Idiot Politician of the Week

Presented by James Wigderson.

No, no, you’ve have to go see who it is.

Democrats outnumber Republicans in Pinellas County

From the St. Petersburg Times, it appears the county I grew up in has changing politics.

Pinellas County has turned blue, at least when it comes to voter registration in this GOP stronghold.

For the first time in more than two decades, figures from the Supervisor of Elections Office Friday showed registered Democrats outnumbering Republicans, 233,240 to 233,181.

The last time Democrats had the edge, according to records from the supervisor’s office, was in 1984. A decade ago, Republicans enjoyed a 30,000-voter advantage.

When my mom and dad moved there in 1963, they could only register as Democrats.

The reasons?

• National discontent with the GOP.
• Pinellas is becoming younger and more diverse

But what do voter registrations really tell us?

[R]egistration figures only tell part of the story. There are more Democrats in Florida than Republicans, yet the GOP controls nearly all levers [sic] of state government.

I guess we’ll see what happens. In Florida and nationwide.

Don’t like negative political ads?

Also via techPresident comes the site called Look for the Good, which seeks, among other things, to counter act the effect of negative ads during the campaign season.

No, really.

Here’s their suggestion,

When a negative political ad comes on the TV or radio, mute the sound or change the channel.

Hey, I already do that.

More humor

Courtesy of Dane101

Good afternoon from Dane101’s Department of Better Living! We’ve put together some quirky, funny, and/or just plain bizarre links to brighten up your lazy Sunday. Click on each description for a laugh (or WTF?! moment)

I saw the picture and read one item and knew I had to link.

Awww, they were only funnin’

Yep, that’s what they say.

How stupid of me not to see it.

The Left needs to start looking for the beam

Just the post to throw back a Bible verse the Left loves to use. And a word the Left likes to throw at people who try to live what they believe, yet falter sometimes.

Matthew 7:1-5

1“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. 3“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.

A local left-of-center blogger recently juxtaposed a picture of Scott Walker and Adolph Hitler. Sorry, there will be no link. It disgusts me and my respect for this formerly engaging blogger has dropped to new lows. That any sane person could see a similarity between a fine man and a mass murdering psychopath is beyond me.

To their credit several left-of-center bloggers and commenters have criticized him for doing this.

He posted an “explanation” later. Here is the jist.

Of course I was not really comparing the two.

But he was. “Two Ambitious Men” was the title of the post.

Tell me that the Gableman campaign did not know exactly what they were doing when they juxtaposed a picture of Justice Butler next to that of a sex offender who also happened to be the same race as Butler?

They may have known what they were doing. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll ask Justice Gableman if I see him again. He’ll probably deny it. So what will be gained?

The fact remains that any sex offender, as vile and disgusting as the crime may be, is on such a higher plane than Hitler.

Maybe, as someone said, Tim should stick to baseball.

Apologies to anyone offended.

Yet, the fact that the pictures remain posted makes me doubt the sincerity of the apology.

The fact of the matter remains that when the Left wins elections, it’s because of issues and when they lose elections, it must be that the Right somehow did something so despicable that they must be compared with Nazis.

The Left needs to grow up.

(h/t to Nick.)

Idiot politician of the week

James Wigderson names his latest.

That elliot

Always looking on the bright side.

Bible and government by Dr. John Cobin - a review - part 3

In this post, I hope to finish the rest of the book that I started with this post and this post.

In chapters 3 and 4 Dr. Cobin gives us his view of popular Biblical views of government. His key premise is that,

With few exceptions over the course of human civilization, civil government has been relatively evil insofar as mankind’s temporal well being is concerned. Furthermore, in an individualistic sense, civil government is always evil to someone. Certainly, Uriah would not have thought King David’s treatment of him to be a nice or a good thing (II Sam. 11:4, 15).

Wow. Quite a statement for a Christian to assimilate.

But wait there’s more.

Popular thinking that government is always a lesser evil than the extreme case of political anarchy is mistaken. Proponents of such thinking fail to reckon with the brutal record of civil government.

Bet that got your attention.

He gives an example of

those who have faced extermination at the hands of communists might not agree that the tyrannical government that dominated and oppressed them was better than anarchy.

Perhaps, but that wouldn’t mean that all civil government is evil all the time. Even the communists might have done something good.

He may be correct that “the existence of anarchy does not imply that society has neither rules nor order” but that does not mean it would work in this day and age. He believes the market would provide order, but that is too much to hope for that anyone but the most fervent believer in free markets to accept.

There is a danger of power which is why we must be vigilant.

We see an example in Revelation, where government is used by Satan to persecute the faithful remaining on the earth.

But wait there’s more. Joseph, an Old Testament hero seen as a picture of Christ, is criticized by Cobin for

bad, proactive economic policies where people were effectively swindled out of their land by the state (Gen 41:33-44). The state profited handsomely by the craftiness of Joseph.

Whew. This will be more than most Bible believing Christians can accept completely.

His solution? Christians should not actively participate in government.

The Appendix to Chapter 3 purportedly lists all policies of governments in the Bible and classifies them as good ambiguous or evil.

Chapter 4 continues looking at the Bible and government, looking at three key passages, Romans 13:1-7; 1 Peter 2:13-17 and Titus 3:1-2. Let’s just say that he practically reverses the commonly held view and does so unconvincingly.

Dr. Cobin believes that good government is the exception rather than the rule. He also feels that Christians are under no compulsion to obey every law. He spends most of Chapter 5 dealing with that. I would agree as long as the Christian is prepared to face the consequences, something Dr. Cobin appears unwilling to do.

Chapter 6 gives a policy analysis of the Christian and American public school. Suffice it to say that he believes

The public school has at once been both the greatest, most pernicious threat to liberty and American Christianity.

Few conservatives would disagree, hence the popularity of parochial and home schools.

The final chapter sums it up and gives a table of issues and how Christians should react.

I’ll have one more post on the book, or more correctly, on the author and my reaction.

Campaigns and why we get tired of them

The race for the Supreme Court is getting nastier as the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported Saturday morning.

Not that this was a surprise to any one. After the last election’s nastiness between Linda Clifford and eventual winner (?) Annette Zigler, we knew we were in for it.

It’s been ramped even higher than we suspected with the latest ad from the Gableman campaign, which has been universally condemned by the left of center blogs who are calling it unfair at best and, most likely, racist. The AP did a fact check on it and found it misleading.

Other recent coverage can be found here and here.

I don’t really like these kinds of ads. I’m a lovey, cuddly sort of guy. I’d rather issues be discussed than sling mud.

Now I have no illusions. Politics is a full contact sport. It’s dirty and degrading.

Negative ads are apart of that landscape. One reason is because they work.

Sometimes.

But it seems they are more prevalent in the Supreme Court races. Perhaps because what else is there to talk about. There’s only so many ways you can say you’re a good judge and you’d make a fine justice.

But I think often these kinds of ads are the reason people aren’t interested in politics and thus don’t vote in elections.

I know they don’t do much for me.

Except cause me to grab for the remote.

Poll: Most Americans don’t read political blogs

From Reuters

A majority of Americans do not read political blogs, the online commentaries that have proliferated in the race for the U.S. presidency, according to a poll released on Monday.Only 22 percent of people responding to the poll said they read blogs regularly, meaning several times a month or more, according to the survey conducted by Harris Interactive.

Well, 22 percent ain’t bad, is it?

More posts on this:

steveegg at No Runny Eggs.

Neo Con News, where there is a list of more folks posting on this.

Obama Accuses Clinton of Deception

From the Washington Post

Eager to shift the narrative after a difficult week, Sen. Barack Obama’s campaign sharply criticized the tactics of his rival, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, charging her campaign with attempting “to deceive the American people just so that they can win this election.”

Isn’t it interesting, now that they don’t have to defend them against “The Vast Right Wing Conspiracy,” how many Democrats are telling us what we conservatives already knew?

The end of a sad tale

I know many of my conservative brethren think there’s more behind the Georgia Thompson affair, but nothing was ever proven and this poor woman was made the scape goat.

Campaign finance laws are good

As long as you’re not required to participate in them.

Sen. John McCain, a passionate advocate of limits on campaign finances, is turning down government matching funds for the primary to free him to spend more money as he prepares for a general election contest.

McCain, who appears headed to win the Republican presidential nomination, sent letters to the Federal Election Commission and the Treasury Department notifying them of his decision to withdraw from the presidential election financing system.

McCain had asked to participate in the public system last summer when his campaign, his fundraising and his poll numbers hit a low point that threatened to unravel his candidacy.

Of course, there’s an advantage to this,

By not taking the money, McCain is free to raise more and to promote his presidential candidacy until the Republican nominating convention in September.

Campaign officials said McCain could still participate in the public financing system in the general election, when the nominees for the two parties would be eligible for about $85 million to spend between their nominating conventions and Election Day on Nov. 4.

McCain might have been out of the race, if not for the matching funds.

Loopholes will be found in any campaign finance law and will kill it. This one, in particular is obsolete.

There are better ways.

Governor says he made mistakes

From the Los Angeles Times

Reflecting on four years as the state’s chief executive, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Thursday that he now regrets a number of the policies he championed in his early days in office and acknowledges his own rhetoric was at times overheated and naive.

“I have learned a lot of things where I felt one way before I went into office, and all of a sudden you learn things are not quite this way and you change,” he said. “People call it flip-flopping. I would rather flip-flop when I see something is a wrong idea than get stuck with it and stay with it and [keep making] the same mistake.”

So, has the governor grown? Or is this another example of being captured by bureaucracy?

Review of Bible and Government - part 1

Written by Dr. John M. Cobin, an investment adviser and Visiting Professor of Economics and Public Policy, Bible and Government(subtitled Public Policy from a Christian Perspective) gives a view of government from a Christian perspective most Christians would probably be surprised to read.

This is not Mike Huckabee government, folks.

And he doesn’t wait till chapter one to get started. In the introduction he asks four basic questions (p. 5):

1. What kind of government should Bible-believing Christians support?
2. What public policy must be obeyed?
3. When, if ever, should Christians revolt?
4. To what extent is the Christian’s submission to the state qualified?

These questions Dr. Cobin seeks to answer in his book.

He then discusses three dominant philosophies of biblical public policy that have emerged (p. 7-9).

…theonomists (or Christian Reconstruction) would tend to allow civil government action that assists in the establishment of the postmillennial golden age. …Anabaptists… advocate non-participation in most civil government offices. [ed.-in some cases, this leads them to pacifism]. …Still a third perspective,…seems to offer a revitalized vision of the divine right of kings….if God ordains the state, then nearly all of what it decrees must be obeyed as if God Himself had issued the order.

Reformed Christians (like Huckabee) see civil government as “a redeemable and, hence, potentially useful institution that may be placed in the service of God’s kingdom as a restraint against evil.” This is what most evangelicals mean by Cobin proposes that at least part of civil government is beyond the pale of transformation.

What might surprise some Christians is Dr. Cobin’s interpretation of 1 Samuel 8:4-20. Israel is asking for a king and Samuel is trying to tell them what a king will mean, especially in the area of taxation.

Another of Cobin’s premises is that civil government is, in fact, a lethal institution. He quotes extensively from a speech that includes data that can be found on this website.

Well, that’s the introduction, there’s more to come.

When will Fred begin to attract voters?

UPDATE: OK, the comments here go with the post above on Huckabee. I split this post up to separate the subjects. I thought of trying to copy the comments to that post, but didn’t want to risk it. That’s why they look out of place.

Most of the conservative Cheddarsphere here in southeastern Wisconsin is supporting Fred Thompson. I like Fred. I’ve said so before. I just wonder how long he will be in the race.

Let me back up a bit.

The blogosphere was all atwitter last week over a report that Fred would withdraw from the race if he didn’t do well in Iowa. This was denied by the Thompson camp and indeed was probably a dirty trick by some other campaign.

Or was it? Fred did OK in Iowa, good enough for encouragement among his supporters. South Carolina is the rallying cry.

But how is Fred doing? Actually?

OK, I don’t believe in polls either and in this environment they may quickly change and there’s no guarantee that any primary or caucus will turn out the way the polls are.

But just pretend with me that polls mean something. I mean candidates do. The media do.

According to Professor Franklin’s calculations, Fred is second in SC. Not great but within margin of errors. He’s no higher than third anywhere else. Looking at RealClearPolitics.com averages, Thompson is third in SC and no better than fourth anywhere else.

The numbers have to move sometime for Fred to stay in it. You can’t keep coming in third and win a nomination.

Most Fred heads seem believe that McCain, Romney and Huckabee will knock each other out. Huckabee won’t last and, presumably, McCain and Romney will fade because they’re not “true” conservatives.

Time will tell and it may start Tuesday.

Stop the Presses - 2

From CQ Politics,

A GAO report examines SCHIP coverage of adults and finds that,

States that cover adults as part of their State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) are more likely to experience funding shortfalls than states that do not, according to a report released Thursday by the Government Accountability Office.

Wow. I’m glad they let us know that.

If you suffer from insomnia

I present to you the Democratic Debate transcript from today.

Also noted is Why Dennis Kucinich was not invited (as well as Mike Gravel).

Neither Dennis Kucinich nor Mike Gravel had a campaign office in Iowa by the Oct. 1 deadline, according to reports filed with the Federal Election Commission. Gravel also did not have any paid staff in the state by the deadline.

Presumably Alan Keyes met these requirements, a remarkable feat of organization?

Political Fact checking sites

Always a tricky process because it depends on your view of the facts, but here are some you may find handy (and will be found in my sidebar):

PoliFact - a new site by the St. Petersburg, FL Times and CQ Politics. Includes articles, the Truth-o-meter, attack file, candidates, our rulings issues and link to the two sponsoring sites.

FactCheck - the Annenberg Fact Check has been around for awhile. It has a feed and an e-mail update available.

techPresident - This site goes to the technical side of fact checking. For example, one recent article looks at exposing Clinton sock puppets.

The Washington Post FactChecker -  This is actually a blog (probably some of the rest could be considered blogs also) among the WaPo’s other blogs.