The Other McCain

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

Obama Supports Dog-Killer Vick, Jinxes Philadelphia Eagles vs. Minnesota Vikings

Posted on | December 29, 2010 | 14 Comments

Exactly why the president of the United States felt the need to phone the Eagles’ coach to praise him for giving Michael Vick a second chance, I don’t know. What I do know is that it didn’t help the Eagles:

The NFL’s first Tuesday game in 64 years produced a fittingly unusual result as Minnesota stunned NFC East champions Philadelphia 24-14.
Minnesota quarterback Joe Webb threw for 195 yards and ran for a touchdown in his first career start filling in for the injured Brett Favre, while Adrian Peterson ran for 118 yards and touchdown.
The pair helped the Vikings (6-9) knock Philadelphia out of contention for a first-round playoff bye.
The Eagles (10-5) could have secured a first-round bye with a victory over the Vikings and Dallas next week, plus a loss by either Chicago or Atlanta next week.

What was Obama thinking? Was he trying to get the dogfighting vote? Did he figure that the ASPCA and the Friends of Animals would ignore his intervention on behalf of the dog-killer?

Maybe Obama was trying to shore up his support among Philadelphia fans, but if his jinx ends up costing the Eagle a shot at the Super Bowl, the backlash might be enough to put Pennsylvania back into the “swing state” column for 2012.

Category: Barack Obama, Football

Cousins for Cain?

Posted on | December 29, 2010 | 5 Comments

Who is that muscular giant with tattooed arms shaking hands with Herman Cain?

That’s my cousin Brian Buchanan, who lives near Atlanta and — last time I talked to him — was working as a nightclub bouncer. He sent me that photo by Facebook and told me that he took our cousin Pepper Ellis-Hagebak to hear Herman speak on the square in LaGrange, Ga., in May. (I’d imagine Pepper’s head exploded. She’s kind of a liberal.) If Herman ever needs personal security, I’m sure Brian would be available. Read more

Category: Election 2012, Family, Georgia, Herman Cain

LIVE AT FIVE – 12.29.10

Posted on | December 29, 2010 | 1 Comment

TOP NEWS
Bloomberg Under Fire As New York Streets Remain Unplowed

Butler Street in Brooklyn at 0830 Tuesday

“The mayor needs to stop acting like Baghdad Bob and saying every thing’s OK when we can see with our own eyes that clearly it’s not.” – Queens councilman Peter Vallone


Kremlin To West: MYOB
Russians reject criticism of Khodorkovsky verdict

Federal Judge Clears The Way For Murcokeski
Miller’s appeals dismissed



POLITICS
Why The New Governor Of Hawaii Is Taking On The Birthers

Governor Abercrombie at his first press conference

Intends to change state policy, release documents

Rangel Establishes Legal Defense Fund

Mayoral Candidates Blast Clinton For Emanuel Endorsement


Chris Liu: I Am The YouTube Pilot

GOP Large And In Charge In Texas House



THE ECONOMY, STUPID
PRC Cuts Export Quotas For Rare Earths 35%
Home Prices Fall 0.8% In October; Year-to-Year Decline First Since January
Groupon Goes Solo, Plans To Raise $950 Million
Apple, Mobile Services Top McAfee’s 2011 Threat Predictions
Apple Hit With Class Action Lawsuit Over Privacy Violations
Samsung Launching iPod Touch Rival



SPORTS
NBA-Best Spurs Rout Reeling Lakers 97-82

Lakers' Bynum fouls Spurs' Splitter

Spurs send defending champs to third straight loss, following humiliations at the hands of the Heat and Bucks

Vick Returns To Pro Bowl; No Seahawks Picked for Second Straight Year

Wolfpack Capitalizes On Mountaineers’ 5 Turnovers, Wins Champs Sports Bowl 23-7

Lightning Hangs Tough, Loses To Former Teammate Recchi On Last-Second Power Play Goal

Stanford Women Ready For UConn After Rout of #4 Xavier



FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS
Reese Witherspoon, Hollywood Agent Engaged

Jim Toth and Reese Witherspoon

Witherspoon began dating CAA rep after breaking up with Jake Gyllenhaal

“Teen Mom” Released From Jail

Rihanna, Matt Kemp Call It Quits

Lohans Mulling Legal Action Against Movie

Sam Cooper’s Proposal Leaves Lily In Tears Of Joy

Price Of Freedom For Kelsey Grammer? $50 Mill



Vivid Honcho May Save Octomom From Foreclosure

Wills & Kate: We’ll Manage Without Butlers & Servants



FOREIGNERS
ECOWAS Reps Demand Gbagbo Resign
Churches Unite To Assist Travelers Stranded In Moscow Airports
Religion of Peace Sect Claims Responsibility For Nigeria Bombings
ROK’s Lee Says No Alternative To Six-Party Talks
Turmoil In Pakistan As Second Party Leaves Ruling Coalition



BLOGS & STUFF
Fausta: Why Do We Have A Lieutenant Governor?
Legal Insurrection: WikiLeaks Brings Terror Back To Zimbabwe
Jihad Watch: Indiana Grandma, Muslim Convert Under Investigation For Terrorist Links
Pirate’s Cove: Majority Of Americans Want Government To Keep Hands Off Internet

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Category: Live at Five

Ready for the Best. CPAC. Evah?

Posted on | December 28, 2010 | 30 Comments

Confirmed speakers for this year’s event — Feb. 10-12 at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in D.C. — include Ann Coulter, Andrew Breitbart, Newt Gingrich, David Horowitz and Haley Barbour — and you can expect many more big names to be announced in the next six weeks.

Lisa DePasquale and her crew out-do themselves every year and 2011 — coming in the wake of a crushing Republican mid-term victory — is certain to be the most memorable CPAC ever. I’ve called it “Mardis Gras for the Right,” and if you’ve never been to CPAC, this is the year to go. You don’t want to miss it.

Given so many reasons to be excited about CPAC 2011, I’m disturbed to see that some people think this is a good occasion to marginalize themselves:

Two of the nation’s premier moral issues organizations, the Family Research Council and Concerned Women for America, are refusing to attend the Conservative Political Action Conference in February because a homosexual activist group, GOProud, has been invited. . . .
FRC and CWA join the American Principles Project, American Values, Capital Research Center, the Center for Military Readiness, Liberty Counsel, and the National Organization for Marriage in withdrawing from CPAC. In November, APP organized a boycott of CPAC over the participation of GOProud.

Which is nuts. There are many organizations that participate in CPAC who have agendas I don’t agree with. So what? My attendance does not constitute an endorsement of the agendas of those organizations (and heaven knows, they don’t all endorse me). Coalition politics sometimes requires that people get along with people they disagree with.

Dave Weigel points out that “nothing’s going to stop presidential candidates and thousands of activists from attending and getting media coverage.” Exactly what the boycotters think they’ll gain by pursuing a strategy of auto-marginalization, I don’t know.  This certainly seems an inauspicious occasion to make such a gesture.

Meanwhile, go sign up for CPAC now!

UPDATE: Lots of blowback in the comments. I tried to call Lisa DePasquale to get her reaction before I published this, and expect to hear from her tomorrow.

UPDATE II: There’s a kind of “thought police” aspect to this CPAC uproar that is relevant to some other things going on out there. It’s a free country and the principle of voluntary association means that people are free to include or exclude whom they will in their organizations and events.

Obviously, nobody can force any individual or group to support or attend CPAC. But to very publicly boycott CPAC . . . I don’t know. Something about that bothers me.

UPDATE III: Welcome, Ace of Spades HQ Morons! Meanwhile, Matt Lewis writes about this and other gay-themed controversies on the Right.

One of the things that troubles me about this uproar is that some social conservatives use “libertarian” as a pejorative. My problem with the gay-rights movement is that it is not libertarian, but rather egalitarian.

Also, there’s a lot of unseemly bashing of social conservatives in the comments. But I don’t have time to address this right now, because my wife has plans for my afternoon.

Category: CPAC, Gays

‘I Feel Like I Just Found Out I’ve Been Living on the Moon’

Posted on | December 28, 2010 | 8 Comments

So says a progressive feminist, in agreeing with Ace of Spades’ take on the Julian Assange rape accusations, as described in an Australian newspaper account:

She says they had consensual sex but she woke up the next morning to find him having intercourse with her to which she had not consented.
When she asked him if he was wearing anything, he had allegedly said: “I am wearing you.”

Ace’s conclusion about this:

Maybe some date-rape charges are a bit grey-area, but this charge doesn’t seem gray-area, if true. It sounds like rape.

Yes, if true. But that’s just the problem, isn’t it? It’s her word against his, and convicting Assange of rape would require — at least in the Anglo-American system — that a jury find her testimony convincing beyond a reasonable doubt. Read more

Category: Ace of Spades, Crime, Feminism, Sweden, WikiLeaks

Jonah Goldberg Is Wrong

Posted on | December 28, 2010 | 34 Comments

Goldberg celebrates the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell as a step toward the “rise of the gay bourgeoisie.” But what is happening is not the bourgeoisification of radicalism; rather, it’s the radicalization of the bourgeoisie. If the American middle-class adopts more and more the radical-egalitarian worldview of the Left, this cannot be sold as a triumph of conservatism, no matter how cleverly Jonah Goldberg or any other Official Conservative Spokesman frames that argument.

The repeal of DADT was a defeat for conservatives, and it will likely prove the harbinger of yet other such defeats. Conservatives spent 17 years arguing that repealing DADT — a policy which was itself originally a compromise — would have harmful effects on military readiness.

We shall wait and see. But it would be a terrible thing if, when the disastrous consequences of this radical policy change become apparent — as I am confident they will — conservatives are afraid to speak up because our Official Conservative Spokemen have declared the issue off-limits.

(Via Donald Douglas at American Power.)

UPDATE: I’m grateful to see Goldberg respond via Twitter:

Ignoring the “strategic b.s.” retort — because I’m not sure what he means by that — I will adduce yet further evidence of Jonah’s wrongness, namely that any argument which begins by citing David Brooks is inherently dubious.

More seriously, I am reminded of the Battle of Chancellorsville, when Joe Hooker ordered George Meade’s corps — which had fought hard to hold the crest of a ridge two miles east of the key crossroads — to pull back. Meade was furious: “If he can’t hold the top of the hill, how the hell does he expect to hold the bottom of it?”

The Senate Republicans’ lame-duck collapse on DADT is analogous: The abandonment of a defensible position which gives the opponent an advantage that is likely to prove decisive.

But it is all as foretold long ago by a farsighted early critic of feminism: “The fantastical project of yesterday, which was mentioned only to be ridiculed, is today the audacious reform, and will be tomorrow the accomplished fact.”

Category: American Power, Gays, Jonah Goldberg, Military

Glenn Reynolds ‘Nuke the Norks’ Only 5th Place in Sully’s ‘Malkin Awards’ Finals?

Posted on | December 28, 2010 | 24 Comments

You might have thought he’d be a runaway winner for Andrew Sullivan’s award recognizing the most “shrill, hyperbolic, divisive and intemperate right-wing rhetoric” with this war-mongering entry:

If [the North Koreans] start anything, I say nuke ‘em. And not with just a few bombs. They’ve caused enough trouble — and it would be a useful lesson for Iran, too. We can’t afford another Korean war, but hey, we’re already dismantling warheads.”
— Instapundit, Nov. 23, 2010

Gen. Buck Turgidson couldn’t have said it any better and yet, according to Sully’s latest update, Professor Reynolds is a mere fifth place in the competition. Go vote for Instapundit and correct this injustice!

Some of my friends have chided me for failing to get nominated for the Malkin Award this year, after I placed second to Glenn Beck in last year’s competition. Am I becoming . . . responsible? Are my over-the-top right-wing rants less over-the-top — or perhaps even less right-wing — than they used to be?

Perhaps. Or perhaps Sully didn’t nominate my instantly infamous reaction to the Julian Assange date-rape accusations because he, too, is a misogynistic rape apologist.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Despite my “impishness” and link-trolling, I certainly didn’t intend to misrepresent the professor’s quote. I thought he would be flattered by the comparison to that patriotic hero, Gen. Buck Turgidson. (Yeah, I know, some critics of Dr. Strangelove don’t see Gen. Turgidson as a hero. But nuking commies — that’s real patriotism, my friend!)


Category: Andrew Sullivan, Instapundit

More Herman Cain Awesomeness

Posted on | December 28, 2010 | 22 Comments

The term “Herman Cain porn” was coined at Red State to describe videos like this one from Citizens4Cain:

The “next Reagan” label is a heavy burden, but even if Cain is not equal to the Great Communicator — is anyone, really? — he is at least a Doggone Effective Communicator. Like I said, “Steve Forbes with charisma.”

BTW, there were some negative comments on yesterday’s post — “Herman Cain: ‘We Have People on the Ground’ in Early Primary States” — which I’m hesitant to describe as the work of outright trolls. To the one commenter who said my “gushing over Herman Cain is starting to get embarrassing,” I’ll say this:

  • Which candidate do you prefer in the GOP primaries? If you want to make an argument on behalf of one of the other Republican candidates, please do so.
  • You really ought to read this 1994 Newsweek article that highlights Cain’s key role in helping defeat HillaryCare.
  • I became aware of Herman Cain during the 2004 Georgia Senate primary, when my older brother — a truck driver who still lives down home in Douglas County, Ga. — called me to share his support and praise for Cain. That really got my attention and, if you knew my older brother, your reaction would have been like mine: “Wow. This guy must be the real deal.”
  • I first interviewed Herman Cain in May 2007, after he’d returned to WSB radio following his cancer treatment. And in a post from April, Smitty described me as a “Herman Cain Fanatic,” as I spoke to Smitty by phone immediately after hearing Cain’s speech at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference. All of which is to say that my enthusiasm for Cain shouldn’t surprise anyone.
  • My enthusiasm for Cain, however, is not to be confused with hostility to anyone else’s favorite candidate (unless your favorite candidate is Mike Huckabee, in which case you need to get back on your medication.) I like and support both Sarah Palin and Mike Pence, I’ve defended Haley Barbour, I’ve got nothing against Mitch Daniels, and I’ll remind you that I supported Mitt Romney in 2008 (as did Herman Cain, by the way). So it’s not a zero-sum game.
  • Finally, it’s more than a year until the Iowa caucuses and there’s no telling what’s going to transpire between now and then. So if any particular candidate is not your first choice, don’t sweat it — and be careful about going to war against a candidate who might be preferable to your least favorite candidate.

If Doug Hoffman’s NY-23 campaign and the “No One Red Cent” rebellion in support of Marco Rubio convinced you of nothing else, it should have convinced you that I love nothing better than to support a grassroots David against the establishment Goliath.

Look, I remember when Allen West couldn’t get the time of day from the GOP establishment; next month, he’ll be Congressman Allen West. And I also remember arriving in NY-25 on a Sunday when, barely two weeks before Election Day, the front-page news was a poll that had Ann Marie Buerkle trailing by 12 points. Next month, she’ll be Congresswoman Ann Marie Buerkle.

In a David-vs.-Goliath situation, you don’t start by trying to calculate the odds of success, because the odds are liable to be so daunting as to inspire helpless despair. But let me ask you this: What were Herman Cain’s odds in 2006, when the doctors diagnosed him with Stage 4 cancer? Think about that before you say Cain can’t win.

As my father used to tell me, “Can’t never could.”

Category: Election 2012, Herman Cain, Video
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