December 8, 2004 by s.z.

Second-String Annoyers 1.  Michelle Maglalang Malkin  She links to a story about a Pearl Harbor vet who says that he goes out to schools and clubs and tells about his experiences, but there's not as much interest in his reminiscences any more.  He attributes this to the attack being "too long ago."  But Michelle has a better explanation. One of the reasons for the lack of interest is mind-rotting political correctness. Remember when the movie Pearl Harbor was released three years ago? Asian-American activists protested that vividly reminding audiences of the Japanese attack might stoke hate crimes. John Tateishi, head of the Japanese American Citizens League complained: "No matter how much we look to the future, we keep getting dragged back to Dec. 7. This movie does that -- pulls us back to that attack." I believe that mind-rotting political correctness is also to blame for our failure to remember the Maine, and for the disinclination of kids today to listen to stories they've heard before.  2.  James Lileks  James begins today's Bleat by telling us how his wife's car started to have problems, so she took his car, and he took hers to the garage. "I didn’t mind," he claims.  Yeah, he does EVERYTHING around the house, and gets no appreciation for it, but HE doesn't mind.  But someday he will drop dead of a heart attack because of the strain, and THEN they will be sorry. Or maybe it will be a nervous breakdown.  The signs are all there.  Like when he tells us about waiting with Gnat for the car to be repaired, and how he eavesdropped on an older couple who were discussing items from the newspaper, and James got ticked off at the old guy for being irritated about the wrong stuff.  (I guess he wanted to be the only coot in the coffee shop.)  The anecdote ends with the woman returning to her knitting -- "Either that or she was clacking infant bones together for some inscrutable purpose," James writes.  Yes, she was probably clacking infant bones.  Anyone who gets indignant about the junk tacked on to the budget bill is just the type who would kidnap kids like Gnat, cook them and eat them, and use their bones for clacking. Next, a review in the local paper of Inherit the Wind offends James by mentioning a "moral divide," so James has a debate with the late Clarence Darrow, and discredits Darrow's defense of Leopold and Loeb.  (If James had been the D.A. back then, the two sociopaths would have FRIED!) And then he gets into a snit about the coarsening of our culture -- how DARE people make movies like Closer, when a movie about people like James would be so much more artistic. But try and sell the critics and producers on the idea that a happy marriage with kids has more to say about the human heart than a tale of a 40 year old man who throws over his family for a 16-year old stripper. When Mrs. James throws over James for a 16-year-old stripper, maybe the Lileks family will get the attention from Hollywood it deserves. And then James has another snit fit about how the TV networks and sitcom writers hate people like him.  Perry Mason is not amused. 3.  Sean Hannity and James Dobson  COLMES: Do you think it was indeed moral values that won it for George W. Bush? DOBSON: They're no question about it. God told him so. DOBSON: My take on it is that people who are hard-working, middle American, mostly, who care about their families and care about moral values often go to church on Sunday, have been watching what's been going on in this country. They've seen the moral decline, they've seen what's happening in the schools, they've seen what's happening especially in Hollywood, and the entertainment industry, and then they saw what Massachusetts tried to do to the family. They were very alarmed by that. And we're not just talking about Evangelicals, they're Catholics, mainline Christians, people with no faith at all, but hold those views. And when they got an opportunity, they said enough is enough. COLMES: Let me go back to the Charles Krauthammer column. Which I agree with Sean, was a terrific column, today. But he goes on to point out that moral values encompasses a group of issues, and they were pitted on — up against individual issues, like the war in Iraq. As a group of issues, moral values can be different things to different people. Moral values could mean not going into Iraq, not having war, and so to extrapolate and say that that there — therefore, meant those people were voting for Bush for that reason, may not be accurate. DOBSON: Well, I think the polls show that it was accurate and there are values that matter most, and one of them is marriage. I have no doubt whatsoever about the fact that the issue of marriage, of the effort to impose same-sex marriage on this country and on the family, especially by the courts, who are unelected and unaccountable and who are arrogant and determined to impose their views on us, that stuck in the hearts of the people, and when they got an opportunity, they expressed themselves at the polls. COLMES: Well, one of the other things Charles Krauthammer points out, which is on the gay issue, in the 11 states in which gay marriage referendums were held, President Bush increased his vote by less than he did in the 39 states that did not have the referendum, and in Ohio increased it maybe by less than one percent. So those statistics don't bear out the idea that it was gay marriage that put it over the top for President Bush. DOBSON: Alan, you can make statistics jump through hoops! When it comes right down to it, it doesn't matter what Krauthammer says, what the polls say, or what statistics showed about how the number of people who said they voted for values was higher in the 1992 election when Bill Clinton was elected president.  No, if people voted for George Bush, then they HAVE to be in favor of Dobson's agenda. That's just the way it is. HANNITY: Let me read a quote to you, if I can, and we don't have a lot of time here. And this is from [former Washington Post Carl Bernstein, he said, "We have a minority religious group who want to impose their religious values on a secular country that has separation of church and state." And he goes on, "I think what is dangerous is we're fighting a war against fundamentalism that we must win, and if we become fundamentalists and try and establish values in our own country while trying to fight fundamentalist Muslim people who want to kill us, I think that's a terrible thing." This is how some of these so-called journalists and pundits are seeing this. They can't be more wrong. DOBSON: Isn't that amazing? This is a government of the people, by the people and for the people. It's a government where we have a right to express our views, all people from all ends of the spectrum. And yet those that hold conservative views are somehow called nasty names: Jihadists. They're somehow equating with those that bomb people. See, Dobson KNOWS that when 53% of the voters cast ballots for George Bush, they were voting against gay marriage, secular schools, and naughty TV shows and movies.  So, when the government overturns Roe V. Wade, amends the Constitution to prohibit same-sex marriage, and imposes some kind of govermental censorship on movies and TV, it will because the majority of the people want these things, even if they say they don't.  And when it happens, America will be NOTHING like, say, Saudi Arabia.  And any pundit of jounalist who doesn't want this to happen couldn't be more wrong. 4:40:33 AM

Who Said It? Gary Kleppe correctly identified our last Mystery Guest (the one who said such classy things about Teresa Heinz Kerry) as Thomas "Sell You My Kidney for a C-Note" Sowell. Now, in an item explaining that the assault on Christmas (no religious floats allowed in that Denver parade; Macy's employees not saying "Merry Christmas," etc.) is part of a cunning secularist plan to make our country into a socialist, heathen hellhole like Canada, who said the following? T]he USA cannot defeat terrorism and any other evil without a strong, traditional foundation that clearly defines right from wrong. The struggle today is not about Christmas, but about the spirit of our country. Yes, if you say "Happy Holidays," you are supporting terrorism. 2:50:38 AM

The Annoyingness Just Keeps on Coming As you no doubt know, Pandagon is currently accepting nominations for this year's "Most Annoying Conservatives" contest.  And man, are there some worthy contenders being suggested -- including one of our favorites, Annie Jacobsen.  Her nomination caused Roger Ailes to actually visit that Woman's Wallstreet place -- he reports that not only is Annie's "Scary Skies" saga up to part ten by now, but that she's getting a regular column called "Annie Jacobsen Freaks Out." (Hey, if Roger says it, I believe it.) Another name being bandied about for this award is Mark Steyn, whom we happen to find so very annoying that we ignore him whenever possible.  So, imagine our delight when we learned, thanks to the very annoying Hugh Hewitt, that Mark has a new book coming out. (Hugh urges his readers to give it to everyone they know for Christmas -- but since it won't be released until April, I think Hugh should be the subject of a Michelle Maglalang/Bill O'Reilly coal campaign for advocating the heretical idea that Christmas gifts not be disseminated until spring.)  Anyway, here's the info on this annoying new tome: America Alone : Our Country's Future as a Lone Warriorby Mark Steyn Okay, right off the bat we have to say, "What do you mean OUR country, Canadian man?"  Product Details: Hardcover: 256 pages Publisher: Regnery Publishing, Inc. (April, 2005) And if it comes from Regnery and has an American flag on the cover, then you KNOW it's going to be good.  Well, not so much "good" as "bought in bulk by conservative millionaires to get it on bestsellers lists, and then given as prizes to worthy young conservatives, and to the needy, in lieu of paying corporate taxes." Publisher's Review In this, his first major book, Mark Steyn--probably the most widely read, and wittiest, colomnist in the English-speaking world--takes on the great poison of the twenty-first century: the anti-Americanism that fuels both Old Europe and radical Islam, America, Steyn argues, will have to stand alone. The world will be divided between America and the rest; and for our sake America had better win. And if the same editer who proofs the ad copy also works on Mark's book, it's bound to be even more important that it would be otherwise.   And hey, if Mark is the most widely read columnist in the English-speaking world, it must be because of those damned Canadians, Brits, and readers of the Jerusalem Post.  I say that America should invade them all now, to deal with this poison -- and for our sake, America had better win.  1:58:33 AM