A Little Country Humor

For the uninitiated, this farm implement is used to fertilize fields by distributing bovine feces.

Move Over Uncle Ted

Rocker Eric Clapton is a fan of shooting trips in the countryside - because the outings help him bond with like-minded people.

The star is the co-owner of London shop Cordings, a supplier of hunting and fishing supplies, and admits he often indulges in trips to bag game.

And Clapton is adamant he has learnt a lot from his favourite pastime.

He says, "I'm not really that gregarious. And shooting with groups of people up and down the country has taught me a lot about how to get on with my fellow human beings."

The musician recently cleared out his gun cabinet, selling 13 pieces off at auction in Britain.Clapton insists he had to get rid of the weapons, because he became hooked on collecting them.He adds, "It is following the same pattern as when I collected guitars - I get obsessed, then engulfed and finally narrow the collection down."

Quote Of The Day

"Misogynist: A man who hates women as much as women hate one another. "
- H.L. Mencken

The Boxing Day Hunt

From The Telegraph:

"This will be a grand day for traditional England – Boxing Day always is. Folk will turn out in force to watch the merry spectacle of the local hunt, as it mills around on the village green or beside the ha-ha of a country house: mince pies and port; horsemen uncertain how to consume them without dropping whip or reins; cream and tan hounds under the eye of a leathery huntsman; red-coated masters receiving the gratitude of all, as well they might, since making good any holes in the hunt finances falls to them; everyone as smart as guardsmen, the steaming horses seeming to share the sense of anticipation, if not bonhomie, with their riders, as the pageant moves off to follow hounds into the frost-spangled, midwinter countryside."

What is England without fox hunting? The mere fact that it was outlawed four years ago does not keep hunters from participating. Over 300,000 showed up this year.

So True

The Mom Song

The Mom Song from Northland Video on Vimeo.

Mark Steyn At His Best

I haven't posted any Mark Steyn for a while and this was just too good to pass up:

We're In The Fast Lane To Bailoutistan

"See the USA in your Chevrolet!" trilled Dinah Shore week after week on TV.
Can you still see the USA in your Chevrolet? Through a windscreen darkly.

General Motors now has a market valuation about a third of Bed, Bath & Beyond, and no one says your Swash 700 Elongated Biscuit Toilet Seat Bidet is too big to fail. GM has a market capitalization of about $2.4 billion. For purposes of comparison, Toyota's market cap is $100 billion and change (the change being bigger than the whole of GM). General Motors, like the other two geezers of the Old Three, is a vast retirement home with a small money-losing auto subsidiary. The UAW is AARP in an Edsel: It has three times as many retirees and widows as "workers" (I use the term loosely). GM has 96,000 employees but provides health benefits to a million people.

How do you make that math add up? Not by selling cars: Honda and Nissan make a pretax operating profit per vehicle of around $1,600; Ford, Chrysler and GM make a loss of $500 to $1,500. That's to say, they lose money on every vehicle they sell. Like Henry Ford said, you can get it in any color as long as it's red.

In the 20th century, most advanced nations made automobiles but only America made them mythic: "Drive the USA in your Chevrolet!" sang Dinah. "America's the greatest land of all!" America had road movies. With car chases. Thelma and Louise drove their vehicle off the cliff and, unlike the Old Three, they didn't demand American taxpayers come along for the ride. But, if you didn't want to hit the open road, you could just hang around, being cool. In Chuck Berry's immortal quatrain:

"Riding along in my automobile
My baby beside me at the wheel
Cruising and playing the radio
With No Particular Place To Go."

Not if you were a European teen. Cruising was an American activity. A Saturday night out for a Brit meant hanging around at a rain-streaked bus shelter hoping the night service would show up. Even if you had a particular place to go, you had no means of getting there.

So many areas of endeavor that once embodied the youth and energy of this great land are now old and sclerotic. I include, naturally, my own industry. I loved the American newsrooms you saw in movies like "The Front Page," full of hard-boiled, hard-livin' newspapermen. By the time I got there myself, there were no hard-boiled newspapermen, just bland, anemic newspaperpersons turning out politically correct snooze sheets of torpid portentousness. The owner of The Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune recently filed for bankruptcy protection. The New York Times is mortgaging its office to fund debt repayment. The Detroit Free Press is cutting out home delivery except on Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays, thereby further depressing sales of delivery trucks in the Motor City.

The newspapers blame the Internet, just as Detroit blames Japan. But the Japanese have problems of their own. One day they'll get theirs. That's the beauty of capitalism. Nothing is forever. The big railroad barons smoking cigars and enjoying pheasant under glass in the dining car on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe thought Henry Ford was a schmuck. Who'd want to ride around in that thing? Next thing you know, everyone's getting their kicks on Route 66:

"You'll see Amarillo
Gallup, New Mexico
Flagstaff, Arizona
Don't forget Winona
Kingman, Barstow, San Bernardino."

Ah, California. The Golden State! To a penniless immigrant named Arnold Schwarzenegger, it was a land of plenty. Now Arnold is an immigrant of plenty in a penniless land. What's the motto on the license plates? "Ah'll be back …for more of your money!" In California you don't have to be an orange to have your pips squeezed. The Terminator makes Gray Davis look like Calvin Coolidge. Care to terminate a government program, Governor? Hey, great idea! We'll hire 200 people to do an impact study on terminating the Department of Impact Study Regulation and get back to you in a decade. And when Gov. Girlyman has run out of state taxpayers to fleece for his ever-more-bloated bureaucracy, he'll go to Washington to plead for a federal bailout of Cantaffordya.

California! The state that symbolizes the American Dream! If you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere!

No, wait, that's New York. "This is the worst fiscal downturn since the Great Depression," announced New York Gov. Paterson. So what's he doing? Why, he's bringing in the biggest tax hike in New York history. If you can make it there, you'll be paying state tax on it, sales tax, municipal tax, a doubled beer tax, a tax on clothing, a tax on cab rides, an "iTunes tax" on downloads from the Internet, a tax on haircuts, 137 new tax hikes in all. Call Albany today and order your new package of tax forms, for just $199.99, plus 12 percent tax on tax forms and 4 percent tax-form application fee partially refundable upon payment of the 7.5 percent tax-filing tax. If you can make it there, you'll certainly have no difficulty making it in Tajikistan.

Hey, and who needs to make it there when you can just get appointed there? Gov. Paterson is said to be considering appointing Princess Caroline of Kennedy to Hillary Clinton's vacant Senate seat. After two and a third centuries of republican experiment, America has finally worked its way back to the House of Lords.

"Friends Say Kennedy Has Long Wanted Public Role," Anne Kornblut assured readers in an in-depth Washington Post tongue-bath. She hasn't "long wanted" it to the extent of, you know, running for dog catcher in Lackawanna and getting – what's the word? – "elected," but, if you have a spare Senate seat, she's graciously indicated that she'd be prepared to consider accepting it. As lady-in-waiting Anne Kornblut pointed out, Caroline is highly qualified, being "the author of several books." It's true! She's an experienced poetry editor. She edited "The Best-Loved Poems Of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis." Jackie Kennedy wrote poems? Of course! She wrote so many poems that some are better loved than others.

See the USA from your Chevrolet: An hereditary legislature, a media fawning its way into bankruptcy, its iconic coastal states driving out innovators and entrepreneurs, the arrival of the new Messiah heralded only by the leaden dirge of "We Three Kings Of Ol' Detroit Are/Seeking checks we traverse afar," and Route 66 looking ever more like a one-way dead-end street to Bailoutistan. Boy, I sure could use a poem by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis right now, even one of the lesser-loved ones.

"I feel like I lost my country," the Hudson Institute's Herbert London said the other day, wondering whatever happened to the land of opportunity and dynamism. But I'm more of an optimist. Maybe Princess Caroline will be appointed CEO of GM and all will be well. Or maybe Bed, Bath & Beyond will put wheels on the Swash 700 Elongated Biscuit Toilet Seat Bidet.
And on that cheery note let me wish you a very Hopey Changemas.

Red Neck Christmas Pictures

You Didn't Know They Made A Tractor? Have You Seen Their SUV?

A Last Minute Holiday Gift Suggestion For Yours Truly

Bumper Sticker Sighting

o1/20/13

Apparently, turn about is fair play. Reported by our young miss.

Quote Of The Day

"A moderate Republican is like a Volvo with a gun rack."
- Robin Williams (paraphrased)

Picture Of The Day

Courtesy of my brother in-law and taken in Monterey, CA.

Quote Of The Day

"Abstract Art: A product of the untalented, sold by the unprincipled to the utterly bewildered."
- Albert Camus

How Well Did You Score?

It's test taking time over at ISI and you can participate here:

Our Fading Heritage: Americans Fail a Basic Test on Their History and Institutions is the third major study conducted by ISI on the kind of knowledge required for informed citizenship. In 2006 and 2007, ISI published the first ever scientific surveys of civic learning among college students. Each year, approximately 14,000 freshmen and seniors at 50 schools nationwide were given a 60-question, multiple-choice exam on basic knowledge of America’s heritage. Both years, the students failed. The average freshman scored 51.7% the first year and 51.4% the next. The average senior scored 53.2%, then 54.2%. After all the time, effort, and money spent on college, students emerge no better off in understanding the fundamental features of American self-government.

This year, ISI sought to learn more about the real-world consequences of this collegiate failure. ISI crafted a study to measure the independent impact of college on the acquisition and maintenance of civic literacy over a lifetime. First, a random sample of 2,508 American adults of all backgrounds was surveyed, allowing comparisons to be made between the college and non-college educated. They were asked 33 straightforward civics questions, many of which high school graduates and new citizens are expected to know. Respondents were also asked several questions concerning their participation in American civic life, their attitudes about perennial issues of American governance, and other behaviors that may or may not contribute to civic literacy. Finally, the results were run through multivariate regression analysis, allowing ISI to compare the civic impact of college with that of other societal factors.

Do Americans possess the knowledge necessary to participate wisely in the affairs of the nation?

Seventy-one percent of Americans fail the test, with an overall average score of 49%.

Earning a college degree does little to increase knowledge of America’s history, key texts, and institutions. The average score among those who ended their formal education with a bachelor’s degree is 57%, or an “F.” That is only 13 percentage points higher than the average score among those who ended their formal education with a high school diploma.

Officeholders typically have less civic knowledge than the general public. On average, they score 44%, five percentage points lower than non-officeholders.

A Literary Confession

I am not, at this moment in time, the most gifted of writers and have amply documented my meager proficiency here many times. I personally consider my use of English to be fairly unique. With all due respect, I understand at times it’s a nightmare. But at the end of the day, we can all absolutely agree on one point about good writing - it’s not rocket science. I probably shouldn’t of written this but if I hone my skills 24/7….

Santa Fred Explains The New Economy

Quote Of he Day

"I checked the weather on the Internet. I honestly don't understand why anyone would watch a lunatic waving his arms at a green screen talking about someone else's weather. But then again, he's on a broadcast that has brittle-looking clothes horses reading a bad newspaper slowly. Kinda a matched set. You must think you're going to live to be a thousand if you've got time to watch a news broadcast."
-Sippican Cottage

Quote Of The Day

"We are witnessing a new hysterical style, in which the Baby Boomer “me generation” that now runs America jettisons knowledge of the past and daily proclaims that each new development requires both a radical solution and another bogeyman to blame for being mean or unfair to them."
- Victor Davis Hanson

Quote Of The Day

"I'm thankful for Sarah Palin's vice presidential bid, which taught us that Alaska is not in a box off the coast of California."
-Paula Poundstone

Alt-Country?

This is a gas. Or is it diesel?

CWCID: Instapundit

Quote Of The Day

"The absurd is sin without God."
- Albert Camus

More Bread Blogging

Mark Bittman strikes again with more and speedier versions of the original No Knead bread recipe:

Speedy No-Knead Bread
3 cups bread flour
1 packet ( 1/4 ounce) instant yeast
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
Oil as needed.
1. Combine flour, yeast and salt in a large bowl. Add 1 1/2 cups water and stir until blended; dough will be shaggy. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest about 4 hours at warm room temperature, about 70 degrees.
2. Lightly oil a work surface and place dough on it; fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let rest 30 minutes more.
3. At least a half-hour before dough is ready, heat oven to 450 degrees. Put a 6-to-8-quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, Pyrex or ceramic) in oven as it heats. When dough is ready, carefully remove pot from oven. Slide your hand under dough and put it into pot, seam side up. Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed; it will straighten out as it bakes.
4. Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes, then remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes, until loaf is beautifully browned. Cool on a rack.
Yield: 1 big loaf.

Fast No-Knead Whole Wheat Bread
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup whole rye flour
1/2 cup coarse cornmeal
1 teaspoon instant yeast
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
Oil as needed.
1. Combine flours, cornmeal, yeast and salt in a large bowl. Add 1 1/2 cups water and stir until blended; dough will be shaggy. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let dough rest about 4 hours at warm room temperature, about 70 degrees.
2. Oil a standard loaf pan (8 or 9 inches by 4 inches; nonstick works well). Lightly oil your hands and shape dough into a rough rectangle. Put it in pan, pressing it out to the edges. Brush top with a little more oil. Cover with plastic wrap and let rest 1 hour more.
3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake bread about 45 minutes, or until loaf reaches an internal temperature of 210 degrees. Remove bread from pan and cool on a rack.
Yield: 1 loaf.

We Won

You heard it here first....

Quote Of The Day

"The moment of truth in the nation's automotive bailout debate might have come this week. As the CEOs of GM, Ford and Chrysler begged Congress for federal aid, a Detroit radio talk-show host asked whether Michigan, as well as the car companies, should get assistance. The state is being hit by an economic hurricane, he said, just as New Orleans was hit by a natural hurricane.

Huh? Will the victimology myth never end? Hurricane Katrina was an act of God. The car crisis is an act of man. For the difference, consult the Bible. Any version will do."
- Paul Ingrassia in The Wall Street Journal

Talk About Turkeys

Governor Sarah Palin pardoned a turkey destined for the Thanksgiving Day table on Thursday and then ignited a fire storm by giving a three minute interview while two other turkeys were being dispatched over her left shoulder.

Governor Palin should know better by now than to trust any form of media. While she is being flailed by the "candy asses" at the Huffington Post and MSNBC I don't think any of them have questioned the intentions. motivations or integrity of the camera crew. So score one for the media; Sarah Palin did what any number of politicians have done and will continue to do - say something "off color" into a live microphone or be filmed driving a tank.

This kerfuffle also points out a much deeper issue that becomes apparent when urban Americans encounter realities rural Americans take for granted - which often revolves around "food" and how it gets to the table. We are all hunters in this clan and during a recent birthday feast for yours truly our table was graced with elk and venison - a meal truly fit for a king. We are under no illusions about the efforts involved in bringing that food to table because it most certainly did not come shrink-wrapped in plastic from the grocery store. The unwillingness of so many to show even a basic level of understanding about where their food comes from or take any responsibility for what is being done on their behalf is, at best, hypocritical. But to be outraged by the "reality" of the situation is just intellectually dishonest.

"You Can All Go To Hell - I'm Going To Texas!"

Uncle Ted pulls out all the stops on a radio show in California:

"Your logic, your truth, your good will, your decency, your work ethic -- it still is the guide post of America. You are "We the people."

It is the lunatic fringe that is celebrated by a media bent on socialism, bent on revitalizing the Mao Zedong agenda -- you are not the minority, you are the majority.
You know rush hour? What a pain in the *ss rush hour is? Do you have rush hour in Bakersfield? I bet you have rush hour. You know what that is? You know what that is? Those are people with alarm clocks. Those are people who get up because they have a burning fire in their soul that says, "You must be productive. In order to be a good, decent human being, you must be an asset. You must work hard before you play hard."

So Gary, you are not along. But, what the real curse is, it's not the lying, left-wing, Mao media, it's those of us who know better, but don't speak up. The people of California have backed down. The people who are productive in California have backed down to the pimps, and the whores, and the welfare brats, and their media, and their politically correct representatives, Boxer, Feinstein, Schwarzenegger, who literally will lie through their teeth to benefit some blood sucking constituency while your paycheck is being raped and pillaged to pay for some bling-bling infested punk.

You've got to start raising Hell -- and I am constantly being gunned down by the media; I'm a curse, I'm a dangerous guy, I'm a madman, I'm scary, I have too many guns, I shoot all the deer -- eat me. I stand up and I take the bullets because my name is Davy Crockett. This is the wall of the Alamo. If you can't shoot Santa Anna's men, shut up and load my gun. So get tough and get tougher.

You don't need tough love in America, you need tougher love. Around the water cooler, at the church, at school. At the work place, at the picnic, and the bowling alley. You should be pounding the desk with your fist, raising hell, and take this beautiful state back from the pimps, and the whores, and the welfare brats, and the gang-bangers who seems to have all the rights in the world while the good people, the productive, law abiding people don't have jack squat -- and I think I am going to throw up."

Perspective

Where Does All Our Money Really Go?

In The Know: Should The Government Stop Dumping Money Into A Giant Hole?

Visions Of Obama

Ain't it just like the Left to play tricks when we're tryin' not to riot?

We all say we're not screwed, we're all doin' our best to deny it

As Dems claim a mandate for change, temptin' you to defy it

Hope blossoms on the opposite side

In our camps the flamewars abide

The talk radio station plays nice

But it's got nothing, really nothing, to entice

Just Limbaugh and Hannity so entwined

And these visions of Obama that conquer my mind

In our empty treasury the pols play blindman's bluff with the supply chain

And the leftoid bloggers they whisper of escapades on the Palin Campaign

We can hear Abe Lincoln slap his forehead

Ask himself if it's him or us that's really insane

Neoneocon, she's all right, she's stayed clear

She's delicate as she posts to the 'sphere

But she just makes it all too concise and too clear

That Obama's not here

The ghost of 'lectricity howls in the comments at her blog

Where these visions of Obama have come up from the bog

Now, little boy Ace, he takes himself so seriously

He slags Andrew Sullivan, he likes to post dangerously

And when bringing O's name up

He speaks of a farewell finger to thee

He's sure got a lotta gall to be so scrappy and all

Hosting open thread squawks for recall while America's at the mall
Oh, how can I explain?

It's so hard to rant on

And these visions of Obama, they kept me up past the dawn

Contemplatin' congress, your sanity goes up on trial

Voices blather this is what lobotomy must be like after a while

But Pelosi musta had the Biden Botox blues

You can tell by the way she smiles

See the Little Green Footballs all freeze

When the jelly-faced Kossacks all sleaze

Hear the ones with dementia say, "Jeeze

Find us more killers to appease."

Oh, tax-hikes and deficits swarm in our new head of state

Where these visions of Obama are not up for debate.

This blogger now speaks to the Anchoress who's trying hard to pray for him

Sayin', "Name me a politician who's not a parasite and I'll go out and I'll campaign for him"

But like Michelle always says

"Can't find a decent Dem much, can ya man?"

As she, herself, prepares to napalm them

And the real Messiah, He still has not showed

We see the Cross we emptied now corrode

Where Liberty and belief once had glowed

Mr. Death, he now steps to the road

He writes they're coming for more money than they're owed

On the back of the Jihad truck that loads

While the next 9/11 explodes

The harmonicas play high fading blues for John McCain

And these visions of Obama are now all that remain.


Courtesy of Vanderleun

Welcome!

As a student of Soviet history in my ill spent youth I always found this story to be as illustrative as it was amusing. I happened to remember it just as the Obama's were meeting the Bush's at The White House today.

"On October 14, 1964, after being deposed by his rivals at a Central Committee meeting, primarily for being an "international embarrassment," Nikita Khrushchev, who until only moments earlier was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, sat down in his office and wrote two letters.

Later, his successor, Leonid Brezhnev, upon taking office found the two letters and a note Khrushchev had attached:

"To my successor: When you find yourself in a hopeless situation which you cannot escape, open the first letter, and it will save you. Later, when you again find yourself in a hopeless situation from which you cannot escape, open the second letter."

And soon enough, Brezhnev found himself in a situation which he couldn't get himself out of, and in desperation he tore open the first letter. It said simply, "Blame it all on me." This Brezhnev did, blaming Khrushchev for the latest problems, and it worked like a miracle, saving him and extending his career.

However, in due time Brezhnev found himself in another disaster from which he could not extricate himself. Without despairing he eagerly searched his office and found the second letter, which he tore open desperate for its words of salvation. It read thus:

"Sit down, and write two letters."

From 52 To 48 With Love

From TigerHawk:

"Here's a little online community art project that is either a heart-warming affirmation of America or a teeny bit nauseating, depending on your personality.For my part, I think it is a friendly gesture from a bunch of undoubtedly nice people. I just worry that the same folks believe that this might also be the best path to peace in the Middle East."

This one is my favorite. We are definitely at the "actions speak louder than words" stage.

Too Little Too Late

From Deborah Howell, The Washington Post ombudsman:

"The Post provided a lot of good campaign coverage, but readers have been consistently critical of the lack of probing issues coverage and what they saw as a tilt toward Democrat Barack Obama. My surveys, which ended on Election Day, show that they are right on both counts."

Is it just me or would it not have been better to correct the reportage before Election Day since you knew you were providing biased coverage? Only unbridled arrogance can account for this.

If nothing else, this election cycle has proven that the MSM have no credibility left and are most certainly not a source of unbiased information. Coupled that with their current financial difficulties and circulation declines it can only hasten their eventual demise.

How Beautiful We Were

Van der Leun at American Digest:

A short list. In no particular order.

We told our children that any child could grow up to be President. And then we made it come true.

We had car shows, boat shows, beauty shows and dog shows.

We ran robots on the surface of Mars by remote control.

Our women came from all over the world in all shapes and sizes hues and scents.

We actually believed that all men are created equal and tried to make it come true.

Everybody liked our movies and loved our television shows.

We tried to educate everybody, whether they wanted it or not. Sometimes we succeeded.

We did Levis.

We held the torch high and hundreds of millions came. No matter what the cost.

We saved Europe twice and liberated it once.

We believed so deeply and so abidingly in free speech that we protected and even honored and in some cases even elected traitors.

We let you be as freaky as you wanted to be.

We paid you not to plant crops and not to work.

We died in the hundreds of thousands to end slavery here and around the world.

We invented Jazz.

We wrote the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Gettysberg address.

We went to the moon to see how far we could hit a golf ball.

We lifted a telescope into orbit that could see to the edge of the universe.

When people snuck into the country against our laws, we made parking lots and food stands off to the side of the road so they wouldn't get hurt, and we let them use our hospitals for free, and we made their children citizens.

We didn't care what God you worshipped as long as we could worship ours.

We let the People arm themselves at will. Just to make sure.

We gave everybody the vote.

We built Disneyworld. Just for fun.

We had a revolution so successful it was still going strong two and a quarter centuries later.

We had so many heroes, even at the end, that we felt free to hate them and burn them in effigy.

We electrified the guitar.

We invented a music so compelling that it rocked the world.

We had some middling novelists.

We had some interesting painters.

We had some pretty good poets.

We had better songwriters.

We ran our farms so well we fed the globe.

We made the automobile and the airplane.

We let you get rich. Really, really rich. And we didn't care who you were or what you were or where you came from or who your parents were. We just cared about what you made or what you did.

We had poor people who, even at their most wretched, were richer than any other poor people on the face of the planet.

Even towards the end, as we dissolved in petty bickering and the idle entertainments that come with having far too much leisure and money, we were trying to make it higher, finer, brighter, better and more beautiful.

Even towards the end, the best of us declined to give up and pressed on. "Where to? What next?"

Quote Of The Day

"The treatment President Bush has received from this country is nothing less than a disgrace. The attacks launched against him have been cruel and slanderous, proving to the world what little character and resolve we have. The president is not to blame for all these problems. He never lost faith in America or her people, and has tried his hardest to continue leading our nation during a very difficult time.

Our failure to stand by the one person who continued to stand by us has not gone unnoticed by our enemies. It has shown to the world how disloyal we can be when our president needed loyalty -- a shameful display of arrogance and weakness that will haunt this nation long after Mr. Bush has left the White House."
- Jeffrey Scott Shapiro in The Wall Street Journal

Quote Of The Day

"Look, I expect to be one of the most severe critics of the Obama administration and the Democrats generally in the years ahead (though I sincerely hope I won't find that necessary). But Obama ran a brilliant race and he should be congratulated for it. Moreover, during the debate over the financial crisis, Obama said that a president should be able to do more than one thing at a time. Well, I think we members of the loyal opposition should be able to make distinctions simultaneously. It is a wonderful thing to have the first African-American president. It is a wonderful thing that in a country where feelings are so intense that power can be transferred so peacefully. Let us hope that the Obama his most dedicated — and most sensible! — fans see turns out to be the real Obama. Let us hope that Obama succeeds and becomes a great president, for all the right reasons.

As for John McCain, he is an American hero and arguably the best candidate we could have fielded. I will in the days to come offer no small amount of criticism about his campaign. But where his campaign may have lacked qualities that would have helped it win, the candidate never lacked for honor and integrity. Thank you John McCain for your sacrifice, commitment, and honor.

God bless America, and may He guide Obama to be the best president possible."
- Jonah Goldberg

Election Results 2008

The Definitive Word On "Redistribution Of Wealth"

Into The Final Stretch

Happy Halloween

Quote Of The Day

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."
- C.S. Lewis

Obamarx

Apocalypse Now

I have always had my own doubts about the "wisdom" of the electorate and unfortunately, Ben Smith over at Politico isn't helping:

"I just got an astounding e-mail from a Republican consultant I know well. He's a guy who's always thought Obama had a "glass jaw," and was always among those agitating for hitting Obama harder.

Recently, he conducted a focus group in an upper-Midwestern state, showing them the kind of ad he thought would work: A no-holds-barred attack, cut for an independent group, which hasn't aired.

I'm just going to reprint his amazed e-mail about the focus group:

Reagan Dems and Independents. Call them blue-collar plus. Slightly more Target than Walmart.

Yes, the spot worked. Yes, they believed the charges against Obama. Yes, they actually think he's too liberal, consorts with bad people and WON'T BE A GOOD PRESIDENT...but they STILL don't give a f***. They said right out, "He won't do anything better than McCain" but they're STILL voting for Obama.

The two most unreal moments of my professional life of watching focus groups:

54 year-old white male, voted Kerry '04, Bush '00, Dole '96, hunter, NASCAR fan...hard for Obama said: "I'm gonna hate him the minute I vote for him. He's gonna be a bad president. But I won't ever vote for another god-damn Republican. I want the government to take over all of Wall Street and bankers and the car companies and Wal-Mart run this county like we used to when Reagan was President.

"The next was a woman, late 50s, Democrat but strongly pro-life. Loved B. and H. Clinton, loved Bush in 2000. "Well, I don't know much about this terrorist group Barack used to be in with that Weather guy but I'm sick of paying for health insurance at work and that's why I'm supporting Barack."

I felt like I was taking crazy pills. I sat on the other side of the glass and realized...this really is the Apocalypse. The Seventh Seal is broken and its time for eight years of pure, delicious crazy...."

I don't know about "eight years of pure, delicious crazy" but ignorant voters like this drive me around the bend. I know it's a short drive but all the same, it is my firm belief that these people are not doing the Republic any favors by voting. Unfortunately it is this same group that will decide the election. Quit calling them "Undecided" and call them what they really are - "Uninformed".

Quote Of The Day

"Well, I mean, quite honestly, why should they be penalized for being successful. I mean, that's what you're telling me. That's what it sounds like you're saying. That's wrong. Because you're successful, you have to pay more than everybody else? We all live in this country. It's a basic right. And Obama wants to take that basic right and penalize me for it, is what it comes down to. That's a very socialist view and it's incredibly wrong. I mean, $250,000 now. What if he decides, well you know $150,000, you're pretty rich too. Let's go ahead and lower it again. You know it's a slippery slope. When's it going to stop?"
- Joe "The Plumber" Wurzelbacher

Quote Of The Day

"Okay, everyone is always telling Boudreaux and Thibodeaux jokes implying that Cajuns aren't smart, but anybody who would build a city 10 feet below sea level in a hurricane zone and fill it with Democrats.....is a genius!"
- Vanderleun

Video Of The Day Or Why I Love Dogs

An airman returns home after a 14 month deployment.

Picture Of The Day

"When Black Friday comes
I'll stand down by the door
And catch the grey men when they
Dive from the fourteenth floor...."



At least during the 1929 Wall Street crash they had the decency to jump.

Recipe Of The Day

SWEET AND SAUCY GRILLED SALMON

Recipe by Alaska Fisherman Sarah Palin
Wasilla, Alaska

1 can (12 oz.) tomato sauce
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup molases
3 tbsp. ketchup
2 tbsp. apple cider vinegar
2 tbsp. dried minced onion
1 tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
1 tbsp. mustard
1 tbsp. dried bell pepper dices
1/4 tsp. each cinnamon and nutmeg
4 to 6 Alaska salmon fillets or steaks (4 to 6 oz. each)

Blend all ingredients, except seafood, in bowl; let set 10 to 15 minutes. Dip seafood into sauce, then place on hot oiled grill, not directly over heat source (coals or gas). Cover and vent. Cook about 6 to 12 minutes per inch of thickness, brushing with extra sauce, if desired. Do not overcook or burn edges.

Makes 4 to 6 servings.

Also great with Alaska halibut or cod!

"America, This Is What A Feminist Looks Like!"

So said Shelly Mandel, the president of LA's National Organization for Women, yesterday in Carson, CA. All I can say is "Finally!"


Have you seen this reported anywhere in the main stream media? Funny, me neither.

CWCID: wizbang

Quote Of The Day

Investment advice from BRITAIN:

"If you had purchased £1000 of Northern Rock shares one year ago it would now be worth £4.95, with HBOS, earlier this week your £1000 would have been worth £16.50, £1000 invested in XL Leisure would now be worth less than £5, but if you bought £1000 worth of Tennents Lager one year ago, drank it all, then took the empty cans to an aluminium re-cycling plant, you would get £214. So based on the above statistics the best current investment advice is to drink heavily and re-cycle."

CWCID: Instapundit

Eat The Rich

Oh, a storm is threatning
My very life today
If I don't get some shelter
Oh yeah, Im gonna fade away

Oh, children ....

Oh, see the fire is sweepin'
Our very street today
Burns like a red coal carpet
Mad bull lost its way ....

Quote Of The Day

"I know they say that the reason we don’t get great people running for great offices is because great people don’t want to be involved in politics. But Jesus on the dollar bill, THIS IS RIDICULOUS. These four people - Obama, McCain, Biden, and Palin - not a single one of them deserves the job they’re applying for when you get right down to it. Not a one of them, not even close. McCain is the only one who I think is actually smart enough, but he’s an asshole. So you have three dummies and an asshole running for the two most important jobs on the entire planet."
-Rachel Lucas

Happy National Hunting and Fishing Day

This article is from Ted Nugent and was published in Human Events:

There is a powerful, natural force in the fall air, and I, for one, cannot turn my back on it. I know the origin of "conservatism" and the pragmatic, rugged individualism logic that drives it and us.

As a conservationist, I believe in the wise use of our precious life-giving resources and clearly understand man's critical responsibility to the stewardship of our wild ground and our wildlife.

I learned a long time ago that if I wanted to enjoy a fire at Christmas time, that I had to plant trees in the spring. Not to boast, but the Arbor Day Foundation even gave me, your humble Motor City Madman, a conservation award, and I'm just a guitar player. I wonder how many trees Sting or Dave Mathews planted last year.

I hunt, kill animals, start fires, and barbecue my families' daily sacred protein health food. I bait hooks, catch fish and then cook them in garlic and butter. That’s absolute perfection, just as God intended. Only a disconnected liberal cultist of denial could find fault with my perfect conservation lifestyle that is based on the sound science of biodiversity, sustain yield and responsible, renewable resources hands-on utility. Venison is the rocket fuel of the gods, and I celebrate it daily. It sure makes for some unstoppable fiery and sexy guitar noise.

President Nixon recognized the vital conservation role of hunters, fishermen and trappers when he established National Hunting and Fishing Day in 1972. This Saturday marks the 36th anniversary of National Hunting & Fishing Day, and it is party time at the Nugent camp.

Many Americans don't know that President Nixon even established a National Hunting & Fishing Day or that this Saturday marks its 36th anniversary.

Many people don’t know that outdoorsmen provide roughly 75% of all funds for state departments of natural resources for overall environmental management. Quality air, soil and water come from healthy wildlife habitat, and that has always been our mission statement.

Many don’t know that funds generated through hunting, fishing and trapping licenses, stamps and various other self-imposed fees are also used to protect non-game species, provide areas for bird watchers, and build trails for hikers. You're welcome.

Too many people don’t know that there are more turkey, elk, whitetail deer, geese, black bears and cougars in North America than at any time in our nation’s history. America’s wildlife management system is envied around the world for its overwhelming successes.

Hunters, fishers and trappers demanded this, and we rejoice in our success.You probably don’t know that hunting, fishing and trapping generates more than 30 billion dollars annually to the U.S. economy, 2.5 billion in annual federal tax revenues, 4.2 billion in state tax revenues each year and provides well over 593,000 jobs for Americans. Wildlife has to be counted in the asset column where it belongs, if you have a soul.

You probably don’t know that tens of millions of American families spend hundreds of millions of hours in the great outdoors or that hunting is one of the safest recreational pursuits in America, with far fewer injuries or deaths per capita than skiing, football, cycling, swimming or boating.

You probably don’t know who Pope & Young were, never heard of Fred Bear, and don’t know what the acronyms DU, RMEF, NWTF, FNAWS, NSSF or SCI stands for, even though their conservation accomplishments are Herculean and deserve our respect.

You probably didn't know that hunters provide over 250 million meals each year to the less fortunate by providing a portion of our game to homeless shelters through our non-bureaucratic, non-tax wasting, therefore very efficient Hunters for the Hungry programs. Our pleasure.

You probably never thought about the fact that not one teenage punk gangster has a hunting or fishing license in his pocket. Not one.

Some of you might not know that the 2nd Amendment has zero to do with hunting. The 2nd Amendment was not written by our Founding Fathers so I could go duck hunting. Only a fool would think so.

You don’t know these wonderful things because the outdoor community has not reached beyond the choir to educate anyone about the amazing success story of America’s conservation efforts, activities and programs. Damn shame. I do what I can.

The fault, of course, for such widespread ignorance lies at the feet of rank-and-file hunters and fishermen, our outdoor organizations, and the industries that support and benefit from our conservation lifestyle. With a hunting hating liberal media, it is nearly impossible to find a truthful article on hunting anywhere. Even so, for the most part, our hunting industry couldn't promote a blanket to a naked man in a blizzard. Sadly, Bubba lives, but I'm doing everything I can to beat him back into his cave where he belongs.

In this turbo-electrified, computerized, instant gratification world in which our children are immersed, the thrilling disciplines of hunting and fishing teaches patience, responsibility, humility, persistence and real cause and effect. There is no argument that these are the character traits that mold immature young people into mature, productive, conscientious adults. Look at me.

There are no politics in a deer blind. An omnisciently alert whitetail buck does not care if you are Republican or Democrat, liberal or conservative.

It is good, however, to know that Gov. Palin is a real outdoors woman. She doesn't sling a shotgun over her shoulder once a year to mug for the camera in hopes of attracting votes from hunters and fishermen. She actually hunts caribou and fishes. This tuned in naturalist knows pure organic chow when she sees it. She’s the real deal.

This Saturday is National Hunting & Fishing Day. It is the day that signifies yet another glorious hunting season is upon us. It is perfect, and I am in, gung-ho, heart, mind, body, tooth, fang and claw, spirit and soul. Place your grilled venison orders here with me here. Happy hunting season 2008.

Politics

As this election cycle begins its final decent I am seriously considering disengaging from the entire process until November though I will, of course, retain my right to try and persuade others to vote as I will. Perhaps I am a casualty of a presidential race that began in earnest two years ago or maybe I am just disgusted by all of the negativity in politics which always seems to reach a jet engine crescendo about now. But nothing is likely to happen before Election Day that will cause me to change my mind or my vote so I must learn to live with the heavy burden of being the antithesis of the “undecided” voter.

I have never understood the undecided voter – maybe ignorance truly is bliss, though I have found that this Republic of ours requires a great deal of citizen supervision. Since I realize that politics is not everyone’s passion I would like to offer this as a patriotic public service to all of you “undecided’s” out there.

Country Squire’s Common Sense Guide
to Selecting a Political Candidate

To use the guide, merely vote for the political candidate whose positions most closely resemble the following criteria:

Supports a Strong Military.
Supports Lower Taxes and Less Regulation.
Supports a Smaller and More Efficient Government.
Supports Personal Responsibility and Self Sufficiency at Home.
Supports Freedom, Representative Government and Capitalism Abroad.

Repeat at every election.

Quote Of The Day

"The secular mindset cannot grasp that in a morally corrupt world filled with evil, that some might be called to seek the wisdom and power of God to resist evil and defend the good, and through such prayers seek the hope and character to transform the world in some small way to a place where good overcomes evil."
- Dr. Bob

The Undefended City

From Bill Whittle at National Review:

"When all is said and done, Civilizations do not fall because of the barbarians at the gates. Nor does a great city fall from the death wish of bored and morally bankrupt stewards presumably sworn to its defense. Civilizations fall only because each citizen of the city comes to accept that nothing can be done to rally and rebuild broken walls; that ground lost may never be recovered; and that greatness lived in our grandparents but not our grandchildren. Yes, our betters tell us these things daily. But that doesn’t mean we have to believe it.

Ask the common people of all politics and persuasions aboard Flight 93 whether greatness and courage has deserted America. Through this magical crystal ball — the one we are using right now — we common people can speak to one another. And by reminding ourselves and those around us of who we are, where we came from, what we have achieved together and of the marvels we have yet to achieve, we may laugh in the face of despair and mock those people that think a man with an MBA from Harvard knows more about running a gas station than the man that actually runs the gas station.

It is the small-town virtues of self-reliance, hard work, personal responsibility, and common-sense ingenuity — and not those of the preening cosmopolitans that gape at them in mixed contempt and bafflement — that have made us the inheritors of the most magnificent, noble, decent and free society ever to appear on this earth. This Western Civilization… this American City… has earned the right to greet each sunrise with a blast of silver trumpets that can bring down mountains.

And what, really, is a Legion of Narcissists and a Confederacy of Despair against that?"

Answer Me These Questions Three...

Time For Some Campaignin'

This is another masterpiece from the folks at JibJab which furthers that fine American tradition of "non-partisanship":

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

The Frustration Of Barack O’B

Posted by Kathryn Jean Lopez at NRO:

The Frustration of Barack O’B.

(with apologies to Robert W. Serivce)

There’s strange things done on a White House Run by the fellows who would be elected,
The campaign trail has it secret tales that could make half of us disaffected.
Desperate Irish Housewife  has seen some queer sights, but the queerest she ever did see
Was one frosty, cold night in the northern moonlight : she bumped into Barack O’B.

He had no Armani, no Prius, no Streisand,

And no Secret Service detail,

But he drove a dogsled and he wore a fur coat — 
The kind only Michelle would buy retail.
“Barack,” Desperate cried, “whatcha doing out here? 
Hawaiians don’t make good dog-sledders!”
“It’s that new girl,” he growled, as the Malamutes howled,
“I’ve just got to make voters forget her!”

“I’ve slipped in the polls since that Palin gal spoke,
And my mojo I’ve got to recharge.
So I bought me this sled an these dogs and this coat
And these earmuffs in size extra-large.
So now I look rugged and real, don’t you see?
A regular Admiral Peary!
Undecideds will all now come flocking to me
And I’ll take back the world blogosphere-y!

If it’s Yukon they want then it’s Yukon they’ll get
I’ll show them I’m no city slicker!
I’ll have moose, I’ll have wolves, I’ll have Great Northern Loons
All on my next bumper sticker!
Then I’ll give ‘em a speech.  You know, more hope-and-change.
They’ll forget all about ‘Miss -McCain’s- Pick!’
I’ll send her right back to the cold Wasatch Range—
Hey, do you know if sea lions wear lipstick?” 

Now things get mighty queer in Election year
And the strongest men’s judgement gets hazy.
But this candidate’s panic was so un-messianic
I feared the poor guy had gone crazy.
“It isn’t the wolves or the loons,” Desperate said,
“It’s the heart, and the brains.  She’s a keeper.”
Barack shook his head, and to himself said,
“What I need is a prettier veeper.”

Then the load on his sled seemed to move!  And it said,
“I told you, you shouldn’t’ have picked me.”
‘Joe, you just need a fire,” said Barack in tones dire.
Joe shrugged. ”Fine.   Just don’t try to lipstick me.”
Then Barack shouted, “Mush!” And all in a rush
The dogs took off over the tundra.
DIH shook her head, and to no one she said,
“The pressure this country is under!”

There’s strange things done on a White House Run by the fellows who would be elected,
The campaign trail has it secret tales that could make half of us disaffected.
Desperate Irish Housewife  has seen some queer sights, but the queerest she ever did see
Was one frosty, cold night in the northern moonlight : she bumped into Barack O’B.

The Bush Doctrines

Charles Krauthammer sets the record straight in today's Washinton Post:

Charlie Gibson's Gaffe

By Charles Krauthammer
Saturday, September 13, 2008; A17

"At times visibly nervous . . . Ms. Palin most visibly stumbled when she was asked by Mr. Gibson if she agreed with the Bush doctrine. Ms. Palin did not seem to know what he was talking about. Mr. Gibson, sounding like an impatient teacher, informed her that it meant the right of 'anticipatory self-defense.' "

-- New York Times, Sept. 12

Informed her? Rubbish.

The New York Times got it wrong. And Charlie Gibson got it wrong.

There is no single meaning of the Bush doctrine. In fact, there have been four distinct meanings, each one succeeding another over the eight years of this administration -- and the one Charlie Gibson cited is not the one in common usage today. It is utterly different.

He asked Palin, "Do you agree with the Bush doctrine?"

She responded, quite sensibly to a question that is ambiguous, "In what respect, Charlie?"

Sensing his "gotcha" moment, Gibson refused to tell her. After making her fish for the answer, Gibson grudgingly explained to the moose-hunting rube that the Bush doctrine "is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense."

Wrong.

I know something about the subject because, as the Wikipedia entry on the Bush doctrine notes, I was the first to use the term. In the cover essay of the June 4, 2001, issue of the Weekly Standard entitled, "The Bush Doctrine: ABM, Kyoto, and the New American Unilateralism," I suggested that the Bush administration policies of unilaterally withdrawing from the ABM treaty and rejecting the Kyoto protocol, together with others, amounted to a radical change in foreign policy that should be called the Bush doctrine.

Then came 9/11, and that notion was immediately superseded by the advent of the war on terror. In his address to the joint session of Congress nine days after 9/11, President Bush declared: "Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime." This "with us or against us" policy regarding terror -- first deployed against Pakistan when Secretary of State Colin Powell gave President Musharraf that seven-point ultimatum to end support for the Taliban and support our attack on Afghanistan -- became the essence of the Bush doctrine.

Until Iraq. A year later, when the Iraq war was looming, Bush offered his major justification by enunciating a doctrine of preemptive war. This is the one Charlie Gibson thinks is the Bush doctrine.

It's not. It's the third in a series and was superseded by the fourth and current definition of the Bush doctrine, the most sweeping formulation of the Bush approach to foreign policy and the one that most clearly and distinctively defines the Bush years: the idea that the fundamental mission of American foreign policy is to spread democracy throughout the world. It was most dramatically enunciated in Bush's second inaugural address: "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world."

This declaration of a sweeping, universal American freedom agenda was consciously meant to echo John Kennedy's pledge in his inaugural address that the United States "shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty." It draws also from the Truman doctrine of March 1947 and from Wilson's 14 points.

If I were in any public foreign policy debate today, and my adversary were to raise the Bush doctrine, both I and the audience would assume -- unless my interlocutor annotated the reference otherwise -- that he was speaking about the grandly proclaimed (and widely attacked) freedom agenda of the Bush administration.

Not the Gibson doctrine of preemption.

Not the "with us or against us" no-neutrality-is-permitted policy of the immediate post-9/11 days.

Not the unilateralism that characterized the pre-9/11 first year of the Bush administration.

Presidential doctrines are inherently malleable and difficult to define. The only fixed "doctrines" in American history are the Monroe and the Truman doctrines which come out of single presidential statements during administrations where there were few other contradictory or conflicting foreign policy crosscurrents.

Such is not the case with the Bush doctrine.

Yes, Sarah Palin didn't know what it is. But neither does Charlie Gibson. And at least she didn't pretend to know -- while he looked down his nose and over his glasses with weary disdain, sighing and "sounding like an impatient teacher," as the Times noted. In doing so, he captured perfectly the establishment snobbery and intellectual condescension that has characterized the chattering classes' reaction to the mother of five who presumes to play on their stage.

9/11

This Pretty Much Sums It Up

Signs at an Ohio campaign rally. Submitted by our young miss.

And There You Have It

According to a GlobeScan BBC poll the world wants Obama to be president:

 “US Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama may be struggling to nudge ahead of his Republican rival in polls at home, but people across the world want him in the White House, a BBC poll said.

 All 22 countries covered in the poll would prefer to see Senator Obama elected US president ahead of Republican John McCain.

 In 17 of the 22 nations, people expect relations between the US and the rest of the world to improve if Senator Obama wins.

 More than 22,000 people were questioned by pollster GlobeScan in countries ranging from Australia to India and across Africa, Europe and South America.

 The margin in favour of Senator Obama ranged from 9 per cent in India to 82 per cent in Kenya, while an average of 49 per cent across the 22 countries preferred Senator Obama compared with 12 per cent preferring Senator McCain. Some four in 10 did not take a view.”

 And in related news:

 “Seven years after the Sept. 11 attacks, there is no consensus outside the United States that Islamist militants from al Qaeda were responsible, according to an international poll published Wednesday.

 The survey of 16,063 people in 17 nations found majorities in only nine countries believe al Qaeda was behind the attacks on New York and Washington that killed about 3,000 people in 2001.

 U.S. officials squarely blame al Qaeda, whose leader Osama bin Laden has boasted of organizing the suicide attacks by his followers using hijacked commercial airliners.

 On average, 46 percent of those surveyed said al Qaeda was responsible, 15 percent said the U.S. government, 7 percent said Israel and 7 percent said some other perpetrator. One in four people said they did not know who was behind the attacks.”

 I simply can not come up with a better reason to stop paying attention to what the rest of the world thinks. This stuff just writes itself.

What a bunch of maroons.

More Thoughts About Sarah Palin

From Bill Whittle at National Review:

"Newt Gingrich’s fire-breathing army of young reform Republicans who stormed congress in 1994 grew, in about a decade, into the party of Duke Cunningham, Trent Lott, and the Bridge to Nowhere. I watched this unfold — especially after 2004 — and time and time again, the core conservative values of discipline and responsibility were betrayed, mocked, and ignored. Restraint is not an easy sell in a society this affluent — not compared with the view of government as a bottomless bag of candy. That’s why we’re supposed to be the party of adults. 

Power corrupts, and I believe there is no power more intoxicating and corrosive than the ability to spend other people’s money at will. If Newt’s Army could go so far astray, you can bet the country was disillusioned, disappointed, and furious — not just ready for change, but eager for it, even change as ethereal and diffuse as what Senator Obama has been peddling. We lost the Senate and the House in 2006 because of this. We were going to lose the presidency in 2008 for it. And we deserved to lose it. 

And so — prior to this week — all we had was a grim determination to vote against a dangerous, socialized vision of the future. We were portrayed — largely accurately — as old, tired, out-of-touch, out of ideas, out of candidates . . . too white, too male, too square. It doesn’t matter how true or false that caricature was. That was the narrative, and there was enough of it that fit.

And then the earthquake came.

Sarah Palin is the anti-Obama: not a victim, not a poser, not riding a wave but rather swimming upstream — and most of all, not having run for president her entire life. She is the first politician I have ever seen — and I include Ronnie in this, God bless him — who strikes everyone who sees her as an actual, real, ordinary person. Immediately came T-shirts saying I AM SARAH PALIN. HER STORY IS MY STORY. There is a lot of Obama swag out there, too, but none of it says HIS STORY IS MY STORY. Hold that thought till November 5. 

She is so absolutely, remarkably, spectacularly ordinary. I think the magic of Sarah Palin speaks to a belief that so many of us share: the sense that we personally know five people in our immediate circle who would make a better president than the menagerie of candidates the major parties routinely offer. Sarah Palin has erupted from this collective American Dream — the idea that, given nothing but classic American values like hard work, integrity, and tough-minded optimism you can actually do what happens in the movies: become Leader of the Free World, the President of the United States of America. (Or, well, you know, vice president.)"

CWCID: TigerHawk

Noonan On Palin

From Peggy Noonan at The Wall Street Journal:

"Because she jumbles up so many cultural categories, because she is a feminist not in the Yale Gender Studies sense but the How Do I Reload This Thang way, because she is a woman who in style, history, moxie and femininity is exactly like a normal American feminist and not an Abstract Theory feminist; because she wears makeup and heels and eats mooseburgers and is Alaska Tough, as Time magazine put it; because she is conservative, and pro-2nd Amendment and pro-life; and because conservatives can smell this sort of thing -- who is really one of them and who is not -- and will fight to the death for one of their beleaguered own; because of all of this she is a real and present danger to the American left, and to the Obama candidacy.

She could become a transformative political presence.

So they are going to have to kill her, and kill her quick.

And it's going to be brutal. It's already getting there."

The Real Story Behind The Palin Nomination

Quote Of The Day Redux

"Palinize: to slander and caricature a working-class female public figure for the noble advancement of liberalism."
- Victor Davis Hanson

Quote Of The Day

"When liberals start acting like they're opposed to pre-marital sex and mothers having careers, you know McCain's vice presidential choice has knocked them back on their heels."
- Ann Coulter

Sarah Works

This is a great piece by Bruce Walker over at American Thinker:

The selection of Sarah Palin works, on many levels and in many ways. McCain knew what he was doing when he picked her. Consider all the ways in which Palin helps the Republican ticket.

Women voters know not only that the election of McCain likely will lead to the nomination of Sarah Palin as the Republican nominee in 2012 or 2016, but the election of McCain-Palin may well mean that the nominee of both major political parties in 2012 will be a woman: Palin, if McCain decides not to seek another term, and Hillary, who would be the presumptive favorite for the Democratic nomination in 2012 if Obama loses in 2008.

In other words, women voters who vote in this election know that they can probably ensure that the next president is a woman, if McCain is elected. That knowledge will pull wavering women away from Obama-Biden and to McCain-Palin.

Sarah may do more than any person in modern history to close the gender gap, not only for Republicans but for conservatives. Unlike Hillary, who rode into Washington on the back of her husband, Sarah Palin created her own career. Unlike Hillary, who dwells within a small family focused on politics, Sarah has a big family and focuses on life. As a conservative, Sarah Palin sees life as more than politics, election campaigns and litigation. Her husband has a real job in the real economy. Sarah is athletic, animated, alive. Her family seems very real to us. She seems very real to us.

Sarah Palin is pro-life, which solidifies McCain's base with conservative voters, but she is pro-life with a vital twist: She has walked the walk. Women who favor the right to abortion love to point out that the male political leaders who want to limit abortion do not know what it is like to give birth, to care for an infant, or to endure the heartache of a child born with serious illnesses. Sarah knows all those things at a very personal level. When Sarah gave birth to Trig, her son with Down Syndrome, she walked the walk in a way that few people ever have had to do on the abortion question. He will grow up in a warm, loving family and his mother can tell the world, with perfect sincerity, that all human life has great worth.

She walks the walk on Iraq as well. Track joined the Army. He is going to Iraq. Sarah and Todd are laying their most precious possession, the life of their child, in harm's way for the sake of freedom. Sarah Palin, like John McCain, can tell the American people that they know precisely what sort of sacrifices we all must be willing to make if America is to be safe and free. The contrast between McCain-Palin and Obama-Biden on the personal sacrifices made for America is profound.

The criticism of her inexperience is already brewing, but Sarah can say that she has more executive experience than Obama and Biden combined. Moreover, she has been a gutsy chief executive of Alaska, which means that she has shown an ability to resist the blandishments of lobbyists which neither Obama nor Biden have demonstrated. McCain and Palin really do represent a resistance to pork exceptional in a presidential ticket.

As gas prices becomes an increasingly pressing personal issue for huge numbers of Americans, and as more and more Americans support drilling for oil as a logical way to bring down gas prices, Palin brings a strong and persuasive perspective on ANWR drilling. She loves the outdoors. Alaska is her home state, the place where her family lives. When Sarah says, as she doubtless will, that no outsider can care more about preserving the beauty of Alaska than she does, it will be hard to contradict that. So when she then says that drilling in ANWR will not damage the loveliness of that Alaskan natural wonder which she loves, then Sarah will be believed by millions of otherwise ambivalent voters. Sarah, moreover, will be able to make a very cogent intellectual argument for drilling. She knows more about this issue than Obama, Biden or even McCain. And it is an issue that becomes more important to Americans by the day.

Sarah Palin on the ticket also creates some serious problems for Democrats in planning their campaign about the Republican ticket. How, for example, will a reflexively arrogant man like Joe Biden act toward Sarah Palin in the Vice Presidential Debate? This is the same man who talked about Obama as well spoken, for a black man. How careful will Biden be when he debates Palin? The debate will be a virtual minefield for someone as callous as Senator Biden. One slip, one impolitic remark, could shift millions of votes.

Governor Palin also lives in a frontier state, a land about as far away from Washington as you can be and still hold political office in our republic. This is a theme that can resonate with voters. Delaware is right next to Washington: Biden commutes home after work. Chicago, the Daley Machine, does not seem to be much of an improvement. But Palin, and for that matter, McCain, come from another part of America completely. Alaska and Arizona are very distant from the capital whose machinations must be curbed. The image of two people from America's frontier cleaning up our nation's capital is potent.

The biggest catch, though, is Palin herself. She seems utterly genuine. Her life story sounds familiar and comforting. Her words come from her heart. Her ideas come from a mind not trapped in Beltway Newspeak. We want change? She is change. More than just change, though, Sarah Palin represents change for the better. She personifies all the goodness in America which we seem to have lost. Her election will be a shot across the bow of every entrenched politician in the federal government. As a nominee, Sarah works.