Best Line of the Night
It’s a toss up between my sister:
“Rock Chalk Jayhawk. Holy Shit. Where’s the Advil?”
or
President Bush, after throwing a high, out of the strike zone opening pitch which was immediately followed by the first pitch of the game to Chipper Jones who crushed it for a home run:
“If he’d thrown the pitch I did he wouldn’t have hit it out.”
Update:
Video that inspired by sister.
Update:
Pitch that President Bush threw:
Update on Colbert Challenge
A blog reader has pointed out to me that Obama is running away with Colbert’s Democralypse. That’s the challenge Colbert issued to supporters of Obama and Clinton. He set up a deal on donorschoose.org where you can donate money to schools in Pennsylvania in honor of Obama or Clinton. Whomever gets the most money wins the Keystone state.
So far Obama’s had $85,960 donated in his name, helping more than 15,000 students.
Hillary’s had $14,712 donated, helping almost 3,000 students.
Sounds like a convincing victory. A hat tip to Kettletop for pointing it out to me.
Hillary Ruins Christmas
I found this video post on WisdomIsVindicated. The video, not the blog, was created by the same guys who do MS3K.
A Penny Saved
This probably wasn’t the hard-hitting economic issue Obama was looking for to talk about, but it provided a funny exchange.
From Politico.com:
“A voter at Sen. Barack Obama’s town hall meeting in Greensburg, Pa., yesterday asked whether he would consider eliminating the penny.
‘We have been trying to eliminate the penny for quite some time — it always comes back,’ Obama said. ‘I need to find out who is lobbying to keep the penny.’
Somebody in the crowd pointed the finger at Illinois, the home of Abraham Lincoln.
‘Oh, you think it’s Illinois? You’re blaming us?’ he asked before turning serious. ‘I will seriously consider eliminating the penny as long as we find another place for Lincoln to land.’”
Obama: Primary A Movie That Went Too Long
“ABC News‘ Sunlen Miller Reports: Calling it a lengthy primary season, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., offered a Pittsburgh, Pa. crowd an analogy on the Democratic primary race, saying it is like ‘a good movie that lasted about a half an hour too long.’
Obama said he and Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., have been running in the Democratic primary so long that they could reverse roles and recite each others’ lines without missing a beat.
‘I think there are some people who felt like, ‘God, when will this be over?” he said.”
Powerful McCain Ad
I don’t know whose producing the ads for McCain’s campaigns, but they are very powerful. Here’s the latest installment:
Howard Dean sort of stepped in it today in issuing this response to the add:
“While we honor McCain’s military service, the fact is Americans want a real leader who offers real solutions, not a blatant opportunist who doesn’t understand the economy and is promising to keep our troops in Iraq for 100 years.”
I don’t think using your POW status to show that you’ve been in tough situations before is being an “opportunist.” I think you can attack McCain on pretty much anything else, but dude is entitled to his POW survivor stories. Of course, the RNC overreacted and called for Obama and Hillary to “denounce” Dean’s comments.
Obama Would’ve Left Church
Today on the View Barack Obama said that if Wright hadn’t retired and if Wright hadn’t acknowledged that what he said had deeply offended people he would’ve left the church.
Obama Back to Significant National Lead
From Gallup:
Today’s Gallup Poll Daily tracking update finds Barack Obama with an eight percentage point advantage over Hillary Clinton (50% to 42%), this gives him a statistically significant advantage for the first time since before the Rev. Jeremiah Wright controversy.
Sports Radio Host Defends Obama
The Philadelphia Sports radio anchor who was interviewing Obama when he said his grandmother was just another “typical white person” tries to put the controversy to rest and defend Obama. I think anyone who wasn’t looking for a controversy understood what Obama was trying to say, but it’s nice to see someone else step up and defend him:
“I interviewed Sen. Barack Obama on my 610 WIP radio show last week. That’s right, I spent seven minutes and 45 seconds talking to a man who may soon be the leader of the free world. That the opportunity would fall to me and my co-hosts was inconceivable because we only occasionally deal with life outside of sports. That we would then all become embroiled in the national crisis of the day was downright surreal.
During a softball interview (sorry, Columbia), Obama referred to his white grandmother as a “typical white person” who would be intimidated if she walked past a black man on the street. The context was clear. He was by no means saying she was a racist; he was merely depicting the mindset of that generation. Obama was trying to show the way people once thought about race — even the woman who helped to raise the first truly serious African-American presidential candidate.
Within hours, we were besieged with questions from the media. At each stop on the media tour, I tried to explain the context of the remark, but the only reporters or pundits who believed me were those with no desire to punish Obama. It was the lead story that night on “The O’Reilly Report,” “Hannity & Colmes” and countless other right-tilting broadcasts.
CNN provided the most revealing moment. My WIP co-host Al Morganti agreed to make an appearance via satellite, which included a telephone pre-interview. When asked how he felt about Obama’s remark, Morganti said he didn’t think it was a big deal at all. The woman on the other end of the phone said that opinion would not fit well into the broadcast. He was never called back.
So what did I learn from this surprise visit to the world I left three decades ago? I learned I’m probably not much better than these media leeches seeking the daily blood of controversy. In many ways, I do the same thing. I come up with a strong opinion, and then I look for facts that will support the bias — discounting contradictory evidence.
The difference is, I’m commenting about sports. My opinion may be uncomfortable for a coach, player or owner, but no one is going to raise taxes or go to war because of it. I’ve never been more relieved at my career decision 30 years ago than I am right now.
It’s pretty clear I never fulfilled that promise to my advisor. I have bridged no new paths. Sports has become nothing more than my shelter from a real world that is too real.
The story had one final twist a day after the interview, when we learned that Obama had booked his appearance on our show because he wanted to make his picks in the NCAA Tournament.
There I was, obsessing over a visit to his ruthless world, and all the senator really wanted was a few minutes of refuge in mine.”
Michael Reagan Takes on Hillary
A very funny article from Michael Reagan, Ronald’s son, about Hillary. He posits:
“Mrs. Clinton has been insisting that her global junkets as first lady, and her meetings with foreign leaders, qualify her to be president of these United States.
I never thought of it that way, but if she is correct then I am eminently qualified to follow my father’s footsteps and take up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., not merely as a member of the president’s family, but as president in my own right.”
And just for good measure, he throws in a major diss, comparing Hillary to Nancy:
“Nancy Reagan, for example, had far more experience than Hillary, but she was content to be the loving wife of a president instead of crowing about the famous world leaders she met in her eight years as first lady and claiming it qualified her to be president. Unlike Hillary, Nancy tells the truth.”
You can read the full article here.
