Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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"[A]side From Being Tortured, What Did McCain Do to Excel in the Military?" |
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Posted by:
Carol Platt Liebau at
10:11 PM |
Lefty John Aravosis over at AmericaBlog wants to know: "Honestly, aside from being tortured, what did John McCain do to excel in the military?"
If this doesn't expose the gap -- in sensibility, understanding and everything else -- between the left and the right in this country, nothing ever will. For sheer ingratitude and disgracefulness, it's a hard question to beat.
I'm waiting for all the proponents of "civility" who condemned "conservative bloggers" for criticizing John Kerry's stories about his military service and his behavior after it to start sputtering with outrage.
These are the people who support Barack Obama. This is the kind of argument they're willing to make to defeat John McCain.
Here are the facts for any honest lefty who wants to traffic in truth rather than smears. An overview:
From his five years in a North Vietnamese prison camp to his tenure as the Navy’s liaison to the Senate, John McCain’s Navy record boils down to a series of unadorned paragraphs that bestow upon him some of the nation’s top military honors.
That includes 17 awards for excellence, including the Legion of Merit, where he was praised for providing Navy leaders “with sage advice and sound judgment for enacting critical legislation during a period of severe fiscal constraint” in his capacity as liaison to the Senate from the Navy’s Office of Legislative Affairs.
And for details on the torture that Aravosis dismisses so cavalierly, check out this podcast (##89-91) (HT: Ed Morrissey at Hot Air). It's not pretty. What's more, he was "singled out" for especially brutal treatment because of his father's and grandfather's roles in the Navy. And yet he still refused the enemy's offers for early release.
John McCain wasn't my first choice to be Republican nominee. But the sheer indecency of these kinds of tactics may be helping to ensure that even less-than-enthused conservatives will start flocking to McCain's banner.
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Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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Harry Reid: "Coal Makes Us Sick. Oil Makes Us Sick." |
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Posted by:
Hugh Hewitt at
6:00 PM |
The Leader of the Don't Drill Democrats in the Senate declaims against two giant and productive industries that employ hundreds of thousands of Americans. His full statement:
"The one thing we fail to talk about is those costs that you don't see on the bottom line. That is coal makes us sick, oil makes us sick; it's global warming. It's ruining our country, it’s ruining our world. We’ve got to stop using fossil fuel.”
(HT: The Corner).
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Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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Why Chuck Todd is Right, and Why McCain Can Win ... |
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Posted by:
Matt Lewis at
5:24 PM |
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Yesterday on "Meet The Press," Tom Brokaw sought to "school" Chuck Todd concerning political predictions. Here's how "Viva Chuck Todd" scores the exchange:
The Chuck did what he's paid to do: prognosticate based on careful examination of current trends and data. Specifically, Obama not winning Montana and North Dakota. This set Tom off to quickly chide The Chuck in one might say, a condescending way: "Now be careful what you say at this stage about what he's going to win and what he's not going to win." The Chuck politely deferred to grandpa Tom's scolding and got back in the flow.
But, of course, Chuck Todd is correct. That's because he rocks, and Brokaw doesn't (there is no website called "Viva Brokaw!").
In all seriousness, Todd's point underscores the primary reason John McCain still has a chance to win the election; National popularity matters much, much less in a "winner-take-all" electoral system than it would in a national election.
Consider this: In 2004, Bush got 64 percent of the vote in North Dakota. Clearly, John McCain won't do that well -- but he will most assuredly win the state (as Chuck Todd correctly predicts).
Here's why Todd can essentially guarantee it: Let's suppose that Obama's popularity is so impressive and overwhelming that it garners him 10 more points in North Dakota than John Kerry got just four years ago. That would be impressive, but he would still lose the state by a landslide. And McCain would still get all three electoral votes. You see, it really doesn't matter if Obama gets 49 percent of the North Dakota vote, or 35 percent of the North Dakota vote -- he still loses the state. That extra 14 points of popularity means nothing.
This isn't the only example of how Obama's chances are being over-sold. Today, cable TV news was "abuzz" about Obama's chances to win in the South (this is supposed to send shivers down my spine and show that Obama is building this amazing juggernaut). The truth is that Obama has no chance in the real south. The only real chance Obama has to pick-up a "southern" state is in Virginia -- and that has more to do with the changing demographics in the state than it does with Obama's popularity. Virginia is a purple state, and has been for a while, now.
Obama does have a chance in VA, but McCain can make up for it by picking off a Kerry state. This, of course, is not impossible. He has a chance to win New Hampshire (where McCain rules), Minnesota (home of Pawlenty and the GOP Convention), Pennsylvania (home of "bitter gun-clingers") and Michigan (Romney country), just to name a few ...
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Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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McCain "Limited" By Captivity in Vietnam? |
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Posted by:
Carol Platt Liebau at
5:23 PM |
If you are an American soldier who has been captured, imprisoned and tortured during your service to your country, remember that Democrats will attack you for it should you ever seek high office. Now an "informal Obama advisor," Rand Beers, is saying that John McCain was "limited" by his years in captivity. Add him to the list compiled by Jim Geraghty of the other Democrats who've criticized McCain's service, including George McGovern, Jay Rockefeller, Tom Harkin, Democratic congressional candidate Bill Gillespie, Ed Schultz, Tony McPeak, and Wesley Clark.
It's amazing that representatives of a party now being led by a man with such exquisite concern for the terrorists imprisoned at Guantanamo would be so dismissive of a soldier who spent five years in the Hanoi Hilton -- under conditions considerably less favorable, and with far fewer rights, than the detainees in Cuba currently have.
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Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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"Use It or Lose It" Loses |
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Posted by:
Michele Bachmann at
2:28 PM |
In an effort to pass some kind of energy bill before the 4th of July recess and having failed with their price gouging bill, the Democrats brought H.R. 6251 - the Responsible Federal Oil and Gas Lease Act sponsored by Rep. Rahall from West Virginia -- to the floor last week. The bill is also know as the "Use it or Lose it" bill.
Not only does it do nothing to increase oil production, this bill prohibits the Secretary of the Interior from issuing new leases for exploration for, or production of, oil or natural gas, unless the applicant certifies that he is “diligently developing” the leased lands or surrenders the leases. This bill would restrict the development of American energy, while sending a signal to the energy markets that petroleum had better come up quick or not at all, a move that could trigger higher energy prices and discourage investment in energy exploration.
19 Democrats joined 176 Republicans in defeating this "duplicate" piece of legislation. I say duplicate because Federal energy lease holders already must produce oil or natural gas within five to 10 years to live up to the terms of the lease and the law.
Interestingly enough, back in 1992, Speaker Pelosi – as well as Majority Leader Hoyer and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Nick Rahall (D-WV), author of the bill – voted for the very duplicate provisions of the current lease structure. According to Title 30, Subsection 188(a) and (b) of the United States Code, “any lease … may be forfeited and canceled … whenever the lessee fails to comply with any provisions of this chapter, of the lease, or of the general regulations… Any lease … shall be subject to cancellation by the Secretary of the Interior after 30 days notice upon failure of the lessee to comply with any of the provisions of the lease.”
So here we are in recess having left Washington, D.C. again without acting on any meaningful legislation to increase the supply of American-made energy to help lower gasoline prices. Now we know why Congress' approval rating is at 18%.
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Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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Obama Seeks to Tamp Down on Clark Controversy ... |
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Posted by:
Matt Lewis at
2:20 PM |
This morning, Barack Obama sought to distance himself from the Wes Clark comments, saying:
"For those like John McCain who have endured physical torment in service to our country — no further proof of such sacrifice is necessary," Obama said. "And let me also add that no one should ever devalue that service, especially for the sake of a political campaign, and that goes for supporters on both sides."
Once again, Obama proves himself to be a capable politician. Lesser opponents might have agreed with Clark. Others might simply have ignored Clark's comments, and let them fester. Instead, Obama immediately sought to deprive McCain's allies from making this an issue.
In fact, Obama seems determined to deprive his opponents the advantage of having anything for which to criticize him. We say he hasn't been to Iraq -- he goes to Iraq. We note that he says he won't wear a flag pin -- he starts wearing a flag pin. Rev. Wright becomes a problem, he gets thrown under the bus, etc. ...
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Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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The Learning Tour |
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Posted by:
Carol Platt Liebau at
11:59 AM |
Barack Obama's world learning tour has the eerie feeling of someone trying desperately to get up to speed about matters of which he has no knowledge.
Funny -- when McCain traveled overseas, it was obvious that he was engaging with issues on which he had a lot of knowledge and familiarity, which is why it worked politically. He essentially met up with "old friends" in places he'd been before.
Barack Obama is going overseas to get a look at things for the first time and to meet everybody. No doubt it is one more maneuver intended to help us "see" Barack as president and a hasty effort to gain a little credibility in discussing foreign affairs.
But it does seem to point up Barack's inexperience vis a vis John McCain.
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Monday, June 30, 2008 |
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The Left Hits McCain's War Record |
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Posted by:
Matt Lewis at
9:50 AM |
Are they "swift boating" McCain?
It started with Jay Rockefeller, who essentially accused McCain of being an "Air Pirate." Then, this weekend, Wes Clark made his idiotic remarks. Is there an effort to undermine McCain's heroic image? You bet your life!
... Following are a couple quotes from Ben Smith's post that further illustrate how the left is targeting McCain's war record:
... "Getting shot down, tortured, and then doing propaganda for the enemy is not command experience," Aravosis wrote in the blog post, entitled "Honestly, besides being tortured, what did McCain do to excel in the military?"
... "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." A few things to note:
1. This further highlights how Obama and his supporters are not engaging in a "new" type of politics. This is the same old attack-style politics where one side tries to undermine and destroy the reputation of the other side. And the fact that several prominent Obama surrogates have "gone there" leads me to believe this is an organized effort to undermine McCain's strength (while Obama keeps his hands clean). It occurs to me that Obama is in Independence, MO today to talk about patriotism. Is it patriotic to attack a former P.O.W.?
2. The left are the ones who are not willing to move on from the Vietnam war. These comments show they are still fighting protesting the war. Only people with no class whatsoever would attack the military service of a former P.O.W. -- but then, again, these are the same people who spat into the faces of our service men when they returned home.
3. This illustrates how out-of-touch the left still is regarding military service. This is the last thing Obama needs, but the truth is that -- sooner or later -- people reveal their true feelings. The left loathes the military.
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