Moe Lane

(H/T: Hot Air) There’s an assumption here that should be challenged as a matter of course:

“We heard story after story from current Organizing for America volunteers about how they were getting disillusioned with Obama because he wasn’t fighting for the public option,” [Progressive Change Campaign Committee flack Adam] Green said. “Obama’s email list may soon become a hollow shell if he does not fight Joe Lieberman and insist that there be a public option.”

…’become?’ Organizing for America is a hollow shell.  It’s been a hollow shell from pretty much the moment that it stopped being a ‘sexy*’ campaign tool that didn’t actually require its members to do anything except hand over money and votes. See here and here and here and here and here and here and here for more commentary along those lines.  OfA will probably be very useful to the President when it comes time for his re-election – anybody still taking it seriously by then will be a prime source for campaign contributions – but as an instrument of enabling policy changes?

Let me put it this way: OfA wants people like me to fear it.  Not mock it.

Moe Lane

*For given values of ‘sexy.’

Crossposted to RedState.

The Little Drummer Boy, Reilly

More cowbell.

Moe Lane

PS: No, I have no idea who these folks are.

Byron York wants to know what Republican legislators are doing in Copenhagen.

Getting snowed in, apparently.

As if on cue with former Vice President Al Gore’s arrival in Copenhagen, the site of the United Nation’s climate summit is expected to receive heavy snowfall and bitter cold temperatures. With a bit of amusement some have pointed to the arrival of the cold weather as an example of the ‘Gore Effect’.

In recent years, the term ‘Gore Effect’ has come to take note of unseasonable weather that seems to accompany the Nobel Laureate or when a significant global warming event is held. Since 2004 these coincidences occur with uncanny frequency.

Well, at least this way Al Gore’s killing less polar bears.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

(Via Hot Air Headlines) Ben Lerner asks a couple of questions that this administration doesn’t want to answer:

So what happens if Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other 9/11 masterminds, whose trials Attorney General Eric Holder has decided will take place in the criminal justice system in New York, get off on a technicality or are somehow O.J.-Simpsoned by a jury? Can we still hold them? If not, where do they go?

At its simplest, one of two things will happen:

1. They get let go.  That means that the guy who planned the 1993 WTC attack and the murder of Daniel Pearl (to give just two examples) walks out onto an American street, free and happy.
2. They stay locked up, and to the Devil with the court system.  No, I don’t [expletive deleted] know why captured terrorists were given legal rights and a trial if an unfavorable result was going to be ignored anyway, either.

Those are the options: media circus, or show trials.  The administration had better well hope they do a better job at handling this than they have at… well, everything… so far.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

And by ‘favorite’ I mean either ‘one you’d like to see gone’ or ‘one who is on the cusp.’  Watching either type try to decide whether they can hold out another two years for a Presidential election – and whether there’s any point to it, given the way that this President’s approval ratings keep shrinking – should provide us all with many hours of innocent amusement for the next few months.  Or not-so-innocent amusement.

My current candidate for the next round of spend-more-time-with-my-family?  Alan Mollohan, WV-01.  As Brian notes, Mollohan is a corrupt suckweasel who may get indicted soon; as Don notes, Mollohan is having fundraising troubles; and as Jim notes, people are lining up to get a stab at the privilege of challenging Mollohan for his seat. WV-01 is R+9; Cook lists it as competitive (“Likely Democratic“).  And (again) like Brian, I suspect that the DCCC’s going to want to spend its money elsewhere next year.

Interesting times for the Democrats.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

(Via Nodwick) On the one hand, the movies on this list that I’ve actually seen:

Pitch Black
Star Trek
Spider-Man 2
The Incredibles
28 Days Later
Iron Man
The Dark Knight
District 9
Serenity

…are all excellent (in particular, Pitch Black making the cut pleased me). On the other hand, the omission of Cloverfield in favor of (pick your obscure film here) seems a bit raw.  On the gripping hand, I’m hearing that Avatar kind of sucks as anything except partisan agitprop.

Moe Lane

Mayyyyybe:

Rep. John Murtha’s (D-Pa.) campaign has asked the Democrats’ reelection arm to write a memo detailing how he can use funds in his campaign account if he retires.

[snip]

The office acknowledged asking the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) for the advice, but explained that it did so only in response to a constituent who assumed that members could put their remaining campaign funds to personal use when they retired.

[snip]

Murtha’s explanation seemed strained to some observers, who said his office could have simply told the constituent that personal use of campaign money is prohibited when a member retires.

Murtha’s problem – aside from being greedily corrupt, of course – is that he’s facing organized opposition in both the general and primary season. It would be a really good thing for the PA Democratic party if Murtha resigned to prepare for his legal defense spend more time with his family.  Then again, if Murtha was the sort to think about others…

Moe Lane

PS: Tim Burns and Bill Russell are both running for the GOP nomination.

Crossposted to RedState.

I have scarred you, with this.

I do not apologize. It was the only way to kill the pain.

Via David Thompson, via AoSHQ Headlines.

…which, as a reminder, was a deliberate, premeditated attempt to murder women and children via arson; and there has been no progress in the investigation since the last time I checked.  In fact, despite the fact that somebody tried to burn down a church as part of a political statement – I am uninterested in feeding the delusions of those who would argue otherwise* – federal law enforcement agencies are apparently not investigating this themselves.

And this would be the point where I go away from the keyboard and start to swear.

Moe Lane

*I’d love to be proven wrong.

Crossposted to RedState.

Normally I’m all about the filthy lucre, but screw it:

You’re there, and so is Ace, and so am I.

Moe Lane

PS: But feel free to buy something on Amazon.com.

Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer, Dr. Elmo

This song is 30 years old.

…just how much raw time a newborn can eat up without one even noticing.  Particularly at night.

I assume that such selective amnesia is actually some sort of Darwinian survival mechanism: it helps ensure that couples have more than one kid.