Obama, governing hard left in a center/right country

It's like an A&P carriage with the bad wheel that always pulls to the left. At a dinner the other day at the Human Rights Campaign, a gay group, Obama went the whole nine yards. Repeal don't ask, don't tell. Yeah now the gay guy can go off to some foreign war orchestrated by a bunch of neocons and get blown away - progress. He wants a law giving domestic benefits to gay pard'ners, he wants Hate Crime legislation enacted pronto but most off all he's urging Congress to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (the DOMA). Now most folks are more than tolerant of gay folks now but the residual distaste for the act remains, they don't want to see it codified into law somehow. Now there be a few conservative bloggers in these parts of the libertarian bent who breeze all this away but for the Rest of Us enlightenment doesn't come easy, we're fine that the sexual menu has more on it today than in the past but there ARE limits. 'Member when I went to Mt. St. Michael in the Bronx and the morality/sex ed teacher said anything besides the missionary position is kinky, pity this guy's poor wife but by the same token we ain't gonna be buying a jelly fist anytime soon (the reader will note I left out any references to gerbils, I'd like to think that's a fringe thing). BTW that movie Al Pacino would like to forget about, Cruising is icky on an existential level, nobody and I mean nobody liked it, even the gays hated it. You're disoriented after seeing it and you just sit there but being the avid DVDer you just had to watch Pacino wave the yellow hanky in the gay bar and the guy in the swing. OK so this is all cultural stuff and I said a little ways back that the case against gay marriage is based more on cultural preference than hard logic but at any rate the larger issue here is that Obama doesn't care about any of this, apparently he'd rather be a one-termer who effected radical social change, it's THAT important. Abortion can't be far behind on the agenda since he's now catching up on his campaign promises so he says. IMO Obama should go to an abortion clinic himself for a few days and watch a few of them being done especially the later-term ones, at least see firsthand what he supports wholeheartedly. Do I think Obama's a communist? I'm slower to come to these conclusions than say a Glenn Beck but I could probably be convinced over time. Obama, masturbating his liberal base but will a minority but loud base in what is basically a center/right country carry him over to a second term? Well not if half the country turns gay. Moderate he isn't, triangulation ain't his thing and you probably won't recognize this country in four years. Stay tuned for FOCA...

But who else was in the running the Dalai Lama?

Well it wasn't gonna be Bibi we know that. As long as your name isn't George W. Bush you have a shot. I understand the rationale for Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize, taking measures or trying to take measures to reduce the world's nuclear stockpile (only the most nostalgic paleocons yearn for those good ole Nagasaki days) and his outreach to Muslims in the famous Cairo speech obviously played more than a part but his mere nine months in office weaken the argument considerably I might add. Oslo Norway, known to be very liberal, don't they smoke pot over there?

So are congrats in the offing or in order from us right-wingers? not if you're Glenn Beck or Sean Hannity. Maybe O's decision to take away our radar in the Czech Republic and our interceptors in Poland had something to do with it, imagine Reagan doing this!!! but really who else was gonna win this one if you want to be totally objective about it? DR. OZ?

But Z wanted a Big News Event and he sure as hell got one!!

A philosophical question

Does conservatism or do conservatives in general come to preordained conclusions? Should conservatives come to preordained conclusions, the Insta-Opinion? Lately it's how to treat Roman Polanski (cut off his gonads and sautee them) but it could be anything. Is this good or can we at least differ around the edges?

Let me tell you what was happening on the Glenn Beck Program today

Beth got me turned on to him and so I sampled a little more today and he seemed like a different Beck but I'll get to that in a sec. So they made fun of him on SNL, that show is so lame and so well past its prime that unless Tina Fey was involved it doesn't even merit a blip. OK so today Beck was talking about the federal government may force your kids to get the new Swine Flu vaccine and he was talking about all those mothers who say HELL NO!! So Beck and his sidekick were hashing this out, this massive distrust of the government thing. Beck said it's not healthy and he divided the mistrusters into two main groups: those who think the government is incompetent and those who think the government is up to something nefarious.

FOLKS, Beck ain't immune to criticism either, he's human and by taking on a kind of fringe element here that even he disagrees with he looks moderate and reasonable by comparison. Point of this blog is not to say Beck is extreme himself but that's the common assumption and perception that's out there thanks in large part to the media although he does use actual quotes of people in making his case, Obama's past statements in interviews about the Constitution doesn't address income redistribution for instance, that's a pretty Marxist thing to say and no SNLer can bury it with parody. So on today's radio show if you just tuned in for the first time and had no clue as to who Glenn Beck is Beck sounded like someone taking on all those folks who distrust the federal government (POT - KETTLE - BLACK) but in answer to Beck's own question why are all these Moms saying no to vaccinating their children two words -- TUSKEGEE AND MKULTRA. We all know what Tuskegee was all about but for those of you who are new to MKULTRA this was an ultrasecret project of the CIA in the '50s and '60s that involved among other things dosing different sectors of the US population with LSD without their knowledge and studying the results (I'm still waiting for some conservative feedback over this, perhaps in a future Jonah Goldberg column?). So am I on the same side as these Moms who think the government is up to something James Bondish with the new Swine Flu vaccine? not in a million years but understand root causes here and am surprised Beck didn't bring them up. Yes righties, actual conspiracies do exist on occasion, the Moon does enter its blue phase every now and then.

Is Beck losing his cojones? If you find them will you please return them?

Hate speech on the Left - the murder of a pro-life activist

Go to http://bluewavecanada.blogspot.com/2009/09/reality-of-violent-opponents.html for the tragic story of pro-life activist Jim Pouillon's murder. Jim Pouillon was sitting across a school in Michigan holding his pro-life poster when a car pulled up and did a drive-by. The self-avowed pro-life hater also allegedly killed another man and was searching for a third when apprehended.

Do pro-choicers need to police their own speech? Does Keith Olbermann need to dial down the vitriol? Should we hold the NOW gang personally responsible for Jim Pouillon's murder?

Ya wanna know something? on a theoretical, abstract and even practical plane it's all good and despite the most heated verbiage on BOTH sides actual incidents of violence is something that's really few and far between. Ya wanna know something else? some people just don't LIKE free speech, lately it's the liberal crowd. Now ever since the tea parties and townhalls liberals in general like Bill Moyers and Frank Rich and the liberal msm in particular, well put it this way their absolute hatred for conservatism is coming to a rolling boil now, all the invective they can muster up is coming YOUR way but if I can sum up their overall theme about US we're totally for the rights of the individual against the welfare of the larger society or community, we're anarchists who are totally against the government or the State, potential McVeighs, we're against charity or caring for others, we're conspiracy-mongers (although what's wrong with the notion that the occasional conspiracy theory may actually be true?), in short we hate the State (well kinda true) but the biggest thing I'm seeing of late is that liberals HATE free speech, it's always free speech is good and fine and swell and American BUT (go over what they said about O'Reilly in the wake of George Tiller's murder) but on this front what would happen if we didn't always call for tempering or policing our own speech? what if we just let her rip? what if we just let free speech be, say what we will? I submit that in general

NOTHING

would happen, and the few extreme cases that are alleged to have been caused by the hateful speech of others however dubious the connection does not justify in the least chipping away, abridging or otherwise curtailing or suppressing the free speech of others. OR to put it another way so Ted Bundy liked porn.

A fan of neoconservatism (NOT)

Irving Kristol, godfather of neoconservatism 1920-2009

It's not just that the philosophy of neoconservatism has led us into many a foreign adventure. This is either good or bad depending on your viewpoint, for Pat Buchanan it's bad but I really have no problem if the guiding moral principle involved is to liberate an oppressed people but here read this from a 2003 column in The Weekly Standard by Irving Kristol (bold-type mine)

and as Glenn Beck would say READ CAREFULLY (ooooooh):

"Neocons do not like the concentration of services in the welfare state and are happy to study alternative ways of delivering these services. But they are impatient with the Hayekian notion that we are on 'the road to serfdom.' Neocons do not feel that kind of alarm or anxiety about the growth of the state in the past century, seeing it as natural, indeed inevitable.

People have always preferred strong government to weak government, although they certainly have no liking for anything that smacks of overly intrusive government. Neocons feel at home in today's America to a degree that more traditional conservatives do not.

Note the not so subtle digs at paleoconservatism or the purer form of conservatism. Z makes the case that you cannot have a large state that is also not intrusive, that's a neocon fantasy, and from my vantage point you only need something new or neo if there is something wrong with the old product. OR to put it another way who's more popular right now, Rush Limbaugh or David Frum?

How to put the racism issue to bed once and for all

Elect a black conservative president next time, say Clarence Thomas or Thomas Sowell. If we still hate the nigger then ok.

What really stands out about Patrick Swayze (1952-2009)

From Wikipedia:

"Personal life

Swayze was married to Lisa Niemi from June 12, 1975 until his death."

Ghost has got to be one of the most romantic movies of all time, a must have in any serious DVD collection. I really was hoping as we all were that he was going to kick this thing but I don't think they know how to treat cancer yet. You don't know which is worse, the cancer or the chemo but this has really turned into the Year of the Famous Dead Person -- Ed McMahon, Farrah Fawcett, Michael Jackson (they're STILL talking about it), pitchman Billy Mayes, Walter Cronkite and of course Ted Kennedy (and others I'm leaving out but those are the most prominent, you'd have to google the rest). I sure hope next year is less dark.

To hear liberals tell it

the conservative grassroots is filled with Hate. First the Tea Parties and then the town halls but the way I see it is Democracy in Action,

it's all good

and have liberals forgotten their own maxim that dissent is the highest form of patriotism? So some folks showed a little passion, it's nice to know some Americans still have some spunk left in 'em and I'm trying to diagnose the lib problem here. Is it we're not supposed to critique the nation's First African-American President? Well welcome to the ballgame bro! I think it's healthy that folks are up in arms about the lack of fiscal restraint by Government which among other things is what's animating the conservative grassroots these days. It's OUR money after all. Whether you agree or disagree with the tea partiers and townhallers there's nothing even vaguely unconstitutional about it all but libs are treating it as a hate crime.

I'm lovin' it!

The MSM under the microscope

As my brother is fond of saying take an average group of people and they'll likely tend to be non-ideological, you can have someone who is pro-life but for gay marriage at the same time, you can have a conservative who bashes Big Business (that'd be me) but the whole point is there are so many opinions out there and that's good. It's pretty much an established fact that the vast majority of the msm are liberal in their political orientation, ok sure you have your occasional Brit Humes, ok you have Brit Hume but on balance they always take the non-conservative position on practically any given issue. They won't call themselves liberal of course, we're objective you know (a Marvin Kalb piece of gospel they fall back on when challenged) but they certainly do harbor certain opinions and this seeps out every now and then in their coverage of the Whatever and the seepage is known as bias. I like to think of it as cat spray, marking their territory or a little septic action in the backyard but ok, so now here's the question before the Board today (or judging by my sitemeter of late is that the Bored?) -- do these budding journalists, aspiring reporters enter college, journalism school, the institutions of Higher Learning without much in the way of a strong political package to begin with either way and then something happens within the school itself that churns out a bunch of cookie-cutter liberals OR are they liberals to begin with who are merely honing their journalistic skills to better practice their non-bias bias? Again on ANY GIVEN ISSUE, Ted Kennedy - be respectful, talk radio - Bad, health-care reform - obvious, Van Jones - Glenn Beck racist......I MEAN WTF IS GOING ON HERE???

Introspection on abortion

Usually when I'm debating with a pro-choicer at some forum or blog, when things get to the boiling point and I'm driving my point home, when things get a tad too personal the opposition will throw the pejorative "self-righteous" in my face which they like to say characterizes the social right. OK I'm speaking only for myself here, can't speak for Sarah Palin, for the Rev. James Dobson, Randall Terry, Jeb Bush, just little old me. In my day to day I consider myself so far from the holy, for the bulk of my life I've never even remotely felt myself approaching sainthood and yet at the same time I've reached the conclusion that many pro-abortion folks are utterly heartless but it's not self-righteousness that spawns this evaluation as I've none of it to begin with. I think many pro-choicers are dark people and while I consider myself to be your rank-and-file sinner, I fully expect a lengthy stay in Purgatory at the least I don't want to take that final step over to the dark side (I hear BB cogitating a response) and the reader will note I was careful to use the word "many" here, didn't say "majority", "most" or "all" but candor compels me to admit for instance that many characters in the Terri Schiavo saga were downright creepy, I know a few liberals who feel the same way and again this is only a conclusion drawn from a sinner who is so far from the mark but draws the line at killing. As dear old Anonymous once noted "morality consists in drawing the line somewhere", you don't have to twist my arm if Beyonce and Britney, Eva Mendes and Jessica Alba are playing nude volleyball on the beach but I don't like to see dead fetuses in garbage pails. I guess the latter makes you a right-wing extremist, a fringe guy or gal these days at least according to polemical rules as defined by liberals who seem to feel that flexibility in one or more areas should guarantee your pro-choicedom. The other pejorative they'll frequently throw in my face is "Mr. Religious Fanatic" which for me is, as Mike Tyson would put it ludikwis since I've never gone out on a theological limb in any discussion or forum or blog with my latest calculations of who's in Hades these days, quite the opposite. Just an autobiographical note here SO GET IT STRAIGHT!!!

Think tanks, beavers and other things conservatives won't talk about

My friend and I are what you would call non-ideological conservatives. In my view the main problem with politics today is that the vast majority of libs and cons read from the same playbooks. Do libs have to be for abortion at every turn for instance? Anyway we got on the subject of think tanks.

Think Tanks

Many companies today use them. My friend seems to have a thing for supermarkets, always seemed to have been working in one at any given time so he was telling me he has it on good authority that the supermarket business in particular is heavy on the think tank stuff, hiring expensive consultants to implement their recommendations. Think tanks, yes they literally do meet in a house and chart the course of your workday from giving everybody only one day off a week to making most workers part-time but giving them almost full-time hours. Being pro-Big Business the average conservative is not going to talk about these things which is why you have me. On the other hand a rather small but not insignificant portion of the population seems to be happily unemployed and that's where the rest of my conservatism kicks into high gear. If I have to work so do you. At least work gives a discipline and structure to your life as opposed to all these people I just saw waiting for the library to open. What's wrong with this picture?

The Environment

Geez it would be nice if conservatives had at least some love for the environment. I remember when I was a kid my Dad took us behind Warehouse Lane in Elmsford, NY Back then it was mainly UPS there and in this stream you could see the beavers working, gnawing at twigs and building their dams, using their tails to pat the mud down and so I was telling a friend about this and we went there the other day. Have to relegate it to a fond memory though as the place has been more built up since those days with other businesses now but the thought occured: now we're not what Rush would call lefty-commie-enviro-whackos but considering that the beaver population had been so heavily decimated in the past due to early trapping when you do encounter actual beavers today in a populated area doing their thing one would think it has a special value. One would think SOMEONE would have left the place alone since a more reasonable environmental philosophy would recognize that the beaver should have a higher status than the snail-darter and so be worth protecting. In short I want the Palisades Mall AND the beaver and don't see why such things have to be overly political, either/or political pigeonholing. Gotta build! Gotta build! Well having gone there the other day it did bother me, ya gotta leave some things alone not only on an environmental level, there are romantic and poetic considerations as well. Maybe it's my midlife crisis but you should be able to relive some of your childhood memories.

So think tanks make your job rough and you don't even have the solace of looking at the beavers anymore. My schematics say something is wrong here.

Our over-the-top media (as usual) - why I'm not into political necro

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy 1932-2009

I'm sorry but whenever I hear Phil Collins' "In the Air Tonight" I think of him ("If you told me you were drowning I would not lend a hand") but more on that in a minute. It's funny to hear the msm refer to Kennedy as the liberal lion of the Senate but that's because he described himself as a liberal so it was ok, the msm had no choice. It's kind of like coming out of the closet, the media won't do it for you (the responsible media anyway), you have to get the ball rolling yourself. If not they would have happily referred to him as a moderate because in the universe of the msm, must have something to do with the warping of space/time, parallel universes and wormholes but there are no liberals. OK on to the murky waters of Chappaquiddick.

MY THEORY and it's a darn good one is this and it was first proposed to me by a woman -- Ted was not in the car that night. He gave the keys to Mary Jo when he shouldn't have, everybody must've had some that night and so she was the one who drove off the bridge all alone. This helps enormously to help clear up some discrepancies like why he didn't notify the police immediately afterwards and why he was spotted early the next morning outside his hotel room all clean and with fresh clothes on and seemingly not a care in the world and that's because he didn't know at the time. Not exemplary behavior to be sure but not the monster he was often made out to be by right-wingers to this day.

OK a true John John story. JJ went to a nice restaurant with a woman and the head waiter told this other couple he was relocating them to make room for the Kennedy scion and so the guy was naturally miffed. JJ must have sensed this because after he came in he invited the other couple over to join them for dinner. Years later JJ bumped into the man again and remembered him and asked "so how was your dinner?" That to me speaks volumes, that's all I need to know about the man.

Liberal and conservative views on the CIA

Pretty much conservatives are very pro-CIA. I've a more varied view of the spooks but before I get to that I do think it's a terrible terrible mistake for Obama's AG Eric Holder to decide to prosecute any CIA officials for authorizing or using certain interrogation techniques of terror suspects that liberals have felt went too far. You might make the case from a technical moral standpoint that the methods were somehow wrong but what I for the life of me don't get is this apparent soft spot among the leftie community for those who wish to do us great harm and for Obama to approve of this prosecutorial approach merely cements his repuation as a liberal. From stimulus to health-care to this, it ain't hard to figure. It's not a centrist or moderate pattern at all, it obviously masturbates his base but to point this out you risk the ire of folks like Bill Moyers who, how do I put this? you're engaging in hateful mythology even though you're merely connecting the dots and highlighting the truth. Anyway to balance out my view of the G-men found this under the Wikipedia link for LSD:

"Beginning in the 1950s the Central Intelligence Agency began a research program code named MKULTRA. Experiments included administering LSD to CIA employees, military personnel, doctors, other government agents, prostitutes, mentally ill patients, and members of the general public in order to study their reactions, usually without the subject's knowledge. The project was revealed in the US congressional Rockefeller Commission Report."

Yeah so Bill O'Reilly is not a big fan of those Matt Damon/Jason Bourne movies because it casts a bad light on the CIA, liberals can't bash the CIA enough and so perhaps BB can shed some light. Perhaps the late Bob Novak had the best take on politics in general: "Always love your country but never trust your government."

The Freedom of Choice Act

Interesting that Obama has spent so much time on health-care "reform" when he had made a promise at some Planned Parenthood confab a few years back that signing the FOCA into law would be the first act he'd do, Priority Numero Uno. Everyone (libs included) should start seeing him for the bullshit artist he is. Gotta laugh though, when Obama was elected many in the liberal msm sounded the death knell for conservatism as a movement, funny how a few fringe people can derail such a massive project as health-care reform. He tackled too much too soon, wanted to ram everything through and couple impatience with arrogance and it ain't a good combination. Conservatism was never really dead, just waiting for the right moment to reenergize itself and as for FOCA I'd be really surprised at this point if anybody brings it up. With 40 million+ abortions to date since 1973 where is the legislative urgency? Obama has been a boon to the conservative movement so be glad he was elected. We as a country got to Make History and we get our country back too, not a bad deal by any stretch!

Obama is in deep denial

Even many Democrats have turned against the public option and so the best analogy I can use is that Obama is like some man who has so much to offer and yet he's being rejected and so the initial stage is denial, it ain't happening, people don't understand, maybe I need to 'splain better. I said this over at Pamela Hart's blog but Obama putting out a government website to "correct" all the "misinformation" about health-care reform would be like to expect a bunch of JFK conspiracy theorists to consult the Warren Commission Report. Hey dude you need to get over yourself, you ARE being rejected and that cute little tv spot of a bunch of cars cutting off the ambulance (i.e. those special interests blocking much-needed health-care reform) well it was clever but it ain't gonna change anyone's minds. Obama has to know in the back of his head that this is soon gonna be the first major failure of his presidency, no amount of shucking it up at those townhallers is gonna help and he's like some guy coming out of the local porn emporium with his little care package and the pastor sees him, the town widow, the postman, Brian with his yo-yo and the wind opens up his trenchcoat and what comes flopping out but it says SOCIALIST all over it. No man public option wasn't a make or break deal, I got these here for a friend and ah fuck it man, I'm more liberal than my own Congress. I got my Harvard cred, I thought you were with me on this. Nothing personal about your Grandma but that AARP crowd, they're what's known in the game as a bunch of useful idiots. I had the msm on my side all along and even they couldn't help me now how depressing is that?

Interesting questions

Is there free will in Heaven? http://catholicdiscussion.yuku.com/topic/1585/t/Is-there-a-potential-for-sin-in-Heaven.html

Why is there no repentance after death? http://catholicdiscussion.yuku.com/topic/1513/t/Why-no-repentance-after-death.html

As well as my own: If God is Eternal then that means He existed for all Eternity going backwards in Time, how is this possible?

Beth and I discussed the importance of appreciating the gift of life God gave you (and presumably this also means if your life sucks) so basically if you wind up in Hell you can say you had no say in the matter of YOU coming into existence so you're only there 'cause God created you in the first place (for this you'd need a good lawyer).

AND the really really BIG QUESTION of the day: Why is Charles Manson follower Squeaky Fromme getting out of jail but Bernard Madoff has something like 8 life sentences or something?

The msm really really really really wants health-care reform

I wish they'd just go back to reporting the news instead of giving opinions. Hey Charlie Gibson pal, if it bothers you that much write an Op-Ed and oh, those Fact Checks they can shove up their ass. Funny how the "facts" always seem to go against the critics. I don't want some government bureaucrat sticking his finger up my rear, I have my own doctor to do that thank you. Better yet since Obama's so worried about little old me maybe he can put on the latex himself. Hillary seems a little testy of late. I don't think she's happy as Secretary of State, I think she really wanted his job, the bitch wanted the whole enchilada. Maybe they can have a Cash for Clunkers program where you can turn in your fat wife.

Rick Pitino, another crumb

OK so a few years back famed University of Louisiana basketball coach Rick Pitino had an affair with this Karen Sypher woman and gave her money to have an abortion. So unless my closed-captioning deceived me and I seemed to read the same thing in the paper the next morning they had sex in some restaurant. I've said it before but a main problem with the whole pro-choice movement is the basic fact, there's no getting around it that widespread abortion fosters and encourages social irresponsibility and yet the pro-choice movement never seems to care or talk about the moral context in which many of these "procedures" take place. The other thing is with Bill Clinton sexual scandal made him stronger, boosted him up in the polls but with everyone else it's wrong and maybe a career death sentence. Call this the Bubba Triple Standard, some asshole woman reporter by the name of Nina Burleigh once wanted to give him a blowjob for his role in keeping abortion legal, hell put a dead fetus in the room and maybe this chick can start squirting. Hey Rick keep the snake in its cage next time! if your wife won't give you a Slurpee go to 7-Eleven.

Life is like the bad job that never changes

A blog inspired by Beth's theme of late and as I said there sometimes I have to rejigger theology in my own head from time to time due to events. The late playwright Arthur Miller who as I recall was not known for being a religious person had this to say in his autobiography TimeBends: "Fuck you Death!" Probably for many of us we've come to accept death as natural and normal if not really a great thing, it's not and I think Miller tapped into something here basic to Christian thought without even knowing it and that is there is something fundamentally flawed with the Universe, in the original Christian understanding death did not enter the world until Man sinned and I covered alot of this ground already in my blog about why emotionally I can never be pro-choice (http://not-the-left.blogspot.com/2009/01/spiritual-view-on-pro-life-im-entitled.html) .

It's not an either/or situation, you can hold that God exists and yet Life is absurd and without meaning at the same time (although this is largely subjective since the happy and the unhappy cannot seem to relate to each other). The atheist "solution" besides ignoring Intelligent Design is too easy and doesn't address this central existential problem head on. Now whenever I've drifted towards this view people call you depressing, negative, pessimistic...relax, I'm merely stating a hard philosophical truth and do counsel people to get as much out of Life as you possibly can, you can and should enjoy Life to the max anyway but the answers religious folk give in such situations are too pat. So why do those of a spiritual bent continue to fool themselves insisting that God has plans for all of us which are too inscrutable for us to even figure out, always on some unknowing mystical plane? What about the 8 dead in the Taconic tragedy? I'd have thought a divine plan would not be so easy to foil.

The thought occured during my walk in Piermont this morning that maybe we're not meant to be here that long anyway and yet we cling to this life with all its absurdity and tragedy and yet maybe the good angels are whispering to us to just let it go. As soon as we're born we start to die, life's a bitch and then you die so why do we try to reconfigure a reality that isn't? Man sinned, we muffed it and can't seem to get back on track. Why are we here? Why were we born? I have no answer to that just know that it's not our true destination so if it's merely a sojourn does the duration really matter? IMO the real problem is secularism which teaches us to become too attached to this one life and meaning then becomes derived through materialistic means: career, house, money, sex etc. Final Thought - Your life here on Earth is very short, even the average lifespan of say 75 years is short when you stop to think about it so how the tragic affects us emotionally and spiritually is finite too and when the time comes when everyone looks back on this dot called Life, well as I said it really didn't make a whole lot of sense and we're in Heaven now so seen against the backdrop of Eternity its relevance is only temporary.

If it's Bubba it has to be bad

Now you'd think the safe return of those two American journalists being held prisoner by North Korea would be a happy event even if it did take Bill Clinton himself to go over there but listening to Hannity during my drive the other day and, must be manic-depressive politics or something but he seemed to be saying Clinton shouldn't have done that and what did we give them in return? Oh I don't know, maybe Bill got Kim Jong-Il a couple of strippers or a little ulterior motive action, maybe he just wants a little Asian favor in return (once you go Asian you never go Caucasian), how the hell do I know? Wonder if the families of Laura Ling and Euna Lee feel the same way as Hannity but somehow I doubt it.

Well since I brought up strippers funny story. Many years ago my friend and I were supposed to go to my brother's birthday party or party of some sort or some type of social occasion involving brother, brain cells dying on a daily basis so the details are fuzzy at best but long story short we didn't go. We wound up at our old haunt Barnes & Noble as we didn't feel the party was socially obligatory and when I talked to my mother later she scolded me, said we were supposed to go and that we were probably at some strip joint instead having a good time. No Mom we really are that boring.

In the East life is cheap, in the West life is expendable

In the East: "Here's a pack of cigarettes, fix my car."
In the West: "Sorry, that cancer drug's not covered."

Maybe the government should fix your car too. Kind of missed Obama's speech last night, didn't know it was even on as no other president has spoken to the nation so often but caught some snippets on PBS after it was all over. With ObamaCare it has become almost impossible to not see Obama as a socialist or having socialist tendencies or at the very least belonging to some variant subspecies of the socialist genus (let me consult my field guide here). He's so convinced his vision is correct, a charge often leveled against us conservatives, his is an almost messianic mission. His rhetorical device of always painting the opposition to whatever he believes in, nay knows to be true as obstructionists to Progress, I know what he's doing the slick SOB. Obama has often been compared to Ronald Reagan but he's the opposite of Reagan in almost every way. He's killing us softly.

Hot Topics

The 40th Anniversary of Man's First Steps on the Moon

I think we had it backwards. Any rational species would have cured Cancer first, maybe wiped out the Poverty, the Hunger, taken care of a couple other items and then hurtled off into Space. I'm not against space exploration but worry about our own little dot in the Cosmos first.

Walter Cronkite

I know he was a journalistic legend but I got nothing out of him. Very memorable and poignant, him announcing that President Kennedy just died was for me his most classic moment but the Most Trusted Man in America? Who comes up with this bullshit? I think it's because I was born with a bug up my ass but I just don't See Things the way most folks do. Barbara Walters, another one.

The Wendy Williams Show

This supposedly hot hot show has pushed my Channel 9 News past 10 o'clock well into 11 because I have to listen apparently to this happening chick prattle on endlessly about absolutely NOTHING. People in the audience ask for her advice, for example a 28-year old woman stands up to ask if there's anything wrong with her going out with a 23-year old and Wendy all hip says "do him" but I'm thinking what's so radical about a mere 5 year age difference? It's the type of show you find yourself watching about twenty minutes too long with the remote in your left hand and the Christian Brothers to your right and then it hits you like a revelation, why the hell am I watching this?

Sex Tapes

Supposedly there's now one of John Edwards with the lady not his wife but I don't wanna know. The last one was horrible though, Amy Fisher and her fat Italian ex-husband like she's giving him a blowjob and he's squatting there all hairy after he ate too much pasta. It's the kind of stuff if you were housesitting one night and you're all alone and someone left it on the coffee table on top of the gardening book and the TV Guide and there's really nothing at all on TV like Wendy Williams, some lame 2 & 1/2 Men syndicated repeat and some crime show on Ch. 2, you're like you're only gonna watch it for laughs. You ARE gonna pop it in for perusal, not at first, it's only a theoretical concept then, just an intellectual note that it exists and you're aware of it for keeping tabs on the culture but then your robotic arm puts it on the beckoning discholder and it will be rationalized as a comic evaluation to talk about some day around the water cooler should the topic ever present itself and you'll be the knowledgeable hipster but even porno pete is ashamed.
Obama

It's like the man has legislative OCD or something. He's like the person at work handing around a petition, "here here, quick sign this" and you don't even have a chance to read it. If he's doing this much in six months what's he gonna do in four years?? Maybe I'll just be like my cat and sleep it out.

The REAL purpose of Government

I've heard it said that the First purpose of Government, maybe the only legitimate purpose of Government is to keep us safe. It's not to pass health-care reform, God knows it's not to take over the auto industry, it has absolutely nothing to do with teaching kids about sex. It's not paying for abortions or funding some aspiring artist who may be controversial, it's not any of this and yet in their primary purpose the Government fails miserably. OK we've done a better job with terrorism since 9-11 but just the same the average citizen should be safe from violent crime in general ya think? So why is it the chief role of Government to keep us safe? so we can enjoy our God-given rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness that's why. I know I'm speaking as an old fart here, soapie and I be geezers with our walking sticks who aren't with the times but if the Government can't keep you safe on the street or in your home or at the airport or on vacation here or abroad WHAT THE HELL GOOD IS IT?!? OK good I now have government-run health care but I've just been shot, well whoop-dee-doo!! OK so just to review the real purpose of Government is what again?

Sarah Palin's resignation

This is hard for me. Alaska Governor Sarah Palin announced her intent to resign last Friday, July 4th eve and libraries were closed that day, the holiday of course and Sunday too due to summer hours. She did it on purpose but just wanted to say this was a slap in the face to every Alaskan voter who voted for her. They wanted HER to lead, HER to govern them, no one else and she obviously doesn't recognize this moral and political obligation on HER part. Either way you slice it it ain't good, somewhat fruity and nutty in the middle, slightly eccentric on the outer edges. It either makes her look suspicious (there was a menage a trois between her, SC Governor Mark Sanford and this Chapur babe down in Argentina) or weak (who knew DAVE had so much power?). Oh God it feels good to get this out ("I'll be out in a minute!").

Cancer detectives

We covered alot of ground in our phone conversation last night Beth and I and so I wanted to explore further a theme about cancer I brought up and it's this: just how old is cancer? when did it first appear on the scene? when exactly did people start dying from it? Even as a kid there is something about the cancer problem that has always struck me, something unusual, we act like it's an old disease, ancient in fact but is it? I've read alot in my life, reading lists we had in high school and then just for the pure enjoyment of it later on and I said I don't even remember cancer being a topic of conversation let alone people dying from it during the Middle Ages, in the colonial period, even during the Abe Lincoln era. Did Shakespeare ever remark "the Queen just died from cancer?" So we mulled this over and Beth said maybe cancer existed back then but people didn't know what it was but I lean more towards it didn't really exist until modern times and by modern times I mean at least the framework of the 1900's. I'm now looking at cancer historically, in the context of History. It's the timeline that interests me the most and as we all know that Nazi doctor Dr. Josef Mengele became infamous for conducting medical experiments on human subjects including dwarves but what kind of experiments were they exactly? specifically what was he looking to do and what kind of work was he really doing for the Hitler regime and why? Does cancer disproportionately affect people of certain races? Does cancer have something to do with the explosion of modern technology and were we all better off in the days when we lived a more natural life as Beth seems to feel?

You know one of the most beautiful things about blogging is you get to exercise total creative control over your work, I'm happy with it and if you don't like it just move on and so what I try to do here is to come up with an Original Thought or two every now and then. Just heard on the news this morning that Obama has appointed some type of Cyber Czar to monitor people's online habits so where are all the liberals on this one? Frightening! but at any rate they're more than welcome to read this.

I don't have all the answers, I only pose the questions. BTW my sitemeter crashed the other day, it's apparently broken like some odometer that goes back to zero so pay no attention. I'll be off tomorrow, Saturday and Sunday of course since that's the schedule of most public libraries in my area around this 4th of July weekend. Make it a safe one and enjoy and see you back on Monday.

Sentencing day for Bernie Madoff

Let it be said if I were speaking to the judge I'da said many of Madoff's victims were greedy and stupid themselves, after all how much money do you need to retire? (of course I would have needed heavy security to just go home). I'm living comfortably now, don't need much, I don't have millions to invest anyway (poor Steven Spielberg - boohoo!). So today Manhattan U.S. District Judge Denny Chin sentenced Madoff to the maximum meaning 150 years in prison and everyone cheered and got off but what else could he do? The sentence is an existential absurdity, murderers have gotten out in less time. Oh but it will be pointed out that Madoff's a murderer himself because three of his victims took their own lives but truth be told only weak people kill themselves. Everyone's acting like 150 years is a hell of a long time, does it apply to successive reincarnations? Getting back to MJ......

Just a screw or two that needs tightening (Phillips or flathead?)

I liked the original version better, that Republican Governor of South Carolina Mark Sanford couldn't take his job anymore and without telling anyone just hit the Appalachian Trail to clear his head for a few days, I mean anyone can relate. Turns out though he was getting his skin flute played by some Latin mama down in Argentina. Some poetic e-mails have surfaced, have to say not bad from a literary angle from the usual junk we've been accustomed to (fingertips, soul connection). Having an affair is kind of the norm these days, that and smoking a doobie in your yoot so if you haven't done either you're some kind of weirdo. As the song says so where do we go from here?

A campaign spot by Michael Bloomberg you'll never see

This arrogant man got the law changed in New York City so he could run for a third term as Mayor. Just saw on the news last night there have been 32 deaths here in NYC due to the H1N1 virus or Swine Flu. I'm tired of hearing "underlying causes", maybe liberalism is the underlying cause. Thirty-two deaths, that's unacceptable, we're not living in the age of Typhoid Mary after all. He's been running some ads by a state pro-abortion group touting his work on behalf of women's health. Abortion is never mentioned so you can forgive someone for mistaking it for a breast cancer spot. Bloomberg is one of those hardcore pro-aborts, beyond pro-abortion. He's the type that would do them himself if he could ("give me the f****n forceps!"). He called a reporter who questioned him on changing the term-limits law "a disgrace." He's always been just a touch mental, when he walks around he reminds me of that Yul Brynner robot in Westworld. Just glad I don't live in the City just a surrounding suburb safe from this RINO.

Why people are threatened by miracles (or the bias against miracles)

A miracle strongly implies a God, a God in turn we suspect has a moral code for us to follow, a moral code means we have to make a decision in the end for either Heaven or Hell, damnation or salvation. To someone who ain't livin' right they will go to the ends of the earth to disprove the most obvious miracles, he isn't into them and so to be into them means he would have to turn his life around. The next question becomes maybe miracles are more common than we realize but we'd rather not go there so we downplay them or rationalize them away so we can continue with the life we've been accustomed to. If Science can't explain it then that means we have to throw the porn away or the drugs or not get another abortion sometime down the road or be nice to our neighbor or give up our seat on the bus to some elderly woman with a limp. The atheist can't be bothered with Fatima even though it's the most fascinating subject because the implications are disturbing at least for him.

A pet peeve of mine -- Intelligent Design is NOT, I repeat not Creationism. All it says is there is a Prime Mover behind it all, a Creative Imagination but has nothing to do with the literal seven days of Creation as described in the Book of Genesis. I can only think this is a quite deliberation obfuscation among liberals and it's getting old. I DO believe a sublime force made the cosmos, I don't however believe in talking snakes. Get it right!!

Jimmy Carter still thinks he's president

Worked the late shift last night and got home and turned on the tube before going to bed. The Ch. 11 News told me of an assassination plot against Jimmy Carter in Gaza. "Carter has been in the region meeting with all sides of the conflict" Jim Watkins told me. STILL wants to broker that Mideast peace deal and not be remembered for long gas lines and inflation, some kind of syndrome going on here.

This constant and I mean constant push for gay marriage. Even former Republican Majority Leader of the NY State Senate Joseph Bruno has come out for it so it's really only a matter of Time before gay marriage becomes like abortion, people will be queasy about it but used to it. Come to think of it the Anus ain't causing the abortion problem.

DTV, more channels than ever but I'm still BORED OUT OF MY SKULL!!

Justice as a value

Elie Wiesel, after his visit with Obama to the Buchenwald concentration camp, had this to say: "I think he (Obama) has a sense of humor but I'm not so sure he has a sense of justice yet." Early concepts of justice could be understood to be inside or outside the bounds of the law. Hamlet is rife with the most primitive and elemental concepts of justice and only in later years could you say that in Western civilization to find justice solely within the law is the only way to go, that vigilante justice is immoral. This blog takes that position as it is Mr. Wiesel's position but his comment is very very interesting, somewhat enigmatic regarding President Obama. What does he mean? what was he trying to say? it's pregnant with Meaning.

How many times are we counseled to just look the other way re various injustices, to let it go, is it really worth pursuing? and such, to be careful etc. Stephen Pagones pursuing a civil case against the Rev. Al Sharpton over the Tawany Brawley hoax apparently destroyed his marriage. He was the Assistant in the District Attorney's office up there in Dutchess County NY who was falsely accused with others of raping the young black girl Tawana Brawley in Wappingers Falls and Sharpton, the lawyers Alton Maddox and C. Vernon Mason led the charge. Some would say why did he pursue it so many years after the fact? everyone knows it was a big-time hoax, it embarrassed Cosby and the case is so old, so yesterday but I agree with him. In many cases to not pursue Justice, to listen to the pragmatic counselers of indifference, well it might be unfair to call it a kind of liberalism but it ain't conservative. Justice is right up there with freedom and personal responsibility and lower taxes and smaller government in the conservative View of the Universe. Even on a much smaller scale justice is important. As I blogged the other day about the misfortune that my cat met last Sunday morning, basically her skull was crushed in and she was left in a puddle of her own blood on the side of the road, that is also an issue of justice on a personal scale and I'm sure there are legions who would disagree. Inside the parameters of the law yes, of course but when you're a true conservative whether the issue is big or small you don't question for a moment the value of justice, any other way tends towards liberalism.

There is also the civil and criminal case against a group of Yonkers firefighters coming up. Basically it is alleged that a few of them would dose some of their fellow firefighters with acid or LSD and in one particularly vicious case while their victim began to hallucinate they screamed obscenities at the top of their lungs in his ears. It is also charged that they have harassed some of their victims for having decided to pursue the case against them. There is also the alleged coverup of the bloodwork by the City. These incidents all go back ten years at least but there has been a culture of corruption in City government for quite some time or so it's been said. Now again I'm sure there are many many people who would say why pursue such a case? it happened so long ago, the chemicals have long since passed everyone's brains and it's so dangerous to go up against a group of alleged psychos, don't you watch the movies? Ah yes but this is NOT the conservative position, not the true one anyway, and to not pursue justice in certain cases sets a very bad precedent indeed, it's defining deviancy down to quote the famous phrase from the late NY Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

Justice is also cathartic, it serves a basic emotional human need for closure. Justice is so many things to so many people but I am bothered about Elie Wiesel's observation, have we lost a sense of justice in our culture? That liberals seem overly concerned with the rights of criminals and these days terrorists, there's more than a grain of truth to that. Their concerns are not unimportant but I too get the sense that Obama would rather just talk it out with the bad guys rather than do the right thing. To be taken to task by a noted Nobel Peace Prize winner however politely worded, that's a hell of alot of blogworthy material right there!

Adam Lambert & Clay Aiken

USUALLY and I'm just sayin' when someone disses the other like Clay did recently and the other responded in kind it really means they have a secret crush on each other. Sounds like they like each other, do I see a teabag in their future?

David Carradine - Even if I were bored out of my skull which is most Sunday nights I wouldn't auto-erotically-asphyxiate myself. I'd sooner read the tube of Crest or bang the crumbs out of the toaster. BB take it away.

Any subjects not covered so far? I can't think of any.

Getting bogged down by false issues

In Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn NY there's a Holocaust Memorial honoring ALL the victims of the Hitler regime. New York City owns it and it's located at Emmons Avenue and Shore Boulevard so that's your summary. Assemblyman Dov Hikind has a problem though, well read on from Hikind: Jews Only - Holocaust-memorial flap by Edmund DeMarche and Leonard Greene in the June 8th issue of the New York Post:

"Hikind said even though 5 million people from other groups - including gays, the disabled and Jehovah's Witnesses - were killed along with 6 million Jewish people during the Holocaust, the memorial in Sheepshead Bay should be for Jews only.

'To include these other groups diminishes their memory,' said Hikind...These people are not in the same category as Jewish people with regards to the Holocaust,' Hikind said following a press conference at the memorial. 'It is so vastly different. You cannot compare political prisoners with Jewish victims'...

...'There's no doubt that most of the atrocities at the Holocaust were done upon Jewish people,' said Council Speaker Christine Quinn. 'But it goes against history and their memory to not commemorate all groups that were persecuted by the Nazis'...

...'The Holocaust memorial means you memorialize anyone who died in the Holocaust,' said Theresa Scavo, president of Community Board 15, who lobbied for the additional recognition. 'It doesn't matter what color or sexual orientation you were.' "

File this one under the need to have a problem. Even if we magically got rid of all our problems, issues and controversies tomorrow people would still make up more. So we have 5 million non-Jewish victims vs. 6 million Jewish victims, those are shattering numbers either way. The news will never be at a loss, there will always be news even if we have to make it up.

The vast right-wing corporate media conspiracy (or VRWCMC)

Watched Bill Moyer's Journal last night which sometimes I do on slow Friday evenings. I'm not out clubbing which shows my age but anyway if you can paint with a broad brush here IMO most of his guests tend to be liberal although they don't seem to like that word so let's go with not conservative. Many of them tend to be anti-military for lack of a better word with the occasional poet thrown in for a little culture action. E.J. Dionne of The Washington Post recently wrote a column which ties into the theme here and that is that Newt and Rush and Sean control the mainstream media, they give Bob Schieffer his talking points! Let them spell it out for you 'cause most of us are too dense and have suffered under the delusion all these years that the msm has a very pronounced liberal bias. The media, the corporate media as they call it actually tilts heavily to the Right......excuse me for a minute I'm laughing so hard my ribs hurt, I think I'm gonna die......Last I heard this argument it was Eric Alterman making it and he even wrote a book about it and so......oh God it hurts!! Now the names of Moyers' guests always elude me by next morning, I disagree with much of what they have to say but they are so damn interesting and speak well. They are so convinced of their parallel universe, of their own alternate reality To Explain Things that you can't hate them, you want to believe these folks they're so sincere but my computations come in differently than theirs. To hear Dionne and Moyers (or the guests who speak for him) tell it Obama's a moderate not living up to the conservative caricature of him, that frustrating bastardo! Hey guys it's early yet, that remains to be seen. You feel more than a little weird and confused after watching his show like how could you be so stupid all these years and not see The Bigger Picture?? come out of your brain fog dude and smell the fresh air and let Rush go hibernate in his cave. Newt and Sean and Rush, 'tis a right wing media machine all along, who knew?

The world's most controversial issue

Frankly I'm more than a little tired of this whole Israeli/Palestinian issue. It consumes so much time, energy and attention of each succeeding administration. Since I was a kid I didn't even follow politics but I knew the names -- Jimmy Carter, Menachem Begin, Anwar Sadat, Camp David. Give the Palestinians a homeland, their own state and be done with it. Maybe Obama should speak more to the point and say the issue doesn't concern us anymore, we're done, we're moving on -- Darfur, Tibet, Haiti. Wasn't Bibi PM once before? How is this possible? It'd be like Bill Clinton becoming president again. The Middle East, the Never-Ending Story.

The roots of violence

Here's what it is in a nutshell, moral relativism and it even applies to the man who shot abortionist George Tiller to death. As I said at Kris's Elephant blog when you condone the killing of even late-term unborn babies you set up yet another exception to Thou Shalt Not Kill and then someone might decide the next exception is YOU, it's moral relativism turned on itself. Man as a rational creature (don't laugh) cannot choose evil for evil's sake, it has to be rationalized first as a good and in the case of violence the person doing the violence feels he is enforcing a moral code. Enforcement of a moral code is at the roots of modern-day violence and the person doing the killing feels the moral code being enforced is about absolute Right and Wrong. When Boston lawyer Tom Capano killed his lover Anne Marie Fahey who wanted to break it off with him he killed her and is now awaiting the death sentence (see the bestseller And Never Let Her Go by Ann Rule). Here's how he can more than live with himself and bide his time in prison, he believes in his heart of hearts she deserved her fate, by spurning him she was violating some type of moral code, a kind of absolute and universal code of we should be together forever and in the case of true sociopaths like Capano and O.J. Simpson it's not enough to believe in this moral code which many of us may believe in too but here's the difference. Most of us might accept the moral code of don't break my heart or it's wrong to kill unborn babies but in the mind of the socio this moral code needs to be enforced, it's a kind of karmic necessity, a cosmic balancing of the Scales of Justice so no matter that Tiller's killer believed in the absolute moral code of it's wrong to take the life of the unborn, he acted like a relativist for acting this out. You can't go there, it is what it is and only God can judge Tiller. For me anyway this is not debateable and one of my cardinal rules is once you throw up something for debate over time it will become morally defensible, we don't debate the pros and cons of rape for instance. Kind of a disturbing beginning of the week all around.

Send complaints to...

OK so Beth has weighed in on the murder of abortionist George Tiller and yes technically she is correct but I also agree with Daniel who posted there he thought Tiller was an evil man. The real issue is this: not the rare act of violence by an anti-abortionist but why are the late-term abortions that Tiller specialized in even legally allowed in this country? Killing Tiller, besides being wrong also has the consequence of making somebody into a martyr who doesn't deserve to be. You had to be a psycho to do the work he did for thirty long years which also begs the question of what kind of late-term patients these women were who sought his services in earnest. That the man apparently was a regular churchgoer boggles the mind and it's one reason I'm not overly keen on eulogies, many times they don't do justice to the character of a man. That the mainstream pro-choice movement never saw the necessity of ostracizing him at the least speaks volumes of THEM and that includes Obama's new Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius and so that's that.

A double whopper w/cheese has like over a thousand calories

What, you didn't know? Yeah in New York State a law was just passed that restaurants have to post the calories for each food item and I mentioned this to someone and she went "how stupid, that's Communism." Well not technically but I get her point. We've entered the realm of passing nonessential laws some time ago and each thing by itself is a small-scale evil as soapie would say but cumulatively they add up to something that ain't good for democracy. IF we keep passing law after law with no end in sight this noble experiment called America will expire a natural death, it may not be Communism but there's some kind of ism at work here. Trouble is who's gonna fight a small-scale evil as having to post calories if you're a restaurant owner? You can't afford not to comply, well most of us can't and so the next nanny-state law gets passed and you comply and on and on it goes...dunno but don't you think you have less personal freedom since Roe vs. Wade? kind of a paradox which really highlights that your personal privacy and freedom ain't the real focus and priority of liberals after all but when you figure it if you have to tell the consumer how many calories are in their thick shakes why shouldn't a pregnant woman be shown a sonogram? Libertarianism with which I disagree in parts is at least consistent. Liberals are often charged with anti-Americanism, not sure if this is fair but why do I get the distinct sense they're against McDonald's?

I can't help it if I was born a Great White Male

Sonia Sotomayor, first nominated to a federal judgeship by none other than Bush the Sr. then on to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals covering NY, CT and VT. Said once that policy is made at the appeals level, said something else about me but whatever. She'll be confirmed, can't lose the Hispanic bloc but got to thinking last night about this thing called Borking. Now Robert Bork in his Slouching Towards Gomorrah comes out foursquare for censorship, feels free speech as envisioned by the Founding Fathers had to do with only speech that was political in nature and ya wanna know something? It was ugly and over-the-top but I'm glad the man wasn't confirmed. With me when you talk about Free Speech you touch a nerve, I might be all over the map on some other issues but here he got my dander up. It's not the Ron Pauls and the Michael Savages the Right needs to distance themselves from, you might not agree with what they have to say but God knows they'll defend your right to say it. Bork might look like a Christmas ornament but don't let that fool you, his philosophy is dangerous. That said allow me to digress on something the Gray-Haired Brother said over at Beth's Place the other day that got me to thinking. We talk about abortion too much for his taste but in my view liberalism with its reflexive support for legal abortion actually fosters and reinforces social irresponsibility. OK take the housewife who has an affair with the mailman while her husband is at the office, she gets pregnant and has an abortion, chances are he'll never find out about it. The Pro-Choicer, put it this way, a hitman is not the least bit interested in why somebody wants to get rid of somebody else, could be the color of his tie that's not his concern, just show me the money and then we go dark. The choicer does not care about the WHY you want to get an abortion, aborting the mailman's kid falls under the all-inclusive heading of reproductive rights, women's sexuality YADA YADA YADA while the Pro-Lifer and I'll plead guilty here sees a moral lesson for the woman in carrying the child to term. YES, the child if allowed to be born is a constant reminder of the original error in moral decision-making on the part of all the parties involved. Here's where in my gut I'm against Pro-Choice, take away not so much the scarlet letter, that's not where I'm coming from but take away the flesh and blood consequence of the act and all morality loses its moorings and becomes adrift at sea, do this do that do what your little heart desires. So how does this relate to Obama for that matter? Well as a liberal by taking that Pro-Choice position whether it's his intent or not (probably isn't) support for legalized abortion reinforces social irresponsibility, how could it be otherwise? just to know where my side is coming from OR to put it another way

you ain't livin' right.

I've always found Colin Powell mildy irritating

You don't hate him, he's more like that smug neighbor of yours with the slightest wisp of an arrogant self-confident air, he has a 'tude going and it ain't in your favor. He's morally superior, he knows it, you know it and the mailman knows it. In fact before forming an opinion he feels you need to consult him if only to tell you where you're wrong. You're on your porch happily puffing away on your fine $6.50 cigar that you bought at Mom's, it's not a celebratory cigar by any stretch since your life sucks but anyway he passes on the sidewalk, doesn't say anything, continues on his way to get something out of the trunk of his Hummer but was that just the hint of a pissy expression as he waved his hand away at that fine Honduran aroma, some kind of body gesture lingo about your habit? He's the more powerful version of the poor man's Kennedy and he's lecturing you on what's wrong with your party. It ain't moderate see? You need to grow yourself beyond your base and stop listening to the dictates of the right-wing element. Usually this pretty much ONLY means you object to fetal parts backing up the plumbing system of some abortion clinic although it could mean immigration and gun-control too but it MOSTLY refers to the A-word. He says Rush is an entertainer and the GOP needs another spokesman. I agree but not for the same reasons. It's not his conservatism just that the GOP needs someone besides some rich well-fed guy in a golf shirt with the little alligator logo puffing on an expensive cigar who lives in a mansion. Don't get me wrong, he can stay, he's more than welcome but him and Cheney? get real!! Anyway he still says he's a happy GOPer whatever that means. Col looks like some guy you'd work with, you tell him a joke and he doesn't smile and just walks away, you may as well have sneezed and he goes to Corey "is Aisle 8 all packed out yet?" You see him rapping with Chris Rock and he kinda smiles as Chris calls him a house nigger but YOU? you ain't cool, you're part of the problem, you're a social-con. Fact Condi kinda feels the same way about you......sorry the guy kinda just gets under my skin.

Shows that are not basic to the survival of the Republic

The View - basically coffee-table liberal political chicktalk with a token conservative thrown in for kicks but without the gravitas of say Washington Week in Review, in fact Gwen Ifill would ruin it by raising the median IQ there. You got your washing machine going, you're hanging clothes out on the line, ya gotta give the cat some dry food and get your shopping list going, you're not exactly magnetized to the set, it's more an ambience thing. Rosie O'Donnell was the closest thing they ever got to pure free speech but then they got scared.

The Simpsons - this spinoff from the Tracy Ullman Show has been on wayyyyy too long. Take it off already and go with some Hawaii Five-O reruns or bring back Oscar and Felix. Never my cup of tea, not a bad show but does it have to be around as long as Woolworth's was? will it outlast Nathan's? D'OH

The Tonight Show - Leno's last week, Conan starts June 1. Could care less who interviews Jennifer Garner for the fifteenth time. Once Conan's term ends maybe Ashton Kutcher can host since apparently taking this once legendary show off the air might cause the Earth to go slightly out of its orbit in which case Obama would HAVE TO intervene and maybe host the show himself.

SNL - pretty self-explanatory. Got some buzz with the Tine Fey/Sarah Palin thing but overall pretty drab. Sure it was groundbreaking in the '70s but that was how long ago? It'd be like keeping the Brady Bunch going long after the original cast members have left simply because of nostalgia. Ninety minutes too long, can throw a movie into that slot.

I call these institutional shows but I rarely watch them. Shows may come and go but there is never any serious thought to getting rid of any of THEM. I say they've more than run their course so put 'em in the vault already or in the case of The View simply burn them.

Obama's Notre Dame speech

Actually said something I agreed with which is unusual, said about abortion "in some sense the two sides are fundamentally irreconciliable." This was clever on his part, it had the subtle effect of making Obama look like a kind of disinterested observer of the issue, above it all looking at the debate from the outside, a professorial air being intellectually open to both sides despite his 100% rating from NARAL. Of course they all say they want to reduce the ole abortion rate and it's such a heart-wrenching decision for the woman. Of the second point I personally know of stories where the parties involved were unusually casual about it all and as to the first your average pro-choicer opposes such modest measures as informed-consent legislation so really it's just more pro-forma statements from a liberal president. Despite Clinton's safe, legal and rare it's not really about Choice at all but Abortion and the right to get one freely and without judgement from parents or other parties and to be fully subsidized by the American taxpayer if need be. Pro-forma statements are important though, it shows you have a heart and have properly wrestled with the issue even though your own views just accidentally, ever so coincidentally coincide with those of Kate Michaelman.

Saw bits and pieces of the Farrah Fawcett special

very mixed reviews. Controversial, macabre, morbid were just some of the adjectives used. Will say this though, here is the rare celeb who never really bothered me, never saw her on some political soapbox and no matter who it is, unless it's Osama bin Laden or Fidel Castro I always throw a prayer or two their way. Started a thread once over at Big Blue Wave, a Canadian forum for conservatives and I may have outHoused House on that one:

http://bluewave.yuku.com/topic/1752/t/The-cancer-cell-is-not-powerful-but-weak-amp-confused.html

bit and pieces I gleaned from a Dummy's Guide to Cancer once, hope it's interesting. So there was Farrah clutching her rosary beads, probably made our old friend Hitch wince but I missed the vomiting, I'm a real channel-surfer you know. So let's say we "reform" health-care however you define that term, of what good is that if there's no Cure yet? The limitations of modern medicine imo far outweigh its advances, are any cures for any of the major big ones even on the horizon? Anyway what are your thoughts on the Farrah Fawcett special?

This gospel of moderation

Do moderates have any convictions to call their own besides moderation that is?

File this one under a false issue

According to last Thursday's PageSix Christopher Hitchens has written in his intro to the new book Certitude by Adam Begley and Edward Sorel:

"In my own lifetime I have seen a series of popes make public apologies to Jews (for the false charge of deicide and its consequences), to Protestants (for the Counter-Reformation), to Galileo to forcibly converted and exterminated South American Indians, to Eastern Orthodox Christians (for the massacres in the Balkans) and to Muslims (for the Crusades). One day if - just suppose - it is discovered that AIDS was a worse affliction than the condom, rather than the other way around, the necessary admission will have to be delayed for years by the fact there was once a sacred dogma involved."

Now I realize Hitch is a hard-drinking man and some of the hardcore stuff he is regulary accustomed to really make the grievances come out, about a week ago I had a couple of Rum and Pepsis and sank into some kind of weird depression and pretty much went over my shitlist and then some, hardly the mood to be in to waft off to a peaceful slumber but last I checked the Roman Catholic Church cannot by force of law forbid you from buying a Trojan or a Ramses. The thought occured if people don't listen to the Pope on the matter of abortion why would they over a piece of latex or lambskin? If one is going to cruise down the ole Hershey Highway with different males every week it's pretty much a given you haven't been following much of Church teaching lately anyway. As Oscar Wilde once said to be witty without being charming is an unpardonable mannerism of style. Hitch is from the Ann Coulter school of thought though from the other side, everyone you disagree with even the mailman who once casually threw your mail on the porch, nuke everything in sight, it's a psychic massacre and he's wallowing, going down the hallway and opening up the next door to the next poor shmuck who has pissed the guy off ("hey you [insert insulting witticism of choice]"). H-Block and his scorched earth policy, you accidentally bump into him one day and you know how someone's eyes are always darting up and down when they're first talking to you? they have an opinion, it ain't very relaxful to be around such people which finally brings me to the conclusion you can totally disagree with the Church on condoms and everything else under the sun and still think Hitchens is a dick:)

The real motive behind censorship and suppression

OR confronting people with an uncomfortable truth becomes a threat

To kind of cap things off then - some of my themes of late, the control issue and what's really behind it. The human urge to censor is a powerful one and really applies across the board, Right and Left have been equally guilty thoughout history but lately the Left have been the bad guys and the Right comes across now as more and more the champions of what liberals used to be about, freedom of thought and expression. No matter, people who practice censorship and suppression and it could be an individual, a group of individuals, a political group or movement or at its most pervasive and dangerous a government or the State, be it Right or Left they are threatened by something. People who tell you how to think or how you should think, over time if enough people think alike it becomes a form of political correctness and its sanctions for dealing with those who think outside the box are a kind of form of mind control else why the need to punish those who think differently and view things in their own sometimes unique ways? The whole Political Correctness Movement is threatened by something, the free use of your mind and its awesome power and in this respect it's more than an annoyance or a nuisance, it's a form of evil and I'm applying this in a general sense not to particular individuals. The mind represents freedom of thought and inquiry so those attackers of the Miss USA runnerup Carrie Prejean let's say, they are not only offended by what she's saying relating to traditional marriage but they are threatened by the mere thought she may be right. Many many years ago I offered to buy some pro-life videos for libraries here in Westchester County NY, should've been a done deal since freedom of thought and expression is the very foundation of their existence according to them but the sheer resistance I encountered in my own county from liberal librarians and pro-abortion groups prove to me they were threatened by something, threatened by IDEAS since the films in question were merely informational in nature, popping a movie into your VCR is not the same as banning abortion but because Z doesn't give up my persistence paid off over time and the county library system agreed to carry one of the films and the Westchester Coalition for Legal Abortion was allowed to get theirs in too. Geez was that so hard? The nature of the enemy is US, we're the threat but then again if THEY'RE so threatened by us then it means we have some power, the power of our minds and the ability to express that which they hate so really when you stop to think about it us conservatives shouldn't be so down in the dumps of late. If you get put on a list you're important, consider it a compliment and the sheer force of our ideas will prevail over time. The Death of Conservatism? not by a long shot!!

The way I see it

Conservatives, despite believing in smaller government or saying they do actually trust the government more than liberals!!! I'd hazard a guess that the vast majority of mainstream conservatives believe Oswald acted alone, since they don't believe in our government ever having nefarious overtones the various JFK conspiracy theories are loony and paranoid simply because they are metaphysical impossibilities. Take the Vietnam War, to this day your rank-and-file conservative's only problem is that we didn't stick it out long enough to defeat the Communist North Vietnamese. Conservatives positively hated the social and political upheaval of the '60s because the main aim or goal of conservatism is social and political stability. Oh they'll say it's freedom and liberty and to a certain degree that's true but they still trust the government more and so you had people like William F. Buckley Jr. almost single-handedly purging the John Birchers from the mainstream conservative movement, McCarthy is only defended by the likes of Ann Coulter these days and the conservative talk radio host most suspicious and least trusting of the government overall, Michael Savage, is constantly being marginalized by most other conservatives. You might say conservatives like the '50s and liberals love the '60s more, conservatives go with the oatmeal every day whereas liberals prefer the jalapenos. Spike Lee can voice some pretty radical Katrina theories but libs won't dare try to marginalize him and oust him from their movement, Tuskegee opened the door and so while most libs may not agree with Lee they understand and why do they understand? because historically they have trusted the government less. Put another way, who over time has Questioned Things more, liberals or conservatives? WHO are the conformists of the status-quo, of homogenous thought and who see a basic inherent problem with our very institutions (hint: which side of the torture issue are you on? how do you view the CIA?)? Not taking sides here at all but what I like about soapie is he questions things more than your average conservative talking head not in a conspiratorial way but by getting back to First Principles which both sides fail miserably on, a pox on both your houses. If I may put it another way how come Bush never got teabagged?

So why doesn't this work in reverse?

Liberal Supreme Court justice David Souter is retiring and returning home to New Hampshire because unlike Arlen Specter he has a life. Now consider some of the Supremes nominated by conservative presidents over the years who for some strange reason later evolved into liberals: Nixon got Harry Blackmun on the court and we all know what he did, Reagan gave us Sandra Day O'Connor and Bush the Sr. gave us Souter who usually voted with the liberal wing. So what Z is asking today is how come a liberal president never nominates someone to the court who later turns out to be a staunch conservative and a real pain in the ass to people with a liberal agenda? I'd bet dollars to doughnuts Obama is not gonna put up someone who later is going to "accidentally" overturn Roe vs. Wade so is it because the liberal vetting process is better? do conservative judges leave more of a paper trail? are they more vocal in their views? or does just saying Judge Q or W is good because he only interprets the Constitution and nothing more really mean anything these days? geez EVERY potential Supreme Court nominee is gonna say that. I'm in a wondering kind of mood today.

Cultural trends I don't get

Celebrity stalking

First off this isn't or shouldn't be a problem for us conservatives, rank-and-file conservatives view the average Hollywood celebrity as an airhead with left-wing leanings so where's the attraction? Then there's what I once called over at Hannityland our social caste system, no way Tyra Banks is gonna go out with some lonely drifter so why even go after someone totally outside of your own socio-economic orbit when you can bother the girl next door? So Brady Green, Tyra's stalker has been convicted at a non-jury trial and the judge would rather sentence him to psychiatric counseling rather than the 90 days in jail. I've talked about this before but you can't police somebody's head, you can only punish their actions. If I like Celebrity X or Z that's entirely between me myself and I, so long as my actions don't get out of bounds my mental domain is totally autonomous and no business of the Law. I am the sole judge and arbiter of my imaginative life, you cannot punish a person's thoughts and Hannity once said that's the real problem he has with hate-crime legislation, you're really in effect punishing a person's thoughts. So basically this judge sentencing Mr. Green to spend time with a shrink, first off it won't work nor should it, so some egghead is going to be able to dislodge IT? Only Mr. Green's actions should be the purview of the Law and as such he'd be better off getting the 90 days, as with Hannity's point there's the faintest whiff of fascism in the air say if Green is in some Barnes & Noble some day and wants to purchase a Tyra Banks calendar and the clerk calls security. It's Orwellian thought control and reading about these cases which for some quirk are becoming more common among the celebrity set a common thing is sending the woman flowers and gifts. Now you can debate the wisdom of this, Z doesn't think it's such a great idea in this day and age but by the same token it never struck me as a crime-crime, you know like bank robbery or embezzlement. If I were a cop I'd be like I didn't become a cop for this, it's basically Society making up laws as they go along. Celebrity stalking, it's weird for so many reasons and it's weirdly political but basically the mind cannot be put into a prison, punish people for what they do not what they think. If there's one rule at Stranded it's be not afraid, everything is bloggable and the day the cops come for your Cindy Crawford calendar it's over.

I normally could care less about beauty pageants

They have that rep for being shallow you know but this whole Carrie Prejean thing, the Miss USA runner-up from California and her comments on gay marriage. Well I did a simple google search to find out exactly what she said to cause such a ruckus and I'm like you couldn't be more temperate, mild and polite not to mention honest. Celebrity blogger Perez Hilton asked a simple question to which she gave a simple response and if Perez would just take a Q-tip and clean the sperm out of his ear he'd see that. Here's where pageant officials are being hypocritical, they don't like her being so openly political they said in a transparent statement but let's say she had come out in support of gay marriage, I just think it's not her being political that really bothers folks but rather her politics per se. Sheesh you can't say anything these days, I just wish they'd all get on that giant rocket phallus-ship to the Moon or something. Perez called her a bitch on his blog but be that as it may I'm with Camille Paglia on this, I don't buy into this whole gay male exclusivity thing, never did. Beyonce and Britney are playing nude volleyball on a beach against Jessica Alba and Tyra Banks, her stalker's there watching but you ain't? oh but Antonio Banderas is in the buff outside on the veranda of his nice Spanish villa, Castillian breezes in his hair, thing flopping around and he's puffing on a Cohiba and you're a-go? Political correctness has to go sooner or later, may as well start the rollback now, good a time as ever. Rock on Carrie!!

Maybe if she were less worried about Michael Savage

and more concerned with the earliest stages of the swine flu, Napolitano of DHS that is. If there are deaths in this country or many deaths related to whatever this is it will reflect badly on the Obama Administration, fair or unfair it will reflect. We're supposed to be a few eras beyond Typhoid Mary and for any administration official to say we ought to resign ourselves and expect a few deaths, well you just don't go there. I wanna go in my old age in a rowboat with a fishing rod in my hands and my dog dozing off half hanging over the side like in that Norman Rockwell painting and not at the hands of some disease that our government couldn't get a handle on in time because it was politically incorrect to do so (Mexico, illegals). House, he would know what to do.

He's 79, why doesn't he just retire?

Rep. Sen. from PA Arlen Specter, now a Dem. No great political analysis here, I leave that to others but from what people are saying it ain't hard to figure. He's a cancer survivor to boot so I never got this work 'til you drop philosophy. I work now 'cause I have to but when the time comes I won't go over. When you love work that much you confound God, work was supposed to be a curse from the time of Adam, you're not getting it. Specter says the extremes have taken over both parties so why switch to the other one? I don't find the story all that jazzy but maybe McCain can give 'em that filibuster-proof majority, who knows?

Al Gore on Capitol Hill

"Climate change legislation has the moral equivalence of the civil rights struggle of the 1960s."

HUH? Even the most avid ecos don't make this argument. Is a tree a person? Al Gore has always been a bit......otherworldly. He's either nuts or has a higher spiritual understanding of these things than the rest of us but I'm gonna go with flakey for now.

The fetal conundrum

People especially liberals often assume if you take the pro-life position that they can guess with a rather high degree of accuracy your position on other issues, some pro-choice whiners at Danny's place a few months back assumed quite naturally that I was for the war in Iraq but for me I take each issue as it comes. A theme has emerged at my blog of late and that is I don't apply social conservatism across the board. I'm on the record, on porn and prostitution I am very libertarian and with gay marriage I have no problem with the federalist approach although you'd have to put a gun to my head to attend the gay nuptials ("ok I'm getting dressed just let me find my tie"). BUT abortion is different my friends and that's because it's very very unique from the three big issues I just mentioned. Those have a personal element of distaste for so many by their very nature, my God just think Eliot Spitezer in nothing but his black socks but these issues generally do not involve the taking of an innocent human life (ok, generally speaking). For the average liberal though he glumps them all together into some kind of collective trauma of keeping the government out of our lives, actually out of our sexual lives because he does care very very much if you smoke or use an aerosol can. For the liberal with a conscience abortion is resolved this way: from a biological perspective he or she readily admits it's a human life, he's very personally against it as he's always fond of saying but because that human life resides for a time within a woman's body it ipso facto becomes a feminist issue, a women's rights issue not so much because of the nature of the fetus as he has pretty much figured this out by now but by the sit'chayshen. He or she can't get it out of his damn head that because the home of the fetus is the womb that the homeowner as property owner can do as she likes, it's nothing personal. She might see the fetus as an intruder although truth be told she answered the door when the penis rang. I'm a bad person because I only see the human life, I ain't sophisticated like Bill Moyers you know? I just know how to spit chickens.

While it doesn't prove Obama's a socialist

this begs the question why leaders like Hugo Chavez and Raul Castro vastly prefer him over Bush. They say they know, they have a way of telling, they can pick up on these things so is Obama giving off some kind of socialist vibe? a signal? {wink wink} maybe Obama is in denial of these things himself, he's conflicted, he's not orientated yet, he's had a couple of socialist dreams recently that probably meant nothing. Come on over to the other side

comrade!

Savage went off the deep end last night

Actually when you have a catalyst like Janet Napolitano, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and her report that veterans returning home may pose a terrorist threat Savage is gonna blow a gasket but he went off on some pretty radical tangents last night and practically called the Obama Administration a totalitarian regime in the works, a bunch of Nazis and oven-stuffers he said who are gonna knock on your door in the middle of the night to take you away for saying the wrong thing, anti-abortionists are on her list, Obama may be the Beast with horns rising out of the sea to rule the world with China and Russia and oh yeah, McCain was the Manchurian Candidate. Actually the real threat is not those who have served their country so well but radical assholery and Obama if he had any smarts would can her right now...Now my Dad says there are things you keep to yourself, things you don't talk about. You might have the thought for a nanosecond that these new DTV converter boxes are the government's way of spying on you, maybe you think your boss is on acid ("a random drug test wouldn't hurt buddy") or the stray kitten that shows up on your doorstep is really the reincarnation of your dead cat. It's the Realm of the Untalkable, most people if they're honest have some theories, views and opinions that fall outside the Norm shall we say but you pretty much shelve it, don't want the respectable folks talking. Put it this way, if I blogged after two tumblers of the Christian Brothers it'd be a whole other blog, real Robodoon stuff but anyway what you got last night was the raw feed, Savage's political id, free association and real stream-of-consciousness totally unencumbered by should I say this or should I say that? The thing was so scary last night that I had to switch on Gwen Ifill's Washington Week in Review after to bring me back down to Earth, like waking up from a bad dream in a cold sweat and you still think there's a squirrel in your room. Now Savage seems to be on everyone's shitlist these days, even right-wingers don't like him and I disagreed with almost everything the man said BUT it was awesome, I like it

it's all good.

What to do when you have radical friends

Democratic peer pressure

This issue has to make Obama uncomfortable. New York is now the latest state to push for gay marriage. Democratic Governor David Paterson is sending up a bill to the Assembly pronto, Chuck Schumer has only recently converted to the gay marriage cause and Bam must be thinking "you know guys your state has its own economic woes and you're concerned with this right now?" It's like when you have a group of friends and over time you see they're a little bit off, just a wee tad like Bam is in the back seat and Paterson is driving his souped up GTO with the hemi, Chuck is sitting right next to him, they both got little old lady cataract glasses on and Paterson puts the pedal to the medal and Bam is like "SLOW DOWN ALREADY!!" They pick up Bloomberg, for some reason I can't get it out of my head that he's not a Democrat, he's for the gay marriage too and he's enjoying the ride as well. I don't think Obama wants to go down in History as the one-term president who effected radical social change or more likely at least wanted to as I really doubt even if Richard Simmons were president he'd be able to pass gay marriage in all 50 states in just one term. Even if Obama in his heart of hearts were for the thing I think he'd much prefer to be safely ensconced in his second term before upheaving society as we know it. I think he wants to govern moderately for the next four years, he has his nice sweater on with the little alligator but his friends Dave and Chuck are like

"hey Bam come and watch the sheep video with us"

maybe someone passes him a joint. They take him to a club and pay for a free lap dance for him but he's sitting there all stiff,

you know man can't he just break free and hang with his own crowd? those who get it about not rocking the boat too much, these be tough economic times. Can't we be content with making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for now, kicking back with some milk and getting those economic numbers up again ("hey guys it's time for a break") while Dave and Chuck behind his back are calling him a f****n faggot for not getting on board. He's the first African-American president for cryin' out loud, he's Made History, lower the flame and just let it simmer for awhile.

Rush's persecution complex

He has one big-time you know. I haven't listened to him in literally a couple of years now but of the occasional snippets I hear and read about he's STILL complaining of the conspiracy against him. He can't talk about ANY subject without bringing IT up. New York Governor David Paterson has raised taxes through the roof here acting like your typical Democratic executive and Rush was complaining about this recently, says he has no choice but to move out of the state but then had to add he (Paterson) wants that and so good ole Dave started messin' with him and said if he knew his tax policy would have that effect he would have considered it much sooner. Now conservatism is largely reactionary by nature almost by default. Since liberalism pretty much holds sway in all areas of life today so much of conservative energy is spent merely reacting to the dominant philosophy of the day, it's a conservative malaise with a heavy shaving of Zoloft. Let's say it's all true, vast swaths of the msm hate Rush and want to silence him, one 24/7 subproject of the VLWC (or Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy) wants to suppress him through a new Fairness Doctrine, what of it? While if even some of these things are true it doesn't help the Right to have a persecution complex. Rush gives it that conspiratorial and paranoid edge but the time he wastes marinating in his own self-pity instead of just pushing conservative principles, it reminds me of the time you waste in traffic jams. Part of him wants to be an existential hero, some kind of angst-ridden character out of some graphic novel constantly warring with forces larger than himself. It's like working with someone who says all the time "they hate me, they want to get rid of me" instead of just putting in your eight hours, pumping it out and going home. God GOD I miss the days of the caller abortions and the blow monkeys!

Where to begin?

So yeah, unless you've been living in a cave like a blind salamander you're aware that Mel's wife of, what is it? like almost thirty years is divorcing him for his philandering ways. Seven or eight children, staunch and ultra-traditionalist pre-Vatican 2 Catholic who once said his Protestant wife is going to hell, spotted on a tropical beach with some bombshell Russian singer in a bikini so why'd he make The Passion? I've a theory about this and it involves a little Stephen Hawking, wormholes, superstrings applied to psychology, Einsteinian Freudianism......I'm working on it......it's my Loop Theory. Let's say you're not just average conservative, you keep walking along this loop and you enter the woods of SuperConservatism, I mean EVERYTHING bothers you but remember it's still a loop or a giant circle and what's on the other side of the loop? Where your ultraconservatism ends is where liberalism begins, I'm still working on the precise algebraic differential equation...but before you know it your average SuperCon "accidentally" walks into some porn shop, just browsing mind you, keeping tabs on the culture a la Tom Wolfe. When he wakes up the same hand that once condemned his wife to hell is now circle-jerking to some Slovakian fantasy, the same mouth that once lumped all things post-Vatican 2 as Antichrist is now saying "Jose Cuervo I pray for your power!" It also helps explain why former lefties like David Horowitz are now confirmed righties, they traveled the same loop as Mel only from the opposite direction. Fruit loops.

Pro-gay conservatives

Another two-parter, I HAVE TO say something about Mel Gibson but let's get back to Z's Law of the Power of Negative Appraisal for a minute. It works like this, for years we've taken libs to task for being pro-abortion until they have to overexplain themselves, "oh no we're not for THAT, no man, you got us all wrong" and so basically all you have to do from a political angle is to criticize someone and according to this basic law of political psychology the person will start to move in the direction of the critic, nay will almost or just stop short of adopting his position or may even take on a diluted version. OK, so now for the same amount of time the average conservative has been labeled a gay-basher, a homophobe and so now they can't wait to show their new gay colors like Bree on Desperate Housewives doing a complete 180 after she found out her son is gay. So now you have conservatives applauding the State of Vermont for legalizing gay marriage through the legislature, BINGO! pass the lube, we weren't really against gays marrying in the first place just wanted you to respect federalist concerns is all. This is Kyle Smith of the New York Post but for a fair majority of us we still have a residual distaste for gay acts. We don't form an entire movement around it the way the evangelicals have, we don't have the fervor or the time and we're more than tolerant but by the same token don't ask us to celebrate the destruction of your anus. Kyle says it all amounts to this, the buggery bothers us but I'd go further. The larger issue is the loss of masuline culture. Sure a guy wearing a dress won't upset the Order of the Universe but we have a problem with it if it's not part of a comedy sketch, we can't picture him like Dirty Harry jumping from the overpass onto that school bus with the sniper holding the schoolkids hostage and any culture that celebrates the first tranny mayor who's ugly btw is a little off. We actually prefer male culture as we should, those weren't tranny SEALS after all who shot those three Somali pirates to death. In relations between the sexes feminism wants to criminalize the Alpha Male, if I'm meandering it's because it's all part and parcel of the same package, it's all part of the pussification of America but it doesn't mean you have to be like Mel Gibson...(to be continued)

Conservatives out of sorts

First off we have to put a checkmark in Obama's corner. He gave the order for the use of force last Friday to free Captain Richard Phillips from those Somali pirates. He gets a kudo or two in my book but somehow Jimmy Carter would've f****d it up.

The Winter of our Conservative Discontent - Beth has had it with liberals, you can't change their minds she says but before we go there we gotta look at our own camp. IMO the fiscal conservatives (FCs) want to take over the Party and purge us social conservatives (SCs) from the ranks. OK, maybe not soapie and Patrick M but the ones who pull the strings do. The FCs don't just want to stop moralizing about things like abortion, rather they want to moralize or mainstream abortion so as to talk about other more important things. Now as I blogged recently when you take the social issues off the table there is less and less that bonds us FCs and SCs together - economic policy, military campaigns and overall patriotism is basically what you're left with, kind of a thin gruel like eating the same thing everyday. Here's where the FCs are wrong though. I'm an idealist not just about politics but Life in general, even if our politics were correct Life could still suck. Put another way you need spirituality, conservatism has to be about moral values too. One of the SCs' focus is doing the right thing, the FCs would add nothing wrong with that but such right choices need to be freely made in an environment of maximum freedom. Whatever, we could have the right economic policies tomorrow, ultimate victory in Iraq and all the rest and still have the usual laundry list of social ills, divorce, abortion, drug abuse etc. In short how can you be a conservative and not talk about spirituality, about moral values? Social conservatism is about preserving traditions, not about saying psychedelics are good for you, that's libertarianism. So before I can respond to Beth's points we need to define what conservatism means, what does it really stand for? with so many strains of conservatism today it's hard at times to know exactly what it is we're fighting for and conversely before we take on liberalism we have to know what that stands for too, what precisely are they fighting for on their side?