A Good Lead For Dems On The Hill This November.

As we have covered in the past on several occasions, Capitol Hill gets targeted with some interesting ad campaigns. The most recent to grace the pages of Politico, however, seems more fit for a high school football game program than the halls of power.

It is an ad about the benefits of working at McDonald's, with seemingly no other purpose:

Maybe The New York Times Got This One Right.

We spend a decent amount of effort lampooning our effete and out of touch friends at the New York Times. They miss the boat on a lot of things. This is largely due to their snobbish and often anti-American world view. That said, wannabe Euro-snobs are often entertaining and occasionally they get a few things right. So let us give them credit where credit is due.

In 2003 the New York Times Magazine ran a now (in)famous cover story that asked if Spain was the "new France" in the culinary world. To the Times' credit, since then Spanish restaurants have rapidly climbed up every ranking in the business.

This week S.Pelligriono released their 2010 Top 50 Restaurants in the World List. Sure enough, four of the top ten are located in Castille o Aragon.

1. Noma, Denmark
2. El Bulli, Spain
3. The Fat Duck, UK
4. El Celler de Can Roca, Spain
5. Mugaritz, Spain
6. Osteria Francescana, Italy
7. Alinea, USA
8. Daniel, USA
9. Arzak, Spain
10. Per Se, USA
http://www.theworlds50best.com/awards/1-50-winners

That Old Time Religion.

Kentucky is the stage for one of the most interesting early Senate races this year. The Blue Grass State will almost certainly vote red in November and replace retiring Senator Jim Bunning with a fellow Republican. The primary is the real battle and it takes place at the end of May. Secretary of State Trey Grayson was considered the early shoe-in, but recent polls have shown this establishment favorite to be following in the foot steps of the Florida Governor: Grayson now trails upstart quasi-libertarian Rand Paul by double digits in nearly every poll.

Rand Paul is a doctor, first time office seeker and more notably the son of completely-libertarian Congressmen Ron Paul of Texas. There is plenty to write about the emergence of a candidate like this in a U.S. Senate race and Reason Magazine recently did a good job on that exact topic. What we find most notable about the younger Paul is his stance on foreign policy. He neither falls into his father's non-interventionist camp nor is he a nation building neo-conservative. Rather he seems to take what we consider to be the truly conservative foreign policy stance. One that Goldwater and a younger Reagan and Buckley could be proud of.

Unlike his father, Rand Paul believes in spending more on national defense. He supports a continued war in Afghanistan. And he seems to have no real qualms about going to war when war is needed.

Unlike the neo-cons who have dominated Republican foreign policy debates in recent years (at their best they are represented by the careful calculations of a thoughtful Dick Cheney and at their worst by the painful blovations of Rudy Giuliani), Rand Paul believes in ...gasp... actually declaring war before going to war. He insists that he supports the idea of an American presence in Afghanistan but would not support the current American activities there until a proper declaration of war is passed. Further, while he would increase military spending, he claims he would oppose every "defense" oriented program that is not actually about national defense. In other words, the money wasted by Clinton era Democrats transforming the military from a fighting force into a catalyst for social mobility, and the money wasted by W-Bush era Republicans on unnecessary, no bid contracts would both be cut if young Doctor Paul had his way.

Now obviously all of these things are easier said than done, but currently no one in the Senate is even giving these ideas lip service. If elected (and it looks increasingly like he will be) Rand Paul would be the only Senator with a truly paleo-conservative outlook on foreign policy.

Conservatives Should Reluctantly Support McCain.

Conservative icons Senator Jim Demint and Rep. Michelle Bachmann have thus far remained neutral in the Arizona GOP Senate primary. Many in the media have claimed that this amounts to a de facto endorsement of Former Congressman J.D. Hayworth's primary challenge to their moderate incumbent colleague, Senator John McCain. We hope, and very highly suspect, that Demint and Bachmann have stayed out of the fray so far to show support for the general idea of conservatives challenging moderates and not as implicit supporters of Hayworth over McCain.

Hayworth comes with the baggage of corruption charges from when he was in Congress and has a habit of making over-the-top statements that provide liberals with dangerous ammunition against the conservative movement as a whole.

McCain, on the other hand, has been a moderate Republican but still always a Republican. He has not committed Arlen Specter, Olympia Snowe, Lindsey Graham or Charlie Crist style treason against conservatives.

It is probably a good thing that Demint and Bachmann have not backed their colleague, as not to discourage future conservative challengers. Yet conservatives will still be best served by a McCain victory.

An Example Of What Is Wrong With Politics.

Ever wonder how a deep red, conservative state like South Carolina could elect a moderate like Lindsey Graham? Or how the party establishment in Pennsylvania could continue to support Arlen Specter until literally the day he jumped ship?

Look no further than Florida's Brian Ballard for the answer. If the GOP is not able to benefit from the current anti-Obama momentum, it will be the fault of folks such as Ballard:

To some Crist loyalists, the prospect of LeMieux siding with Rubio amounts to personal treason.

“George LeMieux would be a very good, very talented lawyer in South Florida billing hourly were it not for Charlie Crist,” said Brian Ballard, a Tallahassee GOP lobbyist who has vied with LeMieux over access to the governor’s ear and whose father-in-law was passed over for the seat Martinez vacated. “But he would not have the dream he’s had over the past few months of being a U.S. senator and he would not be considered for statewide elected office.” http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0410/36242_Page2.html

Does Ballard seriously mean to suggest that George LeMieux should decide to use his growing influence in a United States Senate race based solely on who he owes a favor to? This is not a dog catcher race or even state legislature. This is a major race. Charlie Crist could very well be the deciding vote in favor of the liberals on any number of fiscal issues.

Make no mistake: Friends, influence and favors matter in politics. But in elections such as this, they primarily serve as barriers to entry and not the final deciding factor. No matter how great a candidate's ideas are, he will not be able to run a successful U.S. Senate race without the backing of some very influential friends and donors. In the current race, however, both Marco Rubio and Charlie Crist have passed that barrier to entry. They both have notable endorsements and have raised sufficient funds. At this point, the race should be about qualifications, principles and feasibility of victory. (And if LeMieux still seriously favors Crist on these grounds, then so be it.)

At the end of the day, for a party hack like Ballard to demand that a sitting U.S. Senator make as important of a decision as this based solely on patronage suggests that there is an antiquated, flawed and crippling culture infecting Charlie Crist's Tallahassee. And it is state level problems such as this that could end up being Barack Obama's best friend in 2010 and beyond.

A Bad Use Of Resources.

Arlington, Virginia is the most educated county in the country. It is ranked in the top twenty in terms of median household income, is highly "walkable," and has a low crime rate. It is not a place where there are a lot of people deliberatly trying to break the law.

Over the past twenty four months, a notably high number of new restaurants and bars have opened in the Clarendon neighborhood of Arlington. Despite the economic downturn, these enterprises are thriving.

Over the past two decades Arlington has elected liberal after liberal to local, state and county offices. This along with law-and-order conservatives elected in the rest of the state results in a bad combination of liberal style over-regulation with conservative style zealous-enforcement.

Recently, despite no visible reason to do so, the Arlington Police and Fire Departments have launched gestapo-style fire code raids on the afformentioned Clarendon establishments. On a recent Friday night no less than five police cars with twenty officers backed up a fire marshall team to crowd the streets and sidewalks while they carried out their raids.

Arguably, there are good reasons for fire codes, but the manner in which the Arlington Police and Fire Departments have taken to carrying out their enforcement against thriving new businesses is unnecessarily adversarial and devoid of cooperation in a situation where no one is trying to do anything wrong. If these bars and eateries need to make changes to become compliant, a good deal of taxpayer funds and a general sense of civility can be saved by a different, less jack-booted approach.

This Day In New York Times History.

On April 23, 2000 the New York Times jumped on to the dot-com craze bandwagon by reporting about a massive increase in web companies leasing office space in Manhattan. By itself, this is not really noteworthy, but in typical New York Times fashion they took things a step too far and boldly proclaimed a new real estate order:

The report is an indication of how quickly new-economy companies, which include those involved in e-commerce, new media, network infrastructure, Web technology and software development, have gone from obscurity to become a major factor in the city's real estate market. http://www.nytimes.com/2000/04/23/realestate/commercial-property-manhattan-office-space-dot-coms-accounted-for-25-first.html?scp=20&sq=&st=nyt

Charlie Crist Is No Joe Lieberman

A recent Politico article, warned Florida Governor Charlie Crist that he would likely see his Washington establishment friends disappear if he ran as an independent. The same would likely occur in his home state.

The collective warning from Washington’s GOP establishment was one that Crist can’t afford to ignore as the April 30 filing deadline approaches. Statewide races in sprawling Florida, with its 10 media markets, are fought on the airwaves — which makes them expensive endeavors. And if Crist runs as an independent, his national fundraising could quickly dry up.

“If he runs as an independent, I think the best day he has is the day he announces,” a longtime Crist adviser conceded. “The normal rules of gravity apply. How do you raise money?”

This source, who has talked to Crist about his decision, said, “I told him that every Republican official is going to support [Republican Senate challenger Marco] Rubio. And by telegraphing this, you’re making them jump.” http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0410/36119.html#ixzz0ljnU6QtB

This is one of three main reasons why Crist would be ill-advised to run as an independent.

1) Crist ain't Lieberman. As discussed above, Crist would lose the support of allies, donors and advisers. Crist is simply not the type of establishment figure in his home state or nationally that Joe Lieberman was in 2006. Lieberman had spent nearly twenty years representing Connecticut in the Senate in 2006 and was just a handful of votes away from being Vice President in 2000. Comparatively, Crist has been Govenor for less than four years and was a virtual unknown outside of Florida politics before then.

2)Rubio ain't Lamont. Lieberman's liberal challenger was a fringe candidate. Ned Lamont was a product of a DailyKos inspired "netroots" movement. Rubio, on the other hand, is a mainstream conservative supported by everyone from Jim Demint to Mike Huckabee.

3)Florida ain't Connecticut. In 2006 the GOP had no chance in Connecticut. The Lieberman/Lamont race was a two-way contest. This year in Florida, however, the Democrats will have a chance. This may be the biggest factor of all. The Connecticut race was essentially a state wide do-over of the Democratic Primary and every voter knew it. That would not be the case in Florida.

Larry Kudlow On Tax Day.

From Larry Kudlow's show on Tax Day last week...

This Is Why You Don't Take Your Work To Happy Hour.

The website Gizmodo.com reported recently on what appears to be a next generation, not yet released Apple iPhone found lost and sitting in a bar in California. Apparantly, the device had been remotely wiped clean of its software and operating system by Apple when they realized that it had gone missing. Yet the nerdy-folk at Gizmodo were still able to take it apart and confirm that it was a genuine next generation or prototype iPhone. We have a feeling that someone in Cupertino will be in trouble.

The Evil “L” Word.

Lobbyist have become something of a cross between the boogie man and an easy, kill-the-man-with-the-ball style target in elections over the last decade. Hardly a campaign season goes by without attack ads from both sides claiming that their opponents are “in bed” with government relations professionals. Yet at its heart lobbying is just a matter of voicing an individual’s or a group’s opinion to elected officials. And doing so is kind of a key component to representative democracy, right?

Even at the “high paid” and “professional” level, lobbyists are primarily just conduits and advocates (albeit often slick ones) for their clients. To the extent that a small minority have undue influence over government officials, this is more of a generalized problem of ethics and corruption in government than anything else.

None the less, as part of the ever growing witch hunt against contacting elected officials…wait, “lobbying”…many states have enacted “grassroots lobbying restrictions.” These restrictions place obtrusive reporting requirements and severe penalties on any citizen who dares to influence the public debate without permission.

Fortunately, The Institute for Justice has filed suit to challenge such a restriction in Washington state and is looking into challenges in other jurisdictions.

Washingtonians from both sides of the political spectrum filed a lawsuit today to stop their state from monitoring, collecting and publicly disseminating information about the political activities of private citizens who do nothing more than urge their fellow citizens to take political action. They seek to vindicate the belief that if the First Amendment protects anything, it protects the right of all Americans to speak to one another about the issues affecting their lives without having to first register with the government.

There are few things more distinctly American than grassroots political activism. From town hall meetings and statehouse rallies to talk radio, blogs and “meet ups,” Americans are constantly finding new and innovative ways to participate in
politics. Through such activities, people can alert elected officials to constituents’ preferences, educate fellow citizens about how to make their voices heard, and even persuade the public to adopt new views. In fact, it’s hard to imagine our system of government working without an active and engaged populace of grassroots activists.

But little-known laws existing in a majority of states threaten to strangle this kind of political participation with red tape, ensuring that the public square is occupied by only those established voices that have enough resources to overcome the immense burdens imposed by so-called “grassroots lobbying” laws. These laws require groups to register with the state and file frequent and detailed reports about their contributions, expenditures and activities.

Under Washington’s “grassroots lobbying” law, if you urge your fellow citizens to contact government officials and spend more than the state’s arbitrarily low ceiling (only $500 in one month or $1,000 in three months), the government forces you to register with it and report your name, address, business and occupation, as well as the names and addresses of anyone with whom you are working to spread your message. The state also demands to know the names and addresses of each person who contributes more than $25 to your efforts.

http://ij.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3316&Itemid=165

The British Bill Clinton?

There is an old belief that former Prime Minister Tony Blair was the "British Bill Clinton." This train of thought, however, may have been challenged on Thursday night. In a British political first, the three major party leaders (and therefore candidates for Prime Minister) debated each other. The word on the street is that "third party" Liberal-Democrat leader Nick Clegg was the winner. A review of the debate shows a personable Clinton-esque performance by Clegg. Let's take a look...

Compare this performance by Tory David Cameron and Clegg (the video link starts at 15:00, watch for about two and a half minutes, until at least around 17:20):



With this one by President Bush and then Governor Clinton:


Amazingly similar! And it only took the British eighteen years to catch up to this level of discourse!

EDIT: Also, when talking about crime they really make Britain seem like an awful Clock Work Orange type place.

It Is Just So Well Written!

Next time you hear praise for the New York Times, remember that it is written by guys like this:

Congressman Grayson And The Florida Tea Party Party.

As the world now knows, Orange County, Florida mayorial candidate Matt Falconer and Congressman Alan Grayson are not strangers.

But there is more to the story. Last week, in an email to supporters Falconer said the following (emphasis added):

This week the Florida Tea Party Party sent a fundraising letter to Republicans in Orange County using my name to promote donations to the "Florida Tea Party Party." I did not provide authorization to use my name in the letter nor do I endorse or support the Florida Tea Party Party. The letter came as a complete surprise to me.

Because I know these blind requests for donations cost more to mail than they bring in donations there is a hidden agenda behind the Tea Party Party fundraising letter. The letter may have cost $8000 to mail and if they are lucky bring in $1000 in donations. Someone other than the Florida Tea Party Party leaders paid for the mailing.

The brains behind the Florida Tea Party Party is political operative Doug Guetzloe. Doug's current political customers on his radio show advertisements include Congressmen Alan Grayson and my opponent Mildred Fernandez. I suspect Mildred Fernandez has employed Doug Guetzloe to do what he does best; to throw mud on opposition candidates. I now view the Florida Tea Party Party as a political consulting firm not a political party.

This is a pretty big accusation by Falconer, not just against Fernandez but implicitly against Congressman Grayson as well. And there is more: The only official candidate of the newly formed Florida Tea Party Party is nominally running “against” Grayson. Former Republican Peg Dunmire is running as a third-party Tea Party Party candidate in the 8th Congressional District against both Republicans and Grayson. Many observers argue that such third party Tea Party candidates will only serve to split conservative votes and benefit Democrats like Grayson.

Notably, after the announcement last month of Dunmire’s out-of-left-field candidacy the good Congressman suprisngly took the time to comment and respond. Even more suprising, however, he has not yet commented at all on the assertions and accusations in the above email. And Grayson is not one who normally stays silent about any accusation.

Why is Grayson paying attention to this under-funded, third party "challenge" from Dunmire and then suddenly going silent at Falconer's implicit accusation?

Fat Americans And Their Fast Food!

The fast food industry has been something of a whipping boy for the liberal elite New York Times-Washington Post set. From Super Size Me to Fast Food Nation, red and yellow fast food straw men have been routinely set up and knocked down.

A new bout of this will likely occur with the release of KFC's new "sandwhich:"



How bad for you is the KFC Double Down? Let us compare:

• The standard fried version of the Double Down is 540 calories.


• The grilled version of the Double Down is 460 calories.


• The Carmelo's Chicken Rigatoni from Macoroni Girll is 1080 calories.


• A large Cranberry Supreme smoothie from Smoothie King is 1108 calories.

For reference, gaining a pound is usually the result of consuming roughly 3,500 extra calories. Look at the above numbers and do the math.

Now clearly the best results would be achieved by eating something sensible and healthy like a plain turkey sandwhich or carrot sticks. But none-the-less the jump to demonize fast food joints is often misguided.

Would Term Limits Create More Alan Graysons?

The National Review Online recently featured an analysis of Florida Congressman Alan Grayson questioning whether the often over-the-top Democrat even wants to be re-elected. His recent antics truly call this into question. Furthermore, his pre-existing personal fortune would suggest that he does not really need the work (or the opportunities and connections that come with serving in Congress). In short, he does not have much personal skin in the electoral or political game.

Which leads us to another question: If all House members were destined to serve only a short pre-determined maximum amount of time, would more be prone to act out openly like Grayson?

More Sage Wisdom From The New York Times

Last week The New York Times published an article on a new literary movement: The exploration of the concept of "knowing that they know that you know." This concept has been previously explored in as lofty of mediums as a the primetime sit-com Friends. Never the less, the NYT reports that this movement might represent a chance at revival for the waining field of literary academia.

Hmmmm. We don't know.

To illustrate what a growing number of literary scholars consider the most exciting area of new research, Lisa Zunshine, a professor of English at the University of Kentucky, refers to an episode from the TV series “Friends.”

(Follow closely now; this is about the science of English.) Phoebe and Rachel plot to play a joke on Monica and Chandler after they learn the two are secretly dating. The couple discover the prank and try to turn the tables, but Phoebe realizes this turnabout and once again tries to outwit them.

As Phoebe tells Rachel, “They don’t know that we know they know we know.” This layered process of figuring out what someone else is thinking — of mind reading is both a common literary device and an essential survival skill. Why human beings are equipped with this capacity and what particular brain functions enable them to do it are questions that have occupied primarily cognitive psychologists.

Now English professors and graduate students are asking them too. They say they’re convinced science not only offers unexpected insights into individual texts, but that it may help to answer fundamental questions about literature’s very existence: Why do we read fiction? Why do we care so passionately about nonexistent characters? What underlying mental processes are activated when we read?

Ms. Zunshine, whose specialty is 18th-century British literature, became familiar with the work of evolutionary psychologists while she was a graduate student at the University of California, Santa Barbara in the 1990s. “I thought this could be the most exciting thing I could ever learn,” she said.

At a time when university literature departments are confronting painful budget cuts, a moribund job market and pointed scrutiny about the purpose and value of an education in the humanities, the cross-pollination of English and psychology is a providing a revitalizing lift. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/01/books/01lit.html

The "Congressman From ACORN" Has A Meltdown At Perkins.

"W" Finds A Place To Wipe His Hand.

Will Google Have An Easter Theme Tomorrow?

Google put up a "happy holidays" theme on Christmas and a celebration of Hans Christian Anderson on Good Friday. Check tomorrow and find out.

UPDATE 4/5/2010: Google had no theme on Easter Sunday.