The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Shorter Obama: ‘It Sucks to Be Me’

Posted on | November 14, 2013 | 57 Comments

It’s an endless tsunami of political pain for Obama nowadays. When your signature issue goes sideways, there’s really nowhere to hide when you’re the Leader of the Free World. Has anyone else noted the irony that ObamaCare now is basically “Bush’s War” circa 2006?

Everyone is now realizing that this massive failure is an electoral albatross for Democrats going into 2014. I’m starting to hear talk from GOP operatives about their campaign plans, and they’re just absolutely loving the political environment that is developing. Scarcely had Obama’s Awful Press Conference From Hell ended than the NRCC‘s rapid response team shot out a Twitchy-style roundup of Twitter reaction, “12 Tweets That Explain What An Unmitigated Disaster Obama’s Press Conference Was,” some of which I’ll just steal.

If conservatives can just stop infighting and second-guessing for a little while, we may be looking at a real GOP juggernaut for 2014.

Victory is the balm that soothes all wounds.





 


Category: Barack Obama, Election, Health Care

ObamaCare: Death Panels for the DCCC

Posted on | November 14, 2013 | 69 Comments

Oh, what a difference a week can make! After the unfortunate result in the Virginia gubernatorial election, liberal pundits (and some Republicans) were declaring Ken Cuccinelli’s defeat to be the obituary of the Tea Party movement. Yet if there was one issue that defined the Tea Party, it was opposition to ObamaCare, and the utterly catastrophic debut of that program — about which Jonah Goldberg has interesting things to say — has amply vindicated their opposition.

If you want to see a microcosm of the problems looming for Democrats in their 2014 mid-term campaign to recapture the House, look no further than New York’s 23rd Congressional District:

Martha Robertson is the Democratic candidate challenging Republican incumbent Tom Reed in NY-23, my home district.
We have highlighted Robertson many times before regarding her unsubstantiated fundraising claim that “GOP ops” tried to take down her website. Robertson’s campaign never has provided proof of that claim, leading to a fair amount of negative local television coverage and even national press attention.
The fundraising scandal, which I doubt is over, likely will be overshadowed by a much bigger problem: Robertson is a long-time and vocal supporter of mandates with the ultimate goal of single-payer.
In light of the Obamacare debacle, and the inability of the federal government even to set up a website portal, a complete federal government takeover of the health care system is a hard sell.

Professor Jacobson provides video of the doomed Democrat:

This upstate New York region, where I did substantial shoe-leather coverage in 2010, is the kind of “purple” district that would be a prime target for a Democrat take-back, were it not for (a) the bad candidate, (b) her badly-run campaign, and (c) ObamaCare.

Not every swing district will have Democrat candidates as hapless as Martha Robertson, and some Republicans may face a tough fight. However, every GOP incumbent now has already held his seat through the 2012 high tide for Obama’s coattails, and the ongoing catastrophe of ObamaCare will create electoral headwinds for Democrats. Why? Because every Democrat vote in a House election will be a vote to hand the Speaker’s gavel back to Nancy Pelosi.

“We have to pass the bill so that you can find out
what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.”

How’s that workin’ out for ya?

 

Category: Democrats, Election, Health Care, Legal Insurrection, Nancy Pelosi, New York

In The Mailbox 11.14.13

Posted on | November 14, 2013 | 8 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


Don’t know if it’s the flu or just a cold, but either way it kept me from staying up late/rising early to do Live At Five. Apologies.


OVER THE TRANSOM
Aewl’s Abode: TRICARE vs. Obamacare
Blackmailers Don’t Shoot: Green Energy Policies Are Destroying The Environment
Proof Positive: It Wasn’t Obama’s Asterisk
Michelle Malkin: Bros And Hos – Obamacare’s Bread And Circuses
Twitchy: A Bigger Trainwreck? Wil Wheaton Starts #TeamSinglePayerHealthCare Hashtag


RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Power: #Obamacare Girl Comes Out!
American Thinker: Remaking The Military In The Image Of Obama
The Necropolitan Sentinel: Leave The Obamacare Girl Alooooone!
Don Surber: Daily Scoreboard, November 13
Jammie Wearing Fools: Of Course – Evil Clown Ezekiel Emanuel Blames Obamacare Disaster On Fox News
JustOneMinute: More BS In Defense Of Obamacare
Pat Dollard: Congress To File Articles Of Impeachment Against Eric Holder Today
Protein Wisdom: Sickness Falls; Also, I Don’t Feel Well
Shot In The Dark: The Dogma-Based Party
The Jawa Report: Sandcrawler PSA – Death Star More Popular Than Obamacare
The Lonely Conservative: When Is A Lie Not A Lie? When It’s An “Incorrect Promise”!
Megan McArdle: No Sign Of Plan B For Obamacare


Category: Blogging, Linkagery

Lena Dunham and the Politics of Vagina

Posted on | November 14, 2013 | 241 Comments

“If you’ve ever watched Girls or have been aware of the things Lena Dunham says, you’d see a portrait of narcissism and entitlement. …
“It is the idea that the women on the show are entitled to men wanting them. Despite any flaw — whether it be physical, emotional, or a lack of accomplishments — they are owed a relationship with a man. Based on this premise, any poor behavior or lack of interest in their appearance cannot be the cause of why he didn’t call back.”
— Amy Otto, Nov. 12

“Why is it that every single issue of Cosmo has a ‘how to masturbate’ article or a ‘how to have better orgasms’ article or some variation thereof? And why are these magazines in racks at the supermarket checkout line, so that the minute your kids learn to read, they’re confronted with cover-blurb headlines like ‘Super Sex Secrets to Drive Him Wild’? …
“If you’re not happy with your sex life, you’re not going to find the answer in Cosmo.”
— Robert Stacy McCain, June 28

More than a century ago, Karl Marx’s colleague Friedrich Engels first used the term “false consciousness,” a concept that was developed by later Marxist-Leninist thinkers to explain why the proletariat failed to respond to communist calls for violent revolution. Workers who did not share the Marxist sense of class struggle — who did not share the radical agenda of overthrowing the bourgeois state, abolishing religion and the market economy — were said to be in the throes of false consciousness. Opponents of Marxist revolution, it was said, were deficient in knowledge of the historical processes of material development, and therefore influenced by “myths,” including the belief that they might improve their condition under the existing industrial capitalist system.

What does this have to do with Lena Dunham’s vagina? Everything.

Dunham’s show is a sort of propaganda for postmodern feminism, and Amy Otto critically examines the tenets of this ideology:

So since the central conceit of feminism (that one is owed a man’s attention) cannot be questioned — yet results in women being quite incapable of sustaining a relationship — we must pretend that obtaining said relationship is no longer important. We wouldn’t want to dispute the tenets of feminism:

  • He should love you and put up with any behavior you throw at him.  Its “quirky” and not deranged that you question him about everything he feels at every moment.
  • You don’t have to be particularly accomplished or worthy of his time. Being a woman is enough. You go, girl!
  • You are as beautiful as a supermodel no matter who you are — and men who dare to seek out a woman of similar or slightly higher attractiveness are craven idiots. You deserve a man as handsome as you would like him to be.
  • If it’s something that females experience, everyone else should pay for it too.
  • Corporations purposely pursue “sexist” strategies to exclude 50% of the market. Society is so inherently sexist that profit comes after the deliberate exclusion of women.

I say all these things as someone who was fed this nonsense by our culture and who partially bought into it for years — years of being single I might add.

You should read the whole thing, because her point is that beliefs about sex and relationships — beliefs influenced by popular culture, including Cosmo magazine and TV shows like Lena Dunham’s Girls — have a meaningful impact on politics. This is why free-market advocates are mistaken if they think they can win the War of Ideas strictly by making libertarian arguments for economic freedom, while ignoring the so-called “social issues” that are involved in the Culture War.

Yes, there are pro-choice lesbians who embrace economic liberty, but when you start examining electoral demographics and opinion polling, you find a strong correlation between the bourgeois lifestyle (marriage, religion, property) and the bourgeois belief system. Anyone who has examined exit polls understands that the “gender gap” could more accurately be called the “marriage gap” or the “religion gap”; disadvantages for Republicans among women voters are mainly a function of whether women are married and attend church regularly.

In 2012, 53% of married women voted for Romney, whereas 67% of unmarried women voted for Obama. While the published exit poll data did not correlate gender and church attendance, we do know that those who attend religious services weekly (whether male or female) voted 59% for Romney, whereas those who never attend church voted 62% for Obama. Those who believe that abortion should always be legal voted 76% for Obama; those who believe abortion should always be illegal vote 79% for Romney.

‘Giddy, Sex-Starved and Desperate’

There are some who look at data like that and draw the incorrect inference: “Social issues are hurting Republicans! The party is too beholden to the Religious Right!” But ask yourself this: Do the irreligious, the unmarried and the pro-abortion voters otherwise support the Republican agenda? Or, as I believe could be demonstrated — if sufficiently detailed data were available — is it the case that support for economic freedom is strongly associated with the bourgeois values represented by poll data on marriage and church attendance?

And don’t you think Democrats know this?

Annica Benning says this controversial ad for ObamaCare “portray[s] women as giddy, sex-starved and desperate”:

Amy Runyon-Harms, executive director of ProgressNow Colorado, defended them, saying: “People get upset when you portray women as independent.”
That is interesting — independence can now be defined based on sexual promiscuity?
In fact, the underlying message is not independence, as government-funded birth control doesn’t convey any form of personal independence, certainly not financially.

But that’s just it, see? Democrats want women to be “independent” from men — i.e., unmarried — so that they will then be dependent on government. And if these allegedly “independent” women are “giddy, sex-starved and desperate,” they’ll eventually need a scapegoat to blame for their miserable loneliness: Blame the oppressive patriarchy! Blame “corporate America”! Blame Republicans!

Defining “independence . . . based on sexual promiscuity” not only undermines marriage, but it also (a) results in women being infected with diseases, for which they require medical treatment, (b) creates demand for legalized abortion, and (c) fosters unwed motherhood, with more children growing up in poverty. The propaganda of Lena Dunham thereby helps grow the Democrat Party coalition.

And what about basic Judeo-Christian bourgeois morality, which Engels derided as “false consciousness”? It’s not just about sex, you know. The strongest possible condemnation of the liberal Welfare State can be summarized in four words: Thou shalt not steal.

It is fundamentally wrong to demand that government give you “free stuff” you have not earned, paid for by the taxes of people who work hard for their money. Amy Otto notices the “narcissism and entitlement” in Girls, which we might also call simple selfishness.

An irresponsible, self-centered attitude — Veruca Salt demanding, “I want it now” — is really what contemporary feminism is all about. Disassemble the ideological infrastructure, get past all the elaborate pseudo-intellectual rhetoric, and feminism is about the avoidance of responsibility: “Bad things happen to me because . . . sexism!”

It’s like the lazy young hippie punk with no skills who nevertheless refuses to take a “dead end job” at a fast-food restaurant because he’s not about cooperating with The Capitalist System, man.

‘A Culture of Complete Anarchy’

The same bourgeois morality that discourages sexual promiscuity also encourages hard work, thrift and honesty. Values matter, and the values upon which the American republic was founded were not the values celebrated by Lena Dunham’s Girls.

If America is to endure, to find the strength of will necessary to recover from the disastrous policies of the Obama administration, it will need a faith powerful enough to inspire courage. Pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle has a few words:

Rather than moral absolutes governing what’s right or wrong, Driscoll said that there’s a general view that people should be true to themselves — that they should essentially stand by their feelings and desires.
“We’ve shifted from a worldview where there is a God who makes laws, and they apply to you, to whether or not there is a God it does not matter — ‘I don’t recognize any laws external to me. The only thing that guides me is my own internal convictions,’” he said. “Authority has shifted from external to internal, from God to me. And what you end up with is not a discussion of morality but a defense of personality. And that’s the world we live in.”
Driscoll believes that there is “a culture of complete anarchy in the name of tolerance and diversity.”
“One in four women sexual assaulted, one in six men, people that are sexually addicted, sexually assaulted, sexually abused, rampant debt, broken families, suicidal,” he told TheBlaze. “The number one category of prescription medication is antidepressants. Somebody’s gotta stand up and say, ‘This ain’t working — we gotta try something else.’”

If we are heading toward “a culture of complete anarchy,” why? Because we have rejected “a God who makes law,” so that the law is whatever we want it to be, including a law that compels insurance companies to let you stay on your parents’ policy until you’re 26, including a law that compels pro-life Christians to pay taxes used to fund abortion and contraception for irresponsible women who don’t want to pay for the consequences of their degenerate lifestyle.

The Politics of Vagina — the “narcissism and entitlement” celebrated in Lena Dunham’s Girls — is defended by feminists for the same reason ProgressNow Colorado promotes “independence . . . based on sexual promiscuity.” Democrats know who votes for them and why, and they know that “a culture of complete anarchy,” without morality or religion, will yield more votes for Democrats.

Of course, this culture will also destroy America as we know it, but destroying America as we know it is what Democrats are all about.




 

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers!

 

 


Category: Abortion, Culture, Feminism, Marriage, Religion, Sex

Fall Off The Planet, Cohen

Posted on | November 13, 2013 | 28 Comments

by Smitty

Richard Cohen stepped into a pile of ObamaCare on the 11th of November, emphasis mine:

Today’s GOP is not racist, as Harry Belafonte alleged about the tea party, but it is deeply troubled — about the expansion of government, about immigration, about secularism, about the mainstreaming of what used to be the avant-garde. People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children. (Should I mention that Bill de Blasio’s wife, Chirlane McCray, used to be a lesbian?) This family represents the cultural changes that have enveloped parts — but not all — of America. To cultural conservatives, this doesn’t look like their country at all.

One might be tempted to write it off as Maher-tian logorrhea, but then he’s all “Wut? I’m offended anyone’s offended”:

“I don’t understand it,” said the columnist, who lives in New York City. “What I was doing was expressing not my own views but those of extreme right-wing Republican tea party people. I don’t have a problem with interracial marriage or same-sex marriage. In fact, I exult in them. It’s a slander” to suggest otherwise. “This is just below the belt. It’s a purposeful misreading of what I wrote.”

Let’s break that down:

What I was doing was expressing not my own views So far so good.
but those of extreme right-wing Republican tea party people Really? I’d wager you can’t name one.
I don’t have a problem with interracial marriage Neither do the bulk of Americans, if you’d care to Escape From Your Bubble.
or same-sex marriage. Which will always be an oxymoron to me, on a personal level, but if voters choose it, well, there you have it.
In fact, I exult in them. Pictures, or it didn’t happen. Wait. I’m happier sight unseen.
It’s a slander” to suggest otherwise. Speaking of slander, honest Americans would like to forgive you for what you just said.
“This is just below the belt. Isn’t that where you like to, you know, swing?
It’s a purposeful misreading of what I wrote.” I’ve met some Lefties who at least try to argue honestly, Richard. However, the last ten years have revealed a vast crop of bullies who argue in bad faith, and project only the worst intents upon those who don’t agree with them.
While falling short of pigeonholing you, Richard, I will say that, like President Obama, I don’t believe a godforsaken thing you utter, and assert that a position roughly 180° off of your viewpoint is likelier to correspond to reality and truth.
Category: Journalism, Media Bias

Nov. 13: ObamaCare Failure Day

Posted on | November 13, 2013 | 67 Comments

Historians should mark this day on their calendars as the point at which the failure became obviously irretrievable.

Troubled HealthCare.gov unlikely
to work fully by end of November
— Washington Post

White House officials get earful
from Democrats on Obamacare
— CNN

Obamacare is in much more trouble
than it was one week ago
— Ezra Klein

Kathleen Sebelius had a conference call today to announce how many people had signed up for ObamaCare — about 100,000 so far, of whom about a quarter enrolled through the glitchy website:

Some 106,185 people signed up for Obamacare in its first month of operation, a period marred by major technological problems with both the federal and state enrollment websites.
Fewer than 27,000 Americans selected an insurance plan through the federal healthcare.gov site, which is handling enrollment for 36 states, according to figures released Wednesday by the Obama administration. . . .
Nearly 79,400 people signed up for coverage through state-based exchanges, with California leading the way with nearly 35,400 selecting a plan. States have also been battling system errors, with Oregon having yet to accept online applications.
These figures reflect people who have selected insurance plans through the exchanges, but not necessarily paid for them. Americans have until Dec. 15 to pay if they want coverage to begin on Jan. 1. Open enrollment lasts through March 31.

“HealthCare.gov has been a complete disaster for the administration. It’s clear that they’ve been low-balling what to expect, and I’m not quite sure they low-balled it enough.”
— Gloria Borger, CNN

The sign-up numbers are just a tiny fraction of the millions who have lost health insurance because of ObamaCare-caused cancellations.

 

Category: Barack Obama, Health Care

Why Do @MaxBlumenthal Fanboys Hate @AlanaGoodman and @RosieGray?

Posted on | November 13, 2013 | 21 Comments

Because They Hate would be an acceptable answer, of course, but after BuzzFeed’s Rosie Gray put the spotlight on how Max Blumenthal’s anti-Israel book was being defended by Max’s father, longtime Clinton adviser Sidney Blumenthal, the hate machine cranked up.

Then today, the Free Beacon’s Alana Goodman reported about a book party that Sid hosted for Max, and the machine went into overdrive:

These people are not merely dishonest. They actively hate truth.




 

 

PREVIOUSLY:

 


Category: Israel

ObamaCare Lie = ‘Incorrect Promise’

Posted on | November 13, 2013 | 36 Comments

“Obama: Anatomy of a World Leader,” by Alex Gray (detail)

“I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.”
— Barack Obama, June 3, 2008

Orwellian euphemism from the New York Times:

The split between lawmakers and the White House reflects the dilemma the president finds himself in as he seeks to follow through on last week’s acknowledgment about his incorrect promise on health care coverage.

There’s another Twitchy roundup, including these tweets:

The Twitchy roundup does not, however, include this:

AOSHQ Moron representin’, yo!

 


Category: Barack Obama, Health Care, New York Times
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