Let’s Go Back To Lautenberg

The country is split exactly down the middle on this issue. The vast majority of Americans have one position, and our loudmouthed liberals have another.

Are we ready to (to coin a phrase) “move on” from election day and think about pumpkin pie filling, corn meal, turkeys, stuffing, and parades?

No, screach the liberals. They were disappointed, you see, on the evening of November 2 when they found out the exit polling data was not all it was cracked up to be. As always, their disappointment must translate to evidence that someone’s out to screw ’em. Disappointment can’t ever be a part of life, nosiree. There always has to be an appeal. Republicans, on the other hand…how do they act in the same circumstances? It must be exactly the same way, right? There is absolutely no difference between pinhead liberals and the people I’m told are “right wing” right? We do live in a mirror universe don’t we, and the day Senator Kennedy left Mary Jo Kopechne to drown, a Republican somewhere must have been doing exactly the same thing, right?

Well it turns out we don’t need to leave that to theory.

In 2002, as the mid-term elections were drawing near, Sen. Robert Torricelli of New Jersey was running into serious trouble. His scandals were coming to a head at the same time the campaign was reaching a climax, and it became clear he didn’t have the political capital to win re-election. Possibly at someone’s suggestion, he withdrew from the race and Frank Lautenberg took his place as the Democratic candidate.

A Cato news release from that time period captures the essence of what happened next: Lautenberg’s placement on the ballot conflicted squarely with New Jersey law. Thou shalt replace thy candidate 51 days prior to the election, and no less, says the law. The Torricelli/Lautenberg switch came 35 days prior. Hmmm…if you live on earth and breathe oxygen and carry red blood in your veins, like I do, this doesn’t seem “nuanced” at all. Thirty-five and fifty-one. One of those numbers is less than the other one. One would think that’s pretty cut and dry.

But one would be wrong. The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled in effect that the people of New Jersey had a constitutional right to a Republican candidate and a Democratic candidate. The right to a two-party ballot, not mentioned in the law, trumped the rule about 51 days, which was explicitly mentioned. Unless you flunked math in the first grade and didn’t re-take the test since, you’d have to agree the Republicans were screwed.

Democrats say they are screwed now. Look how different those exit polls were from the actual voting results.

I’d like to call the “mirror people”‘s collective attention to two things here:

1. In 2002, the battle cry of the conservatives was “hey look what the law says and look what they did.” Today, liberals want us to look not at the law, but at exit polls. This is problematic. Polls, almost by definition, must be less than precise. The law is the law. The law takes its validity from the fact that it applies to everyone impartially. You may not like the law, as the Democrats in New Jersey surely didn’t in 2002. But if the law conflicted with Republican interests they would have liked it just fine. People inwardly understand that they can’t trust a “fair weather friend” of the law – you must support it all the time, or not at all.

2. Republicans brought up the horrible decision the New Jersey Supreme Court made, beating their chests about 35 being less than 51, until the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the case. I didn’t hear about it one single time after that. They dropped it. Democrats, today, on the other hand are saying “Hey, lookit this. Hey, lookit that. Lookit this exit poll, lookit that voting machine, lookit lookit lookit.” Whatever authoritative body has certified & accepted whatever reported vote, is of no concern to them. They’re rabble-rousing, hoping for a massive hue & cry that will legitimize their “lookiting”.

I think it’s upbringing. My Mom was very big on the concept that not only did nobody ever say life would be fair, but more often than not, it’s unfair as all get-out. Looks like someone else’s mom (small m) taught them when the little league umpire says you’re out, he must have been out to get you from the very beginning. It’s simply unacceptable to think even for a minute that you might have lost a game “fair” and square, under circumstances that, for lack of a better phrase, just plain suck. Good luck next time and all that. Some people never learned this.

That’s what being a Democrat is all about today.

They’re so angry…

…angry about the exit poll thing, and the machine counting thing, and the no receipt for voting thing. Only Sex Pistols music would do for this video.

And don’t worry, they’d be JUST as angry if the Haunted Tree won the election. Trust them on this. That’s why they were so concerned about exit polls and voting machines before November 2, remember?

(Trying to remember if I’ve ever gotten a “voting receipt” before…hmmm….)

U.S. Says Troops Now Occupy Fallujah

Godspeed to our brave soldiers who are slogging it out, so people like me can have the freedom to sit on our asses and blog about it.

FALLUJAH, Iraq – U.S. military officials said Saturday that American troops had now “occupied” the entire city of Fallujah and there were no more major concentrations of insurgents still fighting after nearly a week of intense urban combat.

Cool, cool, cool. I hope this cuts down somewhat on the violence over there. More…

On Facial Hair

Beards are cool. Well, all beards aren’t cool. Some aren’t. Mine definitely is.

It was about ten years ago, the last time I ever spoke to my ex-wife, that I learned for the first time she was a Democrat. Yuck. In the decade of wisdom I’ve acquired since then, I’ve come to realize something. Some women love beards and some women hate beards. Rarely do I get along with women who hate beards. Rarely do I fail to get along with women who like beards.

Of COURSE I have to form a theory about it, so here it is. Some women simply don’t like to be reminded that men and women are different. It’s not like you’re putting women down by saying so; Lord knows, there are ways in which men & women are different, in which women are better & men are the worse for it. Brittle women like this (see “On Basketball Towns and Brittle Women”, below) don’t like to even cogitate on that. No, no, no. Women are no better, no worse. Exactly the same. They shall not tolerate any discussion, any opining, any vocalizing, any thinking to the contrary.

Keep your silence on how men are bigger jerks when they drive in traffic, or can’t fold shirts as well. Silence, male. If it needs to be pointed out how women are superior, I, your superior woman, will do it.

I think one out of three women are like this, the remaining 67% being complete sweethearts. I dunno, though, maybe I’m sucking in the remaining 33% like a flame sucks in a moth, but I’m really done with that 33%. They’re like Jerry Springer guests. You can’t tell ’em anything.

I wouldn’t know too much about it though. In the dozen or so years since I was last clean-shaven, I haven’t met a whole lot of them. I like that.

If the Internet wasn’t built for this, it should’ve been

http://www.virtualbartender.beer.com/beer_usa.htm

This one needs no introduction

I can’t think of the proper way to lead in to this one…except maybe a groan. And a post script: Remember, these are the people who want us to check with them before we invade Iraq.

Such a great way of putting it

Walter Williams weighs in on why we’re such a divided nation. It’s not the water we drink, the air we breathe, the food we eat – it’s the “we”. Read it. It’ll make such perfect sense you’ll wish you thought of it, if you haven’t already thought of it.

On Basketball Towns and Brittle Women

This is a map of California. It is a population-density map, but I embellished it to include, as accurately as I could place them, all the “Hooters” restaurant locations.

Do you notice anything strange about this? Anything at all?

That’s right…if you’re in the Sacramento area as I am, you live in a place with PLENTY enough nose-count and commerce to justify a nearby Hooter’s location, but there’s nary one to be found. You have to drive A HUNDRED MILES to get to the nearest one.

Hooter’s executives have wisely tuned in to this issue and started to do something about it, making plans to build one near Arco Arena. Adding weight to the theory that there is something cultural going on to keep the franchise out of here, a citizens’ committee has formed to fight the move. Why? Rumor has it there is a high school nearby.

Wow, stop the presses. Kids in high school might see some pretty girls.

Hey concerned parents. What’s a Royal Court Dancer? You’ve got them right across the street.

This is all such a red herring. The fact is, women in this location are brittle. By that I mean, they have an idea of what kind of “fun” men are supposed to have, and let’s just say this has more to do with the movies Sandra Bullock makes now than the kind she used to make. “Thou shalt look upon no prettier female than I.” Supply and demand.

I saw this attitude before, in Detroit. Men are annoying; men having fun, looking at pretty girls, are even more annoying. I haven’t seen this anywhere else.

What do Detroit and Sacramento have in common? They’re basketball towns. Hey, it’s just a theory, I can’t prove a thing about it. But I do know basketball towns aren’t healthy mentally. They wish they were football towns, and can’t admit it. For basketball to be the primary spectator sport in a municipality, it seems to do something to the relationship between men and women.

But then again, there are now five Hooter’s locations within 20 miles of Detroit. There goes my theory I guess.

Here’s something people don’t quite get about Hooter’s: It’s actually a very good place to have lunch when you’re on a business trip. It’s CHEAP. The waitresses aren’t just pretty – they’re smart, responsive and friendly too. When you need something they’re all over you, and when you don’t, they buzz off and let you eat. Shoot, skimpy outfits or no, Sacramento could really use something like that.

I’ve seen a lot of Hooter’s waitresses and…uh…their “hooters”. About the size of croquet balls, if that. Nobody’s falling out of their top as far as I can see. It’s not a strip joint, nothing even close to it, so the “I don’t want to explain to my darling baby what a ‘Hooter’ is” is just demagoguery. Fact is, Sacramento can’t have the restaurant because our brittle women won’t let us.

What’s the solution? Maybe as simple as, just ignore all the shouting and yelling and let the damn place in. Women who are so insecure they want to control who all else their men look at, are probably dim enough that they’re just doing what they see other women doing. The cultural stuff will work itself out. The one thing I’ve noticed consistently in my travels is that wherever there’s a Hooter’s, the women are friendlier whether they work there or not. Or who knows, maybe it’s just that I’m in a better mood.

May-December Romances

Patrick Stewart is almost forty years older than his girlfriend.

This means absolutely nothing to anybody anywhere…no relevance to anything. However, it might be useful to you to take note that I’m 20 years older than you, if your name is Lindsay Lohan.

Things That Don’t F@!!*!”!ing Matter

These are things some liberal pinheads repeat a LOT, thinking they’re somehow relevant to whatever argument is at hand – usually whether we have a good President or not – but are actually irrelevant. Not only irrelevant, but highly irrelevant. They don’t F@!!*!”!ing matter. Most of them are actually true – but my question is, who cares???

There are a few “Bushisms” in here. You know what a Bushism is, don’t you? They’re things that Bush has said that are thought to be incorrect, either in fact or in opinion. Just harmless, rib-pokin’, good clean fun. Wink wink, nod nod. Hard to remember it wasn’t so long ago, such items were far more malicious and we were being expected to file ’em away until the time came, and pull the lever for “Anybody But Bush.” As if it’s impossible to be a bad president and still say “nuclear,” or a good one and say “nukular.”

#1. President Bush is not as good at public speaking as his predecessor
#2. Clinton could play the saxophone
#3. Vice-President Al Gore kissed his wife for a really long time
#4. We gave weapons to Iraq in the eighties
#5. We gave weapons to bin Laden in the eighties
#6. Rumsfeld shook hands once with Saddam Hussein
#7. When he went to visit the troops over Thanksgiving, the lights in President Bush’s plane were turned off
#8. Former President Carter is building houses for homeless people
#9. Saddam Hussein had his mouth checked by a doctor, and the examination was televised
#10. The PATRIOT Act is being used to prosecute some crimes that are unrelated to terrorism
#11. President Bush went into Iraq instead of chasing al Qaeda from country to country
#12. We aren’t responding to North Korea the same way we have responded to Iraq
#13. World opinion is not sympathetic to our handling of Iraq and the War on Terror
#14. President Bush’s approval rating in the U.K. and other foreign countries, is a little on the low side
#15. “They misunderestimated me”
#16. “Gore Got More”, since the Electoral College is established right in the main body of the Constitution
#17. Texas executes a lot of people and does it pretty quickly
#18. President Bush fell off of a “Segway”
#19. Subliminable
#20. President Bush choked on a pretzel
#21. Enron
#22. Congress didn’t get to see the memos from Miguel Estrada
#23. Rush Limbaugh abused pain killers
#24. Natalie Maines is ashamed that the President is from Texas
#25. It could be dicey trying to support a family of twelve on a minimum-wage income
#26. Strategery
#27. People opposed to the war are having their “patriotism questioned.” (Come to think of it, when, where, by whom?)
#28. After 9-11, you may not be able to fly if you act too much like a pompous hippie dickhead around the security people
#29. Wesley Clark used to be a four-star general (before he got fired)
#30. Schwarzenegger’s father was an Austrian Nazi stormtrooper
#31. John Kerry has very presidential-looking hair
#32. Some illegal aliens work really hard doing jobs you don’t find many fully-fledged (white) citizens doing
#33. Howard Dean appears to be very passionate
#34. Jesse Jackson’s opinion on just about anything
#35. Any proposed statement of fact resting on a statement by someone named Clinton
#36. “The Wage Gap between the Rich and the Poor”
#37. Schwarzenegger may have groped women
#38. Some people may be offended by religious symbols
#39. William Bennett has had a gambling problem
#40. “Flight Suit”-gate
#41. Nancy Reagan may have consulted an astrologer
#42. The turkey Bush was holding on a plate wasn’t real
#43. The Washington Times was founded by the Rev. Sun Yung Moon
#44. Pretty much anything brought to light so far about Dick Cheney or Halliburton
#45. Cowboy boots
#46. David Stockman submitted a proposal suggesting that ketchup is a vegetable
#47. The United Nations did not say “Yes” before we went into Iraq.
#48. Any statement containing the words “Bush” and “Friends,” “Buddies,” “Cronies” or “Pals”.
#49. Any innuendo at all containing the name “Karl Rove”.
#50. “Mission Accomplished”-gate.
#51. There appears to be a gap in President Bush’s service records
#52. Bin Laden hasn’t been caught yet
#53. Our enemies never stop thinking of ways to hurt our country, and neither do we

I’m particularly fond of (have huge red flags raised by) Number 27. Believe it or not, when you voice an opinion and somebody tells you to shut up about it, his attempt to shut you up does NOT validate your opinion. It could still be a stupid opinion. That’s just something to keep in mind for later when you’re arguing with a third party about whether your opinion is valid or not. “I’m having my patriotism questioned for saying this” means NOTHING.

That is not to say the original opinion is not correct. It very well may be. But to connect the subject of other people trying to shut you up, to the validity of your opinion, just makes you look ignorant.

Someone please clue Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins in on this.

Platforms the Democrats Could Dump If They Want to Win

A little something I wrote up after the 2000 elections, added onto after the 2002 midterms, and now it’s time to haul it out again. Yeah, I actually kept track of it through all that time. Palm Pilots are so cool.

And yeah, somehow it’s still relevant. Democrats are still losing. They will continue to lose until they eject as many of these as they can stand to:

#1. “It’s good that we got Saddam out, but Bush should be fired and we should give the White House to someone who never in a million years would have thought of getting Saddam out.”
#2. “You absolutely have a right to work for a paycheck if you’re part of a union, and you absolutely do not if you are not.”
#3. “Where the First Amendment is concerned, ‘establishment’ has to do with simply mentioning religion, but we’re only concerned about Christian religions.”
#4. “America has no right or privilege to defend herself if France doesn’t want her to.”
#5. “A four percent increase over last year, when you were planning to provide a six percent increase before, is a cut.”
#6. “Profits are obscene, unless they are profits realized by a teacher’s union, a trial lawyer, or Hollywood, then they’re OK.”
#7. “The National Rifle Association is a big, powerful, sinister lobby; the Teacher’s Union is not.”
#8. “Ronald Reagan and Bush’s Dad are really bad people for having supported the Taliban against Russia back in the eighties…but James Bond and Rambo are okay, even though they did the same thing.”
#9. “Cops are always liars. Crooks always tell the truth.”
#10. “Everyone accused of a crime is innocent until proven guilty, except for straight guys accused by women of sexual harrassment or date rape.”
#11. “Nevermind about the hundreds of dollars in Federal withholding being taking out of your paycheck before you ever see it…but a fifty cent ATM fee is absolutely outrageous and ought to be outlawed.”
#12. “Everyone who believes in ‘God’ and has the balls to mention it in public, is a wild-eyed puritan zealot who will steal all your condoms.”
#13. “Blacks can’t succeed at anything without help from the Government.”
#14. “It’s okay to fight a war as long as you don’t win it too decisively.”
#15. “Straight guys killing a gay guy is a hate crime, but vice-versa is not.”
#16. “Smoking factories in American cities are bad for the environment; smoking CRATERS in American cities will be just fine.”
#17. “The ends justify the means when we take money away from those who earned it & give it to those who did not; but not when we take out Saddam Hussein.”
#18. “As soon as someone can prove to us al Qaeda isn’t providing health insurance for their employees, we’ll stop being easy on them.”
#19. “A smarmy, jaded five-second sound bite is the perfect forum to debate whether someone’s misfortune was bad luck, or bad judgment. Smart-alecky remarks provide all the thoughtful deliberation needed to settle that serious question.”
#20. “Abortion is not a States’ Rights issue; gay marriage is.”
#21. “Hungry people don’t need high-paying jobs quite so much, as free drugs for their rich grandparents, a global-warming treaty and hybrid cars.”
#22. “Wanna stop terrorism? Stop making people mad, that’ll do it. Osama just needs a little counseling.”
#23. “The reason we went into Iraq, was for the oil.”
#24. “We never had anything to worry about with the WMD – we should have SOMEHOW known that, and not gone in.”
#25. “Saddam Hussein is a harmless little old man…except his CONVENTIONAL explosives are really dangerous.”

Now that the election is over, before I tuck this thing away & let it gather more dust until 2006 I should stick in something about Michael Moore.

There is a VERY real chance the Haunted Tree could have won this election…IF he came out nice and early and said “I have nothing to do with Michael Moore, and I don’t put any stock into any of the absurd things he is saying.” I’m not saying it’s likely. But the chance is there. Spewing out Michael Moore theories during the debates, certainly couldn’t have done much to help him.

Lindsay, need a shoulder to cry on?

Sorry to hear about the break-up. Tell me all about your feelings. Have your girl call my girl. We’ll do lunch. Maybe dinner and a movie.

Just plain nuts

Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute…I thought in the “America should not have gone into Iraq” school of thought, you were strictly forbidden from even contemplating anything that had not been absolutely positively proven beyond the shadow of any doubt. I thought you were supposed to prove MORE than what was suggested before you spoke it out loud sans question mark behind it, let alone act on it, i.e., you have to prove Saddam had weapons before you said he was dangerous.

What’s with this stuff then?

The stance taken by Bush and Blair in blowing their trumpets so often spells out two things: first, that they are deep-down uneasy with what they have done, indeed Tony Blair nearly resigned earlier this year and contemplated changing from Anglicanism to Catholicism, which, however noble a quest, reveals that he is troubled inside and second, this Anglo-Saxon Alliance remains and continues to be an insult to the international community which through the United Nations Organization, made one simple request: that Washington and London adhere to international law.

These Bush-haters have throroughly engraved new wrinkles in their brains and I’m afraid if they woke up tomorrow fully intending to think straight again, the process would elude them forever. Bush and Blair blow trumpets? This proves something entirely unrelated to trumpet-blowing?

Soon after we invaded Iraq I found this page which nicely defines your “adhere[nce] to international law,” Mister hyphenated-last-name Pravda guy. In summary, the United Nations authorized member nations to enforce the provisions of Resolutions 687 and 678. Resolution 1441 did not call for additional deliberations or consideration by the Security Council to use force.

Let’s face it: “Illegal under international law” is nothing more than a rallying cry. It has little relation to the truth, and it is not designed to have any such relation at all. You repeat it over and over, people get riled up. Their numbers grow and their anger grows…but not quite enough to win an election. So stick a sock in it.