Power Line's Hindracker hits the big time:

NBC News has asked me to be part of their election night broadcast team. I'm not sure yet exactly what the format will be, but I'll be in New York at the NBC studio. I'll once again be paired with the Wonkette. Given the long hours that these election night shows consume, I expect to get some air time. I'll try to lend whatever balance I can to NBC's coverage, and if I get the opportunity, I'll let Tom Brokaw know that I'm one of the guys he called a "Jihadist" in connection with Hurricane Dan.

So: tune in to NBC on election night. If it's a good night for President Bush and the Republicans, I'll be the only happy guy in the building.

I'll be with the Los Angeles Bear Flag Leaguers on the West Side, celebrating the Bush win, and I would think we'll probably tune in, though it certainly won't be up to me.

Posted by: Attila at 08:06 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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Over at Jane Galt, Megan McArdle has fiiiinaaalllyy made up her mind. She goes through the issues close to her tree-hugging, libertarian heart and tells us which guy wins out on each issue before making her reluctant declaration.

It's good reading, because she in some ways a genuine centrist, and she's smarter—and better-informed—than I am. Good stuff. Go, now—no matter your political persuasion. It's one of the most thoughtful political essays I've read this whole damned election season.

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Oh, no fair. Eminem has this new video to underscore the fact that we're never the cool kids on the block. And they're all wearing their black hoodies to the polls.

Nice video, though: I like the way the animation is integrated into the live action of Eminem himself.

Hm. Should I wear my gray zip jacket with the hood? Will it make me cool? At 42, I'm finding that quality more and more elusive.

We should wear hoodies that are white. Or multicolored ones in red, white and blue. Or orange hoodies, since it'll be two days after Halloween. Or maple-leaf brown, for autumn.

You know what we should wear?—red. It's the symbol of blood and bravery.

Michele praises the video, and notes that it's Eminem's right to speak his mind about the President. But she points out that it's a little hypocritical of the left to 1) lionize celebrities who speak out on politics only when you agree with them, and 2) suddenly decide they like Eminem after all, when just ten minutes ago they despised him as a gay-bashing misogynist who glorified violence.

Hey, Michele—that was then. This is now.

You know what sucks about this election? In a sane year, efforts like those of Election Protection would be bipartisan efforts, rather than the Democrats having their own poll observers and the Republicans, our own. Or we'd at least be able to cooperate to the point that we would have squads of observers, equally matched as to party, at each location to make sure that no one is intimidated, but that no voter fraud occurs. Instead, we have mutual suspicion and rumors of intimidation based on race—and yet, at times, an out and out celebration of vote fraud by Democrats. And of course that isn't right, either: whenever someone votes fraudulently another citizen is being disenfranchised.

This sucks. No matter what happens, I hope America regains its equilibrium, and I weep for what we've lost.

I hope it doesn't take another attack to bring us together again.

Please get this over with, and please—let there be some peace and reasonableness when it's done. And get my democracy to some radiation therapy, please: it has cancer.

Posted by: Attila at 10:26 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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. . . malfunctions in the Rove chips? I'm having trouble thinking straight. Lots of static.

Supposed to say . . . Russians took the explosives from Al-Qaqaa . . . Ter-AY-suh is ugly, and Edwards is dim . . . we're up in Florida and Pennsylvania, and still might take Ohio. Michigan is falling, falling to us fast. Hawai'i is being seduced by the dark side . . .

Out. Signal's out. Nothing to blog about.

Perhaps Voldemort can help me; as it turns out, he's a good IT guy. Who knew?

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Megan McArdle, guest-blogging for Glenn Reynolds, links to her idea of an "October surprise."

I think it's cute, but I'm crude. I've been told that it's about ten years old.

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Wrote a rather remarkable essay called "Why I'm (Slightly) For Bush." And one of the most remarkable things about it is that it was printed in The Nation.

Real Clear Politics has it listed right next to Andrew Sullivan's endorsement of John Kerry, of course.

Wonder if they're still talking. I hope so.

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My husband has a friend who's a dyed-in-the-wool Democrat—a staunch union advocate, someone who associates the GOP with society's elites. He's had a troubled relationship with his party for years, especially when it was pushing hard for gun control in the 1990s. But on the whole he's been remarkably loyal. He despised Gore for the phony he was, and swore he wouldn't vote for him. But at the last minute he found himself at the polls pulling the level for Albert, Jr., with a heavy heart.

He's voting for Bush this year.

Why? Well, for one thing, he was in an army LRRP unit in Vietnam, and got wounded. When they offered him a purple heart, he refused it: in his mind, purple hearts were reserved for those who got badly wounded—shot up so much they needed surgery to survive. People who suffered, not people who got scratches. And for another thing, as an anti-elitist he despises the fact that officers can recommend themselves to receive decorations for valor—and enlisted men cannot. The fact that Kerry took advantage of this inequity disgusts him.

And Kerry's actions when he returned from the war do not help at all.

But most of all, our friend is convinced that we are locked in a mortal conflict with an enemy who wants to kill us, and we need someone decisive at the helm. Someone who really wants to win this war, rather than hold summits.

Kerry's history, and what it says about his character, doesn't help. But mostly, our friend wants the guy who's willing to do what it takes to protect this country.

So he's holding his nose and voting for Bush.

And he won't be the only one: there are plenty of Democrats who feel the same way. They may not proclaim it loudly right now, but in a week they'll let their ballots do the talking.

Remember the "Reagan Democrats"? They're back.

Posted by: Attila at 04:41 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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. . . has Bush at 296, and Kerry at 242 EVs. Plus: Cal-ee-fornia has just moved from "Solid Kerry" to "Close Kerry." Mary Beth Cahill is in bed with a headache.

Real Clear Politics has it much closer, of course: Bush 234, Kerry 228, with a handful of undecideds—but those include both Florida and Ohio. Obviously, Bush needs both those states to win (well, he might not need Ohio, if he gets Minnesota and/or Wisconsin—but no one wants something close enough that the Dems can contest it in the courts).

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Scott Ott breaks the story! Bush concedes that there will be bad news after the election:

"My opponent speaks the truth when he says that some Americans are going to get some bad news--maybe even before the sun comes up on November 3," said Mr. Bush, "It will involve defeat and the realization that huge sums of money have been wasted on an unwinnable battle against a determined and entrenched foe."

Read the whole thing.

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From Roger L. Simon:

If the reports that Mohammed El Baradei or someone close to him is behind the leak of the putative documents that caused the new NYTrogate Scandal regarding missing explosive in Irag, the implications are staggering.

Consider this: That means a high official of the United Nations... and not just an ordinary high official but one empowered with preventing nuclear weapons proliferation... is trying to influence a US election. And we thought we had seen everything with the Oil-for-Food scandal!

Read the whole thing.

Via Protein Wisdom.

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. . . gives us "tomorrow's news today"—

On Thursday, the L.A. Dog Trainer will run a long piece on the Iraqi quagmire, repeating uncorrected the claim that 380 tons of explosives disappeared from the Al Qaeda military facility, long after President Bush had sent troops into Iraq. Patterico will then send a polite email to “Readers” Representative Jamie Gold, informing her that the explosives actually disappeared shortly before our troops arrived last year, and that in any event, the facility is called Al Qaqaa, not al Qaeda.

It just gets better. Go, now.

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. . . for the Kedwards October surprise. You'd think the poor dears could do better than this ancient "missing explosives" nonsense.

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All of which you need to read, right now. But here's a money quote for you, anyway:

This is no time to vote for Europhile delusions. The Continental health and welfare systems John Kerry so admires are, in fact, part of the reason those societies are dying. As for Canada, yes, under socialized health care, prescription drugs are cheaper, medical treatment's cheaper, life is cheaper. After much stonewalling, the Province of Quebec's Health Department announced this week that in the last year some 600 Quebecers had died from C. difficile, a bacterium acquired in hospital. In other words, if, say, Bill Clinton had gone for his heart bypass to the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal, he would have had the surgery, woken up the next day swimming in diarrhea and then died. It's a bacterium caused by inattention to hygiene -- by unionized, unsackable cleaners who don't clean properly; by harassed overstretched hospital staff who don't bother washing their hands as often as they should. So 600 people have been killed by the filthy squalor of disease-ridden government hospitals. That's the official number. Unofficially, if you're over 65, the hospitals will save face and attribute your death at their hands to "old age" or some such and then "lose" the relevant medical records. Quebec's health system is a lot less healthy than, for example, Iraq's.

One thousand Americans are killed in 18 months in Iraq, and it's a quagmire. One thousand Quebecers are killed by insufficient hand-washing in their filthy, decrepit health care system, and kindly progressive Americans can't wait to bring it south of the border. If one has to die for a cause, bringing liberty to the Middle East is a nobler venture and a better bet than government health care.

Via Roger L. Simon.

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If Hawai'i is in play, the Dems are in even more trouble than they appear to be.

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With all the contradictory poll data going around, it's nice to see Clinton hit the campaign trail on Kerry's behalf. There's no better indication that the Democrats know Kedwards will be going down in flames.

(Why, you ask. Well, because at this point Clinton's legacy is getting pretty dicey, and I genuinely think he would like to be part of the first/only husband-wife team to take the White House separately: it would ensure him a unique place in history. You can take your conspiracy theories, 'cause I think most Democrats want desperately to take the White House back right now. But I also think Bill would like to see Hillary ensconsed there in '08. He wouldn't be campaigning for Kerry if he thought the Dems had a chance this year.)

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. . . among teenagers, that is. I'm hoping One Vote's Mock Vote is a harbinger of things to come: it was quite a little landslide for the President. Illinois!

Via martini man.

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I spend too much time preaching to the choir. This essay is different, because it is where I will lay my case out for re-electing George W. Bush. It is not for political junkies, but for people who only follow the news when they have a chance between their other obligations. I'm going to put it to you as straight as I can, and try not to inject a lot of emotion into this piece—though I promise I am passionate about it.

I want you to vote for the President, no matter what you might think of him as a man, or as a speaker, or as a politician. No matter which of his policies you might disagree with. And no matter what your party affiliation might be. I'll try to keep it short. I have high hopes that I'll at least get you to think about a few important issues. Please read this through, and if it makes you think at all, pass it along to your friends—whether I persuaded you or not.

To begin with, I want to point out two things about the voting process. First of all, it's private. You don't have to tell anyone the way you voted. Not your spouse. Not your parents. Not your teachers, co-workers, or friends. Some of us let our concern over what other people might think prevent us from voting the way we might want to in our most private moments. To do this is to squander the privileges that a lot of men (and a huge number of women) died for over the centuries winning our independence, strengthening the Union, and defending this country. Democracy is precious; use it to its fullest. I may wear my politics on my sleeve, but there is really no need for you, dear reader, to be as vulgar as I am.

Secondly, political thought is not an aesthetic issue, but one that requires reason and common sense. In other words, when you are thinking about your vote, do not use the part of your mind that puts your wardrobe together, or arranges your art on the wall, or engages in any creative endeavor: this project needs your problem-solving mind, the part of you that figures out how you're going to make more money this month when you're short on rent, or how to open new markets for your small business, or how to position yourself so you can get that promotion next year, or how to sell your art. This realm is a function of your left brain; fashion and aesthetics have nothing to do with it.

What I'm suggeseting here, in part, is that you can be a Bohemian and still vote for Bush: no one will confiscate your hemp clothes or your vintage hats if you do so. Promise.

THE WAR IN IRAQ
There are a lot of arguments either way about whether we should have invaded Iraq. The fact is, we are there now, and millions of people are better off without Saddam Huessein in power. By deposing Saddam, we saved a lot of lives that would have been lost if we hadn't followed through on regime change (a policy that was initiated by Bill Clinton, by the way). Let me say it again: there are people who are alive now that wouldn't have been if Saddam had stayed in power.

And now that we're in Iraq, it's worth noting that some Iraqis are saying the terrorist/Baathist insurgents in their own country will take heart if George Bush is not re-elected. It will be seen as a repudiation of his policies, and there will be a very real expectation that John Kerry, as President, will be more likely to cut and run. The predictable result: there will be more assaults on innocent citizens of many countries, and particularly Iraq.

No matter how or why we got into the Iraq situation, it would be fatal to falter now: for the sake of the Iraqi people, we need to see this situation through in a resolute fashion. A win for John Kerry would cost lives, no matter what policy course he pursued. If you want to stop the suffering of the Iraqis, you'll vote for Bush.

THE ECONOMY AND TAX CUTS
This is a hard one, because for so many of us prosperity has appeared to be "around the corner" for some time now, and it's hard to keep the faith when you're one of the ones who isn't working. Yet considering the suddenness with which the "dot-com" bubble burst, and how closely after that 9/11 occurred, the economy has made a dramatic turnaround over the last two years. Obviously, the way to create jobs is to cut the taxes of those who are in a position to hire people. As is so often said, I don't usually get hired by people who are in a weaker financial position than I'm in; usually it's people (and companies) with money that do the hiring, and when they are being taxed at a high rate that simply doesn't happen as much.

MILITARY MATTERS, SECURITY, AND CONSCRIPTION
There are two allegations against the President in this regard: that he hasn't executed the War on Terror very well (either in Afghanistan or in Iraq), and that the military is at this point stretched so thin that a draft may become inevitable. As to the first charge, both the Afghani campaign and the Iraqi effort were far more successful than anyone dared hope. Certainly Iraq is at a delicate point wherein there are a lot of insurgents trying to do a lot of damage. But the Iraqi bloggers tell us that if Kerry is elected the insurgents will assume a drastic change in U.S. policy. Right or wrong, they'll perceive a high likelihood that we'll "cut and run." This would be a complete disaster for both countries. In fact, some maintain that the modern Islamic extremist movement that is hell-bent on killing Westerners started in Afghanistan, in the power vacuum left when the Soviet Union and the U.S. finished their proxy war there and abruptly departed. Do we want to risk electing a guy—John Kerry—who might set up exactly the same conditions in a Middle Eastern country?

In fact, a lot of what Kerry has said indicates that his priority would be getting out fast, rather than leaving the country in the strongest possible shape a new democracy can be in. If this project is handled right, Iraq can be a beachhead for democracy in the Middle East, and that entire region can set a new course. But this cannot be undertaken by a man who doesn't believe we should be there in the first place. Kerry is the wrong guy in the wrong place at the wrong time to pursue a strategy for making this country safe. In fact, he appears to have very few ideas beyond doing things differently than Bush would, and trying to make other countries like us more.

I don't want to be liked. I want to be safe, and I want my friends and family to be safe. As long as there is a guy in the White House who is perceived to be a bit of a "cowboy," we are safer—because although the "non-state actors" may not care too much what we might do, the countries that have been feeding and supporting them will care a great deal. Nations like Saudi Arabia and Iran will come around because they will fear that this crazy guy Bush might—just might—invade them, too.

In the particular world we live in this will be a good thing.

And, as for "the draft," every military expert says there's no reason we'll need any such thing: the armed forces would rather use people who volunteered, because they are motivated and smarter, and they fight harder. The bill proposing a draft was brought up by Democrats, and when it was brought to a vote it was defeated very quickly. Those who talk about a possible draft are usually trying to scare people into voting for the wrong guy: it's a sleazy tactic.

HALLIBURTON
There is a tremendous concern out there that because the Vice President used to work for a company that handles both military contracts and energy, there might be a conflict of interest in terms of our conducting a war at all—and certainly our invasion of a country that has huge oil reserves. Three points:

1) Cheney is paid money from that company that compensates him for work he did in the past, and the amounts are the same no matter how successful (or unsuccessful) the company is—so there is no conflict of interest;

2) A lot of the work done by military contracters in Iraq can only be done by a very specialized workforce. Bush-haters like to talk about "no-bid contracts," but most of these contracts date back to the Clinton era—when we were downsizing the military and it made sense to "farm out" some of their work—and were only renewed during the Bush Administration. Furthermore, there's no point in having an elaborate bidding process when there are only a handful of people in the entire world who can really tackle a particular job;

3) Over 40 people who work for Kellogg, Brown and Root (the military contractors who are part of Halliburton) have died in Iraq. There are a lot of guys who work in either the infrastructure part of Halliburton, or its energy side, who just want to make a living. They are not "the military-industrial complex," or rich buddies of the Vice President. They're people who are feeding their families doing really hard work that is sometimes quite dangerous.

Some see our invasion of Iraq as an amoral project, and maintain that energy interests close to the Bush Administration merely wanted to get hold of Iraq's oil. If they just wanted the oil, though, they could have bought it from Saddam. That would have been less moral, but much easier and cheaper—and without the political price that Bush had to pay.

BUSH'S "LIES"
There was some bad intelligence before the Iraq war, but everything that Bush and his advisors thought before we invaded Iraq was believed by every nation around the world that has any intelligence capability at all. And by officials in the Clinton administration. And by John Kerry. And by John Edwards. In fact, some of Saddam's advisors have said his public statements were meant to deceive other nations—Iran in particular—into believing that he had Weapons of Mass Destruction. He was bluffing, and we called his bluff.

We certainly know that as soon as the inspectors left Iraq, Saddam intended to get his weapons programs back on track. So unless we planned on leaving the inspectors in his country long-term, we would have ended up where we thought we were to begin with. In the meantime, we had tried to keep Saddam under control with sanctions, which led to suffering in his country. Then the U.N. began its oil-for-food program, which turned into a way for Saddam to stash money away for his future WMD programs, and meanwhile to reward countries such as France for allying themselves with him. Billions went to Saddam, and to officials in other countries, and relatively little went to the Iraqi people. It was an obscenity.

RACE AND THE REPUBLICANS
Let's also discuss race. There is a notion out there that Republicans in general—and the President in particular—are uncomfortable with people who aren't white. Yet three of his advisors are black, and his nieces and nephews (Jeb Bush's kids) are Latino. There were a lot of allegations that black people were disenfranchised in Florida during the 2000 election, but there have been many enquiries and no one has been able to document that any such thing occurred. When a charge that serious is made, it should be backed up; otherwise it is just a partisan slander.

The Republicans are the party of Lincoln, who issued the order that ended slavery in this country. The Republicans voted for the Civil Rights act of 1964 in greater percentages than the Democrats of the time did. The GOP is the party of racial equality.

Please do not be ruled by prejudice (or the innuendo of those with a partisan agenda) on an important issue like whether a candidate is a bigot or not.

The fact is, black support for Bush has doubled since the last Presidential election; word is finally starting to get out that there is no conspiracy or desire to hold African Americans back, and that the ever-increasing employment rate helps all of us, regardless of our color. As small business owners, many black people are starting to realize that high taxes hurt them, too.

It's a new world, and the old ideas about racial polarization no longer work. (If, in fact, they ever did.)

That's my case. It isn't artful; it isn't particularly well-written. It comes from the heart, and it's meant to make you feel okay about giving the President one more term.

Thank you for your time.

Joy McCann, aka Little Miss Attila
http://attila.mu.nu

Please circulate this to your friends and relatives (as text or as a link), particularly if they are considering voting for Kerry, or insecure in their support for Bush. Or if they live in Florida, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Ohio, Arkansas, Oregon, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Missouri, or Iowa. Or any of the other 37 important states in the union. Or in Washington, D.C.

Posted by: Attila at 09:39 PM | Comments (13) | Add Comment
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There's a new political spot being rolled out in the what is supposedly the most expensive political ad campaign this year; it focuses on Ashley, the girl who lost her mother in the 9/11 attacks, whom the President comforted last spring, to the point that she was finally able to cry. You've seen the picture before. Go here to see the ad, which has a Quicktime option (hooray!).

I've always loved that photo for the way the President looks in it.

Via Dean Esmay.

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Blogging light to nonexistent for the next two days: I'm working my office job and fending off my usual sleep disorder thingie ("delayed sleep syndrome," they call it).

And on Saturday, the spouse and I are headed to Santa Barbara for 2-3 days, so you may not hear too much from me for the next week.

Be good.

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The Club for Growth has completed final edits on the hilarious ad produced by David Zucker, of Airplane! and the Naked Gun series. Please do three things:

1) Go take a look at it, even if you're a pacifist in the War on Terror, and/or a Kerry supporter. I promise you'll still get a laugh out of it. And

2) If you aren't a pacifist, please send whatever you can afford to the Club for Growth to help them buy airtime and get this commercial shown in some of the states (Ohio, Florida, Arkansas, Iowa, Pennsylvania) that are hanging by a thread. Who knows? If they get enough money they might even air the ad in New Jersey, which is now in play (despite being a Democratic stronghold, and appearing on almost no lists of "swing states"—have you noticed that the President and First Lady are spending lots of time there these days?). If each of my non-pacifist readers gave $20, that would be $2,000 for the cause. And if the other bloggers who are currently linking only had my level of readership and did the same, that would be $200,000. But they don't only have my level: Glenn linked to the ad as well, and I wouldn't be surprised if they raise the whole two million, if people are responsive enough. And

3) If you are a blogger, link to this spot and remind your readers that the Club for Growth could use their help in getting the word out.

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