Say Anything Blog

Like many Republicans, I think Ron Paul is a bit naive on foreign policy.

But his stances on economics, immigration, limited government, and abortion make him - on balance - truly the most Republican candidate in the race.

For those Conservatives out there that do not like Ron Paul for his perceived isolationist stances keep this in mind -

Fortress America is better than No America.

John McCain’s immigration and open borders policy is far more dangerous to the security of this nation than Ron Paul’s stance that we should disengage from the world.

Mitt Romney is a fraud. A phony. A plastic candidate. He will govern by public opinion and polls. He will govern as the Republican version of Bill Clinton.

Mike Huckabee is a liberal. A Southern Socialist. He would use the power of government to mold America and limit freedoms based on what he sees as “God’s Way.” For all the faults of our secular government, we do not want a theocratic government. Huckabee would bring a Holy War against all of Islam, not just the terrorists. He has said in these words “the constitution must be amended to fit the word of God.” This is not what we need.

For those of you that do not like the choices of McCain, Romney, and Huckabee but are reluctant to vote for Ron Paul, let me finish with this:

If you truly believe that Ron Paul will not be the nominee, and you don’t like the other choices, what will it hurt to vote for Ron Paul?

Let’s send a message to the Republican Party - we’re mad as hell and we aren’t going to take it anymore.

Ron Paul is a vote for None of the Above.

Ron Paul = None of the Above

Warner Todd Huston

We are told over and over again that the United Nations is the answer to all the world’s ills. It is often claimed that without the UN things would be so much worse in troubled spots around the world. But, when we look at the pernicious effect the UN has where ever it goes, it’s awfully hard to reconcile the claims with the hard truth. For one thing, we’ve seen the UN responsible for turning indigenous teens into prostitutes for UN workers in Cambodia, Africa, and Bosnia. Well, now we can add vandalism of sacred, ancient wall-art to the ever growing list of evils perpetrated by UN operatives.

But, where is the Media to report this outrage against human history and sacred religious relics and sites? About the same place they were when underplaying the reports of UN “peacekeepers” and employees forcing young women into prostitution the world over… absent from the scene.

From raping poor women to raping art treasures, the UN is in the forefront of the efforts to demean and destroy all across the third world. Today the Times online give us the story of UN “peacekeepers” defacing 6,000 year-old art in the Western Saharan rocks of Africa.

UN vandals spray graffiti on Sahara’s prehistoric art

Archaeological sites boasting ancient paintings and engravings of giraffes, buffalo and elephants have been defaced within the past two years by personnel attached to the UN mission, known by its French acronym, Minurso.

Graffiti, some of it more than a metre high and sprayed with paint meant for use for marking routes, now blights the rock art at Lajuad, an isolated site known as Devil Mountain, which is regarded by the local Sahrawi population as a mystical place of great cultural significance.

[...]

And where is the outraged coverage from the MSM over the destruction of these treasures?

No where to be seen.

Why is that? Perhaps because the UN is responsible for this cultural rape, not the evil Taliban?

Well, you can decide the motives for ignoring this story, but it is one that should be told nonetheless.

For the corrupt UN(and our MSM) the hits just keep on coming.

H/T to Denny who got it from Wade who stole it from here

If the primary season reveals no decisive front-runner, and if conservative delegates head toward the GOP convention with the nagging feeling that our best candidate wasn’t in the race, we urge them to consider acting on what so many Republicans and Reagan Democrats are thinking. Drafting Newt Gingrich is a real solution to the current leadership problem. Even as a vice presidential choice, Gingrich would solidify the ranks and reinforce the GOP’s position as the party of bold ideas, but as a presidential choice he could bring about a truly needed Second Reagan Revolution.

By Perry Atkinson and Bob Just

McCain is simply too distasteful to me, too liberal, too much for compromise, too little a conservative. So, why not put out a call to all conservatives to try and deny McCain the nomination and wait until the convention to draft Fred and Newt? That has to be a better solution than Juan McCain!

Anyway, I think it is an idea worth considering!

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=59971

There are rich men with trophy wives and now rich women with trophy boy toys

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wanted: rich older women interested in hot younger guys.

LOL!
Oh gee… stop twisting my arm

Applicants must be over 35, earn at least $500,000 a year or have a minimum of $4 million in liquid assets, entrusted assets or divorce settlement.

That’s the basis of a speed-dating event organized by a New York entrepreneur bringing together 20 “sugar mamas” and 20 “boy toys” vetted by an elite New York matchmaker.

“Symbiosis has allowed ugly rich men to attract young, gorgeous, money-hungry women for centuries; it’s now the women’s turn,” proclaims pocket change nyc, the Web site that Jeremy Abelson is using to promote the event.

Sheesh… I only need to make $400,000 more a year and a lil’ under $4 million in liquid assets and I’m on my way to sign up

I can’t find the picture. Last night’s debate. Huck is trying to make a point. Romney and McCain sat there looking at him with fake smiles (sneers) condescending to have to sit there and listen to him.

If you wonder why I dislike Romney so much its that painted on condescension smile he carries with him wherever he goes. McCain just sits there like Mr Potato Head (in case you never noticed the similarity) and tries to smile.

Listen, hear, measure and answer. That's what you are supposed to do. Don’t give me that “Yadda yadda yadda I can’t wait till he’s done talking so I can talk some more”. “Who cares about him, I’m what’s important here”.

I know, Politics ain’t beanbag. I know phony is what it takes these days. But, quicher grinnen Mitt. It ticks me off. And if I could get you alone I’d do what I did to those phonies in High School. We’d have a grinectomy beatdown.

Sure, I was a High School Geek. But I was a big mean high school geek. That’s what Romney needs to have a little attitude adjustment.

More fallout from Arizona’s hiring laws:

Arizona’s employer-sanctions law is driving illegal immigrants to leave the state, as intended.

The departures were first felt at stores and businesses that cater to such immigrants. Sales suddenly dropped.

Now, apartment complexes, especially those with affordable rents in neighborhoods with large immigrant populations, are feeling the effects. Individuals and entire families are moving, leaving behind empty apartments that can’t be filled.

Some renters are handing over their keys and breaking leases because they’ve lost their jobs due to the sanctions law and can’t pay the rent. Others are simply skipping out in the middle of the night.

“Most folks aren’t even telling us; they are just leaving,” said Estela Bojorquez, manager of the Villa de Sonora apartments in west Phoenix, which is trying to fill 59 vacant apartments out of a total of 156. Bojorquez attributes half of the vacancies to illegal immigrants moving out of the state because of the sanctions law. Job losses because of a slowdown in the economy - especially in housing construction, which employs many immigrants - also are contributing to the departures.

It’s the same story across town at the Mountain Vista apartments in south Phoenix. The 190 apartments at the complex off Roeser Road were 99 percent full just a few months ago, before the sanctions law went into effect Jan. 1. Now, 19 apartments, or about 10 percent of the total, are vacant.

As a result, many immigrants are leaving, either to other states where they think it will be easier to get jobs, or back to Mexico, where the majority of illegal immigrants in Arizona are from.

Fidel Covarrubias, 28, was renting a two-bedroom apartment at the Villa de Sonora complex on Thomas Road near 59th Avenue for $690. On Monday, he and his wife and four children were packing up their bags in preparation to move to Texas. He turned in his apartment keys the same day and told the manager they were moving.

The construction worker explained that his hours had been cut to just one or two days a week because housing construction is so slow. His wife, meanwhile, lost her job cleaning restrooms at Metrocenter mall at the beginning of the month because of the sanctions law. With the first day of February approaching, they decided to move to Dallas, where they have relatives.

Unintended fallout from the employer sanctions law--slum lords are stuck with a glut of apartments that they formerly knowingly rented to illegals.  Check cashing stores, Mexican markets and businesses… all are suffering.

Perhaps the worst part of all--if my kid gets sick, the hospitals are probably struggling to keep their ER’s filled with illegals and their kids with little more wrong than stuff noses.  What will the hospitals do without their flood of ER patients?  Will the hospitals go out of business like the slumlords are?

Find it here

Former President Bill Clinton was in Denver, Colorado, stumping for his wife yesterday.

In a long, and interesting speech, he characterized what the U.S. and other industrialized nations need to do to combat global warming this way: “We just have to slow down our economy and cut back our greenhouse gas emissions ‘cause we have to save the planet for our grandchildren.”

At a time that the nation is worried about a recession is that really the characterization his wife would want him making? “Slow down our economy”?

I don’t really think there’s much debate that, at least initially, a full commitment to reduce greenhouse gases would slow down the economy….So was this a moment of candor?

He went on to say that his the U.S.—and those countries that have committed to reducing greenhouse gases—could ultimately increase jobs and raise wages with a good energy plan..

So there was something of a contradiction there.

Or perhaps he mis-spoke.

Or perhaps this characterization was a description of what would happen if there isn’t a worldwide effort…I’m not quite certain.

You can watch that one clip HERE or you can watch the whole speech at the website of ABC News’ great Denver affiliate KMGH by clicking HERE.

It’s worth watching—he also pushed back against a 9/11 conspiracy theorist heckling him.

“Everybody knows that global warming is real,” Mr. Clinton said, giving a shout-out to Al Gore’s Nobel Peace Prize, “but we cannot solve it alone.”

“And maybe America, and Europe, and Japan, and Canada—the rich counties—would say, ‘OK, we just have to slow down our economy and cut back our greenhouse gas emissions ‘cause we have to save the planet for our grandchildren.’ We could do that.

“But if we did that, you know as well as I do, China and India and Indonesia and Vietnam and Mexico and Brazil and the Ukraine, and all the other countries will never agree to stay poor to save the planet for our grandchildren. The only way we can do this is if we get back in the world’s fight against global warming and prove it is good economics that we will create more jobs to build a sustainable economy that saves the planet for our children and grandchildren. It is the only way it will work.

“And guess what? The only places in the world today in rich countries where you have rising wages and declining inequality are places that have generated more jobs than rich countries because they made a commitment we didn’t. They got serious about a clean, efficient, green, independent energy future… If you want that in America, if you want the millions of jobs that will come from it, if you would like to see a new energy trust fund to finance solar energy and wind energy and biomass and responsible bio-fuels and electric hybrid plug-in vehicles that will soon get 100 miles a gallon, if you want every facility in this country to be made maximally energy efficient that will create millions and millions and millions of jobs, vote for her. She’ll give it to you. She’s got the right energy plan.”

[...]

(Which begs the question—does she want to slow down the economy?)

The Chief Leftie finally comes out of the closet and reveals the real leftie agenda behind the global warming propaganda: worldwide socialism. Who would have guessed it?

Find it here

Here is an excerpt from a radio address by Reagan in April of 1979, specifically addressing the issue of the Free Enterprise system. It is reproduced as he wrote it.

It isn’t unfair to say that today the world is divided between those who believe in the free mkt. place & those who believe in govt. control & ownership of the economy.

I’ll be right back.

Our free mkt. system is usually termed capitalism and by that definition capitalism has hardly been around long enough to deserve all the evil for which it is being held responsible.

Most of us aren’t really conscious of how recently the capitalist system came into being. Possibly we look back & think of the extravagant luxury of kings & emperors & see that as capitalism. We have a modern counterpart today in the rulers of Marxist nations. The ruling hierarchy of the Soviet U. live on a scale more akin to royalty than do the heads of capitalist countries.

Maybe our trouble is caused by the term capitalist itself. Actually all systems are capitalist. It’s just a matter of who owns & controls the capital–ancient king, dictator or private individual. We should properly be looking at the contrast between a free mkt. system where individuals have the right to live like kings if they have the ability to earn that right and govt. control of the mkt. system such as we find today in socialist nations.

We have a very visible example of the contrast between the free mkt. & govt. ownership in a household necessity we take for granted. The invention of Alexander Graham Bell–the telephone offers us irrefutable proof of the superiority of the free mkt.

As recently as 1880 there were only 34,000 miles of telephone wires on the whole N. American Continent. There were dozens & dozens of small telephone companies using several different kinds of equipment and there was no inter-connection between these different companies. The same situation prevailed in all the other so called advanced nations.

If someone had openly advanced a plan to put a phone in every home, on every farm, in every hamlet & city and hook them all together I’m sure someone would have said, “only govt. has the resources to do that.”

Now strangely enough in most other countries govt. did take over the telephone system and to this very day the telephones in a great many countries are part of the postal system. In America the govt. wasn’t bulldozing it’s way into the free mkt. place as it is today. For that we can be grateful. The scattered, competing phone companies were left to the magic of the mkt. place. And that magic worked as it always does.

We take the phone so much for granted it’s hard to realize things weren’t always this way. We can dial directly to any point in the country and to a great many outside the country.

With no intention of insulting anyone it I have to say it only takes a few days trip in many of those other countries to where the telephone is a govt. service to realize there is a difference. A long distance call there can be quite an adventure–so can getting a phone installed.

But here we have them in our cars if we like, in private or corporation owned executive planes & on boats. We bounce long distance calls off privately owned satellites and use telephone lines for network radio & remote broadcasts of sporting & special events.

And all of this came about because private individuals wanting to make a profit for themselves kept thinking of better services to offer, confident that we’d want that better service.

This is RR Thanks for listening.

Compare this to John McCain’s view of the free market, as he revealed in last night’s debate.

This is a demonstration from Corpus Christi Texas this January (2007) on Martin Luther King’s birthday.  The end of this week begins Black History Month.  We as a nation have really placed people in a Ghetto fed by “graduates” of our public schools.  Is this mess what MLK lived and died for?

“I want to see the day when men are not judged by the color of their skin but by their ability to spell”.

I know Dr King said it differently, but why do we abuse people by pushing through the grades without judgment and they hit the streets no better prepared for life than if they had stayed home and watched TV.  The whole race is judged by it’s lowest common denominator.  WE ARE judged by the words we use.  We are judged double when they are in the public venue like this.  All this idiocy at a cost per student in Texas of over $7000 per year.  It’s worse in Illinois. In the district where I live they spend over $10,000 per year.  I want my wasted money spent on public education back.

Oh, just so you can check this out for yourself, snopes has an article on this.

I wish government would get out of education.  It doesn’t work.  It’s a failure at every level.

Close all public schools, issue vouchers like a K-12 Pell Grant.  It works for College, it’ll work for elementary schools.  Another good Idea from George Bush.

Oh, and RBB, I’ll head this one off at the pass, these genius’s don’t even know if there is evolution or creation.  Heck they can’t even spell either one.  Home schooling is no danger to these dunces.  They didn’t get an education at all.

Someone has to tell the truth about this travesty.  I just did.

After an 8 hour drive from St. Louis to Wichita, and then into the little podunk town called Mulvayne (10 miles south), I didn’t expect much from my trip to the treeless land they call Kansas.

But after spending a week with my sister and neices, I feel re-energized and centered. Despite the drive I feel almost like a new person, and starting a new job (hooray to more money) helps too!

But I’m happy to be back, and am ready to crank it back up a notch at SayAnything. It’s nice to take a step back from the world every now and again, get away from them thar Intarwebs, and go do something deeply personal to reinvigorate yourself.

And while I know this isn’t the standard fare for SayAnything...perhaps we all need to recharge the batteries every now and again and remember what’s important. Politics may piss us all off to no end (especially with the crap that we have in the primaries), but our lives go on pretty much untouched by the big stuff. And it’s nice to be reminded of all that every now and again.

I thought it was just me, But I’m disposed toward Huckabee. But I thought this was a good night for him despite his continued whining about not getting enough face time. His answers were cogent and sharp. His last answer about the Reagan Endorsement would be a good campaign ad. Then I read something from Schneider.

Schneider (a liberal) said:

Huckabee, I think, stood out in this debate as the one who made sense, talked as ordinary people do, and rose above politics. They may have scored. He connected. And that’s a problem for Romney, who would like to become the alternative to John McCain among conservatives who oppose the Arizona senator. But he has very tough competition from Huckabee, who’s forcing people to re-think his run at a time when he was supposed to be out of the game.

But this has always been the way he’s worked: Romney uses money to stay competitive. Huckabee has debates.

If Huckabee had a couple Million in the coffers maybe he could get a bit more traction. On the other hand look what money has done for Romney.

Gosh, to see what Huck has done with so little money, think of what a great fiscally conservative President he’d be.

Not much of a surprise, there! A moderate to left Republican endorses a moderate to left Republican!

SIMI VALLEY, Calif. - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will endorse John McCain on Thursday, giving a boost to the Republican presidential front-runner six days before California’s high-prize primary.
The two will appear at a news conference after touring a Los Angeles-based solar energy company and the governor will make his endorsement official, his senior aides confirmed.

Schwarzenegger’s endorsement of McCain is yet another setback for Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who saw Florida slip from his grasp Tuesday after McCain rolled up the support of that state’s two top elected Republicans, Gov. Charlie Crist and Sen. Mel Martinez.

And if Bill Mitchell’s head hasn’t exploded by now, he’ll love the next line of the story:

His strategy in tatters, Romney plans to offer himself as the conservative alternative to McCain as he pushes ahead in hopes of winning enough delegates to topple the Arizona senator when 21 states vote in the Republican contest on Tuesday.

His strategy in tatters...a certain...poetry, wouldn’t you say? But, then, endorsements don’t mean anything do they? Do they??
Hat tip to Wizbang

by Sideshow Bob from Free Republic

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1961546/posts

In my opinion SideshowBob has just written the most succinct article defining our recent history and current situation;

There have been more than a few recent articles and editorials attempting to affix blame for the demise of the Republican Party. Peggy Noonan blames President Bush. Rush Limbaugh believes a McCain nomination will kill the party. However, even in a worse case scenario, the Republican Party will probably stagger along for several years much like the last decade of the Whigs. Conservative Republicans should probably be more concerned about the impending demise of the conservative movement within the party. Some individuals can be blamed more than others, but this folly has many fathers. The latest blow to conservatives has come from within – thanks to Dr. James Dobson and other egotistical evangelicals. Political doomsayers may be correct and it is likely too late to save the conservative movement in 2008. Conservatives can correct their path to destruction for 2010 and beyond, but only if they look back at recent history, recognize the actions and actors that have brought the party and movement to this point, and to learn from a long series of missteps and mistakes.

Ronald Reagan built a winning coalition of conservatives, independents and establishment moderate Republicans in 1980. A coalition of social, economic and security conservatives had come together to form a plurality within the GOP and wrest leadership of the party from the establishment, moderate GOP. The Iran-Contra scandal (Mistake #1) weakened the coalition and the moderate wing of the party regained control of the GOP (Mistake #2), which led to the election of President George H.W. Bush (Mistake #3).

While the elder Bush had adopted – albeit reluctantly – many conservative ideals, he and the moderate GOP leaders advocated a “kinder, gentler” approach (Mistake #4). Conservatives might have been content to take a back seat to moderate GOP leadership, but they read Bush’s lips and their support and enthusiasm for the Republican Party evaporated after the Bush tax increase (Mistake #5). In 1992 some conservatives were taken in by Ross Perot and his anti-establishment, anti-Washington message (Mistake #6). Others just stayed home (Mistake #7) and helped Democrats elect the Dope from Hope, Bill Clinton, with just 43% of the popular vote (Mistake #8)…

So, there is a program/organization which pays crack-addicted women a few hundred bucks cash to get IUDs so that they won’t have crack babies born into lives of despair, suffering, etc. Children Require A Caring Kommunity. Wow.
I think there are a few red flags here that one could pause to ponder. Seriously. It is my understanding that there are currently approx. 7,000 women partaking in this program in the US.

1) Soon (if not already) taxpayers will be footing the bill. Is giving anyone money for crack (that is what, in effect, this is) okay, no matter the circumstances? My tax money? And I can’t smoke crack, because its ILLEGAL.
1a) It should be noted that paying people a one time fee ain’t that bad when one considers the amount of tax money repeated visits to rehab and the hospital by these sorts of people cost in tax money… or to lock them up… for their illegal activities… This is a weak counterpoint, IMO.
2) It seems there are autonomy and consent issues when we are talking about crack-addicted individuals who are being coerced, in effect, with cash into significant transfers of autonomy, such as reproductive autonomy.
3) The sort of precedent that is established by allowing this sort of thing seems like it is going in the wrong direction. What sorts of other types of laws or policy might be enacted that is going further, but close enough to C.R.A.C.K. to use it in a justificatory manner?
4) I suspect that the demographics for the roughly 7000 females currently involved in the program may lead some to think that this program has a not-so-distant affinity to eugenics.
5) IUDs are abortives. Does the concern for the child, on the part of the anti-abortion crowd, leave them open to similar policies in which other sorts of more pre-emptive methods of birth control are used? Can anyone speak Chinese?

I urge you guys to think about this stuff. Discuss it. Call someone and talk to them about it. Its odd. It smells fishy. I don’t necessarily have a strong Christian ethic or anything, but this strikes me as being in an ethical grey area whose depths might best be left unexplored.

Are we reasonably to think that this is the sort of case where some sort of overall benefit can rationalize the situation? DO we even achieve a benefit with this?

I was discussing C.R.A.C.K. last night with a couple law scholars I know. I find it deeply disturbing, do you? Do the ends justify the means?