This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Barack Obama/Joe Biden

  • Huffpo nimroddery

    Some dolt who goes by the name of Ryan Grim did exactly no research or background on this article at Huffington Post about some IVAW schlubs schlepping through the halls of Congress spreading their halfwit opinions.These two IVAW members are new to me and don’t have profiles at IVAW; Brock McIntosh and Jake Diliberto. Neither has a DoD record at Military.com, so they’re probably new civilians. But this Grim guy is a dolt. He writes about Vets for Freedom;

    A new pro-war group calling itself Vets For Freedom plans to begin lobbying Congress Thursday, pushing for an escalation.

    Yeah, IVAW was formed 18 months before VFF, so VFF is a “new…group”. More than likely, Grim didn’t have the gumption or wherewithal to do a bit of googling and find out that VFF isn’t all that new. Just new to his ignorant ass. According to his bio at HuffPo Grim is “the senior congressional correspondent for the Huffington Post”. So much for any real news coming out of HuffPo’s congressional staff.

    So, master researcher Grim begins by taking shots at VFF’s Thomas Cotton with help from Diliberto;

    Diliberto went mano a mano on CNN with VFF rep Thomas Cotton. Cotton had a simple appeal to authority: He’s for whatever General Stanley McChrystal wants — and that’s more troops.

    Before they went on, says Diliberto, he could hear his opponent prepping himself. “He kept repeating, ‘General Stanley McChrystal. General Stanley McChrystal. General Stanley McChrystal.’ ”

    Backers of escalating the eight-year-old war present a variety of complex arguments, but at their heart is Cotton’s mantra: “General Stanley McChrystal. General Stanley McChrystal. General Stanley McChrystal.”

    Yeah, here’s a transcript of the interview. Cotton mentions McChrystal twice – the same number of times the interviewer, John Roberts, mentions McChrystal’s name. But that doesn’t make the pro-victory guys sound as bad as Grim likes them to sound.

    Devon Read explains his child-like understanding of the conflict in Afghanistan;

    The kind of training Afghans don’t need, the soldiers say, is military. We’ve been training young men to fight in Afghanistan for decades, they note, and look where it’s gotten us. An overwhelming number of soldiers trained by the U.S. go on to fight for the Taliban instead, which was itself originally trained by the U.S., notes Read. “So if we train 400,000 soldiers and 200,000 go fight for the Taliban, what have we gained?”

    So, their solution? Just let Afghanistan go back to being an Islamist shit hole like we did in 1988.

    I watched Diliberto on Larry King last night to get his side straight from him since I can’t trust HuffPo. I’m beginning to wonder if Diliberto is even in IVAW. Larry King says he’s a member of “Veterans for Rethinking Afghanistan” which I suspect sprang from the intellectually vacuous, Leftist navel-gazing YouTube video entitled “Rethinking Afghanistan“. So apparently, Grim didn’t even get Diliberto’s affiliation right.

    But anyway, Diliberto’s plan for Afghanistan is to send cops out to arrest and imprison al Qaeda, I guess because no one is doing that already, huh? He claims more troops won’t solve our problem. He went up against that new VFF group’s ED, Pete Hegseth and Pete wore Diliberto’s ass out. I was hoping that Larry King would have video this morning, but alas, none.

    See I don’t get this; when Shinseki said we needed more troops in Iraq, the Left said we needed to listen to Shinseki. When Petreus said we needed more troops in Iraq, the Left said it was fruitless. Now McChrystal says we need more troops in Afghanistan, no one wants to listen to the generals.

    The thing about this Larry King interview is that no one mentioned IVAW, although this DIliberto has some kind of tie to IVAW, nor did they mention that Wes Clark (who was also on the show) is on the board of VoteVets. Funny, huh?

  • Biden in Watertown

    Joe Biden, one of the Democrat leadership who had a hand in tossing Joe Lieberman from the Democrat Party, chastized Republicans for running Dede Scozzafava out of the race for Congress in New York’s 23rd District this morning, as told by the Washington Times;

    “They may not have any room for moderate views in the Republican Party upstate anymore, but let me assure you: We have room,” said Mr. Biden, said at a pre-Election Day rally for Democrat Bill Owens.

    Yeah, as long as you conform to the daily positions the Democrats adopt. Remember Jane Harmon who Nancy Pelosi denied a chairmanship because Harmon supported President Bush’s war against terrorists? Yeah, they have room.

    Mr. Biden cited the withdrawal of Ms. Scozzafava, a moderate, as proof that Republicans won’t tolerate dissent, describing Mr. Hoffman’s supporters as right-wing extremists. “This has never been a place that has embraced extremism on the left or the right,” he said.

    And how would Joe know that? How many trips has he made over the years to Jefferson and Franklin Counties, NY?

    [Dede Scozzafava’s name] sparked tremendous applause among Owens supporters on Monday here at the North Side Improvement League.

    Duh! She was more liberal than the Democrat, and then endorsed the Democrat, Bill Owens, instead of the conservative candidate, Mark Hoffman. Since it was a rally for Owens, why wouldn’t they applaud?

    Democrats at the rally on Monday decried outside involvement in the election. […] [June O’Neill, vice chair of the New York Democratic Party] added: “Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck — they don’t live here.”

    Um, neither does Joe Biden.

  • Scozzafava to NY23: Vote for the establishment

    Yeah, I kinda figured that Dede would be that sort of prick who is vindictive rather than the bigger person. Apparently, her decision to drop out of the New York’s 23rd District race was selfish – if she couldn’t win, she didn’t want to lose – so she decided to throw her voters to Bill Owens the Democrat candidate. That demonstrates to me that she wasn’t fit to represent conservatives of the district in the first place.

    Frank Rich wrote in the New York Times yesterday that “The GOP Stalinists invade New York“;

    Last week it turned out that Hoffman’s prime attribute to the radical right — as a take-no-prisoners fiscal conservative — was bogus. In fact he’s on the finance committee of a hospital that happily helped itself to a $479,000 federal earmark. Then again, without the federal government largess that the tea party crowd so deplores, New York’s 23rd would be a Siberia of joblessness. The biggest local employer is the pork-dependent military base, Fort Drum.

    Yup, Jefferson County’s largest employer is Fort Drum – no dispute here. In fact, John McHugh stayed in office for decades because he preserved the sprawling military base’s presence in the North Country. Before Mario Cuomo decimated the business climate in Upstate New York, it was home to sprawling family farms and now-dormant factories. In fact, most of Upstate New York still remembers what it was like to not depend on the whims of government largess for their future – that’s why they’re Republicans.

    EJ Dionne, in the Washington Post, tries to dispute the grassroots aspect of Hoffman’s success thus far;

    But the truth is that it was national money (notably from the conservative Club for Growth) and national muscle (from former House Majority Leader Dick Armey and Sarah Palin, among others) that prevented Scozzafava from ever having a chance.

    Yeah, except neither Armey nor Palin are elected officials anymore – like Joe Biden who is in Watertown tomorrow to campaign for Owens tomorrow. They oppose the party machine – that makes them grassroots. And I suppose that Rich wouldn’t see anything wrong with “Organizing for America” trying to convince a resident of Maryland to influence a local race in Virginia. How is that different?

    Gingrich was being the true conservative here, arguing that local party people ought to be able to choose candidates in their own jurisdictions, even if national conservatives don’t like how the locals choose. This is at least as much a victory for the inside-the-Beltway conservative machine as for grass roots conservatives.

    I guess Dionne thinks that to be a “true conservative” we have to follow the party’s instructions and vote for their choice, no matter how contrary to our views they intend to vote. Party machines in Upstate New York are the folks who inflicted Eric Massa on them. Eric Massa is the Democrat who told his voters that “I will vote adamantly against the interests of my district if I actually think what I am doing is going to be helpful. I will vote against their opinion if I actually believe it will help them.”

    That’s the type of pompous, elitist representation New York’s 23rd District would’ve had from Scozzafava. So because she’s petty prick, she throws her voters to Owens – in favor of the establishment and the political machine. That’s the way the Inside-the-Beltway folks like ’em.

    Added: Gateway Pundit says she took the advice of Chuckie Schumer. Any more speculation on why she was forced out?

  • Shocka! Obama campaign didn’t vet their candidate.

    David Plouffe, the Obama campaign manager has a book coming out early next month and George Stephanopolis released some of the more glaring admissions Plouffe makes. Probably the biggest Doh! moment is his admission that they didn’t bother to do any research on the candidate himself;

    Plouffe writes, “ …we had done zero research on our own candidate beyond a small and incomplete package from the 2004 Senate race. With this lapse, we were violating a central rule of politics – know more about yourself than your opponents and the media do. Since we had not scrubbed every quote, vote, speech, and donor of Obama’s, we knew we’d be getting questions we couldn’t foresee, unless he remembered each incident and vote precisely, we’d be scrambling to mount a defense.”

    That explains why so many people ended up under the proverbial bus and why the campaign refused to grant much access to the candidate beyond carefully scripted events.

  • My marching order for today

    Organizing for America sent me instructions today. I have five Virginia voters to call and tell them when and where to vote. Luckily, I have complete instructions on what to say and how to have a civil conversation;

    marching-orders

    I wonder why Organizing for America would want a Maryland resident to influence voters in Virginia. Or why think that a Virginian would be influenced by a Marylander, or why they think a Marylander would care about the governorship of Virginia.

    Well, excuse me, I’ve got some calling to do for Bob McDonnell.

  • A blow struck for conservatism

    Dede Scozzafava dropped out of New York’s 23rd District race for John McHugh’s vacated seat, according to the Watertown Times (found at Ace with flaming skull);

    “It is increasingly clear that pressure is mounting on many of my supporters to shift their support. Consequently, I hereby release those individuals who have endorsed and supported my campaign to transfer their support as they see fit to do so. I am and have always been a proud Republican. It is my hope that with my actions today, my party will emerge stronger and our district and our nation can take an important step towards restoring the enduring strength and economic prosperity that has defined us for generations.

    “On Election Day my name will appear on the ballot, but victory is unlikely. To those who support me – and to those who choose not to – I offer my sincerest thanks. Dede.”

    So with Joe Biden making an appearance in Watertown with Democrat Bill Owens on Monday, victory is all but assured for Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman.

    I think that was the bravest thing Scozzafava could have done and I commend her…braver still would be the Republican Party supporting Hoffman unconditionally like the Conservative Party of New York has unconditionally supported countless Republican candidates since the Conservative Party was founded in 1962. Since their founding, no Republican has won the governorship of New York without the endorsement of the Conservative party. Now it’s time to return the favor. I’m sure that’s what influenced George Pataki to endorse Hoffman yesterday – now for the rest of the GOP to follow suit.

  • Bloom is off the rose

    USAToday reports that Hillary Clinton, our Secretary of State, decided to get tough with Pakistan one of our strongest allies in the near east;

    “I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn’t get them if they really wanted to,” Clinton said in an interview with Pakistani journalists in Lahore. “Maybe that’s the case. Maybe they’re not gettable. I don’t know.”

    I wonder how tough she’ll be when she talks to Iran – you know someone with whom we should be tough. She defended her comments on television this morning;

    “I wanted to get that out on the table, because the Pakistanis have talked about a trust deficit and it’s a two-way street,” Clinton said in an interview shown on NBC’s “Today Show.” “We have questions, they have questions.”

    Yeah, because at this point neither side knows how much they can trust each other. The Pakistanis don’t want to hang their collective neck out when they know that the US Left will pull the rug out from under them at any minute for no good reason other than their feelings.

    Over the last few days, I’ve watched Clinton get tough with the Afghans and the Pakistanis, but they tread lightly around Iran and Korea…you know, the folks that want to wipe us out.

    Clinton was asked about American commitment to the war against terror;

    “What guarantee,” the woman asked, “can Americans give Pakistan that we can now trust you — not you but, like, the Americans this time — of your sincerity and that you guys are not going to betray us like the Americans did in the past when they wanted to destabilize the Russians?”

    Clinton responded that the question was a “fair criticism” and that the U.S. did not follow through in the way it should have. “It’s difficult to go forward if we’re always looking in the rearview mirror,” said Clinton, on the second day of a three-day visit, her first to Pakistan as secretary of State.

    Well, that’s not an answer. That’s not reassuring. It tells me that this administration will reevaluate their commitment on a daily basis – probably using polls. Like Clinton’s husband did with Haiti, Somalia…and Afghanistan. Oh, sorry…I looked through that rearview mirror again.

  • Yeah, we’re the ones with a problem

    This is from Firedog Lake’s Blue Texan. When I read it, I thought about the commenter here that said no matter what he does, we’ll never like Obama. Apparently, you guys like Obama enough for the rest of us;

    fdl-bds

    Yeah, Obama makes ONE trip to Dover so he’s automatically a better President than Bush was. OK. that’s your opinion, but at least get the whole quote from the Stars and Stripes interview instead of picking words out;

    President Bush has met hundreds of families of fallen soldiers, but he has yet to attend a servicemember’s funeral, he said Tuesday.

    “Because which funeral do you go to? In my judgment, I think if I go to one I should go to all. How do you honor one person but not another?” he said.

    The appropriate way to express his appreciation to the family members of fallen troops is to meet with them in private, he said.

    I get the feeling that the Left is feeling a bit wee-wee’d up from the embarrassment of the media’s tongue bath of the President so they’ve turned to out-dorking the media. Even Alan Colmes joins in;

    colmes-bds

    To be truthful, I appreciate the President going to Dover, but taking the press corp with him is fairly disgusting. The media’s behavior reporting the event is laughable – one photo opportunity at Dover doesn’t make him a leader, or even thoughtful.

    In my opinion, he’s setting us up for a disappointment in Afghanistan.