Another Democrat protecting Iran

It looks like Joe Biden is now joining James Webb in going to the mat for Iran.

Let's review some of what Iran has been doing:
* They support Hezbollah, the terrorist group that bombed the Marine Barracks in 1983, with all sorts of weapons, including C-802 anti-ship missiles.

* They have provided weapons to insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan - weapons used in fatal attacks against our troops.

* The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps has sent advisors to terrorist groups and the insurgents in Iraq.

* Iranian leadership has openly declared their intentions to acquire nuclear weapons and to wipe Israel (perhaps America's best friend in the Middle East) off the map.

Biden's defense of this regime is appalling. What part of "Iran helps terrorists kill our troops" doesn't he understand?

There's a reason it was called Clinton News Network...

It seems CNN picked up at least one planted question.

In fact, the whole CNN debate struck me as more of CNN's caricature of Republicans (Lou Dobbs seems to be their classic example) rather than a real debate.

MacRanger has a decent round-up.

This was a set-up, and anyone going on CNN needs to know it's hostile territory.

A dark side to the Huckabee surge?

I hope that Article 6 Blog is wrong, but reading the New York Times coverage on Huckabee today really leads me to doubt it.

If so, then I think conservatism needs to head to the ash heap of history.

If the New York Times is to be believed (and a fair degree of salt is required with that outlet at times), it seems that Huckabee's people are playing the Mormon card. Now, is it true? I don't know, although a Huckabee supporter did go after Sam Brownback for being Catholic.

I don't hold with National Review's brand of conservatism much any more. But Kathryn Jean Lopez is dead on target in this column:

If you are not going to support Republican Mitt Romney for president because you don’t think he is the guy to win the war on terror, that is your call. If you are pro-life and you do not buy his abortion conversion story, it’s a free country. But if you are not going to support Mitt Romney for president because he is Mormon, or because you think he will not be elected president because he is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, say your prayers for America.

I'll be watching very closely, because the questions that emerge are going to be very basic. I'm already uncomfortable with the fact that some on the right seem to view disagreement with them on immigration as "treason", or a difference of strategy s being a sign that I'm a "party hack" who "sold my soul". Now, they seem to think that playing the religion card is acceptable conduct.

It's going to take one hell of a reason for me to work for their political empowerment.

They want us there...

The Iraqi government seems to be eyeing a long-term American military presence.

If I'm a Democrat running for Congress or the White House, the "Oh, crap!" meter is running very high at this news. If there is this formal request that the United States of America maintains a long-term presence in Iraq, it becomes much harder for the Dems to please their political base. It would put them in line with Muqtada al-Sadr as well as Iran and Syria, but that would be it.

Oh, and they would be leaving an ally in the lurch. Typical of them (see their treatment of Colombia under President Uribe), but it won't play well here, especially if the declaration of intent becomes public.

Jeffs is off to prison.

May he drop the soap, and may he be brought to his cell, and greeted by his cellmate, saying, "My name is Spike, honey."

They're up to no good...

Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez recently paid a visit to Tehran to meet Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

This is one meeting which I hope NSA bugged and wiretapped six ways from Sunday.

Best to know what these folks are up to.

EDIT: Looks like "up to no good" was an understatement.

Why I'm not backing McCain, Reason #3382343

Liz Mair discusses John McCain's attack on Rudy Giuliani.

Perhaps the most damning is this sentence from the "correct answer" given for one of the questions on a quiz.

The nomination of Rudy Giuliani would likely lead to the formation of a third party made up of social conservatives.

Quite revealing, if you ask me. In essence, John McCain is willing to give the third-party types a stronger hand if it increases his chance.

It's the nasty side of John McCain, which has, in the past, flared up. In this campaign, his supporters have Mormon-baited, particularly in South Carolina. Repeatedly. And it was not hard to track it down, either.

It's the reason why McCain's an also-ran, and Giuliani is the front-runner. McCain will disagree with you and jab you in the eye. Even if you agree with him, you can find his approach counter-productive in the extreme. Giuliani may disagree with you, but he works to find common ground.

Thus endeth the post.

Can I have one?

Anyone who lives in the DC area and who deals with the traffic will appreciate this report from the Popular Mechanics blog.

Youtube has a 71-second video.

Who has one? Dunno, the company ain't sayin'.

I wanna know how much it costs.

Witherspoon's baggage...

It seems that the Tancredobots have found their challenger to Lindsey Graham: Sitting RNC member Buddy Witherspoon. Pink Flamingo did some digging, and found out some stuff that people ought to know.

Read it - and keep it in mind the next time Michelle Malkin complains about "race-baiting" or "misrepresentation" - when someone's tied with the Council of Conservative Citizens, he's with some very shady company. Malkin seems willing to look the other way.

I doubt that South Carolina voters will.

0-for-40

That is the Democrats' track record on cutting and running from Iraq.

And now, the surge has shown signs that it is succeeding. And it is causing a turnaround in public opinion, according to Pollster.com.

Republicans (including the president) have made real progress in swaying opinion to their side, while 10 months of Democratic efforts have failed to persuade citizens that the war continues to be a disaster. The war of partisan persuasion has tilted towards the Republicans and away from the Democrats, at least in this particular aspect.

In essence, the battle of public opinion is being won here, and that means our troops have a chance to win the war over there.

And the Democrats now get to explain reality to their base.

She's no Iron Lady...

Hillary seems to play the victim any time someone asks her a hard question.

Hillary is smart and she can be pretty good. But when you throw her off her script, she gets rattled, big time.

Add to that the way the MoveOn/DailyKos wing has been calling the shots, and the Dems are in a hole. Tack on the do-nothing Democratic Congress, and the Dems have real problems.

Rove's read...

Karl Rove's read of the 2008 landscape - at least as it pertains to Congress - is worth keeping in mind.

Why is Rove's take worth remembering? Let's lay it out: When he and President Bush were running the game plans from 2000-2004, the GOP made electoral gains.

After pledging a "Congress that strongly honors our responsibility to protect our people from terrorism," Democrats have refused to make permanent reforms of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that the Director of National Intelligence said were needed to close "critical gaps in our intelligence capability." Their presidential candidates fell all over each other in a recent debate to pledge an end to the Terrorist Surveillance Program. Then Senate Democratic leaders, thinking there was an opening for political advantage, slow-walked the confirmation of Judge Michael Mukasey to be the next attorney general. It's obvious that this is a man who knows the important role the Justice Department plays in the war on terror. Delaying his confirmation is only making it harder to prosecute the war.

Democrats promised "civility and bipartisanship." Instead, they stiff-armed their Republican colleagues, refused to include them in budget negotiations between the two houses, and have launched more than 400 investigations and made more than 675 requests for documents, interviews or testimony. They refused a bipartisan compromise on an expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program, instead wasting precious time sending the president a bill they knew he would veto. And they did this knowing that they wouldn't be able to override that veto. Why? Because their pollsters told them putting the children's health-care program at risk would score political points. Instead, it left them looking cynical.

The list of Congress's failures grows each month. No energy bill. No action on health care. No action on the mortgage crisis. No immigration reform. No progress on renewing No Child Left Behind. Precious little action on judges and not enough on reducing trade barriers. Congress has not done its work. And these failures will have consequences.

In essence, I think AJ-Strata has been right - the American public is going to look for a problem-solver in 2008. The Republicans have two of them competing for the nomination, and ranking 1-2: Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney.

The 2006 midterm defeat is now looking like a great boon to the GOP. In essence, the GOP now has the chance to shake some of its strident fringe on issues like immigration and abortion, instead focusing on winning the Global War on Terror and getting the economy in shape. The Dems will be beholden to their strident fringe, which bitterly opposes the war.

Shades of 1988, anyone?

Conservative strategic incompetence, revisted

Well, another election in Virginia is over. The Republicans have once again suffered losses when all the votes were counted.

For the third straight year.

In each of these three years, they took a hard line on immigration. And let's see what it got them:

The governorship? Nope, an avowed liberal who opposes the death penalty is currently in the governor's mansion.

The Senate seat held by George Allen? Nope, it's now held by a Democrat who has been determined to coddle Iran.

The state senate, which had been Republican for eight years? Nope. That is now gone.

Ever since conservatives staged their revolt against President Bush, citing his failure to adhere to principles, the GOP has been losing ground in the state of Virginia. This is not one election, this is three elections.

This is not a matter of explaining ourselves better - I could buy that argument if it had been one election or maybe two. But losses in three straight elections? No, I cannot buy that argument. I can only conclude that people are not buying our explanations.

Certain people have promised that holding to principle on this issue (in essence, maintaining a hard line) would be a cornerstone of victory. Well, if there have been victories, I have not seen them here, or across the country for that matter (the GOP had more of a mixed bag across the country).

It is time to hold them accountable. I ask that my readers begin to do so by contributing to Republicans who supported President Bush's approach to immigration. I also encourage them to donate to groups like the Republican Main Street Partnership and the Republican Leadership Council.

And for conservatives who wish to complain, I can only quote Ernst Stavro Blofeld in You Only Live Twice:
"This is the price of failure[.]"

Prudes strike again...

Don Wildman is really starting to piss me off. Once again, he is trying to tell the military how to run their exchanges.

C'mon, Don, these guys are risking their asses to protect your right to be an asshole. Letting them read Playboy if they choose to do so is a small favor we can do for them.

GOP chances in 2008...

Fred Barnes has a good article in the Weekly Standard.

Two things did jump out at me. The portion about the Hispanic vote is what I'm saying here, as well. The hard line has arguably turned off Hispanics.

The second is Bush. President Bush has a personal following, largely among people who think he has done his best and like him. I cannot speak for anyone else, but when Republicans were trashing the guy who was doing a good job calling the shots, I really did not feel like sticking my neck out for them.

In essence, the conservative revolt has now alienated the Bush Republicans - people who are largely conservative, but who bristle at those who try to impose an ideological doctrine on them. I'm one of those - largely on immigration - who has found himself increasingly leaning towards the Republican Main Street Project and the Republican Leadership Council, largely because I do not really trust conservatives at this juncture to put the Global War on Terror first.

And looking at Pakistan, can there be any that issue is far more important. Some are even willing to try to blackmail the Republican party over this, or declare that I have "sold my soul" over that stuff. And that approach is repulsive enough to overcome my general agreements with most of their positions.

Conservatism is in trouble. If I can't bring myself to back them when I agree with them most of the time, how do they hope to persuade others who may have more disagreements with them than I do?

Pakistan...

The situation in Pakistan is a very rough one. I've written something at Strategypage, but we need to talk the options.

Now, we hear that President Bush may be reassessing the relationship with Musharraf. We do need to assess the situation, but we have something else to think about: Over 40,000 coalition troops who we need to supply - from us and thirteen allies. Fourteen if you count Afghanistan and the 50,000-plus personnel there.

Musharraf is friendly, and he is rational. Given that Pakistan has nearly 100 nukes, we need to keep him in as long as possible, until we have a better idea who will succeed him. But right now, things are risky.

Schilling to Milwaukee?

If this report is anywhere close to true, then Doug Melvin needs to talk with the guy ASAP.

Sheets, Schilling, Gallardo, Villanueva, and Suppan would easily be the best rotation in the majors.

Can Brewers fan hope?

WHACK!

From the Drudge Report:

Bush says Dems beholden to 'Moveon.org bloggers and Code Pink protesters'... Developing...

Given that the Democratic presidential nominees seem to be arguing over who will roll out the most cowardly foreign policy, one has to agree with this on a factual level.

Remember, MoveOn.org even opposed kicking Taliban ass after 9/11.

UPDATE: We have a link.