The Other McCain

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

CPAC Day 1: Deadline in the Lobby Bar

Posted on | February 10, 2011 | 8 Comments

Greetings from the fabulous Marriott Wardman Park Hotel, scene of the awesomest CPAC evah! The photo above was taken last night in the lobby bar, where I filed my column for today’s American Spectator:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — More than 10,000 activists will convene here today at the Wardman Park Marriott Hotel for the biggest gathering of conservatives in history.
This year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) will not only be the biggest in the 38-year history of the event, it is quite nearly certain to be the most festive and energized. Following on the heels of last fall’s mid-term election triumph, conservatives are in a mood to celebrate and this three-day conference is where they will assemble for that celebration.
You wouldn’t know this, of course, from most of the press coverage. According to the media, the right is deeply divided by internecine feuds, with social conservatives battling libertarians and neocons in a grand three-way donnybrook that threatens to destroy the Republican Party.
Sic semper hoc.
For as long as I’ve been covering CPAC, reporters have been hyping the idea that this event is extraordinarily controversial, using their coverage of the conference to suggest that the conservative movement is teetering on the brink of its final ideological implosion. . . .

Please read the whole thing. Trying to write while surrounded by partying CPAC-ers — the early arrivals, including many bloggers — was an extraordinary challenge. I kept telling people, “I’d love to talk, but I’m on deadline!” Here are a few photos to give you a flavor of last night’s carnival atmosphere:

Atlanta talk-radio host and GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain talks to conservative activist Ruth Malhotra. After Cain arrived last night, he was quickly surrounded by CPAC attendees eager to shake his hand and get their photos taken with the guy I introduced to my friends as The Next President of the United States.

John Hawkins of Right Wing News and Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs. “Smile and say, ‘Charles Johnson’!”

Who are these two women with Fingers Malloy? The answer might be somewhere in my notes, but those were scrawled on a cocktail napkin I can’t find right now.

Da Tech Guy regales a CPAC-er with tales of cannoli.

Again: Who is this woman with Fingers Malloy?

Category: CPAC

My Favorite Line by Shakespeare

Posted on | February 10, 2011 | 24 Comments

“The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”
— Dick the Butcher, Henry VI, Part 2, Act IV, Scene 2

OK, maybe not all the lawyers. My son-in-law will be attending law school this fall and hasn’t done anything to deserve killing. Yet.

Also, my son-in-law is a Christian, and thus remembers my favorite words of Jesus:

“Woe unto you also, ye lawyers! for ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.”
— Luke 11:46 (KJV)

Yes, we have a rich cultural tradition of lawyer-hating to draw upon, but it’s rather surprising to find that a man who makes his living teaching future lawyers can admit that he is thereby unloosing a plague upon mankind:

When laws are complex, there’s almost always a way to lawyer around them, but to do that you have to pay a lawyer to figure it out, and then you have to structure your business in a way that’s driven by the need to get around dumb and complex legal restrictions, rather than in a way that makes for an efficient business. But the demand for lawyers is a symptom of the problem, not the cause.

That’s from Professor Glenn Reynolds’s most recent column at The Washington Examiner, and you should read the whole thing or he might sue you.

Category: Instapundit

LIVE AT FIVE – 2.10.11

Posted on | February 10, 2011 | 1 Comment

TOP NEWS
One And Done: Jim Webb (D-Va.) Won’t Run For Reelection in 2012

Senator Jim Webb

Life just got even harder for the Democrats’ Senate caucus; Dems’ bench in Virginia none too deep

Obama’s Mixed Messages On Mubarak
 Advisors split on when and how Egyptian president should go

American Jihadi Trained In Pakistan Pleads Guilty To Terror Charges
May be sentenced to life in prison for helping recruit and train others



POLITICS
Giffords Speaks: Doctors Hail Progress In Recovery

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords

May be recovering fast enough to attend husband’s shuttle launch in April

President Seeks Cuts In Heating Oil For Poor

Officials Warn Of Domestic Terrorism Threat

Study: Veterans More Likely To Be Homeless

HUD Halts Millions In Funding To Philadelphia Housing Authority (Video)



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
Deutsche Bourse, NYSE Euronext To Merge?
Republicans Grill Bernanke Over Inflation, Debt (Video)
Bipartisan Support For Scrapping Fannie, Freddie Draws Criticism
HP Presents TouchPad, Veer, Pre 3 In Direct Challenge To Apple’s IPad, IPhone
RIP Guitar Hero, 2005-2011
New “Duke Nukem Forever” Screens – Come Get Some!



SPORTS
It’s Official: The Cavs Are As Bad As It Gets

And the Cavaliers lose again...to Detroit.

Losing streak of 26 matches Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ record of futility

Knicks Contain Griffin, Rest Of Clippers Still Enough To Win

#3 Longhorns Too Much For Sooners



Duke Rallies In Second Half To Edge Tarheels

Virtually No Chance For Deal Between Pujols, Cards Before Deadline



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Lindsay’s Probation Revoked; $40K Bail Set In Theft Case

Lindsay Lohan goes to court over accusation of jewelry theft

“You’re no different than anyone else, so please don’t push your luck, because I’m telling you, things will be different,” Judge Schwartz warned.

Ashlee Simpson Files For Divorce

Katy Perry & Russell Brand Seek Couples Therapy

Charlie Sheen: “I’ll Pay The Crew”

Jennifer Aniston Swears “I Am Happy!”

Katie Holmes Studied $cientology In Bus Built With Slave Labor

Will Shane Black Direct “Iron Man 3”?

Brad “Warbucks” Pitt? Willow Smith Wants Star For “Annie”



FOREIGNERS
Egyptian Strikers Add To Pressure On Mubarak
Teenage Suicide Bomber Hits Pakistani Army Recruiting Center
Korean Talks End Without Agreement
Berlusconi Battles Burgeoning Sex Scandal
Taiwan Detains General Suspected Of Spying For PRC



BLOGS & STUFF
Peter Wehner: The Obama Undertow And The 2012 Elections
Flopping Aces: Dems Trying To Get Thomas To Recuse Himself From Obamacare Case
Marybeth Hicks: Barbarism The New National Norm?
Allahpundit: You Know, Maybe Santorum Wasn’t Ripping Palin
Jihad Watch: 100 UC Irvine Faculty Call For Dismissal Of Charges Against Muslim Students Who Organized Disruption Of Ambassador’s Speech
JammieWearingFool: Dumbest Woman In Congress Upset By Pepsi Commercial
Megan McArdle: In Praise Of Cheap Food
Matt Welch: Arianna Huffington, Slavemaster?


— compiled by Wombat-socho

Category: Live at Five

Rep. Chris Lee (R-Stupid) Quickly Becomes Former Congressman

Posted on | February 9, 2011 | 52 Comments

The illusion of online anonymity strikes again:

Rep. Christopher Lee is a married Republican congressman serving the 26th District of New York. But when he trolls Craigslist’s “Women Seeking Men” forum, he’s Christopher Lee, “divorced” “lobbyist” and “fit fun classy guy.” . . .
On the morning of Friday, January 14, a single 34-year-old woman put an ad in the “Women for Men” section of Craigslist personals. . . .
By email, Lee identified himself as a 39-year-old divorced lobbyist and sent a PG picture to the woman from the ad. (In fact, Lee is married and has one son with his wife. He’s also 46.) . . .

Fast-forward to the denouement:

Rep. Chris Lee, R-N.Y., resigned from Congress . . .
“It has been a tremendous honor to serve the people of Western New York. I regret the harm that my actions have caused my family, my staff and my constituents. I deeply and sincerely apologize to them all. I have made profound mistakes and I promise to work as hard as I can to seek their forgiveness,” Lee said in a statement Wednesday night.

(Via Memeorandum.) Let me explain something: If you want to be a member of Congress and screw around, join the Democratic Party. You can screw around all you want and no problem, if you’re a Democrat. But you can’t do that and be a Republican member of Congress.

UPDATE: Fastest scandal ever! The Internet not only makes it easier for cheaters to cheat, it makes it easier for cheaters to get caught, and the rapidity with which the damning evidence becomes public tends to accelerate the resignation.

Category: New York, Republicans, Scandal

Dave Weigel Calls Himself ‘Progressive’? (Also: Dibs on ‘Arianna Huffington Nude’)

Posted on | February 9, 2011 | 34 Comments

Did ex-libertarian David Weigel just say what it looks like he said here?

Imagine a future in which AOL, the online portal for millions of people, farms out its news content to the Huffington Post. Imagine a future in which Yahoo!, the online portal for millions of similar people, hires the deputy publisher of Talking Points Memo to launch its blog network.
For a progressive who thinks the Internet is increasingly driving the narrative, this is heartening.

No more Koch money for you, Dave!

OK, so now that we’ve cleared that up, let’s talk a bit more about the HuffPo/AOL deal, with Tom Blumer documenting the fundamental issue:

Since start-up, HuffPo hasn’t paid its bloggers either, despite getting [more than $35 million in capital investment], and achieving [annual] revenues of about $30 million. . . . AOL is gambling that HuffPo’s apparently across-the-board gratis arrangement with its content providers, who as of mid-2009 numbered about 4,000, will continue. Why in the world should it?

Read the whole thing, because this points to an inescapable problem with the group-blog “community” site concept: If you are relying on unpaid contributors for a significant amount of content at a site where the proprietors are earning enough revenue to pay full-time salaries to some people, how do you justify paying nothing to most of your contributors?

Where is the incentive for “chopped liver” contributors — evidently not valuable enough to merit salaries — to keep feeding free content onto your site? If some people are expected to write for free, on behalf of “the cause,” why are other people getting paid to write for “the cause”?

Oh, right: They do it for the prestige of being able to call themselves a “Huffington Post contributor” (who isn’t good enough to get paid).

If Arianna collects a lump sum of $18 million plus a job with a $4 million annual salary, shouldn’t HuffPo contributors feel that they’ve been shamefully exploited?

Dana Milbank asks: “Did Arianna Huffington just sell out her fellow progressives?” Someone could make a handsome profit selling “Honk If You’ve Been Sold Out by Arianna Huffington” bumper stickers.

If this is how Arianna rolls, why should anyone do anything other than roll their eyes at her declaration that she “hopes to turn AOL into a center of ‘citizen journalism’ in advance of the 2012 elections?”

In that context, “citizen journalism” can only mean: You work for free, and we’ll cash in if you do good work.

Speaking of cashing in: AOL closed last Thursday at $22.24 and closed Tuesday at $20.89. If you owned 1,000 shares of AOL, you just lost $1,350 for “the cause” in the span of three days’ trading. How do you feel about your $1,350 loss, compared to Arianna’s $18 million gain?

Also: People are now trying to get Google-bomb traffic out of the HuffPo/AOL deal. Yeah, it would be a shame if people started Googling for “Arianna Huffington nude” or something like that.

UPDATE: Weigel insists that I’ve misinterpreted what he said and that he did not actually mean to declare himself a “progressive.” By way of apology, I’ve offered Dave the “Arianna Huffington sex video” Google bomb.

The “Arianna Huffington sucks” Google bomb was already taken.

UPDATE II: “Search engine optimization won’t work forever.” True. But it didn’t have to work forever, just long enough for Arianna to sell out. And I’m sorry, Farhad Manj, but you’re too late to claim the “Arianna Huffington blows” Google bomb.

Category: Dave Weigel, Huffington Post, Progressivism

CPAC Update: Rep. Allen West Will Buy Me Beers and Also Give Keynote Speech

Posted on | February 9, 2011 | 34 Comments

One of these things is very important news:

Freshman Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.) will be the closing keynote speaker at the Conservative Political Action Conference this year, he said in a Wednesday morning tweet.

Will update with further news of who’s buying me beers at CPAC. Other than “everybody,” of course.

UPDATE: It can be neither confirmed nor denied that Matt Lewis is buying me beers.

UPDATE II: Here is the Tweet by which Congressman West made his big announcement:

Some of you may notice that he didn’t say anything about buying me beers. Well, (a) he only had 140 characters to work with, and (b) some things are too important for a mere Twitter announcement. We expect a press release momentarily. Meanwhile, The Hill reports:

By choosing West, CPAC sends an interesting message. The Florida freshman hasn’t been afraid to clash with the GOP leadership in the House, and he enjoys a unique status as just one of two black Republicans elected in the House.

Uh, that word “unique” has an actual definition. If there are two of something, it’s not “unique.”

UPDATE III: Jerry Wilson is not in the CPAC holiday spirit:

The clubby chummy high school-ish clique vibe is pathetic. . . .
I have yet another doctor’s appointment this morning to see if the staph infection in my sinuses, which has plagued me for several months, is any better. Also, all appearances indicate I have some kind of infection, possibly staph as well, in my lungs or close vicinity thereof. I’ve undergone four rounds of antibiotics in the past five or six months, and in the case of the first three treatments (I finished the most recent one yesterday) all the symptoms came back at full strength within a matter of days.
I’m tired of being sick, and I’m scared about why this isn’t going away.

Persistent illness is indeed cause for concern, and I certainly hope Jerry gets well soon. My own health has been less than optimal the past few days, but remain resolutely determined to ignore any source of woe during “Mardi Gras for the Right.”

If I keel over dead before it’s done, I can only hope that I have done my share by then to put the “party” back in the Republican Party. Until they plow me under, however, Laissez les bons temps rouler!

UPDATE IV: Now a Memeorandum thread. The choice of West is commended as “brilliant” by Cubachi.

You may wonder, “Why is Stacy so certain that Allen West is going to buy him beers?” Let me remind you that I spent Election Night at West’s victory party in Boca Raton.

There was a cash bar at the party and, although I was fortunately able to impose on some of my friends to purchase the necessary refreshments, the very thought a Republican congressional campaign would expect me to buy my own beer . . .

Well, it offended my sense gonzo ethics. If a professional journalist doesn’t even get free beer, what’s the point in becoming a professional journalist?

Might as well go to law school or something.

Category: Allen West, CPAC

Amity Shlaes for Senate?

Posted on | February 9, 2011 | 9 Comments

Adam Brickley has an interesting suggestion for New York Republicans:

The GOP needs a high profile opponent who will force Gillibrand to explain herself – and given her record we don’t think she can. The only question is who can do this while raising the money to compete in expensive New York
Our suggestion is Amity Shlaes – syndicated columnist, first rate historian, and bestselling author. She is the very antithesis of Sen. Gillibrand, and she has a huge national following that could fund an insurgent campaign with small donations. Her history of the Great Depression, The Forgotten Man, has become essential reading among economic conservatives of all stripes – from tea partiers to establishment moderates to Ron Paul devotees. Hence, we have absolutely no doubt that her legions of devoted fans and readers could fund a gargantuan campaign without breaking a sweat, giving her more than enough ammo to both win the GOP nomination and bury Gillibrand under a hail of advertising.

Read the whole thing. Brickley is the blogger who launched the “Draft Palin” blog back when nobody had ever heard of Alaska’s governor. Matt Lewis at Politics Daily says Brickley “has an uncanny ability to spot talented candidates that others overlook.”

Upstate blogger The Lonely Conservatives says “Run, Amity, Run!”

Category: Election 2012, New York, Senate, The Lonely Conservative

‘Rhymes-With-Shmoogle’

Posted on | February 9, 2011 | 9 Comments

Pejman Yousefzadeh disassembles Conor Friedersdorf with admirable gusto, beginning, “I really have things I would prefer doing this evening instead of engaging in yet another blogfight with someone at the Atlantic, but . . .”

Yousefzadeh eviscerates Friedersdorf for defending anti-Israel crank Philip Giraldi and you’ve really got to read the whole thing, which includes such splend phrase-making: “Friedersdorf gives birth to, kills, and makes necessary a mournful funeral and a lively wake for scores of strawmen . . . ” Read more

Category: Blogging, Israel
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