Eleven Years

ago today, it was 103 degrees in the Bay Area. On that day, I was stuffed into a tuxedo and fit to be married. Gracious friends of ours gave us two precious hours as they watched the kids and we enjoyed a simple Italian dinner.

In the 11 years after the hottest day of the year, the Mrs. and I have lived through good times, so-so times and a few times where it just plain sucked. And in the 11 years, God has carried us, grown us, challenged us and blessed us beyond the imaginations we had that one day. It's pretty amazing how God can make a selfish kid into a father of three, or turn a young girl into the household pillar of strength. What more can I say but that God is god and God is good. Here's to more years of marriage!

"Undecided to the end"

Jonah Goldberg summarizes Kerry's campaign after the DNC closes. Goldburg takes on Kerry's perchant for the flip-flop and the implications towards the Democrat's approach to national security.

Kerry is running during a war that some consider vital, some see as confusing and others dismiss as unnecessary. Kerry wants to win over all three groups by agreeing with all of them. He does this by talking in paragraphs of boring logical-loop-the-loop sentences that seem to be written in vanishing ink. But he's also trying to downplay the importance of the war. Kerry wants to "handle" the war on terrorism, not dedicate himself to it.

. . .

The world may be consumed by the maelstrom, but Kerry will guarantee that America remains in the eye of the storm. He'll do this by conjuring chimerical "strong alliances" and negotiating in "good faith" with sycophantic foreign leaders around long tables festooned with bottled water and clever cheese. Never mind that these are impossible promises — much like Neville Chamberlain's "peace in our time." Indeed, impossible promises are often the ones voters want to hear most.

It's easier to be the challenger than the incumbant. The challenger can promise the world without having to demonstrate any ability until it's too late; the incumbant must not only promise the world, but do so under a burden of proof garnered by past performances. "Talk is cheap."

Where's the Bounce?

Post DNC, you expect a Kerry bounce in the polls. GOP think tanks figured on a 10-15% spike, post convention. But The Politburo Diktat wonders, : Where's the Bounce? Kerry leads Bush 48-45 as of today, according to the Rasmussen Report daily tracking poll. However, it will be Monday's numbers that will include survey interviews after Kerry's acceptance speech. In other words, today is yesterday.

Rasmussen also runs a regular poll of the electoral votes. Check it out.

Zarqawi captured?

Purportedly by US and Iraqi police, as reported by Al-Jazeera. Not sure how substantial this is.

Reports in Kuwait on Friday said a man assumed to be Al Qaeda leader in Iraq, Abu Musab Zarqawi has been captured near the Syrian border. The report claimed that the man was captured during a joint operation by U.S. occupation forces and Iraqi police, Al Siyasah newspaper, quoting Iraqi sources, said Friday.

If true, good news heading into the weekend! Let the conspiracy theories fly, I've got my tin foil hat ready!

Glenn Reynolds thinks that it was nice of the Republicans to wait until Kerry was done with his speech.

Feste points us to sources that deny the arrest. These source may be "unreliable".

UPDATE: Glenn Reynolds (tipped by reader, Michele Catalano) notes that "AlJazeera.com is not connected with the Al Jazeera TV network, and that it's quite unreliable. Given that we haven't heard more about this, I'm pretty sure it's bogus." Too bad.

If You're a Republican, You're Not an American

According to Michael Moore, demagogue to the Democratic Party (but maybe not Democrats). NRO notes:

. . .radical filmmaker Michael Moore launched into a shouting, red-faced denunciation of Republicans Tuesday, saying supporters of the GOP are different from "real Americans"; that they are "people who hate"; that they are "up at six in the morning trying to figure out which minority group they're going to screw today"; and that in the upcoming presidential campaign, they "are going to fight...smear...lie...and hate."

Later, there is more on Moore:

"The right wing is not where America is at," Moore said. "Most Americans, in their heart, are liberal and progressive. It's just a small minority of people who hate. They hate. They exist in the politics of hate."

...

Moore conceded that there are "good Republicans." Those Republicans, he said, will vote for Kerry in November.

Normally, Michael Moore would just drop off into the noise, but the problem is that the guy is being lauded by the Democratic Party leadership :

What made the Moore movie so consequential--and so scary--was its open embrace by the Democratic Party. Senator Daschle stopped work in the Senate on a defense appropriations bill so Senators and staffers could attend the premiere. Daschle, Senator Barbara Boxer, and DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe attended the premiere, “applauding throughout and giving Moore a standing ovation when it was over,” according to the New Republic. 6-24-04. . .Jason Zengerle of the New Republic noted that the Democrats in the past “kept Moore at arm’s length, deeming him too controversial and mercurial to be of much political use,” but that changed after Moore’s attack on the President as a “deserter” during the New Hampshire primary seemed to make the issue stick and Moore seemed useful to the general cause of shredding Bush. (hat tip to the blog, "Daschel v. Thune: Analyzing the Biggest Senate Race in the USA")

And Moore has a history of being deceptive in quoting others.

It seems that Sen. Daschle, et al, tacitly agree with Moore, or at best tolerate him as a useful tool. I ask Democrats, does this represent your party? Does this man represent your views? And should the drive to win the election endorse tactics that smack of Leni Riefenstahl?

And now for something completely different . . .

The Democratic convention is over, John Kerry is the nominee and I still don't have anything to say except good, now Jeopardy and Simsons won't be preempted by convention coverage.

I probably won't have much more to say about the Republican convention either.

But UPI does have a good story and its NOT about politics. Its about putting President Bush's vision of getting us back to the Moon and on to Mars. NASA is taking the first steps in looking at the type of vehicles they will need to get people to and from the Moon and will be sending out proposals to industry in January 2005. Two contractors will compete for the right to build the new vehicles (similar to the F-22/23 and the JSF competitions in the Air Force).

Have a good weekend.

Really Bad Photo Op Department

You would THINK that somebody would have vetted this picture before it got relased as the cover for MSNBC's article on Kerry's campaign today. Ya think?



And just to be doubly sure, say it with me: KERRY IS NOT HITLER.

Bitter Aside: Do you think that the same pose for President Bush wouldn't have gotten some really snarky comments?

UPDATE: Bush gets his day in the sun.