Because We Can

Now this is interesting. In the Clinton presidential library there is an “Impeachment Exhibit” which has been roundly criticized by the former President’s opponents and questioned even by his allies for the self-pitying overtone playing out therein. Surprisingly, nowadays much of the “Move On” argument rests on this quote from Newt Gingrich. This Washington Times piece gives as good an overview as any other I can find:

The former president, in exhibits he approved, repeatedly castigates Newt Gingrich…assert[ing] that the former House speaker led a cabal of radical right-wing “revolutionaries” bent on destroying Mr. Clinton for one reason: “Because we can.”

This is new stuff. I remember a lot of arguments from six years ago about how President Clinton’s transgressions were not such a big deal, it was time to “move on”, he lied in response to a question about private matters that were nobody’s business so it didn’t count, etc. etc. etc. Newt Gingrich’s incriminating statement, as I recall, was mentioned briefly in some glossy magazine article. Maybe it was Newsweek. Certainly, the bulk of the “Move On” school of thought was not resting on this, as it apparently does today.

Maureen Dowd brings to this situation a delicious piece of irony, and I don’t know if she’d be willing to do so if she understood the ultimate effect of the irony. Mister Clinton had started this crisis in the first place, thereby placing himself in the situation he was in, because he himself had done something – for no other reason than because he could.

In his “60 Minutes” interview, Bill Clinton calls his intern idyll “a terrible moral error,” illuminating “the darkest part of his inner life.”

“I did something for the worst possible reason,” he told Dan Rather about his march of folly with Monica.

“Just because I could. I think that’s just about the most morally indefensible reason anybody could have for doing anything.”

Just because he could. What a world of meaning is packed into that simple phrase.

His “could” reflects a selfish “Who’s gonna stop me?” power move, stemming from a droit du seigneur attitude, as opposed to “should,” signifying obligation, or “must,” indicating compulsion.

The former president engaged in a relationship of choice, not necessity. As a friend of mine explains:

“It’s a guy thing. We’re not likely to get up off the couch if we don’t have to. We might cheat with a chick who just happens to be there if we feel we could get away with it.”

In his memoirs, Clinton complains about Republican droit du seigneur, writing that impeachment was driven neither by “morality” nor “the rule of law” but, as Newt Gingrich said: “Because we can.”

I don’t think Dowd is trying to be ironic — just yet anyway. The quotes all belong to others, her narrative is minimal at this point and what she’s trying to do is build a recognition of what all is going on before she uses the last part of the column commenting on it. But I find it interesting that Speaker Gingrich is supposed to be engaging in something “immoral” for doing something just because he could, when what he’s doing is prosecuting a higher authority figure who got in trouble for doing something just because he could.

A President can do a lot more things than a House Speaker. If it’s wrong for the Speaker to do things just because he can, isn’t a greater danger posed when our President is doing things just because he can? Mr. Clinton’s argument as I understand it, which Ms. Dowd apparently supports, is that you should have a moral red flag of sorts being raised when you find out about someone in a position of power doing things just because they can. The Jurassic Park theory, okay I can buy into that. All right then…if you buy into the argument that Newt Gingrich is some kind of force of cosmic evil, and the “because we can” comment is representative of this, doesn’t the whole affair then seem like a case of just desserts? Blaming Newt suddenly becomes about as morally high-handed and well-advised as blaming…something like gravity.

There is something else however. The Clinton/Dowd moral red flag test, itself, is something I find to be problematic especially when we discuss authority figures within & the constitutional structure of the United States. People should not do things just because they can. There has to be some kind of higher calling. What’s this?

You might say the pilgrims left England and fled to this continent because they had to, but that would be a matter of opinion. It would be just as legitimate to say they did it because they could.

You might say the Founding Fathers declared our independence because in the situation they faced they had no choice. It would be just as legitimate to say they did it because they could.

In fact, because I can strikes to the very heart of motive for any profit-making venture, and America has been built on these, one at a time, as a house is built on bricks.You might say Alexander Graham Bell had to invent the telephone or he did it to help people. You might say Thomas Alva Edison invented electric lighting on an altruistic quest to promote the public good. You might say Henry Ford invented the automobile simply to help his fellow man. I’d lay even odds, though, that if you could bring these guys back from the grave they’d say they did it because they could.

In fact, without bothering to research the issue too deeply I’d speculate that a lot of what is good about America, would be washed away in a heartbeat if we were to repeat history solemnly dedicated to ensuring that nobody ever undertook any task, large or small, if they were doing it just because they could. The Dowd/Clinton red-flag test, from where I sit, looks decidedly un-American and, well, more than a little bit red. Come to think of it, in my own personal life, things I did because they were the right things to do, have simply kept a bad situation from getting worse. Things I did because someone told me to do them, simply preserved my reputation as a can-do guy on whom people can depend, when the chips are down. It’s not that I’ve done much stuff that is overwhelmingly positive or has made life significantly better for myself or somebody else – but those few things, are things I did because I could, every single one of them. All…um…six, or four, or three or whatever.

My gut feel is that anyone who examines the past events in their own life, if they do it honestly they’ll have to come to the same conclusion. Something deep to think about.

Beer can insulation

A Russian man who collects beer cans has turned his collection to practical use.

He is using them as insulation after his wife told him: “Either the cans go or I do”, reports Pravda.

Anatoly Tupitsin, from Davidovka, said: “I suppose she was right, every room was full of cans and there was not much space for us.

“But now I have solved the problem by using them to cover the walls of the house and they have proved excellent insulation.”

Marine Rushes From Iraq After Wife Shot

A Marine serving in a war zone in Iraq rushed back home to be with his pregnant wife Friday after she was wounded in an apparent random shooting in a supermarket parking lot

Authorities said Julia Cook, who had been living with her parents in Mannsville, N.Y., while awaiting the birth of her son, was apparently in the wrong place at the wrong time. She was visiting high school friends Sunday night when someone opened fire with a shotgun, then drove away.

Noel Gomez, 19, arrested six hours later, told detectives he decided ahead of time on a location where he wanted to kill someone, according to his arrest affidavit. He is jailed without bond, charged with attempted homicide, aggravated assault and reckless endangerment.

Mothers, Cover Your Childrens’ Eyes!

Horror of horrors! Did you know Hooters was not the only one? “Hooters earns more than $750 million a year from nearly 400 restaurants and that success has inspired a host of copycats.” Who knows how many sports bar establishments there are out there, parading around their nice-looking young females in clothes that don’t cover them from head to toe? It’s a plague! Texas has a whorehouse in it, Lord have mercy on my soul! We got trouble right here in river city! Your precious little babums who will be plenty old enough to lift a glass of beer, rent a moving van, get sued and get his ass blown off in Iraq two years from now, might see a pretty girl.

Don’t just sit there, do something!

Goodbye Ted Rall

Get ready for a whole bunch of weeping about the First Amendment by liberals who can’t even begin to understand it. The Washington Post has fired Ted Rall.

Different Rules

Two weeks ago we had an election in which The American People re-elected their Democratic President and overwhelmingly rejected the Republicans, and the whole bible-thumping, conservative, hate-mongering agenda, which has no respect for people as individuals and your right to personally manage your life as you see fit. Republicans have responded like the little boy who is told he can’t bring his pet frog on the family vacation, and responds by torching the car – sailing into the Thanksgiving vacation venting their spleen with righteous anger, calling the electorate “stupid” and coming up with unflattering stereotypes about the people who turned out to vote against them. To top it all off, now that our Democratic President has shown his bravery and integrity by nominating a black woman to be Secretary of State, the Republicans have come out with vicious, racist attacks, reminiscent of Reconstruction era, against both the President and the nominee.

Oops, sorry. I got my parties backwards again. You can tell this because if it was the Republicans who were acting like racist pukes, you wouldn’t need a web log to read about it. The story would be everywhere.

Radio host calls Rice “Aunt Jemima”

Abridged text follows…

MILWAUKEE — A radio talk show host drew criticism Thursday after calling Condoleezza Rice an “Aunt Jemima” and saying she isn’t competent to be secretary of state.

John Sylvester, the program director and morning personality on WTDY-AM in Madison, said in a phone interview Thursday that he used the term on Wednesday’s show to describe Rice and other blacks as having only a subservient role in the Bush administration.

Sylvester, who is white, also referred to Powell as an “Uncle Tom” – a contemptuous term for a black whose behavior toward whites is regarded as fawning or servile.

He said Thursday night that he was referring to remarks by singer and civil rights activist Harry Belafonte that the price of admittance for blacks to the Bush White House was subservience.

The station’s corporate office received about 100 calls about his comments, Sylvester said.

He added that he has a long history of commitment to civil rights and has supported Madison’s black community.

He said he was planning a giveaway on Friday’s show of Aunt Jemima pancake mix and syrup. “I will apologize to Aunt Jemima,” he said.

This stuff is unbelievable. It just goes to show when you think your cause is righteous, never again do you have to be “right”. I mean, you know, correct. I don’t understand why any minority, or anyone who seeks to advance the causes of minorities, ever puts up with it.

Sacramento News & Review on Hooters

Same comments as the one I made, more or less, put in a different way. This commentary was printed back in June in our local free liberal nutbag rag, Sacramento News & Review.

See? Tighty-righties and lefty-loosies can find common ground after all.

For the record, the readership of SN&R had a lot to say on the subject as well. Most of their letters can be found in the issue that appeared the following week.

The common theme about “it’s right next to a school” is something I find terribly disturbing. A great multitude of parents out there, it would appear, are much more concerned about bringing up their children in a sheltered environment, than they are about educating their children about the world around them & making sure the kids have what it takes to be an adult when adulthood comes around to knock the kids on their asses. It brings to mind a conversation I heard yesterday morning in my commute, regarding the trouble ABC has gotten into for airing “Saving Private Ryan” uncut.

Saving Private Ryan, uncut, is pretty rough stuff so I can understand the concern. But play this conversation (paraphrased) in your mind. Mother calls up and says ABC is squarely in the wrong; she tries to keep an eye on what her kid watches on TV, is extremely vigilant about this. Nevertheless, Private Ryan flew under her radar. Now the boy has nightmares.

Yeah, that’s right, it could be a significant problem. How old are we talking about here?

Fifteen.

Okay, say the hosts…well, your point is well taken but, uh, fifteen is a little bit seasoned to be waking up with nightmares isn’t it? Has your son had what we would call a sheltered life?

Mother giggles. Yeah. Tee hee.

The subject changed and the hosts of the program did NOT pursue this like a pit bull on a pant leg, as I would have. As long as we’re all getting terribly concerned about things that are rightfully decided in private, like, shall I have a cold brew and eat a bucket of wings & look at some orange shorts – let’s get terribly concerned about THIS. Your kid watching a movie is cause for concern. Your kid not being able to handle minor jolts like this, at FIFTEEN, is a “tee hee.”

Excuse me. Fifteen is between 25 and 36 months away from eighteen. That’s signing up for enlistment if he should so choose…enrolling in Selective Service whether he chooses to or not…taking out loans, writing checks, moving away, getting lost, getting sued, and so on.

I think my childhood was pretty damn sheltered. But by twelve I was delivering newspapers and mowing lawns for money, going on LONG hikes way up in the mountains. WAY up. As in, yes, kids sometimes get lost and die. My scoutmaster was the outdoor type; fortunately, he knew what he was doing and the worst never befell us in all those years. My point is, we really didn’t have room for kids who inwardly lacked the natural mechanisms to cope with unseen adversity. It would have been potentially fatal. Candidates showed up for hikes of this duration, and WERE turned away if they were thought not tough enough.

What the very young men are doing in Fallujah, fills me with hope about the generations coming up. But mothers like this, and the writers of these letters to SN&R, fill me with dread.

In parenthood, when exactly did “filtering” become so much more important than “seasoning”?

The Making of the Christian-Jihadist Myth

Not that I’ve stopped to measure, but I’d be willing to bet important appendages I’ve heard the words “Christian” and “Evangelical” several times more in the last two weeks than I did in the ten months before that. I know exactly why that is, but it’s always helpful to understand a little bit more about how this squares with the truth.

Gonna Need Some Help On This One

The headline is “Right-wing moralists launch censor war”. The most striking passage from the article is “There�s a climate of intimidation, especially in response to the election. It�s a new kind of cold war, and it comes from the top, from George Bush and Karl Rove.”

While I have practically unlimited respect for pinhead liberal college professors at U of W, simply put, I defy anyone to find any evidence to support what is being claimed by the pinhead quoted here, or for that matter the thesis of the overall article. The FCC, I’m led to believe, is awash in complaints about this that & the other, because George W. Bush has been re-elected. Hey, pinhead article-writer guy. George Bush has been the President for four years now…Janet Jackson just had a scandal involving her boobie. You don’t think the boobie scandal could have kicked something off here do you? Something partisan-neutral perhaps? No, that wouldn’t fit your prejudices very well.

I wonder if you’ve got something to support this train of thought…maybe some memorandums from 1973 written in Times New Roman font perhaps?

How To Protest

Yeah I have a real life, with a job & everything, but I still think I’m fairly well connected to what’s going on in the world. Nevertheless, if someone has figured out what this bozo was protesting about, it’s news to me. I have no clue what his beef was. None.

So if you’re going to protest, I wouldn’t suggest going for the “setting yourself on fire in front of the White House” route. It doesn’t seem to pan out too well.

To Do

We’re Not Not Sorry?

The “We’re Not Sorry” web page I mentioned on November 13, see below, is no longer working. It’s a liberal conspiracy, I tells ye.

Just kidding.

The Book That Was Never Written

It pleases me greatly that this carries a creation date of April 3 and a posting date soon after that. The subject is that Kerry’s candidacy was doomed, from at least the timeframe I wrote this up if not long before, owing to his failure to sell us anything. That’s essentially the same thing Mr. Miniter (see below) is writing about today.

Give it a once-over. In April it looked, to some, kind of silly. Nowadays, dare I say so myself, it looks…kind of…spooky. No applause, just money.

————

George W. Bush�s poll numbers are doing well. You can tell this because very few news outlets are talking about polls anymore. From here on, his approval ratings may go up or down. But I�m done questioning what will happen this year. His re-election has been won; I�ve known this for some time.

It�s not because of the War on Terror, which sometimes goes well and sometimes doesn�t. It�s not because of the economy, which sometimes looks good and sometimes doesn�t. It�s because of what John Kerry has not done yet. What he can�t do.

It�s a book he hasn�t written.

Each man, successfully toppling a sitting U.S. President in this century, has written this book. Indeed, you could make the argument you can�t become President under any circumstances without writing this book. The book need not be published; it need not be put down on paper, let alone bound, copied or distributed. But it must exist. This is vital.

The Table of Contents looks like this:

1. We have a problem.
2. You will elect me.
3. I�m going to do this thing.
4. The thing I�m going to do will have this effect�
5. Problem solved.

Some Democrats, who make a great deal more money than I ever will by handing out advice I�m not smart enough to conceive, fail to grasp this. George W. Bush is popular because he�s written this book. Democrats have countered this move, overly confident that their defenses are adequate, by simply disagreeing. No, tax cuts do not stimulate the economy. No, taking Hussein down has not made the world a safer place. No, Al Qaeda has not weakened since September 11, 2001. No, no, no.

To the suggestion that they are overly cozy with the academic world and with the printed news media, liberals respond the same way: No. They are oblivious to the morsel of solid logic stating that if they weren�t so drunk on the elixir of media partnership, they would not be so drunk on the elixir of No. The �N� word offers no potential whatsoever as a logical argument or counter-argument, but it offers all the potential in the world as ammunition for propaganda machines, surrounding an enemy, firing rapidly from multiple directions at once. That is the only effective purpose of an argument consisting entirely of the word No; to disseminate it with the �Big Lie� technique. There is no other purpose for it, no other use.

Jimmy Carter, now recognized universally as a spectacular failure as our 39th President, by getting elected in the first place succeeded in one area where even Bill Clinton failed. He wrote the book, cover to cover. He had strong statements for all five chapters of the book. Clinton is widely recognized as a political Rudolph, lighting the way for the Democrats to figure out how to get into the White House at a time when they didn�t even know how to do it. History may record him as more of a lemming than a reindeer.

Clinton�s plot holes in Chapter 4 left the story a little thin. �I�m going to raise taxes on the wealthy and make new programs�the economy, now the worst in fifty years, will do better.� Conservatives and moderates protested incredulously, their sentiments echoing Churchill�s remark about the man standing in the bucket. How, Gov. Clinton, can that man lift himself by the handle? Democrats, to the best I can remember today, did nothing to intellectually counter this, although Churchill�s metaphor has stood the test of time and makes good logical sense. Clinton won, so they must have known best, right?

Chapter 4 is disposable? Candidates can connect their proposed actions to any outcome they want, willy-nilly? Clinton did it so everyone can do it?

That�s what the Kerry campaign appears to think, but if I worked there, I�d be scared. Clinton had personal charisma. I�ve never met the man; but I�ve never heard of anyone who did meet him, failing to comment in superlative ways about his personality. He is larger than life. He lights up the room. He makes you feel like he cares about you. When he talks to you, you feel like you�re the most important person in the world.

Has anyone ever said this about John Kerry? Anything even remotely like that?

Ah, but Kerry has the War on Terror to crusade against. Some people are very angry about the War on Terror. Doesn�t that give Kerry a chance?

It could�but here�s why he�s going down. It�s not even going to be close. I don�t care if the Dow tumbles by 1,000 points, or if gas soars to nine dollars a gallon. Kerry will lose, and here is why.

Clinton left some holes in Chapter 4. With regard to the War on Terror Kerry hasn�t even written anything after Chapter Two!

That�s right. The Kerry campaign�s message is �we are engaged in a war that is illegal and unethical, vote for Kerry.� That�s it. President Kerry will do�what, exactly? Withdraw? I don�t know that for sure. Seek a bigger role for the United Nations? Is that really doing something? What will that do? Is the strategy really to compete in a �popularity contest� so that those who are willing to die to take out Americans will start liking us? Or at least not hate us so much? Is that the plan? I don�t know.

Does anybody know?

The Bush campaign has raised the specter of a Massachusetts Senator who is as reliable in his convictions as a bouncing football. That has been a shrewd and effective strategy for the White House, but the capricious, fickle positioning day-to-day of Senator Kerry is simply a side issue. On what to do with our domestic and foreign-relations challenges, Kerry really hasn�t issued a position about which he could change his mind. He�s running on �This really sucks; vote for me.�

Nobody in modern times has become our President on such a platform. This election�s over.

Don’t Look Back

Brendan Miniter writes, today, in OpinionJournal on the reason why Democrats got PWN3D in this election:

What Americans will not tolerate is pessimism, defeatism and stagnation. It’s not for nothing that Jimmy Carter’s presidency ended amid an era of “stagflation.” When Mr. Carter put a sweater on in the Oval Office and told Americans to get ready to start accepting less, he might as well have resigned. Ronald Reagan won the presidency in a landslide in 1980, promising a brighter, better and stronger America. Four years later he won in a walk talking about “morning in America.”

He sounds a lot like me about eight months ago. Republican or Democrat, you cannot win the Presidency unless you sell something. Many a time over the last eight months it looked like the pattern was going to be broken. I was never worried. I bet my hair on Bush. A lot of Bush supporters started cheering for the other guy just to see what I’d look like bald, but they came away disappointed and I knew they would, because Kerry hadn’t sold anything.

A man with a plan…versus…a man with a sweater. It’s no contest. That’s American politics for you. Open your case of goods and show us what you got, Mister Salesman, or get off our porch.

Know Your Nobel Peace Prize Winning Terrorist Thugs

Muhammad Abdel Rahman Abdel Rauf al-Qudwa al-Husseini was born in Egypt in 1929, the fifth child of a well-to-do merchant. He was educated in Cairo. After his mother’s death when he was four, he lived at least part of the time with an uncle in Jerusalem. Yasser Arafat, this is your life.

Secretary of State to Resign

Top State Department officials say Secretary of State Colin Powell has announced his resignation from President George W. Bush’s cabinet. Officials say Powell has told his aides that he intends to leave once Bush settles on his successor.

The White House is preparing an announcement on Powell. Powell reportedly handed in his resignation Friday. But the president has not yet accepted his resignation.

More…

I’m so sorry…

You’ve heard of the Sorry Everybody web page?

Help is on the way. There is a We’re Not Sorry counterpart to it. Hat tip to Neal Boortz.

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.