The Weekly Standard has been having a lot of fun whittling down support of J Street, which is a group that pretty much defines itself as the liberal answer to AIPAC – and that pretty much says it all, does it? Anyway, J-Street is having a conference, and TWS has been cheerfully shining a flashlight on the whole thing for the last month or so. Their current score?
With the departure of Kampeas, J Street has now lost five speakers — the three def poets that they cut for the “use and abuse of Holocaust imagery,” Geoff Davis, the Kentucky Republican whose name disappeared from the conference program today and whose office refuses to comment on the matter, and now Kampeas. In addition to the 12 members of Congress who’ve yanked their support, that’s 17 individuals who have either distanced themselves from J Street or have been thrown under the bus by J Street lest they provoke any more controversy.
List not including Senator John Kerry, who is being… John Kerry about the whole thing. Anyway: while I suppose that Marty Peretz is correct in his assessment of J Street’s actual power (and quite crude in the way that he refers to them); watching TWS smack them around like this is fun. Which is reason enough for them to continue.
I will freely admit it: I didn’t get a chance to see Up in theaters. Yes, I hang my head in shame. Anyway, it’s coming out in three weeks, and I’m reliably informed that it was merely yet another goram spectacular Pixar film, so: Movie of the week, to replace Patton.
And if you take a look at his Necronomicon*, you’ll see that people are already treating it with all the respect that such a grandstanding act deserves.
Needless to say, I’ve already gotten the screen shot. Silly man.
Moe Lane
*Somebody should have told him what “book of the names of the dead” means in Latin. And note that I’m not assuming that he meant this all along; Grayson’s not that imaginative.
It’s a sampler, not the full video/audio. About which I’ll speak more of, after Part II.
I’d also like to note that I’ve been expecting this since I noticed that the address of the ACORN office on the intros didn’t match the one in either Baltimore or DC.
At least, that’s the impression you’d be left with if you were the sort to take seriously everybody who upset that not everybody was signed off on the POTUS Peace Nobel thing. Luckily, taking them seriously is still a minority opinion in this country:
Most Americans do not believe President Obama should have won the Nobel Peace Prize, and are divided on whether the award is a good thing, according to a new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll.
Sixty-one percent of respondents said Obama did not deserve to win the prize announced on Oct. 9, according to the poll; 34% said he did deserve the honor.
When asked if they were personally glad that Obama won the award, 46% said they were and 47% said they were not glad.
Via the Examiner, via AoSHQ Headlines – but not via Gallup, which has unaccountably not referenced the poll on the front page as of this writing. Perhaps they were just in a hurry this morning.
This got triggered by the refutation of Dede Scozzafava’s allegation that John McCormack – John McCormack – screamed questions at her, I think. Jim Geraghty’s had enough, and so have I.
The time has come for the RNC and NRCC to ask for their money back. This goes well beyond any reasonable difference on policy. There’s room in the party for pro-choice Republicans and pro-gay marriage Republicans and maybe even the odd pro-card-check Republican. But not this kind of arrogance, this kind of clumsy dishonesty, this kind of reckless hostility to a reporter and a publication that need not be an enemy.
The RNC and NRCC are better than the Scozzafava campaign; it’s time for them to demonstrate that they know how a candidate and her staff are supposed to react when asked a question, and show that Scozzafava’s team’s behavior is just not acceptable.
It’s time for the national GOP to – reluctantly, and I understand their reluctance! – drop Dede Scozzafava and go with Doug Hoffman. This isn’t a situation where the national party is overriding the will of local primary voters; it is a situation where a particular choice of candidate turned out to be the wrong one. Bad choices may be reversed. It’s also time for Ms. Scozzafava to act in the best interests of first the voters of NY-23; and second, the Republican party; by dropping out of the race. As it stands she is helping the Democratic candidate, whose presence in Congress and support of the current ruling party would certainly hurt the former.
Everything from January to September comes from what will no doubt be the single most potent anti-Shea-Porter site in 2010: I refer, of course, to her own House website. Watch the ‘evolution’ of a Beltway Bandit:
January, 2009: “Low-income seniors could really use this money right now,” said Shea-Porter. “Extending the tax rebate to seniors is not only the fair thing to do, but it’s also one of the best ways to stimulate the economy. This helps all of us.”
February, 2009: “Congress has passed an economic stimulus package to provide much needed aid to American families and small businesses,” said Congresswoman Shea-Porter.
March, 2009: “Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter today announced that New Hampshire will receive a $25,827,000 grant for the State Energy Program and a $23,218,594 grant for weatherization projects. These funds, totaling $49,045,594, are through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.”
April, 2009: “Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter today announced that New Hampshire will receive $4.6 million in funding for airport infrastructure. These funds were made possible by the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. “
May, 2009: “Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter today announced that the Portsmouth National Passport Center will receive $2,570,000 for facility renovations. This funding is provided through the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.”
June, 2009: “Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter today announced that the North Conway Water Precinct will receive $8,190,000 from the United States Department of Agriculture Rural Development’s Water and Environmental Program. … The funding comes in the form of a $4,255,000 grant and a $3,935,000 loan made possible by the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.”
July, 2009: “Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter today announced that $558,591 would be sent to New Hampshire to provide employment-related services to dislocated workers affected by layoffs and closures from eight manufacturing companies around the state. … This funding is through the National Emergency Grant (NEG) from the Department of Labor and is made possible by the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.”
August, 2009: [Rep. Shea-Porter took the month off.]
September, 2009: “Congresswoman Carol Shea-Porter today announced that the University of New Hampshire will receive $487,350 to research internet safety materials used by Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Forces. … This grant is provided by the United States Department of Justice and is made possible by the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.”
For somebody who thought that the stimulus was such a failure, she was certainly happy to see all that money. And she certainly wasn’t shy about assigning it to non-infrastructure projects, either.
Now, I can understand not wanting the money, and not taking any of it. I can also understand wanting the money, and taking it. I can even understand not wanting the money, but taking it (whether because it’s been effectively forced on you, or because you figure that you should make the best of a bad situation). What I can’t understand is how somebody can want the money, take the money, then pretend that she’s against how the money was given to her in the first place – and still be taken seriously as a elected representative.
Which is a roundabout way of saying: Frank Guinta for Congress. Because this embarrassment has gone on for long enough.
From the Politico, on Democratic ‘help’ in that campaign:
Indeed, the event in a Tysons Corner office building about 10 miles from Washington was a vivid illustration of the powerful downward dynamic that often affects campaigns once they start to take on the scent of death.
, 
in theaters. Yes, I hang my head in shame. Anyway, it’s coming out in three weeks, and I’m reliably informed that it was merely yet another goram spectacular Pixar film, so: Movie of the week, to replace 
.
, and is (to the best to my knowledge) in the public domain.