This Saturday night, following South Park, tune in for Comedy Central’s “Greatest Athletes of All Time” special telecast.

You’ll see legends from the world baseball:

Basketball:

Boxing:

Football:

And many more!

Plus, Comedy Central’s “Greatest Athletes of All Time” will feature the best Tweets from your favorite current NBA stars:

Don’t miss it!

Comedy Central’s “Greatest Athletes of All Time” is proudly sponsored by:

And by…

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Gingrich, just days ago, referred to Obama’s administration the “most radical in American history.” Okay, I was starting to warm back up to the Newtmeister again… until later, when Newt explained why he did the global warming PSA with Nancy Pelosi — one of the willing tools in the leftist toolbox of that “most radical administration ever”:

Taking action on “climate change” is the excuse of choice of Obama/Pelosi/et al for the implementation of socialist policy, so Newt needs to understand that calling Obama “radical” while at the same time endorsing the modus operandi for instituting that radicalism leaves conservatives scratching their heads.

You can talk all you want, Newt, but if you run for president, especially after that explanation, if your name is on the ballot, this is what a lot of conservative voters will see:

(h/t WeaselZippers)

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The mother of a 48 year old California nutburger arrested for threatening Nancy Pelosi is blaming Fox News for her son’s outburst:

His mother, Eleanor Giusti, told reporters that “she does not think he would be capable of carrying out the threat; he has never owned a gun, and she blames Fox News for getting her son worked up.” Asked what could have influenced her son, she told the reporters: “I say Fox News, or all of those that are really radical.”

And with one sentence, the left has a new idiot to exploit. Mom sounds like a real genius — no wonder Junior ended up so stable.

The “Fox News” claim is of course being linked to the Tea Parties, and that’s all the Democrats and the media will need to get a night of lead stories about how Tea Parties are getting dangerous.

But looking at the facts puts to rest the “Fox News/Tea Partier” theory:

Gregory Giusti was convicted in 2004 of criminal threats: The San Mateo District Attorney’s office says he was trying to evade the fare on a local commuter train; when the conductor ordered him to get off the train, Giusti began yelling and threatening the conductor’s life. As a result, Giusti was sentenced to one year in county jail and three years supervised probation, according to ABC News, which adds that he was also ordered to undergo mental health counseling, and that “a lawsuit filed in February by Hamilton Square Baptist Church in San Francisco … says Giusti has engaged in and continues to engage in a campaign of harassment against people at the church.”

Giusti has a record of dodging public-transit fares and causing disruptions. He was sued by the Bay Area Rapid Transit system in 1996. According to ABC News, he also has two convictions in San Francisco for welfare fraud and petty theft from 1992.

So we’re to believe that somebody who wanted public services for free, harassed Christians, thought it was okay to steal from others and give to himself, didn’t believe in owning a gun and enjoyed the welfare scene was a big Fox News fan and, ergo, probably a “Teabagger”? That’s a stretch so big that the story will have to be written on bungee cord.

If anything, this guy could be the poster-boy for what the Tea Partiers and average Fox News viewers oppose.

If this spiral-eyed kook was indeed angry with Pelosi for the health care bill, as has been reported, it was because he was getting impatient waiting for his free health care to kick in, as many are.

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Supermodel Gisele Bündchen and husband, NFL great Tom Brady have recently shown their support for WWF’s Earth Hour by filming two videos that encourage people around the world to join them in turning off their lights for Earth Hour on Saturday, March 27th at 8:30 pm.

They’re still peddling the man-made “climate change” hoax and presumably have settled on going dark as the best way to make sure nobody can see Al Gore pick-pocketing the world:

I hereby not only pledge to turn all my lights off for one hour that day, but for a full eight hours — just like I do every night.

If Tom really wants to save some energy on lights, he’ll stop worrying about the lamp in my living room and instead maybe cancel a few of those night games at Gillette Stadium:

Or maybe if there were fewer lights on Tom’s wife, the polar ice caps could be saved:

Cross-posted at DougPowers.com

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Richard Hofstetter, an entomology professor at Northern Arizona University who worked on the project, told Discovery News that “the most annoying sound” his colleague, Reagan McGuire, “could think of was Rush Limbaugh or rock music.”

McGuire started to pump the sounds of Limbaugh into portions of infested tree trunks brought into their lab, but Hofstetter said McGuire “could not bear listening to Limbaugh, so he ended up playing Rush backwards, which still kept the voice and intonation the same, but the words were meaningless.”
[...]
He and his colleagues found that while Limbaugh and the heavy metal initially bothered the beetles, the insects mostly ignored the sounds after a while.

I tried the same method to scare liberals out of my wallet, but it didn’t work.

In the end though, blasting Rush Limbaugh into trees not only didn’t make the beetles stop destroying the trees — but now they also want Obama to fail. Way to go, guys.

Hopefully Rush finds out about this and figures out a way to say something so when the entomologists later play it backwards, they hear something like “Joe Biden is the devil!” That’d freak them clear out of their Birkenstocks.

(h/t Newsbusters)

DougPowers.com

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For some reason I feel like Michael Moore just told me that I really need to eat more salads:

President Obama is catching heat from Nevada lawmakers and business leaders regarding his comments Tuesday criticizing trips to Las Vegas.

During the president’s town hall meeting in Nashua, New Hampshire, he discussed the need to curb spending during tough economic times. “When times are tough, you tighten your belts,” the president said. “You don’t go buying a boat when you can barely pay your mortgage. You don’t blow a bunch of cash on Vegas when you’re trying to save for college.”

The Obama administration’s $3.8 trillion budget projects a $1.6 trillion deficit in the current fiscal year due in part to enormous pork projects, “stimulus” scams and entitlement programs — not to mention $237 million to buy an Illinois prison so terrorists can be closer to us (how thoughtful) — and I’m getting lectured about buying a f—–g boat?

The guy with six-figure “date nights” with a wife who wears $2,700 coats and $540 sneakers who said we all need to “sacrifice for the next generation” says we shouldn’t be spending the night at Caesars Palace to try to recover some of the money he’s losing us?

And what’s with this “don’t go to Vegas when you’re financially hurting” kick? Obama’s own budget is loaded with gambles. For example, Obama’s new budget assumes passage of the health care bill. Talk about a big gamble! The odds of winning big at a Vegas slot machine are better than Obamacare passing in its proposed form.

But of course if health care doesn’t pass and the deficit balloons as a result of the budget being all out of whack, it’ll be your fault because you opposed it. Well, yours and Bush’s.

Usually I like to see a little more populism in my populists.

Closing thought: So, Obama’s trying to help get Harry Reid re-elected in Nevada by telling people they shouldn’t be spending their money in his state? Good luck with that. We’re witnessing the Obama Curse claiming another victim right before our eyes.

Update: Obama’s really making pals fast out there. Nevada’s Governor: “Doesn’t President Obama know that thousands of families in Las Vegas are suffering because of his failed economic policies?”

The Mayor of Las Vegas talks about Obama’s visit later this month to campaign for Reid: “I’ll do everything I can to give him the boot back to Washington.”

Read all about it in Obama’s next book, “How to Lose Friends and Influence People to Vote Against You.”

Update II: Obama has given up on telling people how to spend their money and is instead telling them how to spend their time:

President Obama’s back is against the wall, so he’s getting in touch with his inner Agnew, hitting the neo-nattering nabobs of cable and the net.

“If we could just — excuse the press — turn off the cameras,” he told Democratic Senators at their annual retreat. “Turn off your CNN, your FOX, your MSNBC, your blogs, turn off this echo chamber … where the topic is politics. … We’ve got to get out of the echo chamber. That was a mistake I made last year – not getting out of here [Washington].”

I’m going to take that advice too… that should free up some time so I can go buy a boat and plane tickets to Las Vegas.

Cross-posted at DougPowers.com

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Harry Reid, Senate floor, Dec. 21, 2009:

“All over America, people are dying too soon. More and more, Americans who come down with the flu, or develop diabetes, or suffer a stroke are dying far earlier than modern science says they should die. More and more, Americans who contract skin cancer or have a heart condition are dying rather than being cured.

“Pull out the medical records of these patients, and the official forms will tell you they’ve died from complications of a disease or a surgery. But what is really killing more and more Americans every day are complications of our health care system.”

Harry Reid, January 26, 2010:

The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, deflected questions about health care. “We’re not on health care now,” Mr. Reid said. “We’ve talked a lot about it in the past.”

He added, “There is no rush.”

Will some enterprising reporter please ask Reid if he was wildly exaggerating the problem in the first place, or just doesn’t care that people are dying due to problems in our health care system because ramming through the wildly unpopular Obamacare bill could cost him re-election? It’s one or the other. Frankly, either option makes him look like a jerk, but Reid is used to that.

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For me, an emergency global warming summit being disrupted by snow both at the site of the summit and at the home of many of the participants is proof-positive of the existence of not only a benevolent God, but one with a sense of humor:

In a strange twist, a Washington snowstorm is forcing Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, to make an early departure from a global warming summit here in Denmark.

Pelosi told CNN that military officials leading her Congressional delegation have urged the 21 lawmakers to leave Copenhagen several hours earlier than scheduled on Saturday.

Holding a global warming summit in a blizzard has all the sales effectiveness of trying to draw attention to an upcoming worldwide famine via a conference at Old Country Buffet.

The bad news with Pelosi’s early exodus from Denmark is that she’ll be back in Washington earlier than expected, and I’m guessing she’s more harmless in Copenhagen than in DC. I heard that Pelosi had to evacuate Denmark so fast that she stiffed a Danish plastic surgeon on the bill and is completely unaware she left in such a rush that she still has a scalpel sticking out of her forehead. Shh, don’t say anything.

The blizzards aren’t just in DC — they also saw a ton of the white stuff in Copenhagen. I’m referring of course to Al Gore. But they also got a lot of snow.

And it’s not just the U.S. and Denmark that are being socked with snow and bitter cold during the global warming panic-fest. England is getting in on the fun. The weather is so bad that both of England’s dentists can’t make it to the office.

Al Gore said that British PM Gordon Brown had “done more than any world leader to bring momentum to this process.” And Brown can stay and keep that momentum going, because flight delays in the UK due to snowstorms have him stuck in Denmark at the moment — not that the Brits will miss him.

For all the global warming Kool Aid drinkers who might read this and say “of course it’s snowing, it’s wintertime!” All I ask is that they return the favor in the summertime and say something similar the next time Al Gore wants us to panic because it’s 105 in Phoenix in July: “Of course it’s hot, it’s summertime!”

Bill Clinton covers the other end of the spectrum for the global warming alarmists though, because they can explain all this away by saying that global warming actually makes some places colder. So pretty much anything that happens is proof of global warming — just shut up and hand over your wallet, Skippy.

To top off the chill from the global warming blizzards, Obama and Hillary are getting the cold shoulder from the Chinese:

This afternoon, the US president and his secretary of state Hillary Clinton called another meeting with China, but were snubbed again when only three low-level Chinese delegates arrived.

And two of the three were only there to deliver David Axelrod’s Kung Pao Chicken.

It’s funny how politicians can get us so in debt to a country and yet expect them to follow our orders. That’s the audacity of Hope.

Cross posted at DougPowers.com

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In CVS stores for less than a week, the Commander in Chia has already gotten the boot.

The chain Tuesday said it is no longer selling the Chia planter modeled after President Obama.

Chia Pet maker Joseph Enterprises launched an ad blitz leading up to the sales of its Chia Obama last week in Chicago, San Francisco and Tampa, Fla., the first time the item was in a major chain since Walgreens abruptly pulled it after a few days of testing last spring.

Walgreens officials said they received a few complaints. CVS would not say why it stopped the sales.

Fortunately, they didn’t pull them from the shelves before I managed to get my hands on the “limited edition” version, which comes complete with commemorative “seeds of hope” and the First Lady gardening on the head:

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It’s said that the villian(s) in the remake will be Russians and Chinese, but given the fact that the director has donated money to Obama — as has one of the film’s co-writers — I have a feeling that some additional threats to freedom will be insurance executives who moonlight as racist tea partiers and disrupt the town hall meetings of well-intentioned liberal politicians.

The boom-boom happens at about the :45 second mark — I might be crazy, but I think you can see former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick planting the only copy of his personal finances in the building just before it blows:

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Curt Schilling, the former major league pitcher who won the allegiance of Bostonians by leading the Red Sox to the 2004 World Series, said Wednesday that he has “some interest” in running for the seat held for nearly 50 years by Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy.

Schilling, a registered independent and longtime Republican supporter, wrote on his blog that while his family and video game company, 38 Studios, are high priorities, “I do have some interest in the possibility.”

Though Kennedy embraced a wildly different political philosophy than Schilling, the former pitcher might be a comforting and familiar replacement in the eyes of voters because the two share a common trait: One of these men had a deadly down-and-away slider, and so did Schilling.

Given that, Schilling might have a chance at winning in Massachusetts if he decides to run — a better chance than Bill Buckner would have anyway.

Cross-posted at DougPowers.com

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As I sat still amid a throng of idling cars occupied by frustrated drivers on the verge of road-rage, I looked down the road a bit, and proudly displayed in full view in front of a construction site where nobody was working on a 65-degree sunny morning was a sign just like this one:

From a political sales perspective, I think this was the biggest mistake the Obama administration has made so far — and that’s saying something. There’s nothing worse for a politician than to put a sign up to remind everybody exactly who it was that caused them to be late for work and pissed off that morning. Especially in an area that nobody’s been working in for quite some time.

Obama putting up “Recovery Act” signs that are synonymous with his administration in full view of the accompanying traffic jams has all the sales impact of placing Alpo billboards in front of pet cemeteries.

Road work is a necessary inconvenience (well, often it is anyway), but taking credit for extreme traffic backups is just plain stupid — which is why traffic jams have never been “sponsored” before, and probably never will be again when or if the geniuses behind Hopenchange ever figure this out.

In his insistence upon putting the “stimulus” signs next to highway projects, Obama might be costing himself the 2012 election, one angry driver at a time. Couple that with the “Peggy Effect,” and The One is in trouble.

Cross-posted at DougPowers.com

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Rose Friedman, wife of 64 years to the late economist Milton Friedman, died last week. Here’s part of her obituary from the University of Chicago:

Rose Friedman, an economist and co-author of a number of important books with her late husband Milton Friedman, died of heart failure on Tuesday, Aug. 18 at her home in Davis, Calif. While the exact date of her birth is uncertain, she is believed to have been 98 years old.

Friedman and her husband, a University of Chicago professor and winner of the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, were the authors of a number of influential books, including Capitalism and Freedom and Free To Choose, which was published as a companion book to a public television series by the same name. Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and free-market leaders in Eastern Europe were all devoted admirers of the Friedmans’ views.
[...]
Rose Friedman will be remembered as a talented economist and an influential advocate of freedom, said her daughter Janet Friedman. “Her economic work helped to discredit the idea of government management of the economy, rolling back policies that were hindering wealth creation and thus helping extend the blessings of prosperity to millions around the world. And as a standard-bearer for human liberty, she contributed to the galvanizing of public opinion, especially in the 1980s, against the growing encroachments of intrusive government,” she said.

Rest in peace, Mrs. Friedman, and thanks for your work to promote the virtues of freedom and smaller government. We need to be reminded of those things today more than ever.

(h/t Instapundit)

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A 60-ton steel-beam fragment has been returned to the site of New York’s World Trade Center as part of a permanent exhibit, city officials said.

Let this beam send a symbolic message to those who might seek to do the U.S. and its citizens harm. President Obama has made it clear: if you provide support to those who plan or implement of the slaughter of Americans, we will find you, send you to Bermuda to live, and consider prosecuting your interrogators!

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The guy in this video asking why Obama wants to “rush” into spending trillions of dollars when it took him six months to choose a dog doesn’t appear to be wearing Brooks Brothers or sporting any swastikas, but I’m sure Lanny Davis wants him ID’d and photographed nevertheless. Lanny’s upset that “fascist tactics” at townhalls are interfering with the left’s implementation of fascism. How dare we!

What would be hysterically funny if it weren’t so pathetic is the Democrats’ attempt to make it appear that these townhall protesters are “fringe” and it’s just a few rabble-rousing Nazis causing trouble. Approval for Obama’s handling of health care is at 39% and falling fast.

But even if support was at 1% and the “strongly disapprove” was at 99%, Democrats would still push forward under the guise that those “opposed” are just fringe wacko “rent a mobs” hired by insurance companies. They have to press forward — if health care falls, the entire house of cards comes tumbling down, ivory towers and all.

Some Democrats, however, are distancing themselves from the demagogues in Washington. They know that this anger is genuine and potentially highly contagious, and they will feel it on election day if they’re not careful.

So, will Brooks Brothers emerge victorious, or the Hart Schaffner Marxist wardrobe of the DC Dems? Right now, it’s too clothes to call.

By the way, I think that Brooks Brothers has been taken over by Pelosi & Company, because here’s their latest ad:

[Note from Hot Air staff: This image was removed on September 2, 2009, at the request of Brooks Brothers.]

Cross-posted at DougPowers.com

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h/t GatewayPundit

That’s essentially the Obama administration’s defense against allegations (and flat-out proof) that Obamacare will do away with private health insurance options. Case in point:

The White House is directly addressing viral attacks on the president’s health care reform push, trying to defuse spreading rumors suggesting a government takeover of insurance.

The administration on Tuesday targeted a clip featured on the Drudge Report claiming Obama wants to eliminate public health insurance with a video of their own.

Pointing to the right-leaning aggregator on her computer, White House Office of Health Reform Communications Director Linda Douglass “says the people who always try to scare people … are at it again,” manipulating old video to “leave a false impression.” She then plays video of the president promising that anyone who likes their health insurance will be able to keep it.

Okay, forget about that video clip that shows Obama in 2003 saying he’s seeking a single-payer health plan.

Why listen to anyone when we can look at the actual Obamacare Bill, otherwise known as HR 3200? Here’s part of what it says in Section 113, pg. 21-22 about private insurance (blue square added):

“Not provide incentives for small and mid-size employers to self-insure” means that you will not have a choice! (Their “pro-choice” philosophy begins and ends at killing babies). There will be penalties for those who self-insure. If potential buyers of private health insurance are regulated into a government program, then this will eliminate private companies.

“But we’re not getting rid of private insurance companies.” No, just their customers — what’s the difference? Obama and the libs want to take the same approach with firearms — you don’t have to make guns illegal if you can make the ammo impossible to buy.

Technically, private insurance options won’t be illegal… but technically Hitler never outlawed kosher delicatessens, either.

The government has no plans to offer a “competitive plan.” The plan is to eliminate private options. Period. Otherwise there’s no point in the exercise. They’re not going to all this trouble to be “shown up” by the private sector. There will be no private sector in health care if this bill passes. Does a fearful aversion to “adverse selection” sound like an entity that welcomes competition?

Don’t blame the pro-Obamacare politicians for what they’re saying — some probably haven’t even read the bill. The rest are trying to pull one over. So you can either believe what they say, or your lying eyes.

Just ask yourself this: If this is so good for America, why does the Obama administration and Dems in Congress feel the need to lie so egregiously about what is and isn’t in the bill?

Other horrific details of Obamacare are here.

Cross-posted at DougPowers.com

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Why did Obama shoot from the hip with that comment about the police officer without doing his trademark pause filled with “ums” and “uhs” to try to process the implications of what he was about to say? It might have something to do with the fact that the Fraternal Order of Police endorsed McCain for president.

If the FOP had endorsed Obama and were already in his pocket, do you think the politician seeking re-election in Obama would have caught himself before he said what the community organizer seeking retribution in Obama wanted to say?

Heck, in some areas, the Fraternal Order of Police fits Homeland Security’s definition of “right wing extremist” groups, so Obama’s lack of appreciation for what these cops do and how they do it, along with his baseless accusations of racism, is hardly surprising.

Let’s just put it this way: When you have a vested interest in seeing groups like ACORN metastasize, law enforcement officials doing their jobs by the book aren’t exactly welcome additions to the family of Hope and Change — and sometimes it shows.

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Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) told activists rallying on Capitol Hill in support of the newly reintroduced Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), that the United States should join 27 other countries that have equality guarantees for women, including Rwanda, Algeria, China and Afghanistan.

“It does make a difference if an Equal Rights Amendment is in place or not,” Lee told the people who gathered outside of the Capitol on Tuesday.

“Twenty-seven other countries, including Rwanda, Afghanistan, Algeria and China have equality provisions,” Lee said.

Because when you think of equal rights, you think of Rwanda, Algeria, China and Afghanistan.

In the literal interpretation of “equal rights,” Lee is correct. In China, for example, dissidents are all equally thrown in prison or equally killed. Babies conceived to parents who already have one child are equally murdered.

Then there’s this from Marie Claire’s “Worst Places on Earth for Women”:

AFGHANISTAN: A woman dies during childbirth every half-hour, the highest maternal mortality rate in the world. Domestic violence is endemic; 87 percent of Afghan women have been assaulted by a family member.

Afghan women are just 13% away from the assaults being completely equal and fair!

The literacy rate for women in Afghanistan is 28%. In spite of that, any of those 72% of illiterate Afghan women would be make more competent U.S. Reps than Sheila Jackson Lee.

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The government has moved from spending wildly excessive amounts of money on pork, to wildly excessive amounts on money on a small amount of ham.

Follow some of the links on Drudge concerning how the “stimulus” money is being spent, and you’ll realize why you’re not seeing a lot of stimulation — unless you’re buddies with a politician.

Here’s the most pathetic item listed on the Recovery.Gov website so far. Taxpayers spent $1,265,800 a pound for some ham. Over the weekend I spent $3.79 a pound — I circled in red the guffaw-inducing parts:

Makes you long for the fiscally responsible days of $900 toilet seats, doesn’t it?

Here are some more that Drudge linked:

RECOVERY.GOV // AWARDED: $1,191,200 FOR ’2 POUND FROZEN HAM SLICED’…

RECOVERY.GOV // AWARDED: $351,807 FOR ‘REPLACE AND UPGRADE THE DUMBWAITER’… (I think this has something to do with reconditioning Joe Biden’s hair plugs, but I’m not sure)

RECOVERY.GOV // AWARDED: $1,562,568 FOR ‘MOZZARELLA CHEESE’…

RECOVERY.GOV // AWARDED: $5,708,260 FOR ‘PROCESS CHEESE’…

RECOVERY.GOV // AWARDED: $16,784,272 FOR ‘CANNED PORK’…

The latter is proof-positive that if you’re in the business of pork long enough, eventually you end up with actual pork.

The “stimulus” scam is one of the biggest, most expensive frauds in history — just after man-made global warming, which is, not coincidentally, peddled by the same people.

But hey, let’s let ‘em run the health care system of the entire nation! Great idea.

Anybody who supports government-run health care is either in on the scheme, mentally challenged beyond belief or “all of the above.”

Oh, and don’t forget, $18 million in taxpayer money was wasted to re-design the Recovery.Gov website where all the waste is listed.

Update: The gov’t explains the “two pound” misunderstanding:

The references to “2 pound frozen ham sliced” are to the sizes of the packaging. Press reports suggesting that the Recovery Act spent $1.191 million to buy “2 pounds of ham” are wrong. In fact, the contract in question purchased 760,000 pounds of ham for $1.191m, at a cost of approximately $1.50 per pound. In terms of the dairy purchase referenced, USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA) purchased 837,936 pounds of mozzarella cheese and 4,039,200 pounds of processed cheese.

While the principal purpose of these expenditures is to provide food to those hardest hit by these tough times, the purchases also provide a modest economic benefit of benefiting Americans working at food retailers, manufacturers and transportation companies as well as the farmers and ranchers who produce our food supply.”

Somebody’s stimulating themselves one hell of a ham and cheese sandwich.

In spite of the explanation, I’m wary of a government that’s purchasing tons of food in order to feed all the people they know will be unemployed by wildly over-expensive “stimuli” such as purchasing tons of food.

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My own wildly sarcastic opinion on a possible ban on smoking in the military is this: Heaven forbid the brave young men and women we send out to face enemy bombs and gunfire should do something unhealthy:

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This guy reaches and misses more than the pivot man at a haphephobic circle-jerk:

Two thoughts come to mind. First, Cap & Trade is going to cost far more than $40 per family per year. So in order to save enough money to justify supporting Cap & Trade, my family would have to be about 100 times the size of the Duggers and all the kids would have to be severe asthmatics.

Secondly, how can the taxpayer expense of Cap & Trade be called a wash because we’ll be saving money on our children’s health care when the Democrats are assuring that all our health care will be free anyway? Even using Dean’s own numbers, if Cap & Trade amounts to $40 per family per year, and the Democrats have achieved their dream of fully paid-for national health care, then it is costing each family $40 per year.

How stupid does he think we are? Don’t answer that.

And now, as a reminder of better days, here’s a Howard Dean golden oldie:

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Why is she wearing this shirt? For starters, the shirt with a picture of her posing on an NVA anti-aircraft gun was at the cleaners. Secondly, for marketing purposes — to pitch a line of “Jane Fonda mug shot” merchandise to benefit the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention. That should do the trick. I know when I was younger I certainly wouldn’t have wanted to be anywhere near a woman wearing clothing with Jane Fonda’s picture on it.

The mugshot was taken after Fonda was arrested in an airport on drug charges. The drugs apparently turned out to be vitamins, but what I found interesting is that the motivational speaker for the NVA, self-confessed communist, socialist and… you name it… is actually a fiscal conservative when it comes to taxpayer money:

Writing about her false arrest on her blog earlier this year, she said: ‘They confiscated (my vitamins) as well as my address book (which was photocopied) and arrested me for drug smuggling. ‘I told them what they were but they said they were getting orders from the White House – that would be the Nixon White House.

‘I think they hoped this “scandal” would cause the college speeches to be cancelled and ruin my respectability. I was handcuffed and put in the Cleveland Jail, which is when the mugshot was taken.

‘I was released on bond and months later, after every pill had been tested in a lab (with taxpayers money!) the charges were dismissed and there were a few paragraphs hidden in the back of papers that they were vitamins, not drugs.’

If all it takes to get liberals to suddenly care about wasting taxpayer money is to say their vitamins are drugs and send them off for testing, let’s stake some agents outside the Berkeley GNC store and let the arrests begin!

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The National Enquirer has reported for some time now the existence of a tape featuring intimate moments between former Senator and vice presidential candidate John Edwards, and his mistress Rielle Hunter.

I managed to get my hands on two portions of the written transcript — they are shocking and graphic:

::begin transcript::

“Oh yeah baby, I like it right there.”

“Okay, where’s the hair dryer, John?”

::end transcript::

But then, something went wrong, and Edwards was finally caught cheating…

::begin transcript::

“Rielle, I think we should commit to something long-term…”

“Mmm, hmm… unless you think it might look too curly.”

**phone rings**

“Hello? … This is Rielle, who’s this?”

“Oh my God, hang up the phone!”

::end transcript::

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Drudge featured a photo, that appears to show Obama going all Bill Clinton in Rome. However, it’s a still picture, but a video exists that the media is now tearing apart frame by frame.

GMA analyzed the tape as if it were a Zapruder film of bootyliciousness and concluded that the video clearly shows Obama wasn’t checking out the girl’s butt (they also don’t think he’s a socialist, so take that for what it’s worth) — however, the experienced male glancer will tell you that you always have a “plan B” in case you’re caught looking and need to make it like you were focusing on something else, so who knows.

It doesn’t appear that Obama was overtly checking the girl out (if he was, at least he didn’t make it quite as obvious as Bill Clinton) — Sarkozy, however, is another story altogether:

At least we’ve found one way to get these G8 guys to move to the right.

Cross-posted here.

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Update: That was fast… a movie is already in the works about this incident:

Taking a page from Christopher Columbus and telling uneducated natives (and/or those who received a government education) during an eclipse, “Give us your trinkets and corn and we’ll bring the sun back,” the G8 participants are pretending they have any ability to control the temperature, and if we (and most importantly our wallets) follow them, we’ll be safe:

President Obama and other leaders backed historic new targets for tackling global warming last night in an agreement designed to pave the way for a world deal in the autumn.

For the first time, America and the other seven richest economies agreed to the goal of keeping the world’s average temperature from rising more than 2C (3.6F).

The sun and the axis tilt of the earth were not available for comment at press time. I for one don’t expect the sun to fully cooperate, but at the same time, never underestimate the power of bureaucratic fear-mongerers with unlimited access to your money.

I can’t believe they didn’t come up with an equally arbitrary number for in case the average temperature drops, because that’s what’s happening. An apparent oversight of this magnitude only means that it’s probably not an oversight, but simple fodder for the Copenhagen meeting later this year.

Bottom line: If the average temperature fluctuates at all, as it always does, we’re going to pay for it with money and freedom. “Global warming” is the ultimate fascist movement — and yet Al Gore has the gall to liken the “struggle against global warming” to the fight against the Nazis?

I might get fined for this, because this statement might cause the global temperature to rise, but I’d dare to say that the struggle against Al Gore’s manufactured movement is a lot more like the fight against the Nazis than the fight against man-made global warming. In the first place, the Nazis were actually proven to exist — but a minor detail like that will never stop Gore or the power and control-hungry G8 politicians.

The good news is that if Obama continues to get his wish list fulfilled, the U.S. will no longer be among the eight richest countries in the world so he won’t be invited back to agree to devastatingly arrogant schemes, the above being just one example. In 10 years, the wealthiest nation-sized object on the planet will be Al Gore.

Many months, or maybe over a year ago, I posted this famous George Carlin bit about the arrogance of the environmental movement, and it fits in today better than ever and is worth another look:

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You can almost see the reporter wondering why the fish pulled from the water wasn’t wearing its Gorton’s box.

At the end of this short clip, you’ve got to love how Diane Sawyer thanks the reporter for selflessly getting so close to some fish in order to score the Palin interview. Eat this, Ernie Pyle:

(h/t Newsbusters)

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Well, Sarah Palin certainly added to the fireworks yesterday by announcing that she’d be resigning as Alaska Governor effective in about three weeks.

Why did she do this? After perusing the news sites this morning, there are so many theories out there that I won’t even bother to go into all of them — suffice to say that Palin’s ability to perplex and befuddle the media and commentators is as healthy as ever. There are ongoing attempts to assign the resignation speech a “they won’t have soccer mom to kick around anymore” tone, but my hunch is that’s far from what happened yesterday.

Is she finished with politics? Is she running for president? Did ACORN get her to quit? Is she going to host a game show called “You Bet’cha Life”? These questions will be answered in a short period of time.

Frankly, though I’d be disappointed to see her out of the picture in the national political scene, the blow would be softened by the knowledge that we won’t have to watch a good family being run through a cruel wringer. However, should Sarah decide to continue on into national politics, something tells me that the Palins are stronger than the wringer, so it won’t break my heart to see her run for president.

Among all the reactions to Palin’s resignation, none are more hilarious than the Democratic National Committee’s response:

DNC Spokesman Brad Woodhouse:

“Either Sarah Palin is leaving the people of Alaska high and dry to pursue her long shot national political ambitions or she simply can’t handle the job now that her popularity has dimmed and oil revenues are down. Either way – her decision to abandon her post and the people of Alaska who elected her continues a pattern of bizarre behavior that more than anything else may explain the decision she made today.”

Those who dismissed Palin as the governor of a meaningless, backwards state are now the first out of the gate to accuse her of abandoning her absolutely vital duties to that important state? Funny.

I don’t recall anybody accusing Obama of abandoning his post and the people of Illinois when he resigned his senate seat after 46 months — half of which were spent traipsing around the country running for president. If Palin is running for president, she’s doing it the responsible way. Obama is the one who “abandoned” his constituents, not that we heard anything about that from the mainstream press Obamaniacs.

Concerning Palin’s resignation, DNC cabana boy David Gergen said this on CNN:

“I think most of us long ago gave up trying to figure out what goes on in Sarah Palin’s head.”

Coming from a guy who can figure out what goes on in Joe Biden’s head, this is a compliment of the highest order.

If Palin is running for president, politically speaking, there’s little to no downside to resigning now to focus on national politics. If she’s running for president and kept the job as governor, she’d be accused of neglecting her post as she traveled the lower-48.

In other words, denying her resume an extra year and a half as Alaska governor is not going to be a deal-breaker when it comes to whether or not she’s the GOP’s nominee in 2012.

Time till tell. If Sarah pops up in Iowa and New Hampshire before too long, it won’t be to hunt bears, but donkeys.

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Here’s the closer:

No one’s excusing Sanford’s behavior. But as we slog through another week of the Jackson postmortem-paloooza and wonder at the fact that we’re also still hearing about the South Carolina governor’s love for certain tan lines, maybe it’s worth asking ourselves why. Is it because we’re uncategorically appalled? Or is it because maybe, just maybe, there’s a tiny bit of Mark Sanford in, if not all men, quite a few of them? And that’s more than you can say of Michael Jackson.

Are all men, at the core, Mark Sanford?

That’s a fair enough question as long as it’s followed up. Since Ms. Daum is one of those who’s also guilty of keeping the Sanford story alive, we can’t answer her question without simultaneously answering this one: Is there a tiny bit of María Belén Chapur in, if not all women, quite a few of them?

In other words, Meghan, “it takes two to bango.”

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Yes, that’s right, as soon as Jackson expired, a visibly upset CNN — as Congress votes to spend the U.S. into further oblivion, a war rages on overseas, Iran is in complete disarray and a mentally ill midget in North Korea threatens to shoot bottle rockets toward Hawaii — asked the obvious question: “Where is Bubbles?”

Don’t worry, CNN tracked down a no-doubt emotionally scarred Bubbles (there’s only so many cruel “Michael Jackson blowing Bubbles” jokes a chimp can be exposed to before losing his frickin’ mind), who is 26 now and probably doesn’t appreciate being reminded of his days in the Neverland circus.

As always, CNN was there:

There is journalistic precedent for this type of hard-hitting reporting, however, because after Tarzan died, Edward R. Murrow did a similar story about the King of the Jungle’s chimp:

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President Obama, who was against the Iraq war every step of the way and opposed the surge, spoke yesterday about the withdrawal of troops from Iraqi cities:

U.S. President Barack Obama said the withdrawal of American combat forces from all Iraqi cities on Tuesday is “an important milestone.” Mr. Obama said he expects more violence in Iraq, but that the country will emerge stable and sovereign.

It’s amazing enough that Obama’s entire statement on the successes in Iraq didn’t positively acknowledge the troops or Bush, without whom none of the progress in Iraq that Obama is essentially taking credit for would have been possible, but here’s the real knee-slapper:

“The future belongs to those who build, not those who destroy. And today’s transition is further proof that those who have tried to pull Iraq into the abyss of disunion and civil war are on the wrong side of history,” the president said.

By working to undermine, prevent and stop the operations in Iraq to free that nation, Obama, Harry “the war is lost” Reid, et al, by course of their actions against the war, were clearly willing to allow Iraq to be pulled into the abyss of disunion and civil war.

From where I sit, Barack Obama just admitted that he and countless Democrats were on the wrong side of history, and I agree 100%. Who says liberals and conservatives can’t find common ground on certain issues?

To turn around one of John Kerry’s famous quotes on flip-flopping, Obama was “against the Iraq war before he was for it.”

Obama is that kid who voted to cancel the entire baseball season because the team wasn’t going to win any games, skipped all the contests, and then elbowed out all the other players to get his picture taken holding the championship trophy on team photo day.

The media outlets are accusing Sanford of stealing the moving and emotional words he emailed to Maria Belen Chapur last year, line for line, from various articles that reporters covering the 2008 election campaign wrote about then presidential candidate Barack Obama.

The mainstream media outlets are seeking an admission of guilt from Sanford, but so far haven’t gotten one.

“Those love letters were very personal and represent a deep affection, respect and admiration for a flawlessly beautiful human being in its purest, most spiritual form, and I can assure you they are original and were written from the heart,” according to a spokesperson.

“So were the Governor’s letters!” Replied a Sanford staffer in defense of the besieged governor.

More on this story as it develops.

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How much is your career worth to you?

Oddly enough, here’s Barack Obama last August praising China’s infrastructure and speaking about how America needs to emulate that country’s “vastly superior” way of building things, which means that if you’re in the U.S., put on your hard hat and watch for falling “progress”:

Pelosi plied undecided members with chocolate-covered Dove bars in a series of small group meetings.

That’s right — the entire future of America could hinge on some fat, pasty fence-sitter’s hankerin’ for a f*#@$*g ice cream bar! Ain’t politics grand?

Oh well… no time for fury about this. Get on the phone now and, if your Rep. is one of the “undecided” snakes, see Pelosi’s Dove bar and up the ante a half dozen Three Musketeers, a gallon of ice cream (specify Ben & Jerry’s if your Rep. is a lib), ten packages of Laffy Taffy and a Sara Lee cheesecake. Slaves to instant gratification can be easily swayed.

Even more frightening, insiders tell me that Pelosi and Reid are only about three pizzas and a candy-gram short of securing enough votes to pass National Health Care.

The U.S. Government and its collection of worms, weasels and vermin are wonderfully adept at exploiting people who haven’t even been born yet, and they’re at it again.

According to the Wall Street Journal, if allowed to pass, Cap and Trade would likely be the biggest tax in American history — and it will be signed by a president who promised not to raise taxes on those who make less than $250,000. Uh huh.

The Congressional Budget Office says that the climate legislation would cost the average household only $175 a year by 2020, but the Heritage Foundation says the CBO isn’t taking many things into account. Besides that, 2020 is when the caps begin to really tighten. Get a load of this:

When the Heritage Foundation did its analysis of Waxman-Markey, it broadly compared the economy with and without the carbon tax. Under this more comprehensive scenario, it found Waxman-Markey would cost the economy $161 billion in 2020, which is $1,870 for a family of four. As the bill’s restrictions kick in, that number rises to $6,800 for a family of four by 2035.

Selling off America’s future so Al Gore, select members of Congress and the special interest groups that they’re attached to like lampreys can profit today is a crime. These scam artists in Congress need to be put out of business now — and quite a few of them should be rooming with Bernie Madoff.

Get a hold of the office of your member of Congress and tell them that if they vote for this affront to America you’ll fight until your last carbon-dioxide spewing, ozone depleting breath to run them out of office. And if your member of Congress is not going to vote for Cap and Trade, thank them.

Michelle Malkin has a list of reps on the fence (i.e. who still have a finger in the air to judge the political wind). It’s unbelievable how somebody can be “undecided” on this.

My Representative, Vernon Ehlers (R), is one of those “on the fence” (he’s leaning toward voting “yes”), so last night I wrote him the following:

Congressman Ehlers,

Thank you for your time!

Nobody seems to be able to find a picture of her though, but it’s certainly not for a lack of trying.

I gave it a shot at Google Images — searching the name of the woman, Maria Belen Shapur — and here was the top search result:

Yes, that’s the MIT beaver mascot. I could make a connection here, but I refuse to lower myself.

The search turned up a few other completely unrelated things as well.

Hey, maybe Sanford was up to something else in Venezuela (if that’s where he was) and “Maria Belen Shapur” is just his version of Captain Tuttle from M*A*S*H*. Ya never know with politicians these days.

Update: Actual photo found?

President Obama’s name would grace a new Prince George’s County elementary school a few miles from the White House under a proposal scheduled for a vote tonight, barely five months after he took office.

If the Prince George’s Board of Education approves the plan, Barack Obama Elementary School would be the first in the Washington region named after the president. The school is under construction outside the Capital Beltway in Upper Marlboro and is slated for completion by year’s end.

Putting an Obama school in a place called “Marlboro” is a little like building Bill Clinton High in Big Bone Lick.

The new Obama school is really going all out with their sign, too:

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By order (“decree” I think was the word they used) of the White House, a few rule changes will be in effect for the All-Star game. They include, but are not limited to, the following:

1: The umpires will all be lawyers who don’t know very much about baseball but think they do.

2: A pitcher who strikes out a batter will stop throwing so hard or face ejection from the baseball community and/or possible charges of racism.

3. If a pitcher charges the mound in anger, the violence will be condemned but not stopped, since it’s a matter for the pitcher and batter to resolve. If the fight should last for hundreds of years, Jimmy Carter will be called in to mediate.

4: At the end of the game, the players must give half the money they made for playing in the game to the umpires, and the rest of it to the worst player.

5: A team that falls behind by several runs can apply for a “run stimulus,” which will be provided by taking away runs from other teams in future games.

6: In order to make the game more in tune with liberal economic theory, “zero sum game” rules will apply. For example, if the score is 4-4 and one team scores a run, the other team must lose a run, making the score 5-3. If the first team scores another run, the score would be 6-2. The good news for the team with 2 is that by applying “zero-sum game,” even though they’re down by 4, they’ll only have to score 2 runs to tie the game, and if they are unable they can apply to receive a run bailout (see #5).

7: In order to secure a future endorsement from the Earth Liberation Front, no wooden bats will be used, and it is recommended that players bat using biodegradable, reusable shopping bags filled with hope.

8: The outfield positions will be referred to as “Progressive,” “Moderate,” and “Extreme Right.”

9: The teleprompter will be considered to be a part of the field.

10: The “7th inning stretch” will last three hours and feature a re-airing of ABC’s special on Obama’s plan for national health care running on the jumbo-tron, along with the presentation of a license to perform heart and brain surgery to Doc Halladay, pending passage of the national health care plan.

11. Members of the media will be allowed to towel off the president twice per inning. Reporters awarded this honor will be chosen via lottery (the president has granted an MSNBC request for Chris Matthews to take home all used towels in lieu of one year’s salary).

12: If one team gets down by more than five runs, the government will take the team over, hire a manager who doesn’t know anything about baseball, regulate the players’ pay, cancel the game and use the ballpark for an ACORN pep rally.

Twitter update:

Okay, I finally caved to a couple of requests that I get on Twitter. Unfortunately, because of my delay in signing up, pretty much any semblance of my name was already taken, so I went with the title of my column.

You can sign up to follow my riveting Twitter updates at ThePowersThatBe. To a great degree I’ll point to posts at my blog and to my columns, but I also plan to jot down random thoughts that are too short to warrant a regular blog post.

But that doesn’t matter. If there’s “hope” to be had, people will find a way to link Obama to it. CBS’s “Early Show” even featured a picture of Neda, the unarmed woman who the regime gunned down in Iran — but the picture was in the style of Shepherd Fairey’s “Hope” poster that was created for Obama:

But it doesn’t end there.

“Obamicon,” the website where you can make your own Obama-style poster, has even come out with an Iranian version using the colors of Iran — again, to give the impression that Obama stands with the protesters in Iran.

Give me a break. Obama will celebrate the 4th of July at a US Embassy barbeque with Iranian diplomats from the same regime that is slaughtering the people that Obama’s being credited with offering “hope.” Will the media consider it to be a show of solidarity with the Iranian pro-democracy movement if Obama makes these representatives of the regime wash the blood off their hands before sitting down to dinner with him?

Here’s an “Iranicon” that says what Obama really means to the quest for freedom in Iran:

If Obama is a symbol of hope in Iran, it’s to the ruling regime and not to any pro-democracy/fair elections movement.

As a side note, have you noticed how many times Obama has used the rationale of Iran being a “sovereign nation” (the “it’s none of our business” response) as a reason for his tepid reaction to a murderous regime? On any other day, we’re all “members of the global community,” live in “one world” and we’re all just a single village of global citizens.

If the only time Obama respects national sovereignty is when the concept of freedom and liberty is being assaulted within its borders, we’re in a lot of trouble.

From the A.P.: Planned N. Korea launch unnerves Hawaii residents:

Comforted by the U.S. military’s missile defense systems, Hawaii residents doubt a North Korean missile would light up the clear island sky like fireworks on the Fourth of July.

But that doesn’t mean the islands’ laid-back beach-goers aren’t worried that a long-range missile could be launched in the direction of Hawaii’s emerald mountains and white sand beaches around Independence Day.

“The North Koreans are unbalanced and could try anything,” said Dan Gleason while walking his Jack Russell mix dog in downtown Honolulu. “If they do hit Honolulu, I hope it’s a good shot, because I don’t want to go through the aftermath.”

Yeah, but at least you’ll still be in Hawaii. It’d be better than surviving a nuke strike in Scranton.

But the Wall Street Journal reports that most people on Hawaii are more concerned about the economy than by threats from North Korea’s unhinged loonshrimp.

In either case, Obama has ordered extra missile defense on the island. If a North Korean missile goes anywhere near the U.S., the Aegis system has been retrofitted so it can carry Jimmy Carter up to intercept and negotiate with any incoming missiles.

By the way, the original headline to the A.P. story was “North Korea threatens Obama birthplace with nukes” but it was changed because, for some reason, it caused panic in Kenya.