A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day...so check back often.
In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
EPA Tightens Pollution Standards - The Environmental Protection Agency yesterday limited the allowable amount of pollution-forming ozone in the air to 75 parts per billion, a level significantly higher than what the agency's scientific advisers had urged for this key component of unhealthy air pollution. (READ MORE)
NRCC Treasurer Under Scrutiny Was Thought of as 'Gold Standard' - In the tiny world of people who keep the books for Washington's multitude of political committees, Christopher J. Ward was considered the Republican "gold standard," in the words of a former co-worker -- one of the few people with so much expertise in election law that everyone wanted Ward... (READ MORE)
Carlyle Fund's Assets Seized - A publicly traded affiliate of the Carlyle Group said yesterday that lenders were seizing its assets, sending the fund, Carlyle Capital, into insolvency. The collapse of Carlyle Capital is the first time a Carlyle Group fund has failed and is a stinging embarrassment for the District private-equity powerhouse... (READ MORE)
Florida's Mail-In Primary Plan Opens Rifts in Washington and Tallahassee - The Florida Democratic Party is pushing forward with a plan for recontesting its primary, largely with mail-in ballots, despite vigorous opposition from Democrats in the state's congressional delegation as well as concerns from the campaign of Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.). (READ MORE)
Legislators Seek to Stanch Spate of Home Foreclosures - As the number of foreclosures in Maryland continues to climb, state lawmakers are considering one of the nation's most ambitious packages of legislation to control the housing crisis by strengthening homeowner protections and toughening oversight of the mortgage-lending industry. (READ MORE)
Spitzer out; no deal on prostitutes - New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer was unable to cut a deal with prosecutors before his resignation yesterday, after getting caught in a call-girl scandal that transformed him from "Mr. Clean" into "Client 9." (READ MORE)
Mayor still fears for New Orleans - New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin said yesterday that the presidential candidates have not seriously addressed the remaining economic and human needs of his city, which was devastated by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005. (READ MORE)
Hayden takes China to task - China is "strangling" emerging island democracies in the Pacific in pursuit of narrow goals, the director of the CIA said in an interview in which he criticized Beijing's failure to act as a responsible global power. (READ MORE)
Prince William sees exodus of Hispanics - Months after Prince William County began one of the country's toughest crackdowns on illegal immigrants, officials and residents report signs that substantial numbers of people have left the county, particularly from Hispanic neighborhoods. (READ MORE)
Warriors welcome Fallon's resignation - Current and former military officials welcomed the resignation of Navy Adm. William J. Fallon, the top U.S. military commander in the Middle East, saying he failed to prevent foreign fighters and munitions from entering Iraq. (READ MORE)
Police initiate search for guns - The Metropolitan (DC) Police Department yesterday announced a new crime initiative that will include officers going into high-crime neighborhoods to search homes for illegal guns. "The premise is that residents can have the trust of the ...department," said police spokeswoman Traci Hughes. (READ MORE)
Pelosi's FISA sabotage - After a brief period last week when it appeared that the House Democratic leadership might be preparing to end their obstructionism regarding the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), it's business as usual for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Today, the House is expected to consider a FISA bill crafted by senior Democrats that does not give retroactive liability protection to telecommunications companies that helped monitor the electronic communications of terrorists after September 11. Last month, the Senate voted 68-29 in favor of legislation including such protections, with 19 Democrats voted with the majority. (READ MORE)
Amber Waves of Green - When it comes to picking taxpayer pockets, no one -- not the trial lawyers or even AARP -- has it over the farm lobby. How's this for clout? Though last year was one of the best ever for farm incomes -- up 44% to $87.5 billion -- farmers are about to score the most lavish subsidies in American history. (READ MORE)
The Spitzer Rules - Immediately after New York Governor Eliot Spitzer announced his resignation yesterday, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Michael Garcia issued an unusual statement: "There is no agreement between this office and Gov. Eliot Spitzer, relating to his resignation or any other matter." Anybody who hasn't spent the past three days lost at sea knows precisely what "other matter" Mr. Garcia was referring to: (READ MORE)
Obama and the Race Card - Is it just us, or does Barack Obama seem a mite too quick to play the race card when facing criticism from political opponents? In recent days, the Obama camp has been demanding an apology from Geraldine Ferraro, the former Vice Presidential candidate and current Hillary Clinton supporter who last week let slip that, "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman of any color, he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept." (READ MORE)
On the Web:
Daniel Henninger: A Disproportionate Life - "Every year you say you've seen it all, but you haven't." -- Matthew Mataraso, Albany lobbyist. If Eliot Spitzer had spent his free time with Albany's in-house hookers, this wouldn't be happening. Publicly embarrassed? Yes. Resign? I doubt it. Now he's done. Princeton, Harvard Law, New York attorney general, governor, toast. A friend of long political experience in New York once told me that a woman he knew said, after her husband got elected to the legislature, he went to Albany and was morally ruined. I mentioned this once to a lady who held a position of importance in the state's governing apparatus. She rolled her eyes: "Albany is a cesspool." (READ MORE)
Dorothy Rabinowitz: Obama on Offense - It came as a relief to hear, in the last few days, that both Democratic candidates were now about to go on the attack, though pundits agreed such low tactics had been forced on Barack Obama. There's something reassuring about the usual election season blather over negative campaigning. That relief is a response, mostly, to any whiff of normality promising to emerge in the current Democratic race. Still, the prospects are thin, given the rapturous response Mr. Obama has enjoyed at the hands of a good part of the press -- attitudes so obvious that the usual stern media denials that their coverage was other than objective have been hard to find. (READ MORE)
Alan M. Dershowitz: The Entrapment of Eliot - The federal criminal investigation that has led to Eliot Spitzer's resignation as governor of New York illustrates the great dangers all Americans face from vague and open-ended sex and money-transaction statutes. Federal law, if read broadly, criminalizes virtually all sexual encounters for which something of value has been given. Federal money-laundering statutes criminalize many entirely legitimate and conventional banking transactions. Congress enacted these laws to give federal prosecutors wide discretion in deciding which "bad guys" to go after. (READ MORE)
Mark Bloomfield: How We Beat the '70s - With rising oil prices, rising unemployment, and inflation eating away at the economy, a powerful politician pushes for a populist tax hike in Washington. It sounds a little like the current state of play. But the year was 1978, the push for a tax hike came from President Jimmy Carter, and the tax in question was on capital gains. Mr. Carter wanted to tax capital gains at the same rate as ordinary income -- effectively doubling the rate for many taxpayers. He didn't get his tax hike, but he did spark a pro-growth insurgency that reframed the tax debate. (READ MORE)
Deiter Helm: Sins of Emission - EU leaders will gather today and tomorrow in Brussels to sign off on the European Commission's proposals to cut carbon emissions by 20% by 2020 -- with the added bait of a 30% reduction if the U.S. and other countries make meaningful commitments. For the U.S., it appears that the question is no longer about whether it will adopt targets, but rather about how and what. To some this all looks like good progress. Yet it is based upon the very shaky arithmetic of the Kyoto Protocol and its legacy. The Kyoto framework looks at the emissions that countries produce within their borders, and this is seductively flattering. Both the U.S. and Europe have seen their CO2 output growth slowing even as economic growth has marched on. It might appear that economic growth and emissions have been decoupled. (READ MORE)
Sabine Freizer: Combustible Caucasus - While most of the world was watching the elections-cum-coronation in Russia earlier this month, in a far corner of the former Soviet empire, the fallout of another fraudulent poll left at least eight dead and over a hundred injured. Sadly, the violence in the wake of Armenia's presidential election, though a first in the streets of the capital Yerevan, follows a dangerous pattern now all too familiar in the South Caucasus. The oft-repeated scenario goes like this: First, irregularities and allegations of fraud mar elections. Then, the opposition organizes mass demonstrations in protest. (READ MORE)
Ken Blackwell: The Roe v. Wade of Gun Rights - The two red-hot issues fused by the District of Columbia v. Heller case -- guns and judges -- are two of the most divisive in American politics. D.C. v. Heller could become one of the most important cases in American history, with profound political and policy implications. The case will directly affect 90 million American gun owners. Whether they have a constitutional right to own guns immediately makes their ownership either a protected right or merely a privilege that the government can restrict at will. Either way everyone else in our society is indirectly affected. (READ MORE)
Victor Davis Hanson: The Tired Gaza Two-Step - Gaza erupted in celebration last week to the news that a Palestinian had murdered Jewish religious students in Jerusalem. And almost daily terrorists send rockets from Gaza into nearby Israeli cities, hoping to kill civilians and provoke Israeli counter-responses -- and perhaps start another Middle East war. This is not the way some imagined Gaza two and half years after the Israelis withdrew both civilians and soldiers from the territory in September 2005. At the time, the Palestinian Authority controlled Gaza, but in early 2007, Hamas took over in a violent civil war, claiming legitimacy after once winning a popular election. (READ MORE)
Steve Chapman: The Other Prostitution Scandal - Politicians take people's money with a promise to fulfill desires that supposedly can't be attained any other way. Prostitutes do the same, though by reputation, they are more reliable in delivering. It's not surprising for people in the same line of work to gravitate toward one another, as Eliot Spitzer and a woman named Kristen reportedly did in a Washington hotel room. I understand why Spitzer's alleged hiring of a call girl was stupid, selfish, reckless, immoral and a betrayal of his family. What I don't understand is why it was illegal. (READ MORE)
Paul Greenberg: The Lost Art of the Apology - Barack Obama faces a test of character in this unending race for the Democratic presidential nomination: Does he continue to take the high road, saying he aims to unite rather than divide the country, or does he respond in kind when his opponent throws every low thing she can at him? It's not a test Hillary Clinton is likely to face. By now surely no one doubts her ability to plumb the political depths. A veteran of many a political campaign, hers is not the politics of unity but of the war room. To sum up her guiding philosophy: Attack, attack, attack. And one more thing - take no prisoners. She's not about to apologize for some of the stunts her campaign has pulled in this campaign, whether it's distributing a picture of her opponent in Somali dress, accusing him of plagiarism, or hubby's trying to dismiss Barack Obama as just another black candidate a la Jesse Jackson. (READ MORE)
Rebecca Hagelin: Paying the Price to Wipe Out the Enemy - The headline in my local weekly paper was strikingly idiotic: “Ending War through Diplomacy.” The article spoke only of the current war against terrorism. I think we need to remind ourselves exactly who it is we’re at war with: terrorist thugs who, well, terrorize. Such evil-minded individuals aren’t prone to sit down for a polite discussion. People forget that we’re not at war with Iraq -- we’re at war in Iraq. We’re not fighting a nation or a government with a designated leader. We’re fighting terrorists who scurry among Middle Eastern countries and hide out in caves. (READ MORE)
Donald Lambro: For Democrats, the Worst of Times - This has not been a good week to be a Democrat. New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, the most prominent Democratic governor in the country, who built his reputation on prosecuting the crooks on Wall Street, has been caught patronizing high-priced call girls in a prostitution ring. Spitzer, a holier-than-thou force against wrongdoing, has become this year's poster boy for hypocrisy, arrogance and moral turpitude -- not the public image that Democrats want in the middle of their election-year campaign to portray the Republicans as mired in a "culture of corruption." The timing of all this hurts them, too. The stunning revelations about the governor have effectively wiped the Democratic presidential race off much of the nation's front pages just as it is moving toward the home stretch. (READ MORE)
Robert D. Novak: W's Gun Battle - Preparing to hear oral arguments Tuesday on the extent of gun rights guaranteed by the Constitution's Second Amendment, the U.S. Supreme Court has before it a brief signed by Vice President Cheney opposing the Bush administration's stance. Even more remarkably, Cheney is faithfully reflecting the views of President George W. Bush. The government position filed with the Supreme Court by U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement stunned gun advocates by opposing the breadth of an appellate court affirmation of individual ownership rights. The Justice Department, not the vice president, is out of order. But if Bush agrees with Cheney, why did the president not simply order Clement to revise his brief? The answers: disorganization and weakness in the eighth year of his presidency. (READ MORE)
Jules Crittenden: Yeah, But - Kuhn at Politico thinks last month’s Pew poll showing growing confidence in the Iraq war effort will remake the presidential debate. With Dems still pushing unconditional withdrawal, independents will swing McCainward. What Kuhn fails to note, however, is the return of the “Yeah, But” narrative in war reportage. “‘There is no military solution,’ Clinton is prone to say, a sentiment echoed by Obama. Obama has also proposed an end date for ‘removing all combat brigades’ from Iraq.
‘Thinking about where we were at the time of the congressional elections, it’s ironic that the Iraq issue could actually be the one that most favors the Republican and most other issues — including most foreign policy issues — could most favor the Democrats,’ O’Hanlon added. ‘Yet Democrats keep wanting to fight the Iraq debate.’” All good. Kuhn notes that a surge in violence could reverse perceptions and reactions in the notoriously fickle and easily swayed electorate. What Kuhn doesn’t note is that over the past week, with several violent incidents, the “Yeah, But” narrative is being fired up again. (READ MORE)
Ed Morrissey: Pew: Majority of Americans see a successful conclusion in Iraq - Public confidence in the Iraq war has risen to its highest level in almost two years. Fifty-three percent now believe that the US will ultimately achieve its goals in Iraq, fifteen points higher than just six months ago, according to Pew Research: “American public support for the military effort in Iraq has reached a high point unseen since the summer of 2006, a development that promises to reshape the political landscape. According to late February polling conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, 53 percent of Americans — a slim majority — now believe ‘the U.S. will ultimately succeed in achieving its goals’ in Iraq. That figure is up from 42 percent in September 2007.” (READ MORE)
Allahpundit: Fred Kaplan: Fallon wasn’t pushed out over Iran - Kaplan knows the military and isn’t inclined to give Bush the benefit of the doubt ever, both elements of which make this compelling. Blackfive and NBC hinted yesterday that his resignation had less to do with him standing in the way of war with Iran than with intangibles. Here’s Kaplan backing them up, coming close but not quite all the way to accusing Fallon of insubordination: “Contrary to the charges of some Democratic lawmakers, this is not another case of an officer’s dissent being stifled. Nor does Fallon’s departure herald a tilt in U.S. policy toward war with Iran…” (READ MORE)
Don Surber: Apology - Hillary to black editors: C’mon, we’re liberals. How can we be racist? Judging solely by the direct quotes in the AP article, I’d have to say Sen. Clinton just doesn’t get it. She spoke at a forum sponsored by the National Newspaper Publishers Association, a group of more than 200 black community newspapers across the country. She apologized for her husband’s dismissal of Obama’s win in South Carolina as being a state Jesse Jackson won. (Bill Clinton had won it it too.) Mrs. C said: “I want to put that in context. You know I am sorry if anyone was offended. It was certainly not meant in any way to be offensive. We can be proud of both Jesse Jackson and Senator Obama." (READ MORE)
Flopping Aces: Reid Believes Founding Fathers Wanted Earmarks - This guy can’t be for real: “Earmark foes are preparing to force a vote that would oblige senators to disclose all campaign contributions connected to their pet projects. Reid said last year’s ethics law provided ‘total transparency’ of the process by requiring legislation for the first time to specify who the authors of each earmark were. ‘As we look back in history, the Founding Fathers would be cringing to hear people talking about eliminating earmarks,’ Reid said, noting that the Founders dictated in the Constitution that all spending should originate in Congress, not the executive branch. Wha-wha-what! The Founding Fathers wanted a system in which politicians could sock away money for their own states in the dark? And here all along I thought the power of appropriations means fully disclosing the spending going on and floor votes on those monies. Guess I was a silly fool. (READ MORE)
Democracy Project: Salon’s Preview of Winter Soldier II Propaganda - Salon asks, “Will American war crimes be revealed?” at the Iraq Veterans Against the War’s sequel to the fraud-filled Winter Soldier theatre offered in 1971 by Vietnam Veterans Against the War. “The event is designed to be another purging of the horrors of war, and another effort to put American military policy on trial in the public eye.” However: “In interviews with Salon, several veterans from the group described incidents in Iraq that they believed constituted wrongdoing by the U.S. military, including disproportionate use of air power resulting in civilian deaths. The soldiers were unable to provide Salon with any conclusive evidence of war crimes.” Not that that stops them from alleging war crimes, anyway. (READ MORE)
Chickenhawk Express: IVAW Member Compares Gathering of Eagles to a Common Housefly - I am not a member of the Gathering of Eagles but I do frequent their website and support their counter-protests. The GOE has been subjected to the same threats that I and many others have been subjected to. Despite the apology on the IVAW homepage for the actions/threats of 2 members, Jen Hogg posted an article today on the IVAW website comparing GOE to the common housefly and not worthy of debate. “In the buildup to IVAW’s Winter Soldier there are many individuals and a few groups who are opposed to the hearings. Their voice is mostly silently broadcast on the internet through their blogs but one group has a different level of desire attempting to confront IVAW. That group is the Gathering of Eagles. Recently I saw them standing in the cold rain in order to protest an event with one IVAW speaker, so if nothing else they have dedication. Yet what does this mean to IVAW?” (READ MORE)
The Anchoress: Ferraro Quits: Old Man River Keeps Rolling - Geraldine Ferraro, having suggested publicly not once, but twice, over the course of 20 years and two African-American presidential bids, that (essentially) the black man can only ascend to the presidency through affirmative action or white guilt, is stepping down from her position in the Clinton campaign’s finance committee: “Ferraro said she is stepping down so, ‘I can speak for myself and you can continue to speak for yourself about what is at stake in this campaign.’” Okay. Possibly she wasn’t in the mood to endure any further heat for her comments, or she doesn’t want to open Hillary up to the logical response to her charges, which would be, “how does your theory differ from the theory that Hillary is only where she is because she was married to Bill?” - a question I am sure the Clinton campaign does not want long-bubbling to the surface. (READ MORE)
The Belmont Club: Weapons turned inward - When Paul Krugman complained that the bitter internecine conflict between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton meant that "a large part of the progressive movement seems to have lost its sanity" he must have meant Crazy Like a Fox. It would be more accurate to say that progressive politics has now come to resemble extremist politics. Consider the tactic of plausible deniability. Plausible deniability refers to informal arrangement through which a person may deny any connection to a disreputable activity he actually orders. The two ends to this clever arrangement are the protected principal and the secret agent acting on the mastermind's behalf. When Geraldine Ferraro said that "if Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position" only to resign after Hillary Clinton expressed her high-minded indignation, were the two acts unrelated? (READ MORE)
Donald Douglas: No Pride: The Left's Patriotism Gap - I noted previously, after the Texas primary, how Barack Obama claimed that young Americans today, traveling abroad, can't hold their heads high and proclaim: "I Am an American." Obama's sentiments - which echo his wife's own anti-Americanism - should not be considered some peripheral issue bound to get lost in all the talk of health care and national security. No, the question of pride in nation goes beyond specifics to the fundamental qualities of what we want in our president, an American president. Obama's a powerful speaker, but his elegant, lofty words cannot hide the considerable specificity to his unpatriotism. (READ MORE)
Ace of Spades: Racism: Photoshopped Rolling Stone Cover Suggests Obama Is Steamy-Sweaty, Possibly Radioactive - For how long will the racist media trade in age-old stereotypes about black physicality and bioluminescence? God, it looks like Jack Kirby illustrating a William Faulkner novel. I've changed my mind: I want Obama as the Democratic nominee. Not only is he much more beatable than I first thought -- corruption, that Marxist harpy of a wife -- but the media bias should he prevail will be (licks fingers) muah!, magnifique. They're already melting the fuck down and the guy hasn't even beat the Yoko Ono of politics. Well I guess Yoko Ono is the Yoko Ono of politics, too. The Yoko Ono of the Clinton Family Band, then. (READ MORE)
A Newt One: Winter Soldier Frauds II Soon Upon Us All - Here is a link to Michelle Malkin's You Tube site where YAF's Jason Mattera confronted the original Winter Soldier Fraud, John f'ing Kerry. In the video, Kerry lies by saying, “[...] These are the-many of those charges, incidentally, were subsequently verified by different entities. [...]” That is poli-speak for, "I am a US Senator and how dare you bring this up at this time". He lied, again! The rest of the "special post" is here, at MM.com. It is truly a must read. The post goes into great detail the goings on of the cretins and treasonous frauds. If you are a link hound as many of us are, you will be in Link Heaven. In other developments, ArmySergeant, has issued apologies to Michelle Malkin and others for the threats issued against them and certain IVAW members have had their memberships either terminated or indefinitely suspended. (READ MORE)
The Daily Ramble: Waterboarding - The Democrats in the House today failed to override the ban and handcuff our intelligence in the fight against terror. Of course, the republicans will not speak so much about the waterboarding component and will highlight the fact that this bill had more pork than a neighborhood 'Piggly Wiggly', which is good also. The wasteful spending should have been stopped when the R's had control of Congress and for that reason they no longer have it. The democrats will (and do) claim that this is all about torture, ignoring the fact that waterboarding has been deemed legal by the AG and not torture under any laws in this country. Of course they had the opportunity once to make it illegal and chose not to, but that's why 20/20 is such a good thing (in hindsight that is). (READ MORE)
Big Dog: Richard Belzer Couldn’t Polish Her Boots - I wrote earlier about actor/comedian Richard Belzer’s slam against our brave men and women serving in the military. In case you missed it, Belzer said; “You think everyone over [in Iraq] is a college graduate? They’re 19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn’t get a job.” As I have stated, they all have jobs. These are jobs they took willingly so that lesser people like Belzer could sleep in peace at night. Belzer could not stack up to any of these fine troops. Case in point, 19 year old Monica Lin Brown of Texas has become the second woman to earn the Silver Star since WW II. This 19 year old, who according to Belzer joined the Army because she could not get a job, is a medic who was in a convoy that was struck by a bomb. (READ MORE)
Baldilocks: How "Blackness" Came To Be - Regarding my post “Is Obama Black or White? Yes,” reader Salt Lick has a few questions—the answers of which I think would be useful for all to see. For clarity’s sake, the lines from the original post are block-quoted, Salt Lick’s questions or comments are in bold and my answers/comments are in normal font. Let’s have at it, shall we? “Hello Baldi - I've been reading and rereading your post for over a half-hour, trying to understand your central point. It seems to me that you are not defending Sinbad's attitude so much as asking his critics to consider the reasons underlying it. You are mostly annoyed that ‘some’ people are saying Obama's race shouldn't matter because it's convenient for them, not because they really want to ignore his race (whatever that is). Am I right?” Yes. I do think that some whites feel slighted because Obama calls himself black--either because they "love" him so much and view the self-ID as exclusionary from them. (READ MORE)
Kit Lange: Berkeley: Don’t Support the Troops–Ever - Berkeley “thinker” explains that any support for the troops is bad–even if they’re friends or relatives. Berkeley, CA–Every so often we read something that is so evil, so disgusting, and so vile that it stays with us after it’s read, like some kind of curse we can’t shake in our minds. This article is one of those vile things. Kenneth Thiesen, of the Berzerkley Observer, wrote a piece called “Why I Don’t Support the Troops.” Interestingly enough, he gets one thing right: “It is objectively impossible to support the troops of the imperialist military forces of the U.S. and at the same time oppose the wars in which they fight.” Well, no kidding. We’ve been telling you people that for a while now. (READ MORE)
Richard S. Lowry: Recording History - Part XIII - Jason and Lindsey - December 12, 2004 changed Jason and Lindsey Arellano’s lives forever. U.S. Marine Sergeant Jason R Arellano, 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines, Kilo Company, 2nd Platoon’s third squad leader found himself in Iraq for the second time. He had last seen American soil on September 11, 2004, leaving his loved ones in prayer and anticipation. Jason and Lindsey recently shared the following write-up with me after I contacted him to request an interview for my book. Jason told me that they wanted to write it all down before the memories faded. Hopefully, they will gather other stories of that fateful day and publish a book of their own. No doubt, I will tell Sergeant Jason Arellano’s story, but this poignant tale will be left for their telling. (READ MORE)
Michelle Malkin: Document drop: Unclassified memo warns military personnel of anti-war threats to recruiters, Army installations/facilities - Responding to my reporting on the Left’s escalating war against military recruiters, a source sent me the following unclassified memo issued this week warning military personnel and civilian employees across the country to be on alert against possible threats and violence by anti-war and anti-recruiter protesters gearing up for demonstrations on the fifth anniversary of the war in Iraq. Officials are on guard against the Pittsburgh nuts threatening to “cage” recruiters, as well as the threats against the Tacoma, WA recruiting station. I believe it is in the public interest to underscore the ongoing threats our military personnel face here at home. Like the memo says: “Remain vigilant.” Oh, and by the way, the Times Square recruitment station bomber has still not been identified and caught. (READ MORE)
ShrinkWrapped: The Next (One Term) President - Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John McCain are all running to become a one-term President. On election day in November, the key question for anyone who walks into the polling booth is who will do the least damage and is least likely to most exacerbate our escalating problems. There are two major reasons the next President is likely to serve one-term, the economy and the war. Both areas present implacable problems that will not be solved within the next 5 years and therein lies the tale. Tony Blankley is only the latest to note that the Presidential campaign thus far is being run by people who have no interest in tackling the present structural difficulties facing our economy. (READ MORE)
Mark Steyn: This Has Been One of Them - Marvin Wald died a few days ago in California at the age of 90. He's not a famous writer but he gave us one of the most famous lines in American popular culture: "There are eight million stories in the naked city. This has been one of them." It was first heard at the very end of Wald's 1948 cop movie The Naked City, and then a decade later every week at the conclusion of the TV series based on the film. It's a line I've used a lot over the years - for example, after 9/11, when the Transportation Secretary Norm Mineta was going around boasting that his new security procedures would have no profiling and would subject the 89-year old midwestern gran'ma to as much scrutiny as a 24-year old Saudi male. I imagined Mineta as a TV detective sifting through the clues but being in no hurry to narrow down the range of suspects: "There are eight million stories in the naked city. And I want to hear all of them." Six decades after its debut, it was still a recognizable line. (READ MORE)
Texas Rainmaker: How Are You Enjoying the Change? - A little over a year ago: 1. Consumer confidence stood at a 5-year high; 2. Regular gasoline averaged under $2.30 a gallon; 3. The unemployment rate was down to 4.4%. 4. Americans were enjoying historically-high home equity. Since voting in a Democrat Congress in 2006 we have seen: 1. Consumer confidence plummet; 2. The cost of regular gasoline soar to over $3.25 a gallon; 3. Unemployment rise to 4.8% (a 9% increase); 4. American home equity hit the lowest point in six decades; America voted for change in 2006… and change is what we got! (READ MORE)
Mark Tapscott: Missouri Democrat Claire McCaskill gives rousing anti-earmark speech in Senate - This is a rush transcipt of McCaskill's speech earlier this afternoon in support of the 2009 budget amendment she is co-sponsoring with Sen. Jim DeMint, R-SC, providing a one-year moratorium on all earmarking. I'll get an edited version up in place of the following ASAP. “MCCASKILL: madam president, i'd like to speak a few minutes about the amendment that i have cosponsored with senator demint concerning the earmarking process in congress. you know, it's very unusual that a problem is as bipartisan as this problem. spending public money is something we should take very seriously. it's one of the most important things we do. we all have to remember it's not our money. this spending of public money should be done on merit. it should be done on a cost-benefit basis.” (READ MORE)
Jay Tea: Pawns And Brokers - Well, is there a better show around right now than the Democratic race for the presidential nomination? (Well, now that "Eliot Spitzer's Ho-Down" has been canceled.) The fighting between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama is the stuff of which legends are made. I'm not certain, but I believe that each candidate has enough delegates (between elected and designated, or "super," delegates) to deny the other a first-ballot victory. Which means that it will, if nothing changes, it's going to be a brokered convention. The first solution that comes to mind is if one of the two leaders voluntarily steps aside "for the good of the party." That ain't likely to happen at all. (READ MORE)
The Midnight Sun: U.K., The Voices of Reason are Falling Silent - At a time when Britain needs its conservatives the most; at a time when the Tories are looking more and more insipid while the ruling hegemony, the Left are chomping all in their path with their iron teeth, one more good man drops out of the fight, citing problems with the party as his reason: “We have just received the following press release from the office of Dr Bob Spink, committed eurosceptic and Chairman of the Campaign for an Independent Britain: Bob says: ‘The Party has failed to deal with local breaches of its rules and electoral irregularities,and with criminal activities over a long period and there are now corruption and other investigations, surrounding certain senior members of my local Association. It is with great sadness that I therefore felt compelled to resign the Party whip. I hope my action in resigning will bring the necessary changes and therefore be in both the public and the Party’s best interests.’ Tories lose another MP at Westminster” (READ MORE)
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