Creditors to Trump:
You're fired.

This should be a Bush ad:

(Image via The Curt Jester)

Heading Out To Play: I'll be starting the weekend a little early tomorrow, 7:00 am to be precise, here. I plan on attending at least one other round, probably Sunday but will be here on Friday. After watching golf I have to get out and play, of course. Perhaps I'll post something insightful between now and Monday, but if not, you know why.

Furthermore, keep in mind that the most important event in golf begins next week. Unfortunately, I'm not one of the lucky ones to procure tickets to this most wonderful experience (and refuse to pay the prices to have one, though one day I probably will). However, I did have the opportunity to attend a practice round in 2001 and kick myself every time for not bringing my camera, which can be done since it's a practice round. For those who have been to Augusta know, it's everything it's hyped up to be.

Last week a former Archbishop of Canterbury had remarkably un-PC things to say about Islam. The Daily Telegraph called his remarks "the most forthright by a senior Church leader."
Update: The link is fixed.

Rice's Time To Shine: Mark Goldblatt has an essay on NRO today which expresses my sentiments, regarding Condoleezza Rice's appearance before the 9/11 commission, exactly. On Brit Hume's Special Report last night, Fred Barnes and Mort Kondrack said the same thing: Rice will have a feast on the commission panel and will emerge not only unscathed, but heralded. Goldblatt writes:

Now the liberals will get their wish: Dr. Rice will tell her side of the story, under oath, in public. And with the suspense that's already gathering around her appearance, it will be a hit. The rest of the nation will soon discover what careful observers of the Bush's inner circle already know: Rice is the most poised, articulate, and convincing speaker in the entire administration. She will mop up the floor with Clarke.

...

Not only will Rice make short work of Clarke, she will emerge from the hearing with conservatives flinging themselves at her feet, begging her to run for president in 2008. (There's already a website devoted to her potential candidacy even though she's said, on multiple occasions, she has no interest in the office.) And it would serve liberals right if she did decide to run, for Rice would be their worst nightmare. She would win the women's vote outright, peel away half the black vote, and set back the Democratic party for a generation.

I'm looking forward to it. Check out the article.

Bush leads Kerry by 6% in PA:
Hard to believe, but it appears that the president's media barrage has been effective. Go Mark McKinnon!

Also in the poll: Specter has a huge lead over Toomey among registered Republicans, but only 36 to 33 among likely primary voters.

On the pro bono tip: I am really excited. This past fall, I sent an application to the Eleventh Circuit requesting consideration for placement on the CJA ("Criminal Justice Act") panel, which, if approved, would provide me with the opportunity to handle pro bono federal appeals. Well, today I received a call from a nice fellow at the court asking me if I was interested in defending a prisoner in a 1983 action. I told him, "Absolutely!" Anyway, I am thrilled. Although I observed numerous federal appeals as a law clerk, I have yet to argue before a federal appellate court; and this case will be scheduled for oral argument shortly after I turn in the brief. It should be a great experience. I will fill y'all in as the case progresses.

I saw Bob Dylan last night in a Victoria's Secret television commercial. Really. This story in the Rocky Mountain News quotes a VS exec: "'We asked him to be in the commercials and he said yes, he would gladly go off to Venice with the supermodels,' she said."

Iraqis Drag Bodies Through Streets After Attack: No good deed . . .

Honoring our national guardsmen: Citizen Smash leads the way. Kudos to you, sir (Thanks to Fitz @ BTQ for the heads up on this story).

Reviews on eh.net of two books that might interest some SA readers: a mostly negative review of Jim Powell, FDR's Folly: How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression, and a mostly positive review of William Scarborough, Masters of the Big House: Elite Slaveholders of the Mid-Nineteenth-Century South.

Candor from a lawyer: I found this admission by a lawyer seeking career advice to be rather refreshing:

Question: I have a great resume. My academics are excellent: straight A's in college, top 10% at a top-five school, Law Review. I clerked for a federal appellate judge, and spent two years at a prestigious New York law firm. The problem is that although I look great on paper, I am, in truth, a pretty bad lawyer. I continually make errors in judgment. I miss details that others pick up. I'm consistently beaten down in conflict situations. I say the wrong things to clients. I make unwarranted concessions to opposing counsel. I am very inefficient. I have difficulty digesting complex business fact patterns. I'm suffering from a serious crisis in confidence that I may always be incompetent as an attorney. If I were really good at this profession, I might stay. But I think I stink.

Two questions: How could I have done so well in school, gotten the right clerkship, the right job, and be a rotten advocate? How do you know when it's time to admit that you really aren't cut out to be an attorney and shift to another field of employment? Keep in mind that I have engaged in a pretty objective analysis of who I am.

Sincerely,
Not Cut Out?

If only more attorneys were that open and honest about their abilities (or lack thereof).

More on the case against global warming.

From what I understand from my young cousins, global warming is a fact. At least that is what they learn in science class in the public schools. I have always had my doubts about this, especially since many of those so concerned about global warming show a general preference for more government regulation. And what better way to get government more involved in our lives than by saving the planet. Call me cynical, but......

Anyway, David R. Legates of the University of Delaware just completed a research project which debunks much of what is typically accepted regarding climate change. A summary of the results, in the form of an op-ed, can be found HERE.

After examining more than 240 individual proxy records analyzed by nearly 1000 researchers, we concluded that taken individually, proxy records offer strong support for the widespread existence of both a Medieval Warm Period (A.D. 800 to 1300) and a Little Ice Age (A.D. 1400 to 1850), undermining Mann's conclusion that the climate of the 20th Century was unusual when compared to the variability over the last millennium. (Proxy records are secondary or inferred sources from which assumptions about air temperature may be drawn).

And so the debate rages on. It will be interesting to see how the global warming crowd responds to Legates' conclusions.

Supreme Court opinions of the day:
The Supreme Court issued two opinions today.

Both were reversals of the Ninth Circuit.

Negative campaigning goes too far: I understand that every campaign goes through a little mud-slinging, but man, this is wayyyy over the top!




Of course, it's just a parody from Fark.com. Nobody would really make a campaign ad that inflammatory... would they?

Self-defense, law, and morality: Over at Stop the Bleating, Matt has a post on the law of self defense in which he offers this observation:

Human life -- even that of a scumbag -- is inherently valuable, and we should take it very seriously when a life ends through violence. There is, and should be, a strong preference for permitting the taking of human life only after the "victim" (and I use the term without connoting any moral judgment) has been given due process of law, and the facts that justify the taking have been clearly established. Of course we can't demand that sort of formal process in every situation; that would place too heavy a burden on every man's natural right to life. So we have no choice but to create a test that determines when it's acceptable to kill people without formal judicial process, and when it's not.

I disagree with this characterization, not because I don't believe that there are cases where citizens may attempt to stretch self-defense too far, but because I don't believe this is the proper philosophical ordering for the right of the self-defense. We don't merely allow people to use lethal force in defense of themselves because due process can't be administered; that would make due process rights prior to the right of self-defense. Instead, self-defense, at least in the tradition of the enlightenment, is considered to be the most important right, and thus the one which ought to be given the greatest latitude.

In Locke, for example, we start out with a right not to be harmed or deprived of life, liberty, or estate (i.e. property). From this comes a right to self-defense. The social contract from which society is born, on the other hand, proceeds from the desire for collective enforcement of laws, and it is here where the notion of due process arrives. Still, the right of self-defense remains since it cannot fall under the purview of the social contract. To restrict it would be to hand over your very life to the state. Even Thomas Hobbes, who advocated autocracy, believed that individuals had no rights save one -- the right to defend oneself.

Where Matt is correct is in outlining that standards must be set for what constitutes self-defense, but if these parameters are set too narrowly or vaguely, the right of self-defense crumbles. This is why I find it worrisome when citizens are convicted of murder or manslaughter for using lethal force against an aggressor under the notion that since the perpetrator attempted to retreat temporarily, or for some similar reason, the victim lacked cause to kill a person who invaded their home. In my mind, your life is forfeit when you invade another person's property. An individual citizen placed in that situation is in no way obligated to contemplate whether or not the attacker, still in their residence, is no longer a threat. Police should have to consider that, but not Joe-six-pack with a crazed crack addict in his living room.

I suppose that I part company with the law here, since the standard of 'reasonableness' comes into play, but I believe the law places to great a burden on people who have been attacked. In a split second the roles cannot reverse, and victim becomes aggressor. I just don't buy it.

But the GOP is the party of the rich. Right? Your average t-shirt featuring a conservative message: about $20. A tee shirt featuring the smug grin of Hillary: $55. USA Today has a short story on political tees here, including a picture of the aforementioned Hillary shirt (to spare you a trip to the site).

Stuart Buck speaks:
He's okay. He lacks coordination on his right side right now, but all is expected to come back in time.

Praise God.

The liberal media becomes even more so:
Tomorrow debuts the new liberal radio talk show network featuring Al Franken and Janeane Garafolo (or whatever her name is). I won't be listening.

Via Drudge, we learn that the left isn't happy with its de facto monopoly on television:

Mr. Gore and his business partner, entreprenuer and Democratic fundraiser Joel Hyatt, will acquire Newsworld International for around $70 million from Vivendi. The Observer will also report that Mr. Gore approached French-owned Vivendi through French President Jacques Chirac in 2003, hoping to get a better deal from Vivendi CEO Jean-Rene Fourtou. That resulted in a meeting with Universal Television executives and the COO of Vivendi in the summer of 2003.

Gore and Chirac? Two America haters together? What a surprise!

[Snarky post over. Just had to get it out of my system, y'know?]

Of lies, love, and election fraud in South Texas:
One of the less savory aspects of Southern elections is the high level of fraud. Indeed, in Republican circles, it has been standard practice to assume that any close election would be given to the Democrats. This has changed recently, however, as Republicans are likely to have enough of a local presence that fraud is no longer as commonplace. [That doesn't hold at all true for urban areas; they're still bad. Remember Philadelphia and St. Louis in 2000? -- Ed. Sh! That's not my point!]

South Texas has historically been the area of Texas where votes are bought en masse. When first elected to the US Senate, Lyndon Johnson was known as "Landslide Lyndon" because of the election that he stole in the Democratic primary by buying votes in South Texas several days after election day.

Fast forward to 2004. The Democratic district 28 primary was a squeeker on election night, with several counties reporting "late." Former Texas Secretary of State and challenger Henry Cuellar was ahead for most of the night, until Bexar County -- incumbent Congressman Ciro Rodriguez's home base -- reported several hours late.

Personally, I hope Cuellar wins. He supposedly contemplated a party switch in 2000, when he supported George W. Bush over Al Gore. Gov. Rick Perry appointed him as Secretary of State -- a launching pad for aspiring Texas pols -- until he resigned to challenge Republican Congressman Henry Bonilla in 2002. Cuellar was planning to challenge Bonilla again until redistricting put him in Rodriguez's district -- his former friend and colleague -- and he decided to challenge Rodriguez in a primary instead of moving to challenge Bonilla. Given the formerly friendly relations between the two opponents, it's probably no surprise that this was a contentious primary.

Today, Zapata County found an extra 304 ballots. Cuellar turned a 150 vote margin of defeat into a 30 vote lead. Rodriguez is planning to formally challenge the election, although I'm sure that there are "election irregularities" that favor both sides.

Some things never change, I guess.

UPDATE: Cuellar now leads by 197. This is a turnaround of almost 400 votes.

TANGENTIAL UPDATE: Several commenters are complaining that I'm making a specious argument in the first paragraph and claiming that Democrats are inherently more prone to fraud than Republicans. I'm not claiming that; they're simply reading things into my argument that are not there. What I'm saying is that there are now more Republican election administrators in the South, and hence less fraud that hurts Republicans. Because there is now a Republican and a Democratic presence today in the South, elections are run much more fairly.

One of the funny things about not solo blogging/call to send me posts:
I don't feel the need to blog. I blog based entirely on whim. I also occasionally write posts, but don't post them because I never completely finish or I choose not to be too controversial.

My blog reading has also gone way down. Strange, since I have more free time now than when I was a solo blogger.

So, help me out and send me your blog posts. Before I joined Southern Appeal, I was frequently frustrated by the lack of attention -- in the form of links -- that I felt my substantive and quality posts received. Fortunately, Steve was kind enough to offer me a place to blog before a bigger audience, so I don't worry as much about that anymore.

So if you're a blogger, email me your posts and I'll do my best to link to them.* This particularly holds if you disagree with me on an issue or if you are a liberal. One of the best things about the blogosphere is the easy exposure to your opponents' thoughts and arguments. Lately my blog reading list has leaned more to the right than usual, so I'd like to rectify that.

*I love positive sum games. We both win: lesser known bloggers can get exposure and I can be a lazy blogger, ala InstaGlenn.

If Neas hates him, then he must be my kinda guy: William G. Myers.

The media hits will keep coming:
The national media works itself into a frenzy every time a Republican has a chance at the White House. The very soft coverage of Kerry will continue, while the media will put Woodward's views on page one.

Lloyd Grove reports:

I hear that "Plan of Attack," supersleuth Bob Woodward's still-secret study of President Bush's war on terrorism, will be very bad for the Bush reelection campaign - which is still reeling from gun-toting former terrorism chief Richard A. Clarke's critique of Bush, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and other administration figures in "Against All Enemies."

Color me unsurprised. Let's hope the White House is better prepared than it was for Richard Clarke. The White House's reponse to Clarke was pathetic. Clarke was easily refuted, and yet the White House response was slow and feeble.

Some good advice for high school seniors waiting to hear from college admissions offices, courtesy of David Brooks in the NY Times today.

Stuart Buck update: And it's good news. He's doing much better.

Recent commentary from AEI: James Glassman on "Regulatory Hysteria" in reaction to the corporate scandals of 2001; Leon Aron on contemporary Russian novelist Boris Akunin; Radek Sikorski on a future role for NATO.

Pryor to give commencement speech to Regent University: You can get the details here (LvSWVaL).

Alistair Cooke, RIP: The NY Times obit is here; the BBC has an extensive tribute to him, complete with highlights from his 58-year-long series, "Letter from America," here.
Update: The Telegraph obit is here.

I'm lucky enough to have missed most of the media uproar last week over Richard Clarke's indictment of the Bush Administration, circa 2001. Rich Lowry offers some perspective on Clarke's "tenor and tone" on NRO today. Seems to me that people are in danger of missing the most important point, which is: Assume that everything Clarke says is accuate. So what? His story is backward-looking; the choice that voters have to make in November is forward-looking. Will Bush or Kerry do a better job in defending the country in the future? That's what people need to keep in mind, don't you think?
More on the 9/11 commission, from Stratfor, here (scroll down and click on "Click here to read a recent, full page sample anaysis").

How the Senate Narrowly Saved Pro-Life Bill: An interesting behind-the-scenes account.

Kerry Testing the Limits of GWB Campaign Preparedness. I don't think he's even close to approaching them. Yesterday Kerry said Bush's "policy" was that gasoline will approach $3 a gallon (his use of "policy", not mine). In a nice rebuttal move, the Bush campaign launched this calculator, designed to show you how much more you'd be paying at the pump today had a gas tax Kerry supported passed into law.

TV ads score big in Bush turnaround: You ain't seen nuthin yet, Sen. Kerry.

Colleague of Clarke Disputes Part of Account: Perhaps Clarke's book should be moved to the fiction section.

"The Myth of the Racist Republicans" A review by Gerard Alexander, in the spring issue of the Claremont Review of Books. (P.S. I just got back from spring break, and haven't had time to get caught up on the last week's postings here. So, my apologies if someone has already pointed this one out.)

Major Anti-Terror Bust in U.K.: Well done.

Freedom of the Press in Iraq

There has been quite the buzz about the U.S. military's recent shutdown of a popular newspaper in Iraq. Authorities argue that the newspaper poses a danger to US troops. The offending article said those who cooperate with the United States should be killed as a matter of patriotic and religious duty. The paper said it would publish a list of names of Iraqis aiding the coalition.

While we should be careful when in comes to infringing on the right of free speech, which the Iraqi Interim Constitution guarantees in Article 13, I think the authorities made the right call here. The newspaper piece was directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action (murder), and considering the situation in Iraq, the advocacy was likely to produce such a result. This is essentially the U.S. Supreme Court's Brandenburg test, which makes a good deal of sense as far as the Court's tests go.

Thanks For Your Past Support, But: Rep. Denise Majette (D-GA) announced yesterday that she would give up her congressional seat in order to run for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Zell Miller. Majette, in 2002, defeated former Rep. Cynthia McKinney in the Democratic primary and had what was considered a relatively safe seat. Now she's virtually committing political suicide by running for a state wide election, in which her past supporters have to be really excited about. Even better, McKinney has already announced her intention to run for her old seat. It appears that the race will be between her and Atlanta City Council President Cathy Woolard, who is openly gay.

What does this mean for the Republicans in the senate race? Perhaps Mac Collins will benefit from Majette's announcement as she will, possibly, pick up some of the black vote which otherwise would have crossed over to vote for Herman Cain. Let's hope not. By the way, Majette's announcement took many by surprise, as she has no backing whatsoever from the Democratic establishment for this move. However, she said she had God's, and that's all she needs.

With Big Government programs, are Republicans really returning to their roots??

It's no secret that conservatives and a good portion of the Republican base are unhappy about many of the policies of the Bush administration. "Compassionate Conservatism" has proven to be more about big government than what we know as conservatism, a major tenet of which is "limited government." We know the issues driving the debate on Bush's conservatism: Amnesty for illegals, creation of a Medicare prescription drug entitlement, runaway spending, greater federal meddling in education, etcetera.

Most commentators portray Bush as moving away from the true principles of the Republican Party. But is Bush really taking the Party back to its roots? Were the tenets of limited government in the GOP just an aberration? This is exactly the case according to Robert B. Ekelund, Jr., and Mark Thornton in this excellent essay over on the Mises Institute's site. The authors make some interesting points:

However, there has not been a sudden sea change in party platforms and the rampant fiscal irresponsibility of the Republicans is not a mystery; they are merely returning to their historical roots. The Republican Party was established as a party of big government and economic intervention. Their reputation as a party of limited government is of more recent vintage and stands on a flimsy foundation.

. . . .

The ambitious economic agenda of the Republican Party had its roots in the economic platforms of Federalist icon Alexander Hamilton and Whig leader Henry Clay. They advocated protective tariffs for industry, a national bank, and plenty of public works and patronage. The flurry of new laws, regulations, and bureaucracies created by Lincoln and the Republican Party during the early 1860s foreshadowed Franklin Roosevelt's "New Deal" for the volume, scope and questionable constitutionality of its legislative output.

This essay is a very interesting read on the history of the GOP and policies that gave rise to the party. The excerpts above can't do the piece justice. The moral of the story is that perhaps liberals and moderates have not hijacked the GOP. Maybe it's the limited-government types who did the hijacking of the GOP and the current party is doing what it was created to do, that is, expand the scope and power of the federal government.

Parody Blogs: Via the poonster, I am informed that the great one (Bashman) now has a parody blog. Will Baude & Co. also have a blog nemesis. But what y'all might not know is that SA has one as well.

Well, it sure seems like a parody blog at times. :)

BTW, Poon, whatever happened to "Souter Appeal"? :)

Prayer For Stuart Buck: Via Instapundit I found the alarming news that friend of SA Stuart Buck suffered two strokes over the weekend and is in an Arkansas hospital. The extent of his condition is unknown. Stuart, as most know, is extremely young, only 29. Let's keep him and his family in our prayers.

UPDATE: Plainsman points out that Stuart's wife, Farah, has a post on his blog providing some insight into Stuart's condition.

Judicial Nominations. I think it was commented on below, but yesterday it was reported that Democrats in the Senate have indicated that they are going to hold up EVERY nomination until the President stops "abusing the advise and consent process." Such a claim is so patently absurd so as to be almost laughable, if it were not so infuriating.

The Dems should be grateful for a couple of things: (1) that so many people are completely ignorant of the facts, circumstances and law regarding the nominations process, and (2) that the Republicans are a bunch of spineless weasels. Where is the outrage at such a claim ? Where has been the outrage over the stalled nominations? Where has been the support for President Bush's recess appointmens? The Republicans in Congress are worthless. Absolutely worthless.

What makes a Great President?

When citizens and historians list the great presidents, included in the top five almost always are the "activist" presidents--those who either expanded the role of government via the welfare state or were involved in some sort of warfare. You know the list: FDR, Lincoln, Wilson, LBJ. Seldom on these lists do we find the presidents who kept government spending down, avoided foreign wars, cut the bureaucracy, and vetoed unconstitutional legislation.

In this election year, we ought to think about what presidential greatness is as we listen to the likes of Kerry and Bush. Personally, I'd love to see another Grover Cleveland on the stump. That's right, good old Grover. Grover is primarily forgotten today because he was not an activist president. During his tenure we enjoyed peace and usually could count on him to combat expansions of government power. Larry Read has an excellent essay on Grover Cleveland which I found in the archives of FEE. Here is a snippet:

Cleveland took a firm stand against a nascent welfare state. Frequent warnings against the redistributive nature of government were characteristic of his tenure. He regarded as a 'serious danger' the notion that government should dispense favors and advantages to individuals or their businesses.

In vetoing a bill in 1887 that would have appropriated a mere $10,000 in aid for drought-stricken Texas farmers, Cleveland noted that 'though the people support the Government, the Government should not support the people.' For relief of citizens in misfortune, the president felt it was important to rely upon 'the friendliness and charity of our countrymen.'

That veto was one of many. In fact, Cleveland in his first term refused to sign twice as many bills as did all previous 21 presidents combined. Most of those bills were nothing more than cynical attempts by somebody to get something from somebody else by the force of the government's gun.

Today, we have a Republican in the White House who fights to expand "big government conservatism" and a liberal challenger in Kerry who wants an even bigger more active government. I guess that is what one must do if he is to be a "great" president.

Mary Landrieu yells at Laci Peterson's mother:
Roll Call reports:

Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) got into a shouting match with the mother and stepfather of Laci Peterson in a nasty, closed-door meeting on the eve of Thursday's Senate passage of the Unborn Victims of Violence Act.

"Mary Landrieu just berated them," claimed one person in the room, who noted that Sharon Rocha and Ron Grantski were yelling back during the tense 20-minute showdown. "It got so loud that you could hear [the shouting] in the next room."

Rocha and Grantski were going door-to-door on Capitol Hill to lobby on behalf of the legislation that would make it a crime to harm a fetus during an attack on a pregnant woman. The legislation is informally known as Laci and Conner's Law after the unborn grandchild that was killed along with the couple?s daughter in December 2002.

Landrieu sparked the couple's fury by claiming they could not be "serious" about the issue if they didn?t also support the domestic violence money. The Petersons, as well as other victims' families in the room who had seen relatives murdered in recent years, did not take kindly to that charge.

Classy, Mary. Classy. I bet all Louisianans are proud of Senator Landrieu.

Clarke claimed to be a Republican in 2000...?
The Meet the Press transcript:

MR. RUSSERT: And we're back. Did you vote for George Bush in 2000?

MR. CLARKE: No, I did not.

MR. RUSSERT: You voted for Al Gore.

MR. CLARKE: Yes, I did.

MR. RUSSERT: In 2004 you'll vote for John Kerry?

MR. CLARKE: I'm not going to endorse John Kerry. That's what the White House wants me to do. And they want to say I'm part of the Kerry campaign. I've already pledged I'm not part of the Kerry campaign and I will not serve in the Kerry administration.

MR. RUSSERT: Will you vote for him?

MR. CLARKE: That's my business.

John Kerry, liberal:
The numbers prove it.

This is a bit of a "duh!" statement. But the numbers don't lie:

In recent weeks, a number of commentators have asserted that Kerry's voting history is complicated to classify. The evidence doesn't bear this out. If you were to take the numbers shown here, cover up Kerry's name and then ask a sample of American political scientists, "I have here a senator who in the past 10 years has had an average ADA score of 92 and an average ACU score of 6. Is he a liberal, a moderate or a conservative?" they would have no difficulty in classifying the 2004 Democratic candidate as, for better or worse, a liberal.

No more popup ads:
Microsoft is going to block popups as the default option on Internet Explorer.

Of course, this won't mean much. Advertisers will simply switch to the floating ads that "float" on top of the page until closed.

And that's probably a good thing. The web has been free because it has afforded advertisers an opportunity to sell their products. Without popup ads, we'd probably have far less free material such as newspapers.

I'd hate to lose free material on the web just because popups were blocked. Ads may be annoying, but they are worth it.

The home of the future?
The WashPost's Rob Pegoraro reports on Microsoft's concept home, where everything is run by computers.

Fascinating. I wonder how much the future will look like this.

"Campaign finance reform" needs reforming:
I've never understood how liberals got co-opted into supporting the McCain-Feingold campaign finance "reform." Not only is McCain-Feingold anti-free speech, but it consolidates power into a few huge corporations:

But for the next six weeks, [Karen Hughes] will cross the country on a 16-city book tour that will have the effect of a publisher-subsidized campaign trip. On Monday night, the day before Hughes' book is due in stores, Barbara Walters will interview Hughes on ABC. The same day, Time magazine will publish excerpts. Viking, Hughes' publisher, will not say how many copies of Ten Minutes From Normal it is printing but describes its publicity campaign as extensive.

Indeed. The whole Richard Clarke brouhaha is a corporate donation to Democrats, and this publicity campaign for Karen Hughes' book is a corporate donation to the Bush campaign. In fact, these publishing corporations have political speech that you and I don't have under McCain-Feingold.

Not only does McCain-Feingold give too much power to corporations, it also perpetuates and exaggerates the dim legacy of Buckley v. Valeo: self-funders. That is, because it heavily restricts political speech, McCain-Feingold favors the rich, who can dump millions into their own self-aggrandizing campaigns for political office under Buckley v. Valeo.

This is particularly worrisome because the Senate -- and Senate Democrats in particular -- has become a millionaire's club. Especially recently, Senate Democrats must recruit millionaire "self-funders" whenever possible (eg. Georgia), because McCain-Feingold restricts the resources the DSCC has to support Democratic Senate candidates. In order to be competitive financially in key battleground states, Senate Democrats need a few self-funders each election cycle.

This is what McCain-Feingold has wrought: a less transparent system of political money which takes away power from individuals and gives it to big media corporations. McCain-Feingold outlines a system which handicaps middle class political candidates in favor of the wealthy elite and the political incumbents.

The solution is simple: trash the whole system. Replace it with unlimited political contributions with full disclosure. Professor Bainbridge is right: "Disclosure that emphasizes speed, accessibility, and transparency seems like such a simple solution." Or as Justice Brandeis said: "sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants."

Bush likely to opt for court nominee with Federalist ties--Right-wing legal society grows in political clout since 1982 inception: Damn right.

Tolerance and Pryor Restraint--Senate Democrats likely new attitude: Be "open-minded" or else!: William had an excellent op-ed in the WSJ yesterday on the fallout from the dems' obstructionist tactics regarding Bill Pryor's nomination to the Eleventh Circuit. Here's a taste:

If all social norms are now to be consigned to "private morality" or "religion," tolerance will require that they be quarantined into dark, private corners off the public square. And the Judiciary Committee will be the battleground. We had a glimmer of this during the Pryor hearings, when few critics were interested in the legitimate question: whether Mr. Pryor was able to put the law above his own views. That's not surprising, because the evidence--on both abortion and the now infamous Ten Commandments case--demonstrated that Mr. Pryor was perfectly capable of so doing.

Instead, the focus became "deeply held beliefs," with Sen. Russ Feingold (D., Wis.) asking if it was true that he'd changed his vacation plans to avoid bringing his two daughters to Disney World on Gay Day. That grilling took place before the spate of expansive rulings on everything from Lawrence (Texas sodomy) to Goodridge (Massachusetts gay marriage) to Judge Jones's decision on the Scouts. Were Mr. Pryor to return to the committee today, I imagine the exchange to run something like this:


Sen. Schumer: Mr. Pryor, you belong to a faith that opposes extending marital rights to gays. Isn't that so?
Mr. Pryor: It is.

Sen. Schumer: And you abide by the tenets of your faith, do you not?

Mr. Pryor: I try to.

Sen. Schumer: You are a man of principle, and I salute you for that. But as much as I may respect your First Amendment right to these views, how can we on this Committee send to the federal bench a man who believes in discrimination?

It makes for a splendid shift. In place of the bloody frontal assaults we've seen previously (à la Ted Kennedy warning of the "segregated lunch counters" and "back-alley abortions" that would return to America if Robert Bork were confirmed), Judiciary Committee Democrats may now pay ostensible respect to the principled stands of the nominees they oppose while defining them as religious and as such requiring exclusion from the public square.

. . . .

As Roe ought to have taught us, when the courts substitute their own social decisions for those properly exercised by the people through their elected representatives, the battlefield moves from the ballot box to the Judiciary Committee. Absent some sharp legislative corrective, the likeliest outcome of the "tolerance" demanded by Lawrence and its progeny will be the tarring of judicial nominees as extremist for holding views shared by two-thirds of the American people.

I say bring on the tar. Personally, I'd rather be a witness for the truth, like Judge Pryor, than a black-robed moderate suck-up. Who knows? Maybe I'll be lucky enough to get a recess appointment one day. :)

Kerry--"I'm Catholic, but my Catholicism has no bearing on the most important decisions of my life": A loyal SA reader directs us to this Time article that discusses the "faith" of Senator John Kerry, and in the process offers the following thoughts:

I think this story is going to spread exponentially during the campaign. It bothers me less that he favors legal abortion - I think it is at least remotely possible to square that position with the idea that abortion is nonetheless immoral - than it bothers me that Kerry says his religious beliefs won't inform his decisions as president. First of all, it's a lie: a man's beliefs as to cosmic truth inevitably inform all of his important decisions, for good or ill. Second, it's insulting to the Church. If your faith is so insignificant that it has no impact on your posture on life-and-death issues, what's the point of having any faith at all? Kerry trivializes the Church's importance. If he really thinks that religion is so insignificant, he should have the courage of his convictions and stop masquerading as a Catholic -- or any other sort of religiously serious person.

I'm the last person to be upset with anyone for struggling with his faith. My problem with Kerry, however, is that he is NOT struggling with his Catholicism; he's making a joke out of it.

Spot on, brother.

Congressional overeating and the obesity lawsuits.

About a week ago I posted on the pending legislation to stop the trial lawyers from bringing obesity lawsuits in both state and federal courts. The post received a number of comments, and thus I expanded it into an op-ed piece which appears over on LewRockwell.com. Here is a taste:

While the Food Consumption Act is obviously an effort to strike out at the trial lawyers, a better punishment might be keep the status quo and leave the trial lawyers stuck with their clients. Take as an example Caesar "Cecil" Barber, who retained an attorney in 2002 to file suit against McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, and Kentucky Fried Chicken. Barber blames his 272 pounds, diabetes, and high blood pressure on eating establishments that had the gall to serve him the food he ordered. "They said '100 percent beef.' I thought that it meant it was good for you," explained Barber. "Those people in the advertisement don't really tell you what's in the food. It's all fat, fat, and more fat. Now I'm obese."

It's hard to feel sorry for the likes of Cecil. But it is even harder to feel sorry for the lawyers filing suit on behalf of the Cecils of the world. Just imagine the incessant calls from the fast food plaintiffs wondering each day whether their lottery checks, er uhh, "settlement proceeds" have come in yet.

Of course, the point of the op-ed is that Congress overeats just as much as poor Cecil. The Personal Responsibility in Food Consumption Act, which has already passed the House, is an unwarranted infringement on state law and prevents the states from serving as laboratories of democracy on this issue. While the obesity suits are silly, this latest congressional power grab is even worse.

Judicial power rules state, to delight of liberal ideology: Len Munsil on rule by judicial fiat in Arizona.

Should have known: This is why liberals are REALLY upset with Scalia for having gone duck hunting with Cheney. :)

Seventh Circuit Backs Privacy of Hospital Abortion Records: The N.Y. Times has this report, and you can read the Chicago Tribune's take on this case here and the Chicago Sun-Times's coverage here.

(My judge--Manion--dissented on the main point. More on this later)

Senate Democrats Take Stand on Judges: Dear President Bush, tell the dems to do as they wish, and then go ahead and give recess appointments to every pending nominee who will take one. We'll ram the rest of them through after the 2004 election.

The dems' obstructionist tactics are outrageous and unprecedented. If they want to take it up a notch even further, then let's oblige them. This is a fight for the heart and soul of the federal judiciary, and, for that matter, the rule of law. This is a battle we mustn't lose.

The Awful Specter of Yet Another Term: Here's hoping Toomey takes ol' marble mouth out in the primary.