So, Jerry Wright Was a Crazy Uncle?

Hume last night:

The Reverend Jeremiah Wright may have stepped down as pastor, but the Trinity United Church of Christ may continue to haunt Barack Obama.

Newsmax reports the new Senior Pastor, Otis Moss, has called biblical patriarch Abraham a pimp, said Noah and Moses were thugs and said Jesus had a “soft spot for thugs.” Moss has also praised late rapper Tupac Shakur as a prophet despite his profanity-laced lyrics that glorify violence and a criminal record including assault and sexual abuse.

Cybercast News reports another pastor as the church, reverend Reginald Williams, has written in the church bulletin that the Pentagon trains Latin Americans to become terrorists and the major TV networks are run by right wing racists who see blacks as subhuman.

The Obama campaign has not yet responded to our request for a comment.

Well, look. I’ve been saying since this topic first came up that Wright is not at all unique, and that one does not sign onto such a church without buying into what’s being taught. All these points make Obama out a liar when he says he had no clue of the hatred being taught.

Added a couple BitsBlog functions tonight.

I don’t know if I’ll keep them, but let’s try them and see.

The first one is “BitsBlog Tags”. These are collections of posts that the system thinks are related to the current topic. Nice cross reference.

The second is a number of posts that the system thinks may be related based on keyword use. For example, I’ll add the words ‘gun violence’ to the post here. Note what it does with those words, below.

As I say, I don’t know if I’ll keep them, but let’s see how it works for a while.

Tim Eberly of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution really needs to learn some journalism basics:

A 24-year-old man shot and killed a teenage intruder Friday after the youth and some other juveniles tried to break into the his northwest Atlanta home, police said.

The shooting occurred around 1:15 p.m. at 1426 Hawkins St., off Chappell Road, police said.

The victim was 16 years old, said Lt. Keith Meadows, commander of the Atlanta Police Department homicide unit. His name was not made public Friday afternoon.

Let’s do a little basic editing.   The victim of the crime was the home owner.   The decedent, was not the victim.  He was the perp, now a dead perp.  The age of the decedent, perp, is simply not relevant.  The home owner, defender, had neither the time nor the obligation to check the perp’s age before defending his property.

• David will undoubtedly get a smile over James Joyner’s first post on Saturday. Men and women are different… who knew?
• Speaking of James, we had an interesting discussion as regards Rumsfeld, et al, over there, you’ll want to check out. As I said over there, it strikes me that the less than ideal situation that developed in Iraq following the initial invasion was the result of an argument within the Military over which comes higher… Military doctrine, or orders from the civilian leadership. I think that argument gets glossed over in the politically driven rush to blame the civilian leadership.
• Comments about Henke‘s understandably thin-skinned response to MK aside, he’s bang on right with the racism that is at the root of the Democrat party. As I told him, I’ve been saying it for years; The very reason that such as MK can’t seem to recognize their own racism and sexism is that the very root of their political identity is based on group politics. For all the screaming about how racist and sexist everyone else is, the real core of racism and sexism today, is the Democrat party. Put another way, it’s called PROJECTION. And let’s face it, if it wasn’t for the tool of racism, Obama wouldn’t be even in the running for their nomination at this point. Similarly, if it wasn’t for sexism as a tool, Hillary Clinton would be working a small claims court in south Chicago.
• That said, I will now in fairness take a large bloody chunk out of Henke’s backside and along with him, that of Patrick Ruffini, and Soren Dayton. I note with some bemusment, their ‘Next Right” attempt.  The fact is that support of the right for Republicans is melting away... that much these three have correct. The problem is…. them, and people like them which are about as right wing as Bill Clinton is.  And of course, their inability to recognize the problem. They as individuals have much to commend them, and they are each occasionally brilliant. I have very publicly agreed with each when they’ve been right.  (Remember, we’re all about the ideas, here) However, they’re moving, in general, in the wrong direction.   Let me be clear, here; I openly question the claim to the title of “Conservative” or “Libertarian” (At least within the American context) of anyone who bangs the ‘global warming’ drum for Al Gore. Further, I will question such credentials of anyone who equates Gitmo to a Gulag. That includes these three. And yes, that includes John McCain, too, and President Bush to the extent he’s signed onto this nonsense.  Here it is, people…. If this is the way the right is supposed to march, if this is the ‘next right’ … Well, thanks, but no, I’ll find another way.  That others are coming to the same conclusion, and in large numbers, is exactly why McCain is at the moment trailing in the polls to Obama, when Mickey Mouse should be able to beat someone of Obama’s record of non-accomplishment.  This is not a situation where McCain hasn’t done enough to win over the leftists… he’s not going to win significantly among them anyway. Thinking that kissing their backsides is going to win him votes is a serious judgement error, of a kind I want nowhere near the reins of power.  McCain’s biggest problem is that the right is leaving him, and I think with no small justification.  McCain had better address that issue, and so should the Republican party… though I fear it to be far too late for this cycle. That means, unfortunately, McCain is going to have to stop taking council from the ‘new right’ which is not in fact, “Right” at all.  Failing that, the Republicans will fail in November, and correctly so. I say “unfortunately”, because I have come to doubt McCain has it in him. (A sad commentary on the state of things) This is not a matter of how we present ourselves of the net, as these three are suggesting. rather, this is a matter of the message itself. not being conservative.   It’s got to be of the right, first, before it can be called the ‘next right’.
• Speaking of Obama, for a lot of reasons, I didn’t say anything about this one over the weekend, but 57 states? I mean, come on, people. And if you actually go through what he was saying, he was figuring there are 60 states. The excuse of course is that he was tired. I’ve been tired before, and trust me, I still knew there was 50 states. But I’ll bet I’d be tired at 3am when that phone call comes in, too, understand?  I’m with Armbinder, here… In case you’ve not figured this out, I’m not a fan of Mccain. But let’s be honest, here… If McCain had said this, you know the reaction from the press would have been that he’s gone senile on us, and likely would have gotten another ‘lost his bearings’ comment from Obama.
• Yes, Billy I noticed that about Martin. Personally, I’ve never been on that particular reservation (As my comments over this “Next Right” pile of crap should amply show) and so I regard his questions as a good sign.
• Listen, Jimmah… Israel would be fully justified, if a little delayed, in leveling the entire area with continuous carpet bombing. Are we clear on this? I mean, how much must Israel suffer before a response is justified, in your eyes? Idiot. Memo to Amy Carter: Isn’t it time to start thinking about round the clock nursing care? The guy has obviously lost his bleeping mind.
• Ya know, I like Chess. I’ve played since I was a boy, having learned to play the basics while still in grade school. I still allow myself to get thrashed by my own computer, or someone online occasionally. But I never got to Fran’s level. I admire him for it, I even understand what he’s talking about here, mostly… but I don’t think I can get to playing at that level. With me it’s always been more on feel and instinct, than on a by the books approach.
• OK, You’ll be angry with me, I’m sure. But it strikes me that there’s an awful lot of people who worship at the feet of Darwin, who apparently haven’t evolved very much, particularly in the area of reasoning. What these morons fail to reckon with is the fact that we as beings have evolved since our original creation does not of itself negate the fact that were WERE created.
• Re-arranged my desk over the weekend, which of course means that means re-wiring the thing. I’ve cut it down to 3 monitors, and moved the Audio mixer and EQ over to the desk for easier access. Looks pretty cool, actually, but I’m still chasing loose connections in the audio stream. (Shrug) Goes with the territory. Maybe I’ll put up a pic later, once I get it all working.
• Added some code to the blog, this weekend, too. A number of folks I spoke with wondered if a link summary couldn’t be added to the bottom of each post, to make searching them out easier. Well, Okay…. Done.  While I was in there, I also added some speedups inside the database.  Godwin’s law, though, prevails… the load increases according to the ability; Given I’m beating the tar out of the database with the new link summary, the server load ends up being about the same, between the two of ’em. Figures.
• The current oil surges tend to remind me of the dot-com bubble of the 90’s. This bubble is going to break at midsummer, gang.  Apparently, I’m not alone in that read.
• Why does anyone take St Andrew the Incontinent seriously in much of anything, anymore?
• I’ve played literally hundreds of weddings in my time, but never for a bride that looked better than Jenna Bush did over the weekend.  Say what you will, the girl is beautiful, with a smile that will melt most people where they stand. Nice to see it happen, and good for the two of them. I like it when good things happen to good people.
• Memo to Ron Paul: Just beacuse Republicans don’t consider McCain to be the answer, doesn’t mean that you are. Let me be perfectly clear, here; Get lost, moron. Same goes for Bob Barr.
• Hillary Clinton looks to do very well indeed in West Virginia… indeed, she’ll be in landslide territory.  Which to my mind does raise again, Begala’s question… if eggheads and blacks will be enough to get Obama through the general election. It’s starting to look like the answer is ‘no’. If my name is ‘Dean” I’m looking for a change of underwear about now.

To you, NOTHING is foolproof.

Bob Novak at RCP:

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Close-in supporters of Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign are convinced he never will offer the vice presidential nomination to Sen. Hillary Clinton for one overriding reason: Michelle Obama.

The Democratic front-runner’s wife did not comment on other rival candidates for the party’s nomination, but she has been sniping at Clinton since last summer. According to Obama sources, those public utterances do not reveal the extent of her hostility.

Now isn’t that interesting? 

 This sounds rather strangely like two very similar personalities butting heads. The implication, though, both of this report, and my speculation, is that we have in Michelle Obama, an even more controlling and politically ambitious woman than Hillary Clinton, herself, and almost certainly one as domineering over Barrack Obama, as Hillary Clinton has been over Bubba. But, more;

If the two women are similarly dominant in their relationships with their husband’s political career, it also implies one far more ambitious than Hillary Clinton ever was, given the timeframes and career paths… At least Bubba was govenor of a southern state for a few years, and came up through at least some of the ranks. Obama, meanwhile, has only been a Senator for three years, about half of which he’s been concentrating on running for POTUS far more than he’s been doing his Senatorial duties.

Given that level of influence, it seems logical to suggest that she might also have at least the same degree of influence that Hillary Clinton had over Bubba while they were in the White House.  It also seems logical on that basis to question how much Michelle Obama buys into the anti-American, racist nonsense, that was coming from the pulpit of Jerry Wright, for 20 years, given the degree of influence she demonstrably has on the candidate.

Hume, Friday:

New information from the National Climatic Data Center might cool some global warming theories. According to the center, April 2008 was the coldest April in 11 years. The average temperature last month here in the U.S. was 51-degrees Fahrenheit. That figure is 1 degree cooler than the average April temperature for the entire twentieth century.

President of the National Center for Policy Research Amy Ridenour tells FOX News, “this is further proof that global warming is not happening. Somebody has to be the grownup in this debate and the fact is, climate change is variable. If it wasn’t, then we wouldn’t have weathermen.”

April 2008 ranks as the 29th coldest since record keeping began 114 years ago.

Hmmm. 11 years. How long are sunspot cycles, again?

Again, people…. AGW is utter garbage.

Remember a few days ago I remarked about how Obama had fired one of his staffers for talking to Hamas?

Well, of course Obama’s been running up the flag of denial over the matter, and treating this guy like he was a total stranger… just a crazy uncle… just another Jerry Wright.

Well, think back a bit further, to the CNN/YouTude laugh festival. Recall, please, that at that yukfest, Obama stated he’d meet with Iran.   Like he doesn’t know that Mahmoud AhmydinnerJacket is pulling the strings on the Hamas puppet?

Of course, now Obama is backpeddling furiously on that statement, claiming that McCain has distorted what he said. Has Obama forgotten the internet age, where everyone already knows what he said and denial won’t cut it, anymore?

And the questions raised about how this kind of nonsense surrounds Obama so very often, remain unanswered.

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(CNN) — Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign rejected suggestions Sunday that Sen. Hillary Clinton is staying in the race in hopes of brokering some kind of agreement with the likely Democratic nominee.

“I don’t believe that Sen. Clinton is looking for a deal,” Obama’s chief campaign strategist, David Axelrod, told “Fox News Sunday,” when asked about suggestions she may want the Obama campaign’s help retiring her campaign debt.

“I don’t think that’s what this is about,” he said.

Last week, Obama sparked rumors that his campaign would pay off Clinton’s campaign debts once he secured the nomination.

“I’d want to have a broad range of discussions with Sen. Clinton about how I could make her feel good about the process and have her on the team moving forward,” Obama told reporters Friday.

Is it just me, or does that sound just a trifle odd? Reports I’m seeing place Camp Clinton about $20m in debt just now. Those reports are consistent with the long string of unpaid bills we’ve been hearing about on and off for months. It would also be directly online with the reason she’s still not removing herself from the race… she’s trying to keep the fund raising arm going to cover that debt.

But on what basis would Obama make such an offer?  Simple; She’s still a threat. Perhaps not from a standpoint of she can still win the nomination, though I still consider that arguable… there’s always the convention…. but from the standpoint of damaging Obama in the General election.

And that, to my mind, shows how very weak Obama is as a candidate.

Mother’s day.

It’s one of those days that no matter how much you do, it always ends up feeling like it wasn’t enough, even though Mom will be the last to complain about anything.  That’s not due to failings on our part; The Debt of thanks we owe our mothers is one that cannot be properly repaid, and no amount of profuse thanks can balance the books. All we can do is to meekly acknowledge that debt, and let her know she is loved, because in the end, that is all she will really want, anyway. Mother’s day gives us the opportunity to do just that.

But there is more to this day; The reverse is also true; You are her reach into the future, part of her lives on in you. With so much of her in you and you being how she will live on here on earth, even beyond her own years, how can she help but be proud of you?  So, that thankfulness, that connection flows both ways.

Happy Mother’s day, Mom.

Corn ethanol is becoming the Emily Litella of energy.

Don Surber.

?

McCain, as in Robert Stacy McCain, notes that while BO purports to want to win next Tuesday primary West Virginia, which would kill Mrs. Clinton’s campaign,  he has no plan to actually ever set foot in the state: 

Yeah, lots of GOTV and honk-and-waves on Team Obama’s West Virginia schedule, but no Obama. Maybe they’re afraid one of those toothless moonshiners might mistake Obama for a revenuer and blast him his shootin’ iron

Aside from being home to Don Surber, West Viriginia is also the home of Senator Bobbby “Sheets” Byrd.   Did Sheets pass the word for BO to say out of his state?

BO is on recond as wanting to talk to our enemies.   Yet while BO willing to set down and talk to the ilk of Hugo Chavez and Bashar al-Assad, he not willing to talk face to face to the people of West Virginia.   Get Don, if I didn’t know better, I’d say that BO doesn’t like you.

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Romesh Ratnesar, Time, asks “Is It Time to Invade Burma?”

That’s why it’s time to consider a more serious option: invading Burma. Some observers, including former USAID director Andrew Natsios, have called on the U.S. to unilaterally begin air drops to the Burmese people regardless of what the junta says

Not only no, but Hell no.   Let the People’s Liberation Army invade.   We can provide logistical support, but China supplies the boots on the ground.

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Why the cows, a/k/a the feminazi, a/k/a gender feminists are doomed.   Mother Nature is not a feminist.  The long explanation by John Derbyhire, National Review,:

In biology, however, “fitness” is a term of art, a measure of how well an organism is adapted to its environment. Reproductive success is a pretty good measure of fitness, in this term-of-art sense. Thus if, as my reader seems to believe, dumb people have more kids than smart ones, then dumb people are fitter (in the biological sense) than smart people, by definition. They are better adapted to their environment.

You might think that smart people are superior in some way to dumb people, but Ma Nature doesn’t agree with you. The only “superiority” She acknowledges is reproductive success. She also doesn’t insist that every species, in every environment, get smarter, faster, bigger, and stronger. If the demands of fitness decree that dumber, slower, smaller, and weaker bring reproductive success, She’s fine with it. She’s even fine with it if the fool species goes extinct … as practically all species do sooner or later.

 A simp;e explanation by James Robert “Jim Bob” and Michelle Duggar:

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Hat tip: Allah Pundit, Hot Air.

The fecundant shall inherit the Earth.

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The London Times:

One of Barack Obama’s Middle East policy advisers disclosed yesterday that he had held meetings with the militant Palestinian group Hamas – prompting the likely Democratic nominee to sever all links with him.

Robert Malley told The Times that he had been in regular contact with Hamas, which controls Gaza and is listed by the US State Department as a terrorist organisation. Such talks, he stressed, were related to his work for a conflict resolution think-tank and had no connection with his position on Mr Obama’s Middle East advisory council.

“I’ve never hidden the fact that in my job with the International Crisis Group I meet all kinds of people,” he added.

Now, one could certainly argue that the proper political response to the situation was given by Obama to this situation. But why are so very many of these incidents popping up? why I so many of old mom and his friends and close associates being found with ties to terrorist organizations?

Even assuming the most Pollyanna-ish explanation and the assumption that he is completely innocent of any such associations himself, his circle of friends most certainly has those associations in an unusually large number.  Doesn’t it kind of make you wonder who he’s going to be appointing to key foreign policy and defense positions in an hypothetical Obama administration?