“If your candidate is going to stage enormous rallies in front of tens of thousands of chanting Germans (with monuments to Prussian military might in the background) in the middle of his Presidential campaign, it isn’t the GOP’s fault if the footage comes out looking a little like Hitler at Nuremberg.” - Ross Douthat, The Atlantic

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es, it was necessary for Douthat to write this because Dem commentator Rick Perlstein was shaken up by the Obama/Britney/Paris ad (see post below), thinking it to be a Rovian effort that had “Barack Obama will rape yo daughters overtones,” and, quoting Douthat this time, “was edited to blatantly evoke Triumph of the Will as well - the better to freak out elderly Jews in South Florida.”

Headline: Bias

LA Times reader Walter Mielke had had enough, so he fired off a letter: “Bias towards Obama. Front page everyday. Tired of it.” And that triggered an 11-paragraph defense from the thin-skinned, pro-Obama LAT. Of course, it started with a pro-Obama picture - The One waving to 200,000 adoring Berliners - then went on with the usual “We’re not biased. We’re not. We’re not! WE’RE NOT!!!.”

Even in reporting its lack of bias, the LAT had to list some of the stories it’s run:

Housing crisis is a test for McCain

McCain takes a risk on Social Security

McCain wins some respect

Hmm. Sound a little underdoggish to you? A little down and out? Meanwhile, Obama’s headlines were to die for:

Obama’s views resonate in Iraq

Obama stands by his plan to end war

And the rest of the story? I’ll turn to just one sentence from Bookworm’s scathing analysis of the LAT excuse to give you an idea of how bad it was:

What immediately leaps out of the above series of excuses is the nature of the stories about the two candidate: The personal story about Obama is about his yearning for his father; the personal story about McCain is about how he screwed his first wife.

As O’Reilly says, we’ll give the last word to the LAT:

“McCain and Obama have put themselves up for the highest elected office in the land. We think their background is not only fair game — it’s something every thinking voter would want to know more about.”

That’s hardly fair. Couldn’t help myself.

Media Bias 2008 will cover pro-Obama media bias all the way up to the election. Items are listed from most recent to oldest; the numbering reflects this and is not a ranking. Send Media Bias 2008 examples via “comments”‘ below, or to email2laer [@] yahoo [dot] com.

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y now you’ve heard about, read about and no doubt seen this McCain ad:

What you may have missed in the whole “Obama as a tacky celebrity” to-and-fro is this critique of the ad from that fount of political commentary, E! Online:

Oh, John McCain.

First, you side with Heidi Montag in The Hills catfight, and now this? In your new campaign ad, you suggest Barack Obama is a celebrity more popular than Paris Hilton and Britney Spears.

That’s hardly fair. Those two are too busy these days with other concerns to worry about being at the top of the boldfaced heap.

If you want to get tough on Obama, why not compare him with some really hot celebs. Take Christian Bale—have you seen the box-office figures for The Dark Knight? Huge! Or Miley Cyrus? She’s massive. And for that matter: Why not compare Obama to enduring stars like Will Smith, Tom Cruise or Tom Hanks?

You could even pit him against some of your supporters: Jon Voight, Erik Estrada or Spencer Pratt? That’d be interesting.

But Paris? Come on, there’s gotta be a better comparison. You’d almost think you were trying to belittle him or something.

Exactly.

You won’t find political commentary that probing at Politico, Bub. And BTW, to wrap up celeb reaction to this ad - which is absolutely great for feeding its viral reach - there’s this:

Hilton has blasted the MCCain camp for using her image without asking for permission.
A spokesperson for the star says, “Miss Hilton was not asked, nor did she give permission for the use of her likeness in the ad and has no further comment.”

Her proud parents donated $4,600 to McCain. No word on how much they gave to BO.

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arack Obama’s words are sooo inspiring, like these from yesterday:

“[There are] things you can do individually though to save energy - making sure your tires are properly inflated … and getting regular tune-ups.”

Hearing this, a Gulf-region sheik leaped to follow the wise teachings of The One:

A RICH Arab sent his Lamborghini on a 6,500-mile round trip to Britain for a service.

The £190,000 supercar was put on a scheduled flight from Qatar to Heathrow – then flown BACK after the oil check.

Money was no object as the flight would have cost the owner – thought to be a Sheikh – around £20,000. …

His black-and-gold supercar costs £3,552 to service at an approved dealer – on top of the £20,000 to freight from Qatar to Britain.

The Murciélago LP640 – driven by Batman in movie The Dark Knight – arrived from the Middle Eastern country on Friday.

It cleared customs and was trucked to specialist mechanics in London for the service.

On Monday it was flown back 3,250 miles to the oil-rich state where it was collected by the owner. (The Sun)

Grumpy, no-fun Greenies and Warmies are furious of course, jabbering about global warming, carbon footprints and economic justice, but ‘cmon! What’s important here is that the Lambo just might be getting better gas mileage now, and we have Obama to thank!

Dual hat-tips: Rush and Incredible Daughter #1

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‘m going to tip my hat regarding one of my Watcher’s Council votes by directing your attention to a rather hefty Investor’s Business Daily Editorial, Barack Obama’s Stealth Socialism.

This is one of those rare pieces that I actually copied into an email and fired off to a bunch of family members. Why? Because I love my family and I don’t want them to be hurt.

Here’s how it kicks off:

Before friendly audiences, Barack Obama speaks passionately about something called “economic justice.” He uses the term obliquely, though, speaking in code — socialist code.

And as president, “we’ll ensure that economic justice is served,” he asserted. “That’s what this election is about.” Obama never spelled out the meaning of the term, but he didn’t have to. His audience knew what he meant, judging from its thumping approval.

It’s the rest of the public that remains in the dark, which is why we’re launching this special educational series.

“Economic justice” simply means punishing the successful and redistributing their wealth by government fiat. It’s a euphemism for socialism.

We all know about BO’s chumminess with unseemly characters like Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright. This piece introduces us to a number of others, including Frank Marshall Davis:

A careful reading of Obama’s first memoir, “Dreams From My Father,” reveals that his childhood mentor up to age 18 — a man he cryptically refers to as “Frank” — was none other than the late communist Frank Marshall Davis, who fled Chicago after the FBI and Congress opened investigations into his “subversive,” “un-American activities.”

As Obama was preparing to head off to college, he sat at Davis’ feet in his Waikiki bungalow for nightly bull sessions. Davis plied his impressionable guest with liberal doses of whiskey and advice, including: Never trust the white establishment.

“They’ll train you so good,” he said, “you’ll start believing what they tell you about equal opportunity and the American way and all that sh**.”

And Gerald Kellman:

His boss there was Gerald Kellman, whose identity Obama also tries to hide in his book. Turns out Kellman’s a disciple of the late Saul “The Red” Alinsky, a hard-boiled Chicago socialist who wrote the “Rules for Radicals” and agitated for social revolution in America.

The Chicago-based Woods Fund provided Kellman with his original $25,000 to hire Obama. In turn, Obama would later serve on the Woods board with terrorist Bill Ayers of the Weather Underground. Ayers was one of Obama’s early political supporters.

There’s much more, including a bare-knuckled outline of Obama’s policies that would make Lenin proud.

Yeah, yeah, I know. Youthful folly. People change. Is that really a bet you want to make when the other candidate’s credentials are decent, solid, open to all and carved in granite?

J

ust a year ago, about 60 percent of Californians opposed offshore drilling, but now a new survey from the highly regarded California polling organization the Public Policy Institute of California shows things have turned dramatically:

Fifty-one percent of Californians favor more oil drilling off the coast – a 10-point increase since July 2007 – according to a statewide survey released today by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC). This is the first time since 2003, when PPIC first posed the question, that more Californians favor offshore drilling than oppose it (45%), a shift caused in large part by a surge in support among Republicans.

Expanding on that, PPIC reports that Republican support for drilling is now at 77 percent, up from 60 percent a year ago, and Independents are up to 44 percent from just 33 percent a year ago. Even Dem views are shifting, with 35 percent now in support, versus 29 percent last July.

Obama’s message promoting alternative energy will play well here, too, as support for greater research and commitment to alternative energy is strong across party lines, running at 83 percent.

But McCain’s new message - drill more/do more, do everything to reduce dependence on foreign oil - will resonate more powerfully here than Obama’s new message - be sure to fill your tires to the manufacturer’s specifications.

“The court finds the memorial at Mt. Soledad, including its Latin cross, communicates the primarily nonreligious messages of military service, death and sacrifice. As such, despite its location on public land, the memorial is constitutional.”

-U.S. District Judge Larry Alan Burns

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t’s a shame something so simple as placing a cross in an overwhelmingly Christian nation has become so difficult, and can be allowed only by so narrow a definition as this fine-grained parsing by Judge Burns. But still, a victory is a victory and the Soledad cross lives on.

And so does its opposition. According to the LA Times, the ACLU is considering an appeal to the very liberal 9th Circuit.

Ironically, it was another version of the sort of liberal craziness we see from the ACLU and the 9th Circuit that turned Judge Burns’ decision:

In his ruling Burns agreed that the cross is the preeminent symbol of Christianity, but said “it does not follow the cross has no other meaning or significance.” He pointed to the exhibits on public beaches, such as Santa Monica’s, where the group Veterans for Peace uses crosses in the sand to represent U.S. service members who died in Iraq.

Apparently the Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy isn’t coordinating its messaging strategies effectively.

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ometimes I think our Dem-drenched legislature in Sacramento won’t stop its headlong plunge into social activism and socialism until they’ve demolished the state. Turns out the Russians have beaten them to it.

Here’s the Reuters headline: Russia Wipes California From Its Maps.

How did I miss that? Has it really gotten that bad here? Was it the legislature’s new Gay Day bill that finally tipped the scale? Maybe it’s the cities that did it … LA’s banning of fast foods restaurants in South LA or maybe San Francisco’s axing of pharmacy tobacco sales both of which sure pushed the Golden State into ever-deepening, draconian darkness.

Oh … never mind …

MOSCOW (Reuters) - California will no longer exist on the Russian map.

Russia’s north-western region of Nizhny Novgorod has decided to eliminate the tiny village of California due to the lack of inhabitants, Itar-Tass news agency reported on Thursday.

The village was set up in the 19th century by a Russian landowner as a snub to the government for selling Alaska to the United States in 1867, Tass said.

The once vibrant village has been in decline since the Soviet collapse, with the last of its residents leaving in 2000 to seek better lives elsewhere.

It will now officially cease to exist as a geographical unit ….

For White House, Hiring Is Political

WASHINGTON — On May 17, 2005, the White House’s political affairs office sent an e-mail message to agencies throughout the executive branch directing them to find jobs for 108 people on a list of “priority candidates” who had “loyally served the president.” (NYT)

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eporters will be far too busy lining up for the jobs Obama hands out to those who “loyally served the president” to ever write a story like this, should BO be elected!

Co-authored with Jim

A

bit more than month has passed since Bill Moyers and Michael Winship penned their column It Was Oil, All Along. I missed it when it came out, and not very many bloggers have posted on it in the interim, so let’s set the Wayback Machine to June 27, 2008 and have some fun!

It Was Oil, All Along
By Bill Moyers & Michael Winship

Oh, no, they told us, Iraq isn’t a war about oil. That’s cynical and simplistic, they said. It’s about terror and al Qaeda and toppling a dictator and spreading democracy and protecting ourselves from weapons of mass destruction. But one by one, these concocted rationales went up in smoke, fire, and ashes. And now the bottom turns out to be….the bottom line. It is about oil.

Shiver me timbers! Terror … al Qaeda … toppling Hussein … democracy in Iraq … all up in smoke! I missed that somehow. But then I never saw them as concocted, either.

Alan Greenspan said so last fall. The former chairman of the Federal Reserve, safely out of office, confessed in his memoir, “…Everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil.” He elaborated in an interview with the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward, “If Saddam Hussein had been head of Iraq and there was no oil under those sands, our response to him would not have been as strong as it was in the first gulf war.”

What one word best describes oil? To a lefty, it’s probably “pollution.” To a realist, it’s “strategic.” Were it not so, but it is so. Would they have us not make any effort to protect the world’s largest oil reserves from falling into the hands of a ruthless, anti-American despot? The Left would like everyone to believe that the US was out to steal the region’s oil, and they have convinced the most simpleminded among us.

Remember, also, that soon after the invasion, Donald Rumsfeld’s deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, told the press that war was our only strategic choice. “…We had virtually no economic options with Iraq,” he explained, “because the country floats on a sea of oil.”

What’s not true about that statement?

Shades of Daniel Plainview, the monstrous petroleum tycoon in the movie THERE WILL BE BLOOD. Half-mad, he exclaims, “There’s a whole ocean of oil under our feet!” then adds, “No one can get at it except for me!”

No wonder American troops only guarded the Ministries of Oil and the Interior in Baghdad, even as looters pillaged museums of their priceless antiquities. They were making sure no one could get at the oil except… guess who?

Would someone please name me a war in which the victorious army immediately dispatched troops to guard museums?