Elizabeth Smart Speaks Publicly of Ordeal For First Time

From the Los Angeles Times, "Elizabeth Smart, Abducted in 2002 in Utah, Speaks Publicly of Her Ordeal for the First Time":

For the first time since her 2002 abduction captured worldwide attention, Elizabeth Smart spoke publicly about her ordeal, testifying Thursday in federal court that self-proclaimed religious prophet Brian David Mitchell repeatedly invoked religion to justify the sexual abuse she said she endured for nine months.

"Any time that I showed resistance or hesitation he turned to me and said, 'The Lord says you have to do this, you have to experience the lowest form of humanity to experience the highest,' " said Smart, who was 14 when she was kidnapped.

Testifying in a hearing to determine whether Mitchell is mentally competent to face federal kidnapping charges, Smart, now 21, calmly said she had been shackled and repeatedly raped. She testified that Mitchell "married" her in a bizarre wedding ceremony the night of her abduction and that he believed he would vanquish the anti-Christ someday soon.

Her kidnapping set off a nationwide search, which ended in 2003 when a motorist spotted Smart, who was a wearing blue pillowcase-like veil over her face, as she walked down a street in a Salt Lake City suburb with Mitchell and his wife, Wanda Barzee. The motorist recognized Mitchell from news reports.

Mitchell and Barzee have been ruled mentally incompetent to stand trial in state court. Federal prosecutors have filed kidnapping charges against them and called Smart as a witness to bolster their case that Mitchell, who has been in a state mental hospital for years, is faking his mental illness to avoid punishment.

Smart has remained largely out of the public eye since her abduction, though she appeared on CNN to offer advice to Jaycee Lee Dugard, who in August was discovered 18 years after being kidnapped from South Lake Tahoe.

"I would just encourage her to find different passions in life and continually push forward and learn more and reach more for them," Smart said, "and not to look behind, because there's a lot out there."

More at the link.

At the video above, "Elizabeth Smart's Dad Speaks."

Laughing Matter: Audience Erupts as Letterman Admits to Affairs

Sister Toldjah's got the story, "Video/Transcript of Audience Laughing as Letterman Admits to Affairs." Plus, here's the YouTube from the Los Angeles Times, "David Letterman on Extortion Attempt: 'I Felt Menaced By This'":

Also, at AP, "Letterman Creates Brilliant Hour of TV From Woes." But see Neptunus Lex:

Have we really come to the point in our culture where child rape can be forgiven if you make good movies? Where the sexual exploitation of employees is forgivable so long as the exploiter makes us laugh? I ask once more: Who are these people?

Via Memeorandum.

Republicans Target Obama's Foreign Policy

From the Los Angeles Times, "GOP Targets Obama's Foreign Policy":

As he embraces direct talks with Iran and weighs his strategy in Afghanistan, President Obama is facing a new political threat from Republicans: Be hawkish on foreign policy or risk letting your party be painted as weak in next year's midterm elections.

Top Republicans have adopted that line of attack in recent days, led by congressional leaders and at least two of the party's possible 2012 presidential contenders.

Their warnings to the president mark a shift in tone and tactics for a Republican Party that had been largely supportive of Obama administration policies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The GOP lost its long-held advantage as the party of national security when the public rejected the policies of former President George W. Bush in the 2006 and 2008 elections. But now, Republican strategists say that foreign policy could prove to be a potent weapon in 2010.

The Republican strategists are poring over Obama speeches, such as his June address to the Muslim world, that they can portray as apologies for American actions abroad.

Additionally, GOP strategists are homing in on Obama's recent policy shift on missile defense, in which the administration decided to cancel a radar installation in the Czech Republic and ground-based interceptors in Poland that had been proposed by Bush to protect Europe from Iranian long-range missiles. Obama wants to focus instead on combating short-range missiles that some intelligence officials say are a more likely threat.

Republicans are panning that shift as a unilateral concession to Russia, which viewed the Bush missile plan as a threat.

"The agenda is coming down the pike on national security, and Republicans are going to see an opportunity to regain the mantle," said Vin Weber, a former congressman from Minnesota who is advising the governor of that state, Tim Pawlenty, on a possible White House bid in 2012.

Well, it's not like it's going to be hard or anything.

I meant to post this earlier (and take five minutes and read the whol thing), from Pat in Shreveport: Caroline Glick's majesterial essay, "An Enfeebled Obama."

Cartoon Credit: Theo Spark.

Are Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter Good for Conservatives? or, David Frum's Political Stockholm Syndrome (And Charles Johnson's)

From Frontpage Magazine, "Are Sarah Palin and Ann Coulter Good for Conservatives?" (with David Horowitz on David Frum's emotional attachment to the right's partisan enemies):

It seems to me you are suffering from a kind of political Stockholm syndrome. You inhabit a mental universe shaped by media like Newsweek and the New York Review of Books, in which you are a hostage of the Left. As a result you’ve absorbed some of their attitudes, and look at Palin and other non-U conservatives through their eyes, instead of your own.

Also, amazingly, Charles Johnson's mounting a smear campaign against Palin's book. A Google link is here: "Sarah Palin's Book Ghostwritten by Associate of White Supremacist McCain." Pluse, here's the Google cached page of Little Green Footballs. It's okay to click without giving Charles Johnson any blog hits. Check Saber Point for more on that, "If You Just HAVE to Visit "Little Green Footballs," Here's the Way to Do It", and "Mentally Ill Blogger Charles Johnson Hides Shrinking Numbers of New Members."

Related: More Palin Derangement, " Steve Schmidt: Palin Would Be “Catastrophic” For GOPers in 2012" (via Memeorandum).

Sarah Palin: Going Rogue Cover Shot, Book Description Now Available

TrogloPundit's been having fun with the Sarah Palin photo I posted the other day at my Going Rogue announcement. So perhaps now's a good time to say a few words about Ms. Palin ...

It turn's out that Fire Andrea Mitchell tweeted the cover-photo for the book jacket of the autobiograpy, Going Rogue: An American Life. I've posted the picture at the sidebar. Click here to pre-order. See also, Conservatives for Sarah Palin, "The Cover to "Going Rogue: An American Life"; Updated: Harper Collins Book Description Added."

There's also an interesting story up at Politico, "Palin Co-Author: Evangelical, Partisan." It turns out that Palin's co-author is Lynn Vincent, who wrote Donkey Cons with Robert Stacy McCain:

There are at least three types of politicians' books. One is the overtly autobiographical, in which an aspiring candidate casts his or her life in heroic terms. Another is the careful, policy-heavy memoir. Some of those, like Obama's "The Audacity of Hope," feed public curiosity, but more often disappear without a ripple. (Remember John Kerry's "A Call to Service"? Didn't think so.) The more commercially promising sort is the third kind, the fire-breathing partisan tract.

Palin's choice of Vincent suggests that hers will be, emphatically, a partisan tract. And it is of a piece with a post-election posture in which the nation's most intensely popular, and most intensely unpopular, Republican has chosen to deepen her bond with her base at the cost of antipathy from the independent voters who decide presidential elections.

"Sarah Palin is not a Washington person - that's her whole schtick - so she's not going to get some inside the Beltway writer," said Sara Nelson, a longtime publishing industry watcher who is books editor of Oprah Winfrey's Magazine, "O."

"The success of this book will rise and fall on how much it appeals to the Christian right," Nelson said. She called Vincent "a smart choice," if a surprising one, given that Palin was represented in her dealings with publisher HarperCollins by the ultimate Beltway insider, lawyer Robert Barnett, who also handles Obama's book projects and those of dozens of other Washington eminences.

I'm betting interest is going to explode in upcoming weeks. I'm just LOVING that hyper-partisan angle. And Palin's going to start raking in so much PAC-cash it's ridiculous!

And, from Glenn Reynolds, "SARAH PALIN’S BOOK remains #1 on Amazon. Quite impressive, given the media hostility."

Anyway, Smitty at The Other McCain's got some additional samples from the Troglopundit experiment, "Sarah Palin AutoMotivator."

Plus, see my friend Dana over at "Common Sense Political Thought," and also, Ginny Ray at Obi’s Sister, The Blog Prof, and The Rhetorican.

David Letterman Admits Sexual Affairs With Staffers, Details Extortion Plot

From ABC News, "David Letterman Confession: I Had Sex With Staffers, Got Targeted by Extortionist":

David Letterman told the audience of his late night talk show that he had sexual relationships with female members of his staff, and added he forked over a bogus $2 million check as part of an extortion plot on the matter.

Letterman, 62, made the confessions to the audience during a taping of "The Late Show" for broadcast Thursday night, according to a statement by Worldwide Pants Inc., Letterman's production company.

"This morning, I did something I've never done in my life," Letterman told his audience, according to the statement. "I had to go downtown and testify before a grand jury."

During that testimony, Letterman acknowledged unspecified sexual relationships with staff members, the Worldwide Pants statement said.

"My response to that [allegation of sexual relationships] is, 'Yes I have.' Would it be embarrassing if it were made public? Perhaps it would," Letterman said. "I feel like I need to protect these people. I need to certainly protect my family."

Earlier this year, Letterman announced on his show his marriage to his longtime girlfriend, Regina Lasko, who he began dating in the 1980s. The pair have a son, Harry Joseph Letterman, whose impending arrival Letterman announced on his show in 2003.

It's unclear from the Worldwide Pants statement when Letterman's sexual relations with his female staffers occurred.

But according to the statement, Letterman received a package three weeks ago containing a threat to reveal those indiscretions "if Letterman did not pay the individual a large sum of money" -- specified in a later communication as $2 million.

More at the link.

This story's still pretty much breaking. See also, TMZ, "Letterman Says Someone's Extorting Him." (Via WeSmirch.) Nothing at Memeorandum yet.

Hat Tip: Fire Andrea Mitchell on Twitter (sceencap above). Plus, "Old Perv David Letterman Admits to Affairs With MULTIPLE Female Staffers."

**********

UPDATE: There's a Memeorandum thread going now --- it's going to be a big one!

Are Republicans Making a Comeback?

From Dan Balz, "A Republican Comeback?":

Are Republicans at a low ebb or making a comeback?

The question is prompted by the new release from the Gallup organization, which showed that the gap in party identification is now the smallest it has been since 2005. Democrats are still in the lead, but not by the double-digit margins they often enjoyed the past two years.

The report was the second in a month from Gallup to suggest that, eight months into the Obama administration, Democrats are losing favor with at least a portion of the electorate. Republicans are cheering the findings as a sign of a potentially important change in the political landscape. Democratic strategists offer cautionary notes about what is actually happening.

Bunch of caveats here, blah, blah ... then:

In the first three months of this year, Gallup found that 17 percent of all adults were independents who leaned toward the Democrats, and 11 percent independents who leaned toward the Republicans. Since then, however, Democrats have lost ground with indpendents and Republicans have gained ground. Gallup's third quarter data showed that 15 percent of adults were Republican-leaning independents, and 13 percent Democratic-leaning independents.

Jennifer Agiesta, The Post's polling analyst, did some calculations to look at how these "non-partisans" have leaned over the past few years in Post-ABC News polls. The results show a reduction in the Democrats' advantage of previous years. From 2005 through 2007, these non-partisans said they leaned toward the Democrats by margins of 13, 16 and 12 percentage points. In 2008, that fell to 8 points and so far this year, the gap has been 6 points.

Democratic Mark Mellman said the narrowing gap is not unexpected, given some decline in Obama's popularity and the state of the economy. "One would expect the Democratic advantage to be down from its recent highs," he said in a message. But he noted that a six-point advantage is still healthy.

Republican pollster Neil Newhouse said that, in the past few years, public antipathy toward Bush drove some self-identified Republicans to start calling themselves independents and Democratic-leaning independents to call themselves Democrats -- in other words a general shift to the left in people's perceptions of their party identification.

"In response to Obama's overreaching and overspending, what we're seeing is a slight reversal of that previous trend -- [independents] are turning against Obama and the partisan margin between [Republicans and Democrats] is narrowing," he said.

Democratic pollster Anna Greenberg called the evidence of movement mixed but said she believed that, with the shift of some independents into the Democratic camp, the remaining independents may be more Republican in their attitudes.

"Independents, by definition, tend to be more socially liberal than Republicans and less populist than Democrats, so I would expect them to express more skepticism about the role of government and issues of government spending when it comes to health care reform," she said.

That's actually a bit of over-analysis. Frankly, self-identified independents have been going up all year. The glow is off the hope-and-change bandwagon. The tea partiers have had a dramatic effect, and Democratic Party hubris and thuggery have been pulling down the left's numbers like anchors overboard. And as the public increasingly clues-in to the Democrats' culture of corruption at the highest levels of government, the GOP's fortunes will continue to improve regardless of partisan identifications.

Folks want effective government. The economy is not improving, and new reports indicate that the left's economic stimulus was basically a big-government scam (see Robert Barro and Charles Redlick, "Stimulus Spending Doesn't Work" ... via Memeorandum). And now that President Obama has prioritized Olympic lobbying over pressing U.S. domestic and foreign problems, new survey data find a plurality of Americans calling his Copenhagen trip a "bad idea." Don Surber sums up the overarching trend: "Change. Hope. 2012."

Brendan Nyhan is trying (hopelessly) to argue otherwise, and he notes that "the Republicans are currently viewed more negatively than any minority party in the previous four midterms in terms of both net favorables and the difference in net favorables between parties." According to Nyhan, it remains to be seen if these hypothesized negatives will "translate into fewer GOP House seats at the polls ..." Of course, the "generic ballot" measures mean that many questions remain "to be addressed."

All this political science is killing me!

Thankfully, Ronald Brownstein's got the remedy, "A Fleeting GOP Boost In 2010?: Republicans May Do Very Well in the Midterms Without Solving Their Demographic Challenges":

From all indications, the face of the electorate will look very different in 2010 from the way it did in 2008. That prospect presents an immediate danger for Democrats. But it also represents a more subtle, long-term threat for Republicans.

Small shifts in who votes can have big consequences on Election Day. And Democrats face the disquieting likelihood that the groups that most favor President Obama (particularly young people and minorities) will decline as a share of the vote next year while the voters who are most disaffected from him (white seniors) will increase their share.

The GOP's longer-term threat Cook addresses is the demography-is-destiny model of generational realignment to the Democrats. The obvious response is to remind folks that we haven't had a true partisan realignment since the 1930s. If the Dems were going to have one, it would have been in 2008. And how's that turning out now? The GOP's going to get back to basics. New candidates will emerge as the next generation of leadership for the party. The conservative/libertarian grassroots that's been mobilized this year will coalesce into a center-right majority as the prospects of electoral power come into focus. The long-term partisan challenge will be for the Democrats: How will the contemporary left develop a new governing philosophy on the shoals of the eviscerated hope-and-changism of the disastrous Barack Obama interregnum?

The Communist League in Canada

Well, as they say, you learn something new everyday. Check out this flyer from Canada's Communist League, via Lumpy, Grumpy and Frumpy:

World Capitalism Has Entered its deepest depresion that is part of the deepest social and economic crisis in living memory. Canada's ruling class families are fully part of the expanding wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan. 2,700 Canadian troops are in Afghanistan where Washington is substantially increasing the number of U.S. of troops and the power and the size of the command structure in that region. At the same time, 130,000 troops remain in Iraq ...

It turns out that the local candidates mentioned at the flyer as associated with Pathfinder Press, which is the publishing house for Canada's pro-Castro communist international. More on these folks at the link.

It's amazing how widespread is communist agitation today, in the U.S., Canada, and elsewhere. The agenda of the anti-capitalist protesters at last week's G-20 wasn't all that different --- perhaps more on the "anarchy" side of things. But next week International ANSWER is mounting nationwide protests to mark the 8th anniversary of the war in Afghanistan.

I'll have more on that later.

Hat Tip: Blazing Cat Fur.

From 'Knuckle-Dragger' to 'Traitor': Democratic Demonization Gets Threatening

You know, it's bad enough that we have cowardly Congressman Alan Grayson attacking conservatives as "knuckle dragging Neanderthals." That slur apparently received a warm welcome by the Democratic leadership. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi declared that Representative Grayson has no need to apologize, and that's despite widespread condemnation of Grayson from mainstream quarters. Gloria Borger decried Grayson's remarks as resorting to the exact same name-calling Democrats claim to denounce. The context for Grayson is Joe Wilson's "you lie" exclamation during President Obama's recent address on healthcare. Put aside the fact that the President is a liar and dissembler, it takes an awful lot of gall for Democrats to smear concerned citizens and their elected representatives in Congress as "knuckle-draggers."

That's par for the course, though, naturally. As Confederate Yankee so aptly put it earlier this week, "The Real Extremists Are on the Left." (Leftists at a CBS News blog suggested conservatives should be arrested and shot while "attempting to escape.")

So it's no surprise to see the genuinely evil hatred at The Swash Zone blog this week. The blog's proprietor, (O)CT(O)PUS, has declared a jihad against the "racist" conservative "birthers" and "teabaggers." See, "THE GRAND INSURRECTION PARTY AND THE POLITICS OF TREASON":

The party out of power has devolved from the Loyal Opposition Party to the Oppositional-Defiant Party,” and now the “Grand Insurrection Party.” The time-honored art of political compromise and consensus is dead. The GOP has opted out of participatory democracy.

Samuel Johnson once said: “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” Your humble Octopus disagrees. The U.S. Constitution affords plenty of mud-wiggle room for scoundrels. If patriotism is the first refuge, the First Amendment is the next, where cowards assert their bigotry and stupidity by saying anything they want under Constitutional protection, or so they think. The Second Amendment offers yet another refuge: When reason and civil discourse fail, the malcontents and misfits of the GOP invoke this Amendment to incite others to violence by proxy, or so they think. The fear-mongering, hate-mongering scoundrels of the GOP overlook a fundamental point.

We have the same rights. We won the last two elections. We have a mandate to reverse the failed policies of the GOP whether they like it or not. With each passing day, the GOP has pushed political discourse beyond the fringes of civilization, and the time is long overdue to hold them accountable before more people get killed. I will defend my politics, my principles, and my person with words as I must and with arms (all 8 of them) if necessary. Octopus hath spoken.

If you check that link cited by (O)CT(O)PUS at bottom there, it goes to a site spreading more of the same leftists hysteria and smears surrounding the William Sparkman murder. Of course, as Ann Althouse noted recently - reflecting the view of more reasoned individuals, "I'd say that Sparkman, doing his census work, encountered a criminal enterprise — perhaps a drug lab — out where people thought no one would — or should — be coming around."

The real crazies are the radical leftists who can't tolerate passionate dissent. From Barack Obama to Nancy Pelosi, and then on down to the most frighteningly nihilistic elements of the extreme-left blogosphere, the Democratic Party looks increasingly intent to crush the free speech rights of traditional Americans concerned about real, rising threats of Democratic authoritarianism. It's quite amazing, really.

Representative Alan Grayson: Republicans Are 'Knuckle Dragging Neanderthals'

Yep, Represenative Grayson actually says it: Republicans are "knuckle-dragging Neanderthals who think they can dictate policy to America" (at about 5:55 minutes):

The "knuckle draggers" slur is pretty popular across the leftosphere --- which explains how stupid an attack it is. (The "knuckle dragging" associations are based on essentially racist stereotypes that have been debunked by scientific anthropology ... so much for the "reality-based" community!)

But check out Michelle Malkin's post, "Alan Grayson’s Diarrhea of the Mouth."

And in some related diarrhea, Matthew Yglesias applauds Grayson's politically incorrect demonology, and essentially extends the knuckle dragging slur --- in defending global warming hysteria --- to the "stupid" population of the U.S. conservative heartland:

In particular, you really can’t talk about the climate change issue in a sensible way without mentioning the irreducible wrongness of residents of a large developed nation endangering the lives and livelihoods of a couple billion people in the developing world with our industrial activities.

Stay classy, Matt.

First SNL, Now 'So You Think You Can Dance': Is Pop Culture Safe for Kids These Days?

I guess it's a good thing that I'm a news junkie, because popular entertainment's getting pretty raunchy these days - and that's saying something. Just last weekend, Jenny Slate swore on Saturday Night Live (and apparently Megan Fox put in a bump-and-grind star-turn with Kenan Thompson). And now it turns out that an auditioner on Tuesday night's "So You Think You Can Dance" flashed her private parts while rolling around on the floor. The New York Daily News has the story, " 'So You Think You Can Dance' Flash: Contestant Exposes Herself on National TV." But for a bit more of an in-the-know take, see DListed, "So You Think You Can Flash Your S***** On Network TV?":

THINK OF THE CHILDREN! First, Jenny Slate f*** bombed us all on SNL this past weekend, and now a giant bare vagina made an appearance on So You Think You Can Dance last night (see above NSFWish). No, Ryan Gaycrest was not a guest judge. An actual vagina popped out on stage when a dancer invited us into her carniceria during her audition. I KNOW! Our pure eyes have been tainted. We should have never boarded the Mayflower and come to America. Dark-sided!

Go to the OMG Blog for even more explict coverage (NSFW).

Everyone's apparently getting a kick out of it, but frankly, it's to the point where is actually not culturally safe to watch television - and readers know I'm no prude, But geez, I've got young kids!

American Nihilist Defends Suspected Terrorist Najibullah Zazi: Blames U.S. Imperialism!

Here's more of the standard-fare anti-Americanism we can expect from the demonic boys at American Nihilist, "Locking up the Innocent." The piece is defending Najibullah Zazi, who has pled not guilty to allegations the he's the mastermind of what's being called "one of the most serious terrorist attacks on American soil since Sept. 11, 2001."

Here's the comments, from Dr. Obama Biobrain:

The man pled not guilty, yet they're keeping him in jail anyway. What part of "not guilty" don't they understand? It might make sense to keep him locked up if he had admitted he was guilty, I mean, assuming he wasn't making a joke. But someone who says they're not guilty? What sort of justice system is this? Whatever happened to the presumption of innocence?

And the main thing to remember is that this guy's an Afghan immigrant, so we really owe him something. After all, we sent our imperialist troops to his country, sullying his native land with our impure materialism and infidel religion, and we were guilty as hell. Yet our troops roam free, even after admitting to the murders of thousands of his people, while this guy remains locked up for merely wanting to murder ours.

In other words, Americans deserve whatever Zazi and his allies are ready to dish out.

Great. Real patriots over there at American Nihilist.

For the full details, see Atlas Shrugs, "NY Jihad Raid Goes National: Denver jihad plot suspect admits Al-Qaeda ties," and "FBI: Notes on Jihad bomb-making in Zazi [the nazi's] handwriting - Target NYC,"

The Obama Experiment: 'President Obama’s Health Care Taxes'

From The Obama Experiment, "“Dictionary” on President Obama’s Health Care Taxes":

More good stuff at BarackObamaExperiment.com.

Related: James Pethokoukis, "Obama’s Not-So-Secret Plan to Raise Taxes" (via Memeorandum).

All American Blogger: 'Obama’s Cult of Personality'

Another great video from Duane Lester at All American Blogger, "Obama’s Cult of Personality":

Check RightWingNews for links to Duane's previous v-logs.

Nude Brooke Shields Exhibit Prompts Backlash

A photo exhibit featuring images of a young Brooke Shields nude has sparked a cultural and political backlash. Lots of stories in the news. See, "Exhibit Featuring Nude Photo of 10-year-Old Brooke Shields Sparks Outrage." (Via Memeorandum.)

Plus, the Daily Mail, "Tate Removes Nude Picture of 10-Year-Old Brooke Shields After Police Pornography Probe." And from London's Telegraph, "Tate Modern's Brooke Shields Photograph: A Crass Lack of Morals in Mink-Coated Reagan Years":

Whenever the Metropolitan Police force is called to an art gallery to defend our morals, you can be sure that the work they don't want the public to see will be one of the most important in the show.

Tate Modern's Pop Life is a fascinating show, but one of the most interesting works in it is the American artist Richard Prince's 1983 work Spiritual America.

It takes the form of a ready-made or found object – a publicity photograph showing the prepubescent actress Brooke Shields naked, her body wet from the bath. What's more, her hair has been elaborately done and she is wearing so much lipstick, mascara and eye shadow that it looks as though the head of a 25-year-old Playmate had been spliced on the body of a child. The original photo was commissioned with the approval of the child's mother who, as her manager, allowed it to be published in the soft porn magazine Sugar n' Spice as a tactic to get her daughter noticed and so further her career.

The Telegraph features a partial shot of controversial image. The full photograph is here, The Saatchi Gallery: London Contemporary Art Gallery.

Above Image Credit: Denver Post.

ACORN's Socialist Party Cadres

From Founding Bloggers, "ACORN’s Political Parties and Their Democratic Socialist Patron":

See also, Red State, "Inside The ACORN Rolodex: ACORN Has Its Own Political Party Other Than the Democrats."

Communists Mobilize 'Direct Action' for ObamaCare: 'Aetna is the Real Death Panel'

At the video: Demonstrators are wearing "Medicare for All" t-shirts. Check the website at Health Care for All. Here's the blurb from the YouTube:

The 19 participants, wearing T-shirts with slogans that read Medicare for All and chanting patients, not profits! linked arms and sat down in the lobby of the Aetna building, prompting Aetna employees to step around them on their way into their offices, where insurance claim reviewers are busy looking for ways to deny people the lifesaving treatment that they need. A crowd of supporters picketing outside the building held signs that said "Aetna is the real death panel," and "Single payer now."

And from the neo-Stalinist Democracy Now!, "As Senate Panel Debates Public Option, Groups Take Direct Action to Promote Single Payer" (via Memeorandum):

These are life and death decisions, and their profits should not be coming before patients.

But the overlying message of this is that the healthcare—health insurance industry should not be seen as a solution to our healthcare crisis. They are the cancer of the healthcare crisis. We need a single-payer system. And the band-aid, putting over the cancer, that President Obama and the Democrats are pursuing in Washington is not going to make the situation better. In fact, it’s going to make it worse, because they’re going to empower these insurance companies with hundreds of billions of dollars in annual new revenue by having working people, who can’t even afford to put food on the table in too many kinds, forced to buy private insurance that’s overpriced and a pretty lousy product. It’s amazing that we’re seeing the government forcing people to buy insurance, when the insurance industry is the cause of so much of the problems that we’re facing here.

So, people who want to get involved in this, we’re looking for people to sign up to protest, mobilizeforhealthcare.org, and come there and sign up, whether you’re a patient, whether you’re—want to get involved in this. We’ve had hundreds of people sign up already, and we want hundreds and hundreds more, because this is going to be a national campaign.

And here's the lineup of affiliated groups, at Healthcare for All:

INITIATING GROUPS: Healthcare-NOW!, Prosperity Agenda, Center for the Working Poor

ENDORSING GROUPS: Progressive Democrats of America, AfterDowningStreet.org

Socialists, communists, and union goons. These folks wanted death panels for Bush/Cheney.

And despite the disclaimer, they're totally in the tank for Barack Obama, demonizing everyday Americans who work hard, pay the bills, and support the system. Recall Gallup's survey out today, for example, "Gallup: 61 Percent Say Health Insurance is Personal Responsibility."

See also, the New York Times, "17 Held in Protest Outside Health Insurer’s Offices."

'This Is Our Secret' - Roman Polanski Grand Jury Transcript

Steve Lopez has the best piece I've read on the Polankski story yet, "Polanski's Defenders Lose Sight of the True Victim." Liberal quotations from the transcript. And isn't it classic when we have the molester tell the victim, "This is our secret"? ...

Quoting again from the grand jury transcript, with the girl being questioned by a prosecutor:

Q: Did you take your shirt off or did Mr. Polanski?

A: No, I did.

Q: Was that at his request or did you volunteer to do that?

A: That was at his request.

She said Polanski later went into the bathroom and took part of a Quaalude pill and offered her some, as well, and she accepted.

Q: Why did you take it?

A: I don't know. I think I must have been pretty drunk or else I wouldn't have.

So here she is, at 13, washing down a Quaalude with champagne, and then Polanski suggested they move out to the Jacuzzi.

Q: When you got in the Jacuzzi, what were you wearing?

A: I was going to wear my underwear, but he said for me to take them off.

She says Polanski went back in the house and returned in the nude and got into the Jacuzzi with her. When he told her to move closer to him, she resisted, saying, "No. No, I got to get out."

He insisted, she testified, and so she moved closer and he put his hands around her waist. She told him she had asthma and wanted to get out, and she did. She said he followed her into the bathroom, where she told him, "I have to go home now."

Q: What did Mr. Polanski say?

A: He told me to go in the other room and lie down.

She testified that she was afraid and sat on the couch in the bedroom.

Q: What were you afraid of?

A: Him.

She testified that Polanski sat down next to her and said she'd feel better. She repeated that she had to go home.

Q: What happened then?

A: He reached over and he kissed me. And I was telling him, "No," you know, "Keep away." But I was kind of afraid of him because there was no one else there.

She testified that he put his mouth on her vagina.

"I was ready to cry," she said. "I was kind of -- I was going, 'No. Come on. Stop it.' But I was afraid."

She said he then pulled off her panties.

Q: What happened after that?

A: He started to have intercourse with me.

At this point, she testified, Polanski became concerned about the consequences and asked if she was on the pill.

No, she told him.

Polanski had a solution, according to her.

"He goes, 'Would you want me to go in through your back?' And I went, 'No.' "

According to her, that didn't stop Polanski, who began having anal sex with her.

This was when the victim was asked by the prosecutor if she resisted and she said, "Not really," because "I was afraid of him." She testified that when the ordeal had ended, Polanski told her, "Oh, don't tell your mother about this."

He added: "This is our secret."

But it wasn't a secret for long. When the victim got home and told her story, her mother called the police.

Also, from Marcia Clark, "Polanski's Lost Alibi" (via Memeorandum):

Assuming Polanski loses his fight to resist extradition, he’ll be back in court—and not “just” for the rape. He now could be charged with failing to appear in court. It’s a slam-dunk of a charge in this case, and it carries a potential sentence of three years in state prison. If it’s proven that Judge Rittenband intended to violate the plea bargain, it’ll make Polanski’s flight understandable, but it won’t make it legal. Nevertheless, the defense will most certainly play this card for maximum advantage to show why Polanski shouldn’t be punished for having fled before the sentencing.

There is some talk that the defense might ask to withdraw the plea on the rape charge and go to trial, but I very much doubt that will happen. Polanski’s looking at a long fall if the case gets pulled together.

Plus, at Cold Fury, "The Last Word on Polanski."

The Media-Terrorist Complex

From Snapped Shot, "The Media-Terrorist Complex Rises Again":

Believe it or not, one of these two photographs is real.

Masked Palestinian Hamas militants speak to the press during a press conference in Gaza City, Wednesday, Sept. 30, 2009. Israel and Hamas militants announced a deal Wednesday that will see Israel release 20 Palestinian women from prison this week in exchange for a videotape proving that a captive Israeli soldier held in the Gaza Strip is still alive. The decision was the first tangible sign of movement in more than three years of talks over the release of the soldier, Sgt. Gilad Schalit, who has not been seen since he was captured by Hamas-linked militants in a cross-border raid in June 2006. (AP Photo/Hatem Moussa)

*********

Be sure to read the full post. I like this part:

Would you have attended these press conferences if the Ku Klux Klan was hosting one about the evils of the civil rights movement?

Would you be going out of your way to provide the Nazi German point of view during coverage of World War II?And editors, would you allow glowing coverage of either of those two groups to dominate your news coverage?

Because Hamas, an organization which has genocide written into its constitution, is no better than either of those two groups—and yet, you seem to think that the news consumers of the world are dying to know what Hamas has to say.

Hat Tip: Atlas Shrugs.

Another Mumbai? Qaeda-Taliban-Lashkar Ready to Strike Again

Recall former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's statement last week:

The last time we left Afghanistan, and we abandoned Pakistan ... that territory became the very territory on which Al Qaeda trained and attacked us on September 11th. So our national security interests are very much tied up in not letting Afghanistan fail again and become a safe haven for terrorists.

It's that simple ... if you want another terrorist attack in the U.S., abandon Afghanistan.

Keep that in mind when noting this morning's frontpage report at the New York Times, "Militant Group Is Intact After Mumbai Siege" (via Mememorandum):

Ten months after the devastating attacks in Mumbai by Pakistan-based militants, the group behind the assault remains largely intact and determined to strike India again, according to current and former members of the group, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and intelligence officials.

Despite pledges from Pakistan to dismantle militant groups operating on its soil, and the arrest of a handful of operatives, Lashkar has persisted, even flourished, since 10 recruits killed 163 people in a rampage through Mumbai, India’s financial capital, last November.

Indian and Pakistani dossiers on the Mumbai investigations, copies of which were obtained by The New York Times, offer a detailed picture of the operations of a Lashkar network that spans Pakistan. It included four houses and two training camps here in this sprawling southern port city that were used to prepare the attacks.

Among the organizers, the Pakistani document says, was Hammad Amin Sadiq, a homeopathic pharmacist, who arranged bank accounts and secured supplies. He and six others begin their formal trial on Saturday in Pakistan, though Indian authorities say the prosecution stops well short of top Lashkar leaders.

Indeed, Lashkar’s broader network endures, and can be mobilized quickly for elaborate attacks with relatively few resources, according to a dozen current and former Lashkar militants and intelligence officials from the United States, Europe, India and Pakistan.

There's not much of a thread on this at Memeorandum. Nor is there much of a thread at Andrew Malcolm's piece on the Obama administration's Afghan withdrawal agenda, which I discussed here: "What Obama Won't Say ... America Will Cut and Run From Afghanistan."

But folks should not be complacent about the catastrophic threats ahead, nor should folks be reassured by Democratic foreign policy grandstanding. Secretary Rice nailed it: If you want another terrorist attack in the U.S., abandon Afghanistan.

See also, American Digest, "The Road to a Democrat Led Defeat of America Goes Through Afghanistan."