Matt Berry: "He's a really patriotic guy"

Raisin had a field day with our last post about football patriot and erstwhile OL&L contributor, Matt Berry. But we can take it. In that article, we wrote about John Kerry's infamous botched joke and the usual idiocy from Chuck Rangel and referred the reader to Berry who we argued was an example of the type of person who often volunteers to serve--educated, accomplished, yet desiring to defend his/her country.

Well, Berry has been home from basic for a few months and while preparing for officer candidate school, he has continued working on ConSource--another project we've written about before.

In our daily review of cougarfan.com, we came across a recent ABC News 4 piece about Berry and his military service. His candor is refreshing. None of the false, 'shoot 'em up' bravado the loony left uses to caricature soldiers and conservatives. Nope, Berry is as honest about his patriotic desires to serve his country as he is his fears of what might happen to him in Iraq or Afghanistan. Click here to watch the video.

Thanks for your service, Matt.


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Dennis Miller on Harry Reid 6/10/07

Like hip hop, we were introduced to Dennis Miller and his "rants" by our friend Michael J Mouncer. We listened to Miller with our beloved debate coach, AP government teacher and committed liberal, Chuck Hammaker-Teals. As the lone conservative in that triumvirate, we took a lot of flak for a lot of things. This was back when Bill Clinton's "peccadillos" were all the rage, you know, back when al-Qaeda was plotting 9/11 and America's demise.

Counting Miller, we guess that triumvirate was really a fearsome foursome. And like many other former libs, Miller woke up to reality in the post-9/11 world and joined the forces of liberty, justice, and the American way. All three (Hammaker-Teals, Mouncer, Miller (in spirit)) remain friends. We're glad the political numbers have evened out a bit since 1999.

Hey MJ, still a big Miller fan?

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Mitt Romney Watch III

We're late to the game with these links, but the questions they address remain relevant to the ongoing issues surrounding Mitt Romney's campaign for President.

First, Romney's Mormon Question over at time.com. From Time you get about what you'd expect. Left of center writing for the slightly above average American reader. Time is for the intellectually curious who are interested in politics, but not that interested and not that intellectual. They want more than they get from a newspaper, but not what they might get from The Nation on the left or National Review on the right. So, option one is the superficial, mainstream look at Mitt Romney.

For the more ambitious, those who fancy themselves to be a bit more intellectual, check out the transcript of a lengthy interview/discussion with Professor Richard Bushman. Hat tip to our old man for finding and emailing us the link to this insightful dialogue.

All the heavy hitters from most of the major periodicals attended and many of them asked questions: John Fund from The Wall Street Journal, E.J. Dionne from The Washington Post, et al. The piece starts out with a prepared presentation by Bushman, followed by Q&A with members of the press.

Of particular interest to us was the evolution of Mormon politics since the church's inception. From the radicalism of Joseph Smith to the conservatism of the last century, Bushman explores the historical factors surrounding these ideologies. If you want to know about the compatibility of Mormonism and Democracy, this is your primer. Mormonism and Democratic Politics: Are They Compatible?


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Pardon Libby

We've been reading the op-ed "soundoffs" section over at the Seattle P-I. It's part of our effort to avoid becoming as insular our liberal friends who continue to drink the kool-aid over at Daily Kos, The Nation, NYT op-ed, Washington Post op-ed.... uh, yeah, it might be a quicker exercise to list only the conservative outlets.

Predictably, they are all foaming at the mouth about the 30 month sentence given to Scooter Libby yesterday. Never mind that there was no original crime committed. Never mind that the prosecutor knew it wasn't Libby who leaked the information to the press, but rather Bush administration critic Richard Armitage. Never mind also that Libby's only crime was not being able to remember from whom he first heard about the leak. None of that matters. For the loony left, it's far more important that facts are bent to fit the conspiracy theories that soften their reality.

Kind of like the loony left's favorite accepted notion about Castro's Cuba--specifically, that health care down there is awesome(!!). Michael Moore produced his latest docu-drama based on that "fact." Forget for a moment that all the information we have about Cuba's health care comes from Castro's propaganda machine. He wouldn't lie about this stuff, would he?

But, like Miller, we don't want to get off on a rant here. The point is that the loony left substitutes "liberal talking points" for "facts." Kind of like the dustup between whacky Rosie and Elizabeth Hasselbeck on The View we watched on Youtube yesterday. Kind of like the ideological differences between the Democratic candidates in the debate the other day (sarcasm in print just doesn't work; there were no differences). All of this from the party that insists it is open minded and intellectually diverse. Has "pro-life Democrat" become an oxymoron yet?

So, for now, they get to rant about how Libby is the first of the administration "criminals" to face prison time. Hopefully, President Bush will soon pardon Libby, so then the loony left can add another layer of complexity to their favorite campfire conspiracy stories.


***Remember: D-Day Anniversary, 6 June 1944.***


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