Nightly Ramble: The Burger Edition

Welcome, one and all to the most intense nightly read anywhere on the ‘sphere… The BitsBlog Nigtly Ramble

• Children: This observation is so obviously true, that it’s interesting it still has to be made. I guess it’s the same function, though, that I spoke of to him a while ago, when I spoke of teaching and re-teaching the concepts of freedom.  I hesitate to try to add anything to the line, but of course I will, if only to call attention to it.Note the use of the phrase “seemingly trivially”. Moving mountains with the turn of a phrase, that boy. It’s not trivial, of course. It is, rather from the perspective of the child, foundational. Children build their lives, their personality, on what are to us, small things.
• Iran: Yes, the news coming out of Iran is increasingly worrisome. The suggestions are there, that the government there is gearing up for a serious crackdown. Michael Ledeen at Pajamas Media comments:
  

  …the most powerful leaders in Iran are facing a life or death showdown. Both Khamenei and Mousavi-the two opposed icons of the moment, at least-know that they will either win or die. After nightfall, millions of revolutionaries chant from their rooftops “Allah is Great” and they are chants of defiance hurled at the Islamic Republic. I cannot imagine a soft landing.

  Nor, frankly, can I.

  The issue for the future of world politics though, however the part Ledeen speaks to falls out, becomes one of our response, or more correctly, our lack of one. I’ve written to this point, in an article scheduled for sometime this weekend, also at Pajamas Media :

  Mr. Obama could and should have spoken up at once, at the very least, telling Iran’s current leadership that how it treats its opposition will determine its place in the world going forward. But no…. that calls for a real leader. What we have instead is Obama, who now withholds comment, plays it safe, hoping apparently to win the day with his winning smile and a few shovelfuls of manure. But win…. what, exactly?

  Obama’s cooperative silence might get a brief bit of peace, perhaps, or at least the absence of war… (and no, they’re not the same thing)… but the freedom that Reagan and JFK placed so high a value on? Apparently not.

  This is kind of betrayal of freedom that those around the world will remember. It is that betrayal that those folks will remember, regardless of how this particular upset in Iran falls out, but particularly if the current regime remains in place.  At this point, and barring a lot of Iranian blood being shed, I don’t see it being changed. even with a lot of Iranian blood being shed, without the overt support of the west, I don’t see regime change happening.  Those seeking that regime change from within Iran will surely be jailed, and most will die quietly. Mousavi particularly, being now the defacto leader of the opposition,  not survive if the mullahs prevail. We’ve seen this far too often to think it’s going to go down any other way, now.

  Don’t misunderstand…  I have no doubt in my mind that Iran, eventually, will get their government back under the control of the people. Revolution will happen, change will come, and there will be freedom in Iran. There’s nothing that will stop that now. It’s simply a matter of time. Perhaps, decades. That ball was started rolling by George W. Bush with the first domino being Iraq. Obama’s choice to remain near silent in all of this will cost a lot of Iranian lives on the way to that freedom, however.  Thus the question for us as a nation, is how we will be remembered by the Iranian people and indeed the rest of the world, once that shift to freedom takes place. As it stands now, I can’t see it being the world’s perception of us not supporting freedom in this case, being a good one. They’ll remember an entire generation of Iranian freedom fighters getting washed away by these thugs… while, under what passes for leadership by Obama,  we stood by and refused to help.

• More Iran:  I mentioned Micheal Totten yesterday, and his non-stop Iranathon. God bless the man for slugging away at this stuff.  I also mentioned him being on Moran’s show last night, and tossed the link, if you’ll recall. Now, I’ll toss a link for James Joyner’s show, since Totten was there last night. And here you are.
•  Cue Richard Nixon: The White House is refusing to answer questions about the AmeriCorps IG firing, says Byron York. Here’s the thing, though…  it’s not just Walpin… it’s now three IG firings that are being questioned, says Dan Riehl.  I won’t say this is going to be Obama’s undoing, because Democrats simply are not held to the same ethical standards Republicans are.  But I will say that had John McCain done anything of the sort, the Democrats would have the tar pots all warmed up already.
• Speaking of ethics  investigations: The issues surrounding Chris Dodd are still out there and growing.
• And more: Not that the White House or Dodd are the only ethics challenged Democrats.
• A little late, guys…  Seems Obama is becoming increasingly unpopular as people get the idea that his policies have some ramifications…. Oh.. and Killing that fly the other day seems a major irritant to the PETA folks.  Heh. When a leftist loses PETA as a support group….
• Pay no attention to that man behind the curtin:  ABC is now claiming that the reason it won’t take paid ads talking back at PresBO about government healthcare is that they don’t take advocacy ads. Of course we’re not supposed to notice that the whole show they’re planning over there is an advocacy ad, right?  I figure they’re so close to the thing, they don’t think it corrupt. Look for example at the rather troubling voting patterns at ABC news, and you’ll see what I mean.As George Carlin once observed… “Have you ever noticed your own farts don’t smell so bad?” Seems to me something of the sort is in operation here with ABC. More properly, perhaps, is something I said to this point a few years ago at Q&O…””When standards go by the way, people tend to fall to their own devices, and beliefs.”
  “Now, by their own polling, the US press is a group of people who are overwhelingly leftist to the tune of 85-90%. Which way will things fall among such a group, when those journalistic standards get bypassed? Which way is objectivity more likely to fail?” And surely, objectivity isn’t happening at ABC.
• ABANDON SHIP!!!!   Even Tom Daschle, one of the Obama inner circle on healthcare  from the off, is now telling him to ditch this turkey.  
• (Sigh)  All I can say about this story is the guy went out doing what he loved doing.
• Message to Stephen Collins:  Hey, Moron… here’s how: Arthur Shawcross.  Not that I think you’ve got the spine to understand that, either.