The Kerry Tax Plan (Windows Media Player format) from the Club for Growth puts it all in perspective. Makes you wonder why the ultra-famous lefties are complaining about getting a tax cut check back.
Thanks to DGCI.

Thank you Michele. Once again you have made it clearer than I ever could. The words are like an entry from the encyclopedia of life as to what the difference between the left and right are these days.
Hatred is why I have no regard for the left wing. Not my hatred, and not most others on the right. It is the hatred that spews out of the mouthpieces of the left wing. It is taken as a fact on the left that Ken Starr and Rush Limbaugh hated President Clinton. But that isn’t true. They may not have liked him, distrusted his policies and politics, and hated that he got away with a felony while in office, but they never wished him dead.
Not so the Michael Moores and the rest on the left. I have no doubt that they dream of a left wing martyr assassinating the President Bush to save the world.
Michele’s commentary sums up the hate from the left well.

That’s a pretty big difference when you think about it. One set of people will go to the polls and vote with confidence. The other group will go to the polls and vote with trepidation. One uses their heart to guide them, one uses their hate.
It’s the hate that separates them, too. I don’t think many people on the right actually hate Kerry. They don’t think he will make a good president. They don’t like his nuance, they don’t trust him with the keys to the country, but they don’t hate him. At least nobody is writing plays about killing him.
Hate and fear. That’s what I’m seeing from the left. And it’s funny in a way, because it wasn’t too long ago that the left was accusing the right of running a campaign of fear.

But the best part is a comment left by BumperStickerest:

Dad of two elementary-aged boys here - I drew the distinction for them between ‘The Left’ and ‘The Right’ along common-sense lines.
I explained to them that the Right tends to be more common-sensical about things, to a point. More ’size up situation, consider the alternatives, and go with what you think is best, based on what you know.’ That sort of thing.
The Left, I explained, tends to be bat-shit crazy thinking that people with common-sense are evil and that the cloud fairies will plant the money trees that will pay for all the stuff they want to do.
I think my message is getting through.

The Student Movement Coordination Committee for Democracy in Iran has a press release about the Iranian mullahs promoting John Kerry for President. All out of their enlightened self interest of course.

Some of the well known, US based, Islamic regime’s apologists and lobbyists have mobilized in order to boost Senator J. Kerry’s Presidential Campaign among the Iranian-American community. In that line, paid interviews with their controversial leaders or TV advertisements for Mr. Kerry, with two of the Los Angeles based TV networks, such as “Tamasha” and “Channel One”, and “Radio 670 AM” have started since mid-September. But contrary to these three non scrupulous and money oriented networks, all the others, who have a sense of integrity, have rejected the substantial offers made to them.

In other Persian news, riots seem to be breaking out:

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.

They are certainly smarter than our media. They are playing them for everything they can get.Tim Chavez from the Tennessean gives me a little insight.

”The Najaf shrine  HUNDREDS of dead women and children were brought out after Sadr left,” Rose wrote. ”They (Sadr’s supporters) rounded them up during the battle and brought them in to be executed. Why? Because they anticipated the Americans would eventually enter the shrine and walk into a media ambush. We never went in. The people of Najaf love us right now because of that. They hate Sadr and want him dead.

”Have you heard that one yet (in the media)?”

No we haven’t. We just get one side. That’s bad journalism  by a news media acting in concert with Kerry.

I will always remember this now every time there is a news story about dead women and children in the Middle East. Unless it can be proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Americans/Israelis/etc. did it, the assumption is now that the bad guys either executed or staged the killings.
Thanks to DGCI.

This is making the rounds. Thanks to Dizzy Girl.
(more…)

Common sense is not normally found in newspapers, especially the opinion columns. But The Daily Times has an article on the Cat Stevens mess that has people writing in furious that have the opinion because he is a musician he is harmless. But this is the best disection of that theory I have seen yet.

Unfortunately, we live in an age where terrorism must be taken seriously here at home.
If that means that Cat Stevens can’t come into the country because he has a connection to a terrorist organization, no matter how ancillary that connection may be, then fine. We’re a safer country.
Racial profiling is flat out wrong when it’s done by police on the highway, pulling over African Americans just because, well, they’re African American, but there has to be some level of acceptability when officials question Muslims or middle Easterners traveling into our country after Sept. 11.
By all accounts Stevens was treated in a very benevolent manner, but for our safety, officials do check into certain people because they are either of Mid-Eastern descent or a religious convert. By all means, go ahead and do it.
And for those of you who say, “why should we be concerned with Cat Stevens coming into our country,” I remind you of Benedict Arnold who performed valiantly at the Battle of Saratoga, only to be convicted of treason. Or Aldrich Ames, who fed U.S. Intelligence secrets to the former Soviet Union. Or Alger Hiss, who worked in the Roosevelt administration in the ’30s and ’40s and all the while was a Russian spy.
Just because Cat Stevens is a musical icon to many people here in the U.S., doesn’t mean he has sanctuary here. He’s made choices in his life that have made him a possible threat to our every day safety.
He chose to move to Brazil as a tax exile in the 1970s. He stirred controversy in 1989 by endorsing Ayatolla Khomeini’s decree that Salman Rushdie deserved to die for his book, “The Satanic Verses.” Stevens later reversed that position, but he’s gone beyond the sensitive folk singer of the “Ëœ60s.

Hey, I might be a world famous network engineer, but that does not mean I’m not dangerous. Everyone should watch enough CSI to know that its always the innocuous housewife, or the entertainer, or the golfball salesman from Ohio who ends up being the murderer.
Just because Cat Stevens wrote hippie love songs back in the 70’s doesn’t mean his beliefs make him exempt from criticism, or being blocked from entering the country. No one has a right to enter a country except for its citizens.

Captain’s Quarters has found a story about another Kerry lie. Kerry seems to think that he was in Safwan during the Gulf War for the cease-fire. Whats the difference between me and John Kerry? I’ve actually been in Safwan!

Frequent CQ contributor Bandit watched the O’Reilly Factor last night on Fox News, which replayed a 2001 interview with Senator John Kerry. Bandit reports that during that interview three years ago, Kerry stated that he went to Iraq on March 3rd during the signing of the cease-fire agreement that ended the first Gulf War:
“I mean, I was in Safwan. I went there when the signing of the armistice took place at the end of the war.”
That would have been a pretty remarkable trip, if Bandit reports this correctly; at the moment, Fox News does not have a transcript available. Both Bandit and I recall that Iraq was still considered a war zone, an unlikely (but not necessarily impossible) place to find a US Senator, especially one who would have had no official capacity during the ceremony, and even more especially, one who had voted against the authorization to use force in the first place.

Question for all: Who knows what “Boater Sierra” is? I’ll give a hint, it has something to do with this story.

“Get your crack, smack, dope, heroin, and Yahoo in that alley over there…”
The Internet is now a disease. And it is highly addictive.

That, at least, is according to an “Internet Deprivation Study” carried out by Yahoo! and advertising outfit OMD. Participants in the human experiment were deprived of the web for 14 days, and found themselves quickly succumbing to “withdrawal and feelings of loss, frustration and disconnectedness”. The reason for the rapid collapse of their universe is - say the researchers - because “internet users feel confident, secure and empowered. The internet has become, to some, the ultimate symbol of modernity to the point that participants were hobbled without convenient access to routine information like maps and telephone numbers. The pervasive nature of the internet is such that participants often forgot or lost the desire to use ‘old fashioned tools’ like the phone book, newspapers and telephone-based customer service.”

And this has nothing to do with the internet porn either!

Sarah Hensley, I wish to offer you condolences on the immenent loss of your father. Terrorists will almost definitely kill him soon. I hope that this does not happen ever again, but I am afraid that as long as these animals are not put down soon enough, it will continue.
Sarah - I hope that you grow up strong and proud. I wish that some day, you become President. And that you remember what these “people” did to your father.
And also that you have the nuclear football in your hands.

I always love Scott’s commentary at The Razor

It’s a freaking melt-down, a psychotic-break. If CBS was a person, it would be climbing a bell tower with a rifle right about now; if it was a drunk, it would be downing it’s final bottle of Jack before pouring itself behind the wheel for a night of hell-raising in the car.

The end is not going to be pretty. And you know what?

It will all be for nothing. None of this will stick to Bush. They could raise Killian from the dead and shit real memos out of their righteous asses for weeks - and no one would care.

CBS is America’s al-Jazeera. They’ll be firing all the Jews and bagging their women in burqas in no time.

I love that part about the bell tower.
I still have a hard time believing that the network that brings the shows like JAG and CSI also runs 60 minutes.

You are never sure if being a NeoCon is a good thing or not. But according to the Christian Science Monitor NeoCon quiz, I am actually a realist:

Realist

Realists”¦
Are guided more by practical considerations than ideological vision
Believe US power is crucial to successful diplomacy - and vice versa
Don’t want US policy options unduly limited by world opinion or ethical considerations
Believe strong alliances are important to US interests
Weigh the political costs of foreign action
Believe foreign intervention must be dictated by compelling national interest
Historical realist: President Dwight D. Eisenhower
Modern realist: Secretary of State Colin Powell

From All Things Jennifer-

You know perfectly well whom you’re voting for. The only reason you say you’re undecided is that it’s a cheap ploy to get attention.

This nails it for about 90% of the so-called “undecideds.” Or those who make it such a grand point to say that they are independent voters, best man for the job, etc.
Well duh. The amount of party voters who tow the line are a lot smaller than these people realize. Most people, even those heathens in political parties, will vote mixed ticket. It is ok to join a party. You can always leave if you must. But in most states, you then get to help choose who the candidates are. The more choice the better. A question for those independents: if you are so unsatisified with the candidates, when is the last time you got involved in the process?

Kerry Support Rebounds, Race Again Even makes the following mistake in its polling questions:

The second wave of polling also finds less acceptance of Republican criticism of the Democratic candidate. Fewer voters agree with the statement “John Kerry changes his mind too much.” Fewer think the chances of terrorism would increase if Kerry is elected. In addition, a substantial majority of voters (66%) believe Vice President Cheney went too far when he suggested recently that risk of terrorism would increase if voters “make the wrong choice.” That opinion remained steady through the polling period.

Repeat after me: Vice President Cheney did not suggest that the risk of terrorism will increase. He suggested that Kerry would treat it as law enforcement not as a war. At least this is on target:

Kerry’s slippage in the post-convention polls also has undermined confidence in his chances of victory, including among Democrats. The percentage of all voters anticipating a Bush victory climbed from 44% in August to 60% in September, a figure that held steady through the polling period. Among Democrats, the number predicting a Kerry victory fell from 66% in August to 43% this month.

Used to be a democrat would just end an argument with either: “Baby Killer” or “Hitler/Nazi” when they had no logic for thier situation. At least their vocabulary has now increased a bit.
Captain’s Quarters now reports on the Kerry/Edwards campaign using the utterly brilliant closing line: “VietNam, I was there, you weren’t, nyah nyah”

Vice President Dick Cheney turned Sen. John Kerry's own words against him Tuesday while criticizing the Democrat for calling the war in Iraq "the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time." In an echo of a charge President Bush leveled at Kerry last week, Cheney contended that Kerry's position was held early in the primary campaign by Democratic presidential rival Howard Dean.
"Sen. Kerry said, and I quote, 'Those who doubted whether Iraq or the world would be better off without Saddam Hussein and those who believe today that we are not safer with his capture, don't have the judgment to be president or the credibility to be elected president,'" Cheney said.
"In the spirit of bipartisanship, that's one position of Sen. Kerry's that I do agree with," he said.

Like it or not, that’s political debate, and pointing out inconsistencies in an opponent’s publicly stated positions is not only fair game, but very germane to the election. In response, one would normally expect the Kerry campaign to present examples of Cheney or Bush switching positions or a clarification of the nuance behind the seeming contradiction that Cheney points out. One would expect that kind of response from adults. This is what we get from the shrill adolescents at the Kerry/Edwards campaign:

Mark Kitchens, a spokesman for the Kerry-Edwards campaign, called Cheney's criticism an insult.
"Cheney's attacks come from a man who took five deferments from Vietnam and are disingenuous at best. His attacks are an insult to all of us who have ever worn the uniform," Kitchens said. "George Bush and Dick Cheney like to blame others for their failures but they fail to see that the buck stops at their desks at the White House."

In a way, I do wish the UN had a pair. Can you imagine these thin-skinned debutantes actually getting criticized for something, by, lets say, France?
“Ze US eez arrogant!”
“Waaaaah! The North VietNamese didn’t call us arrogant! You are so mean! You weren’t in VietNam! oh, you were? Dien Ben what?”

Many of you have noticed by now that the Day by Day cartoon is no longer on our page. Unfortunately, that is because Chris Muir has stopped writing his wonderful artwork, at least temporarily. Several members of his family apparently have severe cancer, so he is making the right choice in deciding to spend more time with them.
We wish him the best of luck, and hopefully a speedy recovery to his family members.
Chris has been known to visit this site on occasion and leave comments. He is a valued friend to conservatives everywhere.
Chris - we love your cartoon, please come back soon and best wishes!

Serves him right…

A man who was trying to shoot seven puppies was shot himself when one of the dogs made the .38-caliber revolver discharge, deputies said.
Jerry Allen Bradford, 37, of Pensacola, was charged with felony animal cruelty, the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office said Wednesday.
Bradford was being treated at an undisclosed hospital for the gunshot wound to his wrist, said sheriff’s Sgt. Ted Roy.
Bradford said he decided to shoot the 3-month-old puppies in the head because he couldn’t find another home for the shepherd-mix dogs (search), according to the sheriff’s office.
On Monday, he was holding two puppies, one in his arms and another in his left hand, when the dog in his hand wiggled and put its paw on the trigger, making the gun discharge, the sheriff’s report said.

c’mon… everyone has heard of the SPCA by now. What an NCMF.

The assault weapons ban is almost finished. FYI - a primer: the weapons banned in the feel good legistation are not more powerful than other firearms. They are not machine guns. They will not spray fire everywhere. It has nothing to do with how deadly they are. It was based completely on lies and deceit. This legislation was completely about control of the population by left wing politicians. Have a nice day, and take a liberal to the gun range this weekend!

The Scottish Parliament’s website is written in, well, Scottish.

Walcome til the Scottish Pairlament wabsite
The Scottish Pairlament is here for tae represent aw Scotland’s folk.
We want tae mak siccar that as mony folk as can is able tae find oot aboot whit the Scottish Pairlament dis and whit wey it warks. We hae producit information anent the Pairlament in a reenge o different leids tae help ye tae find oot mair.
This section o wir wabsite introduces ye til the information that is tae haun on wir wabsite in Scots.
Gettin involvit in the Scottish Pairlament
We hae producit a publication cried “Makkin Yer Voice Heard in the Scottish Pairlament” that tells ye aboot the different weys that you can let the Pairlament and the Memmers o the Scottish Pairlament (MSPs) ken whit ye think.
Follae this link for tae look til the publication “Makkin Yer Voice Heard in the Scottish Pairlament” in Scots.
Follae this link for tae look til the publication “Makkin Yer Voice Heard in the Scottish Pairlament” in ither leids.
Gin ye wid like tae discuss whit wey we can help ye tae get involvit in the darg o the Pairlament, please contact us.

Kind of funny at first reading everything fonetikalee, but if you actually sound out the words, it does sound authentically Scottish Brogue.

Right Thinking’s Lee brings up a comparison of the Swift Boat vets vs. media behemoth Michael Moore. The original is over at Moorewatch.

Michael Moore has had his ass kicked by the Swift Boat Veterans.
Moore went after President George W. Bush with a blunt instrument, was a hero of the angry left and the darling of the old media, but did little, if anything to derail President Bush. But lead SwiftVet John O'Neill used a scalpel to go after John Kerry, all the while being despised and hated by the old media and the angry left. But his incisions into the Kerry campaign were precision like and left deep cuts and scars on the Kerry campaign and were considerably much more successful. The scars remain on the Kerry campaign to this day.
The net results; a bunch of Viet Nam veterans and the New Media bested Michael Moore and his Old Media pals at their own game.

Wonderful. It shows also why the current attacks on Bush are also doomed for failure. Any non-biased story about Bush’s guard years would have to show taht he more than made up for the last two years of slower duty with a lot more in the first few. In my six years in the guard, I spent almost the entire first two on full time active duty. Then two years later I spent six months doing two tours in Desert Storm. The year after, almost a full year either as a full time or civilian employee. I could have taken my entire last year off totally and it would have made almost no difference at all to my total points.
But here is the fundamental differences:

1. Bush did not make his service part of his campaign at all, let alone the centerpiece. How many people will be swayed by the latest round of leftwing attacks? If they hold it against him that he was part of the guard in the first place, they already knew that.
2. People are going to judge Bush solely on the last 4 years. Since he has a real political record now as President, it is about the only thing people are going to consider.
   

   “It’s kind of like a panic on the part of Kerry: Just because he got clobbered with his record he thinks something like this would hurt Bush,” said Pete Domenici, a Republican Senator from New Mexico. “But they’re not in the same ballpark.”

Texans for Truth, a political organization backed by a group seeking to defeat Bush, said it would begin airing television advertisements in five states next week, featuring a veteran of Bush’s Alabama Air National Guard unit who says he never saw the future president on the base.

So says the Bloomberg article. Just who is this shadowy group fronting money for Texans for Truth? My god, they may be democrats! Halt the presses! This is a breaking news story!

Can someone please explain to me why everyone in the world is so damn incompetent? Every single person I’ve dealt with lately in a professional capacity has demonstrated themselves to be completely inept at doing their jobs, from my pharmacist to the people who worked in the store where I bought my eyeglasses. What the hell is wrong with everyone?

Lee wonders at Right Thinking…
Sounds familiar to me. Our pharmacy has gone right in the toilet the last few months, and don’t get my wife started about her eyeglasses experience! People are acting like european waiters. With no tipping, they have no enthusiasm for better service.