Moe Lane

[UPDATE]: Welcome, Instapundit readers.

Yes, that Tim Robbins.

Yes, that Michele Bachmann.

(pause)

The Hell?

Via AoSHQ Headlines.

Crossposted to RedState.

This is via That’s My Congress, which is about to become very confused about why it’s getting traffic from a VRWC site. Here’s the list:

Lois Capps
Michael Capuano
Ben Cardin
Diana DeGette
Eliot Engel
Barney Frank
Alan Grayson
Carolyn McCarthy
Bill Pascrell
Adam Schiff
Allyson Schwartz
Heath Shuler

…and they have two things in common. First, they’re all Democrats. Second, they all have email addresses with Erickson & Company. And what is Erickson & Company? As That’s My Congress puts it:

Erickson & Company is not a lobbying firm. Instead, it helps set up events like the Heath Shuler’s BBQ, at which lobbyists and other people seeking special favors can come, check in hand, to pay for access to elected officials and their aides.

In other words, it’s a legal [and Democratic-aligned] money-laundering facility for lobbyists. Need to toss Heath Shuler some cash, but you’re a dirty lobbyist? Well, go to Shuler’s little BBQ (run by a go-between), drop a grand for a plate of food, and say hi! No fuss, no muss, no need for disclosure. Shuler’s happy: he’s getting his cut of your entry fee. The go-between is happy: it’s getting its cut of your entry fee. And you’re happy: this is a lot cheaper than a maximum campaign contribution would be.

So remember this, the next time anybody on that list – or, honestly, any Democrat – talks about the evil of lobbying: the sound you hear isn’t scorn towards those who would try to pay for influence.  Nope.  It’s scorn towards the rubes who don’t know how to tell when a Democrat is gaming the system.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

When it comes to Twilight-themed tattoos, ‘lame’ will work perfectly as well as a descriptor, whether it be today or twenty years from now.

H/T: Instapundit, naturally. And note that I don’t really have anything against Twilight, per se: I neither watch nor read it and I’m apparently not part of the target demographic.  I will admit to a certain jaundiced attitude towards the assumptions, but then I watched Buffy The Vampire Slayer more or less (if you’ll pardon the semi-pun) religiously.

…was used by NPR to fund homophobic hate speech.  WARNING: the geniuses at NPR haven’t learned how to put up flash videos that don’t autoload, so don’t click on the link unless you feel like regaling your workspace with a condescending, yet ponderous, primer that relies on the Left’s favorite word to describe people who don’t like health care rationing.

God, but these people are insecure.

Moe Lane

See also Athens Runaway and Riehl World View.
Crossposted to RedState

Micah Sifry wrote a follow-up to his post on the withering of Obama Organizing for America, and it’s just as interesting as the first one was. More practically useful, in its way: anybody involved with building/maintaining a local Tea Party group, or other local conservative/libertarian/Republican grassroots organization should read it.  But – again – there’s one particular passage that I want to address:

…[A]nd heck, doesn’t the Democratic party want more local chapters[?]…

Not in the sense that Micah means, no.  They want their current local chapters filled with people who show up, swell the ranks, pay their dues, and perform whatever tasks the local chapter leadership expects of them.  Which, for most local chapters, involves maintaining the status quo.  Actually letting those wild-eyed activists do anything would give said local chapter leadership the galloping staggers.

Anyway, read the whole thing, particularly if you’re a Right-grassroots organizer.  But if you’re a progressive: read this, and tell yourself that nothing’s wrong, really.

Moe Lane

PS: What?  No, the GOP has a different problem in that regard, which I have no intention at all of discussing in even a semi-public forum.

Crossposted to RedState.

I have a mantra for you.  Every single day, remind yourself:

‘Aim to misbehave.’

I had a lot of self-conscious twaddle after that, but I deleted it for being self-conscious twaddle.  It’s a new year and a new election cycle.  Celebrate it by being a merry counter to our current ruling party: if those dullards* hate anything, it’s being laughed at.

So laugh.

Moe Lane

*The most fun kind of dullards, in fact: the kind that tragically think that they’re actually quite stylish and edgy.

Crossposted to RedState.

Cloverfield – Roar!, Yvetta Tannenbergerova, The City of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus & James Fitzpatrick

Cloverfield was the film that caused me to give Star Trek a chance. Which I almost didn’t.

…thankfully, it’s just their Top 10 ‘geek’ movie list for the last decade.

Although not completely: I’d swap out Casino Royale for Iron Man – or, more accurately, replace Gladiator with it. Oh, and remove Wall-E and replace it with All Those Goddamn Spectacular Pixar Films. The others are dealer’s choice, and not worth fussing over, as long as you see them.  It’s a good list, in other words; one way that you can tell is that I watched all but one of those films, at least half of them in theaters – and liked all the ones that I saw*.

Moe Lane

*With the partial exception of Gladiator.  But that was because the first five minutes made me realize that what I really, really wanted to watch was an epic movie about Roman legionary warfare.  Not quite the movie’s fault, and such is life.

I would whale upon this Matt Bai column, except that at the end it’d just boil down to two thoughts:

1. Only a graduate of Tufts and Columbia Universities could even seriously entertain the notion that a graduate of Columbia and Harvard Universities would ever be accurately described as being a ‘populist’;
2. And only a progressive journalist would think that being compared to Woodrow Wilson was complimentary.

Via Hot Air Headlines.

Moe Lane

PS: Well, why not? This video still gets me hate mail, so I figure it still stings.

Crossposted to RedState.

Time to start the waltz, methinks.

A few days ago Sissy Willis asked a very interesting question: Will Sarah Palin endorse Scott Brown?  I’ve been thinking about it a bit; and while I can see the arguments both pro and con, I think that it’s time that Sarah Palin did.  You have to speculate to accumulate, after all.

So let’s light this candle.

Moe Lane

PS: Scott Brown for US Senate.

Crossposted to RedState.

…I’m thinking about it, I’m thinking about it.  Everything that I’ve read recently has either been something that I’ve already done, or something that’s part of a series, or not really Book of the Week.  I’m kind of stumped.

As reported here and here and here.  Be prepared to live in New Zealand for a while if they take you.

Also, they’re splitting the party book into two parts.  I’m… not entirely certain that’s a good idea, but I am entirely certain that Peter Jackson wouldn’t be able to hear me over all that money and all those Academy Awards.