Jeff Emanuel at Redstate notes examples of how the Hollywood Left has decided that it’s cool to be patriotic again. 

Contra what many supporters would have us believe, this doesn’t demonstrate the mythic ability of Barack Obama to inspire folks to come together across the divide and sing kumbayah in harmony; rather, it shows that the take-my-ball-and-go-home-when-I’m-not-catered-to crowd (of which First Lady Michelle “For the first time I’m proud of my country” Obama is one) has decided to come back and play with the rest of us now that The Other is gone and one of “theirs” is in the Oval Office.

To the Hollywood actors, the liberal blogosphere, and my more leftward-leaning fellow Arena contributors: welcome to the party. Most of us recognize that America is America, however much hate you may harbor for its leaders, and have supported it the entire time — through Reagan, through Bush, through Clinton, through Bush again, and will continue to do so through Obama’s presidency. We won’t agree on everything — for example, I hope much of Obama’s domestic agenda fails utterly — but it won’t stop him from being “my president too,” or me from patriotically supporting my own country.

There were reports that it was suddenly cool to be an American again.  But such fair-weather patriotism isn’t patriotism at all.  It’s childishness.  The Right has been and will continue to be proud of our country, something the First Lady apparently wouldn’t understand. 

It’s been said that George W. Bush squandered the goodwill we had immediately after 9/11.  Matthew Kaminiski writing in Forbes last month, however, brings another perspective as we begin the Obama administration; don’t mistake sympathy with pro-Americanism.

One hates to spoil a good party, but here’s a bet that’s far safer these days than a U.S. Treasury bill: Even with Obama at the White House, they won’t really like us any more than before.

Read the rest of this entry

From Mike Lester:

Is PETA still being taken seriously by anybody?

The Young America’s Foundation put together a list of the top 10 abuses by academia in 2008.  From banning conservative speakers, to threatening expulsion for praying (behind closed doors), to banning Thanksgiving, it seems that the more liberal our school become, the less they are the bastions of free speech, debate and tolerance they were intended to be.

We’ve just inaugurated our first black President.  I want to reiterate what I said some months back; I’m proud of our country for this accomplishment.  This by no means says that racism is completely dead in America.  But it does speak to the great progress made since Martin Luther King, Jr. had his dream. 

Telling a child of any race that they can, through hard work, be whatever they want to be, even President of the United States, isn’t some guilt-assuaging wishful thinking.  It has happened.  Racists, as with any sin, will always be with us.  But Barack Obama’s move into the Oval Office shows that it can be done.

Congratulations, America.

At least according to the incoming President Obama.  Charles Krauthammer explains, but I just have the bullet points here to get you to "Read the Whole Thing"(tm).  All lines below are quotes from the article.

• Vindication is being expressed not in words but in deeds — the tacit endorsement conveyed by the Obama continuity-we-can-believe-in transition.
• It is the repeated pledge to conduct a withdrawal from Iraq that does not destabilize its new democracy and that, as Vice President-elect Joe Biden said just this week in Baghdad, adheres to the Bush-negotiated status-of-forces agreement that envisions a U.S. withdrawal over three years, not the 16-month timetable on which Obama campaigned.
• It is the great care Obama is taking in not preemptively abandoning the anti-terror infrastructure that the Bush administration leaves behind.
• [On interrogation techniques]  Obama still disagrees with Cheney’s view of the acceptability of some of these techniques. But citing as sage the advice offered by "the most dangerous vice president we’ve had probably in American history" (according to Joe Biden) — advice paraphrased by Obama as "we shouldn’t be making judgments on the basis of incomplete information or campaign rhetoric" — is a startlingly early sign of a newly respectful consideration of the Bush-Cheney legacy.

The upshot?

Which is why Obama is consciously creating a gulf between what he now dismissively calls "campaign rhetoric" and the policy choices he must make as president. Accordingly, Newsweek — Obama acolyte and scourge of everything Bush/Cheney — has on the eve of the Democratic restoration miraculously discovered the arguments for warrantless wiretaps, enhanced interrogation and detention without trial. Indeed, Newsweek’s neck-snapping cover declares, "Why Obama May Soon Find Virtue in Cheney’s Vision of Power."

Another "Now They Tell Us" moment in the mainstream media.  All the anger and disdain thrown at Bush, figuratively here and by a certain Iraqi reporter there, is over ideas and policies that the incoming administration has show it’ll be slow to dismantle.  Those policies have indeed kept up safe for the 7 years since 9/11. 

No, the ends do not at all justify the means.  But for some of us, these were just wars.  For others, neither Afghanistan nor Iraq were just, and the reflexively anti-war crowd will continue to push Obama, as they did Bush, to just do whatever our enemies want so they won’t get angry with us.  Or perhaps isolate them, which "worked" so well for the 70+ years of aggressive communism in the Soviet Union.  That even failed miserably with Hussein’s Iraq, with our own "allies" funneling aid to them through the back door. 

No, George W. Bush kept us safe, and, despite the rancor and alarmism, without shredding the Constitution or civil liberties.  Obama played on the fears of his supporters long enough to get elected President, but the time has come for action, and before you judge the actions of his predecessor, see what his actions are.  That will speak louder to the success or failure of George W. Bush than any pundit’s pen can write.

Don Surber says, "The Ws will remain on the keyboards."  So will the Os, I’m guessing.  Nothing but high praise from the incoming administration on how well the transition has been.

Don notes:

$100 million can buy you lots of things.

Class ain’t on the list.

Bush once again does us proud.

And he did so after having a poor example set for him.  Good job, W.

The plunging oil prices over the past few months have brought to light a failing of socialism that Hugo Chavez is now having to deal with.  When he was awash in oil revenues, he could afford to give it away and pretend that his utopia was working, and the inefficiencies could be smoothed over.  However, reality set in, and he had his hat in hand, returning to the evil capitalists for what might be called a bailout.

President Hugo Chávez, buffeted by falling oil prices that threaten to damage his efforts to establish a Socialist-inspired state, is quietly courting Western oil companies once again.

Until recently, Chávez had pushed foreign oil companies here into a corner by nationalizing their oil fields, raiding their offices with tax authorities and imposing a series of royalties increases.

But faced with the plunge in prices and a decline in domestic production, senior officials here have begun soliciting bids from some of the largest Western oil companies in recent weeks — including Chevron, Royal Dutch/Shell and Total of France — promising them access to some of the world’s largest petroleum reserves, according to energy executives and industry consultants here.

It’s like that whole idea of government control isn’t working out for them.  Odd, that.

Tom Hanks called the Mormons "un-American" for opposing California’s Proposition 8 which "constitutionalized" the definition of marriage being one man and one woman.  So now, to the Left, changing the state Constitution via the proper process is un-American, but judges who unconstitutionally legislate from the bench are patriots.  Upside, meet down.

But here’s an interesting observation that LaShawn Barber made, and that I’d like to highlight on Martin Luther King Day.  There’s another constituency that voted overwhelmingly for Prop 8 that the Left hasn’t marched against.

Why were they focusing on Mormons, when 70 percent of black voters in the state voted YES on Prop 8? Curious, but not complicated. I made the observation, as did Thomas Sowell, that white homosexuals hadn’t dared and would not have dared “march” to black churches and harass black churchgoers, although it would have made more sense for them to head down to Watts or Compton or up to Oakland and express their disappointment. Can you imagine such a scenario? I’d pay good money to see that.

Now I’m wondering the same about actor Tom Hanks. Singling out Mormons for voting to protect traditional marriage, Hanks called them “un-American.” An overwhelming majority of blacks supported the measure. I suppose the same applies to them, yes? Perhaps Hanks is waiting until MLK’s birthday on Monday or Barack Obama’s inauguration on Tuesday to make his pronouncement. What do you think? I’d pay good money to hear that.

Save your money, LaShawn.  You and I both that that ain’t gonna’ happen.  It’s a dirty little secret of the Left (generally) that it’s still OK to bash the religious. 

What’s actually un-American, in my opinion, is this mashup of Google maps and public information to point out the addresses and locations of people who donated to the Prop 8 cause.  Legal?  Sure.  Petty, vindictive, inflammatory and McCarthy-ist?  Oh yeah, you got that right.  And sure enough, McCarthy was looking for folks who were un-American, too!  Scott Payne over at The Moderate Voice notes a bit of disingenuousness on the part of same-sex marriage advocates. 

I’ve thought for a long time that the African-American community has, in general, been a very conservative group, but have been sold a bill of goods by internal leaders to look to government to save them rather than themselves.  I think if they took an issues test showing which party or politician fits their values most, a lot of them would be surprised.  Bill Cosby has been a huge factor in getting the word out, not so much politically, but in the sense of taking ownership of one’s own situation and not waiting for someone else to fix it.  That shouldn’t be a left/right thing, but far too often the measure from the Left of how well things are going tracks with how many people are on welfare and how much money they’re getting.  Government dependency was most decidedly not MLK’s dream. 

The NY Times’ Eric Lichtblau, who apparently thought he was blowing the whistle when he first reported on this, now has to report that this was all legal.  You consort with the enemy, you’ll be listened to.  Listening in on international calls or reading international e-mails when the bad guys are involved is legal.

In validating the government’s wide authority to collect foreign intelligence, it may offer legal credence to the Bush administration’s repeated assertions that the president has the power to act without specific court approval in ordering national security eavesdropping that may involve Americans.

UPDATE: More analysis at Q&O, where a dissenting point of view from the Right is taken on.

The media has, once again, set up 2 different standards for Republicans and Democrats, this time regarding the spending on inaugurations.

Four years ago, the Associated Press and others in the press suggested it was in poor taste for Republicans to spend $40 million on President Bush’s inauguration. AP writer Will Lester calculated the impact that kind of money would have on armoring Humvees in Iraq, helping victims of the tsunami, or paying down the deficit. Lester thought the party should be cancelled: “The questions have come from Bush supporters and opponents: Do we need to spend this money on what seems so extravagant?”

Fast forward to 2009. The nation is still at war (two wars, in fact), and now also faces the prospect of a severe recession and federal budget deficits topping $1 trillion as far as the eye can see. With Barack Obama’s inauguration estimated to cost $45 million (not counting the millions more that government will have to pay for security), is the Associated Press once again tsk-tsking the high dollar cost?

For the (unsurprising) answer, read the whole thing.

Sally Quinn and Jon Meacham, she of the Washington Post and he of Newsweek, have sort of a point / counterpoint set of articles in the "On Faith" section of the paper’s and magazine’s combined website.  Quinn argues that the tag "so help me God" shows "contempt for non-believers, while Meacham argues that the oath to God shows "regard for church and state".  Read Meacham’s piece first, as Quinn responds to specific points in his article.

The foundation of Quinn’s argument is that she thinks that religion should be compartmentalized.

Much good is done in the name of religion and there are many wonderful, intelligent and honorable people who are believers. I simply think that it doesn’t have a place in the public square.

And why is that?

My problem is with God. Actually, my problem is with the concept of God. I don’t know what "God" means.

But it’s not readily apparent that, because of her ignorance, why she might think that discussion of such a topic shouldn’t be allowed in public.  And just because, as she asserts, previous Presidents who invoked God had moral failings, it doesn’t invalidate their God. 

At one point, Quinn confesses confusion over Pascal’s Wager, but her reaction to it only points out her ignorance on this whole "God" thing.

Pascal’s wager never made sense to me. If there is an omniscient and omnipotent God and we believe in him we’re good to go. If there’s not and we don’t believe in him we don’t have a problem. If there is and we don’t believe in him, it’s because he doesn’t want us to and therefore we are following his will.

If you don’t know what "God" means, then how can you possibly draw the inference that if we don’t believe in him it’s because he doesn’t want us to?  How could you possibly assert that?  Isn’t it equally as likely an explanation that we’re not looking for him?  Or perhaps we’re simply on a quest to find out facts about God, but not get to know him.  Or that we’re afraid to find out about him because of what we may find out about ourselves?  Or that we refuse to believe in a God that permits evil in the world?  There are as many reasons to not believe in God as there are human beings. 

Meacham’s argument for "…so help me God" is less about religion and more of a case of "hey, what can it hurt?"  He at least does make a good show of dealing with that Jeffersonian phrase that has been elevated to "founding document" status by some.

The secular nature of the American government is one of its abiding strengths, but moments of prayer or a "So help me, God" here and there are no threat to the wall of separation Jefferson spoke of in his New Year’s Day 1802 letter to the Danbury Baptist Association. We can keep church and state separate, and we should. But as a matter of history and human nature, we cannot keep politics and religion separate, and we should not try. For politics and religion are both about people, about their hopes and their fears and their values and their sense of destiny and of duty.

And so we have a new poll on the blog:  Should the President, Obama in particular, use the phrase "so help me God"?  The poll has a simple yes/no answer, but I’m sure reasons for both are as varied as the voter, so let us know why you think he should or shouldn’t.

With all the promises of change that Barack Obama got his supporters to believe, we’re now finding out that "promises" are more like "goals".  Or perhaps "hopes".

Close Gitmo on the first day in office?  First week?  First 100 days?  Well, technically, he may only issue an order to do it soon, but it’s "a challenge" to even close it within the first 100 days.  The ACLU wants a timetable.  Good luck with that.

"That’s a challenge," Obama said on ABC’s "This Week." "I think it’s going to take some time and our legal teams are working in consultation with our national security apparatus as we speak to help design exactly what we need to do."

It’s not as easy as some on the Left expected it would be.  The "Reality-based community" finds that facing reality isn’t what they thought it would be.

Iraq withdrawal within 16 months?  Well, Biden has said that they’re going to follow the Bush plan instead.  Additional take on this and all the Iraq issues at RedState.

Universal Health Care is being back-burnered.  Indeed, the economic crisis should be one of the top priorities, but I thought this whole scheme was supposed to save us all money.  If it’s such a win-win for the economy and health care, why delay?  Hmmm.  (Perhaps it has something to do with how poorly UHC is working in places like Massachusetts?)

No lobbyists serving in policy areas they have worked to influence in the past year.  So then, September 2008 is technically last year.

Interrogation techniques that Obama campaigned against may actually get a new lease on life.  Newsweek tells us:

Dick Cheney, who will step down as vice president on Jan. 20, has been widely portrayed as a creature of the dark side, a monstrous figure who trampled on the Constitution to wage war against all foes, real and imagined. Barack Obama was elected partly to cleanse the temple of the Bush-Cheney stain, and in his campaign speeches he promised to reverse Cheney’s efforts to seize power for the White House in the war on terror.

It may not be so simple

This could be another entry in my "New They Tell Us" category.  This was so simple during the campaign, but now they tell us it’s complex.  Nuance, anyone?

All this added to Obama’s waffling on tax cuts, windfall profits taxes on Big Oil, and FISA.  Now, I have no illusion that Obama has become some sort of bedrock conservative (though he’s been seen in the company of some), and we’re still likely to see many a liberal policy enacted.  However, underneath all this complaining by the Left that the new boss seems the same as the old boss is one thought; maybe the old boss got some things right.

FuturePundit reports on two more papers that show we can take adult stem cells and turn them in pluripotent stem cells; those just as useful and flexible as embryonic stem cells.  Since there are absolutely no ethical issues with the use of adult stem cells, the question then has to be; why don’t we funnel the research dollars going into embryonic stem cells into this instead?  You would think there’s some ulterior motive or something.

From Gordon Campbell:

As low as the IDF can make them, civilian casualties are guaranteed when you store and launch your missiles from civilian area.  Hamas gets a win-win situation for terrorism when it gets world sympathy for casualties as a result of this stationing, and it gets Palestinian sympathy when it kills Jews.  You cannot negotiate with terrorists; you can only defeat them.