Free kibbles

Russia signs arms deal with breakaway Georgian provinces South Ossetia and Abkhazia. This is sure to incite further violence in the region. Russia is prepared to use oil as a weapon against Europe if Europe imposes sanctions on Russia for their aggression in Georgia. This is energy blackmail. Russia has announced to the world it will do anything it wants and nobody can sanction it in response because if they do, Russia will cut off oil supplies. Europe was stupid to put itself in the position of being dependent on Russian oil, we're stupid for not developing our own energy resources, and Georgia is paying the price. While Russia consolodates its gains in Georgia, the west continues to do nothing but posture. It's absurd that our politicians haven't drawn the link to our "Ban. Import. Subsidize." energy policy and the aggression of tyrants in Russia and Iran. Republicans should be beating Democrats over the head with this, and Libertarians should be beating both parties over the head with this, but they aren't.

Kremlin critic shot dead while in police custody.

Here's a new attempt by liberals to slime Sarah Palin, claiming her youngest son is really her grandson.

A never aired 4 year old Nightline interview with Barack Obama where he explains that we cannot cut and run from Iraq. Funny how things change when Obama sticks his finger in the wind. Apparently this interview was just aired a couple days ago, but nobody's talking about it. The press must be trying to bury it.

It's always good to read experts who understand that because of decades of bad government policy by both parties, we're facing a looming debt crisis that is greater than the Great Depression and could potentially destroy the United States as we know it. We need more people saying it.

Minnesota sheriffs, police and FBI raid a number of locations and arrest dozens of protesters before the Republican convention. They confiscated a gun, throwing knives, and a bow and arrows.

McCain cuts back convention because of hurricane Gustav. I saw Gov. Jindal give a press conference today. That guy is on top of the situation. If his inept predecessor had done her job nearly as well, Katrina would have been less of a disaster. Disasters are inherently local phenomenon and best handled locally. It's a shame that Bush ended up taking the blame for terrible Democrat politicians in Louisiana and New Orleans.

Free kibbles

Russia trying to appease the west over Georgia. Interesting. I bet the falling ruble and falling stock market had more influence than any posturing by the west. I think they also feel a chill, as well they should. We shouldn't fall for any appeasement that gives Russia a more powerful position in Georgia. We should still put them on probation in the G8 until they withdraw to pre-invasion positions and levels.

Bill Maher says the media coverage of Obama was so glowing that it looked like Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews wanted to have sex with him.

Let's put this experience thing to bed once and for all. Obama was elected to Illinois state senate in 1996 and started serving in 1997. He has 11 years experience in elected office. Obama has spent 144 days in the Senate. Sarah Palin started serving Wasilla city council in 1992. She started in elective office 18 years ago and has served about 13 years total, 8 of it as a chief executive. She has also served 2 years as Ethics Commissioner of the Alaska Oil and Gas Commission. She has been governor of Alaska for 20 months. The facts show Obama is far less experienced than Palin. Moreover, Obama is running for president, who must be prepared on day 1. Palin is only running for vice-president, who doesn't have to be prepared unless something happens to the president. So while it's safe to say Palin is less qualified than most VP's, she's still more qualified than Obama, who is easily the least qualified of the 4 candidates, and who is running for the highest office, not the secondary office. For Obama's campaign, his press allies, and his supporters to question Palin's experience is a foolish. All it does is expose how woefully unprepared Obama is. Some Obama journalist should put this experience argument to bed before Obama makes a bigger fool of himself than he already did with his campaign's initial attack on Palin.

It sounds like the Obama camp is getting itself together. Attacking McCain on women's issues is far smarter than attacking Palin. What's new in this article is that apparently McCain's camp didn't thoroughly vet Palin, which shows questionable judgment. McCain should have been very seriously considering Palin and Kay Bailey Hutchinson, but I find it really hard to believe that anybody will turn against McCain because of Palin's support for guns or pro-life position. McCain already held those positions.

New Orleans has mandatory evacuation for hurricane Gustav. I hope the levies hold this time. If this hurricane ruins the Republican convention, this could cost Republicans the election.

Thomas Sowell compares Barack Obama's successful rhetoric and dangerous policies that were tried and failed in the '30s and '70s to those of FDR. And this brings up the question again, given the disasterous record of failure of FDR's policies, keeping us mired in the Depression for nearly a decade, why is he lionized by liberals? This gets back to the grasp of reality of liberals. Twice this century, the policies championed by Obama have been implemented in the US with disasterous results, but just as America fell for FDR's hype and endured abysmal failure, death and destitution because of it, liberals are repeating that same process with Barack Obama.

McCain picked Sarah Palin

McCain picked Sarah Palin. From the introduction, she's got it all. She's a woman. She climbed the ladder from PTA to city council to mayor to governor on her own. Her husband is in a union. She has 5 children. Her oldest son is shipping out to Iraq. She's a lifetime member of the NRA. She hunts. She fishes. She's speaks great. She's quick on her feet. She's pretty. She's expert on energy. Her security detachment better be on the ball because Democrats and their agents in the press are going to come after her with long knives. She's classy. She makes Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton look like the political hacks they are.

Expect Democrats to attack her for running for office instead of staying home and taking care of her downs syndrome baby. They'll attack her for the investigation over replacing a cabinet member just like they attacked Bush over firing the Attorneys. They'll attack her for lack of experience while lauding Obama's freshness. They'll claim McCain picked her out of political opportunism, but they won't say anything about Hillary riding Bill's coat-tails. And she will be so far above them in class and professionalism that every attack will make her look better and Democrats and their agents in the press look worse.

Right now at least, Sarah Palin is the most exiting thing to happen to politics since Reagan.

I'm not the only one who thinks every time a liberal attacks Palin on her experience, it boomerangs back on Obama. Palin has more executive experience than McCain, Obama, Biden, and Clinton combined. I guarantee you she knows that and will make that point loud and clear. It's funny that liberals don't see the hypocrisy in supporting Hillary Clinton, who's only claim to fame was riding her husband's coattails to a New York Senate seat, and Barack Obama who buddied up to a unrepentant terrorist and white-hating, race-baiting preacher and rode them into his Senate seat, while deriding Sarah Palin, who climbed the ladder from PTA to city council to mayor to governor on her own merits. From what we've seen so far, Palin is a self-made woman, unlike Obama or Clinton. It may turn out she's the beneficiary of powerful and corrupt patrons like Obama and Clinton, but I doubt it, and we have no reason to think so so far.

Maybe that's why Democrats hate self-reliance - they can't do it. Obama and Clinton had to depend on other so acheive success. Palin made it on her own.

Major Garrett describes how the Obama camp, just as I predicted, reflexively attacked Sarah Palin. At least they reversed themselves after a while, but they still didn't go all the way and praise Hillary Clinton for making this possible and praise Republicans for following Democrats' lead. This was just an instinctive, animal response, as expected.

Palin is vulnerable on this abuse of power scandal whether the scandal has any merit or not. I have no idea if it does or not, but the liberal press can and will dog her with questions about it all day, every day. The press won't ask Obama about Rezko, Ayers, Wright, or any of his communist mentors all through his life, but they will harass and abuse Palin over firing this cabinet member forever. If McCain wins, they won't stop.

The more I think about it, Palin is the antithesis of Barack Obama's and liberals' theme that America is too tough for Americans to become successful without government handouts. She's the antithesis of Hillary's It Takes a Village. She's the antithesis of the victimization society, especially of minorities and women, that liberals think America is. That's why they reflexively attack her and will try to destroy her.

I don't think Palin is a desperate pick at all. Opportunistic, yes. Desperate, no. I'm stunned by this guy's claim that McCain is in bad shape and that we're being fooled by close polls. The polls at this time always way overestimate the Democrat. I don't know why every poll doesn't come with that footnote attached. He also severely undervalues her experience. She is the best expert on energy of all the candidates. She's the toughest candidate on corruption. The importance of those 2 things with the electorate should never be underestimated. I bet she knows more about the economy, the most important issue to voters, than any of the others because she was running a local government then a state government while they sat in committees.

Free kibbles

China won't support Russia's actions in Georgia because of Tibet. Georgia severs diplomatic ties to Russia. Duh. Unlike the Soviets, Russian leaders have to deal with a falling ruble and stock market, providing a deterrent on their imperialism.

Iraq signs oil deal with China. As long as we get plenty too.

CNBC is reporting that McCain picked Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for VP. Wow. She hasn't even been governor yet for 2 years. If that's true, that would be a bold pick. If McCain announces Sarah Palin as his choice today, I predict the price of oil will immediately fall as the speculators calculate the probability that Republicans will win with a strong supporter of drilling for oil as VP.

Sarah Palin is helping solve our energy problems by enabling a Canadian company to build a natural gas pipeline across Alaska.

I thought the McCain ad congratulating Obama right after his speech last night was an excellent way to steal some of Obama's thunder while seeming magnanimous.

Obama's campaign has made blacks proud of America, and that's a great thing. I hope it lasts after he loses.

Obama's campaign fires off smear-laden attack on reporter who reports on the links between Barack Obama and terrorist Bill Ayers. This is a slimy email, showing just how scared the Obama camp is that Americans will discover Obama's links to radicals and terrorists. I would love to hear Obama's rebuttal and see the documentation to back it up.

More of the entrenched nepotism and corruption that permeats Chicago politics.

Ancient towns found in the heart of the Amazon.

Nuclear decay rates change with earth's distance from the sun. Oops. So much for those "constants".

Author says Obama is better at faking sincerity than Bill Clinton. That's for sure. It's easy to tell when Bill Clinton lies. His lips are moving. This essay analyzes all the misdirections, I won't say outright lies, in Obama's speech.

Pat Buchanan asks the impolitic question, what happens if Obama loses. The media have painted this campaign as a battle between racists on the right and the end of racism on the left. That issue trumps all others including dangerous events in the world. By doing so, they invite racial upheaval if Obama loses.

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal explains how fiscal restraint (what he calls fiscal conservatism) helped the state recover stronger than it was before Katrina.

Charles Krauthammer eloquently compares Barack Obama and the Democrat party to a Vegas marriage between strangers on a bender.

Yet another person is finally waking up and recognizing we're in a second Cold War. We've had our heads buried in the sand about this Cold War for years, and the longer we keep it in the sand, the further behind we're going to fall.

Free kibbles

Asian nations including China rebuffed Russia's hope for support. I think this can be directly linked to China's Tibet problem. If China supported independence for South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the Tibetian independence movement would gain power. At the same time, it puts a damper on Chinese ambitions to recapture Taiwan. But totalitarian states don't care about precedent. China will still grab Taiwan when it thinks it can do so without US intereference or when it thinks it's powerful enough to overcome US interference. Taking advantage of useful idiots in liberal America and Europe, Putin blames the US for Russia's invasion of Georgia, saying the US staged it to help McCain in the election. Putin has learned well from Lenin, Stalin and the Tzars. He's playing us for fools just like Stalin and Lenin, using hatred of Bush and McCain instead of ideology, and many in Europe and America are falling for it just like the fell for it from Stalin and Lenin.

The Christian Science Monitor explains how Russia's agents attacked Georgian forces to draw the Georgian president into the trap by responding. After Georgia responded some civilians got caught in the crossfire, as happens in any battle, and Russia used this excuse to invade under the UN's mandate to stop genocide. But no genocide was occurring, and the Russian invasion undermines the ability of the international community to intervene to stop real genocide while at the same time making it more likely another country will abuse that well-intentioned UN mandate.

Government school district loses accrediation. This is government at its most typical. It can get a whole lot worse, but liberals still want to surrender our health care to government.

Democrats are afraid McCain will pick a woman for VP, and rightly so. If McCain picks a woman, I think the Democrats will reflexively attack McCain for doing so, calling it political grandstanding, and the woman. But that would be the wrong approach. If McCain picks a woman, Democrats should immediately praise Hilllary Clinton for her leadership in breaking the glass ceiling and making it possible for McCain to pick a woman. They should backhandedly praise McCain for following the lead of Democrats in accepting women in positions of power. Obviously Republicans would point to Condi Rice to argue that, but they would be on the defensive. If Democrats were smart, they would immediately take credit for McCain's choice of a woman instead of instinctively attacking that choice.

Spirit and Opportunity continue trekking across Mars. What a phenomenal success these 2 rovers have been.

Indicted pork king Ted Stevens wins Republican primary. Come on, Alaska. Kick this corrupt creep to the curb.

Fantastic essay showing the fundamental problem with modern liberal thinking, that personal responsibility is a "recipe for division and failure", and how Democrats capitalize on that to buy votes.

Democrats at work again. California activist is petitioning to add a 35% wealth surtax on Californians and also to tax anybody moving out of the state 55% of their assets over $20 million. They want to hold rich people hostage and tax them until they're poor like everybody else will be. America is racing in this radical left direction at a headlong pace. Don't be surprised if this makes it on the ballot.

Why is the LPGA forcing its members to speak English? I understand its a private business so it can do that, but why? If people don't want to learn English, that should be their call as long as they don't try and force anybody else to accommodate them for their lack of understanding of English.

Tropical storm Gustav is coming! Run for your lives! Civilization has never encountered a tropical storm and everybody must panic! Run! Run! Pray that you see the dawn!

It's like the news agencies are praying to God for a major hurricane, and God just won't bend to their will, so they're going to pretend that every tropical depression and tropical storm is class 5 hurricane. This insane alarmism is driving me crazy.

Ann Coulter reminds us that Joe Biden is a disgraced plagiarist.

Victor Davis Hansen predicts the end of NATO. Let's hope so. It's long outlived its purpose. Let's hope it goes easily, not under pressure. Let's hope we end out security welfare to Europe and Europe chooses to defend itself.

Hezbollah kills Lebanese army officer.

National Journal explains the process of determining how liberal or conservative a senator is, which found Obama to be the most liberal and Biden to be the third most liberal.

Jefferson, Polk, Truman, and Reagan understood how to blend diplomacy and the use of force.

Free kibbles

Russian President Medvedev meets with Chinese President Jintao about Georgia. Two tyrants in a pod. China hopes for "dialog and consultation". Right. Sounds like they're playing good cop - bad cop, saying all the placating words that the weaklings in charge in the west love to hear. In Ukraine, UK foreign secretary urges hard-line response to Russia. Good for him. But will Europe listen? Russia worried about buildup of NATO ships in Black Sea. Excellent. US coast guard ship docks in Georgia to deliver 34 tons of aid. Putin threatens oil supply to Europe if west retaliates for Georgian invasion. Russia's new foreign policy is energy blackmail. G7 condemns "act of fellow G8 member". That's useless rhetoric.

What the G8 should do is put Russia on probation. I know that sounds childish, but in a lot of ways, nations, which have no higher authority, behave like children. Russia should be excluded from the G8 as long as it occupies any part of Georgia. If the elected Georgian government falls during the occupation, Russia should be permanently removed from the G8. If Russia pulls back to its original peacekeeping status while the current the government is still in power, Russia should be readmitted to the G8. It's not hard to come up with a carrot and a stick to put pressure on Russia to right this wrong. I think everybody in the G8 and maybe all of Europe would support a proposal like this.

Immigration officials detain 600 suspected illegal immigrants at manufacturing plant in Mississippi. That's the largest ever raid. Gate crashers are afraid.

Massachusetts SAT scores rise a couple points. That's a good thing, but other studies have shown that the improvement only comes from wealthier (white) children and that stricter testing requirements had no effect on the schools that were already failing their (black) students.

Newegg stops collecting New York sales tax. The New York law is already being challenged. This is a perfect example of how taxes drive businesses out of states. Both Amazon and Overstock.com closed their New York affiliates, costing New York jobs, instead of collecting the sales tax. New York should have cut spending instead of increasing taxes.

Obama is so scared of Americans finding out about his long-running personal and professional relationship with unrepentant Weatherman terrorist Bill Ayers that he is trying to intimidate broadcast stations, their advertisers, and use the Justice Department to silence the ad. Obama is scared of winning an election of informed voters, so he's trying to use legal means and bullying tactics to keep the electorate uninformed. That's after having those records of his work with Ayers purged before allowing public access.

Now that he's won the nomination, Obama is going to change his message. Maybe that's the change Obama has been talking about.

Joe Biden is not the change Obama has been talking about.

Obama promises a practical speech with a purpose, meaning policy details (including spending numbers?), instead his usual vapid rhetoric. Maybe that's the change Obama keeps talking about.

Bill Clinton hints that Obama can't deliver on anything. There's no change there.

Dick Morris thinks Michelle Obama's speech changed her from political liability to political plus. Maybe Michelle's makeover, pretending to be something she's not, is the change Obama keeps talking about.

I'm looking forward to seeing this Greek temple facsimile at Obama's acceptance speech. I expect this is much ado about nothing, but with Obama, you never know. Drudge has a picture up. It looks a lot like the Parthenon. That's audacity.

After watching some of the Democrat convention and seeing all the hoops and machinations Democrats are going through in an attempt to mollify women voters, I think the possibly that McCain picks Kay Bailey Hutchinson for VP is high, and she would be a great choice for him. She's from Texas. She's more conservative than he is. Democrats would reflexively condemn the choice, because that's what Democrats do (think Condoleezza Rice), further alienating women voters.

Nancy Pelosi calls supporters of drilling names, asks if she can drill their brains.

ISS notebook computers have virus.

Programmers expose huge security hole in internet.

The Daily Show has dropped its pretense of being fair by placing a funny billboard that insults Republicans in Minneapolis in preparation for the Republican Convention. They had no such billboard for Democrats in Denver.

Wind turbines make bat lungs explode. I bet bats evolve pretty quickly to avoid wind turbines.

A scam artist is passing off articles as if they were written by Thomas Sowell.

Dick Armey nicely summarizes the specter of large Democrat majorities in Congress regardless of who wins the presidency as the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse: higher taxes, energy regulation, union protection legislation, and socialized medicine. We get so caught up in the presidential politics, we forget that Congress has far more power over our lives than the president, and powerful Democrat Congress will be disasterous for America.

HIV rate in NYCity is 3 times the national rate. I guess New Yorkers didn't get the memo - no unprotected sex and no dirty needles.

Not only is Medicare, the precursor to America's socialized medicine fraudulent, it forced auditors to perform fraudulent audits to cover up it's fraud. Study shows 31.5% of Medicare payments were fraudulent, but Medicare's fraudulent audit only uncovered 7.5% fraud. And Democrats want the government to take over the health care business. Socialized medicne would be 100% fraudulent.

Power transmission and power spikes are major obstacles for wind farms.

Jon Stewart has a point about the 24 hours cable networks creating phony urgency, and the newspapers seem to be trying to copy that to compete, and therefore they're losing. He's also right that the print media should offer a counterpoint to that - well thought out and researched news. He doesn't mentioned that it should be unbiased, and that's a mistake. By its very nature, political bias feeds into phony alarmism and phony urgency, so getting rid of the bias is necessary to make a great print news product.

This is the kind of bizarre stuff that happens when a nation's population stops reproducing, as is the case with Russia with a fertility rate of 1.3. Russian judge throws out sexual harassment case because sexual harassment is necessary for the continuation of the species.

Free kibbles

West condemns Russia for recognizing the independence of the rebellious regions of Georgia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. I'm sure all those condemnations really hurt Russia. Apparently western leaders have forgotten what every schoolchild knows: sticks and stones can break my bones, but condemnation from western leaders can never hurt me. I bet Putin and Medvedev are laughing their asses off at western impotence and incompetence as they plot to take Ukraine next.

I'm going to try and watch Hillary's speech tonight because the division of the Democrats is entertaining. This is like watching people fight over which poison they all should drink. The new McCain ad sounds great. They're keeping protesters a mile away? That seems excessive. What is politics without protesters?

Apparently Obama is very scared of his connection to Ayers being exposed. It sounds like Obama is saying that since Ayers's terrorism happened in the '60s (and the '70s, but Obama doesn't mention that) it doesn't matter. The newly released records show that Obama and Ayers often worked together. We already know that Obama launched his state senate campaign at Ayers house. So much for Obama's claims, "he's just a guy who lives in my neighborhood." Obama worked with a terrorist and that terrorist helped launch his political career. This is explosive and should instantly disqualify Obama for president (as should many other things that haven't.)

Great essay by Michael Barone explains that Bill Ayers was accepted into Chicago high society because he's the son of a major political mover and shaker in Chicago, and in Chicago nepotism reigns supreme. He also explains that it's one thing for Chicago high society to embrace an unrepentant terrorist because he's the favored son of a powerful family, but its quite another for an outsider like Barack Obama to come into Chicago and seek out the patronage of an unrepentant terrorist. Fortunately for Obama, his wife Michelle had enough connections to the Chicago power structure, including Rev. Wright, to get Obama the outsider accepted into their shockingly corrupt political system.

Another dangerously radical associate of Obama's has come to light, and this time it's a radical Muslim who helped Obama get into Harvard. Obama has spent his entire life courting and surrounding himself with dangerous extremists, yet he wants us to believe he's some kind of moderate uniter. Obama gets scarier by the day.
Nancy Pelosi came right out and said that she wants oil companies to pay royalties to the Imperial Congress to extract oil. Royalties. In the old days, when the king granted land to his vassals, he would demand a royalty for any minerals discovered on that land. It's called royalty for a reason.Thomas Jefferson championed the idea that free Americans, like the shareholders of the oil companies, should never have to pay a royalty because there was no king in America. Nancy Pelosi's Imperial Congress is the new king, freedom be damned, demanding royalties of Americans who own the oil companies. That cost would be passed on to the consumer as a hidden tax.

Pelosi also took on the Catholic bishops over abortion this weekend. Good timing. I'm sure Obama appreciates everything she's doing to help him.

Study suggests neanderthals may have been as smart as modern humans.

I didn't need the Farmer's Almanac to tell me this was going to be a cold winter.

I don't think that data showing average income rose steadily between 2003 and 2006 can be used to claim average income is rising today.

Among other random thoughts, Thomas Sowell says, "Right after liberal Democrats, the most dangerous politicians are country club Republicans." Thank you. Is there another kind of Republican other than Ron Paul?

You can never get enough horror stories about socialized medicine. Liberals seem unable to comprehend them.

Bernanke wants to centrally plan our economy

My goodness this is scary. Fed Chairman Bernanke proposes to give federal regulators sweeping new power to not only regulate individual institutions for financial soundness, but to regulate the entire industry. What he's really suggesting here is that federal regulators centrally plan our financial industry. This is another case where a problem caused by government, the recent credit crisis, results in bigger, more oppressive, and more dangerous government. Central planning never works. We need to extract the Fed and the government from our financial industry to make it more stable and responsible to customers and shareholders, not faceless, bureaucratic central planners.

The idea that some isolated bureaucrats in Washington could possibly do a better job regulating an entire industry than the 10s of millions of people who are involved in the industry as employees, stockholders, customers or otherwise is lunacy. That lunacy caused the Great Depression. It caused the economic problems of the '70s. It caused the current credit crisis. Now Bernanke wants to expand that lunacy tremendously.

And you can bet most Democrats and most Republicans will jump on board at the opportunity to expand their power at our expense, all the while telling us how much they support free markets. Think of the opportunities for vote-buying, nepotism and corruption. How could our aristocrats resist?

This is a pattern for Bernanke. He doesn't think the Fed should be limited to fighting inflation. He has used his power to attempt to manage our economic growth. He consistently goes beyond his mandate to control inflation and tried to grab new powers for the Fed. He thinks the Fed should centrally plan our entire economy. If I was a conspiracy theorist, I would wonder if this credit crisis wasn't planned in advance just so the Fed could make such a huge power grab.

US government worse than China's government

Unlike Boortz, I have no problem with Obama pointing out the Chinese do a better job at infrastructure building than the US. It's true. The anti-freedom aristocrats in Washington D.C. are worse than communists. They spend our money buying votes and building more power for themselves instead of building and maintaining our infrastructure. The communists are smart enough to develop all their energy resources, including drilling off the Florida coast. But the aristocrats in Washington ban us from doing so. Because our government is so much worse than the communists, China is kicking our ass on the world stage. As is Russia.

Obama's solution in wrong though. China's government is better than ours because it's smaller. Our government is so much worse because it's bigger than the entire Chinese economy. The solution, or course, is to re-embrace freedom and severely limited government and recapture the prosperity that flows from those things. But don't attack the messenger for pointing out our government is worse than communist China's government right now.

I'm sure lots of people would say that the Chinese don't have political freedom. But in our system we have only the appearance of political freedom. We re-elect the same representatives who are worse than the communists 94% of the time. And when it comes to choice, what's the difference between a big-government Democrat aristocrat and big-government Republican aristocrat?

To be fair, we do have political freedom. We don't have to vote for people who are worse for us than communists, we just do it every election anyway. We have nobody to blame but ourselves.

Free kibbles

Another step toward getting US combat troops out of Iraq by 2011. Iraqi PM Maliki says the US has agreed to the deal.

Illegal immigrants self-deporting in record numbers. Isn't is amazing what a little bit of enforcing our laws will do? Of course Democrats get in office, their taxes on the rich, who hire illegal immigrant nannies, gardeners and construction workers, might send even more packing.

Russia wants good relations with the west but is hearing only threats. The way Russia shows their desire for good relations with the west is to invade a free country on its border and try to topple its pro-western government. What a bunch of bull. Russia is playing the west for fools, and most of the west is playing right along. Russian parliament votes to recognize independence of the 2 rebellious provinces of Georgia. Supporting independence for rebellious Georgian provinces is another way Russia shows its desire for good relations with the west. Syrian President Bashar visits Moscow in support of Russia's invasion of Georgia and won a new supply of weapons in response. The alliances of tyrants are getting tighter. This is a natural response to the expansion of NATO.

Here's one of Putin's useful idiots at the NYTimes claiming Russia didn't want this war. Ignore the fact that Putin's goons provoked this war by attacking Georgian citizens from South Ossetia, forcing the Georgian president to respond to the rebellion at the time and place of Putin's choosing. The NYTimes has a long history of having useful idiots cover-up Russian tyranny, atrocity, oppression and aggression.

On the other extreme, the British Times thinks the Russian invasion of Georgia will weaken Russia. I don't see how. They're strategy of long term pressure by Russian troops ostensibly establishing security zones in Georgia but outside the rebellious provinces and Georgia's major port will likely bring about the fall of the pro-western government and lead to a Russian puppet government, giving Russian control of the final pipeline for the flow of oil from the east to the west. We can only hope that the west isolates Russia, but with Putin controlling all that oil flowing into Europe, it's unlikely.

Pakistan governing coalition splits.

Zimbabwe's opposition party won surprising victory for speaker of parliament. Mugabe will probably have him killed.

Dollar nears 6 months high.

Modern Rosetta stone is a disk and designed for future generations.

Government give government employees special treatment during tropical storm Faye. Have I mentioned that these people are aristocrats just like any other aristocrats in history? I'm so glad the city provided sandbags to these individuals while the commoners were ignored.

Nancy Pelosi and Democrats hate the military, and Pelosi made that abundantly clear once again when she ordered that a poster commemorating the sacrifice of America servicemen in Iraq and Afghanistan be removed from the Capitol hallways. You would think Pelosi and Democrats would be smart enough to at least pretend they cared about the military and veterans shortly before an election, but their hatred of the military is more powerful than even their power lust.

Obama misrepresents $800,000 in funds sent to the serial campaign law violater ACORN. This stinks of corruption.

Obama identifies exactly what's wrong with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, then he promises to extend the moral hazard at the root of the problem anyway. This is kind of like when Obama was confronted with the fact that raising the capital gains tax reduces revenue and lowering it increases revenue, Obama said he would raise it anyway.

According to this liberal, the only possible way McCain can beat Obama is because of racism. The message is, if you don't support Obama, you must be a racist. You couldn't possibly disagree with him on issues or character. Once the Democrat convention is over, this is going to be the mantra from the left all day, every day. Don't get me wrong, racism is a huge factor in this race. 90% of blacks support Obama just because he's half black. On the other hand, 40% of whites support Obama. Based on those numbers, a far better argument could be made that if Obama wins the election, it's only because of racism.

Follow that with yet another comparison between Jesus and Obama (both are black and liberal), and you've got the press' entire agenda until November.

Rampant fraud in Medicare is the model for liberal socialized medicine plans.

The solution to problems created by government is always bigger, more oppressive government. In this case the problem is the government monopoly on schools. The symptom is kids who skip out of their terrible government schools often. The non-solution is GPS ankle-bracelets. The next, new symptom of will be a dramatic increase in juvenile deliquency.

Teenagers are getting jobs. Why haven't they had jobs all along. Oh yeah, the minimum wage.

Bus drivers stopped from turning left. Singling out bus drivers doesn't make much sense, but it might make a lot of sense to redesign city streets to get rid of left turns for everybody. I bet traffic flow would be greatly improved. Or it may be a disaster. They have computer models for traffic flow. Some city planner should simulate this.

Ron Paul provides a welcome history and economics lesson about the evils of central planning.

The Onion reports that the Bush administration warns US allies not to border Russia. These guys are funny.

This is a perfect example of what's wrong with our political system, which is a mirror of our country. Last year, Democrats declared any state moving its primary earlier than a certain date would not have their delegates counted. Michigan and Florida violated those rules, and the DNC said it wouldn't count their delegates. After much whining and nashing of teeth, the DNC changed the rules mid-stream and said half their delegates would be counted. Now at the convention the DNC has decided not only to seat the Florida and Michigan delegates, but to count them all, and to give them preferred positions on the floor. All this in the name of beating Republicans. The lesson is, break the DNC rules, be really loud and selfish about it, and the DNC will reward you for it.

But rules are important. Obeying them is important. Discipline is important. And this is an important rule because it prevents chaos. Rewarding Florida and Michigan for breaking the rule undermines the rule of law and respect of government in the interest of beating Republicans who are almost identical to Democrats. Whatever happened to doing the right thing? What ever happened to self-control? Our government is feeding this unhealthy "me, me, me" attitude, it always burdens and harms mainstream Americans for the good of noisy special interests. And it's ruining our country.

Google is losing employees, but are they losing their mojo? I've seen uncharacteristic performance problems for gmail and adwords lately.

Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations online.

Author claims that the development of formal economic models has proved what we already learned from history - free market and free trade form the best economic system ever devised.

Free kibbles

Russia may be running out of oil.

This cockroach race captures the absurdity of our political process in which we continually elect representatives who are bad for Americans and therefore bad for America. Even in this, the lesser evil won.

Cato has an interactive map of botched paramilitary police raids.

Amanda Carpenter points out some amazing differences between Obama and Biden and wonders how and if they can be reconciled.

Funny. Relative price of different liquids.

Fakes China has used to make the Olympics present a better image of China.

US basketball team recaptures gold.

Humpback whales are recovering.

Michael Dukakis wants his reputation back

Michael Dukakis wants his reputation back.

Comparisons of Barack Obama to Michael Dukakis are irresponsible and an insult to Dukakis. As bad as Dukakis was, Obama is a much more dangerous candidate. Dukakis didn't spend 20 years listening to Rev. Wright's insane rants. Dukakis didn't buddy up with a terrorist like Bill Ayers. Dukakis didn't seek out and surround himself with communists his entire life like Obama. Obama is far and away the worst, most dangerous candidate in my lifetime.

Barack Obama isn't dangerous because of his inexperience - he's dangerous because of his experience. Because of his skills and lying and misrepresenting himself, he quickly rose through the Chicago corruption factory, the Illinois corruption factory, and the Washington corruption factory. That kind of meteoric rise can only be achieved by a person with a uncommonly dangerous ability to make corruption work for him. Obama's facility for corruption even outstrips the Clintons'. Fortunately, Bill Clinton was focused on his sexual escapades, not destroying the country. Not Obama. Obama has said exactly what he wants to do - he wants to destroy the country by forcing it to change into Europe or the Soviet Union.

I want to see Michael Dukakis step up and condemn these comparisons between himself and Barack Obama. Nobody should allow their reputation to be attacked like that. Unfortunately, one similarity between Dukakis and Obama is that both are wimps, so it's unlikely Dukakis will stand up for himself.

Free kibbles

Russia determined to keep troops in strategic Georgian port and to keep buffer zones around disputed territory. They had no intention of abiding by the ceasefire terms from the beginning. South Ossetians loot Georgian village after Russian troops force villagers out.

Bhuttos' widower, infamous for his past corruption, is the front-runner for new Pakistani president.

Obama picks Biden for Vice-president. Yawn. Maybe Biden can inform Obama there are not 57 states.

Michael Barone explains that the media typically embraces the narrative of the Democrat candidate at the convention with no questions asked while it typically tries to poke holes in the Republican narrative. He expects the same for Obama. Don't we all.

Sophomoric infighting continues to plague the Democrats as Obama sent a 3am text message to needle Hillary because she wasn't his VP pick. And McCain is running around pointing a finger like an elementary school tattle-tale. Political aristocrats don't have to live in the real, adult world, and it's all a game to them. Our lives don't matter. Our country doesn't matter. For aristocrats, it's about using people like pawn in their personal chess games. It's like Obama's absolute lack of compassion for his half brother who lives in a hut in Africa on less than a dollar a month. If Obama can use that guy as a pawn in his game, he will. These aristocrats aren't like us. We should never vote for them.

The press pass for the Democrat convention has an upside-down flag with Obama's picture on it. Stalin, Mao, and Obama are pleased. Too bad there isn't a picture.

Thomas Sowell points out the obvious - parents who homeschool their children educate them better than professional teachers in public schools. Government has failed at educating our children, and we must end the government monopoly on schools.

Obama declared that the number of abortions is rising, when in fact, the number of abortions are falling. It was either ignorance or an outright lie. I'll bet the latter.

How Obama used standard political tricks to eliminate the competition in his first run for office in 1996.

Liberals have put out a video condemning corporal punishment in schools as if it was Abu Ghraib. Give me a break. If the students did something to deserve swats, then they deserve the humiliation.

Charles Krauthammer details NATO weakness on Russia's invasion of Georgia.

McCain's principle foreign policy advisor is effectively on the payroll of Georgia's government - a lobbyist to get the US to bring Georgia into NATO. And Bush, McCain, and Obama all support bringing Georgia into NATO. Hello? How many divisions, fighter planes, submarines are they going to bring to the defense of the US? Bringing Georgia into NATO is lunacy for NATO but sweet, sweet love for Georgia. Our expansion of NATO into eastern Europe is the same.

University of Chicago claims to plan to release documents linking Obama to Bill Ayers from their work at the Chicago Annenburg Challenge on Tuesday. The problem is, those documents are supposed to be released already, but the library hid them from the public. I'm sure that only select portions, those that don't expose the links between Obama and Ayers, will be released. Some info on the original cover-up.

I don't know who Luiza Savage (obviously a liberal) is, but I'm happy to see somebody else recognize what's so obvious that I've been saying it for years - Bush is a liberal. Other than tax cuts, the overwhelming arc of his agenda has been more similar to LBJ than to any other president. LBJ would be jealous of the success of socialism under Bush. A few years from now, when Bush's legacy can be evaluated a little more honestly by history than liberals can do now, Bush will stand with LBJ, FDR, and Wilson as the 4 most progressive (liberal) presidents in history.

Once again Ralph Peters is right on. He explains exactly what Putin's goals were when invading Georgia. He shows how Putin set it up to happen on his timetable when the west was even more asleep at the switch than usual. And he explains why the west is such easy pickens for a dynamic leader like Putin. Victor Davis Hanson describes the myriad, confused interpretations of events in the west. Pretty accurate and therefore funny.

Analysis shows that government efforts to shore up New Orleans levy system to prevent another Katrina are just as flawed as the previous efforts that led to Katrina. To the think the federal government had the wherewithall to build sufficient levies for New Orleans is delusional. The corruption factory in Washington won't fix New Orleans' levies. At least the corruption factories in Louisiana and New Orleans have something to lose if the levies fail, so they could probably do a better job.

Great post explaining why many people don't really want freedom.

Free kibbles

Russians pull back from Georgia at snail's pace, and will take 10 days to withdraw, leaving 2,000 troops in Georgia.

Cato explains that inflation caused by runaway federal spending that is being paid for by the Fed increasing money supply is a type of tax.

Cato contrasts our market-driven college school system to our bureaucratic primary and secondary school systems.

Cato says immigrants come to the US to work, not get on welfare or cause trouble. Certainly many do, but maybe Cato has never heard of MS13. Immigrants who come to America legally come to work. Those who break the law and come here illegally by definition have no compunction about breaking our laws and must be stopped from working or gaining benefits so they'll go home.

Scientists explain how fire caused the collapse of building 7 after the World Trade Center attacks.

Obama's Zero to Five indoctrination plan is back in the forefront. Obama thinks raising children is too important a task to leave to parents, and since government does a wonderful job with children (not our graduation rates), the government should take over. Yikes!

Online version of Milton Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom. Excellent.

David Walker's documentary on the looming debt crisis, IOUSA, is out. The WSJ explains that we cannot tax our way out of the entitlement crisis.

California mayor stops kids from selling homegrown watermellons because of lack of permits. You must have government permission to sell watermellons in California. The weight of our laws is crushing our spirit and earnings.

Is anybody surprised that the credibility of news organizations is dropping?

The war on drugs isn't stopping teens from getting drugs. Duh. Kids get more drugs because they're illegal and therefore uncontrolled than if they were legal and controlled.

As warped as this sounds at first, you can't deny the logic. Homophobia is genetic too. There's no doubt that genetics plays a role in homophobia just like genetics plays a role in homosexuality and every other behavior. Let's apply the same standards to both. Homophobes have as much right to their behavior as homosexuals. And this idea opens a larger can of worms. Genetics plays a role in every behavior, but families and societies try to change behaviors that are considered negative for the good of the individual and society. To say that because a behavior is influenced by genes, it must be OK, is not a valid argument in support of any behavior. Otherwise we'd have to accept all behavior without exception, which is absurd. Any particular behavior has to be judged by society on its own merits based on its affect on society. Which brings us full circle. As long as nobody gets assaulted or threatened or intimidated, both homosexual and homophobic behavior are fine with me. It seems to me both homosexuals and homophobes should just leave each other alone, but radicals in both groups have some twisted need to push themselves into the face of the other, or worse (which is genetically influenced behavior too, and should be rejected by society).

Free kibbles

US and Iraqi negotiators have agreed on a deal to pull US combat troops out of Iraq by 2011. This is awesome news. I hope the ratification process doesn't stall this agreement.

How many times has the US said Russia must leave Georgia "now"? Why are we wasting our breath? There we go again, walking loudly but carrying no stick. Quit talking and do something. Kick Russia out of the G8. Cut off the Russo-NATO meetings. Do something. I keep waiting for somebody to explain to me how Georgia's army, which consists of some guys in pick-up trucks, is going to help defend the United States by joining NATO. The Russians halted the Russo-NATO meetings, not us. They understand the importance of boldness and action and the uselessness of rhetoric. We should learn that lesson.

The trees in the park started shedding leaves today. That's about a month early. This little hot spell feels a lot like what we used to call Indian Summer, which would be about month early too. I think we're going to have another long, cold winter.

Right on cue, scientists report that 2008 will be the coolest year of the century so far. Poor Al Gore. The world just won't do what he wants.

Obama jumps on McCain because he didn't know how many homes he owned. As dumb as that makes McCain sound, we must be the dumbest people on earth to vote for the candidates these 2 parties run.

Some freak sent 2 letters to 2 McCain campaign offices with threats and white powder. I sure hope this is a fake and they catch and punish this person.

If Obama is so compassionate and concerned about the poor, how come he hasn't reached into his own pocket of millions and helped out his half-brother who lives in Africa on a dollar per month?

PETA donor wants to buy a Sea World, release all the animals, and replace them with virtual reality and animatronic displays. Now this is what environmentalists should be doing if they really want to help the environment - using the power of the free market to promote environmentalism. Invest in wind farms. Invest in solar. Quit dragging every development project the courts. But the environmental movement has been hijacked by anti-capitalists, and all they want to do is stunt the development of the United States.

This is what happens when taxpayers fund research - wasted money. Research should be funded by the private sector.

British police arrest and jail man for filming police van going the wrong way down a one-way street. Those cops should be charged with kidnapping.

Solar cycle 24 is still missing in action. This is the first sunspot in a month. The longer before solar cycle 24 takes over, the colder it will be that entire cycle. Scientist shows correlation between solar cycles and past climate and predicts significant global cooling for the next 20 years. That means a shorter growing cycle that can be partially offset by more CO2 in the atmosphere. Scientist claims that a weak solar cycle doesn't necessarily mean cold temperatures. His data seem to contradict other reports of how cold the Maundar minimum was. But all the predictions I read suggest cycle 24 will be more like the Dalton minimum, not the Maundar minimum.

Weatherman-blogger show how skeptics stopped a report from a government weather agency that has been corrupted into a global warming advocacy group. Crazy story says global warming will lead to contaminated blood transfusions. Good grief.

Free kibbles

Oh my goodness. Zogby poll shows McCain leading Obama by 5 points. Before you start claiming bias, the same poll had Obama up 7 points a month ago. It's unheard of for a Democrat to be behind in a poll at this time. Worse yet, the generic polls showing Democrats still have a huge lead over Republicans. Worse yet, Bush still has a horrible approval rating. The American people are seeing through Obama. Democrats have to be fit to be tied about how horrible a candidate they chose.

You know Hillary is still angling to steal the nomination if she can. Wouldn't she just love to have her party call on her to save the election for the Democrats. I think the Clintons' very slick, ongoing undermining of Barack Obama is taking a toll on him in the polls as well as his own performance.

Magpies recognizes themselves in the mirror. Scientists have long said only humans are self-aware, but that never made any sense to me. Every dog I've had seemed plenty aware of itself and seemed to recognize itself in the mirror.

Cato reports that Pakistan's infighting about judges distracts them from significant threat of the rapidly growing terrorist movement along the Afghanistan border.

Cato explains that the mass surveillance of Americans entering and leaving the country has nothing to do with terrorism.

I can't put it any better than this quote from Cato about how government is driving up our health care costs: "Government controls half the nation's health care spending, gives employers control over a further 25 percent, and voila! health care costs are devouring everyone's paycheck because everyone is spending someone else's money. Universal coverage would just let government devour even more of workers' paychecks. The madness will end only when government returns the money to the workers and gets out of the way."

Columbus Sucks the Life Out of Ohio

Columbus Sucks the Life Out of Ohio

by Mark Luedtke

Does anybody else remember when Columbus was a small town that surrounded Ohio State? According to Wikipedia, in 1960 (before I was born – I'm not that old), Cleveland was Ohio's largest city with a population of 876,050. Cincinnati was second with 502,550. Columbus was third, home to Ohio State and a few government offices, with a population of 471,316. Fast-forward, and Cleveland's 2007 estimated population was 438,042. Cincinnati's was 332,458. Columbus's was 747,755.

The combined populations of Cleveland and Cincinnati have dropped by 44% since 1960. Columbus's population has increased by 59% over the same period. Over the same period, Dayton's population dropped from 262,323 to 155,461, a 41% decrease. Columbus isn't growing because of a beautiful and strategic position on the Great Lakes or the Ohio River. Columbus isn't growing because of a beautiful and strategic location on the Great Miami River or I-75. The only thing Columbus offers that no other city in Ohio can compete with is Big Government.

Forbes magazine just listed America's 10 fastest dying cities. Cleveland was 5^th, Dayton 6^th, Youngstown 9^th, and Canton 10^th. Thanks for stating the obvious. Really. Because apparently Ohioans didn't get the memo that Ohio is being crushed under the burden of Big Government. Michigan is next worst. Detroit is the 2^nd fastest dying city and Flint is the 8^th. Yay Buckeyes. We're outpacing Michigan in the race to poverty and irrelevance.

In 1970, only 3 states had a lower tax burden than Ohio. Moreover, Ohio had no income tax. Ohio was the place to do business. Thanks to our low taxation and high economic freedom during the '70s, Ohio weathered a real energy crisis, economic crisis, and automobile industry crisis that makes today's exaggerated crises look like Nancy Pelosi throwing a hissy fit. Which is pretty accurate.

But in the '70s, Ohio adopted an income tax, Marx's onerous tax designed to punish productivity. As a result, the Tax Foundation reports that today Ohio has a top marginal rate of 6.555%. Ohio is the 7^th most highly taxed state. Ohio ranks 46^th in business tax climate. 45 other states are more inviting to businesses and the jobs they create than Ohio. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that because of Big Government, businesses and young professionals are fleeing Ohio to economically greener pastures, like Texas with its small government and zero income tax, like rats fleeing a sinking ship. The only place in Ohio not sinking is Columbus, thanks to tax dollars and people sucked from the rest of the state. Big Government in Columbus is literally sucking the life out of the rest of Ohio.

But we can't blame all Dayton's problems on Ohio government. Big Dayton Government chases productive citizens to greener pastures too. Dayton forces an additional 2.25% income tax rate on productivity. Remember when The Green was a downtown Dayton development? Dayton government pushed the project to Beavercreek. Now Reynolds and Reynolds is moving its 400 jobs to Kettering. Pretty soon the only people left in Dayton will be welfare recipients and old people too poor to move to Florida.

And lawyers. I bet 90% of the businesses downtown are law offices, businesses subsidized by tax breaks, and the banks which serve them. Even that can't last. National City just closed a downtown branch.

Longtime residents love to reminisce about the glory days of Dayton, and there's a lesson to be learned from those stories. Kitty's was a thriving downtown restaurant not too long ago, but the city provided tax incentives to bring Uno's to town. Because of Uno's tax breaks, Kitty wasn't able to compete, and she was forced out of business. The Landing is subsidized by tax breaks, hurting nearby condos. Tax incentives lured CareSource to Dayton.

Dayton's leaders know high taxes run businesses out of town and low taxes enable businesses to thrive, but why should government favor some businesses over others? That's a recipe for nepotism and corruption. All businesses benefit from low taxes. Individuals and the community too.

Dayton and Ohio citizens have nobody to blame for our economic woes but ourselves. Instead of voting for freedom, low taxes, severely limited government, and the prosperity that always flows from those things, we vote for Big Government politicians and policies that crush state and local economies. We should only vote for politicians who will cut taxes and spending and abolish the income tax, but we always vote for the opposite.

Governor Strickland plans to use $1.7 billion in new bond debt, that must be paid for by future taxes, to force Ohioans to buy expensive, alternative energy, create a Big Government administered jobs program that's guaranteed to chase more jobs out of the state, and create additional bureaucracy in our K-12 and college education systems, making them even less accountable to students and parents while also quashing school vouchers and private schools.

The private sector could provide better education and care for the needy at lower cost than government, which would create jobs. Instead, Montgomery Co. voters chose to raise taxes to subsidize Sinclair Community College, which fails to graduate the vast majority of its students, and to raise taxes for the Health and Human Services welfare program, which pays people to not work. The higher taxes and wasteful spending chase jobs out of the county.

As long as we continue to vote for Big Government, Ohio and Dayton will continue their downward spirals.

Free kibbles

Instead of pulling out of Georgia, Russian troops are taking Georgian prisoners and seizing US equipment in Georgia. This shows the worthlessness of rhetoric and talk. The Europeans are scared about upsetting Russian relations. The Russians sure weren't scared about upsetting relations when they invaded Georgia, were they? Russia is waging a new Cold War, and the west is playing ostrich, as if that will make things better. That's nothing but moral cowardice, self-indulgence, and laziness. Western Europe is pathetic, and we're not much better. Russia's actions warranted an immediate, unified, strong diplomatic response such as kicking Russia out of the G8 and withdrawing from the NATO-Russo talks. Trade sanctions should already be in the works. Instead, all we've done is spout off hot air.

Russia scoffs at NATO threats and continues to play the west for fools, a role we seem to be naturals for.

Taliban launches major attack in Afghanistan, killing 10 French. NATO is exposing its irrelevance, and we should dissolve it and enable Europe and the US to make make new agreements based on modern threats.

Chavez nationalizes another foreign business.

So far this Congress is setting do-nothing records for least legislation passed, but at the same time, they've passed more resolutions than any other. Cato points out that passing resolutions translates to political gain for representatives without any cost, and that we shouldn't judge Congresses by how many laws they pass. I prefer they do nothing to most everything else they do.

Pat Buchanan makes some good points about US policy playing a role in sparking this new Cold War, but he's wrong on some issues. The US should never apologize for supporting self-government in eastern Europe. Putin may not like those people being free and interacting with the west, but that's his problem because he's a tyrant. We did the right thing. Russia has no legimate claim to the oil around the Caspian and that's no excuse for invading Georgia. But pushing NATO into those countries was a huge mistake. Georgia isn't going to protect the United States from attack. And while it did send 2,000 troops to aid in Iraq, to its credit, Georgian troops could never mean the difference between winning a losing a war for the US. We should have encouraged the old Soviet satellites to band together to defend themselves against an Imperial Russia because we have no business sending American troops over there and western European countries, other than dwindling Britain, are practically useless as allies in a war.

Buchanan seems to be trying to draw equivalences between US encouragement of democracy in eastern Europe and Russia's start of a new Cold War. There is no such equivalence.

Abortion rights group produces documents proving that Obama has lied about his votes on legislation requiring doctors to attempt to save the lives of babies who survived abortion attempts. Obama voted to kill the bill, allowing abortion doctors to let the babies the die. Obama's campaign has grudgingly admitted that the documents are correct. But Obama is taking a page from John Kerry's playbook, who took it from Clinton, and calling the people who produced the document liars. To a Democrat president candidate, anybody who exposes the candidate as a outrageous liar must be called a liar themselves but louder and more often so the people can be convinced of the Big Lie. This could sink the Obama campaign because it's clear evidence Obama voted to support infanticide.

Thank you Thomas Sowell for pointing out something I've been saying for a long time - the US needs to stop walking loudly while carrying a little stick and recognizing the US should pull out of NATO. The EU has a larger GDP than the US and can certainly defend itself from any threat if it so chooses.

Boortz shows that the so-called mortgage crisis affects less than 2% of homeowners.

Hillary Clinton wants a plank in the Democrat platform saying the primary process "exposed pervasive gender bias in the media". She wants Democrats to institutionalize the excuse that she lost the nomination because of gender bias in the media. This would basically say she's the legitmate nomineed, not Obama.This is an attempt by the Clintons to put Obama in a no-win situation. He either has to basically say she should have won or say gender bias in the media isn't a problem. Either way, he loses.

Library mysterously blocks reporter from investing documents that detail the links between Barack Obama and Bill Ayers of Weathermen infamy.

House earmarks up this year.

Whereever government money flows, corruption flows with it. Wind farms are no exception.

Washington bartenders tell the differences between Republicans and Democrats in bars.

Interesting essay describes how the '60s enabled the radical, hate America movement to hijack the Democrat party in an attempt to turn America into western Europe.

Ann Applebaum explains that at least part of Russia's motivation to invade Georgia is that fear of elected governments embracing free markets so close may lead to the same kind of revolution in Russia. She also points out how Russia is using Gazprom to fracture the west. Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, who has been sucked onto the board of Gazprom by Russia, blames the west. He's basically an obscenely paid apologist for Putin. Clear, concise essay describes the circumstances around the Russian invasion of Georgia. and why mistakes made by the west are no excuse or justification for Russia's invasion.

Amity Schaels lists 5 ways to derail the economy, comparing 5 policies that kept America mired deeper and longer in the Depression that we should have been and highlighting how today's government, mainly Democrats, are repeating or planning to repeat the same mistakes.

The drinking age should be lowered to 18. If you are responsible enough to vote and responsible enough to get a job, an apartment and start your own life, you are responsible enough to drink. It's ridiculous that fraternity party behavior, notoriously irresponsible anyway, should be used as an excuse to take away the freedom to drink alcohol from all people between the ages of 18 and 21. Obviously, the prohibitionists disagree.

Free kibbles

German Chancellor Merkel, who recently blocked Georgia's entrance into NATO, promises NATO membership to Georgia. That's scary. If NATO goes to war with Russia in Georgia, German troops won't lead the effort - American troops will. Most of Europe proves every day through its dwindling military budgets and unwillingness to fight next to the United States that they cannot be counted on in a war. Expanding NATO is simply further extending US forces with no return for the US.

Condi Rice declares to NATO chiefs that Russia must not be allowed a strategic victory for invading Georgia. As obvious as that is to any sane person, Euro-weenies disagree. I'd rather have a mutual security pact with a bunch of literal flower pansies than with these Euro-weenies. Se must end our security welfare named NATO to these Euro-weenies and make them face the stark reality of defending their own people instead of sitting on the sideline and criticizing us for doing so. If they don't defend themselves, let them see how effective it is to talk to the Russian army in their capitals.

Pakistani President Musharraf resigns. This is the culmination of our interference in Pakistan's internal politics and the childish foreign policy that pretends one election equals freedom. Freedom is a lot harder than that and takes numerous institutions to support it, not least of which is security, which Pakistan does not have.

Florida has passed a price gouging law to keep businesses from raising prices during disasters. This so-called price gouging law is a huge mistake because those higher prices serve 2 purposes. First, they provide the rationing mechanism which keeps critical supplies which greatly increase in demand during a disaster available for everybody. Second, they provide the incentive for people outside the disaster zone to rapidly ship those same critical supplies from their own businesses into the disaster zone. This new price gouging law will greatly reduce the people's incentives to mitigate a disaster and will lead to shortages of critical supplies, resulting in higher casualties.

Nancy Pelosi introduces Obama as "a leader God has blessed us with at this time." Democrats are trying to have it both ways again. They push Obama as the Messiah on the one hand, but on the other, they attack anybody who points it out and makes fun of them for it. Something tells me Democrats think George Bush defeated them twice because of his faith, not because they ran candidates who were even worse than Bush, hard as that was do.

Free kibbles

Congratulations to Michael Phelps for winning 8 gold medals. That's amazing.

Russian President Medvedev once again pledges to pull out of Georgia. How many times have we heard that already? I can't tell if Medvedev is working with Putin, placating the west while Putin continues his imperial ways, or if Medvedev and Putin are at odds.

Here's an example of one of Obama's fascist work programs - if you want to listen to Obama speak at the convention, you have to put in at least 6 hours of volunteer work for his campaign. Sound familiar? This tells us where Obama is taking the country and shows that there's nothing compassionate about welfare. He's going to transform welfare programs into forced-work programs. Michelle Obama keeps telling us that, but nobody is paying attention. This shows the horrible reality of welfare, it gives the govenment power over welfare recipients. That's why the government loves welfare. That's why welfare of any kind is destructive to both recipient and provider and should be abolished.

It is hard to tell these teens are being satirical. They did a great job.

Los Angeles is using a grant from NEA, that's federal tax dollars, to fund a book fair in Mexico while cutting library services in Los Angeles.

Newt Gingrich explains the complications in drilling for oil on a government lease including the expensive litigation brought by environmental groups.

Nancy Pelosi lines her pockets with money from wind power supporters.

Democrats suffer from too few limousines at their convention. The limousine liberals won't be able to ride in the style to which they're accustomed.

It seems to me that anybody advocating for Sharia law in America is trying to overthrow the Constitution, which is treason.

This girl's dress covers everything it's supposed to cover, and she should sue the security guard and mall for kicking her out.

What in the world is "photographing without permission"? If you're in public, you can be photographed. Just ask New York City with all its security cameras.

These "25 Reasons You Might Be a Liberal" are perfect.

Government mandated solar power in California is going to cost California residents more money. Alternative energy is not yet cost-effective, and mandating it hurts the poor most of all, making them even less able to adapt to inevitable climate change.

Free kibbles

Russian President Medvedev signs Georgian cease-fire, but Russian troops have not pulled back. Russian military is pressing ethnic Georgians in South Ossetia into forced labor.

In more proof of evolution, humans are losing some muscles and nerves retained from our ape ancestors.

Mass graves show that Sahara boasted plenty of rain fall 10,000 and 8,000 years ago. I guess man-made global warming from SUVs turned the Sahara into a desert 8,000 years ago.

Dogs cannot digest corn. I'm going to have to check this out further.

Free kibbles

Russia will attempt to exploit the divide in Europe after invading Georgia and Poland's signing of the missile shield deal. Dumb European countries will be swayed by Russia temporarily, like Germany and France were against the US when Bush took office. But both those countries changed direction and developed closer ties to the US, and European countries that embrace Russia now will eventually reject Russian aggression and come running back to the US. While Russia continues to roll through Georgia, the US continues to talk. Talk's cheap. We should be acting. By now, Bush should have organized the G7 to reform without Russia.

Russia threatens nuclear strike against Poland because it agreed to host the missile defense shield. If there's a silver lining in all this, it's that the world finally waking up to the Cold War Putin's Russia and China have been waging against the west. We have to wake up to it before we can win it.

Article claims Pakistani President Musharraf will resign in days. Great. This is the only effective leader Pakistan has, our strongest ally in Pakistan, the US government undermined him, and now he might forced out. Cato reports that at the same time, the civilian government has proven inept and the people of Pakistan are beginning to look to the army to take over again. I suppose Bush's Pakistan policy could have been worse, but it's hard to see how with Musharraf being forced out and Osama bin Laden enjoying a safe haven in Pakistan. The Democrats also share the blame for our bad Pakistan policy since they led the charge to take power from Musharraf.

McCain and Obama are tied again. This is the most bizarre campaign I can ever remember. Obama's is an unabashed communist sympathizer and radical black movement supporter, the American people are naturally afraid of that, his mother is a communist sympathizer, his father and mentors were a communist advocates, he has the glowing endorsement of the communist party, his policy proposals are hard-core socialist proposals, but McCain refuses to capitalize on it. Now McCain is considering naming Lieberman as his VP. It's stunning terrible these 2 candidates are. America is a basically libertarian country, but the 2 parties are running a belicose liberal and hard-core socialist/communist sympathizer. Compared to both these candidates, Michael Dukakis would look good.

US Olympic swim team uses fluid dynamics and high tech to improve performance.

Scientist identifies recently evolved new species of water lily, proving that evolution is occurring right now.

Comparison of George Bush's green ranch home and Al Gore's energy burning monstrosity.

Pat Buchanan exposes US hypocrisy by comparing our actions in Serbia and Kosovo to Russia's actions in Georgia and South Ossetia. We should have never stuck our noses in the Serbia-Kosovo conflict, and while the circumstances and motives of the US in Serbia and Russia in Georgia are very different, we entered Serbia as part of a multi-national peacekeeping force to end ethnic cleansing, not an invader intent on toppling the elected government and taking control of an oil pipeline like Russia, the accusation of hypocrisy is pretty accurate. His comparison of Israel's invasion of Lebanon after Hezbollah kidnapped an Israeli soldier is also misguided - Georgia did not attack Russia as Hezbollah, a Lebanese institution, attacked Israel. Buchanan does a good job explaining how our post-Cold War foreign policy has alienated Russia. But Pat, when did Bill Clinton, who bombed Serbia and sent in US troops, become a neo-con?

Victor Davis Hanson explains that the Russian invasion of Georgia was long-planned, instigating the perfect opportunity supplied by Georgia's bombing of South Ossetia. He has a great quote about western apologists:

The Russians have sized up the moral bankruptcy of the Western Left. They know that half-a-million Europeans would turn out to damn their patron the United States for removing a dictator and fostering democracy, but not more than a half-dozen would do the same to criticize their long-time enemy from bombing a constitutional state.

The Russians rightly expect Westerners to turn on themselves, rather than Moscow — and they won’t be disappointed. Imagine the morally equivalent fodder for liberal lament: We were unilateral in Iraq, so we can’t say Russia can’t do the same to Georgia. (As if removing a genocidal dictator is the same as attacking a democracy). We accepted Kosovo’s independence, so why not Ossetia’s? (As if the recent history of Serbia is analogous to Georgia’s.) We are still captive to neo-con fantasies about democracy, and so encouraged Georgia’s efforts that provoked the otherwise reasonable Russians (As if the problem in Ossetia is our principled support for democracy rather than appeasement of Russian dictatorship).

From what the Russians learned of the Western reaction to Iraq, they expect their best apologists will be American politicians, pundits, professors, and essayists — and once more they will not be disappointed. We are a culture, after all, that after damning Iraqi democracy as too violent, broke, and disorganized, is now damning Iraqi democracy as too conniving, rich, and self-interested — the only common denominator being whatever we do, and whomever we help, cannot be good.

Ralph Peters give more details explaining how much planning and preparation had to have gone into Russia's invasion of Georgia. He also points out this invasion has exposed glaring weaknesses in Russia's military, especially it's air force, which has failed to destroy the oil pipeline despite numerous attempts to hit it.

Ann Coulter points out the obvious - before John Edwards volunteered to take a paternity test, he had already made certain his mistress would refuse to allow one. This guys is as transparent as Barack Obama.

Jonah Goldberg compares the Clinton's to movie monsters because they never die and will come back to scare everybody at the Democrat convention.

Thomas Sowell explains that the reason labor unions want to do away with secret ballot for unionizing is so they can use intimidation tactics to grow the unions.

George Will has an unusually bitter column about how Russia's invasion of Georgia should have brought the world back to reality, but Obama and Bush were slow to figure it out, and the world is transfixed on the Olympics in tyrannical China.