Faustam fortuna adiuvat
The official blog of Fausta's Blog Talk Radio show.
Monday, May 12, 2008
Blue Skies
Ed Morrissey writes about a most happy event: his son's graduation, in Will and Circumstance
I looked at my son and wondered how he did it, and marveled at the will it took to graduate summa cum laude from one of the most well-respected universities in the nation.
That has to be one of the most wonderful, happy events in any parent's life.
Years ago when I was really really sick and my blood sugar levels were totally out of control, the one thing I prayed for was for God to let me live long enough to watch my son graduate from college.
That thought was what made me find the way to get well again, for, as Gabriel Garcia Marquez's story Miracle in Rome teaches us, children are the salvation of their parents.
It is a two-way street, after all: Yesterday I was reading Fetiche's post at Eternity Road
Motherhood is a conservative role. A devoted mother finds her fulfillment in giving life to others, and protecting their innocence as best she can, until they're ready to face the world on their own. That's conservation for you: the conservation of new life against corruption, perversion, and dissipation. Well-reared children arrive at adulthood armored against those things. They have their mothers to thank for that.
I met Ed Morrissey last year after reading his blog every day for several years and have had the pleasure of conversing with him, and by all definitions of the word he's an affable and polite gentleman who measures his words and is not prone to anger.
That makes it all the more enjoyable to watch him bring out the big stick and pound it hard.
Essentially the NYT is speculating on whether "female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, visiting his offices and accompanying him on a client's corporate jet" - as lobbyists are prone to do - and a possible "close bond" amounted to an affair (of which there is absolutely no proof) eight years ago.
That's right folks, two Presidential election cycles ago. That's fifty six dog years.
The NYT's position strikes me a ridiculous and sexist. I have worked with men all my life and have developed close friendships that will never amount to sexual affairs, but if one's to go by the NYT criteria every woman in the world can be the target of such allegations.
Got that? Nothing actually happened. The big story here is that there may have been an "appearance" of a "close bond".
And where did the Times get this information? Well, you have to read past the rehash of the Keating Five scandal of the mid-1980s, past a strange accusation involving McCain's use of direct flights from Washington to Phoenix, and past his crusade to clean up Washington through the BCRA (which I adamantly opposed and still do) to get to the Slimes' sourcing. It turns out that they talked to two anonymous former staffers -- neither of whom allege that the relationship actually became romantic -- and who describe themselves as disgruntled.
Great sourcing there, guys. Way to corroborate a non-story. I guess Lucy Ramirez must have been hard to find this time around.
Let's give credit where credit is due. JIM RUTENBERG, MARILYN W. THOMPSON, DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and STEPHEN LABATON all show the kind of journalistic chops that made Us such a must-read in doctor's offices and lavatories around the world. The next time, they need to include more pictures of Britney Spears exiting limousines to capture the essence of this kind of reporting.
They don't have those pictures, but they're willing to show the motorcade to the psychiatric ward. Which apparently has them too busy to be interviewed on the radio about the McCain story: Patrick Hynes was resoundedly turned down when he invited Rutenberg, who also said no one else at the Slimes was willing to come to Patrick's radio show.
Race 4 2008 has more on the FCC aspect of the story.
Tonight at 8PM Eastern I'll be joining the guys at Heading Right. Will we start another drinking game? If we do, should it be over every time anyone says "Ronald Reagan", considering that the debate will be held at the Ronald Reagan ranch in Simi Valley, CA?
This afternoon at 3PM Eastern I'll be Ed Morrissey's guest, along with our mutual friend Val Prieto. We'll be talking about Cuba, Venezuela and politics.
Tonight I'll be liveblogging the debate at Heading Right.
Tomorrow at 11AM, Siggy and I will be talking about food with Happy Catholic.
Tuesday, January 29, at 11AM, Siggy and I will have a new, one-hour show.
During all my podcasts chat will be open at 10:45, and the call-in number is (646) 652-2639. Join us!
Both states have been criticized as unrepresentative of the country given their size and lack of racial diversity. Iowa — population 3 million — is 95 percent white; New Hampshire — population 1.3 million — is 96 percent white. Democrats tried to inject more diversity into the process by adding early contests in Nevada and South Carolina, but Iowa and New Hampshire moved even earlier.
The system became so scrambled last year that New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner was prepared to move the primary into December to keep ahead of other states that scheduled their own early primaries and caucuses. If anything, the front-loaded calendar made Iowa and New Hampshire more important.
Gardner and other defenders of New Hampshire say the country — and the candidates — are well-served because the primary requires close contact with voters, not just a big advertising budget and name recognition.
Betsy is disgusted that we are still stuck paying attention to the Iowa caucuses, and so is Hitchens:
I was in Des Moines and Ames in the early fall, and I must say that, as small and landlocked and white and rural as Iowa is, I would be happy to give an opening bid in our electoral process to its warm and generous and serious people. But this is not what the caucus racket actually does. What it does is give the whip hand to the moneyed political professionals, to the full-time party hacks and manipulators, to the shady pollsters and the cynical media boosters, and to the supporters of fringe and crackpot candidates. It is impossible that the Republican Party could be saddled with a clown like Huckabee if there were a serious primary in Iowa, let alone if the process were kicked off in Chicago or Los Angeles or Atlanta. (Remember that not Iowa but its "caucuses" put Pat Robertson ahead of George H.W. Bush in the race for the GOP nomination in 1988.) The process might be a good way for Iowa to pick its party convention delegates, though I frankly doubt even that. It is an absolutely terrible way in which to select candidates for the presidency, and it makes the United States look and feel like a banana republic both at home and overseas.
I don't really understand the importance of the Iowa caucus (the rules of which Hitchens and Howard Kurtz both refer to as "arcane"), but in tonight's podcast Ed Morrissey will talk about it.
The call-in number is (646) 652-2639, and we'll also have live chat. Join us at 9PM Eastern.
I had the pleasure of being Ed's guest in today's podcast, along with FlyLady.
Don't forget to listen to my podcast from last week on Venezuela. Next Wednesday at 5PM Eastern my guest will be Erik Svane of No Pasaran. Please note the time change.
All right, I know a great satire site when I read it. Scott Ott must have contracted with the Hillary Clinton campaign for this argument, right? Only a true satirist or a complete idiot would go after a campaign opponent for his academic record -- in kindergarten! Claiming that Barack Obama didn't tell the truth when he said that his presidential run wasn't the result of some long-held plan, Hillary dug up the evidence after checking the Crayola signatures (via Best of the Web)
But Ed also comes clean on his own precotious ambition:
By the way, in case you were wondering, here's my kindergarten essay on my political ambitions:
When I grow up, I want to spend eighteen years as a mid-level manager for alarm company call centers. After that, I want to write about politics on DarpaNet. I hear all the hot chicks dig balding, middle-aged political pundits.
Last night I joined the guys at Heading Right who liveblogged the CNN/YouTube debate.
I had to break at 9PM for my prescheduled podcast on the pharmaceutical industry. I will post later about what my two guests, Siggy and Dr. Sanity (who called in with questions) had to say about the subject.
I haven't been following the attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey hearings, but one thing is clear: Why would anyone put themselves through such a stressful nomination process?
Nonetheless, properly circumscribed, the idea of an “Anglosphere” can constitute something meaningful. We should not commit the mistake of “thinking with the blood,” as D. H. Lawrence once put it, however, but instead emphasize a certain shared tradition, capacious enough to include a variety of peoples and ethnicities and expressed in a language—perhaps here I do betray a bias—uniquely hostile to euphemisms for tyranny. In his postwar essay “Towards European Unity,” George Orwell raised the possibility that the ideas of democracy and liberty might face extinction in a world polarized between superpowers but that they also might hope to survive in some form in “the English-speaking parts of it.” English is, of course, the language of the English and American revolutions, whose ideas and values continue to live after those of more recent revolutions have been discredited and died.
Captain Ed Morrissey has uncovered who's behind this racist smear against Fred Thompson:
Apparently hoping to confuse web surfers looking for Fred's website at http://www.imwithfred.com/, a new site has appeared at www.imwithfred2008.com -- only this site welcomes people to the Ku Klux Klan, "Bringing a Message of Hope and Deliverance to White Christian America!" It includes links to a variety of disgusting racist sites.
I'll be Ed's podcast guest this afternoon at 3PM to talk about this. Please tune in!
Few things online are more fun than doing a podcast or being in a podcast. I have had the privilege of being in Captain Ed Morrissey's podcasts, and today Ed was my guest, along with Siggy.
We started by discussing prayer, then the bridge in Minneapolis, Hollywood and the cult of celebrity, ABBA, and we concluded with a few remarks about the unionized bloggers idea. As Ed said,
The whole Marxist thrust was that the workers should take over the means of production. Well, you know what, in the blogosphere the workers OWN the means of production, and they still want to form a union!"
You can listen to the podcast here. You'll enjoy it, too.
Baron Bodissey: "We have a problem that law is not enforced, and our president and our own administration have made wanting to enforce the law a symptom of bigotry, racism, and unkindness and lack of compassion"
We also discussed France's nuclear deal with Libya, the EU, and anti-Americanism, and you must listen to the rest of the podcast. As a follow-up, during the week Sigmund Carl and Alfred posted about a Gates of Vienna's commenter on the subject of the EU's constituion.
It is a privilege to have these conversations with Dymphna, Siggy and the Baron, and I look forward to having one of these podcasts every month.
On a related subject, Siggy once said,
For every prayer that is extended our way when most needed, there are an equal numbers of prayers that we must extend because those prayers are needed.
Dymphna is recovering from shoulder surgery and I invite all my visitors to pray for her speedy and complete recovery. Next Monday, August 6 my guest will be the excellent Captain Ed Morrissey
I have been reading daily Captain's Quarters for years and it was a real thrill to meet Ed last March (that's my hand over his shoulder). Ed's the podfather of BTR political podcasts and it's a real pleasure to talk to him. Don't miss the podcast Monday at noon Eastern time.
Some of the programs are making their way to viewers on the Internet or by satellite to stations abroad. Other shows are not reaching any audience at all, but cameramen, sound engineers and actors are continuing to produce most of RCTV's programs in hopes they may once again reach viewers across Venezuela, if only by cable.
In this battle of renditions, it is important to mention that the Brazilian Congress has veto power over Venezuela's ongoing application process for full membership in the regional trade alliance Mercosur and it could damage Chavez’s continental plans independent of Lula's actual directions. Chavez faces the political constraint of having to "sell" Venezuela's membership to the Brazilian Congress as well as to the President
Read the rest.
Secretary of State Condeleezza Rice spoke up for democracy at the OAS meeting, where the president of the organization calls her "Condi", as if they were in his back yard enjoying cold drinks. The Venezuelan guy demanded that the US allow a Venezuelan commission to visit Gitmo with TV crews.
This is about more than one TV station. President Chávez has become a destabilizing figure throughout the hemisphere because he feels he can silence anyone with opposing thoughts.
He wishes to hear only his own voice, to see his own face replicated a thousand times on the television channels that he controls. He ignores the fact that the true revolution of our era consists of listening to others rather than silencing them through repression or government decrees.
The rest of Latin America's leaders cannot remain indifferent to the closing of RCTV or to Chávez's threats to close other media outlets that give time to opposing opinions. Those of us who confronted authoritarianism in the past must again stand up for continent-wide solidarity.
This should be a perfect moment: this week the Organization of American States holds its annual general assembly in Panama. Unfortunately, the RCTV issue was not on the official agenda of the plenary session.
And, as we just saw, the OAS dropped the ball altogether.
As far as I'm concerned, it ain't diverticulitis. And the fool doing the reporting must be dreaming to even think that Fidel would be a late convert to free-market reforms.
Via Babalu, here's the interview in Spanish. Notice the date stamp, June 4, 2007 (day/month/year): Looks like Castro's wearing loose dentures. Interesting how he makes a point of showing the newspaper, as if he was a hostage.
II only watched for a few minutes, but Matt has a penchant for contradicting himself: first he shows a jazzy powerpoint slide of how good Havana would look if only the USA would bring trade and prosperity, and then he mentions that nearly every other country in the world cn trade with Cuba.
Yet people only earn fifty cents a day. Why is that?
Matt just can't seem to get it, so let me spell it out for him: Because COMMUNISM DOESN'T WORK, Matt!
To the editor: I felt enough had been written about the Princeton Public Library's recent "human rights" film festival. However, since three letter writers have chosen to keep the subject alive, a response is warranted.
One letter denounced "hard-right anti-Castroites" who protested the inclusion of pro-Cuba films. Well, if it is "hard-right" to loathe a dictator who brooks no dissent, jails political prisoners, and has clung to power for a half-century, I plead guilty.
A few questions for the writer: Does this make you a "hard-left pro-Castroite?" Should you have mentioned that your wife organized the festival? Among those "hard-right anti-Castroites," do you include the elderly man who spoke about his years in Castro's prisons? Finally, does Cuba, which Human Rights Watch calls the "one country in Latin America that represses nearly all forms of political dissent," really deserve to be lauded in a festival about "human rights?"
Festival organizers even embellished their films with a guest speaker:- a particularly noxious woman who would not even concede that Castro's gulag is less than democratic. For the former prisoner, it was literally insult heaped upon injury.
Another letter praised the festival's "courageous" pursuit of free expression. With apologies to Warner Wolf, give me a break! "Courage" implies steadfastness despite a threat of harm, such as daring to dissent in Cuba, or boarding a raft hoping to reach Florida.
In the case of our film festival, a few activists used other people's money (taxpayers) to show films promoting their own world view. Attendees learned about the plight of the millionaire Dixie Chicks, whose "rights" were apparently trampled when radio stations refused to play their music.
At last year's festival, we heard that corporations, by their very nature, are "psychopathic" and in need of therapy. Yet each year, festival organizers are praised by their colleagues, and letter writers commend their "courage." My point is that ascribing "courage" to people who dabble in radical politics insults to those who actually deserve that adjective.
It is vitally important to mention that in the festival's three years, there has not been one offering about the Muslim/Arab world, where "rights" are truly in short supply.
What about the right of a female to drive, to study, to avoid genital mutilation? The right of an Israeli teenager to have pizza without being vaporized by a suicide bomber? The right to publish cartoons mocking the "prophet" Mohammed? Not a syllable in three years. Is it because these "courageous" librarians are afraid to offend Muslims, who fight back with fatwas? Is it because condemning Islamic abuses doesn't mesh with their world view, in which the West is the source of all evil?
If the festival organizers want "dialog," let it commence. We might begin by asking whether Princeton's overburdened taxpayers wish to subsidize a festival that is less about "human rights" than it is a pretense for promoting a political agenda. And, oh yes, those "psychopathic" corporations might consult their therapists about the wisdom of supporting people who loathe their very existence. signed Paul J. Budline
Update, 4PM: Val Prieto and I were Captain Ed's guests, and you can listen to the podcast here. We discussed the many inaccuracies and omissions from the Today Show, not the least of which are the imprisoned dissidents, like Vladimiro Roca and Oscar Elias Biscet, Coco Farinas (who's protesting for access to the internet) and also dissidents like Martha Beatriz Roque Escabello and Ladies in White (wives, mothers, and sisters of 78 dissidents who were imprisoned for distributing books). Later in the program Dymphna and Ziva called in. Great news for Maria Conchita Alonso fans, she's producing a documentary and will be in a movie about Venezuela.
Fausta was born and raised in Santurce, Puerto Rico and is a long-term resident of Princeton, New Jersey. She discusses New Jersey, taxation, current events, and how news are reported in the French and Spanish-language media at Fausta's Blog.
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