Wrong, wrong, wrong

Kerry's debate performance is being spun like a top, but while everyone in the MSM is focusing on his appearance and speaking skills, most everyone else is ignoring what he said.
Well, not everyone. Bill Hobbs takes a look at what Kerry said about a vital weapons system:

John Kerry thinks America having nuclear weapons is akin to terrorists and rogue regimes having them. Think about it. To Kerry, the danger is the bomb itself, not the motives and agendas of the government that is holding it. Thus, a succession of American presidents commanding an arsenal of nuclear weapons as a deterrent against a Soviet missile attack were morally equivalent to the Mad Mullahs of Tehran who have been threatening to obliterate Israel just as soon as they get a nuke.

The truth is, John Kerry's opposition to nuclear bunker busters would make America less safe if he is elected and able to kill the program. But it is entirely consistent with Kerry's anti-military ideology.

Read the whole section. Meanwhile, Power Line sees though all the spin as well:

Usually, candidates tend to reveal their true colors towards the end of a long debate. Tonight, Kerry did so at least three times. First, when asked to identify the most serious threat we face, he said it was nuclear proliferation, not terrorism. And he mentioned that he wrote a book about the subject, pre-9/11. This illustrates how, deep down, Kerry filters the war against terrorism through his lifelong "no nukes" leftist prism. Unfortunately, Bush didn't do much better in his response to the same question, broadening Kerry's answer to include all WMD in the hands of terrorists but not mentioning Islamofascism or Jihad. Kerry, who probably sensed his error, quickly endorsed Bush's view, with an assist from Jim Lehrer (who tossed Kerry more softballs than a batter practice pitcher at a church picnic). But soon thereafter, Kerry committed a more acute version of the same error when he argued that we were sending "mixed messages" by developing new nuclear weapons of our own, while talking about how to keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of terrorists. This was leftist "moral equivalence" at its worse, but again the president didn't call him on it. Finally, let's not forget Kerry's insistence on passing the global test, and his claim that in order to regain the world's respect we have "a lot of earning back to do." If the debate had lasted another half hour, Kerry might have been speaking French. There, I've almost talked myself into thinking that Kerry didn't win.

Times doing long piece on Intel failure

According to Drudge, this New York Times piece has been in the works for months. Such timing.

In 2002, at a crucial juncture on the path to war, senior members of the Bush administration gave a series of speeches and interviews in which they asserted that Saddam Hussein was rebuilding his nuclear weapons program. In a speech to veterans that August, Vice President Dick Cheney said Mr. Hussein could have an atomic bomb "fairly soon." President Bush, addressing the United Nations the next month, said there was "little doubt" about Mr. Hussein's appetite for nuclear arms.

....

Today, 18 months after the invasion of Iraq, investigators there have found no evidence of hidden centrifuges or a revived nuclear weapons program. The absence of unconventional weapons in Iraq is now widely seen as evidence of a profound intelligence failure, of an intelligence community blinded by "group think," false assumptions and unreliable human sources.

Yet the tale of the tubes, pieced together through records and interviews with senior intelligence officers, nuclear experts, administration officials and Congressional investigators, reveals a different failure.

Far from "group think," American nuclear and intelligence experts argued bitterly over the tubes. A "holy war" is how one Congressional investigator described it. That debate, which started in April 2001, produced two competing theories about the tubes. One, championed by the C.I.A., suggested a new nuclear menace. The other, advanced by the Energy Department, suggested a regime replenishing its rocket supply.

More questions on Oil for Food

I'm sort of stunned seeing this in the New York Times: The question is, will anything come of it, or will it have to first pass a Global Test?

Congressional investigators say that France, Russia and China systematically sabotaged the former United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq by preventing the United States and Britain from investigating whether Saddam Hussein was diverting billions of dollars.

In a briefing paper given yesterday to members of the House subcommittee investigating the program, the investigators said their review of the minutes of a United Nations Security Council subcommittee meeting showed that the three nations "continually refused to support the U.S. and U.K. efforts to maintain the integrity" of the program...

...The paper suggests that France, Russia and China blocked inquiries into Iraq's manipulation of the program because their companies "had much to gain from maintaining'' the status quo. "Their businesses made billions of dollars through their involvement with the Hussein regime and O.F.F.P.," the document states, using the initials for the program. No officials of the three governments could be reached for comment.

The paper also accuses the United Nations office charged with overseeing the program of having "pressed" contractors not to rigorously inspect Iraqi oil being sold and the foreign goods being bought. The program office, headed by Benan Sevan, who is also under investigation by a committee appointed by the United Nations, turned a blind eye to corruption charges, the paper says, because it apparently saw oil-for-food "strictly as a humanitarian program."

Cheat Sheets at Debate?

Is there anyone out there that can provide some screen shots of Thursday's night debate? A reader has passed this on from the Swift Vets Board and I'd like some additional confirmation on this:

I have just watched a replay of the opening of the debates (Available here, scroll down a bit). Right after Kerry shakes hands with Bush and Kerry steps behind the podium, Kerry pulls something out of the inside of his breast pocket. For all I know it could be a 'cheat' type sheet. It was not a hanky or kleenex. If that's the case, Kerry pulled a fast one on the country and his so-called debate abilities can be debunked. This is absolutely AGAINST the rules and should be questioned by the media and debate commission. What can I do to bring this to national medial attention?

Also...

According to the rules of the debate, neither campaign is to use any footage of the debate in a public forum. Of course, we know that Kerry's side went out immediately after the debate and ran footage of the President's facial expressions. The debate rules also stated that the speaking candidate was the only one who was supposed to be filmed but the media refused to accept that rule and filmed the non-speaking candidate anyhow.

A third rate...

I'm going to keep an eye on this one and see what comes out of it. But the democrats really couldn't be that stupid, could they?

SEATTLE -- The state's Bush-Cheney campaign headquarters in Bellevue were burglarized overnight and three laptop computers containing campaign plans were stolen, Republican Party officials said Friday.

Sometime between 2 a.m., when campaign workers went home, and 8 a.m., when the office reopened, a person threw a rock through the window of Jon Seaton, executive director for the state's Bush campaign, said Chris Vance, state GOP chairman.

Stolen were three laptops that Vance said belonged to Seaton and Chris Taylor, head of the office's get-out-the-vote campaign. A third computer had been slated for a field office.

Information on the computers included much of the Bush-Cheney campaign strategy for the state, he said.

With friends like these...

I think it's time we stop calling France our friend and ally. I wasn't aware of this quote, but it brings home what few are willing to admit:

Others want Iraq to fail because they want America to fail, with or without Bush. The bitter tone of U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan when he declared the liberation of Iraq "illegal" shows that it is not the future of Iraq but the vilification of the United States that interests him.

Add to this the recent bizarre phrase from French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin. The head of the Figaro press group went to see him about the kidnapping of two French journalists in Iraq; Raffarin assured him they would soon be freed, reportedly saying, "The Iraqi insurgents are our best allies."

In plain language, this means that, in the struggle in Iraq, Raffarin does not see France on the side of its NATO allies — the U.S., Britain, Italy and Denmark among others — but on the side of the "insurgents."

More news from the Future: AP reports from the debate, 3 hours before it happens!

ABC has pulled the AP report down from their site but not before a blogger could archive it.

The 90-minute encounter was particularly crucial for Kerry, trailing slightly in the polls and struggling for momentum less than five weeks before the election. The Democratic candidate faced the challenge of presenting himself as a credible commander in chief after a torrent of Republican criticism that he was prone to changing his positions.

Bush was expected to confront questions about leading the nation into war on the still-unproven premise that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. He also has faced accusations that he lacked a strategy to deal with the violence and chaos that have left more than 1,000 Americans dead and that the Iraq war has diverted U.S. attention from al-Qaida and other terrorists.

With a record of four years in office to defend, Bush had a debate strategy of being optimistic about Iraq but acknowledging that times were tough. His stance is that Americans know he is a decisive leader even if they don't always agree with his decisions and that Kerry has taken conflicting positions on Iraq and can't be trusted to lead the nation.

Although Kerry voted to give Bush authority to invade Iraq, he says he would not have followed Bush's path to war a path that alienated allies and, the Democrat says, left Americans less secure. Kerry argues Bush is out of touch with reality, paints too rosy a picture about Iraq and lacks a strategy to end the crisis.

Kerry also says Bush has neglected other major problems like North Korea and Iran, two nations suspected of pursing nuclear weapons

Who do they think they are fooling?

Hollywood wisdom

Any of you out there see "Lost in Translation?" It's the movie with Bill Murray about a washed out actor dealing with a stay in Tokyo, Japan and hanging out with a lady that's way too young for him. Anyhow, there's a character in the flick that is a brainless blonde actress that is staying in the same hotel. A true airhead. Rumor has it that she was based on Cameron Diaz. After reading this wisdom from today's Oprah show, I can see why she was used as the inspiration for an idiot.

Rules? We don't need no steenking rules!

This one needs no comment. It's going to get ugly between now and November:

(09-30-2004) - Democratic candidate John Kerry's campaign demanded Thursday that the lights signaling when a speaker's time has expired during debates with President Bush be removed from the lecterns because they are distracting, but the commission hosting the debates refused.

An angry exchange between representatives of the Kerry campaign and the Commission on Presidential Debates took place just hours before the candidates were to meet at the University of Miami for the first of three debates, The Associated Press learned. Kerry's team threatened to remove the lights when they visit the debate site with Kerry later in the day.

"We'll bring a screwdriver," said a Kerry aide familiar with what several people called an angry exchange. The commission did not return a call seeking comment.

Look out for the spin

This should have been expected:

Terry McAuliffe and the Democrats are getting increasingly desperate.

The DNC has sent out an e-mail to their suscribers in an attempt to influence the "post-debate spin."

Subscribers are being asked to writer letters to the editor, call talk radio, and vote in online polls.

Sounds like they're picking up the practice of "Freeping"

Debunking the fraud...before the fraud is committed

Word to document hoaxers. Don't try to fool the Bloggers. You will get burned. Case in point from Wizbang:

The blogosphere is abuzz that there might be an authoritative expert by the name of David E. Hailey, Jr., Ph.D. who might have proven the CBS documents are legit.

The Boston Globe is so excited they are getting ready to run with it.

I hope they do. Dr. Hailey is a liar, a fraud and a charlatan.

And I have the goods.

And does he ever. Read the whole thing.

Is MoveOn getting an advanced look at CBS stories?

The Volokh Conspiracy has a few observations about why MoveOn is demanding that a CBS story that hasn't even run yet be put on the air:

Wizbang explains how MoveOn knew about what CBS had said in a story that hadn't run yet. It appears that CBS gave a tape of their half-hour story (before its scheduled broadcast) to organizations that share CBS's orientation, such as Salon. Salon has a long, credulous description of CBS's story, with direct quotes (nonmembers are subjected to a long ad to get a free day pass to Salon Premium).

Talk about collusion. CBS sinks further and further into the muck.

Truth? We don't need no steenking Truth?

INDC Interviewed the CBS Evening News and got some Rather interesting quotes, one about the story that ran the other night about those fake e-mails about the "draft":

INDC: "Ok, the e-mails in the story have been criticized because they've been debunked online for some time, why did you use them?"
Karas: "The truth of the e-mails were absolutely irrelevant to the piece, because all the story said was that people were worried. It’s a story about human beings that are afraid of the draft. We did not say that this (e-mail) was true, it’s just circulating. We are not verifying the e-mail."

Sigh...

CBS Alters Broadcast Transcript

From LGF:

CBS News is now trying to cover up their failure to identify Beverly Cocco as a chapter president of “People Against the Draft.”
The transcript of their broadcast from last night is here: CBS News - The Issues: Reviving The Draft.
Rathergate.com has a video capture of the broadcast, and this line is absolutely not in Richard Schlesinger’s report as it aired last night.

What the hell does the press think it's doing?

Ace has the details on a media scandal that isn't getting the attention it deserves:

The Justice Department has charged that a veteran New York Times foreign correspondent warned an alleged terror-funding Islamic charity that the FBI was about to raid its office — potentially endangering the lives of federal agents.

The stunning accusation was disclosed yesterday in legal papers related to a lawsuit the Times filed in Manhattan federal court.

The suit seeks to block subpoenas from the Justice Department for phone records of two of its Middle Eastern reporters — Philip Shenon and Judith Miller — as part of a probe to track down the leak.

Read the whole thing.

Intense Fighting Throughout Iran?

This report isn't making any of the wires that I'm aware of yet, but it's making it's way through the Blogsphere:

Reports over the past 24 - 48 hours via several important information services such as SMCCDI, Peykeiran, Zagros and direct email reports and phone calls from Iranian citizens is beginning to shine light on what at this time looks to be country-wide fighting and quickly escalating into what could potentially become a freedom revolution.

Several independent citizen sources have reported the formation of significant crowds throughout the country, and have heard many loud explosions and gun shots, including in the cities of Tehran, Esfahan, and Shiraz.

SMCCDI and Peykeiran have both reported intense battles between freedom-loving Iranian citizens and the regime's fanatical militias in the village of Meeyan Do Ab. Both sources are reporting many deaths and injuries both to the villagers and regime's forces.

In the past week and recent days, many regional commanders and leaders of the regime's militias have been targeted and killed along with many of their militiamen.

Initial reports from Iranian online news sources as well as from western satellite news media are reporting intense fighting throughout Iran, and report that such fighting is increasing at a constant rate.

Torpedo #7 away!

Just in time for the debates:

WASHINGTON, D.C. --- Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a non-partisan, non-profit group representing more than 250 Swift Boat veterans who served with Senator John Kerry in Vietnam, announced today they are joining forces with a group of American prisoners of war who were held captive by the North Vietnamese during the Vietnam War. The merger coincides with a new $1.4 million television ad campaign released by the new group Swift Vets and POWs For Truth.

“We welcome the POWs to this battle on behalf of truth, the real truth of who John Kerry is and how he betrayed his fellow veterans. His visits to Paris to meet with the enemy – and his subsequent public endorsement of their so-called ‘peace plan’ – only served to encourage our enemies and prolong the captivity of our POWs,” said Admiral Roy Hoffmann, founder of Swift Vets and POWs for Truth.

“For John Kerry to now claim that his activities were part of an effort to help solve the POW problem is absolutely ludicrous. Kerry encouraged the North Vietnamese to keep us in captivity longer which meant more torture, more lost years and, sadly, more death,” said Vietnam POW Ken Cordier who was held captive for six years and three months and was awarded two Silver Stars, a Bronze Star, and a Purple Heart among other decorations.

View it here.

By the way, Stolen Honor, the documentary about Vietnam POWs and Kerry, is now online.

Voter fraud seems to be everywhere

Michelle Malkin has some updates on the latest attempts at voter fraud which seems to be all over the country.

Bill Hobbs has links here and also here.

Remember, If It's Not Close, They Can't Cheat.

The Draft: Kerry Advocates Mandatory Service to Graduate from High School

With all the bogus stories flying around out there about a possible return of the draft, it would appear that CBS and those on the left are overlooking one important fact. It would appear that John Kerry himself is pushing a plan to create a "New Army of Patriots."

On a page that has been pulled from the official John Kerry site, but stored forever in the Web Archives of the Wayback Machine, details for these plans are clearly outlined. Here's just a sample:

...John Kerry believes that in these times, we need to bolster these efforts with a nationwide commitment to national service. Whether it is a Summer of Service for our teenagers, helping young people serve their country in return for college, or the Older Americans in Service program, John Kerry's plan will call on every American of every age and every background to serve. John Kerry will set a goal of one million Americans a year in national service within the next decade.

John Kerry Outlines Plan to Require Service for High School Students

...As part of his 100 day plan to change America, John Kerry will propose a comprehensive service plan that includes requiring mandatory service for high school students and four years of college tuition in exchange for two years of national service.

"Service for College" Initiative

...A Kerry Administration will offer Americans the chance to earn the equivalent of their state's four-year public college tuition in exchange for two years of service. If service members decide not to go to college, their award can be used for job training or to help start a business. John Kerry will set a national goal of half a million young people serving their nation every year within ten years.

100,000 Older Americans in Service

As President, John Kerry will defend and strengthen vital programs such as Medicare and Social Security, but he also believes on calling on America's seniors to give their time, experience, and expertise to an America that needs their help. As President, John Kerry would create the Retired Not Tired Program. ... Alternatively, seniors will be able to use these funds to defray their own health care costs. John Kerry plans to engage 100,000 seniors a year in service in the next decade.

High School Service Requirement

As President, John Kerry will ensure that every high school student in America performs community service as a requirement for graduation. This service will be a rite of passage for our nation’s youth and will help foster a lifetime of service. States would design service programs that meet their community and educational needs.

Creating a New Community Defense Service

John Kerry believes we must create a new Community Defense Service to be guided by our nation’s first responders. This service would be comprised of hundreds of thousands of Americans in neighborhoods all over the country.

A Summer of Service for Teenagers

Thirteen to seventeen year olds are too old for child care and too young for many summer jobs. John Kerry believes we should tap their energy and idealism through a summer of service learning. Supervised by AmeriCorps members, these young people could help out in nursing homes, clean up local areas, or teach seniors computer skills. In turn, they would receive a $500 grant to apply to their college or vocational educations down the road.

To me, a lot of this sounds like indentured servitude...blatant socialism. "The Nations Youth Resources?" Where have we heard this before? Forcing children into civilian service? Who are they kidding?

Hey kid! Want to graduate? You owe Uncle Sam two free years of your life! Yo Grandma! You want all your medicines and health care? Give us 10 hours a week!

"From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs..."

UPDATE: A reader says the following:

Looks like the Kerry Serivce plan was moved (not really "pulled" unless you consider that it looks much revised from the previous info).

here:
http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/national_service/

and here:
http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/national_service/plan.html

Anyhow, it's saved on the Wayback Machine. Thanks goodness for Sherman and Mr. Peabody.

CBS uses fake e-mails on draft issue

According to RatherBiased, CBS News aired a story tonight about those fake e-mail running around about the draft!

Three weeks after he denounced the internet as being "filled with rumors," the embattled CBS anchor ran a story on his Tuesday "Evening News" program hoping to stir up fear of an impending military draft.
In a story that was a textbook example of slipshod reporting, CBS reporter Richard Schlesinger used debunked internet hoax emails and an unlabeled interest group member to scare elderly "Evening" viewers into believing that the U.S. government is poised to resume the draft.

The RatherBiased posting then breaks down which far left groups was used in this totally BS report.

Also left out of the CBS story was the fact that while there are two bills in Congress that are seeking to reestablish the draft, both of them (S-89 and HR-163) are sponsored exclusively by Democrats and have been pronounced DOA by the Republican leadership.

Ye Gods! I've been harping on this for the last ten days and have included links to those very piece of legislation, yet CBS, with all of their fact checkers couldn't put this into their report...

Unless of course, that was done on purpose. RatherBaised also has the transcript and video of the report.

ONG BAK!!!! Teaser trailer in up!

"The film action fans have been waiting for since Bruce Lee...Introducing the new superstar of martial arts....Tony Jaa."

ONG BAK -- The Thai Warrior

See review here. I've had the DVD from overseas since March. It's time America sees this guy. You will not believe it. No wires or CGI.

If you have to leave, take good care...

...I guess he met a lot of not-so-nice friends out there...

TORONTO - Yusuf Islam, the British singer formerly known as Cat Stevens, was the guest of honour at a Toronto fundraising dinner hosted by an organization that has since been identified by the Canadian government as a "front" for the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.

In a videotape of the 1998 event obtained by the National Post, Mr. Islam describes Israel as a "so-called new society" created by a "so-called religion" and urges the audience to donate to the Jerusalem Fund for Human Services to "lessen the suffering of our brothers and sisters in Palestine and the Holy Land."

Hire a lawyer, Dan

Trouble brewing for the folks at CBS?

There is ample evidence of criminal intent by CBS both pre-broadcast and post-broadcast. One as-yet unrealized consequence (other than to CBS Legal) is that communications between a lawyer and client are no longer privileged when the subject matter is furthering a crime or a fraud. The Texas forgery code provides that publication of two or more fake government documents is a felony. Hence, discussions between CBS Legal and CBS producers are fair game – they are not privileged.

Read the whole thing.

The vile spectacle of Democrats rooting for bad news in Iraq and Afghanistan

Why does it take an admitted lefty like Christopher Hitchens to spell out to the democrats what we on the right have been saying all along?

"What will it take to convince these people that this is not a year, or a time, to be dicking around? . . . How can the Democrats possibly have gotten themselves into a position where they even suspect that a victory for the Zarqawi or Bin Laden forces would in some way be welcome to them? Or that the capture or killing of Bin Laden would not be something to celebrate with a whole heart?"

Maybe Chris, because they care more about power and their party than their country? Hat tip to Instapundit.

More wisdom from France

France is sticking their nose in it again...and guess what they want to talk about and who they want taking part in the discussion:

WASHINGTON — France said Monday that it would take part in a proposed international conference on Iraq only if the agenda included a possible U.S. troop withdrawal, thus complicating the planning for a meeting that has drawn mixed reactions.

Paris also wants representatives of Iraq’s insurgent groups to be invited to a conference in October or November, a call that would seem difficult for the Bush administration to accept.

That's right, the French think that the men who kidnap civilians, chop off their heads and use suidide bombers should be invited in for a friendly chat. You don't talk to these animals, you kill them. Each and every one of them. It is time that we see the French for what they really are.

Collaborators with terrorists.

Misplaced Anger

The NBC station in Atlanta now has a story up about how the widow of one of the civilians recently beheaded is lashing out at the Bush administration:

Hensley, who was working as a civilian in Iraq, was kidnapped along with two housemates. Last week, those captors beheaded Hensley and Eugene Armstrong, both Americans. The fate of the third hostage, Kenneth Bigley of Britain, is still not known.

“We truly believed he was safe and the situation was going to work out for him and unfortunately, it didn’t,” Pati Hensley said on the show.

She said she criticized the Bush administration’s policies in Iraq when the White House called to confirm her husband’s death.

“I really feel it’s time for them to take care of Americans and to stop being the world peacemaker,” she said.

While we all grieve for this woman's loss, I can't help thinking that her anger is very misplaced. Her husband was a civilian, not a member of our Armed Forces that was ordered to go over there. He went over there as part of his job of his own free will and wasn't forced to do so. He could have said "no." She may want to talk to the company he was working for and ask what kind of security was provided for her husband. I noticed that the company nor the work they did was mentioned in the story.

She is probably out of her mind with grief right now, and I feel that NBC and other networks are exploiting the grief of these families by asking political question about the horrific, public murders of these men. The media stake out their homes like vultures, and as soon as the deaths are confirmed, they are banging on the front door, asking for a comment. If I had lost a family member like this, the last place I'd want to be is being interviewed on the Today Show.

If we need to blame anyone, it's the Islamofascists and their supporters, not the president.

Damned by his own words

Read the whole thing:

So is it plausible for John Kerry to have believed in 1997 that Saddam was a grave threat requiring the use of significant, preemptive, and unilateral military force but to now, more than five years later and in a post-9/11 world, stand before us and argue the opposite? It is not.

John Kerry's own words both then and now damn him as a man who changes his beliefs and positions based on political expediency and nothing more.

Ankle-biters?

What is it with these folks in the Old Media? It would appear that there isn't very many of them that are taking the drubbing that they are getting from the Blogsphere very well. I thought that getting feedback from their readers was suppose to be a good thing and make them better journalists. Instead, we get cracks about sitting around in our underwear and such. Here's the lastest swipe from Newsweek:

I celebrate the liberating tools that let people post their thoughts unfiltered. But as with many other utopian predictions about how the open nature of the Net will create arenas that transcend foibles of the physical world, our faults have followed us to cyberspace. We were promised a society of philosophers. But the Blogosphere is looking more and more like a nation of ankle-biters.

Instapundit weighs in on this as well, and has a good point about how "our betters" are treating us.

In his opinion, I should be blogging on health care. Maybe I would be, if Big Media covered things like the Cambodia story honestly, as it did not. (Even now, Levy doesn't mention the Kerry campaign's admission that he wasn't there.) Indeed, as I wrote back when the Cambodia issue was hot, "the press -- and this, to me, is the most interesting and disturbing part of the story -- has been shamelessly covering for Kerry." That seemed like a big deal to me, and still does. Follow the link to read much more on that subject.

I've always thought well of Levy, and I'm sure that he didn't intend to misrepresent my meaning. But -- as is so often the case with Big Media folks -- he came in to the interview with his storyline predetermined, and he put things into that mold whether they fit or not. (It also, as always, makes me wonder where else this is happening without my noticing it.)

"Predetermined." As in yesterday's 10 page story on blogs that already had it's mind made up.

Who supported Hitler?

Once again, the old "Bush's granddaddy helped Hitler" smear is out there again, this time via the Guardian from across the pond.

While there is no suggestion that Prescott Bush was sympathetic to the Nazi cause, the documents reveal that the firm he worked for, Brown Brothers Harriman (BBH), acted as a US base for the German industrialist, Fritz Thyssen, who helped finance Hitler in the 1930s before falling out with him at the end of the decade. The Guardian has seen evidence that shows Bush was the director of the New York-based Union Banking Corporation (UBC) that represented Thyssen's US interests and he continued to work for the bank after America entered the war.

So, in other words, Grandpa Bush once worked for a bank that handled money for someone who was initially a friend of Hitler...and then wasn't. Boy, what a real bombshell this is.

Well, two can play at that game.

During May of 1938, Kennedy engaged in extensive discussions with the new German Ambassador to the Court of St. James's, Herbert von Dirksen. In the midst of these conversations (held without approval from the U.S. State Department), Kennedy advised von Dirksen that President Roosevelt was the victim of "Jewish influence" and was poorly informed as to the philosophy, ambitions and ideals of Hitler's regime. (The Nazi ambassador subsequently told his bosses that Kennedy was "Germany's best friend" in London.)

Columnists back in the states condemned Kennedy's fraternizing. Kennedy later claimed that 75% of the attacks made on him during his Ambassadorship emanated from "a number of Jewish publishers and writers. ... Some of them in their zeal did not hesitate to resort to slander and falsehood to achieve their aims." He told his eldest son, Joe Jr., that he disliked having to put up with "Jewish columnists" who criticized him with no good reason.

Like his father, Joe Jr. admired Adolf Hitler. Young Joe had come away impressed by Nazi rhetoric after traveling in Germany as a student in 1934. Writing at the time, Joe applauded Hitler's insight in realizing the German people's "need of a common enemy, someone of whom to make the goat. Someone, by whose riddance the Germans would feel they had cast out the cause of their predicament. It was excellent psychology, and it was too bad that it had to be done to the Jews. The dislike of the Jews, however, was well-founded. They were at the heads of all big business, in law etc. It is all to their credit for them to get so far, but their methods had been quite unscrupulous ... the lawyers and prominent judges were Jews, and if you had a case against a Jew, you were nearly always sure to lose it. ... As far as the brutality is concerned, it must have been necessary to use some ... ."

Brutality was in the eye of the beholder. Writing to Charles Lindbergh shortly after Kristallnacht in November of 1938, Joe Kennedy Sr. seemed more concerned about the political ramifications stemming from high-profile, riotous anti-Semitism than he was about the actual violence done to the Jews. "... Isn't there some way," he asked, "to persuade [the Nazis] it is on a situation like this that the whole program of saving western civilization might hinge? It is more and more difficult for those seeking peaceful solutions to advocate any plan when the papers are filled with such horror." Clearly, Kennedy's chief concern about Kristallnacht was that it might serve to harden anti-fascist sentiment at home in the United States.

So, do you folks on the left really want the conversation to go in this direction? Hm?

The Force is weak with this one...now, I'm inspiring 'toons

Got this one via e-mail yesterday, but couldn't see the graphic until today for some reason. Looks like I'm going to have to tell more jokes like this one.

Mommy, make it stop!

Sigh...

SPRING GREEN, United States (AFP) -Democratic presidential challenger John Kerry appealed for an end to the TV advertising war that has marked his election battle against President George W. Bush.

How is Kerry going to fight the terrorists if he can't take someone playing clips of his own statements without throwing a hissy fit?

Kerry: I Was For The First Gulf War After I Was Against It

Bill Hobbs has an interesting look at another one of Kerry's flip-flops.

Say what?

Light blogging today. First off, OpinionJournal has a couple of whoppers from John Kerry's second wife, who doesn't seem to realize that Congress has a say in some things, like health care. But the real telling quote is this one about how to fight terrorism:

"The way we live in peace in a family, in a marriage, in the world, is not by threatening people, is not by showing off your muscles. It's by listening, by giving a hand sometimes, by being intelligent, by being open and by setting high standards."

Yeah, as that will really help. If some nutjob is at my door telling me to convert to Islam or lose my head, I'm not inviting him in for milk and cookies and a nice, quiet chat....I'm going for Mr. Colt to administer Headache Cure #.45.

Also, I don't understand why someone who asks a question during a question and answer session can be called a "heckler".

Trying the draft issue...again

Geez, these people just never give up, do they? Now Newsweek is trying to push this phony draft issue that the democrats are using to try to scare the young, stupid and stoned, not to mention their parents. MSNBC gave it some cyberink recently, leaving out some important facts, like whose idea it was in the first place. Then there's that hoaxed spam that's hitting e-mail boxes all over college campuses. Well now, here's Jonathan Alter to try to make a bunch of kids and their moms soil themselves over something that just isn't going to happen:

While Bush has no plans to reinstate a draft, he could be forced into it by events. Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel, a likely presidential candidate in 2008, says that a draft "might become necessary" in the years ahead. The threshold question before the election is this: which candidate is more likely to have so few international friends amid a crisis that he would have to move beyond the all-volunteer force? This question takes the seemingly arcane issue of burden-sharing and brings it home to the American heartland. If we need, God forbid, to occupy another country that truly threatens the United States, we will either do it with the help of our allies or with the conscription of our kids.

Lots of coulds, ifs, mights, maybes and hypothetical questions about worse case situations in the article...which seem to be part of the gloom and doom that the democrats push daily.

Once again...

...let me repeat it again:

Bill Summary & Status for the 108th Congress S.89. Hollings (D-SC) sponsored it. It has no other sponsors. The Republicans have kept it bottled up in committee for nearly two years.

Bill Summary & Status for the 108th Congress H.R.163. Sponsored by Rangel (D-NY). All the co-sponsors are Democrats. Not one Republican. It's been held up since March 2003.

Not. Gonna. Happen.

Another "conspiracy"

Someone over at Democratic Underground, home of many a four-letter word and way-out-there nutty theories about Karl Rove being an evil mastermind, has loaded up the bong with the killer stuff and cranked out this laughable conspiracy theory on Rathergate.

It would be funny if it wasn't so pathetic.

Another Rathergate connection?

Allah has the details.

Blogs from the right? WHAT blogs from the right?

The New York Times Magazine has published a lengthy piece entitled "Fear and Laptops on the Campaign Trail", which is about political blogs. That's fine, expect there's one glaring problem.

There's no coverage of blogs from the right. They're all from the far left. Every. Single. One.

LGF puts it best.

There is not one word about the anti-idiotarian blogosphere. No LGF. No Roger L. Simon. No Michael Totten. No Allah. No Belmont Club. No Power Line. No INDC Journal. No Command Post. No Michele. No Cox & Forkum. No Rantburg.

Instead, readers are treated to interviews with folks like Markos Zuniga, the owner of Daily Kos. You may remember that's where that now infamous, horrific comment was made when the four American civilian contractors strung up like pieces of raw meat in Falluja. Oh, you remember: Zuniga wrote, "I feel nothing over the death of mercenaries," and then added, "Screw them."

Ace throws in his two cents, but is a little more direct about it:

Gee, PowerLine LGF refuted a 60 Minutes story and put the entire CBS News organization in a state of crisis, and Wonkette tells dick-jokes (bad ones, actually). Who's more newsworthy?

Why, f@#&ing Wonkette, of course.

It's unbelievable. Instapundit gets a brief mention, Kaus gets a paragraph, FreeRepublic gets one passing reference, and then back to Kos, Marshall, Wonkette

He's got a point about the jokes--the humor on the right is way better than what is cranked out by the left. My little thing about Kerry and C-3PO caused many a computer screen to be sprayed with coffee or soft drinks via readers' noses, while the best that the lefties can do is make vile puns involving the president's last name and a lady's pubic region. Why aren't we surprised that the title of this garbage is a rip off of Hunter S. Thompson? It probably required the same amount of pharmaceutical inspiration to crank out ten pages of this bile posing as news. Who do they think they are fooling?

Kerry vs. Boots on the Ground

Blogs for Bush takes a look at the difference between Kerry's recent comments about Iraq as opposed to someone who is actually there every day.