Quick Roundup 292

Fake Tsunami?

Not too long ago, I commented on the Obama candidacy and a Christopher Hitchens column that declared the Illinois senator to be the "current beneficiary of a tsunami of drool" -- only to see him badly underperform all the predictions I saw to finish behind Mrs. Clinton in New Hampshire.

Over at American Thinker, Charles Sykes has an interesting take on why this happened:

A central tenet of modern liberalism, after all, is the unshakeable [sic] conviction that white American [sic] is deeply and irredeemably racist. For three decades, America's white liberals have invested in the belief that American [sic] is so incapable of racial fairness that society needs a panoply of laws, preferences, quotas, set-asides, and remedial programs to ensure that black people are treated fairly.

...

It follows that many race-holding liberals will be among the last to believe that America will ever elect an African-American as president.

White liberals face this cognitive dissonance: if they decide that America is ready for a black president and back Obama they would also be forced to surrender or at least modify decades of convictions about American bias.

The euphemism for this is "electability," and it is one of the reasons why the race and gender cards are being played so aggressively among post-New Hampshire Democrats.

The spectacular failure of polling in New Hampshire may well be the first hint of how deeply the divide will affect the coming primaries. Notably, the polls for the Republican race were on target; but the Democratic polls drastically overstated Obama's support. Despite the initial wagon-circling denials of the media, the phenomenon is not new. In the past, other African American candidates -- Doug Wilder in Virginia; David Dinkins in New York, and Tom Bradley in Los Angeles - have done better in polls than at the ballot box, raising the possibility that white voters who wanted to look racially virtuous told pollsters they were backing Obama, but then actually voted for the white woman on the ballot. [bold added]

I think Sykes is on to something here, and it should be interesting to compare polls and primary results over the next few contests.

After all, if leftists are nervous about investigating the biological basis for intelligence because they see such as a threat to their egalitarian agenda, why would they greet evidence that such an agenda is no longer "necessary" with open arms or, worse yet, help create it?

Checking in on News Hounds So You Don't Have to

En route to something else recently, I encountered a smear of Fox News Business Contributor Jonathan Hoenig, who commented some time ago on our nation's (and Israel's) war policy. In addition to this, the news clip shows him taking a dishonest question from Alan Colmes that implied that the failure of oil prices to drop after Iraq was an indictment of the premise of going to war. Having already blasted our prosecution of the war, Hoenig correctly indicates that leftist policies at home are doing their share to keep fuel prices high.

News Hounds' take? To call Hoenig's response a "non-sequitor" [sic] and slam him because his opinion does not toe the line of that of the majority!

Hoenig's MIddle [sic] East strategy does not reflect the opinion of the majority of Americans. According to a CNN poll today, 39 percent think Israel should continue its military action "until Hezbollah can no longer launch attacks" (not exactly "levelling them with no mercy," as Hoenig wants) while 43 percent say Israel should agree to a cease-fire as soon as possible. But that viewpoint has yet to be expressed by a guest on Hannity & Colmes.

The last time I checked, the truth was not a matter of majority vote.

News Hounds' motto is, "We watch FOX so you don't have to." Have to what?

Think independently, from what I can tell.

The State vs. Saving Lives or Energy

David Veksler, commenting on Boston Mayor Thomas Menino's campaign against CVS opening private clinics has the perfect rejoinder to the mayor, who stated that, "Allowing retailers to make money off of sick people is wrong." He simply inserts another industry our lives depend on.

He also asks whether Bush Bulbs really save energy, and makes an interesting point.

-- CAV