Link-Starve BuzzFeed!

Man, that'd be harsh, although Professor Reynolds denies he was going to starve BuzzFeed for traffic.

See Althouse, "Instapundit threatens to link-starve BuzzFeed."

And Instapundit replies, "I WASN’T “THREATENING TO LINK-STARVE BUZZFEED”":

I don’t do boycotts, generally. But they seem to have wider ambitions than being a poor man’s ThinkProgress, and if they convince everyone to the right of Kos that they can’t be trusted, that’s what they’ll become. Lost trust can cost.

Keep in mind this is all about that "dog-whistle" Photoshop I blogged previously. The commentary on this was up over the weekend and I missed it, but it's worth updating. (And Doug Ross and The Other McCain both linked. Thanks!)

And remember, conservatives have exhaustingly repudiated racism, seen again and again in signs like the one above. Althouse has more, "Shameful, lowly race-baiting... but who's doing it?"

That said, Dan Riehl has this, "In Defense of Buzzfeed."

I'll have more later, so tune back in...

Malala Yousufzai Airlifted to Britain

It's a good thing. She was as good as dead if she stayed in Pakistan.

At the New York Times, "Schoolgirl Wounded by Taliban Is Airlifted to Britain":

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – The Pakistani schoolgirl who was shot by the Taliban last week for advocating girls’ education has been flown to Britain for emergency specialist care, the Pakistani military said on Monday.

Malala Yousafzai, 14, left an air base in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, where she was being treated for head wounds in a military hospital, on an air ambulance sent from the United Arab Emirates.

In a statement, the military said she would receive immediate treatment for her skull, which was fractured after a bullet passed through her head, as well as “long-term rehabilitation including intensive neuro rehabilitation.”

Malala will be treated at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham in central England, a center which has specialized in the treatment of troops wounded in Afghanistan, Prime Minister David Cameron’s office said in a statement quoted by The Associated Press.

Pakistan said it would pay for her treatment.

A Pakistani military intensive care specialist accompanied her on the flight, which by midmorning Monday had stopped in the United Arab Emirates for refueling en route to Britain.

The mercy flight produced a sigh of relief of sorts among Pakistanis who have kept an anxious national vigil for Ms. Yousafzai since she was shot by a militant gunman last Tuesday as she returned from school in Mingora, the main town in the Swat Valley, in northwestern Pakistan.

The daughter of a schoolmaster, Ms. Yousafzai had become known for her eloquent and impassioned advocacy of education and children’s rights in the face of Taliban threats, which made her a potent symbol of resistance to the militants’ extremist ideology.

Actually, families better keep their kids close. I expect this is the beginning of a new reign of terror. See Der Spiegel, "Schoolgirl Shooting: Pakistanis Fear Resurgent Taliban in Swat Valley."

How Lincoln Emerged in the Stratosphere of Greatness

From Conrad Black, at the New York Sun, "As Daniel Day Lewis’ Portrayal of the 16th President Is About To Hit the Silver Screen, Our Columnist Offers an Assessment of the Original" (via Ed Driscoll at Instapundit):

The mighty American star system has elevated and demoted thousands of people over the 236 years since the propagandistic arts were first torqued up in the Declaration of Independence. But the supreme champion of the American personality cult has been Abraham Lincoln. Given the hyperbole which frequently attaches to much-admired Americans, there is a temptation to assume that Lincoln could not possibly deserve the stratospheric elevation he has received. But he does.

Lincoln was born on the Sinking Spring Farm in Hardin County, Kentucky, on February 12, 1809, received only about a year of formal education, and moved with his family to the frontier country of Indiana, and then, at 21, to Illinois. He largely educated himself as a voracious reader, worked at a variety of jobs, had his first, disturbing, look at slavery on a trip down the Mississippi in 1831, and toiled in a law office until he became a member of the Illinois Bar in 1836.

His mother died when he was young and he had little rapport with his father. But he got on, was a tall and rugged man, companionable, and a fine raconteur with a good sense of humor, who gradually built up his legal practice and became a leading attorney.

He was troubled by slavery as fundamentally wrong: “I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our Republican example of its just influence in the world.” This seems an obvious position to hold now, but America was largely founded and built by slave-holders. Although Lincoln did not at first consider African Americans to be equal in talent and intelligence to Caucasians, he eventually amended that view, when he came to know more of them.

Lincoln came gradually to believe that the incongruity to proclaimed American values, and the outright evil of slavery, were so profound that the nation could not survive. He was for, above all, the preservation of the Union, and favored various methods of curtailing and gradually eliminating slavery. These included support for the original idea of paying for the emancipation of slaves and their voluntary return to Africa, to the purpose-created country of Liberia.

Continue reading.

I haven't been this excited about a new movie in a long time. Abraham Lincoln is my favorite president. The more I read about him the more fascinated I become. And I love sharing things like the Gettysburg Address with my students, especially because they too are fascinated by him, and of the sacrifice that he eventually made for the preservation of American democracy.

The trailer is in theaters. My oldest boy and I saw "Taken 2" over the weekend and we watched it. Daniel Day Lewis, when viewed at some angles, looks like he's Lincoln himself. It's an amazing likeness. I'm excited.

Obama Surrogate: Benghazi Never Asked For More Security

Via Breitbart:

Also at Gateway Pundit, "Obama Campaign: Come On, Benghazi Was Only A Compound (Video)."

Nigel Farage Discusses Euro Crisis With Neil Cavuto on Fox News

Via Theo Spark:

Dana Loesch Documents TSA Harassment

She tweeted the whole encounter.

Dana recited TSA rules, posted at the website, which indicate the right to a public screening. But she was still denied.

The full report is at Twitchy, "TSA nightmares: Dana Loesch tweets another outrageous account of harassment."

Felix Baumgartner Breaks Sound Barrier

At Fox News, "Fearless Felix Baumgartner Safely Lands Record Breaking 24-mile Leap to Earth."

Also at the New York Times, "Felix Baumgartner Was Just Thinking About Coming Home." (At Memeorandum.)

Islamofascists Protest 'Age of Mockery' at Google's London Headquarters

They're bleedin' idiots.

At Telegraph UK, "Muslims protest 'age of mockery' as thousands descend on Google HQ." (Via Memeorandum.)

Plus, check the video at Blazing Cat Fur, "Muslim Fanatics Demand Google Bow to Their Insanity."

Questions About the Libya Attack

From the editorial page at the Los Angeles Times, "Re U.S. was urged to add Libya guards, Oct. 11":

It has become increasingly clear that the Obama administration (which I formerly supported) was perfectly willing to make our freedom of speech, rather than its own ineptitude and lack of vigilance, the villain in the recent attack on our Libyan consulate.

That our United Nations ambassador, Susan Rice, went on political shows on TV spreading distortions and untruths regarding the atrocity in Benghazi is an obscenity.

Michael Jenning
Van Nuys

Notice that Mr. Jenning is a "former" supporter of the president, a more common designation than the Democrat media is letting on.

But see also John Hinderaker, "What Happened In Benghazi" (via Memeorandum).

And at Atlas Shrugs, "Obama's #savage cover-up of an act of war against America: What really happened in Benghazi."

I'll have more shortly ...

'the' or 'The'? Editors Won't Let It Be

I think of this every time I post a music video. Is it, for example, "the" Wallflowers or "The" Wallflowers?

More on that att the Wall Street Journal, "Editors Won't Let It Be When It Comes to 'the' or 'The': Wonky Wikipedia Debate: Whether Beatles Article Merits Capital 'T'":

The Beatles once sang, "Have you heard the word is love?" In a Wikipedia war raging around the group, the word is "the."

For some eight years, editors at the online encyclopedia have been debating whether the article "the" should be uppercased when referring to the band. Is it "the" Beatles or "The" Beatles?

The lowercase faction says the Wikipedia manual of style and external style guides are on its side.

The uppercase faction says that trademarks should be capitalized and that the official Beatles website uses an uppercase definite article.

The dispute has become so contentious that some Wikipedia editors have been banned from participating. "Discussions on this page may escalate into heated debate," warns the internal "Talk" page where editors discuss changes to the Beatles entry.

"Please try to keep a cool head when commenting here."

Now, Wikipedia is trying to settle the question with a community poll, where readers will get to decide which case will prevail. The poll is expected to close Monday. Currently, the Beatles entry mainly sidesteps the issue by avoiding the name of the group in mid-sentence. Still, there are a couple of instances where "the" is lowercased.

The two surviving Beatles aren't singing out on the question. Paul McCartney's agent said the former Beatle wouldn't be available for an interview. Ringo Starr's agent said she doubted she could reach her client quickly enough.

Lowercase advocates point to a handwritten 1970 letter from Beatle John Lennon, who was murdered a decade later, that uses a small "t."

If Mr. Lennon were alive today, "he would have a good laugh at all the 'fans' who think that a lowercase 't' is somehow a disgrace to the band," says Gabriel McFadden, an editor who calls himself "the leader of the lowercase faction." He won't reveal his location because he says he has been "cyberstalked" over the dispute.

Different publications have different capitalization rules. The Wall Street Journal uppercases the "the" in its own name but lowercases it for other publications. As for the musical group, it is "the" Beatles.

I wrote "the" Wallflowers yesterday, so I guess I'll just keep it at that.

More from WSJ at the link.

Sunday Cartoons

Via Legal Insurrection, "Branco Cartoon – One Heartbeat Away."

I don't see Wordsmith's "Sunday Funnies" up yet, but I'll update (from Flopping Aces).

But see Jill Stanek, "Stanek Sunday funnies: “Joe just being Joe” edition."

And Nate Beeler's cartoons are at Cagle.

More later...

Rosie Jones Filming BigD Peanuts 2013 Calendar (VIDEO)

Lovely.

And there's more from yesterday at the Sun's Page 3, "2013 looks Rosie!"

Space Shuttle Endeavor Completes Move to California Science Center

The Los Angeles Times has had pretty amazing coverage of the shuttle Endeavor. I love this picture below, from the front page of today's paper. The caption reads, "TRAYMOND HARRIS, left, and Ryan Hudge play basketball as the shuttle Endeavor passes by in Inglewood on Saturday." And here's the report there, under the photograph, "Shuttle crawls obstacle course."

ABC News 7 had live coverage of the final stage of the move today, and the here's the update at the Times, "Endeavour within sight of Exposition Park."

And from yesterday, "Space shuttle Endeavour rolls on toward its new home."

Former Senator Arlen Specter Has Died

The New York Times reports, "Arlen Specter, 82, Dies; Former Senator From Pennsylvania."

And at WND, "FORMER SEN. ARLEN SPECTER DIES AT 82: Chief architect of 'single-bullet theory' in JFK assassination."

That So-Called Racist Mitt Romney 'Dog-Whistle' T-Shirt is Almost Certainly Photoshopped

I personally don't believe that someone would wear a shirt like that to a Mitt Romney rally. I attended dozens of tea parties on 2009-2010, and I only once saw controversial posters, at the protest against Nancy Pelosi at the Orange County Airport --- and I denounced those in a series of posts identifying the San Diego organizer, Roger Ogden, who later apologized for the misunderstanding and claimed his posters were not racist.

This story was all over Memeorandum yesterday, most conspicuously at Crooks and Liars, where the hopelessly idiotic Dave Neiwert claims this one, utterly suspicious t-shirt "proves" Mitt Romney's running a "dog-whistle" campaign. But the photo, which is licensed to Getty Images, got traction at more reputable outlets, such as New York Magazine, "Check Out This Mitt Romney Supporter’s Horrendously Racist Fashion," and originally at the much-less reputable BuzzFeed, "Man At Romney Rally Wears Mindblowingly Offensive Shirt."

Well, it goes without saying that some folks aren't having it --- Robert Stacy McCain, for example, "False-Flag Troll, IRL":

I can pretty much guarantee that this man photographed at a Romney rally in Lancaster, Ohio, is not in fact a Republican, but rather is a plant sent out by the Democrats as a dirty trick.

Clue #1: Wearing a “Romney/Ryan” sticker on the back of his T-shirt. Nobody does this. Nobody.
Clue #2: It’s kind of chilly in Ohio this time of year, and the guy’s wearing only a T-shirt, while those around him are wearing coats.
My guess is that this guy also wore a coat when he entered the rally, then stationed himself toward the back of the crowd (in front of the riser where the press photographers are stationed) and then removed his coat to expose the T-shirt, with the explicit purpose of having it photographed.
. . . aaanndd, Clue #3: No name? A press photographer is going to take a picture like this and make no effort to ID the guy? Nuh-uh.

Actually, it's even less credible.

See Wordsmith's post at Flopping Aces, "Racist Romney/Ryan supporter in Lancaster, Ohio?" Click through for the analysis, but bottom line: Wordsmith's calling bullshit. And what's more, one commenter says that he went through the Getty photographer's slideshow from the Romney/Ryan rally and there are no crowd images, or any other images, with this man wearing that particular t-shirt. But most interestingly, one commenter links to a "photo forensics" site that claims to have a date-stamp for the digital file as "Profile Date Time 2012:01:25 03:41:57" (here).

If the "forensics" data is accurate, the photo's from January of this year, and thus is not only Photoshopped but is also not a picture from a recent Romney/Ryan rally in Ohio.

But again, the main reason this as a completely manufactured controversy is the past record of conservatives utterly rejecting any racist paraphernalia at campaign events and tea parties. Where there's been racism it's been completely repudiated. When the famous photo of so-called Texas tea party "leader" Dale Robertson emerged, the absolute renunciation was swift. Newsbusters has the flashback, "TPM Trumpets Racist Rebuffed by Tea Party Groups as 'Prominent' 'Leader'." And of course folks will remember that the leftist media was jonesing for racist tea-partiers so badly that it had to invent them, for example, Contessa Brewer, "Guy With AR-15 at Obama Rally Was Black Dude: MSBNC Kinda Leaves That Part Out."

The so-called racist Mitt Romney "dog-whistle" t-shirt is almost certainly a scam. It's bogus. We've seen this movie before and the ratings are in: total flop. The "race card" doesn't work anymore, if it ever really did. The left's goal is to falsely delegitimize criticism and silence dissent. This photo below, seen early in the tea party era at Gateway Pundit, captures what's really going been going on with race on the right:

I'll update if more information becomes available, but I'll tell you again, it's a scam. Just one look at that "Romney/Ryan" picture and you can see that's an obvious Photoshop.

Donna's Diner in Elyria, Ohio

I don't worry about the national polls. My biggest concern is Ohio. And while I discount PPP's Democrat-leaning surveys (the poll's a Daily Kos joint, with new numbers out today having Obama up by 5 points, unrealistically), I'm not sure if the first debate was enough to give Romney a decisive advantage there. Things look pretty good at RCP's polling average for the state, and even there the NBC/Marist poll along with PPP is skewing the average to the Democrats.  And more on these two polls at AoSHQ, "Pollsters: 1/5 of Ohio Vote Already In! Me: Bull."

In any case, more later on the polling numbers --- especially a week or so from this Tuesday and the next presidential debate. Meanwhile, here's a ground-level report from Ohio, at the New York Times, "At the Corner of Hope and Worry":

ELYRIA, Ohio

Another day begins with a sound softer than a finger-snap, in an Ohio place called Elyria. In the central square of this small city, the gushing water fountain applauds the early-morning chorus of sparrows. A car clears its throat. A door slams. And then: click.

The faint sound comes as 7:00 flashes on the clock of the Lorain National Bank building, looming over the square. The pull of a string — click — has sent life pulsing through a neon sign, announcing to all of Elyria that, once more, against the odds, Donna’s Diner is open.

Its proprietor, Donna Dove, 57, ignites the grill that she seems to have just turned off, so seamlessly do her workdays blend into one endless shift. She wears her blond hair in a ponytail and frames her hazel eyes with black-rimmed glasses that tend to get smudged with grill grease. She sees the world through the blur of her work.

A dozen years ago, Donna found a scrap of serendipity on the sidewalk: a notice that a local mom-and-pop restaurant was for sale. After cooking for her broken family as a child, after cooking for county inmates at one of her many jobs, she had come to see food as life’s binding agent, and a diner as her calling. She maxed out her credit cards, cashed in her 401(k) and opened a business to call her own.

Donna’s Diner. Donna’s.

You know this place: It is Elyria’s equivalent to that diner, that coffee shop, that McDonald’s. From the vantage point of these booths and Formica countertops, the past improves with distance, the present keeps piling on, and a promising future is practically willed by the resilient patrons.

It is where the recession and other issues of the day are lived as much as discussed. Where expectations for a certain lifestyle have been lowered and hopes for salvation through education and technology have been raised. Where the presidential nominees Barack Obama and Mitt Romney each hope that his plan for a way back will resonate with the Donna Doves, who try to get by in places like Elyria — where the American dream they talk about can sometimes seem like a tease.

Continue reading, on some of the hardship Donna and her patrons are facing, and then this:

The fresh aroma of coffee face-slaps the air. Soon the Breakfast Club regulars, that gaggle of Elyrian past and present, will be here to renew their continuing discussion of what was, is and isn’t in this city of 55,000. The presidential election sometimes serves as a conversation starter, like a curio placed between the salt and pepper shakers.

The talk will continue as yolk stains harden and refills turn tepid. Their Ohio is a swing state, after all, and their Elyria sits precariously on that swing. More Democratic than Republican, it has several global companies and the memory of many more; an embattled middle class and encroaching poverty; and the faint sense that the Next Big Thing better arrive before even its beloved park fountain, visible from the diner’s front window, gets shut off...

Free Speech is Dying in the Western world

From Jonathan Turley, at the Washington Post, "Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech" (via Instapundit):

Free speech is dying in the Western world. While most people still enjoy considerable freedom of expression, this right, once a near-absolute, has become less defined and less dependable for those espousing controversial social, political or religious views. The decline of free speech has come not from any single blow but rather from thousands of paper cuts of well-intentioned exceptions designed to maintain social harmony.

In the face of the violence that frequently results from anti-religious expression, some world leaders seem to be losing their patience with free speech. After a video called “Innocence of Muslims” appeared on YouTube and sparked violent protests in several Muslim nations last month, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned that “when some people use this freedom of expression to provoke or humiliate some others’ values and beliefs, then this cannot be protected.”

It appears that the one thing modern society can no longer tolerate is intolerance. As Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard put it in her recent speech before the United Nations, “Our tolerance must never extend to tolerating religious hatred.”

A willingness to confine free speech in the name of social pluralism can be seen at various levels of authority and government. In February, for instance, Pennsylvania Judge Mark Martin heard a case in which a Muslim man was charged with attacking an atheist marching in a Halloween parade as a “zombie Muhammed.” Martin castigated not the defendant but the victim, Ernie Perce, lecturing him that “our forefathers intended to use the First Amendment so we can speak with our mind, not to piss off other people and cultures — which is what you did.”

Of course, free speech is often precisely about pissing off other people — challenging social taboos or political values.

This was evident in recent days when courts in Washington and New York ruled that transit authorities could not prevent or delay the posting of a controversial ad that says: “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat jihad.”

When U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer said the government could not bar the ad simply because it could upset some Metro riders, the ruling prompted calls for new limits on such speech. And in New York, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority responded by unanimously passing a new regulation banning any message that it considers likely to “incite” others or cause some “other immediate breach of the peace.”

Continue reading.

And notice how it's all leftist outrage at conservative speech. Every single example is a progressive attempt to limit speech. There's one example not quoted above of an atheist in Greece punished for criticizing a monk. But that's it. As I've argued here for some time now, progressives are the main threat to freedom of speech. It's a sad day when folks speaking truth to barbarity, in the case of Islam, are threatened with prosecution. And it's not just Islam, although much of the current attempts to criminalize speech come from progressive terrorism-enablers. It's conservative speech all around that's being criminalized. Democracy dies when you can't speak out to defend it. Simple as that. Progressives are undemocratic.

Dick Cheney Slams Joe Biden's Debate Performance

Dick Cheney was the model of the dignified, accomplished vice president, ready to step into the role as commander-in-chief, with absolutely no one questioning his fitness to serve.

The same can't be said for Joe Biden. It's a scary thought just imagining that crazy freak assuming the office.

'Skyfall' Review

The trailer is great.

And at Telegraph UK, "Skyfall, James Bond, review":

When is a Bond film not a Bond film? It’s a question likely to prey on the minds of the very many cinema goers who will see this 23rd official 007 adventure. Skyfall shakes together familiar elements of the Ian Fleming canon – the cars, the guns, the exotic locales with the dames to match – into a blistering comic book escapade that the old Bond, and one suspects Fleming too, would find altogether alien.

Sam Mendes’s frequently dazzling, utterly audacious entry in the franchise has less in common with its much-loved predecessors than Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight. After its release in 2008 (when it left Quantum of Solace, the 22nd Bond film, trailing in its wake), Nolan’s pathbreaking superhero picture almost single-handedly reconfigured the modern blockbuster template. Like a wise old dog, 007 has studied it carefully, and learned some new tricks.

Here, Bond (Daniel Craig) faces a foe almost as inscrutable as the Joker himself: Raoul Silva (Javier Bardem), an ex-MI6 agent who worked with M (Judi Dench) in her pre-Handover Hong Kong days who has returned, unhinged by a perceived betrayal, as a master computer hacker bent on vengeance.

Bardem’s lip-lickingly camp turn makes him the oddest Bond villain since the Roger Moore era, and his nicotine hair flops queasily over his forehead in a way that calls to mind Julian Assange. By acknowledging the rise of cyberterrorism in the same way Nolan played on the West’s new vulnerability in the wake of 9/11, Skyfall is a Bond film for the Anonymous generation.

Continue reading.

Daniel Craig is an awesome bond. I'm sure "Skyfall" will be spectacular.

The Lovelies Step Out in Style for amfAR Inspiration Gala in Los Angeles

And the stunning Kate Hudson leads the list of beauties.

See London's Daily Mail, "Very revealing in red! Kate Hudson takes the plunge and shows off plenty of cleavage in a daring scarlet gown at amfAR event."

And check the photo of Ms. Hudson standing side-by-side with Katy Perry. I think the pop star's got some catching up to do in the glamour department, interestingly enough.

And also at the link: the phenomenal Alessandra Ambrosio.

Romney Debate Gains Show Staying Power

From wonder boy Nate Silver, at the New York Times (via Memeorandum).

Image Credit: The Looking Spoon, "GOP Embassy Cuts Aren't Why The Benghazi Attacks Happened."

BONUS: From Alana Goodman, at Commentary, "Did Intelligence Tell WH There Were Protests in Benghazi?" (via Memeorandum).

Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama

The publisher sent me a copy, and it's available at Amazon: "Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama."

Kate Upton Steps Out in Strapless Dress at New York Film Festival Premiere of 'No'

At London's Daily Mail, "Kate Upton flaunts her assets in a strapless dress at No premiere as family members confirm she's dating baseball player Justin Verlander."

Maybe the little hottie'll be at the ACLS game tonight. See the New York Times, "In Third Meeting in Seven Octobers, Expect Strikeouts and Rain."

European Union Wins Nobel Peace Prize

From Iain Martin, at Telegraph UK, "EU winning Nobel Peace Prize is beyond parody, like knighting Fred Goodwin in the middle of a mad boom":

Daftest of all is the notion that the EU itself has kept the peace. It was the Allies led by the Americans, the Russians and the British who defeated and disarmed the Germans in 1945. The German people then underwent the most extraordinary reckoning, transforming their country into an essentially pacifist society. The EU had very little to do with it. Throughout that period it was Nato, led by the Americans and British, which kept the peace in Western Europe. The American taxpayer picked up most of the resulting tab, and the British paid a significant part of the bill too.

RTWT.

Also at Foreign Policy, "Worst. Prize. Ever."

'Reboot the Mission'

Cool clip, from the Wallflowers.

Catholic Bishops Denounce Joe Biden's ObamaCare Lies

Freedom Eden has the report from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, "Catholic Bishops' Statement on Joe Biden's Lies." (At Memeorandum.)

And here's the new Romney ad, "Who Shares Your Values?":

Space Shuttle Endeavour Moves to Science Center

Amazing pictures at the Los Angeles Times, "Space shuttle Endeavour rolls through the streets of L.A."

And see, "Shuttle arrives at Forum ahead of schedule."

Despite crawling along at a speed of about 2 mph, the space shuttle Endeavour appears to be making good time on its journey home to the California Science Center.

The massive space vehicle pulled up to the Fourm in Inglewood around 7:30 a.m. Saturday, and was greeted by thousands gathered there to see it. It arrived more than an hour ahead of schedule, but Southern California Edison crew members said it will remain at the Fourm until 9:30 a.m. as planned. The crews cleared some transmission lines early and movers decided to proceed.

A celebration at the Forum, which includes music and some public speakers, was set to begin about 9 a.m.

Officials are considering whether they can get the shuttle to the California Science Center before sunset, which occurs at 6:20 p.m. Saturday.

Cleveland Bus Driver Decks Black B*tch With Uppercut

The dude got suspended, but he was obviously done taking that sh*t.

At Gateway Pundit, "Cleveland Ohio RTA Bus Driver Uppercuts Unruly Female Passenger (Video) (via Memeorandum)."

Polls Show Joseph Biden — 'Malarkey McSmirk' — Losing Debate to Paul Ryan

More public opinion data show Joe Biden as a national laughingstock after Thursday night's debate. At PolicyMic, "Who Won the VP Debate 2012: Paul Ryan Wins the Polls Against Laughing Joe Biden":

Republican debate reaction: "The vice president was mean to our candidate." Suck it up and stop whining... It's only going to get worse.
— J. Casper (@repsac3) October 12, 2012

If you're a liberal or a Democrat, you probably loved Joe Biden's performance last night; if you're an independent or a Republican, not so much.

According to RealClearPolitics.com, the Obama campaign was deeply wounded after last weeks presidential debate. Mitt Romney not only came off as more likable the he ever had previously, but he also came off as more knowledgeable and confident than President Obama. Over the past eight days, the polls have shifted over to Governor Romney's favor.

Biden was sent out to reverse this increasing trend, rally the base and show the American people that the administration still had fire in its belly. There is, however, one word that Vice President Biden forgot, and that word is overkill.

Biden's been here before. All throughout the 2008 Democratic primary season, and during his 2008 VP debate with Governor Sarah Palin, he was calm, collected, even presidential. He was a likable and charming guy. This time, we saw a different Joe Biden.

Biden smirked, grinned, and waved his hands wildly. Some people would call it impassioned. Others might suggest that he was doing an impression of a southern preacher trying to perform an exorcism. He shook his finger repeatedly in the air, and interrupted Congressman Paul Ryan 82 different times. Paul Ryan maintained his cool, and was polite to a fault.

As the old adage goes, it's all about how things look. Biden tried to exude strength, but ended up coming across as unhinged, cocky, arrogant and rude. Paul Ryan tried to come across as confident and composed, but may have come across as slightly timid. So who ended up getting the best results for their team in the end? Well, as of right now, it might very well have been vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan.

According to the CNN poll of independents, Paul Ryan won the debate, 48% to 44%. The same poll showed that people who watched the debate believed that Paul Ryan expressed himself better than Joe Biden, 50%-41%. An NBC poll of 435 uncommitted voters after the debate showed Paul Ryan winning with 63% to 31%. CNBC had it 56% to 36%, again with Paul Ryan coming out on top. Even the Danville Advocate Messenger had Paul Ryan on top at the end of the day, attracting 56% to Biden's 41%.

So how could Joe Biden's strategy have backfired so horribly? It's quite simple. He did not come off as 'presidential.' He wasn't Joe Biden. He was Malarkey McSmirk.

More at the link.

Only someone who is personally, literally a bullying asshole, like Walter James Casper III, would actually think Biden did well. Honestly, you'd have to be a horrible, horrible person to think that Biden gave a good performance. And no one on the right is arguing that Biden was "mean." Everyone is arguing that he was angry, blustery, brusque, contemptuous, cranky, overbearing, rude, and completely unserious. Biden's performance was so bad that he actually proved himself unfit to serve. But for epic harassment troll and Internet predator Repsac3, conservatives are "whining." Typical. Leftists have absolutely no class. They've got no basic decency. When you can't win on the merits you shout down not only your opponent, but the moderator as well. It was an historic debate, but not in a good way. Biden's already outranked Al Gore for giving one of the worst debates in history. Commentators are saying Biden's was the worst they'd ever seen.

And here's Peggy Noonan with more, "Confusing Strength With Aggression":

In terms of content—the seriousness and strength of one's positions and the ability to argue for them—the debate was probably a draw, with both candidates having strong moments. But in terms of style, Mr. Biden was so childishly manipulative that it will be surprising if independents and undecideds liked what they saw.

National Democrats keep confusing strength with aggression and command with sarcasm. Even the latter didn't work for Mr. Biden. The things he said had the rhythm and smirk of sarcasm without the cutting substance.

And so the Romney-Ryan ticket emerged ahead. Its momentum was neither stopped nor slowed and likely was pushed forward.

Meaning that things will continue to get hotter. The campaign trail, commercials, all sorts of mischief—everything will get jacked up, cranked up. Meaning the next debate is even more important. Which means, since the next debate is a town hall and won't be mano-a-mano at the podium, that the third debate, on foreign policy, will be the most important of all.

And just like the first debate, Obama's going to get crushed.

In sum, Joe Biden failed at the most important goal in Thursday night's debate: to halt Mitt Romney's momentum. Not only did he fail at that, he showed once and for all just how big a bullying buffoon he really is.

Joe "Malarkey McSmirk" Biden. That one's for the ages.

Romney Hammers Biden on Libya Lies

At the Wall Street Journal, "Romney Takes Aim at Biden Over Libya":

RICHMOND, Va.—Mitt Romney accused Vice President Joe Biden of "doubling down on denial" as the GOP hopeful escalated his criticism of the Obama administration's actions after the consulate attack in Benghazi, Libya.

"There were more questions that came out of last night," Mr. Romney told the crowd, referring to Thursday night's vice-presidential debate in Danville, Ky. "The vice president directly contradicted the sworn testimony of State Department officials. He's doubling down on denial."

At the debate, Vice President Joe Biden said the Obama administration didn't know American officials wanted additional security in Libya before the attack, which left four Americans dead, including the U.S. ambassador.

"We weren't told they wanted more security there. We did not know they wanted more security again," Mr. Biden said in the debate Thursday evening. "We said exactly what the intelligence community told us that they knew. That was the assessment. And as the intelligence community changed their view, we made it clear they changed their view."

Prior to the attack in Libya, the State Department scaled back its security there, to the alarm of some officials. That decision was the subject of a contentious congressional hearing where former U.S. security officials testified that they requested additional personnel.

At Thursday's debate, GOP vice-presidential nominee Rep. Paul Ryan said U.S. marines should have been guarding the U.S. ambassador before the attack and was critical of the way the Obama administration has handled the investigation. "This is becoming more troubling by the day," he said. "They first blamed the YouTube video; now they're trying to blame the Romney-Ryan ticket for making this an issue."

The attack and subsequent investigation have prompted additional scrutiny of the Obama administration and its intelligence agencies and have marred one of President Barack Obama's election-year strengths: national security.

"When the vice president of the United States directly contradicts the testimony, sworn testimony, of State Department officials American citizens have a right to know just what's going on," Mr. Romney said at a rally here Friday. "We're going to find out."

Yeah, we're going to find out alright, and it's not going to be pretty. Even the left-leaning bloggers at Foreign Policy called out the blustery veep attack dog, "Biden contradicts State Department on Benghazi security":

Vice President Joe Biden claimed that the administration wasn't aware of requests for more security in Libya before the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S. mission in Benghazi during Thursday night's debate, contradicting two State Department officials and the former head of diplomatic security in Libya.

"We weren't told they wanted more security. We did not know they wanted more security there," Biden said.

In fact, two security officials who worked for the State Department in Libya at the time testified Thursday that they repeatedly requested more security and two State Department officials admitted they had denied those requests.

"All of us at post were in sync that we wanted these resources," the top regional security officer in Libya over the summer, Eric Nordstrom, testified. "In those conversations, I was specifically told [by Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Charlene Lamb] ‘You cannot request an SST extension.' I determined I was told that because there would be too much political cost. We went ahead and requested it anyway."

And here's the damage-control update at Foreign Policy, "White House: Obama and Biden were never aware of requests for more Benghazi security."

It turns out as well that Obama's now throwing Hillary under the bus. See the Daily Caller, "White House throws Hillary under the 2012 bus [VIDEO]," and "Author Ed Klein: As Benghazi blame nears Hillary, Clintons grow furious."

That's President Clusterf-k for you!

PHOTO CREDIT: The Astute Bloggers.

Sally Field Gushes Over Homosexual Son at HRC Gala

I was ROTFLMFAO after seeing this headline, at iOWNTHWORLD, "Pure Crap – Sally Field Speaks About Her Gay Son as if He’s Something Special Because He Likes It In the Pooper."

Get married, I don’t care. Please stop with the “there is something extraordinary about being gay” crap.

There isn’t. In fact, Field starts out by saying she is SOOOOOOO PROUD of her snowflake while indicating that he’s a slacker, and then she ends by saying he isn’t any different from anyone else except he likes it in the pooper. Be proud of your kid, but not for that. That’s not something to boast about.

No, taking it up the ass is definitely not something to be proud about, but then again, progressives have no values, so socially destructive behavior is A-OKAY!!

Romney Opens Up Decisive Lead in Florida

At the Tampa Bay Times, "Times/Bay News 9/Herald exclusive Florida poll: Romney 51, Obama 44":

Barack Obama's lackluster debate performance last week has dramatically altered the presidential race in Florida, with Mitt Romney opening up a decisive 7 percentage point lead, according to a new Tampa Bay Times/Bay News 9/Miami Herald poll.

The survey conducted this week found 51 percent of likely Florida voters supporting Romney, 44 percent backing Obama and 4 percent undecided. That's a major shift from a month ago when the same poll showed Obama leading 48 percent to 47 percent — and a direct result of what Obama himself called a "bad night" at the first debate.

The debate prompted 5 percent of previously undecided voters and 2 percent of Obama backers to move to Romney. Another 2 percent of Obama supporters said they are now undecided because of the debate.

"There's no question in my mind that debate made people stand up and pay attention, and it really wiped away any questions people had about Romney, whether they were undecided or soft for Obama," said Brad Coker of Mason-Dixon Polling & Research, which conducted the poll for the Times and its media partners.

Keep reading.

And see Alana Goodman, at Commentary, "New Florida Poll Bad Omen for Obama."

Very bad.

Alana breaks it down, especially on the Hispanic vote, purportedly the Democrats' biggest constituency after the "back in chains" blacks.

Smokin' Britney Spears Steps Out in Slinky Tight Grey Dress as She Attends Whitney Houston Tribute

Lovely.

At London's Daily Mail, "Simply beautiful: Britney Spears steps out in fitted grey dress as she attends Whitney Houston tribute."

Lindsay Lohan Endorses Mitt Romney

No surprise, but Robert Stacy McCain got right on that story.

See, "Further Proof That Chicks Dig Mitt UPDATE: @Tawny_Kitaen, Too? OMG!" (Via Memeorandum.)

More at Business Insider, "Lindsay Lohan Endorses Romney, And It's Actually a Really Big Deal."

Stephanie Cutter Won't Resign

From Katie Pavlich, at Townhall, "Exclusive Video: Cutter Stands by Libya Comments, Refuses to Resign."

She really does need to go. The noose is tightening.

Previously: "Bret Baier Slams Stephanie Cutter Over Politicizing Libya Terrorist Attack."

Bret Baier Slams Stephanie Cutter Over Politicizing Libya Terrorist Attack

At Gateway Pundit, "BLOWOUT!… Obama Spokesperson Stephanie Cutter & Bret Baier Clash on FOX (Video)."

Expect more of this as the Obama campaign unravels.

Four Americans were murdered – Including the US Ambassador in the 9-11 massacre.

The Obama Administration blamed it on a YouTube video – a lie.

Also at Hot Air, "Video: Bret Baier grills Stephanie Cutter on her Benghazi comments."

Republican National Committee Messaging Memo

From Lynn Sweet, "Biden's 'Smirking'."

Jerk With the Smirk Bombs Badly

At Jammie Wearing Fools:

If the aim of Joe Biden Thursday night was to win over the base of the Democrat Party, then he certainly succeeded. Crude, boorish, offensive, condescending and belligerent, he encompassed the trademarks of the angry left.

When you’re unable to debate the issues, then shout down your opponent, interrupt and act like a buffoon. In other words, he represented a party that has nothing to offer but smear, distraction and lies. He told whoppers that went unchallenged by the incompetent moderator Martha Raddatz and can’t possibly have endeared himself to independents on the fence.

FNC’s Chris Wallace, certainly no partisan, though it was the crudest performance he’s even seen...

Almost unbelievably bad. Almost.

Previously: "Blowhard Biden Bombed," and "Paul Ryan Beats Blustering Buffoon Joe Biden in Vice Presidential Debate."

Blowhard Biden Bombed

From Fred Barnes, at the Weekly Standard, "Biden Bombed" (via Memeorandum):

You don’t win a nationally televised debate by being rude and obnoxious.  You don’t win by interrupting your opponent time after time after time or by being a blowhard.  You don’t win with facial expressions, especially smirks or fake laughs, or by pretending to be utterly exasperated with what your opponent is saying.

That’s why Vice President Joe Biden didn’t win the one and only debate last night with his Republican rival, Mitt Romney’s running mate Paul Ryan.

In fact, though Ryan had several weak moments—one of them was on Syria—the only conceivable takeaway from the veep debate was Biden’s out of control conduct.  It will be long remembered—and not favorably.

There’s one person who should be delighted with Biden. That’s Al Gore. He had the honor of having delivered the most over the top and weird performance in a presidential campaign debate when he sighed and frowned and acted frustrated in his first debate with George W. Bush in 2000. Now Biden has taken that crown—or dunce cap—from Gore.      

The only good thing about Thursday night’s debate for the Obama campaign was that it involved Biden rather than Obama. As a result, it’s not likely to have any impact in the election and may not even affect the polls over the next few days.

Keep reading. Actually, the result will be to keep the Romney momentum alive, as I noted last night. But see also Robert Stacy McCain at the American Spectator, "Crazy Uncle Joe":

Vice President Joe Biden took Americans on a one-way trip to Malarkey-ville last night, with a weirdly aggressive debate performance in which, according to one count, he interrupted his Republican rival 86 times. Even many of those who generally approved of what Democrat spinners referred to as Biden's "happy warrior" act expressed concern that the vice president was, to quote CNN's Gloria Borger, "condescending at times" toward Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan.

Make that "condescending at all times," and you may have a consensus that would include even the debate's liberal moderator, Martha Raddatz of ABC News. Biden's behavior resembled the hypomanic phase of bipolar disorder, as he grinned incongruously or faked laughter in reaction to Ryan's answers, rudely scoffed at the Republican's policy proposals as "bluster" and "loose talk," and bulldozed past whatever feeble attempts Raddatz made to halt his repeated filibusters.

Arrogant? Overbearing? Angry? If those are your ideal qualities in a vice president, Biden's your man...

More at Big Journalism, "Media Hits Biden: 'Stop Smirking!' 'Weird,' 'Jerk'" (at Memeorandum).

Paul Ryan Beats Blustering Buffoon Joe Biden in Vice Presidential Debate

I knew right away that Vice President Biden was going bully his way through the debate, looking to shut down Paul Ryan as a punk upstart without the credibility to challenge an alpha vice president. He scored only on the bullying part.

Like the first presidential debate, I wasn't so sure my instinct would be fully shared by the chattering classes of the Democrat-Media-Complex. But the results are coming in: Ryan won the debate. He remained cool and collected, knowledgeable on the issues, and got a couple of zingers in edgewise when Biden wasn't shouting down the entire production, including moderator Martha Raddatz.

AoSHQ has the big headline: "Ryan Wins CNN's Poll of Undecided Likely Voters, 48-44%Also Wins on Likability, Ryan 53% Biden 43% AP Poll: Ryan 51%, Biden 43%." And at CNN, "CNN Poll on debate winner: Ryan 48%, Biden 44%" (via Memeorandum).

And here's Mark Tapscott at Instapundit, "VEEP DEBATE THOUGHTS":

Vice-President Joey Giggles did himself no favors with constant laughing at Ryan, and may have done his boss some damage with his condescending finger-pointing and shouting at moderator. And Rep. Paul Ryan displayed an admirable level of composure, equanimity and grace under pressure.

Also from Michael Barone, "Thoughts on the vice presidential debate":

Joe Biden appealed to Democratic partisans, firing them up by attacking and, even more often, smirking at Paul Ryan’s arguments. But smirks only work when your audience starts off agreeing with you. That would be the case with strong Democratic partisans, but it’s not at all that clear that it appeals to Independents, or to those who are undecided or moveable. He was trying to dismiss Ryan’s arguments as ridiculous, in line with Democratic talking points that no rational person could possibly agree with him, but I think that only works with people who are already convinced. He may have increased Democratic voters’ enthusiasm—down in the dumps after Barack Obama’s performance eight days ago—but he didn’t do much in the way of converting those who are not already converted.

More at that link.

And Robert Stacy McCain reports, "PAUL RYAN SCORES CRUSHING VICTORY OVER BIDEN IN DEBATE."

Now over at Twitchy, "Why so serious? Biden’s debate grimace creeps out, angers viewers," and "Who’s sighing now? Joe Biden 2012 = Al Gore 2000?"

Also, "Chris Wallace on Joe Biden: I have never seen such a disrespectful debater," and "Biden lies: ‘We weren’t told they wanted more security’ in Benghazi."

Between the bullying and smirks, topped off with Ryan's cool demeanor, the post-debate spin is only going to get worse for Team Obama.

Bottom Line: Paul Ryan more than exceeded expectations. It's a big win for the GOP ticket and will keep the Romney momentum alive. More than ever, folks will say the race is Romney's to lose.

(Expect updates...)

Ed Driscoll links at Instapundit. Thanks!

Has Anyone Heard From Sam Tanenhaus Lately?

From Robert Stacy McCain, at the American Spectator, "Whatever Happened to Sam Tanenhaus?" (via Instapundit):

HAS ANYONE HEARD from Sam Tanenhaus lately? Many weeks have elapsed since his byline has appeared in print, no one can remember the last time Tanenhaus appeared on TV, and certainly his friends must be deeply worried about him by now. Has Tanenhaus succumbed to chronic depression? Has he gone off on a binge in Las Vegas? Has he met with foul play? The thought of fi ling a missing person’s report has crossed my mind.

Readers may not remember the name Sam Tanenhaus, and may need to be reminded that three years ago the editor of the New York Times book review section was almost ubiquitous as a political commentator. In February 2009, a few weeks after President Obama was inaugurated, the New Republic published a cover story by Tanenhaus entitled, “Conservatism Is Dead: An intellectual autopsy of the movement.” The article was perhaps as remarkable for its length—nearly 6,700 words—as for its argument. According to Tanenhaus, what we had become accustomed to think of as conservatism is not actually conservative at all. The beliefs that animated the American conservative movement from its post-World War II origins to the triumph of Ronald Reagan’s presidency had somehow been replaced by a false consciousness, and the failure of this ersatz imitation produced the fatality to which Tanenhaus presumed to apply his forensic skill, thus: “After George W. Bush’s two terms, conservatives must reckon with the consequences of a presidency that failed, in large part, because of its fervent commitment to movement ideology: the aggressively unilateralist foreign policy; the blind faith in a deregulated, Wall Street-centric market; the harshly punitive ‘culture war’ waged against liberal ‘elites.’”

Any disagreement with the conclusions of this autopsy was brushed aside with a few sentences about conservative leaders who had not “absorbed the full implications of their defeat” and who “offered little apart from self-justifications mixed with harsh appraisals of the Bush years.” This was unacceptable, said Tanenhaus: “What conservatives have yet to do is confront the large but inescapable truth that movement conservatism is exhausted and quite possibly dead.” From there, he waded into the bogs of antiquity, in that misty dawn of conservatism’s emergence from the fever swamps of reaction.Tanenhaus went all the way back to Edmund Burke and then carried readers forward through more recent history to tell a narrative that, strange to say, located the point at which the movement went wrong in its unquestionable victories: the Reagan presidency and the subsequent capture of Congress in 1994. ConServatism was only respectable, it seemed, when it was powerless. Reagan’s success was a triumph of “revanchism” over “realism,” Tanenhaus asserted, while he likened Newt Gingrich—who led the GOP to its first congressional majority in 40 years—to French revolutionary Georges Jacques Danton. “The right, which for so long had deplored the politics of ‘class warfare,’ had become the most adept practitioners of that same politics,” Tanenhaus declared. “They had not only abandoned Burke. They had become inverse Marxists, placing loyalty to the movement—the Reagan Revolution—above their civic responsibilities.”

Continue reading.

A Den of Lying Liars and Crapweasels

Michelle just unloads on the administration. Must-see TV:

One of Worst Cover-Ups in the History of the Republic

I don't think it's "probably" one of the worst, but Liz Cheney hammers the administration all around:

Does Rush Deserve to Be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?

From Randall Roberts, at the Los Angeles Times:

... And then there's Rush, one of the most prominent groups of the 1970s and '80s prog rock movement whose fans have been screaming at the proverbial windmills for the 13 years that the band has been eligible. Forty-four years after it formed, the band responsible for songs such as “Tom Sawyer,” “The Spirit of Radio,” the epic concept album “2112” and dozens of gold records has made the first cut on its way to the theoretically hallowed walls of the Cleveland historical institution.

It couldn't come too soon for the group's very vocal fan base, which has waged campaigns over the years to have Rush — singer-bassist Geddy Lee, guitarist Alex Lifeson and drummer Neil Peart — acknowledged. With each denial, Rush's fans had become more embittered. Petitions had been signed. Fans on Twitter raged nearly every day. The frustration is understandable.

The Hall of Fame's indifference to progressive rock is akin to the literary establishment's relationship to science fiction. With bands such as King Crimson, Yes, Jethro Tull and Emerson, Lake & Palmer unrecognized (Genesis is the exception, having been inducted in 2010), Rush's inclusion suggests a committee begrudgingly willing to acknowledge prog rock as creatively valid — but ultimately unimportant when discussing greatness and the “canon.”

Me? I respect Rush's vision way more than I actually like its music, and it's for a single inarguable reason, one that I suspect is true of many others: I can't stand Lee's voice. It's silly, annoying and detracts from the band's ideas and lyrics. “The Spirit of Radio,” the band's best pop song, would be perfect were it sung by someone singing in an octave (or four) less ridiculous.

And here's the playlist from yesterday afternoon's drive time, at The Sound L.A.:

3:02 - Refugee by Tom Petty

3:05 - Rock 'n Me by Steve Miller

3:08 - Show Me The Way by Peter Frampton

3:13 - Hey You by Pink Floyd

3:17 - Born To Be Wild by Steppenwolf

3:27 - Silly Love Songs by Paul Mccartney And Wings

3:33 - Gimme Shelter by Rolling Stones

3:38 - Down On The Corner by CCR

3:40 - Tom Sawyer by Rush

3:45 - I Hear You Knocking by Dave Edmunds

3:54 - Spirits In The Material World by Police

3:57 - Riders On The Storm by Doors

And here's a shout-out to Linkmaster Smith, at The Other McCain, "World’s Youngest Blogger Dances to Muse."

Charles Krauthammer on Libya Cover-Up

At RCP, "Krauthammer On Libya Cover Up: Hillary Clinton Told Video Story While Body Of Ambassador Was Next To Her."

Vice President Joe Biden Gets Thumbs Down From Voters in Pew Research Survey

Folks better be careful. Biden'll put 'em all "back in chains."

See: "Biden Viewed Unfavorably, Divided Opinions about Ryan: No Clear Winner Expected in VP Debate."

Paul Ryan gets a 44 percent approval. And from the report:

By a 42% to 25% margin, more independents expect Ryan to do better than Biden in the debate. Most members of both parties predict victory for their party’s candidate, but Republicans are more confident than Democrats. Nearly eight-in-ten (78%) Republican voters say Ryan will do the better job in the debate. Fewer Democrats (62%) expect Biden to do better.

It's gonna be good.

Image: Hey Girl, It's Paul Ryan.

Security Cut Before Libya Raid

This is the most inconvenient story for the morally-bankrupt progressive left, especially Rachel Maddow, at the Wall Street Journal:

WASHINGTON—The State Department scaled back U.S. security staff in Libya in the weeks and months before the Sept. 11 attack in Benghazi that killed four Americans, despite requests for additional personnel, former U.S. security officials told a politically charged congressional hearing.

The requests were detailed on Wednesday in testimony by two former security officers in Libya to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and in diplomatic correspondence released by the panel.

Republicans and Democrats scrutinized the testy, four-hour hearing for its potential impact on the Nov. 6 presidential election. Republican Mitt Romney alleges President Barack Obama failed to safeguard diplomatic personnel overseas and ignored signs that an al Qaeda affiliate was preparing for terrorist attacks in North Africa.

The State Department's regional security officer in Libya until July, Eric Nordstrom, in testimony and in State Department cables, described his concerns that the administration was moving too quickly to pull out U.S. security agents and replace them with Libyan staff.

A focus during the hearing was a State Department decision resulting in the removal of a 16-member security detail from Libya in August, part of what the administration said was a move toward a more normal diplomatic presence in postrevolution Libya.

That security detail's former commander in Libya, Lt. Col. Andrew Wood of the Utah National Guard, contended that the Tripoli-based squad, known as a Site Security Team, could have proved crucial in fending off the Sept. 11 assault on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, which killed Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens.

"Superior weapons and superior tactics, that is what the SST brought," Col. Wood told the hearing. "Why they would turn that asset down is best answered by themselves."

The State Department disputed Mr. Wood's formulation. A senior State Department official noted the SST—lent to the State Department by the Pentagon—was based in Tripoli, not Benghazi, and rarely had any staff traveling with Amb. Stevens. "The notion that all 16 of them were going to go with him is lost here," said the official.

The official added that the 16 members were replaced "shooter for shooter"—though the majority of the replacements were Libyans trained by State Department Diplomatic Security personnel. The official said it was difficult to assess the total number of security staff working in Libya, because it wasn't a "static" situation.

The hate-America Democrats. What a disgrace to this nation. Thankfully the American people are seeing the light, if the polls are a good indication. With good fortune we'll be rid of this depraved Democrat administration on January 20th.

Project Veritas Exposes DNC Staffer in Double Voting Fraud

At Small Dead Animals, "Omigod, this is so funny! It's cool though..."

And at Instapundit, "BUSTED: New O’Keefe video: Obama campaign staffer caught helping activist vote twice.

Another Sucker-Punch Video Shows Black Thugs Viciously Attacking Teacher

At least they've got the suspect in custody.

At Fox News, "Teen arrested in sucker punching of teacher in Pittsburgh alley."

PREVIOUSLY: "Black Teenager Punches, Knocks Out Bus Driver in Kansas City."

Just walk the other way when you see a gang of black thugs. It's unsafe. And it's not racist to say it, despite the depraved rants of the morally-bankrupt progressive left.

David Paleologos of Suffolk University's Research Center: Obama Can't Win Florida, North Carolina, or Virginia

At The Hill, "Pollster pulls out of Fla., NC and Va., says Obama can’t win there."

Obama Denies Cover-Up, Blames 'Faulty Information' for Administration's Libya Clusterf-k

This is at the Los Angeles Times, "Obama says faulty information went out about Libya attack."

WASHINGTON -- President Obama on Wednesday acknowledged that his administration passed faulty information to the public about last month’s deadly attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, but suggested those reports came in the interest of keeping the public abreast of what they knew at the time.

In an interview with ABC’s Diane Sawyer that aired Wednesday night, Obama said that “as information came in, information was put out,” and that those reports “may not have always been right the first time.”

There's portions of Diane Sawyer's interview with the president here, although the discussion focuses on the campaign, not Libya.

Here's Jack Tapper's report on yesterday's developments on Capitol Hill:

Steve Wynn Slams Obama

I saw Wynn on Piers Morgan's a month or so ago, and he was hard on Obama then, but he's really pissed off here. Watch it all the way through. He's brutally unloading on President Clusterf-k:

Jake Tapper Presses Jay Carney on Libya Terror Attack

Jake Tapper is one saving grace at ABC News: "What Happened In Benghazi — Today’s Q’s for O’s WH — 10/10/12."

Lying Liar Stephanie Cutter on 'Piers Morgan Tonight'

She's a bad lady. A very bad lady.

Outbreak Spurs Calls for New Controls

At the Wall Street Journal:

As many as 13,000 patients may have been exposed to fungal meningitis from tainted spinal steroid injections, authorities said Monday, as some lawmakers called for bringing certain specialized pharmacies under greater regulatory scrutiny.

The oversight of compounding pharmacies, which create customized versions of medicines, is gaining greater attention as the death and illness tolls in the outbreak continue to rise. On Tuesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said 11 people had died and 119 people in 10 states had been sickened by fungal meningitis, a rare but potentially deadly inflammation to the brain or central nervous system.

New Jersey is the 10th state to report at least one illness, the Associated Press reported. The other states involved in the outbreak are Tennessee, Michigan, Virginia, Indiana, Florida, Maryland, Minnesota, North Carolina and Ohio.

The CDC said a majority of the thousands exposed to the tainted injections had been contacted and weren't ill. The number of meningitis cases could still rise in the coming days and weeks, but it isn't possible to forecast how many might ultimately get sick, the CDC said. Patients have come down with the illness one-to-four weeks after receiving the injections.

State regulators, federal agencies and the pharmacy industry all share some responsibility for monitoring compounding pharmacies like the New England Compounding Center, the Massachusetts facility that shipped the contaminated steroid tied to the meningitis outbreak. But health officials and lawmakers say these facilities essentially slide through the cracks because no one entity has full responsibility for overseeing them.

"Compounding pharmacies currently fall into a regulatory black hole," Rep. Ed Markey (D., Mass.) wrote in a letter to Margaret Hamburg, Food and Drug Administration commissioner, on Monday.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D., Conn.), called for the FDA's oversight authority of the facilities to be extended if necessary, saying that compounding pharmacies' "relative immunity from standards of safety and effectiveness seems anomalous and unacceptable." Mr. Blumenthal is on the Senate committee that oversees how much jurisdiction the FDA has.

If the FDA had full oversight of these pharmacies, it could treat their compounds as new drugs and require the pharmacies to submit clinical trials before the drugs are allowed on the market. It also would have more powers to inspect facilities.

Continue reading.

I Was Right About That Strange Jobs Report

Jack Welch won't back down, at the Wall Street Journal:

Imagine a country where challenging the ruling authorities—questioning, say, a piece of data released by central headquarters—would result in mobs of administration sympathizers claiming you should feel "embarrassed" and labeling you a fool, or worse.

Soviet Russia perhaps? Communist China? Nope, that would be the United States right now, when a person (like me, for instance) suggests that a certain government datum (like the September unemployment rate of 7.8%) doesn't make sense.

Unfortunately for those who would like me to pipe down, the 7.8% unemployment figure released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) last week is downright implausible. And that's why I made a stink about it.

Before I explain why the number is questionable, though, a few words about where I'm coming from. Contrary to some of the sound-and-fury last week, I do not work for the Mitt Romney campaign. I am definitely not a surrogate. My wife, Suzy, is not associated with the campaign, either. She worked at Bain Consulting (not Bain Capital) right after business school, in 1988 and 1989, and had no contact with Mr. Romney.

The Obama campaign and its supporters, including bigwigs like David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs, along with several cable TV anchors, would like you to believe that BLS data are handled like the gold in Fort Knox, with gun-carrying guards watching their every move, and highly trained, white-gloved super-agents counting and recounting hourly.

Let's get real. The unemployment data reported each month are gathered over a one-week period by census workers, by phone in 70% of the cases, and the rest through home visits. In sum, they try to contact 60,000 households, asking a list of questions and recording the responses.

ome questions allow for unambiguous answers, but others less so. For instance, the range for part-time work falls between one hour and 34 hours a week. So, if an out-of-work accountant tells a census worker, "I got one baby-sitting job this week just to cover my kid's bus fare, but I haven't been able to find anything else," that could be recorded as being employed part-time.

The possibility of subjectivity creeping into the process is so pervasive that the BLS's own "Handbook of Methods" has a full page explaining the limitations of its data, including how non-sampling errors get made, from "misinterpretation of the questions" to "errors made in the estimations of missing data."

I love that introduction, "Imagine a country..."

Yeah, imagine. RTWT.

Florida Parking Garage Collapse

At the Palm Beach Post, "‘The whole place shook’: Garage collapses, killing 2."

Supreme Court Oral Arguments in Major New Affirmative Action Case

Althouse reports on the coverage from SCOTUS blog, "Justice Breyer directly asked whether Grutter — the case approving of a type of affirmative action admissions — should be overruled?"

And then going straight to SCOTUS blog, see the roundup, "Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin." And especially, Lyle Denniston, "Argument recap: Will Grutter be reshaped? (FINAL UPDATE)":

Affirmative action is alive but ailing, the idea of “critical mass” to measure racial diversity is in very critical condition, and a nine-year-old precedent may have to be reshaped in order to survive. Those were the dominant impressions at the close of a one-hour, nineteen-minute argument in the Supreme Court Wednesday. There is almost no doubt that the University of Texas’s affirmative action plan for admitting its freshman classes is in trouble with four Justices, but has at least qualified support from three others. The one most in doubt among the eight taking part: Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. He wanted to be convinced that the program does not use race at all costs, and it appeared that he was not.

Continue reading.

Plus, Jess Bravin at the Wall Street Journal, "Justices Clash on Affirmative Action." And from David Savage, at the Los Angeles Times, "Ruling out race in college admissions: How far will high court go?"

And from earlier at the Times, from Richard Sander and Stuart Taylor Jr., "Do race preferences help students?" And a rebuttal from Rachel Godsil, FWIW, "Affirmative action and the unprepared minority myth."

But see Elizabeth Price Foley at Instapundit, "A LIBERAL CRITIQUE OF AFFIRMATIVE ACTION: Richard Kahlenberg has an op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal, evaluating the insanity of today’s affirmative action efforts by universities and colleges..."

Long Beach Press-Telegram: Yes on 32

I'm glad to see it.

"Endorsement: Yes on Proposition 32 -- Unions have inordinate amount of power in state politics":

To understand the need for Proposition 32, all a voter has to do is look at the the vast sums of cash pouring into the campaign against it. A total of more than $50 million has been donated to the "yes" and "no" campaigns. Of that, the vast majority has gone to fund advertising for the "no" side. And of that, most has come from unions representing California teachers and other public employees.

This is an example of the financial power that gives unions outsized political influence everywhere from election campaigns to the halls of the state Legislature and local city halls, too often resulting in laws that benefit union members over the interests of all Californians.

Now California voters have a chance to rein in that power. They should not miss the opportunity on Nov. 6. The editorial board urges passage of Proposition 32.

The measure would do three things: It would ban donations to state and local candidates by unions and corporations. It would ban the political use of money deducted from paychecks by unions or corporations. And it would ban government contractors from contributing to the campaigns of public officials who control the awarding of those contracts.

The measure's well-funded opponents complain that it would affect labor interests more than business interests -- because businesses don't use payroll deductions in the same way as unions, and because companies that aren't corporations are exempt from the proposition.

But the proponents don't pretend they're aiming for balance in the proposal. They want to curb the influence of unions over the decisions of state lawmakers, which has been out of balance for years.

That is a cause that this page has supported for a long time. We endorsed 2005's Proposition 75 and 1998's Proposition 226, which would have required unions to get individual members' permission before spending dues money on politics. (Those propositions lost by 8 percent and 6 percent, respectively.)

The arguments then are no less valid now.

Recent examples of Big Labor's influence in Sacramento include the power it has exerted over pension reform and prison issues. Another egregious example that arose this summer was a bill considered by the Assembly Education Committee to make it easier for school districts to fire teachers accused of terrible crimes involving sex, violence or drugs.

Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla of Pacoima had introduced the bill in the wake of several child sex-abuse cases in Los Angeles schools. The bill passed the Senate with bipartisan support. It had popular support.

But the California Teachers Association bused in members to confront the key Assembly committee, underscoring its arguments for protecting the job security of teachers with a not-so-subtle reminder of the union's 800-pound-gorilla influence. Enough committee members voted against the bill to kill it.

They bused in thugs. That's what they always do.

More at the link.

Mark Rothko Mural Defaced in Tate Modern gallery

Rothko's my favorite.

I saw this story the other day at Althouse.

Sean Hannity Interviews Jim Lehrer

This was very interesting, from Monday night: