Liberal love

Got this e-mail today:

wow
you are really a piece of pure, rancid filth.
but, then so are most fascists and cheney regime apologists/supporters/ass lickers.
what an utter waste of flesh you creeps are.
have a nice day!!

My correspondent didn't say what I'd done to upset him, but I suppose it was my argument that Halliburton/KBR cannot automatically be assumed responsible for the rape of one of its contract employees in Iraq.

That argument was linked at a left-wing blog, where it was suggested that I was endorsing rape. In fact, I was arguing against the "sue somebody" mentality of tort lawyers who will seize on any opportunity to stage courtroom raids on the profits of major corporations:

Americans routinely sue their employers for millions, then have the effrontery to complain about the lack of "good jobs."

Because KBR is (or was) a subsidiary of Halliburton, and because Cheney was once CEO of Halliburton, some people are willing to believe anything bad they're told about the company. As I said, "the facts of the legal case remain to be examined," but it seems to me a stretch to assume that KBR bears civil liability for a criminal act like rape, an act that the company itself surely condemns.

Why do our ACLU-loving liberal friends never extend the "presumption of innocence" to corporations? Do the stockholders of KBR have no rights?

Media bias in 1,311 words

Newsweek's 3,400-word preview of an Obama-McCain general election campaign draws a 1,311-word response from John McCain campaign aide Mark Salter:

The Obama senior staffers were described as idealists and decent sorts, and [ju-jitsu] experts who could use Republican Party smears and deceitful tactics against their authors. I’m sure both David Plouffle and David Axelrod are fine, upstanding citizens. But the former ran a campaign for Senator Torricelli and the latter worked on the campaigns of Mayor Daley. I don’t remember those campaigns being notable for their delicate courtesy and softball tactics toward their opponents.
Without a trace of skepticism, your reporters embraced the primary communications strategy the Obama campaign intends to follow: any criticism of their candidate is a below the belt, Republican attack machine distortion that should discredit the authors. And any attempt by our campaign to counter that suggestion will be dismissed as a rant.

(Via Hot Air Headlines.) What any media critic should notice about the Newsweek article is that it starts with a leisurely 320 words humanizing Obama -- feet up on the table, adjusting his socks, etc. -- before introducing the Republican opposition thus:

The Republican Party has been successfully scaring voters since 1968, when Richard Nixon built a Silent Majority out of lower- and middle-class folks frightened or disturbed by hippies and student radicals and blacks rioting in the inner cities.

Then a Clinton adviser is quoted saying their campaign has been holding back on negative attacks on Obama, but:

The Republicans "won't suffer from such scruples," this adviser says. Sen. John McCain himself has explicitly disavowed playing the race card or taking the low road generally. But he may not be able to resist casting doubt on Obama's patriotism. And the real question is whether he can -- or really wants to -- rein in the merchants of slime and sellers of hate who populate the Internet and fund the "independent expenditure" groups who exercise their freedom in ways that give a bad name to free speech.

The "merchants of slime and sellers of hate who populate the Internet"? Right. And they're all Republicans.

What I gather from this Newsweek article is that there isn't a single conservative with any influence in their newsroom. Otherwise, at some point in the editorial process, somebody would have called Evan Thomas and Richard Wolffe into a conference room and said, "Uh, guys, let's go over this story. What's the concept here?"

This isn't an opinion column. It's the cover story. You cannot flatly assert, without evidence or argument, that the GOP's electoral success is entirely dependent on "merchants of slime."

The article describes David Bossie of Citizens United as being "already deep into a mudslinging campaign against Obama." What has Bossie done? He's commissioned a documentary film about Obama. Bossie's a conservative, and I presume that the film will be as effective as "Hillary: The Movie," which Citizens United released in January. In fact, I interviewed Boss at the movie's DC premiere:

"We already have our research staff working on Obama and, if he is the nominee, we will have a film out this summer, just like this one," said David Bossie, president of the conservative group Citizens United and executive producer of "Hillary: The Movie," which premiered last night in Georgetown.

That movie wasn't just right-wing "mudslinging," and I don't expect the next one to be. To characterize a critical documentary as "mudslinging" is to dismiss and malign it -- and the Obama movie is still months away from completion.

A very bad idea

Nude vacation resorts. Notice that none of the nude vacationers pictured in this New York Times travel feature are young and attractive.

A bunch of ugly old naked people? That's not a vacation. That's day shift in a nursing home: "Are you ready for you bath, Mr. Ferguson?"

People have been pushing this nudism thing for years, and yet the people involved with it continue to be the same old freaks. Nudism sounded interesting back in the '60s, when groovy hippie chicks were getting naked at Woodstock or letting it all hang out at a commune in the woods with a Zen guru. Far out! Peace! Love!

That all ended when the hippie chicks discovered capitalism, which eventually led to nudie bars. None of those women in the New York Times article about nudist resorts was good-looking enough to work in a nudie bar. Heck, a couple of those dames looked like they could be bouncers in a nudie bar.

So, basically, this $300-a-night nudie resort in Mexico is about a bunch of sick old freaks and their fat ugly girlfriends walking around naked.

Paying $300 a night to hang out naked in Mexico with a retired insurance executive named Bernie? No thanks, I'll stay home.

Say it ain't so, Rush!

Rush Limbaugh:

"One of my next objectives is to try and convince Republicans to cross over and vote for McCain down the road," he quipped.

(Via Hot Air.) Not me. McCain threw away that chance when he tried -- not one, but twice -- to push amnesty through the Senate. No votes for amnesty and no votes for those who voted for amnesty. Ever. Period.

Confused women in W. Va.

A mass mailing leads to mass confusion:

The Secretary of State's office is reminding first-time voters that the deadline to register to vote in Tuesday's primary already has passed.
Betty Ireland said she's worried that a mass mailing aimed at getting young women in West Virginia to register to vote might cause confusion.
A group called "Women's Voices. Women Vote" sent out more than 16,000 mailers to unmarried women in the state after April 22, the last day to register in time to vote Tuesday.
People who've never voted can still register, but they won't be eligible to cast a ballot in the primary.

Confused women, running late. No surprise there.

You may remember "Women's Voices. Women Vote" (WVWV) as the group responsible for the suspicious North Carolina robo-calls. WVWV has received grants from the left-wing Tides Foundation. In March, WVWV was one of several groups (including La Raza, ACORN, Move.org and the AFL-CIO) that announced a coalition to make "the most expensive mobilization in history" for voter turnout this year.

Can't wait to see Don Surber's reaction to this news. What? West Virginia women weren't confused enough already, without these "outside agitators" coming in to confuse them further?

One question

Why hasn't he resigned already?

Vito Fossella's admission that he fathered a love child exposed another of his lies: He had told his girlfriend he was separated from his wife, the Daily News learned
Friday.
Retired Air Force Col. Laura Fay told those around her recently that the Staten Island congressman had split with his wife, Mary Pat, one source said.
"Fay thought - up until the release of the statement - that Fossella was separated," said the source, who is familiar with the relationship.
The source said Fay learned of the lie when a friend who saw a draft of Fossella's statement realized it didn't say he was separated.
Fossella, who has always stressed "family values," admitted Thursday in the statement that he fathered Fay's 3-year-old daughter during an illicit affair.
The revelation came a week after he was charged with drunken driving in Alexandria, Va., and seemed to tear apart the family.

Let's face it: When the phrases "love child," "illicit affair" and "drunken driving" occur in the space of six paragraphs about one congressman, that story is eventually going to end with "resigned in disgrace." Some scandals are survivable; this isn't one of them. Why is Fosella delaying the inevitable?

UPDATE: Just got an answer:

GOP strategists are debating whether he should resign or announce that he will not seek reelection in November.

"GOP strategists"! Your married Catholic congressman fathers a love child and gets busted for drunk driving, and you need "GOP strategists" to tell you what he should do? This reminds of the "GOP strategists" who thought Bob Ney could try to hang on in Ohio. Instead, he waited until August 2006 to announce he wouldn't seek re-election, and helped drag down the entire Ohio Republican Party with him.

OK, if only "GOP strategists" are allowed to participate in this discussion, I hereby declare myself a "GOP strategist": Vito Fossella should have resigned long ago, but at this point, first thing tomorrow morning will suffice.

The right history of the Left

Kathy Shaidle reviews Daniel Flynn's new book:

[T]he Left has always attracted very peculiar people who’ve preached very peculiar "solutions" to life's "problems." In fact, the sameness of the Left as chronicled by Flynn actually illustrates the conservative view of life: that human nature is fallen, universal, and cannot be permanently altered for the better through education or engineering.
Certain leftist types turn up again and again through the centuries, brought back to colorful life in Flynn's book: fanatics, altruists, adventurers, splitters, spiritualists, free spirits, and one particular type Flynn dubs the "puritanical perverts": Alfred Kinsey, Timothy Leary, and other "overbearing personalities whose zeal for sex, drugs, or whatever other pleasure made them paternalistic libertines."
What they all have in common, Flynn writes in Conservative History, isn't a "laundry list of complaints and wishes" so much as "an attitude": "It is, in its simplest form,
scorn for what is and hopes for what could be. The ideology's appeal exists in neither the experienced past nor the concrete present, but in the imagined future."

By all means, read the whole thing. I first encountered Flynn through his excellent 1999 pamphlet, Cop Killer: How Mumia Abu-Jamal Conned Millions Into Believing He Was Framed. That pamphlet demonstrated Flynn's deep understanding of how liberal media engage in what can only be called propaganda -- dishonest communication intended to propagate false belief. In Cop Killer, Flynn explains the facts of the killing of Officer Daniel Faulkner, facts that Mumia's media enablers routinely ignore. No honest person can read Cop Killer and still buy into the "political prisoner" nonsense promulgated by the "Free Mumia" idiots.

It is not surprising, therefore, that the author of Cop Killer should win praise for his latest work.

Did KBR rape Jamie Leigh Jones?

UPDATE: Greetings TBogg/Firedoglake readers. In fact, contrary to what you read there, I am a former employee of The Washington Times (resigned in January) and this post is not about "the bitch obviously had it coming," it's about whether KBR should be held corporately responsible for criminal actions it neither authorized nor condoned. -- RSM

She'll get her day in court:

A Houston woman who says she was gang raped by co-workers at a Halliburton/KBR camp in Baghdad won a major court battle late Friday when a Texas judge ordered that she can bring her case to court instead of forcing her into secretive arbitration proceedings with Halliburton and KBR. . . .
Jones says that after she was raped by multiple men at a KBR camp in the Green Zone, the company put her under guard in a shipping container with a bed and warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be out of a job.

I don't think she's doing the lawsuit to get rich. Her lawyer, yes; herself, no. She'll get hers from the book deal and the movie rights. Excuse my extreme cyncism, but Jamie Leigh Jones' story has got "NYT bestseller/Oscar-winning movie" written all over it.

Gang rape is a crime, and the perpetrators should be punished, but Halliburton didn't rape Jamie Leigh Jones.

Halliburton hired Jones, and also apparently hired her rapists, but gang-rape was not any part of Halliburton's policy. They're in the engineering services business, not the rape business. They don't make a profit from rape, and yet somehow are being held financially liable for the criminal conduct of the persons unknown accused of raping Jones.

There was also an alleged cover-up:

According to her lawsuit, Jones was raped by "several attackers who first drugged her, then repeatedly raped and injured her, both physically and emotionally."
Jones told ABCNews.com that an examination by Army doctors showed she had been raped "both vaginally and anally," but that the rape kit disappeared after it was handed over to KBR security officers.

If, as she alleges, security officers destroyed evidence of the rape, then by all means those security officers should be held accountable, just as the rapists should be held accountable, and whoever imprisoned her in a shipping container should also be held accountable. However, this kind of accountability -- punishing actual wrongdoers -- is not what the Jones lawsuit is about. What this lawsuit is about is a tort lawyer financially raping the stockholders of a major corporation.

The cost of this lawsuit will be borne by stockholders in Halliburton/KBR, stockholders who were not party to the crime, who would never condone such crimes, and who yet are being held accountable for these crimes. How so?

In her lawsuit, Jones' lawyer, Todd Kelly, says KBR and Halliburton created a "boys will be boys" atmosphere at the company barracks which put her and other female employees at great risk.
"I think that men who are there believe that they live without laws," said Kelly. "The last thing she should have expected was for her own people to turn on her."

In other words, it's like the "hostile environment" aspect of sexual harassment case law, the Catch-22 of equal rights. On the one hand, if KBR had refused to hire a woman for Iraq contractor employment, they'd have been guilty of illegal discrimination. On the other hand, they send a 20-year-old blonde into a male-dominated work environment in the middle of a war zone and she gets raped, and the corporation is held liable for the crime.

Did the board of directors approve a "boys will be boys" directive for KBR's Iraq barracks? Which vice-president of KBR signed off on the memeorandum that "created" that "atmosphere"? But the lawyers for Jones know that the jury that hears the case won't think logically. Instead, the jurors will decide that KBR is rich, and the plaintiff is poor, and something bad happened, therefore the company should shell out millions of dollars -- and the tort lawyer will buy himself a new houseboat.

In its own way, this is a legal abuse as bad as the McDonald's coffee lawsuit. I have all the sympathy in the world for a rape victim, but sympathy is not law.

The employees who go to Iraq to work for KBR are all adults. One wonders what policy KBR might have instituted to prevent male-female fraternization in its Iraq barracks without being accused of illegal discrimination.

Given that such fraternization was permitted, the law of large numbers would suggest that among the thousands of men working for KBR in Iraq, some few would be willing to participate in a gang-rape. (She says she was drugged; claims of being dosed with "date-rape drugs" mysteriously proliferate in the era of Jello shots. Note that Jones was below the legal U.S. drinking age at the time of this incident. Don't 20-year-olds ever get just plain-old drunk anymore? What did gang-rapists do before the discovery of Rohypnol?)

While the facts of the legal case remain to be examined, I have a hard time figuring exactly how the rape of Jones results in corporate culpability on the part of KBR. Americans routinely sue their employers for millions, then have the effrontery to complain about the lack of "good jobs."

Mr. Reform's glass house

Kind of a problem to be the candidate who crusaded to "get big money out of politics," then you pick a lobbyist to run the Republican Convention:

The public relations executive whom Senator John McCain’s campaign had chosen to run the Republican National Convention this summer resigned his post on Saturday after a magazine reported that his firm had lobbied for the military junta that runs Myanmar.
The executive, Doug Goodyear, said in a statement that he was stepping down as the coordinator of the convention, which will be held Sept. 1-4 in Minneapolis-St. Paul, “so as not to become a distraction in this campaign.”
“I continue to strongly support John McCain for president and wish him the best of luck in this campaign,” the two-sentence statement concluded.
Mr. Goodyear is the chief executive and a founding partner of the DCI Group. . . . He offered his resignation after Newsweek reported that his firm had been paid $348,000 in 2002 to represent the junta.

See, that's why I'm "The Other McCain," to make clear the distinction between myself and McCain-Feingold, Kennedy-McCain and now Myanmar McCain.

(Via Memeorandum.)

UPDATE: Thanks for the link, Michelle Malkin, who notes this Pittsburgh Tribune-Review column about Myanmar McCain's "outreach":

McCain had made significant progress in reaching out to conservatives over the last month or so. But his La Raza embrace is a serious lapse of judgment, one of a number of lapses that, if the primaries are a valid indicator, could lead to a full quarter of the Republican electorate staying home on Nov. 4.

Reaching out? I certainly didn't notice any "reaching out" to conservatives, but maybe I wasn't paying attention. Did he call for the repeal of McCain-Feingold? Did he repudiate No Child Left Behind and the Medicare prescription drug bill? Did he at least do the Obama "mistake" move and "distance himself" from Ted Kennedy?

No, he did none of these things. He's an unrepentant RINO -- a La Raza RINO! Good luck with that in November.

UPDATE II: A second McCain campaign aide has resigned over ties to DCI.

UPDATE III: Linked at Free Republic, where someone posted this clever Photoshop job:

Hillary's volunteers

Georgetown University law professor Heidi Li Feldman hits the road for Hillary, cross-posting at Taylor Marsh's site:

I am passing through Boonsboro, on the cusp of West Virginia. Not 100 miles from DC and we are in the Shenandoah mountains. Farms, cows. More cows. Getting out this way sparks many thoughts. ...

Actually, Dr. Feldman (since Boonsboro is just a few miles down MD-66 from my house) you're in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The Shenandoah Valley (like the river for which it is named) is south of the Potomac River, on the Virginia/West Virginia side.

But yeah, "farms, cows" -- although most people in rural areas nowadays aren't farmers and don't live on farms. They live in the small towns or in the new developments. Many are retirees, but others commute to jobs in bigger places like Frederick, Hagerstown, Martinsburg or the Dulles region. I commuted all the way from Hagerstown to DC (about 150 miles round-trip) five days a week for nearly five years. Dr. Feldman continues:

Literally just crossed into West Va. Crossed the Potomac after Antietam Battleground. Not far from Harper's Ferry where John Brown made abolitionism famous. Not a bad jumping off spot to fight for the cause. ...

Antietam National Battlefield Park, to be exact. I'd be happy to give you a guided tour sometime (my Facebook profile picture was taken at Burnside's Bridge). And abolitionism hadn't been exactly obscure before the perpetrator of the Pottawatomie massacre showed up in the Old Dominion. But I digress. Back to Dr. Feldman:

Headed straight to the Clinton campaign office. Just saw the first Clinton yard sign just outside of Shepardstown.

Shepherdstown, where I covered Hillary and Chelsea on Wednesday. Back to Dr. Feldman:

Campaign staff in Charlestown: Clinton roaring in other parts of West Va., but in this pocket, eastern area, things are tighter. So they were delighted to have us turn up. We headed out with signs and spirit. ...
Hit the campaign office in Charlestown, West Virginia at 3:30 or so. Focus for the day: visibility. Paint the town with a presence for Senator Clinton.

This is what's called a "honk-and-wave." Perhaps not the ideal way for a campaign to utilize the skills of a Georgetown law professor. The Eastern Panhandle is the most affluent part of West Virginia (lots of prosperous retirees), it's home to Shepherd University, and also has a larger black population than the rest of the state, so it is one of the better Obama regions. Other Obama bastions in the state are Morgantown (where the state university is located) and the state capital, Charleston (not to be confused with Charles Town). Dr. Feldman continues:

Erin and I, another out-of-stater who had arrived to help, gear up. I put stickers all over myself, grab a placard. Erin, grabs a big triple sign. The campaign asks us to go to Martinsburg, a town about 20 miles away. Nisha, the campaign rep, explains that there is a major mall there and they need us to get people's attention. . . . I slap a sticker on my forehead. But Erin makes me take it off, which I do only because she sticks some extras on my back.

At this point in the narrative, I was wondering: "Who's Erin?" Is she the "loyal spouse" referred to as providing "crucial help" in Dr. Feldman's personal blog? One of those "Massachusetts marriages"? Couldn't find enough biographical material online to confirm or deny such a suspicion, although Dr. Feldman does refer to her "calico catties," which means she's definitely . . a cat blogger. (Lesbians I can cope with. Cat-blogging law professors? Shudder.) Dr. Feldman continues:

Erin is a champion hand-waver. She just connects with the drivers who see her waving. Meanwhile, in my demure and shy way, I'm jumping up and down with my placard. Right away we get positive feedback: many folks -- of all ages and races (many blacks, many whites, some browns) -- give us a thumbs up. If they honk for Hillary, I do a little jig for them and that seems to make the next car inclined to honk too. Meanwhile, the brave Erin kindly continues to act like she knows me and is not afraid.
Of course, not everybody who sees us is so thrilled we are there. Most are courteous, a very few quite rude. The occasional person shouts to us, in a not unfriendly way, "I like Obama." To anybody who shouts out this difference of opinion in a civilized manner, I shout back: "Free speech -- I love that!" And I do. Often, the other person gives me a smile and a wave.

I like how Dr. Feldman makes mention of the diversity (blacks, whites, browns) of the passersby in West Virginia, as if to point out it's not all toothless hillbillies. I wonder if the "few very rude" reactions are (a) Obama supporters, or (b) Republicans who haven't gotten the "Operation Chaos" message yet. Dr. Feldman continues:

Martinsburg is a like a lot of towns in this country. There are literally two sides of the tracks. We are at the mall on the less wealthy side. The area is not poverty-stricken, but it is just the sort of place that needs somebody with Senator Clinton's economic plans and commitment to universal healthcare. And it is easy to see why Senator Clinton can win West Virginia in a match up against John McCain. These people seem down to earth, they know about needing energy and commonsense to solve problems. Senator Clinton's style and ideas definitely seem to resonate with them.

Among the reasons Martinsburg is not "poverty-stricken" is that, for starters, it sits alongside I-81, about 20 miles south of I-70 and about 40 miles north of I-66.

That is to say: Taxpayer investments in transportation infrastructure have helped spur economic development in the lower Shenandoah Valley. Down in Georgia, where I come from, every small-town Chamber of Commerce is all about roads, roads, roads, because they know that means jobs, jobs, jobs, which in turn means growth, growth, growth. Build good roads, keep the taxes low, educate your workforce, and the jobs will come. (Right-to-work laws are also a big help.)

Martinsburg has benefitted economically from its proximity to Virginia, which has followed the same "Sun Belt" growth strategy as Georgia, while politicians in West Virginia have been slow to figure it out. For so long, West Virginia was all about resource extraction, and seems to have developed a class-warfare politics with the mine operators and the UMW as the dominant competing interests.

But once coal-mining was mechanized (resulting in greater efficiency and fewer of those pick-and-shovel jobs) West Virginia seems to have had a hard time letting go of the industrial-era politics of the past. Thank God that Georgia had forward-looking political and business leaders, or Georgians would still be sitting around, poor as dirt, complaining about low cotton prices and the closing of the textile mills.

OK, so much for the lecture on political economy and post-industrial development. Back to Dr. Feldman:

I drove a a 30 or 40 mile circuit around the area today. Lawn signs everywhere: in front of homes, at intersections, alongside farmers' fields. Signs for mayoral candidates. Signs for people running for sheriff. Signs for people running for county clerk. And in one patch, big signs saying "No Zoning" - obviously in that area there's a ballot question on the issue! . . .

God bless the anti-zoning people. Zoning is fascism, a violation of property rights. Back to Dr. Feldman:

Saw some [signs] for Senator Clinton, some for Senator Obama. No clear majority either way, based on my entirely unscientific viewing. What stood out loud and clear was an absence of McCain signs - although there were a fair number of ones for Ron Paul. Guess what this means? Based on what I can see of their signs, the people of West Virginia are not jumping to vote for John McCain. But the Democratic Party has to give them a candidate they can get behind, who will bring them to the polls to vote Democrat in November.

We'll see. Counting yard signs in May isn't likely to tell us much about election returns in November. Paying too much attention to broad trends in partisan alignment can lead to overlooking the fact that elections come down to the candidates. A good Democratic candidate can win in a Republican state (e.g., Webb in Virginia) and a good Republican candidate can win in a Democratic state (e.g., Schwarzenegger in California).

Dr. Feldman's comment about the number of Ron Paul signs echoes the remarks of an Obama operative in West Virginia I spoke to last week. This operative, a young Harvard grad, was impressed with the level of support for Ron Paul he'd encountered in the state.

A big part of the Ron Paul boom is anti-war conservatives, and another part is hard-core First/Second Amendment types who don't appreciate being muzzled by McCain-Feingold. A big part is undoubtedly the libertarian "Potheads for Paul" factor: People who (a) like low taxes and (b) don't want The Man kicking down their doors to seize their weed. West Virginia is apparently home to a goodly number of these free-market aficionados of the illegal smile.

Ultimately, the 2008 presidential race may boil down to whether Ron Paul's "Weed, Not War" vote can be corralled by the former CIA man, former federal prosecutor, former Republican congressman, and National Rifle Association board member who authored the first congressional resolution to call for the impeachment of Mrs. Clinton's husband (before the Monica Lewinsky scandal). And Bob Barr is holding a press conference Monday.

Don't mean a thing . . .

. . . if you ain't got those swing states:

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's top aides [Friday] accused Sen. Barack Obama of ignoring West Virginia, saying Democrats must win the state in the fall and using her 43-point poll lead there as evidence that her longshot bid deserves to run its course.
"What is the basis for the so-called 'presumptive nominee' not competing in a state that would be a key swing state?" Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson asked reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast, adding that a Tuesday victory could be a turning point for his boss.
A 15-point win for Mrs. Clinton, "in an atmosphere in which she is being written off and told to leave the campaign, if voters hearing that in West Virginia decided to choose to affirm her candidacy despite that, I think that would say something significant about her ability to compete and win votes in a very tough environment," he said. Since winning North Carolina and coming within two points in Indiana, Mr. Obama has done everything to indicate he views himself as the Democratic presidential nominee -- avoiding engaging with Mrs. Clinton, and disregarding his rival's calls for a debate and pivoting toward the general election. . . .
Mr. Obama predicted a defeat in West Virginia on Tuesday, telling reporters Mrs. Clinton was likely to beat him by "significant margins," in both West Virginia and in Kentucky on May 20. In Kentucky she is favored in polls by 34 points.

Obama's dissing of Kentucky and West Virginia, on top of his losses in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Indiana -- to say nothing of the DNC's stiff-arming of Michigan and Florida voters -- should be very troubling to Democrats. Do a little Electoral College math, and it becomes clear that Obama's painting Democrats into a corner.

Come November, if this all blows up in Democrats' faces, no one can say the warning signs weren't clear.

Obamessiah watch

Chicago is one of the most corrupt cities in America. It's also been a Democratic Party bastion for more than 70 years. Mere coincidence. John Kass of the Chicago Tribune writes:

The presumptive Democratic presidential candidate's politics were born in Chicago. Yet he is presented to the nation as not truly being of this place, as if he floats just above the political corruption here, uninfected, untouched by the stain of it or by any sin of commission or omission. It is all so very mystical.
Perhaps viewing Obama as a Chicago political creature would conflict with the established national media narrative of Obama as a reformer.
Actually, there's no "perhaps" about it.
"I think I have done a good job in rising politically in this environment without being entangled in some of the traditional problems of Chicago politics," Obama told reporters and editors at a Tribune editorial board meeting several weeks ago. Yes, an excellent job.
Except for his dalliance with his indicted real estate fairy, Tony Rezko, a relationship Obama considers a mistake, the senator has not played the fly to Mayor Richard Daley's spider. Almost, but not quite.

Rezko's a "mistake," just like Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright are "mistakes." Any scandal that pops up, Obama says "mistake" and his media disciples nod their heads in worshipful silence. Speaking of Obama's disciples, the New York Times has a glowing Obama profile, celebrating his "pragmatic" politics, prompting this rejoinder from pro-Clinton Democrat blogger Jeralyn Merritt:

He dumped his Palestinian friends like Rashid Khalidi when he decided to go after the Jewish vote. . , . If I were a Palestinian, I'd be upset too. If I were a strong Israel supporter, I'd be nervous. See the Times article on pages 5 and 6, about how once he got introduced to Chicago's billionaire Crown family and sought its campaign contributions, he moved towards supporting Israel.

A political mirror, a chameleon, an empty vessel, a blank slate, a screen onto which desperate souls project their hopes. (Note to self: Buy DVD, re-watch A Face in The Crowd.)

UPDATE: Susan at Larry Johnson's "No Quarter" blog notes that Corrente Wire has excerpted and analyzed the NYT profile:

Others see his deft movements as a politician shifting positions and alliances for strategic advantage, leaving some disappointed and baffled about where he really stands.
“He has a pattern of forming relationships with various communities and as he takes his next step up, kind of distancing himself from them and then positioning himself as the bridge,” said Ali Abunimah, a Palestinian-American author and co-founder of the online publication Electronic Intifada, who became acquainted with Mr. Obama in Chicago. . . .
That seems to be a familiar pattern with Obama - it’s “buddies for life” while he needs them, then he forgets about them when they are no longer useful, or tosses them under the bus when they become inconvenient. This doesn’t bode well for the OFB …
… this hotshot “civil rights” attorney has nothing to show for his experience. Most people who run on their record have a record to run on. Even Rudy Giuliani made his name going after organized crime. …
It seems everything Obama does benefits Obama. Every job, every friendship, is just part of the same pattern.

Everything to everybody; Chicago's own Lonesome Rhodes. Another benefit of Rush Limbaugh's "Operation Chaos" is thus illustrated. By pushing the Democratic primary campaign further along, "Operation Chaos" has afforded the Clintonistas a greater opportunity to get bitter and cyncial about Obama and the Democratic Party machinery that apparently has delivered him the nomination.

Depending on the outcome here, we may be looking at a bumper crop of ex-Democrats in the near future. Disillusioned ex-Democrats are some of the most fierce and effective conservatives. I remind you that Ronald Reagan was an ex-Democrat.

Hillary: 'Endeavor to persevere'

A "private call," not necessarily a secret call:

Hillary held a private rally-the-troops conference call with her super-delegate supporters this afternoon, urging them to believe that "this race is not over," vowing to them she'd promote Dem unity after the primary, and conceding that she knows what they and the party are going through "is not easy." . . .
Hillary projected a surprisingly cheerful tone despite recent events, and if she is having doubts about what's going to happen, she didn't show it on the call. "Despite what some in the media are saying, this race is not over," she said.

That's the spirit! Gallantly fight on! If you have to retreat, make sure it's a fighting retreat.

P.S.: The title of this post is from "The Outlaw Josey Wales."

McCarthy: Naming names

That's Daniel McCarthy -- Tory Anarchist blogger and an editor for The American Conservative who name-checks me as attending a Cato Institute book forum featuring Ain't My America author Bill Kaufmann and "lots of people Dick Cheney would like to see in Gitmo."

National Review contributors please note that mere attendance at this event does not make me an "Unpatriotic Conservative." I'm just nuanced.

On the other hand, once the interrogation starts, I'll be glad to rat out my friends. None of that Fifth Amendment for me, thanks. I'm like Ron White -- I have the right to remain silent, I just don't have the ability.

Eddie Arnold, R.I.P.

Via See-Dubya at Michelle Malkin, one last tip of the hat to the Tennessee Plowboy:

The Hank Cochran-penned "Make the World Go Away," a defining 1965 No. 1 country hit which made the pop top 10 in both America and Britain, perfectly encapulates a sentiment common to everyone who's ever bred cattle or just eaten them. "Make the world go away/And get it off my shoulders/Say the things you used to say/And make the world go away..." Did any troubled, wishful lyric ever better express the appeal not just of love but of music itself?

My mother worked at RCA's Atlanta office in the late '60s and early '70s, and of all the stars who ever stopped by their office, Eddie Arnold was her favorite: A perfect gentleman who was unfailingly courteous and friendly toward the "little people."

One of the great secrets of success -- not just in music, but in anything else -- is to be nice to people, especially the "little people." Elvis Presley got his first break in music because he made an impression on the receptionist at Sun Records. If you think you're going to make it in the long run by sucking up to the rich and powerful while looking down your nose at ordinary people, you're going to be disappointed.

Hillbillies hate Hope

OK, it's probably unfair to stigmatize West Virginians with the word "hillbillies" -- contrary to stereotypes, it's not all incest, moonshine and bad teeth over there -- but they really don't seem to dig Obama:

In Hardy County, Democrats outnumber Republicans more than 2 to 1. But there is little enthusiasm for Barack Obama in this mountainside enclave, a portent of trouble for the Illinois senator in next week's West Virginia primary and the general election beyond.
Nearly 97% white, the county is as conflicted as any rural and working-class Democratic bastion as it struggles to adjust to the likely prospect of the party nominating its first African American presidential candidate.

The L.A. Times reporter then gets quotes from Democratic mouthpieces to help him develop the none-too-subtle theme that anybody who votes Republican in November is a racist:

"My worry is there's just too many people in this country who aren't ready to elect a black president," said Charles L. Silliman, a retired Air Force officer who is Hardy County's Democratic Party co-chairman. "There's a lot to like about him. But I'm just afraid that too many people will vote against him based on their fears and prejudice."

Never mind the elitism, the "57 states," the radical anti-American preacher, the Hamas connection, the Weather Underground connection -- never mind any of that, and never mind that policy-wise, Obama's just a clone of John Kerry.

No, none of that matters at all. The L.A. Times knows why you don't support Obama, you inbred banjo-plucking bigots.

Please note that it is the Democrats and the MSM -- is that redundant? -- who are setting up this election as a referendum on racial rectitude. Except for his Philadelphia speech, Obama himself has tried to avoid making race front-and-center in his campaign, but the Democrats and the media just won't let well enough alone.

We're going to hear this theme endlessly reiterated for the next six months. Win, lose or draw, the MSM will portray the November results as a plebiscite on ethnic tolerance. If Obama wins, we'll get two months of uninterrupted op-eds and Page One analyses of "what it means." If Obama loses, the MSM will tout it as permanent proof of endemic American racism.

The worst part? The only way to prevent this nightmare is for Hillary Clinton to steal the nomination. So thank you, MSM, for forcing Americans to pray for a Clintonian swindle.

UPDATE: Dan Riehl has a similar reaction:

The media obsession with the racism meme, without acknowledging the entire picture, is simply a symptom of a media that's stuck on old stupid, offering little if any genuinely intelligent, deep, or honest analysis of the entire picture.

Yet the media swoons for Obamessiah, and anyone who doesn't share Chris Matthews' tingles is a benighted bigot.

UPDATE II: Wow, even liberal Democrats like Jerome Armstrong are getting tired of the racism meme:

I'd humbly suggest, to all the Obama supporters that join us here on this blog, that if you can't stand the heat of the West Virginia primary, you stay out of the kitchen. While I'm at it, I also suggest that you refrain from accusations against West Virginians as being racist. . . .
Racism is ignorance, but unfounded accusations of racism are just as low on the scum-radar.

This is probably as good a place as any to recount a conversation I had yesterday with my brother Kirby, who's a truck driver in Georgia -- and also one of the most insightful political analysts I know. Kirby said that these bogus accusations of racism are going to destroy the Democrats in the general election if Obama is their nominee.

Every bit of negative news for Obama -- every gaffe, every scandal, every time he dips in the polls -- is going to be viewed through the prism of race by the media and the Democrats, who are then going to use it to spin this theme: If you don't like Obama, you're a racist. And nothing infuriates the white working class more than bogus accusations of racism.

Kirby said that the backlash against this tactic could be so bad that it could even put California in play. I scoffed at this, but Kirby was serious. "Think about it, Stacy. They've got Schwarzenegger as governor out there. . . . If the Democrats have to fight for California, it's going to be a serious drain on their resources."

Kirby suggested the possibility of an electoral blowout along the lines of 1972 or '84, which I consider unlikely, but he's definitely got a point about the explosive danger to Democrats if they overplay the race card.

Working-class whites don't have the reflexive "white guilt" reaction toward minorities that is so common among the affluent elite. When you start pointing the finger of "racism" at the white guy who's punching a clock and struggling to pay his bills, what he hears is, "Feel sorry for me." And his reaction is, "WTF?" It's not that he's about "hate," it's just that his life is hard enough that he doesn't have time to go around oozing empathy toward others.

I think this is part of what Team Clinton has been trying to explain about the demographic trends in the Democratic primaries, though without much success. Paul Begala's "eggheads and African-Americans" quote might sound callous, but it touches on the danger to Democrats if they nominate a candidate who alienates white working-class voters. John Kerry's snooty attitude hurt him in this regard, and it's not hard to imagine Obama having a similar problem -- especially if you get a bunch of talking heads on TV insinuating that opposition to Obama is purely a function of white bigotry.

If I were handling media for Team Obama, I'd be coming down like a hammer on anybody in the MSM who's playing on this racism meme. The dynamic is a lot more complex than that, and there's serious potential that this could generate a backlash.

For years, Kirby has been tipping me to "under-the-radar" stuff that people inside the Beltway don't notice, and he's very perceptive -- like the time he alerted me that Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes had alienated school teachers, a harbinger of the historic Republican midterm sweep of the state in 2002. When Kirby forecasts trouble for Democrats in November, I feel obligated to record his forecast. He's been right about these things so often, and it's fun to point out that sometimes the big-shot pundits have less political insight than a truck driver.

UPDATE III: How many truck drivers does Andrew Sullivan know? . . . Wait a minute. I'm not sure I want to know the answer to that question.

UPDATE IV: Linked by Don Surber, who notes:

Perhaps if Obama actually tried to win here, he could. But Obama has spent more time in the Virgin Islands than he has spent here.
Of course, he evidently thinks the Virgin Islands is a state.
To be sure, the Chicago political machine has sent a squad or two down here. But it is more like a training exercise for teh young. Cannon fodder.
The main team is elsewhere, perhaps catching its breath.

Yeah, lots of GOTV and honk-and-waves on Team Obama's West Virginia schedule, but no Obama. Maybe they're afraid one of those toothless moonshiners might mistake Obama for a revenuer and blast him his shootin' iron.

Celebrity update

Too busy to keep up with the tacky tabloid news? Via WeSmirch, here's the latest star-studded lowdown:

• Britney Spears is dating a 43-year-old billionaire. That's billionaire with a "b," which explains why you other 43-year-old guys out there shouldn't even bother thinking about Britney.
• Heidi Klum's hotness has entered its terminal phase. An extremely sad day for those of us who remember Klum's Sports Illustrated glory way back when.
• Lindsay Lohan, thief? It's only a matter of time before she's busted while attempting to hot-wire a Chevy in Compton.
• Somebody you never heard of is on the cover of Harper's Bazaar, apparently because she dates George Clooney.
• Elizabeth Hurley's cleavage. That's not exactly news, except that she's obviously gotten about half a million bucks' worth of plastic surgery and now only faintly resembles her former self.
• Liv Tyler's back on the market, divorcing her husband, a musician in a band I never heard of.
• In possibly related news, Ashlee Simpson is about to marry a musician in a band I never heard of.
• DMX is arrested for marijuana and pit bulls. DMX is a rapper. Unlike Liv Tyler's ex-husband or Ashlee Simpson's husband-to-be, I've actually heard of DMX.
• Playboy's latest "Playmate of the Year" has a tattoo. Don't ask where.
• Finally, if this is what the producers call a "highlight" from Leaving Sarah Marshall, just wait until it's on cable:

Clinton campaign scrambling?

Yesterday, Allahpundit posted a link to an online invitation to a Mother's Day fundraiser at the Sheraton in New York featuring Hillary and Chelsea Clinton. That event is scheduled for 1:30 p.m.

Meanwhile, the Clinton campaign's West Virginia press office this morning sent out a media update that included this:

Hillary and Chelsea will hold a Mother's Day celebration in West Virginia on Sunday.

No time or location stated, which suggests to me that the scheduling is still up in the air. And with that 1:30 p.m. event scheduled in New York, it becomes like one of those word problems in the 6th-grade math textbook:

Charleston, W. Va., is 500 miles from New York City. Hillary Clinton has a 1:30 p.m. event at the Sheraton Hotel in downtown New York. If she wants to schedule a morning event in Charleston, what time should she schedule it, in order to be sure she's not late for her New York event? Please calculate this problem based on private jet travel from Yeager Airport to LaGuardia, allowing time for landing delays at LaGuardia and traffic congestion between LaGuardia and the Sheraton.

Obviously, you'd want your West Virginia event to be Sunday morning, so that TV coverage of the Mother's Day message would be seen during both the noon and evening local newscasts. But that 1:30 fundraiser in New York puts you on a short leash in terms of logistics and scheduling.

So, as of 10 a.m. Saturday, the Clinton campaign couldn't even give the media a time and location for the Sunday event it was promoting. Looks like piss-poor planning, and an overworked staff now trying to improvise a schedule at the last minute.

MSM darling vs. MSM messiah

During the GOP primary season, some Republicans seemed to think John McCain would be able to take advantage of the media's "Maverick" crush in the general election campaign. Quin Hillyer ain't buying:

The media darling McCain is going to be in for a bumpy ride now that his opponent is Obama, the media savior who makes the commentariat feel warm tingles run up their legs. The media will throw over a darling for a messiah every time.

Quin links an Amanda Carpenter column about Washington Post coverage of an Arizona land deal in which the reporter tries to make McCain look as sleazy as Hedley Lamarr from Blazing Saddles.

Sadr capitulates?

This could be very good news:

Followers of rebel cleric Muqtada al Sadr agreed late Friday to allow Iraqi security forces to enter all of Baghdad's Sadr City and to arrest anyone found with heavy weapons in a surprising capitulation that seemed likely to be hailed as a major victory for Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki. . . .
The agreement would end six weeks of fighting in the vast Shiite Muslim area that's home to more than 2 million residents and would mark the first time that the area would be under government control since Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003. . . .
It also would be a startling turnaround in fortunes for Maliki, who'd been widely criticized for picking a fight with Sadr's forces, first in the southern port city of Basra and then in Sadr City.

It's very difficult to judge the military and political situation in Baghdad from half a world away based on news reports. But the Mookster is clearly a stooge for the Iranian mullahcrats and has been a bad actor since Day One, and if this signals the beginning of the end of his mischief, then it's a good thing.

On the other hand, I was disturbed by something that Gabriel Malor (a recent law school grad) posted at Ace of Spades HQ. Gabriel was slamming a lefty blogger who did an anti-American rant based on a news story about an Iraqi army order for civilians to evacuate Sadr City. That rant was the basis for Gabriel's argument that concluded:

This is why the Left must lose in November. I'm not asking you to vote for John McCain. I'm asking you to vote against having a Leftist in the White House.

Hold the phone there a minute, son. The study of Latin and logic used to be a prerequisite to law school. Can you say, "non sequitur"?

Are we really sure that the next Democratic president will base his (or her) foreign policy on the views expressed in that lefty blogger's rant? Granted, every Democratic president since at least LBJ has made a disastrous botch of foreign policy, but to draw a logical line from Point A (the lefty blogger's rant) to Point B (Obama's foreign policy) is a bit hasty. It's an error akin to blaming Republicans for every crackpot utterance of Pat Robertson.

Furthermore, Gabriel, leaving aside the mala fides of the lefty blogger (hey, I can sling me some Latin when I need to), do you mean to suggest that the wisdom of the evacuation order is not subject to debate? Let's quote that news story:

Iraqi security forces, after more than of 40 days of intense fighting, on Thursday told residents to evacuate their homes in the northeast Shiite slum of Sadr City and to move to temporary shelters on two soccer fields. . . .
Two soccer fields in east and northeast Baghdad are expected to receive some 16,000 evacuees from the southeast portion of the city where the fighting has been most intense.

Holy smokes! Think about going to a concert or sporting event with a crowd of 16,000. Now, imagine trying to house that entire crowd in tents in a space the size of two soccer fields. Food, water, sanitation -- we're talking a logistical nightmare, just to achieve a minimal level of existence. That might be preferable to leaving the civilians in their homes while the fighting rages, but it's still a drastic measure, and one that would nearly triple the current number of Sadr City refugees.

Somehow, I couldn't help but think of the famous 1864 Hood-Sherman correspondence regarding the latter's order for the evacuation of Atlanta. Most would say that Sherman got the better of the argument, but it certainly didn't endear him to the civilian populace. Here we are, five years into the Iraq war, and if we're still waiting to be greeted as liberators, it seems we'll be waiting a damned long time.

Mass evacuations? A six-week fight for a slum? An Iraqi army that can barely contend with a two-bit punk like Mookie?

Gabriel, if this is your best argument why Americans should stampede to the polls in November to pull the lever for John McCain, you've got problems much worse than the ranting of one left-wing blogger.

UPDATE: An imbed's account of a visit to Sadr City. And Jules Crittenden is cynical about the prospects that Sadr will place nice now.