Why we know that Biden’s ‘confrontation of Bush’ story is false.

For those in a hurry, the short version is ‘Because Joe Biden is a known moral coward.’

I read, of course, the story “Bush Aides Challenge Biden’s Boasts of Oval Office Slapdowns“:

Aides to former President George W. Bush are challenging the veracity of Vice President Joe Biden’s claim this week of having privately castigated Bush, who does not remember the incident or an earlier episode in which Biden claims to have similarly rebuked Bush.

Biden spokesman Jay Carney declined to specify the dates of his boss’s purported Oval Office scoldings of Bush. Nor would he provide witnesses or notes to corroborate the episodes.

…but this was one time that it was largely unnecessary, thanks to the people involved. When it came to the GWOT, George W Bush was and is not the sort of man who would seek out Joe Biden’s company, crave Joe Biden’s counsel, nor heed Joe Biden’s advice; an attitude which has since been proven to be fully justified, given that these days the White House is busily pretending that they’re doing anything in Iraq besides following Bush’s strategy. That’s on the one hand – and if you read the article, you’ll note that not even Biden’s dumb enough to try to claim that the President was anything except resolute on the matter.

And if you want to take Joe Biden’s word for it, absent apparently any physical evidence or corroborating testimony… feel free. You’ll be taking the word of a man who, back during the election, sat by and said nothing when his seemingly-sincere apology for a nasty political attack from his side was contemptuously retracted by his running mate’s press secretary. That was a bit of a clarifying moment for me personally; prior to that, I had Biden merely down as a blowhard who you’d nonetheless find convivial enough company in a social setting. Afterward, I was pretty much forced to conclude that he was a blowhard whose ambitions were sufficiently petty that the goal of Vice-President of the United States would be enough to allow him to self-justify anything that would get him to his goal. Up to and including staying silent while other people lied in his name. But we’re expected to believe that a man like this would actually confront the President of the United States on a policy that both he and the President knew that the President was in the right about.

Fascinating.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: a reassurance.

It’s not a review, because I’m bad at those. But I can do recommendations.

The main worry that I had with Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was that it seemed to be tailor-made for Snakes on a Plane Syndrome: which would be a situation where the concept was a lot more interesting than the end result.  Fortunately, that didn’t occur here.  Having read and actually liked the original Jane Austen novel back in college – perils of being an English major – I would say that Seth Grahame-Smith’s updated material was inserted into the original text quite well.

By all accounts – which seem to jibe with my remembrance – most of the book remains unchanged from the original; it is Grahame-Smith’s argument that the original was almost designed to be updated with zombie attacks, and it’s hard to argue with him.  Austen’s characters translate almost startlingly easily into a world where the dead walk, people are routinely waylaid and eaten, and ninjas are an essential part of any society lady’s retinue.  The violence, which is in the finest traditions of the zombie genre, are not actually jarring.  In fact, the combat scenes are, if anything, less vicious than the drawing room witticisms and snubs that they generally replace.  What makes it all function is that Grahame-Smith actually has a basic respect for the original work, and took some pains to demonstrate that respect; and he succeeded in actually writing something above the level of ‘gimmick’, no doubt to his surprise.

I have an affection for this book, in other words: and I suspect that Jane Austen, once she had the conceit explained to her (and recovered from the somewhat crude ongoing joke), probably would have, too.  If you like either zombies or Jane Austen, I think that you’ll like this one.

Yeah. We all had a good laugh about the funding thing.

AllahPundit’s just the latest one I’ve seen who’s done it: it being “rolling his/her eyes at watching the left-sphere poor-mouth their lack of ad revenue.” Apparently, we’re all rolling in that sweet, sweet, advertising dough over here, while they’re being imposed upon by their compatriots for no recompense at all.  No, really. This is going to shock the rest of us over at sites like RedState, Right Wing News, Protein Wisdom, Sister Toldjah, and well, myself*; none of us have a seven-figure yearly budget.  Heck, some of us don’t have a budget, period.

And at least a couple of sites on that list should.  You gotta speculate if you want to accumulate, as Terry Pratchett‘s been known to say.

[UPDATE]: Heh.  I suspect that Glenn Reynolds is raising one eyebrow.  Just a tad.  He goes for minimalist, sometimes.

Moe Lane

*Not that my personal site’s traffic level is comparable to the first two, but what the heck: I still have a laptop replacement drive going on (click the Donate button to the right), and I am registered with BlogAds.

And if not me, well, I’m sure that you read somebody that’s worthy of tip-jar hitting.

Umm… didn’t most of them die?

Well, except Boromir Faramir (thanks, AoSHQ), of course. Via @phxgonline:

‘300’ Sequel Officially in the Works
Legendary Pictures, the production company behind the 2007 blockbuster 300, has confirmed the inevitable: Development of a sequel is underway.

Well, maybe they’re all in Tartarus or something, and the 300 have to break out and march back across Hell to the upper world in order to save the Athenians’ bacon at Marathon. Sort of Anabasis meets Doom.

(pause)

Yeah, actually, that does sound pretty cool.

Moe Lane

Iowahawk re-announces his nuclear status.

(H/T: Cynthia Yockey*)  Iowahawk has brought back something from the archives:

Announcement of Glorious Nuclear Achievement to Gangster Stooges of Blogosphere
In the back yard of scientific researchings behind the Great Storage Shed of the People, Iowahawk scientists successfully conducted above-ground nuclear missile test explosions under secure and many malt liquor conditions on early hours of October 10, 2006 April 6, 2009, at a stirring time when alarm clocks of the neighborhood have yet to clangle. To the impotent yappings of the neighboring gangster devils, Iowahawk responds: howl away, bourgeois traitors of Lakewood Mobile Home Court! Your pitious lamentations and cowardly 911-callings will never stop Iowahawk from the great leap forward into great and powerful prosperity, using his mighty quiver of nuclear-tipped cherry bombs and fully-fissionable bottle rockets for peaceful unity purposes!

Continue reading Iowahawk re-announces his nuclear status.

No stop at Normandy.

RS’s Mark Impomeni lets us know that we’re snubbing the French for a change:

Reports out of London indicate that President Barack Obama declined an inviation from French President Nicholas Sarkozy to visit Normandy’s Omaha Beach and the American Cemetery at Colleville-sur-mer on his way to Strasbourg for the NATO summit last week. The Daily Telegraph reports that White House officials travelled to France last month to discuss the visit with their counterparts on Sarkozy’s staff. But one American official familiar with the negotiations said that President Obama never had any intention of making the stop over.

The Telegraph also indicates that the French claims that Obama will be in Normandy for the 65th anniversary of D-Day have not been corroborated by the White House.

[rubbing head with hands] Continue reading No stop at Normandy.

How *is* that ‘Digital Libertarians for Obama’ thing working out for people?

(Via Instapundit) I don’t know off the top of my head whether Cory Doctorow actually drank that particular Kool-Aid, but there’s an astounding amount of whining and denial taking place in the comment section to his critical post about Obama and wiretapping.  Between the “the Master loves us and would never betray us” contingent and the “they’re all pawns of the establishment!” contingent, there’s endless opportunities for schadenfreude.  Which we should restrain ourselves from indulging in too deeply… for quite cynical, pragmatic reasons, such as “some of these people can be encouraged to vote their class interests.”  Which is to say, Republican: because right now the dig-libs are going to get a much better level of pandering from us than they’re going to get from the Democrats.  The latter isn’t even bothering with lip service at this point.

Yes, that means “selling out.”  As Michael Flynn once noted, that means the same thing as “growing up.”

Moe Lane

PS: Besides, the way things are right now if the dig-libs decided to infiltrate county and state GOP organizations they wouldn’t just get away with it.  The existing power structure would give them all free sodas.

Crossposted to RedState.

The Cuban situation about to get depressingly worse?

It can always get worse.

If you saw the CBC members’ visit to the Castro regime and winced (I’m sorry, but I can’t describe what happened there without using the word ‘slobbering’), I’m afraid that I have bad news for you: there may be more provocations to follow. Via Kausfiles, a reminder about how this regime operates:

…whenever it looked as if Cuba was on the path to rejoining the world, Mr. Castro has done something to derail its progress. Recall that he relentlessly battled Mikhail Gorbachev over perestroika and glasnost. Mr. Castro warned that these changes would be the Soviet Union’s downfall — evidently missing the point. In a new, flattering documentary about Cuba’s leader by Oliver Stone, ”Comandante,” Mr. Castro dismisses Mr. Gorbachev as a man ”who destroyed his country.”

Or consider what happened in 1996, after the Clinton administration and Cuba had settled on migration and drug interdiction accords. Mr. Castro (after months of warnings) shot down two planes operated by the exile group Brothers to the Rescue, killing four people. The result was the signing of the Helms-Burton Act, which tightened the embargo. Did Mr. Castro know that Congress would react this way? Of course he did.

Continue reading The Cuban situation about to get depressingly worse?