Coulter’s taking heat for standing up for Michael Steele (or is it for standing up against Irving Kristol’s son?):

Michael Steele was absolutely right. Afghanistan is Obama’s war and, judging by other recent Democratic ventures in military affairs, isn’t likely to turn out well.

No problem here, right? Wrong. Neocons are clamoring in propagandistic harmony that this is everybody’s war–America’s war–that we’re in it for the long run, or short run, or whatever it takes to achieve “victory.” There is no flaw in foreign policy, they contend; the peasant class of the Republican party must simply support all war all the time whether it’s the product of sound, or egregiously misguided, ambitions.

Note, though, that Steele and Coulter are specifically eyeing Afghanistan rather than making a broad-stroke foreign policy-in-general statement. They are both still interventionists and exceptionalists and everything else we want in our leaders. But, Afghanistan barely qualifies as a state to begin with.

Having some vague concept of America’s national interest – unlike liberals – the Bush administration could see that a country of illiterate peasants living in caves ruled by “warlords” was not a primo target for “nation-building.”

By contrast, Iraq had a young, educated, pro-Western populace that was ideal for regime change.

She makes Iraq the “right” war, and though it may not necessarily be justifiable in this way,

Iraq also was a state sponsor of terrorism; was attempting to build nuclear weapons (according to endless bipartisan investigations in this country and in Britain – thanks, liberals!); nurtured and gave refuge to Islamic terrorists – including the 1993 World Trade Center bombers; was led by a mass murderer who had used weapons of mass destruction; paid bonuses to the families of suicide bombers; had vast oil reserves; and is situated at the heart of a critical region.

still, at least it makes sense.

The obsession with Afghanistan was pure rhetoric. Democrats have no interest in fighting any war that would serve America’s interests. (They’re too jammed with their wars against evangelicals, Wal-Mart, the Pledge of Allegiance, SUVs and the middle class.) Absent Iraq, they’d have been bad-mouthing Afghanistan, too.

So for the entire course of the magnificently successful war in Iraq, all we heard from these useless Democrats was that Iraq was a “war of choice,” while Afghanistan – the good war! – was a “war of necessity.” “Bush took his eye off the ball in Afghanistan!” “He got distracted by war in Iraq!” “WHERE’S OSAMA?” and – my favorite – “Iraq didn’t attack us on Sept. 11!”

Of course, neither did Afghanistan.

Specifically, then-presidential candidate Barack Obama and the undereducated, 20-something host of Obamaniacs made this distinction with great hysterics (and apparently, with great electoral success). This is Steele’s point (and Coulter’s): Afghanistan is Obama’s war because he made it so. It was Bush’s war for a few months, and then it was an occupation. Not because he “took his eye off the ball” or because he conceded victory, but because there is no such thing as “victory” in Afghanistan. 


We’ve been hearing for a few years that Afghanistan is more worthy than Iraq. But by Coulter’s (compelling) logic, it’s exactly the opposite. Iraq made sense. Afghanistan, if considered as a nation-building case, is a drain and the minimal commitment the better.

But here comes the shocker. You see, I was expecting Coulter to write about this incident. But I was expecting her to take Kristol’s side (why, I don’t know). So this really took me back:

Republicans used to think seriously about deploying the military. President Eisenhower sent aid to South Vietnam, but said he could not “conceive of a greater tragedy” for America than getting heavily involved there.

Coulter thinks Vietnam too was a tragedy to get heavily involved in? Is Eisenhower next on the hit list after Teddy Roosevelt?

But now I hear it is the official policy of the Republican Party to be for all wars, irrespective of our national interest.

What if Obama decides to invade England because he’s still ticked off about that Churchill bust? Can Michael Steele and I object to that? Or would that demoralize the troops?

Our troops are the most magnificent in the world, but they’re not the ones setting military policy. The president is – and he’s basing his war strategy on the chants of Moveon.org cretins.

Is she suggesting the Republican party’s been hijacked by dare I say–neoconservative–interests who insist on unquestioned support for all war all the time lest one be considered *gasp* unpatriotic? 


Yes, she is:

(Didn’t liberals warn us that neoconservatives want permanent war?)

She even distinguishes national defense from perpetual war (take that, Kristol & co.!):

I thought the irreducible requirements of Republicanism were being for life, small government and a strong national defense, but I guess permanent war is on the platter now, too.

I thought so too.

Of course, if Kristol is writing the rules for being a Republican, we’re all going to have to get on board for amnesty and a “National Greatness Project,” too.

And therein is the point. Much of the Republican/conservative chatterbox consistently embraces someone as far left as Joe Lieberman because he’s on board for never-ending and consistently escalating war. The neoconservative creature is no conservative. He has no reason to embrace life (unless it’s politically expedient), small government (unless it advances a few, narrow corporate interests, or is politically expedient), or a strong national defense (unless it can be used as a propaganda tool for permanent war).

Make no mistake: Steele and Coulter are by no means endorsing a Libertarian foreign policy view; they are merely questioning the policy in Afghanistan, specifically (and identifying a crisis in the conservative thought process as pertains to foreign policy). And that, I guess, is enough to lose the respect of the conservative masses who are clinging (yes, clinging) to the propaganda of permanent, pointless, expensive, bloody, no-end-in-sight wars. Let’s hope the neoconservatives don’t successfully expel conservatives from the party in the name of Obama’s Afghanistan adventure.

@/Blog

The insinuation (mostly by the likes of Sen. Sessions) that Elana Kagan hates the military is not only unfounded, but is just the sort of non-issue, knee-jerk politics that continues to plague the Republican party. What is meaningful in bringing to light the obvious choice of a Harvard Law dean to restrict recruiters on the basis of DADT’s conflicting with the school’s anti-discrimination policies?

She will adequately praise the military; she will be confirmed, anyway.

What about the deeper issues? What about “original intent”? So far, these have been granted standard fare questions, and been given standard fare responses.

We saw this same sort of “g*d d*mned cop-hating, military-hating liberals” politics with Sonia Sotomayor, in re the firefighter case. Sure, Republican senators are thusly adequately covering the “f**k liberals” base, but what about the “Constitutional republic” base? What about the “enumerated liberties” base? What about the “future for our children and grandchildren” base?

Republican leadership in the House and Senate are not only borderline corrupt, but have hijacked conservative/republican/what-ever-have-you principles for the sake of partisanship, and have made confirmation hearings, especially, a game of “these liberals hate real America, and they’re probably gay, so join me in opposing the dandy Democratic conspiracy to teach our kindergarteners fisting.” Not that they’re wrong in opposing such things, per se, but I wonder, why are they worried about college non-discrimination policies while the very foundations of wealth and liberty are collapsing? Wait, I just answered that.

@/Blog (cross-posted)

Tim Scott and Nikki Haley, if you must, are both minorities. One is Asian Indian, a woman, the daughter of Sikhs and is accused of adultery (a crime punishable by stoning in some parts–being accused, that is). The other, a black man, beat the son of one of South Carolina’s most infamous (segregationist) politicians, Strom Thurmond.

So, why (did they win)? The obvious answer is that they are both solid conservatives, and evince an overwhelming air of honesty and trustworthiness. But it’s difficult to overlook their respective races/gender as a factor. It’s not the same principle as affirmative action, mind you: unqualified candidates are not considered. One must be conservative to win the conservative vote. One must be a compelling candidate. It’s not race alone, nor is it race that is the most important factor.

But it is a factor. It is not a top-down orchestration of reverse-racist policies; instead, these are enthusiasm candidates, who won by the efforts of the grassroots and through intense hype. A not insignificant part of that enthusiasm was their identity. In some ways, it’s almost defensive. In others, it’s a compelling path to meaningful political victory.

So it’s not white guilt. It’s not a publicity stunt. It’s not underhanded. But it’s a factor. My question is, just how much of a factor is it, especially going forward?

Cross-posted here.

@/Blog

Don’t get me wrong: his campaign up to this point has been rather brilliant, taking an established politician and selling him not only to the Florida GOP but to national conservatives (grassroots and establishment alike) as the true, “outsider” principled conservative choice for Florida and the Tea Party. Which he is, I trust.

But something’s shifted. The awkward grammar of his ubiquitous web ads are spelling out something more and more starkly partisan. “Conservative,” “Principled,” “Ideas,” etc. now all easily translate into merely “Republican” with a capital “R.” While Crist gains in the polls and could even become a true front-runner in the next few weeks, Rubio’s campaign–and this might just be my news- and commentary-scavenging subconscious here–is appearing desperate, almost on the verge of all-out slander and begging (and being sidelined) as their national message/statewide primary victory is diluted as he’s no longer the obvious “it” candidate for the national grassroots and he’s no longer cleansing the party itself.

Perhaps that’s it, and his successful messaging was built into the fact that he was keeping the party principled. Or perhaps he’s just not appealing to the wider electorate (I doubt that–take a look at some recent Floridian Senators and tell me Rubio doesn’t look like a breath of fresh air).

Or perhaps the gulf oil spill is the new bailout, and Rubio just hasn’t been outspoken enough on it (while Crist is on the front lines).

But one thing that’s clear if he’s going to beat Charlie Crist and Kendrick Meek in November is that the messaging has to change. He’s got to make headlines again (at least around the blogosphere) with bold ideas, and not just sell himself as the guy with bold ideas.

Come on, Rubio, we know you’ve got it.

The international president of the steelworker’s union ends with, and consequently ruins, my favorite phrase, carpe diem, in this ridiculous column or whatever it is praising Obama for being like Carter [!], selling botched and thoroughly debunked “government creates good-paying jobs” economics, and worst of all declaring windmills to be a glorious achievement (whooping-crane killing, apparently, notwithstanding).

Time to go nuclear, in my estimation. Like that one guy in the video says “wind, like solar, is a relatively dilute source of energy…[it] takes a much bigger footprint on the land…5 to 10 times that of nuclear.”

@/Blog

You see, we lost big in ’06, but we didn’t lose by much. There are opportunities literally everywhere for the Republican party to take back and in many cases capture for the first time in a long time, Congressional seats that swung just a little bit Democrat in the last few cycles. The 19th Congressional district of New York is a prime example of this: it went for Bush by 2% in 2000 and 9% in 2004, and was represented by Republicans from 1993 until a Democrat was (barely) elected in ’06. (It went for Obama by 3%.)

Now we’ve got a solid nominee in Nan Hayworth, a Mount Kisco ophthalmologist whose candidacy embodies the domino threat Congressional Democrats face in November. With a local coalition of conservative groups’ and leaders’ support and a first-class campaign operation, she is surely to be among the GOP candidates consistently listed as probable members of the 2011 freshmen class between now and November.

Surely those 19th District “swing” voters have come to their senses after 18 months of Obama, and should Hayworth sustain an aggressive campaign, her support will only continue to intensify and her name recognition will elevate (it is a bit low, mind you). Tell me, how can she possibly lose?

Support her promising campaign here and/or here.

Cross posted at 20/10 Blog.

From time immemorial, that’s generally been the consensus.

Nevertheless, thoughts on the subject range from this:

‘We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes-something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters’ paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.’

To this:

“They’re killing machines, they have no place in the food chain they’re, whatever quotas they set they’re not great enough,” said Montana resident Wayne Leischner.

And everything between.

It’s an intensely complex issue today, where traditional agricultural practices like big-sky-country ranching exist robustly, but are fading nonetheless; and where game management ranges from true subsistence hunting in remote areas of Alaska, to pure trophy cage hunting in pockets of the Midwest. But the question always seems to come down to a moral one: ought ‘we’ as humans eradicate or sharply “control” wolves in the wild? Is there any room for them, anywhere? And further, with the last corners of the world being settled and developed, will there be room for them in some of the few places where they are yet unmolested?

My question is, did God err in creating wolves (or, if you will, any other creature)?

Read me at 20/10 Blog

It was only a matter of time until Rand Paul’s totally undramatic and unsurprising CRA-’64 “comments” coalesced with memories of Ron Paul’s non-support for Israel-no-matter-what-when-or-why, and produced this. When the anti-black racism smear doesn’t quite sink in, there’s always one, more powerful card to play.

Funny how these two “constituencies”–blacks and Jews–are the two that Republicans so tenuously caress and go out of their way not only to not extol a smidgeon of insult toward, but to butter up and preemptively defend against racist accusations toward…yet are the two that vote most overwhelmingly for Democrats.

Perhaps if we stopped “eating our own” like letting ‘racist’ accusations against Ron and Rand Paul fly (not to mention Tom Tancredo, etc.), then the party would appear to be more unified on principle. And we might just win over some of those “ethnic” votes in the process. Just saying.

Cross-posted at 20/10 Blog.

That’s Libertarians, not liberals.

As I wrote about here, Brink Lindsey, a Cato “scholar”, borderline betrays the libertarian brand in an NRA-type move, going for what’s popular (remember V-Tech?) rather than upholding the unabashed principles he’s (supposedly) there for in the first place.

Whether you agree with Paul’s premise or not, we can agree that giving the federal government one exception theoretically (especially in the libertarian viewpoint) leads to more and more exceptions. Scratch that. Exceptions like the Civil Rights Act (blacks were slaves for hundreds of years and semi-slaves for the past hundred, so exceptional federal action is warranted) have led mercilessly to countless more  exceptions in policy, and to a massive shift in the American attitude toward the role of government.

Sorry for using the word exception so many times, but the point of limited, enumerated powers is to guard against exceptions, even when not ‘doing something’ is deeply unpopular. The 50-years-later chatter on the topic of the Civil Rights Act usually sounds like ‘well, it would have never happened on its own’ as if only federal power can lead and has led to desirable human progress. As if always ‘doing something’, always building a bigger, better bureaucracy will solve all ‘problems’ whether they’re identified by a stock index or a mob. Again, what about precisely enumerated powers is so difficult to comprehend (or maybe just easy to ignore)?

So, what’s left, I guess, through all the mess, is to discuss the politics of it. I, of course, take the hard road, and splice the already split-in-a-thousand ways, minute “establishment Libertarian” political ‘force’ over impurity. Heh. Do we see him shedding his lead? Do we see him stay almost frustratingly local?

But, my advice, Rand: don’t go chalkboard. Trust me, the mainstream media is not trying to engage you in professorial academic discussions. About anything.

Further proving my consistent point that “global warming” and the deranged ‘alternative energy’ crowd have destroyed environmentalism, a recent controversy in Palo Alto highlights a rift between “wow we can capture gasses and power homes with alternative fuels” and “wow we have about ten square inches of parkland, several square miles of housing developments, and it would be nice to keep preserving this mere eight acres of parks.”

As reported by the Stanford Daily,

“We can do something right now that is great for the environment and also great for the economy,” added former Mayor Peter Drekmeier. He said use of an anaerobic digester employed at the facility would divert 6,000 tons of carbon from the atmosphere and power 1,400 homes, saving the city about a million dollars a year.

The proposed site’s proximity to a water treatment plant is ideal, but it lies on an eight-acre strip of dedicated parkland. Open space advocates attended Monday’s meeting to argue that this piece of land should join Byxbee Park as previously planned.

“The Baylands Park has been planned for years by competent and dedicated people,” said Palo Alto resident Enid Pearson, addressing the council. “If we can’t count on our planning process, why not just pick any random project and let it be built anywhere?”

The mayor, of course, just sounds like a politician. But the AGW fanatics are all over this ‘anaerobic digester’ nonsense, because, you know, it makes them sound smart and futuristic and such.

If you’ve ever been to the ‘environmentally friendly’ bay area you’ll notice that it’s about half environmentally friendly and about half the worst imaginable type of land use planning–clearly single-family home real estate developers controlled everything in this part of the Golden State (So Cal as well, obviously) for quite some time.

You want to put a finger on California’s Great Recession? How about the mentality that an entire economy can be built on building strips of homes in deserts, the mortgage debt therein, and the hope that people will just move here forever and ever and ever (and be able to pay all their debts with jobs in a spiral economy largely based on building and selling more homes)?

But I digress. What’s the trade-off in this composting facility v. park debate? A few measly acres in a place that is so developed that rain-turned-run-off is greater than that of Manhattan, with about 1/100th the population (my guess)…versus a composting plant, that’s not for gardening you know, but to “capture gasses” and pump it around to contribute a negligible trace of electricity back into the grid?

So, on a greater scale this is a poignant debate and a critical topic. Don’t get me wrong–I’m a fan of composting. Do it yourself. Plant a garden or give your compost to someone who has one. But, has the environmentalist movement completely abandoned its worthy goals (parks, trees, whales, and birds–&c.) for one single goal (anything anybody claims will help ‘solve’ “global warming” trumps anything else everywhere and everywhere)?

It seems that many of them have. If we have to deal with a little bit of the slightly unsavory coal industry for a few more decades while nuclear power takes more of a hold and mechanical efficiency improves, I’ll take it….if it means some more open space, some woods, and habitat for thousands of species big and small, in a city like Palo Alto.

I hope the “gee, it will have economic benefits while we save the environment [by paving over it]” politics fails to the “just let us have our damn eight acre park” environmentalism. I’m afraid, though, that AGW will win again. [Read me @ 20/10]