Bizarro World

This is the best (and shortest) comment about last night's debate between Brown and Coakley in Massachusetts for, wait for it.... "Kennedy's seat" Here's the great takeaway quote:

"Note how easily [debate moderator David] Gergen reached back for what he thought was a blazing fastball — “You’re going to sit in Teddy Kennedy’s seat!” — and discovered that it was a hanging curve that [Senate candidate Scott] Brown knocked over the Green Monster at Fenway, where it’s still bouncing around somewhere on the Mass Pike."

http://bigjournalism.com/mwalsh/2010/01/12/does-the-kinsley-rule-apply-to-journalists-too/#more-5194

One of these days, folks are going to look around and realize the new GOP conservatives running for office this year (Brown, Rubio) are the epitome of the Dems they have always thought they were voting for (cool, young, hip, smart) and the Dems are the Dinosaurs, old fogies and racists they have typically associated with Republicans ("Negro dialect" Harry Reid, Botox intoxicated Nancy Pelosi and the assorted crooks from Chicago currently running loose in DC spending our money like drunken sailors....

Ft. Hood and the suicide of Western Civilization

The jihadist Major Nidal Malik Hasan's attack on servicemen at Ft. Hood once again proves that we face a deranged enemy that must be defeated.

However, the real story here is America's willing cooperation in its own defeat. A half-century of hyper-sensitive political correctness is beginning to take a serious toll on our country. My point is well encapsulated by the statement of the Army Joint Chiefs of Staff, General George Casey, following the incident:

Our diversity not only in our Army, but in our country, is a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that’s worse.

Yes, you heard that right. Losing our "diversity" (which apparently is defined by having a known Islamist sympathizer in a high-ranking army position) would be worse than losing the 13 servicemen that were mercilessly gunned down at Ft. Hood.

Frankly, this statement amazes even me. In this day and age in America, it is deemed more important to have impeccable multicultural "diversity" credentials than it is to protect the lives of our citizens and servicemen. If a few people have to die in the name of "diversity", then so be it!

General Casey should be removed from his position for his insensitive and downright dangerous view on this incident. I won't hold my breath, as I'm pretty sure his boss shares the opinion.

The President wasn't lying....

Joe Wilson apologized to President Obama for the manner in which he shouted at the President, calling him a liar during his speech on health care to a joint session of Congress on September 9, 2009, but he should also apologize on the substance. President Obama did not lie. Here’s what the President said before Rep. Wilson shouted out.

“There are also those who claim that our reform efforts would insure illegal immigrants. This too is false. The reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.”

Now parse those words. President Obama is telling the truth about his reform proposal. He’s just hoping those listening don’t comprehend what his words actually mean. Reform opponents are not claiming that reform would INSURE illegals, they claim that reform would NOT insure illegals. They claim, rightly so, that this reform does not address the illegal immigrant problem vis-à-vis health care. Obama says reform would NOT apply to illegals. He’s absolutely right!

Illegals would not have to get insurance. They would not have to provide documentation to the IRS that they are insured by a government approved plan. They would not have to carry cards or documentation everywhere they go to prove they are covered. They will not have to pay the taxes that are sure to come as the program grows and corruption, waste, fraud and abuse proliferate (as with all government programs).

All they have to do is continue doing what they are already doing – go into any emergency room and get all the care they need and walk out again without paying a dime.

President Obama was telling the truth – illegals won’t be insured; this law will not apply to them. They’ll get everything for free like they do now and we’ll all end up paying the bill, as we do now.

The Rabbit Hole

"The senator’s actions in the hours and days after emerging from that pond tell us something ugly about Kennedy the man. That he got away with it tells us something ugly about American public life." Mark Steyn

Amidst the hagiography of this weekend's laying to rest of the mortal remains of one man, Steyn reminds us that we're all complicit when we allow the truth to slide down the rabbit hole.

Remember that Robert Packwood, Republican Senator, was driven from public life (when was the last time you heard his name) because he patted a woman's bum in the elevator. His biggest regret? That he wasn't a liberal Democrat. He'd be sitting in Harry Reid's seat now if that were the case.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MjZlNjA1MTRmYWViNjMwMDUyNjc1ZTg0NDQwZjk2ODc=&w=MA==

Objects of Cultural Disdain

John Podhoretz, the movie critic refers to "Object(s) of Cultural Piety" or OCP. Once something or someone becomes an OCP, it (or he/she) must be the subject of veneration. As a movie critic, he points out that once the commercially genius Steven Spielberg (Jaws, Raiders, Jurassic Park) directed Schindler's List, he went from venerated because he could make money to someone just plain venerated. This is when he became an OCP. No matter what sludge he has produced or directed in subsequent years (Lost World, the latest Indiana Jones movie), no one can criticize him. Podhoretz makes the same case for Pixar whose last two movies have been duds when compared with Toy Story or Nemo.

I was thinking about his great point when I saw this today...

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/06/09/letterman-top-ten-palin-has-a-slutty-flight-attendant-look/

David Letterman's "joke" about 14 year old Willow Palin is so beyond the pale that I couldn't understand how a mainstream TV personality could possible get away with it.... And then I understood. Sarah Palin is an OCD - an Object of Cultural Disdain. All the right people hate her and so they can laugh at the thought of her little girl having sex with Alex Rodriguez in the dugout. And they all think that the people who watch his show would laugh too and it never crossed their small minds that people just might be offended.

Sarah Palin is a big girl and can take it even though the mischaracterizations of her are untrue, unfair and insulting. But you know how far down the "cool" list she is when someone like Letterman feels he can say such crude things about her child and not just get a way with it, but be slapped on the back as a great comedian.

Of course it also made me wonder how fast he would have been fined, fired and roasted over open coals if he had dared say something like that about Malia Obama (she's 11). As well he should be. How much hate does it take for a Letterman (or an audience member or viewer who laughed) to not see that? The problem with the veneration of the Obamas (OCP's if there ever were any) is that the worshipers of gods always need devils to hate. And sometimes those devils turn out to be innocent children.

So is there a middle ground in the abortion debate?

Regina Brett, columnist for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, wrote this today:

http://www.cleveland.com/brett/blog/index.ssf/2009/06/abortion_debate_needs_to_inclu.html

I figured that I'd try to answer her question.... Here's my reply to her:

Ms. Brett -

I read your Plain Dealer article on abortion today with interest. Your article basically answers the question you ask at the beginning as to why those "in the middle" are quiet - it's ambivalence. You know life is precious. You have your own joyful experience to attest to that. But you also know that life presents great challenges to us as well, and we want to have all options available to us to resolve those challenges. That is where the rubber meets the road, so to speak.

You speak of your wanted grandchild with love and affection. You speak of the unborn child of a 17 year old who doesn't want to be pregnant with more detachment (naturally - there's no relationship). But what's the difference between those two fetuses? One is wanted and one is not? Is that how we value human life? Sadly, it is. And that's what makes abortion such a corrosive issue. If life is precious, how can we close our hearts to precious life - any precious little life? The unborn child of that 17 year old is of no less value than your grandchild, is he/she? How can humans with warm hearts actually think in those terms? But we do when it comes to the political issue of abortion. Insisting that they are "equal under the law" would make us pro-life. Insisting they are not makes us pro-choice. But how do we describe those who want to believe those two lives are equally precious, but don't want to tell that 17 year old what to do with "her body?" It makes us confused and unable to reconcile those positions. That's why we stay quiet. We can't face our own moral confusion, so we shrug our shoulders and keep our mouths shut.

It's politically unpopular to proclaim all life to be precious, but in every other aspect of our lives, except abortion, we do that. We give thanks when a child overcomes cancer - because life is precious. We take part in relays for life to cure cancer - because life is precious. We mourn the loss of our oldest relative who has passed - because life is precious. We recoil in horror at the holocaust, at the memory of 9/11 and at senseless gun crimes - because life is precious. But we avert our eyes when we walk past a Planned Parenthood clinic - because life is precious, but those lives aren't protected because we don't want to impose our values and tell someone what to do with their own challenges.

So we remain silent. Thank you for bringing this to our attention. For years, I wanted to have it both ways too. I tried to reconcile my own precious children's lives with the "need" for legalized abortion on demand. I finally realized that I could not. I work to protect those little lives by supporting services like Maggie's Place - a new facility in Cleveland that takes in pregnant women who wish to keep or adopt out their babies. I try to make people aware that our abortion laws are toothless. Women do not have enough protection against predatory abortion providers - they are not given options and our culture doesn't insist that they receive them. Our culture doesn't support adoption and we should do more to do, as you say, focus on preventing abortion.

My hope and prayer is that every woman would be careful with her body and not put herself in a position to have to choose abortion, that she would value life so much that she would take responsibility and I pray that all of us would support her if she is pregnant and cannot support both herself and he child. We must do more, Regina. I thank you for bringing this up. I hope we can all find more answers - but the most important thing we must do is to face the question you raised today - and loudly proclaim that all life is precious and we will do all we can to change a culture that merely wishes to dispose of life when it's not wanted. That, Regina is no answer.

Thanks and best wishes.

Pam

John Brown and George Tiller

The death of abortionist George Tiller at the hands of a cold-blooded murderer has the left agitated and excited about an opportunity. Within an hour of his death, the blogs were alive with accusations that talk radio, right-wing blogs and anyone who is pro-life had blood on their hands and insinuated that "rhetoric" was the cause of this murder.

They want to equate those of us who value life, who believe abortion on demand to be a stain on our country and, most importantly, speak up about the issue, with a murderous individual. It suits them to use this tragedy for Tiller's family for their own purposes - to try to shut us up.

Democrats have done this before. In 1859, John Brown, an ardent abolitionist, incited a deadly insurrection at Harper's Ferry to draw attention to the plight of the slave. Abraham Lincoln, condemned him as a "misguided fanatic." But Southern democrats alleged that his rebellion was the tip of the abolitionist iceberg and represented the wishes of Lincoln and the Republican Party. It was in their best interest to tie this fanatic with legitimate abolitionists.

Not one mainstream pro-life organization or individual will stand with the man who took Tiller's life. (Interestingly enough, there were plenty of mainstream abolitionists who did stand with John Brown - among them Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau who praised his actions.)

George Tiller's death is a tragedy for his family. He is a victim of a murderous hatred. He is not a victim of the pro-life movement. I fear that his death will be all the excuse many need to equate speech with action and will attempt (and may succeed) in shutting us up. If that happens, every American who values free speech will be able to mark Sunday, May 31 as the day free speech died along with George Tiller.