NRO's The Corner: Rolling Bile, Spit, and Gnash Thread

Let's start with Ralph Reed:

When President Obama announced his nomination of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court, Joe Biden thankfully spared the nation another muttered profanity (there was no boasting about a “big f-ing big deal,” though surely it was). The rest of the country is suppressing its own outburst, for the selection of Kagan takes beltway cynicism to a new low, which is saying a lot in a city where some claim a massive health-care entitlement will reduce the deficit.

Obama selected a Supreme Court nominee with zero judicial experience and virtually no background as a litigator. Realizing her liabilities, he and his allies substitute biography for experience, pushing the myth of the girl from Manhattan who challenged her rabbi as a teenager and blazed a trail for women in a man’s world, all while displaying a “nurturing Jewish mother” side. The New York Times assures us Kagan is a “pragmatist” and a “consensus-builder.” Harboring any doubts? Well, as dean she renovated the gym, opened a skating rink, and improved women’s restrooms at Harvard Law School. So there!

One wonders if Obama thinks anyone actually believes this nonsense. He claims he chose Kagan because she understands how the law affects “ordinary people.” You know, like the folks on the Upper West Side, at blue-chip law firms, and in Harvard Yard. No, there is nothing ordinary about Elena Kagan.

http://www.looptvandfilm.com/blog/obama_ninja.jpg

No, there is nothing ordinary about Elena Kagan.

Its like getting C's at Yale as you coast on daddy's legacy.

Was hoping this thread would start with a poll too.

Greetings from Lisbon [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

Volcanic ash and a flight over Poland later . . . My first random conversation in Portugal involved Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, WFB, Karl Rove, and Laura Ingraham, from a Chicagan here (not with NR) to pray at Fatima tomorrow with the pope. I promise I didn't even initiate it.

she talked about weezy f baby?

That reminds me: did we ever talk here about this, in which Corner denizen Michael Novak argues that the USA should go to war against Iran so that people like him can continue to visit the Holy Land on holiday? Here's the opening line:

"On Easter Sunday, I was able to sit in prayer for a while at the Shrine run by sweet Italian nuns on top of the Mountain of the Beatitudes, the most famous of Sermons. It was infinitely peaceful, and I needed it."

Out from the Online Closet [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
It's not just blog sites anymore ... the Washington Post today discusses the latest Supreme Court justice's sexual preference. And while doing so, Ruth Marcus makes the case to Obama that his next pick should be an actual gay justice — it's the diverse thing to do:

From my (straight, married mother) point of view, a gay justice would be a benefit to the court and the country. To the country because it would speed up the inevitable: acceptance of gay Americans in all walks of life. To the court because — as with any additional perspective — an openly gay justice would add to the richness of the court's understanding of cases, particularly gay rights cases, that come before it.

Would we need bisexual, transgender, and "questioning" justices (going through the GLBTQ list) before our nation's college campuses were adequately represented?

It's remarkable to me that this woman's personal life is being so openly discussed — without her or the president making it an issue. There are plenty of substantive judicial issues to discuss. But then Senate judicial fights in recent years, have been known to slander nominees and make a spouse cry — they've even attacked family vacation choices.

05/14 03:58 AM Share

college campuses?

lol at the last sentence:

Rubio Country Here We Come [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

I see that the RNC has chosen Tampa for their next convention. Well done. This means Marco Rubio doesn't have to be on the ticket to be a star of the show. And it will help make the story more about Jeb's record as governor than his last name when he is the nominee.

If we were on Twitter I would add #klohasmadecrazierpoliticalpredictions to the end of that.)

totally missed the colon up there and thought k-lo was calling herself a "straight, married mother" o_O

My favorite Corner post of the last two years, worth reprinting:

On one of NRs early cruises, the first one the Borks attended, I met the judge for the first time at NRs cocktail party and offered to get him a drink. I asked what he was drinking. A martini, of course, was the reply. I said I would join him. We bellied up to the bar and asked for two martinis. The bartender started to make them when Judge Bork looked at him and said, give me those (meaning the gin, vermouth, and the shaker). The bartender dutifully turned them over and the judge proceeded to make our martinis the way they were SUPPOSED to be made. A great man with a great sense of humor

lol that someone in real life would actually do that

A great man, with a great sense of humor.

http://img.infibeam.com/img/73629361/119/3/9780060573119.jpg

It's like an Esquire fantasy about how men in the 1920 used to act.

never forget:

Nixon Forces Firing of Cox; Richardson, Ruckelshaus Quit
President Abolishes Prosecutor's Office; FBI Seals Records

By Carroll Kilpatrick
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 21, 1973; Page A01

In the most traumatic government upheaval of the Watergate crisis, President Nixon yesterday discharged Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox and accepted the resignations of Attorney General Elliot L. Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William D. Ruckelshaus.

The President also abolished the office of the special prosecutor and turned over to the Justice Department the entire responsibility for further investigation and prosecution of suspects and defendants in Watergate and related cases.

Shortly after the White House announcement, FBI agents sealed off the offices of Richardson and Ruckelshaus in the Justice Department and at Cox's headquarters in an office building on K Street NW.

An FBI spokesman said the agents moved in "at the request of the White House."

Agents told staff members in Cox's office they would be allowed to take out only personal papers. A Justice Department official said the FBI agents and building guards at Richardson's and Ruckelshaus' offices were there "to be sure that nothing was taken out."

Richardson resigned when Mr. Nixon instructed him to fire Cox and Richardson refused. When the President then asked Ruckelshaus to dismiss Cox, he refused, White House spokesman Ronald L. Ziegler said, and he was fired. Ruckelshaus said he resigned.

Finally, the President turned to Solicitor General Robert H. Bork, who by law becomes acting Attorney General when the Attorney General and deputy attorney general are absent, and he carried out the President's order to fire Cox. The letter from the President to Bork also said Ruckelshaus resigned.

These dramatic developments were announced at the White House at 8:25 p.m. after Cox had refused to accept or comply with the terms of an agreement worked out by the President and the Senate Watergate committee under which summarized material from the White House Watergate tapes would be turned over to Cox and the Senate committee.

In announcing the plan Friday night, the President ordered Cox to make no further effort to obtain tapes or other presidential documents.

Cox responded that he could not comply with the President's instructions and elaborated on his refusal and vowed to pursue the tape recordings at a televised news conference yesterday.

That set in motion the chain of events that resulted in the departure of Cox and the two top officials of the Justice Department and immediately raised prospects that the President himself might be impeached or forced to resign.

In a statement last night, Cox said: "Whether ours shall continue to be a government of laws and not of men is now for Congress and ultimately the American people."

The action raised new questions as to whether Congress would proceed to confirm House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford of Michigan to be Vice President or leave Speaker of the House Carl Albert (D-Okla.) next in line of succession to the highest office in the land.

Richardson met at the White House in the late afternoon with Mr. Nixon and at 8:25 p.m. Ziegler appeared in the White House press room to read a statement outlining the President's decisions.

The President discharged Cox because he "refused to comply with instructions" the President gave him Friday night through the Attorney General, Ziegler said.

Furthermore, Ziegler said, the office of special prosecutor was abolished and its functions have been turned over to the Department of Justice.

The department will carry out the functions of the prosecutor's office "with thoroughness and vigor," Ziegler said.

Mr. Nixon sought to avoid a constitutional confrontation by the action he announced Friday, the press secretary said, to give the courts the information from the tapes which the President had considered privileged.

That action was accepted by "responsible leaders in the Congress and in the country," Ziegler commented, but the special prosecutor "defied" the President's instructions "at a time of serious world crisis" and made it "necessary" for the President to discharge him.

Before taking action, Ziegler said, the President met with Richardson to instruct him to dismiss Cox, but Richardson felt he could not do so because it conflicted with the promise he had made to the Senate, Ziegler said.

After Richardson submitted his resignation, the President directed Ruckelshaus to dismiss Cox. When Ruckelshaus refused to carry out the President's directive, he also was "discharged," Ziegler said. The President's letter to Bork said Ruckelshaus resigned.

Mr. Nixon then directed Bork to carry out the instruction. Bork did so in a two-paragraph letter to Cox, in which he said that at the instruction of the President he was "discharging you, effective at once, from your position as special prosecutor, Watergate special prosecution force."

Bork signed his letter as "acting Attorney General."

Richardson told the President in his letter that he was resigning with "deep regret." He explained that when named Attorney General "you gave me the authority to name a special prosecutor."

"At many points throughout the nomination hearings, I reaffirmed my intention to assure the independence of the special prosecutor," Richardson said.

He said he promised that Cox would not be dismissed except for "extraordinary improprieties."

"While I fully respect the reasons that have led you to conclude that the special prosecutor must be discharged, I trust that you understand that I could not in the light of these firm and repeated commitments carry out your direction that this be done," Richardson said.

Richardson expressed "lasting gratitude" to the President, under whom he also served as under secretary of state, Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare and Secretary of Defense. He became Attorney General in May after the resignation of Richard G. Kleindienst, who explained that because of his close association with former Attorney General John N. Mitchell and others involved in Watergate he did not believe he should stay in the post and carry out their prosecution.

"It has been a privilege to share in your efforts to make the structure of world peace more stable and the structure of our own government more responsive," Richardson wrote Mr. Nixon.

"I believe profoundly in the rightness and importance of those efforts, and I trust that they will meet with increasing success in the remaining years of your presidency."

The President replied with a one-sentence letter, addressed "Dear Elliott." It said: "It is with the deepest regret and with an understanding of the circumstances which brought you to your decision that I accept your resignation."

The White House did not release an exchange of letters between Ruckelshaus and the President. But Ruckelshaus wrote a resignation letter and released it.

In a letter to Bork, the President, noting that by law he was acting Attorney General, said that Cox had "made it apparent that he will not comply with the instructions I issued to him."

"Clearly the government of the United States cannot function if employees of the executive branch are free to ignore in this fashion the instructions of the President," Mr. Nixon wrote.

"Accordingly, in your capacity of acting Attorney General, I direct you to discharge Mr. Cox immediately and to take all steps necessary to return to the Department of Justice the functions now being performed by the Watergate Special Prosecution Force.

"It is my expectation that the Department of Justice will continue with full vigor the investigations and prosecutions that had been entrusted to the Watergate special prosecution force."

At the Justice Department, where there were repeated requests by newsmen to interview Richardson and Ruckelshaus, department spokesman John W. Hushen said they had "no desire to come out and talk to newsmen."

Hushen quoted Bork: "All I will say is that I carried out the President's directive."

totally missed the colon up there and thought k-lo was calling herself a "straight, married mother" o_O

― Guns, Computer, The Internet (harbl), Friday, May 14, 2010 8:46 AM (2 days ago)

i just did the same thing and couldnt figure that post out for like five minutes

Actually, I blame Bork less for following Nixon's order than for the host of opinions he'd craft as a judge, for becoming an ogre after the bitterness of not getting confirmed consumed him. According to Ethan Bronner's Battle For Justice, Bork stayed for the stability of the Dept of Justice, whose morale was at a historic low; he knew even then that Nixon wouldn't finish his second term, so careerism had little to do with it.

oh boy!

Cruise SOS [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

If you happened to have the opportunity to sit and chat with Norman Podhoretz and Midge Decter for two hours, what might you ask? I will both share the Corner engagement on the cruise and share some of the discussion on NRO before too long ....

"no social skills, need help plz"

"Can I punch you in the face?"

amazing one-two punch from our boy here

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZjhkODhlZWFlYWNlYzgyYzgyYWIxNjhjZTAwNjAxOGY=

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NDc0YjczZGY2Y2FkZTNiZGEzMTQ5NjQwODRiYzFkM2U=

one strange thing I've noticed about the corner lately is that they recount Charles Krauthaummer's comments on Fox News and give them their own posts on the Corner.. Like he's their most respected pundit.

Miss USA — Using Politics to Sell Sex? [Lisa Schiffren]

I see that, for the second year in a row, politics has intruded upon the Miss USA contest. After last year's tedious debacle with Carrie Prejean and the gay-marriage question, you'd think they would have learned to steer clear of hot-button social issues.

In the final round of this year's contest, the beautiful blonde who came in second was asked what she thought of Arizona's new immigration law. This is a subject that has spurred heated and unpleasant discussions across the land, but Miss Oklahoma was up to the task. She began her answer by saying "I'm a huge believer in states rights," which means, she explained, that she thinks it was okay for Arizona to pass the law. Now, that strikes me as a singularly politic way of avoiding the parts of the issue that are upsetting to people without ducking the question.

The ultimate winner, Miss Michigan, was asked if contraception should be paid for by health insurance. She thought that it should be. She explained, "I believe that birth control is just like every other medication, even though it's a controlled substance."

Controlled substance? Missed the point? Never mind. That dark-haired beauty, Rima Fakih, who hails from Dearborn and was educated in Catholic schools, will take her place as the first Arab-American Miss USA.

As it turns out, these political provocations were simply distractions from the real story. Miss USA is no longer about lovely, wholesome girls looking for scholarships. Under "the Donald's" new rules, posing for soft-core underwear ads was part of the talent testing — presumably, he does not want to exclude any hot and sexy young woman with a few nude pictures in her past, a little porn in her portfolio, or a stint as a stripper to her name. Indeed, becoming an underwear model is now considered a perfect career aspiration for contestants — which is good, because that was the substance of the pageant.

Happily, this means that Miss Michigan's exploits as a pole dancer won't disqualify her from the title.

The decline and fall continues.

05/17 06:53 PMShare

Under "the Donald's" new rules

trump's owned miss usa for fourteen years

i actually assumed it was a trump-created knockoff off miss america, but apparently miss usa has been a thing since the 50's, with miss america going back to 192something

I love that, for these people, good use of your time = worrying about a fucking beauty pageant

good use of my time = reading half a dozen right wingers losing their shit about an arab girl winning a beauty pageant

i posted the nuttiest one to the politics thread but nobody bit :(

McCarthy's deranged posts are daily phenomena. Maybe he can cover beauty pageants...?

good use of my time = reading half a dozen right wingers losing their shit about an arab girl winning a beauty pageant

man I would say that lol'ing at people whose concern is "but what about the integrity of the beauty pageant" is 100% good use of a morning

will be using "The decline and fall continues." as my ilx signature from now on

After last year's tedious debacle with Carrie Prejean and the gay-marriage question, you'd think they would have learned to steer clear of hot-button social issues.

wow you're reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally missing the point of donald trump, now aren't you

Miss USA is no longer about lovely, wholesome girls looking for scholarships on-air careers in local television

Remember this pearl:

Cosmo [Mona Charen]

Funny you should mention that. I was in the supermarket yesterday with my 14-year-old son who asked "What's up with Cosmopolitan? What is that?" I replied, "It's a magazine for sluts."

so much pity for Mona Charen's son

Dan's response to this still makes me laugh out loud.

Oversexed and Regretting It [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

Actress Raquel Welch on the downsides of "sexual freedom."

Oversexed and Regretting It [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

okay yes very mean but wow did I laugh at this

also Mona is going to regret her response when her son hits 16-17 and starts wearing shorts made out of Cosmos

If you need a quick primer on the birds and the bees, on how a culture has been misled, and on why Carrie and her friends from yet another Sex and the City movie have had miserable, not-so-pretty lives, the woman once declared “Most Desired Woman” by Playboy can help you out.

When the first Sex and the City movie came out a few years ago, I went to a depressing midnight showing on its opening night in New York.

Uh, why was she there?

"research"

I can't even imagine her out of the house past 8pm.

c'mon, late night taco trucks, baby!!!

anyway

What's up with Cosmopolitan?

http://chattahbox.com/images/2010/01/Jerry_Seinfeld.jpg

Please the generosity of spirit:

Buh-Bye Arlen [Jonathan Adler]

My first job in Washington, D.C., during the summer after my freshman year in college, was an internship in the office of Senator Arlen Specter. (In my defense, my political views were still developing, and he was my "hometown" Senator.) At the time Specter was a nominal Republican, though it seemed most of his staff were Democrats. His counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee had previously worked for Senator Kennedy. I didn't see much of him, and what limited interaction I had was not particularly favorable — and I've not been a fan ever since. Good riddance.

In Case You Missed It [Jonah Goldberg]

You have 364 days to plan for the next National Asian and Pacific Islander HIV/AIDS Awareness Day.

05/20 09:30 AMShare

rot in hell you little pissant

American Idolatry [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

I’m still NR cruising (there were two cruises to Portugal and Spain, Jay was on the first — read about it here — and I’m on the second), so I can only keep up with so much of what is going on back home. And so, naturally, one of the things I’ve kept up with is…American Idol.

Please tell me that I am missing something about this Ellen DeGeneres–Crystal Bowersox controversy, because it reads like someone looking to manufacture outrage. I find it more shocking that “Hallelujah” (have you heard the words to that song? ) would be sung on a primetime show that lots of families watch than that Crystal would be asked to sing a Paul McCartney song.

"NR cruising" = hitting on Mona Charen at the martini bar.

I find it more shocking that “Hallelujah” (have you heard the words to that song? ) would be sung on a primetime show that lots of families watch

(have you heard the words to that song?)

only about 100000000 times since 1995

is she objectin to the biblical references...?

heyo! xp

uh probably the bit about getting tied to a chair or something would be my guess

In Case You Missed It [Jonah Goldberg]

You have 364 days to plan for the next National Asian and Pacific Islander HIV/AIDS Awareness Day.

05/20 09:30 AMShare

rot in hell you little pissant

love you for this goole <3

I've not been a fan ever since

Americans who say "I've not" are disgusting savages.

^^^ real talk

Lots of this going around today:

For the Record, I Would Have Voted for the Magna Carta [Daniel Foster]
There is something unusual happening in the blogosphere and the Twitterverse as I write. In response to Rand Paul's problematic take on federal authority and racial segregation, self-avowed libertarians like Washington Post’s Dave Weigel and The Atlantic’s Megan McArdle are falling all over themselves to say things like “for the record, I would have voted for the Civil Rights Act.”

Well, of course you would have. De jure racism is an evil. I would have voted for the Civil Rights Act too. And while we’re at it I would have never signed off on the Corrupt Bargain that ended Reconstruction by installing Rutherford B. Hayes in the Presidency. Better yet, I would have killed John Wilkes Booth during one of his early performances of Richard III or vacated the appointment of Roger B. Taney to the Supreme Court.

But at the end of the day, isn’t this counterfactual game sort of pointless? There is certainly a “correct” answer to all these historical questions — side with the angels on every significant civil rights debate since the founding — but that’s not the same as the thoughtful answer.

if only i could back in time to kill racists -- but that would be murder!! man, even that wouldn't be right. fuck me.

There is certainly a “correct” answer to all these historical questions — side with the angels on every significant civil rights debate since the founding — but that’s not the same as the thoughtful answer.

The Thoughtful Racist by Daniel Foster.

"if i were highlander i'd be down with wm lloyd garrison and freedom riding and all that, but dammit life is short and i want to be a racist"

there is certainly a “correct” answer to all these historical questions — side with the angels on every significant civil rights debate since the founding — but that’s not the same as the thoughtful answer.

I suppose it's unintentional that using phrases like "side with the angels" and "that's not the same as the thoughtful answer" exposes Foster as a cynical asshole.

*expose

yeah luvvit when the conservatives just get down to the "ugh you people think you're SOOO GOOOD" attack

^^^that is generally all they've got; also plays well to cretins.

Re: Mother of Michelle Obama Questioner Will Not Be Deported [Mark Krikorian]

No surprise there. In a tightly run immigration system that actually had integrity, the illegal-alien mom might have something to worry about. But given that the "kids say the darnedest things" moment happened before the TV cameras, in front of the first lady (and her Mexican counterpart), the illegal-alien mom actually won the lottery — she's as good as amnestied now.

meanwhile, Derb finds reasons to hope: "Hungry, angry people working two jobs for a handful (or wheelbarrowful) of inflated-away dollars won’t be in a mood to fuss much about the human rights of detained terrorists, or of people in unfriendly nations, or of migrants violating our borders. Nor will they bother much about global warming or spotted owls (yummy!) Smiting one’s enemies hip and thigh may even come back into fashion — a jolly good thing in my opinion."

leftists always say that the poor and desperate turn to fascism, always nice to hear someone hoping for it

In Case You Missed It [Jonah Goldberg]

You have 364 days to plan for the next National Asian and Pacific Islander HIV/AIDS Awareness Day.

05/20 09:30 AMShare

fuck this dude btw

Raquel Welch [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

My column on her awakening to the pain that the Pill has wrought seemed to strike a nerve this week. For more on the topic in the last weeks (the anniversary of the Pill) see here and here.

http://www.takimag.com/site/article/two_and_a_half_men_airs_otherwise_unpalatable_truths/#When:04:02:20Z

oh man i didn't know that Derbyshire moonlights on other websites spouting even more ridiculous creepy shit

* Inside a pretty woman there is often a slut, who can be awakened by a man with good “game.”

* Low-class white women are often obese and coarse.

Now, these aren’t the kinds of truths you’d want as up-front advertisements for a stable, harmonious society. They are truths none the less, and need an occasional airing.

the kind of fascinating part is the delusion that because society rejects a belief it is inherently noble to support it.

Palin on Rand Paul [Ramesh Ponnuru]

Pete Wehner: "Understandably scarred by the 2008 campaign, [Palin] is on a quest to clear her name by pounding the media at every turn. They are always to blame — even when, as in the case of Rand Paul, they are not actually to blame."

----------------------

re: Palin on Rand Paul [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

She may also be determined to demonstrate what political loyalty looks like, in response to the lack thereof some on the McCain campaign showed her.

----------------------

Re: Palin on Rand Paul [Ramesh Ponnuru]

Loyalty is no excuse for making false claims. Those of us who believe that the media often treats conservative points of view unfairly should be especially annoyed when that legitimate argument is used to cover for Republican mistakes and thus discredited.

----------------------

Re: Palin on Rand Paul [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

No argument here, Ramesh.

OWNED.

Sex Makes Babies [Maggie Gallagher]

The problem is not the Pill. The problem is the idea, which promoters of the pill introduced and promoted with great fanfare, that we have separated sex from reproduction.

We teach the young to think of pregnancy as a rare emergency, an unexpected side effect of engaging in sexual acts. This disconnect produces a great deal of lunacy in our culture, and suffering for children, too.
----------

Newsflash: Sex makes babies.

is that what's behind all the gay hate, that they get off easy?

pretty much

'Obama's Katrina' [Yuval Levin]
I think it’s actually right to say that the BP oil spill is something like Obama’s Katrina, but not in the sense in which most critics seem to mean it.

It’s like Katrina in that many people's attitudes regarding the response to it reveal completely unreasonable expectations of government. The fact is, accidents (not to mention storms) happen. We can work to prepare for them, we can have various preventive rules and measures in place. We can build the capacity for response and recovery in advance. But these things happen, and sometimes they happen on a scale that is just too great to be easily addressed. It is totally unreasonable to expect the government to be able to easily address them—and the kind of government that would be capable of that is not the kind of government that we should want.

Let’s say a major hurricane hits a large and densely populated American city with five hundred thousand inhabitants. Much of the city is below sea level, and the flood-waters that follow in the wake of the storm quickly overrun it, filling nearly every street with water, in many places fifteen feet in depth. The magnitude of human suffering and destruction of property is mind-boggling. But within six days, everyone is out of the city and in total approximately one thousand people—one in five hundred residents—lost their lives in the calamity. Hour by hour, the government response was messy and ugly—it could hardly be otherwise given the magnitude of the disaster. But looked at with a little perspective, is that really a story of a failure of government response, or is it an example of how to contend with an immense natural disaster in a densely populated urban center? Is it a model of incompetence, or the most effective mass evacuation in human history?

Now let’s say a massive oil drilling platform, working with a variety of flammable and explosive liquids and gases in huge amounts more than 40 miles out in the ocean suddenly experiences a catastrophic failure that sets off a fiery explosion, sets the rig on fire, and causes it to sink—releasing an enormous gush of oil into the ocean more than 5,000 feet below sea level. Vast quantities of oil spill into the sea, threatening fish, wildlife, and coastal industries. The company that owns the rig, together with federal regulators, scientists, and engineers, tries a variety of different techniques—from remotely operated vehicles to containment domes to pumping heavy fluids down large pipes onto the well head—some of them invented on the fly, while 80 ships and several thousand people engage in a sophisticated cleanup and containment effort. Is this a failure of regulation and a model of slothful inefficiency, or is it an impressive display of human ingenuity and power in response to a terrible accident? We don’t yet know how long the spill will continue or how bad its consequences will turn out to be. And obviously it would have been great to avert such an accident, or to respond even faster and more effectively when it happened. But can we really say that not having done so is a massive failure of government, or of the oil industry?

We seem to think that given our modern powers, there ought to be no accidents and no natural disasters anymore, and when those happen we blame the people in charge. Well, call me crazy but I don’t want a government so powerful that it could move half a million people in mere hours in response to a hurricane, or would have such total control over every facet of every industry that the potential for industrial accidents would be entirely eliminated. Such power would come at enormous cost to a lot of things we care about.

you're crazy

the kind of government that would be capable of that is not the kind of government that we should want

rong

Considering the positions + readers of NRO, that's actually a pretty well articulated point. If you are against government power then you certainly can't complain when they fail to act effectively in the face of disaster.

Well you can't wan't to drown government in the bathtub and expect it to do your laundry in the end I suppose.

As I leave Oslo, Evo Morales, the Bolivian president, arrives. He is just perfect for the Norwegians — I mean, for the Norwegian political elites: Third World, “indigenous,” not quite a commie, not quite a democrat, something in between. Perfect.

love the scare quotes there

those Norwegian political elites, thinking they're hot stuff.

Post of the week:

Rhymes Without Reason [Mark Steyn]

I had no idea until today that this was the marching slogan of Queers Against Israeli Apartheid:

Butch, femme, bottom, top
Israeli apartheid has to stop.

Hmm. Michael Coren expands on the paradox of an anti-apartheid rallying cry itself obsessed with categorization. But I found myself wondering: Is there a Queers Against Sharia? If not:

Butch, femme, top, bottom
Gay bars in Riyadh? It's hard to spot 'em

Bottom, top, femme, butch
Pride parade's dull since the Taliban putsch

Top, bottom, butch, femme
With complimentary FGM

Top, bott, butch, femme, trans
Quit your chanting and read your Korans.

If there's one thing I never get tired of, it's the idea that to criticize one thing you must also criticize all things wrong with the world. (Also, a google search didn't reveal gay rights criticism of Islamic states?)

well that's the thing with any ideological cultural crit---all the failings of the world (as you see them) are secondary to the collective's failure to understand whatever it is you have ~grasped.~

how is Evo Morales not indigenous? also, the critique (such as it is) could be said about the "elite" in any country (I think).

http://article.nationalreview.com/435185/conservative-rock-songs-deconstructed/john-j-miller

lol

found this clicking around from that link:
John J. Miller on Iron Maiden on National Review Online

hahaha.

The second song is one of Iron Maiden's most familiar: "Two Minutes to Midnight." It's an anti-nuke tune whose politics aren't exactly to my liking.

lol pathetic

http://rightwingnews.com/2010/06/the-20-hottest-conservative-women-in-the-new-media-2010-edition/

http://rightwingnews.com/resizebyid.php?id=1

Judge Not [Jonah Goldberg]

Yes, I was a judge of the Hottest Conservative Women in New Media "contest." My shame spiral is bottomless.

figured that out years ago, J

http://i47.tinypic.com/2irn3m8.jpghttp://i47.tinypic.com/2irn3m8.jpghttp://i47.tinypic.com/2irn3m8.jpg

poor k-lo

the liberalheretics' video section is just a ray stevens video.

http://www.theliberalheretic.com/blog/node/993

http://www.opednews.com/populum/uploaded/2682500807_fb4fe635c5-41896-20091231-2.jpg

poor k-lo

has anyone ever pointed out how much Steele looks like Shock G/Humpty Hump

http://25.media.tumblr.com/zk2Z35IWTkstjwa2r5qxzcZ6o1_500.jpg

dude.... they kind of have the same voice too!

WHAT UP

let's take it to the streets

i always thought he looked like larry david

http://nicedeb.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/michael_steele.jpghttp://l.yimg.com/l/tv/us/img/site/54/00/0000035400_20061023184733.jpg

btw, is there any way any of us could help start a nutjob argument about whether Malkin's shattering of the race barrier on that Hot Women list is a byproduct of affirmative action? I would like to see her thought process if someone could get that rolling.

ann coulter's inclusion was a nice gesture towards transgendered people as well.

classy

Marfan's took Lux Interior, yet Coulter still lives. UNFAIR.

Sir Jerk? [Jay Nordlinger]
So, Paul McCartney is in the East Room of the White House, with President and Mrs. Obama. He is being fêted because he has just won an award from the Library of Congress. He caps the evening with this remark – this is his farewell, his send-off: “After the last eight years, it’s good to have a president that knows what a library is.”

Can anyone tell me why people are such schmucks? Why they are so graceless and clueless and nasty? I mean, Paul McCartney’s like the richest, most popular, most honored musician in the world. Does he not have it in him to behave like a gentleman — or at least a non-boor — while he’s being celebrated at the White House? Does he have to be the Wanda Sykes of popular music? Is it not possible to love Obama, as McCartney does, without hating Bush — or at least insulting him on a high, non-political occasion?

I don’t care that “Penny Lane” is a pretty tune, Paul McCartney is a horse’s butt. Let me amend that: He acted like one, on Wednesday night.
06/04 09:14 AM Share

Funny how this WH and its supporters laugh about Bush and reading yet show their own ignorance in making comments about a law in Arizona deriding it yet they openly admit they have not read it. This comes from the highest law enforcement and homeland security positions in the land. Is it perhaps 17 pages is beyond their comprehension skills or do they feel that reading is unnecessary since their supporters seem to swallow everything they say hook line and sinker and feel that perhaps they are too inferior to read for themselves and therefore won't discover that the Arizona law is more protective of immigrants than the federal law? I think if I were a democratic supporter I wouldn't be ridiculing anyone right now for their reading skills, and I won't even mention they can't read the laws that make it illegal to offer someone a position whether paid or unpaid to get out of a race. But then I guess worrying about laws only comes into play when a democrat is trying to prosecute a republican, otherwise they claim "business as usual and everyone does it". Maybe they can make a list so we can all read it of which laws only apply to certain political parties and which ones we can ignore when it suits us.

Posted by: justmyvoice | June 3, 2010 5:55 PM | Report abuse

It's crazy, but I don't totally disagree with Nordlinger xp, I think he makes a reasonable point. If I were in the White House, I'd be really formal and not crack jokes about other Presidents

I mostly posted that Nordlinger comment to set the scene for the Corner comments that are sure to follow.

btw, I totally think it's ok to make jokes about President Taft getting stuck in the bathtub nowadays.

LOL @ the outrage over Macca's remarks. Bush read books OK, but he was the king boor as pres, back-slapping and nick-naming, treating the world stage as his personal lockeroom

anybody else notice that the corner has been hacked w/bogus spam-links

LOL @ the outrage over Macca's remarks. Bush read books OK, but he was the king boor as pres, back-slapping and nick-naming, treating the world stage as his personal lockeroom

truthbomb^^^

mega lolz @ the Wanda sykes of popular music

Nordlinger posted a ton of inane shit today but the best was his attempted psychoanalysis of that Irish Nobel laureate who was on one of the Gaza ships

Re ‘Bolton!’ [Jay Nordlinger]

My inbox is full of e-mail in full-throated support of an idea we discussed earlier: Bolton for President. Some say, “My friends and I have talked about this for months.” Readers really want to bypass secretary of state altogether and send Bolton right to the Oval Office. In fact, that may be easier for JRB: election by the people over confirmation by the Senate.

Seriously, shouldn’t there be some outside-the-box candidates in 2012? A Petraeus, a Bolton? Must the field include only the same old suspects? Do you know a clearer thinker, a sharper speaker, a bolder official than Bolton? The times could use a guy like him, frankly. And in debate against Obama — wow.

Many readers have said, “About time we had a president with a mustache.” That’s what President Bush used to call him, or called him at least once: “The Man with the Mustache.” Readers also said, “When was the last time we had a president with glasses? Bush 41? How about before that?” A lot of people mentioned TR: mustachioed and bespectacled.

Finally, one reader said, “We conservatives always set our sights too low. Forget having Bolton as president. Make him dictator for a day, à la Friedman and China.” Yeah, and don’t forget that Woody Allen wants to confer dictatorial powers on Obama, too (temporarily, to be sure).

Anyway, I think I feel a draft . . . “Bolton for President.” To paraphrase an old line — I learned this from Bob Novak; a 19th-century Republican speaker of the House said it, I think — “The Republican party and the American people could do worse, and probably will.”

yeah nordlinger has been giving everyone else a strong run in the stupid + pissy + clueless + arrogant stakes. who the hell is this guy?

"And in debate against Obama — wow."

lol

Anyway, I think I feel a draft

between his ears

BOLTON FOR PRESIDENT: Because Cheney Was Too Well-Liked

that’s what President Bush used to call him, or called him at least once: “The Man with the Mustache.”

oh dear God

Cover Your Mouth When You Yawn [Jay Nordlinger]

You want some boring old dog-bites-man? “A 46-year-old resident of Henan province who was abducted in March 2009 while talking to people in public about Falun Gong died in Zhengzhou prison camp last month . . .” Who was this dead kook? “Mr. Tian Yun was from Houguolei Village of Henan in Central China.” And what happened?

Shortly after being detained on March 27, 2009, Tian was “sentenced” in a sham trial at Hui County Court to three years in a prison camp. He was subsequently taken to Zhengzhou Prison in Xinmin. According to sources inside China, Tian was beaten, shocked with electric batons, and deprived of water at the prison camp. The camp guards tried to force Tian to denounce Falun Gong but he refused. He continued to be tortured and died in custody as a result of the abuse.

Yeah, yeah, happens every day, almost. Ho-hum. If you have insomnia, you can read the rest of the article here. The rest of the world can return to our regularly scheduled programming: the ongoing, eternal appeasement of the monsters in Beijing. Must never upset those monsters, ever. Being a ChiCom means being able to torture and kill at will — while the world simpers at your feet.

06/09 01:55 PMShare

Nordlinger is the sort of guy who laughs hysterically at his own jokes.

We let them get away with it because their communists.

their is they're when you are a communist

Oh man.

bunch of interesting things in that:

- Ahmadinejad is obv totally wrong
- Wallace is making a sort of academic point ("I am just telling you what ~he said~"), as a reporter, and hannity animated that point to represent wallace's opinion, and what's his face read that falsely ascribed opinion as somehow being something that Wrong People (Obama!) are sayin "yeah that sounds right to me" to

an entire ilx thread in one blog lost imo

also it embodies precisely everything wrong about political discourse in lolmerica. instead of saying "ahmedinijad u rong" he targeted the guy who ~told him what ahmedinijad said~

good luck usa

"Has everyone on the planet bought the Obama argument — the one he articulated in his Address to the Muslim World, delivered in al-Cahara, or Cairo, or whatever you want to call it — that Israel was a consolation prize for the Holocaust, pure and simple? Does anyone know jack squat about Zionism?"

America's strong bonds with Israel are well known. This bond is unbreakable. It is based upon cultural and historical ties, and the recognition that the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history that cannot be denied.

Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust.

^text from Cairo speech.

Nordlinger has always been a prissy, fussy creep - he once described Obama's daughters as "scrumptious"

Helen Thomas's Vice [Daniel Foster]

What looks to be Helen Thomas's last interview pre-gaffe has just turned up in, of all places, Vice magazine — a mostly-useless gazette of bored hipster cynicism and debauchery that occasionally publishes interesting photographs.

lol

lol it was inevitable

a mostly-useless gazette of bored hipster cynicism and debauchery that occasionally publishes interesting photographs.

^^subscribes to Playboy "for the interviews"

a mostly-useless gazette of bored hipster cynicism

ehhhh, otm

interesting photographs!!

man, what with orly taitz suing dan lacey it's been a banner for irl collisions of ilx obsessions

I define it more "nihilism" but there you go

Woah at the NRO truthbomb. Guess a clock is right twice a blah blah blah

"The most anticipated American sports event in many years"? [Andy McCarthy]

Score this round for Costa/Chruchill. Of course I wish only the best for our guys — now that someone has told me the game is happening, I hope they win. But even with the gimmick of inter-league play deteriorating into match-ups the most rabid baseball fans can't can get excited about, I imagine tonight's showdown between the Kansas City Royals and the Cincinnati Reds is more anticipated in America than any soccer game (unless your 6-year-old happens to be playing in it).

It really does seem like the Times is written only for Upper West Siders ... or maybe just for other New York Times writers.

REAL MURICA

andy mccarthy's very powerful imagination

I miss the days when we posted actually for real batshit crazy shit from NRO, and not like banal observations that the NY Times writes for a specific audience.

you miss the days from earlier this week?

on the internet I think the rule is that "I miss the days" can refer to anything that happened over 45 seconds ago

that's true, the man with the mustache post was pretty awesome

McCarthy was educated at Columbia University and New York Law School, and has served as a professor at the latter and at Fordham University Law School.

REAL MURICAN

McCarthy has long been a die-hard fan of the New York Mets.

LOL

we got a date for morbs

i think there may be ulterior motives for this proposal

Leaving the gorgeous Orthodox church service, I went home through another of New York’s rich displays of beauty — this one created by the hand of God, and not the art of man. Yes, it was the Puerto Rican Day parade, an exuberant tribute to Puerto Rican culture, but famous especially for its lovely women in skimpy outfits roughly a size and a half too small for their wearers. What say we arrange, every Friday, a mini-Puerto Rican Day parade in front of the mosque? It could be quiet and respectful — we Americans are not, after all, boorish thugs — but nonetheless pointed: displaying the female body as nothing to be ashamed of or to be hidden behind burkas, and the entire female human being as a prized bearer of rights in our society, a person with a voice in the public square. This would turn the mosque into our teaching moment. If it turns out that the mosque is run by decent sorts, the demonstrations could peter out. If evidence mounts that the mosque is just another cover for Saudi Wahhabi terror supporters and other jihadists . . . the demonstrations could get a little louder.

In a hearts-and-minds struggle between jihadists on one hand, and our Puerto Rican brothers and sisters on the other, I’ll put my money on the Puerto Ricans any day.

http://api.ning.com/files/KWzBYIoJGjgJdXnE9D8fqilihFxzhBC7iByUONZQVnSp*U4v8WdfpDUK1SD*L3PX1ifYyXPUdcphE8pXz1IGQTOeMCFk6yad/Drinky_Drinking.jpg

Iron Ladies [Robert Costa]
Sarah Palin is in talks to meet with Lady Thatcher:

Her representatives approached Margaret Thatcher to ask for a meeting as part of a bid to enhance her claim to be the ‘heir to Ronald Reagan’ and prepare to challenge Mr Obama.

And Lady Thatcher has agreed to see Mrs Palin, who stood as the Republican vice-presidential candidate in 2008. A spokesman said: ‘We had an informal approach asking if Lady Thatcher would meet Mrs Palin if she comes to Britain and we said yes.’

A date for the meeting has not been set.

personally I fully endorse the idea of Margaret Thatcher satiating her neverending lust for the taste of human flesh on Sarah Palin

Margaret Thatcher, by all accounts, suffers so badly from dementia at 88 that arranging such a meeting is a form of elder abuse.

Sarah Palin has a passport?

Plus, who is paying her for this, BP?

You Need to Know [John J. Miller]

There are a handful of musicians (or groups of them) whose albums I buy sight unseen and sound unheard. They could put out a collection of melodic armpit farts and I'd still line up for my copy on the release date.

One of them is Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Here's the really good news: Mojo, out today, is the best album TP has recorded since the 1980s. It won't be a classic-rock hit parade like Damn the Torpedoes, but it has a few first-rate songs and is strong from start to end. It reminds me of Southern Accents—not because it shares that album's self-conscious ambition, but for its easy embrace of a bluesy regional heritage plus a willingness to experiment with new forms. There's a reggae song on it, for crying out loud. For the most part, though, Mojo sounds like a 21st-century band recording a 1970s southern rock album. My first impression is a good one and I have a feeling that it's going to grow on me.

It Was Fun for a Second . . . [Jay Nordlinger]

Below, I did one musical note, or one note touching on music — it was really a political one. Care for a musical note now? Okay, a little background — real quick-like: “Darmstadt” is a codeword in music for music of the most politically correct kind — the “serial” music epitomized by Boulez, Stockhausen, Nono, and their comrades. These people have lorded it over music, in dictatorial fashion, for decades. We say “Darmstadt” because those composers used to gather in that German city for summer courses. Darmstadt is sort of the Kremlin of music.

Okay, enough background. I receive a press release from a music group, as I do several hundred times a day. It says “Darmstadt Send-off Concert” — and my heart leaps, because I have misread it: I mistakenly read, “Darmstadt Send-up Concert.” I thought, “Oh, great! Someone is actually putting on a concert poking fun at the Darmstadt school? How revolutionary, how brave!”

But no: “The International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) will join fellow new music pioneers JACK Quartet . . . for a preview of programs they will perform at the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt, Germany in late July.”

Oh, yeah: Same old, same old. Too bad. Will someone please do a Darmstadt send-up concert? That would be too cool.

06/18 03:22 PMShare

Would it really?

They wouldn't name their show in foreign, would they?

Though Nordlinger as failed music critic makes sense, in a way.

i don't think the new thread has been cookin' like the old one. has the crazy & the mean & the dishonest gone down at the Corner?

it'll gear up for the election, I'm sure.

Last year:

Friday, June 19, 2009
Happy . . . [Mark Krikorian]

Juneteenth!

06/19 11:30 AMShare

This year:

Happy Juneteenth [John J. Miller]
America doesn't need another official federal holiday, but if we were to get one, June 19 would work for me.

06/19 07:54 PM

Maybe they are becoming less batshit crazy...

i don't think the new thread has been cookin' like the old one. has the crazy & the mean & the dishonest gone down at the Corner?

Honoring Our Fathers [Marco Rubio]

Fatherhood is a gift. And caring, selfless fathers are needed more today than ever before. From helping children with homework to showing them unconditional love, fathers everywhere are leaving lasting impressions on the lives of their children.

Each Father’s Day, America’s children honor and give thanks to the men who have shaped us into who we are today. In raising us, they sacrificed to ensure that — when our own time came to start families, build businesses, and defend America — we would answer the call to preserve and strengthen the exceptional nation we inherited from them.

When I think about all it has taken for my generation to inherit this great country, I think about our Founding Fathers, the veterans who have served our nation and the entrepreneurs who have created unmatched prosperity. But I especially think of the fathers I've met throughout my life — ordinary men, with ordinary jobs, but who possess extraordinary ambitions for their children, along with the unshakeable belief that America is the one place on earth where anyone can accomplish anything.

father's day...when our own time came to start families, build businesses, and defend America...our Founding Fathers, the veterans who have served our nation and the entrepreneurs who have created unmatched prosperity...

it's so hard to find a card!

lol, if that's the current level of batshit they're operating at then they really have mellowed.

equating father's day to the founding fathers is on some fascist hyperpatriot shit imo...& businessmen (only men) fathering prosperity? who thinks like this that is not batshit>?

and veterans...

Walter Sobchak: Those rich fucks! This whole fucking thing... I did not watch my buddies die face down in the muck so that this fucking strumpet...
The Dude: I don't see any connection to Vietnam, Walter.
Walter Sobchak: Well, there isn't a literal connection, Dude.
The Dude: Walter, face it, there isn't any connection.

Idk, hijacking a Hallmark holiday to discuss the Founding Fathers (people I certainly don't have any problem acknowledging), or veterans seems like no big deal to me. Re: business, you know they feel capitalism is a great positive force in history so it's not surprising to see that expressed here. Batshit != views I disagree with. Batshit = things no thinking human being could agree with

Also kinda batshit to believe that a fathers day ode to fathers is batshit because it only mentions men. Superlulz

it only mentions entrepreneurs u dufus. the assumption is that they are men, likewise vets.

these are not the connections of a sane person fyi, these are the connections of a fundamentalist

"batshit" is in my book a compliment -- crazy in a compelling way. Rubio's statements aren't batshit, crazy, or compelling, just boring and sad (Father's Day is great cuz it reminds me of the avaricious zeal of our own dads).

let us give thanks to that long ago generation of literate men who agreed on next to nothing, who we outrageously call our fathers, surely they are just exactly like the pissant sports dad upper manager i have always aspired to be...

sorry if i'm letting my resentment of this great land show a little there

Tradition has its benefits.

"Ha ha at least my Dad didn't leave us, Secret Kenyan!"

The reactions to the McChrystal comments have been...educational.

little praetorianism, i'm guessing? i haven't really looked

Buy the Book, Cruise with the Author

ew

Should He Go? [Jonah Goldberg]
Now that I've read the whole thing, I still think McChrystal showed a terrible lapse in judgment letting Rolling Stone into the tent and for saying anything that could be construed as disrespect for the Commander-in-Chief. I can't agree with Cliff that this is all much ado about nothing. That said, I also think a lot of the quotes aren't as bad as it first sounded. The mocking of Biden isn't actually mocking of Biden so much as a game of trying to come up with crazy hypothetical responses that might get McChrystal in hot water. Even the stuff about Obama being unprepared and whatnot are offered from McChrystal aides, not McChrystal himself. As for the bad-mouthing of the civilian and diplomatic crowd, it's unseemly but I don't know if it rises to the level of scandalous. Still, Obama has every right to be angry, even if he shares some of the blame.

I should also say that I also came away liking McChrystal a lot more. He really is an impressive guy. Clearly arrogant and all that, but you need a healthy ego to do what he does

Bernie Goldberg has written a number of best-selling (and thoroughly entertaining) books that cover the gamut from media bias – such as his 2009 hit, A Slobbering Love Affair: The True (And Pathetic) Story of the Torrid Romance Between Barack Obama and the Mainstream Media (which you can purchase here from Amazon) – to public nuisances. Bernie is sharp, wise, funny, and most importantly, a guest speaker on the National Review 2010 Post-Election Cruise. If you’re one of those scaredy-pants who has always wanted to come on an NR voyage but has been afraid to take the plunge (admittedly not the best cliché to use for a cruise promotion), we dare you … no, we double dare … make that triple dare you, to visit www.nrcruise.com and get one of the remaining cabins in our ever-dwindling allotment (close to 275 cabins have already been reserved!) for what will prove to be the trip of 2010. And it will be precisely that: with Bernie, the other Goldberg, Karl Rove, Victor Davis Hanson, Phyllis Schlafly, Greg Gutfeld, Andrew Breitbart, Scott Rasmussen, and oodles of other great conservative speakers there to discuss the election results and their consequences for the conservative movement and the US of A, how can it not be?

jonah goldberg repping the free-jazz school of historiography

A lot of people don’t know this, but it’s hardly like the Nazis invented the term. It dates back to the 19th century, but was popularized in Germany by the Weimar Republic, which took to inscribing the phrase on many large public-works projects, not just at Auschwitz — which of course was built by the Nazis, who continued the practice. The Orwellian undertones to the phrase are real, and the associations with the Holocaust are horrific, but Arbeit Macht Frei was a popular “progressive” slogan on the road to serfdom.

"(which you can purchase here from Amazon)"

guessing there was a link on here? b/c o/w lol. well, in any case, lol @ that bit, so dorky sounding...

though I bet you could run a good hustle (in all sorts of ways) on that cruise

have there been any complaints about swarthy foreign soccer players and their diving?

i suppose it's unamerican to even be watching, so maybe not

Re ‘Here We Go Again’ [Jay Nordlinger]
Jonah, this is an old song, but, I agree, it’s important to sing it: The world gives you so many occasions. I remember when Nightline would have as its two pundits — Left and Right — George Stephanopoulos and David Gergen. I used to comment that they had both served in the Clinton communications shop. I also trotted out the old line, “All points of view from A to B” — or maybe A to L? N?

And I’m reminded why conservatives had to build their own media outlets. It’s sort of like Jews and country clubs. Jews built their own, not because they wanted to, necessarily, but because the other clubs wouldn’t let them in. They weren’t being “clannish.” They wanted to play golf, on first-class courses.

(Groucho on his daughter: “She’s only half Jewish. Can she play nine holes?” Alternatively, “She’s only half Jewish. Can she go into the pool up to her knees?”)

Well, we conservatives built our own media outlets — because the other clubs wouldn’t let us in. I guess it’s working out okay. But there are interesting arguments to be made, and listened to.

Just by the way: Isn’t it sort of insane that, in the years when Bill Buckley was the most brilliant and entertaining columnist in the land, the New York Times didn’t want him on its op-ed page? Wouldn’t he have been an adornment? Isn’t it sort of insane that he never won the Pulitzer prize for commentary? When they were giving it to people who weren’t fit to change the ribbon on his Smith-Corona?

But enough insanity . . .

P.S. Gandhi never won the Nobel Peace Prize.

oh the injustice of it all

also: is it just me or have k-lo's worshipful posts on the catholic priesthood taken on a creepy obsessive tinge

And I’m reminded why conservatives had to build their own media outlets. It’s sort of like Jews and country clubs.

http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/conservative-victimization

RT @kathrynlopez: im not listening to huey lewis and the news but i wouldnt mind if i were

and we were wondering where the crazy went

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NDg0NTNiYjFlNzJhOTNiMTdhYzhmZGJiNWQxZTA2Mjk=

'You sit and ask yourself: What are we doing here?' [Andy McCarthy]

Why would General Stanley McChrystal give that kind of access to a lefty rock-n-roll magazine? Maybe because he's a kindred spirit who felt the need to assure Rolling Stone's Michael Hastings that he voted for Obama — even against McCain, a military legend who shares McChrystal's transnational progressive outlook...

goes off from there. white hot!

chait is really a loathsome political writer

I have never heard of a Jewish country club wtf is that all about

there is one in a suburb of mpls, some old roomies of mine worked on the grounds crew

(to goole, sid hartman was one of the bigwig members, guess who is reviled by the staff?)

hmm, dunno, that dark star guy? or is that a trick question.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/06/23/delusions

chait is really a loathsome political writer

― k3vin k., Thursday, June 24, 2010 4:26 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

lol really?

which part of him do you loathe the most

melanie lynskey played him in the movie so i can't hate

Andrea Mitchell [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

just congratulated Barney Frank at the end of her interview with him on MSNBC, for all his hard work on the banking bill.

I just thought that needed to be shared. Carry on.

If that's all the oversharing K-lo is going to do, let's be thankful.

Smells Like... Bacon???!? [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

LOL

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_WFYQWi4zsb4/TCT-SklIeDI/AAAAAAAADYA/7j97tOkA9ZY/s400/SP32-20100625-150209.gif

is that real

Yep, via here.

K-Lo is assigned to an appropriate beat.

ice cold

"Deep-fried, beer-battered, bacon-wrapped cheese hotdogs" [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

The Game [John J. Miller]

Is it racist to hope Ghana loses?

it wasn't until you raised the issue

i'm not saying i'm racist. i'm just not saying i'm not racist. and i think it's very interesting that i would make a post like that.

Because of political correctness, the real victim of racism is John J Miller.

"Is it racist to hope Ghana loses?" is the entire post by the way.

where's Mordy? He needs to write Miller.

lol, what should I write him?

btw, that's the batshit NRO I've been missing

An Observation on the Zeitgeist [Jay Nordlinger]

In Impromptus today, I talk about the International Committee of the Red Cross, Guantanamo Bay, the War on Terror (as it used to be known), and other such stuff. Over the weekend, I read an article by the great Claudia Rosett — an article from 2002. And part of it made me a little bit sad — because it showed how the general American attitude has changed over the last several years.

In the 2002 article, Claudia cited a joke — a joke made by Jimmy Fallon on Saturday Night Live. He was talking about how the ICRC was fixated on the living conditions of our terror detainees. (These Genevans are not so fixated on other prisoners’ living conditions.) Fallon said, “They’re suicide bombers. They hate living conditions.” Do you think such a joke could be, would be, made today? Did we have a better understanding of the jihad then, or now?

haha what's hilarious about that to me is nordinger actually goes through a very thoughtful process there ("okay, popular anecdote...something is different than 8 years ago...i will now attempt to carefully consider these differences"), but inevitably ends up right where he started ("fuckin' politcal correctness!")

K-Lo's tweets have been hilarious today:

the use of the word "progressive" today could make for a glenn-beck-inspired drinking game. you'd be drunk by the time his show comes on

About the Kagan hearings:

if she truly embodies modesty, get her back on a college campus, they could use that!

i believe miguel estrada takes "extraordinary notes." too bad he was not hispanic enough to be sit on u.s. court of appeals.

he says that a little humor would do the supreme court a lot of good. has arlen specter never heard clarence thomas's laugh?

‘Cheering in the Pressbox’ [Jay Nordlinger]
This afternoon, I wrote a long, rather huffy post on liberal media bias. It was prompted by 1) those reporters who were caught on tape trashing Sarah Palin, and 2) the David Weigel affair. I have deep-sixed the post, however — spiked it. I can huff about media bias again, as I have in the past. (And I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll — not budge the house an inch.)

Let me instead say this: I think many of my conservative colleagues are far too gingerly when it comes to liberal media bias. Far too timid, delicate, and forgiving. For a long time, complaining about media bias has been seen as uncouth. It’s something we all need to learn to live with, like death, taxes, and mosquitoes. Don’t be uncool by bitching about it, man.

I wish I could find an Abe Rosenthal column, written many years ago. It was about the reluctance of Jews to call anti-Semitism anti-Semitism, when anti-Semitism presented itself. They were eternally worried about “crying anti-Semitism” — so they stayed mute, when they should have been crying.

So unusual was this column, it was thrilling.

It’s hard to know just when to pull the trigger — entirely a matter of judgment. Some people are too quick on the anti-Semitism trigger (or the racism trigger), and some people are too slow. It takes real judgment — real knowing — to pull it at exactly the right moment.

Every now and then, the curtain is pulled back on the mainstream media — and we see how these guys talk and act when they’re at their most authentic. This is important. Liberal media bias is maybe something we all have to live with, but that doesn’t mean it’s something to ignore, be blasé about, or excuse.

I’m grateful to both Walter Cronkite and Barbara Walters for something: They admitted, yes, the media are liberal, and a good thing, too. It has to be that way, they said. For — and this is Walters talking — journalism involves the “human condition,” and liberals care about the human condition. Unlike conservatives, who of course couldn’t give a rat’s a** about the human condition.

Anyway . . . Conservatives should be frank and bold when it comes to the media, as to everything else. And if others say you’re tiresome or whiny or uncool . . . well, so be it. Did you sign up for conservatism to be cool?

One more thing, before I go: I have a friend who’s an old-school political reporter, practically a dinosaur. He stresses the principle, “No cheering in the pressbox” — a statement taken from sports journalism, obviously. No cheering in the pressbox? The guys I have in mind — mainstream-media reporters all — don’t so much cheer as turn cartwheels while blowing on vuvuzelas. And they are cartwheeling and blowing for the Democratic party.

whew yah good thing you deep-sixed that long huffy post about the mainstream media

I think many of my conservative colleagues are far too gingerly

what language is this supposed to be in again?

lol

Let me instead say this: I think many of my conservative colleagues are far too gingerly when it comes to liberal media bias. Far too timid, delicate, and forgiving. For a long time, complaining about media bias has been seen as uncouth. It’s something we all need to learn to live with, like death, taxes, and mosquitoes. Don’t be uncool by bitching about it, man.

I wish I could find an Abe Rosenthal column, written many years ago. It was about the reluctance of Jews to call anti-Semitism anti-Semitism, when anti-Semitism presented itself. They were eternally worried about “crying anti-Semitism” — so they stayed mute, when they should have been crying.

So unusual was this column, it was thrilling.

It’s hard to know just when to pull the trigger — entirely a matter of judgment. Some people are too quick on the anti-Semitism trigger (or the racism trigger), and some people are too slow. It takes real judgment — real knowing — to pull it at exactly the right moment.

Every now and then, the curtain is pulled back on the mainstream media — and we see how these guys talk and act when they’re at their most authentic. This is important. Liberal media bias is maybe something we all have to live with, but that doesn’t mean it’s something to ignore, be blasé about, or excuse.

He writes like a pedo putting the make on a little boy. Ugh.

I love that parenthetical about the "racism trigger." Might want to tune that dog whistle, Jay.

It takes real judgment — real knowing — to pull it at exactly the right moment.

when will the right moment come to compare comments about palins lack of coherent speech to the historical oppression of jews?

NOW, JOHN, NOW!!!!!

It takes real judgment — real knowing — to pull it when the us plays ghana

dying

oh man! Nordlinger is catching up to K-Lo in providing serious lolz:

When you smear good people like Limbaugh and Sauerbrey, you don’t merely hurt them, which is probably your intention. You harm the place in which all of us live.

"which is probably your intention"

You harm the place in which all of us live.

lol what

does he mean northern virgina?

Andrei Zhdanov writes

Poetry Watch, cont. [John J. Miller]

Yesterday, I offered qualified praise on the selection of W.S. Merwin as poet laureate. Well, I probably should have qualified it even more! At First Things, Joseph Bottum exposes Merwin as a crazed Bush hater who somehow believes that our former president managed to "silence all criticism" of his administration after 9/11. Yeah, that's what happened. At any rate, Merwin is a perfect poet for an administration that can't stop pointing a finger at its predecessor. Will Paul McCartney be next?

Heh [Jonah Goldberg]

I got this email over the weekend:

Good Day Jonah,

Thought you might get a kick out of this as my son and I did- as I was on my way earlier today to Borders books in Milpitas,Calif. my son asked me to pick up a copy of Liberal Fascism.Upon arrival,I couldn’t find your book on the shelf where it was supposed to be;a helpful store clerk located it in an off shelf “overstock” section(then did place the copies on the shelf).Once home,as my son was starting to read your book at ,a business size orange card fell out with a stamped message ”THIS BOOK EQUAL CONJOB”…… the attempt to be protected from your views by someone at the printers or the bookstore,and with poor grammar to boot, just sort of adds to your case.

Please note the writer's own punctuation.

Goldberg reminds me of my project manager at my last job - mannerisms, speaking voice, hell, looks even

TY for new display name, Borders employee.

Goldberg reminds me of my project manager at my last job - mannerisms, speaking voice, hell, looks even

Pitying you.

Google's Commie Artist [John J. Miller]

Google's logo image today is of Frida Kahlo, the Communist painter. Here's her self-portrait with Stalin, whom she revered.

UPDATE: E-mailer:

I wonder what they'll be doing for Leni Riefenstahl.

07/06 06:53 AMShare

i think mordy's right, the corner is changing in some ways, but i can't put my finger on it. and not that it really matters either... lots more content from this miller dude, and nordlinger, who seems like a completely blinkered idiot. dumber than jonah goldberg, even!

like this post above, what i love is the sense of complete right-wing-world greenhouse living. the guy is really pleased with himself for pointing out that frida kahlo was a communist. and she's right there on the google!! but... everybody knows this. literally every human being knows this fact.

http://www.theonion.com/articles/communists-now-least-threatening-group-in-us,3191/

Thank You Justice Kennedy [Jonah Goldberg]

It's a sentiment not often expressed around here, but it's appropriate today. So far Obama has replaced one old liberal with a younger (wise Latina) liberal and is about to do it again (minus the wise Latina part). But if Justice Kennedy were to retire before 2012 he would throw the current Supreme Court balance completely over to the liberal bloc for years to come. I don't fetishize the notions of "balance" or "centrism" on the court, but I value them greatly if the alternative is giving over the last branch of government to liberalism for years to come. So thanks very much Justice Kennedy.

Is Divorce Contagious? [Maggie Gallagher]

The British press is reporting on a new study showing that your divorce risk soars if any of your close friends divorce. This is consistent with a lot of what we know about divorce.

We often act as if divorce is the result of a careful and considered range of alternatives, or that it happens without forethought, for no good reason at all. The truth is that people who divorce have had dissatisfaction in their marriage (like a lot of other people), but most can also identify good things about their marriage. The decision to divorce is not inevitable; it is a decision that often could have gone either way.

I have stopped divorces in my own social circle, simply by saying “It sounds like you would be better off, but there’s not much in it for your kids.”

Gordon Liddy once told me that a woman wrote to him when he was in jail saying she felt sorry for him. He wrote back and said, “I sense sadness in your note,” at which point she unloaded her marital dissatisfactions on him. He wrote back and said, “If you are that unhappy, maybe you should divorce.” A few years later, she wrote back: “You SOB, I’m a poor broke single mother with two kids.”

He thought that was a lesson in how some people need to reflect more. I marveled, “Some guy in jail told her to get a divorce and she did!”

Inevitability is almost always a story we construct afterwards, not the truth before.

07/07 01:33 PMShare

I marveled!

Gordon Liddy once told me
Gordon Liddy once told me
Gordon Liddy once told me
Gordon Liddy once told me

I love it when right-wingers talk about divorce since it splits the Catholics & Protestants and it would be great for US right-wingers to reenact the Wars of Religion.

I have stopped divorces in my own social circle, simply by saying “It sounds like you would be better off, but there’s not much in it for your kids.”

I wonder how often she gets slapped in the face.

http://www.mockpaperscissors.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/maggie-gallagher.jpg

i love it when right-wingers talk about writing about your marriage problems to g. gordon liddy while he's in prison as if it's not utterly fucked up

yes, actual lol @ the Liddy lines, like, she must know how preposterous that sounds, right?

Euler, do you know what kind of people we're dealing with here?

She wants to impress her Corner-ites that she (a) knows Gordon Liddy (b) knows Gordon Liddy well enough to trust his marriage advice. Both points are, shall we say, problematic.

yes, I had an fb friend "like" K-Lo this week.

*impress her Corner-ites with the fact that

xpost

http://i31.tinypic.com/70e3oh.jpg

^^^ tempting!

It's a sentiment not often expressed around here, but it's appropriate today. So far Obama has replaced one old liberal with a younger (wise Latina) liberal and is about to do it again (minus the wise Latina part).

Not that he cares but at some point the multiculturaLOL of "wise latina" is going to fade from public discourse if it already hasn't and leave JG looking even more overtly racist.

Looking back on the Sotomayor nomination, I was struck by how much of it was really much ado about nothing.

I couldn’t find your book on the shelf where it was supposed to be; a helpful store clerk located it in an off shelf “overstock” section (then did place the copies on the shelf).

what a conspiracy

not the Corner, but Corner-worthy

No lemonade for you!

Generosity to strangers is the work of the devil. I wonder how he would have concluded if it had been ice water?

I sure hope he paid his brother for the ride.

Name Game [John J. Miller]

Kentucky Fried Chicken changed its name to KFC and now National Public Radio is changing its name to NPR. I just wish the hosts and correspondents would refer to it "taxpayer-funded NPR."

Currently on the Corner: All roller derby, all the time!

It's NRO rather than the Corner per se, but K-Lo wrote a column attacking the American administration for supporting a new Kenyan constitution that allows women at risk of death to get abortions

maybe i should post this as a product advisory over on i love people-making:

Etch A Sketch® Turns 50 Today [Jack Fowler]

Happy Birthday to the iconic toy. Why do we care at NR? Because in the magazine’s early years, one regular advertiser was the Ohio Art company. Owned by the late W. C. Killgallon (a true conservative whose children carry on), Ohio Art manufactured Etch A Sketch® and other toys (spinning tops, tea-party sets) that today evoke a simpler time and more wholesome means of playing. If you come across an NR from the ’60s or early ’70s, odds are you’ll see a company ad, ablaze in red, on the inside back cover, hawking the Etch A Sketch® and other goodies. Decades later we remain grateful to the company and to the Killgallons for helping Bill Buckley’s fortnightly stay afloat in the lean times (heck, they’re still lean), and wish it well on this Golden Anniversary.

By the way, you’ll find an epic battle over at www.SlinkyvsEtchaSketch.com. Vote through July 31st.

07/12 02:55 PMShare

Currently on the Corner: All roller derby, all the time!

― "the English sweat" (a new disease) (clotpoll), Saturday, July 10, 2010 10:57 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark

^^ shit is hilarious btw

batshit Andy McCarthy is a total sports nerd, I don't know if it's kinda humanizing to see such a crazy dude pontificate about sports or insane that even in the middle of a rant about something that clearly means a lot to him, McCarthy throws in a high-taxes-dig. http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MTg4OWVhZjZlYWYzNWY0NmY0YWQ3NjI1NDBhMGMxZGU=

He probably lacks the cojones to waterboard the losing team himself.

Jonah:

So I think BP should embrace their new bad boy image, own their rep. They’re never going to win over their enemies. They’re not even going to win back their friends. Even if they survive this Gulf disaster, they’re destined to be nickel-and-dimed, shaken down and mau-maued by every green group and grasping pol in Christendom.

So why not accept the fact that they’re the bad guy? Go dark. Go edgy. Make all your executives wear dark trench coats. Encourage up-and-comers to cut corners, blackmail the opposition and throw lavish hooker and cocaine parties, just like in the movies. Machiavelli said it’s better to be feared than loved. Why should that only be true for medieval princes and the Church of Scientology? Go street, BP. Ask your investors and customers to root for the bad guy. Admit you’ll go the extra mile to make a buck. Don’t admit you’ll break the law (wink, wink), just let it be known that you think law enforcement is the government’s concern, not yours. You’re sticking with sucking as much cash-juice from the ground as possible. Just like Hyman Roth, as long as you make money for your partners, you’re golden.

ha yeah that'd make a lot of personality-disorder righty types really stoked: "BP's ruining the oceans and you liberals HATE it -- in your face!"

go street bp

So I think Jonah should embrace his new bad boy image, own his rep.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_sW65ilskOC8/SnDSeirAm7I/AAAAAAAAY9k/FEqUPL1gHjs/s400/JonahGoldberginCar.jpg

never gets old

loooolll:

What's This Mama Grizzly Thing? [Kathryn Jean Lopez]

From my syndicated column this week: "now that the cultural upheaval that has been creeping into our lives since the Sixties is fundamentally threatening our national identity, the natural protective instincts of women are kicking in even on a political level, in an undeniable way."

can we plz start calling her only "mama grizzly"

ha yeah that'd make a lot of personality-disorder righty types really stoked: "BP's ruining the oceans and you liberals HATE it -- in your face!"

― les yeux sans aerosmith (underrated aerosmith albums I have loved), Monday, July 19, 2010 8:08 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

just came to the post in question in my google reader, and 6 ppl have 'liked' it.

Likewise I might say that the music of Sir Mix-a-Lot portrays over-sized fundaments with so much love and tenderness that it is sometimes impossible to pull out the theme of man's inhumanity to man. Or maybe he just likes big butts.

I once read this outrageous claim that women themselves were involved in the cultural upheaval of the 60's.

Derb would like to dedicate this next song to Ellen Page:

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZmMzM2Q0MDFmNTAwYjlmYjYzNTBkMzhkYTlkMmQzYTY=

What is it with these movie guys and their dead wives? Grieve, get over it, life goes on. The men involved are never old or poor — who in movies ever is? — so there is no obstacle to their getting new wives. Come on, guys, the world needs populating.

The men involved are never old or poor — who in movies ever is?

wut

Andy McCarthy, you are a piece of work.

I repeat: how did this man work for the Justice Department?

Ground Zero Mosque Imam's Muslim Brotherhood Friends [Andy McCarthy]

My column this weekend, on the homepage, is about the connections between the imam pushing the Ground Zero mosque, Feisal Abdul Rauf, and two of the Muslim Brotherhood's American tentacles, the Islamic Society of North America and the International Institute of Islamic Thought.

The Ground Zero mosque project is not about religious tolerance. We permit thousands of mosques in our country, and Islam is not a religion. Islam is an ideology that has some spiritual elements, but strives for authoritarian control of every aspect of human life — social, political, and economic.

jesus fuck

thats the corner i know and love

Tentacles?!?!?

Islam is not a religion. Islam is an ideology that has some spiritual elements, but strives for authoritarian control of every aspect of human life — social, political, and economic.

wow

that's a new favorite meme. see here and here, e.g.

oh man do i have to

Sharia law is the law that subjugates women, that cuts off the hand of the thief, that beheads the adulteress, that's sharia law, and that's what Islam is.

you'd think the corner would be cool with this tbh

Imo the problem isn't describing Islam as an all encompassing jurisprudence, economic, political system so much as how is that different than any other religion? Last I checked the Church wasn't exactly hands-off.

oh idk if you've heard Christianity isn't a religion or a way of life - it's a personal relationship with Jesus Christ <--- this summary is seen as irreducible & immune to restatement

nifty right?

Islam Christinanity is not a religion. Islam Christianity is an ideology that has some spiritual elements, but strives for authoritarian control of every aspect of human life — social, political, and economic.

I don't know how Andy proposes winning this "war" if he dismisses the religion of half a billion people as a historical aberration.

conversion duh

ann coulter had the answer all along:

We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity.

of course back in 2001 that was enough to get her dumped by NRO. how things change.

Part biography, part history, part detective story, RADICAL-IN-CHIEF reveals the carefully hidden tale of Barack Obama’s political past. Stanley Kurtz, who’s research helped inject the Bill Ayers and ACORN issues into the 2008 presidential campaign, presents the results of more than two years of digging into President Obama’s radical political world. The book is filled with previously unknown information about the president’s past, tied together by a bold argument about what Obama’s deepest political convictions really are.

RADICAL-IN-CHIEF marshals a wide array of never-before-seen evidence to establish that the president of the United States is indeed a socialist. Tracing an unbroken thread of socialist activities and political partnerships, from Obama’s youth through his community organizing days and beyond, the book confirms that the president’s harshest critics have been right about his socialism all along.

Socialism in America [Stanley Kurtz]

Jonah, I thought your socialism piece was very much on target. Essentially, my book provides the American version of what you were describing using European examples. American socialism is similar in some respects to the European variety, but also differs in interesting ways. Community organizing is a big part of what makes American socialism distinctive, and this, of course, is where Obama comes in. This is what I will show in detail, drawing on a lot of material that has never been seen.

07/28 10:41 AMShare

i'm on the edge of my seat here!!

Kurtz cut and pasted the synopsis for Goldberg's book?

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NDMwZjZmMzUxM2M0MjJiNDg1ZjU3YWRhZWIzMWQwMmY=

this takes the day's award for pissant petty whining

http://www.nationalreview.com/images/ads/ad_subscribe_article-bottom_2009.jpg

how come no one's mentioned the redesign?

Also, welcome back, Jonah from sun and teabagging:

I’m back from the San Juan Islands, where I had a delightful time with family, and speaking to tea partiers.

The San Juan Islands are up near Vancouver Island. I suspect the tea partiers = crusty friends of his deceased father.

http://global.nationalreview.com/images/logo_corner_080610_square.jpg

lol

Don't ever change, Andy:

Andy McCarthy
August 07, 2010 11:25 AM
By Kathryn Jean Lopez

issues another Ground Zero mosque warning.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/243052/judging-books-their-covers-jonah-goldberg

i can't decide which is funnier, Jonah's pretensions to intellectualism or his total lack of self-awareness (okay these things are probably connected)

his whole shtick is one giant straw-man argument conducted in a vacuum. why of course, jonah, you don't need to read those liberal's books or listen to the arguments they "may" counter you with - they're wrong. they're liberals.

I've gone from finding the corner perversely amusing to being really annoyed by these people, which I guess is their point. delete bookmark.

The new design isn't helping. I'm hoping things get more batshit as election time approaches. Don't give up hope, m@ark!

The speakers are booked!.

Buy the Book, Cruise with the Author

hiyo

can't decide which is funnier, Jonah's pretensions to intellectualism or his total lack of self-awareness

http://global.nationalreview.com/images/logo_corner_081310_square.jpg

Chickening Out Hurts the Bottom Line
August 18, 2010 3:10 PM
By John Hood

The suits at KFC — the restaurant chain that used to be called, proudly, Kentucky Fried Chicken — have claimed that their 2009 decision to emphasize grilled chicken and sandwiches was based on “extensive consumer research.” I don’t find their assertion credible. I think they were trying to adjust the company’s direction and marketing strategy to their perception of the prevailing political and social attitudes about obesity. I don’t think the execs carefully considered how their consumers would react, particularly to ad campaigns that explicitly repudiated the fried-chicken brand of KFC.

I’m not alone in drawing these conclusions. KFC franchisees are livid about the resulting loss of business. They have sued the parent company to wrest control of KFC marketing from execs who fail to understand that, in the words of one franchisee, “by and large the general public doesn’t give a damn how many calories are in it.” After all, dieters and health-nazis are unlikely to make up a significant share of the KFC customer base in any event.

What’s the larger significance of KFC’s internal battles? In both the public and private sectors, far too many decisions are made on the basis of silly fads, partial glimpses of nebulous trends, a temptation to placate powerful interest groups, or a pathetic desire to be seen as enlightened. In the private sector, companies sometimes waste time and money on pointless public-relations exercises, senseless recycling programs, and the like. But subjected to the rigors of competition, these firms tend to pay the price over time and adjust their behavior accordingly. In the public sector, however, politicians don’t have to worry as much about losing ground to competitors. Their absurdities persist. Their pretensions multiply.

Leaders who make hard-headed decisions on the basis of valid empirical evidence, logical reasoning, and sound priorities tend to do well. Leaders who chicken out and pander tend to fail in the long run — except in safe political districts, where they can afford to screw up, hang around, and accumulate rent-controlled apartments.

the restaurant chain that used to be called, proudly, Kentucky Fried Chicken

There would be mass suicide at the NRO offices if KFC ever went out of business.

KFC-Jean Lopez.

'mass' as in a lot of people, or just by weight?

lol has the dude not seen the DOUBLE DOWN

here's the article linked in there

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_34/b4192019553596.htm

Leaders who chicken out

Oh the wit.

What a bunch of mothercluckers.

so proud I never fell for that recycling fad

The sun's not red, it's chicken.

Someone use their Photoshop powers and do something with K-Lo and a bucket of KFC chicken.

god no

Bucketgirl

Here play with this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/obsequies/2605265939/

AUGH xp

I hate you so very much, Ned Raggett

Ah well.

"Hey there, Alfred...pass the potatoes..."

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v296/WilliamCrump63/ColonelLopez.jpg

:o

lol at the hair

holy christ. This is like Laura Dern's face in Inland Empire -- it will haunt me for the rest of my days

Now just replace 'chicken' with `Lopez.'

I don't think Jonah is being given enough credit as a KFC fan.

This is like Laura Dern's face in Inland Empire -- it will haunt me for the rest of my days

You're far too kind. My shop skills have gone way downhill since Tuomas Is Real and Breakdancin' Ken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ucVjoTr_7s&feature=related

K-Lo's secret blend of herbs and spices.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=tijuana+picnic

oh no no no no no no no
(lol)

This fucking guy.

Wait is it Star Trek week again over there?

The cruise is next week! Get your cabin, Ned!

Only if I can install a black hole in it.

Don't talk about Dan that way!

Andy McCarthy: QQ

Having worked for a very long time with moderate Muslims, I can tell you it’s disheartening to be called an Islamophobe. Not by the CAIR types — who cares what they say? No, it’s when the charge (or at least the whiff of it) comes from thoughtful people, people like Ron Radosh, whom I admire. When that sort of thing happens, it tells me two things: first, the smear tactics of the CAIR types work; second, maybe I haven’t been clear enough — although God knows I have tried to be — about my position.

Christ, what an asshole.

some of his best friends are moderate Muslims!!!!!

he was even okay with letting his daughter date a moderate muslim!!!

lol

"When someone at work tells me I'm wrong, I tend to accuse him of misinterpreting me."

"When that sort of thing happens, it tells me two things. Oddly, neither or them are ever 'I might be wrong here.'"

NRO-related LOL in the NYT book review today, an indignant letter to the editor complaining about last week's review of a Norman Podhoretz review identifying him as "an embittererd paranoid old crank" signed by Rich Lowry and other conservatives: "it debases the national discourse." FFS nobody connected w/the Corner can complain about THAT.

review of a Norman Podhoretz biography...

M@ark, I assume you've read Vidal and Hitchens' hilarious reviews of Podhoretz memoirs over the years? Awesome stuff.

By Katrina Trinko

That was the message a spirited, thousand-plus crowd delivered — to New York and D.C. politicians, to imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, and to all those who support building a mosque near Ground Zero — during a three-hour rally today that began near the proposed site for the mosque and ended with a short march to Ground Zero.

The rally, sponsored by the Coalition to Honor Ground Zero, drew a chanting, hollering, flag-waving crowd. Many participants carried signs, their messages ranging from photos of loved ones to “SHARIA” (written in blood-red dripping ink) to pleas for moderation (“If You Want To ‘Bridge The Gap’ Then Show Some Sensitivity And Put A Gap Between This Mosque & Ground Zero”). Protesters included 9/11 families and friends, New York police and firefighters, and bikers who had just completed a trek that began in Shanksville, Pa., and included a stop at the Pentagon.

Speaker after speaker testified to the importance of the Ground Zero site to Americans. “If we want a nation of peace,” said city councilman Dan Halloran, whose cousin died on 9/11, “then peace comes with understanding. And they need to understand that this is sacred ground to New Yorkers.”

A strain of populism was evident among the protestors. Several speakers mentioned the ruling class. One man held a sign bearing these words: “As An Out of Work Union Carpenter, I Rather [Would] Starve Than Earn a Bloody Check From That Trophy To 9/11 Terrorist[s].” Tom Trento, director of the Florida Security Council, mentioned his 87-year-old Teamster father, who had delivered scaffolding to the construction site of the World Trade Center. “[My dad] told me that no self-respecting Teamster in the brotherhood will deliver a bag of cement to that rat’s nest,” said Trento.

The participants’ views on Islam varied. Some seemed to believe that no moderate version of Islam exists. “These people, this Sharia people, are out to get you. They’re out to convert you. . . . They want to have their own law in our country,” warned actor Tony Lo Bianco. “In the Muslim world, a moderate believes that you can take down America without violence,” said Debra Burlingame, co-founder of 9/11 Families for a Safe and Strong America. “You can do it by infiltrating their colleges and universities. You can do it by infiltrating the media, government, [and] cultural institutions, and you can bring down the house of the infidel from within.”

Not everyone took such a hard line. Most of the individuals I spoke to were fine with the mosque being built, just as long as it wasn’t in such close proximity to Ground Zero. “We’re not opposed to Islam. We’re not opposed to a mosque, because, obviously, there are mosques within a five-block radius of the World Trade Center,” said Maureen Bosco, whose son Richard died on 9/11. “We just feel it’s too close.”

There was excitement about November 2; several speakers reminded politicians they would be held accountable. The protestors lauded Rep. Peter King (R., N.Y.) and former mayor Rudy Giuliani — “rumor has it . . . that if [the imam] is walking down this street and Rudy Giuliani sees him, he’s going to kick his a**,” said Trento, launching the crowd into cheers of “Rudy! Rudy!” — and vigorously bashed President Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Mayor Michael Bloomberg...

during a three-hour rally today that began near the proposed site for the mosque and ended with a short march to Ground Zero.

Nice of her to point out that it isn't at Ground Zero.

“If You Want To ‘Bridge The Gap’ Then Show Some Sensitivity And Put A Gap Between This Mosque & Ground Zero”

Then takes all of one sentence to forget.

We’re not opposed to a mosque, because, obviously, there are mosques within a five-block radius of the World Trade Center,” said Maureen Bosco, whose son Richard died on 9/11. “We just feel it’s too close.”

Five blocks good, two blocks bad. What about three or four?

Oh Tony...

http://www.friendsandfamily-themovie.com/headshots_small/_Lo_Bianco2_bwDropShad.jpg

pleas for moderation (“If You Want To ‘Bridge The Gap’ Then Show Some Sensitivity And Put A Gap Between This Mosque & Ground Zero”).

some protest sign slogan moderation would have been nice in the name of concision

Next you'll be asking them to use spell check.

“If we want a nation of peace,” said city councilman Dan Halloran, whose cousin died on 9/11, “then peace comes with understanding. And they need to understand that what idiotic white people want is more important than anything else.”

Also, this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwaNRWMN-F4

"And they need to understand that what idiotic white people want is more important than anything else.”

LOL

Breaking Radio Silence

By Jonah Goldberg

I spent the day at Splash Mountain in Ocean City yesterday (for some reason, Ocean City strikes me as a G-Rated Sodom and Gamorrah). While my daughter and I had a grand time, I’m convinced I picked up some sort of bug in the swirling bacteria frappe of insufficiently chlorinated water. But I’ll be on Special Report tonight, loaded with the right drugs. Good times.

Seeing "Sodom & Gamorrah [sic]" and "my daughter and I" next to each other is just . . .

if ever there was a time for creepy wet guy in his car pic...

classic

http://twitter.com/allyzay/status/22030739325

before you enlarge the photo, k-lo's twitter avatar makes her look like jerry garcia

http://www.salon.com/news/islam/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/08/24/goldberg_idiot_bias

this was cute "reporting": The participants’ views on Islam varied. Some seemed to believe that no moderate version of Islam exists. “

what a coincidence that they regurgitated your exact talking point right back to you.

classic

http://twitter.com/allyzay/status/22030739325

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, August 24, 2010 5:08 PM (52 minutes ago)

ahhhhhhhh

He's not joking.

How Many Corner Readers
August 28, 2010 12:41 P.M.
By Kathryn Jean Lopez
are Restoring Honor today?

Dumb as hell, this Jonah. And a liar:

This time last year, there was a wide and deep consensus that the country needed a second stimulus (President Bush’s first one of $152 billion was thrown down the memory hole). Many Republicans, licking their wounds after successive drubbings at the polls and fearful that prophecies of a generation “in the wilderness” might prove true, were either eager to side with the popular new president or were at least resigned to the fact that they might have to, particularly if Obama was going to honor his commitments to bipartisan governance.

A letter from a concerned father:

Hello Mr. Miller, I have followed your posts for years on NR’s Corner, including putting together lists of conservative books, movies, etc. My daughter is taking an AP U.S. History course at her high school [in Maryland]… One of her assignments is to read and do a report on one of three books (only one of the three and no other). They are: Kerouac’s “On The Road”, Friedan’s “Feminine Mystique”, and Carson’s “Silent Spring”. As you can quickly determine, all books of a nihilist, leftist bent, written during the 50′s and 60′s. While I am not concerned about my daughter being radicalized, as I’ve taught her critical thinking, l am concerned about the limitiing, one-sided approach that is being dictated to students at least at this high school … My problem is that despite growing up during this era, and now teaching college history at the local community college, I cannot think of intellectually challenging books that would offer a counterbalance to these three. During my formative years, I read “Conscience of a Conservative”, “God and Man at Yale”, and other books by, then, contemporary conservative authors. I would like to meet with my daughter’s teacher and suggest three alternate books for him to consider in the future to equlaize this one-sided requirement. If you have any recommendations, I would appreciate them.

"I've taught her critical thinking"

On the road...to serfdom!

Also he has no idea what nihilism means.

His daughter will teach him after reading Hayek.

we believe in nossing!!

Honestly I'd be willing to bet that if the students read conservative texts that are contemporary with Friedan et al they'd prob laugh their asses off at how retrograde they are

Now I'm wracking my brain for semi-respectable books that might apply. The Culture of Narcissism? Not sure Lasch was much of a conservative though

Election Movie Recommendation
September 1, 2010 4:45 P.M.
By Hans A. von Spakovsky

I don’t usually do movie reviews for NRO, but this week I got a chance to preview a movie that will be released on October 15, just two weeks before the general elections. I Want Your Money is a terrific documentary limning the starkly different visions of Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama. It goes beyond the economic issues suggested by the title and explores the limited-government–vs.–nanny-state differences as well.

The movie mixes interviews, archival footage of speeches, and some very funny animation. The latter includes a segment in which Ronald Reagan teaches an economics lesson to a classroom filled with students such as Barack Obama, Jimmy Carter, and Arnold Schwarzenegger (all of whom would probably get an “F” for the course). This is not your usual (boring) political documentary. It’s engaging and funny, even as it conveys a serious message about economics and politics.

What made seeing it particularly interesting for me was that I was accompanied by my boss, former attorney general Ed Meese. It was quite something to watch Ronald Reagan giving his 1980 inauguration speech and his RNC convention address in 1984 while sitting next to a man who was actually at the capitol or near the podium when the Great Communicator delivered those eminent expositions on liberty, economic freedom, and who we are as a nation.

This documentary dramatically shows the dangers to our nation’s economy and well-being of deficit spending and an unsustainable national debt. It also vividly illustrates how differently two presidents handled economic recessions: one pushing tax cuts, reducing regulations, controlling spending, and limiting the size of government; the other pushing tax hikes, additional regulation, huge deficits, and an exponential increase in the size of government.

As the movie’s flier says, the film is about “mounting government debt and deficits, and why it matters.” Why it matters can be seen in the contrast between the largest peacetime economic expansion in history and continued record unemployment sans recovery.

Hollywood will hate this movie, as will supporters of President Obama, Senator Reid, and Speaker Pelosi. Director Ray Griggs is probably risking his career in Tinseltown. But it’s a movie that needed to be made, and is well worth seeing. I hope lots of Americans do—before November 2.

here is Ray Griggs' career in tinseltown:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2050708/

I don't have any problem with professors assigning Burke, Disraeli, Hayek, or whatever actually.

and that father must realize his daughter will probably get those assigned readings...in a good liberal arts college.

E-mail from a Dad
September 2, 2010 9:32 A.M.
By Kathryn Jean Lopez
When my son was in second grade (1987) in public school, my wife came home in tears one day because the school had told her that Matthew had ADD and needed to be medicated for it. Long story short, we took him out and enrolled him in Catholic school.

He is a Marine Corps sniper team leader and a policeman at a local municipality, having graduated number one in his class at the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Academy. (and all without Ritalin). Imagine that.

(ducks)

So he was a terror to his Catholic school teachers and fellow students, became asshole fascist as an adult = compassionate conservatism at its best.

ha i dunno, that's not so different from stories of kids getting slapped with an ADD diagnosis and growing up to be professional dancers or something.

a lot of cops present with "symptoms" of ADD (i'm told) cos they have to be good at sitting in a car and staring at every little thing they come across.

Classic Alfred post

ha! The implication of that letter is that liberal psychologists overmedicate their students, no?

I would assume so considering its NRO

medication is for pussies, suck it up etc

i dunno, it seems like a right-wing parody of a well-known hippie trope.

"not everybody is good at boring old school, just because a kid doesn't want to sit still doesn't mean he's sick, he's just talented in other ways... like getting screamed at by nuns and dropping a gangbanger at 400 yards"

K-Lo has never said no to Carrabas meatballs.

i thought the gist was more like "public school administrators are morons" with a dash of "ADD & other learning disorders are just mollycoddling liberal psychology bullshit"

seems like general undirected resentment at basically everyone

public schools, seculars, psychologists, liberals, diseases, the modern world, criminals, enemies foreign and domestic, drugs

Reaching Across the Aisle
September 8, 2010 11:17 A.M.
By Matthew Shaffer

Last night Karl Rove went into the belly of the beast, debating “Resolved: Repeal Obamacare” with the Yale Political Union in the Yale Law School auditorium. Rove was a sensation, quickly disarming and charming a hostile audience. When the chairman of Yale’s Progressive Party, sophomore Jordon Walker, satirically praised Rove’s good looks, the former deputy chief of staff rose, bowed, approached Walker, and placed a gentle kiss on his forehead. “If only you were twenty years older and an attractive woman,” Rove pined.

Walker later described the kiss as “a wet one.”

what the

http://crooksandliars.com/files/uploads/2008/06/karl_rove_01.jpg

what the

Back when Karl was just another Bernhard Goetz fanboy.

this fucking guy:

Enough Already with Reverend Jones

By Victor Davis Hanson

Everyone is trying to outdo one another in righteous condemnation of the Reverend Terry Jones and his micro-flock, to assure the world that 50 people out of 300 million does not a majority make. That is altogether fine and good, and yet we all know the asymmetry involved — whether it is a scholarly remark made by a pope and the Muslim riots in response, or the policies of many Arab countries forbidding open worship by other religions and, in some cases, the presence of non-Muslims in entire cities.

But all that said, our political and military leaders — whether a general, a secretary of defense, or a president — are making a grave mistake by commenting directly on this pathetic figure. If a gesture is needed by our leaders, a simple “The United States ensures freedom of speech, even disturbing expressions of it, and has always paid the subsequent price for ill-manners” would have been enough.

How long before we see some loons somewhere in the US demand that Saudi Arabia open Mecca up to non-Muslims? And insist that the policy is a deliberate insult to the west?

to assure the world that 50 people out of 300 million does not a majority make.

the irony does my head in

Oh. My. God.

Citing a recent Forbes article by Dinesh D’Souza, former House speaker Newt Gingrich tells National Review Online that President Obama may follow a “Kenyan, anti-colonial” worldview.

Gingrich says that D’Souza has made a “stunning insight” into Obama’s behavior — the “most profound insight I have read in the last six years about Barack Obama.”

“What if [Obama] is so outside our comprehension, that only if you understand Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior, can you begin to piece together [his actions]?” Gingrich asks. “That is the most accurate, predictive model for his behavior.”

“This is a person who is fundamentally out of touch with how the world works, who happened to have played a wonderful con, as a result of which he is now president,” Gingrich tells us.

“I think he worked very hard at being a person who is normal, reasonable, moderate, bipartisan, transparent, accommodating — none of which was true,” Gingrich continues. “In the Alinksy tradition, he was being the person he needed to be in order to achieve the position he needed to achieve . . . He was authentically dishonest.”

big scoop for NRO!

With Peter Robinson hiking in the Sierras (that's not a euphemism, he actually is hiking in the Sierras), Jonah Goldberg sits in and perhaps needless to say, adult supervision is in short supply. Hence, we cover Star Trek (of course), gay bars and the GZM, the use of fake swear words in popular culture (Johnny Dangerously, anyone?), and the time Rob spotted former Labor Secretary Robert Reich in a hot tub. Really. Not to worry though, there's plenty of serious discussion (tenure and taxes, primary election analysis, and of course, conservatives and pop culture) to go around.

http://ricochet.com/Ricochet-Podcast

oh man, the pat sajak columns on there. Ricochet might be the new corner.

How long before we see some loons somewhere in the US demand that Saudi Arabia open Mecca up to non-Muslims? And insist that the policy is a deliberate insult to the west? - hannity's been on this tip for awhile but esp stressing it w/ regard to ground zero victory mosque.

But all that said, our political and military leaders — whether a general, a secretary of defense, or a president — are making a grave mistake by commenting directly on this pathetic figure. If a gesture is needed by our leaders, a simple “The United States ensures freedom of speech, even disturbing expressions of it, and has always paid the subsequent price for ill-manners” would have been enough.

Heh I don't entirely disagree, particularly w/r/t Obama. He shouldn't have given it the time of day. And then, only if pressed, been like "Oh yeah I heard about that. What a shame. You see, in America, we place a great deal of importance on the right to burn whatever you want (within reason): Quran, Bible, flag, etc. But hey, you know what's really awesome about America?" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/08/heartsong-church-memphis-islamic-center_n_710053.html

WH comm staff needs some Toby Ziegler up in that piece.

So now we are supposed to understand that Ground Zero == Mecca For Right Thinking Americans?

I can't understand the thinking behind this "Victory Mosque" language. Do Hannity, etc. think that Muslims have conquered America already? Do Muslims historically build preemptive Victory Mosque in countries they plan to conquer at some future date? When Muslims did invade a country did they actually build Mosques as some sort of suck-on-this statement or because there were a bunch of Muslims there now who needed somewhere to pray?

INTERCEPTION!

Wrong thread, lol

lol

How crazy can you go in only three paragraphs? This crazy!!!

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/246272/imagining-islam-andrew-c-mccarthy

f only the fantasy were true: If only there actually were a dominant, pro-American, echt moderate Islam, an ideology so dedicated to human rights, so sternly set against savagery, that acts of terrorism were, by definition, “un-Islamic activity.” Imagine an Islam that, far from a liability, proved an asset (indeed, an indispensable asset) in combating the threat against us. Imagine that we could accurately call the threat mere “extremism” — no “Islamic” (or even “Islamist”) modifier being necessary because the “extremists” truly were a tiny, aberrant band, fraudulently “hijacking” a great religion.

If the fantasy were true, who among us would not be proud to mark the annual observance of September 11 by breaking ground on a $100 million Islamic center cum mosque at the site of the most horrific attack in American history? In the nine years since the atrocities that claimed the lives of nearly 3,000 Americans at the Twin Towers, the Pentagon, and a field in Shanksville, Pa., such an Islam — if it really existed — would have spearheaded the defeat of America’s enemies.

Such an Islam, over nine long years, would have risen up and made itself heard. It would have identified by name and condemned with moral outrage the imposters purporting to act in its name. It would have honored America’s sacrifice of blood and treasure in the liberation of oppressed Muslim peoples. It would have said “thank you” to our troops. It would have joined America, without ambiguity or hesitation, in crushing terror networks and dismantling the regimes that abet them. It would not have needed trillion-dollar American investments to forge democracies; it would naturally have adopted democracy on its own.

hooooly shit

i'll be damned, still not jaded enough, andy mccarthy can still say shit that makes me want to punch him in the neck

But all that said, our political and military leaders — whether a general, a secretary of defense, or a president — are making a grave mistake by commenting directly on this pathetic figure.

this is tru tho

what i didn't know when this got brewing a week or so ago -- and of course was not reported in anything i've read about it, but blogged by tom ricks (iirc) -- is that this thing has been getting HUGE play in middle east media. it's a big deal already. p sure that's the audience that petraeus, gates etc are thinking of. since domestic media sure as shit isn't.

why isn't victor davis hanson remarking on that? because he's a fucking numbskull

while i can understand petraeus/gates/etc wanting to stop it, they should have known they would only fan the flames.

i understand westboro has picked up the flag? what next

also yeah our media sux

that mccarthy quote isnt crazy imo, he's just dumb

It would have said “thank you” to our troops.

it would naturally have adopted democracy on its own.

these statements are all-out crazy

He must have done an incredible amount of research to understand what Muslims stand for.

and that father must realize his daughter will probably get those assigned readings...in a good liberal arts college.

― Gucci Mane hermeneuticist (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, September 1, 2010 5:01 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

late 2 this but i read hayek & 'god & man at yale' & 'atlas shrugged' @ my liberal arts coll

and

no im a fascist & i voted for palin

ok

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/246380/laboring-vineyards-john-derbyshire

christ, what an asshole

victor davis hanson ...he's a fucking numbskull

otm

Funny thing is he has these academic credentials that make him look halfway respectable, but his writing shows he either has shit for brains, or (more likely) he has no interest in speaking truth or writing sense, but will do or say anything to serve his bosses.

John Derbyshire must have struck out HARD with the liberal girls in college to be that pissy about people with graduate degrees in art/sci stuff.

He must have struck out HARD with women in general, if his writing is anything to go by.

None of us can deny that John Derbyshire, a "writer — novelist, pop-math author, reviewer, and opinion journalist" has made "non-negative contribution to the life of the nation", unlike the professors in the wedding announcement.

i always like a little inverted-marxism slash denuded-fascism talk. "parasites", you say?

denuded isn't really the right word there.

ill takedown of dinesh d'souza at the economist (via tnc)

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/09/obama_derangement_syndrome

"Message to American billionaires and the people who write for them: many events and movements in world history did not revolve around marginal tax rates on rich people in the United States."

he took that d'souza thing down like hardcore daaaamn

Suddenly...Jay Nordlinger!

I don’t know about you, but I’m addicted to Chris Christie videos like some people are addicted to porn. I could watch them all day. I particularly like it when he confronts schoolteachers: because no one ever confronts schoolteachers (except maybe unruly, pugnacious, or precocious kids). Schoolteachers are always sacrosanct, politically — but not with Christie.

jesus

I’m addicted to Chris Christie videos like some people are addicted to porn

i mean

just

nordlinger is sweating profusely just thinking about confronting politically sacrosanct schoolteachers

have you SEEN Nordlinger? He looks like a guy who sweats profusely.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aw0aBkt8CPA

fyi, this is what Nordlinger is whacking it to

That was kind of hot.

I just experienced a terrible moment: my pants got wet in front of my students.

Are there a whole bunch of videos of Christie confronting schoolteachers or is Nordlinger just watching the same event as filmed by different news outlets? Multiple angles.

@ 0:35

"if you want it, i'm prepared to give it to you."

"teachers do it because they love it."

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_VSjdKAQpeMw/THr53yhzqrI/AAAAAAAAH98/STrtI3bjHTo/s400/Obama_Bow_Chris_Christie_2010_07_29.jpg

Always bowing.

that's not a bow, he's being sucked in by gravitational forces

Christie has joeks.

Nordlinger is also the guy who wrote "the Obama kids are 100 percent scrumptious," btw

I don't want to know what the underside of this guy's computer desk looks like.

And I didn't want to consider that image. We don't always get what we want. Blech.

I wish Obama had said, "Well, Joe, you don't HAVE to be a plumber."

Rather painful, but watch Jonah praise Newt's "brilliance"

http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/30925?in=21:15&out=27:41

“Obama Makes Rare Church Appearance”
September 19, 2010 3:06 P.M.
By Rich Lowry

Poor President Obama. His approval ratings have been sinking, Democrats abandoning him–and now he has to spend part of a gorgeous Sunday morning going to church. The indignity! (Apparently it’s his sixth visit as president.) He was still able to make time for an afternoon golf game, though.

it's like the 1920s w/these righteous boobs. Sinclair Lewis & HL Mencken roll in graves.

which is more galling, rich? that obama prays like a "true" christian or that he plays that most republican of sports - golf.

Where's he getting the idea that Obama thinks it's an "indignity"?

This thread, probably.

In a November 14 2008 article, Time magazine senior editor Amy Sullivan noted that "Ronald Reagan didn't go to church at all"

for "security reasons" natch. hey, if obama starts attending on the regular NRO can scold him for 'egotistically' disrupting services & endangering his fellow supplicants.

It really, really doesn't get better than this. How many platitudes and slogans can you cram into an essay? How much slavishness?

And how much crazy? Because the wackadoo comes across in this essay even more clearly than in most of her writings.

Freedom is very much on American minds, frequently served these days, with tea.Freedom is very much on American minds, frequently served these days, with tea.Freedom is very much on American minds, frequently served these days, with tea.Freedom is very much on American minds, frequently served these days, with tea.Freedom is very much on American minds, frequently served these days, with tea.Freedom is very much on American minds, frequently served these days, with tea.

Freedom is very much on K-Lo's mind, best served with Carrabas tomato sauce.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/247101/getting-even-jay-nordlinger

you crazy for this one, Jay

that's actually one of the more insane things i've ever seen

people have to have better ways to spend their time

i can't even imagine what happens whenever that guy goes to the movies

Three cheers to your e-mailer. I was a very prolific jazz reviewer for years — live performances and recordings — but totally quit when Obama got elected. The constant e-mails, liner notes, and remarks at gigs that trashed Bush and the Right, while extolling the coming of The One, enraged me, and I just couldn’t take it anymore. Why should I spend one minute of my (volunteered) time helping jazzers when they obviously despise what I stand for?

I had to e-mail all sorts of people, asking them to stop sending me CDs. The responses I got were both shocking and disheartening.

i just

look you don't have to be one of those all out space hebrew coltrane types but, dude, what

history of jazz, kind of complicated, you know

I don't know from jazz clubs. Was The One praised often in 2008 and '09?

I've been going to the wrong clubs.

come to think, jazz might be the biggest performer - audience mismatch for political leanings in music

For him, these violations occur mainly at his synagogue and at the folk-music venues that he and his wife like to haunt... (The violations are always from the left, it can perhaps go without saying.)

Dude goes to some seriously different synagogues than I have been to, then. If he really wants to be free of the scourge (lol) of liberalism, he should consider becoming more orthodox maybe?