The GOP field of candidates right now is a mess
Posted 12/27/07
As I write this, it's the weekend before Christmas and everyone still wants to talk politics.
I'm trying to get in a bit of last minute Christmas shopping and I spin the dial to listen to the Rush Limbaugh program and he let it be known that he is not a fan of Mike Huckabee. Atlantic Magazine is the publication that stirred the pot. Marc Ambinder wrote this on Thursday:
"What's the Huckabee universe's take on why Rush Limbaugh does not like the man from Arkansas? I asked a prominent DC-based Huckabee ally," and here's what the "prominent" Washington-based "Huckabee ally" said:
"'Honestly, because Rush doesn't think for himself. That's not necessarily a slap because he's not paid to be a thinker -- he's an entertainer. I can't remember the last time that he has veered from the talking points from the DC/Manhattan chattering class. If they were praising Huckabee, he would be, too. Also, I have to think that he's dying to have Hillary in the White House. Bill Clinton made Rush a megastar. Having another Clinton back in power would make him the Leading Voice of the Opposition once again.'"
The "Huckabee ally" was not named. The Atlantic is a liberal publication so the story could have been the usual hit piece and normally a very skeptical Limbaugh would have noticed this and scoffed. Instead Rush unloaded.
"Huckabee is using his devout Christianity to mask some other things that are distinctively not conservative. He is against free trade. He really doesn't believe in free market. Well, let me read what George Will wrote today. This is when I go along with ‘the DC-New York axis.’ But I just want to read from George Will's column, a paragraph today. “Huckabee's campaign actually is what Rudy Giuliani's candidacy is misdescribed as being: a comprehensive apostasy against core Republican beliefs.’ That's an easy argument; all you really have to do is look at his record."
The reason Huckabee has risen in the polls so quickly and forcefully is that the GOP field is weak. Huckabee has been willing to criticize George W. Bush and that is enough for some. He's a better speaker than any of the other candidates and has dominated the debates and that has helped with others that vote in the Republican primaries. His Christian principles have helped him tremendously with other potential voters as well. But on issues he is spotty at best with conservatives and for some he will never be able to deliver enough.
So who is Rush backing? He would love to get behind the winner but like the rest of us, he has no clue who will win this thing.
He tried this out on the show, saying: "That's why I haven't endorsed anybody. I'm waiting. I don't know how else I can do it. I realize that there are a lot of you out there: You got a candidate, and you think that if I got behind your candidate it would put 'em over the top, and you might be right…"
One can guess that Rush won't have any problem backing Mitt Romney or Fred Thompson. All of the other GOP candidates are going to be difficult for Rush to sell without selling out.
Mitt and Fred Failing
Mitt Romney put a lot of his efforts into Iowa and unless Huckabee implodes, Romney will lose in Iowa. He's now struggling mightily and his campaign is unraveling. Romney is getting the John Kerry treatment on flip-flopping and he needs a boost somewhere. Maybe he will get it with a New Hampshire win.
It's even worse for Fred Thompson who seems genuinely uninterested in the entire primary process. It's an easy argument to say that Thompson could easily fill any of the three roles in the Wizard of Oz. He needs a brain that can think faster, a heart to get in this race to try to win and the courage to play up his conservative credentials. He may even have all three, but he just doesn't seem like he wants to show it off right now.
The John McCain Surge
And what if it is John McCain? A new poll, by the American Research Group, finds the 71-year-old McCain tied in the lead with 26 percent overall with Romney. That is a remarkable 11-point surge for McCain from the last poll in November.
Other surveys point to a similar comeback by the former Vietnam prisoner of war and Arizona senator. A USA Today/Gallup poll published on Wednesday showed him climbing to 27 percent, with his Massachusetts rival not very far ahead with 34 percent.
McCain can legitimately blast away on fiscal discipline and slam war critics, as the surge in Iraq has been successful so far and the US Congress just passed out more pork. But he has always been pro-Amnesty for illegal immigration and many conservatives will never forgive him for sandbagging the First Amendment with his campaign finance reform bill that was signed into law. This field is a mess.
(Our CK Rairden’s work is never a mess. Let him know what you think email him at ckden@yahoo.com)
With Huckabee owning Iowa, things could get interesting
Posted 12/24/07
Mike Huckabee is soaring and Hillary Clinton is stalling. It's going to be rough around the Clinton home this Christmas once the realization hits that Hillary is more unlikable than once believed. Still before we bury her and America's mayor Rudy Giuliani (his poll numbers are slipping as well) it should be noted that there are no real substantive changes in the national primary according to the latest USA Today/Gallup survey taken over the weekend.
Among Republicans, Rudy Giuliani leads with 27%, followed by Mike Huckabee at 16%, Sen. John McCain at 14%, Fred Thompson at 14%, and Mitt Romney at 14%.
Among Democrats, Sen. Hillary Clinton leads with 45%, followed by Sen. Barack Obama at 27%, and John Edwards at 15%. Of course, there's no such thing as a national primary, so don't put too much emphasis on these numbers.
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Ron Paul Breaks Fundraising Record
You've probably never heard of Ron Paul but he's running for president as a Republican and he is taking in a ton of cash. He is anti-war and an isolationist and has support from the far right, and from the far left from such esteemed groups as Move On.Org. He would immediately withdraw troops from Iraq, Afghanistan and everywhere else around the globe and America would basically take a hunker down mentality as far as the military goes. Basically as Reagan believed in "Peace Through Strength" Paul believes in "Peace through Weakness." That's attractive to about seven percent of fringe voters and apparently all of them are willing to give money to Paul, a 72-year old US Congressman from Texas.
The campaign's fourth-quarter fundraising total of $18.2 million includes a one-day haul of $6.2 million, which is a record. Most of the donations were made over the Internet in what the supporters called a "money bomb" timed to coincide with the 234th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party. The record take means Paul will likely lead his rivals for money raised during the fourth quarter.
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Is Barack Obama Experienced Enough to Be President?
Hillary Clinton is pushing her 'experience' in the White House as the reason she should be elected as the next president. She claims Obama is a novice as he's probably never stolen anything from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, let alone backed up a moving truck and made off with some furniture and the silverware.
I'm guessing that is the experience Hillary speaks of, because when she was claiming to be a co-president with Bill, she failed miserably. By the end of Clinton's first term Hillary was back in the kitchen in an apron, baking cookies while Bubba was playing games with the help. The good news for Obama is that is Bill Clinton believes experience is overrated.
Here's a quote from Bubba, "The same old experience is irrelevant. You can have the right kind of experience or the wrong kind of experience. And mine is rooted in the real lives of real people, and it will bring real results if we have the courage to change.”
Of course that was in 1992 when he was trying to sell us all on his youth and energy and DNA and blue dresses. Now he's trying to say that his inexperience was better than Obama's inexperience.
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Mike Huckabee Bashes Bush
I'm still not very excited about any of the GOP nominees having a very good chance at keeping the White House and defeating a Democrat in November of 2008. The one way that it may be possible is to begin by slamming the Bush White House on the way they have communicated and dealt with the Iraq war and ripping into the Bush Administration for their secrecy and stubbornness. Mike Huckabee is already well on his way.
Over the weekend he slammed the Bush administration's efforts, denouncing a go-it-alone "arrogant bunker mentality" and questioning decisions on Iraq. As an added bonus he got specific. Huckabee said Bush did not send enough troops to invade Iraq, and he accused the president of marginalizing Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff, who said at the outset of the war that it might take several hundred thousand U.S. troops to control Iraq after the invasion. "I would have met with Shinseki privately and carefully weighed his advice," Huckabee said.
Tough stuff and the other GOP nominees had better take note. Huckabee also mixed in his now patented humor with this quip, "I may not be the expert as some people on foreign policy, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night."
In October I wrote that I believed Huckabee was a long shot but "If he wins Iowa all bets are off." Right now he owns Iowa. This might get interesting.
(Every week CK Rairden gets as specific as Mike Huckabee, right here in your Landmark. Email him specifically at ckden@yahoo.com)
Al Gore is important and he has the utility bills to prove it
12/13/07
On Monday, Al Gore gathered up that Nobel Peace Prize everyone made such a big deal about when it was announced last month.
You may want to hum a little R.E.M. (…It’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine) as Gore is convinced the planet will soon turn on us and my best guess is the Tennessee charmer believes that we will soon go the way of the dinosaurs, unless we pay more taxes.
No, I’m not kidding. Start humming, here comes the doom and gloom.
“We, the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency - a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here,” Gore warned as he took a private jet to Norway to grab the award.
“It is time to make peace with the planet,” Gore said in his acceptance speech that quoted Churchill, Gandhi and the Bible. “We must quickly mobilize our civilization with the urgency and resolve that has previously been seen only when nations mobilized for war.”
It’s the end of the world as we know it…”
Gore urged China and the U.S. to “make the boldest moves, or stand accountable before history for their failure to act.”
Uh-huh, Al Gore won’t be moving out of his mansion or quit heating his swimming pool, though. But you here in fly-over country had better act.
Proving he is still a limousine liberal, Gore thinks taxes are the answer. The mouth-breather actually urged nations to impose a CO2 tax. And in the usual fine form, Gore says if we don’t act the poor and minorities will be hit the hardest. Gore finished his remarks by claiming that the crisis “could prove extremely unsettling” to those at the bottom rung of the ladder.
So - is Al Gore taking the lead and moving the family to live in a hybrid van down by the river? Not just yet. The crisis is bad, but only you need to make sacrifices.
Al is important and he has the utility bills to prove it. Earlier this year it was revealed by the Tennessee Center for Policy Research documented that the former vice president’s 20-room home and pool house in Tennessee devoured nearly 221,000 kilowatt-hours in 2006, more than 20 times the national average of 10,656 kilowatt-hours.
The Gores in 2006 averaged a monthly electricity bill of $1,359 for using 18,414 kilowatt-hours, and $1,461 per month for using 16,200 kilowatt-hours in 2005. During that time, Nashville Gas Company billed the family an average of $536 a month for the main house and $544 for the pool house in 2006, and $640 for the main house and $525 for the pool house in 2005. That averages out to be $29,268 in gas and electric bills for the Gores in 2006, $31,512 in 2005.
It’s hard to believe that with leadership like that, Gore was never elected president.
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A Vote for Oprah is a vote for Obama is a vote for Martin Luther King?
Oprah pulled her best Hillary Clinton impersonation this weekend while on the stump for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. The Big O pulled out a southern accent while speaking in South Carolina. It was beautiful stuff, she is just so genuine. O said on the stump, “Dr. King dreamed a dream. But we don’t have to just dream the dream anymore,” Winfrey said. “We get to vote that dream into reality.”
“There are those who say it’s not his time, that he should wait his turn,” she added. “Think about where you’d be in your life if you’d waited when people told you to.” Referring to the state’s Democratic primary date, she said, “South Carolina — January 26th is your moment.”
Oh the humanity! I feel like I should go out and buy “A Million Little Pieces” by James Frey. Or at least cast my vote for Barack Obama.
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Hillary is Freaked Out
Our pal Hillary Clinton is a bit freaked out by the whole thing. The woman that was to be anointed queen just ran into the O-O buzzsaw and she certainly didn’t like what she saw.
She’s losing numbers in the polls almost every week and now one of her staff has been caught digging for dirt, any dirt on Obama. A deputy campaign manager for Mrs. Clinton sent an e-mail out on Sunday, trying to find out about Mr. Obama’s background as a community organizer in Chicago.
According to the NY Times, the deputy campaign manager is Bob Nash, who served as White House personnel director in the Clinton administration. In March, Nash left his position as vice chairman of Chicago ShoreBank to join Mrs. Clinton’s campaign.
He was fishing for dirt and the person he sent the e-mail to redacted his address and then forwarded the e-mail to the media. They in turn printed it to show off Hillary’s latest dirty trick as she tries to take down Obama.
(CK Rairden is important and his Landmark-sized paycheck proves it. Reach our Conservative Crusader at ckden@yahoo.com)
Latest polls are making the presidential frontrunners extremely nervous
12/6/07
It is all about the polls and the frontrunners are getting nervous.
“National support for Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republican Rudy Giuliani significantly eroded over the past month,” the USA Today wrote on Monday. They had a Gallup poll to back it up. Hillary immediately went on the attack, blasting away at Barack Obama’s experience.
“So you decide which makes more sense: Entrust our country to someone who is ready on day one ... or to put America in the hands of someone with little national or international experience, who started running for president the day he arrived in the U.S. Senate,” Clinton said.
That probably sounds a lot better than ‘You decide which one, I’ve hauled the silverware out of the White House before and I will do it again.”
Hillary Clinton Fatigue
It’s a bit stunning Hillary has lasted this long at the top unscathed. She is as annoying as any candidate who has been a frontrunner has ever been and she has zero charm. She’s just not likeable and voters are already getting fatigued.
I still say she takes the nomination but with 11 months to go, if voters have already tired of the cackle and the staged questions, imagine what it will be coming down the stretch.
Her support has fallen 11 percentage points in a month in Iowa alone.
The Mike Huckabee Surge
Mike Huckabee is blowing up in the polls. Just a few months ago, the Republican presidential candidate from Arkansas was hanging around at the bottom of the polls with fellow GOP longshots Ron Paul and the Tom Tancredo. Now the former governor of Arkansas, despite some very shaky conservative credentials, has risen to the top of the polls. In what is a shocking move toward the top, Huckabee leads in Iowa and now has closed to within three points of Rudy Giuliani nationally.
According to a story posted on Rasmussen Reports, a Republican polling firm, in the first full round of national polling completed since last week’s YouTube debate among Republican Presidential hopefuls, Huckabee has pulled to within three points of the frontrunning Rudy Giuliani. Heading into the debate, Giuliani led Huckabee by twelve.
Huckabee vs. Hillary
The report also notes that, “new polling data released today shows that Huckabee has pulled to within a single percentage point of Hillary Clinton in a general election match-up. Huckabee is also a frontrunner in Iowa and essentially tied for second in New Hampshire.”
Some pundits believe Huckabee’s numbers will surely go down as fast as they’ve gone up while others are beginning to consider the possibility that the bass-guitar playing governor may become a serious contender for the Republican nomination, the report noted.
I’m still torn. He was the ‘voice of reason’ at the CNN YouTube debates and he certainly comes across as the most intelligent of all of the candidates on the GOP side. Despite his lack of fundraising and spending, his appearances have resonated with conservatives that seem desperate to get behind a legitimate candidate.
Harry Reid: America’s Military is Still a Failure
Who are you going to believe, me or your lying eyes?
Despite most analysts conceding that the surge is accomplishing its military goals Harry Reid is still betting on a US Military defeat. He’s been hoping for things to go badly in Iraq for a long time, and he still isn’t willing to give up, despite consistent reports from that country that the “surge” has borne fruit in the form of enhanced security, fewer Iraqi civilian deaths, and fewer coalition casualties.
A report from DC-based blog Politico reports: “Democrats are increasingly bailing on their previously held view that the troop surge in Iraq has been a “failure,” but Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid isn’t ready to jump on the bandwagon with other Democrats who say the surge has worked. The Senate re-opened for business on Monday after a two-week Thanksgiving break, during which key Democrats traveled to Iraq and declared that the surge is working, at least from a security and military perspective.”
I have criticized Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) for his constant criticism of US troops but even he stunned fellow Democrats late last week with his statement that “the surge is working.”
He later added that political reconciliation has been lagging but even so, Murtha’s view was backed by Rep. Norm Dicks (D-Wash.), who also said the surge worked after he returned from Iraq.
But Reid, in a Monday press conference, ceded no ground. “The surge hasn’t accomplished its goals,” Reid said. “... We’re involved, still, in an intractable civil war.”
I don’t think Democrats can continue to sell failure and expect to win big in 2008. It may be time for the Dems to kick Harry to the curb.
(Unlike Hillary, CK Rairden's poll numbers remain strong. Email him at ckden@yahoo.com)
Anti-war films bombing at box office; Hillary getting bombed in many polls
11/29/07
The political notebook starts out this week in the Middle East.
Are we really winning in Iraq? It must be true as it is printed in the New York Times. Now what will the Democrats do?
The New York Times regretfully acknowledged last week that “as violence declines in Baghdad, the leading Democratic presidential candidates … are trying to shift the focus to the lack of political progress there, and highlighting more domestic concerns like health care and the economy.”
This won’t be pretty.
Investment is heavy in the defeat of the US Military by many Democrats and they were counting on using that to beat over the heads of Republicans in 2008. It just goes to show why Dems fail so often as there are so many other ways to defeat the GOP candidates right now. No one has ever really appreciated the politicization of the war and it is especially distasteful that so many wanted to drag the American soldier down in the political mud. Of course it is not “Mission Accomplished” and won’t be for some time in Iraq but the success there is a serious set- back for many Democrats.
Anti-American Iraq War Films Bomb at the Box Office
One thing I don’t believe that many of the anti-war types ever understood is that no matter how tired Americans say they are of the war in Iraq, they still want a US victory. Hollywood types that make films certainly never really understood it. Since they can’t spit on soldiers as they once so proudly did in the Vietnam era, they are now reduced to producing really awful films to make political statements.
They are now zero for four. While the public is staying away in droves from “Rendition,” “Lions for Lambs” and “In the Valley of Elah,” audiences are really avoiding “Redacted,” a film by a whiny pacifist named Brian De Palma. (The director of “Scarface” and “Mission Impossible” among several other very watchable movies.) The film is a sick take on the US military.
The picture is about US soldiers who rape a 14-year-old Iraqi girl, then kill her and her family. The “message movie” was produced by NBA Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. “Redacted” - which “could be the worst movie I’ve ever seen,” said critic Michael Medved -took in just $25,628 in its opening weekend in 15 theaters, which means roughly 3,000 people saw it in the entire country, according to a report from the New York Post.
Hillary Clinton Getting Trounced by Leading Republicans
I was almost certain that the GOP couldn’t keep the White House in 2008. And I still believe they will lose seats in the US House and Senate but now I wonder of they won’t retain the control of the presidency thanks to the fact that no one really likes Hillary Clinton.
How bad is it?
She is getting trounced by the top five GOP candidates.
The story splashed in from a Zogby poll on Monday afternoon and it brought some pretty awful news for Camp Hillary. A Zogby Interactive survey shows that Hillary would lose to every one of the top five Republican presidential contenders. The item says that this represents “a reversal of fortune for the national Democratic front–runner who had led against all prospective GOP opponents earlier this year.”
According to the poll, Clinton trails Republican candidates Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, John McCain and Mike Huckabee by three to five percentage points in the direct matches.
Meanwhile, fellow Democrats Barack Obama of Illinois and John Edwards of North Carolina would defeat or tie every one of the Republicans, this latest survey shows.
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How Big Will Illegal Immigration Be as a Campaign Issue in 2008?
The tide has long turned against amnesty for illegal immigrants. However, even the most ardent supporter of people breaking into the country may take pause with this report. The Washington Times has a blockbuster story that they released on Monday that was based on leaked law enforcement documents.
They reported that a Mexican drug cartel collaborated with Iraqi and Afghan terrorists to plan an attack on Fort Huachuca in Arizona, the nation’s largest intelligence-training center. According to the story, Fort officials “changed security measures after sources warned that possibly 60 Afghan and Iraqi terrorists were to be smuggled into the U.S. through underground tunnels with high-powered weapons to attack the Arizona Army base,” according to multiple confidential law enforcement documents obtained by the DC-based newspaper.
The story cites an FBI advisory that claims that each Middle Easterner paid Mexican drug lords $20,000 “or the equivalent in weapons” for the cartel’s assistance in smuggling them and their weapons through tunnels along the border into the U.S. The weapons would be sent through tunnels that supposedly ended in Arizona and New Mexico, but the terrorists would be smuggled through Laredo, Texas, and reclaim the weapons later.
A number of the Afghans and Iraqis are already in a safe house in Texas, the FBI advisory said. This report will strengthen the hand of those who argue that an open border with Mexico is a security risk.
(An open dialogue with CK Rairden is never a security risk. Email him at ckden@yahoo.com)
It's time to give thanks--and then hand out turkeys--to those who are deserving
11/21/07
While many folks now struggle with the nuances of a politically correct Thanksgiving Day holiday, it is celebrated in a traditional fashion at Casa Del Rairden.
Family members and friends will gather round while a dead bird a dead pig and all the trimmings are prepared and served. Heads will be bowed, eyes closed and a prayer of thanks to God will be said.
It’s been that way for many years, and will continue despite the pressures of some in our society to make “politically correct” changes to a true American holiday that acknowledges God and understands that thanks should be given for the fortunes of our great country, and the marvelous gifts of our freedoms.
There will be a few changes this year. We will move the celebration west to the shores of the Pacific Ocean and spend the Thanksgiving weekend with our Malibu friends. But other than a view of the dolphins playing in the sea from the deck of our rental home everything will remain the same.
And as always we will enjoy the modern American traditions as well. TV monitors will be tuned to the football games that will played on television. At Casa Del Rairden West, the bets will be placed (for entertainment purposes only) and starting early in the morning the modern American tradition of TV football viewing on Thanksgiving Day will be carried out.
Football, turkey and thanks—that’s a slice of Americana in late November. In that vein, it also affords the opportunity to combine the two cornerstones of the fourth Thursday in November, thanks and turkey, into CK’s annual November Thanksgiving Day awards, turkeys to those who deserve it, and thanks to those who’ve earned it.
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A special thanks goes to our soldiers, and all of those in the US Military and our allies at home and of course those that will spend yet another Thanksgiving away from their families so that all of us can live very comfortable lives. Remember them when you give thanks.
And keeping with that mode, I’m passing out a turkey to all of the members of the US Congress that are trying to hold up funding for the American military for political purposes. These jokers' toughest gig seems to be navigating their way through the Minnesota airport while these women and men make sacrifices and while some will make the ultimate sacrifice. Congress needs to do their simple job of funding the troops.
Another turkey goes to President George W. Bush. If he would have hit the ground running after winning in 2004 and made more of an effort to communicate exactly what these fine military folks are doing on a day-to-day basis, the support for the troops' mission would never have reached such lows.
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Now another turkey will be to the entire US Congress for their absolute failure to control the border and not providing the money for law enforcement so they can get illegal immigration under control. How bad is it? Some turkey named Elliott Spitzer is the governor of New York and this dolt actually tried to take advantage of it by handing out the privilege of a driver's license for those people that refuse to obey American law.
Another turkey goes specifically to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama who backed this plan. Hillary has since flipped and flopped and at last count said she didn’t want the illegals to get the driver’s licenses but by the time you read this she may be for it again.
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Since we will be in California special thanks should go out to all of the firefighters from California and all of the neighboring states that fought the wildfires last month as they worked their way through Southern California.
A big turkey goes to OPEC who for some reason now believes that we need to pay $4 a gallon for gas. As the Christmas season pushes forward with each dollar Americans shove in the their tanks that means that’s fewer dollars for American businesses. Add more turkeys to those politicians that have opposed off shore drilling here in America and have also fought hard to keep American companies from building refineries. We are now 40 years behind thanks to these turkeys and now are at the mercy of foreigners.
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But remember this when newscasters (and the above type news) unload bad news each and every day. This is still America and we are by far the greatest country in the world. This is still (as Ronald Reagan once most eloquently stated) the shining city on the hill. Since there is an election coming up, for the next year you will hear from turkeys running for office just how bad it is in this country.
Don’t believe it and be thankful for that.
(CK Rairden serves up a delicious column every week of the year, only here in your Landmark. Email him at ckden@yahoo.com)
Hillary's campaign guilty of 'planting' questions from audience members
11/16/07
First Lady in Waiting Bubba Flops
Thumbing through the political notebook, it was humorous to watch Hillary Clinton stumble and immediately try to blame others for her evasiveness in the last debate. She was abysmal (see last week’s Off the Wall) and immediately tried to spin her way out of it, just as her husband Bill Clinton did so often. She even dispatched First Lady in Waiting Bubba out to try to stop the bleeding. It was a sad effort.
Bill Clinton tried the defense of his wife against political critics by citing the “swift boat” television ads of the 2004 presidential campaign that questioned John Kerry’s patriotism and the campaign commercials in 2002 that suggested Sen. Max Cleland of Georgia was soft on terrorism. This was what he said happened in the debate when a point blank question was asked if Hillary favored driver's licenses for illegal aliens.
It didn’t fly, and now people are wondering if Bubba has lost his touch.
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Can a US Senator Win the US Presidency?
I’ve never understood why US Senators believe they would be good presidents. Only one has ever won and that was Jack Kennedy over Richard Nixon in 1960 and that took some help from some Chicago area graveyards.
This year, on the GOP side Senator John McCain is running and on the Democratic side Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are seeking the highest office in the land. History has not been kind to US Senators, can any of these three change history? Let’s look at how tough it will be from those that have tried it recently.
1964 - Senator Barry Goldwater from Arizona: a popular champion of conservatism and seemed a formidable match against Lyndon Johnson. But Goldwater only collected 38.5% of the popular vote, and won only 6 states.
1972 - Senator George McGovern from Minnesota: very popular with the left, who believed Vietnam would be the issue to drive Nixon from office. But McGovern claimed only 37.5% of the popular vote, and won only one state.
1984 - Senator Walter Mondale from Minnesota: the Democrats thought his ‘straight-talk’ style would appeal to Americans. But Mondale was up against the Reagan buzz saw and claimed only 40.6% of the popular vote, and won only one state.
1996 - Senator Bob Dole from Kansas: the GOP believed his war record and impeccable personal integrity would win over voters against the scandal-ridden Bill Clinton. But in a three way race Dole took only 40.7% of the popular vote, though he did win 19 states.
2004 - Senator John Kerry from Massachusetts: Democrats thought his medals from Vietnam would make him credible as a critic of Bush and the war in Iraq. Kerry did the best of the losing Senators, claiming 48.3% of the popular vote, and like Dole he won 19 states.
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Hillary Pleads Stupidity, Hopes You Will Too
Democratic contender Hillary Clinton’s campaign has admitted to planting questions with audience members in Iowa and pointing out the plants to the candidate. When Clinton stopped at a bio-diesel plant she took questions from the crowd.
She called on a young woman. “As a young person,” said the well-spoken Muriel Gallo-Chasanoff, “I’m worried about the long-term effects of global warming. How does your plan combat climate change?”
“Well, you should be worried,” Clinton replied. “You know, I find as I travel around Iowa that it’s usually young people that ask me about global warming.”
No kidding.
The question was a plant, totally rigged in advance, like a late-night infomercial. Just before the public forum, a Clinton staffer had chosen the young woman, a student at Grinnell College, and asked her to ask that specific question.
One day after that confession Geoff Mitchell, a minister who recently moved to Hamilton, Ill., from Iowa, told ABC News that he was approached this spring by Clinton’s Iowa political director Chris Haylor to ask Clinton a question about war funding.
I see a pattern and no one should be surprised.
The Clinton political machine is designed to avoid unscripted questions from audience members or even media members. That is a good strategy until Hillary gets caught like she did in the debate struggling for real answers to hard questions. For her part, Hillary didn’t play the chick card as she had earlier; she claimed she “didn’t know” her campaign was using this practice to make her look good.
If you are playing along at home, Hillary would like you to know that when her husband is cheating on her, she doesn’t know. And when her campaign is cheating on you, she doesn’t know. Does that mean she is looking for a strategy of landing the votes of voters that are as clueless as she admits to being?
Hmm, maybe she is smarter than I think. What the American public doesn’t know is exactly what makes them the American public.
(CK Rairden is our champion of conservatism. Reach him at ckden@yahoo.com)
Girlie men grow stones and challenge Hillary, who then plays the victim card
11/8/07
This time perhaps some of you should have tuned in for a presidential debate. I know that I have said I will watch all of the presidential debates so you won’t have to - most of the time it is like watching paint dry - but last week a funny thing happened. Hillary Clinton finally was asked some difficult questions during the MSNBC debate that was moderated by Tim Russert of “Meet the Press.”
It was all good clean fun as the fellas took aim at Hillary. She has dominated the Dems so far mostly by proving she has more hair on her chest and more testosterone than the rest of the men combined. Certainly the guys that wish to be president from the left side of the aisle are what California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger would call “girlie men.” None of them have had the stones to even challenge Hillary on her ideas and the fact that she may be more secretive than the Bush Administration.
***
It actually seemed like none of them really wanted the nomination and Hillary had a monster lead and a free ride. But during this debate, the boys club of presidential wannabes stepped up attacks that she has waffled on her position on Iraq, Iran and other major issues. They demanded that she clarify her stand on illegal aliens and specifically asked her about a New York plan that will just hand a driver's license to illegals.
Her answers were comical. She tried to explain why she once said that New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s plan to allow illegal immigrants to get driver’s licenses “makes a lot of sense.” She must have realized that she just basically said that Clinton Part II would reward illegal behavior with perks and after answering the question once, she raised her hand later to add, “I did not say that it should be done, but I certainly recognize why Gov. Spitzer is trying to do it.”
That prompted the Breck Girl John Edwards to pounce: “Sen. Clinton said two different things in the course of about two minutes.” Barack Obama, too, was “confused on Sen. Clinton’s answer” and “can’t tell whether she was for it or against it.”
***
Tim Russert tried to get her to clarify her position. She refused, telling him that was a gotcha question. No, Hillary - a gotcha question would be why didn’t you burn that blue dress?
Many voters are fed up. This is a very big concern and Hillary was caught flatfooted. You could see the frustration as she rolled her eyes. Many believe that she wants illegals to have driver’s licenses as that would lead to voter registration and about 20 million new voters that can be bussed to the poll every election day.
It was Hillary’s worst day and she has never really rebounded. She blamed everyone but herself, including MSNBC. And her supporters were very upset with moderator Tim Russert. In a literal “shoot the messenger” message, one supporter even wanted him dead, or maybe just wounded. Mark Penn presided over a conference call on Wednesday to rally supporters to the idea that they should play the card that Hillary is a woman and was attacked because of her gender. During that call a very devoted female contributor suggested that Tim Russert “should be shot.” The woman quickly repented, not the sentiment, but the fact that she shouldn’t have said it on a conference call.
***
So - Hillary played the victim card. Once she got brushed back by the boys in the debate. Hillary tried the good old “Don’t hit me, I’m a girl” strategy. The problem is it appears the backlash may just be getting started. Even US House leader Nancy Pelosi turned on Clinton. Pelosi said on Monday that Hillary’s campaign appears to have been trying to exploit that perception in the wake of last week’s Democratic debate.
Hillary has released a video entitled the “politics of pile on” that claims that her fellow Dems are just being too mean to her. Pelosi wasn’t too thrilled with that either. In distributing the whiny Web video and splicing together her opponents’ attacks, her campaign appears to be exploiting perceptions of Clinton facing down a field of aggressive male challengers, Pelosi said.
“I think the campaign is trying to take advantage…probably people who didn’t even watch the debate, to say, ‘Oh, they were really rude,’ or something like that, and that has some salience,” said Pelosi. Ouch!
Hillary looked like a fool on the stage in Philadelphia, crying and complaining that the questions were too tough and her opponents were being too hard on her. She desperately wants to be president but now it seems as if she believes she should be anointed instead of having to do the heavy lifting. Hillary has so far acted on a strategy of bob and weave (no, not like Monica, more like Mohamed Ali), answer no questions and avoid the press at all costs.
It had worked until she stood like a deer in the headlights in front of the cameras. She was very fortunate that it was not a one-on-one debate and that hardly anyone watched. I’m really going to enjoy watching how she performs when the questions are coming at her in rapid fire in front of a network audience when there is no break to allow her to try to re-group.
(CK Rairden's Off the Wall column appears each week only in your Landmark. Reach him at ckden@yahoo.com)
Liberals doused in their effort to turn California fires into political tool
11/1/07
Last week California was burning.
As the video came flooding in from the Malibu fire on Sunday, it was all too familiar. When the heat gets a bit too much in the summertime at Casa del Rairden in Arizona, we escape to the coastal village of Malibu and the cool breezes that flow in from the Pacific Ocean.
But when the fires started the winds had shifted. They are called the Santa Anna winds in California and they blow in from the deserts and produce heat and send temperatures soaring into the nineties even on the beaches.
So I watched with concern, called and e-mailed my liberal friends to make certain everyone was okay and said a prayer for the people of Southern California. The fires would get a whole lot worse before they got better, and by mid-week a path of fire from the Mexican border to Santa Barbara had cut through the state.
Like me, most people were worried and hopeful, while others saw an opportunity. The first was Harry Reid, the US Senate leader from Nevada. Reid thought his best bet was to blame the fires on global warming.
“One reason that we have the fires burning in Southern California is global warming. One reason the Colorado basin is going dry is because of global warming,” Reid told reporters.
He was challenged by a reporter, “You said that the reason the fires are burning in California is global warming?’’
Reid stumbled through the answer, “No. Here’s — here’s what... I didn’t say the reason the fires were burning in Southern California is global warming.”
CNN was also happy to pile on.
According to notes from CNN’s Monday news meeting that were obtained by The Drudge Report, when the fires were raging, network president Jon Klein told his employees to use the California fire tragedy to “push” their “Planet in Peril” special, but he did take time to warn reporters not to “irresponsibly link” the fires to “Global Warming.”
In other words, CNN wanted to cash in on the fires, but they wanted accomplished in a “responsible manner.”
And the media was cheering for disaster - they definitely wanted to capitalize on the destruction for ratings and they weren’t pleased when there were few complaints from residents that they weren’t getting enough help from the government and the firefighters and other rescue workers.
That was noticed by the Governator. ABC reporter Claire Shipman did her level best to get California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to say the efforts to combat the state’s wild fires were going poorly. Shipman interviewed the governor on last Wednesday’s “Good Morning America” and wondered about “the comparison to Katrina that everybody’s making in the back of their mind...”
At one point, you could tell that Governor Schwarzenegger was completely fed up and finally cut off Shipman’s pleas for negative assessments of the effort by actually grabbing her arm. He bluntly scolded her, “Trust me when I tell you, you’re looking for a mistake and you won’t find it because it’s all good news, as much as you maybe hate it, but it’s good news.”
It was classic television moment. California politicians tried vigorously to make this a partisan issue as well. They wanted to capitalize on their own citizens' loss by slamming the war in Iraq. The first was left wing US Senator Barbara Boxer. As people’s homes were being destroyed Boxer said, “Right now we are down 50 percent in terms of our National Guard equipment because they’re all in Iraq, the equipment, half of the equipment. So we really will need help. I think all of our states are down in terms of equipment.”
Not to be outdone, California Lieutenant Governor John Garamendi said during an interview with Chris Matthews of MSNBC that the California National Guard should be re-deployed from Iraq to help fight the fires. He claimed that thousands of California National Guardsmen were in Iraq and that was the reason the fires could not be contained.
The trouble with this type of hyperbole is that it is just too easy to run the numbers and prove that these mouth breathers are wrong. FEMA Administrator R. David Paulison, appearing on CBS News, rejected the premise of these complaints: “I have not seen that at all, quite frankly,” he told CBS in response to Boxer’s charges. In a round of morning television interviews, Paulison repeatedly said that there were “plenty of Guardspeople” available.
And Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense Paul McHale said “unequivocally” that the war in Iraq has had “no negative effect at all with regard to our ability to provide sufficient forces to assist civilian authorities in fighting the wildfires.” Of more than 17,000 National Guardsmen currently available to fight fires in California, the Pentagon says, only 1,500 been called to active duty.
So that means 15,550 guard members or so were in California ready to go at a moment’s notice and 1,500 were in Iraq. Sadly, all the lieutenant governor cared about was not his constituents and their plight, he only cared about complaining about the war in Iraq while his state was on fire and people were suffering.
But fortunately, the media that were cheering for a Katrina like disaster and the liberal politicians were thwarted in their efforts to turn the fires into a political tool. This wasn’t liberal versus conservative, this was firefighters and citizens versus several wildfires. And thankfully the partisans were dismissed out of hand by some good leadership from Gov. Schwarzenegger, some hard long hours by firefighters and some very strong citizens that refused to allow their will to be crushed by a horrific natural disaster.
I was very proud of my second home state and how it reacted, despite the fact that they were under assault almost immediately by political pariahs and a media that was openly cheering for them to fail. Since the mouth breathers want so desperately to keep score here is the tally: California 1, the media and Barbara Boxer, Harry Reid and John Garamendi 0.
(CK Rairden fights liberal fires weekly here in your Landmark. Email him at ckden@yahoo.com)
Can anyone named Huckabee actually win a nomination for president?
10/25/07
Can anyone named Mike Huckabee actually win the Republican nomination for president? Can America take another president from Arkansas?
Huckabee probably asks the better question, “Do we really want potentially 28 years with only two families occupying the White House?” After watching another pointless debate held by Fox News on Sunday night, certainly it appears that two candidates are head and shoulders above the rest. One is Mike Huckabee and the other is Rudy Giuliani.
The rest of the field is so drab and lackluster it is frightening that this is the best that the GOP has to offer its voters for the highest office in the land.
For those that had high hopes for Fred Thompson, you can now check those at the door. At times it is difficult for him to string two sentences together. Sam Brownback has finally exited gracefully, kudos to him. Mitt Romney just strikes me as too insincere and John McCain really has very little left. The rest of the GOP field Tom Tancredo, Ron Paul and Duncan Hunter are just taking up space.
One note on Ron Paul, he has a narrow, but highly-motivated following on the Internet and would not rule out running once he gets dumped by the GOP primary voters. He is a Libertarian at heart, and the best guess is that the party would place him on their ticket meaning he could be the Ralph Nader of 2008. I don’t believe he could get on many state ballots as an Independent.
***
Back to the GOP field and Huckabee. He’s certainly charming and the former Baptist preacher can hand out one liners with the best of them. After a brutal opening to the debate where the frontrunners slammed each other with each sentence, Huckabee stepped in and put the spotlight on Hillary.
He said, “You know, it’s interesting, the most, I guess, wonderful reaction we’ve had in this entire room is when Hillary’s name is mentioned. It gets louder than an Aerosmith concert. But I want to say this — you’ve asked: What’s the difference? No matter which one of us is on this stage — and, look, I like to be funny, let me be real honest with you. There’s nothing funny about Hillary being president.”
Laughter and cheers followed and he is funny. Here are some of my favorites so far.
On his band, Capitol Offence: “We’re playing at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa, where Buddy Holly and Ritchie Valens played their last concert. I will not be flying out that evening.”
On health care: "We’ve got a situation with 10,000 Baby Boomers a day signing up for Social Security, going into the Medicare system. And I just want to remind everybody when all the old hippies find out that they get free drugs, just wait until what that’s going to cost out there.”
On Arkansas: “I heard a man was telling a joke about a politician from Arkansas. I told him: ‘You won’t believe this, but I am a politician from Arkansas.’ He said to me: ‘Don’t worry son, I’ll tell it real slow.’”
On his poor upbringing: “We only had this Lava soap [which contains pumice stone]. I was in college before I realized a shower wasn’t supposed to hurt."
Of course it takes more than humor to win the White House, it takes gobs of cash and Huckabee has very little. But he does have some momentum. Over the weekend the “Values Voters Summit” was held in Washington and this was supposed to be a slam dunk for Mitt Romney. It wasn’t.
Time Magazine’s Amy Sullivan reported this from the event, “But it was former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee who lit up the crowd with a fiery sermon as the last candidate to address the gathering. He took second place, just 30 votes behind Romney. When organizers broke the votes down into those cast online and those of summit attendees, the results revealed a true thrashing. In the tally of those present at the summit, Huckabee swamped his opponents, capturing 50% of the vote. By contrast, Romney was the choice of only 10% of on-site values voters.”
In the most recent Rasmussen poll in Iowa, Huckabee was third with 18 percent, within striking distance of Romney at 25 percent and just behind Thompson at 19 percent. I don’t really believe that is enough but if he wins Iowa all bets are off.
How would he do if he won the nomination against Hillary Clinton? The GOP would have to implement another Southern strategy and it would all come down to Ohio once again.
All of this is the longest of shots but with the Republican Party adrift and leaderless, it is as good as any for conservatives desperately seeking any reason to vote in 2008.
(CK Rairden brings his strong politically-astute observations weekly. Reach him at ckden@yahoo.com)
Nobel Prize has become popularity contest for left-wing causes
10/18/07
Finally Al Gore gets a win. The global warming alarmist and world champion of granting a world body authority over your lives grabbed himself a genuine Nobel Peace Prize last weekend.
Al Gore certainly was thrilled. He declared that we should all heed his warnings. He said that global warming was not a political issue but a worldwide crisis. “We face a true planetary emergency. ... It is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity,” he said. “It is also our greatest opportunity to lift global consciousness to a higher level.”
Gore won the award along with the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, another controversial body, for “their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.”
So - why the Nobel Peace Prize?
When Alfred Nobel died on December 10, 1896, it was discovered that he had left a will, dated November 27, 1895, according to which most of his vast wealth was to be used for five prizes, including one for peace. The prize for peace was to be awarded to the person who “shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding of peace congresses.” The prize was to be awarded “by a committee of five persons to be elected by the Norwegian Storting.”
Since it would be impossible to give Al Gore the prize on that definition the Norwegian committee said it has broadened its interpretation of peacemaking and disarmament efforts outlined in the will. They claim that “The prize now often also recognizes human rights, democracy, elimination of poverty, sharing resources and the environment.”
What does that mean? Well, nothing. The Nobel Peace Prize pretty much lost its way sometime around the time they handed it to world class terrorist Yasser Arafat. That’s correct, the five mouth breathers that hand this thing out each year actually granted it to a man responsible for terrorist bombings. They also tossed it at Jimmy Carter in 2002 in a political statement aimed at the United States and President George W. Bush.
The award was never handed to Ronald Reagan or the Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher, both who kept the USSR at bay during a long Cold War before defeating the former Soviet Union.
That pretty much sums it all up right there, the award is nothing more than a popularity prize for left wing causes.
So why all the buzz? The media loves Al Gore. They love his film “An Inconvenient Truth.” He won an Oscar for the film, and was lauded by Hollywood. Schools everywhere like to show it to kids to and tell them it is true. Unfortunately he couldn’t convince some truck driver in the UK. Even though Al Gore will tell you that the debate is “over” and he is the ultimate truth. Stuart Dimmock took the government to court, alleging that the film portrays “partisan political views,” the promotion of which is illegal in schools under the Education Act 1996.
Uh-oh - surely the court would side with Al Gore - right? Not so much. In order for the film to be shown, the government must first amend their Guidance Notes to Teachers to make clear that 1.) The Film is a political work and promotes only one side of the argument. 2.) If teachers present the film without making this plain they may be in breach of section 406 of the Education Act 1996 and guilty of political indoctrination. 3.) Eleven inaccuracies have to be specifically drawn to the attention of school children.
The inaccuracies are:
*The film claims that melting snows on Mount Kilimanjaro evidence global warming. The government’s expert was forced to concede that this is not correct.
*The film suggests that evidence from ice cores proves that rising CO2 causes temperature increases over 650,000 years. The court found that the film was misleading: over that period the rises in CO2 lagged behind the temperature rises by 800-2000 years.
* The film uses emotive images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests that this has been caused by global warming. The Government’s expert had to accept that it was “not possible” to attribute such events to global warming.
* The film shows the drying up of Lake Chad and claims that this was caused by global warming. The government’s expert had to accept that this was not the case.
*The film claims that a study showed that polar bears had drowned due to disappearing arctic ice. It turned out that Mr Gore had misread the study: in fact four polar bears drowned and this was because of a particularly violent storm.
*The film threatens that global warming could stop the Gulf Stream throwing Europe into an ice age: the claimant’s evidence was that this was a scientific impossibility.
*The film blames global warming for species' losses including coral reef bleaching. The Government could not find any evidence to support this claim.
*The film suggests that the Greenland ice covering could melt causing sea levels to rise dangerously. The evidence is that Greenland will not melt for millennia.
*The film suggests that the Antarctic ice covering is melting, the evidence was that it is in fact increasing.
*The film suggests that sea levels could rise by 7m causing the displacement of millions of people. In fact the evidence is that sea levels are expected to rise by about 40cm over the next hundred years and that there is no such threat of massive migration.
*The film claims that rising sea levels has caused the evacuation of certain Pacific islands to New Zealand. The government was unable to substantiate this and the court observed that this appears to be a false claim.
Few minds will be changed with Gore’s prize or his defeat in a court of law. The decision here isn’t if the earth is warming up, or cooling down. It is what partisan hacks like Gore wish to do with the propaganda. Gore wants to hand America’s freedoms and future over to a world body and he sees the environment as the best way to accomplish that.
The next few years will let us know if America can find its own truck driver to stand up and put Gore in his rightful place.
(CK Rairden smokes a Nobel Peace Pipe at his Arizona home. Email him at ckden@yahoo.com)
With SCHIP, 'welfare as we know it' might just be back in business
10/11/07
When President Bush vetoed a bill that would get a whole bunch of low and middle income families health care at the expense of taxpayers, the Democrats were certain they had a winning proposition on their hands.
I mean c’mon, if we can’t afford as a country to dole out health care to kids what kind of a country are we?
Democrats desperately want to grow a program called SCHIP (State Children’s Health Insurance Program). It’s really cool - if you have kids and don’t want to pay for their health care insurance and make up to about $82,000 per year, you sign up and the kids’ health care is handled by the government.
Oh and by the way, your “kids” can be up to 25 years old. You know how hard it is to get them out of the house these days.
It’s basically socialized medicine and a welfare plan, and as our pal Bill Clinton “ended welfare as we know it” back in the 1990s, that doesn’t sell very well anymore. So the Democrats wanted to put a face with the program.
So what do they do - they trotted out a little 12-year old kid from Baltimore, Maryland to tell the world his story. He would be dead if it weren’t for the free health care his parents signed up for, he claims. He gave the rebuttal to the president’s Saturday radio address explaining his veto of SCHIP.
“I was in a coma for a week and couldn’t eat or stand up or even talk. My sister was even worse,” Graeme wrote. “My parents work really hard and always make sure my sister and I have everything we need, but we can’t afford private health insurance,” he claimed in a rebuttal written for him by Democats.
Graeme was in a severe car accident three years ago, and received care paid for by the government. His sister, Gemma, was also severely injured in the accident, so we definitely have a real life tragedy.
Now let’s see if this kid and his sister needed the help or if their parents failed them.
In a Baltimore Sun article, the family claims to be raising their four children on combined income of about $45,000 a year.
“Bonnie Frost works for a medical publishing firm; her husband, Halsey, is a woodworker. Neither gets health insurance through work,” the article claims.
The trouble is - the kid’s family appears to be fairly well off and has decided they shouldn’t have to pay for his health care. They want you to foot the bill.
Graeme is a middle school student at the exclusive $20,000 per year Park School in Baltimore, MD. His sister also attends a school that is about $20,000 per year as well. So if you are playing along at home - public schools are not good enough for their kids, but public money for health care suits them just fine.
Bloggers have challenged the family and dug up a whole bunch of information on this bunch. Halsey Frost is the kids’ dad and he has owned his own company “Frostworks,” since at least 1992. He chooses to not give himself or his kids insurance as he is the employer. He also employed his wife as “bookkeeper and operations management” prior to her recent 2007 hire at the “medical publishing firm."
As her employer, he apparently denied her health insurance as well.
His company, Frostworks, is located in Baltimore and that building was purchased for $160,000 in 1999. The building owner’s mailing address is listed as the Frost’s home. The commercial property he owns is also listed as the business address for another company called Reillys Designs, which leads to the question of whether rental income is included in the above mentioned salary total, a blogger has discovered through public records.
More information on the couple - the current market value of their improved 3,040 sq. ft. home at 104 S Collington Ave is unknown but a house right down the street sold for $485,000 this past March and it was only 2,060 sq. ft. They say their mortgage is setting them back about $1200 per month.
Now I’m guessing since this family knows how to work the system for free health care, they have likely found a loophole and little Graeme and his sister are likely using taxpayer dollars to attend the private schools they are signed up with.
Make no mistake; the story with these kids is a tragedy. But his mom and dad failed him and decided their house and their business were more important than his health care and his siblings’ health care. Democrats used this 12-year-old kid and his mom and dad will likely be exposed as left wing activists that allowed it. They all should be ashamed.
And let’s face it - if this is the new face of “needy” in our country, “welfare as we know it” is back in business.
(CK Rairden as we know him can be reached via email to ckden@yahoo.com)
Democrats seem intent on snatching defeat from the jaws of victory
10/5/07
I guess Rush Limbaugh and Harry Reid won’t be breaking bread anytime soon.
On Monday, Reid took to the floor of the US Senate to try to get even with Republicans for thrashing Reid’s pals at MoveOn.org and his target was Rush Limbaugh. The old crusty desert rat and the leader of the US Senate ripped into the conservative cigar smoking radio talk show host claiming that Limbaugh hates the US military.
“Rush Limbaugh took it upon himself to attack the courage and character of those fighting and dying for him and for all of us. Rush Limbaugh got himself a deferment from serving when he was a young man. He never served in uniform. He never saw in person the extreme difficulty of maintaining peace in a foreign country engaged in a civil war. He never saw a person in combat. Yet, that he thinks his opinion on the war is worth more than those who have been on the front lines,” Reid said.
“Rush Limbaugh owes the men and women of our armed forces an apology,” he said.
His pal Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa piled on saying: “Maybe he was just high on his drugs. I don’t know.” How dumb is Harkin? He was caught in the 1980’s fudging his combat résumé by claiming that he flew combat missions in Vietnam. Barry Goldwater challenged Harkin on that fact and he had to back away and admit that he didn’t fly any combat mission but “flew sorties over Cuba in the sixties.”
For the record, he was a ferry pilot.
The great military defender Harry Reid said the surge had failed and our troops had lost in Iraq. He said that by the way, before the surge even started. Reid called General Petraeus a liar which was very interesting considering he refused to meet with Petraeus for briefings on Iraq. Reid even tried to cut funding for the troops he now claims he supports.
So what did Limbaugh say to incur the wrath of the troop-hating Harry Reid and the imaginary soldier Tom Harkin?
Here’s the transcript form Rush’s show: A caller named Mike claimed to be a member of the US military and said, “What’s really funny is, they never talk to real soldiers. They like to pull these soldiers that come up out of the blue and talk to the media.”
Limbaugh finished his sentence, “The phony soldiers.” The caller continued, “The phony soldiers. If you talk to a real soldier, they are proud to serve. They want to be over in Iraq. They understand their sacrifice, and they’re willing to sacrifice for their country.”
Okay so who was the bombastic host referring to? He says it was a man from Arizona named Jesse Macbeth. If that’s the case Limbaugh has a pretty good defense. Macbeth is a 23-year old mouth breather that sought fame and notoriety by claiming to be a veteran of the Iraq war. Macbeth also made up stories included tales of war crimes and a variety of atrocities that he claimed that US Troops had undertaken while he was in Iraq. But he was never in Iraq.
In fact earlier this year a criminal complaint was unsealed in the United States District Court in Seattle, Washington, charging Macbeth with one count of using or possessing a forged or altered military discharge certificate (he posted that online at a liberal anti-war website and was a hero of those that support Reid for months before the facts emerged) and one count of making false statements in seeking benefits from the Veterans Administration. The complaint alleged that Macbeth posed as an Iraq war veteran and illicitly collected more than $10,400 in benefits.
In June, Macbeth pleaded guilty to one count of making false statements to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and was sentenced to five months in jail and three years probation.
So if Limbaugh is talking about this guy, (and just a few minutes later in the call he mentioned him by name according to the transcript) it’s hard to argue as this little creep is the definition of a phony soldier and has the conviction to prove it.
The group that pointed out the “phony soldiers” comment is a liberal website bought and paid for by George Soros, a billionaire anti-American activist. They wrote that it was a full two minutes after the initial “phony soldiers comment that Rush brought up the name Jesse Macbeth. Not two hours, but two minutes in a give and take radio show I think I have to give this one to Limbaugh as well.
But Reid has decided to push the issue even more. He has called on Clear Channel CEO Mark Mays to condemn the remarks by Limbaugh. And he wants an apology. Limbaugh did offer an apology on Monday, for Media Matters.
“I want to apologize to all of the members of the United States Military, both in uniform and out, active duty and retired, for Media Matters for America,’’ Limbaugh said. “They will not apologize to you, and they will not apologize to me. I want to apologize to you on behalf of them. As all of you military personnel know, I, since (the) beginning of time and since the beginning of this program, certainly 19 years ago, have been one of the most ardent, loyal, in-awe supporters of any and all who wear the uniform — including those who disagree with the mission.’’
Reid is in a tough spot. The bulk of the US military loves Rush Limbaugh and other conservative talkers. They loathe people like Harry Reid and the ilk that surrounds him. Reid just called them losers earlier this year. And by going on the floor of the US Senate and complaining as Reid did, he elevated Limbaugh and now he’s boosted him with this little firestorm.
I can’t recall the last time I listened to Rush, but thanks to Reid I logged on today and did. I used to believe that there was no way the Democrats could blow it in 2008. But someone had better tell them to shut up, lest they snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
(CK Rairden snatches victory from the jaws of defeat. Snatch him via email to ck.rairden@nationalledger.com)
President of Columbia University getting backlash for Iranian speaker
9/28/07
Fear and self loathing were on full display at Columbia University on Monday.
President Lee Bollinger, in an attempt to elevate his stature among the self-hating pointy headed intellectuals of the Northeast, personally invited the Iranian president, a little terrorist named Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to speak and gave him not only stature but a good hour of propaganda tape to slice and dice and use however he sees fit with an American college backdrop for dramatic effect.
In a move that surely shocked the ivory tower Ivy Leaguer, by the time Monday rolled around Bollinger had been called pretty much every name in the book from a variety of Americans on both sides of the political aisle.
I’m quite certain he believed that he would be widely lauded for his decision to grant a forum to a man that most likely was one of the kidnappers that stormed the US Embassy in November 1979 and held Americans and America hostage for 444 days.
But Bollinger didn’t care about the past transgressions or future plans of Ahmadinejad, he wanted a bump on the cocktail circuit and some praise from the elites.
Many call Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a madman, but he’s not. He is, however, a fanatic that is now supplying arms to those fighting and killing American soldiers in the war in Iraq. His government is assisting the Shiites with as many weapons as possible to kill our soldiers fighting in the region.
Ahmadinejad has also called the Holocaust “a myth” and called for Israel to be “wiped off the map.” He is, quite simply, a sworn enemy of the Unites States of America.
He certainly can’t beat us militarily, but he would love to grab some headlines and applause from the self-loathing in America that believe the United States is all too powerful and needs to be brought down a notch or two. He got that on Monday with many Columbia students wildly cheering his every translated word.
Bollinger tried again to defend his decision by saying that “tough questions” would be asked of Ahmadinejad in an open forum. Though questions were asked - Ahmadinejad either lied or turned and asked Bollinger the questions which made the old white guy look very foolish. The last thing America needs is some mouth breather like Bollinger playing diplomat on a college campus.
But he tried and Bollinger landed the first punch when he opened strong, trying to at least sound tough with this: “Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator,” Bollinger told Ahmadinejad, accusing him of brutal crackdowns on the country’s academics and homosexuals. “Why are you so afraid of Iranian citizens expressing their opinions for change?” he asked, challenging the leader of the Islamic republic to explain his comments downplaying the Holocaust.
“Frankly, in all candor Mr. President, I doubt you will have the intellectual courage to answer these questions,” he added. “When you come to a place like this, this makes you quite simply ridiculous. You are either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated,” he said.
He then welcomed him to speak and the propaganda began. So - who is the real dummy here? Sure the Iranian president took a few tough words from the president of the college, but then he was allowed to ramble on unchecked for nearly an hour. He was given undeserved prestige and a worldwide forum and a hall of useful idiots that cheered for him no matter what he said.
Some examples - “Let me tell a joke here,” Ahmadinejad said at one point. “I think the politicians who are after atomic bombs, or testing them, making them, politically they are backward, retarded.”
He was cheered.
“In Iran we don’t have homosexuals like in your country,” he said. “In Iran we don’t have this phenomenon, I don’t know who told you this.”
The crowd laughed at this one, I guess thinking it was a joke, even though gays are killed in Iraq for the crime of - well, being gay. A few in the audience actually mustered up some boos.
Asked about Iraq, Ahmadinejad again denied Iran was providing advanced weapons to Shiite extremists to use against US troops.
“We think, in fact, the (US) military should seek an answer to its defeat in Iraq elsewhere,” he said, insisting Tehran wanted a stable Iraq on its border.
Again cheers rose from the kids in the hall that our supposedly our future best and brightest.
One student was later questioned on how the press in Iran would cover the visit. The answer, “I think they will be fair.”
Here’s just a slice of how it was reported.
“Despite entire US media objections, negative propagation and hue and cry in recent days over IRI President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s scheduled address at Colombia University, he gave his lecture and answered students' questions here on Monday afternoon.”
He answered no questions. He lied and called America a terrorist nation. His words with the cheers from the American college audience in the background are now being played throughout the Middle East and used as propaganda.
Certainly colleges and institutions of higher learning around the world should challenge their students to explore all points and come to a decision, but it ends there. Columbia’s president is not a diplomat.
The easy exploration here: Columbia University President Lee Bollinger is now Ahmadinejad’s favorite useful idiot.
Congratulations.
(CK Rairden writes from his home in Arizona. Tell him no lies via email to ck.rairden@nationalledger.com)
Hillary has another health plan as she runs for co-presidency, Part II
9/21/07
Hillary Clinton is back with a new plan for government health care. Oh, but for the record she says it is not government health care.
She may be right - but certainly it sounds like it will be government-forced health care.
Hillary’s failed efforts between 1992 and 1994 bruised and battered her co-presidency with her intern-loving husband Bill Clinton and damaged their first presidency greatly. That “reform” effort was so cumbersome and so rigid it was not only defeated but led to the Republican Revolution and helped put Newt Gingrich in power in the US Congress and eventually placed George W. Bush in the White House.
Now she’s back and running for the co-presidency, Part II, and she believes that she has learned from her mistakes.
This week she unveiled what sounds like a huge government program that would force Americans to buy health insurance. She compares it to the way states force those that drive to have automobile insurance coverage.
Of course, states can just pull your license plates if you are caught without automobile insurance. I’m not really sure what the government will do to you if you don’t buy the government mandated insurance, maybe they will set up a health care jail down at Guantanamo.
And she was more than a bit vague on the program, but she was clear that what she is proposing is going to cost a ton of taxpayer cash. She has put the number at $120 billion a year which means it will likely be four times that amount.
“We are the richest country in the world and we spend right now more on health care than anyone else in the world,” she bellowed in Iowa. “Two trillion dollars a year. But we’re ranked 31st in life expectancy and 40th in child mortality. Each year, 18,000 people die in America because they don’t have health care. Let me repeat that. Here in America, people are dying because they couldn’t get the care they needed when they were sick. At the same time, over the past six and a half years, the special interests have had a field day at the expense of the middle class and hard-working families.”
Just a side note here - since she was already in the White House and did nothing to solve what she dubbed the “Health Care Crisis” from 1993 to 2001, that would be fourteen and a half years - but hey who’s counting?
She says that large businesses will be forced to pay for their employees’ health care. Just a tip to Hillary: Employers don’t really pay for anything, the employees will pay for it with lower wages and other benefits that will be cut.
If you run a small business, Hillary gives this, “Under my plan, we won’t require small businesses to cover employees. Instead we will provide tax credits to ensure that many of them do. These tax credits will be based on size and average wages, so that small businesses can provide health care without destroying their bottom line. This credit could be as high as 50% of premiums for firms with fewer than 25 employees.”
It is hard to tell but I’m guessing that means those folks will be placed under the government plan Hillary wants to create. Make no mistake, health care is a mess and needs to be fixed. Portable insurance would be a logical step, but that is going to be very difficult. And major cuts will mean research and development will likely be cut, time with your doctors will be cut and very likely the overall quality of care will drop.
Hillary does dangle a pretty nice carrot, though. She says the government plan will be just like the one that the US Congress has. She added in her speech:
“[If] you don’t have health insurance or you don’t like the insurance you have, you can choose from the same wide variety of private plans that members of Congress choose from. I’m calling it a Health Choices Menu. So essentially the Congressional health care plan becomes the American health care plan. The idea here is simple. The American people should have access to the same array of health care choices and benefits as the Senators and Representatives they elect.”
While I’ve always wanted Congressional perks, something tells me this one will have me sitting in waiting rooms waiting for care like I am in a Minnesota airport bathroom stall. And I’m thinking I will get more than a bit anxious when the government doctor begins tapping his foot at me while placing on a rubber glove and telling me to relax - this won’t hurt a bit.
(CK Rairden fears rubber gloves from his home in Arizona. Write him at ckden@yahoo.com)
Gen. Petraeus simply fighting for success of assigned mission
9/14/07
The liberal activist group MoveOn.org ran a full page ad in Monday’s New York Times under the banner, “General Petraeus or General Betray us? Cooking the books for the White House.”
It had a picture of the General that would give his testimony to the US Congress on the developing situation in Iraq and more specifically, the results of the troop surge.
I’m guessing these mouth breathers believed the “betray us” play on words was clever. Few Democrats in the US Congress believe so after the beating they took on Monday. Republicans basically rolled up the newspaper the ad ran in, and smacked them like puppies with it.
Democrats have generally supported the far left fringe in the run up to the elections in 2008. All of the Democratic presidential candidates have played to the far left as they have tried to win the nomination, including frontrunners Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama. John Edwards auctioned off his soul to the fringe radicals.
At some point they will have to run far from these kooks, but this ad Monday just pushed that up. The problem for MoveOn.org is that the ad will strike many Americans as extreme and likely turn a lot of people off. They are attacking the patriotism and loyalty of a man who has spent 37 years in his country’s uniform, and many of those in combat zones. American’s aren’t going to take that.
Add to that as a New York Times/CBS News poll being reported out Monday indicates, most Americans (68%) have more faith in the military to bring the Iraq War to a successful conclusion than they have in civilian leadership in either White House or Congress.
Calling General Petraeus fighting for the success of his assigned mission a “betrayal” is not only an outrageous statement it is absolutely false. The success of the mission is his job, the war was launched by a duly elected president with the backing of an overwhelming bipartisan majority in Congress. It’s their role, not his, to make the call to withdraw.
It was a stupid move by the left-wing group and what the Democrats believed would be a day for them touting victory politically by claiming the American military was defeated and needed to withdraw was quickly turned on them. Republicans waved the New York Times ad at the Democrats and demanded that the Dems denounce the group that was calling the General a traitor.
The GOP pounced. Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) said “They’ve got an entire political machine invested in troop withdrawal, precipitous troop withdrawal,” he said about congressional Democrats. “And I hope they do get left behind.” A GOP Senate aide said of the day’s testimony: “It gave our moderates a lot of breathing room.”
Dems were stumped and didn’t seem to be sure of what’s next in their political strategy. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), for example, was unmoved by the prospect for compromise. “No. We need a timetable to get out,” Harkin said. But Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) said the partial troop withdrawal was a “positive step.”
Fred Thompson, one of the frontrunners for the GOP nod for president, took the political opening. He called on Democratic presidential candidates Monday to refund all donations received from MoveOn.org after the liberal advocacy group ran the ad.
“I understand there’s a front page ad that’s been taken out by this outfit called MoveOn.org in the New York Times today,” said Thompson at a campaign rally in South Carolina. “And it basically accuses our general who’s leading our troops in Iraq right now of betraying his own country. This outfit basically, in large part, funds the Democratic party. I call upon the Democratic party and all those Democratic contenders for the White House to disavow this libel against this brave American.”
CNN reports that Moveon.org supporters have contributed over $108,000 to Democratic presidential candidates this year through the group’s political action committee, citing Federal Election Commission records. Sen. Barack Obama led his party’s field in contributions received through Moveon.org, with just over $30,000 received since the start of his campaign. Rep. Dennis Kucinich received almost $25,000 compared to just over $23,000 for former Sen. John Edwards and $18,000 for New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson. Sens. Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden each received between $5,000 and $6000, while Sen. Chris Dodd received just under $1000.
FEC records also show that Moveon.org has collected $176,000 from its supporters and distributed them to four vulnerable House Democrats.
America has tired of this war, but would still like to see an American military victory. And while Democrats were all set to declare a political victory, their pals over at MoveOn.Org basically snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. It was a foolish ad and a cheap shot at a man that has dedicated his life to duty, honor and country.
They deserve the backlash and so do the Democrats that support their thinking and take their money.
(CK Rairden won't auction his soul to the fringe radicals. Email him to ckden@yahoo.com)
Is Fred Thompson lazy or just insistent on going at his own pace?
9/6/07
Fred Thompson is lazy. That is the message being sent out by opponents of the big man from Tennessee.
By the time you read this, Thompson should have made the official announcement that he is running for president.
On May 30, Thompson asked to be released from his duties on the Emmy Award-winning “Law & Order,” where he played New York district attorney Arthur Branch. Immediately the press began questioning whether or not his departure from television was due to prepare for a presidential bid.
On June 1, Thompson formed the “Friends of Fred Thompson” committee and later announced on “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” that he was “testing the waters” regarding his possible run for the White House.
Now Fred will go back to Leno on Wednesday night. And get this - while he is with Leno, the other GOP candidates will debate in New Hampshire.
That brought this response from Mitt Romney.
“We all get the chance to go on the talk shows. But it’s not the sort of questions you get in the debates or the town meetings that I’ve had,” Romney said in an Associated Press interview, alluding to Thompson’s planned appearance with Jay. Thompson is to officially enter the race Thursday.
“The talk show circuit is fine, but the town meetings show you’re willing to listen to people and take their questions,” continued Romney.
“I think it will boost the ratings for Jay Leno’s show, but I’d rather be doing well in New Hampshire,” Romney deadpanned.
More people will see Fred Thompson on the NBC show. Dante Scala, New Hampshire primary expert and associate professor of political science at UNH, said the fact that Thompson will likely get more exposure, due to better ratings, on the “Tonight Show” has “more than a little something to do with it.”
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