I've linked this before -- but deep in my soul I prayed it was a photoshop. Surely a candidate for Vice President would not be so obscene as to allow herself to be photographed with Scandi-ite perverts, penguin-humpers, and icebacks, could she? Surely a trick of the left wing, right?

But the Weekly Standard confirms-- it's all too real.

She's made Thules of us all.

Disgusting. Repulsive. Yes, gob-smackingly vile and filling me with heart-ache.

I don't know what to do to stop this degenerate Thorsucker from getting elected.

Oh wait, yes I do:

Sarah Palin is secretly pregnant with the Bjorn-seed of the horn-headed fjord-fucking snow-wop tundra-monkey on the top right.

The Eagleton Scenario? The clock ticks.

If You're New: It is the official position of this site (and most of the commenters) that America is founded upon a tolerance and respect for all races, classes, genders, creeds, and sexual orientations, except for the licentious lutefisk-lovers of the Scandinavian penninsula, who are all degenerate cryosexuals and who need to be, errm, "redeployed" out of the country post-haste.

Or at least confined to their urine-soaked igloos so they can't pollute the values and morals of America's impressionable youth with their disgusting Wotan-worship, cryptosocialist agenda, and relentless hawking of modestly-priced home furnishings.

The Scandification of Europe? This map is more chilling than WWII propaganda maps of an Octopus Germany strangling the continent.

thanks to JamesR.

Posted by: Ace at 12:01 PM | Comments (59)
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That is precious. That is rich. That's some weird, wild stuff.

McCain is trying to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. By winning the war 'n shit. Hokay.

And note that when this charge was leveled at Obama -- a situation in which it was not falling-down funny -- it was an "attack on Obama's patriotism" and a smear he ran to Mommy Media over.

Oh, and suddenly Mr. Debate-Dodger is all psyched for a "substantive" debate on foreign policy with McCain.

Posted by: Ace at 11:48 AM | Comments (65)
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Eh. O'Reilly's jocular style here (and his pbvious delight that The One finally agreed to talk to him) has the effect of letting Obama off the hook, I think.

And of course Maverick agrees with Obama on ANWR.

The only candidate on either ticket who's serious-minded enough to prioritize American economic and national security above worries that a poor caribou being upset by the aethetics of a pipeline is the bubbleheaded fluffybrained beauty queen from Wasilly.

Teaser video here.

Hey, Mav: You know what would be really "maverick"? Defying the absurd soft-headed conventional wisdom of America's soft-handed chattering classes and supporting the American national security and economy over the aesthetic sensibilities of a fussy, "dedicated bachelor" caribou who thinks a pipeline would ruin the feng shui of the frostmire and "totally clash with the lighting concept he's going for."

In fact, you'd have the NYT and WaPo editorial boards on your side -- or at least their early-eighties incarnations, as they then (before they were insane) argued that locking away billions of barrels of oil to "protect" a frozen ice-swamp known chiefly for its summer bounty of thundering herds of precious environmentally-sensitive meagamosquitoes was, oh what's the word?, stupid as fuck.

Sarah Palin's Tour of ANWR? If Maverick fears public opinion on this issue (which, last time I checked, was only barely in favor of keeping ANWR locked down, if at all), why not send Palin to ANWR with a media entourage, so the public can see the icy shit-tundra the environmentalists want to protect?

The media would have to follow her. And the public could finally see the frozen-mud hoarfen the media is claiming is as verdant and teeming with life as the banks of the Amazon.

Posted by: Ace at 11:09 AM | Comments (28)
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Again, I totally forgot the season started (well, for most teams) today.

Palinmania has made me stupid.

Posted by: Ace at 10:53 AM | Comments (31)
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She calls it the Clinton era but only talks about Hillary.

Teh bitch factor?

More than that: she became the archetype of the Powerful American Woman. She herself once explained the hostility she inspires as the misdirected fury of men who were angry at a “female boss” or other female authority figure. They felt bad about being subordinate to a woman at work, so they took it out on her.

The words "frumpy" and "pantsuit" are also applied.

Anne wants to sound like she "gets it". I don't think she does. On the new Palin era:

All of this while managing a personal life which sounds alarmingly like a Nashville country-and-western ballad: daughter pregnant at 17, husband once arrested for drink driving, sister married to an abusive husband, son on his way to Iraq. Everyone wants to know how she does it.

Fine. I'll accept their weakness and struggling to comprehend.

You don't look a gift horse in the mouth. Because it will bite you.

Also, some Demure Thoughts about Clinton, election conclusions which seem obvious to the sentient, and the lib elite running the Dem party.

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 10:41 AM | Comments (31)
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Ah, what the hell. I don't usually put up comment threads for the Top Headlines sidebar on the weekends (because I'm lazy), but there's a lot of good stuff over there found by the cobloggers.

It's free to comment, so what's stopping you?

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 10:13 AM | Comments (14)
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Gaffe machine strikes again.

Now, I'm not actually suggesting that Obama is a Muslim or subscribes to any Muslim views. Certainly, this clip is too short to let us know what was being discussed, but I get the sense he meant "John McCain hasn't accused me of being a Muslim." Unfortunately, his mouth got the better of him and something unexpected came out:

"You're absolutely right that John McCain has not, uh, talked about my Muslim faith."

He had to be corrected by Stephanopoulos.

About the debates: I'm looking forward to them, but let's not set the bar too low. We run the risk of making the same mistake Democrats made about Palin last week. After all, he did alright in the Democratic primary debates. And he'll be debating McCain who has had some good nights and some bad.

On the bright side, there are differences between now and the Democratic primary debates. Back then he was winning and people like Joe Biden were still marveling at how clean and articulate he is. There were very few genuine policy differences between the Democratic candidates. Now he has to live up to the myth he's created for himself. His confidence has been badly shaken up. And all the flip-flops he made right after Clinton dropped out have left him open to attack.

Still, if McCain goes into the debates winning in the polls, his strategy must be to maintain the status quo. Nothing fancy, nothing risky. A boring debate would almost be preferable to high drama. On the other side, if Obama goes to the debates desperate to recover the lead, expect him to be dancing all over the place, taking wild shots, and trying to score points.

The New Mantra [Special Guest Poster Barack Obama]: Now, I'm going to try to scare you. I'm going to tell you all sorts of things about myself. I'm going to tell you that I consort with terrorists, that I don't look like those other guys on the dollar bills. Oh, and did I mention, I'm a Muslim?

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 10:02 AM | Comments (75)
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Gallup's Daily Tracking numbers are out and have McCain leading 48% to 45%.

These results are based on Sept. 4-6 interviewing, and include two full days of polling after the conclusion of the Republican National Convention last Thursday night. McCain has outpolled Obama on both Friday and Saturday, and is receiving a convention bounce just as Obama did last week.

Tomorrow's report will be the first in which all interviews were conducted after the conclusion of the convention.

The margin of error is plus or minus 2%.

The last time we checked in with Gallup was on Friday when the numbers were reversed. Slublog wrote:

What I find interesting is that despite the near-ludicrous hype, Obama has not proven to be a breakaway candidate like Bill Clinton, who jumped anywhere from 12-16 points after his convention and never really looked back. We've been told that the electorate is hungry for change and they're angry at the GOP, but they seem reluctant to embrace the "change" candidate.

Despite a week of Palin-bashing, the Republican ticket seems to be doing quite well. The claim that McCain's judgment is so flawed that he would select a western governor to be "a heartbeat from the presidency" just didn't catch on.

We haven't seen the end of McCain's convention bounce. He has, with Palin's help, appropriated Obama's "change" theme. And, come to think of it, Obama's "post-partisan" theme. Republicans and moderates are just as hungry for a new Washington as Democrats. And it's proven to be way to late in the game for that McSame stuff to stick.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 09:30 AM | Comments (75)
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Friday Obama took some hits for this less-than-convincing answer to a question about gun bans. He said:

"If you've got a gun in your house, I'm not taking it," Obama said. But the Illinois senator could still see skeptics in the crowd, particularly on the faces of several men at the back of the room.

So he tried again. "Even if I want to take them away, I don't have the votes in Congress," he said. "This can't be the reason not to vote for me. Can everyone hear me in the back? I see a couple of sportsmen back there. IÂ’m not going to take away your guns."

The question was about gun bans. It's not clear from reports whether they were talking about gun regulation (for example, making it difficult to purchase a firearm) or gun confiscation or, more likely, didn't specify.

I, along with most others, thought he was talking about gun regulations. I had no real reason to believe that except that gun confiscation in this country is nearly unthinkable and when we talk about gun bans, we usually mean the kind of regulation that stops people from acquiring them, but not from keeping the ones they already have. Any presidential candidate to even flirt with the idea of confiscation would be quickly and unceremoniously booted off of the national stage.

But doubleplusundead makes the case that Obama really wants gun confiscation:

"If you've got a gun in your house, I'm not taking it," Obama said. But the Illinois senator could still see skeptics in the crowd, particularly on the faces of several men at the back of the room.

Take note of that line I underlined. The gun is in your house, meaning you own it, Obama says nothing about going out and purchasing a new firearm. He's not really lying in that statement, he probably won't be sending the authorities to kick down your door and empty your gun cabinet. Which is all irrelevant, because that isn't what the lady asked. She asked if Obama was going to support gun bans. Let's look at the rest of the quote,

So he tried again. "Even if I want to take them away, I don't have the votes in Congress," he said. "This can't be the reason not to vote for me. Can everyone hear me in the back? I see a couple of sportsmen back there. I'm not going to take away your guns."

Again, Obama didn't answer her question, he's answering a question about confiscation policy, she's asking about bans which would prevent purchase of certain (perhaps all?) firearms. This is a tricky rhetorical device to avoid answering her question. He won't answer her question, she won't say if he'll pursue bans.

Click over and read DPUD's whole thing, but then come back here and tell me what you think. Is the statement "even if I wanted to, I couldn't" really an admission that Obama wants to take away guns and not just ban their sale?

Does the distinction even matter? Are there some voters out there who would support gun bans, but not gun confiscation?

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 09:00 AM | Comments (55)
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While you guys are discussing OODA (my paltry brain can only tenuously link that concept to campaign strategery), AOSHQ commenter davis,br tips us to this essay by Caroline Glick.

McCain's undoing of the elite, leftist media provides a universal lesson for contending with the Left. At base, the Left's ideology, whether relating to women's rights, human rights, academic inquiry or war and peace is not universal but tribal. Moreover, when the Left is challenged on any one of its signature issues, because it cannot actually make a case for the universal applicability or even logic of its views, it tends instead to embrace the politics of personal destruction while ignoring the obvious contradictions between its stated beliefs and actual behavior.

Emphasis me.

We've been pointing this out for years, of course, while shaking our heads at the pattern of hypocrisy and personal slander that has become the left's signature fighting style. It's not so much that they misunderestimate (heh) their opponents, but that they so eagerly discredit themselves as journalists and as leftists.

I just liked how this particular column encapsulated the sudden, outrageous, and very public media self-pantsing that occurred this past week. A good read if you've got the time.

It should be embarrassing to them, but they're still standing there with their trousers around their ankles saying "What? Palin's a shitty mother. There. I SAID IT."

Maybe some of you genius-morons can come up with a funny name for this fighting style.

And look, don't worry that we're going to give the game away by telling the (impulsive, childlike) leftist media what they're doing wrong. They don't listen to redneck idiots like us anyway, and furthermore they can't help themselves.

When offered a choice between measured, ideologically consistent arguments, and bizarre, shrieking smears that violate their own value system, the collective intellectual Colossus that is the Left will choose option B most of the time.

Because they're so effin' smart.

Posted by: LauraW at 08:33 AM | Comments (68)
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