Nightly Ramble: The ‘Corner Store’ Edition

Welcome, one and all to the most intense nightly read anywhere on the ‘sphere; Bitsblog’s Nightly Ramble

It’s the Corner Store edition. Just a few quick items. In, and out.

• Obama to be upstatged: As you likely already know, Barack Obama will adress Congress for the first time as Presidient, Tuesday night.  The Republicans already have the guy upstaged… Bobby Jindal will deliver the response. Gotta hand it to them, this is simply a brilliant move.  Even moreso, Jindal turned down the ‘stimulus’ money on… wait for it…  on the sheer principle of the thing.  You can bet that will set the tone for Jindal’s response to Obama. As I’ve told you before, people… if this really is the way the Republicans are going, you can expect a large surge in support for Republicans going forward…. and to the exact degree they resist this monster. Surber is asking what’s the excuse when this attempt fails just like the last two times?   I suspect the Republicans are starting to see that not as a chance but an eventuality… and the Democrats are going to be owning this bag of dung they’ve tried to sell to us… but ONLY IF Republican leaders do in fact resist… and loudly…. the way the rank and file is.
• Wall Street vs White House: Jeff Carter suggests at Pajamas Media, today, that the Obama vs Santelli controversy is grounded in the natural animosity between the markets and D.C.  Well, natural since the Democrats got the White House, anyway.  Obama had best watch himself, though; Santelli has far more support than Obama does, if I read the signs aright.
• The Solution: If Obama is looking for ‘shovel ready’ projects, asks Mickey Kaus, why not do the border fence?
• Ya load 16 kids.. what do you get?  Lots of money for one thing,  and a spotlight, for another.  At some point, this circus has to stop.  Given the amount of money being pushed her way at this point, you can imagine I think why Nadya Suleman’s insisting the currently listed sperm donor isn’t the father.  If the biological father steps up for support of the kids, her (Mauch larger) source of funds… IE: people’s charity, dries up… as does the spot light that’s been tranied on her. And is it just me, or do you guys get a chuckle when people nickname this rather troubled woman after a James Bond Flick? And yes, I mean it when I say troubled.  Look, who, after having many kids already, steps up for eight more, doesn’t have serious mental issues?
• It is what it is: I see Jim Bunning is catching hell for speaking the plain truth; Justice Ginsburg will be gone within a year. The fact is that the statistics say she’s got less than a 25% chance of coming through the cancer she reportedly has.  As I told James Joyner this morning: Call it what you will, but you’re not going to convince me that Bunning is wishing evil on the woman, for a couple reasons; First… and I’m sorry about this…  Evil’s already visited her, apparently, and anything further would be a duplication of effort at least. Secondly, and from a national perspective of greater import, is the idea that as bad as she’s been from a constitutional standpoint, any replacement for her will be even worse, given the current administation, and the current Senate. I can hardly imagine Bunning wishing for that. And look, before you start up,  there’s a major difference between defending Bunning and suggesting that the TP reax is overblown. After so many years of alternating liberal manufactured angst and liberal manufactured outrage, this certainly takes on the apparence of the latter at least.
• Type casting: As I remarked to Bruce the other day, one can fully understand Obama sending Hillary Clinton on a mission to China, begging the Chinese to buy up the debt he’s just incurred.  If nothing else, the Clintons are expert at obtaining funding by whatever means… and much of that fundraising involved the Chinese then, too.
• SITYS: So, the race huxter Al Sharpton is trying to use the power of government to silence his critics? Gee, who’d have ever thought he’d do that?  I mean, ignore, for the moment we’ve been warning of this for years.
• Hollywood pats itself on the back, few notice: My wife who watched the Oscars last night, noted that they didn’t hit viewers with a lot of ads. The reason for that of course is they couldn’t sell the spot loads they originally set up. The ratings have been dropping the last several years running. This year was no different; the ratings for last night’s Oscars show an all-time low, in terms of share.  In fact, ratings this year were 20% off even last years abysmal ratings.  They have no clue WHY, of course. They still are disconnected from Joe and Jane Sixpack. A start would be getting prices to a point where Americans can actually afford to go to the movies. Past that, content that is more in tune with their beleifs as oposed to movies and TV being used as a bully pulpit for Hollywood’s narrow views would be a help. Until they figure all that  out, they’re not going to turn this around.,and frankly, it’s just as well that they won’t, under those conditions.
• Why: I told Jen Rubin I was a fan, several weeks back. This column is an example of why.
• Cruel Joke:  Given Joe Biden’s record, this is the unkindest cut of all.