It’s been a belated Fitzmas with Jack Abramoff’s plea and ongoing cooperation with federal prosecutors. The power brokers within the GOP have a lot to worry about, but you’d not know it listening to the mainstream media.

Read beyond the fold.

It's easy to ignore Phyllis Schlafly, but her current column at Townhall is a doozy, even by her own considerable standards.

This year's spectacular Rose Bowl game attracted a phenomenal 35.6 million viewers because it featured what we want: rugged men playing football and attractive women cheering them on. Americans of every class, men and women, remained glued to their television sets and nearly 95,000 spectators watched from the stands.

The runaway success of this game proved again that stereotypical roles for men and women do not bother Americans one bit. Political correctness lost out as all-male teams battled and women cheered.

It's too bad that male sports are being eliminated on most college campuses. Except for Texas, USC, and a few other places, radical feminism rules in the athletic departments at the expense of popular male sports.

Yeah right. So much for the NCAA basketball tournament, the NIT, the dime a dozen bowl games around new year's day, etc.

It seems the poor dear needs a reality check. OK, I'll grant you there have been some issues with Title IX and the elimination of men's programs and scholarships because of a lack of sufficient numbers of interested women to make the numbers is stupid and an injustice. But we got here in the first place precisely because for the most part women's athletics weren't given the attention and resources necessary to offer legitimate programs.

While I appreciate the angst the rebalancing has caused, universities are schools first and foremost and in terms of their educational mission there can be little doubt Title IX was a net positive.

And does ANYONE really believe the nonathletic majority choose a university based on which sports are offered? Sheesh!

The Carpetbagger Report

Hugo Schwyzer

Cross posted from GregPrinceBlog

The wingnuts continue to parrot the talking points that the GOP culture of corruption is really a bipartisan scandal. Setting aside for a moment the reality that when a Republican talks about bipartisanship he wants you to be bi while he's partisan, that's simply not the case.

A good examples is brought out by Josh Marshall at TPM.

The AP reports of meetings between Reid's office and Abramoff's representatives. What's amusing is what isn't reported on. Did Reid change his positions to ones more favorable to Abramoff's clients? Not only didn't he change his positions, he was co-sponsor of the bills they were opposing.

Don't let that little fact get slipped from the talking points you'll hear. Of course lobbyists are going to meet with people opposing their clients - that's what lobbyists do. The question is whether you see politicians indefensibly changing their positions in response to junkets, to donations, and other pressures. In Reid's case, you clearly don't.

But hey, in the interest of being balanced the AP couldn't be bothered to report on something as inconvenient (to the GOP) as the truth.

Scott Shields has a good point:

For a variety of reasons, some of which I still don't get, the old fashioned media wants very badly for this to be a bipartisan scandal. This is only the latest attempt to make it so. But by leaving out such key information as the fact that Reid never supported the Republicans on the Marianas, the whole story is called into question.

Crossposted

Glenn Greenwald focuses on the complete meltdown of dissent and introspection within today’s Republican party. You’re either with Bush all the way, or you (gasp) a liberal.

Now, in order to be considered a “liberal,” only one thing is required – a failure to pledge blind loyalty to George W. Bush. The minute one criticizes him is the minute that one becomes a “liberal,” regardless of the ground on which the criticism is based. And the more one criticizes him, by definition, the more “liberal” one is. Whether one is a “liberal” — or, for that matter, a “conservative” — is now no longer a function of one’s actual political views, but is a function purely of one’s personal loyalty to George Bush.

More below the fold

E. J Dionne bemoans the retirement of Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) as the last of his kind--a liberal Republican.

Not surprising really for a died-in-the-wool liberal like Dionne.

I'll miss Boehlert and his optimistic moderation. Our politics worked better when a sufficiently large band of Republican moderates and liberals could take the edge off polarization and orient government toward problem-solving. But the liberal Republicans are gone. We have to deal with the GOP we have, not the GOP we wish still existed.

I have good news for Dionne--his GOP has been found occupying the halls of power!

If this isn't a "right-down-the-middle" moderate compromise between conservatives and liberals, then what else could it be? We cut taxes to please the conservatives, and we increase spending to please the liberals--everyone gets something.

Others Blogging:

The Moderate Voice

Carry On America

In a recent column in the Opinion Journal, Daniel Henninger talks at some length about the prevalence of vulgar language in the blogosphere and wonders at the trend of “disinhibited language” in society. I am hardly innocent of waxing vulgar in my own blog, and I really don’t have any problems with vulgarity judiciously applied. I do think there comes a point, however, when vulgarity only shows you don’t have anything more intelligent to say and the frequent use of, shall we say, colorful metaphors just makes me want to tune the speaker, or writer, out.

Continue beyond the fold:

I saw something very disturbing last night.

Ann Coulter was a guest on the Tonight Show and while Ann's schtick is well-known in the circles that read this blog and others, its not as familar to the general public--the public that watches the Tonight Show.

Jay Leno was about as good a reflection of my dread as anything--While Leno is genuinely and professionally a hail-fellow-well-met kind of guy, he was distinctly uncomfortable with Ms. Coulter. Other words I'd use to describe Leno's disposition? Intimidated comes to mind. His eyes seem to be saying, "how much time do I have left with this bitch?"

This wasn't just a dud appearance on a popular entertainment, it was putting a face to the conservative movement.

Whether that was a conscious strategy by NBC's cadre of liberal-left operatives doesn't matter. The outcome is what it is.

It matters more than you think. Conservatism is generally viewed as as an intellectual conversion process, but all conversions are proceeded my missionary figures, and for us that was Ronald Reagan. He invited you to consider conservative arguments with a sunny disposition, a dazzling sense of humor and a comprehensive facility with conservative principles. I have never since his terms in office, known so many people to have "come over" to the conservative cause, and I think that is largely because liberals have circled the wagons with much more intense vitriol, and conservatives simply haven't found anyone to take the Reagan role as chief proselyter.

George Bush is the nominal face of conservatism today, and he certainly is a charming, if less articulate representative of conservatism than Reagan, but what if liberals could put a different face on conservatism--one of their own choosing?

Enter Ann Coulter.

Regardless of how lovely she is as a colleague or next-door neighbor, her public persona is all wrong for the conservative movement, and I strongly suspect her increasingly natonal profile is being encouraged by people with a longer view. Why for instance, would Ann Coulter get a Time Magazine cover and not Rush Limbaugh? Coulter has no where near the clout in conservative circles that Limbaugh does. Has Limbaugh ever been on the Tonight Show? I suspect if he was, he'd do very well indeed and certainly that isn't in the interest of the liberal-left in this country.

Its of course "not fair" to judge people on their looks and other qualities of their outward appearance, but everybody does it and exploits the fact-of-life to their advantage. Catherine Zeta-Jones isn't a complete incomprehensible choice for T-mobile spokesperson. Ann Coulter is a striking woman, but in a Cruella DeVille sort of way (I apologize in advance, but this has to be said). The voice is hardly melodious, and her halting cadence is unpleasant. Add to that her penchant for sarcasm and you have a distinctly off-putting public image, which of course is the point of putting her on the cover of Time, on the Today Show, on the Tonight Show and anywhere else the liberal-controlled media can shoe-horn her in.

I wish Ann Coulter well, and I look forward to reading her book, but I have a serious problem with making her the face of conservatism, particularly since it isn't conservatives making that choice.

But just barely.

Surely the Republican'ts have SOMETHING better to do with their time than attempted rape of the US Constitution?

Amazing.

Animal testing is an issue in the UK. Most of the New Labour apparatus is clear that the medical benefits to man trump the emotionalism of the anti-vivisectionists and that the illegal, sometimes terroristic attacks on scientists must be beaten. When I've seen the issue raised on conservative sites (diabolical britspeak profanity warning), the likes of PETA are scorned to the hilt...tree-hugging liberals....skinny twerps. The BBC just staged a debate. The protestors were inarticulate dolts. The scientists were cool and logical within their definitions.
But still it stinks. To refute a common debating point: would I accept animal testing to save myself? Yes. So I'm a hypocrite and the anti-vivisection argument fails? Yes, I'm a hypocrite, no the argument doesn't fail. I would accept testing on any animal, but especially on the human animal, to save myself. That makes me selfish (and sane), but the anti-vivisection argument stands since Law should protect the rest of you against me as I wish Law to protect other animals against us.

The fallacy in all this is the ego-syntonic superstition that human animals are more important than other animals. Maybe, maybe not, but a scientist should be sceptical of human criteria to decide the question. Mankind vivisects because it can and because it can sanitise the the disgusting, cowardly deed by keeping it out of sight. I don't know about animal rights, but I do sense the virtue in human duties, one of which is the duty to abstain from tormenting other animals. If the cost of that is worse medicine (though I doubt it), then so be it for the sake of decency.

Things change. Orthodoxies change. This perversion of science, which includes abortion and vivisection, is not science, but a guilty use of power..

"Then everything includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite (an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power)
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last, eat up himself."

Embryonic stem cell research is nicely pinned by "and last, eat up himself."

Peggy Noonan reflects on the left's rather interesting reaction to the Wallace interview of Bill Clinton.

One can't exaggerate how large Fox looms in the liberal imagination. They see it as huge and mighty and credit it with almost mythical powers. It is a propaganda channel whose mission it is to destroy the Democratic Party. That's part of why Clintons' performance had such salience. Finally he was standing up to an evil empire.

It is odd that they are so spooked. In October America is set to become a nation of 300 million. What a big country. Fox News's average evening prime-time viewership is less than two million. Its average daytime is less than a million. And if my mail is an indication, they're already Republicans. Fox's power is that it is an alternative to the mainstream media. It did not take its shape by deeply inhaling liberalism and slowly breathing it out.

For some reason Noonan kind of skips over what should be the central question--why is the Left so irrationally threatened by Fox News? Noonan notes that Fox News, Rush Limbaugh and the conservative blogs are simply exploiting an existing market. The media monopoly of the left may have rendered conservatives invisible, but they were always there.

The new media did not divide us. The new media gave voice to our divisions. The result: more points of view, more subjects discussed, more data presented. This, in a great republic, a great democracy, a leader of the world in a dangerous time, is not bad but good.

This is a really interesting question because it demonstrates the limits of propaganda. Even when a country has a complete monopoly on public speech, dissent continues to exist just underneath the surface. My mother grew up in Germany as a young girl during the war and recounted to me how her mother, while walking with her children, encountered a neighbor on the street, had a little chat after which the neighbor raised her hand and exclaimed, "Heil Hitler". After the neighbor has passed on, my grandmother started to laugh and quietly comment on how ridiculous it all was. My mother was rather shocked to discover that her mother was a dangerous radical.

Really oppressive regimes long ago discovered that marginalizing groups isn't enough; one has to isolate individuals so that no groups can form in the first place. Saddam's Iraq was an excellent example of how propaganda was melded with a network of informers and a system of brutal repression (but hey, Iraq was better off with Saddam according to not a few American lefties...)

The irony in the left's hysterical concern over Fox News is that Fox isn't propaganda. I must confess that I get bored with the relentless effort to provide balance in their reporting. As anyone who watches Fox knows, the network routinely has a "Democrat strategist" and "Republican strategist" to provide the respective party talking points on all political developments. Panel discussions always include one or more liberals or outright leftists. Even the notorious Sean Hannity is balanced with uber-liberal Alan Colmes.

I strongly suspect that the real problem the left has with Fox News is precisely this counter-point, the "muddying" of the intellectual waters with a contrary point of view. Nothing disturbs an ideologue (any kind really) more than having their world-view credibly challenged, or seeing a "can't-fail" argument fall flat in the face. The distress is so intense it can breed violence. During a recent business trip to the Northeast, I had dinner with some people who I suppose never heard the maxim that one shouldn't discuss politics or religion in social situations. It was remarkable to observe the stunned reaction to my dissent to the "consensus" on the Iraq war, and the frustration over my ability to make cogent arguments to defend my position. The surprise was essentially that someone who didn't look and sound crazy had a different opinion than they did.

That in a nutshell is what I think really underlies the fear of Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, etc... Its a challenging argument that can't be dismissed, ignored or refuted, and that's always very disturbing.

When you see Nancy Pelosi pumping her fist up and down out of concern for "children", you know the issue has jumped the shark.

A 17 year old young man is not a child, unless your a Democrat and you need to make political hay. Everybody seems to be either overeager to characterize this as pedophilia or terribly frightened that if they don't condemn it in the strongest terms then they'll alienate "values voters".

Lets be clear about this--these aren't altar boys. At seventeen you know enough to say "bug off creep" unless you don't want to, and clearly this was a two-way conversation. How many young men are sexually abstinent at this age? Having said that, Foley is guilty of precisely the same crime that Bill Clinton was--sexual exploitation of a subordinate.

Its wrong. Foley was right to resign, but flailing away at Hastert or pumping your fist self-righteously when your party derives a large part of its power base from the sexual permissiveness lobby is just too much. Lets face it--if Foley was a Democrat this would be par for the course (and they have the history to prove it..).

I think this whole thing has and will backfire on the Crats. Is the media talking about Woodward's book or Foley's shenanigans?

Right.

In the end, the Crats are still the party of partying, and the Republicans are still the family-values guys and in the meantime the Crats aren't getting their Iraq-is-a-disaster message out.

Curt at Flopping Aces has extensive analysis and commentary.

Blog P.I. breaks down the reaction in the conservative blogosphere.

Don Surber echoes me (or I echo him, anyways there is an echo...):

Let us get real as to what happened here: A 16-year-old boy was sent e-mails that made him feel creepy. Evidently, several other pages were sent more explicit messages. May I suggest that upper middle class minors approaching their 18th birthdays are not as vulnerable as some in the press are making them out to be and gosh, a few might have even heard of the word "ho-mo-sex-u-al-it-y."

John Hawkins rescues the Kossack apologetic for Gerry Studs from PC oblivion.

Here's part of the description of the Daily Kos's dkosopedia on Gerry Studs, a Democratic Congressman who had sex with a male page. This is the April version of the entry. Since the Foley scandal broke and the Democrats decided to use it as a political issue, there have been a series of edits and this section has been removed.

"On July 20, 1983, Gerry was censured for having an affair 10 years earlier with a male page. He...turned his back] as the charges against him were read. The anti-gay crew had worked hard to demonize him (as they would [[Barney Frank]] several years later over allegations of a male prostitute having clients in Frank's apartment). Gerry held a press conference with the page and admitted to a relationship. They each firmly stated that what had gone on in their bedroom was their business, and absolutely no one else's."

That's right, folks. According to the people at the Daily Kos before the Foley scandal, criticizing a Congressman for having sex with a 17 year old page was nothing but the, "anti-gay crew (working) hard to demonize him."

Now today, the very same liberals who have that morally bankrupt view are insisting that people like Dennis Hastert resign for not figuring out sooner, with no hard evidence whatsoever, that Foley was another Studds.

How soon before critics on the right question whether the latest AP asshattery against Harry Reid is an aptly timed election ploy? Couldn't Karl Rove come up with something better than this as an October Surprise? Granted, I don't think NoKo or Foley were quite what the administration had in mind...

The most succinct summary goes thus:

The AP's John Solomon, the go-to guy at the Associated Press for any anti-Democratic efforts, and this piece is absolute crap. The crux of the claim:

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid collected a $1.1 million windfall on a Las Vegas land sale even though he hadn't personally owned the property for three years, property deeds show.

Actually, he did own that land. It just so happened that three years ago, he transfered the property from his own personal name to that of an LLC.

It'd be kind of like me selling Daily Kos, and someone claiming I reaped a windfall from it because I "sold it three years ago". I didn't. Daily Kos became an LLC. As did Reid's piece of land.

And btw, this was all disclosed to the ethics committee. The place were things got sloppy is that Reid continued to disclose ownership of the land as a personal asset rather than ownership in the LLC which owned the land. But that's it. Fact is, the LLC had no other assets other than this piece of land, and Reid disclosed ownership of the piece of land.

Solomon is either being dishonest or an idiot. But watch the wingers and GOP try to gain traction off this story to divert from their coddling of a sexual predator.

Update: Note that there is no charge or evidence or anything that would suggest that Reid used his position of authority to boost the value of the land. That would be troublesome. As it is in NC-11 where Rep. Charles Taylor (R) used earmarks to line his pockets:

So, what is the story behind the stories? Did Reid run over John Solomon’s dog? Maybe John Solomon just serves as a convenient outlet for smear merchants who know that he won’t ask too many questions. Either way you have to wonder whether the AP is best served by keeping this guy around.

Crossposted:

Earlier today, I ran across a clip of Keith Olbermann doing apologetics for Al Gore's massive carbon footprint (hey, he has a big house, give him a break...). That got me looking around YouTube and I ran into this Glenn Beck Rebuttal of Olbermann's typical trash-talking of all the other cable news hosts (the vast majority of which get better ratings than he does).

At some point someone was going to do this.

The Net's not always a kid-friendly place; there is plenty of foul language out there. And of course, the blogosphere is no different.

But how different are the Rightosphere and Leftosphere when it comes to "dirty" language? Which side produces the most profanity-laced diatribes? Via Instapundit, I happened upon this interesting challenge from InstaPunk:

I propose an exercise to be performed by those who have the software and expertise to carry it out. The exercise is this: Search six months' worth of content, posts and comments, of the 20 most popular blogs on the right and the left. The search criteria are George Carlin's infamous '7 Dirty Words.' [Click this link for the list of expletives.]

And this is what I found, using what I deemed -- through a mix of TTLB and 2006's Weblog Award lists -- to be the 18 biggest Lefty blogs, and 22 biggest Righty blogs. I couldn't account for the 6-month time period, and I even gave the Lefty blogs a 4 blog advantage. But it didn't make much of a difference.

The results were not all that surprising if you've spent any time reading over in the sinistrosphere, but 18 to 1?

I ran the search on this site for comparison--just 35 hits in an 18 month period and half of them are quotes of someone else's profanity. We're like the Disney version of the blogosphere. Only Scrappleface had fewer bleepables (11).

To be fair, some lefty sites appear to eschew profanity as much or more so than their conservative brethren. As you might expect, Jesus' General had only a modest 73 hits.

UNCoRRELATED most frequent curse words? Shit and Piss.

That's about the extent of my cursing. When it comes right down to it--vulgarisms are simply a cop-out when it comes to expressing oneself in normal discourse. I make exceptions for banging your thumb with a hammer and like incidents. The only time I ever heard my father curse was while working in his machine shop one summer. He was making some adjustments to a die cutting machine he had designed and built to produce plastic inserts and pinched his thumb in some rollers. Everyone around him froze momentarily as he exhibited an expression of extreme pain. He finally blurted out, "Don't just stand there, getting me a effin' box wrench!"

The one and only time.

The amazing thing about that incident was how fast everyone scrambled to get some box wrenches for him. The power of curse word was in its infrequent use. Reserved for emergencies as it was, it definitely made an impression.

In the final analysis, I think the propensity for swearing by the left reflects the same motivations it does for anyone else--insecurity, anger, frustration and powerlessness. Its quite interesting that in spite of Democrat congressional control and a beleaguered Republican presidency, conservatives are still pretty even-keeled. My guess is that conservative bloggers are simply well-adjusted as a general rule, possibly of a generally higher socioeconomic level and/or they simply have better coping mechanisms.

A couple of my favorite bomb-throwers-->

Rick Moran at Right Wing Nut House is pretty riled at Ann Coulter.

Instead of repeating what everyone agrees about Coulter, let us take a moment to marvel at the Pavlovian response that Coulter not only expected but intended with her untoward remark about John Edwards. She is a “controversy slut” as my good friend Jay so succinctly put it. Why in God’s name the left falls for it and why the right then feels the need to respond is absolutely nuts! This is what she wants. She is playing us like a violin – right and left. And the fact that this despicable woman then gets to sit at home and laugh at all of us makes my blood boil.

My reaction isn't quite the same. If we didn't have Ann Coulter we'd have to invent her. As I pointed out in an earlier post, all three leading Republican candidates got to burnish their gay-friendly bonafides, Ann got a boost to her notoriety and John Edwards looked like an idiot--again. Why would any conservative be upset?

Rick issues a fatwa:

I urge everyone – right and left – to take the following actions:

1. Never write another blog post about Ann Coulter no matter how outrageous, cruel, or bigoted her language.

2. Immediately write the Presidents of Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN demanding that they refuse to schedule Coulter on any show for any reason on their networks.

3. Write the editor of Human Events and demand that they drop her column.

4. If her column appears in your local newspaper, write a letter to the editor demanding that they drop her column.

5. If you see her writings in any on line or print publication, write the editor and demand that they stop carrying her columns.

6. Any upcoming forum in which she is scheduled as a speaker or panel participant, write a letter to the organizers and make it clear that the reason you are not attending is due to Coulter’s presence.

The goal is to starve the witch of the attention she craves. I’ll have more on this later today, including an on-line petition we can sign and send to the cable nets and a report on my progress.

Gee, sounds a little Greenwaldish to me. I think Coulter serves a vital function--aside from giving me a chuckle on occasion--Political correctness is the problem and Ann Coulter is the solution. You don't have to agree with her, but the fact that she had the guts to ignore the victim cloak of the 9/11 widows to point out what everybody could already see, is a vital function in society.

<--She probably doesn't meet the criteria either...

Joe Klein's been taken to task by the left for unnecessary pigeon-holing. I wasn't paying attention except to note that Kevin Drum's response was just as provincial as Klein's. Klein must enjoy the conflict so he's broadened his tongue-in-cheek bigotry to include right-wing extremists.

Well, I've been accused of being a right-wing extremist more times than I can count, so I thought I would evaluate myself against Klein's wing-nut-kooko-meter. Later on I'm going to post a survey so you can determine your own wing-nuttiness.

A right-wing extremist exhibits many, but not necessarily all, of the following attributes:

--believes that America is always, in every instance, the ultimate force of moral authority in the world.

Sorry, can't cop to that. I know what Jimmy Carter did in Cambodia. On the other hand, I absolutely believe that Democrats efforts to insure defeat in Iraq are immoral in the extreme, designed to achieve their political goals domestically, at the expense of hundreds of thousands if not millions of lives.

--believes that Saddam Hussein was linked to 9/11—even if not directly, he was just that sort of guy.

Nope. I have never believed this--too risky for Saddam. On the other hand, the left-wing fantasy that bin Laden and Saddam would never cooperate is just so much foolishness. We have plenty of documentation to the contrary.

--sees transnational non-governmental groups like Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International as “the next threats” to U.S. sovereignty. Calls them Transies, derisively.

I've never even heard of the term 'transies'. My perception of HRW and AI is like my perception of the media--populated arrogant, pissant lefties, but notable for their bark rather than their bite.

--doesn’t hold a passport, as a matter of principle: there’s nothing over there except depravity.

I've had a passport since I was 18. I can guarantee you I've been more places that Joe has, and while I was there, I took the time to learn the language.

--believes that capitalism creates perfect justice, and that any attempt to tax or regulate it constitutes “social engineering.” (Doesn't believe in evolution, but does believe in social darwinism.)

Capitalism creates efficiency, not justice. Evolution is a theory not an ideology or religion to "believe in". Social darwinism seems to me to be a feature of Democrat policy--the creation of entitlement slaves is a tacit confirmation that some minorities are "losers" who need special assistance to participate in society.

--believes global warming is a left-wing myth.

Global warming is a fact, anthropogenic causes for global warming is a myth.

--believes in the Second Amendment to the Constituion, but has some “problems” with the First.

I like them both, but I worry daily about lefties using legislation to constrain political discourse--oh wait--that already happened with McCain-Feingold. I worry about a Democrat Congress wiping out talk radio with some sort of ironically-named legislation like the "fairness doctrine". Individual rights are a problem for the left, not the right, which is why I am a conservative and not a fascist left-winger.

--believes that any form of universal health insurance is socialism, even the tax credit system first proposed by the Heritage Foundation.

Since socialism is defined as a socio-economic system in which property and the distribution of wealth are subject to social control, the yes, a universal health insurance system is socialist by definition. In a free country, citizens would have a right to make personal economic choices.

--believes that there are inferior races.

I not the one that thinks blacks should be treated like children and given booster seats to sit at the grown-ups table.

--believes that there are inferior religions.

Guilty on this one. "By their fruits, ye shall no them", is what Jesus said in his sermon on the mount. Superior outcomes indicate a superior religion and vice versa.

--believes in a global conspiracy led by Jewish bankers, Hollywood executives and journalists.

This is pretty clearly a left-wing thing. All these best anti-semites are socialists and Democrats. Remember Jesse Jackson and the Hymietown remark?

--believes, despite the above, that Israel is absolutely wonderful, and that when it achieves full dominion over its Biblical lands—especially Judea and Samaria—a great battle will be fought and Jesus will descend from the clouds.

That's a fundamentalist Christian thing, not a "right-wing extremist" thing. I think its interesting that a Jew can complain about his treatment and then mock the beliefs of Christians. Ain't it a great country?

--believes that homosexuals are condemned to hell.

Sorry, this right-wing extremist doesn't believe in hell.

--only receives news from Fox or right-wing radio talk show hosts.

Klein is mad because nobody reads him. Yes, I do watch Fox and not CNN or MSNBC or the networks nightly news shows. I do on occasion listen to Rush and I wish Hugh Hewitt still had a regular spot here in Utah. Mostly I read a variety of newspapers and other publications on the internet like everybody else under the age of 50. The real issue for you is that you and your employers are fossils.

--believes Hillary Clinton is a dangerous radical.

No, I believe she's a dangerous establishment Democrat.

--regularly uses harsh, vulgar, intolerant language to mock liberals.

I like to use clever, subtle and amusing language to mock liberals. On the other hand, I've never heard of a situation in which hundreds of right-wing extremist commenters wishing that a political figure had actually died in a terror attack, much less the left-wing host of a cable show.

This is just a partial list, off the top of my head...but I'm sure, as with lefties, these guys simply don't exist, either.

I'm sure they exist...somewhere...like Big Foot. I've never met one, but I have been everywhere and met everyone.

For the sake of literary convenience, its easier to create a stereotype that to shoot a rhetorical arrow into a cloud of loosely associated individuals who don't see things your way. Yet for the left, the alternative is to actually debate principle and policy.

That would not be good.

Much easier, and perhaps even more effective to simply engage in personal attacks, gross generalizations and conspiracy theories.

"Bushitler and his right-wing extremist minions are planning to take over the world's oil and strip us all of our civil rights."

Yeah, kind of like that--no--exactly like that.

UPDATE: Bob Krumm

This past week the pro-gay, pro-choice, twice-divorced Republican from a Northeastern state received just two less votes than the highest vote getter in a straw poll conducted in one of the most conservative Southeastern states. Also, at the American Conservative Union’s CPAC convention over the weekend, this “moderate” candidate, again came in second to a different primary opponent. And when you factor in “second choice” votes, he resoundingly carried the field. Meanwhile, at the same conference, a very conservative pundit makes an anti-gay remark and is denounced for it–not just by Democrats, but by most Republicans as well.

I thought that the GOP was supposed to be the hate-mongering christo-fascist theocratic party. What happened?

Matt Sanchez has a column up on Salon to reconcile the fact that he is hispanic, a Marine Corp reservist, a student at an Ivy League university and a former gay porn actor.

I kid you not.

Sanchez got some notoriety for complaining about the anti-military bias at Columbia university, which got some play among conservative forums, but as he says, was largely ignored by the left.

What was not ignored was a published picture of him with Ann Coulter.

Howard Kurtz makes mention of Bill Kristol's Washington Post article on "Why Bush Will Be A Winner", noting that it received widespread ridicule and angry retort by the left who have a massive investment in the failure of every Bush administration policy from taxes to the war on terror.

What has driven his detractors crazy is that he has never acknowledged error in a serious way, instead brushing aside his botched predictions to lecture the country on the right course of action. Even as other conservative columnists have broken with the president, Kristol has stood his ground.

The irony here is that his detractors are the most intellectually disingenuous species that have ever existed. While the Iraq war like all other wars this country has fought, has had its reverses and mistakes, the left and their media accomplices have simply been moving the goalposts all over the field to insure that their political and ideological interests would be well-served.

What the brouhaha over Kristol's analysis reveals is that events have really had little or no impact on that segment of the population that actively concerns itself with what happens in Iraq. The left were always against the war in Iraq for ideological and political reasons. Nothing that happens in Iraq was ever going to change their minds. Success in Iraq and for the U.S. was and is catastrophic failure for themselves. Kristol probably represents a similar mindset on the right, but its patently ridiculous for left-wing ideologues to criticize him for being ideological. Nevertheless, Kristol has acknowledged problems in Iraq and the possibility of failure. You won't get the same kind of consideration of the left.

Its amazing to me that few people if anyone really, sit back and ask themselves some serious questions about motivation. The Democrats and they're left-wing conspiracy have always wanted us out of Iraq, even before we went into Iraq--and not because they knew we would lose. Hey, its the internet--do some digging. What possible reason could they have for not wanting us to depose a brutal dictator and establish a democratic regime as a replacement?

Don't bother with the cherry-picked responses--look at the totality of the reasons over time (they were routinely changed...). The bottom line is that the prospect of Bush freeing 50 million people from poverty, brutality and oppression was politically a huge problem for both Democrats and ideological socialists. They opposed the war in Iraq for the same reasons France and Russia opposed it--because it didn't serve their particular interests.

Now consider Bill Kristol's reasons for supporting the war in Iraq.

There simply is no comparison--Kristol makes a consistent, clear case for U.S. intervention in the middle east as necessary for the preservation of democracy and freedom.

Opposing success in Iraq immoral, plain and simple, and the torturously convoluted responses by the left strongly suggest that they know this. They pay lip service to the lives of American service when its clear they know none personally, despise the military and in the words of Marcos Zuninga Moulitsas (Daily KOS), "screw them" is the operative sentiment.

Should the Democrats succeed in pulling us out of Iraq, and should the outcome be as everyone expects; when the terrorist come for our left-wing American friends, let them die well and without pathetic calls for the rest of us to lay down our lives in their defense.

After all, its none of our business.

No one takes the time to do character assassination on ineffective nobodies.

The left hates Ann Coulter because she is damned effective at blowing away the left's rhetorical smoke screen.

John Hawkins compiles Coulter's bon mots from the past year.

My favorite?

Assuming against all logic and reason that the Democrats have some serious objection to the war in Iraq, perhaps they could tell us which part of the war on terrorism they do support. That would be easier than rattling off the long list of counterterrorism measures they vehemently oppose.

My favorite Michael Douglas movie was "Falling Down" made in the early 1990s. I still remember one line in particular.

"I'm the bad guy?"

Through a series of events, the Douglas character--"D-Fens" morphs from a struggling, put-upon middle-aged, divorced defense industry engineer into a raging lunatic, fully justified in his rampage within his own mind. At the end, he struggles to grasp the fact that has become "the problem" that the police are called to resolve.

Roger L. Simon post at Pajama's Media reminded me of the sense of wonder in D-Fens at how he had finally come to be "the bad guy".

So in those slow motion moments when the 767s crashed into the World Trade Center everything switched around. The cool guys in school were no longer the cool guys. One clique – the leftie, hippie into yuppie, liberal media and showbiz alliance – moved out. Some semi-stodgy ex-Scoop Jackson policy wonks moved in.

Idealism had been stolen from the Left. (In truth, as I indicated, they didn’t have much remaining, but that probably made it all the worse.)

This constituted an insult (in the medical and other senses) to a lot of people’s self-images. The neocons were to be hated because they had stolen that idealism. In a sense, they had stolen those same people’s youths. For a very short period, Abbie Hoffman had morphed into Paul Wolfowitz. The neocons were to be envied then. And no doubt they were.
...

Somebody’s ox had been gored. Idealism is the good guy’s province. When your idealism has been stolen, you are no longer the good guy. You are the bad member of the family. No one wants to be that – a loss of love is involved. But what do you do?

I think Simon is right on the money here--all of the left's actions to date have been a desperate grasping for the high ground. The concern for the children soldiers, the invented atrocities, the "cause" of global warming (even as scientist contemplate the inevitable ice age...)

Yes, my Democrat friends--you are the bad guys...

Let's see:

Conservatives give more;
Conservatives have better mental health.

Correlation is not causation, but we must conclude that generous, sane people tend to be conservative.

I was read Macranger this morning, ruminating over the election of George W. Bush as the