A Two-Point Change in the Polls is Not a 'Bounce' — Especially With the Undercover Media Cognoscenti in the Tank

President Obama has seen at most a two or three point change in the polls from two weeks ago, in the days just before the GOP convention. Frankly, the changes are practically imperceptible. The polls are basically where they were in early August, when Mitt Romney selected Paul Ryan as his running-mate --- when at that time it could've been said that the GOP ticket got a small bounce (and nobody in the MSM was saying any such thing, surprise). As I reported earlier, the so called "convention bounce" phenomenon is essentially ephemeral. Looking back at earlier election years, the gains after the conventions evaporated as the general election campaign wore on in the last couple of months. In other words, the final leg of the presidential race matters. The last stages of the campaigns will turn undecided voters into "decidedes" and one of the campaigns will emerge as the clear leader at the final stretch.

So that's why I'm getting some good laughs from Nate Silver, the so-called wonder kid of horse race polling. Poor Nate has been jonesing horribly for even the slightest blip of an Obama-Biden bounce. He squeezed out a "hint" of a bounce in his writing the other day, and last night he went all out with a major commitment in political analysis: "Sept. 8: Conventions May Put Obama in Front-Runner’s Position." Oh my! Talk about iconoclastic political reporting! Step back from the ledge, Nate. Think of the children!!

But the fact is that Obama's a wildly likable incumbent who's had virtually the entire MSM establishment in the tank. Yeah, he's the front-runner alright, doh. The big story is why the Democrat ticket hasn't pulled out a prohibitive lead by now. Lord knows the press is trying. They even went undercover to pick up some Obama swag from the convention in Charlotte: "Too good to check: Media buying Obama swag under fake names at Democratic convention?"

The wonder kid reports that Obama might ultimately pull out a five-point post-convention bounce --- we won't know until later this week, when the tracking poll surveys catch up with sample respondents queried after the convention. I'll give Silver a big shout out later in the week if he's on the money. But in the end, any bounce won't matter much. The race will be neck-and-neck down to the wire of November 6. We have boatloads of political advertising to expect by then, and of course the presidential debates, which could make a big difference. Indeed, Jeff Zeleny and Jim Rutenberg have more on that, at the Times, "Five Crucial Factors to Watch, Just 58 Days From the Election" (via Memeorandum):

WASHINGTON — Two months before the election, President Obama and Mitt Romney agree on one thing: the collection of states where the race will be decided.

As Mr. Obama opened a two-day bus tour of Florida on Saturday, Mr. Romney set his sights on trying to put Virginia back in the Republican column. Television advertisements from both sides were filling the airwaves in those two vital states and six others from Nevada to New Hampshire, while outside groups supporting the candidates tested for traction elsewhere.

With the political conventions over, the battle to determine whether Mr. Obama will win re-election or Mr. Romney will become the 45th president of the United States is fully engaged. The race has been deadlocked, according to many measures, and each side was predicting that it would see no lift from its convention. That seems to have been true in Mr. Romney’s case, while Mr. Obama’s aides were hopeful that new polls due out this week would prove them wrong.

But for now, Mr. Obama may hold a slight edge because the race remains essentially tied, which means voter disappointment has not turned into a resounding call for his defeat despite the challenging economic climate.

“Now, our friends at the other convention were more than happy to talk about what was wrong with America but not talking about what they’d do to make it right,” he told supporters on Saturday in Seminole, Fla., only a few miles from the site of the Republican convention.

Mr. Romney, speaking to veterans in Virginia Beach on Saturday, referred to the disappointing jobs report released a day earlier. “This week has not been a lot of good news,” he said. “But I’m here to tell you things are about to get a lot better.”

Continue reading.

The five factors: The electoral map, the debates, the ads and messaging, possible third party bids in some states, and campaign finance.

I'm making no bets at this point. I mostly think that Obama could lose and lose badly, but there's so much that can happen between now and election day. And I don't trust the media to get the real story out about who the president really is and how badly his administration has led the country. My gut instinct is that the wisdom of the American people will prevail, and that we'll see a political retrenchment in November in the furtherance of good government and basic political decency. That would mean, obviously, that voters will throw the Democrat bums out on their sorry asses.

So, keep checking back here for all your political reporting and analysis needs.

Hat Tip: Memeorandum.

Debbie Wasserman Schultz Denies Accusing Republicans of 'Undermining Israel Security' in Interview With CNN's Don Lemon

Israel Matzav has the video, "Dumb Dumb Debbie claims to be 'misunderstood'.'

Watch it at the link. Wasserman Schultz repeatedly lies that she was "misrepresented" by Philip Klein at the Washington Examiner, which she tries to blow off as a "conservative blog."

But Klein has responded, "Confronted with audio, DWS makes another erroneous statement about the Washington Examiner." That's a detailed fisking of Wasserman Schultz's lies, but this part is key:

Asked by CNN anchor Don Lemon if she had any regrets about this episode, Wasserman Schultz said she did not. “I regret that the Examiner has repeatedly taken what I said out of context,” she added. “If they had printed the entire quote, and if they had actually told ambassador Oren what I actually said, I think his response would have been different.”

But when I posted audio of her comments, I actually included the 28 seconds leading up to her Oren quote and the 38 seconds after it. I did so to purposely bend over backwards to provide even more context to her quote than was even needed to show I transcribed her accurately in my initial report.

For what it’s worth, it isn’t just the conservative media that is saying I quoted her accurately. The Washington Post looked at her initial accusation of a misquote and concluded: “Klein’s quote was exactly accurate, meaning Wasserman Schultz falsely accused the Examiner of misquoting her. The DNC chair earns Four Pinocchios.” The fact checkers at PolitiFact gave her their “pants on fire” rating.

What’s odd about this whole episode is that Wasserman Schultz could have put this issue largely to rest initially by simply clarifying her point and saying that her statement was misunderstood. Instead, she keeps digging in – claiming that I reported things that I didn’t and accusing me of misquoting her when I went out of my way to provide full context of her remarks.

Well, she wouldn't do that, because then she'd have to admit that she was wrong in the first place. Leftists don't to that, especially Israel-bashing leftists like the DNC chair, whose own office has been under fire previously for attacking American Israel supporters as "Jewbags."

PREVIOUSLY: "'Not All Democrats Are Anti-Israel, But Almost All Anti-Israelis Are Democrats."

How Big Is the Student Loan Default Problem?

The New York Times reports, "A Big Default Problem, but How Big?":

Long-range projections by the Department of Education estimate that the default rate over 20 years, for borrowers who began repayment in 2009, is 17 percent; among students who attended profit-making colleges, the predicted default rate is 49 percent.

It is messy, though, to compare those long-range estimates with the official default rate published by the Department of Education. The long-range estimates are calculated on the dollar amount of loans in default, while the official rate is based on the number of borrowers in default.

Looking at defaults another way, about 15 percent of all borrowers have been in default at the end of the last six fiscal years, which ends Sept. 30, according to Department of Education data. Currently, 16 percent of borrowers are in default, nearly twice the official default rate.

Actually, you can't really default on government loans. They can't be wiped out through bankruptcy, for example. You're on the hook for the money you borrowed, no matter what. More on that from the Times, "Degrees of Debt: Debt Collectors Cashing In on Student Loan Roundup" (via Memeorandum):

Unlike private lenders, the federal government has extraordinary tools for collection that it has extended to the collection firms. Ms. [Amanda] Cordeiro has already had two tax refunds seized, and other debtors have had their paychecks or Social Security payments garnisheed. Over all, the government recoups about 80 cents for every dollar that goes into default — an astounding rate, considering most lenders are lucky to recover 20 cents on the dollar on defaulted credit cards.

I've probably said this before, but I'm not sympathetic to students who take out too much debt. I worked my way through college and didn't take loans until graduate school. I borrowed a ton of money, but my payments are commensurate with my career and earnings. I don't know what young people are thinking when they take out nearly $100 thousand in loans for some worthless degree in post-epistemology gender collectivist studies, or whatever the going discipline these days. Half of these idiots end up at the Occupy Wall Street protests looking like abject progressive scum. It's ridiculous.

More at Memeorandum.

Farewell to London 2012 Summer Olympics and Paralympics

At Independent UK, "Farewell to Games that exceeded all our hopes":

Two sporting extravaganzas, a record-breaking medal haul for Britain, disabled sport showcased as never before … no wonder even the Aussies say it was better than Sydney...

And see, "Editorial: A magical summer: Were the £9bn Games worth it? Of course, for a Britain that is a better, happier country."

BONUS: At London's Daily Mail, "Revenge of the Blade Runner! Pistorius destroys opposition as he takes gold in the Olympic Stadium's final event."

The Party That Obama Un-Built

From Kim Strassel, at the Wall Street Journal, "Where is the next generation of Democrats?":

Charlotte, N.C. - Julian Castro is no Barack Obama. And for that, Democrats have themselves to blame.

The focus of this week's Democratic convention was President Obama. Lost in the adulation was the diminished state to which he has brought his broader party. Today's Democrats are a shadow of 2008—struggling for re-election, isolated to a handful of states, lacking reform ideas, bereft of a future political bench. It has been a stunning slide.

The speech by Mr. Castro, the young and charismatic mayor of San Antonio, was the Democrats' attempt to recapture the party optimism that then-Senate candidate Obama sparked at the 2004 convention. John Kerry didn't win, but that year marked the start of an ambitious Democratic plan to revitalize the party.

In 2006, Nancy Pelosi muzzled her liberal inclinations to recruit and elect her "Majority Makers"—a crop of moderate and conservative Democrats who won Republican districts and delivered control of the House for the first time in 14 years.

Democrats in 2006 also claimed the Senate, with savvy victories in states like Montana and Virginia. The party thumped Republicans in gubernatorial races, winning in the South (Arkansas), the Mountain West (Colorado), and in Ohio (for the first time since 1991). A vibrant candidate Obama further boosted Democratic ranks in 2008.

By 2009, President Obama presided over what could fairly be called a big-tent coalition. The Blue Dog caucus had swelled to 51 members, representing plenty of conservative America. Democrats held the majority of governorships. Mr. Obama had won historic victories in Virginia and North Carolina. The prediction of liberal demographers John Judis and Ruy Teixeira's 2004 book, "The Emerging Democratic Majority"—lasting progressive dominance via a coalition of minorities, women, suburbanites and professionals—attracted greater attention among political analysts.

It took Mr. Obama two years to destroy this potential, with an agenda that forced his party to field vote after debilitating vote—stimulus, ObamaCare, spending, climate change. The public backlash, combined with the president's mismanagement of the economy, has reversed Democrats' electoral gains and left a party smaller than at any time since the mid-1990s.

Of the 21 Blue Dogs elected since 2006, five remain in office. The caucus is on the verge of extinction...

Continue reading.

And keep in mind, much of the destruction of the old-line Democrat Party can be laid at the feet of the radical nutroots left, which is way more extreme than anything the tea party has even dreamed of. But don't tell that to the legacy media. You'll be ostracized as a "conservative troll."

No, the Faux Family-Friendly Speeches at the Convention Didn't Fool Me One Bit — the Democrats Are Socialist Collectivists In All But Name, Bent On Transforming Society Just as Barack Hussein Promised

See Stanley Kurtz, "Are Republicans Fooling Themselves?":

Overall, the Democrats put on an effective show. With the possible exception of the McGovern convention, this was the most left-leaning Democratic gathering in memory. Some of that may have been counterproductive, particularly on social issues. To the extent that Republicans dismiss this convention as either a failure or relatively meaningless, however, I think we’re fooling ourselves.

This election could go either way. If Obama squeaks by, he will have done so with the help of a Democratic party that has taken a large, open, and disturbingly leftist turn. I think we’re missing the significance of that. It is completely accurate to say that the Democrats are pushing a bogus reformulation of the American way of life — slapping a bunch of flags on their Julia ad and turning classic conceptions of civic and religious community into covers for a cradle-to-grave welfare state. Unfortunately, this way of thinking is becoming the new normal in this country, and Obama and his convention have only helped to cement the change.

Conservatives can puncture these arguments all we like, but we can’t cut through the media filter. More than that, the conservative case can’t break through the left-controlled education system that has profoundly shaped the Millennials. True, youth unemployment is giving many second thoughts about Obama, yet it’s been more a matter of sapping Millennial enthusiasm than of changing attitudes and ideas.

Do demographics doom the expansive liberal welfare state, regardless? In some sense, they do. Yet if Obama is in the driver’s seat as our fiscal woes mount, he will use the crisis to further his restructuring. California is our advance guard — our Greece — yet their budget crisis is two months away from prompting one of the boldest redistributionist transformations this country has seen in years (even if barely anyone knows it yet).

Only the Romney campaign can cut through the cultural, educational, and media filters and force a debate over the Obama Democrats’ bogus redefinition of the American dream. The media can ignore what conservatives say, but they still have to cover the candidate. With the exception of his welfare ads, however, the Romney campaign has avoided an assault on Obama’s ideology. Romney’s entirely plausible strategy is to downplay the ideological battle (Ryan nomination notwithstanding).

More at the link.

And see the extremely radical Booman Tribune, which spews the classic progressive cover for the hard-left's transformation agenda, "Mr. Kurtz? He Dumb."

No Kurtz isn't "dumb." He's just willing to get out there and expose things others are afraid of mentioning. That said, recall the Wall Street Journal also argued the same basic point as Kurtz, "Obama Was Honest When He Said He Wanted to Remake America."

And remember, this is the party that voted three times --- three times, without blinking an eye --- to vote God out of the public realm --- voting against public opinion polls that find overwhelming majorities affirming the role of God in their lives and in the life of the nation.

Plus, at the video above, man-and-woman on the street interviews show Democrat after Democrat agreeing that Americans are part of the government, and by implication not of the civil society that is supposed to form an associational bulwark against coercive tyranny. So, yes, the hard-left Democrats are indeed changing --- more rapidly than most have noticed --- the basic notions of civil society and the social contract. Don't miss Linkmaster Smith for more comments on that, at The Other McCain, "Democrat Transition Into Communist Party Continues Apace."

Conservative Trolling

Lots of folks are talking about this piece from David Weigel, "The Age of Trolling: How a small band of conservatives generated half of the Democratic Convention’s headlines."

Linkmaster Smith offers an abstract take, "@DaveWeigel Nearly Discovers Capitalism, Shrugs It Off As ‘Trolling’." And at AoSQH, "Slate's 'Conservative' Writer Dave Wiegel: When the Conservative Media Reports Stories the Partisan Liberal Press Embargoes, It's 'Trolling'."

And this is good, from "streiff" at Red State, "Dave Weigel: Conservative Journalism = Trolling":

I usually don’t devote much time to thinking about the third tier Democrat enablers who make up much of the press. This includes anyone at Buzzfeed, anyone at Politico, Ezra Klein, Greg Sargent, and, of course, Dave Weigel.

Today I’m going to make and exception for Weigel because his recent article in Slate is really instructive on how the media operates and how it expects us to operate....

According to Weigel, it is “trolling” to report on the Democrats excising God from their platform and their kowtowing to their radical islamist element by not acknowledging Jerusalem as the capital of Israel is somehow “distracting.” He thinks that the goat rope that followed, the booing of the mention on God and the hapless, befuddled Anthony Villaraigosa’s declaring against all evidence that two-thirds of the body had voted to restore both God and Jerusalem to the platform. It is “trolling” to mention a prominent California delegate compared us to Nazis.

In short, for conservatives to report anything that interferes with the organized fellatio of Obama that passed for mainstream media coverage of the Democrat convention is equivalent to internet trolling.

This is what we are up against this fall. We aren’t fighting bias in the media, we are contending with palpable hostility from a media that is viscerally committed to the re-election of Barack Obama.

Well, it's not just "this fall," but otherwise a very nice summary.

And see American Glob, "In Which Dave Weigel Forgets He Was a Member of JournoList" (via Instapundit here, and more here).

Oh, and by the way, some of the most objectionable "trolling" would be that of Yid With Lid and his reporting on the Dems' God and Jerusalem clusterf-k, which Dunetz broke himself, with a boost from the Weekly Standard. See, "Democrats Strip Pro-Israel Language From Platform." So, CWCID. Kudos to Yid With Lid. That was one of the more important stories coming out of Charlotte. Really. A Blogspot blogger handing the MSM hacks their asses? Definitely doesn't fit the accepted narrative.

Homeless Man Kills Pelican for Food

He was hungry, had no luck fishing, and said WTF?

A man's gotta eat. (And perhaps too proud to be an Obama food stamp dependent, who knows?)

At KTLA Los Angeles, "Homeless Man Charged, Accused of Choking Pelican to Death:

MALIBU, Calif. (KTLA) -- Prosecutors on Friday charged a homeless man with animal cruelty, accusing him of killing a pelican with his bare hands.

Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies arrested 30-year-old Sergio Alvarez late Wednesday afternoon after horrified witnesses claimed they saw the man trying to choke a pelican near the Malibu Pier.

The pelican struggled briefly before going limp in Alvarez's hands, according to sheriff's reports.

And at Los Angeles Daily News, "Hungry homeless man sentenced to 60 days in jail for choking pelican to death."

And don't miss the comments there, which run along the lines of, "Hey, three hots and a cot ... the dude won't be hungry now..."

Lana Del Rey Nude GQ Photo Shoot

At London's Daily Mail, "No clothing needed! Lana Del Rey is more than comfortable in her own skin as she strips off for nude GQ shoot."

And at GQ, "Lana Del Rey covers GQ!"

'Not All Democrats Are Anti-Israel, But Almost All Anti-Israelis Are Democrats

That's the post title from William Jacobson, at Legal Insurrection.

And linked there is Joel Engel's entry, at the Weekly Standard, from 2004, "From Me to Jews":

The evidence is overwhelming that acceptable anti-Semitism has moved from right to left on the political continuum, and that its philosophical home now resides in the Democratic party, which has become less the party of liberals than of leftists. Even before Al Sharpton stood as a presidential candidate last year, Democratic politicians genuflecting for black votes--Al Gore, Bill Bradley, and Hillary Clinton, for example--often trekked up to Harlem to kiss his ring. And yet, this was a man who in previous years had either led or instigated two anti-Jewish demonstrations, one in Crown Heights and one in Harlem, which together resulted in the deaths of eight people. Does that matter to Democrats and John Kerry? Apparently not. Sharpton was rewarded with a choice slot at the Democratic National Convention, something that is impossible to imagine being given to the likes of former Republican David Duke, whose incitements have frankly born far less blood than Sharpton's.

Yeah, well, Sharpton's a star on the far-left hate-channel MSNBC, so there you go.

Dems Tone Deaf on the Moral Crisis

From Star Parker, at WND:

Maybe Democrats have some slick salesmen, like Bill Clinton and our current president, who can sell you swampland and have you convinced that you’ve bought choice beachfront property.

But the omission of any mention of God and recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital from the Democratic Party platform, which were in it in 2008, and then the almost failed attempt to add them after the fact, showed the clear truth about the 2012 Democratic Party.

It took three boisterous floor votes to add these principles to the platform – and listening to the ayes and nays in the third vote, it is questionable that they actually got the two thirds that were needed.

The omission of these key principles from the Democratic platform was the party equivalent of what journalist Michael Kinsley calls a political gaffe – when a politician inadvertently says what he really believes.

Party operatives panicked when they realized that the platform, as initially drafted, showed today’s Democrats exactly for who they are – the home base for the nihilism, radical moral relativism and welfare statism that defines today’s far left.

But the Democrats are the party of the entertainment industry. They know how to create fiction and appeal to fantasies.

So the party of the radical left brands Republicans as extremists...

Hmm...

Nihilism? Check. Radical moral relativism? Check. Welfare state dependency? Check.

Looks like Parker's hit the nail on the head. The progs no doubt will be coming after her for speaking truth to power. She must be destroyed!

William Jacobson Reviews '2016: Obama's America'

The movie is a devastating exposé of Barack Obama, and especially the "guard dog" media that enabled this president's election.

See, "Legal Insurrection 2016":

Dinesh D’Souza found a theory — the anti-colonialist ideology of Obama’s Kenyan absentee father — which explains Obama.  I found the theory interesting, but unnecessary.

There are plenty of left-wing politicians and academics who share the same desire to bring American down several notches, who accept the rise of Islamists as necessary to counter the West and Israel, and who view government as a tool for redistribution of wealth both domestically and internationally … and who did not have an anti-colonial Kenyan father.

Whether Obama is a product of his desire to emulate his father’s anti-colonialism, or just another leftist product of our educational system and a left-wing upbringing, the result is the same.  We have a disaster on our hands.

The film demonstrates how Obama cunningly used race both for his advancement and to deflect scrutiny of his ideology.

I did not need this movie to know that.  Almost four years ago I saw that Obama’s use of race as a political weapon was the defining byproduct of the 2008 campaign

The most depressing aspect of the film was the cover-up by the mainstream media. Obama was the least vetted candidate ever, someone with associations which would have been disqualifying for anyone else.

That too was no surprise.

 Continue reading.

Palm Beach County Democratic Chairman Apologizes, Takes Leave Following Repulsive Anti-Christian Comments

At Instapundit, "PARTY OF HATE: FL DNC Boss Apologizes, Takes Leave of Absence After Saying Christians ‘Want Jews to Die’."

Also at the Palm Beach Post, "Damage control: Palm Beach County Dem chair apologizes for anti-Christian rant."

Blake Lively Gucci Première

Below is the director's cut, discussed at New York Daily News, "Gucci unveils complete ad for its Premiere fragrance spot with Blake Lively:

The TV spot, helmed by director Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive), was shot in the iconic Sheats Goldstein Residence in Beverly Hills. This longer version also features shots of a desert landscape.

And People Magazine reports, "Blake Lively Reveals Her Beauty Secret Weapon."

Also at Glamour, "Blake Lively on Her Love of Fragrance, How NOT to Do Your Makeup, and What She Learned About Style from Gossip Girl," and London's Daily Mail, "Cupcake queen Blake Lively reveals her secret to staying slim: 'Being 25 years old and having a good metabolism'."

The 'Born That Way' Theory of Homosexuality Has Been Extended to Pedophilia

I was hesitant on this one, but Robert Stacy McCain's essay is too good to ignore.

See, "The Problem With Sexual ‘Rights’.'

There's a long build-up to climax, if you will, but here's the gist of the controversy:

If you’re going to read the whole article at Gawker, be prepared to cope with feelings of outrage at how the “born that way” theory of homosexuality has been extended to pedophilia.

The writer of the article, Cord Jefferson, is at pains to distinguish between the term pedophile and the term child molester and, although few parents will give a damn about such semantics, it is enlightening in this regard: The scientists interviewed by Jefferson are interested in determining how crime can be prevented by persuading pedophiles not to act on their “sexual orientation.”

Yet this possibility — that persons need not act on their idiosyncratic sexual impulses – is entirely rejected by the rights-oriented legal philosophy that inspired Justice Kennedy’s Lawrence decision or Judge Wolf”s ruling in the Kosilek case. Both Kennedy and Wolf seem to presume that people have a right to satisfy their sexual desires, and there was an entire caucus at the Democrat convention dedicated to defending such rights.

If, however, the safety of citizens requires that certain sexual desires be sternly repressed, the objection of “rights” loses its force, and even such a liberal as Ta-Nehisi Coates is outraged by the tone of moral neutrality with which Cord Jefferson examines the claims of scientists about pedophilia as a sexual orientation.

Noel Sheppard notes that the Gawker writer is a “self-professed progressive,” and it is remarkable how the logic of progressivism inexorably leads to conclusions that even progressives find themselves compelled to reject — at least for now, that is.

Perhaps, as with homosexuality, our academic, legal, scientific and cultural elites can successfully destigmatize pedophilia, upending society’s moral consensus in such a way that our dread of child molesters is replaced by a horror at the benighted bigotry of those who fail to understand the science that proclaims that they’re “born that way,” and that this endows pedophiles with rights which no well-meaning person can oppose or criticize.

Oh, what wonders the “emerging awareness” provides!

The Gawker article in question is "Born This Way: Sympathy and Science for Those Who Want to Have Sex with Children." It's so unmentionably depraved I prefer not to link. I did read Ta-Nehisi's post and was frankly surprised he doesn't go there --- surprised, because if you're progressive and favor homosexual rights it's not a stretch to legitimize pedophilia, which is, of course, child rape. Oh, you can get in trouble for saying it (that pesky thing called political correctness), but again, read that depraved piece at Gawker and you'll see what I mean.

And kudos to Noel Sheppard for going through that horrible piece of garbage to the very end, where in fact the writer confesses he's a "self-professed progressive." Sick, I know, but that's what progressive ideology is all about. See, "Gawker: 'Pedophilia Is a Sexual Orientation'."

Also concise and to the point is Clayton Cramer, "Born That Way."

God, Jerusalem and American Foreign Policy

From Caroline Glick:

There are two reasons for Americans' enduring interest and concern about Israel. And they were both revealed this week at the Democratic National Convention when the story broke about how this year's Democratic platform differs from its 2008 platform. First it was reported that the platform contained no mention of God.

Then it was reported that unlike the 2008 platform, this year's Democratic Party platform made no mention of Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

This year's platform watered down the language on Israel in other significant ways as well.

It did not refer to Israel as the US's "strongest ally" in the Middle East. It did not call for the continued eschewal of the Hamas terror group by the international community. It did not mention US opposition to the Palestinian demand for the so-called "right of return" - through which Israel would be destroyed by an influx of millions of foreign Arabs in the framework of a peace treaty between Israel and the Palestinians. But whereas these other deletions were generally ignored, the platform's silence on Jerusalem generated a maelstrom of criticism that exceeded even its deletion of God.

Significantly, rather than treat the deletions of God and Jerusalem as separate issues, the media and the Democrats themselves presented them as two sides of the same coin. When on Wednesday the party's leadership decided to restore the language of the 2008 platform on God and Jerusalem - but not on Hamas, the so-called "right of return," and Israel's strategic significance to the US - they opted to do so in the same amendment.

The widespread perception of God and Jerusalem as related issues tells us something important about the American character. And it tells us something equally important about Obama and the party he leads.

Prof. Walter Russell Mead described Israel's place in the American mindset last year. As he put it, "Israel matters in American politics like almost no other country on earth. Well beyond the American Jewish and the Protestant fundamentalist communities, the people and the story of Israel stir some of the deepest and most mysterious reaches of the American soul. The idea of Jewish and Israeli exceptionalism is profoundly tied to the idea of American exceptionalism. The belief that God favors and protects Israel is connected to the idea that God favors and protects America."

Mead continued, "Being pro-Israel matters in American mass politics because the public mind believes at a deep level that to be pro-Israel is to be pro-America and pro-faith. Substantial numbers of voters believe that politicians who don't 'get' Israel also don't 'get' America and don't 'get' God."

By removing both God and Jerusalem from the platform, Obama and his fellow Democrats stirred the furies of that American soul at its foundations.

They showed they don't "get" Israel or God. And by extension, they don't "get" America.

No doubt. And read it all at the link.

Ben & Jerry's Sues Caballero Video Over 'Boston Cream Thighs' and 'Peanut Butter D-Cups'

This is too funny to pass up, at the Los Angeles Times, "Ben & Jerry's sues over 'Ben & Cherry's' porn series":

PHOTO: Ben Greenfield and Jerry Cohen get comfortable at the local XXX theater for a screening of "Chocolate Fudge Babes."

Caballero Video in Canoga Park, one of the area's oldest pornography studios, sought to pay homage to Ben & Jerry's with its X-rated "Ben & Cherry's" flicks. The ice cream maker wasn't impressed.

The Vermont company, known for frozen treats such as Boston Cream Pie, Peanut Butter Cups and Chocolate Fudge Brownie, sued Caballero this week in federal court alleging trademark infringement.

The DVDs, according to the filing, involve "blatant and outrageous copying and misappropriation of the Ben & Jerry's intellectual property." Ben & Jerry's won a court order temporarily halting the studio from marketing and selling titles such as "Boston Cream Thighs," "Peanut Butter D-Cups" and "Chocolate Fudge Babes."

The DVD producer, known officially as Rodax Distributors Inc., must stop offering the 10 titles in its Ben & Cherry's series as the case proceeds and remove all online mention of the X-rated products, according to the court order.

Caballero also was ordered to get rid of packaging that mimicked Ben & Jerry's distinctive containers, which feature cows, grassy fields, puffy clouds and the slogan "Vermont's Finest." Caballero's version incorporated similar elements as well as actresses posing seductively under the phrase "Porno's Finest."

Neither Caballero nor Ben & Jerry's could be reached for comment.

Well, Ben and Jerry couldn't be reached for comment because they're probably out packing fudge at a nearby Occupy Wall Street protest, the damned pervert freaks!

Also at iOWNTHEWORLD, "Ben and Jerry’s Sues Porno Company For Spoofing Their Flavors."

Radical Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky Cheers Democrat Party Becoming More 'Progressive', i.e., Communist

Via Weasel Zippers, "Dem Rep. Jan Schakowsky Tells Kremlin TV She’s Happy Democratic Party Becoming More Communist…"

And Americans for Legal Immigration linked my Benita Veliz post from yesterday, and here's this from the comments:

Sadly the Democrat party has moved so far left it knocking on the door of communism and I really don't believe the rank and file party members understand the day of the blue dog is gone now we're left with misfits and radicals.

So true.

PREVIOUSLY: "Progressives Are Communists (If You Didn’t Know)".

Our National Debt Is Now More than 16 Trillion Dollars

A great clip from the House Republican Conference.

And don't miss this piece from Mark Steyn, "A Nation of Sandra Flukes" (via Memeorandum):

Sandra Fluke has been blessed with a quarter-million dollars of elite education, and, on the evidence of Wednesday night, is entirely incapable of making a coherent argument. She has enjoyed the leisurely decade-long varsity once reserved for the minor sons of Mitteleuropean grand dukes, and she has concluded that the most urgent need facing the Brokest Nation in History is for someone else to pay for the contraception of 30-year-old children. She says the choice facing America is whether to be “a country where we mean it when we talk about personal freedom, or one where that freedom doesn’t apply to our bodies and our voices” — and, even as the words fall leaden from her lips, she doesn’t seem to comprehend that Catholic institutions think their “voices” ought to have freedom, too, or that Obamacare seizes jurisdiction over “our bodies” and has 16,000 new IRS agents ready to fine us for not making arrangements for “our” pancreases and “our” bladders that meet the approval of the commissars. Sexual liberty, even as every other liberty withers, is all that matters: A middle-school girl is free to get an abortion without parental consent, but if she puts a lemonade stand on her lawn she’ll be fined. What a bleak and reductive concept of “personal freedom.”

Obamanomics 101

It's Andrew Klavan, via Instapundit and The Other McCain:

ECB's Mario Draghi the Most Powerful Man in Europe!

I wrote that title without the slightest sense of hyperbole.

See the New York Times, "Europe's Central Bank Moves Aggressively to Ease Euro Crisis":

FRANKFURT — The European Central Bank on Thursday took its most ambitious step yet toward easing the euro zone crisis, throwing its unlimited financial clout behind an effort to protect Spain and Italy from financial collapse.

Mario Draghi, the president of the central bank, won nearly unanimous support from the bank’s board to buy vast amounts of government bonds, a move that would relieve investor pressure on troubled countries but also effectively spread responsibility for repaying national debts to the euro zone countries as a group.

The decision propels political leaders farther down the uncertain and winding road toward a Europe with centralized control over government spending and economic policy, instead of a collection of nation states that sometimes seem to share little more than a currency and a slumping regional economy.

Mr. Draghi demonstrated once again that he may be Europe’s most powerful leader, perhaps the only one capable of brokering an accord among politicians whose national concerns and mistrust of one another have allowed the crisis to boil for two and a half years.

But there is a risk once again that monetary policy is moving faster than political leaders are able to create the institutions, such as a European bank supervisor, needed to ensure the survival of the common currency.

For the central bank itself, the pledge on Thursday to buy bonds from sovereign states, in conjunction with a fund financed by governments in the 17 European Union nations that use the euro, is a major evolution from its original narrow mandate to restrain inflation.

The bank and Mr. Draghi had the quiet support of all European leaders in taking this latest action, aimed at keeping bond speculators from driving Spain and Italy into budget-blowing borrowing costs. “The euro is irreversible,” he repeated several times Thursday.

"Unlimited financial clout."

"Europe's most powerful leader."

There's something inherently totalitarian in that. Indeed, go back and listen to Pat Condell's vlog from January, "The Gathering Storm." It's all chilling. Mario Draghi, and the rest of it.

Summer's Winding Down

It's not quite fall, although Dana Loesch is feeling it, as she's coming down with a cold and respiratory problems. Give a tweet and wish her well.

Summer won't be over until the 22nd. And even then it's always summer somewhere on the planet, and hence endless bikini blogging awaits, so check back.

PHOTO CREDIT: "Knuckledraggin My Life Away."

You Can Tell If Something Hurts Liberals By Their Shrill Insistence We Not Discuss It

A great post at AceofSpadesHQ (via Right Wing News).

Obama Was Honest When He Said He Wanted to Remake America

At the Wall Street Journal, "Transformers 2":

For all the spin and deception of politics, sooner or later every politician reveals his true purposes. For Barack Obama, one of those moments came when he declared shortly before the 2008 election that "We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America." Above all else, the President who asked voters for a second term Thursday night sees himself as destined to transform America according to his own progressive dreams.

For most of 2008, Mr. Obama was able to disguise this ambition behind his gauzy rhetoric of hope and post-partisanship. The fine print of his agenda betrayed his plans to expand and entrench the entitlement state, but most voters ignored that as they chose his cool confidence over John McCain's manic intensity amid a financial panic.

Candidate Obama was eloquent and likable. His personal story echoed of America's history as a land of opportunity. Voters put aside any worry about his ideology and took a chance on his promise of a better tomorrow.

Four years later the shooting liberal star, as we called him then, has come down to earth. What should have been a buoyant recovery coming out of a deep recession was lackluster to start and has grown weaker. The partisanship he claimed to want to dampen has become more fierce. The middle-class incomes he sought to lift have fallen. These results aren't bad luck or the lingering effects of a crash four years ago. They flow directly from his "transforming" purposes.

Continue reading.

IMAGE CREDIT: The Looking Spoon.

Chainsaw Massacre Propaganda Video Used by Free Syrian Army

Extreme video, via Blazing Cat Fur, "Warning Extremely Graphic: "Syrian" Propaganda Chainsaw Atrocity Video." It's a Mexican drug cartel clip, apparently. Which is interesting in how violence so close to home, perhaps fueled by U.S. demand for narcotics, is creating violent propaganda material in demand by our terrorist enemies overseas. And make no mistake, if the worst of the Syrian "free" insurgents come to power, it'll be like the Taliban in Afghanistan. See this report for more on that: "Killing of Rebel With Qaeda Links Opens Debate on Syrian Opposition."

Toast to the Troops

Smokin'!

Hot Shots Calendar 2013: Rosie Jones and India Reynolds

Lovelies:

Heroes of Hotness

Amazing:

More at Front Magazine.

The GOP Is Not Racist...

It's Alfonzo Rachel, via Theo Spark, "GOP Is Not Racist, Notwithstanding Liberal Lies."

Anti-Semitism Alive and Well in Romania

From Professor Michael Curtis, at the Gatestone Institute, "Anti-Semitism Alive and Well in Romania; Or How the Holocaust Never Happened":

The virus of antisemitism is alive and well in Eastern Europe, and so is the denial of the Holocaust. It is particularly disconcerting that a younger generation in Romania, and more than likely everywhere else in the world, should be infected with this virus, and is -- or claims to be -- ignorant of the real treatment of Jews in the 20th century.

Dan Sova, a 39 year old Romanian lawyer and Social Democrat, who has been a Senator in the Parliament since 2008, was promoted to the position of Minister for Parliamentary Relations by the Prime Minister Victor Ponta on August 6 after saying on a television broadcast on March 5, that "no Jew suffered on Romanian territory (during the Holocaust) thanks to Marshal Antonescu." Two days later Sova was removed "temporarily" from office as speaker of his political party. He has also said that "only 24 Jews were killed during the Iasi pogrom (of June 28-29, 1941) by the German army."

Both statements by Sova were false and malicious. Ion Antonescu, the pro-Nazi dictator of Romania during World War II was "leader of the state," prime minister, foreign minister, defense minister, and self-appointed Marshal. He joined the Tripartite Pact of Germany, Italy, and Japan against the Allies in November 1940, two months after it had been signed. He also established close personal contact with Hitler. It was Antonescu who on June 27, 1941, ordered the commander of the military garrison of the town of Iasi, in northeast Romania, to "cleanse" the city of its Jewish population. The action was not instigated by the Nazis but by the Romanian authorities and the Romanian army on their own initiative.

It is estimated that during the two days of the pogrom in Iasi, between 13,000 and 15,000 Jews were massacred in the streets or else died in the death trains on which 100 Jews were herded into each boxcar; most died of thirst, starvation, or suffocation. The actions of the Romanian regime in the Holocaust led to the deaths, not of 24 Jews, but a number estimated to be between 280,000 and 380,000 Romanian Jews -- most likely the larger number, in the territories under its control.

It was not Nazi policy that triggered the massacre of Jews but the Romanian government itself -- with the enthusiastic participation of the military, and the endorsement of the broader society, similar to the better-known participation of the French Vichy regime and French authorities during the war.

Continue reading.

Desperately Seeking Middle-Class Taxes

At the Wall Street Journal, "What Obama's critique of Ryan tells us about Obama's budget plans":

Democrats in Charlotte are pounding away at the savage budget cuts that Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan supposedly favor and their phantom plan for "raising taxes on the middle class," as President Obama puts it. The truth is the opposite, but table that for a moment. The President seems not to realize his critique is really a scorching if implicit indictment of his own time in office.

Think about his logic like this: Mr. Ryan's House budget details a long-range plan to equalize spending and tax revenues without—ahem—raising tax rates. But if such fiscal restraint is as deep and draconian as Mr. Obama claims, then as a matter of arithmetic the White House must favor a tax increase of an equal size, or something close to it, in order to pay for the amount of government he wants to sustain.

***
The nearby chart dramatizes this reality. It shows the accumulation of outstanding debt as a share of the economy in the modern era. This is debt held by the public—the kind the country has to pay back to bond investors, and not the IOUs that one part of the government owes to another part. These debt projections are highly speculative, and faster economic growth would do a great deal to mitigate them. But we offer them to help readers compare the Ryan and Obama budget visions...

Continue reading.

And folks said Obama was just like Clinton? Amazing that he'd even want to be, but then again, the Democrat secular collectivists got nothin'.

Bleak New Jobs Report Harshes Democrats' Convention Bounce Mellow

James Pethokoukis reports, "The awful, awful August jobs report" (via Memeorandum):

This was not the employment report either American workers or the Obama campaign were hoping for. A huge miss. It shows the U.S. labor market remains in a deep depression, generating few jobs and little if no income growth.

Continue reading.

Also, Instapundit has more here and here.

And still more at the Wall Street Journal, "Slow U.S. Hiring May Spur Fed":

America's employers added jobs at a tepid pace in August, posing a re-election challenge for President Barack Obama and raising the likelihood the Federal Reserve will step in to spur growth when it meets in the coming week.

The Labor Department employment report, which draws more than its usual scrutiny as elections approach, said the U.S. added a seasonally adjusted 96,000 jobs last month. That is down from the 141,000 added in July and too few to make headway in putting the nation's 12.5 million unemployed workers back on the job.

The unemployment rate ticked down to 8.1%, from 8.3% in July, but for the wrong reasons. The jobless rate, based on a separate survey from the main job tally, fell as people gave up searching and left the workforce, not because they found positions.

People give up after awhile, especially with the clusterf-k Democrats in office.

More at the link, with graphs.

RELATED: Here's that bounce, from Gallup, "Obama Bounces Up to 52% Approval, 48% to 45% Over Romney." Not that big a bounce, actually, and they're ephemeral in any case, especially with these job numbers. The mellow is harshed.

Three Times They Said No to God

That was fast.

I discussed the Democrat Party platform fiasco in my classes and I told students I'd be surprised if Republicans didn't create some campaign ads out of the disastrous floor vote optics. And here they come already, at Common Cents, "Allen West Ad '3 Times They Said No to God'":

And see J. Christian Adams, "Losing It in Charlotte":

Lee Atwater couldn’t have written a better script for the Democratic National Convention that just ended in Charlotte. The Charlotte fiasco was a less violent version of the fiasco in Chicago in 1968, except the lunacy was now inside the venue, not outside.

RTWT.

'Why Organic Is Better (Never Mind the Study)'

I had purchased the paper the day this story came out, but Instapundit linked it as well, "BUT IT’S SO TRENDY: Stanford Scientists Cast Doubt on Advantages of Organic Meat and Produce."

And boy, trendy is right.

Here's a response from the letters to the Times, with an emphasis on "Never Mind the Study":

To the Editor:

“Stanford Scientists Cast Doubt on Advantages of Organic Meat and Produce” (news article, Sept. 4) misses the point.

The first sentence suggests that people eat organic food with the hope of getting more vitamins per serving. I choose organic food because it contains fewer pesticides, and is grown more naturally.

Furthermore, the article contradicts the implications of the headline; it provides evidence that organic food contains fewer chemicals, and cites several examples that validate the reality that organic food is in fact healthier.

The fact that nonorganic food also contains pesticide levels below the standards of the Environmental Protection Agency doesn’t indicate that organic and nonorganic foods are actually equally healthy.

Finally, the article acknowledges that this study ignores food’s taste, and doesn’t mention other factors, including support of independent farmers, healthier conditions for workers, biodiversity and reduced environmental degradation.

JOSH GRAY
Roxbury, Conn., Sept. 4, 2012

That's some truly snooty commentary without even the slightest mention of data to support the claims, and I've bolded the most important point, besides. I'm sure organic could taste ten times worse than cardboard and idiots like this would still be spouting such progressive nonsense.

There are more letters at the Times.

And see Jonathan Tobin's piece on this as well, "Broken Clock Alert: Organic, Schmorganic."

Britney Spears Strips Down for 'Elle Magazine' October Cover Story

At Fox News, "Britney Spears drops her pants for a magazine shoot – This month, The X Factor star Britney Spears makes a splash on the cover of ELLE’s October issue..."

Nice photos at the link.

Canada Severs Diplomatic Relations With Iran

I had Blazing Cat Fur's report at the sidebar, but I'm moving it over to the front-page, "About Time: Canada closes embassy in Iran, expels Iranian diplomats."

And see Telegraph UK, "Canada breaks off diplomatic relations with Iran":

Canada closed its Tehran embassy and expelled Iranian diplomats on Friday, in an unexpected and dramatic move.

Canada expressed concern for the mission's safety and criticised Iran's support for the Syrian regime and its threats against Israel.

"Canada's position on the regime in Iran is well known. Canada views the government of Iran as the most significant threat to global peace and security in the world today," Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird said.

"Diplomatic relations between Canada and Iran have been suspended. All Canadian diplomatic staff have left Iran, and Iranian diplomats in Ottawa have been instructed to leave within five days," he added, in a statement.

Canada did not cite a specific incident that caused the breakdown in ties, but issued a strongly worded attack on Tehran's support for Bashar al-Assad's pariah Syrian regime and its "incitement to genocide" against Israel.

More at that top link, and also, "Iran sends elite troops to aid Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria."

An arc of influence across the Persian Gulf and Middle East regions, the implications of Iranian power seem to be lost in this administration. Syria is not turning out so well and it won't be good for U.S. interests and those of our allies.

Democrat Values Are Not American Values — 'How Will You Answer?' (VIDEO)

We were shown over and over again this week that the Democrats don't stand with the average, blood-of-the-soil American. They might talk the talk, but on foreign policy to social issues, the Democrats are dragging this nation down in a godless maelstrom of hatred and death. I pray Barack Obama suffers a massive defeat in November --- and I'll be working toward that effect as well.

Check out this vital clip, which ran last night on television around the time of President Infanticide's speech, via Pundette:

PREVIOUSLY: "Democrat Abortion Extremists Reside Way Outside the American Mainstream."

BONUS: From Peggy Noonan, at WSJ, "The Democrats' Soft Extremism." Correction, Peggy: Hardcore extremism. The Democrats' Hardcore Extremism. (Via Memeorandum.)

Illegal Alien Benita Veliz Speech to Democrat National Convention

At the New York Times, "A ‘Dreamer’ Addresses the Democratic Convention":

Benita Veliz was only at the lectern at the Democratic convention for a few minutes on Wednesday night. CNN did not even turn its cameras on the stage during her brief speech. But for many Latinos in the hall, her moment under the lights was a stunning surprise.

Yeah, CNN ignored the illegal alien's speech, conveniently, of course. The idiot Dems had enough bad optics for the week. No need to pile on with lawbreaking grievance activists. Seriously. The woman's speech was one of the most important of the convention, as it officially confirmed the Democrat Party as the party of lawlessness and utterly sick ethic political pandering. The "DREAM Act" is not about legalizing those who came through "no fault of their own." It's about building a bullet-proof Hispanic ethnic voting bloc, damn the Constitution, to say nothing of national sovereignty.

UPDATE: Linked at iOWNTHEWORLD, "The Lawless Left On Display – Until It Was Blacked Out By MSM." Thanks!

Eva Longoria Speech to the Democrat National Convention

Eva Longoria's a smokin' hottie, one of the hottest babes on the Democrat roster. The problem, of course, is that she's Democrat, and by implication objectively stupid. So, take it for the eye candy, if nothing else:

And then see Lonely Con, "Forget Eva Langoria – Read This Instead."

Cardinal Timothy Dolan Speech to the Democrat National Convention

It's frankly astonishing that they allowed the Cardinal anywhere near the podium. The Democrats' convention pushed pro-death politics. It's sickening.

Nice Deb reports, "Best Speech of the Dem Convention: Cardinal Dolan’s Benediction (Video)."

Shameless: Dems Portray Obama as Patton at DNC

You gotta love it.

I tweeted this comment below before I saw Dana Loesch's essay at Big Peace:

Reality check: Obama was biggest antiwar Dem in 2008. Now foreign policy just a campaign prop for reelection. Shameless.
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) September 7, 2012

Read Dana's entry at the link.

A great piece.

Foaming, Frothy Jennifer Granholm Unleashed

If I recall correctly, this lady drove Michigan into the ground.

She's a freak, and she deserves this mock-up at Power Line, "THE DEAN SCREAM REVISITED."

More video at TPMtv, "Granholm Brings Down the House..."

Scarlett Johansson's Speech to the Democrat National Convention

I would have preferred Natalie Portman. And I'm interested to know why she didn't speak after all. I wouldn't be surprised if some off those "reviled" Jewish neocons --- so despised by the Democrat left --- talked her out of it.

President Obama's Speech to the Democrat National Convention

I think "four more years" will just about do this country in. And boy, was this a terrible speech or what?

The full clip is here.

And the Wall Street Journal reports, "Obama Presses Plan for U.S. Resurgence: Goals Are Scaled Back From Sweeping Proposals in 2008":

CHARLOTTE, N.C.—President Barack Obama portrayed himself as a stout defender of the middle class and a leader with a plan to create jobs across the U.S. economy in a speech Thursday accepting the Democratic nomination for re-election.

The president hoped to offer voters more specifics than his Republican foe, laying out a set of goals for a second term designed to demonstrate he has started rebuilding a ravaged economy and has a strategy for going further.

The goals, most of which echo those previously set by Mr. Obama, provided a message aimed to ease the economic anxieties of Americans during the last stretch of the campaign.

"I'm asking you to rally around a set of goals for your country," Mr. Obama said. He cited ambitions to create manufacturing jobs, slow the growth of college tuition and bolster trade. He called them "real, achievable plans that will lead to new jobs, more opportunity, and rebuild this economy on a stronger foundation."

"That's what we can do in the next four years," he said.

The president's prime-time address capped a three-day convention that focused on the economic struggles of the middle class. Democrats used the convention to argue that Mr. Obama had put the country on a path to recovery and deserved more time.

President Obama, pledging to expand jobs and lift the middle class, accepted his party's nomination for re-election

"America has turned the corner," Vice President Joe Biden said, taking the stage before Mr. Obama. He added: "The work of recovery is not yet complete, but we are on our way."

Mr. Obama's goals reflected a shrunken vision compared with the sweeping plans of his 2008 speech accepting his party's presidential nomination, which had included "affordable, accessible health care for every single American," immigration reform and "energy independence"...

Continue reading.

And see Instapundit for some of the responses. And Gateway Pundit especially, "Krauthammer Pans Obama’s Speech: 'He Gave One of the Emptiest Speeches I’ve Ever Heard on a National Stage'."

Added: From Jonathan Tobin, at Commentary, "The 2008 Messiah Has Left the Building." And at Legal Insurrection, "Composite acceptance speech." (At Memeorandum.)

'Rhiannon'

From Tuesday afternoon's drive-time, at The Sound L.A.

And according to Wikipedia's song entry:

During 1975–1980, Fleetwood Mac's live performances of "Rhiannon" took on a theatrical intensity not present on the FM-radio single. The song built to a climax in which Nicks' vocals were so impassioned that, as drummer and band co-founder Mick Fleetwood said, "her Rhiannon in those days was like an exorcism."

4:22 - My Sweet Lord by George Harrison

4:27 - La Grange by Zz Top

4:30 - I'm On Fire by Bruce Springsteen

4:33 - Come Sail Away by Styx

4:38 - Dance Little Sister Dance by Rolling Stones

4:42 - Dance The Night Away by Van Halen

4:45 - Evil Woman by E.L.O.

4:55 - Hold The Line by Toto

4:59 - I Need To Know by Tom Petty

5:01 - Moondance by Van Morrison

5:07 - Rock & Roll (live) by Led Zeppelin

5:10 - Trampled Under Foot (live) by Led Zeppelin

5:19 - The Ocean (live) by Led Zeppelin

5:24 - Rhiannon by Fleetwood Mac

I'll have more blogging later...

Conflict Ivory

This is just sad all around.

At the New York Times, "Elephants Dying in Epic Frenzy as Ivory Fuels Wars and Profits":

Africa is in the midst of an epic elephant slaughter. Conservation groups say poachers are wiping out tens of thousands of elephants a year, more than at any time in the previous two decades, with the underground ivory trade becoming increasingly militarized.

Like blood diamonds from Sierra Leone or plundered minerals from Congo, ivory, it seems, is the latest conflict resource in Africa, dragged out of remote battle zones, easily converted into cash and now fueling conflicts across the continent.

Some of Africa’s most notorious armed groups, including the Lord’s Resistance Army, the Shabab and Darfur’s janjaweed, are hunting down elephants and using the tusks to buy weapons and sustain their mayhem. Organized crime syndicates are linking up with them to move the ivory around the world, exploiting turbulent states, porous borders and corrupt officials from sub-Saharan Africa to China, law enforcement officials say.

But it is not just outlaws cashing in. Members of some of the African armies that the American government trains and supports with millions of taxpayer dollars — like the Ugandan military, the Congolese Army and newly independent South Sudan’s military — have been implicated in poaching elephants and dealing in ivory.

Congolese soldiers are often arrested for it. South Sudanese forces frequently battle wildlife rangers. Interpol, the international police network, is now helping to investigate the mass elephant killings in the Garamba park, trying to match DNA samples from the animals’ skulls to a large shipment of tusks, marked “household goods,” recently seized at a Ugandan airport.

The vast majority of the illegal ivory — experts say as much as 70 percent — is flowing to China, and though the Chinese have coveted ivory for centuries, never before have so many of them been able to afford it. China’s economic boom has created a vast middle class, pushing the price of ivory to a stratospheric $1,000 per pound on the streets of Beijing.

High-ranking officers in the People’s Liberation Army have a fondness for ivory trinkets as gifts. Chinese online forums offer a thriving, and essentially unregulated, market for ivory chopsticks, bookmarks, rings, cups and combs, along with helpful tips on how to smuggle them (wrap the ivory in tinfoil, says one Web site, to throw off X-ray machines).

Last year, more than 150 Chinese citizens were arrested across Africa, from Kenya to Nigeria, for smuggling ivory. And there is growing evidence that poaching increases in elephant-rich areas where Chinese construction workers are building roads.

“China is the epicenter of demand,” said Robert Hormats, a senior State Department official. “Without the demand from China, this would all but dry up.”

Continue reading.

This is a story that raises a number of issues in political science, of international law and politics, and comparative political and the political economy of development.

It's interesting that China's the source of almost all demand for ivory, and I wonder if pressure from the U.S. could work to curtail it. Mostly though, even though a small amount of ivory is worth more than a month of the average man's pay in Africa, I simply don't understand how anyone could kill those animals in such a way.

Python at Chester Zoo Gives Keepers Struggle

That's one hella snake.

At Telegraph UK, "Python struggles with zoo keepers in annual check":

Six brave volunteers at Chester Zoo help with holding a 23ft-long python who gets a heart check-up.

Team Romney Calls Out Obama on Democrat Party Nazi Slurs

You know, because the Dems are all about civility.

At Althouse, "If Obama's call for "civility... is to be taken seriously," says Romney, stop ... comparing your opponents to Nazis."

Freedom to Blog Update September 6, 2012

It's been awhile since I've updated, but this story's as vital as ever.

At Aaron Worthing's, "Twitter Fascists Try to Silence The Blogger’s Defense Team."

And at Bob Belvedere's, "The #BrettKimberlin Report D+103: Chicken Little’s Sky Is Falling."

Previous entries are here.

Bill Clinton Speech to the Democrat National Convention

Well, FWIW, here's the New York Times' report, "Clinton Delivers Stirring Plea for Obama Second Term."

And check the related items at Instapundit.

Elizabeth Warren Hammered Over Ethnic Indian Claims

At the New York Times, "For Warren, Bad Blood Over Ethnic Claims":

Karen Geronimo, a member of the Mescalero Apache tribe in town for the Democratic convention, knows what she wants from Elizabeth Warren, the Senate candidate from Massachusetts: a blood sample.

“Someone needs to make her take a DNA test,” said Ms. Geronimo, whose husband, Harlyn Geronimo, is the great-grandson of the legendary warrior Geronimo.

The still-simmering controversy over Ms. Warren’s self-proclaimed American Indian heritage has chased her from the campaign trail in Massachusetts to the convention hall, resonating with a small but vocal constituency: American Indian Democrats.

During her academic career, Ms. Warren, a Harvard Law School professor, identified herself as a minority, citing her one thirty-second Cherokee blood, a fact that Republicans pounced on to try to portray her as an opportunist and a fraud. The line on her résumé does not seem to set well with some Indian members of her own party.

“If you’re going to be Native, don’t just be Native on paper,” said Lexie LaMere, a Nebraska delegate and member of the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska. “What’s troubling is that she’s shown nothing in her history of being involved in Native American issues.”

Mr. Geronimo, wearing a “Native Americans for Obama” button, said he was disappointed when he first heard of Ms. Warren’s claim.

“She needed leverage to further her career and started digging,” he said. Ms. Warren brushed aside reporters who asked about the concerns on Wednesday, saying: “I’ve answered those questions. I’m here to talk about what’s happening to America’s working-class families. That’s my job. It’s my full-time job.”

Still, she may want to avoid bumping into Indians around the hall. Jim La Pointe, the great-grandnephew of Crazy Horse and a member of the Rosebud Sioux tribe, had a test in mind for Ms. Warren.

“I’d like to hear her speak her native language,” he said with a sly smile.

VIDEO CREDIT: Legal Insurrection.

Elizabeth Warren Speech to the Democrat National Convention

Everything is rigged. The middle class is getting hammered. And Fauxcahontas is leading the charge!

Actually, William Jacobson is unimpressed:

Warren’s speech was flat, didn’t come across well on television, she wasn’t on her game. Kept talking about people rigging system. No rock star status tonight.

Sandra Fluke Speech to the Democrat National Convention

The Democrats' ultimate infanticide tool:

And at the Los Angeles Times, "Fluke: GOP positions 'offensive, obsolete relic' of past."

More at Jill Stanek's, "Politico: Democrats forced to switch strategies because abortion now a losing issue."

BONUS: At the New York Times, "At the Democratic Convention, an Emphasis on Social Issues."

Welcome to the Democrat Convention!

From Alan Caruba, at Theo Spark's, "The DNC's Orgy of Lies and Hypocrisy."

Cartoon c/o Theo as well.

Richard Trumka Speech to the Democrat National Convention

The ultimate Democrat thug:

FLASHBACK: "Big Labor's Lies: Richard Trumka's Bald-Faced Falsehoods on Wisconsin's Budget Stalemate."

Cecile Richards Speech to the Democrat National Convention

The CEO of the world's biggest infanticide operation:

RELATED: At Weekly Standard, "Democratic Platform Endorses Taxpayer-Funded Abortions":

And the Democratic party doesn't want to make abortions "rare."

Sandra Fluke Primed As Tool of the Feminist Left

I've got some entries scheduled to go live overnight, but until then, here's Michelle's earlier preview of Day 2 at the secular collectivist convention:

And at Michelle's blog, "Obama’s (Un)American Auto Bailout."

Debbie Wasserman Schultz Cancels Interviews After Disastrous Floor Vote Clusterf-k

At Weasel Zippers, "Wasserman Schultz Cancels Interviews After Disastrous CNN Appearance Where She Denied “Discord” On Convention Floor After Jerusalem Vote…"

PREVIOUSLY: "Democrats Really Didn't Want 'God' in Party Platform," and "Oops! Democrats Restore Language on Jerusalem to Party Platform."

Democrats Really Didn't Want 'God' in Party Platform

I doubt these are the kind of optics mainstream Democrats had in mind. And frankly, by the sound if this voice vote, the "God" plank never really got the approval needed to be inserted back in. I simply find it breathtaking that one of the two major parties would even hesitate for one second to affirm the role of God in our national politics. But as I mentioned previously, the Democrats are a secular collectivist party bent on driving moral values out of the public realm. It's obscene.

And for the record, Dave Dayen at the far-left Firedoglake exudes the anti-God bias of the party, "Democrats Cave on Platform, Make Changes on God, Jerusalem."

And David Atkins, at Digby's Hate-abaloo, admits the nays carried the floor, "An explanation of how the Platform kerfuffle went down":

Note that the affirmative vote to approve the changes would have needed to be a two-thirds vote. And it's fairly clear from the audio that the ayes didn't even have a majority. And yet Chairman Villaraigosa ignored the will of the delegates and "in his opinion" gave it to the ayes. So how did this travesty happen?

More at that link above.

Clearly, the activist base of the party hates God and decency, and the party never would have approved the change without simply ignoring the preferences of the delegates. I'd be surprised if we don't see an epic attack ad pummeling the Democrats for their secularist extremism in short order. Shoot, you couldn't script a better outline for a monumental sledgehammer-slam on these idiots.

More at Memeorandum.

Oops! Democrats Restore Language on Jerusalem to Party Platform

The idiots restored "God" to the platform as well.

The New York Times reports. And the supreme idiot Debbie Wasserman Schultz couldn't even explain the epic clusterf-k to softball interviewer Piers Morgan:

Also at CNN, "Just in: Democrats update platform with Jerusalem, God reference" (via Memeorandum).

It's natural that a hard-left secular collectivist party would delete reference to God from the party's platform. And I'm not sure who they're trying to fool by putting it back in. And Israel? Mitt Romney was right. This administration threw the Jewish state under the bus years ago, and there's been no turning back. I'm sure slowly but surely all but the most deranged Max Blumenthal-style Democrats will realize it and GTFO.

Michelle Obama Offers Personal Tribute to Husband

The Los Angeles Times reports, "Michelle Obama pays tribute to her husband in convention speech."

And the video is here.

Mooch is hard for me to watch. She's the ultimate progressive hypocrite:

Well, Michelle Obama's done. And those cheeseburgers are waiting backstage!
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) September 5, 2012

Teachers Unions' Alliance With Democratic Party Frays

So says the Los Angeles Times:

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Teachers unions have been the Democratic Party's foot soldiers for more than half a century, providing not only generous financial backing but an army of volunteers in return for support of their entrenched power in the nation's public schools.

But this relationship is fraying, and the deterioration was evident Monday as Democrats gathered here for their national convention.

A handful of teachers and parents, carrying large inflated pencils, picketed a screening of "Won't Back Down," a movie to be released this month starring Maggie Gyllenhaal and Viola Davis as mothers, one a teacher, who try to take over a failing inner-city school.

The plot is ripped from the headlines: California has the first "parent trigger" law in the nation, which allows parents to petition for sweeping changes to improve low-performing schools. The first parent trigger attempts have occurred in Compton and Adelanto; the former failed, and the latter faces numerous obstacles.

Parent triggers, along with other emerging efforts, have some Democrats questioning their party's longtime support of guarantees that public school districts have made to teachers for decades. Those efforts also include merit pay, charter schools, weakening the tenure system and evaluating teachers partly based on their students' performance on standardized tests.

"There is no longer sort of this assumed alliance between the Democratic Party and the teachers unions," Michelle Rhee, a leader in the movement, said in an interview. Rhee, a Democrat who is a target of the unions' ire, discussed the issues on a panel after the film screening here and one at the Republican National Convention last week.

"There are now lots of Democrats who are saying, 'You know what, we're for teachers and teachers unions, we support the concept of collective bargaining, but there are clearly some things that need to change, and we are willing to stand up and talk about those challenges,'" she said.

More at the link.

Two reactions: One, I continue to be astounded at the supreme selfishness of America's teachers' unions. It's never about putting the children first, absolutely never. Two, I don't believe for a second that the unions' relationship with the Democrat Party is frayed in the least. Randi Weingarten and her ilk have nowhere else to go, in any case. They can grumble all they want about movies and school reform, but so far their bureaucratic death grip on the schools seems very secure.

See the related report at the New York Times from the other day, "School Choice Is No Cure-All, Harlem Finds." Black parents are searching frantically for a good education for the children. And big plans for school choice, like Mayor Bloomberg's, often come up short, with devastating effect for families.

DNC's Debbie Wasserman Schultz Caught Lying About Alleged 'Dangerous for Israel' Comment

As I've been saying, it's non-stop lies with these people, the cretins.

Philip Klein's initial report is here, "Debbie Wasserman Schultz: Israeli ambassador called GOP “dangerous for Israel”."

That would be Ambassador Michael Oren, who denied it: "Israeli Ambassador ‘categorically’ denies DWS claim he said GOP was ‘dangerous for Israel’."

When caught lying, the DNC Chair claimed she was "misquoted" by "a conservative newspaper."

But that's not so, as Alana Goodman points out, "Audio Proves DWS Wasn’t Misquoted."

There's audiotape here.

Hey, the New York Times even picked it up, "Wasserman Schultz Comments Draw Denial from Israeli Ambassador."

This story needs to go viral. The Democrats are all about accusing the Republicans of lies. And yet here we have concrete evidence that Wasserman Schultz lied, and then lied about her lies, the lying liar.

Alana concludes:

Could this possibly get any more embarrassing for the DNC? Wasserman Schultz not only misled Fox News, she also tried to baselessly smear a meticulous reporter, Phil Klein, who fortunately happened to record her statement on audio. Not only did DWS misrepresent the Israeli Ambassador’s comments, she also inaccurately claimed that Klein misquoted her. Why would any journalist — or, for that matter, any foreign diplomat — take her seriously again?

Push Positive

Amazing.

At Telegraph UK, "Lara Stone gets upfront for Calvin Klein."

Theo's Tuesday Hotties

What a roundup.

See, "Tuesday Totty...", and "Bonus Babe..."

Plus, "Bedtime Totty..."

Cathy McMorris Rodgers Speaks to the Republican National Convention

I missed this earlier, and folks know she's one of my very favorite Republicans:

And ICYMI, at Michelle's, "RNC recap in living color: The speeches and stories Obama wants to whitewash."