This was exactly how I've felt for so long

From Bush's Eulogy:

We lost Ronald Reagan only days ago but we have missed him for a long time.

Bush's Tribute to Reagan
Thatcher's Tribute to Reagan

It's just illustrative...

The Clintons manage to fall asleep during Reagan's funeral. Seriously... couldn't they have managed not to do that?
(I watched this. This is not out of context - they were falling asleep.)

I know it was different for me, and for most of those listening - who believe in the things being said there.

but... but... pleeeaaasseee?

McCain Rejects Kerry's VP Overture:

Seriously, what does it say that Kerry, knowing McCain's public resistance to being Kerry's Veep nominee, still tries to send signals that he wants McCain to be his second?

Is there NO ONE in the whole Democrat party that would be adequate? No one charismatic enough, 'moderate' enough, or ... I don't know... young enough that they could maybe avoid trying to beg the party in power for a handout?

Of course, the response is that "No, no, McCain would show how Kerry can 'reach out' to the other side."

Of course, Kerry doesn't voice that 'other side', he doesn't have policies that are conservative, and he hasn't gone and offered to implement any conservative policies that McCain might have.

And then, of course, there is the fact that this supposed outpouring of 'reaching out' doesn't appeal to McCain himself, one of the most liberal Republican senators, enough to persuade him away.

heheh...

but don't forget.. Kerry's winning - it shouldn't even matter who his running mate is. I mean... the LA Times said he's winning big right now - I think he should pick Howard Dean, just to show us all who's boss!

Reuters has no credibility as a news organization

Reuters AlertNet - U.S. ripe for Reagan nostalgia after grim year: This is amazing, but Reuters manages here to make it look as though America at large is so desperate to be sedated with happy happy joy joy nostalgia that they will entirely ignore all of reality and all of the past.

How do you lessen a man who was one of the most prominent and successful figures of the 20th century, if not the most? Try an opening paragraph like this on for size:

The death of perennially optimistic actor-turned-president Ronald Reagan offered distraction to a nation exhausted by months of grim news from Iraq and ripe for an outpouring of nostalgia, experts said on Thursday.

Aww, isn't that nice, Reagan is, well, in a nutshell, a distraction. America was ripe for nostalgia, just like we were ripe to be taken over, 1984 style, by George W. Bush's cronies, after 9/11, right? Oh, yeah, now you're gettin' it.

Look at how Reuters respects American sentiment:

Americans embraced the switch on television news to blanket, patriotic coverage of the state funeral of a man credited with ending the Cold War. And Reagan's funeral has drawn thousands of Americans to the streets in California and Washington to pay respects to the man who battled Alzheimer's disease for a decade.

"A lot of people, when they remember the Reagan administration through the colored glasses of today's political situation, look back on it quite fondly," Thompson added.

blanket, patriotic coverage - wiping out all reference to the real events of the day for a person who some say might have been responsible for ending the cold war. Well, amidst all that patriotic (remember: patriotic=people who are cowed by the government, if you aren't one of the elite like Tim Robbins) coverage, we would be remiss if we did not point out that really they're just seeing through the 'colored glasses' of today: it's just so incredibly bad today in politics (read: George W. Bush should go!!) that, to the great unwashed, the 80's has to look like a sandbox of delight by comparison.

I'm dry-heaving now. I've already retched my lunch and dinner and this morning's breakfast with this pap. The article just goes on and on and on - not one single quote from all of those Americans inebriated with the drug of patriotism.

But Mark Egan sure was good enough to mention that one guy "is among those tired of the week long Reagan coverage on cable television."

But, one guy, tell us what you really feel. 'Cause if you do, Reuters would really, really love to publish it as if it were news.

One Guy says: "All of us are having public Alzheimer's about the types of things he did in office," isn't that sweet?? Aww... I'm wiping a tear from my eyes right now...

Reuters is not a news organization.

Jacques Chirac wants to rape America

and nobody in 'mainstream' media feels inclined to tell you about it.

This is so subtle, and may be entirely lost on the public at large, but, basically, Chirac wants another anti-American prosperity initiative to replace Kyoto.

G8 leaders to discuss a fresh campaign in lagging anti-poverty war

embedded deep in the story is this:

"Another approach to raising funds to aid poor countries would be taxing international capital flows, advocated by Presidents Jacques Chirac of France and Luiz Inacio Lula de Silva of Brazil.

But that idea is fiercely opposed by the United States, which favors private sector initiatives and measures to facilitate the transfer of funds earned by immigrant workers to their home countries."

"Taxing international capital flows" Jeez....

This could be a long and drawn out analysis, but I'll just stick to the basics here.

• Who has all the discretionary funds to go spending on projects like fighting poverty? Or, said in the euphemistic terms of the French, who is the source and greatest share of 'international capital'? *bing!* - - America.
• To whom will the money go when it is redistributed to fight poverty - freedom-loving, industrialized, wealthy nations, or to totalitarian, corrupt dictatorships that perpetuate poverty among their nation's people? *bing!* - - The Dictators - - oooh ahhh...
• Will we be able to require that nations 'clean up their act' in order to receive welfare from America - or will we be accused of starving children in the poorest of nations just because their leaders don't agree with Western racist philosophy? *bing!*
• What helps other nations who don't want to compete with America but want all of its benefits (read: FRANCE) - continuing to strip American profits and give it to the black hole called poverty, or letting America keep its profits by actually requiring that government leaders indroduce freedom, which is the only way to minimize poverty? Uh, yeah.

So in the end, it will be in France's benefit to help sustain global poverty, because an international tax will strip America of its resources, (but not France or the rest of old Europe, since it is in such financial decline), and will artificially increase the competitiveness of the socialized nations that get to run the whole glorious program.

Don't believe me? Try Kyoto, which excluded every polluting nation, but would have taxed us blind, or try the Oil-for-Food scam, which gave billions and billions to European contractors for propping up America's enemy while those same nations fought to prevent us from deposing Iraq's leader. But those didn't work, so we need the International Anti-poverty War!

Bend over U.S. of A - here it comes!

Another example of why it is you should ignore that kind, considerate, inner voice

Fawning Critics Don't Say Book Was Fraud:

"In the fall of 2000, professor Michael Bellesiles of Emory University published his book Arming America, which purported to establish that the core historical argument behind the Second Amendment was a fraud. "

...

Bellesiles turns out to have quoted sources out of context, to have falsely reported data, and to have claimed to have used documents that have not existed since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. One historian familiar with Bellesiles’ work called it a case of "bona fide academic fraud." Emory University is investigating.

You know that little voice inside your head that reacts when you see really silly-looking bad news that seems to debunk your naturally conservative beliefs? The voice goes like this:

I want to be a fair Republican/Conservative. I can't just dismiss this book/research/article because it's liberal. It seems to be backed up by fact, and I'm sure I would have heard if it just wasn't true somehow."

Stop. Stop right there. That's your problem. That last line that the kind voice uses. If all this stuff that they say wasn't true, surely I would have heard it somewhere. Here's the slap in the face to help you get a clue:

... the New York Review of Books ran a review on Oct. 19, 2000, by Edmund Morgan stating that "Bellesiles may have overstated his case a little, but only a little...He has the facts. [N]o one else has put them together in so compelling a refutation of the mythology of the gun."

The New York Review of Books has not published a retraction.

The Christian Science Monitor's review of Arming America that ran on Sept. 7, 2000, cheerily predicted that "the NRA will continue peddling its myths, oblivious of Bellesiles and his annoying truths." The Christian Science Monitor has not withdrawn this statement.

The Atlantic Monthly published a review in its November 2000, issue that did point out some minor errors in Bellesiles’ book. But it also wrote: "Bellesiles has made a detailed study of the records of gun ownership and militia service...Blending quantitative analysis with a careful reading of public documents, he paints a new picture of the role of privately owned firearms in American history: [before] the Civil War, relatively few Americans owned guns."

A search of their site shows no mention of Bellesiles since.

Publishers Weekly wrote on July 24, 2000, "[H]is agenda, however, does not taint Bellesiles’ scholarship...he painstakingly documents the relative absence of guns before the Civil War." Publisher’s Weekly has not withdrawn or amended this review.

When your little voice says, "If I want to know the truth about anti-conservative books/research/articles, the last place I should assume I'll receive it is any mainstream newspaper or network." - that's when you should start deferring to the little voice.

But the truth is that only if a debunking ends up being against conservatives (e.g. Abu Ghraib) will the networks splatter it across their screens and dedicate highly paid pundits to keep talking about the moment to moment shift in opinion, effect on industry and/or economy, or second-by-second fluctuation in poverty-stricken areas around the nation.

TRUTH bears itself out over time, yes. But it is not immediately available for comment when broadcast 'journalism' is still the dominant media. The perfect example is in Ronald Reagan, whose true and good impact on the world will be slowly but surely borne out now that he has gone to be with God.

deference to those who knew

I admit I am just too young to give my own tribute to Ronald Reagan. But many, many others knew the Reagan we love so much.

For anyone even moderately interested in tearing through the misinformation of the last 10-20 years, these sites provide excellent lineups of rememberances:

realclearpolitics
Rush
The Corner on National Review
National Review Online
NewsMax

'Bush should have died, not Reagan': Morrissey

'Bush should have died, not Reagan': Morrissey: "Thousands of fans at Dublin Castle, in Ireland, cheered when the ex-Smiths frontman made the announcement that the former American president, who had battled with Alzheimer's Disease, had passed away.

And an even bigger cheer followed when Morrissey - who is no stranger to controversy - then said he wished it had been the current President, George W Bush, who had died."

You know, thank goodness I've read enlightened thinkers like these:

The Independent Weekly: Dissent is Patriotic

JURIST - Cohn: The Patriotic Duty to Dissent

Conservatives Denounce Dissent

Before becoming enlighted about what patriotism meant, I might have though that Morrissey's comments were disgusting and abhorrent.

Now, of course, I know that he was - even though he isn't an American - being a patriot for America.

Thank goodness for patriotism - not all the fake, "Reagan won the cold war," "Reagan was a humble statesman," stuff that the people who knew him are all saying, but the real patriotism of wishing for an American president's death.

Oh, oh, wait... now it matters that he's not an American. I'm sorry, I must reconsider:

A fiction shattered by America's aggression:

"People outside the United States have stopped believing the American story."

Think Again: Oops. - Center for American Progress:

"It's an ancient dream of empire-builders to unify the world, but George W. Bush's way of being a uniter, not a divider, is surprising and unique-he's united the world against himself."

I see.. Morrissey is actually Earth's spokesman.

I am so clear on it all now.

Our fight for faith is as ancient as faith itself - and keeps repeating

President Reagan's Remarks at an Ecumenical Prayer Breakfast in Dallas, Texas:

"The 1962 decision [against compulsory prayer] opened the way to a flood of similar suits. Once religion had been made vulnerable, a series of assaults were made in one court after another, on one issue after another. Cases were started to argue against tax-exempt status for churches. Suits were brought to abolish the words ``under God'' from the Pledge of Allegiance and to remove ``In God We Trust'' from public documents and from our currency.
Today there are those who are fighting to make sure voluntary prayer is not returned to the classrooms. And the frustrating thing for the great majority of Americans who support and understand the special importance of religion in the national life -- the frustrating thing is that those who are attacking religion claim they are doing it in the name of tolerance, freedom, and openmindedness. Question: Isn't the real truth that they are intolerant of religion? [Applause] They refuse to tolerate its importance in our lives."

This is why Reagan was so hated. It is why George W. Bush is so hated. And I further insist that the hatred of faith precedes greater consequences:

I submit to you that the tolerant society is open to and encouraging of all religions. And this does not weaken us; it strengthens us, it makes us strong. You know, if we look back through history to all those great civilizations, those great nations that rose up to even world dominance and then deteriorated, declined, and fell, we find they all had one thing in common. One of the significant forerunners of their fall was their turning away from their God or gods.

Reagan was a wonderful, honest, faithful man, who was not a pretender to principle, but an adherent to his convictions.