A new entry in our "Is This Really Frightening or What?" files.

"Many of you are well enough off that . . . the tax cuts may have helped you. We're saying that for America to get back on track, we're probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."--Hillary Clinton

That may be the leftist quote of the year. From the San Diego Union-Tribune on the Clinton's visit to San Francisco, "The leftiest big city on the Left Coast." A hilarious read. Via Wall Street Journal's Best of The Web Today.

Highlights for the Seattle Times (i.e. perceived lowlights for the Bush administration) include:

• In 13 of Iraq's 18 provinces, electricity was available fewer hours per day on average last month than before the war. Nearly 20 million of Iraq's 26 million people live in those provinces.

  Anyone remember how Saddam used the power grid to punish whole regions for their transgressions? (Beats whole regions punished for their transgressions by, say, nerve gas though, doesn't it?) Or how whole regions would be dark to ensure Baghdad's uninterrupted supply?

• Only $13.7 billion of the $58 billion pledged and allocated worldwide to rebuild Iraq has been spent, with $10 billion more about to be spent. The biggest chunk of that money has been used to run Iraq's ministry operations.

  We are going to be there a while. Should we have spent everything already? Given limited manpower and materials, is it even possible to have spent everything already?

• The country's court system is more clogged than before the war, and judges are frequent targets of assassination attempts.

  This is the best one of all. The court systems are clogged. Think about that for a minute. Picture the previous Iraqi "court system" and try to imagine just why they weren't clogged. This is Mussolini making the trains run on time only it isn't trains. It is bullets to the brain.

• The new Iraqi civil-defense, police and overall security units are suffering from mass desertions, are poorly trained and ill-equipped.

  Go figure. There is still a war on. Really. This is dangerous work in Iraq. High turnover is unfathomable?

• The number of what the now-disbanded Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) called significant insurgent attacks skyrocketed from 411 in February to 1,169 in May.

  That is bad news. The good news is that we killed lots of them sumbitches. The better news is that the new Iraqi government is about to go start killing these sumbitches, too. And they won't be as hampered by...er....Western cultural sensibilites as we were.

The courts are clogged. That is just way too rich.

Who needs to crush dissent?

"FOX News Channel (FNC) garnered more than 50% of the cable news audience in primetime and total day during the second quarter of this year, according to Nielsen Media Research.

In contrast, CNN and MSNBC both attracted less than a third of the same market share. In primetime, FNC commanded 55% of the cable news market share, averaging 1.4 million viewers, while CNN claimed just 32% of that audience with 828,000 viewers."

{snip}

"FOX News Channel is a 24-hour general news service covering breaking news as well as political, entertainment and business news. For more than two years, FNC has been the most watched cable news channel and currently presents nine out of the top 10 cable news programs. Owned by News Corp., FNC is available in more than 85 million homes."

Priceless.

The has been much comment about how 9 out of 10 big time movie reviewers think Cholesterol 451 Fahrenheit 9/11 a masterpiece...as if they were somehow different and apart from anyone else in the mainstream media (see Frank Rich).

If you want to get a reading on the nation's movie reviewers go to Beautiful Atrocities and take a look at this long list comparing reviews (by the same reviewers) given Fahrenheit 9/11 and The Passion of the Christ....which as of today has grossed $608 million world-wide.

Here is a favorite:

"Geoff Pevre, Toronto Star:

F9/11: A plea for America's deliverance ... it may not be an argument one agrees with, and it may be unbalanced and propagandistic, but it is both convincingly argued and sincerely motivated.

Passion: A work of fundamentalist pornography."

A useful site to go to and calibrate your "Hater Detectors".

Andrew Sullivan delivers the Fisking of a lifetime to William Raspberry over his column on Cholesterol 451 Fahrenheit 9/11.

Raspberry joins a long and distinguished list of professional journalists who correctly state that the movie is biased, unfair, and "is overwrought piece of propaganda--a 110-minute hatchet job that doesn't even bother to pretend to be fair". And then wholly endorses the movie because, even though Mr. Moore is not completely honest, never examines any point of views other than his own, and makes facts line up to suit his purposes, he (Raspberry) need only agree with the conclusion.

I realize that last sentence sounds harsh when written about a long time and respected journalist like Mr. Raspberry, and makes Mr. Raspberry look like just another shallow, knee-jerk Reagan Bush hater.

That is why I will provide the source. It is Mr. Raspberry himself from the same column:

"I wish Moore had been more scrupulously honest, more interested in examining other points of view, less inclined to make the facts line up to serve his purposes. But I can't say he reached the wrong conclusion."

Mr. Raspberry also compares Moore to Louis Farrakhan. What? You think Raspberry considers that bad?

"Some of his facts may be wrong and some of his connections strained, but his attitude is right. What's more, he'll say in plain language what nice, educated people cannot bring themselves to say: The man is a devil."

So is described by Raspberry the man who preaches that the white man is the devil and that Jews need to be exterminated.

Wesley Clark did it and it sank his ship faster than a Howard Dean rally cry. "Yeeeeeaarrrgghhh!" We can only hope Kerry will follow suit, although it seems rather unlikely. After all, Moore apparently doesn't even have enough real fans to fill two rooms in a suburban home.

Okay, okay, so there was more than one dwelling involved, but doesn't the whole idea of having a Michael Moore House Party seem horribly lame? What, the Javits Center was booked? Tupperware party cancelled?

Come to think of it, judging by Moore's girth, I'd definitely peg him for a Pampered Chef fan. "Break out the obscure cheese whiz anointment utensil, Hazel. Mr. Moore hasn't eaten in going on twenty minutes now. He's starving!"

What a surprise here:

"Chirac told a news conference that the NRF -- set up last year with a heavy French contingent but not due to become fully operational until October 2006 -- should only be used when there is a serious security crisis, not for Afghan-style missions."

{snip}

"The NRF is being set up to give NATO the military capability to do what it could not do after the Sept. 11 attacks on U.S. cities in 2001: strike back quickly and forcefully when an ally is attacked by a distant foe.

A cutting-edge multinational force with warships, fighter planes and eventually over 20,000 troops, it will be lethal, agile and ready to be deployed to hotspots within five days."

A lethal and agile cutting-edge force ready to be deployed to hotspots around the globe.

With a large French contingent.

This is too easy.

I happened to catch a few minutes of the Craig Anderson Show on Friday morning before I headed to Houston. Normally, I give that radio show and its hardcore audience a miss these days, but I had been informed that resident sheriff and intergalactic do-gooder Gary Painter would be the featured guest. Specifically, I wanted to hear what, if anything, Mr. Painter had to say about the current hot-topic situation in Midland regarding the licensing and zoning of sexually oriented businesses (SOBs) within the Midland city limits.

The sheriff, as it turns out, had plenty to say. And his comments frightened me.

To paraphrase, Painter said he would not stand for the existence of SOBs anywhere in the county and would do anything he could to prevent them from setting up shop. His biggest beef, however, was with the current reasonable efforts to outline appropriate zones for such venues.

"If we pass ordinances that zone for sexually oriented businesses, I won't be able to keep them out," Painter said.

Wow.

The problem with that -- as has been discussed here and around town ad nauseum -- is that strip clubs are protected by the First Amendment and cannot be legally driven away through police incursion. Furthermore, there are currently no laws or city ordinances attempting to regulate such businesses in Midland. So, in effect, we have a sheriff who is enforcing his personal will, rather than any law. Welcome to West Texas.

Mark my words, there is a storm brewing on the horizon with regard to this issue. If and when an SOB comes to town, it will undoubtedly be harassed and strangled by the sheriff and his unethical, illegal tactics. This, in turn, will most certainly lead to an understandably huge lawsuit that the county will lose. In other words, the sheriff plays, we pay -- and it'll be one hell of a big tab.

It's time someone reined this guy in, and I hope it's the citizenry, rather than a court action.

Tue Jun 29, 2004 09:29 AM ET
BAGHDAD (Reuters) President Bush's plans for the expansion of his American dominated imperialistic, colonial, hegemonic, and racist empire suffered a crushing setback yesterday when......

George Bush was said to make up out of whole cloth a lie about "Yellowcake uranium" being sought in Niger by rogue states in a State of the Union....even though that is exactly the intelligence provided by the Brits said. Yes. That's right. Bush made it all up even though the Brits confirm that that is the information that they provided Bush.

The Brits still stand by their assessment, by the way, even if international man of mystery Joe Wilson's tea leaf readings disagree.

Now this from The Financial Times:

"Illicit sales of uranium from Niger were being negotiated with five states including Iraq at least three years before the US-led invasion, senior European intelligence officials have told the Financial Times.

Intelligence officers learned between 1999 and 2001 that uranium smugglers planned to sell illicitly mined Nigerien uranium ore, or refined ore called yellow cake, to Iran, Libya, China, North Korea and Iraq."

The Belgravia Dispatch spends some time on this.

This is big. So big that the NYT may have to move it all the way up to page 9b.

Via Enter Stage Right, a moving and heartening letter from a soldier, Joe Roche, who is in Baghdad. Joe is a regular correspondent with Amy Ridenour. She has posted this latest letter on her National Center Blog here.

We have defeated Sadr's uprising and dealt him a powerful blow that has signaled all potential would-be tyrants that the U.S. is serious. Contrary to the fudging news, Karbala, Najaf and Kufa have all been abandoned by the Mahdi Army. The local people turned on them, sometimes violently. Today local Iraqi forces secure those cities while the U.S. military is present to support them.

This, through the internet, is how we find out what is really happening over there. You're not going to to read this in the paper or see it on the ABCBSNBC Evening News. Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: For more on this subject, I bring you Victor Davis Hanson from Friday's NRO:

We are winning the military war in Iraq and Afghanistan. The terrorists are on the run. And slowly, even ineptly, we are achieving our political goals of democratic reform in once-awful places. Thirty years of genocide, vast forced transfers of whole peoples, the desecration of entire landscapes, a ruined infrastructure, and a brutalized and demoralized civilian psyche are being remedied, often under fire. All this and more has been achieved at the price of political turmoil, deep divisions in the West — here and abroad — and the emergence of a strong minority, led by mostly elites, who simply wish it all to fail.

Read all of his column, too.

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

"In a desperate attempt to create jobs and income, the run-down village of Tutow is transforming itself into a communist-era theme park, complete with a Berlin Wall replica and Kalashnikov-toting border guards."

Does The Commisar know about this?

I am sure much will be made of Michael Moore's slanderfest not being shown in a Midland movie house, intimating that somehow dissent is being crushed here by (if I may) Popcorn-Eating Brownshirts, but the reason it is not being shown here is because the owners of the theatre don't want to lose money and aren't in the business of subsidizing the "brave" Mr. Moore, who no doubt is on the train to the gulag as I write this and not getting a standing O somewhere by a room full of people who left college their freshman year to pursue acting as a career.

The list of movies that I have had to go to Odessa to see over the years is long.

Shakespeare in Love (pre Best Picture Oscar) comes immediately to mind.

The comments are open for any other additions to the list.

UPDATE: Eric at Fireant Gazette provides a method to calibrate your "Accuracy Meters" regarding Mr. Moore.

The headline says "If approved, MDC Deal could add 68 new jobs".

For this article to make sense you either have to believe that:

1) Conversations were held by the top management of these companies that basically decided that while they needed to expand to meet the demands of their respective markets in order to ensure the continued growth and financial health of their companies...the whole expansion thing is non-economic and makes no sense at all unless we get the taxpayers of Midland to pay for jobs #66, #67, and #68. For 12 months. (Really, where is a $2-3 billion dollar company going to come up with that kind of scratch?)

or

2) Conversations were held by the top management of these companies that basically decided that expansion was needed to better serve their market and, having determined that, decided to go get as much free money as they could from the MDC in exchange for a headline that read...well....just like the one above.

Is the MC made up of people that venal?

Absolutely not. That is what is so disheartening in a way. To a man they are all good, decent and caring Midlanders who want the best for Midland. There is no question about that. But what is it about getting to decide where corporate welfare payments go that makes the whole idea not just palatable, but enlightened policy?

The line between what is acceptable government intrusion into the private sector and what is acceptable in the level of taxation is much less dependent on any party philosophy than by who it is that gets to decide where the money is spent. Of this I am convinced.

Money taxed and spent by Democrats is...well....the usual politics of tax and spend wherein they try to (har har) "tax us into prosperity".

Money taxed and spent by local Republicans is an investment.

I scratched out the word local above because this happens everywhere. Republicans hold both houses of congress and the White House. Is government getting smaller? No. It is just an ever increasing government with slightly different priorities than before. Same as Midland.

This an election year. It will provide a wonderful opportunity to compare and contrast statements made by locals concerning the spending habits of national democrats, taxation and its interference in the private sector with statements regarding local, enlightened taxation and its interference in the private sector boosting of the local economy.

Note: On the off chance that the picture makes no sense, have a look at the first comment.

The press is going gaga over Cheney's remark on *gasp* the floor of the Senate. He used the f-word. Not in an address to the Senate, mind you, but in a conversation with a guy that has been publicly calling him a crook for three years.

In another installment of Walsingham's "I've Got Five Bucks That Says" series, here is number 23:

I've got five bucks that says that sometime in his career, Ted Kennedy has not only said the word but has actually done the deed on the floor of the Senate.

Walser....I have to say that you are waaaaay off-base concerning your comments on how the Midland Horseshoe is that last piece of the puzzle that will be the catalyst for Midland's impending non-oil related economic boom.

Anyone who has been paying attention knows that the catalyst will be a super-sized Midland Center.

"Yeah, Big Time!"

UPDATE: "I expressed myself rather forcefully, felt better after I had done it." I love this guy! Four more years of straight talk, please. When do we get to vote?

Jessica's Well: Proud to be a member of the Digital Brownshirts since 2002.

Update: By request, the Offical logo has been revised. The swastika was removed and replaced with "VRWC". This was done for two reasons: 1) The swastika was offensive to some, and 2) The Vast Right Wing Conspiracy is a lot scarier and evil anyway, right?

ANOTHER UPDATE:
OK. The official logo has been updated again because of a comment from "Blair". I mean, any self-respecting Digital Brownshirt would have a pocket protector, wouldn't they?

YET ANOTHER UPDATE:
Check this out. Now there is even a blogspot blog called Digital Brown Shirts....and it is giving away our secrets! I have also heard rumors that someone has registered "digitalbrownshirts.com". And, no, I didn't do either of these things.

Welcome Metafilter handwringers! Upset with Nazi imagery used for purposes of satire? Take two episodes of Hogan's Heroes and call your shrink in the morning. And please remember that when Al Gore said what he said he meant it. This is a joke.....you may not think it funny....but it is a joke.

The Photoshop gag that became an actual Alliance?

Others "joining" or linking to The Alliance of Digital Brownshirts and who otherwise understand satire when they see it:
Chadster
Boyd at Texas Native
Mind of Mog
Wizbang Blog
Zygote-Design
Slantpoint
xrlq
Politburo Diktat
King of Fools
Airborne Combat Engineer
Suburban Sundries Shack
Right Moment
Left and Right
Boi From Troy
The Llama Butchers
Legal XXX
Neophyte Pundit
Spatulaville
Mostly Cajun
Miller's Time
Army of One
Sharp as a Marble
Emperor Misha at AIR
Mrs. du Toit
A Warm Smoking 1911

Thanks, guys and gals, for the links and for getting the joke. I didn't intend for this to become a real alliance nor do I think it needs to. We are obviously irritating Mr. Gore plenty good as it is.

So I am going to finish with this post by answering these questions:

Why such blatent Nazi Imagery/Real Brownshirts/Ernst Roehm/Swastikas?

Answer: Because the Former Vice President of the United States called those who "pressure reporters and editors" with alternative viewpoints "Digital Brownshirts". Period. The graphic nature of the picture of a real brownshirt (Ernst Roehm no less, I found out later) was to remind everyone what a real brownshirt really was and, by extension, how ridiculous the former Vice President's charges are. I removed the swastika to be extra safe, but it didn't matter to some.

How long do you expect this alliance to last?

Answer: I expect the life of this Photoshop gag to last as long as the planets circle the sun or until it rolls off of the main page. Whichever is shorter.

This was not intended to be a real alliance. But for those who would like to remain a pain in the former V.P.'s side by pressuring these poor editors and reporters and want to keep reminding everyone of the V.P.'s ass-hatted comments about brownshirts, then here is a good solution:

Go to Sharp as a Marble and get this logo that, because of the lack of real Nazi imagery, is a much more suitable long-term reminder of the true views of a man who almost became President.

ONE MORE UPDATE:

The proposed Midland Horseshoe will have a market value of $14 million dollars?

That is the price of the construction. Build it and see if someone would buy it for even half that. It is a facility that from the from get-go that will not support itself and will require tax subsidies to maintain. Forever.

We can argue all we want about The Multiplier Effect™ and how, finally, after the new airport, the new stadiums, legalized kickbacks to the private sector, and two (count 'em, two!) magic development districts downtown (that don't tax, mind you, but assess!), we will have in place the final piece of the puzzle.

The price tag is $14 million. The market value is what someone would pay us for it once built.

Michael Moore makes the claim in his....er....documentary that Bush "failed to take control" immediately upon hearing about the September 11th attacks while reading to school children in a Sarasota classroom.

Someone who was actually there begs to differ.

Meanwhile, has been movie reviewer and aging concubine to the left Rex Reed blows the lid off of the biggest story of the year: Dick Cheney owns Unocal!

"There were some allegations in the story that could be easily disproved..." -- Bill Clinton, My Life, p. 565

Here's The Story.

The internet/Lexis/Nexis nexus strikes again: with a little work you can have nearly perfect recall of the published word. Folks can't hide from what they uttered for the press in the recent past. Ask Mr. Kerry (or any other politician for that matter).

Dave Kopel of the Rocky Mountain News reflects on this week 22 years ago, during Reagan's first term. Lots of inability to see that the future the administration was pushing for was possible. No admission that the contrary view was contrary to the long-term history and the long-term interests of the United States. A sample:

The headline sneered at America's "A-bomb hysteria" and Denerstein proclaimed that "we live in a society capable of sublime idiocy." True enough, although history shows that the hysterics and sublime idiots were Reagan's critics who demanded immediate disarmament and who opposed Reagan's policy of eliminating the root cause of the Cold War by destroying Soviet Communism.

To state the obvious, does any of this bias and blindness sound familiar in the coverage of our current president?

via NRO's The Corner.

Must Reading today at Belmont Club here and here. The first being the best written piece I have read in a long while on the war, and our current domestic political circumstance.

The particular venom with which the Liberals regard President Bush is at heart a reaction to what they perceive as a coup de etat directed against the carefully constructed edifice of their historical achievements. snip...the idea that certain "progressive" modes of behavior, once attained, are irreversible. In this view, an entire set of attitudes, commonly referred to as "political correctness" and their institutional expressions, like the United Nations, have become part of a social contract, part of an unwritten constitution.

The second article is on the escalation of hostilities with Iran. Read 'em both.

I am thinking that a FULL faculty parking lot would be a better "Man Bites Dog" story here.

The inimitable Mark Steyn today;

The Clintons' Democratic Party was great for the Clintons but disastrous for the Democratic Party: during the 1990s, they lost the House and the Senate and a ton of governorships and state legislatures, and eventually, with nothing else left to lose, they lost the presidency. Clinton's heat left the party so parched for talent they had no successful governors to run for president and were forced to turn to a stiff hack weathervane senator in the hope they could so damage Bush they could drag their boy across the finishing line.

Emphasis, and resultant chuckling, mine. As usual, especially with regards to Mr. Steyn's work, read the whole thing.

More Clintonian reading matter here, here, here and, yawn, here.

Someone please inform him, "You are not running for anything any more, Bill."

Good luck with that, Commissar.

UPDATE June 21: Kate O'Beirne on our first adolescent president, originally written in October of 1998, posted on NRO today. Just a little reminder.

For any of you out there who doubt the all knowing, all seeing Walsingham I give you this post from way back in February of 2003:

"Right now this DMMD thing is being billed as a plan where downtown property owners elect to "chip in" to create a fund to help improve downtown. An indication of the true nature of this plan will be whether unwilling downtown property owners can opt out of the plan. My guess is no. At which point it becomes a tax increase, albiet one for just the downtown area. But here is the big question: Can this thing that would be a de facto tax increase just be created (at the behest of just a few) by the State and run by the City with no vote or referendum at the local level? Paranoia is kicking in.....I need more details."

Jose Padilla!

Or at least an article on Jose's "defense" team's scientific "experts." From Enter Stage Right, a great website and blog. The teaser:

Dr. Marcus J.Goldman isn't impressed by the argument that Jose Padilla's defense team has been arguing: that a uranium dirty bomb wouldn't kill very many people.

"We go to downtown property owners and say, 'Let's chip in some more money for what we'll call an assessment.'"

It seemed so innocuous at first glance....to the untrained eye, anyway. It is a lot more serious now.

So let us now review what the Downtown Midland Management District (DMMD) is and how it got there.

• It is an entity that can levy taxes on a subset of the population.
• It can incur debts and obligations on behalf of same.
• It was created not by the taxpayers but by legislative fiat at the behest of the well connected.
• It has an un-elected board that is self perpetuating and answerable only to itself.
• Standard procedures regarding conflicts of interest and declared financial interests do not apply.

"We go to downtown property owners and say, 'Let's chip in some more money for what we'll call an assessment.'"

"Their plan is to gather signatures from downtown building owners representing 51 percent of the district's valuations (currently, the district has 33.69).

[Snip]

Perry said, once completed, properties inside the management district with an appraised value of $200,000 or more will be assessed a tax of 32 cents per $100 valuation.

[Snip]

Opposition can be expected. Some building owners might not desire an assessment on their property and some citizens might see the district as an example of the rich getting richer. Still, Perry said he hasn't heard much criticism.

Did everyone catch that? They are seeking approval from 51% of the valuation, not 51% of the owners. How many other taxing entities do you know about that get created in such a way and where some votes count more than other votes....and where you can just outright purchase the dilution of the votes of the opposition? (And, yes, I realize that the more property that these 'proponents' own the higher their own tax hit assessments will be...but they need only get to 51% to begin their dollar mining operation on the other 49%).

Hey, "49% of the valuation" guys....it sucks to be you.

So we decide that we would like to host Carnival of the Vanities No. 91 and find out that the only real rule is that we have to post whatever people send to us. To facilitate this we even introduced a special e-mail address (carnival@jessicaswell.com) into which to receive the wisdom and collective knowledge of that which is known as "The Blogoshere". Just so you know that we have been faithful to our charge I give you the first item to arrive in the mailbox.

Kevin Baker at The Smallest Minority has some great observations and interview snippets concerning "Americans, Gun Controllers, and the Aggressive Edge"....with a movie twist.

I will let the accompanying explanation stand for this submittal from Libby at Last One Speaks:

"My dear friend Mark Bode was interviewed by the NYTimes this week. He's publishing a book this month done in tribute to his father, the late Vaughn Bode. Those of you my age will remember his dad's underground comics but anyone will be able to appreciate Mark's unique interpretation of his Dad's style."

Dave at IsraellyCool is facilitating the sign-up of future suicide bombers. Sign up now and get a free set of steak knives!

Vic Rubenfeld at The Big Picture discusses Big Media's continuing drop in credibility.

Dustin Frelich at eTalkingHead has some more on the recent L.A. Times poll that shows that voters who prefer John Kerry over George Bush tend to prefer John Kerry over George Bush.

Pieter Dorsman at PeakTalk finds some interesting information on what many Europeans consider their great goal in life.

And just how long has it been common knowledge that smoking is bad for you? RoguePundit answers and has other observations on the convenient (and sometimes very lucrative) ignorance about smoking.

Dispatches from the Culture Wars reports that not only is the Reverend Moon still alive, he is altogether goofier than a run-over dog.

George C. Marshall and Dwight Eisenhower are obviously incompetent boobs that should have never had a hand in planning Operation Overlord! Well, by Year 2004 media talking head standards anyway. Susan at Small Town Country Girl remarks on the bravery of the men (and many boys, really) that actually saw up close how no battle plans survive first contact with the enemy...and won the day anyway.

Jeremiah at FringeBlog unearths an original copy of the Liberal Creed.

Spare Change suggests we boot FDR off of the dime.

DimPenumbra comments on the inverted morality of the 1982 movie "Creepshow". Also commented on is a "stealth conservative" editor of the New York Times Book Review. To calibrate the author's Stealth Conservative Detection Device use this sentence contained in the post:

"As a certain patriarchal, elitist, fascist cable news network is fond of saying: 'We report, you decide.' "

Cognocentric goes parkbusting and catches Lawrence Martin in mid-Gorbasm. (One free week on the Blogroll for anyone who can tell me what I mean by the term "parkbusting".)

From Blogo Slovo: Need a long, hot shower? No problem. October isn't that far away.

Red and Blue States coming together on racial preferences? Discriminations, appropriately enough, comments.

Anyone who thinks that Gay men don't drive current fashion please explain the near ubiquitousness of the goatee. What is the next great fashion driven by Gays? Deane Esmay tells us.

Dale Franks at Q and O points out that the redistribution of wealth isn't all its cracked up to be.

Floyd the Chimp has had enough of Michael Moore's Lies, Lies, and Videotape style of...er...storytelling. Perhaps we should call them dekeumentaries instead.

John Ray, a man of many blogs but few templates has a discussion of the psychology of Ronald Reagan, saying that "Reagan had the strong, independent psychological makeup that Leftists lack"; notes that the EPA is telling people to ignore EPA statistics; and weighs in on some of the deceptions being used in the "War on Obesity".

Patrick Brown at Ubi Libertas totally misses the point that the new X-Ray screening devices that see through clothes are a program to get pervs off of the street and into respectable jobs.

Josh Fielik (Quibbles and Bits) gives us "The Last Ride"...a version of Ronald Reagan's ultimate fate that differs mightily from that of ass-kick fodder T3d Ra11. Keeping with the unofficial theme of multiple blog bloggers Josh also tells us about the new Primo Viaggio Infant Car Seat by Peg Perego...which everyone knows is inferior to the Binford 5000 Turbo Infant Car Seat.

Brian Noggle at PopUp Mocker warns: "If a blog uses free Bravenet Counters, Bravenet has recently started displaying pop-up ads without the blogger's knowledge".

Pietro at The Smarter Cop thinks that John McCain may finally be getting as irritated at John F. Kerry as Pietro at The Smarter Cop.

Evan Thomas at Sparticleman woke up in a different world Sunday morning. And subscribes to a different paper than me, apparently.

Da Goddess makes the modest proposal that protesters should, at the very least, understand what the signs they are holding actually mean. (With Pictures!) Later she is greatly aroused, mentally and physically, by her hottie washing machine repairman. (Without pictures!)

Wicked Thoughts observes that most criminals ain't exactly Lex Luthor.

Kofi Annan gets protested! At H-A-R-V-A-R-D! Solomonia has the report and pictures.

Of course The Commissar condemns bourgeois Capitalist exploitation of women. But Bolshevik exploitation of women? Please, comrades, that is another matter.

Ian at Banana Oil suggests the next two fronts to be opened up in the War on Terror.

Jack at The People's Republic of Seabrook (Home of the Vast White Trash Conspiracy) is justifiably proud of himself for not beating up an old guy that probably had it coming. Oddly, he then proceeds to beat himself up when he doesn't have it coming.

And when John Kerry needs to pump up his image later in life he can volunteer with Habitrail for Humanity.

Interested Participant is not so sure about...er....diversity when it comes to highway traffic.

Andrew Ian Dodge goes light on the Carnival and heavy on the Vanity.

Tim Dunlop of The Road to Surfdom provides a juxtaposition of a Bush speech condemning torture and the legal memo explaining how to get around Geneva Conventions.

Sean at The American Mind provides us with two ways to remember Ronald Reagan.

And now some "Host's Picks":

Wallace at Big Gold Dog brings closure to a huge quarterback controversy.

Joolie Julie at Yellow Bug Schmooze provides an alternative phrase for those who are uncomfortable using "ass-hat" or "barking moonbat".

Eric at Fireant Gazette discusses WMD's that have been located.....in Texas.

Finally and vaingloriously, are there any bloggers out there that can beat this Hat Tip?

Thank you Ladies and Gentlemen....we'll be here all week.

Also, if you submitted an entry and don't see it here, re-send it. Like I said...we'll be here all week.

Upcoming Carnival of the Vanities stops:

June 23rd: A Single Guy In The South
June 30th: quasi in rem
July 7th democrats give conservatives indigestion
July 14th d-42.com
July 21st Soundfury
July 28th Jeff Doolittle
August 4th - Seldom Sober
August 11th - The Smallest Minority
August 18th - Fringe
August 25th - Ego
September 1st - Blogo Slovo
September 8th - Food Basics
September 22nd - The Eleven Day Empire

Perspective is a good thing. Ben Stein puts the statistics of the battles commemorated in the recent WWII remembrances in perspective for us.

The magnitude of the Russian contribution to winning over Hitlerism can be hinted at by the statistics. The United States lost 292,000 men in battle deaths. This was a staggering total and every one of them is a heartbreak. The Soviets lost over 25 million by most estimates, including millions of civilians. There were a number of battles on what the Germans called the Eastern Front that dwarfed anything going on in the west. In several individual campaigns such as Stalingrad, Leningrad, the Battle of Berlin, and others without names, millions of Russians were involved and more Soviet lives were lost in each campaign than the U.S. lost in the whole war.

I knew once and had forgotten. Thank you, Mr. Stein. Oh yeah, read the whole thing...a lesson in great writing.

The Swedes have developed a stealth naval ship, the Visby Corvette.

I am sure that the Swedes think that this is some sort of technological breakthrough....but the French already have an aircraft carrier that is essentially invisible.

I can't tell you how much pleasure I take each and every time I have to explain who Clark Clifford is.

My. My, my. My, my, my.

Isn't this interesting.

The United Nations has determined that Saddam Hussein shipped weapons of mass destruction components as well as medium-range ballistic missiles before, during and after the U.S.-led war against Iraq in 2003.

Snip

The briefing contained satellite photographs that demonstrated the speed with which Saddam dismantled his missile and WMD sites before and during the war.

Where have these guys and their photos been for the last year? Is the UN still trying to cover up their ties to Saddam and the Oil for Food (, Palaces and Missiles) program? Where did the missing BILLIONS of dollars go? When are we going to crack down on these corrupt, lying, thieving bastards?

UPDATE, 16 June: Here is The American Spectator's Steven Martinovich's punch line(s) on this topic, posted today:

The implications of the United Nations' discovery of how Hussein's regime got rid of many of its banned weapons programs is staggering, especially considering that it happened partly under the watch of U.N. weapons inspectors. And yet many in the media are either unwilling or unable to break out of their cycle of waiting to report the next terrorist attack. The truth about the justification for the war and Saddam Hussein's Iraq is gradually being revealed to the world, but it seems our journalists don't want to tell the story.

"...our journalists don't want to tell the story." Ain't that the truth! Maybe the blogosphere will get the news "out there." Nice job, Steven! Read the whole thing here.

Blogosphere Linkage: Nobody Asked Me But..., Spoons, Ravenwood's Universe and Damnum Absque Injuria. And an alternate spin on the same story: here.

Now this is how you give a Hat Tip.

(This is from Fox News Sunday in October 2003 and may be the first Hat Tip given the blogospere by the Mainstream Media. It will stay as long as my bandwidth holds out. Anyone wanting to mirror this, please feel free.)

Another giant from the Cold War era, Lech Walesa, weighs in on Reagan.

"When talking about Ronald Reagan, I have to be personal. We in Poland took him so personally. Why? Because we owe him our liberty. This can't be said often enough by people who lived under oppression for half a century, until communism fell in 1989."

[SNIP]

"I have often been asked in the United States to sign the poster that many Americans consider very significant. Prepared for the first almost-free parliamentary elections in Poland in 1989, the poster shows Gary Cooper as the lonely sheriff in the American Western, "High Noon." Under the headline "At High Noon" runs the red Solidarity banner and the date--June 4, 1989--of the poll. It was a simple but effective gimmick that, at the time, was misunderstood by the Communists. They, in fact, tried to ridicule the freedom movement in Poland as an invention of the "Wild" West, especially the U.S.

But the poster had the opposite impact: Cowboys in Western clothes had become a powerful symbol for Poles. Cowboys fight for justice, fight against evil, and fight for freedom, both physical and spiritual. Solidarity trounced the Communists in that election, paving the way for a democratic government in Poland. It is always so touching when people bring this poster up to me to autograph it. They have cherished it for so many years and it has become the emblem of the battle that we all fought together.

As I say repeatedly, we owe so much to all those who supported us. Perhaps in the early years, we didn't express enough gratitude. We were so busy introducing all the necessary economic and political reforms in our reborn country. Yet President Ronald Reagan must have realized what remarkable changes he brought to Poland, and indeed the rest of the world. And I hope he felt gratified. He should have."

Heh. Some B-Grade Actor. Some Cowboy.

Climbing higher in the Amazon.com ratings is the book "Brainwashed: How Universities Indoctrinate America's Youth" by Benjamin Shapiro.

I have yet to read Mr. Shapiro's book....but it reminded me of a book from years back written by Benjamin Hart titled "Poisoned Ivy" that tells the story of his time at Dartmouth College during the time of the founding of the *gasp* conservative student run newspaper "The Dartmouth Review".

Highly recommended reading.

155 out of 200.

Finally. Michelle Catalano says what needed to be said about the biggest whore/pimp duo going today.

Update: Further, Michelle follows up with a post that contains more value and thought than three months of posts from the blogosphere's version of Maureen Dowd.

"The DPD is posting pictures on its Web site of people busted for allegedly soliciting prostitution.

The Internet page not only has pictures of the alleged Johns, but their names, birth dates and hometowns, too. The photo gallery is under the heading of "indecency related offenses," and police officials said it's pretty popular.

Lt. John Dagen said in the first 24 hours alone, the site had more than 4,100 hits. He said they even had two women call the department, after hearing their husbands' pictures were posted on the Web site."

"Cuba's primary service to the world has been to provide living proof that it is possible to conquer poverty, disease and illiteracy in a country that was grossly over-familiar with all three. That is a pretty big service. The fact that it has been delivered in the face of sustained hostility from an obsessive neighbour makes it all the more stunning."

---- Labor MP Brian Wilson in The Guardian

Hat Tip: Tim Blair

Here is a mental exercise: From the moment former President Reagan died, all of the networks had a parade of commentary and interviewees talking about Reagan and his presidency, etc. As is network practice, the cameras do not stay on these commentators full time, rather they go to "the cutaway video".

Picture in your mind what they used for Reagan's cutaway video clips...."Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.", actual footage of people smashing away at the wall with their picks and hammers, etc.

Now, using the comments, what is the cutaway video that will be used for the remaining four ex-presidents (Ford, Carter, Bush 41, Clinton) when their time comes? (I don't include Bush 43 because his time in office is not finished.)

I will even go first.

For Ford, I halfway expect a video clip not of Ford himself, but of Chevy Chase falling down. That, or a Whip Inflation Now (WIN) Button.

For Carter: Camp David, but also hostages. Hostages. Hostages. Hostages.

For Bush 41: Maybe some more footage of the Berlin Wall coming down. Certainly some Gulf War I footage. But "Read My Lips" will have them both beat by a 2-1 margin. That, and shots of the homeless.

Clinton: Rope line hug. Blue beret. Finger wagging. Welfare reform, maybe.

Next?

I can confirm what Susanna at Cut on the Bias heard yesterday. Rush Limbaugh again mentioned the Life Magazine article uncovered by this blog in October of 2003 and it was in the most interesting context. He was discussing how the liberal news media has lost it's monopoly on news coverage in this country due to what he called "the new media". He even went so far as to opine that where we used to have just the main stream press that was left leaning, we now have both a "blue media" and a "red media".....a play on the red states v. blue states divide in the country. Included in this "new" or "red" media was an unmistakably positive reference to bloggers.

At this point, Jessica's Well is still unattributed as the original re-discoverer of the Life agazine article even though Rush's website uses my original graphic which kind of makes it obvious that they did not arrive at this article independent of this site.

But to be fair to them, this only came up late in the show last Friday and they have had their hands full with the Great One's passing. I have sent a couple of e-mails and know of several others that have been sent in our behalf. I hope for the best.

We have had our fair share of Instalanches. It would be interesting to see what a Limbalanche is like.

Thanks to Wizbang, Poliblogger, and Politburo Diktat for support on this.

The investigation into the prostitution ring continues in Odessa, no doubt causing great angst among the so-far unknown clientele. We can debate back and forth what these....er.....patrons ought to have coming for their transgressions but these two lines from the article are kind of disturbing:

"District Attorney John Smith said Thursday that some of the suspects’ wives would be questioned if their husbands aren’t cooperative."

Followed closely by

"'It’s not a victimless crime,' he said. 'Look at how many wives are going to be hurt. Look how many potential divorces will come out of this victimless crime. Look at how many careers are going to be ruined.' ”

Prosecution is one thing.....and maybe more context is needed here....but am I the only one that smells a mean streak here? The whole tone coming from the District Attorney's office tells me that they have possession of the list....and like what they see.

I expected the Reagan haters to come out before long. And they have. I fully expected to be royally incensed at them also.

But I am not.

The story that history is writing and will continue to write has already gotten away from these haters. It is beyond their control. He will be remembered as one of the great ones.

UPDATE: Drudge has linked to some of them already. One of them, the pissant Rall I won't even link to. The other, Christopher Hitchens, stands upright, draws out his sharpest sword, takes a deep breath and lunges hard with the mightiest upward stroke he will ever muster.

And promptly breaks off his sword in the sole of Reagan's shoe.

Lileks today. Topics: Home Depot, Reagan, starting out liberal in a liberal newsroom. The usual deeeelightful writing and wit. And this on the future dating world for his daughter:

Just having a chainsaw attached to your forearm speaks volumes. Come on in, son. Tell me about yourself. Why you lookin’ at Betsy there? You ain’t never seen one? Oh, you’ve never seen one in place of a hand, is it. Well, don’t you look at it. You look right here, in my eyes. Now. Tell me about yourself. Startin’ with your bloodtype.

Father of two daughters, I can relate. Go read the whole thing.

Exactly sixty years ago from right now the airborne troops had already landed in the Norman countryside and were going through their night of hell in preparation for the amphibious assault that would come in just a few more hours. At dawn other young men would pour out of Higgins boats into withering machine gun and mortar fire to try to pry Europe loose from the grasp of the most murderous dictator imaginable...in the 'hottest' war of the 20th century. Perhaps the hottest ever.

We also need to remember one great enough to defeat an enemy without firing a shot, effectively liberating half a continent. One who rescued his own nation from malaise and a toxic self-doubt.

I feel very, very small today. But I am very thankful.

Where do we get such men?

UPDATE: Two great roundups of comments from the blogosphere at Politburo Diktat and also at Tim Blair.

Village Voice hatemonger writer Michael Feingold:

"Republicans don't believe in the imagination, partly because so few of them have one, but mostly because it gets in the way of their chosen work, which is to destroy the human race and the planet. Human beings, who have imaginations, can see a recipe for disaster in the making; Republicans, whose goal in life is to profit from disaster and who don't give a hoot about human beings, either can't or won't. Which is why I personally think they should be exterminated before they cause any more harm."

Hat Tip: Iraq Now through Instapundit.

This has been eating on me for some time so I am going to rid myself of it. Here goes:

I am sorry I called Jeff Jarvis Howard Stern's Hand Puppet.

There. I said it.

Jeff Jarvis has one of the best blogs on the whole damned internet and I find myself reading it several times a day. So should you. I cannot understand why he thinks that curbing Howard Stern's ability to pump envelope pushing crap into and out of my daughter's Barbie Radio via the public bands borders on censorship and I never will....but be that as it may his site is one of the best resources/reads out there. Especially on the "emerging Iranian/Iraqi blogger" beat. He is no one's hand puppet.

So for what it is worth, Mr. Jarvis, sorry for the hand puppet shot.

More on the issue of Muscular Selective Law Enforcement v. Sexually Oriented Businesses.

"'Legally, we cannot run businesses out of our community,' [Newly Elected Kennedale Mayor Pastor Jim] Norwood said. 'We can regulate businesses, and that's what I've asked the rest of the council members to support me.'

Owners of the businesses, however, believe they are singled out unfairly.

'Ever since he did this, the police come and sit in our parking lots and harass our customers as they come out the door,' Beverly Van Dusen, owner of New Video, said. "

"What? Bill Gates just died in a plane crash??? CHECK PLEASE!!!"

Captain's Quarters is having a Photo Caption Contest. Go over and have some fun.

The could have found their way to this article independently, I suppose, but they are using our original graphics.

Nonetheless, so far we have been unattributed as the source.

I have sent an e-mail to the EIB Network in the hope that we can get a nod out of this from the great one himself. On the air. I am trying to think of something cooler than that, but I just can't.

UPDATE: While we are on the subject of "Hat Tips", I would bet that the New York Times articles that are mentioned came from The CounterRevolutionary.

UPDATE: They are indeed the scans from The Counter Revolutionary.

Join me as we raise our voices to The Blogfather and humbly ask "Please don't let the blogosphere get revised out of all this".

From David Gelertner in today's Opinion Journal.

"When I was a child in the 1960s, names like Corregidor and Iwo Jima were still sacred, and pronounced everywhere with respect. Writing in the 1960s about the battle of Midway, Samuel Eliot Morison stepped out of character to plead with his readers: "Threescore young aviators . . . met flaming death that day in reversing the verdict of battle. Think of them, reader, every Fourth of June. They and their comrades who survived changed the whole course of the Pacific War." Today the Battle of Midway has become niche-market nostalgia material, and most children (and many adults) have never heard of it. Thus we honor 'the greatest generation.' "

With this week leading up to the 60th anniversary of the Normandy landings there is plenty of opportunity to see some great history on the tube.

Start with Ike: Countdown to D-Day. Tom Selleck does a great job in his portrayal of the chain smoking Ike and very much conveys the coolness v. major major stress that he was under leading up to D-Day.

They missed one opportunity for what could have been the most poignant scene in the film. By several accounts after Ike met the Airborne troops just before their departure he had tears in his eyes upon his return to the his staff car.

Show that and I am one big puddle. I wish they had.

Peggy Noonan is a Must Read today. Her column is at least as great as it usually is. You know it's good for you. Just read it. Now.

It occurs to me that all young people who graduate from elite American universities now want to go into communications. It's a whole generation that wants to communicate.

But what do they want to communicate? They don't seem to have a clue.

Just saying.

Midget Wrestling is a bit much.

Even if they are "All-Stars".

The ACLU has apparently totally run out of things to do. They are now trying to rid the Seal of the City of Los Angeles of it's *gasp* cross.

From Lileks:

"The crosses represent California’s history - but of course that’s no defense. History, alas, is full of inconvenient details. History can offend. The mere recognition of a historical truth can offend. Apparently that’s the worst thing you can do nowadays: offend. But it has to be a particular kind of offense. Lenny Bruce was celebrated for offending the right people, and this enshrined the act of offending as some sort of brave stance against The Man, The Grey-Flannel Suited Establishment, the whole Ike-Nixon Axis of Medieval, the straights. Gotta offend the straights or you’re not doing your job. The only function the bourgeouise have is to sit there with their mouths open, Shocked. If they’re having a good time, someone’s not doing his job.

But. Imagine if the seal had two female mythological symbols of Peace and Progress, holding hands, and a religious group sued because they said this was a clear example of the state promoting lesbianism. "But, um, historically and allegorically, that’s not what it’s about." Don’t care! We’re offended! We bleed, you heed! Take it off! No one would give them a second thought, nor should they. But when the ACLU musters a phalanx of lawyers to erase a historical symbol from the city seal, the burghers quail."

UPDATE: The above is not the only assault of the day on religion. Here is more.

Howell Raines, late of the once great New York Times, gets bludgeoned into unconsciousness by Captain Ed.

The fun really begins with the comments thereafter....my favorite being from lyle:

"My impression has long been that Raines is stupid. Not in the way that Bush is alleged to be stupid. Bush is a man of deeds, not words. Raines is only words, and he's a weak-minded repository of liberal cliches, without the capacity for reflection or independent thought.

He's not alone. In his generation (and mine) the second-raters have risen to prominence in the liberal media, the arts, and academia. Below them are the ranks of sycophants and third-raters they've hired. An entire generation of bosses like Raines have managed to exclude their betters.

In doing so, they inadvertently spawned the alternative media. Liberals like Raines and Kerry are fighting a desperate rearguard action which they will lose."

Big Gold Dog vs. John Kerry's Energy Policy.

"Playing both sides, as he is wont to do, John suggests that we use less of the foreign oil that he is also demanding that we get more of."

Fish. Barrel. Smoking Gun.

Orwellian Moment of the Week:

Military Service = Slavery

Hat Tip: Michael King...a blog you should check out.

Funniest t-shirt I have seen in a while.....but then I always have been a Zionist stooge.

The Commissar out-Wonkettes Wonkette.

Update: An inbound e-mail states: "If Wonkette left out the references to ass-f******, she could write for Maureen Dowd while MoDo was on vacation and no one would ever notice."

Ben Stein on the mood of the part of America that is not represented by the mainstream media and network news:

As far as I can tell, their dismal view of the nation and their general level of hostility and anger are largely unrepresentative of what the true mood of the nation is. Certainly it is wildly unrepresentative of the state of the nation. This nation, by and large, is wildly prosperous and happy. People of color have made amazing progress. Women in particular have made amazing progress. The news on the TV might as well come from the moon.

Great stuff, reflective of the attitudes of most of us who reside away from the media centers and Left and East Coasts. Read the whole thing. While you're at it, there are several other articles posted today on the Spectator website that bear reading as well.

UPDATE: E-mail letter responses to Mr. Stein's column are here. The best of the bunch:

It's always a pleasure to see articles by Ben Stein.

While is it true that the pockets of pessimistic liberalism (is there another kind?) tend to be urban areas saturated with coffee houses, I doubt caffeine intake alone is the cause of such sniveling behavior.

It is more likely that for people with such rotten views of America, and life in general, only bitter, burnt, overpriced coffee can get them to crawl out of their holes every morning for another day of whining and puling.

-- Patrick
Milwaukee, Wisconsin

After being (correctly) gigged by The Commissar for our lack of coverage, here is the article published in the Midland Reporter-Telegram Sunday about the high school graduation of Jessica McClure. And, in the article, the refutation of the stupid article in Stuff magazine on "Jessica McClain" that we covered in this blog a while back. Further evidence is in the real Jessica's graduation photo that ran in the paper here (scroll down a bit).

Hopefully, she will get the amount of publicity she wants from now on (very little?). We wish her Well in all her future endeavors!

In one of the articles there is a phrase that I would have thought would have been seen much more than it has been in these articles: competitive bidding.

Surely Rio Nuevo cannot be the only group of investors willing to take state owned water out of West Texas and sell it to others. Why is it that it seem like they have the franchise locked up already?

Perhaps it is because they do.

But wouldn't a better plan be to do the draw down studies first, then decide what amount of water could be safely withdrawn from these aquifers (if any) and once that determination has been made then open these leases to competitive bidding?

That seems a no-brainer. So why does it appear that Rio Nuevo is the only player in the game?

Beware the smoke filled rooms.

UPDATE: More on this from the Odessa-American.

The blog-based Desert-Mountain Times also has more.

Abdullah al-Muhajir!.....I mean, Jose Padilla!

From Lileks:

"Yesterday marked the third Memorial Day since 9/11 to pass without a terrorist attack on America. Spin the war however you like; that has to count for something."