While We Weren't Watching

So busy have we been tracking the Obama/Clinton race that we haven't really been tracking the GOP returns. It turns out that even though McCain long ago got the delegates he needs, there's some interesting stuff in those overlooked stats. Andrew Malcolm at Top of the Ticket fills us in:

In Indiana, McCain got 77% of the recent Republican primary vote, Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney, who've each long ago quit and endorsed McCain, still got 10% and 5% respectively, while Paul took 8%.

On the same May 6 in North Carolina, McCain received less than three-quarters of Republican votes (74%), while Huckabee got 12%, Paul 7% and Alan Keyes and No Preference took a total of 7%.

Pennsylvania was even slightly worse for the GOP's presumptive nominee, who got only 73% to a combined 27% for Paul (16%) and Huckabee (11%).

Either of the Dem candidates would kill for 73% of the vote, but for McCain, his inability to command the Dem vote so long after he won the nomination shows that there could be considerable trouble ahead, first at the convention, then in the General.

Malcolm's column focuses on a possible convention fight from Ron Paul's supporters:

The last three months Paul's forces, who donated $34.5 million to his White House effort and upwards of one million total votes, have, as The Ticket has noted, been fighting a series of guerrilla battles with party establishment officials at county and state conventions from Washington and Missouri to Maine and Mississippi. Their goal: to take control of local committees, boost their delegate totals and influence platform debates. ...

They hope to demonstrate their disagreements with McCain vocally at the convention through platform fights and an attempt to get Paul a prominent speaking slot. Paul, who's running unopposed in his home Texas district for an 11th House term, still has some $5 million in war funds and has instructed his followers that their struggle is not about a single election, but a longterm revolution for control of the Republican Party.

So eager are they to follow their leader's words, that Paul's supporters have driven his new book, "The Revolution: A Manifesto," to the top of several bestseller lists.

Still, all the nastiness the Paulites could possible foist on the convention will pale by comparison to what the Clinton faction could do to Obama. The Paulites are taking the long-term view, determined to hang in there until the GOP becomes fiscally conservative and isolationist. A mixed bag there.

Short term, as in now through 2012, there may be more to worry about from the Huckabee set.

Huckabee has professed never-ending allegiance to McCain (at least for this race), but in a piece I really didn't like much because of its paranoid and bizarre tone about Christians, Robert Novak spells out a cultish scenario, in which Obama is a biblical curse and Huckabee God's choice for 2012:

One experienced, credible activist in Christian politics who would not let his name be used told me that Huckabee, in personal conversation with him, had embraced the concept that an Obama presidency might be what the American people deserve. That fits what has largely been a fringe position among evangelicals: that the pain of an Obama presidency is in keeping with the Bible's prophecy.

According to this activist, at the heart of the let-Obama-win movement is longtime Virginia conservative leader Michael Farris -- the nation's leading home-school advocate, who is now chancellor of Patrick Henry College (in Purcellville, Va.) for home-schooled students. Best known politically as the losing Republican candidate for lieutenant governor of Virginia in 1993, Farris is regarded as one of the hardest-edged Christian politicians. He is reported in evangelical circles to promote the biblical justification for an Obama plague-like presidency.

Novak doesn't report that droves of Christians will vote Obama to bring on the plague; in fact, he reports that Farris has said he would never vote for either Obama or Clinton. But they will be at the convention to push the Christian right agenda.

The media is playing up this story in part because the Dem race as slid into a boring period, like the final rounds of a heavyweight match, with the opponents leaning into each other, landing tired body punches, and in part because any McCain news is news.

But it seems to me that it will play out primarily in the arcane affair of drafting the platform, and that's not at all a bad thing. McCain's platform could use a commitment to fiscal conservatives and strict constructionist judges, and little more than that is likely to come out of the battle.

Now what I'd really like to see is a bunch of stories speculating on what the Dem convention is likely to be like.

hat-tip: memeorandum

Quote Of The Day: Trotskyite-Paulite Edition

"If I may quote Trotsky of all people, this Revolution is permanent."
-- Ron Paul in an email to supporters

Uh, Ron ... the revolution wasn't permanent for Trotsky. Did you miss that part? It kind of fizzled out after creating untold human misery. Sort of like the misery you'd create as president, pulling us back into our borders to let the evil in the world spread unchallenged.

Anyway, Paul's pulled the plug. In the email he doesn't say he's dropping out of the race in so many words, but he does say he's letting most of his campaign staff go and is concentrating on the Texas primary ... not the presidential primary, mind you, the primary for his House seat.

Seems Paul's a bit concerned that his constituency down home is no longer his constituency.

I do like that Paul stakes out the extreme position for free markets, so we sane free-marketeers have a better shot at maintaining a sound economic policy. And what was his now sleepy campaign if not a free market venture?

He's raised multiple millions, spent little of it, and now is going home to Texas. And across America, Paulites are looking at their wallets and wondering ... Why did I send that nutcase my money? When did I become part of the whacked-out five percent?

hat-tip: memeorandum

Sunday Scan

Cloverfield, Nevada Style

The film Cloverfield has used viral internet marketing to become quite a sensation -- but at its heart, it's just a Godzilla movie, with a big mean monster wreaking havoc in New York.

And yesterday, a little, pale monster wreaked havoc in the glitter gulches and dusty desert towns of Nevada. And today, just as I predicted, we are suffering through the media coverage of it:

Boy, oh, boy! Hidden behind all the hoopla, headlines and the Nevada caucus victories of Mitt Romney and Hillary Clinton is one little-noticed but stunning political development and number:

Ron Paul, the one-time Libertarian candidate and 10-term Republican congressman from Texas, was in second place. That's right, Second Place. The 72-year-old ob-gyn who's always on the end of the line at GOP debates or barred altogether, was running ahead of John McCain, Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani, in fact, ahead of....

all other Republicans except Romney, who easily captured his second state in a week after Michigan.

Uh-huh. But let's keep our heads on straight. It was Romney with 51% of the votes (all 22,659 of them!) followed by the pale imp with 14%, attracting a whopping 6,087 to his cause -- a full 436 more people than John McCain attracted.

Photo clipped from: Dino's Forum

Marking History

They laid an historical marker outside a house in Port Arthur, Texas today. Here's the story.

In that house there once lived a little four-year-old girl who grew up to live far too short a life as Summer of Love diva Janis Joplin. There was another house she lived in earlier, but it's gone now, so this is her official childhood home.

The marker was placed today as opposed to any other day you might think of because it marks what would have been Joplin's 65th birthday.

Whoa, am I feeling old.

I was 17, I think, when I first put Big Brother and the Holding Company's Cheap Thrills on my little stereo and heard her gravely voice. And I'm still 17 in my head when I think about her ... how could she have been born 65 years ago?

New Euro-Islamist Threat

This is not something I'm quite prepared to think about:

The source implied that the [Spanish intelligence agency] CNI had specific information on itinerant terrorists heading for the UK, France and Portugal.

The squib, from a London Times article, troubles me not just because Incredible Daughter #1 is in Paris, but because I've never seen the words "itinerant terrorists" before. We have in America a tradition of itinerant preachers and judges; from sick Islam, we get itinerant terrorists, travelling from place to place, killing innocents in the name of Allah.

Terrorists Get 72 Raisins?

Amidst a lengthy and interesting story at Act! For America covering the suppression of ancient Islamic texts in Germany, so anyone interested in a revisionist view of the Koran cannot get access to them, was this interesting tidbit:

According to an Islam tradition, Muslim martyrs will go to paradise and marry 72 black-eyed virgins. But some Koran scholars point to a less sexy paradise. While beautifully written, Islamic texts are often obscure. The Arabic language was born as a written language with the Koran, and growing evidence suggests that many of the words were Syriac or Aramaic.

Specifically, the Koran says martyrs going to heaven will get "hur," and the word was taken by early commentators to mean "virgins," hence those 72 concubines. But in Aramaic, hur actually meant "white" and was commonly used to specifically mean "white grapes."

It's easy to crack a joke over this, but if there's any question at all about the nature of so critical a text -- a text that is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocents a year -- why does the keeper of the archive, Angelika Neuwirth, protect them from anyone other than pro-Islamist researchers?

For more on this fascinating story, see Andrew Higgins' WSJ article, The Lost Archives.

hat-tip: What Bubba Knows

Pulling The Plug On Terrorists

Just wait 'til some Palestinians start crying about having to eat cold falafels in the dark -- oh, how the anti-Israeli press will rain an ink-storm on Israel. Here's the story, from Sky News:

Large parts of the Gaza Strip have been plunged into darkness after its main power plant shut down.

It comes after Israel blocked fuel supplies to the Hamas-run territory and closed its borders.

Israel says the blocklade is a response to rocket attacks by militants.

It claims 230 rockets have been fired at border towns in a new wave of aggression.

"It claims?" I don't suppose we can expect the media to actually report that rockets are falling like locusts on Israel.

Already, the Palestinian PR machine is busy maximizing the impact:

"The catastrophe will affect hospitals, medical clinics, water wells, houses, factories, all aspects of life."

Oh, boo hoo. First, stop sending rockets into civilian neighborhoods, especially when there's no war going on. And second, get your act together, Palestine. You've had 60 years to provide for yourself, but here you are, dependent on Israel for your power ... with fuel purchased by Europe.

How these people garner so much sympathy and so little criticism amazes me.

Human-Animal Embryo Research

Two research companies in England have been granted licenses to mix up human and animal embryos, reports Science Daily.

One is going to take the genetic matter out of cow embryos and mix 'em up with human embryos, in a quest for better human stem cells.

The scientists would attempt to extract stem cells from the blastocyst after six days. Stem cells are building blocks that can grow into any type of tissue such as liver, heart and muscle cells. The quality and the viability of stem cells would then be checked to see if nuclear transfer technique has worked. The scientists would also be observing the way that the cells are reprogrammed after fusion to see if there are useful processes they could replicate in the laboratory. The embryo would have to be destroyed at 14 days old in accordance with the licence.

I have to admit, this all goes way, way over my head. I understand that there's nothing about this license that will allow any intermingled animal/human embryonic material to (1) live or (2) get into humans, but the research is taking the science to another new level, and after that will be another new level.

At some time, a mistake will occur or a license will be granted that shouldn't have been. That's just the way it goes with us inquisitive humans. All this going too far will make a great novel ... and it's one work of nonfiction I hope I never read.

George Clooney, Messenger Of Peace

Position to fill: International shell game operator needs good looking individual with real swoon-power, a hard-left orientation and a history of supporting the wrong side in global causes to cover up organization's myriad global failures.

Position filled! The Rosett Report reports:

As Hollywood buffs and UN money-raisers already know, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has just named actor George Clooney as the UN’s newest Messenger of Peace, with a “special focus on UN peacekeeping.” Clooney, currently visiting Sudan, is expected to “receive his designation” Jan. 31st at UN headquarters in New York.

Oh, great. We get to see even more of Clooney opening his mouth and letting his politics spew out. Rosett's not expecting much good of it to come, either:

This would all be great if UN peacekeeping actually produced peace. But the illusion that the UN is a grand force for good in this world deserves to be catalogued somewhere between World’s Most Amazing Scams and Believe It-Or-Not Best-in-Special-Effects. The reality of today’s UN is more like a cross between “Animal House” (the movie, with John Belushi) and “Animal Farm” (the book, by George Orwell).

Her post is a gem. Do read the whole thing.

Racist Ron's Excuse Is Pathetic

clipped from youtube.com

Even for 24-hour-news-cycle outlets like CNN, a 10 minute, 36 second story is exceptionally long, but that's what CNN gave to this report on Ron Paul's racist newsletters, as originally reported in The New Republic's piece Angry White Man.

On the clip, Paul says:

Yeah, it is [shocking], and of course it's been rehashed a long time and it's coming up now for political reasons, but everyone knows in my district that I didn't write them and I don't speak like that.

Staffers have reaffirmed this, saying Paul did not write the pieces.

It doesn't take having a career in messaging, as I do, to realize that the professional term for this is "poppycock." Paul's newsletters carried his message to constituents, fundraisers, contributors and hangers-on for over a decade. Paul's office produced them, his name was on top, and it presented his views, sometimes in a very personal way, like this 1992 piece, which says of carjacking:

I frankly don't know what to make of such advice [about how to prevent carjacking], but even in my little town of Lake Jackson, Texas, I've urged everyone in my family to know how to use a gun in self-defense. For the animals [black, hip-hop youth, from an earlier reference] are coming.

I all for firearms for self-defense, but any fool can see that this is written in the first person and includes references to Paul's town and Paul's family. If it's not written by him, it was written by a ghostwriter close to him to appear to be by him.

When I'm writing for a client, I personalize it in similar ways so it sincerely reflects the client; not only his views, but his life. Whoever wrote this, and Ron says utterly unconvincingly that he doesn't know who did, knew Paul and was comfortable writing in his place.

The writing absolutely reflects Paul's views; that's how ghost-writing works. Similar stuff is sprinkled through ten years of Paul's newsletters, and it's inconceivable that he never reviewed a word of it, and never demanded a rewrite. It's also inconceivable that a small-time congressman with a shoestring staff of fellow travelers doesn't know who wrote the piece.

So we're left with only two possible conclusions:

1. Ron Paul is a lying racist, or
2. Ron Paul doesn't know how to manage a staff.

Either option does not a good president make.

Sunday Scan

All The News That Causes A Fit

Speaking hypothetically, if a conservative major MSM outlet (see why we have to be speaking hypothetically?) hired a liberal columnist, would anyone even peep? Well, peeping they are about the NYT's hiring of the Weekly Standard's William Kristol as a columnist.

As the picture shows, Libs aren't too keen on letting Kristol speak his piece, so it'll be nice that NYT readers will now have a weekly wincing and grinding of teeth, as we do on reading any number of their far left "thinkers."

And it's beyond nice to read this in the NYT:

Mr. Kristol, 55, has been a fierce critic of The Times. In 2006, he said that the government should consider prosecuting The Times for disclosing a secret government program to track international banking transactions.

In a 2003 column on the turmoil within The Times that led to the downfall of the top two editors, he wrote that it was not “a first-rate newspaper of record,” adding, “The Times is irredeemable.”

Is redemption at hand? Nah, not by a long shot.

"Considering?!"

If you're planning to become a parent someday, clip and file this one under "What not to do:"

GARLAND, Texas - An essay that won a 6-year-old Texas girl four tickets to a Hannah Montana concert began with the powerful line: "My daddy died this year in Iraq."

While gripping, it was not true .... Her mom acknowledged to contest organizers the claim was made up specifically to win the contest. ...

The girl won a makeover that included a blonde Hannah Montana wig, as well as the grand prize: airfare for four to Albany, N.Y., and four tickets to the sold-out concert on Jan. 9.

The mother had told company officials that the girl's father died April 17 in a roadside bombing in Iraq.

"We did the essay and that's what we did to win," Priscilla Ceballos, the mother, said in an interview with Dallas TV station KDFW. "We did whatever we could do to win."

Winning, Ceballos taught her daughter, is more important than honesty or integrity.

Ceballos and offspring were busted when the Dept. of Defense confirmed that the alleged father, one Sgt. Jonathon Menjivar, did not exist.

Support our fighting men! Kill them fictionally for concert tickets!

Most amazingly, contest organizers, instead of immediately pressing criminal charges against Ceballos so her unfortunate daughter might finally learn a civics lesson, are "considering" taking away the girl's tickets.

Healthy Christian Skepticism

While some famous Christians are hopping on the global warming bandwagon, George Pell, the Cardinal Archbishop of Sydney, isn't so sure. In a year-end column, Pell said:

The Bali summit on the Kyoto Protocol and climate change was a public relations triumph, although I'm hopeful the new government will not impose major costs on the people for dubious versions of climate goals.

We need rigorous cost-benefit analysis of every proposal and healthy scepticism of all semi-religious rhetoric about the climate and, especially, about computer models for the future. It is difficult to predict what the weather will be like next week, let alone in 10, 20 or 100 years.

"Semi-religious?" Pell is being diplomatic, since great faith is required to accept Warmism lock, stock and barrel. (hat-tip: Greenie Watch)


Ron Paul's Medal Mettle

Consistency, blogs Josh Nelson at The Seminal, "is one of Ron Paul's strongest points in his presidential campaign." Put Paul loses his mettle when it comes to Congressional medals.

Nelson points out that Paul voted against awarding custom-made, $30,000 solid gold Congressional Gold Medals to American luminaries, asking "Why should taxpayers pay for these medals?"
Why, then, did Paul earlier submit a bill (which, like all of his bills, went absolutely nowhere) calling for a military metal for everyone who served in the armed forces during the Cold War, from September 2, 1945 to December 26, 1991?

DoD fought the bill. Why? Well, think of the weapons you could buy or salaries you could pay for the loony concept's price tag: $240 million.

More damning than the flip-flop ("I was for costly Congressional medals before I was against them"), is that the supposedly anti-government, pro-individualism Paul was saying in this bill that it didn't matter whether recipients served well, stood out, or accomplished anything during their service; everyone gets a medal.

I've thought many things of Ron Paul, but I've never thought him to be a "trophy for everyone who plays" sort. (Art: Neoperspectives)

The Debate Is Over!

We've heard that one before. Not just global warming, mind you. The debate has long been over on vegetables. Eat 'em raw for max nutritional value; cook 'em and lose some benefit.

Right? Everyone says so! Just like global warming! Think again:

ScienceDaily (Dec. 30, 2007) — In a finding that defies conventional culinary wisdom, researchers in Italy report that cooking vegetables can preserve or even boost their nutritional value in comparison to their raw counterparts, depending on the cooking method used.

Specifics? You want specifics? We got 'em:

In the new study, the researchers evaluated the effects of three commonly-used Italian cooking practices — boiling, steaming, and frying — on the nutritional content of carrots, zucchini and broccoli. Boiling and steaming maintained the antioxidant compounds of the vegetables, whereas frying caused a significantly higher loss of antioxidants in comparison to the water-based cooking methods, they say. For broccoli, steaming actually increased its content of glucosinolates, a group of plant compounds touted for their cancer-fighting abilities. The findings suggest that it may be possible to select a cooking method for each vegetable that can best preserve or improve its nutritional quality, the researchers say.

The lesson: Beware of false algore-ithms.

My Dinner With Grover (And Ron Paul's VP?)

After Ronald Reagan, Grover Cleveland just might have been the last great American president.

That sentiment would have gotten me cross-wise with my hosts last night, who would not have put in the Ronald Reagan qualifier. No, friends, the folks at the Grover Cleveland Social Club hold the 22nd president (and 24th, as Cleveland was the only president to come back after a hiatus and be re-elected) in exceptionally high esteem.

Grover was admirable, indeed, a man of character the likes of which I don't see among any of the current candidates ... although last night's hosts would argue that Ron Paul is Grover Cleveland reincarnated.

Here's a quote that packages Cleveland pretty niftily. In it, he is addressing his thoughts on federal aid to farmers whose crops had been damaged by drought:

"Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character...."

Prescient, huh? Especially from a Dem! The White House's history archives, provide the following brief summary of Cleveland's primary policy efforts:

He also vetoed many private pension bills to Civil War veterans whose claims were fraudulent. When Congress, pressured by the Grand Army of the Republic, passed a bill granting pensions for disabilities not caused by military service, Cleveland vetoed it, too.

He angered the railroads by ordering an investigation of western lands they held by Government grant. He forced them to return 81,000,000 acres. He also signed the Interstate Commerce Act, the first law attempting Federal regulation of the railroads.

In December 1887 he called on Congress to reduce high protective tariffs. Told that he had given Republicans an effective issue for the campaign of 1888, he retorted, "What is the use of being elected or re-elected unless you stand for something?" But Cleveland was defeated in 1888; although he won a larger popular majority than the Republican candidate Benjamin Harrison, he received fewer electoral votes.

Elected again in 1892, Cleveland faced an acute depression. He dealt directly with the Treasury crisis rather than with business failures, farm mortgage foreclosures, and unemployment. He obtained repeal of the mildly inflationary Sherman Silver Purchase Act and, with the aid of Wall Street, maintained the Treasury's gold reserve.

When railroad strikers in Chicago violated an injunction, Cleveland sent Federal troops to enforce it. "If it takes the entire army and navy of the United States to deliver a post card in Chicago," he thundered, "that card will be delivered."

After the last several presidents' failure to control either the size of government or its spendthrift ways, all this sounds positively delightful.

Because the hosts of the evening -- OC Reg commentary writer Steve Greenhut, his former colleague John Seiler and friend Tony Bushala -- are all Libertarians, big and little "L" Libertarians abounded at the event, including Art Olivier, former Libertarian candidate for California governor and U.S. Veep.

Art and I chatted for some time, and he explained why Libertarians run in the face of insurmountable odds. I thought it was to educate and educate and educate people until we get the concepts through our dense heads, a point he agreed with in more polite terms, but he said he runs to keep the party alive.

Eventually, he feels, the stars will align with the right candidate at the right time, and the Libertarians will advance beyond their current place, where they are unable to get any higher than city councils, and break onto the national scene. Until then, his job is to keep the flame burning.

All things are possible, folks. The status quo is not forever. But Libertarian naivety on foreign policy will keep 2008 from being that year.

Olivier also revealed:

• If Ron Paul doesn't get the GOP nomination (and they view that as a big "if"), he will run for president as the Libertarian candidate.
  
  
• He believes such a candidacy will hurt both the GOP or the Dems. He feels if the Dems nominate Hillary, anti-war Dems will vote for Paul, as will GOP voters concerned more about privacy and big government than the War on Terror.
  
  
• He, Olivier, would run for Vice President.

He would be an asset to any ticket -- tall, handsome, well-spoken, personable and approachable. I only wish I would have asked him how he feels about the 9/11 Truthers' Moonbats' attraction to Paul. Who in the world would want to get into office on the shoulders of that sad bunch?

Sunday Scan

Birds (Vultures?) Of A Feather

Why are we not surprised by this bit of news from Fars, the Iranian news propaganda-wire?

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad here Sunday voiced Tehran's support for Zimbabwe's independence and progress, and called for the utilization of all the ample potentials existing for the expansion of Tehran-Harare cooperation.

According to a report released by the Presidential Press Office, the president made the remarks in a meeting with Zimbabwe's new ambassador to Tehran, where he underscored that Tehran perceives no limit to the expansion of ties with Harare. ...

Ahmadinejad praised resistance of the Iranian and Zimbabwean nations against bullying powers, and reiterated, "Iran strongly supports the rights, independence and progress of the Zimbabwean nation."

For his part, the envoy appreciated Iran's support for the Zimbabwean nation against the bullying powers' aggressions, and underlined Harare's resolve to develop all-out ties with Iran and use Tehran's valuable experiences in the various grounds.

Proof here that you can tell a person's character by the company he keeps. The two nations may wish to pause to ask the all-important question: "Why are they bullying us?"

The Betty Windsor Channel

Queen Elizabeth has gone digital, with her own page on YouTube. Until they post her new Christmas message, you can view her first televised message, from 1957, in which she looks up from her written notes and says,

Happy Christmas.

She then looks down at her notes to refresh her memory, and adds,

Twenty-five years ago, my grandfather broadcast the first of these Christmas messages. Today is another landmark because television has made it possible for many of you to see me in your homes on Christmas day.

In 2007, thanks to The Royal Channel, the Official Channel of the British Monarchy, you'll be able to catch Queen Betty on your Iphone at "approximately 3 pm. GMT on Christmas day.'' In the meantime, you can stay pumped viewing such videos as The Prince of Wales Visits the Robert Clack School, Part 1, on the frivolous side and The Queen and Her Prime Minister on the really rather interesting side. It's not every day, after all, you get to hear John Majors talking about the ambiance in these private meetings, "with Corgies scattered about."

But don't expect to find clips of Betty in her bedroom like you'd expect elsewhere on YouTube. This is the Royal Channel, after all, and the real Queen Elizabeth, whomever she may be, is nowhere to be found.

God ... By The Numbers

You can tell a person's perspective on faith by whether they use the words "expressions of faith" or "religiosity" in a sentence like this one:

Our analysis of thousands of public communications across eight decades shows that American politics today is defined by a calculated, demonstrably public _______ unlike anything in modern history.

Kevin Coe and David Domke used "religiosity," so we can suspect how they feel about the rising tide of expressions of faith in campaigning today. But that doesn't take anything away from their article on History News Network, Think Religion Plays a Bigger Role in Politics Today? Y ou're Right. Statistics Prove it.

Coe and Domke point to Reagan's acceptance speech in 1980, when he requested a moment of silent prayer, as the starting point for an era they describe statistically as follows:

If one looks at nearly 360 major speeches that presidents from Franklin Roosevelt to George W. Bush have given, the increase in religiosity is astounding. The average president from FDR to Carter mentioned God in a minority of his speeches, doing so about 47% of the time. Reagan, in contrast, mentioned God in 96% of his speeches. George H. W. Bush did so 91% of the time, Clinton 93%, and the current Bush (through year six) was at 94%. Further, the total number of references to God in the average presidential speech since 1981 is 120% higher than the average speech from 1933-1980. References to broader religious terms, such as faith, pray, sacred, worship, crusade, and dozens of others increased by 60%.

Presidential requests for divine favor also show a profound shift. The phrase “God Bless America,” now the signature tagline of American politics, gained ubiquity in the 1980s. Prior to 1981, the phrase had only once passed a modern president’s lips in a major address: Richard Nixon’s, as he concluded an April 30, 1973, speech about the Watergate scandal. Since Reagan, presidents have rarely concluded a major address without “God Bless America” or a close variant.

What impresses me most in this statement is that those who would have us believe that America is not a Christian nation must deal with the fact that presidents from Roosevelt to Carter, who apparently did not espouse "religiosity," mentioned God in 47 percent of their speeches.

How do you account for that, other than by agreeing that America is, in fact, a Christian nation?

Another Floating Cross

clipped from www.youtube.com

In this clip (which really isn't worth your time viewing) from California's premier conservative political news blog, Flash Report, we see a surprised Cal. Senate Republican leader Dick Ackerman wishing us a Christmas greeting as Flash Report publisher Jon Fleishman drops by for an unexpected visit.

As Fleishman leaves, there is a cross by the inside of the front door, above Ackerman's right shoulder. It seems the "floating cross" introduced by Mike Huckabee is taking the nation by a storm ....

You Must Follow Proper Channels!

Over at the leftist blog Media Matters, we are supposed to be upset because Fox News sourced a story to a ... a ... a ... blog!

On December 21, the front page of FoxNews.com contained a headline under the "LATEST NEWS" tab that read "Report: Over 400 Scientists Dispute Man-Made Warming." However, the purported "LATEST NEWS" item did not link to a news report but, rather, to a post on "The Inhofe EPW Press Blog," the blog of Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK), ranking minority member on the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.

The horror! Unable to say anything to defend the Doctrine of Warmism Infallibility from this nailing of the Thesis of 400 to the digital door of the Church of Warmism, Media Matters can only attack the media, not the message.

Which is why Media Matters doesn't.

hat-tip: Greenie Watch

The Unicyclists And The Feminists

Think a unicycle can teach you nothing about radical feminism? Think again.

A study by a unicycling British professor seeks to trace the causes of humor (to male aggressiveness, it turns out), but along the way trounces the feminist dogma that differences between men and women are environmental, not genetic.

Here's a bit of Science Daily's write-up of the research paper:

Professor Sam Shuster conducted a year long study observing how people reacted to him as he unicycled through the streets of Newcastle upon Tyne. What began as a hobby turned into an observational study after he realized that the huge number of stereotypical and predictable responses he received must be indicative of an underlying biological phenomenon.

The study was an observation of people's reactions to a sudden unexpected exposure to a new phenomenon - in this case unicycling, which at the time few had seen. He documented the responses of over 400 individuals, and observed the responses of many others.

Over 90% of people responded physically, for example with an exaggerated stare or a wave. Almost half responded verbally -- more men than women. Here, says Professor Shuster, the sex difference was striking. 95% of adult women were praising, encouraging or showed concern. There were very few comic or snide remarks. In contrast, only 25% of adult men responded as did the women, for example, by praise or encouragement; instead 75% attempted comedy, often snide or combative as an intended put-down.

Shuster concluded, correctly I think, that the intense aggressiveness of young males, many of whom would try to knock him off his unicycle, was masked with age by biting humor. Caustic, sarcastic, aggressive humor remains the domain of men ... and Rosie.

But why would women react nurturingly to a unicycle, something none of us are exposed to much as we grow? Could it be that women are ... nurturing? And that men are aggressive?

If you are a radical feminist, you can try to discount this via the old toy guns vs. toy dolls arguments, but really, unicycles? Unicycles don't carry a societal perception that is either aggressive or passive; they are merely different, and therefore draw out a purer reaction, a reaction that shows very clearly how different men and women are.

Ron Paul's Biggest Applause Line

Tucker Carlson must be on the outs at MSNBC (and that's the outs of the outs, if ever there was such a thing) because he was recently tasked not just to follow Ron Paul around for a couple days, but to follow him around in Nevada.

He reports that in Pahrump "the crowd went wild, or as wild as a group of sober Republicans can on a Monday night. They hooted and yelled and stomped their feet," when Paul stated that there is no constitutional authority for a federal bank. Later, a Paul staffer confirmed to Tucker that "It's our biggest applause line."

Wow. Carlson has an explanation:

There are two ways to interpret a fact like that: Either the Ron Paul movement is more sophisticated than most journalists understand, or a lot of Paul supporters are eccentric bordering on bonkers.

I'll go with the latter.

Now What?

Ron Paul raised $6 million on the Internet yesterday, topping John Kerry's old record of $5.7 million and adding it to his previous take of $4.3 million.

All we've seen so far from this incredibly swelling war chest is a couple TV commercials that look like it took all of $23.57 to produce. (Granted, I don't live in Iowa or New Hampshire so I may be missing something ... but I'm savvy enough to check out YouTube.)

clipped from youtube.com

This is not a man who is going to win the Republican nomination; not in a million years, not with another $10 million of Internet-raised money. So what happens to Ron Paul when the convention is over and he's flush with cash and has no party to be the nominee of?

In answering another of the planted questions on the CNN/YouTube debate, Paul quickly dismissed any idea that he would run as an independent, but then spent the rest of his answer talking about how strong his campaign is.

Could he influence the nominee on cutting expenses? If so, great, and it could make him happy enough to be quiet and possibly accept a Cabinet position at Treasury or a position on the President's Council of Economic Advisers.

But Paul will not be able to talk the nominee into adopting a cut and run strategy in Iraq, so he ultimately will not be satisfied with the GOP nominee and will be sitting on the sidelines with millions of dollars and thousands of emails every day urging him to run.

The man who asked Paul the planted question, Mark Strauss, although apparently not a Paulite, referred to him as "crazy like a fox." Yeah, but is the emphasis on "crazy," as in crazy enough to run anyway, or on "fox" as in foxy enough to see the consequences of those actions?

It's a very thin line, isn't it, with these "crazy like a fox" types? The 2008 election may very well ride on which side he falls on, and I have no idea which side it will be.

Still No Evidence 9/11 Nuts Rule

I will never refer those who think the US government is behind the attacks on our country on September 11, 2001 as "9/11 Truthers" because from a messaging point of view, the term yields the high ground to the disgusting whackos. So, I'm not happy to pass along this bit of news:

Nearly two-thirds of Americans believe the federal government had warnings about 9/11 but decided to ignore them, a national survey found. ...

Sixty-two percent of those polled thought it was "very likely" or "somewhat likely" that federal officials turned a blind eye to specific warnings of the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Only 30 percent said the 9/11 theory was "not likely," according to the Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll. (NYPost)

Of course, the poll is useless because it phrased its questions to sensationalize rather than gain understanding. It certainly doesn't show that 62% of Americans accept the insane, paranoid, anti-American rantings of the Truthers. Specifically:

• What percent of those answering yes believe a routine transmittal within the intelligence agencies may have been lost in the paperwork?
  
  
• What percentage of those answering yes believe a source that wasn't credible provided information that was ignored for seemingly good reason?
  
  
• What percentage of those answering yes are aware of the many, many threats against America made by bin Laden and others; threats that seemed like huff and puff at the time, but turned out to be significant?

Unless polls ask follow-up questions like that to discern what percentage of people who answer "yes" to the question really think that senior U.S. officials knowingly allowed 3,000 people to die because it furthered their foreign policy and personal wealth objectives, and that the legions of operatives required to carry out the diabolical scheme have remained silent, we will not know what percentage of Americans have sadly fallen into the grip of the Truthers.

Designing polls right so they yield this level of understanding is not the exception; it's the routine. But this poll was designed by the Scripps Howard newspaper chain, so sensationalism clearly was more important than objectivity.

Scripps Howard has not posted a link to the survey instrument itself, which used to be fairly routine, but now stands out as particularly guarded and lacking transparency. If we dig deep into the Scripps Howard coverage of the poll, we find down in paragraph nine that "16 percent of Americans speculate that secretly planted explosives, not burning passenger jets, were the real reason the massive twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed."

That's a fairly good indicator of crazed conspiracy buy-in, but the one Truther I'm friends with believes explosives were planted, but doesn't necessarily believe that the U.S. was the one planting them ... so even a 16% whacko factor may well be nothing more than poor polling resulting in overstatement.

Still, the poll undeniably shows that a significant percentage of Americans believe in anti-government conspiracies. It shows, for example, a narrow majority believes the government is aware of the real truth of the Kennedy assassination and is keeping it secret, and about a third believe the government is keeping knowledge of UFOs and aliens secret.

These likely Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich voters can never answer the question "Why?" Why would no one ever break the silence -- especially on Kennedy or Roswell after all these years? Why did Bush want war in Iraq when he didn't campaign on it?

And most important of all, why would people who have dedicated their lives to serving the most freedom-loving, most transparent government on the planet suddenly stop loving freedom and create elaborate cover-ups of crimes against the country they serve?

Don't count on Scripps Howard to provide any answers.

hat-tip: memeorandum