Hypocracy, the Media, and You

I've read the CL headlines.  Since Charleston, it's been non-stop.

I'm agnostic on the flag; I've told you all this.  Don't care either way because it really won't affect my life (or yours-and you know it's true in your heart of hearts, CL editorial board) in any discernible way.

("But SYMBOLISM!" cried Former Democrat Operative Sam Hall.  Symbolism being the thing that puts bread on your table, after all.  How's that article damning Steve Holland and Jamie Franks going, by the way?)

But I'm really flummoxed at some of the headlines.

The first that drew my attention was the three days that the CL hyped the "Mississippi Celebrities for Changing the Flag" ad/article/whatever.  If my memory serves, it was the same week that the Center for Medical Progress released their Planned Parenthood videos, which the media seemed to have discovered this week.  Thanks, Carly!

My thoughts went to the Planned Parenthood videos immediately.  How many of these Celebrities would put their name to a letter to defund PP?  Archie Manning, Hugh Freeze...maybe Dan Mullen?  After all, if a flag hurts your feelings, what does a person describing how they cut through a live baby's face to get to the brain FOR MONEY do to you?

(Please save me the "EDITED VIDEO" sermon.  There's nothing out of context about it, and you know it.)

The second was Steve Earle.

You may remember Steve.  Back in the 80s he was a really good, edgy, country artist.  Since about 1990, however, he's slipped into paranoia, activism, and his music has been noted more for being more political than...you know...good.  Johnny Cash warned you about this, Steve.  He even did a song about it.

For those of you under 30, he's probably more well known for CMT documentaries (do they even do those any more, or is it all reality shows? Haven't watched CMT since I discovered YouTube).  Plus a little song he did in 2002 from the perspective John Walker Lindh.  Name ring a bell?

JWL was the original American Islamist.  He'd be at home at the preschool with the non-competitive musical chairs.  Sometime around 2000, he became a member of the Taliban.

So Steve Earle has sympathy for Johnny Taliban.  You, the average American who didn't learn guitar under Townes Van Zandt and make millions from "Copperhead Road?"  No, he doesn't have sympathy for you.  Cause you think the wrong way.

I'd love some justification from the Clarion Ledger as to why anyone who disagrees with Earle is worse than the Taliban, who blew up monuments because they didn't agree with the beliefs of those who disagreed with them.  But that would require them to make a connection I'm certain they don't want to make.

Ted Kennedy Dies at 77

Ted Kennedy certainly lived a full life. Dying today at 77, he leaves behind a family, a number of grandchildren, and millions of dollars. He also leaves with a reputation as a statesman and a champion of "health care reform," a bill of which will likely bear his name when it comes to the floor of the Senate.

But in the midst of the sadness for a man who lived to three score and seventeen, we shouldn't forget Mary Jo Kopechne, dead 40 years now. Her life ended at ust 28 years old, and the main reason is Edward Moore Kennedy, who cravenly left her to drown as he swam to safety. A diver sent into the car believed she was alive up to 2 hours after the Senator drove off of a bridge. Had he been Edward Smith or Jones, he likely would have done a nice stretch of time in a penetentiary for his conduct. However, as one of our exalted elites, he was allowed a slap on the wrist. For his negligence, his driver's license was suspended for six months.

Six months of being driven around by other people for killing someone.

So weep for Teddy Kennedy, Lion of the Senate. Weep harder still for the young woman whose life ended because she trusted him, who has been largely forgotten today. It is she, not his years in Washington, that he should be remembered for.

All The News That's Fit to Sip Lattes To

I opened up the Daily Journal website and it seems that Starbucks, which charges unreasonable prices for coffee and then gives it strange names, has decided to cut costs (since, after all, in this economy, $4 for a coffee is a luxury).

Yes, it sucks for anyone who works at Starbucks. But somebody should have seen this coming.

The big question is, why is this worthy of an update along with the Stimulus, a cigarette tax hike, and the oddity that is a deer going through a Pizza Hut window?

Because it will cause a disruption in the lifestyles of the Daily Journal staff! They might have to go into a convenience store to get coffee with the unwashed masses. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is a real economic tragedy.

Old King Coal Was A Merry Old Soul

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hdi4onAQBWQ

Vote for him at your own peril, coal staters. Or people who like electricity.

Priorities

Give speech to enthusiastic German crowd, in hopes of winning their votes? Sure, greenlight it (I'm assuming that he does know that Germans can't vote in November. Does he?).

Visit troops stationed in Germany, including those wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan? Sorry, got to get to my Nautilus machine.

Think I'm kidding? Oh, I wish I was.

1:42 p.m.: SPIEGEL ONLINE has learned that Obama has cancelled a planned short visit to the Rammstein and Landstuhl US military bases in the southwest German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The visits were planned for Friday. “Barack Obama will not be coming to us,” a spokesperson for the US military hospital in Landstuhl announced. “I don’t know why.” Shortly before the same spokeswoman had announced a planned visit by Obama.

From Der Speigel, the German magazine.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,567821,00.html

For Me, Not For Thee

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/jul/22/city-gives-dnc-host-committee-pass-gas-tax/

So just to get this straight: A gas tax holiday is bad for the consumer according to Sen. Messiah, but ok for the Democrat party elite?

Good to see someone is calling BS on this, and getting it exactly right.

"The DNC is not government. The RNC is not government," said Faatz, who, at the time, had been told that the "same exact thing" was happening in Minneapolis-St. Paul. "They are political parties and they are putting on a huge party, and that is not providing services to each and every citizen each day."

The RNC, by the way, says they're paying at the pump, just like you and me.

I Learned Something Today!

Michelle and Barry Messiah think they're more like me than the other two candidates. He's so right.

I can remember, in my youth, when Mom took me to Indonesia, and later, when I was in a lush prep school in Hawaii. Those were tough times for us. Later, I was forced to move in with my grandparents-one of whom was a bank vice president. I know-how tough can one guy have it? That's not all, though.

After leaving the prep school, I enrolled first at Columbia for undergrad, then at Harvard for law school. Sure, things were tough there-once, someone disagreed with my moot court arguments. After that, in my early career, I had to work at a thankless job. I don't know if I could have made it without my fellow Ivy Leaguer wife, who had a tough job as a diversity outreach coordinator.

Times sure were tough-especially the six months I took off from work to write my memoirs in my thirties. Eventually, I was lucky enough to meet the right people-a real estate developer, a kindly professor, and a minister-who helped me get into politics. Sure, the $240,000 my wife and I made eight years ago seems like a lot, but have you seen the price of arugula, or how much dance and piano lessons for the kids are? And don't get me started on the payments on our house, which cost a million bucks!

Really, anyone could have lived that life. It's been tough but we've persevered. How could anyone think that is elitist?

True Patriotism

http://hotair.com/archives/2008/04/15/obama-back-to-wearing-an-american-flag-pin/

Apparently, the definition of 'true patriotism' is now: When getting your butt handed to you in the polls because people are starting to think you're an out of touch snob, it's true patriotism to finally show that you love America-unlike, say, your spiritual guru.

Thankfully, for Barry Messiah, he was handed it by a veteran, so it doesn't mean he actually, you know, want to win in Iraq or anything. That would just be, I don't know...distracting.

A little late even to fool the rubes who are clinging to John Wayne and Jesus, though, don't you think?

Barry Messiah, Bitterness and Elitism

I guess it was bound to happen eventually. It does with anything new and shiny and eye-catching; the paint job fades on a new car, the shine goes out of a new silver ring. The same must be happening with Barry Messiah, the shining hope of the American left. We here at the Spot have talked about the little things that lead one to question the judgement of the Junior Senator from Illinois, like his interesting choice of wife (never proud of her country until now), his minister (God Damn America), and his friends (the people who bombed the Pentagon).

The latest, of course, is his equating the ownership of guns and the practicing religion with hatred, fear and other social ills. The statement is revealing, probably moreso than anything else he's said. Isn't it funny, constant readers, that the man who has made his mark by being so vague in his fine rhetorical speeches has finally told us what he really thinks...and what he thinks, is that you and me, those of us who don't live on the coasts or in a major city, are a bunch of rubes who have been duped into believing things that are contrary to our interests.

Here's the thing, Barry. My parents didn't get to travel around the world before they were old enough to drive. They didn't get to go to prep school, or take spring breaks to Pakistan. They didn't get a chance to get into Columbia, or Harvard law, or to have a nebulous career as a 'community organizer' and a million-dollar mansion. Of course, they weren't associating with Tony Rezko either, but I digress. However, just because they didn't doesn't mean they don't understand the crap that you're spewing. They understood it perfectly. I'm willing to bet that most of the folks you're talking about in Pennsylvania understand it too. In fact, I'll go so far as to say that they, since they have an actual real-life experience, understand things a lot better than Barry Messiah.

But Barry finally gave us a glimpse into the real him, I think. The man who is different, who will inspire us to change, who can heal the divisions of the past, is actually another one of the same old big-city elites who look down their noses at the people who might get their hands dirty, or who don't subscribe to the Marxist drivel that they keep peddling. Another condescending screed about how the rest of us are too stupid and scared to figure out that we're being duped.

No, Barry, we understand it perfectly here in flyover country. And we don't buy that the problem is us, that we just didn't understand what you'd said to a bunch of wine-country liberals out west. But I guess that's another insight into the character of the Son of Ann. I wonder if he understands why we might be a little upset with being called stupid.