The Nigh Seen Creeder

Sen. John "Droopy" Kerry's contempt for America's military was on display in an appearance at Pasadena City College yesterday. According to Droopy, the military is full o' dumbasses:

"You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and do your homework, and make an effort to be smart, uh, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."

I'm sure Droopy will say that the abovementioned quote has been taken out of context. I don't know what could have been said immediately before or after that statement to make it any less contemptuous of those who are currently fighting and dying to protect our freedoms.

That being said, new readers may wonder what's up with the "Droopy" stuff. During the 2004 presidential election, I pointed out on my now-defunct blog that John Kerry looks a whole lot like the cartoon character Droopy. To my new readers I ask ... were these two switched at birth or what? To wit:

According to Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, only Democrats "love the Lord." Imagine if a Republican, instead of a Democrat posing as a Republican, said such a thing about his opponent. It would be front-page news, indeed.

Some very interesting - and idiotic - things are coming out of Junior's mouth as the U.S. Senate campaign enters the home stretch. As I've said many times now, God help us if this guy's elected next week.

If - God help us - Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, is elected next month, he may wanna book a trip to Australia to mend some fences. Indeed:

"[If Junior], already a US congressman, wins his bid to become a more powerful senator, Australia had better watch out."

"Just days after Congressman Harold Ford, Jr., was caught on camera during his Memphis Meltdown, Ford, Sr., staffers were caught on tape using profanity and aggressively manhandling a young Republican staffer – all while Congressman Ford stood by watching idly," reports WKRN's VolunteerVoters.com.
 
Junior's repeatedly stated that his family is not an issue in this year's U.S. Senate campaign.  Pa Ford is doing his damndest to make sure the Ford family is the issue during the last week of the campaign.  The implosion continues ...

A great many conservatives have posited that it might not be such a bad thing if the GOP loses control of the U.S. House. Today's Wall Street Journal explains that if the Democrats win control of the House, those of us who believe in free-markets should be afraid ... very afraid. A sample:

"[Wannabe Speaker Nancy] Pelosi says reversing [the 2003] tax cuts "at the high end" would be 'an early resort.' This would raise the top income and dividend tax rate back to 39.6% from 35%, and the capital-gains rate back to 20% from 15%, substantially raising the cost of new investment in the United States. Economist John Rutledge estimates that raising the dividend rate alone would reduce the value of the S&P 500 stocks by between 5% and 8.5%, roughly a $500 to $700 billion decline in the wealth of the 52% of American households that own stock."

Never let it be said that the Nigh Seen Creeder is reluctant to admit when he's wrong. Earlier this week I reported that the United States' current deficit is 2.3 percent of the overall economy. In fact, the deficit is 1.9 percent of GDP. I was not the only one who used unrevised numbers to prove a larger overall point (i.e. the deficit is not as bad as certain politicians would have us believe); indeed, the Wall Street Journal has also admitted that it used early numbers in its reporting and editorializing. To wit:

"It turns out that the budget deficit news for fiscal 2006 is even better than we previewed in these columns. Thanks to a burst of September revenue, Treasury reported ... that the deficit fell to $247.7 billion, or 1.9 percent of GDP, below our report of $260 billion."

Because of the Bush tax-cuts, the economy growing at a solid clip, revenues to the Treasury are growing at an even faster rate than the overall economy, and the deficit is falling. I've always been led to believe that the purpose of the tax code is to collect revenue while maintaining solid economic growth. That's precisely what's happening now.

Democrats want to tinker with the current marginal tax rate structure. They've given no solid economic reason to do so. All they've managed to do so far, especially when confronted with the fact that tax receipts from the wealthiest 5 percent of taxpayers have been growing at a faster rate than the remaining 95 percent, is pull canards and catch phrases from their bag of class warfare tricks.

Next time you're in speaking distance of a Democrat who wants to "roll back" Bush's tax-cuts, calmly relate the fact that the economy is solid, tax revenues are growing, and the deficit is falling. Then ask your Democrat friend to explain, without using the words "rich, fair," or "huge deficit," why he or she wants to change the tax code. When stammering or silence ensues, simply turn on your heal, laugh while still in earshot, and walk away.

Rush Limbaugh is taking heat for suggesting that Michael J. Fox, who suffers from Parkinson's disease, was off his meds when he filmed television spots for various Senate Democrats who support federally-funded stem-cell research. On CNN this morning, reporter John Fox called Limbaugh's comment a "new low." John Fox and others who're currently trashing Limbaugh should check out this interesting post. A sample:

It is on the surface a cynical and mean question.  Would he really do something as exploitive like stop taking his meds to appear more symptomatic and therefore sympathetic?

Sadly, yes ... or at least he has in the past This from his own Web site:

"I had made a deliberate choice to appear before the subcommittee without medication. It seemed to me that this occasion demanded that my testimony about the effects of the disease, and the urgency we as a community were feeling, be seen as well as heard. For people who had never observed me in this kind of shape, the transformation must have been startling." 

So yes, Fox has done that, and may have this time as well.

I found this entry on WKRN's political blog. Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, has repeatedly stated that his family should not be an issue in the race for U.S. Senate. Now that it's been revealed that Harold Ford, Sr., is practically running his son Jake's independent campaign for the 9th District congressional seat, Junior can no longer ignore questions about his family's role in, and his position on, what is becoming a very ugly race in Memphis.

Tennesseans should recognize that if Junior is elected next month, they can expect six years of Ford-style jackassery.

According to Harold Ford, Sr., who once went on record to rip the "white devils" who'd voted 'gainst him, Bob Corker's supporters are "crackers."

Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, has done his level best to distance himself from his scandal-plagued, race-card-playing family. Thanks to Harold Ford the First, the scandal-plagued, race-card-playing family in question is quickly becoming THE issue in the Corker vs. Junior campaign.

The current issue of Newsweek features Sen. Barack Obama on its cover with this question: "Our Next President?" It's not surprising that in this age of image over substance, an individual who's been in the U.S. Senate less than two years is suddenly the presidential "it" guy. Sen. Obama has a compelling life story, for sure, but his announced vision for America - related in a book and numerous television appearances - consists entirely of feel-good, Oprah-esque claptrap.

The current Obama phenomenon reminds me of the Colin Powell for President effort in 1996. Paying no mind to the fact that Powell had said practically nothing of substance 'bout the economy, education, entitlement reform, etc., the punditocracy decided Powell's uber-moderate Republicanism was just what the country needed "to bring people together." The Powell presidential effort never materialized because Powell did not have the stomach for the rough and tumble of electoral politics. Obama, on the other hand, not only has the stomach for politics (he has three campaigns under his belt), he's now on record as saying that he just might run for president in 2008.

Barack Obama has a pretty face and he can impress an audience with pretty talk; thus, it's no wonder that certain media outlets and talking heads are hyping him as the next president. What these talking heads don't want to talk about is Obama's voting record -- and for good reason. Maybe, just maybe, the media mavens know that once his voting record becomes an issue, voters will fall off the Obama for Prez bandwagon as quickly as they'll supposedly jump on. Here's a brief overview of his record on important issues:

Abortion -- Obama believes that American women, young and old, should have an unfettered right to an abortion at any stage and for any reason.

Health Care -- Obama says that health care is a "basic human right." Therefore, he supports a government-run national health care system.

Gun Control -- Earlier this year, Obama voted against shielding firearms manufacturers from lawsuits due to gun violence and in favor of legislation that would ban the sale or transfer of any and all semi-automatic firearms.

Immigration -- As an Illinois state senator in 1998, Obama voted to give welfare and Medicaid to undocumented immigrants.

Judges -- Obama voted against the nominations of both John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court, and he participated in the filibuster of Alito.

During the past two years in the U.S. Senate, and during eight years in the Illinois Senate, Obama compiled a decidedly left-wing voting record. After next month's elections the U.S. Senate will - if current polls hold up - be virtually tied. It's highly unlikely that Senators Harry Reid, Dick Durbin, and Chuck Schumer (among others) will tolerate much straying from the ranch when every vote will be needed to make life miserable for a very lame-duck president. Given another two years in an even more partisan congress, the championing of left-wing issues mentioned above will become a mere tip of the political iceberg.

If Barack Obama does indeed run for president in '08, he may certainly wow the left-wingers who turn out for Democratic presidential primaries. However, he'll have a hard time convincing swing-state voters in a general election that he's not Ted Kennedy sans red nose and boozy bloat. As far as presidential politics goes, Democrats will never be successful as long as they have to concede entire regions of the country (the South, the Texas to North Dakota agricultural belt) to the GOP. Barack Obama, despite his pretty face and pretty tongue, will have a very difficult time convincing voters in Kansas, Texas, West Virgina, or Tennessee that it's a good idea to give welfare to illegals or that it's a bad idea to let hunters purchase semi-automatic rifles.

Again, Barack Obama ain't gonna be president.

If you haven't seen Harold Ford, Jr.'s (aka Junior) petulant campaign stunt from last Friday, you can watch it here. Bill Hobbs has an excellent take on Junior's meltdown in Memphis:

Ford miscalculated huge, and put the spotlight directly on the infamous Ford family - full of indicted, convicted and corrupt politicians for whom politics is the family business. Ford inherited his Congressional seat from his dad, but it came loaded with Ford family baggage that seems to get more junk crammed into it all the time.

"I know you're here to talk about my family," Ford said to Corker.

"No, no. I'm here to talk about you," Corker replied.

Ford initiated the mugging but Corker won the confrontation, hands down, showing a quiet toughness and a level of maturity far above Ford's.

In a candidate profile published in the Tennessean, U.S. Representative Bart Gordon had this to say about the budget deficit: "One of the main drags on the economy right now are rising interest rates which, to a great extent, are a function of our increasing deficit."

Let's check out what economist Larry Kudlow said recently regarding the deficits and interest rates:

"Believe it or not, there are still people out there who cling to the view that deficits drive up interest rates. How can they justify that when the current interest rate structure is at a 45-year low with the Treasury-bond yield around 4.75 percent?"

As a share of gross domestic product, the deficit is 2.3 percent of the overall economy. That's lower than it's been at any time since 2001, when the economy suffered the double-shock of the Clinton Recession and the September 11 terrorist attacks. Not only is the deficit share of GDP lower than Europe's and almost equal that of Japan's, it's nowhere near the 6 percent of GDP reached during Ronald Reagan's first term.

The fact of the matter is, Keynesian economists and Democratic politicians are the only ones still peddling the canard that deficits cause interest rates to rise. The same Keynesian and Democratic nitwits are the only ones who're willing to make the equally silly claim that deficits in and of themselves do great damage to the economy. To put these people in their place, all one has to do is look at the United States' recent economic history: A large budget deficit did not stop the Reagan Boom in the 1980s, which followed large-scale tax cuts, and a large budget deficit has not stopped the Bush Boom ... which followed large-scale tax cuts. So much for the argument that deficits are always and forever irredeemably bad.

Rep. Bart Gordon needs to get his head and his ass wired together, economically speaking.

I just finished reading Presidential Leadership: Rating the Best and Worst in the White House. In this impressive work, published by the Wall Street Journal, an ideologically balanced group of 132 prominent academics rates each and every former President of the United States. Historian Paul Johnson was chosen to limn Bill Clinton, and he does so with keen insight. To wit:

"[Economically,] Clinton in fact did nothing. It was not so much masterly inactivity as mistressly inactivity, [which] had one outstanding virtue. It turned the Clinton years into one of the longest periods of laissez-faire in U.S. history. If Clinton had been a continent man, and so with time to be an activist president, the consequences would almost certainly have been disastrous for the American economy. As it was, with the president busy elsewhere, the nation thrived mightily, as always when the White House does nothing."

Well stated, Dr. Johnson.

National Review's Rich Lowry recently penned a short article on gas prices with the following subtitle: Down are gas prices; out is a Democratic talking point. Oh, if only that were true.

Democrats harped for months about high gas prices, blaming President Bush's supposed coziness with oil executives for prices that topped three dollars a gallon in some places. Now that gas prices are plunging, you'd think Democrats would be happy. Well, they ain't. Democrats are now accusing the president and Big Oil of manipulating prices in order to influence next month's congressional elections. Wannabe senator Claire McCaskill (D-Missouri) said as much during a recent debate:

Just look at the gas prices. Look at the manipulation of the gas prices. I'm not sure anybody ... believes these gas prices are going down for any other reason than that we're having an election. I'm sure that most people know they're going to go right back up after the election's over.

Closer to home, the Nashville Today tabloid published a rant from an anonymous nitwit who sounds like a less eloquent (if that's possible) Claire McCaskill:

It seems awfully strange that suddenly gas prices are going down and the elections are coming up.  I don't really understand that.  I bet the gas will go sky-high after the elections.  I believe it.  The gas prices are all a political maneuvering by our politicians who are involved with the oil companies.  I think that we need to figure it out.  We need to study that. Something needs to be done and somebody needs to find out.

Anyone who suggests that gas prices have been falling because of political manipulation is displaying economic ignorance of the first order. As any first-year economics student will tell you, the price of crude oil is easily the most significant factor in determining gasoline prices. Crude oil is a publicly traded commodity that is susceptible to market fluctuations. For the past year and a half or so, crude oil contracts on the commodities exchanges trended upward due to perceived supply disruptions caused by turmoil around the world, i.e., the ongoing confrontation with Iran, political volatility in Venezuela and Nigeria, major hurricanes in areas in which the majority of the United States' refineries are located, etc. As certain world tensions eased, so did the price of oil.

Let's also not forget that prices have historically risen in the spring and summer in anticipation of increased travel through the Labor Day holiday. (Gas prices reached record territory in late summer 2005 and 2006.) Some will say that this is yet another example of oil companies taking advantage of American consumers. On the contrary, basic economics tells us that prices rise when demand increases. The laws of supply and demand are no different for gasoline than they are for other consumer goods.

Each and every time there's a "gas crisis" in America, Congress (Democrats, mostly, with a few Republicans who should know better thrown in for posterity) perp-walks oil executives through various committee hearings in an effort to prove that a conspiracy is afoot. This charade takes place on an almost yearly basis, and members of Congress are always forced to admit that, yes, the laws of supply and demand determine what consumers will be paying for a gallon of gas.

I'm sure most Americans believe that gas prices - nay, all prices - are determined by a cabal of corporate CEOs. Again, such thinking reflects gross economic ignorance. If each and every citizen were forced to complete a course in basic economics, we'd not have to listen to the likes of Claire McCaskill and Mr./Ms. Something Needs To Be Done again.

Hodan "P.T." Brown says he's agin' George W. Bush because "the president ... hasn't articulated a plan, a vision, or any sense of direction for this country since taking office." I don't know where Mr. Brown has been during the past six years. Wherever he was, he wasn't spending much time reading papers or watching the news.

The fact of the matter is that President Bush, by his words and deeds, has articulated very clearly his vision for America's future. Take the economy, for example. In 2003, President Bush proposed bold tax cuts on investment and capital in an effort to revive a sluggish economy. Three years later, the stock market is in record territory, annual GDP growth has been steady at just under 4 percent, unemployment keeps falling, and, as the Wall Street Journal reported recently, revenues to the U.S. treasury are growing at a faster rate than the overall economy. Pretty impressive, if you ask me.

Whether it's No Child Left Behind, the various faith-based initiatives, proposing individual investment accounts within Social Security, or the attempt to spread democracy in the Middle East, President Bush has done nothing but plan and propose bold visions. It takes a mighty uninformed/ill-informed individual to suggest that the president has spent the last six years doing and saying nothing.

That being said, I reject Mr. Brown's assertion that a vote for Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, is a vote for revolutionary change. Junior fancies himself a right-leaning Democrat who's not afraid to buck his party's leadership. When one examines Junior's record, however, one sees that he votes in almost perfect lockstep with the liberal-led Democratic caucus in the U.S. House. If Junior wins in November, it will take Tennesseans all of six months before they begin having buyer's remorse. Zell Miller he ain't.

Bill Hobbs asks, "Has a major daily newspaper in a state capital city ever done less to cover a state legislative election than the Tennessean has this year?

The answer, of course, is no ...

One of my favorite fellow bloggers, Hugh Hewitt, has Junior pegged:

I find [Harold] Ford, [Junior] a generally appealing guy, but if I were running the world there would be a law that you can’t be a career politician until you’ve done something else in life. This would hold doubly true for the children of politicians who as a class don’t seem particularly impressive or gifted. (See Casey, Robert Jr. for more on this subject.)

One other thing about Harold Ford. He graduated the University of Michigan Law School and failed the bar. This is not common. Michigan is an outstanding law school, perhaps even in the country’s top 20. Most of its graduates effortlessly pass the bar.

The relevance of this? Perhaps Ford is just a young guy who has coasted along with a pretty face and a famous name without being burdened by any undue amount of substance.

Editor's note: I couldn't have said it any better myself.

Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, visited Tehran University last Friday to lead prayers and preach to the faithful. Sensing that some infidel-inspired tomfoolery could've erupted, the Ayatollah decided to bring his best assault rifle (pics courtesy of Little Green Footballs).

According to the Tennessean's Larry Daughtrey, Bob Corker's assertion that Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, "inherited" his seat in Congress is a distortion of the historical record.  Daughtrey attempts to prove himself wise by uncorking this snide gem in support of his thesis:
 
The last time anyone looked, the [1996 9th District Congressional primary] was an open election, and Ford had five opponents in the primary ... election.

The 1996 9th District primary was indeed an open election, and five Democrats were lined up against Ford, Junior.  That's where Daughtrey's correct assessment of the election in question ends. 

Junior's father, Harold Ford the First, represented the 9th District in the U.S. House for over twenty years.  During that time, he built an impressive political machine that not only helped him during his re-election campaigns, but helped him emerge from a federal corruption trial - during which the race card was shamelessly played - unscathed as well.  When Junior entered the race to replace his retiring father in Congress, the full weight and muscle of the Ford machine was ponied up for his campaign.  Thus, Junior was running as a defacto incumbent.

When the votes were tallied on primary Election Day in August 1996, the 9th District race wasn't even close:  Junior posted an impressive 25-point victory over his nearest opponent. Memphians who voted for Junior knew full well that they were voting for dynastic change ... they'd proudly displayed yard signs and bumper stickers upon which the simple slogan "JR.: Congress" was displayed.

Merriam-Webster defines "inherit" thusly:

To receive from an ancestor as a right or title

Considering the facts mentioned above, I defy anyone to tell me that Junior did NOT inherit his congressional seat.

Mr. Daughtrey, this means you ... !

In a Bush-bashing piece in the American Conservative (go figure), Leon Hadar says this about the Iran-Iraq War:

Ronald Reagan ... encouraged Saddam [Hussein] to launch what would become the bloodiest war in the modern history of the the Middle East.

The conflict between Iran and Iraq began in September 1980. Ronald Reagan did not take office until January 1981. Given that the Iran-Iraq War began two months before the Gipper - God bless 'im - was even elected, how on earth did he have anything to with the start of said war?!

It was Jimmy Carter who encouraged the Iraqis to invade Iran. He did so during months of secret communications with the Saudis, who were deeply afraid of the Shi'ite theocracy that'd emerged in Iran following the 1979 revolution.

I would think that a feller who works at the highbrow CATO Institute would know this. I guess that's what I get for thinkin'.

Applaud diversity and celebrate cultures all you want, but there's an ugly downside to the Hispanization of Nashville -- as this Web site reported a couple of weeks ago. This morning's Tennessean goes even further. A sample:

Although Hispanic members are less than 10 percent of Nashville's street gang population, they were responsible for about 45 percent of last year's gang-related violence, [Metro] police said.

"Air America Radio, the liberal talk and news radio network that features the comedian Al Franken, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection," a network official told the Associated Press.

"The network had denied rumors just a month ago that it would file for bankruptcy protection. On Friday, Air America spokeswoman Jaime Horn told the AP that the filing became necessary only recently after negotiations with a creditor from the privately held company's early days broke down. ...

"According to documents filed with U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, Air America owes Franken $360,750 and $9.8 million to RealNetworks Inc. CEO Robert Glaser, who owns 36.7 percent of the company and had previously served as its chairman."

"The U.S. general in charge of Iraq says there has been significant progress in quelling violence in Iraq with the exception of Baghdad," reports United Press International.

"At a Washington briefing, U.S. Army Gen. George Casey said despite the daily news of sectarian violence in the capital, much of the rest of the country was relatively calm and the training and development of Iraqi security forces was making headway."

I'll wager that this story will not lead any of the Big Three's national news broadcasts ce soir.

I have a newsflash for the folks who participated in the Nashville Scene's "Best of Nashville" contest: Whitt's is NOT the best barbecue restaurant in Nashville. The fact that this sad excuse for a restaurant has been chosen as the best in its particular category for over fifteen freakin' years reveals much about the taste(s) of those who read the Scene.

Whitt's is to barbecue what McDonald's is to hamburgers. That is, Whitt's is cheap and will fill you up in a pinch, but any serious BBQ-eater will tell you that the pork shoulder served there is too dry and mealy to be considered first-class. Furthermore, why is it that in all the years Whitt's has been doing business in Middle Tennessee, the folks there have yet to develop a passable BBQ sauce? Could it be that the owners and operators of Whitt's are reluctant to do away with their one and only condiment, which is 95 percent straight cider vinegar, because it's the only thing keeping customers from choking to death?

Local barbecue aficionados are well aware that Nashville's best barbecue joints, i.e., Neely's, Pop's, Mary's, and Hog Heaven, aren't chain restaurants, and they're not located in Hillsboro Village, Green Hills, SoBro, or the "District." (I hate to pass judgement, but I'd be willing to bet a dollar to anyone's dime that a majority of the individuals who took the time to partipate in the "Best of Nashville" contest head to, well, Hillsboro Village, Green Hills, and downtown to eat out.) Nashville's sidestreets and backroads are filled with restaurants dishing out unique and well-crafted meals. Far too few of these restaurants made their way into the Scene's "Best of ..." issue.

Pretty sad, if you ask me.

On the same day that Bob Rochelle called this hilarious pro-Mae Beavers ad "immature," his campaign began airing an incredibly cheesy TV spot featuring a little girl throwing a temper tantrum.

Looks like someone's a big, fat hypocrite, n'est-ce pas?!

"Europe appears to be crossing an invisible line regarding its Muslim minorities: More people in the political mainstream are arguing that Islam cannot be reconciled with European values," reports the International Herald Tribune.

"You saw what happened with the pope," said Patrick Goeman, 43, the owner of Raga, a funky wine bar in central Antwerp, half an hour outside Brussels. "He said Islam is an aggressive religion. And the next day they kill a nun somewhere and make his point.

"Rationality is gone."

The American Prowler checks in:

One of the stories going around Democrat Party circles is that party operatives like Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and American Family Voices weren't quite ready for primetime with the opposition research materials they had gathered for the 2006 election cycle.

According to one political consultant with ties to the DNC and other party organizations, "I'm hearing the Foley story wasn't supposed to drop until about ten days out of the election. It was supposed the coup de grace, not the first shot."

So why the rush? According to another DNC operative: bad polling numbers across the country. "Bush's national security speeches were getting traction beyond the base, gas prices were dropping, economic outlook surveys were positive. We were seeing bad Democratic numbers in Missouri, Michigan, Washington, Arizona, Florida Pennsylvania, even parts of New York," says the operative. "A month before, we were looking at launching an offensive against Republicans who according to polling barely held a five-seat majority if the election were to be held at the end of August. That was doable for Democrats from September 1 to November 7. But by mid-September, Republicans were back to having held seats for a 15-seat majority. In the Senate, it looked like a wash. We held seats in Florida, Nebraska, picked up seats in Pennsylvania, but that that was about it. They were holding in Missouri and possibly within reach of Maryland and Washington. We were looking at a disaster in the making."

On the same day that Nancy Pelosi promised to repeal the Bush tax cuts if Democrats win control of the House next month, the Labor Department released a report showing that 6.6 million jobs have been created since August 2003. What's significant about August 2003? That's when the Bush Administration cut taxes on dividends, capital gains, and the highest marginal income tax rate.

As this Web site reported two weeks ago, President Bush's tax cuts stimulated the economy in such a way that it's become a job-creating juggernaut. Speaker wannabe Pelosi wants to reverse course. As the Wall Street Journal stated in a Monday editorial, "Never underestimate the ways that Washington politicians can do economic harm."

Indeed.

Larry Daughtrey wants us to believe that he is an unbiased observer of all things political in the state of Tennessee. Mr. Daughtrey is many things, but it takes a great leap of, well, something, to call him unbiased. Daughtrey proves such each and every time he finds himself published in the Sunday Tennessean.

When I spooked Capitol Hill as an intern, I thought Larry Daughtrey was one of the more sagacious journalists trooping through the halls of Legislative Plaza. As I grew older - and, if I may say so, more astute - the aura surrounding one Larry Daughtrey began to dissipate. Indeed, I began to pick up on subtle leftist hints tucked neatly into every Daughtrey-penned column. For example:

In 2001, Republican Governor Don Sundquist and Democratic leaders in the General Assembly were pushing hard for a state income tax. In a July 2001 column, Daughtrey actually suggested that Senator Jeff Miller heard voices from God, and these voices told Sen. Miller to oppose a state income tax. I sought clarification from Mr. Daughtrey in an e-mail: "When did Jeff Miller ever state that God told him to vote against a state income tax?" I'm still waiting for a reply.

You have to be quick to pick up on Daughtrey's left-wing bombs; but you can count on at least one in virtually every column he pens. In his most recent Tennessean Opinion piece, Daughtrey reveals himself to be a Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, sycophant by uncorking this gem:

Ford is so far to the right of his party's center that the [liberal] label [will not] stick.

Larry Daughtrey knows better than to refer to Junior as anything but a liberal Democrat. As this Web site reported on two - two - occasions, pegging Junior as a conservative is like pegging vinegar as a sweet foodstuff. Daughtrey's perpetuating an obvious untruth simply shows that he is a liberal hack, pure and simple.

Oh, well, should we expect any better from someone who writes for the Tennessean?

Dumb question, I know ... !

Here're some wise words for the Vote No On 1 folks:

"Partisans of same sex marriage demand to know how two 'gay' men pledging themselves to one another can possibly hurt a 'straight' couple. Indirectly.

"If marriage is to include gay men and women, by what standard can we exclude non-gay threesomes? Nothing in the [pro-gay marriage crowd's rantings and ravings] have provided a principled ground upon which to forbid adult incest, polygamy or polyandry. Homosexuals bristle at this argument. But they must answer a question: How does a homosexual father convince his daughter that polygamy is out of the question?

"Marriage must, if the word is to retain its meaning, be only between one man and one woman. For as critics on both sides of the debate acknowledge, we're having a hard time upholding the integrity of marriage among the heterosexual population. At this moment, we ought to be reinvesting marriage with the honor it once commanded, not bleeding it of substance."

-- Mona Charen

Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, has spent the better part of a year trying to convince Tennessee's electorate that he is a fiscal conservative.  To buttress this claim, Junior declares in a recent campaign ad that he's "never voted for a budget that wasn't balanced." While Junior may be correct in stating that he's always voted for balanced budgets, examining his record in detail reveals that he's anything but a fiscal conservative.

As a member of the minority party for most of his congressional career, Junior has been able to vote against the GOP's unbalanced budgets as a matter of principle. These principled votes, however, represent but a paltry few of the hundreds of votes Junior's cast over the years. When we take a comprehensive look at Junior's overall fiscal record, this is what we discover:

During the 1st session of the 109th Congress, Junior voted to boost the federal budget by $60.6 billion. That is, the cost of all of the bills which Junior supported in the time period in question totaled $60 billion. During the 108th Congress, Junior voted for $155.5 billion in new federal spending; and during the 107th Congress, Junior's tally was $64.5 billion. Thus, for the past four and a half years, Junior voted for over a quarter of a trillion dollars in new spending by the federal government. By contrast, he voted for a paltry $217 million in spending cuts. (Source: National Taxpayers Union)

As with most of Junior's campaign proclamations, his contention that he's a fiscal conservative falls apart upon closer inspection. If'n all of Junior's proposed spending during the past few years had been approved, the federal budget would've grown by 25 percent.

Junior the Fiscal Conservative? Puh-leez.

According to Esquire magazine, actress Scarlett Johansson is the Sexiest Woman Alive.  After being slowly (anonymously) revealed with subtle hint-giving in the previous five issues of Esquire, Ms. Johansson is being honored with a "sexiest" cover story/layout in the November issue. 

In last month's Esquire, the mystery Ms. Johansson, if you will, was asked to name one place in which she "will never be found."  The Republican National Convention was her answer.  Ms. Johansson thus joins a long - and growing - list of Hollywood nitwits who use each and every interview and appearance as an opportunity to share their leftist political views with the world. 

Speaking as a card-carrying member of the GOP, I can think of one additional place in which Ms. Johansson ought never be found: a voting booth.

National Review's Anthony Dick has rich liberals (see George Clooney, Rosie O'Donnell, Babs, George Soros, et al.) pegged:

By acknowledging one's "privilege" and then striving to combat it through endorsement of radical political change, it becomes possible to dissociate oneself from the reactionary mainstream. Railing against the status quo thus facilitates the reconciliation of radical beliefs and bourgeois lifestyle.

According to the Nashville Scene's William Dean Hinton, Music City's graffiti writers "are mostly white, well-off kids who want someone - anyone - to listen."

Mr. Hinton obviously hasn't spent much time in South Nashville.  Innumerable street signs, bridges, overpasses, and four-wall structures (public and private, abandoned and occupied) in South Nashville display grandiose graffiti; and I can tell you for a fact that South Nashville's graffiti artists are neither white nor well-off.

Drive down any lane in South Nashville's Antioch or Woobine communities and you'll see some thing upon which "BP" or "SUR 13" has been spray-painted.  The persons responsible for this tagging, if you will, belong to two rival Hispanic gangs. This is how the Tennessean's Suzanne Blackwood, reporting from Woodbine, described these folks:

They are territorial and often violent. They tend to carry guns, participate in drug deals and other illegal activity. They are usually made up of young people from poor socioeconomic backgrounds that range in age from 13-21.

William Hinton wants us to believe that the graffiti covering Nashville's nooks and crannies is the product of bored white kids. The folks who live in South Nashville know better, and then some.

"I am a Muslim, and in all the Islamic lessons I have had, all the religious lectures I have been to, all the mosque sermons I have attended, never, not once, has it been preached that to kill is OK."

-- Tamim Arif, "Islam doesn't teach killing is acceptable," Tennessean

Mr./Ms. Arif obviously has not been reading his/her Koran.  It took me a grand total of 5 minutes to find passages in the Koran in which killing is not only regarded as OK, it's encouraged as well.  To wit:

Koran 9:73
Prophet, make war on the unbelievers and the hypocrites and deal rigorously with them. Hell shall be their Home: an evil fate.

According to Mohammed, any barbaric act against the unbelievers is completely justified.

Koran 8:12
Remember Thy Lord inspired the angels (with the message): "I am with you: give firmness to the believers, I will instill terror into the hearts of the unbelievers, Smite ye above their necks and smite all their finger tips of them."

Here Mohammed is giving step by step instruction on how to torture and kill those who refuse to follow Islam.

Koran 47:4
When you meet the unbelievers in the Jihad strike off their heads and, when you have laid them low, bind your captives firmly. Then grant them their freedom or take ransom from them, until War shall lay down her burdens.

In the above verse, Mohammed is giving detailed instruction about how to maim and torture unbelievers in Jihad. And finally when the Muslims are satisfied enough after torturing and maiming the unbelievers, they should proceed to demand ransom for the captives. All for the sake for all-merciful Allah!

Koran 5:33-34
The only reward of those who make war upon Allah and His messenger and strive after corruption in the land will be that they will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet and alternate sides cut off, or will be expelled out of the land. Such will be their degradation in the world, and in the Hereafter theirs will be an awful doom; Save those who repent before ye overpower them. For know that Allah is Forgiving, merciful.

In this verse, Mohammed devises another recipe for torturing unbelievers. This particular recipe involves chopping off alternate limbs and expelling non-Muslims out of the land.