COUNTERCOLUMN: All Your Bias Are Belong to Us

The State of Virginia failed to mail absentee ballots to military voters on time, so the McCain campaign has filed suit to extend the deadline for counting those ballots to the 14th.

What's amusing is this:

Responding to the suit, Obama campaign spokesman Kevin Griffis said the Democratic presidential candidate "is strongly committed to protecting the rights of veterans and active-duty military. That is why our campaign sent a letter to every secretary of state earlier this fall urging them to do everything they can to ensure that the vote of active military and veterans are counted."

Libtards are willing to run to the courts at the drop of the hat - especially to defend the rights of terrorists captured and held overseas.

When it comes to defending the rights of our own servicemen and women, though, well, not so much.

Military people: McCain went to court to fight on our behalf.

Obama sent a letter.

Well, I'm sure it was a very strongly worded letter.

"Just words, just speeches," indeed.

Splash, out

Jason

Labels: McCain, Obama, Politics, soldiers' issues

9:04 Hello, everyone! It's the town hall format. I hate these pseudopopulist wankfests.

9:05 Obama mentions AIG's 400 thousand dollar junket. He's right...that was absolutely unconscionable. Shareholders should be screaming for management's heads on pikes. But it should have been SHAREHOLDERS. Not government. (Granted, those are pretty much the same people.)

9:07 No, Sen. McCain. It's not YOUR job as a politician to fix the problem. It's ours. Just get out of the way.

Added: McCain says "My friends." Everybody drink a shot!

9:07 McCain's rambled for too long before he got to his point...which was an a proposal for an artificial shoring up of home values. Obama was stronger and more coherent on the first question. Point: Obama.

9:10 Warren Buffett would be an EXCELLENT choice for Secretary of the Treasury. But fat chance he'll take it!

9:12 Another "what's in it for me" question.

9:14 McCain on Fannie and Freddie "There were some of us who stood up against us. There were others who took a hike." Too bad he didn't bother to follow through on that point. This is a town hall debate. Subtlety doesn't work here. Now Obama's going to be UNSUBTLE...and more effective. With his deregulation lie. Obama's lying his ass off (as usual). And Obama's being more effective. Point: McCain on substance, Obama in style.

9:19 The "How can we trust you when both parties got us into this mess?" No, Republicans didn't get us into this "crisis." To the extent any party is responsible, this is PURELY a Democrat mess. It is very clear that it was Republicans sounding alarm bells going back years. It was the DEMOCRATS in charge of Fannie and Freddie, and it was the DEMOCRATS who sold us out to ACORN. It was the DEMOCRATS who defended Frannie and Freddie and shielded them from regulators, and who demanded they overextend themselves into subprime and adjustable mortgages.

9:22 "Senator Obama has never taken on the leadership of his party on any issue." YES! Bring it! (He doesn't.)

9:26 Obama calls for an independence on foreign oil in 10 years. Except he opposes every reasonable alternative energy source. Will he be challenged?

9:27 Obama wants to go through every line of the federal budget. Is he calling for a line item veto? Talk about a radical expansion of the power of the President!

9:28 McCain calls for elimination of government programs. Good. Will Obama do the same?

9:30 McCain calls for a spending freeze. During an expected recession? Keynesian economics be DAMNED. (Well, maybe it SHOULD be damned. It's grossly inflationary. But let's be aware of what we're doing!

9:32 Obama is pro offshore drilling all of a sudden! And he's pro-coal! Who knew?

9:35 "The last president to raise taxes during tough economic times was Herbert Hoover!" Yeah, perhaps.

9:37 McCain starts throwing the goodies. Though I like the health savings voucher ideas, as well as the per child tax credit increase.

9:38 Tom Brokaw sprouts a pair, and quashes Obama, who wants to play fast and loose with time.

9:39 "The straight talk express lost a wheel." Good line. That stuff works in this format.

9:41: McCain hits the "taken on party leadership" point again. But McCain is wrong if he thinks that Social Security is easy to fix. It is NOT easy to fix. But I like the privatization idea more with the Dow at 9,500 than I did with the Dow at 12,000. Of course, it is precisely when the idea is BEST that it is most unpopular, and precisely when the idea is worst that it is most popular.

9:42 Wait a minute.... Obama says if you like your current plan, you can keep your current health insurance. But he also says he can cover everyone else's preexisting conditions under a federal plan, AND reduce premiums. Sorry, but their ain't no such thing as a free lunch. A federal system that offers guaranteed issue to self-selectors creates a HUGE adverse selection problem for the government.

10:00 I haven't heard a single Ayers reference yet. McCain's not mean enough.

10:00 "Called a Peacemaker but I never knew why. I never knew why. I didn't understand. Mama said a pistol is the Devil's Right Hand!"

10:02 God I hate that stupid 3rd grade reasoning on Iraq. "I don't understand how we invaded a country that had nothing to do with 9/11." No shit, sherlock. We didn't invade Iraq because it had something to do with 9/11. We invaded it because it was an obvious and motivated potential sponsor of future terrorist attacks. Obama doesn't understand that you can't secure America by looking in the rear view mirror.

Further, Obama says we should intervene in Darfur, where we have NO interest. But we shouldn't in Iraq, where we have crucial national interests at stake. I hate that half-wittery.

10:01. Obama said "my friend." (drink).

10:10 "Should we respect Pakistani sovereignty?" Why ask questions that cannot be truthfully answered?

10:20 MadTom writes in that Republicans bear the blame for Fannie and Freddie because Republicans were in the majority. Not really. Even strong majorities in a majority party need a few minority party individuals to go along. Republicans can go 70-30 in favor of any issue as a majority party...an overwhelming position...but they will not be able to overcome a fanatic voting bloc like the Democrats set up to defend Fannie and Freddie. (By the same token, the majority Dems in congress needed Republicans to pass the Voting Rights Act in 1964! Republicans voted in favor...Dems voted against. But the vote carried the day.

10:26 "Without preconditions." Bring it, Mac! Hammer that! Force the SOB to deny it, so we can rub his face in the video.

10:27 McCain says "my friends" again. (Drink.)

10:27 Obama says "we cannot allow Iran to get a nuclear weapon." But it doesn't mean anything. But Obama does categorically reject the authority of the UNSC to veto actions in our own interest.

Damn unilaterist.

10:30 Did Obama just confirm that his assessment is that Iran is using centrifuges specifically to develop nuclear weapons?
If so, then it is flatly impossible for the US to attack Iran "under false pretenses." Because the only real pretense is true!

10:36 McCain: "Well, I believe in the soul, the cock, the pussy, the small of a woman's back, the hanging curve ball, high fiber, good scotch, that the novels of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, overrated crap. I believe Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter. I believe in the sweet spot, soft-core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas Eve and I believe in long, slow, deep, soft, wet kisses that last three days.
[pause]
Goodnight.

Labels: McCain, Obama, Politics

"I'm afraid Senator Obama doesn't know the difference between a tactic and a strategy."

Ooh. That's going to leave a mark.

Labels: McCain, Obama, Politics

This isn't the Obama I know.

Labels: Biden, McCain, Obama, Politics

John McCain gave over 27% of his income to charity in 06-07.

Obama gave 5.8% and 6.1% in those two years.


Hmmm. 27 to 6. Sounds like Koufax's Win/Loss record in his hall of fame prime!

McCain might not be able to type well. But he knows how to write a check!

As for Biden: He gave three tenths of one percent.

Wow. I don't think Palin's released her figures yet, but all she has to do is tithe, and she will be body-slamming Obama...while raising four children, on less money!

Biden isn't going to want to show his face. "Stand up, Chuck!" ROFL!

Splash, out

Jason

ADDED: Plus, I'd weight what a conservative gives to charity a lot more than what a libtard gives. If a conservative does charitable giving, it will go to feed the hungry, teach people to read, it will go to the Scouts, to Little League, the Red Cross, or other worthy causes.

When a libtard gives to a charity, it's more likely going to PETA or some damned tree-hugging outfit dedicated to saving dolphins from becoming sushi.

Labels: Biden, McCain, Obama, Palin, Politics, taxes

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

"Stand up, Chuck!!!"

HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!

Splash, out

Jason

UPDATE: Why does Obama hate the handicapped?

Labels: Democrats, McCain, Obama, stupid

There has been much hoo-hah over the last couple of days over John McCain's story of a guard who had loostened his bonds overnight, and who later, on Christmas day, stood alongside McCain outside of his cell and wordlessly drew a cross in the dirt with his foot, stood alongside McCain for several minutes, before erasing it to avoid punishment from his own superiors in the Communist Vietnamese hierarchy.

The lefties, without evidence, accuse McCain of plagiarizing the account from Solzhinitsen -- as if no Christian under persecution could ever have made such a gesture before in recorded history.

By the time of the McCain incident, the Ichthys fish was in common usage as a symbol of Christianity, having been revived from the early Christians living under Roman persecution - a fact that seems to have been lost on the undereducated moron who penned the Kos diary, who heard the story and missed the historical resonance of the gesture, instead laughably thinking that it sounded something like a scene of Ben Hur.

Well, if it does appear in Ben Hur, it's because Cecil B. DeMille did more homework than libtards are accustomed to doing. According to Christian traditions that rather predate the Viet Nam War, early Christians would draw one of the two arcs of the Ichthys symbol in the dirt with their feet. If the person they met in the street was another Christian, the other person would complete the fish. The relentlessly secularist libtards wouldn't know about this piece of history: in their ignorance, they think Solzhinitzen must have made it up out of whole cloth. But Wikipedia says that the Ichthys symbol was back in usage in the Pacific Rim in the 1960s as a discreet symbol of Christian fellowship. (It's not so discreet now that lots of people have Jesus Fish on the backs of their cars. But it was then.)

My point: A practicing Christian would likely have been familiar with the practice of drawing a cross or fish in the dirt with his or her feet - especially a Christian who was practising their faith under the risk of imprisonment, torture, or death, like McCain was, and like that Vietnamese guard.

It's a gesture that has historical resonance to a Christian that it does not to the secular wing of Libtardism, which is no doubt the wing advancing the plagiarism accusation.

The story cannot be proven false; and certainly rings true to me, as entirely plausible.

And libtards, of course, are always stupid.

Labels: Christianity, McCain, The Left, Viet Nam

That's the line from another deranged libtard ... with all due respect for McCain's military service, natch.

ABC News' Teddy Davis and Molly Hunter Report: While Barack Obama was urging supporters not to devalue the military service of rival John McCain, an informal Obama adviser argued Monday that the former POW's isolation during the Vietnam War has hobbled the Arizona senator's capacity as a war-time leader.

“Sadly, Sen. McCain was not available during those times, and I say that with all due respect to him," said informal Obama adviser Rand Beers. "I think that the notion that the members of the Senate who were in the ground forces or who were ashore in Vietnam have a very different view of Vietnam and the cost that you described than John McCain does because he was in isolation essentially for many of those years and did not experience the turmoil here or the challenges that were involved for those of us who served in Vietnam during the Vietnam war."

"So I think," he continued, "to some extent his national security experience in that regard is sadly limited and I think it is reflected in some of the ways that he thinks about how U.S. forces might be committed to conflicts around the world."

Yes, this Democrat thinks that McCain, somehow magically rendered illiterate by his time in prison, is an intellectual cripple, by virtue of the fact that he missed out on the key developmental experience of smoking pot, dropping acid with Timothy Leary and and banging hippie chicks during the Summer of Love. Obama, of course, has the advantage of living through this time of enlightenment. He would have been about seven or ten years old at the time.

What a condescending prick.

Splash, out

Jason

Labels: Democrats, McCain, Politics, The Left

The Obama orcs are shaking their spears at McCain's military record, doing their damnedest, as I wrote in the post below, to neutralize one of McCain's differentiators between himself and Obama, who couldn't be bothered to wear the uniform.

Specifically, John Aravosis, of AMERICAblog, who recently attacked the permanently disabled John McCain for collecting disability pay incident to the multiple broken limbs, beating, bayoneting, and torture he received in North Viet Nam (on top of having been wounded in the Forrestal fire when a bomb exploded on the carrier deck), is now pointing out that McCain did, in fact, make a propaganda video for the North Vietnamese after having been tortured within an inch of his life.

He jests at scars that never felt a wound.

It's not "nice" to ask the question, but it's actually a pretty good question. Yes, we all know that John McCain was captured and tortured in Vietnam (McCain won't let you forget). A lot of people don't know, however, that McCain made a propaganda video for the enemy while he was in captivity. Putting that bit of disloyalty aside, what exactly is McCain's military experience that prepares him for being commander in chief? It's not like McCain rose to the level of general or something. He's a vet. We get it. But simply being a vet, as laudable as it is, doesn't really tell you much about someone's qualifications for being commander in chief. If McCain is going to play the "I was tortured" card every five minutes as a justification for electing him president, then he shouldn't throw a hissy fit any time any one asks to know more about his military experience. Getting shot down, tortured, and then doing propaganda for the enemy is not command experience. Again, it's not nice to say say, but we're not running for class president here. We deserve real answers, not emotional outbursts designed to quell the questions.

Yes, McCain broke, at one point, and submitted to a propaganda project. I guess I'll bring that up anytime some self-congratulating libtard floats the unthinking lie that torture doesn't work.

Aravosis isn't fit to lick the polish off of John McCain's shoes, though. Let him wrestle for scum sucker honors with another oxygen thief and national embarrassment, Medea Benjamin, who attaches the smear not just to McCain, but all Vietnam veterans:

"I wouldn't characterize anybody who fought in Vietnam as a war hero," said Medea Benjamin, a co-founder of the theatrical anti-war group Code Pink. "In 23 bombing sorties, there must have been civilians that were killed and there's no heroism to that."

Libtards hate troops. They have no respect for them whatsoever. Scratch the surface and you'll find roiling hatred of their betters and condescension toward the men and women in the ranks.

And then there's this.

Splash, out

Jason

Labels: McCain, The Left

Turns out that's a lie.

Labels: McCain, The Left

Wesley Clark levels his rhetorical guns at John McCain, stating that McCain lacks the executive experience needed to be president.

Presumably, McCain's post POW service as a capable squadron commander doesn't count, while the absolute hash Hillary made of HillaryCare in 1993 is just the ticket, as is Obama's decades of executive experience as... well, as a "community organizer."

At any rate, Clark looks at more than 25 years as a legislator and a distinguished career in the U.S. Navy, and finds McCain, in relation to Obama, "untested and untried."

Laughable.

"I don't think getting in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to become President," says Clark, who endorsed the far less distinguished career of John F. Kerry and the non-existent military careers of John Edwards and Obama at various times. I wonder just what experiences Obama brings to the table as a (snicker) "community organizer" that McCain lacks that qualify Obama to become president.

For crying out loud, Clark has a tin ear. But get ready for more of this, as Obama sends his minion orcs to try to undercut a key McCain differentiator - his military career.

Neptunus Lex, himself a career Navy officer, has more.

For my take on Clark, click here.

My sense is that the top two retired four-star pro-Obama partisans, Clark and McPeak, are curious choices, because both of them do not appear to have been well-liked or respected in the ranks.

That's not as big a deal to me as one would think. A lot of fine officers were detested in the ranks. At least until they brought victories under their command. For example, Patton, Stonewall Jackson, Douglas MacArthur, etc. But it's curious to me that both of these guys seem to be cut from the same mold... more along the lines of Old Fuss & Feathers than Omar Bradley.

Splash, out

Jason

Labels: McCain, Politics, Wesley Clark

So the libtards and other apologists for Islamofascism have their miserable knickers in a twist over John McCain's linking Iran to Al Qaeda in a couple of recent appearances.

The thing is, they're wrong. McCain is right. There have been a number of documented connections between Iran and other extremist groups, both Sunni and Shia, to include, specifically, Al Qaeda, as they make common cause to undermine American power and attempt to drive us out of the region.

From the Washington Post, in 2004:

On Iran, by contrast, the report concludes that al Qaeda's relationship with Tehran and its client, the Hezbollah militant group, was long-standing and included cooperation on operations, the officials said. It also details previously unknown links between the two, including the revelation that as many as 10 of the Sept. 11 hijackers may have passed through Iran in late 2000 and early 2001 because Iranian border guards were instructed to let al Qaeda associates travel freely, sources familiar with the report have said.

[9/11] Commission and government officials emphasize that they have found no indication that Tehran knowingly helped in the plot. But the commission report will cite evidence that Iran allowed al Qaeda members into the country even after the attacks.

The Sept. 11 panel has also raised the possibility that al Qaeda may have had a "yet unproven" role in the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing, which killed 19 U.S. servicemen and has been blamed on a Saudi Hezbollah group. Iran is a primary sponsor of Hezbollah, or Party of God, which the United States considers a terrorist group.

Many of the commission's findings about Iran were discovered only in recent weeks from, among other sources, electronic intercepts and interrogations of al Qaeda suspects in U.S. custody, sources familiar with the commission's findings said. Even before then, Chairman Thomas H. Kean (R), a former New Jersey governor, said, "There were a lot more active contacts, frankly, with Iran and with Pakistan than there were with Iraq."

See this, also, from Time Magazine: 9/11 Commission Finds Ties Between Al Qaeda, Iran

And this, too, from Peter Brooks

Shockingly, it's been long forgotten that Iran became home to some of al Qaeda's most wanted after the fall 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. Tehran admitted as much, claiming that al Qaeda operatives were under "house arrest" and would be tried.

Of course, nothing of the sort happened . . .

So al Qaeda "refugees" from Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan, North Africa and Europe — including senior military commander Saif al Adel, three of Osama's sons and spokesman Sulaiman Abu Ghaith — now operate freely from Iran.

In fact, just last week, the German monthly magazine Cicero, citing Western intelligence sources, claimed that as many as 25 al Qaeda thugs are living in Iran under the protection of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

Cicero cites a "top-ranking" Western intelligence official saying, "This is not incarceration or house arrest. They [al Qaeda members] can move around as they please." The IRGC even provides logistics help and training to al Qaeda.

Cicero doesn't mention which al Qaeda operations Iran is supporting, but there's little doubt that Tehran is aiding the terror in Iraq, where there are more and more Iranian "fingerprints" on insurgent/terrorist attacks.

These ignoramuses have been taking it as an article of faith that Sunnis and Shias will never make common cause against a Western enemy. But you have to look no further than the cooperation of the Sunni Hamas and the Shia Hezbollah against Israel to disprove their stupidity.

Iran and Al Qaeda will befriend any friend and oppose any foe in order to ensure the survival and success of tyrrany. In the short term, they will even befriend each other.

Splash, out

Jason

Labels: Al Qaeda, Iran, Iraq, McCain