Moderate Candidate Has Early Lead in Iran's Presidential Election

The Lede has a big live blog, "Latest Updates on Election Day in Iran."

And see, "Moderate in Iranian Election Leads in Initial Returns":

TEHRAN — Iranian voters turned out in huge numbers on Friday, a late surge of interest in the presidential vote that seemed to swing the tide in the favor of the most moderate candidate in the field. But it was uncertain whether any single contestant would exceed the 50 percent threshold needed to avoid a runoff next week.

With long lines at the polls, voting hours were extended by five hours in parts of Tehran and four hours in the rest of the country. Turnout reached 75 percent, by official count, as disaffected members of the Green Movement, which was crushed in the uprising that followed the disputed 2009 presidential election, dropped a threatened boycott and appeared to coalesce behind a cleric, Hassan Rowhani, and the mayor of Tehran, Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf.

Iran’s interior minister, Mostafa Mohammad Najjar, said Saturday morning on state television that preliminary results showed Mr. Rowhani with a strong lead, followed by Mr. Ghalibaf. Mr. Najjar did not say when the final result would be available. Iran has more than 50 million eligible voters and as of early Saturday morning nearly three million votes had been counted.

If Rouhani wins, the biggest winner is the Iranian people. Biggest losers are Khamenei, Netanyahu, and DC neo-cons. #IranElection
— Trita Parsi (@tparsi) June 15, 2013

And check #IranElection on Twitter for additional updates.

Taylor Rosenbauer

My son likes to fingerboard, and he's good at it

He wanted me to post this video.

This kid at the clip, Taylor Rosenbauer, is one of the best fingerboarders.

Beltway Establishment Renders Harsh Verdict on Edward Snowden

Here's Politico's piece from the other day, "Establishment renders harsh verdict on Edward Snowden":

He is the toast of the libertarian left and the libertarian right. But for most of the political establishment, across the ideological spectrum, it has taken only a few days to conclude that Edward Snowden is nothing less than a dangerous villain.

If any part of Snowden hoped for a Pentagon Papers-style response to his leaks – a round of applause across Washington and New York at the daring revelation of secret national security information – this week certainly shattered any such illusion.

Ask nearly anyone in a position of authority in Washington and you will get a similar judgment on Snowden, the 29-year-old former defense contractor who exposed a vast National Security Agency surveillance program in multiple newspapers last week.

Continue reading.

And then check Kirsten Powers, "The Sickening Snowden Backlash":

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper blatantly lied to Congress about the activity of the NSA, and there seems to be no ramifications. Yet the Washington establishment wants to put Snowden in jail and throw away the key for telling the truth. We are told to blindly respect an institution that persecutes whistleblowers for leaks of overclassified government information while watching the Obama administration’s leaking of secret government information to aggrandize the president during his reelection campaign. So, please tell us more about how we should have more respect for our institutions.

She has a good point.

More at the link.

But as readers know, I don't trust the motives of people like Snowden --- who is no patriot in my book --- and I consider government's most basic role as protecting its citizens, Hence,  I accept the tradeoff between liberty and security. To the extent there's a problem, it's in the context of this administration's serial scandals, complete lack of accountability, and utter hypocrisy. It's progress for the leftists to be criticizing these programs. But we're nowhere where we were when Bush was in office, during which Democrats called for impeachment over warrantless wiretapping. No, there are some like Greenwald who're consistent. And I like Kirsten Powers, but folks should be thinking about finding the balance between honest disclosure and protecting the homeland. The full-blown crusade to turn this into the ultimate scandal of Big Brother totalitarianism is pretty laughable.

More from Max Boot, "Stay calm and let the NSA carry on":

The real scandal here is that the Guardian and Washington Post are compromising our national security by telling our enemies about our intelligence-gathering capabilities. Their news stories reveal, for example, that only nine Internet companies share information with the NSA. This is a virtual invitation to terrorists to use other Internet outlets for searches, email, apps and all the rest.

No intelligence effort can ever keep us 100% safe, but to stop or scale back the NSA's special intelligence efforts would amount to unilateral disarmament in a war against terrorism that is far from over...

Continue reading.

Charles Krauthammer: Obama’s Syria Response 'Preposterous'

Yeah, it's all messed up, and there ain't a whole helluva lot we can do to make things better, in any case.

Arming al Qaeda terrorists? Sounds like a winner (snark).

PBS NewsHour Stuggles in New Media Marketplace

I like PBS News Hour.

Sure, it's a leftist show, but it reminds me of the older age of journalism. I don't watch it much anymore, mostly because I'm blogging, or watching Fox News or sports, although I catch a segment on YouTube now and then.

At the New York Times, "Venerable Format of ‘NewsHour’ Struggles With New Era of Media":

For many of its 38 years, the sober studio-interview format of the “PBS NewsHour” has served the program well, drawing viewers and corporate underwriters alike. But with a deep financing crisis forcing layoffs and other cutbacks this week, some public television employees believe that format — and a general unwillingness to embrace the digital realities facing journalism — may be jeopardizing the program’s future.

“NewsHour” came under criticism in a confidential May 2012 report commissioned by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, one of the program’s major supporters in recent years, that concluded bluntly that the program needed to aggressively “modernize news gathering production.”

The report stressed the need for a major reorganization that included developing new digital platforms and clarifying its editorial focus. It also said more “decision-making transparency” was needed from MacNeil/Lehrer Productions, the profit-making company that co-produces the program for PBS. (The company is controlled by Jim Lehrer and Robert MacNeil, its founding anchors. Washington public television station WETA is the other producer.)

The pressures facing “NewsHour” are not unique. “What every traditional media organization is confronted with today is how to change profoundly to reflect the revolution in how people consume media,” said a former CNN bureau chief, Frank Sesno, now director of the School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University. But many organizations have moved more quickly to adapt, equipping producers with inexpensive video cameras to reduce news gathering costs, and investing in online and mobile platforms.

Mr. Sesno said that he “desperately” wants “NewsHour” to succeed. “They’ve got to figure out how to do the deeper dive and bring people along with them,” he said, by developing more of a conversation with the audience and becoming a “multimedia information experience. You can’t just be a TV show anymore.”

More at the link.

Well, everything's shaking out. The fact that I don't watch the show anymore is indicative of the problem. It's hard to sit down, around dinner time, and consume an hour-long news segment that's sort of fuddy-duddy in approach. I like the old-school vibe, but Frank Sesno's write: You gotta bring in people with you, make it somewhat interactive, and engage your constituency.

In any case, at the video is Kashmir Hill, who's a privacy blogger at Forbes, and Victor Mayer-Schönberger, who has the the May-June cover article at Foreign Affairs, "The Rise of Big Data: How It's Changing the Way We Think About the World."

So There Was No Economic Incentive to Buy the Electric Cars...

At Caroline Glick's, "Oil brings us to a better place..."

It's about Better Place Corporation's attempt to build an electric car company in Israel. Didn't work out so great, actually:

What failed with Better Place wasn't the idea of Israeli hi-tech prowess and ingenuity. What failed - again - was the notion that there is a way to use alternative energy sources - like electricity - to replace the internal combustion engine. And there isn't. There isn't because laws of supply and demand govern the economics of the car industry even when Shai Agassi is the one selling alternative economic laws.

A great piece.

RTWT.

'We Will Never Again Have a Republican President...'

Michele Bachmann has a stark warning:

Big Rule 5 Afternoon

Via Guns and Bikinis.

More at Randy's Roundtable, "Thursday Nite Tart (on Friday): Miss Panama Carolina Brid."

Also at Reaganite, "As Seen on RedEye w/Gutfeld!: Fox NY- Fox Business Channel's Anna Gilligan." And at Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, "The Friday Pin Up."

More at Pitsnipes and Gripes, "Who's up for a game of beer pong?" And the Right Way, "Friday Babe."

Now over to the Last Tradition, "Teyana Taylor Shows Off Bikini Body." And from Gator Doug, "DaleyGator DaleyBabe Camille Washington."

And at Pirate's Cove, "If All You See……is an evil dog which sucks up all the resources of the world causing the oceans to boil, you might just be a Warmist."

Also, at Drunken Stepfather, "BAMBI NORTHWOOD-BLYTH TITTIES FOR VOGUE OF THE DAY."

And at Blackmailers Don't Shoot, "Pretty Girls on a Thursday: Pin-Up Edition," and "Pretty Girls on a Thursday, Git ‘Er Done Edition."

Check Theo's as well, "Red Friday Totty," and "Bonus Totty..."

More at TCOTs, "Rule 5 News: 08 June 2013 A.D.," and the Other McCain, "Rule 5 Monday."

Still more at Conservative Hideout, "Girls and Guns, and did I Mention Links? June 12, 2013."

As always, drop your links in the comments if I've missed you and I'll update.

ADDED: From Animal Magnetism, "Rule Five Friday – Animal’s Manifesto, Part Nine."

Forensic Analysis Confirms Sharyl Attkisson Computer Hacked

As if there was ever any doubt.

At Big Journalism, "CBS NEWS: SHARYL ATTKISSON'S COMPUTER HACKED 'MULTIPLE TIMES'."

Also, from Twitchy, "Sharyl Attkisson: CBS confirmed my computer was hacked ‘on multiple occasions’." (Via Memeorandum.)

USA Today Publishes BDS Press Release Almost Word for Word, Accuses Israel of 'Large-Scale Abuses of Palestinian Rights...'

I posted on this earlier, "Alicia Keys Urged to Cancel 4th of July Concert in Israel."

But I guess they cribbed the piece almost word for word from the BDS Nazis.

At Algemeiner:

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel found itself a friend in major American newspaper USA Today recently, when a press release about its efforts to have Alicia Keys cancel her upcoming show in Israel appeared almost verbatim in an article on the newspaper’s website.

The American Journalist Jeffrey Goldberg first tweeted about the disturbing similarities Thursday, a day after the article appeared. “@USATODAY ran a BDS press release as a story. Here’s the newspaper piece Here’s the release” he wrote.

Sheesh. I'll first check with BDS before reading MSM media accounts on the boycott.

More at the link.

Turkey Protests Mobilize the Slingshot Grandmas Constituency

Via the Blaze, "A PICTURE IS WORTH 1,000 WORDS: MEANWHILE, IN TURKEY…"

Hat Tip: Meredith Jessup, on Twitter.

Let's Get It Started With Some Page 3 Girls!

Via the Sun UK, on Twitter.

Meanwhile, National Review campaign reporter Jim Geraghty takes issue with John Hawkins' top 20 conservative hotties. See, "Why I’m a Wary of Even Good-Natured Pundit Beauty Contests."

Well, I guess you gotta be PC to stay in the top ranks of the conservative media game. I'm just not playing that game.

PREVIOUSLY: "Are You Freakin' Kiddin' Me? — Michelle Fields Should Be Tops in Any Hottest Conservative Women Roundup!"

ADDED: Check out some Scarlet Bouvier on Twitter!

'Promise me you will never run for office again, and we'll drop this case...'

The quote's from Lois Lerner, the disgraced IRS hack and former thug FEC commissar, attempting to intimidate Republican Al Salvi after he was brought up on campaign finance charges during his 1996 Senate bid.

See George Will, "Scowling face of the state," via Cold Fury, "Look folks, you don’t build an all-powerful Leviathan State without intending to use it."

F-k the Democrats.

Could Syria Ignite World War III?

Now that's a dramatic headline, at London's Daily Mail, "Could Syria ignite World War 3? That's the terrifying question as the hatred between two Muslim ideologies sucks in the world's superpowers."

@CNN Bets on Kate Bolduan

I'm not sure why, but CNN's going with Ms. Bolduan, who seems like a high-school cheerleader more than a serious hard-news anchor.

At the Washington Post, "The dawn of Kate Bolduan, co-host of CNN’s ‘New Day’."

'300: Rise of an Empire'

Well, it won't be out for over a year, but I can dig it.

Glenn Greenwald Blamed the U.S. for 9/11 and Called for the 'Weakening of America...'

I blog about Glenn Greenwald quite a bit. He's consistent and makes the loser leftists look like dolts.

But I'm amazed at how the libertarian right is lionizing him, obviously clueless to Greenwald's anti-Americanism and vile Israel-hatred.

But Trevor Loudon's got the dope, "“9/11″ Was “Very Minimal in Scope”, Calls for the “Weakening of America” – NSA Leaks Journalist Glenn Greenwald."

Read it all.

The Immigration Bill Is a Scam

From Kurt Schlichter, at Townhall, "The Immigration “Crisis” Is No Crisis."

The Papers of the Founding Founders Are Now Online — Seriously? The 'Founding Founders'?

I thought this was a hoax at first.

At the White House homepage, here.

Honestly, I had to check for myself, and here it is: "The Papers of the Founding Founders Are Now Online." http://t.co/zbSOV1EEus #HeadDesk
— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) June 14, 2013

And see Twitchy, "‘Founding Founders’? White House creates gender neutral birth of a nation."

RT @lheal: @charlescwcooke @sistertoldjah Heh. pic.twitter.com/WuaMseTycE
— Sister Toldjah (@sistertoldjah) June 13, 2013

Also at National Review, "White House Website Lauds ‘Founding Founders’" (via Memeorandum).

Added: From William Jacobson, "Sometimes I feel like a Founding Fatherless child."

Syria Crosses Obama's Red Line on Chemical Weapons

I've said it many times, but the U.S. should have considered military intervention in Syria long ago. I doubt we'd make things better at this point. An Islamist regime coming to power won't be an improvement on Assad. As sick as it sounds, there's no good choice for Syria right now.

Maybe Obama will get some wag-the-dog relief from all the scandals with some bold talk, however, and the congressional hawks are ready to help in --- John McCain, for example.

At CSM, "Syria crosses 'red line' on chemical weapons. How will Obama respond?"

Also at Astute Bloggers, "MORE PROOF HE IS EVIL: OBAMA HAS DECIDED TO GIVE MILITARY SUPPORT TO AL QAEDA'S AFFILIATES."