Campaign 'Dirty Tricks,' Voter IDs And Ann Coulter's Dad

So, why would Old Media be squawking about campaign "dirty tricks" when they themselves are more guilty of dirty tricks than anyone else? Well, it's just the old leftist double standard at at work. Apparently, when Old Media comes up with something that hurts a GOP candidate, it is good journalism, but when someone comes up with something that hurts a Dem candidate, Old Media brands it as "dirty."

Writing for Accuracy In Media, Cliff Kincaid and Roger Aronoff have the following to say:

ABC reporter Brian Ross suggested that campaigns which expose other candidates' lies and deceptions are somehow engaging in dirty tricks. He cited the cases of Republicans helping expose Al Gore and John Kerry as liars. One case involved Gore, during a 2000 presidential debate with George W. Bush, making a false claim about flying with then FEMA director James Lee Witt to observe some oil fires in Texas. Ross said Gore had "walked into a trap" when he said that, and strongly implied that it was dirty politics to point out that he was lying. Gore, when confronted with the record, admitted the story was false the next day on Good Morning America. What is dirty about that? Another example of a supposedly dirty trick against Democrats was when a Republican operative had, in 2004, confidentially given Brian Ross a videotape of an interview with John Kerry from 1971, in which Kerry is seen saying, totally in proper context, that he had given back "six, seven, eight or nine" of his Vietnam medals, though he had been denying that on the campaign trail. Ross said ABC had verified the authenticity of the tape, and put it on the air. He then showed what he described as a "suspicious and angry Kerry" who accused ABC "correctly of using Republican material." But it wasn't Republican material, it was a videotape of a TV show that was given to them by a Republican operative. What is wrong with Republicans exposing Democratic lies?

Apparently nothing, unless you happen to be a leftist-leaning reporter pushing a leftist-leaning agenda rather than actually reporting news.

The article goes on:

Other cases cited by Ross involved good old-fashioned opposition research. All of these activities, including the distribution of videos of candidates making contradictory statements, are legitimate. What makes them possibly illegitimate is when the media focus on them to the exclusion of a serious discussion of substance and issues. The Washington Post, for example, ran a series of stories during the Virginia Senate contest about Republican George Allen getting caught on video using the term "Macaca" to describe a campaign worker for his opponent, Jim Webb. The Post constantly implied, without proof, that this was racist on Allen's part. Allen mishandled the controversy, in part by failing to adequately explain where the mysterious term had come from. In the end, the controversy prevented Allen from talking about legitimate campaign issues and was a major distraction. The coverage had the intended effect, from the point of view of the liberal Post. It helped elect Webb.

And Webb has turned out to be a liar himself. One of his beggest campaign promises was that he would never vote to raise taxes and Virginia believed him. On his first opportunity to vote on a possible tax increase, Webb decided to become a lapdog of the DNC rather than represent his constituents. He voted to approve of an $800 billion tax increase despite his promise not to do so.

So, the next time you hear Old Media complaining about "dirty tricks," it probably means that someone in the GOP did some pretty thorough research.

Who's Guilty Of Campaign Dirty Tricks?
Cliff Kincaid and Roger Aronoff
Accuracy In Media via GOPUSA.com
January 8, 2008

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Yesterday, the Supreme Court took up the issue of requiring voters to show proper identification before being allowed to vate. Personally, I think this is a good idea. It would help to prevent situations where people try to vote twice, try to vote in someone else's place or try to vote under a false name.

From Fox News:

On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear arguments challenging the Hoosier State’s controversial 2005 voter ID law. It’s the highest-profile Republican v. Democrat case to reach the high court since the infamous 2000 Bush v. Gore lawsuit that effectively decided that year’s presidential race. This case doesn’t have as much at stake, but has still managed to inflame the passions of political partisans even during this primary season. The law was passed on a party-line vote by a Republican-controlled legislature and signed into law by Governor Mitch Daniels — also a Republican. Those in favor of it argue that the law is necessary to help prevent election fraud at the polls. They also note that the Indiana law is one part of a nationwide trend since the controversial Florida ballot counting in 2000 to maintain and improve the integrity of the election process. And they say that the law effectively combats bloated voter registration lists that could be ripe for abuse

And that is the big issue, combating voter abuse. Opponents claim that it amounts to a new poll tax but that hasn't panned out since they have been completely unable to produce anyone who was actually barred from voting under the new law.

Here in Loudoun County, Virginia, we are required to show proper ID before voting and that is the way it should be.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Supreme Court To Hear Arguments Challenging Voter ID Law
Lee Ross
Fox News
January 8, 2008

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And finally, we note with sadness that Ann Coulter's father has passed away. Ann has written a very moving tribute to John Vincent Coulter:

Father hated puffery, pomposity, snobbery, fake friendliness, fake anything. Like Kitty's father in "Anna Karenina," he could detect a substanceless suitor in a heartbeat. (They were probably the same ones who looked nervous when I told them Father was ex-FBI and liked to shoot squirrels in the backyard.) He hated unions because of their corrupt leadership, ripping off the members for their own aggrandizement. But he had more respect for genuine working men than anyone I've ever known. He was, in short, the molecular opposite of John Edwards. Father didn't care what popular opinion was: There was right and wrong. I don't recall his ever specifically talking about J. Edgar Hoover or Joe McCarthy, but we knew he thought the popular histories were bunk. That's why "Treason" was dedicated to him, the last book of mine he was able to read. ... When Mother was in a rehabilitative facility briefly after surgery a few years ago and Father was not supposed to be driving, we were relieved that a snowstorm had knocked out the power to the garage door opener, so Daddy couldn't get to the car. It would just be a week and then Mother would be home. My brother came home to check on Father the first day of this arrangement to find that he had taken an ax to the side door of the garage, so he could drive to the rehab center and sit with Mother all day.

Mr. Coulter sounds like a very devoted man.

You can access the complete column on-line here:

John Vincent Coulter
Ann Coulter
AnnCoulter.com
January 9, 2008

Democrats In Denial About Iraq, MS-13 Strikes Again And Supreme Court Looks At Lethal Injections

Ever since MoveOn.org completely embarrassed the Democrats with their slanderous ad about General Patreus, the Dems have been very mum and quiet about the War on Terror, in particular, the pacifying of Iraq.

It is no secret that the surge strategy is working now and has been for several months. Where there used to be headline after headline about more U.S. troop deaths in Iraq, the headlines barely mention it anymore. In other words, "if it isn't bleeding, it isn't leading." Old Media will never make front page news out of a situation that appears to be going good, especially if such news makes a Conservative look good. Old Media will instead sniff out stories to make the Conservative look bad.

But they can no longer do that with Iraq. That's why the Dems are quiet. They don't want to admit that they were wrong and Presdient Bush, under advisement of his military commanders, was right.

According to the Review & Outlook section of the Wall Street Journal:

Across the political spectrum, observers have announced the surge a success. This achievement must be a source of enormous pride to the U.S. soldiers and Marines who have pulled it off. So what we take away from the four Democratic Presidential candidates' stunning display of misinformation and false statements about the surge Saturday evening is that they have simply stopped thinking about Iraq. They seem to have concluded that opposition to the war permits them to literally not know what the U.S. or the Iraqis are doing there. As the nation commences the selection of an American President, this is a phenomenon worth noting.

What Barack Obama said is most noteworthy here:

His first assertion echoed what has become a standard line by the war's opponents, that "we have not made ourselves safer as a consequence." What can this possibly mean? In more than six years there hasn't been one successful terrorist attack on the U.S., even as places elsewhere were hit or actively targeted. Then Senator Obama placidly said that the Sunnis in Anbar Province began to help the U.S. "after the Democrats were elected in 2006." What's more, the Democrats' victory showed them they were "going to be left very vulnerable to the Shias." This obviously means the Democrats would abandon them. But the Sunni Awakening, as it is called, with its fall in bloodshed, occurred only after the Anbar Sunnis were convinced that the U.S. troops would not abandon them to al Qaeda in Iraq. Sunni sheiks have said explicitly it was the new U.S. policy of sustaining the offensive against AQI that made it possible for them to resist the jihadists. The U.S. military has supported the spread of these "awakening councils" in other areas of Iraq. It is navel-gazing in the extreme for Mr. Obama to suggest U.S. Congressional elections caused this turn.

Perhaps someone out there will remind B. Hussein Obama that his own leader in the Senate, Democrat Harry Reid of Nevada, was all over the national news screaming, "The war is lost!"

If Obama honestly believes that such an attitude caused the changes in Anbar, then surely the Senator will purchase a bridge is Brooklyn that I have for sale.

More:

Governor Bill Richardson, who touts his foreign policy credentials, in the space of a minute made five false statements about Iraq. He asserted "zero" internal reconciliation, "zero" progress on sharing oil revenue, "zero" regional elections, "no" increased effort by the government to train their own security forces and "no" effort to push back against Iran. One can certainly question what the Iraqis have done in all these areas, but to reduce the last year to a nullity isn't worthy of a serious candidate. "If you look at what happened in Iraq," said John Edwards, you'll see that violence fell after the British withdrew from "where those troops were located." This is precisely the opposite of what happened. The Brits were located in southern Basra province, and their drawdown began last month after what U.K. Foreign Secretary David Miliband at the handover ceremony called a "massive" decline in insurgent activity. Mr. Edwards's view that a troop pullout will reduce Iraq's violence is unique among public figures anywhere. In different ways one can explain the views of these three. Senator Obama seems to be talking his way toward believing that eloquence and credibility are the same thing; Mr. Edwards's campaign is aggressively parochial in its interests; and Bill Richardson used the debate Saturday to blow up the remnants of his campaign.

The Dems need a serious reality check.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Democrats In Denial
Wall Street Journal
January 8, 2008

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And in a previous blog entry, we saw how Mara Salvatrucha, aka MS-13, defaced a Vietnam Veterans War memorial in Connecticut. It seems as though they have struck again.

From the World Net Daily:

Authorities in New Haven, Conn., have launched an investigation into the establishment of the radically violent MS-13 street gang in their city after a second case of apparently gang-related vandalism within a week. ... "This irks me. This hurts me deep to my heart," Vietnam Army veteran Emery Linton Sr. told the station then. Linton, who served in Vietnam from 1969 to 1972, noted he lost friends there and called the mess on the memorial a slap in the face to veterans who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country. "People here respect these names. They gave their lives for everything, for the freedoms they have," Linton said. As WND reported, the El Salvador-based MS-13 operates in 44 U.S. states, according to the FBI. WND reported as early as 1995 the gang reportedly was meeting with representatives of al-Qaida and smuggling operatives into the United States from Mexico.

It should be especially noted here that New Haven, Connecticut is a sanctuary city that provides illegal aliens with driver's licenses so they can access public services at the taxpayer's expense.

And exactly how long will we continue turning our heads in the opposite direction?

You can access the complete article on-line here:

MS-13 Hits Vietnam Vets' Memorial Again
World Net Daily
January 8, 2008

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Finally, we have the Supreme Court looking into the issue of whether or not execution by lethal injection causes pain for the condemned. Check this out:

Several justices indicated a willingness to preserve the three-drug cocktail that is authorized by three dozen states that allow executions. Such a decision would allow lethal injections, on hold since late September, to resume quickly. Justice Antonin Scalia said states have been careful to adopt procedures that do not seek to inflict pain and should not be barred from carrying out executions even if prison officials sometimes make mistakes in administering drugs. "There is no painless requirement" in the Constitution, Scalia said. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito also indicated their support for the states' procedures. Other members of the court, who have raised questions about lethal injection in the past, said they are bothered by the procedures used in Kentucky and elsewhere in which three drugs are administered in succession to knock out, paralyze and kill prisoners. The argument against the three-drug protocol is that if the initial anesthetic does not take hold, a third drug that stops the heart can cause excruciating pain. The second drug, meanwhile, paralyzes the prisoner, rendering him unable to express his discomfort. "I'm terribly troubled by the fact that the second drug is what seems to cause all the risk of excruciating pain, and seems to be almost totally unnecessary," said Justice John Paul Stevens.

I'm terribly troubled by the fact that these murderers caused excrutiating pain to their victims and the victims' families but libs only have feelings for the murderers, not the murdered.

I thought libs were supposed to be sensitive people.

You can access the complete article on-line here:

Justices Divided Over Lethal Injections
Mark Sherman
Associated Press via GOPUSA.com
January 8, 2008