Josh Ferguson

I've Got a New Blog

2007-07-16T14:08:00.000-07:00

The Pentavirate hasn't really panned out as well as I foresaw but I'm not really ready to give up on it yet, either.

Nevertheless, I've started a new personal blog at joshferguson.org. I hope you enjoy it. I'm starting out with some interesting For Sale By Owner stuff and moving on from there. Check it out and enjoy.

I've moved!

2005-02-27T10:01:00.000-08:00

I've moved to a new blog! I've joined up with 4 other great writers to start The Pentavirate. Please come check us out. We've gone beyond just politics to bring a much more divirsified range of topics. Enjoy it!

This Just Seems Very Wrong

2005-01-28T10:05:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I came across something via slashdot that was very disturbing. National Geographic has an article about doctors using stem cells to fuse DNA of humans with animals thus creating different hybrid human-animals known as chimeras (taken from Greek mythology of an animal that has a lion's head, goat's body, and a serpent's tail).

Chinese scientists at the Shanghai Second Medical University in 2003 successfully fused human cells with rabbit eggs. The embryos were reportedly the first human-animal chimeras successfully created. They were allowed to develop for several days in a laboratory dish before the scientists destroyed the embryos to harvest their stem cells.

In Minnesota last year researchers at the Mayo Clinic created pigs with human blood flowing through their bodies.

And at Stanford University in California an experiment might be done later this year to create mice with human brains.

Scientists feel that, the more human-like the animal, the better research model it makes for testing drugs or possibly growing "spare parts," such as livers, to transplant into humans.

Watching how human cells mature and interact in a living creature may also lead to the discoveries of new medical treatments.

While I understand the potential benefits, this of course introduces a plethora of ethical dilemmas. What are the limits? How human is human? At what point do we grant rights? It's definitely something that's going to be at the forefront of debates very soon.

Mixed Feelings On Palestinian Election

2005-01-28T09:25:00.000-08:00

The Washington Post is reporting that 3/4 of the open seats in the recent local elections have gone to the Hamas political group. Hamas is considered by the US government as a terrorist group and is responsible for most of the terrorist acts enacted against Israeli civilians. When I first read this, I was truly disheartened. This announcement seemed, to me, to push back any possibility of peace coming to this area.

But towards the end of the article was a quote that encouraged me:

"I am sure this democratic process will diminish the influence and effect of these religious parties, but we have to get them into the political system, and then they will have to act according to the rule of law and democracy, and that will be a great achievement not only for Palestine, but for the whole region," said Raji Sourani, a human rights activist in Gaza.

This has a ring of truth in it and I sure hope it turns out to be the case.

Sen. Harry Reid's Staffer: A Real Class Act

2005-01-28T08:29:00.000-08:00

A staffer for Senate Minority Leader, Harry Reid, decided to do his own little protest on the West Front of the Capitol. The Washington Times has the story:

About 20 minutes into Mr. Bush's speech, Mr. Ackerman, 36, and another man held up a sheet that said "No War." According to a Capitol Police report, Mr. Ackerman and another suspect "were blocking the view of the audience, and they were engaged in a verbal dispute with members of the audience."

The report states that Capitol Police officers told Mr. Ackerman and the other suspect to relinquish the sign or be arrested, but that "neither complied and both were placed under arrest." The report did not name either suspect, although Mr. Ackerman's identity was confirmed with the Capitol Police.

I understand not agreeing with a president's policies but is it really appropriate for a staffer for a US Senator to stage a public protest during the inaugural address? What does this say about the Senator he works for and represents? There is this concept of "time and place". Imagine what would have happened if a staffer of Sen. Trent Lott or another Republican had done the same thing during Clinton's inaugural address. Somehow I don't think a little blurb in the Washington Times would be the only place you'd find the story.

AP: Support For Iraq War Waning

2005-01-26T09:10:00.000-08:00

Or that's what the AP would want you to believe. Today the AP has released a poll and rather than simply printing the findings of the poll, they take the opportunity to editorialize on it.

According to the poll, 53% of Americans now feel that the creation of a stable democratic Iraq is unlikely compared to 43% who still believe it will happen. This is down from last April when 55% of Americans polled felt it was likely. Support in every demographic has slid. Specifically mentioned was those who make between $25,000 and $50,000.

Other groups that showed a significant decline were those with incomes between $25,000 and $50,000 a year, young men, those without college educations - groups very likely to know people serving in Iraq.

I'm not sure how they can make that assumption. I'm not in that demographic yet I know many people, including family members, that are serving in the military in the War on Terror. How was this assumption reached? Or was this more to try and introduce the idea that the military men and women and their friends and family are the ones that are turning on the conflict in general. Little editorials sprinkled here and there introducing a bias in the article.

And that's the point. Like I posted about before, the media keeps pounding and pounding on the negative aspects of what is going on in Iraq and has successfully begun to erode public support for the war. If we heard every day, over and over, when each person in this country was killed in a car accident and kept track of the death toll on the streets and if we were pounded on about the horrible effect cars were having on all of our lives, sooner or later it would erode the public support of cars. That's what is going on with our coverage in Iraq. Unlike with cars where we can see the benefit in our every day lives to balance out negative press, we can't easily see the positive coming out of Iraq allowing us to have a balanced perspective of our progress over there. The AP even admits it though they probably didn't realize it.

The steady news reports of violence in Iraq have taken a toll.

If a person took time on the internet, they could find the positive stories too, but most people do not have the time to do that and only get what they see on the 6:00 news or in stories from the AP.

After spending most of the whole article talking about the pessimism of the country concerning Iraqi democracy and stability they throw in as an aside this little piece of information almost at the end of the article:

Even though Americans are becoming more pessimistic about Iraq's future, support for the troops remains high. A majority still supports keeping troops in Iraq until the situation has stabilized, despite the worries.

"We can't pull out now, not after all those guys have died," said Janice Shinn, a Republican-leaning postal worker from Pedricktown, N.J. "But we have to see it through. We can't just leave like we did in Vietnam."

...and people don't understand what we mean by a media bias....

Social Security Is In Trouble: Raise Taxes Of Course.

2005-01-24T10:26:00.000-08:00

Is raising taxes the only answer our government knows to solve a problem? Today the AP is reporting some possible solutions to the Social Security crisis according to Rep. Bill Thomas (R-CA) the chairman of the House tax-writing committee. His answer to the current problem with Social Security is to implement a "value added tax." What is that?

Thomas mentioned the valued added tax, a kind of consumption tax. It is, in effect, a sales tax imposed at each level of production of goods and services.

Yeah, that's the ticket. Let's tax companies to save Social Security. Here's how law-makers think: If you tax companies, than the general public will never see it and won't be up in arms about the tax hike. Social Security will be saved for another 20 or 30 years and everyone's happy. After all, corporations are evil anyway just out to steal your money. They deserve to be taxed more.

Here's what they don't tell you: If a companies taxes go up, that becomes an extra expense. Do companies just eat expenses and make less money? Sometimes. It depends on what the competition is doing and charging. If an expense is across the whole industry, all it does is it gets passed down in the price of the product. What happens when most every industry in the country gets this new expense? The price of most every product will go up. That's called inflation. So who, in the end, pays for this tax increase? The people do, it's just not as obvious as a hike in the payroll tax percentage. People's paychecks may be the same, but we will all be poorer because each dollar will buy less.

Social Security is broken. It's been bandaged before and they're trying to bandage it again. Eventually, you won't be able to bandage it anymore and it will be scrapped. Why not scrap it now?

Now I'm going to do some math. Numbers very easily get errors, so if anyone sees a problem, please let me know.

When I usually get a statement from Social Security, it basically tells me that I can expect about $1000 monthly payments when I retire (in about 40 years). Now let's calculate what someone would get should they invest the money they put into Social Security. We'll assume a $50,000/year income for 40 years. I'm also assuming that the Social Security portion of the FICA withholding is about half so 7.5%. (Don't forget that you're employer also pays 7.5% towards your FICA.)

Annual Income: $50,000
Monthly Income: $4166.67 ($50,000/12)
SS portion to invest: $312.50 (7.5% of $4166.67)
Time until retirement: 40 years
Return on Investment: 3% (A very modest return)
Value of Investment at retirement: $288,930.56 (Using Future Value function in Microsoft Excel)
Divided Monthly for 20 year: $1203.88 per month.

That's $200 more per month than Social Security will give you. Granted there are some problems with my numbers, but I've stated my assumptions. This also assumes that at retirement, the whole nest egg is pulled out of investment and just divided into payments for the next 20 years. If only the monthly portion was pulled out and the rest left in the investment, it'll increase even more.

Imagine what would happen if the money was invested into something a little more aggressive. Let's assume an 8% return (very realistic in today's market). The monthly payment would be $4538.31 per month!

The other thing is that if you were to die before the money was used up you could leave it for your children. With Social Security, you're just out of luck.

So why are there so many against privatization? Set a cut off date for those that can participate in Social Security as is, for example, the age of 40. Everyone younger than 40 will put their Social Security portion of their payroll taxes into an IRA like fund allowing the person to invest it however they choose. This will not only increase the assets of the individual, but the influx of investors in the market will help the whole economy.

What if someone doesn't invest it wisely or is too aggressive and loses it all? The government won't allow them to die in the streets, of course. Turn it over to the welfare system. It's better for a few to end up in the welfare system than for every one of us relying on a check from the government as part of our retirement income.

If we need to raise taxes to get those last few through the old system, or better yet, cut spending, than so be it. In the long run, the whole country will be better off for it.

Good News From The Front

2005-01-20T08:41:00.001-08:00

Tired of getting all bad news about the Iraqi war? LTC Tim Ryan is fed up. He wrote an op-ed for the WorldTribune.com outlining the obvious media bias to anything bad while completely ignoring the greater good going on in Iraq. This is definitely a must-read for everyone out there to help keep a perspective to what is happening in the Iraqi front of the War on Terror.

Here are some highlight quotes:

Television and newspapers spilled a continuous stream of images and stories about the destruction done to the sacred city, and of all the human suffering allegedly brought about by the hands of the big, bad Americans. These stories and the lack of anything to counter them gave more fuel to the fire of anti-Americanism that burns in this part of the world.....While the media was busy bashing the Coalition, Muqtada's boys were kidnapping policemen, city council members and anyone else accused of supporting the Coalition or the new government, trying them in a kangaroo court based on Islamic Shari'a law, then brutally torturing and executing them for their "crimes." What the media didn't show or write about were the two hundred-plus headless bodies found in the main mosque there, or the body that was put into a bread oven and baked....

The media allows the terrorist to use relatively small but spectacular events that directly affect very few, and spread them around the world to scare millions. What about the thousands of things that go right every day and are never reported? Complete a multi-million-dollar sewer project and no one wants to cover it, but let one car bomb go off and it makes headlines. With each headline, the enemy scores another point and the good-guys lose one. This method of scoring slowly is eroding domestic and international support while fueling the enemy's cause....

It appears many members of the media are hesitant to venture beyond the relative safety of the so-called "International Zone" in downtown Baghdad, or similar "safe havens" in other large cities. Because terrorists and other thugs wisely target western media members and others for kidnappings or attacks, the westerners stay close to their quarters.... A car bomb at the entry point to the International Zone one day, a few mortars the next, maybe a kidnapping or two thrown in. All delivered to the doorsteps of those who will gladly accept it without having to leave their hotel rooms how convenient.... There is a transparent reason why the majority of car bombings and other major events take place before noon Baghdad-time; any later and the event would miss the start of the morning news cycle on the U.S. east coast. These terrorists aren't stupid; they know just what to do to scare the masses and when to do it. An important key to their plan is manipulation of the news media....

I have had my staff aggressively pursue media coverage for all sorts of events that tell the other side of the story only to have them turned down or ignored by the press in Baghdad. Strangely, I found it much easier to lure the Arab media to a "non-lethal" event than the western outlets. Open a renovated school or a youth center and I could always count on Al-Iraqia or even Al-Jazeera to show up, but no western media ever showed up ever. Now I did have a pretty dangerous sector, the Abu Ghuraib district that extends from western Baghdad to the outskirts of Fallujah (not including the prison), but it certainly wasn't as bad as Fallujah in November and there were reporters in there.

The media is glorifying the bad and apparently ignoring the good which is nothing less than aiding and abetting the enemy. The constant negative coming from the American media is helping the terrorists spread their terror world-wide through very small actions on their part. There's no doubt that the enemy is leveraging them all they can. It's time for the American media to finally decide which side they're really on?

LINKS
Updated 1/21: Chrenkoff tallies the numbers of good stories versus bad stories on a typical day.

New Video From JibJab

2005-01-20T08:39:00.000-08:00

For those who remember "This Land" from JibJab, they have a new one out. Check it out at www.jibjab.com

Tax Cuts Just What The Doctor Ordered For An Ailing Economy

2005-01-18T13:59:00.000-08:00

In my last post I talked about the pushes the government can do to help create an environment where the economy can thrive. Apparently, in spite of democratic opposition, tax cuts have once again encouraged just that kind of environment.

Lawrence Kudlow writes in the Washington Times:

A supply-side tax-reform movement, a shrinking budget deficit, new-found spending discipline, and a determination to confound conventional wisdom by reforming Social Security has George W. Bush's second term off to a roaring start even before he is officially sworn in.

3 times now in American history have we cut taxes. The first was with John F. Kennedy. The second with Ronald Reagan. The third with George W. Bush. Each time the economy has benefited and so does the coffers in Washington.

Unknown to most, because the media seems unaware or partisan, the federal deficit is rapidly decreasing as tax revenues are pouring in. The tax cuts have increased general spending and more importantly increased investment bringing in even more profits which are then taxed at a higher rate.

Once again supply side economics has shown itself to be the champion.

The Economy Is Good But Not Great - The Government's Dirty Little Secret

2005-01-18T13:50:00.000-08:00

We've heard from a lot of sources, especially from sources that support the Bush administration but also including independent analysts as well as Allen Greenspan, that the economy is in full recovery and frankly they're right...to a point. GDP is expected to increase by 3.5% to 4.7% depending on who you ask. The Federal Reserve says that "inflation and longer-term inflation expectations remain well contained." Everything is looking peachy except for one thing: Jobs. Jobs just haven't increased at the rate so many expected. There's little doubt that the Bush tax cuts has helped push the economy in the right direction, but they've fallen short of their expectations when it's come to job recovery.

Now this brings me to the government's dirty little secret. They don't control the economy. This may come as a shock to most people, but the government has very little control of the economy. Now this hasn't prevented many presidents from taking credit when the economy is good and it hasn't prevented many presidents from being voted out of office when the economy is bad. The truth is, the government can do little more than give light pushes in a general direction.

Now I'm not saying that over the long term a government can't grind an economy into the ground or encourage it to new heights. The government's best role is in creating an atmosphere where the economy can thrive and the United States is one of the best atmospheres in the world for an economy to thrive.

The Federal Government can only do two things with regards to the economy: Tax and Spend. During a recession, if a government decreases taxes and increase spending, these two acts can, in the short term, increase the amount of investment and spending done by businesses and consumers and provide work for companies.

The Federal Reserve has two things it can do: Change the amount of money that is in the economy and change interest rates. During a recession, if the Federal Reserve decreases interest rates and increases the amount of money in the economy (by printing money and/or buying T-Bills), these two things encourages businesses and people to spend and invest more whether it is in a new home or in new machinery or a new factory.

These things that the Fed and the Government can do is nothing more than encouraging the economy to improve.

During the 2000 recession, the federal government has decreased taxes and increased spending (thanks in part to the War on Terror). The Federal Reserve has lowered taxes (I'm not sure what they have done with regards to the money in the economy). The result? People have bought homes and cars like crazy. Businesses have invested more and purchased new capital. These things have increased our GDP and the stock market is on a positive trend. Usually in this situation, when businesses have more money, they also hire more people and invest in human capital as well, which they have, just not as much as expected.

"On Jan. 2, 2004, The Wall Street Journal reported that 54 economists it surveyed believed that 'rising corporate profits and steady economic growth are expected to prompt companies to hire workers more aggressively in the months ahead....'

This economic recovery is creating new jobs (and 2004 was the best year since 1999), but it's not creating enough new jobs to support a full recovery from a recession. And no one not private-sector economists, not academic economists, not Council of Economic Advisors economists had forecast such a scenario."

So whose fault is it? Nobody really. Congress and the president have done everything within their power. Allen Greenspan has done everything within his power and they've gotten results but they cannot force businesses to hire. They can encourage it but they can't force it.

And this is my main point. My grandmother told me once, "Never take too much credit or blame for what your kids do." Likewise, the Federal Government and the Federal Reserve, despite what they would have you believe, can't take too much credit or blame for the economy. They have done well to push it in the right direction, but we should think twice about hammering them when the recovery isn't perfect.

(the numbers and quotes taken from an article written by Susan C. Walker)

Is Social Security A Crisis Or Not?

2005-01-06T08:54:00.000-08:00

Do you Remember during the 2000 presidential election how a major issue was the Social Security crisis? The Gore campaign used to throw around numbers and years for when Social Security would dry up and not be able to pay out promised benefits. Al Gore wanted a "lock box" so that funds couldn't be borrowed from Social Security. The problem was that a "lock box" wasn't a solution, just a way to keep the inevitable from happening sooner than forecast.

Bush, on the other hand, had a real alternative to help Social Security in the long run. The people looked at the two plans and chose the latter.

One thing that was not debated was the fact that Social Security is, in fact, in jeopardy. Apparently that has changed. Now that President Bush is moving towards his plan of allowing a portion of payroll deductions to be used in a 401K style retirement as a Social Security alternative, some Democrats seem to think the crisis isn't so bad. (AP Story)

"We need to establish in the public mind a key fiscal fact: right now we are on an unsustainable course," Wehner's e-mail said. "That reality needs to be seared into the public consciousness; it is the precondition to authentic reform."

But Democrats say the White House is exaggerating the system's future financial picture to dismantle the New Deal program.

"This memo shows that some in the Bush administration will resort to the worst kind of scare tactics to undermine Social Security," Rangel said.

Referring to an e-mail that outlined a plan to promote the new Social Security plan, Democrats are claiming that the dangers of the Social Security program becoming insolvent are being exaggerated and a form of fear tactics. Apparently what is good for the goose is not good for the gander. Scaring seniors seems to be a Democrat hallmark during elections with no action thereafter.

The fact is, before any kind of reform of this magnitude, the public needs to be very clear as to the reasons for the reform along with the benefits of the reform over the previous way of doing things. No one debated the insolubility of Social Security until now. Calling out "Scare Tactic" is merely a smoke screen to divert the attention of the real issue, the solvency of Social Security.

LINKS
Right Side of the Rainbow
Digital Dissent

Free Advance Screening Of In Good Company

2005-01-06T08:00:00.000-08:00

Universal Pictures and Grace Hill Media are trying something new out. Rather than going through the normal channels for marketing a movie, they're going to leverage the power of the blogosphere to market the movie.

Here's the Deal:

Any blogger that agrees to post a review of their new movie In Good Company (Here's the Trailer and Movie Site) will be invited to a free advance screening of the movie for them and a guest. That's all there is to it. To participate, send an e-mail to info@gracehillmedia.com and request to be placed on the list.

Perhaps this will start a new way of marketing for movies in the future.

2.1 Kids Just Too Many!

2005-01-05T09:14:00.000-08:00

The Washington Post had an alarming article reporting that the percentage of women that hasn't used birth control in the past 3 months has risen from 5.2 percent in 1995 to 7.4 percent in 2002. The article wasn't alarming in its content but in its tone. Though they claim that teenage use of contraceptives has gone up, disturbingly something they applaud, this increase is in adult women, especially over 30.

My first thought was that people must be wanting to have more children. While this option was mentioned, the experts quoted in the article had many more negative reasons topping their list.

Physicians, statisticians and advocates who specialize in reproductive health had several theories for the rise in unprotected sex. They pointed to possible factors such as gaps in sex education, the cost of birth control, declining insurance coverage, fears of possible side effects of contraceptives and personal attitudes about childbearing.

With all of the hand wringing as to why people aren't using contraception as much, from the evil insurance companies not paying their "fair share" to the evils of abstinence programs (if it's the fault of the abstinence programs, then why is the problem only in adult women?), the real root of their concern comes out.

Family planning is a "fiscally conservative policy," countered Jensen of the Women's Health Research Unit. For every $1 spent on contraceptive services, he said, $3 is saved in other government programs such as Medicaid, the State Children's Health Insurance Program, welfare and education.

They just don't want any more people born so they don't have to pay for the poor among them and to educate them. These are people who think it's irresponsible to have any children. To them, a change in the personal attitude toward child bearing is just as bad a reason not to use birth control as mis-education and insurance companies not footing the bill. If these people were truly concerned about the money supporting people in these programs, perhaps they should put more energy towards preventing the illegal immigration that sap our government programs instead of a drop of 2% in birth control use.

I'm not even convinced there really is an issue. This article is based on 2 studies 10 years apart. Studies like these are just snapshots. It'd be much more useful to see the birth control use percentage for every 3 month period from 1995 to now and try and identify a trend. After all, 2 points might define a line but they definitely can't determine a trend. There are many factors that can affect birthrates in the short term. The Population Reference Bureau identified these examples:

Short-term fluctuations in birth and death rates that produce unusual bites or bulges in population pyramids, such as the baby boom, often can be traced to such historical events as wars, epidemics, economic booms, or depressions. The decline in the birth rate during the Great Depression caused a small bite in the U.S. pyramid for the group born between 1930 and 1934. World Wars I and II caused a deficit of older men in Germany. The impact of these events emphasizes the interrelationships among population change and economic, social, political, and health factors.

(Also see this article on the trends of populations as affected by birth rates, death rates, and immigration.)

To me this appears nothing more than alarmist junk science to push several causes and to obtain more funding for their pet projects. Until I see more and better information, I'm not impressed.

National Sales Tax Should Replace All Other Federal Taxes

2005-01-04T08:48:00.000-08:00

Bush has mentioned a number of times now his desire to reform the tax code. In a speech given to new members of Congress, it made his list of top things we wanted to work on this term (AP).

Unfortunately I have heard mostly about the elimination of this deduction or that deduction in order to simplify the current income tax but I haven't heard much about the National Sales Tax option. I don't think that this option should be ignored. Bear with me to give a brief explanation.

This tax would eliminate all other federal taxes, meaning, it will replace personal, estate, gift, capital gains, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, self-employment, and corporate taxes. People will take home their gross paychecks (minus any state taxes, of course). To replace this a national sales tax will be used. Many experts say that a sales tax rate of 23% on all final retail sales would be sufficient to bring in revenues equal to what the current system generates.

Now, many of you would ask, "What about the lower income people? This would hurt them more." To address this issue, the government would send out a monthly "prebate" to each family (prebate meaning a return a tax money before it is spent, get it?). The check sent out to each family would equal the money spent on taxes up to the poverty line according to the Department of Health and Human Services. For example, according to HHS, the poverty level for a family of four is $18,850 per year. 23% of $18850 is $4336. If you divide that up per month that makes $361.33. So a check for the amount of $361.33 will be sent out to every family of four in the country each and every month. This ensures a graduated amount of taxes paid according to how much they spend above the poverty line.

This system has a lot of benefits.

1) It significantly reduces the size of the IRS and the number of audits. Most Americans will have nothing to do with the tax system at all. States will be responsible for collecting the tax revenue and forwarding it on to the federal government. Most states already have a system for collecting sales tax that can be utilized. The states and retailers will receive an amount of money for the processing of the taxes.

2) It eliminates any kind of loop hole in the tax system. Everyone, whether a corporation or an individual person will pay the same tax rate. There is no hiding taxes. No cash work under the table. No tax shelters. No manipulation of income to minimize taxes.

3) It encourages savings and investment. If you listen to the news, you would think that the best thing to do with your money for the economy is to spend it. That couldn't be further from the truth. The best thing that can be done with money is to save or invest it (the same thing) where the power of the dollar can be multiplied many times. People can save and invest money without fear of any taxation until that money is spent. Eventually all money accumulated will be spent by the consumer and at that point the government will get its taxes whether it be this year or 30 years from now.

4) It prevents the government from hiding tax hikes. The government won't be able to cut or raise taxes without it being painfully obvious to all Americans. This is essential to the oversight of government by the people.

5) Prevents outsourcing of labor. America will become the ideal place to create and run businesses. Without the government penalizing businesses with hefty tax rates, outsourcing to overseas will become greatly reduced and many more Americans will be put to work because the cost of doing business will be greatly reduced. In addition, a lot of foreign businesses will set up shop in the United States rather than other places in the world.

6) Prices will go down. With the elimination of taxes as a cost of doing business companies will be able to offer their goods at a lower prices, not because they necessarily want to but because market forces will force it down. On average, 22% of the price of goods are from taxes and 25% of services.

7) It bases taxes on consumption instead of income which is much more stable.

There are many more benefits to a system like this. There's a really good FAQ at FairTax.org.

I'd like to hear what people think about this. Please leave comments to discuss this.

Teenagers' Abortions Are None Of Their Parents' Business

2005-01-03T10:36:00.000-08:00

Schools across the country can't even give a child an aspirin without parental notifications but my great state of California has just made it illegal to notify parents if a child needs to leave school for "confidential medical treatment" which includes anything from a drug test to an abortions. FoxNews has the story.

State Attorney Gen. Bill Lockyer, a Democrat, said the legislation was meant for the small number of children coping with rape or incest who probably wouldn’t be able to talk to a parent but need some way to seek help.

If this law is truly to help in only these two cases, then why not restrict the law to only those cases. The fact is, this is a way to sidestep parental rights. The more "enlightened" people out there feel that they know better how to raise our children than we do. They're trying to push their policies on our kids regardless of how their parents feel about it.

If a child has a problem of this magnitude, the parents should be informed. The school district should not be accomplices in the deception of parents. Even in the cases of rape or incest the parents need to know. In those two specific cases, not only do the parents have to know but the police as well. There is nothing in a teenagers life that should be kept secret from their parents. If they have been the victim of a heinous crime such as incest or rape and the parents are the offenders, then they need to go to law enforcement for help. In no way should the schools be part of this. This is nothing more than a back-door way to erode parental rights and "protect" our children from more conservative ideals that parents might have and promote a more "liberal" agenda.

MoveOn Is Taking Over

2004-12-10T09:42:00.000-08:00

CNN is reporting that MoveOnPAC, a 527 group, sent an e-mail to their supporters.

"For years, the party has been led by elite Washington insiders who are closer to corporate lobbyists than they are to the Democratic base," said the e-mail from MoveOn PAC's Eli Pariser. "But we can't afford four more years of leadership by a consulting class of professional election losers."

This quote was of particular interest:

"In the last year, grass-roots contributors like us gave more than $300 million to the Kerry campaign and the DNC, and proved that the party doesn't need corporate cash to be competitive," the message continued. "Now it's our party: we bought it, we own it, and we're going to take it back."
....
"Call me crazy, but I think the fact that for the first time in party history we outraised the Republicans, and did so primarily through grass-roots fund raising is something to be proud of," Cabrera said.

The Democratic party has a real problem. MoveOn represents the Michael Moore crowd. They are definitely on the left side of the party. From their quotes, it looks like they're planning on either taking over the party from the more moderate elements or will end up starting their own party. If MoveOn starts their own party, it would mean the end of the Democratic party. The Democratic party needs the far left to win elections. This is obvious from the elections lost because of Ralph Nader. If MoveOn takes the party over, they will alienate moderates and push them over to the Republicans. In the past 25 years and longer, the Democrats haven't been able to run and win a liberal president. Kerry was the closest they got but that was mostly because of an anti-Bush sentiment within the whole party as well as the fact that Kerry never committed to too many positions. Bill Clinton always ran as a Southern Democrat and a moderate. Many of his policies weren't moderate (ie Socialized Medicine) but he was always able to run on a moderate platform. So the Democrats find them selves in a very difficult position.

On a side note, this quote I thought was funny:

"In the last year, grass-roots contributors like us gave more than $300 million to the Kerry campaign and the DNC, and proved that the party doesn't need corporate cash to be competitive,"

I thought 527 were supposed to have no direct ties or coordination to the candidacy itself. So much for campaign finance reform.

P.S. - I'm looking for a copy of the whole e-mail. If anyone has a link to it, I'd appreciate it.

LINKS

Powerline
Shot In The Dark

Parents Go On Strike

2004-12-09T11:34:00.000-08:00

The parents of a Deltona, Florida family have gone on strike to teach their kids to help out around the house. The story can be read here.

"I want socially conscious children. That's what I want. Children who can see the world beyond them," Barnard said.

Barnard said the kids don't know how to rinse the dishes, let alone put them in the dishwasher.

Barnard and her husband, Harlan, moved out of the house and into the driveway complete with picket signs, the tent, a grill and a television Monday. Tired of wisecracks and no help with cleaning or straightening up, they went on strike.

"We cannot let them continue on this path because this is not preparing them for the real world ... It's not that I want indentured servants, I want children who can see beyond their own noses," Cat Barnard said.

Some have suggested the wrong people are in the driveway and that the Barnards need to be tougher and not use psychology with their kids.

I tend to agree with the people in the last paragraph. There is a real lack of discipline among many parents today. Parent's are afraid to punish their kids or else they might not be their best friend. Kids seem to have the upper hand in the family and that's just wrong. When my wife and I took a pre-natal class before my first child was born, the nurse would go on about not letting your baby cry, feeding on demand, not keeping a schedule, and basically doing whatever the kid wants you to do. The fact is, kids want structure. They want boundaries. These things make them feel safe because they know what to expect. They will always test boundaries, but they give them a sense of security. They don't want parents to be friends. They have peers that are much better at that. They want parents to be parents. Too often I see people that let the kids rule the roost and in the end, they aren't going to learn to be accountable for their actions because they never have consequences. I fear for the children raised up in this kind of situation and for our society as a result of it.

Rumsfeld's Questioners Planted By Reporter

2004-12-09T10:36:00.000-08:00

Drudge is has a copy of an e-mail from an embedded reporter that apparently planted the questions about the armored vehicles that Secretary Rumsfeld was asked yesterday in Kuwait. Here's a copy:

From: EDWARD LEE PITTS, MILITARY AFFAIRS
Sent: Wednesday, December 8, 2004 4:44 PM
To: Staffers

Subject: RE: Way to go

I just had one of my best days as a journalist today. As luck would have it, our journey North was delayed just long enough see I could attend a visit today here by Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. I was told yesterday that only soldiers could ask questions so I brought two of them along with me as my escorts. Before hand we worked on questions to ask Rumsfeld about the appalling lack of armor their vehicles going into combat have. While waiting for the VIP, I went and found the Sgt. in charge of the microphone for the question and answer session and made sure he knew to get my guys out of the crowd.

So during the Q&A session, one of my guys was the second person called on. When he asked Rumsfeld why after two years here soldiers are still having to dig through trash bins to find rusted scrap metal and cracked ballistic windows for their Humvees, the place erupted in cheers so loud that Rumsfeld had to ask the guy to repeat his question. Then Rumsfeld answered something about it being "not a lack of desire or money but a logistics/physics problem." He said he recently saw about 8 of the special up-armored Humvees guarding Washington, DC, and he promised that they would no longer be used for that and that he would send them over here. Then he asked a three star general standing behind him, the commander of all ground forces here, to also answer the question. The general said it was a problem he is working on.

The great part was that after the event was over the throng of national media following Rumsfeld- The New York Times, AP, all the major networks -- swarmed to the two soldiers I brought from the unit I am embedded with. Out of the 1,000 or so troops at the event there were only a handful of guys from my unit b/c the rest were too busy prepping for our trip north. The national media asked if they were the guys with the armor problem and then stuck cameras in their faces. The NY Times reporter asked me to email him the stories I had already done on it, but I said he could search for them himself on the Internet and he better not steal any of my lines. I have been trying to get this story out for weeks- as soon as I foud out I would be on an unarmored truck- and my paper published two stories on it. But it felt good to hand it off to the national press. I believe lives are at stake with so many soldiers going across the border riding with scrap metal as protection. It may be to late for the unit I am with, but hopefully not for those who come after.

The press officer in charge of my regiment, the 278th, came up to me afterwords and asked if my story would be positive. I replied that I would write the truth. Then I pointed at the horde of national media pointing cameras and mics at the 278th guys and said he had bigger problems on his hands than the Chattanooga Times Free Press. This is what this job is all about - people need to know. The solider who asked the question said he felt good b/c he took his complaints to the top. When he got back to his unit most of the guys patted him on the back but a few of the officers were upset b/c they thought it would make them look bad. From what I understand this is all over the news back home.

Thanks,

Lee

I know that the armor on some of the personnel vehicles has been lacking. Should the military get better armor? Of course, and it's in progress. The President has been trying to procure money from congress to try and improve the situation. The fact that soldiers are improvising in the mean time is nothing new. This has always been done in the military and is encouraged. The problem I have with it is its purpose. This was set up purposely to further a reporters career and to give the media something to jump on the administration about. The media has used it to try and show that there is widespread discontent and a huge lack of support within the military for this administration which is very obviously not true. Just like focusing on the few number of deserters and lawsuits, the media is trying to take something that is miniscule in consequence and blow it up to push their political view.

LINKS:

Powerline
A Line In The Sand

Desertion and the Deserting Deserters who Desert

2004-12-08T10:52:00.000-08:00

Two news stories have caught my eye in the past three days. The first is about a petty officer in the Navy, Pablo Paredes, that has made a huge media spectacle concerning his refusal to deploy on Monday from San Diego. The San Diego Union Tribune has been reporting on it since Saturday when he started calling news agencies for press coverage. It's also been all over the local news. Paredes went down to the naval pier to make his point seen and was planning to through his military ID into the water (though he didn't when he found out he could be fined for destruction of government property). He brought friends to video tape the whole thing with instructions to send it to Michael Moore should anything happen to him. I'm sure he was disappointed when he wasn't so much as even arrested. What will Paredes do now?

Paredes is looking for a lawyer to represent him for free before he turns himself in to the Navy.

"I knew what was coming," Paredes said, "and now I just have to see it through."

The second story I found today thanks to Drudge. A marine, Jeremy Hinzman, didn't show up for deployment and has escaped to Canada and is seeking political asylum. Hinzman is testifying in a hearing on all of the atrocities and murders of civilians US soldiers are committing over in Iraq. Of course, most of the occurrences cited were well known in the media and were legitimate given the circumstances (ie shooting up a car of civilians as it attempted to rush a military checkpoint). Here's a telling quote from Hinzman:

"I was deeply concerned about the civilian casualties," he said.

"What they were doing was committing murder."
....
"This was a criminal war," Hinzman said.

"Any act of violence in an unjustified conflict is an atrocity."

The fact is, these men as well as some others that have popped up in the media here and there signed a contract and made a commitment and took an oath. It is up to them to fulfill their commitment. They don't have the option to pick and choose where they want to go and what conflict to take part in. If that were the case, it would make the military ineffective as a fighting force. They obviously have the right to break their contracts and their commitments, but they will suffer the consequences of their actions. Paredes will likely spend a year or two in jail. Hinzman should get deported back the US to face his consequences as well. I'm sure some on the left will cheer them on for their protest because of their general disdain for the military, but most people, like myself, will have no respect for men who refuse to carry out the duty that they had agreed to.

Annan Digging In

2004-12-07T11:26:00.000-08:00

The AP has a story with Kofi Annan's response to Senator Coleman's, among other's, call for his resignation.

"I have quite a lot of work to do and I'm carrying on with my work," Annan said when asked when he would respond to those calling for his resignation. "We have a major agenda next year, and the year ahead, trying to reform this organization. So we'll carry on."

Asked if he was definitely saying he would not resign, Annan replied: "I think you heard my answer."

It's telling that the only ones calling for his resignation are from the United States.

Five Republicans in the House of Representative on Monday backed a call last week by a GOP senator for Annan to resign amid allegations of corruption in the U.N. oil-for-food program. But outside the United States, there is no clamor for the secretary-general's resignation, and he has picked up support from many of the 191 U.N. member states.

Why is that? The Oil-For-Food Scandal has allowed billions of dollars to be siphoned off and gone to Saddam Hussein's palaces, weapons programs, and supported Islamic terrorism, especially in Palestine, and has lined the pockets of officials all over Europe and Asia. Kofi Annan's own son has been found to be one of the ring leaders. All of this has happened either with the cooperation of the Secretary General or at the very least right under his nose. This, obviously, affected the UN's ability to deal with Iraq effectively and to enforce its own resolutions to the point that the US had to go outside of the UN and obtained its own coalition to get the job done.

Now Kofi Annan wants to be the one to reform it all. Why should he have that chance? He's already demonstrated himself to be at best incompetent and at worse a criminal. And look at who's supporting him. EVERYONE ELSE!!! What is this world that we live in? Why isn't every nation clamoring for his resignation? I know we can't be an island in the world and start isolating ourselves again like in the early 20th century, but you can see why people have wanted to. Is this the UN we want to be a part of? Is corruption so commonplace everywhere else, that they can flaunt it now? We have our own corruptions, but at least we don't accept it and when it's found, the public demands payment for the crimes. Until the UN and the rest of the world gets its act together, it will continue to be ineffective in its role and it will be up to us to pick up the slack. It is in our best interest to do whatever is in our power to either reform the UN or get out.

LINKS

Captain's Quareters
Shot In The Dark
American Kestrel

America's Enemies - Past and Present

2004-12-06T14:16:00.000-08:00

Here's a story I heard last night. You can read the full text in the Deseret News. Here's the main story:

....Several months later on Christmas Eve, I had just celebrated my 20th birthday on Dec. 21. We were on our way home from the Mediterranean approaching the Straits of Gibraltar on our way to the North Atlantic. We were happily bound for the East Coast of the good old USA. It was a stormy night that Christmas Eve, and I was once again on watch at the bow of the ship.

The sea was covered in white caps, which make it almost impossible to see "turkey feathers," a term we used to describe the white plume that flows behind a submarine's periscope when it is close to the surface. Understandably all of our thoughts were of home and of Christmas and of hopes of soon being with our families.

The past days had been unremarkable, and the sights, sounds and smell of the ocean lulled me into a sense of well-being. Then it all seemed to happen in an instant. I saw the plume of a periscope appear off the port side of our ship. It couldn't have been more than 100 yards away. I had no chance to ring the bridge this time. They must have seen the periscope at the same time I did because the ship was suddenly alive with alarms and shouts of men scurrying to their battle stations.

But there was no time to ready ourselves for a fight. There was no time to protect ourselves in any way. The submarine was already on us, rising up out of that choppy sea. The enemy had us dead to rights. I'll never forget what happened next.

There was a flashing. Dash dash, dot dot dash dot. I mouthed the letters as I saw the German submarine blinking its Morse code message. I couldn't believe what was I was seeing. M-E-R. Could I be reading it correctly? Another "R" and then, dash dot dash dash, a "Y." It was happening so fast as the second word flashed to us in the darkness. C-H-R-I-S-T-M-A-S. Then it was over. As fast as the U-boat had appeared it sank back into the blackness of the sea and was gone.

We all stood transfixed. No one moved for several seconds as we recovered from our shock and surprise. We had escaped death before by a twist of fate or maybe luck.

But on this Christmas Eve we had been given a gift. As the reality of what had just transpired and the words "Merry Christmas" took hold in our minds and then our hearts, we unitedly sent up a cheer. A cheer of relief, and of joy and true celebration.

I have had many wonderful Christmases since that Christmas Eve in 1944. I was able to marry and spend 56 years with my lovely wife and help to raise our three children.

Each consecutive Christmas has been surrounded by grandchildren and now, great-grandchildren. None of these memories would have ever been possible if it wasn't for that fortuitous night when the "enemy" gave a ship full of men the gift of peace and one of their best Christmas memories possible.

World War II has been described by many as the last good war. Here we had an enemy that was truly evil. They were bent on world domination and killed indiscriminately for no better reason than ethnic heritage and prejudices. Yet things like this happened. I've also heard stories of battlefields becoming quiet (though this may have been World War I) on christmas eve and enemies sharing a brief moment of peace together. How does this compare with our current enemy of radical Islam? Would something comparable to this happen in our current conflict? Could something like this happen? Give me your thoughts in the comments section.

Radical Muslims And Ritual Human Sacrifice

2004-11-19T07:28:00.000-08:00

I read an oped piece in the New York Post from a couple of weeks ago and it was really eye opening. It is absolutely a must read for everyone concerned about Islamic terrorism. Ralph Peters, author of Beyond Terror: Strategy in a Changing World., explains how this new brand of Islamic Terror is very different than the old terror that Europe has been "living with" for the past several decades. Here's an excerpt:

The Islamic terrorists we now face will never become statesmen. They wish to shed our blood to fortify their faith, to impose their beliefs upon the world, to placate a vengeful god.

That doesn't offer much room for polite diplomacy. Islamic terrorists have reverted to the most primitive of religious practices: human sacrifice. Their brand of Islam is no "religion of peace." They're Aztecs without the art. And it takes a Cortez to deal with them.

According to Peters, the US is leading the way in the most effective way to deal with these terrorists. "Old Europe" is setting itself up as a target and will likely see something that dwarfs 9/11. I'd like to hear what others think about this article. Also, if anyone has links to other oped or articles Ralph Peters has written, please leave them in the comments.

Iran Matching Nuclear Warheads To Missiles

2004-11-18T10:07:00.000-08:00

MSNBC and Reuters are reporting that Colin Powell and the state department has reason to believe that Iran is working on putting nuclear warheads on their missiles.

"I have seen some information that would suggest that they have been actively working on delivery systems. . . . You don't have a weapon until you put it in something that can deliver a weapon," Powell told reporters traveling with him to Chile for an Asia-Pacific economic summit. "I'm not talking about uranium or fissile material or the warhead; I'm talking about what one does with a warhead."
....
"I'm talking about information that says they not only have these missiles, but I am aware of information that suggests that they were working hard as to how to put the two together," Powell said, referring to the process of matching warheads to missiles. He spoke to reporters during a refueling stop in Manaus, Brazil.
....
"There is no doubt in my mind -- and it's fairly straightforward from what we've been saying for years -- that they have been interested in a nuclear weapon that has utility, meaning that it is something they would be able to deliver, not just something that sits there," Powell said.

There are also separate reports saying that Iran is enriching Uranium to be used in nuclear weapons according to an exile group called the National Council for Resistance in Iran, or NCRI.

On Wednesday, Mohaddessin used satellite photos to pinpoint what he said was the new facility, inside a 60-acre complex in the northeast part of Tehran known as the Center for the Development of Advanced Defense Technology. The group said that the site also houses Iranian chemical and biological weapons programs and that uranium enrichment began there a year and a half ago, to replace a nearby facility that was dismantled in March 2004 ahead of a visit by a U.N. inspections team.

The group gave no evidence for its claims, but Mohaddessin said, "Our sources were 100 percent sure about their intelligence." He and other group members said the NCRI relies on human sources, including scientists and other people working in the facilities and locals who might live near the facilities and see suspicious activities.

They predict that Iran will have a deliverable nuclear weapon within the next 5 to 6 years. This is serious. The Bush administration said that it hasn't decided what to do with this information but plans to take it to the UN Security Council.

I doubt that Iran will be the recipient of an invasion like Iraq. I believe our forces are too spread out until we have more stability in Afghanistan and Iraq. Nevertheless, we have a unique opportunity to put pressure on Iran and support many of the democratic revolutionaries already present in Iran from our position in Iraq and from our new bases in the region.

LINKS:
Captains Quarters
Right Wingnuthouse
The Key Monk

OK, I Did It

2004-11-17T15:14:00.001-08:00

I hate these things on other people's blogs so what do I do? I do the quiz just to see what happens. Then when I saw how fitting it was, I decided to post it. I'm so ashamed of myself....

Which Monty Python & the Holy Grail Character are you REALLY?
brought to you by Quizilla

Please read on to my more serious posts.

Fritz Hollings' Farewell Speech

2004-11-17T09:23:00.000-08:00

Fritz Hollings, Senator from South Carolina, gave his farewell speech on the Senate floor. In Hollings' typical irreverent style, he made these comments excerpted from Fox News:

"I don't leave with the idea that the Senate is not what it used to be... We've got a way better group of senators," he said, recalling that when he arrived in Washington in 1966, "We had five drunks or six drunks."

He said now, "We don't have time to be drunks."

Hollings noted that there was only one woman, Margaret Chase Smith (search), R-Maine, in his first years in the Senate, and that she was "outstandingly quiet."

"Now we've got 15 or 17 and you can't shut them up," he joked. There are 14 women senators.

Apparently this is typical Fritz. He's an 82 year old man with a long history in the Senate. They were meant to be jokes and they're being taken as such. I thought they were funny. The thing I want to point out, though, is the double standard. I wonder what the reaction would have been if a republican had made these jokes. Would it be all over the media? Would women's groups come out denouncing the whole party because of these few words? Would women Senators go on camera talking about how shocked they are that this kind of Neanderthal thinking still had a place in the Republican Party? Of course we can't ever know for sure, but I tend to think we'd be getting a different reaction from the media and other groups had Fritz been a Republican, I mean, look at what happened to Sen. Trent Lott.

An article worthy of the Onion

2004-11-16T13:04:00.000-08:00

While reading Drudge, I read a story that read like a story written for the satirical news website, the Onion. The Boca Raton News printed a story about a psychological disorder related to John Kerry losing the election that many people in Palm Beach county are suffering from.

A post-therapy John Kerry supporter spoke out about her trauma treatment for the first time this weekend, saying Florida psychologist Douglas Schooler took her from the depths of despair over President Bush’s victory to a new lease on life.

Forty-four year old Karen of Boca Raton, a divorced mother of one who didn’t want her last name in print, called the trauma specialist’s intensive election therapy “profoundly effective” and described his hypnosis technique as “a healing process.”

“I wasn’t sleeping,” Karen told the Boca Raton News in an interview. “I was very devastated and very astonished that people would re-elect this president. I was moody about the war and economic issues. I felt very unsettled and fearful. I thought, ‘Oh no, what will happen for four years?’”
Karen, whose medical insurance covers the treatment, said she approached Schooler last week after finding herself unable to function publicly due to President Bush’s re-election.

“Dr. Schooler absolutely understood the pain this election caused me and he opened my mind to a new point of view,” Karen said. “You’re relaxed, he talks to you and you just come out of it feeling more positive and renewed. It took one session. He did some relaxation techniques and probably did some things I didn’t even realize.”
A Schooler client for seven years, dating back to her divorce, Karen said the doctor helped her realize it had been unhealthy for her to expect Kerry to win.

“If I’d had time, I would have volunteered for Kerry, but I work full-time,” Karen said. “I was so invested emotionally, watching the debates, and was very disturbed whenever I heard a Marine has been killed. I thought Bush’s actions were war crimes. But I’m sleeping again since the therapy and have felt better ever since. I don’t know what will happen now, but I’m going to take it day by day and see what happens.”
The Boca Raton News reported last week that more than 45 South Florida Kerry supporters sought psychological help after the Democratic candidate conceded to Bush on Nov. 3.

That number, including 20 patients treated by Schooler, had risen to more than 50 by the weekend.

As I read through the article, I couldn't believe that this was real. I kept thinking that it was satire. People are actually seeing therapists because John Kerry lost the election. Maybe this is the natural result of outcome-based education or no-score little league.

The thing is, every side loses elections. While I was glad that Bush won the presidency, living in California, I had some disappointments as well. I voted against the state funding embryonic stem cell research and I definitely voted against Nancy Pelosi for Senator. Both of those races were very important to me, but they lost. So what am I going to do about it? Will I stay in bed for weeks in a deep depression at the direction my state is going? Will I rant and rave and gnash teeth every time I think of the election? Even if John Kerry had won, would I consider it the end of the world? Of course not. It would energize me to do even more to further my issues. It will make me work that much harder to convince others of my view points. This blog, in a small way, is my way of doing that. I present my views and try to give logical arguments in support of them. If I can convince just 1% of the people that come by and read my posts, then I'm doing some good and am furthering my cause.

In the end, people have to realize that we can't control everything that happens to us, but we can control how we react to them. Instead of choosing depression and a doomed outlook on the world, I'll choose to fight.

UPDATE:

Apparently Rush Limbaugh has made fun of this article as well. There's a second story about this Here

Celebrating Veteran's Day

2004-11-11T08:46:00.000-08:00

I just wanted to let all members of the armed forces past and present know how much I and my family truly appreciates them. They are the reason we are safe in our country. They are the reason we have the freedoms that we enjoy. They are the reason we are the most successful representative democracy in the history of civilization. May God bless all servicemen, veterans, and their families. Their sacrifice is appreciated.

I wanted a discussion on how we can show appreciation to our veterans and our servicemen. Please feel free to leave comments on ways we can support those who have fought and are fighting for our country and stories of things that you or someone you know has done to show their gratitude.

Let me share one that I just heard this morning on the radio on the way to work.

A listener called in about her son who has been fighting in Afghanistan. He had just been back on leave for 2 weeks for the birth of his baby. While here, he had taken their car in for a brake job. Another customer in the repair shop insisted on paying for the brake job for him to express thanks for all that he was doing in Afghanistan to protect our country.

So please leave other stories that you might have about showing appreciation for our troops and veterans.

What To Do With Specter

2004-11-10T13:06:00.000-08:00

There's a lot going around about what Senator Specter did and whether he should still get the chairmanship of the judicial committee. I've mainly stayed off the topic since it seemed to be everywhere else, but I've sparred somewhat with liberals in comments on their blogs and thought I should put forth my position before putting it to rest, at least for now.

Specter did a very stupid thing. I think he knows that now, though at the time I don't think he realized what he was doing. He spouted off, as most Senators do, and offended a large number of Bush supporters by asking Bush to only send centrist judges because the country was so split during the election. He made two mistakes in this.

Republicans are still fuming about the judge nominees in the last 4 years. Bush sent, not pro-life judges, but strict constructionist judges that were committed to interpret the constitution and not find new rights that weren't previously there. Democrats see that as pro-life since that is how Roe v. Wade came to be. Specter is a moderate Republican who is pro-choice. Democrats used a back-handed way denying these judges a vote (they had enough votes to approve them) with a Senate rule allowing filibustering.

His second mistake was coming out in open opposition to his party. He won as a Republican and got support for his campaign, not only from the party, but also from Bush himself when we actively campaigned for his re-election. Now I do not believe that the party can dictate how Specter can vote for these nominees, but I do believe that he has the obligation to help the party and the president give these nominees a vote.

He didn't realize the Pandora's Box he opened with these comments. Letters and phone calls flooded in calling for the party to not put him in as chairman of the judicial committee. Some assume that it's part of some sort of Christian Right conspiracy to make sure they have the power in the government. I just think it was from a group of conservative Republicans sick and tired of allowing people with a litmus test for judges run the show. He has since come out in support of the president and said that he would support getting the judicial nominees their vote.

Should Specter still get the chairmanship? I think he should. The flood of calls, letters, and e-mails have humbled Specter and reminded him that he still has to answer to the American people. Nevertheless, the Republican party needs to be inclusive. We need to accept those that share most of our ideals but may disagree with just a few policies. If all moderate, pro-choice Republicans are destined to be banned from leadership, how long are they going to stay Republicans? Does that mean that we have to cave to their issues? No, of course not. Each Senator can vote their conscience and answer to their constiuency. But they can still have a place in the party. Nobody wins elections unless they give people that don't agree with every plank in the platform a place within the party as well.

LINKS:

Anti-Everything has the opposing view and some of my comments in the comment section.
Powerline
Mount Virtus
Blogs For Bush

Is It A Mandate?

2004-11-09T09:33:00.000-08:00

Many pundits and bloggers are quick to point out the reasons that the President didn't get a mandate. Let's look at some of the reasons he did:

Bush is the first president to win a majority since 1988. This is something the left's beloved President Clinton could never muster.

Because of the high turnout, Bush received more popular votes than any president in history.

For the first time since Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1934, the president has strengthened his party's position in the Congress for both of his elections.

The first President since 1924 to re-elect majorities in the House and Senate

The first President since 1936 to gain seats in both the House and Senate

And it's that last three that are the most important. People not only voted for Bush, but they also voted for the Senators and Congressmen (Congresspeople?) that holds his same ideals. This shows that the people like the Republican platform and the goals that Republicans have for our nation.

I've never really listened to the President's weekly radio address and the rebuttal but I happened to be driving on Saturday when the local talk station broadcast (rebroadcast?) the addresses. The President talked about uniting the country and some plans he has for country. What was interesting was the rebuttal. It was given by Nancy Pelosi, the Congresswoman from California and minority leader in the House. She basically said that the Democrats want to unite the country but put it on the President to make sure it happens. In other words, she asked what will President Bush do for them. She's not the only ones. I've heard left leaning reporters and Democrats make it clear that they're not going to budge on what they want, regardless of the fact that they've lost elections all over the country including the presidency. This is amazing! Their attitude is not: Since you won, what can we do for you? It's: Since we lost, what will you do for us? The Democrats are giving no indication, whatsoever, that they're ready to cooperate with the president and with the will of the majority of the country.

Whether it's considered a mandate or not, the fact is that President Bush has won the election. The President has made promises in the campaign that he has an obligation to fulfill now that he has been elected because he was elected based on those promises. We, the American people that elected the president, require him to stand up to his end of the bargain no matter what the losing party says or does. That's the way of democracy. If you win, you further your agenda. If you lose, your agenda gets stalled.

Here's a short laundry list of things I'd like to see happen:

Appoint strict constructionist judges, judges that will interpret the constitution and not make law.

Move Social Security toward privatization.

Revamp the tax system. Specifically I support the Fair Tax.

Fight a strong War on Terror and fulfill our commitment to the afghans and Iraqis.

Make the tax cuts permanent.

Shrink government.

Kerry Voters are More Intelligent....Or Are They?

2004-11-08T10:20:00.000-08:00

A coworker e-mailed me a web page, though he admitted to me that he hadn't checked it out yet. Here's the gist:

People that voted for John Kerry have higher IQs. The site shows a table that lists each state and the average IQ for that state in order from highest IQ to lowest. The top 16 plus 3 more sprinkled in towards the top voted for Kerry and everyone else (mostly below 100 IQ scores) voted for Bush.

When I first saw it, it obviously didn't seem right. It lined up to well and the IQ numbers just didn't make sense. I then set out to do some research.

Lest you be deceived, here is what I found:

This actually originally comes from the 2000 election with Al Gore. The table has merely been re-color coded to reflect the returns of the 2004 election. Apparently this was so appealing to liberals that they believed in it right away and it was even reported in some reputable publications such as the St. Petersburg Times in Florida and the Economist magazine. Shortly after the publications, they were retracted because the numbers are just basically fabricated. This is basically a feel-good table to make people that voted for the candidate that lost.

Here's a web site with this information, not to mention links to the real IQ by State information.

UPDATE:

Mediakit explains more extensively other reasons this is bad data in adition to the numbers being just plain wrong.

Introspection? Naw, I'll Just Hurl Insults!

2004-11-05T15:40:00.000-08:00

With the loss of the election on Tuesday many Democrats are starting to ask themselves: "What went wrong?" They've lost the Presidency 5 out of the last 7 elections and they're steadily losing seats in both houses of Congress. Slate has run a series of articles from different Democrats discussing just that point.

Of interest is an article written by Jane Smiley, an author of many novels and essays. Smiley seems to throw introspection right out the window in favor of sheer, brute insults at the Americans that voted for George W. Bush.

The election results reflect the decision of the right wing to cultivate and exploit ignorance in the citizenry. I suppose the good news is that 55 million Americans have evaded the ignorance-inducing machine. But 58 million have not....

The reason the Democrats have lost five of the last seven presidential elections is simple: A generation ago, the big capitalists, who have no morals, as we know, decided to make use of the religious right in their class war against the middle class and against the regulations that were protecting those whom they considered to be their rightful prey, workers and consumers. The architects of this strategy knew perfectly well that they were exploiting, among other unsavory qualities, a long American habit of virulent racism, but they did it anyway, and we see the outcome now, Cheney is the capitalist arm and Bush is the religious arm. They know no boundaries or rules. They are predatory and resentful, amoral, avaricious, and arrogant. Lots of Americans like and admire them because lots of Americans, even those who don't share those same qualities, don't know which end is up. Can the Democrats appeal to such voters? Do they want to? The Republicans have sold their souls for power. Must everyone?

Could it be that Democrats are losing touch with the majority of Americans? No. Could their nuanced positions and weak stance on protecting America be wrong for America? No. Could the Democrats be doing anything wrong whatsoever? Of course not! According to Smiley, There is one simple reason that George W. Bush won the election. Americans are sniveling ignorant morons who can't tie their shoes but can be manipulated into voting for Republicans.

Jane Smiley is revealing more as to why the Democrats are losing than she thinks. Democrats think that the majority of people can't take care of themselves and therefore take it upon themselves to take care of them. Democrats don't trust people to make the right decisions. They can't conceive that Conservatives believe in what they do because of rational reasoning and thought. They can't fathom that people don't want to be taken care of and think (erroneously, of course) that they can take care of themselves. They feel they are smarter and superior to the masses. This is the reason they are losing power and they will continue to lose power until they come down off of their high horses and see eye to eye with the rest of America.

Until they can start looking inward and change themselves instead of trying to change us, they'll just have to get used to the title: "Minority Party".

LINKS

Powerline

County by County Vote

2004-11-04T11:32:00.000-08:00

This picture looks so familiar....

Perhaps John Edwards is right. We do have 2 Americas. We have the self-reliant, independent, rural, and sub-urban America and we have the government-loving, dependent, and urban America.

(picture from Captain's Quarters)

Early Exit Polls Fakes

2004-11-04T10:25:00.000-08:00

All night as election results started coming in, the network reporters discussed what went wrong with the exit poll numbers. In past years, the exit polls could usually offer a mostly accurate view of the trend of the votes coming in. In 2000 these polls were part of the reason Gore was called in the state of Florida before the polls had even closed in the pan handle. Because of the 2000 fiasco, the exit polls were revamped but in the 2002 election they were again giving inaccurate results to the point that the National Election Pool stopped releasing data.

This year was the worst year yet with respects to exit polling, but this election there was a difference. As investigated by the American Spectator, the early exit poll numbers that came in were fakes put out by the Kerry campaign.

According to at least three sources, one inside the Kerry campaign, and two outside of it, but with ties to senior Kerry advisers, some of the "early polling numbers" were in fact direct reports from Kerry campaign or Democratic Party operatives on the ground in such critical states as Pennsylvania, Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, and Wisconsin. According to a Washington lobbyist with knowledge of the numbers, the numbers were packaged together so as to appear to be exit poll results. They were then scrubbed through several sources to land in the lap of sympathetic bloggers who these operatives believed would put the numbers up with little question.

Shortly thereafter, the real exit polling came out still showing Bush behind but not by such huge margins.

This was obviously a way to not only give encouragement to Kerry supporters and suppress Bush supporters, but to also try and discredit the new media. Unfortunately, too many bloggers as well as the Drudge Report were so eager for data to post, that they weren't careful about the source. It's not entirely their fault, of course. This was intentionally meant to fool them. Even Carl Rove took them at face value, though he was obviously skeptical of them. Nevertheless, as a new news source, we need to be more careful. I watched anchors report with barely concealed glee how they didn't report the bad poll data but that the internet had.

Here's the deal. Exit polls are obviously inaccurate. It's simply a way for the networks to make a whole news day out of something that you can't know until evening time. It's meant to give a horse-race feel to the election which does nothing more than give the networks ratings. Likewise, the constant polling throughout the whole campaign with huge margins of error do little more than to give an idea of what's happening rather than an accurate view of where the country is. Polling is just a tool with limited worth. It will continue to be used as a tool. What we need to get away from is the poll becoming the news rather than the candidates or their views. I can't tell you how often I've read or heard news stories that did nothing more than just report this poll or that poll. At risk of repeating myself, polls are not news. They are a tool, and a tool of limited effectiveness at that.

LINKS

Captains Quarters
Powerline
Shot In The Dark
The Daily Blogster
View From A Height
American Kestrel

Election Thoughts

2004-11-03T10:56:00.000-08:00

I spent much of the night last night flipping between different coverages of the election. I'm lucky being on the west coast in that I didn't have to stay up so late to find out that we weren't going to get a concession that night. I only had to stay up until 11:30. I have some observations about the election and the coverage.

I watched most of the coverage on CNN. CNN actually surprised me. For the most part you didn't see frustration or bitterness on the part of the reporters as it became clear that Bush was going to win. They seemed to be making a concerted effort to try and do an impartial analysis on the election results. The one glaring exception was when the results of New Jersey came out, how excited they were to point out that even though many people from New Jersey were killed in 9/11 and that their number one priority was terrorism according to the exit polls, they overwhelmingly voted for Kerry. This was just a bit irritating considering there really wasn't much doubt, ever, that New Jersey would go for Kerry. It's a democratic stronghold. So it's hardly indicative of anything that New Jersey went for Kerry. At any rate, kudos to CNN for trying to keep the reporting impartial.

I don't really understand how they project states for a candidate. It seems that some states get projected with a mere 1% of the precincts reporting while others have to wait for hours. I understand that if the percentage is close, you can't have a clear winner. Nevertheless, they seemed to sit on Florida without calling it even though nearly all of the precincts had reported and there was a 5 point spread. Ohio is another one. The spread was a lot closer but it was clear that the margin was increasing and not decreasing and there just weren't many votes left to count. CNN didn't project Ohio until late in the morning today.

I was impressed that the President decided to wait for Kerry to concede before he claimed victory. Kerry made it apparent that they wouldn't concede until the provisional ballots were counted in 11 days regardless of how unlikely it could make a big enough difference to swing the state in his favor. Bush could have went out and claimed victory causing a lot of contention but, like the class act he is, decided to just sit tight and wait for the concession confident in his win.

Kerry impressed me that he didn't make the country wait for 11 days before conceding. It took him longer to concede than I think was logical, but I'm very glad he finally did it this morning. He could have drawn this out and it would have been within his right, but he decided to reunite instead of divide and that's commendable.

Yet again, we showed the world that the United States of America can handle the democracy that we made fashionable throughout the world. UN election monitors were not needed. We showed the Jimmy Carters out there that we can handle ourselves and manage even a close election in a civilized manner.

I'm obviously very happy with the results of this election. Republicans increased their seats in both of the house and the Senate and retained the presidency. President Bush is the first president since 1988 to get a majority of the popular vote, receiving more popular votes than any other president in history, and the first president that won purely by Electoral Votes in a first election to win a second term. The biggest surprise of this election was the key issue on American's minds. It wasn't the war on terror. It wasn't Iraq. It wasn't the economy. It was values. Americans are still a values-oriented people and it's good to see that it's important to our people as a whole.

Please Vote

2004-11-02T23:59:00.000-08:00

I would encourage everyone to vote for Bush, but even if you don't agree, just vote for whomever you support. It's your patriotic duty.

Why Do We Have the Electoral College?

2004-11-01T16:20:00.000-08:00

I was surfing some blogs and I came across a post from Cybervassals.com asking to explain the Electoral College. I commented and gave a short explanation, but I thought I'd post on it as well because I think a lot of people have this same questions.

The Electoral College goes back to the idea that the United States is a union of independent states. Essentially it is the states that elect the president. Each state has the number of votes equal to the number of congressman + senators in that state. When you vote for president, you're indicating to your state legislature how you want your state to vote. The state legislature then sends their electors to cast all of their votes (in most cases) for the candidate with the majority. Technically, I believe, a state doesn't necessarily have to allow its citizens to vote for the president, though that is the way every state in the US does it. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong on that.)

There is no reason a third party can't win an election. Each state has laws as to how to get on the ballot and usually there are about 5 or 6 party candidates to choose from. In the end, though, these other parties aren't well supported and don't get enough votes to carry a state and therefore earn the electoral votes.

US Senators used to be elected by the legislatures of each state as well but that was changed with the 17th amendment in 1913 to have the senators elected through a direct election by the people of the state. Originally the Senate was supposed to represent the state government and the House of Representatives was supposed to represent the people of the state.

On a side note, some believe that the 17th amendment is the reason for the government getting too large and money and corruption being too much a part of the federal government. Many have called for a repeal of the 17th amendment. See a CNN story about it here.

Basically the Electoral College is the last remnant of federalism left in the United States.

Note: This is according to my understanding of civics. If I'm wrong on any of these points, please comment and I'll make any corrections necessary.

UPDATE:

I've been asked in comments whether I think it should be abolished. I have to tell you that I used to feel very strongly that we should go to a national election system, but more recently I've been leaning the other way.

When I read the constitution and I do research into the history of our government, I can't help but see some genius in how the founding fathers set up our nation. They wanted to try and keep as much of the government as local as possible where people have a chance of making change. According to that CNN article above, since they've changed the way Senators are elected, Senate campaigns have spent tremendous amounts of money with the voter getting very little access in return. That's not how things were meant to be.

Since the Civil War, the states have lost more and more of their rights to the federal government in direct violation of the constitution without the country even bothering to amend the document. I'm a firm believer in States rights. With the power at the state level, we the people have greater control over the laws.

I guess this has been a long way around explaining what I think about it. I think the federalizing of our nation is not a good thing and the electoral college, being the last remnant of federalism, would be worthwhile to hold onto if for no other reason than to remind us how things should have been.

Who Does Osama Want?

2004-11-01T14:00:00.000-08:00

I've seen in blog after blog all over the web people claiming that they know who Osama Bin Laden wants to win the election. Bush supporters say that he supports Kerry because of his soft stance against terrorism. Kerry supporters say that he supports Bush because of how effective Bush has been as a promotional tool for recruiting Al Qaeda operatives.
Finally Bin Laden, himself, has declared his support in the latest video. The New York Post published this article (via Drudge) concerning this.

Osama bin Laden warned in his October Surprise video that he will be closely monitoring the state-by-state election returns in tomorrow's presidential race — and will spare any state that votes against President Bush from being attacked, according to a new analysis of his statement.

I think that we can now settle this question once and for all. Osama supports John Kerry and will try and influence our election in Kerry's favor with the threat of force. Think about that and all of its implications when you vote tomorrow.

LINKS

Powerline has the link to the full text of Osama Bin Laden's video.
Blogs For Bush
American Kestrel
SCSU Scholars
Vultures Row is humurous

Kerry's Sticking To His Guns?

2004-10-27T11:18:00.000-07:00

What's with Kerry and grabbing these faulty reports and running with them? Now, I haven't mentioned the New York Times piece about the missing munitions because I thought it was pretty much being covered not only by the new media but by the main stream media as well. I figured it was squashed as soon as it came out. I was amazed this morning on the news to hear that Kerry is still using it in his stump speeches as late as today.

Was this supposed to be the October surprise? If so, it's backfired.

When I first heard about it, I was concerned that it was squashed so fast, that the exposure would be too limited to reflect poorly on Kerry. It looks as though Kerry's going to try and ride it anyway which, it seems to me, could only be to his detriment.

I'd really like someone to ask Kerry, "Who do you trust more, the 101st Airborne or the UN?" The answer, of course, is obvious but I wonder what he'd say.

LINKS

Powerline
Captains Quarters

I Voted....Finally

2004-10-26T10:03:00.000-07:00

I've always liked absentee voting. I used to do it when I was going to school out-of-state while my registration was in Washington State. I figured Washington State needed as many conservative votes as they could get. I signed up for permanent absentee status and my ballots came to me like clock-work. I then lived for several years that didn't have that service. You could get an absentee ballot, but you had to sign up for it for each election. Very inconvenient. Once we started having kids, it made voting even more difficult for me and my wife.

Now I've just moved to California and once again I've signed up for permanent absentee voting. I thought it was for the convenience of not having to go to the voting booth. Little did I know that California voting is a whole different kind of beast!

I first received my voting guide. This voting guide is larger than some small town white pages. In it was a discussion on the 16...Count them...16 propositions. Many states have the proposition and initiative process which allows citizens to create laws and get them passed via the electorate. Apparently, California invented the process and takes it to a whole new level!

But wait, that's not all. The voting guide for San Diego County arrived and in it, the discussion on the 7 county-wide propositions.

Finally, a pamphlet arrived discussing a proposition that was community level with its one proposition.

24 propositions! Let me say that again. 24 propositions! And this is in addition to all of the candidates on the ballots.

It took my wife and I 3 hours per evening over the course of 2 evenings to make decisions on all of these propositions and I have to admit that that didn't even give time to reading all of the material about each issue.

So I was grateful for the fact that I voted absentee just for the simple fact that there is no way I could remember how I would vote on 24 propositions and who knows how many candidates.

Now, don't get me wrong. I think the proposition process is nice. It allows people to take their concerns directly to the people when their representatives refuse to listen to them. Nevertheless, I give the founding fathers credit for coming up with a representative government knowing that a pure democracy would be a total disaster. Sometimes I hear people that claim that, given current technology, that a pure democracy is now possible and that we should work more towards that. Anyone thinking that should vote in a California election and it'd become very clear that a republic is definitely the way to go.

Tribute To The Soldiers

2004-10-26T10:01:00.000-07:00

You see these things floating around the internet via e-mail and web sites. I usually don't give them much time but this one seemed to touch me today. Here's the link. Enjoy.

http://www.thepalletmaster.com/flash1.html

Congress Wants To Ban All Abortions

2004-10-26T09:31:00.000-07:00

Last night I was watching regular network TV (Fox), something I really don't do very often these days. I saw about a dozen different political ads in the couple of hours I was sitting there. The one that really stood out as being absurd was the most recent ad by Barbara Boxer's campaign.

You can view it here.

If you believed the ad, there just a step away from banning ALL abortions in this country, even when the mother's life is at risk. Now I'd like to see the data on that. She says that there are members in Congress that want to ban abortions. All of them. I want her to name names. Why? Because I don't believe it. I can't think of a Senator nor a Congress person that wants to ban abortions in the cases of rape, incest, or when the life of the mother is in danger.

Now, let's talk about the dirty little secrets "pro-choicers" don't talk about. If Roe v. Wade gets overturned, not a likely prospect, it will not outlaw abortions. WHAT?!?!?! That's right. The overturn of Roe v. Wade will not outlaw abortion.

It would simply return the right to outlaw or not outlaw the practice to the state, where it should be anyway. If you live in California, it's very likely that you will not have trouble getting an abortion. If you live in a more conservative state, you may have to go to a neighboring state.

My attitude on the whole issue is that it should, in fact, be a function of the state to legalize or outlaw abortion. Any state that does outlaw the practice (obviously excepting the cases of rape, incest, and health of the mother) should encourage adoption programs to give mother's an option outside of abortion and to place these children in homes with parents that want them and would bring them up to be productive citizens.

Well, I'm Convinced

2004-10-22T14:50:00.000-07:00

After an interview of Eminem by Rolling Stones (brought to us by Drudge), I can't see how anyone could vote for Bush.

EMINEM: 'BUSH LIKE A DOG CHASING ITS TAIL'
Fri Oct 22 2004 13:45:08 ET

Rapper Eminem bodyslams President Bush in the upcoming edition of ROLLING STONE, publishing sources tell the DRUDGE REPORT.

President Bush is "like dog chasing its tail," the Hollywood-bound Eminem tells the magazine, set to street during the first week of November.

RS: You get deep into your feelings about President Bush and Iraq on "Mosh." Do you think the Iraq War was a mistake?

E: He's been painted to be this hero and he's got our troops over there dying for no reason. I haven't heard an explanation yet that I can understand. Explain to us why we have troops over there dying.

RS: There is no good answer.

E: I think he started a mess. America is the best country there is, the best country to live in. But he's [expletive] that up and could run our country into the ground. He jumped the gun, and he [expletive] up so bad he doesn't know what to do right now. He's in a tailspin, running around like a dog chasing its tail. And we got young people over there dyin', kids in their teens, early twenties that should have futures ahead of them. And for what? It seems like a Vietnam 2. Bin Laden attacked us and we attacked Saddam. We ain't heard from Saddam for ten years, but we go attack Saddam. Explain why that is. Give us some answers.

RS: Are you voting?

E: This is the first year I've registered to vote. And I'm gonna vote. Bush is definitely not my homie, but I'm still undecided. Kerry has been known to say some things that's caught my attention, made a few statements I've liked, but I don't know. Whatever my decision is, I would like to see Bush out of office. I don't wanna see my little brother get drafted. He just turned eighteen. I don't want to see him lose his life. People think their votes don't count, but people need to get out and vote. Every [expletive] vote counts.

Developing...

With facts like the ones Eminem has put forth, it's really hard to see how anyone could possibly vote for Bush. As far as I can tell, here are the facts according to him:

Bush got confused and instead of attacking Osama Bin Laden, he attacked Saddam. I mean, here was Saddam in Iraq minding his own business for the past 10 years and BLAM, Bush attacked him while nothing at all happened to Al Qaeda.

The whole country is in a tailspin and nothing is going right.

Iraq is Vietnam 2.

Bush is going to draft 18 year olds around the country.

I have no response to these hard core facts. There is nothing I can do, now, but vote for Kerry. Now I have to figure out how to get my absentee ballot back....

In all seriousness, the one thing I am glad of is that Eminem has decided to register and vote this election. He may not be supporting my candidate, but I do like to see people taking part in the electoral process. It's a bit disheartening that the right that so many have fought and died for is so easily thrown by the wayside and not exercised. Maybe someday he'll look at what's going on in the country and start looking beyond the rhetoric and make informed decisions on the candidates. Chances are, he'll still pick the more liberal candidates, but at least it'll be informed.

ER Overrun By The Insured

2004-10-20T11:28:00.000-07:00

Reuters reported on a study finding out who is going to the Emergency Rooms around the country.

"The mistaken belief that emergency departments are overcrowded by a small, disenfranchised portion of the U.S. population can lead to misguided policy decisions and a perception by hospital administrators that emergency patients are not as valuable to the institution as patients having elective surgery," Weber said in a statement.

The fact is, roughly 85% of the US is insured at any given time and that number is very likely to be much higher (see this post). We just don't have this health care crisis that Kerry wants us all to think we have. Our ERs are not getting overrun by the uninsured. The vast majority of the people do have insurance and many of the uninsured aren't even under the poverty line. They're young people and others that just, simply, choose to pay medical costs out of pocket instead, after all, that still is an option in our free market economy. We have a problem with run-away premiums but that can be better handled through tort reforms than creating a nationalized option.

Peter Jennings Doesn't Know If He Can Be Unbiased

2004-10-20T08:26:00.000-07:00

Via Drudge, Channel 7 in Omaha has some excerpts from an interview with Dan Rather asking him about the media bias. Here was Dan's response:

"I'm a little concerned about this notion everybody wants us to be objective," Jennings said.

Jennings said that everyone -- even journalists -- have points of view through which they filter their perception of the news. It could be race, sex or income. But, he said, reporters are ideally trained to be as objective as possible.

He's right on this point, of course. It's not that everyone expects the reporters to be 100% unbiased, but we do expect them to at least try to be unbiased. What ever happened to just focussing on Who What Where When? We're seeing a lot more editorializing coming from our reporters and anchors than just the facts. Not only that, it's the facts that they don't report that causes as much bias as the facts that they do report.

Of course, all of their woes is a result of the new media of talk radio and the blogosphere.

Jennings maintains those polls may be driven by groups with an agenda.

"There's a whole industry of conservatives saying, 'Ah, it's those damn liberals,' and a whole group of liberals saying, 'It's all those damn conservatives,'" Jennings said.

The problematic response, Jennings said, is the way people tailor the way they consume news.

"If you tailor your news viewing, as some people are now doing, so that you only get one point of view, well of course you're going to think somebody else has got a different point of view, and it may be wrong," Jennings said.

Tommy Franks Fires Back

2004-10-19T11:45:00.000-07:00

Several times, during the debates, John Kerry claimed that Bush had "outsourced" the capture of Osama Bin Laden to Afghan war lords and that Bush took his "eye off the ball" in Afghanistan in order to fight the war in Iraq. Bush was curiously quiet and let these charges go by unanswered. I'm not sure why that would be, but he obviously had his reasons.

Apparently, Tommy Franks couldn't let the charges go by unanswered. Tommy Franks ran both the fronts in Afghanistan and Iraq and he knows precisely the Whats and Whys. Tommy Franks wrote an op/ed in the New York Times in order to answer these charges.

His main points are:

We didn't know one way or another whether Bin Laden was in Tora Bora at the time.

We didn't outsource to the afghan war lords. We used them because of their knowledge of the area and we had special forces there assisting.

We didn't divert troops or equipment to Iraq. When there was the lead-up to the attack on Iraq, we had 9,500 troops in Afghanistan. When major hostilities ended in Iraq, we had over 10,000 troops in Afghanistan.

Once again Kerry seeks to mislead the voters and cast a pessimistic view on the events in Afghanistan and Bush's execution of the War on Terror.

Kerry Talks Well, But What Did He Say?

2004-10-19T10:40:00.000-07:00

The debates have come and gone. Most Main Stream Media articles are focusing on Kerry's performance in the debates and how well he presented himself. Many liked the way we spoke. They liked the way he had facts and figures at his finger tips. They thought he looked presidential. He was a good looking, smooth talking candidate. Curiously absent from the articles and the commentary is the substance of what he actually said.

One item that got him immediate into immediate trouble was his reference to Mary Cheney and her sexuality. That was a clear mistake and has been discussed around the alternative media extensively. He tried to smooth it over with some comments that not even his supporters could believe, but he never apologized. An explanation with an apology would have appeared magnanimous and more genuine, but his refusal of an apology made him look petty.

Something else that was particularly unnerving was his call for a "Global Test" when it comes to any international (perhaps domestic as well?) action the United States feels fit to do. Of course we all know that what he means by a "Global Test" is approval by France and Germany since most of our other staunchest allies are standing beside us in the Iraqi front of the War on Terror. We don't need to pander to nations that do not have our best interests at heart before we can think about what we need to do to protect ourselves.

Kerry exploited the fear of seniors by charging Bush with trying to kill Social Security in order to enrich his friends. This of course is absolutely not true. Social Security is at risk and Bush has a plan to try and shore it up, but he has always vowed that the current benefits will not go down. What's Kerry's alternative plan? Do nothing. He criticizes with no alternative.

Kerry wants to create a federal health care service option for the American people. He tries and flowers it up by saying it is just an option that people can take part in at will. He tries to make it not sound as all-encompassing as Hillary-Care in the early 90's. Here's the dirty little secret, though. The federal health care will be paid for by each and every one of us whether we use it or not. What incentive will an employer have to provide health insurance to an employee when the employer can simply save the money and tell the employees to go to the federal plan? Sure, a person could pay for their own, but why would they shell out the extra money for an independent plan when their tax dollars are already going towards the federal plan? As more and more people will have to go on the federal plan, taxes will have to go up and up to cover it. And like all socialized services, efficiency will go down, quality will go down, costs will go up, and there won't be a thing most people will be able to do about it. In the end, most everyone will be forced to be on socialized medicine while the very rich that can afford private insurance premiums on top of their increased taxes will be the only ones that have the option of private quality health care. This of course, at some point, will be considered unfair and the rich will be forced on the same program as the rest of us. Then, WHAMO, Socialized Medicine. Kerry hopes to bring what Hillary Clinton tried to do through the back door. The American people, who obviously don't know what we really need, will have to have socialized medicine snuck in on us, thus, saving us from our own ignorance.

Is this what we want in a president? Someone who plays dirty tricks and exploits the children of the candidates in order to embarrass them? Someone who wants to give away our sovereignty to other nations? Someone who uses scare techniques on Social Security in order to criticize the alternative plan but do nothing for the problem? Someone who will sneak socialized medicine when it is obviously not wanted by the majority of the American people?

Get past the smooth answers, nice hair, spray-on tan, botox, and statistics of a questionable origin, and you have an ultra-liberal extremist.

Bush Ahead in Most All Polls

2004-10-19T10:13:00.000-07:00

According to RealClearPolitics.com's average of the national polls, Bush has a decent lead with just 2 weeks until the election.

» 3-Way Spread: Bush +3.2

» Head-to-Head Spread: Bush +2.5

EV Count: Bush 227 - Kerry 220

LINKS:

Powerline
Captain's Quarters

How Long Does It Take John Edwards To Do His Hair?

2004-10-19T09:46:00.000-07:00

You be the judge.

Slate

LINKS

Powerline

More on More on the Mexican Border and Terrorists

2004-10-15T08:39:00.000-07:00

A blog I just found, A Physicist's Perspective wrote this post on the difference between the two candidate's views on the border.

David Mobley gives some good information on the candidates' position and then states that he's unsure what has to be done. I like this. Everybody is unsure as to what has to be done. If anyone tells you they have the answer is obviously ignoring a large part of the problem.

The most common solution I hear is that we should militarize the borders. When asked how they'll pay for it, they don't have a good answer. Many of the people that want a militarized border are also for smaller government. That's tough.

We obviously can't place army divisions on the border because the cost would be astronomical. On the other hand, the thing leaks like a sieve and something has to be done.

I think Bush is on the right track and I think Kerry also said something that made some sense (we'll see if he changes his position by next week). The temporary workers permit will go a long ways to helping us keep track of the people coming in and out of the US from Mexico. The most dangerous thing about the illegal immigration is that we have no idea about who is coming in and who is coming out. The temporary worker cards gets these people into a database and takes some pressure off the border patrol.

Bush also mentioned UAV (Unmanned Air Vehicles) patrolling the border helping border patrol find not only illegal immigrants but also drug smuggling. I know the border patrol has been looking into this already and have seen some very successful demos. UAVs can patrol for up to 24 hours at a time by remote control and can use infrared cameras to identify people and vehicles. They're also quiet. They can't be heard from the ground, unlike the helicopters the border patrol uses. Upon identification, the UAV operator can phone the border patrol to bring in their helicopter and men to apprehend them. What's nice about the UAVs are that they can record the whole process from start to finish and use the tapes as evidence in court against drug smugglers. A classic defense is for a drug smuggler to hear the helicopter and jet from their truck and pretend they're an illegal when they get caught. The border patrol has no way to connect them to the truck and so the worse that happens to them is they get deported. With a tape, they wouldn't have that defense.

Another thing that has to happen is to focus on prosecuting the employers that hire illegals. Unfortunately, with the ease of creating forged documents (right CBS?) an employer who might suspect a worker to be illegal can plausibly hire the worker anyway if they show them a semi-professionally forged document. In order to hold employers completely accountable, we need to give employers an easy way to identify whether temporary worker permits or social security cards are valid. That's where biometrics come in and the only intelligent thing Kerry said about the issue. An employer, even a very small employer, can afford a simple fingerprint scanner (retinal scanner?) that could cross check with a national database of foreign nationals in the US for work. Social Security numbers and driver's license numbers should be able to be checked to see if they are valid and that the name corresponds to the number. Simple things like these could go a long way in reducing the number of illegals working in this country. Employers will have the incentive to check employees out before hiring them because it will absolve them from liability. If there are no employers for illegals, illegals won't come here to work. There will be incentive for them to go through the legal process.

Will these procedures eliminate illegal immigration? No. Can it help reduce it at a fraction of the cost of a militarized border? Absolutely. I think the candidates are on the right track, though we'll see how they will implement it after election day.

Oh What a Tangled Web We Weave

2004-10-15T08:10:00.000-07:00

John Kerry is practicing damage control after his reference to Dick and Lynne Cheney's daughter, Mary in the national debate. Fox News has a summary of all the comments made. Edwards started it in the Vice Presidential debate with this comment:

"I think the vice president and his wife love their daughter. I think they love her very much. And you can't have anything but respect for the fact that they're willing to talk about the fact that they have a gay daughter, the fact that they embrace her. It's a wonderful thing,"

Cheney, in response, just thanked him for kind remarks.

Then John Kerry made this comment during Wednesday debate:

"We're all God's children, Bob, and I think if you were to talk to Dick Cheney's daughter, who is a lesbian, she would tell you that she's being who she was. She's being who she was born as. I think if you talk to anybody, it's not a choice."

This was responded to by Lynne Cheney at a rally after the debate.

"Now, you know, I did have a chance to assess John Kerry once more and now the only thing I could conclude: This is not a good man," she told a crowd of 800 debate-watchers in a Pittsburgh suburb. "Of course, I am speaking as a mom, and a pretty indignant mom. This is not a good man. What a cheap and tawdry political trick."

Why so much air time on the daughter of the Vice President's daughter's sexuality? Kerry's campaign manager, Mary Beth Cahill, explained when asked about it right after the debate.

"She seems to be very proud and open about her sexuality, her parents seem to be very proud of her," Cahill said. "It comes up, there are a lot of questions here about gay marriage, and she is someone who is a major figure in the campaign. I think it's fair game and I think she has been treated very respectfully."

Apparently the Kerry-Edwards campaign feels that the child of the Vice President is fair game in stump speeches and nationally televised debates. Elizabeth Edwards made this comment Thursday morning on ABC Radio News:

"She's overreacted to this and treated it as if it's shameful to have this discussion. I think that's a very sad state of affairs. ... I think that it indicates a certain degree of shame with respect to her daughter's sexual preferences. ... It makes me really sad that that's Lynne's response,"

It's abundantly clear that the purpose of bringing up Mary Cheney's sexuality was to try and embarrass the Cheneys at their daughter's expense. There used to be something of an unwritten rule that the children of your opponent are off-limits in campaigns, but I guess nothing is too low for Kerry right now. He's pulling out every stop, ethical or not, to try and sway votes. Luckily this one seems to have back-fired.

Kerry said yesterday:

I love my daughters. They love their daughter. I was trying to say something positive about the way strong families deal with this issue,

Sorry, Senator. I wish you had taken your dying mother's advice: "Integrity, integrity, integrity." Too little. Too late.

Lynne Cheney Not Impressed With Kerry's Performance

2004-10-14T09:59:00.000-07:00

The Washington Post reports that Lynne Cheney, wife of the Vice President and mother of Mary Cheney, whom John Kerry mentioned by name when asked if homosexuality was a choice, took Kerry to task about his politicking the personal lives of the Cheney family.

Mary Cheney, one of the vice president's two daughters and an official of the Bush-Cheney campaign, has been open about her lesbian status. The candidates were asked if they believe homosexuality is a choice, and President Bush did not mention Mary Cheney. Then Kerry said, "If you were to talk to Dick Cheney's daughter, who is a lesbian, she would tell you that she's being who she was, she's being who she was born as."

Lynne Cheney issued her post-debate rebuke to a cheering crowd outside Pittsburgh. "The only thing I can conclude is he is not a good man. I'm speaking as a mom," she said. "What a cheap and tawdry political trick."

This was obviously a way to try and embarrass Bush and Cheney with the religious right wing. I think it has another affect. It shows a family that have their ideals and struggles just like every other family in America and personalizes them to America. It also shows that Kerry isn't above using the families of his opponents to get what he wants.

I Am One of the 45 Million Without Health Insurance

2004-10-14T09:00:00.000-07:00

There's a famous quote by Benjamin Disraeli (often misattributed to Mark Twain): "There are three kinds of lies - lies, damned lies and statistics." Last nights debate was full of all three.

The one I want to specifically address is the number being bantered around stating that there are almost 45 million people who are uninsured. The obvious conclusion they want people to draw is that the economy is so bad and health insurance premiums are so high that a huge percentage (almost 16%!!!) of the American population is without health insurance (and therefore without health care?).

Well, I have a confession to make. My family of four are 4 of that 45 million without health care. That's right. We have been victims of the Bush economy. Now before anyone feels too sorry for me or my family, let me explain. I changed jobs at the beginning of the year. My last job ended on the last work day of January and I started my new job on the 1st of March. My last job had very good coverage without a deductible and my current job has even better coverage without a deductible, but for 1 whole month (February, the shortest month of the year)my family and I did not have health insurance.

That's right. That statistic includes people that are between jobs and have lost their insurance temporarily until their next job starts up.

Alan Reynolds from the CATO Institute wrote an article in the Washington Post on October 5 and it's reprinted on CATO's website called Politicized 'Facts' debunking many of these "statistics about the loss of jobs, the number of people in poverty, and the number of people who are uninsured.

To fix such problems, a superior Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) is less frequent but more intense. That survey is conducted four times a year but not every year. In 1998, the latest available, the SIPP survey found only 21 million without health insurance for the entire year — half the number in the headlines. The SIPP survey confirmed, however, the CPS finding that about 40 million were indeed without insurance for part of the year. In May, a widely ignored Congressional Budget Office report noted that "between half and two-thirds of the people who experienced a period of time without insurance... had coverage for other portions of that year." Although reporters and politicians will keep shouting that more than 40 million people are continuously without health insurance, that is just another Big Lie.

One reason many young people lack health insurance is that they rightly expect paying their own medical bills will be cheaper in most years than paying insurance premiums. One reason a disproportionate number of Hispanics lack health insurance is that many are here illegally, and therefore avoiding a conspicuous paper trail.

These are the things Kerry doesn't tell you. One thing that made me chuckle, though, is that it may come back to haunt him. Right after the debate, one commentator on NBC showed how his health plan will fall well short of covering the 45 million people without health insurance.

The fact remains, the economy is growing at 3.2 percent. We have gained 1.2 million jobs since the beginning of the year. There are only 21 million people without health insurance, most of which are without it by choice and not because they are too poor. The drop in the median household income (3.4 percent) has been lower than in the last 3 recessions (4.7 - 5.4 percent). And the percent of people that live under the poverty line (12.1 percent) is lower than it has been from 1980 to 1998.

They can't dispute the facts so they use statistics instead. As Gregg Easterbrook said, "Torture numbers, and they'll confess to anything."

It's been a while

2004-10-14T08:53:00.000-07:00

Things have been busy. So busy that I haven't been able to keep up much with my blog. My apologies to anyone who has come just to find older information.

Bush Is For Rape!

2004-09-30T10:19:00.000-07:00

Drudge has a quote from Cameron Diaz from the Operah Winfrey show that states that if you don't vote, then rape will be made legal.

CAMERON DIAZ ELECTION SCARE: 'IF YOU THINK RAPE SHOULD BE LEGAL, THEN DON'T VOTE'
Thu Sep 30 2004 12:12:11 ET

On Oprah's Wednesday 'voting party' show featuring important celebrities like P. Diddy (Vote or Die!), Drew Barrymore and Christina Aguilera, svelte suffragette Cameron Diaz took to shock tactics to get the female vote out.

After a discussion with Oprah on lynching and the vote, Diaz spoke of the dire consequences for women if they sit out this election:

Ms. DIAZ: We have a voice now, and we're not using it, and women have so much to lose. I mean, we could lose the right to our bodies. We could lo--if you think that rape should be legal, then don't vote. But if you think that you have a right to your body, and you have a right to say what happens to you and fight off that danger of losing that, then you should vote, and those are the...

WINFREY: It's your voice.

Ms. DIAZ: It's your voice. It's your voice, that's your right.

Is she insane? Is this what the democrats have been reduced to doing to get people to vote for John Kerry? Do they really think that people are so stupid that they'll believe anyone is for legalizing rape. But that's what they have now. They can throw lies out and see if enough sticks to either get people to vote for Kerry or not show up to the polls out of fear. Truly despicable.

Mexico Wants Open Border

2004-09-27T09:53:00.000-07:00

The Washington Times has a report concerning Mexico's new "border czar". Arturo Gonzalez Cruz, from Tijuana, would like to see the border between the US and Mexico to be open like the borders within the EU.

"I would like to see a border similar to the one that Europe has right now ... where they have common, very common objectives," he recently told reporters in Tijuana. "They have a common economy. They have policies that transcend their borders where they work with them to get it."

Of course Mexico wants an open border. That would improve Mexico and it's citizens immensely, but what will it do to the American economy? Can we rely on Mexico to make sure terrorists can't get into Mexico and therefore come into the United States? Can Mexico guarantee that it's political corruption won't bring down the economies of all three nations? Can Mexico guarantee that drug trafficking won't run rampant between the two nations? I'm sorry, but what's good for Mexico isn't always good for the US.

We Weren't Wrong, Just Mistaken

2004-09-20T09:33:00.000-07:00

Drudge reports a statement from Dan Rather concerning the forged memos.

EXCLUSIVE // Mon Sep 20 2004 11:58:02 ET
STATEMENT FROM DAN RATHER:

Last week, amid increasing questions about the authenticity of documents used in support of a 60 MINUTES WEDNESDAY story about President Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard, CBS News vowed to re-examine the documents in question - and their source - vigorously. And we promised that we would let the American public know what this examination turned up, whatever the outcome.

Now, after extensive additional interviews, I no longer have the confidence in these documents that would allow us to continue vouching for them journalistically. I find we have been misled on the key question of how our source for the documents came into possession of these papers. That, combined with some of the questions that have been raised in public and in the press, leads me to a point where - if I knew then what I know now - I would not have gone ahead with the story as it was aired, and I certainly would not have used the documents in question.

But we did use the documents. We made a mistake in judgment, and for that I am sorry. It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism.

Please know that nothing is more important to us than people's trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully.

So trying to not admit that they were wrong to do it, they say that they aren't convinced that the memos are authentic, but it's ok, because they have a "tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism." So it's ok to slander the President of the United States as long as you have a tradition of it. Well Dan Rather definitely has a tradition of slandering the Bush family without fear or favoritism. If they were misled, then they need to expose the source. Why are they protecting this source? Makes you wonder....

GOOD LINKS:

Powerline
Captain's Quarters

UPDATE:

Bill Burkett has come forward and claimed that he was the source for CBS News but he doesn't claim to be the original source. Burkett said that he misled CBS Producers in order to protect the source. Here's the kicker, though. Burkett refuses to release his source. So CBS probably hopes that this gets them off the hook to release their source, yet the original source is still safely anonymous. CBS shouldn't have relied on a 2nd or 3rd hand source in the first place. They've lost credibility.

Marian Carr Knox Says Memos are Fakes

2004-09-16T10:03:00.000-07:00

Last night on 60 minutes, Rather interviewed Knox, Killian's secretary during the time of Bush's Guard service. While through most of the whole interview, Knox was very negative about Bush, she did say that she did not type the memos and that the wording within the memos were more in line with Army rather than Air National Guard.

Even someone that is admittedly anti-Bush, won't authenticate the memos. It's incredible that CBS still stands by the memos.

Rather Wants to Break the Story

2004-09-16T09:44:00.000-07:00

The Washington Post interviewed Dan Rather yesterday. They quote Rather saying:

"If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story," Rather said in an interview last night. "Any time I'm wrong, I want to be right out front and say, 'Folks, this is what went wrong and how it went wrong.' "

Somebody needs to tell Rather that this story was already broke by the blogosphere shortly after the memos were released.

CBS Feeling the Effects

2004-09-16T09:21:00.000-07:00

Drudge is reporting that CBS has plummeted in every one of the top 10 markets in the country by as much as 6 to 1.

"The audience appears to [be] polarized," a top CBS source said from LOS ANGELES on Thursday. "Rightly or wrongly, we're being perceived as 'anti-Bush,' which I do not think is fair to Dan, who is a fine journalist... of course we do not like to see the ratings coming back the way they are this week."

Well, if the shoe fits....

Nevermind Whether They're Authentic, Answer the Charge!

2004-09-15T16:30:00.000-07:00

The New York Observer (via Drudge) quotes Dan Rather saying:

"With respect: answer the questions," said Dan Rather, the CBS News anchor. He was asking a direct question to President George W. Bush, his re-election campaign and his political allies in the press and on the Web. "We've heard what you have to say about the documents and what you've said and what your surrogates have said, but for the moment, answer the questions.

"I say that with respect," he added. "They'd be a lot stronger in their campaign if they did do that...."

"It's never been fully, completely denied by the Bush-Cheney campaign or even the White House that he was suspended for meeting the standards of the Air Force or that he didn't show up for a physical," he said. "The longer we go without a denial of such things - this story is true."

So let me get this straight. Anybody can come and and make any charges against the president. They can create whatever documents that suit them. They can say anything they want. They can make whatever lie furthers their cause and regardless of the authenticity of the sources, they can demand that the president answers the charges. We have all of the military records. We know that Bush was honorably discharged and that he had glowing comments made about him in the official record. What more can be said? Rather thinks that he's above actually having to bring up authentic charges against the president. If you ask me, that doesn't take courage. That takes a lack of good sense. As we all know, the truthfulness of the charge doesn't matter, it's the seriousness of the charge.

GOOD LINKS:

Powerline
Captain's Quarters
Wizbang

CBS Makes Statement on Memos

2004-09-15T16:23:00.000-07:00

Drudge placed the quote from CBS President, Andrew Heyward, concerning the Bush memos.

"We established to our satisfaction that the memos were accurate or we would not have put them on television. There was a great deal of corroborating [sic] evidence from people in a position to know. Having said that, given all the questions about them, we believe we should redouble our efforts to answer those questions, so that's what we are doing."

CBS has decided that, apparently, it's not important whether the memos were forgeries or not, the information within them was accurate. Note that they used the word accurate instead of authentic. They are going to hang on and hope that by not admitting their forged, they can make people believe in them whether they are authentic or not. CBS has lost all credibility in this and I wouldn't be surprised if a federal inquiry doesn't get into this.

GOOD LINKS:

Powerline
Captain's Quarters
Wizbang

CBS Document Examiners Say They Were Forgeries

2004-09-15T09:18:00.000-07:00

ABCNews.com is reporting that two of the document experts CBS hired to authenticate the Bush National Guard memos have come forward saying that they had told CBS that they were not authentic.

Emily Will, a veteran document examiner from North Carolina, told ABC News she saw problems right away with the one document CBS hired her to check the weekend before the broadcast.

"I found five significant differences in the questioned handwriting, and I found problems with the printing itself as to whether it could have been produced by a typewriter," she said.

Will says she sent the CBS producer an e-mail message about her concerns and strongly urged the network the night before the broadcast not to use the documents.

"I told them that all the questions I was asking them on Tuesday night, they were going to be asked by hundreds of other document examiners on Thursday if they ran that story," Will said....

The second document examiner hired by CBS News, Linda James of Plano, Texas, also told ABC News she had concerns about the documents and could not authenticate them. She said she expressed her concerns to CBS before the 60 Minutes II broadcast.

"I did not authenticate anything and I don't want it to be misunderstood that I did," James said. "And that's why I have come forth to talk about it because I don't want anybody to think I did authenticate these documents."

CBS had good reason to know that these documents were forgeries. I liked what Emily Will said saying that if they ran the story on Wednesday that hundreds of document examiners would question them on Thursday. CBS didn't count on the blogosphere to keep them honest.

CBS is going to make a statement today concerning the documents and, according to the Wall Street Journal, will bring additional evidence forward. CBS is cornered and just will not relent and so are digging themselves deeper and deeper. The truly sad thing is that they're destroying their credibility and a whole lot of careers for something that people won't even care about when it comes to voting for or against the president. The fact is, people can look at the last four years to see what kind of commander-in-chief he'll be. They don't need to look back at military service from 35 years ago. Bush released all of his military records back in 2000, something Kerry has refused to do, and since there was nothing incriminating there, they have to "discover" new documents saying what they want to them to say to try and discredit him. This may have been useful in the 2000 campaign, but for an incumbent, it's just plain stupid.

CBS can solve this real quick. Name your sources. Produce the original documents and have a panel of independent experts analyze it publicly. Of course, they won't produce the originals because there are no originals.

GOOD LINKS:

Powerline picked this up.

Captains Quarters goes more in depth about the burden of proof of these memos.

Check out The Politburo Diktat and Wizbang too.

CBS Hangs On To Sinking Ship

2004-09-13T10:57:00.000-07:00

CBS News is still standing by its story in spite of mounting evidence that the Bush Memos were forgeries. CBSNews.com had this to say:

In a report on Friday night's "CBS News Evening News," Dan Rather reported that many of those raising questions about the documents have focused on something called superscript, a key that automatically types a raised "th."

Critics claim typewriters didn't have that ability in the 1970s. But some models did, Rather reported. In fact, other Bush military records already released by the White House itself show the same superscript - including one from as far back as 1968.

Some analysts outside CBS say they believe the typeface on these memos is New Times Roman, which they claim was not available in the 1970s.

But the owner of the company that distributes this typing style told CBS News that it has been available since 1931.

In classic coverup fashion, they represent only half the critiques and resolve them and then just not mention the rest. For example, the issue isn't that the font, New Times Roman, wasn't around in the 70s, it was the fact that most typewriters didn't have the ability to use it, not being a fixed width font. If CBS wants to truly get to the bottom of this, as a news agency should want, they should release the documents, release the names of the people that authenticated it, and release the source.

Nevertheless, in the end, it doesn't matter. We are trying to determine who would be a good president. With Bush, we know what kind of president he would be. We've seen him for the past 4 years. With Kerry, we're guessing. We have to take what we know about him from his past to try and determine whether he would be better than the sitting president. That's what makes Kerry's voting record relevant. That's what makes his service relevant. That's what makes his past statements relevant. This smear on Bush using forged documents is just trying to cloud the issues, the very thing Kerry claims he's trying to focus on.

GOOD LINKS:

Powerline has so many posts about this, I'll just link the main site.

Blogs For Bush lists experts that claim they are forgeries.

Captains Quarters claims that Dan Rather thinks the memos are forged as well.

Yes, Senator Kerry, But What Will You Do?

2004-09-13T09:18:00.000-07:00

Time Online has the transcript of an interview with John Kerry. Here are some excerpts:

We can do a better job at homeland security. I can fight a more effective war on terror....

We have a health-care plan for all Americans. We're going to stop subsidizing jobs that go overseas and create jobs here in America. We're going to fund education and not leave millions of children behind every day....

I will pursue a far more aggressive, proactive statesmanship role to bring countries to our side in an effort in which they have an interest....

I believe very deeply that it takes a new President, a new credibility, a fresh start, to change the whole equation in Iraq. I will get countries involved in ways that the President doesn't have them involved today, and I will get our troops home....

I won't cede our security to any institution, but I know how to reach out to countries and leaders and build bipartisan-support structures necessary to strengthen the country.....

But what's important here is that I can fight a more effective war on terror.....

And it just goes on and on from there. Kerry is very good at being broad and saying he would do a better job but doesn't say how and why he would be better at it. It's time for Kerry to be "crystal clear" on these things and actually share his secret plans with the rest of us so we can judge it upon its merits. Until then, he's a complete unknown.

Forgeries Came From Kerry Campaign

2004-09-10T09:35:00.000-07:00

American Spectator writes about the source of the documents coming from the Kerry Campaign. Drudge linked to this article and subsequently took their server down. I'll copy the article here and highlight the parts that are the most interesting.

Washington Prowler
Anatomy of a Forgery
By The Prowler
Published 9/10/2004 12:09:06 AM

More than six weeks ago, an opposition research staffer for the Democratic National Committee received documents purportedly written by President George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard squadron commander, the late Col. Jerry Killian.

The oppo researcher claimed the source was "a retired military officer." According to a DNC staffer, the documents were seen by both senior staff members at the DNC, as well as the Kerry campaign.

"More than a couple people heard about the papers," says the DNC staffer. "I've heard that they ended up with the Kerry campaign, for them to decide to how to proceed, and presumably they were handed over to 60 Minutes, which used them the other night. But I know this much. When there was discussion here, there were doubts raised about their authenticity."

The concerns arose from the sourcing. "It wasn't clear that our source for the documents would have had access to them. Our person couldn't confirm from what file, from what original source they came from."

The documents that CBS News used were not documents from any of Bush's personnel files from his time in the National Guard. Rather, CBS News stated that they were documents uncovered in the personnel files of Killian. That would explain why the White House or the Pentagon had never before released or even seen them.

According to a Kerry campaign source, there was little gossip about the supposedly hot documents inside the office of the campaign on McPherson Square. "Those documents were not something anyone was talking about or trying to generate buzz on," says the staffer. "It wasn't like there were small groups of people talking about this as a bombshell. I think people here weren't sure what to make of it, because provenance of these documents was uncertain."

A CBS producer, who initially tipped off The Prowler about the 60 Minutes story, says that despite seeking professional assurances that the documents were legitimate, there was uncertainty even among the group of producers and researchers working on the story.

"The problem was we had one set of documents from Bush's file that had Killian calling Bush 'an exceptionally fine young officer and pilot.' And someone who Killian said 'performed in an outstanding manner.' Then you have these new documents and the tone and content are so different."

The CBS producer said that some alarms bells went off last week when the signatures and initials of Killian on the documents in hand did not match up with other documents available on the public record, but producers chose to move ahead with the story. "This was too hot not to push. If there were doubts, those people didn't show it," says the producer, who works on a rival CBS News program.

Now, the producer says, there is growing concern inside the building on 57th Street that they may have been suckered by the Kerry campaign. "There is a school of thought here that the Kerry people dumped this in our laps, figuring we'd do the heavy lifting on the story. That maybe they had doubts about these documents but hoped we'd get more information," says the producer. "If that's the case, then we're bigger fools than we already appear to be judging by all the chatter about how these documents could be forgeries."

ABC News' political unit held a conference call at 7:00 p.m. Thursday evening to discuss the memo and its potential ramifications should the documents turn out to be a forgery. That meeting took place around the time that the deceased Killian's son made public statements questioning the documents' authenticity.

According to one ABC News employee, some reporters believe that the Kerry campaign as well as the DNC were parties in duping CBS, but a smaller segment believe that both the DNC and the Kerry campaign were duped by Karl Rove, who would have engineered the flap to embarrass the opposition.

The DNC and the Kerry campaign obtained (produced?) these documents and suspected they were forgeries. They sent them to CBS and CBS suspected they were forgeries but went ahead with the story anyway because "This was too hot not to push." They probably figured nobody would check them on it anyway. They didn't count on the new media to debunk this the way that it did.

I think it's interesting that it is apparently illegal for campaigns to coordinate with 527 groups but it's just fine for them to coordinate with networks and news organizations.

GOOD LINKS:
Powerline, of course.

CBS News backpedaling

2004-09-10T08:50:00.000-07:00

Drudge reported last night that sources have told him that CBS is launching an internal investigation to get to the bottom of the forged documents.

CBS NEWS executives have launched an internal investigation into whether its premiere news program 60 MINUTES aired fabricated documents relating to Bush's National Guard service, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

"The reputation and integrity of the entire news division is at stake, if we are in error, it will be corrected," a top CBS source explained late Thursday.

The source, who asked not to be named, described CBSNEWS anchor and 60 MINUTES correspondent Dan Rather as being privately "shell-shocked" by the increasing likelihood that the documents in question were fraudulent.

Rather, who anchored the segment presenting new information on the president's military service, will personally correct the record on-air, if need be, the source explained from New York.

I especially liked the quote about Rather being "shell-shocked". They're in trouble and they know it. They ran with a story without checking the authenticity of it. They claimed that they did but it's very apparent that they didn't. I'm sure they'll come out with some plausible reason why they were duped but it'll have to be some spin artist to make this one ok. Rather and CBS News has proven itself, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they are nothing more than a bunch of partisans out to try and help Kerry in his campaign. Their credibility is lost. Just because they don't operate under the 527 law doesn't mean they aren't any better than moveon.org or any of the others, they're just sneakier about it.

GOOD LINKS:
This story, of course, has been Powerline's baby and they're keeping close tabs on it.

Captain's Quarters is following the story.

And, of course, Blogs For Bush

60 Minutes Document a Probable Fake

2004-09-09T13:53:00.000-07:00

60 Minutes did a whole show on some supposed personal memos stating that Bush had served dishonorably in the Air National Guard. Now first of all, why did 60 minutes rush to air with these documents when not a word is said about the Swiftboat Vets for Truth's charges against Kerry.

Little Green Footballs did a little investigative work of his own. He typed out the text of one of the memos using all defaults and Times New Roman font on his Microsoft Office 2004 and then compared it to the memo from 60 Minutes. Here they are.

Original:

Office 2004:

They have identical spacing. The only difference is the "th" that is raised (something impossible to do with typewriters of the time) is slightly higher in the original but upon printing, the raised "th" matched. Then the two were superimposed.

Superimposed:

Can there be any doubt? It's amazing that 60 minutes couldn't detect a forgery (a poor and sloppy one at that) but it took about a day for this to come out in the bloggosphere.

The thing is, why does any of this matter? What is the point? Kerry has made his Vietnam service a centerpiece of his campaign. Kerry is saying that we should vote for him because he served bravely in Vietnam and therefore can be Commander-In-Chief. He doesn't want you to look at his voting record of the past 30 years because that tells a different story. He wants everyone to focus on his war record only. That is what has brought the Swiftboats Vets out against him. Bush has never stood on his National Guard service. In fact, he's even admitted that when he was young and foolish, he was indeed young and foolish and did a lot of things he wasn't proud of but he's a different man. He's changed. We can look back and Bush's last 4 years and tell what kind of president he'll be for the next 4 years. That's what's most important in looking at Bush's past. With Kerry we should look at his record too, but he'll try and divert you from that every time in favor of his Vietnam record, which we're finding out, wasn't that great either.

GOOD LINKS:
Powerline has been following this quite closely.

Captains Quarters has posted about this.

Blogs For Bush is also following it.

Cheney Tells It How It Is....Kerry-Edwards Can't Take It

2004-09-08T14:07:00.000-07:00

I've noticed that the only think Kerry and Edwards can do when they can't answer a charge is to scream that they're being called unamerican and unpatriotic. Cheney, in typical Cheney fashion, was direct and to the point on the difference between how the two candidates will fight the war on terror. The New York Times reported:

Cheney was campaigning Tuesday in Des Moines, Iowa, when he suggested the United States, if Kerry were elected, would risk falling back into a ``pre-9/11 mind-set'' that terrorist attacks are criminal acts that require a reactive approach. Bush's offensive approach works to root out terrorists where they plan and train, he said.

He also made this comment:

``It's absolutely essential that eight weeks from today, on Nov. 2, we make the right choice, because if we make the wrong choice then the danger is that we'll get hit again and we'll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States.''

Here's the only way Edwards and Kerry know how to respond. Edwards said:

``This statement by the vice president of the United States was intended to divide us,'' Edwards said. ``It was calculated to divide us on an issue of safety and security for the American people. It's wrong and it's un-American.''

They know that Cheney is right. They will be weak in standing up to terrorism. They know that they'll treat it more like a law-enforcement exercise rather than a war. They know that they'll pander to Europe for permission in order to do anything to defend ourselves. Most importantly, they know that the American people don't agree with that and so they do the only thing they can. Scream how Bush/Cheney aren't playing fair and that they're breaching topics that are off-limits. Is this who we want as the leader of the free world?

National Sales Tax Mulled

2004-09-08T13:07:00.000-07:00

After Bush mentioned a simplification of the tax code in his acceptance speech, a national sales tax is starting to get more attention and more support within congress. Foxnews.com discusses this proposal.

Under Linder's plan, the national sales tax would be set at 23 percent, which he claims would be enough to replace the funds that the canceled payroll tax would have raised. The national sales tax would be in addition to the average 6.2 percent state sales tax that people already pay.

Linder said low-income Americans would benefit the most because they would receive a rebate or "prebate" for the new 23 percent sales tax. Linder's plan would abolish the IRS, creating in essence, he said, a $3 trillion to $5 trillion tax cut. The states would then be responsible for distributing these funds.

I've discussed this before in this post, Make April 15th just another day. We are overdue for an absolutely simple tax code saving billions of dollars in inefficiencies.

Boing!

2004-09-03T15:18:00.000-07:00

In spite of all the political analysts leading up to the Republican Convention claiming that there was little room for a bounce, Time has come out with the first poll after the convention giving Bush a 52% to 41% (Nader had 3%) lead over Kerry, the largest lead since it became a 2-man race.

For the first time since the Presidential race became a two person contest last spring, there is a clear leader, the latest TIME poll shows. If the 2004 election for President were held today, 52% of likely voters surveyed would vote for President George W. Bush, 41% would vote for Democratic nominee John Kerry, and 3% would vote for Ralph Nader, according to a new TIME poll conducted from Aug. 31 to Sept. 2.

Now this was while the convention was still going on. I'll be waiting to see the polls starting after the convention ended to get a clearer look. At any rate, people are beginning to see a clear distinction between the two candidates and they like Bush better. Bush is a straight shooter. He stands up for what he believes in and the people always knows where he stands and, frankly, he's just plain likeable. This will go a long way with the people come November.

I saw this originally on Instapundit via Powerline.

GOOD LINKS:
Blogs For Bush mentions this as breaking news.

Kerry Fights Back

2004-09-03T11:33:00.000-07:00

John Kerry, not willing to wait more than an hour after the end of the Republican National Convention, made spoke in Ohio, finally itemizing some of the things he's going to work for as President.

To paraphrase Kerry, if you like the direction the country is heading, vote for President Bush. If you think Kerry can do better, vote for him. Seems simple enough.

If you are for protectionism and a decrease in how effectively American companies can compete, vote for Kerry.

If you are for the government simplifying regulations and getting out of companies' way so they can succeed and not be handicapped by the government, vote for Bush.

If you are for highly regulated and/or socialized health industry, vote for Kerry.

If you are for bringing health costs down through tort reform maintaining our superiority in health care, vote for Bush.

If you are for complicating the tax code even more and making sure the wealthier half of Americans pay even more taxes, vote for Kerry.

If you are for lower taxes for EVERYONE and a simplified tax code, vote for Bush.

If you are for continuous pandering to certain European countries for permission to defend itself, vote for Kerry.

If you are for America being in charge of its own defense, regardless of the opinions of other nations that do not have our best interests at heart, vote for Bush.

To me it's pretty clear. I think I'll go ahead and take John Kerry's advise and vote for Bush.

GOOD LINKS:

Blogs For Bush makes some final comments on Bush's plans.

Captain's Quarters as well.

Powerline has a nice play by play of Bush's speech as it was happening.

Generation Why?, as always, good analysis

Kerry: Let's Focus On The Issues....No Wait!

2004-09-02T12:04:00.000-07:00

With the Swiftboat Vets coming hard at John Kerry and his campaign, the thing you hear from Kerry and his supporters the most is that we should focus on the issues. Well, last night at the Republican National Convention, Zell Miller decided to focus on the issues. I think everyone should read his speech, or better yet, see his speech. It is truly an impassioned speech from a Democrat that has watched his party walk away from his core values to pander and sell itself to special interest groups. You can read the speech here or view it here if you click the "video" tab on the right. Here are a couple of my favorite excerpts:

It is not their patriotism - it is their judgment that has been so sorely lacking. They claimed Carter's pacifism would lead to peace.

They were wrong.

They claimed Reagan's defense buildup would lead to war.

They were wrong.

And, no pair has been more wrong, more loudly, more often than the two Senators from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy and John Kerry.

Together, Kennedy/Kerry have opposed the very weapons system that won the Cold War and that is now winning the War on Terror.

....

This is the man who wants to be the Commander in Chief of our U.S. Armed Forces?

U.S. forces armed with what? Spitballs?

Twenty years of votes can tell you much more about a man than twenty weeks of campaign rhetoric.

Campaign talk tells people who you want them to think you are. How you vote tells people who you really are deep inside.

....

John Kerry, who says he doesn't like outsourcing, wants to outsource our national security.

That's the most dangerous outsourcing of all. This politician wants to be leader of the free world.

....

In this hour of danger our President has had the courage to stand up. And this Democrat is proud to stand up with him.

The whole thing is fantastic.

GOOD LINKS:

Powerline has three good posts about the reaction to Zell Miller here, here, and here

Captain's Quarters has an excerpt from the Chris Matthews interview with Sen. Miller

Blogs For Bush have their own commentary on the Miller speech.

The Vets Are Back In Town

2004-09-01T13:45:00.000-07:00

The Swiftboat Vets are back with another ad. Check it out here.

The Swiftees have also given Kerry a way out of their onslaught. On the front page of their site they have posted a letter to Kerry on how to get them to stop their ads.

We urge you to:

1. Apologize for your conduct once you returned from Vietnam. Your exaggerated testimony before the US Senate; the blanket indictment of your fellow veterans; throwing away medals and ribbons; all of these actions dishonored America and the armed forces. Your rhetoric and actions were not only wrong, they aided the enemy and brought great pain to POW's, veterans and their families.

2. Clarify the conflicting accounts involving the Bay Hap River incident of March 13, 1969 (Bronze Star and 3rd Purple Heart). You have now described three different versions of this incident. In the first version of this incident presented during the Democrat National Convention, you stated: "No man left behind," suggesting to the American people that you alone stayed on the river to rescue Mr. Rassmann. Later, when forced to acknowledge conflicting eyewitness testimony from fellow swift boat veterans, you said that your boat left the scene to return moments later to retrieve Jim Rassmann from the water. Yet, in another version of the same incident discovered in the Congressional Record, you reported that your boat struck a mine and Rassmann fell off the boat. Mr. Kerry, please explain to your fellow veterans and the American people which version is the truth.

3. Affirm that the injuries for which you received your purple hearts never required any medical treatment beyond perhaps a bandage and that, in all instances, these injuries were self-inflicted and came from your own weapon. Further, that if any of these purple hearts were falsely awarded, that you would not have been eligible to leave Vietnam after serving only four months.

4. Acknowledge what your own biographer is now saying, that the Christmas in Cambodia claim is "obviously wrong," that you were never in Cambodia over Christmas or any other time during your brief, four-month tour in Vietnam and that your statements before the United States Senate in 1986 were false.

I wonder what Kerry will choose to do. He's already tried to call members of the group to see what he can do to stop the ads but I doubt he's willing to do this. Kerry has already announced some new campaign advisers to help with his sinking boat. Kerry's going to try and weather this storm which will keep the Swiftees on the attack until November. Maybe eventually people will see the person that wants to be the leader of the free world for who he really is.

I'm Back From Vacation

2004-09-01T13:42:00.000-07:00

Well, after a week in Seattle, I'm back from vacation. It was a nice rest and I enjoyed myself with my family. Much has happened since last week so lets get back to it....

I'm Melting...Melting...Melting

2004-08-24T10:39:00.000-07:00

Captain's Quarters reports that Fox News' Major Garrett reported that Kerry may have admitted that his first Purple Heart could have been from a self-inflicted wound.

GARRETT: And questions keep coming. For example, Kerry received a Purple Heart for wounds suffered on December 2nd, 1968. But an entry in Kerry's own journal written nine days later, he writes that, quote, he and his crew hadn't been shot at yet, unquote. Kerry's campaign has said it is possible his first Purple Heart was awarded for an unintentionally self-inflicted wound.

I really feel for the people working on the Kerry campaign. It seems they're kept in the dark and then when are pressed hard (ie on the Christmas in Cambodia story and now this) they're forced to guess at his web of lies. It's interesting that they're not exactly sure but said it was possible that the Purple Heart was awarded for a self-inflicted wound. Kerry lies and leaves his campaign workers flapping in the wind.

Kerry Works On Damage Control

2004-08-24T10:22:00.000-07:00

Drudge is reporting that Kerry telephoned Robert "Friar Tuck" Brant Cdr., USN (RET) Sunday to try and smooth things over with the Swiftboat Vets.

Dem presidential hopeful John Kerry personally phoned anti-Kerry swift boat vets, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

Kerry reached out to Robert "Friar Tuck" Brant Cdr., USN (RET) Sunday night, just hours after former Sen. Bob Dole publicly challenged Kerry to apologize to veterans.

Brant was skipper of the #96 and # 36 boat and spent time with Kerry in An Thoi. Kerry and Brant slept in the same quarters, and Brant used to put Kerry back to bed at night when Kerry was sleepwalking.

Brant received a call from Kerry at his home in Virginia while he was watching the Olympics on TV.

The call lasted 10 minutes, sources tell DRUDGE.

KERRY: "Why are all these swift boat guys opposed to me?"

BRANT: "You should know what you said when you came back, the impact it had on the young sailors and how it was disrespectful of our guys that were killed over there."

[Brant had two men killed in battle.]

KERRY: "When we dedicated swift boat one in '92, I said to all the swift guys that I wasn't talking about the swifties, I was talking about all the rest of the veterans."

Kerry then asked if he could meet Brant ["You were one of the best"] -- man to man -- face to face.

Brant declined the invite, explaining that Kerry was obviously not prepared to correct the record on exactly what happened during Vietnam and what happened when Kerry came back.

Developing...

This goes to show just how damaging the Swiftboat Vets have been to the Kerry campaign. Kerry is doing everything within his power short of a public setting of the record straight to get these guys to stand down. Fortunately the vets are standing their ground and will not stop until nothing less then publicly setting the record straight, which I doubt Kerry will ever do. You have to hand it to these guys. They have caught a lot of heat for standing up and exercising their right to free speech. They have practicly been crucified by the press. They've been called liars and lackeys of the Bush campaign but they have stood their ground. In the 60's and 70's they were called on by their country to defend her and they did so bravely. They seem to be still doing just that.

Not surprisingly, Powerline, Captain's Quarters, and Blogs For Bush all have their take on this.

New Ad by the Swiftboat Vets

2004-08-23T10:17:00.000-07:00

The Swiftees have released another ad. You can view it at their site. The Kerry claims that it's part of a smear campaign coordinated with the Bush campaign.

I viewed the ad on Friday. It has audio from John Kerry's testimony before the Senate in 1971 about the atrocities that Vietnam Vets had been accused of committing. Between audio clips were members of their group stating what his testimony did to their morale especially those in the prison camps.

Kerry is livid. He's attacking this every way he can think of. He's filed a complaint with the FEC that Bush is coordinating with this independent group. He's calling on the president to denounce the group and their ads. Bush has denounced all 527 groups. He's always maintained the position that they shouldn't be a part of the election. He's been consistent on this.

Kerry wants him to denounce this particular group because of how damaging it is to him. Bush won't do it and why should he? Bush has been the victim of millions of dollars worth of 527 propaganda and hasn't said a word about it. He's never called on Kerry to denounce those ads. Apparently, it is now a requirement for Republicans to endorse or denounce every independent ad slated against the Democratic candidate while the Democrats can put out anything they want. They want it all their way because only then can they have a chance at winning elections.

UPDATE: As always, Captain Ed has a great take on this on Blogs for Bush and Captains Quarters

UPDATE: Powerline too

Iraqi Weapons Scientists Being Picked Off

2004-08-23T10:08:00.000-07:00

The Washington Times reports:

Anti-coalition forces have killed a prominent Iraqi chemical-weapons scientist whom U.S. investigators were questioning at Abu Ghraib prison, in an attempt to unravel the mysteries of Saddam Hussein's arsenal.

The scientist's death is not the first such killing, and it has some U.S. analysts wondering whether there is a pattern and also whether the Iraqi insurgents had incredibly good intelligence and a deadly aim — or were just lucky.....

The death is at least the fourth hostile-fire killing of Iraqi scientists who had been talking to the ISG. There have been press reports that as many as nine have been slain.

One of the country's most prominent nuclear scientists, Majid Hussein Ali, was found dead earlier this year, shot twice in the back. He had been questioned by the ISG.

It doesn't prove anything, of course, but it sure is interesting.

Hilarious

2004-08-20T15:48:00.000-07:00

Powerline posted this one

Kerry Begins To Melt

2004-08-20T15:39:00.000-07:00

Drudge has just updated his site.

Apparently Kerry has filed a complaint with FEC against the Bush campaign claiming that the Swiftboat Vets For Truth ad was put out in connection with the Bush campaign, which is illegal for a 527 group to do.

I think Kerry is finally starting to melt down. By doing this, Kerry probably hopes to cast a sinister shadow on the Bush campaign of illegal activity but what he's going to end up doing is putting more light on the Swiftboat ads then they had before. With this complaint being filed, the mainstream media is going to have to pay more attention to these men's claims. More people are going to look at the situation and think, "If they are truly lies, why is Kerry trying so hard to shut them down any way he can."

It's funny how a former Vietnam war protester that values free speech so much can work so hard to deprive others of the same right.

UPDATE: Blogs For Bush comments on how Kerry's campaign isn't exactly clean in its ties with 527s

Kerry Bans Books

2004-08-20T11:21:00.000-07:00

Powerline comments on an article from Drudge saying that the Kerry campaign is trying to get Unfit for Command banned from being published.

From Drudge:

The Kerry campaign calls on a publisher to 'withdraw book' written by group of veterans, claiming veterans are lying about Kerry's service in Vietnam and operating as a front organization for Bush. Kerry campaign has told Salon.com that the publisher of UNFIT FOR COMMAND is 'retailing a hoax'... 'No publisher should want to be selling books with proven falsehoods in them,' Kerry campaign spokesman Chad Clanton tells the online mag... Developing...

Democrats scream about radio stations and consumers boycotting their products as an infringement on their first amendment rights. Here's a member of the federal government doing everything he can to prevent the publishing of a book that paints him unfavorable. Maybe Chavez in Venezuela has a place for Kerry in his government after November.

UPDATE: Blogsforbush picked this up too.

Vets combat Kerry and it's Bush's fault?

2004-08-20T09:37:00.000-07:00

Kerry is doing damage control. He's getting accused by over 250 Vietnam vets, members of Swiftboat Vets For Truth, that he has repeatedly lied about his Vietnam service which Kerry has made a central focus in his campaign. At first he ignored them but now that they're having an effect, he blames Bush for it. What?

Washington Times wrote today:

John Kerry yesterday accused Vietnam veterans who say he didn't deserve his combat decorations of lying and blamed President Bush for not denouncing their television commercials laying out their charges....

Mr. Kerry yesterday aimed most of his fire at the president. "If he wants to have a debate about our service in Vietnam, here is my answer: Bring it on."....

Now let me get this straight. Vets attack his service claims, and he want Bush to debate him? Bush has never said anything about his service in spite of the substantial evidence against Kerry. Bush has denounced 527 groups, which Swiftboat Vets For Truth is, and thinks that they are merely soft money that should be banned while Kerry thinks 527 groups are just fine...unless they're against him.

Both Mr. Kerry and Mr. Bush have said the other served honorably during Vietnam - Mr. Bush in the Texas Air National Guard, assigned to duty in the United States - but others have questioned the service of both men.

White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan yesterday said Mr. Kerry's attempts to tie Mr. Bush to the ads were "false and baseless." He would not specifically denounce the Swift boat ad, and repeated the White House assertion that all ads paid for by "soft money," large unregulated contributions to tax-exempt "527" organizations, should end.

"Senator Kerry should join us in calling for an end to all this soft money," Mr. McClellan said. "Senator Kerry has declined to do so. The president has been on the receiving end of more than $62 million in negative false attacks from these shadowy groups."

This is classic Kerry not wanting to take responsibility for what he says and does and if someone ever questions him on it, he blames someone else. Do we want a Commander-In-Chief where the buck stops nowhere?

UPDATE: Generation Why? takes part in this discussion as well and makes some excellent points.

O'Neill OpEd part 3

2004-08-20T09:22:00.000-07:00

Part 3 of John O'Neill's OpEd is in the Washington Times today. He summarizes his feelings in the last two paragraphs:

John Kerry's name tossed around as "president" and "commander in chief" summoned many of us Swiftees from long political slumber - from games with grandchildren or feet by the fire - to render one last service to the nation.

That service is the hard task of informing an uninformed America - against the wishes of a media sympathetic to Kerry and his myth - of John Kerry's total unfitness to command our armed forces or lead our nation. We are our own small "band of brothers," resolved to sound the alarm.

It's criminal how these men are being treated simply because they oppose John Kerry. The media invites them to their shows simply to shout them down and not let them make their points. John Kerry and the DNC threaten them and television stations with lawsuits if they run their ads. Bookstores refuse to carry O'Neill's book even though it's number one on Amazon and number 2 on the New York Times best selling list. Do we forget that these men are war heroes too? Do we forget that they sacrificed for their country? Or is that something that only John Kerry did? Let's show them the respect they deserve.

OpEd by John O'Neill tells all

2004-08-19T12:11:00.000-07:00

John O’Neill, the writer of Unfit For Command and leader of the Swiftboat Vets for Truth, has been writing a 3-part OpEd for the Washington Times that summarizes some of his biggest points of contention with John Kerry’s Vietnam service. One particular section of the article, to me, summarizes things nicely:

Thomas W. Wright, another Swift Boat commander in Coastal Division 11, said Kerry "was not a good combat commander."

Wright said he had such "serious problems" working with Kerry that he finally objected to going on patrol with Kerry. Elliott granted Wright's request that Kerry no longer be assigned to operations under his command.

Wright remembers that Kerry would disappear without warning on multiboat operations. He recalls that Kerry's boat had poor fire discipline and would open fire without prior clearance or apparent reason.

"John Kerry's leadership and operational style were different from mine," Wright said in a written statement in April. "I can see how his crew thought he was a hero, but it seemed like he was a hero fighting out of situations he shouldn't have been in to begin with. I had a lot of trouble getting him to follow orders.

"You had to be right, and you had to have fire discipline. You couldn't blame something on the rules of engagement."

George Bates, another officer in Coastal Division 11, participated in numerous operations with Kerry from January 1969 to March 1969.

In Bates' view, Kerry was a coward who overreacted with deadly force when he felt threatened. Bates, a retired Navy captain, believed that Kerry treated the South Vietnamese in an almost criminal manner.

Bates is haunted by a particular patrol with Kerry on the Song Bo De River in early 1969. With Kerry in the lead, their Swift Boats approached a small hamlet with three to four grass huts. Pigs and chickens were milling around.

As the boats drew closer, the villagers fled. There were no political symbols or flags in evidence. It was obvious to Bates that existing policies, decency and good sense required the boats simply to move on.

Instead, Kerry beached his boat. Upon his command, numerous small animals were slaughtered by heavy-caliber machine guns. Acting more like a pirate than a naval officer, Kerry disembarked and ran around with a Zippo lighter, burning up the entire hamlet.

Bates was appalled by the hypocrisy of Kerry's quick shift to the role of a peace activist condemning war crimes upon his return home. Even today, Bates describes Kerry as a man without a conscience.

Sorry about the length of the selection, but it all fits nicely together. I think this also summarizes why, perhaps, some of the men on his boat seem to think him the hero while most everyone else can see what he really is.

John Kerry won’t tell us much about what he plans to do as president so we have to infer from his past actions how he will be. He apparently doesn’t think things through. He is a knee-jerk leader. He’s doing who-knows-what when he should be taking care of business at hand. And in the end, it’s someone else’s fault when things don’t come out right. That’s definitely who we don’t need as the Commander-in-Chief in the war on terror.

UPDATE: Blogsforbush.com questions Kerry's leadership based on his current reaction to opposition of the swiftboat vets among others.

UPDATE: Captains Quarters criticizes Brinkley for not being the historian he claims to be in regards to the Kerry Vietnam story.

UPDATE: Powerline posts Kerry's defiance of the Swiftboat Vets' story and calls for a debate between him and Bush. Now let me get this straight. John O'Neill challenges his record so he calls for a debate with Bush about it? Weird.

Kerry Criticizes With No Real Alternative

2004-08-18T10:56:00.000-07:00

The Washington Post reports on Kerry's criticizing Bush's plan to reorganize our troops stationed around the world.

"Why are we withdrawing troops from Korea at a time when we are negotiating with North Korea -- a country that really has nuclear weapons?," he asked.

Kerry, making frequent references to his own military service in Vietnam and his membership in the VFW, said, "Nobody wants to bring troops home more than those of us who have fought in foreign wars. But it needs to be done at the right time and in the right way.

"This is not the right time," he said. "The president's plan does not strengthen our hand in the war on terror" and "it in no way relieves the strain" on today's military.

I believe that this redistribution is long overdue. The United States is in the process of rethinking how it handles military conflicts and how to be the most effective with the least number of troops. The stationing of massive amounts of troops at bases around the world worked well for the Cold War, but we're fighting against a different kind of enemy. This enemy is international and can strike anywhere in the world. I heard an interview on the radio over a month ago and I wish I could remember what program and who was being interviewed. The man being interviewed was very high up in the command of the Army. I'll see if I can't track down the person who was speaking and the radio program. He essentially said, when asked if we have enough in the Army to do the jobs required of it, that we have plenty of people in the Army. The problem is that Army personnel are too specialized and are often left home when there is a conflict that doesn't require their specialty. They are going through a restructuring of how the Army does things. Their goal is to train troops in an array of skills and have them much more easily be shipped to where they are need quickly. This seems to be what Bush's plan is. They're going to make them into a leaner meaner fighting force that can be used anywhere in the world and they don't require the maintenance of a huge number of bases scattered all over the world. This is forward thinking. This is what we need in a Commander-In-Chief.

UPDATE: Blogsforbush.com Shows that this is actually a flip flop from a mere 17 days ago. Kerry's only position is the position opposite Bush's position!

UPDATE: Generation Y has some good comments about the flip flop as well.

The Shoe That's On the Other Foot

2004-08-17T10:03:00.000-07:00

The Washington Post reports on MoveOn.org's response to the Swiftboats For Truth ad calling for George W Bush to condemn the ads (which he, incidentally has not sanctioned in any way).

Retired Rear Adm. Roy Hoffmann, founder of the Swift boat group, much of whose funding has come from a Texas developer, said in a statement: "We find it odd that MoveOn PAC would question the right of a group of veterans to voice an opinion on a legitimate issue -- an issue first raised by John Kerry -- and now the centerpiece of his campaign. . . . We will not be silenced."

Asked why Bush should be responsible for an ad by an independent group with the same legal status as MoveOn, Eli Pariser, the PAC's executive director, said: "They're clearly a surrogate organization. The Bush campaign has a responsibility for what's being done on its behalf. Certainly if Kerry felt MoveOn was doing something he didn't agree with, he has every right to condemn our ads."

It's rough when the shoe is on the other foot and you have a 527 making you look like a fool. It goes to show that even people who disagree with you have a right to free speech.

Border Patrol Not Allowed to Deport

2004-08-17T09:33:00.000-07:00

The Washington Times picked up a story that's been around for the last week or so down here in the San Diego area. Apparently the Border Patrol had put together a 12 member "Mobile Patrol Group". This group was charged with picking up illegals within the interior of the country and not just along the Mexican border. The Mobile Patrol Group had picked up about 450 illegals at known public gathering places for illegals, but the Department of Homeland Security has ordered them to desist because they "failed to consider the 'sensitivities' of those detained."

Homeland Security Undersecretary Asa Hutchinson criticized the arrests, saying they had not been approved by officials in Washington and violated U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) policy, the agency that oversees the Border Patrol.

In a letter, Mr. Hutchinson, undersecretary for border and transportation security, assured Rep. Joe Baca, California Democrat — and other members of the state's delegation who complained about the arrests — that in the future, Homeland Security would enforce immigration laws "in a reasonable manner" and would consider the "sensitivities" surrounding the enforcement of those laws in its interior-enforcement program.

The California delegation had described those detained as victims of racial profiling and said the arrests caused panic in the Hispanic community.

Last week there was a townmeeting held in Temecula and I heard parts of it on the radio. It was abundantly obvious that the people attending the townmeeting not only approved of the work of the Mobile Patrol Group but were outraged that they were being forced to stop their activities. Everybody knows where groups of illegals hang out looking for work. There's a bridge that I cross every day on my way to work no more than a couple of miles from my house where 15 or 20 illegal Mexican men wait for someone to stop and offer them work for the day. The Mobile Patrol Group was going to these places and picking up the men on immigration violations.

T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council, which represents the agency's 10,000 nonsupervisory personnel, attended the meeting and called for the arrest of illegal aliens by the patrol in the nation's interior to continue.

"These mobile patrol arrests were actually having an impact in Mexico," said Mr. Bonner, a 26-year Border Patrol veteran. "Word was getting around that you weren't necessarily OK once you got past the border."

Law-enforcement authorities said the California arrests came as a result of intelligence operations that identified locations where suspected illegal aliens were thought to gather. Much of the information, the authorities said, came from local police and residents.

The team targeted illegal aliens at public sites, including bus stops, in a 3,000-square-mile area of Southern California. Some of the arrests were made 100 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border.

Hey, maybe this Mobile Patrol Group should be a model as to how things should be done instead of being ordered to stop activity. Obviously they were effective picking up illegals and having them deported. We have a serious illegal immigration problem in this country and special amnesty programs aren't going to fix it. We need small but highly effective groups rounding these people up and sending them back to where they come from. There are millions of illegals in this country and we have limited resources to enforce immigration, so when someone figures out an effective way to handle it, lets model it, not stomp on it.

Kerry is Still Lying About Cambodia

2004-08-16T15:56:00.000-07:00

A new blogger has just emerged. Thanks to a link from Hugh Hewitt, he's getting a lot of attention. Froggy Ruminations was written by a former Navy Seal whose father was also a Navy Seal in Vietnam in 1970. Here's the end of his post.

In order to get permission to conduct an illegal incursion into Cambodia by Swift boat the following must occur: 1. Extremely fresh intel of a high value target (think U.S. POW, or VC chieftain). 2. Take that intel outside the group and up to intel at a higher level (risking compromise) in order to obtain boat support from the Swifties to go into Cambodia. That is extremely unlikely to the point of absurdity.

Furthermore, neither myself or my father in law knows anyone who was inserted anywhere by a Swift boat during Vietnam. It just wasn't done. It wasn't something SEALs wanted, and it wasn't something Swifties did.

Bottom Line......Kerry is a liar.

Kerry just needs to give up the Cambodia story completely. He has recanted the part about being in Cambodia on Christmas Eve of 1968 but still claims to have taken CIA and Navy Seals into Cambodia in the early part of 1969. No matter how he tries to spin it, he can't come up with a story that gets him out of his previous lies. It's almost pathological. He should just give it up, cut his losses, and move on to November. I think his goal, at this point, is to hope that the mainstream media never picks it up so that most people won't be exposed to these lies. We'll see.

Edwards Stomped on the Little Guy

2004-08-16T15:14:00.000-07:00

The Washington Post reports on the malpractice lawsuits running rampant in Edward's home state of North Carolina and Edward's personal part in the problem.

"The John Edwards we know crushed [obstetrics, gynecology] and neurosurgery in North Carolina," said Dr. Craig VanDerVeer, a Charlotte neurosurgeon. "As a result, thousands of patients lost their health care."

"And all of this for the little people?" he asked, a reference to Mr. Edwards' argument that he represented regular people against mighty foes such as prosperous doctors and big insurance companies. "How many little people do you know who will supply you with $60 million in legal fees over a couple of years?"

We need tort reform right away. I'm not sure why we haven't heard more about it in the past 4 years than we have. I'd like to hear what both candidates have to say about it and make it a central theme in the campaigns. Democrats don't want any changes and if they have to make changes, as ineffective as possible. Republicans have talked about a limit on punitive damage awards.

I agree with the limit on punitive damages, but I don't think it goes far enough. I think that on top of that limit, it should be law that in any case thrown out for being frivolous, the plaintive should be responsible for all court costs. I think that this way, people and their lawyers will at least make sure they have a valid case instead of bringing a case that they know is frivolous in hopes of a quick settlement with the insurance company. Until there is some responsibilities placed on the plaintive, things will only get worse.

WMD in Syria?

2004-08-16T08:50:00.000-07:00

The Washington Times reports that there is evidence, though not proof, that Saddam moved WMD into Syria right before the invasion of Iraq.

Saddam Hussein periodically removed guards on the Syrian border and replaced them with his own intelligence agents who supervised the movement of banned materials between the two countries, U.S. investigators have discovered.

The recent discovery by the Bush administration's Iraq Survey Group (ISG) is fueling speculation, but is not proof, that the Iraqi dictator moved prohibited weapons of mass destruction (WMD) into Syria before the March 2003 invasion by a U.S.-led coalition.

We know that Iraq had WMD. We know that Saddam couldn't account for them in his report that he gave the UN. The question we're trying to figuring out is what happened to them. Did he hide them? Did he send them to Syria? Did he lose them? I think we will find out eventually but probably not for a while. There are lots of documents and intelligence to put together before we'll be able to put the whole picture together.

UPDATE: Powerline mentions this same article.

California Supreme Court Does the Right Thing...For Now

2004-08-13T09:06:00.000-07:00

The Washington Times reported that the California Supreme Court found that Mayor Gavin Newsom had overstepped his mayoral powers in granting more than 4,000 homosexual couples marriage licenses. There's no doubt that the Mayor overstepped his bounds. I don't think anyone really thought that a mayor of any city has the right to change state laws. It was a purely political maneuver. Towards the end of the article (isn't it interesting that the most telling quotes are usually near the end of the article?) the reporter writes this:

When the California Supreme Court agreed to hear the San Francisco case, the justices said they would decide only whether Mr. Newsom overstepped his mayoral powers. But they noted they could also entertain a constitutional challenge -regarding whether homosexual couples should be treated the same as heterosexual couples under the California Constitution - if such a lawsuit were to reach them.

Now this quote from this article was not a direct quote from the justices, but it seems to me by the way that it is worded, that the justices will eventually rule that prohibiting same-sex marriage as unconstitutional. Here's the line that says this:

...regarding whether homosexual couples should be treated the same as heterosexual couples under the California Constitution...

Just the fact that they stated it that there is an unequal treatment between homosexuals and heterosexuals shows what will eventually happen. The thing is, it's backward thinking. There is no equality. Any man has the exact same opportunity to marry any woman that any other man has and the same goes for any woman has the exact same opportunity to marry any man that any other woman has. I understand that this will set homosexuals off because they do not want to marry people of the opposite sex, but that doesn't change the fact that, under the law, they are equal to heterosexuals.

I have no problem with civil unions or other legal contracts between homosexual couples, but lets leave marriage out of it. We do not have to redefine an institution that has been around for thousands of years in just about every society just so that a small group can have their relationships sanctioned by the government. Let them develop their own institution, but leave marriage out of it.

It's My Resignation and I'll Resign When I Want To

2004-08-13T08:48:00.000-07:00

McGreevey, the New Jersey Governor, yesterday, admitted to having an extramarital gay affair and has decided to resign as governor of the state, according to the Washington Times this morning. Apparently the Governor has a lot more problems coming down the pike as well, which is probably more the reason for the resignation than just the affair.

The Democrat said his resignation would be effective Nov. 15, a move that avoids the risk of his party losing the seat in a special election.

Senate President Richard J. Codey, a Democrat, will become acting governor and serve out the remainder of Mr. McGreevey's term, which ends in early 2006.

Had Mr. McGreevey left office before Nov. 15, a special election would have to be called before New Jersey's regular 2005 election.

Former Republican Gov. Christie Whitman said Mr. McGreevey "made a courageous decision" but criticized his wait until Nov. 15, saying it "smacks of politics" and it "would be in the best interests of the state" if he left office immediately.

While it's perfectly legal to resign whenever he wants to resign, if he's going to do it, the sooner the better. It doesn't matter what party he were from, I think that playing politics with your resignation date is not looking out for the best interest of the people of your state. With all of the information on the scandal coming out, New Jersey's going to have a completely useless Governor for the next 4 months. If he would just resign and get it over with, the Lieutenant Governor could take his place until November 15 and get the business of the state done until a new Governor can be elected. The lieutenant Governor taking the place of the Governor is useful in the order of government, but whenever possible the person to take that office should be the person elected to it. It's not right to maneuver so that that doesn't take place.

Update: Captain's Quarters goes more in depth as to why McGreevey decided to resign.

Update: Powerline gives an opinion too.

Kerry lied about Cambodia

2004-08-12T10:38:00.000-07:00

The London Telegraph today reports that the story of Kerry spending Christmas Eve of 1968 in Cambodia was an invention of Kerry.

Michael Meehan, a Kerry campaign adviser, told ABC Television: "The Mekong Delta consists of the border between Cambodia and Vietnam, so on Christmas Eve in 1968, he was in fact on patrol . . . in the Mekong Delta between Cambodia and Vietnam. He was ambushed, they fired back, he was fired upon from both sides, from the Cambodian side of the border and the Vietnam side during that day in 1968."

Who knows if this is in fact true either. Kerry told the Cambodia story on the Senate floor in 1986. This is a credibility issue. Kerry made his Vietnam service a key point in his campaign. If he's lying about this, what else is he lying about?

Update: Powerline has some comments on this as well.

Update: Captain's Quarters has a great post about his pattern of lying.

Is Iran Next?

2004-08-12T10:08:00.000-07:00

The Washington Post reports the increasing danger of Iran developing nuclear weapons.

European countries were as worried by this development as Washington, and because the United States has no relations with Iran, Europe stepped in last fall and negotiated a deal with Tehran. It was an excellent agreement, under which Iran pledged to stop developing fissile material (the core ingredient of a nuclear bomb) and to keep its nuclear program transparent. The only problem is, Iran has recently announced that it isn't going to abide by the deal. As the IAEA's investigation became more serious, Tehran became more secretive. One month ago the agency condemned Iran for its failure to cooperate. Tehran responded by announcing that it would resume work in prohibited areas....

In the face of these stark dangers, Europe seems remarkably passive. Having burst into action last fall, it does not seem to know what to do now that Iran has rebuffed its efforts. It is urging negotiations again, which is fine. But what will it tell Iran in these negotiations? What is the threat that it is willing to wield?

Europe isn't willing to put its money where its mouth is. The European Union wants to simply play negotiating games and to ask real nice that other nations behave. What does this all remind us of? Didn't Europe learn anything from World War II? The US can't be the loan enforcer of the world. Europe is going to have to step up or else another huge crisis will develop within the next few years.

Little Is Worst Than Big

2004-08-11T14:09:00.000-07:00

Captain's Quarters posted a New York Times article reporting that the police had picked up an illegal Pakistani immigrant who had made some very unusual video tapes of places in the South. Ever since the 9/11 attacks, I've always thought that if the terrorists tried to take out a target in a small town, it would do something much worst than large targets. It would show the American people that nobody is safe. It isn't just those that work in tall buildings in big cities. It isn't just those that work in Washington D.C. Anybody anywhere is at risk and it would be impossible to guard every soft target across the country. This may be an example of the terrorists doing just that.

Al Qaeda - Iraq Connection

2004-08-11T12:33:00.000-07:00

Jesse Sweeney (JS) has challenged that there was no connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda (See comments under Missile Sting post). This is simply not true. According to the 9/11 report (pages 60, 61, 66) there in fact were connections between Saddam's regime and Al Qaeda and Bin Laden. Saddam even offered Iraq to Bin Laden as a safe haven. It's unclear whether any of these offers from both sides were ever taken advantage of, but the fact that there was a relationship progressing between the two groups in response to the US being a common enemy is clear.

This, nevertheless, clouds the real issue. Iraq was invaded because Saddam had connections to terrorists. Saddam had the ability to create weapons of mass destruction and distribute them to terrorists to be used. Saddam had made cash rewards to the families of suicide bombers among the Palestinians. Saddam had many weapons already that were unaccounted for. Saddam refused to account for them. Saddam never aloud free access to the country to inspectors. Saddam was in violation of the conditions set for the end of the Gulf War in 1991. All intelligence pointed to the fact that Saddam was a current threat that had to dealt with. This was corroborated by the intelligence from Britain, Russia, and many other nations. Invading Iraq was the right thing to do and we are, in fact, safer because of it.

With Enemies Like These, Who Needs Friends?

2004-08-11T10:22:00.000-07:00

Powerline zeroed in on a story by the Washington Times saying that Bin Laden is planning on a major assassination to signal major attacks here in the United States. A telling paragraph in the article was this:

"The goal of the next attack is twofold: to damage the U.S. economy and to undermine the U.S. election," the official said. "The view of al Qaeda is 'anybody but Bush.'"

Now that we know who Bin Laden wants to win the election.

I noticed another paragraph that was interesting to me:

The officials also said the terrorist group has begun using female members for preattack surveillance and possibly as suicide bombers, thinking that women will have an easier time getting past security checkpoints at airports, borders and ports.

I was just wondering...If they promise multitudes of virgins in paradise to male jihadists that give their lives, what are the women promised?

Signed affidavit

2004-08-10T11:13:00.000-07:00

George Elliot has signed a sworn affidavit for his statements made in behalf of Swiftboat Veterans for truth. You can get a copy from here. It's part of a campaign to try and encourage TV stations to play their commercial on the air. Recently TV stations have been threatened with libel suits from Terry McAuliffe's attorneys if they aired the commercial.

There's no way that a libel suit will be brought against the TV stations. A libel suit would require John Kerry to actually testify under oath which he, of course, would not do. It's just a way to intimidate people from exercising their first amendment rights through force of government.

It's interesting that liberals cry when there are economic implications when they exercise free speech (ie Dixie Chicks) but have no problem using the government to silence their opponents. Please tell me what's wrong with this picture?

Europe to observe US elections

2004-08-09T10:10:00.000-07:00

I found this on the Free Republic.

When 13 Democratic members of the U.S. Congress asked United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan to send election monitors to the U.S. this fall, the move outraged many Republicans and other proponents of national sovereignty.

When those same 13 Democratic members of Congress were turned down by Annan, they took their request to Secretary of State Colin Powell again to the shock of many Republicans and those who warn about foreign entanglements.

Yesterday, those 13 Democratic House members got their surprising answer from the State Department the administration will indeed invite foreign election monitors to observe the U.S. elections in November.

I can't believe that the Bush administration would invite a foreign body to come and observe the elections in November. Kofi Annan is right. This flys in the face of our national sovereignty. This is the most absurd thing I have ever heard. Since when is the US subject to international observation like we're some 3rd world country performing their first free elections after the rule of a dictator. This is almost consenting that the election of 2000 was indeed invalid and Bush wasn't the rightful winner.

There's an interesting paragraph at the end of the story:

Meanwhile, Rep. Corrine Brown, a Florida Democrat, announced that the Democratic Institutions and Human Rights Office of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe has confirmed that it will be present in the United States specifically, in Florida on Election Day.

However, state election authorities in Florida have already announced that such observers are not to be allowed access to the voting process and, in any case, they would have to remain at a distance of more than 50 feet from the polls.

This begs a constitutional question. Can the federal government demand observers for an election within a state? Constitutionally, it's the electoral college that elects the president. It's up to the state how those electoral votes are determined and it's up to the state to certify the election. I wonder if Collin Powell can merely invite the OSCE to observe the casting of the electoral votes. Florida is already placing restrictions on these observers basically making their job ineffective anyway. Good for Florida.