. . . hard-hitting:

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. . . on the Russia-Georgia conflict. I wouldn't dream of trying to summarize it; just go.

I even forgive Ace for being more fluent in obscenities than I am—at least for now. (Though the copy editor in me thinks he might have overdone "sucker of cock" in referring to Robert Scheer. Still, one cannot nitpick when it comes to True Blogging Performance Art, and the man was, as the surfers say, "in the tunnel." It is, I must admit, a thing of beauty.)

The fact is, I'm toggling back and forth between worrying about the energy crisis and worrying about (the country of) Georgia. But they are inextricably linked, and the Georgia crisis is also closely related to our efforts in Iraq: Russia's actions are a threat to the West's oil supplies and a threat to Ukraine. Its actions are pulling the forces of Georgia out of Iraq (a country that has provided a full third of the troops we've used to win that war).

This is a big fucking deal. Let's mobilize, build more nuclear power, get our biofuel act together, and drill anything that looks like it might have any petroleum in it whatsoever; after all, it's petro-superiority that lends Russian its moxie now. Why not?--the need for fuel is a big part of how the Soviets bested the Nazis in WWII. (And a big part of how we beat Japan, for that matter.)

And let's get Georgia and Ukraine into NATO. Like, now.

Furthermore, anyone who is considering voting for Obama now, with these twin crises unfolding . . . words fail me.

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The very idea is utterly shocking.

Someday I'll have to dig out my letter of excommunication, and post it here for the amusement of those who like to follow the chronicles of my cult years.

Actually, my biggest problem with Hymers isn't the fact that he ran (and from what I hear, runs) a cult-like church. It's that underneath it all he's just a rather boring individual.

But I have to get out to the Convention Center today, so I don't have time to get into the mendacity of evil.

Wait. I lied. My biggest issue with Hymers is the fact that I get a ton of traffic for people searching "defloration pics." Apparently, the 'bots see "Hymers" as a misspelling of "hymen."

Of course, it's vaguely appropriate: I lost my cult virginity and my physical virginity in the same organization. The first, by persuasion. The second, by force.

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Over 300 spam comments this time.

I keep thinking of the Kinks line about rock 'n' roll: "This might turn into a steady job."

Yeah, well. It's certainly steady . . .

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. . . and love lying in bed with a sports-bottle full of mango-pineapple juice.

Ace debates the merits of Rice's tough talk, toggling back and forth between concern about whether Rice has gone too far and high delight at the Russian accents on display. (I always suspected Ace of having a secret fondness for Eastern European dialects.)

He thinks the Administration is employing a "tripwire" strategy, among other things. That's probably right.

As for the idea that Rice is pushing the Russians too far, I don't know about that. There aren't a lot of Westerners in existence who know more about Russia/the Soviet Union than Condi Rice does. This is where she concentrated most of her academic study, and she speaks fluent Russian.

She's been playing catch-up for years in studying the Islamic threat: Soviet studies are her home turf.

Putin will blink. He has to.

As for AllahP's contention that sending Lieberman and Graham to the country of Georgia sounds "a sour note," I'm not sure. Certainly there's a cheap side to it, inasmuch as it links his campaign strongly to the Russian-Georgian crisis, which is a bit like putting the Hillary "3:00 a.m. in the White House" ad on a continuous loop in people's minds.

On the other hand, the idea of having Obama at the helm while there's a showdown of this magnitude going on scares me enough that cheap tricks bother me less than they otherwise might.

And in fact, the ploy might be justified in this regard: I think one of the reasons the Russians are feeling, um, empowered right now is that the U.S. is in the middle of a Presidential election, which makes the body politic over here a good deal more fractured and distracted than it usually is. (The other is that the Russians have plenty of oil, and we do not, because we prefer to keep our coastlines pretty, every square inch of Alaska pure and virginal, and the Gulf uninfected by oil wells. Even oil facilities we cannot see from our beaches—those located beyond the horizon on the Atlantic and the Pacific—bother us. Never mind if we cannot see them; we know that they are there. It's, like icky and stuff.)

Whereas if there's a nuclear war, lots of people will die, and the overpopulation problem will be solved. The entire species' carbon footprint will lessen considerably.

But a presence of some on the Armed Services Committee who coincidentally happen to be associated with John McCain may simply be a way of assuring the Russians that, if anything, the heat might turn up in several months, and that they may not want to do anything too stupid right now.

That is, it might be a good time for the Russians to glance at their watches, say "would you look at the time!" and mosey on back. Or at least to keep a lower profile and cut down on the trash-talkin'.

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. . . when you can't find work digging ditches.

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. . . displaying properly anywhere today? It seems to be half-blocked, everywhere I look for it.

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. . . from both sides, now.

Ace is probably right on this one: there are segments along the beaches of California that have remarkable potential, and we do have a bit of an infrastructure here, as well.

Bottom line: We can't take the Pacific coast off the table, and we shouldn't be taking ANWR off, either: it's got production potential similar to that of the Gulf, and with a smaller footprint in terms of acreage that would be affected.

On the other hand, aggressive nuclear development and mandated flex-fuel cars are also super-important. It could be that the difference is in the fine print: could the Pacific Coast and/or ANWR be re-debated at a later point, or is the language in the GoT version (and the DontGo version, for that matter), iron-clad?

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for those in favor of infanticide.

We are . . . Sparta!

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After doing right by me for months, iPhoto has now decided that after I crop a picture, and tell it just how little I want it to be, I can neither:

1) have it remain small within iPhoto, nor

2) move it to my desktop, rename it, and have stay at the dimensions I've specified.

What this means is that Movable Type will not let me upload any picture I take, because they are all "too large." Even if I told iPhoto in no uncertain terms that I wanted to make the image little.

Obviously, there's something I haven't found. Anyone know the answer? This used to work just fine. Wait: not fine. I did have to re-size the photos to appropriate dimensions after placing them. But at least MT would allow me to upload them, and now it's turning 'em all down.

Still, one would think that iPhoto would respect my wishes to make an image small. I thought the computer was supposed to do the will of the human. Another naive misconception on my part? (Mandy and I have had this talk about the dog-human relationship, and have not achieved perfect accord.)

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Shame on them. Roger Kimball takes them to task for the smear:

That’s one of many questions the public should be asking about Barack Hussein Obama. Today’s piece in the Times veritably weeps with anxiety. Corsi’s book has dwarfed a similar effort to discredit John McCain (35,000 in print): is there no justice in the world? The Times was in a tough spot with this book. The paper’s usual procedure with books it dislikes is to ignore them. Someone must have made the calculation that it was better to try to head off Corsi’s book at the pass, to strangle it in the crib as it were. I think they will rue the decision. Most people who read the Times would probably have been only dimly aware of The Obama Nation had the Times not brought it to their attention. Now they have had it rubbed in their faces. The paper did its best to dismiss the book, but questions and doubts will linger–not so much about Jerome Corsi but about Barack Hussein Obama.

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This kind of puts my recent argument with my dad into perspective (Kal's rhetorical excesses and spelling mishaps notwithstanding).

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Still on-schedule to open October 3rd. Be there, or be hexagonal.

The Variety write-up:

Vivendi Entertainment has picked up North American rights to David Zucker's new comedy "An American Carol" and will release it in the fall.
Pic tracks a cynical, anti-American filmmaker who sets out on a crusade to abolish the July Fourth holiday. He is visited by three ghosts who try to show him the true meaning of America.

Directed, produced and written by Zucker, known as one of the masterminds of the "Airplane!" and "Naked Gun" franchises, the pic is also produced by Mpower's Stephen McEveety and John Shepherd.

The cast includes Kevin Farley ("Monk") as the filmmaker, plus Kelsey Grammer, Leslie Nielsen, Dennis Hopper, James Woods and Jon Voight.

Lewis Friedman and Myrna Sokoloff co-wrote the script.

There's a great article by Stephen F. Hayes in The Weekly Standard about the An American Carol, which may serve as a "coming out party" for some of Hollywood's closeted [and semi-closeted] conservatives. (Those who are not action heroes like Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger, and therefore aren't in a position to tell the H-wood establishment to "go fish"—though even Willis couldn't get a movie made based on Michael Yon's writing about Deuce Four. Yet. If Zucker and Company can end the blacklist on those who support the War on Terror—or at least diminish its power—that could change.)

Hayes:

I spoke to Lee Reynolds, who plays the New York police officer whose efforts to search the terrorists are thwarted by the ACLU. Reynolds, too, is a conservative--something David Zucker did not know when he cast Reynolds in the anti-Kerry ad he produced in 2004. Reynolds was active duty military for 12 years and shortly after 9/11 worked as the chief media officer for detainee operations at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

When he returned, he took a job as a production assistant on a film--he asked me not to name it--shot in several locations across the United States. Reynolds worked hard and, he says, won the confidence of the film's directors, who gave him more responsibility. But just as he was making a name for himself, word began to spread that he had been in the military and, far worse, that he supported the efforts of his uniformed colleagues in the war on terror.

"Once they found out I was a Republican, unfortunately for some people it was a problem," he recalls. Several people who had talked to him regularly throughout the shoot simply stopped. And a trip that he was to have taken to participate in an offsite shoot across the country was abruptly cancelled. Another person was sent in his place. Reynolds says that he had only two colleagues who treated him the same way they had before, including "an anti-Bush lesbian" who was disgusted by the dogmatism of the others on the film. Reynolds, now a reservist, is scheduled to leave for Iraq in early 2009. The more Zucker is known as a conservative, the more frequently he has encounters with others who consider themselves conservative.

On one of the days I was on set, McEveety had invited Vivendi Entertainment president Tom O'Malley to meet Zucker. Vivendi had just agreed to distribute the film and had promised wide release--news that had the cast and crew of An American Carol in particularly good spirits.

O'Malley and Zucker chatted about the fact that O'Malley is the nephew of Candid Camera's Tom O'Malley and that they are both from the Midwest, among other things. Zucker thanked him for picking up the movie, which will be one of the first for Vivendi's new distribution arm. O'Malley told Zucker that he was particularly interested in this film in part because he, too, leans right.

Such revelations are common occurrences at the periodic meetings of the secret society of Hollywood conservatives known as the "Friends of Abe" ["Lincoln, not Vigoda," as the Standard article points out elsewhere]. The group, with no official membership list and no formal mission, has been meeting under the leadership of Gary Sinise (CSI New York, Forrest Gump) for four years. Zucker had spent a year working on a film with Christopher McDonald without learning anything about his politics. Shortly after the film wrapped, he ran into McDonald, best known as Shooter McGavin from Adam Sandler's Happy Gilmore, at one of these informal meetings.

"It's almost like people who are gay, show up at the baths and say, 'Oh, I didn't know you were gay!' " Zucker says.

h/t: About a week and a half ago, Ace of Spades quoted extensively from the Standard article, playing up the "blacklist" angle. I would have linked him then, but he uses too many dirty words.

Actually, it was—and is—a sensitive subject around here. I would hate to count up how many media jobs I've failed to get because people were able to figure out that I was right-of-center. And I'm sure my husband has lost out on entertainment jobs for the same reason, though as an improv actor and comedian he's a bit quicker on his feet, and is much better at "the Los Angeles tapdance," wherein one is confronted with some sort of remark about how evil G.W. Bush is, or how the War in Iraq is just "making us more enemies," and one is sort of forced to smile brightly and change the subject.

It never fools people when I do it, and I'll bet that even A the H hasn't managed a 100% success rate in hiding his convictions.

A conservative estimate would probably suggest that we've lost tens of thousands of dollars to the prejudice. The true figure is probably in the hundreds of thousands.

Yes, yes: I've spoken with Joel Surnow of 24, and I know he doesn't believe in the blacklist. He's all, like, "if you're a good writer, you'll make it." But, again: his genre is action, and the rules are more flexible for action TV/features. There's that whole "Clint Eastwood" excuse that people make to themselves: "well, if they work on that sort of project, it probably warps their thinking; they begin to see things in black-and-white after a while. Can't help themselves, the endearing little money-makers."

Support alternative points of view in the entertainment industry. End of lecture, for now.

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It's started up again!—

Shannon Elizabeth comments on John EdwardsÂ’ affair and its potential fallout for the Democratic convention and Dem delegates:

Elizabeth: “I met John-John when he was still as Senator, but to be honest, I was so high on X that all I remember about the evening was his inviting me over to ‘the other America,’ where, if I’m remembering correctly, he was going to dress me up like a naughty housekeeper . . . . "

Read the whole thing. Unless, you know—you want to respect yourself in the morning . . .

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Is Senator Clinton like, annoyed at Edwards for lying about his affair? 'Cause I can see how she would find his conduct outrageous. Not just the "crime," of course, but especially the "cover-up."

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Has the McCain campaign produced any non-racist ads whatsoever?

Via Ace, who delineates the mental hoops the lefties had to jump through in order to interpret the ad as racist, and remarks, "Is anyone else becoming rather annoyed at the left's insistence that white conservative men do nothing but sit around all goddamned day worrying that some black guy is going to take our womenfolk away from us?"

UPDATE: Well, if the Obama supporters weren't so fucking sexist, they might realize that women of any race aren't property to be "taken" by blacks or Asian dudes or Klingons, or anyone else. Get those people to a consciousness-raising session, stat!

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. . . in the entire history of television animation.

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Of course, I don't like to point that out too often, lest his enormous ego truly catch up to his staggering brainpower, and take over.

But it hasn't, yet. Jeff remains, despite repeated attacks from both the leftosphere and some genuine online kooks (but I repeat myself . . .) a wonderful, warm guy—who is, in person, terrily down-to-earth.

Stacy McCain sums the situation up nicely: Jeff's back on his own front page, and there's much rejoicing in the streets. A minor disagreement between him and one of his guest bloggers isn't of much consequence in the long run—though if it gets us more of Jeff's writing in the here-and-now, it's obviously going to make the blogosphere a better place.

Right now, Jeff's continuing the Protein Wisdom series on Jonah Goldberg's excellent Liberal Fascism, which I'm reading myself for the third time at this moment. Yup: it's really that good.

P.S. Regarding that little link over here by "the other McCain," I'll tell you a secret: there are bloggers who don't drink. But I shan't be blowing their respective covers any time soon.

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"I think you're off the deep end."

"The deep end of what?" I ask my dad.

"I don't know what. But there's something really wrong with you."

Ah. I'll try to get that fixed right away, then—that thing he can't quite diagnose or even articulate. That nonspecific thing. I'll claw my way right out of the deep end of [static, mumble mumble, vague paternal disapproval].

I wonder if he got that from his first wife, to whom he hasn't been married in four decades. Because it certainly sounded . . . familiar.

In point of fact, the discussion shouldn't have upset me in the least, because it has nothing to do with me: rather, it was a moment of payback to wives #1-3. Which is another way of saying that the whole encounter was about my grandmother, but since she's gone deaf—I guess I have to hear it.

It also served as notice that, for the first time in my life, my father doesn't just require tolerance and patience from me, but Actual Handling. Like any 70-somethng parent.

I've always wanted to be part of a real family! See?—we're normal after all, in our own way! Pinocchio finally gets his wish . . .

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Let's not forget: Russia is one of the countries (along with Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and Iran) that has gained disproportionate advantages because of our own weak energy position.

So although we're busy with our bread (gas-price-rage) and circuses (the tainted Olympics), Russian aggression in Georgia is not entirely separate from this decade's energy crisis, and we shouldn't be ignoring it.

Our weakness with respect to energy makes it harder to step in and help other nations to repel aggression—especially members of the OPEC mafia.

And, no: I don't want to be "the world's policeman." But once in a while these things have to be nipped in the bud. (There was once this situation in Czechoslovakia* that wasn't addressed in a timely fashion, and the whole thing turned into a bit of a mess, IIRC.)

* Originally I put "Poland" here, until John of the Evil Snackage corrected me (see the comments). Rather a stupid mistake, but I was in a hurry. Also, there were four of them, and the sun was in my eyes. And while they beat me up, the dog was eating my homework . . .

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