LEATHERNECKM31

Death in Afghanistan; CnC works on the only handicap he can do something about

News item:

The US military had a tough day in Afghanistan, with 11 soldiers and three civilians killed and three helicopters lost. In the largest incident, a CH-47 Chinook crashed as it was departing a firefight in Baghlan province (this very likely was a Chinook as there were 14 Afghan troops, 11 US troops, and 1 US civilian injured in the crash). The Taliban claimed it shot down the Chinook, but the US military said "The cause is not believed to be from enemy action."

Here is the initial report of the Chinook crash (the follow-up report provided the casualties). The three civilians killed are Drug Enforcement Agency personnel. The operation targeted drug operations:

Read more from the Long War Journal

Meanwhile, here’s the Fifth-Columnist who can’t seem to find the time to command troops in the field or even send critically needed reinforcements, but has all the time in the world to play Charles Barkley-like golf.

And where’s the state-run news media on this obvious outrage? He has time to declare pig flu a “national emergency”, yet where are his words of comfort and reassurance of retribution for  families and comrades of the dead?

Why, the answer is right here (via Weasel Zippers.com):

CBS' Mark Knoller — the unofficial documentarian and statistician of all things White House-related — wrote on his Twitter feed that, "Today-- Obama ties Pres. Bush in the number of rounds of golf played in office: 24.

Took Bush 2 yrs & 10 months."

Where’s the outrage that was heaped on President Bush for playing golf? And he was winning his war.

Here’s some more golf links-politics that Barry Hussein has time for…. bending to the demands of the National Association of Gals—N.A.G.—whose presidentrix, Terry O’Neal (with an apparent straight face), was grousing about:

"The boy's club" atmosphere at the White House, as exemplified by the president playing basketball earlier this month with 11 members of Congress and four Cabinet Secretaries -- all men.

Well what’s a failing, lying, president to do?

What priorities must be served…? Well, in a master stroke (pun intended), Barry The Timid—in an incredible coincidence—took to the links with a woman — chief domestic policy adviser Melody Barnes.

(For more formal photo shoots in keeping with the dignity of being a presidential advisor, Miss Barnes wears shoes.)

Finally, a president we can be proud of… and another first to Barry; the dreaded Putting Green Ceiling has been shattered. It is a wonderful moment for The One and his subjects.

OMG! Hold the presses… I just discovered the Melody Barnes is black!!!! (above). So it’s TWO more first for the TelePrompTer POTUS!… first woman, and first black duffer.

But his presidency is certainly not about race.

The Predator Update: 

Where is Mr. Blackwell when you need him?

I swear to God… if this woman does not stop outraging my sense of color, fashion and layering I will publically rips my eyes out in front of the White House.

I read she was on Leno’s show (sic) the other night where she decided this ensemble was best for TV:

Is this woman blind!?

I remember this pattern from my grandmother’s bed spreads.

I’ve had acid trips that weren’t this jarring.

And what better to go with than orange flowers in this garden-like setting but a large, chocolate, satin bow with rhinestones?

It’s enough to make me want to say periwinkle.

Robert Novak: Last of the real reporters, 1931-2009

Bob Novak was the last of his generation, of men who were reporters…. not “journalists”, or “staff writers”, or gawd forbid, “investigative journalists”.

Guys much like him, but with less talent, were the guys I worked for and with early in my newspaper career.

I’ve often said that almost anyone with a good high school record can learn to write an inverted pyramid, 10-paragraph news story, but not just anyone can be a “reporter.”

Case in point: Woodward and Bernstein – who turned in most of the major stories in what came to be known as Watergate. Woodward, college preppy, was the writer and the good, old-fashioned, shoe-leather reporting was mostly the domain of Bernstein who started as 16-year-old copy boy at the old Washington Star.

When a few years later he was denied a job as a reporter because he was a college dropout, he was hired at the Washington Post which knew a reporter when it saw one, and didn’t require a B.A.

Now that “journalists” have masters degrees in “mass communications” and have a “profession”, not a trade or craft; that ex-plains the sorry state and wholesale sellout of the journalism craft.

I digress.

Though it became fashionable in the last 20+ years of his career for communists, far left democrats and other socialists to hate him, Novak, reviled as “The Prince of Darkness”, was an Army Korea War vet and no fan of the Presidents Bush.

He was also a life-long registered Democrat who was widely feared by any and all of Washington’s power elite for the better part of half a century.

In the mid-1960s, Richard Nixon peaked from behind the curtain shortly before he was to speak, and when he saw Novak seated in the front row of the assembled press, he grabbed an aide and said, “Look at him; that’s Bob Novak. That’s the enemy.”  

Now, that’s a reporter.

One year ago this month Novak characteristically announced his retirement as a reporter:  “Doctors will soon begin appropriate treatment. I will be suspending my journalistic work for an indefinite but, God willing, not too lengthy period;” and later added an update… announcing his diagnosis was “dire”. 

Not long ago Walter Cronkite died, finally, at 92; he couldn’t fetch Novak a cup of coffee, yet the left loved “Uncle Walter” and hated Novak.

That’s because Bob Novak was a reporter.

From now on I’ll be less well informed and not nearly as entertained.

Here is a warm remembrance from Ken Tomlinson in Human Events; don’t bother with any state-run media obits.

Remembering

When heavy-cruiser the USS Quincy, CA-39, steamed into “The Slot” between Ford and Savo Island during the invasion of Guadalcanal, she carried 807 officers and enlisted men.

Virtually half would never see the sun rise.

In the early hours of 9 Aug., 1942, she was one of three American (USS Vincennes and the USS Astoria) and one Australian cruisers stationed in the northern approaches to the invasion zone and was sunk there by a force of Japanese cruisers in the disastrous Battle of Savo Island. Only one vessel on the patrol survived, though heavily-damaged.  

Attacked by a squadron of numerically superior Jap warships near Savo, the US ships only eight months after Pearl Harbor, were inferior in both armament, crew experience and especially night gunnery in which the Imperil Navy excelled.

It was a massacre.

 

With its captain dead on the bridge and all its 8-inch and 5-inch guns destroyed, the Quincy was caught in Jap searchlights (left), dead in the water, on fire and badly down aft. She was sinking quickly.

 

Survivor

Daniel Galvin, 21, of Hanover Mass., plunged into the Pacific swam about “50 strokes” before looking back and glimpsing the ship’s final moments as it was sucked down into the sea.

“I could still see, even in that light, that the flag was flying, and the propellers were still flipping over. It went down with a lot of my shipmates still on board,” he said.

The Quincy sank in less than 10 minutes. The Vincennes and the Astoria were gone as well, as was the Aussie ship.

Gavin recalls:

“‘Hey Galvin!’’’

It was Clyde Bolton, a friend from Concord, N.H., bobbing in the water.

“’Whaddya want?’’’

“’Come over here!’’’ Clyde Bolton yelled.

“’You come over here,’’’ Dan Galvin yelled back as he struggled to stay afloat.

They were no more than 50 feet away from each other in the water, and before you knew it, Clyde Bolton, badly burned, slipped beneath the surface.

“I should have gone over to Clyde when he called me,’’ Galvin said. “I think about him every day. I wish I swam over to him.’’

Two weeks ago, 67 years to the day that Dan Galvin lived while so many around him died, he did what he does every Aug. 9. He puts on his sailor’s white hat, steps out on his front porch, and he read the names of each of his 389 shipmates who went down with the Quincy.

Sometimes he gets through the list without crying. But every year it gets harder.

“I worry,’’ said Galvin. “I worry that when I’m gone, no one will remember these men.’’

Complete Boston Globe story here, and video report here.

Revenge: In the Navy tradition, another heavy cruiser was christened USS Quincy (CA 71) launched in 1943 and participated in the D-Day invasion of Europe. She was decommissioned 2 July 1954, the name “Quincy”was struck from fleet rolls, and she was scrapped in 1974.

Both cruisers were preceded by the first to bear the name, a German cargo ship which was seized in Florida in 1917, and renamed USS Quincy (AK-10) in Feb. 1918; she was decommissioned and sold in 1922.

Quincy update:

August 1992—The Quincy was located and examined on the sea floor of what had come to be called "Iron Bottom Sound". She lies upright in some 3000 feet of water, with her bow broken off immediately in front of her forward eight-inch gun turrets, both of which are trained out to starboard. The ship's shell-riddled forward superstructure, shattered left gun of Turret # 2, destroyed aircraft hangar and collapsed after deck are indications of the battering she received from Japanese weapons during her final moments on the surface and from the crushing force of the deep sea after she sank.

Countdown to Hope and Change now at nine days and a wake-up

Just heard on the Glenn Beck Show that the New York Times has published a half-page ad for Al Jazeera--the raghead propaganda machine.

I can't find anything about it on the Internet.

Hardly a surprise, given the anti-American agenda of The Times... the paper long known for revealing our national security secrets, but to the joy and direct support of our enemies.

Now, 65 years later, our military doesn't even trust the next president, let alone the seditious news media. To wit:

Barack Obama's transition team on Friday denied a report in a British newspaper that the president-elect wants to open secret talks with Hamas.

The Guardian, citing transition team sources, reported that Obama's advisers are urging him to use U.S. intelligence agencies to "initiate low-level or clandestine" communications with the militant Islamic organization battling Israeli forces in Gaza.

Here's a link to the Guardian story and while I don't trust the Brits anymore (and probably less) than our domestic newsroom elitists, it seems to be a well-sourced story.  

This community-organizing buffoon has been entrusted with the "nuclear football", and that keeps me up at night, but he now has the means, motive and opportunity to FDR the economy... and as someone who was counting on his retirement portfolio, that keeps me up the rest of the night.

One of the few national reporters worthy of the title, ABC's John Stossel, concisely set forth in an op-ed piece last month why Obama and his minions will destroy, not improve our economy:  

Arrogant Conceit: Obama Thinks He Can Reform The Economy

This is not the first time a president chose reform over recovery. Franklin Roosevelt did it with his New Deal, and the result was long years of depression and deprivation. Roosevelt's priorities were criticized not just by opponents of big government but by none other than John Maynard Keynes, the British economist whose theories rationalized big government. Before FDR had been in office a year, Keynes wrote him an open letter, which was printed in The New York Times:

"You are engaged on a double task, Recovery and Reform; -- recovery from the slump and the passage of those business and social reforms which are long overdue. For the first, speed and quick results are essential. The second may be urgent, too; but haste will be injurious. ... Even wise and necessary Reform may, in some respects, impede and complicate Recovery. For it will upset the confidence of the business world and weaken their existing motives to action.

"Now I am not clear, looking back over the last nine months, that the order of urgency between measures of Recovery and measures of Reform has been duly observed, or that the latter has not sometimes been mistaken for the former."

This bears repeating: For it will upset the confidence of the business world and weaken their existing motives to action.

American businessmen may be a lot of things, but seldom are they suicidal. Seeing that FDR was not to be trusted and that they would loose money by risking their capital to his socialist adherence to high taxes and massive government spending, they sat it out and the Depression continued.

In Europe it was called "The Depression", in America it was called "The Great Depression"... and with good reason.

Japan, not Roosevelt, ended our Depression.

It was only weeks ago that most of us were shocked at hear "$750 billion-dollar bailout" tossed around like it was lunch money.... that is now but a distant memory, and trillions of dollars ago.

And the socialist, anti-Americans haven't even occupied the executive branch yet.

Even economists at UCLA, not known to be an hot bed of right-wing conspirators, admitted in 2004 that Roosevelt prolonged the Great Depression by seven years.

"Why the Great Depression lasted so long has always been a great mystery, and because we never really knew the reason, we have always worried whether we would have another 10- to 15-year economic slump," said Lee E. Ohanian, vice chair of UCLA's Department of Economics. "We found that a relapse isn't likely unless lawmakers gum up a recovery with ill-conceived stimulus policies."

"Ironically, our work shows that the recovery would have been very rapid had the government not intervened," said his co-author, Harold L. Cole

If we real Americans do not stop Obama, our country will be weakened... weakened to the point that she may not recover. 

We stand now at the abyss.

 

"Gimme rewrite....."

Major left-wing newspapers (is there any other kind?) are beginning to crumble from coast to cost... and I am only slightly saddened.

The wages of sin is death.

• Last October the Christian Science Monitor ceased publication and went entirely web-based, the only possible alternative.
• The venerable 150-year-old Rocky Mountain News is on life-support and up for sale, which means it will fold because no one in their right mind would buy a newspaper these days.
• The Tribune Co., which owns eight major daily newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune and Baltimore Sun, plus a string of local TV stations is filing for bankruptcy.
• And now the New York Times, the first paper that comes to mind when listing those that endanger the lives of our troops, reveal national defense secrets and provide aid and comfort to our enemies, has borrowed $225 million against its mid-Manhattan headquarters building "to ease a potential cash flow squeeze."

Dead newspapers walking.

Like dinosaurs, newspapers didn't see the end coming--the rise of the internet as a news destination and their arrogance didn't allow them to realize that two-thirds of the the country hated them for their bias.

Since the 1960s these papers and dozens more like them in every state of the union have tried to run and ruin the country, by creating news, and engaging in "advocacy journalism", favoring any liberal over any conservative.

It has been a long time since any thinking person actually trusted what was contained in much of the Times' reportage.

There never has been "objective journalism". It's not possible as long as reporters are humans. But there was a time when journalism was "fair". I just got in on the tail end of the era when newspapering was still a proud profession in the early 70s. It was still "fair" because there were white-haired and bald guys who had seen WWII personally in the editors' seats.    

I began meeting a daily deadline for a living in 1973 (years earlier if you count working for and editing the Fresno State daily student paper with a circulation of  26,000). I was a true believer that a newspaper's purpose, as Finley Peter Dune wrote than 100 years ago, was to "comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable...." 

I believe that "The Fourth Estate" had a critical, constitutionally-protected role to play in the balance of power in this nation. A watchdog to watch for wolves.

At that duty, newspapers have miserably failed.

By the time I got to FSU my peers were flocking to journalism schools because of Watergate and Woodward and Bernstein, and every peace love hippy dippy liberal do-gooder who wanted to "change the world" (sound familiar?) actually believed that as "journalists", despite first-rate callowness and chutzpa, only they stood between the Constitution and a fascist state.

Everything became "investigative reporting"... only a child of the 60s would come up with such redundant and idiotic descriptor for their job. Everything became "gotcha", instead of careful, well-written stories... the "first, rough draft of history."

And somewhere along the line newspapering was declared a "profession". Hogwash, reporting is a trade, like plumbing or surveying. I can teach a reasonably intelligent high school student to write and inverted pyramid story in a couple of hours.

There are good writers who are not good reporters, and their are good reporters who cannot write to save their ass. Both, nonetheless can do a good job; ironically this is the way the Washington Post's famous Watergate reporters worked... Bernstein, the tough kid who joined the Post as a copy boy in his teens, did the reporting while Woodward, the Ivy League silver spooner did the writing. 

"Woodstein" as they became known in the business, were the poster boys of leftist journalism. Arrogant, superior, elitist socialists with egos the size of the New York Times Sunday edition.

Tens of thousands tried to emulate them.

And shepherded along for the last forty years by this legion of "journo-Americans", we have become a socialist state; they helped put this country in the hole it currently occupies, yet they keep digging.

Instead of "afflicting the comfortable" they worked from an "enemies' list"... ironically borrowed from their arch enemy, Dick Nixon. Their list included Christians, conservatives, the military, guns, chastity, capitalism, centuries-old social norms, monogamy, modesty, sobriety, and highest on the list---protecting unborn babies.

Newspapers, admonished to "afflict the comfortable", instead packed newsrooms with reporters based on race and gender often without regard for talent, temperament or resume.

This was most widely practiced in television "journalism" where looks mean far more than anything else. I can visit any city in the US and see the same "news team" designed by a committee... one black anchor (extras points if the black anchor is female), one female anchor (extra points of the female is Hispanic or Oriental), a wacky and usually plump weatherman or a sexy weatherwoman.   

Just to push the point everyone in the newsroom who mentions the name of any Spanish surnamed reporter must pronounce the name of  Margarita de la Garza-Guitierrez as if they were working in Mexico City.

But in my generation, none of this is racial and gender bias... it's "affirmative action".

Whatever happened to "the best candidate for the job"?

That doesn't matter to those who swallow hook, line, and sinker the socialist/ communist line of a Utopian workers' paradise where all things are "equal."

 The story of Jayson Blair is instructive:

Blair, a hot shot, 27-year-old black NYT reporter, brought along as one of Editor Howell Raines' pet projects was finally found to have written scores of news stories that he simply made up. He actually claimed to have been in other states, meeting sources and conducting interviews when he was writing form home or in a coffee shop.  

In a post-firing investigation and unprecedented, lengthy expose on itself, the Times revealed that at one stretch Blair had fabricated least 36 of the 73 articles he'd written.

The paper's astounding response:

''Our paper has a commitment to diversity and by all accounts he appeared to be a promising young minority reporter,'' Raines said. ''I believe in aggressively providing hiring and career opportunities for minorities.''

And even after Raines resigned under pressure, another editor insisted, "For strong reasons both of journalism and justice, [the Times is] committed to deploying a diverse news-gathering staff. We believe the paper must not turn from that commitment."

Truth, responsibility, fairness, ethics?  No, the first order of business in modern day journalism is social engineering... first them, and then you.

As these leftists such as Howell rose through the ranks, they became editors and publishers and went from slanting the occasional story when they thought they could get away with it to using their higher position to literally change and alter coverage and assignments, spike stories and protect their political allies by simply not printing the truth.

Conversely, the spent hugely disproportionate amounts of capital and resources in hammering on a non-story or an out and out lie until it became widely believed.

"Bush lied, people died."

"Bush was a draft dodger."

Washington D.C. elected.. twice... a crack-head; the NYT and its progeny did nothing to condemn such shameful situation or even express national outrage.

I'll admit I get nostalgic about my newspaper days; The smell of ink and newsprint, the hum of the presses, the bad coffee and cigarette smoke, the intensity, the sirens, police and fire scanner chatter, the arguments and the stress of deadlines, and above all... "getting it right."  

Seems like just a dream.

                              -30-

I second our Amendment....

Attention bitter gun and Bible clingers: it's time to remind ourselves of The Messiah-Elect's plans for your God-given right to trade a sub-human's life for your family's.

• In anticipation of an April 16 debate in Philadelphia on the anniversary of the Virginia Tech shootings, Obama told the Pittsburgh Tribune: "I am not in favor of concealed weapons. I think that creates a potential atmosphere where more innocent people could (get shot during) altercations."
• Obama's Web site says: "He will protect the rights of hunters and other law-abiding Americans to purchase, own, transport and use guns for the purposes of hunting and target shooting."
• Obama believes the D.C. handgun law (struck down by the Supreme Court last summer) is constitutional. More here.

Nothing would please the socialists and communists more than disarming America by having Obama and the left-wing Congress muscle through a federal law banning concealed carry... as a prelude to doing away with the Second Amendment entirely.

Think that can't happen...? Think again. There was a time not so long ago that you could buy surplus military rifles dirt cheap and the postman would deliver it to your house.

And remember, D.C. v Heller saved our "right to keep and bear arms" by a single vote.

Obama, with his 24-hour, high-tech, armed protection doesn't worry much about his family's safety... he doesn't worry a gawd-damned bit about yours. 

 

Hummm, now that the multi-faceted coup has placed Obama in the Oval Office, the MSM has discovered a guy named Bill Ayers and the fact that The One lied his ass off about his relationship with the terrorist bomber and his murderous wife. 

And now Ayers is now officially gloating:

In the afterword to an updated version of his 2001 memoir "Fugitive Days", Ayers describes Barack Obama as "a family friend," which contrasts with Obama's description of him as "a guy who lives in my neighborhood. -- American Thinker.

I say "murderous" because I believe Bernadine Dohrn is guilt of conspiring, constructing, transporting and placing the bomb that killed a young San Francisco police officer, Brian V. McDonnell in 1970, juts like I believe O.J. Simpson butchered two innocent people at 875 N. Bundy Drive.

Dohrn was on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted list and J. Edgar Hoover called her "the most dangerous woman in America." There is no statute of limitations on murder and although there was not enough evidence against Dohrn almost 40 years ago, science may yet prove her guilt.

The powerful bomb packed with barbed wire fence post staples, was intended to kill and maim; pieced of the bomb were found three blocks distant atop a three-story school building.

Larry Grathwohl, a former FBI informant in the Weather Underground, has testified before Congress that Ayers told him at the time he was in the terrorist organization and that Dohrn had personally planted the devastating bomb.

Grathwohl said Ayers criticized his terrorist cell, claiming that there was "... a real problems was that someone like Bernardine Dohrn had to plan, develop and carry out the bombing of the police station in San Francisco, and he specifically named her as the person that committed that act.”

More from Media Memo on the MSM/Obama conspiracy to undermine McCain-Palin as Obama advisors prepped the air-brain Katie Couric for her Sarah Palin interviews  :

Couric shed some light on her preparation for the interviews: Beforehand, she sought advice from former senator Sam Nunn and Council on Foreign Relations president Richard Haas. They told her to draw Palin out on her geopolitical worldview and urged her to let the governor speak at length without interrupting her. Maybe she should bring them along with her when she takes over at Meet the Press?”

Apparently Couric's question: "What do people read up in Alaska?"--like Alaska is part of the Neanderthal Federation--was one of her own.

DUH

And for all those gullible enough to fall for to the McCain cowards' and Obamedia character-assassins' conspiracy to knee-cap Gov. Palin... the truth will out and from the NYT yet, yeah--after the election is over: 

"It was among the juicier post-election recriminations: Fox News Channel quoted an unnamed McCain campaign figure as saying that Sarah Palin did not know that Africa was a continent.

"Who would say such a thing? On Monday the answer popped up on a blog and popped out of the mouth of David Shuster, an MSNBC anchor.

'Turns out it was Martin Eisenstadt, a McCain policy adviser, who has come forward today to identify himself as the source of the leaks,' Mr. Shuster said."

"But a film maker Eitan Gorlin was the phony McCain adviser Martin Eisenstadt. The pranksters behind Eisenstadt, Mr. Gorlin and Mr. Mirvish, say the blame lies not with them but with shoddiness in the traditional news media and especially the blogosphere."

No Comment:

(IsraelNN.com) Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni have voiced opposition to a plan by outgoing United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to sponsor a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for the establishment of a new Arab state.

Israel Channel One television reporter Ayala Chasson reported that the government is concerned the proposed resolution will be slanted against Israel and that Secretary Rice wants it passed as a show of achievement before leaving office.

Okay, I lied. ... and people thought this broad was SecState, presidential and/or vice-presidential timber. 

Ah, but lastly... a palette cleanser from the UK's Telegraph:

"Iraqi and US forces have arrested a man responsible for beheadings in the volatile Diyala province north of Baghdad, a defence ministry spokesman said.

"The suspect, Riyad Wahab Hassan Falih was described as 'a very high-level, wanted terrorist' who was responsible for training al-Qaeda members 'specialising in beheading people.'

I hope there is a water-board in his future and a tragic mishap on the way back to his cell.

There's no fixin' stupid...

I'm seldom wrong about such things.

Some of the most humorous moments of my life occurred during the run up to the gigantic world-wide disaster known as "Y2K"... oh, the humanity.

I'll always remember where I was when it happened; Parker Colorado... I watched two large grocery store's supply of bottled water completely disappear the last week of December, 1999.  

I even pointed out to one of the store managers that I for one, did not miss seeing that he'd raised the prices in the weeks preceding The New Year.

You do recall that not long ago our most pressing need was to deal immediately with G.B., don't you?   

And now each day brings me closer to the moment when the predicted horrors of Global Warming (sic) are proven to be be a scam and a fraud... but an effective one, having bilked billions of dollars from governments and the private sector, and stole two Oscars and a Nobel Prize.    

I always get a flu shot because I know that one cannot get the "flu" from an inoculation containing killed viruses; I long ago stopped trying to explain that to urban myth devotees who insist to the contrary... based on their personal experience. It's delusional.

Here are a few more you may have forgotten:

• Widespread heterosexual AIDS
• Bird flu
• Allergic-to-everything-in-the-world syndrome
• nuclear winter
• catastrophic overpopulation
• world's oil resources depleted in (10, 17, 23, etc.) years.
• global cooling
• Killer bee catastrophe and/or the bee extinction catastrophe

There are dozens more myths that are both maddening yet highly entertaining.

Gosh, how do I avoid being swept up in such stupidity?

Simple... as the man said, "my momma didn't raise no fools".

This is also how I can easily discern between John McCain and Barack Obama, Bush and Carter, Bush and Kerry, Bush and Al ("Is it hot in here?") Gore.

I also know the difference between Gen. Petraeus and Gen. Weasley Clark, and the difference between George Patton and Michael Jackson--both famous white men.

Yeah... it's a gift.

Oh, and I also know that when Mr. DImbolique Nashar, Esq. e-mails me offering $14 million in exchange for my Social Security Number and my bank information, I should hit "delete".  

Thus, it comes as no surprise to learn that new research indicates the "self-esteem movement" of 1980s, has gone too far, does not improve confidence or enhanced ones life, and could even be detrimental.

Gosh, who knew? I was sure that doing away with letter grades, valedictorians, First Place, and printing millions of "My son is a great kid at Oak Tree Elementary" bumper stickers was gong to produce the next Greatest Generation. 

Instead, we have this:

"Today's college students are more narcissistic and self-centered than their predecessors, according to a comprehensive new study by five psychologists who worry that the trend could be harmful to personal relationships and American society.

As an example, Jean Twenge, the study's lead author and a professor at San Diego State University, cited a song commonly sung to the tune of "Frère Jacques" in preschool: "I am special, I am special. Look at me."

"We need to stop endlessly repeating, 'You're special,' and having children repeat that back," said Twenge. "Kids are self-centered enough already."

"Twenge,... said narcissists tend to lack empathy, react aggressively to criticism, and favor self-promotion over helping others."

Now, add this one from yesterday:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Navy can conduct sonar training exercises off the southern California coast without restrictions designed to protect whales, dolphins and other marine mammals, the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday in a defeat for environmentalists.

The 40-year-old training program of the Navy's sonar technicians is critical to our national security, even Cub Scouts understand that, but not enviro-traitors.

These zealots are communists and traitors; they have no flipping idea whether sonar waves harm their precious whales and snails; the truth is they don't care if our valiant sailors of the Silent Service are killed.

Liberal: "Oh, GA, isn't that a little harsh."

GA: "Aren't you a little stupid? What do you call someone who fights the US Navy for decades trying to prevent our military from protecting themselves from enemy subs?"

The SCOTUS vote was 7-2, but remember the times in which we live:

"We don't know what the Supreme Court decision means for the next go-round. We will have a new commander in chief. It's a new game," said Mark Delapaine, an analyst with the California Coastal Commission.

Exactly... we have entered fully The Age of Stupidity.

Around the horn...

As I remember, "The Peter Principle" posited that in a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence... and there they remain.

Examples are: Elizabeth Hasselbeck, Larry King, and Sen. Barbara Boxer.

And now we can add Rahm Emanuel, The Messiah-elect's closest advisor.

P of P evidence (courtesy of: JammieWearningFool.com):

President-elect Barack Obama's newly appointed chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, served on the board of directors of the federal mortgage firm Freddie Mac at a time when scandal was brewing at the troubled agency and the board failed to spot "red flags," according to government reports reviewed by ABCNews.com.

Emanuel was not named in the SEC complaint (click here to read) but the entire board was later accused by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) (click here to read) of having "failed in its duty to follow up on matters brought to its attention."

• and...Emanuel’s Americans for Democratic Action voting index averages out (by my math) to a 96 percent liberal score.
• His ADA scores: 95 percent in 2003, 100 percent liberal perfection in 2004 and 2005, 90 percent in 2006, and 95 percent in 2007.

Not as good as his boss, but right up there. My recent post on Emanuel here. 

Powerline blog sums Emanuel up this way:

Emanuel is a brawler. He's legendarily tough and effective and ruthless. He's the type of guy who makes enemies, then makes lists of his enemies, then makes lists of his enemies' friends, then makes lists of how they'll pay. If you thought the Obama administration would be all about bringing people together and would simply make sad faces when stubborn congressmen refused to come to the table, this is a clear sign otherwise. If good feelings don't suffice, bare-knuckle politics will happily be employed.

On the fly here are a few thoughts of what an Obama regime means to those of us in the IPORs (Isolated Pockets of Resistance).

First..... The One-elect's new website here explains His first shot at socializing, well, everything:

The Obama Administration will call on Americans to serve in order to meet the nation’s challenges. President-Elect Obama will expand national service programs like AmeriCorps and Peace Corps and will create a new Classroom Corps to help teachers in underserved schools, as well as a new Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, and Veterans Corps. Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year. Obama will encourage retiring Americans to serve by improving programs available for individuals over age 55, while at the same time promoting youth programs such as Youth Build and Head Start.

Noose news:

Despite the fact an "African-American" (or more accurately, Arab-American) will soon be president you'll see a continuing undercurrent of stories about how America remains a bitter, clinging, racist country. Expect "noose" and burning cross stories to abound, and of course many will be "investigated" by the FBI as a possible threat against the president.

If some small-town loudmouthed bar fly starts raving about the "nigger president" it will be magnified to a state of emergency by the MSM, just as the 24-hour cable news reports a local police chase or fire as "national news".... only because they have video. 

Here's an example from CBS -- notice how hard Ed Murrow's progeny worked to get the Obama angle.  

And a picture of things to come? This may not be unprecedented, but it is rare. Below is a photo of Obama's SS security detail during a trip to the gym yesterday.

Ordinarily (and for good reason) you don't see such a public show of heavy weapons in a presidential process... too Banana Republic you might say.

While there is no such thing as under-reacting when it comes to the president's safety and I have no idea what the intel was yesterday, this may become standard fare and that's bad for a number of reasons.    

And here's an example from cracker-jack citizen journalist Debbie Schlussel of how blacks will continue to bitch about this country, as long as... well, as long as there are black people.

Actor Will Smith, a millionaire since he was a teenager, and now makes $20 mil a pic, insisted on another black multi-millionaire's TV show, "... we've been rejected for so long.

"You wanna be a part of America, but we've been rejected for so long that it's hard to take ownership."

"We've" been rejected? You got a slave in your pocket, Will?

"60 MINUTES anchor, crew roughed up in China..."

... understandable.

Komrades! News from the western front...

I see Drudge is 24 hours late (a fortnight in today's news cycle) in headlining Joe "D-oh" Biden's bizarre comments last Sunday claiming, "We're going to have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy (Obama)."

As of this a.m., The Obama camp has nothing more than boilerplate of the "Bush lied, people died" variety" which is a lot more than Biden, who has had nothing to say (this just in--Joe has cx'ed all campaign appearances today):

"With our nation facing two wars and 21st-century threats abroad, Senator Biden referenced the simple fact that history shows presidents face challenges from day one," said campaign spokesman David Wade

If McCain "The War Monger" had uttered such a dark and confusing statement, the national drive-by reporters would be Velcro'ed to his every move until he offered a detailed explanation. And once they had the statement, they'd bash McCain for trying to "frighten" the electorate and "politicizing" world tensions.

National coverage of The Gaffenator's latest...? not so much.           

Meanwhile:

(AP) - Republican John McCain and his supporters on Monday branded Democrat Barack Obama a liberal and criticized feminists and the media as they rallied their conservative base in Missouri, a

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., introduced McCain by declaring him under siege by the "liberal elite media", and defended Gov. Sarah Palin against attacks from the "feminist left."

Yawn... criticize Obama The Socialist as a "liberal"? Hell, John even liberals don't call themselves "liberals" anymore... they're past that, they're "progressives" now.

If you want to "rally" the base then call him what he is:  a George Soros-funded, socialist operative who has been indoctrinated for more than two decades by, among others, fellow Chicagoan Saul Alinsky, the Godfather of "community organizing", and a committed Marxist.

(Historical note:  The study of Alinsky’s methods also apparently created much of Hillary Clinton’s political persona, and formed the basis of her political methodology and college thesis.)

From David Horowitz' FrontPageMag.com:

But Obama was trained by the Alinsky-founded Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF) in Chicago and worked for an affiliate of the Gamaliel Foundation, whose modus operandi for the creation of “a more just and democratic society” is rooted firmly in the Alinsky method. As The Nation magazine (in 2007) puts it, “Obama worked in the organizing tradition of Saul Alinsky, who made Chicago the birthplace of modern community organizing.…” In fact, for several years Obama himself taught workshops on the Alinsky method. Obama and his fellow agitators made demands for many things in the Eighties, including taxpayer-funded employment-training services, playground construction, after-school programs, and asbestos removal from neighborhood apartments.

The Nation reports, “Today Obama continues his organizing work largely through classes for future leaders identified by ACORN and the Centers for New Horizons on the south side.”

Continuing in FrontPage, John Perazzo writes:

"In the Alinsky model, 'organizing' is a euphemism for 'revolution'—a wholesale revolution whose ultimate objective is the systematic acquisition of power by a purportedly oppressed segment of the population, and the radical transformation of America’s social and economic structure. The goal is to foment enough public discontent, moral confusion, and outright chaos to spark the social upheaval that Marx, Engels, and Lenin predicted—a revolution whose foot soldiers view the status quo as fatally flawed and wholly unworthy of salvation."

There, Maverick... got it?

I did the above in about 20 minutes, complete with attributions.

Anybody can come in second on Nov. 4, I could... how 'bout actually kicking his ass instead of just telling us you will.

And just when, exactly, was that ass-whippin' schedule to kick off?

Let's get cynical... cynical; let's get cynicaaaall

I lived a great portion of my life in Colorado, where I watched TV coverage of the weather grow from few seconds (current temp, wind velocity, it will/won't rain tomorrow) to reporting fall and winter storms as the Eighth Sign of the Apocalypse, by "teams" of "New Watch 4 Triple-Doppler Commandos."

I have laughed near unto tears at a succession of journalistic dunderheads stand outside in light snow and tell me that "this could be worse by morning."

Given a normal or above average snow fall, the TV coverage would "go to 11" and alarm the public no less than the "War of the Worlds" radio broadcast of 70 years ago next month.         

For some time now the 24-7 news cycle has treated all news and all weather in similar, "The Sky Is Falling" fashion.

Doom and gloom attracts attention. Think not? Go to you local airport and start screaming "My plane's gonna be bombed!"  Once you're out on bail, go back to the airport and calmly state in a reasonable voice, "My plane's gonna land safely."

After yesterday's dramatic rejection of The Bailout during which the market dropped farther than on 9/11, there has been the same kind of hysterical, blizzard, hurricane-type coverage.  

Yet with a little over two and half hours to go before today's close on Wall Street, we're at 10,722.43, up 356.98 since yesterday's close.

I'm not saying the current economic mess is not a crisis; I'm taking issue with how the old MSM reports these days... either with great irresponsibility or worse, with great political purpose.   

'If it bleeds, it leads" gains viewers; more viewers means higher add rates and thus, more money... we know that.

The politics are far more sinister; and that's what we are not giving enough attention.

Just this morning faithful reader and fellow arch cynic,  Fire@Will, posited as follows:

What if this crisis is not the accidental result of various actions and inactions on their part – but, in fact, the real (Democratic Party) intention all along? 

How would creating a perceived crisis of Biblical proportions help the Left?  (Let me count the ways…)

Years ago, Bush, McCain, Greenspan and others warned about the dangers of the mortgage loan policies, including specifically the problems with Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac. 

The same leading Democrats (Barney Frank, Pelosi, etc) who now are blaming it all on “Bush’s failed economic policies” made public assurances that there was nothing wrong with the way they (the FM’s) were passing out bad loans and keeping two sets of books.  Had they not covered up the problem, and dealt with it in 2005, this crisis could have been averted.

What’s next?  Once we’ve circumvented/ravaged the Constitution with our emergency economic package, maybe we should see what other crisis only we can “save” the people from.  

Try to think like a socialista. 

I'm with Will; I know what's going on... I need to know why. For example, why was a complete outline of he GOP congressional strategy for the bailout is given to Obama by Bush Administration Sec. of Treasury Henry Paulson? Why did he have it before McCain suspend his campaign and returned to Washington?   

This headline might be telling.

Obama Might Keep Paulson During Transition   

And two bits from Rush:

• "I have one answer to the mortgage crisis... rent: r..e..n..t."
• Civilian federal employees get a 3.9 percent pay raise in 2009 spending bill.

Yeah... some crisis.

"Two days ago, I saw a vehicle that would haul that tanker. You want to get out of here? You talk to me."

Reason 137 why you are a fool to pay for your children's college education:

The New York Sun:

Booed by Columbia University students a year ago, President Ahmadinejad of Iran early yesterday received a much warmer reception from 400 American students and professors at the Hyatt hotel in Midtown Manhattan.

"Especially at a time when our leaders and policymakers aren't meeting with this man, it was refreshing to hear from him," a senior at North Central College of Naperville, James Nebl, said. Mr. Nebl flew from Chicago with seven other students from the college to hear the Iranian leader. The college paid for the trip.

"It was incredible," a North Central College senior, Ann Fisher, said. "I honestly believe that the National Intelligence Estimate is correct and that since 2003, the nuclear program has been peaceful."

"They were beside themselves," A North Central professor said of his students, adding that the meeting an "amazing educational opportunity," and said that he would have felt the same way if the meeting were with Saddam Hussein or Adolf Hitler.

"I love you all," Mr. Ahmadinejad told the roomful of students, the Boston Globe reported. "I feel I am with very old friends."

You were, Mr. President, you were.

You'll be happy to know that your congress, busy in the middle of doing nothing, had time to vote $25 billion in low-cost loans to U.S. auto companies for retooling plants to produce more fuel-efficient vehicles.

And that's over and above the $700 billion corporate bail-out already proposed.

I  think that for the first time in my life, we are about to learn what America is really made of, and I don't believe that it will be pretty or short.

We will differ from our parents' generation who weathered the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl and WWII by pulling together being resourceful and thrifty; we will reach deeper fissures of division.

Demonstrations will turn into riots and riots to bloodshed. People have already been murdered in gas lines in the South... killed because of 10 gallons of gas. What will they do when things get really bad?

Black Americans have already hinted at, and some have flippantly said that should The Messiah lose the November election that there would be race riots. Of course I believe it... I was within a fire truck's drive to Watts in '65, and witnessed on television the rampage of murderous blacks attacking whites and Koreans over crack addict Rodney King, as well as them cheering the slaughter of two whites by O.J. Simpson.

At left they attempt to murder Reginald Denny.

A black doesn't become president? Of course there will be killings.   

Al Gore, a former vice president of this country, has called for civil disobedience in opposing the constriction of new coal-fired plants; plants that provide electricity to power our nation, energy that makes the difference between live and death for some.

And this occurs at the time when we face a fanatical and psychotic enemy seeking to capitalize on any weakness we reveal. They have nothing to lose because they already live in the 14th century. Worse, Muslims actually believe in provoking Armageddon regardless of their own deaths, to trigger the return of their god and begin killing the remaining infidels... us.