A dead soldier's perspective

I'm back from my self-imposed exile from the Internet (the real world is an awfully interesting place after all.)
In browsing through the several dozens of blogs I read regularly, an entry at American Princess caught my eye. Titled "Something Very Sad", through it we learn of the death of a blogger/soldier in Iraq. I had never before read anything by Andrew Olmsted. This, his last word is a must read. May God bless his family and friends.

Quiet

Hello there. I've been detoxing from the Internet during the Christmas-New Year's break.
I plan to be back and better than ever in the new year.

You call that a quagmire? THIS is a quagmire!

Since things have been going much better of late in Iraq, the MSM and the Democratic presidential candidates have not been using the term "quagmire" quite as often.
And never have they made reference to a true quagmire that began during the Clinton Administration and continues to this day. That would be the American troop presence in Kosovo, an autonomous region of Serbia seeking independence.
Kathy at Cake Eater Chronicles offers an excellent history lesson on the region and a people who, like the representatives of the Religion of Peace ™ take things quite personally and have a world view that peaked 1500 years ago.



(photo courtesy Michael Kerjman)

An idea so crazy, it just might work

The election process in our nation has gotten entirely out of hand.
In the race for President, why not have a single primary day across the nation?
ALa at Blonde Sagacity offers a thoughtful post on this topic.

Monday Marketing Mayhem

You've seen the TV commercials for a variety of products featuring a loud talking pitchman, "Hi, Billy Mays here..."
Imagine if he were to take on the product featured in this video clip:
(h/t Brietbart.tv)

Just sayin'

Save the Quarterback, Save the World

Another big football weekend is upon us. The big game of the week is the battle of Good versus Evil. Of course I mean the game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Satan's Minions, the New England Patriots.
And to get you in the mood for this mortal combat, here's a little time waster to brighten your day. (huge hat tip to Pitt Girl)

Who needs writers when Ellen gives us live Presidential Parent

How cute. Jenna Bush calls home while appearing live on the Ellen Degeneres Show. (h/t BreitbartTV)




Watch toward the end when Jenna reminds her Dad about the best day of his life.

Presidential Candidate Compatibility (a/k/a “InDecision 2008”)

The Internet is a wonderful thing. As we are now just under one year away from the 2008 Presidential election, I’ve noticed several online quizzes aimed at helping determine which candidates’ positions on various issues match one’s own views.

After a little sifting through Google, I found dozens of such polls and took ten of them. The results? A head scratcher.

InDecision 2008
Poll	My ideal candidate(s)	URL
USA Today Candidate Match Game	Fred Thompson, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney	http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/candidate-match-game.htm
ABCNews Match-o-matic	Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani	http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/page?id=3623346
VAJOE Candidate Calculator	Duncan Hunter, Tom Tancredo, Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee	http://www.vajoe.com/candidate_calculator.html
WQAD Select a Candidate Quiz	John McCain	http://www.wqad.com/Global/link.asp?L=259460
Glassbooth Election 2008	Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, Fred Thompson	http://glassbooth.org
Internet Straw Poll	Mike Huckabee	http://www.internetstrawpoll.com/politics-rasa-explore/question/?c=39&
OnTheIssues VoteMatch	Duncan Hunter, Tom Tancredo	http://www.ontheissues.org/default.htm
GoToQuiz Ultimate 2008 Candidate Matcher	Mitt Romney	http://www.gotoquiz.com/ultimate_2008_presidential_candidate_matcher
Minnesota Public Radio	John McCain, Tom Tancredo, Duncan Hunter, Fred Thompson	http://minnesota.publicradio.org/projects/ongoing/select_a_candidate/poll.php?race_id=13/?refid=6
SelectSmart Presidential Candidate Selector	(Sam Brownback, Stephen Colbert), Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, Duncan Hunter, John McCain, Tom Tancredo	http://www.selectsmart.com/president/2008.html

The results are certainly interesting, and perhaps more indicative of the bias present in each of the respective polls. Each poll takes a slightly different approach to metrics. Several of these polls use highly biased questions (along the lines of, “Do you approve of Dick Cheney eating puppies for breakfast?”) I kid, no puppies were sacrificed in the writing of this blog post. Here’s a real question from the GoToQuiz Candidate Matcher, “How do you feel about embryonic stem cell research?” The choices are: A- It may lead to cures for diseases, so we should eliminate Bush's restrictions, B- It isn't moral, so we should keep or increase Bush's restrictions, or C- I don’t know. I don’t know about you, but it has always seemed rude to refer to individuals by only their last name (other than in informal settings among friends), but it has been commonplace during the past eight years to reference our President as simply “Bush.” But then, more than a few on the Left have still not come to grips with the fact that GW won, twice.

Getting back on topic, I did not surprise me that the names rising to the top were Republican (I still consider Richard Nixon’s presidency a success but for that little gaffe named after an overpriced hotel.) I have not decided who to support, but consider Fred Thompson, Mike Huckabee, and Mitt Romney my personal frontrunners. Imagine my surprise then when John McCain and Rudy Giuliani entered the mix as I took the various quizzes. Actually, the biggest surprises to me were Tom Tancredo and Duncan Hunter. I have paid little attention to either one. Now it appears I have some more research to do.

In an effort to ake some sense of these polls, I performed some statistical analysis (actually little more than weighted averages) and came up with this chart:

Candidate	Weighted preference
Fred Thompson	12
Tom Tancredo	11
Mitt Romney	9
Mike Huckabee	9
Duncan Hunter	8
John McCain	6
Rudy Giuliani	4

Fred tops the list, yet I have serious concerns that he’s not the Reagan Resurrection many conservatives prayed for.

I remain undecided.

Eagles: Long Road Out of Eden - not your usual rock & roll seniors tour

"Eagles! The Eagles are coming!"
Peregrin (Pippin) Took (from J.R.R. Tolkein's Lord of the Rings)

They formed a huge portion of my life's soundtrack in the 1970s and 80s, and now the Eagles are back with a superb new album, Long Road Out of Eden. The link goes to the band's website where you can hear one complete song and several samples from the album, plus a collection of old hits.

60 Minutes did a very nice segment on the group's decision to return to the studio. It's trimmed into multiple segments on the CBS News website:
Eagles Dark Days
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=3538308n
Eagles: the Pressure Cooker
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=3538306n
Eagles back in the studio
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=3538304n

For me, Long Road Out of Eden demonstrates Don Henley, Glen Frey, Joe Walsh, and Timothy Schmidt still possess their musical chops. This album may not surpass sales of their multi-platinium Hotel California, but it has all the the creative energy of their earlier work.

Hope in Hollywood from a former West Winger

Hat Tip to Craig Newmark for this commentary by actor Ron Silver at his newly minted blog, Silver Bullet:

Senator Joe Lieberman, the Democratic Vice-Presidential candidate only eight years ago, gave an extraordinary speech on national security last week that the mainstream media did not cover. It's a shame. And it's a shame the Democratic Party shunned Lieberman and tried to defeat him in a primary. They made it clear that there is no place for him in the party he's dedicated his life to. I'm a Joe Lieberman Democrat.

JFK reportedly remarked, "sometimes the party asks too much." He was referring to the deal his Democratic Party made with southern segregationists to maintain control of Congress. His words are as true now as they were then. Sometimes the party asks too much.

I count myself firmly in the tradition of Wilson, FDR, Truman and Kennedy…and yes, Reagan and George W. Bush. "Go anywhere, bear any burden," "try to do our best to make a world safe for democracy." Our national mission, a worthy and ennobling one, is to expand freedom where we can. These are revolutionary goals very much in keeping with our Founders' vision. They are hardly conservative, let alone neo-conservative goals.

We cannot fight a war by pretending we're not in one. This requires transformative, upset the apple cart thinking. It requires people who are revolutionary, not reactionary. As much as we might like, we cannot return to a pre-9/11 world.

The President is challenging the world with a new order. There is always passionate opposition to change. Have grievous mistakes been made? Yes. But just as Wilson, FDR, Truman, Kennedy, and Reagan laid the foundations for fighting and prevailing in the Cold War, Bush has responded to 9/11 with a foreign policy revolution of similar magnitude: a reorganization of government institutions and appropriate legislation to meet the emerging threats.
Containment and deterrence are ineffective in this brave new world. There is no containment if you can't see the enemy; there is no deterrence if the enemy desires death.

I believe the President's critics are profoundly mistaken. I believe they misunderstand how he's trying to protect us. I believe they misunderstand the nature of the threat. I believe they misunderstand history. If they succeed in dismantling what President Bush has set in motion, the results may well be catastrophic and history will never forgive them.

George W. Bush: a revolutionary liberal internationalist? History may so decree. Let's wait and see.

I enjoyed Ron Silver's portrayal of the "gun for hire" political strategist Bruno Gianelli on West Wing. His new blog offers evidence that there remain a few sane voices on the left. We need more reasoned discussion from left, right, and center.