It’s been a while since Calvin Woodward appointed himself the fact-checker of the American press, but then again, we might not have noticed, because John Kerry hasn’t been much on our minds lately. Also, we’re the fact-checkers of the American press, including all Woodwards great and small.
OBAMA: “Cats go ‘meow.’” THE FACTS: Roaring is not ‘meow,’ and according to the nonpartisan Cat Fancy magazine, lions are almost 50% more likely to be a cat than the average house pet is.
OBAMA: “Dogs bark.” THE FACTS: Obama did not mention that bark is also the thing on trees.
OBAMA: “Water is wet.” THE FACTS: Given his background, Obama is almost certainly aware that Hawaiian Punch is also…
Somebody needs to ‘fess up. Who put truth serum in Calvin Woodward’s coffee this morning?
Whoever it is, they’re in a heap of trouble, as Woodward produced a fact-checking critique of Barack Obama that is so good you’d swear most of it was ghostwritten by a conservative talk host.
It will be interesting to see how much distribution it gets. I would suggest not counting on too much, but being open to a pleasant surprise.
Regardless of its distribution, you’d better believe they’ve read it in the White House, and they’re wondering what in the world happened.
Here are key paragraphs from Woodward’s rundown, which is really, seriously, a read (and save) the whole thing item (it is saved at my host for future reference; HT to Mark Levin, who excerpted the…
I mean, Woodward, if you’re out there, these are characters who want to destroy objective journalism, or rather to redefine the words ‘objective’ and ‘journalism’ to mean zany propaganda from the extreme, dangling fringe of the paranoid right. Psst: They’re not really your friends.
According to the New York Times, we Republicans are having a debate “over how to rebuild the party in the wake of Senator Arlen Specter’s departure.” Just like how the Democrats had to rebuild their party after Ben Nighthorse Campbell switched parties. You remember that, don’t you?
Yes, that was in 1995, just after Bill Clinton lost his historic race against Bob Dole with the global economy going down in flames, plus the lying and the starting a useless war and the torture, yes. Then Democrats were all like, “The American public thinks we’re insane, and, so let’s teach them a lesson by acting double-super crazy, blar-har-snuck-har,” and tried to unseat Ben Nighthorse Campbell in a primary against Amiri Baraka.
Then all of a sudden all Hell broke loose for no reason at all, sparking a big debate, which never happened because Hindy is clearly passing the kouchie on the left-hand side, not to mention the dutchie.
No, what this means is that Republicans are having a debate over how to rebuild the party in the wake of Senator Arlen Specter’s departure, and Hindy wasn’t invited, therefore it must all be part of the Liberal Media Conspiracy, which plants false stories in the press in order to advance a left-wing agenda at home and defeat American troops overseas.
You know what’s ridiculous? These people have been claiming that for years, but it’s only now that they’ve wrecked themselves and the country that the ‘liberal MSM’ has started to challenge that wackadoodle crackpot conspiracy theory as something other than a legitimate opinion demanding of respect, and most ridiculously of all — in fact paradoxically — deserving of equal time.
PAUL remembers: If memory serves, the Dems internalized the lesson implicit in Campbell’s switch, promptly moderated all of their liberal positions, and were swept back into power as the party of moderation.
Here abides reasoning. The Dems didn’t learn this imaginary lesson and ended up eating a decade of Cinnamon Fail Crunch — so we don’t have to learn it either.
It’s been a hectic couple of days for guys like Erick Erickson. Let’s see how Erick reacts to changing events this time: by creating a teetering Jenga of rationalization that makes them seem to confirm what he already believes, or there’s actually nothing to go after the ‘or,’ so this sentence ought to have ended awhile ago.
Erick Erickson, RedState: Blackballing Toomey and Hating DeMint
In which I am forced to disagree with a whole heap of guys far smarter than myself and who I greatly admire.
That happens to us all the time, only in reverse.
In what I can only believe is coordination with the Senate GOP Leadership because everyone is on the exact same talking point, I am more than a little disappointed with the wailing and gnashing of teeth coming from the Republican commentariat.
X is secretly doing Y. My rage is actually disappointment. It is in sadness that I bellow and smash my TV with a folding chair.
The other day, Senator Jim DeMint told Arlen Specter that DeMint would be backing Toomey. Somehow he is to blame for Specter jumping to his natural party. Nevermind that Specter’s staff says it is because Specter can’t win a Republican primary.
OMG some villainous conspirator smashed my TV with a folding chair. We are somehow to blame for Specter secretly being a Democrat for 43 years just because we were trying to oust him in a primary and replace him with the president of a wingnut-welfare foundation? Gaah! [smash smash] family heirlooms [smunch crash] grandparents, priceless [foosh!] flamethrower ha ha ha!
And it is not just that. Everyone from Ramesh Ponnuru to Michael Barone to the Wall Street Journal
We like both kinds, country and western.
…is collectively wringing their hands about the selfish conservatives and Club for Growth wanting to remain an ideologically pure minority party that can’t win the majority because it shuts out squishes.
I.e., seeing every victory as a mandate to become angrier and more extreme, while every defeat makes them try to ‘show it who’s boss’ by becoming angrier and more extreme. After a couple decades of this, you have guys like Erickson yelling for violent resistance against the Obammunist death squad pancake gophers, while normal Americans quite naturally think they’re insane.
And if you have to ask what a squish is, buddy, keep ringing that doorbell for all I care.
That’s garbage and they should know it.
RAMESH: Erick, look, this is the handle of the shovel, and this is the shovelly end. You hold it this way.
ERICK: [points at the shovel] That’s garbage and you should know it.
RAMESH: That’s the garbage, in that big freaking pile right there. OMG, you shovel it into this can with the shovel.
MICHAEL BARONE: It’s true.
ERICK: [sits down on pile] I’m not going to stand for this garbage.
I, for one, have no problem with a big tent.
I welcome Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe. I welcome Rudy Giuliani. I’m fine with Charlie Crist as long as he stays where he is
…because a real conservative could actually win the Florida Senate seat. I’m fine with John McCain.
At least when he’s trying to get rid of Specter — an idea unique among RedState ideas in that it failed backwards, i.e. worked too well. Otherwise he totally hates him.
I think most Republicans and most conservatives realize we are never going to have a majority without tolerating a certain number of more liberal party members in areas that have decided to shut out conservatives for one reason or another.
That lesson was really brought home lately, when some bunch of jerks tried to force Arlen Specter out of office, and ended up in a world of butthurt.
Re: ‘a certain number,’ that number is roughly calculable. Erick can solve for X: About 22% + X = 51% Read the rest of this entry »
If I ignore the fact that black people really like Obama, I can make a case that he hasn’t been a very popular president so far. And hey, if I just kick it old skewl and restrict Obama’s popularity ratings to those of white male property owners, then I can make the case that… what, why are you all looking at me like that?
Folks, we have received confirmation that not only is K-Load horribly, horribly real … but the two lovebirds are now apparently using the Corner to schedule their booty calls:
Weird News [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
I’m en route to Los Angeles to meet up with Jonah. Odder still, when you consider that in the early years we labored to rarely be in the same room. All for the sake of The Corner, natch.
Above: Is that a Snickers bar in your pocket or are you just happy to see me? No, seriously — is that a Snickers bar in your pocket? Give me the fucking Snickers bar, Jonah!
Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said Tuesday he will support the nomination of an Indiana University law professor to head the Obama administration’s internal law office.
He is the first Republican to publicly declare his backing for Dawn Johnsen, whose selection to head the Office of Legal Counsel has grown into a fight about abortion rights and counterterrorism practices.
Some Republicans have promised to try to block Johnsen’s confirmation either because of her support for abortion rights or because she criticized the legal justification used by the Bush administration for the torture of detainees.
I smell a primary challenge and another party defection comin’ down the pike! Don’t lemme down, GOP — it’s time to purge another senator!!!
Arlen Spector’s move to the Democrats, which potentially gives them a filibuster-proof majority in the United States Senate, is excellent news for Republicans.
I’m sure the Democrats at some point in the future will mess up and get tossed out of power. The party that replaces them needs to do better than Newt on the whole “having any grasp on reality” thing that has clearly eluded him.
Dude, losing senate seats is not a victory for your party or for the conservative movement. I just don’t get how you guys think.
A Sinking Ship: “Yay! We’re rat free! We have no more rats! Not a single rat on boa…glub! Glub! Glub! sputter! Glub! Glub! gasp! Not one single ra… glub! Glub! GLUB! Gurgle… gurgle….
glub…”
[an eerie silence, as the waters close and become still]
Using military resources for a cheap photo-op. Scaring the pants off the public. Exploiting 9/11 imagery for self-aggrandizement. Keeping secrets and causing mass panic.
Um, can you imagine if a GOP administration did this?
Trying, ungh…
Can you imagine?!
I know! We’ll use our imagi-na-tion.
Above: Imagi-na-tion!
Above: Using military resources for a cheap photo-op
Above: Scaring the pants off the public
Above: Exploiting 9/11 imagery for self-aggrandizement
I’m getting tempted to register as a Republican simply because I feel sorry for them.
Also, we do need two functioning parties in this country in order for our democracy to remain somewhat successful, and I’d like to help move the GOP at least marginally more toward the center so the next time they’re elected they don’t start performing resurrection rituals on Terri Schiavo.
Basically, what I’m saying is this country would be vastly better off if both major political parties ignored the GOP base. Who’s with me?
The Congressional Republicans have produced some good charts that show what has happened to the country’s fiscal health since the Democrats took control of Congress and, worse yet, what they themselves project over the coming years. This one charges the Democrats with irresponsibility:
Fair enough. But why is it that the public sector is never charged with greed? What we see in this chart is, in fact, the insatiable hunger for money and power that characterizes Washington Democrats.1 Now that they are in control of both the legislative and executive branches, the Democrats’ greed is unchecked. You can see the result.
Well, they say a picture is worth a thousand words. How is it that we never before realized the rapacity of these liberal plundocrats? See if we trust them again, because there is one word for this, and that is ‘tax and spend.’ Good day.
Ding-dong. Hello? What’s this thumbtacked to the tree?
We, you know, await with ongoing good cheer the correction that Hinderaker will never make. For if done in good faith, one such correction would force another, thus forcing another, causing in short order a mea-culpalanche, a rending of garments and a growing and subsequent tearing of beards that could only end with Powerline erased in its totality from the Internet and its server dropped into one of those lakes they have ten thousand of, apparently, out there in Minnesota.
It could be replaced, as we often imagine, with a large, primary-colored message in MS Comic Sans saying ME GO BAFWOOM, over a stick-figure drawing of Hindy with his hair standing up in penciled spicules, making the sine-mouthed expression of the physically confounded. Or else the following:
WELCOME TO OWERLINE
Notice there is no “P” in it!
Please keep it that way!
-The M’g'm’t't
Or we’ll think of something else; you know how it OMG ARLEN SPECTER TEH WHAT, NOW?
[picks up remote and turns on the Internet]
1 Hinderaker’s position on the hunger for money depends very much on whether the hungerer is a good-hooray-person or a bad-hiss-person.
Tintin adds: There’s some additional tomfoolery with this graph. The data points have been moved to fit on the line, rather than the line being drawn to fit the data points. If you graph the line with equal units for each axis, well, surprise, surprise, the slope when the nice Republicans were in charge gets steeper. And the slope for when the evil Democrats will be wrecking the economy decreases rather than increases over time.
Just when you thought Big Hollywood couldn’t be any more preposterous, along comes Chris Muir with one of his comics which, as always, needed to be fixed:
Not only did Chuck Schumer cut flu finding by saying approvingly that flu finding was cut, but it was cut in a pathetic attempt to appease us — which failed because we tricked him! Eat blame, loser. Malkin has more.
The unhinged liberals are attacking Republicans for cutting flu funding! Schumer! Him! Him! Blame! He! Schumer! Him! Simultaneously, he loves pork. Loves pork! Snarl! Aroo! I drag feces through his flesh with my teeth! Shriek! Squeal!
Boss Malkin is like whatever, and I’m like, fine, slow news day, but I thought Republicans were supposed to take threats too seriously, because now we’re supposedly in trouble for what, cutting spending? I guess that’s where bipartisanship gets us, huh? SUCK IT, COLLINS! BLAR HAR HAR!
Howl! Gurgle! Partisan Democrats are unhingedly attacking us, when all we did was beat [clang] to death with a fireplace [clang] poker, like YOU with the [clang] to CRACK YOUR [clang] HEAD AND STOMP [clang] EYEBALLS [clang, stomp-stomp crash] KILL DOG [yipe! yipe! clang!] BURN WITH GASOLINE [foosh! yipe! yipe!] EVERYTHING BURNING, BURNING, YODEL-AY-HEE-HOO!1
Looks like Obama’s got egg on his face! He’s desperate to blame us for cutting flu funding while we’ve been fooling him by tanking his health nominees. Guess he should’ve done something besides let us thwart him, huh? Welcome MichelleMalkin.com readers!
1 This is not a faithful Shorter, but we’re curious as to how funny it would be if every Malkin appearance had her screaming nonsense, breaking things, and attacking people. It seems like the kind of thing that would be funny once or twice, then not funny the next three or four times, but then funny again for infinity times.
Also, while Collins and Schumer have been shuttlecocked back and forth as symbols of Republican and Democratic perfidy, neither seems to have done anything especially blameworthy, or to be very important to the swine-flu story as it’s developing. That said, it seems likely that the fault for whatever happens will somehow rest with conservatives, and will reflect shame upon conservatism as an ideology. Because why would things stop doing that all of a sudden?
When a party enters power and attempts to investigate…excuse me, let me put these goalposts over here, thank you.
Um, when a party won’t even play fair by conducting its baseless investigations while its adversaries are in power, then how can they expect…excuse me, one moment, let me slide them over this way, sorry, thanks.
So. Did these people try to prosecute their rivals after their rivals did not break laws? No? Well in that case, how would you like it if we prosecuted Obama for killing two Somali pirates without reading them their Miranda rights? Because it…oh, hang on.
It was, ooh, bad enough with the infamous political lynching of Scooter Libby in the absence of any crime, but America does not erase purged officials from its photographs like Stalin did, because that’s how the U.N. will get you! Yes! They will smell blood like sharks, and…
Alas! Alas, society will be weakened by our endless cycle of revenge against you. Heh-heh. Because we have no principles — I mean because you don’t, so why should we have any? Because you made us not have any, like how all of you supported the war in Iraq until the insurgency began, and then you made up some crazy lie about “ooh, it was all Bush’s idea,” and how there were no quote-unquote “WMDs,” because…aw crap, wait.
Because in 2003, Bush had saved America from terror. Yes. And then you partisan streetfighters were feeling pretty good, huh? Because I guess then you felt pretty big, huh? Because then you started to attack your deliverer for quote-unquote “wiretaps” and so-called “torture” ooh, ooh, rrr! That’s what you thought you’d do. Snorgle-horgle-haggle-hoob…ah, excuse me, I’ll be back in one second, thanks.
Hi, thanks, and that’s…and that’s why you’ll be all “ho-hum” when the terrorists come back and attack and kill, unless, no wait.
You’ll hate Obama then, when the terrorists come back. Oh boy will you hate Obama. And you’ll want to prosecute him then, ha ha! That’s what you’ll want to do. Prosecute Obama! Opposite!
Not so sure of yourselves now, huh? It’s like I’ve been saying all along, isn’t it? Huh? Isn’t it? Oh, I feel the frost of winter. [smiles thinly, sweeps cloak about himself in a grandiose flourish, exits as though on treads to a single note on a kettle drum]
Action Alert from the Sarah Palin List:
“Rahm Emanuel & Co. seizing an opportunity with the supposed swine flu crisis?”
I have been inundated with emails: Are Obama and Rahm Emanuel engineering a swine-flu “crisis” to save the Sebelius nomination? I have to wonder. Call your Senators NOW.
ABOVE: The baseball cap is not the only thing bass-ackwards about Rob Port
…And so we return to the other side of the right’s ingenious and growingly hysterical arguments in favor of governmental torture. For as conservatives defend the President’s authority to violate the Constitution at will, they spend much of the rest of the time in a euphoria of persecution, growingly hysterical over the other President and his ability to do things without even asking anybody, through the expedient of winning a single election. It doesn’t help matters that he is creating a fascist police state of communist Hitler outrage, and plotting to put them all in prison camps.
How do they resolve this seeming contradiction? Oh, you know.
In 1986, with the Michigan vs. Jackson decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the police cannot interrogate you without your lawyer present unless you give them your consent. Obama wants to change that.
Hey, it’s the Torygraph, heh-heh, I mean Telegraph. Also on tap there this week: why Britain must return to Thatcherism, a report on the disastrous Obama presidency, something on the global-warming hoax, a defense of free markets, a demand for lower taxes on the wealthy… They seem to have a certain thing going. Their man Conrad Black left under a bit of a cloud.
The Michigan vs Jackson ruling in 1986 established that, if a defendants have a lawyer or have asked for one to be present, police may not interview them until the lawyer is present.
Any such questioning cannot be used in court even if the suspect agrees to waive his right to a lawyer because he would have made that decision without legal counsel, said the Supreme Court.
However, in a current case that seeks to change the law, the US Justice Department argues that the existing rule is unnecessary and outdated.
Can you sense something great coming? I’m totally sensing something amazing on the way.
The sixth amendment of the US constitution protects the right of criminal suspects to be “represented by counsel”, but the Obama regime argues that this merely means to “protect the adversary process” in a criminal trial.
Ooh, ‘regime.’ Here it comes.
The Justice Department, in a brief signed by Elena Kagan, the solicitor general, said the 1986 decision “serves no real purpose” and offers only “meagre benefits”.
Here comes the payoff…
First, imagine if a Republican administration were doing this. Then imagine what the media’s reaction would be.
:o
Don’t expect that same reaction for Obama. Because he’s a liberal, he’s held to a different standard.
As though to vouch for the fact that we haven’t just drunk too much root beer and gotten all fizzy, here comes Cap’n Ed:
Can you imagine what the outcry over this would have been had President John McCain, or for that matter President George W. Bush, had tried this? Newspapers around the nation would have decried his assault on civil liberties. PFAW and the ACLU would have staged rallies in every American city, and they would have called Bush, McCain, or any other Republican a fascist for denying legal counsel to people under police questioning. We’d have an endless line of appearances on television news programs from people who got coerced into false confessions after having been denied counsel.
:@
O wau. Zom-guh. Witf!?
You know, it’s not enough for a conservative merely to be stupid and angry, because if that alone were satisfying to them, they could stand in the bathroom yelling “DER!” all day barely bothering anybody. No, we suspect that Ed must also be trying to misrepresent this story in order to help others be stupid and angry — to cause a stupelanche, a failcano.
Even though I have never seen one single episode of The Simpsons, the Post Office’s issuance of stamps depicting the characters on that show is final and conclusive proof that Barack Obama is flushing this country down the toilet. We should have more George Washington and Ronald Reagan stamps. Not Simpson stamps, even if that show is on Fox. Only socialists and Europeans would issue stamps that commemorate a cartoon show. What next? Beavis and Butthead? South Park?? The Fucking Flintstones??? Mickey Fucking Mouse????!! DONALD MOTHERFUCKING DUCK??????!!!! … And maybe, just once, someone will call me “Sir” without adding “You’re making a scene.”
1As Gavin is tampering with the sacrosanct format of the Sadly, No! shorter, there is now no reason that a shorter can’t be longer than the post that it is shortening.
Ridiculous are my critics and proven are my claims, for the CIA officially says2 that a plot to fly an airliner into L.A.’s Library Tower3 was foiled through the waterboarding of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.4Boo-yah!5
1 Thiessen, formerly chief speechwriter for George W. Bush, is temporarily notorious for this Washington Post op-ed, and is lately engaged in a battle of wits with Slate’s Timothy Noah. Andrew Sullivan stands with Noah, while Crazy Andy McCarthy is ook-ooking on Thiessen’s side, explaining how Saddam Hussein was in league with Al Qaeda, and occasioning relief by not dragging Obama’s birth certificate into it.
2 A 2005 memo from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel to the chief CIA counsel says that the CIA had told them this. (The .PDF is the second from the top.)
3 According to the Bush administration, this alleged plot was foiled in 2002.
4 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was captured in Rawalpindi, Pakistan on March 1, 2003.
5 Thiessen explains how this is possible:
George Bush said so in speeches, specifically “the most carefully vetted speech in presidential history,” i.e. the most carefully parsed speech probably in the Bush presidency, which Thiessen was presumably in on. Appointees signed off on this speech with CYA memos, specifically HonestJohnNegroponte, whose legal exposure in the matter of interrogations is palpable. Therefore, no matter what the intelligence community says now, their real opinion is faithfully reproduced in this world-historical Bush speech, no backs, infinity.
A timeline of incidents from the same speech, mostly dubious, agrees with what Bush said in that speech.
An interested party and possible subject of investigation, former CIA director Michael Hayden, cites the same speech on an April 19 FOX News interview, and adds some sourceless claims that can’t be checked.
Thiessen makes a few more unverifiable claims (i.e. “according to the intelligence community”), adding, “These are just a few of the plots that were broken up because of information gained from CIA interrogations.” That means Thiessen knows about others but isn’t telling!
Our recommendation, of course, is waterboarding. Also, we could ask Thiessen if that practice yields reliable information, and keep doing it until he says no.
We await Mr. Noah’s rebuttal with mustard and relish.
Now that even Harvey “Gay Gay Gay Gay Gay” Milk has a school named after him and everywhere you look on the teevee you see gays and more gays and even more gays, it’s time that we stop focusing on the bad things that straight people do to the gays and start focusing on all the bad things that the gays do to ordinary straight people such as myself. Like those three gays in D.C. who killed a straight guy.1 My nephew is gay, and he agrees with me completely.
1 Displaying her typical journalistic incompetence, Alicia gets the name of the website on the DC murder completely wrong. Sometimes incompetence is a gift in disguise.
Welcome to the Flight 93 Memorial Blogroll and Burst, which is designed to bring more well deserved attention to the ridiculous Muslim Honoring Memorial being now being planned and soon to be constructed in Shanksville PA. A memorial that is supposed to honor the innocent victims that were mercilessly murdered that day in the name of Islam, not the murderers themselves.
What I really want to do is just mirror his entire site here. With the sole comment being a picture of a guy going like this:
:o
That is what the PC, cuddle the Muslims crowd is trying to sell us down in Shanksville, and guess what, we’re not buying it, not today, not ever..
Funny me, but I thought the victims that day were 3000 plus loved and terribly missed Americans, not 19 filthy radical terrorists who are all thankfully rotting in hell today along with their Messiah Allah and everyone else that ever killed and maimed in his despicable name.
The theology is more interesting than I’d like to admit. Could God take the Islamic version of himself and throw him into Hell? And if so, what if the Catholic version tried to pitch the Baptist one in there? This seems like a kind of thing that could get messy really easily.
Also, I was worried that I’d oversold Chicago Ray, but no, he really does seem to be a Swank-grade discovery. You know where he’s going with this, right? Read the rest of this entry »
Oh, but Ramesh, lawbreaking isn’t necessarily against the law at all, because what if there’s a crime and the law keeps you from finding out whether there is one or not?
