Meet the New Boss!

Gerard Baker probably won't be endorsing Hillary:

As you consider her career this past 15 years or so in the public spotlight, it is impossible not to be struck, and even impressed, by the sheer ruthless, unapologetic, unshameable way in which she has pursued this ambition, and confirmed that there is literally nothing she will not do, say, think or feel to achieve it. Here, finally, is someone who has taken the black arts of the politician’s trade, the dissembling, the trimming, the pandering, all the way to their logical conclusion.

The King-men

Jay Nordlinger:

[Saddam's] execution was an occasion — for many — to knock George W. Bush and our whole enterprise in Iraq. And to condemn the Iraqi government for botching the hanging.

Okay, fair enough. But what a strange way to view Saddam’s execution. If people could hate totalitarian dictatorship as much as they do George W. Bush — the world would be a happier place.

Such is the lust for power. And these same people think of themselves as progressive and populist, both of which mean, apparently, to hell with the people outside, we want ours and we want it guaranteed. Such is Western Enlightenment.

Duck Dodgers, call home.

Ray gun demonstrated for dispersing crowds and forcing people to leave places where they're a threat. But it won't go into production until 2010. Faster please.

Of course, the left will denounce it as inhumane, but rubber bullets, water cannons and tear gas aren't exactly rose petals, you know.

ROBERT SAMUELSON is skeptical about the bright future of biofuels. Me too.

There's only one president.

Something tells me that the bully pulpit isn't what it used to be. The president is only one voice in the media din we live in these days. He's drowned out by pundits, commentators, editorial writers, reporters and bloggers, even before he's had a chance to say a word. His own press secretary seems to have a louder voice. Then there are the rest of the politicians, who throw around sound bites like they were million dollar earmarks, each one pontificating more pompously than the last.

I didn't watch or listen to the SOTU. These days, I'd prefer that he just put it in writing and sent it up to the hill. Why give the hyenas a sound byte to help them lead into their criticisms. Forget the Kabuki dance of the teleprompter, who applauds first and for how long and who's grimacing or stone-faced. None of it means anything. The sound and the fury is in the streets of Baghdad.

The myth of an intellectual left

Atrios on health care:

Or you could just sign everyone up and pay for it out of taxes one way or another. I'm flexible about how exactly it's implemented after that, but the biggest absurdity in all of these plans it that you have to add additional complexity to the tax code, and a ridiculous additional layer of administration/bureaucracy.

So, to avoid additional administration/bureaucracy and complexity, we snap our fingers and tell Congress to pay the bill? Yeah, that'll work.

I'm already sick of the presidential campaign

The media seem most interested in having the government assume the burden of everybody's health care. Despite all of Glenn Reynolds' optimism, from my position of 15 years of rheumatoid arthritis, the medical care system seems more able to prolong the misery than to really make life better. The main things I can see that might slow down the rising costs, market forces and restrictions on rewarding litigation, aren't seriously being considered. Everybody seems to assume that the government can afford this along with all the other entitlements.

Hello? Is anybody paying attention at all to the financial outlook for Medicare Medicaid and Social Security? Is it really justified to assume that the government will pay all our personal expenses? Once more people are drawing out than are paying in, what future is there for democracy?

Me, too! I want somebody who isn't running!

Not a Bush, Clinton, Obama, McCain, Giuliani! If he/she wants the job, he/she should not be nominated.

First Gay Sex, Then NAMBLA.

Now bestiality.

I want to hear PETA's position (oops, bad word choice) on this. Personally, I see this as another example of vice being seen too often, familiar, endured, then embraced.

Bill Richardson won't win the nomination, but probably should.

Bill Richardson may be the only Democrat in the race for presidency who has any qualifications for the job. He's held a number of jobs in government, knows foreign policy, but via the UN, and he's been a state governor. The others have legislative experience and have a lot of opinions, but the closest any of them has been to actually running a government is Hillary's stint as First Lady. I can't say that gave her anything more than a lot of bad examples.

How could they be so stupid?

It's not a good day to be the MSM. Michelle Malkin went to Iraq and returns with more evidence that the AP has been had by local informants. Why would a major media business risk its prime asset, its credibility on such flimsy evidence?

Amir Taheri provides another example and of in which a translator misstated the reason a demonstration was underway, and asserts that:

Iraq's new political life is either ignored or dismissed as irrelevant. The creation of political parties (some emerging from decades of clandestine life), the work of Iraq's parliament, the fact that it is almost the only Arab country where people are free to discuss politics to their hearts' content - these are of no interest to those determined to see Iraq as a disaster, as proof that toppling Saddam was a modern version of the original sin.

Ouch!

Maybe alcohol isn't so evil as I thought.

It seems to work wonders as a truth serum.