The Guardian has Senator Kerry's anti-terrorism plan:

"Kerry said he would address the root caucuses of terrorism by protecting chemical and nuclear facilities, increasing security at ports and airports, restoring federal funding for 100,000 police officers and adding 100,000 fire fighters across the country "

I am having problems here figuring out what the root caucuses(sic) of terrorism have to do with protecting things in this country which, from all indications, we are doing already fairly well. I always thought that the root causes of terrorism were conditions like poverty, lack of opportunity, religious and/or political extremism, etc.. What is Senator Kerry talking about or does he know? Maybe Senator Kerry thinks that terrorism has something to do with the caucuses in Iowa? Could be. Really.

Maureen Dowd is a 'columnist' for the New York Times. Her 'column', called "Stations of the Crass", is a ridiculous two pronged attack on both the Mel Gibson movie, "The Passion of the Christ" and, for some reason, President Bush ,who had nothing to do with the making of the movie. I guess she could not find enough bad things like this to write about the movie:

In "Braveheart" and "The Patriot," his other emotionally manipulative historical epics, you came out wanting to swing an ax into the skull of the nearest Englishman. Here, you want to kick in some Jewish and Roman teeth. And since the Romans have melted into history . .

Where does she get this kind of baloney? This is utterly stupid, especially from a New York Times columnist. Is there one theater goer who felt they had to murder an Englishman or Jew after viewing any of these movies? Of course not. This woman needs to be retired. When she stoops to using a movie review as a vehicle to gratuitously attack the President it is a signal she has lost whatever journalistic integrity she had before if she ever had any in the first place.

said: "It is a good thing Saddam Hussein is no longer in power. It is a good thing we are democratizing the country."

"praised the Bush administration's war and nation-building work in Iraq and said he has no serious concerns about the lack of weapons of mass destruction."

A leading Republican? Why no, it is Senator Tom Daschle, the main Democratic attack dog!! Why the sudden change in spots? Could it be there is a senate election in South Dakota this year? Why yes, there is an election.

A couple of comments from the National Review about the election that will explain Senator Daschle now being a friend of the President and the administration after bad-mouthing everything Republican for 2 1/2 years:

1. By almost any measure, South Dakota is an exceptionally Republican state. Recent party-registration figures in South Dakota are 48.1 percent Republican to 38.5 percent Democrat. Registered Republicans outnumber registered Democrats by more than 43,000 voters.

If that isn't enough, South Dakota has voted for a Democratic president just four times since being admitted as a state. The state is reliably Republican even in lean years. For example, Bob Dole won South Dakota in 1996 with 46 percent of the vote.

And, most importantly, South Dakota is Bush country. Bush beat Gore by roughly 72,000 votes in 2000 and won the state with 60 percent of the vote.

2. If Al Gore's message didn't play well in South Dakota in 2000, how well do you think a liberal from Massachusetts who favors gun control, is stridently pro-choice, and voted against the death penalty for terrorists who kill Americans abroad will do in 2004?

3. Democratic Senator Tim Johnson narrowly defeated John Thune in 2002. To pull off this feat Johnson had to: (a) vote for the president's tax cut and advertise his vote on TV (a tax cut Daschle voted against), (b) play up the fact that he is generally pro-life, (c) focus attention on his son's admirable service in the military, (d) get lucky enough to have a pesky libertarian candidate take 3,070 votes away from Thune, (e) turn out an amazing number of Native Americans on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Shannon County, and (f) focus almost exclusively on the question of who can bring home the most pork. All of this got Tim Johnson a 528 vote victory out of 337,508 votes cast.

To say Senator Daschle might be a little concerned about the election is putting it mildly. It takes a mighty frightened Democrat like the extremely partisan Senator Daschle to praise President Bush and his administration. First, Senator Daschle loses the majority leader's post and now he is faced with becoming just an ordinary citizen again or maybe helping his wife out with her Boeing lobbying duties.

I heard a proposal today to eliminate drug usage in professional sports. It involves testing. Drug testing is, of course, not new. It has always bothered me because of the privacy issue and false positives. The proposal I heard was that there would be one communal sample, one test for each team immediately after the conclusion of a game. If the communal sample tested positive, the team would forfeit the game. The idea is that the players know who is using drugs and soon the drug users would experience more than a little peer pressure.

When I was a coach I used to have players run laps for a variety of individual silly team infractions for the same reason. Then I had a kid who enjoyed making the team run so I stopped the practice of punishing all for the irresponsibility of one person. Besides, the kids would get enough of that when they grew up and began paying taxes to support a large group of irresponsible people.

Go ahead, try it.

Tip: Dave Barry's Blog

Senators Kerry and Edwards will appear together on ABC's ThisWeek Sunday news show. It would be hilarious to play a variation of the old college game of Hi Bob where participants would chug a glass of beer every time someone on the Bob Newhart Show said "Hi Bob".

So get the group together to watch the show and every time Senator Kerry or Edwards says The President, President Bush, Bush, or Flight Suit Boy drink one sip of your favorite adult beverage.

I will try to keep track of the number of times these two refuse to address the issues facing our country by engaging in non-stop Bush Bashing. This will be a hard assignment because I seem to doze off everytime Senator Kerry talks for more that 15 seconds.

If George Stephanopoulous happens to read this I have a suggestion for some questions:

Show some footage with sound of President Bush being wildly cheered by the sailors on the aircraft carrier USS Lincoln and ask the candidates if they think that the sailors thought that the President's visit was just a photo op or if he was welcoming them home after they risked their lives in service of their country and completing their mission in Iraq. Then ask Senator Kerry how he thinks servicemen and women felt when they returned to the US from Vietnam and watched your demonstrations on TV and listened to you accuse them of murdering innocent civilians. Ask him which is the best way to welcome home troops.

PBS News Hour Show has become the John F Kerry Show. Last night was the umteenth segment they have had that either featured him or contained a significant amount of Kerry footage. First, last night, we had a segment of Senator Kerry making a campaign speech filled with what have become the same old, tired Bush Bashing memes. Then we had an "interview" of Senator Kerry by Gwen Ifill. Ms Ifill tossed up some soft balls for Senator Kerry to hit and he would swing wildly at them as he proceeded to give a short speech while not answering each one. By the time he finished talking I forgot what the question was. Every answer was "I fought for this.", "I fought for that", "I led the fight for this", "I led the fight for that.", and "I served in Vietnam.". The man is totally and utterly boring and definitely is trying too hard to sound tough with all this 'fight' and 'bring it on' veribage. Isn't it kind of strange for someone to try to act tough with his anti-war background? He supported the war in Iraq in the Senate and as a member of Senate Intelligence Committee who had access to the same intelligence as President Bush and now wants it both ways by acting like a tough guy and denouncing the war with a namby pamby lame excuse.

His being absolutely boring and the condesending tone of his voice had me reaching for the trusty remote on about the 3rd question. Senator Kerry must have attended the Condesending Voice School for the Rich and Powerful with Vice President Albert Gore. Senator Kerry seems to be using the same phrases and words Vice President Gore used so successfully when he was campaigning. Someone should alert the poor guy.

An interesting batle is developing over a piece of land in the Phoenix area known as Black Mountain. Black Mountain is a beautiful, almost untouched desert area that some want to open to public recreation, i.e., hiking, while conserving it and others want to preserve it by limiting public access. By opening to public recreation they mean building restroom facilities, access roads, parking lots and a limited number of defined hiking trails.

Hiking in the beautiful mountains and fascinating Sonoran desert is a big time recreational activity in Arizona. Most hikers want areas to remain pristine as possible with the exception of hiking trails. Hikers for the most part are environmentalists when it comes to the recreational areas they hike in. They do not want it destroyed or commercially developed yet they want access to it via the trails. Preservationists want an area to remain totally untouched. Conservationists say that hikers are already using unimproved trails through the area so preservation is a pipe dream unless a big fence is put up around it to keep people out or establish some hungry mountain lions there.

One of my favorite areas is overrun with hikers and mountain bikers on weekends. So much so that I only go there in the off-season. The problem is that not all hikers respect the land. It just takes a few hikers going off-trail to destroy a fragile desert eco-system. A few drop trash with the expectation someone else will pick up after them. A certain amount of trash doesn't get picked up and gradually pollutes an area. The parks people have installed ugly trash barrels along the main trail. Someone who will drop trash on a beautiful trail certainly won't be bothered to use a trash barrel. A can of spray paint in the hands of wrong person can ruin a trail forever.

With home building gobbling up acre after acre of land in the Valley of the Sun we have to have recreational areas, but also we have to preserve some of it for the future. Black Mountain is a damned-you-do and damned-if-you-don't problem because hikers already know about it and are already hiking there in greater numbers. The question becomes whether opening it to more people will preserve it in the long run by making the trails permanent.

Good things do happen in Iraq. This is one of the many good things. Tobin Bradley makes me feel proud to be an American.

Tip: Andrew Sullivan

David Brooks points out in the New York Times that the Zarqzwi Rules (Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al Qaeda leader in Iraq) include this:

Massive retaliation works. We now know that Saddam Hussein felt free to defy the international community because he thought that casualty-averse Americans would never actually invade his country. At worst, we'd drop a few bombs, which he could survive. Now our enemies know us better, and respect us more. "America, however, has no intention of leaving, no matter how many wounded nor how bloody it becomes," Zarqawi warns his colleagues. This shift in perceptions should deter some attacks all by itself.

How did Zarqawi and Saddam Hussein reach the conclusion we would not invade or leave if the casualty rate got to be too high? Obviously by watching large anti-war demonstrations that would constantly decry the losses we are suffering or would suffer. Hussein and Zarqawi thought by killing enough of our troops the anti-war people, who have impressively massed thousands in the streets with Bush bashing posters, would prevail and President Bush would have to withdraw. President Bush however has been steadfastly resolute.

Now Zarqawi is caught up in a quagmire of his own making. We are standing fast and slowly and surely depleting his forces and resources and it certainly appears that the anti-war people are not going to get their way. We are not leaving and President Bush is likely to be in office another 4 years.

The level of violence in Iraqwould have never achieved the level it did without the anti-war groups' help. Coalition forces would have restored order by now and we would be well on our way to getting out of Iraq. Instead our troops and the Iraqi people are being subjected to daily attacks because the terrorists still are holding out hope that the anti-war people will continue to stab President Bush in the back and eventually cause the US to leave so they can run the country themselves. Without the anti-war groups' help they do not have a chance to win. The anti-war groups could care less about the Iraqis. Their main objective is not to help the people of Iraq and to save American and Iraqi lives. The objective has nothing to do with war. There objective is to bring down President Bush. To them if a few more Americans and Iraqis die and they achieve their goal who cares?

You can read a somewhat humorous William F Buckley article about Senator Kerry and his mortgage on his house jointly owned by Senator John Forbes Kerry and his wife Teresa Heinz Kerry here. Ah, the problems of the rich and famous. Will Senator Kerry's backers give Senator Kerry back his house by contributing enough to not only cover the $200,000 in interest he owes but repay the principle? Every dollar the campaign uses to repay that $6 million Senator Kerry owes is one dollar less he can spend on his campaign.

What I can not understand if the Democrats are successful in playing the class warfare game during the election will everyone hate Senator Kerry and his wife?

Daniel Pipes tried to speak at UC Berkley at event open to the public recently. Pipes is is director of the Middle East Forum, a member of the U.S. Institute of Peace, and a columnist for the New York Sun and the Jerusalem Post. Read about how the liberal and radical Muslim Nazis at Berkley treated him during his lecture. Freedom of speech is apparently dead at UC Berkley unless you are saying things that the leftist agree with. These people want to shut down all discussion of the issues in this country. It has reached the point where we have to have police at lectures to keep order.

The ChronWatch article concludes with this:

The fact is, radical Muslim students and their leftist counterparts are the most domineering, destructive, and dangerous forces in higher education today. If we’re to win the War on Terrorism, we may have to start with our own college campuses.

It is funny how the leftists in this country continually preach about diversity and tolerance yet never practice it themselves. Or should I say sickening.

Drudge does it again. Go and check out the picture Drudge posted with the story.

CAMPAIGN DRAMA ROCKS DEMOCRATS: KERRY FIGHTS OFF MEDIA PROBE OF RECENT ALLEGED INFIDELITY, RIVALS PREDICT RUIN **World Exclusive** **Must Credit the DRUDGE REPORT** A frantic behind-the-scenes drama is unfolding around Sen. John Kerry and his quest to lockup the Democratic nomination for president, the DRUDGE REPORT can reveal. Intrigue surrounds a woman who recently fled the country, reportedly at the prodding of Kerry, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned. A serious investigation of the woman and the nature of her relationship with Sen. John Kerry has been underway at TIME magazine, ABC NEWS, the WASHINGTON POST, THE HILL and the ASSOCIATED PRESS, where the woman in question once worked. MORE A close friend of the woman first approached a reporter late last year claiming fantastic stories -- stories that now threaten to turn the race for the presidency on its head! In an off-the-record conversation with a dozen reporters earlier this week, General Wesley Clark plainly stated: "Kerry will implode over an intern issue." [Three reporters in attendance confirm Clark made the startling comments.] The Kerry commotion is why Howard Dean has turned increasingly aggressive against Kerry in recent days, and is the key reason why Dean reversed his decision to drop out of the race after Wisconsin, top campaign sources tell the DRUDGE REPORT.

If true, it sounds if Senator Kerry did not have an affair during sexual harassment trial like President Clinton did so we won't get the pleasure of watching him lie to a federal judge in a court proceeding. The Democrats can be thankful for that. His wife might kill him unlike HRC who had her political future to consider when she stood by her man. Who do these guys think about when they do these things - just themselves?

Clinton may have had a hand in this. Keep an eye out for evidence of it. I do not think that the Republicans did because they are probably looking forward to running against Senator Kerry. Senator Edwards is the worst candidate for the Republicans in my book.

Senator Kerry's biggest problem, if this is true, is his wife: From Slate:

She (Mrs Heinz-Kerry) waxed discursive on her favorite sunscreen (Clinique), the healing properties of green tea, and the charms of life in Europe. In a June 2003 profile in Elle, she said she used Botox and would consider plastic surgery, that "everybody has a prenup," that she would "maim" her husband if she caught him cheating on her. She also commented on changing her name: "Now, politically, it's going to be Teresa Heinz Kerry, but I don't give a shit, you know? There are other things to worry about." Whoa Momma!! as they say in Arkansas.

And I thought Gov Dean was going crazy when he backed off his pledge to quit if he lost Wisconsin a couple of days ago. He was tipped off by someone.

Update: Well, suckered punched again. I must start waiting a little while for these things to develop. Apparently the affair has been called off. With the affair story debunked, Gov Dean dropped out of the race for the nomination.

World Net Daily comes up with this bumper sticker at the end of a good article.

Tip: The Hedgehog Report

I have been reading with a great deal of interest about the President being AWOL from or deserting his National Guard unit back in the 70's. Democratic National Committee Chairman, Terry McAuliffe, flat out says that President Bush was AWOL. Senator Kerry and General Clark tiptoe around the issue by using the old rhetorical device of not talking about it by continuing to say they are talking about it thus keeping the issue in front of the press.

There has been a lot blogged about this: we'll present you decide.

Baldilocks (what a great name!) gives an intelligent, common sense summary of what AWOL means and how extended leave works in the Guard or Reserves from personal experience.

The Mudville Gazette discusses the issue in a great post call "AWOL Again" and makes a great point of Democrats making crimes a matter of opinion.

HobbsOnline does a good job of covering the issue here. Be sure to read Al's and dadmanly's excellent comments to this post especially the 'not observed' on President Bush's evaluation.

Senator Kerry's 'outstanding' record in Vietnam is covered here. It gives a slightly different view of his tour in Vietnam that the I-served-in-Vietnam commericals Senator Kerry is showing around the country. You can read about the President's service and then read compare it to what this former POW, Jen Marinez in the Mudvilee Gazette, thinks of Senator Kerry's service during and actions after the Vietnam War. This is also an interesting post by Martinez.

Kevin Drum at CalPundit has discusses the President's service and puts forth a document that accounts for the unaccounted for time in the record. Of course, Kevin casts doubts on this as an actual document by saying it may be a 'clever forgery' (all the other documents casting doubt on President Bush's service are not) because it does not fit in with the Democratic meme. He also directs us to another document that he characterizes as a warning to President Bush to attend meetings. This looks like standard boiler plate every new inductee signs. Since there is no date on it we do not know. Read the comments. These people are flat out desparate. Kevin haughtily says: "So Bush may indeed have "fulfilled his obligation," as he says, but only because he had essentially been relieved of any further obligation after his transfer to ARF. It's pretty clear that no one in the Texas Air National Guard had much interest in pursuing anything more serious in the way of disciplinary action." Why would the Texas National Guard want to pursue anything further if President Bush fulfilled his obligation to the Guard? Brilliant thinking.

The Evangelical Outpost makes explains the different between those who join the National Guard, conscientious objectors, draft dodgers and those who run to Canada. It seems Senator Kerry is confused. Again.

Here is a great comment refuting CalPundit's repugnant post. It says it all. Should be required reading by everyone interested in this issue. This, by the same guy, is also good reading.

You can go to this site and see how some on the left have made a business out of this issue. Only in America.

RealClearPolitics takes out Kevin Drum of CalPundit in a real good post.

An interesting blog entry about President Bush's aircraft, the Convair F102A, is here. Be sure to read the comments for some interesting points made by CW.

Professor Bainbridge simplifies the issue and gets it right right here.

Interesting comments by President Bush's former flight instructor.

Update: Calpundit has dropped the AWOL story. I keep asking why and haven't gotten an answer. One blogger has asked conservative bloggers to apologize for posting material about Senator Kerry's alleged affair. I will apologize for my happy snearing post when I see some apologies materialize on liberal blogs for smearing President Bush on the AWOL issue. I won't hold my breath.

From the New York Times:

In 1985, a 31-year-old North Carolina lawyer named John Edwards stood before a jury and channeled the words of an unborn baby girl.

Referring to an hour-by-hour record of a fetal heartbeat monitor, Mr. Edwards told the jury: "She said at 3, `I'm fine.' She said at 4, `I'm having a little trouble, but I'm doing O.K.' Five, she said, `I'm having problems.' At 5:30, she said, `I need out.' "

But the obstetrician, he argued in an artful blend of science and passion, failed to heed the call. By waiting 90 more minutes to perform a breech delivery, rather than immediately performing a Caesarean section, Mr. Edwards said, the doctor permanently damaged the girl's brain.

"She speaks to you through me," the lawyer went on in his closing argument. "And I have to tell you right now — I didn't plan to talk about this — right now I feel her. I feel her presence. She's inside me, and she's talking to you."

The jury came back with a $6.5 million verdict in the cerebral palsy case, and Mr. Edwards established his reputation as the state's most feared plaintiff's lawyer.

At one time in Senator Edward's life he could hear the babies in the womb talking to him when it meant he was going to get a couple of million dollars by lovingly depicting what he heard an unborn child say in a medical malpractice trial.

Senator Edwards apparently became hard of hearing when the babies were going to be innocent victims of abortion instead of a victim of medical malpractice. I guess a doctor murdering the baby instead of just injuring it is different in the Senator's world. His moral character demands that we punish doctors (and enrich himself) for injuring the unborn but not for killing them.

Senator Edwards, despite his extraordinary ability hear certain babies' cries in the womb when he was going to profit from it, now hears only the shrill cries of the bloated, greedy abortion industry instead of those children that going to be murdered. Senator Edwards supports abortion including the barbaric practice of partial birth abortion. A compassionate Democrat?

"Certainly, those who went to Vietnam suffered greatly. I have argued for years, since I returned myself in 1969, that they do deserve special affection and gratitude for service. And, indeed, I think everything I have tried to do since then has been to fight for their rights and recognition. But while those who served are owed special recognition, that recognition should not come at the expense of others; nor does it require that others be victimized or criticized or said to have settled for a lesser standard. To divide our party or our country over this issue today, in 1992, simply does not do justice to what all of us went through during that tragic and turbulent time. "

- Sen. Kerry speaking on the Senate floor Feb. 27, 1992. The previous day, Sen. Bob Kerrey, a Vietnam veteran and candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, spoke in Atlanta, where he criticized fellow candidate Bill Clinton for his lack of military service during Vietnam.

Senator John F. Kerry has brought up President Bush's service in the National Guard 31 years ago in his campaign. I guess he has changed his mind about dividing the country over Vietnam now the person in question in President Bush rather than President Clinton. We will see if any lefty blogger's finely tuned hypocrisy detectors pick up on this.

Read entire speech here in the WSJ Opinion Journal.

Dean received one of his biggest ovations after a heckler asked what he'd do to reduce the abortion rate. He suggested universal health care for children, sex education that isn't just abstinence-based, and finally, "We're going to tell all those white boys who run the Republican Party to stay out of our bedrooms."

Governor Dean had to work hard to screw up that reply. How universal health care for children and sex education that isn't abstinence-based will reduce abortions is not all that clear to me. Then, to make matters worst, he throws in a racial slur on top of a liberal shibboleth that has become an idiotic rallying cry for the abortionist wing of the Democratic Party. Does this man sound Presidential to anyone?

Tip: WSJ Opinion Journal's Best of the Web 2/2/04