In the weeks before the election, I noticed a growing number of my fellow citizens wearing Obama’s face on their t-shirts, usually in the spirit of socialist realism art. There’s not a politician alive who I admire enough to the point of worshipful adoration that I’d sport his likeness on my clothing or plaster it all over the wordsmobile (I do, however, wear my FA t-shirts with pride and enthusiastically tell people it’s a right-wing website when asked).

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Recently Celebrity funnyman and half assed political pundit, Jon Stewart of The Daily Show, took it personally and was offended when Gov Sarah Palin remarked that she was happy to be in a small town where REAL AMERICANS can be found. Stewart and other liberals were offended because they saw that as a claim that they are less patriotic, that big city dwellers are less patriotic, and that they as individuals were less patriotic. Turns out, statistics back of Gov Palin’s claim (though I doubt we’ll see an apology from Stewart, Biden, Obama, or other faux liberals).

Naturally, how to measure patriotism is a matter of argument. One way is to look at differences in military involvement: Rural and small-town families are more likely to see their children go off into combat, and return in body bags. Or, we can turn to one of the few recent non-partisan surveys on the matter, the American National Election Study from the University of Michigan. It’s produced every election year, and the most recent data is from 2004.

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LIBERAL used to mean tolerant, understanding, open-minded, open-armed. Not anymore. In 2008, the Democratic Party has become a party of hate, power, and fear rather than open-mindedness, tolerance, etc., and no one picks up on those sentiments faster than American youths.

Central Florida 7th grader called racist for wearing Palin t-shirt
She’s only 12 years old but Ashleigh Jones is feeling the heat of this election year.

That’s because the seventh grader at New Smyrna Beach Middle School was called a racist by classmates for wearing a pro-Sarah Palin t-shirt.

Jones is volunteering at the Republican Headquarters in New Smyrna Beach. The Palin t-shirt was a gift from her fellow volunteers.

link

Yeah, it’s from the McCain camp, but let’s not just completely blow off and ignore what 100 economists say…if for no other reason than Obama’s math doesn’t add up (link).

You can’t tax 5% of the American workforce with another $1,200,000,000,000 and expect those same people to INCREASE their spending on investments (especially when they stand to make less on investments as he’s raising the capital gains tax), to increase hiring, and to increase payscales. It doesn’t work.

ARLINGTON, VA — Today, McCain-Palin 2008 released the following statement signed by 100 distinguished and experienced economists at major American universities and research organizations, including five Nobel Prize winners Gary Becker, James Buchanan, Robert Mundell, Edward Prescott, and Vernon Smith. The economists explain why Barack Obama’s proposals, including “misguided tax hikes,” would “decrease the number of jobs in America.” The prospects of such tax rate increases under Barack Obama are already harming the economy. The economists conclude that “Barack Obama’s economic proposals are wrong for the American economy.” The proposals “defy both economic reason and economic experience.”

The full economists’ statement on Barack Obama’s economic proposals and a complete list of economists who support it follows:
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One simply has to marvel at the absolute arrogance of Fareed Zakaria’s latest articles. It’s not surprising…just a perfect example of how an intelligent, educated, over-marketed mind can be rendered utterly stupid by political partisanship.

First he wrote an article complaining about Republicans and people who warn that planet Earth is not a civilized place, but rather it is a very dangerous one where evil exists in men-often powerful men with increasing access to dangerous technologies and equally decreasing reluctance to take action due to a lack of deterrence that stems from denialists like Zakaria.

The World Isn’t So Dark
There is some truth to both visions of the world, but in my view the reality is much closer to Obama’s—more so than most American politicians seem willing to admit. We live in remarkably peaceful times. A University of Maryland study shows that deaths from wars of all kinds have been dropping dramatically for 20 years and are lower now than at any point in the last half century. A study from Simon Fraser University finds that casualties from terrorism have been steadily declining since 9/11. It is increasingly clear—look at their voting from Indonesia to Iraq to Pakistan—that very few Muslims anywhere support Islamic fundamentalists. More countries than ever before now embrace capitalism and democracy.

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Ladies and gentlemen,
Boys and girls,
Cats and dogs,
Forget the Olympics…THE REAL GAMES ARE IN DENVER!!!!

I thought of all kinds of ways to make a quick movie snippet or something multimedia, but in my YouTube raw meat search…something caught my eye, flipped my trigger, and just seemed SO PERFECT for the occasion. So please, press play on this 1992 ode to confusion, chaos, and searching rather than accepting. It’s a throw back to a time when Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, Jessica Simpson, and so many others were still playing with their Barbie girls. A time when Saddam had just had his ass kicked and people believed he was contained (yeah, ’cause dictators learn their lessons and never hold grudges). A time when the Clintons were taking DC, and a generation was realizing those student loans had to be paid some day….and that someday was approaching fast. Read the rest of this entry »

TWO US professional Bigfoot hunters claim to have found a body of the legendary creature and will present evidence of the astounding discovery to the world’s press and scientists tomorrow.

Matthew Whitton and Rick Dyer, who run Bigfoot expeditions, say they found a dead Bigfoot in the woods of north Georgia, in the southeast of the US, about two weeks ago and have put the carcass in a freezer.

QUESTION: who gets to protest: PETA, HUMAN RIGHTS Watch, or pro-immigration advocates?

(side note, we’ve got coyotes in our backyard now-driving my dogs nuts, and making me question the rationality of gun control laws every time they walk under my kids’ playset and past the neighbors’ playset).

This is the same group that traditional media outlets based their claims that the evidence of Global Warming was incontravertible.

The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming. The APS is also sponsoring public debate on the validity of global warming science. The leadership of the society had previously called the evidence for global warming “incontrovertible.”

In a posting to the APS forum, editor Jeffrey Marque explains,”There is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the IPCC conclusion that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution.”

LINK

An inconvenient truth for the left, its leaders, its parrots, its talkingheads, and of course…for the Heatmeiser

UPDATE BY MataHarley: I don’t like crashing other author’s posts, but in this case, Scott’s swamped with work and requested I put some adds in, as we were discussing off FA privately.

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Flopping Aces threads on global warming invariably strike the debate chord. They are a study in one-upmanship, chock full of quotes from supporting links, studies and articles. But our debate always suffers from one fatal flaw… that is the starting point of our respective opinions.

Our commonality is we all believe the climate is, and always has, changed. The disagreement begins when we discuss whether that change is significantly connected, or caused by man releasing gaseous emissions into the atmosphere.

In this respect, I felt it a worthy post to dedicate a thread to the so-called “consensus” on AWG (or Anthropogenic Global Warming)… or also oft put as “settled science”. And for this, I give a big H/T to Mike’s FA thread, Another Global Warming Lie Bites the Dust”, which has endured days of lively and, for the most part, civil debate.

Also, H/T’s to both commenters Dave Noble and Aye Chi, inspiring me while trading good-humored barbs about “consensus”. Or perhaps best summarized by Dave on that thread as:

Your closing statement is a dogmatic assertion because it is unsupported by facts. Similarly, it is now up to you to provide supporting facts, or to knowingly fail to do so. Otherwise our conversation degenerates into a meaningless (and boring) do-loop of:

“There is a scientific consensus”
“No, there isn’t”
“Yes, there is”
“No, there isn’t”

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From the Liberals Hurt Our Kids File.

Via the Washington Post.

Fairfax County School Board members said they are likely to abandon a staff report that showed racial and ethnic gaps in some measures of student behavior, including in the demonstration of “sound moral character and ethical judgment.”

The board had delayed an April vote to approve the report after concerns were raised that findings were based on subjective measures, such as elementary report card data, and that they would fuel negative stereotypes.

~~~

The school system’s report was an early attempt to measure progress on a host of goals the board considers “essential” for success in the workplace. It identified disparities among groups of students in several skills, including the ability to contribute effectively in a group, resolve conflicts and make healthy choices, and in the demonstration of moral character and ethical judgment.

Such a target-rich environment. Read the rest of this entry »

This is the state of our academia today. If you’re conservative then you must be shouted down, not allowed to speak, rush the stage or throw pies in your face.

Former top Bush aide Karl Rove didn’t get the friendliest of receptions at the University of Iowa Sunday, CNN affiliate KCRG reports.

Rove, who was paid $40,000 to speak at the University, was confronted with an at-times hostile crowd of 1,000, and was interrupted on several occasions.

At one point during the speech, Rove reportedly lashed out at some of the students, saying, “You got a chance to ask your questions later and make your stupid statements, let me make mine.” Read the rest of this entry »

I always look forward to anything that has Ben Stein attached to it. Movies, articles, books, what have you. And in keeping with that tradition this movie is going into my “must see” list:

From the few reviews I have read of the movie from those who saw the still raw version at CPAC it appears the main thrust of the movie is academia intolerance. Science should always be about the research of new ideas and free debate. But when the film makers have to hide the faces of scientists who dare discuss ID in a rational way you know that this freedom doesn’t exist.

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