Crush Liberalism

Liberalism: Why think when you can “feel”?

NYT story: 0.02% of Iraqi and Afghanistan veterans kill back in America

Naturally, the NYT headline doesn’t read that way.  If it did, who outside of the Kos kooks would consider it newsworthy?  From the Weekly Standard:

IN A PAGE-ONE STORY published Sunday, January 13, 2008, “Across America, Deadly Echoes of Foreign Battles,” the New York Times reported on homicides by veterans of the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Seven Times reporters contributed to the lengthy story, which was co-authored by Deborah Sontag and Lizette Alvarez.

The Times “found 121 cases in which veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan committed a killing in this country, or were charged with one, after their return from war.” All but one case involved male veterans. They speculated that their research “most likely uncovered only the minimum number of such cases, given that not all killings” were “reported publicly or in detail,” and because “it was often not possible to determine the deployment history of other service members arrested on homicide charges.” 
…
The Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) and other veterans’ advocacy groups are absolutely correct that not merely “many” but the vast majority of veterans not only remain completely law-abiding but go on to lead stable and productive personal, professional, and civic lives. Assuming 121 homicide cases in relation to 749,932 total discharges through 2007, 99.98 percent of all discharged Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have not committed or been charged with homicide.

And assuming 121 cases and 749,932 total discharges, the homicide offending rate for the discharged veterans would be 16.1 per 100,000. The U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) has demographic data aplenty on homicide offending rates. For instance, in 2005, for white males aged 18-24, the rate was about 20 per 100,000. The Times opined that 121 was the “minimum” number, even as it counted veterans charged but not convicted with veterans tried and found guilty. Doubling the number to 242 would double the rate to 32.2 per 100,000.

Such crude but contextualizing calculations aside, the right question to ask is whether the veterans, other things being equal (controlling for age, race, gender, education, income, prior criminal history, and other variables), offend at rates that are significantly different from otherwise comparable groups (including groups that have an extreme PTSD incidence). Without doing the relevant statistical (multiple-regression) analyses with all the requisite empirical data, it is impossible to say. 

Borrowing on that line of reasoning, I am likely to go postal on someone, since I’ve been to Memphis. In 2005, Memphis had a population of 672,277 and had 153 murders. That comes out to roughly 22.76 murders per 100,000…higher than the 16.1 murder rate of the “wacko-vets come home” rate. I’m a ticking time bomb. So don’t p#ss me off!

Nope…no liberal media bias!

January 15, 2008 Posted by | Afghanistan, Iraq, media bias | 4 Comments

McCain booed in Michigan as the amnesty shill that he is

I don’t know if this will hurt him, since polls show a near-tie in Michigan between Johnny Mac and Mitt Romney.  But I love the treatment he got nonetheless.  From MSNBC:

Sen. John McCain threatened Tuesday to cut short a speech to union leaders who booed his immigration views and later challenged his statements on organized labor and the Iraq war.

“If you like, I will leave,” McCain told the AFL-CIO’s Building and Construction Trades Department, pivoting briefly from the lectern. He returned to the microphone after the crowd quieted.
…
But he took more questions, including a pointed one on his immigration plan.

McCain responded by saying immigrants were taking jobs nobody else wanted. He offered anybody in the crowd $50 an hour to pick lettuce in Arizona.

Shouts of protest rose from the crowd, with some accepting McCain’s job offer.

“I’ll take it!” one man shouted.
McCain insisted none of them would do such menial labor for a complete season. “You can’t do it, my friends.”

Some in the crowd said they didn’t appreciate McCain questioning their work ethic.  (Ya think?  Now THAT is an effective way to court votes: “Support my criminal alien amnesty plan, because you’re too damned lazy to pick the lettuce yourself for a six-figure salary!  Brilliant, Johnny Mac.  – Ed.)

Impressed by McCain’s moxie
“I was impressed with his comedy routine and ability to tap dance without music. But I was impressed with nothing else about him,” said John Wasniewski of Milwaukee. “He’s supposed to be Mr. Straight Talk?” 

Reap what you sow, Senator Lettuce.

January 15, 2008 Posted by | illegal immigration, McCain, unions | 4 Comments

I repeat, there is NO constitutional right to vote in federal elections

This is a follow-up to yesterday’s post explaining how Cynthia Tucker got it wrong when she asserted that the right to vote was enshrined in the Bill of Rights.  I clearly showed that it is not.  Her fishwrap employer issued the following “correction“:

In Sunday’s @issue section, Cynthia Tucker’s column about the voter ID law referred incorrectly to a “right to vote” in the Bill of Rights. The “right to vote” appears explicitly in the 15th, 19th and 26th amendments to the U.S. Constitution. 

This, too, is incorrect, and while I do think that yesterday’s case of “it’s in the Bill of Rights” was a case of ignorance, I am certain this “correction” is a case of outright deception.

There is no “right to vote” in any of those amendments.  I have links to the text of the 15th, 19th, and 26th amendments.  In short, what they say cumulatively can be summed up thusly and clearly:

If a state has decided to allow its citizens to vote, and it decides to place conditions on which citizens can vote and which ones cannot (e.g. convicted felons can’t, non-residents can’t, etc.), there are conditions that cannot be used to deny an otherwise qualified (as determined by the state) voter.  Those conditions include race/color, gender, previous condition of servitude, or age (beyond the age of 18). 

In other words, when states decide who qualifies as a voter, they may use any criteria except the aforementioned criteria on which to base the qualifications to vote.  If a state said that its electoral votes would be decided by a coin toss by the mayor of Pickatown, it would be legal and constitutional.  If the state said that its electoral votes would be decided by a coin toss by the mayor of Pickatown provided that the mayor was not black (or female, or X years of age over the age of 18, or a former slave), then that would be illegal and unconstitutional.  Got it?

Spin it any way you like, AJC, but the fact of the matter is that there is no constitutional right anywhere in that document that provides for a “right to vote” in federal elections.  Period.

January 15, 2008 Posted by | media bias, vote fraud | 6 Comments

Former editor takes her activism from the paper to the ACLU

It’s obvious that today’s fishwraps have abandoned all pretense of objectivity in order to advance agendas.  Don’t believe me?  Take it from the proverbial horse’s mouth:

Terri Burke, former editor of the Abilene Reporter-News, has been named executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas.

Burke, 56, will begin work at the ACLU of Texas on Tuesday. Her duties will include lobbying, fundraising, administering the organization and communicating with the public.

Burke said her new job seems like a continuation of her work in the newspaper business.

“I wanted to be a journalist because I thought journalism was a way to further the democratic process,” Burke said. “At its heart, journalism is about the First Amendment. All my life, I’ve been interested in those kinds of issues.” 

Let’s get one thing perfectly clear: the role of journalism is not to “further the democratic process”, but to pursue newsworthy stories and report them objectively and without prejudice, letting facts speak for themselves.  This chick clearly implies that she saw her role as a journo to be a political one.

Quips Bryan:

If there’s irony to be found here, it’s in the fact that the ACLU often uses the courts not to further the democratic process, but to destroy it. 

Nope…no liberal media bias!

January 15, 2008 Posted by | ACLU, media bias | Leave a Comment

   

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 25 other followers