Living Well is the Best Revenge

And if you happen to be a Conservative PM of Canada there is no better way to make your life a little better than solving the most recent iteration of the decades softwood lumber dispute between Canada and the US, something the previous 2 Liberal administrations failed to do, in less than 3 months in office.

And the nashing and wailing from the opposition must sound like music to their ears, when mixed with the praise from the Premiers of the three provinces involved with this bitter battle, especially when 2 of the 3 provinces are run by the provincial counterparts of the very same federal opposition parties that are trying to condemn the multi-billion dollar deal.

Compare and contrast

I just found it interesting to compare Cole Smithey's review of Paul Greengrass's 'United 93' to his review of Michael Moore's 'Fahrenheit 9/11'.

Smithey is just one of only 5 critics to pan 'United 93', but he acts as a pretty good example of 3 of the other 4 in his reasoning. The 5th, Jeffrey M. Anderson, actually gave it 2.5 out of 4 which is just shy of the 65% rating Rotten Tomatoes requires for a Fresh rating.

Not that reviews matter all that much in this case, but it is nice to see a movie of this magnitude, without any of Hollywood's power names attached, still receiving raves from the critics. I sure Harrison Ford would do an amazing job playing the part of an air traffic controller, or heroic passenger, but this wasn't the movie for that type of distraction and it's nice to see that Greengrass instead decided to focus on the story.

I will definitely be seeing this movie on the big screen some time this weekend or in the very near future.

My view on the 'Flag Flap'

Since this seems to be a story that will just not go away I figured I'd get my 2 cents in.

Just let me start by saying my blogging's been a bit light this week because of two reasons: first of all, my prime blogging time (9-6) has actually been taken up with work this week. I know it's a rarity but it does happen and by the looks of things at the office it may be happening more often than not for the next couple of months. Damn development projects. Secondly, I rented a XBox 360 for the week to give the ol' tires a good kicking and have been trying to give it a fair shake. So far color me unimpressed. Sure the graphics are smoother but of the games I've tried there is really nothing that seems to require 'next generation' processing. Add to that and it's picky support of the older games and I'll just have to give it a pass. That being said, I will be picking up a Revolution as soon as it's available. If history has taught us nothing it's that Nintendo knows how to make a fun console. Even this week, with the lovely new (and surprisingly loud) 360 sitting on my floor, I've found myself turning back to play Need 4 Speed: Most Wanted on my GameCube. Although, truth be told, I only bought it last week so the sheen is still pretty new.

So back to the topic at hand.

On the subject of lowering the flag for each soldier killed in combat, I'll have to side with Harper on this one. While it is a very emotional time for the friends and loved ones of the fallen, history, and decorum, dictate that all our fallen heroes be treated equally. By continuing with the Liberals 'case by case' policy, we are in effect showing dishonour to all those soldiers who may be killed who we don't lower the flag for. If a soldier is killed while training to go to Afghanistan is his or her sacrifice not as worthy as one killed while in the field? Will we lower the flag for them? Who sets the standards? Who decides?

We know from even these past few years that there were times when the Liberals chose not to lower the flag. Why? Who knows, but my point is you either do it for everyone or not at all, anything less is a sign of disrespect that should not be tolerated. That is why the Harper government has decided to reconstitute the policy of only lowering the flag for the fallen soldiers on Remembrance day. This also helps to maintain the solemness of the action. As in everything, if the lowering of the Peace Tower flag becomes a routine event, then it begins to lose it meaning as a symbol of national mourning. That does not mean that some circumstances could not call for a lowering of the flag, such as the deaths of prominent publics servants (former MPs, PMs, etc) or national heroes, but the call to military service is a special one. MPs, for instance, are not generally called upon to put their lives at risk to perform their duties, so their deaths are generally unexpected. Members of the armed forces, on the other hand, have taken it upon themselves to put their lives on the line to protect others, and as such are much more likely to be killed or injured while performing those duties. As such we as a people, have decided that the 11th of November be put aside as our national day of remembrance for all those who have fallen and all those who have served.

Now none of this prevents local officials or the home bases of the fallen soldiers to lower their flags to honour their sacrifice, which is routinely done, but when it comes to the national stage we need to ensure that all of our fallen soldiers are treated with the respect and dignity they deserve.

On a related note, with regards to 'casket controversy' that's also been raised this week, I have to say I have a slightly different view than what appears to be the governments position. I believe it is fully justifiable to have some visuals of the caskets to act as an important reminder to the cost of war and the important job these men and women do every single day. I also agree with the governments position to allow those visuals to be recorded at the point of departure. Where I have a slight disagreement is with their policy on media coverage of the coffins arriving back on Canadian soil. While I do believe the default response should be to disallow media coverage, I also believe the final decision should be left up to the surviving family members.

While these soldiers deaths may be a national loss, they are first and foremost a private loss to their husbands, wives, children, parents, siblings, extended family and friends. For that reason I believe they should have the final say on what is or isn't to be shown once they arrive home. If they should choose to share their loss with the public, for whatever reasons they may choose to do so, then I believe they should have that right. In those cases authorized members of the media should be able to video/photograph the funeral processions from the arrival of the plane carrying the fallen soldier to whichever point the family deems appropriate. I do not, however, believe it is the media's right to broadcast these images against the wishes of the families involved. Once the soldier arrives home, then the story goes from being a national one to a private one, and I just don't think we, as a nation, should be intruding on the grieving process of a family more than they feel comfortable with. But that's just my opinion, and I can understand people may feel differently. I just don't want the deaths of our soldiers to become fodder for the type of tabloid journalism and partisanship that we see so often from the US media.

Rabble Rousing

I'm not sure if I should be thanking Steve over at Angry in The Great White North for pointing out this thread at Rabble or not.

It was inspired by the tragic deaths of 4 Canadian soldiers yesterday in Afghanistan, but from comment 1 it was clearly evident that the news was just an excuse for yet another anti-military/US, pro-Taliban rant from the lunatic fringe.

You are unlikely to find a more open discussion from today's extreme left about their thoughts about the military than this one.

Here's just one comment:

"Well I got news for you--4 dead and 2200 to go--
and I hope 'they die and die like flies' as Nina Simone might say..."

I will never understand the 'compassionate' left's inability to set any moral standards. What they demand of their governments here, equality for all, tolerance, etc.. they then condemn them for elsewhere.

I'll just leave it at that because otherwise I could go on all day about how much people like 'Unionist' and 'Fear-ah' disgust me.

-------------------------------------

To the families, friends and colleagues of:

• Cpl. Matthew Dinning, born in Richmond Hill, Ont., and stationed at Petawawa, Ont.
• Lieut. William Turner, born in Toronto and stationed at Edmonton,
• Bombardier Myles Mansell, born in Victoria, B.C., and stationed at Victoria.
• Cpl. Randy Payne, stationed in Wainwright, Alta.

the people of Rabble do not represent the views of the majority of Canadians, and while words may be of little comfort during this time, please remember this:

"Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his brother."

These four men, and all their fellow men and women in uniform, not only understood the true meaning of that phrase, but lived it.

Plugging a Leak, CIA style

Seems like some people are starting to wonder if the whole "Hidden CIA detention centers" story wasn't just some form of misinformation put out by the CIA itself to try and find the source of their security leaks. If true, it was pretty much a perfect plan.

• Create a juicy story that the anti-Bush obsessed media would jump all over themselves to get.
• Allow only a select few people know the details.
• Wait for it to appear on the front page of every newspaper from here to Timbucktoo.
• Wait for the expected EU investigations to come forward with reports showing no evidence said centers exist.

If anything the only drawback is that, in general, the MSM is much less likely to make a big deal of the complete lack of corroborating evidence, or the results of the EU report that could not find any such camps, then they were over the original story. But I guess it's just a matter of which is more important, one more PR hit in an environment where even perfectly legal, and routinely used, defensive measures targeting known terrorists can be spun as attacks on Americans civil liberties, or catching agents who are using their position to follow a political agenda. I'd have to side with the latter.

Now, this is all based on the presumption of innocence until proven guilty or course and in the end it could turn out that the original stories were true, but even if that happens, this still shines as a great example of modern journalism standards at their finest; if you can find an anonymous source with a nice juicy scandal, run with it and don't worry about fact checking.

Do they do recalls on Pulitzers?

(h/t Captain's Quarters)

A new messge from Al-Zarqawi

And only Iowahawk has all the details.

Let the circle jerk begin!

This is the reason I took Slashdot off my list of homepages at home.

For a bunch of supposedly educated 'geeks' who look at things from an analytical perspective, whenever anything slightly Bush related comes up (or Microsoft for that matter), then all objectivity is thrown out the window and BDS takes over.

It's funny, I stopped reading after the first 60 comments but while they all referenced the same 'violation of my civil liberties' meme that's so popular in the hate Bush crowd (pardon the unintended pun) I have yet to see anyone give a clear cut case of theirs or for that matter anyone else's, rights having been systematically violated. But I guess it just must be true since so many people claim it is.

And yes, I admit I like Bush, but even so, if you are going to make a claim about someone abusing the system is it too much to ask for some concrete examples every now and then.

Sometimes it's hard to differentiate Slashdot from Kos.

Swedish logic 101

I have to agree with Charles over at LGF, the statements made by the Swedish Chancellor of Justice just have to be read to be believed.

Especially telling about how he views the Middle East conflict:

The Swedish Chancellor of Justice responded by closing the pre-trial investigation on the grounds that ‚“the lecture did admittedly feature statements that are highly degrading to Jews (among other things, they are consistently referred to as the brothers of apes and pigs)‚” but pointing out that such statements ‚“should be judged differently ‚– and therefore be regarded as permissible ‚– because they were used by one side in an ongoing and far-reaching conflict where calls to arms and insults are part of the everyday climate in the rhetoric that surrounds this conflict‚”.

Funny, I can't remember the last time I heard of complaints of anything even slightly as vitriolic as the recorded statements coming from any Temple, anywhere but statements like the one found on the Swedish tapes are all too common in Mosques, throughout the world.

You can't get a much clearer picture of one-sided justice then a government who force (or strongly persuade) the shutting down of a website because of a political cartoon and then turn around and present this defense when admittedly anti-semitic hate speech is being distributed to the public.

Gold and Blue make Green

I had to read the entire story to make sure this wasn't some trumped up award but it all appears legit, former PM Brian Mulroney has been named the greenest Prime Minister in Canadian history.

A panel of 12 environmentally conscious Canadians, including former Environmental Ministers and members of the Sierra Club, were asked to nominate (with reasons) and evaluate who they thought was the Prime Minister whose actions have done the most for the environment. Mulroney received 5 out of 12 votes.

Unbeknownst to me, Mulroney apparently had a very good reputation for standing up for environmental concerns during his years in office, and unlike the recently defeated Liberal governments who had made many promises on the subject, he delivered.

He will be receiving his award this Thursday, in what is apparently the event of this early spring season. If I had known I would have bought tickets. Not necessarily because of the award, but because as a federal employee, I can get tickets to the $2500 a plate gala for only $40; a pricing structure put in place to prevent 'gift tickets' from being used as bonuses from third parties. It will probably beat the Swiss Chalet I was planning on ordering.

The world's laziest Cyberstalker

This (warning: The preceding link connects directly to a Daily Kos thread), has just got to be one of the dumbest 'insta-controversies' coming out of the left side of the blogosphere in a long while; well at least since the other week when the oddball attack against a certain blogger's ability to write her posts, while simultaneously having a life, was all the rage.

Their complaint, this time, is that Michelle Malkin published the names and contact information for the leadership of the group responsible for last weeks UC Santa Cruz protests against Military Recruiters on campus. Now, I can see someone getting outraged if she looked up their numbers independently for the express purpose of outing them, but she didn't. What she did do was publish the first couple lines from their PRESS RELEASE which happened to include all their contact information, clearly laid out.

If you're wondering why I'm using the copy at Oread Daily it's because it has yet to be edited to remove the offensive info. After the controversy became big news, most left leaning sites quickly edited their copies to remove the contact information. While I have no problem with that action, many of these same sites are now being used as examples of the fact that the information was not publicly known except through Michelle's leak. At least the PIMC version clearly marked where they edited out the contact info while others, like this Infoshop version, did such a bad editing job, they accidentally deleted the groups email address and not just the personal contact information.

So my point, if you want your personal information to remain personal, DO NOT PUBLISH IT ON A "FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE" PRESS RELEASE!

I would think intelligent college students would have understood that, but I guess if there other actions are any indicator, common sense is not one of their strong suits.

See Michelle's site for more.

Just for added kicks, Olbermann Watch is leading the discussion as to how Michelle's reprinting of information from a press release was enough for good ol' KO to label her "Worst Person" of the day. The same day, that 9 people were killed in a terrorist attack near a fast food stand in Tel Aviv. Nice to know he's got his priorities straight.

Somehow, it just never gets old.

I really don't know what brought about the latest round of Robert Byrd pieces over at Protein Wisdom, but Jeff has been at it again. This time, instead of continuing with his series of interviews with a certain former piece of attire of Senator Byrd's (follow the links to read all 7 interviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7), he's decided to use go a little bit more artistic, by creating a series of oil paintings:

"Guests Mingle at a Robert Byrd Family Easter Egg Hunt"
"Guests Mingle at a Robert Byrd Backyard Barbecue"
"Guests Mingle at a Robert Byrd Cocktail Party"

I wonder how much a print of the "Easter Egg Hunt" would set me back?

"A Rose by any Other name...

... won't try to kill you." Or at least that looks like that's the new philosophy across the pond.

So it's official, the European Union has now begun to look to Matt and Trey to develop their security initiatives.

Using the now classic, 'bury your head in the sand' technique described on last weeks South Park, it appears the EU is finally ready to implement their plan to prevent any further acts of violence by angry Muslim hordes. In a bold new initiative, they have proposed to ban the use of terms such as 'Islamic terrorism', 'Islamofacism' and in general, trying to make it a crime to ever make any connection between Islam and the large number of terrorist-like activities performed by people claiming that as their prime motivator.

I'm sure that will settle everyone down.

Now I don't mean to imply every Muslim is a terrorist in hiding, or even that the percentage of potential terrorists make up any significant amount of the total population of the estimated 1 billion Muslims in the world, but to try and deny the connection between terrorism in general, and the more extreme forms of Islam practiced in various countries around the globe is just insane.

As the saying goes, and I have heard this repeated by several well respected Muslims, "Not every Muslim is a terrorist, but most terrorists are Muslim".

There is no more glaring example of the ostrich mentality of these so called EU intellectuals than this quote near the end:

"Islam, on the other hand, is a religion like any other religion, and cannot by any means be associated with fascism."

Well sorry to burst your bubble Mr. Coolsaet, but Islam is different from all other forms of religion around the world. It is the only mainstream religion, that I know of, that creates a fundamental tie between church and state and as everyone knows, two of the most powerful motivators for action are religion and national pride. That was as true 1500 years ago as it is today and is one of the main reasons Mohammad combined the two to create the core of the Islamic belief system. He clearly set the tone as he was both the religious and political head of Islam and despite how some may portray him, he was not a man known for taking no for an answer. After building a power base of faithful followers, he began a ruthless campaign to make Islam the dominate religion across the known world. To the extremists, that is still the main goal of Islam today and that overwhelming need to have Islam dominate all other religions is not something that will just go away because you refuse to use certain words.

LGF and PT have more.

Anti-war protestors: A study in irony

Over the past couple of days, Michelle Malkin has been covering the behavior of the anti-war crowd at UC Santa Cruz and their efforts to prevent military recruiters from attending a job fair on campus. Nothing new there, just another group of angry far left extremists trying to exert their limited power anyway they can.

What really strikes me about this though is the fact that, as is often the case in these types of protests, if anyone with an opposing viewpoint dares to show their face, in this case the four recruiters whose jobs it was to man the information booths setup at the fair, the anti-war crowd is often very quick to attack them, both verbally and physically (even to the point of bragging about throwing rocks at the recruiters vehicles).

Is that not the very nature of war itself? Two or more groups, unable to reach a compromise, taking physical actions to force the other parties to the disagreement to capitulate to their demands. Are they not, by there very actions, proving that war sometimes is a necessary evil.

Pretty much unless you, as a protestor, are sitting off to the side, quietly holding your sign, then you yourself are participating in war-like actions. Everything else is just a matter of scale.

Best use of Occam's Razor I've seen on the web in a long time

From DocJim505, commenting in this thread over at Captain's Quarters in reference to the recently translated Iraqi intelligence documents;

"Message to the libs: when your mother taught you not to play with sharp objects, she wasn't referring to Occam's Razor."

I'd like to see them try and spin this

As if it wasn't already getting more and more difficult to be an anti-war protestor in the States with all the newly translated Iraqi document coming out proving, without the shadow of a doubt, Saddam's connections with both terrorism in general and Al-Qaida in particular (linking to Captain's Quarters since he's been tracking the various memos as they come out), now comes word that even those young boys that were held prisoner at Gitmo actually miss their time there.

The fact that this report was posted a month two years ago at The Guardian and this is the first anyone's really heard of it tells you a lot about the MSM's fixation on all the negative stories they can find.

Statements like;

"Americans are polite and friendly when you speak to them. They are not rude like Afghans. If I could be anywhere, I would be in America. I would like to be a doctor, an engineer or an American soldier."

paint a slightly different picture of the treatment of underage prisoners than the one most anti-war groups would like to portray. Although I'm sure someone out there is trying to find a way to redefine torture to include the fact that they didn't get to go snorkeling as much as they would have liked to.

If it wasn't posted on the Guardian's website I'd swear it was just Iowahawk trying to write a more serious sounding satire.

(h/t LGF)

Update:
Corrected date references. Article date is actually from 2 years ago making the MSMs silence even more deafening.

My kind of race

So I've been thinking of putting my name in the race for leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.

I figure my odds of winning increase daily as every Liberal from St. John's to Vancouver Island hold press conferences to announce they are not going to compete. By the time of the convention I would guess it would be a down to the wire race between me and whatever MP the caucus was able get drunk the weekend before and trick into signing the papers. Though I'd really like to get in before some other Joe Schmo has the same idea as I really wouldn't want to split the 'completely disinterested' vote during the convention.

Being a life long conservative, I'm pretty sure I can skirt around of any taint from past Liberal scandals, but just to be clear, that doesn't mean I'm above "finding" large sums of money in plain brown envelopes while eating out. When in Rome and all that. Though interested parties may have to drop by Local Heroes (usually the Bank Street location) or on a good night Moxy's (off Ogilvie) instead of some upscale Italian restaurant if they're looking for me. I would also like to state that any "donations" made in this way would not necessarily buy you any favours from my Liberal party, but it sure couldn't hurt.

The first thing to do after winning, of course, is pick the MP that annoys me the most and kick them out of their seat so that I could steal their riding in a bye-election. Then the biggest decision is what to do once in power? Just sit back and enjoy the fat MP salary (currently ranked in the top 2% in the country) or work aggressively to try and get my agenda passed, which mostly centers around getting traffic cops sniper training (have I ever mentioned how much I hate people who don't signal while changing lanes).

I'll probably take the weekend to think it over.

Making the best of bad situation

I have to give it to House Democrats over this Cynthia McKinney fiasco. They've thrown out their usual playbook and have opted for common sense instead. While McKinney has been parading around to anyone who will listen with her "Racist cops dared ask me to identify myself" followed quickly, and sometimes in the next sentence by "they are an honorable group of police officers" almost every other Democrat, including the Black Caucus hasn't been getting within a 100 feet of this issue unless pressed, and even then usually limiting their comments to how well the Capital Police Force perform their jobs.

When the only people you can get to stand behind you are those you are paying or the standard race baiters that show up to support anyone who claims discrimination, no matter how ridiculous the charge, then it's a pretty strong indicator that you're attempt to shift the blame isn't working, and I for one think it's about time. You never know, after all this people may think twice about trying to blame others for their mistakes and make it easier for cases of real discrimination to come to light.

Expose the Left has a whole weeks worth of videos of McKinney, her lawyers, Pelosi and almost ever news personality who currently has a show:

- James Myart (one of McKinney's lawyers) on Hannity and Colmes
- Tom Delay on Your World with Neal Cavuto
- Tom Delay on Fox and Friends
- GA State Rep. Roberta Abdul-Salaam at her 'McKinneyest' playing the race card
- Various McKinney links
- LAPD Detective defends McKinney, except when presented with her assault on the officer
- The Situation Room review the situation including Nancy Pelosi statement on the case

And the two best videos:

- Soledad O'Brien asks some tough questions and gets the same non-answers
- McKinney on Fox and Friends continues to try and make it a race issue.

It's amazing how many times McKinney can blame her own over the top reaction over a simple request for ID into a racial issue.

Update:
McKinney apologizes(?) but in true McKinney style she manages to avoid actually really admitting any blame.

The best line:

"...and I regret it's escalation..."

I guess her definition of low key was only getting Danny Glover and Harry Belefonte to stand with her while calling repeated press conferences to claim 'racial profiling' and outright racism on the part of the Capital Police. If she had meant it to become a big story she would have called in the big guns, like Denzel (although hopefully he would have 'had other plans that week'). And the addition of being a guest on every talk show with a viewership over 10 (or did she do Countdown too?) was her way of keeping things 'under wraps'.

This women's idiocy knows no bounds.

Yes, it really does say what you think it says

All I know is that if this law ever makes it to Canada, there's a little Dodge Viper across the road that's just begging to be taken "without its owner's consent".

(h/t LGF)

Bush is ruining Hollywood!

Ok, I still have a hard time accepting how so many people accuse George Bush of creating all the world's terrorists (did we forget the USS Cole, WTC 1993, etc.. ad naseam?) or global warming (if he can devastate the environment in just 6 years while in a relatively good mood, do you really want to make him mad people) but now those realists in Hollywood have found a new crime to add to Bush's ever growing list of felonies; he's responsible for the poor box office receipts of Basic Instinct 2 (PowerLine Blog).

How Paul Verhoeven (director of the original Basic Instinct) could make that claim with a straight face I'll never know, but I think it speaks volumes about how far to the left Hollywood in general has gone that this is considered a valid argument.

I don't know about you, but I'll bet the 6% rating on Rotten Tomatoes might have more to do with the poor showing than whether of not the President considers it a good film.

Rick Rescorla

No story from September 11, 2001 stuck with me like that of Rick Rescorla and yesterday, at Fort Benning, this man's incredible story was immortalized in the form of statue (h/t LGF) in the place where he went through Officer Candidate School on his way to Vietnam.

For those who have never heard of Rick, at the time of the World Trade Center attacks he was the Vice President of security for Morgan Stanley, in the South Tower, and if nothing else it's worth reading his story just because of this, of the 2700 Morgan Stanley employees that worked in the second tower, only 6 died that day; Rick, his 2 man security team and 3 others.

After taking the job at the WTC Rick and an old army buddy evaluated any security flaws and even warned the Port Authority of the possibility of someone attacking the pillars in the parking structure, all this prior to the first WTC attack. Even on that day in 1993, people noted that Rick was the last person out of the building, making sure 'no man was left behind'. He even ran drills of MS employees to make sure everyone was ready for a second attack which he was sure would come; and once again, he was right.

It was this dedication to his fellow man that ultimately cost him his life. After successfully starting evacuation procedures, even while the official Port Authority commands were to stay put, and directing his teams out of the building, Rick returned to the burning tower to make sure everyone else was out. Even though his office was on the 44th floor, several reports have put Rick as high as the 72nd, in his search for anyone requiring his teams assistance. The towers fell before him and his men could make their final descent.

This Picture was snapped by a secretary on her way out of the tower, and clearly shows Rick on his bull horn directing traffic and leading the evacuees in various songs including "God Bless America"; all the while remaining perfectly in control.


Like all the NYPD and Fire Fighters that gave their lives that day, when everyone else was running out of a burning building, Rick and his team were running into it; overcoming one of the most powerful of instincts, self preservation, to save every life they could.

The Mudville Gazette has more on his actions in Vietnam that led him to become a highly decorated officer. Among other stories, it details his actions during one of the most important military actions at the beginning of the conflict at Ia Drang Valley, the battle behind the book 'We Were Soldier Once and Young', and the basis for the Mel Gibson film. If you look at the cover you can see Rick in his heyday, once again marching towards the danger that others would quickly flee.

Rick Rescorla was 62. The bravest of the brave.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident"

But even so, it's always nice to have some data to back you up.

This recent study performed by the Director of the Political Communication Lab at Stanford University, Shanto Iyengar, and Washington Post polling director and staff writer, Richard Morin, found that while people of all political stripes generally dislike Hitler and Michael Jackson, that's about the point that all civility ends.

Using a combination of a modified version of wack-a-mole and a series of surveys, the two were able to determine that not only does one political leanings help determine which politicians you will generally like or dislike (you don't really need to pay two researchers to do that) but more interestingly, by how much they affect your like or dislike.

What they found, is that while Republicans strongly dislike Democratic political leaders, Democrats truly despise and hate Republican leaders (a 14% difference in negative ratings of opposition party members).

On an interesting side note, they found that for independents, and only for the independents, when faced with the wack-a-dictator portion prior to being questioned about national politicians, their views towards the Republicans were moved slightly, but measurably, towards a more favorable position.

As Lowell Ponte over at FrontPage points out (near the bottom), when mixed with the results from MRI tests done in a recent study at Emory University, which indicated that when people start to process information that contradicts their political views, the emotion center of the brain begins to take over and the logic center takes a break, explaining why for some people, the President can do no good.

And this all started because I was following Michelle's recommended links for more background into Cynthia McKinney's checkered history. I strongly urge you to read the whole FrontPage article from her post.

Ahh, the wonders of the Internet.

"Being in Congress while black"

I'm pretty sure the charge should have been "Being in Congress while dangerously stupid".

Here's a hint Ms. McKinney, if you try to forcibly bypass a Capital Police security checkpoint, with no visible ID, not even the special pin given to all congresscritters to identify them as such, then don't be surprised when a security officer tries to stop you. And hitting them in the chest with your phone, well that just speaks for itself. And the fact that this is not her first time trying to do this speaks even louder.

Alan Colmes defense of her actions last night, first trying to shift blame to the police and then using the moral relavitists position of "well I can't really judge because I'm not a black women" was utterly ridiculous. Sorry Alan, it doesn't take the viewpoint of a black women to realize that what she did, regardless of the Police response (which from all accounts, with the exception of Ms. McKinney's of course, appears to have been to merely request ID and then temporarily detain her when none was produced), was wrong.

Claims of racism in situations like these just go to show the inherent racism in the complainant more so that the person on the receiving end. Not everything is about color, despite what some people would like you to believe (and how the hell did Danny Glover and Harry Belefonte get involved so quick).

And one final point, if this person was trying to run a security checkpoint, I'd be worried too. I've seen her in many other photos where she looks quite normal, this is not one of them (screen capture from Michelle Malkin).

Check out Michelle's Site for video from McKinney's press conference.