Theo North

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$5 says Big John Thompson has a seat at that table tonight.

Earlier: Roy Hibbert, Product of a Jesuit Education

Theo’s taking off his gloves and his glasses, ‘cuz he’s about to provoke a blog slap fight. Gop3.com writers Katie and Brandon, you’ve been led like sheep to the slaughter, like every South Carolinian idiot in the Koger Center last night. I could find other sources saying similar things to complain about, but I’ve chosen Gop3.com for two reasons: one, Brandon never refuses a challenge and two, Katie is new to the blog and change scares me.

I know that Paul’s internet warriors have already been all over this, but they’re bungling the defense of their candidate the same way their candidate bungled his own defense in the debate. Giuliani twisted Paul’s words — Paul’s intention was not to blame America for 9/11 or to say that we “invited” the attacks, but simply to use the well-established theory of blowback as a support for his isolationist position.

Isolationism is, certainly in the twenty-first century, the wrong response to the risk of blowback from foreign ops. Any time you engage another country, be it for reasons of trade, war, or politics, your actions will give rise to malcontents, who may in some situations organize and arm themselves. There will even be malcontents in your own country (the malcontents who organized after the Iraq war are called Democrats). What you need to do is ensure that these malcontents are dealt with and prevented from militarizing. If in the Middle East the US had been supporting democratic regimes for the last thirty years, or at least regimes with reasonable understandings of liberty and freedom, we’d be living in a very different world today.

What is so offensive about this entire exchange is not that Paul can’t communicate effectively or that Giuliani jumped on Paul’s verbal flub with no mercy, but that when Giuliani thumped his chest and shrieked, “NINE-ELEVEN, NINE-ELEVEN, NINE-ELEVEN!!!” the crowd in the Koger Center, Republicans in their living rooms around the country, and bloggers at their keyboards around the world immediately began thumping their own chests and bellowing, quite literally aping Rudy’s own display. There is a sickness in the GOP, and one of the symptoms of this sickness is that we’ve allowed debate to be stifled by the apes in our party who think foreign policy is explained best and completely by “national defense.” These are the same people who won’t talk about immigration policy untill there is a moat of lava separating the US from Mexico, and the same people who are chatting up Fred Thompson because the media has propagated the “conservative Reaganesque knight on a white stallion” meme. It is disgusting to see this 9/11 horse and pony show pass for a “debate” and more disgusting to see Republicans eating it up.

The Weekly Standard has an outstanding profile of John Cox (pictured above with the reigning Miss Hooksett, NH)

This is old news but good news. Or at least funny news. Below is a clip from Rudy’s Giuliani’s old radio show, as featured on an episode of This American Life.

Rudy Loves Ferrets

HT: Horse’s Mouth

UPDATE:

(via Hotline)

Don’t miss Chuck Goudie’s “Clinton’s childhood story is an agrarian tall tale.”

I can’t stop watching (and laughing at) this video. The sincerity and enthusiasm of the local anchors, Brigham’s singing, Brigham’s life-size GWB cut-out, Brigham’s “I love George W. Bush, a lot,” that Brigham is named Brigham… Yes, I am a horrible person.

Let’s hope that Sam has invested as much time preparing for this debate as his staffers have invested in honing their 1337 Photoshop skillz.

“Pizza and Pop” makes me think of Cartman saying, “More people will come if they think there’s punch and pie!”

The LAT reports that John Edwards’s campaign has paid hundreds and hundreds of dollars to luxury hairstylists to keep their candidate looking pretty. You’d think that after running for President full-time for six long years, Edwards wouldn’t be repeating the same silly mistakes from 2004.

Speaking in DC today (which also happens to be Yom Hashoah, the Israeli Holocaust Remembrance Day), America’s Governor Tommy Thompson lauded the Jews’ business prowess. From Haaretz:

Former Wisconsin governor and Republican presidential hopeful Tommy Thompson told Jewish activists Monday that making money is “part of the Jewish tradition,” and something that he applauded.

Speaking to an audience at the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism in Washington D.C., Thompson said that, “I’m in the private sector and for the first time in my life I’m earning money. You know that’s sort of part of the Jewish tradition and I do not find anything wrong with that.”

Thompson later apologized for the comments that had caused a stir in the audience, saying that he had meant it as a compliment, and had only wanted to highlight the “accomplishments” of the Jewish religion.

“I just want to clarify something because I didn’t [by] any means want to infer or imply anything about Jews and finances and things,” he said.

“What I was referring to, ladies and gentlemen, is the accomplishments of the Jewish religion. You’ve been outstanding business people and I compliment you for that.”

Thompson, who raised roughly $300,000 in the first quarter, may want to consider hiring some Jews to work on his finance team.

The horrible, insensate, shocking events at Virginia Tech’s campus today may have some benefits: it could be the only thing that saves Gonzo and Wolfie from being gunned down by the media this week. It’s too bad that this came a week too late to save Imus.

Also, what the hell is Dana Perino doing?

“He was horrified and his immediate reaction was one of deep concern for the families of the victims, the victims themselves, the students, the professors and all the people of Virginia who have dealt with this shocking incident,” White House deputy press secretary Dana Perino said.

“His thoughts and prayers are with them.”

“The president believes that there is a right for people to bear arms, but that all laws must be followed,” Perino said, noting that Bush and Education Secretary Margaret Spellings held a conference on school gun violence last October.

“Certainly, bringing a gun into a school domitory and shooting … is against the law and something someone should be held accountable for,” Perino said.

The WaPo placed a world-class violinist in a gateway lobby of the L’Enfant Plaza Metro Station, playing a Stradivarius, to see if commuters would recognize genius in a street performer. Much of the article of the article is written in a Reliable Source style, but with the integrated video, it’s very interesting.

(WP)

CafePress Store.

This week the NY Times reports that “Mitt Romney made his most extensive remarks on military and foreign policy on Tuesday, saying that if elected president he would push to add at least 100,000 troops to the armed forces and significantly increase military spending.

Just as John McCain is delusional about the security situation in Iraq, Mitt Romney is delusional about the realities of army recruitment. Sorry, that’s a grand overstatement. Romney is not delusional, he’s simply a big pander bear looking for conservatives to cuddle up to him. Never mind the fact that the Army Reserve can’t meet it’s current modest recruitment goals (how many similar stories have you seen about various branches of the armed services over the past three years?), if Romney were president we would have legions of eager young men signing up to serve. If you’re a fan of Romney’s schitck, please let me know — I’ve got some great oceanfront property in Arizona that you might be interested in.

(NYT)
(McNews)