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Ace of Spades calls out ABC for mocking Matt Drudge’s scoop yesterday and then disappearing it when it turned out to be true.
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Obama lying about his own record yet calling others the liars. How does he keep things straight? And after the Edwards coverup, shouldn’t the msm be making it a point to look into these things??

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More.

The DNC really believes in security. Not.
Sheesh people, get a vetter.

Question: Isn’t it big news when a leading candidate for president of the U.S. admits that since 2003 he has been lying about a vote he once made? Even more to the point, isn’t it big news when the candidate himself was on TV not long before that admission saying that everyone else is the liar? So, why is the media silent on the 180 degree about face that the Obama campaign has just made concerning Obama’s BAIP vote?

Fun Facts

Seems the UK just doesn’t know anything about the US of A.

The “Debate”

I had to go with that title, because JK basically stole my own title and post. (ps – he did this before, yes, before I posted. He must be reading my mind is all I can figure. scary.)

AN AWESOME (NON) DEBATE

He’s right. It was an awesome nondebate. Rick Warren did great at treating each candidate respectfully and fairly. He didn’t go for the stupid “Why did you take the flag pin off?” type questions.

We learned a lot about each candidate and they both did very well in their own ways.
As JK said, after Obama left the stage I assumed he won. When McCain got on I kept waiting for a problem but he didn’t have one. When he left the stage it was clear he had won.

Clearly McCain has a lifetime of experiences to draw on. Obama has the “on the other hand” way of thinking that is very appealing to a lot of people. I suspect that for a President, most people will be looking for a decisive person who doesn’t wallow in the intricacies of every single perspective out there. But we’ll see.

A few specifics

I was very happy to see McCain share some very personal stories. Not only in Vietnam but when he opposed Reagan over placing the marines in Lebanon or the failure of his first marriage.

I think Obama was honest and not just being grateful/thankful when he said that he would rely on his wife for guidance. Good? Bad? You decide.

McCain was clear that to him life begins at conception. I’m a bit of a stickler on this with people, because theoretically this would mean that he would outlaw hormonal birth control. (conception = when the egg is fertilized. Hormonal birth control disallows this fertilized egg from implanting itself and hence no pregnancy. It all happen post conception though.)
I know McCain has to go for the clear answer without the “nuance”, and no one wants to hear the science, but he stated “Life begins at Conception.” Period. There is no nuance in that answer but I suspect there is some in the results and I want to know more.

Obama’s answer was definitely more nuanced. What I don’t get is why he can’t come out and be clear that
-yes, there are problems defining when life begins, and
-yes, we want fewer unwanted pregnancies, but
-NO, the government should not be interfering with what a woman does with her own self.

Obama nuanced himself right around that by focusing on the baby/fetus vs the woman. Here is Obama’s response to the question(s) concerning this.

Obama nuanced himself out of good and evil also. Yes evil does come from wanting to do good sometimes but,……… yeah? (See the crusades, Salem witch [sp fixed] hunts, Native “conversions”.)

McCain was crystal clear that evil was not us. Osama bin Laden thinks he’s doing good by eventually converting the world to Islam.
-Obama would see that. Nuance.
-McCain doesn’t give a rip. Osama is evil. No nuance.

So we’ll see. It was a very good juxtaposition. This election will say a lot about the electorate these days. At least I hope so. I hope that people care enough to learn a little something about these 2 men and vote for whom they think will be the better president.

For me – John McCain and his version.

Now, go read JK,
and read Bryon York
and Michael Gerson and William Kristol
and Rich Lowry

“Hey Putin…”

Click here to see 3 emails to Putin. One from each Bush/Obama/McCain.

ht Vodkapundit.

A Nation of Whiners?

David Brooks seems confused. He wrote this oped about the differences between American culture and most Asian cultures.

The world can be divided in many ways — rich and poor, democratic and authoritarian — but one of the most striking is the divide between the societies with an individualist mentality and the ones with a collectivist mentality.

That was on the 11th.

Then today he wrote this oped where he’s confused by apparent lack of grief in China. He interviewed a man who had lost his wife in the big earthquake in May.

This week, he sat on the spot of her death, telling the story with a matter-of-fact, almost cheerful air. A small group of villagers was hanging around, and the interview, outside under a tarp, was a communal affair. The villagers joked with each other and smiled frequently in a manner I found hard to fathom as they described the horrible events from May.

Uh – David…..people in China grieve, but they would of course go about it differently. They don’t expect their government to prevent death. They realize that others grieve also and they believe we all work together to overcome odds. Read your first column dude.

Mr. Brooks has a great respect for these attitudes ending with

I don’t know if it’s emotionally sustainable or even healthy, but it raises at least one interesting question. When you compare these people to the emotional Sturm und Drang over lesser things on reality TV, you do wonder if we Americans are a nation of whiners.

Maybe he needs to write a column on American culture. The can-do spirit and the idea that everything can be improved upon. If there is a disaster it’s only because someone didn’t do their job right and by george we could do it better. We haven’t dealt with poverty/disaster/totalitarian govt forever and we know we have choices. What would be the point of just “accepting” and going about our business vs cursing the night when we know we can create a light bulb?

Culture Mr. Brooks. Culture. Sheesh – I understand that and I’m a redneck!

Obama during a crisis

Still “leading from behind”.

Even the NYTimes can see it.

I sincerely thought that Obama would start acting Presidential within a couple days of the Georgian situation. First though stay calm, don’t jump to conclusions. People appreciate that. (even though McCain knew the whole situation so well, there was no jumping at all, just pointing out the conclusions.)

Once he was caught up by what I had hoped were his many and smart advisors, I assumed he would take a break from his vacation, go to DC, give some advice on diplomacy either via speeches or interviews or even direct phone calls. This way he could “show us what he’s got”.

Sadly, he did.
He’s got nothin.

From Hot air:

McCain spent the week leading the American response in a real way, forcing the White House to catch up. Obama spent the week … body surfing and golfing. For a candidate who already has a confidence deficit on national security and foreign policy among voters, Obama seems strangely disengaged on what is the most crititcal and emergent foreign-policy issue of the campaign. He has taken a strangely passive path, and the contradictory statements by his surrogates have made Obama seem even more vacillating than usual.

Most interestingly, the media has finally started to notice.

Peter Beinart: “It’s true because I say it’s true.”

This column struck me as amazing this morning. It’s concerning the election and Mr. Beinart is suggesting that Barack needs to take up the question of race, ask for affirmative action by class and then win the discussion on race.

That’s not the amazing part.

But it is going to be about race, at least in part. That’s the lesson of recent weeks, when the McCain campaign brought up race (on the pretext that Obama had brought it up first).

Pretext??

Race will be central to this campaign because McCain needs it to be. He simply doesn’t have many other cards to play.

HAHAHAHAHAHA. McCain has too many cards to count in this race. I’m amazed he doesn’t lay them all down at once except that the ‘underdog’ usually gets some sympathy press anyway.

The history of post-Vietnam presidential elections is littered with Democratic nominees who thought they could run on policy and ignore symbolism.

Would that be the John Kerry, “I’m a war hero” campaign?

Think about it this way: Many of the voters who right now won’t vote for Obama because he’s black would probably vote for Colin Powell even though he’s black. That’s because they don’t see Powell as a racial redistributionist, a guy who would favor his community at their expense. There’s no rational reason to believe Obama would, either.

“no rational reason…” “NO rational reason……”? How about his church? I don’t actually believe that he would, but NO Rational Reason??

Unbelievable.

I don’t even think that Obama believes this crap.

Good, no, GREAT News from Iraq

King Abdullah of Jordan visited.
Here’s the story copied in it’s entirety from the Jordan Times.
This is HUGE progress!

JT and agencies

AMMAN/BAGHDAD – His Majesty King Abdullah on Monday held talks in Baghdad with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and Vice President Adel Abdul Mahdi.

The King, who arrived in the Iraqi capital for his first visit to the country by an Arab leader since the US-led invasion in 2003, stressed his willingness to support the security and stability of Iraq, “which is an integral part of the security and stability of the Arab nation”.

He said Jordan deals with all components of the Iraqi population on equal footing, adding that unifying the efforts and ranks of various Iraqi groups, including the Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds, and putting the house in order is the only way to build a unified and sovereign Iraq that is capable of serving its people and Arab nation, according to a Royal Court statement in Amman.

The statement quoted the King as saying that Iraq will always be an advocate of Arab causes, urging all Arab countries to extend a helping hand to Iraq at this critical time because a “strong Iraq is a source of power for Arabs”.

Within this context, the statement added, the King underlined Jordan’s recent appointment of an ambassador to Iraq, describing the move as a “boost to bilateral ties”.

He said his visit to Iraq should be followed by mutual visits by officials from both countries at various levels to work out mechanisms to develop ties.

Talks focused on ways to encourage the private sector in both countries to explore cooperation prospects and enter joint ventures. The King said the two sides should build on the outcome of the Joint Jordan-Iraq Higher Committee meetings held in Amman recently.

King Abdullah and Maliki reviewed economic cooperation opportunities that benefit both the Jordanian and Iraqi people.

Maliki described the King’s several-hour visit as “a progressive and positive step towards strengthening relations between the two countries and a prelude to better Iraqi ties with the rest of the Arab countries”.

Abdul Mahdi said Iraq is keen on bolstering its relations with its Arab neighbourhood, a matter that would help boost joint Arab action.

Meanwhile, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said in a television interview following the King’s visit: “The King of Jordan took a bold step when he visited Iraq today. We expect other Arab countries to move in this direction.”

12 August 2008

Perfect (non)sense

Yes, let’s let the fox guard the henhouse.

The Endangered Species Act has worked in countless cases (the latest being the wolf). It may have it’s problems but having the same government entity that wants to do a project also do the review of species that could be potentially endangered is ridiculous.

Georgia, again

Theoretically, Russia has halted forward movement in order to give Georgia a chance to surrender. Or rather because they were done “punishing” Georgia for their genocide on Russian citizens in South Ossetia.

“The security of our peacekeepers and civilians has been restored,” Medvedev said, referring to Russian arguments that the incursion was needed to repel a Georgian offensive in South Ossetia. Russian officials have claimed that a Georgian push into the province last week claimed some 2,000 lives, including those of more than a dozen Russian peacekeepers stationed there.

Interestingly enough, if you go to the UN website [which I really don't like and so I have a hard time with it] there is no Russian complaint about Georgian genocide. Maybe I just can’t find it, but it seems like before attacking Georgia for it’s supposed genocide, Russia, in accordance with all the rules, should have filed a complaint with the UN.

Or, if the rules are going to change maybe we should sit back now and wring our hands so that Pakistan can have an incursion into India. [New news: India shoots dead at least 7 Muslim protesters in disputed Kashmir.]

In the WSJ today, Gary Schmitt and Mauro de Lorenzo write of how the West can stand up to Russia. Things have changed since it was written but it’s worth a read for the history and because it’s the only other place I’ve seen even a suggestion that Russia should have turned towards international institutions first if they had a problem with Georgia.

Next, the West should make use of Russia’s claim that its role in South Ossetia and Abkhazia is driven by the need to protect the populations there. If so, Moscow should have no objections to U.N.-sanctioned peacekeepers and observers moving into those two regions to replace the jerry-rigged system of “peacekeepers” that, until the war broke out, consisted of Russian troops, local separatist militaries and Georgian forces.

George Will has a great quote today.

McCain, who has called upon Russia “to immediately and unconditionally . . . withdraw all forces from sovereign Georgian territory,” favors expelling Russia from the Group of Eight, and organizing a league of democracies to act where the United Nations is impotent, which is whenever the subject is important.

Emphasis mine.

And Ralph Peters is over the top ticked off about this.