So, let’s review.

• Via Little Miss Attila, we see that getting cap-and-trade passed in the Senate is seen as being… problematical.
• Via Instapundit, we see that Al Franken is now officially the junior Senator from Minnesota. That, of course, makes sixty.
• Via Hot Air, we see that the netroots are threatening to go on Crusade against the Democratic party if the Democrats don’t start using their clear mandate to do everything that the progressives want them to do.
• Via Ace of Spades HQ, we see that Gallup is reporting that the public’s perception of the Democratic party have just flipped, with a plurality of the population now thinking that the party is too liberal (for the first time since 1996).
• Via Rasmussen, we see that a plurality of the population doesn’t like this bill (41%) and doesn’t think that it’ll help the economy (42%).  That’s a lot of Earth traitors.
• And, oh, yes: the GOP flipped the generic Congressional ballot again - although that last will probably bounce back and forth for a while.

Yeah. This is going to be an interesting July.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

[UPDATE]: Coleman has conceded.  And while I rarely agree with the Angry Left on anything, I do agree on this: Reid has no more excuses.

For the Minnesota Supreme Court decision declaring Al Franken the winner, that is.

Real fast: the ABC News report that was sent out is actually from January; apparently the Governor was not specifically ordered to issue the certificate (don’t ask me why); Gov. Pawlenty made one of those statements:

Gov. Tim Pawlenty had indicated as late as Monday that he was willing to certify Mr. Franken as the winner once the state’s highest court decided the recount and Mr. Coleman’s battle. On CNN on Sunday, Mr. Pawlenty said: “I’m prepared to sign it as soon as they give the green light.”

Asked what he would do if Mr. Coleman decided to appeal to the federal courts, as had been mentioned before this ruling, Mr. Pawlenty added: “A federal court could stay or put a limit on or stop the effect of the state court ruling. If they chose, if they do that, I would certainly follow their direction. But if that doesn’t happen promptly or drags out for any period of time, then we need to move ahead with signing this, particularly if I’m ordered to do that by the state court.”

Some legal experts already are pointing out that the Minnesota Supreme Court did not issue a directive ordering Governor Pawlenty to sign the certificate. And there is, according to legal experts, a rehearing period of 10 days, under the Minnesota judges’ ruling.

And so we wait to see what Norm Coleman does next. Hotline says it’ll be to concede: either way, it’ll be at 4 PM.

Let’s start with the NRCC’s incentive program for last-minute 2Q donations that they announced yesterday:

Every dollar you give through tomorrow, June 30th, will be quadrupled. So if you give $5, we’ll make it $20. If you can afford $25, we’ll make it $100.

That’s four times the impact of a normal contribution, and it will be put to immediate use replacing Pelosi’s puppets in Congress with principled, conservative Republicans.

At this point, somebody has reflexively started a very long comment on why this offer should be ignored. While he’s writing it, let me explain why you shouldn’t.

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Seeing this proposed 28th Amendment to the Constitution from Big Hollywood (H/T: Instapundit):

No law, bill, resolution or any act of Congress shall exceed 2000 words, including all footnotes, amendments and signatures. Congress shall not vote on any item longer than that. Each item requiring a vote shall be read aloud in its entirety in session to a majority of members. Those not in attendance may not vote on the item.

…I’m reminded of this bit from Robert Heinlein’s Expanded Universe. In one didactic bit, he has a Senator propose something called a ‘Semantic Amendment:’

“It permits a citizen to challenge the Constitutionality of any law or regulation, Federal or any lesser authority, on the grounds that it is ambivalent, equivocal, or cannot be understood by a person of average intelligence. Paragraph two defines ‘average intelligence.’ Paragraph three defines and limits the tests that may be used to test the challenged law. The fourth paragraph excludes law students, law school graduates, lawyers, judges, and uncertified j.p.’s from being test subjects.”

Fascinating to contemplate, no? Also, exceptionally unlikely to happen any time soon. But that’s not precisely the point. The point is that when people start talking about changing the Constitution like this, what they’re really saying is “I’m getting sick and tired of the idiots running things right now.”

Let those in power with eyes to see not see this, and not understand - for they are not of my political party.

Moe Lane

PS: I don’t know: how many people like Bob Gale are out there? Guess we’ll just find out, huh?

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Palate cleanser, as Allahpundit likes to say.

It’s bad when the White House press pool can’t keep a straight face.

Anyway, you’ll need a palate cleanser in order to properly appreciate this recipe for carpetbag steak (via @EdDriscoll). I don’t even really like oysters, and this sounds tasty.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

(Via Sister Toldjah) We should never have let Paul Krugman fester behind that TimesSelect subscriber wall. It broke something inside of him:

But 212 representatives voted no. A handful of these no votes came from representatives who considered the bill too weak, but most rejected the bill because they rejected the whole notion that we have to do something about greenhouse gases.

And as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet.

Now, I’m not one who would normally get into a man’s religious beliefs, but any faith that requires you to anathematize what was at last count 40% of the population* as ‘traitors to the planet’ seems to be a very silly faith for a pundit to have, or at least espouse openly. For extra irony? I’ll bet you that if and when Krugman gets muttering drunk, one of his favorite topics of slurred discussion is probably a tirade on the subject of the perfidy of fundamentalist Christians.

Moe Lane

PS: Sister Toldjah has more at the link on the topics on the peculiarities of Krugman’s faith, the sudden permissibility of defining dissent as treason, and this administration’s own War on Science.  No reason to reproduce her work.

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(Via AoSHQ) It has been declared a holiday, and for good reason. They’re getting their country… well, ‘back’ is the wrong word; under the Baathists it was never really ‘theirs’ to begin with. But they do take responsibility for their cities and towns now.

Iraqis Celebrate Day of National Sovereignty Marking US Troop Pullback

Iraqis are staging a national celebration to mark the impending June 30th withdrawal of U.S. troops from most cities, towns and villages. Celebrations in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, include music, dance and poetry.

I think that this is a nicely iconic image:

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Like RS’s Erick Erickson and TNR’s Ironman, I instinctively shy from a boycott of the NRCC because they had eight members out of one hundred and seventy eight who flunked a test vote.  Some of the names on that list hurt to see, and a couple are exercises in teeth-grinding; but perfect is the enemy of the good, and Congressional Republicans have done a good job in using our lopsidedly minority status to the best effect possible.  Nobody’s pretending that this was passed with bipartisan support.  Nobody’s even trying.  That’s better news for next year’s elections than what I was frankly expecting, back in December 2008.

That being said: this was a test vote, and these eight represent eight ‘Blue Dogs’ that could safely vote No on this bill and keep pretending to their constituents that they believe in fiscal responsibility, and there needs to be some sort of response to that.

I have a modest suggestion along those lines, and his name is Anh “Joseph” Cao (LA-02).

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(Background here.)

They had a court order.  Fausta updated:

1:50PM
Indeed, Honduras’ La Prensa states that (My translation: If you use this, please credit me and link to this post)

An official statement of the Supreme Court of Justice explained that the Armed Forces acted under lawful grounds when detaining the President of the Republic, and by decommissioning the materials to be used on the illegal poll which aimed to bring forth Executive Power against a judicial order.Other sources verified that the president of the Congress, Roberto Micheletti, will assume the presidency of the republic in a few hours.
…
Honduran president Manuel Zelaya was detained this morning by the military in compliance with an order of the courts of law.

Meanwhile, the foreign policy experts over at State and the White House* have gone into, bluntly, full Ugly American mode: they’re currently declining to recognize the right of the Hondurans to remove their own head of state on constitutional grounds. Apparently, when it’s a choice between a chief executive on the one hand and said chief executive’s country’s judiciary, legislature, military, and own political party on the other… well, it all apparently depends on what Hugo Chavez thinks.

Let’s just hope that they don’t ask Chavez what he thinks about the Jews.

Moe Lane

PS: Let me expand on that just a little.  I don’t think that this administration is slavishly following Chavez’s lead: I think that they care so little about South American affairs that accommodating their stance to that of a darling of the radical Left seems to them to be a no-brainer.  If the White House is worried about getting the answer to this wrong, it’s not immediately obvious.

*H/T: Gateway Pundit, Hot Air.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

AoSHQ linked to this piece mostly to highlight the Warren Buffet quote on cap and trade:

“it’s a huge tax and there’s no sense calling it anything else. I mean, it is a tax. So it — and it’s a fairly regressive tax.”

- Real quickly, Mr. Buffet: how did you vote in the last election, again? -

…but I wanted to actually highlight the following exchange between George Stephanopoulos and Obama crony David Axelrod. In the interests of fair use, I am going to executive summary this one; feel free to compare it against the original. I think that I’ve captured the sense accurately, at least.

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Via Fausta’s Blog:

Soldiers arrest Honduran president: AP+

MECIXO CITY, June 28 (AP) - (Kyodo)—Soldiers on Sunday arrested the Honduran president and took him to an air force base just before voting was to begin on a disputed constitutional election, according to the Associated Press.

President Manuel Zelaya’s private secretary told the AP that Zelaya was arrested and brought to a base on the outskirts of the capital, Tegucigalpa.

[snip]

Zelaya had pledged to go forward with a referendum on constitutional reform despite the opposition of the Supreme Court, the military, Congress and members of his own party.

Fausta has background here: if you don’t have time to read it, note that proto-dictator Hugo Chavez (and whoever’s channeling Fidel Castro this week) is spitting nails on this. Given that, as the Wall Street Journal notes, this entire thing got started over President Zelaya’s attempt to set up a referendum* in opposition to pretty much the opposition of the rest of the Honduran government, civilian and military… well.  A man is known by his friends, and I wish I knew what the equivalent Spanish idiom is.

Moe Lane

*One that would allow him to run for re-election.  The Honduras Constitution forbids that; given of what I know of South American history, this isn’t exactly surprising.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

As in, trying to incite the populace against a long-established demon figure.

Iran arrests UK embassy staff

The British government is “deeply concerned” at the arrest and detention of British Embassy employees in Tehran, the foreign secretary said today.

David Miliband said Britain had protested to the Iranian authorities about the arrests made on Saturday.

He described the detentions as “harassment and intimidation of a kind that is quite unacceptable”. He added: “We want to see (them) released unharmed.”

Iranian media reported today that authorities had detained eight employees of the British Embassy in Tehran for an alleged role in postelection protests, signaling a hardening of Iran’s stance toward the west.

No, it’s not always about us.

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I’d say send one to your Representative, too - but that ship has sailed.

(Scrappleface, via Vodkapundit)

Besides, either you’re in a GOP district, which means (with eight unfortunate exceptions) your legislator is already clued in - or you’re in a Democratic one, which means that you were planning to vote against the person anyhow.

Right?

Open thread.

Moe Lane

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Mad, mad Oliver! (Link fixed.)

…I was going to write this whole thing up Dr. Seuss-style, but honestly? It came out completely lame. Anyway, it’s really simple: Oliver Stone’s angry as anything over the way that people cruelly went out and didn’t see his last movie, so he does what anybody would in his situation (and mindset) - go onto Bill Maher’s show and call Reagan and Bush stupid poopyheads. It’s cheaper than therapy, which Oliver Stone probably can’t afford right now anyway.

It always fascinates me how certain elements of the antiwar movement are so determined to discount the intelligence of the very people that effortlessly kicked their rear on foreign policy. I mean, they didn’t even slow down either President - so if Ronnie and/or W were dumb, then what does that make them?

Moe Lane

PS: All that being said, I liked The Doors.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Hey, I’m honest enough to admit when I’m wrong about something - and although I could weasel out of this, I won’t: it is clear from context here that my expectations were that the Democratic party would redesign their Presidential primary system (to prevent someone doing unto the President as he did unto Clinton) at some point in 2010. Well, that was flat-out wrong of me, and I’m sorry that I called it so badly. It wasn’t going to start within a year at all.

It was actually going to start within three days.

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It’s quite good (H/T: Instapundit), but it has one bit at the end that needs to be addressed:

UPDATE: FWIW, the Waxman-Markey climate bill passed 219-212. Any guess how many of those 219 (or, for that matter, the 212) really know everything that is in the bill? [bolding mine]

None of them, but I just want to make sure that there’s no false equivalence going on here. If you’re a Member of Congress and you’ve just been handed an insanely long bill and told “Vote on this” without being given any time to read or comprehend it, you actually can honorably vote on it. It’s just that the only vote that doesn’t break your oath of office would be No.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Brian’s excellent post about Debbie Halvorson and her fake independence lacked only one thing: this.

Not his fault - it took a little bit of finding - but it’s an excuse to put this front and center. Adam’s main site is, of course, here. It’d be great if he hit his fundraising number by the deadline, wouldn’t it?

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Let’s see: Mark Sanford’s disgraced, Michael Jackson’s dead, that couple that everybody else in the universe obsessed over divorced or something, and the Democrats in Congress managed to pass the Twenty-First century’s answer to Smoot-Hawley - yes, this would be a nigh-perfect time to break the news that indefinite detention’s back on the agenda. The only way that it would have been better timing would have been if Tiger Woods had broken his leg again, in fact.

White House Is Drafting Executive Order to Allow Indefinite Detention of Terror Suspects

The Obama administration, fearing a battle with Congress that could stall plans to close the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, is drafting an executive order that would reassert presidential authority to incarcerate terrorism suspects indefinitely, according to three senior government officials with knowledge of White House deliberations.

Such an order would embrace claims by former president George W. Bush that certain people can be detained without trial for long periods under the laws of war.

Not much else to say, except of course that this isn’t really a surprise. It’s Gitmo or extraordinary rendition; other countries need to be bribed or browbeaten into openly taking our illegal combatants, and they are certainly distinctly unwelcome on American soil. If I had to guess, we’re going to end up with extraordinary rendition - and no, that isn’t the right answer.

Not my responsibility, though: I voted for the other guy.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

So… the guy who’s against gay marriage (unlike his predecessor) went to a LGBT fundraiser and told them that his boss (who is also against gay marriage) intends to get DoMA repealed (while at the same he’s still defending it, in terms that started a backlash) and wants to end DADT (while doing nothing to actually end it*); and in the process somehow manages to confuse the governor of Virginia (and DNC chair) with the governor of New Jersey.

In other words, it’s Thursday for Joe Biden.

(H/T: Andrew Malcolm & JammieWearingFool)

Moe Lane

*Unfortunately.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Via Glenn Reynolds, it’s time for another round of Elections have Consequences!

Action: The North Carolinan legislature (run by Democrats) is about to provide legislation to the governor of North Carolina (Democrat) that allows North Carolina to collect sales tax from Internet transactions.

Reaction: Amazon has closed its Amazon Associates program to North Carolina residents.

To all North Carolinan bloggers and website owners out there - particularly the ones who helped to make sure that North Carolina kept its Democratic majority on the state level - my sincere sympathies; but I must note that this is what happens when you elect too many Democrats.

So stop doing that.

Moe Lane

PS: And before you think I’m being smug: I’m in a state (Maryland) dominated by the Democratic party myself. I’m pretty sure that they voted something like this down, but I trust them with fiscal policy about as far as I can throw them - and I can’t throw worth a darn.

So if you feel the need to buy something, well… here’s the site. Get it while the getting’s good, huh?

Crossposted to Moe Lane.