The Other McCain

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

Blog Hardware Update

Posted on | July 21, 2010 | 26 Comments

by Smitty

At The Other McCain, our relentless struggle for world conquest has always been distracted by shiny things that can improve our blog-fu.

You may already know that this blog is hosted by Silver Logic, who may be worth considering if you’re escaping the Blogger ghetto (NTTAWWT).

For a reasonable price, I scored a HDC-TM55. The simplicity of the features, the zoom, the stabilization, and the ability to do some basic editing on-camera make this a worthy blogging component.

Right now I’m chilling on the windward side of Hawaii at an old shipmate’s place on He’eia Pond.

View Larger Map
Looking East across the bay at the air station about 4 nautical miles away, I was able to capture a fighter aircraft landing at the air station. The clip itself isn’t interesting at all. What I think is notable is being able to go for a moving target at some range without a tripod, and then having some onboard editing capability to shave off the even less interesting bits. My netbook (see below) just doesn’t have the guts to do any editing at all, at least with Avidemux under Windows 7. Possibly it’s the OS or the editor, but I think that the hardware just isn’t what you want for even casual editing.

This blog post is composed on an a Dell Inspiron Mini 10 using Emacs, as I’m just a trifle nutter that way. Yeah, the data plan costs a bit, but, if you want to blog live events like Beck’s Restoring Honor or the 9/12 March on DC, you sort of have to be packin’ the gear.

And I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know much about video editing, so anyone with suggestions about tutorials or software under ‘Doze or Linux to try (NTTAWW Mac, I just don’t have one), feel free to light up the comments.

Category: Uncategorized

Drip, Drip, Drip: Leaks From Journolist Reveal More ‘Progressive’ Genius

Posted on | July 21, 2010 | 16 Comments

It’s becoming obvious that the Daily Caller’s Jonathan Strong either (a) has obtained the entire archives of Journolist, or else (b) is receiving batches of e-mails directly from someone who does have the full archive.

Monday, Strong published e-mails in which Journolisters collaborated in an effort to limit coverage of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s rants during the 2008 Democratic primary campaign. Tuesday, Strong revealed still more damaging e-mails in which Journolisters likened Tea Party protesters to Nazis:

“You know, at the risk of violating Godwin’s law, is anyone starting to see parallels here between the teabaggers and their tactics and the rise of the Brownshirts?” asked Bloomberg’s Ryan Donmoyer. . . .
“I’m not saying these guys are capital F-fascists,” added blogger Lindsay Beyerstein [who has written for Newsweek, Salon, Slate], “but they don’t want limited government. Their desired end looks more like a corporate state than a rugged individualist paradise. . . .”

Lots more there, including an NPR producer fantasizing about the death on Rush Limbaugh and a UCLA law professor speculating about the possibility of shutting down Fox News. (Note to Jonathan Zasloff: The FCC can’t “simply pull their broadcasting permit,” because they are a cable network, which is not FCC-regulated broadcasting.)

What I find perplexing is that, so far as I can tell, neither Donmoyer nor Beyerstein had ever covered a Tea Party rally in person before speaking so authoritatively (in summer 2009) about the protesters’ alleged motives. Evidently, they were just watching TV coverage or reading stuff on the Internet and basing their opinions on that.

Of course, it’s entirely possible that avowed progressives would not like Tea Party activists even if they did meet them in person, but on what basis could Beyerstein state with such certainty that the protesters “don’t want limited government” if she had never even talked to any of them?

And why is Beyerstein wasting her time trying to be a journalist? If she has the ability to read the minds of people she’s never met, she could make a fortune as an online psychic.

Category: Media Bias, Tea Party

Georgia Primary: Ray McKinney Leads 12th District; Liz Carter Leads 4th District

Posted on | July 20, 2010 | 5 Comments

With 60% of precincts reporting in the GA12 GOP primary — to take on Democrat Rep. John Barrow in November — Ray McKinney has 45% of the vote in a four-candidate field. Unless he gets more than 50%, there will be an Aug. 10 runoff. Barrow holds off Democratic primary challenger Regina Thomas by a 2-to-1 margin, which will disappoint her supporters at Daily Kos and other liberal blogs. The disgruntlement of Thomas voters could hurt Barrow’s chances for re-election in a district that Democrats have barely won in recent mid-terms.

Meanwhile, with just 25% of precincts reporting in the 4th District — to take on Rep. Hank Thompson — our blog’s beloved Liz Carter appears on her way to a solid victory in the GOP primary, with 55% of the vote in a four-candidate field. Yank Hank!

Category: Election, Georgia

Terry Rathbun: Grassroots Revolution

Posted on | July 20, 2010 | Comments Off on Terry Rathbun: Grassroots Revolution

Our friend JSF at Valley of the Shadows calls attention to California conservative who needs your support:

If you live in Los Angeles, the term “People’s Republic of Santa Monica,” comes up a lot in conversation. Heck, one of my favorite films, Southland Tales has Justin Timberlake protecting the Santa Monica Pier (and doing a great version of The Killers “All the Things that I’ve done,”).
As a political activist, I don’t just think in theory, but in practicality: How do we win back the People’s Republic of Santa Monica? Simple, raise money and support a great candidate for the 41st Assembly District of California . . .
Let me introduce to you Mr. Terry Rathbun, candidate for the 41st AD.
Here is his biography:
Terry was born and raised in Los Angeles County and currently lives in Encino. In 1990, Terry left to join the U.S. Navy and served on active duty until 1999. During his time in the military, he served in theater in support of Operations Desert Storm and Desert Shield. In the year 2000, Terry returned home to Los Angeles where he attended college and currently owns and manages his own IT consulting business. Terry is actively involved in the Kiwanis Club of Northridge and coaches youth baseball.

Military veteran running for a state legislative seat in a district where Democrats don’t think a Republican can compete. But if Terry Rathbun can get a nationwide online fundraising effort — $5, $10, $20 at a time — this could be a shocker.

Read more at Valley of the Shadows.

Category: California, Election, Valley of the Shadow

Ginsburg to Retire? Rumors Swirl Again After Kagan Judiciary Committee Vote

Posted on | July 20, 2010 | 6 Comments

Remember my exclusive item May 28 at The American Spectator?

Senate staffers Thursday were hearing rumors (ultimate source unknown) that the retirement of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is less than two months away.
The plan reportedly is this: If Elena Kagan’s nomination to the court can be confirmed early this summer, Ginsburg would then announce her retirement, so that confirmation for Ginsburg’s replacement could be finished before the end of the year. . . .

OK, so the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 13-6 today to approve Kagan’s nomination and guess what Paul Bedard of U.S. New & World Report is hearing?

President Obama might have a third chance to add a younger liberal to the Supreme Court if rumors about Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg retiring come true.
Several activists involved in the current fight over Obama’s pick of Solicitor General Elena Kagan to replace retiring Justice John Paul Stevens say there are strong rumblings that Ginsburg will also retire soon, assured that she will be replaced by a liberal judge. [See a gallery of Kagan cartoons.]
While the court won’t comment on the rumors, indications are that she might be looking to leave soon because of the recent death of her husband and also because of her own health issues. She recently underwent chemotherapy for pancreatic cancer.

Getting the scoop two months ahead of everybody else? Yeah, I should be going to Vegas, baby.

Category: Supreme Court

Another Department Of Agriculture Point

Posted on | July 20, 2010 | 5 Comments

by Smitty

Da Tech Guy floats the question about the NAACP crowd’s reaction to blatant racism.

What about questions of the mission of the USDA? As you read Wikipedia, it seems that maybe the USDA is one of those oufits which may have made some sense in a pre-Information Age, but whose functions probably ought to be taken up at the State level, so that the throat emitting policy is much closer to the hand that works the lever in the voting booth.

P.J. O’Rourke had a chapter on Agricultural Policy in Parliament of Whores, which said, to summarize “boil that horse down for glue”.

Of course, the resulting product would adhere about as well as the current Congress to Constitutional principle, but at least it would feel like itself sticky and blame the previous administration in its slickness.

It’s time to re-ratify, at least informally, the country’s commitment to its founding principles.

Category: Uncategorized

Ensuring Those Pawns Have Something To Get Off Their Chess

Posted on | July 20, 2010 | 6 Comments

by Smitty

Jennifer Rubin has a great take on a WaPo immigration reform article:

Because, you see, if he passed a bill, the issue would go away. And then Hispanics wouldn’t be mad at the GOP. It is quite a buried lede. The story here is not as the Post’s headline reads: “Republican immigration position likely to alienate Latinos, Obama officials say.” It is, instead, “Obama Wants Divisive Racial Issue, Not Immigration Reform.”

This leads me to paraphrase a most cynical old shipmate of mine, from about a decade ago. If BHO were to level with the American people, he might say something along the lines of:

I’m not good at getting stuff done. I’m good at talking about stuff as if it should have been done, but somebody else impeded my progress, and you should hate them for it.

The polls seem to indicate that those pawns are awakening to the fact that they’re trapped in a game of which they’d been unaware.
Chess is really an inferior metaphor for this post. There is no ambiguity in chess. It is 100% transparent, all the time. What a shame this administration is the opposite of that.

Category: Uncategorized

Thank God: U.S. Dept. of Labor Will Only Purchase American-Made Pornography

Posted on | July 20, 2010 | 10 Comments

Unlike the Bush administration, which allowed greedy offshore porn producers to compete for Labor Department contracts:

Contractors must now prove that any Russian pornography used in fulfilling U.S. government orders was made without children.
That’s the bizarre message that U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration sent out this week when its Labor Department placed Russian pornography on a blacklist of products that “might have been mined, produced or manufactured by forced or indentured child labor.”
The 29-item list, published on the Labor Department’s web site on Monday, “is designed to make sure that federal agencies do not buy products made with forced or indentured child labor,” according to a fact sheet on the department’s web site. . . .
“[The blacklist] requires federal contractors who furnish such a product to make certifications designed to help ensure that forced or indentured child labor was not, in fact, used to make the product,” the fact sheet says.
It was not clear Tuesday when and why the U.S. government might require contractors to provide pornography from Russia or any other country.

Obviously, the Labor Department doesn’t want unionized porn performers to be forced to compete with cheap foreign pornography imports. Sort of a Smoot-Hawley for porn.

Category: Russia, Sex
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