The Nigh Seen Creeder

I'm going to Big Sandy, TN, to do some huntin' and fishin' (and maybe a little drinkin').

The Nigh Seen Creeder will return Sunday, September 2.

Update: Here's the back-side of my aunt's Big Sandy, ahem, dwelling. This is where I'll be beddin' down for the next couple o' nights:



Kentucky Lake is a stone's throw - 'bout 100 yards - from the back deck of my aun't maison. (The pic at which you're gawkin' was taken this past May; hence, there's a lot of green for you to look at!)

Wish you were here!

"Duke's ... is ... the ... best ... mayo ... ever! (And it's Southern-made, to boot!)"

Click here for more info.

In case you haven't heard, the University of Michigan-Dearborn has installed footbaths in some of its bathrooms:

"The latest battle of religion in the public square is unfolding in Dearborn, Michigan, a city with one of the highest Muslim populations in the country. At the University of Michigan's local campus, administrators have recently refitted several school bathrooms to include small footbaths in the corner -- an accommodation for Muslim students who must perform ritual washing as part of their daily observance. The issue has more than a few of the usual suspects [see: ACLU] trying to explain their way out of their usual positions on the separation of church and state."

Errol Phillips, a self-described Independent Jewish Conservative, asks an important question:

"Where then are ritual baths for Orthodox Jewish women, confessionals for Catholics, meditation rooms for Buddists ...

"When are we going to finally say enough is enough?"

When, indeed?

A Colorado elementary school will no longer permit students to play tag:

"An elementary school has banned tag on its playground after some children complained they were harassed or chased against their will.

"'It causes a lot of conflict on the playground,' said Cindy Fesgen, assistant principal of the Discovery Canyon Campus school.

"Running games are still allowed as long as students don't chase each other, she said."

Meanwhile, Illinois School District 126, which coverins Alsip, Hazelgreen and Oak Lawn, has defended its decision to assign summer reading to 12 and 13-year-olds "that is replete with harsh profanity and references to teen sex (even teen sex with adults)." More:

"Prairie Junior High School’s required reading list for rising 8th graders gave children six books to choose from over the summer. Parents have complained that three of the six books contain adult content which is highly age-inappropriate. Those complaints, however, have fallen on deaf ears. At a recent school board meeting, school board members said they intend to continue assigning the books. The following are excerpts from just a handful of the many salacious passages found in one of the books, Fat Kid Rules the World, by K. L. Going:

· God, I want to touch her. Her legs are full. ... If I could just reach under that skirt. ... (p. 6)

· No one beats me or f—s me without my permission. (p. 11)

· F—k off, morons. (p. 47)

· I swear I’ll tear your g—damn, f—ing balls off…(p. 57)

· "She’d f—k you if you stay in the band," he says (p. 141)

· ... and now he has promised me that a forty-something woman will sleep with me if I’m the drummer (p. 142)

"To add insult to injury, the school didn’t even have the courtesy to warn these kids — or their parents — about the adult content within the assigned reading. And parents are understandably furious."

You know, I envision a day in which school-age kids aren't allowed to play tag or dodgeball, or keep score during sporting events, but they'll know all of the ins-and-outs of sex (pun intended) by, oh, age 13. Indeed, I envision a day in which 13-year-old kids can describe human genitalia in better detail than they can describe the rules of grammar.

Come see me in 20 years and tell me I'm wrong!

Joseph Knippenberg has a few thoughts on Larry Craig and social conservatism:

"Leaving aside what actually happened in the Minneapolis restroom (and other times in the past), Craig’s handling of the aftermath has been incredibly inept. It’s hard to imagine him winning reelection, and he shouldn’t try. For the good of his family, his state, and his party, he should announce that he won’t be seeking reelection.

"What I want to dwell on is the claim - made here, for example - that one can’t without hypocrisy be a social conservative (favoring traditional marriage) and have a questionable private life. Why not? Can’t I be a sinner and still condemn sin? Must I, because I’m a sinner, be easy on myself and others? Must I, because I’m a sinner, refuse to recognize sin for what it is?

"Of course, one could respond that the issue isn’t the condemnation of sin, it’s the refusal to admit one’s own guilt. A confessed philanderer could urge fidelity in marriage and chastity outside it (leaving the positions to stand on their own legs), without holding himself up as a paragon of virtue or an example to be imitated. The sin, then, is the hypocrisy, portraying oneself as an upholder of "family values," all the while--or at least episodically, lapses of judgment or self-control--violating the values one upholds in public. There is, it seems to me, a fine line here. Can’t I advocate a position without holding myself up as an examplary representative of it? Did Larry Craig ever explicitly say (I don’t know the answer to this question): 'I’m the model everyone should be imitating; everyone should be like me?' Or did he just, in his public self-presentation, put his best foot forward? Don’t we all do that? Or should or must we begin every interaction with a comprehensive public confession of sin?"

Some forty years ago, President Lyndon Johnson launched a gaggle of Great Society programs in an effort to eliminate poverty in America. Today, decades and several billions of dollars later, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards is basing his entire campaign on the conceit that widespread poverty requires an even greater Great Society, and thus increased government spending.

Since this is the second time John Edwards has based a national campaign around his belief that massive poverty exists in America, I think we should explore the subject in some detail. To wit:

This week, Robert Rector, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation, released a study in which he examines various statistics about America’s "poor." Here is what he discovered:

"Overall, the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car (30 percent of ‘poor’ households own two cars), air conditioning, a refrigerator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR, or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded.

"By his own report, his family is not hungry, and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family’s essential needs. ... A third of ‘poor’ households have both cell and land-line telephones. A third also [have] telephone answering machines."

According to Rector, a major reason for children living in poverty is the breakdown of families. He notes:

"If work in each family were raised to 2,000 hours per year -- the equivalent of one adult working 40 hours per week -- nearly 75 percent of poor children would be lifted out of official poverty. ... If poor mothers married the fathers of their children, nearly three quarters of the nation’s impoverished youth would immediately be lifted out of poverty."

As any thinking conservative knows, no government program(s) can reverse the decline of the American family. However, Rector does identify one area in which "big government" can help the poor and needy. That area is illegal immigration:

"A quarter of legal immigrants and fifty to sixty percent of illegals are high-school dropouts. By contrast, only nine percent of non-immigrant Americans lack a high school degree. As long as the present steady flow of poverty-prone persons … continues, efforts to reduce the total number of poor in the U.S. will be far more difficult.

"A sound anti-poverty strategy must not only seek to increase work and marriage among native born Americans, it must also end illegal immigration, and dramatically increase the skill level of... legal immigrants."

In case you haven't heard, Senator Larry Craig (R-Idaho) recently pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct in connection with an incident where he allegedly solicited a plainclothes police officer in a men's restroom in the Minneapolis airport. Craig, who has served in the U.S. Senate since 1991, denies that he did anything wrong in the bathroom in question; and earlier today, Craig stated that his guilty plea, which he now regrets, was entered to simply make the issue "go away."

Sen. Craig was an early supporter of Mitt Romney's presidential campaign. Today, he resigned his position as Co-Senate liaison for Romney's White House bid. Following his resignation, Craig's name was pulled from Romney's official Web site, and YouTube videos, in which Craig praised Romney's "strong moral values," were also deleted.

This morning, a co-worker who knows that I'm supportin' Mitt Romney asked me if I intended to address the Craig-Romney "scandal" on the Nigh Seen Creeder. Since Romney's broken all ties with Sen. Craig, I think the Craig-Romney scandal was diffused before it even began. Indeed, since Romney didn't have nothin' to do with what Craig did (whew!), he shouldn't bear any taint from l'affaire Craig. (Woe unto any media sort who tries to spray Craig-stink, if you will, on Mitt Romney. I'm sure the Romney campaign is loaded for bear.)

That said, and speaking of political scandals, I'd like to tell Creeder Readers 'bout something that appeared in today's Wall Street Journal. In an article entitled "Can Family of Modest Means Be Big Clinton Backer?," Brody Mullins tells us this (subscription required):

"One of the five biggest sources of political donations to Hillary Rodham Clinton is a tiny, lime-green bungalow that lies under the flight path from San Francisco International Airport.

"Six members of the Paw family, each listing the house at 41 Shelbourne Ave. as their residence, have donated a combined $50,000 to the Democratic senator from New York since 2005, for her presidential campaign, her Senate re-election last year and her political action committee. In all the six Paws have donated a total of $200,000 to Democratic candidates since 2005, election records show.

"That total ranks the house with residences in Beverly Hills and Manhattan's Upper East Side among the top addresses to donate to the Democratic presidential front-runner over the past 2 1/2 years, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of donations listed with the Federal Election Commission.

"But it is unclear how the Paw family is able to afford such political largesse. Records show they own a gift shop and live in a 1,280-square-foot house that they recently refinanced for $270,000. William Paw, the 64-year-old head of the household, is a mail carrier with the U.S. Postal Service who earns about $49,000 a year, according to a union representative. Alice Paw, also 64, is a homemaker. ...

"Moreover, the Paws' political donations closely track donations made by Norman Hsu, a wealthy New York businessman in the apparel industry who once used the Paw home as his legal address, according to campaign-finance records. Mr. Hsu is one of the top fund raisers for Mrs. Clinton's presidential campaign. ...

"People who answered the phone and door at the Paws' residence repeatedly declined requests for comment, as did Mr. Hsu."

I encourage Creeder Readers to procure a copy of today's WSJ and read the above-mentioned article. Since the Clintonistas seem incapable of learning from their past mistakes (see Lincoln Bedroom, Johnny Chung, etc.), do we really want to put another one o' their ilk in the White House?

If you can't say "no," then you can't have no sense ... indeed.

A few months back, Washington Post political blogger Chris Cillizza said this 'bout Fred Thompson:

"We can't shake the idea that [Fred] Thompson could wind up like retired Gen. Wesley Clark in 2004, whose best day as a candidate was his first."

Each time I hear somthing like this ...

"Republican Fred Thompson sidestepped questions Monday about the departure of yet another high-level aide to his presidential campaign-in-waiting"

... I have similar unshaken ideas.

Udates at A Man's Gotta Eat:

Happy Birthday, Bic Mac!
One fine shramp recipe
Me rikey rye!

What're freshman U.S. Representative Steve Cohen's biggest accomplishments since being elected to Congress last year? Well, he's renamed some Post Offices in his District, and he passed a resolution honoring Stax Records for "enriching the nation’s cultural life with 50 years of soul."

That’s the conclusion drawn from a Majority Accountability Project review of a recent report compiled by Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) detailing the collective achievements of the Democrat freshmen class in the 110th Congress.

When it comes to representing 9th District voters, it would appear that Steve Cohen is as useful as a certain appendage on a boar hog (you know what I mean).

Elan Journo tells us 'xactly what the multiculturalists are up to:

"Multiculturalism's goal is not to teach about other cultures, but to promote - by means of distortions and half-truths - the notion that non-Western cultures are as good as, if not better than, Western culture. Far from 'broadening' the curriculum, what multiculturalism seeks is to diminish the value of Western culture in the minds of students. But, given all the facts, the objective superiority of Western culture is apparent, so multiculturalists must artificially elevate other cultures and depreciate the West."

"Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama often says he will be a candidate that will bring both parties together and Saturday he named a few of the Republicans he would reach out to if elected," GOPUSA reports.

"Among the Republicans he would seek help from are Sens. Richard Lugar of Indiana, John Warner of Virginia and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, Obama said."

How come Sen. Obama didn't name-check yours truly? Surely an Obama Administration could make use of my patented brand of jackassery!

Still not convinced that Hugo Chavez is a nutbucket? Check this out:

"What are we to make of Hugo Chavez’s decree that the clocks of Venezeula shall all be set forward by half an hour -- in order to increase the 'metabolism and productivity' of workers? My question is: why only half an hour? If the government can regulate metabolism and productivity in this manner, when why not accelerate time by an hour or two, quite possibly three? At this rate, we’ll all be hurtling headlong into — what? Insanity, perhaps. Or just plain old economic ignorance."

Update: Chris says he's springing forward, too!

"That's nothing. I set my calendars forward four months, and you wouldn't believe all that I get done. By the way, Merry Christmas everybody!"

This is what's happening in the western part of George W. Bush's America:

"Record low unemployment across parts of the West has created tough working conditions for business owners, who in places are being forced to boost wages or be creative to fill their jobs. ...

"Unemployment rates have been as low as 2 percent this year in places like Montana, and nearly as low in neighboring states. Economists cite such factors as an aging work force and booming tourism economies for the tight labor market. ...

"The U.S. Department of Labor reports the mountain West region - covering eight states along the Rocky Mountains - has the lowest overall unemployment rate in the nation. The region hit an all-time low of 3.4 percent in May."

Someone needs to tell Al Gore to pack his rifles and head to Norway, stat (HT:Patriot Post):

"We have already heard that bovine flatulence is contributing to global warming. Now, another large animal whose methane emissions are warming the planet is under attack. This time, Scandinavian moose are the culprit -- they are burping and, er, blowing too much of that other hot air. Norwegian researchers blame their national animal for producing 2,100 kilos of carbon dioxide each per year. By comparison, you would have to travel nearly 8,100 miles by car to emit that much carbon dioxide. Global-warming alarmists and PETA lunatics will undoubtedly butt antlers on this one. Hunting season is coming up in Norway and an estimated 35,000 moose (out of a total population of 120,000) will be killed."

Earlier today, the Club for Growth released an economic white paper on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. The fifth in a series of white papers on the pro-growth records of presidential candidates, the report "provides an extensive summary of Mitt Romney’s economic record from his unsuccessful run for the U.S. Senate to his single term as governor of Massachusetts." You can view the report here.

From the Club for Growth's press release:

"'Governor Romney's economic record contains a mixture of pro-growth accomplishments and some troublesome positions that beg to be explained,' said Club for Growth President Pat Toomey. 'While his record on taxes, spending, and entitlement reform is flawed, it is, on balance, encouraging, especially given the liberal Massachusetts Legislature. His record on trade, school choice, regulations and tort reform all indicate a strong respect for the power of market solutions. At the same time, Governor Romney's history is marked by statements at odds with his gubernatorial record and his campaign rhetoric.'"

"Political pundit James Carville has sent out a mass e-mail on behalf of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee seeking 'the bumper sticker slogan that will carry us through the 2008 elections,'" NewsMax.com reports.

"Carville – lead strategist for Bill Clinton’s successful 1992 presidential campaign – said the slogan will be used on the DSCC’s Web site, on campaign literature and on the 'bumpers of jalopies from coast to coast.'"

John Hawkins has some suggestions for Herr Carville. My favorite:

"From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs."

Yeah, I know that's from the Communist Manifesto. And I know Democrats have fits when you call 'em - or compare 'em to - communists. But you tell me, how does that slogan differ from Hillary Clinton's "shared responsibility for shared prosperity" campaign theme? I'll answer my own question: It don't. So there.

Radar Online has posted an excerpt from O.J. Simpson's bizarre faux confession, If I Did It. There's no if to it ... O.J. did it:

"Now I was standing in Nicole's courtyard, in the dark, listening to the loud, rhythmic, accelerated beating of my own heart. I put my left hand to my heart and my shirt felt strangely wet. I looked down at myself. For several moments, I couldn't get my mind around what I was seeing. The whole front of me was covered in blood, but it didn't compute. Is this really blood? I wondered. And whose blood is it? Is it mine? Am I hurt? ...

"I looked down and saw her on the ground in front of me, curled up in a fetal position at the base of the stairs, not moving. Goldman was only a few feet away, slumped against the bars of the fence. He wasn't moving either. Both he and Nicole were lying in giant pools of blood. I had never seen so much blood in my life. It didn't seem real, and none of it computed. What the fuck happened here? Who had done this? And why? And where the fuck was I when this shit went down?"

Read the rest here.

Jenna Jameson is the most successful porn star of all time. The "films" in which she's done the dirty have sold gazillions of copies, she has her own adult channel on DirecTV and Dish Network, she co-wrote a best-selling memoir, and she is a millionaire a couple of times over.

After reading 'bout la vie du Jameson, some gals might start thinking, "There's money to be made in the porn biz. Maybe I'll give it a spin!" Keep on thinkin' that, ladies, and you can look like this when you're 33-years-old:

According to Elrod, Hillary Clinton is only losin' by two to Fred Thompson in Alabama (HT: Kleinheider):

"That she wins in Upper South states like KY and VA is noteworthy but not terribly surprising; Bill Clinton won KY twice, and Virginia is clearly trending blue with the massive growth of northern Virginia. But Alabama is as red as ever. In fact, one of Hillary Clinton’s most infamous moments in the campaign season so far was her failed attempt at code switching at a black church in Selma - an event that drew ridicule throughout the South. Yet there she is, just 2 points below Fred Thompson.

"If this poll is accurate then the backers of Fred Thompson have to be asking themselves if he’s really the right guy."

I, Joltin' Django, would like to make the following statement:

If Hillary Clinton - should she become the Democratic presidential nominee in 'o8 - loses the state of Alabama by 2 points or less, I will streak down Nashville's 2nd Avenue at 4 p.m. on the Friday following the election.

Bank it (apologies to George Plaster).

According to an article in today's Wall Street Journal (subscription required), the United States may soon become a signatory to the Law of the Sea Treaty. What's the Law of the Sea Treaty? Well, it is:

"[A] little-known but highly contentious international treaty - set to come before the U.S. Senate next month for ratification - that governs every aspect of ocean law, from underwater mineral rights to access to shipping lanes.

"The 208-page Law of the Sea Convention, debated since the 1930s and sealed in 1982, has stirred passions for decades in Washington. Critics in the Senate have repeatedly blocked its ratification, saying the pact would undercut U.S. sovereignty."

What's changed to make the Wall Street Journal think that the U.S. Senate will finally approve the Law of the Sea Treaty? Well, this:

"[S]carce energy sources, the thawing Arctic ice cap, and the U.S. Navy's desire to for unfettered access to the world's seaways. These motivations have helped galvanize an odd coalition of environmentalists, oil interests and military brass to persuaded enough senators to back the treaty."

As far as I'm concerned, the United States needs to join another international body which is biased against it like it needs a hole in the head. Those who disagree would do well to read this article by Rod Martin, which was published in 2004 on a now-defunct Web site:

Sometimes words can mislead by lulling us to sleep when we should be awake. Utter the words, "Law of the Sea Treaty" (LOST), and watch people's eyes glaze over.

When it comes to this treaty, the road warriors of the Left hope yours do, too.

Don't let them. Keep reading. LOST, if ratified, would represent the single greatest loss of sovereignty in the history of America. It must be stopped.

For our purposes, the LOST story begins in 1980, when Republicans condemned this Carter-era treaty in their national platform. It continues in 1981, when the treaty was sprung on President Reagan. In 1982, he consigned it to the circular file -- and fired the State Department staffers who had negotiated it.

End of story? You'd think.

In 1994, Madeleine Albright, then Bill Clinton's UN ambassador, signed the treaty. But for the subsequent Republican landslide that November, the Democratic Senate would certainly have ratified it. Foreign Relations Chairman Jesse Helms, however, put a stake through its vampire heart.

Or so it seemed. Like a zombie in Dawn of the Dead, a decade later, LOST has been found yet again.

This time, thanks to a rather creepy alliance of liberals like John Kerry and Joe Biden with squishy "moderate" Republicans led by Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Richard Lugar, it's steamrolling toward ratification.

And that's very bad.

Why?

LOST would cede control of the oceans -- 3/4 of the Earth's surface -- to a powerful new UN entity, the International Seabed Authority (ISA).

This agency would wield unprecedented power to regulate the seas, impose worldwide production quotas on deep-sea mining, oil output, and other activities, levy and collect taxes, oversee exploration and research, and create a court to make rulings and enforce them. And LOST would empower ISA to collect the profits of private companies and transfer them to socialist, Third World regimes.

Let's stop and think about this, since Mr. Lugar will not. If production quotas are imposed, say goodbye to any hope of American self-sufficiency in strategic materials. And if profits can be collected and transferred, that means what the United States earns, Sudan, China, or Cuba will keep, assuming our companies (and jobs) survive at all.

But it gets even worse.

LOST would ban President Bush's Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), which interdicts ships suspected, for instance, of ferrying terrorists or transporting North Korean nukes to the Middle East (or American ports). It would prohibit us from collecting intelligence in territorial waters (greatly expanded by the treaty). It would force us to share intelligence with our enemies and transfer key technologies, from our underwater mapping systems to our means for detecting enemy submarines.

In other words, this treaty would surrender our sovereignty, redistribute wealth and power from us to an unelected, unaccountable, runaway UN bureaucracy, transfer wealth from the world's democracies to its failed dictatorships, strengthen the militaries of our foes while straightjacketing our own, and threaten our national security at the worst possible time, when we're engaged in a global fight to the finish against terrorism and the tyrants who sponsor it.

This is an atrociously anti-American treaty; yet Senator Lugar and friends are hell-bent on convincing their colleagues to ratify it. And they're not playing by the rules. When LOST critics tried to testify against it last year, Lugar and Company prevented them even from speaking.

Now Lugar is trying to get LOST ratified before anyone can organize and warn the American people.

In 1980, the Republican Party Platform got it right, condemning this treaty by name.

In 1982, President Reagan got it right by tossing LOST into the trash.

In 1995, the new Republican Congress got it right by pronouncing LOST "dead on arrival."

It is now time for a new generation of Republicans to rise up for liberty, sovereignty, and national security and lead the charge against this monstrous UN power grab.

President Bush has saved us from two unfathomable sovereignty-shifting boondoggles already, withdrawing us from the ABM Treaty, and "unsigning" Bill Clinton's treaty to create the International Criminal Court.

But this is a surprise attack, from the so-called "moderates" inside the Republican camp. It's going to take all of us to fight them.

It's time to organize, to email, call and write letters, to senators and to the White House.

Time is desperately short. Before the UN taxes start, before the UN Navy sails, before U.S. sovereignty gets an unceremonious burial at sea, we must stop LOST now.

Copyright: Rod D. Martin, 12 March 2004.

-- Rod D. Martin, Founder and Chairman of Vanguard PAC, is an attorney and writer from Little Rock, Arkansas. A policy director for former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Special Counsel to PayPal.com Founder Peter Thiel, he is the Center for Cultural Leadership's Senior Fellow in Public Policy and Political Affairs and a Vice President of the National Federation of Republican Assemblies.

"Having no plans for dinner ce soir, I decided to stop at H & T's [Homecooking] on my way home from work for some take-out. As soon as I looked at the menu, I remembered why I'd made only one trip to H & T's since it opened in 2005."

Read the rest at A Man's Gotta Eat.

The Family Research Council says hate crimes laws are unconstitutional (and I agree):

"In a move that is a direct violation of the 14th Amendment which affords equal protection under the law, the House of Representatives passed a 'hate crimes' measure that would grant certain victims of crimes allegedly motivated by bias--greater protection than other victims of violence. The measure passed by a vote of 237 to 180. ...

"Criminalizing thoughts as well as actions, and creating special categories of victims is unconstitutional. The actions of a majority of the House today undermine the promise of equal protection under the law guaranteed by the 14th Amendment. This legislation creates second-class victims and a legal system of 'separate and unequal.'

"There has been no proof that violent crimes perpetrated against any of the groups listed in the bill have not been prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, yet now Congress is asking the federal government to get involved in issues that are, and should remain, local concerns.

"By far the most disturbing threat we face by this legislation - is the threat it poses to free speech and our religious liberties. In some jurisdictions that have adopted similar laws, 'hate crimes' have been defined to include not just physical acts of violence but merely verbal ones as well. When 'thought crimes' laws are interpreted this way, they pose a serious threat to freedom of speech and religious liberty."

The FRC's Peter Sprigg penned an op-ed which appeared in the Washington Times a couple of weeks ago that's well worth checking out. It's hard to argue with this:

"[T]he principle engraved on the Supreme Court building is 'Equal Justice Under Law.' Creating special classes of victims would violate that principle. That's why senators should reject the 'hate crimes' bill."

According to a new Gallup Poll, only 19 percent of Americans think the U.S. Congress is doin' a good job:

"A new Gallup Poll finds Congress' approval rating the lowest it has been since Gallup first tracked public opinion of Congress with this measure in 1974. Just 18% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing, while 76% disapprove, according to the August 13-16, 2007, Gallup Poll.

"That 18% job approval rating matches the low recorded in March 1992, when a check-bouncing scandal was one of several scandals besetting Congress, leading many states to pass term limits measures for U.S. representatives (which the Supreme Court later declared unconstitutional). Congress had a similarly low 19% approval rating during the energy crisis in the summer of 1979."

"The 'feminist' radio company whose founders include Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem failed to attract an audience and it signed off the air for good on Friday," GOPUSA reports.

"When the talk-radio network, called GreenStone, officially launched in September 2006, NewsMax.com reported that it was a 'new left-wing radio network that plans to appeal to women listeners and counter the dominance of conservative talk radio.'"

Jane Fonda had a radio network? Who knew?!

Why are leftists so hell-bent on trying to "counter the dominance of conservative talk radio?" Why can't they just be happy knowing that their point of view, well, dominates ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, NBC, NPR, PBS, Time Magazine, the New York Times, and the editorial page of virtually every big-city newspaper in the U.S.?

The following letter appeared in the August 13 Sports Illustrated. Tim Shullberg, who hails from Long Beach, California, provides us with an eloquent homage to Hammerin' Hank Aaron:

"Thank you, SI, for a great cover honoring Hank Aaron ('The People's King,' July 23). How pristine the image is -- no batting gloves, no wristbands, no gold chains or earrings, no body armor and not even pine tar. Just a man with a cylindrical piece of wood waiting on a horsehide sphere. Magnificent."

This is a smaller version of the photo that was the subject of Mr. Shullberg's letter:



Magnificent, indeed.

"[Bill Clinton] was re-elected without asking for a mandate to do anything big, and he didn't get anything big done as President."

-- Bob Shrum

TABASCO® has a new sauce. What it is? Check out A Man's Gotta Eat for details.

I really dislike Larry Daughtrey. There, I said it. It's bad enough that Daughtrey is a left-wing hack, not to mention being just a tad elitist, now he's gone and tried to pass himself off as an expert on baseball in the city of Nashville.

Writing in this morning's Tennessean, Larry D. says this 'bout the Nashville Sounds: "Vanderbilt has better baseball, anyway." Uh, do what?!

I'll bet a dollar to anyone's dime that Daughtrey doesn't read the sports section of the paper for which he works. I mean, no one who's read the Tennessean's sports page as of late would ridiculously imply that the Nashville Sounds aren't any good.

Here's a newsflash for one Larry Daughtrey: The Nashville Sounds have the best record in the Pacific Coast League, and they're on track to win their second PCL championship in three years (winning the PCL championship is the AAA equivalent of winning the MLB World Series). In addition, Sounds pitcher R.A. Dickey - a former University of Tennessee standout - is tied for the most wins in the PCL.

Sure, Vandy has a terrific baseball program. But they were booted from this year's College World Series before it ever began. Unless and until they win the CWS, the Commodores really do not have any bragging rights over the Nashville Sounds.

That said, I can't be the only one who finds it hard to envision ol' Larry and Martha Craig sitting in one of Herschel Greer Stadium's faded seats sipping beer and eating hot dogs. Since he doesn't read the sports page, and since he'd probably rather eat dirt than be caught on Chestnut Street after dark, I guess his ignorance vis-à-vis the Nashville Sounds shouldn't be a surprise.

When I think Larry Daughtrey 'n' baseball, I see him tooling into Vandy's Hawkins Field between the first and second inning, staying until, oh, the end of the fourth, and then heading to Sperry's for a salad and a $20 Scotch.

When it comes to baseball, Larry Daughtrey don't know ****. There, I said THAT.

To borrow a line from Buck Strickland: Cripes, almighty, it's hot!

At exactly 8:22 this morning, I and several of my neighbors experienced a power outage. The Nashville Electric Service was on the scene in less than an hour; however, it took NES's finest almost six hours to complete their fixin' and reparin'. At 3:00, my thermostat, which sits right smack in the middle of my house, read 85 degrees, but it felt more like 95 degrees. I was sweatin' my arse off!

When the lights and A/C powered up, I made a quick trip to Dairy Queen for a Blizzard. When I came home I took a cold shower (my second of the day), then I dressed in nothing but skivvies ...

Nothing's working. Indeed, I'm finding it very difficult to get my core temperature down (apologies to Cosmo Kramer). I anticipate a looooong night of tossin', turnin', and sweatin'.

What really sucks is the fact that I missed my online fantasy football draft this morning -- after my 9 p.m. trip to Wal-Mart last night to pick up the Fantasy Football Index. Damn, damn, damn! (Apologies to Florida Evans.)

I wonder how much a summer cottage in Nunavut would cost?

Joltin' Django loves him some meatloaf; and right now, he's up to his gills in spicy baked beef and tomato sauce. To find out where Django got stuffed ce soir, check out the latest post at A Man's Gotta Eat.

In case you haven't heard, activists with ties to the GOP want to change the way California awards its electoral votes. California now allots all of its 55 electoral votes to the statewide winner in presidential elections, a practice followed in most states.

A proposed ballot initiative, The Presidential Election Reform Act, calls for awarding two electoral votes to the statewide winner in California, with the rest allocated according to results in each congressional district. Only Maine and Nebraska currently allocate their electoral votes by congressional district.

California has voted Democratic in every election since 1992. If the Presidential Election Reform Act is approved by voters next June, however, the Republican presidential candidate could win 20 or more electoral votes in 2008. (Four years ago, President Bush carried 22 congressional districts in California while losing statewide by double-digits.)

Democrats, naturally, are up in arms at the prospect of not being able to pencil in California's 55 electoral votes before the election takes place. Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer told the Associated Press that the proposal is a "power grab" orchestrated by Republicans "to keep the presidency in Republican control."

Democrats were curiously silent when North Carolina's Democratic-controlled legislature approved a measure to abandon its winner-take-all method of awarding electoral votes a few weeks back. That state, though, is one Republicans have carried in every presidential election since 1980. Thus, the Democratic legislature, which was egged on by the Democratic governor, was doing the "people's business" when it voted to ensure that Democrats pick up a couple of electoral votes in the Tar Heel State.

As most Creeder Readers know, I'm agin' efforts to tinker with the electoral college. However, if all states began to proportionally allot their electoral votes, I'd be all for it. Why? Republicans would have a lock on the electoral college that Democrats would find impossible to pick. Indeed, if such a sytem had been in place in all 50 states in 2000 and 2004, President Bush's margin of victory in the electoral college would have been even greater. Check out the county-by-county map from 2004 if you don't believe me (red counties, of course, are counties carried by Bush):


Since it would be well nigh impossible for a proportional system to be implemented nationwide, I just cannot bring myself to support the California ballot initiative. The last thing we need is for California to set a precedent and have a dozen states follow suit, turning the electoral college into a patchwork of winner-take-all and proportional systems. That'd make the electoral college something very different from what the Founding Fathers envisioned: A check on the unreasonable and fleeting passion of the masses.

Earlier this week I told you about Harvard Professor Robert Putnam's landmark diversity study in a post entitled The downside of diversity. In today's Wall Street Journal, Daniel Henninger discusses Putman's findings at greater length in "The Death of Diversity." A sample:

"Now comes word that diversity as an ideology may be dead, or not worth saving. Robert Putnam, the Harvard don who in the controversial bestseller Bowling Alone announced the decline of communal-mindedness amid the rise of home-alone couch potatoes, has completed a mammoth study of the effects of ethnic diversity on communities. His researchers did 30,000 interviews in 41 U.S. communities. Short version: People in ethnically diverse settings don't want to have much of anything to do with each other. 'Social capital' erodes. Diversity has a downside.

"Prof. Putnam isn't exactly hiding these volatile conclusions, though he did introduce them in a journal called Scandinavian Political Studies. A great believer in the efficacy of what social scientists call 'reciprocity,' he wasn't happy with what he found but didn't mince words describing the results:

"'Inhabitants of diverse communities tend to withdraw from collective life, to distrust their neighbors, regardless of the color of their skin, to withdraw even from close friends, to expect the worst from their community and its leaders, to volunteer less, give less to charity and work on community projects less often, to register to vote less, to agitate for social reform more, but have less faith that they can actually make a difference, and to huddle unhappily in front of the television.' The diversity nightmare gets worse: They have little confidence in the 'local news media.' This after all we've done for them.

"Colleagues and diversity advocates, disturbed at what was emerging from the study, suggested alternative explanations. Prof. Putnam and his team re-ran the data every which way from Sunday and the result was always the same: Diverse communities may be yeasty and even creative, but trust, altruism and community cooperation fall. He calls it 'hunkering down.'"

Ryan Lizza tells us why Barack Obama is doomed:

"One day this spring, Obama's pollsters were crunching numbers, and they discovered something odd. For as long as Obama has been in national politics, his approval ratings have been stratospheric. His whole campaign strategy rests on translating that enthusiasm into actual votes, turning those who are temporarily enthralled by Obama's celebrity into real supporters. The history of presidential primaries is littered with candidates who captivated voters early in the process only to be abandoned for the more cautious alternative come Election Day. Neither John McCain nor Bill Bradley could convert their momentary star power into victories over the establishment candidacies of George W. Bush and Al Gore in 2000, and perhaps most famously, Howard Dean was abandoned by voters for the seemingly reliable John Kerry at the last moment, in 2004.

"Now Obama's pollsters were finding alarming evidence that their candidate was vulnerable to the same phenomenon. When they compared the percentage of Democrats who said they strongly approved of Obama with the percentage who said they would vote for him, they found that the latter number was significantly lower than the former. Inside the campaign, aides dubbed this 'the Gap.' It was a sobering, hard number that quantified the difference between vague enthusiasm and actual votes. For Hillary Clinton, the gap is much smaller. The majority of voters who strongly approve of her also say they will vote for her.

"In fact, Hillary was collecting about two-thirds of Democrats who liked her, while Obama was collecting less than half. The numbers suggested that the calculus for Hillary voters was much simpler: Democrats who liked her knew all they needed to know about her. But for Obama voters, there were questions. Was he tough enough? Did he have enough experience? Could he actually win in the general election?

"No, he's not going to overcome this gap. I think the Democratic nomination race is over. Hillary is in a better position to use the family brand name to win the nomination than Bush Jr. was in 1999. So we could go from January 1989 to January 2017 -- 28 years! -- with the Bush and Clinton families swapping the presidency. Or 36 years, if Jeb Bush -- a genuinely excellent governor in Florida -- can somehow rehabilitate the family name."

"One of the two major political parties of the United States has linked all its electoral hopes on domestic pathologies, economic downturns and foreign failure. It is actually difficult to name any positive development for America that would benefit the Democratic Party's chances in a national election. ... The issue is that if Democrats want to win, they can do so only if bad things happen to America." [Emphasis mine}

-- Dennis Prager

Wanna know why the Islamists hate us? Because we use airport bathrooms and wear non-white panties:

"[H]ow do those beasts in the West answer the call of nature? They stand in front of other people, in toilets at airports and other public places. They do not care about covering their private parts. Even their underwear is colored and not white, so it can conceal all that filth. We are a nation that has long known the meaning of cleanliness, what to do when nature calls, and what the rules of hygiene are."

-- Saudi cleric Muhammad Al-Munajid

I'd like to say that this is unexpected news, but it ain't:

"Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton cites her experience as a compelling reason voters should make her president, but nearly 2 million pages of documents covering her White House years are locked up in a building here, obscuring a large swath of her record as first lady.

"Clinton's calendars, appointment logs and memos are stored at her husband's presidential library, in the custody of federal archivists who do not expect them to be released until after the 2008 presidential election."

Democrats crawl all overthemselved deriding Republican "secrecy," yet it is their presidential candidates who don't know the meaning of full disclosure: Bill Clinton refused to release his medical records, leading many to speculate that he'd been treated for a sexually transmitted disease; and John Kerry ignored calls for him to release all documents pertaining to his military service, which allowed the Swift Boat Vets and other critics to claim that his naval career wasn't as noteworthy as advertised by the Kerry campaign.

Now we learn that most of the documents from Hillary's years in the White House will not be released until after the 2008 election. Like I said, I'd like to say that this is shocking news, but we are talkin' about Democrats here.

Members of Code Pink, a left-wing group based in California, are going on a hunger strike to protest the war in Iraq. "We have about eight people who are going to stop eating, including me," Code Pink spokeswoman Nancy Mancias told the San Francisco Gate.

Tomorrow, the group plans a protest House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's home, where they will urge to hold a town hall meeting with anti-war constituents.

I hate to be tacky, but the members of Code Pink I've seen can certainly afford to skip a few meals! To wit:

Pundits and politicians never tire of telling us that America is "strong" because of its diversity. A massive new study has concluded just the opposite.

Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam interviewed 30,000 people across the United States and found that in diverse communities, people are less likely to vote, volunteer, give money to charity, and work on community projects.

If Putnam's study had come to an opposite conclusion, i.e., high levels of community spirit in diverse areas, I'm sure his study would have been front-page news in every newspaper in the country.

This is very interesting:

"The study comes at a time when the future of the American melting pot is the focus of intense political debate, from immigration to race-based admissions to schools, and it poses challenges to advocates on all sides of the issues. The study is already being cited by some conservatives as proof of the harm large-scale immigration causes to the nation's social fabric. But with demographic trends already pushing the nation inexorably toward greater diversity, the real question may yet lie ahead: how to handle the unsettling social changes that Putnam's research predicts."

Wanna know where you can get the best pizza in Nashville? Check out today's post at A Man's Gotta Eat.

I've picked on Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, quite a lot over the past few months; but I was really pulling for him to kick Markos Moulitsas' ass, rhetorically of course, on Meet the Press yesterday. Instead, as Allahpundit keenly observes, Junior gladhanded Moulitsas, "who spent last weekend sneering at the 'con job' organization [the Democratic Leadership Council] he leads and the 'bunch of cranks' who populate it." By the end of the Junior-Moulitsas, ahem, debate, I half expected them to engage in a fellowship hug. Check this out and you'll see what I mean:



That said, I think Kalapana's short review of the Junior-Moulitsas pillow fight is spot-on:

"Two socialists with different levels of rancor for wealth producers and every value America was founded upon. Kos is the most consistant of the Demosocialists:

"'In any conflict between two men (of two groups) who hold the same basic principles, it is the more consistent one who wins.' -- Ayn Rand, The Anatomy of Compromise"

We have seen the future of the Democratic Party, and its name is Markos Moulitsas. God help us all ...

Mark Steyn, whom I consider to be the finest conservative scribe since William F. Buckley, Jr., tells us why Al Gore's global warming hooey is, well, hooey:

"Something rather odd happened the other day. If you go to NASA's Web site and look at the 'U.S. surface air temperature' rankings for the lower 48 states, you might notice that something has changed.

"Then again, you might not. They're not issuing any press releases about it. But they have quietly revised their All-Time Hit Parade for U.S. temperatures. The "hottest year on record" is no longer 1998, but 1934. Another alleged swelterer, the year 2001, has now dropped out of the Top 10 altogether, and most of the rest of the 21st century – 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004 – plummeted even lower down the Hot 100. In fact, every supposedly hot year from the Nineties and this decade has had its temperature rating reduced. Four of America's Top 10 hottest years turn out to be from the 1930s, that notorious decade when we all drove around in huge SUVs with the air-conditioning on full-blast. If climate change is, as Al Gore says, the most important issue anyone's ever faced in the history of anything ever, then Franklin Roosevelt didn't have a word to say about it.

"And yet we survived."

It will be interesting to see how Al Gore reacts to the news that the hottest years on record were in the 1930s -- when there were less greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. One thing I know for sure: Big Al won't be debating anybody 'bout the above-mentioned facts and figures any time soon.

Milk prices hit a record last month in the United States, with consumers paying an average $3.80 a gallon, compared to $3.29 in January. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is forecasting that milk prices will remain high throughout the year.

Now, this milk sit-chee-a-shun has got me to thinkin'; and I have a few questions for anyone who cares to answer 'em for me:

How come I can't find a poll in which 20 percent of Americans blame the Bush Administration for the rising cost of milk? (A Gallup poll conducted last summer indicated that 20 percent of the voting public blamed President Bush for high gas prices.)

When should we expect congressional hearings seeking to expose nefarious price-gouging schemes initiated by the dairy industry's corporate honchos?

When will Senator Harry "Sleepin' at the Ritz" Reid and Representative Nancy "Madame Moonbat" Pelosi suggest that America should dip into its "Strategic Milk Reserve" ... ?

All kidding aside, the spike in prices for dairy products, due to exploding demand in China and higher prices for cattle feed, is no different from this past summer's spike in gasoline prices, which was caused by a worldwide increase in the price of oil and decreased refining capabilities.

Americans who consume dairy products may not (don't) know it, but they are receiving a valuable tutorial in basic economics: growing demand, coupled with supply pressure, will increase the cost of goods and services.

The Club for Growth has issued its 2007 RePORK Card. Over the past few months, the U.S. House of Representatives voted on 50 separate anti-pork amendments. The Club for Growth tallied them up and recorded the votes. Reps. Jeff Flake, John Campbell, and Jeb Hensarling offered most of the amendments "to illustrate why pork-barrel spending is such a corrupting practice." You can see the entire 2007 RePork Card here.

Tennessee's own Jim Cooper not only bests his fellow House Democrats on the RePork Card, he bests his fellow representatives in the Tennessee delegation. Here's how Tennessee's U.S. Reps did (these scores reflect the percentage of YES votes on 50 anti-pork amendments):

Cooper - 98 percent, 49/50 (score/ratio)
Blackburn - 94, 46/49
Davis, David - 91, 43/47
Duncan - 88, 44/50
Wamp - 12, 6/50
Davis, Lincoln - 4, 2/50
Gordon - 4, 2/50
Cohen - 2, 1/50
Tanner - 2, 1/50

Update: Thanks to Creeder Reader Tim for pointing out this important fact: Jim Cooper is the only Democrat to score above 20 percent on the Club for Growth's RePork Card.

Regular Creeder Readers may recall my bad, bad experience inside Mt. Olivet Cemetery a couple of months ago. After that bad day I vowed that I'd never go to Mt. Olivet Cemetery again.

In this week's Nashville Scene, Christine Kreyling tours Nashville's historic cemeteries, including Mt. Olivet. After reading her excellent piece, I may just have to rethink my ain't-going-back vow. A sample:

"Since its founding, Mount Olivet has been the final resting place of Nashville’s leading families. A walk along its lanes yields a roll call of the city’s power structure. It’s not surprising, therefore, that its collection of funerary sculpture and architecture, if sometimes grandiose, is the finest in the city. Mount Olivet is an exclusive and tony place. The grounds once featured a conservatory that sold plants and flowers for grave decoration. And admission was by ticket only, issued to lot-holders for the exclusive use of family and relatives."

If Al Gore is so sure that he's right and global warming skeptics are wrong, why is he so afraid to debate the issue? From the Patriot Post:

"Labeling opponents of his global warming crusade 'an organized campaign, financed to the tune of about $10 million a year from some of the largest carbon polluters to create the impression that there is disagreement in the scientific community,' Al Gore recently rehashed his claim that big-oil interests are 'trying to manipulate opinion.' The AP headlined the story: 'Gore: Polluters Manipulate Climate Info.'

"But who here is the real manipulator? Gore has consistently refused to debate the merits of his global-warming campaign. Recently, the self-designated environmental expert -- whose climatologic education includes a degree in government from Harvard and studies at Vanderbilt University Divinity and Law Schools (what unique qualifications) -- rejected a challenge from author Dennis Avery, a trained agricultural economist and former agricultural analyst for the U.S. Department of State. According to Avery, 'If global warming truly is the most important public policy issue of our day, then it is high time the public got to hear the arguments from both sides matched up against each other.' Not so, according to Gore, who lives in his own world where 'there is very little disagreement' on the issue." [Emphasis mine]

"They'll find their way back to the middle. And if they don't, they won't win."

-- Harold Ford, Jr., aka Junior, discussing the current crop of Democratic presidential candidates, all of whom refused to appear at this year's Democratic Leadership Council's confab

"The reality is, without the DLC, and without candidates who subscribe to our platform, Democrats wouldn't be in the majority today. If we abandon that group, we will lose the majority and we will lose the White House."

-- More from Junior

Blue Dog Dems, watch out. The nutbuckets are angry:

"Some [liberal groups and left-wing blogs] are already talking about primary challenges for Democrats whom they consider enablers of [President] Bush, like moderate Blue Dogs who formed the core of Democratic support for the eavesdropping proposal in the House. On the Web site Open Left, the blogger Matt Stoller accused the Blue Dogs of one of their 'standard betrayals.'"

"South Carolina is poised to hold its Republican presidential primary earlier than Feb. 2, 2008, likely in mid-January, a move that is expected to push New Hampshire and Iowa to follow suit," GOPUSA reports.

If this madness continues, it's not inconceivable that the New Hampshire primary and Iowa caucuses will one day be held a full year before the next year's presidential election.

Update:

More from this morning's Wall Street Journal:

"The first votes of the 2008 presidential election could well be cast in 2007 -- in Iowa homes and halls decorated for Christmas -- once the dust settles from a new round of jockeying among the states with early nominating contests."

Update: Update:

"The South Carolina Republican Party moved its presidential primary to Jan. 19 on Thursday in a move that will likely force New Hampshire and Iowa to move earlier on the schedule," WMUR Manchester reports.

"South Carolina Republican Party Chairman Katon Dawson announced the decision at the New Hampshire Statehouse. He said that the location was chosen to show solidarity with the state that traditionally holds the first primary in the country.

"'We're here to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with our friends in New Hampshire,' Dawson said.

"Under New Hampshire law, Secretary of State Bill Galvin must schedule the primary at least a week before any similar contest, meaning it could be held no later than Jan. 12. Galvin also has the power to schedule the primary at short notice."

I hate to speak ill of a person who's terminally ill, but I've come to the conclusion that Elizabeth Edwards, wife of presidential candidate John Edwards, is a dumbass. I mean, every time the woman opens her mouth, something stupid comes out.

Check out Liz's latest morsel of shipdittery:

"We can't make John black, we can't make him a woman. Those things get you a lot of press, worth a certain amount of fundraising dollars. Now it's nice to get on the news, but not the be all and end all."

WTF?!

If John Edwards can afford two, three, four hundred bucks for a haircut, surely he afford to buy a sock for his wife's big mouth.

Get you a ripe one, don't get a hard one
Plant `em in the spring, eat `em in the summer
All winter with out `em's a culinary bummer
I forget all about the sweatin' and diggin'
Everytime I go out and pick me a big one

Homegrown tomatoes, homegrown tomatoes
What'd life be without homegrown tomatoes
Only two things that money can't buy
That's true love and homegrown tomatoes

-- Guy Clark

Check out today's post at A Man's Gotta Eat to learn why I'm postin' lyrics from a song 'bout homegrown tomatoes.

Optical Systems, Inc. has created a flashlight that's so bright it'll temporarily blind someone, and then it will get 'em all disoriented, dizzy, and nauseous. What a flashlight!

Using special types of super-bright LEDs, the flashlight's beam flashes while quickly changing colors, and this somehow makes a person at whom the light has been pointed feel like he's going to throw up.

Man, what I wouldn't give to have one of these in my pocket so's I could point it at the next numbnut I hear saying something like, "George Bush is the reason gas prices are so high" or "Bush has had very little to do with the success of the economy."

This man is STILL baseball's Home Run King:


"Hank Aaron overcame poverty and racism to become one of the most accomplished baseball players of all time. 'When I was in a ballpark,' he said, 'I felt like I was surrounded by angels, and I had God's hand on my shoulder.' By steadily pursuing his calling in the face of unreasoning hatred, Hank Aaron has proven himself a great human being, as well as a great athlete." [If you're a baseball fan, you know why I highlighted the words "great human being."]

-- President George W. Bush

"Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who ran as a moderate in past campaigns in Massachusetts, on Monday rated himself as conservative as the late President Reagan," GOPUSA reports.

Wanna see a picture of two idiots in action? Here 'tis:


As much as your typical Hollywood leftist enjoys prattling 'bout free speech and free expression, you'd think Hugo Chávez would be the last person on earth with whom Sean Penn would agree to rub elbows. I guess ol' Sean forgot about - ignored is probably more like it - these recent happenings in Venezuela when he decided to take a ride in el presidente Chávez's jeep:

● In 2006, Reporters Without Borders ranked Venezuela 115th out of 168 countries in its global press freedom listing, sharply down from 2005's rating of 90th. Freedom House currently rates Venezuela as 'not free' according to its latest survey.

● Earlier this year, Chávez announced that the operating license for RCTV — Venezuela's second largest TV channel which has been broadcasting for 53 years — will not be renewed due to its anti-Chávez editorializing.

● Last month, Chavez issued a decree mandating the deportation of any foreign visitors to Venezuela who criticized himself or his administration.

A Creeder Reader sends this "many a truth is said in jest" picture:


In case you haven't heard:

"[Barack Obama] warned U.S. ally Pakistan he would put U.S. troops in Gen. Pervez Musharraf's country to root out terrorists. ...

"Pakistan's political instability, and its possession of nuclear weapons, has some worried Musharraf could be replaced by religious fanatics.

"Pakistan has nuclear weapons and is politically unstable, raising concerns that the current military leadership could be replaced by religious fanatics who would be less cautious in using the weapons.

"Fleshed out in [his bomb Pakistan] speech, Obama's foreign policy is shaping up to be a 'talk to your enemies, invade your friends' approach to American relations abroad." [Emphasis mine]

A new post is up at A Man's Gotta Eat. Want visual proof that Joltin' Django is a glutton par excellence? Well, check out today's post!

I will be posting daily at A Man's Gotta Eat. Be sure to tell a neighbor about, and direct a friend to, AMGE. Joltin' Django will 'preciate it!

As far as the remaining "Django Recommends" sites are concerned (Django's Bookshelf, Django's Must-See DVDs, Django's Turntable), I will publish one post at the beginning of each week in which I briefly discuss the books, music and movies that I've been enjoying (or not enjoying). Stay tuned ...!

Rich Galen tells us 'bout Nutbucketfest 2007, aka YearlyKos:

"Consider what would have happened if Republican candidates blew off a meeting with a moderate Republican organization to attend the 'Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy Nuts Convention' in, say, San Diego or Charleston.

"Can you imagine how the Popular Press would have vilified the GOP candidates? It would have interviewed every single attendee and found something which would have shown him or her to be (a) a lunatic, (b) a hypocrite, (c) an embarrassment, or (d) all of the above.

"The Democratic candidates for President all refused to attend a meeting of the moderate Democratic Leadership Council (of which Bill Clinton was a charter member) but, went out of their way to attend a convention of the most acidly Liberal group of Bloggers in American all of whom are either (a) lunatics, (b) hypocrites, (c) embarrassments, or (d) all of the above. ...

"[T]he Democratic candidates for President bowed, scraped, pandered, and supplicated themselves before a bunch of people who think Democratic Members of the House who voted in favor of the bill to allow surveillance of suspected terrorists as 'Dems who ... failed us. Who failed our country.'

"One Senator who voted for the bill, Ken Salazar (D-CO) was vilified by a Kos Blogger thus:

"Senate (sic) Salazar was the first dem I ever voted for that WON. I was so happy! I did my part! And he's a freaking Liebercrat surrender monkey.

"These are the people with whom the Democratic candidates for President are not only willing to align themselves, but from whom they are actively seeking support."

Errol Phillips, an "Independent Jewish Conservative" with whom I correspond frequently, says this 'bout Barack Obama:

"The more I hear what comes out of this fool's mouth, the more I think that he should go no futher into politics than his County's Dog catcher."

I said something similar about ol' Barack a few months back:

"God help us if Obama's ever elected to another office other than Chicago's dogcatcher."

Great minds DO think alike!

Against my better judgement, I've agreed to join some friends for a round of golf today. I'm gonna burn the you-know-what up, I know, but at least I'll get some solid tee time with my new Cleveland driver!

The Nigh Seen Creeder will return Monday, August 6.

According to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, a growing number of Americans say the U.S. Supreme Court has become "too conservative" since President Bush began nominating justices:

"Nearly a third of the public - 31 percent - thinks the court is too far to the right, a noticeable jump since the question was last asked in July 2005. That's when Bush nominated John G. Roberts Jr. to the court and, in the six-month period that followed, the Senate approved Roberts as chief justice and confirmed Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr."

If the 31 percent of poll respondents who think the Supreme Court is too conservative had been asked to cite a specific case to support their position, how many out one hundred do you think could've done so? I say maybe - maybe - five out of one hundred could have. Hell, if you asked the our-Supreme-Court's-too-conservative crowd to name three or more Supreme Court Justices, you'd be lucky to find five out of one hundred who could do that.

As I stated a couple of weeks ago, I have absolutely no use for polls that elicit agree/disagree, yes/no, not enough/enough/too much, etc. responses without asking WHY as well.

Polls? Piss on 'em ... that's what I say!

Jenna Jameson is the most successful porn star of all time. The "films" in which she's done the dirty have sold gazillions of copies, she has her own adult channel on DirecTV and Dish Network, she co-wrote a best-selling memoir, and she is a millionaire a couple of times over.

After reading 'bout la vie du jameson, some gals might start thinking, "There's money to be made in the porn biz. Maybe I'll give it a spin!" Keep on thinkin' that, ladies, and you can look like this when you're 33-years-old:

Jonah Goldberg is my new hero! He says what I've been thinkin' for years:

"So, maybe, just maybe, we have our priorities wrong. Perhaps cheapening the vote by requiring little more than an active pulse (Chicago famously waives this rule) has turned it into something many people don't value. Maybe the emphasis on getting more people to vote has dumbed-down our democracy by pushing participation onto people uninterested in such things. Maybe our society would be healthier if politicians aimed higher than the lowest common denominator. Maybe the opinions of people who don't know the first thing about how our system works aren't the folks who should be driving our politics, just as people who don't know how to drive shouldn't have a driver's license.

"Instead of making it easier to vote, maybe we should be making it harder. Why not test people about the basic functions of government? Immigrants have to pass a test to vote; why not all citizens?

"A voting test would point the arrow of civic engagement up, instead of down, sending the signal that becoming an informed citizen is a valued accomplishment. And if that's not a good enough reason, maybe this is: If you threaten to take the vote away from the certifiably uninformed, voter turnout will almost certainly get a boost."

If you're a white person - or an older black person - and you're still using the term "bling," then you, my friend, are a wigger ... a big ol' wigger (at least that's what R&B singer Kanye West says):

"Only white people and older black people say 'bling' now. If a white person uses slang too early, then that makes them look like a wigger. But if black people use slang too late, then it makes them look like a wigger."

Speaking to a group of fellow Capitol Hill staffers, U.S. Rep. Heath Shuler's chief of staff, Hayden Rogers, uncorked this gem:

"Taxes, taxes, taxes. I have no problem with taxes, bring 'em on."

Rep. Shuler campaigned last year as a pro-life, low-tax Democrat. Someone needs to ask him if he too "has no problem" with taxes, taxes, taxes.

When it comes to this election year's crop of mayoral candidates, it's slim pickings for liberty-lovin' conservatives like moi.  To be honest, it's slim pickings every election year. I cannot understand why a city the size of Nashville, with a vibrant business community and important educational institutions, churns out unaccomplished Democratic politicos and first-class nitwits each and every time an election rolls around.

When will Nashvillians have the opportunity to vote for a truly visionary mayor?  Where's Nashville's Rudy Giuliani, who promised to get über-tough on crime ... and did?  Where's Nashville's Brent Schundler or Stephen Goldsmith, who promised to take on liberal advocacy groups and public sector unions to push for education reform and privatization of public services ... and did?

I would like to take this opportunity to announce that I, Joltin' Django, won't be votin' for none of the you-know-whats who're runnin' for mayor. Let me tell you why:
 
David Briley - I refuse to vote for a candidate whose base voters, if you will, are Bongo Java hairheads and East Nashville hipster doofi.  'Nough said.
 
Buck Dozier - When I was in high school, I had to endure a "sex education" lecture delivered by one Buck Dozier.  I cannot look at the man without thinking about his spiel on the importance of foreplay: "Boys, don't rape your wives."  Do I want that memory to return each and every time I see Mayor Buck's round face on the nightly news?  Heavens, no!
 
Bob Clement - When Clement was running for re-election to the U.S. Congress in 1992, he ran a television ad in which he made this statement:  "Government cannot be all things to all people.  What government can do is create jobs."  WTF?!  Anyone who's that ignorant 'bout basic economic principles has no business sitting in the mayor's office in any major metropolitan city.

Karl Dean - Dean Term One would in actuality be Purcell Term Three.  That is, Dean is an almost exact clone of Bill Purcell.  To say that Mayor Purcell has been a mediocrity is an understatement.  His major accomplishment(s)?  Dozens of unnecessary sidewalks and a not-so-subtle attempt to run the Nashville Sounds out of town.  I, for one, have had enough liberal Yankee mayors to last me a lifetime.

Howard Gentry - If I were going to hold my nose and simply vote for "anyone," I'd probably vote for Gentry.  He's a dedicated public servant and a nice enough guy, but he has neither the business savvy nor the vision to run a big city with big-city problems.

Kenneth Eaton - I'd vote for Bill Boner before I'd vote for Mr. Eaton.
 
Since I'm not voting for any of the announced candidates for mayor, for whom will I vote?  I'm seriously considering writing-in Adam Dread for mayor.  Hell, he's the only politician who's done anything bold and inspiring during this year's election.
 
As for the rest of the 2007 ballot, I ain't votin' for none of these folks (this is not an exhaustive list, by any means):

Vice Mayor

Carolyn Baldwin Tucker - Have you heard the "Car-O-lyn Beeeee Tucker" radio ad? Jesus, it's the most embarrassing political ad since Steve Cohen's "Get Goin' with Cohen" ads during the 1994 Democratic primary for governor. I just don't think Ms. Tucker has a lot goin' on upstairs, if you know what I mean.

Diane Neighbors - I could say something truly tacky about Ms. Neighbors, but I shall refrain. I'll simply say this: Neighbors was endorsed by the Tennessean, and that's reason enough not to vote for her.
 
Council-at-Large

Ronnie Steine - Steine has a pair the size of basketballs to think that he deserves another term on the Metro Council. Anyone who's read his interview with the Nashville Scene knows that the man has been less than forthcoming about his shopliftin'/thievin' past. Do I want a closet kleptomaniac representing the entire county in the Metro Council? HELL no.
 
Megan Barry - If Barry's only half as left-wing as her husband, she's way too left-wing for me.  If'n Ms. Berry is elected to the Metro Council, it'll just be a matter of time before she goes all nutbucket and introduces a resolution to impeach the president or legislation to make Nashville a "sanctuary city" for illegal aliens.  Mark my words ...
 
Saletta Holloway - Holloway was my councilwoman for eight years.  I reckon I've had at least a couple-dozen conversations with the woman over the years, and I long ago came to this conclusion: Saletta Holloway is a fool.  Anyone who witnessed her rambling, incoherent speechifying during television coverage of the Metro Council's proceedings would have to agree.
 
Dave Pelton - I was all prepared to vote for Mr. Pelton -- a self-identified Republican.  Then he got himself endorsed by the Metro Nashville Education Association and it got me to thinkin':  What did Pelton say on the MNEA's candidate questionnaire to receive their endorsement? I'll bet he didn't vow to support charter schools, school choice, tenure reform, or alternative certification, that's for sure. When it comes to the MNEA and elections, I have a simple policy:  Take the list of MNEA endorsements into the voting booth and vote agin' each and every one of their candidates.
 
Richard Exton - Exton's yard signs are prominently displayed in front of the Teamster's HQ on Antioch Pike.  Strikes one, two, AND three.  Exton's out.

Jerry Maynard - Maynard says the best way to deal with illegal immigrants in this city is to show "tolerance." Yeah, that'll work! Anyone who spouts leftist claptrap with that much ease isn't worthy of being elected dogcatcher, let alone councilman-at-large.
 
Tim Garrett - Tim Garrett carried water for Speaker Jimmy Naifeh when he was serving in the State House of Representatives.  Yeah, I know, that has nothing to do with what happens in the Metro Council.  I just cannot - will not - bring myself to vote for anyone, for anything, who sniffed Naifeh's throne.

Charlie Tygard - On his "official" campaign Web site, Tygard says he wants to "invest in programs that ... keep Nashville healthy." What the hell does that mean?! Is Tygard trying to say that he wants to create programs to force the citizens of Nashville to jog and eat their vegetables? God help us all.

Jerry Summers - Summers is on record as saying that he wishes to "increase funding to improve" Metro Schools. Anyone who thinks that Nashville's public schools are suffering from a lack of funding doesn't know a certain part of his or her anatomy from a hole in the ground. If Summers wanted to make a substantive promise vis-à-vis education, he'd promise to run the MNEA out of town.

Score one and a half for the good guys:

"Dallas Police were searching for at least one more person in connection with a home invasion early Wednesday that left one suspect dead and possibly two others shot, police said.

"Four men, possibly five, forced their way into a home in the 9000 block of Woodshore Drive shortly before 2 a.m. Wednesday, robbed a man at gunpoint and fled with a 'large sum of money,' said homicide detective Sgt. Larry Lewis.

"As the men ran to the getaway car, the resident fired at them with an AK-47 rifle, killing one and critically wounding another, police said. An abandoned car with the men inside was found a couple of blocks away. Police are trying to determine whether the armed men fired back at the resident. He was not injured."

What is it about nutbuckets and stop sign-defacing?

I found this anti-war message plastered on a stop sign in Donelson:


That sticker is of course a dig at conservatives who support the Iraq War. I wonder if the leftist nutbucket - let's be clear, only a leftist nutbucket would procure stickers featuring that simplistic, silly slogan - who put sticker to stop sign would agree that abortion is not pro-life? Of course not. Saying such a thing would place one in agreement with a tenet of modern conservatism (GASP!).

That said, if'n I wanted to go around defacing stop signs, I think I'd do so with this poster:


Reckon that'd get the nutbuckets riled up?!