Archive for 2012

TEN YEARS AGO ON INSTAPUNDIT: Reader Doug Levene writes:

We just returned from Friday night services, where I was reminded of Golda Meir’s remarks probably 40 years ago. Asked when there would be peace between Israel and the Palestinians, she replied, “When the Palestinians learn to love their children more than they hate the Jews.”

I guess we’re not there yet.

Still not.

HEH: Outraged Media Matters Demands Democrats Return Hilary Rosen’s Massive Campaign Contributions. “It’s been incredibly amusing watching Democrats distance themselves today, pretending they hardly have anything to do with each other? Funny, considering Rosen has contributed at least $189,000 to them. Oh, she did toss a couple of bucks to a few Republicans over the years. Last one? Mark Foley.”

UPDATE: “The scandal is: They let the mask slip. They let it show.” Plus: “The Democrats don’t really believe anything. They’re just working on various voting blocs. They started this ‘war on women’ theme, but it was a means to an end. Women were out there, so numerous, so richly exploitable. The campaign made its move. And then… the slip.”

JIM TREACHER: Hilary Rosen provides a valuable lesson in how not to apologize.

Meanwhile, IowaHawk wins the Tweet Of The Day:

Related: If you’re a stay-at-home mom, Democrat strategist Hilary Rosen would like you to shut up and make her a sandwich.

UPDATE: Reader Susan Kaestner writes:

It does not surprise me in the least to see derogatory housewife comments from Democrats.

In 2002 I operated a very small 527 that ran ads exposing the voting records of a TN state representative who was running in a new census created state senate district that had been molded and served up to him by fellow state Democrats. Seeing that in the process of gerrymandering they didn’t research the demographics of the new district very well my relatively unknown 527 got involved. The soon to be former state legislator was quoted in the Tennessean newspaper as calling me a “terrorist”–this being less than a year after 911. In the same article the Speaker of the House, Jimmy Naifeh (D), took the cake by erroneously insisting I must be a front for a group of rich Republican men because I was “just a little stay at home housewife.”

For the record I’m at least 6’2″ in heels–about a half a foot taller than the Speaker. You would think if your best strategy against conservative women is to call them names you could at least do it with better accuracy than to use the word “little.”

Perhaps to this day Mr. Naifeh does not realize it was the first skirmish in the long and eventually successful battle to end his public service. The next election cycle he found that he needed to spend good deal of his PAC money on purchasing expensive Memphis TV time to save his own seat instead of doling it out to other Democratic candidates. It was unfortunate for him that I launched a statewide campaign explaining among other things how his wife was the highest paid lobbyist in the state.

My advice for politicians is don’t mess with stay at home moms. We deal with children who are about the only thing sneakier and more devious than politicians. Building defenses against puppy dog eyes and crocodile tears creates a certain ruthlessness. Underestimate us at your own peril.

Now Naifeh’s gone.

INSTAVISION: My Catherine Crier interview is now on YouTube.

ALAN DERSHOWITZ: Charges Against Zimmerman Won’t Hold Up. “It’s irresponsible and unethical. . . . This affidavit doesn’t even make it to probable cause. Everything in this affidavit is consistent with a defense of self-defense. . . . A good judge would throw this case out.”

UPDATE: Reader Chuck Cobleigh writes: “Is it just me, or are others listening to Alan Dershowitz describing the Zimmerman probable cause affidavit and the Florida prosecutor’s ethics and having the name ‘Mike Nifong’ echoing in the background?”

A FLYING CAR THAT’S WORTH DRIVING? Sorry, I want my Jetsons-style antigravity.

RICHARD FERNANDEZ ON CHINA, NORTH KOREA, AND THE AMERICAN ACADEMY:

The thing about Communism, at least to the uninitiated, is that it appears to be identical in all respects to a hereditary aristocracy. If one didn’t know better it would seem that the more Communist a country, such as North Korea, the more it resembles a monarchy. In China the children of the Polituburo members are actually called princesses and princes and they gad about in a style that make the current European royalty look like a bunch of low-rent grifters.

How admirable then, that intellectuals like Cornell West, Van Jones and Bill Ayers can go around and seriously sell socialism and Marxism in the name of “equality” and “egalitarianism”. You know, because they are one with the Common Man. Their superior educations must provide a true insight into the nature of Marxist societies because to uninitiated the whole thing looks like a scam to trick people into waging “revolution”, in which a few odd million will be horribly killed, to create a worker’s paradise and Green society. Except all the resulting outcomes we actually examine reveal only societies ruled by an aristocracy no different from, nay more lavish than the Court of the Sun King’s at Versailles. Versailles didn’t even have indoor plumbing.

But at least it had trees and bushes in the garden. North Korea doesn’t. North Korea’s forests have been burned down by the happy peasants to cook their gruel and to keep from dying of cold in winter. Defectors heading south know they’ve reached the Republic of Korea because they can see trees again. In capitalist South Korea. And as for the environment in China … well why do you think the Red Princes and Princesses go to Paris to dance the night away?

Future generations may wonder how it was possible for sophisticated Western intellectuals to actually devote their lives to bringing about Communism as if it were anything more than a swindle.

Today’s intellectual class is a direct descendant of the courtier intellectuals of the Divine Right era. Its skillset still resolves as much around sucking up and playing politics as around producing anything of value. Naturally it would prefer an aristocracy, and tends to despise the bourgeoisie and free markets.

TAKING SOLAR POWER TO NEW HEIGHTS: NASA Invests In Satellites That Beam Power Down to Earth.

As spaceborne energy-harvesting schemes go, this one seems faintly possible — an array of curved mirrors directing sunlight toward solar cells, their energy production microwaved down to Earth. It’s so realistic, actually, that NASA is providing funding for a proof-of-concept study. . . .

It would consist of a modular array of movable thin-film mirrors, which could be taken into space using current cargo ships and assembled piece by piece. This would be less expensive than building a gigantic array and launching it. These curved mirrors would redirect sunlight toward an internal collection of photovoltaic panels, and the solar energy would be converted into microwaves. Then the Earth-facing portion, or the bottom of the margarita glass in the image at top, would transmit low-frequency, low-intensity waves toward Earth. At the receiving end, power plants would convert the microwave energy into electricity, adding it to the power grid.

Build enough orbital solar plants and you can supply earth’s power needs effectively. Build more and you can use the extra electricity to split water into hydrogen for vehicle fuel.