Fun with SiteMeter

Filed under:Blogging,Heh,Wacky Oregon — posted by Anwyn on December 30, 2007 @ 11:20 pm

Somebody came to this blog by googling the phrase “how healthy is it to live in oregon.”

Well, it depends. What political persuasion are you, and how high do you like your blood pressure?

I Have Only One Word for You, Ms. Rowling

Filed under:Authors — posted by Anwyn @ 11:18 pm

Resist.

Someone Lit a Fire Under SeeDub

Filed under:Cool,Politics,Priorities — posted by Anwyn @ 8:47 pm

Damned if you do (want it too much) and damned if you don’t (seem to). The double-twisted vise you’re caught in when you run for president. Fred Thompson has already given an answer that more than satisfies me:

In the first place, I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t. I wouldn’t be doing this if i didn’t. I grew up very modest circumstances. I left government, I and my family have made sacrifices for me to be sitting here today. I haven’t had any income for a long time because I’m doing this. I figure that to be clean you’ve got to cut everything off. And I was doing speaking engagements and I had a contract to do a tv show, I had a contract with abc radio like I was talking about earlier and so forth. I guess a man would have to be a total fool to do all those things and to be leaving his family which is not a joyful thing at all if he didn’t want to do it.

But I am not consumed by personal ambition. I will not be devastated if I don’t do it. I want the people to have the best president that they can have.

But I approached it from the standpoint of a deal. A kind of a marriage. If one side of a marriage has to be really talked into the marriage, it probably ain’t going to be a very good deal for either one of them. But if you mutually think that this is a good thing. In this case, if you think this is a good thing for the country, then you have an opportunity to do some wonderful things together.

I’m offering myself up. I’m saying that I have the background, the capability, and the concern to do this and I’m doing it for the right reasons. But I’m not particularly interested in running for president, but I think I’d make a good president.

But as SeeDub points out with considerably more heat and extra helpings of what should be, but apparently isn’t, Mr. Obvious logic, it isn’t just what he says but what he does.

No, he doesn’t want to be President. He just loves debating with Ron Paul. He just loves fielding moronic questions from ham-headed local reporters. He just kissed off a plum lifetime job on one of NBC’s flagship dramas, where the catering truck was right there and the interviews by the entertainment press were light and fluffy and respectful and there weren’t any “hand shows” about global warming.

Of course, he’ll always treasure those hours spent in briefings talking about ethanol subsidies to policy wonks. You just know he gets a warm fuzzy feeling coming up hat in hand to strangers, asking them to keep his campaign bus fueled and his commercials on the air. And he just gets his rocks off on having James Dobson wonder whether he’s really a Christian or not. Woo hoo!

Preach it.

Quote of the Day

Filed under:Cool,Politics,Priorities — posted by Anwyn @ 6:53 pm

Daddyman, upon watching Fred Thompson’s video message to the Iowa caucus-goers: “Did he just say he’s going to save the Democratic party, too?”

Electability: “Now I’m asking my fellow Republicans to vote for me not only for what I have to say to them, but for what I have to say to the members of the other party–the millions of Democrats who haven’t left the Democratic party so much as their party’s national leadership has left them. In this campaign I’ll be seeking the support of millions of Democrats who no longer believe that they can trust their own party’s leadership on the issue of national security. I’ll be seeking the support of millions of Democrats with young families who’re beginning to see the economic burdens they may face because of their party’s leadership’s taste for high taxes and politically motivated refusal to fix Social Security and remove the threat of the shortfall in federal benefit plans that could be a catastrophe for younger taxpayers. And finally, I’ll be seeking the support of Democrats who are weary of spin politics and the permanent campaign, and endless attempts to control the media dynamic–who think policy stances ought to be judged on a higher criteria than what works better in a sound bite or fits this week’s campaign message guidance. So I’ll be asking good Democrats as well as independents to give us another chance to see if a Republican president and Congress that’s dedicated to conservative principles can move forward with an agenda that goes beyond mere partisanship and political expediency and actually deals with the long-term foreign and domestic crises we face.”

What makes that statement stand out is the marked lack of any drivel about “consensus” or “bipartisanship.” The reality is that people who agree on issues have consensus; people who disagree can get, at best, compromise. Thompson should appeal to Democrats who are less interested in straight-up opposition to whatever the current Republican administration is doing and more interested in what’s actually best for a given situation. I know at least one Democrat who already said to me, after seeing Thompson on Meet the Press, that he could live with him as president because he seemed like a reasonable, intelligent person–which are the main two characteristics required for working with opposition. Those calling the loudest for “consensus” are usually the ones with the most stridently unreasonable policy ideas–or those with no ideas at all, who prefer to whine, “Can’t we all just get along?” Not so Thompson–he runs the way I’ve always thought most sensible: Vote for me if you agree with these positions I’ve outlined. Period.



image: detail of installation by Bronwyn Lace