Knife to a Gunfight

David Frum is about to debate Michael Moore on BBC World. Should be interesting. A smarmy. cynical Hollywood hypocrite with a reputation for deep dishonesty vs. a Reagan Whitehouse speechwriter.

Well Said

See NZ Pundit on the US election. Wish I'd said that.

The Guardian's Freudian Slip Apology

The Guardian sort of, kind of apologised in a Clintonian-Ratherian way.

"The final sentence of a column in The Guide on Saturday caused offence to some readers. The Guardian associates itself with the following statement from the writer. "Charlie Brooker apologises for any offence caused by his comments relating to President Bush in his TV column, Screen Burn. The views expressed in this column are not those of the Guardian. Although flippant and tasteless, his closing comments were intended as an ironic joke, not as a call to action - an intention he believed regular readers of his humorous column would understand. He deplores violence of any kind."

Maybe they meant "disassociates"

An ironic joke, huh, Charlie? Why don't you try making a few ironic jokes about bombs or hijacking next time you're in the check-in line at Heathrow, or better yet, Kennedy.

What a moron.

The Guardian Calls for Bush's Assassination

Bush hatred among the foaming-mouth left has reached its logical end with Guardian "writer" Charlie Brooker's fatwa against President Bush.

That right, a columnist in a serious, if somewhat deluded publication, one that has editors and sub-editors and other people whose job is control the rantings of its more feverish employees, has called for the murder of the President of the United States. We're all used to the sweating screeds against Bush, but murder is normally limited to pet media in Tehran and Damascus. This is far beyond the pale.

It's time for a boycott of Guardian advertisers.

And lets hope that a couple of serious gentlemen from the Secret Service and their friends at Scotland Yard pay a call on Mr. Brooks. It's a crime in both the United States and Britain to call for the assassination of public figure or to incite to murder.

The Golden Handshake

Ackbar over at New Zealand Pundit has this on the Tamihere kiss goodbye. The Waipeirera Trust will pay IRD their pound of flesh. remember folks, that was once your money. So let me get this straight, the Government collects taxes which they hand over as treaty settlement dosh, which various iwi shovel back at politicians--earned or not. If we did that, it would be illegal.

Well, that should certainly do it.

Now I know for certain that Kerry is not man who is firmly grounded in reality as most of us understand it. He's asked Al Gore to campaign for him in Florida. Now whose stupid idea was this? Karl Rove's? Gore is a delusional bi-polar, a switch with only two settings: crushing, drool inducing, pedant or gibbering paranoid wildman. Gore reminds me of those old East European royals forever plotting to regain the throne of Lower Blowmevia

What is with Kerry? I never thought he was much except an old lefty blowhard, but I can't figure out who keeps giving him lame advice. Could be Karl Rove, that Evil Genius; could be Bubba throwing a spanner into the works to give Hilary a clear shot in 2008; could be Ter-ay-za "Let Them Get a Real Job" .

Bush must be chortling in his sleep over this.

John Tamihere

Cold Mountain
Poor old John Tamihere, he was a bit of a blowhard, but you had to like the guy, kind of like Winston Peters with attitude. Unfortunately, he forgot that Nanny doesn't like Maori with attitude who look they might stray off the Labour plantation, especially if they stray in a government car. Nanny saves up secrets and she'll tell them if you make her angry.

OK, he took the money after he said he wouldn't, but that's not the first time a politician said something on the hustings and then did something else, right Nanny? Further, it looks like he earned it.

I hope he joins the Maori Party and kicks Labour's smug ass in a byelection.

PC Idiocy Watch

Things like this make me wish that were somebody authorised to take officious, supercilious bueaucrats out of their cubicles and administer stern warnings, followed by a sound beating. Can this wanker possibly be serious? I'm afraid so, and that ladies and gentlemen, is why I am a refugee from the land of my birth. Recent visitors, I beg you, tell me is everybody in the United States this precious?

Granted Washington state is very near the great center of PC lalaland. But banning Halloween because it's offensive to Wiccans? What is a Wiccan anyway? And don't send me any self important crap about how it's serious business.

Circling the Drain

As the Kedwards campaign begins the final slog of its journey to oblivion, David Brooks explains why. Read the whole thing, but this pretty well sums it up:

But there is a deeper assumption, which has marred Democratic politics for
years. Some Democrats have been unable to face the reality that people have
been voting for Republicans because they agree with them. So these Democrats
have invented the comforting theory that they've been losing because they
are too virtuous for the country.

I said a long time ago that W was easily beatable given a credible Democratic candidate I don't know who that would be, but there must be some Democrat out there somewhere who doesn't feel compelled to take policy advice from Scotch soaked old dinosaurs like Kennedy or airheaded Hollywood types. There's lots of noise coming from Greenpeace or NOW or Moveon.org or the teachers' unions or the Hobbit Vegans Against Bad Thoughts, but the fact is there aren't enough of them to elect the party's candidate. Clinton understood that. He took their money, squeezed a little ass, then tacked right and beat Bob Dole like a red headed stepchild.....badda-bing, into the White House.

A lot of conservatives are not happy with Bush's domestic agenda, but whether one is so-called neocon, or a paleocon, or an angry white male, or gun toting, Bible banging redneck, or a Wall Street suit, national security at the moment trumps all all domestic issues. One can debate whether that should or not be so, but there it is.

Read Roy Jenkin's biography of Churchill. Nobody liked him, nobody liked what was happening domestically, but the UK needed a wartime leader and the opposition failed to offer a credible one. As soon as the war was won, Winston was out out on his ass.

I suppose finally I return to my case that the active core of the Democratic Party is far to the left of the electorate's consensus, and more importantly, the Party doesn't even realise it. I put this down to the self-referential relationship between the party and the coastal media. They just don't listen anyone who says they might be wrong.

Anti-Americanism in Europe

This article by Carol Gould was sent to me by a friend. It set in motion a chain of thought which ended in, "Why in the name of God should Americans give a tinker's dam about Europe?"

Most Americans would to be too polite to point out that it was exactly this kind of moral cowardice, political blindness; cheap, gutless racism and unthinking slavishness to prejudice that let the real Nazis walk all over Europe like a toilet floor.

Most Americans would to too polite to remind the moral geldings of old Europe of the repeated gross failures of their political arrangements, or the extreme debt in blood and treasure they owe to the United States.

Most Americans, outside of Berkeley or Ann Arbor anyway, wouldn't conclude that the entire continent has been releived of its critical faculties by French hucksters like Jacques Derrida.

Most Americans wouldn't think to suggest to that we should offer residence to every Jewish man, woman, and child between Lisbon and Moscow so that old Europe can get with becoming a society of old white socialists and teenage Muslim radicals.


Most Americans, but not me.

Wanted: Sleazebag Trial Lawyer. Contact Kerry for Prez

It may be time to let John Kerry sink into self-parody and drown and move on to more important things...like hammering John Edwards for the fraud and the liar that he is. Charles Krauthammer doe a pretty good job of showing Edwards up for a trailer trash shyster. What next, is he going promise to raise the dead?

Neighbours: Type A and Type B

Whether you live in a large apartment complex, a suburb, or even a farming area, you know that there two types of neighbours. When Type A neighbours ring your doorbell unexpectedly, you invite them in, open a bottle of wine or make some coffee, and sincerely hope they can stay for dinner. When Type B neighbours drop over, you turn off the lights, remain very quiet and sincerely hope they go away. When I heard about John Edwards and his wife making snide cracks about Dick Cheney's daughter, it hit me. The Edwardses and the Kerrys are Type B and the Bushes and Cheneys are Type A.

Kerry is just clueless and Ter-ay-za is just obnoxious, but John Edwards is repulsive.

The man is the very epitome of an ambulance chasing trial lawyer..he'll say anything to win. It wasn't just the stuff about Mary Cheney, but that business about how the lame will walk again if Kerry is elected was sickening.

Senator Yellowstain

US Senator Mark Dayton, Democrat of Minnesota, fears that terrorists will target his Washington DC office building between now and the inauguration....so he's closing the office and packing back to his home in the Canada-like state of Minnesota. Don't forget to close the cellar door after you.

Coward.

The Aussies

Heartfelt congratulations to the Australians, who have proved once again that they are firmly with civilisation and against barbarism, that they will not fail or falter in the face of danger. On the second anniversary of the Bali bombing, and in the shadow of al-Qaeda's gross attempt to influence their election with the Embassy bomb in Jakarta, the Australian people have proved what they're made of. Unlike the cowards in Manila and Madrid, or the carping appeasers in Berlin and Paris, the Australians stand tall.

And where is New Zealand?

Two Years On

Cold Mountain

It is 2 years today since the capering and grinning emissaries of Hell blew up that nightclub in Bali. 2 years on and still the Australians stand on the side of civilization. God bless Australia.

It Does Get Better.

Here in the former Politically Correct Republic of Christchurch, the voters threw out the lefty city council with the weekend's beer bottles. The headline in the Press was predictably, "Voters Reject Left and Right Options". Nonsense, the voters threw out almost the entire Christchurch 2021 slate, stalking horses for Labour and the Greens. Head Commissar, oops, Mayor Garry Moore, managed to hold on though.

And what were they mad about? Garbage bags.

It behooves us all to pay more attention to the portents of small events.

Can It Get Any Get Any Better?

I don't think I've had a better Sunday morning since that Christmas in Cambodia...oops, wrong story. Anyway, opening the newspaper to see John Howard re-elected, Mark Latham with that kangaroo-in-the-headlights look, millions of Afghanis turning out to vote, and the cherry on top of my Sunday.......Jacques Derrida gone straight to Hell....metaphorically speaking of course.

ACT

What is it with the Christchurch Press and ACT? Has Rodney Hide somehow offended folks in our fair city? I was at the ACT regional conference last week and I saw a bunch of people, suits and jeans-wearers alike, who are seriously tired of handing over more than a third of their income to Helengrad to hand out on Labour's little vote buying schemes. Rodney wound up the crowd with a humorous, have-to-laugh-to-keep-from-crying, speech on how Nanny Helen and and her little helpers have a solution to everybody's problems--just hand over more money to Nanny, and she'll help you spend it on the right things. Catherine Judd, what a woman, made the assembled press look small and small-minded. Deborah Coddington gave an excellent speech on the NCEA. (Saint) Roger Douglas rallied the faithful.

Keep Don Brash honest....give your party vote to ACT.

This Has Got to Be a Joke

The National Front couldn't invent this in their wildest goose-stepping dreams.Under this theory we could all be paying Ngati Bludgeu a dollar for every breath of air we take, every step we make on New Zealand soil, and every drink of water (or anything made with water, unless of course we use Perrier). Do we get a refund when we piss or exhale? I've had about enough of this and I suspect most Maori have as well, first it was the electromagnetic spectrum, now airspace. Call me reactionary, but maybe the government should consider deducting from any treaty settlement the costs of the infrastructure, judicial system and medical care that are a result of European settlement. Is there some good reason why New Zealanders are required to reject 2000 years of western civilisation for a dying Stone Age culture?

If this is true......

Drudge has a very strange report that Kerry may have been using a crib sheet at the debate in violation of the agreed terms. Kerry, with his back to the audience and most cameras, pulled something out of his jacket pocket and placed it on the podium just before the start. The strange thing was the non-answer that Drudge got from the Kerry team. Instead of just saying that it was a pen, or comb, or a nose hair trimmer or his lucky CIA decoder ring, the flak just said, "Kerry didn't cheat."