Redstate

Posted at 5:27pm on Jul. 3, 2008 Barry caves again - "not wedded to a particular timeline on Iraq"

By bs

Promoted from blogs. But don't worry that we'll stop at this - we all want a slice of this one. - Moe Lane

Hey, Moe - the reversal cometh.

The Politico is reporting that The Obamessiah, the One who was to be our savior from Iraq, is now backing off of his dogmatic "get the heck out of Iraq NOW" position.

The Spelunker now says

“I am going to do a thorough assessment when I'm there," he told reporters in Fargo, N.D., according to CBS News. "When I go to Iraq and I have a chance to talk to some of the commanders on the ground, I'm sure I'll have more information and will continue to refine my policies."

Really. Well, I'm just floored. Who would have thought that he would have caved on yet another position?

Read on.

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Posted at 10:31pm on Jul. 1, 2008 Environmentalist wackos are sooooo predictable

By bs

As a resident of the St. Louis metropolitan area, I am very familiar with floods, their impact, and the history of major flood events in the area. I've lived through major floods in 1973, 1982, 1993, and now in 2008. I've seen the area build up and businesses move into the valleys and riverfronts around the metro area and along the Missouri and Mississippi rivers all around St. Louis. I've even studied hydrology and meteorology in college prior to changing majors from meteorology to computer science. So I become rather amused to read the "experts" write about such topics in the media.

Posted in Miscellanea — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 9:43pm on Jun. 14, 2008 The Empty Suit Candidate

By bs

I try my best to pepper my discussion entries with pictures, because, as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. So today I went in search of a picture of an empty suit to illustrate the total dearth of substance in our friend The Obamessiah. Imagine my (lack of) surprise when I searched Google Images for the term "empty suit" and I got back dozens of pictures that involved Barack himself. Shocker!

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Posted at 6:17pm on Jun. 13, 2008 The Feminization of the American male

By bs

(HT: Justin Taylor)

If popular culture in the United States is to be believed, we are now a country of tough females and weenie males. A gradual emasculation of the American male has been under way for quite some time now, accelerated by things such as the aggressive branding of overactive boys as "ADHD" and the subsequent over-drugging with Ritalin, etc, or through the way the media and culture portrays the male.

Posted in Life Issues — Comments (108) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 9:36am on May 28, 2008 Democrats - worrying about things that REALLY matter

By bs

It seems that Democrat snobbery is again at work, only this time at the Denver DNC convention. Anyone who's been at a convention or other trade show knows that the food that's served is generally the same old stuff - chicken, chicken, and more chicken, served on barely-washed generic table service or elcheapo paper plates & plastic silverware. But no, the normal fare is not good enough for the elitists in the Democrat Party. No siree - they have to make sure they have organic food, served on earth-healthy dinner ware! The Denver Post reports on this latest development.

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Posted at 3:12pm on May 26, 2008 Re: Stanley Fish and the 2% Solution

By bs

AcademicElephant and Jeff Emanuel wrote Redhot articles today on Stanley Fish and his outrageously hypocritical position on the disproportionate number of lefties on the faculties of universities around the nation. Jeff's update pointed to affirmative action as a proof point that displays the inconsistency of alleged academics such as Fish.

Posted in Liberals — Comments (3) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 9:51am on May 16, 2008 Republicans - "like a deer in the headlights"

By bs

In today's WSJ Opinion Journal, Peggy Noonan again demonstrates why I so enjoy reading her stuff. She paints a perfect picture of the deep problems the GOP has in 2008. The biggest case in the article is made by quotes from a memo created by Rep. Tom Davis. I loved this bit of insight from Mr. Davis:

But this week a House Republican said publicly what many say privately, that there is another truth. "Members and pundits . . . fail to understand the deep seated antipathy toward the president, the war, gas prices, the economy, foreclosures," said Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia in a 20-page memo to House GOP leaders.

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Posted at 1:19am on May 12, 2008 PR - what do we need to do?

By bs

To win in the 2008 election, one of the most important adjustments the Republican party must make is in PR - public relations. The Democrats have done a much better job (IMHO) of capturing the hearts and minds of the run-of-the-mill voter of late. Their messages are simple and resonate better. Some examples of messages:

Iraq:
Democrats: We need to get out, now.
Republicans: We need to prosecute the Global War on Terror and protect our country from terrorists (which we haven't seen since 2001)

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Posted at 2:00pm on May 3, 2008 Heard on the 'net...

By bs

Props on this one go to my associate, bk:

Received a call from a friend from out of U.S. who could not figure our dilemma:

His comment--You have a choice among a mean woman lawyer who is married to a lawyer, a black who is married to a mean woman lawyer, and a war hero who is married to a big breasted woman who owns a beer distributorship, so what's the choice?

Makes sense to me...that in and of itself should convince the voters. It could make for a spectacular campaign ad...

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Posted at 12:31am on Apr. 3, 2008 Time Magazine on "The Clean Energy Scam"

By bs

So I'm dropping off my rental car this afternoon, and I notice the cover of the latest TIME Magazine, which screams "The Clean Energy Scam". I naturally assumed that someone had pasted a TIME logo over the top of the National Review or some similar reputable publication. But no, it's the real thing.

Posted in Energy — Comments (35) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 5:38pm on Mar. 15, 2008 The Kos Kidz take a page from an old version of the Redstate book

By bs

So I wrote a diary or two a while back about the civility gap here on Redstate at the time. And as Dan posted at that time, it would eventually clear itself up, which it appears to have done now (for the most part) as we've pretty much all become resigned to McCain as the candidate for the GOP. However, things apparently are a little hotter with the Kiddies over at Kos.

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Posted at 11:58pm on Feb. 17, 2008 That didn't take long - the race baiting has begun

By bs

And who better to do it than Frank Rich, in his piece of trash article "The Grand Old White Party Confronts Obama". In a completely unsurprising screed from one of the leftiest of the left, Rich throws a plethora of racial insinuations about the GOP and John McCain. Some choice quotes:

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Posted at 2:47pm on Feb. 1, 2008 Time for a break, I'm afraid

By bs

I have diligently followed discussions here for months, starting around May-June timeframe. During this time, my awareness of the political world and the candidates for POTUS has been greatly enhanced, and I am a much better-educated person for it.

But the shrillness and nastiness that has developed here, especially in the last few weeks, is difficult to take and painful to read. I previously wrote a diary titled "A plea for civility," which I believe was pretty well-received (#1 on the hit parade for a while), but I'm not sure it had a great deal of impact. There are those out there/here who seem to think that acting rude and nasty is part of normal discourse.

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Posted at 12:58pm on Jan. 22, 2008 A plea for civility

By bs

In all the noise that's been expelled here recently, I missed this blog entry by our friend Oz. In his entry, he states:

Yes. I know it's a primary for the job of Most Powerful Person in the World (aka POTUS) and not an elementary school classroom.

What does distress me is the vitrolic tone of many of the comments.

and later says

but if you've got a good argument then you shouldn't have to resort to name calling, you dim-witted, dictionary-eschewing, narcoleptic robots :-)

When I started posting here, one of the things that struck me was the more-or-less civil nature of the discourse and the way the moderators, et. al. maintained the peace. But apparently, in the heat of the primary season, where the GOP candidates seem to be quite divided in many of their positions, a number of the commenters here have taken a nasty turn. Name-calling, both of the candidates and of their supporters, has become commonplace. Insults such as calling supporters of certain candidates "crybabies" or "whiners" or accusing some of not being "true conservatives" seems to have become more the norm than the exception. Things have turned truly nasty, and I think it may be hurting the value of what RedState has to offer. I certainly do not blame the moderators for this, since they could probably ban about 3/4 of the folks here for such violations (reminds me of a chat I once had with an NFL referee - he told me that if he wanted to, he could have flagged every single play in the games he did, but that would have significantly hindered the flow of the game...)

So - the plea: could we please, please cease the insults? You may not care for a particular candidate - you may literally (yes, I'm using it correctly, absentee...:-) ) hate the guy/gal. But if you have a coherent argument, you should not have to resort to calling him/her a name. If you have a coherent point against particular commenters or groups of commenters, you should not have to resort to name-calling. If you disagree with something that a candidate says or does, or with a position that a fellow blogger/commenter takes, dispense with the insults and make your case logically, with evidence to back your assertions.

My recommendation is that the first insult gets a warning, and the second results in a five-day timeout. And I'll be the first to put my neck on the chopping block to say "if you catch me doing it, put me in TO."

This has come up at least one other time in the past. A few months ago, someone else made a similar plea, and I think it kind of stuck for at least a while. That particular blogger even stated that we needed to lay off on the condescending names for the Dem candidates (e.g. the various versions of Mrs. Clinton's first name...). The most grievous violations here seem to be against John McCain and Mike Huckabee, and the insults fly fast and furious against supporters of basically all five candidates.

So - please - can we stop the name-calling and other immature behavior? [RodneyKing]Can't we all just get along[/RodneyKing]

UPDATE: An administrative note - I did not write this blog with any particular blogger(s) or commenter(s) in mind (really!!). It was a cumulative thing.

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Posted at 5:44pm on Jan. 12, 2008 Hillary = Gollum or Smeagol ? You decide.

By bs

After reading a number of articles about the stink about Hillary's "teary moment" last week, especially Michelle Malkin's article, where she opines

Anyone who believes Hillary spontaneously teared up and got emotional on the campaign trail has been in a coma the last three decades.

I got to thinking: "Hey, Hillary really reminds me of Gollum" (no insult to her appearance intended).

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