Wall Street plummets

The US House of Representatives rejects the latest bailout offer, and the Dow Jones goes into freefall.

When assigning blame to the US Congress or the President for this problem, keep in mind that the same thing is happening in other countries as well. The UK's solution is to outright nationalize their failing banks. While I detest nationalization, this may be better than simply loaning money to banks that already failed, as was the proposed plan in the US. I predict we will end up with that plan, but a slightly more watered down version than was rejected yesterday.

Meanwhile, what to do? In the classic film It's a Wonderful Life, Mr. Potter gets control of the bank and much of the town by buying up shares while everyone else is desperately selling. In trying to persuade folks from not selling their shares to Potter in the Building & Loan, George Bailey said: "we're panicking and he's not".

Some free advice: right now is a very good time to buy, buy, buy!

Click here to continue reading...

Are we really in a crisis?

Everyone is saying that we are. But I just took a loan and bought a house myself with no worries, and no problems.

Disclaimer: I'm no financial expert. But like many other bloggers, I don't pretend to be. I have looked into what I can in the current "financial crisis" which is being hyped by the media, the President, and Congress. The bottom line seems to be that too many risky loans were made to people who couldn't pay them, and now everyone is losing confidence in the system.

Now the issue on the table is the estimated $700 billion bailout. "Bailout" is the common term, although people should keep in mind that the money would be a loan, not a handout. That point I can't emphasize enough, because most of people's anger over the deal is the misperception that poor people will end up paying for huge CEO salaries. The CEOs might get rich(er), but they still have to pay the government back. Unless they go belly-up again...

For this reason, I can't support the current proposal. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is urging immediate action to open the credit markets back up and avoid a nationwide depression. But I can't help thinking that maybe the credit markets should dry up for awhile. Maybe, just maybe, we have too much debt as it is and need to reign it in.

One alternative to the current plan is to allow these companies to fail and die a natural death. Additionally, in a plan which no one is proposing, you can set up a government-run credit bank with a limited 10-year charter to fill in the gaps and keep the money flowing. Otherwise, you are loaning money to the same people that got us in this mess in the first place.

This is election time, so the other issue involved, of course, is the blame game.

So who is to blame for the current mess? Barack Obama and his surrogates in the blogosphere are exclusively blaming the Bush administration and Republicans in Congress.

But subprime lending (the act of charging risky borrowers more to borrow money) has been around in one form or another for centuries. The current form of the practice dates from at least 1993, when the term was coined during the Clinton administration. Investor's Business Daily pretty much gets it right:

The untold story in this whole national crisis is that President Clinton put on steroids the Community Reinvestment Act*, a well-intended Carter-era law designed to encourage minority homeownership. And in so doing, he helped create the market for the risky subprime loans that he and Democrats now decry as not only greedy but "predatory."

Yes, the market was fueled by greed and overleveraging in the secondary market for subprimes, vis-a-vis mortgaged-backed securities traded on Wall Street. But the seed was planted in the '90s by Clinton and his social engineers. They were the political catalyst behind this slow-motion financial train wreck.

And it was the Clinton administration that mismanaged the quasi-governmental agencies that over the decades have come to manage the real estate market in America.

As soon as Clinton crony Franklin Delano Raines took the helm in 1999 at Fannie Mae, for example, he used it as his personal piggy bank, looting it for a total of almost $100 million in compensation by the time he left in early 2005 under an ethical cloud.

Of course, the current administration and the current Congress, and Wall Street CEOs are not blameless either. But there is one more culprit in the room that no one wants to acknowledge: ordinary borrowers who took out loans that were beyond their means. It's not popular to say it, but many of these folks are entirely to blame for their own actions.



Interested in reading more? Click on any label below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my  RSS Feed

Click here to continue reading...

Racism and the US election [Updated]

"Racism" is the gift that keeps on giving - to anyone who wishes to whip up as much hysteria as possible. Here was an AP story today; the implied message here is that if you don't vote for Obama, you are racist:

Poll: Racial views steer some white Dems away from Obama

WASHINGTON (AP) — Deep-seated racial misgivings could cost Barack Obama the White House if the election is close, according to an AP-Yahoo News poll that found one-third of white Democrats harbor negative views toward blacks — many calling them "lazy," "violent," responsible for their own troubles.

The latter remark is hardly surprising, since true conservatives tend to believe that in most cases, all people are largely responsible for their own troubles.

I concede that there are a fair amount of people who will not vote for Senator Obama because he is black. But any day, I will balance that against the masses of people who are supporting him simply because he is black.

And while we are at it, why don't we also compare this against the number of people who will not vote for McCain because he is old, or because his running mate is a woman? Even by the AP's own calculation, the number of these "racists" is only 2.5% (although in a race this close, that could be decisive).

If you think I'm reading too much in the AP story, keep in mind that plenty of others have said the same thing, and much more blatantly. Just last month, Jacob Weisberg, the editor-in-Chief of Slate.com, wrote an article on the subject entitled: "If Obama Loses, Racism is the only reason McCain might beat him". And it gets worse:

If Obama loses, our children will grow up thinking of equal opportunity as a myth. His defeat would say that when handed a perfect opportunity to put the worst part of our history behind us, we chose not to.

In other words, he is blatantly appealing to white guilt and accusing us all of being a racist nation if Obama is not elected. Incredibly it's as if he doesn't see any other issues in the campaign at all...

CNN's Jack Cafferty said something very similar in one of his recent rants. You can see it ably picked apart here by Todd Huston at Newsbusters.org. Strangely, he Cafferty seems to think we are not talking enough about race, even though the media has been obsessed with it from day one.

Discussing this same topic, WSJ's James Taranto wryly points out:

Denouncing people as racists does not seem like a very effective way of winning their votes, so one has to suspect that Sebelius, Letson and Hagan [who believe racism is the only reason people will not vote for Obama] are more interested in explaining Obama's loss than in preventing it.

Why don't we concede that all voters use a host of prejudices when voting for candidates of either side?

UPDATE 22 Sep 2008 0834 AM:
Nate Silver at the Fivethirtyeight blog astutely points out some of the same problems with the poll that I did, as well as some additional ones, although his perspective seems to be more one of trying to reassure us that Obama is electable.



Interested in reading more? Click on any label below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my  RSS Feed

Click here to continue reading...

Pakistan is on the frontline in the war on terror

The crater, embedded from the BBC.

As you probably already know, yesterday 57 people were killed (including two Americans) and 266 injured when a suicide truck bomb detonated at a Marriot hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan. Two diplomats were also killed - including the Czech ambassador, even though the Czech Republic has not deployed any soldiers in Iraq or Afghanistan. Additionally, most of the dead were simply drivers and hotel security guards waiting outside the building. This just helps underscore why this is a global problem, and Al Qaeda's absolute disregard for innocent life. That is the definition of evil - a word which has been so abused in the United States that it's more often been applied to President Bush than to these terror networks.

The blast left a crater 24 feet deep and almost 60 feet wide. There is unconfirmed speculation that the Prime Minister's residence may have been the initial target, or that the attack was really aiming for US Marines in the hotel. In my opinion, the actual target mattered little to Al-Qaeda; far more important was the body count they could obtain from the blast.

Just last week there were reports of border incursions by US Special Forces and a threat by Pakistan to open fire if US troops conduct another cross border raid. I didn't mention it at the time, because Special Operations Forces operate in unknown countries all the time, that is the nature of the business (more power to them). I doubt greatly that this was the only such incursion. It's difficult to win a war when your enemy believes he can cross the border with impunity but you can't.

The other thing to keep in mind is that despite Pakistan's bluster, it is highly unlikely they would ever fire on US troops in any case, because 1) to do so would be virtual suicide, and they know this, and 2) the US would cut off all aid to Pakistan, including weapon sales.

Moreover, terrorist attacks such as this may help remind Pakistan who their real enemies are. In a encouraging move, Pakistan announced that they will now step up raids against Al-Qaeda border outposts.



Interested in reading more? Click on any label below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my  RSS Feed

Click here to continue reading...

Weekly round up

Photo of the week: Peaches Geldolf, is modeling for Agent Provocateur's line of "Season of the Witch" lingerie

SOMALIA: A German shipowner pays $2 million dollars ransom to Somali pirates who hijacked his vessel and kidnapped the crew. But this money only rewards terrorists, and goes to buy more weapons and equipment so other innocent vessels will be threatened in the future. Haven't we learned anything from the past? Also, see similar incident here. France has the right idea, and storms a pirate ship instead. Good for them. Vive la France!

UK: England is now the most densely populated region in all of Europe, primarily due to skyrocketing immigration (and the figures don't even take into account the illegal population).

UK: Sharia courts are now officially permitted in the UK. They are Muslim religious courts that rule on community issues such as domestic violence, inheritance, and divorce, due to mutual agreement beforehand (like going on the "Judge Judy" show in the US). The article claims that women are receiving a smaller share in financial decisions than they would in a regular British court. If that's true, it's entirely their own fault - any woman foolish enough to choose to have a Sharia court hear her case deserves exactly what she gets. Oh, and Muslim religious courts have no place in the country anyway, but that's a given that seems to have fallen by the wayside...

UK: Outrageous incident in which a hotel clerk refuses a room to a customer simply because he is in the Army. If this happened in the USA, it would have generated a great deal more outrage. The hotel apologized, but there was still no explanation for the refusal in the first place. The English now seem to view these incidents as almost normal. Patriotism isn't so cool anymore...

SPAIN: One African immigrant is killed and thousands of others go on a violent rampage. This is the usual story in Europe, an immigrant is killed by the police, and the community bursts with outrage. But the really perplexing thing in this case is that he was killed by another immigrant during a drug deal gone bad. Trashing your own neighborhoods in protest of your own crimes seems a strange way to improve your standard of living. And a question: why didn't the major media outlets cover this story? Is it because they couldn't blame it on the police?

ISRAEL/ARGENTINA: Debbie Schlussel points out a heck of a story, that unfortunately gets buried in the current "now, now" news climate. Apparently, Israeli Mossad agents hot on the trail of Adolf Eichmann (the most wanted Nazi war criminal at the time), stumbled across the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele, and didn't apprehend him because they didn't want to jeopardize the Eichmann mission. Fascinating stuff.

GERMANY: In a somewhat related story to the one above, a 90 year-old Josef Scheungraber is on trial for Nazi war crimes committed 64 years ago. It may be the very last Nazi crimes trial ever.

PAKISTAN: Girl was married at 9 years-old to a man who was 45, tries to get an annulment when she is 17, and is gunned down by her own family because of her "dishonorable" actions. Need I say more? Discussion at Jihadwatch.

Iowa, USA: Fort Dodge Community College president Robert Paxton resigns over the "scandal" of him appearing in a photo giving beer to young woman. Since drinking beer is legal, and the woman was of legal age, I'm not sure what the problem is. But someone was outraged somewhere. Looks like Mr. Paxton didn't aggressively fight the action either, since his severance package was about $400,000! One hell of a salary from a community college... But what the hell, it's only money, right? It's not like students need it or anything...

USA: The Obama tax cut web site claims to show you what your tax cut would be under a President Obama. Problem is, the math doesn't add up. For example, it says that a single parent, making only $10,000 a year, would get a $490 tax cut. Problem is, anyone at that income level already doesn't pay any taxes. So how can you cut $490 out of zero? The site is nothing more than a fraud.

UK: Christmas and Easter are banned from a Yorkshire Coast College's calendar, in order to "increase inclusion and diversity”. I.e., for fear of offending Muslims. Should I remind them that the UK is a officially a Christian nation?

South Carolina, USA: In Hilton Head, a fourth-grade student is suspended for having the blade from a broken pencil sharpener in school, followed by a storm of outraged calls and emails to the school. In response, the principal wrote a letter of explanation to parents, but it was not very reassuring, since she admits the sheriff's department was called to respond to the 10 year-old armed suspect. It gets even worse when she admits that the school doesn't have a zero-tolerance policy anymore; i.e. she was not forced into this level of hysterical overreaction, but rather chose to do so. Good discussion at Overlawyered.

New York, USA: Hasidic Jews are upset with bicyclists, particularly female bicyclists, riding through their neighborhood "without dressing modest(ly)". They are also complaining that the bicycles pose a threat to "children and elderly residents". Since they don't use bicycles themselves, maybe they don't understand, but this seems like common sense: don't cars pose much more of a threat to pedestrians than bikes?



Interested in reading more? Click on any label below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my  RSS Feed

Click here to continue reading...

Special interest groups back NYC bill to give voting rights to non-US citizens

Vote sticker, by Ann Larie Valentine

As if you haven't seen enough garbage coming in this election season already (found via Gates of Vienna):

At a rally outside City Hall yesterday organized by the New York Coalition to Expand Voting Rights, supporters of a City Council bill that would extend voting rights to 1.3 million noncitizen New Yorkers said it's unfair that immigrant residents pay more than $18 billion in state income taxes when they can't vote for their representatives.
...
A supporter of the bill, Council Member Robert Jackson of Harlem, said in his district alone there are about 40,000 people who are paying taxes and don't have the right to vote. He said the coalition needed to publicize the position of every council member on the proposal and the reasons for their stances.

Let's publicize the positions of people who back this lunatic bill, and see if we can strip them of their voting rights for even suggesting such idiocy...

If people are upset about paying taxes, living in the community, and not being able to vote, there are two better options available:

1) Become a US citizen!
2) Go back to your own country and vote there (assuming that country has voting rights at all).

After all, I wouldn't imagine moving to a foreign country and demanding the right to vote for their leaders. I lived in Germany for many years without voting in their system, and I don't feel the least bit slighted. I was a guest in their country, and I voted in US elections by absentee ballot.

Now, it's important to keep in mind that: a) the bill covers local elections only, and b) theoretically would only apply to legal residents, not illegal immigrants. But two problems there already: a) That's one hell of a slippery slope, and b) how do you know who is a legal resident or not? Remember, these are the same kinds of people who also uniformly oppose requiring ID cards when voting.

So how do they justify this, anyway? As usual, right on cue, when you have no real arguments on your side, the old "racism" accusation:

He suggested that those opposed to giving noncitizens the right to vote might be motivated by racism, and noted that in the early years of American history noncitizens were allowed to vote.

That second argument is interesting; before WWI, being a citizen was not a uniformly a requirement for voting. But before that time, the world was very different, and the country generally had open immigration anyway. Besides, the "early years" do not always the best examples to emulate. Women and blacks also weren't allowed to vote back then. Does he want to go back to that??



Interested in reading more? Click on any label below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my  RSS Feed

Click here to continue reading...

7th Anniversary of 9/11

I'm not going to write a tribute, or get very sentimental today. There's plenty of that going on elsewhere today.

What I would like to point out is how few people in the world believe Al-Qaeda was responsible for the attacks on Sep 11, 2001.

In an international poll (found via Hot Air) in only 9 out of 17 countries surveyed, do the majority of people believe Al-Qaeda was responsible. And it gets worse:

On average, 46 percent say that al Qaeda was behind the attacks while 15 percent say the US government, seven percent Israel, and seven percent some other perpetrator. One in four say they do not know.

But what about Western countries? They have the most common sense right? Well, I'm ashamed to say, not much:

Even in European countries, the majorities that say al Qaeda was behind 9/11 are not overwhelming. Fifty-seven percent of Britons, 56 percent of Italians, 63 percent of French and 64 percent of Germans cite al Qaeda.

Remarkably, the countries that had the highest percentage of people who correctly identified Al-Qaeda as the culprit were Kenya and Nigeria, with 77 and 71%, respectively. Is this because they don't have very much access to all the conspiracy theories floating around the net?

The worst offender is Egypt where an astoundingly low 16% say AQ was responsible, while an equally mind-boggling 43% think Israel was to blame. Israel!

The New York Times recently ran an excellent article (one of the very few times I have recommended the NYT) on 9/11 attitudes in Egypt and why they won't accept the facts of 9/11. A typical example:

“Maybe people who executed the operation were Arabs, but the brains? No way,” said Mohammed Ibrahim, 36, a clothing-store owner in the Bulaq neighborhood of Cairo. “It was organized by other people, the United States or the Israelis.”

The importance here is that even if we are winning the military fight, we are currently losing the information war in many countries. And that is the aspect of the War on Terror that has the most lasting effect.

Click here to continue reading...

Enron attorneys are to get $688 million dollar jackpot

Just to point out that there are a lot of important issues today that are not getting enough press coverage, this story about Enron is a good example.

For those few who might not know about the Enron scandal, it can be summed up this way: Enron was a hugely successful energy company until 2001, when someone discovered that accountants had been cooking the books for years to hide huge losses. As a result the company folded into one of the costliest bankruptcies in history. Investors lost hundreds of millions of dollars, and criminal indictments followed. Not surprisingly, lawsuits by investors followed as well.

Their lawyers have now secured a whopping $688 million dollar payday skimmed off of investor's losses - money that could have been better spent helping those who lost their life savings after investing in Enron stock. It is the largest such payout in history in a securities fraud case.

They claim they spent 280,000 man hours working on the case, and chalked up $45 million in expenses (that's some expensive typing and filing!). But even taking those figures at face value, it translates into a net fee of $2,296 an hour. You can assume that all the senior partners at those law firms will get at least $10 million apiece - enough money that they, and even their children, can live in luxury for the rest of their lives without ever needing to work again a day in their life.

For another comparison, to put that in salary terms, working 40 hours a week at that rate translates into an annual salary of $4,8 million dollars!

The attorneys will argue that they deserve this payout because they recouped $7.2 billion for their clients, resulting in a payout of less than 10 percent of the take (normally trial lawyers take 40%).

But this underscores the problem with America's system of rewarding attorneys with commissions; exceptionally large cases lead to obscene paydays - with payouts that surpass those of even the corrupt Enron CEOs.

The USA desperately needs tort reform, and unfortunately, it's an issue that is not even on the table this election season.

More on this case at Overlawyered.

Click here to continue reading...

The "genius" of Russell Brand

... is what MTV is calling his disgusting monologue on the MTV music video awards last night. He is a British comedian, virtually unknown in America. Normally, I wouldn't dive into this kind of thing (especially since music videos ceased being relevant over a decade ago), and it's already all over the media, but there's something else I wanted to point out. Quote:

Please elect Barack Obama! Please! On behalf of the world. Otherwise, you know, would you have let that retarded cowboy fella be president for eight years?

Not a very PC statement about retarded people, but I'm not very PC either. The "cowboy" statement is the one I wanted to remark on. There is a disconnect here between the USA and Europe; many Americans might be surprised that to Europeans, the word "cowboy" is usually meant as an insult. On the other hand, Europeans should know that in the US, the term is not an insult, it's simply a profession (or arguably, a lifestyle), and not considered derogatory in any way. On the contrary, it's often a badge of pride.

Unfortunately, that wasn't all Mr. Brand said. It gets worse:

Sarah Palin. She’s a VILF! Maybe a vice president I’d like to fumble, fondle, I dunno. I do feel a little bit sorry for her daughter, getting pregnant, poor kid. Is it a boy? Is it a girl? No, it’s a P.R. stunt. Come on. Be honest.

It goes on and doesn't get any better from there. Since this man is trying to pull private matters into the ring, then it might be useful to know that Mr. Brand was once fired by MTV for coming to work dressed as Osama Bin Laden after the 9/11 attacks. He is also a recovering alcoholic and heroin addict who admits he has been arrested for public indecency 11 times.

If MTV wanted a "shocking" figure to give them a ratings boost, they probably got it. But the backlash might not be worth it - their message boards are flooded with angry comments. Michelle Malkin puts some samples up at her site.

Click here to continue reading...

One example why comedians can be bad political pundits

Comedian Bill Maher getting the star treatment on Salon.com:

Barack Obama can't help it if he's a magna cum laude Harvard grad and you're a Wal-Mart shopper who resurfaces driveways with your brother-in-law. Americans are so narcissistic that our candidates have to be just like us. That's why George Bush is president.

Besides the fact that George W. Bush is the son of a former President (which means he doesn't have much in common with guys who resurface driveways), there's one big problem with his statement: Bush is not only a Harvard grad (where he got his MBA), but a Yale grad as well. He didn't graduate magnum cum laude, but still, this is "just like us"?

Expect to see more distortions like this in the days ahead; Obama supporters are increasingly frustrated. The latest poll numbers have McCain significantly ahead of Obama. A USA Today poll has him an astounding 10 points ahead among likely voters.

Of course, these polls mean little right now. It is still early, it's during the time of the Republican convention bounce, and we haven't even had any debates yet.

Click here to continue reading...

Divorced from reality

Just one more post on the Palin controversy for now.

Andrew Sullivan prints one of those "dissents of the day", a reader that disagrees with him (that's the only way he can respond, since he doesn't allow comments at his site). A quote:

I have been so disappointed in the double standard I have seen you apply over and over again to the McCain and Obama campaigns. ...This week I have seen feminists question whether Sarah should be working, what with her five children and special needs son; I have seen them savage her decision about HER BODY to get on a plane when she was perhaps in early labor. I have seen the majority of the media mock and cast doubt on her experience, her character, her intelligence etc. to the degree that they have NEVER done to Obama, in truth lesser qualified on paper than Gov. Palin. ... That the media doesn't understand how this plays to the general public just shows how insulated and out of touch they are. I have followed campaign after campaign because I am a junkie, and I have never seen this type of venomous treatment of a candidate before. I am not even sure that I won't vote for Obama, but the treatment of Gov Palin makes me sick to my stomach. The media and the bloggers, yourself included, had better prepare for a backlash. If someone like me, 37 years old, mother of three, fiscal conservative but social liberal feels this way, I can guarantee I'm not the only one. I have been so disappointed in this blog; usually so fair and even handed. I am saddened that whatever disillusion you have with the current administration seems to have led you to join the ranks of the rest of the rabid, hypocritical, and out of control media.

"Usually so fair and even handed"? Who is she kidding? Anyway, except for that, there really is no justifiable counter argument, but I have to give Sullivan credit. He contorts heavily and comes up with a pretty creative response:

What the reader doesn't get, I think, is that all the revelations about Obama took place over a very long period of time - months and months. Because Palin is a total unknown and because her past is so colorful, to say the least, and because there are only two months before the election, the media has jumped all over it. That's our job. They have compressed in five or six days what was raised about Obama over twelve months. Of course it seems tougher right now. But I don't believe it is. If Obama's family were as colorful as Palin's, you can bet the press would have been all over it. If Obama's sister had nine kids from two fathers neither of whom she is currently living with, do you really think the press would not have written about it?

This is an illusion created by a very compressed schedule and a totally unvetted candidate...

Get that? The only reason why the media has gone hysterical over a 17 year old girl who is not even running in the election is because of the time crunch until the election! If Sarah Palin had only been running for almost two years, like Obama, this never would have happened! Sullivan cannot possibly be so stupid as this. It doesn't matter if it's 100 stories in year or 100 stories in a month. Invading the privacy of this 17 year old girl is still just as wrong either way. And he's wrong about Obama's family anyway - he's got quite a few colorful relatives; he has a brother living in absolute poverty on less than a dollar a month in Nairobi, Kenya (which would be kind of embarrassing for a sitting President), and claims to have cousin-in-law who is a black Jewish Rabbi (pretty unusual, and certainly colorful). And these are just the tip of the iceberg. But the media shys away from this because Obama is their darling and they don't want to make waves.

Previously, Sullivan, like so many others, gave a different excuse for targeting Gov. Palin's children:

Brandishing a child with Down Syndrome as a campaign statement is daring the press to ask questions about him.

Disgusting. Yes - the family simply accompanying Gov. Palin at the convention equates to "brandishing" or "parading" them around. Of course, if they weren't there, he would be one of the first to accuse them of a "cover up" or being ashamed of their child. And as Palin sexism watch states:

Maybe the media would be happy if Palin put a mask over the kids' faces like Michael Jackson or something.

Enough said.



Interested in reading more? Click on any label below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my  RSS Feed

Click here to continue reading...

This time it's the daughter: "slutty teen", "whore" [Updated]

Bristol with her baby brother - photo by Emily on Flickr.

Unless you've been living in a cave, you know that within only a few days, the media sharks have shifted their feeding frenzy from Governor Palin (incidentally, am I the only person in the netosphere addressing her by her title?) to her 17 year-old daughter Bristol, who is now (gasp) pregnant.

You know, I still haven't made up my mind about Sarah Palin, but these kinds of hit jobs on her family are only pushing me into her direction.

Wildly popular gossip columnist Perez Hilton sinks as low as he can go, and calls Bristol a "slutty teen" and a "whore" on his web site. Incidentally, Sen. Obama's mother had him when she was 18, so she was likely pregnant at 17 as well. She was also unmarried. Would Hilton have called her a "slut" and a "whore"?

Us magazine, whose editor in chief supports Obama, is running this headline on the Palin family:

BABIES, LIES & SCANDAL ... - Mom of five: New embarrassing surprises

The background is a photo of Gov Palin holding her son Trig, with Down's syndrome, as if to suggest he is one of the so-called "scandals". Judging by the angry comments at their site, this wasn't popular with their readers. This may have also been payback for the Palins granting People an interview instead of Us. Compare this cover to their previous one on the Obamas at Michelle Malkin's site. Enough said?

The National Enquirer tabloid (through purely anonymous sources, of course) are alleging that Gov. Palin had an affair with her husband's business partner.

Andrew Sullivan is becoming increasingly unhinged with a desperate flurry of posts about Palin. One example he's written about several times already: he thinks it's a "scandal" that someone from "Jews for Jesus" spoke in the same Church the Palins attended, and asked for donations. Oh the horror! He has also arrogantly made repeated requests for the Palins to hand over their medical records. Since he is well, no one special, I'm not sure why he seems to think his calls should be answered (he can't even vote as he is not a US citizen).

What ever happened to reporting on the actual issues?

To his credit - and not that of his supporters - Barack Obama said firmly that he believed these kind of stories were off limits. Whenever Bush says something like that, his detractors accuse him of playing the high road while his cronies went low. I'll give Sen. Obama the benefit of the doubt here that he is sincere.

However, his friends aren't listening. Sen. Barney Frank said he believes family members should be fair game. Why? According to him, because:

"They’re the ones that made an issue of her family."

The only reason why they made them an issue was to answer the ridiculous rumors that Gov. Palin's son Trig was really her grandson!

YM editor and regular Huffington Post columnist Bonnie Fuller actually accuses Gov. Palin of "exploiting" her daughter's pregnancy, being the "worst mother since Lynne Spears" (Britney Spears' mother), and of forcing her daughter into a shotgun marriage. She gives no evidence for any of this, but I guess that's not important to her. I guess we are to believe that simply announcing Bristol's pregnancy is equivalent to "exploitation"? Especially when Gov. Palin had little choice - the media were already swarmed with rumors, and Bristol's pregnancy would have been impossible to hide forever under this kind of scrutiny. And people like Ms. Fuller are only adding to that scrutiny. What is just as disturbing are the number of commenters who claim that Gov. Palin is a bad parent because she is still working while she has a special-needs baby. Is that really the liberal philosophy? Isn't there, I don't know... a father available as well? Don't they think he can contribute?

Steve Sailer has an interesting post up about how one of the reasons this story is so big is that humans are always fascinated with fertility. Can't argue with that. His blog is also surprisingly supportive of Gov. Palin overall.

Anyway, if you can't win on the issues, resort to attacking the innocent. That seems to be the plan here.

UPDATE Sep 4, 7:24 AM:
Ross Douthat is a blogger I'm probably going to read a bit more in the future; he also writes for the Atlantic but he's a far more sane version of Andrew Sullivan. Regarding this story, he points out that in a single day the mighty New York Times had no less than three above the fold stories on this 17 year-old's pregnancy. He also condemns Richard Cohen's retching article comparing Gov Palin to Caligula's horse (in one of his odd moods, the Roman emperor Caligula once appointed his horse to be counsul of Rome).



Interested in reading more? Click on any label below to read related articles, bookmark this site, or subscribe to my  RSS Feed

Click here to continue reading...