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| Still captured from video initially released on biggovernment.com |
Now to honest, I'm not a big fan of ambush journalism in general, the paparazzi or sting operations. I don't think Bill O'Reilly can discuss a serious issue in 12-minute segments, anymore than I can believe popular television psychologist Dr. Phil McGraw can resolve the feud between the Hatfield's and McCoy's between commercial breaks. The real purpose, I think, is to see if the target will overreact to the harassment. (The best way is to treat these guys with patience and civility but not to reward them with a sound bite or reaction that will become a defining moment of the encounter, not one's position on the issues.)
I personally like Andrew Breitbart, a rare conservative in the progressive bastion of Hollywood. An early resource in the development of the famous Huffington and Drudge portals, Breitbart has his own news website and has started adding websites, like Big Hollywood and Big Government, in a sense a conservative new media conglomerate, just as Oprah Winfrey has created her own media empire. Big Government made its mark with the breaking story of the amateur sting on a DC area ACORN operation. Breitbart similarly broke the story of the new incident.
If you watch the video, you see Etheridge responding to a purported student asking the prickly response of the Democratic Congressman to simply being asked if he supports the "Obama Agenda". Etheridge responds by first continually asking the reporter, "Who are you?", a not-so-subtle attempt to intimidate the reporter for asking a reasonable question: Who could have figured, 17 months after the coronation of Barack "Yes, We Can" Obama, that Etheridge would react defensively to being asked if he supports the leader of his party's agenda? Gone is the cockiness of James Carville whom famously predicted that the GOP would be spending a generation in the desert, doomed to losing elections with dominant Democrats...
If you watch the video you see Etheridge going after the camera recording the incident, wrapping the reporter's wrist in a tight grip and initially refusing to let go, and cuffing the reporter's neck in the video capture photo (above). There are people who get arrested for assault for less than what we plainly see in the video. This is inexcusable, unprofessional, criminal behavior, and the people of North Carolina deserve better. I will point out the Congressman apologized, but only after the incident became the hottest viral video on the Internet.
The BP Oil Spill and Alice in Wonderland Politics
Both sides of the political spectrum are expressing some truly bizarre points of view over the oil spill. I'll start with a couple of ideas (not necessarily mainstream) from the conservative side. For example, one oil industry veteran spun a conspiracy theory that the Deepwater Horizon disaster was actually the result of a conspiracy between BP and the Obama Administration to sell Obama's climate change legislation in the US Senate. Another curious argument is that we wouldn't have had to drill in deep water (with the relevant issues of pressure requiring the use of specialized robots) if politicians in coastal states allowed drilling closer to shore. There is a grain of truth in that as indicated by the distance from shore specified in Obama's modest expansion of offshore drilling off the Gulf and East Coast. (We saw similar considerations for the recently approval wind power project off the coast of Massachusetts, opposed for years by the Kennedy clan.) The point here is that there are more than a few other functioning deepwater platforms out there. Obviously if we could tap the same oil at much shallower depths, it would have controlled for risk better, but the vast majority of drilling and improvements in failsafe technology have not resulted in these kinds of incidents. Yes, let's drill more aggressively in the oil shale properties of the west-central region, let's open of more of Alaska's resources, etc. But no principled conservative should back away from wherever the oil is based on one bad incident. We need all the oil we can develop locally to halt an unsustainable dependence on external sources of oil. The space shuttle program did not stop because of the Challenger disaster. The race to the moon went on despite some initial false steps (e.g., Apollo 1).
Of course, Obama, Kerry, and others are now trying to politically exploit what they see is a backlash against offshore oil development as a result of the BP incident, driving the cap-and-trade/climate change agenda, but when I heard Kerry on national talk soup a week ago, promising the snake oil of economic prosperity as a result of showing leadership in clean energy. PLEASE. With a budget deficit this year, entirely under Democratic leadership, setting a new record (of more than $1.4T), and decades of heavy government subsidies for alternative energy, and with alternative energy providing less than 10% of aggregate market share (and most of that in hydroelectric plants, which are subject to their own environmental concerns), why are we pushing something that will actually increase business and consumer taxes in the middle of a fragile economic recovery?
All of this is pretentious nonsense. I'm not arguing for a carbon-only energy policy. If we can displace gasoline use by improvements in battery technology, electric power, cellulosic ethanol, compressed natural gas, algae-based fuels, improved engine technology, etc., or provide companies incentives for allowing workers work from home or a more local facility once or twice a week, etc., great; it's what we conservatives call an "all-of-the-above" approach. But whereas Kerry's approach requires massive federal funding we can't afford, we can employ more American workers in oil and gas industry TODAY instead of sending money to oil exporters employing their own workers. But then what do you expect when Obama decides for a 6-month drilling moratorium, which costs tax revenues and well-paid jobs, not to mention more oil from foreign suppliers.
Political Cartoon
Nate Beeler points out something I alluded to in yesterday's post about the extensive appeal process and other concessions that Colorado education reformers had to agree to in order to take a first step towards holding teachers accountable for their effectiveness in the classroom. I am still not happy with Charlie Crist's veto of an earlier teacher reform measure in Florida, which I personally regard as a concession to win teacher political support.
Quote of the Day
To love is to stop comparing.
Bernard Grasset
Musical Interlude: Chart of 1964. Probably the best year ever for pop music. The Beatles dominated the charts, we saw the Supremes arrive on the scene, and the music was incredible. I LOVE the silly love Beatles love songs, the sheer exuberance of being in love with McCartney's "I Want to Hold Your Hand". I don't even listen to the radio anymore; there are few songs today that can hold a candle to the brilliant songwriting of the Beatles and Motown. Maybe a decent song here and there from U2, Dido, and others, but I'm not a fan of hip-hop and rap, and it seems the charts are loaded with that music.
The Beatles, "I Want to Hold Your Hand"
Dusty Springfield, "Wishin' and Hopin'" (charming video; great vocals)
The Beatles, "A Hard Day's Night"
Roy Orbison, "Oh, Pretty Woman" (probably the greatest vocal performance of the rock era and one of the most distinctive songs ever)
The Beatles, "She Loves You"
