Liberalism is an Addiction

by Burt Prelutsky

It occurred to me the other day that in spite of a bad back and his marriage vows, JFK chased everything in skirts; that Gary Hart allowed his libido to sink his political career; that even nerdy Jimmy Carter confessed to having lust in his heart, although nobody in recorded history has ever been so silly or sanctimonious as to suggest that lust resided anywhere above the belt; and that Bill Clinton, like a spooky version of Mr. Rogers, patiently explained to America's kids that oral sex isn't really sex.

With all that in mind, doesn't it strike you as hypocritical for the Democrats to get up in arms over a married mother of five running for the vice presidency? Doesn't it seem at least slightly absurd that the only sexual activity that liberals frown upon is the sort that actually leads to babies being born? ...

I'm certain that by this time most people have seen the photos of the American flags that were left for the trash collector after the Democratic convention in Denver. Even though I have a flag outside my front door and hate to think of a flag, the symbol of a nation that inspired my two sets of grandparents to travel 7,000 miles so I could be fortunate enough to be born an American, I wasn't as troubled by the photos as I would have been if they'd been misused after the Republican convention. Liberals, after all, are always insisting that they're as patriotic as conservatives, but I don't believe it. If they were, they'd respect the military far more than they do, they wouldn't nominate someone like Barack Obama and they certainly wouldn't keep saying how much America is despised around the world, while ignoring the fact that it's a badge of honor to be despised by the likes of Russia, China, Iran, Yemen, North Korea, Venezuela and the PLO. They would also acknowledge that there must be a darn good reason why millions of people who weren't as lucky as we were to be born in America are, literally in some cases, dying to come here.

So, when I see that the Democrats disrespected the flags, I understood that to them the flags were only cheap props like the balloons, the bunting, the confetti and those corny Greek columns. The real problem isn't that the left trashed a few flags, but that they keep trashing the country.

A friend of mine has come up with what I regard as a wonderful solution to the problem of leftist influence. She proposes that liberals be offered an incentive to leave the country, as they are constantly threatening to do whenever it appears that a Republican might be elected president. The sum she came up with is a million dollars per person That sounds like a lot until you realize that nowadays people casually toss around sums in the trillions when discussing federal budgets and deficits. Still, I think there is room for negotiation. The point is, these left-wing whiners would get a deal similar to the one the protagonist received in Edward Everett Hales's short story, "The Man Without a Country." Unlike Philip Nolan, though, they wouldn't be sentenced to spend the rest of their lives sailing the seas, but they would be denied the opportunity to ever set foot again on this sacred ground. Not even for a visit. Even if only a relatively small number of leftists accepted the deal, I, for one, would consider it money well spent.

Liberals have an impossible time defending their beliefs, which is why they rely on slogans and catch phrases, unfounded rumors and ad hominem attacks, on those who, like Sara Palin, think clearly and live according to Judeo-Christian principles.

The brains and values of left-wingers have decomposed to the point where they actually believe Keith Olbermann, Rosie O'Donnell and Chris Matthews make sense and that people like Whoopi Goldberg, Al Franken and Bill Maher, are funny. That is why I say that liberalism is an addiction -- and why, as with other addictions, I'd like to see it kicked. Kicked good and hard.

Source

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Palin and wolf hunting

A wildlife group's ad attacks Palin for supporting the shooting of wolves from airplanes. She does, but there's more to it than that. Killing a few wolves stops lots a caribou calves from being killed. What have the animal lovers got against caribou calves? No mercy for calves? Are some animals more equal than others? Maybe the animal lovers concerned think caribou are a type of vegetable. They seem dumb enough. Real animal lovers would SUPPORT Palin

A new ad from Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund shows the pursuit and shooting of a wolf from a small plane and tells viewers that Sarah Palin "actively promotes" such killings. It's true that she does, and in 2007 she offered $150 payments for anyone who brought the left forepaw of a wolf to state officials. The ad calls the practice "brutal and unethical" but doesn't tell the whole story.

* Alaskan officials call it "predator control," not aerial hunting, and use it to keep the populations of moose and caribou high for subsistence hunters.

* The program is limited to just 9 percent of the state's land mass, or five of 26 Department of Fish and Game districts.

* Far from being endangered, as they are in the Lower 48 states, gray wolves number between 7,000 and 11,000 in Alaska.

This TV spot isn't for the squeamish, especially not squeamish animal-lovers. Its visuals include sinister-looking photos of Gov. Sarah Palin juxtaposed with footage of a wolf trying to outrun an airplane, then being shot and writhing in pain. Finally we see a small plane taking off, a wolf carcass tied to one of its wing struts.

There's a lot of emotional huffing and puffing in the ad. It says "Sarah Palin actively promotes the brutal and unethical aerial hunting of wolves and other wildlife" and says she encourages "cruelty" and "champions ... savagery." But strip away the emotional characterization and we're left with a description of Palin's position that is essentially factually correct, though incomplete....

If you think the explanation above implies a more complicated landscape than the ad shows us, you're correct. In the first place, while gray wolves are listed as an endangered species in the Lower 48, and great efforts have been made to reintroduce them in some Western states, they are abundant in Alaska. Ron Clarke, assistant director of the Division of Wildlife Conservation at the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, says the state is home to between 7,000 and 11,000 of them. Wolf populations in Alaska have bounced back since the 1950s, when federal agents conducted an extensive poisoning and aerial shooting campaign; moose and caribou proliferated as a result, in some cases leading to severe degradation of their own habitats.

Second, it's not for nothing that wolves have acquired their big, bad reputations. Studies indicate that predators (wolves and bears) often take 70 percent to 80 percent of the moose and caribou that die each year in Alaska. Research by the state Department of Fish and Game shows that "a single wolf eats 12-13 moose in a typical year and/or 30-40 caribou, mostly calves."

More here

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ELSEWHERE

Deal for Financial Bailout Disintegrates as Obama, McCain Look On: The fate of the Bush administration’s $700 billion Wall Street’s bailout package was thrown into doubt Thursday evening, after congressional leaders left a landmark White House summit on the economy hurling accusations at each other and declaring there was no deal. Congressional leaders continued into the evening negotiating the proposed bailout of the financial industry with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s participation, but the negotiators ended the night without a deal. The summit at the White House, which included Barack Obama and John McCain, was intended to be a consensus-building exercise - one of the final stops on the rocky road to approving the controversial rescue package. Congressional leaders just hours earlier had announced they had reached an agreement in principle on the rescue package. But as Obama and McCain left, officials and aides who had attended the meeting said the summit ended on a very low note. “This meeting ended bad - real bad,” one source told FOX News. Others described the tone as “angry” and “heated,” saying Democrats were upset with House Republicans in particular who would not drop their opposition to the administration’s proposal."

John Rosenberg has an interesting post on why the Democrats don't pass the "bailout" bill that they seem so heavily to favour. They do after all have a majority in both houses. Why, then, do they insist on Republicans joining in them in passing the bill? I think it is obvious that they know it is a bad bill and do not want to be saddled with the blame for it at election time.

Data security? Unknown in Britain: "Files containing the personal records of thousands of serving and former RAF staff have been stolen, the Ministry of Defence confirmed last night. Three computer hard drives storing the information were taken last Wednesday in a raid on a high-security area at the Service Personnel and Veterans Agency at RAF Innsworth, Gloucester. The agency provides support for about 900,000 current and former RAF personnel. The loss of the data comes in the same week as a disk containing the names and addresses of almost 11,500 teachers went missing in the post. The Government has already come under scrutiny for its data protection procedures since the details of 25 million child benefit recipients were lost in transit by a courier almost a year ago. Earlier this month, Jack Straw, the Justice Secretary, ordered an inquiry into the loss of a computer hard drive containing the details of up to 5,000 employees of the justice system."

For more postings from me, see OBAMA WATCH (2), TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, EYE ON BRITAIN and Paralipomena

List of backup or "mirror" sites here or here -- for readers in China or for everyone when blogspot is "down" or failing to update. Email me here (Hotmail address). My Home Pages are here or here or here

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The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialist) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party" (In German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei)

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