This interview with Professor Carter was shown on New Zealand TV on Friday, April 18, 2008. He makes a lot more sense than Al Gore.
Wafflegate: Obama Refuses To Answer Tough Questions
Desperate not to screw up anymore before today’s election in PA, Obama has apparently been ducking the press for 11 days now, refusing to give press conferences, evading reporters even while flying with them, and dodging the few tough questions he gets:
In an exchange in a Scranton diner that may well lead to Obama being dogged by hapless young Republican volunteers dressed in foam waffle costumes come the general election, Aswini Anburajan of NBC asked the presidential hopeful what he thought of Jimmy Carter meeting Hamas. Visibly annoyed, Obama responded: “Why can’t I just eat my waffle? I’m just eating my waffle here.” Realising he was being videoed, he then winked at Anburajan and tried to make a joke of the moment. But it was too late.
Tony Harnden at the Telegraph has the whole story. And kudos to those in the MSM who have actually stepped up and started doing their job.
Europe Signs Away Sovereignty
The heads of all the states in the European Union have signed up to the Lisbon Treaty. Once this treaty is finally ratified, the EU acquires a constitution and becomes a legal entity, in effect the United States of Europe. Politicians and their bureaucrats in Brussels have settled the matter behind closed doors. None of the 27 countries involved was allowed to hold an election to say whether or not their people approved of the surrender of national sovereignty that is at the core of this unprecedented political experiment. Several countries, Britain among them, had promised to hold a referendum, but all, again led by Britain, found some crafty way to cheat on their promise.
The preceding paragraph opens a column by David Pryce-Jones on National Review Online. Do read the whole thing.
It is really hard for Americans to understand why the British or the Continentals go along with this sort of thing. Do I only imagine that I would refuse to sit passively by as I was deprived of the right to vote on my own future and that of my family? That we would just turn it all over to a bunch of unelected bureaucrats to decide about our laws and security and customs?
Our own notions of freedom and rights came from our British heritage. Now you have Labour Prime Minister Brown trying to figure out how to give the British people back some sense of patriotism, of Englishness. (In the meantime, they have dumped Winston Churchill out of the school curriculum as unimportant.) Gordon Brown commissioned a review of citizenship in order to find ways of “increasing a shared sense of belonging”.
According to Melanie Phillips, suggestions are that schoolchildren should swear an oath to the Queen and promise to obey the laws in a ceremony similar to those for new immigrants. Apparently British ministers look enviously at the way Americans pledge allegiance and proudly fly their flag, and feel that the right kind of loyalty oath will increase a feeling of Britishness.
But Gordon Brown misses the point. Americans rally to the flag, not because of a pledge, but because of great pride and belief in what their country stands for. We love our country for what it represents — freedom and equality — which are just superior to anything else. And because we believe so strongly in the importance of freedom, we are prepared to fight and die for it.
The facts of our history have thus made it easy for us to assume that our national life, as distinguished from that of the European peoples who trace their identity to a remote era, has had a clear purpose. Life in America — appropriately called the American Experiment — has again and again been described as the test or the proof of values supposed to have been clearly in the minds of the Founders. [Daniel Boorstin: Hidden History]
Never, Boorstin suggests, has there been a nation which so firmly believes that it was founded on a full-blown perfect theory. The words of Lincoln in 1863 affirm that “our fathers brought forth on this continent , a new nation, conceived in Liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal”.
It is worth reflecting on this a little at a time when sovereignty supposedly is so unimportant, and patriotism is derided. When former presidents are chatting with the enemy, and some make a big deal out of a decision not to wear a flag pin. There are many in our own country that believe that sovereignty is not a big deal and that international law and international governance might be desirable.
I’m Afraid These Children are the Future…
Remind me never to have surgery done by a University of Colorado graduate. Or anything else for that matter.
How NOT to campaign for McCain
Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels demonstrates the wrong way to rally Republicans.
“Global Warming” My Big, Fat, Frozen Butt!
It’s the middle of April and it’s snowing in Seattle. Seattle is known for rain, not snow — and for good reason. I’ve lived here since I was a toddler and we never get more than a few sporadic inches, and never past early January.
It’s April for crying out loud!!! I’m cold! Would everyone please run their car engines, turn on all the lights, and perhaps burn some oily rags in the fireplace?! This “global warming” crap is taking far too long!
Oh, what’s that you say? The globe hasn’t warmed in ten years and this past year has been the coldest on record since 1900? The polar ice caps are growing and the computer models that are the basis for all the global warming alarmism have been proven to be junk that can’t predict today let alone the future?
Then could someone tell me why we’re even talking about so-called “global warming” anymore? And while you’re at it, could you pass me a blanket?
Update: In the interest of full disclosure, the above photograph is not Seattle (it may or may not be the cascades), nor, as I have been reminded, is my butt big and fat. I claim artistic license!
ABC Incurs Liberal Wrath
…for daring to hold Obama and Hillary accountable. Imagine that! The mainstream media for once asks Obama and Hillary a handful of the kind of “gotcha” questions that Republicans almost exclusively get, and lefties are apoplectic!
An excellent measure of just what a powder-puff, love-fest, cake-walk Obama has been given thus far. If he chokes this badly under mild media pressure, perhaps he won’t be as difficult to defeat as I feared.
More Media Bias Schadenfreude
I only wish it were possible to NOT buy even more copies of the NYT. Even so, it warms the cockles of my “cold” conservative heart to watch that lying socialist propaganda rag continuing its journey down the toilet.
Pope v Hope
Brilliant!
Welcome to America, Your Holiness!
Update: The Anchoress is supplying excellent wall-to-wall coverage of all things Papal.
Up-Update: Highlights of His Holiness’ visit:
United States Army Chorus Performs “Battle Hymn of the Republic” for Pope Benedict XVI:
Kathleen Battle Sings “The Lord’s Prayer”:
President Bush welcomes His Holiness:
Pope Benedict XVI addresses Americans at the White House:
Only Because Obama Hasn’t TALKED to Them Yet!
From the Washington Post:
THREADED through the reports of progress in Iraq by Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker last week was the story of a larger failure: the inability of the United States and its allies to contain the growing aggressiveness of Iran. Since Gen. Petraeus and Mr. Crocker last reported to Congress seven months ago, Iranian-backed militias and “special groups” in Iraq have evolved from a shadow force into the largest remaining threat to U.S. forces and the Iraqi government. It was Iranian-supplied rockets that slammed into the Green Zone in recent days and Iranian-trained militants who stiffened the resistance to Iraqi government forces trying to gain control over the southern city of Basra. [read more]
Never fear! HOPE is here! If only Obama would TALK to them!
Good thing al Qaeda isn’t in Iraq!
Democrats on the Economy — Then and Now
Just another example of how completely full of “it” the Democrat party really is via David Freddoso:
Democrats on the Economy in 1996:
“Our economy is the healthiest it has been in three decades.”
~ Bill Clinton (State of the Union Address, January 23, 1996)
Democrats on the Economy in 2008:
“The bottom line is that this administration is the owner of the worst jobs record since Herbert Hoover.”
~ Senator Charles Schumer (Press Release, March 7, 2008 )
The problem, as Freddoso points out, every single key labor market statistic is better now than they were prior to the 1996 election when Democrats were praising the economy as the best in 30 years:
Key Labor Market Statistics in 1996 and 2008 |
||
| March 1996 | March 2008 | |
| 1. U.S. Unemployment Rate | 5.5% | 5.1% |
| 2. Number of Long-Term Unemployed | 1.33 million | 1.28 million |
| 3. Average Weeks Unemployed | 17.3 weeks | 16.2 weeks |
| 4. Median Weeks Unemployed | 8.3 weeks | 8.1 weeks |
| 5. Not in Labor Force because discouraged over job prospects | 451,000 | 401,000 |
| 6. Democrats calling for Extended Unemployment Benefits? | No | Yes |
| 7. President’s Party Affiliation | Democrat | Republican |
Iraqis Continue Putting Democrats to Shame
Democrats finally gave up their “The War is Lost” and “The Surge is a Failure!” mantras once it became undeniable that the Surge has been a great success. They have since adapted the argument that there has been no political progress in Iraq. Of course that’s complete horsehockey as well. Iraqi leaders have come together to pass many very difficult, contentious laws that required a great deal of cooperation, compromise and trust.
I think Democrat Senator Joe Lieberman said it best (echoing our observations) when questioning General Petraeus on Capitol Hill last week:
“Hey, let’s be honest about this: The Iraqi political leadership has achieved a lot more political reconciliation and progress since September than the American political leadership has.”
Now we learn that Iraqis are continuing that progress, heedless of Democrats dishonest claims to the contrary:
At the same time, Iraq’s Cabinet ratcheted up the pressure on anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr by approving draft legislation barring political parties with militias from participating in upcoming provincial elections.
Al-Sadr, who heads the country’s biggest militia, the Mahdi Army, has been under intense pressure from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, also a Shiite, to disband the Mahdi Army or face political isolation.
Al-Sadr’s followers are eager to take part in the local elections because they believe they can take power away from rival Shiite parties in the vast, oil-rich Shiite heartland of southern Iraq.
And in a new move to stem the flow of money to armed groups, the government ordered a crackdown on militiamen controlling state-run and private gas stations, refineries and oil distribution centers.
It is believed that gas stations and distribution centers, especially in eastern Baghdad and some southern provinces, are covertly controlled by Shiite militiamen dominated by the Mahdi Army.
Can someone please explain how Democrats can fault Iraqis for being more willing to compromise and making more political progress than they have themselves?
(Hat tip: Rich Lowry at The Corner)
