According to the AP, “Democratic leaders say they’ve emptied the swamp of congressional corruption.”

Is that so? Over fifty Democratic members of Congress are still swimming around in the muck:

. . . nine senators and 43 congressmen — are hanging on to more than $368,000 in donations they received from embattled former House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., during the 2008 election cycle.

Those 53 are in marked contrast to the 27 incumbent Democrats who earlier this year returned $378,000 in campaign donations from Rangel’s political action committee, including nine who returned $165,000 but only after being asked about the funds by The Examiner.

Nancy, by your standards, my apartment is spic and span.  Didn’t know that I needed to do to clean it up was to declare it clean.

If the Speaker were serious about draining the swamp, she would ask her friend Charlie Rangel to resign his seat, you know, and end his career with dignity.

And anyway, can you think of a more bone-headed way to handle two ethics investigations of prominent Democrats by declaring that you don’t have a corruption problem in your house?

*(not to mention 9 Senators).

Global Warming Causes Monkeys To Hate Squirrels (for good reason).

(H/t Reader Sonicfrog.)

Every time Republicans lose ground in federal elections, we hear the same chorus coming from the Beltway establishment:  conservatism has had its day, Americans are moving left.

We heard it in 1982 and again in 1992, very clearly in 2006 and most definitely in 2008.

But, if you look closely at each of those elections (save 1982), the victorious Democrats had not defeated Republicans running on a Reaganite record, but Republicans who had adopted the Washington habits of their Democratic peers.

And let us recall that the most successful Democratic President since FDR, Bill Clinton, won not by opposing Ronald Reagan, but by co-opting his ideas.  In 1992, he wasn’t running to expand the federal government, but to re-invent it (whatever that means) and to “end welfare as we know it.”  He may have governed more to the left than he campaigned in his first two years in office, but, after Republicans won Congress in 1994, he quickly shifted gears and steered clear of tax increases and big-budget boondoggles.

No man has ever been elected president by running against Ronald Reagan.  The American people have never repudiated his ideas at the ballot box.  Indeed, the last Democrat to win the Oval Office did so by borrowing Reagan’s rhetoric, you know that stuff about “living beyond our means” and proposing “a net spending cut.”

If we had a real reformer in the White House, we’d see real estate values plummet in our nation’s capital as people long sucking at the teat of the federal government would have to find more productive uses for their talents and energies.  Instead, we see the Washington, D.C-area weathering the great recession much better than other jurisdictions across the country:

The Washington Business Journal reports that while nationwide CEOs of top companies saw a 5.5 percent pay hike, Beltway-area CEOs saw a 37 percent raise — more than in any other city.

This may be yet another symptom of the new Giant Sucking Sound: the nation’s wealth rushing to the seat of government power in the wake of the Bush Bailouts and Obama’s spectacular increase of government’s role in the economy.

Other symptoms: DC’s housing market is the second-strongest in the nation according to one recent measure; the richest county in the nation, and 6 of the 10 wealthiest, are DC bedroom communities; and the area’s unemployment is the lowest in the nation.

The lesson is clear: government, not the free market, is where money is made these days.

But, since government does create wealth, instead as one politician might put it, just spreads it around, it soon too may have trouble finding the resources to pay for the extravagant habits of Beltway denizens.

This is why We, The People are now armed with questions and video cameras to confront our elected officials.

Outrageous.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

One reason the headline Log Cabin v. USA so struck me is that in nearly emptying all my e-mail boxes these past few days, I’ve been struck by the absence of independent thinking among gay organizations in coming up with “solutions” to the problems and difficulties gay people face in contemporary society. And it seems that Log Cabin is no different.

Instead of considering how conservative ideas could benefit gay individuals, they have (all too often) simply deferred to the agenda of the various left-leaning national gay organizations on gay issues as if all gay people must back them because, well, these are the gay issues. And in almost every case (save for legislative repeal of Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell (DADT)), they back policies which either expand the size of the federal government (and, in some cases, state governments as well) and increase its scope. Or both.

Many of the leaders of Log Cabin have, like all too many Republicans, alas, not realized how much the world changed with the inauguration of Ronald Wilson Reagan now nearly thirty years ago. When he spoke these words, he indicated a new approach to addressing our nation’s problems (an approach which neither his vice president nor that future president’s son fully understood):

“In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”

In fashioning a conservative approach to gay issues, gay Republicans should ponder those words. Do we really need more laws to address the issue at hand?  Or, would free-market reforms benefit gay people?

We first saw Log Cabin consider this approach at its national “convention” in 2005 when Chris Barron, then the Political Director of the organization, promoted then-President Bush’s proposed Social Security reforms, noting how they would particularly benefit gay people.  But, with Chris moving to GOProud, his new organization, in many ways, represents the Reagan “revolution” while his old one, in many ways, represents the old Republican guard. (more…)

JammieWearingFool helps us get at the most telling aspect of the John Kerry boat-berthing/tax-dodging story:

The fallout continues for the laughingstock John Kerry and his woes over the good ship SS 1040. Or maybe to use his own words we should call it the Botched Joke. Ironically by running to his favorite newspaper to try and control the damage he’s just kept the story alive.

(H/t Instapundit.)  Emphasis added.

And the last thing he wants to do is keep this story alive.  Other bloggers and pundits have focused on the hypocrisy angle:  while the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee grandstanded about corporations who seek tax shelters abroad, he sought one in a state bordering the one he represents in the Senate.

What JWF gets at is that the last thing any rich politician wants to do: draw attention to his own luxury purchases — particularly in these tough economic times.  Think about this for a moment, many men and women dream of owning their own boat to take to a nearby body of water for weekend and holiday recreation.  They work hard to scrape up enough money to buy a decent boat that costs less than one-tenth (if that) of what Kerry would have owed in taxes on his new yacht had he berthed it in his home state.

Let me repeat:  many Americans dream of owning a boat worth less than one-tenth of the state taxes Kerry attempted to dodge on his new yacht.

Not just that, he had had the yacht built abroad while many Americans, including presumably many boat builders, are out of work.  If he were up for reelection this fall, he’d be a goner.

One final note:  can you imagine the hullabaloo if this were a story about a Republican?  Or if, say, a Republican former president spent a couple of million bucks on his daughter’s wedding?

So, it seems speaking your mind is good for your mental health — at least it makes your feel better:

In a series of studies, researchers surveyed over 1,000 adults to find out if they considered themselves to be activists for any particular issue, from supporting antiwar politics to championing human rights [What about standing up for freedom?  Ed.]. And the researchers found that the stronger a person’s activism, the better that person felt — as long as his or her activities weren’t extreme. Specifically, the highly engaged activists reported experiencing more positive emotions, feeling more satisfied with their lives, and feeling more connected to others.

Guess that means Tea Party patriots are a happy lot.

Does this apply to blogging as well?  I mean by speaking out, you know, writing about certain issues, do we in a sense become activists for them?  Thus the more we blog, the better we feel.  Gotta remember that on days I’m feeling down.  It has been my past practice to avoid blogging when I’ve been in a foul mood (for what I thought were obvious reasons).  Maybe I should change that.

I saw this news item yesterday…

Colombia denies plans to attack Venezuela - BBC.com

Venezuela has sent extra troops to its border with Colombia “in case of attack”.  Colombia has emphatically denied it plans to attack Venezuela. The denial follows accusations by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez that his Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe, is “capable of anything”.  A spokesman for the Colombian government called President Chavez’s remarks “deceptive” and said Bogota had never even considered an attack.

On Friday, President Chavez said he had sent extra forces to the border to boost Venezuela’s defences.  In a phone call to Venezuelan state television, he said the deployment included soldiers, air units and special forces.

Colombian government spokesman Cesar Velasquez said claims that Bogota was planning to attack its “brother nation” were an attempt by President Chavez to deceive his people.

And everything going on in the world at this moment gelled in a scary thought:  What if, in a coordinated manner, Venezuela attacks Colombia, Iran attacks Israel, and North Korea attacks South Korea.  There have been very scary ties between all three of those potential aggressor nations.

If that three-pronged attack happened, how would Obama respond?  Not to mention the rest of the world.

I hope this is just a scary passing thought by a crazy blogger and nothing more.  I also hope war-gamers at the Pentagon have had the same thoughts.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)