Republicans Report Much Better Mental Health Than Others

Democrats suffer from "Oh woe is me syndrome" and have as long as I can remember. The fact that they actually admit is is what's surprising.

Republicans are significantly more likely than Democrats or independents to rate their mental health as excellent, according to data from the last four November Gallup Health and Healthcare polls. Fifty-eight percent of Republicans report having excellent mental health, compared to 43% of independents and 38% of Democrats. This relationship between party identification and reports of excellent mental health persists even within categories of income, age, gender, church attendance, and education.

The basic data -- based on an aggregated sample of more than 4,000 interviews conducted since 2004 -- are straightforward.

More crAP

When is up not up but rather down? When AP reports it....

Spending Down 0.2 Percent in October

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Consumers, battered by a slumping housing market and a credit crunch, slowed the growth in spending to the smallest amount in four months.

The Commerce Department reported Friday that consumer spending edged up 0.2 percent in October, the weakest showing since a similar increase in June. Individual incomes grew by just 0.2 percent last month, the poorest showing in six months.

The weak gains in spending and incomes were likely to raise new worries about spreading economic weakness caused by a severe slump in housing and a credit crisis triggered by rising mortgage defaults. In addition, consumers are also being battered by surging prices for gasoline and other energy products.

It's gone beyond mere spin to out and out lies.

Update: The headline has mysteriously changed to: Consumer Spending Slows in October. Way to cover your tracks boys.

Quote of the Day

Rush Limbaugh commenting on last nights debate: "FRED THOMPSON was the only true conservative on the stage".

That's as close to an endorsement as one will ever get in the primaries from Rush folks.

Huckabee Hooplah (the Gomer factor)

After reading the reviews of last nights debate I wonder if anyone really watched it. The glowing analysis from the left on Huckabees performance is unsurprising as he is one of the most liberal of the contenders and is also the one most easily defeated by Hillary. The positive comments from the right are the ones I find difficult to square.

The hucksters answer on the immigration question was a disaster. For most of the evening he came across as preachy, insincere and evasive bordering on slimy. There are times he reminds me of Bill Clinton lite....the words are smooth and well delivered but you just know he's lying.

What's also suprising is the pass he's getting on his record from the big names in the blogospere. The man is a pro amnesty tax increasing nanny stater who if he wasn't conservative on some social issues could be running for the Democrat nomination. George Bush looks like Pat Buchanan next to Huckabee.

Hopefully we will begin to get a bit more scrutiny now that Huckabee has risen to the top tier. One thing for sure though, it won't be coming from the MSM at least not during the primaries.

Republican Debate #10 (seems like more)

Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson were excellent and scored some points. Mitt Romney started out strong but faltered as the debate progressed. Not one of his best performances. McCain had a couple of strong moments but looked tired and pi$$ed most of the night.

Huckabee had his worst debate performance to date. The few good answers he did have came across as preachy. Guiliani was just plain terrible. He was booed on more than one occasion and looked completely outmatched, a first for him.

Tancredo was solid if anyone cared and Ron Paul was idiotic as usual.

Ratings best to worst:

1. Hunter
2. Thompson
3. Tancredo
4. McCain
5. Romney
6. Huckabee
7. Giuliani

Man Tries to Deposit Fake $1M Bill

Note the verification marker strikes on the right side of the bill, too funny.

AIKEN, S.C. - A bank teller in Clearwater had a million reasons not to open an account for an Augusta, Ga., man Monday, authorities said. Alexander D. Smith, 31, was charged with disorderly conduct and two counts of forgery after he walked into the bank and tried to open an account by depositing a fake $1 million bill, said Aiken County Sheriff's spokesman Lt. Michael Frank.

The employee refused to open the account and called police while the man started to curse at bank workers, Frank said.

This guys obviously been hanging with Rotwang.

Reporters say Baghdad too dangerous despite surge

A perfect illustration of how out of touch the MSM in Iraq really is. After all it's hard to know the temp outside when ones cowering in their basement.

WASHINGTON, Nov 28 (Reuters) - Nearly 90 percent of U.S. journalists in Iraq say much of Baghdad is still too dangerous to visit, despite a recent drop in violence attributed to the build-up of U.S. forces, a poll released on Wednesday said.

The survey by the Washington-based Pew Research Center showed that many U.S. journalists believe coverage has painted too rosy a picture of the conflict.

A separate Pew poll released on Tuesday showed that 48 percent of Americans believe the U.S. military effort in Iraq is going very or fairly well, up from 34 percent in June, amid signs of declining Iraqi civilian casualties and progress against Islamist militants such as al Qaeda in Iraq.

If you really want to know what's going on in Iraq, ask a cabbie.

Stephen King thinks that Jenna Bush should be Waterboarded

How can someone with so much talent have so little sense.

How Big Man In McAllen Bundles Big For Clinton

300 dirt poor families giving 8% of their total yearly income to a politican is way beyond inexplicable.

McALLEN, Tex. -- During the first nine months of this year, Sen. Barack Obama raised just $2,086 for his presidential campaign from people who live in and around this border town of stucco bungalows and weed-covered farm lots, and most candidates raised even less. But Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the Democratic front-runner, has already raised more than $640,000 here, and her campaign expects to collect even more.

Clinton's success in this unlikely setting is based almost entirely on her friendship with one man, McAllen developer Alonzo Cantu. A self-made millionaire who once picked grapes on the migratory farm labor circuit, Cantu persuaded more than 300 people in Hidalgo County, where the median household income in 2006 was $28,660, to write checks ranging from $500 to $2,300 to the senator from New York.

Oft-missing Mitt let cons run free

Personally I think this line of attack is unfair as a candidate cannot and should not be held responsible for every dimwitted action one of their nominees makes. And even though this situation bears little resemblance to the Willie Horton/Dukakis debacle, expect continued disingenuous comparisons to surface.

During former Gov. Mitt Romney’s last year at the helm in Massachusetts, there were plenty of dangerous ex-cons like Daniel Tavares mingling with the public while our presidential wannabe was rubbing elbows with big-shot Republicans across the country.

Tavares - the sick Bay State killer who allegedly executed a pair of beautiful young newlyweds in Washington state last weekend months after being sprung early from prison for killing his mother - was coddled by a criminal justice system largely ignored by Romney.

Romney was out of the office 212 days in 2006.

DePalma Iraq Flick Bombs

Doesn't it just warm your heart to see a self important liberal prima donna lose his shirt on a pretentious ideological turd offering like this...

Americans won't see their movies. While the public is staying away in droves from “Rendition," “Lions for Lambs" and “In the Valley of Elah," audiences are really avoiding “Redacted," De Palma's picture about US soldiers who rape a 14-year-old Iraqi girl, then kill her and her family. The message movie was produced by NBA Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, who insisted on deleting grisly images of Iraqi war casualties from the montage at the film's end. Cuban offered to sell the film back to De Palma at cost, but the director was too smart to go for that deal.

“Redacted" - which “could be the worst movie I've ever seen," said critic Michael Medved -took in just $25,628 in its opening weekend in 15 theaters, which means roughly 3,000 people saw it in the entire country. “This, despite an A-list director, a huge wave of publicity, high praise in the Times, The New Yorker, left-leaning sites like Salon, etc. A Joe Strummer documentary [of punk-rock band The Clash] playing in fewer theaters made more in its third week," e-mailed one cineaste. “Not even people who presumably agree with the movie's antiwar thesis made the effort to see it."

Woman Aborts Child To Help Save the Planet

The one silver lining to this disgusting story is that at least this lunatic will not be perpetuating her bloodline.

Giving birth is a burden on the world. This is according to British born, Toni Vernelli, 35, who had an abortion 10 years ago to ensure her carbon footprint would be kept to a minimum, the U.K.'s Daily Mail reported Sunday.

Vernelli -- who works for an environmental charity -- was later sterilized to help "protect the planet", the Mail reported.

"Having children is selfish. It's all about maintaining your genetic line at the expense of the planet," Vernelli told the Daily Mail, adding she believes bringing new life into the world only adds to the problem.

100,000’s of Iraqis Enthusiastically Return Home

They'll be some bumps in the road but for all practical purposes this thing is won. Expect the left to start harping on the economy, health care and foreclosures. This dog hasn't hunted for 3 months now it just has taken them that long to finally realize it.

Iraqi refugees are returning home in dramatic numbers, concluding that security in Baghdad has been transformed. Thousands have left their refuge in Syria in recent months, according to some estimates.

The Iraqi Embassy is organising a secure mass convoy from Damascus to Baghdad on Monday for refugees who want to drive back. Embassy notices went up around the Syrian capital yesterday, offering free bus and train rides home.

“In the last month, 60 per cent of the Iraqis I know have returned,” he said. “The situation has been changed completely. They all want to go back. Even my own family back in Baghdad is telling me the situation is much better.”

The return of so many Iraqis is a strong vote of confidence in the security situation in Baghdad. However, it also reflects the tightening of visa regulations by Syria two months ago, making it more difficult for refugees to stay and impossible for most to come back if violence flares up again. The border crossing into Syria is closed for them. Their trip to Iraq is one way.

Group Names Naughty, Nice List Of Stores

When some witless store goof gives me the Happy Holiday's crap I promptly reply "Oh I'm in the wrong store, I was looking to buy Christmas gifts" and promptly turn around and walk out.

LYNCHBURG, Va. -- A Christian advocacy group has some advice for Christians as they prepare to do their Christmas shopping: Don't shop at stores that censor the word "Christmas."

As part of its Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign, Liberty Counsel has released its fifth annual "Naughty and Nice" list of stores seeking to attract gift buyers.

The "Naughty List" names stores that make no mention of Christmas in their advertising, vaguely observing the "season" or "holiday" instead. The list includes Gap, Kohl's, Bloomingdale's and Marshalls, to name a few.

The "Nice List" consists of stores that still name the reason for the season. Some stores on that list include Macy's, Wal-Mart, Target and Toys R Us.

List is HERE.

Democrats party of rich

Democrats realized decades ago that taxation is much more about power than it is about helping the less fortunate.

Democrats like to define themselves as the party of poor and middle-income Americans, but a new study says they now represent the majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional districts.

In a state-by-state, district-by-district comparison of wealth concentrations based on Internal Revenue Service income data, Michael Franc, vice president of government relations at the Heritage Foundation, found that the majority of the nation's wealthiest congressional jurisdictions were represented by Democrats.

He also found that more than half of the wealthiest households were concentrated in the 18 states where Democrats hold both Senate seats.

"If you take the wealthiest one-third of the 435 congressional districts, we found that the Democrats represent about 58 percent of those jurisdictions," Mr. Franc said.

Disabled veterans jeered at swimming pool

This from the UK but it is just as likely to have happened here.

Injured soldiers who lost their limbs fighting for their country have been driven from a swimming pool training session by jeering members of the public.

The men, injured during tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, were taking part in a rehabilitation session at a leisure centre, when two women demanded they be removed from the pool. They claimed that the soldiers "hadn't paid" and might scare the children.
The incident has sparked widespread condemnation. Adml Lord Boyce, a former head of the Armed Forces, said last night the women should be "named and shamed".

"These people are beneath contempt and everything should be done to get their names and publish them in the press," he said. "It is contemptible that people who have given up their limbs for their country should be so abused when they are trying to get fit again."

They've paid, more than a short sighted self involved twit like you will ever know.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

The funniest Thanksgiving skit in the history of sitcoms.

Rasmussen 11/21

The all important South Carolina...

The good news for Romney:

Fred Thompson 21%
Mitt Romney 21%
Rudy Giuliani 13%
Mike Huckabee 12%
John McCain 9%
Ron Paul 8%

Very Favorable:

Fred Thompson 32% * Mitt Romney 28% * Rudy Giuliani 24% * Mike Huckabee 22% * John McCain 19% * Ron Paul 14%

Very Unfavorable:

Ron Paul 25% * John McCain 12% * Mike Huckabee 9% * Rudy Giuliani 8% * Mitt Romney 8% * Fred Thompson 4%

Voters who will certainly vote for their choice

Fred Thompson 24% * Rudy Giuliani 16% * Mitt Romney 16% * Mike Huckabee15% * John McCain 13% * Ron Paul 12%

The bad news for Romney...his support is the softest as 68% are open to changing their mind, while every other candidate is between 47-57%.

‘Voters’ Who Broke Story on Romney Calls On Romney Payroll

Pilfering a tactic from NARAL? Most of us are familiar with the tactic of the pro-abortionists that vandalize their own property just to create a cause celebre to blame on the pro-lifers.

Erick Erickson at Redstate (disclosure I too contribute to Redstate) has uncovered some more information on the Mitt Romney phone scandal. Leon Wolf, another Redstate contributor who today endorsed Mitt Romney, also pointed out that this happened previously (described then) when Leon was on the Brownback campaign.

The basic facts are that a Romney staffer, Marshan Roth contacted the Salt Lake Tribune, identified herself as "leaning towards Romney", and told her story:

Marshan Roth, of Fairfield, Iowa, got a call on Wednesday night. It started out like a regular poll, she says, but then asked positive questions about Sen. John McCain and delved into disparaging things about Romney. She was asked whether she knew that Mormons have ‘baptized thousands of dead people’ and that the Book of Mormon was more important than the Bible to Mormons. ‘It was sick. It really was. It made me just furious,’ says Roth, who is leaning toward backing Romney. ‘If you didn’t know enough about McCain, you’d think he was the white knight coming in on his charger saving the world and that Mitt Romney was tantamount to the devil

Erick points out that Roth receives $500/month from the Romney campaign.

Similarly, Rose Kramer, another Romney staffer who describes herself as "a supporter," told a McClatchy reporter her story:

Rose Kramer was at her Dubuque, Iowa, home, waiting for the TV show ‘House’ to start at 8 p.m. Tuesday when a pollster called and started asking her about John McCain. After a few polite questions, the caller started saying unflattering things about Mitt Romney. Kramer, a Romney supporter, got so angry that she missed the opening of her show. ‘I was still ranting at my husband,’ she said.

Rose isn’t just a supporter. She is a staffer, making $1,000/month. She is also a co-chair of Romney’s Iowa Faith & Values Steering Committee.

Again let me make it clear that I do not believe Romney himself is behind any of this. I do, however, and have since it first broke, believe that the Mittophiles are. One of the reasons I don't support Romney is the despicable and ruthless behavior of his followers and this sort of thing would not surprise me one bit.

Update: Blogger in contact with Western Wats resigns from Romney campaign
November 21, 2007 – 2:52 pm

Justin Hart has notified me (JRochelle) that he has resigned from his position as a Vice Chair of the Romney campaign’s Faith and Values Steering Committee after I challenged himfor not disclosing that he was an official in the Romney campaign.

Justin had been, until today, the only person who Western Wats would speak with. This afternoon Liz Mair wrote about a discussion she had with Jeffery Welch, a senior Western Wats executive and Romney donor.

He appears to have resigned soon after contacting the Romney Iowa staffers who the Romney campaign has now admitted to misrepresenting to the press. More HERE.

More of interest HERE.

Mike Huckabee Supported Bill to Give Driver's Licenses to Illegal Aliens

OUCH, this is going to leave a mark.

During the 2001 regular session of the Arkansas Legislature, Mike Huckabee supported giving driver's licenses to illegal aliens.

Mike Huckabee's Human Services Liaison expressed the governor's position, supporting the measure to repeal the law denying the issuance of drivers licenses to illegal immigrants. In 2001, there was discussion of HB 2212 in the state assembly to repeal a 1997 Arkansas law prohibiting issuance of driver's licenses to illegal immigrants. Proponents said the bill was necessary because legal immigrants were getting harassed when they went to get drivers licenses. Huckabee's Human Services liaison defended the bill, saying the following:

"People shouldn't be harassed based on who they are or what they look like," said [Robert] Trevino, who also is Gov. Mike Huckabee's human services liaison. "We just don't want to be treated as second class. We don't have a problem with prohibiting illegal aliens from getting driver's licenses. We have a problem with hassling those who are here legitimately." (Michael Rowett, "Bill Aims To Help Immigrants Get Driver's Licenses," Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, 3/18/01)