Umm...exactly?

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David Neiwert wrote a fantastic defense of hate crime legislation last week. Jesse from Pandagon weighs in this week.

Malkin, on the other hand, like many conservatives, has not been all that impressed. Here she links to a guy who thinks that all interracial crime should be considered a hate crime - because blacks commit more crimes against whites than vice versa. Here and here she took great joy in reporting that certain crimes had been mis- or fraudulently reported as hate crimes.

But in the sad case of the Armanious family murders in New Jersey...well, let's just hear from her:

[A] radical Islamist website has been tracking Christians on the online chat forum, Paltalk--which was frequented by Hossan Armanious...

In response to this, she quotes Robert Spencer:

If the Armanious family did in fact receive a death threat related to their proselytizing on Pal Talk, what are the implications for our free society? If the murders were indeed, as many Copts suspect, a warning to them not to proselytize among Muslims, what does that mean for the free exchange of ideas that has always been one of the central values -- perhaps the central value -- of the American polity?

Psst: That's precisely why liberals are in favor of hate crime legislation.

Just sayin'.

How dare you say it's just a big photo op?

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Adam Keiper has set images of the Iraqi election to Aaron Copeland's Fanfare for the Common Man.

Any pictures of empty Sunni-area voting booths?

Professor Glen Stassen Interview

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When Hillary Clinton made comments about abortion going up under President Bush, Malkin was on the case. Her points were twofold: Hillary Clinton was trying desperately to move rightward, and the study Clinton was referring to was both partisan and flawed.

Media Matters took care of the former claim. To address the latter, I ticked off a few points where Lifenews.com was less than accurate. I also asked Dr. Stassen a few questions via e-mail, which he graciously answered this weekend:

What first led you to do this research and write this article?

My wife's and my experience with the threat that her rubella (German measles) in the 8th week of pregnancy would probably mean severe handicaps with our baby, our deciding against abortion, because we had hope that we could cope--based on her being a pediatrics nurse and our having coped with challenges before--and then the outstanding help we got raising David from doctors, nurses, teachers, and church members. All this sensitized me to the importance of hope you can cope, and of social safety nets, in deciding against abortions. And I was seeing
those safety nets eroding with policies designed to shift the money to the very wealthy. So I feared abortions might be rising.

Lifenews.com desribes the article as "a last-minute effort to call into question President Bush's pro-life credentials." How would you respond?

You can see the same arguments in the book that David Gushee and I wrote over a five-year period and published in 2003. The book is Kingdom Ethics: Following Jesus in Contemporary Context (InterVarsity Press). It won Christianity Today's award as the best book of the year in either theology or ethics. Read chapter 6 on the books's approach, and chapter 10 on abortion. Read chapters 7-12 on our consistent prolife ethic.

Clearly we wrote this not in response to president Bush, but in response to the way of Jesus as we understand it, and our life experiences.

You can see a similar argument made by the US Catholic bishops when they warned that if Congress and President Clinton eliminated the welfare program, it would undermine social safety nets for mothers and lead to an increase in abortions. They proclaimed it before President W. Bush
was on the radar screens.

In my posting, I didn't address some of Lifenews.com's other claims: That you used "faulty statistics" to claim that abortion was on the rise in George W. Bush's presidency. Among other things, [the scientist quoted in the Lifenews.com article] says that "Not only do the data fail to indicate a nationwide upsurge in abortions, but Stassen provides no economic data whatsoever, much less the kind of statistical analysis one would need to show that
abortions and economic factors such as unemployment are linked." For those of us unfamiliar with statistics, do you have a layman's answer to that claim?

I cite the following five sets of confirming facts that unemployment and lack of health insurance cause an increase in abortions:
1) Two-thirds of women who have abortions say they do not see how they could afford to raise the child. When unemployment is up, affording to raise a child is harder.
2) Half of women who have abortions say they do not have a reliable mate. Data from Children's Defense Fund clearly indicate that men without jobs usually do not marry. Therefore, increased unemployment in the last three years predicts fewer marriages and fewer reliable mates,
and therefore more abortions. I checked this for the sixteen states. Marriages in fact were down, as predicted. During this time of increased unemployment, only three of the sixteen states had more marriages in 2002 than in 2001, and as predicted, abortion rates actually decreased
in those states as a group. In the sixteen states overall, however, there were 16,392 fewer marriages than the year before, and 5,855 more abortions, thus confirming the hypothesis that marriages decrease when the unemployment rate increases, and where marriages decrease, abortions
increase. Clearer confirmation is hard to find.
3) Black and Latina women tend to be poorer and more unemployed. Their abortion rates are two to three times higher than white women.
4) The thirty-year trend shows abortion rates moving in tandem with women's unemployment rates. From 1973 to 1980, women's unemployment increased from approximately 6% to 7.6%, and the abortion rate increased from 16 to 29 per 1,000 women aged 15 to 45. (Of course, these were the
first years after Roe v Wade, which surely also contributed mightily to the increase in abortions.) But then abortions did not keep increasing. From 1980 to 1992, unemployment decreased from 7.6% to 5.5% briefly, and then partway up briefly to 7%. During this period of slow decrease
in unemployment, the abortion rate slowly decreased from 29 to 26. During the Clinton administration, unemployment dropped nicely to 4.5%, and the abortion rate dropped significantly to 21. During the present administration, women's unemployment increased above 6%, and the
abortion rate has increased.
5) This now receives additional confirmation from the fact that the National Institute of Health has reported that infant mortality rate actually increased in 2002 for the first time ever since 1940, the first year for which their website reports the data. This also indicates
decreased support for mothers and babies and decreased healthcare.

It would seem that any information on how to cut down on abortion rates would be welcome to pro-lifers. Would you agree that there is an apparent tendency of your detractors to put their support of President Bush ahead of a desire to understand the driving force behind abortion in this country? If so, do you have any opinions as to why this might be?

Yes, unfortunately that clearly seems to be true. In my article, I wrote only that the abortions decreased in the 1990s by 300,000 per year, from 1,610,000 per year to 1,310,000 per year. I named no political party and no president; I did not try to give the credit to president Clinton,
whose presidency began in January of 1993. The attack on my article by O'Bannon and Hussey said that most of the reduction came in the first half of the decade, when George Bush senior was president. They shifted to speaking frrom a partisan perspective. Their claim was an astounding
distortion of the truth. According to the CDC website, the abortion rate stayed flat during Bush's years, and declined dramatically during Clinton's years. During the senior Bush's years (1989-1992), the abortion rate was 24, 24, 24, and 23. Clinton's first year (1993) it was
still 23. But by 1994 it had dropped to 21, and by 1997 it had dropped to 17, where it stayed through 1999, and then dropped to 16 his last year.

Most of the many email responses to my article were nicely appreciative. But many responded not by dealing with the data, but by defending President Bush. The most frequent defense was that the stagnant economy and consistently high unemployment rate and increase of 5.2 million
uninsured were not his fault. I respond to that defense in the forthcoming issue of The Christian Century.

Followup watch: Juan Alvarez

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Dancinfool, a commenter at World O'Crap, found what I was looking for: Confirmation that Juan Alvarez is a US citizen.

Alvarez, if you remember, is the mentally ill individual who caused the Glendale train wreck. Malkin, apropos of nothing but her own biases, wondered aloud whether Alvarez was an illegal immigrant.

Well, that idea was disproved the same day, although to be fair, I was looking for it and couldn't find it. So I won't start the followup timer 1/26, but rather today. When will Malkin mention that Alvarez was, in fact, a citizen of the United States, so we can't blame this particular societal ill on illegal immigration?

Update: My super-cool automatic countup timer (on the sidebar) seems to have died a horrible death, so I will have to do it by hand for now. Sigh.

Iraq elections bring hope?

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First off, a news flash: Andrew Sullivan is apparently a left-wing blogger. I don't know why I should take seriously any post that begins with statement like that, but what the hell...

Malkin baits liberal bloggers who are remaining silent on today's election. Well, my friend the Liberal Avenger has something to say.

Today in Iraq, under paradoxical conditions of both extreme anarchy and martial law, Iraqis will cast their votes then return to their homes without electricity or running water.

Tomorrow the sun will rise upon the same Iraq it rose upon yesterday - a country descending into the depths of hell as a core of invisible people wreak havok against their neighbors and a hostile occupying army.

Tens of thousands of families of tens of thousands of victims of the war will awaken without their mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, neighbors, teachers, friends. Tens of thousands more will awaken without homes.

As for me, I'm certainly hopeful that these elections will mean a better life for Iraqis than they had under Saddam. I hope that we can bring our troops home soon while leaving behind a stable government providing security and the basics for all its people. I'm happy that Iraqis have gotten to participate in their own government, and impressed that they are willing to brave the attacks - and hopeful that the democratic will can help bring those attacks to an end.

Hopeful, but not optimistic. The chances are that it will get worse before it gets better. It's called recognizing a pattern.

By the way: I, for one, am reserving a big part of my judgement until I hear from Riverbend.

Oh, and: Here's Juan Cole on the issue.

Also known as "What's actually happening"

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How Pakistan's Dawn newspaper is playing it: Violence rages on as Iraqis go to polls today: 19 killed in suicide attack, shootings

But we're not petty

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Malkin quotes the AP on the French military's humanitarian efforts in Southeast Asia:

The naval ship's pantry is stocked with wines, baguettes and pate, and its casual dress code is shorts and sandals. There's even an artist - a painter to keep an illustrated record of the trip.
With a panache all its own, France's military is delivering aid to tsunami-battered Indonesia - and showing how a small force can make a difference.

Unsurprisingly, she finds this unimpressive at best. She also leaves out a few interesting paragraphs (emphasis added):

Although media attention has focused on the U.S. contribution, particularly by the nuclear aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and its battle group, aid officials say the French and other forces are playing an equally important role.

"(The French) increase our capacity to move loads into some areas where roads have yet to be reconstructed. Trucks cannot reach these areas," said Daniel Augstburger, head of the U.N.'s relief work on Sumatra's western coast.

That responsibility likely will increase once the Americans leave with their three dozen helicopters...

So the French provide something the Americans can't, and plan to stay longer. No wonder Malkin's feeling insecure.

Oh, and about that painter? Malkin doesn't like him. From the safety of Maryland, she writes:

Hat tip to The Baron, who has this to say about the French artist:

A perfectly healthy human coming ashore in the midst of devestation[sic], not with food and medicine, but with a paintbrush. I only hope he chooses a less insulting medium than watercolors.

Touche.

What exactly sets a painter apart from the thousands of reporters and photographers that have swarmed the scene?

Oh, right. He's French.

Urnnghghhhghgnrgnh....

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Fighting a bad cold. Stupid, stupid, bad cold. Posting will be light to nonexistent today, unless she says something crazier than usual. Please read the archives while I'm gone and I plan to take something like 20,000% RDA of Vitamin C so I'll be back and ready to go on Monday.

No, it isn't

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Michelle calls this the "Stupidest Explanation for the Tsunami. Ever":

The act of war deliberately and thoughtlessly wounds, poisons and handicaps the life-sustaining womb of all mankind. The Earth reacts, as any living thing would, when attacked. Earthquake, tsunami, flood, tornado, hurricane, mudslide, and resulting loss of life may be the natural emotional response.

We must behave responsibly and live peacefully or we may all be "shaken" off like a bad case of fleas.

Listen, that's a little bit out there. But it's not even close to the stupidest explanation ever. Probably not even in the top ten.

How about because the area is a "hotbed of Radical Islam"?

Have you forgotten the "Swedish people are gay" hypothesis?

In fact, now that I think about it, I might not have phrased it in quite the earth-mother way the LTE did, but if God's hand were actively involved (and as a Quaker, I find that so unlikely as to be insulting) I'd be a lot more prepared to believe it had to do with our stewardship of God's creation than who's having sex with whom.

Damn short-hairs

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I think I'm starting to get a taste of how white-bread Republican mom and dad must have thought observing the antics of 60s campus radicals.

Conservative students at the University of North Texas staged a protest of President Bush's upcoming amnesty plan by conducting a "Capture the illegal immigrant" event on their campus.

Malkin quotes the college newspaper: "Three Young Conservatives members walked around campus wearing bright orange t-shirts with the words 'Illegal Immigrant' on the front and 'Catch me if u can' on the back for the game."

Hey, that's great. I wonder if they also painted their faces brown, just to make it more believable. Malkin says "I think the kids deserve praise for paying attention to the costs of massive illegal immigration."

Don't fool yourself. If this were the 60s, these kids would be playing "Horsewhip the Watts rioter."

Media Matters: The blogger's friend

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On President Boxer I wrote that "Media Matters owns Bill O'Reilly." Well, they indirectly own Michelle Malkin, too:

FOX News general assignment correspondent Major Garrett suggested that Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) had changed her position on abortion in a recent speech in order to pander to culturally conservative voters in advance of a 2008 presidential bid. The truth is that Clinton's speech was fully consistent with her previous statements and votes on the issue.

Read the whole thing, then recall that Malkin called Clinton's speech a "brazen quest to move rightward."

As my young internets friends might say, pwn3d!

The open borders lobby strikes again?

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It's hard to know how to respond to a statement like this:

The OBL (open borders lobby) is naturally up in arms. What does it matter if someone [Juan Manuel Alvarez, the apparent attempted suicide who caused the Glendale train derailment] has violated immigration laws?

Go ask the relatives of the dead train commuters.

First of all, Malkin doesn't seem to have any evidence that Alvarez is an illegal immigrant. Except, of course, his last name. Second of all, go ask the relatives how much relief they would feel if it turns out that this speculation about Alvarez' alien status is just that - speculation. "Thank God. At least he was here legally."

And, indulging Malkin's out-of-left-field speculation (because yes, there is always a possibility it might be true) for a moment, if he is here illegally, and since he has a prior record, if Homeland Security had their act together, this wouldn't have happened in the United States. It might have happened in Mexico.

But that doesn't change the fact that Malkin assumes immigration status based on behavior and a last name. It's a lot of discussion to have at this stage of the game.

More on life in a war zone

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I blogged here and here about Malkin's cavalier dismissal of the war experiences of a truck driver in Iraq.

Then I found this post by Brandon Starr, whose brother is a truck driver in Iraq.

Now you tell me anyone has it easy over there.

(Broken link fixed - thanks LibAv!)

A higher standard than what?

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Malkin is both right and wrong about the new payola revelations:

In 2002, syndicated columnist Maggie Gallagher repeatedly defended President Bush's push for a $300 million initiative encouraging marriage as a way of strengthening families. But Gallagher failed to mention that she had a $21,500 contract with the Department of Health and Human Services to help promote the president's proposal...

Can't tell you how deeply disappointed I am to read this, especially given that Gallagher has been a fearless and independent (or so I had thought) voice in defense of traditional marriage.

She's right because she has been consistently disapproving of Armstrong Williams, and is continuing that theme with Maggie Gallagher.

She's wrong because she's spending too much time worrying about the reporters. The story, for crying out loud, is the Bush administration. That's not to say she's not unhappy with them:

Also can't tell you how galling the stupidity of the Bush administration officials who doled out taxpayer funds to conservatives in the media is. Who else is out there? First, the Department of Education. Now, the Department of Health and Human Services. What other departments put the right's media figures on the dole? Better step forward and come clean. NOW.

...

Thanks again, Bush administration.

It seems as though Malkin wants us to believe that, Abu Ghraib-style, two departments of the federal government came up with the same idea independently - that we should punish the pundits and wag our fingers at those silly Secretaries of.

This is going higher than that. Consider this a prediction: It's gonna be a circus.

Even a broken clock...

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Let me see that new column! Let me at it! I'll tear it apart! I'll murdelize it!

Oh.

(New snappier title - thanks, dream!)

At the risk of veering wildly off-topic...

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I could not resist the delicious irony:

There are still people in the mainstream media who profess bewilderment that they are accused of being biased.

-- Thomas Sowell.

Writing on Townhall.com.

(Forgive me, I'm bored, since Malkin is presumably again working on this week's column - for Townhall.com.)

This bothers me in an almost indescribable way

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My thoughts are with the loved ones of Roy Hallums, the American hostage who was seen "denouncing" Bush in a videotape today. I use the quotes because it is absolutely fair to disbelieve anything said by a hostage under the most extreme duress imaginable. But it's Malkin's credibility I'm concerned with here as she quotes Rusty Shackleford:

"This does not sound like the Roy Hallums as described to me by his family and friends. I'm sure the rifle pointed at his head had something to do with his pleas."

Absolutely. Amen. May he return safely and as untroubled as possible. It's almost enough to make one forget what Michelle thought about the trustworthiness of family and friends in a previous circumstance.

Almost.

Shut up, Hollywood

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Unless you agree with me.

Update: Okay, shut up again.

Lies, damn lies, and (accusing others of lying about) statistics

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Malkin makes a semi-puzzling statement about Hillary Clinton...

In her brazen quest to move rightward, N.Y. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton attacked President Bush's record on abortion, claiming at a Washington, D.C., march today that:

In the (first) three years since President Bush took office, eight states have seen an increase in abortion rates and four saw a decrease.

"Quest to move rightward?" The only way I can figure that this is a "rightward" move is if one accepts the ridiculous idea that your average pro-choicer sees a drop in abortions as a bad thing. Considering that Sen. Clinton's husband just about coined the phrase "safe, legal, and rare", calling Clinton's statement - and the sentiment it represents - "brazen" is disingenous at best.

Malkin goes on, though, to quote Lifenews.com at length in its attempt to debunk the Stassen op-ed from which Clinton probably took her numbers. Glen Stassen, Lewis B. Smedes Professor of Christian Ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary and author of Kingdom Ethics: Following Jesus in Contemporary Context, supposedly (according to Lifenews) published the op-ed "[i]n a last-minute effort to call into question President Bush's pro-life credentials." He is also an avowed pro-lifer. In his own words:

My wife caught rubella in the eighth week of her pregnancy. We decided not to terminate, to love and raise our baby. David is legally blind and severely handicapped; he also is a blessing to us and to the world.

Lifenews makes this claim:

Stassen's article first claims that abortions were on the decline (down 17.4%) during the 1990s. The assumption he makes is that the economic policies of Bill Clinton caused the decrease.

A quick search of Stassen's article finds that he never once mentions Clinton's name. He does say: "When President George W. Bush took office, the nation's abortion rates were at a 24-year low, after a 17.4% decline during the 1990s. This was an average decrease of 1.7% per year, mostly during the latter part of the decade." That's a poorly written sentence, in my opinion, but it's not the pro-Clinton tirade it's made out to be.

Additionally, Lifenews says

"Stassen never demonstrates that his 16 states are representative of the 50 states,"

which is true - in the op-ed article. But a click on the statistics demonstrates just that:

A Z-test of statistical significance of the sixteen states for the one year that I reported, representing about thirty million women of child-bearing age, suggests greater than 99.9999% confidence that they represent the fifty states.

Back to Hillary. Lifenews also quotes Hillary:

Meanwhile, Clinton also said that during her husband's administration, "we saw the rate of abortion consistently fall."

"The abortion rate fell by one-quarter between 1990 and 1995, the steepest decline since Roe was decided in 1973," Clinton told a conference of the Family Planning Advocates of New York. "The rate fell another 11 percent between 1994 and 2000."

Those numbers also come from the flawed Stassen study.

Dr. Stassen's work keeps changing from a study to an article and back again. Moreover, I can't find these particular statistics in the article, nor any evidence from Lifenews to support the claim that these numbers are false.

There are some issues with the Stassen article, but like any scholar, Stassen seems to have addressed them and in some cases corrected mistakes. And Clinton's claims do oversimplify things a bit. But to call her remarks "rightward", and the article they come from "a last-minute effort" to hurt Bush, amount to a one-two punch of intellectual dishonesty. Stassen does have an opinion about Bush's policies, however - and he's agreed with by some sort of cabal of left-wing babykillers:

The U.S. Catholic bishops warned of this likely outcome if support for families with children was cut back. My wife and I know - as does my son David - that doctors, nurses, hospitals, medical insurance, special schooling, and parental employment are crucial for a special child. David attended the Kentucky School for the Blind, as well as several schools for children with cerebral palsy and other disabilities. He was mainstreamed in public schools as well. We have two other sons, and five grandchildren, and we know that every mother, every father, and every child needs public and family support.
What does this tell us? Economic policy and abortion are not separate issues; they form one moral imperative. Rhetoric is hollow, mere tinkling brass, without healthcare, health insurance, jobs, childcare, and a living wage. Pro-life in deed, not merely in word, means we need a president who will do something about jobs and health insurance and support for prospective mothers.

Update: Made a few edits for clarity and typoes.

Tempest in a teacup

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Malkin reports:

The University of Oregon has reportedly ordered an employee to remove a "Support Our Troops" magnet from his maintenance vehicle because it's a "political statement" in violation of school policy.

Amazingly - absolutely shockingly - she's told only part of the story. See the words "school policy"? Try "state law." Emphasis added:

In an e-mailed statement.. the University of Oregon says it is unclear if the decals are a political statement.
But to make sure they are in compliance with state restrictions... all stickers were ordered to be removed.

That little detail doesn't keep Malkin from discovering a firestorm of leftist anti-sticker, anti-troop sentiment...by linking to a single blog with a snarky "what-good-does-a-sticker-do-when-attached-to-a-gas-guzzler" type message.

Oh, and reprinting a picture of two protestors holding a sign which reads: "We support our troops when they shoot their officers." The caption reads:

He posts a photo of the kind of "Support Our Troops" statements the Left prefers

Hey Michelle, see the black mask and the black vest and the general black? That's why they call them "black bloc." They're no more "The Left" than Fred Phelps is "The Right."

Update: Malkin's reader James Saker does appear to have some actual examples of the University of Oregon's tolerance of political expression - as long as it's anti-war. This is no real surprise; my quibble was with the particular example Malkin had chosen and the seemingly key piece of information she glossed over.

A very heartfelt goodnight

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One of my most enduring memories of television as a very young child is Johnny Carson's character Art Fern. I had to look this up, because I really just remember the end...

"Take the Ventura Freeway to another freeway until you get to the Slauson cutoff. Stop the car. Get out of your car. Cut off your Slauson. Get back in your car and travel until you come to ...the fork in the road."

I hadn't even heard this until today, but apparently he was still writing jokes and sending them to Letterman - and Letterman was using them.

I miss Johnny.

Busy Sunday Cop-out post

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No time to post today, really, which is unfortunate, because Malkin's on fire today.

If you need something to read, check out President Boxer, a group blog to which I am occasionally contributing.

Also, thanks to Rittenhouse Review and Sullywatch for blogrolling us. The early adopters need a bit of love, don't you think? (And for the really early adopters, don't forget to visit Liberal Avenger and Mad Kane.)

More goodness tomorrow.

Who's the fanatic here?

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Dave Friedman contrasts Volokh's view of immigration with Malkin's. Try to guess whose is whose.

So when we refuse to let some people come here, or refuse to let them stay, we might be protecting our national security. But we might also be hurting our national security, by denying us the services of someone who may one day greatly help our nation...

the OBL ['open borders lobby'] continues to argue that cracking down on illegal immigration and tightening terrorist-friendly loopholes are "anti-immigrant."

Blogroll A-Z: Alarming News Ambra Nykol

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Well, Alarming News is kind of boring, actually. That's not to denigrate the author - it's more like a compliment. Although it is interesting to see this:

I work at a political consulting firm in NYC. From time to time I will write favorable posts about my clients because I believe in my clients and their causes. Consider this statement as adequate disclosure for all my possible conflicts of interest now and in the future.

Wow. If we take as a standard the reaction from the right(although not, that I can see, by Karol of Alarming News) that Kos and Jerome received...that's totally inadequate. Where's Hugh Hewitt on this one? (Wrong, as usual. Karol's and Kos' disclosures are both adequate, Kos' even more so.)

But let's skip to Ambra Nykol, shall we?

Ambra is a staunch pro-lifer. I don't know that it's her defining attribute, but it's certainly one of the most prominent. And when surveying her blog, the second post that I read (after a positive critique of Laura Bush's inauguration outfit) contained the following little gem.

Speaking about a court case in Spokane she says:

Do mine eyes deceive me? Did the judge really include in his decision the phrase, "the right to be born"?

Why yes, he did. In fact, he included in his decision "the right to be born" into an abusive marriage, in which the husband is a drug addict - and is not even the baby's father. Wow. Are you sure you want to use this case as an example of how much pro-lifers value the children?

She also accuses Planned Parenthood of purposefully giving out faulty condoms so that they will become "customers in the infanticide turned big business holocaust known as 'abortion clinics'." Oh, and naturally she is anti-Plan B, which in my estimation will be one of the most effective ways of limiting abortion.

And this is more funny than anything else: Ambra runs a mostly glowing profile of a young right-wing activist named Hans Zeiger, who wrote the following:

The reason I'm an optimist about the future of America is because I tend to think that MTV does not speak for young Americans. But if I'm wrong, if the MTV generation is as perverted and spiritually impoverished as its namesake, then we might as well elect Drew Barrymore president in a few years and get this country all over with.

From Nykol's post (titled Know Your Rebels):

Last year Zeiger was also a runner-up in MTV's "Stand Up and Holla" essay contest.

Now that's integrity.

Previous Entries:
Ace of Spades HQ
a small victory

I'd probably turn them off too

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Malkin's apparently quoted in today's WSJ article about the blogging ethics conference.

While sometimes shocking in its vitriol, the instant feedback from readers keeps bloggers accountable, says Michelle Malkin...

Excuse me while I go in search of the mysteriously missing comments section...

And, well, I blush to mention this next part:

"When you hit that little publish button and something goes up, you know that literally millions of eyeballs around the world are there to parse it," and deconstruct every word. "It certainly raises the stakes," she says.

Why, whoever could she be referring to?


(Heh. Sometimes it's fun to pretend to be full of oneself. I'm really not, I promise.)

Occam's Razor?

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Malkin blames House Democrats for Code Pink's protest at the inauguration yesterday.

I can think of at least one alternative explanation.

I don't know who will be right, but if it's me, I'm sure we'll see an immediate retraction of this:

Shame on them. If they wanted to disrupt the president's speech, the Democrats should have had the guts to do the dirty work themselves instead of hiding behind Code Pink's skirts.

Cowards.

Muslim male extremists stole my Neiman-Marcus cookie recipe

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Malkin defends a woman in Nashville who forwarded a piece of chain e-mail and was disciplined by her employer, the city.

Metro Finance Director David Manning said Lazo-Bell used ''poor judgment'' in forwarding ''such an inappropriate message.'"

Unfortunately, Lazo-Bell seems to agree with those accusing her of wrongdoing. She has issued a pathetic apology...The city of Nashville owes Lazo-Bell an apology, not the other way around.

And just what did Lazo-Bell forward that caused such an uproar? Well, it's a quiz. And not just any quiz. Here's a sample question:

In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by:

(a) Scooby Doo

(b) The Tooth Fairy

(c) Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid with dynamite left over from the
train job.

(d) Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

(Michelle links to the quiz, a file charmingly titled muzzie_quiz.htm).

The quiz, presumably, shows the left's "backwards" approach to the idea of racial profiling. If only we'd admit that all terrorists are Muslim extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40, we could really get down to the business of homeland security.

Hey, here's a few more questions for your quiz:

In 1995, the Oklahoma City Federal Building was bombed by:

a) Sharko

b) Maura Tierney

c) Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

d) A white guy

In 1995, nerve gas was released into the Tokyo subway system by:

a) Jeffrey Tambor

b) Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

c) Japanese cultists

d) Frylock

In 1998, an abortion clinic in Alabama was bombed by:

a) Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

b) Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law

c) A Christian male extremist mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

d) Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

In 1996, the Atlanta Olympics were bombed by:

a) See c) above

b) Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

c) Tom Goes to the Mayor (a bomb in and of itself)

d) Guillermo Del Toro

See? I can write funny mass e-mails that clog up precious resources too!

Oh, almost forgot one:

In all of the above cases, precious investigative time was or would have been wasted looking for:

a) Mr. Goodbar

b) Spinoza

c) Fidel

d) Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

Inauguration Round-up Round-up

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Malkin does the overview thing on today's inauguration, posting some pictures of flag-burners and a news item about the Backbone Campaign. She updates late in the day with a quote from Reuters - "no comment necessary":

Kerry spent much of Bush's big day out of the limelight.

Yet when he first stepped out of the U.S. Capitol to attend the inauguration ceremony, his smiling face was shown to the crowd on a big outdoor television screen.

A smattering of cheers from the predominantly Republican gathering was quickly drowned out by loud groans and a few jeers. One man shouted, "Loser."

This comes in a post she titles "SORE LOSER ROUNDUP." Way to hold on to the supposed moral high ground.

Strangely, she doesn't link to this story in her list of inaugural "party poopers." Nothing like a little historical perspective.

Did that make you feel better? Getting that off your chest?

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Democratic Sen. Robert "Sheets" Byrd, past recruitment officer for the KKK and former advocate of racial segregation, has announced that he will obstruct the confirmation of the first African-American woman to be nominated to be Secretary of State.

But just in case we want to get upset about this racebaiting crap, she provides herself an oh-so-clever out:

And if you don't think that's exactly how CBS and the rest of the MSM would have played the story if Byrd were a Republican and Rice a Democratic nominee...

Yeah, yeah. Just as writing the post in the first place was an excuse for Malkin to engage in a another little poke in Byrd's eye, I'm writing this post mostly to mention that Mad Kane, a woman with fantastic taste in blogrolls (I, on the other hand, have been negligent until now in returning the favor), has started a site which I think we can all get behind:

President Boxer.

Barbara Boxer's actions throughout the Ohio vote and Condi Rice hearings are more than enough to earn my support. Moreover, Boxer puts her fellow democrats to shame.

Oh yeah.

Everything old is new again and other thoughts

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"I looked the man in the eye. I was able to get a sense of his soul." -- George W. Bush on Vladimir Putin, June 2001
"From my soul I greet you and your loved ones on the coming New Year." -- Vladimir Putin, among other nice things, to Vassily Kononov

Malkin reports on Vladimir Putin's plans to build a statue of Stalin.

"The writer is the engineer of the human soul." -- Joseph Stalin, unknown

And then she devotes the rest of her post to "lefty alternative rag, The Seattle Weekly" which is "actually" asking for a statue of Lenin to be torn down. I dunno, Michelle, does that surprise you? Have you really bought your own hype that all liberals are Leninist dictator-lovers? Really?

Well, in honor of tomorrow's events, there's one more quote I'd like to invite you to think about. It, too, comes from Bush's soul mate's hero.

It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.

If you're not in combat, Iraq's a playground

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Stone Court visitors: Thanks for coming! If you're looking for my post on Lawrence Summers, click here. But by all means, check out today's fine post as well:
------------------
Malkin's latest column purports to tell the "rest of the story" of Lance Cpl. Andres Raya, a Marine who "died in a murderous shootout with police." According to Malkin,

Anti-war writers and Latino activists have turned the cop-killer, Lance Cpl. Andres Raya, into a martyr...Ignoring the cold-blooded murder of one of the ambushed police officers who was lured to his death, international headlines instead trumpeted the supposedly traumatized Raya:

Teenage War Veteran Committed Suicide 'By Cop'

Marine 'Committed Suicide by Cop to Avoid Iraq Return'

Let's stop right here. In Malkin's estimation, the "suicide by cop" meme is an "international" "anti-war" invention, utterly disrespectful of Sgt. Howard Stevenson, the man Raya shot during the apparent botched robbery.

Where did this "suicide by cop" idea start? Indymedia? La Voz de Aztlan, who Malkin quotes: "U.S. Marine Andres Raya decided to take some cops with him. Most probably he was harassed by them while growing up Mexican in this small northern California town"? Or is the answer in the Modesto Bee?

"It was premeditated, planned, an ambush," Ceres Police Chief Art de Werk said. "It was a suicide by cop."
De Werk said investigators are not ruling out other motives or accomplices, but believe that Raya, a Marine who had served seven months in Iraq, was concerned about the possibility of going back into combat.

Oh, so the idea that Raya was traumatized by his experiences as a Marine started with...those fringe leftists in the Ceres Police Department.

To be fair*, later investigation "...found he wasn't due to go back to Iraq, never faced combat situations and never even fired his gun,' Stanislaus County Sheriff's Deputy Jason Woodman said." And to continue with the fairness, there is absolutely no evidence that there is any stress whatsoever for non-combat troops in Iraq. Especially for drivers. Malkin:

Raya was high on cocaine at the time of the ambush, according to police reports. He was reportedly affiliated with the prison gang Nuestra Familia. Investigators found photos of Raya wearing gang colors and a shopping list in his bedroom safe that included body armor, assault rifles and ammunition. Authorities also discovered a video showing Raya smoking what appears to be marijuana and making gang sign gestures. The tape showed desecrated pieces of the American flag laid on a gymnasium floor to spell out expletives directed at President Bush.

The family, meanwhile, denies that Raya had any gang ties. When it comes to Nuestra Familia, "reportedly affiliated" apparently refers to a report in the Chicago Sun-Times of "a safe in Raya's room containing a book by a member of the prison gang Nuestra Familia." On that particular issue, let me just say that I have a book by a columnist named Michelle Malkin, and I would hate to have it used as evidence of my political leanings. Back to the story...

An e-mail to the Modesto Bee, from a "longtime friend" of Raya, said "Before he joined, he was very motivated. The first time I saw him back (from Iraq), he wasn't so motivated. He cracked negative jokes about people who were serious. … He was negative towards the Marines. He still seemed like the same guy, he just had a hard time." The Sun-Times article says Raya told family and friends "gruesome stories of house-to-house combat and of watching Marines commit suicide."

Malkin doesn't address the vintage of the materials "proving" that Raya was a gang member; the reaction of the family makes it seem likely that they postdate his return from Iraq. Malkin reports that "Raya's neighborhood was decorated with anti-cop graffiti such as "Kill the Pigs" in his memory"; the Bee quotes "the Rev. Dean McFalls, who formerly served at St. Jude's Catholic Church in Ceres and is a friend of the Raya family", who said "the graffiti [was] 'despicable' and said it devastated the family."

So where does this leave us? Well, Malkin thinks the only question left is

why and how Raya -- who police say had a propensity for violence well before he joined the Marines -- got into our military in the first place.

As noted, Malkin did not establish any evidence that the "police say" he had a propensity for violence prior to Iraq. I did not find - but am open to submissions - any sign of the police saying any such thing. Meanwhile, Malkin only scantily addresses the most compelling defense of the "suicide by cop" theory: The apparent facts of that night. Modesto Bee again:

It happened just after 8 p.m. Sunday in front of George's Liquors on Caswell Avenue. Raya had asked liquor store employees to call police, saying someone had shot at him.

Surveillance video shows Raya pacing as he waited for police. He pulled a rifle from under his poncho and shot Ryno [who survived], then fired at Stevenson.

A terrible tragedy - for the families of both Sgt. Stevenson and Raya.

Obviously, Raya committed a terrible act. But covering our ears and impugning his character won't help us understand what changed while he was in Iraq - and how many more Andres Rayas we may be facing by the time this is all over.

Update: Liberal Avenger makes a strong point about Malkin's blog post addressing this column.

This is disingenuous, dangerous "reporting" on her part. Either he was an illegal alien or he wasn't. He was a Marine and from other Malkin rhetoric we should apparently assign godliness to Marines, except, apparently if they are illegal. If he was illegal go ahead and point it out. If he wasn't - and I'll bet you dinner that he wasn't - we'll never see an apology, correction or retraction from Malkin.

One thing I've noticed - and it's not just Malkin, by any means - is that blogging columnists looove to throw the stuff that was just too unsupported to make the column into the blogposts. Those pesky journalistic standards don't apply here, baby!

That said, I'm not altogether impressed with Malkin's journalistic standards in the column proper, either, but what can you do...
-----------------------
*And MalkinWatch is nothing if not fair.
Up

All quiet on the Malkin front

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Probably readying tomorrow's column, so we'll just sit quietly till then. Well, except to say this: Shouldn't it be "FINALLY PAYING MORE THAN LIP SERVICE TO THE TROOPS"? After all, improved benefits for soldiers is what people like Randi Rhodes and Al Franken started screaming for months ago. Don't forget who's in charge of this stuff nowadays, Michelle.

Ohhhh Yeaaaah!

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Malkin accuses the left of being "Kool-Aid drinkers" as she quotes the Pentagon's response to the Hersh article.The main point the Pentagon has to make other than flat-out denial (because we know how much flat-out denial is worth from the Pentagon) is some sort of internal inconsistency:

Mr. Hersh cannot even keep track of his own wanderings. At one point in his article, he makes the outlandish assertion that the military operations he describes are so secret that the operations are being kept secret even from U.S. military Combatant Commanders. Mr. Hersh later states, though, that the locus of this super-secret activity is at the U.S. Central Command headquarters, evidently without the knowledge of the commander if Mr. Hersh is to be believed.

Shall we take a look at the actual article? First, the assertion that the operations are being kept secret from CinCs:

“The Pentagon doesn’t feel obligated to report any of this to Congress,” the former high-level intelligence official said. “They don’t even call it ‘covert ops’—it’s too close to the C.I.A. phrase. In their view, it’s ‘black reconnaissance.’ They’re not even going to tell the cincs”—the regional American military commanders-in-chief.

Any of "this" refers to "series of findings and executive orders authorizing secret commando groups and other Special Forces units to conduct covert operations against suspected terrorist targets in as many as ten nations in the Middle East and South Asia." And now, the "Central Command Headquarters" comment:

The Pentagon’s contingency plans for a broader invasion of Iran are also being updated. Strategists at the headquarters of the U.S. Central Command, in Tampa, Florida, have been asked to revise the military’s war plan, providing for a maximum ground and air invasion of Iran.

So Hersh is, in fact, talking about two different things: secret operations inside Iran and other countries, and a standard war plan for Iran - a type of plan which, by the way, the US has had for many years, and for many different countries.

So, the Pentagon's rebuttal of Hersh's claims consist of a few unsubstantiated denials, and a snarky look at an internal inconsistency - which isn't an inconsistency at all. Now who's drinking the Kool-Aid, Michelle?

Update: For more on why never to believe a Pentagon denial, visit Norbizness.

But where's the mommy truck?

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Stone Court has a good response to Malkin's snarky support of a talk by Harvard President Lawrence Summers on the reason there are more successful male academics than female. (Summary: It's the uterus - oh, and the genetics that go with having a uterus. But mainly the uterus.) Stone Court's Fred Vincy writes:

Malkin condemns MIT biologist Nancy Hopkins for walking out on Summers rather than engaging in "rigorous academic debate", but neglects to mention that, according to the Globe, "Hopkins was the main force behind an influential study documenting inequalities for women at MIT, which led that school's former president, Charles M. Vest, to acknowledge the pattern of bias in 1999." That is, and not to put too fine a point on it, she actually knew something about the subject that Summers was just making stuff up about and, I'm pretty sure, Hopkins was willing to engage in quite a bit of "rigorous debate" to get MIT to admit to bias.

Now, Vincy is clearly much more knowledgable about economic theory than I am, which is why I'm deferring to him on this one, but this thought comes to mind: Summers claims that he was simply "synthesizing data" from the work presented at the confrence, but the Boston Globe reports:

In his talk, according to several participants, Summers also used as an example one of his daughters, who as a child was given two trucks in an effort at gender-neutral parenting. Yet she treated them almost like dolls, naming one of them "daddy truck," and one "baby truck."

Ah yes, nothing like Freud's reductive method: If my daughter does it, it must be universal. Using this logic (and not having heard the talk - neither did Malkin, by the way - I don't know how much Summers relied on this kind of thing) I can prove that Summers' theories are bogus: I know a female academic, and she's smarter than any male academic I've ever personally met.

Done and done.

What to wear...what to wear...

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Commenting on "Count Me Blue" bracelets, Malkin "confesses"

to owning and wearing the following red-in-spirit apparel around blue-ish Montgomery County, Md.:

...Around the house: Ted Rall Thinks I'm a House Nigga t-shirt

Gee, Michelle, you mean you don't wear that out of the house? I don't know if I call that showing the courage of your convictions.

Welcome Home, Indeed

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The 27-year-old Watevliet High School graduate said the reception he received upon his return was overwhelming and makes risking his life for his country all the more worthwhile.

"When you step off that plane and people are waving the American Flag, it makes the hard times, bad food and cold showers in Iraq all worth it," said Lane, who has spent 5 1/2 years in the military. "It's the greatest feeling in the world."

Malkin thanks Capt. Patrick Lane for his service - a sentiment which we share. Sadly, we are also aware of the reception which may just await him beyond the tarmac.

U.S. veterans from the war in Iraq are beginning to show up at homeless shelters around the country, and advocates fear they are the leading edge of a new generation of homeless vets not seen since the Vietnam era...
Data from the Department of Veterans Affairs shows that as of last July, nearly 28,000 veterans from Iraq sought health care from the VA. One out of every five was diagnosed with a mental disorder, according to the VA. An Army study in the New England Journal of Medicine in July showed that 17 percent of service members returning from Iraq met screening criteria for major depression, generalized anxiety disorder or PTSD.

We sincerely hope that this is not the case for Capt. Lane. And we sincerely hope that should it be, that Ms. Malkin will be just as anxious to write about you.

Whatta day.

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We were Political Site of the Day! Of course, most of you that visited us today know that already...since that's how you found us...

So, 'dya blogroll us yet? :D

That will probably be the last smiley you ever see on this site. The good news, though, is that we've switched to Haloscan commenting (for all its faults) because, to be honest, I have discovered through a highly scientific study that Blogger's comment system is terrible, and that's the one and only reason for the sparse commenting from visitors. That or the fact that all of my posts are such self-contained works of art that no further comment is necessary or even possible.

:D

No, that's the last one. Anyway, thanks to everyone who has visited us in our first less-than-a-month of existence. Please do come back for more Malkin-baiting brilliance.





Oh, okay. Here's one more. :D

I am not a Washington State political expert...

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...nor do I intend to play one on the internet. I do find it instructive, however, that, by my count, Rossi never raised the possibility of fraud or a revote until...well, until it looked like he might be losing. From a Dec. 17 Seattle Times article:

"Last week the Republicans were saying we need to resolve this as quickly as possible," Democratic Party spokeswoman Kirstin Brost said. "This week they're saying we need another election."

What was happening on Dec. 17? Well, the recount was happening, for one.

More germane to our purpose here, of course, is Malkin's opinion on the election in her "old home state." Today she posts an oh-so-funny photo of some guy who can't spell "fascists."

Looks like Gov.-elect Christine Gregoire (now known in GOP circles as Gov.-pretend Fraudoire) is too deep in debt to pay for a spell checker.

Wow. Sounds like Malkin was on top of this election fraud stuff. She must have been agitating for a revote from the start.

Guess what?

Nov. 24:

Republican Dino Rossi has won the gubernatorial recount in Washington State. Sore-losing Democrats, who thought beleaguered attorney general Christine Gregoire was going to coast to victory, are preparing to demand not only a hand recount--but also a second full recount as well.

Notice that she called them "sore-losing" 11 days after she posted a story about questionable vote rejections - counseling Gregoire to concede without resorting to the courts.

To recap: Democrats should concede elections despite evidence of errors in vote-counting and possible denial of franchise. Republicans? Not so much.

Update: Here's a great diary - part two of two, apparently - by Carla over at Daily Kos about the military vote and whether it was, in fact, discounted. Nothing set in stone, of course, but the evidence here says it wasn't.

P.S.: Welcome PSoTDers! Thanks for visiting! Please come back anytime...

Whoopsy Daisy

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Malkin links to a blog post which has since been debunked...by the blogger's own commenters.

Please do visit my links under "GIVE." The Red Cross, for sure, can always use help and is assisting the victims in La Conchita.

She gets letters

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When I read the title of Michelle's post today - MINORITY CONSERVATIVES AND THE SELLOUT SMEAR - I rolled my eyes. What does Armstrong Williams' race have to do with anything?

Then I read the e-mails she gets, and I realized my mistake - they read like the worst of the worst comments on Little Green Footballs. Sad. It's a reminder that any minority in the public eye is a magnet.

I personally suspect all conservative pundits of similar transgressions, regardless of race. It shouldn't surprise me, though, the hate Malkin gets based on her race. I personally don't like her because of her views on internment and immigration, but for much of America, left and right, it still all comes down to race. It's crap like that which leads conservatives to say that the left opposes Alberto Gonzalez based on race, not on the fact that he apparently sees the President as a king.

There is no "but" here. Just more proof that racism thrives in the United States, regardless of political affiliation.

Damned if you do

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Remember that one time that I agreed with Malkin?

Will other Hollywood Citizens of the World follow suit?

Now, the thing is, looking back, that seems a lot less sarcastic than it did at the time; we have to remember that Michelle was on the "we're-not-stingy-at-least-not-as-much-as-the-left" bandwagon at the time. Anyway, other Hollywood Citizens of the World are following suit - led by George Clooney - on a large scale. Now, I don't know what, if anything, the participants in this telethon are giving on their own; but they're showing up. Better late than never. Malkin is silent on the issue, unsurprisingly - although Bill O'Reilly isn't.

Somehow I have the feeling that if Malkin comments, it's going to be more along those lines. But we'll wait and see.

Update: Challenge extended, challenge accepted. O'Reilly's agreed to be a presenter.

Poor, poor LGF...

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MalkinWatch is strongly against DOS attacks and the anti-free speech stance they usually represent.

That said...

Someone out there wants to shut down LGF and shut up Charles Johnson and his commenters--the best in the blogosphere.

Ohhhh, yeah. We'll have a blogroll A-Z on LGF soon enough*, but let's just take a look at what some of the "best commenters in the blogosphere" have to say, shall we?

These animals view any kindness/morality as weakness. They need to take one of them up in a helicopter, in full view of all the rest, and toss him out - that my sound vicious, but it is less vicious than sawing somebody's head off. Maybe then the rest will cooperate more willingly.

(1) Round up four or five captives whom you wish to interrogate. Tie them to posts in the ground, in a circle about ten feet apart, all of them facing each other.

(2) Walk up to the biggest and ugliest of them, and ask him the question(s) you wish answered. If he refuses (which usually happened), torch him with a flamethrower and wait patiently until the screaming is over.


(3) Walk up the the one remaining who appears the most scared (usually one who just threw up). Ask the same question(s). Almost always, he will fall all over himself answering.

And in response:

That won't work. You must kill the first one without asking him anything.

The way to interrogate terrorist prisoners is severe pain BUT not death for example:

1. Use a pruning shears to cut off digits until they talk
2. Acid baths that desolve skin, but not bone
3. Dipping the terrorist in boiling water for long periods
4. Dipping the terrorist in ice baths for long periods (pull them out just before they pass out, wouldn't want to kill them)
5. Expose appendages to liquid nitrogen and then break them off. Very painful after nerve endings defrost.
6. Use the "baseball bat" treatment like in the movie "Casino", but don't touch their head.
7. Electric shock therapy to genitalia.
8. Cattle-prod therapy.


If these don't work kill the bastard.

A method that works on a group captured together: cut the carotids of one. Let him bleed to death in front of the others. Interrogate a second one. He doesn't answer, bleed him to death. Repeat until one talks. Then kill the remaining ones - if any.

Easy. Shove a toothpick up their urethra, and show them pix of rear-end of some prime goats. The pain should follow shortly...

After that, bigelize the town they came from.
Oh, and mecca.

And in response to a rare voice of reason who said "Torture is a bad idea"...

i suggest you contemplate that thought while you are tied up, and my blade is bared.

i think you will come around to my way of thinking...
or scream endlessly into the night.

either way, i could care less.

Yeah, real bunch of winners there, Michelle.

*Actually, we won't, because unless I'm blind, Little Green Footballs isn't on Michelle's blogroll. Hmm...

Blogroll A-Z: Ace of Spades HQ

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First things first: I recently had a knock-down drag-out discussion with the commenters on Ace of Spades HQ, and it was quite civil; enjoyable even. "AbuGonzales" didn't fare as well, but when you pick a name like that, you gotta expect it to push a few buttons.

Second things second: The first thing I noticed the first time I visited Ace of Spades was the header. Go look; throwing Ace a couple hits won't hurt anything. I have always hated that H.L. Mencken quote:

Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit upon his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.

But then, I've never really liked H.L. Mencken. First of all, "upon his hands"? Upon? I dunno about you, Henry Louis, but when my hands are bespitten, it's because I spat on them, not upon them. Semantics aside, there's another big problem with the quote, especially when used by a conservative: Doesn't it basically describe an insurgency? Doesn't it imply that any hard-done-by person is actually entitled to fight back? With deadly, even gruesome force if necessary? Or does that right only apply to Americans?

Well, I get the feeling that's pretty much where Ace is coming from. Not to mention the fact that the quote rings doubly hollow coming from someone who's, apparently, fighting the war from behind a keyboard.

A couple of other things stand out to me: Ace is fond of using buzzwords before they really become buzzwords: "legacy media"; "paleoconservative." Yes, very clever. Also very telegraphic: This overuse of "new" buzzwords is very illustrative of how participants in the Conservative echochamber are anxious to continually manipulate frames. Fortunately, our friends at Daily Kos are working hard at reframing - read the site.

The other thing that stands out to me at Ace of Spades can be summed up in two words: Paul Anka. Ace is obsessed with Paul Anka. Well, obsessed is too strong a word, but not by much. It all comes from a recording in which...well, you can listen, or not. It's all too boring for words, actually.

As is this edition of Blogroll A-Z, so let's end it here with a summary. Ace of Spades HQ: Neocon jingo-rama.

Previous Editions: a small victory

Obsession

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Well, what with Malkin beating the CBS dead horse, I haven't felt much like writing today. As far as a rebuttal to the CBS controversy, I have two things to say. One of them is this: While apparently CBS and, yes, Dan Rather did not do the necessary vetting, I actually remain unconvinced of the memos' invalidity. Why am I so obtuse, you say? Well, that leads me to thing number two. But I'll let TBogg say it so much better than I could have:

Four lose their jobs...one still hasn't shown up for his.

Keep in mind that despite the internal CBS findings...

Bush was AWOL

If one weatherman tells me it's sunny, and the other tells me it's raining...I'm looking out the window.

Where do those liberals get those crazy ideas?

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From a blog post titled WHY NO ONE PAID ME TO SELL NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND:

Mindless liberal critics like to paint every conservative journalist as a Republican-subsidized cheerleader.

Well, to be fair, Michelle, some of you clearly are Republican-subsidized. Is it really tinfoil-hattery to suggest that where there's one, there just might be many?

Don't worry, though. If you were paid to promote anything, and I'm not saying you were, it wasn't No Child Left Behind.


Then again, maybe it was.

Reproduced without comment

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From a great column by Katha Pollitt:

Even Michelle Malkin is probably not actually dumb.

Don't worry, it's out of context. Well, not by much.

The Sounds of Silence

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Not every blogger should be required to comment on every issue, but I find it illuminating that Michelle hasn't weighed in on the Armstrong Williams payola issue. In fact, the deafening silence from much of the right is entertaining, to say the least.

Update: Clearly we're getting to Ms. Malkin (Okay, not really). Not one hour after our post comes this post:

Rod Paige should be fired. Those who came up with this disgusting scheme should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Any other pundits who accepted money from the Bush administration, whether from the Education Department or any other bureaucracy, should come forward now and disclose. And then they should immediately return the money.

Well said. I notice she is very careful - "Rod Paige", "the Bush administration, whether from the Education Department or any other bureaucracy" - to help pass the buck before the surface of how high this goes is even scratched. I trust that, if it's found to go to the highest level, she will repeat this admonition even to President Bush:

Grow some principles, for God's sake.

On the day she addresses a comment as explicit as that directly to W., with no mitigating language preceding it, this blog will close its doors, having been made unnecessary.

MalkinWatch looks forward to a long and fruitful tenure.

How 'bout just cause he sucks?

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On the Kid Rock controversy:

Many social conservative groups have launched a protest against the White House inauguration committee's decision to invite Kid Rock to perform Jan. 18 at the Washington, D.C., Armory in a concert hosted by Bush daughters Jenna and Barbara...
In response to a flood of calls, the inauguration committee has apparently backpedaled, according to WND.
Good. Glad to see that some conservatives aren't embarrassed about upholding decency.

Or at least musical integrity. Although I don't think that's what's on the protestors' minds...

"If this sex-crazed animal, whose favorite word is the F-word, is allowed to sing at Bush's inauguration this will send a clear message to pro-family Americans that the Republican Party has taken them for a ride and ditched them in the gutter," Randy Thomasson, president of Campaign for Children and Families, told WND.

Beautiful. But at least no one's suggesting some sort of draconian, constitution-shredding response to this issue.

"This guy ought to be inaugurated into jail life for violating obscenity laws."

Hey, thanks, Jan LaRue of Concerned Women for America! Way to sell out everything this country stands for because you're afraid of some hack musician turning your children into hash-snorting lesbians!

Update: Heh. Well, let me back off a little from Jan LaRue; because of a weird split in the page I though it read "jail for life" instead of "jail life." I still don't think Kid Rock should go to jail - especially considering that LaRue was referring to the Super Bowl halftime show, which, other than some questionable fashion choices, hardly met the legal definition of obscenity - but I originally thought she was one step away from recommending Ol' Sparky.

Update 2: Right Thoughts has a conservative's perspective on this whole thing.

Look, I love Malkin (a fact to which anyone who reads this blog can bear witness), but she has a stick up her ass about everything pop culture. She’s uptight from the word go. PEOPLE HAVE SEX, AND OFTEN ENJOY DISCUSSING IT IN VARIOUS WAYS. It’s time to accept that fact. Elvis wasn’t always singing about shoes.

He quotes from some other blogs who feel the same, and closes with this gem. Never thought I'd agree with JimK:

Oh OH! How this escaped me I have no idea. Did you notice who is tops on Malkin’s “social conservative groups” list? The ever-loving son of a bitch Wildmon and his “American Family Association. A bigger pile of crap masquerading as a human being you’ll be hard pressed to find, but it seems some people have no problem associating with that kind of filth. AFA and Wildmon are bastions of hate and repression. Malkin should be ashamed to have that link on her website. I may have a dirty mouth, but those people have dirty souls.

Update 3: She's even opened comments on this one. Someone not me wrote:

Hey Michelle,
How much did George Bush and the White House pay you to spread the Swift Boat Veterans lies? You are next in the "Crossfire."

I'm betting she won't be making a habit of the comment thing.

Update 4: More comments funny:

I am proud of the way that Bush has taken on the intolerant religious fundamentalists in the Middle East, and we cannot allow the degradation of our culture while we are fighting to purify others. Like Tim McNabb says, a few posts above, Kid Rock is "a carrier of the disease religious conservatives are trying to wipe out." We should really wipe these people out for real, once and for all, so we can get back to fighting fundamentalist intolerance in the Middle East without any distractions.

"Don't listen to the experts, listen to me!"

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Here's how we will end up interrogating terrorists and enemy combatants if the Dems get their way.

She's referring to this article, which proposes the following interrogation technique to "make everybody happy":

* He will be asked to "please" give us information.

* If no information is given, he will then be asked to "pretty please" give us information.

* If there is still no response, he will finally be asked to "pretty please with sugar on top" give us information.

* Any further requesting would be badgering and could be construed as torture. If given court approval, though, the interrogator could offer to be the terrorist's "very best friend" in exchange for information.

Now let's hear from someone who knows anything about anything:

I had a couple people tell me that I was too soft on the prisoners and that I should toughen up my technique. But you know you get a lot of bad information when you torture people because they'll say anything they can to get away from the pains.

What kind of lily-livered softie says something like that? Why, it's Roger Brokaw, an Abu Ghraib interrogator!

Most of the prisoners appeared to him to be average Iraqis picked up for petty crimes or for being in the wrong place at the wrong time - not terrorists. No matter how much he questioned them, they didn't seem to have any useful information. Brokaw believed them, but he says his superiors didn't.

Most data indicates that he was right.

"There was just a general atmosphere of condoning things, of just a lack of oversight," says Brokaw. "In spite of the fact that different rules and regulations were coming down telling us we couldn't do this and we couldn't do that, but it was like it was all lip service. I mean you could just kind of feel it. There just wasn't something right."

So I guess the question is, do we listen to a bunch of bureaucrats and pundits who want us to torture every Muslim we can find over there, or do we listen to a professional interrogator who says that not only is torture wrong, but ineffective?

I'll take the guy who actually knows what he's talking about.

Zero-sum game?

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From yesterday's column:

Greetings, America-haters. Do you think you could stop raving against our "war criminals" and "killing machines" -- and you, Teddy Kennedy, could you stop panting over those Abu Ghraib photos -- for a moment and join me in praise for our military's compassion and innovation?

Do we have to stop? Or can we admit that, when used for humanitarian reasons, militaries - especially America's - are almost indispensable? Maybe we should use them that way more often:

"I'd much rather be doing this than figthing a war," - helicopter pilot Lt. Cmdr. William Whitsitt, helping the survivors of the south Asian tsunami.

(Of course, Andrew Sullivan chimed in on this issue with:"Earth to Whitsitt: you're a soldier." Well, he's a sailor, Andy, but thanks for your input.)

I wish I had room to print the name of every sailor, pilot, rescue swimmer, technician and engineer who serves in this strike group -- and on every other American ship, plane and helicopter on its way to help the tsunami victims. You deserve to be seen and known and thanked and remembered. You make America proud.

Yes, Michelle, they absolutely do. But you're still laboring under the impression that when lefties complain about the actions of the military, we're complaining about Lt. Cmdr. Whitsitt. Guess what - we're not, and in most cases, neither is the world. It's the leadership, the decision makers, the ones who choose to use military resources for wars rather than humanitarian aid - they're the true "war criminals" and "killing machines".

At the United Nations, saluting our troops is called jingoism. Where I'm from, it's called gratitude.

And where I'm from, this whole column is called "conflation."

Post deleted on account of stupidity

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It's a slow day, and I didn't research very well. Let me just say that in this case, at least, Malkin's instincts appear to be correct.

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free

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One of the complaints, if a slightly esoteric one, that I have with Malkin's stance on immigration is that she seems to think that immigration laws are the same everywhere, or that they've always been the same throughout history. She never says as much, but the attitude seems clear. Today she complains about a Wisconsin program allowing illegal aliens - ones who, by the way, are paying taxes - to buy homes. She links to an earlier column:

A Department of Homeland Security investigator informs me that an ongoing federal probe of FHA/HUD-backed loans found that "a staggering number were approved to persons with false Social Security numbers." The Denver metro area alone accounted for 20,000 to 40,000 of the FHA-approved loans for suspected illegal aliens. "Even if a small percentage of the loans were foreclosed, HUD could be bankrupted," the homeland security official said.

First of all, neither Malkin nor the homeland security official clarify why an FHA foreclosure on an illegal alien is any more damaging to HUD than an FHA foreclosure on a citizen. "A small percentage" of foreclosures occur all the time. Moreover, Malkin provides no evidence that illegal immigrants show any higher rate of foreclosure than citizens.

Really, what we have here is Malkin objecting to people who arrived here illegally a) paying taxes and b) otherwise boosting the economy. This on top of earlier writings about how the "underground economy" among illegal aliens hurts the overall financial health of the nation.

Which brings us back around to Malkin's black-and-white view of immigration:

America: Still the world's home sweet illegal alien home.

It's as though "illegal" were a worldwide, historywide standard. I warned you this was esoteric...

Blogroll A-Z: a small victory

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Tonight we're starting a new feature here on MalkinWatch called, as you can see above, "Blogroll A-Z." Malkin has a fairly extensive blogroll, doubtlessly filled with diversity of opinion and open discourse. Let's take a look, shall we? The first on the list:

a small victory.

The first post today is a link to a Sepultura mp3. Not my style of music - not many people's - but to each their own. Lots of talk about baseball and personal matters - and a quote from Napoleon Dynamite, so that's good.

But wait! I think I've cracked the code as to why a small victory made the list...

So...I'd like to give you a bit of a preview of 2005 at A Small Victory.

Here's what you will not find: Political rants. Anger fueled diatribes against the left. Anything to do with Dan Rather, the plight of mainstream news outlets, or bloggers taking over the world.

Careful, Michele - you may get delisted.

Okay, that's not fair - maybe I should check out a post you called one of your favorites of 2004.

The motion of the boat had begun to make young John Kerry sick. If he were back home, his mom would rub his tummy and give him an aspirin to calm his nerves. But this wasn't home. This was Nam. Or somewhere near Nam.

Oh, that's rich. I wonder if you were one of those troop-supporters wearing purple heart band-aids at the RNC? I don't see any reference in your (to be fair, self-describedly incomplete) bio to military service. Let's see some of the things that are in your bio, shall we?

I support George Bush. In fact, I love George so much I want to have his babies.

Beautiful. Just goes to show that women really do pursue a man who will lie to them, I guess.

I think John Kerry looks like he swallowed a swordfish. I hate his wife. I think she's an arrogant bitch, to be blunt about it.

That's too bad...I know she was so hoping you could be friends.

I enjoy capitalism. I like money. I like spending money. You'll never see me diving into dumpsters for food even though I can afford a meal because that is the most ridiculous thing I ever heard of. In fact, I think most of those far leftie ideals are ridiculous.

Is dumpster diving a leftie ideal? First I heard of it, and I'm a pretty big leftie. Apparently it's a real thing (called Freeganism), and she links to it, but it's not a philosophy that appears to be taking over the world.
All that said, I definitely appreciate this sentiment...

How to tell if you are rude? Do you step into an elevator before the people exiting have gotten a chance to get out?

So it's a bit of a mixed bag.
Next: Ace of Spades.

What part of "It's okay cause it'll never happen to me" don't you understand, Atrios?

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Atrios asks...

Does anyone really wonder what Malkin's views about internment would have been if she had been born Robert Matsui?

Atrios, if the daughter of immigrants can be so virulently anti-immigration, I'm guessing she'd be able to suck it up. After all, Matsui himself said:

I spent approximately three and a half years of my life there, although I have no personal memory of it.

No harm, no foul, right? At least in Malkin's world.

Update: Norbizness has an it's-funny-because-it's-true-but-also-just-because-it's-funny take on the same issue.

Beating a stingy horse

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Malkin continues to use the word "stingy" for her own gain regardless of how it was used to begin with...

SANDRA BULLOCK: NOT STINGY
The Austin (Tx.) Business Journal reports:

On-again, off-again Austin resident Sandra Bullock has donated $1 million to the American Red Cross for tsunami disaster relief in southern Asian and eastern Africa.

Kudos to her! Will other Hollywood Citizens of the World follow suit?

First of all, Michelle, inasmuch as the word "stingy" was being applied to the US, it was never applied to its private citizens, but rather a government that at the time had promised only $15 million in aid. And if, as you and other righties claimed, that $15 million was enough, why has it since been raised to $350 million?

Having said that, she does make a good point, as much as I hate to admit it...as of yet, Hollywood has been curiously silent; I'm not a staunch defender of Hollywood activists anyway, but it does seem like an obvious opportunity for Sarandon et al. to put their money where their mouth is.

I would imagine we will hear more about this in the near future, but for now, let's get cracking, Babs!