Bad call, Lou

Kevin Gregg is going to be the Cubs' closer.

But Carlos Marmol ought to be.

Obama is a more popular messiah than Jesus

Deaconess Emily Carder has pointed out a poll indicating that President Obama is more popular than a host of historical luminaries, including our Lord and Savior.

Part of me wants to be upset; after all, at least lip service to Jesus is customary in our culture. On the other hand, maybe honesty about stuff like this is a positive sign.

It's not as if the news were really a surprise. After all, if Obama hadn't been more popular than Jesus, how could he- or any other pro-choice candidate- have been elected in the first place?

A while back, Uwe Siemon-Netto even pointed out that a poll of "Evangelicals" taken before the last election indicated that gas prices had a higher impact on their votes than abortion. Yes, it would appear that the popularity of Jesus Christ is definitely on the wane, even among those who are supposedly His disciples.

Bad idea, worse timing

Senate Defense Committee chair Carl Levin (D-Mich) predicts "painful cuts" in the defense budget.

The prediction comes at precisely the moment when the U.S. military has been thrown into a virtual panic mode by intelligence of a sophisticated new Chinese long-range aircraft carrier kill system against which we have no defense.

This is not a good idea. "The common defense" is not only one of the few responsibilities the Constitution specifically mandates for the Federal government, but one of the primary tasks of government generally. Practically anything should be trimmed from the budget before the Obama administration undertakes crippling, Clinton-style cuts to the military.

HT: Drudge

Angie Harmon isn't intimidated

During last year's campaign, criticism of Barack Obama was often equated with racism. Obama's supporters denied that they were doing this. They still do.

But actress Angie Harmon is getting sick of the criticism that supposedly isn't happening.

Can't say I blame her.

HT: Drudge

I'm almost embarassed for both of them!

You may laugh. You may have a stroke. You almost certainly will not believe your ears.

But unless you have been in a coma for the past eight and a half years, you will not fail to be amazed:



Go ahead, Keith.

Call me a Fascist, too!

HT: All-Encompasingly

Must be Orion's armpit

Space is a near vacuum.

This being the case, it seems odd that astronauts agree that it smells funny.

Speaking of odors, I learned back in early grammar school the unflattering origin of the name of the city where I grew up. Wikipedia explains it thus:

The name "Chicago" is the French rendering of the Miami-Illinois name shikaakwa, meaning “wild leek.” The sound shikaakwa in Miami-Illinois literally means 'striped skunk', and was a reference to wild leek, or the smell of onions. The name initially applied to the river, but later came to denote the site of the city.

Thus, the city of Chicago derives its name from its reputedly unpleasant odor. The Cubs have worked to maintain that tradition for over a century.

Neither does the city where I live now fare well in the name department. I knew about the Trappist monk theory of the origin of the name "Des Moines," but not about the other, more colorful theory Wikipedia mentions:

The origin of the name Des Moines is uncertain. The French "Des Moines" translates literally to "of the monks." "Rivière Des Moines" translates to "river of the monks," known today under the anglicized name of Des Moines River. However, the term could have referred to the river of the Moingonas, named after an American Indian tribe that resided in the area and built burial mounds. A hypothesis says that the name, if it is from the French language, refers to French Trappist monks, some of whom lived in huts at the mouth of the river. A more recent hypothesis uses a study of Miami-Illinois tribal names to say the word Moingona, one of the names given to the region, comes from word mooyiinkweena, a derogatory name which translates roughly to "the excrement-faces." The name was seemingly given to Marquette and Joliet by a tribal leader in order to dissuade them from doing business with a neighboring tribe.

Midwestern place names are nothing if not aromatic.

Photo courtesy U.S. Naval Observatory

ADDENDUM: Since I seem to be getting a lot of Google hits for "Orion's armpit" or variations thereupon (and especially since it also falls under the rubric of smelly names), I should perhaps point out that the star which forms Orion's armpit and about which people are presumably seeking information  is Betelgeuse, which is Arabic for (appropriately enough) "Armpit of the Great One."

Now, where this deficit thing is concerned...

Don't say we didn't tell you.

HT: Real Clear Politics

The disingenuous Mr. Obama

There is a proverb that says that he who defines the question wins the debate.

President Obama apparently believes in that proverb. That's why the red herring is his rhetorical weapon of choice, and why so much of his energy is spent on misdefining arguments which, on the merits, he cannot win.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Once again....

...imagine what the media would have done with these if George W. Bush had been the perp:

Read this carefully, Mr. President.

Herein Mario Loyola of the National Review explains to President Obama and other naifs the distinction between prisoners of war and criminal defendants, as well as why such distinctions matter.

In a couple of months less than four years, Deo volente, we once again may have a president who is a geopolitical grown-up,  to whom such basic things don't need to be explained.

New Madrid Fault may be kaput

When I lived in St. Louis, the New Madrid Fault- source of three of the strongest earthquakes in North American history, in 1811-1812- was a major source of conversation.

The three earthquakes in question were all over eight on the Richter Scale. They changed the course of the Mississippi River, cracked plaster walls in Boston and rang church bells in Montreal. It was generally believed when I lived in Webster Groves back in the late 'Eighties that a major quake on the New Madrid site- which was said back in the 'Eighties to be overdue- would devastate both St. Louis and Memphis, Tennessee, neither of which had been built to withstand earthquakes. And since it had been such a long time since a big quake had hit on the New Madrid faultline, the conventional wisdom was that it would probably be letting loose big time at any moment.

In fact, there were a couple of small tremors when I was still in St. Louis. The image to the right compares the projected damage from a theoretical 6.8 earthquake on the New Madrid Fault to that sustained in the 6.7 magnitude earthquake on the San Andreas Fault in 1994.

But now seismologists are beginning to suspect that the New Madrid Fault may actually be shutting down. One last thing to worry about, I suppose- and one less thing to talk about over coffee at Hodge's Chili Parlor.

An unimpressed ayatollah

Here is Ayatollah Khamenei's response to The One's olive branch to Iran.

The Ayatollah is the one who really runs things over there- and he ain't buyin' it.

No surprise, of course. You can't reason successfully with fundamentally irrational people, and appeasement never works. But of course, it would appear that Mr. Obama has still to learn both of these lessons.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Anybody who doesn't think there's such a thing as divine providence...

...should consider the story of Tsutomu Yamaguchi.

On August 6, 1945, Mr. Yamaguchi was on a business trip to Hiroshima when the city was virtually vaporized by the first American atomic bomb to be dropped on Japan.

He suffered serious burns, but in the morning of August 7 he was released from the hospital and went home- to Nagasaki, where on August 9 he became the only known person in history to have had two atom bombs dropped on him.

Yes, that's what I said. Within three days, Tsutomu Yamaguchi survived the atomic bombings of both Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

He not only survived, but is now 93 years old. He does have a little trouble hearing out of one ear.

God, it seems, had plans for the gentleman that went well beyond August of 1945. On the other hand, some weeks it seems like it just doesn't pay to get out of bed.

Obama economic plans "a way to hell"

The current president of the European Union, the Czech Republic's Mirek Topolanek, has called President Obama's plan to spend our way out of the recession "a way to hell."

Not even the Europeans are buying it, Mr. President!

HT: Drudge

ADDENDUM: Am I the only one who recognizes the debt the European Union's flag owes to that of Indiana?

Hillary: U.S. to blame for Mexico narco-violence!

Guess who is to blame for the narco-violence in Mexico?

According to Hillary Clinton, it's the United States- and our "insatiable" demand for narcotics!

HT: Drudge

Of pots and kettles

Before Barney Frank starts slandering people like Antonin Scalia as "homophobes" in the gay media, perhaps it's time that Frank himself- and all the media- start paying a bit more attention to Frank's own ethical track record.

If Barney Frank were straight, there are very few districts in the nation which would not have promptly turned him out of office one it came to light that a prostitution ring was being run out of his apartment.

Countering Obama's glitter with substance

Bobby Jindal has some polishing of his stump skills to do, and some foreign policy experience to acquire. Besides, he appears disinclined to run unless The One makes such a hash of things that beating him would be a slam-dunk.

Sarah Palin has been marginalized by the Tina Fey factor, and her obvious lack of national experience and shaky background on the issues to which a credible presidential candidate must be able to speak with authority have to be addressed before she will have a realistic chance to win in November.

Mike Huckabee also needs national experience, and Mitt Romney remains as plastic as ever- besides being crippled by the willingness he displayed last time out to savage fellow Republicans for the sake of his own candidacy, a tendency which has left a permanent bad taste in the mouths of many of the party faithful.

So who should the Republicans run against The One in 2012? Here's a suggestion- and a good one.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Democratic radicals gunning for Democratic moderates on porkulus

When reading an assessment of a politician's ideological stance in the mainstream media, if you really want to know where he or she stands on the political spectrum, simply take the media characterization and move it one slot to the left.

Thus, only a politician who is in fact a radical will be described in the mainsteam media as a "liberal" or a "progressive." A moderate Democrat will be described as a "centrist" or a "moderate." A moderate conservative will be described as "far Right."

It seems thatthe radicals in the Democratic party are gunning for the less extreme liberals (that's "moderates," in mediaspeak), and have organized a group to go after them in support of The One's irresponsible budget.

This story speaks volumes about the ideological radicalism of the Democratic establishment. What it says will be muted, though, by the inability of the media to report such a story without slewing the ideological labels they use to the Right.

HT: Real Clear Politics

GOP even with Democrats in congressional poll!

The media continue to cheerfully spout doom and gloom about the prospects of the Republican party.

Somebody needs to tell them that the Republicans have pulled even with the Democrats in the generic congressional ballot.

Especially given the traditional hit the party in control of the White House takes in its first mid-term election, 2010 is looking more and more like a red year.

Told you so!

Amid a great deal of fanfare from other supporters of The One, conservative Christopher Buckley foolishly voted for Barack Obama under the impression that he was a "serious man."

Buckley says that he is currently reassessing that.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Trib columnist notices Obama's gaffe-proneness

It appears that others are noticing that President Obama is gaffe-prone, too.

So gaffe-prone, in fact, that the contrast between the media's mean-spirited treatment of President Bush's gaffes and its indulgence toward The One is positively embarassing.

Ok. So when to the insults to Mr. Obama's intellect begin, eh?

HT: Drudge

Obama the Radical

Here is an article from the American Spectator which ably examines Barack Obama's status as a stealth radical and a really, really scary figure in our history.

Meanwhile...

Peggy Noonan turns her not insubstantial rhetorical skills to an examination of Mr. Obama's own regrettable lack of substance.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Welcome back, Carter!

While this gentlemen has a somewhat foul mouth- or word processor- his review of The One's performance on Leno the other night is interesting, arguing as he does that we have seen Barack Obama's act before.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Can you imagine the uproar...

...if George W. Bush had ever said this?

Or, for that matter, done these?

My personal favorite:



How many times do you think we'll see that one on TV? I don't think so, either.


HT: Drudge

At long last, Cubs will retire Jenkins' and Maddux's number 31

Especially in the case of Ferguson Jenkins- the ace of the 1969 Cubs, "the best team never to win a pennant-" it's long overdue. And although Greg Maddux had his glory days with the Braves, he came up as a Cub and won his first Cy Young Award on Chicago's North Side.

The Cubs have announced that they are finally going to retire number 31, worn at Wrigley by two of the greatest pitchers in the history of the game.

About time. Hopefully at some point they'll get around to retiring number 2, worn by my distant cousin by marriage, Hall of Famer Gabby Hartnett- arguably both the best player in the history of the team, and the best catcher in the history of the game.

Happy St. Maewyn Succat Day!

That's the name St. Patrick was born with.

Here is a post on St. Patrick himself I did on a previous March 17.

And even though my grandmother's home town, Downpatrick- the place in Ireland most associated with Patrick, and where he, St. Columba, and St. Brigid are all buried- is in Ulster, some Ulstermen in America face something of a quandary as to what color to wear today. Here is a meditation on that subject.

But I thought that this year I'd share a favorite St. Paddy's day peeve of mine.

At the top of this post is a shamrock, symbol of Ireland, Irishness, and St. Paddy.

Directly below it is a four-leaf clover. It is a symbol of good luck- and nothing else.

Now, contrary to what many people think (florists make a lot of money selling shamrocks every year about this time), the shamrock is not some exotic Irish plant. It's simple clover. But its significance lies precisely in the fact that it has three leaves- no more, and no less.

It's associated with St. Patrick and with Ireland because, according to legend, Patrick used it to illustrate the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. "Luck o' the Irish" or not, to confuse it with the four-leaf clover is to destroy its entire symbolism- and thus, its significance.

This is a particular sore point with me because the bartender at my favorite German pub insists on tracing a four-leaf clover in the head of my Guinness. And she's a Notre Dame fan, so she should know better.

Anyway, this is no nit I'm picking here. The inappropriate display of the four-leaf clover on St. Patrick's Day, and its confusion with the shamrock, is obviously inadvertent, in most cases. But it's still just one more post-modern desecration of a Christian symbol which serves the purpose of obscuring its significance, thus- however unintentionally- making it, as the Burger Court called the Nativity scene, "a culturally neutral symbol of the (holiday) season, useful for commercial purposes, but devoid of any inherent meaning."

St. Patrick's Day is the feast day of a great Christian missionary. Yes, I'll have my corned beef and cabbage today, and raise a couple of Guinnii and/or Bushmills'. But St. Patrick's is first and foremost a Christian commemoration, not a superstitious, pagan celebration of "luck" or an excuse to get drunk.

The great Christian missionary whom we honor today would have some rather harsh words to say, in fact, about both.

ADDENDUM: Sigh. Not only did she do the four-leaf clover on my Guinness again tonight, but I saw an ad for Beamish- another Irish stout- covered with four-leaf clovers.

We live in a post-modern world.

Patrick the bunny

This starts with an ad, but be patient. It's well worth it.

This video demonstrates beyond any doubt that even the most timid of creatures can be caught up in the spirit of St. Patrick's Day.



HT: All in Faber

This bunny's name is Patrick

Apropos of the day (be patient; there's a short ad first)...

More evidence that global warming is natural

Yet another study has thrown doubt on the whole notion that global warming is anthropogenic.

If it's a question of following the evidence rather than the party line, it would appear that Al Gore may well be wrong.

HT: Drudge

'Operation Rushbo' proceeds apace

Here's an update on the carefully-orchestrated White House plan (with which Jay Leno and others seem to have fallen into step with quite readily) to identify the unpopular Rush Limbaugh as the face of the Republican party.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Obama's crew dissing Brazil, too!

Not content with alienating both Britain and Russia, the Obama administration is taking its ongoing Foreign Policy Ineptitude Initiative into our own hemisphere, insulting Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva not once, not twice, but thrice: not only postponing his meeting with the President because it was scheduled for St. Patrick's Day, but both misspelling the visiting chief of state's name and giving it incorrectly.

Rumor has it that Triumph the Insult Comic Dog may replace Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State in an effort to salvage some credibility for the Obama foreign policy.

I keed! I keed!

I think.

Ladies and gents.... the Willis Tower!

The tallest building in what I still consider to be my home town- and in the Western hemisphere- is about to get a new name.

The Sears Tower is about to become the Willis Tower.

Obama gets a failing grade from economists

The Wall Street Journal has polled a group of the world's leading economists on the grade they'd give President Obama's management of the economy thus far.

On average, he gets a grade of 59 out of 100. When I went to school, that was an 'F.'

Fed chairman Ben Bernanke, on the other hand, gets a 71- which, as I recall, was a 'C.'

On average, the economists look for the economy to turn around in October. And it's worth noting that Mr. Obama- who predicted that the sky would cave in if his pork-laden stimulus package wasn't passed- now says that the economy "isn't as bad as we think."

HT: Drudge

The stem cell debate isn't only about science, Mr. President!

Steve Chapman of the Trib is a columnist I don't always agree with. But his column on President Obama's stem cell position is right on target.

This is not only about science. It's about ethics.

Not religion. Ethics. Even atheists frequently have ethics.

And sometimes even scientists do, Mr. President.

'Mary Jane" will fry your brain

Remember when marijuana was supposed to be harmless?

Well... it isn't.

A Brit's take on Obama's rudeness to Britain

Don't think the Brits haven't noticed that President Obama- the One Who supposedly was going to restore good relations with our allies- has been positively rude to the British since taking office.

Hey. Some of our allies thought that Dubyah's foreign policy was obnoxious- but at least it was a policy, rather than the kind of sheer diplomatic ineptitude we're getting from Barack and Hillary.

The 'Obama Economy' is getting worse

Since Barack Obama took office in January, the economy has only gotten worse.

His policies don't seem to be working, and he's scaring the living daylights out of stock market investors.

He's not going to be able to blame Dubyah for the economy much longer.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Is Hillary our most inept Secretary of State ever?

It seems that President Obama isn't the only diplomatically challenged member of his administration.

His Secretary of State isn't exactly off to a great start, either.

No, not a great start at all.

One thing does need to be said in defense of Sec. Clinton, however: even though Greece's democratic tradition does go back two thousand years, the Europeans didn't use it much until the oldest democratic regime in the world (actually the oldest surviving regime of any nation on earth!)- that of the United States- dusted it off for them.

HT: Drudge

Omnium gatherum

Even the self-styled 'moderates' in the Obama coalition are beginning to see the dangerous and radical direction the furthest-Left president in our history wants to take us in, using the economic crisis as an excuse.

Tim Reid of The Times of London observes that it the Obama plan doesn't work, it will bankrupt America for a generation.

Charles Krauthammer points out that Mr. Obama is dishonestly using the economic crisis as a cat's paw for his far-Left social agenda.

Sally Pipes observes that the case for so-called health care reform is essentially smoke and mirrors.

And the Manchester Union-Leader has two words for the president's program: "wanton recklessness."

HT: Real Clear Politics

Will 'Freedom of Choice Act' result in the Catholic church having to close all its hospitals?

That's a distinct possibility. Spokesmen for the church suggest that it would do just that if compelled by law to either become accomplices to the evil of abortion on demand or sell its hospitals to those willing to do so.

Freedom of religion and of conscience, it would seem, is about to be legally trumped by freedom to deprive one's unborn child of its life for any reason one might choose if the so-called 'Freedom of Choice Act' becomes law.

Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton are among the most vocal supporters of this abomination. Not content with having circumvented the democratic process by utilizing implausible logic to discover a right to abortion in the Constitution, it seems that the cultural radicals among us- including the President of the United States- will now seek to force the nation's health service providers to become accomplices in the slaughter of the unborn.

HT: Drudge

'Purple' hypocrisy from the White House

If Barack Obama is a post-partisan president, I'm Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Inside Obama's Limbaugh scam

David Brooks (see the previous entry) dutifully repeated the White House line that Rush Limbaugh is the face of the Republican party.

Details have emerged of Team Obama's plan, hatched by Democratic strategists James Carville and Stanley Greenberg, to try to make Limbaugh the face of the GOP in the minds of American voters.

Michael Steele, regrettably, apologized for his repudiation of Rush the other day. Maybe Steele shouldn't have attacked a segment of his own constituency to begin with. But having done so, he played into the hands of the White House by apologizing to Rush- thereby granting legitimacy to the Carville-Greenberg line.

HT: Drudge

Viable baby born alive- and thrown away, alive- at Florida abortion clinic

It's worth noting that President Obama's position is that, if the woman's medical license hadn't been revoked, this should have been perfectly legal.

To review, Mr. Obama insisted as a member of the Illinois Senate that it should be legal to let any baby die who is born as a result of induced abortion if the doctor certifies that in his or her opinion it was not viable.

The doctor's certification is the only criterion Mr. Obama would have required.

HT: Drudge

Obama is "not who moderates thought he was"

It's a fact that study after study in nations all over the world have established beyond real dispute, though the media doesn't discuss it, and people either don't realize it, or ignore the knowledge: couples who live together before marriage have a divorce rate about twice that of couples who don't.

The reasons are likely complicated, but at least one is that the very advantage of "shacking up-" that you can simply dump your partner and move on at any moment, without entanglements- artificially extends the courtship stage of the relationship well into cohabitation. When actual- rather than rhetorical- commitment takes place, and the legal bond is established, both parties for the first time discover who their new spouse really is, and has been all along. Courtship serves the function of finding that out before things get complicated legally and relationally, and too complicated even emotionally; moving in together short-circuits that process, and
more often than not sets the couple up for a nasty surprise once their guard goes down and they actually let their partner know just what they've signed on for- and with whom.

Here is, on the whole, a very insightful analysis of why the Obama honeymoon with the American people may be heading for divorce court. He's not the suitor the country bought.

Don't say some of us didn't try to warn you.

It does have one flaw, though. Its author- a self-proclaimed "moderate-" still buys the Obama line that the alternative to Obama-style European socialism is "the Limbaugh brigades." That's nonsense, of course- and David Brooks ought to know it, even if he does write for the Democratic Campaign Pamphlet of Record, the New York Times.

HT: Real Clear Politics

Obama's "Alienate the Brits," plan, part deux

First he returned the Churchill bust, and now he's dissing PM Gordon Brown.

Is alienating Britain really that high on President Obama's foreign policy agenda?

I thought Dubyah was supposed to do this sort of thing- and that The One would restore
all the love from our allies.

HT: Drudge