Most Obnoxious Quotes Of 2007

Two sources for this, actually.

First, John Hawkins over at Right Wing News has what he calls the 40 Most Obnoxious Quotes Of 2007.

Example:

33) “I do believe that it’s the first time in history that fire has ever melted steel. I do believe that it defies physics that World Trade Center tower 7 — building 7, which collapsed in on itself — it is impossible for a building to fall the way it fell without explosives being involved. World Trade Center 7. World Trade [Center] 1 and 2 got hit by planes — 7, miraculously, the first time in history, steel was melted by fire. It is physically impossible.” — Rosie O’Donnell talks Trutherism

And McQ, over at Q&O, puts forward some of his brilliant list of favorite quotes, within context of other quotes from the same folks. As an example:

Carl Levin in March, 1999:

“Whether we like it or not, the Balkans is an important crossroads. [.] This is not the time to take risks in undermining those efforts. Those who insist on a debate at this particular moment should think again, or they bear the responsibility for the possible consequences of their actions.” – Democratic Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, Congressional record, March 11, 1999

Carl Levin in Feb, 2007:

“I don’t want to put a specific number on (how many troops we want to withdraw from Iraq) because that really should be left to the commanders who decide how many would be needed to carry out those limited functions. But we’ve got to-the issue we’re facing, the key issue is do we want American troops in the middle of a civil war. That’s the fundamental issue which we want to debate. We’ve been wanting to debate that for many, many weeks, but, of course, we were filibustered before.” – Carl Levin on Meet The Press, Feb 25, 2007

You get the idea.

OK, with the holidays, I freely admit being horribly behind in my reading..

Sister Toldjah, just before Christmas:

I read this blogpost by Michelle Malkin this morning about a fanatical black woman shouting down white people during an angry New Orleans city council hearing last week in which a debate was held about razing public housing. The woman, Sharon Jasper, would have you believe she’s a poor, helpless, victim, but in reality this woman is a known activist in the area who lives in the projects – and just so happens to have a mammoth wide-screen TV sitting in her livingroom. Check out the picture of Jasper’s livingroom here, and take special note of the quote underneath the picture.  Here’s what it reads (emphasis added):

Sharon Jasper sits in the living room of her voucher-backed private residence. “I might be poor but I don’t like to live poor. I thank God for a place to live but it’s pitiful what people give you.”

To say that this is the epitome of the severe damage liberal “entitlement” programs have done to society would be an understatement of epic proportions. We have an entire class of people in this country who “expect” others to do everything for them, including subsidize their very existence, and they don’t want it done “on the cheap.” Oh, I’m sure there are exceptions to the rule, and that there are a minority of people who live in poverty who are fighting to get out of it, but for the most part, if you look around you, if you do your research, you’ll see that poverty is, for the most part, generational, and by that I mean if you read up on the projects today, you’ll find third generation families who live in public housing much like the generation before them did. I’ve read about it in the Charlotte Observer (a virtual re-print of the NYT) in sympathetic articles about public housing and how the city should “do more” to “clean up” public housing developments and do more to make them “crime free.” These third-generation “slum” dwellers know how to work the system because they learned it from generations before them who did the same thing.

This is a direct result of the Great Society programs implemented by the Johnson administration in the mid 60s, programs that were put into place to “correct” problems that were exaggerated by the “enlightened” of the time, “problems” that were, in actuality, declining – no thanks to any major “help” from the federal government.

Exactly so. Part of the idea here is that the Democrats have built so much of their power base on such people. it’s always easier to float downstream than it is to swim upstream.  The So-called “Great Society” for all of its good intentions, did more to trap people in a permanent poverty situation.  Then it all of the discrimination, and other abuses you could name.

The Republican Congress back in 1995 managed to put a clamp on the amount of money going towards welfare programs with what it laughingly called at the time,  “welfare reform”.  The trouble is, that was only a small part of the total package, and in the end didn’t do a great deal to solve the whole problem.  That’s because events overtook the progress being made, and we ended up in a situation where the vast majority of the federal government’s expenditures are direct payments to individuals. do it for long enough, and it becomes a habit, both on the part of the federal government and those receiving its largess.

The article I’m linking here is worth your time, I commend it to your reading. you will notice if you look closely that I am also putting this under the category of swamp stompers, and the intent of that group is to eliminate some of the nonsense it’s been going on in Congress… to ‘drain the swamp’ if you will.  I submit to you that the only way that’s going to happen, is if we refocus our thinking on eliminating governmental largess to people who really don’t need it.  The only people that it benefits, is those seeking to buy votes.  Democrats, mostly.

Just some fireworks from last night.  Listen to the little ones having a time of it.

[wp_youtube]NaiuZ1eiKtQ[/wp_youtube]

Fellow Swamp Stomper Blue Crab Boulevard:

The 2008 Tournament of Roses parade was, yet again, a huge success. Cindy Sheehan’s “Absolute Moral Authority”, not so much.

Those who spent New Year’s Eve camped curbside were joined at dawn by giddy visitors arriving by car, bus and train. The city estimates more than a million people visit Pasadena during the parade and Rose Bowl game festivities. Gail Paulson was drawn to the parade route although she is blind. “There’s a lot a blind person can appreciate at this parade. There’s electricity in the air, the smell of the flowers, the clomping of the horses,” Paulson, 64, of Oxnard, said as her guide dog Elton led her to a seat…… …..Two groups were protesting at the parade. Dozens of anti-war protesters led by “Peace Mom” Cindy Sheehan staked out spots across from television cameras, hoisting signs reading “Impeachment is Patriotic.” The protesters were booed by parade watchers sitting in the grandstand. “This is not the occasion for this,” said Mary Feichtel, 63, of Florida.

Keep in mind, folks… this is SouCal. Even the liberals down there are at the end of their leash with this stuff. I wonder if we can take this as an indication of the outcome of the forthcoming elections, after we’ve watched the Democrats kissing the backsides of anti-war types like Cindy Sheehan?

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Mrs. Pelosi:

“The war in Iraq is the biggest disappointment for us,” … “I mean the inability to stop the war in Iraq.”
 

Don Suber, honorary Swamp Stomper:

Never bet against the American soldier. King George III did. He lost. Jefferson Davis did. He lost. Hirohito did. He lost.

Add Nancy Pelosi to the list

Don has kindly bestowed on the Speaker of the House, Mrs. Pelosi, the honor of “Loser of the Year.”   Don gives the award,  but we’ve got the picture.   I gotta admit, the table cloth Mrs. Pelosi is wearing does befits the honor

Bravo Zulu Don.

Word from the Jerusalem Post just now :

Palestinian Authority officials on Monday expressed deep disappointment after learning that US President George W. Bush, who is expected to visit Ramallah soon, does not intend to lay a wreath at Yasser Arafat’s tomb.

Well, that’s good, for two reasons. First of all, the possibility of an attack is extraordinarily high. Second because as a terrorist, Arafat deserves no such honor as a visit from the President of the United States… unless to urinate on the monster’s grave. Bush is showing good sense, here.

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Addendum:  (David L)

The Clinton’s idea of h0w to treat a terrorist.

It’s New Year’s Day, and I’ve got a day off.

I’m watching a huge orgasm in non-coverage occurring in the primary states this morning, particularly Iowa. in watching all of this nonsense the last couple of days I am reminded once again that the only tool that we have to analyze any of these happenings is the output of the pollster.  The bottom line, however, is that nobody in the realm of polling really understands what’s going on in this primary, nor do they understand how it’s going to turn out.

The Punditariat has been working overtime, the last several months, breaking down polls and trying to attribute even the most minute of swings to this statement or that from those running, or this happening or that from the real world… such as our starting to win in Iraq, or various financial stimuli, or this person or that making a fool of themselves or dying. (Alas, to some degree, BitsBlog included)

And in the end, we are no closer to understanding the outcome of all of this, than we were several months gone.  In typical fashion, we find ourselves in a situation of watching the candidates numbers edge ever closer together.  Thus revealing the fact that the pollsters never really did have an idea of what was going on, after all, and raising the question whether or not the numbers were ever quite so separated as they first showed us.

CNN, for example. after months of giving us numbers and analysis and timetables and pretty charts and scandal after scandal, gaffe after gaffe, attack and retreat, they now say:

DES MOINES, Iowa (CNN) — With two days to go until the Iowa caucuses, a new CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll out Tuesday shows both the Democratic and Republican presidential nomination races tied at the top.

But with a quarter of all Democratic voters and nearly half of all Republican voters still making up their minds at this late stage, almost anything can happen

Limbaugh’s been telling us for months that none of this matters until the vote actually happens. I”ve been saying that before the vote happens it’s all just positioning and stroking of egos.  We’re both right.  (One can better understand why Fred Thompson wasn’t too interested in being a part of all that. It’s a supremely phony, and frustrating experience to those not geared toward dealing in electoral fantasy.

In the end, the rule long established in the NFL about .”Any given Sunday” applies.  That’s why they actually run horse races as opposed to simply going on the horses record of wins and losses in calculating a victory or defeat.

Not that it’s going to mean a great deal more to us once those numbers are turned in from Iowa and New Hampshire; anyone who ends up anywhere in the top 10, in each party is going to claim victory.

One might get the impression on reading all of this that I’m cynically saying nothing at all. That assessment isn’t accurate on all points, but it’s close enough to get by with. Here’s the point, though; all of the expert analysis, all of the high-priced promotion, don’t amount to a full bag of guinea pig pellets.

Think about this; let’s say that none of the people in question actually fares well in the actual voting in the primary states.  Do you honestly think that all of these polling sources, and all of the talking heads are going to say “Gee, I guess we blew that”, and remain closed mouthed for the rest of the election seaason? I don’t think so either.

That’s why we’ve been so closed mouthed, about making predictions based on polling data, here at BitsBlog.  It’s true, we have made some statements here, which suggested that this candidate or that was burned toast.  Easy pickings, you might say…  but anyone who is still anywhere within the top 10, has a chance of winning the nomination, for each party. That’s the cold hard fact.

I say all of this to point two things that you need to know, as we go through this election season…

1: The race isn’t won until they’ve actually run it.

2: Who actually wins those races, comes down to you and I.

The primaries are a good time to listen to the individual candidates, and truly evaluate their ideas and ideals as they express them.  Think of it as a shopping trip.  We’re shopping for leadership.  I have no reservations whatever about evaluation about ideas, here. That’s what this blog’s focus has always been when we talk about political events. It is forever about the ideas. We have given approval or disapproval (the latter often enough in the form of scorn, or ridicule) about ideas expressed by the candidates… (or anyone else, for that matter) But never have we considered such ideas as filtered through polling data, for the reason I’ve been describing to you; the polling data in the end is meaningless.

You shouldn’t either.

(BBCT: Memeorandum for the CNN link)

Sen. Clinton, a candidate for the leadership of the free world, apparently doesn’t know the first thing about the country referred to by some as “the most dangerous place on earth”

 Thomas Houlahan, Middle East Times.

Hat Tip, John Hinderaker, Powerline.

More, Memeorandum.

Addendum:

The Video, via Bryran, Hot Air.   Anybody who is more incompetent on foreign affair than even Mike Huckabee has no business running for President.

Mike Huckabee’s campaign is over.  the campaign  has self destructed, video, via Stop the AC:LU.

Much more, Memeorandum.

 If Huckabeee got upset by Mitt Romney going negative, what would he have have done when Mrs. Clititon went negative?

I want to mention this before it gets too far off the pages of our papers:

The SanFranChron:

The two San Jose brothers mauled by a tiger on Christmas were released from a San Francisco hospital on Saturday, hospital officials said.

Paul Dhaliwal, 19, and Kulbir Dhaliwal, 23, were escorted from a little-used side door on the north side of San Francisco General Hospital, according to a hospital spokeswoman, and whisked away in a sedan without comment.

Their discharge came hours before a vigil for their friend Carlos Sousa Jr., 17, who was killed by the 300-pound Siberian tiger at the San Francisco Zoo. After the incident, the two brothers were rushed to the hospital and underwent emergency surgery for claw and bite wounds to their heads and upper bodies.

The release of the injured brothers came as zoo officials and federal inspectors were still trying to figure out how the tiger escaped from its outdoor grotto shortly after closing time on Christmas afternoon.

Most of you will know that the investigation revealed blood just inside the wall of the grotto, suggesting that someone… likely the kid who got killed, had his leg hanging over the edge of that wall. Of course we’ve also been hearing rather frantic calls to punish the zoo for not being to ‘standard’…

Well, look, let’s dare to apply a little bit of logic to the situation, shall we? They’ve not had an attack such as this in this zoo for years and years… and the wall in question has been around since the ’40’s.  Sound like bad design, to you, or as with me, does it sound to you like a few kids showing off in front of each other?

I could not let Bit have all the fun with the best articles of the year.  Retrived an utterly delicious Snark of the Day from the archives. 

The best Snark of 2007 is “Snark of the Day: Scarlet O’Clinton”

Hat Tip:  La Shawn Barber, La Shawn Barber’s Corner .

Good snarking is a guilt free pleasure, and this target richly deserves the snark.

…in OTB’s Caption contest

I fully recognize that taking Paul Krugman down a peg or three is akin to arm-wrestling an infant. The contest can only go one way, Krugman’s going to loose…and the winner is invariably left with the task of dealing with the losers soiled pants.

Still, Krugman’s readers, particularly his devotees, are mentally impaired enough to take him seriously.  Therefore, someone’s got to counter that. However, something so noble is not my intent. I come to analyze Krugman, not to bury him.  Whatever else he may be, he occasionally, in his self-absorbed misdirection, gives us a clue as to what’s going on in leftist groupthink.

And he even saves us the chore of wading paragraphs deep, this time, into his twaddle. He gives us the clue in the very first para:

Yesterday The Times published a highly informative chart laying out the positions of the presidential candidates on major issues.  It was, I’d argue, a useful reality check for those who believe that the next president can somehow usher in a new era of bipartisan cooperation.

And what is the clue, here? I said over a year back:

The only time you ever see Democrats talking about “bipartisanship” is when they realize they’re vulnerable.

Krugman, who is one of the biggest apologists for the left around, talking about bipartisanship. Think for a minute what that means. If they were confident of winning, if they were convinced they had the support of the American people, if their policy was that well recieved by the American people, do you think they’d be talking about bipartisanship? I don’t. It’s simply not in their makeup… and having read Krugman for many years, I can certainly tell you it’s not in his.

Think, now; They swore up and down that they were going to usher in a new era of bipartisanship when they took over congress. However, as even the left-wing Washington Post noted at the time, they were working to sideline Republicans before the very first gavel.

So why the push now for ‘bipartisanship’? Simple…. they know they’re bound to lose some of their power if they don’t play the old unity game.  They can always ditch the game after the election, just like last time.

(BBCT: Memeorandum)

First Mrs. Clinton was famous for answering questions from plants. Then she stonewalled David Gregory’s. Now she is stonewalling her audience. The Des Moines Register reports on [Mrs.] Clinton’s Silence:

Iowa Falls, Ia. – Iowans have noticed that Democrat Hillary Clinton has not been taking public questions from audiences during most of her final-push campaign rallies.

After her 40-minute monologue ended shortly before 10 p.m. Sunday, Clinton immediately began to sign autographs, pose for photographs and listen to caucusgoers… concerns one on one.

Iowa Falls resident Alene Rickels, 51, when asked her thoughts about the event, told a reporter: ‘Her speech was really good, but it would’ve been interesting to see how she reacted to questions.

‘I really thought she would take questions,’ said Rickels, a middle school teacher. ‘It’s late in the day, so I’m assuming that that’s the reason. I don’t know what she did the rest of the

I can think of several ways to describe Mrs. Clinton, some polite, others not, but none presidential

Hat Tip: Lucianne.

Addendum I:(Bit) In fairness, it must be pointed out that Obama has stopped taking questions, as well. Carrie Budoff Brown at The Politico:

Acknowledgments such as this one might be a footnote in another political year. But ever since Hillary Rodham Clinton’s organization got caught planting questions at Iowa events, campaigns have fielded criticism — and turned sensitive — about appearing overly insulated or choreographed.

The New York senator took heat last week for not inviting voters to ask questions, even though Obama hasn’t answered questions at his last eight events.

Obama aides went into overdrive earlier this month, trying to disprove what appeared to be another planting incident when an 18-year-old, who was wearing a press pass but initially identified himself to reporters as a volunteer, asked a friendly question about tax policy at an event.

Independent reporting found he was on assignment for his local Iowa newspaper, and his mother worked as an Obama volunteer.

It appears that both Clinton and Obama have discovered that it’s easier to stick to the script than to take questions. The hard questions make you look bad, and avoiding the hard ones by planting easy ones do, too.  If anything, I’m amazed that they both didn’t start leaning on the formulaic sooner than this.

Addendum II:  (David L)

Well Fred is taking questions and acting presidential.    As for not taking questions, Michelle gives yet another reason Mrs. Clinton  is avoiding them.

More:  Memeorandum.

It appears Improved Clinch has a heartbeat. Nice to have you back, John. Been too long.