From Barack Obama, March 29, 2008:

“….. look, I’ve got two daughters. 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first of all about values and morals. But if they make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby.”

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Statement today from Sarah and Todd Palin (HT NixGuy):

ST. PAUL — Gov. Sarah Palin and her husband Todd Palin have released this statement following news that their daughter, Bristol, is pregnant –

“We have been blessed with five wonderful children who we love with all our heart and mean everything to us. Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned. We’re proud of Bristol’s decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents. As Bristol faces the responsibilities of adulthood, she knows she has our unconditional love and support.

“Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they will have the love and support of our entire family. We ask the media to respect our daughter and Levi’s privacy as has always been the tradition of children of candidates.”

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UPDATE: I didn’t see Michelle Malkin’s post before I did this, but we’re surely on the same page — “One ticket sees this as a blessing. The other sees it as a curse. Could the core differences between the two be any starker?”

UPDATE 2: Ann Althouse (HT Allah at Hot Air), on another, and very different, stark contrast.

So how did Anchorage Daily News reporter Lisa Demer end up speaking with a California doctor and getting her allegedly expert opinion concerning the circumstances surrounding Sarah Palin’s pregnancy and birth?

Obviously, I don’t know. But it’s not like Dr. Laurie Gregg was a local phone call away.

Here is what Dr. Gregg had to say about Palin’s decision to fly home from Texas (full circumstances are at the adn.com link and at tonight’s previous BizzyBlog post):

Still, a Sacramento, Calif., obstetrician who is active in the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said when a pregnant woman’s water breaks, she should go right to the hospital because of the risk of infection. That’s true even if the amniotic fluid simply leaks out, said Dr. Laurie Gregg.

“To us, leaking and broken, we are talking the same thing. We are talking doctor-speak,” Gregg said.

Is that “doctor-speak,” or Democrat-speak?

Well, I don’t know, but it could be the latter, because, “oddly enough,” there is a Laurie Gregg who is a known Sacramento Democrat and a Golden State political appointee (bold after title is mine):

08/19/2004 GAAS:354:04 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Governor Schwarzenegger Appoints Nine Members of the Medical Board of California

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger today announced the appointment of Steve Alexander, Cesar Aristeiguieta, Stephen Corday, Shelton Duruisseau, Martin Greenberg, Mary Moran, and Ronald Wender to the Medical Board of California, Division of Medical Quality, and Hedy Chang and Laurie Gregg to the Medical Board of California, Division of Licensing.

“The assurance of safe and reliable medical services is a vital component of California’s quality of life,” said Governor Schwarzenegger. “Each of these highly qualified individuals shares my commitment to public health and will work diligently to provide careful oversight of California’s health care professionals.

….. Laurie Gregg operates a private medical practice in Sacramento. She currently serves as the vice-president of the Northern California Obstetrician and Gynecological Society. She holds a Medical Doctorate from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Bachelor of Arts from Pomona College. Gregg, 40, is a resident of Sacramento. She is a Democrat.

How convenient.

Given the educational institution and timeline, and her age, at a link that I visited and saved but have decided to remove, there’s almost no doubt we’re talking about the same Laurie Gregg.

Again, was there no one available in Alaska? Or Washington State? Or Oregon?

I think it’s fair to say in the circumstances that a Democrat Dr. Gregg isn’t presumptively entitled to the last word on Sarah Palin’s maternal judgment.

Why isn’t the presumption of prudence in the hands of Palin and her (so happens to be) female doctor?

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

Six words would have done it, Alan: “I was wrong. I am sorry.”

But nooooooooooo.

First, Colmes “404ed” last night’s post that questioned whether or not Sarah Palin took “proper PRE-NATAL care” (emphasis mine):

For whatever reason, the post couldn’t be accessed via Google cache. Found — see Update within this post below.

Colmes’s original post, apparently in its entirety, and which he seemingly had to retrieve from Kim at Wizbang(!), was this (I took a separate partial shot of Wizbang’s graphic so I could fit it in the available space):

Colmes whined today that the reason he had to take the post down was “because of the vile comments made by a pletehora of conservatives who decided to invade the site and show us just how decent and value-driven some of them are.” Funny, Alan, you won’t let us see the comments, but my recall is that it was a free-for-all that was pretty bad in both directions.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

Update, Sept. 1 — Here’s a Google cache of the post (saved here at BizzyBlog’s host for future reference), courtesy of NewsBusters reader coffee260, containing comments up to 4:26 a.m. after the original 9:54 p.m. post. I don’t know when Colmes 404ed it, so there may have been later comments. My “free-for-all that was pretty bad in both directions” assessment is correct. In fact, if you get past the profanity unfortunately directed at Colmes, the “substantive” counterbile from libs, while present in many fewer posts, is arguably worse than the rightie dish-outs, considering that they’re directed at a pregnant mother and her Down’s Syndrome child (e.g., “the baby isn’t hers” meme, Larry Flynt has pics of Palin, “her heavy drug use combined with her age that caused this poor childs condition”).

+++++++++++++++++++++++

I underlined “pre-natal” in red, because Alan Colmes needs to visit a dictionary:

American Heritage New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
A descriptive term for the period between conception and birth.

This, Alan, is the commonly understood definition. The government programs you so adore that claim to improve prenatal care don’t concentrate on the final days of pregnancy, they allegedly deal with the entire “period between conception and birth.”

So you see, Alan, what you were alleging isn’t just that Sarah Palin wasn’t a good mother because she took a flight home from Texas while her doctor knew full well what she was doing and was okay with it, you were alleging that she was a poor mother during a large portion of the eight months she carried Trig (added Sept. 1), and that taking the flight was symptomatic of her poor “prenatal” care.

How dare you?

What’s more, you chose to run with what Roger “Meathead” Cadenhead wrote instead of going to the source material at adn.com, where you will see that Palin’s female doctor was communicating with her and had no problem with what she was doing:

Palin was in Texas last week for an energy conference of the National Governors Association when she experienced signs of early labor. She wasn’t due for another month.

Early Thursday — she thinks it was around 4 a.m. Texas time — she consulted with her doctor, family physician Cathy Baldwin-Johnson, who is based in the Valley and has delivered lots of babies, including Piper, Palin’s 7-year-old.

Palin said she felt fine but had leaked amniotic fluid and also felt some contractions that seemed different from the false labor she had been having for months.

“I said I am going to stay for the day. I have a speech I was determined to give,” Palin said. She gave the luncheon keynote address for the energy conference.

Palin kept in close contact with Baldwin-Johnson. The contractions slowed to one or two an hour, “which is not active labor,” the doctor said.

“Things were already settling down when she talked to me,” Baldwin-Johnson said. Palin did not ask for a medical OK to fly, the doctor said.

“I don’t think it was unreasonable for her to continue to travel back,” Baldwin-Johnson said.

So the Palins flew on Alaska Airlines from Dallas to Anchorage, stopping in Seattle and checking with the doctor along the way.

“I am not a glutton for pain and punishment. I would have never wanted to travel had I been fully engaged in labor,” Palin said. After four kids, the governor said, she knew what labor felt like, and she wasn’t in labor.

More on Dr. Laurie Gregg, whose quote in the adn.com article has been lapped up by lefties far and wide, in a bit.

As stated earlier, Alan — Six words: “I was wrong, I am sorry.”

Waiting …..

Alan Colmes has been on a downward spiral for the ages since John McCain introduced Sarah Palin as his presumptive Vice-Presidential nominee.

Fellow NewsBuster Warner Todd Huston caught Colmes scraping bottom at his Liberaland web site last night, as the lefty talker and Sean Hannity piñata asked “Did Palin Take Proper Pre-Natal Care?” in connection with Palin’s pregnancy and childbirth earlier this year. Trig Palin was born with Down’s Syndrome on April 18.

A whiff of sanity appears to have prevailed, as the entry is now empty. Also not present: an apology. (Update, 3:30 p.m. — Here’s Colmes’s “apology.” You can decide whether it’s adequate or simply blame-shifting.)

But apparently Colmes has no problem with this entry he put up on Friday afternoon about the circumstances surrounding Todd and Sarah Palin’s wedding (full entry follows; links were in original):

Conservative Family Values

In her speech in Dayton today, Gov. Sarah Palin announced that she and her husband are celebrating their 20th wedding anniversary, which means they were married on August 29, 1988.

On April 20, 1989 – less than eight months after they eloped – their first son, Track, was born.

I think I can guess the real reason why they eloped, and it wasn’t to save money on an expensive wedding.

Colmes’s snide reference is to this NationalJournal.com Almanac entry, which reads:

After returning home, Palin eloped with her high school boyfriend in 1988 to save money on an expensive wedding.

Alan, do you know who pays for traditional weddings?

Stipulate for the moment that Colmes might be correct, and that Palin was pregnant at the time the couple married. Is it really inconceivable to Colmes that Todd and Sarah, who had known each other for many years, might have decided to spare their parents, none of whom as far as I can tell were wealthy, an extravagant expense?

One commenter at Colmes’s post made this telling point:

If it’s true then what matters is that Palin has demonstrated her pro-life bona fides not once but at least twice in her life. Once at marriage, the second time after finding out the baby she was carrying would have Down (sic) Syndrome.

The story of the Palins, and Colmes’s reaction, also brings to mind a fairly well-known Republican whose wife was three months pregnant when they married. He was also ridiculed as “somehow” being a values hypocrite by Colmes’s philosophical predecessors.

It turns out this Republican and his wife had a decades-long romance for the ages. The publication of a treasure trove of letters this Republican wrote to his wife over many decades caused even hardened liberals to tear up as they were read. Normally curmudgeonly Mike Wallace was moved to say:

I had no idea. I knew that they adored each other: she him and he her. But the stuff that you read here is — it’s extraordinary.

….. Listen, I used to look at them when they were in public situations like this. And come on — I mean, the adoring look and all of that, and the way that he looked at her. I used to say, come on, it couldn’t be that. Turns out it was, and the letters make it so apparent.

If you can get through the September 9, 2000 CNN interview about this man’s letters to his wife Nancy without choking up, you may need to check your pulse.

This Republican also served as governor of a Western state. He also was a pretty effective politician.

That Republican was Ronald Reagan.

Be careful what you wish for, Alan.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

The Obama-infatuated media knows a quote to ignore when it hears one.

That Barack Obama and the Democratic Party is in trouble on abortion is inarguable. Obama has been caught red-handed lying about his past positions and votes on Illinois’ Born Alive Infant Protection Act laws, appearing indifferent as to when anyone wishing to eliminate their baby completes the task. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has generated outrage from Catholic bishops and practitioners with her ignorant comments about the history of the Church’s opposition to abortion. John McCain’s nomination of prolife walk-the-walker Sarah Palin has made the contrast between the two parties’ positions as obvious as I’ve ever seen it.

Fanning the flames by reporting yet another controversial comment from Michelle Obama would add dangerous fuel to an already-burning fire.

That likely explains why you’re not hearing about this comment Ms. Obama made at the Women’s Caucus of the Democratic National Convention on Thursday about her husband (bold is mine):

He’ll protect a woman’s freedom of choice, because government should have no say in whether or when a woman embraces the sacred responsibility of parenthood.

Apparently, Michelle isn’t aware of, or doesn’t sufficiently appreciate, the viability of adoption as an alternative, or that the adoption waiting lists are long. Like her husband, who says that determining when human rights begin (i.e., when life begins) is “above my pay grade,” she does not appear to grasp the scientific fact that parenthood begins at conception.

Thank goodness for the prolife and Catholic online publications that did report Ms. Obama’s comment (Catholic News Agency; Life News). Although traditional media were there for the speech, as evidenced by the Associated Press coverage of separate prolife and pro-Hillary Clinton protester incidents that occurred there, you can’t find coverage of Ms. Obama’s “sacred” quote with a search engine.

At the New York Times (search on “michelle obama sacred,” entered without quotes) — there’s nothing.

At the Washington Post (same search) — nada.

A Google News search on “Michelle Obama sacred caucus” (entered without quotes, with a start date of August 28) came back with reports from two prolife publications and the Northeast Region-based NECN.com (the Toledo Blade result refers to Barack Obama’s Greco-Roman Oration Thursday evening):

Traditional media would appear to prefer that news consumers remain unaware of comments such as Ms. Obama’s. They wouldn’t want people to start reaching the “wrong” conclusions — such that this couple is, y far, more proabort than any ever to get one election away from the White House.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

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UPDATE: I guess this appearance wasn’t worthy of media mention either.

It doesn’t get much more obvious than this.

A San Francisco Chronicle article last Wednesday relating to growing concerns about Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s recent campaign performances “evolved” in a quite convenient way for the Illinois senator by the time it got to the paper’s print edition and went through its final web revision. That article, among other things, addressed Obama’s appearance at Rick Warren’s Saddleback Values forum the previous weekend.

The current entry at Google News, obtained by searching “That’s above my pay grade” (entered in quotes), reads as follows:

Although it’s framed in a very biased way (”thoughtful but fuzzier”?), at least a reference to Obama’s infamous “That’s above my pay grade” comment is present (the original transcript segment containing that remark is here).

Wait until you see what happened next.

I copied a text string within that Google News result, and was able to gain access to an earlier cached version of the article (saved at my host in the event the cache goes away), written up by Chronicle Political Writer Carla Marinucci. It doesn’t have a normal web page appearance, but it does appear to contain what would have been the article’s full text, including the Google News result text cited above.

That text consists of 24 paragraphs. Paragraph 16 says:

And Obama’s thoughtful but fuzzier answers to questions about when human rights begin (”that’s above my pay grade”) were a clear contrast - and not a good one - to McCain’s head-on approach that it was “at the moment of conception,” he says.

But if you click on the original Google News link itself, you get taken to a revised version of the article (”Bad news should wake up Obama, experts say”).

At the bottom of that linked page, we are told that “This article appeared on page A-1 of the San Francisco Chronicle.” So this is what print edition readers got to see.

But what they got to see contains only 23 paragraphs. The one removed was — you guessed it — the one that referred to Obama’s “pay grade” comment.

The only other difference I found between the cached and print version was one spelling correction, changing “jiu-jitsuing” to “jujitsuing” in the tenth paragraph. Otherwise the two are the same, word for word.

So at some point, the full original 24-paragraph report was available on the web; otherwise, my original Google News search would not have picked it up. But the “offending paragraph was later deemed to be unworthy of the print edition, and was also removed from the web edition. Now you can’t find that paragraph on the web any more without engaging in workaround tactics.

Don’t even try to tell me that traditional media outlets aren’t doing everything they can to cover for Barack Obama.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

Entry #8 in the publication’s “Top 10 RINOs” list at the time:

8. Gov. Mitt Romney (Mass.)
Has said, “I believe that abortion should be safe and legal in this country.” Supports civil unions and stringent gun laws. After visiting Houston, he criticized the city’s aesthetics, saying, “This is what happens when you don’t have zoning.”

Among the many noted RINOs at the time Human Events didn’t consider to be as bad as Romney: Ohioans Bob Taft, Mike DeWine, and George Voinovich.

Yet during the campaign, Human Events gave Romney several extended softball interviews. In this one on December 28, 2007, Romney was never asked about civil unions, didn’t challenge his previous support of stringent gun laws, and only asked about whether women who have abortions should be prosecuted — a position no presidential candidate that I know of held.

And there was this powderpuff:

Governor, what’s your reasoning behind saying that questions about your faith are un-American?

What could possibly (po$$ibly?) explain this?

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UPDATE: Related and strangely forgotten – Romney did not participate in a “Values Voter” debate in September 2007 (neither did Rudy Giuliani, Fred Thompson, or John McCain).

Romney’s empty chair was asked the following question:

Unfortunately, that’s the best answer he could have given, present or absent.

But what about the “pornography” part of the question? Where did that come from?

Well, here (”Romney Criticized for Hotel Pornography”) and here (a Salt Lake City Deseret News editorial, “The nasty taint of porn”).

According to a July 2007 Associated Press article carried in the Washington Post (never disputed by Romney, as far as I can tell):

Romney said his current concern is not about pornography per se, but children unwittingly stumbling upon it on the Internet or television.

Even though this position directly contradicts that of alleged social conservatives, Romney is now getting support from many of them, including some who were criticizing him in the July 2007 AP article (yeah, I’m talking to you, Tony Perkins).

What could possibly (po$$ibly?) explain this?

Quote 1 is from Guy Benson at Townhall:

Whether it was Obama’s radical policy preferences, blind partisanship, or some combination of the two that motivated his vote is unclear. Although it’s offensive that Obama spun false excuses to try to justify his vote, what ultimately matters most is that he voted “no” on a bill that simply stated killing a living, breathing baby is not acceptable. That vote, in and of itself, is far worse than any political cover-up could ever be.

Quote 2 is from Ed Morrissey at Hot Air. His post at Hot Air is a read-the-whole thinger (”BAIPA unnecessarily burdens doctors with … babies”), but here’s the money quote:

Obama protected infanticide in order to protect abortion on demand.

How does someone who “thinks” this way get this far?

Byron York at National Review points out that one of the presidential candidates had an unfair advantage at Rick Warren’s Saddleback Summit — and, contrary to lefty claims, it wasn’t the presidential candidate I refer to as “JS3M3″ (John Sidney the Mad Maverick McCain III):

In addition, according to Ross, Obama knew a third specific question that Warren would ask — the one about a “president’s emergency plan for adoption.” “[Warren] felt that since that was basically asking for a commitment, he felt that it was fair to tell them in advance that he was going to ask them that,” Ross told me. So Warren told Obama, and planned to tell McCain when McCain arrived at Saddleback, but wasn’t able to because of other distractions. So according to what Ross told me, Obama actually knew one more question in advance than did McCain.

Despite this clearly unfair advantage, “The One” I refer to as “Mr. BOOHOO-OUCH” (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama - Objectively Unfit Coddler of Haters) still got his posterior pommeled.

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Speaking of Saddleback, I’m seeing e-mail exchanges from some who say that it was a big disappointment because this or that issue wasn’t covered exactly as wished. Zheesh, nothing’s perfect.

But compared to previous election campaigns, the addition of a pre-convention forum which demanded that the candidates speak to fundamental religious issues and beliefs is extremely valuable.

Is there any other venue between now and November where when life begins would have been brought up? Thanks to Warren, the issue has moved to the forefront, where it should be.

I’d like to see it become a permanent fixture, though I hope Warren rethinks his questioning approach (he told Hannity Monday that he made a conscious decision to avoid asking follow-up questions, which I believe are occasionally absolutely necessary, even in a tight time frame).

My wish is probably for naught. Now that the Dems have seen what happens when one of theirs, even their Messiah, has to actually come up with something of substance, I believe they will mightily resist future involvement.

______________________________________________

Pushback — On the evolving excuse-making by Team Obama, and the candidate’s claims that those who dug and found the truth were “lying” about his Illinois Born Alive Infant Protection Act votes — “Meanwhile we await the apologies for being called liars.”

This call for an apology should be a daily exercise for the next 76 days.

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From FiveThirtyEight notes that Ohio is leaning to McCain –

….. with Ohio now trailing behind Obama’s numbers nationally — we regard Obama as a 1.0-point favorite in the national popular vote, but McCain an 0.6-point favorite in Ohio — McCain now rates as slightly more likely to win the electoral college than the popular vote, a reversal of the trend apparent for most of the past couple of months.

The Gallup trend is a narrowing of Obama’s national lead to near-nothingness — and that’s of registered, not likely, voters.

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Good sign — Orrin Hatch is saying something sensible (update: for once):

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) today blasted extremists and their Democratic allies in Congress whose policies against boosting domestic oil production are hurting the nation’s poor.

Speaking on the Senate floor, Hatch said the Majority leadership is trying to deflect attention from their anti-oil agenda and its impact on the poor by introducing sham bills to make it appear as if they are really doing something.

“Unfortunately for the Democrat party, the poor are beginning to wake up that the liberals they have always looked to are behind the War on the Poor,” Hatch said. “By War on the Poor, I refer to the movement by the anti-oil extremists to close off every good domestic oil resource, which is a direct cause of the high energy prices Americans face.”

My only problem is that Hatch’s reference to “extremists and their Democratic allies in Congress” is redundant.

UPDATE, 10 a.m.: Brian in the comments takes me to task for saying something complimentary about Hatch. I didn’t make clear my belief that Mr. Hatch saying something sensible is the exception rather than the rule. Accordingly, I added “for once” above.

Geez, just yesterday, I wrote (sixth item at link), “Despite the marvelous athletic heroics, so much about the “Olympic Movement” is so deeply disappointing on so many levels.” Here’s a new level. There’s little doubt that some of China’s female gymnasts are below 16 years of age, the minimum allowable age, have competed and hauled off medals. The IOC won’t investigate. Would they have done so if China weren’t the host?
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An “unforeseen” problem: “Two weeks after announcing they had sold every one of the record 6.8 million tickets offered for the Games, Olympics officials expressed dismay at the large numbers of empty seats at nearly every event and the lack of pedestrian traffic throughout the park, the 2,800-acre centerpiece of the competition.” Stop the presses — The Communist government of China, host country to the BizzyBlog Internet Wall of Shame, lied (/mock surprise).
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The outrageous harassment of Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn for “unethically” delivering babies for free continues.
_________________________________________

So Nancy Pelosi is mad about this from Joe Lieberman: “Campaigning for Republican John McCain in York, Pa., on Tuesday, Lieberman appeared to question Obama’s patriotism when he called the election a choice ‘between one candidate, John McCain, who has always put his country first, worked across party lines to get things done, and one candidate that has not.’” The truth hurts, San Fran Nan.
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Allahpundit lets loose on the extreme “pro-choiciness” of “The One” I refer to as “Mr. BOOHOO-OUCH” (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama - Objectively Unfit Coddler of Haters) — “But say this for him: His liberal logic is consistent. If the mother’s intent is to abort and the baby somehow survives the procedure, why should its stroke of luck (or the doctor’s negligence) thwart her ‘choice’? She came there to kill it, she has a constitutional right to kill it, so she gets to kill it. Anything less would be insufficiently ‘progressive.’”
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The totally misnamed Fairness Doctrine, if revived, may apply to bloggers. Gee, “someone” saw this possibility early last year — “….. you can rest assured that ‘progressives’ would like nothing better than to push the absurd ‘equal time’ concept down as far as possible — even to the blogs and the forums if they can.”

It’s a bit early for politicians to be creating distance between themselves and their party’s presidential candidate, is it not?

Whether it’s because of a (cough, cough) “clerical error” or an exercise in political self-defense, Louisiana Democrat Senator Mary Landrieu has done that.

But in a report early this afternoon, Associated Press writer Melinda Deslatte was curiously incurious (saved at host for future reference) as to why Landrieu might be concerned about being tied too closely to the Illinois senator. Instead, Deslatte turned her report into an exercise in charge-trading between the incumbent and her Republican challenger, the deliciously named John Kennedy:

Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu, who faces a tough re-election, has had her name removed from a fundraiser announcement for presidential candidate Barack Obama.

Landrieu will attend the “Lipstick, Laughter and Libations” fundraiser for Barack Obama at a Washington restaurant next week, but she won’t help host it.

Landrieu’s campaign said her name only was added to the online announcement of the fundraiser on Obama’s Web site as a mistake. Her Republican opponent’s campaign said she is trying to keep her distance from her party’s presidential candidate and removed her name after they pointed it out.

“She was never scheduled to host,” said Landrieu campaign spokesman Scott Schneider. “She is attending, and there was some sort of clerical error in which somebody said she was hosting, but she is not.”

A spokesman for Landrieu’s GOP opponent, John Kennedy, said he believes the senator removed her name because she doesn’t want to be too closely connected with Obama in Louisiana, which has trended Republican in federal elections.

Deslatte didn’t investigate why Landrieu might be worried about hosting Obama. Why, one would think that she would be doing anything she could to be a host.

The Louisiana senator’s concern, simply stated, is most likely this: Barack Obama is radically proabortion; Louisiana is not.

In 2002, in a contentious re-election battle, Landrieu was so concerned about abortion being her undoing that she reversed her previous position on partial-birth abortion and came out in favor of a ban.

The radical feminist organization Emily’s List, which insists that all of its endorsed candidates “back abortion rights, including the right to late-term (or ‘partial birth’) abortions; be a Democrat; and, in primary elections, be a woman,” had supported Landrieu’s candidacy in 1996. In 2002, the group renounced their support:

The organization was heavily credited with getting Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., elected in 1996 in the closest Senate race in the country that year. But the PAC withdrew its support after Landrieu came out for a ban on controversial late-term abortions, referred to by opponents as ‘partial birth’ abortions.

But Barack Obama isn’t “merely” a clear supporter of reinstating partial-birth abortion now that the US Supreme Court has ruled the federal law prohibiting the practice constitutional.

Obama, as an Illinois state senator, even voted down a bill (HT Michelle Malkin; paper trail index here) to “protect live-born survivors of abortion - even after the (senate) panel had amended the bill to contain verbatim language, copied from a federal bill passed by Congress without objection in 2002, explicitly foreclosing any impact on abortion.”

You read that right.

Given the Illinois Senator’s positions and Louisiana’s still-strong Catholic constituency, it’s understandable why Landrieu would have wanted to avoid being the host of his fundraiser, whether her name “somehow” got included because of a (cough, cough) “clerical error” or not.

Instead, Deslatte’s readers are left to wonder what the fuss is all about. Her readers deserved to know, or to at least be made aware of some possibilities. But the AP writer, like so many of her wire service colleagues, let them down.

Cross-posted at NewsBusters.org.

Whoa — Nancy Pelosi, T. Boone Pickens, and a monstrous energy conflict of interest (HT Michelle Malkin):

(Pickens’s) energy company, CLNE, was offered for public investment in an IPO in May of 2007, an IPO that was not advertised, but which resulted in Nancy Pelosi quickly jumping on board. Nancy Pelosi Purchased between $50,000-$100,000 in CLNE stock on May 25, 2007 apparently on it’s (sic) initial public offering.

Read the whole thing, especially about Pickens’s apparent plans to disrupt what is said to be a fragile water supply in Texas.

It may be worse than indicated at dontgomovement.com. It’s one thing if Pelosi got in on the initial subscription at between $13 and $17. It’s another if she got the stock at about $3-$4, which is what many of the founders appear to have paid in.

Oh, and has anyone told you that William R. Hambrecht, Founder and CEO of WR Hambrecht & Co., one of CLNE’s underwriters, is a very involved Democrat who has made political contributions of over $640,000 since the 2000 campaign cycle — with, from all appearances, every single dollar going to Democrats and leftist causes (2000 - $374K; 2002 - $40K; 2004 - $76K; 2006 - $91K; 2008 - $65K)? That includes $6,300 in those five cycles to Nancy Pelosi for Congress, $2,300 to OH-05 congressional stealth candidate Robin Weirauch in 2007, and $2,000 to OH-01 challenger John Cranley in 2006.

Just d**n, for a lot of reasons.

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Clear-cut – “The One” I refer to as “Mr. BOOHOO-OUCH” (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama - Objectively Unfit Coddler of Haters) voted down an Illinois bill (HT Michelle Malkin; paper trail index here) to “protect live-born survivors of abortion - even after the panel had amended the bill to contain verbatim language, copied from a federal bill passed by Congress without objection in 2002, explicitly foreclosing any impact on abortion.”

Malkin: “(This is) abortion militancy you can believe in.”

Me: Thank God for Jill Stanek.

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Here’s the good news: Shale oil reserves are being developed.

Here’s the bad news: Not our shale oil reserves. No-no-no. Jordan’s (HT Powerline).

A point that bears repeating until people see how what hysterical enviro-nonsense is doing to us — We are the ONLY country on earth that fails to see the energy resources it has as gifts from God to be obtained for everyone’s benefit and improved well-being. Instead, we see them as things that have to be locked away, lest they be “greedily” exploited.

The headline of the AFP article referenced says that Jordan’s reserves are “huge.” At the Powerline link, you’ll see that we have 2.118 trillion (with a “tr”) barrels of potential shale oil reserves. That’s “more huge.” At our current usage rate of 20 million barrels a day, that’s a 290-year supply (2.118 trillion divided by 20 million divided by 365.25 equals 289.94 years).

Congress has placed these reserves off-limits. That’s not funny, that’s sick. Update: And conflicted — see first item above.

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Bottly harm – The Tax Policy Blog reports that Chicago, which had been hoping for a flood of tax revenue to go with an air of politically correct superiority from a bottled water tax, is coming up rather thirsty:

Chicago’s new bottled water tax has brought in just $2 million since going into effect on January 1 through the end of May, far off track for the $10.8 million they hoped it would raise this year. Daley claims that tax revenues would pick up as the weather warmed have turned out not to be the case, as consumers buy their bulk water purchases out-of-town.

At this rate, the Windy City will be lucky if its water windfall is $5 million. Meanwhile, stores inside the city, besides losing water sales, are more likely than not selling fewer other things because of reduced store traffic, and possibly paying the city less in sales and other taxes as a result.

City fathers can bury the environmental purity nonsense too — How many extra gallons of gas have been burned by consumers to avoid the tax? A lot more than zero, make it a far from carbon-neutral arrangement.

NixGuy and yours truly threw cold water on this idea months ago.

A vote for Barack Obama is a vote supporting the reinstatement of partial-birth abortion. ANY candidate supporting Obama gives de facto support for reinstating partial-birth abortion.

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In a speech to Planned Parenthood in July 2007, “The One” I refer to as “Mr. BOOHOO-OUCH” (Barack O-bomba Overseas Hussein “Obambi” Obama - Objectively Unfit Coddler of Haters) decried the Supreme Court ruling a few months earlier that had given the constitutional okay to the recent federal law that prohibited partial-birth abortion (a term, by the way, accepted by the Supreme Court as appropriately descriptive in the course of its deliberations and in its pronouncement).

Thus, it is clear Obama would like to see the legality of partial-birth abortion restored. It is clear in the context of the Planned Parenthood speech that, as president, he would work to see it restored.

A President Obama would nominate any and all judges, up to and including justices of the Supreme Court, who would conform to his radical proabort views. Once appointed, his judges would rule to reinstate partial-birth abortion when given the first opportunity.

Additionally, it appears probable that there will be no meaningful counterweight. As president, Obama’s party would likely have a Senate majority that would vote to confirm any and all judges he nominates.

Thus, a vote for Obama for president would be a vote that would more than likely lead to a reinstatement of this heinously barbaric procedure (WARNING: I’m about to link to descriptions of the procedure which contain disturbing graphic words, pictures, and upsetting language — Here, in words; here, in pictures).

Partial-birth abortion so disturbed the late Democratic New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan that he initially said:

“I think this is just too close to infanticide. A child has been born and it has exited the uterus. What on Earth is this procedure?”

Later, in a March 2, 1997 Meet the Press interview, Moynihan went further:

“….. it is infanticide, and one would be too many.”

With Obama, it’s not just about continuing the abortion status quo; it’s about extending it. So another politician’s position that he or she is “personally prolife, but Roe v. Wade is the law of the land” no longer suffices (as if it ever did; but that’s an argument for another time).

Anyone who supports Barack Obama is supporting a presidential candidate who will work to see that partial-birth abortion is restored, and who will, if elected, more than likely be in a position to see that it is restored.

Thus, any politician supporting Obama, or anyone voting for Obama, is giving de facto endorsement for the reinstatement of partial-birth abortion, regardless of his or her own supposed “personal views.”

For starters, this would include Mr. “Abortion Is ‘a Distraction from What Really Matters,’ But I Really Am Prolife.” That would be John Boccieri, who is running for the open seat in Ohio’s 16th Congressional District. The video at the link shows that Boccieri, who claims to be prolife, won’t make any kind of commitment to voting prolife. Boccieri’s Issues page at his web site is, conveniently, silent on abortion.

But it really doesn’t matter what he claims to believe anyway, because since he has endorsed Obama (I confirmed this), he has give de facto endorsement the reinstatement of partial-birth abortion, and is not in any sense prolife.

The only way Boccieri can regain any kind of prolife credibility is to formally announce that he has withdrawn his endorsement of Obama.

More names will be named as the campaign season progresses. But the fundamental point, that supporting or voting for Obama for president endorses the reinstatement of partial-birth abortion, remains salient for those both named and unnamed.

This is not arguable, and there is no rhetorical dodge.

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UPDATE: Add to the list the Pennsylvania Senator who is now officially a PLINO (ProLife In Name Only).

That would be Bob Casey, Jr. of Pennsylvania.

Casey’s endorsement of Barack Obama (”I believe in this guy like I’ve never believed in a candidate in my life, except my father”) gives de facto support for reinstating partial-birth abortion. Sorry, Bob, your father is spinning in his grave, and you are a disgrace.

Casey’s rumored agreement (HT Hot Air) to speak at the Democratic Convention in an attempt to shore up the CINO (Catholic In Name Only) merely confirms the obvious.

As with Boccieri, the only way Casey can regain any kind of prolife credibility is to formally announce that he has withdrawn his endorsement of Obama.

UPDATE 2, August 9: The certainty that Obama would nominate judges who would overturn the court ruling on partial-birth abortion is further reinforced by Obama’s consistent opposition as an Illinois state senator to a bill (the Induced Infant Liability Ac) “mandating medical care for children born alive during induced abortions.” Deal Hudson at Life News runs down the history:

No one disputes that in 2001 he voted against medical care for these children in committee and voted “present” on the floor; in 2002, against the bill both in committee and on the floor; and in 2003, as chairman of the committee, kept the bill from going to the floor at all.

And yet in spite of the facts, Obama’s backers continue to insist that he should not be considered a supporter of infanticide.

But why shouldn’t his opposition to the Illinois bill earn him that label? After all, in opposing the state legislation, Obama signaled his willingness to allow newborns to die without receiving medical attention after surviving a failed abortion.

….. Obama claims he would have voted for the 2002 federal bill if he had been presented with it.

That’s a strange assertion, given the fact that the 2003 state bill was identical to the 2002 federal bill.

Obama’s record makes it very difficult to believe anything other than he has been a supporter of infanticide. If he has changed his mind, all he has to do is say so.

UPDATE 3, August 9: While at the Democrats’ national convention, Michelle Obama will be at “a gala reception” of the national organization that will only give money to candidates who will reinstate partial birth abortion:

Thomas Edsall of the Washington Post laid out Emily’s List’s radical views in 2002. The organization’s reaction to the 2007 Supreme Court partial-birth abortion ruling is here (”a call to arms”). This June 6 statement at Emily’s List’s web site leaves no doubt that it supports Barack Obama for president.

UPDATE 4, August 11: Captain Ed took a long time to get there, but correctly concluded that there is no “Catholic Conundrum.” Even if you somehow think Obama is better on issues of social justice (a very weak claim, IMO), life and death issues trump those considerations. It’s not arguable.

Attn. Team McCain: Here’s my long-shot suggestion — Sarah Steelman should get on the short list, for these reasons: here (”Mo. treasurer crusades to deny funds to terrorists”), here (”Steelman calls for end to ethanol mandate”), here (”GOP Reformers Face a Tough Fight” - a must-read), here (”Rebel with an independent streak”), and here (runs the table on every issue).

Let the Missouri GOP stick to its old-time ways if it wishes. Sarah Steelman is the maverick choice. You have to act fast before she becomes Show Me State Governor. Steelman shores up a state that shouldn’t be in play, but is, thanks to its current Bob Taft-like governor.

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UPDATE: If you didn’t catch the fireworks in the comments that were added yesterday at Part 3 (”His Risky Associations and Entanglements”), it’s worth a visit (link is to beginning of comments; yesterday’s begin at #8). Attn. Team McCain — Also catch the final comment just added this morning.

UPDATE 2, 9:00 a.m.: The Phoenix Business Journal is reporting that “McCain’s short list of vice presidential possibilities has been essentially narrowed to six” — Tim Pawlenty, Colin Powell, Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Joe Lieberman, and Tom Ridge.

Ohioans will note the absence of Rob Portman. Further:

Sources familiar with the Arizona Republican’s VP search process list Pawlenty and Romney as the odds on favorites but said there was some preference to pick a woman or minority as McCain’s running mate. That would mean Powell, Palin, the 44-year-old Alaska governor, or former Hewlett-Packard chief executive Carly Fiorina.

Urgency seems to be dissipating: “The Arizona senator is expected to pick a running mate in the coming weeks.”

UPDATE 3, 9:15 a.m.: At WSJ’s Washington Wire Blog — “Virginia’s Rep. (Eric) Cantor Gets a Push to Be McCain’s VP.”

UPDATE 4, 10:45 a.m.: From TopNews –

According to two top aides to the presumptive GOP nominee, the decision is likely to be announced after Obama returns from Europe on Sunday and before the Beijing Olympics begin Aug. 8 so that the Olympic happenings do not deflect attention from the announcement of a running mate.

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The case, in one sentence — Mitt Romney’s constitutional subversion and poor economic stewardship while he was governor of Massachusetts; his risky and unvetted foreign, business, and political entanglements; and his conduct during the GOP primary campaign make him an objectively unfit and unacceptably risky vice-presidential pick for John McCain.

Don’t do it, John.

The Detailed Case: Part 1 — As Governor, What He Did to Massachusetts; Part 2 — As Governor, What He Did to the Nation; Part 3 — His Risky Associations and Entanglements; Part 4 — His Disgraceful GOP Primary Campaign

Other Posts: July 20 — Mary Katharine Ham Should Trust Her Instincts (As Should We); July 19 — K-Lo Demonstrates the Delusion; July 17 — Paul Weyrich Lays the Foundation; July 16 — The Case Against Mitt Romney: Series Introduction

From the Primary Season: Feb. 4 — The Pre-Super Tuesday Comprehensive Objectively Unfit Mitt Romney Index

The case, in one sentence — Mitt Romney’s constitutional subversion and poor economic stewardship while he was governor of Massachusetts; his risky and unvetted foreign, business, and political entanglements; and his conduct during the GOP primary campaign make him an objectively unfit and unacceptably risky vice-presidential pick for John McCain.

Don’t do it, John.

The Detailed Case:
- Part 1 — As Governor, What He Did to Massachusetts
- Part 2 — As Governor, What He Did to the Nation
- Part 3 — His Risky Associations and Entanglements
- Part 4 — His Disgraceful GOP Primary Campaign

Other Posts:
- July 20 — Mary Katharine Ham Should Trust Her Instincts (As Should We)
- July 19 — K-Lo Demonstrates the Delusion
- July 17 — Paul Weyrich Lays the Foundation
- July 16 — The Case Against Mitt Romney: Series Introduction

From the Primary Season: Feb. 4 — The Pre-Super Tuesday Comprehensive Objectively Unfit Mitt Romney Index
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UPDATE: At the Values Voter’s Blog — “Gregg Jackson makes some very serious charges against the conservative media establishment.”

UPDATE 2: My comments on yesterday’s disgraceful column by Ann Coulter are below the fold –
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Note: This post has been carried forward from earlier today.
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This is the final of four posts covering:

• What Mitt Romney did to Massachusetts while he was Bay State governor.
• What he did to the nation while he was governor.
• His risky associations and entanglements. This one has a “surprise.”
• (THIS POST) What he did to the nation, the Republican Party, and John McCain during his GOP primary run.

UPDATE: Though the details below are important, Dick Morris does a nice job this morning (HT Ironman, in the first comment below) describing the essence of Romney’s unsuccessful bid for the GOP presidential nomination –

And John McCain rightly did not like Romney’s tactics during the primaries. Using his gigantic money advantage to dominate television, he seized early leads in virtually all of the primary states, only to lose them later on. And, when they started slipping away, he resorted to unfair, distorted, scorched-earth negative ads, betting that his opponents couldn’t afford to spend enough for the truth to catch up to his charges.

John McCain should not forget this, and should pick someone else.

UPDATE 2: From Gregg Jackson and John Haskins this past Sunday (title abbreviated) — “Romney a Better Fit for Obama Than McCain.”

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MITT ROMNEY’S DISGRACEFUL PRIMARY CAMPAIGN

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This is the first of four posts covering:

• (THIS POST) What Mitt Romney did to Massachusetts while he was Bay State governor.
• What he did to the nation while he was governor.
• His risky associations and entanglements. This one has a “surprise.”
• What he did to the nation, the Republican Party, and John McCain during his GOP primary run.

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WHAT MITT ROMNEY DID TO MASSACHUSETTS

This post will focus on four items that for the most part “only” affected Massachusetts. Clearly there are national implications in each, but they are not as direct as the one I will save for the next post. There are other failures under Romney’s watch that merit attention, specifically judges, adoptions, and parental rights; but there is only so much time and space.

He championed a state-run healthcare system that is coming apart.

A May 21, 2008 Wall Street Journal editorial (backup link) noted how CommonwealthCare aka RomneyCare is working in the real world:

Mitt Romney’s presidential run is history, but it looks as if the taxpayers of Massachusetts will be paying for it for years to come. The former Governor had hoped to ride his grand state “universal” health-care reform of 2006 to the White House, but his state’s residents are now having to live with what he and the state’s Democratic Legislature passed. As the Boston press likes to say, it’s “the new Big Dig.”

….. the plan isn’t “universal” at all: About 350,000 more people are now insured in Massachusetts since the reform passed. Federal estimates put the prior number of uninsured at more than 657,000, so there was a reduction. But it was not secured through the market reforms that Governor Romney promised. Instead, Massachusetts also created a new state entitlement that is already trembling on the verge of bankruptcy inside of a year.

….. This year’s appropriation for Commonwealth Care was $472 million, but officials have asked for an add-on that will bring it to $625 million. For 2009, Governor Deval Patrick requested $869 million but has already conceded that even that huge figure is too low. Over the coming decade, the expected overruns float in as much as $4 billion over budget. It’s too early to tell how much is new coverage or if state programs are displacing private insurance.

….. Hailed at first as a new national model, the Massachusetts nonmiracle ought to be a warning to Washington. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are both proposing versions of RomneyCare on a national scale …..

So let me get this straight: Establishment Republicans, prominent talk-radio types and many pundits, some of whom made their careers opposing HillaryCare in 1994, are feverishly (pun intended) lobbying John McCain, who says that “Families should be in charge of their health care dollars and have more control over care,” to choose as his running mate the guy who created a government-controlled healthcare disaster. Because, “obviously” (/sarc), he’s an “economic conservative.”

Nonsense. Any advantage John McCain might have as the guy who won’t foist HillaryCare/ObamaCare 2008 on us evaporates. Though he may try (and he has), Mitt Romney cannot renounce his handiwork.

Mitt Romney raised taxes and fees.

The Center for Small Government, which is behind the initiative to repeal the income tax in Massachusetts, says that:

In each of the four years Romney served as governor, he raised taxes - while pretending he didn’t. He claims he only raised mandatory government “fees.” But government mandatory fees are nothing but taxes, and taxes are nothing but mandatory government fees. Romney’s new tax-fees raised hundreds of millions of dollars in new tax revenue for the state government every year.

He also increased several taxes by “closing loopholes” to enable collection of a new Internet sales tax and by passing legislation that enables local governments to raise business property taxes. This, he claims, is not raising taxes.

McCain’s credibility on refusing to raise taxes, and keeping the Bush tax structure that has been in effect since 2003 in place, will take a huge hit if he chooses tax-raising Romney as his running mate.

Romney allowed/encouraged large increases in government spending.

Again, from the Center for Small Government:

…. not only did Mitt Romney refuse to cut the overall Massachusetts budget, he expanded it. Dramatically.

The Massachusetts state budget was $22.7 billion a year when he took office in January of 2003.

When he left office four years later, it was over $25.7 billion – plus another $2.2 billion in spending that the legislature took “off budget.” (Romney never reminds us of this fact.)

The net effect of budgets proposed and signed into law by Mitt Romney? An additional $5.2 billion in state spending – and a similar increase in new taxes.

….. when it comes to tax and spend policies, he’s not only in lockstep with the Democrats. He leads the way.

Each of the four years Romney served as governor, he started budget negotiations by proposing an increase of about $1 billion. Before the legislature even named a budget figure.

Romney initiated massive new spending - without any prodding.

Under Mitt Romney’s “stewardship,” state spending in Massachusetts increased 23% ($5.2 billion in increases divided by the original $22.7 billion budget) in four years. That’s roughly twice the rate of inflation during that period.

John “No Earmarks” McCain (about 1/3 of the way through McCain’s text at link) undermines his message of toughness on spending by choosing Romney.

Mitt Romney introduced statutorily sanctioned state-subsidized abortions in Massachusetts for the first time.

I’m getting a bit ahead of the core of the next post, but an appetite-whetter on the proper role of the separate branches of government will be helpful here.

Twice, Massachusetts’s court system “ruled” that poor residents are entitled to state-subsidized abortion services. As you will learn later, if you didn’t know already, a court ruling is not a law. Legislatures pass laws. Previous administrations in Massachusetts apparently imposed state-subsidized abortions on the health care system without bothering to demand that the Legislature pass a law enabling them.

There’s a word for this: “illegal” (if you find that hard to handle, go to the link, or wait for a fuller discussion tonight).

But, as I noted way back in November, the Legislature-passed RomneyCare’s package of services includes ….. state-subsidized abortions, which now have a legal underpinning in the Bay State for the first time:

Mitt Romney claimed to have experienced a prolife “epiphany” before signing CommonwealthCare and its state-sanctioned, state-subsidized abortions into law. Some “epiphany.”

John McCain claims to support “Human Dignity and the Sanctity of Life.” As with the previous three items, if the Arizona senator selects Mitt Romney as his running mate, he undermines the strength of yet another core message.

Mitt Romney, at least domestically (I’ll look at the foreign matters in a later post), undermines most of John McCain’s key differences with Barack Obama. The Obama campaign and the Democratic Party will have endless fun pointing out the myriad flaws in Romney’s record, and how that record is at odds with McCain’s core principles. No amount of money from Romney’s own stash of cash, or that of his friends and benefactors, can hope to make up for that.

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UPDATE, July 23: Massachusetts resident John Haskins told me in an e-mail that Romney starved local and county governments:

In your analysis of Romney’s economic impact in MA, I didn’t notice a mention of the fact that the sole result of his redirecting some state spending that was funding local government services (so that he could market himself as a “fiscal wizard” when running for president!) was that our property taxes more or less doubled. (I have no figure, but they are far higher as a direct result.) That has made the burden of home ownership unbearable for many. This is fueling defaults and foreclosures, which devastate families with children, and deflate the housing market and eventually bankrupt mortgage lenders (layoffs in the financial sector), crush the residential construction industry, cause construction layoffs, then more mortgage defaults by those laid off… and then other financial dominoes fall.

We are now paying property taxes based on market values that are far higher than anyone could imagine selling their home for. Longer term, property taxes tend not to drop when the justification for their increase is no longer valid. So we undoubtedly have a permanent annual increase of thousands of dollars being paid by each family (homeowners).

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Previous Related July Posts:
- July 20 — Mary Katharine Ham Should Trust Her Instincts (As Should We)
- July 19 — K-Lo Demonstrates the Delusion
- July 17 — Paul Weyrich Lays the Foundation
- July 16 — Introduction