The Other McCain

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

From the Undeceived to the Rube: My Second Notice of Your Previous Insult

Posted on | July 10, 2011 | 68 Comments

It’s come to this: Not content to insult our intelligence by claiming that her vote for Obama in 2008 was a “rational choice,” now Ann Althouse has sown discord between Smitty and me, distracting me from important issues — there has been another royal upskirt incident that regular readers would normally expect me to cover in comprehensive detail — while I replied to his pro-Althouse post:

Smitty, I assure you I don’t give a damn about Ann Althouse’s voting habits, but was ticked off by her attempt to distinguish her “rational choice” from the millions of other fools who voted for O.
You can’t do that. If anyone had bothered to read the “Future Ex-Democrats” column that I linked in the post — and I linked with the express hope that people would read it — they would find my own confession that I was a huge supporter of Bill Clinton in 1992. And I explained why I was such a damned fool. What I did not do was to attempt to claim that my folly was anything but folly.
Althouse evidently wants to have her cake and eat it, too, without any questions. Pretty damned imperious, don’t you think? And, indirectly, an insult to those of us who were never fooled by Obama. If it was “rational” to vote for Obama in 2008, after all, isn’t Althouse saying that those of us who didn’t vote for him were irrational?
Well, maybe you’re willing to be publicly insulted that way, but I’m not going to take it. Unless and until she owns up to her rubitude — and takes back that slanderous insult — she is still a rube.

Far be it from me to seek to make enemies of Professor Althouse and her many loyal readers. But there is an old country saying that applies here: Don’t piss down my back and tell me it’s raining.

Every man is the steward of his own honor, and none of us can make ourselves judges of whether someone else has been insulted.

We can, however, judge whether the insulted party has responded prudently to the insult. Read more

Category: Ann Althouse

Allen West Continues To Answer The Question ‘What If BHO Was A Leader?’

Posted on | July 10, 2011 | 7 Comments

by Smitty (h/t Lucianne)

As reported in the Daily Caller

Appearing on Nashville radio host Steve Gill’s show last week, West said Obama would be “complicit” with what he sees as Justice Department attempts to slow down and avoid a congressional investigation into Operation Fast and Furious and Project Gunrunner if he didn’t push his attorney general to resign. “The president needs to realize that Eric Holder needs to be removed from the Department of Justice,” West said after detailing why he thinks Holder should appear before an investigative committee to testify about how the DOJ has handled its response to the Operation Fast and Furious investigation. “Or else I believe President Obama is complicit and he is in approval of the actions of his attorney general.”

Gill followed up by asking West if he thought a special prosecutor was needed to investigate Operation Fast and Furious. West said he thought so, adding that the mishandling of the operation is a part of a “trend” he sees forming at the DOJ. West said the way Holder has handled Operation Fast and Furious is reminiscent of how he handled the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation scandal.

Read the whole thing.
I’m already on record as saying I think this scandal will result in a premature ejection from Pennsylvania Avenue. OFF has a special straw-breaking-camel’s-back feel to it, atop all of the other creepy, idiotic undertakings from this administration. It will be the OFFramp for this clownshow.
And who better to be the spokesperson for the ‘Get this joker out of here!’ chorus than West? Having shaken the man’s hand, I daresay they don’t arrive more impeccable. Thank you, Florida, for electing him.

Category: Uncategorized

Alan Colmes Whining About Boehner Showing Vertebrae

Posted on | July 10, 2011 | 8 Comments

by Smitty

. . .why, that’s just frickin gravy: “$4 trillion in cuts held hostage to far-right ideologues”
Alan, if the current outburst of common sense is so scary, why don’t you just emigrate to Greece?
@Boehner: keep you pimp hand strong, man.

Update: better detail at The Sundries Shack.

Category: Uncategorized

Tut Tut, Stacy: Let’s Not Stand Here Bickering And Arguing
Over ‘Oo Voted For ‘Oo

Posted on | July 10, 2011 | 19 Comments

by Smitty

In a rare moment of disagreement with the marquee name on the blog, I don’t think taking swipes at any repentant, legal voter over the 2008 election is helping matters.

  • History is immutable. If someone made a rational decision, based upon imperfect information, then that should be respected. Bainbridge ran the Philadelphia aground on an uncharted reef; sometimes, it happens.
  • Sometimes worse is better. They told me that if I voted for McCain, and McCain won, that the ru[b|d]e awakening would be put off another four years, and I replied: “Nice counter-factual!”. In other words, the come-to-Beavis meeting the country has needed would have been less likely in a McCain Administration. From that perspective, BHO ain’t no bug; he’s a feature.
  • The Progressive Project to wreck America did not begin under BHO. BHO is perhaps the icing, but he is not the cake. The upshot here is that since we’re pretty much all at least little guilty of insufficient civic participation, we can dispense with the finger pointing. I’m neither Jewish nor Roman Catholic; this point is not a guild projection. Quite the opposite. Anyone willing to come to their senses and realize that Statist Idolatry of the Progressive flavor is a Bad Thing, and repent, should be the last target of guilt. Anyone still clinging bitterly to their unaffordable Utopian ideals (and I know one or two) merits a gentle hug. You can’t get into recriminations without resembling the Wisconsin teachers union or a pack of clowns, insofar as the two categories differ.

While I hate to see anyone suffer, I also don’t hope we recover so quickly as to blow by the structural causes of the current crisis: centralization, Socialism, the Iron Law of Bureaucracy, and civic laziness. The people have quietly endorsed the Progressive project through inactivity. We have to reclaim Liberty and gently refuse to let any silver-tongued devil promise some cheap substitute for Liberty and go unchallenged.
That is all.

Category: Uncategorized

Cthulhu 2012

Posted on | July 10, 2011 | 29 Comments

“Why settle for the lesser evil?”

Sarah Palin on the current evil in Washington:

It’s a matter of public record that I did not go to Harvard Law School, but I can add.
The same “experts” who got us into this mess are now telling us that the only way out of our debt crisis is to “increase revenue,” but not by creating more jobs and therefore a larger tax base; no, they want to “increase revenue” by raising taxes on job creators who are taxed enough already! As Margaret Thatcher said, “The trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.” That’s where we are now. Hard working taxpayers have been big government’s Sugar Daddy for far too long, and now we’re out of sugar. We don’t want big government, we can’t afford it, and we are unwilling to pay for it.
This debt ceiling debate is the perfect time to do what must be done. We must cut. Yes, I’m for a balanced budget amendment and for enforceable spending caps. But first and foremost we must cut spending, not “strike a deal” that allows politicians to raise more debt!

Don Surber has video of Saturday’s meeting of top White House advisers:

“Gentlemen, we must do something Immediately! Immediately! Immediately!”

Perhaps Ann Althouse has something relevant to say about President LePetomane’s “steely nerve, his intelligence, and his groundedness.”

Speaker Boehner has said the two magic words: “No deal.”

So now we’re back to zero. The Lonely Conservative fears they’re putting budget BandAids on a fiscal gunshot wound.

We should listen to the voice of reason: “We’ve got to get our fiscal house in order here in Washington. I’m not sure it’s going to happen under the current leadership.”

Questions for a rube: “Remember? That conversation with Joe The Plumber? Were ya sleeping?”

Yet the larger question remains: “Where Did the Pleasant Cthulhu Go?”


Category: Barack Obama, Budget, Economics, John Boehner, Sarah Palin

Re-Explaining the Amazon Thing (Or, Is Your Husband Reading The Right Blog?)

Posted on | July 9, 2011 | 15 Comments

When I’d mentioned earlier that someone bought a $199.99 piece of jewelry via my Amazon Associates link — thereby earning me an $8 commission — some of the commenters seemed not to understand how it works. Look, here’s the wonderful Amazon “carousel” widget:

This is a selection of products I’ve picked out — including a fedora, and a couple of books I highly recommend — but it doesn’t matter whether you actually buy those specific items. If you click the Amazon link and purchase anything (big, small, expensive, cheap, whatever) during that visit to Amazon, that earns me a 4% commission.

So it doesn’t necessarily matter what Amazon products I advertise, so long as you click the links and buy stuff. Of course, if you want to buy some really expensive stuff, that would be super-cool with me.

Maybe some of these “right-wing billionaires” I keep hearing about might want to help a cracka out, y’know? (Go with the mink, Mr. Koch!)

The reader who bought the $499 3-D Blu-ray player last week? He explained that he’s furnishing his personal home theater via Amazon. He lives within driving distance and has invited me to come watch movies when he gets everything set up. I’m not so much into 3-D, so maybe we can have a film noir festival.

But these are mere suggestions. It doesn’t matter whether you’re buying books or mink coats, whether you’re furnishing your home theater or buying jewelry for your wife. As long as you click the Amazon links on this blog and buy something — anything — I get 4% of the purchase price.

So, ladies, if your husband is reading this blog and you don’t get a $4,500 mink coat for Christmas, don’t blame me. I tried. IYKWIMAITYD.

PREVIOUSLY:

Category: Amazon, Blogging, How This Here Internet Thingy Works

Now THAT Is What I Call a ‘Finale’

Posted on | July 9, 2011 | 12 Comments

From Lancaster, Ohio’s 4th of July show:

That show was previewed by the local newspaper July 1:

“When that finale is done, the only thing you hear is the rip-roaring of the crowd,” [Hamburg Fireworks president Ken Sprague] said. “They’re saying, ‘Oh, my God,’ and, ‘Wow.’ The wow factor is huge.” . . .
Sprague said it’s difficult to say exactly how much firepower will be let off Monday. But the five-minute grand finale alone has more than 3,000 shots.
“The grand finale is what makes the Lancaster show so awesome,” Sprague said. “Every grand finale, in my opinion, should end with the big loud kabooms, or what we call salutes. It’s very intense at the end of the Lancaster show.”

Five minutes = 300 seconds, so the finale (which actually went for six minutes) averaged nearly 10 shots per second.

Of course, that’s a professional show, but you’d be amazed at what can be accomplished using ordinary consumer fireworks — if you use enough. And by “enough,” I mean Read more

Category: Fireworks, Video

Ann Althouse: Rube

Posted on | July 9, 2011 | 124 Comments

“[Obama] really is a solid, normal person who remained grounded in the middle of all this craziness. And I like to think that, now that he’s President, with his steely nerve, his intelligence, and his groundedness, he’ll do the job that must be done. The trickery is over.”
— Ann Althouse, Jan. 22, 2009

“The guy who said that his election would heal the planet and cause the seas to recede was the guy we were warning Ann and all the other rubes about. Ann thought she had Obama figured out; that the guy behind the curtain was sane and smart and up to the job; the guy on stage was all an act. As Glenn Reynolds so often asks ‘who’s the rube,’ Ann?”
— Moneyrunner, July 9, 2011

Friday, the Wisconsin law professor asserted that she “made a rational choice” in voting for Obama in 2008, because she does not want to admit the truth: She was wrong, and not merely incidentally wrong, but disastrously, catastrophically wrong.

Like I said on Election Day: “Don’t Blame Me, I Voted for Bob Barr!”

No American should ever feel compelled to vote for a candidate they believe to be the lesser of two evils, and I didn’t. 

If you put a gun to my head and told me to vote for John McCain, I’d tell you to go ahead and pull the trigger. The whole point of calling this blog “The Other McCain” was to distance myself from the disgrace of my distant cousin. He is the emblem and example of all that is wretched, dishonest and corrupt in American politics, and if there is any comfort in the Obama Age, it is this: John McCain will never be president.

We should all thank God for that. And the Republican Party should hang its head in shame at having nominated that treacherous bastard.

In the immediate aftermath of the 2008 election, I wrote three columns analyzing the GOP’s well-deserved defeat:

Go read all of those and tell me if I was wrong about any of it. I wasn’t. I was right, right, right, the whole time Ann Althouse was being wrong, wrong , wrong. However, I’m not just reminding you of how right I was for the sake of my own vainglorious ego, but because Althouse — by continuing to defend her disastrous choice as “rational” — is undermining the work that needs to be done to convince millions of her fellow rubes that they should become ex-Democrats:

Such irrational expectations are inevitably followed by disillusionment. No prediction of what the next four years might bring is safer than this: The yawning gap between Hope and reality will produce a bumper crop of ex-Democrats.

I wrote that less than three weeks after Election Day, and Professor Althouse is doing the exact opposite of what needs to be done to persuade those millions to abandon the Democratic Party. Instead of claiming she “made a rational choice,” she needs to begin asking herself why — and honestly telling readers how — she was so completely deluded as to believe that Obama would be successful because of “his steely nerve, his intelligence, and his groundedness.”

He’s a left-wing ideological fanatic, Professor!

His calm exterior demeanor, his resonant baritone voice, his occasional nod toward political pragmatism — these superficialities cannot deceive intelligent observers. Barack Hussein Obama is a menace to American liberty, inimicably hostile to everything good and decent in our nation’s traditions, and he must be defeated.

Why does Ann Althouse refuse to own up to being a rube? Does intellectual pride prevent her from admitting that her expectations of Hope and Change were no more rational than those of Peggy Joseph?

“I won’t have to worry about putting gas in my car; I won’t have to worry about paying my mortgage. You know, if I help him, he’s gonna help me.”

You’re even a bigger rube than Peggy Joseph, Professor, because you should have known better, and you refuse to confess your error.

I agree wholeheartedly with Moneyrunner: “Intellectual Pride Makes You Stupid. . . . and denial is not a river in Egypt.”

UPDATE: Donald Douglas accuses me of insincere traffic-baiting:

We know Althouse breaks political convention, and she’s been hammering Obama for some time now. Besides, you just like posting her picture.

No, honestly: Read the linked posts — both Althouse and Moneyrunner — and see if you don’t think it was a bit too much for her to put an asterisked footnote into her Friday post, trying to deny her rubeness.

Or should that be “rubehood”? Never mind. The point is that she needs to own it, and until she does, she deserves to be mocked, and often, and by someone who knows how.

UPDATE II: Thanks to the commenter who suggested “rubitude” for Althouse’s condition. The Lonely Conservative offers lots of rational reasons why she didn’t support Obama.

UPDATE III: Linked by Pat Austin at So It Goes in Shreveport — thanks!

UPDATE IV: Linked by That Mr. G. Guy — thanks! — and now a Memeorandum thread.

UPDATE V: Small Dead Animals suggests morning-after remorse on Professor Althouse’s part. It’s probably sexist to think of it that way. But I’m scarcely the one to be lecturing others about sexism, eh?

UPDATE VI: Everything you ever need to know about not trusting Obama, Cynthia Yockey learned as a lesbian Democrat supporting Hillary Clinton.

UPDATE VII: “From the Undeceived to the Rube: My Second Notice of Your Previous Insult.”


Category: Ann Althouse, Barack Obama
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