tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-127029812011-08-16T20:03:59.770-07:00A place where freedom reigns, individuals aspire, the Constitution matters, and P.C. group-think is a really bad detour. A place where it's still possible to get a darned good cup of coffee for under a buck. This blog is a travelogue about that place. Buckle up. The trip starts now.Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comBlogger4571100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-64355982881496159762010-04-06T08:12:00.000-07:002010-04-06T08:21:27.307-07:00

Sane Nation's Web Location Has Changed.Click Here and Be Sure to Bookmark the New Permanent Site.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-28565757264452484612008-03-17T15:28:00.000-07:002008-03-17T15:55:00.297-07:00

Conventional political wisdom holds that Barack Obama's biracial identity works entirely to his benefit politically. Having a foot in both camps, so to speak (the theory goes), he doesn't have to play racial identity politics of the kind that have earned Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton reputations as notorious race hucksters. The problem with the Ebony Plus Ivory hypothesis is this: It doesn't

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-75456244300757268832008-03-10T08:59:00.000-07:002008-12-10T14:17:32.700-08:00

Notice Hillary's wagging finger.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-85875103569305239132008-02-29T12:11:00.000-08:002008-02-29T12:18:47.616-08:00

You decide: Now, one of Clinton's laws of politics is this. If one candidate is trying to scare you and the other one is try get you to think, if one candidate is appealing to your fears and the other one is appealing to your hopes, you better vote for the person who wants you to think and hope.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-3775182068037879352008-02-22T12:58:00.000-08:002008-02-22T13:44:16.890-08:00

Last night both Obama and Clinton invoked the late Texas congresswoman Barbara Jordan's legacy of deep conviction. Then the two candidates declared their shared commitment to the idea that open borders are the best borders. Barbara Jordan would have been appalled. Over a decade ago she called for eliminating chain migration, ending the nonsensical Visa Lottery program, and enforcing tight

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-48291547182362009082008-02-18T11:00:00.000-08:002008-02-18T17:47:17.694-08:00

Hillary's accusation that Obama stole key phrases from speeches by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick is significant because it has the potential to strike at the heart of Obama's central political asset, namely the widespread perception (held even by those who don't share his views) that he's a "man of integrity." Is it acceptable to borrow language from another politician, without

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-72690871102741097142008-02-11T12:16:00.000-08:002008-02-11T19:05:26.692-08:00

Another weeping spell? Crying briefly helped in New Hampshire. Lots of women identified with the idea that she was being bullied by The Guys. But many of these same women are too savvy to buy whimpering as an ongoing winning strategy. Tears won't do the trick. The race card. Bill tried it when he smugly compared Obama's victory to Jesse Jackson's 1980s presidential campaign. The strategy failed,

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1163207042993248382006-11-10T16:48:00.000-08:002006-11-13T14:44:56.210-08:00

See, I actually believe the Democrats when they say they want to govern from the middle. I just think it's been so long since they've been anywhere near the mainstream, they don't know what it looks like any more. 1. Leading anti-war congressional Democrats have asked George McGovern to help them formulate the Democrat's Iraq exit policy. George McGovern! He could save himself a plane ride by

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1163110463279816242006-11-09T14:04:00.000-08:002006-11-10T12:51:29.083-08:00

There's word that Pelosi intends to prevent colleagues who are hawkish on national security from getting important chairmanships. The speaker-to-be is said to be especially keen on punishing California Rep. Jane Harman for supporting the war in Iraq and the Patriot Act. Let's put this in perspective. With Dennis Kucinich ("Let's surrender as fast as possible") and Joe Lieberman ("We cannot

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1163013888454406342006-11-08T11:21:00.000-08:002006-11-08T11:24:48.600-08:00

Sen. Tom Coburn weighs in with an excellent analysis: The overriding theme of this election ... is that voters are more interested in changing the culture in Washington than changing course in Washington, D.C. This election was not a rejection of conservative principles per se, but a rejection of corrupt, complacent and incompetent government...This election does not show that voters have

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1163003397371300952006-11-08T07:43:00.000-08:002006-11-08T09:48:14.086-08:00

Republicans ran as the Party of Reform, harking back to 1994 when they took over the House with a commitment to start explaining America to Washington again rather than the opposite. Twelve years later, what had they "reformed"? Republicans talked about reforming the "culture of corruption" that characterized their Democrat House predecessors. Twelve years later: Jack Abramoff. Congressional

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1162962559716541742006-11-07T20:39:00.000-08:002006-11-07T21:25:30.680-08:00

The Democrats gained control of the House of Representatives by searching out and recruiting a strong team of moderate and conservative candidates who steered clear of hot-button cultural issues like abortion, homosexual marriage, and affirmative action. These candidates hammered their Republican opponents on scandal, excessive spending, economic anxiety, and the need to resolve our involvement

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1162670552714832852006-11-04T11:33:00.000-08:002006-11-04T13:38:09.916-08:00

Everything we need to know about the character of Ted Haggard is revealed by the mode of his denials ("No sex") and the medium of his admission ("Bought meth, didn't use it"). Haggard rolls down his car window and conducts a fricking news conference, discussing the details of what he did, didn't do, shouldn't have done, ought to have known. He does this with his wife and son sitting in the car,

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1162316914915336692006-11-01T09:24:00.000-08:002006-11-03T10:44:28.830-08:00

I get asked, "What do you when you're not writing." Answer: I work as an independent high-level social scientist doing high-level research on Human Nature. This is a broad field, so I specialize. I study actual Human Beings. Is that thinking outside the box, or what? My super-specialized research field is Human Stupidity. I began with this hypothesis: People who behave stupidly on a regular

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1162343796059362082006-10-31T16:52:00.000-08:002006-10-31T21:05:58.156-08:00

He's finished. John Kerry will never recover politically from his elitist Freudian-slip/slap at America's military as a dumping ground for "uneducated" young men and women. Nor will Kerry's slapdash "botched joke" cover story work, because the setup makes no sense. If Bush's alleged failed Iraq policy reflects his lack of education, Senator, please explain how that squares with Bush's earning a

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1162160962602897542006-10-29T13:40:00.000-08:002006-10-29T15:19:24.070-08:00

Wouldn't you know. The usual suspects in the due-process crowd are raising the roof about the the Durham district attorney's admission that his office didn't bother to actually interview the alleged victim before filing rape charges against the three lacrosse players. What these critics don't understand is that there's a different standard of proof involved in cases involving gender and race.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1162083083343148902006-10-28T17:50:00.000-07:002006-10-29T10:40:54.796-08:00

Sexual? What would make anyone think that? The campaign of Republican Sen. George Allen on Thursday released excerpts from some of the war novels (Democrat Senate candidate Jim) Webb wrote between 1978 and 2002. Among the excerpts is a scene from the 2002 novel "Lost Soldiers," in which a man embraces his four-year-old son and places the boy's penis in his mouth. "It's not a sexual act," Webb

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1161904398928914342006-10-26T16:04:00.000-07:002006-10-27T16:31:56.183-07:00

"Three separate and coequal branches." Even if you slept through most of your high school civics classes, your subconscious probably remembers that phrase. It captures one of the defining characteristics of America's experiment in self-government, where three distinct branches of government — executive, legislative, judicial — check and balance each other. Works in theory, but not always in

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1161809341189901262006-10-25T12:36:00.000-07:002006-10-26T07:29:02.770-07:00

The guy's obviously smart. Hip. Cool. Gracious and graceful. His moderate tone conveys passion. He appears pragmatic yet comes across as a man of ideals. Being new to the national scene makes him an ideal screen upon which the country can project its pen-up hopes for a leader on horseback to ride in, rescue the distressed damsel, chase off the villains and crooks, restore decency and honor to the

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1161703980185008312006-10-24T07:19:00.000-07:002006-10-24T12:23:36.526-07:00

A few weeks ago my ringing telephone showed a number I don't like to see flashing on my caller I.D. It was my second-grade son's school calling during school hours. My kid had taken a fall from the playground monkey bars; he'd banged his head. "Nothing too serious," the school nurse assured me, "but he says he's got a headache from the fall and would like to come home." Because I work at home,

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1161134895997850812006-10-17T18:10:00.000-07:002006-10-24T07:19:19.406-07:00

So Madonna went to Africa and returned home with a black child to add to her diverse family. I don't get what all the fuss is about. What's that? You say you've never wanted to purchase a kid, including a symbolic one? Think. Maybe you didn't act on it, but wasn't the desire there? Especially if you're a white liberal American with lots of money and loads of guilt about your country's alleged

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1161022633274539342006-10-16T10:49:00.000-07:002006-10-16T11:54:19.286-07:00

It started as an essay last year for the San Francisco Chronicle, leading to a contract with Sentinel Books to describe the steps and stages by which I came to realize that the contemporary left is unalterably at odds with the classical liberal tradition, which ironically finds its greatest advocates these days among many conservatives (and of course libertarians, federalists, constitutionalists

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1160507697204152072006-10-10T11:06:00.000-07:002006-10-11T10:46:30.506-07:00

Instead of "madman," how about "ruthless dictator with a relentless determination to achieve his clear strategic aims"? The phrase doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, but still: What benefit is to be derived by continuously framing North Korea's leader as a mental health aberration? The aberration is believing meaningful bargains can be reached with the likes of Kim Jong-il through dialogue

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1160338065723417322006-10-08T12:28:00.000-07:002006-10-08T19:25:51.900-07:00

I generally don't talk about my personal life here, but the time has come to fess up about something that happens in my bedroom several times each week. I wake up with Melanie Morgan. Mondays through Fridays this striking, articulate blonde begins my morning with some variation on the following: "Just when you thought liberals couldn't be more stupid, get ready to hear about this morning's

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1160267515561354682006-10-07T17:08:00.000-07:002006-10-07T17:38:23.623-07:00

A reader writes: "In the wake of Foley, do you still see the GOP keeping control of Congress in November?"There's really no way to predict how the Foley tempest will effect the midterm election campaign. And there may be other volatile dynamics yet to enter the political scene; a month is an eternity in today's political climate. But if I'm limited to a binary "yes or no" choice, I would say: yes

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1159989012548471972006-10-04T11:02:00.000-07:002006-10-04T13:23:00.176-07:00

The mainstream media's manic attempt to plumb the depths of the collective mind of conservative voters, which in fact amounts to a disguised quest to discourage those voters from going to the polls in November, is starting to remind me of those hilarious high-speed chase scenes from the old Benny Hill Show. At the end of each episode the posse pursuing Hill became longer and longer in a feverish

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1159763607090240082006-10-01T21:27:00.000-07:002006-10-03T19:51:07.476-07:00

Andrew Sullivan is a gay man who frequently writes about gay themes. He is a leading proponent of same-sex marriage. Concerning monogamy and fidelity, Sullivan says gay men should not be held to the same standards as straight men. When same-sex marriage is legalized, Sullivan writes in his book Virtually Normal, heterosexuals will have to develop a greater "understanding of the need for

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1159561448905895572006-09-29T13:22:00.000-07:002006-09-29T15:40:55.066-07:00

Here we have photographic evidence depicting the heinous torture that American military forces regularly inflict upon the people of Iraq. You've heard of "waterboarding," but have you heard of "hand squeezing"? It's a sickening practice that is made to appear to be an ordinary handshake. The man in the white robe has been told (according to an unnamed sources who said he talked to Dan Rather,

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1159548912520995962006-09-29T09:08:00.000-07:002006-09-29T16:41:23.443-07:00

The proper response to people who blow up buildings, lop off journalist's heads with machetes, use children as human shields — that kind of frivolity — is to learn to live with them. This sage advice comes to us from Oliver Stone, the movie maker who became a rich man by mongering cinematic paranoia about the death of JFK. Stone says the money we've spent fighting radical jihadists would have

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1159490326754514812006-09-28T17:16:00.000-07:002006-09-29T09:08:16.086-07:00

Iran and North Korea getting nukes. Nancy Pelosi in the Speaker's office. How to secure American ports against catastrophe. These are among the topics we could discuss today, but I'm tired of the A-list. I feel this need to go slumming. I have learned to honor this feeling. Accordingly, let's talk about Daniel Smith. Turns out Anna Nicole Smith's son died of an accidental drug overdose. Daniel

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1158886526860725332006-09-21T17:03:00.000-07:002006-09-22T08:52:57.716-07:00

A reader writes with savvy comments and a sharp question: When Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger refers to a California legislator of Hispanic descent as "hot," liberals accuse him of being a racist, even though the legislator says she took the comment as a compliment. When the CBS program Survivor announces plans to group contestants by race and ethnicity, liberals denounce the network for

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1158173666561865162006-09-13T11:27:00.001-07:002006-09-13T11:54:26.603-07:00

There they were — 190 top Taliban thugs apparently saying prayers over the grave of one of their fallen soldiers. Or maybe it was a military formation. The image was captured by a high-flying American drone, and it would seem that the Pentagon decided not to send a missile to blast these scumbags (this being the correct technical term) off the face of the earth. Why? Because American military

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1158105203439515542006-09-12T16:38:00.000-07:002006-09-13T11:27:09.240-07:00

I usually prefer comparing competing scenarios to making full-blown predictions about future events, especially when the factors influencing those events 1) are multiple, 2) are volatile, and 3) have several weeks to mutate via factors not yet in view — such as national security issues. Even so, I'm prepared to go out on a limb at say: the GOP maintains both houses of Congress on November 7. I

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1158080772146879852006-09-12T09:42:00.000-07:002006-09-12T10:13:04.453-07:00

How extraordinary, the nation's consensus. On the fifth anniversary of September 11, all Americans — even the fiercest critics of U.S. foreign policy, even the most rabid Bush Derangement Syndrome — came together in agreement that, yes, The World Trade Center was destroyed, the twin towers no longer exist. Beyond that point, the consensus doesn't exist. The majority of Democrats in Congress

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1158001423267917942006-09-11T09:37:00.000-07:002006-09-11T13:29:30.493-07:00

The danger of remembering what happened five years ago is the danger that memory will triumph over understanding. To say we remember where we were — what we saw, what we heard, what we felt — is to say little more than that on September 11, 2001, we were sentient beings. What do we see today? This is the question that matters. "America is at war." We'll hear these words in the background of

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1157601115314494392006-09-06T18:46:00.000-07:002006-09-06T21:05:11.073-07:00

Mohammad Khatami is the former president of Iran. Mohammad Khatami is regularly described as an Iranian "moderate." Here is an example of Mohammad Khatami's moderate views about that plucky nation called Israel: "We should mobilize the whole Islamic world for a sharp confrontation with the Zionist regime.... If we abide by the Koran, all of us should be mobilized to kill." Mohammad Khatami this

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1157578393915897262006-09-06T14:07:00.000-07:002006-09-06T15:49:59.466-07:00

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has pledged to veto a California legislative bill to mandate universal health care. Supporters of the bill use a four-letter word to describe the kind of health care it would deliver: Free. Arnold says the state of California can't afford the bill's costs. How short-sighted. There are still some Rich People in California, Governor. Their taxes should just be increased

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1156867139183211332006-08-29T08:32:00.000-07:002006-08-29T09:07:37.980-07:00

If Katrina had hit vanilla Orange County instead chocolate New Orleans, the damage would have been repaired in a matter of weeks. We've all heard this charge from the usual demagogues who make solid livings lighting and throwing the racial equivalent of gasoline in Coke bottles, ducking for cover and hoping to scorch as much ground as possible, always in the name of social justice, sensitivity,

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1156728514950174382006-08-27T17:36:00.000-07:002006-08-28T11:08:55.410-07:00

A guy pens a note to his girlfriend: I want you to know how much I "love" you. At first she's touched by the sentiment, but she can't help wondering why the word love is inside quotation marks. Doesn't that usually convey irony, or some similar kind of emotional distance? I wonder if this same question is going through Katie Couric's mind today, in the wake of what strikes me as a curiously

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1156618897225520442006-08-26T12:01:00.000-07:002006-08-26T12:37:29.550-07:00

There's a growing class of persons who live in America. Persons who were born in America or naturalized as American citizens. Persons who distinguish themselves by not being willing to say they support the idea of 1) American troops winning and 2) radical Islamic jihadists losing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now most of these persons — George Soros comes to mind, along with the leadership of groups

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1155837645778133672006-08-17T10:54:00.000-07:002006-08-17T12:03:45.783-07:00

John Mark Karr says he drugged her, but the autopsy found no drugs in JonBenet's body. Reports indicate she had been stranged and beaten; Karr says he "accidentally" killed her. Karr says he's guilty, but his ex-wife says they were in Alabama together. In short, it doesn't look like a slam-dunk for the prosecution, unless of course forensic evidence can place Karr at the murder scene. But could

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1155759586966152872006-08-16T12:31:00.000-07:002007-02-12T17:50:01.156-08:00

Shocking, stunning, unbelievable: Bill Clinton doesn't like turning 60! He liked it better when he was the youngest one in the room, the prodigous youngster who wowed everybody with his preternatural brilliance. Why is even the most casual observer of this man's reckless life not even remotely surprised by Clinton's confessed preference to avoid graduating into anything resembling adult

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1155672786325179712006-08-15T12:37:00.000-07:002006-08-15T21:03:52.176-07:00

Several leaders of America's black community say the time has come to take AIDS seriously. "Now is the time for us to face the fact that AIDS has become a black disease,'' says Julian Bond, chairman of the NAACP. "It has invaded our house, and our leaders must accept ownership and fight it with everything we have.'' What Mr. Bond appears to be saying is: When black people engage in high-risk (

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1155103895445610872006-08-08T22:55:00.000-07:002006-08-08T23:11:36.023-07:00

There comes a certain point in a man's life when the assemblage of his adversaries reveals important things about his character. To see Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton celebrating Lamont's victory in Connecticut tells me all I need to know about the essential decency of Joe Lieberman. Forget, just for the moment, that Lieberman as a young man went to the South to support the civil rights movement;

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1154630562913745992006-08-03T11:28:00.000-07:002006-08-03T11:44:37.943-07:00

Last night, a 4.4 earthquake occurred 17 miles due east of my northern California home. I was in my home office reading online news; my 7-year-old son Skyler was playing a computer game downstairs. I felt the tremor and flew down the stairs, fearing maybe the Big One had come again. “Sky, that was an earthquake,” I told him. My boy knows I have a penchant for practical jokes. He says, “Dad, is

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1154530491473155812006-08-02T07:13:00.000-07:002006-08-02T09:17:48.463-07:00

Sen. Patrick Leahy's got the Middle East crisis all figured out. Send in more envoys! Actually, Leahy's advice is redundant because the word "envoy" is from Old French envoi, from envoyer ‘send.’ So what Leahy and other accomodationists favor is sending as an end in itself. But we need to be precise, and fortunately we have two basic models for what to send and why. The Leahy paradigm: Bush

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1154527863526380352006-08-02T06:49:00.000-07:002006-08-02T07:11:03.636-07:00

You missed one important point. If states allow named fathers to escape paternity via DNA testing, that leaves some children without a father who owes child support -- and then it becomes up to the state to assume financial responsibility, usually via welfare. In a contest between whether the state assumes financial responsibility or some poor sap gets screwed, guess which one most legislators

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1153934468521232242006-07-26T10:00:00.000-07:002006-07-26T10:38:15.850-07:00

That men must be responsible — financially at least, dedicated time and energy at best — for the children they sire is self-evident. The epidemic of fatherlessness in our culture may well be the root of social pathologies too numerous to mention. But it is also true that men who are not in fact the father of a given child cannot be expected to assume that responsibility by force of law. Yet in

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1153689963595967942006-07-23T14:16:00.000-07:002006-07-23T15:02:40.476-07:00

So say a growing number of hardcore advocates of American defeat in Iraq. Joe Lieberman must be defeated! According to the latest polls, a plurality of Connecticut Democrats now favor surrender-now candidate Net Lamont. Guess what? I agree with 'em. I devoutly hope that Connecticut Democrats will reject Joe Lieberman when they go to the polls August 8. Lieberman's moral stature will skyrocket

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1153494822838836242006-07-21T07:51:00.000-07:002006-07-21T10:35:21.876-07:00

Given the growing consensus that Bush's nixing of the embryonic stem cell legislation is bad politics for the GOP, a key question must be asked. Why would this most politically astute president, who has vetoed no other legislation, risk serious electoral fallout by so publicly rejecting a bill to advance medical discoveries that could very well save human lives? I'm going to go out on a limb here

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1153177460767363182006-07-17T15:40:00.000-07:002006-07-17T16:32:36.996-07:00

Democrats have made no secret of their desire to get a handle on the whole values thing. What motivates so-called values voters? How can we ever so progressive types convey to the American electorate what exactly we value? What is a value, anyhow? These are the basic questions Democratic Party pollsters keep bringing to focus groups to find out how the liberal left, pretending not to be either

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152829904088849202006-07-13T13:47:00.000-07:002006-07-14T20:46:51.563-07:00

Jack Kevorkian and Peter Singer have this thing about death. They really enjoy it, so long as the casualties don't happen too close to home. Not me, says Jack. Not mom, says Peter. Otherwise, let's get rid of the weaklings, the losers, the vast horizon of useless humans. Kevorkian's currently doing 10- to 25-years for second-degree murder in the 1998 poisoning of Thomas Youk, 52, of Oakland

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152678972262086002006-07-12T09:20:00.000-07:002006-07-12T11:53:21.130-07:00

Mark Leno is a California state legislator who spearheaded a failed effort to let sex predators caught with fewer than 100 pieces of child porn get a kinder, gentler response. Fewer than a hundred? Not a problem. What's a little child porn among friends, wink-wink, nudge-nudge. A glimpse of the world according to Mark Leno. Let's be clear. "Child porn" is not obscene photos that belong to

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152671447792775002006-07-11T18:27:00.000-07:002006-07-11T20:56:25.140-07:00

Today's question: How pathetic can a once-respected journalist be and expect to be taken seriously? Answer: Pretty darned pathetic. When Dan Rather asserted that the dubious documents concerning Bush's military service had been "authenticated," he went way out on a limb. When Rather continued to defend the documents, he sawed off the limb and fell to the ground. Ever since that fateful day, Dan

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152589223944035942006-07-10T20:04:00.000-07:002006-07-10T22:52:59.266-07:00

The head guy down at Club Gitmo — also known as Guantanamo Bay Naval Base — says he's gosh darned concerned that captives continue to plot ways to bring about their own demise. Rear Adm. Harry Harris Jr. says guards have confiscated hoarded drugs and hidden nooses in the cells housing some 450 captives with alleged links to al Qaeda and the Taliban. ''It is not possible to make a detention

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152292561345881952006-07-07T08:56:00.000-07:002006-07-07T20:26:42.426-07:00

Liberalism 101: Human motivations are determined by external circumstances. Individual choice? Basically an illusion. Personal responsibility? Get real. It's the social system, stupid. For instance, why did a Littleton, Colorado high school student team up to murder 12 of his classmates and one faculty member? Because his English teacher disrespected him, that's why. The kid writes a creative

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152226203480296062006-07-06T15:36:00.000-07:002006-07-06T16:07:57.036-07:00

Ken Lay's unexpected death complicates prosecutors' bid to seize pieces of his estate, but that doesn't mean the man shouldn't be punished even in death, judging from the fury of some who can't quite believe they no longer have Lay to represent the intrinsic villany of capitalism. Hey, don't get me wrong; I have no use for a guy who clearly lied, cheated, and stole his way to enormous wealth at

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152124207491695632006-07-05T11:12:00.001-07:002006-07-05T12:08:06.376-07:00

All of us have heard liberals complain that requirement for voters to produce photo ID cards are repressive, oppressive, marginalizing, racist, anti-poor-people. Now we learn that a specific electoral system makes use of photo ID cards, electronic fingerprints and computers that can pinpoint each voter's home on a map. Moreover, on voting day every polling station receives a book of digital

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152124155189261932006-07-05T11:12:00.000-07:002006-07-05T19:04:23.756-07:00

All of us have heard liberals complain that requirement for voters to produce photo ID cards are repressive, racist, marginalizing, rigged against poor people. Now we learn that a specific electoral system makes use of photo ID cards, electronic fingerprints and computers that can pinpoint each voter's home on a map. Moreover, on voting day every polling station receives a book of digital photos

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1152038166620802332006-07-04T11:27:00.000-07:002006-07-04T14:30:21.943-07:00

"Do they live in America? ... You mean they don't like freedom?" My then 6-year-old son asked me these questions last year upon learning that there are people who hate seeing the American flag (except when it's on fire). I discussed that in a 2005 essay on why I love Independence Day. I hope your day is one of family, friends, and festivities — and that you'll take some time to remember that

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151986150625585152006-07-03T20:58:00.000-07:002006-07-04T15:01:49.256-07:00

...just got much bigger. Joe Lieberman's decision to file as an independent is politically smart. It also happens to be the right moral choice. This is a senator who considers himself a loyal Democrat in the tradition of Harry Truman, a Democrat whose principaled refusal to abandon Iraq to fascists appeals to Connecticut independent voters, even as Leiberman's commitment to principle offends the

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151523164445841212006-06-28T12:21:00.000-07:002006-06-30T09:48:08.746-07:00

Two Flags. Two ways of honoring what the flags stand for. Suppose the men in each photo decide to torch the flag they're raising. Call one "Flag A" and the other "Flag B." Setting fire to Flag A is an act of "constitutionally protected free speech." Burning Flag B is a "hate crime" punishable by fine or jail or both. Test: Which flag is which? Make your best case for why.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151512776805772962006-06-28T09:25:00.000-07:002006-06-28T12:45:04.456-07:00

Barbara Walters says Star Jones Reynolds is out of a job because "her negatives were rising ... The audience was losing trust in her. They didn't believe some of the things she said.''Omigod. "Audience losing trust." "Credibility gap." With standards like that, is any of the elite media truly safe? Meanwhile, sisterhood is powerful. And Dan Rather was last seen hurtling toward the Earth at rapid

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151458385571501692006-06-27T17:58:00.000-07:002006-06-27T19:03:30.463-07:00

I have had it with the ongoing attempts to smear the virtuous young woman who says she was raped by twenty Duke lacrosse players — wait, I mean five — OK, so actually three. Critics say her story is "all over the place," but the very demand for consistency and coherence on the young woman's part is one of the tried and true ways the Patriarchy works to silence female victims of male privilege.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151431020291766312006-06-27T10:33:00.000-07:002006-06-27T15:22:02.673-07:00

People who burn the Stars and Stripes are vile scum. Given my commitment to diversity I believe vile scum deserve their rightful place in society, next to child molesters, meth dealers, and Air America hosts. This is to say I believe it not unreasonable for a levelheaded society to regulate the actions of vile scum (the first two by criminal statute; Air America via ratings). Hence I have no

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151429412792027772006-06-27T10:13:00.000-07:002006-06-27T15:18:47.563-07:00

"I've been racking my brain... I'm trying to figure out how Bob Dole's luggage got on my airplane. I told the doctor, 'Look, I'm worried about the next election.'" "The people at Customs were as nice as they could be; they just didn't believe me when I told them that I got those pills from the Clinton Library gift shop. They told me at the Clinton Library gift shop that they were just little

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151374775474596392006-06-26T18:23:00.000-07:002006-06-26T19:34:40.733-07:00

The New York Times, a newspaper located not far from where the World Trade Center used to stand, righteously refused to publish the incendiary Danish cartoons, out of "respect" for Islam. No less proudly, the Times has taken to exposing every American national security program it discovers, "no matter how legal the program, how carefully crafted to safeguard civil liberties, or how vital to

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151369069571209362006-06-26T17:02:00.000-07:002006-06-26T19:36:41.213-07:00

The war in Iraq is an insurgency. Coalition soldiers daily encounter warriors who don't wear uniforms announcing their jihadi status; to the contrary. Because our men and women in uniform face killers who hide in civilian populations and attack from the shadows, they need to be able to respond instantaneously to the potentially deadly circumstances of insurgent warfare. The bizarre act of holding

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151166781764227472006-06-24T09:04:00.000-07:002006-06-24T13:49:09.426-07:00

Senator Kerry opposed the Levin amendment because it didn't set a date certain for U.S. troops to flee from Iraq. "It's the same program as the president," Kerry complains to Anderson Cooper. "What is the difference?" Kerry wants us to know that it takes strength to abandon a people seeking to be free after decades of despotism. "I believe you have to have a tough policy that actually gets the

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1151009919209707162006-06-22T13:50:00.000-07:002006-06-22T14:04:55.143-07:00

Climate scientists Michael Mann, Raymond Bradley and Malcolm Hughes have concluded that the Northern Hemisphere is the warmest it has been in 2,000 years. So the only thing left — a minor detail, as it were — is for Al Gore to demonstrate how, exactly, humans caused that through CO2 emissions during the lifetime of Jesus. Also how the species (and the home planet) managed to make it through that

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150838858352714002006-06-20T13:56:00.000-07:002006-06-20T14:34:07.663-07:00

Dan Rather's departure from CBS is sad — in the same sense as John Kerry's posture of inflated self worth, sad like Bill Clinton's ongoing quest to prove his relevance. Sad, as in pathetic. Rather is a guy who made himself famous getting tossed around by Texas hurricanes, dueling with a beleagured Richard Nixon, getting mugged, and uttering "folk wisdom" distinguishable from plain non sequiturs:

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150640190000061592006-06-18T07:11:00.000-07:002006-06-18T07:19:31.870-07:00

The victims of Katrina can't be blamed for spending federal relief money on wild nights at strip clubs. This because government spending programs invite abuse, by their very nature, says the LA Times. Actually, they're right about that — but still, how about holding people accountable? We dare not do that, because it "comes perilously close to blaming the victim." Besides, we're talking about New

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150639336332706722006-06-18T06:47:00.000-07:002006-06-18T11:45:42.086-07:00

"We've reached an odd place in Western history when a case has to be made for fatherhood, but here we are." So begins Kathleen Parker in an excellent essay about the importance of dads. "Fathers are awesome," she enthuses. But are fathers really necessary? Here's a quick overview of what father absence looks like today in the U.S.: ...The 30 percent of children who live apart from their fathers

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150611842219343242006-06-17T23:02:00.000-07:002006-06-18T07:09:49.116-07:00

Billy Jeff Clinton says he doesn't have the slightest idea whether his gal Hillary is a fixin' to run for president in two years. But he'll tell anyone who'll listen: if'n she was to run and win, why he'd "do whatever she wants" because that's what a good citizen would do. And Bill, he's not just a good citizen, why he's a first rate global citizen — like we all should be, don't ya know. Best

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150576545843115842006-06-17T13:23:00.000-07:002006-06-17T13:35:45.863-07:00

Thanks to the indignant public outcry of Americans who are tired of our fighting men and women being treated like second class citizens, leg and writst shackles have been removed from seven young Marines and a Navy corpsman sitting in a military brig. These soldiers have not been charged with any crime, yet they have already been convicted by headlines like: "Iraqi's slaying planned by Marines,

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150300913773770702006-06-14T08:59:00.000-07:002006-06-14T14:56:55.596-07:00

A certain quantity of insanity must be present within the body politic at all times. Though the exact quantity of nuttiness is unknown, its allotment shifts continuously across the left-right continuum. Often the madness takes the form of conspiracy theories, which, when disproved, are believed with even greater certainty by the mental patients, who remain at large. This is to say that the very

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150300480102055132006-06-14T08:37:00.000-07:002006-06-14T08:57:38.180-07:00

Ever vigilant to preserve their reputation as wardens of America's largest open-air asylum, San Francisco's city supervisors have voted $2 million in legal aid and other assistance to illegal immigrants. Yes, that's taxpayers paying for "services" to illegals, including support for their efforts to use the American legal system to flout the American legal system. Supervisor Chris Daly, the most

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150221310932411772006-06-13T10:50:00.000-07:002006-06-13T12:16:41.473-07:00

"It's only been out a week, but audiences seem not to have poured forth from Al Gore's movie and, in an unprecedented reversal of political polarity, demanded higher gasoline prices." So begins a terrific Opinion Journal op-ed that praises Mr. Gore's altruism: A valid service is performed in satisfying the eternal human appetite for gloom and doom (and no virgins were sacrificed), distracting

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150167475897986822006-06-13T10:35:00.000-07:002006-06-13T10:19:05.956-07:00

That her books are so widely read tells us how depraved our society has become — so declares NYT columnist David Carr. I'm old enough to recall how the shootings of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy by lone gunmen revealed what a "sick society" we had become. Odd (in that non-surprised yet amused kind of way) how the left's citation of social pathology is ever so so selective. (The

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150217435865127472006-06-13T09:33:00.000-07:002006-06-14T09:02:37.616-07:00

Karl Rove escapes indictment, Dean fit to be tied, Schumer can't let go. The White House press pool gets diverted while Bush jets to Iraq. Meanwhile, the president's numbers are up, and the ever-hapless John Kerry (a day late and 60,000 Ohio voters shy) will be lucky to get three other senators to support his latest declaration of defeat.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150126199751260522006-06-12T08:29:00.000-07:002006-06-12T08:47:49.956-07:00

"Democrats to roll out action plan." So declares the San Francisco Chronicle's Monday front one lead headline. "We are unambiguously together on the grand agenda,'' declares Rep. Ellen Tauscher. "Our challenge is to get it down to the five easy pieces that everyone wants to hear. Our challenge is to be succinct,'' she said. Ready? Ta-da: The Democratic National Committee in May distributed

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150124708498629542006-06-12T07:33:00.000-07:002006-06-12T08:30:55.803-07:00

It was a lousy system. Correction: it was a hideous, monstrous system. Sane people knew this, when the system was called "communism." Many thoughtful people think communism disappeared when the Berlin Wall crumbled, when the USSR disappeared, when Boris Yeltsin came to power. Wrong. The word "communism" may have vanished from common use but the dream endures in the hearts of people who have

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1150122520413940962006-06-12T07:25:00.000-07:002006-06-12T08:31:14.316-07:00

"We do not have any significant changes," said Lixion Avila, a senior hurricane specialist. "The system remains poorly organized."Finally. A FEMA-sized hurricane.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149777179545318502006-06-08T07:17:00.000-07:002006-06-08T12:23:01.353-07:00

AH, JUST ANOTHER HUMAN BEING: Zarqawi, that is. Sad to see him go. That's the response of Michael Berg, father of Nicholas Berg, whose head was sawed off by Zarqawi himself, or so I seem to recall. If not Zarqawi, then one of his henchmen. Zarqawi, you see, is a very put-upon guy, a man who became a public executioner because he ran out of options you see, because we Americans did what we did.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149690946909873062006-06-07T07:17:00.000-07:002006-06-07T08:14:42.410-07:00

DEMOCRAT'S STUNNING MORAL TRIUMPH: This just in: Republicans today worked to put the best face on California Republican House candidate Brian Bilbray's overwhelming near-defeat by Democrat Francine Busby, whose mere garnering of fewer votes constitutes a resounding moral victory that bodes ill for other Republican congressional candidates this fall.That's my imagined political story of the day.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149649395932797242006-06-06T19:53:00.000-07:002006-06-06T22:14:35.893-07:00

DOWN FLORIDA WAY: Katherine Harris thinks she knows why she's been shunned by GOP leadership and ignored by big donors in her U.S. Senate campaign. "Perhaps in some elite circles, the reason I have not gotten more support...is because they don't believe I can be controlled," Harris said today during a speech to the nonpartisan Forum Club of the Palm Beaches.No, Katherine. It's because when you

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149648667177988732006-06-06T19:28:00.000-07:002006-06-07T08:16:42.533-07:00

HADITHA: If the charges are true, the perpetrators must be punished according to strict military law. But even if the charges are true, Americans will not stand by and allow the tragedy to be exploited by a media whose claims of nobility are no longer believed by most Americans. So says Patrick J. Buchanan, who has been struck (as I have) "listening to the breathless reports of Haditha, noting

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149631349442187872006-06-06T14:45:00.000-07:002006-06-06T15:10:30.080-07:00

ALL THE RAGE: The driver cuts you off, and your heart rate goes up to 180 beats per minute. He gives you the finger, and your blood pressure likewise shoots up, 220 to 130 or even higher, compared to normal readings of 120 to 80. You're not going to let him (or her) get away with it, and with that sentiment your body uses up sugar extremely fast creating a sugar deficiency. As a result you find

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149562118129335192006-06-05T19:33:00.000-07:002006-06-05T20:54:05.810-07:00

AT DUKE: Oh, the piety of Duke University President Richard Brodhead, announcing that his school's lacrosse team will play again next season: "I am, I know, taking a risk in reinstating men's lacrosse," Brodhead said in a statement. "The reinstatement is inevitably probationary." Now what exactly are the risks? A university investigation ... found a history of disciplinary problems involving

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149518393600706212006-06-05T07:38:00.000-07:002006-06-05T07:49:50.673-07:00

SLAM DUNK: Punch a Capitol cop, go to jail — right? Not if you're Cynthia McKinney.

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149362325306660872006-06-03T11:42:00.000-07:002006-06-03T12:39:40.183-07:00

REVEREND AL: Gore, not Sharpton. Yes, he's back, the self-described "recovering politician from Tennessee. His experience as a Vanderbilt Law School dropout, you see, qualified him to condemn President Bush for breaking the law when, in the wake of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the White House authorized wiretapping on international phone calls of terrorist suspects. Cheered by the

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149350604612042782006-06-03T08:40:00.000-07:002006-06-03T09:17:51.146-07:00

THE LOSER KEEPS ON LOSING: "They gave me a hat," John Kerry says. "I have the hat to this day," he declares, rising to pull it from his briefcase. "I have the hat." Yes, but does John Kerry have a brain? The guy who has been running for president for three decades has apparently decided that the best way to build a case for a repeat candidacy in 2008 is to return the Swift Boat charges to center

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149348891211773362006-06-03T08:00:00.000-07:002006-06-03T09:08:38.070-07:00

SAME-SEX MARRIAGE: Expect to hear a lot about it in the next ten days, what with Bush again endorsing the Federal Marriage Amendment. Proponents and opponents of FMA agree on one thing: we need a national approach to this issue. Let's allow same-sex marriage across the board, say supporters. No, let's enshrine marriage as between one man/one woman in the Constitution, opponents declare. What's

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1149181686200105362006-06-01T09:51:00.000-07:002006-06-01T21:36:03.876-07:00

THIRD WAY: Either you support the Bush administration's management of the Iraq war, or you favor the Kerry-Sheehan "apologize & come home yesterday" non-approach. For quite some time that's been the unstated de facto binary choice. Yet with each passing day the need for a third alternative becomes clear — one that realizes it was right to topple Saddam but America's post-toppling strategy has

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1148846881921002472006-05-28T12:53:00.000-07:002006-05-29T06:48:12.240-07:00

THEY'RE LISTENING: Republican members of the House are getting the message that, in the words of GOP moderate Christopher Shays, "[i]t would be a huge mistake to give people a path to citizenship that came here illegally."Key words: Connecticut (not a border state) and moderate (generally disposed to ignore conservatives). More and more House members are getting it, that the current Senate bill,

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1148597330524024022006-05-25T15:28:00.000-07:002006-05-25T15:52:34.426-07:00

DA VINCI: I haven't seen the movie and didn't read the book, owing to lack of interest rather than principled objections. That said, I'm struck by the Vatican's boycott campaign. If this movie is indeed blasphemy, just urging Catholics to stay away seems rather tepid. Surely there are more effective ways to make objections known. Ask Salman Rushdie. If the Pope wants to get serious, he might

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1148566712434901082006-05-25T07:02:00.000-07:002006-05-25T15:28:26.556-07:00

DON'T PASS GO, UNLESS YOU CAN SHOW THAT YOU KNOW: In a temporary outbreak of sanity, California's highest court has reinstated the exit exam requirement for high school seniors, setting aside a lower court's ruling that it is "unfair" to expect graduating students to be, um, educated. Not surprisingly, among those most disappointed are: students who won't get to experience yet another opportunity

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1148410409050306132006-05-23T11:43:00.000-07:002006-05-23T11:55:39.823-07:00

OWNING IRAQ: Once upon a time there was an opportunity to persuade the people of Iraq — Sunni, Shia, Kerd, et al — why democracy is in their best interests. Not by making them read essays by Locke and Madison, but by giving them ownership of their nation's oil fields. Not ownership in the collectivist sense of communism and socialism but, says Milton Friedman, in this sense: "Who, I ask

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1148401277580969982006-05-23T09:07:00.000-07:002006-05-26T06:18:49.446-07:00

ESTRICH EPIPHANY: In rising to defend Fox News against typical left-wing rancor, Susan Estrich reveals — or perhaps lets slip — her understanding that the left cannot win political campaigns or cultural battles by openly advocating leftist ideology: I not only have worked for every network, I also worked, formally or informally, for every Democratic candidate to run for president in the 1980’s

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12702981.post-1148335665729821192006-05-22T14:51:00.000-07:002006-05-22T15:10:09.683-07:00

THE WORLD IS TO BLAME: Former New Jersey governor Jim McGreevey is eager for us to know the depravities of his personal life, so he has published a book with all the sordid details of the extent to which he tried to keep his homosexuality a secret — including from the woman he married even though he knew he wanted to be with men. There's something else McGreevy wants us to know — that none of it

Keith Thompsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09156446056422613006noreply@blogger.com