Author: Moe_Lane

Pawlenty skips SRLC for MN NG troop return.

Well, this is gratifyingly not 2012-related:

Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty will miss a major Republican gathering next month of possible 2012 GOP presidential contenders and instead will attend a welcome home ceremony for troops returning from Iraq, a Pawlenty spokesman tells CNN.

The two-term Minnesota governor, who is considering a bid for his party’s presidential nomination in the next election, was scheduled to attend the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans.

[snip]

Instead of going to New Orleans, Pawlenty will appear at the April 10 welcome home ceremony for the Minnesota National Guard’s 34th Red Bull Infantry Division. The approximate 1,200 troops are finishing a long deployment to Iraq. Pawlenty was also at the unit’s sendoff.

I was contemplating going to SRLC myself, but my excuse for not going is much more prosaic: I can’t afford to. Which is life.

Anyway, as you may remember, I had a chance to utterly ignore time limits and ask him a couple of questions at CPAC; he’s stereotypically Minnesota Nice.  It’s also gratifying for this story about him picking greeting his state’s troops over a political meet-and-greeting to be not put out as a partisan political issue.

After all, that’s my job.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

#rsrh Also, he’ll be signing it in a broom closet.

Don’t ask where the Members of Congress will be.

Really.  Don’t.

This says it all, really:

President Barack Obama will sign the executive order Wednesday that prohibits federal funding of abortion surrounded by members of Congress who oppose abortion rights — but he won’t do it for the cameras.

(Via Hot Air Headlines) Actually, not quite all.  Politico was kind enough to give us a list of those Members of Congress who can safely be said to have flunked the intelligence test you need to stay in Congress: Continue reading #rsrh Also, he’ll be signing it in a broom closet.

‘This is a patient’s bill of rights on steroids’

In other words: artificially boosted, likely to be impotent, and a major health risk if you’re a kid.

(Via Hot Air Headlines) The AP did not so much bury the lede as it dismembered it and hid the pieces in separate locations, so we need to do some stitching:

Obama made better coverage for children a centerpiece of his health care remake, but it turns out the letter of the law provided a less-than-complete guarantee that kids with health problems would not be shut out of coverage.

Under the new law, insurance companies still would be able to refuse new coverage to children because of a pre-existing medical problem, said Karen Lightfoot, spokeswoman for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, one of the main congressional panels that wrote the bill Obama signed into law Tuesday.

[snip]

Full protection for children would not come until 2014, said Kate Cyrul, a spokeswoman for the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, another panel that authored the legislation.

[snip]

Obama’s public statements have conveyed the impression that the new protections for kids were more sweeping and straightforward.

Also: Obama’s public statements have also conveyed the equally-false impression that the President has a clue about what’s actually in his signature legislation, but you can’t really expect the AP to write that out.  Although one gets the impression that the thought might have actually passed through the head of the writer.  Which would be an improvement, at least.

Anyway, you’d think that at this point the President would have the mother-wit to check the speeches that they hand to him.  He just doesn’t like to learn, does he?

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Adam Kinzinger (R CAND, IL-11) up in two polls.

This Hill article is not quite accurate:

If this is any indication of where the healthcare debate has left Democrats, they could be in trouble.

Rep. Debbie Halvorson (D-Ill.) trails her reelection race by six points in the first public House poll conducted after the healthcare debate.

The Public Opinion Strategies (R) poll for Iraq veteran Adam Kinzinger (R), which is set to be released widely, shows him leading Halvorson 44-38. The congresswoman is largely unknown, with a 33 percent favorability rating and 31 percent unfavorable.

…it’s not the only poll. Sean Trende over at Real Clear Politics is reporting that newcomer pollster We Ask America is likewise showing Adam over Halvorson:

Moving into the Chicago exurbs, first term Congresswoman Debbie Halvorson appears to be in a heap of trouble against former McLean County Commissioner Adam Kinzinger. She trails 42%-30% in the R+1 Eleventh district, which has traditionally sent Republicans to Congress.

Take that with as many grains of salt as you like, of course. Still, this is one of the GOP’s bright spots, even in an election cycle full of them.

Adam’s site is here; the Public Opinion Strategy poll is here.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Three things to take away from this Amy Bishop article.

Via POWIP:

Gun in Ala. campus shooting bought 2 decades ago
By DESIREE HUNTER (AP) – 15 hours ago

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — The gun used to kill three people during a faculty meeting at an Alabama school was bought for the suspect’s husband two decades ago when he said he was having problems with a neighbor, an investigator testified Thursday.

The investigator told a judge that an acquaintance bought the gun in New Hampshire for Amy Bishop’s husband to skirt a waiting period where the couple lived in Massachussetts.

In no particular order:

  1. There’s something going on with the husband.
  2. Bill Delahunt should not get off the hook for letting this one back out onto the streets, just because he’s cutting and running from Congress.
  3. If Amy Bishop had decided to cook off in MA instead of AL, the restrictive gun laws of the former wouldn’t have done a damned thing to make it harder for her to kill three people.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

‘Stuck-on’ Stupak… stuck on Stupak’s EO.

Turns out that the Obama administration is taking Stupak’s Executive Order as seriously as… well, everybody else:

President Obama signed the Senate health care bill into law Tuesday. He did not sign the executive order on abortion negotiated with Michigan Democratic Congressman Bart Stupak in an 11th-hour arrangement that may well have saved the entire health care reform effort.

A White House official told Fox, Obama will not sign the Executive Order Tuesday and has set no specific date to do so. Stupak predicted Obama would sign the order later this week. The White House said only that Obama would sign the order “soon.”

Now, it’s like this. It’s one thing to be a prostitute. It’s another thing to be a cheap prostitute. It’s yet a third thing to be a cheap prostitute who accepts Monopoly money. But to be a cheap prostitute who gets stiffed on your Monopoly money? That takes skill.

Moe Lane

PS: I recognize that Hot Air has a valid argument that eventually the President will stop tormenting Stupak and give him his Monopoly money, but AoSHQ’s implicit rejoinder that Stupak hasn’t degraded himself enough for it yet (he’s getting there) has a certain truth there, too.

PPS: My apologies to prostitutes, of course.

Crossposted to RedState.

‘Next week on C-SPAN: Cabinet fart-lighting contest!’

God save the Republic.

[UPDATE]: Greek, Roman, what’s the difference? Dead white guy either way, and it’s not like anybody in this administration reads the classics anyway.

So that’s no literacy in English, no math skills, and no historical knowledge. I figured that I could get away with the nerd thing, being one myself – but I may have to apologize to the other members of my sub-group for the implied slur if this keeps up.

I swear, sometimes I almost think that those people pull this stuff just to embarrass me in public (f-bomb warning):

Also, apparently the Vice President uses the same online quote website that the President does. It’s like watching Revenge of the Nerds, only featuring functional illiterates who aren’t good at math.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

FL SEN Primary: DOOM.

Mr. Crist, can we talk?

It isn’t your night.  I’m sorry, but it isn’t.  Marco has a twenty-plus lead over you by now.  You won’t survive the primary.  You won’t win on a third-party run, either.  2010 is a GOP year; but it’s not your year.  I do not say this to wound you, but because it needs to be said.  Florida wants a fire-eater.  You are not.

So here’s my suggestion.  Announce that you are dropping out, for the good of the party, and so that you can do some ’soul-searching.’  Spend the rest of your term as governor doing all the good things that good, conservative Republican Governors do.  Be Marco Rubio’s best buddy, with a happy smile and a wave.  Get him elected.  Then start up your Senate bid for 2012; you would be a better match against Bill Nelson anyway.  If you do this, you would start with the goodwill of the Florida Republican party – who don’t want to have a tumultuous primary – and the goodwill of the new junior Senator from Florida for your campaign.  These are not bad things to have.

Just… think about it, all right?

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.