The Other McCain

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

Somehow, I Thought This Was About The Republican Primaries

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 11 Comments

by Smitty

via Miss Cellania

Category: humor

Can Mitt Be Stopped? ‘A Self-Fulfilling Prophecy of Romney Inevitability’

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 47 Comments

“The final tally in the New Hampshire primary showed Rick Santorum clinched fourth place and Newt Gingrich took fifth, according to the New Hampshire secretary of state.
“Throughout late Tuesday night and early [Wednesday] morning when the votes were tallied, Gingrich had been fourth, but Santorum overtook him, beating him by just 138 votes, with 23,174 votes for Gingrich and 23,312 for Santorum.”
— Boston Globe

On the phone with a friend this afternoon, we were talking about the Perry problem, which is beginning to depress me. Da Tech Guy is trying to be philosophical about it, but I’m getting discouraged, because it’s turning out as badly as I’d feared, and perhaps even worse. Frightening vibes of vindictive sadism are emanating from the Perry camp, and this is never a good sign.

Three days after Christmas, a CNN poll finally validated what I and others had been saying for weeks: Rick Santorum’s tireless campaigning in Iowa was producing a last-minute surge. And suddenly Santorum, who had spent months grousing about his relative lack of media coverage, was swarmed by reporters everywhere he went.

Almost as quickly, the Perrybots attacked. They had spent three weeks expecting that once Mitt Romney’s attack ads destroyed Gingrich in Iowa, the beneficiary would be The Only Candidate Who Could Beat Romney™ (as they had been marketing their guy since mid-summer). The fact that Iowa Republicans shifted instead to Santorum drove the Perrybots into unprecedented paroxysms of frothing rage.

What especially infuriated them was that the Perry campaign, which had been saturating Iowa with some $3 million of ads — including an ad that attacked both Gingrich and Romney — hadn’t anticipated Santorum’s December surge. So by the time it became apparent that Santorum was surging, it was too late for Perry to do anything more than hit Santorum with a last-minute radio ad, plus some cheap underhanded smear tactics like disseminating anonymous anti-Santorum flyers. (Which the Perry people then deviously tried to blame on Ron Paul’s campaign.)

Despite everything that the Perry campaign and its proxies could throw in at the last minute, however, Santorum came within eight votes of beating Romney in Iowa and, as I said to my friend on the phone today, “How much different would it have been if Erick Erickson hadn’t spent five days slamming Santorum at Red State? Couldn’t that have cost Santorum the votes he needed to beat Romney?”

Of course, the anti-Santorum messages didn’t stop after Iowa and this vengeful negativity from Perry’s people — as if Santorum unjustly deprived them of something that was rightly theirs — was not unnoticed, either by the Santorum campaign staff or by various journalists covering the campaign. A rather eminent pundit asked me last weekend in New Hampshire, “What the hell happened to Erickson?”

What is especially annoying about this is that, for all the harm inflicted on Santorum, they haven’t done Perry any good at all. He’s still down at the bottom of the GOP heap and, even if he gains ground in South Carolina now — as at least one anomalous poll suggests — all Perry can do is drain votes away from either Gingrich or Santorum, the two candidates with a plausible chance to beat Romney there.

So I was telling this to my friend, who has already joined the “Roll Over for Romney” camp, and explaining that I intend to fight as long as there is anything left to fight with, but was frustrated by the apparent determination of the Perry people that, if their guy can’t be the “Not Romney” alternative, then they’ll destroy whatever other “Not Romney” has a chance, just for the pure hateful spite of it.

It grieves me terribly to see such petulance from people I’ve long regarded as political allies, just as it embarrasses me to have to cite Bill Kristol (!) as an example of clear-thinking courage:

Thus Karl Rove in the Wall Street Journal last Thursday: If Romney, having beaten Santorum by all of eight votes in Iowa, wins in New Hampshire, where he has a summer home and has been campaigning for six years—well, then we should all just accept the inevitability of Romney. After all, then “Romney is 2-0.” And if he’s 2-0, by whatever margins and in states with 11 electoral votes—“he becomes the prohibitive favorite” for the nomination.
Really? Well, no. But the point [of Rove’s argument] is to convince Santorum supporters, and those of you who might consider becoming Santorum supporters, that he has no chance, so as to create a self-fulfilling prophecy of Romney inevitability. After all, “Mr. Santorum shouldn’t kid himself; he faces huge obstacles. . . . He hasn’t had to endure withering scrutiny but will shortly. His chief opponent has tremendous organizational and financial advantages and has been through the rigors of a presidential primary race.” Rove does note with gracious condescension, “Mr. Santorum has a shot, and that’s all he could have hoped for.”
Actually, Santorum can hope to win. He has been running to win. And after what he pulled off in Iowa, it’s foolish to suggest he doesn’t have a chance to win. His Iowa performance, and his speech Tuesday night, were impressive enough to suggest to primary voters in subsequent states that they should make an effort to judge both his capacity to win and his capacity to govern.

Exactly so. For a long time, Santorum’s critics said he seemed “whiny” or “sanctimonious,” but in the past few weeks, Santorum seems to have gained confidence and found his voice, and people are responding to his positive message. Unlike either Gingrich or Perry, Santorum never resorted to using “Occupy Wall Street” arguments against Mitt Romney. And Santorum’s ad have been optimistic and inspirational:

The Santorum campaign has said they’ll spend $1 million to spread that message in South Carolina, and there is reason to hope that, with a week to go — and two debates — before next Saturday’s vote, he can finally score a breakthrough win.

Despite my own pro-Santorum bias, however, I’d be OK if somehow Gingrich pulls ahead to beat Romney. If the point is to stop Romney from clinching in South Carolina, it doesn’t really matter who stops him. But there are only so many anti-Romney votes to go around, and every vote wasted on Perry (currently 20.9 points behind Romney in the RCP average of South Carolina polls) is in effect a vote for Romney.

Think about it: When the votes in South Carolina are counted on the night of Jan. 21, if Romney wins by a margin smaller than the vote total for Rick Perry, the supporters of Perry will have inadvertantly handed the nomination to the RINO they spent six months denouncing as unacceptable to conservatives.

By all normal political logic, Perry’s humiliating fifth-place showing in Iowa should have been the end of his campaign, but his staff and consultants insisted that he had to keep going, if only to give them a chance to spend the rest of the millions in campaign cash he’d collected. Yet they have refined the avoidance of blame to a high art, so I’m sure when all is said and done, Dave Carney and his (well-compensated) friends will lay all the blame for their failures on some convenient scapegoat.

But this is depressing me, and I don’t want to be depressed. What I want is for people to wake the hell up and start thinking for themselves, and realize that trends in human affairs are never really inevitable. The actions of individuals make a difference, and if you have the courage to stand up and speak out, you can make trends happen, rather than always being the victim of somebody else’s trend.

That’s why I like Rick Santorum: He’s the guy who says you don’t have to vote for Romney just because somebody told you Romney’s “electable”

All the noise from all these pundits won’t amount to a hill of beans, if the people of South Carolina decide to take a stand and tell the pundits to go straight to hell. Join the fight — and fear the vest!

Category: Election 2012, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Polls, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, South Carolina

Froma Harrop And Procul Harum: Both Progressive Rock, But Only One A Band

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 34 Comments

by Smitty (via The Conservatory)

Head over to Dan Collin’s place and watch it, since the embed isn’t playing nicely for us. The tone-deafness (if you will) reaches nearly creepy levels.

rdbrewer at AoSHQ has some quoteworthy analysis:

I’m left with questions. 1) Did she not know this was John Oliver from The Daily Show, and was she not aware of the kinds of things that typically happen during Daily Show interviews? 2) Was this a case of intentional hypocrisy on her part for rhetorical gain? Or was she acting out of complete ignorance?
. . .
In fact, she double-downed again, *accusing the Tea Partiers of having difficulty recognizing irony. Oliver clarified, to paraphrase, “You mean, even where there’s almost a dictionary definition of it right in front of them, they don’t get it?” Her response, “Absolutely.”
Well, I can understand where she’s coming from. The possibility her positions were absurdly mutually exclusive must never have occurred to her. After all, high-minded, super-intelligent people never make mistakes.

On is reminded of Nancy Pelosi, when called on the carpet over ObamaCare’s Constitutionality: “Are you serious? Are you serious?” I actually have a dear friend, X,  who is of the Froma/Nancy mold. The last time I spoke to her, her new emotional flail was sexual abuse of children. The problem is real and serious, and I do not sink to minimize it.

What creeps me out about X or a Froma is the matter-of-fact, calmly fanatic certainty with which they will tell you that Tea Partiers are terrorists and the U.S. is turing into a cauldron of sadistic carnal abuse. I told X words to the effect: “It would be interesting to see how you show statistically that humanity is any more depraved now than ever.”

This is the same kind of unquestioning regurgitation that fuels global warming hysteria. I want to agree with rdbrewer at AoSHQ that these are rational people having us on. The alternative that they are soulless zombies in masquerading as humans is terrible. Also, what would you do differently if they were? Ultimately, I move closer to the opinion that people on the Left are not playing with a full deck. To answer my own question then, I’m saying I’m minimizing the amount of time I waste playing cards with these creeps. The more important task is to remove them from positions of power.

Update: linked at Legal Insurrection.

Update II: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Here, enjoy a Beckett reference.

Category: Progressivism

USMC: B(l)ad And Bladder

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 30 Comments

by Smitty

There isn’t any way to defend the action of the Marines urinating on Taliban corpses. It was all over the NBC news last night. But step back and question the timing:
In what context did this occur? The trial will be interesting, as we may discover that, while not justified, there were motives. Possible examples include a firefight, or intelligence indicating that the targets of the desecration had snuffed some US Marines.
Should we question the timing? Isn’t the U.S. making a major policy shift in Afghanistan right now? Are these Marines being used to:

  1. Control the media cycle about U.S. policy toward Afghanistan.
  2. Offer some anti-U.S. ammunition to Kabul.
  3. Make the probable budget whacking of the Pentagon seem emotionally justified.

How about some kind of balance in the reporting? The desecration of the corpses is wrong, but the reporting might have you thinking that absolutely nothing else happened in Afghanistan but this reprehensible act.

In summary, while not trying to justify these Marines in the slightest, the media is pissing on the U.S. about as much as those Marines pissed on the Taliban. Thanks for nothing, you sad media Murtha-ites.

via American Power

Category: Aghanistan, Military

Founder of the Axis of Fedora

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 4 Comments

Pete Da Tech Guy is having a post-New Hampshire primary fundraiser.

I’ve already contributed — Pete generously acted as my chauffeur during part of the New Hampshire trip, in addition to all his excellent blogging — and I therefore urge all my readers to do likewise.

Whether it’s $10, $20 or $50, please HIT DA TIP JAR!

Category: Da Tech Guy

Tragedy in Two JPEGs

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 19 Comments

by Smitty

This has been all over the net. Most recently from Power Line. But it showed up in the Reader along with the following, via iOwnTheWorld:

Update: linked by Surber and Dell.

Category: Abortion

EXCLUSIVE: Sean Bielat Sends Fundraising E-Mail for 2012 Campaign

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 13 Comments

Sean Bielat, the Marine veteran who mounted a surprisingly strong Republican challenge to Barney Frank in the 2010 mid-term election, has sent a fundraising e-mail to his supporters, seeking contributions for his planned 2012 campaign for the Massachusetts 4th District seat.

In the e-mail, obtained exclusively by The Other McCain, Bielat seeks donations in the amount of $17 for his campaign, which he plans to announce officially Tuesday, Jan. 17.

Bielat’s likely Democrat opponent for the newly redistricted MA-4 seat will be Joseph Kennedy III.

“The Massachusetts Democrats are desperate to reclaim Barney Frank’s district and re-brand it as yet another ‘Kennedy Seat,'” Bielat wrote in the e-mail. “We can’t let this happen! Putting someone into office simply because of his family is bad for Massachusetts, and it’s bad for the nation.”

Strong online fundraising helped turn Bielat’s 2010 campaign against Frank into a race that garnered nationwide attention. After MA-4 was re-districted to include more Republican voters, Frank announced he would retire rather than seek re-election, a decision many attributed to the expectation that Bielat would once against run for the seat.

* * FULL TEXT OF BIELAT E-MAIL * *

January 12, 2012

Dear —-,
In 2010, I made it my goal to retire Barney Frank. With the help of thousands of people in Massachusetts and across the country, against all odds, we ran a highly competitive campaign against a 16 term incumbent in a gerrymandered district designed to protect him. We gave Barney Frank quite a scare and many pundits have suggested that our efforts played a significant role in his recent retirement announcement. While we fell a bit short on Election Day, we built a network of people who cared enough about tomorrow to get involved today.
2010 was also an amazing year for me personally. My wife Hope and I were blessed with our first child, Theodore. In 2011, were blessed once again, with the birth of our daughter, Seraphina. As all parents know, having a child changes your view of the world and gives you a new sense of purpose. Suddenly, changing this country’s course to build an America with even more promise became less of an abstraction.
Many people have asked if would consider another run for Congress. Running for office isn’t a decision to be taken lightly, and Hope and I weighed the pros and cons of another run. After much consideration, it all came down to this–We looked into our kids’ eyes and asked ourselves:
“What can we do to provide the best possible future for our children?”
The answer was clear. Simply resting on past accomplishments, and patting ourselves on the back for whatever role we played in Barney Frank’s decision to retire, wouldn’t be enough. In order to create the right future for our kids and our country, we must continue to work. For this reason, I’m happy to say that I will be a candidate for Congress once again in 2012.
Recently I sent a tweet regarding my plans for 2012.
@SeanBielat I have made a decision re: another run for Congress. Save the date: January 17th. #tcot #mapoli #MA04

This simple tweet appears to have helped launch a campaign…not mine, mind you, but that of Joe Kennedy III, the grandson of Robert Kennedy and son of Citizens Energy Director Joe Kennedy II. The Massachusetts Democrats are desperate to reclaim Barney Frank’s district and re-brand it as yet another “Kennedy Seat”. We can’t let this happen! Putting someone into office simply because of his family is bad for Massachusetts, and it’s bad for the nation. Sending more people to Washington spouting the same tired rhetoric is perhaps worse.
Wasn’t 30 years of Barney Frank enough? Wasn’t 64 consecutive years of Kennedys in Congress enough? Now Democratic Party insiders think that they can replace Barney with yet another Kennedy, a young man who has never lived in the district, but has a famous last name, to secure a seat for another several decades.
That’s why I need your immediate support. My formal announcement is on January 17th, but we are at work already. My goal is to raise $25,000 by the time I announce–that gives us just over 4 days.
Please consider donating $17 to commemorate January 17th, the date we officially begin the effort to elect a new voice for Massachusetts. The Kennedy family will be able to raise huge amounts of money without difficulty; however, ours is a grassroots campaign and we will only win with your help. Please contribute if you’re able to.
The people of Massachusetts deserve better. The country deserves better. Our kids deserve better. We need to stop the runaway progressive train and put America back on the right track. Your donation will go a long way toward restoring jobs, preserving our liberty and security, and bringing about some “change” that actually makes sense. It’s time to restore America’s greatness. Can you help us? Donate today!
Thanks for taking the time to read this note and thanks for being willing to get involved in shaping this country’s future!

Sincerely,
Sean Bielat
Candidate for US Congress
Massachusetts-District 4

p.s. In 2010, we showed that we could take on an entrenched incumbent like Barney Frank. Now the 4th District is much more competitive due to redistricting, and since it’s an open seat, we have an excellent chance of winning…but only if we get the support we need.

Sean Bielat (R-MA) is a US Marine, a successful businessman and a proud father. To donate now, visit SeanBielat.org. Please also follow his tweets and posts on Twitter and Facebook and share his updates across your online networks..

Category: Election 2012, Massachusetts, Sean Bielat

Campaign-Induced Tourette’s Syndrome

Posted on | January 13, 2012 | 34 Comments

‘The Phantom Menace’ in Des Moines, Iowa, Aug. 9, 2011

“Perry’s decision to make his announcement in South Carolina was widely viewed at the time as a genius move that would lock down his support in a crucial early primary state, and once he emerged as the most viable conservative alternative to Mitt Romney, Perry would have no trouble making up whatever he’d lost in Iowa by dissing Ames.
“Such was the conventional wisdom in August . . .”
— Robert Stacy McCain, Oct. 17, 2011

“There could be some populist cred for Perry if big donors tied to Wall Street start leaving him, but that’s a big trade-off for the funding Perry desperately needs in South Carolina. If he can’t put ads on the air and compete with Romney, Santorum, and Gingrich, then Perry won’t go anywhere in his last-gasp effort to stay in the race. He’s already at the bottom of the pack in the latest Insider Advantage poll, at 5%. Even Jon Huntsman scores better than Perry in South Carolina, at 7%.”
— Ed Morrissey, Jan. 12, 2012

“Oops he did it again. When asked to name and provide the number of federal departments he’d eliminate as president, Texas Gov. Rick Perry managed to list three, but they weren’t the three agencies he consistently names on the stump or that he attempted to name when he committed his now infamous ‘oops’ moment.”
— ABC News, Jan. 13, 2012

“Mitt Romney still holds first place in the South Carolina Primary field, while his opponents jockey for second with the voting eight days away.”
— Rasmussen Reports, Jan. 13, 2012

While I was in New Hampshire, I occasionally startled my hosts with outbursts of profanity, cussing my way toward deadline. It’s my theory that unless you thoroughly cuss out your computer once in a while, the damned things become arrogant. So I’d be sitting there in Mike Rogers’s kitchen, frustrated by the effort of trying to upload a video, and suddenly erupt in a fit of vulgar shouting at my laptop.

But it’s not just the computer that’s testing my patience these days. It’s also the campaign itself. Because I see a widespread confusion prevailing among conservatives that has been generated by the same bandwagon-jumpers who, in August, kept telling us that the Mighty Rick Perry Juggernaut was going to roll all the way to Tampa and then on to the White House.

The Perry myth — “Howdy, Thank You, Erick“ — has gone through several permutations in the months since Perry’s debate disasters torpedoed his poll numbers. But the myth has enjoyed a zombie afterlife in the form of a phrase that the Perrybots made ubiquitous back in the heyday of the Smilin’ Texan’s frontrunner glory:

“A Vote for [Blank] Is a Vote for Romney”

You could fill in the blank with any name — Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, whoever — and it didn’t matter to the stooges and shills who were riding aboard the Mighty Rick Perry Juggernaut. Their peculiar variation on the Bandwagon Fallacy involved not merely the hyping of Perry as The Only Man Who Could Beat Romney™, but also the orchestrated derogation of any other “Not Romney” candidate.

Ergo, supporters of all other Republicans were dismissed as hopelessly naive: “Don’t you know that a vote for [your candidate] is a vote for Romney?” Read more

Category: Election 2012, Mitt Romney, Rick Perry, South Carolina
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