Monthly Archives: July 2008

July 29, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Phil Spector finds that lovin’ feeling

Andrew Malcolm reports that Phil Spector appeared for a hearing in the retrial of the murder charge pending against him looking spiffy and sporting a “Barack Obama rocks” button. Malcolm chalks up Spector’s endorsement of Obama together with other endorsements of dubious value including those of Jane Fonda and the late Dale Lee Bishop, who was a participant in the 1998 claw-hammer homicide of an acquaintaince. Bishop endorsed Obama just »
July 29, 2008 — Scott Johnson

…and gladly teach

Charles Lipson teaches international politics among other things at the University of Chicago. In “‘Last lecture’ a lesson in great teaching too,” Professor Lipson takes the occasion of the death of Randy Pausch last week to meditate on what it means to be a great teacher. Professor Lipson writes: [T]eachers like Pausch do two things at once. On one level, they convey specific ideas and analytic methods and then help »
July 29, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

A deep bench

Last week I lamented that many of the top prospects for the number two spot on the Republican ticket seem like “nearly men” — candidates who are just a flaw or two away from being assets to John McCain. Thus, Tom Ridge’s potential to assist McCain in Pennsylvania is probably offset (or worse) by the impact his position on abortion would have on the conservative base. And Mitt Romney’s potential »
July 29, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Ted Stevens Indicted

Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska has been indicted by a Washington, D.C. grand jury. The seven-count indictment “relate[s] to his holding of public office.” The Justice Department will hold a press conference to announce the indictment in a few minutes. I have no idea whether the charges against Stevens have merit or how serious they are, but he is up for re-election this year and has trailed in recent polls. »
July 29, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Social Networking For Republicans

If you Google the word “Facebook,” the first entry that comes up, naturally, is the main Facebook site. The second is Barack Obama’s Facebook page. The RNC has now parodied Obama’s use of social networking quite cleverly with a page called BarackBook. The site is a useful guide to Obama’s friends, with videos and a news feed. What is Barack doing right now? (Facebook users will get the reference.) “Barack »
July 29, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Got milk?

Israel Today reports that the gentlemen of Hamas who control the Gaza Strip have distributed a set of carefully-staged photographs demonstrating that smuggling tunnels running under the Gaza-Egypt border are for milk and other essential goods, not weapons. The photographs (included with the story) show masked Hamas men lifting jugs of milk and sacks of baby food from the entrance to one of the tunnels on the Gaza side of »
July 29, 2008 — Scott Johnson

An evolutionary mistake

In Kennedy v. Louisiana this past June, the Supreme Court struck down the death penalty enacted by six states for child rape. I wrote briefly about the Court’s decision in “Our robed masters strike again” and in “Anthony Kennedy’s song of himself.” One of the two grounds on which the Court’s 5-4 majority held Louisiana’s death penalty to be unconstitutional was the Court’s perception of a national consensus that capital »
July 28, 2008 — John Hinderaker

A Surprising Leak by the Obama Campaign?

When the prayer that Barack Obama inserted into the Western Wall was made public, I had an unworthy thought: the prayer sounded suspiciously as though it had been written for public consumption. For Obama, embarrassed by his association with Jeremiah Wright and increasingly tagged as arrogant, the prayer seemed to touch all the right bases, including a plea to “help me guard against pride.” But any suggestion that Obama had »
July 28, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

A bounce or a short-hop?

For the past few months, I’ve been tracking, if you will, the Gallup and Rasmussen tracking polls. They have pretty consistently confirmed that (a) Obama is 2 to 5 percentage points ahead of McCain and (b) things haven’t changed very much since Obama wrapped the nomination. My view has been that they likely won’t until the Democratic convention. Last week, however, the two tracking polls showed some movement in Obama’s »
July 28, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

A winning proposition

The conventional wisdom is that, as the economic downturn shifts the focus of the presidential debate back to domestic issues, the advantage goes to Obama. This view isn’t entirely implausible, but it tends to be overstated by members of the liberal MSM who think that the Democrats have all the right answers domestically and have lost presidential elections only because of national security and cultural concerns. The conventional wisdom notwithstanding, »
July 28, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Who Cares?

The McCain camp is jumping up and down about the fact that over the weekend, Barack Obama essentially came over to John McCain’s view on Iraq. This was the exchange Obama had with Newsweek’s Richard Wolffe: Wolffe: You’ve been talking about those limited missions for a long time. Having gone there and talked to both diplomatic and military folks, do you have a clearer idea of how big a force »
July 28, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

All quiet on the Everton front

Many thanks to Roger Hassell for the report, complete with photo, on his encounter with the Everton team. It’s all the excuse I need to update our readers on Everton’s off-season. As usual, it’s been uneventful. While most of Everton’s rivals in the second cluster of Premiership teams — the tier below the big four of Man U, Chelsea, Arsenal, and Liverpool — have made plenty of news on the »
July 28, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Passing Through Berlin

Barack Obama is the most left-wing candidate the Democrats have nominated for the presidency since George McGovern. If Obama wins the presidency, I think it is fair to postulate that it will be George McGovern’s first term. Like McGovern, Obama staked out his territory as the antiwar candidate at the left end of the field of Democratic presidential candidates. His antiwar position, including his concocted critique of Hillary Clinton’s purported »
July 27, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Another day in Arafatistan

An Israeli operation in Hebron has resulted in the death of the terrorist mastermind of the suicide attack on Dimona earlier this year. Carl in Israel has posted a good round-up. The Jerusalem Post reports: The IDF said that in a joint Border Police and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) operation the forces surrounded a house where 25-year-old Shihab Na’atsha, a Hamas explosives engineer, was hiding. The IDF said Na’atsha »
July 27, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Will Deciding to Drill Lower Oil Prices?

Over the last couple of weeks the price of oil has dropped around $20 per barrel. Some observers have been quick to credit President Bush, who rescinded the executive ban on exploration and drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf, and Congressional Republicans, who have kept up pressure on Democrats to allow exploitation of our domestic resources. But is this realistic? Certainly producing more oil would reduce the price, but if »
July 27, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Cotto-Margarito: A Classic

We previewed the welterweight championship bout between Miguel Cotto and Antonio Margarito Friday night. The fight turned out to be one of the best in a long time. Veteran referee Kenny Bayless called it the best fight he’s ever been in the ring for. Cotto, the favorite, dominated the early rounds with crisp counterpunching. But Cotto, a pretty hard puncher, couldn’t faze Margarito, who attacked relentlessly from the opening bell »
July 27, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Everton touches down

Paul Mirengoff is our resident Everton soccer fan. Reader Roger Hassell writes: I’m a regular reader of Power Line, and I take note of your occasional posts regarding the Everton Football Club. My family and I were returning from a European holiday yesterday. We flew United Airlines Flight #939 from London Heathrow to Chicago. My youngest son and I were seated in business class, awaiting departure, when the Everton Football »