Head vampire says: 'Leave the fangs alone.'

by Smitty (h/t HillBuzz)

Bernanke, and the rest of the bloodsuckers, need to go.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said curbing the central bank’s authority to supervise the banking system and tampering with its independence would "seriously impair" economic stability in the U.S.

Because $12 Trillion in debt doesn't, you know, count.

A number of the legislative proposals being circulated would significantly reduce the capacity of the Federal Reserve to perform its core functions," the Fed chairman said in a commentary released yesterday on the Web site of the Washington Post. The measures "would seriously impair the prospects for economic and financial stability in the U.S.."

And Heaven favor Ron Paul's economic efforts. Do read End the Fed, by the way.

Bernanke has presided over the most expansive use of Fed powers since the Great Depression. While the 55-year-old Fed chairman has said he averted a financial meltdown, lawmakers have voiced concern about taxpayer-sponsored bailouts and proposed the most sweeping dismantlement of Fed authority since the creation of the institution in 1913.

There are no good reasons that an honest broker fears an audit. If you're the Climate Research Unit or the Federal Reserve, there may be some other motives. One cannot fathom, in a purportedly free society, why we've allowed the Federal Reserve to live as long as it has, given the ruinous policies correlated with its existence.

Or is the value the Federal Reserve adds akin to BHO's "jobs created or saved" nonsense?

How we allow an organization such as the Federal Reserve to exist under our Constitution remains a mystery. If we allow Bernanke's billet to exist un-elected, then why do we bother with the rest of the rituals for Congress and the Executive? No. The Federal Reserve Act was the kind of major change to the fabric of the country that should not have been brought in as mere legislation. Like Social Security, if we want this sort of vampire, we should have a Constitutional Amendment to bare the neck.

Daphne Unmoved by Sarah

by Smitty

Daphne, at Jaded Haven takes some shots at Sarah Palin. As this blog has critiqued Rick Moran on the topic of the lady, it would seem unsporting not to offer similar treatment for Daphne, who is far more entertaining.

I won't be reading her book, she didn't write it and I could not care less about last year's campaign trail. She's a private citizen now, smartly cashing in on circumstance. I wish her well in her commercial endeavors, may she reap the beast of public consumption and grow fabulously rich.

Fair enough.

God help us if her populist drivel ever takes hold, the republic has already been raped to shreds by enough simplistic, pluralist pro-democracy political hacks baying "people power" to the ignorant masses.

Is this a specific swipe at Barack Obama? Are you saying Reagan was populist drivel? Who would you prefer, and how would this person address the real issues of $12 trillion in debt and a vampiric Federal Reserve?

This country's smart modern day conservatives imagine that the perpetual promised land of America's founders is based on a few simple premises; a place where were we are free to achieve, innovate, excel, cash in, choose and create a life without interference from the state. The people who believe in these tenets have no need of populist politicians, yet they continuously embrace their alarmist calls as a last measure, furthering the state into more regulation of man's freedom.

Have you watched the National Debt Road Trip? Have you looked at the vampiric growth of entitlements? It's neither clear that your libertarian state exists, nor that a potential Sarah Palin platform would do, other than (possibly) drive things in that libertarian direction. She could also turn out to be John Sydney McCain in a skirt. It's all unknown. Between the lines of her FaceBook musings, she seems willing to concede the Constitutional ground to the Federal government on health care reform.

Populism is the antithesis of conservatism, it's more socialist happy juice for the underclass, a jizz of simplistic dogma that appeals to ignorant voters, a simple knock down, two step of soft moves for the people, by the people. You'll never have independence when you indicate a willingness to bow to the will of a self-serving, tax-less people. The masses will annihilate your every avenue of success out of sheer, ruthless perversity. They'll vote for your demise out of blind spite. The founders knew this core truth of human nature.

Are you a John Batchelor fan, Daphne? Interestingly, I come from pure white trash roots, yet have managed to score some academic credentials (woo hoo). My observation is that the difference between the populist bumpkins so cheerfully derided by the elitists, and the city slicker elites themselves is the average word lengths used in conversation. People are people are people. If we're going to go down this class stratification road, then let's just punt on the popular vote and let the apparently smarter people just sell us down the river.

The Progressive propellerheads are the authors of the current situation. The nominally conservative, elitist jackasses (everyone since Teddy Roosevelt with the exception of Reagan) have been enablers. The bulk of the GOP hopefuls in play for 2012 have been enablers. John Sydney McCain is an enabler. The difference between BHO and a hypothetical JSM administration, AFAICT, would be the rate of the decline. BHO's Chicago propensity to 'cash in for the homies', if anything, is a feature, hastening the eruption of the crap volcano.

So what I need to see from Sarah, or any other leader worth paying heed, is a commitment to a foundation for diminishing the Imperial Fed. Otherwise, she's just fannying about.

The conservative brands do it as well as the liberal ones, it's all about feeding the state. Our girl Palin is busy shoveling heaping dumb bucketfuls of bromides to that ancient beast of polity. I happened upon a ridiculous post today equating her in fond terms with Thomas Paine. I was appalled at how many ignorant people were lapping this shit up. Are you fucking kidding me? Paine and Palin? That's a partnership that would cause most true conservatives to grab some rope if they didn't immediately succumb to congestive heart failure.

In addition to making a buck, it's quite apparent that Sarah is building up the war chest, and connecting with people in the lower 48. As Dan Riehl notes, she may be making a move in a solid policy direction as early as next year. At that point, like BHO in office, she's likely to start dividing people. Unfortunately, you don't seem aware that "that ancient beast of polity" is really the Federal Government. Also known sometimes as 'Cthulu'.

I would be a happy woman if I saw more people going rouge, questioning the people and parties in power, taking a large step back from the personal and giving the direction of our country a clear hard, dispassionate look. Yeah, that would be good.

You seem to have a tacit assertion here that people have not followed your prescription and arrived at Sarah. Is this some mathematical impossibility?

I, for one, take a similar independent thinking tack. But the ballot requires names. Someone has to be on there. It's quite possible that Sarah will outline a platform that is more GOP RINO swill, should she ever get as far as running in a primary.

Short of seeing the platform, though, your criticisms seem as nebulous as those of Rick Moran. Are you for another candidate, or simply not enchanted with the lady? I'm still in the optimistic corner, myself.

Incompetent dopehead pipe-bomber as dangerous as al-Qaeda, lefty implies

Pathetic Loser No. 1:

Police said no charges have been filed against Mark Campano, 56. Police found 30 completed pipe bombs in his apartment along with components to make more, plus 17 guns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.
Campano is in an Akron hospital with injuries received when one of the bombs exploded. . . .
Campano is a former anesthesiologist who lost his medical license in 2005 because of an addiction to the drug clonidine, according to state records. He had similar problems with the drug as far back as 1994 when he was cited by the West Virginia Board of Medicine.

And here's what a former neighbor said about him:

Barbara Vachon lived next door to Campano at the Center Park Place Apartments for several years and said he was a big reason she moved.
"He was always trying to get me and another neighbor to listen to anti-government tapes and watch anti-government videos," said Vachon. "I would never watch them. He was some kind of radical, and he didn't believe in the government."
"There was a steady stream of creepy visitors going in and out of his apartment," she said.

Well, yeah, the government took away his medical license and busted him for drugs, so an "anti-government" attitude might be expected. Criminals in general are "anti-government." But now meet Pathetic Loser No. 2:

Of course, if this had been a Muslim extremist caught with such an arsenal, we'd be getting talk-show panels on Hannity featuring Michelle Malkin ranting at length about the threat of Islamic jihad, blah blah blah. Not to mention chatty discussion on Fox and Friends and Morning Joe.
But instead, because he's just a white anti-government extremist, hey, let's just give it a big shrug.

Note the apples-and-oranges comparison involved here. A Muslim extremist might be connected to al-Qaeda -- you know, 9/11, embassy bombings, "death to infidels," that kind of thing -- whereas this dopehead loser guy would be connected to . . . ?

Michelle Malkin! Sean Hannity! Fox News!

UPDATE: One of the things that annoys me about this lefty's presentation of the dopehead pipebomber as an "anti-government extremist" is how it is typical of the way liberals argue. Given the liberal predominance in academia and media, liberals become accustomed to debating everything on their own terms.

The only issues that matter are the issues that matter to liberals. And when it comes to discussing those issues, they only wish to discuss certain facts, which can have only one meaning. As much as they love to whine (when losing) that no one recognizez the ambiguity and nuance of the issues, it is liberals who are always oversimplifying things.

Go back to the Matthew Shepard murder, which liberals insisted was a simple story of homophobia, of society's hateful intolerance, of the evils of Christian conservatives, and the need for hate-crime protection for gays.

Alas, the facts didn't fit this narrative. Matthew Shepard was not killed by "society," or by Christian conservatives, he was killed by a couple of two-bit hoodlums. Both of Shepard's killers had records of petty crime (one for dope possession, one for burglary) and neither had any connection to any religious or political organizations at all.

Yet to hear the Matthew Shepard story as told by liberals, you might have thought Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson were hard-core Republican operatives, personally trained as assassins by Jerry Falwell and sent to Wyoming by James Dobson with orders to kill a gay man.

But anyone who tried to point out this discrepancy between the reality of Shepard's murder and the symbolic mythology of "The Martydom of St. Matthew the Gay," was accused of de facto homophobia. In other words, to contest the liberal narrative -- the just-so story of saintly victimhood -- was to invite accusations of complicity in murder. The facts of the case (the identity of the criminals and the nature of their crime) were subsumed by the political template.

So here is this dopehead pipebomber in Ohio -- a genuine menace to society, no doubt -- yet liberals insist the most important facts to liberals are not, inter alia, his evident incompetence or his long history of drug addiction. No, they say, the only thing that matters is that he liked tto "listen to anti-government tapes and watch anti-government videos."

What kind of videos and tapes were these? Heritage Foundation seminars? Alex Jones 9/11 Truth videos? Triumph of the Will? We don't know. There are all manner of things that might be characterized as "anti-government," from libertarianism to anarchism to conspiracy theories. Exactly what Campano's political views were, we don't know and frankly, at this point, it's irrelevant. He wasn't arrested for his ideology, but for making illegal explosives.

Yet here comes the liberal temper tantrum, that this "anti-government extremist" is not getting the same sort of media coverage that he would receive if his name was Abdul and he were inviting his neighbors to watch jihad videos. OK, that's arguably true -- but what's the point?

The point is simply that liberals are desperate to find a symbolic villain who can be used to illustrate the danger of "anti-government sentiment" -- hello, Clay County, Kentucky! -- to serve as an indictment of Glenn Beck, the Tea Party movement and conservatism in general. And thus the bizarre attempt to make the Ohio dopehead pipebomber analogous to al Qaeda, as if the logical alternative to the Bush administration's War On Terror should be an Obama administration War On Right-Wing Extremists.

We could laugh at this, were it not for the reality that such loopy ideas can have disastrous consequences. In the late 1990s, the Clinton administration awared a $1 million Department of Justice grant to Mark Pitcavage to create a program to do "anti-terrorism" training for state and local police. Pitcavage's expertise? You guessed it: Right-wing extremism. So while al Qaeda was plotting the 9/11 attacks, the DOJ was training law enforcement to keep their eyes peeled for militia crackpots.

Now think about the amount of law enforcement manpower devoted to investigating the alleged "anti-government sentiment" in Kentucky that turned out to be suicide. And then compare that to the Army's seeming indifference to the warning signs of the Fort Hood killer.

Ask some of the survivors at Fort Hood if they think we're paying too much attention to Islamic extremism.

Oh, and another point about Gore

by Smitty

The Blogprof has some bunk by Al comparing Global Warming to Civil Rights.

Al's credibility is thoroughly shot. While there is always hope for redemption in the future, at least in the theological sense. However, the present and the past are all suspect.

For example, the 2000 election. Al was on Weekend Update with Seth Myers recently trying to make a dry joke about being a 'popular vote' guy. As we start roasting a few ACORNs over an open legal fire, what revelations about the 2000 election might emerge? Was the whole Florida thing just an attempt to work the refs, as Al Franken more recently did with success?

That's the thing, Al: your reputation is your most vital asset. Your best hope for redemption is to go write a tell-all memoir and just come clean about the whole global takeover plot.

On the subject of great guitar riffs

by Smitty

Dustbury notes a web poll crediting noted Seattleite Jimi Hendrix as having the best guitar riff ever.

I'd like to throw in a vote for Joe Satriani, who admits to being a Hendrix disciple. Here, in probably my favorite track by Joe, he takes the brutally simple figure "da-duh da-duh", and sets it on fire. The whole thing is incinerated by 2:00 into the track.

Then, just to show you what a genius he is, Joe brings it back and works it at a medium pace. The second half of this track seems (to the non-guitarist) to pick up right where Hendrix's reading of "All Along the Watchtower" left off.

"Chords of Life" is off of "Strange Beautiful Music", which is a desert island release, as far as I am concerned.

Update: from the comments, Trio Rypdal does indeed set standards:

'It's a Barnum and Bailey world, just as phony as it can be...'

by Smitty (h/t Rhetorican)

Jacob Weisberg should study climate science, judging by his disconnection with facts:

This conventional wisdom about Obama's first year isn't just premature—it's sure to be flipped on its head by the anniversary of his inauguration on Jan. 20. If, as seems increasingly likely, Obama wins passage of a health care reform a bill by that date, he will deliver his first State of the Union address having accomplished more than any other postwar American president at a comparable point in his presidency.

We can rule out drunkenness. It's not possible to be that blotto and still form words on a keyboard.

Is it religious fanaticism? Mundane wishful thinking? Is Weisburg a member of a sequestered group whose only source of information is Kieth Olbermann?

I think Weisberg meant vilified:

Through the summer, Obama caught flak for letting Congress lead the process, as opposed to setting out his own proposal. Now his political strategy is being vindicated.

Note this disconnection with the Constitution:

For the federal government to take responsibility for health coverage will be a transformation of the American social contract and the single biggest change in government's role since the New Deal. If Obama governs for four or eight years and accomplishes nothing else, he may be judged the most consequential domestic president since LBJ. He will also undermine the view that Ronald Reagan permanently reversed a 50-year tide of American liberalism.

This is as close as I can get to agreeing with Weisberg. The Progressives assert their righteousness based upon the 70 year hang time of FDR's SuckNew Deal. It is true that, in the battle for liberty, the country and its Constitution was flanked by the forces of liberal fascism.

I'm unsure who holds the view that Reagan reversed the decline of American liberty in any way. Ronnie was an overture whose chief boo-boo was in failing to provide continuity for the vision. Bush41 was a reversion to RINOism, as the liberal fascist singularity renewed its zombie-like grasping after our freedoms. The national debt, which Ronnie himself expanded, Weisberg--have you heard of it? It's set to render the rest of the discussion completely irrelevant.

Weisberg's foreign policy paragraph is hilarious in its glaring omissions. The punchline for this little steamer is the last line:

A version of this article also appears in this week's issue of Newsweek.

Oh, Newsweek? In that case, the NEA should commission someone on ukulele to set the whole thing to music:

Michael Gerson describes chronicles is the No. 1 symptom of the decline of journalism

The World's Most Useless Douchebag -- co-author of the infamous sentence, "Herewith, a brief primer" -- decides to do some real reporting. By visiting the Newseum:

Like the nearby Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, the Newseum -- Washington's museum dedicated to journalism -- displays dinosaurs. . . .
Behind a long rack of preserved, historic front pages, there is a kind of journalistic mausoleum, displaying the departed. The Ann Arbor News, closed July 23 after 174 years in print. The Rocky Mountain News, taken at age 150. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which passed quietly into the Internet. . . .
But a visit to the Newseum is a reminder that what is passing is not only a business but also a profession -- the journalistic tradition of nonpartisan objectivity. . . .

(Objectively, Michael Gerson is a douchebag.)

At its best, the profession of journalism has involved a spirit of public service and adventure -- reporting from a bomber during a raid in World War II, or exposing the suffering of Sudan or Appalachia, or rushing to the site of the World Trade Center moments after the buildings fell.

(None of which Michael Gerson has ever done.)

By these standards, the changes we see in the media are also a decline.

(And by any standard, Michael Gerson is a douchebag.)

Most cable news networks have forsaken objectivity entirely and produce little actual news, since makeup for guests is cheaper than reporting.

(Translation: "WWAAAAHH! I'm not on O'Reilly!")

Most Internet sites display an endless hunger to comment and little appetite for verification.

(Translation: "Andrew Sullivan is my favorite blogger.")

Free markets, it turns out, often make poor fact-checkers, instead feeding the fantasies of conspiracy theorists from "birthers" to Sept. 11, 2001, "truthers."

(Translation: "I'm on the payroll of a Saudi-funded think tank. What do I care about free markets?")

Bloggers in repressive countries often show great courage, but few American bloggers have the resources or inclination to report from war zones, famines and genocides.

Next time you're tempted to denounce somebody as a complete douchebag, resist the temptation, because no douchebag is more truly complete than Michael Gerson.

(Via Memeorandum. More from Mark Steyn at NRO and Big Government.)

UPDATE: It would be a terrible thing if anyone resorted to sensationalistic headlines:

Saudi-Funded Pundit Bemoans
Lack of Objective Journalism

Objectivity!

Facts Make Jiggery-pokery Really Arduous

by Smitty

This weeks FMJRA title celebrates a level of global thievery vast enough to make Bernie Madoff blush. The CRU clowns were not only playing fast and loose with grant money, their duplicity has been distorting public policy along heinous lines for years now. May the perpetrators rot.

It's hard to tell whether the Big Lie of global warming exceeds die Große Lüge that the health care debate is become. What amount of cure-worse-than-disease is sufficient to give even modern hyper-partisan über-pragmatists pause? Is it sheer religious zealotry? Do they grasp their wrong-headedness, but need to play out the charade in full, in political tool fashion, for their owners?

May the grace of God continue to empower us to deal peacefully, legally with these destroyers in the 111th Congress.

And now onto our regular FMJRA.

Yeah, Top Ten: Yeah
Special recognition is afforded to Bombs and Dollars for putting us at #7. This is exactly the sort of shamelessness we applaud and encourage.
Not to be outshone, Mulieris Dignitatem inaugurates The Other McCain Award, with a photo hinting at Stacy's heretofore unknown sci-fi alter-ego.

Try-dumb-virate Care:
PelosiCare, ReidCare, ObamaCare, I don't care: it's giving steaming piles of hooey a bad name, like that of the atrocious 111th Congress from whence 'twas excreted.

• Dixinet reveals the surprise identity of Senator Louisiana Purchase.
• Belvedere rounds up reactions and adds some thoughts.

Yeah, I Bought Three Copies:
Gave one away today to someone.

• The Daley Gator hat tips our 11 reporters fact-checking Going Rogue post. Then he suggests Stacy run her 2012 campaign, to which she hasn't exactly committed ATM.

Bill Sparkman Results:
Stacy, of course, owned his own Memeorandum thread on the topic.

• The Reganite Republican Resistance honored Stacy's shoe leather efforts.
• Paco Enterprises: "...once again, the idiots wind up accidentally self-administering suppositories made with their own bottle-rockets."
• The Camp of the Saints picks it up, and offers a roundup coda.

Clubbing SEALs:

• American Power picked up our re-transmit of Blackfive's reaction.
• The Camp of the Saints concurs on the "brick in the wall" observation.

The New Stage in the Struggle:
It will be an open question for historians whether the bizzarre revelations of 2009 for the climate, about ACORN, Insptectors General, and all of the other noise swirling about amounts to a new phase. Bob Belvedere maintains the definitive index on the IG-Gate.

• SI VIS PACEM picked up the post.
• So it Goes in Shreveport links us while rounding up coverage of the Gerald Walpin case, and follows with the Michelle Rhee angle.
• The Camp of the Saints echos the concern.

Rush puts the whole mood to music in this video that might last for too long on YouTube:

South by Southwest?

• Stogie links us, but doubts the lefty drift: "I think it is unlikely that South Park will go too far left. If they do, they will surely hear about it."
• Political ByLine is amazed that the state media can get away with much.
• The Camp of the Saints is moderate in its South Park views.

A Week Without Andrew Sullivan? Not This One:

• The Reganite Republican Resistance picked up on the Andrew Sullivan as anti-Semite question.
• Carol's Closet opines that that Andrew is 'plain nuts'. No salt of the earth on the assortment.
• Dan Riehl points out that some japes are simply unfunny.
• Political ByLine links us in a related post.

Parodies in Paradise

• Fischersville Mike thinks that he created a monster, with the afterbirth of the Copacabana parody. "Its name was RICO. It was a statute..."

Still Unsure Why Rick Moran Torques Me So Much:
The last week afforded a couple of opportunities to rebut Rick.

• Smash Mouth Politics decided she is litmus paper.
• SI VIS PACEM: "I don't care how Moran sees himself, but in framing his argument in Leftist fashion and adopting Leftist premises, it's... difficult for him to make his argument from Conservatism."
• House of Eratosthenes offered a coveted "Best Sentence I’ve Heard Or Read Lately (BSIHORL)" to the following: To tweak Nietzsche, socialism is the opiate of the bureaucracy, but addiction lacks middle ground.
• Paco Enterprises thinks that aspiring to be as smart as Rick Moran is a low bar. Hey, man: 'Set low goals, fail to meet them' is one of my major points in life.
• Bob Belvedere nominates me for Fisk Chef. That would be Stacy. Out here on the porch, I'm just the sous chef. One does not over-rate one's apron.

Your Organization Supports the Opposition:
Stacy managed to post about the CCHD issue in a model of journalistic restraint.

• Da Tech Guy reacts favorably to Stacy's post.

Brewhahah:

• So it Goes in Shreveport slices Stacy's argument thinly, differentiating between genuine enjoyment and foppishness in beverage choice.

Monty Python settles the argument definitively, [NSFW]:

• Dustbury links us with a retro title that is highly appreciated.

Other FMJRA outings:

• The Reganite Republican Resistance, and also here.
• The Blogprof: Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
• So it Goes In Shreveport
• The Daley Gator
• Adrienne's Catholic Corner has a short one, with a picture of a cotton ball disguised as a kitten.
• Fischersville Mike, on the internet, with the Buffet reference.
• Piece of Work in Progress
• Paco Enterprises
• Instapundit
• No Sheeples Here attacks, conquers parade.

Miscellaneous Shouts:

• Fischersville Mike noted the Dennis Moore retirement post.
• American Glob asks if this blog has any ideas about the curious mis-alignment of resources in the war on terror. Yes: involvement. The only reason the left isn't rolling over us is that we're paying attention. No charlatan gets away with anything before the truly attentive audience. What we see is a pile of tripe, but don't let the horror deflect the gaze.
• The Classic Liberal opines that Ed Begley is just plain crazy.

There's your Thanksgiving weekend FMJRA. Technorati still has not technical restoration in sight. Which remains a crying shame. I've got some other ideas, but I need to STFU and implement them before wasting anyone's time on the hand waving. In the meantime, don't let my inattentiveness in the RSS reader get you down. Take action. Mail your updates, corrections, and rubber-chicken floggings to Smitty.

Say it ain't so, Tiger!

Doug Ross alerts us to this sad rumor from TMZ: Before his car accident, Tiger Woods argued with his wife about reports by the National Enquirer that Tiger had an affair with notorious floozy, Rachel Uchitel.

For the record, the floozy has denied the Enquirer story, but who can trust a floozy to tell the truth? More disturbing is the possibility that the golf champion took a mulligan on his wedding vows to Swedish beauty Elin Nordegren.

My advice to you, Tiger? Plead insanity. Because you'd have to be crazy to cheat on her.

Even though those nude photos turned out to be a hoax (we pride ourselves on careful research here), Elin's still a genuine Swedish super-model, not to mention the mother of your children.

The Rod Stewart Celebrity Cheating Rule applies here: If you're going to cheat on a Swedish super-model, it's got to be at least an equal exchange, and a notorious floozy is way below the acceptable exhange rate for Swedish super-models.

Stick with the insanity defense, Tiger. Your car accident? That was obviously a cry for help. This is a good time to reference one of the most inspirational scenes in American motion picture history:

Otter: I'll tell you what. We'll tell Fred you were doing a great job taking care of his car, but you parked it out back last night and in the morning, it was gone. We report it to the police, your brother's insurance company buys him a new car. D-Day takes care of the wreck.
Flounder: Will that work?
Otter: Hey, it's gotta work better than the truth.
Bluto: My advice to you is to start drinking heavily.
Otter: Better listen to him, Flounder, he's in pre-med.

Get well soon, Tiger! Meanwhile, we will continue to investigate rumors that people are doing Google searches for Rachel Uchitel photos. These reports can not yet be confirmed or denied, although if Rachel Uchitel topless or Rachel Uchitel sex video becomes available, we promise to keep our readers informed of the latest breaking developments.

UPDATE: David Frum laments that cable TV news doesn't talk about serious issues. As if the possibility of Tiger Woods cheating on sexy Elin Nordegren wasn't a serious issue. And as if cable TV news could survive without celebrity sex scandals.

Hey, Dave: We can't all be on the AEI payroll, OK? There's this thing called the "private sector," where we greedy capitalists have to figure out a way to pay for our wives' Black Friday shopping sprees.

Professor Donald Douglas ca n explain how this "capitalism" thing works. Supply, demand, yadda yadda.

UPDATE II: Dan Riehl knows the news value of this story. Dan's traffic was through the roof back during the Natalie Holloway heyday.

It is elitism to suppose that political news is the only news worth reporting. As a professional journalist, I've always appreciated the New York Post, which mixes real political reporting with garish celebrity tabloid news. Why does that work? Rule 5(B) explains it:

All politics all the time gets boring after a while. . . . Even a stone political junkie cannot subsist on a 24/7 diet of politics. The occasional joke, the occasional hot babe, the occasional joke about a hot babe -- it's a safety valve to make sure we don't become humorless right-wing clones of those Democratic Underground moonbats.

Relax and have fun.

UPDATE III: Professor Jacobson's speculation was right on target, and Carol at No Sheeples Here exposes the conspiracy against Tiger Woods.

UPDATE IV: Left Coast Rebel tries to cash in on the Google-bomb action. He raises an important question: Did the pressures of fame cause Tiger to stray? I doubt it. Tiger had been world-famous for several years when he married Elin in 2004.

A more likely scenario: The routine of marriage began to feel uncomfortably repetitive to the popular bachelor who had become accustomed to swinging his club freely on the world's finest courses. IYKWIMAITYD.

Tiger Woods certainly wouldn't be the first hubby who, after a few years of golfing the same par-4 over and over, couldn't resist an invitation to tee off on another fairway. At which point, Mrs. Woods decided to remind him of that "death do us part" vow by going upside his head with a 5 iron.

Let's hope this attitude adjustment had the desired effect. Remember, Tiger: She's got a kitchen full of knives, and you've got to sleep sometime.

Random Rule 5: Liv Tyler

Just checking the Site Meter and noticed a click-over from a site called Proof Positive. Couldn't find our link on his page, but I did find some Liv Tyler babe-blogging. Two quibbles:

1. In order to qualify for Rule 5 Sunday inclusion, it is important that you link to The Rules.
2. Generally speaking, we try to keep Rule 5 Sunday at a PG-13 level, so the see-through top photo showing Liv Tyler's nipples might not make the cut.

We'll seek a ruling from Smitty on this one. Thanks for your continued cooperation.

Is Kathleen Parker's evil underrated?

In a wee-hours Twitter rant this morning, after discussing whether the University of Alabama's No. 2 poll ranking was fair (it's OK, and the ranking will take care of itself if the Tide upsets the No. 1 Gators next Saturday), I shared my 2009 Evil Top 10 rankings:

Evil rankings are indisputable: 1. Satan. 2. Auburn.
-- rsmccain

No. 3 is a tie between Charles Johnson and Osama bin Laden
-- rsmccain

Which makes Fidel Castro No. 5, David Brooks No. 6, Kim Jong Il, No. 7, Charles Manson No. 8
-- rsmccain

10th Place (tie): Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Kathleen Parker
-- rsmccain

Naturally, this brought protests: What about Maureen Dowd?

Too bad. This year, Maureen Dowd got knocked off the Top 10 Evil list!
-- rsmccain

No, Kathleen Parker clearly managed to out-evil Dowd this year. Decisions of the judges are final.
-- rsmccain

Today, however, as if she had anticipated her emergence into the Evil Top 10, Kathleen Parker's column appeared on Memeorandum with the headline, "Ten 'principles' could keep thinkers away from the GOP." For some bizarre reason, the column itself has a different headline: "The GOP's Suicide pact," and begins:

Some people can't stand prosperity, my father used to say. Today, he might be talking about Republicans, who, in the midst of declining support for President Obama's hope-and-change agenda, are considering a "purity" pledge to weed out undesirables from their ever-shrinking party.
Just when independents and moderates were considering revisiting the GOP tent. . . .

All of which is in reaction to a proposed resolution -- note the emphasis -- that circulated via e-mail last week among Republican National Committee members. The fact that it was first reported by MSNBC tells you where Kathleen Parker gets her news nowadays, and look how the pro-Obama cable network framed the issue:

This comes on the heels of a rift in the party that was exposed in the once-obscure special election in Upstate New York's 23rd Congressional District, in which national conservative leaders, including Sarah Palin, clashed with national establishment Republicans. The so-called GOP civil war threatens to derail moderate Republican candidacies in heated 2010 Republican primaries already underway. Florida's Senate race is perhaps the best and most prominent example.

For the past year, the mere mention of "Sarah Palin" has been enough to inspire Sully-esque ranting by Kathleen Parker, and she does not disappoint:

The list apparently evolved in response to the Republican loss in the recent congressional race in Upstate New York, when liberal Republican Dede Scozzafava withdrew from the race under pressure from conservatives and endorsed Democrat Bill Owens, who won. Republicans had held that seat for more than a century.
James Bopp Jr., chief sponsor of the resolution and a committee member from Indiana, has said that "the problem is that many conservatives have lost trust in the conservative credentials of the Republican Party."
Actually, no, the problem is that many conservatives have lost faith in the ability of Republican leaders to think. The resolutions aren't so much statements of principle as dogmatic responses to complex issues that may, occasionally, require more than a Sharpie check in a little square.

And the pièce de résistance of Parkeresque evil:

The old elite corps of the conservative movement, men such as William F. Buckley and Russell Kirk, undoubtedly would find this attitude both dangerous and bizarre. When did thinking go out of style? . . .
As Kirk wrote in his own "Ten Conservative Principles," conservatism "possesses no Holy Writ and no Das Kapital to provide dogmata . . . conservatism is the negation of ideology: it is a state of mind, a type of character, a way of looking at the civil social order."

You can be sure that when some latter-day elitist like Kathleen Parker cites Kirk and Buckley, the citation will always be used against conservatives. The elitist versions of Kirk and Buckley are revisionist mannequins, shorn of any unfashionable populism so as to obscure the fact that the conservatism of yore -- when Buckley defended Joe McCarthy and helped inspire the conservative insurgency that made AuH2O the Republican nominee in 1964 -- was thoroughly disdained by the soi-dissant elite of that time.

By the way, it is a myth that Republicans had held the 23rd District seat for more than a century. But Parker's elitist prejudice and her second-hand misperception of the Hoffman campaign derive from the same source: A willingness to accept at face value the spin delivered by the MSM, a gullibility that derives from a belief that conservative media are somehow inferior to their liberal counterparts.

And even though she doesn't mention Sarah Palin in this column, we know who was the target of Parker's ire. It was the hockey mom from Wasilla whose endorsement generated a one-day $116,000 haul for the Hoffman campaign. This is why Parker and other Palin-haters have so vehemently insisted that Hoffman is some sort of far-right extremist.

Parker makes a big point of arguing for intellectual nuance, when she's the one reacting viscerally to even the slightest evidence that the Republican Party might embrace a Palin-style populism.

Well, 2009 is not over yet. At least Charles Manson remains safely behind bars and Ahmadinejad has been quiet lately. Kathleen Parker's evil ranking may require re-appraisal.

(P.S.: If you're wondering why the Gators didn't rate inclusion in my 2009 Evil Top 10, it's because their evil is a transitory phenomenon. If Alabama beats Florida next Saturday, their evil will be vanquished, whereas Auburn is permanently evil.)

Paging Dr. Helen...

by Smitty

Ed Driscoll quotes Andrew Sullivan on his favorite politician:

"The lies of Sarah Palin are different from any other politicians'. They are different because they assert things that are demonstrably, empirically untrue..."

Possibly Dr. Helen could explore whether Andrew thinks he is the Climate Research Institute and Governor Palin is Global Warming. This abnormal psychology theory is wild, I admit, but there is nothing wrong with the theory or the subject that a bit of hockey stick to the noggin can't calibrate.

'Cap and Trade Is Dead'

Well, duh! This is kind of obvious, isn't it? Once the fraudulent "science" behind the global warming scare was exposed, Al Gore became the Piltdown Man of American politics and that whole Kyoto-style agenda was as obsolete as the mullet and parachute pants. Delicious commentary from Eric Raymond:

For those of you who have been stigmatizing AGW skeptics as "deniers" and dismissing their charges that the whole enterprise is fraudulent? Hope you like the taste of crow, because I do believe there’s a buttload of it coming at you. Piping hot.

Unlike crow, schadenfreude is a dish best served cold. And I remind you what I said in June:

The simplest way to define conservatism is this: The belief that liberalism is wrong.

All along, the strongest evidence that anthropogenic global warming (AGW) was a hoax was a simple fact: Liberals believed in it.

Kind of like the Obama administration's economic plan, really. It didn't take any prophetic power to declare last December, "It Won't Work." And the emerging obviousness of the failure of Obamanomics is just further confirmation of the fundamental truth that liberalism is always wrong.

Now, if only we can get liberals to agree that Florida will win the SEC championship next Saturday, an Alabama victory is guaranteed.

(Hat-tip: Memeorandum.)

UPDATE: G.M. Roper:

The recent exposure of emails, data and software from the pre-eminent global warming organization -- the Climate Research Unit -- shows not only that scientists are human and thus tribal, arrogant and sometimes deceitful, but also the modern process is inadequate and antiquated.
Skeptics have argued that critical data had been "cooked," and scientists had been refusing requests for data. Now we know that not only was the data misused and that the scientists had been engaged in a coverup and suppression of dissent, but also that they are not even able to understand their own data. . . .

Read the whole thing. What we need, I tell you, is a scientific consensus that Florida will win next Saturday. Get the CRU working on it. Roll Tide.

Anti-war protest in Frisco

by Smitty

Orgtheory is looking for staff to survey an anti-war protest in Frisco next Wednesday, 02Dec09.

Anyone on the left coast not in the state-run media who has the time is encouraged to check it out. Prime questions are:

1. Do the propaganda organs cover it?
2. Does anything resembling accuracy creep into their coverage?
3. How (in)delicately do the protesters treat the Community Organizer in Chief?

This blog predicts that, depending on the need to deflect attention from ObamaCare and Warmaquiddick, there might be some substantial coverage. Particularly if the pre-printedsigns feature significant Bush-bashing.

Alabama 26, Auburn 21

And all is right in the universe. Maybe I'm broke. Maybe Obama and Pelosi are running America into the toilet. But the Crimson Tide beat Auburn today. Alabama is undefeated going into the SEC title game against Florida next week. That's good enough for me.

UPDATE: Doug at Daley Gator is evil. Tim Tebow is also evil. Yet I wouldn't want anything genuinely bad to happen to either of them.

So I will not, for example, hope that Tim Tebow gets run over by a bus between now and Dec. 5. Because that would be wrong.

On the other hand, hypothetically, if Tim Tebow were to eat some tainted seafood next Friday, so that he is sidelined Saturday by acute diarrhea . . . Well, that would be a mere coincidence.

Which is not to say that I hope something like that actually happens. Because that would be wrong.

UPDATE II: (Smitty) It's one thing to by called evil by Stacy McCain, but when No Sheeples Here concurs, that's what's called a tough blogger day.

Celebrate Your 'Gay Rights' While We Enjoy Our Right to Change Channels

Adam Lambert's defenders play the homophobia card:

When CBS had Adam Lambert as a guest on its "Early Show" Wednesday morning, it may have believed it would placate viewers who were upset when Mr. Lambert had his invitation withdrawn by ABC's "Good Morning America." Instead, the booking has led to further complaints from those who say Mr. Lambert has been subjected to a double standard. . . .
In a statement, the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation said that CBS had been unfair in its treatment of gay performers. "I would have hoped CBS would provide the same treatment for images of gay and lesbian people and not create an unfair double standard that treats our community differently," said the alliance's president, Jarrett Barrios. "CBS regularly shows kisses throughout” its daytime programming. "The kiss was not blurred on ABC nor in news coverage on other networks."

Oh, cry me a rainbow river, you pathetic whiners. Excuse me, but I'm old enough to remember the '70s, when being gay was a personal choice, not a political identity. This idea that TV viewers don't have a right to decide for themselves what is or is not offensive -- an undemocratic impulse, wherein the ideological dogma of the elite must triumph over the common sense of the majority -- is actually a cause of homophobia, and not its cure.

In 2009, homosexuality no longer has the culture-shock value that Lambert sought to exploit. His performance was merely tasteless. ABC, CBS and other TV networks are engaged in a commercial enterprise, and must therefore keep in mind the sensibilities of the viewing public, rather than kowtow to the PC dictatorship of GLAAD.

GLAAD is demanding that TV networks broadcast programming that a majority of viewers don't want to watch -- and implying that TV viewers who change the channel are guilty of a "hate crime."

Laura Gallier has some thoughts on Adam Lambert's unshocking performance, and I have further thoughts at the Hot Air Greenroom.

UPDATE: Let's talk real hate:

Speaking of repulsive scenes on TV: Auburn 14, Alabama 0 in the 1st QTR? That's DISGUSTING!
-- rsmccain on Twitter

'Bama spotted Auburn 2 TDs, just to make it interesting. ROLL TIDE ROLL!
-- rsmccain on Twitter

@Auburnwareagles Are More Gay Than Adam Lambert http://tinyurl.com/ylrkb75 NTTAWWT
-- rsmccain on Twitter

I must clarify that "NTTAWWT" applies only to gays, not to Auburn fans, who are truly disgusting.

UPDATE II: E-mail to a gay conservative:

Thanks for your reply. As I explained at my own blog, I hate the faux-bohemian (faux-hemian?) poseurs who think the bourgeoisie exist only to have their sensibilities shocked. Adam Lambert certainly didn't shock me, except that any singer would be so stupid as to publicly seek the "More Gay Than Clay Aiken" award. In terms of niche marketing, it's not exactly lucrative. The gay audience prefers its men more manly. Unless Lambert is planning on going the camp-drag route, his flamboyant sissy act is a dead end. In a few years, he'll be lucky to get a gig lip-synching old Bette Midler songs in a show bar.
What is repugnant about Lambert is his insulting assumption that he was doing something original, as if we hadn't seen this act before. He is merely rehashing a bogus exhibitionist stance of cultural opposition -- "Oh, look at me! I'm daring! I'm radical! I'm naked!" -- that was transmitted from the '50s beatniks to the '60s hippies and thereafter became a cliche. (When I was a teenager in the '70s, National Lampoon mocked it mercilessly.)
It was not until Madonna came along in the mid-'80s that fake outrage enjoyed any new currency, and then only because Madonna's teeny-bopper fans were too young to remember the '60s. I liked Madonna's first album OK -- "Lucky Star" and "Holiday" were clever -- and was working as a nightclub DJ when it came out. But the ridiculous hype whereby she was presented as an "innovative" artist? Oh, please. By the time she released her coffee-table book, "Sex," in 1992, I'd taken a massive dislike to her -- which was also my reaction to that other '80s "icon," Michael Jackson.
That these third-hand recycled tropes of faux-hemianism are now being fobbed off once more as if they were pioneering artistic expressions is so ridiculous as to deserve laughter. And for GLAAD to pretend that a network's response to audience complaints is "discrimination" or "censorship" is even more absurd. Nobody has a right to perform on national television, and if the producers of the AMA show had told Adam Lambert, "Go away, you talentless twerp," prior to the broadcast he wouldn't have had a legal leg to stand on. But these Official Gay Movement fascisti think that everybody quivers in fear at their bullying tactics, and that nobody will ever call them out for their dishonest thuggery.
Guess what? They're wrong. And I'm sure there are plenty of gay people like you who are sick and tired of being exploited by these Official Gay Movement elitists who are, in fact, just the lavender wing of the Democratic Party. GLAAD doesn't represent ordinary gay people any more than the AFL-CIO represents ordinary blue-collar workers or NOW represents ordinary women.
For that matter, now that I think about it, obnoxious punks like Adam Lambert don't represent most musicians, either. Ted Nugent and Gene Simmons know a thing or two about outrageous showmanship, but I rather doubt they'd endorse the kind of childish stunt Lambert pulled on the AMA. Putting on a show for your audience is one thing; insulting their intelligence is something else. Trying to substitute sexual politics for actual talent is a form of artistic counterfeiting. My advice to Lambert would be to start memorizing Bette Midler lyrics now.
-- RSM

You don't shock us, Adam Lambert. You bore us.

'Jingle jingle,' IYKWIMAITYD

The crass commercialization of Christmas is not my fault, despite my shameless capitalistic exploitation of the holiday season. Indeed, you might say, I'm a victim of this lamentable phenomenon.

My wife and eldest daughter started shopping at 4 a.m. this morning. The bank balance yesterday was somewhat encouraging of a happy holiday season -- perhaps too encouraging, really, because when Mrs. Other McCain returned home at 11:30 a.m., she said, "I'm worried."

"Are you saying you got carried away?" I asked.

"Yeah, maybe a little carried away," she replied, and then gestured toward my computer with a cryptic remark: "Jingle jingle."

You don't need a Secret Decoder Ring to know what that means. Though she is by nature quite thrifty -- how else to support our large family on a freelancer's erratic earnings? -- Mrs. Other McCain is also exceptionally generous.

So it is that the spirit of holiday giving sometimes overwhelms my lovely bride on Black Friday, to such an extent that she temporarily forgets about our overdue car payment. And our past-due cell-phone account. And our overdue heating bill.

"Jingle jingle," she said, meaning that Mrs. Other McCain is now counting on me to do something -- anything -- to prevent an immediate financial disaster. Past performance has inspired in her a remarkable faith in my miraculous ability to generate just enough income to keep us out of the soup-kitchen line, and I dare not disappoint her.

Therefore, her genius husband is now desperately trying to justify Mrs. Other McCain's faith by dreaming up some new incentive for readers to hit the tip jar, on a holiday weekend when blog traffic sucks.

UPDATE: Among the most valuable services I have performed in the past year -- and thus deserving a tip-jar hit for the holidays -- is the inauguration of "National Offend A Feminist Week," which inspired dozens of bloggers to flip the virtual finger to those humorless Womyn's Studies majors and their self-righteous misanthropic flock of fun-killers.

Among the more idiotic claims of feminism is that conservative men are "intimidated" by strong, intelligent women. Like everything else that feminists want you to believe, this is wrong.

My wife is strong and intelligent. Sarah Palin is strong and intelligent. So much for the "intimidation" argument. Of course, my wife and Sarah Palin are also inarguably hot, which feminists are not.

Conservative men don't discriminate against women. We do, however, discriminate against ugly women who can't take a joke, which is what National Offend A Feminist Week is about. And because I dare to speak truth to (ugly humorless feminist) power, you should hit the tip jar.

UPDATE II: Punk-smacking Adam Lambert? Mocking Al Gore? C'mon, folks, you gotta hit the tip jar for that.

Oh, and BTW, Jimmie Bise and I were just on Twitter discussing the possibility of my going to Atlanta next weekend to cover the Alabama-Florida showdown for the SEC title. But my brakes and tires are worn out from all that high-speed Kentucky driving, so you might want to hit the tip jar for that, too.

UPDATE III: Random Rule 5 with Liv Tyler? Bashing snooty elitists like Kathleen Parker? Celebrity sex scandal news with Tiger Woods and his super-model wife? What other blog gives you all that? Hit the tip jar!

Sarah Palin: 'Going Rogue' book tour

Conservatives for Palin has highlights of the first week of the Going Rogue book tour. Anyone who would derogate Palin has to cope with the undeniable fact that she inspire so many people. Kristina is a college student who waited in line in Rochester, N.Y.:

My sister and I arrived at Borders at 2:30am. I was shocked to see so many people lined up this early to see Sarah! So we quickly scoped out a parking spot, parked, and then headed to the back of the line where about 200 Sarah Supporters stood in front of us. . . .
From 3am until it was time to head inside Borders, Katelyn and I bonded with the many people who surrounded us. Most of them were much older then the both of us (my sister 17 and me 20) but our ages were what stirred up a lot of conversation. People were impressed and thrilled to see young Sarah Palin supporters and several people asked why we supported her. Since my sister was still a new comer to politics and to what Sarah stood for and believed in, I took the lead when it came to telling people what I love about Sarah Palin and why I support her. I even did an interview with a local news station and later, while standing in line, I did another interview with a news reporter from my home town. After doing a bunch of talking and two interviews, my sister asked me, "aren't you tired of talking?" My answer to her was, no! Every chance I get to talk about Governor Palin, I feel honored and it's so easy to talk about her to others because I know and admire so much about her! So it's always a joy when speaking about Sarah Palin. . . .

You can read the rest of that.

Holiday Book Sale 2010 Begins!

Last year's Holiday Book Sale was a smashing success, so we're back again for more. Why fight the crowds at the mall, when you can buy books from your favorite blog? Ordering online through Amazon is easy and, through the Amazon Associates program, I get a small commission on each book you buy here. Let's start with three recent bestsellers where I've got a personal connection:

• Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Cronies by Michelle Malkin -- Not only is this the first major book to expose the corrupt background of the Obama administration, including the role of ACORN and SEIU, but it's also the Best. Book. Evah! (That's because my name is mentioned in the acknowledgements on page 291.) Think of it this way: Christmas is about love. You love Michelle, you love me, you love whoever you're buying the book for, and I'm going to love my Amazon commission. What a perfect gift, huh?
• Guilty: Liberal "Victims" and Their Assault on America by Ann Coulter -- OK, so Ann didn't give me a shout-out in the acknowledgements. She did, however, cite me in the footnotes (page 265) for my reporting on a 2007 hate-hoax at George Washington University. Also, I got to hang out with Ann during her visit to D.C. in August. I only hang out with cool people, so all Coulter books bear The Other McCain Seal Of Coolness, even those that don't mention me in the footnotes.
• Going Rogue: An American Life by Sarah Palin -- I covered Palin during the 2008 campaign and, when someone jokingly suggested me to help the Sweetheart of the Heartland write her memoir, I countered with a much better suggestion: Lynn Vincent, with whom I co-authored Donkey Cons. The result? A smash bestseller! Too bad a certain GOP presidential candidate ignored my advice about that Wall Street bailout, but the whole concept of "President McCain" was frightening to the American people, and who can blame them? (Don't Blame Me, I Voted For Bob Barr!) But give Crazy Cousin John this: He made exactly one good decision during that campaign and that was Sarah Palin. Buy her book.

You notice something here? All three of these books are written by smart, powerful, beautiful women -- just like my wife. And my smart, powerful, beautiful wife expects me to make money from this blogging thing, so you should definitely order some books.

Your conservative friends and family members will enjoy these thoughtful gifts. And what about your liberal friends and relatives? Just imagine the look on their faces when they open the package and see what you've given them.

Now, imagine giving your annoying liberal sister-in-law all three of these books: Malkin, Coulter and Palin.

Some things are priceless, and that's a holiday memory you can cherish forever.

What to Give Your Wife for Christmas

(Note to readers: This post will be more enjoyable if you try reading it aloud with a Deep South accent, somewhere in the range between Haley Barbour gumbo and Jerry Foxworthy grits.)

My conservative concern for traditional family values means that I am enthusiastically pro-marriage. In addition to my two decades of marital bliss, with six wonderful children, I'm constantly playing matchmaker with my single friends, trying to hook them up with their soulmates.

Once I get theem matched, I then begin to harass them about getting married -- "When's the wedding? Why don't y'all just run down to the courthouse and tie the knot?" -- so as to avoid a problem caused by long engagements: The temptation to fornication. You might surprised just how commonplace pre-marital sin has become in our society. Or perhaps not.

Pro-family advocacy doesn't end on the wedding day, of course. Once the young lovebirds get lawfully hitched, it's time to start badgering them about making babies. Some suspect me of furthering a clandestine agenda, but my Victory Through Breeding Program is no secret. Between sodomy and abortion (the most important "rights" for liberals), the Democratic Party is charting a path to demographic oblivion, and conservatves can hasten that process simply by doing what comes natural.

The birds and bees. Tarzan and Jane. "Let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel." IYKWIMAITYD.

Despite the genius simplicity of my pro-family agenda -- "Get married and make babies" ain't rocket science, folks -- there remains the problem of divorce. A woman won't get married and breed a Duggar-sized brood if she's afraid her hubby is going to run off with some two-bit homewrecking floozy like Mark Sanford's Argentine tramp. Guys, if you want that long-lasting death-do-us-part deal, you've got to show your wife that you really love her.

Which brings us to the subject of what to buy your wife for Christmas: The Cuisinart Grind and Brew.

Trust me on this one, my friend. Nothing says "love" like the Cuisinart Grind and Brew. Add the beans, add the water, push the button and -- whirrrrrrr! -- just a few minutes later, you've got 10 cups of fresh-ground, fresh-brewed coffee.

Better Marriage Through Technology, you see, because the Cuisinart Grind and Brew comes with a timer-alarm function. Your wife can set it up at night before she goes to bed and at 6:51 a.m., be awakened by the beautiful music -- whirrrrrr! -- of that high-speed bean-grinder going into action, knowing that the coffee will be piping hot when she brings you that first cup of the morning at 7 a.m. And since you don't have to get in the shower until 7:20 a.m. . . .

Well, a little snuggle-time is a fine way to start the day. IYKWIMAITYD. But wait -- there's more!

The Cuisinart Grind and Brew features a thermal carafe that keeps your coffee hot for hours. So if your early-morning snuggle-time leaves you in such a mellow mood that you decide to call in sick at work -- "Hey, boss, I'm sorry, but I think I might coming down with something here . . ." -- that second cup will still be warm when you finally crawl out of bed about 10 o'clock.

Now, some of you fellows may be thinking to yourselves, "Do I really want to give my wife a household appliance for Christmas?" Relax, boys. This isn't like a vacuum cleaner or something. The Cuisinart Grind and Brew is a luxury gourmet experience, especially if you add a few clever gifts under the tree:

• Chocolate Covered Coffee Beans by Caffe' Sant' Eustachio -- Pure luxury from Rome's most famous cafe -- 8.8 ounces of fine beans.
• English Toffee Decaf Coffee by Red Buffalo -- Delicious toffee flavor with no caffeine makes for a relaxing hot cup on a cold winter's night -- 12 ounces of fine beans.
• Dark Roasted 100% Kona Coffee by Hawaii Roasters -- Why worry about all that "fair trade" crap from South America and Indonesia, when you can enjoy this delicious product of American imperialism? Dark roasted for that hard-core caffeine jolt to get you going in the morning -- 16 ounces of fine beans.
• Dark Chocolate & Mint Squares by Ghiradelli -- Coffee and chocolate go perfectly together, and Ghirdelli is the world's finest -- 5.32 ounces of deliciousness in a gift bag. If your wife likes dark chocolate, she might also like their Twilight Delight Intense Dark 72% Cacao Chocolate. For a more varied selection, give her Ghiradelli's Ghiradelli Holiday Assortment, which comes in an attractive gift tin.
• William Wallace Shortbread Highlanders by Walkers -- OK, she's got the coffee, she's got the chocolate -- what's missing? Cookies! And these delicious shortbread cookies are 29% butter. They come in a beautiful 14-ounce tin commemorating Scottish freedom fighter William "Braveheart" Wallace, so the missus can indulge her Mel Gibson fantasies, too.
• Imported Scottish Pure Butter Assorted Shortbread Cookies by Walkers -- Yes, my friends, this lovely gift tin contains the motherlode: Nearly four pounds of high-calorie, cholesterol-filled goodness. And smart husbands know the secret message here: "No, honey, you're not getting fat. There's just more to love."

Well, there you have it, fellows. The secret of a long, happy marriage is to give your wife something thoughtful for Christmas.

The best part? You can remind her how much you love her 364 days a year, just by saying those magic words that every woman longs to hear: "Hey, honey, can you fix me another cup of coffee?"

Merry Christmas, y'all!

UPDATE: Addressing some reaction to my pro-family agenda. Also, trying to explore new frontiers in shameless capitalist blogging.

Whom You Hire Matters, but How Much?

by Smitty

I think Obama's Parade of Rookies a red herring. If you're driving toward a brick wall, it really doesn't matter whether you're coasting in, or all ahead full-tilt boogie. You smack the wall, the Corvette's modern art, and your name is not Rick Allen.

Consider:

• The national debt.
• The cancerous growth of entitlements.
• Budget deficits that are encouraged by Congress.
• The calls for more idiocy in the form of Obamacare and Cap & Trade.

Wildly inappropriate for Thnanksgiving, yet still a fine summary: If you listen to fools, the mob rules.

Ed Driscoll quotes Jonah Goldberg, quoting Paul Krugman, emphasis mine:

For years, conservatives and liberals have flirted with the idea of disposing of the fool's errand of bipartisanship. Seeking compromise with partisans across the aisle is a recipe for getting nothing important done.

For liberals, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has been a leader of this school. In 2007, Krugman wrote in Slate magazine that progressives should abandon any pretense at working with Republicans. The "middle ground," he wrote, "doesn't exist — and if Democrats try to find it, they'll squander a huge opportunity. Right now, the stars are aligned for a major change in America's direction. If the Democrats play nice, that opportunity may soon be gone."

Krugman speaks truth. As with malignant cancer, there is no middle ground with this socialism. Anyone calling themself a "Progressive", Democrat or Republican, intentionally or idiotically, supports the destruction of the country. The coward-driven Cloward-Piven Strategy is just such a chaser to FDR's free-basing of the Constitution:

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all regardless of station, race, or creed.
Among these are:

• The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the Nation;
• The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
• The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
• The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
• The right of every family to a decent home;
• The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
• The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
• The right to a good education.

The lack of a medium like the netty-tubes in 1944 meant that there was much less chance for people to say: "Hey, FDR: 'We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights' is a steaming loaf of crap. Article V, mike foxtrot--have you heard of it?" Krugman echos this anti-Constitutional idiocy: "the stars are aligned for a major change in America's direction".

The stars are aligned for a restoration. It's either the original, Federalist direction, and let the States succeed or fail on their own merits, or unknown economic chaos. There is scant room for compromise with Cloward-Piven. States should follow that road to hell at their discretion, but the country as a whole must reject it.

We come full circle to the inexperienced cabinet question. If the remedies under discussion fail to address the strategic issues, then, tactically, you may as well put Conor Friedersdorf in there.

But, hey, it's thanksgiving. Ending on a downdbeat note is among the few things I ain't goin' to do. I'll leave you with kind of an old clip of Stacy enumerating just a few other things that we ain't.