Brain Trust

CNN brightens our day with this bit of buffoonery from a man who has made a career out of embarrassing himself. Speaking to a panel about the shared agenda of Jewish and African-American Democrats Rep. Alcee Hastings (D,FL) delivered himself of this asseveration:

"If Sarah Palin isn't enough of a reason for you to get over whatever your problem is with Barack Obama, then you damn well had better pay attention. Anybody toting guns and stripping moose don't care too much about what they do with Jews and blacks. So, you just think this through."

We're told that the room erupted in laughter and applause which leads me to conclude that thinking things through must be as novel a concept among the members of his audience as it is for Rep. Hastings. The impeached former judge managed to pack an exceptional amount of racial demagoguery and logical incoherence into just a single sentence. Apparently, both Hastings and his audience believe that anyone who hunts is a neo-nazi. Either that or Hastings and his listeners have the IQ of protozoa.

CNN goes on to tell us that Hastings was joined on the panel by Rep. Steven Cohen (D,TN). Cohen is the gentleman, you'll recall, who recently proclaimed from the House floor that Barack Obama is like Jesus Christ (they were both community organizers) and Sarah Palin is like Pontius Pilate (they were both governors). Get it?

It's fitting, I suppose, that these two fine minds should appear together on the same stage. They have a lot in common.

Not having exhausted his supply of theologically edifying pronouncements before Congress, Cohen added this observation at the event with Hastings: "A lot of what Jesus talks about is wonderful, talks about helping people and lifting them up and caring about people who are sick and all those things. He's a great Democrat."

Indeed. The difference, however, between Jesus and many congressional Democrats is that Jesus actually did more than talk about helping people.

Anyway, Hillary was also at the event. The photo below shows her listening to Mr. Hastings. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but she appears to be marveling at how anybody who was once a judge and who now serves in Congress could possibly say anything so pathetically stupid:

A nation shares in her wonderment.

RLC

Is McCain Fit?

My friend Jason calls our attention to an essay by George Will in which he lays hold of a troubling aspect of Senator McCain's character that we ourselves have fretted over on a number of previous occasions - his volatile temperament. Will argues that the man is temperamentally unsuited for the office of the presidency, and it's hard to argue with him, especially since we've made a similar case ourselves before and during the primaries.

In this election, however, one has to keep in mind one very important fact. We are voting not just for the next president. We are voting for that president's party. A vote for Obama is a vote for Harry Reid, Ted Kennedy, Barbara Boxer, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, John Murtha and a host of others. It's a vote to help the Democrats achieve their goal of removing all restrictions on abortion, of altering the meaning of marriage, of effecting a massive redistribution of wealth from the middle and upper classes to the underclass, of treating terrorism as a police matter, of piling onto American business onerous regulations and taxes that will make it impossible to compete in the global market, of continuing the accelerating secularization of our society, of opening our borders to anyone who wants to take up residence in our country, of nationalizing health care, of denying parents the choice of where they send their children to school, of maintaining high fuel costs, of quelling freedom of speech, particularly when it is conservative or religious, and much else as well.

Some of this may come to pass under a McCain presidency, of course, but it's almost certain that all, or most of it, will come to pass if the Democrats control both the White House and the Congress.

Will is correct. The GOP has nominated a less than ideal candidate which is why most of the enthusiasm for him is a result of his selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate. But we must look at more than just the two men running for president. We must also consider what kind of society their respective parties will create for us. For my part, I don't feel at all comfortable with the Democrats' vision of what the future should be.

RLC

Just Tell the Truth

What is Senator Obama's position on social security? He goes to Florida and tells retirees there that had George Bush been successful in privatizing social security three years ago seniors would have lost a bundle in this latest bear market, an assertion which is patently untrue. For one thing, Bush's program would have not been open to anyone 55 or older, which would exclude current seniors, and would have been optional in any event.

Then the senator's website quietly removed from their social security statement Obama's previous assurance that it would be both unnecessary and unfair to raise the retirement age.

So what's going on here?

Ed Morrissey thinks that Obama's Florida statements were a way of preparing the ground for a new social security plan that would indeed raise the retirement age. In other words, the misrepresetation of Bush's plan is the run-up to another policy back flip.

Maybe, maybe not. Raising the retirement age may be the right thing to do, even if Obama has been saying all along it would be the wrong thing to do, but misrepresenting Bush's plan to retirees in order to discredit Bush and, by extension, McCain, is not.

RLC