Informed Speculation

I’ll be leaving shortly to visit my family for Christmas. I hope to post some over the next few days, but it won’t be my usual three or four posts a day, I’m sure. I’ll get back to normal blogging on Monday. I’ve really enjoyed putting this blog out and I thank all of you [...]

Thanks to the magic of trackback, I discovered this piece by Joust the Facts. He’s all over the Michael Lind article like Garfield on lasagna, so please take a look… Speaking of the Lind article, my post got a most curious response from Not a Fan (no kidding? I wouldn’t have guessed it…). I quote [...]

For that bratty kid that belongs to some cousin you see once a year, some cheap toys from the Onion… For the family ‘Progressive’, Cooper For President has politically correct gifts form Neiman Marxist… All good conservatives will love this US out of UN Christmas ornament… Finally (this one is real), in the spirit on [...]

deacon at Power Line linked today to an article in the American Prospect by Michael Lind under the heading ‘One Leftist Gets It.” There is much to like in the piece – read deacon’s post (and the original, of course) for several highlights. Here are some more of the good bits: According to the authors [...]

The Fly Bottle makes the excellent point that Social Security reform is a great idea even without a crisis (but there is one!) (courtesy of Reihan, guest-blogging for Andrew Sullivan)… Arthur Chrenkoff goes around the world in 80 blogs… In an astonishing display of stamina, Tim Blair posts the quotes of 2004, seperated by date [...]

I wanted to do something special for the holiday edition of Weekly Jackass. I thought of doing a Google search for somebody saying something outrageous about Christmas, but that’s too easy. This week’s Jackass would look at someone complaining about Christmas as a novice, in light of his impressive record of outrageous statements. He’s a [...]

I have already admitted to stupidity on the subject of presidential pardons; today, the Instapundit has led me to a source that reveals my ignorance in all its glory… No Wictory Wednesday post yet from PoliPundit – but check out the blogroll to the right all the same; it’s fun to check out new blogs [...]

Sort of, anyway. Nicholas Kristof gets into the spirit of the season with some kind words for the Christian Right (hat tip to RealClearPolitics). He praises conservatives for leading the way on several issues that the Left should surely support, were it not for hatred of the Bushies. Included among them are Darfur, increased funding [...]

The Left, it seems, needs constant reminders that denial ain’t just a river in Egypt (ouch!). A reader of this blog (see comments to this post) opines: This whole O.F.F. ‘scandal’ is a joke: it’s based on a list of people ‘found’ by an Iraqi general lying about the Ministry of Oil 2-3 weeks after [...]

CNN has an article on Bush and his sparing use of the Presidential pardon. I very stupidly asked if it was time to get rid of the pardon in an earlier post, not having known or remembered that it’s in the Constitution (d’oh!). For the record, W. is up to 31 (Clinton issued over 450, [...]

David Brooks has an excellent article in today’s New York Times regarding the series of ‘mistakes’ Bush and Sharon have made that have us closer to peace in that region than any other moment in my lifetime. The critics of Bush and Sharon have been adamant in their conviction that we are targeting Islam and [...]

Intelliseek has a year-end study that names BoingBoing as the blog most often referred to in other blogs (this marks its first appearance here…not sure if that has any significance). The self-styled ‘Directory of Wonderful Things’ is apparently over 1 million monthly visitors – just a tad higher than I get here at Decision ’08 [...]

It’s certainly good to see a Mark Steyn column of recent vintage. His website has had a message about a hiatus of sorts for some time that had me and others concerned. If you don’t know his work, you should take some time to browse around the site. Few writers on Election ’04 filled me [...]

Tim Blair has a piece on Michael Moore’s shifting motivations… Writing in today’s OpinionJournal, Kenneth L. Cain says Kofi Annan must go – but not for Oil-For-Food (and JustOneMinute says it’s about to happen again)…. Merle Haggard a poet? He sure is, says the Big Trunk at Power Line (I couldn’t agree more)… Don’t miss [...]

I highly recommend this article by Victor Davis Hanson in National Review on the credibility of the left. He has four recommendations: Don’t use the ‘Islamophobia’ excuse to avoid condemning terrorism and hatred. Get over the use of ‘imperialism’ where it does not apply. Wise up to the scandalous behavior of the UN. Find some [...]

Arthur Chrenkoff wonders if the Republican theft of the last two US elections influenced Saddam to abandon his precious democratic principles… More on the trials and tribulations of the UN in the Kofi Annan era at Capitalism Magazine… Mark Noonan on Mark Warner: Mark Warner, to put it in a nutshell, is the perfect Democratic [...]

Clive Stafford Smith, a British human rights lawyer, is campaigning to ensure Saddam Hussein gets a fair trial, unlike his tens of thousands of victims. Smith’s previous gig was to ensure that human rights were being observed at Guantanamo, courtesy of a grant from the George Soros Foundation (hat tip to little green footballs by [...]

Mark Sanford doesn’t have the name recognition of a Powell, Rice, or Clinton, but the conservative governor of South Carolina has some other compensating qualities: he’s relatively young, his conservative politics fit in well with the national mood at the moment, and there is a precedent for Southern governors winning nationally. A correspondent suggested I [...]

I often use the phrase Radical Left in an effort to avoid demonizing every person who doesn’t share my views. Is that just a copout? I think not – allow me to demonstrate: Left: Newsweek…………………..Radical Left: Rolling Stone Left: Peter Jennings……………..Radical Left: Dan Rather Left: The New Republic……………Radical Left: The Nation Left: Al Gore pre-2000……………Radical [...]

…to Power Line on being named Time’s Blog of the Year. Some blogs you check out once in a great while, others every day – for me, Power Line is in the latter category. Pay them a visit if you haven’t already…