Get even.
Courtesy of Instapundit reader Pamela Barbey.
Sunday, October 31, 2004
Happy HalloWeen!
Bushies, don't get spooked by scary Kerry, aka the ghost of Jimmy Carter.
Get even.
Courtesy of Instapundit reader Pamela Barbey.
Get even.
Courtesy of Instapundit reader Pamela Barbey.
Friday, October 29, 2004
Hoax Update
The disingenuous pranksters at Yes Bush Can are e-mailing bloggers again to announce they switched their “endorsement” from Bush to Kerry. Guys, you and your role models Al Franken and Michael Moore owe whatever success you achieve to gullibility on the left, not on the right.
Their message reads:
Oh, I think we all understand.
Their message reads:
"A week ago, we sent you an email asking for help debunking anti-Bush documents. After receiving hundreds of responses, it become clear that all the documents were actually real: the Bush/Cheney DUIs, the Ken Lay letters, and even the bin Laden memo. For more information visit the documents page: http://www.yesbushcan.com/falsedocs.shtml We also received hundreds of emails from concerned bloggers that eloquently expressed the problems with the Bush administration. And as we traveled across America campaigning for Bush, we learned more than we wanted to know about Bush's policies. We came to see that this administration is a catastrophe for most people. As a result, we are abandoning our support of Bush and officially endorsing John Kerry for President. You can read more at the Yes Bush Can web site: http://www.yesbushcan.com/ We deeply regret our misguided support and apologize for our previous email. This will be the last email we will send directly to bloggers. If you want to join us in supporting Kerry, you can find out more here: http://www.yesbushcan.com/act.shtml Thank you for your understanding, Yes Bush Can"
Oh, I think we all understand.
Wednesday, October 20, 2004
First in Her Class
Presidential elections never center on the Vice President or First Lady, but you learn a lot about a candidate from the two most important personal choices he can make: his life mate and his running mate. With self-restraint bordering on the monkish, I have devoted only two posts to the inestimable Mr. Cheney. I did plan to write about Laura Bush closer to the election, but the new quotes from Zsa Zsa, I mean Teresa Heinz Kerry, have inspired me to seize the day.
I luv Laura. Not l-o-v-e, of course, an emotion reserved for people I have actually known, but I feel a warm visceral connection every time I see her. She is such a pretty lady from the inside out, radiating grace, dignity and humility. She strikes me as our most purely all-American First Lady in at least a generation.
To watch her reading to children is to understand the sacrifice she made as a new wife who walked away from her dream career. She seems like a natural-born educator with her even modulation and patient posture, and she did identify her calling early in life. I think some of the most effective teachers, especially those at lower grade levels, are aglow with a benevolence that I call the Good Witch Glinda effect. Laura Bush has it.
I am not moved to defend her just because we are both members of the library sisterhood, although she does us proud. More than a tireless advocate for literacy, she exemplifies a lot of the family values that many women admire. She seems smart, strong, loyal, nurturing, protective, and very loving. She has been a teacher, librarian, mother of twins, wife of an ambitious man, and role model to millions. Most women appreciate her hard work and self-denial for the sake of her family. Most women can relate to her experiences and choices. The fact that Teresa Heinz Kerry feels superior is not news, but for her to demean the woman who holds the position she covets is another ugly precedent in a campaign that is unprecedented for its ugly precedents.
When you are in a healthy, happy relationship yourself, you recognize the same behavior in others. The genuinely affectionate and respectful way George and Laura treat each other in public feels instantly familiar to my husband and me. They serve as a conspicuous contrast to the Kerrys, a complex couple who share a love of their own voices. The last time we had a complex couple of narcissists in the White House, the country was dragged through a sordid drama that forced parents to answer uncomfortable questions about cigars and stained dresses.
The first eight months of the Bush 43 administration are obscured by that infamous day in September. But I recall a collective sense of relief that normality and responsibility had returned to the highest office in the land. Laura Bush reminds me how far we have come and how much we have to lose.
If Teresa Heinz Kerry has forgotten what a really big job looks like, maybe this will nudge her memory.
I luv Laura. Not l-o-v-e, of course, an emotion reserved for people I have actually known, but I feel a warm visceral connection every time I see her. She is such a pretty lady from the inside out, radiating grace, dignity and humility. She strikes me as our most purely all-American First Lady in at least a generation.
To watch her reading to children is to understand the sacrifice she made as a new wife who walked away from her dream career. She seems like a natural-born educator with her even modulation and patient posture, and she did identify her calling early in life. I think some of the most effective teachers, especially those at lower grade levels, are aglow with a benevolence that I call the Good Witch Glinda effect. Laura Bush has it.
I am not moved to defend her just because we are both members of the library sisterhood, although she does us proud. More than a tireless advocate for literacy, she exemplifies a lot of the family values that many women admire. She seems smart, strong, loyal, nurturing, protective, and very loving. She has been a teacher, librarian, mother of twins, wife of an ambitious man, and role model to millions. Most women appreciate her hard work and self-denial for the sake of her family. Most women can relate to her experiences and choices. The fact that Teresa Heinz Kerry feels superior is not news, but for her to demean the woman who holds the position she covets is another ugly precedent in a campaign that is unprecedented for its ugly precedents.
When you are in a healthy, happy relationship yourself, you recognize the same behavior in others. The genuinely affectionate and respectful way George and Laura treat each other in public feels instantly familiar to my husband and me. They serve as a conspicuous contrast to the Kerrys, a complex couple who share a love of their own voices. The last time we had a complex couple of narcissists in the White House, the country was dragged through a sordid drama that forced parents to answer uncomfortable questions about cigars and stained dresses.
The first eight months of the Bush 43 administration are obscured by that infamous day in September. But I recall a collective sense of relief that normality and responsibility had returned to the highest office in the land. Laura Bush reminds me how far we have come and how much we have to lose.
If Teresa Heinz Kerry has forgotten what a really big job looks like, maybe this will nudge her memory.
Monday, October 18, 2004
The Wrong Man at the Wrong Time
Hugh Hewitt asks: Why vote for Bush and what’s wrong with Kerry?
John Kerry is half-right in one sense. This is a single-issue election about getting more of the same. Based on experience, you can reasonably expect that a re-elected Bush will renew the foreign and domestic policy goals he pursued in his first term. His campaign has been a continuation of his record of four years. With Bush, what you see is what you get.
Kerry’s campaign has been a string of unresolved inconsistencies alternately true to and at odds with his twenty-year record of raising taxes while undercutting national defense. Based on experience, you can reasonably expect that a President Kerry will be both liberal and inconsistent, i.e. more of the same. With Kerry, you can believe his election year promises or you can believe your lying eyes.
The single issue for Bush supporters is that we must win the war on terror now. The single issue for Kerry supporters is that we must replace George W. Bush with a Democrat now. There are a slew of other issues of varying degrees of import in the national campaigns and on ballots throughout the land. But they all add up to a hill of ash when a jihadist drops a dirty bomb on your neighborhood.
John Kerry told New York Times Magazine that 9/11 did not change him, his approach to terrorism or his opinion that it is a containable "nuisance," implying that a certain level of terrorism is acceptable. His chief advisors are holdovers from the Clinton administration, which portends that the Kerry years could be 1998-2000 all over again. You may recall that Clinton, in response to terrorist attacks on our interests abroad, authorized missile strikes, got gun shy after a few setbacks and then kicked the can down the road.
There is nothing in Kerry’s record, policies or character that suggests he is prepared to ride out the inevitable setbacks in the war on terror. When President Kerry gets spooked and calls a time-out, we already know the terrorists won’t take their balls and go home. If you don’t think that’s a likely outcome, just ask the anti-war voters why Kerry’s their guy.
Kerry would like to redefine Bush’s gritty resoluteness as inflexible stubbornness and his consistency as a lack of nuance, but those are the two qualities that reassure Americans no terrorist can rest easy on Bush’s watch. When your home and family are under assault, you don’t want the police officer that comes to your door to be a weak-kneed braggart who boasts about his honors at the Academy to compensate for his lack of accomplishment since. You want an experienced cop who will apprehend the bad guys and make sure they never threaten your safety again.
If you want to know which candidate the terrorists fear, just watch what they do in these final days to influence our election like they did in Spain. My hunch is that they gave a free pass to Afghanistan and Australia for a bigger payoff in Iraq or here, if they can pull it off. As valuable as the coalition support has been, John Howard and Tony Blair cannot wage this war successfully without our full commitment and our enemies know it. If we lose this battle and Kerry wins the election, the costs of recovering later will be much greater than 9/11.
John Kerry is half-right in one sense. This is a single-issue election about getting more of the same. Based on experience, you can reasonably expect that a re-elected Bush will renew the foreign and domestic policy goals he pursued in his first term. His campaign has been a continuation of his record of four years. With Bush, what you see is what you get.
Kerry’s campaign has been a string of unresolved inconsistencies alternately true to and at odds with his twenty-year record of raising taxes while undercutting national defense. Based on experience, you can reasonably expect that a President Kerry will be both liberal and inconsistent, i.e. more of the same. With Kerry, you can believe his election year promises or you can believe your lying eyes.
The single issue for Bush supporters is that we must win the war on terror now. The single issue for Kerry supporters is that we must replace George W. Bush with a Democrat now. There are a slew of other issues of varying degrees of import in the national campaigns and on ballots throughout the land. But they all add up to a hill of ash when a jihadist drops a dirty bomb on your neighborhood.
John Kerry told New York Times Magazine that 9/11 did not change him, his approach to terrorism or his opinion that it is a containable "nuisance," implying that a certain level of terrorism is acceptable. His chief advisors are holdovers from the Clinton administration, which portends that the Kerry years could be 1998-2000 all over again. You may recall that Clinton, in response to terrorist attacks on our interests abroad, authorized missile strikes, got gun shy after a few setbacks and then kicked the can down the road.
There is nothing in Kerry’s record, policies or character that suggests he is prepared to ride out the inevitable setbacks in the war on terror. When President Kerry gets spooked and calls a time-out, we already know the terrorists won’t take their balls and go home. If you don’t think that’s a likely outcome, just ask the anti-war voters why Kerry’s their guy.
Kerry would like to redefine Bush’s gritty resoluteness as inflexible stubbornness and his consistency as a lack of nuance, but those are the two qualities that reassure Americans no terrorist can rest easy on Bush’s watch. When your home and family are under assault, you don’t want the police officer that comes to your door to be a weak-kneed braggart who boasts about his honors at the Academy to compensate for his lack of accomplishment since. You want an experienced cop who will apprehend the bad guys and make sure they never threaten your safety again.
If you want to know which candidate the terrorists fear, just watch what they do in these final days to influence our election like they did in Spain. My hunch is that they gave a free pass to Afghanistan and Australia for a bigger payoff in Iraq or here, if they can pull it off. As valuable as the coalition support has been, John Howard and Tony Blair cannot wage this war successfully without our full commitment and our enemies know it. If we lose this battle and Kerry wins the election, the costs of recovering later will be much greater than 9/11.
Four More Years
When Luis and I married on October 18, 2000, I was an obsessive political junkie and he was fascinated by history, not current events. I pledged to love, honor and share the remote control. That last part was a conditional vow, as he soon learned.
We wed a little more than two weeks before the general election. "I'll stop watching the news every night and all weekend long," I promised with honorable intentions at the time, "after the election is over." How was I to know the election would last until December? By that time, I was delighted to relinquish the TV controller as we were both heartily sick of the Florida controversy.
Four months later Luis went to work in an environment dominated by well-informed GOP activists, further awakening his civic sensibilities. Then came September 11th, which transformed my husband’s worldview to such a degree that he has considered running for elective office someday. This election he is persuading more undecided voters to support Bush than I am. We are a big, happy family of political junkies, but we do have one television per person, just in case.
Aside from the birth of my son, whom Luis has taken on as his own, these have been the very best times. I think we mesh so nicely because we share values, a powerful devotion and an irreverent sense of humor, the antidote for a lot of ailments. Luis has a mime-like gift for graceful physical comedy and makes me laugh when I would rather cry. He is remarkably free of neuroses and helps me focus on all my wonderful blessings. He is a loving family man who wears responsibility and commitment with elan. He is wise and perceptive beyond his years.
He sat beside me during chemotherapy sessions. He bolstered our son and me with his unfailing strength. He comforted us when my sister died unexpectedly. He moved my handicapped brother from Florida back to California and welcomed him into our home. I cannot imagine life without him. He makes my life worth fighting for.
On this, our fourth, anniversary, Luis and I have agreed to give it a try for four more years, God willing. I am the luckiest woman in the world.
We wed a little more than two weeks before the general election. "I'll stop watching the news every night and all weekend long," I promised with honorable intentions at the time, "after the election is over." How was I to know the election would last until December? By that time, I was delighted to relinquish the TV controller as we were both heartily sick of the Florida controversy.
Four months later Luis went to work in an environment dominated by well-informed GOP activists, further awakening his civic sensibilities. Then came September 11th, which transformed my husband’s worldview to such a degree that he has considered running for elective office someday. This election he is persuading more undecided voters to support Bush than I am. We are a big, happy family of political junkies, but we do have one television per person, just in case.
Aside from the birth of my son, whom Luis has taken on as his own, these have been the very best times. I think we mesh so nicely because we share values, a powerful devotion and an irreverent sense of humor, the antidote for a lot of ailments. Luis has a mime-like gift for graceful physical comedy and makes me laugh when I would rather cry. He is remarkably free of neuroses and helps me focus on all my wonderful blessings. He is a loving family man who wears responsibility and commitment with elan. He is wise and perceptive beyond his years.
He sat beside me during chemotherapy sessions. He bolstered our son and me with his unfailing strength. He comforted us when my sister died unexpectedly. He moved my handicapped brother from Florida back to California and welcomed him into our home. I cannot imagine life without him. He makes my life worth fighting for.
On this, our fourth, anniversary, Luis and I have agreed to give it a try for four more years, God willing. I am the luckiest woman in the world.
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