Disingenuous much, Rupert?

An old adage intones, "Be careful what you wish for. You just might get it."

Rupert Murdoch is signaling displeasure with Team Elephant's choice of Presidential candidate.

To hear Rupert Murdoch tell it lately, Mitt Romney lacks stomach and heart. He “seems to play everything safe.” And he is not nearly as tough as he needs to be on President Obama.

Mr. Murdoch’s thoughts on the Republican presidential candidate’s prospects? “Tough O Chicago pros will be hard to beat unless he drops old friends from the team.” Chances of that? “Doubtful,” he tapped out in a Twitter message from his iPad last weekend.

Then, on Thursday, Mr. Murdoch’s flagship newspaper, The Wall Street Journal, published a blistering editorial criticizing Mr. Romney’s campaign, accusing it of being hapless and looking “confused in addition to being politically dumb.”

Mr. Murdoch has never been particularly impressed with Mr. Romney, friends and associates of both men say. The two times Mr. Romney visited the editorial board of The Journal, Mr. Murdoch did not work very hard to conceal his lack of excitement. “There was zero enthusiasm, no engagement,” said one Journal staff member who was at the most recent meeting in December.

You'll pardon me if I pause here to soak in the schadenfreude.

You see, it was Murdoch's Fox News that has served as the leading cheerleaders for Romney for the past year. It was Murdoch's Fox News that declared Romney the front-runner well before the primaries started and continued to label him the front-runner through the early primaries notwithstanding the obvious lackluster response to him from the electorate. It was Murdoch's Fox News who declared Il Dilettante the only candidate who could defeat Obama. And it was Murdoch's Fox News that served, effectively, as Romney's unpaid propaganda machine.

NOW Rupert decides he isn't that into Romney? NOW?!?!?!?!?

You created this situation, Rupert. You can like it, or, like the rest of us, you can lump it.

But don't try to sell us your belated regrets now. Anyone who has been paying attention ain't buying it.

Response to friendly taunting

A little over a week ago I noticed that The Modern Pharisee had resumed blogging. In his post The Lesser of Three Evils, he essentially laid out the case that Ron Paul supporters owed it to themselves and their country to choke back their bile and disgust and vote for "the best conservative candidate on the ballot" this Fall, citing the experience of King David.

In The Pharisee's view, David chose "the lesser of three evils" when given a choice.

While I was reading the post, a paraphrase of Carly Simon's 1970s hit song You're So Vain kept running through my head. "You're so vain. You probably think this post is about you, don't you, don't you, don't you?"

Well, uh, yeah. I did think that post was about me. Hugh and I have had that particular discussion before. But whether or not it was vanity became irrelevant when I received this Google message from Hugh.

Hugh: I'm back to blogging, and this is for you (and a few others)

http://hughmcbryde.blogspot.com/2012/04/lesser-of-three-evils.html.

That got a smile out of me. Okay, taunt accepted. Now it's my turn.

I like your analogy. But it's a bit flawed (sorry, Hugh). David was forced to choose between three horrible punishments, while we may choose between three options that, while not pleasant, are certainly NOT horrible punishments. David's three choices were (a) seven years of famine, (b) fleeing his enemies for three months, or (c) three days of pestilence. Our three choices are (a) vote for the incumbent Corporatist thug, Il Duce, (b) vote for the winner of the Republican primaries Corporatist dilettante hand-chosen by the Team Elephant elites, or (c) stay home and flip 'em both the bird. In our case, choice (c) is not only no punishment, but satisfying, in a juvenile sort of way.

Hugh's analogy further breaks down. David did NOT choose the punishment that befell his people. He chose one of the three options that he absolutely did not want to occur. He left the final decision up to the Lord.

I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the LORD; for his mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man.

One way or another, in our situation, we have to choose (a), (b), or (c).

We know that choice (a) is out of the question. Il Duce incorporates all of the worst traits of horrendous presidents of the past, including thug Woodrow Wilson, messianic Franklin Roosevelt, "Great Society" Lyndon Johnson, and bumbling Jimmy Carter. But is choice (b) really that much better? Sure, Il Dilettante has great, presidential hair. But he's flip-flopped on every major issue over the past 20 years. If he's a conservative, then I'm Conrad Hilton. The elites moved heaven and earth -- including turning Fox News into the official Romney for President communications organ -- to push Romney through. Why so much effort? It's because...wait for it...NOBODY (and I mean NOBODY) wants him. Okay, Ann Coulter wants him. She can have him.

Choice (c) looks better and better to me all the time. I've already stated that this country is too far gone for any single individual operating as President to fix it.

Four years ago I reacted angrily when The Hausfraurer said that he would no longer vote, because, by voting, he was lending legitimacy to this phony, Corporatist system. Four years later, I completely agree with him.

The game is rigged. There isn't a dime's bit of difference between the "two" candidates. They both love big government; they only disagree when it comes to how big and who pays.

Sign me up for choice (c).

New Tizona Post

And it begins...

The pattern has been played out over and over. A potential Team Elephant presidential candidate starts to rise in the polls. A bulls-eye is affixed to that candidate. A combination of Republican elites, their allies in the punditocracy, and Big Media (the BM for short), which simply can't help itself when an opportunity to dump on a Republican presents itself, begin hammering on any and all perceived defects of said candidate. Next thing you know, the new frontrunner is cast on the scrap heap, either to quit (like Herman Cain) or to flounder haplessly trying to regain momentum (like Michele Bachmann and Governor Perry Gardasil).

Now that Newt Gingrich is dropping faster than shares in Freddie Mac, Ron Paul has surged into a virtual tie and perhaps even the lead in Iowa.

That's bad.

Read the rest at The Tizona Group.

New Tizona Post

This isn't an election we're witnessing. It's a coronation, at least on the Team Elephant side of the ledger.

Why would I call it a coronation? How could I call it a coronation when there is no clear front-runner and the first primary hasn't even occurred yet? Follow along as I read the tea leaves.

Read the rest at The Tizona Group.

New Tizona Post

Romney. *shakes head ruefully*

Yeah, he’s trying to appeal to everybody. He certainly appeals to the Elephant Elitists, who have all but anointed him as The Chosen One. But if you really examine who he is and what he represents, he certainly won’t appeal to YOU.

The Eisenhower Warnings

Frequent Tizona Group commenter J.M. Heinrichs made the following comment in reference to a comment I made about Ron Paul being the only Team Elephant candidate who would take on the military-industrial complex.

People keep forgetting that Eisenhower issued two warnings, and the Mil-Industry one was the lessor.

That got me thinking. Everyone who knows anything about history is familiar with Eisenhower's admonition about the military-industrial complex. But another warning? I was intrigued. I googled Eisenhower's speech and found this.

The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.  (emphasis mine)

Does that sound familiar to you? It should.

The War on Man-made Global Warming (AGW) is just one example of what has become a symbiotic relationship between left-leaning politicians, left-leaning bureaucrats, and left-leaning academics. Science has been co-opted by this nefarious troika to the detriment of both science and humanity.

Government money is allotted to those scientists who come up with the "results" that government wants to see. Public policy is made on the basis of these "influenced" findings. And politicians leverage these "facts" to demogogue against those who question their agendas.

It's a pity that this Eisenhower warning wasn't given the same weight as the other, equally important warning. Only time will tell whether it will be the military-industrial complex that is our undoing or the scientific-technological elite.

I'm baaaaaaack

Just like a case of herpes, I have returned. My vacation was refreshing and invigorating. But now I'm back and it's time to address the "big issues of the day".

As if!

Nah, I'm going to dedicate my first post-vacation post to saying, "I told you so!"

Did I not tell you? DID I NOT TELL YOU?!?!?!?

When Il Duce named Jeffrey Immelt as his "jobs czar" back in January, I said that Immelt was a repugnant slug who represented the very worst in crony capitalism. I said that the company he chairs, General Electric, is "the #1 looter corporation".

Seems there are those who agree with me.

The New York Times reported last month that General Electric earned $14.2 billion in international profits, including, $5.1 billion in the United States. Yet GE did not pay a dime in federal income taxes last year. Oddly, President Obama chose GE Chairman and chief executive Jeffrey Immelt to head his President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.

According to the Associated Press, Immelt's compensation package doubled to $15.2 million last year, while this year, GE is seeking major concessions from the unions that represent its shrinking American workforce. That makes Immelt the wrong guy for the job of jobs czar.

Or as former Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold wrote, "Someone like Immelt, who has helped his company evade taxes on its huge profits -- and is now looking to workers to take major pay cuts after his compensation was doubled -- should not lead the administration's effort to create jobs."

I almost wish I could just paste the whole essay, written masterfully by Debra Saunders, into this post. But in the interest of giving credit where credit is due, you should go to RealClearPolitics and read the whole thing yourself. You'll be glad you did.

One last quote from the opinion piece.

When Obama appointed Immelt to his jobs and competitiveness council, the president said that Immelt "understands what it takes for America to compete in the global economy."

Unfortunately, Immelt seems to have learned that the best way to increase GE's profits was to eliminate a fifth of its American workforce, ship jobs overseas and hire a small army of tax attorneys.

A generous person might argue that GE's experience makes Immelt the smart choice to reform the tax code.

But Immelt can't be in charge of GE and reform a tax system it helped pervert. Obama must know that. Obama must not care.

Dripping with irony

Senator John Kerry Lurch made an appearance this past weekend. The reception he got was the sweetest type of schadenfreude imaginable, and for all of the right reasons.

A loud and angry crowd in Northampton confronted Sen. John Kerry over his support for the war in Afghanistan, the government’s response to the recession and other issues.

Anti-war protesters interrupted Kerry numerous times Saturday as he met with constituents.

OMG, is that the best or what? Mr. Vietnam Veterans against the war. Mr. Winter Soldiers investigation. And he gets heckled for what? Supporting an unpopular war!!!

It just doesn't get any better than this. Seriously.

So-called conservative comments on CPAC

In case you missed it, Ron Paul won the straw poll at CPAC, with Hairdo Healthcare finishing second. The indignity of this result was too much for one of Fox News' legion of Neocons to bear.

The top three winners of this weekend's CPAC straw poll will not win the 2012 presidential nomination. And if any of the top three do break through to prove that prediction wrong, none of them will go on to win the White House in 2012.

This year's top three placeholders in the poll were Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and Gary Johnson. Ron Paul and Mitt Romney repeat their standing from the 2010 poll as No. 1 and No. 2, respectively.

If the results of this straw poll do not sufficiently demonstrate the bizarre nature and overall oddity of this year's gathering of "conservatives," nothing else can.

Ron Paul, though technically still a Republican, has given up his GOP identity to embrace the chance to be the poster child for the more libertarian streak that has run rampant through CPAC, largely unabated for the past two years. Mitt Romney, the virtual author of Obamacare, and 2008's third-place finisher for the GOP nomination, is weighed down by the fact that his universal health care mandate in Massachusetts has largely failed – with the exception being the $50 state-subsidized abortions. Gary Johnson was only added to the lineup at the last minute, his presence stoking the flame of immoral libertarianism that actually advocated for legalized pot and the redefinition of marriage to include homosexual unions.

In other words, this year's CPAC wasn't about advancing conservatism. Rather, it exposed the radically disrespectful element of the libertine.

It has been the inclusion of the libertarian aspects of the past two years that has thrown the message of conservatism askew in a widely disproportional way.

It is the libertarian in attendance that produced the free pornographic calendar passed out to attendees in 2010. It is the libertarians in attendance who openly promote the inclusion of groups like GOProud, largely as an attempt to silence groups who would speak in strong support of traditional moral values. It is the libertarian in attendance who slandered President George Bush, by claiming his appreciation for the Constitution was best summed up as a "damn piece of paper." It is the libertarian in attendance that proclaimed the war to prevent terrorists from regathering strength and coming after our homeland as "illegal." And it is the libertarian in attendance that eschewed, booed, cajoled and screamed "war criminal" to Vice President Dick Cheney, a man who served his country with commitment and still attempts to help the world understand the threat of the radical Islamic element devising plans to eliminate us and our allies.

Now the libertarians stuffed the ballot box of the CPAC straw poll, and for the second year in a row made it the laughingstock poll in the eyes of the voters. (This year's voters are perhaps more engaged, more aware and more plugged in than ever before.)

In head-to-head polling going back a full year to last year's CPAC, neither Ron Paul nor Mitt Romney has consistently topped a head-to-head match-up against a greatly weakened President Obama. Romney has only topped the sitting president once in that 12-month period. Gov. Mike Huckabee, a no-show at CPAC for the past years, has beaten the president head-to-head in nearly every poll taken.

David Keene, the American Conservative Union’s outgoing president, gave a lengthy discounting of this year's poll in the lead up to it. That should serve as a very clear indicator that next year's CPAC needs some significant changes if it is to become the great conference it has been in past years.

Libertarians and Conservatives are as different as Libertarians and Liberals. The truth is libertarians are the worst form of political affiliation in the nation. Combining the desire of economic greed, with the amoral desire to promote any behavior regardless of its cost to our culture is a stark departure from the intent of the Founding Fathers.

And it is not consistent with the average conservative voter in America.

Libertine? Legalized pot? Advocating behaviors? Not consistent with the average conservative voter in America? How extraordinarily rich! But my favorite part of his meltdown was this.

Libertarians and Conservatives are as different as Libertarians and Liberals. The truth is libertarians are the worst form of political affiliation in the nation. Combining the desire of economic greed, with the amoral desire to promote any behavior regardless of its cost to our culture is a stark departure from the intent of the Founding Fathers.

Seriously? "Amoral desire to promote any behavior"? Where does this jerk get THAT from? No libertarian is actively promoting ANYTHING except freedom from government.

His whole article is an attack against liberty-loving people everywhere. His thesis is predictable, because it's the Team Elephant establishment and Neocommie platform: war without end, big government in our image, and "you're either with us or against us".

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: if you're a conservative, Team Elephant is NOT your friend. And Fox News is NOT conservative: it's nothing but the organ of propaganda for the Neocommies.

Meet the new boss

Most Republicans were extremely pleased when RINO Michael Steele was unable to retain his position as RNC Chairman. Steele was unpopular with the Team Elephant elites. He was even more unpopular with the Tea Party.

But is the new RNC Chairman, Reince Priebus, any better? Eh, not so much.

While Priebus boasted, during his campaign for RNC chairman, of his good relations with Wisconsin tea party groups, the leaders of those groups give his tenure mixed reviews, with some accusing him of giving only lip service to the movement while stacking the deck against its candidates, shutting them out of the process or working to absorb them into the GOP.

“Priebus will do whatever it takes to co-opt the tea party movement,” said Mike Murphy, chairman of a tea party-allied 527 group called The Republican Liberty Caucus of Wisconsin, founded in late 2009.

In the midterm elections, Murphy’s group supported tea party candidates, including some who were undercut by the state GOP, which largely ignored long-shot tea party candidates and endorsed the primary rivals of others at its May convention — months before the primary election.

As The Who famously sang, "Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss."

I wrote yesterday that the Tea Party made a gargantuan mistake by not forming a third party or joining forces with one of the existing third parties. Their movement was co-opted by Team Elephant, just as I said it would be. The new Chairman is further proof that I'm right.

But Mike Murphy isn't going to just roll over and let the elitists roll the Tea Party. He's starting to see things my way.

“He didn’t allow for conservative voices that didn’t jibe with the establishment view and if he charges down that course (at the RNC), the tea party people will wake up and it may very well split up the Republican Party” coalition that powered the GOP’s 2010 landslide, said Murphy.

Let's hope for the future viability of the Tea Party that he's right.

Message to the looter class

How can you tell when your society is destined for ruin?  Easy.

"Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion -- when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing -- when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors -- when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you -- when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice -- you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that it does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot.

"Whenever destroyers appear among men, they start by destroying money, for money is men's protection and the base of a moral existence. Destroyers seize gold and leave to its owners a counterfeit pile of paper. This kills all objective standards and delivers men into the arbitrary power of an arbitrary setter of values. Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to produce it. Paper is a check drawn by legal looters upon an account which is not theirs: upon the virtue of the victims. Watch for the day when it becomes, marked: 'Account overdrawn.'

"When you have made evil the means of survival, do not expect men to remain good. Do not expect them to stay moral and lose their lives for the purpose of becoming the fodder of the immoral. Do not expect them to produce, when production is punished and looting rewarded. Do not ask, 'Who is destroying the world?' You are.

An excerpt from Atlas Shrugged by Ain Rand.

How valid is Rand's assessment.  Pretty spot on, if you ask me.  Pretty spot on.

A hearty welcome to the 112th Congress of the United States.  Loot on!

A change in talk radio?

I don't normally listen to Quinn and Rose in the morning.  Oh, sure, I used to on occasion, if for no other reason than for confirmation of the latest "conservative" talking points and for their histrionics about "the most importantest election ever!", whichever election it might be.

But this morning Mike Church went to commercial and The Sports Junkies were in a commercial break as well, so I tuned in Q-n-R.  What a surprise!  Rose (of course it wasn't Quinn!) was waxing wroth against a dangerous man.  And it wasn't Il Duce!

Rose read from an article written some months ago by WorldNetDaily founder Joseph Farah.  The last sentence of the article reads,

There is perhaps no more dangerous man in America today than Mitt Romney. If he succeeds Obama, it will be the final nail in the coffin of American liberty. You've been duly warned.

That Farah, a man of principles, would say this about Mitt Romney is not unexpected.  Farah isn't one of those "vote for the guy with the 'R' after his name or we'll all die!" pseudo-conservatives.  He sees the Elephants for what they are.

But for Rose to read his article -- and agree with it wholeheartedly -- is something of a "man bites dog" moment.

Is there something happening out there in Talk Radio land?  Have the blathering heads seen the writing on the wall and started distancing themselves from the Rockefellerite elitists of Team Elephant?

It's too soon to say for sure.  But I, for one, hope that, like the old folk song says, "the times they are a changin'".

Piling on: more TSSA abuse

TSSA (you can't spell Schutzstaffel without the double S) is the hot topic these days, crowding out the G20 Summit, the ConAgra/Archer Daniels Midland/Big Agra food industry takeover bill, and, well, everything else. And why not?  After all, they make it so easy!

The latest is this tale of humiliation.

A retired special education teacher on his way to a wedding in Orlando, Fla., said he was left humiliated, crying and covered with his own urine after an enhanced pat-down by TSA officers recently at Detroit Metropolitan Airport.

“I was absolutely humiliated, I couldn’t even speak,” said Thomas D. “Tom” Sawyer, 61, of Lansing, Mich.

Sawyer is a bladder cancer survivor who now wears a urostomy bag, which collects his urine from a stoma, or opening in his stomach. “I have to wear special clothes and in order to mount the bag I have to seal a wafer to my stomach and then attach the bag. If the seal is broken, urine can leak all over my body and clothes.”

Long story short...

I tried to warn him that he would hit the bag and break the seal on my bag, but he ignored me. Sure enough, the seal was broken and urine started dribbling down my shirt and my leg and into my pants.”

The security officer finished the pat-down, tested the gloves for any trace of explosives and then, Sawyer said, “He told me I could go. They never apologized. They never offered to help. They acted like they hadn’t seen what happened. But I know they saw it because I had a wet mark.”

Humiliated, upset and wet, Sawyer said he had to walk through the airport soaked in urine, board his plane and wait until after takeoff before he could clean up.

Ah, but don't worry, Mr. Sawyer.  Il Duce feels your pain.

President Obama said today he sympathizes with passenger complaints about aggressive body pat-downs at airports, but his counter-terrorism aides say they are necessary to guard against hidden explosives.

Balancing privacy and security is a "tough situation," Obama told reporters at a news conference following the NATO summit in Lisbon, Portugal.

"One of the most frustrating aspects of this fight against terrorism is that it has created a whole security apparatus around us that causes a huge inconvenience for all of us," Obama said.

Uh, no, Mr. President. It is NOT a huge inconvenience for ALL of us.  You traipse all over the world in the opulence that is Air Force One.  And even those members of Congress who make a big show of flying commercial (hey, how 'bout that? [/sarcasm]) manage to skip the humiliation reserved for the rest of us (hat tip: Ye Olde Journalist).

No airport pat-down for the incoming House speaker.

On Friday, the GOP's John Boehner was guided past the metal detectors and hand inspections given to other passengers on his flight home to Ohio.

Boehner's spokesman Michael Steel said his boss followed procedures set by Capitol Police and the Transportation Security Administration. Steel said the same rules apply to other congressional leaders.

Yeah. The same rules apply to other congressional leaders. Because, after all, only we mundanes should be humiliated, NOT the elites who rule us.

Toes forwarded a proposed solution to the TSSA madness. I think it's a huge improvement over the current MCF.

Solution to issue of full-body scanners at airports: A booth you step into that will detonate any explosive device you may have hidden on or in your body. The explosion is contained within the booth. Win-Win? No profiling and will eliminate long and expensive trials. Hmmmm: In the airport you hear a muffled explosion. Later an announcement, "Attention, standby passengers! Seats now available on flight number...

Priceless.

Vulture Droppings: Electoral Defeat

Vulture Droppings is a semi-regular feature of this blog. It's a kind of "Random Thoughts" post in which I try to quickly summarize a particularly large event or series of events. Think of it being sort of like what a vulture leaves behind after devouring a horse. You don't get the whole horse, just highly processed leftovers.

---

Some of you are going to read the title of this point and come to the conclusion that I've finally gone around the bend.  You're going to assume that I've completely LOST IT.  While you may, in fact, be right about my failing sanity (until you've lived a workload like I've had for the past 4 months, you have NO IDEA what insanity really feels like), I am speaking from the heart here.

This edition of Vulture Droppings deals with my analysis of the 2010 elections, which are, thankfully, finally over.  If I had to watch one more ad for Candidate A in which Candidate B was painted as Hitler's more evil twin, followed apace by an ad for Candidate B in which Candidate A was painted as worse than Stalin, I think I would have stuck a pencil in my eye.

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It is said that a pessimist views the glass as half full, while the optimist sees it as half empty.  So what does that make me?  I see the glass as nearly empty, leaking, and what little water remains in it is polluted.

What most so-called conservatives are touting as a major electoral victory is nothing of the sort.  Team Elephant won the House - hey, how 'bout that?  "Oh come on, Vulture!  Even you have to concede that the historic taking of the House is a major victory!"

No.  No I don't.

The House will make for a nice, boisterous legislative soap opera for the next two years.  But the Senate is still under the control of Harry Reid (more on that later), and the White House is still in the clutches of Il Duce.  Good luck getting anything constructive done in the next two years.

---

What constitutes victory? What defines defeat?  Let me take a stab at it.

• Victory would have included a major purge of Team Donkey leadership.  

See Harry Reid?  Still standing.  See Nancy Pelosi?  Sure, she's no longer the Screecher of the House...but she's still standing.  See Barney (Elmer Fudd's evil twin) Frank?  Still standing. Team Elephant might not have had a legitimate chance at taking down "Air Force 3".  But that senile old fool Harry Reid was ripe for the taking.  And Barney Frank was extremely vulnerable, given his cozy relationship with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.  But the elitist snobs that run Team Elephant (into the ground, I might say) weren't about to lend any material support to a commoner like Sharon Angle.  She wouldn't fit in at a Washington cocktail party at all!  Neither was there any real effort on the part of the Elephants to take down Frank.  You leave Harry Reid and Barney Frank standing -- that's not victory.

• Victory would have included a change in the kind of candidates elected by the Elephants.  

Set aside for a moment Rand Paul's win in Tennessee.  See anyone else "different" winning anywhere?   I don't.  And, no, Marco Rubio doesn't count.  I think he's every bit the faux conservative that John Boehner is.

Sharon Angle?  Joe Miller?  Christine O'Donnell?  They were undermined at every turn by the Elephant elites.  Face facts, conservatives: your side threw the game.  They were happier with losing those races than with dealing with commoners in their midst.

But don't worry.  John McCommie won reelection.  Yeah....

• Victory would have set the stage for the dismantling of Obamacare.

You can't roll back Obamacare with just the House.  Face facts -- we're stuck with it.  In 2 years, even if the Elephants win the House, the Senate, and the Presidency, they'll throw up their hands and say that Obamacare can't be rolled back because too many people are dependent on it.  That's Washington DC Realpolitik.

---

You're going to think I've lost my mind, but I'm actually sorry that Russ Feingold lost his Senate seat in Wisconsin.  Yeah, he's a big Lefty.  But he's an HONEST big Lefty.  And he was one of the few in Washington willing to stand up to the abuses of the DHSS (you can't spell Schutzstaffel without the double S).

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One final observation on the election.  No matter the political climate.  No matter the economic parameters.  Even if the very survival of the human race were at stake, it just wouldn't matter.  The People's Republic of Maryland will vote Democrat.

The Elephants didn't even bother to field a candidate against Senator-since-Reconstruction Barbara Mikulski.  Yeah, there was some guy's name with an 'R' next to it on the ballot.  But I wouldn't recognize him if he was standing in my kitchen carving the turkey at Thanksgiving wearing a sweater with his name embroidered on it.

6 of 8 Congressional districts went Donkey.  The 2 that didn't?  Frederick County and points west, and the Eastern Shore, both heavily agricultural.

Martin O'Malley, quite possibly the worst governor in the State's history, won in a crushing landslide against former governor (and RINO) Bob Erlich.

Yeah, I'm ready to move.  You can't live in Libtardia for 20-plus years and not have it affect you.

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Vulture Droppings: Most Importantist Election Ever Edition

Vulture Droppings is a semi-regular feature of this blog. It's a kind of "Random Thoughts" post in which I try to quickly summarize a particularly large event or series of events. Think of it being sort of like what a vulture leaves behind after devouring a horse. You don't get the whole horse, just highly processed leftovers.

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There's an election tomorrow.  Hey, how 'bout that? [/sarcasm]

"Shame on you, Vulture!  It's the most importantist election ever!"  Uh huh.

"Vulture!  It's all different this year!  The Tea Party is gonna change everything!"  Really?  How so?  The Tea Parties have been completely co-opted by Team Elephant.  Why would I say that?  What evidence do I have of such a thing?  A sampling:

Some traditional Republican consultants are advising — with a straight face — that newly elected Republican members of Congress "reach across the aisle…and "work with the Democrats."

John Boehner "rallies the troops" with empty (and limp) words "backing" Tea Party principles.  He swears spending will be rolled back to "pre-bailouts levels".  Seriously?  Going from $1.5 trillion deficits to $1 trillion deficits?  Oooooh!  I'm SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO impressed!

And worst of all, the Queen of Inside the Beltway faux conservatism "celebrates" the Tea Party as having "saved" Team Elephant from King George the Dim.  Ms. Noonan, for those of you who weren't paying attention, was one of King George's biggest apologists during his 8 year reign of error.

---

"Vulture! Even YOU have to admit that we're better off with Republican-co-opted Tea Party candidates than with the Dhimmi-crats who have rammed a 50-year wish-list of Progressivism down our throats the past 4 years!"

Better?  Better HOW?  BETTER would have been for the Tea Parties to have come together as a third party or under the umbrella of one of the existing third parties (Libertarian or Constitution, for example).  BETTER would be for those candidates to be able to enter Mordor on the Potomac (hat tip: Mike Church) with a clean slate and a fresh canvas than to walk into the clutches of Mitch McCommie and John BaneTurd.

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Here's the big reason I'm so unenthusiastic.  I'll lay it out in a single sentence.  The co-opting of the Tea Parties by Team Elephant guarantees the failure of the principles that brought those people together.  Guaran.  Effing.  Tees it.

There is no principle that Republicans will not run from, no compromise they will not accept, no stand crucial enough for them to make.

What happens to the Tea Parties after their "champions" are relegated to the Congressional equivalent of the Back Bench, and the John Boehner Business-as-Usual express continues propping up Crony Capitalism?  What happens after Mitch McConnell compromises for the umpteenth time on a point of principle that just SCREAMS for men of courage and conviction to just say "NO!"?

You kill this once-in-a-political lifetime awakening of the sheeple, and you kill any chance we ever have of wresting power away from the looters.

But that's the idea really, isn't it?  That's why the GOP has co-opted the Tea Parties.  They like the gravy train that is "public service" in Washington every bit as much as Team Donkey does.

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Pledge to America is lame

Nearly assured of a massive victory at the polls in November, Team Elephant did what it does best: it undermined its own chances for success.  Their chosen mode of self-immolation this election: Son of Contract With America.

This propaganda masterpiece, called  A Pledge to America, is a real head-scratcher.  There is no reference to nor acknowledgment of the Tea Party.  Why would the Elephant elites give any credit to people they both loath and seek to discredit?

A lot of slick pictures accompany the propaganda piece.  These are images meant to elicit an emotional, patriotic response from the reader.  It made me sick.

The document is divided into sections tailored at issues the elitists think are important to ordinary Americans. The promise in the preface to "honor the Constitution" and "those precepts that have been consistently ignored – particularly the Tenth Amendment", is broken right away in the Foreword, where they state that, when it comes to spending cuts, "common-sense exceptions for seniors, veterans, and our troops" will be made.  Business as usual, anyone?

Here's the worst from each section.

Section 1, Job Creation.  Job creation.  Job creation.  They still think the GOVERNMENT creates jobs.  Nevertheless, the steps they propose to take, while hardly representing job creation, do at least improve the business environment to where employers MIGHT consider hiring.

Grade: B

Section 2, Reduce the Size of Government.  The people who gave us King George the Dim's War Without End are trying to sell us reduced government spending and the size of government?  That's rich. 

They promise to "act immediately to reduce spending" (yawn).  They promise to cut government spending to "pre-stimulus, pre-bailout levels".   Hey, how 'bout that? [/sarcasm]   Pre-bailout levels?  That's it?  WTF!  I think the American people -- and particularly the people who make up the Tea Parties -- want more than that.  Much more.  This "promise" is a joke.

They want to put "limits" on the growth of Government.  Limits?!?!? On growth?!?!?  Are you effin' kidding me!  A real plan would seek to reduce the size of government by at least 15% JUST FOR STARTERS.

They plan to hold weekly votes on spending. Hey, how 'bout that? [/sarcasm] And this dog and pony show will achieve what exactly? 

But it's the last "promise" that really set my teeth on edge.  "We will make the decisions that are necessary to protect our entitlement programs for today’s seniors and future generations".  You can't make this stuff up. 

Grade: F

Section 3, Health Care.  They promise "repeal and replace".  70% of Americans support repeal.  But replace? 

Part of what constitutes "replace" is to "ensure access for patients with pre-existing conditions."  I kid you not.

Grade: D-

Section 4, Reform Congress and Restore Trust.  I laughed my ass off when I read that.  Seriously?  Among the promises in this section is a promise to "adhere to the Constitution".  How, precisely, do you plan to do that AND "ensure access for patients with pre-existing conditions" AND "maintain entitlements", neither of which is Constitutionally permitted?

Grade: F

Section 5, National Security.  I can summarize this in two sentences.  Spend more money on defense systems like missile defense.  And continue the War Without End.  There is also a hollow promise to "enforce our immigration laws".  Nobody believes that.  Nobody. 

Grade: F

Section 6, Checks and Balances.  The shortest section, this is yet another attempt by the Elephant elites to sucker us.  I can sum this section up in two words: "Trust me".  The right answer -- No way!

Grade: F

There you have it.  Aren't you impressed?  Doesn't this steaming POS make you just long to rush to the polls to vote for the guy with the 'R' by his name?

Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'll get a shower.  I feel dirty.

Fraud? Not a problem!

Deadeye was reading the Frederick News-Post yesterday and found this news item that made her more than a little miffed.  She told me that I absolutely MUST blog about it.  When Deadeye speaks, Vulture listens.

The long and short of it?  Crime pays.

Ignoring calls to scrutinize troubled contractors, the U.S. military has awarded a portion of a $490 million contract to an American corporation that's under investigation for possible fraud.

The Army Corps of Engineers awarded the contract to Louis Berger Group, a New Jersey-based company that federal prosecutors have acknowledged is being investigated for allegedly overbilling the U.S. government.
[...]
Two months after the government learned of the employee's allegations, the U.S. Agency for International Development tapped Louis Berger to oversee another $1.4 billion in reconstruction contracts in Afghanistan.

Court documents reveal that the Justice Department is negotiating a deal that could "aid in preserving the company's continuing eligibility to participate" in federal contracting in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

The obvious question that springs to mind here is: WTF?

What exactly does a crooked company have to do to merit exclusion from future government contract work?  Overbilling the customer is the #1 cardinal sin of government contracting.  NOTHING else comes close.  Most companies lose all of their current contracts and have zero chance of being awarded any future contracts if found guilty.  Most.

So what is it about this company that they're allowed to skate?  It's a New Jersey company...does that mean it's skating due to Union ties?  Mob ties (JUST KIDDING!!!!!!!  I DON'T LIKE CEMENT OVERSHOES!!!!!!)?  "Help" from congressional arm twisting?

It's yet another demonstration of the principal ill affecting the USA at this point in its decline.  There are two systems of Justice.  The first one, for the Mundanes, inflicts punishment without regard for common sense or human decency.  The second one exists to exonerate the Elites when they get caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

Topic revisited -- Team Elephant's "reformation"

I last spoke on this subject some days before the primary elections.  Now the primaries for Delaware, Maryland, New York, and various other states are complete.  Let's see what Team Elephant has been up to in the time since my last taunt post.

Wanna see true colors?  See this.

In an extraordinary move, the state Republican Party began automated phone calls attacking O'Donnell in the campaign's final hours. The calls feature the voice of a woman who identifies herself as Kristin Murray, O'Donnell's campaign manager in her 2008 unsuccessful Senate campaign, accusing the candidate of "living on campaign donations — using them for rent and personal expenses, while leaving her workers unpaid and piling up thousands in debt."

O'Donnell's campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Republican officials have said privately they intend to write off the seat if O'Donnell is victorious against Castle.

The establishment would rather lose than support a candidate whose views aren't those of John McCommie, Lincoln Chafee, and other stalwart "conservatives".  What is it you're not seeing here, conservatives?  These people hate you and hate everything you believe in.

Most telling was the establishment response to O'Donnell's win.

However, a top Republican official told CNN on Tuesday night that O'Donnell will have to show she can generate viable support before the national party will give her money.

"It is now incumbent on Sarah Palin, (U.S. Sen.) Jim DeMint and the Tea Party Express to help support her," the official said on condition of not being identified by name. "They got her here. Now make it happen."

After the establishment said they wouldn't support O'Donnell financially, she made her own pitch -- and picked up $1.5 million dollars just since Tuesday!  You're looking bad, Rockefellerites!

New York posted a stunning upset as well.  Carl Paladino upset RINO Rick Lazio.

The Team Elephant establishment is grossly out of touch with its base.  I would say DELIBERATELY out of touch; they really would rather see grassroots candidates lose.  They will only support "their kind".  WHY you people still affiliate yourselves with that party, I cannot understand.

As the Team Elephant Establishment Spins

The latest soap opera offered for your entertainment and bemusement is called "As the Team Elephant Establishment Spins".  You see, the anointed candidate in Kentucky, Trey Grayson, lost to libertarian Rand Paul.  Wait, let me rephrase that.  Trey Grayson got his clock cleaned by Rand Paul.

This has to be a huge disappointment to folks like Elephants in the Blue Grass, about whom I wrote last month, who were gung-ho for the Establishment guy.  I will say of Mr. "Grass" that he was extraordinarily gracious in defeat.

But others weren't, particularly Elephant establishment leader Mitch McConnell (via his spokesmouth).

“The electorate is pissed,” said Mike Shea, a long-time political adviser to McConnell. “Rand did a really good job of tapping into those themes and tapping into that anger. Trey is a nice guy, but in his commercials and everything else, he seemed completely unable to generate any kind of dialogue to indicate he was tapping into that. If you meet him, he didn’t seem like he was angry.”

Oh. That's what it was. It wasn't that the electorate liked Paul.  They just wanted to vote for an angry guy.

Those of us of a certain age recall that in 1994, when Team Elephant took the House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years, Big Media (the BM for short) spun it as "revenge of the angry white man".  Is that really where you want to go, Mr. McConnell?  Because you're every bit as expendable as anyone in Washington.

Tired establishment candidates and RINOs went down to defeat.  This has to have the Elephant elites banging their heads on the wall.  The last thing they want is for their party to be coopted by mundanes.

Further proof "conservatives" don't get it

I frequently receive email advertisements from NewsMax.com.  It's what happens when you don't pay attention to checkboxes when you "register" for a website.  I could unsubscribe.  But then I'd miss gems like this.

It is remarkable that Theodore Roosevelt (TR to his friends), who has been beloved as an iconic patriot and president, would become a controversial figure today.

This unusual development is largely due to the rise of Glenn Beck.

Glenn has been right on many issues and his views are resonating with Main Street.

But he is wrong on one big issue: Theodore Roosevelt is not, as he claims, the root cause of President Obama’s intrusive, “big government” policies.

It is no accident that TR’s face is chiseled into Mount Rushmore along with those of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln, as he is rightly regarded by historians as one of the greatest presidents in American history.

As TR himself might say, "Balderdash!"

TR is on Mount Rushmore because President Calvin Cooledge was adamant that, in addition to the Father of our Country, George Washington, the monument must include two additional Republicans and one additional Democrat.  Since Republican Presidents not named Reagan have been uniformly dreadful, TR was settled upon as the second Republican, the tyrant Abraham Lincoln being the first.

Notice that the two Democrats chosen for the monument had been dead in the neighborhood of 100 years at the time they were chosen.  You really do have to go back that far to find a Democrat who was worth a damn.

Back to TR.

I've been reading a book called American Progressivism.  It's a tough read; it mostly consists of the speeches and political writings of Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson.  Mr. Ruddy, TR was everything Glenn Beck says he was.  He may even be worse than Beck has alleged.  Roosevelt was actually proposing grander Fascist policies during the 1912 Presidential campaign than Wilson was!  While Roosevelt may not have brought about the world's first Fascist government -- that was left for Wilson to accomplish -- he was instrumental in setting the table for Wilson's abuses.

So why is Ruddy so adamant in defending Roosevelt?

A few words of disclosure here: I am an ardent Theodore Roosevelt devotee and have been a longtime member of the Theodore Roosevelt Association (the membership roster has me listed after another TRA member, Karl Rove).

And my brother, Daniel Ruddy, a historian, is the author of a new book called “Theodore Roosevelt’s History of the United States” (published by Harper Collins). It draws upon TR’s own words to construct a unique history of the United States based on Roosevelt’s colorful insights and provocative views.

Ah, now it becomes clear! His brother has written a "history" of Roosevelt. The word "history" is in scare quotes because we're all familiar with the kind of "histories" we get when authors with a predisposition to adulation for the subject of their work write.  They tend to produce slavering paeons that conveniently omit the subject's peccadillos.

Anyone who calls themselves a conservative but thinks that TR was peachy keen is no friend of freedom.  No one -- I repeat, NO ONE -- who loves freedom can justify the policies and pronouncements of this smug, "I know best what's good for you the sheeple" elitist a-hole.

Of course, that's the kind of disinformation we get from the Team Elephant mainstream these days.  Get used to it.  Because, notwithstanding all pronouncements to the contrary, this Elephant hasn't changed its spots.  It's every bit the Donkey Lite party in 2010 that it was in 2008.