Legal Commentary
BeldarBlog 
The online journal of a crusty, longwinded trial lawyer, bemused observer of politics, and internet dilettante
Post Frequency: 1.4/day Last Entry: October 02, 2009 at 14:14:30 Recent Entries: 396
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Blame where due
Posted on October 02, 2009Of course, it's entirely George W. Bush's fault that Chicago didn't get the 2016 Olympic Games. ******* UPDATE (Fri Oct 2 @ 12:32 p.m.): I wrote the one-sentence post above as a joke, based just on reading a news headline on my Blackberry over lunch. But when I turned to the New York Times' report on the International Olympic Committee's...
NY appellate court throws Gunga Dan vs. CBS lawsuit out of court in its entirety
Posted on September 29, 2009Just before last Christmas, in my most recent post about Dan Rather's much-publicized lawsuit against CBS, I explained that CBS' lead lawyer ? my former law partner Jim Quinn ? was operating under an unfortunate set of circumstances, as a result of which it was virtually certain that the case wouldn't shed any further or more definitive light on the...
In the Obama Administration, closing "Guantanamo was everyone's part-time job"
Posted on September 25, 2009If you need another reason to question the Obama Administration's basic ability to provide the single most important function of the federal government ? keeping America safe from foreign enemies ? read this WaPo story. The Spin True to form, the WaPo's writers and editors carefully withhold the screamingly obvious judgment that drips from the facts they report, and indeed,...
End legislative malpractice by amending the Constitution
Posted on September 23, 2009From University of Tennessee constitutional law professor Glenn Reynolds, aka InstaPundit, an item with which I fiercely agree: DAVID POST: Should Lawmakers, Um, Read the Laws They?re Voting On? Sounds like something you?d ask in a third-grade civics class...
Mike Leach's misplaced pique
Posted on September 20, 2009Texas Tech head football coach Mike Leach threw a middle-sized fit Saturday night during Tech's 34-24 loss to the Texas Longhorns, insisting that the officials had improperly frustrated an attempted trick play by the Red Raiders. According to the Dallas Morning News: Texas Tech coach Mike Leach was upset with the officials at halftime...
Obama's arrogance hits new heights, with no limit in sight
Posted on September 20, 2009The President of the United States and his senior staff have bragged to the New York Times that they have asked the sitting governor of the State of New York, David Paterson, to drop out of the 2010 New York gubernatorial race. Speaking for attribution but not under their own names, "two senior administration officials and a New York Democratic...
Beldar summarizes Obama's health care address to Congress
Posted on September 09, 2009Once upon a time - on a magic day when the calendars all said "Oh, nine! Oh, nine! Oh nine!" - King Canute rode on his Magic Pony down the aisle of the Wizards' Castle until he reached the pretty blue carpet at the bottom. Even though he wasn't at the seashore, when he climbed down from his pony, the...
You know you're an SOB when ...
Posted on August 31, 2009Funniest quote I've read in the Houston Chronicle in some time: ?It doesn't matter if you have a snowsuit on - if you're touching customers, they're touching you - they're a sexually oriented business,? Geffin told the judge. ?You can call yourself a restaurant, you can call yourself an ice cream truck, but if your drawing card is topless dancers,...
Thoughts on the death of Edward M. Kennedy (1932-2009)
Posted on August 26, 2009I extend my condolences to the family and friends and partisans and allies and admirers of Sen. Edward M. ("Ted") Kennedy (D-MA) upon his passing. Alas, my first two reactions to the news were not flattering to him, and indeed they are likely to annoy many of those to whom I've just extended my condolences...
"Sotomayor & Associates" ... meh, who cares?
Posted on July 08, 2009Nothing has happened since May 26 to make me change my initial take on Pres. Obama's nomination of U.S. Circuit Judge Sonia Sotomayor to fill Justice Souter's seat on the Supreme Court. (That take, in short, was this: Obama would never nominate anyone of whom I approved, and Judge Sotomayor, if confirmed, will vote the same way as Souter has,...
In memorium: James Dillard Dyer, Jr. (12/24/22 to 6/22/09)
Posted on June 22, 2009[As written and released today for publication in the Lamesa [Texas] Press-Reporter and other west Texas publications, by his family:] Lamesa native and life-long resident James Dillard Dyer, Jr. ? a World War II veteran who became a long-time merchant and civic leader ? died peacefully in his sleep during the early morning hours of Monday, June 22, 2009...
POTUS as the Great Defender of the Faith
Posted on June 05, 2009Did you have the same reaction that I did back in 2001 when - in an official speech specifically directed to the Christian world during one of his trips to the Middle East, a speech whose official theme was "A New Beginning" - President George W. Bush firmly rejected the constitutional separation of church and state, and instead proclaimed that...
Beldar's initial take on the Sotomayor nomination
Posted on May 26, 2009Elections have consequences and, as he's prone to remind us, Obama won. I firmly believe that the President of the United States has the right to choose who he wants as his nominees to the Supreme Court, and that the Senate, in its advice and consent role, ought to confirm those nominees unless they're objectively unqualified...
Supermax prisons' no-escape record doesn't answer concerns about moving Gitmo terrorists onto U.S. soil
Posted on May 20, 2009I'm already very tired of hearing the stupidest new talking point of the mainstream media: "Why worry about bringing terrorists from Gitmo to the mainland U.S., when we've never had a single escape from a federal 'Supermax' prison?" Duh. This is the sort of 9/10/01 thinking, the sort of "treat global terrorism like a domestic law enforcement problem," that is...
Obama's budget: "Smart people" decided "what we need to do," with no limits and no concern about revenues or deficits
Posted on May 14, 2009It's a couple of weeks old now, but I just caught up enough in my magazine reading to reach Ryan Lizza's article in the May 4th New Yorker entitled Money Talks, a report on how the Obama Administration has gone about preparing the federal budget. And as is so often the case in New Yorker articles, what stuns me about...
Beldar on Posner on conservatism
Posted on May 13, 2009U.S. Circuit Judge Richard Posner of the Seventh Circuit is a fine jurist, and a profound thinker and writer on matters economic and legal. To the extent he and Barack Obama rubbed an occasional elbow as part-time faculty at Chicago Law School, he's probably as close to a "conservative" as the latter encountered ? but that's very much a comment...
Star ____?
Posted on May 10, 2009In anticipation of my going to see the new movie tomorrow, I have this simple question for you all: Star Trek or Star Wars?Make it so: Star TrekThe Force is with me: Star Wars pollcode.com free polls
Great competitors among Rockets and Greyhounds
Posted on May 10, 2009Most Houston sports fans, including me, are reveling in one of the most satisfying Houston Rockets wins in many years ? a thorough drubbing of the perpetual rockstar team of the NBA, the Los Angeles Lakers, by a final score of 99-87 that somewhat conceals the Rockets' overall domination (including a 29-point lead in the early fourth quarter)...
Holocaust 2
Posted on May 08, 2009Even in this long winter of discontent for conservatives, I am optimistic about America. Even this early on, it's obvious to me that the Obama Administration is wearing clown shoes. Just like Hollywood tries to make Tom Cruise look 6' 2" through creative camera angles, shot composition, and discretely hidden wooden boxes and ramps, the mainstream media will continue to...
Review: Lowry & Korman's "Banquo's Ghosts"
Posted on May 06, 2009I adore a good spy novel. When I was in grade school, my mother (of all people) turned me on to Ian Fleming's James Bond books. (She had to telephone the local librarian to confirm that it was okay for me to check books out of the "adult" section.) And I've liked, and read, the genre ever since...
OMG! Like, before he was 30, Obama was a law review editor! ZOMG-OMG!!1!
Posted on May 03, 2009From the New York Times: Many American presidents have been lawyers, but almost none have come to office with Barack Obama?s knowledge of the Supreme Court. Before he was 30, he was editing articles by eminent legal scholars on the court?s decisions. I'm sure the ghost of William Howard Taft, who'd been a judge on the U...
Another well-crafted but foolish paragraph of Peggy Noonan's with which I disagree
Posted on May 03, 2009Peggy Noonan can surely do better than allusions to '70s soft-rock hits like this one, even when she's right on the substance: ... [Obama's] presentation [during the past week] was low-key, authoritative, and had the look and feel of moderation. When you can give this impression while some of your decisions?for instance, on the legitimate cost and reach of government?are...
Why I celebrate Chrysler Corporation's petition for Chapter 11 reorganization
Posted on May 02, 2009Count me as one person entirely unsurprised to read that representatives of the Obama Administration were making outrageous and improper threats to the Chrysler bondholders whose refusal to capitulate ended up in Chrysler's Chapter 11 filing. White & Case bankruptcy lawyer Tom Lauria gave a radio interview to Detroit talk radio host Frank Beckman, portions of which are transcribed here,...
Lines that cannot have come from a conservative's pen
Posted on April 30, 2009Quoth Kathleen Parker (italics hers, boldface mine): As a recovering obsessive-compulsive, the past 100 days have been a torture of quantification. How?s he doing SO far? Is he the change we?ve been waiting for? Is Barack Obama really a centrist, as so many (including I) had hoped? Or is he one of them dadgum fascist-Marxist-commie-Moozlems?! Obama is who he said...
Specter
Posted on April 28, 2009The Obama Administration and the Democratic Party have just welcomed a hand grenade, sans pin, on board their bandwagon. Anyone who ever counts on Arlen Specter for anything is likely to be disappointed. There have been many precedents to prove this: The only thing Specter has ever been reliable at is being unreliable...
NYT again misreports maximum potential penalty that could have been sought against surviving Somali pirate
Posted on April 22, 2009U.S. Magistrate Judge Andrew J. Peck of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York has ruled that the surviving Somali pirate captured by the U.S. Navy after attempting to hijack the M/V Maersk Alabama, Abduwali Abdukhadir Muse, will stand trial as an adult...
Review: Beldar & kids see "Duplicity"
Posted on April 19, 2009"Twisty!" That's the one-word verdict of my son Adam on the corporate espionage thriller, Duplicity, which he, my daughter Molly, and I saw early this afternoon. Molly and I not only joined in that verdict, but concurred with Adam's degree of substantial satisfaction in pronouncing it...
Libs scrape the bottom of a stinky, stinky barrel to recycle Spitzer
Posted on April 17, 2009Anyone who actually believes that disgraced whoremonger and cosmically comical hypocrite Eliot Spitzer has "mastered the art of the recovery," and that he's now been "rehabilitated," is simply delusional. Anyone who's trying to persuade you of that is someone with an extremely liberal agenda ? and someone who's in an ill-concealed panic because they see how thin their team's bench...
News from America guaranteed to prompt terrorist belly laughs
Posted on April 17, 2009This makes me laugh too, sorta ? but it simultaneously makes me want to weep, for my profession and my country, and for what the former has done to hamstring the latter's desperate fight against the terrorists who would destroy us if they could (first and third bracketed portions mine, others by TIME): The CIA desire to use insects during...
Surviving Somali pirate captured by U.S. Navy should face death sentence under U.S. hostage-taking law
Posted on April 12, 2009God bless the United States Navy! And what a spectacular Easter blessing for the brave Captain Richard Phillips of the MV Maersk Alabama and his gallant crew and grateful family! Three of the four pirates who were holding Captain Phillips on the Alabama's lifeboat were shot dead, apparently through the exceptional marksmanship and professionalism of Navy SEAL snipers...
The world will little note, nor long remember, the angle of Obama's bow from the waist to King Abdullah; but ...
Posted on April 10, 2009I'm in a particularly crusty mood at the moment, and this post may draw disagreement from many or maybe even most of those who read it. That's okay. I've just been working up to a rant, and I have to let it out. ******* In March 1936, my father was a 14-year-old in rural Lamesa, Texas, and he was fairly...
"I don?t know what the term is in Austrian"
Posted on April 06, 2009One might think a degree in political science (with a specialization in international relations) from Columbia University, followed by service as chair of the European Affairs subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, might have given Barack Obama some clue as to the language spoken by the people of our NATO ally, Austria...
Today's spam email header that's least likely to pique my further interest
Posted on April 02, 2009"It will be hard for women to resist the temptation not to sleep with you."
Real "Kansas values" from candidate Rob Wasinger
Posted on April 01, 2009I was grousing yesterday about the Obama campaign's pretense that its candidate was imbued with "Kansas values," so it's perhaps karma, or perhaps just happy coincidence, that I received an email from a trusted blogospheric friend today directing me to a post on Redstate...
Barack Obama: multi-cultural success, fiscal disaster
Posted on March 31, 2009This is an interesting article about President Obama on Politico.com. The gist is that because "his background is more exotic than the typical president," he therefore has "more touchstones and cultural reference points than any predecessor ? and he is not shy about invoking them in all manner of forums to make all manner of points": As candidate, he often...
Rahm Emanuel, "former investment (cough*scoundrel*cough) banker"
Posted on March 27, 2009Hugh Hewitt points to a Chicago Tribune article which points out that Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel "made at least $320,000 for a 14-month stint [as a board member] at Freddie Mac that required little effort," and probably many tens of thousands more from stock sales...
Fisking Obama's latest attack on the GOP
Posted on March 25, 2009From a short report, mostly comprising direct quotations, at Politico.com: President Barack Obama chided Republicans for criticizing his agenda without being able to name priorities of their own. ?The Republican Party right now hasn?t sort of figured out what it?s for,? Obama said during a Monday interview with regional press, according to a transcript posted Tuesday by the Louisville Courier-Journal...
Beldar & daughter catch the Houston Dynamo's season opener
Posted on March 22, 2009Last night, I attended my first-ever professional football game ? errr, well, perhaps I should say professional fútbol game ? along with my youngest daughter, Molly, and several members of her middle school soccer team. It was the season opener for the Houston Dynamo, the 2006 and 2007 Major League Soccer champions...
So you think we're better off spending money on pork than on keeping the F-22 Raptor production lines going?
Posted on March 21, 2009Without air superiority, America isn't a superpower. It is exactly that simple. "No one would dare challenge America in the air," say those who want to slash defense spending. "We don't need more cutting-edge aircraft because the ones we already have are sufficient to intimidate all of our possible opponents...
When will Obama succumb to the pressure and begin to Wag the Dog?
Posted on March 19, 2009Conrad 'Connie' Brean: And it's most certainly NOT about the B-3 bomber. John Levy: There IS no B-3 bomber. Conrad 'Connie' Brean: I just said that! There is no B-3 bomber. I don't know how these rumors get started! ? Dialog from Wag the Dog (1997) Through adroit triangulation, fierce stonewalling, the constant spin of the perpetual campaign, and other,...
While I wasn't blogging, I was lecturing lawyers on ethics
Posted on March 16, 2009I had many distractions from blogging during my hiatus, but one was preparing a continuing legal education paper and lecture. I like lecturing on ethics topics. That's not because I consider myself an expert on legal ethics. I'm not ? and indeed, I begin every such lecture with full disclosure that I'm nothing more than one of the audience members'...
It's "Morning-After in America"
Posted on March 15, 2009I've taken a multi-week hiatus from blogging during the Obama Administration's honeymoon, but David Broder has declared the honeymoon to be officially over now. (Many thanks to those who've sent me encouragement or expressed concern via comments or emails during my silence...
Stupidest tool with internet access and some semblance of an audience who's commented upon the Obama inauguration
Posted on January 21, 2009We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things.... ? Barack Obama, Inaugural Address upon becoming the 44th President of the United States. There is simply no excuse for United States Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts bungling the presidential oath of office to such an extent that Barack...
A tip of Beldar's cap to Juan Williams
Posted on January 21, 2009For my money, the best pundit of the just-past election and transition season, friends and neighbors ? either in print, on radio, or on TV ? has been Juan Williams, who draws his paychecks from the perhaps improbable combination of NPR and Fox News. That doesn't mean I've agreed with him more than I've agreed with any other pundits...
Regarding Obama's inaugural address
Posted on January 20, 2009The Forty-Fourth President of the United States, Barack Hussein Obama, began his inaugural address with a fib.\*/ No, I don't mean the salutation ? "My fellow citizens" ? for I have never been among those who were captivated with any of the various theories about Obama's birthplace or years in Indonesia or the like...
Takedown and pin
Posted on January 17, 2009Regular readers, long-suffering souls that you be, may recall this same handsome young man's photo in a post from last February that also included a video clip. Through an act of great self-discipline, I'm going to limit myself to no more than two posts, and only a later one with video, in which I will permit myself to brag on...
Of Sputnik babies, paratroopers, and senators: Why Caroline Kennedy's "qualifications" are a bad joke
Posted on January 04, 2009The first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, was launched on October 4, 1957, and burned up upon re-entering Earth's atmosphere on January 4, 1958. About mid-way through its effective life, on November 26, 1957, my mom launched me in Lamesa, Texas. And on the very next day, in New York City, Jackie Kennedy launched her daughter, Caroline Bouvier Kennedy...
Review: Beldar & kids see Jim Carrey's "Yes Man"
Posted on January 03, 2009My oldest daughter, Sarah, was working today, but I took my sons Kevin and Adam and my younger daughter Molly to a Saturday afternoon movie matinée. None of the choices were terribly appealing, but they opted to take a chance on Jim Carrey's latest comedy, "Yes Man...
Rather seeks trial to promote his revisionist history, but the world still can't look to CBS News for the actual truth
Posted on December 23, 2008Charles Johnson and Glenn Reynolds are not the only ones who are dismayed by the "revisionist history" being pushed by Dan Rather and uncritically repeated by National Public Radio. I played a small but enthusiastic part as one of bloggers who were scrutinizing Dan Rather, "60 Minutes," and CBS News during the 2004 Rathergate controversy...
Renewing Texas drivers licenses online
Posted on December 23, 2008In consulting the Texas Department of Public Safety's website to find out the location of the nearest drivers license renewal office, I learned today that I, and many other Texans, are able to renew our drivers licenses entirely over the internet, paying by credit card and promising (via an online click) that we haven't incurred some new visual or other...
Review: Blackberry Storm cellphone
Posted on December 19, 2008I. Background: Curmudgeonly lawyer as early adapter In the late 1980s and early 1990s, I was an early adapter for cell phone technology. That's when I was a big-firm lawyer who traveled a lot and who did not at all like being out of telephone contact or riding in ordinary taxis...
Beldar predicts that Blagojevich won't be impeached until convicted in court
Posted on December 14, 2008This post may may make some people in Illinois mad at me. I'll have to risk it. Prof. Ann Althouse is having fun ridiculing Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan's efforts both before the press and before the Illinois Supreme Court. Madigan is trying to persuade that court to effectively remove Gov...
Problems leaving comments here?
Posted on December 14, 2008TypePad is making some improvements under the hood, and I think some of them may be causing conflicts with some of the customized templates I'm using for my comments. At least as I perceive the problem, it starts with the moment I click on the data entry field for the comment text ? that's where I start getting odd behavior,...
Unabashedly oldschool (tragically unhip) blogging
Posted on December 09, 2008For the record, in response to Wired's claim (h/t Instapundit) that blogs are "so 2004": My blog has always been for "long-form writing," as my masthead conspicuously warns. I'm generally satisfied with how my posts fare in search engine rankings. I don't think my commenters are 'tards...
Minnesota court of appeals affirms Craig conviction
Posted on December 09, 2008I wrote quite a bit last year about Sen. Larry "Wide Stance" Craig (R-ID)'s pathetic attempts to withdraw his guilty plea for disorderly conduct in a Minneapolis-St. Paul airport restroom, and after reading the trial judge's opinion rejecting that attempt last October, I concluded that for purposes of any appeals, Sen...
There was nothing "culpable" about the 2003 Texas redistricting
Posted on November 26, 2008I'm angered to read the following passage in a very silly and badly informed article called The End of Gerrymandering, and in particular, I'm dismayed to read it in the Weekly Standard: But Republicans have not been without culpability, especially in recent years...
Beldar's reaction to rumors of Hillary for SecState
Posted on November 19, 2008Per the AP: Hillary Rodham Clinton, meanwhile, was expected to decide soon whether to take the job [of Secretary of State in the Obama Administration], which associates said she believes is hers if she wants it. Transition officials for President-elect Barack Obama said the former first lady had not formally been offered the job and other candidates have been vetted...
Blog noir at Patterico's
Posted on November 17, 2008Wikipedia tells us that "film noir," literally "black film," is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize moral ambiguity and sexual motivation. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as stretching from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
Twisted dollop of evil scum Bill Ayers claims his and Weather Underground's bombs were mere "protests" and never terrorism, but that U.S. gov't "murdered" thousands every month
Posted on November 15, 2008I know that when John McCain called Bill Ayers just "some washed up old terrorist," he was trying to minimize Ayers' significance and deprive him of any current relevancy. But that was just another of McCain's well-intentioned misjudgments. Ladies and gentlemen, friends and neighbors, there is evil in the world, and Bill Ayers was, and remains to this very day,...
Regarding the Obama camp's leaks about confidential talks with the POTUS
Posted on November 12, 2008On January 20, 2009, Barack Obama will become the 44th president of the United States. We call him the "president-elect" in recognition of that fact, and it's an important fact. But until then, he's the junior senator from Illinois ? complete with a goofy pretend seal of office (you'd think he would have learned, but no) and the apparent political...
Beldar on Brooks on conservatism
Posted on November 12, 2008My subject in today's post is David Brooks' column in yesterday's New York Times on the future of conservativism. And here on my blog, I am going to give that column every bit of the thoughtful discussion, and exactly as many hyperlinks, as it deserves, given the current credibility of its author on this subject and the source of its...
Meanwhile, in the Oval Office
Posted on November 10, 2008Ann Althouse is right: This photograph of Dubya and Obama in the Oval Office is "[a]rtfully composed and deeply historic." It's flattering to both men, and although it cannot soothe all or even most of my worries about the impending Obama Administration, it's nevertheless reassuring in many important ways...
Visualizing Obama's victory
Posted on November 09, 2008A new reader I've known for a long time emailed me with this link to a series of fascinating maps (with explanations for how they're prepared) created by Mark Newman, the Paul Dirac Collegiate Professor of Physics at the University of Michigan. I'll reproduce one of the most interesting (and, arguably, meaningful) here: So what do you think Obama's victory...
No to Gorelick for AG
Posted on November 09, 2008The Democratic Party's ethical standards have now plummeted significantly below those which prompted Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards to joke in 1983 that "The only way I can lose this election is if I'm caught in bed with either a dead girl or a live boy...
A plea to John McCain: Find and expose the anonymous sources telling lies about Sarah Palin and use the McCain temper to "make them famous"
Posted on November 08, 2008In the many hours I spent online doing background research on Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin before I wrote my first post about her on June 8, 2008, I read many dozens of newspaper stories about her, dating back to her time as mayor of Wasilla in the late 1990s, in the state's largest newspaper, the Anchorage Daily News, as well...
BeldarBlog re-design done (for now)
Posted on November 08, 2008Many thanks to those of you who've provided feedback on the changes in format I've been experimenting with here. I've decided to stick with a fixed-width white container for post text, and to go with something wider than the 500 pixels I'd used since 2003...
Yard sign, remodeled
Posted on November 07, 2008Dave from Sugarland sent (and gave me permission to republish here) a photo of his yard sign ? which is not the product of vandalism, but rather, of his intentional remodeling: Simple. Energy-conscious (re-cycling). Works for me.
Changes in comments format
Posted on November 07, 2008While I was tinkering with other things tonight, I think I've figured out how to make two changes to the format in which comments are displayed. First, comments will no longer display email addresses (even with what's supposed to include no-spam harvesting code)...
Are the wider margins better?
Posted on November 06, 2008When I first started blogging in 2003, most folks used lower resolution settings on their monitors, and there were very few wide-screen monitors. My sense is that both of those things have changed, so at least temporarily, I've widened the white text-box for my posts (as opposed to my grey-colored sidebar on the right) to make each of the text...
Is Barack Obama a good man?
Posted on November 06, 2008John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the charismatic and popular 35th President of the United States, was a war-hero who'd managed to get his PT boat cut in two by a Japanese destroyer. He was the son of a mob-connected bootlegger, and he won the presidency in one of the closest elections in American history ? his margin of victory came from manufactured...
Thanks and farewell [to HH.com] from Beldar
Posted on November 06, 2008This, in all probability, is the last of my teaser posts here noting a guest-post of mine at HughHewitt.com. It's been great to have the traffic at Hugh's place. It's been frustrating to have no control over the comments there, however, which are sometimes indistinguishable from things you'd read from the more immature posters and commenters at dKos...
Feeds
Posted on November 06, 2008Some things about the internet, I know about. Some things I don't. Some things I don't know are known unknowns, and some are unknown unknowns, but one of my known unknowns is the whole subject of feeds, aggregators, and the like. My blog hosting company, TypePad, has provided some sort of feed, which I think I have turned on properly,...
Congratulations to President-elect Obama
Posted on November 05, 2008Okay, with this post, I'm caught up again on cross-posting here for the guest posts I've made so far at HughHewitt.com. If you're reading down the page from this post, keep in mind that the teasers here for posts since late October were all done in the wee small hours after I already knew the disappointing election results...
Congrats to U.S. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) on his re-election
Posted on November 05, 2008I'll blog more about state-wide Texas races, probably, but I wanted to go ahead and congratulate Sen. John Cornyn before the wider audience at HughHewitt.com.
Palin voting
Posted on November 05, 2008Mark Stein also found a photograph of Sarah Palin voting that I like. Thank you, Mr. Stein.
In 9pm EST calls, NM switches to blue
Posted on November 05, 2008And it got worse for my team from then on.
Too soon IMHO to call Pennsylvania
Posted on November 05, 2008When I wrote this guest-post, it was. But it's not anymore.
Steyn's blood and guts assessment
Posted on November 05, 2008Steyn made me laugh when I wasn't in a very funny mood. Thanks, Mark.
Don't fixate on a video of a tough black guy with a stick in Philly, 'cause he's not what's threatening our rights
Posted on November 05, 2008If there's evidence of widespread and consequential voter fraud, I haven't seen it yet, but I remain very concerned about the clear evidence of widespread fraud in voter registrations because I don't think people commit that crime unless they intend those registrations to count for something...
Cotton candy beginning to hit the network airwaves
Posted on November 05, 2008If the exit polls were wrong, they weren't wrong enough to matter. I still think they're evil.
Marinucci claims SF Chron didn't report Obama's promise to "bankrupt" coal industry and cause "skyrocketing" electric rates because readers weren't interested
Posted on November 05, 2008My team lost the election, but in this follow-up guest-post about Obama's promise to bankrupt the coal industry and make electric rates skyrocket over at HughHewitt.com, I believe I thrashed the San Francisco Chronicle soundly. I suspect they've gotten over it already, huh?
Dow-Jones at 9633.01 as I write this
Posted on November 05, 2008Okay, this is me, grasping at straws in yet another Election Day guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
No surprise, but the NYT says CBS News and others may "call" the election before even Central time zone polls close
Posted on November 05, 2008This turned out not to be a problem. An election that turns out not to be close hides a great many risky early calls.
Ayers casts his vote at same polling place as Obama
Posted on November 05, 2008I really, really, really don't like Bill Ayers. It bothers me that he can vote. He should still be in prison.
A hiss for Prof. Philip Busse, and a cheer for old St. Olaf!
Posted on November 05, 2008Sign-stealers of either party are criminals, and I was glad to see one such criminal who'd bragged of his crimes on the Huffpo actually pay a price.
Election Day news before the polls close is among the least important news of the entire election season
Posted on November 05, 2008This was sort of a "pay no attention to any of the men behind the curtain" post, again designed to try to encourage people not to be discouraged. More GOTV.
Palin's public call on Stevens to "do the right thing" may mean "publicly commit to resign if the trial judge upholds the jury's verdict"
Posted on October 28, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com hazards a guess as to what Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is saying privately to just-convicted U.S. Senator Ted Stevens. It involves a resignation letter.
Bill Ayers claims he and other former radicals are "good guys" who are being "demonized"
Posted on October 28, 2008We all think we're "good guys," I suppose, but some of us ? in particular, those among us who are unrepentant, unrehabilitated domestic terrorists and radical "educators" ? are actually twisted dollops of evil scum. So I say in another guest-post at HughHewitt...
Former editor-in-chief of "Ms." magazine reports on her first-hand exposure to Sarah Palin
Posted on October 28, 2008In a guest-post at HughHewitt.com this evening, I linked to a pro-Palin analysis from a surprising source.
Conversations with Molly
Posted on October 28, 2008My Monday afternoon guest-post at HughHewitt.com is about a conversation I had with my youngest daughter this afternoon regarding spreading the wealth.
Obama's 2001 appearance on a Chicago PBS radio program shows him focused on building a "coalition of power" to bring about redistribution of wealth which even the Warren Court couldn't achieve
Posted on October 27, 2008I don't have any doubt that Barack Obama wants to redistribute America's wealth. Unfortunately, I can't agree with National Review's Katheryn Jean Lopez that this excerpt from a 2001 PBS radio broadcast proves that. Ultimately, the broadcast is still pretty scary, though, which is the distinction I try to maintain in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt...
On this 41st anniversary of John McCain being shot down over Hanoi
Posted on October 27, 2008My last guest-post of Sunday evening at HughHewitt.com marks the 41st anniversary of John McCain's last mission over Hanoi.
Actually, I am Bill too, but not THAT Bill
Posted on October 26, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com links a funny ha-ha piece from Iowahawk that's also funny-sad (when you drill down through the links). And yes, Bill Ayers is still a twisted dollop of evil scum.
The Rezko-Obama payoff reduced to one sentence
Posted on October 26, 2008I just don't understand how anyone can't grasp this: Tony Rezko did a six-figure favor for Barack Obama in connection with Obama's house purchase. The only other explanation requires one to believe that Obama is a brilliant real estate pro and that Tony Rezko is stupid enough to pay full asking price at exactly the same time...
Politico-sports metaphor for the day
Posted on October 26, 2008Sarah Barracuda to Barack Obama, re basketball nets, in one of my guest-posts today at HughHewitt.com.
SNL opening skit on Biden & Murtha gaffes
Posted on October 26, 2008Early this morning I guest-posted an embedded video clip of SNL's opening spoof last night on Rep. Jack Murtha's and Sen. Joe Biden's amazing accidental truth-tellings of the past week.
Challenge for next administration will be to be worthy of our military's professionalism and dedication
Posted on October 26, 2008On a guest-post yesterday at HughHewitt.com, I expressed my gratitude and admiration for our professional military forces, who are already on special alert as we approach the election and the transition to a new administration.
AP, mainstream media, use misleading headlines to falsely impute to Lieberman doubt about Palin's readiness
Posted on October 26, 2008AP this year isn't "Associated Press," it's "Anti-Palin." One of the latest examples is detailed in a guest-post I made yesterday at HughHewitt.com.
For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul?
Posted on October 26, 2008As I explained in a guest-post yesterday at HughHewitt.com, I'm still waiting for any honest Democrats to demand that the Obama campaign identify, fire, and help prosecute the people who decided to disable the anti-fraud controls from its online credit card donation program.
Obama, Frank, and the Dems plot course to repeat the debacle of Desert One with 25% cut in military funding
Posted on October 26, 2008Obama brags that he'll cut spending with a scalpel, but of course Congress originates all federal spending, and powerful Democratic Rep. Barney Frank is planning on a meat axe that will cut military spending by 25%. This will guarantee us a return to 1980 and the days of Desert One, or so argues my guest-post from yesterday at HughHewitt...
When it comes to polls and pollsters: Illegitimi non carborundum
Posted on October 26, 2008Jay Cost at Real Clear Politics uses some fancy math to show how bizarre this year's polls are, and in particular how much they're contradicting each other, as compared to previous years' polls. Don't let any of 'em get you down, I argued in a guest-post at HughHewitt...
Fred Thompson: Obama's agenda "based upon the belief that there are elites among us who know more and know better" how to use our money
Posted on October 26, 2008Friday, I reprinted Fred Thompson's excellent video campaign message in a guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Try as they might, ABC News reporters can't dilute power of Palin's use of Biden's words to critique Obama's unfitness
Posted on October 26, 2008Early Friday morning, my guest-post at HughHewitt.com contrasted the power of Sarah Palin's quoted words to the misleading misdirection of the ABC News reporters trying to cover her.
Don't be misled into thinking "early voting" reports necessarily, or even very closely, correspond to actual votes cast!
Posted on October 26, 2008The mainstream media is trying to make you think it knows exactly how the early voting is going, but it's assuming that registrations equal actual voting decisions, which is very misleading (as I argued in a Thursday guest-post at HughHewitt.com).
Temporary bookmark for Patterico
Posted on October 26, 2008As cross-posted in a guest post at HughHewitt.com, my friend Patterico's temporarily at Patterico.net while his original .com address is still hijacked.
The Purchase of the White House
Posted on October 26, 2008My Thursday guest-post at HughHewitt.com decries the sheer volume of money being used to buy a term in the White House for Barack Obama.
The "clear signal to the world" is of Obama's profound unreadiness
Posted on October 26, 2008My guest-post early Thursday morning at HughHewitt.com mocks the spin Team Obama is trying to put on Joe Biden's accidental truth-telling about how the world will test a new President Obama. The theme: "How can anyone in the world take them seriously, when Barack Obama and his lean, mean team of 500 foreign policy advisers can't even manage to achieve...
Even the higher marginal tax rate that you don't pay directly can still push you, and everyone, into poverty
Posted on October 26, 2008My lastest guest-post tonight at HughHewitt.com is about taxes and spreading the wealth. I argue that "those higher taxes cannot possibly be crafted so that they just affect rich old Peter over there ? not by a smart Harvard economics professor, and not even by Barack Obama...
Gen. Powell as a tree falling in the forest unvisited by the undecided
Posted on October 20, 2008Mickey Kaus and I agree about Gen. Colin Powell's endorsement of Sen. Obama, as I explain in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Biden warns us to "mark [his] words: It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy."
Posted on October 20, 2008Joe Biden ? mere idiot, or idiot savant? I still incline toward the former view, but his dire warning from yesterday (at a fundraiser when he thought there were no recordings being made) is apt, and it's the subject of my latest guest-post at HughHewitt...
The many tentacles of the Ayers-Obama coverup: Candidate, media, leftie bloggers all willing to rewrite history to support each others' lies
Posted on October 20, 2008Night and fog. That couple who lived on the corner, who you haven't seen since last week? They never lived there. Nacht und nebel. If you're smart, you'll stop asking about that couple who didn't ever live on the corner. My latest guest-post on HughHewitt...
Obama leaks cabinet choices in time for Halloween scare
Posted on October 19, 2008Sen. McCain meant, I think, to reassure Americans that they need not be "afraid" that Barack Obama is an "Arab" or a "terrorist" himself. But Americans have ample cause to be afraid of other aspects of an Obama presidency, as my guest-post at HughHewitt...
A searing and timely account ... of a state senator who glorified a domestic terrorist turned radical "educator"
Posted on October 19, 2008Other than his unsigned Harvard Law Review note, is this the first published writing of Barack Obama — a glorification of Bill Ayers? My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com reprints this photo of the book review with a link back to its source and just a bit of commentary.
Caribou Barbie rocks on an otherwise dreadful episode of SNL
Posted on October 19, 2008Alec Baldwin is still a vile idiot, but to his credit, he allowed himself to be parodied in Gov. Palin's very effective appearance on "Saturday Night Live." I still wouldn't let him in the same building with either of my daughters. More comments about Gov...
Dazzling daylight between Webb & Obama on guns and other policies
Posted on October 19, 2008The below-mentioned Matt Bai piece in the NYT Sunday Magazine also produced a couple of priceless quotes, reproduced in my guest-post at HughHewitt.com, that I hope are quoted and emailed to every gun-owner, conservative, and moderate in the Commonwealth of Virginia.
'Horns are for real
Posted on October 19, 2008I sing the praises of Colt McCoy and the Longhorns, who were 57-31 victors over Mizzou on Satureday night, in yet another guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
From the First Gospel of Obama (NYT revised translation)
Posted on October 19, 2008The One actually was engaged in an evangelical crusade to convert the San Franciscans to the glories of guns and religion. That's why he tried to persuade the NYT's Matt Bai, who reprints a couple of long and incomprehensible paragraphs along those lines which inspired my latest whimsical guest-post at HughHewitt...
A sad reaction to Peggy Noonan's Palin meltdown
Posted on October 19, 2008I tried not to write a response to Peggy Noonan's ugly anti-Palin op-ed in Friday's WSJ, but ended up not being able to resist. I hope it's reasonably snark-free. It's a guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
A respectful nod to Paul Mirengoff
Posted on October 18, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com is about Paul Mirengoff of PowerLine, with whom I disagreed (and, I think, still do) regarding Gov. Palin. Paul's at least open to recognizing inconsistencies in the opinions expressed by other Palin critics from the right, in particular from Peggy Noonan...
"How many plumbers do you know makin' a quarter million dollars a year?"
Posted on October 18, 2008I can't not blog about Joe the Plumber, can I? He's the subject of my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com, the point of which I don't think is particularly profound, but it's apparently too subtle for The One to grasp.
Hang in there, Dean
Posted on October 18, 2008Dean Barnett, who was a previous guest-poster at HughHewitt.com and a frequent guest-host for Hugh's radio show, is still in an ICU battling cystic fibrosis. As I've said in a short guest-post there, he's in my prayers this weekend.
Docs opining on McCains' prognosis divide into two groups: Those who know what they're talking about, and those who're guessing
Posted on October 18, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com distinguishes between those doctors who've actually examined and treated John McCain, who say his prognosis from his 2000 cancer surgery is quite good, and those who are just guessing, who want to scare people into thinking that it's not...
Rest stop
Posted on October 17, 2008You might think Barack Obama would be the better stand-up comic as between him and John McCain, but you'd be wrong. The proof is in the embedded video in the report I've linked (in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com) from last night's Al Smith dinner, at which Sen...
WaPo's endorsement of Obama reveals editorialists as wishful thinkers, him as blank canvas
Posted on October 17, 2008The WaPo's endorsement of Barack Obama this morning is almost self-fisking, but I couldn't resist having a go in a guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Reports of bloodthirsty McCain-Palin supporters are mostly exaggerated or simply false
Posted on October 17, 2008"Tell him" was misheard by a Scranton newspaper reporter as "Kill him!" And then it was once again off to the races with nonsense about how murderous and bloodthirsty the crowds are after Gov. Palin incites them to violence. My guest-post at HughHewitt...
Just another one
Posted on October 17, 2008My take on the third and final presidential debate appears as a guest-post at HughHewitt.com. Another what? Another conventional tax-and-spend Democratic politician from Chicago.
McLaughlin series on "The Integrity Gap" between McCain and Obama will arm you for water-cooler debates
Posted on October 17, 2008I've fallen behind in cross-posting, but yesterday my wee-small-hours guest-post at HughHewitt.com was a link to and recommendation of Dan McLaughlin's latest in his series on "The Integrity Gap."
Today's SCOTUS ruling does NOT mean there's no voting fraud problem in Ohio
Posted on October 17, 2008Today's SCOTUS ruling on the Ohio voting case is almost impenetrable. But I'm convinced it's an important case on an important subject, even though I think its moral is deeply concealed. It's not a statement that there's no voter fraud going on in Ohio, nor even a statement that clears the Democratic Secretary of State in Ohio, Jennifer Brunner, of...
Bill Ayers, Eagle Scout from Hell
Posted on October 15, 2008My family history in Scouting may have caused me to over-react in my late-night guest-post about an op-ed about Bill Ayers at HughHewitt.com. But I can't think of any rank or position that's more inappropriate to use as a comparison for that twisted dollop of evil scum than "Eagle Scout...
My question that I wish Bob Schieffer would ask Barack Obama tomorrow night
Posted on October 15, 2008What do elemental mercury and the Congo have in common? They're the subject of the only two pieces of legislation Barack Obama has passed through Congress as author and principal sponsor. In my evening guest-post at HughHewitt.com, that's what I suggest moderator Bob Schieffer ought to ask Obama about in tomorrow night's debate.
Sarah Palin's campaigning is infused with contagious joy
Posted on October 15, 2008While watching Gov. Palin's televised address at a campaign rally today, I was inspired to write my mid-day guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Advice for those conservatives with palm-shaped forehead bruises
Posted on October 15, 2008My morning guest-post today at HughHewitt.com is a combination pep-talk and attempt to offer constructive suggestions to those who are too fixated on polls and the MSM's "it's all over" meme.
A reply to Prof. Post: It's nonsense to argue both that it was okay for Gov. Palin to actually fire Monegan, but that it wasn't okay for her to merely threaten to fire Monegan
Posted on October 12, 2008Even very smart people sometimes miss the obvious, especially when there are politics involved. I'm sure he's a very smart person, but I think Temple law professor David Post wasn't thinking clearly when it comes to either the Branchflower Report or my first post about it at HughHewitt...
Saturday best wishes
Posted on October 11, 2008In my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com, I ask the timeless question: "How 'bout them Longhorns?" Congrats to them on their 45-35 win over the No. 1-ranked O.U. Sooners. I'm enjoying a beautiful and relaxing fall day today, and I hope you are too. (I couldn't abide by the red-and-white theme at Hugh's blog today, though, without inserting this burnt orange...
Condolences
Posted on October 11, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com extends my condolences to Betsy Newmark, the fine blogger who writes Betsy's Page, on the loss of her father, George Washington Bamberger, last night at age 93. I suspect he and my own dad had more in common than just their service as volunteers in the Pacific Theater in World War II.
More judicial tyranny from Obama-style judges: CT courts overturn state law to recognize gay marriage
Posted on October 10, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com criticizes activist judges on the Connecticut Supreme Court who've today imposed their own views over the will of the majority of their state's voters in the guise of interpreting their state constitution. I'm not against same-sex marriage, but I'm against imposing it on an unwilling majority of the public by judicial decree...
The race stays close, and Obama isn't becoming any blacker
Posted on October 10, 2008My strangely titled guest-post yesterday at HughHewitt.com compares Barack Obama to Bill Cosby/Cliff Huxtable in terms of his familiarity and, insofar as his race is concerned, non-threateningness. But I argue that it's fine, indeed appropriate, to be afraid of him, and to withhold one's vote from him, for reasons having nothing to do with race...
Branchflower report on Tasergate: Just one guy's opinion that contradicts itself and ignores the relevant facts and law
Posted on October 10, 2008Give a lawyer a $100k budget and tell him to produce a political hatchet job, and what do you get? The 263-page piece of garbage now on the internet and in the hands of Alaska legislators called "The Branchflower Report." My take on it as the latest bit of political thuggery in Tasergate is now up as a guest-post on...
If he can't keep his campaign plane from stinking, what makes anyone think Obama can handle the world's hardest executive job?
Posted on October 09, 2008The same news network that gave us Rathergate now serves up the news that the Obama campaign plane literally and chronically stinks. Will the MSM reporters next cry out for Barack Obama to call them Edna? My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com won't help you understand that last techno-punk rock allusion, but it does ask a serious question about Obama's executive...
"The Audacity of Hope" versus "The Erosion of Doubt"
Posted on October 08, 2008Canaries and unicorns abound in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com, with more thoughts on the big-picture significance of Tuesday night's presidential debate.
McCain the Warrior awoke, pivoted on Obama the Professor, and pounded him
Posted on October 08, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com analyzes the second presidential debate between Captain John McCain and Professor Barack Obama. For those not wholly besotted with him, Obama's mystique wears off with repeated exposure. McCain or someone on his team knew that when they proposed lots and lots of town-hall debates, and Obama was smart to refuse that offer...
CNN: Ayers and Obama jointly planned kick-off of Obama's political career at Ayers' home
Posted on October 07, 2008This is an amazing piece of video ? not least because of its source. I think I've managed to successfully embed it in an otherwise wordless guest-post at HughHewitt.com, whose website mechanics make such postings kind of iffy, but if you can't see it either here or there, try this link...
SCOTUS decision applauded by Obama prompts federal judge to order release into our national capital of 17 Chinese Muslims captured in terrorist training camps in Afghanistan
Posted on October 07, 2008We catch them in terrorist training camps in Afghanistan, where they'd gone to be taught with the cooperation and under the protection of the Taliban. Now, as laid out in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com, a federal court has said that because their home country, China, will imprison them if we return them there, we have to let them run...
Ayers to kids: "Kill your parents!" Ayers to courts:"Don't hold teen murderers responsible!"
Posted on October 07, 2008Barack Obama chose to share a stage with Bill Ayers in 1997 in a juvenile justice-themed event promoted by Michelle Obama. The lovely Michelle was quoted in the press release as saying that the panelists were "experienced" with the criminal justice system, but it didn't mention that one of them was an unreformed, unrepentant would-be cop-killer and mass murderer, as...
Dealing with Palin haters
Posted on October 07, 2008So many distractions yesterday that I got behind in cross-posting here. One of my new guest-posts at HughHewitt.com is a riff on Palin Derangement Syndrome, the successor to Bush Derangement Syndrome.
Brokaw claims Ayers is now a mere "school reformer"
Posted on October 05, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com ponders how Tom Brokaw can revere the Greatest Generation's heroism in the 1940s, yet dismiss Bill Ayers' terrorism in the 1960s and 1970s, and call him a mere "school reformer" despite his present radical plans to turn our educational system on its head and turn every teacher into a "community activist" to teach against "oppression...
NYT minimizes and conceals both extent and seriousness of Obama's multi-year ties to terrorist Ayes over multi-million-dollar conspiracy to radicalize American education
Posted on October 04, 2008This guest-post at HughHewitt.com links and quotes Stanley Kurtz' latest, which demolishes this puff piece from the NYC on the depth and nature of the ties between Ayers and Obama.
The genesis of, and last clear chance to avoid, the national crap sandwich
Posted on October 04, 2008The Townhall.com software and I are not good enough friends yet for me to have successfully embeded this video in a guest-post there, but I can do that here: The video, from the Republican National Congressional Committee, is pretty good in pointing out Democrats who were simultaneously defending Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, blocking reform efforts, and taking their contributions...
Did someone feed Palin answers to give Cameron for the questions from Couric which she'd ducked?
Posted on October 04, 2008In an afternoon guest-post at HughHewitt.com, I express an opinion contrary to my good friend Patterico's about whether Gov. Palin had answers for Katie Couric about what periodicals she reads and SCOTUS decisions she disagrees with, but chose not to share that info.
The integrity gap between Obama-Biden and McCain-Palin
Posted on October 03, 2008My latest guest-post on HughHewitt.com is a plug for Dan McLaughlin's first in a three-part series on the Integrity Gap between the two parties' tickets, and it focuses on Gov. Palin. Dan marshals the evidence in meticulous detail, always with supporting links...
Through Sarah Palin, ordinary, non-mystical Americans may reclaim their national government
Posted on October 03, 2008To say that I was pleased with Gov. Sarah Palin's performance in the vice presidential debate would be a considerable understatement. In my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com, I make my case for why Caribou Barbie definitely rocked.
My counsel to the House: Do the deal, don't bet the country's economy
Posted on October 03, 2008My Thursday wee-small hours guest-post on HughHewitt.com was an essay in favor of House passage of the revised economic stabilization bill, even though it is a crap sandwich.
Nielsen ratings on Veep debate show 70 million Americans' fascination with Sarah Palin
Posted on October 03, 2008Only the 1980 Reagan-Carter presidential debate outdrew last night's vice-presidential debate. My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com explains why these monster ratings are great news for McCain-Palin.
Life imitating "Fargo"?
Posted on October 03, 2008There's just no good William H. Macy in this election cycle, but in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com, I propose some other parallels between politicians and characters in the movie Fargo.
Carl Cameron's interview with Gov. Palin
Posted on October 03, 2008My late afternoon guest-post at HughHewitt.com summarizes some of the gaps that Gov. Palin filled in for Fox News' Carl Cameron that she had declined to address with Katie Couric.
Palin on Hannity
Posted on October 02, 2008Whoops. I missed one. A guest-post on HughHewitt.com, that is, in which I quoted a chunk of Gov. Palin's very good interview on Sean Hannity's radio show this afternoon.
The stage is set for the Veep debate
Posted on October 02, 2008I'm predicting a debate that's "entertaining and informative" in my latest, and perhaps shortest, guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
SCOTUS admits blunder on UCMJ, but says "Nevermind," and shows again how Obama's model judges pull constitutional law from thin air
Posted on October 01, 2008When the Supreme Court is so wrong, I take small pleasure in being right in predicting that they'll perversely continue being wrong. But I nevertheless claim that credit in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Old media dinosaurs have NOT asked Sarah Palin about her actual accomplishments
Posted on October 01, 2008If you're a regular reader here, you already knew all about Sarah Palin's accomplishments before John McCain named her as his Veep nominee. But my new guest-post at HughHewitt.com mentions three in particular that the mainstream media seems to be particularly clueless about.
Is Veep debate moderator Gwen Ifill biased?
Posted on October 01, 2008Disclose the book, but let viewers decide if there's any real bias. So I advise Gwen Ifill in my latest guest post at HughHewitt.com.
Ifill quells no qualms by being defensive
Posted on October 01, 2008I'm particularly proud of this sentence in my latest guest-post on HughHewitt.com: "They won't be black dollars, or white dollars, but green dollars."
In game of "Pelosi may I [vote no]?" the Speaker's answer to Dems was "Yes, you may!"
Posted on September 30, 2008It's a long title, but it sums up my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com pretty well, I think.
E.J. Dionne, Jr. offers definitive example of cognitive dissonance in debate analysis
Posted on September 29, 2008E.J. Dionne, Jr. is an amusing fellow, often most so when he doesn't intend to be. My amusement at two of his most recent paragraphs generated my most recent guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Ex-generals and admirals back McCain over Obama by 4-to-1 margin
Posted on September 29, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com compares the respective tallies of ex-generals and -admirals who've endorsed John McCain and Barack Obama to become the next commander in chief. Obama had an impressive line-up, literally, on stage at the DNC before his acceptance speech...
Smitten Pakistani president smacked by feminists at home for sexism towards Veep nominee Palin
Posted on September 29, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com ponders why feminists in Pakistan are able to recognize sexism (albeit of a fairly harmless sort) toward Sarah Palin in the actions of their own president, while American so-called feminists are blind to any and all sexism directed her way by themselves or their fellow Americans of the Hard Left.
From Bill Kristol's lips to John McCain's ear: Free Sarah!
Posted on September 29, 2008I couldn't quite bring myself to cross-post my Treebeard & Botox post below at HughHewitt.com, so my latest guest-post there is once again on the subject of Gov. Palin. Long before whatever handlers and aides from the McCain team started advising her and planning her schedule, she was kicking butt and taking names in Alaska...
Key to economic stability bill's defeat was Pelosi's refusal to make this a "party loyalty" vote
Posted on September 29, 2008It's not just, or even mostly, Republican nay-sayers who were against the bill either on principle or because they were offended by Pelosi's partisan speech. The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 was Democratic bill ? not Bush's bill, not the GOP's bill, and it went down to defeat because Speaker Pelosi refused to use the tools at her disposal...
Elections have consequences, and one of those is that Pelosi bears responsibility for the financial bill's defeat
Posted on September 29, 2008To apportion credit or blame where due, you might want to read my late afternoon guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Newsweek hot for "Mr. Cool"
Posted on September 29, 2008My mid-morning guest-post at HughHewitt.com critiqued Newsweek's critique of the two presidential candidates' temperaments.
How the candidates spent the day after the first debate
Posted on September 28, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com could have been devoted to Joe Biden's facial expression in the photograph above. Instead, it's devoted to the fact that while John McCain worked the phones on the day after the first presidential debate to try to save the financial security of the country, Biden and Barack Obama spent the day promoting The One's presidential...
Treebeard & Botox
Posted on September 28, 2008As is my wont, I'm using Sunday evening to watch recordings of the morning's talking head shows. Right now I'm watching Sens. Lindsey Graham and John Kerry, neither of whom I'm particularly fond of, being quizzed by Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday (having already watched a remarkably good performance by John McCain on the ABC News program, in which...
Post-mortem on the first presidential debate
Posted on September 27, 2008John McCain had a good night, while Obama's was at best average. I explain why that translates to an Obama loss in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
On a clear day, you can indeed see Russia from Alaska
Posted on September 27, 2008You'll learn about the difference between Ignaluk and Inalik in my latest guest-post on HughHewitt.com, plus find a link to a webcam from which, for one hour each day, you can literally peer into tomorrow.
"I wanted him to know my son's name"
Posted on September 27, 2008My latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com is about the bracelet Obama had to read from last night during the presidential debate.
A recommendation to help you grok the current economic crisis
Posted on September 26, 2008Cliff Notes for the current economic crisis, linked and briefly discussed in my latest HH.com guest-post.
Obama's tin ear
Posted on September 26, 2008I think Obama has blown any chance he might have had to win the election with a single ill-chosen word, which is revealed in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Don't second-guess McCain's choice of Palin yet based on speculation that Jindal might have been a better one
Posted on September 26, 2008I like Bobby. I like Sarah. This year, Sarah made more sense for John, sez I ? respectfully contra Bridget Johnson at PajamasMedia ? in my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com
Will Obama loom over McCain in the debates?
Posted on September 26, 2008Four words: "What about Dingle-Norwood?" If that doesn't ring a bell, you probably should read my latest guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
In the current financial crisis, only McCain is indispensible
Posted on September 25, 2008The non-Palin guest-post that I've just put up at HughHewitt.com is probably my all-time strongest praise for John McCain. The current financial crisis is the prompt, but the specific subject which drew that out of me is "leadership."
Durbin's using financial crisis to extort redistribution of wealth from responsible homeowners to the profligate
Posted on September 25, 2008Some people, including me, are worried that the proposed financial bailout will eventually cost taxpayers a big net chunk of money, either through higher taxes or increases in the national debt, if the bailout structure doesn't repay the Treasury. But did you realize that Dick Durbin, Barack Obama's senior partner in the Senate from the Great State of Illinois, is...
Neither Palin nor any human in her shoes could satisfy the mainstream media's lust for "gotcha" questions
Posted on September 25, 2008When we're talking Sarah Palin and the old media hacks, no good deed goes unpunished — as I argue at length in a guest-post at HughHewitt.com.
Contra Bonnie Goldstein at Slate.com, Gov. Palin has never "admitted publicly" that any communications with Monegan were intended to "urge Wooten's firing"
Posted on September 24, 2008Yes, I know, the titles are too, too long, but I have another early-morning guest-post about Sarah Palin up at HughHewitt.com. Although of course most of it's unrelated to my guest posts there, yesterday Hugh's site got close to 120k visits or page views according to Sitemeter...
Pix for animal lovers
Posted on September 24, 2008Okay, this one I'm not going to cross-post at Hugh's place, in part because I'm not comfortable enough with the interface there yet to deal with photos confidently, and in part because I'm really just re-posting two photos that were originally juxtaposed in the Humane Society Legislative Fund's endorsement of the Obama-Biden ticket over the McCain-Palin ticket (h/t John McCormack...
In 1995, Obama notified the world that he'd tie himself to extremists like Bill Ayers
Posted on September 24, 2008In part because I was a college classmate and friend of its originator, I try to resist falling prey to Godwin's Law in my blogging. But I can't help wondering if someday, Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance will be considered as prophetic as a certain other book written in the late 1920s by a certain...
Washington Democratic Party hacks second-guess Gov. Palin about her relative time spent in Juneau and elsewhere
Posted on September 24, 2008It really shouldn't surprise me or annoy me, or do anything but amuse me, when some Democratic Party hack waiting out his exile in a think-tank purports to do "reporting" for Politico.com in the form of a ridiculous bit of second-guessing of how Gov. Sarah Palin divides her time between Juneau, Anchorage, and Wasilla...
Biden reconsiders, decides it really is okay to mock McCain for POW disability which prevents him from using keyboards
Posted on September 23, 2008I've put up my first non-Palin guest post at HughHewitt.com. (Be sure to read at least the first comment.)
"Caribou Barbie" kicks serious tail
Posted on September 23, 2008I've got another guest post up at HughHewitt.com, giving credit for humor where due but urging Gov. Palin to embrace her inner Caribou Barbie.
A fisking of David Talbot's assembly of Alaska's defeated candidates and felons to whine about "mean girl" Sarah Palin
Posted on September 23, 2008It's almost indecently easy to fisk stuff that's published on Salon.com, and I enjoyed doing so in another guest post about Sarah Palin on HughHewitt.com this morning.
Spare me your reverse-reverse snobbery about Sarah Palin
Posted on September 23, 2008I've put up yet another guest-post about Gov. Palin at HughHewitt.com. This one's pretty snarky, but I respectfully submit that it's a response to snark-rageous provocation from Michelle Cottle, a leftie pundit at TNR.
Wisdom & elitism: The moose-hunting hockey mom versus the community organizer from Harvard Law
Posted on September 22, 2008It may be only temporary ? I still have a mostly-downed tree suspended across my electric line drop in my backyard ? but for the moment I have power and internet back, thanks in part to a visiting crew of power linemen from New York State. And I'm hoping that a nearby tree-cutting crew from North Carolina which is sweeping...
New clueless anti-Palin meme: She's a black widow who'll turn on John McCain
Posted on September 22, 2008I have another guest post up at HughHewitt.com.
Ike: Recovering from the storm
Posted on September 14, 2008Yes, we'll remember Ike for a while in Houston. But it could have been much worse, at least for me and mine. I'm safe. My kids and ex are safe, and they even have power back on, not too many blocks away from me. The water pressure is coming back up gradually, and there's been no significant flooding in my...
The red flag from Alaska that Team Obama chose to ignore
Posted on September 12, 2008I've put up another Palin post at HughHewitt.com.
Ike: Calm before the storm
Posted on September 12, 2008From my simple vantage in southwest Houston (Sharpstown/HBU area), folks seem pretty calm and purposeful as Hurricane Ike continues to head straight for us. As much out of curiosity as anything, I stopped at my regular corner convenience store, which was still pumping gas (about a four-car line at each pump) and selling most of its regular foods and merchandise...
In Gibson interview, Gov. Palin was right: There is no single clear meaning for "the Bush Doctrine"
Posted on September 12, 2008So I argue in my first substantive post while guest-blogging at HughHewitt.com.
Beldar to guest-blog at HughHewitt.com until the election
Posted on September 12, 2008I'm tickled to announce that between now and the election, I'll be doing some guest-blogging at HughHewitt.com. Hugh and the good folks at Townhall have offered me that opportunity as a way to make my posts accessible to a broader audience. There as here, however, the views I express will be my own, as will my blunders...
On 9/11/01 plus seven
Posted on September 11, 2008I'm resigned now to the reality that even on 9/11/01, some Americans never understood 9/11/01. For them, it's never been a question of whether, or when, they'd forget their fierce resolve that America would stand up to attacks on it. They never had that resolve...
Beldar unpanicked by Ike
Posted on September 10, 2008An enormous amount of news broadcasting about hurricanes is unserious and irresponsible. Even print media's coverage can be pretty hysterical. I've seen quite a few big storms, starting with Tropical Storm Claudette when I was a summer law clerk here in 1979 and Hurricane Allen on the same weekend that I first moved to Houston full-time in August 1980, so...
Newsweek bonds with child-abuser in Tasergate non-scandal
Posted on September 10, 2008I've blogged quite a bit before about Tasergate (here and here), but the newest hatchet job on Sarah Palin comes from Newsweek (h/t Jim Geraghty at NRO's Campaign Spot). Newsweek reports that then private-citizen Sarah Palin, her sister Molly, and their family were cautioned by the judge in Molly's divorce case not to "disparage" Molly's ex-husband, Alaska Trooper Mike "Tasered-My-Kid"...
A critique of Dahlia Lithwick's debate advice to Joe Biden
Posted on September 09, 2008Dahlia Lithwick tells us in her latest online column in Slate that she is a "longtime parliamentary debater" (by which I think she means, she's from Canada) and a "longer-time female," and that as such, she is going to "humbly offer [Joe Biden] a few tips on how to debate a girl...
Sarah "Barracuda" Palin sends Secret Service agent on personal errand to put one innocent American family under scrutiny
Posted on September 09, 2008Sarah Palin's enemies say that once she's in a position of power, she uses that power ruthlessly to further her personal agenda. Now, there's new proof of just how personally Gov. Palin takes things, as evidenced by the errand ? involving one particular American family that had come under her scrutiny ? on which she recently dispatched an armed member...
Biden says election of Palin as VP would be "obviously a backward step for women"
Posted on September 09, 2008I firmly believe that between now and November 4th, Joe Biden will be Barack Obama's gift to the GOP that just keeps on giving. Today's offering: Asked by a local television reporter in Milwaukee, Wisconsin if electing Palin would be a step forward for women, Biden said, "well look, I think the issue is what does Sarah Palin think? What...
Trials and turmoils of The One on the rough, tough campaign trail
Posted on September 08, 2008Quoth The One, on the subject of his many sacrifices, 'midst high-dollar donors ($2,300 or $30,800, the higher price presumably including unlimited shrimp and a photo op with The One) at one of two back-to-back New York events hosted by the (notably lesser) rock star Jon Bon Jovi and a neighbor: "I hope you guys are up for a fight...
NYT confirms startling detail about Palin child's name!
Posted on September 08, 2008Yes, indeed, as I had speculated, the NYT has now definitively confirmed that infant Trig's second middle name ? he's officially "Trig Paxson Van Palin" ? was indeed intended as a pun on the name of the rock group Van Halen and its stars of that same surname, Eddie and Alex...
Palin and the Alaska National Guard
Posted on September 07, 2008Via Rob at The Spyglass, I came across this four-minute video clip about Gov. Sarah Palin's duties ? and her above-and-beyond performance of same ? as commander of the Alaska National Guard. It makes several good points, not only in illuminating the responsibilities that all governors have in directing their states' guard units, but also about how Sarah Palin in...
Glib dismissals of Gov. Palin's executive record are unfair and unpersuasive: A further response to Paul Mirengoff
Posted on September 07, 2008A couple of days after John McCain's surprise nomination of Sarah Palin, I wrote a post entitled A plea for patience with sour, conventional conservative pundits who are still getting their minds around the Palin pick. In it, I argued that since Gov. Palin was an unconventional choice, and someone largely unknown to many conservatives, we ought to not rush...
A respectful suggestion to the McCain-Palin campaign: Change your slogans
Posted on September 07, 2008In 2006, when Sarah Palin and Sean Parnell ran for governor and lieutenant governor in Alaska, their campaign slogan was "New Energy for Alaska." I think there is a lot of truth to Sarah Palin's one-liner, during her acceptance speech at the GOP convention, to the effect that the presidency is not supposed to be a voyage of self-discovery...
Dear Mr. Obama
Posted on September 07, 2008I believe that this entire video, which runs less than two minutes, is worth your time. (H/t The Return of Scipio.)
Kaus is just wrong in diagnosing McCain's "rather lose an election than a war" claim as bogus
Posted on September 07, 2008Mickey Kaus is probably my favorite left-of-center-leaning blogger, but right now he's badly off his stride. After a ghastly reference last week to Trig Palin as a "prop" at the GOP convention, he now swings and misses with this observation (emphasis omitted, links in original) (h/t Instapundit): McCain would like everyone to think his campaign imploded last summer because of...
Axelrod spinning out of control on Palin and related topics
Posted on September 07, 2008Obama campaign czar David Axelrod was hilarious on Fox News Sunday this morning. Pressed by host Chris Wallace as to whether Sen. Obama thinks he has more executive experience than Gov. Palin, Mr. Axelrod first exploded into a litany of non-responsive Obama campaign talking points, a filibuster that probably lasted for two minutes...
The McCain-Palin campaign on offense
Posted on September 07, 2008I love metaphors. I especially like elegant metaphors, which can include sports metaphors. I'd previously made the point that the Palin choice was definitely not a Hail Mary (which is a desperation play), but I'd characterized it as a long bomb (on first down, from mid-field)...
"I feel like we deserve to win more than they deserve to lose"
Posted on September 06, 2008Normally I'm not much of a "just linking" blogger. I figure you folks can find what you want without much help from me, if you found your way here in the first place. But Bill Whittle has posted an exceptional piece about Sarah Palin and John McCain on the NRO website that I wish I had written...
Don't confuse Republicans' thrill over the Palin nomination with the Dems' worship of Obama: A reply to Paul Mirengoff
Posted on September 06, 2008My blogospheric friends over at Power Line are still struggling to get their minds, individually and collectively, around what has just happened in the Grand Old Party. Paul Mirengoff writes: We conservatives have had a good time ridiculing the Obama phenomenon, especially its messianic feel ? the willingness of its adherents to pour so much hope and belief into such...
More metaphors from the wild kingdom to describe the Obama-Biden campaign's "Palin problem"
Posted on September 05, 2008Politico.com has a funny story up now entitled Obama's Palin strategy: Sit and wait. Oh yes, please. That's a fabulous idea. The Obama campaign has no silver bullet to use against the Palin. Instead, Obama has decided to largely avoid directly engaging her and will instead keep his focus largely on John McCain and on linking the Republican ticket to...
Alaska governor's position among the most powerful and most challenging, in the U.S.
Posted on September 05, 2008Given its source, today's article in the NYT entitled The Unusual Challenges Palin Faced in Alaska is remarkably balanced and informative. As PrestoPundit Greg Ransom notes, though, in his post linking the article, Remember when the Democrat press wouldn't stop telling us about how Texas has a "weak Governor" system, when Bush was running for President? Well, don't expect them...
Palin seeks truth from state agency with jurisdiction, refuses to cooperate with political hatchet job, in Tasergate non-scandal
Posted on September 05, 2008A blogospheric friend sent me this link to an op-ed in the Anchorage Daily News, asking me for my thoughts on what a columnist there was describing as Gov. Palin "stonewalling" the state legislature's investigation into "Tasergate," a non-scandal I blogged about on the evening of August 29th, immediately after Sen...
Palin's history shows ever-growing opposition to earmarks
Posted on September 05, 2008GOP vice presidential nominee has been accused of "flip-flopping" and being hypocritical on the subject of federal "earmarks" ? appropriations to state governments associated with particular state spending projects. This article from the Anchorage Daily News is probably the best reporting I've seen on the subject, and I highly recommend it to you...
Meanwhile, in the convention hall
Posted on September 04, 2008As I type this, the sound system from the GOP convention floor is cranked up all the way, playing Heart's galloping mega-hit from 1977 (my college graduation year, yay!) ? "Barracuda." All of the GOP delegates are transported with enthusiasm. This is classic rock and roll, but this is not your daddy's Republican Party...
The Palin nomination had plenty of foreshadowing, despite MSM meme of it being a bolt from the blue
Posted on September 04, 2008Simon at Stubborn Facts has a link-filled post (h/t Althouse) which refutes the MSM's meme that the Palin nomination "came out of the blue." Lots of people were becoming "Palinfatuated," and it wasn't just bloggers: Gov. Palin placed a close second behind Mitt Romney, for example, in the Pajamas Media online poll that began in mid-June and ran for several...
Sexism versus shoddy journalism and elitism in the stream of Palin invective
Posted on September 04, 2008I may be in a minority in this. And I'm willing to be educated, or reminded of something I forgot. But the most blatantly, obviously sexist question I've heard in the last 35 years has been the one put to Sarah Palin or other GOP representatives, to the effect of "Can Sarah Palin really be vice president while being a...
Empirical proof of Palin's leadership abilities relative to Barack Obama's
Posted on September 04, 2008Fred Kaplan writes in Slate: At times like these, I'm relieved that I don't cover elections. There's bum DNA in my heart, and the agita might send me keeling over. How else to react to the sight of sophisticated people saying, with impressively straight faces, that Sarah Palin is qualified to be vice president ? even president ? because she's...
Team Obama's response to the political speech of the 21st century
Posted on September 03, 2008I just heard Brit Hume read aloud the Obama-Biden campaign's response to Gov. Palin's acceptance speech. It went: George Bush. George Bush. George Bush. That's not an exact quote, but it's awfully close. I promise you there was no other substance to it at all...
Palin's acceptance speech
Posted on September 03, 2008My take, in three words: The. Real. Deal. Your comments?
Noonan on Palin: The rest of what was said, and what she thinks
Posted on September 03, 2008You can rely on remarks wrenched badly out of context from a recording made of her unguarded remarks on an open microphone. Or you can read the rest of what Peggy Noonan said, and what she really thinks, about Sarah Palin's nomination. I recommend the latter, especially if you've already read the former.
Brave couple meet war hero
Posted on September 03, 2008Below, Levi Johnston, future husband of Bristol Palin (center left), meets Sen. John McCain as his VP selection and Bristol's mom, Gov. Sarah Palin, looks on. (H/t PowerLine via InstaPundit) Look at Bristol's smile. That is priceless, and it warms my heart...
Palin is popular — not because she's a "populist," but because she works for the whole population "with a servant's heart"
Posted on September 03, 2008Christopher Orr has a very interesting post at The New Republic about Gov. Palin entitled The Case Against the Case Against Sarah Palin. No, it's not savaging the MSM or Hard Left sources who've been vomiting out smears so fast it's hard to keep track of them ? I, for one, have been playing Whack-a-mole since the announcement on Friday,...
Dems ought not count on Sarah Barracuda to blow the VP debate
Posted on September 02, 2008PrestoPundit Greg Ransom has an embedded video of Sarah Palin at the final gubernatorial debate before her November 2006 general election victory over Democrat Tony Knowles and independent Andrew Halcro. It's about 84 minutes long, and much of it (especially the middle third) was focused on issues that are unique to Alaska, such as whether to pass a constitutional amendment...
Are the pregnancy smears coinky-dinky? Or conspiracies involving the Obama-Biden campaign?
Posted on September 02, 2008I've never run one of these polls before, but I'm curious how my readers would respond if prompted to guess on this one. NOTE: I have no evidence showing that there was any campaign involvement in the origination or spread of these rumors. And Sens. Obama and Biden both vigorously deny that they or anyone in their service has been...
Not a radical secessionist: Sarah Palin, registered Alaska Republican continuously since 1982
Posted on September 02, 2008Another pathetic, disgusting smear attempt. What will it be tomorrow? "Palin is evil clone produced from long-frozen embryo salvaged from Eva Braun's corpse"? (Subheading: "Nevertheless continues to oppose abortion, stem-cell research.") ******* Governors have a public relations role on behalf of their states...
Palin ahead of the curve in 2006 on "all of the above" solutions to energy problems
Posted on September 02, 2008Long before the current spike in gasoline prices at the pump that has kindled the raging debate on national energy policy, even before she had ever been elected to any statewide office, Sarah Palin was already studying what her state should do as the world begins to exhaust its petrochemical resources...
A timely Palin family history regarding the competition between privacy and political possibilities
Posted on September 01, 2008This is the only post I intend to write about the vicious rumors and, then, news regarding Gov. Sarah Palin's daughter Bristol, and I am not going to open comments on this post or permit comments on the topic on other posts. I have precisely one point to make on this topic, and I only write this because it's a...
Comparing Palin and Obama based on their respective experience in political campaigns
Posted on September 01, 2008Since the announcement of Sarah Palin as John McCain's choice for the GOP vice presidential nomination, the Obama camp has been stressing that his experience is superior to Gov. Palin's on grounds that he's been trained and tested through his presidential campaign...
Obama talks (and talks and talks) the talk on global poverty, and the talk is for more talks
Posted on September 01, 2008On the same OTB post I referenced just below, someone in the comments demanded to know (for purposes of contrasting Gov. Palin's accomplishments with Sen. Obama's) what bills Obama had introduced. I think he meant to ask, actually, what bills Obama had introduced that had actually passed the Senate, despite opposition, and then been enacted into law via passage through...
When toting up Palin's credentials, do not omit her experience as chair and ethics officer of the Alaska Oil & Gas Conservation Commission
Posted on September 01, 2008I'm cross-posting here, with only slight revisions, a comment that I've left on a post from James Joyner at Outside the Beltway entitled Experience: Obama v. Palin. --------------- Dr. Joyner: You, like most others who are only starting to look at Gov...
Because we can learn about Sarah Palin from looking at her family scrapbook ...
Posted on August 31, 2008More Palin pix ? you'll want to see these. (H/t to Prestopundit Greg Ransom, who has many other great links, videos, and posts on Gov. Palin!)
MSM and critics mischaracterize Palin as being ignorant of general Veep job duties by taking out of context her statement that she'd want to know her specific responsibilities as McCain's Veep
Posted on August 31, 2008I had previously seen online references to Gov. Sarah Palin having asked a question during an interview on CNBC that supposedly demonstrated her lack of understanding of the general job responsibilities of the Vice President of the United States. The argument thus being peddled is that Sarah Palin can't possibly be qualified for the job if she doesn't know what...
An indirect graphical indication of public interest in Sarah Palin
Posted on August 30, 2008I'm not modest, but my blog's traffic is, and I'm okay with that. My normal traffic, as measured by Sitemeter, generally runs between 1-2k page views per day, for which I'm genuinely grateful. On days when InstaPundit or Hugh Hewitt or someone on The Corner or my friend Patterico links something I've written, I may get three or four times...
Palin and the résumé test: a respectful reply to James Joyner
Posted on August 30, 2008[Note: I'm republishing here the photo that ran with the post to which I'm replying, not because it's at all relevant to the subject matter, but because it shows Gov. Palin in a relaxed office setting (probably her Anchorage office) that includes a bearskin and an Alaskan king crab...
A plea for patience with sour, conventional conservative pundits who are still getting their minds around the Palin pick
Posted on August 30, 2008I've gotten more than a few emails urging me to take up the cudgels against David Frum or Charles Krauthammer or other conservative pundits who've expressed anything from serious reservations to outright alarm at the Palin nomination. One, whom I won't mention by name here, said that if the Palin nomination excites the GOP base, we ought to "get a...
Palin's kids are NOT named after TV witches (sheesh)
Posted on August 30, 2008If there were any shred of doubt left as to whether Andrew Sullivan is a ridiculous tool ? and guest poster Alex my friend Patterico at Patterico's Pontifications has cataloged several other examples ? it's erased by his uncritical, enthusiastic republication of a reader email asserting that Sarah Palin's daughters Willow and Piper are named after TV witches in Buffy...
Obama's first post-Palin-pick TV ad: Um, look over there, there's Dubya!
Posted on August 30, 2008Voiceover: "Well, he's made his choice," says a female voice, "but for the rest of us, there's still no change." (Cut from video clips of energized crowd cheering McCain and Palin to videos of single man, then a single woman in facial close-up, both obviously painfully constipated, but thoughtful...
Single most clueless media "attack" on Gov. Palin's credentials
Posted on August 30, 2008For the same day of the announcement, the Utterly Clueless "I'm a troll who lives inside the Beltway and could not possibly survive for 12 hours if abandoned in any red-state city for 24 hours" Award goes to Jonathan Martin at the Politico (boldface mine): Palin, 44, is less than two years removed from being mayor of Wasilla, Alaska; has...
Palin knows being pro-production doesn't mean being in the oil companies' pocket
Posted on August 30, 2008Saturday's Houston Chronicle has a superb, insightful article by staff reporter Tom Fowler which quotes independent but knowledgeable energy industry experts who are familiar with Gov. Sarah Palin's record. It's packed with specific facts about that record, and the quoted experts ably draw a set of important distinctions...
Not a messiah, not even from Harvard, but the one (lower-case) we've been waiting for
Posted on August 30, 2008Fred Barnes and Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard have both been Palin prophets, both online and as television pundits. Now they have up a pair of punchy, persuasive online pieces worth your while: Barnes' Providential Palin and Kristol's Let Palin Be Palin...
The Palin family's energy bona fides versus the Democrats' big talk
Posted on August 29, 2008When Barack Obama or Nancy Pelosi religiously intone, yet again, with serene and bleak confidence that "We can't drill our way out of this," I can't help wondering if either of them could tell the difference at a glance between a drillbit, a pumpjack, a derrick, and a blowout preventer...
Don't be misled into thinking that Gov. Palin has championed the same sort of "windfall profits taxes" on oil companies that Obama has
Posted on August 29, 2008Stephen Spruiell was generous and self-critical enough to link today on The Corner a comment I wrote to one of my own Palin posts in which I took issue with a post by my excellent friend Ed Morrissey (formerly of Captain's Quarters) at Hot Air. Basically, I thought Ed (and, inferentially, Mr...
Why Biden won't be able to do to Palin what Bentsen did to Quayle
Posted on August 29, 2008Some conservatives are worried that Sarah Palin will become another "Dan Quayle at the Veep debate, being skewered by Lloyd Bentsen." I've been thinking about that possibility since the Biden nomination. My first reaction was that as a life-long Texan, I knew Lloyd Bentsen (well, actually, my father did); Lloyd Bentsen was my friend...
Non-scandal involving Gov. Palin: Even though he's an admitted child-abuser who Tasered his own step-son and used a deadly weapon to break the law, Trooper Wooten still has a job
Posted on August 29, 2008I'm republishing as a post in its own right what I wrote in a comment on July 21 on my post describing Gov. Sarah Palin as the "Most popular politician in the country" ? which she indeed is among her own constituents in Alaska, and, I predict, will soon become around the rest of the nation...
Yay! It's Palin!
Posted on August 29, 2008I'm enthused ? and oh-so-pleasantly surprised! ? about John McCain's choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin to be his running mate, for all of the reasons stated in my previous posts about her [and new ones, which I'll be adding to this table as I write them ? Beldar]: POST DATE Would Alaska Gov...
Obama over the top
Posted on August 28, 2008Events may prove me wrong. But I believe that in hindsight ? even, say, a year from now ? the high point of the failed Barack Obama presidential candidacy will be recognized as having occurred a few seconds before he spoke these lines in his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention tonight: You know, John McCain likes to say...
Beldar at the beginning
Posted on August 28, 2008When I started this blog in 2003, near the bottom of the personal information that's always been linked from my sidebar, I included an explanation for the origin of my nickname, "Beldar," during my days as a member of the Finquo Pledge Class of the Longhorn Band's Kappa Kappa Psi service fraternity 30 years ago...
Bubba and Slow Joe at the DNC
Posted on August 27, 2008Can there be any remaining doubt that Bill Clinton is the most accomplished and brazen liar in the history of the United States of America? Could anyone who was watching be so naïve as to believe that he believed a single word that he said about Barack Obama, or about his own intentions to campaign for Obama? (I skipped John...
Hillary at the DNC
Posted on August 27, 2008I wasn't able to watch last night's live coverage of the Democratic National Convention, but I watched replays in the wee small hours. I was fascinated by the reports that the Obama campaign juggled former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner, the supposed "key-note speaker," into an earlier time slot with fewer TV viewers because he was refusing to deliver up enough...
Teddy at the DNC
Posted on August 25, 2008Only a grinch could begrudge the Democrats their convention. I hope they have a good time. I'm prepared to be entertained by any conflict that breaks out, but I won't be disappointed if there is none. And I'll watch quite a bit of it, and maybe share a few of my reactions here...
Why I probably ought never be in the same room with Barack Obama
Posted on August 25, 2008I've never been arrested. The closest I've come as an adult to being in a fist-fight was more than 10 years ago, when a drunk sucker-punched me after I knocked on the door of his ski condo at 3:00 a.m. to ask him and his friends to turn down their music, and by the time I got off the floor...
Michelle and Barack Obama as national mom and dad
Posted on August 25, 2008Let's just stipulate that Barack and Michelle Obama have adorable daughters. I expected Michelle Obama's speech to be thoroughly homogenized and pasteurized and reassuring. Was it? I don't know, although the part I saw was bland. I fell asleep, and only woke up near the end, when Barack Obama "joined" his family via a teleconferencing hookup from Kansas City...
Why Obama's conventional Veep choice should free McCain to make an unconventional one (Palin or Jindal)
Posted on August 24, 2008Barack Obama, who is at least superficially a very unconventional presidential candidate, has now picked an exceptionally conventional vice-presidential running mate in Joe Biden. Biden was born in 1942; he was first elected to the Senate in 1972, when Obama was 11 years old, and Biden has been there ever since...
Obama picks Veep nominee whose main claim to fame is being caught repeatedly as a plagiarist
Posted on August 23, 2008As I post this, the NYT is announcing on its website that Barack Obama has chosen fellow senator Joe Biden as his running mate. If true, then Obama has apparently made NYT pundit David Brooks a happy man. He's certainly made me happier as a committed Obama opponent! I'm pretty sure that David Brooks is a nice man...
Obama's belatedly acknowledged case comment in the Harvard Law Review raises questions about his campaign's fundamental honesty
Posted on August 22, 2008On June 23, 2008, prompted by what I thought was a poorly researched and incomplete article by Jeffrey Ressner and Ben Smith on the Politico website, I wrote a post entitled Why Didn't Obama Publish anything in the law journal he edited? The key passage from the Ressner and Smith article, at least for purposes of my own post, was...
McCain versus Obama: "placelessness," faith, and dreams
Posted on August 16, 2008Peggy Noonan wrote an op-ed in yesterday's Wall Street Journal entitled The End of Placeness. Although more often lately I have found myself disagreeing with her political observations, I remain a fan of her prose, in part because it has a vivid and authentically consistent voice even on the printed page...
Fashion and The One
Posted on August 16, 2008Per the front page of today's WaPo, on what must surely be a slow news day: The Barack Obama campaign, which has been actively courting the fashion industry, has coordinated some 20 or so designers who are creating official merchandise for the candidate's Web site...
Not from Kansas
Posted on August 12, 2008It's amazing how bad the fact-checking can be in a newspaper like the Washington Post (emphasis mine): Obama's embodiment of a newer America begins but hardly ends with the fact that he would be the first black president. In a country where people liked to know where you were from, Obama lacks a ready answer ? he is part Hawaii,...
Windfall profits taxes on energy companies?
Posted on August 07, 2008Here's a current affairs multiple choice question that is dirt simple: For the second quarter of 2008, two highly pertinent financial figures reported by ExxonMobil were its net income (as calculated according to U.S. GAAP, i.e., generally accepted accounting principles) and the taxes it paid...
Beldar to Lowry, for the benefit of McCain, on ANWR
Posted on August 06, 2008Rich Lowry, the editor of the National Review, asks a question on The Corner today that I don't think he means to be rhetorical (bold-face mine): Drilling is, of course, the best domestic issue Republicans and McCain have going for them. Can you imagine what the debate would look like if McCain hadn't changed his position on off-shore drilling a...
Under the most favorable characterization, Obama displays the stupidity of youth in urging the tapping of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve
Posted on August 05, 2008Depending on the circumstances, sometimes only a few years' difference in life experience can translate into an enormous gap in wisdom. I was born in November 1957, at the tail-end of the Baby Boom. Teens from small towns in the west Texas prairies learned to drive early in those days...
Beldar has no fault to find with Obama's special airplane chair
Posted on August 04, 2008I was among those most mocking when it came to the Great Seal of Obama. But unlike my blogospheric friend Hugh Hewitt, I don't have a particular problem with Obama's "special chair" on his campaign airplane, as shown in this CBS photo (which I've enlarged and enhanced to make the printing on the leather more obvious): It's not a knock-off...
Problems viewing BeldarBlog from particular browsers?
Posted on August 02, 2008Personally, I use Firefox 3 ? free, fast, less buggy and less of a memory hog, and with cool plug-in apps that are also free ? almost exclusively, and I love it. I only use Microsoft's Internet Exploder Explorer on those few (and increasingly more rare) occasions when I'm effectively forced to because someone's written an IE-only web app...
McCain vs. Obama: A self-image comparison
Posted on July 30, 2008McCain: Obama: "In war and peace, I have been an imperfect servant of my country. But I have been her servant first, last and always. Whenever I faced an important choice between my country's interests or my own interests, party politics or any special interest, I chose my country...
In memoriam: Bary Edward Eagleson (11/20/56 to 7/15/08)
Posted on July 29, 2008Two weeks ago, my family lost a very good friend. I've been searching sadly for words since then to write about him, and I'm not satisfied with these, but I don't want to delay making this post any longer, and they'll have to do. Odds are, you didn't know him...
Regardless of his ranking among Senate liberals, Obama is the Most Dangerous Liberal in America
Posted on July 29, 2008Ramesh Ponnuru on The Corner links Josh Patashnik at The New Republic, who ? contra the ranking by National Journal, which tagged Obama as the "Most Liberal Senator of 2007" ? links a "separate and more elaborate ranking system, developed by highly regarded political scientists Jeff Lewis and Keith Poole," which asserts that Obama is merely "the 11th most liberal...
Palin versus Obama at Landsduhl
Posted on July 27, 2008Some politicians only bother to undertake good deeds when they can bring their campaign reporters and photographers. Others are more decent and less craven. In July 2007, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AL) traveled to a U.S. military base in Kuwait to visit Alaska National Guard soldiers who provide logistical support for our operations in Iraq...
Questions about Obama as a foreign affairs rock-star versus subcommittee chairman
Posted on July 25, 2008When the Democrats gained majority control of the U.S. Senate in January 2007 based on the results of the 2006 elections, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) was named chairman of the Subcommittee on European Affairs of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Its jurisdiction is formally defined to include the following matters (boldface mine): The subcommittee deals with all matters concerning U...
Did Bobby Jindal claim to have performed an exorcism?
Posted on July 22, 2008In comments to a post on Outside the Beltway entitled McCain to Pick VP This Week: Romney or Jindal?, someone commenting under the name "Hal" quipped: "McCain/Jindal '08: Because The White House Needs An Exorcist!" Now, that's typical moonbat twaddle that I'd ordinarily ignore, but a couple of comments down, another blogger, Dr...
MSM covers up both Obama's arrogance and imprecision in interview gaffe during Afghanistan/Iraq trip
Posted on July 21, 2008Today on CBS's Face the Nation, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., in Afghanistan, told the paparazzi-pursued correspondent Lara Logan that "the objective of this trip was to have substantive discussions with people like President Karzai or Prime Minister Maliki or President Sarkozy or others who I expect to be dealing with over the next eight to 10 years...
And the band marched on
Posted on July 21, 2008On Outside the Beltway, Dr. James Joyner posted today a story (with an embedded video clip that, alas, appears to have already been zapped from YouTube) entitled Army Band Hit By Skydiver, Marches On. It reminded me of an incident that I witnessed in Austin at the Texas/Texas A&M football game during Thanksgiving Weekend in 1974...
"Most popular politician in the country," a hockey mom from Alaska, is indeed in "the realm of the possible" as McCain's Veep choice
Posted on July 18, 2008It's not quite all-Palin all-the-time at BeldarBlog, but I'll forgive you if you draw that conclusion. I'm as hungry for inspiration as anyone else who's planning on voting for McCain next fall, so the natural subject on which to seek inspiration is his pending choice of a running mate...
Obama picks Hagel as his travel buddy for Iraq
Posted on July 13, 2008Last year, I wrote of Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE): It's not that I think he's unpatriotic. It's that I think he's too stupid to be left alone in a room with a book of matches. So to demonstrate his bipartisan bona fides, and to illustrate his willingness to seek wisdom and judgment from across the aisle as well as from...
R.I.P. Dr. Michael DeBakey and Tony Snow
Posted on July 12, 2008I've heard this morning already news of the deaths of two Americans, one prematurely and the other after a full life, but both remarkable men. Dr. Michael DeBakey was a legend who forever changed both cardiovascular medicine and the City of Houston. Exactly three years ago this week, I was in the cardiac care unit at The Methodist Hospital, and...
McCain should say: "I shall go to Alaska! (And I will take along the press!)"
Posted on July 11, 2008I tend to agree with Hugh Hewitt's characterization of Richard Baehr's opinion piece entitled How McCain Could Win as "best column of the day." In particular, regular readers will recognize some of these same arguments as having previously appeared on this blog, among other places, but Baehr stitches them cogently and concisely (boldface mine): So who would help the ticket...
Gramm's right, McCain's wrong, but Gramm and I will both vote for the grumpy old man anyway
Posted on July 11, 2008Okay. I understand why it's politically expedient to throw Phil Gramm under the bus. But Gramm ? who has a PhD in economics, who taught that subject at Texas A&M for many years before entering the U.S. Senate, and who knows damn well what the definition of a "recession" is, and that under that definition we still haven't been established...
Funniest thing I've heard this month
Posted on July 09, 2008Fox News reports that lots of blog posters on my-obama-dot-whatever have written there that, based on Obama's policy reversals on such things as FISA telecom immunity, they've been calling his party headquarters demanding refunds of their campaign contributions...
Brilliant idiocy on energy from Democratic über-policymaker Robert Reich
Posted on July 07, 2008A short piece entitled "Short Straw Economics" in today's NYT Magazine (h/t Althouse) contains questions to and answers from Robert Reich. Reich was Secretary of Labor for the Clinton Administration. He's currently in exile from government as a professor of public policy at UC Berkeley...
The important point that Kennedy v. Louisiana proves about Boumediene v. Bush
Posted on July 06, 2008This is a post in which I attempt to connect some dots between two awful Supreme Court decisions. As usual, I meander a bit en route. You can skip to the numbered paragraphs and the bold-faced stuff near the end if you grow impatient. ******* Friday night, on the anniversary of our nation's independence, I much enjoyed the televised presentation...
Why committing now to begin drilling ASAP will indeed affect the oil price now
Posted on July 02, 2008I wrote last week, without bothering to do any online research or include any links, about why under basic economic principles, what we do now (or choose not to do now) affects present expectations about the future supply of oil, and why those expectations do indeed affect the current price of oil...
Palin would give voters grounds to consider the 2008 GOP Veep nominee on more than the three traditional occasions
Posted on July 01, 2008Writing in the New York Observer, Steve Kornacki methodically disputes the purported benefits that Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty might bring to the second slot behind McCain on the GOP's 2008 ticket. I came away with a better impression of Gov. Pawlenty's appearance last Sunday on ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" than Kornacki did ? Kornacki says his repetition of...
Review: Kaylene Johnson's "Sarah: How a Hockey Mom Turned Alaska's Political Establishment Upside Down"
Posted on June 29, 2008Enthusiasm for reform-minded, fiscally prudent, and socially conservative Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has moved beyond the "buzz" stage to the point where it's now rolling thunder. On June 8th, after finishing several hours of internet research, I posted a long essay (with many photographs) entitled Would Alaska Gov...
Hold oil speculators accountable while driving down the prices of crude oil and gasoline
Posted on June 26, 2008This isn't rocket science. Instead, it's quite literally Economics 101. Dems, including both Congressional leaders and their party's presidential candidate, Barack Obama, are all about "investigating" the role of "speculators" in the oil futures markets who, they claim, are responsible for driving up the cost of oil and, thus, the cost of gasoline at the pump...
Why didn't Obama publish anything in the law journal he edited?
Posted on June 23, 2008"Obama kept Law Review balanced," according to the title of an article by Jeffrey Ressner and Ben Smith on the Politico website. By that, they mean that during his one-year term as president of the Harvard Law Review, Barack Obama gave final approval to the publication of articles by law professors, and shorter "notes" by student authors, that reflected a...
Beldar on WaPo on Obama's "scrupulous manag[ement] of his own biography"
Posted on June 23, 2008In my last post, I wondered when the WaPo will get around to writing about Barack Obama with any genuine objectivity. An article in today's issue actually starts off promisingly: In the opening weeks of the general-election campaign, Sen. Barack Obama has moved aggressively to shape his campaign and offered a clear road map for the kind of candidate he...
Beldar on WaPo on Houston
Posted on June 23, 2008Okay, I'm a Houston booster. Houston has been berry, berry good to me, and I admit to having a chip on my shoulder about how unfairly it's usually portrayed by the national media. (To Hollywood, it simply hasn't existed since Terms of Endearment, Urban Cowboy, or Apollo 13...
McClellan, Conyers, WaPo, and AP vie for prize for "Most Disingenuous" in Plamegate testimony and "news articles" that never mention the name "Armitage"
Posted on June 20, 2008You're watching absolutely false conventional wisdom being repeated over and over again, folks, until only us few with more than 50 functioning neurons and the willpower to resist propaganda actually remember the truth. Without a transcript, I can't be certain that no one mentioned Richard Armitage's name at any point during the hearing...
Legal, but offensively cocky: Obama rips off official presidential seal for his podium, and adds the motto "Vero Possumus"
Posted on June 20, 2008Yeah, sure, I'd defend to the death Obama's technical legal right under the First Amendment to mangle national icons, burn flags, yada yada yada. It's a free country, and that freedom includes the right to engage in political expression that is crass, tasteless, and irredeemably cocky...
Palin leads Pajamas Media veep poll
Posted on June 19, 2008As of this moment, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin ? whom I've previously written about at length as a potential grand slam home run as a vice presidential nominee for John McCain ? leads Mitt Romney by a narrow margin, 19% to 18%, in a straw poll being conducted by Pajamas Media...
Scratch a liberal, uncover a communist
Posted on June 18, 2008U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), speaking to the press today (my transcription from TIVO'd coverage on the Fox News channel during Neil Cavuto's show, about 10 minutes ago): So if there's any seriousness about what some of our Republican colleagues are saying here in the House and elsewhere about improving the number of refineries, then maybe they'd be willing to...
Did Michelle Obama, channeling Rev. Wright's racist paranoia, condemn south Chicago girls and young women to unnecessary and preventable STDs and cervical cancer?
Posted on June 18, 2008To stem the political hemorrhaging it was causing, Sen. & Mrs. Barack Obama have withdrawn from membership at the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. But to what extent did what they heard while they were members affect their activities outside the church over the last several years? Recall these paranoid, racist statements of Rev...
Beldar on Woo on Boumediene; and related thoughts
Posted on June 17, 2008I respectfully concur, without reservation. ******* Obama, meanwhile, has put himself squarely back into a 1993-style, early-Clinton Administration mode of considering our conflict with radical Islamic fundamentalists as being just another exercise in crime-fighting...
Lest you think there might possibly be precedents to support Boumediene, consider Justice Kennedy's admission: There aren't any!
Posted on June 15, 2008Often it's very difficult for lay readers, or even insufficiently motivated lawyers, to figure out whether there really is or isn't strong precedent from prior cases to support a particular Supreme Court decision. The majority opinions almost always say, "Oh, yes, rest assured that this is just one more in a long, straight line of decisions; our result today was...
Boumediene isn't a rebuke to Bush, but a judicial grab of power over war from the Executive and Legislative Branches
Posted on June 15, 2008Some people seem to think the current question about the detainees at Gitmo is whether Dubya can simply lock them up and throw away the key without ever giving any of them any sort of trial. For example, in comments to my post from Thursday deploring the Supreme Court's decision in Boumediene v...
SCOTUS disgrace: Foreign terrorists captured abroad held to have same rights under U.S. Constitution as U.S. citizens
Posted on June 12, 2008It's a sad, sad day for our country. A majority of the members of the United States Supreme Court have shown themselves unable to distinguish between an existential military struggle ? quite literally, a war over the very existence of western civilization ? and ordinary street crime committed by U...
Coffin nails, lies, and the junior senator from Illinois
Posted on June 10, 2008So what else has Obama been lying to the American public about in addition to his lies about quitting smoking last year? Why's he still being so evasive about the most recent time he "fell off the wagon"? Every successful ex-smoker I know can tell you to the day when he last had a cigarette; almost every liar about quitting...
Texas CPS workers interviewed on FLDS intervention
Posted on June 08, 2008In a comment to my last post on the FLDS polygamy/child abuse controversy, regular reader and commenter DRJ left this link to a San Angelo newspaper's interview with some of the Children's Protective Services workers who were involved in the initial intervention at the Yearning for Zion ranch and who continue to be involved in the on-going investigation...
Would Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin be a home-run hit as McCain's Veep?
Posted on June 08, 2008I fear that it may be counterproductive for conservative bloggers to make any recommendations to the McCain campaign regarding his vice presidential selection. And the conventional wisdom is that, the GOP convention coming after the Dems' convention, he ought to at least wait to see who Obama picks (although Obama may not wait until his convention either)...
WaPo says Obama would be "pragmatic" to adopt Bush's Iraq policy and says Obama is "unreasonably wedded" to bug-out plans
Posted on June 07, 2008In an incredible editorial sub-titled "After all, he doesn't see the region much differently than President Bush does," Saturday's WaPo notes, as I did yesterday, that over the course of the past week, Obama has flip-flopped into general alignment with the Bush Administration's position on Jerusalem and, more broadly, most of the Bush Administration's position on how to approach Iran...
Next year in Jerusalem?
Posted on June 06, 2008The precise status of Jerusalem has been the focus of blow-torch hot debate continuously since it was captured (or liberated or re-captured, there's argument even about that) by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. Israel, pointing to historic Jewish ties to the ancient city going back to the 10th Century BC, considers Jerusalem to be its modern capital...
Beldar's big-picture observations re Obama's nomination
Posted on June 04, 2008In April 2007, I predicted that Barack Obama would win the Democratic nomination, but I did not predict the sliver-of-a-whisker closeness of the race. Now the five months of the primaries are done, with five months remaining to the election. Besides the identities of the two major parties' nominees, what else, if anything, is the big news from the last...
Not credible
Posted on June 04, 2008Bill Clinton and Gina Gershon?!? Not believable, not even before her lawyers' threat-letter to Vanity Fair with its denials that they were ever even alone together. There's frankly no telling which Hollywood types might be willing to do a Monica-reprise even today...
Obama friend, client, contributor, and home-purchase benefactor Tony Rezko convicted on 16 of 24 corruption counts
Posted on June 04, 2008Like this was a big surprise to anyone who's been paying attention: A federal jury today convicted developer Antoin "Tony" Rezko of corruption charges for trading on his clout as a top adviser and fundraiser to Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Rezko's guilty verdict on 16 of 24 corruption counts could have broad repercussions for Blagojevich, who made Rezko a central player...
NYT: Obama stands "calm in the swirl of history"; also time-travels, but makes no time for clerkship and little time for practicing law
Posted on June 04, 2008In a fawning news article by Michael Powell, the New York Times today describes Barack Obama as "a protean political figure, inspiring devotion in supporters who see him as a transformative leader even as he remains inscrutable to critics." The basic facts of his biography, however, such as they are, are apparently also inscrutable even to adoring reporters from the...
Congrats, America
Posted on June 04, 2008I'm in full agreement with Chief Justice John Roberts: "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race." Despite the racism bound up in its history, I firmly believe that America is ready to follow that prescription...
Obama must rely on minions to rewrite history to dilute the effect of his worst gaffes
Posted on June 01, 2008Here's the concluding paragraph of a New York Times report announcing that Sen. & Mrs. Obama have resigned their membership in Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ: Now that Mr. Obama has addressed his ties to the church and pastor in a long speech and fully broken with both, it is not clear what else he can say or do...
Texas Supreme Court points to less disruptive protections available for FLDS children
Posted on May 29, 2008This afternoon, the Texas Supreme Court denied a request made by the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services to overturn last week's ruling by the Austin Court of Appeals in the polygamy/child custody dispute involving the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints...
Beldar on Volokh on the Texas polygamy/child custody case
Posted on May 24, 2008A few folks have asked me for my take on the Austin Court of Appeals' overturning this week of the state trial judge's interim child custody decision in the big Texas polygamy/child custody case. UCLA Law Prof. Eugene Volokh is one of the smartest law professors blogging today, and I agree with him probably 98% of the time...
Odds I would have given, and odds I won't take, on future terrorist attacks on American soil
Posted on May 20, 2008There could be another one tomorrow. Or in three months and a few days, to commemorate the anniversary of the first one. But there has not been a major terrorist attack, by al Qaeda or otherwise, on American soil during the roughly six and a three-quarter years since 9/11/01...
New unpaid political endorsement on BeldarBlog
Posted on April 22, 2008Those using aggregators as their sole means to review new posts here may miss the new unpaid political endorsement now running in my sidebar. I suspect it will be the first in a series between now and November 2008. Comments pro and con, so long as in reasonably good taste, are earnestly solicited.
True statement, despite having come from Hillary: "MoveOn didn't even want us to go into Afghanistan"
Posted on April 20, 2008I know that with the degree of concentration they've maintained on their overriding goal of replacing George W. Bush, it's hard for the Hard Left, and indeed for the entire Democratic Party, to actually remember what was going on within the United States in the first few days and weeks after 9/11/01...
Beldar on Baze
Posted on April 16, 2008Today, in Baze v. Rees, the SCOTUS rejected two capital defendants' challenge to Kentucky's intended use of the "three-drug cocktail" for administering its death penalty. The vote was seven to two ? only Justices Ginsberg and Souter voted to reverse ? but no more than two justices agreed on any single rationale for affirming the Kentucky Supreme Court's decision to...
Recordings and Sen. Obama's "politics of purpose"
Posted on April 15, 2008Some folks are faulting the blogger who recorded, then reported, Sen. Barack Obama's comments at a San Francisco fund-raiser about "bitter" small-town voters who "cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren?t like them." They argue that intimate fund-raisers like this one "are always off the record," such that Sen...
NYT chooses picture that reveals much about Dubya
Posted on April 05, 2008From Fox News (emphasis mine): White House officials are criticizing The New York Times for publishing a photo they see as editorially unfair. Accompanying an article on Friday about this week's NATO summit in Romania, The Times included a very large photo ? almost half a page in size ? that showed President Bush standing somewhat alone...
Is Obama still smoking while hiding and denying it?
Posted on April 04, 2008I've written very recently of my sympathy for Sen. Obama's difficulty in trying to quit his cigarette habit. It literally took a heart attack three years ago to get me to stop, and even so, the last time I had a craving for a cigarette was ... oh, about six seconds ago...
Dear Dr. Dean: Amputate, but don't deny or further delay the surgery on FL & MI delegations
Posted on April 03, 2008Memorandum To: Howard B. Dean III, M.D. Chairman, Democratic National Committee From: William J. Dyer a/k/a "Beldar" Conservative Republican lawyer-blogger Re: Florida & Michigan delegations, 2008 Denver Democratic National Convention ---------------------------------- Doctors like getting advice from lawyers on non-legal matters about as much as doctors like being sued by lawyers on medico-legal matters...
A soccer game on a steamy spring afternoon in Houston
Posted on April 02, 2008The drizzle earlier in the afternoon hadn't been enough to wash the high-count grass and tree pollen out of the air. With brilliant shafts of late afternoon spring sunshine now wandering across the soccer field, this was definitely a "two coats of sunscreen" day, and you you could almost, but not quite, see the clouds of humidity just above the...
Webb as Obama's Veep choice?
Posted on April 02, 2008James Joyner speculates about the possibility that Barack Obama might choose a fellow first-termer, Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA), as his running mate. (H/t InstaPundit.) That prospect tickles my funny bone, so I'll republish here (with modifications and additions) a comment I originally left on an Althouse post some time ago: George Soros' head would instantly explode if Obama picked Jim...
Obama's never been a "professor of law" nor any full-time or tenure-track legal educator
Posted on March 30, 2008How big a deal is it that in speeches and in campaign literature, Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) has identified himself from time to time as a "law professor" or even a "professor of law"? It's not as big a deal as the Clinton campaign has made it. But it's a bigger deal than some poorly informed or outright dishonest Obama...
Bainbridge nails it on Obama's "financial markets" speech today
Posted on March 27, 2008Having been alerted by the MSM that Barack Obama planned a major speech from New York City today on the financial markets and his would-be Administration's plans to deal with them, I hunkered down to watch the speech with a vague thought of writing a blog post about it...
WaPo: Well, sure, Obama's a capital-L Liberal, but Dubya made him be that
Posted on March 26, 2008This entire WaPo news article is unintentionally funny, mostly because of its discussion of the convergence of interests between Hillary Clinton and John McCain in portraying Barack Obama as a "Liberal." But the funniest part is in the middle, in which ? per "fair and balanced Journalism 101" principles ? the WaPo writers step back to examine the underlying fairness...
Puzzling through Prof. Kmiec's endorsement of Obama
Posted on March 24, 2008This (by Pepperdine University Law Prof. Douglas W. Kmiec, a genuine legal star in the Reagan and Bush-41 Administrations) is the least persuasive and most hang-dog endorsement (of Barack Obama) that I've ever seen. If it were written in a newspaper, I'd have suspected that it had been butchered by the editors, and that they'd mistaken the substance for the...
People who are too smart to find the word "arms" in the Second Amendment
Posted on March 22, 2008I'll warn you up front: This is as harsh an assessment as I've ever written on this blog. I know this guy has lots of credentials that are supposed to mean he's smart and well-educated. But I've read this blog post about the pending Heller case before the Supreme Court about five times now...
Congrats to Mark Yudof
Posted on March 20, 2008In the fall of 1977 and spring of 1978, Mark Yudof was my first-year section's Contracts professor at Texas Law School. I especially remember him for his very dry wit, and he was quite engaging ? a raconteur of a professor, teaching with relish that most essential and transformative of first-year law school subjects.
Beldar's one-paragraph, one-picture reaction to Obama's speech on Rev. Wright and racism
Posted on March 19, 2008In his speech yesterday on racial matters in Philadelphia, the supposedly "post-racial" candidate of the 21st Century revealed himself to be as fully immersed in ? and therefore constrained by and a prisoner of ? identity-based politics as any traditional Democratic candidate who's ever lived, breathed, and pandered...
Review: Beldar's watching, and highly recommends, "John Adams"
Posted on March 18, 2008As I age, I become more sentimental, and about more things. One topic of my sentimentality is American history generally, and the American Revolution and the American Civil War especially. Thus, I identified completely last summer when reading this post by Ann Althouse, who described listening to an audio-book version of Paul Johnson's George Washington: The Founding Father while she...
Happy St. Pat's
Posted on March 17, 2008Short and sweet: I extend to each of you my favorite Irish toast: "May misfortune follow you each and every day, for all the rest of the days of your life ? and may it never, ever catch up!"
Durbin: "To hold Sen. Obama accountable for speeches and sermons that were given before he joined the church is fundamentally unfair"
Posted on March 17, 2008At least the lightbulb of the junior senator from Illinois shines much more brightly than that of the senior senator from Illinois, who seems to have missed the fact that the junior senator joined the Trinity United Church of Christ in 1988, and that even when he was away in law school (1988-1991), Sen...
DKos announces preemptive civil war against Hillary and Clintonistas; no time to wait for U.N. mandate
Posted on March 17, 2008The history, the logic, and the facts lead to one conclusion: Hillary Clinton's campaign is a grave and gathering danger. To suggest otherwise is to hope against the evidence. To assume this campaign's good faith is to bet the lives of millions and the peace of the world in a reckless gamble...
Most frighteningly plausible fantasy I've read this month
Posted on March 17, 2008On the Balkinization blog, Michael Stokes Paulsen posts the Opinion of the Court (written by Mr. Justice Kennedy, and joined by Justices Souter, Ginsburg, Breyer, and Clinton) in Spitzer v. United States. (H/t InstaPundit.) The largest flight of fantasy is that the underlying conviction is for solicitation of prostitution, which, of course, is not ordinarily a federal crime...
Why I'm unpersuaded by Obama's disavowal of Rev. Wright's political polemics from the pulpit
Posted on March 15, 2008BY MR. WISENBERG: Q Mr. President, I want to, before I go into a new subject area, briefly go over something you were talking about with Mr. Bittman. The statement of your attorney, Mr. Bennett, at the Paula Jones deposition, "Counsel is fully aware" ? it's page 54, line 5 ? "Counsel is fully aware that Ms...
Lies about "the George W. Bush Recession? of 2008" are well underway
Posted on March 14, 2008The headline reads: "Most Economists Say Recession Has Arrived as Outlook Darkens." The breathless, unequivocal text at the beginning of the article is unrelentingly foreboding in tone: The U.S. has finally slid into recession, according to the majority of economists in the latest Wall Street Journal economic-forecasting survey, a view that was reinforced by new data showing a sharp drop...
With "friends" like this on his defense team, no wonder Spitzer continues to be delusional
Posted on March 14, 2008Today's New York Times reports that "[f]ederal prosecutors are investigating whether Gov. Eliot Spitzer used campaign funds in connection with his meetings with prostitutes, including payments for hotels or ground transportation." The story is moderately interesting, if not surprising, insofar as it reports the basis for the feds' interest...
Spitzer's very guilty, but exactly of how much is still unclear
Posted on March 12, 2008If you read this morning's Wall Street Journal, you'd come away with the impression that Eliot Spitzer spent a mere $19k on high-dollar hookers to get himself into his current troubles. Turn instead to the New York Post, and you'll see allegations that he blew at least $80k on a habit that went back 10 years...
Spitzer "casts himself not just as an enforcer of the law per se, but also as an enforcer of a broader social compact"
Posted on March 10, 2008The quote in the title of this post comes from a 2005 article in the New York Times Sunday Magazine on "Spitzerism" as a law enforcement philosophy. It was written by The New Republic's Noam Scheiber. In response, I posted here to agree with Scheiber that Eliot Spitzer, a rising-star Democrat who was at that time New York State's showboat...
A peculiar and ostensibly conservative assessment of the Bush-43 Administration as a "failed presidency"
Posted on March 09, 2008Having just praised a short article in the Weekly Standard's online version by Ed Whelan, I find myself reluctantly obliged to pan a very long one also published there by Jeffrey Bell, a visiting fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center (of which Mr...
Blog milestones
Posted on March 09, 2008During the past week, BeldarBlog passed the 1000-post mark, with something over 11,500 comments and 1062 trackbacks. TypePad's stats, which vary some from Sitemeter's, show slightly over 2 million "lifetime page views" at an average rate of 1245 per day since I started blogging in August 2003 (including some long periods of inactivity)...
Obama's potential judicial appointments
Posted on March 08, 2008The rest of the article is definitely worth reading too, but in two concise paragraphs, Ed Whelan gives us the essential things we need to know about what kind of federal judges a President Obama would appoint (emphasis Ed's): Although Obama has served in the Senate for barely three years, he has already established a record on judicial nominations and...
The Democratic Party leadership's reflexive anti-Americanism
Posted on March 08, 2008I'm a conservative. In particular, I'm a hawk on the Global War on Terror, but I'm also a hawk on foreign policy and national security matters more generally. That's obvious to anyone who's even skimmed the surface of this blog, and I make no bones about it...
Backyard astronomy
Posted on March 04, 2008If you were looking through a simple backyard telescope at the Earth and its Moon, this is what you'd see. If your backyard were on Mars.
Psst! Senator Obama! Got a light?
Posted on March 01, 2008From Ellen DeGeneres' interview with Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) on Thursday, February 28, 2008 (my transcription, from a video clip that is available, at least for now, on YouTube): DeGENERES: Here's the big question: Have you been able to not smoke? When there's so much pressure and so much stress, to try to do such a ? it's such a...
New Hillary TV ad in Texas promises that in the New Clinton White House, she won't be sleeping with Bill
Posted on February 29, 2008Sort of, anyway. Maybe it just implies that she won't be sleeping at all. Meanwhile, the famously nocturnal Bill must be off-camera, in the next room playing Hearts or maybe having phone sex.
Highly specific Texas primary exit-poll datum (one voter)
Posted on February 27, 2008I took advantage of one of Harris County's many, convenient early voting locations tonight about 6:15 p.m. There was about a 15-minute line, but there were probably two dozen electronic voting machines up and running, with a full complement of four volunteers doing the check-ins, so the line moved quickly...
If foreign citizens would cheer, swoon, and sing "Kumbaya" along with Pres. Obama, does that make him a fit commander-in-chief and head of state?
Posted on February 24, 2008WaPo's David Ignatius opines today that Barack Obama is just so damned cool that the rest of the world outside America ? allies and enemies alike ? will join in the swoon for him that has caught up so many of Obama's American supporters. Thus, Ignatius argues, America will actually be better off having a president whose military, foreign policy,...
Best advice (from a GOP perspective) so far in 2008 for the eventual Democratic nominee
Posted on February 19, 2008Columnist E.J. Dionne, in today's WaPo, gives us an op-ed entitled "A 'Challenge' Worth Challenging," in which he writes: [O]ne of John McCain's favorite lines ? his declaration that "the transcendent challenge of the 21st century is radical Islamic extremists," or, as he sometimes says, "extremism" ? could define the 2008 election...
The short list; or, "How to solve the problem that neither Barack nor Hillary can be persuaded to take the #2 slot"
Posted on February 19, 2008Scott Ott is always worth reading, but at his best he's simply brilliant.
McCain privately apologized to Cornyn shortly after May 2007 profane shouting
Posted on February 17, 2008Back in May 2007, I made one of the bigger fusses of anyone in the right-of-center blogosphere over Sen. John McCain's rude behavior toward one of my home-state senators, John Cornyn. I'd previously written from time to time about my disapproval of McCain's positions on a variety of substantive issues, especially his leadership of the GOP renegades from the so-called...
Is Hillary offering Barack the Veep slot via a press leak?
Posted on February 10, 2008It's always amazed and amused me how many times, in negotiations over settling a lawsuit, my opponents will say something like this: "We'd consider paying something in the $200,000-$250,000 range" or "We'd probably take something in the $250,000-$300,000 range...
Don't kid yourself into thinking that the enthusiasm of Obama supporters can be dismissed as being a "personality cult"
Posted on February 07, 2008Music. Rhythm and repetition. Striking visual images, especially of people and their faces. I can't imagine that the ancient Greek and Roman politicians two millennia ago failed to make good use of these in connection with their elections (or, failing that, their rabble-rousing) because they can inspire extremely powerful reactions...
Are we at war? And what is the political consequence of that for conservatives in this election?
Posted on February 06, 2008Are we a nation at war? I ask you to ask yourself that question afresh. Most of my regular and even occasional readers, including some who are life-long Democrats, will be tempted to give a reflexive, automatic, and affirmative answer to that question...
Why is this young man's hair mussed?
Posted on February 02, 2008This is my younger son, Adam, age 15, in a photo snapped earlier today. Adam's a freshman at Bellaire High School here in Houston. On Saturdays, it's not uncommon for his hair to be mussed. But the reason his hair is mussed in this particular way on this particular day is pretty cool, in my admittedly biased opinion.
Inquiring minds want to know
Posted on January 31, 2008Unasked question at tonight's Democratic debate: Senators, please explain to America and the world what the exact difference would be between the Marine forces you each have already planned for the task of securing the rooftop of the new American embassy building in Baghdad as the last American helicopter loads up to leave from there en route back to the...
Benches, birds, and bees: Daddy, where do judges come from?
Posted on January 31, 2008From a post today by the estimable Ramesh Ponnuru on The Corner, commenting on what kind of judges John McCain says he will appoint: First, from an interview in the spring of 2007, on the type of judges he would look for: "I think it?s vital to strictly interpret the Constitution of the United States and have a record of...
Regarding the Thompson '08 campaign (sic transit gloria mundi)
Posted on January 31, 2008I've been pondering what I ought to write about Fred Thompson's withdrawl from the 2008 presidential race after the South Carolina GOP primary. Usually I'm not much of a pure "linker" as a blogger, because I figure most of you who find your way here already have your own regular reads, and you really don't look to me for recommendations...
Beldar reacts to tonight's Reagan Library GOP debate
Posted on January 30, 2008Untainted by other punditry or blogs, my immediate reactions to tonight's GOP debate: Tonight's debate was far more illuminating than most previous ones, precisely because there were only four candidates three candidates and one clown on stage. (Now if they could only lose the clown ...
McCain, judicial nominations, sleeves, and warts
Posted on January 29, 2008I don't much care about Wall Street Journal political reporter John Fund's report yesterday that's roiling the blogosphere and cable news talking head shows. Fund reported that Sen. John McCain "has told conservatives he would be happy to appoint the likes of Chief Justice John Roberts to the Supreme Court...
And Obama ricochets off the turnbuckle into a reverse pile-driver move on Hillary, who slams off the canvas but rebounds into a scissors leg-lock around Obama's neck ...
Posted on January 22, 2008This video is the political equivalent of a televised professional wrestling match ? in which both wrestlers genuinely lose their tempers, and each lands some genuine blows that hurt the other. Best single exchange, at about six minutes into the video, as they're arguing about whether Hillary & Co...
The "trophy wife" in action
Posted on January 15, 2008Watch the video clip of Jeri Thompson that Allahpundit has linked at Hot Air, in which she comments on Fox News about the current GOP presidential race. Then draw your own conclusions as to whether she's just a "trophy wife" (with all of that term's ugly connotations)...
The fat lady has barely begun her warm-ups
Posted on January 09, 2008Most of the mainstream media, and large chunks of the blogosphere, are behaving like children ? more specifically, like children who have not yet completed third-grade arithmetic. Network anchors, national columnists, and prominent bloggers (left and right) have pronounced both the Fred Thompson and Rudy Giuliani campaigns either dead outright or else on life-support (with Do Not Resuscitate toe-tags)...
"I will beat these people, just like I've been beating them for my whole life"
Posted on January 06, 2008John Edwards in tonight's Democratic debate in New Hampshire (my transcription from TiVo, emphasis also mine), in an impassioned riff that's the very core of his stump speech: I think what matters ? we've had a lot of conversation about the first day in the White House...
Beldar's quick takes on the Iowa caucuses results
Posted on January 04, 2008First take: Mike Huckabee, referring not very obliquely to Mitt Romney, in the single most brutal, deft, and insincere negative campaigning one-liner of the 2008 GOP presidential primaries: On "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" Wednesday night, Huckabee said that voters are looking for a presidential candidate who "reminds them more of the guy they work with rather than the...
Video proof that Fred Thompson can and will respond instantly and in kind to sneak attacks on American soil
Posted on December 28, 2007Fred defends aide Bob Davis from Christine Byun of ABC and John Bentley of CBS in snowy Iowa. The GOP nomination continues to be wide open. A campaign contribution right now to any of the major GOP candidates except Gov. Romney (who can self-finance and has indeed done so) is likely to have more impact than anything you've given to...
Christmas 2007 musings on politics and history
Posted on December 23, 2007Journalist Matt Bai is a clever fellow and a good writer. His coverage of the Left has not infrequently been "critical" both in the sense of offering a critique and of offering an unflattering portrayal, and that's true too of his lengthy essay in today's NYT Sunday Magazine entitled The Clinton Referrendum...
I'm With Fred
Posted on December 19, 2007I. Why now? There has never been, nor will there be, any question that I will vote against the Democratic Party's 2008 nominee for president. And because I don't care to waste my vote on a protest, it will be cast for the GOP's nominee, whoever that turns out to be...
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