'Freedom Makes Us Free'

Too hot for the National Post, at Blazing Cat Fur, "Guest Post By Laura Rosen Cohen: Freedom Makes Us Free":

If today, someone calls me a dirty Jew, I care very little -- and frankly don’t need the state to fight my battles. If suddenly, in Canada or America, the state were to suddenly decide that because we are Jews, that we are not legally entitled to own property or that we are no longer legally full humans, equal under the law, then, Houston, we would have a problem and civilized, western societies such as ours would reject the state’s totalitarian, antisemitic plans.

RTWT at the the link.

Try to Love Again...

GSGF sent me the American Power widget I just added at the sidebar. And for fun I included the "Moonage Daydream" clip as well (more on that tonight). So, I'll just post a little more music now before I head out to the Michele Bachmann rally. Sheryl Crow's liberal as all get out, but I like her, and she's beautiful in this video. (Pat Houseworth loves his '60s-era bands, even though they were all antiwar, so it's a common problem among conservatives). Actually, "The First Cut is the Deepest" is a Cat Stevens song, and I'm mostly familiar with Rod Stewart's cover. But Crow popularized it for me in the 2000s. I remember her live performance at the American Music Awards (I think), and the song stuck ... So, enjoy, and check back later to see if I was able to score a photo with Michele Bachmann!

Bachmann Bails on National Tea Party Convention

From Politico, "Lawmakers Back Out of Tea Party Event" (via):

In another sign that controversy is taking a toll on next week’s National Tea Party Convention in Nashville, Tenn., two of its top attractions — Reps. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) — have decided to opt out of their prior plans to speak at the event.

The high-profile blows to the convention come as several sponsors have backed out and organizers are struggling to sell tickets to Sarah Palin’s keynote address amid controversy about the convention’s unusual finances.

As first reported by POLITICO, the convention is being run by a for-profit Tennessee corporation called Tea Party Nation, registered to a little-known Tennessee lawyer whose efforts to position himself as a national tea party leader have put him at odds with some state tea party activists. The lawyer, Judson Phillips, intended to turn a profit from the convention, with the stated goal of seeding a so-called 527 group that would air ads praising conservative candidates or criticizing their opponents, though he now concedes he’s hoping just to break even and has tabled the 527 idea.

Maybe the guy will cancel it. Some folks are taking Sarah Palin to task for her participation, although I just don't like the idea of ticket sales for a tea party.

I'll be heading over to meet Michele Bachmann this afternoon, so perhaps I'll hear more on this. And if I'm lucky I'll get some good pictures as well. So check back tonight for that stuff ...

Marcy Wheeler: 'I Didn't Actually Watch SOTU', But FU Obama and the Banks Anyway...

The admission obviously disqualifies Marcy Wheeler from being taken seriously:

I didn’t watch the SOTU last night – though I did follow along on Twitter.

Kinda like staying at Holiday Inn, I guess ...

Twitter's great -- awesome even -- although, naturally, you can tweet and watch/listen at the same time. That's just kinda the way it works, yo!

But this part is especially rich, on "punishing" the banks:

I am utterly fascinated by the way Obama dealt with this – probably his Administration’s single biggest failure – the failure to keep more people in their homes. Aside from the mention of those abstract children, asking why they have to move, there’s no admission of the human cost of the mortgage crisis. Instead, homes are just investments, the ability for individual families to spend more to stimulate the economy, a store of value ....

So while it’s perhaps a subtle rhetorical point, it is, to me, also a stunning revelation of the way in which the Administration still fails to see how the banks should be punished, because their fraud devastated all these families. Obama fails to see that housing has not just an upside–investment, jobs, growth–but also a huge downside of crumbling communities as one after another neighbor gets evicted from their home.

Actually, I watched and listened to the speech, and there's absolutely no question the president's concerned about foreclosures, and frankly, his latest plan imposing new regulations on commercial banks WILL punish them. The financial sector expects the administration to damage competitiveness, and thus to DESTROY jobs (which a rudimentary knowledge of business finance would indicate). Dr. Wheeler's thus not only disqualified, but clueless as well. Note how her essay constitutes post-modern conceptions of authority. Dr. Wheeler's supposed to be a expert on "literary-journalistic" traditions, but we're not talking state censorship here (which is apparently her expertise). We're talking about authenticity and credibility, and there's she's lacking. Note how without actually watching SOTU Dr. Wheeler privileges her own opinions over what actually happened -- and what actually has happened in the regulatory scheme of things -- which is exactly what she did with her allegations of Andrew Breitbart's involvement in the James O'Keefe bust at Senator Landrieu's office. Folks like this aren't to be trusted, especially coming from "Hammering" Jane Hamsher's crib (home of some of the netroots left's most despicable bloggers).

CA GOP Matchups With Boxer

From today's poll at the Public Policy Institute of California (via Memeorandum):

In a theoretical Senate matchup, Boxer falls short of a majority against each of the potential challengers. She and Campbell are in a close contest (45% to 41%). While 79 percent of Democratic likely voters favor Boxer, 84 percent of Republican likely voters favor Campbell. Independents are more divided but favor Boxer (42% to 37%). Gender differences among likely voters are stark: Boxer has a 14-point lead among female likely voters (50% to 36%), and Campbell has a 6-point lead among men (46% to 40%). Boxer has an 8-point lead over Fiorina (48% to 40%) and DeVore (47% to 39%).

There's not much difference between Fiorina and DeVore vis-a-vis Boxer, but considering the former's big money and name recognition, the results are a bit surprising to me (she should be doing better).

DeVore has improved a tiny bit in this poll (compared to here), although he's got a lot of ground to make up. (Name recognition is driving Campbell's support at this point.)

My sense is that he's got to get aggressive with some media and advertising, and that takes money. He's got a money-bomb gearing up for February 1st, so check that out if you're able to help. Tom Campbell will not protect innocent lives if elected, and as noted, Fiorina's pro-life posture is sketchy. See, "Life, Values, and California's GOP Senate Primary."

Noisy and Messy

From the president's speech last night:

Democracy in a nation of 300 million people can be noisy and messy and complicated. And when you try to do big things and make big changes, it stirs passions and controversy. That's just how it is.

Actually, a little messier than he'd like:

Update on James O'Keefe

Here's the latest from the Washington Post, "ACORN Foe Tweeted About Planned Sting of Sen. Landrieu's Office" (via Memeorandum). However, no tweet cited there says any such thing:

On New Year's Eve, conservative activist James O'Keefe telegraphed across the Internet that he was up to something big.

On the social networking site Twitter, he said that his past undercover video stings had exposed wrongdoing at Democratic-leaning organizations -- and he foreshadowed one more in the offing.

"2008: Planned Parenthood VPs fired 2009: ACORN defunded 2010: Get ready cuz this is about to get heavy," he wrote on his public Twitter page, dubbed "JamesOKeefeIII."

Actually, checking O'Keefe's Twitter page, it's interesting that it's the big media outlets who've been issuing retractions on this story. As I noted immediately on Tuesday, Marcy Wheeler at Firedoglake (who crudely characterizes the episode as "TeaBuggerGate") had already accused Breitbart of involvement before any facts were known, and of course ACORN was throwing a party at the news. Our media world is TFUBAR when stories like this get turned around and folks like James O'Keefe are painted as criminals before anyone knows a thing. (And if you dig real dirt on the left's demonic shakedown artists, that's not "real journalism.") We now know, of course, that initial allegations of intent to wiretap Senator Landrieu's office were false. Jill Stanek has written a post reflecting her belief in O'Keefe and her vindication as new information has come in. See, "The arrest of James O'Keefe."

But in case you missed it, here this from the comments at Althouse the other night:

What's wrong with you people? James O'Keefe did America a big favor once, and I'll wait to hear what he was fishing for this time before I condemn him or call him stupid. If he has a legal defense fund, I'm in. Why should he pay for doing what the media refuses to do? That kid's a hero. Investigative journalism ain't no "15 minutes of fame" bullshit, it's serious business - y'all need to get serious as well.

I support good people - not goodie-goodie - and James O'Keefe's contribution to this latest incarnation of conservatism - The Tea Party Movement - can't be overstated. It's bigger than Scott Brown's, though Brown was in a better situation to have an impact, because these were kids - acting when nobody else would - proving to the world we were right about the corruption of ACORN all along. That was the crack in liberalism's facade and you know it.

This young man realigned our political world. Like I said, I'm with him until I hear more. The fact the rest of you have to think about it, or are assuming anything already, gives me pause:

What does loyalty mean to you?