A Man for This Season
Brent Tantillo • February 9, 2010 6:01am • Uncategorized
Few have had as an illustrious and disappointing career as the late Rep. John Murtha who passed away yesterday from complications associated with gallbladder surgery. He was 77. The former marine and head of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense wielded enormous power for nearly two decades as he brought home the bacon for constituents back home and used his appropriating might to assert his opinions on wars abroad, particularly in Iraq.
In fact, it really was John Murtha who rallied the frontal guard against the Bush Administration’s efforts to win the Iraq War, something for which he will always be remembered and we should never forget for it naivety and bravery. He was naive for thinking that the war in Iraq wasn’t a central pillar on the war on terror, a fact that eight terror-free years (the Christmas bomber was an attempt) belies, but brave for fighting for the soldiers in the field for a winning strategy that General Petraeus and George W. Bush eventually provided. Unfortunately, Murtha loved the sound of his voice too much to shut up and admit that Petraeus had done it right when the surge provided a winning strategy. No, Murtha saw blood. And he used that blood to attack those who believed they were defending America.
In addition to his mixed past regarding the Iraq War, Murtha was a strong supporter of earmarks. He believed in bringing home the bacon for his constituents, and did he. He kept open a first-class airport in Johnstown, Pa, so that Murtha could fly back and forth between Washington. And of course, the airport was named for Murtha. To keep Mr. Murtha’s private airport open cost taxpayers over $200 million per year. But Murtha didn’t apologize:
“If I’m corrupt, it’s because I take care of my district,” he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in March 2009. “My job as a member of Congress is to make sure that we take care of what we see is necessary.”
That about sums him up — John Murtha — we’ve known you’re kind before. Just like Huey Long or Tom Delay, politics for you was more about you than us.
A New Surge for Republicans
Brent Tantillo • February 8, 2010 6:36am • Uncategorized
Peggy Noonan believes the election of Scott Brown to the Senate in Massachusetts is ushering a new wave of republicanism: one that stays away from those sticky values issues, and focuses on fiscal responsibility. I doubt it. Americans are an inherently conservative people who love their liberty. They don’t like gay marriage, but they don’t want the government to go as far as tell them what they can and can’t do in their bedrooms. And that’s what Scott Brown believes. If the Republicans can wrap up this idea in a bow and sell it, then perhaps the Democratic Party will experience losses in November.
Does God Have a Sense of Humor?
Brent Tantillo • February 7, 2010 13:20pm • Uncategorized
Apparently so, as he leaves global warming scientists, scammers, and believers in fits of conniptions, as he dumps record amounts of snow in DC, Baltimore, and Philly, and has caused Americans to experience one of the most severe winters ever, all while global warming scientists are admitting they manipulated key data to make the world appear as if it was warming. ”Climategate,” as this scandal is being called, has taken the wind out of the sails of those who want to slow human consumption and production for the sake of lowering greenhouse gases. It looks like an “Inconvenient Truth,” was only “Inconvenient” after all. Rather, it appears, that global warming like so many other things, was a failed tool to control the masses, an attempt to use fake data to make us inalterably less human — to force us from growing, prospering, reproducing, etc. Whether Al Gore was a puppet or ringleader of these pointy-headed pinheads will likely never be known, and frankly who cares? What really matters is that the “truth” did shine like a disinfectant upon the likes of Gore and his ilk, and their movement to control humanity as fallen asunder.
Some Weekend Reading
Brent Tantillo • February 6, 2010 9:11am • Uncategorized
I’m backed up on reading and blogging on pieces that I’ve put aside. Therefore, I am going to post a brief synopsis of a number of pieces that I believe are worth your attention this weekend:
* Apparently the trend of Americans getting fat is abating.
* The Ukraine’s Orange Revolution has been a disappointment.
* Apple Sees New Money in Old Media with introduction of iPad.
Mr. President, Do Us Proud (for a Change)
Candace de Russy • February 4, 2010 19:02pm • Uncategorized
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Mentally Retarded Lawyers: Uncle Sam Wants YOU!
Winfield Myers • February 4, 2010 11:24am • Uncategorized
In a world already filled with lawyer jokes, the feds have just provided fodder for more, thanks to the tender words of Rahm Emanuel. You’ll recall his quip–from last summer–that far-left activists who attacked moderate Democrats over their hesitancy to support the administration’s health care push were “f—— retarded.”
Following Sarah Palin’s criticism of him, Rahm now says he’s sorry (thereby confirming Palin’s weakness, right?). He’s so sorry, in fact, that he’s allying himself with groups determined to wipe out use of the “R” word.
As if on cue, the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division has posted an ad for 10 new civil rights lawyers. In line with the federal government’s desire to privilege the marginalized, it extends a particularly warm welcome to those with disabilities–including lawyers suffering from “mental retardation.”
The Civil Rights Division encourages qualified applicants with targeted disabilities to apply. Targeted disabilities are deafness, blindness, missing extremities, partial or complete paralysis, convulsive disorder, mental retardation, mental illness, severe distortion of limbs and/or spine.
So, did you hear the one about the lawyer, the priest, and the rabbi in a boat speeding toward a waterfall?
Eugene Volokh offers the most likely explanation for the ad’s wording. Some of the comments are keepers.
Channeling Bush?
Brent Tantillo • February 4, 2010 5:05am • Uncategorized
According to Atlantic Review, President Obama is growing increasingly impatient with Europe’s lack of coherence and purpose on foreign policy and has decided to stay home, rather than attend an EU summit of leaders in Madrid this coming May. The Atlantic Review pointedly asks, when will Europe begin to miss George W. Bush? Secondly, perhaps the President understands George W. Bush a bit better now?
Irresponsible President, Irresponsible Budget, Irresponsible Dems
Candace de Russy • February 3, 2010 13:59pm • Uncategorized
President Obama’s 2011 fiscal plan is, as Mark Levin has been widely quoted as saying, “the most irresponsible budget in a free society that any president — ever — has proposed.”
Doug Ross backs up this dictum with the requisite charts and figures, demonstrating that this wildly profligate plan, if adopted, would completely decimate our economy by 2020.
There can be no doubt as to what Americans of good sense must do about those of our leaders who would place us and our progeny on this reckless and destructive course. In Ross’s words:
If we are to save the Republic, this party of destruction — the modern, Soros-controlled, hard left Democrat Party — must be crushed in November at the ballot box.
Crushed politically until it is no more.
The survival of our children depends upon it.
Soaking Everybody
Brent Tantillo • February 3, 2010 7:15am • Uncategorized
The Other Club posts a link showing that during the George W. Bush Administration the share of taxes that the “rich” paid actually increased, despite popular wisdom.
Reuters posted a report yesterday, that was subsequently taken down, showing that the middle class, not the rich, will be affected more greatly by the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. The Christian Science Monitor explains further how this went down and shows much of the original Reuters story was actually quite accurate.
Senate Roundup
Brent Tantillo • February 2, 2010 5:16am • Uncategorized
Polipundit has an insightful roundup of the 2010 landscape in the Senate. The Republicans could pick-up 8 seats. They also note in my home state of Florida that Rubio tops Crist for the Republican nomination to replace the seat formerly held by Mel Martinez.
