Liberals hate free speech

...also privacy rights and the sanctity of our entire political process. But who's counting?

A federal appeals court says Washington's secretary of state can release of names and addresses of people who signed petitions calling for a public vote on the state's expanded benefits for domestic partners.

A panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday issued an order reversing a decision from U.S. District Judge Ben Settle in Tacoma, who held that releasing the names could chill the First Amendment rights of petition signers.

And before you try tell me they only want to uphold the integrity of the process, note the topmost reason WhoSigned.org lists for doing this:

"When signatures for Referendum 71 have been verified WhoSigned.Org will: Work to make this public record signature information accessible and searchable on the internet."

Hmmm...

On the news this morning they said the right to contact the signers of this petition was also being sought.

Double hmmm...

I'm guessing "right to contact" means more Prop 8-style, gay-mob beat-downs of elderly women. But don't quote me on that... I have a wife and children to think about.

'Flashforward' has vision, but have we seen it before?

Flashforward, the first of the fall season's new hopefuls (hoped by me anyway) aired last night, and I'm a little torn.

The show sports a killer premise, an A-list writer/producer, and an uber-capable cast -- kudos to the ever-underrated Joseph Fiennes for maybe the best American accent from a Brit ever. Not to mention a bulletproof pilot that had me bumping it to near the top of my DVR timer queue.

But it's "near the top" because Lost still sits higher and, more to the point, got there first.

Comparisons to Lost are invited: Dark Knight writer David S. Goyer is the power behind Fastforward, and he freely admits he's a "huge, huge" fan of the Splash-proclaimed greatest TV drama ever.

The good news is, he understands what makes Lost tick. The pitfall becomes merely following the template. (Flashforward's kangaroo moment felt cheesily close to Lost's polar bear for me.) We've been down this road before, so those hairpin turns don't take us by surprise anymore. Meanwhile Lost is still barreling down the unmapped parts of that road far, far ahead.

So I guess I'm saying it might be a lightning-in-a-bottle deal. Lost's fan-based viral video and web sleuthing aspect sprung up organically, FF comes prepackaged with it, which rarely works.

And most of the fun last night for me came from the apocalyptic mushroom cloud hanging over the Event. Unless they sustain that, as opposed to the Prison Break-like whodunit this has the potential to become, we have another problem.

Or maybe just chalk it up to my own impossibly high standards. Compared to NCIS: Los Angeles the other night, this is the best show ever.

Encore showing of the pilot runs tonight at 8 p.m. on ABC. Check out the promo below.

You're just a middle class Socialist brat...

I wonder if Danny Elfman had the Democrats in mind when he wrote "Dead Man's Party."

Huh--??

OK, some background: Before he was a big time movie composer, Danny Elfman had a little band back in the 80s and 90s that you may remember -- Oingo Boingo. Thoroughly alternative with layers of punk energy on stage. I liked the music, but I really warmed to the conservative message in songs like "Only a Lad" and "Capitalism."

With Michael Moore saying we need to end capitalism and the President doing everything in his power to make it happen, I've had 'Capitalism,' boinging around in my brain for a couple days.

I'm thinking somebody needs to cover this song pronto and get it into a lot of heads, because talk about a song ahead of its time...

There's nothing wrong with Capitalism
There's nothing wrong with free enterprise
Don't try to make me feel guilty
I'm so tired of hearing you cry

There's nothing wrong with making some profit
If you ask me I'll say it's just fine
There's nothing wrong with wanting to live nice
I'm so tired of hearing you whine
About the revolution
Bringin' down the rich
When was the last time you dug a ditch, baby!

If it ain't one thing
Then it's the other
Any cause that crosses your path
Your heart bleeds for anyone's brother
I've got to tell you you're a pain in the ass

You criticize with plenty of vigor
You rationalize everything that you do
With catchy phrases and heavy quotations
And everybody is crazy but you

You're just a middle class, socialist brat
From a suburban family and you never really had to work
And you tell me that we've got to get back
To the struggling masses (whoever they are)
You talk, talk, talk about suffering and pain
Your mouth is bigger than your entire brain
What the hell do you know about suffering and pain . . .

There's nothing wrong with Capitalism!
There's nothing wrong with Capitalism!
There's nothing wrong with Capitalism!
There's nothing wrong with Capitalism!

YouTube link:

Dear Leader Speaks: the final word

Chalk up Obama's speech to the cheeelrens as another win for our side.

With a total conservative power outage in Washington, liberalism a raging wildfire, so it's all about containment right now.

So far so good.

With the Town Halls Gone Wild phenomenon, the Dems will have to punt on health care... Van Jones just had his czarist crown knocked off by Glenn Beck's September Revolution... Now, just before the big do-or-die speech to Congress, today's "how can we help the president achieve his goals?" pitch to American kiddos has been quickly toned down to "I pity the fool who don't stay in school!"

So are we actually kinda sorta winning? Without leadership? We're doing something. All we need to do is keep it up for another 1,229 days, 23 hours, 53 minutes, and 47 seconds.

My favorite moment in the Master Rhetorician's address today? The president says you shouldn't look to basketball for success in life...then holds up Michael Jordan as a role model. (Maybe you should put on some clothes if you're going to keep Emperoring today, sir. Little eyes are watching.)

But even with all the Cult of Personality warnings to avoid, did you notice how he still couldn't resist touching on the awesomeness of Being Barack? Has there ever been a president who self-referenced as much as Dear Leader Barry? This time we learned that because he studied hard at the dinner table in Indonesia, we can be somebody too! (Alpha...Omega! Alpha...Omega! Alpha...Omega!)

You too, John Piper?

Dawg be trippin'!

Ah, man... John Piper just made a poopie.

What's the point of praying kids "take their studies seriously" when those studies can only, legally be a 100% man-centered curriculum? And there's attitude here, too, which kinda baffles me.

I just took part in a major Facebook brawl -- with fellow Christians -- over whether or not believers should enlist their kids in a soul-flattening state education if there's an alternative, so this one felt like a bit of a knife in the back.

Clearly he's reacting to the level of vitriol against Obama's speech to the cheeelrens. But that doesn't fill me with confidence on his grasp of the bigger picture.

Amazing the lines being drawn in the culture war lately. Christians, Mormon commentators and secular Libertarians vs. Christians, Libs and Statists. (Not that Piper is on the latter's side, but suddenly I have to put him on my "Guys Who Don't Get It" watch list, and that's no fun.)

My take on the speech itself...

Charles Krauthammer had it right when he said the problem isn't what Obama is saying, which appears to be bland. Or even the (quickly amended!) teacher's guide that had asked kids to find ways to "help the President." It's the fact that school kids are being asked to have a special relationship with any president, regardless of affiliation. Time was, and wisely so, when country and Constitution were paramount in the civic education of young Americans. Now we're holding up elected officials as the heart and soul of the nation?

Oy.

Afghanistan: getting ugly fast

What a mess. Forget "social re-engineering." That should never be the mission of the U.S. military, and the Founders would be livid. We were right to knock down the Taliban after 9/11, but doing anything but leaving immediately after that -- with the promise to return and make them glow like Chernobyl if they mess with us again -- is a recipe for Vietnam II, even if our motives are right.

Story here, courtesy of the inestimable Michael Yon courtesy of Big Hollywood...

New Afghan War: Frontline Correspondent Says Fight Has Morphed

Shared via AddThis

B holes are better

Live free or die

Any place where a guy named Doobie can walk around freely in his kilt and shades with an AR-15 and a Braveheart claymore on his back is a place I want to be. Preferably next door, because you know that guy's neighborhood is the safest on the planet. (Not to mention the humdinger block parties he probably throws.)

Seriously, though. These people are doing it right. Keeping it light, while keeping it real. Making freedom fun while living out the ideals back home. Like Woodstock without the hippies, Marxism and B.O.

Read the article, then check out the Free State Project website.

(Kudos also to the Associated Press, yet again, for some solid, unbiased reporting on life in the Obama Era.)

You can still rock in America...

One benefit of liberals running the media is the joy to be found in hijacking their material. I smile every time I hear Chrissie Hynde's "My City was Gone" because I know how much it must burn her biscuits that most people know it only as Rush Limbaugh's theme song.

You see it a lot on the campaign trail, where it's the sorry excuse for a Republican candidate who doesn't get at least one angry cease-and-desist for using some bootleg tune at a rally. (I loved watching McCain's use of "Right Now" lead to a minor flareup of the bad blood between right-leaning Sammy Hagar, who thought it was "cool," and members of his former backup band, Van Halen, who grumbled about "no permission" asked.)

It may be early, but I've got a good soundtrack suggestion for whoever's headlining for the GOP in 2012.

Yes, after watching President Barry's health care press conference/disinformation event tonight, I'm tired of laughing him off. I know we need to pace ourselves, but I'm in rebel mode right now, and this one is just what the doctor ordered. Can't miss with rage-powered lyrics like:

What if I say I'm not like the others!
What if I say I'm not just another one of your plays?
You're the pretender!
What if I say I will never surrender!!

A kickin' song. A killer video. Suitable for killing Taliban or raging against the Obama machine... I give you Foo Fighter's supremely stealable The Pretender. (And when Dave Grohl calls to cry about it, put phone to speaker and crank it to 11.)

Foo Fighters - The Pretender (Video Premiere)
by Alisvideo

(Video missing? Watch it here on YouTube.)

Barack O'Mama Jeans

Maybe this is the real reason they were booing him at the All Star game?

I'm Geert Wilders!

...And Rick Warren is His prophet

Purpose-driven naivete

Rick Warren believes God needs Allah's help to combat man's inhumanity to man because "some problems are so big you have to team tackle them."

What, too big even for Bono??

(More here.)

Your tax dollars at work: Gay Pride edition!

So let me get this straight. California is so broke that it's closing state parks and issuing IOUs in order to pay for essentials like law enforcement. Yet the California Highway Patrol finds the resources to man a recruiting booth at the gay freak show known as "Sacramento Pride"?



My dad went to the anti-tax TEA party held at the same location a month or two ago. To my knowledge, the CHP didn't set up shop on that occasion, and if you asked them, I'd bet you a case of fruit-flavored KY Jelly they'd say something about the partisan nature of the day. At which point I'd ask them about their position on a key point of the Pride event -- opposition to Prop 8.



I heard somewhere that gays just want to be "treated equally under the law." Apparently that doesn't include the ones on public nudity and indecency. And if the cops tried to enforce them, you know these second-class citizens would riot like it's 1969.

And with President Obama praising those gay street brawlers (who injured a cop or two as I recall) I probably wouldn't risk it anyway.



Luckily, the CHP is too busy signing guys in bare-butt leathers to arrest them. Which explains at least one member of the Village People, too.

All these photos, by the way, come courtesy of a Facebook friend's album. There were more shocking ones -- including a leather-strapped, bare-chested lesbian with pierced nipples roaming the streets with a sno-cone -- but Facebook removed them overnight. Wouldn't want young eyes seeing stuff like that, would we?

Which brings me to the Sacramento Pride website, which promised a "kidzone" for the event. And no, that's not a joke about the picture below. Pretty sure they meant an actual kidzone, meaning Facebook has higher standards than the CHP.



Do you consider yourself Californian? My condolences. If I were you, I'd go out and raise holy hell about this.

What writers are up against

Sadly, I believe Frank Darabont when he relates, regarding his script for 'Farenheit 451,' this exchange:

I actually had a studio head read that script and say: "Wow, that's the best and smartest script that I've read since running this studio but I can't possibly greenlight it." I asked why and he says "How am I going to get 13-year-olds to show up at the theater?"

I'd have an snarky retort at this point, were it not for the weekend receipts for 'Transformers 2' staring me in the face.

Today in history...

Epic Tragedy

Today in 1453 the 1,000-year-old city of Constantinople -- most powerful and spectacular city in the history of mankind -- fell to militant Islam:

"...The Emperor and his commanders were trying frantically to rally their troops and push back the enemy. It was too late. Waves of Janissaries, followed by other regular units of the Ottoman army, were crashing through the open Gates, mixed with fleeing and slaughtered Christian soldiers.

Then the Emperor, realizing that everything was lost, removed his Imperial insignia, and followed by his cousin Theophilus Palaeologus, the lord Branas, the Castilian Don Francisco of Toledo, Katakouzinos, Mathaios Sgouromalis and John Dalmatus, all seven holding their swords, charged into the sea of the enemy soldiers, hitting left and right in a final act of defiance.

They were never seen again...

". . . the great church of Hagia Sophia was filled to capacity. Thousands of people were moving towards the church. Inside, Orthodox and Catholic priests were holding liturgy, the last Christian service after almost 1,000 years. People were singing hymns . . . .

"Bands of Ottoman soldiers began now looting. Doors were broken, private homes were looted, their tenants were massacred. Shops in the city markets were looted. Monasteries and Convents were broken in. Their tenants were killed, nuns were raped; many, to avoid dishonor, killed themselves. Killing, raping, looting, burning, enslaving, went on and on . . . .

"The great doors of Hagia Sophia were forced open, and crowds of angry soldiers came in and fell upon the unfortunate worshipers. Pillaging and killing in the holy place went on for hours. Similar was the fate of worshipers in most churches in the city . . . .

"Thousands of civilians were enslaved, soldiers fought over young boys and young women . . . the invaders broke the heads of those women who resisted on the floor of the churches and they raped them dead. The famous icon of Apostole Loukas was totally destroyed.

"The sultan asked for the young sons of Duke Loukas Notaras. Their father refused and Mehmed was ready to take their heads. Notaras asked him to kill him after his sons so that he was sure that they were dead and not disgraced from the perverted sultan."

If this massive, advanced civilization fell to the same enemy we face today, what makes us think it can't happen to us?

(Hat tip, ACM)

Remember Neda

I sit here watching this on Father's Day -- my own little girl asleep in peace across from me in our living room, the birds chirping and a cool breeze coming through our open door on a nice day in a free country -- and it puts the whole wide world in heartbreaking perspective.

Barham Saleh praises the troops on Colbert

Iraq's deputy prime minister is so much cooler than ours. Well spoken and very classy. And I hope Colbert realized that when Saleh thanked the American military, he was thanking George W. Bush. (Props to Colbert for doing this, with minor boos for waiting until Obama was in office to realize it was worth doing.)

800,000 (and counting!) surprised by digital TV switch

Mater was right... Tractors is so duuuuumb!

Road Worrier!

This car has Farfegnugen.

Conservatives taking Europe by storm

Mr. Smith Wilders goes to Washington Brussels

Good news from the twilight of Western Civilization...

Right-leaning governments came out ahead in Germany, France, Italy and Belgium, while conservative opposition parties won in Britain, Spain, and Bulgaria. Far-right groups also made gains in Britain, Austria, the Netherlands and Hungary.

Many Socialists ran campaigns that slammed center-right leaders for failing to regulate financial markets and spend enough to stimulate faltering economies. But voters did not embrace their cause.

With more from the UK...

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's center-left Labour party finished third behind the anti-European U.K. Independence Party — a crushing defeat that cast more doubt on Brown's future. The Conservatives are expected to win Britain's next national elections.

Best of all, despised Dutch nationalist Geert Wilders' party made big gains, becoming the country's second most powerful party.

Wilders, who has become popular in the Netherlands running on an anti-Islam and anti-political establishment platform, promised voters he would be tough on immigration and criticised Turkey's bid to join the EU. "Should Turkey as an Islamic country be able to join the European Union? We are the only party in Holland that says, it is an Islamic country, so no, not in 10 years, not in a million years," Wilders said.

Like I said, baby steps. Now if we can only Geert our Wilders on here.