Domestic bliss, 3

FYI... moving furniture makes your muscles sore. Really sore. Ya know, just throwin' that out there. In case you were thinking about moving some of your own stuff around.

Mike Yon in the Weekly Standard

Yon continues to be the go-to reporter in Iraq. Doesn't pull punches, doesn't hesitate to praise Iraqi and Coalition success.

Read All Quiet on the Baghdad Front: When Iraqis went to the polls, the best news was what didn't happen.

Quick links

Victor Davis Hanson has more spot on analysis on Iraq and predicts a noteworthy yet gradual and unspectactular end to the violence - With a Wimper

"The Huffpo ECHO CHAMBER Halloween Party is only ten days away!" Greg Gutfield returns! We missed you, guy.

"How to blog good: Part 2"

It takes an exra special kind of idiot to make neo-nazism look good by comparison

Drudge points to sketchy details on yesterday's four-hour race riot in Toledo, Ohio. It's obvious by the tone of the writing that the author (and the city Mayor that he quotes) didn't approve. Which is as it should be.

When the rioting began, [Mayor] Ford tried to negotiate with those involved, but "they weren't interested in that." He said people in the crowd swore at him and wanted to know why he was protecting the Nazis.

They were mostly "gang members who had real or imagined grievances and took it as an opportunity to speak in their own way," Ford said.

"I was chagrined that there were obvious mothers and children in the crowd with them," he said.

And this is the mentality that sparked it all:

Keith White, a black resident, criticized city officials for allowing the march in the first place.

"They let them come here and expect this not to happen?" said White, 29.

A spokesman for the National Socialist Movement blamed police for losing control of the situation.

All that finger pointing and not a word about comporting one's self in a personally responsible manner. If it sounds like I'm lecturing, well... I am. This is just disgusting behavior.

Iraqis vote...

That's right, Iraqis Vote Today.

That post title is nothing short of amazing given that just a couple of years ago, it would read, Iraqis... um... "Vote" Today. Good luck and God bless a free Iraq.

Mourning America's defeat in advance

Welcome to the occupation

How did this happen? How could the strongest power in modern history, going to war against a much lesser opponent at a time and place of its own choosing, find itself stuck a few years later, hemorrhaging blood and treasure amid increasing chaos?

Quagmire! War's over and we lost. All Iraq has to look forward to is outright civil war and the acsendance of another cruel dictator. Sorry 'bout that, but Bush and Company bungled it.

Such an erroneous view of reality is helpful, though... to the other side.

(via: Mudville Gazette, the must-read antidote to mainstream media's premature surrendering)

UPDATE: Victor Davis Hanson adds, "The story of the war since September 11 is that the United States military has not lost a single battle, has removed two dictatorships, and has birthed democracy in the Middle East."

And it just baffles me why this isn't a headline anywhere in the mainstream media.

Random entry from the journal I kept during my time in Iraq

15 May 2003

-- 1230 hours

It's 112 degrees Farenheit. Hands are too sweaty to draw anymore.

-- 1925 hours

The sun has gone down and the temperature has dropped back down to a balmy 115 degrees from an afternoon high of 122 and all our equipment stopped working hours ago. We bought an egg from an Iraqi at the gate. To fry on the hood of the HUMVEE, you know, just to say that we did it. But by the time we got it back to the site it was halfway to hard boiled and came out of the shell in chunks. It's gonna suck when summer gets here...

I never took high school civics...

... but even *I* know that "freedom of the press" means no oulawing the printing press which in today's world would include computers, typewriters, copiers, fax machines and blogs. Freedom of the press DOES NOT mean special priviledges for a few, elite news agencies. Damn but this proposed shield law is a bad idea.

(via: Drudge)

A social conservative comes out for Rudy

I would jump on the Giuliani for president bandwagon in a heartbeat, as I am not a social conservative. So I support the idea of Rudy's running for a different set of reasons. However, I agree with the author in this criticism of the Bush Administration:

THE REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP VACUUM has many conservatives, many Republicans, and many mainstream Americans longing for authority, for someone to step in and run things. Someone to take charge visibly of the day-to-day conduct of the country's affairs. Somebody who will butt heads willingly, even joyously, with obstreperous backstabbers, obstructionists, foot-draggers, and whiners, whether in the opposition party or his own. Someone who will joyfully champion a public fight against waste and inefficiency. Somebody who may be at times conspicuously wrong, but who will, nonetheless, be conspicuous.

Spot on. Proud as I am of Bush's prosecution of the War on Terror, it astounds me that he cedes authority to his critics to sell his accomplishments as failures to the American people! President Bush is terrible salesman and that may be what cements his legacy into a slot in the fair-to-middlin' range instead of as one of the great wartime presidents. Compare the reclusive Bush to his predecessor, Clinton. As distastful as I found Bill's practice of rushing out to give a statement every time CNN cut live to a celebrity car crash, George would do well to schedule more face time with the public, most of whom like and respect him.

(via: Ace)

RE: French bashing

Something I noticed while searching for articles to link in the previous post was how many articles are out there attempting to refute the "racist sterotype" of French anti-Americanism. Almost to a one, they use a variation of anectdotal evidence. "Hey! I have friends in France and they were nice to me!"

Does anyone else see the problem in extrapolating the general traits of a culture based on the actions of a few? Isn't that how, um... racism gets a foothold in the minds of the logically challenged?

Bash France? Non monsieur! I'm bashing you!

James Taranto and crew over at Best of the Web Today note this rather entertaining AFP piece:

French-bashing alive and well in America

WASHINGTON, Oct 6 (AFP) - Two years after relations between the US and France soured over the Iraq war, French-bashing in America appears alive and well in light of a recent ad campaign by a fast-food chain linking France and cowardice.

The ad by the Subway chain touted a cordon bleu chicken sandwich with the words "France and chicken, somehow it just goes together". A photo of a chicken dressed like Napoleon accompanied the advertisement.

Subway ran the ads in about 10 US states for nearly a month and pulled them in September following an outcry by members of the French expatriate community and other customers offended by the racist undertone.

What's this about a "racist undertone"? Why, I too, am astonished at this intolerable insult to the magnificent race poulet!

[...]"I think (French-bashing) is worse now than it was two years ago because, although it's not as relentless as it was, it has become a lot more accepted and part of the landscape," he added.

Damn that landscape! I specifically instructed the gardener NOT to plant any pernicious landscaping. Why, just the other day I spotted my racist, franco-phobe neighbor viciously pruning my granache trelis, grown from cuttings de Languedoc-Roussillon region. The insensitive bastard!

Marc Saint-Aubin du Cormier, another French native who created a website to monitor anti-French sentiment in the United States and Canada, agrees.

"There is a kind of anti-French streak in the background of the culture of America," he told AFP.

That, sir, would be the very definition of the pot calling the kettle black. Monsieur Marc Saint-Aubin du Cormier? I tremble with shame and chastisement at the very thought of your un-named website "monitoring my sentiment."

Ahhh France... such an excitable yet strangely non-threatening culture, isn't it?

I was a tad worried over Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers

but Iowahawk knows how to soothe my fears:

RELEVANT JOB DUTIES

As Assistant to the President of the United States, and as a female, my current job entails many duties that will help me in a position at the Supreme Court, such as resolving disputes. For example, while planning the last Capitol Hill softball outing, I discovered the Republicans wanted to have barbecue and the Democrats wanted vegetarian. Thinking quickly, I called Pizzeria Uno and order a variety of their delicious deep dish pies which were a big hit with everybody. I think this goes to show that I am a real "people person" with the feminine touch to get the job done, consensus-wise.

Daily KOS: "This is weird"

So this is weird.

A few months ago, Rep. Sherrod Brown was being begged to run for Senate in Ohio. Brown demurred. Rep. Tim Ryan passed, so the baton was passed on to Paul Hackett, which had electrified progressives nationwide with his near-successful special election in a blood red congressional district.

Except that, y’know, he still lost. Other than that, electrifying.

Apparently spooked by the rumors of his (Brown’s ) potential run, Hackett's people leaked all over the place that he was, indeed, running.

Except that, y’know, Hackett lost last time.

Paul Hackett, the Iraq War veteran from Cincinnati who was hailed by national for his narrow loss this summer in a heavily Republican House district, has quickly moved up in rank to challenge Mike DeWine for U.S. Senate in 2006.

“Hailed” for losing?

"Paul Hackett is running for U.S. Senate," said spokesman David Woodruff, who served as Hackett's campaign manager in his special election campaign for the 2nd District House seat against Rep. Jean Schmidt.

That would be Hackett’s “narrow loss” that Kos is so psyched about.

So the Ohio Senate picture has gone from no Democrats to challenge the increasingly vulnerable Sen. DeWine, to a potential primary battle between Hackett and Brown.

And with all apologies to Brown, who is one of the greats in the House, but this isn't cool. He bows out, waits for Hackett to gear up, and then floats a trial balloon about getting back in? Brown must've known about Hackett's decision to run, hence this trial balloon is sabotage.

“Sabotage” suggests a negative motive. How do you sabotage a proven loser?

[…] But in a primary, Brown has the instiutional state party apparatus (no matter how pathetic Ohio Dems might be). Hackett is an outsider.

I know it sounds like I’m gloating. But I’m really not. I just can’t wrap my mind around why Kos cares so damn much about Paul Hackett. Is it because he’s an “outsider” and therefore a likable underdog? What’s the deal? Seriously, this Hackett fetishizing is creepy.

Me, give me an Iraq vet over a career politician, even one with Brown's excellent pedigree. But ultimately, if Brown runs, this will be a choice for the people of Ohio…

And really, Democrats win either way.

Except, y’know, when they lose to Republicans.

Once again, Charlie Rose assembles a crack team of "diverse" experts

Okay, I generally enjoy Rose's show, if only because I appreciate the timeliness of his late night format. I find it cool that I can read an article in the NYT or Washington Post at noon, and then watch as that reporter expands his or her thoughts at 11:00 PM.

But what's really starting to grate on my skeptical-of-the-media sensibilities is the way Charlie's guests seem to pat themselves on the back for disagreeing when there's no real substantive difference in their opinions over the matter at hand.

Tonight? Case in point... writ large. An NPR legal corespondent who thinks Bush has alienated his base over this morning's nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, a Harvard law professor who all but goads Charlie into spitting the word "cronyism," and (wait for it) a conservative from the Cato Institute who disagrees with the President's choice. Whoa nelly. The "diversity" is astounding.

For myself? I know nothing about Harriet Miers, and have no idea whether this was a clever "stealth" nomination or another "cave-in" by the President designed to placate his political enemies who will never respect him in either case. But I know which view was unanimously espoused on the Rose program tonight! Sheesh.

(Un)Truth in advertising

I almost wish I'd seen this trailer before seeing The Shining. If I ever meet anyone unfamiliar with King's work, watch out. Prank time. (Via: Ace)

UPDATE: West Side Story... zombie edition! (via: boing-boing)