A Problem With Liberal Politicians

One of the things that has always frustrated me is the arrogance of liberal politicians who always seem convinced that they know more about everything than everyone (banks, car companies, etc...). Now the President; true to form for liberals, knows more about military tactics than the men who have spent their entire adult life studying the matter.

The AP reports that "President Barack Obama is considering sending large numbers of additional U.S. forces to Afghanistan next year but fewer than his war commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, prefers, U.S. officials said."

10 months in office and the President is already smarter than his top commander in the field! Wow! he sure is a fast learner. Can anyone point to an event in history when a political leader was right, and the military commander was wrong like this? I'm not a historian, but I don't remember that being the case since Lincoln overruled some lame generals looking for an excuse. So in the last 150 years, has it ever been true? (FYI, Obama is not Lincoln)

On the other hand, can you remember Presidents overruling generals to everyone's detriment? (Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Carter, Clinton, Obama, etc....)

Another Great Idea from Europe

Democrats and liberals like to see themselves as being larger than patriotic Americans - they are globalists. We see this in their seeming obsession with turning the U.S. into a country modeled after European Socialism. Norway makes taxes and income records public according to this story at Yahoo!

It's the moment nosy Norwegian neighbors have been waiting for — the release of official records showing the annual income and overall wealth of nearly every taxpayer in the Scandinavian country.

In a move that would be unthinkable elsewhere, tax authorities in Norway have issued the "skatteliste," or "tax list," for 2008 to the media under a law designed to uphold the country's tradition of transparency.

I love Europe. Its a great place to visit with a fascinating history and many wonderful things to see. But I am glad I don't live there if this is what they call "transparency". Makes you wonder what the Obama administration means when they say transparency.

10 Horror Films for Conservatives

Keeping with the spirit of Halloween John Hawkins of Townhall.com has posted a list of his 10 Best Horror Movies for Conservatives. I don't really like horror movies but for readers of this blog, I try to be informative ;-}

Sarah Palin - Going Rogue

For those of you interested in Sarah Palin's Going Rogue: An American Life you can pre-order her new book for only $9. It will sell for nearly $30 next month when it is available. You can order it by clicking the link above.

A Joke With a Ton of Truth

A friend of mine sent me this email. It is a case of humor blended beautifully with truth. It also illustrates the primary differences between liberals and conservatives. Hat tip to Linda McBride.

If a conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn't buy one. If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.

If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat. If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone.

If a conservative sees a foreign threat, he thinks about how to defeat his enemy. If a liberal sees a foreign threat, he wonders how to surrender gracefully and still look good.

If a conservative is homosexual, he quietly leads his life. If a liberal is homosexual, he demands legislated respect.

If a person of color is conservative, they see themselves as independently successful. Their liberal counterparts see themselves as victims in need of government protection.

If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation. A liberal wonders who is going to take care of him.

If a conservative doesn't like a talk show host, he switches channels. Liberals demand that those they don't like be shut down.

If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn't go to church. A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced.

If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it. A liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.

If a conservative slips and falls in a store, he gets up, laughs and is embarrassed. If a liberal slips and falls, he grabs his neck, moans like he's in labor and then sues.

Global Warming and Snow

In a recent post we predicted that this winter would be unusually cold in the US Northeast. That prediction is coming true as this story about the Northeast being struck by an early snowstorm shows. That global warming thing must be on vacation.

What Some NFL Owners Are Saying

As you probably know Rush Limbaugh is not considered worthy to be a part-owner of an NFL franchise. Did you know that Serena William, Fergie, and Jennifer Lopez are NFL owners? Andrew Breitbart has an interesting story about some of the racial things these women have said. Be prepared for some pretty harsh language, something we have never heard Rush say publicly. But since these women are Obama supporters, such things apparently do not matter to the NFL Players Association.

Rogues Gallery

By now you have heard that the President has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Even Saturday Night Live, hardly a bastion of conservative thought, mocked the award. The British seem to think that this is a joke as do many Americans. Here are headlines from the Times Online, a British newspaper's online version.

• Prize Fools - "The Nobel committee’s award to President Obama demeans the peace prize, appears politically partisan and should embarrass the White House."
• Barack Obama's peace prize starts a fight - "Gasps echoed through the Nobel Hall in Osloas Barack Obama was unveiled as the winner of the 2009 Peace Prize, sparking a global outpouring of incredulity"

Those are the rational reactions that reasonable people the world over had when the President was awarded, what is arguably the most prestigious prize in the world, without doing anything to earn it.

But this isn't the first time that the Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded with questionable reasoning:

• Al Gore - the 2007 winner was honored for his work on global warming (see previous posts here, here, and here). What does global warming, even if you believe in it, have to do with peace?
• Mohamed ElBaradei - the 2005 winner was honored for his work leading the UN's atomic agency. Given the current situations in North Korea and Iran, his competence has to be called into question. His award was apparently the result of opposing President Bush.
• Jimmy Carter - the 2002 winner was apparently honored for opposing President Bush or maybe it was for his anti-Semitism.
• Kofi Annnan - the former Secretary General of the United Nations won in 2001. This is the man who presided over what was arguably the most corrupt iteration of the UN in its history. This is the same anti-Semite who accused Israel of deliberately bombing a UN observer outpost.
• Yasser Arafat - in 1994 this murderer of Olympic athletes, hijacker of airliners, school bomber, and instigator of the gunning down of passengers in airline terminals at Rome, Vienna and elsewhere was the Nobel's committee for its leading peacemaker.

This award has become a joke after the Nobel committee has let politics ruin it. Sometimes I just hate politics. By the way the following individuals were nominated but not awarded the prize in deference to the President this year.

1. Morgan Tsvangirai, the Zimbabwean Prime Minister, has been tortured and imprisoned in defence of democracy.
2. Denis Muwege, a physician in war-torn Congo, who has opened a clinic to help victims of rape.
3. Senator Piedad Córdoba has mediated in Colombia’s civil war.
4. Greg Mortenson, American US army medic, builds schools for Afghan girls in places where warlords and drug dealers kill people for trying.

Any one of these individuals would have been a better choice. Best of all the choice would have been based on actual achievements.

Hat tip to Mac McBride.

Global Warming? What a Joke.

Looking at this list of stories making the argument against global warming seem pretty ridiculous.

• Major League Baseball game postponed because of snow in early October.
• US Chill Map for today
• Record low temperatures in Washington
• Coldest early October ever in Nebraska

Even the BBC (Britain's version of CNN or the New York Times) is wondering about the legitimacy of the global warming argument. Their story opens with these lines.

This headline may come as a bit of a surprise, so too might that fact that the warmest year recorded globally was not in 2008 or 2007, but in 1998.

But it is true. For the last 11 years we have not observed any increase in global temperatures.

And our climate models did not forecast it, even though man-made carbon dioxide, the gas thought to be responsible for warming our planet, has continued to rise.

And all the while former Vice President Al Gore continues his maniacal search for relevance. What is it about facts and liberals? They are so good at cherry-picking their facts in order to confirm their politics. Facts that dispute their politics..... well I guess they just don't matter.

Gore Vidal Changes His Mind

Last year Gore Vidal switched his support from Hillary Clinton to Barack Obama. Now he seems to be regretting his choice. In response to a question about how Obama is doing he replied as follows:

"Dreadfully. I was hopeful. He was the most intelligent person we’ve had in that position for a long time. But he’s inexperienced. He has a total inability to understand military matters. He’s acting as if Afghanistan is the magic talisman: solve that and you solve terrorism."

Gore Vidal is far from someone who was temporarily swayed by Obama's leftist views. He has always been a leftist. Look at this quote about Republicans from the same interview.

The Republican Party is a party when in fact it’s a mindset, like Hitler Youth, based on hatred — religious hatred, racial hatred. When you foreigners hear the word ‘conservative’ you think of kindly old men hunting foxes. They’re not, they’re fascists.”

Vidal is still a far-left wacko, but even he has discovered that the emperor has no clothes. I wonder how long it will take the American media to figure that out.

Democratic Fundraiser Sentenced to 24 Years

The AP starts this story by saying "Former Democratic fundraiser Norman Hsu was sentenced Tuesday to more than 24 years in prison by a judge who accused him of funding his fraud by manipulating the political process in a way that 'strikes at the very core of our democracy'."

He was one of the money raisers for the Clintons. Even our justice system finds this man totally corrupt and manipulative. Why couldn't Bill and Hillary pick up on that? The American press characterized this couple as brilliant; some even claiming that Hillary was the smartest woman in the world!

When will we be done with the Clintons? Will they ever go away? How many of their close associates have been imprisoned or are now dead? Although this proves nothing - only suggests that the Clintons are thoroughly corrupt - I don't remember the "incompetent" and "heartless" George W. Bush having associates like this.

Across Europe The Left Loses Clout

Barack Obama and lots of Democrats wish that Americans were more like Europeans. Finally I agree with them. The AP has a story about the resurgence of the political right throughout Europe even admitting that in times of trouble, conservatives are more trustworthy.

"In times of insecurity, the right has credibility," said Enrico de Bernart, a 43-year-old man window-shopping near the Pantheon in Rome. "People trust the right or center-right even if you don't like their objectives."

I think I agree with the President for once. In this way Americans really should resemble Europe more. I think we already are.

Prepare yourselves for the coldest winter in a decade

Cassy Fiano, a great blogger, has a great story about the upcoming "coldest winter in a decade". Bloomberg reports it this way:

The U.S. Northeast may have the coldest winter in a decade because of a weak El Nino, a warming current in the Pacific Ocean, according to Matt Rogers, a forecaster at Commodity Weather Group.

“Weak El Ninos are notorious for cold and snowy weather on the Eastern seaboard,” Rogers said in a Bloomberg Television interview from Washington. “About 70 percent to 75 percent of the time a weak El Nino will deliver the goods in terms of above-normal heating demand and cold weather. It’s pretty good odds.”

Warming in the Pacific often means fewer Atlantic hurricanes and higher temperatures in the U.S. Northeast during January, February and March, according to the National Weather Service. El Nino occurs every two to five years, on average, and lasts about 12 months, according to the service.

Hedge-fund managers and other large speculators increased their net-long positions, or bets prices will rise, in New York heating oil futures in the week ended Sep. 22, according to U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission data Sept. 25.

“It could be one of the coldest winters, or the coldest, winter of the decade,” Rogers said.

U.S. inventories of distillate fuels, which include heating oil, are at their highest since January 1983, the U.S. Energy Department said Sept. 23. Stockpiles of 170.8 million barrels in the week ended Sept. 18 are 28 percent above the five-year average.

It seems like everyone in the know is in agreement - meterologists, futures traders, oil companies - while Congress is debating global warming. Meterologists have a pretty good accuracy where predicting is concerned. They certainly seem to be right a whole lot more than they are wrong. Politicians, on the other hand, have a lousy record at predicting. When is the last time that a politician predicted something and it actually came true?

Leftward Drift

The American political climate has shifted left substantially throughout my lifetime. Andy Williams, a supporter of Bobby Kennedy in the 1960's, is now calling out Barack Obama. Is it because Andy Williams has changed or has the country changed?

The Telegraph newspaper in the U.K. has this story about Andy Williams and his belief that Barack Obama wants this country to fail. They quote the veteran pop singer as follows:

"Don't like him at all," he said, "I think he wants to create a socialist country. The people he associates with are very Left-wing. One is registered as a Communist.

"Obama is following Marxist theory. He's taken over the banks and the car industry. He wants the country to fail."

I always liked Andy Williams. Now I know why. Why do we have to go to the U.K. to get such stories? Could our left-leaning media be enabling this administration once again?

Habitat for Humanity Extravagence

Coming home recently from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) I went by the Habitat for Humanity airplane! Now this plane wasn't a twin-engine propeller plane, nor was it a Lear Jet like many large organizations have to quickly carry small loads of 15 or 20 people to a meeting. Its tail went as high in the sky as a Boeing 767. What is a charitable organization doing with a plane like that? It must cost millions to maintain, and millions more to purchase in the first place. Those planes cost something in the order of $15,000/hour to fly. I wonder how many people who contribute to Habitat for Humanity know that their contributions are going for such extravagance.

German men are 'world's worst lovers'

There is a hilarious article in Britain's Telegraph newspaper where women rate their men as lovers. American men are ranked 5th among the worst behind the Germans, British, Swedish, and Dutch. It could be worse. The Russians are too hairy and the Turks are too sweaty. But even they rank as better lovers than American men.

In case you were wondering, the Spanish men rank as the best and are followed by the Brazilians, Italians, French, and Irish. Hmmm.... maybe the French really are lovers. They don't seem to be fighters.