Via Memeorandum, I read TV Newser’s report that President Obama spent two and a half hours giving an off-the-record briefing to a small coterie of left-wing media luminaries including Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow of MSNBC (which, unlike Fox News, actually is a news organization), Maureen Dowd, best known for overuse of sexy double-entendres [...]
Today I woke up in my own bed again after ten nights in various hotel beds, couches and air mattresses on the floor. My back will take a few days to recover, both from that and from far too many hours in the car. I’d give just about anything to spend the morning at home, [...]
In the information age, having too few computers with online connections is an even greater hardship than having too few bathrooms. Here, belatedly, is the link to my column at NMI this week. It’s about Obama and the Olympics (and old story by now) and my take on it may surprise you.
There were so many blog [...]
Update: NMI published this column today, September 27, 2009. Original post (written September 21) below:
You’re all racists — that was to have been the title of my New Mexico Independent column today. But about an hour after I submitted it, I received an e-mail from my new editor (my previous editor, David Alire Garcia, [...]
I’ve been working on the speech I’m giving at the New Mexico Turn Around conference in Albuquerque tomorrow, so I didn’t have time to write a post today.
I did want to take time to link to Nice Deb’s excellent post debunking the leftist charges of racism again anyone who has the temerity to criticize any [...]
My NMI column this week. I have more to say on the topic — and related topics — but I was in Albuquerque with the kids all day and am dead exhausted, so will wait until they’re asleep to write it. Unless I fall into an exhausted sleep the minute they’re in bed, in which [...]
Again and again on the campaign trail, he repeated the same mantra. The words might vary ever so slightly, but the message was the same:
Let me say this again: no family earning less than $250,000 will see any form of tax increase. Period.
Every time Old Man McCain would say that Obama was going to raise [...]
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Posted 06 August 2009
† Brigette Russell
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Economy § Politics
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Also tagged: Big Brother, George H. W. Bush, government health care, health insurance, Linda Douglass, middle class, no new taxes, read my lips, single payer option, tax increase, taxes, Timother Geithner, White House blog
That was my title for my NM Independent column that runs today (or ran yesterday, since I’m late posting the link and most of you won’t read this until Wednesday morning) but my editor changed it. There are already 16 comments, but I haven’t read them yet as I just arrived at my friend’s house [...]
I promised a Jon & Kate post today, but I had to write my NMI column, so I didn’t get around to finishing it. The rest of the day was taken up with kids, kids, kids, all the time kids. I’m ready to collapse. Jon & Kate will have to wait.
Other random [...]
William Saletin at Slate is a lone voice crying out in the wilderness in support of Mark Sanford. Saletin quotes the meae culpae of Bill Clinton, John Edwards and John Ensign, each of whom followed “the first rule of adultery redemption: minimize the affair” by blaming errors in judgment and speaking of his wife [...]
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Posted 26 June 2009
† Brigette Russell
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Politics
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Also tagged: adultery, affair, Bill Clinton, Jenny Sanford, John Edwards, John Ensign, Maria Belen Chapur, Mark Sanford, midlife crisis, Monica Lewinsky, romance, sex, William Saletin
A few weeks ago, I predicted that President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee would definitely be a solid liberal, and would probably be a female Hispanic.
I also promised that I would not pillory the nominee. And I won’t. Because there is no point. Judge Sotomayor will be confirmed. If some [...]
We don’t know who she or he is yet, but I’m guessing the list of qualifications, in order of importance, goes something like this:
1) Reliable leftist. True believer in abortion rights, gay marriage rights, activist government intervention to right the various wrongs people suffer, etc. Not some cypher who’s going to reveal his [...]
Days, that is, of the momentous and historic Obama Presidency’s first term. 2,800 if he’s a two-termer, of course, but I’m trying to be optimistic. Tomorrow (Wed., April 29) is the actual 100 day marker, but my New Mexico Independent column comes out on Tuesdays, so I thought I’d take the liberty of [...]
A few weeks ago when Georgetown University invited President Obama to give the commencement address, I meant to write about it. Then, when the President asked that the crucifix and IHS logo behind the podium be covered, I meant to write about that, too.
Now Notre Dame University has also invited the President to give [...]
The tea parties, or “teabagging parties” as sophomoric leftists like to call them with tongue (or whatever) firmly in cheek, have generated quite a bit of hot air over the past few days.
It didn’t get much hotter than Janeane Garofalo, comedienne, political pundit and, apparently, eminent neuroscientist, on Countdown:
You know, there is nothing [...]
I’m from a family of Democrats, was raised to be a Democrat, went to college and had Democrat professors echo in more erudite words the same things my parents and grandmother had always said about politics. But always, there was cognitive dissonance. I would read things, hear things, that just didn’t add up in the [...]
My column in the New Mexico Independent today discusses the relationship between the government-financed building of “affordable housing” and the fiscal belt-tightening that has led the top brass of the Santa Fe Fire Department in its entirety to take early retirement.
Our local city government cutting costs in a destructive way with its right hand, while [...]
While I was over at Newsbusters reading a story about how CNN’s Jack Cafferty says the Catholic Church must drag itself out of the 13th century, and another about professor Robert McElvaine blogging at the Washington Post to the effect that Pope Benedict XVI ought to be impeached, I saw this totally unrelated little gem:
Joy [...]
President Obama being too tired to entertain British P.M. Gordon Brown was a hot topic around the blogosphere last week, but because I had something in common with Mr. Obama, I didn’t post about it. You see, I was too tired.
My children are 7, 5, 3 and 8 months and, being a deranged lunatic [...]
I don’t know for whom to feel sorrier: Bobby Jindal or me. Governor Jindal is considered one of the rising stars of the Republican Party, and all us evil rethugs had high hopes for his response to President Obama’s address before Congress. But alas, the American Cicero is a hard act to [...]
The historic election of Barack Obama was said to signal Hope and Change. And Unity. Let’s not forget Unity. Because Mr. Obama was going to put an end to politics as usual. We were all going to work together for the common good of the country. We weren’t going to [...]
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Posted 12 February 2009
† Brigette Russell
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Economy § Humor § Politics § Uncategorized
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Also tagged: After Virtue, Alasdair MacIntyre, Field Negro, Harry Reid, Iowahawk, John McCain, Michelle Obama, Nancy Pelosi, stimulus, Tom Daschle, unity
Iowahawk is one funny guy. His latest post, “It Takes a Proverb to Run a Village,” was inspired by the rather fatuous flap over President Obama’s Egg of Power statue. See here, here, here and here for said flap. Personally, I think it’s kind of a neat looking little doodad, and don’t [...]
I never mentioned Caroline Kennedy (Princess Caroline, as right-wing bloggers like to call her) during all the “Will she or won’t she?” hoopla, in part because I was busy, and in part because I didn’t really care. Nepotism is a fact of life, folks. Is and always has been. Here in New [...]
I’m a bit late commenting on this, but if you want your news fresh, pick a blogger with fewer small children.
Politico got its feathers all ruffled over this:
President Barack Obama made a surprise visit to the White House press corps Thursday night, but got agitated when he was faced with a substantive question.
Asked [...]
Don’t be shocked, but I’m writing today to defend Barack Obama. After all, the new President deserves a honeymoon, even from conservative bloggers, right? Since I can’t in good conscience defend the appalling Geithner appointment or the dubious Clinton one, I’m afraid my defense has to be on more frivolous issues, but still, [...]
On this most historic of historic days, I was going to write about something other than the landmark inauguration of the first black President of the U.S., because that’s what everyone else is doing, and I’ve been too busy being on vacation – and too internet-deprived – to keep up with all the buzz. [...]
In New Mexico, we have to drive everywhere. We live miles from anyplace, but now we’re staying at my mother-in-law’s place on Sunset Boulevard in Pacific Palisades, and we can walk everywhere: grocery store, drugstore, bookstore, restaurants, library, park, church, anywhere we want to go. Because we walk, I only buy the groceries we need for the day [...]
Everybody’s going to have to give. Everybody’s going to have to have some skin in the game.
So says President-elect Obama in his interview with George Stephanopoulos. Fair enough, says I. Because I’ve had my skin in the game for decades. My husband and I have written a lot of five-figure checks to the IRS over [...]
I can’t decide who’s dumber: the genius who came up with the idea of giving the car companies $40 billion when the Senate already voted not to give them $17 billion, or the governor of Illinois.
Watching Rod Blagojevich act like everything’s fine, go on about his business governing the state, and refuse [...]
A special election. A senate race run-off. Two dreary old white guys running. Yawn. I’ve got better things to do.
Apparently this was the attitude of a lot of young voters who flocked to the polls to elect Barack Obama president. True, McCain did win in Georgia, but not by anywhere [...]
Now I’ve seen it all. The New York Times (you know, that paper we right-wing morons are too stupid, closed-minded and bigoted to read) this morning featured an article by Jim Rutenberg entitled “Harsh Words About Obama? Never Mind Now.” His complaint? Those of us on the right who criticized candidate Obama [...]
In your acceptance speech last night, Mr. Obama, you said, addressing those of us who did not vote for you, “I will be your president, too.” I was glad to hear you say it, as I had just been thinking to myself, I did not vote for you, but I congratulate you, wish you [...]
Obamanos, for those of you outside the Land of Enchantment, has been the battle cry of New Mexico’s Obamanistas. It’s clever, I’ll grant them that. It’s clever; it’s slick; it’s hip — just like Obama himself.
As passionately as I wanted John McCain to win the presidency, I’m feeling remarkably tranquil in the wake [...]
As of 8:27 p.m. Mountain Time, CNN.com has Obama and McCain neck and neck in the popular vote count: roughly 28.7 million (50%) for Obama and 27.6 million (49%) for McCain. The electoral count, however, isn’t close at all: 207 for Obama, 135 for McCain.
I well recall the fury of the left [...]
Once upon a time there was a lovely young co-ed called Goldilocks. She almost never read the newspaper because she couldn’t even get all the reading for her classes done, so when was she supposed to read the paper? She never watched TV news because what kind of loser watched the news when [...]
and check out my guest blog on Swing State of Mind, the campaign blog of the Santa Fe Reporter. For my out-of-town friends, SFR is about as left-leaning as a newspaper can be, but in the interest of diversity, they asked me to be their token representative of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy in their [...]
Why, oh why, can’t John McCain explain the economic facts of life in a way Joe the Voter can understand?
A woman with whom I’ve been on an e-mail list for years, a woman who describes herself as somewhere between Democrat and Republican, who has been non-political all the 8 years I’ve known her, [...]
Dave Maass of the Santa Fe Reporter was kind enough to e-mail me a link to his Swing State of Mind post a few days ago, since he knows I can get preoccupied with domestic disturbances (e.g., a 7-year-old and a 5-year-old in danger of killing each other) and forget to check the political blogs [...]
Thanks to all who have checked the site looking in vain for new posts. This is the longest I’ve gone without posting since beginning. Multi-tasking is something I’m usually good at, but this week, not so much. Portia is sleeping through the night, God bless her, but I’m still unaccountably tired. It’s been a difficult [...]
All the talking heads on TV and online have analyzed the debate in all its myriad aspects by now, so what of earth-shttering importance can be added by a tired materfamilias who had to miss bits of the debate here and there because she wasn’t watching it through the DVR because the only way to [...]
I’ve been dying to blog for days, but family matters have prevented it. As it is I’m supposed to be out the door with all my kids in half an hour, and I’m probably not going to make it — at least not with everybody’s hair fixed.
I try to keep a balance on this [...]
Is it just me, or does it seem like Bill Clinton is the only one having a really good time at the Democratic National Convention? He was cheerful as all get-out before Hillary’s speech, leaning in close to the good-looking redhead sitting next to him, chatting her up and giving her both barrels [...]
We’ve driven past the Glorieta, NM, battlefield memorial scores (if not hundreds) of times, but today we finally stopped. It’s a makeshift memorial, on private property and maintained by the owner, who has been kind enough to put in nice, flat trails and even to make little makeshift concrete seats and benches under some [...]
“They’re going to try to make you afraid of me,” says Barack Obama. “He’s young and inexperienced and he’s got a funny name. And did I mention he’s black?”
Why is it that when someone on the left disapproves of something, or disagrees with something, it’s out of principle, while those of us on the right [...]
The Anchoress has found a wonderful quote from G. K. Chesterton that seems to describe the two major party candidates for president in a nutshell:
“There are two kinds of peacemakers in the modern world; and they are both, though in various ways, a nuisance. The first peacemaker is the man who goes about saying [...]
For the first time in my life, my vote for president may actually matter. Until two years ago, I lived in California, as true a blue state as can be. But now I’m a New Mexican, and my state appears as purple on all those red-state-blue-state maps. New Mexico’s electoral votes went [...]
Pictures like this one, and others of Sen. Obama sporting turbans or crescents, circulate in cyberspace along with e-mails warning us that Obama is really a Muslim. As a conservative, as a Christian, and as a Republican, I am deeply embarrassed by this sort of thing, and wish fervently that it would stop.
I oppose [...]
They kept “raising the bar” so that poor Barack just couldn’t catch a break. In a speech last month, Mrs. Obama complained bitterly that “they” (whoever “they” are – maybe the media that was rooting so hard for Mr. Obama that every time Sen. Clinton won another primary, they demanded to know why she [...]