For those of you who would rather listen to the internet opinion pages than read them, here is a new web address OutloudOpinion.com.  It is made up of the Investor’s Business Daily, The New Republic, and Creators.com.  It’s fun to have the articles on as background while you are doing something else.

I watch the Beltway Boys on Fox every Saturday.  I used to watch the McLaughlin Report, but when Eleanor Clift called our soldiers ‘mercenaries’, I stopped watching.  I am the daughter of a man who landed on Utah Beach on D-Day, the wife of a Vietnam-era veteran, and the proud mother of a Marine.  None of these men are (or were) mercenaries–they loved their country and proudly served (and still serve) it well. 

Anyway,I like Fred Barnes and I like Mort Kondrake.  Generally I think they try to be fair and to give their honest opinions.  It’s an opinion show–they are entitled to their opinions.  However–when Mort referred (on the air) to Sarah Palin as ‘that wacko right winger’, I was offended.  Has he ever referred to Barack Obama as ‘that wacko left winger’?  Barack Obama worked as a community organizer with ACORN–you know, that organization that registered fifteen thousand voters in one of our western states, and three of the names turned out to be legal.  That may be a slight exaggeration of what actually happened, but it’s not too far off.  That opens up the discussion of the need for voter id of some sort, but that’s for later.  Again, The Beltway Boys is an opinion show, and they are entitled to express their opinions, but aren’t these the same people who complain about the level of public discourse?  Be careful what you say on the air, please.

Football season is here again.  Yeah!!!!  I love the game–it’s like chess with shoulder pads.  But that’s not the point.  Jonah Goldberg at National Review Online has a short comment by someone on his staff comparing the nomination of Sarah Palin to Bill Walsh’s West Coast Offense.  No one really ever knew what it was, but they knew it when they saw it, and no one ever really learned to defend against it.  Hmmm.

These are excerpts from an article in Front Page Magazine.  It’s a very long article, and I have tried to grab just the heart of it.

The article was a rebuttal to an article by Michael Isikoff on the recent book on the Iraq War by David Horowitz (with Peter Collier).  The first part of the article is Michael Isikoff’s book review, the second (parts of which are quoted below) is the answer to the charges by FrontPage Magazine.

“The real question for critics like Michael Isikoff, who oppose the war, is this: Do they believe that if the United States withdrew its 150,000 troops from the Iraqi border in 2003 Saddam Hussein would not have proceeded to develop WMDs and use them? The Duelfer Report concluded that Saddam would have developed them as soon as sanctions were lifted. Does Isikoff believe the United States could have kept 150,000 troops on the Iraqi border indefinitely in order to use them when Saddam developed nuclear weapons? Does he think that invading a power that possessed nuclear weapons would be more prudent than invading a power that was planning to get them? Is this the case he wants to make? He should make it then, instead of throwing up red herrings like aluminum tubes and Niger uranium deals – which is precisely what we argued in our book.” 

“The real issue is what the Democrats knew about the intelligence debate, not the public. The Democrats voted to use force, endorsed the war, and then within three months – three months! – turned against it and attacked it calling their own country an aggressor nation, their president a liar who sent American youth to die for no reason, and U.S. troops bloody occupiers and war criminals. In defense of this betrayal, the Democrats claim that Bush manipulated the intelligence and deceived them. But this is demonstrably false. It is itself the biggest lie of the war. As the major opposition party in a democratic nation, the Democrats had full access to the intelligence debate and participated in it. Isikoff’s confusion of “the public” with the Democratic leadership has the effect of amplifying the confusion that sustains the Democrats’ claim that they were duped.”

I have a few random thoughts on the election coming up in November.  I’m sure this will not be my last post on the subject, but I do have some random thoughts (generally speaking, I have a random brain).

The Republican brand name has been severely damaged by the media coverage of George Bush since he became President.  Go back and look at the press reports on George Bush beginning in December of 2000.  The press has successfully destroyed a number of Republicans who had bright futures–Newt Gingrich, George Allen, Trent Lott, and I’m sure there are others I’m not even aware of.  However, the power of the mainstream news media has been weakened over the past few years because of talk radio and the internet.   That is why Nancy Pelosi is moving to bring back the “fairness” doctrine to kill talk radio.  In the next two months you will see those attacks aimed at Sarah Palin.  Next week I am expecting to see a number of articles in the mainstream media criticizing the Assemblies of God Church (because she is a member).  Church analysis is not my forte (and I can assure you it’s not the forte of the mainstream media either), but why is it that religion is an issue with Republican candidates, but rarely mentioned with Democrats (other than Nancy Pelosi’s recent dustup with the Catholic bishops)?

One of the important issues in this election (for me) is truth.  The lies are flying fast and furious.  US Magazine has on its cover “Sex, Lies, and Scandel”.  As far as I can see, the only lies told were the rumors in the media that Sarah Palin’s youngest child was her grandchild, but yet the smear is aimed at Sarah Palin.

The bias continues on Oprah.  She will not invite Sarah Palin onto the show.  I guess that’s not a surprise, as she has openly supported Barack Obama, but it’s definitely not equal coverage (Oprah is not a news show, but she’s an opinion leader).

Our job as voters is the check the facts.  What were the economy figures under Clinton?  Is it better to fight terrorism as a law enforcement matter (as Clinton did after the first World Trade Center attack) or to go after the countries supporting it?  Did you know Saddam Hussein was paying $25,000 to the families of suicide bombers in Israel?  Why haven’t we been attacked since 2001?  What has been stopped by the Patriot Act, etc?  Why wasn’t terrorism mentioned at the Democrat convention?

More random thoughts will follow at various times.  Have a good weekend.  Stay safe from the coming hurricanes.

The treatment of Sarah Palin by the media has been unbelievably bad, but there are some interesting aspects of it.  In Politico there is an article about some Clinton aides saying how unfair the treatment of Sarah Palin is by the media.  OK.  Let’s look at this. 

 We all know that the Clintons are not going away.  Their political ambitions have simply been put on hold for a short while.  What outcome of this election is best for a Hillary presidential run in 2012?  Let’s see.  If Obama wins, what happens?  If he does a good job, he gets reelected and Hillary cannot run until 2016.  If he does a bad job, the chances of another Democrat being elected go down drastically.  If Hillary does not enthusiastically support his campaign (or at least appear to), she loses the support of the Democrats who back him.  Would you like to play chess with the Clintons?  I bet it would be interesting! 

What happens if McCain wins?  Before Sarah Palin, that was Hillary’s best bet.  McCain will probably not run for a second term, so his Vice President would be the likely Republican presidential candidate.  Hillary probably does not relish the idea of running against Sarah Palin, but in four years, Hillary can collect enough negative on Sarah Palin to make it work.  Remember, the Clintons play political hardball.  The only reasons Hillary lost in the Democrat Party primaries was that Barack Obama managed to take the financial underwriting of George Soros away from the Clintons because of the war issue.  If you do some reading on George Soros, it will become obvious why it was not part of his plan for us to win the war in Iraq. 

I feel like the little girl in the horror movie who says, “They’re back!”.  Well, they’re not back yet, but they will be. It will be interesting to see which feminists stand up for Sarah Palin.  So far Geraldine Ferraro and Susan Estrich have come forward to point out the double standard being used in the reporting on Sarah Palin; it will be interesting to see if any other leading feminists are honest enough to complain.

The UK Guardian is reporting that Democratic vice-presidential nominee Joe Biden said earlier this week that he and running mate Barack Obama could pursue criminal charges against the Bush administration if they are elected in November.

Wow.  Congress has done this since the elections of 2006, and let’s look at how successful they have been.  First of all, speaking of investigations, William Jefferson (with his money stored in his refrigerator) is still firmly ensconced in the house, Harry Reed’s land deals have never been investigated, and Congress has spent millions of our money investigating things that have already been investigated.  It has not helped their approval ratings–their approval rating is, I believe, in single digits now.  And they have not had time to pass an energy bill.  Do we really want a white house that engages in the same sort of stupidity?

I am not a huge fan of John McCain, but I believe he and Sarah Palin have the maturity to run the country and not play silly games.

From the Corner at National Review Online

As National Review‘s in-house demography bore, I’ve been struck this last week by the left’s fierce hostility to Sarah Palin’s fecundity. One gentleman – well, okay, maybe not a “gentleman” but certainly an impeccably sensitive progressive new male – wrote to me from Shelton, Washington:

This abortion prohibitionist hag won’t cut it among women with brains.And BTW she is a good example of reproduction run amok. 5 kids; 1 retard. I wonder if the bitch ever heard of getting spayed. 

Each to her own, Mister Sensitive. You can be a 44-year old mother of five expecting her first grandchild and serving as Governor of Alaska. Or you can be, like Martha Stewart’s daughter Alexis, a 43-year old single “career woman” hosting a satellite radio show and spending $28,000 a month on “intracytoplasmic sperm injection” in hopes of becoming pregnant. Every woman has the “right to choose” her own path through life, but it’s a lazy assumption to take for granted that most Americans find Sarah Palin’s choices as freakish as our metropolitan elites do.

What was it the feminists used to say? “You can have it all.” Sarah Palin is a mom, and the first female governor of her state. But the enforcers at the National Organization of Women dismiss her as “more a conservative man than she is a woman“.

Golly. These days, NOW seems to have as narrow and proscriptive a view of what women are permitted to be as any old 1950s sitcom dad. 

This showed up in my mailbox at AOL.  I have no idea where it is from, but it is true.

THE EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

I know that some of you don’t like to read long drawn out missives… so here’s the executive summary………
John McCain

Congress: 26 Years   Military: 22 Years

Barrack Obama

Congress: 143 Days    Military: 0 Days

Just think how great a professional of any kind you could be with only 143 days of experience!!!

People want change so badly? . . . . maybe we should lower the experience requirement for doctors, lawyers, airline pilots, etc. This would cause some change!

Obama’s 143 Days of Senate Experience: Just how much Senate experience does Barack Obama have in terms of actual work days? Not much.

From the time Barack Obama was sworn in as a United States Senator, to the time he announced he was forming a Presidential exploratory Committee, he logged 143 days of experience in the Senate.

That’s how many days the Senate was actually in session and working.

The one single Senate committee that he headed never even met — once.

After 143 days of work experience, Obama believed he was ready to be Commander In Chief, Leader of the Free World, and fill the shoes of Abraham Lincoln, FDR, JFK and Ronald Reagan.

Think about it……143 days — 20.4 weeks — 4.7 months

Our children spend more time in pre-school getting ready for kindergarten.

I got this from The Campaign Spot on National Review Online.  I love it.

No Word on Whether She’ll Discuss Properly Field Dressing a Moose

Someone familiar with Sarah Palin’s speech says that one of the themes coming through will be, “you think this [political work] is hard? I grew up on the frontier.” Americans will know, after hearing her, that this is “a woman with a commanding presence.”

UPDATE: Based on the title of this post, a reader responds, “In all honesty, I believe this is one of those issues where you must show, not tell. I have unavoidable engagements that will keep me away from the TV this evening, but I’m setting the DVR just in case she does.”

There is a video of Newt Gingrich talking to MSNBC at newt.org.  The interesting part of the interview is the fact that as soon as Newt asks the reporter to list Barack Obams’s accomplishments (after Newt has listed Sarah Palin’s), the reporter ends the interview.  Amazing.  I still find it very interesting that the focus is on Sarah Palin’s experience–not on anything about John McCain.  I also think her Alaskan background is interesting.   Do these people realize that they are messing with a lady who shoots moose?

I am also concerned about the way the media has decided to target Sarah Palin.  After years of ‘women can do anything men can do–even go into combat’, we are hearing criticism of the fact that she has chosen to run for public office in the middle of raising a (horrors!!!) less than perfect family.  Those of us who live in the real world (with less than perfect families) are cheering.  Evidently, she has the support of her husband and children who all work together to make this possible.  I’m sure all of us know people from large families or with large families and have seen the lessons the children learn growing up about sharing and helping.

At any rate, I question the wisdom of attacking anyone who shoots moose!

There is an article in The Weekly Standard written by a former legal headhunter about the resumes of Barack Obama and Sarah Palin.  It’s interesting that the Barack Obama campaign team is comparing her resume to Barack Obama’s–not to Joe Biden’s.  It’s also interesting that they are not comparing Barack Obama’s resume to John McCain’s.

Thank you, Barack Obama for your statement concerning the media’s attack of Sarah Palin’s daughter.  You can read his statement in National Review Online along with a brief commentary by Peter Wehner.  Barack Obama has shown more respect for the campaign process than the press that is supposed to be covering it fairly.  We need a discussion of issues, plans to move forward, and things that matter to those of us working, paying our bills, raising children, etc.–not continuing personal attacks.

In the news frenzy to attack Sarah Palin, it was somehow overlooked that we handed Anbar Province back to the Iraqis,  I found the article in The International Herald Tribune of September 1.  The story of Iraq is a major unreported success–Osama Bin Laden called Iraq the central front in the war on terror and hoped to turn it into what Afghanistan was in the 1990’s.  Thanks to George Bush, General Petraeus, and the dedication of the amazing men and women in our military, there are no more rape rooms, mass graves, people being sent through chicken shredders, and the other trappings of a totalitarian regime.  There is also another article in The International Herald Tribune today, about the progress being made in Baghdad.  It may be a while before Iraq is a totally safe place, but the daily sacrifices of our military have made us safer and taken a major aggression threat off the map. 

We need to remember to thank our military and their families when we see them.  The price they pay for their dedication is easily overlooked.  If you can afford to buy someone in uniform lunch or dinner, please do.

How is it that Sarah Palin has no experience, but has accomplishments, and Barack Obama has experience, but no accomplishments?  There is an article at Townhall.com talking about the difference in the background and experience of the two candiddates.  It is interesting that generally the media is contrasting her to Barack Obama, not to Joe Biden.  Knowing Joe Biden’s love for the spotlight, it’s going to be interesting to see what he does to change that.

Just a thought–what impact does growing up in Alaska have on a person’s world view?  You live close to nature and in harmony with nature (if you’re not in harmony with nature, you may not survive).  You would have to develop common sense, self reliance, independence, and a survival instinct to deal with the winters.  I think, also, that if you made the choice to live there, you would have or develop a deep love and respect for nature.