Democratic Amnesia Won't Work...

Update - After reading about how President Bush is finally responding to his lying critics, scroll to the bottom of this post for a link leading to a description of a recent debate loaded with Leftist America Bashing... it's lying American political opponents of President Bush who ultimately make this sort of attack so easy for others to believe...

The Whitehouse is starting to respond to the politically motivated anti-war smears of Democrats...

Looks like President Bush isn't going to let this Democrat tactic of lying about their war record and votes fade. Finally!

"It is regrettable that Senator Kennedy has chosen Veteran's Day to continue leveling baseless and false attacks that send the wrong signal to our troops and our enemy during a time of war. It is also regrettable that Senator Kennedy has found more time to say negative things about President Bush then he ever did about Saddam Hussein. If America were to follow Senator Kennedy's foreign policy, Saddam Hussein would not only still be in power, he would be oppressing and occupying Kuwait."

- Scott McClellan, White House Press Secretary

Read the whole thing...

Here's the update link to the debate at Trinity College in Dublin...

Also, visit Gateway Pundit for more on the Bush Pushback...

Global Warming or a Repeating Cycle?

Welcome HuffPo readers! Scroll down for the post on "The Bush Defense". And take a look around with your usual openminded perspective...

For counterpoint to some extreme environmental views, an occasional visit to Patrick Moore's website is a brisk refreshment. Moore was a founder of Greenpeace and has a lot to say.

And here's a great piece on Julian Simon, who, though mocked by experts, repeatedly had the last laugh... Remember his 10 year bet with Paul Erlich? Simon won.

Also, scroll down to an informative post on Michael Crichton... is he a scary guy?

I've got a real case sending me mail today...

Anonymous said...

Actually, they don't want the Iraqi oil, yet.

The Saudis and their Houston brothtren did cartwheels when the Uberidiot was conned into the invasion of Iraq.

They knew, as anybody with half a brain knew, that the probable outcome would be an indeterminable period of lack of Iraq deliveries.

That meant, now watch close cause this is confusing, that oil that could be brought to market would go up in price.

You did notice that didn't you?

Now we're dealing with conspiracies... you are the living end...

Oil is, adjusted for inflation, cheaper now than in 1979... see InflationData.com

"...In other words, Oil would have to average $98.49 for the entire month to be as high as the price we saw in December of 1979. But we are "only" paying about 2/3rds of that amount.

Another factor that makes the Oil price worse in 1979 is the fact that back in '79 interest rates were two to three times higher than they are now, peaking in the high teens. Combine lower mortgage rates with lower taxes and the modern household actually has about $500 extra cash available each month... which will buy a lot of gasoline. But with interest rates rising and inflation climbing we are rapidly approaching 1979 levels..."

So, in the short term, they still aren't getting as much money for their oil as they did nearly 30 years ago. In the long term, of course, it will flow with the stable world price... so what the hell are you talking about? Now go away. But, first, remember, Bush did better in school than Gore AND Kerry [See, I can be asinine, too.].

We get mail...

Anonymous said...

"...Can anyone be so blind, deaf and dumb as to believe that the administration was speaking the whole truth when it claimed it had definitive proof of WMDs in Iraq? Of course Iraq had WMDs. It had the ones we sold them and the ones they developed but Iraq had nothing of consequence when Bush ordered the war to start. Worse yet, the administration knew that. Why else would it guard only the agency that dealt with oil while ignoring everything else in the country? It kept an eye on the prize, the prize it came to get..."

Well, I guess you didn't read the Podhoretz essay.

So, in brief, EVERYONE IN THE WORLD WAS AS BLIND, DEAF AND DUMB AS TO BELIEVE THAT IRAQ HAD WMD AND THAT INCLUDES BILL CLINTON, FRANCE, GERMANY, UK, JOHN KERRY, AL GORE, THE UN, etc.

As for BLOOD FOR OIL, if all we wanted was oil, all we needed to do was [now try to absorb this, please]:

PAY FOR IT ON THE WORLD MARKET.

Just like we're doing now and will do forever.

WE DON'T OWN THE IRAQ OIL.

That's not why we are there. It's cheaper and easier to just buy oil. Believe me, that's all we have to do... there's plenty out there to buy without lobbing bombs and deposing dictators to get it... buy it, use it, look the other way at the genocide.

I guess that's okay with you.

So maybe the President really wanted to do something about terrorism and democracy. Maybe the facts on the ground were wrong. But they were wrong for everyone. Everyone believed the same thing... Read Podhoretz... start over. Thank you.

I wish you people would get it straight.

Oy, vey! Barbra... Enough already, Darling...

Raise your hand if you want her to read the Podhoretz post?

Have you seen what she's saying now?

Finally! The Bush Defense!

UPDATE: 11/11/05 - President Bush has responded to his critics with a strong statement against their revisionist histrionics... Here's where it all began - The Podhoretz essay:

Yes, it's WMD time again... and this time...

It's POLITICS!

And as ususal, it stinks. Norman Podhoretz has analyzed the statements by eveyone involved, reviewed the timeline and has come to the following conclusion. EVERYONE who is smearing Bush today was WITH Bush in the runup to the Iraq War. His thesis:

Among the many distortions, misrepresentations, and outright falsifications that have emerged from the debate over Iraq, one in particular stands out above all others. This is the charge that George W. Bush misled us into an immoral and/or unnecessary war in Iraq by telling a series of lies that have now been definitively exposed.

What makes this charge so special is the amazing success it has enjoyed in getting itself established as a self-evident truth even though it has been refuted and discredited over and over again by evidence and argument alike. In this it resembles nothing so much as those animated cartoon characters who, after being flattened, blown up, or pushed over a cliff, always spring back to life with their bodies perfectly intact. Perhaps, like those cartoon characters, this allegation simply cannot be killed off, no matter what

Nevertheless, I want to take one more shot at exposing it for the lie that it itself really is. Although doing so will require going over ground that I and many others have covered before, I hope that revisiting this well-trodden terrain may also serve to refresh memories that have grown dim, to clarify thoughts that have grown confused, and to revive outrage that has grown commensurately dulled.

Here's a mild sample, referencing Joe Wilson...

...The liar here, then, was not Bush but Wilson. And Wilson also lied when he told the Washington Post that he had unmasked as forgeries certain documents given to American intelligence (by whom it is not yet clear) that supposedly contained additional evidence of Saddam's efforts to buy uranium from Niger...

...To top all this off, just as Cheney had nothing to do with the choice of Wilson for the mission to Niger, neither was it true that, as Wilson "confirmed" for a credulous New Republic reporter, "the CIA circulated [his] report to the Vice President's office, "thereby supposedly proving that Cheney and his staff "knew the Niger story was a flatout lie."

Yet - the mind reels - if Cheney had actually been briefed on Wilson's oral report to the CIA (which he was not), he would, like the CIA itself, have been more inclined to believe that Saddam had tried to buy yellowcake uranium from Niger.

So much for the author of the best-selling and much acclaimed book whose title alone - The Politics of Truth: Inside the Lies that Led to War and Betrayed My Wife's CIA Identity - has set a new record for chutzpah...

"WHO IS LYING ABOUT IRAQ?" Read the whole thing...

No Justice, No Peace

Welcome HuffPo readers... start here and scroll down for the piece on Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson...

Chirac Attacked Over Handling of Crisis

By JAMEY KEATEN
Associated Press Writer

PARIS

French President Jacques Chirac's political rivals criticized his decision Tuesday to declare a state of emergency as ill-suited to quelling rioting. Others faulted Chirac for not taking a more prominent public role in managing the crisis.

Let's not forget: http://intomywoods.blogspot.com/2005/11/maidez-al-sharpton-maidez-jesse.html

UPDATE

Muslims more integrated in US than France

"...To identify as French you have to renounce your faith and have to renounce your previous identity as though your previous self didn't exist. In the US you don't have to," she said.... Arab Americans and Muslims are better educated and have a higher income than the national average, said Edina Lekovic, communications director for the Muslim Public Affairs Council."

"There's no clear connection between the European and the American Muslim experience," she said, explaining that Muslims in the United States are less isolated and homogeneous than their European counterpart..."

Looks like the sarcasm from The Seine is going to lighten up for a while... No more "America is a Third World Country" from the vast, left wing, racist, unemployed people of the Birthplace of Human Rights, eh?

Another Update

Victor Davis Hanson is commenting on the uprising in France...

"...VDH: Well, there's two messages. One, that we in America can see where an unassimilated un-integrated a population goes, and where that leads to, it leads to a sort of an apartheid. And two, we can see what happens with an EU that can't create real economic growth, and has high stagnant unemployment of 10%. And three, this is I think a little bit more controversial, that we can see what happens to a society that doesn't ask the immigrant to integrate, and the immigrant doesn't feel that he has to integrate, or to learn the language, or learn the traditions of the West. So you have this Orwellian situation when thousands of people are rioting, you want to say let me get this straight. You do not want to go back to the country, an hour or two away by air, that you praise in the abstract, but you surely want to stay in a country that you want to burn down to the concrete. It doesn't make any sense, other than this strong, psychological urges of envy, jealousy, wanting something you can't have. Then, besides all that landscape, you get the impression there's something very wrong in Europe that has high unemployement and generous joblessness benefits, so that it allows people not really to have to go look for a job, because there isn't any, but to stay home and sort of nurse these wounds, with enough money to survive..."

Read the whole thing

This is scary...

There's this woman. She says she wants to get married. She's selling her house and taking bids from potential suitors. She's got a publicist for TV appearances and as you can see... headshots.

Here's what she has to say:

The idea of "House With Bride" began while I was contemplating selling my house in Denver, Colorado. Although my company is located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, a few years ago I bought a house in Denver. My life in Albuquerque had solely revolved around my work, and I felt that I needed to make some changes to improve my social life and hopefully meet my "soul mate".

Advice to interested parties: Stay away... you're gonna get punked.

M'aidez, Al Sharpton, M'aidez Jesse Jackson!

Welcome, HuffPo readers. Take a read below and afterwards, click around and get to know us... Thank god you're such an openminded lot.

Bookmark us here: http://intomywoods.blogspot.com/

The North Africans are being shot at, chased, electrocuted and ignored in Paris. There's an uprising of emense proportions and no Social Justice advocate seems to want to intervene on behalf of the oppressed French minority.

"...Rioting youths shot at police and firefighters Thursday after burning car dealerships and public buses and hurling rocks at commuter trains. France's government faced growing pressure to curb the violence, fueled by anger over poor conditions in suburban Paris housing projects... The riots started last Thursday after the electrocution deaths of two teenagers hiding in a power station from police they believed were chasing them in the northeastern suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois... Rather than feeling embraced as full and equal citizens, immigrants and their French-born children complain of police harassment and of being refused jobs, housing and opportunities..."

Are we just going to stand by and watch as these helpless victims of French racism are herded into unvenitlated apartments and left to die the way the French let the elderly and the poor die these last few summers? Over 35,000 deaths that summer and not even a word from Sharpton or anyone else.

Rise up! Demand that the UN investigate these atrocities! Your voice must be heard!

N'oubliez pas... No Justice. No Peace.

Forget Politics for a minute... This is SERIOUS:

Page 6 of the NY Post brings us the apocalypse...

Send this to everyone you know. Shout it from the rooftops...

IF THIS KEEPS UP - WE'RE DOOMED.

"...November 2, 2005 -- PARIS Hilton plaything Stavros Niarchos III is some kind of class act. After he fueled up at L.A.'s Element club the other night, the Greek shipping heir and a posse of pals stopped at Burger King. "Stavros offered a homeless man outside $100 to dump a soda on himself," a source squealed to Us Weekly. The desperate bum took the payout "and everyone laughed," reports the source. This one's a keeper, Paris!..."

If Laurie David thought the flood was coming because we sinned against Mother Nature, then now we're due for the big asteroid collision.

These people must be shamed. By all of us. This isn't about politics... it's about human decency.

He said it on Porpoise

Pearl Swine
Bill Diamond is astute and funny... A rare combination in the blogosphere...

Check him out.

Shock and Awe - Joe Wilson's 2003 speech...

Welcome, Carol Platt Liebau readers and all you openminded folks at HuffPo... take a look at the Wilson post and then click around... have fun!
Bookmark us here: http://intomywoods.blogspot.com/

Thanks to Gateway Pundit...

Scroll to the bottom for the speech Joe Wilson made in 2003 BEFORE the Robert Novak article...

It's breathtaking...

Gateway Pundit says:

In this speech, Ambassador Joseph Wilson:

* describes himself as the investigator sent to Niger by the government

* details the African trip as only he is capable of

* says the government sent him there and not the CIA (a lie)

* says there was nothing to the uranium story (a lie)

* describes the US as "occupiers" of Iraq (a shocking statement at the time)

* describes a conspiracy to help Israel dominate the Palestinians

* calls the Administration warmongers and a--holes

* says Bush is in office for sex

You may need to Copy and paste the link to the Forum where he spoke:
http://www.epic-usa.org/Default.aspx?tabid=68&showlogin=1


You may need to Copy and paste the audio link:
http://next.epic-usa.org/epicdev2/_media/2003forumaudio/28-lecture-wilson-32.mp3

You won't believe it.

Everyone may be wrong... Bush is looking good...

Michael Barone thinks that in spite of recent setbacks, things are looking up for President Bush:

"...George W. Bush's administration has come through what many have been saying would be its worst week, and it has turned out to be -- well, if not one of the best, then one that is far more encouraging than most of the mainstream media expected."

Read the whole thing.

They say Michael Crichton is a scary guy...

Welcome, HuffPo readers... take a look at this post on Crichton and then, with your ususal openmindedness, explore the site...

He's somehow become a traitor to the Left. His book, State of Fear, has caused quite a stir in the environmental world. They don't call it Science Fiction for nothing, says the Natural Resource Defense Council. Oh, they're pretty angry.

Well, now he's recommended some reading for us and I hope you'll take a look...
The titles follow...

[the link to the Wall Street Journal may require a subscription...]

FIVE BEST

Green Gray Areas

Books that question the conventional wisdom on the environment.

BY MICHAEL CRICHTON Saturday, October 29, 2005 12:01 a.m.


1. "Playing God in Yellowstone" by Alston Chase (Atlantic Monthly Press, 1986).
2. "The Culture Cult" by Roger Sandall (Westview, 2001).
3. "Man and the Natural World" by Keith Thomas (Oxford, 1984).
4. "The Skeptical Environmentalist" by Bjørn Lomborg (Cambridge University Press, 2002).
5. "The Logic of Failure" by Dietrich Dörner (Perseus, 1998).

Mr. Crichton is author of the novels "State of Fear" and "Jurassic Park," among many others, and creator of the television series "ER."

Read the whole thing...

It was Barzini all along...

DON CORLEONE

"Tattaglia is a pimp. He could never have outfought Santino. But I wasn't sure until this day. No, it was Barzini all along."

Unlike The Godfather, the truth beneath the Libby/Plame mystery only deepens. What are we hearing from our friends, day in and day out? Libby was too smart to have left notes in his file and then perjure himself with Fitzgerald... there's a deeper game here... It goes up the food chain.

Everyone believes that it was a hit job. An assassination from on high. Cheney did it. He leaked her name, and Libby is taking the blame. For the life of me, I can't understand how you jump to this conclusion.

One thing I've learned is that speculation is a game. It sells papers, ads and make people look smart. But, speculation is short term. Let's see how this plays out. I have all the conjecture, I just don't have all the facts.

Neither do you.

What I'm watching on TV...

Not a day goes by that I do not pass a billboard for Larry David's HBO show, Curb Your Enthusiasm. I'm sure you've seen one, too. His show is perhaps the wildest comedic recording of truth in motion that's been on television in years. Maybe a little close to The Honeymooners, but, exposing the true heart of a brilliant mind excuses any overlap.

Victor Davis Hanson: Sleepwalking Through the Revolution

You can see the list of dead soldiers as compiled by The New York Times here. Not one of us can escape the heavy heart brought on by our brave fallen soldiers and their ultimate sacrifice for our country. In our deliberations on President Bush's call for Democracy in the Middle East, we can all bow our heads, respecting our fallen children... no matter where we stand in our Great Debate...

Victor Davis Hanson has written a passionate and thoughtful piece outlining his belief that now is the time for President Bush to assert himself and refresh the perception of what is being accomplished by our military in this harsh region of the world:

"...We have been sleepwalking through the greatest revolutionary movement in the history of the Middle East, as the U.S. military is quietly empowering the once-despised Kurds and Shiites - and along with them women and the other formerly dispossessed of Iraq. In short, the U.S. Marine Corps has done more for global freedom and social justice in two years than has every U.N. peacekeeping mission since the inception of that now-corrupt organization..."

"...The odd thing is that so far the conventional advice to the president - keep the discussion on Iraq only to U.S. national security, not the upheaval of the existing corrupt order; reach out to the Democratic Senate; curb your idealistic rhetoric with Syria or Iran; ignore shrill enemies; nominate someone that the opposition will not seriously object to - has only emboldened critics here and abroad. It is time to go back on the offensive, both for the idealistic legacy of the Bush presidency and the immediate future of his ideas in the upcoming 2006 elections. The American people, both pro and con, are more than ready for a great debate to settle these issues one way or another."

Powerful, thoughtful and passionate. Read the whole thing.

Hey, I'm sane, again... No, wait, I'm insane...

I get mail...

Anonymous said... "I just read your 'I seem sane' post, and find it fascinating how you fall into the same traps that you state your respondant fell into..."

Thanks for your comment... While I don't really want to respond to your remarks point by point I can't keep myself from jotting down a few off the cuff reactions...

I will say that the Left does a fine job of defining the Right as the FAR RIGHT. I don't think I have to regurgitate those differences for your benefit. By the way, my entire point is about imbalance in perception. My remarks regarding the Right were basically a couple or 3 examples of what Conservatives would like... de-fund the Left, impose balance on union political spending, and reduce Pork [at the word "PORK" I hyperlinked to this: http://truthlaidbear.com/porkbusters.php ]. They take on everybody there equally for PORK.

Conservatives dislike the bizarre spending of the Bush White House and Congress as you'll see if you take this next link to the National Review online blog... VERY annoyed with Bush over MANY things...some I agree with, others, I don't...just like a real person... http://corner.nationalreview.com/ READ them regularly for balance... I read plenty of so-called LEFT leaning sites... I similarly hyperlink to this: http://www.slate.com/?id=2126913&nav=tap2/ which I mention in passing since as you seem to have ignored my "not every Lefty is a LEFTIST" introduction, you may have skipped this link as well...

We all seem to know who the bogeymen from the RIGHT are... you need to see a few from the other neighborhood.

Finally, I think you are way too anxious to find fault with my remarks and have failed to review them as thoughtfully as you think you did. For example you quote me as saying that the Left is "spend, spend, spend... etc." when I say no such thing. Other than mentioning the Leftist penchant for supporting extremist groups without checking their backgrounds see this link again: http://www.slate.com/?id=2126913&nav=tap2/, my only specific remark about the Left is regarding the reaction to Katrina and the lack of horror at the 35,000 deaths [see this link: http://www.earth-policy.org/Updates/Update29.htm] in one month from a European heatwave. I was in Europe at the time and recall the complete lack of concern for those deaths on either side of the Atlantic.

Which DO you remember, by the way, the hurricane hysteria or the genocidal heatwave?

Look again, check out the links and remember, it's my opinion of what I experience and that's all I'm writing about. Clearly, the extremes of all political stripes get way too much attention.

Finally, exactly what do you think of Barbecue? Some folks think it's just Pork. Others include Beef, Poultry, Game and Vegetables. Where do you come out?

We love MEAT... BBQ'd MEAT...

The ribs, brisket, sides and pies at Phillip's Bar-B-Que at 4307 Leimert Blvd in Los Angeles are great.
I've been reading about Phillips for a long time. Not until last week was I remotely in the neighborhood. I went down, read the menu and wound up ordering babyback ribs, beef ribs and sliced brisket. Cole slaw, barbcued beans, peach cobblers, pecan pies and plenty of mixed sauce topped the take out package.
I made it home and suprised the family and some friends with an incredible feast. Don't judge this place by it's appearance. The people who run it are great and the food is out of this world.

I seem sane! Thanks!

I get mail.

This was an interesting comment:

Mr 'Woods'

Pretty funny little hot air story

Altho - I must point out the dem in the story didn't actually blame the rep - he merely made an observation

Pretty good blog! I'm a lefty, but you seem sane!

Good luck [Name withheld]

Okay. Thanks.

Thing is, and I'm sure the writer didn't intend anything more than a wry, backhanded compliment, this sort of flattery is annoying. Having views that don't conform to the Left of Center can be a real pain. For a Jew, you are pretty generous. For an African-American, you're not such a great dancer. For a WASP, you have a pretty good sense of humor. I appologize for any pain I may have inflicted by just trying to make my point.

For a lefty, you seem sane.

Right after 9/11, I was in a meeting with a diverse group of people. The first few minutes were about the events of the preceeding days. One woman, a very nice woman, said, "It's all the fault of the Right Wing Christians." She's Jewish by the way, as am I.

Following her remark were some subdued murmers. I knew for a fact that there were Christians [what political stripe I hadn't a clue] in the room.

I said, "There are a lot of people who think it's the fault of Left Wing Jews."

Her eyes nearly popped out of her head. "But, you're Jewish!"

"Yes," I said, "but I'm not a Left Wing Jew."

Things have never been the same in that little community group.

Not every Lefty is a Leftist. Not every post at HuffPo is going to support the North Koreans, but, a few groups regularly praised there are funded by the International Left. I don't automatically assume that anyone who voted for Al Gore is an enemy agent or revolutionary. I don't actually think about that at all.

I do tend to think my political choices will benefit our country and the world in the long term in spite of the alarmist rhetoric attached to the inevitable criticism. I know that my choices seem different to The Left than what HuffPo has to offer, but, that's because The Left skews the Right of Center's benchmark so drastically.

We're not insane. We're just not YOU.

One goal of The Right is to defund government financial and legislative support of The Left. Take away the government subsidies of litigous advocacy groups. Make unions transparently accountable to ALL the membership with regard to the allocation of dues for political support. Take the PORK out of Federal spending.

Look. While The Left was fanning the anti-American flames, goading our European neighbors to levy insults and accusations against our government during the Katrina crisis, it took weeks before the badly shaken Right of Center Media and bloggers began reminding the world that for the last couple of summers, in France alone, there have been upwards of 13,000 DEATHS due to the intense heatwaves. In 2003, the total was close to 35,000 for Europe. Compared to the relatively small number of tragic deaths in the Gulf States, that amounts to a European Genocide. The deaths took place during the traditional summer vacation.

Nobody home to save them. And they call us a Third World Nation.

Which do you remember?

The heatwave or the hysterical stories of mass murders and drownings?

I already know the answer.

And I seem sane.