Mark A. Kilmer (the weblog)

My wife wanted to watch the “MST3K” feed from foxnews.com, the one featuring Shep Smith, so we sat in bed and watched that before, during, and after Hillary’s speech. It was interesting, but man, Shep and friends can certainly complain about anything. It is good to see some cynicism at a staged event such as that one, and the one we’ll see next week, and it was probably the best way to watch her speech.

It was a positive speech, well delivered. She talked about “I” and “me” quite a bit and stated that she supporters a concept called “Barack Obama, the nominee of the Democratic Party.” She didn’t mention the human being.

According to the WashPost, her speech did not seal the deal with her supporters, but it ought to help her cause in the 2012 primary season.

No letter grade. It’s not that important.

It seems that they’re having a spat over at MSNBC. From Mark Finkelstein:

JOE SCARBOROUGH: I will let you know that “my party,” my party, loathes me, much more than your party, the Democratic party, loathes me.

DAVID SHUSTER: Well that’s a whole ‘nother issue, but the fact of the matter is –

SCARBOROUGH: No, it’s not another issue, because you said –

SHUSTER: The party you served with in Congress have repeatedly suggested, they have ridiculed –

SCARBOROUGH: What about your party? What’s your party? David Shuster, David: what’s your party?

SHUSTER: I have no party. I’m a complete independent.

SCARBOROUGH: Oh, you’re independent. Just like all –

SHUSTER: I’ll show you my voting card. I’ll show you how I’m registered later.

SCARBOROUGH: Oh, I feel so comforted by the fact that you’re an independent. I bet everyone at MSNBC has “independent” on their voting cards. “Oh, we’re down the middle now.” Go ahead, David. No, no, go ahead. You’re an independent David. Go ahead. Talk about my party. Go ahead.

SHUSTER: Are you done?

SCARBOROUGH: No, I’m not done, when the fact is that I’m about as down-the-middle as anybody on television on any network, and you come in with a cheap shot, calling up “your party.”

(A bit later, Scarborough jabbed Shuster over his tardiness.)

SCARBOROUGH: Do you never watch this show?

MIKA BRZEZINSKI: He’s on this show!

SCARBOROUGH: You must be asleep. Oh, that’s right. You usually sleep through the show.

BRZEZINSKI: Sto-o-p-p-p.

SCARBOROUGH: Because you didn’t show up three times in a row! Three times you slept through your alarm and didn’t come on this show.

SHUSTER [to fellow panelists]: That’s how the argument works.

I’m afraid Shuster won that round, but it will be up to Keefums to keep order at the leftist, little cable network.

Jay Hakes has a seven-point plan for cutting our reliance on foreign energy and, as he puts it, “enhancing American influence abroad.” In his 230-age A Declaration of Energy Independence, Bill Clinton’s administrator of the Energy Information Administration at the Department of Energy details the history and makes his case.

The background alone is fascinating. He starts in the late 1940s, when the United States became a net exporter of Petroleum for the first time in our history and looks at what government and industry planners were thinking at the time. For instance, in 1959, President Dwight Eisenhower put a quota on imports of foreign oil, setting it at 12.2% of domestic production. These, Hakes teaches, “would prove far from temporary and would have significant impacts on later vulnerability to foreign pressure.”

We also learn that the oil industry ought to stop whining about increases in the gas tax, which almost invariably serve a noble purpose, but for all his knowledge, Mr. Hakes worked for Clinton.

It’s fascinating as he takes us through the Nixon and Ford Administrations as our modern energy policy was in its infancy. He makes the case for how President Carter solved our last energy crisis. His was a “comprehensive energy policy,” one which required “some sacrifice.” Remember: “He noted, for example, that keeping thermostats at 65 degrees during the day and 55 degrees at night could save half the natural gas shortage brought on by that winter’s fridge temperatures.” (And check the air pressure in your tires.)

The narrative: President Reagan, of course, undid the good which Carter had begun, including a drive toward synthetic fuels. Reagan, you see, tried to abolish the Department of Energy and, failing that, steered its spending away from synthetic fuels and conservation to the nuclear weapons we needed to end the greatest threat to the Western world, the Soviet Union. Reagan even took Carter’s solar panels off the White House roof!

Read On…

(more…)

I did not watch Michelle Obama’s speech last night, with the wife and I instead watching reruns of the Match Game, but I did catch a few seconds of the FNC review. Everyone there – Brit Hume, Chris Wallace, et al. – thought she gave a nice speech but did not convince anyone that her husband was anything other than what they had previously thought he was.

Teddy Kennedy’s allegedly unscheduled speech got better reviews, and the Washington Post put it gently:

Monday’s opening events highlighted the degree to which Obama’s advisers know they have work to do this week, from binding together a Democratic family still divided after a hard-fought nomination battle between Obama and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton to providing reassurance that the man they will nominate shares the values of Middle America and has the toughness and judgment to lead the country.

Monday night’s proceedings didn’t do it, evidently.

It is interesting to note that Jimmy Carter evidently did not speak. The old guy was shown only on vid, and I don’t know if he were even there.

Unity.

Courage.

Hopechangehope.

The aging popstress evidently compared John McCain to Robert Mugabe and to Adolph Hitler when kicking off her geriatric set concert tour.

McCain’s peeps complained that Obama’s “fellow worldwide celebrities refuse to consider any smear or attack off limits.”

She compared Obama to Al Gore, John Lennon, and Gandhi.

So went the chance when Fox News reporter Griff Jenkins tried to talk to the protesting mob at Barry’s Democratic National Convention in Denver. The protestors wanted to stop the war, smoke some drugs, and force their attentions upon the FOW News Channel.

This went live over their air, but… it contains unruly behavior and some graphic language.

[The vid is, of course, from the irreplaceable Johnny Dollar.]

Check it out.

The nation’s political media seems not to be thrilled with Barack Obama’s selection of Joe Biden as his running mate, but they are not angry, either. Joe Biden brings foreign policy heft to the Obama ticket. Joe Biden is a seasoned Washington politician, with a penchant for talk. He’s stated that south east Asians living in Delaware can be found in the local Dunkin’ Donuts. He’s called Delaware a “slave state.” He’s referred to Obama as a “clean and articulate” black guy.

And on and on and on.

Is the media going to cover this?

NPR offers us Joe Biden: From Stutter To Power. That’s nice enough. The New York Times gushes over A Senate Stalwart Who Bounced Back.

My favorite is Neil Kinnock welcomes Joe Biden nomination. (Kinnock is the British politician whom Biden plagiarized in 1988.)

From the SLATE online teen magazine, comes this bit from Jacob Weisberg: IF OBAMA LOSES. The theory is that Bush was so obviously terrible and everyone knows it, so any vote for a Republican is really a vote against Barack Obama because you’re a racist bastard.

It seems to me that Weisberg is simply spitting such dross to get a reaction, but then again, some people could be so out-of-touch, so warped and addled, that they could actually believe this. It would be a frightening place to be, mentally, but the world does of its share of tragic nuts. And it is tragic.

For Sunday, August 24, 2008

FOX News Sunday (FNS): Host Chris Wallace has some Dems: Governors Tim Kaine of Virginia of Virginia and Bill Ritter of Colorado. Then he’ll have Obama campaign spokesman Robert Gibbs. No sign of Ned.

This Week (ABC): Host George Stephanopoulos talks to David Axelrod, whom we all know, and Rudy Giuliani, whom we remember. No sign of Ned.

Meet the Press (NBC): Moderator Tom Brokaw talks to Caroline Kennedy, who co-chaired Barry’s veep search committee, and… Nancy. No sign of Ned.

Face the Nation (CBS): Host Bob Schieffer talks to Dem Governors Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas and Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania. He’ll also talk to the junior Jesse Jackson, Congressman from Illinois. No sign of Ned.

Late Edition (CNN): Host Wolf Blitzer talks to a bunch of Dems, including: Junior Casey; the woman who’ll pick McCain’s Senate replacement, Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano; James Clyburn; and… guess who: Terence McAuliffe. No sign of Ned.

= = = = = = = =

Okay, Joe Biden is Obama’s veep selection. There was a time, very recently, when it seemed the two most common guests on these shows were John McCain and Joe Biden. This had forever altered Sunday mornings for me.

Joe Biden. You know, I think it a shame that it’s not going to be Ned. The only person I’d sooner have seen Barry Obama selecting than Joe Biden is Ned. Why doesn’t Ned have a speaking role at next week’s Democratic National Convention? Ned should keynote! Barry should have selected Ned! Ned should be at the top of the ticket! The slogan could have been: “Gee, gang! C’mon guys! Let’s elect Ned! YEAAARRRRGH!”

Alas, it’s Obama/Joe Biden. We can dream of…

This next week is going to be a blast, folks.