Hillbilly Hog Roast number 2

It is time for the next Hillbilly Hog Roast.

This time we will pick the official Hillbilly Motion Picture. To qualify the movie must have been in theatrical release, rather than a TV movie or direct to VHS/DVD.

The movie does not have to be set in the South, but must in some way embody the hillbilly spirit.

Post your entries in the comments or email them to me. Include at least a few sentences about the movie for the benefit of those of us who may not have seen it.

Entries will be accepted for one week. Then you can have a week to think over the choices and then voting will be done over the third week.

To start things off here is my entry:

Next Of Kin is a classic revenge story set in the city of Chicago, a city with a real life large Hillbilly community (I used to be one of them). The picture has an excellent lineup of acting talent including Oscar winner Helen Hunt and Oscar nominees Liam Neeson and Michael J Pollard. Also in the picture are Patrick Swayze, Bill Paxton, Ben Stiller, Adam Baldwin and one of my all time favorite character actors, the late Andreas Katsulas.

Swayze plays Truman Gates a native of the mountains of Kentucky who became a Chicago police detective after serving in the 82nd Airborne. Gates is married to Jessie (Helen Hunt), a violin teacher and performer with the Chicago Symphony. As the movie begins Truman and his older brother Briar (Liam Neeson) are conducting a long distance contest for the future of their younger brother Gerald (Bill Paxton), who is currently living in Chicago and working as a truck driver for a company which supplies vending machines to restaruants. Truman wants Gerald to remain in Chicago and build a life there, while Briar wants him to return home to the hills after he saves enough money for a down payment on a coal truck.

Tragedy strikes the Gates family when Gerald is murdered by mobster Joey Rosselini (Adam Baldwin) who is the right hand of Mafia don John Isabella (Andreas Katsulas). It seems that the Isabella family wants to take over the vending machine business and hijacking delivery trucks and murdering their drivers (at least if they try to fight back as hillbilly Gerald tries to do) is a main negotiating tactic.

Into this mix throw the old don’s son Lawrence (Ben Stiller) who arrives from business school to get ready to take over leadership of the family (a role that Rosselini had been planning on filling when the time came).

Truman is determined to allow the law to bring his brother’s killers to justice while Briar and the rest of the family back home in the hills believe that it is the families duty to “set things right”. In order to fulfill this obligation to extract an eye for an eye Briar shows up in Chicago with an arsenal of weapons. As his base of operations in Chicago he rents a room in a seedy rooming house in the Hillbilly Quarter which is run by Harold (Michael J Pollard, nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Bonnie And Clyde). Briar tracks Gerald’s killers to the vending machine company where Joey and Lawrence have set up offices (the previous owners having been motivated to sell by the recent violence). Briar shoots the place up and threatens to come back if his brother’s murderer isn’t handed over.

This upsets John Isabella because it makes him “appear foolish”, something no head of a crime family can tolerate. When Joey tells him that the hillbillys are “nothing, they plow rocks for a living”, Isabella responds with one of the best lines of the movie. “Interesting. That’s what they said about our people back in Sicily. Finish this!”

Truman has Briar arrested for illegal possession of a firearm in order to keep him safe from the mob until the police investigation concludes. This changes when the mob, seeking to frighten Truman off the case, assaults his wife. Truman lets his brother out of jail and allows him to help track down the killers, but only if he promises to let the cops arrest the murderers. Together they track down David Jenkins, Gerald’s partner who was with him during the hijacking (who was wise enough to abandon the truck and run). Jenkins, a Black man, has been hiding from both the cops and the mob in the Black community of Chicago’s South Side.

Joey murders Lawrence and blames Briar. The mob murders Briar and Truman returns to his Hillbilly roots, setting out to gain justice the “Mountain Way”. Meanwhile Harold has obeyed Briar’s “if’n I get kilt” instructions and phoned the family back in Kentucky with the bad news about Briar. This sends a convoy of heavily armed hill people (including a school bus full of snakes) on the way to Chicago.

It all comes to a head at night in a graveyard in the middle of Chicago. There the mob, with machine guns, meets hillbillys with compound bows, crossbows, tomahawks, shotguns, hunting knives, bloodhounds, and a school bus full of snakes.

The latest on Haditha

Macsmind has what is probably the most reliable information on the incident at Haditha:

However, talking with REAL sources, apparently what happened is bad, but not as what the MSM is protraying (no duh there), but that doesn't clear the Marine unit involved either. Word is that the investigation has NOT completed, but that it looks like there will be disciplinary action taken.

As to the "all the way to the top!", The command of the unit in question appears to have been commanded by a first line supervisor, who is being defended by Bush critic and Iraq war vet and failed politician Paul Hackett (nuff said).

In other words if true this was a single unit under a single leader with a god complex.

The investiation is still being carried out. Reports from the field indicate that it is being done right. Everyone should just hold on until real information is available.

Another hillbilly signs up

We have a new Hillbilly Ecosystem member! Master Doh-San who blogs at The Empty Mind has joined.

Go pay him a visit and leave a comment. We've been needing a Zen master around here for quite some time.

Right now he's a Lowly Insect, but we'll soon have him sitting on a lilly pad catching flys with the best of them.

The quest for civil wrongs

Brussels Journal enlightens us on life on the other side of the Atlantic:

Today paedophiles in the Netherlands announced that they are going to establish their own political party. The party, which is called Naastenliefde, Vrijheid en Diversiteit (Charity, Freedom and Diversity), will campaign for the legalisation of sex between adults and children. “Ten years ago we were ‘on speaking terms’ with society. But since [Belgian paedophile killer] Marc Dutroux there is no more discussion. All paedophiles are being put in the same box. We are being hushed up,” Ad van den Berg, the NVD co-founder, told the newspaper Algemeen Dagblad. The NVD party aims for a reduction in the age of consent in the Netherlands from 16 to 12, the legalisation of the possession of child pornography and the reduction of the minimum age for featuring in porn from 18 to 16. According to van den Berg, “rearing a child is also about introducing it to sex.” The NVD also wants to give more rights to animals and to allow ‘consensual’ sex between humans and animals.

On this side of the Pond their organization is called the North American Man/Boy Love Association, NAMBLA for short. I provide the link only so that readers can educate themselves. I do encourage you to go over and have a look, especially if you are a parent. Knowing exactly what is out there could save your child's life.

In the following section all of the ialicized quotes are taken from the essay, "Pederasty and Homosexuality", by David Thorstad. It is the text of a lecture given in Mexico City on June 26, 1998. This essay is given a central place on the NAMBLA website and appears to form their statement of purpose.

The central thrust of NAMBLA's argument is that, "Pederasty is the main form that male homosexuality has acquired throughout Western civilization - and not only in the West! Pederasty is inseparable from the high points of Western culture - ancient Greece and the Renaissance."

Note the way in which child molestation is presented almost as though it were the central axis upon which the glories of ancient Athens and Renaissance Europe turned. They lash out at the "assimilationist gay and lesbian groups" who they accuse of "seek[ing] special treatment for a special kind of person who has adopted a "gay" identity - "gay people" - rather than seeking to liberate the repressed sexual potential of everyone."

This idea of liberation of the repressed sexual potential of everyone is a major part of their stated agenda, as is the denial of the idea that sexual orientation is an inborn trait. They argue for an "inherent bisexuality of human beings" and "that younger and older males were naturally attracted to each other and that pederasty was a positive good for society because it helped to socialize young males and provided them with a necessary sexual outlet, thereby reducing undesirable social phenomena such as unwanted pregnancies and prostitution. A few (Hans Blüher, for example, famous for his book on the Wandervogel movement) believed that pederasty and male bonding provided a basis for a stronger nation and state. . . "

It would seem that handing your 12 year-old boy over to the local pedophile will pave the way to a Utopian future. What did we learn about Utopian futures this past Sunday?

There is a strong tendency to view themselves as victims (in the USA what else is new) and to wrap their movement in the mantle of the civil rights and women's rights movements. The "persecuted minority" rhetoric reaches it zenith here, "life and survival for men and boys who love each other is becoming extremely dangerous. To be an active pederast in the United States today is like being a Jew in Nazi Germany. The United States is becoming - perhaps already has become - a police state. The backlash against the increased visibility of homosexuality since the Stonewall Riots in 1969 is striking pederasts most severely. Thousands are currently in jail in the United States for purely consensual relationships, and the gay movement will not lift a finger or a voice in protest. All the liberation movements of the 1960s blacks, women, homosexuals, the left - have either moved to the right or, in the case of the left, virtually disappeared. The women's movement and the gay movement have fallen in love with the state and seem no longer able to differentiate between their friends and their enemies. In fact, these days, the gay movement in the United States functions more as an adjunct of the police than as a movement for liberation. Nowadays, I sometimes feel as if I need to be liberated from assimilationist gay men and lesbians as much as I do from heterosupremacy, capitalism, and police repression."

Apologies to anyone who is now cleaning vomit off their keyboard.

Also, why am I not surprised that capitalism is viewed as just as much an enemy as “hetrosupremacy”?

To sum up. In NAMBLA's world pedophiles are noble souls seeking the enlightenment of society and the uplifting of all persons of all ages. They are engaged in an epic civil rights struggle which is an inseparable part of the greater civil rights movement. Man/boy sex is emotionally and physically healthy and opens a cornucopia of social benefits for any culture wise enough to normalize it.

I need to go out and get another case of .308 for my Garand.

Europe, getting back to its roots?

Captain Ed writes:

The German magazine Der Spiegel has published its interview with Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and it should disturb anyone who reads it fully. The interview reveals Ahmadinejad as a man obsessed with Jews, and one intent on provoking German resentment over its post-war humiliation to split the West on Israel:

Ahmadinejad: Look here, my views are quite clear. We are saying that if the Holocaust occurred, then Europe must draw the consequences and that it is not Palestine that should pay the price for it. If it did not occur, then the Jews have to go back to where they came from. I believe that the German people today are also prisoners of the Holocaust. Sixty million people died in the Second World War. World War II was a gigantic crime. We condemn it all. We are against bloodshed, regardless of whether a crime was committed against a Muslim or against a Christian or a Jew. But the question is: Why among these 60 million victims are only the Jews the center of attention?

SPIEGEL: That's just not the case. All peoples mourn the victims claimed by the Second World War, Germans and Russians and Poles and others as well. Yet, we as Germans cannot absolve ourselves of a special guilt, namely for the systematic murder of the Jews. But perhaps we should now move on to the next subject.

Ahmadinejad: No, I have a question for you. What kind of a role did today's youth play in World War II?

SPIEGEL: None.

Ahmadinejad: Why should they have feelings of guilt toward Zionists? Why should the costs of the Zionists be paid out of their pockets? If people committed crimes in the past, then they would have to have been tried 60 years ago. End of story! Why must the German people be humiliated today because a group of people committed crimes in the name of the Germans during the course of history?

Der Speigel notes in a separate piece that Ahmadinejad's remarks will give new energy to the anti-Semitic neo-Nazi groups currently on the fringe of German politics. Financial Times Deutschland gave mild criticism DS for carrying such potent propaganda on behalf of Ahmadinejad while noting that "an open society should know its enemies". After reading the entire interview, I see nothing to criticize on that score. The DS interviewer continually challenges Ahmadinejad's answers regarding Holocaust denial. (Less worthy of praise is the interviewer's repeated assertion that America has lost the war in Iraq; with Saddam gone and a freely elected representative government in place, DS should have included its criteria for success.)

It is not only an “anti-Semitic neo-Nazi” fringe that this will give “new energy” to. The average European citizen and the average European politician have been longing for a way to put the Holocaust behind them.

The old, traditional European anti-Semitism has not gone away; it is as strong as ever it is simply held in check, submerged a few millimeters below the surface by the memory of the Holocaust. If a way can be found to either deny the event or to at least say that it is long over with and has absolutely nothing to do with anything today think of the advantages (the European thinks to himself). How much more money can be made by trading with the Arab/Persian Muslims if the question of the Jews isn’t tangled up in things. Think how much peace we could buy if “that shitty little country”, as a high official in the French government called Israel a little while back, wasn’t there anymore.

It is only a matter of time before Europe finds its historic Jew hatred to be just too comfortable, too natural, to be resisted any further.

The universe is out of alignment

All evening long I have had the feeling that something was terribly wrong.

As though the entire fabric of the universe was somehow twisted out of shape. Sort of like in that latest Exorcist movie where the herd of cattle killed and ate a pack of hyenas.

I now realize what the problem is. It's Monday and there wasn't an episode of 24.

It's going to be like this until January. How am I going to make it?

Someone hand me a bottle of bourbon and an assault rifle.

The cost of freedom

One song that should have made the list of conservative songs was Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young's "Find The Cost of Freedom".

Look at Arlington National Cemetery and think about the words:

Find the cost of freedom buried in the ground Mother Earth will swallow you Lay your body down

This is the price of freedom.

An evenings entertainment

I went to see Rathkeltair at Jack of the Wood last night. This is what they look like.

The guy on the bagbipes is not Neil Anderson. Neil, who is an officer in the Army Reserve, was called up and is now in Iraq.

This leaves all of the front man duties to Trevor Tanner, the guy in black at the far right.

They put on a great show even though the new piper isn't as well broken in as Neil.

There but by the grace of God. . .

A little while back Paul Belien wrote this in the Dutch section of the Brussels Journal:

"it is the duty of the state to protect its citizens against predators", but that when the state fails to exercise this function, citizens should have the right to arm themselves.

He was speaking about the government giving Belgian citizens the right to carry pepper spray. The “predators” are North African immigrants mostly Muslim and often illegal.

As a result of this statement Mr. Belien has been denounced by The Center for Equal Opportunities and Opposition against racism (CEOOR), a governmental agency in Belgium. He has been threatened with a massive lawsuit and there have been calls for his prosecution.

In Belgium as it is in the UK and as it ultimately will be in America the goal of the gun control movement will be to criminalize self defense itself. You do not breed a nation of docile sheep until you purge out the concept of standing up for yourself in any context from the population.

Multiculturalism in practice destroys a nation. It makes impossible the cohesion, the shared outlook and common interests, which enable a collection of individuals to form a stable society.

Multiculturalism as a political theory is used by leftist elites to suppress dissent by stigmatizing opponents as racists, bigots, fundamentalists or any other of a grab-bag of negative epithets. When the Leftist philosophy has advanced far enough into a nation’s governing zeitgeist it can even be used as a basis for civil and even criminal legal action.

Opponents of the left-wing agenda should watch carefully what is happening in Europe. There are far too many people in this nation who regard organizations like CEOOR to be valiant trailblazers pointing the way to a Utopian future.

I shouldn’t need to remind anyone that the roads to Utopian futures always end in places with names like Sobibor, Kolyma, and Jonestown.

How did you do?

Hat Tip: American and Proud of It

You Passed the US Citizenship Test

Congratulations - you got 10 out of 10 correct!

Could You Pass the US Citizenship Test?

Lemuel's Christmas Wish List

Christmas is only 7 months away so it isn't too early for all my devoted followers to start making plans for my presents.

Here is what is on top of the list:

Read about it here.

More conservative rock songs

There has been a good response to the post about NRO's 50 best conservative rock songs so I'm throwing the floor open for readers to suggest their own songs.

Let's keep the rules the same that NRO used (see below).

Some of the suggestions that have been offered so far:

"Kyrie Eleison" (translated, God be with me) by Mister Mister"

"Living Years" by Mister Mister.

I would suggest:

"Oh, Candy" the anti drug song by Cheap Trick.

"Question" by The Moody Blues. I've heard this song about the futility of materialism used as sermon text by a nationally known evangelist.

Let's hear what you all think.

A new Hillbilly joines up

Cathy at Sunday Morning Coffee has joined the Ecosystem as a Heavily Armed Recluse.

Go pay her a visit and be sure to have your sound enabled.

She took the "How American Are You Test" and came out 80%.

She may need a little help picking boyfriends, though:

I once dated a guy that thought he was the reincarnation of Jim Morrison, but of course he couldn't be the reincarnation of Jim Morrison, because he was born before Jim Morrison died... I never said he was real smart....

Conservative Rock Songs

NRO has John J Miller’s list of the 50 best conservative rock songs.

Here is how he defined a conservative song:

What makes a great conservative rock song? The lyrics must convey a conservative idea or sentiment, such as skepticism of government or support for traditional values. And, to be sure, it must be a great rock song. We’re biased in favor of songs that are already popular, but have tossed in a few little-known gems. In several cases, the musicians are outspoken liberals. Others are notorious libertines. For the purposes of this list, however, we don’t hold any of this against them. Finally, it would have been easy to include half a dozen songs by both the Kinks and Rush, but we’ve made an effort to cast a wide net. Who ever said diversity isn’t a conservative principle?

Here are the top 20 plus the others that are favorites of mine.

1. “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” by The Who. ; buy CD on Amazon.comThe conservative movement is full of disillusioned revolutionaries; this could be their theme song, an oath that swears off naïve idealism once and for all. “There’s nothing in the streets / Looks any different to me / And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye. . . . Meet the new boss / Same as the old boss.” The instantly recognizable synthesizer intro, Pete Townshend’s ringing guitar, Keith Moon’s pounding drums, and Roger Daltrey’s wailing vocals make this one of the most explosive rock anthems ever recorded — the best number by a big band, and a classic for conservatives.

2. “Taxman,” by The Beatles. buy CD on Amazon.comA George Harrison masterpiece with a famous guitar riff (which was actually played by Paul McCartney): “If you drive a car, I’ll tax the street / If you try to sit, I’ll tax your seat / If you get too cold, I’ll tax the heat / If you take a walk, I’ll tax your feet.” The song closes with a humorous jab at death taxes: “Now my advice for those who die / Declare the pennies on your eyes.”

3. “Sympathy for the Devil,” by The Rolling Stones. ; buy CD on Amazon.comDon’t be misled by the title; this song is The Screwtape Letters of rock. The devil is a tempter who leans hard on moral relativism — he will try to make you think that “every cop is a criminal / And all the sinners saints.” What’s more, he is the sinister inspiration for the cruelties of Bolshevism: “I stuck around St. Petersburg / When I saw it was a time for a change / Killed the czar and his ministers / Anastasia screamed in vain.”

4. “Sweet Home Alabama,” by Lynyrd Skynyrd. ; buy CD on Amazon.comA tribute to the region of America that liberals love to loathe, taking a shot at Neil Young’s Canadian arrogance along the way: “A Southern man don’t need him around anyhow.”

5. “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” by The Beach Boys. ; buy CD on Amazon.comPro-abstinence and pro-marriage: “Maybe if we think and wish and hope and pray it might come true / Baby then there wouldn’t be a single thing we couldn’t do / We could be married / And then we’d be happy.”

6. “Gloria,” by U2. ; buy CD on Amazon.comJust because a rock song is about faith doesn’t mean that it’s conservative. But what about a rock song that’s about faith and whose chorus is in Latin? That’s beautifully reactionary: “Gloria / In te domine / Gloria / Exultate.”

7. “Revolution,” by The Beatles. buy CD on Amazon.com“You say you want a revolution / Well you know / We all want to change the world . . . Don’t you know you can count me out?” What’s more, Communism isn’t even cool: “If you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao / You ain’t going to make it with anyone anyhow.” (Someone tell the Che Guevara crowd.)

8. “Bodies,” by The Sex Pistols. ; buy CD on Amazon.comViolent and vulgar, but also a searing anti-abortion anthem by the quintessential punk band: “It’s not an animal / It’s an abortion.”

9. “Don’t Tread on Me,” by Metallica. buy CD on Amazon.comA head-banging tribute to the doctrine of peace through strength, written in response to the first Gulf War: “So be it / Threaten no more / To secure peace is to prepare for war.”

10. “20th Century Man,” by The Kinks. ; buy CD on Amazon.com“You keep all your smart modern writers / Give me William Shakespeare / You keep all your smart modern painters / I’ll take Rembrandt, Titian, da Vinci, and Gainsborough. . . . I was born in a welfare state / Ruled by bureaucracy / Controlled by civil servants / And people dressed in grey / Got no privacy got no liberty / ’Cause the 20th-century people / Took it all away from me.”

11. “The Trees,” by Rush. ; buy CD on Amazon.comBefore there was Rush Limbaugh, there was Rush, a Canadian band whose lyrics are often libertarian. What happens in a forest when equal rights become equal outcomes? “The trees are all kept equal / By hatchet, axe, and saw.”

12. “Neighborhood Bully,” by Bob Dylan. ; buy CD on Amazon.com A pro-Israel song released in 1983, two years after the bombing of Iraq’s nuclear reactor, this ironic number could be a theme song for the Bush Doctrine: “He destroyed a bomb factory, nobody was glad / The bombs were meant for him / He was supposed to feel bad / He’s the neighborhood bully.”

13. “My City Was Gone,” by The Pretenders. ; buy CD on Amazon.comVirtually every conservative knows the bass line, which supplies the theme music for Limbaugh’s radio show. But the lyrics also display a Jane Jacobs sensibility against central planning and a conservative’s dissatisfaction with rapid change: “I went back to Ohio / But my pretty countryside / Had been paved down the middle / By a government that had no pride.”

14. “Right Here, Right Now,” by Jesus Jones. buy CD on Amazon.comThe words are vague, but they’re also about the fall of Communism and the end of the Cold War: “I was alive and I waited for this. . . . Watching the world wake up from history.”

15. “I Fought the Law,” by The Crickets. ; buy CD on Amazon.comThe original law-and-order classic, made famous in 1965 by The Bobby Fuller Four and covered by just about everyone since then.

16. “Get Over It,” by The Eagles. ; buy CD on Amazon.comAgainst the culture of grievance: “The big, bad world doesn’t owe you a thing.” There’s also this nice line: “I’d like to find your inner child and kick its little ass.”

17. “Stay Together for the Kids,” by Blink 182. ; buy CD on Amazon.comA eulogy for family values by an alt-rock band whose members were raised in a generation without enough of them: “So here’s your holiday / Hope you enjoy it this time / You gave it all away. . . . It’s not right.”

18. “Cult of Personality,” by Living Colour. ; buy CD on Amazon.comA hard-rocking critique of state power, whacking Mussolini, Stalin, and even JFK: “I exploit you, still you love me / I tell you one and one makes three / I’m the cult of personality.”

19. “Kicks,” by Paul Revere and the Raiders. ; buy CD on Amazon.comAn anti-drug song that is also anti-utopian: “Well, you think you’re gonna find yourself a little piece of paradise / But it ain’t happened yet, so girl you better think twice.”

20. “Rock the Casbah,” by The Clash. ; buy CD on Amazon.comAfter 9/11, American radio stations were urged not to play this 1982 song, one of the biggest hits by a seminal punk band, because it was seen as too provocative. Meanwhile, British Forces Broadcasting Service (the radio station for British troops serving in Iraq) has said that this is one of its most requested tunes.

21. “Heroes,” by David Bowie. ; buy CD on Amazon.comA Cold War love song about a man and a woman divided by the Berlin Wall. No moral equivalence here: “I can remember / Standing / By the wall / And the guns / Shot above our heads / And we kissed / As though nothing could fall / And the shame / Was on the other side / Oh we can beat them / For ever and ever.”

22. “Red Barchetta,” by Rush. ; buy CD on Amazon.comIn a time of “the Motor Law,” presumably legislated by green extremists, the singer describes family reunion and the thrill of driving a fast car — an act that is his “weekly crime.”

24. “Der Kommissar,” by After the Fire. buy CD on Amazon.comOn the misery of East German life: “Don’t turn around, uh-oh / Der Kommissar’s in town, uh-oh / He’s got the power / And you’re so weak / And your frustration / Will not let you speak.” Also a hit song for Falco, who wrote it.

25. “The Battle of Evermore,” by Led Zeppelin. ; buy CD on Amazon.comThe lyrics are straight out of Robert Plant’s Middle Earth period — there are lines about “ring wraiths” and “magic runes” — but for a song released in 1971, it’s hard to miss the Cold War metaphor: “The tyrant’s face is red.”

28. “Janie’s Got a Gun,” by Aerosmith. ; buy CD on Amazon.comHow the right to bear arms can protect women from sexual predators: “What did her daddy do? / It’s Janie’s last I.O.U. / She had to take him down easy / And put a bullet in his brain / She said ’cause nobody believes me / The man was such a sleaze / He ain’t never gonna be the same.”

33. “You Can’t Always Get What You Want,” by The Rolling Stones. ; buy CD on Amazon.comYou can “[go] down to the demonstration” and vent your frustration, but you must understand that there’s no such thing as a perfect society — there are merely decent and free ones.

34. “Godzilla,” by Blue öyster Cult. ; buy CD on Amazon.comA 1977 classic about a big green monster — and more: “History shows again and again / How nature points up the folly of men.”

37. “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” by The Band. ; buy CD on Amazon.comDespite its sins, the American South always has been about more than racism — this song captures its pride and tradition.

38. “I Can’t Drive 55,” by Sammy Hagar. ; buy CD on Amazon.comA rocker’s objection to the nanny state. (See also Hagar’s pro-America song “VOA.”)

45. “Taxman, Mr. Thief,” by Cheap Trick. ; buy CD on Amazon.comAn anti-tax protest song: “You work hard, you went hungry / Now the taxman is out to get you. . . . He hates you, he loves money.”

"Freezer" Bill Jefferson Update

You're not going to believe this.

Remember how I said that nobody can snatch defeat from the jaws of victory like the modern Republican Party?

Remember how I was praying that Bush wouldn't screw up and apologize for the FBI raid on the corrupt congressman's office?

Breitbart is reporting this from the AP:

President Bush stepped into the Justice Department's constitutional confrontation with Congress on Thursday and ordered that documents seized in an FBI raid on a congressman's office be sealed for 45 days.

The president directed that no one involved in the investigation have access to the documents under seal and that they remain in the custody of the solicitor general.

Is the President trying to cause his party to lose control of congress this November?

Is the Republican congressional leadership trying to lose control of congress this November?


Captain Ed says that Mr. Bush is giving Hastert and the others a cooling off period to step back from their hysterical rhetoric:

George Bush tossed a lifesaver to Denny Hastert and the rest of the imperial Congress today by temporarily sealing the evidence seized from the legislative offices of Rep. William Jefferson, the target of an FBI corruption investigation. Sealing the records gives both branches more time to work out their differences, Bush said, but made clear that prosecutors would eventually gain access to the material:

I'm sorry Ed, but the damage has been done.

Lets take a minute to review. The documents had been under subpoena for months and Jefferson had refused to cooperate. The FBI obtained a search warrant from a federal judge. The Judicial Branch is the branch of government that is empowered to settle disputes between the other branches, BTW.

The FBI did everything right. Jefferson and his congressional defenders do not have a leg to stand on and they are only disgracing themselves.

Mr. Bush, Mr. Hastert, the Democrat Party is busy shooting itself in the foot. GET THE FRAK OUT OF THEIR WAY AND LET THEM GET ON WITH IT!

Hat Tip: Michelle Malkin

Shut up and stand aside!

The American Spectator covers “Freezer Bill” Jefferson’s exploding scandal:

But the best thing about it for Republicans, who numbers-wise have more ethics problems than their opponents, is that the Democrats have come up with a single scandal that not only is outrageous, but also is obvious. Cash bribe, caught on camera, goes directly into lawmaker's possession, which he then stashes with his Breyer's and Ore-Ida's. No need to explain various campaign contributions in exchange for legislative consideration. Not necessary to tie lobbyist wining-and-dining suspected to gain special access. No guilt by association.

No, it's plain as day, just good old-fashioned currency in the palm -- a priceless relic in our almost cashless society. Republicans couldn't have dreamed of a better gift. It's tailor-made for Colbert and Letterman, where the cynical and semi-interested get their political news these days.

This should be good news for the Republicans. Just as the Democrats are gearing up to run this November on the “Culture of Corruption” charge against the GOP along comes Jefferson and lets all the air out of their tires.

But all is not lost for the Jackass Party. No group of people on the planet does a better job of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory than the modern Republican Party:

BUT DEMOCRATS NEED NOT PANIC YET, because just as the Jefferson matter is blowing up big in the media, the inept Republicans want equal time looking bad in the scandal. House members of both parties are indignant that the FBI raided Jefferson's congressional office Saturday night, after he refused to comply with a subpoena for documents issued nine months ago. No less powerful GOP individuals than House Speaker Dennis Hastert and Majority Leader John Boehner jumped out front to complain that the FBI search violated the separation of powers between the executive branch and the legislative branch.

"I think those materials ought to be returned," said Hastert.

Forgetting that the FBI obtained a search warrant from the judicial branch -- the check on government that also happens to evaluate the likelihood of a crime -- Republicans again demonstrated their ITB (Inside the Beltway) myopia by whining about the unfairness of it all. Considering their own troubles, they may as well have posted a flashing neon sign in the Capitol halls begging, "Search my office! Search my office!"

As we've seen time and again, politicians forget that Americans view this behavior in light of what would happen to them in a similar situation. Could Everyday Joe get away with taking $100,000 cash for placing his own gain ahead of his employers'? When caught in the act on videotape by law enforcement, could he expect to evade a search warrant by invoking some special privilege?

Fortunately for the Democrats their Jefferson-induced distress is probably only temporary, since the Republicans aren't smart enough to shut up and get out of the way.

Ain’t that the truth?

All that the bizarre actions of Hastert and his colleagues is doing is making the average American wonder what the Republicans have stashed in their offices.

The entire “separation of powers” argument is an obvious smokescreen. Intelligent people (and by that I mean folks with an IQ in the double digits) know that smokescreens are intended to hide something. Only the congressional Republican leadership would be stupid enough to lay one down to hide . . . nothing.

Conservatives in this country need to get down on their knees and thank God that the Democrats are not only evil, but evil in the most transparently obvious way. Because that is the only thing that can keep Republicans in power this November.

Which way will they tilt?

From The Brussels Journal:

Last week, the EU endorsed a fishing deal with Morocco. This wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for the fact that the deal includes the coastal waters of Western Sahara, a territory that has been occupied by Morroco for more than thirty years.

In the same week that the people of Montenegro had to produce a special qualified majority in order to have its independence recognized by the European Union, that same European Union sends now some very dubious signals to the indigenous people of Western Sahara. It endorsed a fishing deal with Morocco worth 114 million euros, and didn't object to the coastal waters of Western Sahara being included in the deal. According to international law, an occupying country isn't allowed to make deals that include the natural resources of occupied territory.

[Snip]

What's the matter with the European Union? Where are all those advocates of the Big Principles, those who object to war and occupation, even when the goal is to overthrow a merciless dictator? In the end, this fishing deal is a de facto recognition of the Moroccon occupation of Western Sahara

[Snip]

But on a more fundamental level, this case shows once again that the European Union doesn't care much about a people's right to self-determination when its own interests are at stake. . .

The European Union is not about principle on any level. The objections raised by European powers, mainly France and Germany, to the US action in Iraq were not based on any antiwar sentiment, but on the amount of bribe money Saddam was paying.

In the very long histories of the nations of Europe they have time and time again proven themselves capable of utter ruthlessness when their perceived interests are at stake. The key is that they must perceive the threat. They never perceived a threat from Iraq because they believed that Saddam could be managed.

The United States, by liberating the millions of Iraq, was upsetting a very profitable applecart. Get inside someone’s pocket and he will never love you.

As Victor Davis Hanson has pointed out on any number of occasions the Western World invented modern warfare. The “hot knife through butter” quality of American victories in the first and second Gulf Wars over the largest, best equipped and best trained Middle Eastern army gives an indication of the relative combat power of a military force schooled in the Western way of war versus one brought up in the Eastern.

The Moslem populations of European nations need to take note of this. As long as the EU’s leadership believes that it is cheaper to appease that is what they will do. But the second that they perceive that insurgent Islamic immigrant populations pose a threat to their comfortable lifestyles they can once again show the world the face of the ancient ruthlessness which Rome showed Carthage.

Of course that same ancient ruthlessness could easily cause the Union to fully ally itself with the Islamofascists if they perceive their ultimate best interests lie in that direction.

That is the danger of either an ally or enemy who’s only governing principle is realpolitic – unpredictability.

Remember the Beltway Snipers?

Michelle Malkin has a great post up revisiting the Beltway Sniper case. She reminds us of the both the conection to Islam and illegal immigration.

At the time, I covered two main aspects of the story that were underplayed by the MSM--Lee Malvo's illegal alien catch-and-release story and Nation of Islam convert Muhammad and Malvo's Muslim hate-mongering. Snide MSM'ers and the CAIR propagandists attacked those of who called these thugs what they are: terrorists.

This week, the snipers faced off against each other during Muhammad's trial for six of the murders in Montgomery County. Muhammad is serving as his own lawyer. On the witness stand, Malvo revealed the chilling details of just how much terror the Muslim pair sought to inflict in this community--from bombings to mass murder of children and pregnant women to the random slaying of six white people a day for 30 days.

All of this is worth remembering considering the current situation where the two greatest problems facing the nation are the Global Jihad and illegal immigration.

Stop The ACLU Blogburst

From Stop the ACLU:

This is the kind of hypocrisy that Conservatives and most reasonable liberals can agree that the ACLU needs to some house cleaning on. Via NY Times….

The American Civil Liberties Union is weighing new standards that would discourage its board members from publicly criticizing the organization’s policies and internal administration.

“Where an individual director disagrees with a board position on matters of civil liberties policy, the director should refrain from publicly highlighting the fact of such disagreement,” the committee that compiled the standards wrote in its proposals.

“Directors should remember that there is always a material prospect that public airing of the disagreement will affect the A.C.L.U. adversely in terms of public support and fund-raising,” the proposals state.

Given the organization’s longtime commitment to defending free speech, some former board members were shocked by the proposals.

I would take a guess that there is some reason that those that are shocked are “former” board members for a reason. How many times have we heard the ACLU ask the government for transparency? Most people that believe in true free speech and the right to dissent expect the ACLU to hold itself to the same ideological standards that it asks of others.

Nat Hentoff, a writer and former A.C.L.U. board member, was incredulous. “You sure that didn’t come out of Dick Cheney’s office?” he asked.

“For the national board to consider promulgating a gag order on its members — I can’t think of anything more contrary to the reason the A.C.L.U. exists,” Mr. Hentoff added.

The proposals say that “a director may publicly disagree with an A.C.L.U. policy position, but may not criticize the A.C.L.U. board or staff.” But Wendy Kaminer, a board member and a public critic of some decisions made by the organization’s leadership, said that was a distinction without a difference.

“If you disagree with a policy position,” she said, “you are implicitly criticizing the judgment of whoever adopted the position, board or staff.”

Anthony D. Romero, the A.C.L.U.’s executive director, said that he had not yet read the proposals and that it would be premature to discuss them before the board reviews them at its June meeting.

Mr. Romero said it was not unusual for the A.C.L.U. to grapple with conflicting issues involving civil liberties. “Take hate speech,” he said. “While believing in free speech, we do not believe in or condone speech that attacks minorities.”

However, they have no problem if the hate speech is toward American military members at their funerals. It is hypocritical stances like this that brings about such infighting from the pure ideologues to free speech, and those that have their own agenda of only defending speech that they agree with. It sounds a lot like damage control to me, and while I think most conflicts within any organization should be given every effort to be resolved internally, to create a policy that essentially puts a gag order on any dissent within only casts more doubt that the ACLU stands by the principles in which it preaches. The “do as we say, not as we do” attitude would keep many of the ACLU’s members and the general public unaware of important issues in which they I would argue they have a right to know. When the light has been shined on the hypocritical stances within the ACLU, many members may not want the money they have been donating to support projects in which may be in conflict with their own ideological stances. I thought the ACLU supported watchdogs and whistle blowers. Obviously that philosphy only applies to leaking classified national security information, and not their own organization.

Many ACLU supporters are seeing through the hypocrisy.

But some former board members and A.C.L.U. supporters said the proposals were an effort to stifle dissent.

“It sets up a framework for punitive action,” said Muriel Morisey, a law professor at Temple University who served on the board for four years until 2004.

Susan Herman, a Brooklyn Law School professor who serves on the board, said board members and others were jumping to conclusions.

“No one is arguing that board members have no right to disagree or express their own point of view,” Ms. Herman said. “Many of us simply think that in exercising that right, board members should also consider their fiduciary duty to the A.C.L.U. and its process ideals.”

When the committee was formed last year, its mission was to set standards on when board members could be suspended or ousted.

The board had just rejected a proposal to remove Ms. Kaminer and Michael Meyers, another board member, because the two had publicly criticized Mr. Romero and the board for decisions that they contended violated A.C.L.U. principles and policies, including signing a grant agreement requiring the group to check its employees against government terrorist watch lists — a position it later reversed — and the use of sophisticated data-mining techniques to recruit members.

Mr. Meyers lost his bid for re-election to the board last year, but Ms. Kaminer has continued to speak out. Last month, she was quoted in The New York Sun as criticizing the group’s endorsement of legislation to regulate advertising done by counseling centers run by anti-abortion groups. The bill would prohibit such centers from running advertisements suggesting that they provide abortion services when they actually try to persuade women to continue their pregnancies.

Ms. Kaminer and another board member, John C. Brittain, charged that the proposal threatened free speech. “I find it quite appalling that the A.C.L.U. is actively supporting this,” Ms. Kaminer told The Sun.

There is much more internal fighting going on you can read about. Hopefully the ACLU can work this out in a way that upholds their professed principles that they demand from so many others. I’ve said before that if the ACLU can make some reforms that they have the potential to be an organization that is good for the country. Holding themselves to their own standards would be a great start.

Captain’s Quarters is on the same wavelength.

Even if no action is taken, the new instructions make a statement about the organization. The ACLU says by its consideration of this proposal that it cannot withstand dissent, an odd position for an organization that based its existence to protect dissent elsewhere. They seem to say that some dissent is tolerable and others are not, and that the highest authorities hold the privilege of deciding which is which. It’s interesting and terribly convenient that they would only apply that philosophy to themselves.

Bryan Preston:

If the ACLU were as transparent as it demands of everyone else, we could know with certainty whether CAIR funding is having an undue influence on the organization. Though the ACLU’s recent actions make such an investigation more of a confirmation than anything else.

Heh, maybe the ACLU can sue itself.

Proud to be an American

You Are 77% American

You're as American as red meat and shooting ranges.Tough and independent, you think big.You love everything about the US, wrong or right.And anyone who criticizes your home better not do it in front of you!

How American Are You?

I know I lost points on the sports question. I had to leave it blank because none of the choices involved shooting. Also I like beer that is "dark and with flavor" rather than pale yellow piss.

Hat Tip: Born Again Redneck

Not amnesty?

Former Attorney General under Ronald Reagan Edwin Meese III writes in the New York Times:

Two decades ago, while serving as attorney general under President Ronald Reagan, I was in the thick of things as Congress debated the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. The situation today bears uncanny similarities to what we went through then.

In the mid-80's, many members of Congress — pushed by the Democratic majority in the House and the Select Commission on Immigration and Refugee Policy — advocated amnesty for long-settled illegal immigrants. President Reagan considered it reasonable to adjust the status of what was then a relatively small population, and I supported his decision.

In exchange for allowing aliens to stay, he decided, border security and enforcement of immigration laws would be greatly strengthened — in particular, through sanctions against employers who hired illegal immigrants. If jobs were the attraction for illegal immigrants, then cutting off that option was crucial.

Beyond this, most illegal immigrants who could establish that they had resided in America continuously for five years would be granted temporary resident status, which could be upgraded to permanent residency after 18 months and, after another five years, to citizenship.

Note that this path to citizenship was not automatic. Indeed, the legislation stipulated several conditions: immigrants had to pay application fees, learn to speak English, understand American civics, pass a medical exam and register for military selective service. Those with convictions for a felony or three misdemeanors were ineligible. Sound familiar? These are pretty much the same provisions included in the new Senate proposal and cited by its supporters as proof that they have eschewed amnesty in favor of earned citizenship.

The difference is that President Reagan called this what it was: amnesty. Indeed, look up the term "amnesty" in Black's Law Dictionary, and you'll find it says, "the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act provided amnesty for undocumented aliens already in the country."

Like the amnesty bill of 1986, the current Senate proposal would place those who have resided illegally in the United States on a path to citizenship, provided they meet a similar set of conditions and pay a fine and back taxes. The illegal immigrant does not go to the back of the line but gets immediate legalized status, while law-abiding applicants wait in their home countries for years to even get here. And that's the line that counts. In the end, slight differences in process do not change the overriding fact that the 1986 law and today's bill are both amnesties.

There is a practical problem as well: the 1986 act did not solve our illegal immigration problem. From the start, there was widespread document fraud by applicants. Unsurprisingly, the number of people applying for amnesty far exceeded projections. And there proved to be a failure of political will in enforcing new laws against employers.

After a six-month slowdown that followed passage of the legislation, illegal immigration returned to normal levels and continued unabated. Ultimately, some 2.7 million people were granted amnesty, and many who were not stayed anyway, forming the nucleus of today's unauthorized population.

So here we are, 20 years later, having much the same debate and being offered much the same deal in exchange for promises largely dependent on the will of future Congresses and presidents.

Will history repeat itself? I hope not. In the post-9/11 world, secure borders are
vital. We have new tools — like biometric technology for identification, and
cameras, sensors and satellites to monitor the border — that make enforcement
and verification less onerous. And we can learn from the failed policies of the
past.

I hope that all of the alpha hotels that are bleating that the treasonous Senate bill is not amnesty read this. Reagan, who sincerely but mistakenly believed that it was the right thing to do, had no trouble calling it amnesty. That is because he was an honest man with a clear conscience.

The current batch of amnesty proponents are not honest and know that what they are doing will harm the nation. The Democrats I can understand, but the Republicans? I can understand RINO John McCain and his wretched little hand puppet Lindsey Graham, but the rest?

Dump McCain!

One of the most worthy blog enterprises out there is "Blogs for McCain's Opponent", an alliance of blogs that share the common desire of seeing crazy, evil John McCain voted out of office and sent back home to live under the laws that he has helped pass.

I have long thought that the blogroll shoud have a grahpic to go along with it and now, thanks to the efforts of White Trash Republican we have one.

I give you:

I will be adding it to my sidebar today. Click on the Blogs For McCain's Opponent link on my sidebar and go join up. It is a good cause.

Fallout from 24 continues

From The New York Post:

THE producers of "24" took a page from the "Lost" playbook Monday night.

On a scrap of paper - seen so briefly on TV it could only be read by eagle-eyed viewers who had posted the screen on the Internet - a seemingly random group of letters spells out "Jack is dead."

At the end of the season finale, the show's star, Jack Bauer, was kidnapped and appeared to be on his way to China.

Also, the numbers 3105973781, written in a vertical column, turned out to be a voice mail for a Nextel account for "24." By last night, the mailbox was full and inaccessible.

I can't make it out, but I'll take their word for it.

Hat Tip: Blogs4Bauer

William Jefferson Update

Congressman (for the time being) William Jefferson has his official nickname. Mr. Bingley at The Coalition of the Swilling has named him: "Freezer Bill". A well earned epithet. From this point forward use it in all official correspondence.

The latest Democrat bribery scandal

Michelle Malkin has a cute picture up about the latest product for congressmen who need to store bribe money.

She also has some links to commentary on the bizarre tantrum that congress is throwing regarding the FBI raid on Congressman William Jefferson's office.

Now I understand why the Democrats are upset. They were hoping to sail into majority status this November on the "culture of corruption" slogan. Jefferson is just the latest Democrat to get caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "Culture of corruption" was dead before this, but it can't be pleasant to have it continually jammed in your face.

Note to Democrats: You need to abandon any campaign strategy that requires you seem to project any positive qualities of character. Even pointing out some proven Republican dishonesty will ultimately backfire as you have a far larger problem in that area than they do. If you want to regain power focus on your only true strength. Promise the non-productive part of our society that you will steal ever larger amounts of money from the productive part of our society (you know the people who create jobs, pay wages, create wealth, uplift society and raise the standard of living for everyone - you know the people you hate). Ignore the fact that doing this for a long enough time will bring down our economy after all your constituents are too ignorant and selfish to know or care.

But why would Republicans care that the FBI hit a corrupt congressman's office? Separation of powers is a transparently thin excuse for objecting to the FBI executing a lawfully obtained search warrant. Perhaps they are worried that they will lose power this November and then face a President Hillary starting Jan. 2009? After the business with the Travel Office they know what the Clintons will do to anyone who gets in their way.

I just pray that the President doesn't screw up and apologize for this. Stand firm and the media will back off (resist the Devil and he will flee from you).

Celebrating 10,000

The Dowager Viscountess asks how one celebrates one's 10,000th hit.

Next question.

10,000

My site meter passed ten thousand today at 3:43 PM.

Thanks to everyone who has visited and especially to those who are regulars.

Next stop 50,000.

Pedophilia online

Patrick Kelley read the post about the blog being kept by the pedophile. He makes this suggestion:

"Go to the Blogger search engine or Google and look up The Fifth Nail. That's Joseph Duncans blog on Blogger, he's the guy that kidnapped the little Groene children in Idaho."

I did. The Fifth Nail blog archives are here.

As Captain Mal Reynolds would say, "morbid and creepifying"

The way in which this monster attempted to wrap himself in Christianity was truly sickening. The way some Christians seemed to buy his act was also disgusting.

24 5/22/2006

Well its over for another year.

This is semi-live blogging as I'm running to the computer to type during commercials.

Shutting down the Dosai and his priors turned out to be easy and was over with before the first commercial break I had a feeling that part of the storyline would be resolved quickly.

I want to learn to break someone's neck that way.

I wasn't expecting Jack to murder Robocop in cold blood (silly me), but seriously I thought he would be needed to move the story along well into the second hour.

I wonder if the young petty officer will play into the "Jack must disappear" conclusion since he witnessed Jack shoot Robocop and knows that he wasn't armed.

Chloe has an ex husband! I really thought she was a virgin until the first episode of this season. I guess we'll have to think up another reason for the way she has been since season 1.

I can't believe that Mary Todd Weasel is going to sleep with the Weasel. I guess she can "close her eyes and think of England".

I'm surprised he lasted long enough to let Jack get in place.

I've got it figured out! Jack was never going to kill the Weasel. The whole thing was a trick to get a gimicked cell phone to the Weasel.

Weasel is now bugged 24/7. When he talks to the Bluetooth Mafia it will all be recorded by Chloe! Brilliant!

Ok that's it he confessed. Of course there are nearly 20 minutes left so we probably won't get to see Chloe handing off the recording for a few more minutes.

I wonder if Mary Todd Weasel knew that Weasel was bugged.

BTY, he didn't do a very good job of searching her. Really it was more of a "feel-up" than a search. The actor who plays Logan has done a good job this season I guess this was his reward.

NOT a gimicked cell phone! The old microtransmitter in the Mont Blanc trick. I should have known.

Mary Todd Weasel was in on it! This is even better than shooting him with Red Foreman's gun.

Well there we are. Jack and Audry together and so in love.

A call from Kim. As Dr. Who said, "Just this once a happy ending!". But no. She will be calling to tell him that she is being held hostage by the Bluetooth Mafia.

No, Kim isn't calling. Now Jack is hostage.

Col. McQueen and Julie Meyers are having a moment. If they kiss I'm going to heave. Oh, he asked her out [shudder].

Is it the Bluetooth Mafia? Will they bring Jack before them to taunt him? Don't they know what happens to people who taunt Jack Bauer?

NO its the frakking RED CHINESE!!

They're so screwed! Communism is dead in Red China now, they have pissed off Jack Bauer.

Next Season of 24 will feature WWIII!

Anybody want to get creeped out?

I found this blog while checking out my sitemeter.

Hello! My name is John Clennon, and I am a pedophile.

Since I was a very young boy, I've had quite the affinity for people younger than myself. I played with them, I laughed and smiled with them, I even preferred their company over others. It wasn't until i'd reached puberty that I discovered I am attracted to little girls in a sexual way, and I hadn't come to accept it until much later.

I look forward to seeing where this blog may take us, and I appreciate you coming here. The title, "At Our Expense", is intended for those of us like me who do no harm but have lived their lives with an unaccepted sexual orientation. Be it zoophilia, necrophilia, coprophagia, diaper fetish, pedophilia, or whatever, please let us in on your adventures/experiences.

Now where did I put the FBI's phone number?

Oh, by the way John. You had better not go anywhere near Missouri. I know a couple of hillbilly women there who would make you look like you have been through a blender if you got within 10 miles of their little girls.

The 24 pregame show

Less than an hour till the exciting, action packed season finale of 24.

I believe that this is the night in which we will finally get to see Jack Bauer kick the President of the United States' ass.

I also believe that tonight we will get to see Mary Todd Weasel shoot her husband with Red Foreman's gun.

And I believe that tonight we will see the Dosai (they reran the Stargate SG-1 episode with his where his character was introduced and I made notes - the head prior is called the Dosai) will meet his end in the all consuming flames of the Ori.

Am I right? We must wait and see.

You'd better sit down

Michelle Malkin has a long post bringing us up to date on the Senate's attempt to grant amnesty to the alien criminals living among us.

It's a good post and I recomend that you go read it, but what I want to draw your attention to is this:

It is left to Sen. Robert Byrd--yes, Bobby Byrd--to talk straight:

Sen. Robert C. Byrd, West Virginia Democrat, vehemently opposes "this effort to waive the rules for lawbreakers and to legalize the unlawful actions of undocumented workers and the businesses that illegally employ them." Amnesties, he said, "are the dark underbelly of our immigration process."

Yes, that is correct. Robert Byrd is correct. He is telling the truth!

It finally happened

Quote of the day

Life? That's easy! Just nature's way of keeping meat fresh.

- Dr. Who

Liberal Hypocrites

From Blue Star Chronicles:

You know you’re a liberal hypocrite when making jokes about Michelle Malkin’s heritage, her husband being Jewish and ping-pong balls is ’swimmingly cool’ [swish~swish]. But expecting illegal immigrants to learn English as part of the process of becoming citizens is ‘racist’.

There's more. It's good. Go read it.

First remove the board from your own eye. . .

Warner Todd Huston writes in The Conservative Voice:

. . . nation wide no less than 21 Republican incumbents holding both state offices and Federal have been defeated in their own primaries by more conservative GOP opponents in this voting season. And this is probably just the beginning.

-Sitting Representative Chris Cannon is forced into a primary in Utah instead of automatically getting the nod from the Party.

-Tom Osborne lost his bid to represent the GOP for the Gubernatorial contest, even though Osborne is a well-known, long-time politician in the state of Nebraska.

-Five incumbent city council members of Herndon, VA lost their seats due to their support for a "day labor center" for illegal aliens.

-And, in the worst slaughter, in Pennsylvania, 14 GOP incumbents lost their primary contests statewide (both Federal and state and local) to more conservative opponents.

This must be a wake up call to the Party. Are you listening Ken Mehlman? Are you paying attention Karl Rove?What you are seeing is NOT the "Conservative crack-up" that so many lefties are hoping for, but a steeling of the spine of the Conservative voter base.

Give Mr. Huston the gold star.

Too many people are taking the position that criticism of Republican elected officials, especially the President, must be suppressed in the interest of party unity. The result in some quarters is a kind of small scale cult of personality like that which surrounded Stalin in the USSR and still surrounds the Kim dynasty in North Korea.

Needless to say this is deeply unhealthy in a democratic society. It is also suicidal in a political party like the Republicans. Democrats can pull off the “check your mind at the door and march in lockstep” approach to politics. They start off as collectivists with a sheet of talking points instead of a brain. Just listen to one of Rush Limbaugh’s collection of identical quotes from Democrat politicians or mainstream media commentators next time some political story breaks.

Republicans, on the other hand, are individualists. They will not simply shut up and toe the line. Feed them a line of BS and they will smell it a mile away and lose respect for the source. Republicans, or to be more accurate conservatives, respect the truth. That’s why they’re conservatives. You must first of all be honest with them.

Mr. Huston concludes his essay with the warning that conservatives need to be careful and only unseat the RINOs when a true conservative candidate that can win in the general election is available. This is true and I believe that the average conservative is mature and intelligent enough to understand this.

It is fine to say “we must reelect Lincoln Chafee because in Rhode Island it is either him or a moonbat even further to the left whose presence in the Senate will help give Democrats majority status”, but it most defiantly was not acceptable in Pennsylvania where a true conservative could have won. All that the Republican establishment managed to do there was clutch a viper to their breast and make conservatives that much more alienated, mistrustful and angry.

To sum up we need to realize that the Republican Party has value only as a vehicle to advance conservative ideals. Sometimes this will mean supporting people who are not conservative. Just as the US and UK had to ally themselves with the USSR to defeat Hitler. However we must never lose sight of the fact that if all our actions are not directed toward the victory of our values and ideals we will lose in the end.

You can't say that they don't know what they're voting for

The people of New Orleans have reelected “School bus” Ray Nagin. Michelle Malkin observes, “[t]hey say insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

In a democracy a people get the government that they deserve.

A new Ecosystem member!

The Ecosystem really lucked out today. The Peace Moombeam Chronicles has signed on.

If you've never seen the PM Chronicles you've been missing one of the funniest blogs around. I'm talking about the same ballpark as ScrappleFace.

Go over and pay a visit. You won't regret it.

Chimney Rock Village

This is the village of Chimney Rock in the mountains of Western North Carolina. It is about 11 miles from where I live.

This is the geographical feature from which the town and the park draws its name.

I swear it reminds me of something besides a chimney, but I can't put my finger on what.

There is a hiking trail along the face of the mountain. Part if is is through the woods and part of it is along the bare rock.

Part of the movie Last of the Mohicans was filmed here.

Hickory Nut Falls.

Note, these pictures were taken on different days.

Here is a long shot for perspective.

At the foot of the mountain is the Rocky Broad River (to set it apart from the Broad River, the Second Broad River and the French Broad River).

The first explorers through there weren't very creative.

There is a nature walkway that runs along the river. You get to it by going down this stairway.

Of course not many have the courage to make the attempt.

The village is located on Hwy 64/74-A which has been designated as the Blue Star Memorial Highway. During WWII President Roosevelt drove through here on his way between Rutherfordton and Asheville. The schools brought their children out to see him drive by. The kids were taught by their teachers to make the "V for Victory" sign to show their support for the war, the troops and the Commander-in-Chief.

When I was a child the shops in the village were full of the cheapest kind of tourist junk. A few years ago the corporation that owns all the land and leases the buildings to the store owners decided to go a bit more upscale.

Restaurants, art, clothing,Native American crafts and jewelry made from locally mined minerals are the dominant themes.

You can even get a thong bathing suit here. Not that you'll see anyone wearing one at the local lake.

They do sell the official t-shirt of the Hillbilly Ecosystem.

Bubba is the dog. In case you were wwondering.

No place like the village would be complete without an ice cream parlor.

And bears carved with a chainsaw.

I think that this has gotten long enough so we'll continue the tour later. I'm thinking that I'll go up to the actual park and snap some pictures from the rock. The view is magnificent.

We got us another hillbilly!

We have one more hillbilly joining up.

James Foley at No Amnesty - Got It?

Here's what he has to say about himself:

I am from Michigan and would love to join up with your group. I have never been a city boy. The house I live in has been the family home for over 50 years now and is still in the country. I am a Vietnam vet, a patriot, becoming active in Republican politics as a precinct delegate, helping to identify and weed out the pro-amnesty candidates on the local scene. Blogging about the Republicrats in the senate and pandering politicians as I find them.

Beth over at the other new member blog Ramblings of an Undisturbed Mind asks this question:

For those of you who find it almost compulsive to rant and rave on your blogs about how this country is in danger and how you disagree with everything our-note the word our government handles issues-exactly what are you doing, besides bitching?

Well, James showes us how it's done.

A new Hillbilly!

Ramblings Of An Undisturbed Mind has joined the Ecosystem. Beth describes herself this way:

"I'm just an average *real* hillbilly who is sick of reading blogs of liberals and liberal wannabes rambling on and on about our country and the supposed mess that it's in-yet they do nothing about it."

Go over and pay her a visit.

This is blog number 27, if anyone is counting.

Don't calm down. . . yet

I’ve been noticing that a lot of the blogs that have been expressing anger at the sell out on immigration being committed by the President and certain senators are either having second thoughts or are experiencing a kind of emotional burnout. I understand this, but it is a little too soon to let up.

Let’s have a little civics lesson:

Every two years the entire House of Representatives is up for reelection while only one third of the Senate is up for reelection. The Senators pushing hardest for amnesty and open borders are either left-liberals like Ted Kennedy from states with left-wing majorities like Massachusetts or “Republicans” who are not up for reelection this year (one exception is DeWine from Ohio who is falling further and further behind in the polls).

The American people are expressing their will in regard to amnesty very clearly. They do not want it. The House, which must face the public in mass this November, passed a tough “borders only” bill. The Senate, which is mostly shielded from the public this year, is approving a very liberal amnesty/guest worker bill that gives the hollow promise of beefed up border security later (a promise that no person with an IQ in the double digits believes for a nanosecond).

A conference committee is about to be convened to reconcile the different immigration reform bills passed by the House and the Senate. So now, in the words of the immortal Margaret Thatcher, is not the time to go all wobbly.

The House is very well aware of the rage which is boiling away in the non-moonbat portion of the electorate (otherwise known as the “majority”). It has already been announced that the House members who will be appointed to the conference committee will be dominated by anti-amnesty hardliners. This means that no compromise bill that includes amnesty and defers tougher border security, including a fence, is likely to be approved. Unless, that is, the House leadership gets the impression that the public’s feelings have cooled off and they would be willing to accept the Senate’s take on immigration reform.

Then the temptation to just give in to the pressure from the Open Borders Lobby (and their chief spokesman George W Bush) might just be irresistible.

So blow on the embers of your anger for just a little bit longer. Once a conference bill having a border fence and no amnesty is brought back to the Congress to be voted on again the Democrats are going to have a problem. The moonbat portion of their constituency will demand that they vote against it and the non-moonbat portion will demand that they vote for it. The problem for them is that without the votes of both groups they can’t win.

It is true that a handful of “Republicans” face the same problem, but if they fail to be reelected so what? We will be well rid of RINOs like them.

The focus on the depth of George W Bush’s error in carrying water for Vicente Fox and the alien criminals has obscured the fact that without the connivance of both houses of Congress no change in immigration policy is possible.

The Harriet Meiers and DP World port deal prove that the President can learn if the spanking stings enough. Keep up the pressure on the House of Representatives until they kill amnesty and Mr. Bush will retreat for the balance of his final term.

Let the immigration question stay alive into the November election and it will work for us. Leave the final resolution to a later congress and a later president.