The Other McCain

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

Sarah’s Coming to Iowa

Posted on | August 11, 2011 | 28 Comments

NEWTON, Iowa
Tuesday, I met with Peter Singleton and Michelle McCormick of Iowa for Palin. And during our conversation, Peter kept referring to “when” Sarah Palin gets into the 2012 campaign. All the pundits have concluded that she’s not running, but . . . well, it’s Sarah Palin we’re talking about, so never say never:

After a more than two-month hiatus, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is planning to crash the presidential party once again with a heartland-themed re-launch of her “One Nation” bus tour this week in Iowa, according to a Palin fundraising email obtained by CNN.
Palin is bringing her Constitution-draped bus to the Iowa State Fair, just 30 miles south of where the Republican presidential field will take the stage on Thursday for a presidential debate in Ames.
It’s not yet clear which day the tour begins, but her surprise arrival in Iowa will happen before the closely watched Ames straw poll. Palin is not on the straw poll ballot.

Whether I’ll be able to catch Palin’s bus tour is an open question. She hasn’t published a schedule, although she has released a video:

Category: Fear and Loathing in Iowa, Iowa, Sarah Palin

LIVE AT FIVE – 08.11.11

Posted on | August 11, 2011 | 4 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


TOP NEWS
US Widens Sanctions On Syria, UNSC Meets

Bashar Assad meets with the Turkish foreign minister

Largest bank and telco in Syria proscribed as attacks on protesters continue

Dougherty Gang Captured In Colorado
Week-long chase of Florida trio ends in crash south of Pueblo

Stocks Take Another Dive Worldwide
Worries about French debt, pessimism about US economy crush hopes of market rebound



POLITICS
President Goes On Vacation As The Economy Burns

The President rides with his daughter Malia

Maybe Martha’s Vineyard wasn’t the best choice?

Romney Rips Obama On Economy During Iowa Visit

Sarah Palin To Visit Iowa State Fair

GOP Names “No Tax Hikes” Six To Panel

ATF’s “Operation Fast And Furious” Showed Early Signs Of Failure

Reuters/Ipsos: Most Americans Say US Is On Wrong Track

House Homeland Security Chairman Wants Probe Into Administration-Sanctioned Bin Laden Movie



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Seven Reasons The Stock Market Is So Volatile
Asia Stocks Down 2%, Limited By US Futures
Gold Eases From Record High After CME Margin Hike; Still Over $1800
News Corp. Board Backs Murdoch After Hacking Scandal; Company Posts Strong Profit For Fiscal Year
Cisco Profit Tops Estimates, Stock Jumps
Bank Chiefs Seek To Reassure Investors
Apple Tops Exxon Mobil For Market Cap Crown Again
Intel Invests $300 Million In Ultrabooks
A NEW IPAD CHALLENGER APPEARS
HTC Acquires Majority Share Of Dr. Dre’s Beats
Anonymous Plans To Attack Facebook A Hoax?



SPORTS
Uggla Pushes Streak To 31 Games As Braves Sweep Marlins

Anibal Sanchez gives up the ball to manager Jack McKeon after lasting only 1 2/3 innings against Atlanta

Uggla’s two-run single in the first is all the runs Tim Hudson needed for a 9-2 win against the Fish

Granderson Dingers Help Yanks End Skid

Indians Shell Tigers 10-3, Close Within Two In AL Central

A’s Blow 3-1 Lead, Fall To Blue Jays

Cliff Lee Homers As Phillies Rally From Six Down To Beat Dodgers

Cubs Turn On Power To Take One From Nats



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Lindsay Lohan Drug Buy Video “Completely Fictitious”

Real trouble or papparazzi trolling?

Well, okay then.

Rebecca Black Forced Out Of School By Harassment

TBS Cancels “Lopez Tonght”

“American Idol” Judges All Re-sign For Season 11

J-Lo, Marc Anthony Reuniting?
Dubious.

“Twilight” Actor Arrested In Arizona

Lifetime Greenlights “The Client List” Series With Jennifer Love Hewitt

Blake Lively Likes To Play By “The Rules”

Alec Baldwin Not Running For Mayor Of New York – Yet

“Eureka” Stars, Showrunner React To Cancellation; Network Adds Final Episode

Bruce Willis Negotiating To Play Original Joe In “G.I. Joe 2”



FOREIGNERS
British Police Out In Force As London Violence Subsides
“Nothing is off the table,” Cameron said, including water cannon
SEALS Avenged: Chinook Shooters Tracked, Killed With Air Strike
Norks, ROK Exchange Fire Near Scene Of Last Year’s Island Bombardment
China’s First Aircraft Carrier Goes To Sea
US Relies On Mercenaries In Somalia
Accused Bali Bomb Maker Extradited From Pakistan To Indonesia



BLOGS & STUFF
Don Surber: Saving Private Obama
Allahpundit: Tom Friedman Fantasizes About Boehner Joining Obama, Selling Out Tea Party
Yid With Lid: Rick Santelli’s Pimp Hand Is Strong – Slaps Meredith Whitney Down On CNBC
PJ Tatler: From The Ownership Society To Neo-Feudalism
Jihad Watch: CAIR To Christie – Well Done, Thou Good And Faithful Stooge
Wizbang: No Moral Compass
Big Government: ACORN Hit With Maximum Fine In Nevada Court; Judge Wanted To Impose Jail Time
Newt Gingrich: Suspend UN Funding Now!
Troglopundit: Actually, Isn’t Marriage More Like Beer?


SOTD: Bad Reputation

Category: Live at Five

Mitt Romney Comes to Des Moines, Attracts Massive Media Coverage

Posted on | August 10, 2011 | 25 Comments

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney speaks at
a fundraiser for the Polk County Republican Party.

DES MOINES, Iowa
Wow — what a crowd! I just got through covering Mitt Romney’s speech to a fundraiser for the Polk County GOP, and it was kind of eye-opening to see how much more media coverage the national front-runner gets.

So far in Iowa, I’ve been to events for Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum. If they get a couple of local TV stations and two or three newspaper reporters to an event, that’s “good coverage.” But at today’s Romney event — held at the home of a local businessman — it was a totally different level of coverage: The Philadelphia Inquirer, the San Francisco Chronicle, Gwen Ifill, Charlie Cook, Al Hunt, Carl Cameron of Fox News, etc. I counted no fewer than 12 TV or video cameras recording Romney’s speech. Here’s my brief report at The American Spectator:

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney? said Wednesday that America is “in crisis” as a result of President Obama?’s policies.
“I think you have to tell people the truth, and America is in crisis,” the former Massachusetts governor told a gathering of Republicans here. “We elected as our president a person we didn’t know very well. . . . There were people who said, ‘I wonder what will happen if we choose as president a man who has no experience?’ Now we know – and it’s not a very positive thing,” .
Romney spoke at a backyard party at the home of Des Moines businessman Nick Van Patten. The event was a fund-raiser for the Polk County GOP.
“You’ve got a lot of people in this country who are hurting, who are suffering by virtue of the president’s policies,” he said. “You may ask, ‘What did he do that was so bad?’ My answer is, well, almost everything.”
While he hasn’t made a strong effort in the upcoming Iowa Republican straw poll, Romney will participate in a debate Thursday at Iowa State University in Ames.

Mitt was accompanied by his oldest son, Tagg, and Tagg’s 15-year-old daughter Allie, who was making her first-ever campaign trip with her grandfather, whom she calls “Papa.”

My wife called me and said she saw me on Fox News, walking through the background. Given how many photographers were following Romney around during the event, I’m sure some people will pick up their newspapers tomorrow, see a picture and wonder, “Who’s that dude in the hat in the background?”

I’ve got more photos and video of the media mob scene — I even bumped into Duchess Rebecca — but right now I’m on deadline for Thursday’s American Spectator column. Please hit the tip jar.

UPDATE: By the way, I’d said this morning that I planned to hit the Romney event and then run up to Ames for a 7 p.m. Tim Pawlenty rally. That didn’t happen because, although the Romney event was scheduled for 5 p.m., the candidate didn’t arrive until about 6 p.m. and by the time he spoke, it was nearly 7 p.m. So there was no way I was going to make it up to Ames in time to hear Pawlenty, and also I saw a chance to get online quick with that brief news account of Romney’s speech, so I found the nearest McDonald’s and logged onto their WiFi. Once again (as on Monday night), I’ll be filing my Spectator column from a McDonald’s.

UPDATE II: Romney just rolled out this online campaign ad:

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Category: Election 2012, Fear and Loathing in Iowa, Iowa, Mitt Romney, Republicans

Connect These Dots

Posted on | August 10, 2011 | 19 Comments

by Smitty

Maggieby’s Farm: “The breakdown of the family lies behind all other urban dysfunction.”

Althouse: “So, there’s this petition going around asking that Bert and Ernie — yes, the yellow and orange dudes from Sesame Street — get gay married.”

The Progressive is the political equivalent of the stereotypical unethical used car salesmen. You need reliable transportation, he knows your need reliable transportation, and he’s all about separating you from your money with something that superficially passes for reliable transportation, but ultimately fails.

It’s one thing, in a political context, to assume a posture of libertarian indifference to people and puppets in private. Bert and Ernie just don’t matter. I really don’t care.

Yet, as a new father, there is no way under the sun that the World’s Youngest Blogger is going to suffer regular exposure to ideas that are pure dreck. Sesame Street and the Muppets were great back in the day, but something less poisonous, say, Veggie Tales, is what the WYB will be consuming.

While not explicitely setting myself up in judgement over anyone’s choices (the Almighty, History, and Economics do that far more effectively) I will repeatedly make positive choices in favor of the obviously truthful, correct, workable path. If the diseased, Progressive mindset overtakes the WYB later on, it shan’t be for lack of better counsel on my part.

Category: Uncategorized

We Can See The Tell: ‘The Riots Did Not Have A Political Motivation’

Posted on | August 10, 2011 | 11 Comments

by Smitty

Daily Pundit links Taylor at Outside the Beltway on the British riots in what is yet another willful attempt at non-analysis:

As best I can tell, the riots did not have a political motivation (the spark/excuse was the police shooting a suspect) and the general tenor appears to be wanton criminality rather than political statement. Certainly the current economic situation (and the relevant politics) is feeding the behavior, but at this point I don’t think that one can make broad political claims.

Oh horsepucky, Taylor: if these riots lack a political basis, then so did the American Revolution. The differences are (a) that these rioters are much closer to Parliament, and (b) there is no leadership core to kick the useless Parliament to the curb.

These types of events are complicated and one suspects that understanding this particular event will take some time to accomplish. I certainly am not going to claim to have answers at this point and am skeptical about those who claim to understand the event, especially if they think it fits some simplistic ideological worldview.

Taylor, obfuscation is as great a sin as oversimplification. What’s at work here is the unwillingness of the Progressive, Ruling Class Overlords to take an honest look at the situation. Honesty implies some notion of truth, some objective standard against which measurement occurs. Thanks for self-identifying as one of the spineless sophists more part of the problem than the solution, Taylor. Intellectually curious people should avoid your classes like ObamaCare.

Category: Uncategorized

Iowa Notebook: Romney Coming to Town; Pawlenty and the ‘Plausible Chance’ Trick

Posted on | August 10, 2011 | 22 Comments

DES MOINES, Iowa
Mitt Romney will be the featured guest at a “Road to the White House Republican House Party” in Des Moines this evening. That starts at 5 p.m. and then at 7 p.m. Tim Pawlenty has a rally in Ames. It’s a 45-minute drive from Des Moines to Ames, so as long as I leave the Romney event by 6, I’ll have plenty of time to get to the Pawlenty event. So those are my campaign events for today. ABC News notes Romney’s long absence from Iowa:

Romney has not spent the summer attending an endless series of campaign events like many of his fellow contenders (he’s been concentrating on fundraising) and he’s taken heat for staying a little too above-the-fray on important national issues. (He didn’t take a position on the debt ceiling deal, for example, until the last-minute.)
He’s also largely avoided the highways and dusty country roads of Iowa that candidates like Tim Pawlenty, Michele Bachmann, Rick Santorum and Herman Cain have been crisscrossing for weeks. Romney’s last visit to Iowa was in May.

If you want know why Americans hate journalists, look no further than this story by Alexander Burns and Maggie Haberman in Politico:

He’s spent a seven-figure sum and the bulk of his time on the campaign trail courting the Iowa grassroots. Operatives call his expansive Iowa organization the best in the state.
As the only mainstream Republican candidate actively competing in the Ames straw poll — thanks to Mitt Romney’s decision to skip the event and Rick Perry’s presidential race slow-walk—Tim Pawlenty may never have a better opportunity to break through in the 2012 campaign than this Saturday.
With so much firepower behind Pawlenty and so few candidates who have a plausible chance at coming out ahead, Hawkeye State politicos say Ames will be a potentially campaign-changing test of the Minnesotan’s strength.
But if Pawlenty fails to deliver, it will be a grim — and possibly fatal — omen for his underfunded presidential bid.

Who anointed Burns and Haberman with the authority to declare which Republicans are “mainstream” and “have a plausible chance”? Is it their place to decide that, e.g., Michele Bachmann is not a “mainstream Republican” and therefore doesn’t “have plausible chance”? There will be many thousands of Iowa Republicans at the Ames Straw Poll who will cast their ballots for candidates who evidently don’t merit the “mainstream” sobriquet which Burns and Haberman consider themselves uniquely fit to bestow.

And this “plausible chance” trick would not be nearly so insulting if we didn’t know in our hearts — and we do know it, don’t we? — that both Burns and Haberman (like practically everyone else at Politico) voted for Obama in 2008 and intend to vote for Obama again in 2012, so that we have partisan Democrats telling us which Republicans are “mainstream” and “plausible.” Meanwhile, here’s the lead of my latest column:

DES MOINES — Tim Albrecht likes to tell a joke about an Iowa Republican being asked whether he’s going to support a certain presidential candidate in the Ames Straw Poll. “I don’t know,” the Iowan replies. “I’ve only met him twice.”
The joke by Albrecht, spokesman for the state’s popular Republican Gov. Terry Branstad, refers to how accustomed Iowans are to being personally solicited for their support in this state whose first-in-the-nation caucuses have long been a crucial proving ground for presidential candidates. While most Americans go their entire lives without ever meeting a serious candidate for the nation’s highest office, campaigning here is a face-to-face business where voters expect to shake hands and talk directly with those who seek their votes.
That tradition of old-fashioned politicking is what the Ames Straw Poll is all about, which explains why some Iowa Republicans seem a bit miffed by Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s long-rumored entry into the 2012 presidential field. Last week I began calling him the “Phantom Menace” of Iowa because, like the sinister Sith of the “Star Wars” series, he seems omnipresent even though he is far away.  Ads promoting Perry’s candidacy have been running in fairly heavy rotation on Iowa TV recently, and his shadow campaign has been soliciting write-in votes for Saturday’s straw poll. However, the governor himself hasn’t yet stumped here, while the other GOP candidates have been frenetically crisscrossing the state imploring Iowans to “join me here in Ames,” as Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann says in  her own TV ads. . . .

Read the rest at The American Spectator. And while I make no claim to rate as a “mainstream Republican” on the Burns-Haberman Scale, I think there is a “plausible chance” you’ll hit the tip jar.





Just as a final note: I’m meeting today with Will Upton of Americans for Tax Reform, who flew into Des Moines today to attend a Wednesday morning meeting of Iowa conservative leaders. Will called me after he landed at the Des Moines Airport and reports that Mitt Romney was on his American Eagle commuter flight into town: “He was in coach with the rest of us!”

Oh — and Ladd Ehlinger Jr. is coming to town to meet with a potential client.


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Category: Election 2012, Fear and Loathing in Iowa, Iowa, Media Bias, Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty

Will Scott Be A Gentle Walker Into That Black Knight?

Posted on | August 10, 2011 | 10 Comments

by Smitty

Alan Colmes: “Wisconsin Democrats Still Vow To Recall Governor Scott Walker”
Wisconsin unions: “Come back here, Governor Walker, and I’ll bite your leg off!”

Category: Wisconsin

GOP Wins Recall Battle in Wisconsin

Posted on | August 10, 2011 | 34 Comments

Outspent 2-to-1 by Democrats and unions, Republicans held onto control of the Wisconsin state senate, winning four of six challenged seats in Tuesday’s recall elections. And next week, two Democrat senators will face their own recall challenges. Allahpundit live-blogged the whole thing and concludes: “After months of agitation over the collective bargaining law, the supreme court election, and now the recalls, [the Democrats] haven’t regained control of anything.”

Democrats are claiming the GOP cheated. Given the abject corruption of the Democrats and their union-goon allies, that’s rather an ironic charge. It’s like being accused of incivility by Al Sharpton. Speaking of whom . . .

Category: Unions, Wisconsin
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