Island Passage

James Taranto has spotted this reactionary meme at the first Presidential Debate, in Barak Obama's closing statement: You know, my father came from Kenya. That's where I get my name. And in the '60s, he wrote letter after letter to come to college here in the United States because the notion was that there was no other country on Earth where you could make it if you tried. The ideals and the values of the United States inspired the entire world. I don't think any of us can say that our standing in the world now, the way children around the world look at the United States, is the same. And part of what we need to do, what the next president has to do--and this is part of our judgment, this is part of how we're going to keep America safe--is to--to send a message to the world that we are going to invest in issues like education, we are going to invest in issues that--that relate to how ordinary people are able to live out their dreams. And that is something that I...

So there is a lot of back-and-forth about whether the Paulson Bailout will cost the U.S. trillions of dollars; or whether it will in the end reap a windfall of trillions of dollars. The question that I have for those that think this may actually make money is this: Are you nuts? (Note that I generally applaud buying up distressed assets a fire-sale prices, then making a killing once everybody starts to realize how stupidly they have acted. I am, after all, a heartless capitalist.) Andy Kessler makes this point in his Wall Street Journal article : In 1992, hedge-fund manager George Soros made $1 billion betting against the British pound. In 2007, John Paulson's Credit Opportunities fund correctly bet against subprime mortgages, clearing $15 billion for the year and $3.7 billion for him. Warren Buffett is now hoping to make big money on Goldman Sachs. Chad Crowe But these are small-time deals. My analysis suggests that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson (a former investment ba...

This is all very inside baseball. If you haven't been following the presidential campaign since 2006, it may seem as though it is an argument in progress. It is. Feel free to skip. Just a few posts ago I was wondering about Barack Obama, " Who Does He Owe? " It seems as though one of the people he owes is William Ayres . As pointed out by Hillary Clinton, Obama used the position that he had in Ayres operation as a bullet point on his resume. This is the absolute sticking point for me. My family calls me McCarthyite and say that I'm attempting to smear Obama with guilt by association. And yet. "I don't regret setting bombs" and "I feel we didn't do enough", and, when asked if he would "do it all again" as saying "I don't want to discount the possibility." "We weren't terrorists," Ayers told an interviewer for the Chicago Tribune in 2001. "The reason we weren't terrorists is because we did not co...

Things I didn't know about George Putnam : "I detest labels," he once told the Los Angeles Times. "I've been called many things in my career: right-wing extremist, super-patriot, goose-stepping nationalist, jingoistic SOB. And those are some of the nice things. "But those people have never bothered to determine my background: Farmer-Labor Party, Socialist Party, lifelong member of the NAACP [National Association for the Advancement of Colored People], member of the Urban League. I went through the Depression, and my father was reduced to selling peanuts door-to-door . . . I fell in love with Franklin D. Roosevelt. I've been a lifelong Democrat. I'm a conservative Democrat." Sorry. My head will stop spinning in just a minute.

I saw the video of Senator McCain being besieged by the harpies of "The View," and it caused me to reflect. What I wanted McCain to do, what I wanted Sarah Palin to do when confronted by Charlie Gibson, was to laugh . I wanted John McCain to toss back his head, hold his stomach and laugh at the silly improbability of it all until tears rolled down his cheeks. When you think about it, "Do I have to be worried about the return of slavery," seems to require one of two responses. The first is outrage that your viewpoint could be so distorted by a sadly un-funny comedienne. I have no doubt that Senator McCain could rise to heights of outrage should he so desire. The second response is to look at these Lilliputian scold-hens and see how ludicrous their jabber really is. I don't want to hear a mean snarly laugh, nor yet a derisive snort, but a belly laugh that reflects his amusement that these people, these people , contend that they speak for the American people. Ha...

Other than Jobs helped create a multi-billion-dollar industry where there was none? I am anticipating the return of Saturday Night Live this weekend with the election in full swing. In an article about the comedians who will do impersonations of the candidates, Fred Armisen talks about "doing" Barack Obama: Obama might at first seem almost too straight of a character for Armisen. While Hammond is a somewhat traditional standup (he performs frequently and has recently begun appearing on Broadway, notably in "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee"), Armisen is closer to absurdist, Andy Kaufman territory... But he says Obama reminds him of another character of his: Steve Jobs. "There was something about Senator Obama that I felt they had some similarities — in their presentation, in their love for what they do," says Armisen. "Steve Jobs really makes moments happen." So the similarity is that Barak Obama has his own Reality Distortion Field ? F...

I have avoided posting about the Sarah Palin Veep situation. I, like almost everyone else, was caught near flatfooted. I had considered Palin, but had filed her in my mind in along with Bobby Jindal in a box marked: "Rising Stars, check back in 2 years." I have been revolted at the toxic waste dump of hate that has been spilled by her political opponents. But the Obama campaign's featherweight response to Palin was telling in its ineptness. It's like that they felt that had to throw something out there, rather than let the announcement dominate the next six news cycles while they did opposition research. But the response was pathetic . Calling Palin a "former mayor," rather than a "sitting governor?" Getting trapped in comparing the top of the Democratic ticket with the bottom of the Republican ticket? This ineptness in choosing Joe Biden, blowing the Palin announcement, and the daily gaff-o-matic tone of the Obama/Biden ticket has me puzzled. How ...

This is completely brilliant. MooveAlong.org It's a goof site promoting the movie An American Carol .