I've long thought that politics is personal, especially as regards strong partisans, but not as usually thought.

Bill Clinton retained his support from liberals during Impeachment not because he was innocent or victimized, but because he had persuaded liberals to initially take up his cause under the claim of actual innocence. When it later developed that he wasn't innocent at all, liberals did not turn on him and call him "liar."

Why? Because they had a more important interest. By defending Clinton in those early, naive days when the mainstream media was actually pushing the line that Monica was a stalker, Clinton's supporters had gotten a little bit pregnant with the desire to be ultimately vindicated. They'd had arguments with friends and family for months that Clinton was innocent; their interest in seeing Clinton prevail was no longer an intellectual or purely political one. They now had skin in the game. If Clinton got impeached, they'd "lose" the months-long argument they'd been having.

Although they were disappointed to be rudely informed that Clinton had been lying to them all along, that would not match their disappointment at having to admit they were personally wrong to those who they'd argued with. And so, quick as lightning, their defense moved from "He's innocent; these are the confabulations of a borderline-schizophrenic stalker" to "Doesn't rise to the level" and "Let's move on."

In fairness, of course, anti-Clinton conservatives had skin in the game all along, too. But we didn't need to reverse long-held claims in order to continue in our quest for personal vindication-- winning the damn argument.

Now liberal Democrats, of course, have plenty of skin in the game as regards Iraq. They don't want just to see Kerry win. That's important to them, of course. But they also want to be personally vindicated on their long-held passionate pro-Saddam advocacy. To get that sort of personal vindication, they need more than for Kerry to just win while being evasive and "complex" on the issue. They need Kerry to clearly declare his fidelity to their side of the argument, take that position to the American people, and then convince a majority of them that Bush lied, people died.

A lot of anti-Clitnton conservatives were disappointed that we didn't get the big personal validation from Bush's 2000 victory. Yes, Bush won, and we were crazy-happy about that; but then he didn't sufficiently beat up on Clinton, nor press for additional investigations or the like, and thereby bringing us any closer to what we really craved: An official government declaration that We were right all along, signed by the President and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and maybe even Kofi Annan, if he could be persuaded to play ball.

Now, liberals voted tactically in the primaries. They attempted to display something akin to "reasonableness" or "prudence." They voted against the man they really wanted -- the man who actually clearly and unambiguously declared his support for their pro-Saddam views -- because they feared he actually couldn't win the race, and thus couldn't deliver the vindication they craved. They voted for Kerry, a strutting peacock of nuance and shadow, a walking cipher in a Naval uniform. In the interests of winning the election, they put aside their cravings for a politician who would give voice to their darkest and most lunatic conspiracy theories.

But it's several months past now, and the natives are getting restless. They thought they could live with a candidate who gave ambiguous and evasive answers regarding the Great Big Issue about which they wanted personal vindication. But the "You bet I might" vote for war in Iraq type answers are beginning to grate.

They voted for Kerry because he wasn't Howard Dean. But now they're beginning to regret that. What they really want is Howard Dean in John Kerry's naval uniform.

Professional barking moonbat/bag lady Helen Thomas is the first canary in the conspiratorialist coalmine to begin choking on the ambiguous fog that Kerry is spewing:

WASHINGTON -- It appears American voters have little choice between the presidential candidates in the November election when it comes to the disastrous war against Iraq.

...

Kerry has made a colossal mistake by continuing to defend his October 2002 vote authorizing President Bush's invasion of Iraq.

Last week at the Grand Canyon, Kerry said he would have "voted to give the president the authority to go to war" even if he had known there were no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction -- Bush's original justification for war on Iraq.

...

Kerry has passed up several chances to distance himself from the Iraqi debacle. But instead he has left himself wide open to Bush's ridicule. What's he got left -- stem-cell research?

...

The senator should have called Bush's hand months ago and laid it on the line after so much official deception. How could he say he would have voted for the 2002 war resolution after he and the whole world learned the rationale for the war was based on falsehoods?

I.e., he should have Deaned it up.

Does Kerry realize that the U.S. invasion of Iraq without provocation violates the U.N. Charter and the Nuremberg Tribunal principles?

Good question, Helen. I suggest that you keep asking this-- particularly to liberal readers.

Kerry has a weak fallback position-- that he would have planned things differently before going to war and would have lined up more European allies. Knowing what they know now about the Bush fiasco, France and Germany are congratulating themselves for having the good sense to stay out of Iraq.

So Kerry has blown it big time, rising to Bush's bait and throwing away his ace in the hole -- Bush's shaky credibility on the profound question of war and peace.

...

In 1968, Richard Nixon said he had a "plan" to end the Vietnam War and the voters, wanting peace, bought it. Nixon -- in part forced by Congress -- reduced the U.S. troop commitment to Vietnam, but U.S. forces were still there when Nixon was forced to resign from office in 1974 because of the Watergate scandal. But the war ended the following year.

These were not triumphal solutions but they did give Americans some hope of eventual escape from the two quagmires.

In 1964, a Los Angeles Times cartoon by famed Paul Conrad showed a pollster knocking on a door. A woman sticks her head out of a window and the pollster asks her voting preference: "President Johnson or Sen. Barry Goldwater, R-Ariz.?" She replies: "Who else have you got?"

That may be the fix some Americans are in again.

Another Kerry-Nixon comparison.

And liberals don't toss out comparisons with Richard Mephistopheles Nixon lightly.

Lunatic liberals may be our best hope for finally forcing Kerry to announce his real positions on the war on terrorism. Kerry's been feeding them anonydyne pablum, but they want the Good Stuff, the Ol' Red Eye, the big bottle marked XXX in a Bugs Bunny cartoon.

Without Kerry taking the pro-Saddam cause to the people and winning on that platform, the vindication they crave so desperately will always be incomplete.

What's more important to liberals-- winning the argument or winning the presidency?

As a one-time intense anti-Clinton partisan, I can say that the former interest might be slightly more important to the anti-Bush partisans than the latter.

And that makes me smile. Because I think these maniacs just might force Kerry to give away the Presidency in exchange for their support.

Thanks to See-Dubya for pointing out the Helen Thomas piece.

Proof of Thesis: Blaster provides the evidence. Chris Matthews, talking with Tom Friedman:

Well, let me talk to you about, as a person who spends every night here arguing about it one way or the other, trying to understand it one way or the other.

If we do succeed in reconstructing Iraq along the lines of a moderate democracy, then the people who supported the intervention, the preemptive act, the preventive attack on that country, will say we were right. That‘s the problem.

Yes. That's the problem. As Blaster notes, if peace and prosperity come to 25 million Iraqis and the nation's security is strengthened and America gains an ally in the Muslim world, "the problem" is that Chrissy Matthews will have to confess error and admit the Jew Wolfowitz was right.

Transcript here.

Posted by: Ace at 01:48 PM | Comments (21)
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Way Off Bass offers a Shakespearean sonnet to explain John Kerry.

I offer him this one in return. It's from Kerry's lunatic liberal supporters -- particularly those in the media -- to the object of their disappointed love:

Sonnet 147:

My love is as a fever, longing still
For that which longer nurseth the disease;
Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill,
The uncertain sickly appetite to please.
My reason, the physician to my love,
Angry that his prescriptions are not kept,
Hath left me, and I desperate now approve,
Desire his death, which physic did expect.
Past cure I am, now reason is past care,
And frantic-mad with evermore unrest;
My thoughts and my discourse as madmen's are,
At random from the truth vainly express'd;

For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright,
Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.

Okay, maybe that closing couplet is a little over the top, but that's Shakespeare, you know.

Posted by: Ace at 01:22 PM | Comments (2)
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...which is, sadly, the normal pattern:

Privately, but no longer quietly, Democrats are beginning to despair.

They cannot fathom why their man, John Kerry, cannot seem to fathom how easy it should be to put President Bush away, seize the high ground and take command of the issues of the war on Iraq and the war on terror.

This is just proof of their lunacy. It should not be "easy" to beat Bush. In fact, I think a more reasonable take is that Kerry is doing very well considering Bush's tarnished-but-still-considerable popularity and the advantages of incumbency. As well as being a tried and tested Commander in Chief.

But let's move on (TM):

...

Democrats despair because, given all of that, a majority of America's voters still tell pollsters they believe that Bush, not Kerry, can better command the war on terror. And mainly, the Democrats privately despair because they know why the people feel that way. They know it is because Kerry has been pathetically unable to answer, clearly and forthrightly, the simplest questions about the war in Iraq and the war on terror. Kerry cannot explain just what he would have done and what he will do now to better command and win the unwon war on terror.

Wow.

Who knew I'd be in such agreement with liberals about Kerry?

Democrats say privately they don't know what is wrong with Kerry. Here is what's wrong: The Democratic presidential nominee has no clearly defined conceptual framework that is the basis of what he thinks about the war on terror and the war in Iraq. ...

Without that conceptual framework as a foundation, Kerry has been despairingly unable to clearly and forthrightly answer even the simple question a reporter put to him during a photo op moment at the rim of the Grand Canyon.

Here's what Kerry was asked: If you knew at the time the Senate voted on the resolution authorizing the president to go to war in Iraq all that you now know, would you still have voted for the resolution?

Here's what Kerry should have answered: "If we had all known back then what we now know, there is absolutely no way that the Senate would have passed that resolution. I wouldn't have voted for it....."

But here is what Kerry actually did answer. Kerry answered that, yes, he would have voted for the resolution anyway. "I believe it's the right authority for a president to have," Kerry added. Which was not just a lame and lousy answer, it was untruthful. But at least it was better than what he once said when a similar question prompted him to forthrightly declare: "You bet I might have."

"It's frustrating as hell," said Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., as quoted in the New York Times. He said Kerry is being "asked to explain Bush's failure through his own vote. I saw a headline that said 'Kerry Would Have Gone to War.' That's bull. He wouldn't have. Not the way Bush did."

Kerry's problem is that he has been spooked by Bush's political basher-in-chief, Karl Rove, who so successfully painted Kerry into the political landscape as a flip-flopper that every time Kerry is asked that perfectly fair question, all he thinks is: Oh-oh! Gotta be sure I don't look like I'm flip-flopping!

So Kerry gives another knee-jerk nuanced response. But all that the people want to hear is straight talk. From someone. Just once.

There's an easier way to explain this. John Kerry's main problem is that he insists on concealing his actual positions on life-and-death, war-and-peace questions from the voters whose support he courts. He poses as a warrior to pro-war moderates and a war-protestor to pro-terrorist peaceniks.

This isn't nuance. This is deception. One of those two groups are being lied to (and I strongly suspect it's the former).

It's time for the media to stop soft-pedaling Kerry's lies and evasions as "nuances" and "complexities" and call them what they are.

The American people have a right to decide an election based upon a candidate's actual, clearly announced/admitted views.

If John Kerry will not inform us of his actual views, it is the duty of the media to do so.

Two Instances Constitute a Trend! Update: Remember the Liberal Conventional Wisdom of two weeks ago? That this election was "John Kerry's to lose"? (Moderate/semi-liberal Mickey Kaus had some fun with that notion; his basic theme was that Yes, the race may be Kerry's to lose, but don't underestimate Kerry's determination to do just that.)

Well, it seems that liberal Chris Sullentop, writing for the amatuer leftist newsletter Slate, is impressed with Bush's political skills. His conclusion? "He's that good":

... Even from a distance, I can see why Bush charmed the press corps during his 2000 campaign. He's likable, winning, and self-deprecating. He's also quick on his feet, not with an instant recall of statistics but with snappy retorts that break up the room.

...

After last week's Democratic convention, I felt that John Kerry had become the favorite in the presidential race. Now, after only two days with President Bush, I'm not so sure. He's that good. Unlike many people, I'm not threatened by the president's religious rhetoric. It must be the Midwestern Catholic in me. Like the people in the audience, I find it familiar and comforting. I can see why so many people believe the president is "one of us," no matter how rich or how elite his background. And I can see that Kerry will have a tough time besting Bush in all three debates.

Via Itz News to Me and PoliPundit.

Posted by: Ace at 12:10 PM | Comments (11)
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Full article is linked here.

Awesome.

Now that Kerry's own contemporaneous diary contradicts his later claims and his self-nominated first Purple Heart, you think there's a slender chance that someone in the liberal media might bother himself to ask a question?

And don't forget about the SwiftVets, if you've got some spare change jangling in your couch.

Update: A blog called Public Enquiry Project reports that even Joshua Micah Bucephalus Hezekiah Boutros-Boutros Mellencamp Marshall is fretting that the SwiftVets' allegations and ads are cutting into Kerry's support:

Before the ad, 41.94% of Independents intending to vote for Kerry felt that they would “definitely” vote for him; 37.10% felt “most likely” to vote for him; 20.97% were “leaning” towards him; and none were “not sure.”

These levels of commitment changed markedly after viewing the Swift Boat ad. Independents “definitely” voting for Kerry dropped to 29.03%. Those “most likely” to vote for him were relatively unchanged at 33.87%. Those “leaning” towards Kerry dropped to 9.68%. Finally, Independents “not sure” of their initial choice of Kerry increased substantially to 27.42%. This substantial change attests to the effectiveness of the Swift Boat ad’s attacks.

Thanks to FreeRepublic for posting both items.

Small Update: Bill From INDC has a short post linking articles found here. The really cool thing is his version of the Drudge Siren.

I wish I'd thought of that.

Update: Wizbang is blogging the living hell out of this issue today. Just keep scrolling, as they say.

Posted by: Ace at 11:44 AM | Comments (2)
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How can we soldier on in this war without such ubermen?:

German men are being shamed into urinating while sitting down by a gadget which is saving millions of women from cleaning up in the bathroom after them.

The WC ghost, a £6 voice-alarm, reprimands men for standing at the lavatory pan. It is triggered when the seat is lifted. The battery-operated devices are attached to the seats and deliver stern warnings to those who attempt to stand and urinate (known as "Stehpinkeln").

"Hey, stand-peeing is not allowed here and will be punished with fines, so if you don't want any trouble, you'd best sit down," one of the devices orders in a voice impersonating the German leader, Chancellor Gerhard Schroder. Another has a voice similar to that of his predecessor, Helmut Kohl.

The manufacturers of the WC ghost, Patentwert, say they are ready to direct their gadgets at the British market.

Their prototype English-speaking WC ghost says in an American drawl: "Don't you go wetting this floor cowboy, you never know who's behind you. So sit down, get your water pistol in the bowl where it belongs. Ha, ha, ha."

Yes, peeing while standing up: That most crude of American jingoistic impulses.

...

So far 1.8 million WC ghosts have been sold in German supermarkets.

But Klaus Schwerma, author of Standing Urinators: The Last Bastion of Masculinity? doubts whether it will ever be possible to convert all men.

"Many insist on standing, even though it leads to much marital strife," he said.

In German, the phrase for someone who sits and urinates, a "Sitzpinkler", is equivalent to "wimp".

Un. Frickin'. Believable.

I used to say "Culture is the process by which men are civilized into becoming women."

I'll have to modify that.

John Kerry has a plan to get the courageous German ubermen to contribute troops to Iraq, and that plan can be summarized in one word: bidets.

Thanks to Aaron Burr.

Posted by: Ace at 11:37 AM | Comments (7)
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In a play spoofing -- i.e., slandering -- traditionalist Christians.

This casting is all wrong. Satan wouldn't be such a sawed-off little shortie. He also would have some charisma.

Posted by: Ace at 10:26 AM | Comments (13)
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The men were described as "Lithuanian." Lithuanian what, they did not say, and when they do not say, I think we all know where the smart money lay.

For some time I've been greatly amused by Mickey Kaus' hysterical attempts to claim that Al Qaeda are real George Bush fans. He's a Kerry supporter, and so he obviously doesn't want to support the same candidate as bin Ladin; his wild spinning for the "Bin Ladin For Bush" theory is rich in both chuckles and pathos.

Okay, Mick:

If your theory is that "Bin Ladin loves Bush because Bush plays right into his sinister scheme of provoking a War of Civilizations," shouldn't bin Ladin also be, errrm, a big fan of Tony Blair as well?

Tony Blair is one of Bush's few major-nation allies in this thing; indeed, it is often said that Tony Blair, and not George Bush, provides the moral and rhetorical support for Bush's wider war on terrorism (i.e., the war in Iraq).

So what we have is Al Qaeda attempting to evict one Bush ally from office in favor of the Spanish socialist peacenik, and now we have Al Qaeda plotting to kill his main ally.

At some point, Mickey, you're going to subordinate your fanciful and self-pleasing theories to the actual empirical evidence at hand.

The anticipated "No Theory That Is This Self-Satisfying Can Ever Be Abandoned" Spin: Bin Ladin loves Bush, and only Bush, because while a Tony Blair exudes finesse, reserve, and rhetorical persuasiveness, Bush does not. Bush "helps" bin Ladin's plan to recruit most Muslims into a World War on the West whereas a lot of extremist Muslims listen to Tony Blair and say to themselves, "You know, that English guy makes an awful lot of sense. Maybe this jihad we're all so crazy about isn't such a cool idea after all."

Thus, Al Qaeda plots to kill or drive from office all of Bush's smarter-and-more-reasonable allies, while leaving The Great Blundering Crusader-Satan in office.

That will be his response.

What other possible response is there?

Posted by: Ace at 09:23 PM | Comments (4)
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Kerry "denounces" the MoveOn ad assaulting Bush's TANG record (even as his surrogates and spinners push the story to the press, not even having the courtesy of doing so on background).

Now, why would Kerry do such a thing? Do not make me laugh and say he's acting out of principle.

No, he'd only denounce the MoveOn ad in order to help him get the SwiftVets ad taken down, and he'd only do that were that latter ad hurting him.

Guess what? It is hurting him, and polls show it.

The conspiratorialists/liberals/reporters -- it's really sort of a continuous spectrum -- have raked Bush over the coals for his non-AWOL non-scandal to the point where the public largely believes it in rough outlines (despite never having been presented actual proof by the media).

So Bush has already taken his lumps on that score; you can't scuff him up much more than he's already been scuffed.

On the other hand, Kerry's four months in Vietnam are his Fortress, his Crown Jewels, and those jewels haven't been uglied-up yet.

But they're starting to crack under the pressure.

Which is what happens to faux jewels, you know. They look pretty, but they're only paste and cheap colored glass.

Posted by: Ace at 09:22 PM | Comments (8)
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He's still down 2 in the battleground states (among registered voters, a rather indiscriminate category which might even include Ms. Kathleen Anderton, aka "The Author Formerly Known as Legally Competent"), but the trend is positive.

George W. Bush, Beloved of Mighty Cthulhu, might just find that the "stars are right" for waking The Tentacled One from his aeons-long deathsleep.

If Bush does win, please, everyone do me a favor and volunteer to have Cthulhu eat your brains before mine. I want at least three seconds to gloat about it.

And then, of course, I too will gladly sacrifice myself to satisfy the all-consuming hunger of He Who Sleeps In Dream-Haunted Ry'leh.

A deal is, as they say, a deal.

Posted by: Ace at 09:13 PM | Comments (9)
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I love any excuse to recycle old material. Especially when it's a good excuse.

Long ago, a moonbat named Kathleen Anderton wrote a letter to the editor of some newspaper. Her letter was full of such unhinged paranoiac moonbattery that I couldn't wait to inform her that yes, her lunatic suspicions about conservatives were all true.

Well, Ms. Anderton has apparently Google-searched her own name and discovered that article, as well as Way Off Bass' own verbal doses of Thorazine. And she's hopping mad about it all.

She wasn't being a nutter-- she was being ironic and/or satirical, like Jonathan Swift. (PS: Jessica Cutler is also a genius.)

Read her response and draw your own conclusions.

Update! Apparently she didn't just respond to Way Off Bass, as I'd feared. (How could she have forgotten me?) She actually did respond in the comments to the original post, under the shadowy alias "the author."

Sort of like "The Artist" aka Prince, but without the fetish for purple sequins and platform shoes.

Or, you know, the talent.

I'm happy now.

I just hope she didn't miss correspondent Paul's enigmatic and ominous warning:

When they came for the Cryonically-Suspended Incubator Women, I said nothing because I'm not a Cryonically-Suspended Incubator Woman.

When they came for the Legally Huntable Sub-Helots, I said nothing because I'm not a Legally Huntable Sub-Helot.

When they came for the Cyberclone Slaves, I said nothing because I'm not a Cyberclone Slave.

So when they came for me, I invented the Boson Reversal Disintegrator and it turned out not to matter that none of those other people were around any more.

I think that says it all. Ms. Anderton, "The Author," might want to put those words up in her kitchen, right next to the engraved chopping board reading "Bless this Mess."

Update: Responding to "The Author" more, um, thoughtfully:

That's what it was meant to do. As for my use of bad words - jackass, jackass, jackass - oh no, better close your eyes and ears to the things in this world that offend you.

I have no idea what she's talking about here. She writes this in response to Zetetic, but he himself called her a "jackass," and then appended his missive with the slightly-informal valediction "FOAD," which, last time I checked, did not mean "Fine Old 'appy Day." It means "Fuck off and die," so I don't really understand why Ms. Anderton thinks that it's her foul language which is being criticized.

Maybe the Shadowy Man Who Lives In the Back Of the Refrigerator called out to her while she was composing her response.

Besides, we really have done so much good with our war against terror.

I sense this is some of that "Swiftian irony" I've heard so much about.

In related news, the Shadowy Man Behind the Tupperware Casserole Dish says that Farenheit 9-11 may be "factually flawed," but it exposes a "truth greater than mere fact." He also says he's "super pumped" about the upcoming The Apprentice sequel.

I'm sure we're just one step behind that wily Bin Laden, and the Iraqi people are so much better off since we've gone in.

Subtle. I've got no beef against sarcasm, but simply stating the opposite of your beliefs in this bitchy sort of whine (I can almost hear her voice trembling) really isn't much of a trick.

They really do embrace our help and the rebuilding that's going on is just amazing.

In case some of you were taking solace from that remark, be warned: I think she probably doesn't mean it.

Thank goodness the U.S. is such a benevolent force.

Okay, first I doubted her Swiftian talents, but now I'm becoming a believer. The woman slices like mighty Gulliver through my Lilliputian mind.

Sarcasm. The opposite of what you mean. Not. Very. Challenging.

Our peace plan for Israel and Palestine is moving along quite well too. In case you all miss it again, I'm being ironic.

Shut up, really?!!

Plus the newest suggestion for sanctions against Sudan will show those rebels to stop killing the African villagers. I am so glad that we have such a wise and wonderful leader to follow.

His name is Dr. Barrows, and he's been meaning to have a word with you about the disturbing images in your fingerpainting.

Okay, my sarcastic response was hardly any better than The Author's, but, like any artist (such as fellow-literary-heir-of-Jonathan-Swift Kathleen Anderton), I'm limited by the materials I have to work with.

Posted by: Ace at 06:49 PM | Comments (16)
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