Something important is happening in Massachusetts

American Thinker  "The Senate race between Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren is being shaped by the efforts of a blogger, Professor William Jacobson, of Legal Insurrection. This very high profile race reveals how important the internet has become to political discourse.  Once upon a time, only newspapers could launch inquiries and crusades that determined the fate of powerful politicians, but now a single, intelligent, skilled, and determined individual like Jacobson can take on the might of the liberal establishment in Massachusetts...
....
"Thanks to the internet, unlike 1992, we can push back on the feints intended to bury stories. And thanks to the tenacious and skilful research of William Jacobson, those implicated in the media manipulation face some accountability, if only public shame, and possibly more.

"The times, they are a changin'."

I also enjoy the bumper stickers Mr. Jacobsen regularly features in his blog:

And his Tony Branco cartoons:

Surprise, Surprise, Hugo Chavez Wins

politics.gather.com  "While the result was closer than in the past, the reelection of Hugo Chavez shouldn't surprise to anyone. After all through his manipulation of the Venezuelan Constitution and the fact he controls all the wealth in the country he is pretty hard to beat. The question arises is if this could happen here in the United States?

"Could the United States be ruled by a "President for Life" if Barack Obama gets re-elected? It could be possible. After all Obama has made a habit of skirting the United States Constitution through executive orders and illegal appointments, why couldn't he do the same with election laws?

"One of the reasons cited in the Time article on the election is:

They'll claim that Chávez's socialist crusade has made so many jobs dependent on el comandante that most Venezuelans felt fearful of employer retribution if they didn't vote for him.    Read more...

 Hat tip to Paul Roy at Conservative Bloggers on Facebook

Obama-Jay Carney congratulates socialist Hugo Chavez on his win in Venezuela Election

Let's look back to when a new, amateur President Obama first ventured into the world of foreign policy with these articles:

What did that 2009 Chavez-Obama handshake say to the world?
"But to some of his critics, the handshake was a sign of American weakness."
Dick Cheney  "accused Obama of taking an apologetic tone about past U.S. policy on his trips to Europe and Latin America."

Obama wins Hugo Chavez endorsement: 'I’d vote for Obama'  This speaks volumes. Let me repeat that once more in red letters:

Benneton ad: popcrunch.com/Benneton

Obama wins Hugo Chavez endorsement: 'I’d vote for Obama'

" "Chavez also said that if Obama could, he'd return the favor. 

  "Obama is a good guy ... I think that if Obama was from Barlovento or some Caracas neighborhood, he'd vote for Chavez."   That he just might do.

Good question: Why does President Obama ham it up with the likes of Hugo Chavez and yet seems afraid to talk to Fox News?

MsUnderestimated just posted this 2009 Ramirez cartoon

More recently, Marco Rubio calls Obama 'ALARMINGLY NAIVE' ON CHAVEZ'

Nevertheless, the populace endorsed once again ------- stated aim of converting -------- into a socialist state.  Fill in your choice of words.

Obama calls Romney a liar so it must be true

NRO; The ‘Romney Lied’ Defense  The real deception is the Obama campaign’s rank caricature of Romney.  "When Obama aides say that the real Romney didn’t show up in Denver, what they really mean is that he failed to live down to their rank caricature of him. The deception, though, isn’t the flesh-and-blood Romney, but the one-dimensional version broadcast far and wide by the Obama campaign. As he showed during an hour and a half of high-pressure television, Romney is a capable and intelligent man who is ready to be president and has a substantial reform agenda. The Obama campaign’s response to his debate victory basically was, “Don’t believe your lying eyes — believe our super PAC ads.” " Rich Lowry.

Do we see something like all this in the Monty Python sketch?

But I digress...

Via Patriot Update

Princeton Economist: Obama Campaign Is Misrepresenting My Study on Romney's Tax Plan  Quoting an Obama campaign press release: 

In fact, Harvard economist Martin Feldstein and Princeton economist Harvey Rosen both concede that paying for Romney’s tax cuts would require large tax increases on families making between $100,000 and $200,000.

"But that's not true. Princeton professor Harvey Rosen tells THE WEEKLY STANDARD in an email that the Obama campaign is misrepresenting his paper on Romney's tax plan:"....

"You can check the math that shows Romney's plan is mathematically possible here."

Mary Matalin Tells Krugman 'You're Hardly Credible on Calling Somebody Else a Liar'
"There were serious fireworks on the set of ABC's This Week Sunday."

"In reality, Matalin was likely expressing the sentiments of many on the Right sickened by constant media attacks on Romney since Wednesday's debate depicting everything he said as being a lie."

Unhinged Libs Urinating On Romney-Ryan Yard Signs….

Weasel Zippers     Stay classy, liberals.

Twitchy reports No apologies as yet   "Last week, Twitchy told you about unhinged liberals who are stealing and defacing Romney-Ryan signs. With Election Day nearing and the race tightening, some liberals have decided to up the ante:"

More "progressive" civility: Obama supporters threaten to riot if Romney wins

Is this what Obama meant when he called for a “more civil” tone in U.S. politics?

The debate cartoons just keep coming

Pre-debate cartoon showing quite different expectations for Mr. Obama


But later that same day...

Another toon like this.  Another.

5 To-Dos for Obama Before His Next Debate

....2. Ditch John Kerry;  Many are now speculating that Kerry's apparently lackluster prep may have left the president in danger of experiencing the same outcome as Kerry did in 2004: a loss. Ohio Sen. Rob Portman played the role of President Obama in Romney's prep sessions. Let's just say that in keeping with the sports analogy, Portman deserves a bonus, and Kerry may need to have his contract terminated.

What once was "Hope and Change" is now "Mope and Blame," and this time it's John Kerry under the President's bus.

Rush Limbaugh has this take on Kerry's failure to prepare Obama:

"....And because Kerry wants something, it is said that he went soft on Obama in debate rehearsals, because he didn't want to make Obama mad. Now, if we're dealing with somebody that petulant, if we're dealing with somebody that childish and immature -- which might well be the case. But they're asking us to believe a lot here."...

Reporter Lara Logan brings ominous news from Middle East

frontpagemag

Sun-Times Media   Lara Logan "made a passionate case that our government is downplaying the strength of our enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as a rationale of getting us out of the longest war. We have been lulled into believing that the perils are in the past: “You’re not listening to what the people who are fighting you say about this fight. In your arrogance, you think you write the script.”
"Our enemies are writing the story, she suggests, and there’s no happy ending for us.

As a journalist, I was queasy. Reporters should tell the story, not be the story. As an American, I was frightened.

"Logan even called for retribution for the recent terrorist killings of Christopher Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, and three other officials. The event is a harbinger of our vulnerability, she said. Logan hopes that America will “exact revenge and let the world know that the United States will not be attacked on its own soil. That its ambassadors will not be murdered, and that the United States will not stand by and do nothing about it.”"  (Emphasis added)

Video of her 60 Minutes interview.

US preparing to strike targets tied to Libya embassy attack  I don't see Obama having the cojones to do it, but, as with the debates, lowered expectations are good for this president.

"Obama has a range of options available - including drone strikes, Special Operations raids like the one that killed the al-Qaeda leader; and joint missions with the Libyan authorities - but all carry substantial political, diplomatic and physical risks. Administration officials say no decisions have been made on any potential targets, the Times said."

Obama's media

Covering for Obama's debate performance:  "By the way … the list of excuses for Obama’s performance continues to grow.  We had the “angry black man” excuse and, of course, the altitude.  Now we have the following: John Kerry didn’t properly prep Obama, Obama was thrown off by all of Romney’s lies, and Romney used a cheat sheet."

Signs accumulate that liberals are embarrassed by Obama  "President Obama's poor debate performance may have shattered some illusions among his supporters in the liberal media elite. Having invested themselves in the illusion of him as the fulfillment of the liberal dream of shattering glass ceilings and pernicious racial stereotypes, his evident lack of preparation felt like a betrayal to some. They are starting to catch on that they bought into an illusion.  So they are turning on him.

"Witness the shocking empty chair cover on the New Yorker, edited by Obama hagiographer* David Remnick:"

*ha·gi·og·ra·phy 
1: biography of saints or venerated persons

2: idealizing or idolizing biography

Hitler finds out Obama blew the debate

From Meemsy   Caution; we regret the need for a strong language advisory

Hat tip to Neal Boortz

Romney on foreign policy; The Romney Doctrine

Foreign Policy Magazine carried this before Romney's speech:  Advantage Romney? The GOP contender will seek to strengthen his foreign policy credentials today with a major speech at the Virginia Military Institute.
"In the speech, titled "The Mantle of Leadership," he'll ref George Marshall and Winston Churchill and lay out his priorities in each of the world's hot spots, according to The Cable's Josh Rogin, and explain how he believes it's time to "change the course" in the Middle East."

Max Boot, a leading military historian and foreign-policy analyst calls Romney's address  A Strong Romney Speech
"Take my opinion for what it’s worth (I am, after all, a Romney defense advisor) but that was a strong speech  that the governor delivered on foreign policy at VMI today. It was his most sustained and most convincing critique of the Obama record on foreign policy. At the heart of the speech were, I thought, his criticisms of Obama’s record on Iraq, Syria, and the fight against Al Qaeda. This is what he had to say:...
                                                    
Read the main points here...
...."That is a powerful indictment that, if delivered this cogently, Obama should find just as hard to counter in the final presidential debate, devoted to foreign policy, as he found it hard to counter Romney’s critiques of his economic policy record in the first debate."

From Nice Deb; Video: Mitt Romney’s Foreign Policy Address

Ace of Spades HQ; Romney's Foreign Policy Speech  "Much of his language is admirably old-fashioned in the best of ways -- the vocabulary is not much different from what you'd find in a Churchill address. There's a reassuring quality in that; the mind naturally associates timeless words with stability and solemnity.
"A good speech, certainly presidential, well-written and very well delivered. It did not contain any bold pronouncement, but reflected the basics of the standard Reagan foreign policy, as modified post-9/11."

The New York Sun; The Romney Doctrine
"What marks the Romney doctrine is a policy of strength and confidence, one that sees our strength rather than our apologies as the road to peace. We haven’t heard enough of it in the campaign so far. ... His remarks at Lexington make it clear that he has much more to say. It is a moment to be seized by those who are working for a change in direction at home and abroad and who remember, from the early 1980s, how fast America moved off the defensive and onto the road to victory once it had the right leadership in the White House.

Caroline Glick; The reign of imagination

Caroline Glick

"As he suffocated to death at the US Consulate in Benghazi on the 11th anniversary of the September 11 attacks on the US, did US Ambassador Christopher Stevens understand why he and his fellow Americans were being murdered? ....

"Hence Israel - the first target of jihadist Islam's bid for global supremacy - is a strategic burden rather than an ally to the US.

"Hence the US abandoned its most stalwart ally in the Arab world, Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, and supported the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood to power in the most strategically vital state in the Arab world.

"Hence it supported a Libyan rebel force penetrated by al-Qaida.

"Hence it is setting the stage for the reinstitution of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan."

Read the full article here...

The debate on Saturday Night Live

SNL covers the debate

Hat tip to conservativedailynews.com

A big welcome for the president

President Obama held a campaign event in Centreville, Virginia, on July 14th, 2012 prompting about 250 local residents to welcome him. Here's a short video of that event with music by Randy Travis...

http://www.youtube.com/embed/FVLOZuGM1BM?feature=player_detailpage

Hat tip to Walt Stier, Santa Maria, CA