I've been pretty sick with the flu, which seemed to set off all kinds of reactions related to rheumatoid arthritis and diabetes.  I just turned 60 but I don't feel like my best years are ahead of me. 

The New York Times seems as though it's trying to destroy its own credibility faster than New Media can.  First the McCain "affair with a lobbyist" non-story, then bringing up whether being born in the Canal Zone makes him ineligible to be president.  Please.  This doesn't even rise to the level of The Onion for credibility. 

Hillary seems to be paddling ahead of an Obama tsunami.  I believe that it could easily overtake her and leave her amid the flotsam and jetsam of a ruined campaign.  There's no good outcome for the Democrats.  If Obama doesn't get the nomination, triple-As (Americans with African Ancestry) will realize how they've been taken for granted all these years and sit on their votes.  If he does, the Feminist/Gay/MoveOn/Liberal/Progressive/Marxist branch of the party will be angrier than they were having Bush win in 2000 and then go to war in Iraq, and they've make somebody pay.  Actually, Obama is far more liberal than Hillary, but being the first Triple-A president is so Last Century.  Having Hillary win, on the other hand, would not really be a victory for feminism as much as the Return of Billary.  Yuck.

She launched what will be called the "Call in the Night" ad today, asking when the phone rings at the White House at 3:00 a.m. who you would want answering the phone.  The problem is that it's too much of an open question.  Most people wouldn't think of Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama as their first response.  Mine would be General Petraeus, Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson or George Bush.  But if restricted, to those running, it would be McCain, although I refuse to vote for the man.  I think he's too dumb to be president, but he'd be fine in this context.

I watched part of a Biography Channel program on Barack Obama last night, and the more hagiographic it became the more uneasy it made me.  He is the product of a fatherless family, where his mother made him who he is.  He seems to have married a strong liberal lady lawyer who probably won't be one of the tea parties and special causes type  First Ladies.  Indeed, it seems that this could be a repeat of the Clinton's, but with the First Spouse being the stronger of the two.  Otherwise, Barack reminds me a lot of Ralph Nader.  His chosen career was to be a "community organizer" in Chicago, which has to be a new age type of vocation that couldn't exist without Social Science and the Civil Rights Movement, which have basically become the New Socialism.  It threatens our society today as much as or more than Communism did in the 1920s and 1930s, because we assumed that bad ideas for government died with the Soviet Union.   Terrorism is a useful distraction while our schools, our local institutions and our burgeoning bureaucracy continues to invade our lives.  A safety net can become a fishing net if the corners are pulled up by whoever has the levers.  If it can keep you from falling, it can keep you from escaping, as well.

I'm not sure we can really call ourselves a republic any more, unless there is a huge, widespread awakening, and willingness to deny ourselves of socialist programs being proffered by politicians of all parties. 

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/HughHewitt/2008/02/21/the_least_unpredictable_campaign_ever?page=full&comments=true

Charles Krauthammer nails Obama for his insipid platitudes.   Nothing else I've seen has reminded me so much the saying attributed to Winston Churchill that "If you're not a liberal at 20, you have no heart, and if you're not a conservative at 40 you have no head."  One hopes that age and experience increases our ability to see past platitudes, but if that were true, there would be no Democrats over 25.

David Limbaugh has a good analysis of the attitudes of conservatives toward McCain.  I think it's a good point that for pundits (Michael Medved) to lecture and scold us because we don't want to vote for John McCain.  It certainly troubles me to feel that my party doesn't represent me this year, but if I wanted to follow instructions from some file leader, I'd be a Democrat.

The defining issue of this election will be the degree to which the two nominees will be able to persuade the supporters of his opponents to support him or her. The Democrats could be as split as the Republicans.  Mitt Romney has shown good sense in endorsing McCain, making everybody wonder what's wrong with Mike Huckabee.  His explanation for staying in the race doesn't make much sense.  Perhaps he feels that he must do so to force his way onto the ticket with McCain, as the one who can win the South for Republicans. 

But the distaste I feel for McCain, and my decision not to vote in this election, is nothing compared to the fury of feminists who are deprived of the first female president by the nomination of the first African-American president.  But if Hillary wins the primaries, it will be the ultimate proof to blacks that the party takes them for granted and could cause them to sit on their hands.

Rebecca Hagelin has a terrific column about the effect religious prejudice has played in the Republican Primaries this year.  One of the comments made the point that Romney got 90% of the primary votes in Utah as proof that Mormons voted for him and against his opponents based on his religion.  That's a fair point.  I'm sure that Obama has gotten a lot of black votes because he's black, too.  There's nothing wrong with supporting your own, but there is when you vote against somebody merely because of his race, sex or religion,

Utah is only about 70% LDS, so a lot of Non-Mormons voted for him here too to give him that big a win.  It's indicative of how impressed Utahns were and are by his rescue of the Winter Olympics which had been mired in scandal and greed, before he took the helm.  Then 9/11 happened, and we found ourselves hosting the world, but having to make things secure from terrorism.  Of course, the people of Utah who volunteered and cooperated to make it a success deserve credit, but Romney lead the way.  It's impossible to have seen all that up close without being impressed by Mitt's abilities. 

Back to the original issue here.  I'm not sure, but I only know of two religions that teach that religious tolerance is a commandment from God.  One of these is Islam, although radical clerics and revolutionaries ignore the Koran's statement, "Let there be no compulsion in religion."  The other is Mormonism: "Now there was no law against a man’s belief; for it was strictly contrary to the commands of God that there should be a law which should bring men on to unequal grounds."  The Book of Mormon, Alma 30:7

Apparently, a lot of evangelicals have been taught that Mormonism is evil and a threat to their faith.  The main reason I think that evangelicals have been assailed with so much anti-Mormon propaganda is that they have a paid ministry, who lose income when congregants convert to other churches, and they have lost a lot of members to Mormonism.  I imagine that it's pretty tough when a small congregation starts losing its members to some megachurch down the road, but the minister can't propagandize against another minister of the same sect, the way he can against Mormons.

I find these attacks rather sad, because this is not a good time for social conservatives to be polarized against each other.  I think that everyone who believes in God has to confront mysteries for himself, and it does no good to argue about the minutiae of doctrine, especially when the sole purpose is to throw hammers from one glass house at another.  Faith is not something provable except through spiritual means.  Spiritual experience is real, but it can't be replicated by doubters and skeptics. 

Joseph Smith says that in his first vision of the angel Moroni, "He called me by name, and said unto me that he was a messenger sent from the presence of God to me, and that his name was Moroni; that God had a work for me to do; and that my name should be had for good and evil among all nations, kindreds, and tongues, or that it should be both good and evil spoken of among all people."  In that point he was a true prophet.  I remember as a teen visiting the Illinois State Historical Library and being told that behind books about Abraham Lincoln, the largest number of books in the collection were about Mormons, mostly against.  Do I believe that every word that dropped from Joseph's lips came directly from God?  No.  Do I believe that he was a prophet and received many true revelations? Yes.  Can I prove it?  Not any more than anybody can prove that Jesus rose from the dead and is in heaven. 

It's fruitless and pointless to bring up factoids about a religion and then use them to discredit a member of that religion, most of all in the setting of politics.  To me, Mitt Romney's religion was a starting point, a reason to consider him, just as Harry Reid's religion was. But I reached opposite conclusions about the two with respect to their political attractiveness.  I think Harry Reid is a political hack, while I view Romney as a leader of great intelligence backed up by achievements that make me view him as someone who could help this nation through severe crises.  If he were Catholic or Presbyterian or Pentecostal, I'd feel the same, given the same achievements.

Canadian GW activists want politicians jailed for violating Kyoto Protocols. 

I've seen David Suzuki on a lot of Discovery/Animal/Science Channel shows.  He seems to think he's the CBC's version of David Attenborough, but it's evidently gone to his head, or he's just senile.

The subhead asks "How did environmentalism become this totalitarian?"  The answer is that saving the planet is tailor-made for the people who in the '20s and '30s would have joined the Fascists or the Communist Party.  They're looking for the big struggles in History, and of course when you're fighting for History, anything is justified.  That's precisely why the rest of us should be skeptical about the validity of GW. 

I've been reading Witness by Whittaker Chambers about his undercover work for the Soviet Union and his subsequent defection and fight against Communism.  He writes so well about the appeal of the Crisis of History mystique that gave young Communists their faith in the Marxist solution, that overrode all constraints or appeals to patriotism and loyalty, even human decency, as when they saw acquaintances liquidated by Moscow without wavering in their devotion to the party. 

It was atheistic, but it invoked the vision of the all-powerful human intellect as its god, able to centrally plan the Russian economy, but having to steal technology in order to compete with free societies. 

Communism used totalitarianism because, it said, only when the whole world is Communist will the worker's paradise come to fruition.  Fascists used it in the name of the state and national dominance.  Islamofascists use it to enforce what they believe is the word of God, ignoring those verses which say that there is no compulsion or force in religion.  Naturally, those Americans and other Westerners who can't stand it that America has become prosperous and powerful in spite of their advice, who have no faith in anything they didn't invent, would find environmentalism the perfect substitute for religion and the perfect excuse to deprive everyone of their freedoms. 
I've got to say that even if we have to build dikes around Florida and the rest of our coastlines, freedom is more precious than anything these people have to offer.  Totalitarians is what they are, no matter how pleasantly and warmly they name themselves.  These are the people who place the value of a tree above that of a human life, but will willingly lop down even redwoods to let the sunshine reach the solar cells on someone else's roof.   They don't trust anybody's property rights except those they want for themselves.   Whenever anybody tells you he wants to save the world by imposing on your freedom, without anything in return but some computer model, run don't walk to get away.

Madonna made some clearly Anti-American remarks at the big blowout at the U.N. raising money for UNESCO.  Apparently, she thinks that Celebriana is a nation where we mere mortals aren't allowed.  Sophisticates like her are transnational. 

Update:  After further reflection, I think that I may have misinterpreted Madonna's remarks about the Gucci bash being held at the U.N.  She was raising money for UNESCO and for her personal charity Raising Malawi.  Both are good causes, and getting millionaires to kick in to help the poor of the earth is not a bad move. 

There was some suggestion that Gucci timed its participation in this shindig to coincide with the opening of its new store in NYC, but it denies that, and it doesn't bother me if it did.

He's young and healthy enough to run again in four years.  This year he came out of nowhere onto the national stage, but didn't get enough support to go over the top.  He's following Reagan's strategy after he was defeated by Gerald Ford in 1976.  He'll spend the meantime touring, speaking, raising money for fellow Republicans and letting people get to know him better.  In four years, Republicans will look at the choice between John McCain and  Mitt Romney and wonder, "What were we thinking?'

His speech was magnificent.  It touched every issue that conservatives care about, and in a clear, cogent and specific way.  He demonstrated that he has thought through these things and has looked down the years beyond our present troubles with terrorism, and will not be blindsided by some threat we have allowed to build while we were focusing on Islamist jihadis. 

Vote for John McCain, that is.  The pressure is building on those of us who have said this, with arguments that he's still better than Clinton or Obama, but I'm not sure that's true.  I don't believe the argument that he can beat the Democrat.  I think he'll lose.  The comments on this post by John Podhoretz give more of my feelings better than I can.  I'm beginning to feel that I don't really care about politics in a country 40% of the people consider members of my religion are considered less than equal citizens.

Of course, it doesn't matter whether I vote for McCain or not., because Utah will go Republican.  If there's one thing that McCain is strong on, it's the war, but the war is still very unpopular.  The heretofore friendly press will turn on McCain in a heartbeat and savage him mercilessly. 

If you live in a state where you can make a difference, do what you want.  McCain runs well against Democrat candidates today, but the media is still friendly to him.  That will change when he's the Republican nominee.  The generic Republican v. Democrat polls are against Republicans.  If he wins, he'll have a Democrat Congress arrayed against him. 

Well, it looks like McCain will be nominated, unless some kind of miracle occurs  tomorrow or at the convention. 

I have come to despise Huckabee, partly because of his cynical play on Anti-Mormon prejudice and his hypocrisy staying in the race to help McCain.  If there isn't a back room deal, I'll be surprised.

That was written last night.  Today we hear about McCain giving his delegates to Huckabee in West Virginia to prevent Romney from winning.  These guys really hate Romney.  With McCain it's because he sees Romney as trying to deny him of what he has come to think of as his nomination.  With Huckabee, it's jealousy and religious bigotry.   Huckabee will be McCain's attack dog and split conservatives to help McCain in exchange for being named his VP candidate.  They'll both lose in the fall. 

James Dobson has issued a letter that he will not vote for McCain under any circumstances, saying that he'll sit out the presidential election if McCain's the nominee.