***UPDATE - While Bernie's site is still down, local NBC affiliate WPTZ has details on Willie Nelson stumping for Bernie.***

At the moment Bernie's campaign site, Bernie.org, is down so I can't go there and get you a direct link to the Willie Nelson ad, if it's even online. I saw the commercial just the other day and I'm not sure that it was ever on Bernie.org to begin with, but it's a safe assumption that it was because most campaign sites feature the TV ads and additional web ads. I fear that this new Willie news may have caused them to remove it by the time the site comes back up.

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - Country singer-songwriter Willie Nelson and several fellow musicians were charged with misdemeanor drug possession by Louisiana police after a search of their tour bus on Monday turned up marijuana and psychedelic mushrooms.

State Police seized about 1-1/2 pounds (0.7 kg) of marijuana and two-tenths of a pound (91 grams) of mushrooms from the bus, Williams said.

Nelson and four other passengers on the bus were cited for possession and released, while the driver had his commercial driving privileges suspended in addition to being cited for possession. Nelson faces possible jail time of up to six months and an unspecified fine, police said.

More to come hopefully, once Bernie's site is back up... Plus I hope to post the new Rich Tarrant ads, probably in a separate post, but they are currently available at BerniesRecord.com. Pretty damning ads. For previous posts with Tarrant's "Bernie's Record" ads, see here and here.

Here's a classic I just dug up on YouTube. I think it's a couple months old, but just recently uploaded.

 

*UPDATE - LOCAL COVERAGE - Burlington Free Press Sets The Stage*

Republican Richard Tarrant made quick work of two rivals in his party’s Senate primary Tuesday and will face off against independent Bernie Sanders in what is already the most expensive race in the state’s history.

Tarrant was leading his closest rival, retired Air Force Lt. Col. Greg Parke, by nearly a 2-1 margin at 10:20 p.m. when Parke called him to concede the race. Cris Ericson, a third candidate in the GOP primary, trailed far behind.

“It looks very positive,” Tarrant told cheering supporters at his Colchester campaign headquarters earlier in the evening. “We’re in pretty good shape.”

Sanders easily won a five-way race in the Democratic primary Tuesday, the first time he has let his name be on the Democratic ballot. He said he’ll decline the Democratic nomination today under an agreement he made with the party in January. Sanders will appear on the November ballot as an independent.

“I am an independent and proud to be an independent,” Sanders said after greeting supporters at his campaign headquarters in downtown Burlington. “But I have worked very closely with the Democrats and will be a part of their coordinated campaign.”

The looming contest between Sanders and Tarrant is expected to be heated and expensive. Sanders led Tarrant by 21 percentage points in the most recent statewide poll.

Rich Tarrant and Socialist Congressman Bernie Sanders both won their primaries tonight, making official the Senate race that we all knew was coming and one that Bernie should fear due to the obvious and shocking amount of support for the Republican Tarrant (or maybe it's just support against Bernie).

(Montpelier - AP) - Congressman Bernard Sanders and businessman Richard Tarrant breezed to victory Tuesday in their U.S. Senate primaries, setting the stage for a general election battle to replace retiring US Senator James Jeffords.

Sanders, who has said he plans to run as an independent in the November 7th general election, captured 94 percent of the vote with 61 percent of the precincts reporting, coasting past his four opponents in the Democratic primary.

Tarrant, meanwhile, took a 63-33 lead over Greg Parke in the GOP primary, with 62 percent of precincts reporting.
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

Previous:
VIDEOS: VT Senate Candidate Bernie Sanders Is Anti-Intelligence
VIDEO: Bernie Sanders - Against Amber Alert & Child Porn Laws. For Visas For Drug Dealers.

HotAir is live blogging primaries across the country tonight... (h/t Malkin)

*UPDATE*
Tarrant actually cast his ballot in the gym of my old high school:

 

Mwahahahahaha mwahahahaha.... mwah haha..... ha.............. ha.

Liberals better get with the baby makin' sense 8 out of 10 kids grows up and votes the way their parents do, and conservatives are pumping out 41% more children than liberals. Game over libs.

Via The Political Grapevine on Special Report with Brit Hume:

Liberal efforts to get out the youth vote are finding fewer and fewer young Democrats to entice to the polls — all because of the politics of reproduction.

Syracuse professor Arthur Brooks writes in The Wall Street Journal that conservative families are currently producing 41 percent more offspring than liberal ones. Since 80 percent of people grow up to vote the same way as their parents, that "fertility gap" is producing significantly more young Republicans than Democrats.

What's more, Brooks says the gap is widening by more than half a point per year, meaning that even liberal states like California could be decidedly conservative in a decade.

That sound you're all hearing is the sound of liberals screaming "WHAT HAVE WE DONE!?", questioning their pro-abortion stance all these years.

The best part about this is not just getting Republicans elected, but it means less drain on the economy due to overspending on welfare, etc. It means personal responsibility. It means less crime. It means less of everything that is liberal simply because liberals and their "values" (chuckle) will become a smaller and smaller percentage of the country.

***UPDATE***
I just dug up the article, and see a lot of other bloggers beat me to this yesterday.

While I think all the liberal "get out the youth vote" campaigns like MTV's "Vote or Die" fail because they're targeting a bunch of spoiled, lazy, stoner college kids (not to mention that any self respecting person over 18 watches MTV), Brooks believes that this "fertility gap" has been the liberals' worst enemy:

But the data on young Americans tell a different story. Simply put, liberals have a big baby problem: They're not having enough of them, they haven't for a long time, and their pool of potential new voters is suffering as a result. According to the 2004 General Social Survey, if you picked 100 unrelated politically liberal adults at random, you would find that they had, between them, 147 children. If you picked 100 conservatives, you would find 208 kids. That's a "fertility gap" of 41%. Given that about 80% of people with an identifiable party preference grow up to vote the same way as their parents, this gap translates into lots more little Republicans than little Democrats to vote in future elections. Over the past 30 years this gap has not been below 20%--explaining, to a large extent, the current ineffectiveness of liberal youth voter campaigns today.

Brooks goes on to give examples of what this might mean for future elections:

Alarmingly for the Democrats, the gap is widening at a bit more than half a percentage point per year, meaning that today's problem is nothing compared to what the future will most likely hold. Consider future presidential elections in a swing state (like Ohio), and assume that the current patterns in fertility continue. A state that was split 50-50 between left and right in 2004 will tilt right by 2012, 54% to 46%. By 2020, it will be certifiably right-wing, 59% to 41%. A state that is currently 55-45 in favor of liberals (like California) will be 54-46 in favor of conservatives by 2020--and all for no other reason than babies.

And while I thought I was done excerpting, I just can't leave this paragraph out:

The fertility gap doesn't budge when we correct for factors like age, income, education, sex, race--or even religion. Indeed, if a conservative and a liberal are identical in all these ways, the liberal will still be 19 percentage points more likely to be childless than the conservative. Some believe the gap reflects an authentic cultural difference between left and right in America today. As one liberal columnist in a major paper graphically put it, "Maybe the scales are tipping to the neoconservative, homogenous right in our culture simply because they tend not to give much of a damn for the ramifications of wanton breeding and environmental destruction and pious sanctimony, whereas those on the left actually seem to give a whit for the health of the planet and the dire effects of overpopulation." It would appear liberals have been quite successful controlling overpopulation--in the Democratic Party.

So it seems that liberals can't argue that the facts are wrong here, so they resort to the old pro-abortion talking points. Don't think that overpopulation line is anything but an invitation to a free baby killing party at your local planned parenthood. It's a message that the UN is very friendly with, particularly UNFPA (UN Population Fund) as well as many professors and lobby groups (scroll until you see the name Pianka, and read from there). Luckily for us the UN hopes to take control of the planet and stop all this scary "global warming" and overbreeding. Our saviors (sigh).

The Logical Lifeline further realizes why Dems are so anxious to get as many illegal immigrants in the country as possible, and then give them voting rights (liberals who might choose to comment, please don't make me dig up the links to prove that this is on the Dem agenda. If you care enough to comment, then you should care enough to already know this).

OTHERS:
GOP Bloggers, Ankle Biting Pundits, American Papist, Anywhere But Here, Kruse Kronicle, NixGuy, Don Sattic, Moore Thoughts, The Bullwinkle Blog

 

I am really not that interested in Democratic primaries, but I thought I'd pass interested readers along to HotAir and Michelle Malkin's coverage. (h/t Expose the Left).

Allah and Ian at HotAir liveblogged the events, and have videos for you including Liebeman's concession speech.

All I would like to say is that you should consider what today's Lamont victory says about the modern Democratic party. That they have been completely taken over by the far left (see my earlier post on Dean hosting a $10,000/plate dinner at Soros's house for more). Lieberman is as liberal as anyone, except he has the courage to stand by his convictions and previous statements, and not change his mind with each shift in the polls.

CNN reports that McKinney, in her concession speech, praised "leftist leaders" in Cuba and Venezuela, but stops it at that:

Despite her defeat, McKinney was unbowed, unleashing a stemwinder of a concession speech in which she barely mentioned her opponent but praised leftist leaders in Cuba and Venezuela, took aim at the efficacy of electronic voting machines and offered several swipes at the media.

One can only assume that the "leftist leaders" are Castro and Chavez, but why wouldn't CNN just use the names? I suppose it's possible that she didn't refer to them specifically. But if she did (as is a reasonable assumption) name the two men, could it be because CNN knows the stigma that comes with those names, and they don't want to reveal the increasing number of Democrats coming out of the woodwork that sympathize with Castro and Chavez? I don't know, mabye I'm being cynical, but we do already know of CNN's bias and I can't think of any reason why they would just say "leftist leaders" rather than name names, unless the "leftist leaders" refers to people other than Castro and Chavez.

 

Karl Rove expressed confidence for the GOP in this year's elections, in a speech give at the American Enterprise Institute. There was no mention, however, of the indictments that TruthOut and the left have been claming came down this weekend.

Drudge Flash

ROVE: 'WE'RE IN A SOUR TIME. I READILY ADMIT IT.' THU May 15 2006 12:29:11 ET

Ater speaking at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington D.C. on Monday Morning Karl Rove took questions:

QUESTION: It's clear that the position that the administration's in now is not where it would have liked to have been with a few months to go before the mid-term elections. I wonder if you could just say what has gone wrong and how do you turn things around before November.

ROVE: Look, we're in a sour time. I readily admit it.

I mean, being in the middle of a war where people turn on their television sets and see brave men and women dying is not something that makes people happy and optimistic and upbeat.

But I'm absolutely confident that -- I heard this same kind of language about the 2004 elections in roughly the March, April, May, June period of June 2004.

We're going to be just fine in the fall elections.

And we're going to be fine because we stand for things that are important. We stand for strong natural defense abroad and complete victory in the war on terrorism which involves victory in Iraq.

We stand for a strong national defense. We stand for economic policies that are pro-growth, involving tax cuts and free trade. We are strongly for fiscal restraint in the budget process.

And our opponents, at this point, stand for little or nothing, except mere obstructionism. Whether it is the nomination of superbly qualified men and women to the judiciary, or our policies to reauthorize the Patriot Act to keep America safe in a time of global terror, the other party seems to stand for little except obstructionism.

And ultimately, the American people are a center-right country, who, presented with a center-right party with center-right candidates, will vote center-right.

Developing...

 

It's too bad I'm moving out of Nashville on May 21, because I'll miss a big "Hillary for President" push on May 23. Wish I could have been their to photograph the lost souls for you all.

A movement to draft Hillary Rodham Clinton to run for president aims to prove Democrats can win in Southern states, and that's why they're launching their national campaign in Nashville later this month.

The group, called Hillarynow.com, thinks she can appeal to the country-music and NASCAR-loving crowd associated with Southern towns such as Nashville, said Bob Kunst, the Miami Beach-based organizer.

Of course this is an insane dream, which is why Hillary isn't involved, and just a bunch of out of touch supporters think they're on to something. All I can say is that if they convince Hillary that this is an angle she needs to work, I would learn from DNC Chairman Dean's mistakes and steer clear of using lines like:

"I still want to be the candidate for guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks,"

Not only with those Confederate flag wavers see through your pandering BS, but then you'll have to answer to the shakedown brothers and all their millions of followers when they call for a public apology for your racially insensitive remarks.

Also, if she's truly hoping to score some votes in the south, she might also choose a better line than the last Democratic Presidential Candidate (Kerry):

"I would rather be the candidate of the NAACP than the NRA,"

"The whole point is to go where we're not expected," Kunst said.

The national kickoff will be a May 23 fundraiser for Hillarynow.com at a Germantown coffee shop, Enchanted Gingerbread. About 200 Tennesseans are expected to attend, Kunst said.

Hillarynow.com bills itself as the oldest and most active organization in support of her presidency. Another group, votehillary.org, is based in Chester, Va.

Hillarynow.com has raised about $35,000 and has between 10,000 and 15,000 people who have signed up online to support Clinton as the nation's first woman president, Kunst said.

These people ought to rethink where they want to invest their energy. Poll after poll shows that we don't want Hillary. Remember the Gallup poll that showed 51% definitely wouldn't vote for her, and only 16% definitely would? Rasmussen has an updated version that seems a little better (h/t GOP BLoggers), but still not great, and of course the questions are always asked differently from poll to poll. Add that to the fact that polls continue to show her getting destroyed by Republican hopefuls John McCain and Rudy Giuliani.

And no article on Hillary's possible run for the presidency would be complete with out the obligatory "Commander in Chief" reference:

"I think we've started to condition ourselves to the idea of having a woman president," said O'Hanlon, who cited as one factor the television show "Commander in Chief," which stars Geena Davis as the nation's first female president. ABC this week yanked the drama from its May lineup.

Proving my point that this failure of a show was created for no other purpose than to "condition" us for a Hillary run. For more on the show's failure and how idiotic the "it's time for a woman" crowd is, see my earlier post.

If you didn't already think this whole southern Hillary draft was ridiculous, perhaps you'd like to know what sort of activities the organizer has been involved in recently:

Kunst, an activist on many issues, has shown up in Tennessee before, once to protest the United States' embargo against Cuba and another time to attend "Gay Day" in Rhea County. •

Read the rest of the Tennessean article here.

As always, I have to add that I hope Hill does get the nomination, because as far as we can tell at this point, she seems as unelectable as Dean.

 

Visit VanTaylor.com | Why This Matters
Support a conservative Iraq vet for Congress. Put this graphic on your blog:

I received an email from Jordan Powell, who volunteers for the Van Taylor campaign looking for a bit more exposure for a Van Taylor campaign fund drive.

Learn more about Iraq War veteran Van Taylor on the about page of his site, and find out why he wants to Represent Texas on a national level. You can learn more about his conservative values, and what issues he finds most important at this page. A sample:

•Cutting taxes on families and small business
•Eliminating wasteful spending
•Promoting traditional families
•Securing our borders against illegal aliens and terrorists
•Defending 2nd Amendment Rights
•Supporting our troops as they win the War on Terror and take care of veterans

Sounds like a guy who holds the values of the conservative base, that many in Washington have lost in recent years. If you can, help Van Taylor defeat Democratic incumbent Chet Edwards by donating now

 

h/t Drudge

U.S. Newswire via Yahoo! News

To: Assignment Desk, Political Reporter, Daybook Editor

Contact: Elliott Jacobson, 202-558-6394 or 202-460-8340 (cell) for Gravel for President 2008

News Advisory:

Former United States senator Mike Gravel (D-Alaska, 1969-1980) will announce his candidacy for the Democratic Nomination for President of the United States.

WHEN: Monday, April 17, 10 a.m. EDT

WHERE: The National Press Club, Zenger Room, 13th Floor, 529 14th St., N.W., Washington, D.C. 20045

Paid for by Mike Gravel for President 2008

Drudge has much more here. Apparently this is the earliest filing on record:

NEW YORK -- Mike Gravel, a former U.S. senator from Alaska, will next week become the first Democrat to formally declare his candidacy for president.

Nearly two years before the Iowa caucuses kick off the presidential campaign, Gravel will announce his bid to become the Democratic White House hopeful at a news conference Monday at the National Press Club in Washington. He will file his papers today with the Federal Election Commission.

It is believed to be the earliest in a campaign season that anyone has ever filed to be a candidate for president.

more....

Anyway, Mike who?

 

Well, I guess it had been a few hours since we'd heard anything unthinkably idiotic, so a newly elected village council member in Tequesta, Florida decided it was time to make a name for himself by refusing to take his oath of office because there is a line that is in support of the government of the United States!!! Wow, if this guy keeps this kind of behavior up, there may be a place for him in the DNC!

Below is the entire article via AP by way of floridatoday.com:

TEQUESTA, Fla. - A newly elected village council member is suing the municipality to have the oath of office declared unconstitutional because it supports the federal government, something he says he does not do.

Basil E. Dalack, 76, an appellate lawyer, also wants the words "and government" removed from the section that reads, "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support, protect and defend the Constitution and government of the United States and of the state of Florida." The lawsuit was filed last week in federal court.

The oath violates the Constitution by placing a restraint on Dalack's right to free speech and denies him, without due process, occupancy of his elective office, the lawsuit states.

Dalack said if he reads the oath, he would be a blind supporter of the war in Iraq and of the Bush administration and he would have "the blood of all those Iraqi and American kids on my hands."

He is scheduled to be sworn in Thursday, but he has told Village Manager Michael Couzzo Jr. that he will not say the current version of the oath.

"No citizen of the Unites States should be required to swear to support the government, which is the (Bush) administration," said Dalack, who served in the Army in Korea during the Korean War. "Those kids in Iraq died only because of George Bush, and I will not swear to support a government with immoral and unlawful policies."

First off, how did such an idiot get elected to begin with? I mean, you could say he concealed the looniness during the election, but I would think anyone this stupid has trouble hiding it.

Now Basil, it doesn't mean you are supporting President Bush or the Iraq war, or anything else. It simply means you support your country! Smarten up! On second though, I suspect this whole thing is a publicity stunt because he knows this will reach the ears of DNC folks and he knows that far left nuts are running the party now, so he might be hoping to make a big jump in his political career. He could just be an idiot though, who knows.

What I do know is that saying, "Those kids in Iraq died only because of George Bush, and I will not swear to support a government with immoral and unlawful policies, is about as stupid as it gets. Unlawful? Bring the charges bud? Immoral... Well, I could rant for hours on the Democratic party.. Let's skip to how this is "only because of George Bush"... Really? Check the record for who actually voted for the war dude... I was going to go further but this nobody isn't really worth the time right now...

But just to jump back to why I posted this at all - It's just another example of the idiotic behavior we have out of the left in this country. Stop being stupid and just do the job you were elected to do. We already have all the Democrats in Congress sitting on their hands screaming "I hate Bush" in response to anything and any bill that comes their way, insisting they have a plan, but never saying what it is because they don't have one, and the only time they get up is to show up at illegal immigrant rallies to promise them citizenship. Enough of our time and money is being wasted in Washington, do little nobodies like this guy need to be wasting people's time with political stunts too?

 

This was one of the best moments in cable news debate television I've seen in a while, and thankfully Ian at Expose the Left got it. I emailed Ian earlier and as always he came through.

Tony Snow was filling in for Bill O'Reilly on Fox News Channel's The O'Reilly Factor last night, and had a segment on President Bush's terrible poll numbers, the 2006 elections, and a number of other related issues. Kellyanne Conway was the guest on the right, and Jenny Backus was the guest from the left. I caught this on the late re-airing of the Factor which comes on at 3:00 AM here, and wasn't expecting the treat I wound up getting.

Basically the debate is the normal back and forth, nothing new... but as the interview draws to a close Kellyanne backhands Jenny Backus with this line:

"....The fact is that you can't beat somebody with nobody. And what's really hampering and handicapping the Democrats right now is that you are physically unable to complete a sentence about your own vision without mentioning George Bush a thousand times..."

Then they sort of talk over eachother for a minute, and Backus thinks she scores a winner by basically doing nothing but mentioning that Kerry did some fund raising for budding politicians. So what?

That's where the fun starts.. Here's the partial transcript from Ian at Expose the left.

KELLYANNE CONWAY: What is your message?

TONY SNOW: Yeah, Jane, What’s the winning idea?

JENNY BACKUS: The winning idea is that we need change in Washington; we need people who will make government work for the American people, not people who will let the Homeland Security Department [inaudible]

SNOW: What’s the idea?

BACKUS: The idea is to, uh, uh, fund our troops so they can have the armor they need to win in Iraq.

CONWAY: Oh speaking about John Kerry, ‘I was for the $80 billion before I voted against it’.

BACKUS: Well the idea, the idea, on Iraq is to make sure we have oversight. That is why we need change in this election is that this Congress is not keeping an eye on the budget. There is millions of dollars being misspent through Halliburton in Iraq, we have got to get our troops home.

SNOW: Kellyanne, final word.

CONWAY: Yeah, I actually feel better than about these approval ratings because Jenny is one of the smartest strategists in the Democratic Party and that’s the best they can come up in terms of a message. They’re missing the point of the Contract with America; which had this positive proactive agenda that never mentioned Clinton or the Democrats; it just said here’s what we’re going to do. You’ve guys got to purge Bush and Republicans from your vocabulary, you’ll do better.

BACKUS: Change, change, change.

Now of course we expected the obligatory "voted for, before I voted against" jab, but beyond that look at what Backus says. And please don't just read this transcript, you can't even come close to getting the effect unless you watch the video.

I've commented on the post at Expose the Left and I don't know if I can say it better than I already did (except I'm fixing my typo here):

I just can’t get over how awesome it was to see someone ask a Democratic strategist the obvious question in reaction to their anti-Bush rant, and have her look like such a confused deer in the headlines headlights. It was like she was shocked that anyone would ever actually inquire as to what plans they have. “Uh, uh… uh… wait, that wasn’t in the talking points I studied before I came on… uh Halliburton…. oversight…. HEY, LOOK OVER THERE!” (running footsteps and door slamming) cut back to split screen where there is an empty chair where Backus once sat.

Okay, I went a bit overboard there.. but I was almost expecting it as I saw this go down… Boy is she lucky the segment ended though.

Anyway, it's hilarious, but only watching the video gives you the full effect. How is "we need oversight", "fund the troops", and bashing Halliburton a plan or idea? Notice at points when they're talking over eachother she reverts back to digs at the administration again (listen close)... Just propose how you intend to improve one single issue. And "we'd do it better" and "time for a change" doesn't cut it! Will you be proud of yourselves if you win elections simply because, aided by your media, you bashed the oppositions poll numbers in to the ground and won by default? Because that's really about the only reason you'll win anything.

I hate to be repeatative but I just can't emphasize enough what a great piece of television this is. Backus even reinforces what the right says about her party at the end by saying "change, change, change". Again, THAT'S NOT A PLAN OR IDEA! I feel like yelling because it's like she doesn't understand the simple question... Of course the reality is that it's just she shares the dishonesty that most Democrats have, and can't answer the question that couldn't be any more clear, so she plays dumb and recites talking points.

One more time watch the video. Uh...uh... Priceless.

UPDATE

There's a bit of debating beginning over at Expose the Left. A commenter, "Clay", made some idiotic comments, that I think I did a good job of blasting, and it again outlines the NON-plans of these Democrats:

Clay:

I’ll find a site where she lays out a strategy SHE thinks would work, because right and left wingers should know that a show on FOX news shouldn’t encapsulate the entire Democratic parties message.

Democrats do have a plan, the thing is, not all of them can agree on it, what the Dems need to do in 08 is pick a candidate who’s true the the Democratic message, because what the people want is anything but more Republicans.

1. Get us out of Iraq and move to Afghanistan.

2. Get us out of the 8 trillion dollar debt (3 trillion a year deficet I think I saw on the last budget meeting) – Fiscal conservative my ass.

3. Provide more public needs for the people of America. We all need healthcare, we all want better and more accessible schools (cutting loans and just about everything else doesn’t promote smarter Americans).

Democrats need to get back to the base, not just left-of-center candidates.

And I’ll find a site where she lays out a plan.

my reply:

whoa.. don’t know how I missed this before.. the first comment

clay
1. Get us out of Iraq and move to Afghanistan.

2. Get us out of the 8 trillion dollar debt (3 trillion a year deficet I think I saw on the last budget meeting) – Fiscal conservative my ass.

3. Provide more public needs for the people of America. We all need healthcare, we all want better and more accessible schools (cutting loans and just about everything else doesn’t promote smarter Americans).

You’re doing EXACTLY what Backus did… Maybe you guys are really just that insane that you don’t get that those ARE NOT PLANS! If they are then I’ve got plans for you:

1. Everyone in America should retire a billionaire.

2. There shouldn’t be such thing as disease.

3. No one should commit crimes.

Now of course those aren’t plans, those are things that we wish for, but they aren’t a means to those ends… But they are akin to all these “plans” you nutjobs come up with. This is why John Kerry lost the election. The media all but did Bush in, but Kerry kept saying he had a plan for every issue, but no one has a clue what a single one was!

Saying “we’d like to see XYZ happen” doesn’t constitute a plan… AM I GETTING THROUGH TO YOU LEFTIES! I shouldn’t be tipping you guys off, you’re obvoiusly stupid enough to think that the public will buy this bologna, I should just let you continue on like this.

 

h/t Right Wing News

HAha, this is hilarious... I guess desperate times call for desperate measures, like when you're the Democratic party and your chairman Howard Dean has blown all the little money you had.

From a "personal fundraising" page on Democrats.org comes this latest panhandling attempt (reminds me of when Air America was failing so early that they began begging for donations on the air. Perhaps Franken will explain to the Democratic Party how to steal money from Boys and Girls Clubs before it's too late.)

Anyway, see this at Democrats.org if you need the confirmation (screen shot below as well):

Atheists for Democrats!

Atheists for Democrats!

Step up to the plate!

I'm sick of talking about how quickly this country is headed toward a theocracy. I want to do something.

Contributing money to fund Democratic candidates is one of the best ways we can make a difference.

I'm looking for a $1000 BAT. To find out how to create your own, read this.

The bat is a symbol that will forever be associated with Governor Howard Dean and the hundreds of thousands of Americans who during his presidential run first came to understand the power ordinary people contributing $20 or $50 could have when they act together.

That campaign is over, but the impact of "the bat" and the ideas of empowerment and personal responsibility in our political process continues to grow.

We can only build our party everywhere and compete in elections for every level of office if each one of us takes responsibility for making it happen. Your contribution will help me reach my goal -- but more importantly, it will help us build a party that can fight for our common values and restore a government accountable to the people.

I don't really know what else to say, this is just simply hilarious and pathetic. Yeah Atheist For Democrats! Step up to the plate! You've got a real winner on yer hands nutjobs. First of all, a "theocracy"? Yeah, when the 10 Commandments are getting booted out of the public square. When ACLU groups are running wild and trying to change everything including the names of towns like Las Cruces ("the Crosses"), NM. A time when the dogma of Darwin is a government endorsed religion, despite lack of evidence and public support. Setting aside creationism and intelligent design, ANY criticism of the theory of evolution are even being banned in public schools. Is that the theocracy you're talking about bud?

Darwin would be proud of you. Don't be surprised if you get "naturally selected" right out of existence in the next generation if you continue to be so nutty. You know you're scared, the very existence of the modern Democratic Party hangs in the balance. What are you going to do if you lose in 2006, and then again in 2008. Pack it up folks. Others have noted that it's really sad to see what you've become because we need a two party system... but with your behavior over the past few years, we'd definitely be better off without the modern Democratic Party. It's truly terrifying to think about you being in power.

More:
GOP Bloggers, Expose The Left

 

Do we expect anything else from the Howard Dean run DNC? "I hate Republicans" they're "evil", ""The idea that we're going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong", "Republicans are "a pretty monolithic party. They all behave the same. They all look the same. It's pretty much a white Christian party" (to name a few)... So are we surprised at this campaign? I'm not, but that doesn't make it okay.

Now I'm sure there are some libs that would try to compare my photoshops and such to these sort of comments. Well first of all, mine are clearly jokes. Secondly, IM NOT THE RNC! I know, I know - no one has pointed fingers at me yet. But I've seen it in the past. Whenever the Democratic party does something shameful, they point to right wing web sites to justify it, because they have no argument if they tried to say the RNC engages in this sort of behavior. Anyway, it won't probably even come to that in this case because the MSM will never report it, so they won't have to defend themselves.

Drudge Report Exclusive:

DEMS UNVEIL '08 MESSAGE: 'YOU'RE FAT!' Tue Feb 14 2006 08:28:55 ET

**Exclusive**

THE DRUDGE REPORT has obtained an email sent Monday evening by Democratic National Committee (DNC) research director Devorah Adler that contains ten opposition research packets on potential 2008 GOP presidential contenders.

In one packet titled “Newt Gingrich: 08 Watch February 2006” a picture of the former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R-GA) appears with --- him holding two full plates of food!

The quote underneath the Gingrich photo reads “In His Own Words: Gingrich’s Solution To Childhood Obesity: ‘Turn off the TV, cut the fatty diet and get exercise.’ [AP, 2/8/06]”

The ten Republicans picked by the Democrat Party include: Sen. George Allen (R-VA), Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS), Sen. Bill Frist (R-TN), Gingrich, Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R-NY), Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-AR), Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), Gov. George Pataki (R-NY) and Gov. Mitt Romney (R-MA).

One Republican strategist who had seen the opposition research packets said: 'We should expect nothing less than name-calling and referring to one’s political opponents as ‘fat’ from Howard Dean’s Democrat Party.'

Developing...

 

First it became publically known that Senate Dems had told Dean to tone it down when immediately after getting his new job he came out saying the most hateful and divisive things one could imagine. It's been clear that this has happened at least one other time, only it wasn't admitted publicly like the first time.

We've all known that the the DNC hasn't been able to keep up fund raising with the RNC throughout the time Dean has held this position. Some already took note earlier this month. But the new story is that he's getting a scoldin' from his peeps. I can only hope they are to stupid to fire him. He has been the gift that keeps on giving for Republicans, and you probably already know, even though I live in Nashville, I was born and raised in Vermont and take a lot of pleasure it mocking this guy.

via Drudge:

DEAN UNDER FIRE FROM PARTY DEMS; NEARLY ALL CASH SPENT Mon Jan 30 2006 10:52:31 ET

Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill are privately bristling over Howard Dean’s management of the Democratic National Committee and have made those sentiments clear after new fundraising numbers showed he has spent nearly all the committee’s cash and has little left to support their efforts to gain seats this cycle, ROLL CALL reports.

Congressional leaders were furious last week when they learned the DNC has just $5.5 million in the bank, compared to the Republican National Committee’s $34 million.

Senate and House Minority Leaders Harry Reid (Nev.) and Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), along with the Senate and House campaign committee chairmen Charles Schumer (N.Y.) and Rahm Emanuel (Ill.), have made their concerns -- directly or indirectly -- known to Dean, claims the paper.

Emanuel was particularly upset last week upon seeing the latest DNC numbers.

“A lot of people are scratching their heads as to what’s going on,” said one senior Democratic aide.

Another Democratic source familiar with the party fundraising apparatus said there is “obvious displeasure” among the leaders.

Developing...

John Kerry: (sigh) Where'd the money go Howard?

Howard Dean: These haircuts don't pay for themselves John!!!

Anyway, isn't it great to watch the Democratic Party fall apart before your eyes?

 

(scroll for update)

A new Fox News-Opinion Dynamics poll completely contradicts an AP-Ipsos poll on the same topic. This is suspicious to say the least. You might recall an AP-Ipsos poll out just a couple days ago, that supposedly said that Americans didn't support the NSA monitoring electronic communications between people in the US and suspected terrorists overseas:

56 percent of respondents in an AP-Ipsos poll said the government should be required to first get a court warrant to eavesdrop on the overseas calls and e-mails of U.S. citizens when those communications are believed to be tied to terrorism.

Agreeing with the White House, some 42 percent of those surveyed do not believe the court approval is necessary.

You'll recall, I was immediately skeptical (read original post, and comments) of the results because they would have meant that Americans were "either idiots, misinformed, dishonest, or had their answers manipulated by a poll with shady questioning methods." I was leaning more towards tricky questions, and maybe some misinformation. Any honest person would have to admit that the media hasn't portrayed this situation honestly from the get go, and we already know the history of misleading poll taking from the MSM. I wanted to see the exact questions from that poll, but I never did.

Here's the difference with the Fox News poll... they provide a link to PDF document showing the exact poll questions and a detailed breakdown of all the results. They are totally transparent, and clearly nothing tricky done with the questions... here's the difference in the results though:
(poll question)

30. Do you think the president should or should not have the power to
authorize the National Security Agency to monitor electronic communications
of suspected terrorists without getting warrants, even if one end of the
communication is in the United States?

By 58 percent to 36 percent, Americans think the president should have the power to authorize the National Security Agency (NSA) to monitor electronic communications of suspected terrorists without getting warrants, even if one end of the communication is in the United States. Furthermore, six in 10 say they are personally okay with the NSA monitoring their international telephone calls.

Fox News Story
Poll Results - PDF

Hmmm... Something isn't right here. If the AP-Ipsos poll asked the same question, in an honest way, how is it their numbers showed 56% said court approval was necessary (compared with 36% in the FNC poll), and 42% said it wasn't necessary (compared with 58% in the FNC poll.) It doesn't add up. So I stand firm, again, that the AP-Ipsos poll must have used tricky questioning, because these two sets of poll results aren't even close, and Fox's poll lays it all out for us to see.

I recommend actually viewing the poll results PDF to see the full breakdown, in addition to all the other questions and results. Although I think this discrepancy is the most important story here, there are a lot of interesting results in the poll. Like, as usual, people personally feeling good about their lives... but are very pessimistic about the country. This always happens in economic polls for the simple reason that the economy has been great for a number of years now, but the media portrays it as on the verge of collapse. Studies have shown how negatively the news media portrays it, despite the realities... and it always plays out in opinion polls.

Another disturbing result in this poll, but something we've been seeing for a while, is that Americans are more concerned with the economy than terrorism. What's wrong with you people!? Short memories have lead to a false sense of security, and the Misleadstream Media has convinced them to be scared about the economy, despite the overwhelming positive personal feelings of Americans, about their own situations.

But as we all know, this whole "Bush is spying on you" scandal was bogus from day one. Just this week's phony "scandal" or "controversy" that the media and Senate Dems launch out there hoping it will stick. It's literally almost a weekly thing that they do this, but it almost always gets knocked down and then disappears from the headlines when the Dems and the NY Times put their heads together for the next one.

More:
Real Clear Politics
Sensible Mom
Macsmind
The Strata-Sphere

UPDATE: Documenting the deception of the AP-Ipsos poll.. another one bites the dust:
Read these posts by Newsbusters and Ankle Biting Pundits, because they did the legwork anyway. Great stuff. Nice bust guys.

 

hat tip: Michelle Malkin
NOLA.com has the story on a recall effort being waged against Blanco.

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — A formal push to oust Gov. Kathleen Blanco, after harsh criticism of her response to hurricanes Katrina and Rita, began Tuesday when a St. Martinville resident filed a recall petition with Louisiana's elections office.

Louisiana's can learn more about and join the effort here.
Blanco was in Holland today, and Michelle wonders if she might have been shopping for new office furniture, referring to the recent story about the expensive remodeling Blanco is having done at the capital.

You might recall the clips of Blanco throwing a fit over Bush and FEMA's reaction to Katrina, while her own people were the ones blocking the Red Cross.
Louisiana Libertarian apparently gives this news a Dean scream.
Junkyard Blog asks:

...do you want to count on her during the next hurricane season?