Blogs For Victory

…may very well deliver a decisive victory for John McCain in November:

A new analysis of March polling data suggests that John McCain’s cross-party support surpasses that of either Barack Obama or Hillary Rodham Clinton.

According to data provided by the Gallup Organization at Politico’s request, in a hypothetical contest between McCain and Obama, McCain wins 17 percent of Democrats and those leaning Democratic, while Obama wins 10 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaners.

In a potential contest with Clinton, McCain wins 14 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaners while Clinton wins 8 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaners.

By way of comparison, exit polls in 2004 reported that George W. Bush won 11 percent of Democrats and John F. Kerry won 6 percent of Republicans.

Yet, many on the left think they’re heading to a landslide Democrat victory in November. I wouldn’t bet on it. Everyday this race seems to look better and better for John McCain.

Discussed over at Battle Born Politics.

Excellent news:

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has said France will send more troops to bolster Nato’s mission in Afghanistan, subject to certain conditions.

Mr Sarkozy, who is on a state visit to Britain, said he would make the offer at next week’s Nato summit in the Romanian capital, Bucharest.

Britain and the US have frequently called on other Nato members to send more soldiers to fight the Taleban.

The Nato-led force, Isaf, currently has over 43,000 personnel in Afghanistan.

In a speech to the British parliament in London, Mr Sarkozy said the Taleban could not be allowed to regain power.

“In Afghanistan something essential is being played out,” he said.

“France has proposed a strategy to its allies in the Atlantic alliance to enable the Afghan people and their legitimate government to build peace.

“If these proposals are accepted, during the summit in Bucharest, France will propose reinforcing its military presence.”

France already has troops in Afghanistan but like all other NATO forces – other than US, UK and Australia – they work on such restrictive rules of engagement as to be useless in a military sense except as static, garrison troops. President Sarkozy’s proposal indicates that the French military will engergetically engage in battle – and this, in turn, might get the Germans and others to step up to the plate. In the end, we are all in tihs together, and it will be over a lot faster if all concerned put some will into the fight.

The problem with Europe seems to be a lack of will to live, and a resultant unwillingness to fight. But it wasn’t always so – less than 100 years ago, France sternly sacrificed its manhood on the anvil-altar of Verdun, fighting for the core principle that governments must derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. The great-grandsons of those brave men now hold the destiny of France – and, perhaps, Europe – in their hands. President Sarkozy has made a brave offer, we’ll now see if there is any will to live in France, and Europe.

I know, hard to believe that a liberal can fail, especially one who spoke of hope and change in his election campaign…but it does seem to be the case:

BOSTON — Gov. Deval Patrick has lately addressed doting crowds around the country as a surrogate for Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, his friend and fellow gifted orator. Last month, Mr. Obama even acknowledged borrowing language from Mr. Patrick’s stump speeches, casting a flattering light on a novice politician barely known outside Massachusetts.

But there is no such glow at home for Mr. Patrick, the first Democrat to lead his state in 16 years and the nation’s second elected black governor.

Mr. Patrick, who easily won office in 2006 after dazzling voters with a message of hope and change, suffered a nasty defeat last week at the hands of the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives, which quashed his proposal to increase revenues by allowing three resort casinos in the state. None of the governor’s major policy proposals have cleared the Legislature, in fact, and he and Salvatore DiMasi, the speaker of the House, have taken to trading barbs publicly.

Mr. Patrick is faring better than a year ago, when he was under siege for spending more than $10,000 on drapes for his State House office and upgrading his state car from a Ford Crown Victoria to a Cadillac. (He later agreed to reimburse the state for the drapes and part of the car lease.) By his third month in office, Mr. Patrick had announced that his wife was being treated for depression, and by his fourth, he had overhauled his staff.

But even now, governing is not coming easily for Mr. Patrick, 51, a former civil rights lawyer and corporate executive who came to Massachusetts on a prep school scholarship in the ’70s.

So why has he struggled for traction in a heavily Democratic state with a Legislature that should be on his side?

He blames Speaker DiMasi, a veteran of Beacon Hill who embraces old-school ways of doing business and holds far more sway than the governor over his members. Mr. Patrick believes his casino bill could have passed if Mr. DiMasi, who said gambling would be a scourge on the state, had not pressured lawmakers to oppose it.

Why casinos? ‘Cause you’ve got a liberal in charge – and that means if there’s a budget shortfall (which there is in Massachusetts), then the only thing a liberal can think of is how to increase revenues…never a thought to how to cut spending or better run the government. Its also rather typical of a liberal that he’s blaming someone else for his defeat – it isn’t that Mr. Liberal Hope and Change had a bone-headed idea, its that Someone Else failed to deliver the goods. DiMasi might be a lot of things and, sure, he was clearly opposed to the idea of casinos (as should everyone – really, leave casinos to the professionals in Las Vegas…everyone else always seems to make a hash of it, and you can never get “Vegas” anywhere other than Vegas), but its not like he can actually order everyone around – might it be that a majority of the Legislature just decided that casinos weren’t a good idea? Well, you’ll never get a Liberal Hope and Changer to admit that…liberals never make mistakes, you see?

Poor Massachusetts – saddled with an uber-liberal Governor, a Democrat controlled legislature…and Ted Kennedy at the top fo the nauseating heap! I’ll bet they’re starting to regret their choice in 2006…

Those darn Democrats, taking trips paid for by dictators… but, really, this is old news..

Saddam Hussein’s intelligence agency secretly financed a trip to Iraq for three U.S. lawmakers during the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.

An indictment unsealed in Detroit accuses Muthanna Al-Hanooti, a member of a Michigan nonprofit group, of arranging for three members of Congress to travel to Iraq in October 2002 at the behest of Saddam’s regime. Prosecutors say Iraqi intelligence officials paid for the trip through an intermediary.

At the time, the Bush administration was trying to persuade Congress to authorize military action against Iraq.
The lawmakers are not named in the indictment but the dates correspond to a trip by Democratic Reps. Jim McDermott of Washington, David Bonior of Michigan and Mike Thompson of California. There was no indication the three lawmakers knew the trip was underwritten by Saddam.

“Obviously we didn’t know it at the time,” McDermott spokesman Michael DeCesare said Wednesday. “The trip was to see the plight of the Iraqi children. That’s the only reason we went.”

Why is this “old news?” Well, the aforementioned Democrats had previously been reported to have been on a pre-war trip to Iraq that reportedly funded by Detroit-area businessman Shakir Al-Khafaji, an Iraqi-American, who also had ties to Saddam’s regime and accompanied them on the trip. Al-Khafaji received loads of cash from the U.N. Oil for Food scandal. Apparently, Al-Khafaji is the “third-party” mentioned in the indictment.

And guess what? Mark and I discussed this trip in our book, Caucus of Corruption.

Things aren’t looking so good for Democrats’ hopes for the White House this year. According to a recent Gallup poll, “a sizable proportion of Democrats would vote for John McCain next November if he is matched against the candidate they do not support for the Democratic nomination.” The poll says that 28% of Hillary’s supporters would rather vote for McCain than Barack Obama, if Obama got the Democratic nomination. In addition to that, 19% of Obama’s supporters said they’d vote for McCain if Hillary got the Democratic nomination

This certainly shows the impact of the ongoing battle between Hillary and Obama is having on the Democratic Party. True, come November, I wouldn’t expect either of those figures to maintain the same level, but it is clear that the Democratic Party is divided, and the longer this primary race goes for them the worse it will be for the Democrats. But, don’t expect the race to end anytime soon. In fact, I think we’re going to see Hillary and Obama battle it out all the way to the convention in Denver. A Rasmussen poll shows that 22% of Democrats think Hillary should drop out of the race, and and equal number of Democrats believe Obama should drop out.

The Democratic Party is divided, and I’m loving every minute of it. One might even say there’s a quagmire in the Democratic Party.

UPDATE: The plot thickens…

Have at it, folks.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72B3tUAqpo4%5D

I mean, really… did anyone think otherwise?

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BfNqhV5hg4%5D

She says she’s only human… I call it only a liar.

Of course, she’s now chosen a convenient time to come out with comments about Barack Obama’s Jeremiah Wright problem…

The headline:

US Deaths in Iraq Approach 4,000

Odd headline, isn’t it? I mean, they’ve been “approaching” 4,000 since, oh, 3,900 was reached…why put this out now? And why not wait for 4,000?

My guess is that the good news is coming out of Iraq all too rapidly these days and that public opinion in the US is turning towards continued support for the long-haul…and that, of course, will damage Democratic prospects in 2008. So, change the subject – use dead American servicemember’s as a prop in a leftwing morality play, courtesy of the supposedly unbiased MSM.

Of course, the loss of life is a sad thing – but the problem with concentrating on numbers like that is that it fails to put into context just what they died for. Its not like they were killed in a traffic accident just on their way home from work, now is it? Here is some of what they’ve been doing lately:

Tip leads Iraqi National Police to large munitions cache

Coalition forces kill 17 terrorists including six likely suicide bombers, detain 30 suspects

Suspected IED emplacers attacked in vicinity of Samarra

One terrorist killed, 21 detained in operations against al-Qaeda

Plenty to write about – and plenty which is interesting, newsworthy and likely to generate readership/viewership. Why write about the number of dead rather than write about the actual war? Can anyone find a headline from, say, June of 1944 which says that “US Deaths in Europe Approach 200,000”, rather than talking about what the troops were doing?