EckerNet.Com

Officials have found a \”foreign substance\” at the Republican National Committee recently. Initial reports indicate that it may be either a \”backbone\” and/or \”rational thought\”. Results are still pending…

State Republican officials from across the country on Thursday will formally break with the desire of President Bush and other top Republican leaders to include amnesty and other benefits for illegal aliens in immigration-reform legislation.

So far, 47 members of the 168-member Republican National Committee have signed a resolution that unequivocally opposes the Bush-backed policy that would grant legal residency to millions of illegal aliens.

Wow, so you finally decided to listen to your base huh?? Or at least some of the state parties appear to be. Still no word on when President Bush and Department of Homeland Farkups Secretary Michael Chertoff are going to call those 47 people racists and claim they just want to execute all Mexicans. But I have a \”gut feeling\” that they might just choose to remain silent on this one.

The RNC\’s Resolutions Committee is expected to approve the resolution at its Thursday session at the RNC annual summer meeting in Minneapolis-St. Paul, the site of next year\’s Republican presidential-nominating convention. The resolution would then go to a floor vote on Friday by the full RNC membership, made up of an elected national committeeman and woman and the elected state chairman from each state and territory.

And I hope they do, because if so I know at least 47 people I want to join me for a beer at Keegans that evening.

But really is it that surprising?? Conservatives and the general public from all over the nation generated unprecedented levels up outrage over this latest attempt at amnesty and state party members couldn\’t help but hear it. They see what the conservatives want and not being isolated in their ivory towers Washington DC, they have to respond. Or at least 14 state party chairmen did already….no idea yet on if Minnesota\’s was one of those, I\’m gonna try to work on that one. But I guess I\’m a little surprise, and more than a bit concerned that only 14 have endorse the resolution. Afterall, ….

It is rare for committee members to defy the RNC\’s leadership and a sitting president of their own party. But the immigration resolution is merely \”common sense,\” said Maryland Republican Chairman James Pelura.

\”Americans have made it clear that they want the borders secured, respect for the rule of law, and absolutely no amnesty,\” Mr. Pelura said. \”We can do better. We must do better.\”

Yes, we must.

So apparently Hillary Clinton is trying to make money off her cleavage.  Now wouldn\’t that put Hillary on the same level as a common stripper??

Ok now that I\’ve put that image in your head, you can spend the rest of the day trying to get it out.

You\’re welcome.

As most of you have heard, Chief Justice Roberts suffered a seizure and as a result fall off a boat ramp and was taken to the hospital. Reports are that he\’s doing fine and that there doesn\’t really seem to be any obvious medical reason for the seizure (which to me sounds worse than if there was one). But at least it\’s good to hear he\’s doing okay and is likely to suffer no ill effects.

Of course having heard that news, and reading about what our local open borders liberals where up to with the death of Coleman\’s father, I was a little curious how they were responding to this news.

So I wandered over to the Democrats favorite fever swamp (so you don\’t have to) and they did not disappoint. I didn\’t even have to dig, on the first page of their forums I found at least three threads obviously about Justice Roberts. And while there were people in all those threads doing the \”I disagree with him but wish him well\” posts, there were an equal number with the \”Ohhh, that\’s too bad….wink wink nudge nudge\” dance. But then there were quite a few that didn\’t even bother hiding their real feelings…which I present here*.

*Since the DU has the habit of deleting posts that look bad in retrospect, my links go screen captures of the comments instead. I\’ll offer permalinks as well but I can\’t promise they will still work.

wakfs says (permalink)

And this….

…. is why Republicans win. We\’re too nice.

\”Oooh lets wish him well. Let\’s hope for a speedy recovery.\” BULLSHIT.

I hope the guy has a serious illness that doesn\’t kill him, but lays him just low enough to linger until we have a Democratic president take office in 09, THEN he can take his well-deserved dirt nap. These people are evil, corrupt, ruthless tools of corporate america and they will stop at nothing to grant their masters all manner of legal goodies via the Supreme Court at the expense of average working americans like me. I hope they get everything coming to them, and moreso.

You wanna win? You gotta be heartless and ruthless. Roberts is a joke as a supreme court justice, let alone chief justice. Frankly, I\’d rather see that fat prick Scalia bite the big one, but we\’re not that lucky. Hey, maybe a bunch of those self-important cretins will die prematurely when the Democratic president takes office in 09.

Just saying what everyone\’s thinking, or SHOULD be thinking. Remember who the enemy is.

Ahhh, so Roberts is the \”enemy\” then?? Not just someone with a different view of the world. Interesting….yes, clearly you\’re being too \”nice\”.

kaygore says (permalink)

If there is a God, then he is not too young to become the right-hand maiden

to Satan in the inner reaches of Hell.

Gotta love the preface \”If there is a God\”…yes, can\’t show any religious credentials here can we? Although it does appear that kaygore is the praying type because….

kaygore also says (permalink) Better prayer.

Dear God,

Please release Satan\’s hand-maiden, John Roberts, from his worldly cares and allow him to join once again with the Prince of Darkness in the lowest reaches of Hell.

We pray this in the name of your son, our lord, Jesus.

Amen.

I\’m not sure how much influence God has on Satan\’s inner circle, but heh, whatever floats your black heart kaygore.

Meanwhile, not quite invoking Godwin\’s Law….

youngdem says (permalink)

Just because he looks like a decent man doesn\’t mean he is..He is an evil, UNAMERICAN man

Ted Bundy also looked like a decent man.

This one is just a serial killer of fundamental rights.

Wait a sec…is he questioning Robert\’s patriotism?? I thought the left was totally against such underhanded tactics. But seriously Ted Bundy?? Come on…

Fortunately others have learned to control their outbursts….

Massachusetts says (permalink)

May Roberts and every other Bu$hco appointed treasonous Bastard

rot in hell for their interpretive abuse and misuse of OUR (WE THE PEOPLES), Constitution and Rights!

NO SYMPATHY HERE! MAYBE EXXON OR ONE OF THE BIG CORPS WHO CARE LESS ABOUT OUR COUNTRY AND PEOPLE WILL SEND HIM SOME LILIES.

And I might point out that this is an edited comment. In other words Massachusetts posted his comment, then later went back and changed part of it. So it\’s not like this was just an emotional outburst he didn\’t mean. This was typed out, posted and then re-edited and posted again….

catnhatnh says (permalink)

There are 300 million screwed Americans…

…and I can no longer ellicit concerns for those whom have helped to abbrogate the constitution.I refuse to \”wish him well\” or pretend I hope for an early recovery.In my heart of hearts, I pray he dies slowly by an STD that he could have avoided by the condom use he felt it was wrong to advocate for American youth.I hope that tonight, John Roberts confronts his mortality, and then, weighing himself, finds himself as wanting as I do…

I\’m a little curious what this guys Christmas cards look like…

So welcome to the world of political discourse via the eyes of some of our pleasant and oh-so-friendly liberals when discussing a potentially fatal condition of a fellow human being.

Via KingDavid, I notice an article in the Red Star, entitled \”The Triumph Of The Squirrels\”. Basically it\’s a story about how squirrels own us and are destined to take over the world and there isn\’t a damn thing you can do about it. Part of the problem, the story states is that there is nothing you can do to kill them.

Horse Hockey

I\’ve got a tried and true method, that while not 100% successful, is 100% fatal to squirrels if I get it to work right.

1. I see squirrels hiding bread in my grill again.
   • Ok side note here….if I ever find out who in my area is feeding dinner rolls to these varmints I swear I\’m gonna stick that bread roll so far up your rear, they\’ll be naming new brands of yeast infections after you.
2. Open door and let my dog, Sadie, out
3. Dog seeing said squirrels sprints after it…although usually doesn\’t catch them
4. Squirrel terrified by the dog runs up tree and out onto branches, and from branches onto the powerline in my backyard
5. If sufficiently terrified, the squirrel also trys to crawl into the transformer in my backyard
6. Power shorts out as transformer grills squirrel to a very well done state and it falls to the ground

I mean sure, I lose power for a short time, but I\’m usually too busy trying to convince my dog that the squirrel is not a play toy to notice that.

Otherwise it works great, and I snag a minimum of one squirrel a year via this method.

Ok the field finally got back to me and so the details are now set, here they are

Who : You, all bloggers, all blog readers, anyone that has heard the word \”blog\”, anyone that knows how to spell (plus AAA).

What : Paintball for charity…we get to shoot each other, and despite our bruises we feel good about it cause we\’re raising money for a good cause!!

When : Sunday, August 26th (the weekend after the MILF)  Game starts at 2 pm, be there by 1:30 pm.  Game ends when Learned Foot starts crying

Where : The Adventure Zone in Rosemount, same place as last year but I\’ve reserved a different field.  Map

Why : Because it\’s fun and you\’d love to raise money for Soldier\’s Angels, the MOBs favorite charity.

How : Well first of all contact me and let me know you\’re coming, then show up!!  Bring money.

Cost : $35 for the package deal, plus your donation to charity.

That gets you everything you need plus 250 rds of paint.  You\’ll use more paint than that though, so I would highly recommend teaming up with one or two other people and buying a box (2000 rds).  Or if you do alot of killing like me, just buy a box for yourself.  If you really want to save money buy the box in advance at their Pro Shop in Burnsville, location is at the website.

Any other questions, by all means contact me and/or leave a comment on this post.

NOTE : I\’m not bothering extending a specific invitation to the lefties this year (although they are welcome to come).  But as we learned they are pansies and afraid of anything not involving tofu, so not worth my time.

Wow, what a turn around….with the surging polls of the anti-amnesty crowd, it\’s suddenly becoming popular for Republicans to actually care about our laws. Imagine that??? I honestly didn\’t write about this previously because….well I didn\’t think it had a shot and sure enough for awhile it did bounce back and forth and looked like it was going to die a sad lonely death.

Of course, I\’m referring to the amendment to the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act of 2008, introduced by Sen. Graham of all people. And it was even a good amendment, opposed by the White House of course, which would have introduced basically just the border enforcement parts of past bills. Included in this would have been roughly $3 billion to hire more agents and perform a whole variety of border enforcement activities. Lots of good stuff in here. But it was blocked by a procedural motion yesterday….Democrats opposed it with help from Republican Senators Voinovich, Cochran, and Stevens (doesn\’t he have some bribes he should be hiding?).

There was some give and take as political showmanship took place. Apparently Cornyn and Reid came to an agreement last night though…

But Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, resolved their differences overnight and announced agreement Thursday morning. Cornyn won a promise to use some money to pursue immigrants who had entered the United States legally but had overstayed their visas.

Reid had apparently thought that Cornyn wanted harsher language.

\”I was wrong and Senator Cornyn was right,\” Reid acknowledged.

Wow, seriously, how often does that happen?? But in addition to what\’s mentioned above, it also includes that funding for additional agents, walls, vehicles, towers, etc. Basically the good parts that amnesty supporters were using to try to get the rest of America to accept amnesty. Now I can\’t verify the details, because as of my writing this post the text of the amendment is not yet available online.

After having been previously blocked 52-44, the amendment came up again and passed 89-1, with Voinovich voting against it. Abstaining from casting a vote includes Brownback (R-KS), Coleman (R-MN), Conrad (D-ND), Dodd (D-CT), Inouye (D-HI), Johnson (D-Coma), McCain (R-AZ), Obama (D-IL), Stevens (R-AK) and Wyden (D-OR). I\’m not ragging on Coleman there as his father passed away this morning, so he didn\’t take part in any votes today. But it is amusing to see the people who couldn\’t even take a stand on the issue.

So those provisions have made it into the bill. Now the White House was originally against this amendment and was threatening veto but appears to have backed off on that language. I\’m actually sort of surprised that the Democrats voted against it at first. If I were Harry Reid I would have encouraged the Democrats to vote for it and force another showdown between the White House and Senate Republicans. Many of these Senate Republicans are still stinging from the last amnesty bout and would have no interest in siding with the White House again. When given the chance, why Reid didn\’t go for the option that would have further fragmented the Republicans, I have no idea.

However, a veto-proof vote on the amendment sorta kills the possibility of a showdown with the White House, which more than likely is why the veto threats stopped….sorta. Now vigilance must be maintained as this bill goes to conference. My guess is that Democrats and the White House will try to strip the text of this amendment out. But I\’m not entirely certain they\’ll succeed. There is enough support in both the House and Senate for these provisions that almost certainly there will be a supporter on the conference committee.

Finally some good news on the immigration front….now let\’s hope it pans out. However, it is notable that alot of formerly pro-amnesty Republicans like Graham have suddenly found religion on this issue, now that they understand how insanely unpopular it was with the public. Better late than never.
In Related News :

Yes they are still attempted to sneak the AgJobs bill into the Farm Bill. The House is deliberating the Farm Bill now, and Senators Feinstein and Craig are leading the effort but it appears they are hitting more resistance than they are likely to overcome. Notable amongst opponents are Senators Harkin and Sessions.

Senator Specter is apparently thinking of trying to bring back \”amnesty that isn\’t amnesty\”, basically giving them legalized status but not citizenship. So basically amnesty as second-class citizens. Cute Senator, you might want to rethink that plan of attack. Good luck with all that.

Correction : In the first paragraph I originally said that Senator Sessions introduced the amendment, when it was actually Senator Graham.  I\’ve made the correction.  Still a little surprised it was Graham who grew the testicles.

On May 15th, 2006, President Bush gave a speech to address illegal immigration, or undocumented workers as he calls them. In there he did his best to sound tough, although nobody believed him. He talked about how the border patrol had increased from 9000 to 12,000. He bragged that he was going to add another 6,000 badly needed agents to bring the total to 18,000. That would take take for sure, but he had a plan for that too…

One way to help during this transition is to use the National Guard. So in coordination with governors, up to 6,000 Guard members will be deployed to our southern border. The Border Patrol will remain in the lead. The Guard will assist the Border Patrol by operating surveillance systems … analyzing intelligence … installing fences and vehicle barriers … building patrol roads … and providing training. Guard units will not be involved in direct law enforcement activities – that duty will be done by the Border Patrol. This initial commitment of Guard members would last for a period of one year. After that, the number of Guard forces will be reduced as new Border Patrol agents and new technologies come online.

Okay fair enough. After much bitching by various governors, the National Guard was deployed to our southern border and all expectations were that they would remain there until replaced by Border Patrol. Or at least that\’s what Bush committed to in his speech, by saying \”the number of Guard forces will be reduced as new Border Patrol agents and new technologies come online\”.

Ok so where are we today…well as of June 23rd, the Border Patrol stands at 13,701. That\’s a paltry increase of 1,701 agents. So why are the National Guard forces of 6,000 being cut in half to 3,000?? Surely training is not so incredible that each agent is worth two National Guard members, despite only being able to be in one place at one time?

Well I think the answer to that is fairly obvious. Once again the talk is tough about being serious on illegal immigration, but action is as always half-hearted and half-assed. Now that Bush\’s tough talk didn\’t net him his amnesty, he\’s taking his ball and going home. I for one can\’t say I\’m surprised, but I guess I had kinda hoped we could take him at his word at least once.

Instead, we\’re scaling down our protection of the southern border. While at the same time the latino MS-13 gang, no longer content with just having monopoly control over Mexico, has now set their sights on controlling several US cities, such as Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and New York. Apparently, we don\’t have the testicular fortitude to stand up to them.

Makes me kinda wish we had someone in our government who was responsible for enforcing our laws and protecting us from foreign invasions. Sure would have been nice had the Founding Father found a way to work that into our Constitution somewhere. Oh well, you can\’t have everything.

Very Monty Python like…

Well release of the timeline of our plans in Iraq hit the news recently and appear to have made a splash amongst an already war-weary public. And did it surprise anyone to see that it was the New York Times that released the contents of the secret plan?? Of course Cindy Sheehan got arrested recently for yet another anti-war protest. So this topic of war isn\’t going away.

What I find curious is that part of this talk is about the lack of progress of the Iraqi government. Sure they\’ve had their failings, and they\’ve been less than stellar so far but how bad are they doing really?? I mean compared to say….a country with 200+ years of experience at this, how are they doing.

Let\’s take a look at those 18 benchmarks we keep hearing about….and let\’s see how WE are doing against similar benchmarks. The Iraqis got eight out of eighteen….

Goal: Ensuring political groups do not undermine security forces
Unsatisfactory: The effort to make sure that the political authorities are not undermining the security forces or making false accusations is not working properly. The effect is to deny the security forces the services of qualified officers.

You mean like Rep Murtha making false accusations against US soldiers?? Or the Pentagon declaring the Clinton\’s political rhetoric was helping the enemy?? Or Democrats trying their best to give our enemies the best chance at survival? You mean liberals constantly second guessing our troops and hamstringing them with impossible rules and regulations?? You mean like that???

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Reconciliation with former Baathists
Unsatisfactory: Iraqi leaders have been struggling to find a way to accommodate former Baath party members in the political mainstream, and reverse what is now acknowledged as excessive zeal in excluding people with ties to the former Saddam regime.

Basically this boils down to bi-partisanship….and really I can\’t even come up with plausible satire here. Anyone want to even try to claim there is ANY level of bi-partisanship in Washington??

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Reducing the level of sectarian violence and eliminating militia control of local security
Unsatisfactory: Militias are still dominant force in parts of Baghdad, Basra and many provinces.

Well despite liberals claims of BushCo\’s brown shirts and Republican Nazis I think we\’re doing pretty good here. I haven\’t noticed any new government run political prisoner camps opening up lately.

Our grade : PASSED

Goal: Provide Iraqi commanders with authority to go after insurgents and militia, whether Sunni or Shia, without political intervention
Unsatisfactory: The Iraqi commanders have been given the authority but there is continuing political interference along sectarian lines. The Shia-dominated government is reluctant to tackle Shia militia.

Hell our security forces can\’t even go after terrorists without some liberal bitching.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Increasing the number of Iraqi security forces units capable of operating independently
Unsatisfactory: Iraqi army performing better than police but both need presence of US and other coalition forces.

Yeah, we were supposed to increase the size of one of our security forces too, namely the Border Patrol. We haven\’t. And we\’ve even taking to imprisoning them when they do their job.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Disarming militias
Too soon to judge: The conditions are not yet on the ground to bring in legislation that would set out a process for disarming militias, and ensuring a single Iraqi security force accountable only to the Iraqi government.

A single security force huh?? I think that\’s what our Homeland Security Department was intended to do, unite all our security forces under a single banner. So how did that work out….well it\’s chief\’s best efforts have resulted in a \”gut feeling\”.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Raising Iraqi brigades to support operations in Baghdad
Satisfactory: Although the Iraqi government struggled initially to deploy three additional full brigades in support of the surge in Baghdad, it managed to pull in enough forces from other divisions by last month.

Well we\’ve been struggling to hire enough border patrol guards to man the border, so we managed to re-assign some of them to guard presidential candidates, instead of the border. Priorities you know.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Establishing joint US-Iraq security stations in neighbourhoods across Baghdad
Satisfactory: Thirty-six such stations have been fully-established and 32 partially-established.

Eight hundred miles of fence to be built, how much have we built?? Eleven. Oh and a couple years ago we put some fencing on the wrong side of the border so we have to rebuild that.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Amnesty for insurgents
Too soon to judge: There has been almost no movement towards an amnesty law for insurgents. However, the White House says the time is not ripe because of ongoing violence.

Well we tried to pass amnesty for illegal immigrants. Fortunately that failed….TWICE. But they are still trying to bring back parts.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Election reform
Usatisfactory: The White House divides this benchmark into four parts. It gives a satisfactory grade to the Iraqi government for establishing a commission to oversee general elections. However, it fails the Iraqi authorities for failing to draft a provincial election law, or establish provincial council authorities. The Iraqi government has also failed to set a date for provincial elections.

Election reform….yeah, we could use that too!!

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Political support for Baghdad security plan
Satisfactory: The Iraqi government has set up political, economic, and media committees to try to reinforce security operations in Baghdad

Political support for a secure Iraq?? Yeah, right, not with the Code Pinkos and the KosKids climbing all over each other to be the first to surrender to Al Qaeda. And the Democrats can\’t do anything but follow the lead of the fever swamp.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: To deny Baghdad as a safe haven for al-Qaida and insurgents regardless of religion
Satisfactory: Enough progress has been made to allow US and Iraqi forces to continue clearing and securing areas in and around Baghdad.

Would I be beating a dead horse too much here if I made a reference to sanctuary cities for illegals??? Yeah….okay, you fill in the blanks here.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Ensuring that the Iraqi security forces are providing even-handed enforcement of the law
Unsatisfactory: Sunnis continue to believe that the Shia-dominated police force and army is biased against them. The presence of US and other coalition forces has had a positive effect on ensuring a more even-handed approach.

Well, liberals continue to believe that the liberal-dominated media is biased towards liberals, so they introduce the Fairness Doctrine to introduce even more liberal filth. It\’s failure had a positive effect on media and the sanity of everyone.

Our grade : PASSED

Goal: Fairly allocating and spending $10 billion in Iraqi revenues for reconstruction
Satisfactory: Need to speed up spending in the coming months.

Somehow I think our problem is not speeding up spending but slowing it down.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Introducing laws that would allow autonomous regions
Satisfactory: The Iraqi parliament has passed legislation to allow semi-autonomous regions such as in Kurdistan. However, there is no chance of implementation until after provincial elections are held.

Well since the US Congress has pretty much done nothing this term, they\’ve effectively made every state an autonomous region. Although I\’m not sure that was the spirit of this benchmark.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Constitutional review and reform
Satisfactory: A constitutional review committee was formed in November last year to try to resolve conflicts over such issues as the division of power between the centre and the regions, and the status of Kirkuk. It put forward preliminary recommendations last May, and received an extension to deal with the more contentious issues

Ok let\’s save the review and reform….how about we just concentrate on getting the Feds to follow the Constitution first. THEN we can start working on this review/reform thing.

Our grade : FAILED

Goal: Protect minority political rights in the Iraqi legislature
Satisfactory: Minority political parties participate fully, as do women.

Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich, I rest my case.

Our grade : PASSED

Goal: Passing an oil law
Unsatisfactory: Producing legislation that would allow for the fair distribution of Iraq\’s oil resources among Shias, Sunnis and Kurds is seen as crucial for future stability. However, negotiations remain deadlocked by a Sunni party boycott.

Still not drilling domestic oil, still no new refineries, still no new nuclear plants, instead we\’re just concentrating on burning our food supply.

Our grade : FAILED

So the Iraqis got eight out of eighteen, how did we do??? Well we got three out of eighteen.

Hmmm, me thinks someone scored slightly better.

Ok this is something I\’ve counciled people on before but it\’s apparent it\’s a pretty widespread problem amongst politicos on the right.

Reagan

Ok Reagan the man isn\’t the problem, Reagan the idea is.

Before you petition to have be hung, allow me to elaborate.  I think all conservatives can agree that Reagan was a great man.  A true leader with the ideas and the manner that were perfect for his time.  In many cases I don\’t think the world would be awfully different regardless of who the president was at that time, but in Reagan\’s case I shudder to think of how things might have turned out had he not been there.  So I think we can all agree that he\’s a man worthy of praise, admiration and respect.

That said it\’s time to let him go folks.  He was perfect for his time, that doesn\’t mean he\’d be perfect for ours.  Yes his demeanor and ideas emboldened a nation and moved the country and the world forward by leaps and bounds.  So why must you keep looking back???

By invoking his name, you demonstrate you have no ideas of your own.  By leaning on his legacy, you fail to define yourself and your candidate as a forward looking leader.  When you talk about how you are like Reagan rather than what you believe, you demonstrate that you aren\’t half as good as he was.

So please people, stop trying to use him as a cheap political talking point.  Besides, if you have to explain how you\’re like Reagan, then you aren\’t at all.