Modern Family: Selfish Adults Produce Children Absent Marriage, Romance, or Commitment

This is how progressives operate.

The family is an anachronism. And children are just accessories. I feel bad for the kids raised without loving, married biological parents. Because when hipsters decide to have kids in this manner, it's ultimately not with the child's best interests in mind.

At the New York Times, "Seeking to Reproduce Without a Romantic Partnership":

Rachel Hope is 5-foot-9 and likes yoga, dance and martial arts. A real estate developer and freelance writer in Los Angeles, Ms. Hope, 41, is seeking a man who lives near her, is healthy and fit, and “has his financial stuff together,” she said. Parker Williams, the 42-year-old founder of QTheory, a charity auction company also in Los Angeles, would seem like a good candidate. A 6-foot-2 former model who loves animals, Mr. Williams is athletic, easygoing, compassionate and organized.

Neither Ms. Hope nor Mr. Williams is interested in a romantic liaison. But they both want a child, and they’re in serious discussions about having, and raising, one together. Never mind that Mr. Williams is gay and that the two did not know of each other’s existence until last October, when they met on Modamily.com, a Web site for people looking to share parenting arrangements.

Mr. Williams and Ms. Hope are among a new breed of online daters, looking not for love but rather a partner with whom to build a decidedly non-nuclear family. And several social networks, including PollenTree.com, Coparents.com, Co-ParentMatch.com, and MyAlternativeFamily.com, as well as Modamily, have sprung up over the past few years to help them.

“While some people have chosen to be a single parent, many more people look at scheduling and the financial pressures and the lack of an emotional partner and decide that single parenting is too daunting and wouldn’t be good for them or the child,” said Darren Spedale, 38, the founder of Family by Design, a free parenting partnership site officially introduced in early January. “If you can share the support and the ups and downs with someone, it makes it a much more interesting parenting option.”

The sites present what can seem like a compelling alternative to surrogacy, adoption or simple sperm donation.

“I’ve met so many women in this same situation, who aren’t married and feel like they missed the boat,” said Dawn Pieke, 43, a sales and marketing manager in Omaha, Neb., whose daughter, Indigo, was born last October. Ms. Pieke met Indigo’s father, Fabian Blue, on a Facebook page for Co-parents.net in June 2011, not long after the end of her 10-year relationship. She wanted a baby, but feared doing it alone because, she said, “I didn’t grow up with my dad.” Rather than focusing on a love match, she decided to find someone to share both the financial and emotional stresses of child rearing.

Mr. Blue, for his part, had wanted to be a father since 2006. He had considered adoption, but “figured no one would let a single gay male adopt a child, and I didn’t have the kind of income for a surrogate,” he said. He went on Craigslist and parenting Web sites and had coffee dates with a handful of women, but “just like in any relationship there needed to be a spark and it simply wasn’t there,” he said. With Ms. Pieke, though, he said the electricity was palpable from the start. The two corresponded on Facebook and then Skype, asking each other questions about everything from religion to dating to child-rearing philosophies. By November he decided to move from Melbourne, Australia, where he was living, to Omaha.

“My twin sister was like, ‘Are you kidding me?’ ” Ms. Pieke recalled with a laugh. “I said, ‘No. He wants a child. I want a child. We want to meet and see if it’s anything bigger.’ ”

They first met in person on Thanksgiving 2011. “I felt like this guy was my relative or long-lost brother, but then again he was also a stranger,” Ms. Pieke said. They continued the dialogue: reading each other’s medical charts, undergoing fertility tests. He moved into a separate bedroom in her home, and, she said, four weeks later, “He handed me a semen sample, we hugged, and I went into my bedroom and inseminated myself.”

While Mr. Blue and Ms. Pieke plan on sharing parenting responsibility for Indigo equally, they never drafted any kind of legal agreement, which they both agree was unwise. “There were so many things I didn’t anticipate — like, how much should I be responsible financially? What happens if I lose a job? What happens if he does? It’s not a marriage,” she said.

More:

Colin Weil and the mother of his 2-year-old daughter, Stella, made sure to draw up a contract and even went to couples therapy before she got pregnant. Mr. Weil, who is gay, met Stella’s mother, who asked that her name not be used, in October 2009 through a mutual friend who knew that both were single and wanted children. A courtship of sorts ensued, with strings of e-mails and endless phone calls. They met each other’s friends and families, and “decided to go for it,” said Mr. Weil, 46, director of marketing at the Jewish Museum in Manhattan. He said they spent the next few months trying to convince themselves they shouldn’t, “because it seemed crazy.” But Stella now spends one night a week with Mr. Weil and they plan to work up to more.

Mr. Weil believes this type of parenting arrangement is completely logical.

“When you think about the concept of the village, and how the village was part of child rearing for so many cultures for so many thousands of years, it makes total sense,” he said. “The idea that two people — let alone one person — would do it without the village is really nutty.”

But Elizabeth Marquardt, director of the Center for Marriage and Families at the Institute for American Values, a nonpartisan advocacy group in New York, vehemently disagrees. “It’s a terrible idea, deliberately consigning a child to be raised in two different worlds, with parents who did not even attempt to form a loving bond with one another,” she wrote in an e-mail. “As children of divorce will tell you, it’s very difficult to grow up in two different worlds, with your parents each pursuing separate love lives that can be increasingly complex over the course of a childhood.”

Others say she is missing the point that parenting partnerships actually spare a child the future pain of divorce. “Certainly, from a research standpoint, I don’t think having a romantic relationship is necessary to have a good co-parenting relationship,” said Sarah J. Schoppe-Sullivan, an associate professor in the Ohio State University department of human sciences. “Research shows that if parents can have a warm, cooperative, co-parenting relationship, then that’s going to be positive for the child’s development.”

It's a bunch of homosexuals servicing selfish and immature women.

Our society is getting pretty f-ked. Grow up people. It's not all about you and your needs.

A Rational Debate on Guns

Actually, I doubt the gun-grab freaks really want a "rational" debate, since it usually ends up something like this, at iOWNTHEWORLD, "This Empty-Headed Anchorman Better Outlaw His Guest Because He Just Got Assault-Weaponed With Facts and Logic."

Will the Next Pope Be Black?

Who knows? Although I'm reminded of how the United Nations always seeks a candidate from the Third World to serve as Secretary General. Perhaps the Vatican will look to the "Global South" for its next pope.

At London's Daily Mail, "Will the next pope be black? Ghanaian and Nigerian cardinals lead race for Vatican."

LeRoy Carhart Botched Late-Term Abortion Leaves Mother Dead

Robert Stacy McCain reports, "Doctor Death: 29-Year-Old Patient Dies After Late-Term Abortion in Maryland UPDATE: Complete Media Blackout by Feminists, Major News Organizations," and "Carhart Victim Identified: N.Y. Woman Sought Abortion for ‘Fetal Abnormalities’."

Also, "How Many More Women Will Die Before Abortionist LeRoy Carhart Is Stopped?", and "Despite Death in Carhart Clinic, Fanatics Want to Open Abortion Clinic in Wichita."

Pope Benedict XVI to Step Down

This was the huge story at Memeorandum yesterday.

See the Wall Street Journal, "Pope Resigns in Historic Move: Citing Age, Illness, Benedict XVI Becomes First Pontiff to Step Down in Six Centuries":

VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI will become the first pontiff in six centuries to resign, marking the end of a transitional papacy that focused more on theological and internal renewal and less on the broader challenges that face the Roman Catholic church at the start of its 21st century of existence.

The pope's surprise announcement paves the way for a successor who will confront anew the task of rebuilding the church's foundations in an increasingly secular and skeptical West while continuing to spread its roots in the rapidly growing emerging world.

The 85-year-old pope, who before his 2005 election was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, announced the decision to step down in a speech in Latin Monday to a small group of cardinals, saying he no longer had the vitality to perform his duties. Only two top Vatican cardinals were informed beforehand about the historic announcement, which quickly ricocheted around the world.

"His fidelity to maintaining the truth and clarity of the Catholic faith, to cultivating ecumenical and interfaith dialogue and in reaching out to inspire the next generation of Catholics have been great gifts to us all," said Boston Cardinal Sean Patrick O'Malley.

The resignation of Benedict, who heads a church of one billion world-wide, was emblematic of a pope who, though doctrinal in his teachings, often bucked traditions when it came to opening the Vatican up to the world beyond its medieval walls.

Among other achievements, he took on a centuries-old rift between the Catholic and Anglican churches, introducing a pathway for disaffected Anglicans to enter the Catholic fold. He also tried to lift the veil on the Vatican's opaque finances by bringing in international observers to monitor the creation of the Holy See's first financial watchdog. He was the first pontiff to seize on social media, sending messages to a sea of followers over Twitter.

The pope also spoke out about the scandals involving sexual abuse by priests that have roiled the church in the U.S. and other Western countries, and removed some of the bishops implicated in them. Still, he drew criticism from some that he didn't speak out strongly enough or deal forcefully enough with the crisis, which has cost the church hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements with thousands of abuse victims and badly damaged its image world-wide.

In all, his concerns were typical of a pope who didn't shy away from the most volatile issues facing the Catholic Church. "Some people describe him as merely an intellectual who moved in a metaphysical world. No, he's also a man who governed with a huge sense of moral responsibility," said Cardinal Julián Herranz, who has worked closely alongside the pope.

In his speech Monday, Pope Benedict, who was elected in April 2005, said his strength "had deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity." After he steps down, the pope will retreat to a monastery to pray and write, his spokesman said.

More at the link.

And at the New York Times, "Successor to Benedict Will Lead a Church at a Crossroads."

Push to Gauge Value of College Gains Steam

We'll be seeing more of this, especially since continued high unemployment rates leave recent graduates with woefully diminished chances.

At the Wall Street Journal, "Cost of College: Push to Gauge Bang for Buck from College Gains Steam":

U.S. and state officials are intensifying efforts to hold colleges accountable for what happens after graduation, a sign of frustration with sky-high tuition costs and student-loan debt.

Sens. Ron Wyden (D., Ore.) and Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) are expected to reintroduce this week legislation that would require states to make more accessible the average salaries of colleges' graduates. The figures could help prospective students compare salaries by college and major to assess the best return on their investment.

A similar bipartisan bill died last year, but a renewed push has gained political momentum in recent weeks. "This begins to introduce some market forces into the academic arena that have not been there," said Mr. Wyden, adding that support for the move is unusually broad given the political divide in Washington. Rep. Eric Cantor (R., Va.), the House majority leader, said he intends to support a similar measure in the House.

High-school seniors now trying to decide which college to attend next fall are awash with information about costs, from dorm rooms to meal plans. But there is almost no easy way to tell what graduates at specific schools earn—or how many found jobs in their chosen field. Supporters say more transparency is needed as students graduate deeper in debt and enter the rocky job market.

The Wyden-Rubio bill doesn't spell out exactly how this information has to be assembled. The goal is that students and parents could use the U.S. Department of Education website to query data from all 50 states. But the bill relies on states to knit together wage data submitted by employers with information on graduates submitted by colleges.

Virginia, which recently began publishing wages by colleges and program on its own, linked these two data sets using Social Security numbers. It didn't publish the Social Security numbers.

Some colleges are resisting the broader push, saying it would be a burden for states to compile the information, and that it would tell students little they don't know already.

"You don't need a database to tell you that people who major in fine arts won't earn a lot of money when they graduate," said Terry Hartle, senior vice president for government and public affairs at the American Council on Education, a trade group that hasn't taken a position on the bill by Messrs. Wyden and Rubio. Some officials worry that salary is too narrow a measure of the value of a liberal-arts education.

Privacy advocates have concerns with compiling so much data. One potential issue, they say, is that the data could be sliced so thinly that it would reveal information about individuals. "It's the risk of re-identification in small samples," says Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center in Washington, D.C.

Still, Bryce Harrison, who graduated last May from Goucher College, a private school in Baltimore, said wage data could have helped him pick his major. Mr. Harrison, 23 years old, hoped his political-science degree would land him a job with the government.

He has had no luck. With about $100,000 in student loans to repay, Mr. Harrison spent the summer working for his father, power-washing houses. But business slows in the winter, so he is now unemployed and is considering joining the National Guard.

"Was college worth getting in the amount of debt I'm in?" he asks. "At this point, I can't answer that."

Pro Tip: Don't take out unsustainable student loans for an undergraduate degree, to say nothing of graduate or law school. Work your way through college even if it takes longer to complete. It can be done. Avoid the maw of the student loan/student scam industry. This debt can't be wiped out by bankruptcy. Some people are immediately indebted for life.

Americans Were Under Attack. Then: Nothing

I haven't blogged about Benghazi much lately, mostly because the political system's largely moved on. Hillary Clinton smoked her congressional testimony. And the press treats this administration as if it were royalty. There have been a few exceptions, but most in the MFM didn't think Benghazi rated investigative coverage. Indeed, if it wasn't for Fox News, we would have had a couple of perfunctory reports on the networks and the remaining cable channels and that would've been it. Sure, CBS's Sharyl Attkison was pressing hard against the administration's cover-up, but for her probing she was soon shut out of the press loop.

No doubt the scandal remains politically potent, if enough attention can be paid. And recent testimony has shed some unwanted light, from the administration's perspective, on the events of September 11, 2012. But at this point, I suspect people are moving on. Anointing Hillary is more important than getting to the bottom of things.

In any case, see William Kristol and Peter Wehner, at the Wall Street Journal, "The Absentee Commander in Chief":

We've both had the honor to work in the White House. We've seen presidents, vice presidents, chiefs of staff and national security advisers during moments of international crisis. We know that in these moments human beings make mistakes. There are failures of communication and errors of judgment. Perfection certainly isn't the standard to which policy makers should be held.

But there are standards. If Americans are under attack, presidential attention must be paid. Due diligence must be demonstrated. A president must take care that his administration does everything it can do. On Sept. 11, 2012, as Americans were under attack in Benghazi, Libya, President Obama failed in his basic responsibility as president and commander in chief. In a crisis, the president went AWOL.

Thanks to the congressional testimony of outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey late last week, we know they met with President Obama on Sept. 11 at 5 p.m. in a pre-scheduled meeting, when they informed the president about the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. The meeting lasted about a half-hour. Mr. Panetta said they spent roughly 20 minutes of the session briefing the president on the chaos at the American Embassy in Cairo and the attack in Benghazi, which eventually cost the lives of Ambassador Christopher Stevens, security personnel Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods, and information officer Sean Smith.

Secretary Panetta said the president left operational details, including determination of what resources were available to help the Americans under siege, "up to us." We also learned that President Obama did not communicate in any way with Mr. Panetta or Gen. Dempsey the rest of that evening or that night. Indeed, Mr. Panetta and Gen. Dempsey testified they had no further contact at all with anyone in the White House that evening—or, for that matter, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

That's not all we discovered. We now know that despite Gen. Dempsey having been informed of Ambassador Stevens's repeated warnings about the rise of terrorist elements in Benghazi, no forces were put in place or made ready nearby to respond to possible trouble. It also seems that during the actual attacks in Benghazi, which the administration followed in real time and which lasted for some eight hours, not a single major military asset was deployed to help rescue Americans under assault.

And we learned one other thing: Messrs. Panetta and Dempsey both knew on the night of the assault that it was a terrorist attack. This didn't prevent President Obama, Secretary Clinton and U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice from peddling a false version of events in the days and even weeks that followed, as the administration called the incident spontaneous, said there was no evidence of a coordinated terrorist attack and blamed the violence on an anti-Muslim video. So the White House, having failed to ensure that anything was done during the attack, went on to mislead the nation afterward.

Why the deception? Presumably for two reasons. The first is that the true account of events undercut the president's claim during the campaign that al Qaeda was severely weakened in the aftermath of the killing of Osama bin Laden. The second is that a true account of what happened in Benghazi that night would have revealed that the president and his top national-security advisers did not treat a lethal attack by Islamic terrorists on Americans as a crisis. The commander in chief not only didn't convene a meeting in the Situation Room; he didn't even bother to call his Defense secretary or the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Not a single presidential finger was lifted to help Americans under attack.

Continue reading.

FLASHBACK: "Benghazi Reveals Obama Is a Coward and Disgrace."

Forget the Dress Code: Smokin' Kate Perry Busts Out of 'Show-Stopping Key-Hole Cut-Out Dress' at Grammy Awards

Nikki Finke reported on the dress code, "Breasts, Buttocks, Genitals Ban at Grammys – But Also Message-Sending Lapel Pins."

Well, some folks gave their own interpretation of the code, but perhaps none so fabulously at Katy Perry, at the Superficial, "Katy Perry Is the Only Two Things That Mattered at the Grammys. The Only Two Things."

And at London's Daily Mail, "Well that looks a bit different! Katy Perry's arresting Grammys dress was first worn by Chinese star Bingbing Li."

Sullivan High School Students Want Traditional Prom — Without LGBT Radicals

Well, at some point folks push back against homosexual "super rights." I imagine this won't be the last we'll be hearing about this kind of stuff.

At New York Daily News, "Some Indiana parents, teacher want 'traditional prom' to ban gays, lesbians."

And get a load of this response from Christian-bashing "anti-bullying" bully Dan Savage, "Anti-Gay Bigots at High School In Indiana Can't Ban Gay Kids From Prom..."

Young, Big Government Progressives

It remains to be seen, but whether this is an ephemeral trend that coincides with the current Obama-led Democrat-socialists or a longer, secular political realignment is an important question. Either way, conservatives have their work cut out for in them.

At the New York Times, "Young, Liberal and Open to Big Government":

MISSOULA, Mont. — This funky college town, nestled along two rivers where five mountain ranges converge, has long been a liberal pocket, an isolated speck of blue in a deeply red state. Now Montana is electing more politicians who lean that way, thanks to a different-minded generation of young voters animated by the recession and social issues.

Sam Thompson, a 22-year-old environmental studies major at the University of Montana here, considers himself “fiscally conservative” but opposes cuts to Medicare; he expects to need health coverage when he grows old. Aaron Curtis, 27, a graduate student, admired Jon Huntsman, a moderate Republican, but could not stomach Mitt Romney’s opposition to same-sex marriage.

Billie Loewen and Heather Jurva, editors at the student newspaper, speak of a Depression-era mentality that is pushing their generation to back Democrats. Saddled with student debt, they worry about health care and are terrified that they will not find good jobs. “You might be just one accident away from losing everything,” said Ms. Jurva, who has worked 40 hours a week waiting on tables to put herself through school.

It is no secret that young voters tilt left on social issues like immigration and gay rights. But these students, and dozens of other young people interviewed here last week, give voice to a trend that is surprising pollsters and jangling the nerves of Republicans. On a central philosophical question of the day — the size and scope of the federal government — a clear majority of young people embraces President Obama’s notion that it can be a constructive force, a point he intends to make in his State of the Union address on Tuesday.

“Young people absolutely believe that there’s a role for government,” said Matt Singer, a founder of Forward Montana, a left-leaning though officially nonpartisan group that seeks to engage young people in politics. “At the same time, this is not a generation of socialists. They are highly entrepreneurial, and know that some of what it takes to create an environment where they can do their own exciting, creative things is having basic systems that work.”

Well, if they're not "a generation of socialists," young people ought to be gravitating toward folks like Sen. Rand Paul instead of the brain-addled, entrepreneurial-crushing Democrats like President Obama and the idiot Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi.

We'll see. More at that top link in any case.

Cartoon Credit: William Warren.

Basilica of St. Lawrence, Asheville, N.C.

I'm traveling back to California today, so this post will have to hold down the fort. I have plenty more photos to share, but I just love this one of the Basilica:

The Basilica of St. Lawrence, Roman Catholic Church, Asheville, N.C. #Values #ProLife @rsmccain twitter.com/AmPowerBlog/st…

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) February 9, 2013

Visit the website here.

Obama's Drone Attack On Your Due Process

From Noah Feldman, at Bloomberg:

The biggest problem with the recently disclosed Obama administration white paper defending the drone killing of radical clerk Anwar al-Awlaki isn’t its secrecy or its creative redefinition of the words “imminent threat.” It is the revolutionary and shocking transformation of the meaning of due process.

Fortunately, as seen during John Brennan’s confirmation hearing for Central Intelligence Agency director, Congress is starting to notice.

Due process is the oldest and most essential component of the rule of law. It goes back to the Magna Carta, when the barons insisted that King John agree not to kill anyone or take property without following legal procedures.

What they meant -- and what has been considered the essence of due process since -- is that the accused must be notified of the charges against him and have the opportunity to have his case heard by an impartial decision maker. If you get due process, you can’t complain about the punishment that follows. If you don’t get that opportunity, you’ve been the victim of arbitrary power.

Continue reading.

And tune into Glenn Greenwald on Twitter for leftist hypocrisy updates:

In the NYT, @jengranholm becomes the latest Dem to admit: of course we object much less because Obama is presidentis.gd/wnPmUl
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) February 10, 2013

History of Leftist Hypocrisy

A follow up to my earlier post, "Blame Righty AWOL in Christopher Dorner Manhunt."

Meanwhile, at the Los Angeles Times, "Trail of fugitive ex-cop turns very cold in Big Bear," and "LAPD will reopen investigation into 2009 firing of Dorner."

Also at Instapundit, "REMEMBER, ONLY POLICE CAN BE TRUSTED WITH GUNS: Police seeking Dorner opened fire in a second case of mistaken identity." Also, "3 bystanders reportedly shot by police during hunt for murder suspect," and "LAPD Had “No Idea” Who They Were Shooting at In Dorner Pursuit, Says Victims’ Attorney."

Blame Righty AWOL in Christopher Dorner Manhunt

I meant to post this earlier, but better late than never.

Don't miss Michelle Malkin's devastating piece, "The Blame Righty mob falls silent."

RELATED: At Pundit Press, "Liberals Rush to Defend Murderer Christopher Dorner; 'A True Patriot Hero'." And CBS News 13 — Sacramento, "Support Growing For Former L.A. Officer Accused Of Killing Spree" (at Memeorandum).

It's pretty shocking, really. More at Twitchy, "Jesse Jackson tweets plea to Chris Dorner: ‘I understand your feelings of hurt and pain’."

Drones and Democracy

Germany's Der Spiegel reports, "Obama's Leaked Drones a Reminder of the Bush Years."

Yeah, a reminder alright. And one the left's hypocrites would rather do without. Glenn Reynolds has more, "THOUGHTS ON ORIGINALISM AND DRONE STRIKES." Plus, Rich Lowry on the left's kill list hypocrisy, at that link.

Also, "IF HE WERE A REPUBLICAN, HE’D BE A WAR CRIMINAL," and "ILYA SOMIN: The Drone Targeting Dilemma."

Britain's Islamic Preachers of Hate

At Telegraph UK, "Preachers of hate who spread their violent word on British TV channels":

Muslim fundamentalists have used British television channels to preach in favour of violent crime and killing “apostates”.

The communications watchdog, Ofcom, has made a series of rulings against channels which allowed “inflammatory” material to be broadcast in breach of rules which forbid extreme opinions gaining a platform on British television.

The cases, disclosed today, include examples of an imam telling viewers that those who disrespect the prophet Mohammed should be killed, and another broadcaster saying homosexuals should be beaten and tortured.

The stations were found to have committed serious breaches of the broadcasting code by allowing the extreme opinions to be aired unchallenged.

Last night experts warned that the extent and seriousness of the broadcasting breaches raises questions over whether extreme Muslim speakers who were previously confined to small audiences in mosques are able to reach thousands more people by broadcasting intolerant teachings on television.

Although the channels have tiny audiences compared to the mainstream, they are targeted at Muslim communities, including people of Pakistani background, with some of the content being broadcast in Urdu and other languages.

Hmm. That's interesting.

More at the link, even more intense.

This is incitement to violence, for sure, and I can't imagine anyone making a free speech case for it. And British television's likely even more regulated than American TV, so there's be even less protection on speech grounds.

But someone will no doubt claim "racism" and the Islamic hate preachers will find a way to keep preaching the hate. Excellent assimilation over there. Winning.

Zeitgeist Gal Kate Upton on Sports Illustrated 2013 Swimsuit Cover

No doubt SI made a lot of money with the little (big breasted) hottie. She's up for a repeat performance as the swimsuit cover girl.

At the New York Post, "Kate Upton scores another Sports Illustrated Swimsuit cover with this amazing photo."

And in related news, SI's actual sports coverage is now actually non-sports coverage --- and turning off readers and subscribers big-time.

See Andrew Klavan, "Why I’m Canceling My SI Subscription," and Hugh Hewitt, at Townhall, "Talking with Pagans and Talking with Journalists."

New York Times Religion Writer Touts 'Everyday American' Mujahid Abdul-Rashid to Smear Pamela Geller and Whitewash Jihad

Check out this pathetic and completely ad hoc attack on Pamela Geller, dressed up as a kinda "aw-shucks" epiphany that black U.S.-born converts to Islam are as natural as apple pie. Even more sinister is the promotion of the left's lie that "jihad" is all about inner struggle and not holy war against the West and subjugation of infidels. I'm all for regular folks, regardless of religion or ethnicity, appearing in financial industry commercials. But when the New York Times cherry picks a spot that no one is talking about to attack those fighting for truth and protecting freedom of speech, you know there's a larger agenda going on. The writer, Samuel G. Freedman, takes not one but two swings at Geller in what's no more than a 750 word essay. Behold, once again, what's so desperately wrong with the conventional thinking of today's MSM. And it highlights as powerful as anything the ultimate stakes in the fight over the information battlespace.

See, "In TV Commerical, an Everyday Muslim Is, Finally, Just an Everyday American." As the piece winds along at the introduction, the key dhimmi hook is Freedman's attack on Pamela:

On a Sunday afternoon several months ago, I was engaged in one of my favorite religious rituals, watching pro football on television. During a break in the game, I reflexively clicked the “mute” button on the remote control. But my eyes stayed fixed on a startling commercial.

The screen showed a balding man with tawny skin and a salt-and-pepper goatee, and seconds later it spelled out his name: Mujahid Abdul-Rashid. The advertisement went on to show him fishing, playing in a yard with two toddlers, and sitting down to a family meal.

One week later, again during an N.F.L. game, the same commercial appeared. This time I listened to the words. The advertisement was for Prudential’s financial products for retirees. Mr. Abdul-Rashid was talking about his own retirement after 19 years as a clothing salesman, and the family time he now intended to enjoy.

“That’s my world,” he said over that closing shot of the family dinner.

What I had just seen was something rare and laudable: what seems to be the first mass-market product commercial featuring an identifiably Muslim person not as a security risk, not as a desert primitive, but as an appealing, everyday American.

As if to underscore the point, the Prudential commercial with Mr. Abdul-Rashid was appearing on television during the same period last fall that saw two widespread commercial campaigns vilifying Muslims. One was the series of ads on New York subways and buses placed by a group led by Pamela Geller, the outspoken blogger and critic of Islam, which depicted a worldwide conflict between the civilized West and Islamic “savages.” The other was the billboard during the presidential campaign that showed President Obama submissively kissing the hand of a sheik.

Then, during the Super Bowl last weekend, a Coca-Cola commercial trotted out the stereotype of the Arab on camelback. As points of comparison, consider that Frito-Lay retired its “Frito Bandito” caricature more than 40 years ago. And in 1989, Quaker Oats removed Aunt Jemima’s kerchief and gave her pearl earrings so she no longer evoked a house slave.

I was intrigued enough by the Prudential commercial to find Mr. Abdul-Rashid. Like the other nine people in the campaign, he is an actual person, not a hired performer. And as his name implies, he is Muslim, an African-American born in Los Angeles who converted to Islam in 1980...

Blah, blah, blah. Folks couldn't care less, but this idiot Freedman has to turn this into some massive statement  against counter-jihad, especially with this section on how Abdul-Rashid stresses the meaning of his name as "inner peace":

Mr. Abdul-Rashid’s first name, given to him by a Saudi Arabian teacher with whom he studied Islam before converting, is the kind of thing the Pamela Gellers of the world could have waved like a flag. Even some of Mr. Abdul-Rashid’s theater colleagues suggested after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, that maybe he would be wise to change his name. He refused.

“The name Mujahid means someone who strives to live in the way of God,” he said. “And, yes, it means holy warrior, too. But if you ask me, that means fighting the good fight. If you see a hungry person and feed him, that’s fighting holy war. The greatest holy war is within ourselves.”

Not being an advertising specialist, I consulted several experts to hear their view of the Prudential commercial. They concurred on its uniqueness and importance.

“It expands our idea of the American Dream and it gives us a new way of looking at it,” said Timothy Malefyt, a professor of marketing at Fordham University who worked in the advertising industry for 15 years. “This guy shares our ideals, our fears. He talks about his work ethic, his love of family. Right away, you can see he’s Muslim. So he’s different from us, but he’s also like us. This lets us reevaluate American Muslim identity.”

Oh brother. In Islam, "one who strives to live in the way of God" actually means to destroy non-believers of the faith. And when black Americans convert to Islam, there's usually a political --- anti-American --- motivation as much as there is a religious one. Muslim names blare militancy in the black American context. It's a statement. I'm not taking the time, but no doubt if one researched Abdul-Rashid's background we'd find statements critical of the U.S. government in general and the war on terror in particular. The guy's a Bay Area-based actor, for crying out loud. Talk about stereotypical. And the New York Times couldn't resist the  chance to exploit this guy's advertisement for a vicious attack on Pamela, providing no context whatsoever about her "savages" campaign or her work to protect not only free speech rights, but the lives of those threatened by fanatic Muslim "honor" killers of women and children.

Never let these people get away with this. They're depraved politically correct ghouls. The false implications and unspoken lies here are enormous. The Times' editors should be ashamed.

UPDATE: Linked at iOWNTHEWORLD. Thanks!

Clear and Sunny in Asheville

We're about to wind down the conference meetings and have lunch. After that it's a free day and I'm heading over to downtown Asheville to see the sights. I'll be back online tonight. Meanwhile, it's clear and beautiful and should be clear sailing for the flight out tomorrow, first to Atlanta to connect with my flight back to the O.C.

Check back tonight!

Clear and sunny in Asheville, N.C. #Weather twitter.com/AmPowerBlog/st…
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) February 9, 2013

Asheville Update

I have about a half hour or so before I head down to the Saturday evening dinner function. It's been a long day and I've only read a little bit of political news. I'll be post some regular blog entries later tonight. Meanwhile, I took some photos.

The Grove Park Inn is simply massive. This shot looks from the Vanderbilt Wing (where the conference rooms are) to the Sammons Wing (where my hotel room is). It rained this morning (at the photo), although the sun's out bright and shiny this afternoon, so guests would have no idea a monster blizzard is now slamming down on the upper East Coast:

Out front of the hotel, just after I returned to my room during the lunch hour:

The huge wood-burning fire down in the main lobby lodge:

A sign for the political science symposium at the conference rooms:

Some of the guests socializing before a presentation. That's Professor Eduardo Munoz of El Camino College at left. We attended graduate school together at UCSB. I saw him last night (at the first night's social mixer) for the first time in almost 15 years. I recognized him immediately, as he was coming down the hall toward the lounge. We had a good laugh:

I'll have more later...

Oh, a commenter at the last update warned me about the "Pink Lady" of Grove Park Inn. Interestingly, I was reminded of the hotel from "The Shining." Long empty hallways, rustic architecture, and scenic views will do that to you, I guess.

Asheville, North Carolina

I'm at the Grove Park Inn.

I'm attending a political science symposium sponsored by the publisher of the textbook I use in my American government classes. The schedule of events is here.

Here's the view yesterday from my room, overlooking the golf course with the Appalachian Mountains seen faintly in the distance. Blogging will be light over the next couple of days.

RELATED: Steve Greene, Associate Professor of Political Science at North Carolina State University, is kicking himself for not attending, the dork.

American Hero Clint Romesha

I watched this last night, "Clint Romesha, the bravest of the brave."

It's the story of the horrendous firefight at Outpost Keating in Afghanistan, the subject of Jake Tapper's book, The Outpost: An Untold Story of American Valor. At one point Romesha was overwhelmed 400 to 1 by the Taliban, but he regrouped and kept fighting. And when some of buddies went down inside their Humvee, left out in the open exposed, his biggest fear was the enemy would seize their bodies. He was determined not to let that happen. It's a very moving moment at the interview.

This is a war story that rivals some of the greatest war stories in American history. Quite moving all around.

Romesha will receive the Medal of Honor on Monday at the White House. This Ain't Hell has more on that, "Army Staff Sergeant Clinton Romesha to Be Awarded Medal of Honor."

Police Search for Ex-Los Angeles Cop Christopher Dorner

I'm traveling today (more on that later). I caught bits of news on Twitter between flights and I checked briefly at Memeorandum when I got to the hotel. Sooper Mexican was reporting, "News Media Scrub Cop Murderer's Manifesto of Pro-Obama, Hillary, MSNBC, CNN, Gay, and Anti-Gun Comments."

Anyway, I'm now just finished with social hour and getting back to my hotel room. I've got CNN on and Piers Morgan just interviewed former L.A. Police Chief William Bratton. (And folks have been hammering Morgan on Twitter, since allegedly the suspect was a big fan. Ace of Spades HQ has more on that, "If It Will Save a Single Life, We Must Get Piers Morgan's Stupid Fat Face off the Television.")

The Los Angeles Times has been updating all day, so check the search entry here, "ex-cop manhunt." And, "Manhunt: CNN's Anderson Cooper says he got package from fugitive."

And here's the New York Times, "Huge Search for Ex-Officer in 3 California Killings."

Also at Memeorandum.

Uncle Jimbo Slams Leftist Hypocrisy on Guantánamo, Waterboarding and Targeted Killings

You gotta love this, from last month, at Blackfive, "BUSH'S GITMO EVIL, OBAMA'S GITMO JUST PEACHY":

This President takes national security very seriously and look how he has figured out how to avoid those pesky interrogations. Now we simply stick a Hellfire missile up the ass of a suspected terrorist (and his family). So, so much better than getting wet and asking them questions about all their friends.

Now let me be clear, I wholeheartedly support these policies, well not the lack of capture and interrogation. But it is the hypocrisy of the morally superior left that is so nauseating. The greatest evil ever faced by mankind was the creation of the torture factory and most-unconstitutional thing evah- GITMO. The orange jumpsuit became synonymous with Amerikkka under the tyrant Bush. Fast forward to the enlightenment and benevolence under the reign of the One. Suddenly everything bad is good again.

A perfect example is the physics and logic-defying gymnastics performed by one of the most hysterical of the Gitmo-despising, al-Qaeda coddling harpies Ms. Jennifer Daskal, former head Bush-hater at Human Rights Watch. She has an Op-ed in the NYT explaining why we should now keep Gitmo open because, well basically because Barry O says there are bad men there and his word is good enough for her.

Now, almost four years later, I have changed my mind. Despite recognizing the many policy imperatives in favor of closure, despite the bipartisan support for this position, and despite the fact that 166 men still languish there, I now believe that Guantánamo should stay open — at least for the short term.

While I have been slow to come to this realization, the signs have been evident for some time. Three years ago, Barack Obama’s administration conducted a comprehensive review of the Guantánamo detainees and concluded that about four dozen prisoners couldn’t be prosecuted, but were too dangerous to be transferred or released. They are still being held under rules of war that allow detention without charge for the duration of hostilities.

So Barry's guys took a look at these folks (which she worked on), the same guys W's jack-booted thugs refused to turn loose (denying their avowed intention and Allah-given right to rejoin the jihad) and now all of a sudden they can be legally held without trial indefinitely. WOW! ....

I favored drone strikes, enhanced interrogations and indefinite detention for jihadis under W, and in a display of integrity Ms. Daskal obviously lacks, I still support them under O. Principles, you should try them Jennifer.

And here's more from yesterday, "DRONE KILLING US CITIZENS GOOD, WATERBOARDING TERRORISTS BAD":

Today's entry in the ongoing procession of WTF moments that is the Obama administration: A leaked Justice Department memo justifies the use of drones to kill US citizens anywhere, any place, any time just because we can't be troubled to catch them. So no due process, no presumption of innocence, no right to confront your accusers, no fair trial by a jury of your peers, just a Hellfire missile returning you to your component molecules.

Troubling? Yer damn right it is troubling. There is no more dangerous and scary use of state power than the execution of one of its citizens. This set up also has no oversight outside the Executive Branch. I have long supported the use of drones to kill terrorists overseas, and still do. But this is a pretty huge stretch and it seems to be driven by a giant steaming bowl of hypocrisy and gutlessness. Ask yourself why drone killings are all the rage now. Maybe it's because we no longer catch and interrogate terrorists because that is too messy. We were told that Gitmo was the perfect example of what was wrong with America and our "war on terror".

The left's hypocrisy is truly Orwellian, and more and more people are speaking out against it. (Remember, the left only cares about human rights if it helps them politically.) Let's hope that our representatives in the Senate get some serious answers about all of this from CIA Director-nominee John Brennan.

Wall Street Journal Defends Obama Administration's Secret Drone Program

There's no mention here of the killing of Awlaki's 16-year-old son (who I doubt was a "senior operational leader" of al Qaeda), but other than that, a great editorial, "King of Drones":

President Obama has been lucky in many ways, but no more so than in not having a Senator Barack Obama to assail his use of Presidential war powers. For surely Senator Obama would now be denouncing the ways that President Obama has embraced the unilateral, even pre-emptive powers that George W. Bush used in prosecuting the war against al Qaeda.

The latest example is the leak to NBC News of a Justice Department "white paper" that summarizes the legal justification for using drones to kill al Qaeda operatives, including American citizens. The white paper summarizes a more detailed legal explanation from Justice's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) that remains classified—again, like the habits of the supposedly too secretive Bush Administration.

You may recall that Mr. Obama and Eric Holder, before he became Attorney General, denounced the OLC memos that explained why waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation" techniques were legal. Once he became Attorney General, Mr. Holder ostentatiously made four of those memos public on April 16, 2009, along with plenty of moral preening about how the new Administration had banned that sort of barbarism.

Yes, this crowd doesn't arrest and interrogate suspected terrorists. It merely blows them away with missiles from the sky.

Hypocrisy aside, the Justice Department makes an adequate legal case. If John Yoo or Dick Cheney had written it, the document would no doubt be less defensive in asserting executive powers. There might be less talk about "balancing analysis" and more of Constitutional prerogatives. But the Obama paper gets to the correct legal conclusion.

The white paper is naturally being denounced on the anti-antiterror left, which only shows how out of this world these critics are. They claim the Administration has no legal basis for drone strikes, but that ignores the Authorization for Use of Military Force passed by Congress after 9/11 and various National Defense Authorization Acts. Both explicitly give the President the power to capture and kill members of al Qaeda and its allies who have taken up arms against the U.S.

Critics shout that the white paper is a license to kill anyone, anywhere, but that is also false. The memo limits the targets to "a senior operational leader" of al Qaeda "or its associated forces." Congress deliberately included the latter phrase because al Qaeda is a loose network that can strike in many places. It recognizes that this is a long conflict that will be fought in many places and that jihadists will seek new sanctuaries. But the white paper is not a justification to start targeting Tamil Tigers or Karen rebels in Burma.

As for the alleged lack of judicial review, a sure way to lose a war is to require that judges approve a list of enemy targets on the battlefield. In its Bush-era rulings, the Supreme Court merely allowed detainees the right of habeas review once they are in custody. It did not say a judge should have to approve drone strikes or determine who could or couldn't be attacked in battle.

Joe Scarborough: John Yoo's Torture Memos 'Are Child's Play Compared to What the Government Can Do Now and Who They Can Kill...'

This is compelling television, at MSNBC, amazingly.

See Business Insider, "Joe Scarborough Blasts 'Terrifying' Drone Memo: 'If George Bush Had Done This, It Would Have Been Stopped'":

The morning after NBC's Michael Isikoff scooped the memo on the U.S. government's rationalization for legally killing American citizens, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough tore into the program as "terrifying."

"It's hard to say how many stop signs were blown through here," Scarborough said of the white paper, a 16-page document that details the legality of drone strikes on American citizens.

"But for those who were shocked at the Bush administration 'torture memos,' they must be really stunned at this." He called the drone memo "child's play" compared to the so-called "torture memos."

Calling it an "absolute mess" and so frightening, Scarborough said that "if George Bush had done this, it would have been stopped."

Orwellian Drift

Via the Looking Spoon.

PREVIOUSLY: "Oh yes, al Qaeda has been decimated, war is peace, ignorance is strength and freedom is slavery!"

RELATED: "Kirsten Powers: Left's Hypocrisy on Obama's 'Unconstitutional' Drone Strike Memo is 'Completely Despicable'." (And remember, the White House identifies its targeted exterminations with an Orwellian euphemism, the "disposition matrix." FORWARD!!)

Majority Views Government as Threat to Personal Rights

This was posted at Pew last week, "Majority Says the Federal Government Threatens Their Personal Rights":

As Barack Obama begins his second term in office, trust in the federal government remains mired near a historic low, while frustration with government remains high. And for the first time, a majority of the public says that the federal government threatens their personal rights and freedoms.

The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, conducted Jan. 9-13 among 1,502 adults, finds that 53% think that the federal government threatens their own personal rights and freedoms while 43% disagree.

In March 2010, opinions were divided over whether the government represented a threat to personal freedom; 47% said it did while 50% disagreed. In surveys between 1995 and 2003, majorities rejected the idea that the government threatened people’s rights and freedoms.

The growing view that the federal government threatens personal rights and freedoms has been led by conservative Republicans. Currently 76% of conservative Republicans say that the federal government threatens their personal rights and freedoms and 54% describe the government as a “major” threat. Three years ago, 62% of conservative Republicans said the government was a threat to their freedom; 47% said it was a major threat.

By comparison, there has been little change in opinions among Democrats; 38% say the government poses a threat to personal rights and freedoms and just 16% view it as a major threat.

The Plight of the Alpha Female

This is awesome.

At the clip, Kennedy the lovely libertarian interviews Kay Hymowitz on her recent article at City Journal, "The Plight of the Alpha Female":

Women remain scarce in the most elite positions. And it's by choice.

Obama to Release Secret Drone Memos

Watch out for fireworks at Brennan's testimony tomorrow.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Obama agrees to release memos on Awlaki strike":

WASHINGTON — President Obama, who has championed lethal drone strikes as a major part of U.S. counter-terrorism efforts, bowed to pressure Wednesday and agreed to allow the Senate and House intelligence committees to review classified legal memos used to justify a drone strike against a U.S. citizen in Yemen in 2011.

Senators had demanded for months to see the Justice Department opinions that provided the White House legal authority to order the targeted killing of Anwar Awlaki, a New Mexico native who became an Al Qaeda leader.

Complaints by several Democrats over not receiving the documents had cast a shadow on the Senate confirmation hearing Thursday of John Brennan, the White House counter-terrorism advisor tapped to be CIA director.

An administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss classified material, described the decision to release the classified Office of Legal Counsel material as "part of the president's ongoing commitment to consult with Congress on national security matters."

"I think this is an encouraging first step," said Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat who sits on the Intelligence Committee and was among those who had publicly complained about being denied access to the material. He said Americans must "understand the rules under which a president may make these consequential decisions."

Wyden said Obama had "assured me that all of the documents concerning the legal opinions on the targeted killing of Americans will immediately be made available" to the intelligence committees.

Brennan is likely to face questions about the drone strikes that he oversaw in the last four years.

In written answers to 40 pre-hearing questions from the Senate Intelligence Committee, Brennan said civilian casualties from CIA drone strikes had been "exceedingly rare," repeating language he used last April after published reports alleged numerous civilian casualties in Pakistan and Yemen.

Former U.S. officials say that, for a time, the intelligence community considered every military-age male killed in a CIA drone strike to have been a militant.

Brennan declined to explain how U.S. authorities conclude that a militant is "associated" with Al Qaeda or whether the threat he poses is sufficiently "imminent" to warrant being targeted for a missile strike.

Brennan said, without elaborating, that those determinations are made on a "case-by-case basis" by intelligence professionals.

Also at CNN, "BREAKING: Obama to hand over drone documents ahead of Brennan hearing." (At Memeorandum.)

Ex-Communist David Nicholson Chaired the NHS Strategic Health Authority During Height of Deaths at Mid Staffordshire

This is something of a blockbuster, at London's Daily Mail, "David Nicholson - The ex-communist NHS chief, the young wife he fast-tracked and a very lavish lifestyle:

As a young NHS trainee at the height of the Cold War, David Nicholson idolised Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev.

At the same time as starting work in a mental health unit, the Bristol University graduate joined the Communist Party in 1977.

He was no ordinary revolutionary. He was on the hardline, so-called ‘Tankie’ wing of the party which backed the Kremlin using military action to crush dissident uprisings.
Today, David Nicholson is the £270,000-a year chief executive of the NHS.

The one-time radical who used to regard political honours as elitist symbols of bourgeoisie government was happy to be knighted in 2010.

Nicknamed the ‘Big Beast’ of the NHS because of his abrasive management style, his rise up the management ladder saw him take control of the strategic health authority responsible for supervising Stafford Hospital between 2005 and 2006.

It was during this period that patients needlessly died because of appalling standards of care.

Today’s damning report into the scandal could yet bring an end to his career – during which he forced through the last Labour government’s controversial ‘target culture’ that fatally undermined the ethos of care that has traditionally been a hallmark of NHS hospitals.

It has been a remarkable journey for a man who was a Communist for six years until his membership lapsed in 1983.

Critics say that the ‘uncaring culture’ that has developed in some aspects of healthcare can be likened to the one that prevailed during the godless Soviet regimes.
But Nicholson, 57, won’t discuss his Communist past.

What an asshole.

A freakin' Stalinist who threw Brezhnev under the for the bureaucracy-fueled upper bourgeoisie. Yeah, big surprise there that all the people died on his watch.

Here's more at the piece:

Incidentally, relations between Nicholson and [MP Andrew] Lansley had never recovered after the minister spotted the civil service chief travelling first class by train to a conference when Lansley himself was going to the same meeting, but in second class.

But then Nicholson loves travelling first class. On Saturday, the Mail disclosed that he racked up nearly £6,000 in 41 first-class train tickets in a year to Birmingham.

Each time he claimed to have been ‘attending official meetings’ but, in fact, they were held via video-conferencing, meaning he could have taken part from anywhere in the country. MPs have indicated that they will ask Nicholson to justify the expenditure.

Many of the trips spanned ‘long weekends’, prompting speculation he was going to his see his new young wife at their home in Birmingham.

Divorced with two grown-up sons, Nicholson had earlier got engaged in 2009 to Sarah-Jane Marsh, the chief executive of Birmingham Children’s Hospital.

It was not just the 22-year age gap which caused consternation. It was also the fact Nicholson met her while she was seconded to his office as a junior.

Care for the Midlands and East of England, took a shine to the attractive graduate trainee, acting as her mentor.

He also gave her two job references – the second leading to her appointment as chief operating officer at Birmingham Children’s Hospital. She was in the job when the Health Care Commission delivered a devastating report over a catalogue of patient failures at the hospital.

Two years later, despite the criticism, she became chief executive on a £155,000 salary, at the relatively youthful age of 32. By this time she was engaged to Nicholson – the all-powerful head of the NHS.

For his part, Nicholson has told NHS trusts to deliver between £15billion and £20billion in efficiency savings before 2014 (the equivalent of to up to 6 per cent of the current NHS budget).

Meanwhile, his own personal spending included £155,000 worth of expenses in four years. His annual expenses for his plush London flat was triple the MPs’ second homes allowance.

He gave up the property on condition that taxpayers covered any hotel bills incurred and despite the fact he chose to live in Birmingham. He also has a chauffeur-driven car.

How ironic if this former Communist party member’s downfall was triggered not by the tragic effects of the ‘target culture’ he ruthlessly enforced which contributed to the fiasco at Stafford, but if he was censured by a committee of MPs for using taxpayers’ money on his lavish expenses.

Yes. Ironic.

This guy's living a more corruptly lavish lifestyle than an Obama administration crony cabinet member. God help the United States should our newly socialized healthcare system befall the same fate at the NHs.

RELATED: At Telegraph UK, "Stafford scandal: Francis report - the recommendations," and "and "3,000 more patients have died needlessly in hospital":

More than 3,000 people may have died unnecessarily at five NHS trusts in a crisis that could dwarf the horrors at Mid Staffordshire, which were detailed in a devastating report on Wednesday.

Lovely healthcare system they've got there. Just lovely.

Kirsten Powers: Left's Hypocrisy on Obama's 'Unconstitutional' Drone Strike Memo is 'Completely Despicable'

This is great, at Noisy Room, "Kirsten Powers: Liberal Media ‘Don’t Really Care About Human Rights’ Unless it ‘Helps Them Politically’." Watch it at the link.

They don't care. They don't care at all. The left cares about power. They couldn't give a f-k about the human rights of terrorists --- or Americans. And naturally, President Obama is the f-king worst. Progressives are literally depraved. Indeed. "Despicable," in Powers' words.

Who's Defending the Targeted Executions of Americans?

As regular readers know, the U.S. government's drone program isn't that controversial to me, except for the fact of the Obama administration's enormous moral bankruptcy and political hypocrisy. I would admit, however, that the killing of Awkaki's 16-year-old son is problematic. It seems to me that if the U.S. Supreme Court is willing to prohibit capital punishment for minors, then there needs to be something above and beyond the raising-arms-against-the-U.S. argument for such a targeted killing. And was the kid even himself a terrorist? Or he was unlucky enough to have a father who was alleged to be a terrorist?

In any case, if waterboarding was justification enough for progressives for the Bush/Cheney "regime" to face war crimes trials, then Obama/Bidens's targeted assassinations should be worth even more under international human rights law. I'm still reading around the horn on this, but with Brennan's hearings tomorrow the story's going to be prominently featured in the news for the next few days, at least. Meanwhile, a number of folks on the right are defending the president's prerogatives and justifiable national security measures. So, it's quite the assortment of backers and opponents of these due process-free killings of U.S. citizens.

The neocons at Commentary are defending the program, for example, Max Boot, "Obama Drone Memo is a Careful, Responsible Document"; Jonahthan Tobin, "Obama Is Hypocritical but Right on Drones"; and Peter Wehner, "Drone Strikes, Waterboarding, and Moral Preening."

Meanwhile, here's Nick Gillespie at Reason, "Do You Agree With White House that Drone Strikes are 'Legal,' 'Ethical,' and 'Wise'? You Shouldn't."

A Constitutional Convention — The Last Step Before Revolution

From Glenn Reynolds' excellent column, at USA Today, "A revolution in the works?":

The political class usually gets its way, because it thinks about politics -- and its own position -- every waking moment, while the rest of America thinks about these things only in fits and starts, in between living everyday life. But if there's an upside to the increasing unhappiness that most Americans feel toward the political class, it's that maybe it means people are paying closer attention.

What's next? In my constitutional law class the other day, most of my students took the position that they would be unlikely to see a Constitutional Convention in their lifetimes. I'm not so sure. Last year I spoke at a Harvard Law School conference on holding a new Constitutional Convention, one which had participants from all sorts of ideological positions ranging from the Tea Party to the Occupy Wall Street movement. (People got along surprisingly well.)

In the American system, a Constitutional Convention -- which has never been held since the Constitution was adopted -- is the last stop before revolution. It was intended as a way for the people to end-run the political establishment; if enough states request a convention, Congress has no choice but to call it, and the resulting proposals go straight to the states for ratification, bypassing Congress. It's a way to make drastic changes when the political class has blocked smaller ones.

Are we there yet? I don't think so. But we're getting closer all the time. Political class, take note.

RTWT.

It Was Never About Hunting

A great cartoon, at Only Guns and Money, "While hunting is a great tradition in the United States, the purpose of the Second Amendment wasn't to protect it."

BONUS: See Bob Owens taking Greg Sargent to the woodshed:

Requiring government-issued photo/background checks won’t stop or even significantly impede the ability of criminals to acquire firearms, but these same requirements severely cramp the ability of progressives to commit voter fraud, which is one of their greatest strengths.

RTWT.

British Conservatives Vote for Homosexual Marriage

At Independent UK, "MPs vote for gay marriage bill by 400 to 175 in face of widespread Tory rebellion."

What Obama's Gun Proposals Left Out

Some key points on the gun debate, at CSM. Most have said that the president's executive orders are window dressing to score political points, but the argument about addressing single parent households is vital:

President Obama took 23 executive actions on Wednesday to curb firearm-related deaths. That and his proposals to Congress for new gun laws are a necessary response to the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

Perhaps his most important action is a directive for new research “on the causes and prevention of gun violence.” More restrictions on firearms may keep guns away from killers, but a better understanding of the roots of violent behavior – and then addressing them – would be far more effective. Most gun crimes are not done by people with mental illness but by sane people who are prone to violence.

Unfortunately, the White House seemed to focus the new research only on the relationship between violence and the kind of video games and other media images that may influence a killer. While such data would be helpful, kids who imitate fictional violence often do so because they lack a supportive family.

OPINION: Why I'm giving up my guns

Mr. Obama has often noted the need to promote marriage and family – his own family certainly serves as a model. But he must also back research that looks at links between violence and children born out of wedlock or raised by single parents.

One recent study by the Brookings Center on Children and Families, for example, found that children whose births resulted from unintended pregnancy are more likely to “engage in delinquent and criminal behavior later in life.” Author and noted psychologist Andrew Solomon finds that the first risk factor in the making of a criminal is being raised by a single parent.

Current statistics on the home lives of children are not encouraging.

Nearly 26 percent are raised by single parents, and that figure jumps to 72 percent for blacks and 71 percent for the poor. For mothers with only a high school education, more than 4 out of 10 of their children are born out of wedlock – or three times the rate of the 1980s. Only a third of births to women who are unmarried and not cohabiting are intended.

Cohabitation, in fact, has taken off. The number of couples living together without the commitment and protection of being married has more than doubled since the 1990s. In 2012, 40 percent of unmarried partners had children younger than 18.

Both public and private leaders “refuse to take on the issue of children raised by single parents – despite all the statistics showing harm – or deal with it in a meaningful way,” said Robert Doar, commissioner of the New York City Human Resources Administration, in a speech last week.

More at that top link.

This is the national debate we should be having. I've said it many times, but his refusal to address the crisis of the black family will be Obama's biggest failing --- and that's saying a lot considering how f-ked up this president is.

Glenn Greenwald on Obama's License to Kill Americans

I frankly disagree with much of the analysis here, although Greenwald's moral outrage is always a riot, "Chilling legal memo from Obama DOJ justifies assassination of US citizens." This part is very good, regardless:

When the New York Times back in April, 2010 first confirmed the existence of Obama's hit list, it made clear just what an extremist power this is, noting: "It is extremely rare, if not unprecedented, for an American to be approved for targeted killing." The NYT quoted a Bush intelligence official as saying "he did not know of any American who was approved for targeted killing under the former president". When the existence of Obama's hit list was first reported several months earlier by the Washington Post's Dana Priest, she wrote that the "list includes three Americans".

What has made these actions all the more radical is the absolute secrecy with which Obama has draped all of this. Not only is the entire process carried out solely within the Executive branch - with no checks or oversight of any kind - but there is zero transparency and zero accountability. The president's underlings compile their proposed lists of who should be executed, and the president - at a charming weekly event dubbed by White House aides as "Terror Tuesday" - then chooses from "baseball cards" and decrees in total secrecy who should die. The power of accuser, prosecutor, judge, jury, and executioner are all consolidated in this one man, and those powers are exercised in the dark.

I didn't have time, but I would've loved to post all the progressive hypocrisy on the administration's murderous, unprecedented executive tyranny. As I always say, leftist don't care about liberty. They care about power. We should have long ago seen protests up and down Pennsylvania Avenue, calling for Obama war crimes trials at the Hague. But that only happens when a Republican's in the White House. The moral bankruptcy is just stunning.

Brennan Confirmation Hearings to Put Spotlight on Administration's Drone Strikes

This ought to be interesting.

At the New York Times, "Drone Strikes’ Dangers to Get Rare Moment in Public Eye."

Also at Guardian UK, "John Brennan faces grilling over drone leak as senators demand answers."

Calvin Klein Superbowl Model is Matthew Terry, From Bethlehem, Pennsylvania

Norah O'Donnell of CBS News was digging it:

@norahodonnell She liked it. Hey Norah! #CalvinKlein
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) February 4, 2013

And here's the real dude, at London's Daily Mail, "Calvin Klein's Super Bowl hunk reveals the secret behind THOSE abs (and ladies, he's still single)."

Come and Take

At AWD, "LOOK WHO’S SPORTING A MOLON LABE T SHIRT!

An iOWNTHEWORLD joint, "The Shirt Never Looked Better."

Here's That Video of Touré Defending Obama's 'License to Kill' Drone Strike Memo

Here's the report at Twitchy, "New unmanned drone superfan Touré ‘very comfortable’ with killing Al-Qaeda leaders."

And Glenn Greenwald was ripping hard on MSNBC on Twitter.

There's a lot of news on this, fascinating news. Hannity featured a dynamite opening segment earlier and I'll try to post that later. Meanwhile, at The Hill, "Carney: Drone strikes are ‘fully consistent’ with the Constitution." (Via Memeorandum.)

The Progressive War on Science and Reason

I like this commentary, although at this point I don't trust anybody on "climate change" science. And as I've never been a hardcore creationist myself, I'd be careful about lumping conservatives wholesale into any "anti-science" category. But again, I really like the corrective here on who's truly anti-science and irrational.

From Alex Berezow and Hank Campbell, at the NewScientist, "Lefty nonsense: When progressives wage war on reason":

We have all heard about the Republican war on science; we want to draw attention to the progressive war on reason.

We recognise that the term "progressive" is potentially troublesome, so let us lay our cards on the table. In the US, "progressive" and "liberal" are often used interchangeably. But the two should not be confused.

Liberalism, as defined by John Locke, means the pursuit of liberty. By that definition progressives are not liberal. Though they claim common cause with liberals (and most of them are Democrats because very few progressives are Republican), today's progressive movement is actually socially authoritarian.

Unlike conservative authoritarians, however, they are not concerned with banning "immoral" things like sex, drugs and rock and roll. They instead seek dominion over issues such as food, the environment and education. And they claim that their policies are based on science, even when they are not.

For example, progressive activists have championed the anti-vaccine movement, confusing parents and causing a public health disaster. They have campaigned against animal research even when it remains necessary, in some cases committing violence against scientists. Instead of embracing technological progress, such as genetically modified crops, progressives have spread fear and misinformation. They have waged war against academics who question their ideology, and they are opposed to sensible reforms in science education.

We do not want not to demonise all progressives. Some are genuinely pro-science. We recognise the huge value some progressive ideas have had, and that vilifying an entire philosophy based on the actions of its radical ideologues would be unfair.

But we do want to demonise the lunatic fringe. We contend that there is a disturbing and largely unreported trend among influential progressive activists who misinterpret, misrepresent and abuse science to advance their ideological and political agendas.

Of all of today's political philosophies, progressivism stands as the most pressing problem for science. Progressives, not conservatives, are the ones most likely to replace scientific research with unscientific ideology.

Conservatives who endorse unscientific ideas are blasted by the scientific community, yet progressives who do the same get a free pass. It is important the problem be recognised, and that free pass revoked.

Be sure to read the whole thing, since there's a fabulous introduction on how the congressional Democrats switched to "environmentally sustainable" utensils at the Capitol Hill cafeteria in 2007, only to abandon the program (and blaming the Republicans for pulling the plug) after the GOP took back power in 2011.

I also like how the authors do not identify leftists as "liberals." That's important. They are not liberal. They are authoritarian.

Most of all, though, the conclusion bears repeating: "Of all of today's political philosophies, progressivism stands as the most pressing problem for science. Progressives, not conservatives, are the ones most likely to replace scientific research with unscientific ideology." Word.

How the Tories Are Screwing the Pooch — And Screwing Britain

From Melanie Phillips, at London's Daily Mail, "Why failing to stand up for marriage is the reason Tories are always in crisis":

The Tories are in ferment. Plots against David Cameron appear to be seeding like dandelion spores. Rebellion looms in the division lobbies.

The list of Mr Cameron's apparent crimes lengthens by the day.

The threatened triple-dip depression. Gay marriage. Labour's lead in the opinion polls. And the fact that the Prime Minister looks like a loser.

To which one might marvel at just what a shower these Tories are.

For they have behaved mutinously towards every one of their leaders since they toppled Mrs Thatcher in 1990.

The reason for this never-ending uproar surely lies deeper, however, than indiscipline among power-crazed MPs or the deficiencies of individual leaders.

Indeed, it explains why the Tories just can't seem to produce a leader they do support.
It is that conservatism itself is in crisis.

With some honourable exceptions, today's Tories don't appear to know what conservatism is for and what it is against.

In the last century, they all knew they had to defend Britain against socialism.
But when the Berlin Wall fell and Labour started speaking the language of market economics, the Tories seemed to conclude that their fox had been shot.

Fiasco

They could not have been more wrong. The attempt by the Left to undermine and topple Western society had merely shifted from political revolution to social and cultural issues.

And at the very centre of that systematic onslaught lay the intention to destroy the unique importance of the married family and replace it by a lifestyle free-for-all.
Not understanding the full significance of what was happening, the Tories made a total mess of the issue in the 'back to basics' fiasco under John Major, and then staged a full retreat under a barrage of attacks from the Left....

For at the heart of the decades-long onslaught by the Left against the core tenets of Western society lies the doctrine of 'non-judgmentalism', under which it has become forbidden to suggest that anyone's lifestyle is more socially desirable than any other.
Worse still, those whose behaviour lies outside conventional social norms are deemed to be 'victims' and their demands have been relabelled 'rights'.

So views that mothers and fathers are better for children than lone parents or step-parents, or that deliberately having babies outside marriage is selfish and irresponsible, have became unsayable.

The fundamental need children have for their own mother and father has simply been trumped by the selfish desires of adults.

Breakdown

To mask this abandonment of children, their core need was redefined as being 'lifted out of poverty' - which merely made their mothers ever more dependent on state benefits, and thus promoted sexual anarchy even further.

The result has been an unmitigated disaster. In some areas, several generations of family disintegration have resulted in a total breakdown in parenting, so that children are becoming horrifyingly incapable of even basic functions.

According to the Government's adviser on problem families, Louise Casey, some three-year-olds are unable to walk because they are habitually parked in their buggies in front of the TV.

And Russell Hobby, general secretary of the National Association of Headteachers, has spoken of children who, when they come to school, can only grunt as they haven't been taught to speak; and who may also still be in nappies at the age of five.

Ms Casey laments that no official initiatives seem to get through to such families. Of course not - because the one thing that is needed above all, to remove the perverse incentives that have destroyed marriage in such areas, is the one policy that will never be enacted.

The real reason the Tories won't properly address this is not just the inane social nihilism of Nick Clegg. It is surely because the Tory leadership itself has such a shallow and reductive view of marriage - including among its supposed cheerleaders.

Look at the reasons they give for supporting marriage - that it promotes stability, unselfishness and self-sacrifice. That was the substance of Michael Gove's paean of praise for the institution yesterday, as he made the case for extending it to gays.

RTWT at that top link.

And also, "DAILY MAIL COMMENT: Gay marriage and a split no one wanted."

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer Caves on ObamaCare's Medicaid Expansion

She's a real fighter, and always one of my favorite GOP governors, but this is not the best news.

At WSJ, "The GOP's ObamaCare Flippers":

As D-Day looms for ObamaCare, one big question is how many states will sign up for its Medicaid expansion. The recent and spectacular flip-flop of Arizona Governor Jan Brewer is a case study in the political pressure and fiscal gimmicks designed to get states to succumb. It's also a study in the arcane and perverse ObamaCare incentives that are intended to gather ever more health-care spending under federal control.

***
Arizona's current Medicaid program is well run by the program's standards—a low bar—but it is also too large. The program now finances one of every two in-state births and two of every three days seniors spend in nursing homes. Spending tripled in the last decade to $9 billion a year.

That's despite $1.8 billion in cuts since 2009. The state fisc was such a mess that in 2010 Arizona Medicaid banned paying for several types of organ transplants. In March of that year, Ms. Brewer wrote to Mr. Obama calling the Affordable Care Act "a vast new entitlement program that our country does not have the resources to support" and also one that "makes our situation much worse, exacerbating our state's fiscal woes by billions of dollars."

Arizona argued before the Supreme Court that the Medicaid mandate was unconstitutional, anti-federalist commandeering—and seven Justices agreed it was "a gun to the head" and allowed states to opt out without penalty.

But so much for that. In her State of the State address last month, Ms. Brewer pulled a political 180°—or maybe 540°—and said expanding Medicaid would "inject $2 billion into our economy and "save and create thousands of jobs." (Is Larry Summers moonlighting as a Brewer speechwriter?)

One secret of her switcheroo is Medicaid's "matching rate" formula, in which the feds pick up 67% of Arizona's existing spending and 100% (and later 90%) of the costs of ObamaCare's newly eligible population. The state supposedly no longer needs to spend "billions" but merely an extra $154 million in 2014—then bank $1.6 billion from Washington, which her budget documents call "a return on investment of more than 10-to-1."

How can the state conjure such money from nothing? The answer is that Ms. Brewer and Arizona hospitals have cooked up a spending scheme to rip off national taxpayers to avoid even the $154 million the state would at first pay. The hospital lobby first floated this scheme in 2011 "for the specific purpose of generating matching federal Medicaid funds."

Continue reading.

RELATED: At Politico, "Kasich's Obamacare flip burns conservatives."