Listen to the words of John Kerry and his attitude about the military. Kerry makes the assumption that many liberals make that Iraq is filled with soldiers who couldn't do anything else, the military was their only option. But that is not the case, many in the military have some kind of college education. In fact, don't people go into the reserves to pay for college?
"Senator Kerry not only owes an apology to those who are serving, but also to the families of those who've given their lives in this," White House press secretary Tony Snow said. "This is an absolute insult."
Kerry, a decorated Vietnam veteran and Bush's rival in 2004, fired back, saying the president and his administration are the ones who owe U.S. troops an apology because they "misled America into war and have given us a Katrina foreign policy that has betrayed our ideals, killed and maimed our soldiers, and widened the terrorist threat instead of defeating it."
"This is the classic GOP playbook," Kerry said in a harshly worded statement. "I'm sick and tired of these despicable Republican attacks that always seem to come from those who never can be found to serve in war, but love to attack those who did. I'm not going to be lectured by a stuffed suit White House mouthpiece standing behind a podium.
And since making it sound like a political attack isn't working, he's floating the idea it was a joke about Bush:
A source close to Kerry tells NBC News that he was trying to make a "tough and honest joke" about Bush and that in the process he omitted two words which changed the intended meaning. Per the source, Kerry meant to say that he can't "overstress the importance of a great education" and that "if you don't study, if you aren't smart, if you're intellectually lazy... You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq." Kerry mistakenly dropped the "getting us" from his initial remarks.
Yes, I'm buying that, how about you? Just admit it, you have a low view of the education level of the military. It was a snotty joke about the military and spoke volumes about your view of the troops. And notice how the MSM are trying to dig him out of this mess? Very telling.
This is just amazing, I guess we will have to prepare ourselves for more of these stories:
According to the Assyrian website ankawa.com, a 14 year old Christian Assyrian boy, Ayad Tariq, from Baqouba, Iraq was decapitated at his work place on October 21.
Ayad Tariq was working his 12 hour shift, maintaining an electric generator, when a group of disguised Muslim insurgents walked in at the beginning of his shift shortly after 6 a.m. and asked him for his ID.
According to another employee who witnessed the events, and who hid when he saw the insurgents approach, the insurgents questioned Ayad after seeing that his ID stated "Christian", asking if he was truly a "Christian sinner." Ayad replied "yes, I am Christian but I am not a sinner." The insurgents quickly said this is a "dirty Christian sinner!" Then they proceeded to each hold one limb, shouting "Allahu akbar! Allahu akbar!" while beheading the boy.
My heart hurts for this one, I can't imagine what his family must be going through. Please join me in praying for his family.
He made an ad for a bill he hasn't even read and he slandered a candidate in the process and then he accuses Caviezel of not knowing what he's talking about:
Stephanopoulos: In the ad now running in Missouri, Jim Caviezel speaks in Aramaic. It means, "You betray me with a kiss." And his position, his point, is that actually even though down in Missouri they say the initiative is against cloning, it's actually going to allow human cloning.
Fox: Well, I don't think that's true. You know, I campaigned for Claire McCaskill. And so I have to qualify it by saying I'm not qualified to speak on the page-to-page content of the initiative. Although, I am quite sure that I'll agree with it in spirit, I don't know, I— On full disclosure, I haven't read it, and that's why I didn't put myself up for it distinctly.
But I've made this point before, and I really am sincere in it, that anybody who's prayed on this, and thought about it, and really considered it and can't get their mind around or their heart around the idea of embryonic stem cell research, I'd go to war for your right to believe that. And you're right to feel that. I respect it. I truly do.
And if Stephanopoulos was a real journalist he would have read from the bill at this point.
Oh, and as an added bonus, there's this:
Stephanopoulos: Do you think there's any way to finally find common ground with people who do believe in the end that this is tampering with tiny lives?
Fox: Well, again, the point has been made that these lives are going to be thrown away, anyway. They are marked for destruction — thousands of frozen embryos that are a byproduct of in vitro fertilization. We have routinely, before this conversation started on stem-cell research, we have for years thrown them away.
And that's the other thing, you know, this idea of snowflake babies: We're in favor of that. The truth of the matter is that it is only going to account for a tiny fraction—
Tampering with tiny lives??? Can't bring yourself to say, killing? There is no compromise, it's either death or not, redefinition won't change that.
There is no law in this country against fetal stem cell research. If it were as successful as people claimed, then many companies would be doing research in this field and we wouldn't need the government to foot the bill.
“In order to make the Wren Chapel less of a faith-specific space, and to make it more welcoming to students, faculty, staff and visitors of all faiths, the cross has been removed from the altar area,” Engimann said.
The cross will be returned to the altar for those who wish to use it for events, services or private prayer. Student tour guides have been directed to pass any questions or complaints about the change on to administrators.
The cross was in place because of the College’s former association with the Anglican Church. Though the College is now nondenominational and became publicly supported in 1906, the room will still be considered a chapel.
This is why people are becoming less tolerant of religion, it's being driven out of the public eye, into a private space where only those who find it tolerable are able to view it. This makes us quicker to say, "Remove it, it offends me."
If they intended to use the space for something else, maybe they might want to stop calling it a chapel since that word has a specific meaning. According to The Free Dictionary, the word "chapel" is defined as:
a. A place of worship that is smaller than and subordinate to a church. b. A place of worship in an institution, such as a prison, college, or hospital. c. A recess or room in a church set apart for special or small services. d. A place of worship for those not belonging to an established church.
After all they are a college and should set the example of using words properly.
I've always found Camille Paglia to be a thoughtful and intelligent feminist. And I agree with some of her insights, not all because I think she's wrong on the war in Iraq but I think her critique of her party and her understanding of culture is spot on:
That leads to the next topic -- the Democrats. They look like they're facing a breakthrough midterm election, but what about 2008?
I was so distressed when I heard that Mark Warner had dropped out of the presidential race. I thought he was going to bring fresh blood into the primaries. Are we really left with the same old tired nags and with robo-Hillary leading the pack? It's extremely discouraging because we would have won the last election if we'd had a better candidate than John Kerry, with his droning hauteur and his Boston-run campaign that made one gaffe after another. It was very close because the country was already getting tired of the Iraq war.
But what candidate do we have to offer when national security is the No. 1 item on the front burner? Democrats became so distracted by their focus on domestic issues over the past 25 years that they're weak on national defense. I started talking about this when I was trying to reform feminism in the early '90s: If we want a woman president, we need to start training ambitious young women not in women's studies, with its myths of universal male oppression and female victimage, but rather in military history and national security issues. That's why Hillary, after she arrived in the Senate, began doing her homework by getting on the Armed Services Committee. But my generation of baby-boom Democrats hasn't done much deep thinking about international issues except in terms of postmodernist fragmentation or fuzzy, smiley-face multiculturalism. We desperately need better candidates.
As for Warner's departure helping John Edwards' candidacy -- good Lord, that guy is such a lightweight! Are we really going to put America's national security in Edwards' hands? He has no relevant experience whatsoever. [...]
You expect Republicans to be Brahmins, to be self-interested and not affected necessarily by the decisions they make – it's really part of their appeal. Don't you think Democrats' alliance with moneyed elites hurts them more than the GOP?
The Democrats' portrayal of Republicans as fat cats out of touch with ordinary Americans just doesn't fly anymore, and they should drop it. I think the center of the Republican Party really is small-businessmen and very practical people who correctly see that it's job creation and wealth creation that sustain an economy -- not government intervention and government control, that suffocating nanny-state mentality. The Democrats are in some sort of time warp in always proposing a government solution to every problem. It's like Hillary's philosophy that it takes a village to raise a child. Well, does it? Or does it take a strong family and not the village?
What's broadened the appeal of conservatism in recent years is that Republicans stress individualism -- individual effort and personal responsibility. They're really the liberty party now -- I thought my party was! It used to seem as if the Republicans were authoritarians and the Democrats were for free speech and for the freedom to live your own life and pursue happiness. But the Democrats have wandered away from their own foundational principles.
[...]
It seems like religion has never been a bigger issue in American politics, recognized on both sides of the aisle as something that needs to be addressed. Have the Democrats changed the longtime Republican characterization of them as godless?
Well, as long as the Democrats are perceived as the anti-religion party, we're going to lose the culture wars. That's why Hillary has made such a show of churchgoing and wearing crucifixes -- even while there seems to be little connection between her Christian ideals and her backstage activities as a politician and money raiser. But religion is absolutely central to this country in ways that Europe's secularized intellectuals fail to understand. I'm speaking here as an atheist who studies religion and respects it enormously. In the history of mankind, the benefits that religion has brought to society in shaping behavior and moral choice are overwhelming in comparison to the negatives, which anyone can list -- like religious wars and bigotry. Without religion, we'd have anarchy.
Religion is also a metaphysical system that honors the largeness of the universe. It's that sense of largeness, which my generation used to call cosmic consciousness, that is missing in the cynical ideologies promoted by the elite universities -- like post-structuralism, which is obsessed with politics and language and has a depressingly debased view of human experience. Post-structuralism doesn't see the stars or the enormity of nature, which for religious people symbolizes God's power. So I think that the constant sniping at religion coming from liberal Democrats is really a dead end.
But there's reason for alarm at the right-wing intertwining of religion and politics, where the Bible is seen as the prophetic master plan of the universe and where Israel as the Holy Land must be protected at all costs from Muslim infiltration -- duplicating the agenda of the medieval crusades. But to claim, as Democrats often do, that there has always been a separation of church and state in America is misleading: The U.S. simply has no official state religion. The formative influence in our intellectual heritage came from Puritan dissidents in New England. Major universities like Harvard and Yale were founded on religious principles.
The more liberal parents are, the less contact their children have with religious ideas. That will surely disable our future American leaders from being able to understand the religious commitment of Islamic fundamentalists. Liberal journalists often seem incredulous about how anyone would seek death for religious principles. But that was the entire history of early Christianity, when the saints willingly sought martyrdom. We're heading into that world again.
What do contemporary intellectuals have to offer anyhow? What passionate engagement do they have to appeal to young people? Liberal secularism has become bourgeois and materialistic. It's snide, elitist, and politically marginalized. The chattering class clearly has no effect whatever on decision-making in Washington. Conservative radio hosts have been claiming that liberal criticism of Bush's decisiveness in invading Iraq mirrors the shilly-shallying of 1930s intellectuals during Hitler's rise. The intellectuals, with their cultivated internationalism, always counsel procrastination and leave it to the men of action to deal forcefully with fascist regimes.
Of course Democrats are genuinely divided about how we should proceed. There are people like me who want immediate withdrawal of all American forces from Iraq. Every war goes on and on because more and more blood has to be spilled to prove the value of the lives already lost. It's an endless cycle of insanity. Withdrawal would probably plunge Iraq into civil war, and the Democrats don't want to be blamed for the blood bath. But it's going to be nasty whether we stay or go.
I doubt withdrawal has ever been a possibility for this administration. Bush sees Iraq as a staging station to safeguard the oil fields by democratizing the Middle East. Our military bases may be permanently planted in Iraq. It will require a very strong and visionary future president of either party to get us out of this mess.
I think she is right, that women who want to be president should spend time in our military. That is a brilliant idea because they will be Commander in Chief and would need a working knowledge of the military.
And she admits something that many atheists wouldn't, that the world needs religion. This flies in the face of someone like Dawkins who believes that we shouldn't be allowing children to be brought up to follow their parent's religion:
Dawkins does not merely disagree with religious myths. He disagrees with tolerating them, with cooperating in their colonization of the brains of innocent tykes.
This ad is pretty good, it answers the charge that Michael Steele isn't for stem cell research. His sister has MS. People shouldn't throw stones, until they see who they are attempting to hit (in other words, do your research Democrats before you slander your opponent).
And here is a funny ad aimed at the fact that Menendez is under "federal criminal investigation."
MATTHEWS: Well maybe because I've spent so much of my life in New Jersey... but you know, I have to tell you Charlie, it's an ethnic ad. Whatever else it is, it's an ethnic ad. It's about Italians in New Jersey, it's about the mob. Tying Menendez into Torricelli. They're closing the loop, they're making their point, and that has been politics in that state for years, between the WASPy people like Christie Todd Whitman and the Keans, father and son, running against the ethnic people, they tied it all together: If you're ethnic, you're a crook, right?
I downloaded Firefox 2.0 last night and I'm really happy so far. I found out that it does the most amazing thing. What's the one thing that would be really nice to have when you are leaving a comment on someone's blog or on your own blog? A spell checker!!! Yes, it red lines spelling mistakes when you are in the comment editor and in the post editor. Red lining spelling mistakes is so much better than having to use a spell checker since it's so easy to forget to hit the spell checker before posting. With red lining, you know immediately when you've misspelled the word.
Updated to add: This is even better than I thought because it's spell checking everything. All input fields - so now I have spelling checking on Gmail chats and when I compose an email and even when I edit my template. What are you waiting for? Go get it!!
Wolf Blitzer attempted to ambush Lynn Cheney with questions about her husband's comments on torture and Webb's comment about her books, all she wanted to do was plug her children's book:
WB: I want to get to that, all that, but I want to pick your brain a little bit on news that’s happening right now, including your husband, the Vice President. He was interviewed earlier this week out in North Dakota, and he had this exchange with a radio talk show host. Listen to this:
Host: Would you agree a dunk in water is a no-brainer if it can save lives?
DC: Well, it’s a no-brainer for me, but for a while there, I was criticized as being the Vice President for Torture. We don’t torture. That’s not what we’re involved in.
WB: It made it sound, and there’s been interpretation to this effect, that he was in effect confirming that the United States used this waterboarding, this technique that has been rejected by the international community, that simulates a prisoner being drowned, if you will. And he was, in effect, supposedly confirming that the United States has been using that.
LC: Wolf, that is a mighty house you’re building on top of that molehill there, a mighty mountain. You know, this is a complete distortion. He didn’t say anything of the kind.
WB: Because of the dunking, you know, using the water and the dunking…
[...]
Let’s talk about another issue in the news, and then we’ll get to the book. The Democrats are now complaining bitterly in this Virginia race. George Allen using novels, novels that Jim Webb, his Democratic challenger, has written, in which there are sexual references. And they’re making a big deal out of this. I want you to listen to what Jim Webb said today in responding to this very sharp attack from George Allen.
LC: Now do you promise, Wolf, that we’re going to talk about my book?
WB: I do promise.
LC: Because this seems to me a mighty long trip around the merry-go-round.
WB: I want you to respond. This is in the news today, and your name has come up, so that’s why we’re talking about it. But listen to this:
James Webb: There’s nothing that’s been in any of my novels that in my view, hasn’t been either illuminating the surroundings, or defining a character, or moving a plot. I’m a serious writer. I mean, we can go and read Lynne Cheney’s lesbian love scenes if you want to, you know, get graphic on stuff.
LC: You know, Jim Webb is full of baloney. I have never written anything sexually explicit. His novels are full of sexually explicit references to incest, sexually explicit references…well, you know, I just don’t want my grandchildren to turn on the television set. This morning, Imus was reading from the novels, and it’s triple X rated.
WB: Here’s what the Democratic Party put out today, the Democratic Congressional Senatorial Campaign Committee. Lynne Cheney’s book featured brothels and attempted rape. In 1981, Vice President Dick Cheney’s wife, Lynne, wrote a book called Sisters, which featured a lesbian love affair, brothels, and attempted rapes. In 1988, Lynne Cheney wrote about a Republican Vice President who dies of a heart attack while having sex with his mistress. Is that true?
LC: Nothing explicit. And actually, that is full of lies. It’s not…it’s just absolutely not true.
WB: But you did write a book entitled Sisters.
LC: I did write a book entitled Sisters. This description…
WB: And it did have lesbian characters.
LC: No, not necessarily. This description is a lie. I’ll stand on that.
WB: There is nothing in there about rapes and brothels?
LC: Wolf, Wolf, could we talk about a children’s book for a minute?
WB: We can talk about the children’s book. But I just wanted to…
LC: I think our segment is like 15 minutes long, and we’ve now done ten minutes, so…
WB: I just wanted to clarify what’s in the news today, give you a…
LC: Sex, lies and distortion. That’s what it is.
WB: This is an opportunity for you to explain on these sensitive issues.
LC: Wolf, I have nothing to explain. Jim Webb has a lot to explain.
WB: Well, he says he’s a serious writer and novelist, fiction writer. He was doing basically what you were doing.
LC: Jim Webb is full of baloney.
Is this anyway to treat the wife of the vice president? Is this anyway to treat the author of a children's book? You read from the DNC DCSCC talking points about her own book? Why don't you do your own research? Why use what the DNC DCSCC put out especially when CNN is under attack for being the media arm of the Democratic party?
But Lynn Cheney didn't take this lying down and responded to Blitzer's attack on her husband's comment with an attack of her own:
LC: All right, all right, Wolf. I’m here to talk about my book. But if you want to talk about distortion…
WB: We’ll talk about your book.
LC: Right. But what is CNN doing running terrorist tape of terrorists shooting Americans? I mean, I thought Duncan Hunter asked you a very good question, and you didn’t answer it. Do you want us to win?
WB: The answer, of course, is we want the United States to win. We are Americans. There’s no doubt about that. You think we want terrorists to win?
LC: Then why are you running terrorist propaganda?
WB: With all due respect, with all due respect, this is not terrorist propaganda.
LC: Oh, Wolf…
WB: This is reporting the news, which is what we do. We’re not partisan…
LC: Where did you get the film?
WB: We got the film…look, this is an issue that has been widely discussed, this is an issue that we reported on extensively. We make no apologies for showing that. That was a very carefully considered decision, why we did that. And I think, and I think, of your…
LC: Well, I think it’s shocking.
WB: If you’re a serious journalist, you want to report the news. Sometimes the news is good, sometimes the news isn’t so good.
LC: But Wolf, there’s a difference between news and terrorist propaganda. Why did you give the terrorists a forum?
WB: And if you put it in context, if you put it in context, that’s what news is. We said it was propaganda. We didn’t distort where we got it. We didn’t distort anything about it. We gave it the context.
Which is it? Propaganda or nor? Clearly, he has to defend the indefensible, showing the video of our soldiers being shot by the very men who shot them. How is that not propaganda? CNN and the terrorists have one thing in common, the desire to see Democrats win in November. That's why the terrorists sent in the tape and that's why they've increased their level of violence against our troops and that's why CNN is playing it.
The level of discourse in American politics is at an all time low. We hate each other and can barely be civil. Wolf Blitzer is a colleague of Cheney's but that doesn't seem to matter anymore, the important thing is to wound your opponent. It's a sad day when the wife of the vice president is treated this way.
The leading imam in Manchester, confirms that he thinks the execution of sexually active gay men is justified, the rights group Outrage reported.
Arshad Misbahi of the Manchester Central Mosque confirmed his views in a conversation to John Casson, a local psychotherapist.
Casson said: "I asked him if the execution of gay Muslims in Iran and Iraq was an acceptable punishment in Sharia law, or the result of culture, not religion.
"He told me that in a true Islamic state, such punishments were part of Islam: If the person had had a trial, at which four witnesses testified that they had seen the actual homosexual acts."
"I asked him what would be the British Muslim view? He repeated that in an Islamic state these punishments were justified. They might result in the deaths of thousands but if this deterred millions from having sex, and spreading disease, then it was worthwhile to protect the wider community."
"I checked again that this was not a matter of tradition, culture or local prejudice. 'No,' he said, 'It is part of the central tenets of Islam: that sex outside marriage is forbidden; this is stated in the Koran and the prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) had stated that these punishments were due to such behaviours.'"
Gay man rights campaigner Peter Tatchell said, "It is disturbing that some British imams are endorsing the execution of gay and lesbian Muslims.
It is disturbing??? That's the extent of your outrage? And they're executing gays in Iraq? I haven't heard about that.
Aren't you just so tired of the doom and gloom that is reported in the news on a daily basis? I am.
I confess, I've stopped blogging because I noticed that it was making me pretty cynical in what I was posting and thinking and quite frankly, it depressed me. All the corruption, murder and violence I read about is having a negative effect on me. Why am I lamenting about this?
It all started last week. My daughter had to bring in a current event article for her US History class. Now, the challenge was that it had to be a "good news" article. I think her teacher was tired of talking about all the recent school murders/shootings and he wanted to talk about something good for a change.
Well, it really WAS a challenge to find something good in the news to talk about. I think our media culture is fixated on the bad news because I guess they deem it more worthy than the good news. It also probably has to do with selling newspapers and television ratings, but you know what? I'm sick of it.
Our news media[s] are like the "vultures gathered around a dead corpse" [paraphrase of Matthew 24:28]; they pick at the bones of bad news as if they are eating delicious morsels but what they are doing is giving us a culture of death and despair. Well I say no more!
That's why I'd like to start Good News Fridays. I will try to post something cheerful, because let's face it, "a joyful heart is good medicine" [Proverbs 17:22] and it just might innoculate us against all the bad news out there.
So without further adieu, here is what I found for Good News Friday (HT:Glenn Beck)
MR. SIEGEL: I'm looking at all the same polls that you're looking at every day.
MR. ROVE: No you're not. No you're not!
MR. SIEGEL: No, I'm not -
MR. ROVE: I'm looking at 68 polls a week. You may be looking at four or five public polls a week that talk about attitudes nationally, but that do not impact the outcome.
I keep forgetting to tell you about the new blogroll that I've joined. It's Philophronos Blogging and it's a joint effort by a liberal blogger, Henry Neufeld of Threads from Henry's Web and Laura of Pursuing Holiness. It's a blogroll that calls Christian bloggers to remember that we are Christian bloggers:
Christian bloggers should purposefully express our political beliefs with gentleness and respect, with the intention of setting the example for non-Christians. We're not all going to agree. We don't need to agree. But we can debate the issues in such a way that the debate glorifies God and points people to Christ. We're challenging Christian bloggers who write about politics to write at least one post a week until the election - and hopefully after it - that adheres to the following guidelines.
Mrs. McCaskill said her use of a writhing and twitching Mr. Fox to highlight her support of expanded funding for embryonic stem cell research was "fair play", and simply meant to show that incumbent Sen. Jim Talent "while talking about the importance of family ties, actually wants Alex P. Keaton to suffer and die."
However, she said the Michael J. Embryo ad "absolutely crosses the line" by using a fetal actor to "stir up the irrational compassion of voters who should never be forced to think about the implications of stem cell research."
Scott Ott really understands the thinking of his target. The Democrats really do act like their opponents want people to suffer and die.
So, big surprise, the NJ Supreme Court is legislating from the bench. We have to give the benefit of marriage to gays but we can call it what we want. Thanks, Supreme Court for allowing us to call it what we want. Oooh, don't we feel so powerful.
I'm sorry but I don't think that the men who wrote our state's constitution would agree with this ruling:
New Jersey's Supreme Court opened the door to gay marriage Wednesday, ruling that homosexuals are entitled to the same rights as heterosexuals, but leaving it to lawmakers to legalize same-sex unions.
The high court gave lawmakers 180 days to rewrite marriage laws to either include same-sex couples or create a new system of civil unions for them.
The ruling is similar to the 1999 decision in Vermont that led to civil unions there, which offer the benefits of marriage, but not the name.
"Although we cannot find that a fundamental right to same-sex marriage exists in this state, the unequal dispensation of rights and benefits to committed same-sex partners can no longer be tolerated under our state Constitution," Justice Barry T. Albin wrote for the 4-3 majority's decision.
[...]
Garden State Equality, New Jersey's main gay and lesbian political organization quickly announced Wednesday that three lawmakers would introduce a bill in the Legislature to get full marriage rights to same-sex couples.
Gay couples in New Jersey can already apply for domestic partnerships under a law the Legislature passed in 2004 giving gay couples some benefits of marriage, such as the right to inherit possessions if there is no will and healthcare coverage for state workers.
Democratic Gov. Jon S. Corzine supports domestic partnerships, but not gay marriage.
Supporters pushing for full gay marriage have had a two-year losing streak in state courts including New York, Washington, and in both Nebraska and Georgia, where voter-approved bans on gay marriage were reinstated.
They also have suffered at the ballot boxes in 15 states where constitutions have been amended to ban same-sex unions.
Since our legislature already gave them inheritance rights and healthcare benefits, what rights are they being denied? And how in the world would they be entitled to the benefits of marriage when we call it civil union? In the eyes of the nation, they wouldn't be married. What would be the benefit of a civil union? I didn't read the decision and I don't have time to do so but I wonder if the court specified what are the benefits of marriage.
When I saw that the decision was 4-3, I thought for a second that maybe we had some sanity left in NJ but then immediately I thought they probably wanted to go further and I was right:
The media's describing this as a 4-3 decision, but that's misleading. The three dissenters didn't object to the main ruling that marriage rights should be extended to gay couples; on that point, it was 7-0. What they objected to is the fact that the court gave the legislature a choice of labels instead of forcing them to include gay unions under the rubric of "marriage." I.e., the dissenters were even more radical than the majority.
Don't even try to tell me that I should cut down on my gas usage, if you've been flying around in a private jet. Just say no to private jets, Julie Roberts, Jennifer Lopez and Brad Pitt. And the one that really gets me is George Clooney. He is so arrogant and condescending. Hypocrite! Practice what you preach.
Not smart using a racial slur when you're being filmed, especially when your son is in a tight Senate race. Video here.
Updated to apologize! It sure sounded like he said "crackers!" Evidently it was "trackers" and not "crackers." What in the world are "trackers?" Is this a southern thing? Or a political thing?
This has got to be the most childish argument I have ever seen:
Of course there are going to be comparisons between two wars that are unpopular with the news media. And I say the new media and not the public because I believe that the news media didn't like Vietnam and did everything imaginable to end that war. They are trying to do the same with Iraq. They want the public to think we are losing the war but we aren't, the military hasn't lost a single battle over there. Yeah, terrorists are hitting them hard but they're cowards and they fight like cowards.
So, it would make sense that Lieberman has to say the same things about Vietnam that Nixon said. Nixon was right, when we pulled out, millions were killed. And if we pull out, it will be even worse. The only way this becomes another Viet Nam is if the Democrats get control of Congress.
But this war is very unlike Viet Nam in a very important way, we will not be able to walk away from this war as we did in Viet Nam because the enemy will follow us home. Terrorists won't stop fighting us if we pull out. They will just go where we are. They will continue to hit us until they break our will, just as they continue to hit Israel.
You really can't learn too much about what's going to happen on the local level from a national poll. In the Washington Post-ABC News poll, independents are swinging toward the Democrats:
Two weeks before the midterm elections, Republicans are losing the battle for independent voters, who now strongly favor Democrats on Iraq and other major issues facing the country and overwhelmingly prefer to see them take over the House in November, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
The new poll underscores how much of a drag the war threatens to be on Republican candidates in competitive races. With debate underway in Washington about possible course changes in Iraq, Americans cite the war as the most important issue in determining their vote next month more often than any other issue, and those who do favor Democrats over Republicans by 76 percent to 21 percent.
But nowhere does it say how many independents they polled. Since they have results for Republicans and Democrats then it must be a percentage of this number:
The Post-ABC News poll findings are based on telephone interviews with 1,200 adults conducted Thursday through Sunday. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.
Which would mean they're basing their results on probably a sample size of 325 (I'm basing this on other polls I've seen). The sample size is too small to determine what will happen at the national level. It's just another attempt at demoralizing the base. It's will only have the opposite effect.
Updated to correct grammar errors: I've really got to stop posting at 6:00 in the morning. This wasn't even coherent.
Who do you think will win the leadership of the House and Senate? You can vote here.
I'm getting sick of the whole thing. Too much blah, blah Speaker Pelosi, blah, blah, Iraq, blah, blah, protest vote, blah, blah, blah.
If you are the type that only reads the top of a blog, then click here because I want everyone to see the video of the Chinese soldiers shooting unarmed Tibetans. Email it to your friends or post it on your blog.
She just wants to make him a lame duck. OK, do we believe her? That's the first question. I think they're trying to calm the voters who think that's what they intend to do. (It's OK, little sit-this-one-out conservatives, we mean you no harm, we only want to raise your taxes not impeach the president.) So, my next question is, what about the base? They want impeachment, what are they saying? I don't have time to read Kos and DU because I'm studying for a Greek quiz and a Hebrew quiz tomorrow. If you know anything, leave a comment.
Once again I had to sit through Andy Rooney, so I thought I would live blog it.
Why doesn't Andy Rooney know anything? He's sitting here telling me that he doesn't know why we're in Iraq, why doesn't he just listen to what Bush has said over and over again? Shouldn't a newsmen, know the news? Why is such an ignorant man on my TV blathering on about a subject he doesn't know anything about?
And what is really over the top is that he thinks Bush should get on TV and admit he made a mistake going into Iraq. Bush knows it wasn't a mistake, why should he do that?
CBS, time to retire Andy Rooney. Either that are put The Amazing Race on at 8:00 and stop forcing us to watch him because I don't think my blood pressure can take it.
More than half of Americans, 55 percent, would like to see Democrats take control of Congress, according to a poll by Newsweek magazine released on Saturday.
The poll of 1,000 likely voters found that 55 percent would choose a Democrat to represent their district if the vote were held now, and 37 percent said they would vote Republican.
Without the last paragraph:
Of those sampled, 282 identified themselves as Republicans, 349 as Democrats and 330 as Independents.
You over sample Democrats and you expect me to buy the results. Sorry, I might be Christian and conservative but I'm not stupid (though you love to paint us that way). And let's not forget that no national poll can tell us anything about local races. This poll is worthless but that won't stop a talking head or a blogger from using it to prove their point that the Democrats are headed for a victory this November.
How does this guy speak for us? Talk about "arrogance" and "stupidity," why in the world would a diplomat say something so undiplomatic? Shouldn't he understand the type of people that he's dealing with? We look so weak now in the Arab world, why add to our woes:
A senior U.S. diplomat said the United States had shown "arrogance" and "stupidity" in Iraq but was now ready to talk with any group except Al-Qaida in Iraq to facilitate national reconciliation.
In an interview with Al-Jazeera television aired late Saturday, Alberto Fernandez, director of public diplomacy in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the State Department offered an unusually candid assessment of America's war in Iraq.
"We tried to do our best but I think there is much room for criticism because, undoubtedly, there was arrogance and there was stupidity from the United States in Iraq," he said.
"We are open to dialogue because we all know that, at the end of the day, the solution to the hell and the killings in Iraq is linked to an effective Iraqi national reconciliation," he said, speaking in Arabic from Washington. "The Iraqi government is convinced of this."
Do we really need a State Department? Can't we just abolish it and start over? Maybe we can a least reassign this guy to Mexico or Canada where he can't do us any harm.
Look, we don't need to beat ourselves up in front of the enemy, they already look at us as a paper tiger and a nation that talks tough but can't back up our words. We are not a nation of fighters, we are a nation of wimps.
The NY Times is now saying (three months after the fact) that they erred in publishing the story of the secret terrorist banking data surveillance program. Ombudsman, Byron Calame, wrote this:
After pondering for several months, I have decided I was off base. There were reasons to publish the controversial article, but they were slightly outweighed by two factors to which I gave too little emphasis. While it's a close call now, as it was then, I don't think the article should have been published.
Those two factors are really what bring me to this corrective commentary: the apparent legality of the program in the United States, and the absence of any evidence that anyone's private data had actually been misused. I had mentioned both as being part of 'the most substantial argument against running the story,' but that reference was relegated to the bottom of my column.
The source of the data, as my column noted, was the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, or Swift. That Belgium-based consortium said it had honored administrative subpoenas from the American government because it has a subsidiary in this country.
I haven't found any evidence in the intervening months that the surveillance program was illegal under United States laws. Although data-protection authorities in Europe have complained that the formerly secret program violated their rules on privacy, there have been no Times reports of legal action being taken. [...] My original support for the article rested heavily on the fact that so many people already knew about the program that serious terrorists also must have been aware of it. But critical, and clever, readers were quick to point to a contradiction: the Times article and headline had both emphasized that a 'secret' program was being exposed.
Unbelievable! They didn't realize that the program was secret? It was ok for them to expose it if everyone knew. The word, "secret" doesn't matter because that's just a word and words today are meaningless. If the NYT knows about it, then it's not secret and everyone should know about it.
The Carnival is up at Dreaming What Ifs..., the theme is mistakes. I didn't submit an entry this week because I don't make mistakes and even if I did make them, I don't go admitting to them in public (hehe).
Don't these people know that the Democrats and the MSM have already declared this election for the Democrats? Why in the world would anyone think that the Republicans have a shot at winning? It's already lost, the votes have been tallied (sure it's just polls right now, but they have such a history of accuracy we might as well not even bother counting the actual votes) and the Republicans have lost. Pelosi is measuring her new office for drapes, Franks is ready for his portrait and Rangel has all but seized control of the tax code ("When I become chairman of the Ways and Means Committee"--link via PowerPundit). Why go against the tide (heck, the tsunami):
JUBILANT DEMOCRATS SHOULD RECONSIDER their order for confetti and noisemakers. The Democrats, as widely reported, are expecting GOP-weary voters to flock to the polls in two weeks and hand them control of the House for the first time in 12 years -- and perhaps the Senate, as well. Even some Republicans privately confess that they are anticipating the election-day equivalent of Little Big Horn. Pardon our hubris, but we just don't see it.
Our analysis -- based on a race-by-race examination of campaign-finance data -- suggests that the GOP will hang on to both chambers, at least nominally. We expect the Republican majority in the House to fall by eight seats, to 224 of the chamber's 435. At the very worst, our analysis suggests, the party's loss could be as large as 14 seats, leaving a one-seat majority. But that is still a far cry from the 20-seat loss some are predicting. In the Senate, with 100 seats, we see the GOP winding up with 52, down three
We studied every single race -- all 435 House seats and 33 in the Senate -- and based our predictions about the outcome in almost every race on which candidate had the largest campaign war chest, a sign of superior grass-roots support. We ignore the polls. Thus, our conclusions about individual races often differ from the conventional wisdom. Pollsters, for instance, have upstate New York Republican Rep. Tom Reynolds trailing Democratic challenger Jack Davis, who owns a manufacturing plant. But Reynolds raised $3.3 million in campaign contributions versus $1.6 million for Davis, so we score him the winner.
Likewise, we disagree with pollsters of both parties who see Indiana Republican Rep. Chris Chocola getting whomped by Democratic challenger Joe Donnelly, a lawyer and business owner from South Bend. Chocola has raised $2.7 million, versus $1.1 million for Donnelly. Ditto in North Carolina, where we see Republican Rep. Charles Taylor beating Democrat Heath Shuler, a former NFL quarterback, because of better financing. Analysts from both parties predict a Shuler upset.
Is our method reliable? It certainly has been in the past. Using it in the 2002 and 2004 congressional races, we bucked conventional wisdom and correctly predicted GOP gains both years. Look at House races back to 1972 and you'll find the candidate with the most money has won about 93% of the time. And that's closer to 98% in more recent years, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Polls can be far less reliable. Remember, they all but declared John Kerry president on Election Day 2004.
[...]
With only two weeks to go, a barrage of contradictory poll findings is apt to confuse the oddsmakers, not to mention voters.But we're sticking with our numbers, and they say one thing: The Democrats don't have quite enough heft to push aside the elephant.
The last line is great! I like the imagery. Let's hope they're right because I get a stomach ache thinking of Speaker of the House Pelosi and Rangel writing tax code.
Go read the rest because they have analysis of some specific races (they have Talent and Burns winning but Kean, Jr. losing, which is not surprising, we like our politicians tainted with an air of corruption) and they also talk about the effect the election is having on the market.
But I thought that everyone was angry at Lieberman for his support of the war. I thought that this election was going to be a vote against Bush. And I thought that the power of the netroot bloggers was going to sweep Lamont into office. What happened? Not as powerful as they thought?
Democratic chairman Howard Dean praised Ned Lamont on Friday as the challenger dealt with a dose of bad news - a double-digit deficit in the latest poll.
"No one was going to stand up over the Iraq policy until Ned stood up and then the people stood up because Ned was a great leader," Dean said at a rally for Lamont and other Democratic candidates. "We need Ned Lamont."
The campaign event at a downtown Hartford sport bar came as a new poll showed three-term Sen. Joe Lieberman leading Lamont 52 percent to 35 percent among likely voters. Lieberman is running as an independent after Lamont rode a wave of anti-war sentiment to an Aug. 8 Democratic primary victory.
Hey sit-this-one-out conservatives, check out the what the world will be like under Speaker Pelosi, according to the Post. Let us walk our way through their assessment of the situation when she becomes the Speaker of the House. Let's enter their alternative reality where Democrats have a veto proof majority (otherwise, how do they get their agenda past Bush, oh right, they plan to impeach him).
She rose from the ashes of her defeat and got good advice to bash Bush from Kos and his kids:
On election night 2004, Nancy Pelosi faced a painful reality: Her party was again a big loser, failing to win the presidency and losing three more House seats. Pundits were suggesting Pelosi should accept her fate as the leader of a permanent House minority.
But the California legislator had a different idea. Instead, she reached out to advertising executives, Internet moguls and language specialists to ask how Democrats could rise from the ashes and challenge President Bush and the Republicans. The advice that came back was unabashed: "You must take him down" and then hammer away at the differences between the two parties, Pelosi recalled.
To go on and win this year's election by her brilliant strategy of bashing Bush and offering no alternative solution to Bush's faults:
Today the Democrats appear capable of taking back leadership of the House after 12 years in the minority, for reasons largely beyond Pelosi's control: an unpopular war, an unpopular president and a series of scandals that have left the Republicans highly vulnerable.
Nevertheless, if the Democrats win, experts say, much credit is due this 66-year-old woman, whose notable fundraising abilities (she raised $50 million this election cycle) and scorched-earth strategy of refusing to negotiate with the GOP have put her on track to become the first woman to be speaker of the House.
Rising above the charge of liberal by the evil Republicans, she proves she can get along with the conservative heartland by eating pork with them and promising them oil. I'm not sure from where, maybe Venezuela because you know she isn't going to allow us to drill anywhere in the US. No, it's better to harm the environment somewhere else. Why sully our land with drilling. Let those third world nations suffer from their drilling so that we can have oil. But I digress:
This summer, as Republicans were demonizing Pelosi as a liberal liability, Peterson invited her to his rural district -- where she looked comfortable eating a pork chop on a stick and vowed to direct energy money to the Midwest, instead of the Mideast.
She is viewed as obstructionist by the evil Republicans but it's just good management style. Keeping a Stalinist grip on her party leads to unity so that they can be one voice in their liberal demands:
Dismissed by her critics as too liberal, too elitist and too lacking in gravitas, Pelosi, serving her 10th term, has proved to be a tough-minded tactician who has led her caucus from the political center and kept the fractious House Democrats in line. Pelosi and House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) rarely work together, and the Democrats voted along party lines 88 percent of the time last year -- the most unified voting record in 50 years -- according to a Congressional Quarterly study. By hanging together, the Democrats have thwarted many GOP initiatives, including the centerpiece of Bush's second-term agenda, restructuring Social Security.
That approach, while emboldening the Democrats, has earned Pelosi the enmity of House Republicans, who claim she is an obstructionist. Pelosi, who is married to a wealthy San Francisco businessman and wears designer suits, is a favorite target of conservatives. Throughout the campaign, Republicans have sought to scare voters by portraying Pelosi as a liberal extremist who would be weak on national security and prone to raises taxes if her party were back in control.
And the evil Republicans are scaring the voters into not voting for her, claiming she'll undermine our national security and will raise taxes:
Throughout the campaign, Republicans have sought to scare voters by portraying Pelosi as a liberal extremist who would be weak on national security and prone to raises taxes if her party were back in control.
But she isn't undermining our national defense, she plans to improve our defense by removing our troops from Iraq. Even though that would be viewed by the terrorists as a victory (just look at Lebanon if you don't believe me) and would embolden our enemies (read the NIE report if you doubt that):
But as the new minority leader, Pelosi knew she could not impose her views on her caucus and instead initially took the position that it was the Republicans' war, for the Republicans to fix. Privately, however, she spent months conferring with Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), a decorated Vietnam War veteran and prominent voice on military matters, who had voted for the war but was now souring on it. Pelosi knew that her voice would not be as credible as Murtha's.
The two planned Murtha's surprise turnaround a year ago, when he demanded immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops. Two weeks later, Pelosi followed his lead.
Should the Democrats win in November, Pelosi said, their new majority will push for the immediate start of a phased withdrawal of troops, to be completed by the end of 2007.
And as to the evil charge that she will raise taxes, you have to go elsewhere because the Post isn't admitting to that. But here's a clue:
Pelosi has signaled that she would not rely totally on seniority in appointing committee chairs. She has, however, told ranking members on the most powerful panels, Ways and Means, Rules, Energy and Commerce, and Appropriations, that she supports them.
So, even though the Post has crowned her Speaker, do you think we might want to wait until the election to see if she will be Queen? Maybe enough of us I'd-rather-be-sitting-at-home-but-I'm-voting-for-the safety-of-my-kids Republicans will be able to offset your protest vote.
Notice how similar Scott Ott's spoof sounds to the Post piece:
With Republican electoral prospects dimming by the hour, Congressional Democrats today offered to forego "the embarrassment of counting the votes" from the upcoming national elections, but to let the GOP keep some of its seats in the House and Senate.
"It's kind of like an out-of-court settlement,‚" said presumptive House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA. "We'll let our friends across the aisle avoid the humiliation of a public thrashing by our strong, attractive Democrat candidates, but we'll demonstrate mercy by conceding a few seats, so that Republicans have at least a token voice in national affairs."
[...]
Meanwhile, Democrats ride a wave of public adoration due to the party's clear, positive vision for protecting the civil rights of foreign terrorists, retreating from Iraq so that rival Muslim sects can work out their differences without American interference, and restoring the Clinton era "spirit of cooperation" with North Korea.
While some critics have suggested that both parties wait until the American people speak at the ballot box before declaring winners and losers, Rep. Pelosi called that kind of thinking "a quaint relic of ancient history, made obsolete by political pollsters and media pundits."
"After all," she said, "just because we're the Democrat party doesn't mean we have to be slavishly democratic. Some things are better decided by a few smart people behind closed doors."
The Chinese are shooting unarmed Tibetans as they make a pilgrimage into India to see the Dalai Lama. What's amazing is they're telling their people that the soldiers were attacked by the Tibetans but it's clear from this video that they were shot like sitting ducks. The coolness of the Chinese soldiers should tell us something about what our future enemy is like. If they would shoot unarmed men who are just going to see their spiritual leader, they'll shoot anyone.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Friday Europe was stirring up hatred in the Middle East by supporting Israel and warned it "may get hurt" if anger in the region boiled over.
"You should believe that this regime (Israel) cannot last and has no more benefit to you. What benefit have you got in supporting this regime, except the hatred of the nations?" he said in a speech broadcast on state radio.
"We have advised the Europeans that the Americans are far away, but you are the neighbors of the nations in this region. We inform you that the nations are like an ocean that is welling up, and if a storm begins, the dimensions will not stay limited to Palestine, and you may get hurt."
"Conservatives are cranky but not self-destructive," said GOP adviser Mary Matalin, a former aide to Vice President Cheney. "A thing we could do, have time to do and will do in the remaining time will be to hammer home what a Pelosi-Rangel-Conyers House would really mean." She was referring to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), who would become House speaker if Democrats win, and fellow liberals Charles B. Rangel (N.Y.) and John Conyers Jr. (Mich.), who are in line for committee chairmanships.
This is actually the end of the article but it should be near the top. I would agree that Republicans are cranky but we're not stupid and we understand what's going on. Those who care about the country won't be talked into being upset about Foleygate. Sorry, every time I read that evangelicals are upset about this scandal, I laugh at the attempt to discourage me from going to the polls. It's ridiculous to think that something that minor would cause me to sit out such an important election. I care more about the war against Islamic fascists than about a Senator engaged in cybersex with pranksters.
Here is what those who are running the campaign are saying:
Mark McKinnon, who was Bush's chief media adviser in 2000 and 2004, said the campaign may look better in a few weeks if Republicans can refocus the electorate on what a Democratic takeover might mean in terms of policy.
"I think Republicans wish the election were three weeks ago and the Democrats wish it were today," he said. "The fact is, it is three weeks from now. Whatever is going on right now is not the endgame; it's the middle game."
Rove, who believes that Republicans will hold both the House and Senate, said Democrats have failed to capitalize on events because they lack a clear message that presents a compelling alternative to the Republicans. "Generally when you're trying to nationalize something and you're the out party, you have a consistent message," he said. "I'm not sure what that consistent message is on the other side. Is there unanimity on Iraq? I don't think so."
Rove, speaking by telephone while on a campaign swing with the president, discounted polls and other indicators suggesting that Democratic voters are far more energized than Republicans. He said the GOP's get-out-the-vote operation, which proved more effective than the Democrats' in the past two elections, will be as strong or stronger this year.
Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman said that for the past six weeks, a voter mobilization effort in competitive House and Senate districts has produced more contacts than during an equivalent time in 2004
Here is what Republicans who aren't running the campaign are saying:
With top Republican strategists now privately predicting substantial House losses, President Bush and top GOP officials plan to spend the final days of the 2006 campaign attempting to rally partisans and limit conservative defections with dire warnings about the consequences of a Democratic Congress. [...] The mood among most GOP strategists -- with the exception of Rove and a few others -- is decidedly downbeat heading into the final 18 days. They see poll after poll showing a growing number of GOP House incumbents in serious danger, including many who just weeks ago were considered relatively safe for reelection. [...] "The fact of the matter is, right now people are embarrassed by Republicans, and the economic base is still angry" because of high government spending over the past six years, Armey said. Consequently, he predicted, Democrats will take control of the House in three weeks.
Who do we believe?
And then there's this:
Amid predictions that demoralized conservative voters might sit out the election, Bush and other senior Republicans will escalate charges that Democrats will raise taxes, weaken national security and liberalize social policies. Bush struck those themes in campaign appearances yesterday in Pennsylvania and Virginia, and White House senior adviser Karl Rove said he "will consistently refresh that message" between now and Election Day.
Why is this news? What the heck do you expect the president to do? Of course they are going to scare the base into voting! If I were them, I would be plastering Pelosi's face and record on every single commercial for every single House race and even for the Senate races. Heck, I would even do it for local races. That's what's motivating me, Speaker of the House Pelosi.
They have got to be kidding! This is so outrageous, I can't believe anyone would be this stupid:
A protest in London against the publication of a cartoon depicting the prophet Mohammed as a terrorist incensed an Aberporth man, who painted an anti-Muslim slogan on a white sheet and draped it over his garden fence.
The words in bold red paint stated: "Kill all Muslims who threaten us and our way of life. Enoch Powell was right."
Father of two Gary John Mathewson, who was arrested for displaying the banner, told a court: "This won't stop until there is a Muslim president in the White House." continued...
And referring to MP Jack Straw questioning whether Muslim women should wear face veils he asked: "Are you going to arrest him?"
When prosecutor Maggie Hughes pointed out that the banner did not mention extremists Mathewson said: "That's what I meant by those who threaten us and our way of life.'" "Are you going to arrest Jack Straw?"
Adding that during the protest in London a Muslim was dressed as a suicide bomber he asked: "Why was he not arrested?"
One of his neighbours, a retired Army officer with 23 years service, told the court he reported the matter to the police because he feared a visit from Muslim extremists.
[...]
Finding Mathewson guilty presiding magistrate Anne Rees said she and her colleagues felt the words on the banner were likely to cause someone distress, and they did not find it as reasonable.
This is what probably ticked him off:
Why didn't this guy get arrested? The words on his sign would likely cause distress.
I hate these nameless Republican party officials. If you are so sure of yourself and know what you're talking about, then say it on the record. Why stab the party in the back under the cloak of darkness? Be bold about it, so that you can brag when we lose:
Republican officials now concede they could lose a net of 23 to 27 seats in the House, that higher figure being close to twice the 15 Democrats would need to take control. Democrats would need six seats to take control of the Senate, and Republican officials tell TIME they see several scenarios for warding that off. One Republican strategist close to the White House gave this forecast: "We're going to lose Pennsylvania, Ohio and Rhode Island. That's three. Virginia, I think we hold. Tennessee, I think we hold. I'm less certain we're going to hold Missouri and I'm least certain we hold Montana. But to take control, Democrats have to win three of those four, and that's unlikely." If Democrats picked up five, the chamber would be 50-50, guaranteeing frequent appearances by Vice President Cheney as President of the Senate.
Some White House officials became convinced that the House might be lost after they saw polls showing the page scandal had brutalized Republican approval ratings, and one senior party official says that's also part of the reason that the party's hold on the Senate is in such peril. "I kind of see the Foley thing as the tipping point," the official said. "People are just unhappy already and that just did it."
You people are just dupes for the MSM who are deliberately trying to suppress the vote.
And in response to Tony Snow's comment on the Drudge Report:
Tony Snow on election coverage: 'These stories almost look like suppression efforts to bring down Republican morale'...
Ya think? But it won't work for me, they are making me so mad, that I'm going to get up early to vote. That's how mad I am. Do they think we're stupid? Well, we are if we do what they want. Sit out the vote, go ahead. Give them what they want. But I'm not. I won't give them the satisfaction.
Today we released Internet Explorer 7 for Windows XP. I encourage everyone to download the final version from http://www.microsoft.com/ie.
We listened carefully to feedback from many sources (including this blog) and worked hard to deliver a safer browser that makes everyday tasks easier. When I first posted publicly about IE7, I wrote that we would go further to defend users from phishing and malicious software. The Phishing Filter and the architectural work in IE7 around networking and ActiveX opt-in will help keep users more secure. IE7 also delivers a much easier browsing experience with features like tabbed browsing (especially with QuickTabs), shrink-to-fit printing, an easily customizable search box, and a new design that leaves more screen real estate for the web site you’re viewing. IE7’s CSS improvements are incredibly important for developers as many of you have made quite clear. I also think IE7’s RSS experience and platform are important, powerful, and innovative.
"...civil religion is the misidentification of the nation of the United States with the covenant people of God. It is the casual assumption that America enjoys a special role in redemptive history. It is the confusion of the office of the political leader with the office of the spiritual leader. It is the frequent presumption of divine blessings without submission to divine judgment. It is the sublimation of Christian distinctives to a generic amalgam that conflates many faiths into a common national identity. It is as old as America itself. And it is not biblical Christianity." - William Inboden
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