This morning, The Times Editorial Board wrote a defeatist, all is lost editorial about the days of cheap gas being gone. In reading it, I felt the spirit of Jimmy Carter working its way through the editorial. Here’s a portion of the editorial:

Seriously, since those predictions oil prices have consistently set record highs, thanks to (fill in the blank), spurring several reactions from Central Minnesotans.

Among the most encouraging are anecdotes about people changing their gas-based behaviors and especially travel patterns. Indeed, four of five members of this very board fall into that category, with the fifth noting that they didn’t drive much anyway, so yet another price hike/spike induced no big worries.

Similarly, reports nationwide show everything from less travel being planned for this holiday weekend to Americans buying almost 3 percent less gas last week than they did at the same time a year ago. But there also is a different reaction, one which while understandable, seems to signal a reluctance to acknowledge the long-term realities about oil and gas amid supply and demand.

Imagine that. People are reluctant in believing that the days of cheap gas is over. This editorial is just a rewording of Jimmy Carter’s “Malaise Speech.” Remember this paragraph from the speech? (continue reading post »)

Yesterday, Rush confirmed that Clear Channel had signed him through 2016. Now Vanity Fair contributing editor Michael Wolff says that it was a bad decision by Clear Channel. Here’s one of his quotes:

“I think it’s a monster error,” Wolff said. “I know, I’m sitting here saying, ‘What are these people smoking?’ You know, the truth is that Rush Limbaugh has been, he’s ridden the rise of conservatism for 25 years and I don’t, maybe nobody quite, quite has been following the news, but that’s coming to an end.”

First off, Rush hasn’t “ridden the rise of conservatism.” Instead, it’s accurate to say that he’s been the rise of conservatism. Here’s another Wolff quote worth ridiculing:

“It’s going to be over and Rush Limbaugh in a relatively short period of time is going to look like a really kind of out-of-it kind of oddity,” Wolff said. “And I can not for the life of me imagine how someone could have made this deal.”

Men of Rush Limbaugh’s talent and intelligence don’t become oddities, whether it’s in a “short period of time” or otherwise. Rush Limbaugh will leave on his terms at the time of his choosing. (continue reading post »)

The thought of the AP downplaying improvements in Iraq isn’t news. It’s noteworthy, though, to see how they report the good news from Iraq. Here’s how Anne Flaherty described the progress:

No matter who is elected president in November, his foreign policy team will have to deal with one of the most frustrating realities in Iraq: the slow pace with which the government in Baghdad operates. Iraq’s political and military success is considered vital to U.S. interests, whether troops stay or go. And while the Iraqi government has made measurable progress in recent months, the pace at which it’s done so has been achingly slow.

The White House sees the progress in a particularly positive light, declaring in a new assessment to Congress that Iraq’s efforts on 15 of 18 benchmarks are “satisfactory”, almost twice of what it determined to be the case a year ago. The May 2008 report card, obtained by the Associated Press, determines that only two of the benchmarks, enacting and implementing laws to disarm militias and distribute oil revenues—are unsatisfactory.

I’d love to ask Ms. Flaherty a few questions. Here’s a few right off the top of my head: (continue reading post »)

The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Trudy Rubin says that Iraqis feel a ray of hope about their future. I don’t doubt that they’re feeling more optimistic but saying that it’s only a ray of hope seems understated. Rubin says that whenever she wants to know how things are really going, he calls his friend Abbas. Here’s how she describes their latest conversation:

Yet, in three recent phone conversations, he sounded more hopeful about Iraq’s future than I’d heard him in a long time. Why hopeful? Because he finally sees some order returning to Baghdad. The Mahdi Army, the militia of the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, has been expelled from his neighborhood. “The Iraqi people are waking up from the Mahdi Army,” he told me. “Iraqis know now that they are criminals.”

I’m glad that Ms. Rubin recognizes the improvement in Iraq. According to Ms. Rubin’s bio, she’s travelled extensively to the Middle East, including 9 times to Iraq. This isn’t, as near as I can tell, some wet-behind-the-ears leftist ideologue. It sounds like she’s serious about her work.

My difficulties start when I try reconciling Ms. Rubin’s account with Col. Peters’ account, which I wrote about here: (continue reading post »)

The message behind Kevin Rennie’s column is simple, concise and unmistakeable: Sen. Dodd, it’s time to come clean because we’re not going away. It’s a message taht Sen. Dodd doesn’t want to hear but it’s a message that we won’t let him ignore.

‘I would never take ‘trust me’ for an answer, not even in the best of times. Not even from a president on Mount Rushmore.” So declared Sen. Christopher J. Dodd last week on the floor of the U.S. Senate during a debate on government surveillance.

Dodd declared he will not trust our leaders unless he gets to see certain national security documents. Dodd insists, however, that we trust him when he says he didn’t know he received special treatment when he borrowed nearly $800,000 from Countrywide Financial Corp. in 2003.

This calls for an FOIA request. If Sen. Dodd won’t voluntarily comply with our request that he produce documentation on what was or wasn’t said in his negotiations with Angelo Mozilo, then we’ll demand his compliance. Sen. Dodd would be wise to remember that summers are when many scandals are exposed. That’s because there’s a lull in the news. If he wants someone digging into his financial affairs, I’m certain someone will be more than willing to do that.

One thing that’s obvious is that Dodd will play this as long as possible. Here’s what I’m basing that opinion on: (continue reading post »)

This post on popmatters.com is one of the most laughable things I’ve ever read.

Bill O’Reilly recently focused his ire on Minneapolis, where more than 3,000 people gathered last weekend for the National Conference for Media Reform, a group the Fox News personality called “real nuts.”

Real angry is more like it.

The convention, which drew such luminaries as Arianna Huffington, Dan Rather and Phil Donahue, should have been an exchange of thoughts on how to upgrade journalism in all shapes and sizes. And while those conversations did occur, they were too often drowned out by voices dead set on overturning Rupert Murdoch, George Bush and anyone else who wears a suit to work.

Arianna Huffington, Dan Rather and Phil Donahue are luminaries who should help upgrade journalism? That trio wouldn’t know good journalism if it bit their backsides.

Dan Rather got run out of journalism because he let his hatred of President Bush affect his judgment on the Rathergate (remember fake but accurate?). Arianna Huffington’s blog is a vile hate site that’s posted that Tony Snow should die in response to the news that Tony’s cancer had reared its ugly head again. Phil Donahue isn’t a journalist. He’s a former whiny talk show host who hasn’t done real news in the last 3 decades. (continue reading post »)

After reading the opening paragraph to this article, you’d think that drilling off Florida’s coasts would cost Sen. McCain Florida. I suspect that that’s the intent of the opening. Here’s what Lesley Clark, Mary Ellen Klas and Beth Reinhard wrote in the opening paragraph:

John McCain’s support for offshore drilling could hurt his prospects in the nation’s largest battleground state, where voters have long favored safeguarding the economically and environmentally precious coastline.

The trick is to not dwell too long on the opening paragraph. The trick is to get into the meat of the article. That’s where you’ll find quotes like this:

“There is a certain political danger for McCain,” said Mason-Dixon pollster Brad Coker. But he added, “The question becomes: With gas at $4 a gallon, have people’s minds changed? My best guess is that more people today are willing to support offshore drilling with heavy restrictions than a couple a years ago.”

Everybody and their mothers know that $4 a gallon gas trumps all other considerations at this point. The ecomomy can’t take this much longer. The American people know this. That’s why polling I’ve seen shows a dramatic shift. One poll shows that people feel less hostility towards the big oil companies than before, dropping from 34% to 20%. That same poll shows support for drilling on the OCS at 57% as favoring it to 41% opposing it.

Naturally, Democrats attacked Sen. McCain as a flip-flopper: (continue reading post »)

In 1992, Hillary said something that could’ve derailed her husband’s presidential ambitions. Here’s Hillary’s now-famous quote:

“You know, I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had teas, but what I decided to do was to fulfill my profession, which I entered before my husband was in public life.”

What happened after that was the Clinton campaign stuck a proverbial sock in Hillary’s mouth. The next time we heard from her, she was talking about cookie recipes and talking every bit like the stay-at-home-mom she talked down earlier.

Let’s fastforward to this campaign and shift our focus to Michelle Obama. She’s said that “For the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country.” She’s told New Yorker Magazine that America is “downright mean”, that we’re “guided by fear.”

The Clinton campaign realized immediately that they had a problem and hid Hillary so she didn’t derail his presidential ambitions. The Obama campaign let Michelle shoot her mouth off. Now she’s attempting a Hillaryesque makeover and the NY Times is assisting: (continue reading post »)

I just got off the phone with the great people at the Thomas More Law Center, the organization that are defending the rights of the Haditha Marines. I don’t know how I missed their official statment yesterday on Col. Steven Folsom’s ruling but miss it I did. Here’s the heart of their statement:

The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, represents LtCol Chessani alongside his detailed military attorneys. The two Law Center attorneys assigned to his case are former Marine officers themselves. Robert Muise served in the First Persian Gulf war as an infantry officer, and Brian Rooney was a Judge Advocate officer who served two tours of duty in Iraq. Lt Colonel John Shelburne, USMC, and Captain Jeff King, USMC, the detailed military defense counsel, make up the rest of Chessani’s defense team.

Richard Thompson, President and Chief Counsel of the Law Center, commenting on the judge’s decision had this to say, “We are all grateful for the judge’s ruling today. He truly was the “last sentinel” to guard against unlawful command influence.”

“Tragically, our own government eliminated one of its most effective combat commanders. The insurgents are laughing in their caves,” said Thompson.

It’s maddening that the military threw Col. Chessani’s career under the proverbial bus. Nonetheless, that’s precisely what they did when they charged him with dereliction of duty. I suspect that they were pushed into this decision by some politicians looking for a political victory. (continue reading post »)

Based on this article, it appears that charges against Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani might get dropped on the grounds that there was undue command influence applied to his case. Here’s what WND is reporting:

Officials with the law center today said Col. Steven Folson, the military judge assigned to the case, “informed counsel that the hearing in the Chessani case, originally scheduled for three days, June 16-18, has been changed to only one hour on Tuesday, June 17, 2008, at 9 a.m. PST.

“Col. Folsom indicated that the only business he will address is his ruling on the defense motion to dismiss Lt. Col. Jeffery Chessani’s case because of unlawful command influence,” the law center said.

Officially, Lt. Col. Chessani has been charged with dereliction of duty. The accusation made against him was that he didn’t properly investigate the firefight at Haditha on Nov. 19, 2005. The fact that the hearing was changed from 3 days to 1 hour says everything. The defense has made lots of motions, which is why they initially scheduled 3 days to get through the hearing. Here’s the part that is most telling:

Folsom only recently ruled that there was evidence in the Chessani case of unlawful command influence, which is considered the “mortal enemy” of justice within the military judicial structure.

The judge’s conclusion was based on evidence two generals who controlled Chessani’s case were influenced by Marine lawyer Col. John Ewers, one of the investigators assigned to the case. Ewers was allowed to attend at least 25 closed-session meetings in which Chessani’s case was discussed.

If there is proof that Col. Ewers sat in “on 25 closed-session meetings”, then the prosecution has a big problem.

The Thomas More Law Center said the officers involved in the firefight handled its aftermath according to military protocol.

“Even though Lt. Col. Chessani promptly reported the events of that day to his superiors, including the deaths of 15 noncombatant civilians caught in the battle, nobody in Lt. Col. Chessani’s chain of command believed there was any wrongdoing on behalf of the Marines,” the law firm said.

The notion that Lt. Col. Chessani didn’t do his duty is absurd. Here’s what Newsmax reported in June, 2007: (continue reading post »)