage. They have no intention of not acting in their vital interests - even if the world condemns them for it - as they seek to match or supplant America as the dominant power on the planet.

Was it a great speech? I subscribe to Theodore H. White’s view of what makes a great speech where three elements have to be present for a political speech to achieve immortality. First, the moment in time must amplify the words spoken. Since Obama’s Cairo address had no dramatic event or backdrop, that alone would disqualify it from being considered with even the top 100 American speeches much less being analogous to several of Churchill’s ringing addresses.

But the other factors that White believed made a great speech - the place the address is given and the words themselves, which should be great both spoken and read - came close to being fulfilled with Obama’s address. Martin Luther King speaking when he did and where he did acted as a gigantic megaphone for his words. Certainly Obama’s address will receive wide play around the world and the fact that he delivered it in a Muslim country will amplify the message . And the words in the speech itself will be seen in a context that guarantees the address will live beyond the daily news cycle.

In short, a good speech that could have been braver.

UPDATE

There’s a lot of good commentary both right and left. Ignore the politically motivated on both sides and concentrate on independent analysis.

On the right, Ed Morrissey and Christopher Preble of Cato have reasoned analysis. On the left, Peter Daou has an interesting critique. But the reality is, most on the right are trashing it and most on the left either believe it the second coming of the Sermon on the Mount or take great delight in linking to righties trashing the speech.

Conor Friedersdorf receiving some words of wisdom from one of his many strawmen.

A few days ago when the Levin/Dreher/Friedersdorf war was waging at various points around the internet, I wanted to weigh in on it to defend Conor Friedersdorf from charges by some that he was just some youthful lightweight whose attacks on Levin for suggesting a woman’s husband put a gun to his head for being married to such a dolt were misguided and ignorant of the “context” found on conservative talk radio.

After reading this piece at The American Scene by Mr. Friedersdorf, I’m glad I didn’t.

I have given up trying to understand why conservatives place such importance on what comes out of the mouths of pop righties like Levin whose shtick, while entertaining, is taken far too seriously by way too many. Fine. Color me a old fuddy duddy but it used to be conservatives were perfectly able to find inspiration and guidance from genuine thinkers or even thoughtful politicians. I suppose every mass movement needs its popularizers and celebrities these days (I recall the guff astronomer Carl Sagan endured from his colleagues for trying to make extraordinarily complex concepts accessible to minds less scientifically inclined - like mine). But really now, must we elevate to hero status people whose claim to fame is that they can savage the opposition in more colorful and amusing ways than some other shock jock?

Yes, yes, I know that Rush, Levin, and the rest do more than simply make liberals look like idiots, and even dangerous idiots at times. They also dispense conservative wisdom - or, at least what their adoring fans believe is wisdom. Mark me down as unimpressed with most of these shock jocks forays into the realm of conservative ideas. Listening to Limbaugh sometimes reminds me of my best friend John when I was in high school who didn’t read Moby Dick, or The Red Badge of Courage, or any of the classics assigned in literature class but instead bought the comic book version, usually on the morning of the test. Needless to say, he passed the exam but lost out on the richness of Melville’s prose and Crane’s towering anger at the waste of war.

I like a good verbal slap at liberals as much as the next conservative but why must it degenerate into the kind of crude vulgarities used by Levin et al? In the race for ratings, the more inventive the invective, the more friendly that Arbitron meter becomes, I guess.

At any rate, I agreed with Friedersdorf that Levin stepped over the line and should have been smacked down for it. But when a young man like Friedersdorf comes up with a shockingly ill conceived post like this one on “terror hawks” and how Obama could use the same excuses used by Bush to start going after anti-abortion activists, I am glad my support for his arguments against Levin was never put in a post.

This piece has a double dose of straw men, a generous dollop of reductio ad absurdom argumentation, with a heaping pile of manure for desert.

First, what’s with this?

The attack on Dr. Tiller is widely referred to as “terrorism” in the blogosphere. Agree or not, it is easy to image an ongoing terrorist campaign run by fringe pro-lifers to shut down abortion clinics. Heaven forbid that this recent murder is followed by bombings at a few Planned Parenthood locations, but that scenario isn’t unthinkable — copycat atrocities are a sad fact of modern life.

“Easy to image” an “ongoing terrorist campaign” carried out by fanatical pro lifers in a scenario that “isn’t unthinkable? No, it’s not easy to imagine and barely thinkable (Dismissing the possibility entirely cannot be done but “easy to imagine” it is not.) In fact, one would have to deliberately ignore history to imagine anything of the sort. Such acts of murder by unbalanced fanatics have been blessedly rare and have never come in the kind of terrorist wave attack Friedersdorf posits above. The self evident reason is that abortion providers are on high alert after such a terrorist act as are clinics, making further atrocities nearly impossible.

But someone must have put a burr up Mr. Friedersdorf’s behind for him to go off like this:

Should something like that come to pass, I wonder how “War on Terror hawks” would react. My admittedly flawed term is meant to reference folks who believe the executive branch possesses broad unchecked powers to combat terrorism, including the designation of American citizens as enemy combatants, the indefinite detention of terror suspects, wiretapping phones without warrants, “enhanced interrogation techniques,” and other powers initially claimed by the Bush Administration and its defenders. Would these predominantly conservative officials, commentators and writers be comfortable if President Obama declared two or three extremist pro-lifers as “enemy combatants”? Should Pres. Obama have the prerogative to order the waterboarding of these uncharged, untried detainees? Should he be able to listen in on phone conversations originating from evangelical churches where suspected abortion extremists hang out? The answer is probably that different “War on Terror hawks” — anyone have a better term for this? — would react differently, but as a matter of law, it seems to me that if they’d gotten their way during the Bush Administration, President Obama would have the power to take all those steps and more, a prospect that is terrifying to me, not because I think our Commander in Chief is looking for a pretext to round up innocent pro-lifers, but because it doesn’t take many violent attacks before Americans start clamoring for a strong executive response, a dynamic that tends to erode liberties in previously unthinkable ways and spawn mistakes whereby innocents are made to suffer.

First of all, take a breath, my friend. My eyes are turning red just from reading that last sentence.

I must congratulate Mr. Friedersdorf on setting up such a fine strawman. Obama holding pro-life activists as “enemy combatants” sure is dramatic but really now, the odds of that happening fall somewhere between my becoming starting right fielder for the Chicago Cubs and the moon careening out of orbit and hitting the earth before I finish writing this sentence. Still here? Good.

So the idea that “terror hawk” commentators would be faced with such a question has as much chance of occurring as me being elected Governor of Illinois - especially since I am a nominal Republican and, while I wouldn’t mind a little harmless graft now and again, the crooks and rogues who inhabit the sewer of Illinois politics are major leaguers compared to anyone else.

It is a ridiculous argument to make, this idea that any president would come down on anti-abortion fanatics like that. Ditto waterboarding pro life activists (Why??). And Mr. Friedersdorf is naive indeed if he doesn’t believe the FBI isn’t already listening in on what these activists are up to - even if the connection leads to a church. The Bureau no doubt has a handle on most, if not all of the fanatics and probably have a good idea which ones are a threat and which are mostly talk.

Friedersdorf is also probably off base with his contention that a wave of terrorist attacks on clinics would cause an outcry by Americans for a “strong executive response.” No doubt pro-choice activists would quite understandably be yelping for the civil liberties of activists but would the average American, who would be in little danger from such attacks, make the kind of stink about internal security that our politicians made in the aftermath of 9/11?

Mr. Friedersdorf’s arguments are based on the notion that there is equivalence between a terrorist attack carried out by trained cadres hell bent on killing as many of us as possible and, historically speaking, lone wackos or small groups of untrained fanatics attacking small targets that — again, historically - have resulted in a small loss of life. I don’t see the equivalence or much need to worry that Obama or any president - even if Mr. Friedersorf’s terror wave scenario came true - would carry out the draconian measures that President Bush felt necessary to impose in the aftermath of 9/11.

I would be in agreement with Conor if he had stuck to the notion that another terrorist attack that was equally or more devastating than 9/11 would almost certainly lead to additional curtailments of our liberties. I hate to contemplate the notion of what the aftermath of a WMD attack would entail and what impact it would have on our freedoms. But Friedersdorf is trying to make a point about the danger of right wing religious nuts being equal to that of the jihadists - not only as a threat but that tactics used to fight the jihadists would be used to violate the civil liberties of anti-abortion fanatics That dog don’t hunt.

One point Conor makes I agree with; supporting torture techniques like waterboarding is wrong. As for the rest, I have been troubled by some of the Bush-era policies like FISA violations and and some of the more eyebrow raising strictures in the Patriot Act like removing safeguards on FBI warrants. But I am also not a civil liberties absolutist and recognize that the exigencies of war sometimes calls for a curtailment of some liberty. That has historically been the case and to have denied the president the same powers granted every president since Washington would have been wrong.

If I were Conor Friedersdorf, I would pick another analogy to make his point about “terror hawks” than the fringe fanatics of the anti-abortion movement.

Now that all the apologies for Americans freely electing George Bush twice are out of the way, perhaps the president will make this trip to Europe and his “outreach” to Muslims a little more meaningful than his last foray overseas.

Aside from some gratuitous slaps at his predecessor (and some rookie gaffes), I don’t think Obama performed all that badly over in Europe a couple of months ago. It was basically a “meet and greet” trip, heavy on media events and light on substance (except the speech in Turkey where, despite a couple of eyebrow raising passages, wasn’t bad and he said some things that needed to be said to the Muslim world).

But this trip will be different - especially the first leg which begins tomorrow in Saudi Arabia for some important discussions with King Abdullah and then it’s on to Cairo University for his much anticipated speech to the Muslim world. He will also take time to meet with President Mubarak as well as perhaps, some Egyptian dissidents although that part of the trip is still up in the air.

MIDDLE EAST LEG

Obama’s talks with Abdullah will be crucial to establishing a good rapport with an ally that is becoming more and more important as both a stand in for America in places like Lebanon and Jordan as well as a counterweight to Iran’s ambitions. The stop in Riyadh was a late addition to the schedule - a development that did not please Egypt who thinks that the Saudi stop takes some of the luster off their own hosting of Obama on Thursday.

The agenda for Obama’s Abdullah meeting will be quite full but I suspect one of the main reasons for adding this stop was the political situation in Lebanon. Parliamentary elections will take place next week and Abdullah has been doing yeoman’s work in working behind the scenes at our behest to strengthen the Sunni bloc and support the March 14th forces in their battle against the Hezbullah-backed opposition. Israel would take a very dim view of Hezbullah being formally installed as part of the country’s leadership coalition. (They already exercise de facto control of the country by dint of their militia and veto power in the cabinet.)

The probable outcome of the election will be that neither side receives a majority but that Hezbullah will have a chance to form a government if their bloc gets more votes than the democrats. No doubt Obama and the King will discuss eventualities if that occurs as well as the administration’s overtures to Iran and Syria. Some analysts believe that Obama’s trip to Riyadh also signals support for the King’s peace plan , something that Obama advisors have talked about in positive terms. But Israel has rejected it and it is unlikely to be revived at this point.

As I said, a full plate.

Obama will make his long awaited and much anticipated speech to the Muslim world on Thursday. The forum he has chosen is interesting: Cairo University is one of the oldest centers of learning in the world. It has also seen it’s share of student protests against the Egyptian government. It will be interesting to see if Obama plays the role of lecturer and takes Egypt (and the rest of the Arab world) to task for their miserable human rights records or whether he will appear as conciliator, bridging the gap between Muslims and the West.

During a briefing about the trip yesterday with press secretary Gibbs and Deputy NSA’s Denis McDonough and Mark Lippert, we got a preview of what Obama will talk about:

I think what you can expect is a speech that really addresses the range of issues and interests and concerns that we have across this broad swath of the globe that is the Muslim world. And I think the fact is, is that the President himself experienced Islam on three continents before he was able to — or before he’s been able to visit, really, the heart of the Islamic world — you know, growing up in Indonesia, having a Muslim father — obviously Muslim Americans a key part of Illinois and Chicago.

And so it’s going to address a range of issues. You raised some: freedom and opportunity, prosperity. And I think it is fair to say that the President has focused an awful lot of time, as you suggest, focused on revitalizing this economy, which he inherited in such shape. But I think you’ll see his speech addresses the full range of issues and interests that we have on Thursday.

MR. GIBBS: Mark is going to add one point.

MR. LIPPERT: I would just add one other thing, in terms of context, as you’ve seen, is the President, he doesn’t hesitate to take on the tough issues in his speech, just harkening back to his Senate career when he delivered a very, very powerful message on corruption in Kenya; he continually raises these issues here with leaders when they come through both in private and through public statements, as well. So again, you have a President who’s not afraid to engage on very tough, tough issues.

How “tough” can Obama afford to be? Speaking truth to the world’s Muslims would seem to go against everything he has been saying since he was elected. Instead, he will probably be tougher on America and especially Israel than he will be on the tyrants in the Middle East or the despots elsewhere who use religion to keep their populations in line. And as far as taking Muslims to task for their silent assent for jihad, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for him to make mention of that little inconvenient fact.

Marc Lynch has some thoughts on how Obama has laid the groundwork for this speech by talking tough to Israel on the settlement issue, thus (hopefully) making his Muslim audience more receptive to his words:

Secretary of State Clinton, Middle East envoy Mitchell and others in the administration have reportedly been pounding home the importance of the settlements issue at every opportunity — both in private and in what I would consider a well-coordinated strategic communications campaign. General David Petraeus added his voice to the mix in a front page interview in the influential Saudi paper al-Hayat, saying that resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would improve American security and weaken its adversaries. (Perhaps the imprimatur of Gen. Petraeus will sway some American skeptics as well?)

As Obama leaves for Saudi Arabia and Egypt, he will thus benefit from the headlines and op-eds in the Arab press featuring his strong stand on the settlements. His team has done an outstanding job setting the stage, establishing its credibility both with Israeli and Arab audiences and generating real momentum. It should help him get a receptive audience for the much-anticipated address, and allow him to point to deeds matching words (the most frequent Arab criticism of his outreach thus far).

I think this is too optimistic and raises expectations for the president’s diplomacy too high. But then, the pro-engagement lobby believes that a this is just the ticket to light a fire under the Israelis and restart the peace talks - especially after the Netanyahu government is seen as destroying US-Israel relations over the settlements issue and falls as a result. Presumably, the new government will have a different attitude toward the settlements and, voila! Progress is made.

Nobody will ever accuse the Obama administration of not aiming high.

EUROPEAN LEG

This is the symbolic part of Obama’s trip and while his meetings with Merkel and Sarkozy especially will be important with regard to the world’s financial crisis (Gordon who?), the real fireworks will erupt when the president first visits the concentration camp Buchenwald and then meets Chancellor Merkel in, of all places, Dresden.

This is worse than Reagan going to Bitburg, the site of a cemetery where SS troops were buried. (Read the Wikpedia entry for an interesting take on the controversy.) Reagan used the occasion (or was forced into using it by dint of the ignorance of his staff who scheduled the stop not knowing of its notorious history) as an eloquent and emotional opportunity for reconciliation. It ended up being a positive for Reagan despite the controversy.

But Obama in Dresden opens up a trap door for the president that he will have a tough time avoiding.

John Rosenthal:

The symbolic significance of a visit to Dresden by the American president — especially one undertaken in connection with a D-Day commemoration in France — may be missed by some Americans, but it is absolutely unmistakable for the German public. For Germans, Dresden is the symbol bar none of German suffering at the hands of the Allies. The city was heavily bombed by British and American air forces in February 1945, toward the end of the war. According to the most recent estimates of professional historians, anywhere from 18,000 to at most 25,000 persons died in the attacks. These numbers come from a historical commission established by the city of Dresden itself. But far higher numbers — ranging into the hundreds of thousands — have long circulated in Germany and beyond. The bombing of Dresden is commonly described as a “war crime” in German discussions.

Alleged crimes committed by the Allies against Germans and Germany have indeed become a sort of German literary obsession in recent years, with numerous books being devoted to the subject. The taste of the German public for the theme was made particularly clear by the enormous success of author Jörg Friedrich’s 2002 volume The Fire [Der Brand], which is about the Allied bombardment of Germany. The book’s success was so great that Friedrich and his publisher quickly followed up with a picture book on the same topic titled Scenes of the Fire: How the Bombing Looked.

[...]

It is virtually unthinkable that Obama could give a speech in Dresden and not allude to the bombing of the city. Most of the city’s historical monuments — which Obama’s advance team were apparently inspecting — were severely damaged or destroyed in the bombing and had to be rebuilt. Moreover, for Obama to visit both Dresden and Buchenwald would suggest precisely the sort of outrageous parallels that have become commonplace in Germany at least since the publication of Friedrich’s The Fire.

Will Obama apologize for the fire bombing of Dresden? And most problematic of all, will he try to draw moral parallels between Buchenwald and Dresden?

The Germans would like nothing better but I suspect the president will be extraordinarily careful in making any such comparisons. But hasn’t he already made those parallels plain by juxtaposing the visits in the first place? The president has invited comparisons by the very act of his visiting both sites and there is nothing he can do to change that. They barely mentioned Dresden at the press briefing:

…And secondly, why did the President choose Dresden particularly? Is it just because it’s close to Buchenwald? Is he trying to make some kind of implied point about German casualties, civilian casualties during the war? Or is it just purely a biographical thing?

MR. McDONOUGH: You obviously covered a range of issues and it underscore the importance of the trip. Obviously — and this underscores the reason I think the President is eager to change the conversation with our Muslim and Arab friends. We have a range of issues — you named several of them — Iran, proliferation, Afghanistan, Pakistan, obviously Israeli-Palestinian, have got key elections coming up throughout the region. So it’s an important time, it’s an important issue. I think the President believes it’s an important opportunity to advance the national interest.
As it relates to Dresden, I would just say that obviously the President has a lot of respect for the Chancellor. I think that he, from his early conversations with her, was struck by her time in the former East, and so I think he looks forward to an opportunity to see the major changes in the former East, but also to, as I said, harken back to certain undeniable truths and undeniable realities specifically as it relates to the Holocaust.

“Undeniable truths?” Stay tuned.

From Germany, its off to France for a non-controversial visit to the US cemetery at Coleville and a side trip to Caen. My own prediction - totally unrelated to anything - is that the press will be so bored by this point that they will invent a controversy between Madame Obama and Carla Bruni, Sarkozy’s drop dead gorgeous wife. It will sell zillions of papers and have people glued to their seats in front of cable news. Two female titans in a cat fight!

Irresistible.

I am eager to hear the president’s speech on D-Day and compare it from an academic and historical point of view with Reagan’s famous Point du Hoc address. Hard to keep an open mind on this one but perhaps exploring both speeches thematically will tell us not only something about Obama but also, by comparing and contrasting the two set pieces, it should tell us something about the times we live in as well.

Finally, the president gave an interview to the BBC in which he set up a strawman and then proceeded to appear to embrace it - after blowing it away:

“The danger I think is when the United States or any country thinks that we can simply impose these values on another country with a different history and a different culture,” Obama said in an interview with the BBC that aired Monday.

Obama’s opponents have criticized him for appearing to apologize for American policies and behavior while overseas. On Monday, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney — a possible Republican presidential contender in 2012 — scolded the president for his “tour of apology.”

While Obama seemed to suggest in his BBC interview that America has wrongly attempted to force its principles on other nations, he also argued that other nations should want to adopt those principles without coaxing.

“Democracy, rule of law, freedom of speech, freedom of religion — those are not simply principles of the West to be hoisted on these countries, but rather what I believe to be universal principles that they can embrace and affirm as part of their national identity,” he said.

This is pure doublespeak - appearing to take his predecessor to task for “imposing” concepts like democracy and the rule of law on Iraq while chiding other nations for not embracing those same values.

What’s the point? Perhaps we should have just imposed the usual thuggish dictatorship on the Iraqis. Would that have pleased him? This kind of dubious logic comes from possessing a naive outlook on the rest of the world. As other cultures and nations greedily assimilate as much of western culture that their rulers let them get away with, Obama seems to be saying that we’re wrong in promoting those values while at the same time urging other cultures to graft them on to their national identity.

A real head shaker.

Regardless, it will be interesting to watch the president as he tries to achieve some of the ambitious goals he has set for this trip.

Salon’s “Dear Abbey” for hilariously confused and clueless lefties who ask questions of Glenallen Walken about conservatism - “Dear Wingnut” - is one of the most entertaining things about that publication. The childlike and simple minded questions asked by liberals of the author (and the comment threads his column generates) remind me of a kid asking his dad, “Why is the sky blue?” or maybe “How many stars are there, daddy?”

This week’s entry is typical:

Ronald Reagan left office 20 years ago and died five years ago. When are you conservatives finally going to move on?

Walken patiently tried to explain that Reagan’s convictions and principles were timeless and that “moving on” would be impossible because the Gipper showed conservatives how to win:

Part of that is because Reagan was, to borrow a phrase from Lady Margaret Thatcher, “a conviction politician.” He operated out of a set of deeply held beliefs that governed his view of the world, of morality and the presidency. Unlike Nixon or Clinton, Reagan’s concerns about public opinion were addressed in the way he dealt with issues and crises, not whether he dealt with them at all.

Ronald Reagan came into office in 1980 promising to do three things: 1) Restore America’s national pride; 2) Revive an economy crippled by stagflation; and 3) Win the Cold War. He did all three even though, thanks to Tip O’Neill and friends, he had one hand held behind his back. At the same time he cruised to re-election in 1984 with the largest Electoral College majority in history, winning 49 states while losing only the District of Columbia and, by 7,000 votes, his Democratic opponent’s home state of Minnesota. That is a feat that may never be matched.

[...]

Most importantly, it was Reagan’s achievement of building or at least maintaining a successful political coalition composed of social conservatives, libertarian-leaning voters concerned about the economy and the size of government, moderate, “birthright” Republicans, working class Democrats and voters worried about foreign policy issues that make him the enduring standard against which the party and conservatives measure their success today. The ongoing debate between many national Republican leaders and pretenders over what the party should now stand for, following back-to-back routs in 2006 and 2008 — is really a discussion of how best to replicate the Reagan model of campaigning and governance.

Walken also points out that asking the GOP to abandon Reagan would be like asking the Democrats to abandon FDR - neither party can escape the shadow cast by those two giants.

Walken has it about right although I wonder how might one replicate Reagan’s “model of campaigning and governance.” George Bush tried to emulate Reagan’s style of White House management to some extent by giving his underlings and cabinet secretaries enormous leeway in accomplishing broad goals set out by the president. It worked quite well in Reagan’s first term, much less so in the second due largely to poor choices in picking personnel. Bush had even less success, I think, due to his incuriosity about so many things. Reagan was known to grill his people about policy while Bush was, from what we know, much too trusting of his staff.

Also with regard to Reagan’s governance, there is one thing that the base never tires of pointing out to me; that Reagan stood on his principles. This is true - as far as it went. Reagan was also a master compromiser who was a lot less ideological than his critics ever gave him credit. According to many conservatives today, compromising with the Democrats is is worse than making a deal with the devil. Those who work with the other side are RINO’s or misguided fools and have no principles. They point to Bush’s No Child Left Behind and Medicare drug programs as the result of consorting with the enemy. Reagan himself was snookered once or twice by Speaker Tip O’Neil. But on the really big issues, where the Gipper needed Democratic votes to pass his agenda, both Reagan and Bush compromised in order to realize success.

I might mention that so far, I have yet to see any competence by President Obama in governance. The breathtaking reversals, the piss poor communications strategies, the laughably incompetent congressional liasoning, and the fact that most of his administration does not seem to be on the same page on many issues reveal a White House in turmoil with Obama uninterested in anything but campaigning for his agenda. If it had been a Republican administration, the press would have declared it a failure already.

This incompetence is manifested by the fact that nothing - I repeat, nothing - is getting done in Congress with all of his major initiatives either bottled up (health insurance) or dead in the water (EFCA, and TARP II). Everything that is happening in the Obama administration is the result of executive fiat. Anything that needs congressional approval is nowhere to be seen despite the fact that he has massive, overwhelming majorities in both chambers.

And as far as using the Reagan campaign “model,” as a path to victory for Republicans, that would really be sweet - if there was another Reagan hanging around somewhere. Unfortunately, such world-historical figures saunter by only once every several generations. And being able to excite the base (Palin, Huckabee) does not always translate into being able to win over a majority of voters.

But Walken does not address something that I feel many conservatives insist is also a lesson that should be culled from the Reagan playbook; that his agenda should be grafted on to a modern political campaign and that this is the key to victory.

The mantra of tax cuts, increased defense spending, and “small government” (whatever the hell that means) is repeated by many conservatives so often that it almost seems they think that sheer repetition will make it so - sort of like clicking your heels together 3 times and mouthing “I want to go home” except we ain’t in Kansas anymore.

With nearly 50 million families not paying any taxes at all and a budget deficit that will be close to a trillion or more dollars for the foreseeable future, it seems to me that someone who calls themselves a fiscal conservative might want to walk very quietly when talking about tax cuts - unless we are still in a bad recession in 2010 and they are designed to stimulate the economy in which case they will be targeted and perhaps even temporary.

As far as defense spending, that’s a subject that deserves its own post but suffice it to say, we’re already spending half a trillion - much of it buying weapons to fight the Soviets in the cold war. Temporary increases to make up for losses from the wars are needed but we have really got to get serious about changing our thinking on defense spending to address the needs of a modern, 21st century military.

My feelings about running on a “small government” platform have been made known on this site in numerous posts but a summary would be, I am 100% for that concept except no one who spouts about it ever gets around to truly, realistically defining it. It’s one thing to get rid of the Department of Education. But is it the position of small government conservatives that the hundreds of programs administered by the Department of Education are a waste of money and should all be terminated?

I am constantly amused by conservatives who say we should lop off one department of the federal government or another without realizing that one man’s “waste of money” is another’s lifeblood. And the reason many of these programs have been federalized is that the states won’t or can’t deal with the problems of special education and the like. You can’t just yank $62 billion from education spending and believe kids, teachers, and schools wouldn’t be catastrophically affected.

Does that mean we can’t take a very sharp scalpel and start cutting? Absolutely not. Reducing the size and scope of government should be any conservative administration’s top priority. But most conservatives are revanchists on the subject of cutting government, wishing to repeal the Great Society and even the New Deal in order to realize some mythical America where everyone is self reliant and if you needed help, you went to your church or your family. Such nonsensical thinking ignores the reality of living in a 21st century industrialized democracy of 300 million people.

So yes, adopt Reagan’s principles which are timeless artifacts of conservative thinking. Adopt his optimism about the future, his belief in the wisdom of crowds, his determination to overcome obstacles to achieve goals. But beyond that, there is not much the Gipper can teach us about society today that would help Republicans back up the ladder.

Couples who have been married for a while have been encouraged in recent years to plan a “date night” once a month or so just to keep the rituals of courtship alive and keep the “spark” of romance in their relationship.

I personally think this is a great idea. And Zsu-Zsu and I can attest to the efficacy of such a practice. Sure beats sitting at home on Saturday night watching some schlocky movie we rented.

Now parenthetically, I lived in Washington, D.C. for 7 years and can tell you that there is lots to do in that city; great restaurants, live theater at the Kennedy Center, great clubs, and more museums than you can shake a stick at.

Why then did our president and his wife feel it necessary to jet off to New York City at taxpayer expense, forcing the NY city cops to throw the usual presidential security cordon around his motorcade, eat at a tony restaurant in the Village, catch a Broadway play, and then jet back so that the Secret Service could tuck them in for the night in their own beds?

Apparently, according to this Politico piece , because the president promised his wife a Broadway show at taxpayer’s expense if he won the election:

President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama landed in New York Saturday afternoon, and after taking a helicopter from JFK into Manhattan, drove up the West Side Highway, where the northbound lanes were shut down by police for their visit, past Ground Zero, into the Village for dinner at the Village’s Blue Hill restaurant. From there, they went north to Times Square, where they went to to see a production of “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone” at the Belasco Theater on West 44 Street.

Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest read a statement from Obama: “I am taking my wife to New York City because I promised her during the campaign that I would take her to a Broadway show

Asked about the cost of the trip, which Republicans have criticized as indulgent, coming just ahead of the expected announcement of GM’s bankruptcy filing on Monday, Josh Earnest told pool reporter Dave Michaels of the Dallas Morning News, that he “didn’t anticipate being able to provide a cost estimate tonight.”

How romantic. Our first couple flies to New York City, has a cozy, intimate dinner, and graces the Great White Way with their presence all because our president promised his wife a night on the town (at taxpayer expense) if he won the election.

All this begs the question that is nagging at everyone’s consciousness; did the president and the first lady top off their night with a little marital bliss? A little “slap and tickle?” Were our tax dollars well spent to the point that the Obama’s date night had a happy ending in the bedroom?

Don’t blame me for bringing it up. I am only asking the question because of the torrent of nauseating crap that has been written about the Obama’s and their supposedly superior sex life. And given that the trip cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, I, and most Americans, would like to know if our money was well spent. Have one on us, Barry and by the way, who made the first move - you or Michelle?

You think that kind of speculation is vulgar? Me too. But if, according to Judith Warner in the New York Times, Americans fantasize about having sex with the president, or Michelle (maybe both?), then asking whether this taxpayer financed date ended up with the first couple playing “Hide the Salami” is a perfectly legitimate line of inquiry:

Many women — not too surprisingly — were dreaming about sex with the president. In these dreams, the women replaced Michelle with greater or lesser guilt or, in the case of a 62-year-old woman in North Florida, whose dream was reported to me by her daughter, found a fully above-board solution: “Michelle had divorced Barack because he had become ‘too much of a star.’ He then married my mother, who was oh so proud to be the first lady,” the daughter wrote me.

There was some daydreaming too, much of it a collective fantasy about the still-hot Obama marriage. “Barack and Michelle Obama look like they have sex. They look like they like having sex,” a Los Angeles woman wrote to me, summing up the comments of many. “Often. With each other. These days when the sexless marriage is such a big celebrity in America (and when first couples are icons of rigid propriety), that’s one interesting mental drama.”

Yeah, I know. I’m just one of those frustrated conservatives who never gets any and is so sexually uptight that doing it anywhere except the bedroom in the missionary position with the lights off and my eyes closed would be considered sexually deviant. At least that’s the explanation given by this fanatical Bush hating blogger:

It’s not that I envision the President endorsing the “Head O State” dildo, or promoting the benefits of masturbation for prostate health, but I’d like to think that in addition to having the occasional cocktail or staying up past nine, Obama will also be looser on matters regarding the sexual behaviors of the public.

To be sure, people were still getting it on during the Bush era. But that era also saw a rise in unwanted pregnancies and infections, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there was an associated rise in the numbers of folks walking around with psychological or emotional hang-ups regarding sex. Apparently, Bush initiatives like pushing welfare moms into marriage and promoting abstinence until the age of twenty-nine didn’t quite succeed the way he probably hoped.

Truth be told, when Zsu-Zsu and I return from a date night - sometimes at 2 or 3:00 AM - the urge to merge is sometimes overcome by the need for zees. Of course, when the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak, there’s always the next morning, if you catch my drift. Suffice it to say, our date nights, while not financed by my neighbors or by the American taxpayer, nevertheless usually have a very happy - and satisfied (if I may brag a bit) - ending.

But what can you say about this kind of brainless, pornographic idiocy? The idea that Obama and the first lady are in love and probably demonstrate that fact on a regular, intimate basis is so wildly stupid a subject to contemplate, perhaps we should help satisfy the prurient curiosity of liberals and have the Obama’s fill out a questionnaire following each of their date nights. After all, if the tax payers are going to help finance the Obama’s conjugal contentment, maybe we should expect a government report on how our money was spent.

At least the New York Magazine was subtle about their curiosity. This piece from that faux intellectual, cheeky cosmopolitan humor publication at least had the decency to fantasize without short stroking their open mouthed wonder at how really kewl it was to have a first couple that did the nasty-nasty now and again.

Writing about a nice pic of Barack and Michelle tenderly touching foreheads on inauguration night, Stacy Shiff gushes:

The gesture is sweetly old-fashioned, redolent of letter sweaters, gallantry, and Cary Grant. The girl is spicy and newfangled. She’s ushering us around a social corner as much as a political one. Professional rivals, Rock and Doris leaped out of bed in those pj’s the year Obama was born; only now are we discovering what a functioning marriage between equals actually looks like. Michelle Obama promises to resolve the mystery Mrs. Spitzer, Mrs. Edwards, and Mrs. McCain left us helplessly to contemplate: What purpose does the political wife serve if she is neither accessory nor casualty? After decades of fake financials and fictitious balance sheets, WMDs that weren’t there and detention centers that were, our new First Lady is the genuine article. She has a real body—arms! Legs! Curves! And she has a real marriage. Here are two people whose bodies speak as eloquently as their words, who hold each other up, who between them get the temperature just right.

Yeah, I’ll bet that “temperature” was on the rise last night. Do we dare ask whether the president plied his sweetheart with some wine just to get her in the mood? Works for me.

I didn’t invent this meme. If the left is going to go all goo-goo about the president and his lady, wondering, dreaming, fantasizing, about them having sex, about having sex with him or her, or even projecting themselves in their roles, then taking these thoughts to their logical conclusion and speculating whether Obama got some after shelling out all that taxpayer money shouldn’t be offensive to anyone, right?

And if liberals want a real love story - one where the passion and tenderness and attraction lasted into the couple’s golden years, I would suggest they read My Turn by Nancy Reagan. Here was a Hollywood power couple that made the academic Obama and his wife look like insignificant amoebas by comparison. The Reagan’s were a true partnership in every sense of the word. And yes, even in their 70’s, most people could imagine them getting it on. You only needed to look at them when they looked at each other to be sure of that.

But back to critiquing the trip, I don’t like presidents promising anybody anything with my tax dollars in the pot. Secondly, the question must be raised; why New York? An RNC spokesman asked, “If President Obama wants to go to the theater, isn’t the Presidential box at the Kennedy Center good enough?”

Thirdly, with GM set to declare bankruptcy next week and American families trying and, in many cases, failing to make ends meet in these hard economic times, shouldn’t the president be a little more circumspect in his private affairs? I recall Nancy Reagan catching holy hell from the press for raising money from friends to purchase a new China set for the White House (the press accused her of ostentation in hard times) and criticizing the first lady for the donated gowns from famous designers she wore to state events. It was evidence that the Reagan’s “didn’t care” about the little people and only cared about partying with their rich friends.

Obama’s New York jaunt was taken because we have a president whose entire career has been in the public sector, where taxpayer money is viewed as a possession of government, to be spent with no more thought and care than you or I would spend money buying a quart of milk at the store. Public employees think we the taxpayers owe them their little perks and privileges since they feel they are vastly underpaid and underappreciated.

In Obama’s case, he gave no more thought to the cost of the trip or the appearance of propriety in hard times due to the same sense of entitlement he and many other upper level government workers feel. The taxpayer’s property is a means to an end - be it funding health insurance or expensing a car for personal use. The amount doesn’t matter. They are entitled to the perks due to the grave responsibility they carry in taking care of us.

If Obama wants to make these little date night jaunts, I would recommend he tap his email list of 3 million names for the money. Surely his disciples can come up with the millions of dollars it takes to indulge President Obama and his wife their little excursions outside of Washington.

This is an expanded version of a blog post that originally appeared in The American Thinker.