It was reported by Matt Drudge that England’s Prince Harry, son of Princess Diana and Prince Charles, was deployed to the front line of the war in Afghanistan.

First, I love Prince Harry. I find him to be incredibly brave and I think that Princess Di would be proud of her youngest son. However, I am irked that information on his deployment was leaked.

Prince Harry already has a huge target on his head just because of who he is and to magnify that target by giving his location in a war in which radical Islam would behead the boy in an instant is extremely disturbing.

Shame on Matt Drudge for having this on his website. Truthfully, there is no reason in the world why this should have come to light and it only puts the Prince in harms way and diminishes any respect many had for Drudge, including myself.

In any event, England has been forced to pull Harry from Afghanistan so the only thing that Drudge succeeded with when he decided to blow Harry’s cover is taking another good guy out of the mother of all fights and making the mark on the Prince’s head a little bigger.

Sadly, according to the Telegraph Drudge isn’t sorry for spilling beans.

Others: Hot Air

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Update: The man who was staying in the room where the Ricin was found is hospitalized and in a coma. Police claim that they don’t believe that this incident is terrorist related. However, I’m a bit confused; the man who reported the Ricin is unidentified and wasn’t a guest of the motel. Can we conclude that the unidentified man has ties to the comatose man? The whole story seems to still be developing and is quite strange to say the least.

The toxin Ricin was found at a Las Vegas extended stay motel. Ricin is derived from castor beans and is so toxic that the amount of a pinhead can kill an adult person. The toxin gets inside the cells of the body and prevents the cells from making vital protein.

Reportedly an unidentified man, who was not a guest of the motel, brought it to the attention of motel workers:

The substance was brought to the attention of employees at Extended StayAmerica, 4270 S. Valley View Blvd., at approximately 2:30 p.m. by an unidentified man who gained access to one of the motel rooms, though he was not staying at the property, police said.

The motel employees thought that the substance looked suspicious and called authorities. The employees and others who came in contact with the toxin have been decontaminated and hospitalized for observation.

Officers on the scene said that the Ricin was in a small vile along with the actual castor beans.

Source: Las Vegas Sun

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Last night, I was discussing with my mother the British woman I met in Florida who said that the situation in England, vis a vis Muslims, is much worse than even the papers describe. Aside from pointing to political correctness as the culprit, I also also laid the blame, as did the British woman, on Britain’s unlimited immigration problem, hatched at Oxbridge and imposed on the rest of the nation. My kids, who were listening, asked what unlimited immigration meant.

I explained to them that it’s healthy for a country to take in new people, because it brings in new ideas and new energy. However, I said that a country should be able to control how many come in, and should be able to ensure that the people are healthy and are not criminals. They looked blank. I sought an analogy. Imagine, I said, if we went into downtown San Francisco and announced that anybody who wanted could come and live in our house. All they had to do was show up. And imagine, I said, that the ones who showed up were drug addicts and crazy people and criminals, as well as some nice people. Their eyes widened. I went on to explain, and they agreed, that within minutes of this policy, our house would be trashed, stinky, and minus all its nice stuff. They agreed that a country, just like a homeowner, ought to have (and exercise) control over those whom it invites in.

Why does this involve San Francisco? Because I just read today that San Francisco, in violation of federal law, is again inviting criminals into its borders and to use up taxpayer funded resources:

San Francisco’s “sanctuary” policy for illegal immigrants, which has drawn sharp criticism from conservatives, will be promoted in an advertisement campaign complete with multilanguage brochures and radio and TV public service announcements.

The city-funded outreach campaign is expected to roll out this spring and build on San Francisco’s response to last year’s federal immigration raids, which city officials said scared undocumented immigrants into not accessing city services, reporting crimes or sending children to school.

City officials Wednesday were not able to provide The Examiner with a cost breakdown for the campaign.

“We have worked with the Board of Supervisors, Department of Public Health, labor and immigrant rights groups to create a city government-wide public awareness campaign so that immigrants know The City won’t target them for using city services,” said Nathan Ballard, Mayor Gavin Newsom’s spokesman.

[snip]

Supervisor Tom Ammiano, who is working on the planned outreach campaign to undocumented immigrants, said it will ensure “a lot of deserving people” take advantage of city services. “To me, it’s a logical follow-through.”

Boy, am I glad I don’t live in San Francisco anymore. It would drive me into a frenzy to know that my money was being used to turn the City into a haven for criminals. (And I do believe that all illegal aliens, even if they’re not violent or criminally negligent, are criminals because, by definition, they’ve broken the law.)

[Discuss this article with Bookworm over at Bookworm Room...]

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One thing I love about Tivo is the way it gets to know your preferences and makes helpful “suggestions” about things you may want to watch. I don’t mean it taps you on the shoulder and says “Hey, there’s a great show on right now. Shall I record it?” It just records it, and let’s you decide. I have to confess that at first I wasn’t crazy about my Tivo thinking I wanted to watch the latest episode of “Tyra,” but there’s a learning curve for everyone, even a device. Now that it has gotten to know me, it’s much more insightful.

So this morning I discovered that my Tivo has helpfully recorded Tuesday night’s Anderson Cooper 360, and so I got the pleasure of hearing AC lead off the show with the “controversy” surrounding the way that local radio host Bill Cunningham introduced McCain in Ohio yesterday, which he described as “a taste of the sleazy campaigning and swift boating to come.” MMM …let me see, swift boating, as in when you tell the truth about a liberal’s record or policy positions and it’s considered a vicious personal attack?

You’ve probably seen the tape. If not, I’ll put it up later. It’s just as well that you have some time to gear up before viewing it. I warn you: this video is not for the faint of heart. Mr. Cunningham actually–are you ready for this?–called Barack Obama by his full name! I’m not kidding! He said it: Barack Hussein Obama. He also said–I’m sorry, but I hope you won’t find this too offensive–that Obama is a product of the Chicago political machine and friends with notorious political fixer and current underwear sharer, Tony Rezko. How dare this guy tell the truth about Barack Hussein Obama!

If you think I’m being sarcastic, you’re right, but my sarcastic demand for an apology is just that: sarcasm. Unfortunately, Sen. McCain felt the need to apologize for this guy’s remarks as well. Perhaps one of my friends who tells me that I need to support Sen. McCain can explain to me why referring to a candidate by his actual middle name and stating facts about him constitute words that require an apology or need to be taken back.

[Discuss this article with Teri O'Brien...]

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The headline caught my eye — “Right wing plays Muslim card against Obama” — since it was such an obvious attempt to smear all conservatives as, not racists, but religious-ists. As you now, while a conservative radio host did make a speech in which he emphasized Obama’s actual, real, true middle name, McCain was quick to reject the implications behind that speech. In addition, some of the earliest attacks on Obama’s Muslim heritage came from the Clinton campaign, not the Right.

Given all the nasty implications in a seven word headline, I was interested to see how the rest of the article stacked up. It pretty much matched the headline, since it was a patchwork of half truths, outright falsehoods, and sleazy innuendos. Here’s a little fisk of one of the Chron’s front page stories:

When a conservative talk show host introduced Sen. John McCain at an Ohio rally this week and referred to his possible opponent by his full name - “Barack Hussein Obama” - he highlighted a probable attack strategy, should Obama get the Democratic nomination: American xenophobia. [Please note my comments above, to the effect that the emphasis on Obama's religious heritage started as a Clinton strategy and that McCain has gone on record to distance himself from this approach. Also, while there is no doubt that Cunningham emphasized the Hussein part of Obama's name, this paragraph is so disingenuously written that it makes it sound as if any reference to Obama's middle name has become off limits.]

If the ascendancy of Obama and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Democratic race shows that Americans’ attitudes toward race and gender have evolved, the latest round of media images alluding - incorrectly - to an overseas Muslim upbringing for Obama will test the degree to which Americans fear foreigners in a post-Sept. 11 world. Obama is a Christian who never worshiped at a mosque and was raised in a secular household. [To the extent all the statements about Obama's non-Muslim upbringing are asserted as absolute, inviolate truths, this is simply wrong. While Obama was not raised as a strict Muslim, was not educated in a Madrassa, and does not now profess to be a Muslim, he was definitely given instruction in Islam during his time in Indonesia and attended mosques. This, coupled with his father's Muslim background is sufficient to make him a Muslim, if not in his own eyes, in the eyes of ] He attends the United Church of Christ.

Nevertheless, these allusions raise new issues for Americans accustomed to presidential candidates with WASP-sounding names. About 48 percent of the respondents to a February 2007 Pew Research Center poll said they would be “less likely” to support a candidate who is Muslim; 48 percent said it made no difference. The same poll found that 50 percent of respondents would be less likely to support a candidate 70 or older; McCain is 71.

The Muslim allusions “do resonate with people,” said Karen Hanretty, an unaffiliated GOP consultant who formerly worked for former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson. “The vast majority of voters are Protestant or Catholic, and it is unfamiliar to them.”

She predicted that the incorrect Muslim references to Obama will continue [Except for the debunked claim that Obama attended a radical madrassa, everything else this article refers to as an "incorrect" Muslim reference is, in fact, correct. Obama does have a Muslim middle name. He did receive Islamic instruction. He did attend mosques. While none of these statements may reflect the radical Christian he is today, none are incorrect.], but probably wouldn’t emanate from the McCain campaign or the national GOP. Instead, they would flourish anonymously on the Internet or be pushed by independent organizations not connected to the candidates. [Did you notice that the article, now in its fifth paragraph, never explicitly mentions the fact that Sen. McCain explicitly rejected any attempts to attack Obama by implying that he is a practicing Muslim?]

Rumors on the Web

The anti-Muslim baiting has shadowed the Obama campaign for more than a year, when a widely circulated, yet untraceable, e-mail stated he was Muslim. The Obama campaign thinks enough of the power of these rumors that part of the campaign Web site is dedicated to debunking them, using headings such as “Barack is not and never has been a Muslim.” [This is actually an interesting statement from the Obama camp. What religion is a child? His mother and birth father were committed leftists, so their God was probably Communism. He was raised in Indonesia at a school that gave him Muslim religious instruction. His stepfather took him to mosques. At any time, someone could accurately have referred to him as "that Muslim little boy" or, given his Mom's views, "that little atheist boy." The fact is, his childhood religious affiliations, imposed upon him before he reached the age of reason, are irrelevant given that, as an adult, he instead embraced radical Christianity, not Islam. The more accurate statement probably would have been that, "While Barack was exposed to some Muslim education as a child, he is and remains a committed Christian."] The contents of the anonymous e-mails also have been debunked by various media outlets.

Still, for much of the last year, the Muslim whispers have largely passed below the mainstream media radar. But the allusions and images have intensified in recent days, much of them expressed in a cultural shorthand for anti-Muslim sentiment and preying on post-Sept. 11 fears, analysts said.

A 2006 photo of Obama in Kenya wearing traditional Somali dress, including a turban, was leaked to the online Drudge Report, and quickly picked up by mainstream outlets. At a McCain rally Tuesday in Ohio, conservative talk show host Bill Cunningham three times referred to “Barack Hussein Obama” - a none-too-subtle reference to the late Iraqi leader, Saddam Hussein, analysts said. McCain denounced the remarks afterward. [Ah! At last, we've reached paragraph 8 and, considering that the article attempts to paint all right wingers as Islamaphobes ready to kill at the drop of a hat, we finally get what should have been in paragraph one -- the frontrunner's repudiation of smear tactics.]

This week, the Tennessee Republican party sent an online memo to supporters entitled “Anti-Semites for Obama,” saying Americans should be concerned about “the future of the nation of Israel, the only stable democracy in the Middle East, if Sen. Barack Hussein Obama is elected president of the United States.” [And this is absolutely true, not because Obama had some instruction in Islam as a 9 year old, but because he is a Leftist associated with an antisemitic, black supremacist church.]

The memo highlighted recent praise of Obama by Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan, who has a history of anti-Semitic remarks. (Obama denounced Farrakhan in Tuesday’s televised debate with Clinton.) [But he's not denouncing Wright, is he?]

The memo also featured the photo of Obama in the Somali outfit over a caption saying, Obama is “pictured dressed in Muslim* attire in a 2006 visit to Africa.” At the bottom of the Web page next to the corresponding asterisk, the Tennessee GOP admitted that it wasn’t actually Muslim attire but “rather Somali-tribal garb.” [That was, in fact, a stupid tactic, although it certainly made visual sense given the article's thesis. Travelers often dress in local garb and, unlike the Palestinian kufiyah, which has become a stand-alone political statement, other garb from Muslim communities doesn't have any political odor attached -- it's just local color.]

No response from RNC

Republican National Committee spokesman Paul Lindsay declined to respond whether the party would refer to Obama by his full name, saying, “This election will be decided on the important issues facing this country, and that’s how our party intends to win. At the end of the day, voters will reject the Democratic agenda of massive government spending, higher taxes and retreat in the war on terror.” [Get that? Again, Obama's given, legal name is off limits for the debate. This is PC gone mad.]

McCain spokesman Brian Rogers said Wednesday that “Sen. McCain has been clear that he rejects those sorts of tactics. He wants the campaign to be about the issues.” [At last! Given McCain's prominence in the campaign -- he is, after all, the inevitable Republican candidate -- the story took long enough to get around to this explicit statement about McCain's views on this subject.]

Still, even mainstream outlets are chiming in. This week, Time magazine blogger Mark Halperin outlined a 16-point analysis titled “Things McCain Can Do to Try to Beat Obama That Clinton Cannot.” Point No. 11: “Emphasize Barack Hussein Obama’s unusual name and exotic background through a Manchurian Candidate prism.” [Why can't Clinton do that? As I noted at the top of this article, she's already done so more than a year ago.]

“It’s Islamophobia,” said Dina Ibrahim, an assistant professor of broadcast studies at San Francisco State who is Arab and Muslim. “Stick a turban on somebody and call them a bad guy.” [Well, the fact is that certain Muslims do have a little problem with violence, but I freely concede that Obama is not a Muslim, and that my problems with him have nothing to do with his middle name or his childhood exposure to Islam.]

So what’s wrong with calling Obama by his full name? “Because Americans are overly sensitive of terrorists, and they’ve been trained to think that every Muslim is a terrorist,” said Ibrahim. [How dumb do they think we are?]

Conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh - who often calls Obama by his full name - dismissed such fears as political correctness. On his syndicated radio program Wednesday, Limbaugh blasted McCain for apologizing about Cunningham’s remarks, saying, “What if John McCain’s middle name was Adolf instead of Sidney?” [You go, Rush!]

E-mails have legs

No matter what commentators left or right are saying, the Muslim-alluding e-mails continue to travel online. [The nature of emails like this is that we truly don't know their origin. Given Clinton's campaign tactics, it's just as likely that the come from her camp. Why does the article imply that the emails are an evil, racist, Right-wing phenomenon?]

Lori McKinnon, a 43-year-old suburban Dallas resident who nearly always votes for Republicans for president but is now volunteering for Obama, said, “Everyone gets that Muslim e-mail down here. It’s a really big deal.”

But Pew Research Center President Andrew Kohut said, “The remarks may be inflammatory, but there is such a broad acceptance of Obama that it’s doubtful they would do much harm to him. It could whip up the extreme right, but that’s about it.”

“I think the question (of such allusions resonating with voters) has already been answered. Voters have looked at that stuff and said, ‘Why are people talking about that?’ ” said James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute and a Democratic Party superdelegate who supports Obama. “He’s not anti-Semitic. He’s not a Muslim. But he respects the religion of Islam.”

It’s a lousy story and it’s a hit piece on the Right. More than that, it sets up a straw man that allows the media, again, to avoid actually looking at the real Obama: the man who wants to disarm America; who expressly rejects choosing judges who actually apply the law, as opposed to contemplating their liberal navels; who intends to spend America into a stagnant European style economy; who has the stench of Chicago politics and political favoritism hanging about him; who intends instantly to withdraw from Iraq, thereby snatching defeat from the jaws of victory; who deeply admires one of the loudest black voices touting antisemitism, anti-Americanism and black supremacy; who has a bad habit of speaking out of both sides of his mouth; whose wife and mother dislike America and all that it stands for; and who has the most liberal voting record in the Senate.

By the way, that’s just a partial list of things both conservative and moderate Americans should fear when it comes to Obama. The middle name issue is a straw man — it’s not the real thing. We don’t need to fear “Obama the Muslim,” who doesn’t exist, except for purposes of newspaper smears. We do need to fear Obama the uber-liberal and the man who surrounds himself by people who hate America, who hate capitalism, who hate whites, and who hate Jews.

(Incidentally, the only election attack that I know of that was truly a direct religious attack, as opposed to all the innunedo contained in this article, came from Democrats, not Republicans.)

[Discuss This Topic With Bookworm]

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The title to this article is exactly how I’d write it if I were a political hack trying to drum up a faux controversy for use by other political hacks in the mainstream media. Which is exactly what Sam Stein of the Huffington Post did on February 12th as he broke out the yellowkid journalistic mold for a fantasy leftist hack attack on John McCain headlined in giant font, McCain Received $100,000 From Firm Of Abramoff Notoriety.

Before I comment further on the idiocy of Stein’s assertions it is only fair that I mention that there is nothing in his article that isn’t true just as there isn’t anything untrue in mine here. Barack Obama did in fact receive over $80,000 from the same firm that Stein tries to hang John McCain with. In addition both John McCain and Barack Obama were eclipsed by the $162,450 amount received by Hillary Clinton from employees of the same jaded firm.

All figures are compiled by OpenSecrets.org by doing a donor lookup with “Greenberg Traurig” as the donor occupation and each respective candidate in question as the recipient. You must search for recipients using “lastname, firstname” to get the full results.

With the above information in mind I’d like to invite you to take a look into the play book of journalistic hackery and dissect how activists twist and spin the facts to convey their own illegitimate fantasies of republican corruption.

On the stump, Sen. John McCain has touted his work tackling the excesses of the lobbying industry to bolster his reputation as a “maverick” reformer.

“Ask Jack Abramoff if I’m an insider in Washington,” McCain often contends. “You’d probably have to go during visiting hours in the prison, and he’ll tell you and his lobbyist cronies of the change I made there.”

But how much change did McCain actually effect? And is he all that removed from Washington’s special interests?

A review of campaign finance filings shows that the Arizona Republican has accepted more than $100,000 in donations from employees of Greenberg Traurig, the very firm where Abramoff once reigned.

Those donations include several thousand dollars from registered lobbyists who represent, or have represented, businesses such as NewsCorp, Rupert Murdoch’s media empire; Spi Spirits, a Cyprus based company that has fought with the Russian government for the rights to the Stolichnaya vodka brand name; El Paso Corp, a major energy company; General Motors; and the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition, a group of businesses and trade associations “concerned” about the shortage of lesser skilled and unskilled labor.

All told, McCain has received more than $400,000 from lobbying firms, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. And among his major fundraisers (”bundlers”) 59 have been identified as lobbyists by the non-profit organization Public Citizen.

There is nothing illegal about these contributions. But campaign watchdog groups and McCain’s opponents view them as more than just a reflection of political irony. McCain, they argue, has on occasion been far more bark than bite when it comes to taking on lobbying interests.

Indeed, this past week, the Democratic National Committee put together a memo challenging McCain’s assertion that he was a corruption hound while investigating Abramoff. The document and some government watchdog groups note that while McCain put pressure on Jack Abramoff and several prominent Republicans, he also went out of his way during the Indian Affairs Committee hearing to spare his congressional colleagues.

This is what passes as investigative journalism nowadays. You’d have to be stupid to pass this off as a story. What’s worse, that Sam Stein is waiting for e-mails from the DNC to write such a moronic story or that neither of them can seperate fact from fantasy when ignoring the fact that other groups Stein might not be critical of received money from employees of the same firm such as the Democratic Congressional Campaign Cmte, 21st Century Democrats, DNC Services Corp, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Cmte, Moving America Forward, Moveon.org, Democratic State Central Cmte/Maryland, New Hampshire Democratic State Cmte, New Millennium PAC, To Organize a Majority PAC, New Hampshire Democratic State Cmte and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Cmte?

If you are going to sling mud you might as well do some credible research. Keep that in mind as you read Stein’s latest salvo, an equally thin piece that is being parroted by the likes of Keith Olbermann alongside Air America’s Rachael Maddow that implies that McCain protected some in the GOP from the Abramoff scandal. Coincidence? Hardly. Hack job? You bet.

Terry Trippany is the editor and publisher at Webloggin.

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Frankly, I don’t know if I’ve ever said it on my blog, but both my mother and Don Quixote can corroborate the fact that I’ve been saying for years that mutually assured destruction is not deterrent when dealing with Iranian leaders because they not only believe in the Muslim equivalent of the Apocalypse, they also believe that it’s their responsibility to bring it about. These same leaders, therefore, are not worried that sending off a nuclear bomb will result in one coming right back to Iran. Instead, they think that’s a pretty darn good idea. (Of course, it would be an equally good idea, at least from my point of view, if they’d just turn the bomb on themselves and leave us out of their end-of-days visions.)

Since this whole thing is a truly horrible thought, I probably shouldn’t be so pleased that noted Islamic scholar Bernard Lewis is now saying the same thing about Iran. However, since I would believe the risk Iran poses to be true even if Lewis didn’t second it, it salves my intellectual ego to know that I’m in good company with regard to my end-of-the-world nightmares.

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In several posts over the last few days, I’ve commented about Disney efficiency. Thousands of people are fairly painlessly shuffled from place to place; Fast Passes are a think of beauty, especially if individuals handle them well; everything is immaculately clean, including the overused bathrooms; the equipment functions superbly well considering the demands made upon it; and the people who work there are pleasant and handle their jobs with competence. The whole place is a testament to corporate efficiency. Many, however, think corporations are bad things (Obama, anyone?) and, if elected, assure us that they will see to it that the government will manage more and more aspects of our lives (healthcare, anyone?).

For those of you who think this liberal vision is a good thing, I’d like to give you a little example of how the government handles things, along with the added bonus of some insight into how disability advocates view society’s obligations to them:

Where else but San Francisco City Hall could a 10-foot-long wheelchair ramp wind up costing $1 million?

Thanks to a maze of bureaucratic indecision and historic restrictions, taxpayers may shell out $100,000 per foot to make the Board of Supervisors president’s perch in the historic chambers accessible to the disabled.

What’s more, the little remodel job that planners first thought would take three months has stretched into more than four years - and will probably mean the supervisors will have to move out of their hallowed hall for five months while the work is done.

“It’s crazy,” admits Susan Mizner, director of the mayor’s Office on Disability. “But this is just the price of doing business in a historic building.”

Supervisor Jake McGoldrick said Tuesday that the issue went to the heart of liberal guilt that often drives the city’s decision making. He also choked on the price tag, and asked that the board take some more time to come up with an alternative, like maybe just getting rid of the president’s elevated seat.

The root of the problem dates back to when City Hall got a $300 million makeover in the 1990s that made just about every hallway, bathroom and office accessible to the disabled. The exception was the board president’s podium, which is reachable only for someone who can climb the five steps from the chamber floor.

The understanding was that the room would eventually be made fully accessible. But no one worried about the podium until 2004 when Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier, who uses a wheelchair, joined the board.

City architect Tony Irons and representatives of the state Office of Historic Preservation - which had to be consulted to make sure the city was sensitive to the building’s designation as a state landmark - were called in to take measurements.

Then preservation architects from the San Francisco firm Page and Turnbill worked up no fewer than 18 design options - at a cost of $98,000 - with ideas ranging from an electric lift to abandoning the president’s lordly podium altogether.

No one could decide which design to use, so after a year of arguing, the Department of Public Works was ordered to make 3-D computer models of all the options.

The ramp won, which means lowering the president’s desk, which means eliminating three of the “historic” stairs and tearing out Manchurian oak panels that are no longer available, which in turn will mean finding a historically correct replacement.

And because the ramp was going to encroach on the room’s sound equipment, officials decided they might as well use the opportunity to upgrade the board chamber’s entire audio-visual system, to the tune of $300,000.

Here’s what else is going into the million-dollar ramp:

– $77,000 for the city’s Bureau of Architecture project manager, design and construction fees.

– $455,000 for the actual construction, plus asbestos removal.

– $28,000 for a construction scheduling consultant.

– $3,500 for an electrical consultant.

– $68,000 for the Bureau of Construction Management to oversee the construction and various consultants.

– $12,000 for Department of Technology and Information Services oversight.

– $16,500 for permits and fees. (Yes, believe it or not, the city charges itself.)

– And as much as $65,000 for bid overruns.

All for a total of: $1,123,000.

And counting.

The supervisors considered signing off on the work Tuesday but put it over for another week. Even if the board gives its final blessing, however, construction of the ramp won’t be completed before the end of the year - midway through Alioto-Pier’s second and final term.

“I deserve equal access to every part of the chamber,” Alioto-Pier told her colleagues, adding that ending discrimination is worth the $1 million. [Emphasis added plus this point: One million in taxpayer money, that is.]

Incidentally, I am not unsympathetic to the hurdles the handicapped face in this world. It’s also true that many handicapped access ramps and bathroom stalls extend an unexpected benefit to moms with strollers. However, as I’ve blogged before, there has to be some cost/benefit analysis before we give over huge sums of public money, not to benefit all or most of the handicapped, but to benefit one person (as in Alioto-Pier, the only wheelchair bound supervisor ever) or, as is often the case with relentless bureaucratic initiatives, no persons at all.

[Discuss this article with Bookworm over at Bookworm Room...]

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William F. Buckley has passed away at the age of 82; the exact cause is unknown although it is reported that he had emphysema.

Bill Buckley was born Nov. 24, 1925 in New York City. He was the sixth of 10 children of a multimillionaire and he spent his “early childhood in France and England, going to private Roman Catholic schools.”

Mr. Buckley’s list of accomplishments are quite impressive; William F. Buckley, Jr was a :

More important than the above list of accomplishments is that Mr. Buckley was respected by many and he will be missed.

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I’m wondering…why are we supposed to be upset with Bill O’Reilly and not Michelle Obama?

O’Reilly dared to mention the word “lynching” and the name of a black person in the same sentence. Never mind that there was nothing derogatory in his statement, just the mere presence of the “L” word indicates…pretty much whatever we want it to mean.

Meanwhile, some of the same people trying to lynch Bill O’Reilly (it’s okay - he’s white!) are also playing word games with Barack Obama’s wife, Michelle. This is another example of one person being wrong by having his words twisted around and another person being defended by having her words…twisted around.

It depends on what the meaning of the word “is” is. Michelle Obama drew some deserved criticism for a recent speech where she said (her words), “For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m really proud of my country.”

The defenses range from the leftist standard of saying that anything unpatriotic spoken by a member of the left is really patriotic (in it’s own peculiar way) to mincing words that she either left out or meant to say. One pro-Obama comment to USA Today emphasized that the word “really” (as in “really proud”) makes all of the difference. Another opinion piece on Newsvine tries to convince us that national pride and love for country are two different things, that because Michelle Obama has virtually never been proud of her country, it means she loves her country. Leftists are torn between being proud of her remarks and mincing words in clumsy attempts to soften or redefine them.

There is legitimate criticism of her remarks - it isn’t based on her feelings but rather her choice of words. Words have meanings and any speech writer worth their credentials would know better than to put such careless language in a presidential campaign speech (and any serious speaker would know enough to question them prior to saying them). This is one of the inherent problems of a leftist being put in a position to make public comments about the nation that don’t jive with run-of-the-mill Americans, whether those comments touch on patriotism, racial issues, issues of life…few honest comments from the left are supposed to be taken at face value by non-leftists.

One attempt to convolute the meanings of her words suggests that she is simply not proud of certain things about her country. Basically, because we invaded Iraq, she is justified in suggesting a lack of pride in her country…if that is what she really said, which we’re supposed to also believe isn’t what she really said.

It doesn’t really add up.

I’m not proud of the entitlement state we are sliding into. I’m still proud of America.

I’m not proud of the tens of millions of abortions in the last few decades. I’m still proud of America.

I’m not proud of our disgraceful abandonment of Southeast Asia at the end of the Vietnam War. I’m still proud of America.

I’m not proud of the Democratic Party (or Republicans at times for that matter). I’m still proud of America.

Never mind that Michelle Obama has come back with the ‘clarification’ that she is indeed proud of her country. She had followed up the line in her speech claiming a sudden pride in America by saying that, “Not just because Barack is doing well, but I think people are hungry for change.”

In her clarification however, she seemed to backpedal on this by saying her pride is based on how her husbands supporters are rallying around him. The rhetoric of “change” is almost as annoying as her anti-pride remark. She doesn’t care about “change”, she cares about change that benefits her candidate husband. Michael Bloomberg could run on the silly campaign strategy of “change” and if Obama supporters left his side to swarm around Bloomberg, I suspect that her “pride” for the country’s rally around “change” would magically disappear. Every election to a leftist is about change…unless the incumbent is a leftist.

There is an oft ignored lesson in this for Democrats: you can’t win elections by being honest. No one in the Obama camp thought at the time that there was anything wrong with expressing a decades long lack of pride in America. It wasn’t until reactions woke them up that they suddenly realized that these rather simple words needed ‘clarification’.

Clarification is necessary because honesty in this regards will cost her husband votes. Until her husband loses, she will come up with ways to be proud of this country.

For the rest of us, it’s not that challenging.

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