What’s a Guy Need to Do to Get Some Fatwa Around Here?
They have some faaabulous Fatwas down at Muhammed's Rib Shack
1) Find Enoch a Fatwa = 200 POWIP points
2) Caption Contest = 500 POWIP points
Some Hope Afterall?
I thought I'd share some good news my 10 year old daughter inadvertently gave me last night when I got home. She had told me over the weekend that she was going to have a field trip in October, and last night I got some more details. It turns out she's going to a place called "Ameritowne" in Denver. It's an educational program designed "to help teach students about business, economics and free enterprise in a fun and hands-on way." The program culminates with the hands on excercise where the students operate a 17 business community. One of my chief complaints about education in our country is the woeful lack of economics teaching. Frankly I think this is the chief reason people don't understand one of the most basic principals of conservative economic theory, that higher taxes stunt economic growth. I'll be going on this trip (boss permitting) with her and look forward to seeing how this organization is teaching what really amounts to Econ 101.
Bloggers do it for the money?
Working title(s): Dan Riehl, please kick my ass/ Hi, I'm Jenny, I'd like to piss of everyone I respect
Ugh, I'm conflicted. I'm about to break one of the cardinal rules of the rightosphere (per The Other McCain): Don't f*** with Dan Riehl. I particularly don't want to f*** with Dan Riehl because he's been good to me. He's another one of the handful of bigger bloggers that goes out of his way to support smaller bloggers. But I think he's overreacting today. At issue is The Daily Caller's top story from this morning, True stories of bloggers who secretly feed on partisan cash. The gist is an accusation that major right-wing bloggers are paid (either outright or through obscene ad rates) to endorse particular candidates (cough, Meg Whitman, cough) or promote a particular organization's agenda. Riehl calls it a hit piece. I call it a serious accusation that should be investigated.
Riehl is one of the bloggers mentioned in the article,
“Riehl World View” readers might be interested to know that Riehl is not simply a blogger, but also a paid consultant to the RNC. In an interview, Riehl said he was paid an amount in the “hundreds of dollars” for writing a strategy document on how the RNC could better reach out to bloggers. Riehl said his motivation for defending Steele was to aid the Republican Party, and that he didn’t disclose his consulting work because, “I didn’t see it as having anything to do with my views... I never made enough money to be bought,” he said.
Which brings us back to "you don't f*** with Dan Riehl". He's pretty pissed.
It was not a secret that the RNC paid me a few hundred bucks for a document.
I devoted hours and hours of my own time over a period of months trying to coordinate an effort involving many top bloggers and the RNC to improve communications and legal, legitimate cooperation in a partisan sense. I stress that, as it was the RNC that made me aware of certain FEC restrictions, which we were careful to not violate. That's why money wasn't involved. I made phone calls, took meetings, paid Metro and lunch costs, all out of my own pocket because I am dedicated to improving the blogosphere in an ethical manner - as well as winning politically for Republicans at the ballot box. I won't name which top bloggers were involved, but there are many that could vouch for these facts if they wanted to. If they want to stay out of it, that's fine, too.
That's part of a much longer post. He seems to have a beef with Tucker Carlson, personally, and claims to have some kind of dirt on The Daily Caller. We'll see. It stems from DC's widely criticized reporting about the RNC's spending habits earlier this year. I defended DC then, too. The only part of that story I took issue with was one sentence in the initial article that did read like Michael Steele had personally spent RNC money at a bondage club. RNC money was spent at a bondage club, among a number of other silly ways, but definitely not by Michael Steele. Other than that, it was a perfectly valid story and DC earned my trust by having the guts to report it. That whole personal accountability thing was the biggest draw to conservatism for me. While Riehl and others seem to see criticizing our own side as some sort of betrayal, I say if we can't handle legitimate criticism from each other we're in no shape to be in charge of anything. And that goes from Sarah Palin to your local coroner.
As for DC's credibility as a news organization, Riehl says, Tucker Carlson took millions, gave himself a nice office in DC and does little good partisan journalism for us, while using his editorial page mainly to push an anti-Cap and Trade effort. And that, while attacking the RNC and now a conservative blogger - to bolster DC's rep as a serious media outlet, when I'm not sure it is, perhaps?
I could be wrong, but the way I understand Carlson's goal for DC is a focus on reporting, not on partisan anything. If the investors that gave him millions of dollars thought he was going to do anything else with it, that's not my concern.
I think Riehl has good reason to want to put DC's accusations in context, but I do think he is overreacting now in the same way I thought he overreacted back in March. Instead of taking issue with some details that may be in error, he's dismissing the whole story. Nothing to see here. I think I'll have a gander anyway.
This story wasn't just about Dan Riehl. The story was about major right-wing bloggers not disclosing compensation for endorsing particular candidates, totalling thousands of dollars in some instances. I'm not against bloggers being paid. That would be insane. But if they're doing a specific interest's bidding that must be disclosed for the best interest of the reader, the blogger and the right as a whole. I submit that a good guage would be for bloggers to ask themselves if they found out a left-wing blog was doing it (and I know they do even worse) what would they write about it?
Some other people have some thoughts about this. I thought The Other McCain's were particularly insightful. As I've said elsewhere today, I don't pretend to be anything but a hapless n00b at this. I only blog because I find it to be an efficient platform for my thoughts on a range of topics. Melissa Clouthier seems to be on team Riehl, just as she was after Bondage-gate. Read it. She makes some great points on the overall issue. Ed Morrisey is bein' all right about everything like Ed Morrisey tends to do.
My final conclusion is that this is a valid story that could have been reported better. Perhaps the politics of political writing is more of a clusterschtup than I thought (and I thought it was a pretty F-ing big one).
crossposted at KillTruck
Jonathan Strong: Up to Half of Rightie Bloggers Paid for Play
Dan Riehl was called out by Jonathan Strong at The Daily Caller for being paid to produce material supporting right-leaning causes. At issue was a report for which he earned several hundred bucks: much less than he would have been paid as a "consultant," regarding how conservatives might best invest their money in the blogosphere. Among Strong's allegations was that as many as half of the conservative bloggers online were being paid to stick to particular narratives.
My attitude was, meh: if Ace has only been approached twice, and only once in a specific way, then who's going to believe this? I've since been told, over Twitter, that HuffPo is presenting this as Gospel. Okay, so I guess that Pelosi's liable to tout this as proof of her thesis that somebody's paying opponents of the Ground Zero Mosque.
As a result, I've written jonathan-at-dailycaller-dot-com, asking him to tell me how he arrived at his absurd percentage. I'll let you know when and if he replies.
Larry Caribou: CBC’s Man on the Street
Let's make him a star. He has a kind of Keanu Reeves vibe about him, I think.
Mexico Wants To Police Staten Island?
In a series of events which has caused wide notice and a storm of protests, the government of Mexico, through its consulate in New York in the United Nations, has announced it will begin patrolling the New York City borough of Staten Island to “safeguard” its nationals there.
The actions of Mexico come after a series of incidents the Mexican government terms “bias attacks.”
Ironically, these so-called “hate crimes” have been perpetrated by blacks and Asians, indicative of rising tensions between various ethnic groups in the U.S. The Catholic Examiner and NBC New York both reported the Mexican government’s intention to mount surveillance, patrol and police in and around the Staten Island community of Port Richmond, which in recent years has seen a large influx of Mexican illegal immigrants.
Since the Examiner’s coverage, however, councilor officials, city hall and the local press have begun to carefully de-emphasize any possible role of Mexican law enforcement or military in efforts to secure the neighborhood.
It wasn't bad enough that Mexican officials were invited to join in and agitate at amnesty events on the US taxpayer's dime? It isn't outrageous enough that Mexico has been permitted to become a party to a suit to overturn Arizona's immigration law, which is less tough than the federal one that it is modeled on, but which isn't being enforced, and which is far less draconian than Mexico's own law?
Visit beautiful (and it is) Cuernavaca, home to mariachis and headless bodies hung from bridges. Beautiful Mexico, where cops murder mayors who end up on the wrong end of cartel struggles. Please: Mexico should be begging the Marines to visit Veracruz.
Unforced Errors
Richard Blumenthal seems to be in the process of learning a lesson I tried to teach a young NCO several years ago. He was young, and was getting the reputation for parsing words, looking for angles, and spotting loopholes. I explained to him that when you have a reputation as always looking for the angles and loopholes, people can't trust what you say. Even when you say something plainly and simply, people begin to wonder what you really mean, and start looking at your words to see if you're leaving yourself an escape route.
Blumenthal strikes me as suffering from the same affliction, trying to stretch the truth in ways that help his public approval, but leaving himself that escape route in case someone calls him out on it. That was obvious with the whole Vietnam service debacle he walked into. Sure, he was (almost) always careful about how he worded it, but the impression he gave was nearly always that he had served in country. Now comes his attempts to distance himself from "special interest" money.
The thing is, this one never makes sense to me. The latest political fad seems to be to disown special interests and PACs, as if there's something inherently evil with citizens banding together to get a louder voice. "Special Interest" includes everything from the Sierra Club to the NRA. Business PACs and unions. There are associations for everything from enlisted members of the National Guard (EANGUS) to small business owners (NSBA). All this talk of turning down money from "special interests" is neither necessary nor fruitful. Of course, we all know they're trying to distance themselves from the particular special interests that they don't like; but they're just setting themselves up for charges of hypocrisy. If it wasn't for media complicity, they would have been called to the carpet a long time ago.
As for that young NCO, he's now an officer, so I hope he learned that lesson at some point.
Of Course They Know How Insulting It Is
Pat Condell, via Stop Marxism:
Meanwhile, Laura Bush and Michelle Obama are laying wreaths at the site of the Flight 93 crash. Will that memorial have been built by 9-11-2011?
Right Bloggers Have Had It [UPDATE]
The latest round of defamation regarding resistance to the Ground Zero Mosque has got the dextrosphere in a snarly mood. Ace threw the gloves off* to post this eloquent screed:
This Ground Zero Mosque has nothing within it to *disclaim* a glorification of 9/11. There is no museum for the dead; no exhibit showing the bloody fruit of religious extremism. It permits itself to be taken two ways-- to the West, they will say "moderation" and "tolerance," but will the more excitable elements within the religion get that message? Well, I don't think so-- because there's nothing, nothing in these plans to expressly repudiate that.
The message remains open, open to differing interpretations, and I believe that's by design -- just as Imam Rauf's nuanced views of organized murder are open to differing interpretations, one designed to placate the West, the other designed to offer succor and moral uplift to killers.
Yasser Arafat did this all the time, offering one message in English for his patrons in the West, and another one for his supporters in the terror cells of Palestine.
Enough, enough.
There are dozens of bureaucrats in NYC government tasked with making sure the government is sensitive to Muslim feelings.
Is there a single person at Cordoba House tasked with monitoring the sensitivities of non-Muslims, or victims of 9/11? Did they ask any of the 9/11 families if they'd have a problem with this?
No, they went right ahead because they don't give a shit.
And on my end-- If someone so aggressively tells me to my face they don't give a shit about my sensitivities, concerns, and values, then I am not going to extend myself a micron to understand theirs.
Victor Davis Hanson teed off this morning at Pajamas:
Note that the elite, secretly at least, understand that no one should take them all that seriously. A Guantanamo was a Stalag under Bush but now a mere complex dilemma, and not to be shut down under Obama (e.g., one of those released terrorists might show up in Brentwood).
Affirmative action means taking a law school spot from some hard-working white clueless guy from Idaho State or a nerdy straight-A Asian kid in San Mateo, not from a well-connected elite who has the contacts, family lineage, or money to side-step state-sanctioned discrimination. (Has anyone heard a wealthy liberal demand an end to legacy or other such special admittances based on criteria other than merit? Or for that matter, complain that tuition rises faster than the rate of inflation or that part-time lecturers are treated less well than Wal-Mart greeters?) Hating charter schools and teacher merit pay does not mean sending Johnny to the D.C. schools during a government sabbatical in the Obama administration.
For evidence of why we should not take this bunch as too principled, wait until the Obama tax hikes hit the lower tier of the cultural elite. (Not all are in the Kerry class — and even Kerry, remember, felt, for all his tax talk, that he could not quite resist skipping out on a $500,000 tax bite on his yacht.)
Soon we shall read sophisticated and contorted reasoning how and why a Manhattan or Chevy Chase $500,000 a year income is not that much when one has to buy a brownstone, or send Buffy to Sidwell Friends (cf. the Michelle “raise the bar” trope of 2008). Remember, there will be no IRS law that says those who voted for Obama do not get hit with 40% on their upper bracket income, or can opt out on the health care surcharge, or can get out of California’s or New York’s 10% state tax (will there be an article soon suggesting those who live in such caring, high-tax blue states already do enough for world justice so as to be exempt from the new federal tax hikes?), or can receive exemption from the cap on income exposed to FICA taxes being lifted (that will be the largest tax hike in U.S. history)? Is it really fair that a caring and committed progressive in high-tax San Francisco or Manhattan has to pay at the same federal rates as a Neanderthal reactionary in selfish, low-tax Boise or Carson City?
Well, we've already heard this concept floated by Jerrold Nadler.
(via Breitbart.TV)
Over at American Power, Donald Douglas breaks down the proposed financial backing of the mosque, even as the NYT excoriates Obama for creating his own Joyce Foundation for his own NGO cronies.
In late July, the Social Innovation Fund, a new $50 million federal program aimed at financing the replication of nonprofit programs that work, made its first grants.
Patrick Corvington, head of the Corporation for National and Community Service, at an event with Michelle Obama in May.
But what was supposed to have been an emblem of the administration’s commitment to nonprofit groups has become instead a messy controversy over potential conflicts of interest and the process used to select the grantees.
Several of the 48 independent reviewers who vetted the initial 54 applications for the grants were surprised by some of the winners because they had awarded them mediocre scores.
Critics noted that the executive director of the fund, Paul Carttar, had worked at New Profit Inc., a nonprofit group that helps promising social programs. New Profit Inc. received a $5 million grant from the fund.
(Read the whole thing).
Also at Pajamas, Herbert London reveals the multi-culty craptasm going on in Australia:
The truly remarkable dimension of this report is that a largely immigrant community, comprising a small minority, is demanding that classes be taught from its perspective rather than the perspective of the nation to which most chose to come. Australia is demonized as racist while the real challenges posed by Islam are overlooked. Moreover, it is precisely the communal values and institutions in Australia that made it a worthy destination for immigrants in the first place.
Most tellingly, Australia’s so called “racist impulses” were fomented by radical Islamists responsible for the death of 100 Australians in Bali and terrorist plots in Australia itself in which at least twenty people have been jailed.
According to the report, “most Muslims are outspoken in their criticism of terrorism regardless of the perpetrator. This is because Islam only allows for a just war. … From their perspective, the enemies of Islam are the terrorists and they are the warriors of the faith.” In addition, the authors of this booklet contend that “morally, Australia is not a good place to rear children,” citing as evidence drugs and illicit relations. They argue that these conditions militate against integration. It is also an argument employed for their own system of law, sharia.
Walid Shoebat posts there, too, about Imam Rauf's declaration that he doesn't believe in religious dialogue, even as Yid with Lid catches out Presidential Religious Adviser Jim Wallis practicing a little taqiyya, which is not surprising, given that Reverend Wright's church did not urge baptism of its members and had no problem with their being devotees of The Prophet.
David Swindle has certainly put his foot down.
* Removal of gloves may make it easier to type
UPDATE: Ric Locke points out the tautology of lefty reaction, and has some good advice. I don't see any of them grounding their arguments in the facts regarding Imam Rauf and company, preferring instead to argue the issue in the abstract, where they can be as specious as they like.
Real empowerment for women in need, NOW TAX FREE!!!
I have a thing for prostitutes. A fascination that has become a demented joke among those that know me, but it didn't start as one. After the loss of a child and rape, I can't think of a worse situation for a woman to find herself in than trading sex for money. There is absolutely nothing empowering about servicing a dirty stranger in a dirty place for a wad of dirty money. I can't fathom a bad act so bad that anyone deserves to endure that even once, let alone over and over and over just to survive. I don't look at prostitution as a crime. I look at it as a symptom of desperation, a desperation none of us are above succumbing under the right circumstances. This is the part where a lot of conservatives invoke personal responsibility, which is a valid argument if the one making it has never needed a second chance. Not to mention the fact that social problems like addiction, sexual exploitation and the breakdown of the family have obvious implications on American society, regardless of the current size of government. And so, as a Christian I'm commanded to offer a hand out to anyone with a hand up, as an American it just makes sense in the big picture and any woman that could turn a blind eye to the exploitation of her sisters should be forcibly liberated of her ovaries.
Yet modern feminists spend their energy on frivolous sexual harassment lawsuits, inexplicable hatred of women like Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann and the eternally obnoxious fight for forcing a woman to choose. Gloria Steinem, this is your legacy.
Meanwhile, Episcopalian priest, Becca Stevens, has been pulling women out of the gutter for for over a decade, literally. Stevens is the founder of Magdalene, a 2 year residential program for women overcoming prostitution, addiction and homelessness. Magdalene has an 80% success rate, which is astronomical compared to conventional recovery statistics. Magdalene receives no public monies, instead it's funded by private donations and grants, as well as Thistle Farms, which sells homemade bath and body products made by the women of Magdalene.
Through Stevens' day job as a chaplain at Vanderbilt University, she also founded the Anne Stevens School in Ecuador (named for her mother) and a nursing program for AIDS hospice in Botswana.
“Love is my grounding,” she says. “It provides the axioms, those basic truths, that inform the system and govern what I do. First is that love is the most powerful source for social change in the world. Second is that love heals. I’m not called to change the world. I am called to love it.”
Hope and change you can believe in. And if for you seeing is believing, see the fruit in the women of Magdalene.
crossposted at KillTruck and Snark and Boobs
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