DNC = WATB

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RNC ad with Obama and Newtown mother infuriates DNC

The Republican National Committee (RNC) and Democratic National Committee (DNC) clashed Wednesday over a new RNC ad that the DNC says cruelly exploits the Newtown shootings.

The ad, called “The First 100 Days,” criticizes Obama on the failure of his legislative agenda, including gun control, so far in Congress. It features a voiceover saying that Obama’s agenda has “already suffered a string of defeats,” and a black and white photo of the president reaching to embrace Nicole Hockley, the distraught mother of a victim in the shooting massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

Democratic National Committee spokesman Brad Woodhouse called the ad “disgraceful” in a tweet and “disgusting” in another.

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When you watch the video don’t blink or you’ll miss it. And the brief glimpse they’re talking about didn’t come from a memorial service, it was from the POUTUS Presser in the Rose Garden where he used some Newtown parents as stage props while he whinged about Senate Republicans.

If you politicize something, your opponents should be able to politicize it too.

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And so it begins…

We interrupt Myiq’s birthday celebration to announce that David Frum is being, well, David Frum. Which is to say a kool-aid-schwilling Clintonian-deranged swing-hitter whose major job appears to be cock-blocking female candidates and appearing very serious, indeed. Here’s his case against Hillary Clinton, 2016:

Hillary Clinton came second in the nomination fight of 2008. If she were a Republican, that would make her a near-certainty to be nominated in 2016. Five of the past six Republican nominees had finished second in the previous round of primaries. (The sixth was George W. Bush, son of the most recent Republican president.)

Democrats, by contrast, prefer newcomers. Six of their eight nominees since 1972 had never sought national office before.

Obviously, past performance is no guarantee of future results. Democrats chose the next guy in line in 2000 — Vice President Al Gore — and they may well do so again. But speaking from across the aisle, it’s just this one observer’s opinion that Democrats would be poorly served by following the Republican example when President Obama’s term ends.

Hillary Clinton is 14 years older than Barack Obama. A party has never nominated a leader that much older than his immediate predecessor. (The previous record-holder was James Buchanan, 13 years older than Franklin Pierce when the Democrats chose him in 1856. Runner-up: Dwight Eisenhower, 12 years older than his predecessor, Thomas Dewey.)

Parties have good reasons to avoid reaching back to politicians of prior generations. When they do, they bring forward not only the ideas of the past, but also the personalities and the quarrels of the past.

One particular quarrel that a Hillary Clinton nomination would bring forward is the quarrel over the ethical standards of the Clinton White House — and, maybe even more, of the Clintons’ post-White House careers. Relying on Hillary Clinton’s annual financial disclosure reports, CNN reported last year that former President Bill Clinton had earned $89 million in speaking fees since leaving the White House in 2001. Many of these earnings came from foreign sources. In 2011 alone, the former president earned $6.1 million from 16 speeches in 11 foreign countries.

[...]

Yet the biggest risk to Democrats from a Hillary Clinton nomination is not that it would be generationally backward-looking — or that it would reopen embarrassing ethical disputes — but that it would short-circuit the necessary work of party renewal.

To recap, Frum is opposed to Hillary running because:

a) Hillary is not new enough

b) Hillary is too old

c) Bill makes too much money all over the world

D) Hillary is too old

Fuck David Frum. A Russert-style heart attack is too good for him, but judging by his pictures he’s working on it nonetheless. Eat more steak, Davy. Lots more. Fucktard, wish-casting, scum of the earth asshole. And that’s how I REALLY feel.

What about you? This is an open thread.

Holy Frozen Batman!

It happened. Obama was held accountable for something. It’s not much, but it’s something.

President Obama’s 2008 campaign was fined $375,000 by the Federal Election Commission for campaign reporting violations — one of the largest fees ever levied against a presidential campaign, POLITICO has learned.

The fine — laid out in detail in FEC documents that have yet to be made public — arose from an audit of the campaign, which was published in April. POLITICO obtained a copy of the conciliation agreement detailing the fine, which was sent to Sean Cairncross, the chief lawyer for the Republican National Committee, one of the groups that filed complaints about the campaign’s FEC reporting from 2008.

“$375,000 is a huge fine,” said Republican election lawyer Jason Torchinsky. “It may one of their top five- or ten-largest fines.”

But he added, “They’re also the first billion-dollar presidential campaign. Proportionally, it’s not out of line.
[...]

The major sticking point for the FEC appeared to be a series of missing 48-hour notices for nearly 1,300 contributions totaling more than $1.8 million — an issue that lawyers familiar with the commission’s work say the FEC takes seriously. The notices must be filed on contributions of $1,000 or more that are received within the 20-day window of Election Day.

More than half of those contributions were transferred from the Obama Victory Fund,a joint committee between the campaign and the Democratic National Committee.

Sources said the fine resulting from the settlement agreement has been paid, with $230,000 coming from the Obama campaign’s coffers and the remainder from the DNC.

The document outlined other violations, such as erroneous contribution dates on some campaign reports. The Obama campaign was also late returning some contributions that exceeded the legal limit.

Like I said, it’s not much, even though the idiots quoted in the article and the author herself makes it sound breathlessly serious. It’s really just putting the whole thing to bed without actually investigating anything, and offering a veneer of credibility to the most corrupt campaign in American history. There’s nothing there about the illegal contributions from foreigners or the fact that many Vile Progs could have and probably did donate more than the maximum allowed because of that little CVS number work around. But at least it’s something.

You’ll have to wait forever for an investigation into caucus manipulations and delegate-stealing, though. This is an open thread.

The Chicago Way

Chicago Politics

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Un-fucking-believable:

Mel Reynolds, an ex-con convicted of bank fraud and having sex with a 16-year-old girl when he was in his 40s, wants to replace the embattled Jesse Jackson Jr. in Congress.

Standing in front of signs that read “Redemption” Reynolds held a news conference on Wednesday saying he would run in a special election after Jackson resigned in disgrace last week in the midst of a federal investigation.

It was Reynolds who Jackson replaced 17 years ago —in a special election — after Reynolds himself resigned in disgrace after his conviction.

“It’s what you do after the mistakes,” Reynolds said, adding that his crimes were “almost 18, 20 years ago,” and shouldn’t be a life sentence. “I want to serve.”

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The worst part is he very well could win. In fact, if he wins the primary, it’s a sure thing he’ll win the special election.

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Two More Falling?

Of note today:

Jesse Jackson suddenly ready to deal:

Just days after winning a handy reelection to his Chicago-area district, 17-year Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., D-Ill., has entered negotiations for a plea deal that would include his resignation from Congress and likely jail time.

Jackson, Jr., the son of civil rights activist Rev. Jesse Jackson, Sr., and husband to Chicago Alderman Sandi Jackson, has not yet pleaded guilty to alleged misuse of campaign funds to decorate his house and purchase a $40,000 Rolex watch for a female friend. But CBS Chicago reports the congressman’s lawyer, white-collar criminal defense attorney Dan Webb, is negotiating with the federal government a plea bargain that will likely be reached by year’s end.

The tentative deal includes Jackson, Jr.’s resignation from Congress for health reasons, a “guilty” plea involving misuse of campaign funds, and repayment of any contributions that were converted to personal use. At least some jail time is expected. Jackson, Jr.’s pension, which would pay out between $65,000 and $80,000 a year when he turns 62, is also part of the talks.

Is this the end for Pelosi?

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), who built and then lost the largest Democratic majority in a generation, is considering ending her historic 10-year reign as Democratic leader after the second disappointing election in a row for her caucus.

Pelosi has not signaled whether she intends to remain atop a caucus that she has ruled with a near-iron fist, including four years as the first female House speaker and six years in the minority.

[...]

Some Democratic insiders expect her decision by Wednesday, after Congress returns to try to forge a deal to avert a massive set of automatic tax increases and spending cuts.

“She’s talking with members. When she’s ready to make an announcement, she will do so,” said Drew Hammill, Pelosi’s spokesman.

These two no doubt know where a lot of the bodies are buried. It’s an especially neat trick for Jackson, since Gov. Pat Quinn, a real friend of Obama’s, will appoint his successor now that Jackson has won his reelection. As for Pelosi, the question is who will succeed her? Steny Hoyer likely expects a promotion, but I suspect some political maneuvering will go on so that he is thwarted in his chance. He’s an ugly little man, and I that’s not a comment on his looks, so he deserves it.  James Clyburn who fought it out with Hoyer over the Whip position, is unlikely to get it since he publicly broke with Obama over gay marriage.

Are you finding anyone else on the chopping block? We should compile evidence of the purge, don’t you think?

Prejudice, Sterotypes and Bigotry

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Warner Todd Huston at Breitbart:

L.A. Times Hears Racist Dog Whistles from Romney Voters

Sandy Banks of the L.A. Times has figured out why anyone would vote against Barack Obama. Why, they are all racists, of course. Oh, you don’t use “the N word,” she tells us, but we know what you Romney voters really think.

Banks dropped all pretense of logic or fairness in her Sunday piece, claiming that the nation’s “kumbaya era” is over merely because a white man dared run against Barack Obama for the office of President of the United States.

Like all these hate-filled screeds that cast any non-Obama voter as a racist, Banks doesn’t bother trying to actually explain how a nation that elected a black man as President could suddenly revert to pre-civil rights oppression. She just states it straight as if it is obvious fact.

This has been the single most disgusting attack against Romney voters and, if Obama loses his bid for reelection, be prepared to see every last left-winger on TV and in the commentariat claim that the only reason Obama lost is because the country is filled with hood-wearing, Jim Crow-loving racists.

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You don’t have to be an Obama follower to think like that:

In the last couple of days, I have read the consternation of the left as they see the evangelicals and other right wing followers get behind their Mormon. It’s as if the left has forgotten all of the studies by Bob Altemeyer and lessons learned from John Dean about the nature of the authoritarian follower. But it’s even weirder than that because although the right has made it a badge of honor to decouple cause from effect, ignore evidence and discourage reasoned thinking in its followers so that the world looks to them like a violent, chaotic place, I never thought I would see the same sort of behavior rising in the left.

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I was raised in fundamentalist church in a red zone of California. My mom was (and is) a feminist but not a liberal. So I first hit adulthood with a right-wing tilt to my politics. The first time I voted in a presidential election I cast my ballot for Ronnie Raygun. But during my twenties I moved steadily to the left until by the time I was thirty I was a borderline socialist.

I stayed that way for a long time. I was proud to be a liberal and a yellow-dog Democrat. 2008 cured me of that yellow-dog thingie but I still consider myself a liberal Democrat-in-exile.

Two More Days

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Salena Zito:

Main Street In Revolt

The homemade sign for Mitt Romney in the yard of a well-manicured but modest home in Leadville, Colo., forlornly signals the fracture of another onetime supporter of Barack Obama.

If Romney wins the presidency on Tuesday, the national media, the Washington establishment and the bulk of academia will have missed something huge that happened in “flyover” America under their watch.

It is a story that few have told.

It reminds one of the famous quip by New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael following Richard Nixon’s landslide 1972 victory: “I live in a rather special world. I only know one person who voted for Nixon.”

Two years after suffering a historic shellacking in the 2010 midterm election, Democrats astonishingly have ignored Main Street Americans’ unhappiness.

That 2010 ejection from the U.S. House, and from state legislatures and governors’ offices across the country, didn’t happen inside the Washington Beltway world.

It didn’t reflect the Democrats’ or the media’s conventional wisdom or voter-turnout models. So it just wasn’t part of their reality.

In Democrats’ minds, it was never a question of “How did we lose Main Street?” Instead, it was the fault of the “tea party” or of crazy right-wing Republicans.

Yet in interview after interview — in Colorado, along Nebraska’s plains, in small Iowa towns or Wisconsin shops, outside closed Ohio steel plants and elsewhere — many Democrats have told me they are furious with the president. Not in a frothing-at-the-mouth or racist way, as many elites suggest. They just have legitimate concerns affecting their lives.

[...]

Never once have Main Street Americans heard Washington elites ponder, “What did we Democrats do to lose the confidence of so many voters?”

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On Tuesday we get to send a message to Obama and the Democrats:

“CAN YOU HEAR US NOW?“

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When Dinosaurs Ruled The Land

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The Joe Moneybags Gazette:

The Party that Obama Un-Built

The focus of this week’s Democratic convention was President Obama. Lost in the adulation was the diminished state to which he has brought his broader party. Today’s Democrats are a shadow of 2008—struggling for re-election, isolated to a handful of states, lacking reform ideas, bereft of a future political bench. It has been a stunning slide.

[...]

In 2006, Nancy Pelosi muzzled her liberal inclinations to recruit and elect her “Majority Makers”—a crop of moderate and conservative Democrats who won Republican districts and delivered control of the House for the first time in 14 years.

Democrats in 2006 also claimed the Senate, with savvy victories in states like Montana and Virginia. The party thumped Republicans in gubernatorial races, winning in the South (Arkansas), the Mountain West (Colorado), and in Ohio (for the first time since 1991). A vibrant candidate Obama further boosted Democratic ranks in 2008.

By 2009, President Obama presided over what could fairly be called a big-tent coalition. The Blue Dog caucus had swelled to 51 members, representing plenty of conservative America. Democrats held the majority of governorships. Mr. Obama had won historic victories in Virginia and North Carolina. The prediction of liberal demographers John Judis and Ruy Teixeira’s 2004 book, “The Emerging Democratic Majority”—lasting progressive dominance via a coalition of minorities, women, suburbanites and professionals—attracted greater attention among political analysts.

It took Mr. Obama two years to destroy this potential, with an agenda that forced his party to field vote after debilitating vote—stimulus, ObamaCare, spending, climate change. The public backlash, combined with the president’s mismanagement of the economy, has reversed Democrats’ electoral gains and left a party smaller than at any time since the mid-1990s.

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I have to disagree somewhat – the problem with the Democratic party goes deeper than Obama. He is just an acute manifestation of a chronic disease. That’s why the party needs electoral chemotherapy.

It all started back in the 60′s when the New Deal coalition began to fracture and establishment liberals took control of the party. Even though the Democrats had a solid grip on Congress they began to suffer a series of blow-outs in the Electoral College.

From 1972 until 1988 the Republicans won the White House four out of five times – each time by a landslide. The lone exception was 1976 when Jimmy Carter won, but that was due to the backlash over Watergate.

The Democrats focused on identity politics – putting together a coalition of special interest groups like unions, minorities, feminists, environmentalists and the anti-war movement. This was effective in winning Congressional districts in part because the legacy of the New Deal left them in control of redistricting for another couple of decades. They also kept control of the Senate because seniority rules and the advantages of incumbency allowed Democratic dinosaurs to remain in office even as their states began turning red.

Then came Bill Clinton – a different kind of Democrat. He ran as a moderate and managed to pull off a plurality victory in the popular vote, thus winning a majority in the Electoral College. Establishment Democrats and the DFH wing hated him because he wasn’t a doctrinaire liberal. But the voters liked him, especially after they got a good look at Newt Gingrich.

I never realized until 2008 how much the far left despised Bill Clinton because I live in a red zone where liberals are an endangered species. Even the Democrats here are conservative. Back then there was no blogosphere where people could gather and discuss politics. We had to do that stuff face-to-face and I was always one of the most liberal voices around.

I thought Bill Clinton was a great preezy. Nobody around these parts ever called him a “DINOcrat” or a traitor to the party. What’s not to like about peace and prosperity?

Things caught up with the Democrats in 1994 when their institutional advantages of seniority and incumbency left them too ossified to adapt to changing times. Then the Republicans overreached and Bill Clinton out-maneuvered them, winning a second term in 1996. But the Democratic establishment still blamed him for the loss of Congress.

Al Gore lost in 2000 because the left thought he was too much like Bill Clinton. John Kerry lost in 2004 because the voters thought he was too much like McGovern, Mondale and Dukakis. If it hadn’t been for 9-11 Bush probably would have lost anyway. The voters were so disgusted with Bush and “movement conservatism” that by 2006 they voted the Republicans out of office, handing the Democrats an unexpected and unearned victory.

In doing so they returned to power two old dinosaurs – Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. Their goal was to restore the old order, and that included blocking Hillary Clinton from the nomination. It was a power struggle and the Clintons lost. Barack Obama was installed as the nominee and he went on to win the White House.

And that brings us to where the article cited above begins.

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DNC Night III – Obama Speechifies Again

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I don’t know about you but if I gotta listen to him talk I gotta be drunk. Tune in early if you want to catch Hairplug Joe – they bumped the Vice Preezy from primetime. Lurch is supposed to audition for Hillary’s job too.

Thank (insert deity name here) this shit is almost over.

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Life isn’t fair

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Erika Johnson at Hot Air discusses Elizabeth Warren’s speech last night:

There is so much material here, I don’t even know where to begin, so I’ll just pick out a few key lines and go from there.

“We fought to level the playing field before.  About a century ago when corrosive greed threatened our economy and our way of life…” Greed. Oh, greed. You call it greed, I call it rational self-interest; but whatever you want to call it, one thing is certain: The profit motive, which all human beings share, by the way, is the driving force behind everything we have. Individuals trying to provide for themselves and for their families are what continually creates prosperity, a.k.a., economic growth, and an individual’s personal wealth is an indicator of how successful they’ve been in providing a good or service upon which other people voluntarily place a lot of value. How do corporations become corporations, Ms. Warren? I might patronize the hair salon or the car wash once a month or so, and these small businesses are important, to be sure. But “oil companies” and “investment banks” have so much money because I use their services every single day. I drive to work and accrue interest in my savings account all time time, just like most Americans do — and these are all voluntary, mutually beneficial transactions. And what’s more, these large corporations also provide huge numbers of jobs as well as government revenue. Please get off your high horse and quit acting like the life choices of the CEO of the oil company are somehow ignoble compared to those of the hair stylist.

“The Republican vision is clear — ‘I got mine.  The rest of you are on your own.’ Republicans say they don’t believe in government. Sure, they do. They believe in government to help themselves and their powerful friends.” Uhm, why yes actually, I am just on my way to play poker with the corporate emperors of the universe, along with the rest of Republican party. …What the what? Who are these ‘powerful friends’ I’m supposed to have, exactly, and why am I unable to divorce my motives from their oh-so-greedy wishes? News flash: I do not have powerful friends. I vote Republican because I want to lessen the impregnable power of the federal bureaucracy and create more opportunities for myself and my fellow Americans. That is all.

“People feel like the system is rigged against them, and here is the painful part, they’re right.  The system is rigged. …Wall Street CEOs, the same ones the direct our economy and destroyed millions of jobs still strut around Congress, no shame, demanding favors, and acting like we should thank them.” Blergh. This is a perfect manifestation of my precise problem with Elizabeth Warren and her “consumer financial protectin’” ilk. Yes, I grant you, the system is kind of rigged. But why are we blaming Wall Street for rent-seeking, when the metastasized federal government is what’s affording them the opportunity to rent-seek? People will always look for a way to beat out their competition, and if that includes courting favors from the government and crony capitalism, they will. This isn’t rocket science. Federal busybodies trying to incentivize the financial sector into doing things they wanted to see happen based on their political agenda was what caused the financial crisis. Everybody has an agenda — but only the government can enforce theirs through fiat without fighting the natural regulator of free-market competition. Elizabeth Warren was a big supporter of the Occupy Movement, and I made this point right when the Occupy protests first broke out — stop directing your ire at the symptoms and instead direct it at the disease.

And finally, as to the Elizabeth Warren’s claim that the Romney/Ryan ticket doesn’t care about the middle class — doesn’t anybody at that convention realize that Barack Obama’s proposal to hike taxes on America’s wealthiest earners is an absolute farce that cannot hope to pay for the level of government he wants to keep going? I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!

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So much of modern leftist ideology is based upon the idea of fairness. There is nothing inherently wrong with that because fairness is a worthy ideal. The problem comes from trying to define “fair.”

Life is not fair. If it was then we would all be identical. While (ideally) we may all be equal under the law, we are not all equal. Some of use are bigger, faster, smarter and/or stronger than others. Some are better looking. A lucky few choose the right parents and are born wealthy.

Government cannot create equality. In can, however, prohibit the more egregious forms of discrimination. Government cannot guarantee equality of opportunity but it can do something about providing opportunity to everyone.

In some places your entire life is basically predetermined at birth. If you are born poor you will always be poor. Your tribe, race or caste controls the choices available to you.

Here in this country your options may be limited by who your parents are but they do not control your life. An Ivy League education was not really an option for me, but that didn’t prevent me from getting an education. I didn’t inherit anything but my genes but just because I couldn’t rise to the top doesn’t mean I couldn’t rise above my parents.

Government cannot legislate prosperity. All it can do is maintain a physical, legal and economic infrastructure that allows prosperity to take place. That includes penalizing cheaters and preventing unfair competition.

But referees are there to enforce the rules, not choose the winners.

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Sandra Fluke at the DNC

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Sandra Fluke’s DNC Speech Paints Stark Picture of Romney Presidency

The Georgetown law student shut out of a Congressional hearing on contraception earlier this year is basking in the glow of the Democratic National Convention‘s prime time stage.

Speaking before a fired up crowd at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C., tonight, Sandra Fluke painted a stark picture of what a country led by Republican Mitt Romney could be, calling it “an America in which access to birth control is controlled by people who will never use it, in which politicians redefine rape so survivors are victimized all over again,” she said to huge cheers from the audience.

Fluke also singled out Romney’s running mate Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., who worked on legislation that would have redefined rape, banned abortion in all cases, and cut off funding for abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood.

“It would be an America in which you have a new vice president who co-sponsored a bill that would allow pregnant women to die preventable deaths in our emergency rooms,” she said.

The young law student then gave a hearty endorsement for a country headed by President Obama.

“An America in which our president, when he hears a young woman has been verbally attacked, thinks of his daughters — not his delegates or donors — and stands with all women,” said Fluke. “And strangers come together, reach out and lift her up. And then, instead of trying to silence her, you invite me here, and give me a microphone, to amplify our voice.”

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Submitted without comment.

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DNC Night II Open Thread

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Another night of speechifying, starring the Big Dawg. Between the NFL opener and the Giants/D-Backs game I’ll catch a few bits and pieces. Tomorrow night I promise to watch the whole thing. Maybe.

If you’re gonna watch it tonight here’s the place to discuss it.

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Miss me yet?

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Democracy in action

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Jerusalem change made to party platform, over loud objections

Democratic delegates narrowly reinstated to their party platform Wednesday the position that Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, reversing an omission that had angered some Jewish organizations and drew criticism from Republicans that President Obama was distancing the United States from Israel.

The amendment to the platform, which essentially returns to the platform language in the 2008 version, was introduced by former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland. It was put to a voice vote by Antonio R. Villaraigosa, the mayor of Los Angeles, who had to call for it three times before determining that the amendment had two-thirds majority.

The vote far from clear, however, and left many delegates on the floor angry over the outcome – some booing and shaking their fingers at Villaraigosa.

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That sure didn’t sound like 2/3 of the delegates to me. They must be using Obama rules.

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DNC Open Thread

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If you’re watching, here’s a place to talk about it.

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The Smell of Fear

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Ben Shapiro:

Obama Quashes Conservative Media Access at DNC

Media availability for Obama officials and acolytes has been shut up as tight as a clam for conservative media here at the Democratic National Convention. According to sources at Talk Radio News Service, placing a stringer outside the designated TV area to ask high-level Democrats to stop by radio row has been banned by the DNC – in fact, as one source told me, “You need permission from Obama for America.”

Meanwhile, top Obama outside advisor and head of the Center for American Progress John Podesta stopped by radio row this morning – but only long enough to speak with liberal talkers. When I approached him about appearing on KRLA’s “The Heidi Harris Show” along with me and my co-hosts Heidi Harris (conservative) and Brian Whitman (liberal), his handler quickly intervened. Later, the handler stopped by to clarify: did the show have two liberals and one conservative, or two conservatives and one liberal? When I stated that it had two conservatives and one liberal, he quickly shook his head and sprinted away.

The Democrats and their allies are clearly fearful of a major mistake. That’s why they’re keeping their allies away from those who will ask adverse questions. And that’s why I’ve purchased an Obama pin. If they won’t answer questions from a conservative, maybe they’ll answer questions from a faux fellow Obama-worshipper.

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Why are Democrats afraid of the truth? They sure aren’t behaving like they are confident of winning.

This reminds me of the war in Iraq back in 2004-2006. The Bush Administration was convinced that we lost the war in Vietnam because of the media and thought if they could control the news coming out of Iraq they could control public opinion.

They should have listened to Abraham Lincoln:

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.

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DNC Day One

“They stab it with their steely knives but they just can’t kill the beast”

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Maybe it’s all that cough syrup I drank earlier but I have a strange premonition about the DNC convention. Imagine a cross between Titanic and Masque of the Red Death directed by Stephen King. A doomed ship of fools trying to pretend everything is okay but unable to change their course or escape their fate, so they party on the eve of destruction.

Bless their hearts, the Democrats are putting up a brave front. But they have seen the real polls. The Democratic Media Machine keeps trying to assure everyone they are winning but they know the truth too. Their laughter will be forced and their lies transparent.

The end of an error approaches. Soon. Very soon.

“And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.”

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#KerryGauthierPERV is a sexual predator

This is what a 56 year-old PERV looks like

I first read  about this in the UK’s Daily Mail. Police revealed that Minnesota State Congressman Kerry Gauthier (Democrat) was arrested on July 22 for having oral sex with a 17 year old boy in the bushes of a public rest stop.

Democratic lawmaker called on to resign for having oral sex with boy, 17, in bushes at public rest stop after meeting him on Craigslist

• Representative Kerry Gauthier was found engaging in oral sex on July 22
• Police investigated whether or not there was wrongdoing in Duluth rest stop encounter with 17-year-old
• Charges were dropped, but political pressure for Representative to resign is mounting

Don’t be fooled

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I was reading a golden oldie post at Uppity’s place and I was reminded that we never did solve the mystery of how Barack Obama ended up in the White House.

Prior to 2002 Obama was just another ambitious wannabe. Using a successful legal challenge he got himself elected to the Illinois state senate by knocking his opponents off the ballot. If he had powerful friends he wouldn’t have needed to do that. Nor would he have just sat there in Springfield for several years voting “present.” In 2000 he tried to take on Bobby Rush for a seat in Congress and got his ass handed to him. That doesn’t sound like a guy with major political connections.

Then around 2002 things began to change for Obama. The same guy who lost a run for a House seat in 2000 mounted a successful run for the Senate in 2004. But he still needed some luck – If Blair Hull and Jack Ryan didn’t have some juicy dirty laundry Obama would have lost.

Now it really starts to get interesting. Obama gives the keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic convention. I think it’s fair to say that a lot of people were impressed. But Kerry still lost the election.

So now Barack Obama is a U.S. Senator. A very junior senator in a town where Ivy League diplomas are a dime a dozen and speechifying is a job requirement. A junior senator from the minority party. Obama dives into the Village cesspool and disappears.

Slightly over two years later Obama emerges and launches his campaign for the White House. Money and endorsements roll in. The media (who usually hate Democrats) are his biggest fans.

Obama was a newcomer in 2006-2008. He hadn’t been around long enough to develop the political muscle to rig the RBC vote and all the shenanigans with the caucuses and delegates and the nomination vote. He didn’t have the power or skills to shove Hillary Clinton aside against the wishes of the voters. He needed powerful friends to do that for him.

That’s “friends” plural. No one person has that much power. We know who some of them were – Ted Kennedy, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Howard Dean and Donna Brazile. Kennedy is gone but the rest are still around.

So don’t be fooled. Defeating Obama will not get rid of the corruption in the Democratic party.

But it’s a good place to start.

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The Cult of Prodigy

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Roxane Gay at Salon:

There is a cult of bright young things, a cultural obsession with genius, a need to find beacons of greatness in an ordinary world. In a December 2002 article in The Atlantic Monthly, Marjorie Garber writes, “At this point in history genius has become a commodity, an ambition, and even a lifestyle.” She also notes that, “Deep within us lies a certain strain of longing for genius, a genius worship, that might be described as messianic: the hope that a genius will come along to save us from our technological, philosophical, spiritual, or aesthetic impasse.” When young people display remarkable intelligence or creativity, we are instantly enamored. We want or need geniuses to show us the power and potential of the human mind and we’re so eager to find new people to bestow this title upon that the term and the concept have become quite diluted.

[...]

Jonah Lehrer is part of a system that allows magazines, year after to year to publish men, and white men in particular, significantly more than women or people of color. He is part of a system where the 2012 National Magazine Awards have no women nominees in several key categories. He is part of a system where white editors belabor the delusion that there simply are few women or writers of color who are good enough for their magazines because said editors are too narrow in what they want, what they read, what they think, or just too lazy to work beyond their Rolodex of writers who look and think just like them. He is part of a system that requires an organization like VIDA to do an annual count that reveals a disheartening, ongoing and pervasive practice of a certain kind of writer predominantly gaining entrance to the upper echelons of publishing. He is part of a system that exhausts itself denying these problems exist or that these problems matter.

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Lehrer may or may not be a genius, but we wanted him to be one. We wanted him to do right by the narrative he is a part of and to be a bold part of the system that helped make him. For a while, Lehrer did his best, with his sharp haircut and designer glasses and confident talk about how we think and create and imagine. We probably also lost sight of the difference between a spokesperson and what is actually spoken. As Garber also notes in her Atlantic Monthly article on genius, “If we remind ourselves that what is really at stake is creativity and invention; if we can learn to separate the power of ideas from that of personality; then perhaps we will be less dazzled by the light of celebrity and less distracted by attempts to lionize the genius as a high-culture hero — as essence rather than force.” The cult of personality, of bright young things, is dangerous. It blinds us. We keep getting further and further away from ideas, from great writing that is nurtured and thoughtful because we’re more interested in the men behind the ideas.

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It’s ironic that Ms. Gay published this article at Salon, which has a big stable of “bright young thing” writers on staff. She is correct, but the problem is much bigger than she realizes. It isn’t just the writing field that is obsessed with boy geniuses, it’s our whole culture.

True genius is both rare and erratic. Genius carries no guarantee of mental or emotional stability. “Genius” and “wisdom” are not synonymous. Wisdom is intelligence enhanced by education and tempered with experience.

We have raised a couple generations of young people who all think they are the best and brightest. They want and expect instant gratification, including all the perks and rewards of success. All too frequently they get the rewards even though they didn’t earn them.

There was a time when young people were expected to start at the bottom and work their way up. Now they expect to start at the top, pushing aside those who are older and more experienced.

Intelligence is a talent, and talent is a good thing. But it needs to be developed and combined with character and discipline. In the academic world there are shortcuts (some ethical, some not) that can be taken and intelligence can substitute for effort. Students can use the notes of other students and they can party all semester then cram for tests at the end. They don’t need to learn anything, just remember it long enough to pass the course.

The real world is different. Intelligence is often less important to success than hard work. The process of “working their way up” weeds out the slackers and those with character and personality defects.

No one epitomizes this cult of prodigy more than Barack Obama. He is also the poster child for what is so wrong about this obsession with “bright young things.”

By any reasonable measure Barack Obama was not ready for prime time in 2008. At best he was a rising star. He should have been nurtured, mentored, tested and watched. Had that traditional process taken place his character defects would have become evident before he was given the reins of power.

This morning someone asked “Where are all the Democrat’s rising stars?” That is one of the myriad problems with the current Democratic party – they have no “farm” system, no process for grooming the leaders of the future.

A political party, like a business or any organization, should look beyond today and plan for tomorrow. This means both identifying and preparing talented young people for bigger and better things.

Caveat – this IS NOT about picking winners. The process needs to be competitive in order to weed out those who are unfit or unworthy. As the Bible says, “Many are called but few are chosen.“

The process needs to be without pity. Rising stars need to be given opportunities and increasingly more responsibility, but they must sink or swim on their own. They cannot be coddled or carried. Today’s rising stars become tomorrow’s tested leaders.

Hillary Clinton was once a rising star in the Democratic party. She teamed up with Bill and together they built his career. She was a “power behind the throne” as the First Lady of Arkansas and then the United States. Then came her time and she moved into the Senate as Bill moved into private life. She won two elections and was in her second term when she ran for president. She had literally spent her life preparing for that job.

But she was shoved aside to make room for an alleged prodigy.

Imagine if the voters had been allowed to choose the nominee. Hillary would now be president. Barack Obama would either be vice president or would still be in the Senate. I have no doubt that Hillary would be a shoo-in for reelection, even if the economy was still struggling.

That would mean that Barack Obama could not run for president until at least 2016 when he would still only be 55 years old. That would be eight additional years in the spotlight, eight more years for him to either sink or swim.

We would have had the full benefit of Hillary’s talent and experience, then when her time was almost up we would have voted to choose a successor. By then party should have made sure we had more than one option to choose from. But it would be OUR choice, not theirs.

That’s because when the party picks the winners they usually pick losers.

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Bilateral Symmetric Nutball Theory

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WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!!

Just kidding. Well, we really are all gonna die someday, just not anytime soon.

I’m just getting really tired of dire predictions and Chicken Little assessments of the future. Riverdaughter thinks Alabama is just like Nazi Germany, Joe Cannon thinks we need to kill all the Tea Partiers, and the Sky Haters think Milquetoast Mitt is the Mormon Mussolini.

Not a day goes by that someone on the left doesn’t write a hyperbolic post warning us of the imminent end of civilization. The general consensus seems to be that if the Republicans win the election they will repeal the 19th Amendment, reinstitute slavery and make global warming mandatory.

Yes, the GOP has a bunch of deranged pinheads and ignorant cheesedicks in it. But science has proven that for every nutball on the right there is an equal and opposite nutball on the left. This is what is known as the Bilateral Symmetric Nutball Theory.

The vast majority of both parties are good, decent people who want what is best for the country. Take the economy – everybody is in favor of prosperity. Both sides recognize that our current economic situation sucks. What they differ on is the causes and solutions.

Some people need to get a grip. If the Republicans win we’re not all gonna die.

Just some of us.

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