I never thought I’d see one of these:
FYI, the “historic day” McCain is referencing is that 45 years ago on August 28th, Martin Luther King gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. Even if you aren’t going to vote for McCain, he deserves props for putting out an ad like this.
From Victor David Hanson
We didn’t have to wait long for the much anticipated morally-equivalent message from Barack Obama: “We’ve got to send a clear message to Russia and unify our allies. They can’t charge into other countries. Of course it helps if we are leading by example on that point.
Let me get this straight: getting a Senate and House majority to authorize a bipartisan joint war-resolution, going to the UN, assembling a coalition, having a national and world debate on the wisdom of such an operation from December 2001 to March 2003, and then attacking a genocidal dictator, and staying on to foster a constitutional democracy are apparently the same “charge” “example” as an autocracy suddenly invading its democratic neighbor during the Olympics, and staying on to annex some of its territory?
Now if only someone in the Bush and McCain camps could say it that well.
Again, this is one that has made the internet rounds many times. Unlike the College Essay one, Snopes declares this one a hoax.
There have been a few memes I’ve wanted to archive for easy access in the future This one has been around for some time now, and I’m sure most people have seen it already. (more…)
Kathryn Jean Lopez has a column talking about Obama’s recent appearence at Saddleback. I try not to pick on a candidate too much for a possible slip of the tongue or fuzzy moment during any debate(ish) appearence, but I think his comments are worth expanding upon. When asked about what Supreme Court Justice he would not have nominated, Lopez notes:
Obama responded: “I don’t think he was an exp . . . ” — he then caught himself — “a strong enough jurist or legal thinker at the time for that elevation.”
This is a common trope amongst the left, albeit slightly altered so as to not appear too hypocritical when, in the same breath, they support Obama. Lopez continues:
Although a choice sure to fire up his Left base, it was a curious answer, if you consider the record — even beyond the fact that Obama didn’t believe Thomas was qualified to be one of nine in the Supreme Court when Obama’s not quite uber-experienced to be one of one in the White House.
Was it that Barack Obama didn’t like Justice Thomas’s vote on the recent child-rapist case, Kennedy v. Louisiana? No, that couldn’t be it. Barack Obama agreed with Thomas on that decision. Justice Ginsburg, meanwhile — a liberal favorite on the Court, whom John McCain listed as one of his least favorite justices during the same forum — opposed giving child rapists the death penalty. So what’s so wrong about Thomas and so right about, say, Ginsberg, Senator Obama? Explain the logic. He can’t, of course, and still win an election — which is why he agreed with Thomas.
Was it that Barack Obama didn’t like Justice Thomas’s vote on the recent D.C. gun-ban case? Nope; that couldn’t be it either. Barack Obama wound up ultimately agreeing with Thomas and the majority on that one too.
Justice Ginsburg, on the other hand, had issues with the Second Amendment in that case. But you would nominate Justice Ginsburg, Senator Obama?
Did Obama disagree with Justice Thomas on the recent cross-burning case, Virginia v. Black? Obama’s favorite justice, Justice Ginsburg, wrote that cross-burning bans are constitutionally suspect. Justice Thomas disagreed and wrote a passionate dissent. During oral arguments he said: “There’s no other purpose to the cross, no communication, no particular message. . . . [It] was intended to cause fear and to terrorize a population.” Does Obama take issue with the impassioned Thomas dissent?
Calling Obama inexperience is a cliche of the right, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true. Obama’s inexperience means that his bullshit detector isn’t going off when “distinguished” advisors around him try to fill his head with positions that are obviously at odds with intellectual honesty.
When Bush first ran for President, it was made abundantly clear to him that he was inexperienced and not necessarily the most well educated person to run for the office. He surrounded himself with the most distinguished Republican statesmen he could find at the time – back in 2001, no one could argue with the creditials of Cheney, Rumsfeld and Powell. Oh well, hindsight is 20/20 – at least Bush tried.
Obama, however, is currently surrounded by sicophants, and he doesn’t realize it. For the past four years, he’s been the “wunderkind” of the Democratic party. His platform for change is irrelevent – he *is* change. That sort of sense of priveledge and infalibility means that critical thinking takes a back seat to the conventional thinking of the echo chamber. The cycle feeds back upon itself, and only harsh reality can break a person free of it.
I could be accused of suffering a similar affliction, simply reiterating the right-wing trope of Obama’s inexperience, but look again at what he says regarding Thomas. It’s been a common line of attack on Thomas from the left, and as Lopez points out, it’s in contrast to Obama’s stated positions. In this case, Obama is clearly accepting the party line without any critical analysis.
Now, you might say that’s par for the course for politicians. In this case, however, it’s different. We’re not talking about the usual spin on talking points – in this case he clearly opens himself up to charges of hypocrisy. It’s a political unforced error. Most politicians may be slimy, but also most are very good at detecting bullshit. Obama is not, as this incident illustrates.
When declaring his victory in the Democratic Primary, on the cusp of what he no doubts hopes to be his election as President, that “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow”. I know a great many Obama supporters that consider themselves fairly educated and intelligent, certainly above the average voter. Charles Krauthammer – a truly intellegent and educated man – noted that there was a anecdote amongst those versed in history of a King of England who found himself similarly surrounded by sicophants. In an effort to break them of their flattery, he marched down to the shore and ordered the oceans to recede. When the ocean did not recognize his authority and in a fit of spite splashed his feet, he turned to his court and told them even Kings have their limit.
So too, do Presidents, as Obama will learn, one way or the other, should he be elected.
I was looking for something to easily do HTML tooltips. It’s pretty easy to do using the :hover CSS element, but with the major cavet that IE6 doesn’t support it, which makes it nearly useless. But as luck would have it, I found a Javascript library called BoxOver that works better than anything I could have coded up, and all it needs is to be included somewhere in the page. Then all you need to do is include a little markup in the element you want the tooltip to appear with, and viola – really, really cool tooltips.
