You know America's in Trouble...

...When, after the ChiComs do a street vendor round up to get these off the street, 600 American companies didn't hop right in and take up the slack.  Do you know where I can score an ObaMao tee?

A quick image search shows some nifty graphics, but I want the whole calligraphy thing for that authentic touch.

Previously Obscure Sib Cashes In on BO's Asia Trip

One of Barry's many half-siblings has come out with a "semi-autobiographical novel"  just in time for The One's trip to China.  It's not as disconnected as it sounds- this is the brother (we'll call him "Mark" because his other names are too hard to touch type) that lives in China. 

I found this out because I heard on Laura Ingraham this morning that Obama's handlers were gushing about the "perfect pictures" they got of Ghandi Martin Baby Jesus Obama on the Great Wall, which is the only wall he likes to visit, apparently (maybe they told him it was a campaign stop...) Anyway, I looked up the pictures on Yahoo! and found that a) Obama was not on any of its "Most Viewed," "Most Emailed," "World," "Politics" or any other list of subjects.  So I did a search.  I saw all of the pictures (yawn) but then saw something else.  When I clicked on it, this is what I read:

Obama's Half-Brother Makes a Name for Himself in China

I clicked and was transported to this Time Magazine article.  The article itself is only mildly interesting, although it cheers me to know that there's an Obama in the world who doesn't want to [exp. del.] me over because I'm a white American conservative.  More interesting was that the lead in for the news search: "Obama meets with Brother for 5 Minuutes in China." I guess Stan McChrystal should count himself lucky.  But my attention was diverted by what I guess is Time's twist on the stupid "maginifying glass" that websites are using now, where you get a snapshot of a specific topic.  Time's gimmick is to intersperse, between paragraphs, links of interest, all pointing to other Time articles.  The only problem is, the links don't really relate well to the topic at hand.  You can see examples in the article: paragraph discusses Mark's sojourn to China, helpful link asks if you want to find out more about Barack's mother.  Huh? 

So I was taken aback by this [Ndesandjo is Mark]:

Two things: The "backlashes" refer to missteps the President, Barry Jr., has committed in his political career, not the beatings Senior (or Junior, for that matter) meted out to his family, and secondly, TIME MAGAZINE HAS A TOP TEN LIST OF BARACK OBAMA'S SCREW UPS.

I nearly passed out.  I looked at the list and, because it was limited to 10, could not in any way be construed as exhaustive- more like a statistical sampling.  But it was there.

OK- back to work.  Logic beckons.

Holder On Trial, Part Deux

From MKHammer, WS Blog:

Asked by Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) if the justice department had contingency plans, should by some technicality, KSM and others not be successfully prosecuted, Holder replied:

“Failure is not an option. These are cases that have to be won. I don’t expect that we will have a contrary result.”

The answer met with audible snickers in the gallery, perhaps from those who were under the impression that the very essence of our court system is that failure to prosecute is always an option.

"Well, that's an interesting point of view," Kohl said. "And, I'll leave it at that."

This seems to be the standard line from the administration on lotsa stuff, mostly agenda items that either haven't actually happened (the seriously bogged Pelosicare,) or Afghanistan, which is in permanent freeze-frame while Obama schedules his ditherectomy,  cap'n trade, jobs jobs jobs, and Gitmo- let's not forget that! etc., and so on, ad infinitum.  And, if all else doesn't work, create a bogus metric ("created or saved") AND CHEAT ON THAT.

This reminds me of something the British schools started several years ago.  It was deemed too hurtful to tender self-esteems to fail a student, so the new parlance became "deferred success."  So, "failure"is not an option, but [indefinitely] deferred success appears to be the SOP.

Holder on Trial

In front of the Senate Judiciary committee:

Graham: Can you give me a case in United States History where a enemy combatant caught on the battlefield was tried in civilian court?

[crickets]

Holder: "Hmm... I'd have to look at that... the determination..."

STOP THE PRESSES!! YOU MEAN TO SAY THAT HE DOESN'T ALREADY KNOW?!! I guess the consultations with his wife and brother weren't extensive.**

Graham: "We're making history here, Mr. Holder, I'll answer it for you.  The answer is no. [...]"

Holder makes it clear that he doesn't really have a "protocol."  Lindsay knows what he's talking about, and it shows here.  I could do with a little less of the "You're a fine man, you care about making America safe, blah, blah, blah."

**From The Newshour:

JIM LEHRER: Who did you consult while making this decision?

ERIC HOLDER: I talked to the prosecutors in the Justice Department, prosecutors from the Department of Defense, people on the staff here at the Justice Department, people at Defense, a whole variety of people, who shared ideas, thoughts, gave cautionary ideas as well, and, using all of that, came up with the decision that we announced just earlier today.

JIM LEHRER: Did you run it by President Obama?

ERIC HOLDER: Just informed him of the decision.

He's a person who believes that a president's supposed to have hands off with his Justice Department. He's a good lawyer. And there are times when I would like to involve him maybe a little more, but his view is that, in those things that are in the province of the attorney general, all he needs to be is informed.

JIM LEHRER: So, you just told him what your decision was; you didn't say, "What do you think about it, Mr. President?"

ERIC HOLDER: Nope. Told him last night -- or had relayed to him what I was going to do last night while he was on Air Force One on his way to Asia.

JIM LEHRER: Did you talk to anybody outside the government?

ERIC HOLDER: I talked to my wife...

JIM LEHRER: Yes? OK.

ERIC HOLDER: ... about what she thought. And I actually talked to my brother, who's a retired Port Authority police officer who served...

JIM LEHRER: Oh, is that right? Yes.

ERIC HOLDER: ... in New York, New Jersey, and who lost friends and colleagues on 9/11 in the towers, and talked to them about what -- was it appropriate to bring it in New York, the symbolic significance of it, the possibility of getting a good and fair detached jury.

Just Jump In

No, I haven't been blogging elsewhere.  I've been faithful, just not productive.

What have I missed?  Let's see...

• Nadal Malik Hasan stood on a desk and shot up a room full of soldiers while shouting, "Allahu Akbar."  The FBI knew that he was seeking spiritual advice from an imam who is holing up in Yemen because he would be arrested almost anywhere else for spiritually advising people to murder the Infidels, especially the American ones.  Knowing this, and many other salient facts, our President finds Hasan's actions incomprehensible, which is fine for folks who don't think we're at war anyway.  For the rest of us, well, we're getting used to not having our feelings validated by BO.

• Eric Holder says that KSM et al will receive a fair trial and will be found guilty, because all that evidence obtained by the Pakistanis is so squeaky clean and so water-tight (sorry)  that we won't have to bring up the stuff that was obtained by "enhanced interrogation techniques" ................................ For those of you who have always wanted the American justice system to be a little more expeditious and predictable, like, say, NORTH KOREA'S, Eric Holder is your kind of guy. 

So many things wrong with the decision to try the 9/11 terrorists in New York, on American soil, that conservatives are sputtering with disbelief/opprobrium/rage.  The weird thing is, you don't have to be a conservative to wonder how Obama-Holder expect that this will a) benefit them politically and b) make America safer. [Sorry, I forgot: that's not a consideration.]

• I just watched "Special Report:" Charles Krauthammer called Obama "Baby Jesus."  I confess, I laughed out loud.  He also called Eric Holder's rationale for trying KSM in New York "incoherent."  Yup.

I'm looking for an investor.  Product idea: Obama doormats, made especially for the tender tooties of thugs, autocrats, and anyone we've bombed in the last century.

That look's like a half-pike to me.  Where's the pool? 

• Oh, then there's the saved-or-created 6 jillion jobs.  Lessee... created 600,000, but we still have 15 million unemployed workers... and then we find to our SHOCK that the first set of numbers were fudged (here's one compendium of many of documented "inaccuracies.")  This is the logical result of the government being run by people who think the best way to win an election is to have ACORN register voters and have ACORN run the census.  And who think that this is the kind of math that needs to be taught in schools.  I think it's safe to say that numbers also fall in BO's "incomprehensible" zone. UPDATE: Turns out a lot of jobs were created in congressional districts that don't even exist.  Can I be the phantom congressman who gets all those votes from newly employed people who don't actually live anywhere in the measurable time-space continuum? (I like Gregory's take, here.) This is like my favorite "Far Side" cartoon:  Caveman father is holding a tablet that is a carved report card, with his cringing cave son in front of him.  The card reads, "History: F"  Caption reads, "Huh, you so stupid you flunk something not even happen yet."

• Greg Craig got canned.  So who's in charge of closing Gitmo now?

Can we move on to completely random observations that have nothing to do with much outside my own head?  Consensus?  Great.

• Is anyone else completely creeped out by the Prius commercials that have all those people waving around? 

• Austin is 2-1/2 hours away from Ft. Hood.  The Monday after the massacre, the Austin American-Statesman ran a huge story, front page, above the fold, quarter page picture, about how area churches offered prayers and other tangible help to the affected.  If they had come to my church, they would never have known that a national tragedy had taken place in our back yard.  A couple of words mentioned in passing by the priest during a transition: that was it.  By contrast, a St. John Neumann Catholic Church, corprorate prayers were offered for all, and the sermon included a mention, condemning fanatics and remarking on the true meaning of sacrifice, along with announcements for the Veteran's Day mass with reception ("All veterans are encouraged to wear whatever part of your uniform still fits... And we'll be serving beverages that veterans like to drink in Morris Hall afterwards...")  It turns out Fr. Jim is a full Colonel in the Air Force Reserves and head of all the military chaplains in Texas.  He's 72.  A former Episcopalian.  Also a married priest.

I need to change churches.

• Speaking of which, the director of Planned Parenthood in Bryan, Texas resigned after she assisted an abortionist and actually saw the abortion on the ultrasound monitor.  She quit within a week, coincident with the "40 Days for Life" campaign that takes place in September/October.  She's Episcopalian.  I opined at the time that she would find her church less than thrill about her change of heart.  And indeed...

I need to change churches.

My arm's better. 

Tony Esolen is my new best friend.  I didn't realize he was, like, famous, when I engineered an entire college visit for my daughter just so I could meet the guy who wrote this.  I sat in on his Brit Lit class and got to listen to him recite some of John Donne's poems from memory, for example:

_

HOLY SONNETS. XIV. Batter my heart, three-person'd God ; for you As yet but knock ; breathe, shine, and seek to mend ; That I may rise, and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new. I, like an usurp'd town, to another due, Labour to admit you, but O, to no end. Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend, But is captived, and proves weak or untrue. Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain, But am betroth'd unto your enemy ; Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again, Take me to you, imprison me, for I, Except you enthrall me, never shall be free, Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

Someone pass the fan and the smelling salts.  This is major religious bodice-rippage.  Avoiding the near occasion of sin...

Off to visit Mumsy at the Home.  I'll check the weather in the western Pacific first.  Isn't it typhoon season?  We live in hope.

A Great Day For Freedom

"90 percent of life is just showing up." - Woody Allen

"Present." -Barack Obama, when it's a vote in the Illinois State Senate, or when there's a prize, or when there's a teleprompter, but not in Berlin the 9th of November, 2009.

I need help.

I don't understand this (h/t James Taranto, OpinionJournal):

(NORFOLK, Va.) In a last-ditch, against-the-odds effort to help Creigh Deeds win election as governor of Virginia next week, President Obama invoked the assistance of "Cousin Pookie."

Addressing a campaign rally for Deeds at an arena at Old Dominion University, Mr. Obama used a device that served him well during his presidential campaign – especially before African-American audiences.

"Go out and get your cousin who you had to drag to the polls last November, Cousin Pookie, you go out and get him and you tell him 'you got to vote again this time.'"

Is Cousin Pookie a general term for random relative?  Is Pookie an African-American name?  I know I haven't been keeping up with this, but a friend of mine used to send me each year's update on the most popular names in Washington, D.C., and last I checked, "Pookie" didn't make the list.  Is Pookie a guy's name?  Is it a gangsta rap name?  What: Li'l Pookie? Mos' Pookie? Or is "Pookie" just code for "This guy Deeds is a total loser.  But if you're going to vote, just make that turn around the block and vote again the way you know "Pookie" would want you to [wink!]."

There's no more room on State's face for more egg.

Tin-foil Hat Alert, Central American Edition: Manuel Zelaya, c/o "Brazilian Embassy Basement, Tegucigalpa, Honduras" has short-circuited negotiations for his reinstatement by issuing an ultimatum, to wit: "NOW!!" which wasn't met. One can forgive him his impatience: this is a yellow-tinged account of his captivity that is, to some tastes, entertaining, especially if you keep repeating to yourself, "Now this is torture!." He gets a toidy to himself, two others are reserved for his wife and "his closest aides" and the other three are shared by some forty people, including the ambassador. Nice touch: there really is tin foil. No mention of Israeli mercenaries.

But the real news is what's happening in Nicaragua. Daniel Ortega has finessed a reelection by arranging for the Nicaraguan Supreme Court to overturn the constitutional provision that bars his reelection. From the WSJ:

Last week the court's constitutional panel obliged him. The Nicaraguan press reported that the vote was held before three opposition judges could reach the chamber in time for the session. Three alternative judges, all Sandinistas, took their place and the court gave Mr. Ortega the green light. Mr. Ortega has decreed that the ruling cannot be appealed.

Officially, we are "concerned" about this turn of events. Like we were "concerned" about the elections in Iran, the invasion of Georgia, and the prospect of the White Sox making it to the World Series.

Waiting for someone to call this a coup... waiting.... waiting....