Total Security Absurdity

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Gropegate continues to make news and inspire commentary:

Ann Coulter, meanwhile, offers a relevant clue:

Tip for the TSA: When your agents are asking passengers for their autographs, you’re probably not on the verge of nabbing Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. . . .
If security guards at a big, fat terrorist target like the U.S. Capitol can be expected to figure out that members of Congress aren’t a threat, why don’t we trust TSA agents to figure out that little grandmothers, nuns and 8-year-olds aren’t a threat either?

And she mentions my pet peeve about flying:

But all those people have to take their shoes off, remove their computers from their luggage and be subjected to a pat-down because TSA agents are prohibited by the Homeland Security Department from using an ounce of common sense.

The whole security-screening process annoys me, but having to remove my laptop from my carry-on is the worst of it. I carry my laptop in a backpack that’s always crammed with newspapers, magazines and sundry other stuff. The process of taking out the laptop, putting it in a separate bin, then putting it back in after I’ve passed through the screening — a total hassle. And all because three or four years ago, there was some tip that al-Qaeda had figured out how to rig laptops as bombs.

There is never an end to it. Once something becomes part of the screening process, it remains permanently part of the process and, as Coulter says, it’s all because TSA is forbidden to use common sense: I’m not a terrorist threat.

The Middle-Aged Journalist Jihad has never been a serious danger to American air travelers. Of course, if common sense were allowed by TSA,  if they reserved the more intensive screening procedures for people who might actually be terrorists — people with names like “Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab” — this would be “discrimination.”

And so they’re going to keep hassling us forever.

No Argument Here

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Whatever else you want to argue with on Alex Pareene’s list of America’s worst hacks — my original criticisms here — no one can possibly disagree with his choice for No. 1:

The Washington Post’s Richard Cohen has been a columnist since 1976. He’s good friends with Ben Bradlee and Sally Quinn. He works one day a week. At a certain point, in that exceptionally privileged and cushy position, his brain disintegrated. . . .
That’s how we get work like “leave Roman Polanski alone!” and sending me mean e-mails is “digital lynching” and affirmative action punishes all white people and you stupid snot-nosed bloggers don’t get that Cheney was probably right to torture people and Barack Obama should read a newspaper instead of a BlackBerry because a BlackBerry is full of lies. All in the singularly smug, grating prose style of a man who knows he’s an immovable object in one of the most comfortable positions in all of journalism.

The real journalistic tragedy is that, in an age of shrinking newspapers, Cohen — a sloppy thinker and a worse writer — is permitted to waste 18 precious column-inches on one of the most valuable pages in America.

When I think of Richard Cohen, I have to repress a tear.

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EDITORIAL NOTE: I’ve just added to the sidebar two useful features — Archives and Search — that previously had been omitted. Some readers had complained about the absence of these features. When Smitty switched us over to WordPress, there was concern about the KISS principle (Keep It Simple, Stupid) and we didn’t have anything to archive yet, so that got left off. Now we’ve got a full 11 months of stuff, the archives make more sense. Ditto the search function. We’ve managed to sling more than 2,500 posts so far this year, which makes for lots of stuff to search through.

‘Year of the Pro-Life Woman’

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Press release:

Today, the Susan B. Anthony List celebrated the election of the eighth pro-life woman U.S. Representative in the 112th Congress and a major upset in Ann Marie Buerkle’s defeat of pro-abortion incumbent Dan Maffei.
“Ann Marie Buerkle’s win is historic for women, the unborn and New York’s 25th Congressional District,” SBA List President Marjorie Dannenfelser said. “A pro-life gain in this district – thought by many to be out of reach – affirms the wave of pro-life feminine leadership pouring into the 112th Congress. That wave, including Buerkle’s election, further confirms that 2010 is the Year of the Pro-Life Woman.
“As the first woman elected to Congress from NY-25, she brings years of experience speaking out for Life and feminine leadership harkening back to its roots in authentic pro-life feminism. At the same time, she replaces a consistently pro-abortion vote with dependable advocacy for Life on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives.”
As a registered nurse and mother of six, Buerkle will contribute a unique medical background and a strong commitment to ending taxpayer funding of abortion to Congress.
In the weeks leading up to the November general election, the SBA List mailed nearly 23,000 households in NY-25 and bundled nearly $24,000 for the Buerkle campaign. The SBA List spent $2.3 million electing pro-life women to congressional and statewide office, resulting in a 70 percent increase in the number of pro-life women in the U.S. House of Representatives, an increase in the number of pro-life women governors from one to four and the election of the 112th Congress’ first pro-life woman Senator. SBA List-endorsed candidates won 83 percent of the time in SBA List-versus-EMILY’s List head-to-head races.

Where there’s life, there’s hope.

The USS George Washington: When You Care Enough to Send the Very Best

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Jimmie Bise is right: “Nothing Sends a Message Like an Aircraft Carrier,” and President Obama seems to have realized that godless commie dictators aren’t going to be persuaded by mere words:

The Pentagon has dispatched the aircraft carrier strike group led by the USS George Washington to the Yellow Sea for naval exercises with South Korea following the exchange of artillery fire between the North and South.
The exercises are likely to anger China which in the past pressed Washington not to send its aircraft carriers to the sea.
The U.S. military command in Seoul announced that the carrier will take part in exercises in “waters west of the Korean peninsula” from Nov. 28 to Dec. 1.
“This exercise is defensive in nature,” the statement said. “While planned well before yesterday’s unprovoked artillery attack, it demonstrates the strength of the [South Korea]-U.S. alliance and our commitment to regional stability through deterrence.”

As for offending the Chinese:

  1. If they can’t keep the Norks in line, whose problem is that?
  2. Our commercial ties with China are so extensive that war would be absurd.
  3. On the other hand, when will we be stronger? When will China be weaker? If Beijing wants to rumble, I say, bring it on.

But of course, China doesn’t want war with the U.S. They’ll make a lot of diplomatic noise about this situation, but the Pyongyang regime has become an embarrassment to them.

UPDATE: King Shamus isn’t optimistic:

Chances are, no matter what strategy Obama employs, he and his State Department will help to escalate the situation to something near catastrophic levels.

OMG. I hadn’t thought of that. It’s bad enough dealing with the North Koreans. The State Department is where you’ll find the real hard-line commies.

Nine Key States for 2012

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Jennifer Rubin identifies the Democratic senators who are most vulnerable in the next cycle:

Jon Tester, Bill Nelson, Jim Webb, Claire McCaskill, Ben Nelson, Sherrod Brown, and Kent Conrad, for starters. That’s a total of seven Democrats who voted for (were all the 60th vote for) ObamaCare, supported the stimulus plan, and come from states (Montana, Florida, Virginia, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, and North Dakota) that are quite likely to vote for a Republican for president. And the way things are going, you might add Bob Casey (Pennsylvania) and Herb Kohl (Wisconsin), who may have gone too far left in their states.

OK, so who are the possible contenders for the GOP Senate nominations in these states? What grassroots conservatives should be doing is encouraging as many candidates as possible to enter 2012 Republican primaries. If we let John Cornyn and the NRSC handpick their pets, we’ll get a lot of Charlie Crist/Mike Castle types.

Having strong GOP Senate candidates running in these states will have an “up-ticket” benefit, especially in the key presidential swing states like Florida, Ohio and Missouri.

So, if you’re familiar with any of these states, feel free to suggest good conservative candidates.

UPDATE: In the comments, someone suggests Ken Blackwell to take on Sherrod Brown in Ohio.

Sarah Palin Schools Gawker

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Ruby Slipppers has the details:

Days after Sarah Palin and her publisher Harper Collins scored a major win  over the mean team at Gawker, we learn a settlement has been reached.   Alas, there won’t be a TSA screening  for Gawker at the hands of Sarah Palin any time soon.  While some may be disappointed the attorneys at Harper Collins won’t get to rifle through the junk in Gawker’s trunk, this is still a major victory for team Palin.

Read the whole thing.

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Your Daily Charlie Sheen Update

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Sorry, “obligatory” wouldn’t fit in the headline. When last we left Charlie, he was suing his porn-star date in a filing that called her an “opportunistic scam artist.” Oh, but that wasn’t what Charlie was saying in the text messages he sent her the day after their rendezvous:

In one text, Charlie says, “All I need is an Acct number etc and I will wire u 20k if u think that will cover everything … I really feel bad, u are as cool and sexy and as sweet and fun and friendly as they get!”

It seems there was a disagreement about how much her silence was worth. Charlie was willing to pay $20,000 to this “cool and sexy . . . sweet and fun” 22-year-old porn star. But when she tried to negotiate a higher fee, he (and his lawyers) decided that was “extortion.”

In non-Charlie Sheen news: TSA agents prefer to frisk passengers with nice breasts, and a Democrat shows a similarly frisky interest.

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‘Unexpectedly’!

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“New U.S. single-family home sales fell unexpectedly in October and prices dropped to a seven-year low, a government report showed on Wednesday, pointing sustained weakness in the housing market following the end of a home-buyer tax credit.”
— Reuters

“Orders to U.S. factories for long-lasting manufactured goods plunged in October by the largest amount in 21 months, reflecting widespread weakness in a number of areas.
Orders for durable goods dropped 3.3 percent last month, the Commerce Department reported Wednesday. . . .
“The unexpectedly sharp declines raised questions about the strength of manufacturing, which has been one of the economy’s standout performers.”
— Associated Press