Boycott BP? Not Likely

Some of my left-leaning friends are really outraged about the BP gulf oil spill and the fact that they aren't paying yet. Well, I guess that's not really true. I mean, BP is paying, trying to stop the spill. And the spill is costing the company billions in lost revenue. but that's not really what these people are so exercised about. What they want is...a boycott!

Now, right-thinking people know how ridiculous boycotts are. They are ineffective and rarely result in action by the boycotted. Personally, I'm all for people spending their money where and how they want, and if you choose Product "X" over Product "Y" because Product "Y" is created using too trees or baby parts or whatever, I have no problem with that. Just don't call it a "boycott" because that's just silly.

The problem with boycotting oil producers is that whatever you decide not to buy just frees it up for somebody else to buy it instead. Remember the people wanting to boycott Citgo because Hugo Chavez might profit? It's the same problem with boycotting BP over the gulf oil spill. If the U.S. suddenly stopped buying oil from BP and started buying it from someone else, BP would just sell its oil to somebody else. Worse, prices for Americans might actually go up because of such a boycott.

Even if that argument isn't enough to make you sane about boycotting oil companies, there's this: oil is used for a host of things other than powering your Prius. Just look at BP's site where it talks about oil for fuel and lubricants. And that's not even talking about the many products made from oil, including things like wax, plastic, and Kevlar for bulletproof vests. In short, trying to "boycott" an oil company is like boycotting breathing. It's impossible and makes you look stupid.

Whose Been Indoctrinating the Children?

If you only read leftwing sites for coverage of the Texas Textbook controversy, you'd come away believing education was going to hell in a handbasket and that there was a sudden attempt to indoctrinate the kids in eeeevil ways. Take this from MSNBC:

Among the recommendations facing a final vote: adding language saying the country's Founding Fathers were guided by Christian principles and including positive references to the Moral Majority, the National Rifle Association and the GOP’s Contract with America.

Other amendments to the state's curriculum standards for kindergarten through 12th grade would minimize Thomas Jefferson's role in world and U.S. history because he advocated the separation of church and state; require that students learn about "the unintended consequences" of affirmative action; assert that "the right to keep and bear arms" is an important element of a democratic society; and rename the slave trade to the "Atlantic triangular trade.”

Oh, noes. We certainly don't want or need children to have any positive references to the Second Amendment or conservatives. That might halt the slow march to hell liberals have been leading us on forever. From (laughably titled) Teaching Tolerance:

But even if Diskey is right, what’s happening in Texas has national implications. The board’s decisions affect 4.7 million Texas school kids—4.7 million potential future voters who will be acting on biased information.

(Emphasis mine)
Biased information? As opposed to the completely unbiased propaganda information available from groups like Teaching Tolerance? If Teaching Tolerance were actually about informing as opposed to indoctrinating, the argument against the Texas educators might be stronger. But because of groups like Teaching Tolerance, the New York Collective of Radical Educators (CORE) and Rethinking Schools, normal people actually do have to take the educational reins and rench them back to something closer to the center.

The truth is that Teaching Tolerance and other liberal organizations are afraid that students won't be lapping up social justice lessons or twisted views of American history bent to show the United States as racist, sexist, homophobic, greedy and generally a terrible force in the world. If I thought this way, I'd be scared that children might learn nice things about America, too.

Turkey: No Friend to the West?

Read this post if you want to understand the growing problem the West--specifically the U.S.and Israel--have with Turkey.

Turkey is deliberately helping the Iranians to undermine U.S. policy in the Middle East, and by sending a flotilla to Gaza, in defiance of Israel's blockade, is tantamount to an act of war, it seems to me. There was nothing humanitarian about the trip, because as William Jacobson notes, humanitarian aid can come over land. That this group tried to get through the blockade speaks to more sinister aims to bring weapons into Gaza.

Our president's throwing our allies under the bus, including Israel. More here, including the fact that the group responsible for the flotilla supports--surprise!--radical Islam.

Racist Arizonans

Donald Douglas went to the anti-S.B. 1070 march in Phoenix yesterday and got some terrific pictures of the peace-loving protesters there (unlike those nasty Teabaggers). Take a look.

Quote of the Day

From Legal Insurrection:

"This White House is Nixonian in its Clintonian ability to parse words.
"

Obama on Sestak: It Depends on What the Definition of "Job" Is

The White House has released a paper trying to explain away the job offer offer of service on a "Presidential or other Senior Executive Branch Advisory Board, which would avoid a divisive Senate primary, allow him to retain his seat in the House, and provide him with an opportunity for additional service to the public in a high-level advisory capacity," but this still smells.

Bauer asserts, without providing any examples, that there “have been numerous, reported instances in the past when prior Administrations…discussed alternative paths to service for qualified individuals also considering campaigns for public office.” He then concludes that “[s]uch discussions are fully consistent with the relevant law and ethical requirements.”

Why would the White House take months to offer this explanation if there was no illegality to it? Wasn't this supposed to be the most ethical, competent White House in history?

What we're left with is either (a) lying by Joe Sestak about what was offered, (b) lying by the White House about what was offered, (c) incompetence by Joe Sestake about what was offered, or (d) incompetence on the part of the White House about what was offered. It's clear that this paper is an attempt to parse the language of the applicable law so that the White House's actions were not illegal and subject to--dare I say it?--impeachment.

Bauer admits that Rahm Emanuel asked Bill Clinton to offer Sestak an appointment to a “Presidential or other Senior Executive Branch Advisory Board,” and that the appointment would be attractive, i.e., a benefit. The statute does not absolve you of liability if you are offering someone an uncompensated appointment. It also specifies that you are guilty of a violation if you make such an offer “directly or indirectly.” Moreover, since the executive branch may not spend money that is not appropriated by Congress, any such board would be authorized by or at least paid for by an “Act of Congress.”

This situation definitely needs a special prosecutor appointed, but I'm not holding my breath waiting for the Obama minions to do the right thing. It's interesting that the same people screaming for a special prosecutor regarding the firing of U.S. attorneys are yawning and trying to change the subject on this.

Obama's Oil Spill

Tough to feel sorry for Teh One after he said he would roll back the oceans (or some such bullshit) during the 2008 campaign. Charles Krauthammer's column points out this inconvenient fact, plus the fact that we drill in iffy places because environmentalists won't let us drill anywhere else.

I've been told we had 30 years to get off oil, but practically speaking, there's never been a replacement for all the things we use petroleum for, not the least of which is fuel. The risks vs. rewards has been substantially weighted in oil's favor, and until the renewable sources folks can pony up something comparable, we'll continue seeking oil anywhere we can.

"Pants" Judge Loses Wrongful Termination Suit

Surprising only that this story is still going on.

Roy Pearson Jr. is the guy who sued his local dry cleaners for millions because they lost a pair of pants. He later was denied reappointment to his administrative law judge job because he was deemed "unfit" due to abusive behavior. Apparently, his appeals have fallen on deaf ears. Maybe it's time for Mr. Pearson to move on.

Shocker: "Study Finds Increased Government Spending Results in Higher Unemployment"

From Hot Air:

Instead of providing a stimulating effect to the economy, government spending creates pressures on private industry to reduce staff and investment...

If this seems counterintuitive, it might be from marinating too long in Beltway conventional wisdom. When private entities (citizens or businesses) retain capital, it gets used in a more rational manner, mainly because the entity has competitive incentives to use capital wisely and efficiently. The private entity also has his own interests in mind, and can act quickly to use the capital to its best application. Private entities innovate and look to create and expand markets, creating more growth.
In comparison, government moves much slower with capital. It generally works to its own benefit and not that of private entities. Lacking competition, there is no incentive for efficiency. Most importantly, it rarely creates new markets or growth but instead creates a spoils system that ends up reorganizing the status quo to favor some and disfavor others.

Obama's Response to the Gulf Crisis: Not Emotional Enough

Some complain that President Obama isn't emotional enough about the situation, while others claim that nobody cares whether the president cares.

It reminds me a bit of the movie The Queen, where everybody's up in arms because Queen Elizabeth wasn't broken up about the death of her ex-daughter-in-law Diana (actually, this was a real life crisis, as well). As the daughter of a British woman raised during WWII, I can tell you that that generation just didn't show a lot of public emotion (unless it was anger), unlike we Americans who bawl over dog movies.

The point is that showing outrage or fear or whatever over the gulf oil spill isn't going to fix anything and I'd much rather BO do something about it rather than beat the podium. I don't need an empathetic president; I need an effective one, and so far, this president has shown such a lack of leadership as to be downright dangerous.

Is the Sestak Affair an Impeachable Offense?

Exclusive: All 7 Republicans on Senate Judiciary Committee Ask AG Holder to Appoint Special Prosecutor to Look Into Alleged Sestak Job Offer
It certainly needs investigating. From Hot Air:

Darrell Issa, who started the drum-beating about this, is calling it Obama’s Watergate and potential grounds for impeachment, and went as far this week as to threaten Sestak with an ethics complaint if he doesn’t come clean. Here’s the key federal statute, although it’s not the only one in play potentially: Karl Rove cited three criminal provisions on Monday night that could conceivably have been violated.

Republicans can't force an investigation, of course, but it will be interesting to see if the press actually treats this like a "what if it were a Republican?" situation.

This must give Perry "there's no evidence! Oh, and Republicans do it, too!" indigestion. I'll pass him the Tums.

President Obama's Katrina

The White House is taking some heat over its mishandling of the oil spill in the Gulf.

Until this week, the Obama administration had largely managed to deflect responsibility for the Deepwater Horizon disaster onto others — vowing to keep a “boot on the throat” of BP, while slamming lax oversight on the part of federal regulators during the Bush administration.

But now, with crude lapping into the bayou, even Obama’s defenders have turned critical. A White House that prides itself on operational competence and message discipline has been frustrated by an environmental catastrophe it can’t predict, can’t control and can’t out-message — and the strain is showing.

A majority of Americans, by 51 percent to 46 percent, now disapprove of Obama’s handling of the crisis, according to a new CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll.

This is change you can believe in? Yep, this is what you voted for!

As Hugh Hewitt puts it:

The president's timidity comes from his fear that he will be held accountable for a failure to stop the disaster --that this will become his Katrina. It already is, except that President Bush stepped up only two days after the locals failed to execute their evacuation plans. Here the crisis has been a federal responsibility from day one minute one and the president has watched and hoped that BP would figure something out.

This is what leadership from someone without experience doing anything looks like. Obama's idea of leading is to blame someone else and dither.

How Dare Pro-Lifers Call Themselves Feminists!

My earliest altercation with Amanda Marcotte was over a series of posts she did decrying Feminists for Life for having the audacity to say they are feminists who--gasp!--don't believe in abortion. At the time, I hadn't a clue that linking to Amanda's screed would garner so many nasty comments from women (it was a deluge), but it was quite informative to witness first hand the callous attitude such "women" have for life in general and the lives of both women and babies in particular.

It's nearly four years later, and Feminists for Life is still causing consternation among the pro-abort feminists. This time, Echidne of the Snakes has her rattles in a twist because this organization of obviously not feminists thinks that supporting women in "refusing to choose" abortion is a bad thing. The most peculiar thing about Echidne's arguments is something basically every feminist does: they assume women must have sex and that anything that doesn't prevent the typical consequence of sex (i.e., pregnancy) is actually oppression.

This has always seemed like such a strange argument to me, considering the same women usually rush on to explain how economically burdensome children are and that being forced to actually live with and raise the offspring one casually produced is just downright unfair. What makes this argument so peculiar is that we usually aren't talking about the hard cases--rape, incest, life of the mother--but rather, sex that the woman chose to engage in.

Most girls get the birds and bees talk around the age of 10, and are fully informed about contraception by 14 or 15. During that five years, girls have been exposed to so many pro-sex images, from pictures to text, that if they don't think having sex with whoever is normal, then they must really be sick.

But what if we didn't spend all that time and money convincing 14-year-olds that having sex with their 17-year-old boyfriends was normal and nothing to be ashamed of? What if we spent the time telling them that as children, they probably shouldn't be engaging in risky, life-changing behavior that could end them up with unintended pregnancies for which killing the children is really, really not a good thing to do? My guess would be that we could have fewer children f*cking if we spend at least the same amount of time explaining to the 14-year-olds about the lifetime consequences of having sex with someone just for fun as we do teaching them the joys of fisting, for example. But then, I guess, that would be "slut shaming," as feminists call it, and we certainly don't want girls to feel bad about having sex with guys that they love or like or just met. Because, you know, sex is fun and pregnancies can be terminated and you'll never, ever, ever feel bad about that 20 minute procedure.

This is the world feminists want us to live in, a world where having sex is a meaningless activity and pregnancy is a really weird coincidence, not a consequence. In this world, thinking girls and boys and men and women should refrain from having sex unless they are prepared to be tied to that person forever means you "hate sex," and loving sex means that you don't think it's any more significant than farting. But mostly, in this world, feminists can't tolerate the idea that some women would think equality is a cool thing for women after birth...and before. That's just anti-feminism. Or something.

Don't Say My Sourcing Is "Insulting"...

When you source Media Matters, for cryin' out loud.

Will the Justice Department Be Prosecuting This One?

Sestak confirms WH job offer to get out of Senate race

If only it were Halliburton offering the job...

Why Is It Violence Only Happens During Democratic Administrations?

Leftwingers are harranging again that life is always peaceful during evil Republican administrations but violent rightwingers burst on the scene during Democratic regimes. This, of course, is nonsense, as Kathleen McKinney points out.

I'm not defending nutcases who want to assassinate Barack Obama, but I still remember the nutroots dismissing out of hand any violent talk from the left directed at George W. Bush as "letting off steam" or something close to it. Really? Writing films fantasizing about assassinating the president wasn't deplorable? (Pandora at Delaware Liberal argued that "only one" novel with this fantasy came out, so it was ok). Hanging GWB in effigy, painting him as Hitler or Satan was just "patriotic speech."

Now, we're seeing any anti-government violence portrayed as anti-Obama violence, which is patently false. The twerp who flew his airplane into the IRS building in Austin was not a conservative (he was strident in his condemnation of President Bush), and yet liberals in the MSM and blogosphere have tried desperately to tie him to the GOP. Such behavior is unseemly and pathetic. Yes, there are anti-government people in every administration. Just because you don't mind it when your guy isn't president doesn't make it acceptable.

UPDATE: Let's not forget this laundry list of recent leftwing violence.

The Sugar Police: Riding In to a Town Near You

Student Gets Detention for Possessing Piece of Candy

Ten-year-old Leighann Adair came home in tears, terrified to tell her parents she'd been slapped with a week's worth of detention for possessing a contraband substance:

The forbidden fruit: a piece of Jolly Rancher candy.

When I was in sixth grade, our music teacher informed us at the beginning of the year that she would give any student caught with candy a "U" (for "unacceptable," the worst you could get) in citizenship for that six weeks. The challenge was too great for me, and I was determined to eat candy in her class every. single. day. My candy of choice was Hot Tamales, since I could suck on those and they weren't quite so obvious. Alas, eventually I was caught and received the first (and only) "U" of my school career. My parents were furious, but there was no other punishment. The idea that I would have gotten a week's detention is absurd.

It May Outrage as Many People as Obamacare...

Top Official Says Feds May Not Process Illegals Referred From Arizona

John Morton, assistant secretary of homeland security for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, made the comment during a meeting on Wednesday with the editorial board of the Chicago Tribune, the newspaper reports.

"I don't think the Arizona law, or laws like it, are the solution," Morton told the newspaper.

...which would bring more voters to the polls in November, guaranteeing Democrats' defeat. Whose side, precisely, is President Obama on?

We Were Told the Doctors Would Just Take The Patients

Texas doctors opting out of Medicare at alarming rate

More than 300 doctors have dropped the program in the last two years, including 50 in the first three months of 2010, according to data compiled by the Houston Chronicle. Texas Medical Association officials, who conducted the 2008 survey, said the numbers far exceeded their assumptions.

The largest number of doctors opting out comes from primary care, a field already short of practitioners nationally and especially in Texas. Psychiatrists also make up a large share of the pie, causing one Texas leader to say, “God forbid that a senior has dementia.”

The opt-outs follow years of declining Medicare reimbursement that culminated in a looming 21 percent cut in 2010. Congress has voted three times to postpone the cut, which was originally to take effect Jan. 1. It is now set to take effect June 1.

My doctor is one of those who isn't accepting new Medicare patients. Remember when Obamacare was going to solve all our problems? That's change we can believe in!

The Liberal Spin Machine in Overdrive

Liberals are in ecstasy that Democrats held onto a seat that's been a Democrat seat for a generation. Woo hoo! Democrats held a seat! Not that they won anything they hadn't already held. It's just the principle of the matter, see.

Forget that Democrats pretty much own Pennsylvania, even though John McCain narrowly won it in 2008. This is a place that re-elected John Murtha even after his scuzzy connection to Abscam and his pork barrel politicking. Why wouldn't they vote for another Democrat?

How exactly is it a level playing field when the Democrats have a statewide U.S. Senate primary happening at the same time? There was no comparative factor getting Republicans motivated to interrupt their busy lives to vote. That's not soreloserdom blogging, it's just attention to reality. The Democrats were more motivated in this race. This ain't the end of a trend. It's just another special election, in a Democratic district, and on a big Democratic primary day. And a Democrat won. Disappointing. But not paradigm-smashing shocking. And not devastating.

It's not like they won in a Republican stronghold or something. Democrats dodged a bullet, but they're still stuck trying to justify the crappy economy and their profligate spending. It's almost worth it watching Democrats suddenly discover their conservative roots against the nutroot leadership they have. Almost, but not quite.

Many pundits are arguing that Republicans need to be re-thinking any attempt to nationalize the election. I see nothing wrong with noting Democrats' pathetic Obama bootlicking, but after all, all politics is local. Pick 'em off (ooh, a gun metaphor) where possible. You knew they weren't going to give Republicans any credit anyway, right?

More Obama Administration Attacks on Free Speech

The Left isn't afraid to use the power of the government to bully its enemies. Witness the latest attack on that deadly enemy...Goldline:

Forget Goldman. New York Rep. Anthony Weiner has been shooting a bit lower in the finance food chain, going after gold dealers.

His latest target, the company Goldline, which has made its name profiting -- with the help of conservative talkers -- off fees for buying and selling gold against public anxiety.

Goldline is also a sponsor of the Glenn Beck program on the radio and television. As William Jacobson points out:

Why bother with a bit player like Goldline? Because Glenn Beck still is on the air despite a boycott which has succeeded in scaring away some advertisers, but not Goldline.

Goldline is a specific target of boycotts of Fox News and Beck, and has been for months...

We are in dangerous territory folks. The congressional power to investigate, and to pressure the executive branch to bring enforcement proceedings, is being used to support a partisan boycott and to stifle political dialogue.

Whatever your view of Beck, and of the Beck boycott, the government has no business acting as enforcer.

Jacobson is right; this is very dangerous and should be embarrassing to any real American. There's something particularly sinister about targetting a two-bit company because they advertise on a show critical of government policies. Very sinister.

Liberal Utopia in Academia Creates Worst Work Conditions?

Megan McArdle has a piece up about the terrible treatment of adjunct professors and graduate students at universities. The truth is, as anyone taking an English 101 or Algebra course knows, the vast majority of classes at universities these days are not taught by actual tenured professors but by the slave labor of the university system: those who haven't a prayer of gaining tenure.

I'd feel sorrier for them if the bizarre system that allows professors to use arbitrary grading systems and subject students to leftwing rants on unrelated topics weren't so damn cushy for them, or if those not in that system didn't so closely resemble the real world, but, alas, I do not feel sorry for them at all. Welcome to the real world, champ!

I have long theorized that at least some of the leftward drift in academia can be explained by the fact that it has one of the most abusive labor markets in the world. I theorize this because in interacting with many professors, I am bewildered by their beliefs about labor markets more generally; many seem to think of private labor markets as an endless well of exploitation where employees are virtual prisoners with no recourse in the face of horrific abuses. Yet this does not describe the low wage jobs in which I've worked--there were of course individuals who had to hold onto that particular job for idiosyncratic reasons, but as a class, low wage workers do not face the kind of monolithic employer power that a surprising number of academics seem to believe is common.

A recent debate among friends brought forth similar arguments from lefties about the poor and middle class being mistreated by employers (for giving them jobs, I suppose) while the mean ol' CEO and stockholders make billions. It's not fair! How can anybody shop at Wal-Mart in good conscience knowing they buy food from Brazil, for crying out loud? Aren't those clerks and stock boys miserable?

The answer, of course, is that some are miserable but probably not because of their employment. Like most people who work for their income, there are aspects of their jobs they like and others they don't. And most employees are perfectly aware of the tenuousness of their positions, particularly if you live in an at-will employment state.

But such knowledge doesn't make workers more miserable or less productive. In fact, given the behavior of most tenured professors on college campuses, it probably makes those without tenure more responsive to those they teach. But that's just my theory.

Obama Signs Press Freedom Act Then Won't Take Questions

You can't make this stuff up.

There was some rich irony at the White House today -- President Obama signed the Press Freedom Act, and then promptly refused to take any questions.


The new law expands the State Department's annual human rights reports to include a description of press freedoms in each country. It seemed a good opportunity to showcase press freedom in this country.

Taking quesitons would require Teh One having to speak on the fly without blaming somebody else for everything that goes wrong with his administration. Can't have that.

I know it's getting stale, but can you imagine what would have happened had George W. Bush done this? Obama has ducked the press for months. He has mishandled the oil spill in the Gulf and the press has hardly whimpered. How much longer will they be willing to cover for him?

Obama Administration: Policing the Border Equals Forced Abortions

Just when I think the nuts in the Obama administration can't do worse, we get word that they are equating Arizona's immigration law with China's human rights abuses.

Posner said in addition to talks on freedom of religion and expression, labor rights and rule of law, officials also discussed Chinese complaints about problems with U.S. human rights, which have included crime, poverty, homelessness and racial discrimination.

He said U.S. officials did not whitewash the American record and in fact raised on its own a new immigration law in Arizona that requires police to ask about a person's immigration status if there is suspicion the person is in the country illegally.

Because requiring people to legally enter the country is every bit as big a human rights violation as forced abortion, speech and religious suppression, gulags and possibly harvesting organs for money. I'm so glad the America haters are running the government. It's really gonna make China like us.

Laura Bush: Liberalism's Favorite Conservative...

As long as she's supporting issues with which they agree.

Oh what a difference a few years or a different topic makes. Of course, there are still jerks complaining that Laura Bush should have pulled a Hillary and tried to run domestic policy (or something), which would have gone over really well with liberals who thought she, too, was the spawn of Satan until this week.

It's so hard to take these hypocrites seriously. First, they complained that Laura Bush was a Stepford Wife, a murderer, an enabler (pick your favorite alcoholic allusion here) and more. Now, because she's come out in favor of their cause du jour, she's completely huggable!

Or maybe not. The latest I've read is complaints that she should have "done something" for abortion and homosexuals. And my question is what? Have a tea? Give a presser? We don't elect First Ladies. It's, at best, a figurehead position because since Eleanor Roosevelt, we've decided that the women presidents are attached to have to be involved in something or other to show how good and caring and informed they are (and, by extension, the men they are married to).

It's all nonsense and can be more harmful than good. We nearly had Hillarycare, for crying out loud, and "two for the price of one," which deeply disturbed anyone who cared about the Constitution and electoral process. We watched Roslynn Carter direct Jimmeh, we heard complaints about Nancy Reagan's psychics, we've noted Barbara Bush's grandmotherly charm but heard rumors of her coldness to her chirren. In this presidency, we've watched Michelle Obama go to help the poor in pricey footwear.

I guess the point I'm making is that First Ladies are just women married to the president. We don't get to know their political views because they haven't been elected to anything and their views are no more important than my next door neighbor's or the local gas station attendant. I don't really care if Laura Bush supports abortion--she has that right--but I'd be infuriated if I elected her pro-life husband only to have her change his mind about issues I care about. I understand that pro-abortion and gay marriage supporters wanted her to change his mind, but that's precisely why First Ladies aren't supposed to speak out about issues while their hubbies are in office. But it is fairly entertaining watching the same people who excoriated her for eight years now clapping wildly that she secretly supported something they like.

I Think Amanda Marcotte's Head Just Exploded...

after reading about Raquel Welch's new book.

Welch has written a book, "Raquel: Behind the Cleavage," which might just stand out on bookstore shelves. We need it to!...

Further, what she writes knocks the glimmer off the rose of so-called "sexual freedom." The concept, ushered in by the pill, she says, "has taken the caution and discernment out of choosing a sexual partner, which used to be the equivalent of choosing a life partner. Without a commitment, the trust and loyalty between couples of childbearing age is missing, and obviously leads to incidents of infidelity. No one seems immune."

I'm not one of those pro-lifers who is anticontraception. I think that contraception does give a woman a certain degree of control about when and whether to have children and that the power of that is important for women to get to do other things in their lives that they want to do.

But having said that, the sad truth is that the sexual revolution has done more to dehumanize women than anything of the last hundred years. The rise of sex without love or responsibility has caused women (and men) to do things with their bodies that the vast majority would never have thought about doing were it not for contraception and abortion.

I've been castigated repeatedly by the likes of Amanda Marcotte for suggesting that women can and should say "no" to sex when it is outside marriage, where both partners have a commitment to a lifelong relationship. To scratch the itch, then find oneself connected to a guy one doesn't know, must be a disgusting and nightmarish thing. But complaining that the contraception didn't work is childish and, frankly, the least of the woman's problems. Why have sex with a person that you don't want to be linked to for life? And this isn't even talking about divorced parents, which is an entirely different type of problem. How on earth can a person be so flippant with one's body as to give it to anyone who has the slightest appeal, or perhaps only convenience?

None of this is to excuse men for doing the same thing for centuries. But if men's biological history is any indication, not being responsible for bearing children tends to make a person less responsible with their sexuality than knowing that you could be bearing and caring for this person's children for decades to come. Most men aren't so irresponsible. They desire a wife and family. But our society seems to have evolved into a system supporting, through entertainment and politics, the very basest of instincts of mankind. For a presidential candidate to say he wouldn't want his children "punished" with a baby, and that that justifies killing the punishment, should have made most voters recoil. How can a man who says he wants citizens to trust him with so much power hold life in such contempt? And yet, 53% of Americans voted for this man, arguing that his philosophy was "centrist."

When Raquel Welch of all people is arguing that contraception has cheapened sex and dehumanized women, it should give us all pause. I'm sure feminists will howl that she only regrets what she's gotten the chance to do and that she now wants to stop others from having fun. But that's an argument any 14-year-old would make. Having "control of your body" should mean more than throwing it away.

The Democrats' Civil War

This is the first I've seen on the Democrats' civil war. We've watched the Left salivating for 18 months about the "Republican civil war," which really hasn't been much of a war, but rather a return to conservative values and candidates.

The Democrats, OTOH, really do have a civil war between it's left-center base and it's moonbat, fringy left base, which has become way more vocal over the last year. In the Republican "civil war," the losers were RINOs who didn't have much support anyway. And as the country has moved to the right, RINOs were less likely to win anyway.

But the luny left is pushing the Democratic Party even farther away from the center than before. This strategy worked in 2006 and 2008, when Democrats could draw a big distinction between themselves and the unpopular Republicans and George W. Bush. But with GWB out of the picture and Democrats with huge majorities, unpopular policies and an anemic economy, it's hard to see how the strategy works these days.

One of Barack Obama's strategies in the 2008 campaign was that he was the black guy who isn't scary. His policies were centrist and he wanted to unite the country. But the Barack Obama who emerged as president has tried to push the country in directions it is unwilling to go (such as closing Guantanamo Bay or union "card check" legislation) and when he forced it his way (with Obamacare) he infuriated the very people needed for Democrats to retain power.

It's a mix of policies and priorities that don't help Democrats in any way. Americans have been worried about the economy since the fall of 2008, and Obama's priorities (the Porkapalooza bill, Obamacare, cap and trade) have left Americans more than just disillusioned. The shady tactics Democrats used to ram through Obamacare infuriated voters, which is why Dems don't want to talk about health care anymore, but are anxious to do something--anything--for jobs. The anxiety over November losses is also why Congress is shirking its duties by not making a budget for next year. Anything that draws attention to Democrat failures is going to be ignored for the next six months, even constitutional duties.

Of course, the far left fringe of the Democratic Party is no happier than centrists. They've gotten even less of what they wanted and honestly think places like Arkansas are going to elect moonbats. Delusional, true, but it it all the leftwingers have left to cling to, right?

Teaching Tolerance: Free Speech Is OK, But You Need to Embrace Empathy More!

The Southern Poverty Law Center's Teaching Tolerance website typically offers up all kinds of goodies for this Gold-Plated Witch on Wheels to comment on, but I was particularly interested in this post, which, if left in the comments of a rightwing blog would be known as concern trolling.
The post is about the five (not four) students at a Live Oak High School who were suspended for wearing American flag shirts on Cinco de Mayo (see here for my take). The author begrudgingly acknowledges the totally outrageous idea that students have the right to free speech, even when it offends some, but then launches into the real point of the post: we should curtail our speech if it offends someone, and by someone, she means those celebrating another country's Independence Day.

Public school students have rights, and at a minimum their administrators need to ensure that those rights are protected. But the primary mission of educators in public schools is to teach children how to use those rights, and how to be a member of a diverse society. Students need to learn that rights come with responsibilities. And in a pluralistic society, we need to understand and respect the people who live alongside us.

I haven't looked, but I'm sure the author endorses respecting the rights of, say, those protesting government spending or parents wanting the best education for their children. Well, probably not.

If students want to celebrate Cinco de Mayo, I have no problem with that. But when American students want to wear T-shirts with American flags on them anyday--including Cinco de Mayo--that's not intolerant and it's not insensitive. That's freedom of expression, something those celebrating Cinco de Mayo should learn to embrace. And that's the teachable moment the author should have embraced.

Republicans On the Offensive Concerning Obamacare

Republicans aren't letting us forget the abomination of Obamacare, and well they shouldn't.

Senate Republicans are poised to try to reignite the health care debate by launching a coordinated political messaging offensive to target Democrats and the White House for what they contend are the new law’s onerous consequences.



A group of Republican Senators who played key roles in the yearlong fight over health care legislation met Thursday in Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (Ky.) office to discuss the strategy. Under the slogan “second opinion,” Republicans plan to communicate their message on multiple fronts, including on the Senate floor, in press conferences, via the Internet and through television and radio appearances.



A Republican Senate aide described the effort as intended “to draw attention to the consequences of the health care law that the White House hopes people miss.”

It's important to remind people of the horrendous effects of Obamacare, since most of them aren't poised to kick in until after Obama's re-election (or ouster, we hope). We're already seeing some of what was in the bill that Democrats didn't want us to see, but Americans must be reminded right up to November that Democrats passed this legislation even though a majority of Americans didn't want it.

Congress Shirks Their Budgetary Duties

I could probably use that headline in half the posts I write, but it's particularly appropriate when Congress won't pass a budget this year for the first time since 1974.

The news came from Rep. Hoyer himself, who said “It’s difficult to pass budgets in election years because they reflect what the [fiscal] status is.” In other words, with November looming on the horizon, the left doesn’t want their constituents to realize just how much Congress is spending and how high taxes will go.

The budget is a framework the federal government uses to set spending, but since Democrats don't care about spending, why pass a budget?

I'm thinking about sending Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Barack Obama copies of Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover, but I'm not even sure they can read at this point.

Equating Communism With Nazism?

A Hidden History of Evil

In the world’s collective consciousness, the word “Nazi” is synonymous with evil. It is widely understood that the Nazis’ ideology—nationalism, anti-Semitism, the autarkic ethnic state, the Führer principle—led directly to the furnaces of Auschwitz. It is not nearly as well understood that Communism led just as inexorably, everywhere on the globe where it was applied, to starvation, torture, and slave-labor camps. Nor is it widely acknowledged that Communism was responsible for the deaths of some 150 million human beings during the twentieth century. The world remains inexplicably indifferent and uncurious about the deadliest ideology in history.

The problem is that so many on the Left still believe communism's problem was implementation, not theory.

Remember When...

Supreme Court nominees' records mattered? Or when associations mattered?

Now, we're told that associations don't matter, and the idea that Kagan might be gay is a "smear," even as conservatives say it doesn't matter. Is this another example of democrisy?

Taxes Lower in 2009?

USA Today has a story about how Tax bills in 2009 at lowest level since 1950

Amid complaints about high taxes and calls for a smaller government, Americans paid their lowest level of taxes last year since Harry Truman's presidency, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data found.
Some conservative political movements such as the "Tea Party" have criticized federal spending as being out of control. While spending is up, taxes have fallen to exceptionally low levels.

Federal, state and local taxes — including income, property, sales and other taxes — consumed 9.2% of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950, the Bureau of Economic Analysis reports. That rate is far below the historic average of 12% for the last half-century. The overall tax burden hit bottom in December at 8.8.% of income before rising slightly in the first three months of 2010.

Gosh, I wonder what else happened in 2009? You gotta go to Newsbusters to find out.

The newspaper downplayed the pain caused by the recession and the fact that the downturn lowered both incomes and consumption...

But USA Today also buried important reasons for the drop in tax payments. One reason was that the recession cut incomes, but they didn't mention that until the ninth paragraph. Lower income means taxpayers paid at a lower rate because of the progressive income tax structure. In addition, unemployment in 2009 reached levels not seen for roughly 25 years. The recession also caused "sharp" cuts in consumer spending, resulting in much lower sales tax payments.

USA Today gave credit to the massive stimulus bill for "tax cuts," specifically the "Making Work Pay" credit. But the paper waited until the last paragraph to admit that the lower tax burden may only last through the end of 2010 because "virtually all the stimulus tax cuts expire at the end of the year."

Meanwhile, 15.3 million people were out of work last month, and they probably didn't spend very much because of it. The idea that less taxes because fewer people are working is a good thing is disgusting and USA Today should be ashamed to spin the news this way.

More Free Speech: The First Anti-Obama Movie

Oh, there may have been something done before, but this is the first I've seen of one.

A New Jersey judge-cum-filmmaker has chosen to step down from the bench rather than abide by a dictum from state judicial authorities that he not publicize his satirical movie painting President Obama as a modern-day Faust...

The film is about a cocaine-snorting college student who makes a deal to deliver millions of souls to Satan. The main character, played by Del Vecchio, goes on to attend Harvard Law School, work as a community organizer and win the White House. The title's initials stand for "Occidental Births a Monster," a reference to the college Obama attended for a short time.

Not quite as stirring as an assassination fantasy, but a good start to exposing Democrats to the ridicule they thought appropriate for Republicans.

For Those Who Didn't Vote for John McCain

As Michael Medved noted on his radio show today, I'd like to point out that had John McCain been elected president, the two Supreme Court picks Obama has made would have solidified the conservative Supreme Court.

Elections have consequences.

The Way of the Greeks

The welfare state's death spiral

Americans dislike the term "welfare state" and substitute the bland word "entitlements." Vocabulary doesn't alter the reality. Countries cannot overspend and overborrow forever. By delaying hard decisions about spending and taxes, governments maneuver themselves into a cul-de-sac. To be sure, Greece's plight is usually described as a European crisis -- especially for the euro, the common money used by 16 countries -- and this is true. But only to a point...

The welfare state's death spiral is this: Almost anything governments might do with their budgets threatens to make matters worse by slowing the economy or triggering a recession. By allowing deficits to balloon, they risk a financial crisis as investors one day -- no one knows when -- doubt governments' ability to service their debts and, as with Greece, refuse to lend except at exorbitant rates. Cutting welfare benefits or raising taxes all would, at least temporarily, weaken the economy. Perversely, that would make paying the remaining benefits harder.

We're headed the same way with entitlement spending increasing--including Obamacare--leading us over the cliff. But we know this already, even if liberals won't admit it.

From Protein Wisdom:

The selfish gamble implicit in the welfare state is that, though most people know on some level that spending in excess of revenue isn’t a very fiscally responsible long-term plan on which to build a stable society, many are willing to bet that resources won’t run out in the short term — which means these types of voters believe they will still get theirs so long as they continue to “vote in their own economic interests.”

Future generations? Not their problem.

Georgia Seniors Told Not to Pray Before Meals?

The story is somewhat different from the headline.

Senior Citizens Inc. officials said Friday the meals they are contracted by the city to provide to Ed Young (Senior Center) visitors are mostly covered with federal money, which ushers in the burden of separating church and state.

On Thursday, the usual open prayer before meals at the center was traded in for a moment of silence.

It seems to me that if 50 people decided to pray outloud over their meals that there wouldn't be anything the "providers" could do about it, could they? And it certainly wouldn't amount to an "endorsement of religion" that so frightens those making their bucks off the senior meals.

Behind Those High Divorce Rates and High Out-of-Wedlock Birth Rates

For years, liberals have crowed about the stable marriages and low out-of-wedlock birth rates of blue states, but as Ross Douthat notes, there's nothing for blue staters to be proud of in their low out-of-wedlock birth rate numbers. That's because their high abortion rates mask that number.

More important, Cahn and Carbone also acknowledge one of the more polarizing aspects of the “blue family” model. Conservative states may have more teen births and more divorces, but liberal states have many more abortions.

Liberals sometimes argue that their preferred approach to family life reduces the need for abortion. In reality, it may depend on abortion to succeed. The teen pregnancy rate in blue Connecticut, for instance, is roughly identical to the teen pregnancy rate in red Montana. But in Connecticut, those pregnancies are half as likely to be carried to term. Over all, the abortion rate is twice as high in New York as in Texas and three times as high in Massachusetts as in Utah.

So it isn’t just contraception that delays childbearing in liberal states, and it isn’t just a foolish devotion to abstinence education that leads to teen births and hasty marriages in conservative America. It’s also a matter of how plausible an option abortion seems, both morally and practically, depending on who and where you are.

If, as Douthat says, the red state model looks dysfunctional in a modern society, it's possibly because it values life above creature comfort and death. That's something blue staters won't want to talk about. Or maybe they will, since they don't typically consider abortion to be something shameful or to be avoided.

How Dare You Redneck, Religious Idiots Think You Can Run Things!

That's a paraphrase of Darleen Click's take on this liberal snobbery disguised as a thoughtful article on the rise of the Tea Party movement.

The President Bush who emerged after September 11 took his party and the country back to the divisive politics of earlier decades, giving us seven years of ideological recrimination. By the time of the last presidential campaign, millions were transfixed not by the wisdom or folly of Barack Obama’s policy agenda, but by absurd rumors about his birth certificate and his “socialism.” Now he has been elected president by a healthy majority and is grappling with a wounded economy and two foreign wars he inherited—and what are we talking about? A makeshift Tea Party movement whose activists rage against “government” and “the media,” while the hotheads of talk radio and cable news declare that the conservative counterrevolution has begun.

You can go read the whole thing if you really want to be looked down upon, but the gist is that those stupid Americans have the audacity not to accept the ideas and beliefs of the elites to run everything. No, they think they have the right to criticize the government and be skeptical of its methods and reasons for trying to control more and more. Moreover, these idiots actually think they are capable of educating their own children and changing society to reflect their views. That's a style reserved for liberals, you see.

The whole thing shows exactly why the elites don't get it. If it were possible, they'd disenfranchise the masses (well, except for the ones who vote as they like). It's too bad for them that the masses aren't willing to cede their independence so easily.

The Rise of the Purists

If you want to see what the left thinks of establishment Republicans (like Utah's Bob Bennett) losing in the primaries, this sneering post at Crooks and Liars is a good place to start.

Bennett's unforgivable Senate sins were, according to local party hacks officials, daring to consider any form of health care reform, his TARP vote and other ideological votes around constitutional issues like the flag burning amendment. Despite Mitt Romney's endorsement, party purists coalesced around the money and the tea party take-no-prisoners doctrine, respectively.

It's odd to me that the same people fainting over "hope" and "change" are deriding anyone on the right who actually means it. Instead, what we get is complaints about the "far right" taking over the party. A tip for the nutroots: when you are holding up Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush as the Republicans you like, you aren't going to win many friends among conservatives.

Oh, I know. The nutroots aren't really interested in the GOP being affective in any sense (unless it's in helping Democrats pass their agenda). But still, the concern trolls on the left need to do a little more work on their act.

Sex Education All Cleaned Up

After reading this paean to the birth control pill, I can't help but wonder why feminists feel compelled to doctor Margaret Sanger's birth control views?

One of his targets was Margaret Sanger, a nurse who wrote a sex education column, “What Every Girl Should Know,” for a left-wing New York newspaper, The Call. When Comstock banned her column on venereal disease, the paper ran an empty space with the title: “What Every Girl Should Know: Nothing, by Order of the U.S. Post Office.”

Sanger was the first person to publish an evaluation of all the available forms of birth control. As a reward, she got a criminal obscenity charge. She fled to Europe to avoid going to jail, and her husband was imprisoned for passing out one of her pamphlets. In the end, he got 30 days, and Anthony Comstock got a chill during the trial that led to a fatal case of pneumonia.

Sanger was also a huge proponent of eugenics and forced sterilization of the mentally disabled. Oddly enough, feminists, while praising birth control, don't like to bring up its sordid history as a tool for eugenics and racists. I guess it sort of goes with Jessica Valenti's lament that MTV isn't showing teenagers getting abortions. You know, history doesn't make abortion sound so attractive.

A Question We'd All Like an Answer To

Don’t Mention the War

The most striking thing about all three attacks is not what we heard, but what we haven’t heard. There has been very little talk about the global war that the Obama administration sometimes acknowledges we are fighting and virtually nothing about what motivates our enemy: radical Islam.

Obama's myopic view of world events as being America's fault leaves him unable to accept radical Islam is America's true enemy.

Students Kicked Off Campus for Wearing American Flag Tees

You can't make this stuff up.

On any other day at Live Oak High School in Morgan Hill, Daniel Galli and his four friends would not even be noticed for wearing T-shirts with the American flag. But Cinco de Mayo is not any typical day especially on a campus with a large Mexican American student population.

Galli says he and his friends were sitting at a table during brunch break when the vice principal asked two of the boys to remove American flag bandannas that they wearing on their heads and for the others to turn their American flag T-shirts inside out. When they refused, the boys were ordered to go to the principal's office.

So, showing patriotism is ok only on certain days? Why should an American flag T-shirt offend anyone celebrating Cinco de Mayo?

More at Hot Air.

Legal pondering at the Volokh Conspiracy.

Shocker: Employers Contemplate Dropping Insurance

Dammit, I'm getting tired of being right.

Documents reveal AT&T, Verizon, others, thought about dropping employer-sponsored benefits

The great mystery surrounding the historic health care bill is how the corporations that provide coverage for most Americans -- coverage they know and prize -- will react to the new law's radically different regime of subsidies, penalties, and taxes. Now, we're getting a remarkable inside look at the options AT&T, Deere, and other big companies are weighing to deal with the new legislation.

Internal documents recently reviewed by Fortune, originally requested by Congress, show what the bill's critics predicted, and what its champions dreaded: many large companies are examining a course that was heretofore unthinkable, dumping the health care coverage they provide to their workers in exchange for paying penalty fees to the government.

Of course,some of us would argue that Democrats want employers to drop coverage since it's the quickest way to government controlled health care.

Greece's Workers Don't Like Being Pulled Off the Public Teat

The Greek economy is in shambles and the government can't pay its bills, so its parliament has enacted some austerity measures that pissed off the Greeks so much they rioted, killing 3 people.

Under terms of the bailout deal, Greece's government has announced a €30 billion package of measures that will slash public-sector wages, cut pensions, freeze public- and private-sector pay and liberalize Greece's labor laws. In addition, Greece has pledged to raise taxes—including a two-percentage-point increase in Greece's top value-added tax rate, to 23%—and to increase excise taxes for fuel, tobacco and alcohol.

The proposals met with stiff resistance Wednesday. Protesters and police clashed in front of parliament and fought running street battles at various points around the city. Demonstrators set fire to a media van from a Turkish television crew and burned two private vehicles and a fire truck.

It's like the children have been running Greece for too long and now the grownups are having to take over and administer some nasty medicine. The only problem is, when your entire country is on the dole, it's hard to get them to accept the unpleasant fact that there's no endless supply of money and that somebody has to get off their ass and make some dough to pay for things.

Wednesday's 24-hour general strike hobbled government services across Greece, shutting ministries and public offices. State hospitals and public utilities were operating with skeleton staff. Shopkeepers joined the strike at midday local time, while journalists, bank workers, teachers, court workers, lawyers and doctors also walked off the job. All flights in and out of Greek airports were canceled, while rail and ferry operations nationwide have been suspended.

It's a good thing nobody needed to go anywhere today.

Shades of November?

Dem Turnout Falls Off A Cliff

Turnout among Dem voters dropped precipitously in 3 statewide primaries on Tuesday, giving the party more evidence that their voters lack enthusiasm ahead of midterm elections.

In primaries in NC, IN and OH, Dems turned out at far lower rates than they have in previous comparable elections...

By contrast, GOP turnout was up almost across the board. 373K people voted in Burr's uncompetitive primary, nearly 9% higher than the 343K who voted in the equally non-competitive primary in '04. Turnout in House races in IN rose 14.6% from '06, fueled by the competitive Senate primary, which attracted 550K voters. And 728K voters cast ballots for a GOP Sec/State nominee in Ohio, the highest-ranking statewide election with a primary; in '06, just 444K voters cast ballots in that race.

I hope the momentum keeps up through the November election cycle. There's been some worry on talk radio that anger at the Democrats may have peaked too early, but I'm not convinced. When you have the nutroots working hard to discredit the Tea Party effect, you're probably doing something right. I will say this, though. I'm not as concerned that every person elected is a conservative, just a Republican. A politician who votes the way I want 20% of the time is still better than a Democrat.

UPDATE: A rebuttal to the anti-Tea Party argument from Hot Air's Ed Morrissey:

The Tea Party movement is really just half of the story. While Democrats can count on getting their most engaged voters to the polls in the midterms, they can no longer count on the occasional voter as they did in 2006 and especially in 2008. After almost four years of Nancy Pelosi and sixteen months of Barack Obama, the country has dug itself into a huge deficit hole and a moribund economy. The question is no longer who gets the blame for it, but whether Obama and the Democrats are the solution. The lack of enthusiasm among Democrats show that the answer is increasingly no.

President Obama will continue trying to pin the blame for everything wrong with his administration on his predecessor, but fewer voters believe him and more are just starting to label him a whiner and a bully.

NY Terrorist Wanted Revenge for Drone Attacks

As Allahpundit says, do we go with the "it's all Bush's fault" meme or do we blame President Obama?

He’s not lamenting civilian casualties caused by the drone strikes, he’s lamenting the fact that they’ve been too darned successful in decapitating the jihadist hydra in the area.

What this says to me is that the drone attacks are a good thing, even though ramping up the war in Afghanistan is surely a burr under the Democrats' saddle.

Obama and BP: Change You Can Believe In!

If you were wondering why it took President Obama so long to do anything about the oil spill in the Gulf, look no further than his relationship with BP, the owner of the spewing well. Apparently, Barack Obama has been the biggest recipient of BP money.

BP and its employees have given more than $3.5 million to federal candidates over the past 20 years, with the largest chunk of their money going to Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Donations come from a mix of employees and the company’s political action committees — $2.89 million flowed to campaigns from BP-related PACs and about $638,000 came from individuals.

On top of that, the oil giant has spent millions each year on lobbying — including $15.9 million last year alone — as it has tried to influence energy policy.

During his time in the Senate and while running for president, Obama received a total of $77,051 from the oil giant and is the top recipient of BP PAC and individual money over the past 20 years, according to financial disclosure records.

Now, there's nothing wrong, to me, with Barack Obama getting campaign contributions from PACs and individuals. After all, that's the way the law is. But the Luny Left should be furious that Teh One has pocketed more corporate cash from an eeeeeevillll oil company than those evil Republicans who are supposedly in the pockets of the oil industry. Instead, we have the nutbags trying to blame Dick Cheney for the oil spill. Ah, it must be tough to be a leftwinger these days when you have to dig back years to blame someone other than the guy you elected president.

Racist GOP Attracts Black Candidates

It is a conundrum wrapped in an enigma (at least, if you are a Democrat): why some black people are Republicans.

Party officials and the candidates themselves acknowledge that they still have uphill fights in both the primaries and the general elections, but they say that black Republicans are running with a confidence they have never had before. They credit the marriage of two factors: dissatisfaction with the Obama administration, and the proof, as provided by Mr. Obama, that blacks can get elected.

I largely look for the best qualified candidate for the job, not the color of their skin. Strange, I know.

"Two weeks after the explosion, the federal government doesn't have a plan to stop the damage from growing."

From Hugh Hewitt. But they sure do want to let you know that BP will be paying for it. That's reassuring. Of course, I'd be more reassured if the feds had been prepared for it.

Can you imagine what would have been in the press had GWB been president when this happened?

Quote of the Day

"They are not to do anything they please to provide for the general welfare, but only to lay taxes for that purpose. To consider the latter phrase not as describing the purpose of the first, but as giving a distinct and independent power to do any act they please which may be good for the Union, would render all the preceding and subsequent enumerations of power completely useless. It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please.... Certainly no such universal power was meant to be given them. It was intended to lace them up straightly within the enumerated powers and those without which, as means, these powers could not be carried into effect." --Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on National Bank, 1791

ZOMG!!!! They're Gonna Get Illegals For Code Violations, Too!!!11!!!

Some of my left-leaning friends are up in arms that the new Arizona law allows officers to check immigration status for code violations as well as traffic stops. One guy on a thread even argued that borders should be banned. I'm not making this up.

I understand the pro-illegal immigration people being up in arms that a state has finally gotten fed up with lax enforcement of immigration laws and is doing something about it. But seriously. Why must states sit idly by while the feds do nothing about enforcement, which upwards of 70% of Americans want done?

Preacher Arrested for Calling Homosexuality a Sin

My good friend Dana over at Common Sense Political Thought has often argued that once homosexual marriage is permitted throughout the U.S., the Catholic church (among others) will then be targeted if they won't perform weddings for gay couples in their churches. Leftwingers, naturally, pooh-pooh this as just so much fear-mongering, but when you read stories about what is happening elsewhere, you have to ask yourself if it wouldn't happen here, too.

Christian preacher arrested for saying homosexuality is a sin

Dale McAlpine was charged with causing “harassment, alarm or distress” after a homosexual police community support officer (PCSO) overheard him reciting a number of “sins” referred to in the Bible, including blasphemy, drunkenness and same sex relationships.

The 42-year-old Baptist, who has preached Christianity in Wokington, Cumbria for years, said he did not mention homosexuality while delivering a sermon from the top of a stepladder, but admitted telling a passing shopper that he believed it went against the word of God.

Police officers are alleging that he made the remark in a voice loud enough to be overheard by others and have charged him with using abusive or insulting language, contrary to the Public Order Act.

Regardless of how you feel about Christians quoting the Bible selectively, it seems to me that free speech allows a street preacher to, well, preach the Bible as he interprets it and let the listener make up his/her mind about the subject.

Couldn't happen here, right?

Violence at Protest Must've Been Tea Partiers

Oh, wait. It wasn't.
As Ed Morrissey notes,

After months of warning that Tea Party protests would erupt into violence, a wave of vandalism and violence crested in Santa Cruz this weekend. Masked protesters wielding torches swarmed through the business district, smashing windows and chanting “the streets are on fire!” and “Revolution!” It’s exactly the kind of armed uprising that Tea Party critics predicted … except that it didn’t erupt at a Tea Party(.)

Projection from the left, which, I'm sure, will be condemning the violence any minute now...

And maybe guys like this should rethink their rethinking of the GOP, the party that protects his individual rights and doesn't resort to violence when they protest.

Call It the Katrina Double Standard

Bill Maher: 'Why Isn’t Barack Obama Getting More S--t For This' Oil Spill?

I'm glad to see at least a couple on the left (the New York Times being the other one) willing to hold President Obama to the Katrina Standard when it comes to disasters. President Obama has been largely AWOL during the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, but you wouldn't know anything about that to read many lefty blogs (just go to Daily KOS for an example of leftwing amnesia).