P.J. O’Rourke and the Onion AV Club.

(Via AoSHQ Headlines) It’s a good interview, mostly because P.J. O’Rourke is happy to answer “Surely you agree…” questions with all the assurance of a man who will never, ever run for political office. Would that more people did that – and that’s with the understanding that doing so would keep them from running.  We need less people in politics, and more impolitic people.

However, my favorite Q&A is this one:

AVC: Do you worry that some people might dismiss your more serious points because they’ll just assume you’re joking?

PJO: No, I don’t worry about it. It’s much better to have your arguments dismissed because you might be joking than to have your arguments dismissed because you’re not telling the truth. I’ll pick “I’m kidding” anytime over “I’m lying.”

I like that.  I may steal it.

Moe Lane

PS: He’s got a new book out. Driving Like Crazy: Thirty Years of Vehicular Hell-bending, Celebrating America the Way It’s Supposed To Be — With an Oil Well in Every Backyard, a Cadillac … of the Federal Reserve Mowing Our Lawn.  When the title’s too long for Amazon.com…

The Moon we abandoned, actually.

Somber opinions on the space program from Charles Krauthammer:

WASHINGTON — Michael Crichton once wrote that if you had told a physicist in 1899 that within a hundred years humankind would, among other wonders (nukes, commercial airlines), “travel to the moon, and then lose interest … the physicist would almost certainly pronounce you mad.” In 2000, I quoted these lines expressing Crichton’s incredulity at America’s abandonment of the moon. It is now 2009 and the moon recedes ever further.

Next week marks the 40th anniversary of the first moon landing. We say we will return in 2020. But that promise was made by a previous president, and this president has defined himself as the anti-matter to George Bush. Moreover, for all Obama’s Kennedyesque qualities, he has expressed none of Kennedy’s enthusiasm for human space exploration.

Continue reading The Moon we abandoned, actually.

Harry Alford, revisited.

Twenty-one minutes long, but worth every second: this Breitbart interview with Harry Alford was done over the phone, so you can safely stick it in the background and listen and not miss anything.

Mr. Alford, as you remember, went round and round with Senator Barbara Boxer* over some racial attitudes that the latter has yesterday; he expanded on this a bit more. Highlights from the interview:

  • He and the NBCC are not shills for Republicans. In fact, they’re going to be on the other side on the health care issue. Mr. Alford himself is an independent.
  • This level of racially-motivated condescension is all the more outrageous because he’s never been treated like this before, in over a decade of testimony.
  • Mr. Alford’s – fully justified – outrage seems based on the fact that he was there to testify as a representative of a Black business organization, and Senator Boxer kept treating him as a Black representative of a Black (business) organization. Who was Black. Like all these other Black people who agree with Senator Boxer, so their Black opinions were just as relevant as Harry (Black) Alford’s.**
  • So if you’re going to dispute a report being used by the NBCC, and you simply must get your own Black people to back you up, they’d appreciate it if you went and got ones who can at least address the issue from an informed state.
  • And, oh yes: Boxer and staff ran away surprisingly quickly after the hearing.

Really, listen to the whole thing.

Moe Lane Continue reading Harry Alford, revisited.

Elections Have Consequences Watch: TNR edition.

Marty Peretz: “Frankly, I am sick and tired of President Obama’s eldering–more accurately, hectoring–Israel’s leaders.”

Moe Lane: “Try to remember that when 2012 rolls around. Actually, try to remember that when 2010 rolls around and you’re looking at your choices for Representative, and possibly Senator.”

Moe Lane

PS: Seriously, people. It’s nice to complain and everything, but if complaining is all that you ever do, then you’re just background noise. Politicians get used to background noise all too quickly.

Crossposted to RedState.

This sums up the Democratic Congressional strategy perfectly.

On Tuesday night, be given a health care bill the size of Delaware that nobody in your office had a chance to read (over 1,000 pages, in this case).

On Wednesday, watch it be jammed through various committees.

On Thursday, find out from that the nonpartisan oversight group that’s supposed to be regulating this sort of thing hasn’t been able to read it, either.

Note that none of this is considered sufficiently important enough by the Democratic leadership to be worth taking the extra time to read the bill, let alone assess it. Because you should never let a good crisis go to waste, hey?

Moe Lane

PS: If you’re wondering why Rep. Paul Ryan didn’t rip off CBO Director Douglas Elmendorf’s head in that video, it’s because this isn’t Elmendorf’s fault. In fact, Senate Democratic leaders spent some time mocking Elmendorf’s concerns on the bill, presumably because they could. Also: don’t expect the so-called ‘Blue Dogs’ to hang tough on this. They never do.

Crossposted to RedState.

Quote of the Day, Jim Geraghty Division.

“I realize we’re in an era where politicians will do anything to win, but Jon Corzine probably ought to ask himself whether he wants to come through this process with any molecules of dignity intact.”

The answer? Of course not. He’s got nowhere left to go.

Moe Lane

PS: Chris Christie for Governor. Contribute here.

PPS: Since the adultery of a sitting governor is apparently fair game, Jon, I gotta ask: you still indulging in it?

PPPS: You know it’s bad when having the sitting President over isn’t going to help you any.

PPPPS: Christie says hi. No, not to you.

Crossposted to RedState.

Anti-Tea Party Susan Roesgen out at CNN.

You may remember Susan Roesgen as the woman who rather notoriously played the role of Obama stimulus apologist while carrying a CNN microphone at the April 15th Chicago Tea Party (she was also the subject of some now-vanished Jon Stewart scorn over her coverage of a Fargo flood, but that’s a different story). Well, it seems that she’s become an unemployment statistic:

Breaking: TVNewser has learned CNN correspondent Susan Roesgen‘s contract will not be renewed and she will be leaving the network.

[snip]

When TVNewser asked whether Roesgen’s comments at the Chicago tea party rally had anything to do with her not being renewed, a CNN spokesperson said, “I can’t comment on personnel matters.”

In other words, Roesgen’s comments at the Chicago Tea Party had something to do with her not being renewed. See also Ed Driscoll, who revisited Ms. Roesgen’s adventures in advocacy in his report on the July Tea Parties; Founding Bloggers, who had the video that CNN rather badly wanted to go away; and Hot Air, which is openly wondering when MSNBC will offer her a job. Given the way that the two networks are hacking each other into bloody gobbets to claim the #2 spot in cable news, they may have already.

I don’t know who gets to keep this (metaphorical) scalp; but I think that the Tea Party movement can certainly claim it.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.