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The Huffington Post's Mayhill Fowler reports that, at that same San Francisco fundraiser where Obama revealed his previously unknown college sojourn to Pakistan, the junior senator from Illinois seemed to try to get inside the mind of small towners in Pennsylvania, with a dose of sociology and a dollop of dime-store psychology. "You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them," Obama said. "And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration...

<p>You've got a tough job up there in the clouds riding herd over the folks. Apparently you're having problems with the folks speaking out against the America hating left. But that's ok. Just keep your eyes closed, ears plugged and your jaws flapping. Eventually the folks will tune you out and we'll all be better off for it.</p>

'Vegansexuals' shun sex with meaties By staff writers July 31, 2007 10:45am A GROUP of vegans in New Zealand - vegansexuals - are shunning sex with meat-eaters because their bodies are made up of animal carcases. "When you are vegan or vegetarian, you are very aware that when people eat a meaty diet, they are kind of a graveyard for animals," vegan Nichola Kriek said in the Christchurch daily The Press. Another said: "I would not want to be intimate with someone whose body is literally made up from the bodies of others who have died for their sustenance." Annie...

Sen. John McCain said Friday that only "contracting a fatal disease" will cause him to drop out of the presidential race before the primaries begin, as he vowed to take his campaign directly to the voters of New Hampshire and other early-voting states as a means of compensating for his financial difficulties. Watch video here McCain, R-Ariz., told reporters after a speech in Concord, N.H., that he will concentrate more on town-hall meetings and bus-tour campaigning to connect with voters. He vowed to fix the fund-raising woes that have left him with just $2 million in his campaign account, but...

Former Sen. Fred Thompson has begun his unannounced quest for the Republican presidential nomination by telling audiences in New Hampshire that Washington is badly out of touch with the country. As a senior campaign adviser put it to The Washington Post's Michael Shear, Thompson believes that "the politicians have lost their connection with what people really want and what they really expect." Few if any of the other 17 men and one woman vying for the presidency would be bold enough to challenge Thompson's claim. The belief that official Washington is deaf to the people's wishes is a staple of...

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Mayor Bloomberg is decrying the state of the 2008 presidential race, faulting the major party candidates for offering shallow, simplistic prescriptions, and scolding the press for failing to demand more from those seeking the White House. During an appearance at Google's headquarters in Silicon Valley yesterday, Mr. Bloomberg said the televised debates among the presidential candidates have been, in essence, a waste of time. "They have absolutely nothing to do with the job and the qualifications. And they don't tell you anything about whether or not any of those candidates would be good or bad presidents....

The biggest problem with modern American liberalism may be the word itself. There’s just something about the word, liberal, something about the way it sounds – it just hits the ear wrong. If it were an animal it would be something squirming and hairless, something that burrows maybe, with no eyes and too many legs. No child would bring home a wounded liberal and ask to keep it as a pet. More likely he would step on it, or maybe tie it to a bottle-rocket and shoot it over the railroad tracks. The word has a chilling effect even on...

MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) -- Presidential hopeful Hillary Rodham Clinton outlined a broad economic vision Tuesday, saying it's time to replace an "on your own" society with one based on shared responsibility and prosperity. The Democratic senator said what the Bush administration touts as an "ownership society" really is an "on your own" society that has widened the gap between rich and poor. "I prefer a 'we're all in it together' society," she said. "I believe our government can once again work for all Americans. It can promote the great American tradition of opportunity for all and special privileges for none."...

POSTED: 10:34 pm PDT May 21, 2007 FAIRFIELD -- What initially appeared to be a minor traffic accident involving California State Senator Carole Migden is now part of a broader investigation by the highway patrol. The KTVU Ten O'Clock News has learned that several motorists phoned the CHP, warning them to stop an erratic and dangerous driver just before Migden crashed her car last Friday. A peninsula man, who asked us not to use his name, is one of half a dozen drivers so worried about a woman driving erratically and recklessly Friday morning on Interstate 80, they called 911....

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Delegates to the state Republican convention unleashed a rare chorus of boos and hisses at U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss on Saturday, as he spoke up for a bipartisan immigration reform package unveiled in Washington this week. Hear it for yourself by clicking here. Chambliss had just finished emphasizing his devotion to border security provisions contained in the measure, and brought up agriculture’s need for temporary, foreign workers. “We’ve got to face the fact that we’ve got to create a new, truly temporary worker program” — the boos started here, but Chambliss plowed on — “for that segment...

Jack Ohman/The Oregonian

Hosted at the mansion/home of former Denver Nuggets star Kiki Van De Weghe, the event was meant as a strict money gatherer for Giuliani's frontrunner campaign. Only one problem: Giuliani is adamantly anti-gun, with a record to prove it. Being the first in a series of collaborative efforts between Rocky Mountain Gun Owners and the National Association for Gun Rights, we wanted this one to be a surprise (to both the organizers of the event and the attendees). Rest assured we'll let you know when there is another event. A small number of hardcore RMGO activists met outside the Cheeseman...

I recieved this forwarded e-mail this morning... Friends and Colleagues, In case you haven’t heard about this, here is information about an upcoming peace witness. Please forward to your own friends and distribution lists as you feel appropriate. Iraq War Anniversary Vigil Americans across the country are more concerned than ever about our direction in Iraq. Now is the time for Congress to force a change. On March 19th, thousands of us from organizations across the movement will gather together to observe the fourth anniversary of the war through candlelight vigils. We’ll solemnly honor the sacrifice made by more than...

Harsh new taxes on air travel, including a strict personal flight "allowance", will be unveiled by the Conservatives tomorrow as part of a plan that would penalise business travellers, holidaymakers and the tourist industry. The proposals, to be disclosed by George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, include levying VAT or fuel duty on domestic flights for the first time as part of a radical plan to tackle global warming. The Conservatives will also suggest - most controversially of all - rationing individuals to as little as a single short-haul flight each year; any further journeys would attract progressively higher taxes, a...

TIBURON, Calif. -- Some residents of this upscale San Francisco suburb plan to fight a proposed Habitat for Humanity housing development over concerns that the project would decrease property values and increase traffic. The international nonprofit partnered with the owner of a 16.5-acre tract in the town's Eagle Rock neighborhood to build four single-family homes for low-income families, but neighbors fear negative effects on the community. "Habitat for Humanity is to bring the neighborhood up, not to bring the neighborhood down," said Bill Roberts, a 40-year Eagle Rock resident. Roberts said he and dozens of other neighbors are raising money...

Recently, I was re-reading one of P.J. O’Rourke’s books, and this happened to be while John Kerry was on Larry King Live. As Kerry was trying to dig his way out of a hole with such vigor that he was about to reach China, I ran across the chapter title, “Commies: Dead but too dumb to lie down.” I looked up at John Francois Kerry, and it was as if the gods of fortuitous timing were with me that evening. The chapter title, most of it anyway, was the perfect description of what has become of John Kerry’s presidential aspirations....

So this is fun: In a statement from Wal-Mart today, former Senator John Edwards had a staffer contact the electronics manager in a Raleigh, North Carolina store to try and get his hands on a PlayStation 3. Problem was, later that night he reportedly told a story to people on a United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union-sponsored call that his son had ridiculed a classmate about his shoes, which were purchased at Wal-Mart. Upon hearing the news, the company invited Edwards to visit the local store to check out its electronics as well as its shoes for men and...

Mr. Kerry, Well, you’ve done it again. You’ve besmirched our men and women in harms way and, in a shameless display of arrogance and unaccountability, refused to apologize, and attempted to shift the blame for your actions to others. This is a great example of the type of presidential non-leadership that you would have provided. All that was missing in your disgraceful, blame shifting press conference was a finger wagging outburst. From the dishonest testimony before congress about Vietnam atrocities, to accusing our troops of being nocturnal terrorist in Iraq and now your latest insult to the men and women...

MIDI - IT NEVER RAINS IN CALIFORNIA Kerry shot his foot in Southern California First he shot it, then he stuffed it down in his mouth What a fool in California...Democrats, we warn ya Look south...your polls head south He could not resist in Southern California I think maybe Karl Rove is whom he will blame A special trip off to California...but, you Dems, we warn ya In flames...you'll go in flames John Kerry labeled troops murderers...go check out his long record, we are sure Trash talking our guys he won't defer...send this traitor home He couldn't behave in...

Yesterday, John Kerry "jokingly" insulted the troops. Today he refused to apologize: preferring to use his moment in the sun to further "Swiftboat" himself.

In his book, ''State of Fear,'' author Michael Crichton appended an opinion entitled “Why Politicized Science Is Dangerous,” and cautioned against, “a social program masquerading as a scientific one,” citing the widespread eugenics movement in the early part of the last century. “A second example of politicized science is quite different in character,” warned Crichton. “It exemplifies the hazard of government ideology controlling the work of science, and of uncritical media promoting false concepts.” Just as eugenics drew praise and support from politicians, academicians, and media in its time, so too has the manufactured crisis of global warming today. This...

I remember a high school class where we were asked to write an essay about whether we were a conformist or a non-conformist. Of course, everyone wrote that they were non-conformist except for ME. I figured that if you are a TRUE non-conformist you would go against the crowd and actually proclaim yourself a conformist PLUS I also figured out that we have to act as conformists in at least 95% of what we do in order to function in society. For example, speaking a common language, abiding by traffic regulations to avoid accidents, getting vaccinated, etc.. Of course,...

What does it say about America that the killed and wounded soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are more likely to hail from Prattville, Alabama, Lincoln, Nebraska, Mansfield, Ohio, or Klamath Falls, Oregon, than New York City, Beverly Hills or Cambridge, Massachusetts? These statistics paint a bleak portrait of an entire class that has eschewed military service, which is problematic in itself, but particularly since this class comprises America’s opinion makers and cultural leaders. Undeniably, the most noticeable location where this military desertion and the cultural forces that inspire it can be seen is on college campuses, especially in the Ivy...

2008 presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton wowed the crowd at a pre-nomination breakfast in Buffalo Wednesday morning with a story about how she had befriended the maid who cleans her hotel room. With just hours to go before she accepts the nomination for a second term as New York's junior senator, Clinton huddled with party faithful in a downstairs banquet room at Buffalo's convention center. The former first lady recalled how, during her first Senate run, she began staying in a downtown hotel when she traveled to Buffalo - claiming that as time went by she and the maid became good...

Cynics are right: Hercules' old-fashioned new neighborhoods are downright unreal. The houses are too pristine, the landscaping too prim. They're modeled along the lines of a bungalow-filled village of yore, yet the result looks like a pastel launching pad for commuters. No matter. I'll root for a David clad in Ralph Lauren over a bottom-line Wal-Mart Goliath any day.

In an effort to advance their proactive vision for this Congress, on February 1st, 2006, Senators Nelson (FL-D) and Martinez (FL-R) unveiled the Permanent Protection for Florida Act. This measure provides permanent protection for Florida’s coasts and extends the moratoria protecting the entire Atlantic and Pacific coasts through the year 2020.

History has attributed to the War of 1812 the label of "The Second War for American Independence". It is regarded as an American victory not because of any military achievement, but because it etched American independence from Britain in stone. In contemporary terms, the war was a disaster, with the British easily occupying Detroit, chasing a fleeing President Madison from the capital, and setting many public landmarks ablaze. It was during this conflict that great anti-war opposition in the North East led to the Hartford Convention. Small-minded men of the waning Federalist Party, who never got over the ascendancy of...

BOSTON, Massachusetts (AP) -- Leading the world's wealthiest and probably most famous university sounds like the plummiest job in academe -- with a staff, a house, and a half-million dollar salary among the many perks. But running Harvard isn't easy. Neil Rudenstine, school president from 1991 to 2001, was forced to take leave of absence for exhaustion in 1994. His successor, Lawrence Summers, announced Tuesday he would resign June 30 after a tumultuous five years, his ambitious agenda to get Harvard's territorial undergraduate and professional schools on same page done in by faculty revolts and brusque management style. Harvard-watchers inside...

The LDS Church, extremism and our leadership vacuum Utah Voices Jerold Willmore Jerold Willmore During the waning months of Eisenhower's presidency, I was in Washington, D.C., working for Sen. Frank Church during the day, pursuing a graduate degree at night and campaigning for JFK against Nixon on Saturdays. Sundays, I presided over the Sunday school in the LDS Washington Ward, attended by Secretary of Agriculture (and LDS Apostle) Ezra Taft Benson and his family. America was locked in the Cold War. Worse, the fires of nuclear fear were fanned by McCarthyist "red-baiters," none more rabid than Robert Welch, president of...

There's no helping you. This site is now just a diversion -- like a train wreck. This site is inherently for and about raving egomaniacs, and Jim's site policies -- which amount to excluding reality and actual dialogue in favor of political/militaristic pornography -- is conducive to cognitive dissonance, which at the times your worldview is threatened leads you into psychotic breaks (on the political cognitive plane, that is, and just maybe in other realms too). Not to mention that your baseline politics is based in mythology about American demographics, science, economics, ethics etc. You spoonfeed each other in the...

MAYOR Bloomberg has decided to write a check for more than $300,000 so his re-election campaign won't have to contest the summonses it got for plastering the city with more than 4,000 illegal posters. "The decision has been made to pay all that," one mayoral aide said last week. The mayor's campaign had been positioning itself to challenge at least some of the 4,218 summonses that poured in between Aug. 10 and Nov. 9.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy belongs to a social club for Harvard students and alumni that was evicted from campus nearly 20 years ago after refusing to allow female members. According to the online membership directory of the Owl Club, the Massachusetts Democrat updated his personal information -- including the address of his home that is in his wife's name -- on Sept. 7. The club has long been reviled on campus as "sexist" and "elitist" and, in 1984, was booted from the university for violating federal anti-discrimination laws, authored by Mr. Kennedy. Mr. Kennedy has spent much of this week's...

OK, I am offended now. NBC is flogging "3 Wishes" as a family show, an alternate to "Extreme Home Makeover". In it, they find 3 families with some kind of horrible problem or tragedy, and fulfill a wish of some kind. Tonight, for a sad little cancerous girl, they redressed a home in California as if it were a winter wonderland with lights and snow, just like the Midwest Christmases her mom had. They also helped a young boy fly in a fighter jet, and helped a paralised firefighter. In the midst of this family fare, I was slapped in...

A blockbuster NewsMax Magazine story by best-selling author Peter Schweizer exposes how Democratic leaders passionately fight for liberal policies, but go to great lengths to avoid applying those policies in their personal lives. Hoover Fellow Schweizer bases his blistering report on his new book "Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy," which has reached both the No. 1 spot on Amazon.com's list of best-selling nonfiction books and the coveted New York Times list its first week out. ~snip~The California Democrat claims to be a staunch union supporter, and along with her husband has received the...

<p>"We have double sourced that the vice president's chief of staff has been indicted," a reporter for ABCNEWS claimed to a White House press spokesman this afternoon.</p> <p>The White House refused to comment on the claim. The network said they didn't need comment, they were preparing to run with the development on this evening's network news broadcast, sources tell the DRUDGE REPORT.</p>

On October 3rd, President Bush announced his nomination of his longtime friend, White House Counsel Harriet Miers as his nominee for the vacancy created by the departure of Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Miers had been leading the White House effort to help Bush choose nominees to the Supreme Court. Unlike recent Democrat presidential nominees Al Gore and John Kerry who declared they would never nominate a pro-life Supreme Court justice, Bush has repeatedly indicated that he has no litmus test for his judicial nominees on abortion clearly implying a willingness to select judicial nominees who support the arguably...

The "Just Say NO to Miers" Coalition ... ... ... ... ...From Left to Right: George Will, Laura Ingraham, David Frum, Ann Coulter, Bill Kristol, Melanie Morgan ======================================================================== GEORGE WILL: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/04/AR2005100400954.htmlCHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/06/AR2005100601468.html?sub=ARANN COULTER: http://www.anncoulter.com/cgi-local/welcome.cgiDAVID FRUM: http://frum.nationalreview.com/PAT BUCHANAN: http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=9539LAURA INGRAHAM: http://www.lauraingraham.com/ROBERT BORK: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9623345/BILL KRISTOL: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/006/166quhvd.aspMONA CHAREN: http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/monacharen/2005/10/07/159703.htmlTERRENCE JEFFREY: http://www.townhall.com/opinion/column/terencejeffrey/2005/10/05/159416.htmlMICHELLE MALKIN: http://www.jewishworldreview.com/michelle/malkin100605.php3BOBBY EBERLE - GOPUSA: http://www.gopusa.com/theloft/?p=49MELANIE MORGAN: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=46824PEGGY NOONAN: http://www.opinionjournal.com/forms/printThis.html?id=110007363MICHAEL GRAHAM: http://www.free-times.com/Usual_Suspects/suspects.htmlJOHN PODHORETZ: http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/29257.htmPHYLLIS SCHLAFLY: http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=9684NATIONAL REVIEW EDITORIAL BOARD: http://www.nationalreview.com/editorial/editors200510141544.asp

A Supreme Court nomination may not have been the ideal time for Laura Bush to start acting like "Buy One, Get One Free" Hillary Clinton. At least President Clinton only allowed his wife to choose the attorney general. (Remember the good old days when first ladies only got to pick the poet laureate and the White House china pattern?) Between cooking segments on the "Today" show this week, Laura rolled out the straw man – sorry, "straw person" – argument that the criticism of Miers was rooted in "sexism" (which is such a chick thing to say). I'm a gyno-American,...

Pete: Hi Joe. How's it going? Joe: Oh pretty good Pete, how bout you? Pete: Comse comsa. Hey, what do you think of this Miers pick for Supreme Court. You excited!? Joe: Well to tell you the truth I'm a little worried about it. Pete: What! What are you talking about!? Joe: Yea, well,... Pete: Stop right there. Your nothing but a sexist and and and an elitist. Yea. An elitist that's what you are. Joe: But don't you want to know why... Pete: I don't need to know...I, I, I mean I already know. Your afraid of woman in...

The lovably irascible Beldar, the Texas trial lawyer who is one of the two people on earth hotly defending the Miers nomination (the other being our buddy Hugh Hewitt), has posted a convenient link to articles written by Harriet Miers during one of her stints as a bar association honcho. He did this in part to address a charge I made on Hugh's show that Miers shouldn't be taken seriously because over the past 30 years of hot dispute on matters of constitutional law she hadn't published so much as an op-ed on a single topic of moment. Thank you,...

Enviro-Elitist Poses As Gas-Pump Populist By Jeffrey, Terence P Sen. Biliary Clinton (D.-N.Y.) sometimes talks as if she wants oil and gas to be cheap and abundant, but she never stops working to make them expensive and scarce. But there's a key to predicting when she will start gushing about America's need for inexpensive fossil fuels. Call it Hillary's hurricane rule: When a storm interrupts oil and gas supplies from the Gulf Coast, she becomes an instant gas-pump populist. Flash back to Sept. 28, 2004. A headline in that day's New York Times read: "Oil Nears $50 As Gulf Storms...

Evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg made a fateful decision a year ago. As editor of the hitherto obscure Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, Sternberg decided to publish a paper making the case for "intelligent design," a controversial theory that holds that the machinery of life is so complex as to require the hand -- subtle or not -- of an intelligent creator. Within hours of publication, senior scientists at the Smithsonian Institution -- which has helped fund and run the journal -- lashed out at Sternberg as a shoddy scientist and a closet Bible thumper.

<p>WASHINGTON, Aug. 16 - State Department analysts warned the Clinton administration in July 1996 that Osama bin Laden's move to Afghanistan would give him an even more dangerous haven as he sought to expand radical Islam "well beyond the Middle East," but the government chose not to deter the move, newly declassified documents show.</p>

"Some judges profess a single explanatory theory for construing the Constitution, a doctrine that makes one value — majority rule, or limiting government, or minimizing judges' discretion — trump all others. Most such judges will flinch from following that doctrine to conclusions inconsistent with either a long line of precedents or the nation's current sense of justice. But flinching will not save such judges from being portrayed as willing to let severe logic lead the law to conclusions that the nation has decided are unacceptable." "... judicial responsibility for refereeing, by constitutional principles, the government's behavior. And the public's behavior,...

"There are only two possibilities as to how life arose; one is spontaneous generation arising to evolution, the other is a supernatural creative act of God, there is no third possibility. Spontaneous generation that life arose from non-living matter was scientifically disproved 120 years ago by Louis Pasteur and others. That leaves us with only one possible conclusion, that life arose as a creative act of God. I will not accept that philosophically because I do not want to believe in God, therefore I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible, spontaneous generation arising to evolution."...

Pop, but no alcohol in the parkBy Alexa Baracaia, Evening Standard30 June 2005 London's Live8 will be strictly alcohol-free, organisers of the all-day event have announced. But star acts and VIP guests will have bars. The concert on Saturday will see 205,000 music fans descend on Hyde Park from 1pm to 9.30pm. However, the only beverages served in the main site will be water and soft drinks, while tickets warn that bringing any sort of bottles and cans is strictly outlawed. A Royal Parks spokesman confirmed: "The Live8 site will be dry. Nothing alcoholic will be sold and, according to...

The Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History has withdrawn its co-sponsorship of a showing later this month of a film that supports the theory of "intelligent design." The museum said it would not cancel the screening of the film, "The Privileged Planet," but would return the $16,000 that the Discovery Institute, an organization that promotes a skeptical view of the Darwinian theory of evolution, had paid it. Proposals for events at the National Museum of Natural History are reviewed by members of the staff, and it shares sponsorship of all events. After the news of the showing caused controversy,...

I'll keep this short and simple. After six years of membership on FR I've decided to resign from the forum today. I'll keep checking my freepmail for a few days and wind down my posts here, so if any of you wish to contact me please do so there and I will provide you with a means to do so. I hope to continue future posting activities elsewhere - perhaps a blog - but only time will tell. It's truly been a blast and left me with many fond memories, but all good things had to come to an end....

Well, that time has come for me. I’m leaving FR. However, I do not consider this an “opus”, as I am NOT going to use it to rehash old slights or arguments, or to give my personal opinion of what “should be done around here”. As has been so often pointed out, this is Jim Robinson’s site, and he runs it as he sees fit. Rather, all I’m going to do here is give a general reason for my departure, and say a hearty-but-sad “GOODBYE!” to all the folks here who have enriched my life in the past four years....

Religuous people are good people that are being led astray. They are systematically being manipulated to remove the power that they have to use their potent brains. It is easy to believe someone who says he has an alluring answer, an answer that cannot be logically disputed. The fundamental mechanics of religion are the same as a virus. It attacks those that are mentally weakened, and when they are young and suscepable to the concept of magic. Understanding of the beautiful complexity of the world is opening up to individuals that grasp the complex concepts. The universe seems to be...