[credit where due: the woman's proven she's a scrapper. pity about the rest of 'em]

.

NC-IN Primary Data the Media Won't Emphasize

The New York Times's stories for tomorrow's print edition ("Support for Clinton Wanes as Obama Sees Finish Line" and "Pundits Declare the Race Over") clearly point in those directions. The first describes North Carolina as "a decisive loss" for Mrs. Clinton. The second shows how determined the Times appears to be to come up with evidence that Obama has the nomination in the bag, as it actually notes the despised Matt Drudge's headline link earier today to Tim Russert's "The Nominee" video.

Wait a minute.

Jim Geraghty at National Review online appears to be about the only person to have caught the obvious: Barack Obama's overwhelming support from African-Americans means that he performed miserably with the rest of the voters.

Did he ever: [snip: two graphs, basically showing the bellow contention...]

I contend that if this were almost any other candidate, the press would be asking him how he can possibly win the general election if he could get only 35% of the non-African-American vote in North Carolina, and just 41% of it in the state just east of his home state of Illinois.

[btw: if we must focus on the role of racism in this campaign, don't the numbers of 91% (NC) and 90% (IN) support of blacks for Obama suggestion that perhaps the preponderance of racial bias might not be among whites?][has any other candidate ever garnered ninety-percent of any demographic?]

READ MORE

Quote of the week

.
“Operating outside public view, the House Democratic majority is taking extraordinary steps to maintain spending as usual while awaiting a Democrat as president. ...
For the second straight year, no appropriations bill other than defense is scheduled for passage. Instead, spending details are crafted in the Speaker's Office, negating President George W. Bush's veto strategy. In a little-noticed maneuver April 23, Pelosi won passage of a bill preventing Medicaid billions from being saved through Bush administration regulations. ... "

Robert D. Novak

.

Military Spouses Earn Presidential Volunteer Service Award

– President Bush presented military spouses the Presidential Volunteer Service Award today for exceptional support to their communities and the nation. Bush made the presentation as 1,100 military spouses gathered for a Military Spouse Recognition Day celebration on the White House South Lawn.

“The six individuals we honor here today have earned the respect of our nation. They represent thousands of other military spouses that make significant contributions to our country,” Bush said. “So we honor six, but we say thanks to millions. Our country appreciates the service and devotion.”

READ MORE

Markets, Schools, Businesses Demonstrate Peace, Prosperity in Iraqi City

Citizens of Basra, the third-largest city in Iraq, celebrated the opening yesterday of a central market that demonstrated a return of peace and prosperity to an area that until recently was a stronghold of Shiia militias.

Schools closed early as families from the Jameat district gathered with local dignitaries, investors and media to watch the ceremonial opening of the Jameat Market, Multinational Corps Iraq officials reported.

Operation Charge of the Knights, a citizens group that works to restore peace and security to Basra, was credited with opening the market...

READ MORE

U.S. Must Stay in Iraq Till Day is Done and Victory Won

The latte lefties in Congress really are pieces of work — intent, as they seem to be, on crippling the nation’s economy and judiciary, as well as its energy independence. Oh, and declaring defeat in the war on terror. [snip]

With House Speaker Nancy Pelosi now effectively running the appropriations process, the Democrats are loading an administration $178 billion supplemental measure for the troops in Iraq with $70 billion in domestic pork-barrel spending. Having tried and failed on dozens of votes during the past year to limit funding for Iraq, now the leftists’ goal is to force President Bush to accept their wacko domestic spending agenda — or, because of their add-ons, to veto his own Iraq supplemental funding bill.

In the process, of course, they cheapen the deaths of 4,000 American troops (islamofascism, they say, poses a threat vastly less than Nazism or Communism did) — and implicitly declare that the long war on global terror pales in importance against, for instance, the war on global warming...

READ MORE

Out of Africa: a growing threat to Europe from al-Qaeda's new allies

Algiers - It is a vast expanse of desert where conditions are so inhospitable that almost no one lives there. But for al-Qaeda – on the run in Iraq and under attack in Pakistan and Afghanistan – this stretch of the Algerian Sahara has proved fertile ground in its quest to open a new front on Europe’s southern doorstep. (Snip) an Algerian group calling itself al-Qaeda in the Land of Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) – aims to create an arc of influence throughout North Africa by spreading Osama bin Laden’s “brand" through a fusion of disparate fundamentalist groupings...

[G.W.O.T.]

READ MORE

China's next-generation nationalists

They're educated, richer and more aggressive toward the West.

As human rights protesters dogged the Beijing Olympics' torch relay around the world, as supporters of Tibet condemned the violent crackdown in Lhasa, and as Darfur activists demanded change in China's Sudan policy, Chinese young people worked themselves into a different form of righteous anger.

In online forums and chat rooms, they blasted Beijing's leaders for not being tougher in Tibet. They agitated for boycotts against Western businesses based in nations that object to Beijing's policies, and they directed venomous fury against anyone critical of China.
The anger has even spread to American college campuses. In April, Chinese students at USC blasted a visiting Tibetan monk by drowning him out with changs of "Stop lying! Stop lying!"

When one Chinese student at Duke University tried to mediate between pro-China and pro-Tibet protesters, her photo, labeled "traitor," was posted on the Internet, and her contact information and her parents' address in China were listed for all to see...

[another consequence of state run propaganda from birth. This is not a benign nation looking to join the modern world, but rather dominate it]

READ MORE

Testing The Waters

When the United Nations World Meteorological Organization recently reported that global temperatures had not risen since 1998, the explanation given by WMO Secretary-General Michel Jarraud was that the cool spell was the effect of the Pacific Ocean's La Nina current, "part of what we call 'variability.' " Well, oops, the Earth will do it again.

According to the greenies, the Earth is supposed to warm continuously and disastrously without taking any rest breaks. Yet after taking actual data from the Labrador Sea where the Gulf Stream gives up its warmth before sinking and returning southward and projecting forward, the Kiel team says the Atlantic currents will keep rising temperatures in check around the world, much as the warming and cooling associated with El Nino and La Nina in the Pacific affect global temperatures.

Howard Hayden, physics professor emeritus at the University of Connecticut, has described the machinery of the computer models used by the IPCC and others to predict imminent and cataclysmic climate change as ones that take "garbage in" and spit "gospel out".

READ MORE

The Biofuels Backlash

St. Jude is the patron saint of lost causes, and for 30 years we invoked his name as we opposed ethanol subsidies. So imagine our great, pleasant surprise to see that the world is suddenly awakening to the folly of subsidized biofuels. All it took was a mere global "food crisis." Last week chief economist Joseph Glauber of the USDA, which has been among Big Ethanol's best friends in Washington, blamed biofuels...

[watch how long it takes congress to admit error]

READ MORE

Congress needs to get out of the way and let U.S. tap its oil supply

The nation's economy is totally geared to using oil, and unless Congress comes to its senses and allows ANWR and other abundant untapped domestic oil sources to be drilled, the U.S. will remain at the mercy of foreign oil suppliers for many years to come, despite all our conservation efforts and hoped-for but still-unrealized alternative energy and fuel plans.

Big oil companies aren't our enemy; they are the companies that supply and refine the oil and gasoline our economy must have. It's a mammoth, costly effort, and penalizing them financially for being successful makes no sense. It would be akin to the long-ago days when doctors thought they could heal patients by draining off some of their blood; exactly the wrong thing to do.

We're also left wondering how much higher than $100 a barrel the price of oil has to go before Congress ceases to be the cork that keeps America's untapped domestic oil supply bottled up underground. We've got the oil we need. Let's use it to bring down oil prices (and all other prices) and improve our national security...

READ MORE

SCHOOL CHOICE OPPORTUNITY

Scarcely half of American children in our 50 largest cities will leave their public schools with a high-school diploma in hand. These children are disproportionately African-American, and their homes are disproportionately located in our largest public school districts. One of the few hopeful alternatives in these cities are Catholic schools, says the Wall Street Journal. [snip]

• Minority students at Catholic schools are 42 percent likelier to complete high school than their public school counterparts, according to a University of Chicago researcher.
• They are also 2 1/2 times more likely to earn a college degree.

The emphasis on faith-based schools is a reflection of practicality, because turning around a failing public school or starting up a new one is difficult - there are political problems when it comes to solving this crisis, says the Journal:

• Though polls show that African Americans generally favor school choice, they tend to vote for Democrats who don't due to huge teacher union 'contributions'.
• The teachers unions devote their considerable resources to fighting any measure that increases accountability or gives parents more options.

So when politicians have to choose between a teachers union and some African-American mom who would like to take her son out of a failing public school, guess who usually wins?

[you'll often hear an argument against vouchers along the 'state can't give money to religious institutions' line. Feel free to expose their subterfuge: vouchers would go to parents, who would award them as they see fit...]

READ MORE

NBC Analyst Quits Due to Network's Move to the Left

Last February, NewsBusters reported the resignation of retired Col. Ken Allard from NBC News as a result of the military analyst's view the network was undergoing a "precipitous retreat from journalistic and ethical standards."

On Sunday, Allard was more specific, claiming, "I thought they really had moved very slowly to the left, and I also thought that when they had the chance to clarify to the fact that they were not moving to the left, they didn't do so."

CNN's Howard Kurtz set this up on "Reliable Sources"...

READ MORE

Conservatism: Alive and Well in Western Europe

American liberals have to be frustrated by the rebirth of European conservatism. America’s liberal press hopes to perpetuate the myth of a solidly social democratic Europe by ignoring this transformation of European voter preference—at least until after the U.S. presidential election. So then, who will share this good news with the American electorate that despite liberal denial, conservatism is alive and well in Europe? It’s up to the new media, and time is of the essence.

Could it be that European voters are just as “bitter” as Americans about energy and food prices, open borders, radical Islam, the threat of terrorism and other issues that Barack Obama dismisses as “wedge” issues? Could it be that “bitter” Europeans are clinging to “wedge” issues because governments run by social democrats or democratic socialists have failed the European voters?

Europeans are sending Americans a message that the big government, social policies do not work, and that wedge issues are real issues. Those Americans who are paying attention to the conservative gains in Europe are encouraged, if not elated. If American voters hear the truth about Europe, they will be, too.

This is a conclusion that the old media will never even consider...

READ MORE