Thursday, August 30, 2018

Wednesday, August 29, 2018

Grifters and Candace Owens

This is great.

From Melissa Mackenzie, at the American Spectator:


Tuesday, August 28, 2018

'And I don't want the world to see me...'

My fall semester started yesterday, and I should be posting some drive-time music entries in the weeks to come.

Meanwhile, I heard the Goo Goo Dolls sometime over the summer, and I've had this song on my mind. When I looked it up I found this amazing live performance from July 4th, 2004, in Buffalo, New York. As noted at the Wikipedia page, "Over 60,000 fans attended the performance, braving a torrential downpour. The rain cleared in time for the Goo Goo Dolls to start the show, but during their performance of "January Friend", the rain began pouring down again, harder than before. The band played on, finishing the set, despite being pulled off stage briefly for a safety precaution and skipping three songs* that were on the original set list."

Pretty amazing:



Shop Amazon

Here's my generic Amazon link.

I'll post more specialized deals later.

Meanwhile, see Margaret Walker, Jubilee (50th Anniversary Edition).

'It does not behoove us to celebrate defeat and losers are not generally regarded as heroes in politics. John McCain was a loser, and the particular way he went about losing deserves to be studied as an example of what not to do in politics...'

John McCain was Robert Stacy McCain's very distant cousin, and those who've been reading the Other McCain for years probably remember some of the latter's musings on the "crazy" Arizona senator from time to time.

But with his passing it behooves us to take a a fresh and critical look at the "Maverick's" political legacy. Why, for example, is the grief and outpouring so profound among leftists, who during the campaign in 2008 demonized Senator McCain as a racist warmonger?

Well, check the long and compelling entry at the Other McCain, "Every Liberal’s Favorite Republican, and the Problem With ‘Bipartisan Reform’."
All that is necessary for any Republican to win praise from the liberal media is for him to endorse their negative opinion of the GOP, and this is how John McCain became every liberal’s favorite Republican.

This is not how winners play the game. Nor can the kind of “bipartisan reform” agenda with which John McCain made his name synonymous ever do anything to help elect Republicans. There are three basic problems with “bipartisan reform,” first, that GOP officials who support such efforts are always doing so to curry favor with the liberal media; second, that these “reform” schemes always have the political effect of alienating the Republican Party’s conservative grassroots; and third, that Democrats will never support any “reform” unless they believe it will help them win elections (and thus obtain greater power) in the future...
RTWT.


Sunday, August 26, 2018

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."

And at Theo's, "Cartoon Roundup..."


Dakota Fanning Photographed

At Drunken Stepfather, "Dakota Fanning of the Day."

Happy Birthday Claudia Schiffer!

The superstar supermodel turned 48 yesterday.

At RealClearLife, "Celebrate Timeless Supermodel Claudia Schiffer, Who Turns 48 This Weekend."


John McCain, Faith of My Fathers

At Amazon, John McCain, Faith of My Fathers: A Family Memoir.



John McCain, The Restless Wave

At Amazon, John McCain, The Restless Wave: Good Times, Just Causes, Great Fights, and Other Appreciations.



John McCain, 'Maverick' War Hero, Senator, and Presidential Candidate, Dies at 81

By now you've heard the sad news.

I never met John McCain, but during the 2008 presidential campaign, he was my personal hero. My longtime blog readers will know why. "American Power" was among the very first of conservative blogw to come out in support of McCain's bid for the GOP nomination in 2007. That's when I basically went into full-time politics blog mode, and when McCain won the nomination I felt a sense of euphoria and accomplishment. I hope in some small way that I contributed to his success. That, of course, can't be said of the general election campaign in 2008. When the Kenyan interloper won the election I was in a funk not unlike the one that afflicted leftists after Shrillary's loss in 2016. I know the feeling.

In any case, at the New York Times, via Memorandum, "John McCain, War Hero, Senator, Presidential Contender, Dies at 81," and "John McCain to Lie in State at Capitols in Washington and Arizona."

And do read Mark Barabak's excellent obituary, at the Los Angeles Times:



Mecum's 2018 Dodge SRT Demon Offering

This is fantastic!


'Lady Justice does not wear a blindfold over only one eye...'

From the inimitable Kim Strassel, at WSJ, "When Justice Is Partial" (and here):


The country has watched the FBI treat one presidential campaign with kid gloves, the other with informants, warrants and eavesdropping. They’ve seen the Justice Department resist all efforts at accountability, even as it fails to hold its own accountable. And don’t get them started on the one-sided media.

And they are now witnessing unequal treatment in special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe. Yes, the former FBI director deserves credit for smoking out the Russian trolls who interfered in 2016. And one can argue he is obliged to pursue any evidence of criminal acts, even those unrelated to Russia. But what cannot be justified is the one-sided nature of his probe.

Consider Mr. Cohen, the former Trump lawyer who this week pleaded guilty to eight felony charges. Six related to his personal business dealings; the other two involved campaign-finance violations arising from payments to women claiming affairs with Donald Trump. The criminal prosecution of campaign-finance offenses is exceptionally rare (most charges are civil), but let’s take Mr. Khuzami’s word for it when he says Mr. Cohen’s crimes are “particularly significant” because he’s a lawyer who should know better, and also because the payments were for the purpose of “influencing an election” and undermining its “integrity.”

If there is only “one set of rules,” where is Mr. Mueller’s referral of a case against Hillary for America? Federal law requires campaigns to disclose the recipient and purpose of any payments. The Clinton campaign paid Fusion GPS to compile a dossier against Mr. Trump, a document that became the basis of the Russia narrative Mr. Mueller now investigates. But the campaign funneled the money to law firm Perkins Coie, which in turn paid Fusion. The campaign falsely described the money as payment for “legal services.” The Democratic National Committee did the same. A Perkins Coie spokesperson has claimed that neither the Clinton campaign nor the DNC was aware that Fusion GPS had been hired to conduct the research, and maybe so. But a lot of lawyers here seemed to have been ignoring a clear statute, presumably with the intent of influencing an election.

Prosecutions under the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA) are also exceptionally rare, though Mr. Mueller is getting media kudos for hammering the likes of Paul Manafort and Rick Gates for failing to register as lobbyists for foreign entities. The law is the law.

But under this standard, where are the charges against the principals of Fusion GPS, who Sen. Chuck Grassley has said look to have been lobbying on behalf of powerful Russians against a U.S. sanctions law, with its payment again funneled through a law firm? This was a sideline to its dossier work, but Mr. Mueller usually has no issue with sideline charges.

Or what about an evenhanded look at dossier author Christopher Steele?
Keep reading.

Saturday, August 25, 2018

Theodore Draper, A Struggle for Power

At Amazon, Theodore Draper, A Struggle for Power: The American Revolution.



Woody Holton, Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution

At Amazon, Woody Holton, Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution.



Jack Rakove, Original Meanings

Jack N. Rakove, Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution.



What Happened to the Liberal Arts?

Heather Mac Donald's new book is out on September 4th, at Amazon, The Diversity Delusion: How Race and Gender Pandering Corrupt the University and Undermine Our Culture.

And see the roundup on Ms. Mac Donald at AoSHQ, "Late Summer Saturday Open Thread August 25."

And at Prager University:



Rep. Duncan Hunter Blames Wife (VIDEO)

That's pretty scuzzy. (*Shrugs.*)

At the San Diego Union Tribune, "Rep. Duncan Hunter points to his wife and 'whatever she did' in campaign finance scandal":

Duncan Hunter and his wife Margaret entered — and exited — the federal courthouse separately on Thursday.

Rep. Hunter, the Republican congressman from Alpine, rushed to his black suburban as crowds chanted, “Shame. Shame. Shame.”

Margaret left through a different exit. She had her head down. Onlookers said the 43-year-old mother of three looked as if she was about to cry.

A 60-count indictment, filed in federal court in San Diego, accuses the couple of illegally using a quarter of a million dollars in campaign money to fund their lavish lifestyles and filing false campaign finance records with the Federal Election Commission to cover it up.

They pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, falsification of records and aiding and abetting in the prohibited use of campaign contributions.

Congressman Hunter, 41, is well-known in California and on Capitol Hill. His grandfather, Robert Hunter, was a veteran who hosted a popular TV broadcast in Washington D.C. with Republican members of Congress who wanted to give weekly reports on their districts. After moving back to California in the mid-1950s, he developed the Jurupa Hills Country Club and Golf Course, and many surrounding communities in western Riverside, according to news reports.

Hunter’s father, Duncan L. Hunter, held the same congressional seat as his son for 28 years and had a short-lived bid for president in 2008.

By the time the youngest Hunter entered the race for what was then the 52nd District, he had the name recognition of three generations and ties to a massive support network from his father’s previous campaigns...
More.

Previously: "California's 50th District Now Competitive After Duncan Hunter Indictment?"

Friday, August 24, 2018