Friday, April 23, 2004


Hypocrisy personified

John Kerry is sponsoring a petition which accuses Bush of using taxpayer's money to fund his campaign. There are no links to support the accusations, so they remain just that: accusations. (The whole thing is reminiscent of the similar allegations levelled against Hillary Clinton four years ago, and just as unfounded.)

Meanwhile, Kerry has missed almost every vote this year, and 64 percent of the votes last year, yet continues to draw his full salary, despite the fact that by law he is supposed to forfeit his pay.


Of course, Kerry doesn't think that senate votes are all that important.

"In the age of telecommunications, Sen. Kerry is in daily contact with his chief of staff,'' Meehan said. "Voting is just one small part of being a U.S. senator.'' cite

Kerry should take a cue from Bob Dole, the 1996 GOP nominee, who resigned his seat in order to dedicate himself to the race while not depriving his state of half of their senate representation. Instead, he spends his time smearing Bush instead of performing the job for which he is paid. Voting is by far the most important portion of a senator's job, and he has been "AWOL" for quite some time.

posted at 01:30 PM | permalink | Comments (0)





Interesting

Andrew Sullivan links to FundRace, which provides maps of donors by address. I was looking at the maps of the ten biggest donor cities, when I happened across the Atlanta map. One address in Atlanta stuck out, because it was both the largest donor (by far) and it was also a Republican stronghold. When I clicked on the address, I realized that it must be an office, because most of the donors were lawyers affiliated with a single firm. One of the other donors caught my eye, however. Andrew Young (yes, THE Andrew Young; he's identified as the CEO of Good Works International) was listed, as a $2000 contributor to the campaign of Geroge W. Bush. Since Young has been a vocal supporter of the Democratic Party for quite some time, and because there was no balancing contribution to any of the Democratic candidates, I wonder what he's thinking. Somehow, I doubt that he'll be questioned by a reporter, or that he'll have a comment on the subject if asked, but it's still noteworthy.

posted at 10:38 AM | permalink | Comments (0)





Pat Tillman killed in Afghanistan

This AP story reports that Pat Tillman, the NFL player who gave up his career to join the Army, has been killed in action in Afghanistan. There is no confirmation from the DoD yet.

Pat Tillman gave up a three million dollar contract with the Arizona Cardinals to join the US Army Rangers (special forces) after the September 11th attack by Al Qaeda. After the initial flurry of reporting on his decision, he disappeared from the media's radar, which was as he wished. He didn't want a media circus following him; it was a personal decision on his part, and he didn't ask for special considerations.

Tillman was known for his loyalty; he refused an offer from another team (one which would have significantly raised his salary) to stay with the team that drafted him, and then he asked to be released in order to serve his country. I'm humbled by his sacrifice; I'm not sure if I could have made the same decision had I been in his position. I'm saddened by the deaths of any American servicemember, but Tillman sacrificed his fame to serve his country, and gave his life as well.

UPDATE: Any comment in this thread that is inappropriate will be deleted, the poster will be banned, and I will identify the IP address in a separate post. I will not put up with the behavior exhibited by the trolls who have infested the larger sites.

posted at 09:41 AM | permalink | Comments (0)






Tuesday, April 20, 2004


Reciprocity—The flip side

Glenn Reynolds links to a piece that notes that John Kerry is still refusing to release his military records, an action for which Bush was relentlessly dragged over the coals. One of his readers says that Kerry is using the "rope-a-dope" strategy, noting that it worked for Bush.

I disagree. Even though there was absolutely nothing in the records, Bush is still being smeared as being "AWOL", mostly from twits who never served a single day in any military outfit (Michael Moore, anyone?) and disparage those who have. At least the major media have dropped the subject for the most part.

In keeping with the left's obsession with full disclosure, conservatives should demand Kerry release his record, daily, and then shift the terms of the debate should nothing turn up in the records. Maybe enough noise will create a media firestorm like the one that consumed the Bush campaign earlier this year. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, and we ought to take a gander at the records that Kerry wants to keep hidden.

UPDATE: Kerry has released all the records. We'll see what happpens.

posted at 04:46 PM | permalink | Comments (2)


"In keeping with the left's obsession with full disclosure...."

I'm relieved to learn that that whole "Whitewater" thing never happened, given the revelations as to how it threatened our nation.

I regret the whole thing about a President being impeached over technical wording about a blow-job. It would be obsessive to think someone's words -- the President's words -- should be examined closely.

Who would do that?

posted by Gary Farber on April 20, 2004 11:09 PM



What does Whitewater have to do with the unsupportable allegations that Bush was AWOL? In the case of Clinton, he lied (under oath) about his conduct with a subordinate, while on trial for a sexual harassment charge; Bush never lied, nor did he deny that he stopped flying well before his time obligation was fulfilled.

The double standard (on Clinton vs. Bush) is played out over and over again. Allegations that Clinton used drugs? One or two mentions on the news? Allegations that Bush used cocaine? Weeks in the network news cycle. Allegations of Clinton's draft dodging? 10 stories during the whole 1992 campaign, whereas there were 25 stories in 16 days this February on Bush's service. Roger Clinton's wild life was mentioned briefly, while Bush's daughters' escapades received plenty of coverage.

posted by timekeeper on April 21, 2004 12:07 PM






As a college student...

No, I've never been to college, but that didn't stop me from taking this quiz, which plots one's responses to a series of questions on a grid and compares the result to responses from college students. I fell into the "secular humanist" category (shared with 29% of the college students in the survey). The other three categories were "traditional liberal", "traditional conservative", and "religious centrists". Not surprisingly, the largest group encountered on campus was "traditional liberal", comprising almost a third of the total. The survey has this to say about me:

You are a Secular Centrist. Secular centrists like you tend to be:

•Strongly supportive of gay rights.
•Believe strongly in the separation of church and state.
•Less supportive of affirmative action than most college students.
•Less likely to be concerned about the environment than most college students.
•Less likely to believe in basic health insurance as a right than most college students.


I somewhat disagree with the second conclusion, although I understand how that conclusion was reached. All the remaining results should be familiar with regular readers. I am staunchly conservative in areas that are not covered by the survey (fiscal issues, law enforcement, personal responsibility), which would pull me out of the "centrist" column. My tolerance of religion informing one's personal choices, as long as they don't infringe on my liberty, would pull me out of the "secular" column, as it is interpreted by many leftists these days. The test is quick and interesting; check it out for yourself.

BTW, my responses were 5/5/2/1/2/4/1/1/4/3/3.

(Link courtesy of Gary Farber, who ended up with the same results, despite a distinctly different political bent. Yes, Gary, some of us conservatives do read past the Instalanche link<grin>.)

posted at 01:18 PM | permalink | Comments (2)


"My tolerance of religion informing one's personal choices, as long as they don't infringe on my liberty, would pull me out of the 'secular' column...."

I'm curious as to what that means.

Read referrer logs? Me?

(Do I hold against you that you link to me, but apparently consider me too boring to blogroll? Apparently not.)

posted by Gary Farber on April 20, 2004 02:00 PM



Gary, many hold "secular" to mean the same as "atheistic" these days, as any mention of God sends them into a tizzy. While I am not a particularly religious person, I don't freak out when someone mentions their religious beliefs (or lack thereof).

What I am offended by, however, is those who try to legislate their religious preferences into law, whether it is fundamentalist Christians who try to ban abortion or criminalize consensual sex among adults, or atheists who try to ban abstinence advocacy in schools on the grounds that abstinence is a religious concept.

posted by timekeeper on April 20, 2004 03:20 PM






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