From the Anchoress:

It is interesting to think, isnÂ’t it, that if America is brought low (a no-longer unthinkable notion, unfortunately) and the crazymen that weÂ’re hot to appease in Iran, or North Korea or Venezuela get together to do crazy things, the only fully-functioning and war-ready Democracy left to help the world will beÂ…Israel.

Tiny, despised, fierce Israel.

I love irony, but thatÂ’s not an irony I want to see played out.

Unfortunately, the Israelis do not have nearly the force projection that we do. And while there are two oceans separating us from our direst enemies, the Israelis' enemies are right next door. The Israelis cannot stand between China and Taiwan or North and South Korea or Russia and the former soviet republics. If President Obama pusses out, many will suffer.

Related: The impending creation of a more sovereign European Union after Ireland's vote to ratify the Lisbon Treaty has Professor Kenneth Anderson musing about American decline and the President's "multilateralism":

Be wary, O Europe, above all, of liberal internationalist Americans bearing gifts of multilateralism. An America that does not assert, rudely and brusquely, its own interests and views first through Nato and elsewhere, an America that sings sweet songs of multilateral interdependence is, surely, a superpower that has decided to simply go along with what everyone else does, which is another way of saying it has tired of supporting the free riders, which is another way of saying that it, too, says one thing but might do another, and what it might do is not show up when the big battalions are finally needed.

Prudent Europeans fear and do not trust, above all, an America that does not put its own interests first and carry the rest along in train. Re-read Raymond Aron. Europe will soon enough face an Iranian nuclear weapon along with its massive dependence upon Russian natural gas, even as its military strength declines yearly – hourly – and in important respects it is today at least arguably more dependent on the American security guarantee, not less, than at any time since 1990.

Anderson is wordy and in great need of an editor, but he's worth a read if you're into international relations.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 07:43 PM | Comments (93)
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Dave in Texas asked me to do this and I'm nothing if not obliging.

Since I don't really like college football, I have nothing more to say on the matter but don't let that stop you.

And no, you can't haz cheerleader. I'm stuck working today...so I'm not going to suffer alone.

UPDATE [DinT]: Dude, that's just wrong.

So wrong.

Posted by: DrewM at 09:38 AM | Comments (236)
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It's true that in the overall scheme of things Obama's Olympian Fail isn't that big of a deal. The problem is, if He can't get the little things right, what chance does He have in dealing with the hard and important issues?

Based on the postmortems starting to appear on Obama's No So Excellent Adventure, not much. (NY Times link)

A sense of stunned bewilderment suffused Air Force One and the White House. Only after the defeat did many advisers ask questions about the byzantine politics of the Olympic committee. Valerie Jarrett, the presidentÂ’s senior adviser and a Chicago booster who persuaded him to make the trip while at the United Nations last week, had repeatedly compared the contest to the Iowa caucuses.

But officials said the administration did not independently verify ChicagoÂ’s chances, relying instead on the Chicago 2016 committee assertions that the city had enough support to finish in the top two. Mr. Obama, Michelle Obama, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Ms. Jarrett worked the phones in recent weeks without coming away with a sense of how behind Chicago really was.

“Most of our information came from the committee and the Chicago folks,” said David Axelrod, a senior adviser to the president. “But I don’t want to leave the impression that somehow we went on the basis of faulty information. We went because it was the right thing to do.”

When Chicago was eliminated in the first round after receiving only 18 of 94 votes, senior Democrats began debating whether it had been wise for the president to become so invested in the bid. But with Mr. Obama flying back to Washington and out of pocket for hours, Mr. Axelrod rushed onto television to defend the effort.

“I don’t view this as a repudiation of the president and the first lady,” he said. “He would do it again if he had the opportunity.”

So they didn't do any independent research on the stat of play for the bid? Huh, another case where Obama is willing to meet without and preconditions or preparations. See how well that works out?

It's funny but I imagine that if Chicago had won the vote, Axelrod and company would be claiming a lot of credit for their guy. Since it didn't work out, it's not their fault, it's Bush's.

The IOC and Iowa caucus vote is a dubious comparison but weren't we told that the proof of Obama's executive experience was his success in running a political campaign? Turns out that's actually not a skill set that transferable to every situation after all.

Ace has already taken on the lefts new attack line that those of us gloating over Obama's FAIL really hate America, I'd just like to add one thought to it. We were repeatedly told by Obama and his supporters that many challenges facing the country would improve by his simple presence and that his unique personal skills would lead to improved outcomes on a number of issues.

Guess what? It didn't. Both Obama's made very personal pitches (they each used the word "I" like 26 times each), which focused on their stories not the country's. And what did it get us? A humiliating last place finish. Hell, the evil and heated George W. Bush could have guided us to a last place finish.

It's not that we are glad that America failed (it didn't, Obama did) but that we were right. Those of us who spent the last year and a half saying that tough domestic and international problems were real and not simply going to go away because a guy with an interesting life story and an ability to read a TelePrompter was given the big job.

It might be nice if the left acted like adults and admitted that they were wrong and we were right (yeah, and my unicorn is coming, it's just on back order). Pointing out facts as they exist here in the real world is not the same as rooting against America....and the fact is Obama isn't very good at this job.

I now ban myself for the racism inherent in that statement.

(Story via The Corner)

Posted by: DrewM at 07:48 AM | Comments (432)
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Sure, Yahoo sends you the email thing but you ignore it because they don't give you cheerleaders pics.

That's my job.

Incidentally, me, LauraW and Russ have a little side pick group going on, I set it up before Ben volunteered to handle all 250 of you knotheads. And she's kicking my ass right now.

But she can't hold the lead. No way. Plus she'll get bad advice on the Giants and that will be her downfall.

...

Unless I stay stupid on the Cowboys. That'd probably even it out.

UPDATE: Boots are very popular this year, aren't they?

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 05:45 AM | Comments (96)
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TGIF y'all. Tonight we deal with issues dear to the moron heart.

Bacon - Our Line in the Sand
First they came for the nitrites, but I wasn't sure what those were so I did nothing. Then they came for more of the pig, mostly the parts I didn't like so again I did nothing. But now they are coming for the bacon and it is time for us to draw a line in the sand. To say this far and no further. This is The Bacon Line - they shall not pass.

We must fight casual insults to the pig that a decadent, bacon-less Hollywood gives us:

Posted by: Open Blog at 07:59 PM | Comments (332)
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The first one was hilarious.

This one's better.

via HotAir

"People are saying a lot of mean things about Big Government. And calling it "Socialism?" It's gotta stop."

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 07:16 PM | Comments (57)
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Of course.

But he believes that the Bush administration had poor relations with the IOC and remnants of that era remain.

Jackson also said he wonders if repeated airing of footage of the beating death of 16-year-old Derrion Albert on television and the Internet might have influenced the IOC.

Yeah, I wonder. I wonder.

Nah, probably the Bush thing. You had it right the first time, dude.

Now I really feel ashamed for politicizing this. Why, if I'd known the Reverend Jesse Jackson was going to take the high road like this...

Little cowbell suggested by a racist unpatriotic reader.

Look, we're not unpatriotic. We just notice that the guacamole looks like good dippin' material. Nice and cool. Rich and creamy.

Posted by: Ace at 05:55 PM | Comments (186)
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Good news, but... Come on. Who the hell likes Arlen Specter?

43-42 Toomey. Good enough for now.

Thanks to William Amos.

Posted by: Ace at 04:23 PM | Comments (66)
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Check out the smoking craters of debt the Olympics has left behind in other places.

Here's an interesting angle: Although conservatives tend to be against subsidizing stadium construction, for liberals, there's usually an extra dose of outrage, because not only is public money being misspent on something other than abortions and methodone, it's being put into the pockets of wealthy team-owners, and besides, liberals only watch tennis and the WNBA.

That's all the Olympics is. A massive public payment to a private entity to benefit some but not many private businessmen (hoteliers, obviously), and for no real greater reason than prestige.

Well... What is prestige worth? Surely not five or ten billion dollars.

At any rate, while many on the right have been making this case about the Chicago Olympics for some time -- noting that the city was split about it, many people not thinking they wanted to pay a ten year surtax to cover the costs of two weeks of chariot races -- liberals have forgotten all about the very real question of misallocation of limited public resources and rah-rah embraced the bid for Chicago -- just because it would have represented a win for Dear Leader.

You've got jackasses like Glenn Thrush wringing his dainty little boy-hands that Republicans may be viewing this only in terms of wins or losses for Dear Leader -- but what the hell are liberals doing? Since when has paying ten billion on stadium construction appealed to them lately? Seems like it's only now that Prince Obama of Grayskull said it's a good thing that they're rabidly in favor of this.

They're doing this a lot lately. I do not believe that more than 20% of partisan liberals really give a fig about the public option per se. For example, I do not believe that Chris Matthews has any policy wonk interest in the question at all. I neither believe he's thought much about health care in the past nor has he increased his thinking about it in the present.

So why is he so interested in the public option? Only because pushing it through would represent a display of raw presidential power on Obama's part. He only cares about it at all to the extent that it could possibly represent a "W" in his boyfriend's standings.

The Olympics? Same deal. Frankly very few of us even realized Chicago was in the running for the 2016 Olympics (long time in the future, eh?) until a week and a half ago.

And yet, suddenly, among liberals, this became a much greater political cause than health care.

Why? Because it was so important that Chicago spend oodles of money for a two-week party?

No. Because they knew Obama needed a win, desperately, and they figured this was an easy one. Rack this easy win up, claim he's on a roll, try to leverage this easy (and frankly meaningless) win into a win on something more important, like health care.

Which... 80% of them also don't care about all that much, except to the extent Obama can win there and beat those nasty Bible-thumping moose-murdering Republicans.

So, you know -- f'n' spare me, spare the living shit out of me, over this sanctimony of Republicans rooting against your BMOC wannabe-boyfriend. "You're just rooting against our collective Dream Date Ken Doll out of partisan spite!," liberals sputter.

Oh? And why the hell are you rooting for him, I'd like to know. Tell the exact moment when you all collectively became great supporters of publicly-funded stadium construction -- and if that point is more than two weeks ago, I'll eat a beer-truck.

Jay Cost explains the feeling all of us on the right have. While you on the left are still so giddy to be able to root and cheer Obama in all his glorious contests -- like baseball, scheduled just about every day, with frequent double-headers -- the rest of us are starting to get a little weary of Obama Omnipresent.

For you, it's delightful. You still get tingles up your leg and you still marvel at his impeccably-creased trousers.

For the rest of us: Go. The Hell. Away.

This is the permanent campiagn. We have talked about its imminence for years. Well, now it's here and this is what it looks like. This is what a President does in it....

I, for one, am exhausted by our new permanent campaign. That might sound strange coming from somebody who runs the Horse Race Blog, but it is true. The ominpresence of the Obama campaign apparatus is, frankly, wearing me down. I can't get away from him or it, even in my down times. Watching the Office on TBS used to be a real pleasure for me and the missus, but now we must be interrupted by the President of the United States cracking lame jokes at us in the promotion of a second-rate comedian. There is no escape.

It's not simply because enough is enough, though that is part of it. It's also because he is different now. He holds the executive authority of the United States within his person at this moment, and it is sobering to see the holder of such vast power on the cover of a magazine urging us to follow his fitness regime. By continuing the permanent campaign into his tenure so thoroughly, he has given new meaning to the phrase "big government." When he is on the cover of Men's Health telling us how to work out, in a certain sense, the federal government's executive authority is on the cover of Men's Health telling us how to work out.

And so it continues today. What should have been a story about Chicago - or better yet, Rio (good for you, Rio!) - is now a story about...Obama. Of course. Because just about everything in the public sphere must, must become a story about Obama. Because Obama injects himself and his campaign appartus/mindset/worldview into everything. .

...

I was hesitant to place a bet on the outcome of the health care debates, but I'll place one here. Sooner or later, the American people are going to say, "Enough is enough" with this constant, incessant politicking that is inevitably built around the specialness of Barack Obama.

Do you get this, liberals? For you, Obama is, in fact, as the McCain ad said, "the World's Greatest Celebrity," and you continue to be dazzled and delighted at every setback and triumph in his life, as if he's a radiation-mutated Jennifer Aniston, now 100 feet tall, with all the difficulties in her dating life that 95 feet of unwanted height brings.

The rest of us are not as rapt as you.

Please stop insisting that we, like you, spend every minute of our being beaming out positive mental vibrations to your boyfriend. We don't like him. We never did, but your unending insistence we love him just as much as you do is starting to make us hate him.

And you.

You have a crush. I'm sure it feels like nothing you've ever felt before. And the apple of your eye I'm sure is, to you at least, the most wonderful and perfect creature ever to bestride the earth.

We don't have a crush though, and we're tired of hearing about yours.

Posted by: Ace at 02:25 PM | Comments (396)
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Just to show I'm not homophobic or nothin'.

What a fun song. Just fab.

Oh, and per a commenter's suggestion, here's Duran Duran's breakout hit.

More: Am I crazy or do I remember Leftwing Media assholes like David Shuster saying the Iraqi Baathist who threw shoes at George Bush should "get a medal"?

Meanwhile, the British press says what Obama's Spirt Squad in the American Leftwing Media won't:

It was only the Olympic Games, the White House will argue — not a high-stakes diplomatic gamble with North Korea. It is always worthwhile when Mr Obama sells America to the rest of the world, David Axelrod, his chief political adviser, said today. But that argument will fall on deaf ears in the US. Americans want their presidents to be winners.

Mr Obama was greeted — as usual — like a rock star by the IOC delegates in Copenhagen — then humiliated by them. Perception is reality. A narrow defeat for Chicago would have been acceptable — but the sheer scale of the defeat was a bombshell, and is a major blow for Mr Obama at a time when questions are being asked about his style of governance…

This has all added to the perception that Mr Obama’s soaring rhetoric — which captured the imagination during last year’s election — is simply not enough when it comes to confronting the myriad challenges of the presidency. His spectacular Olympic failure will only add to that.

You know what? He needs to learn this, quickly. He needs to know that "bein' cute 'n stuff" is not in fact a foreign policy. And yes -- it is good for America that this man-child learn this with all deliberate speed.

In both the above link and Limbaugh's comments, a bit of baiting of the race-baiters.
more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:53 PM | Comments (250)
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