Random reflections and contemplative thoughts, spiritual insights and humorous anecdotes, fickle film reviews and rambling music musings, occasional (okay, more than occasional) societal and political rants, and a whole lot more... all from the point of view of a humble, constitutional, common sense, conservative, Catholic, work-in-progress kinda guy who never gives up hope, because to be without hope is to become selfish.
Out of a field of candidates that for many were left wanting, my choice from the bunch has, with grace and dignity, bowed out before the South Carolina primary and endorsed Newt Gingrich.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Thursday dropped out of the race for the Republican presidential nomination and endorsed Newt Gingrich, adding a fresh layer of unpredictability to the campaign two days before the South Carolinaprimary.
"Newt's not perfect, but who among us is?" Perry said. He called the former House speaker a "conservative visionary" best suited to replace Barack Obama in the White House...
Gingrich issued a statement welcoming the endorsement. "I ask the supporters of Governor Perry to look at my record of balancing the budget, cutting spending, reforming welfare, and enacting pro-growth policies to create millions of new jobs and humbly ask for their vote," Gingrich said.
Romney reacted by praising Perry for running "a campaign based upon love of country and conservative principles" and saying he "has earned a place of prominence as a leader in our party."
Perry said he decided to suspend his campaign after concluding "there is no viable path forward for me."
Governor Perry will head up a 10th Amendment project for Speaker Gingrich to rally Governors and state legislators toward a plan of devolving power from Washington. This project will include helping shape the Republican platform for the general election, something small government conservatives have been concerned about.
Governor Perry will also campaign for Speaker Gingrich in Texas. Texas has more than enough delegates at 155 (they are proportional) to offset Newt Gingrich not being on the Virginia ballot, which only has 49 delegates.
The circumstances under which I write this are beyond horrible, I get it. It sucks that Gov. Perry is in this position. It sucks that the people of IA, NH, and now SC, have ignored the record of an outstanding governor and true blue conservative. It sucks that people have relied on shallow criteria for selecting a nominee.
It sucks, but the reality is, this is what has happened.
In other news, it's official... Iowa was won not my Romney, but by Santorum!
We are on a path to nominate someone who campaigned against Reagan, campaigned against the Contract with America, campaigned against those who are pro-Life, campaigned against 2d Amendment rights, campaigned against conservatism, and designed and enacted the precursor to Obamacare from which he will not back away.
Not if I can stop it.
Meanwhile, the latest Rasmussen poll in SC has Newt up 33% to Romney's 31%. Santorum's in fourth at 11%.
"The key thing is, yes, entitlement reform is important because entitlements are the biggest component of spending, and the part of spending where the cost pressures are greatest."
...the agreement last week to reduce the nation's debt by at least $2.1 trillion over the next 10 years "fell well short" of comprehensive reforms that some had advocated.
In other words: ObamaCare, Medicare, MedicAid, Social Security.
Remember, also, that CC&B (Cut, Cap and Balance bill) that sailed through the House, but stalled in the Senate and was threatened a veto by The One himself. Seems that, 2-to-1, adults approve of that bill. And it's a CNN poll. The ratio of approval, I'm sure, would be even higher for registered voters. And higher still with likely voters.
Let's re-watch Rick Santelli from a couple days ago:
...Sarah Palin came through today with a Facebook post that strikes the right tone and is at once simple, direct, and comprehensive. It doesn’t rail at past mistakes, nor does it come across as a raised-voice, you’ve-got-to-get-this-people communication. Palin takes it for granted – with refreshing common sense – that we are in a crisis, its features are obvious, and the task now is to deal with it, not continue to argue whether it’s really a crisis or how big it is or whose name we can pin on it.
She makes no bones about the significance of the problem we face. I am particularly impressed with her point that if we don’t square ourselves away, the specter hangs over us of IMF staffers showing up on our doorstep with China and France and Germany arrayed behind them, ready to throw folders on a desk and start telling us how much we can spend on cable TV and incidentals each month. Whether things would really play out for the US as they are playing out for Greece and Ireland is a valid question, but Palin is quite correct that the pitched confrontation is on the horizon now, as it was not six weeks ago – and she has the courage to face that possibility head-on. It’s not pleasant to mention it, but it’s the right thing to do.
The last third of Palin’s post is devoted to laying out what we need to do. Grow the economy by releasing the regulatory clamps on it, starting with the energy sector. Cut spending and reform entitlements. She doesn’t pretend the latter would be easy, but she faces head-on the fact that it is inescapably necessary. I urge you to read her post for the discussion of particulars. It is material and convincing without being in the weeds.
The piece is positive and encouraging for its forthrightness. There is nothing “clever” to be done in this situation; it’s all straightforward. The US federal government has to cut spending and let the economy grow, even if that means breaking the stranglehold of unions on the public trough and overruling advocacy groups and government bureaucrats who don’t want the economy to grow. Pretending that the federal budget is too complex to be governed by the ordinary rules of accounting – or that the US is too special to be limited by the ordinary definition of fiscal solvency – is a dodge, not a sign of insight or expertise.
Palin focuses like any good executive on the big picture. We have to cut spending and get government out of the economy’s way so it can start pumping out revenues again. These things are increasingly obvious to everyone, and moreover, they constitute a plan.
Palin in 2012 with Santelli as Treasury Secretary!!!
Ace points to a video of Joe Scarborough(via Hot Air, via Newsbusters) who poses the question as to why the MSM doesn't know if The One was involved in any way with Blago's 2002 campaign, and why the MSM were vociferously digging up any scrap of dirt on Palin in Alaska but weren't doing a fraction of the same journalistic due-diligence in Chicago.
The first link is to a story that has a former Obama, Edwards and Clinton speechwriter voting for... McCain!(hahahahahaha)
More news and commentary of the L.A. Times suppression of the Obama/Khalidi/Ayers video over at NRO(by Andrew McCarthy) and RWN. RWN also has further analysis here. Flopping Aces has an interesting tidbit towards the end of his post.
Ace has the money offer up to $175,000(150k by one donor, another 25k by an anonymous donor). Ace thinks it's really up to 200k via his many readers kicking in. Then there's Newt offering 50k on Fox News. This doesn't even count the many individual donors who are offering to kick in. LGF has picked up on the whole investigation with a series of posts here, here, here and here.
Michelle Malkin has an article on the MSM tanking for The Obamessiah. But there is some good news that both CNN and ABC balked at the 30-minute InfObammerical media buy that was purchased on the cheap and aired at the exact same time earlier this evening. The One's campaign never bothered to ask Fox News. But it did air on CBS, NBC, MSNBC (no surprises there) and Fox (the primetime network, not the cable news division), as well as several smaller networks such as BET and Univision (again, no surprises there). And Fox chose to actually postpone the World Series game to accommodate The One. (?!?)
Then a little poll news. Not the normal poll stats (which I still don't trust, even though they are all suddenly swinging towards McCain these last two weeks). It's this one here that has Rasmussen showing that McCain (not The One) being more trusted on taxes and the economy. (heh heh heh)
And, finally, RedState finishes it's "Integrity Gap" series. Part I (on Palin) is here. Part II (on Obama) begins here. And Part III (on McCain) is now here.
McCain broadcasts his latest ad here, featuring Joe:
And McCain's second, longer and more personal ad on the issues is here:
Meanwhile, RedState has an very interesting anecdotal story which spills the beans on the Obama campaign's worries:
As she was explaining her perspective it dawned on her to ask why he (the Obama internal pollster) was interested in her view of Palin. He replied that Obama's campaign is extremely nervous about the energized republican base and what he called the "unkown factor" regarding Palin's draw as a candidate.
In the polls they're conducting around the country, and my boss wasn't able to relay specific numbers, the Obama campaign is very, very worried about how Palin appears to be energizing whole groups of people who don't typically get energized about politics, precisely because she appeals so strongly to the middle class, as well as women and dissatisfied republicans that stayed home in 2006.
More than that, they don't know how to guage [sic] and predict the support of people typically turned off by politics, but that are enamored with her "up from the bootstraps" appeal.
I say all of this because this pollster conveyed strong concern about their standing going into the homestretch. They are very concerned about winning the vote of the middle class and whole swaths of the electorate they consider the "unkowns." In fact, and based on her conversation with this internal pollster for Obama, he's not ahead in the polls as we're being told. He's at best tied.
I told you to ignore the polls. Heck, the latest Gallup poll (you know, the one that's least reliable because they don't weigh the party registration, and have been publishing "registered" voters instead of likely voters so late in the season) has come out with their latest poll that finally uses the traditional "likely voters" and is within the margin of error.
Then, you can read Baseball Crank's series on "The Integrity Gap". Part I (on Sarah Palin) is here. Part II (on Obama) is here - it's a long, multi-part series so just follow the links at the bottom of the first post. Part III (which I assume will be on McCain) is not yet posted.
I spent last weekend back in the Philadelphia area to attend a family wedding. While I was there I decided to pay some attention to the political winds that were swirling around the region, and I came away with some interesting impressions via some anecdotal evidence.
In my humble opinion, Barack Obama ain't gonna win PA. It's just not gonna happen.
Obama sunk a lot of time and money into PA during the primary, and lost to Hillary 55-45%. The only regions to swing his way were Philadelphia and some of it's suburban counties, and mid-state. He won Delaware and Chester Counties south and west of the city. But he lost Montgomery and Bucks Counties west and north of Philly and also lost all of western PA, including around Pittsburgh. In the primary!
Obama MUST win the four key counties around Philly, plus Pittsburgh in order to have a prayer of taking PA from McCain on November 4. Obama is pouring a ton of money into PA right now, running full one-minute ads constantly, almost all of them being the type where he is on camera doing all of the talking (trying to appear personable).
Now, out here in Californians we don't use yard signs as much as we use bumper stickers. Your vehicle is king; it's your extended domain. Obama stickers are EVERYWHERE, and have been for quite some time. It started in early 2007 with the ubiquitous "Gore/Obama - The Dream Team" stickers. You would be lucky if you could find a Hillary sticker anywhere over the last year and a half. Yet, when the California primary came and went last June, Hillary thumped Obama by 10% (just like PA), 52-42%. Usually, it's the radicals who are the most "vocal" with their bumper stickers. The rest of the citizens tend to keep their mouths shut (lest they be scolded and scorned, or your car be keyed), and make their voices heard at the ballot box (the surprising success of Prop 13 and Prop 187 being two such examples).
Now, in Pennsylvania (particularly the Philly area), yard signs are the way people express their opinions, and unlike CA, they are not shy about it. If anyone who knows anything about Philly sports fans, this should come as no surprise. So, during my stay in the what's known as the "Main Line" in suburban Philly this past weekend I paid particular attention to these yard signs (this being just five weeks away from election day). I had driven through areas such as Upper Darby, Drexel Hill, Media, Havertown, and places in between (all in Delaware County, which Obama won against Hillary in the primary). In the sea of McCain and McCain/Palin yard signs I saw an exact total of just ONE Obama yard sign.
Obama is screwed.
In PA, they take their guns & religion seriously, and don't particularly like their values being mocked behind closed doors in San Francisco (Pennsylvanians have long memories). They also take the pro-life issue seriously. It's the reason why they replaced Santorum in the Senate with someone else who at least claimed to also be pro-life, and who is the son of a popular former two-term governor who was also pro-life.
I would almost say that I'd be shocked if Obama wins PA. Almost. Because I know that we're dealing with the MSM (mainstream media) who are completely in the tank for The Obamessiah, and have been for quite some time... as evidenced by this post by Captain Ed:
A READER AT A MAJOR NEWSROOM EMAILS: "Off the record, every suspicion you have about MSM being in the tank for O is true. We have a team of 4 people going thru dumpsters in Alaska and 4 in arizona. Not a single one looking into Acorn, Ayers or Freddiemae. Editor refuses to publish anything that would jeopardize election for O, and betting you dollars to donuts same is true at NYT, others. People cheer when CNN or NBC run another Palin-mocking but raising any reasonable inquiry into obama is derided or flat out ignored. The fix is in, and its working."
I have a couple friends who work in the MSM, too, and one of them tells me the newsroom is (exact words) “unbelievably cavalier” about any complaints viewers register about their reports, what they ignore, their bias or the way they edit Republicans vs. the way the treat Dems. “Cavalier” as in the fix is in and they don’t even have to pretend to care what half the country thinks or wants.
Think about it. Compared to what has been written and how the MSM have gone after, vilified and/or dismissed Sarah Palin, have you read or heard ANYTHING of investigative substance from the MSM (ABC, NBC/MSNBC, CBS, CNN, PBS, NY Times, LA Times, Washington Post, USA Today) going into Obama's background, friends, associates, dealings, affiliations, political record or lack of experience in depth? Aside from a glancing look into the Rev. Wright scandal, and the subsequent blanket dismissal of anything of the matter worthy of a fuller investigation, has the MSM done ANY true investigative journalism on The Obamessiah?
Something tells me that the Obama campaign is royally screwed.
UPDATE: The doo-doo's getting deeper. Click here, here, and here.
UPDATE: Now Ace has a potential connection between this Winner & Associates guy and GeekEsque (known for viral postings over at Daily Kos, including disseminating the same video and bogus Palin story). Seems that they work less than a quarter mile down the same street from each other. Hmmmmmmm.
Looks like the Feds have found the young man who hacked into Sarah Palin's personal e-mail account (the hacker's father is a Democrat State Rep from Tennessee). If you scroll down the linked post you find this little gem:
From a commenter at Terry Frank (who has screengrabs of David Kernell's Facebook page):
"There is an apparent connection between David Kernell and David Plouffe. If you do a Technorati search for “david kernell” (http://www.technorati.com/search/%22david+kernell%22?authority=a4&language=en) and then click on Videos about David Kernell, the first video you see i[s] of David Plouffe (Campaign manager for Obaman). He probably did the video for Plouffe.
You read that correctly. Sarah Palin had her email account hacked by a left-wing group who then bragged about it. RedState has the links and an excellent summary.
"Sarah Palin is now under the protection of the United States Secret Service, which means that they are going to very interested in this attack.
"Let me put this succinctly: everybody who had a hand in this is [expletive deleted]ed."
And, it's official, more people watched John McCain's acceptance speech than The Obamessiah's. The numbers are in, with two fewer channels airing the speech. Numbers also do not include PBS (just as before), which uses a different tallying method. UPDATE: The PBS numbers are in, and McCain & Obama tied in the ratings, including the PBS numbers, with each getting 42.4 million viewers. For the entire convention, though, the RNC's 3-Day convention averaged 34.5 million viewers while the DNC's 4-Day convention averaged just 30.2 million viewers.
Sarah Palin's full text of her speech. There is the full speech in video, as well as video highlights on the same page as the text.
The key moment of McCain's speech was the end, with the following text (emphasis mine):
On an October morning, in the Gulf of Tonkin, I prepared for my 23rd mission over North Vietnam. I hadn't any worry I wouldn't come back safe and sound. I thought I was tougher than anyone. I was pretty independent then, too. I liked to bend a few rules, and pick a few fights for the fun of it. But I did it for my own pleasure; my own pride. I didn't think there was a cause more important than me.
Then I found myself falling toward the middle of a small lake in the city of Hanoi, with two broken arms, a broken leg, and an angry crowd waiting to greet me. I was dumped in a dark cell, and left to die. I didn't feel so tough anymore. When they discovered my father was an admiral, they took me to a hospital. They couldn't set my bones properly, so they just slapped a cast on me. When I didn't get better, and was down to about a hundred pounds, they put me in a cell with two other Americans. I couldn't do anything. I couldn't even feed myself. They did it for me. I was beginning to learn the limits of my selfish independence. Those men saved my life.
I was in solitary confinement when my captors offered to release me. I knew why. If I went home, they would use it as propaganda to demoralize my fellow prisoners. Our Code said we could only go home in the order of our capture, and there were men who had been shot down before me. I thought about it, though. I wasn't in great shape, and I missed everything about America. But I turned it down.
A lot of prisoners had it worse than I did. I'd been mistreated before, but not as badly as others. I always liked to strut a little after I'd been roughed up to show the other guys I was tough enough to take it. But after I turned down their offer, they worked me over harder than they ever had before. For a long time. And they broke me.
When they brought me back to my cell, I was hurt and ashamed, and I didn't know how I could face my fellow prisoners. The good man in the cell next door, my friend, Bob Craner, saved me. Through taps on a wall he told me I had fought as hard as I could. No man can always stand alone. And then he told me to get back up and fight again for our country and for the men I had the honor to serve with. Because every day they fought for me.
I fell in love with my country when I was a prisoner in someone else's. I loved it not just for the many comforts of life here. I loved it for its decency; for its faith in the wisdom, justice and goodness of its people. I loved it because it was not just a place, but an idea, a cause worth fighting for. I was never the same again. I wasn't my own man anymore. I was my country's.
I'm not running for president because I think I'm blessed with such personal greatness that history has anointed me to save our country in its hour of need. My country saved me. My country saved me, and I cannot forget it. And I will fight for her for as long as I draw breath, so help me God.
If you find faults with our country, make it a better one. If you're disappointed with the mistakes of government, join its ranks and work to correct them. Enlist in our Armed Forces. Become a teacher. Enter the ministry. Run for public office. Feed a hungry child. Teach an illiterate adult to read. Comfort the afflicted. Defend the rights of the oppressed. Our country will be the better, and you will be the happier. Because nothing brings greater happiness in life than to serve a cause greater than yourself.
I'm going to fight for my cause every day as your President. I'm going to fight to make sure every American has every reason to thank God, as I thank Him: that I'm an American, a proud citizen of the greatest country on earth, and with hard work, strong faith and a little courage, great things are always within our reach. Fight with me. Fight with me.
Fight for what's right for our country.
Fight for the ideals and character of a free people.
Fight for our children's future.
Fight for justice and opportunity for all.
Stand up to defend our country from its enemies.
Stand up for each other; for beautiful, blessed, bountiful America.
Stand up, stand up, stand up and fight. Nothing is inevitable here. We're Americans, and we never give up. We never quit. We never hide from history. We make history.
UPDATE: He did what he needed to do. He contrasted himself as a wise, humble and proven servant versus the arrogant, self-anointed empty suit. He left most of the red meat for last night. This was the after-dinner kitchen table discussion. His intent was to continue to draw in the fence-sitting moderates/centrists/independents as well as the disaffected PUMAs. The rousing ending was pitch-perfect.
I may not agree with him on some key issues, but he's reassured me of his core. Although I'm not one of those moderates/centrists, I was on the fence up until last week because I'm a strong social and fiscal conservative. His choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate, and her introduction last Friday, and especially her speech last night, basically brought me back off of the fence. I just needed to see and hear McCain present himself tonight to allay any remaining trepidation on my part.
I was NEVER going to vote for The Obamessiah.
I can now PROUDLY pull the lever for McCain/Palin.
The next two months will be very interesting and entertaining. And, with the likes of Sarah Palin, Bobby Jindal, Michael Steele, Mike Pence, John Shadegg, Jeff Flake, Tom Coburn, Jim DeMint and others, the future looks very bright.
Hurricane Sarah caught the mainstream media and the rabid left wing all flatfooted as what they thought would be just a brief summer shower turned out to be a major broadside to their political establishment. Tropical Storm Rudy cleared the way for Hurricane Sarah - a rare Cat 6 storm of epic proportions - to just rip to shreds the Democratic strongholds, leaving nothing but liberal wreckage in her wake.
She made landfall last Friday morning in Ohio, and moved her way through Pennsylvania and Missouri. The media was convinced that she would soon fizzle out, but instead she just built up steam and charged her way into Minnesota leaving everyone stunned. It's looking like Hurricane Sarah will be roaring through all the states for the next two months, at least, without losing strength.
Storm warning officials are urging that, in their own best interests, all left wing pundits and liberal pontificators are best to run for cover before they get caught up in the eye of this fresh and growing mother of a storm.
"Palin tried to do 3 things with the speech: build up her own resume, push John McCain, and hammer the hell out of Obama. To say she hit a home run at those three tasks is an understatement. Palin delivered a called shot, with the bases loaded, that went out of the park, across the street, crashed through the window of the Obama campaign headquarters, and rolled right up to the empty suit running the operation."
UPDATE #2A: Palin drew an astounding 37.2 million TV viewers last night! Just shy of the record 38 million that The Obamessiah drew for his acceptance speech last week. Her speech was broadcast on only 6 networks, while The Obamessiah's was shown on 10. Yet, Palin outdrew The One with Hispanics, despite the fact that Spanish-language networks Univision and Telemundo did not broadcast her speech.
UPDATE #2B: It appears that those ratings do not include PBS nor CSPAN totals. The PBS rating for Palin was an additional 3.9 (Obama had a 4.0). No word on the CSPAN numbers and cable/satellite TV's dedicated DNC & RNC channels. That means that Sarah Palin had more than 41 million viewers Wednesday night!
Rumor is going around that - even though The Obamessiah has denied that his campaign had anything to do with the pushing on the story, would fire anyone who was involved, and has laid claim that family members are and should be off-limits on both sides - there may be evidence that this political scum-bagging may in fact have BO campaign fingerprints all over it. As Drudge would say, "... developing..."
BlackFive has a nice little "I did not know that" post about the vital role Alaska and it's governor play in our country's national security:
Alaska is the first line of defense in our missile interceptor defense system. The 49th Missile Defense Battalion of the Alaska National Guard is the unit that protects the entire nation from ballistic missile attacks. It’s on permanent active duty, unlike other Guard units.
As governor of Alaska, Palin is briefed on highly classified military issues, homeland security, and counterterrorism.
It continues:
She's also the commander in chief of the Alaska State Defense Force (ASDF), a federally recognized militia incorporated into Homeland Security's counterterrorism plans.
Palin is privy to military and intelligence secrets that are vital to the entire country's defense. Given Alaska's proximity to Russia, she may have security clearances we don't even know about.
After McCain made & broadcast a genuine and sincere video congratulating The Obamessiah on his historic accomplishment, and after McCain officially announced and introduced Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate, this is the first thing that The Obamessiah campaign had to say about her:
"Today, John McCain put the former mayor of a town of 9,000 with zero foreign policy experience a heartbeat away from the presidency. Governor Palin shares John McCain's commitment to overturning Roe v. Wade, the agenda of Big Oil and continuing George Bush's failed economic policies - that's not the change we need, it's just more of the same," said Bill Burton, Obama campaign spokesman.
Classy, huh?
Nevermind that they try to diminish her as "the former mayor of a town of 9,000" (meanwhile, The Obamessiah vocally touts his "community organizer" credentials and his four years as a Senator - less experience than Dan Quayle had, while Palin was City Councilwoman, Mayor, State Ethics Commissioner, and Governor, with more executive experience than Obama, Biden and McCain combined!).
Nevermind that they try to claim her "zero foreign policy experience" (she's the Governor of a state that borders Canada and Russia, meanwhile The Obamessiah has no foreign policy experience of his own).
Nevermind that he states that she'd be " a heartbeat away from the presidency" (meanwhile, The Obamessiah - with less experience - is hoping to actually be the President).
Nevermind that he points a finger at his opponents' "commitment to overturning Roe v. Wade" (meanwhile The Obamessiah is so radiocally to the left of this issue that he forcefully opposed the Baby Born Alive Act four times while in the Illinois state congress).
Nevermind that The One claims that she has an "agenda of Big Oil" (if he'd just look at her record he'd see that she actually went up against Big Oil and the "Good Ol' Boy" network, and fought corruption from all political parties - including her own; The One, though, has his own issues with connections to the likes of unrepentant American terrorist Bill Ayers and convicted felon Tony Rezko).
Nevermind that The Obamessiah charges that the McCain team will "continuing George Bush's failed economic policies" (meanwhile, the economy never gets into a recession, oil prices have dropped 20% since mid-July, GDP grew more than expected, and unemployment remains steady).
Nevermind that they try to make the claim that "that's not the change we need, it's just more of the same" (meanwhile, The Obamessiah picks Joe Biden - actively the fifth longest serving Senator at 36 years, and who started his career as the ultimate D.C. insider when The One was 9 years old).
Nevermind that The Obamessiah doesn't even mention the historic achievement of the second woman to be on a National ticket, just days from the 88th anniversary of women's suffrage, introduced on Palin's 20th wedding anniversary and on McCain's 72nd birthday (meanwhile, McCain praised and congratulated Obama on being the first (half-)African-American to be nominated on the 45th anniversary of MLK's "I Have a Dream" speech. Or that The One and his own Lady MacBeth (Michelle) had such big egos and harbored so much hate of the Original Lady MacBeth (Hillary) to not even consult her on his VP selection, let alone not even pick her as his running mate. Or that The Hildabeast herself was filled with so much ego and disdain of The One that she could never bring herself to accepting yet another "second fiddle" political post).
And they say that Sarah Palin is inexperienced??? To paraphrase a commenter from one of the many blogs covering this whole thing:
"Excuse me... Mr. Pot? Mrs. Kettle is on Line 2."
P.S. Mark Steyn chimes in. Charlie Martin over at American Thinker comments, as well.
First, McCain launches the following video after Biden gave his acceptance speech:
Then pix got leaked about The Obamessiah's Greek/Roman "Barthenon" backdrop at Mile High Stadium:
Notice that the only times The Obamessiah needs flags (and so many) are when he had to hold that press conference in Philly to distance himself from 20-year spiritual mentor Rev. Jeremiah "G-D America" Wright, and last night in front of the entire universe.
It was supposed to be a mock-up of the White House. Either way, it looked bad because if it's the Barthenon then it perpetuates the whole god-like image, and if it's the White House then it's the height of presumption (just like when he tried to float the faux "Presidential Seal"):
Then McCain pulls one head fake and airs the following ad in the Battleground states (and with the internet, EVERYONE gets to see it):
Which through the Obamessiah campaign off it's game (what, McCain being nice and genuine and congratulatory?).
Then, after the over-inflated empty rhetoric from The Obamessiah last night, all the news outlets were supposed to be gloating and glowing about The One and his "Oratory From On High." Instead? To quote Ross Perot, that "giant sucking sound" is the entire political universe talking about McCain and his mavericky pick as his running mate -- Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin:
* Young (44) * Female (the first Republican female VP candidate) * Family Woman (Married with five kids: her oldest about to serve in Iraq, and her youngest has Down Syndrome) * Career Woman with Executive Experience (Governor 2 years, former Ethics Commissioner, former Mayor, former City Councilwoman) * Husband works in oil fields and is also a commercial fisherman * Social Conservative with a Strong Pro-Life & Pro-Family record * Fiscal Conservative * Maverick Reformer (taking on corruption in both political parties) * 80% approval rating in Alaska * Strong and knowledgeable on oil and energy (active "drill here, drill now" proponent) * Supporter of 2nd Amendment and lifetime member of the NRA * Avid hunter, fisher and sportswoman * Attractive (former runner-up in Miss Alaska contest) * Intelligent * Her state borders two countries: Canada and Russia (right across the Bering Strait - crucial in today's foreign policy climate) * Can hold her own, politically (I can't wait for Joe Biden to do in the VP debate what he inevitably does - stick not just one but both feet into his mouth)
Perfectly played, McCain! Masterfully done!
Let the games begin.
P.S. *cough* I mentioned Palin as a great choice back on July 21.
P.P.S. I cannot wait for the Biden v. Palin debate. That may be the under-card, but that debate will be THE showdown to watch with a large box o' popcorn.
