It’s not a Halloween trick.

It’s not even the Obamacare Death Panel.

It’s much, much worse.

Last week, the White House declared war on Fox News. At first, it seemed like another stupid, short-sighted, inexperienced, arrogant pronouncement by the Chicago thugs running the asylum at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. And, in fact, it is another stupid, short-sighted, inexperienced, arrogant pronouncement by the Chicago thugs running the asylum at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. But it is also a very serious attack on the First Amendment.

Freedom of the Press is at the heart of American democracy. Countless barrels of ink have been drained in asserting, demanding, extolling, and celebrating this treasured gift from our Founding Fathers. And millions of American lives have been sacrificed protecting this Precious Right.

Who’da thunk that when faced with the most insidious challenge to this fundamental principle the very institutions whose existence flows from it would be co-conspirators in it’s potential demise? And yet- that’s exactly what is happening.

Last week Obama sent his minions out to attack and vilify Fox News. And Fox’s competitors – CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, MSNBC – are evidently even more stupid, short-sighted, arrogant and naive than the Chicago thugs who not only publicly and proudly admitted they controlled the press during the campaign but have signaled they obviously intend to continue to do so with the fawning acquiescence of these same media outlets.

It is the duty of the press in a free society to challenge and question the government at every turn. It is their responsibility to act on behalf of the citizens; to protect, to defend, to use the mighty power of the pen against the sword of tyranny. Given the antagonism the Obama Administration is displaying against Fox News they must be fulfilling this obligation. The rest of the pack have become no more than toothless lapdogs. And the White House knows it. And loves it.

This is scary. Really scary. Not so much that The One and his band of Merry Men are trying to destroy this country – that’s been an open secret since the campaign – but that the mainstream American press is an active accomplice in the effort. Shame on them.

Shame.

“Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.” —Harry Truman

Big news this weekend is the result of the latest Rasmussen poll showing Mike Huckabee leading Mitt Romney in a hypothetical Republican match-up.

Talking heads and media experts are weighing in with all sorts of theories on how and why this might be happening. Conventional wisdom (whoever that may be) seems to be suggesting that either of these two are the candidates that the left would most like to have at the head of the Republican ticket because, ultimately, they are most beatable, and therefore their rankings are being artificially inflated. Maybe. I can see where that might be the case for MItt Romney. He definitely has a constituency within the Party, but I’m not so sure how large it really is at this point. And I can sure see where the Dems would have a field day attacking him in an election – so yeah – he probably could be the liberals’ favorite candidate. But what about Huckabee?

I have my own little theory: Since Mike’s been a regular on Fox News with his weekend show, which is fairly well-rated, he’s become a very identifiable quantity. He’s in our living rooms every week – a guest in our homes, as it were. We’ve seen him play his guitar, we’ve heard him ask his guests some questions that we would ask if given the opportunity, and we’ve seen him empathize with celebrities and “real people” in conversations that bring out his warm fuzzy side. His corny humor, silly grin, and balding crown are familiar characteristics in millions of American
homes.

Does it surprise me that Huckabee is leading the Republican pack then? Nope. It makes perfect sense. He’s the guy we know. He stops in every Saturday evening just before dinner and shares a few snicks and grins and a song or two. His show is politics-lite, so we don’t end up too divided by his personal stances on issues. He plays to the center-right. Unlike Glen Beck, he isn’t hammering an agenda that is likely to alienate anybody much. (The White House hasn’t painted a target on his forehead yet – so he’s not the candidate they fear either.) So when the pollster calls, the name of Mike Huckabee is a ready answer.

Political reality: People vote for the candidate they feel they know best. This is true at every level of politics. I will submit that this is the underlying reality for the success of most incumbent campaigns: Voters feel like they know what to expect from the guy or gal already holding the office, whether or not they really do, and whether or not their own political beliefs mesh. Whether it is more true here in Montana, I can’t tell you for sure, but just look at the way the voters swung between democrats and republicans in this state in the last election: Republican McCain for President, Democrat Schweitzer for Governor, Max for Senate and Denny for House. Trusting the familiar – even if they didn’t always like the person all that much or think he was the best possible candidate. (Have you ever heard anyone – from either side of the aisle – seriously suggest Max Baucus was our best and brightest? Me neither.)

The moral of this story is one that political candidates and their campaign managers need to take more to heart. It’s NOT about the issues or your position on the issues that will get you elected. It’s about how many people feel they know you. Except for a few who strictly vote party line (about 20% on each side) the majority of people will vote for a person they know – or think they know – rather than a candidate that more closely matches their own political views. You may not like that. And you’re right, that’s not the way to get the best government. But it’s the way it is. Plan your campaigns accordingly.

H/T to my blogger-buddy Steve from Rabid Sanity for letting me know about Chris Stirewalt’s column in the Washington Examiner today. It focuses a couple of themes that have been simmering in the deep, dark recesses.

Stirewalt’s piece, “Disillusioned Liberals Yearn for Hillary Clinton” rather astutely notes that the Obama campaign pretty much snookered the Democrat faithful into believing in the impossible: That a completely inexperienced, untested, neophyte with a background in affirmative action/community service, steeped in the totally corrupt Chicago political machine of Da Mare, Tony Rezko, and Bill Ayers, baptized in the racist religion of Reverend Wright, and dressed to the nines in the Emperor’s fictional wardrobe of Hope and Change, could assume the responsibility of governing the most powerful nation in the world and somehow not fall face-first into the Fruit Loops. Dang. Blew that one, huh?

So they are now experiencing the first pangs of buyer’s remorse. Awww.

Two years ago the smart money was on Hillary. It seemed like all the stars were lined up in her favor – the money, the media, the momentum. Somehow the Upstart was able to undercut the Designated Diva. The Democrats threw their best candidate overboard for the promise of unicorns, rainbows, and hopey-changitude. Whatever the hell that’s supposed to be.

After less than nine months of fits and starts, ineffectual programs and policies, incomprehensible spending, diplomatic disasters, and a never-ending series of inexplicable TelePrompted pronouncements, most Americans are either regretting their votes or smugly chanting, “We told you so!” According to the latest Opinion Dynamics’ poll, only 43% of Americans would vote for Obama if the election were held today. This can’t be the way the Democrats hoped things would be going by this point in the presidency of the Anointed One. I mean – who could have imagined that this guy could lose an Olympic bid and win the Nobel Peace Prize in less than a month and end up the punchline on SNL for both?

Human nature being what it is, thoughts are now turning to what might have been…

Most conservatives had their moment of regret for Clinton’s loss long ago when they realized that Obama was completely out his depth.
It started during the period of “The Office of the President-Elect” and continued as Google proved better at vetting members of the administration than the transition team.
For those on the Right chiefly concerned with foreign policy, the lament about Clinton’s miserable campaign continues to deepen. They believe that radical Islam and Vladimir Putin will prove to be tougher adversaries than the insurance industry and the senior senator from Maine. The defense-minded Right is still thinking about the 3 a.m. call, and not the one from the Nobel Committee.
But conservatives know that they never would have had a chance with Clinton. Where Obama has overfilled his plate like a kid at Thanksgiving dinner and now stares at an unappetizing mountain of cold mashed potatoes, Clinton would have taken measured bites and finished the whole feast. But had she won, there’s no doubt that she would have ground up the bones of her enemies and baked chocolate chip cookies with them. Obama, though, has proven to be the only person who could make the GOP look reasonable again after the misadventures of the Bush years.

For liberals, though, the strange, sad longing for the woman they rejected has only just begun.

For most of us, this pretty well sums it up…

Apparently this White House just doesn’t get it. Today’s announcement that President “One”derful (or is it “Won”derful?) will not be granting interviews to any Fox News programs this year has further defined this administration as totally incompetent wimps.

Coming on the heels of what is undoubtedly the most undeserving award ever bestowed in the history of the planet, this moronic temper tantrum suggests that not only the President, but also his senior advisors, are so inexperienced, fearful, and weak that they cannot even contemplate dealing with a confrontational environment, let alone actually embracing one. Rather than confidently girding the lion in his den, Obie cowers in the Oval Office, hiding under the desk where Monica Lewinsky once cavorted with a previous tenant, imperiously issuing ultimatums that strike most Americans as sophomoric: “See. If you aren’t nice to me, I won’t play with you guys ever again. So there.”

While this may be a winning strategy in some situations (although I’m not sure what those might be), even Richard Nixon, who famously tried to shut out the NYT during his first term, found that Mark Twain had it right when he cautioned, “Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel.”

David Gergen, who has worked for President Bill Clinton and three Republican presidents, questioned the propriety of the White House declaring war on a news organization.

“It’s a very risky strategy. It’s not one that I would advocate,” Gergen said on CNN. “If you’re going to get very personal against the media, you’re going to find that the animosities are just going to deepen. And you’re going to find that you sort of almost draw viewers and readers to the people you’re attacking. You build them up in some ways, you give them stature.” He added: “The press always has the last barrel of ink.”

Gergen’s sentiments were echoed by Tony Blankley, who once served as press secretary to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. “Going after a news organization, in my experience, is always a loser,” Blankley said on CNN. “They have a big audience. And Fox has an audience of not just conservatives — they’ve got liberals and moderates who watch too. They’ve got Obama supporters who are watching. So it’s a temptation for a politician, but it needs to be resisted.”

Nia Malika Henderson, White House correspondent for the Politico newspaper, also questioned the White House offensive against Fox. “Obama’s only been a boon to their ratings and I don’t understand how this kind of escalation of rhetoric and kind of taking them on, one on one, would do anything other than escalate their ratings even more,” she said.

With his approval ratings steadily falling, his healthcare reform imploding, cap-and-tax off the table, and Afghanistan morphing into a huge mess, you’d think the President would try to sell his message to a broader audience. Fox has the largest cable news viewership in the country, particularly in the critical 18 – 54 and senior demographics (read “voters”). For such a brilliant man, you’d think the poor sucker would have at least an inkling that only talking to the people who already support him is a sure bet for ultimate failure. He can’t keep everybody in that audience enthralled forever. Already certain constituencies are beginning to to resist the gravitational pull. The LGTB march this weekend was evidence that the hopey-changitude magic isn’t working for those who thought that BO’s campaign promises were something to believe in. Then there is word on the street that Hispanic leaders are angry about Obama’s “lack of success in legalizing illegal immigrants.” And the fringe media – Saturday Night Live, Jay Leno, and Jon Stewart of The Daily Show, just for starters – are finding that their audience – Obama’s touted “youth vote” – are quite willing to watch their idol lampooned. How long do they think the adulation can last once the high priest become the head clown?

Eventually, he’s going to have to reach out to the people who watch Fox News. Of course, by then, the rainbows, unicorns, and fairy dust will have lost whatever appeal they originally had.

And they want those uniforms back! Thank God. That’s way too much ugly. Gold and brown – or mustard and poop – is bad enough (sorry Capital HIgh fans), but toss those stripe socks into the mix and “fashion faux pas” doesn’t begin to cover the disaster.

I believe I will go do something other than torture my eyeballs. 10 – 0 isn’t the worst part of this game for my Broncos – unfortunately.

UPDATE: Final Score – Broncos 20, Patriots 17. Still not pretty, but we’ll take it. Last time Denver started the season with a 5 – 0 record they won the Super Bowl. But the uniforms weren’t so obnoxious.

Because I don’t have time for a thousand words tonight….

Wonder if this should be sent to a few Congress critters? Couldn’t hurt.

Lawrence Livermore Laboratories has discovered the heaviest element yet known to science.

The new element,
Governmentium (GV),
has one neutron,
25 assistant neutrons,
88 deputy neutrons,
and 198 assistant deputy neutrons,
giving it an atomic mass of 312.

These 312 particles are held together by strange glueon forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons. It has also been noted that the bosons have been replaced by grossons, the photons by pootons, the muons by maons, and the neutrinos by purinos. Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert; however, it can be detected, because it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A tiny amount of Governmentium can cause a reaction that would normally take less than a second, to take from 4 days to 4 years to complete.

Governmentium has a normal half-life of 2 – 6 years. It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.

In fact, Governmentium’s mass will actually increase over time, since each re-organization will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes. This characteristic of moron promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a critical concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as critical morass.

When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium, an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons.

H/T to fellow HillBuzzard, NeeNee

From the American Thinker comes an amazingly on-target analysis of why the Obamas’ appearances at the IOC meeting last Friday were such abysmal failures:

Of course Barack and Michelle Obama failed in Copenhagen. Their strategy could not possibly succeed. In their academic arrogance, they thought they could sell a product they clearly do not believe in (the United States) and moreover, they could do so by stressing the benefits to the seller (Chicago) and not the buyer (the IOC). And to top it off, they committed the faux pas of talking too much about the sales force (themselves) and not about the product or the buyer.

Gee, what could possibly go wrong?

Anyone who has had to succeed in the real business world — and that includes few if any on Team Obama — instinctively knows that to get business done you have to believe in what you are doing and offer a product or service that is focused on the benefits to the customer. In the Obama World of Chicago pay-to-play power, business gets done by flexing muscle and clearing the field of your competitors. You don’t have to sell anything. You don’t have to believe in anything. It is fine to be self-focused. You simply have to apply the power of the applicable political machinery and you win…

The Obamas’ sales pitch was awful by any definition. Of course. How can our President, who has made his political fortune at the expense of the reputation of the country, sell our country to the IOC with a straight face?

The answer is he could not. And although it would have been an out of body experience, I still thought he would at least attempt to sell America and some notion of our logistical competence and love of sports and so on. I didn’t think he would believe it, but certainly thought the teleprompter would sneak in something good about the country for him to read.

Nope.

He and the First Lady did not even pretend to be proud of us. They went on an unseemly, surreal begging campaign that mixed in uncomfortable bits and pieces of their personal histories with platitudes about what the Olympic Games could do for the children of Chicago. Oh, BTW, the Obama family would personally find it kind of a cool thing for the neighborhood…

The bottom line is this: this was an Obama epic fail. Period. They were the sales force, they were the focus of the sales presentation and they were the product. The Obamas were there to sell the Obamas with the Obamas. All Obama all the time.

And the world said, “No thanks.”

Now if the American Lame Stream Media just wasn’t such a sucker for a snake-oil salesman and his solipsistic wife the rest of us wouldn’t have to try to figure out what to do with all the crap these two are peddling.

I do not have a degree in journalism. (I know you’re shocked to learn this, but just go with it.)

As a blogger, one of the challenges I face constantly – in addition to dyslexic fingers and trying to think of interesting things to write about – is coming up with a catchy headline. You know, something that will attract readers. Something that gives a hint of the scintillating text to follow, yet doesn’t promise more than the prose delivers. Trust me that’s a tall order. I’ve had a couple of good ones over the years: Dead Horse Won’t Die seems like a kind of tantalizing lead. I mean – you can’t tell exactly where the piece might take you. It could be a story about a miraculous equine resurrection – right? Well, it could be! And then, Obama’s Elf has a bit of flare, if I do say so myself. At least you have to keep reading to find out what the heck the post is about. For a rank amateur, I’d give some of my efforts a decent grade.

Today, however, the world was treated to the work of a master. The Mona Lisa of headlines. The piece de resistance, the epitome, the pinnacle. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you DRUDGE:

“THE EGO HAS LANDED”

It simply doesn’t get any better than that.

Except for the story that went with it:

This is the IOC’s show, it wasn’t the Obama’s show, they went over there and tried to hi-jack the whole thing and the IOC bitch slapped ’em, it’s no more complicated than that – Rush Limbaugh

Who says that God doesn’t enjoy a little irony from time to time?

UP – SARAH PALIN

Since stepping out of the direct line of fire as a political target, Sarah Palin’s star has continued to rise – and shine brilliantly – despite the best efforts of the left-wing nuts. This week, her publisher announced that her autobiography would be out in November with an advance printing of 1.5 million copies. Within 24 hours pre-orders for the book set records.

– Sarah Palin’s upcoming memoir is already the top bestselling book on the shopping sites of Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble, a month and a half before the book goes on sale.

The memoir from last year’s Republican vice-presidential candidate, titled “Going Rogue: An American Life,” is scheduled for release on November 17, four months after the book deal was announced and much earlier than planned.

The memoir, which became available for pre-order this week, has been in Amazon.com’s top 100 for three days, and just replaced the latest novel from “Da Vinci Code” author Dan Brown at the top of the list.

DOWN – DAVID LETTERMAN

On the other end of the spectrum, CBS late night wanna-be funny man David Letterman, who thinks raping a 14 year-old is hysterical, was forced to confess to his own sordid behavior during the taping of his show last night. Apparently this jerk has been banging several of his female staffers. I would ask, “What the hell was he thinking?”, but, obviously, his two brain cells are contained in the sacs behind his johnson. Hopefully, the women involved will brush up on the New York sexual harassment laws and lighten the wallet in his Worldwide Pants.

As long as we’re watching the teeter-totters: The new jobs report is out. Jobs down 263,000; unemployment up to 9.8%.

So – how’s that hopey-changitude stimulus working for you now, kids?