Check out their homepage today (screencapped image).

Note the placement. Also, well, gee, why are they exploring the "history of intolerance" in America right now, I wonder?

Thanks to MichaelM.

Posted by: Ace at 01:59 PM | Comments (431)
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Desert Storm veteran, judge, conservative. And he has the endorsements of a lot of people, including Sarah Palin, Mark Levin, Laura Ingraham.

In 2004, Miller stepped down from the bench to run for State Representative. He overwhelmingly won the contested Republican primary and nearly pulled off an upset in the general election receiving over 48% of the vote against the Democratic incumbent in a traditionally Democratic district: the closest re-election campaign the officeholder has ever faced. Joe returned to the successful full time practice of law at his own firm. He has represented clients (including local government as both a part-time employee and on contract) in a wide variety of cases, a number of which have gone all the way to the Alaska Supreme Court.

Prior to becoming an attorney and a judge, Miller served as an officer in the United States Army. He was awarded the Bronze Star for his leadership in combat during the First Gulf War. He received his commission from West Point, where he graduated with honors. Joe is also a graduate of Yale Law School and holds a masterÂ’s degree in economics from the University of Alaska.

Joe currently lives with his family in Fairbanks where he practices law. His wife of 18 years, Kathleen, is a teacher and serves on the Alaska Judicial Council, a commission that makes recommendations to the Governor concerning Alaska judicial nominees.

He seeks donations here; and the Tea Party Express is also raising money for him.

He's running against Lisa Murkowski, who while not really a RINO, has a low-ish score of 70 from the ACU. (Actually, that does make her a RINO, and in previous years she's stunk the joint up with scores as low as 57, which is Snowe/Collins territory.)

That's the sort of score I'd forgive in a Scott Brown, holding a tenuous seat in deep-blue Massachusetts. For red Alaska, we can do better, and there's none of the usual questioning about "But can the more conservative candidate win in the general?" Absolutely the more conservative candidate can win in the general; he'd probably actually do better.

The primary is on August 24th -- they're trying to get a moneybomb going right before the election.

More: Miller also holds a masters in economics from the U. of Anchorage. His law degree's from Yale.

Here's some debate footage, which was important to me to see if this guy came off well or was just a good-on-paper candidate. He does come off pretty well.

Here's some of that blogger's coverage:

The big argument was about Obamacare. Joe Miller renewed his charges that Murkowski's votes to repeal Obamacrare were merely procedural votes and didn't really count, while Murkowski responded by showing how each vote was specifically worded to call for the repeal of Obamacare. Miller did nail down the precise difference between himself and Lisa on health care; while Lisa wants to find a government health care plan that works, Miller believes government should have NO ROLE in health care. Nevertheless, it still appears Lisa won this round with her logic.

I'd say more conservatives are inclined in Miller's favor. Even if you don't agree with his position, stated that baldly, you still want a guy pulling the wagon in that direction.

And then...

A secondary argument about the Constitution broke out. Miller asked Murkowski if she had ever voted for an unconstitutional bill, a question which I thought was a bit silly. Lisa responded that every bill she voted for, in her opinion, was constitutional, and rejected a strict interpretation of the Constitution, implying that it is a "living" document. Miller renewed his contention that judges are persistently exceeding their constitutional limits, like when the Alaska Supreme Court invalidated our parental consent law in 2007.

Bang.

Finally, look, I am agnostic at this point on TARP, but there is no doubt that I was convinced at the time, and agitated in favor of it.

But: the politics of it are awful.

Joe Miller is against it, Lisa Murkowski voted for it. That alone makes him a stronger general-election candidate. He doesn't have that heavy baggage.

Liberal, conservative, independent: Everyone hates TARP. In the entire country much just me, spongeworthy, JackStraw, and Larry Kudlow have anything good to say about it. And I don't say anything about it. I have memory-holed it. It's an unfact.

Blue State Republicans

Let's elect them only from actual blue states, huh?

Posted by: Ace at 11:47 AM | Comments (178)
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As always, that's how I read his frequent claims to want to call Jesse Jackson, Jr., Rahm Emmanuel, and Barack Obama: he's letting partisan liberal Democrats (like Jo Ann Chiakulas) that he'd better be acquitted or he won't be the only domino to fall.

And of course it worked once before.

Posted by: Ace at 10:39 AM | Comments (120)
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DFW Airport

A few weeks back I was in the US Airways terminal at Charlotte Douglass Airport when I saw 70 year old man walk by dressed in black hot pants, a red corset with matching half shirt, and black stockings. Needless to say, his presence caused quite a stir among the other travelers in the terminal.

My first reaction was that this guy had lost a wager and was paying off his debt. His motions and attitude though were not those of an embarrassed bet loser who wanted the whole event over as fast as possible. No, this gentleman was taking his sweet time walking through the terminal. He stopped and posed for pictures. He chatted up the small crowd that had formed around him. He showed no signs of embarrassment whatsoever. Clearly he was enjoying himself.

I approached him and asked him if he had lost a bet. He responded cheerfully: "No, I won the bet. You should see the other guy." He left shortly thereafter and the terminal was abuzz with chatter regarding this oddly dressed individual.

Over the weekend I happened upon an article on the CNN website titled "What's OK to Wear on a Plane?" The story featured a photo of an elderly man at DFW airport dressed in camouflaged hot pants with matching half shirt, stockings, and a black neck choker. Clearly this was the same man I saw weeks earlier.

The CNN story was picked up by FARK.com where several commentators wrote that they had seen this man at airports as varied as Las Vegas and London! It was obvious that dressing up in women's clothing and parading around a public airport was not a one time event for this man. It was evident that he did this on a regular basis.

My curiosity has been piqued. Who is this guy? Is he doing this stunt for his own deviant pleasure or is this the start of some guerrilla marketing campaign? Is he researching a book on his unique travels? Inquiring minds want to know!

Please feel free to muse in the comments section. More photos after the break.
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Posted by: Open Blogger at 10:07 AM | Comments (235)
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Because if I don't get away from the computer and see The Expendables I swear I will have a nervous breakdown.

This Girl Really Likes Ray Bradbury: When I say she likes Ray Bradbury, I mean she really, really likes Ray Bradbury. High Content warning for funny, but explicit, statements about her desire for Ray Bradbury.

Before you click, note the title of the song, which should be visible at the top of the page. It gets marginally notably worse from there.

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Posted by: Ace at 07:16 AM | Comments (217)
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Among my many other geek-isms, I'm also a space-geek, and have been since I was a kid. One of my earliest memories, in fact, is of sitting on my grandmother's lap watching one of the Apollo moon landings on our old black-and-white television. I grew up taking for granted that I lived in the future, and therefore would have all the cool stuff I saw on the sci-fi shows: domed cities, space-ships, jet-packs, aliens, and moon-bases. more...

Posted by: Monty at 05:51 AM | Comments (186)
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Welcome to Otterday!

ThatÂ’s what you people call it, right? IÂ’m a little out of the loop on these things. So there will be some otterish things below the fold.

Remember after the 2000 & 2004 elections there were all sorts of stories about depressed Dems & liberals threatening to flee to Canada in order to escape from McChimpybushitlerton’s Amerikkka? (And some didn’t even wait for the elections to make their threats, stamping their feet, folding their arms and screaming “If Bush wins I’m leaving this country!!! And I want a juice box too!”) A couple of articles on the subject here and here. Actually, the WaPo piece is sorta’ pro-American but at least references the topic.

But you never really hear people on the Right making similar threats, and probably won’t this year since the November elections look promising. But simply as a mental exercise, where would you go if you finally decided to say “screw it?” I hear Australia mentioned occasionally. Probably more than any nation on Earth, Oz seems to share the closest affinity to Americans. (Was that redundant?)

Anyway, more and more I hear people suggesting Belize as an alternative. A member of the Commonwealth, English is the official language, nice tropical climate (excepting the hurricanes), seemingly stable economy and government, favorable exchange rate (though someone needs to school me on that if IÂ’m wrong) and fairly relaxed immigration policies. WhatÂ’s not to like? More info. on the place at the CIA World Factbook and blogs such as this one.

So should Moron Nation pool our resources, move en masse and carve out a jungle compound in Belize or in the Aussie Outback? Maybe kidnap Ace and force him to be our king? (We could call the place “Moronia” or ”Moronistan.” Other suggestions are welcome in the comments) Of course, knowing this crowd, it’ll probably end up like this or worse, this

At least we have a ready-made national anthem (Pardon the low quality. Please write to LauraW if you'd like a refund on your AoSHQ subscription. Go ahead, I dare you.):

But enough of that. It's Otter-time!!!

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Posted by: Genghis at 05:33 PM | Comments (1011)
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Happy Saturday Night!

Here, beloved Morons. Because I love you and think about you like crazy, here is some choice gorgonzola for you.

It stinks.
This is some stinky, old, cheesy-cheese. You will like.

This horrible old...whatever the Hell it is, has been released in its full glory in short youtube increments.

They're all awful. And funny. If you go to Episode 10 you will see John Bolton's Moustache do a cameo in which he executes a guy.

But check this out: the first minute or so of Episode 9, which really sings: more...

Posted by: LauraW at 03:38 PM | Comments (131)
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He's a vegetarian. He demands people not judge him on his various sins (and, first off the bat, there must be something in the Bible about a Foot Locker employee wearing so much mascara).

But then he judges "animal murderers" for their, um, murder.

He makes a simple claim. As he explains in his text introduction:

An often misinterpreted bible quote - it means to only judge others for what they are doing, so long as you are not doing the same thing yourself.

So, according to his reading of the Bible, Jesus' injunction "judge not lest ye be judged yourself" only applies to those sins which you yourself are committing. On the rest, he contends, judge away!

Is he right? Certainly it's a very useful position, a convenient one for him; its an interpretation of Jesus' command which permits him a whole lot of judgment, which he seems to enjoy.

So is he right? Is his theology sound?

Or is engaging in sophistry and twisting the words of Jesus to give himself a pass on doing that which he so clearly enjoys doing?

more...

Posted by: Ace at 11:02 AM | Comments (1413)
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In Body Heat, Teddy the arsonist, sage of murder, explained: "Any time you try a decent crime, you got fifty ways you can fuck up. If you can think of twenty-five of them, you're a genius, and you ain't no genius." (Line at 1:50.)

There are a lot of ways to blow an election and the GOP is pretty good at all of them.

The Other McCain writes:

When you start taking the House races district-by-district, looking at individual candidates, historic voting trends in their districts, their campaign funding, their current level of organization, etc. . . . Honestly, itÂ’s scary out there.

...

Worse than the money situation, perhaps, is the lack of precinct-level organization by Republicans. This was a basic problem in the PA-12 special election. With the help of the NRCC, the Tim Burns campaign was able to roughly match the Democrats in terms of money, but the local GOP didnÂ’t have the kind of organizational infrastructure in terms of county and ward committees necessary to mobilize volunteers for door-to-door canvassing operations.

Phone-banking is important, but even the best phone bank is no substitute for a genuine door-to-door campaign, especially when such canvassing is done by local volunteers contacting their friends and neighbors in their own communities. And, as in PA-12, a basic reason Democrats control these districts is because the local GOP is controlled by weak-minded time-servers who have failed to organize effectively.

There's more at the link, including some races which would be winnable... except the Republican challenger has no money, almost no money at all. Even a rock-star, Allen West, who can tap the national base for funds, still trails his Democratic opponent by almost a half-million dollars.

And Melissa Bean, that arrogant liberal twit (did I misspell that?) who had a goon shut people up at her library "town hall"? She's in a district Bush carried by 55% in 2004 -- thus, a very winnable district -- but simply refuses to debate her opponent Joe Walsh.

Yeah, I wouldn't debate that guy either. His strong-but-warm eyes project laser-beams of integrity and honesty and American grit... right into my pants. Well, into the pants of the general public, I mean. I mean, into people's hearts.

Maybe this metaphor went bad a while ago.

Anyway.

I don't know, exactly, what can be done about this situation. I'd sure like to know.

Money is one thing -- an important thing -- and I'm sure the Online Republican Caucus (ORC) will wind up contributing.

But what about the organizational thing?

In 2008, someone (no, really, "someone") was part of bussed-in operations to key states, so I guess we can do that, but...

I think maybe it's just critical that everyone contact their local Republican offices to find out what can be done about walking the blocks, knocking on doors, and offering rides on election day. Contact them, and contact a bunch of like-minded friends and family members. Because ten weeks is not a lot of time for all the back-and-forth on the phone and meet-and-greets and organization that needs to happen by election day.

Apparently we have a lot of clock-watchers and goldbrickers in these posts. Maybe we need to displace them, or at least surround them with so much drive and competence they can't screw it up for us even if they want to. Surround an incompetent with five competent men and women and the incompetent will fail in his impulse to fail.

It also sounds like some of these candidates are so underfunded and underorganized that you can kind of... like, just walk into their offices and say hi. It doesn't appear that you'll be blocked by a New Praetorian at the door.

And don't give up just because you're in a "safe" Democratic district. There are very few safe Democratic districts this year -- Barney Frank could lose. Scott Brown beat Martha Coakley in his district.

Further, not voting, and not getting out the maximum vote possible among conservatives in such districts, also loses out on all those important state legislature slots, those judgeships, those crucial Board of Elections postings, the AG, the Secretary of State...

We want these positions in friendly hands. We know damn well what Democrats do when they control the machinery of vote tabulation.

By the way, someone and the other morons who bused over to Pennsylvania (I think) to do this reported that it was very satisfying and very fun, meeting like-minded people and working towards one shared goal. So, from their reports, this wasn't exactly hazard duty.

We really need overkill on this. We are way behind. We are in position to score. If we don't score, or if we come away with a field goal, we will have blown the opportunity of a generation. And we'll lose, forever.

On the flip-side: confidence and enthusiasm are good, too.

Posted by: Ace at 08:20 AM | Comments (243)
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