Sarah Palin: The Free Market Antidote to Obamunism

The Blog Prof has a great post up this morning, "Hundreds Wait All Night In 30F Weather In MI To Meet Sarah Palin At Book Signing."

But check out Matthew Continetti's piece this morning, at the Los Angeles Times, "Palin Unveils Her Latest Persona: Her Incarnation as Sarah the Celebrity Paves the Way for Sarah the Free Marketer":

Sarah Palin has a talent for reinvention. Since her first campaign in 1992, she's gone through a wardrobe full of political personas. Study her career and you count no less than five different identities: Sarah the culture warrior, Sarah the watchdog, Sarah the reformer, Sarah the veep and now, Sarah the celebrity.

Such flexibility has allowed Palin to adapt to changing political circumstances. And in a tumultuous political moment, Palin's pragmatism is an advantage.

In fact, we are already seeing the outlines of identity number six: Sarah the free marketer. This is the identity that will be crucial if Palin decides to run for president in 2012 ....

When Palin returned to Alaska after election day, she discovered that she couldn't return to her previous identity. She was still Sarah the veep. Without Democratic support, she had no chance of moving additional reforms through the Legislature. Palin's opponents in Alaska and in the Lower 48 filed a series of frivolous ethics complaints against her. Every time she left her state, the Democrats attacked and drove up her negative ratings. In response, Palin resigned from office.

Leaving the governorship paved the way for Sarah the celebrity. In this phase, Palin is the author of a bestselling memoir. On her book tour, which will take her to places such as Grand Rapids, Mich., and Roanoke, Va., fans and well-wishers are expected to turn out in droves to see her. She has granted major interviews to Oprah Winfrey and Barbara Walters. And she has built a Facebook following of close to a million people. For better or worse -- OK, worse -- she's even produced a satellite celebrity in Playgirl model and future ex-reality-TV star Levi Johnston.

As Sarah the celebrity, Palin can reintroduce herself to the American people on her own terms. In the process, she will make a lot of money. Yet celebrity isn't qualification enough for high office. Fame draws eyeballs, but it doesn't get you votes. If Palin wants to run for the presidency, she also needs to be sure that the public knows her principles.

That's where Sarah the free marketer enters the picture. Palin grasps that the Obama administration and Democrats in Congress are attempting to renegotiate the American social contract. She understands that the Democrats want to increase the role that government plays in the economy and our daily lives.

Palin holds the opposite view. In her book, she talks a lot about fiscal responsibility. She recalls Ronald Reagan's approach to economic growth. In her Facebook messages to supporters, she opposes the Democratic healthcare and climate cap-and-trade bills. She favors reducing regulation and increasing competition.

Palin is reaching out to the anti-tax-and-spend "tea party" movement. She wants to integrate it into the broader GOP. In a recent special congressional election in upstate New York, she intervened and endorsed the pro-market third-party candidate, Doug Hoffman, over the liberal Republican, Dede Scozzafava.

These moves have put Palin on the cutting edge of American politics. She's comfortable as Sarah the free marketer. She's in the middle of the raucous fight over President Obama's sweeping domestic agenda. And to the delight of her fans and the dismay of her enemies, she's not going anywhere.

RELATED: Airhead Newsweek editor Jon Meacham's non-apology for this week's sexist disgrace of a cover story attacking Sarah Palin, "Official Statement on Newsweek's Sarah Palin Cover" (via Memeorandum).

BONUS POST: From Legal Insurrection, "Never Missing An Excuse To Attack Trig Palin."

President Bow-Down-A: 'We've Restored America's Standing'

Here's a little follow up to my earlier post, "Bowing Before Monarchs and Tyrants: Obama 'Restores' America's World Standing With His Head Down - UPDATE: REAGAN DIDN'T BOW!!."

It turns out that President Barack Bow-Down-A's confident that his effuse prostrations are having the desired effect. From CNN, "Obama: 'We've Restored America's Standing'" (via Memeorandum):

A little more than a year after his election, President Obama said his administration has laid the groundwork for success on global and domestic matters.

"I think that we've restored America's standing in the world, and that's confirmed by polls," he told CNN's Ed Henry in a wide-ranging interview this week during his trip to China.

"I think a recent one indicated that around the world, before my election, less than half the people -- maybe less than 40 percent of the people -- thought that you could count on America to do to the right thing. Now it's up to 75 percent."

The president said that makes it easier for world leaders to cooperate with the United States, noting Chinese and Russia involvement in nuclear talks with Iran.

Obama has visited 20 countries during his first year in office, more than any other U.S. president.

Actually, world leaders, for example, the mullahs in Iran (now playing the president like a Stradivarius), are taking the administration for a ride.

For reference, see Caroline Glick's more objective analysis:

Since Obama took office, he has been abandoning one US ally after another while seeking to curry favor with one US adversary after another. At every turn, America's allies - from Israel to Honduras, to Columbia, South Korea and Japan, to Poland and the Czech Republic - have reacted with disbelief and horror to his treachery. And at every turn, America's adversaries - from Iran to Venezuela to North Korea and Russia - have responded with derision and contempt to his seemingly obsessive attempts to appease them.

The horror Obama has instilled in America's friends and the contempt he has evoked from its enemies have not caused him to change course. The fact that his policies throughout the world have already failed to bring a change in the so-called international community's treatment of the US has not led him to reconsider those policies. As many Western Europeans have begun to openly acknowledge, the man they once likened to the messiah is nothing but a politician - and a weak, bungling one at that. Even Britain's Economist is laughing at him.

But Obama is unmoved by any of this, and as his speech at the UN General Assembly made clear, he is moving full speed ahead in his plans to subordinate US foreign policy to the UN.

So much for restoring that "standing in the world."

Stupid Socialists Prove Student Fee-Hike Protests Aren't Just About Student Fees

ABC News has the report on yestedays ANSWER protest at the CSU chancellor's office in Long Beach, "CSU Committee Proposes $900M Funding Request."

The protests were organized by the Long Beach ANSWER cadres, who I profiled in my earlier report, "'We Need to Take 'Em Down' - ANSWER/PSL: Stop the War at Home and Abroad!"

One of the things that you learn about the communists is that they don't really care about gay marriage or student fee hikes. They care about revolution and they'll glom on to anything even tangentially related if it helps with the program of overthrowing the capitalist oppressors.

So, it's no surprise that ANSWER organizers would be recruiting students to the barricades up at U.C. Berkeley, but Roman Zhuk's column at the Daily Californian illustrates perfectly not just the BIG LIE behind all the ANSWER activism, but the stupidty of the tools who sign up for the campaigns:

A UC Berkeley poli sci class ought to be a favorable arena for leftists to promote their views. But what transpired in one encapsulates how the movement against fee hikes, run by the far-left, is an exercise in organizing incompetence.

Two girls come into my class, invited by the professor to give a presentation. One of the girls wears a T-shirt reading "Socialist Organizer." Error No. 1: If you're trying to convince people to join you, you might not want to make such blatant sartorial attacks on the basis of the society they live in.

I thought I'd be alone in challenging the demonstrably wrong information they spewed. Instead, this happened to be a well-informed class where numerous other students jumped in to question their claims. What is their response? Start talking about everything but the issue at hand--the fee hikes. Mentioned were illegal immigrant students, prison policy, health care, the war and the market economy. By the end of the rant, it seemed as if there was not a single student who was not alienated in some way. Error No. 2.

Exasperated, our comrade says, in a condescending tone, something to the effect of "I know you guys are into making money and the stock market and stuff, but I believe education should be free." Because if you're not a greedy careerist, you must join her cause. Insulting your audience -- Error No. 3. Strikeout.

Compare this all to how the most left-wing candidate in living memory was elected to the White House in a relative landslide just a year ago -- a campaign marked by remarkable discipline and unity of message. Change. Hope. Obama. All Americans needed to know, and it worked. Thank goodness that was an aberration, rather than the left learning how to talk to people.

RELATED: "Mobilizing Conference’ for Public Schools Revives ’60s-Era Campus Radicalism."

Michelle Malkin Visits Orange County Conservatives!

Well, it turned out to be more than a "book signing" after all (as I noted this morning).

From the home of the "suburban warriors" of Orange County, the event was billed "An Afternoon with Michelle Malkin." The conservative columnist, author, and Fox News contributor spoke for about 20 minutes from the lectern. She then took questions for well over an hour. Questions and answers were followed immediately by a book signing, out in the main lobby (more on that below).

I arrived a little early, toting along my copy of Culture of Corruption (seen here with the tasty boxed lunch, provided by Plum's Café & Catering):

Before Michelle arrived, here's Minutemen founder Jim Gilchrist, posing for pictures with Diane DeVore, the wife of U.S. Senate candidate Chuck DeVore:

Michelle listened graciously as she received a standing ovation from the audience (the crowd was pushing 1000 people, although I'm kicking myself now for not taking a picture of the group -- just really enjoying the moment of seeing Michelle and not worrying about "reporting"):

Michelle brought a copy of this week's Newsweek, which features Sarah Palin on the cover. Holding it up, she noted that while everyone's frothing over the sexist cover shot, the inside picture featuring Palin as a loose Catholic school girl was over-the-top.

In fact, she's got a post up on it tonight, "The More Offensive Newsweek Photo of Sarah Palin." The Palin cover is just one more example of the leftist media's double standard, Michelle argued, another case of "Female Conservative Derangement Syndrome."

The talk was pretty wide-ranging after that. Michelle suggested that what bothered her most about the Obama regime was its nexus between the corrupt Chicago machine and the hardline communists playing a central role in the administration. (Anita Dunn wasn't "thrown under the bus. She just switched seats.") What impressed me was Michelle's connection with the audience. Conservatives adore her, of course, and our crowd was no exception. But Michelle returned the affection. She argued that the tea party movement was taking the country back, and providing a real focal point of accountability for the Democrats. And it's the grassroots conservatives and bloggers who're the genuine source of real-time feedback on American politics -- and conservative bloggers are providing the primary source material to combat the leftist media.

Especially compelling was Michelle's discussion of the administration's fundamental threat to political freedom in the United States. Noting her experiences talking with immigrants to the country, Michelle pointed out how intensely Democrats are stiffling dissent, and that we're seeing the most fundamental shift to political authoritarianism and intolerance than any time in recent history. For Michelle, the immigrants' experience is a constant reminder of how fragile our liberties are. (Newcomers to America have lived the repression, and they'll tell you when we're getting a replay on the homefront.) Holding her hand up with fingers pressed together, Michelle said, "we're this close to losing all that's precious in America." It's conservatives -- "folks just like you here today" -- who're going to preserve the freedoms that we enjoy. "We can never take these rights for granted."

It was a great talk, with lots more good comments and responses during the audience question time. Michelle was very patient with all participants, and she was extremely respectful of one man who offered a long-winded theoretical dissent against the conservative discourse on Fort Hood (I stepped out for a moment to use the restroom, so I only caught the tail-end of the man's comments, and then Michelle's response). Michelle said that "moral equivalence" is one of her biggest problems with extreme political correctness in the press: "Mormons are not launching terrorist attacks. Jewish Americans are not launching terrorist attacks. We've had decades of jihadi terrorism, well before George W. Bush was in office. But we can't even speak out about Muslim violence..." I'm quoting from memory, but this is the basic gist of Michelle's comments. When she fiinished the audience applauded, then Michelle thanked everyone for letting the man have his say, even if we disagreed with his views. (Also of note: I'll have to confirm it, but Michelle had a personal bodyguard standing nearby the entire time she spoke. Either that, or the university proivided security up close and personal. The gentleman was wearing a bullet-proof vest, which he adjusted a couple of times. Again, I'll need to confirm, but I thought it was smart of Michelle to be prepared, but also a sad state of our politics when major personalities need constant protection in public.)

In any case, anyone who's a fan of Michelle's would be familiar with the basic themes of the day's events, but it was another experience altogether to attend the talk. And the book signing was a real high point. I introduced myself and Michelle was glad to pose for a photo:

I told Michelle that "I write the blog American Power." And then she wrote a keeper of a message on the inside:

I complimented Michelle for a great lecture, and said I'd be in touch.

Americans See China as Economic Threat

From CNN, "Americans See China as Economic Threat":

Americans are split over whether China represents a military threat to the United States -- but there is no doubt in the public's mind that the country poses an economic threat, according to a new national poll.

According to a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday, 51 percent of the public consider China a military threat, with 47 percent disagreeing. That 4-point margin is within the poll's 4.5 percent sampling error.

The poll's release coincides with U.S. President Barack Obama's first visit to China to bolster relations. At a town hall meeting on Monday he made the case to Chinese students that the two countries' philosophical differences should not get in the way of a robust relationship.

According to the survey, two-thirds see China as a source of unfair competition for U.S. companies, while only a quarter are more likely to view China as a huge potential market for U.S. goods.

"That may be why 71 percent of Americans consider China an economic threat to the U.S.," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Americans tend to view foreign countries as competition, and China is no exception."

This is actually one of the most important issues in contemporary international politics.

For a recent political science analysis, see Daniel Drezner, "Bad Debts: Assessing China's Financial Influence in Great Power Politics" (at International Security).

I'll have more on the U.S.-China relationship later.

Right now I'm heading out to a book signing with Michelle Malkin, "An Afternoon with Michelle Malkin" (with the Orange County Leadership Alliance - OCLA). I should have a nice photo-report on that tonight.

Image Credit Above: Los Angeles Times, "Obama and China's Hu Jintao Pledge Stronger Ties."

Waiting for Charles Johnson to Join Andrew Sullivan's Anti-Israel Ravings...

With all the Sarah Palin news, I thought I'd check Andrew Sullivan's page this morning. It's pretty much routine stuff ("the lies of Sarah Palin," blah, blah). While there, I took this screencap of Andrew's "Face of the Day" (a Palestinian terrorist):

Palestinians smuggle sheep into the Gaza Strip through a tunnel under the Egypt-Gaza border in Rafah on November 15, 2009. Residents of the poverty-stricken Gaza Strip fear a shortage of sacrificial cattle ahead of a major Muslim holiday due to Israel's blockade. Eid al-Adha or Feast of Sacrifice marks the end of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca and is celebrated in remembrance of Abraham's readiness to sacrifice his son to God. By Said Khatib/AFP/Getty.

*****

Given Sullivan's long history of anti-Semitism (see my essay at RealClearPolitcs, "Kos and Andrew: Merchants of Hate"), I'm wondering when Charles Johnson will complete his leftist transmogrification by hopping on the left's anti-Israel bandwagon. Actually, while Dan Riehl recently wrote, "Charles Johnson's Deplorable Deception Knows No Bounds" (a reference to King Charles' "racist" attacks on Robert Stacy McCain), I think folks are still waiting for the other shoe to drop on Israel.

In any case, Reliapundit suggested to keep an eye out for the denunciation of Israel at Little Green Footballs. Seeing Andrew Sullivan's attack blog this morning was just a little reminder of what's likely coming down the pike.

RELATED: "Charles Johnson and Andrew Sullivan: Separated at Birth?"

Democrats Go 'Berserk' over Going Rogue

I noted yesterday how the intensity of leftist opposition to Sarah Palin is an extremely good measure of her political power. It turns out that Andrew Malcolm's picked up on the theme, "Going Berserk Over 'Going Rogue;' Democrats' Reaction to Sarah Palin Book and Publicity":

Wow, for somebody who's supposed to be such a political joke, an Arctic ditz and eminently dismissable as a serious anything except maybe a stay-at-home hockey mom, Sarah Palin is sure drawing an awful lot of attention from Democrats and eager critics.

The launch of her "Going Rogue" interviews Monday on "Oprah," of her book today, of her on-air chat today with Rush Limbaugh at 10 a.m. Pacific and of her mid-America bus book tour Wednesday ignited a surprisingly large blizzard of derogatory Democrat dis-missives.

Every few minutes another note from Democratic National Committee operatives and others dropped into electronic mailboxes across the media-verse, helpfully passing on even the tiniest tidbit of negative news about Palin.

You know how sometimes a friend tells you how much he/she doesn't really care about....

...someone else. Really doesn't! And repeats it a sufficient number of times that you become convinced of precisely the opposite?

So maybe she does matter after all.

Oh no doubt, she matters. The main thing to watch is the money race: If Palin successfully raises a massive campaign war chest she's going to be virtually insurmountable in the GOP primaries in 2012. (And on this, note how Daniel Larison, our well-known enemy of the conservative good, is doing his unsuccessful best to debunk Palin's political inevitability. The AmCon America-basher sounds a bit like Bob Schieffer!)

More on that later. Meanwhile, here's a snippet from Palin's interview with Barbara Walters:

More at Memeorandum.

ObamaCare is Deeply Divisive, Poll Finds

The latest Washington Post poll finds the administration ObamaCare legislation dividing the country deeply, "Deep divisions linger on health care":

As the Senate prepares to take up legislation aimed at overhauling the nation's health-care system, President Obama and the Democrats are still struggling to win the battle for public opinion. A new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows Americans deeply divided over the proposals under consideration and majorities predicting higher costs ahead.

But Republican opponents have done little better in rallying the public opposition to kill the reform effort. Americans continue to support key elements of the legislation, including a mandate that employers provide health insurance to their workers and access to a government-sponsored insurance plan for those people without insurance.

Over the past few months, public opinion has solidified, leaving Obama and the Democrats with the political challenge of enacting one of the most ambitious pieces of domestic legislation in decades in the face of a nation split over the wisdom of doing so. In the new poll, 48 percent say they support the proposed changes; 49 percent are opposed.

With the bill through the House, Senate Democrats are now looking for the votes to enact their version of the legislation and keep the reform effort moving forward. Whatever the outcome of the health-care debate, it will have a powerful influence in shaping the political climate for next year's midterm elections.

The House bill contains a highly controversial provision prohibiting abortion coverage for those insured under a new public insurance plan as well as those who received federal subsidies to purchase private insurance. In the poll, 61 percent say they support barring coverage for abortions for those receiving public subsidies, but if private funds were used to pay for abortion expenses, the numbers flipped. With segregated private money used to cover abortion procedures, 56 percent say insurance offered to those using government assistance should be able to include such coverage.

The new poll provides ammunition for both advocates and opponents of reform. For opponents, a clear area of public concern centers on cost -- 52 percent say an altered system would probably make their own care more expensive, and 56 percent see the overall cost of health care in the country going up as a result.

Few see clear benefits in exchange for higher expenses. Rather, there has been a small but significant increase in the number (now 37 percent) who anticipate their care deteriorating under a revamped system, putting that number in line with opinion in July 1994, just before President Bill Clinton's health-care reform efforts fizzled.

Among those with insurance, three times as many continue to see worse rather than better coverage options ahead (39 to 13 percent), and fewer than half of those who lack insurance see better options under a changed system. Six in 10 see it as "very" or "somewhat" likely that many private insurers would be forced out of business by a government-sponsored insurance plan, a potential result that GOP leaders frequently warn about.

As much as the Post tries to spin support for "key provisions" of the legislation, the bill is going to be politically costly to the Dems There's much great "intensity" of opinion among proponents, and political indedpents are too favorable:

Looking toward next year's midterm elections, 25 percent say they more apt to back a candidate who supports the proposed health-care changes; 29 percent are less likely to do so. More, 45 percent, say the vote will not make much of a difference. Independents are nearly twice as likely to be swayed away from rather than toward a candidate who supports the changes (31 percent to 17 percent).

More at Memeorandum.

Sierra Leone's Developmental Crisis

My lecture today, in my World Politics class, was on developmental strategies in less developed countries.

I wrapped up some of the discussion from last week, and before starting an outline on the board, I read this passage from yesterday's article in the Los Angeles Times, "Sierra Leone Crises Have Global Reach":

Sierra Leone is one of those nations where decades of foreign aid have failed to appreciably lift the fortunes of the people. The country is a charity case: 60% of its public spending comes from foreign governments and nonprofit organizations. Since 2002, it has received more than $1 billion in aid.

Yet it has the second-highest rate of infant mortality in the world, behind Angola; even Afghanistan ranks lower. The United Nations says 1 in 8 women die giving birth in Sierra Leone; the rate in the United States is 1 in 4,800. Life expectancy in Sierra Leone is 41 years; in Bangladesh it's 60.

A decade-long civil war in the 1990s drove people from the countryside into the capital, Freetown, and today a city built for 250,000 is home to 10 times that number. Tens of thousands camp out in shacks on a lush mountainside with views of the Atlantic but no clean water or electricity.

I actually read just one sentence at a time, interspersed with commentary (and I looked around at the faces of my students, who were both kind of shocked and saddened).

We've been talking about all of these things in class, for example dependency theory critiques of foreign aid; the U.N.'s Human Developmental Index, with combines indices like life expectancy and the literacy rate to rank nations on a scale of quality of life; and the concept of "urban primacy," which is the idea that big cities are urban magnets in the Third World. There's not many prospects in working the land for most of the population (and there might not be much of an agricultural sector in Sierra Leone in any case), and overcrowding and poverty mean that huges swathes of humanity will live in shanty towns in the slums or foothills of the cities. I have a lot of students in class who've lived or traveled around the world, from Brazil to Egypt to the Philippines. Sometimes we just talk, like last Wednesday. I just asked students who had traveled in the developing world. One of my students immigrated to the United States from Argentina in 2001.

It's been a good semester, at least in that class. More about that later.

Connecting the Dots on Foot Hood Massacre

From Stephen Hayes and Thomas Joscelyn, at the Weekly Standard, "Connecting the Dots: The Shooting at Fort Hood Was No 'Mystery.' It Was An Act of Terrorism Waiting to Happen":

At about 1:30 P.M. on November 5, Army Specialist Logan Burnette, a thick-chested, baby-faced soldier scheduled to deploy to Iraq in a few short weeks, was sitting in the back row of a small auditorium-like room at the Fort Hood Army base near Killeen, Texas. Burnette was joking with several other soldiers as they waited--and waited and waited--to see a doctor for a final pre-mobilization medical review.

"Out of nowhere," Burnette later recalled, "a man stood up in uniform, screamed 'Allahu Akbar,' and proceeded to open fire on myself and the rest of my fellow soldiers sitting there." One of the shots hit Burnette on his left pinky finger. Another on his left elbow. Another in the hip. The rampage continued for several minutes.

Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, went on a shooting rampage at Fort Hood that claimed 13 lives and wounded more than 40. Three hours later, while the base was still in lockdown, an FBI spokesman dismissed suggestions that the attack was terrorism and said that a link between Hasan and terrorist organizations "is not being discussed."

Yet, a little more than a week after the shooting we know that Hasan justified suicide bombings in an Internet posting. He lectured colleagues using the rhetoric of jihad. He warned darkly about "adverse events" if Muslims were not allowed to leave military service. He repeatedly sought counsel from a radical imam with known ties to al Qaeda. He tried to convert some of his patients to Islam--many of them soldiers troubled by their near-fatal experiences with jihadists. He printed business cards that made no mention of his military service but instead identified him as an "SOA," a soldier of Allah.

And U.S. authorities knew about some of this well before the attack at Fort Hood. At Walter Reed--where Hasan spent the six years before his posting to Fort Hood in July--his superiors wondered whether he might be "psychotic" and worried that he consistently sided with jihadists over his fellow soldiers. The FBI had intercepted emails Hasan had sent to Anwar al Awlaki, an al Qaeda supporter with strong ties to three 9/11 hijackers.

But the FBI did not know all that the Army knew. And the Army did not know all that the FBI knew. The participants in an FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task Force discussed Hasan's case briefly and concluded that it did not warrant an investigation. If they had performed even a cursory, unobtrusive examination of this man, his contacts, and his radical views, they would have quickly turned up a great deal of troubling information.

Since the shooting there have been dozens of theories floated about Hasan's motivations. On the night after the attack, CNN's Larry King interviewed the ubiquitous "Dr. Phil" McGraw, who speculated that Hasan's counseling of traumatized soldiers might have in turn traumatized him and caused him to snap. In his November 10 remarks at Fort Hood, President Barack Obama suggested the cause of the shooting was--and may remain--a mystery. "It may be hard to comprehend the twisted logic that led to this tragedy." The FBI agreed: "The investigation to date has not identified a motive, and a number of possibilities remain under consideration." One of them, according to an article in the Financial Times, was "anti-Muslim bias."

Here is another: Nidal Malik Hasan is a jihadist. That so many refuse to even consider this in the face of the overwhelming evidence might help explain why those whose job it was to keep us safe refused to see it back when it really mattered.

Read the whole thing. The remaining dicussion, on all of Nidal Hasan's extensive ties to radical Islam, I've covered here in detail.

RELATED: From ABC, "Officials: Major Hasan Sought ‘War Crimes’ Prosecution of U.S. Soldiers ."

Leftist Bloggers Applaud Anti-American Radical Who Infiltrated Minnesota Tea Party

It's not even a fine line. It's one thing to be anti-racist (i.e., to oppose racial prejudice and discrimination, as does the overwhelming majority of American citizens); and it's quite another to be anti-American (i.e., to excoriate the United States as an illegitimate regime of racism, sexism, and colonialist exploitation, as does the neo-communist left).

It turns out that hardline leftist blogs Crooks and Liars, Daily Kos, and Think Progress are cheering a communist radical who infiltrated a Minnesota tea party on November 14th. The activist, "Robert Erickson," launched an anti-immigration speech that shifted to an explicitly anti-American screed with passages that could have been lifted from an International ANSWER manifesto or Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States.

And in fact, Fight Back!, a communist "people's" website has a report on the story, "Anti-Immigrant 'Tea Party' Confronted in St. Paul," and a Minnesota hardline communist and pro-amnesty group, the Immigrant Rights Action Coalition, sponsored the "speech" by "Robert Erickson." The Twin-Cities Indy-Media blog has an entry as well, "Anti-Racists Steal the Show at White Supremacist 'Tea Party Against Amnesty'." And Daily Kos provides this video:

But notice the text of the speech, especially the extremist repudiation of the United States at the conclusion (which I've highlighted in bold):

Hi, my name is Robert Erickson and I’m really excited to be here. Its people like all of you, and events like this that make our country great! Give yourselves a round of applause!

I just want to talk about a couple themes this afternoon because I love this country and I want to see America be the best place it can be.

Mr. Gutierrez is getting ready to propose an immigration bill in just a few short days, and we have to make sure he knows that we want a bill that’s tough on immigration. Now is the time for us to stand up and make our voices heard!

In Minneapolis, where I’m from, we have a huge immigrant population that’s been causing a number of problems. With the economy in recession, and so many people getting laid off, and unable to find work, immigrants should not be competing for the few jobs that are out there. Its just not fair to the folks who have a claim to this land and the right to be here. All across America, they are contributing to the flooding of our job markets making it hard for American’s to find jobs. Well I’m fed up and its time to let our politicians know that enough is enough, and we’re not gonna take it any more!

We need to secure our borders to protect our country. We need to restore order and put an end to the anarchy that’s sweeping the nation. We need tougher immigration laws to make sure that we send these people back where they came from. We need to protect the sovereignty of the real Americans. We need to hold our politicians accountable.

Its no secret that with an invasion of immigrants, comes waves of crime. We see them involved in massive theft, in murder, and bringing diseases like smallpox, which is responsible for the death of millions of Americans. These aren’t new problems though, they have been going on for hundreds of years, and continue to this day.

I say its time for us to say enough is enough! Are you with me? Are you with me? Lets send these European immigrants back where they came from! I don’t care if they are Polish, Irish, English, Italian, or Norwegian! European immigrants are responsible for the most violent and heinus crimes in the history of the world, including genocide and slavery! Its time to restore the sovereignty of people native to this land! I want more workplace raids, starting with the big banks downtown. There are thousands of illegals working in those buildings, hiding in their offices, and taking Dakota jobs. Let's round them up and ship them out. Then we need to hit them at home where they sleep, I don’t care if we separate families, they should have known better when they came here illegally!

If we aren't able to stand up to these European immigrants, who can we stand up to? We need to send every one of them back home, right now.

Thank you very much, and we’ll see you in the streets!

Columbus go home! Columbus go home! Columbus go home!

Look, I'll be honest: I've been to enough tea parties to know that sometimes the sound systems are poor and a good many of the speeches are dry, especially from someone who would be a no-name like "Robert Erickson" (the difference, of course, is that the tea partiers are patriots). Plus, the Minnesota gig was a small gathering of about 40 people, and most likely few in the audience were really listening carefully to this man's unoriginal speech, and thus his concluding repudiation of America. If they had (and for example, if I would have been in attendance), it's unlikely this guy would have been able to finish his talk. Organizers for the local events I've worked with have in fact been prepared for counter-protests and radical pranksters. My homies really don't cotton to folks like this, and some of the town hall events locally were tense protests with conservatives facing off against ObamaCare's communist contingents (see, "Astroturf at Adam Schiff Town Hall: ACORN, AARP, Organizing for America, SEIU, and Stalinist Apparatchiks for ObamaCare!").

And recall that I actually know a little about what it's like to infilitrate behind partisan enemy lines. While it was the Minnesota tea partiers WHO POLITELY ATTENTED TO THIS COMMUNIST'S anti-American harangue, at the ANSWER events I've covered in recent months, it was THESE GROUPS' PARTY CADRES WHO who excoriated the United States, called for the defeat of the American "empire" in Afghanistan, and exclaimed "'we need to take 'em down!" while decrying the "racist" American regime.

And what's really cool here is that Crooks and Liars, Daily Kos, and Think Progress are all pretty much down with that!

International ANSWER Thugs Attack Tea Party Protesters in Florida

These are the hardline communists I've covered in my numerous reports on International ANSWER. Via Michelle Malkin, "Far Left’s ANSWER Goons Attack Foes of Illegal Immigration":

Here's the blurb at the video:

Supporters of President obama's Amnesty plans attacked Tea Party Against Amnesty & Illegal Immigration demonstrators in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida on November 14, 2009. One of the men attacked is 62 years old. Dave Caulkett of FLIMEN (Floridians for Immigration Enforcement) is assaulted and then kicked in the face while he is down. The other camera man from the Tea Party is hit with several signs ...

Those attacking the Americans that oppose Amnesty for illegal aliens were organized by ANSWER Florida.

Also, from Gateway Pundit, "Commie Che-Supporting Goons Beat Tea Party Protesters In Florida (Video)." Gateway links to ANSWER Florida's page. Plus, from, Americans for Legal Immigration, here's the announcemnt from these communist thugs:

Racism is like anything else in this world: in order to make it fall, you must smash it! That is why we are calling on all people to come out tomorrow, to organize a militant confrontation with the so-called “tea baggers.” Beating back these forces will require us to organize together, take the streets, fight the racists wherever they show their faces and drive them out of every community.

The racist demonization of immigrants only serves the interest of the ruling class during this historical economic crisis. The same bankers, CEO’s, and politicians, both Democrat and Republican, which have for decades devastated the economies of countries in Latin America, Asia, and Africa, have once again devastated the economy in this country. The same ruling class that devastates the lives of working people in other nations through war and super-exploitation are the ones throwing workers out of their homes, denying them healthcare, and laying them off from their jobs in this country.

Racism is consciously used as a tool by the ruling class because they know that as long as working people are divided and fighting each other, the people are not fighting the bankers, CEO’s, and politicians. Only under a brutal system that puts profit over people can you have a whole section of society whose only crime is being forced from their nations because of imperialism and forced to work in the most hostile of conditions in this country. Only racism can justify this reality.

The continual devastation of working people because of this crisis, however, is not the fault of one group of workers. On October 28th, President Obama signed the largest military budget in U.S. history-$680 billion dollars, which does not include the cost of the criminal occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. The new administration is also continuing to hand out the $9.5 trillion dollars in working people’s tax dollars to bailout the already rich.

The money to end the suffering of all working people tomorrow is there. It is our choice as to whether we will allow the right of a few to profit from labor of workers to continue, or whether we will rise up as one class of working people to and take political power into our own hands.

We are building a movement that will beat back racism so that working people of all nationalities can unite and fight against our one, shared enemy: capitalism. Amnesty, full rights for ALL immigrants, is a demand that should be raised not just by the immigrant communities, but by every working class community in our struggle to solve this crisis by our own means.

Join us tomorrow, and join us in building the movement against racism and capitalist exploitation!

See also, Red Alerts, "Florida A.N.S.W.E.R. Chapter Beats 62-Year-Old Man on Street Corner!":

Sounds like a call to violence to me. Also notice how A.N.S.W.E.R. references the various “tea party” groups as “tea baggers” much the way the Democrats and MSNBC do. When will Keith Olbermann take responsibility for the actions his heated rhetoric causes?

But more realistically, when will A.N.S.W.E.R. be held responsible for the violence and mayhem they create in our communities? No matter where you stand on this issue, all people of good conscience can agree that two guys beating the hell out of an old man on a corner is wrong, can’t we?

GOP Nomination is Palin's for the Taking

Back in July I wrote an analysis, "Can Palin Win the 2012 GOP Nomination?" So far, I'm happy to say, much of my argument has held up.

For example, Rasmussen has the latest poll numbers for Palin among GOP voters, "59% of GOP Voters Say Palin Shares Their Values." (Via Memeorandum.)

But more closely in line with my earlier thinking is Walter Shapiro at his essay, "How Palin Could Win the 2012 GOP Nomination":

Undoubtedly at this very moment, two saffron-robed monks in a monastery north of Katmandu are earnestly discussing Sarah Palin's presidential prospects. In the favelas of Rio, the normally fierce arguments about the World Cup and the 2016 Olympics are surely taking a back seat to high-decibel debates over the pre-publication excerpts from Going Rogue.

This is Palin time whether you believe that she is "The Divine Sarah" (as Sarah Bernhardt was once known) or the 21st century version of Barry Goldwater who will lead the Republican Party into the abyss. True believers stress her megawatt incandescence and her Facebook leadership of the conservative tea-party movement at time when all other Republicans seem pallid. Skeptics scoff at the hoopla and argue that the Republican establishment would never nominate someone who, according to a recent CNN/Opinion Research poll, 71 percent of voters describe as "not qualified to be president."

More than two years before the 2012 Iowa caucuses, presidential speculation should come with a soothsayer's money-back guarantee. But what all the discussions of Palin's future miss is the way that Republican Party rules are made-to-order for a well-funded insurgent named Sarah to sweep the primaries before anyone figures out how to stop her. If Palin can maintain, say, 35-percent support in a multi-candidate presidential field, then she is the odds-on favorite for the GOP nomination.

Check the whole post.

Shapiro adds something that few analysts have addressed: The party rules for the GOP presidential nominating system. Whereas the Democratic Party's proportional representation helped drag out last year's primary brawl between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, the Republicans' winner-take-all system is designed to produce a frontrunner and party nominee relatively quickly.

Shapiro cites Elaine Kamarck's new book, Primary Politics: How Presidential Candidates Have Shaped the Modern Nominating System. But see also, William G. Mayer, The Front-Loading Problem in Presidential Nominations.

Also important, and something I stressed in my earlier article, is money: How will Palin's campaign war chest stack up by the end of next year? The timing of her book launch could hardly be better for the politics of presidential camapaign finance. If early fundraising in the 2008 campaign is any indication (tracking trends before any primaries are held), Palin will need upwards of $200 million in the bank (see, "Money's Going to Talk in 2008: 'Entry Fee' for Presidential Race Could Be $100 Million"). My sense is that no other candidate will be able to raise as much as Palin, and only Mitt Romney will give her a credible challenge in the money race, due to his personal wealth.

It's all speculation at this point, but that's what pundits do.

RELATED: Liz Sidoti, "2012 GOP Field Wide Open: GOP Wannabes Jockey for 2012."

Sarah Palin and Going Rogue

This is going to be quite a week for the politics of personal destruction. Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's autobiography, Going Rogue, is out today. Ms. Palin's whirlwind book tour begins with a high-profile appearance on the Oprah Winfrey Show, as well as a very personal interview with Barbara Walters, portions of which will appear this morning on Good Morning America. ABC's Kate Snow has a story, "Game On: Palin Book Blitz Begins: Former McCain Aides Rebut Claims in 'Going Rogue'."

One thing to watch out for is whether critics of Ms. Palin have actually read her book. On yesterday's Fox News Sunday panel, Liz Cheney offered the best comments because she said she'd actually read portions of the book. Along those lines, check out Melanie Kirkpatrick's book review, at the Wall Street Journal, "Her Side of the Story":

She discusses her coming of age in the "new frontier" state of Alaska; her personal faith journey; her experiences with marriage and motherhood, including two miscarriages, a special-needs child and a pregnant teenage daughter; and the free-market convictions that have guided her political career. As a politician, she comes across as a prodigious worker capable of mastering complicated issues—not least the energy policies that matter so much to Alaska's economy—and of building bridges to Democrats.

Through it all, Mrs. Palin emerges as a new style of feminist: a politician who took on the Ole Boy network and won; a wife with a supportive husband whose career takes second place to hers; and a mother who, unlike working women of an earlier age, isn't shy about showcasing her family responsibilities. She writes with sensitivity and affection about her gay college roommate, and she confesses her anguish when she found out that she was carrying a baby with Down syndrome. That experience, she says, helped her to understand why a woman might be tempted to have an abortion. This is not the prejudiced, dim-witted ideologue of the popular liberal imagination.

Perhaps the most important issue raised by Palin's reemergence this week at the center of national politics is, again, whether she's qualified for the presidency. Of course, by just having run as a major party vice-presidential nominee she's broken perhaps the ultimate threshold, although people will continue to attack her as an undignified backwoods hick. Significantly, there's probably an inverse relationship between Sarah Palin's prospects and the radical attacks against her. Not only is the left's rabid demonization of Palin perhaps the best indicator of the former Alaska governor's viability, but the deeper the levels of leftist secular demonology, the higher Palin's favorables among moderates are likely to go.

We still have over a year until the 2012 campaign gets seriously under way. During that time, Ms. Palin will no doubt be continuing her aggressive self-marketing. There's no one on the right who inspires more passion from the faithful, and that's pretty much what it takes to win the presidential nomination. So, Palin just needs to keep chuggin'. Things are going her way.

(And don't put too much faith in these early public opinion polls, for example, Gary Langer's, "Sarah Palin: Rogue for President?" Palin's got lots of time to work her wonders with the American public, and I can guarantee that the left's demonization campaign will only work to increase Palin's favorables over time.)

More at Memeorandum.

Liz Cheney on Fox News Sunday, November 15, 2009

Actually, the whole panel includes Liz Cheney, Mara Liasson, Bill Kristol, and Juan Williams. But Ms. Cheney is so clear on the issues it's stunning. And not just on the New York terror trials, either. On Sarah Palin's potential presidential run, Ms. Cheney suggests that Republicans in 2012 will be running to clean up the damage of the Barack Obama years:

See Gateway Pundit for Ms. Cheney's comments on Palin, "Liz Cheney: Whoever Leads GOP in 2012 Will Have to Undo the Damage From Obama’s Disastrous Policies (Video)."

Marisa Miller at Victoria's Secret Fashion Show!

Well, my good friend Kathy at Hummers and Cigarettes gave me a little ribbing for my recent post on Denise Milani. But I doubt many would take issue with Marisa Miller at Victoria's Secret! Just about everyone loves a good fashion show, of course, and throw in some of the world's superest supermodels and everyone's a winner!

Marisa Miller's Victoria's Secret page is here. The screencaps are from from the hot video at the link!

The fashion show airs December 1st on CBS. Check out the promotional page, "Victoria's Secret Fashion Show - Models, Videos, Photos."

When Some Bloggers Really Should Hang Up Their Keyboards

It's pretty interesting when your blog gets picked up around the Internet as "all that is wrong" with the rightroots blogosphere. But that's apparently what happened to some extent with my post yesterday, "Bowing Before Monarchs and Tyrants: Obama 'Restores' America's World Standing With His Head Down - UPDATE: REAGAN DIDN'T BOW!!"

A key case in point is Charles Cooper's blog at CBS News. I've included a screencap because this post badly needs a correction, "Firing A Shot Across Obama's Bow." The first few paragraphs provide a clue to Cooper's idiocy:

The usual crowd of armchair patriots is having a collective fit over President Obama's decision to greet Japan's Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko with a bow.

A bow?

I kid thee not. This post by Donald Douglass at the aptly-named blog American Power was representative of the sort of apoplectic commentary triggered by the president's visit with the royal couple as he arrived at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo on Saturday.

"Obama's breach of protocol is of a piece with the substance of his foreign policy. He means to teach Americans to bow before monarchs and tyrants. He embodies the ideological multiculturalism that sets the United States on the same plane as other regimes based on tribal privilege and royal bloodlines. He gives expressive form to the idea that the United States now willingly prostrates itself before the rest of the world. He declares that the United States is a country like any other, only worse, because we have so much for which to apologize."

Don't let appearances throw you. Turns out that Douglass is an asssistant professor of political science - one who also declares that he despises "the hard-left radical agenda and discourse" (which I gather includes Mr. Obama and his cohort of closet commies.) His class must be a delight.

Okay, just a few objections:

One, Cooper misspells my name. I'm not sure why exactly, but my guess is that having checked my sidebar profile, with my picture there, Cooper noticed my black American background, and then inferred incorrectly that my last name must be spelled with a double "s". It's not an uncommon mistake, actually, because for some reason folks in the past have automatically assumed that I'm somehow related to Frederick Douglass. This mostly happens among people who've only listened to my name, not actually read it, so Cooper loses double points for poor reading comprehension. (I'll leave aside the question of whether the "Douglass" inference is a form of subtle racial profiling, although clearly to be black with that last name means you must be related to the great 19th century emancipator.)

Second, Cooper should actually take a minute to comprehend what's written and linked to at the post. As I wrote there, "The headline up top is borrowed from Power Line, 'Why is This Man Bowing?' ...", and the block quotation that follows (Cooper's second-to-last paragraph above) is Scott Johnson's analysis, not mine. So why not take issue with Power Line? Too quick off the mark, I'd guess. But even an unranked blogger of the lowest 9th tier wouldn't make such a pathetic, rookie mistake.

Finally, Cooper engages in a rank ad hominem attack at the end of the passage, where he notes that it "Turns out that Douglass is an assistant professor of political science ..." My academic position is totally irrelevant here. This is actually a variant of the "I can't believe you're a professor" slur, which I wrote about previously (see, "You're a Professor, Really?"). Recall that it's not only one of the most stupid leftist attacks, but one of the most intolerant, for it assumes that conservatives shouldn't be inside today's college classrooms.

Cooper's post is so bad, in fact, that CBS News should be embarrassed.

But actually, Cooper's not alone in today's dunce cap hall of shame.

It turns out that Darren Lenard Hutchinson, whose blog is "Dissenting Justice," and who is a Professor of Law at American University, has joined the follies with a demonstration that he ought not branch out into interdisciplinary work in comparative governmental studies.

Note first that Hutchinson goes all in with the demonizing headline at his entry, "Rightwing Fecal Matter Alert: Obama Bows in Japan, World Ends."

Oh brother. Fecal matter? That's harsh, if not a bit silly.

Too bad Professor Hutchingson couldn't follow up the trash talk with some solid analysis. For example, from the post:

The rightwing has spewed smelly fecal matter before, but the latest is the most odoriferous in recent memory. Rightwing bloggers and other commentators are having a nervous breakdown because President Obama bowed when he met with Emperor Akihito of Japan ....

The blog American Power keeps the stench going with an essay "Bowing Before Monarchs and Tyrants." Video footage of Obama greeting Akihito accompanies the article lunacy.

The blog's description of Akihito as a "monarch" or "tyrant" demonstrates the paucity of facts in contemporary conservative commentary. A real monarch (as opposed to a constitutional monarch) exercises absolute power and dominion in a country. Emperor Akihito, however, is merely a figurehead.

The Constitution of Japan gives executive power to the Cabinet and legislative authority to the Diet. The Constitution also creates a national judicial system. Furthermore, it states that "[t]he people have the inalienable right to choose their public officials and to dismiss them."

By contrast, the Constitution of Japan describes the Emperor as a "symbol." The Constitution also states that the "Emperor shall perform only such acts in matters of state as are provided for in this Constitution and he shall not have powers related to government" (italics added).

Even though Akihito is simply a symbol of state, American Power argues that Obama's bow shows that "the United States now willingly prostrates itself before the rest of the world." This statement is simply diarrhea. It also misuses terminology.

First, note how Professor Hutchinson also fails to realize, despite the citation and the block quote, that the analysis at the post is Scott Johnson's, not mine. Thus, duh, Professor Hutchinson should be attacking Power Line for its "fecal" material instead of American Power. (And I guess it's a good thing that Hutchinson's screwing up as a law professor who blogs and not as a practicing defense attorney, for I'd hate to think about how such stupid mistakes might end up putting people behind bars.)

Professor Hutchinson, further, suffers from a basic ignorance of comparative political institutions, and especially an ignorance of the concept of a constitutional monarchy. His mistake is to confuse the specific enumerated powers of the Japanese emperor with that of the generalized model of monarchical authority in a political regime featuring a king, queen, prince, emperor, or emir, etc. For whether the office is head of government or head of state (or both), it doesn't matter how real authority is vested. That is, it matters not so much whether we have a "figurehead" or an "absolutist", it's that there is some sort of hereditary ruler at all, i.e., a monarch. Indeed, this is basic governmental studies. As Wikipedia's entry on the specifics of constitutional monarchy indicates:

A constitutional monarchy is a form of government in which a monarch acts as head of state within the perimeters of a written (i.e., codified), unwritten (i.e., uncodified) or blended constitution. It differs from absolute monarchy in that an absolute monarch serves as the sole source of political power in the state and is not legally bound by any constitution.

Professor Hutchinson does no better, really, on the more narrow controversy of appropriate diplomatic protocol. Americans citizens, least of all the President of the United States, do not bow to foreign monarchs. The president is not a subject of the Emperor of Japan, or any other of the world's kings. A slight nodding of the head while shaking hands is all that's needed, and in fact no previous president has prostrated themselves anywhere near the manner that President Obama did this weekend.

Leftists accuse conservatives of extreme wingnut partisanship when what's really at issue is the completely unnecessary obsequiousness of President Bow-down-a.

And one more thing about Professor Hutchinson: My post does not call the emperor a "tyrant." The reference, at both Power Line and American Power, is to the president's previous breach of diplomatic protocol in bowing to the Saudi king last april. At that time the White House denied Obama's bow. There's no question about it this time.

It's bad enough that we're having this ugly partisan split on the appropriate diplomatic niceties for an American president abroad. But it's especially bad in my case to be attacked so ignorantly by a blogger at one of the three major television networks AND by a professor of law at a major U.S. university based in the nation's capital. I would expect more from people in such positions, much more.

Thus, I call for CBS' Charles Coooper and American University's Darren Lenard Hutchinson to post corrections and apologies to their blogs. And THAT would be the appropriate protocol, given the magnitude of their mutual asshattery.

RELATED: From Jake Tapper, "On President Obama's Bow to the Japanese Emperor, An Academic Friend Writes That Both the Left and the Right Are Wrong." (Via Memeorandum.)

Big Weekend for Visiting Friends and Family at American Power

Friday morning I wrote this on my Facebook profile:

Got a big weekend friends, grading, visiting a political scientist-friend from the East Coast at the Queen Mary tomorrow, visiting with my sister and her family tomorrow night ... Well, better get busy! :)

So, I thought I might as well share a little report of how things turned out.

The "visiting political scientist-friend" is Professor Daniel Nexon from Georgetown University. Dan was in town for the annual meeting of the Social Science History Association, held at the Queen Mary Hotel, at the Port of Long Beach. (The association website is here, the call for papers here, and the schedule of academic panels is here). Dan e-mailed me a month ago to give me the heads up. I picked him up yesterday at 9:00am to get some breakfast. Here's the shot of the liner as I was walking in:

The hotel's main desk is on the third floor. Here's the shot from the gangway as I was walking up:

Dan and I drove across the channel over to the Shoreline Marina in downtown Long Beach. As we we're walking back out after eating, I snapped a quick shot back at the Queen Mary from the parking lot:

I did not take pictures of Dan, for a couple of reasons: One is that I didn't really think about it until we were almost done having breakfast, and two is that this was the first time I'd met Dan in person, and I wasn't comfortable taking Dan's picture. We met online about three years ago. He left a snarky response to a comment I'd left at Democracy Arsenal. This was before I started blogging, although Dan was blogging at Duck of Minerva, an international relations group blog. Currently, Dan is on academic leave from his department and is now working as an policy analyst at the Department of Defense. Being how Dan's involved in fairly high-level policy work, I thought I'd hold off on personal pictures until later. Dan's Georgetown faculty page is here, in any case. And here's the Princeton University Press page for his recent book, The Struggle for Power in Early Modern Europe:Religious Conflict, Dynastic Empires, and International Change.

I might be seeing Dan at the American Political Science Association meeting next September, and if so, I'll check with him then about posting personal pics online.

In the meanwhile, this is my sister Tracy:

Tracy came to visit at my home last night with her husband and daughter. Tracy gave me permission to publish her picture. Recall that I'm being careful about posting family information, but I actually haven't had any problems since publishing my Halloween photo essay a couple of weeks ago. So, let's keep our fingers crossed for continued respectfulness among commenters here, etc.

Tracy has a show dog, a Doberman Pinscher, named Alex, who is almost two years old:

When Tracy first told me she'd gotten a Doberman I laughed with her about it. When we were kids we saw They Only Kill Their Masters, a 1972 crime-suspense flick with James Garner and Katherine Ross.

I think we were actually really scared of Dobermans for a while after seeing that, LOL! But if Alex is any indication, Dobermans are just the sweetest, most gentle animals you'd want to be around. Alex is well trained and not rambunctious at all. He's gentle and playful, and loves kisses and petting. I didn't have time to ask my sister, but Alex has done well in dog show competitions. Also, this is a breeding dog, so Tracy's spoken to me about breeding inquiries she's received.

So, that was my big Saturday. The only thing I've left out is the grading!

In fact , I need to read about a dozen semester paper assignments today, and I'll probably watch some football. I'll be online later this morning and afternoon, as usual, for some hot blogging. And check back for my hot Marisa Miller entry tonight for sure!

*****

P.S. I just noticed the second shot of Alex includes Barack Obama's mug on my TV in the living room. That TV is a 20-inch Magnavox. We had a big Sony Bravia Widescreen, but my youngest son -- during a tantrum a year or so ago -- threw a big hard-plastic Incredible Hulk toy into the screen, the impact of which pierced the television and destroyed the picture. Those things are expensive! So, hopefully we'll get another 32-incher in there pretty soon.

More tonight!

So You Want to Be a Rock and Roll Star...

You know what it's like: There are some songs, like Jimi Hendrix's, "Purple Haze," or The Stones', "Jumping Jack Flash," where the guitar introductions practically clinch the recordings all by themselves. That's how it used to be for me, with Patti Smith's cover of "So You Want To Be A Rock 'N' Roll Star." (Wikipedia's entry on The Byrds' orginal is here, with discussion of numerous covers.) I've included video of both live and studio versions of Patti Smith:

I've yet to update on the Victoria's Secret fashion show (Marisa Miller is phenomenal, so check back soon on that); and in the meanwhile, see Snark 'n Boobs, who cross-posts at IOWNTHEWORLD (with stuff like this mind-boggling entry).

Plus, don't forget Theo Spark's, "Saturday Totty ..."