Despite the teeth of Arizona’s illegal alien law being pulled out by activist judge Susan Bolton, protesters in motion will not be denied!  Today, about 50 people were arrested in Phoenix for confronting police officers at a rally opposing the weakened law.  I hope existing protocol allows the cops to ask about their legal status!  But, I digress… that’s already about 50 more people than have ever been arrested and held for misconduct at any Tea Party event nationwide in over a year.  Just sayin’.

Remember this gem from candidate Obama about how we need to “spread the wealth around” to help everybody?  Or this one about how NO family making under $250,000 will see their taxes go up in an Obama Nation?  Ha!

The real problem for Dems is in the second video:  NO tax increases on the protected class, but he’ll let the Bush tax cuts expire.  Here’s the catch:  millions of American families making under $250,000 got plenty of tax breaks and cuts under the Bush tax plan, which means by letting it sunset you’re automatically raising taxes on most middle class Americans!

The Dems are in a conundrum.  They’d love to rescind the whole thing, but politically that’s difficult in these times.  Keep some, dump other parts is also tricky given that they know the business class and the wealthy drive private sector job growth.  If the Republicans had any guts they’d ask the Dems to state their positions on the record before November, just to watch the Dems squirm and waffle like crazy all Fall!

60,000 barrels of oil a day gushing into the Gulf of Mexico.  Environmental Disaster.  The worst oil spill in the history of the world.  A disaster beyond epic proportions, which will plague the Gulf for years to come.  We’ve been hearing about this for months now, with no end in sight.  The Federal Government under the direction of Obama has even suspended all Domestic offshore drilling, so big is the disaster.  Well, if its such a big disaster, where has all the oil gone? Yes, that’s right.  The state-run media is now reporting that –  ghasp – nature has done most of the work in cleaning up the oil!  At least 40% of it evaporated, and the rest is being devoured by oceanic microbes, who feast on this stuff like candy.  The money quote from this Yahoo! news story:

Perhaps the most important cause of the oil’s disappearance, some researchers suspect, is that the oil has been devoured by microbes. The lesson from past spills is that the lion’s share of the cleanup work is done by nature in the form of oil-eating bacteria and fungi. The microbes break down the hydrocarbons in oil to use as fuel to grow and reproduce. A bit of oil in the water is like a feeding frenzy, causing microbial populations to grow exponentially.

So, nature feeds on oil.  This is hardly surprising, as unlike what environmentalists would like you to believe. Oil is a natural substance, and seepages from the ocean floor are common.  The lesson from this is that nature is resilient.  It is not as easy to destroy as we think.  Mother nature is doing more to fix this oil spill than any Government agency or moratorium on drilling could ever do, and we should be humbled by the thought that it is not so easy for us as human beings to do long-term damage to the Earth.

Tomorrow is the scheduled enforcement date for the infamous Arizona law regarding the potential inquiry into the legal status of people who’ve already been stopped by the police.  Since it mirrors existing federal law and actually is more lenient, the reason people oppose this law is either through insidious racial politicking or through media-driven ignorance.  If I get pulled over by the police in New Jersey I have to show them my license, vehicle registration and proof of insurance — three forms of ID and I’m a lily white boy!  Where are all the protests about Jersey’s law?  Easy:  driving is a privilege not a right, folks.

Even the MSM can’t hide the people’s support of the Arizona law around the nation.  In fact, just the other day musician Elton John came out against those boycotting Arizona as he played in Tucson Arena saying:

“We are all very pleased to be playing in Arizona.  I have read that some of the artists won’t come here.  They are (expletive) wits!  Let’s face it:  I still play in California, and as a gay man I have no legal rights whatsoever. So what’s the (expletive) with these people?”

Geez!  First Rush’s wedding, now this?  Good for him — a Brit who understands capitalism!  Also, there’s a pro-legal immigration group called “Americans for Legal Immigration” who are stressing the government simply make the exodus easier by setting up stations to process people getting out of the country.  They believe comprehensive enforcement will work just fine if implemented in an orderly manner.

Tomorrow’s the big day — protests are planned and since many are leftist-driven there may be trouble, though we truly hope not.

UPDATE:  Today a federal judge has blocked four important parts of the law until the government’s lawsuits run their course.  This should irk a lot of people around the country, including some of the tomorrow’s pro-law protesters.

The People’s Republic of Massachusetts is at it again.  This time, they are trying to reverse two century’s of precedent and change the electoral college system.  They, along with several other states, have passed legislation that would award their 12 electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote.  Massachusetts joins Illinois, New Jersey, Hawaii, Maryland, and Washington as states that have changed to this method of awarding the popular vote.

Mike and I discussed this topic once over lunch, and he had some interesting legal observations on the subject.  For one, who defines the certified popular vote?  There is no official popular vote total in the nation, as the Presidential election is made up of fifty separate state elections.  It also is rather stupid of Massachusetts, as it nullifies the will of the Massachusetts voter, while other states will have far more of a say in upcoming Presidential elections.  I could see a court challenge based on equal protection on this one (lawyers:  is there a case for that here?) based on the fact that Massachusetts voters are essentially having no say in their electors, leaving it to other states to decide who the electors will go to.

Or what about a court challenge if 2012 ends up looking like 2000?  What if a Republican wins the national popular vote (even though such a thing does not exist) but the Democrat would have one the electoral college if the old system had been retained?

In the end, I hope this does backfire.  Notice the states that have passed this law:  Massachusetts, Illinois, New Jersey, Hawaii, Maryland, and Washington are all Democrat-heavy states.  It will be fun to see them all go red in the next election, if the national popular vote goes to a Republican.  In that case, watch how quickly they switch it back.  It is yet another foolish move by Democrats that will be revoked as soon as it is inconvenient to their political fortunes.

Yesterday came news that the leftist site WikiLeaks produced over 90,000 pages of documents allegedly blowing the whistle on “war crimes” during the Afghan War through 2009, coincidentally making sure to keep the Obama Nation clean in all of this.

As many have aptly noted, the information in these leaked documents tells us nothing new:  we knew that some in Pakistan were playing both sides, that there have been civilian casualties (it is a war, right?), Iran’s involved somehow, etc.  However, these kinds of leaks expose names and situations which can threaten ongoing operations and soldiers in the field.  That’s why the leaker and his aids need to be rooted out, investigated, and thrown in jail.

However, WikiLeaks is a leftist group with an agenda beyond finding the truth.  They released a video a few months back allegedly showing a deliberate US bombing of civilians in Iraq.  The MSM jumped all over it since the story, “Collateral Murder,” and video fit their template of the evil US soldier. WikiLeaks was happy to oblige, but here’s the thing:  their transcripts and interpretations of the 40-minute video were wrong and misleading at the expense of our soldiers.  Here’s more proof that those reporters and civilians were in a legitimate combat zone.  Note, too, that the video was from 2007 — another swipe at the Bush Administration, leaving the Obama Nation unscathed.

That video and the latest transcripts are real, but their context and the motive behind their release has a blatantly transparent leftist agenda which will do more harm than good while at the same time distorting the truth of these events on purpose.

The Dem’s insatiable appetite to drive a political point home inadvertently may have gone too far.  In the wake of the BP Gulf Oil Spill, Democrats wanted to pound the demonization of BP by investigating further, looking into a potential link between BP and the 2009 release of Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, the man charged, tried and convicted of the 1988 Pan-Am Flight 103 bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, in exchange for a $1 billion oil exploration deal between Libya and BP.  Altogether, 270 people, including 189 Americans were killed in that terrorist attack.

Al-Megrahi was serving a life sentence in Scotland, but had terminal prostate cancer.  Scotland decided to released him to Libya last August.  At the time, the administration said that they objected to this move.

President Obama further indicated last week that Americans were “surprised, disappointed and angry” to hear of the release.  That was true, but it has come to light that the Obama Administration knew about the release beforehand and preferred the “compassionate release” of al-Megrahi to Libyan hands rather than a promise of al-Megrahi being put in a Libyan jail.

Maybe in the British health care system his diagnosis was definite doom, but the problem is that nearly a year later al-Megrahi is still alive and apparently doing well, free as a bird in Libya.  I agree with British Prime Minister David Cameron that al-Megrahi, the biggest mass-murderer in British history, should have remained rotting in a Scottish prison rather than released under the most favorable conditions (as we now know) based on American pressure.  This is all very disgusting.

I used to call myself a Republican, but haven’t for a number of years now.  The answer is simple:  they suck.  A friend aptly once described our two parties as the Stupid Party (Republicans) and the Evil Party (Democrats):  “stupid” because Republicans never miss an opportunity to jump on their own sword even in the face of success, and “evil” because to the Dems it’s all about the blind accumulation of power.  My advice has often been to divorce oneself from the parties, embrace a philosophy, then vote smartly.

Paul Ryan’s “Road Map” is likely not the answer to all our fiscal problems, but it is a bold start and a sharp contrast to what’s being offered in Washington to deal with the biggest impending financial calamity of our lifetimes:  the coming Entitlement Crisis, or the difference between what we’ve been promised and what government will be able to deliver.  The Road Map is an opportunity to move Independents proudly under a fiscally conservative banner, push the Republicans to the right again all while making tough national choices easier while that is still an option.

But, “ruling class” Republicans are not discussing it.  Obviously, the Republican leadership doesn’t understand the Tea Party movement, where it came from or where it’s headed, otherwise they’d be all over this idea — discussing it openly, the good, bad and ugly.  But, Ryan hears crickets, and the Republicans seem on the verge of making a critical political error by not offering a true contrast with Democrats.  Oh, they’ll likely win pretty big in the Fall, but to what end?  This is why Republicans continue to suck.  Whether or not the Road Map is any good, Ryan is at least talking seriously about bold and true reforms.

Of course, when Tom Harkin called the Obama Care monstrosity merely a “starter home” we all knew the push for the public option and ultimately the statist goal of a single-payer system would not be too far behind.  Well, here it is:  about 130 Democrats have put their support behind adding a public option to Obama Care as a way to cut the deficit (!) by $68 billion by 2020.  Do you know how spending more money covering more people cuts the deficit?  The CBO admits that the deficit cuts would come as a result of tax increases!  Shocking, I know.

Why all this concern about the deficit from Dems spending us into oblivion?  Easy.  It’s all about November 3, the day after the election.  Obama’s already set things into motion through his joke of a deficit commission and sounding like a deficit hawk in a speech yesterday (go to 2:12 and get ready to either laugh or puke).  Deficit cutting should be the main Dem talking point in the Fall behind “Republican tea-baggers are racist!”

So, the Dems will play the game that somehow Republicans will be in the way of making the tough choices on what to cut.  Obama and the Dems increase non-discretionary spending to ridiculously unsustainable heights, then will tear at Republicans for not wanting to play the deficit cutting game by being mean to poor people, seniors and our grandchildren.  Second verse, same as the first.  In their world, government expansion means cutting the deficit.  They really think we’re stupid.

Yesterday, the administration and the NAACP were in total damage-control mode as the Sherrod video exposed much more than just her racist comments taken out of context:  the NAACP released apologies and full tapes, while the administration was offering Sherrod her job back, and the MSM was predictably blaming the messenger — I even heard on CNN this morning (I was only flipping through to Fox) that Andrew Breitbart, who first released the edited tapes, should be investigated!  Um, no.  Breitbart could, however, reveal the shady source who only gave him the out-of-context snippet we saw on Monday!  Be careful what you wish for.

However, I did read a thoughtful piece on why the NAACP is so upset at the Tea Party.  Robert Weissburg writing for the American Thinker argues that the civil rights movement has produced the biggest, most all encompassing big government policies imaginable since World War II.  If there’s no more government sponsored race business, then the ever-expanding role and power of the government must wane and the current NAACP diminishes with it.  That’s where the anti-big government Tea Party comes in as such a threat to the status quo at the NAACP.  Interesting point.