Happy Thursday all.

Australia: Hamburgers Are Just Like Heroin

Well pretty much. Except hamburgers are much cheaper, taste a lot less bitter, are non-addictive, and can be taken orally. Other than that they're exactly alike. And only a horrible, horrible mother would ever get her kid started on the patty lifestyle.

Now behave yourselves on the ONT while I go out and score me a Royale with cheese.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:41 PM | Comments (878)
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9pm eastern on From The Right Radio.

Also appearing on the show, Karen Harrington who is running against Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz in FL-20.

Right now, RCP doesn't have it as a battleground race but then again they didn't have Barney Frank's district on the list either until recently. There are going to be surprises on election day so you can't rule anything out.

I suggested to Ace that he offer to celebrate if she wins by, um, enjoying, a pudding cup in her honor.

For Jenny Erikson.... more...

Posted by: DrewM at 04:47 PM | Comments (178)
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How about a football thread? I'm laid up in Oklahoma with food poisoning, so why not throw the game on.

The Vegas book has OSU +3, which is essentially even because home field advantage is worth three points. This is ludicrous, because A&M is just not that good. My 'boys are gonna slaughter them. *fingers crossed* Kendell Hunter was all-American before he hurt himself last year; he woulda gone pro. He led the NCAA in rushing before they pulled the starters against Tulsa.

This is an open thread.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 03:49 PM | Comments (164)
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You may or may not find this funny. (I don't; I don't think he's funny.)

But that's not the point.

The point is the bitter tears of failure, flowing freely, and the recriminations launched five weeks out. more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:42 PM | Comments (363)
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Endorsed by Quenchy (TM)

...and recruit 40 friends to do likewise. I think this last bit is kind of hard for anyone who doesn't have a blog (or, at least, a swingers' newsletter, as I used to), but even three or four people recruited to do this aids the cause greatly.

Hell, the calls alone aid the cause greatly. (But try to get the friends, too.)

I already told them, I'm signing up myself, and will be placing my 40 calls. Maybe think about doing so yourself.

As you probably have read a bunch of times, we lost that race for Murtha's old seat not due to actual numbers of voters who would vote for our guy but because we simply did not have the turnout machinery in place that the Democrats did. The district preferred the Republican... but a Democrat is now in Congress because their people went to the polls in greater numbers than ours.

In numerous places -- like in Sean Bielat's district -- we have a fighting shot to take these races. But, there, for example, Barney Frank has run unopposed for over 20 years. We just don't have the canvassers, ward-heelers, door-knockers in place there.

Many of the seats we could win, we won't win, for lack of aggressive GOTV.

That's what this is all about -- drawing on the national conservative movement to make calls to places where we just don't have the people in place.

Anyway, I think it's a great idea. I'll be doing it, and I hope you'll consider doing it too.

Posted by: Ace at 12:30 PM | Comments (117)
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Which I don't even believe. I think it's likely Republican and he knows it, but according to the numbers he has to say Toss Up.

Meanwhile, everyone is endorsing Manchin. Assuming he will win, I guess. So Raese is fighting uphill against that.

Although Manchin remains popular – his job approval rating in a September 19 Rasmussen survey was 69 percent – he must make the transition from being the state's chief executive to being a federal candidate in a hostile climate for his party. A case in point is President Obama whose approval ratings in West Virginia are some of his lowest nationally. According to the PPP survey, Obama's job ratings were 30-percent approve to 64-percent disapprove. At the same time, Manchin is getting help from some unlikely sources. It’s not surprising that he’s been endorsed by the major labor unions, but he’s also gotten the endorsement of the Chamber of Commerce. Even more surprising is today’s endorsement from the West Virginia Coal Association, which is a very direct slap at Raese, who is in the coal business.

And the NRA, too, so if you're a West Virginia NRA member, you should give them a piece of your mind.

Posted by: Ace at 11:46 AM | Comments (93)
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Some guy named DrewM. writing over at the New Ledger.

Here's Friedman:

[W]hat is AmericaÂ’s core competency and strategic advantage, and how do we nurture it? Answer: It is our ability to attract, develop and unleash creative talent. That means men and women who invent, build and sell more goods and services that make peopleÂ’s lives more productive, healthy, comfortable, secure and entertained than any other country.

Leadership today is about how the U.S. government attracts and educates more of that talent and then enacts the laws, regulations and budgets that empower that talent to take its products and services to scale, sell them around the world — and create good jobs here in the process. Without that, we can’t afford the health care or defense we need.

This is the plan the real Tea Party wants from its president. To implement it would require us to actually raise some taxes — on, say, gasoline — and cut others — like payroll taxes and corporate taxes. It would require us to overhaul our immigration laws so we can better control our borders, let in more knowledge workers and retain those skilled foreigners going to college here. And it would require us to reduce some services — like Social Security — while expanding others, like education and research for a 21st-century economy.

By "Real Tea Party" he means liberals such as himself who want higher taxes and an economy planned by people who went to good schools.

Drew's response:

Memo to Tom: the tea party movement in general terms isnÂ’t about government plans, unless itÂ’s a plan to shrink government.

...

I just love how Friedman absolutely inverts the fundamental principles of the tea party and then has the audacity to say to them,Â’ this new set of values, completely contrary to your own, is what you really wantÂ’.

David Frum used to knock the conservative base as the "Say It Louder" brigade -- that is, confronted with setback, our response was just to say, "Say it even louder this time."

What is Friedman doing apart from that (or any liberal, for that matter)? Confronted with a serious-minded political movement that's insisting on genuine change, what does Friedman do? What do any of them do? They say it louder.
And think they can convince us that the "Real Tea Party" should be supporting statism and even China-style corporate communism. (I mention the latter because we know what a fan of the Chinese dictatorship Friedman is.)

This is their idea of accommodating new ideas: Rejecting them entirely and just trotting out the same old tired failed policies of the past four years of Democratic rule.

Posted by: Ace at 11:14 AM | Comments (81)
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Ron Johnson jumps to biggest lead eveh, 54%-42%.

LauraW sent this mildly-unsafe-for-work vid of a pug snout-humping a lab. Add your own metaphor and blame her.

Posted by: Ace at 10:36 AM | Comments (123)
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This isn't on Obama so much as it's just the unavoidable tension of the situation: Pakistan is a state supporter of terrorism, period, and has perhaps the most terrorist-loving population on earth. Their cooperation is bought and coerced; at some point, they're going to declare allegiance to Team Terror.

This will probably pass, as it's hopefully just a bit of diplomatic theater; if not, I don't know what.

Pakistani authorities blocked a vital supply route for NATO troops fighting in Afghanistan on Thursday after the killing of three soldiers in two NATO cross-border incursions, officials said.

Trucks and fuel tankers for foreign forces in Afghanistan were stopped at the Torkham border post in the Khyber tribal region near the city of Peshawar, hours after the raid.

"Yes, the NATO supplies have been stopped. It has been done locally," a senior security official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

Posted by: Ace at 10:17 AM | Comments (62)
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Quinnippiac now has Rubio at 46%, which means... well assuming it's true he can't really lose under virtually any scenario.

Republican Marco Rubio holds a solid 46 – 33 percent likely voter lead over Gov. Charlie Crist, running as an independent in the race for Florida’s U.S. Senate seat, with Democrat U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek at 18 percent, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

Geraghty wonders if he'll hit 50% in a three-way race. I reckon so.

Best Case Scenario: Florida: Time for another of CAC's maps. He notes that many of his predictions are coming true.

Again, dark red is what's already held; bright red are districts with at least a 20% of going GOP.

Posted by: Ace at 09:51 AM | Comments (158)
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