From Barry O, regarding that certifiable nutcase of a preacher he’s got:

“The person I saw yesterday was not the person I met 20 years ago.”

Like hell he’s not!  He’s the same anti-American, anti-white, anti-Semitic bigoted moonbat now that he’s been for the better part of his life.  Who in the hell does Osamabama think he’s fooling?  Either he knew Wright was like that and is therefore lying to us all right now by feigning outrage and shock, or he really didn’t know Wright was like that and is thus a complete imbecile who doesn’t need to be anywhere near the Oval Office.  I’m leaning towards the former:

Obama’s recollection in Dreams from My Father of his first time at Trinity United 20 years ago:

The title of Reverend Wright’s sermon that morning was “The Audacity of Hope.” He began with a passage from the Book of Samuel—the story of Hannah, who, barren and taunted by her rivals, had wept and shaken in prayer before her God. The story reminded him, he said, of a sermon a fellow pastor had preached at a conference some years before, in which the pastor described going to a museum and being confronted by a painting title Hope….

“It is this world, a world where cruise ships throw away more food in a day than most residents of Port-au-Prince see in a year, where white folks’ greed runs a world in need, apartheid in one hemisphere, apathy in another hemisphere…That’s the world! On which hope sits!”

And so it went, a meditation on a fallen world. While the boys next to me doodled on their church bulletin, Reverend Wright spoke of Sharpsville and Hiroshima, the callousness of policy makers in the White House and in the State House. As the sermon unfolded, though, the stories of strife became more prosaic, the pain more immediate. The reverend spoke of the hardship that the congregation would face tomorrow, the pain of those far from the mountaintop, worrying about paying the light bill…

Wright doesn’t sound all that different.

The Obamessiah wants us to elect him not on his experience (since he has none), but on his judgment.  Considering he fraternizes with domestic terrorists (Ayers and Dohrn), crooks (Rezko), and conspiracy theory black liberation “preachers” who he just knew wasn’t always like that, I’d say his judgment is questionable at best, and downright lousy at worst.

Unprotected gay intercourse won’t spread the virus, but the junk science fad known as global “warming” sure will!  Just when you thought these environuts couldn’t get any more shameful creative, they come up with this nonsense:

CLIMATE change is the latest threat to the world’s growing HIV epidemic, say Australian experts who warn of the “grim” outlook in the fight against the infectious disease.

A leading professor of health and human rights, Daniel Tarantola, has cautioned that global warming will indirectly make citizens of developing countries even more vulnerable to death and severe ill health from HIV/AIDS.

“It was clear soon after the emergence of the HIV epidemic that discrimination, gender inequality and lack of access to essential services have made some populations more vulnerable than others,” said Prof Tarantola, of the University of NSW.

I lost two friends in the mid- and late-1990’s to AIDS.  I thought it was because they were careless in their youthful gay sexcapades, a reason they themselves conceded.  Little did I know that they died at the hands of the Rovian Kyoto Climate Destruction machine (patent pending).  Bush and Rove killed my friends…those b#stards!

Dick Morris has a theory that has crossed many a minds: Hilldawg is trying to sabotage Obama so she can run again in 2012.  Says Morris:

… Until the last vote is counted on June 3rd, we can chalk up her persistence to determination, courage and sheer obstinacy. But if she persists in her candidacy after the last primary, we must begin to consider whether she has an ulterior motive.

Does Hillary want to beat up Obama so that he can’t win the general election in November, assuring McCain of the presidency so that she can have a clear field to run again in 2012? Obviously, if Obama beats McCain, Hillary is out of the picture until 2016, by which time, at 69 years old, she might be too old to run. But if McCain wins, she would have to be considered the presumptive front runner for the nomination, a status which she might parlay into a nomination more successfully than she has been able to do this year.

Every day that she stays in the race and punches Barack Obama, she must realize that she is decreasing his chances of getting elected in November. Each time that she waves the bloody shirt and says that only she is strong enough to fight the war on terror, she obviously raises doubts about Obama’s strength and leadership. Every time she criticizes him for not switching pastors or for saying downscale white voters are bitter, she raises issues that are very destructive to Obama should he win the nomination.

When does fighting for the nomination in 2008 end and seeking to sabotoge Obama’s chances in November to keep her options alive for 2012 begin? Doubts about Hillary’s motivation are going to keep on growing with each inconclusive primary. After she loses North Carolina and fails to carry Indiana by any significant margin (North Carolina has twice as many delegates as Indiana), people will begin to wonder out loud about why she is staying in the race. And if she remains obdurate after the last votes are cast on June 3rd, it will become an increasingly accepted presumption that she is running a campaign of sabotage against Obama. …

I’m inclined to agree.  Her Highness isn’t going to get the nomination now, regardless of how much Buyer’s Remorse the party has for going with the Obamessiah.  The more damage she can do to Obama, the better the chances are that McLame is going to win in November.  When McCain runs for re-election in 2012, he will be 76 years old.

She will have a better chance at capturing her party’s nomination in 2012, especially with those who abandoned her this year to go with the fatally flawed and failed (in this scenario) Obama.  Those Dems will feel guilty for leaving Hilldawg at the electoral altar for an empty suit that got pummeled in the general election by a geriatric, and they’ll recall how close she came in 2008 to getting the nomination.  They’ll flock to her in droves.

Of course, there are some flaws in this scenario.  For one, there is no way of knowing how the political landscape will look in 2012: the economy, the war on terror, potential scandals, etc.  A lot of assumptions are being made here by Morris and others (myself included).  However, considering that Her Highness is all but doomed this year, does anyone else see what other choices in her mind that she has?

Bright ladies = bad sex, dumb broads = great sex?  Hey, don’t get mad at me, ladies…get mad at the Euros!  It’s their study, not mine!

BRAINY babes find it harder to have an orgasm – because they are too busy thinking, a study claims.

 

The German survey found that the more educated a woman was, the less likely it was that she would be satisfied by sex.

 

In the study 62 per cent of women who had completed their education said they often had problems achieving orgasm.

 

Only 38 per cent of women with a lower educational qualification said they had such problems.

 

The study conducted by a German lifestyle website surveyed over 2,000 women between the ages of 18 and 49.

The moral of the story is this: Guys, if your lady isn’t satisfied by you in the rack, it’s nothing you’re doing wrong…if she’s smart, that is.  If she’s a ditz and she’s still not satisfied, then you need to change your techniques! 

Yes, sir…you’ll get the hard-hitting (no pun intended) analysis of the important issues du jour here at Crush Liberalism!

A victory for common sense has arrived!

Remember this story from a couple of weeks ago?  Apparently, the pinheads at the school got an earful from the community for rewarding mediocrity and have reversed its moronic “every grad is equally special” stance.  Way to go, parents and students!

You all know how I hammer the government school system bureacracy and its unholy alliance with the teachers union (among its other flaws).  Well, never let it be said that I don’t salute them when they (or any of their board members) deserve it.  From Osceola County, FL:

Osceola county school board member Jay Wheeler isn’t making any apology for his email.

“I told the truth!” Wheeler said. We asked, “Did you at all think that might be insulting to some?”  Wheeler replied, “I thought it might be a wake up call and I think it’s something people want to say but were afraid too.’

A little more than a week ago, the Osceola County School District decided to implement school uniforms. Since then, he says parents have complained saying they can’t afford the new clothing.  He disagreed with parents and fired off an email to them saying:

“Everyone can afford Wal-Mart and if they cant they need to think about turning of their cable TV or stop buying alcohol or cigarettes and spend their money on their children.”

Oh my god! That was the response of Maria Quintana we she saw this letter. She was speechless. At first and then she finally found the words, “it is insulting. I have to go to school, I have a job and sometimes it’s really hard you have to struggle and to have them say something like that is really degrading.”

But Wheeler doesn’t care; he says its time for parents to focus on their kids. Saying it’s time to stop being politically correct and start being serious about education.

Finally adding, “I just told the truth and parents need to take responsibility and put their children first!” …

Amen, sir!  Way to go, Wheeler!

Here’s something else that needs to be said but rarely is: if you can’t afford children, don’t have children!  There…free advice, from CLOWNS (Crush Liberalism Objective World News Service)!

And don’t those achievements reflect positively on the Nobel Peace Prize?  From Newsbusters:

As the international disaster of ethanol begins taking its toll on the planet — and, maybe more important, as press outlet after press outlet finally begins recognizing it — will media remember that Vice President Al Gore cast the tie-breaking vote in the Senate requiring this oxygenate be added to gasoline?

After all, regardless of recent reports blaming ethanol for world hunger problems, rising food costs, and increased greenhouse gases, it seems highly unlikely green media will want to tie any of these problems to Nobel Laureate Gore.

Yet, as inconveniently reported by States News Service on August 3, 1994 (no link available, emphasis added throughout):

In a move that enraged midwestern senators, Louisiana Democratic Sen. Bennett Johnston tried Wednesday to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from mandating the use of ethanol in reformulated gasoline. The Senate narrowly killed the measure, voting to table it by a margin of 51 to 50. With the vote tied, Vice President Gore had to come in and cast the deciding vote. [...]

“This is really a gigantic flim flam to the American public,” Johnston said. [...]

Under the Clean Air Act, the nation’s nine smoggiest cities must begin reducing auto emissions by using a cleaner-burning fuel known as reformulated gasoline in January. Reformulated gasoline contains more oxygen than regular fuel.

Until the EPA announced its decision last month, oil refiners had a choice of boosting oxygen in reformulated gasoline with either ethanol or MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether), a petroleum derivative. MTBE is made from natural gas. The nation’s major oil companies have natural gas facilities, many of which are overseas. [...]

During the four-hour debate, opponents of the ethanol mandate said the measure contains hidden costs. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the policy would cost the government $249 million during the next five years. The congressional Joint Committee on Taxation has predicted the ethanol rule would drain $545 million from the national highway trust fund each year.

“It’s highway robbery,” said Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va. “It’s nothing less.”

Besides Gore, take a look at who else was DEAD wrong on this issue:

[Democratic Illinois Sen. Paul] Simon added that the ethanol mandate would not increase costs for consumers.”The price of corn flakes isn’t going to go up by one penny,” he said. “Don’t think you’re helping consumers by voting for the amendment by my friend from Louisiana.”

Nope…no liberal media bias!

Preach on, Brother Moonbat!  The more you open up that construction accident known as your cakehole, I get giddier than Ellen DeGeneres at an Indigo Girls concert!

First, he tells us what most of us already knew (and what I had already said): Obama agrees with him, but has to pretend like he doesn’t (which shoots that whole “sincerity” snake oil O’s been peddling all to hell).

Then, not only does he not renounce his nutty “we had 9/11 coming to us” poison, he orders a double shot.

Now (I can’t say “finally”, because I don’t think he’s nearly done flapping his gums yet), we get some of his “Condemnation of ‘God damn America’ = attacking the black church” mantra that will resonate with the race hustlers of the left…which, judging by the reaction of the National Press Club, that number is quite high.

But hey…Barry O can no more disown him than he can his own family, right?

Of course, CNN “journalist” Roland Martin (not to be confused with the bass angler) abandons all pretense of objectivity engages in some embarrassing #ss-kissing to the Cardinal of Kookville.

Pastor Pinko may finally be able to do what Her Highness and Juan McLame have thus far been unable to do: sink the Obamessiah’s campaign.  Time will tell, of course, but polls are beginning to turn against Obama and in the Hildebitch’s direction.

The left fought this tooth and nail, since it does stymie their efforts to perpetuate vote fraud.  However, they are a resilient bunch, so I’m sure they’ll figure out a way to overcome this obstacle.  If only they’d put in half as much effort at getting a job as they do in trying to cheat at the ballot box, they’d likely be more successful in life.  Anywho, from MSNBC:

The Supreme Court ruled Monday that states can require voters to produce photo identification without violating their constitutional rights, validating Republican-inspired voter ID laws.

In a splintered 6-3 ruling, the court upheld Indiana’s strict photo ID requirement, which Democrats and civil rights groups said would deter poor, older and minority voters from casting ballots. Its backers said it was needed to prevent fraud.
…
The law “is amply justified by the valid interest in protecting ‘the integrity and reliability of the electoral process,’” Justice John Paul Stevens said in an opinion that was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Anthony Kennedy. Stevens was a dissenter in Bush v. Gore in 2000.
…
Indiana provides IDs free of charge to the poor and allows voters who lack photo ID to cast a provisional ballot and then show up within 10 days at their county courthouse to produce identification or otherwise attest to their identity.

Stevens said these provisions also help reduce the burden on people who lack driver licenses.

Stevens concurred with the common sense segment of the SCOTUS?  OK, who found some photos of Stevens in compromising positions with livestock?  Fess up, you wingnuts! 

Isn’t this ruling just sheer lunacy?  Today, voting precincts are verifying voter eligibility.  Tomorrow, they’ll probably do someting barbaric like disenfranchising the dead and the pet population! For those of you on the left, this entire paragraph was sarcasm.

It’s telling that Indiana actually will provide free ID for those who don’t have one, in order to help them vote, thus alleviating the biggest complaint that the left had about the law…and that still wasn’t good enough for them. It’s obvious that the left is all about vote fraud and they knew this law would make their jobs of commiting vote fraud that much tougher.

Just when I thought we had already solved all problems in Florida, I see I was mistaken.

When we’re not busy humiliating ourselves with hanging chads and electile dysfunction, Florida decides to be a trendsetter in the solving the premier problems of the day.  From MSNBC:

They’re proudly displayed by any self-respecting bull, but dangling big metal ones on the back end of a truck could be banned in Florida.

Metal replicas of bull testicles have become trendy bumper ornaments in some parts of the Sunshine State, but state Sen. Carey Baker is campaigning to ban the orbs.

Baker acknowledged that Florida lawmakers have more pressing issues, including huge revenue shortfalls, but said the state needs to draw a line on what’s obscene before more objectionable adornments appear.

State Sen. Steve Geller argued against Baker’s bill.

“I find it shocking that we should be telling people that have the metallic bull testicles … you’re now going to have points on your license for this,” said Geller. …

Maybe the lawmakers are jealous because they lack ‘nads themselves.  Morons.

The same woman who told us in San Fransicko in Marxist fashion that “We’re going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good” gave us this nugget (hat tip QandO):

“We can talk all we want about freedom and opportunity, about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, but what does all that mean to a mother or father who can’t take a sick child to the doctor?” she asked.

Yeah, really…just who in the hell did this Thomas Jefferson guy think he was?

There is so much that is wrong with that statement that it could be dissected for days (and feel free to do it in the comments, if you so choose).  My two main takeaways are this: (1) She’s saying that the principles outlined in the Declaration of Independence are apparently passé; and (2) ignoring the reality that ER’s can’t turn away anyone and thus you can take your sick child to the doctor (or that doctors can and do set up payment plans for the indigent), she’s saying that those passé principles of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness can and should be traded in for government health care.  And the left, paranoid over the things like the Patriot Act and FISA searches, accuse us on the right of trading freedom for security?

Fortunately, this woman will never see the inside of the Oval Office again.

About 70,000 years ago, that is.  Pre-Hummers, pre-factories, pre-Al Gore’s jumbo jet and energy hog of a mansion, etc.  From the AP:

Human beings may have had a brush with extinction 70,000 years ago, an extensive genetic study suggests. The human population at that time was reduced to small isolated groups in Africa, apparently because of drought, according to an analysis released ThursdayThe report notes that a separate study by researchers at Stanford University estimated the number of early humans may have shrunk as low as 2,000 before numbers began to expand again in the early Stone Age.

… Paleontologist Meave Leakey, a Genographic adviser, commented: “Who would have thought that as recently as 70,000 years ago, extremes of climate had reduced our population to such small numbers that we were on the very edge of extinction.”

Who, indeed!  You mean that “climate change” has actually been cyclical in the past?  Why, that’s just crazy talk!  For those of you on the left, the prior two sentences were examples of sarcasm.

Liberal mecca Washington, D.C., is all about Big Government and economic ignorance, and stories like this just emphasize that fact.  From WJLA:

Three streetcars purchased by the District of Columbia for about $10 million are being held in the Czech Republic until the city builds tracks for the cars.

D.C. Department of Transportation Director Emeka Moneme say that although the streetcars were purchased three years ago, there is no timetable for when a rail line will be built.

Moneme says he would like to have the streetcars in D.C. this summer. Plans call for the cars to run from Bolling Air Force Base in southeast Washington to the Anacostia Metro Station.

The streetcars are being maintained by Skoda-Inekon, a company that manufactures streetcars in the Czech Republic.

“We have NO idea if or when a rail line will be built.  Hey, I’ve got a great idea!  Let’s pilfer $10 million of the taxpayers’ money to buy a streetcar that won’t be running on anything!”  Friggin’ brilliant.  What, did Marion Barry come up with that crackpot (pun intended) idea?

From USA Today:

Alarmed by rising global food prices, some European leaders are rethinking their commitment to use ethanol fuel and are considering other policy changes to lower the costs of basic staples.
…
The use of corn and sugar to make ethanol is a main driver of rampant inflation in worldwide food costs during the past year. Grocery bills are up across Europe, and the United Nations World Food Program says that rising food prices have pushed 100 million people into hunger worldwide.
…
“A world food crisis … threatens to roll back progress made in recent years to lift millions of people out of poverty and, through increased inflation, affects us all,” Brown said before opening a summit here on the world food crisis.

Notes Ed Morrissey:

Every fill of the tank with ethanol uses the same amount of corn a child would eat in a year, and let’s not even talk about the amount of potable water used to grow the corn in the first place. Given the above, which is the better use of the corn?

If we produce ethanol from waste — such as with switchgrass, which shows promise — then no ethical problem would exist, although certainly the efficiency issues would remain. Until then, we should end the push to turn food into fuel, driven by the global-climate-change hysteria and pandering to the agricultural sector. Feed people ahead of cars. Is that really such a difficult concept? 

Congrats, you global “warming” Chicken Littles.  You’ve succeeded in jacking our food and energy costs up, even to the point of forcing people into hunger.  You people officially suck.

It doesn’t exist in any version/edition of the Bible, my friends.  Maybe the passage she quotes is from the Book of Big Government, right next to the “And the Lord sayeth, ‘Thou shalt tax the people through the nose to fundeth substandard health care for all’” passage.  That’s her story, and she’s “clinging” to it.  From CNS News:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is fond of quoting a particular passage of Scripture. The quote, however, does not appear in the Bible and is “fictional,” according to biblical scholars.

In her April 22 Earth Day news release, Pelosi said, “The Bible tells us in the Old Testament, ‘To minister to the needs of God’s creation is an act of worship. To ignore those needs is to dishonor the God who made us.’ On this Earth Day, and every day, let us pledge to our children, and our children’s children, that they will have clean air to breathe, clean water to drink, and the opportunity to experience the wonders of nature.”

Cybercast News Service repeatedly queried the speaker’s office for two days to determine where the alleged Bible quote is found. Thus far, no one has responded. …

Claude Mariottini, a professor of Old Testament at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary, told Cybercast News Service the passage not only doesn’t exist - it’s “fictional.”

“It is not in the Bible,” Mariottini said. “There is nothing that even approximates that.”

And to think that folks find the left to be out of touch when it comes to faith!

(Updates at the bottom of this post!)

As you all know, I am a huge proponent of capitalism.  No economic system has done more for the world in terms of lifting standards of living, giving opportunities to move up the economic latter, and representing true individual freedom and liberty.  In short, capitalism rocks, and everything else sucks.

Having said that, I ask this question geniunely and sincerely: Is this what capitalism really is?  From the Washington Times:

Farmers and food executives appealed fruitlessly to federal officials yesterday for regulatory steps to limit speculative buying that is helping to drive food prices higher. Meanwhile, some Americans are stocking up on staples such as rice, flour and oil in anticipation of high prices and shortages spreading from overseas.

Their pleas did not find a sympathetic audience at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), where regulators said high prices are mostly the result of soaring world demand for grains combined with high fuel prices and drought-induced shortages in many countries.

The regulatory clash came amid evidence that a rash of headlines in recent weeks about food riots around the world has prompted some in the United States to stock up on staples.

Costco and other grocery stores in California reported a run on rice, which has forced them to set limits on how many sacks of rice each customer can buy. Filipinos in Canada are scooping up all the rice they can find and shipping it to relatives in the Philippines, which is suffering a severe shortage that is leaving many people hungry.

What in the hell is wrong with this picture?  There isn’t a single reason that people in the United States of America, the single greatest country in the history of the world, should be stocking up on food items!  Continuing: 

“Something is wrong,” said National Farmers Union President Tom Buis, adding that the CFTC’s refusal to rein in speculators will force farmers and consumers to take their case to Congress.

“It may warrant congressional intervention,” he said. “The public is all too aware of the recent credit crisis on Wall Street. We don’t want a lack of oversight and regulation to lead to a similar crisis in rural America.”
…
In addition, the diversion of one-third of the U.S. corn crop into making ethanol for vehicles has increased prices for corn and other staples such as soybeans and cotton as more acreage is set aside for ethanol production. (Yeah, thanks for that, treehuggers! - Ed.)

Do you know what kind of discomfort it brings me to find myself somewhat siding with these “more regulation” types?!?  Me, the free market neo-libertarian capitalist!  But again, is this speculator-induced plague a legit part of capitalism?  Continuing:

The upswing in prices has been exaggerated by the massive influx of investors and speculators seeking to profit from rising prices for corn, wheat, oil, gold and other commodities. Big Wall Street firms and hedge funds have taken huge positions in futures markets that once were dominated by relatively small operators such as farmers and grain-elevator owners.
…
“During such turbulent times, it is tempting to shoot first and ask questions later,” Mr. Lukken said, but he contended the commission should be “cautious” about doing anything to curb speculation. He and other regulators argued that speculators add volume and liquidity to the markets, which makes them operate more efficiently and helps farmers and other players.

What a crock of bovine feces!  Speculators add nothing to the equation but higher prices for the entire freaking world!  It may “help farmers and other players”, but it doesn’t help consumers, particularly low-income  consumers who have no choice but to pay higher prices for food so they don’t starve!  The commodities market was working just fine until these big money speculators took it over.

I have absolutely no problems whatsoever with investors sinking their money into stocks, bonds, T-bills, mutual funds, etc.  But isn’t there something just awfully perverse about flooding a market they were never a part of in order to convince producers of food and oil that situations are more dire than they really are, all in order to drive those prices up and make a tidy profit while the rest of us suffer?  Isn’t capitalism based largely on supply and demand, and in the case of these parasite speculators, aren’t they disrupting that model that has served humanity well for centuries?

Here’s an analogy: Let’s say I come over to your house and breathlessly warn you that a fire is rapidly approaching your house (even though I know it’s not true).  Fortunately for you, I just so happen to have bought a firehose (that I paid $10 for at The Firehose Store).  I will sell you (or lease you) the firehose for $100.  After a convincing sales pitch, you believe me and say “Wow, $100 is kinda steep, but I need to save my house!  OK, I’ll take the hose.”  The fire never comes, and I just profited $90 off of feeding you a load of crap.  I created my own lies-based wealth, and I added nothing of value to your life’s equation.

Was that a normal case of “supply and demand”?  No!  Demand was artificially, and knowingly so, inflated by the speculator in order to make a profit.  That, my friends, is what is happening right now with this commodities market speculation, especially with food and oil.  Speculators pump their money into the commodities market by buying low, they convince the producers that conditions suck in order to get the prodcuers to jack their prices up, then they sell high and profit off the mess they created.  Speculators helped create the real estate mess by driving the price of homes up to irrational levels, and the correction came, hurting a bunch of people in the process (after most speculators cashed in first, though).  Not content with having damaged the real estate sector, they’re now setting their sights on inflicting pain and suffering on the food and energy sectors.  So I ask again: Is this really what capitalism is about?  Frankly, I don’t think so.

This isn’t a class warfare argument.  In my view, I’m defending capitalism, not damning it.  What say you, my friends?

UPDATE (04/24/2008 - 03:00 P.M. EST):  I see that some in Congress share my views.  Congressman John Larson (D-CT) is proposing a ban on oil contract speculation.  I say that we shouldn’t stop at oil, but include food as well.  Basically, speculators never actually buy the commodity.  They buy the contracts, then turn around and sell them for an artificially inflated profit.  Larson is proposing to stop that on the oil side of the commodities shell game, saying that if you want to be an oil speculator, you have to actually buy the oil product.  Excerpt:

“People shouldn’t be allowed to speculate purely with paper, fluctuating and driving the cost of oil, especially when we have adequate supply,” Larson said during a news conference in the Capitol complex. “And demand, in fact, has gone down because of the crunch that everyone finds themselves in.”

Gene Guilford, executive director of the Independent Connecticut Petroleum Association, said most Americans don’t realize that the daily setting of prices for oil, natural gas, electricity, gasoline and diesel fuel contracts takes place on worldwide commodities exchanges, led by the New York Mercantile Exchange.

He said over the last five or six years investment banks, hedge funds and pension funds have forced up demand in the contracts above and beyond the basic rules of supply and demand.

“It’s the financial-services industry in this country that over the last few years has started telling the American people and the Congress of the United States that supply and demand no longer matter,” Guilford said. “When supply and demand no longer matters, then the marketplace no longer works the way it was supposed to work.“

“Amen!” to that last sentence, which addresses the question of this post.  A ban such as Larson’s could go along way to stopping those scumbag speculators once and for all.

The Always Biased Company blames the arming of Mexico’s drug gangs on our constitutional right to self-defense.  Nope…no liberal media bias!

Hat tip to Moonbattery:

Brilliant college mind misspells “terrorism”!

By now, many of you are aware that Barry O has strong ties to unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers, and Obama has a glowing profile (I prefer “whitewashing”…uh-oh, I said “white”!) of Ayers on his web site.

Some of you are also aware of Obama’s ties to unrepentant domestic terrorist Bernadine Dohrn, also whitewashed praised by Barry O.  Both Ayers and Dohrn are frequently referred to by the Obamessiah as “respectable mainstream” figures in Chicago.  If, by “mainstream”, you mean that like any other Joe or Jane Schmore, they loathe America and want it destroyed, then yeah…”mainstream”!  By the way, Power Line has a great piece on just kind of vermin Ayers and Dohrn are and just how “mainstream” they really are.

Well, enter yet another terrorist working with Osamabama in trying to get him into the Oval Office: Hatem El-Hady.  From Frontpage Mag (read the whole thing):

Two years ago, Hatem El-Hady was the chairman of the Toledo, Ohio-based Islamic charity, Kindhearts, which was closed by the US government in February 2006 for terrorist fundraising and all its assets frozen. Today, El-Hady has redirected his fundraising efforts for his newest cause - Barack Obama for President.

El-Hady has his own dedicated page on Barack Obama’s official website, chronicling his fundraising on behalf of the Democratic Party presidential candidate (his Obama profile established on February 19, 2008 - two years to the day after Kindhearts was raided by the feds). Not only that, but he has none other than Barack Obama’s wife, Michelle Obama, listed as one of his friends (one of her 224 listed friends).

But his leadership of Kindhearts is not the only thing that has brought him scrutiny by federal law enforcement officials. Last summer, El-Hady was questioned by the FBI concerning his knowledge of possible conspirators in a UK-based terror plot.
…
Not only was Kindhearts engaged in providing funds for HAMAS in Lebanon and the West Bank, it had hired as a fundraising specialist the man identified as the designated HAMAS bag man in the US, Mohammed El-Mezain. (Hey, wouldn’t that make this dude eligible to meet with Jimmy Carter? - Ed.)
…
And two months before Kindhearts closure by the US government, Beila Rabinowitz had revealed that the South Asia Division Coordinator for Kindhearts, Zulfiqar Ali Shah, had known ties to al-Qaeda, even conducting a 10-day tour with officials for the Tablighi Jamaat organization, which the New York Times had described as “a springboard for militancy” and a “recruitment” center for Al-Qaeda.

Barack Obama has promised change. And as indicated by the public support that his candidacy has received by accused terrorist fundraiser Hatem El-Hady, Obama’s version of change that terrorists and their US supporters can believe in.

So here we have three America-hating, anti-capitalist terrorists who are friends/associates of Barry O.  Factor that in with his anti-American nutjob minister, and the question that is screaming for an answer is this: Just what kind of person is Barack Obama, where he chooses to fraternize with (and work with and receive guidance from) known America-hating sleezebags?  Is O a similar type of sleezebag, or is he so fatally naive to the point of causing harm to this republic should we have the misfortune of this creep getting elected in November?

Johnny Dollar has the audio clip.  I wonder if this gave Matthews’ leg a “thrill”?

How delicious this is…a Clintonista b#tchslapping Chris Matthews!  Man, this campaign has been more fun than watching Mikie Dukakis in a tank!

Newsbusters asks the questions that the MSM and their open-borders advocate friends won’t ask:

Oklahoma’s unemployment rate, which was a seasonally adjusted 4.3% and 4.4%, respectively, in September and October 2007 (4.1% and 4.2% unadjusted), has fallen to a seasonally adjusted 3.1% in both February and March of this year (3.5% and 3.2% unadjusted).

The unemployment rate in most states has gone up from September 2007 to March 2008. In states where the rate has gone down, none has shown an improvement like that seen in the Sooner State — not even close.

Why is that?

What has happened in Oklahoma that hasn’t happened elsewhere?

Well, one thing Oklahoma did last year was to pass an enforcement-focused immigration reform law.

It did so in May, and it took effect in November. Here is how One News Now described the bill at the time it was signed by the state’s governor (original link no longer available):

House Bill 1804 was passed by overwhelming majorities in both the House and Senate of the Oklahoma Legislature. The measure’s sponsor, State Representative Randy Terrill, says the bill has four main topical areas: it deals with identity theft; it terminates public assistance benefits to illegals; it empowers state and local police to enforce federal immigration laws; and it punishes employers who knowingly hire illegal aliens.

Oklahoma is no longer “O.K.” for illegal aliens, Terrill observes. “When you put everything together in context,” he contends, “the bottom line is illegal aliens will not come here if there are no jobs waiting for them, they will not stay here if there is no government subsidy, and they certainly won’t stay here if they know that if they ever encounter our state and local law enforcement officers, they will be physically detained until they’re deported. And that’s exactly what House Bill 1804 does.”

The Oklahoma legislator is pleased the bill he sponsored into law was signed by Governor Henry and believes it will go a long way to curb the illegal immigration problem in the state.

It seems reasonable to ask if the law has accomplished the intended curbing of illegal immigration. This January 9 USA Today article by Emily Bazar (”Strict immigration law rattles Okla. businesses”) indicates that it has — not that Bazar thinks that this is a good thing.

The next question to ask would be whether citizens have taken jobs that illegals used to do. Though the lower unemployment rate doesn’t in and of itself prove that, it does point strongly in that direction.

The improving employment situation in the state has received sparse coverage, and the only two relevant stories I found (here and here) did not attempt to explain why it’s happening.

Will anyone in Old Media dig more deeply into the Sooner State’s situation? Or will they try to pretend that Oklahoma’s improvement doesn’t exist, because finding out why might expose some inconvenient truths, and hurt the cause of illegal-immigrant “amnesty”?

Oklahomans…”quacking bigots“, or pragmatic Americans?  And before I forget: Nope…no liberal media bias!

This is a mugshot from Dekalb County, GA (courtesy of Neal Boortz). I respectfully disagree with the message on her shirt:

Didn’t we hear ad nauseum from the left in 2000 that (a) Gore’s popular vote advantage should have been more important than Bush’s electoral vote advantage; and (b) voters were “disenfranchised”?

This primary season, Obama lost swing states FL and MI.  However, the DNC punished those states (some might say “disenfranchised”) for moving their primaries to an earlier date by removing their delegates.  Obama didn’t mind, since he didn’t win FL, and his name wasn’t even on the ballot in MI.

Obama has been saying that the superdelegates should vote according to the popular vote and not the delegate count.  That’s been easy for him to say, since he leads in both counts.  However, if you count both FL and MI in the popular vote total, Barry O trails the Hildebeast in the popular vote by nearly 122,000 votes!  Would he advocate counting those states and having the superdelegates reflect the popular vote accordingly, or would he advocate “disenfranchising” those key states’ voters?

And would Her Highness, the same woman who proposed a constitutional amendment banning the electoral college and establishing a national popular vote to determine the president (after the 2000 election), abandon her efforts to circumvent the delegate and popular vote system of the DNC by courting superdelegates to ignore the “will of the people” (i.e. the popular vote)?

Will the DNC eventually count FL and MI delegates?  Who knows?  But it’s funnier than a blind lesbian at a seafood market watching the left jump through rhetorical (and hypocritical) hoops about popular votes and disenfranchisement.

How the NYT squares that circle is beyond me.  It seems like just a short three months ago that the Old Gray Hag endorsed the Hildebeast.  Wait a minute…it was just three months ago.  Anywho, get a load of this crap:

The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.

Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.

The Hag isn’t doing Obama any favors here.  The column is saying that Hilldawg should handle Barry O with kid gloves and stop fighting so hard.  In other words, “Just shut up and lose, will ya?”

How about this gem?  Obviously, they must have written this up before the PA primary last night, which would explain why they now look stupider than usual over at the NYT:

If nothing else, self interest should push her in that direction. Mrs. Clinton did not get the big win in Pennsylvania that she needed to challenge the calculus of the Democratic race.

Yeah, that 10% margin of victory in a big state like PA hardly constitutes a “big win”, huh?  Winning four of the last six primaries does nothing to “challenge the calculus” of the race, does it?

Idiots.

Boy, you have got to see this!  I am well aware of the fact that Bill Clinton is a pathological liar, as are all of you.  But my God, people, you have got to see how Shep Smith uses video to expose Bubba’s lies (or feeblemindedness) to the world.  He speaks his mind, then subsequently denies doing it, then blames the reporter…all in the span of less than 24 hours!  If this were comedy gold, I’d give it a good 24k rating.

Hat tip to Johnny Dollar for his efforts on putting this together.

Did anyone realize that Shickadance was still alive?  Me neither.  From Politico:

No, this is not a overdue April Fool’s Joke.

Ben Smith just let me know that he heard a Ron Paul ad on KYW, a news station in Philly.

I thought Ben may have had a little too much wiz on his cheesesteak at first, but sure enough there is an ad.

Without mentioning McCain’s name, Paul paints himself as the true conservative and draws obvious contrasts on immigration, taxes, and campaign finance reform.  No mention of the issue that has drawn so many to Paul, his opposition to the Iraq war (he does say he supports “a pro-America defense policy”).

Anybody want to wager what percent of the vote Paul pulls tomorrow in Penn?  And, to you Paul’ites, are you doing any get out the vote stuff to supplement the ad?

The Bircheresque crank still has a pulse, it seems.  It’s a darned shame that we don’t have anyone with his fiscal wisdom, i.e. spending money on a campaign commercial when he’s already been beat worse than a government mule, running the country, huh?  Maybe he can use whatever money’s leftover to buy his Troofer minions a life.

Page one, no less.  And from the same guy (Jim Rutenberg) that wrote the last piece that was so tabloidesque that the NYT’s own ombudsman said it never should have run.  But the Old Gray Hag is just being the Old Gray Hag, and some partisan hack fishwraps never learn, do they?  No wonder they’re in dire financial straits!

Anywho, the story is here.  In a nutshell, the Hag tries to insinuate that McCain doled out some legislative goodies to a rich real estate mogul in the form of questionable land deals.  It’s a darned shame the smear job never alludes to the support that said land deals got from the treehuggers, other legislators, and other businesspeople.  Widespread support?  Nah…let’s just focus on McCain!

Also, one has to wonder why, since Rutenberg is all interested in shady land deals and stuff, we never read anything like this from his desk a couple of years ago when Harry “Land Shark” Reid was benefiting from land deals that he specifically and personally sponsored!  Reid and his family got a boatload of cash from selling the federally-owned land, but Rutenberg’s interest in crooked land deals is either much more recent or, dare I say it, limited only to Republicans?  I know, I know…that would imply a lack of journalistic ethics and integrity! 

Nope…no liberal media bias!

Everyone, please properly observe Earth Day today.  Here are some tips to get the most out of Mother Gaia’s birthday:

1. Drive a Hummer down to Blockbuster to rent An Inconvenient Truth.
2. Club a fur seal.
3. Eat some spotted owl blackened on your charcoal-fired grill.
4. Chop down a tree for your own firewood.
5. Leave the lights on, Al Gore style.
6. Piddle around the world in a jumbo jet, Al Gore style.
7. Stand outside and empty a whole can of hair spray into the atmosphere.
8. Go grocery shopping and demand that each piece of produce you buy get put into its own plastic bag.
9. Fart.  A lot.  Preferably outside so as to “warm” the atmosphere.
10. Breathe.  Nothing p#sses off an environut more than that one simple act.

Anywho, if you have any additional tips to help us enjoy Earth Day, please pass them on. 

As many of you know, the act of Dowdifying a quote is a left-wing act of deception and cowardice.  It’s where you omit key words (or, in this case, entire paragraphs) from an original quote in order to change its meaning entirely.  The shameful practice was named after the partisan hack columnist Maureen Dowd of the Old Gray Hag, who dowdified a quote from President Bush thusly:

Busy chasing off Saddam, the president and vice president had told us that Al Qaeda was spent. “Al Qaeda is on the run,” President Bush said last week. “That group of terrorists who attacked our country is slowly but surely being decimated… They’re not a problem anymore.”

The actual quote?

Al Qaeda is on the run. That group of terrorists who attacked our country is slowly but surely being decimated. Right now, about half of all the top Al Qaeda operatives are either jailed or dead. In either case, they’re not a problem anymore.

The implication Dowd was making, willfully so, is that Bush was suggesting Al Qaeda was no longer a problem, that Al Qaeda was totally destroyed from top to bottom.  It was clear he was referring to the Al Qaeda leaders who had been jailed or killed, and not the organization as whole.  Deceptive, no?

Anywho, why am I rehashing this?  Because it illustrates how low the left will go to score points, even if they have to dowdify quotes to win.  Dishonesty is the left’s middle name.  Here’s an analysis of a Dem ad, from (of all places) the AP:

SCRIPT: CNN’s Anderson Cooper: “Senator McCain, are Americans better off than they were eight years ago?”

McCain: “I think you could argue that Americans overall are better off, because we have had a pretty good prosperous time, with low unemployment, low inflation. A lot of good things have happened. A lot of jobs have been created … I think we are better off overall.”

KEY IMAGES: A clip of McCain at the Jan. 30 Republican debate in Simi Valley, Calif., sponsored by CNN. A split screen depicts scenes of foreclosure signs, a shuttered plant gate and $4 gas prices as text on the screen states: “Unemployment Up,” “Highest Inflation in 17 years,” “Gas Prices Up 200 Percent” and “1.8 Million Jobs Lost.” The ad ends with two text questions: “Do you feel better off?” and “Is John McCain the Right Choice for America’s Future?”

The problem? They omitted a ton of “yeah, but” quotes from Juanny Mac, the omitted quotes being emphasized:

Here is McCain’s full response to Cooper’s question at the debate:

Cooper: “Senator McCain, are Americans better off than they were eight years ago?”

McCain: “I think you could argue that Americans overall are better off, because we have had a pretty good prosperous time, with low unemployment and low inflation and a lot of good things have happened. A lot of jobs have been created.

“But let’s have some straight talk. Things are tough right now. Americans are uncertain about this housing crisis. Americans are uncertain about the economy, as we see the stock market bounce up and down, but more importantly, the economy particularly in some parts of the country, state of Michigan, Governor Romney and I campaigned, not to my success, I might add, and other parts of the country are probably better off.

“But I think what we’re trying to do to fix this economy is important. We’ve got to address the housing, subprime housing problem. We need to, obviously, have this package go through the Congress as quickly as possible.

“We need to make the Bush tax cuts permanent, which I voted for twice to do so. I think we need to eliminate the alternate minimum tax that sits out there and challenges 25 million American families.

Cooper: “It sounds like you’re saying we’re not better off.”

McCain: “I think we are better off overall if you look at the entire eight-year period, when you look at the millions of jobs that have been created, the improvement in the economy, et cetera.

“What I’m trying to emphasize, Anderson, that we are in a very serious challenge right now, with a lot of Americans very uncertain about their future, and we’ve got to give them some comfort.

“We’ve got to give them some stimulus. We’ve got to give them some tax relief. We’ve got to stop this outrageous squandering spending that causes us to have to borrow money from China, and we’ve got to get our fiscal house in order.

“I think we went on a spending spree that, frankly, betrayed Ronald Reagan’s principles about tax cuts and restraint of spending.”

Shameless, aren’t they? That’s enough to make MoDo herself blush!

Jimmah is as useless today as he was 30+ years ago.  From the AP:

Former President Jimmy Carter said Monday that Hamas — the Islamic militant group (the MSM just can’t bring themselves to say “terrorist”, can they? - Ed.) that has called for the destruction of Israel — is prepared to accept the right of the Jewish state to “live as a neighbor next door in peace.”

Carter relayed the message in a speech in Jerusalem after meeting last week with top Hamas leaders in Syria. It capped a nine-day visit to the Mideast aimed at breaking the deadlock between Israel and Hamas militants who rule the Gaza Strip.

Hamas leaders “said that they would accept a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders” and they would “accept the right of Israel to live as a neighbor next door in peace,” Carter said.

Wow…so the Peanut Putz got the terrorists to abandon their organization’s charter and recognize the right of Israel to exist?  What a miracle worker!  Um, except…

Carter said Hamas promised it wouldn’t undermine Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ efforts to reach a peace deal with Israel, as long as the Palestinian people approved it in a referendum. In such a scenario, he said Hamas would not oppose a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza.

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri in Gaza said Hamas’ readiness to put a peace deal to a referendum “does not mean that Hamas is going to accept the result of the referendum.”
…
“We accept a Palestinian state within the June 4 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital — a sovereign state without settlements — as well as the right of Palestinian refugees to return, but without recognition of Israel,” he said.

Terrorists ignore the will of the people, and they lie?  Gee…who knew?  Apparently, Carter didn’t.

Carter said that ‘The present strategy of excluding Hamas and excluding Syria is just not working”, and I just want to know this: virtually everything that man did in his four years of miserable leadership was an unmitigated failure, so what in the hell would he know about what works and what doesn’t?

He didn’t change Hamas’ minds a single bit.  They re-emphasized their commitment to slaughtering innocent Jews.  All Carter did was legitimize their horrific existence in the eyes of the world.  Even while he’s no longer president, Jimmy the Dhimmi is still making messes in the world that will take generations (if ever) to clean up.