WikiLeaks, WMD & Bush

Larry Elder has a recent column entitled “The WikiLeaks Vindication of George W. Bush.”  In this column he delineates pretty well the case for a mass media apology to President Bush.  Bush was raked over the coals pretty badly for supposedly lying (“Bush lied, people died, “ remember?) during his 2003 State of the Union address about Iraq obtaining uranium from Africa.  Joe Wilson, the infamous Valerie Plame’s husband, made his reputation by denying that Iraq had uranium.

One positive aspect of the WikiLeaks mess is the revelation that Iraq did indeed have yellowcake uranium which could have been enriched to produce nuclear weapons.  Thus George W. Bush was telling the truth, and Joe Wilson (along with the rest of the anti-Bush crowd) was either lying or wrong.  Read Elder’s column for details.

In the column, Elder references the work of Wired magazine’s writer Noah Schachtman.  In his story “WikiLeaks Show WMD Hunt Continued in Iraq – With Surprising Results,” Schachtman writes, “But WikiLeaks’ newly-released Iraq war documents reveal that for years [after 2003] U.S. troops continued to find chemical weapons labs, encounter insurgent specialists in toxins and uncover weapons of mass destruction.”

Hmmm…. 

Apparently so

Politico headline: "Bush job approval rating higher than Obama's"


(The story's about how Bush's approval and popularity have rebounded from the lows at the end of his presidency.)

The Decider haunts Mr. Nuance

In his recent article "The Decider returns to haunt Mr. Nuance as George W. Bush eclipses Barack Obama" for the UK Telegraph, US editor Toby Harnden begins with "...only Obama's stumbles could have made Bush look good again so quickly."

He also references their public images: "Who would have thought that the man hailed as a great American orator and whose stage at the 2008 Democratic convention was a faux Greek temple would be shown up in terms of the theatricality and articulation of the presidency by the man derided as a tongue-tied bumbler and global village idiot?"

Myths About Katrina

The Democrats, with the media's help, have painted Hurricane Katrina as an example of the Bush administration's incompetence and lack of caring (especially about black people.)  Oddly enough, the facts don't always match the narrative.  Several years ago Popular Mechanics ran an article entitled "Debunking the Myths of Hurricane Katrina."  One salient passage:

"...the response to Hurricane Katrina was by far the largest -- and fastest -- rescue effort in U.S. history, with nearly 100,000 emergency personnel arriving on the scene within three days of the storm's landfall." 


Given the recent publicity accompanying the anniversary of the hurricane -- and the accompanying Bush-bashing -- it might be worth a look to get more of the story.

Blundering with impugnity

Recent headline from the Columbus Dispatch: "Obama had facts wrong about visit here."

The story goes on to report how Barack Obama, on a visit to Ohio to tout how well his stimulus plan is working, cited a project that was not funded with stimulus dollars.

"What we've been trying to do is to build infrastructure that puts people back to work but also improves the quality of life in communities like Columbus," Obama said in his remarks. "So Joe is an architect, and he's now working on a new police station that was funded in part with Recovery Act funds."

Two problems here -- first, of course, is that the money came from a congressional earmark rather than stimulus funds.  The second is that the project in question was not a "police station" but rather an abandoned warehouse the city is renovating to house its crime lab and property room.

White House representatives went back later to clarify what Obama meant.  This seems to be an ongoing process whenever Obama says something.  He, or his spokesman, have to go back and say what he really meant to say.

George Bush was ridiculed for his Bush-isms. There were plenty, to be sure, over his eight years.*  His opponents cited these instances as indications of his supposed lower-level intellect. Yet he rarely had to have anyone explain what he really meant to say.  Even when it was inelegant, his meaning was usually clear.

Obama, in his year and a half in office, has committed one gaffe after another without remark. And his supporters still consider him an "intellectual."

In comparison, Sarah Palin was destroyed by the media during the presidential campaign for her response to Katie Couric's question about what Palin reads.  Here's the exchange:

Couric: And when it comes to establishing your worldview, I was curious, what newspapers and magazines did you regularly read before you were tapped for this to stay informed and to understand the world?
Palin: I read most of them.
Couric: What, specifically?
Palin: Um, all of them, any of them that have been in front of me all these years.
Couric: Can you name a few?
Palin: I have a vast variety of sources where we get our news, too.
 
Remember, Palin was roundly criticized and ridiculed for her answers.  Now, here's Barack Obama's response to a similar question from a New York Times reporter.
 
NYT: Sir, we’re landing here, but what are you reading these days? What kind of newspapers do you read, do you read the clips, do you read actual papers, do you watch television?
Obama: Other than The New York Times?
NYT: Other than The New York Times. Do you read Web sites? What Web sites do you look at?
Obama: I read most of the big national papers.
NYT: Do you read them in clips or do you read them in the paper? (Note: This is where the reporter could have asked, "What, specifically?")
Obama: No, I read the paper. I like the feel of a newspaper. I read most of the weekly newsmagazines. I may not read them from cover to cover but I’ll thumb through them. You know, I spend most of my time these days reading a lot of briefings.

Now then. How much difference exists between the answers of "dimwit" Palin and "intellectual" Obama? 


*("Misunderestimate" is a good word. "Strategery" was not coined by Bush but by Will Ferrell impersonating the President during a SNL sketch. Bush's White House staff apparently picked it up as a joke and used it as a nod toward the comedy sketch.)

Slanted Snopes

Just an observation that even non-political websites as trusted as Snopes.com has a political agenda sometimes.  This came to mind recently as Liberals jumped on a Sarah Palin tweet in which she had a typo, interpreting it as her being a "dumbass" and "anti-intellectual."


Here's how Snopes excused Barack Obama's comment during the presidential campaign that he had visited "fifty-seven states" -- First of all, they mixed that fact with e-mails in which nutjobs referred to some fifty-seven Muslim states in whacko e-mails.  In doing that, they move the rumor from being "True" to being "mixture of true and false information."


Then they say this:  "...in May 2008, an obviously tired Barack Obama mistakenly told a crowd..."  (highlights mine.)  And "The actual intent behind Senator Obama's misstatement is easy to discern."


First Snopes diluted the real accusation, which was entirely true.  Then they excused it.


Republicans (like me) made fun of Obama for the slip, but we understood that those things happen.  Nowhere did I ever see someone who made a serious judgment on Obama's intellect based on it.  Liberals, on the other hand, have no qualms on making such a judgment promoting the idea that Sarah Palin is intellectually sub-par. She's another in the long line of prominent Republicans who have been attacked on their supposed lack of intellect, going back (as far as I know) to Reagan, who was described in his time as an "amiable dunce."


One last note -- Al Gore and later John Kerry were described by admirers during their campaigns as "brilliant."  George W. Bush, whose mind Democrats constantly made fun of, had a higher GPA in college than both of them.

Yes, Let's Compare Obama to Bush

Barack Obama threw out the first pitch at the 2009 All Star game today. You can see the video of it here. Here's what Yahoo Sports had to say:

"Earlier on Tuesday, the President said that he planned to throw his first Presidential pitch high so it'd get to the plate without bouncing, but his control was lacking. He clearly didn't throw a strike like George W. Bush famously did during the 2001 World Series in New York just weeks after Sept. 11.

"The more debatable point from the historic moment was the reception the President was afforded... Though Obama was roundly cheered by the All-Star fans, his live presence still didn't attract the applause that George W. Bush did during a taped announcement by the four previous Presidents before the game and some boos could even be heard among the cheers."

Despite what the announcers said, Obama clearly didn't get the ball to the plate. Note where Pujols' feet and glove are.

.

Here's Bush's first pitch from 2001:

For all of Obama's vaunted athleticism, Bush made Obama look like a little girl in comparison. Now, which one looked more like the leader of the free world?

Other People Say Smart Stuff, Too Part XV

I've written about (or plagiarized from) columnist John Hawkins previously. Today he struck paydirt again with his column titled "Five Criticisms of George Bush That Could Be Better Applied to Barack Obama."

From Sublime to Foolish

In a scene from the Tom Hanks movie The Green Mile, miracle-worker John Coffey describes how a killer made a little girl be quiet and not sound an alarm when he took her sister: "He killed them with their love. With their love for each other. That's how it is, every day, all over the world." (Quick wrap-up of the movie: the killer murders both of the girls, but receives justice later.)

Love is an emotion that is basic to humanity. It takes a special kind of psychopath to turn something like that into a weapon to be used against innocents.

Likewise, freedom and justice are principles basic to humanity and civilization. Freedom and justice are virtues universal enough to be written into the U.S. Constitution, and form the backbone of our country.

Now those same virtues are being used against us. Recently, a misquided soul has written a series of letters to a smalltown newspaper, promulgating the fact that he hates George W. Bush, Republicans, Conservatives, everything they do, and all they represent.

His latest tirade deals with habeas corpus, and a recent move by the Senate to limit the ability of Guantanamo Bay detainees to access U.S. courts. The U.S. Supreme Court recently ruled against a GB detainee's access.

There are too many details to go into about this, but one thing the abovementioned myope, and others who feel as he does, chooses to ignore is that these people were captured trying to kill Americans at war.

The tactic they want to use -- and which is oh-so-clear to me -- is to use our own systems against us. The GB detainees want to choke the court with cases, subpoena-ing the President, Vice President, Secretary of Defense et al, in order to disrupt the government. Meanwhile, they'll be able to get headlines every day as the press rushes to report every tidbit of scandal they can gather or make up. As we've seen in the Duke lacrosse "rape" case, the press doesn't need facts in order to run a story.

(Sidequote on the press: "The press supplies an endless stimulus to popular imagination; the press lives upon heat and coarse drama and incessant restlessness." The Conservative Mind, written by Russell Kirk in 1953! Some things never change.)

Likewise, the imams want to 1) Tie up the courts with their lawsuit; 2) Use the specter of a charge of racism to dull the senses of the citizenry's watchful eyes; 3) Push the envelope as much as possible, testing our security so much that abnormal activity is considered normal.

As wonderful as our society is, as well as our system of government (while recognizing its flaws), the US Constitution, as someone has said, is not a suicide pact. We must find a way to fight attempts to corrupt our system. Otherwise we're simply acting like Wells' Eloi while the Morlocks devour us and our way of life.

That Dead Nag of 2000 Beaten Again

A recent posting about, of all things, the Academy Awards, sent me into a tizzy. The fellow who writes the blog is a lawyer and a Liberal, and in passing he speaks of Al Gore being "robbed" of the presidency. You'd think a guy who went to enough school to become a lawyer would know better.

The Liberal chant of "Selected, not elected" and snide comments -- as though they were fact -- that Bush "stole" the election of 2000 still comes up often enough that I want to articulate a short, factual argument that explains what happened in a clear, straightforward manner.

"Al Gore got more votes than Bush." Gore got more of the popular vote. However, the President of the United States is won in the electoral college, not by a popular vote. This is established in Article II of the U.S. Constitution. Each state legislature determines how its electoral votes will be determined and apportioned. (Note: this becomes very important later in the story.) Most states have a "winner take all" system, so a candidate gets all a state's electoral votes, even if he wins by as little as a 50.1% - 49.9% margin. The candidate with fewer popular votes also won the Presidency in 1876 and 1888. (Note: George Bush still got more votes than Bill Clinton ever did.)

"The U.S. Supreme Court 'selected' Bush." The timeline on this is fairly straightforward.

November 7, 2000 (Election day.) The networks call the vote for the state of Florida for Gore, saying he's the winner before the polls are closed in the Florida panhandle, traditionally a Republican stronghold. (How many Republicans shrugged their shoulders and didn't vote after hearing the news? Might this have given Bush more of the popular vote?) Later, after more votes start coming in, they slam on the breaks and call it for Bush.

Nov 8, 2000 - Early in the morning, Gore concedes. Forty-five minutes later he calls back and unconcedes. His lawyers start screaming for recounts.

Nov 10, 2000 - Bush wins the election in the first recount.

Nov 14, 2000 - Section 102.111 of Florida state election law says that any county returns "not received...by 5:00 p.m. of the seventh day following an election...shall be ignored." Today's the day. Those counties' ballots being recounted would be considered "not received."

Nov 16-17, 2000 - The Florida Supreme Court rules that the counties can continue the recounts (contrary to Florida law,) and order Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris not to certify the results yet. Remember that pesky Section 102.111? The Florida Supreme Court has just ordered Harris to violate it. By extending the deadline to Nov 26, they have changed "seven" to "nineteen."

Nov 18, 2000 - After absentee ballots are counted, Bush wins the election after the second recount.

Nov 21, 2000 - The Florida Supreme Court gives counties five more days to finish their recounts.

Nov 26, 2000 - After the Florida Supreme Court's deadline passes, Secretary Harris certifies the election results and Bush wins by 537 votes.

Nov 27, 2000 - Gore sues to nullify the Florida election. The hearing is set for December 2. On December 4, the judge rules against Gore.

Dec 7, 2000 - Gore appeals to the Florida Supreme Court, which rules again (contrary to Florida law) that recounts can continue in specific counties.

Dec 12, 2000 - The U.S. Supreme Court reverses the Florida Supreme Court's ruling, in effect saying that the ruling violated the Constitution, and that the recounts should stop. Bush wins.

The point of this long series of events is that Florida law, established by the Florida legislature (in accordance with the U.S. Constitution) before the election, was changed by the Florida Supreme Court after the election. (Note: all seven judges on the Florida Supreme Court were appointed by Democrats.) It should never have got that far.

Additionally, Bush won the election in every single official count. Later, a consortium of media did some "what-ifs" with the ballots, and Bush won most of those also. Only by applying extraordinary acrobatics to the ballots did Gore ever win.

Whenever a Liberal starts this nonsense all over again, you have my permission to simply call him a "stupid head."