McCain was pretty clever to challenge Obama to those joint town hall meetings.
Either he gets to beat him a couple of times over the summer or gets to beat him up for not doing them.

Based on this statement from the Obama camp, it looks like it will be the latter.

Barack Obama offered to meet John McCain at five joint appearances between now and Election Day—the three traditional debates plus a joint town hall on the economy in July and an in-depth debate on foreign policy in August. That package of five engagements would have been the most of any Presidential campaign in the modern era—offering a broad range of formats—and representing a historic commitment to openness and transparency.

“It’s disappointing that Senator McCain and his campaign decided to decline this proposal. Apparently they would rather contrive a political issue than foster a genuine discussion about the future of our country.

“Senator Obama believes that the American people deserve an open and accessible debate as they choose between real change and four more years of failed Bush policies, and he welcomed McCain’s invitation to offer voters ‘the rare opportunity of witnessing candidates for the highest office in the land discuss civilly and extensively the great issues at stake in the election.

I donÂ’t blame Obama for avoiding the appearances. ItÂ’s not that I think McCain is so great at them (though itÂ’s a better forum for him than a set speech) but Obama is so bad when he has to think and speak off the cuff.

I am not one for all sorts of ‘new politics’ and bridging the partisan divide but if that’s your stuff, McCain really is your guy this election despite all of Obama’s talk and hype on the subject.

BTW- Isn't this more conditions than he said he would put on any meeting he would have with Ahmadinejad?

Hope! Change! Fear of appearing with your opponent...Obama '08!

UPDATE: How chickenshit is Obama? Apparently very. It looks like he agreed to one town hall meeting. On July 4th. Look, I am a political junkie. I watched all but 2 of the Democratic debates and all the Republican debates (except the Spanish language ones both parties had) and there's no way in hell I'd be watching this on the 4th of July.

Posted by: DrewM at 09:16 AM | Comments (32)
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DUBLIN, Ireland (AP) - Electoral officials say Irish voters have rejected the European Union reform treaty with a national "No" vote of 53.4 percent.

The blueprint for modernizing the 27-nation bloc cannot become law without Irish approval and its defeat is a major blow to the EU.

Stubborn, aren't they?

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 08:25 AM | Comments (50)
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There's something funny about this picture of the Ohio judge who on Tuesday threw out Ohio's death penalty procedure. But I can't quite put my finger on it...

Thanks to John Hinderaker. more...

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 07:47 AM | Comments (67)
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...hopefully. There has been a lot of discussion about how many constitutional protections are now possessed by the Guantanamo Bay detainees. The short answer is that we don't really know. Most obviously, they now have the constitutional right to have the legality of their detention examined in the federal courts. But the courts do not have any standards by which to measure the legality of detained alien military prisoners.

I suspect that many courts, when faced with the detainees' petitions, will be tempted to use the standards applied in habeas petitions from imprisoned criminals, since that is the type of habeas petition they are usually faced with. (The other possibility is habeas petitions from individuals held in contempt of court.) For those petitions, the courts look for constitutional deficiencies in the imprisonment. For example, whether the petitioner had access to a lawyer or a speedy trial under the Sixth Amendment. The court's examination is predicated on the understanding that the petitioning prisoner had constitutional rights to begin with.

What happens when the petitioning prisoner's constitutional rights are unclear, as is the case for the Guantanamo Bay detainees? No one really knows. Not all constitutional protections apply in all situations. Some of those limitations are explicit in the Constitution and some are not. For example, the Sixth Amendment protections textually apply only to criminal prosecutions. On the other hand, many of the criminal procedure rules which are derived from the Fourth Amendment apply differently depending on whether the proceedings are criminal or administrative in nature. Now, the Sixth Amendment clearly won't apply to military trials. But whether and how the Fourth Amendment will apply to military prosecutions is an open question. As I wrote yesterday, we just have no idea which protections apply to aliens who have no connection to the U.S. except for their capture by the military.

Common law rules are even more problematic. In the U.S., due process requires that the use of hearsay be sharply restricted even beyond the requirements of the Sixth Amendment. The common law rules of hearsay have been codified in all fifty states and federal law for criminal and civil proceedings, but the common law still exists. Do those common law rules apply with the same force to military prosecutions? I don't know, and no one else does either. There is no doubt that the Guantanamo Bay detainees have some Fifth Amendment due process right. I'm sure that due process requires some protection from hearsay. But I have no idea how much protection is required for this particular group of individuals: enemy alien combatants in military custody.

That question, in fact, all of the questions I raise above, are now in the hands of more than a dozen federal district court judges who probably have dozens of different theories between them. Those clashing theories will have to be hashed out by the various circuit courts and any disagreements among the circuit courts will have to be resolved by the Supreme Court. Guess who can't intervene to answer the questions? Congress. Unlike with the Hamdi and Hamdan decisions, which explicitly left Congress to cure the deficiencies, this ruling gives Congress very few options (even if Congress were inclined to do something).

I've long been sharply critical of Justice O'Connor, but for this case I would definitely have traded Kennedy for her. Even if O'Connor had concurred with the liberal result, she never would have agreed to this, no doubt because she was formerly a legislator herself. Kennedy was a law professor and it shows. Uh, not that I have anything against law professors...

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 07:28 AM | Comments (26)
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Could be. If he does, I donÂ’t think heÂ’s a fan of SluÂ’s.

The Obamassiah (Hi!) was thanked by a supporter for wearing a bike helmet while going for a ride last week. ObamaÂ’s response?

“I had an internal debate,” Mr. Obama said. “Because I knew that the A.P. was going to take a picture, and they were trying to portray it like Dukakis wearing that tank helmet. But I wanted to make sure that the children who saw that picture knew that even the Democratic nominee for president wears a helmet when he goes biking.” (The crowd applauded enthusiastically.)

Then he admitted to being wounded from some critiques of his bike-riding outfit, which included sneakers, jeans and a tucked-in polo shirt.

“Now, obviously the rest of my apparel was apparently not up to snuff, because I got a hard time from all sorts of blogs,” he said, “Who said I looked like Urkel.”

Wherever might he have seen such a thing?

Also, credit to messablue who made the Urkel connection early on.

Welcome to Moron Nation Sen. Obama. Grab a bottle of Valu-Rite and let's discuss your idiotic notions about the economy, foreign policy in general and Iraq in particular, etc...

UPDATE: Senator Obama writes in the comments:

Despite having read this blog for some time now I have just been informed of the quality of comments typical of this site and I must say I am disappointed. This is not the Ace of Spades I knew. After much soul searching I have made the deeply personal decision to no longer read or post here. Please be assured that my faith in beating hobos and drinking val-u-rite have not changed and come January Michelle and I will be looking for a blog where we can feel conformable expressing these ideals but right now Michelle says this isn't helping our kids.

I realize this is a busy site and this amounts to throwing many people under the bus at one time but it's is our hope that this change will provide so many bumps that the ride will actually even out and improve.

Now, if you will excuse me I need to email Scarlett and convince her I am not Urkel.

Heh.

Posted by: DrewM at 06:14 AM | Comments (55)
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Hmm.

Or were Pakistani soldiers accidentally killed in a legitimate attack upon insurgents operating inside Afghanistan? Inquiring vid below the fold.

I don't know. I just know this airstrike, ostensibly recorded on June 10, doesn't look like it's hittin uniformed Pakistani troops. Or a wedding party. (update: commenter Erik the Red points out article says "paramilitary").

TOPICAL THURSDAY! In the sidebar I mentioned the fact-checking, liar scathing truth detector and lie-defyin internet powehhaus that is Barack's New "Nuh Uh!" website, refuting the most lame powerful damnations allayed against his messiahness.

Captured by Slublog, who is sure possessed by the demon Henry, devourer of souls and shit. The straight dope from Barack's own site..

It's true because they say so. He is not a space alien. So fuck off with that shit.

more...

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 06:43 PM | Comments (29)
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I forgot this was on. He just did the SNL "very, very, very old" joke.

Posted by: Ace at 03:45 PM | Comments (48)
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Disneyfied and silly, of course, but I find this far more realistic, logical, and adult-themed than any of the Star Wars prequels.

Skip to 3:06 for the action.

Thanks to stormy.

Posted by: Ace at 03:39 PM | Comments (16)
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One mom did all the sex stuff -- she wasn't apparently a mother of any of the boys present, so, you know, it's not weird or anything.

But the other one watched, and told the boys not to tell.

Of course one did. Probably one of the ones who didn't get MILF-sex.

Police said two Bucks County moms have been charged after a sleepover involving six teenage boys took an alleged illegal sexual turn.

Angela Honeycutt, 38, and Lynne Long, 45, are facing numerous charges after a series of alleged incidents on April 14.

Authorities said the teens, ages 14 to 16, were attending a sleepover at Long's Lower Makefield home when Honeycutt, a mother of two young children, allegedly had sex with a 14-year-old and performed sex acts with a 15-year-old. Long allegedly watched, listened and instructed the teens not to say anything.

In addition to the alleged sexual assault, detectives said Honeycutt exposed her breasts to the teens; open-mouth kissed some of the minors, entered a shower with a juvenile and engaged conversation of a sexual nature.

The two women are charged with three counts of corruption of a minor, sexual assualt of a minor, and four counts of Being the Greatest Mothers in the Whole Damn World.

Thanks to Maetenloch (not a maniac).

The Criminal Complaint: With more dirty details.

Man, this is one MILF Gone Wild.

Eh.

As one woman has her name blacked out, that makes me think she's the mother of one the boys at the sleep-over. They're blacking out her name to protect his identity.

One boy -- "M.L." -- is probably Lynne Long's son. Fortunately, he's not involved in any of this, at least not directly. Because, all kidding aside, that would be really bizarre stuff.

As opposed to medium-to-heavy bizarre, as it is.

"Let me ask you -- take a seat, take a seat.
Do you think it's appropriate for a 38-year-old
woman to have sex with someone far too young
to have my level of skill and stamina?"

Posted by: Ace at 02:06 PM | Comments (80)
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I wouldn't blame him if he didn't (who does?), but it might be a good idea to at least peruse his fellow Time staffer Karen Tumulty's digest of the "whitey" rumor.

According to campaign officials, what finally launched Obama into a full rumor counteroffensive was a story that apparently first made a big splash on the Internet in late May in a post by pro-Hillary Clinton blogger Larry Johnson. Quoting "someone in touch with a senior Republican," Johnson claimed that there was a video of Michelle Obama "blasting 'whitey' during a rant at Jeremiah Wright's church." (Later versions of the rumor had Michelle's "rant" happening at a Rainbow/PUSH Coalition conference.) No such videotape has surfaced.

First of all, Johnson's credibility is awful, as conservative bloggers have repeatedly, well nigh gratuitously, pointed out in mentioning his rumor.

Second, his claimed source of "senior Republican" pretty much scotches the idea that he got this from "conservative bloggers," unless Time.com think that "senior Republicans" are also spending their days blogging.

Sure, Fred Thompson. Sure, Tom DeLay. Gets pretty thin after that. Is LJ claiming he got it from either man?

Third, of course -- LJ cannot be trusted on this point because he has an obvious partisan interest in dishing the rumor about his secondmost hated enemy while claiming it came from his most despised enemy: Republicans.

...

Obama's new rumor shredder makes it easy to find both the "lies" and the "facts" behind the "mystery tape rumor." Secondary pages note that "even some conservatives don't buy it" and list two well-read conservative bloggers who have debunked the tape tale. And in what is likely to be the most read part of the new site, the campaign cites the probable sources of the stories in a section called "Who's behind the lies?" As the Obama sleuths explain it, the "Michelle Obama Mystery Tape Rumor" appears to be a work of fiction lifted "almost word for word from a novel published in 2006."

The article doesn't give credit where it's due for that last bit, but that came from conservative blogger Jim Geraghty, debunking the rumor.

So: Time Magazine notes that even Barack Obama's "fact-check" website says that "conservative bloggers" don't buy it. Time Magazine notes that pro-Hillary liberal blogger Larry Johnson pushed the rumor into the mainstream.

So who does Time Magazine staffer blame for the rumor?

Conservative bloggers, of course!

Posted by: Ace at 02:01 PM | Comments (16)
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