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Politics : I Will Continue to Continue, to Pretend.... -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

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To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/17/2005 12:52:36 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   The Guru Speaks Roger L Simon Sometimes I think the Democrats are walking into walls. (Hey, and I'm still a Democrat. Too lazy to go and register as an Independent or unconsciously reluctant? You decide.) Their latest silliness was visible all over the networks last night where one after the other were opining that Alan Greenspan would put the kibosh on private Social Security accounts during his Congressional testimony today. Prominent among them was Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid who was then shown advocating those same private accounts only a few short years ago. Was Reid having a senior moment or just being a partisan hack? I hope it's the former because the latter is almost ludicrously self-destructive in this instance. Clinton, as is well known, advocated the same thing during his administration. What's with these Democrats? They're starting to make Tom Delay look good. [Not.-ed. Okay, not.] Of course, the world now knows what Greenspan hath decreed. Is he right? Beats me. But I'd trust him over Harry Reid in a New York minute. And so would anybody else with an ounce of sense. I think this whole story has an interesting reflection in the War in Iraq. Those same Democrats who only favored private Social Security accounts when they were in power are the same people who backed Clinton completely during the unseating of Milosevic, but are opponents of the more geo-strategically important unseating of Saddam. Would they have been for the same War in Iraq under the same conditions with the same results had Clinton been in power? I'd bet my house on it. And the same goes for most of the war's media opponents. This is power/party politics with the thinnest veneer of logical rationalization. rogerlsimon.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/17/2005 1:04:06 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Jimmy Carter Revisited Powerline blog We've been pretty tough on Jimmy Carter, but with hindsight, probably not tough enough. If you search our site for "Jimmy Carter," you'll find all of his disgraceful acts that we've commented upon. His history is a sorry one: he started out as a Midshipman and served honorably in the Navy. But at some point, his leftist politics took hold and he started aligning himself with America's enemies. The turning point, I think, came here: <<< Soviet diplomatic accounts and material from the archives show that in January 1984 former President Jimmy Carter dropped by Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin's residence for a private meeting. Carter expressed his concern about and opposition to Reagan's defense buildup. He boldly told Dobrynin that Moscow would be better off with someone else in the White House. If Reagan won, he warned, "There would not be a single agreement on arms control, especially on nuclear arms, as long as Reagan remained in power." Using the Russians to influence the presidential election was nothing new for Carter. Schweizer reveals Russian documents that show that in the waning days of the 1980 campaign, the Carter White House dispatched businessman Armand Hammer to the Soviet Embassy. Hammer was a longtime Soviet-phile, and he explained to the Soviet ambassador that Carter was "clearly alarmed" at the prospect of losing to Reagan. Hammer pleaded with the Russians for help. He asked if the Kremlin could expand Jewish emigration to bolster Carter's standing in the polls. "Carter won't forget that service if he is elected," Hammer told Dobrynin. >>> Conspiring with our chief enemy to try to influence an American Presidential election: We could have called that treason, but we didn't. You can form your own opinion. In more recent years, Carter has never met an anti-American dictator he didn't like. Whether it was Castro, Ortega, Arafat...whoever. And he used the occasion of being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to attack the current American government...just as those who awarded the prize had expected. No class. And most recently, of course, he invited the execrable Michael Moore to sit with him in the former President's box at the Democratic National Convention. Jimmy Carter is a disgrace. We've said so before, and we'll continue saying so as long as he merits the criticism. If you want to learn more, read Steven Hayward's book The Real Jimmy Carter. Here is a brief excerpt from an interview with Mr. Hayward about the wretched former President: <<< Carter panted after the Nobe Peace Prize for years, seeing it as a means of gaining official redemption for his humiliation at the hands of the voters in 1980. He lobbied quietly behind the scenes for years to get the prize, and finally met with success in 2002 when the left-wing Nobel Prize committee saw an opportunity to use Carter as a way of attacking President Bush and embarrassing the United States. The head of the Nobel Prize committee openly admitted that this was their motivation in selecting Carter. Any other ex-president would have refused to be a part of such an obvious anti-American intrigue, but not Jimmy. Here we should observe that Carter conceives himself much more as a citizen of the world than as a citizen of the United States, and I think it is highly revealing that Carter is most popular overseas in those nations that hate America the most, such as Syria, where they lined the streets cheering for Carter when he visited. >>> Yes, I think we've been much too kind to Mr. Carter. DEACON adds: Some folks think that Rocket Man owes President Carter an apology for saying that "Jimmy Carter isn't just misguided or ill-informed. He's on the other side." In my view, Carter owes the American people an apology for the actions cited above, and others. Carter, it seems to me, subscribes to the view that America is, and generally has been, more a force for evil in the world than a force for good. Accordingly, he believes, I think, that the world would be a better place if the U.S. were weaker militarily and less influential. Carter also holds our enemies in higher regard than he holds our friends, particularly in the Middle East. And, as Rocket Man notes above, he is particularly fond of anti-American dictators and, at times, has actively assisted such dictators to our detriment. I'm not sure whether all of this places Carter "on the other side," but it's difficult to understand in what sense he's on our side. Those who admire Carter will say that he's really a patriot who is trying to set the country he loves back on its proper course. Perhaps. But to me, this means that Carter may rejoin our side if we reinvent ourselves by becoming as ineffectual as we were during the harrowing years of his administration. It does not mean that he's on our side now. Posted by Hindrocket powerlineblog.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/18/2005 4:45:31 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   My History Professor's Darkest Moments By Garin K. Hovannisian FrontPageMagazine.com | February 17, 2005 My professor, Mary Corey (History, UCLA), is always inspired and never dull, even in her darkest moments. Especially in her darkest moments. When George W. Bush was reelected, Corey told our class that she was “in a decidedly bad mood,” but proceeded to give a colorful lecture anyway. She is filled with marvelous stories and spiked with a foul sense of humor. She can talk for a whole hour and you would want her to continue. But only if you are a liberal. If you are not, you find yourself decomposing in your seat or chewing through your own tongue. You definitely don’t raise your hand, because the lecture comes to a complete halt. Corey has a hard time hearing (and listening), so she slowly trudges toward your seat and fixes that pair of flaming eyes on yours. You’ve managed to get her excited and the entire class annoyed. And now, you must confront her. You can do it once. Maybe even twice. I did. But to call her out each time, you need some serious nerve—and a solid GPA. Professor Corey has been a history professor at UCLA since 1996. Last quarter she taught a class in US history since 1960, which I took. The official course description was objective: “History of political, social, and diplomatic developments that have shaped the U.S. since 1960.” But I entertained no delusions when I signed up. Assigned books included the anti-Reagan The Seventies by Bruce Schulman, the anti-Vietnam War If I Die in a Combat Zone by Tim O’Brien, and the Marxist rapper Cornel West’s Race Matters. I was prepared for her to be some former hippie who obscures the line between her academic freedom and mine. And I knew I was in for some Bush-bashing, but I’d learned to let it slide in its smaller doses. As a second-year history student, I thought I would give the course a shot despite my apprehensions. What I found in Corey, however, was a woman completely untouched by objectivity, or the desire to achieve it. In her very first lecture, she said, “If you think I’m going to be neutral, I’m not going to be.” And in keeping with her testimony, Corey spent the next ten weeks giving a socialist rendition of history, with no regard for the many other sides of the account. Her bottom-line version of recent American history was some cocktail of male hegemony, racism, class systems, and the vast right-wing Republican conspiracy. Early in the quarter, she went on a rant against capitalism and the market system, which she defined as “the weird faith that everything will work out fine.” “Capitalism isn’t a lie on purpose. It’s just a lie,” she lectured us, “It’s easy for us to look back and say these people [who believe in markets] are dorks.” And for the climax, “[Capitalists] are swine.… They’re bastard people.” I guess one could say in her behalf her candor at least was admirable. Most people would be reluctant to drop all pretense of professionalism in advancing an overtly political agenda in an academic classroom. In this regard, on the other hand, Corey shines. She professes the most offensive opinions as if they were uncontestable facts. She does it over and over—in every lecture, in every sentence. Here’s a sampling of statements she made that I jotted down or recorded in class: “The Vietnam War was a big mistake. And, frankly speaking, the good side won.” “Redistribution of wealth and equaling the playing field must be accomplished.” “It is true that the color line is a dominant force in America today.” “There is a class system in the United States.” “The majority of Americans opposed the war.” “We live in a tremendously racist society.” “I believe Hillary was right. There really was a right-wing conspiracy.” On one occasion, Corey delighted the class with the recitation of the following poem: “Clinton lied / Monica cried / Bush lied / Men died.” Do her political prejudices affect her grading too? I certainly was convinced my exams were graded unfairly and I don’t seem to be the only one. A student reviewer on Bruinwalk.com, which evaluates professors, writes of Corey, “The previous review [of Corey’s classroom performance] needs to be altered somewhat. They said that in order to do well, you should attend lectures and take notes. I would say that in order to do well, you should be a left-wing liberal. Conservatives need not apply. Very little tolerance for opposing viewpoints.” Mary Corey might be fun to listen to and even to look at. But as a professor hired to teach all students and not just radicals, she is despicable. Her extreme leftwing bias is not subdued or contextualized or even labeled as opinion. It moves her every word and justifies her every story. There is no way of getting around it. Corey is neither a scholar nor an academic who appreciates the splendor and complexity of history—of comparing sources and contrasting theories, of trying to understand the vast mosaic of the human narrative. She is an ideologue. And she doesn’t care. After all, she has the podium and a captive audience, and the grading power to intimidate. “God forbid I’m one of those professors that pushes her views on her students,” she says sarcastically. And the student captives laugh. Garin Hovannisian is the editor in chief of The Bruin Standard. E-mail him at ghovannisian@bruinstandard.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/19/2005 8:41:04 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Bush as Hitler (yet again) — David @ 6:19 am Citizens United has placed two Billboards in Hollywood thanking the city for inadvertently ensuring President Bush’s reelection. Wednesday night one of the billboards was vandalized. I need hardly say it – some dim Michael Moorite painted a Swastika on the president’s forehead. As a Jew, but even more as a person with an adequately functioning brain, I’ve had my fill of the “Bush as Hitler” rhetoric emanating from the left. Let me put a fine point on the distinction between the two leaders: Hitler preferred genocidal dictatorship to democracy. Bush prefers democracy to genocidal dictatorship. Get it? libertyfilmfestival.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/20/2005 6:25:38 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Meet the new party of no US News - Nation & World By Gloria Borger As it turns out, Howard Dean is not the best choice to lead the Democratic National Committee. If the party is looking for a new spokesman, there is a better choice--David Spade (with apologies to his Capital One ad): Social Security reform? No. Clear some judges? No way, Jose. Find some agreement on national security? Nyet. Sure, the Democrats are struggling to find their voice, pick their leaders, and agree on a legislative strategy. It's hard work. But it's also too bad they're allowing themselves to look like a bunch of minority naysayers--defined more by old tactics than new ideas. Sad to say, the Democrats are becoming the party of no. The rationale is inevitably tactical: Democrats are the opposition. They do not control any branch of government. So why not sit back and watch the president take on a sacrosanct program--such as Social Security--and fight with his own Republicans? And since the president hasn't yet offered his own reform blueprint, why should the Democrats? "Right now, the president asked us to give him time to have a plan," says Illinois Rep. Rahm Emanuel, who runs the Democratic House campaign committee. He is happy to oblige. Besides, it's not as if the president eagerly courts Democratic voices. "They are so arrogant," fumes one party strategist. "When the administration gets off its high horse, then maybe we can talk." All well and good. But can't the Democrats walk and chew gum at the same time? Last I checked, voters in the 2004 election weren't sure what the party stood for. Given that problem, the old "give 'em enough rope" strategy to hang Republicans won't work--particularly if voters have no idea what a Democratic agenda looks like. "We're murky, obtuse, and ambivalent," says Will Marshall, president of the Progressive Policy Institute, a Democratic think tank. "The danger is that we let the tactical imperatives of opposing Bush lead us to the point of view that that's all we need to do." Exactly. After all, since the Democrats have spent much of the past 30 years talking about saving an endangered Social Security system, how can they now say there is no problem? "If we become the do-nothing party, we become the default party," says Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh, a "red state" Democrat. "We only win leadership when the other guys fail if we stand for nothing." Sure, he asks, "should the president be required to put forward a program first? Absolutely. But then should we have an alternative? Yes." Eyeing the exits? But this isn't about solutions; it's about getting even. Democrats point to the success of Newt Gingrich and his revolutionaries, who opposed Hillary Clinton's healthcare reform plan--riding their opposition to a congressional House takeover. But they conveniently forget some important differences between 1992 and 2005: that Bill Clinton won with only 43 percent of the vote, that Gingrich also proposed an agenda-setting "Contract With America," that conservatives had already made progress with disaffected Democrats. Today, Democrats are losing support with working-class voters--most of whom trusted the president more than John Kerry to handle both terrorism and the economy. "They knew what Bush stood for," says Bayh. "We run the risk of losing our credibility if people don't know what we are for." And it's not just on domestic policy, either. It's tempting for Democrats to say "I told you so" when CIA Director Porter Goss testifies, as he did last week, that the U.S. occupation in Iraq has become a handy recruiting tool for al Qaeda. Or to complain that a successful Iraqi election doesn't guarantee a defeat of the insurgents. But do the Democrats really want to rally behind the Ted Kennedy "bring the troops home now" refrain? "This is not the time for casting anxious glances towards the exits," writes Marshall in an open letter to Democrats. Ironically, it's the Republicans who understand the Democrats' predicament. "We were the party of no since the 1930s," a top White House aide told me. "It took Ronald Reagan and his 'Morning in America' for us to get out of that mind-set and start proposing solutions to problems." And there is no going back. No way. Never.

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/20/2005 6:38:31 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Breakfast in a blue state EMANUELE OTTOLENGHI, THE JERUSALEM POST Feb. 20, 2005 Weekends in New York can turn indigestible when politics dominate breakfast. At an Upper West Side caf , my host greets me and my colleague, then orders a latte, the drink of choice for sophisticated young urban blue-state inhabitants. After an exchange of pleasantries, we both order the healthy choice. Meet the Kerry-core: mid-30s, successful and glamorous, keeping in shape while meeting the demands of a successful professional life in the fast lane. They keep up with the literary world on the metro and know which restaurant offers the newest version of California French-American fusion cuisine. No Hollywood movies for them: too commercial and superficial, the kind of culture that makes sophisticated Europeans loathe simpleton America for its shallowness. But they have seen the latest Broadway show and a Franco-Vietnamese film series playing in the nearby noncommercial movie theater. My interlocutor is a thirtysomething TV journalist from a global network. With perfect nails, perfect hair and perfect command of her charm, she watches me eat my breakfast while her spoon hovers over her granola. She could, no doubt, be a good professional contact. But my colleague spoils the moment by flagging my current affiliation (The American Enterprise Institute) and my sympathy for George W. Bush. My colleague is a foreign correspondent for a European daily who eats eggs Benedict but thinks Michael Moore has "a lot to say": She is fine in New York. Me, I eat granola but cheer for Bush. It's worse than a crime; it's confusing to my host. In her sophisticated understanding of the world, Ms. Latte thinks a PhD-holding, polyglot, granola-eating, urban-dwelling academic with spectacles from Europe (who, in addition, is Jewish) must be a liberal and must hate Bush. Anything different does not exist in her normative universe. It throws her off balance. "You actually like Bush?" she says in disbelief. Here's a chance to exculpate myself. Instead, I gingerly respond, "I actually love Bush!" With her lower lip trembling, my interlocutor goes for the jugular. "Bush is stupid. And whoever supports Bush is stupid." Which effectively makes this hopeful moment stillborn. Not every breakfast must be with the like-minded, of course, but if all breakfasts were like this one, a swollen liver would be a distinct threat. Still, it offers useful anthropological insights on Democratic bitterness after the November defeat. According to Ms. Latte, Bush is supported by duck-hunting, God-fearing rednecks who unreasonably hate foreigners and, religiously speaking, are still in the Middle Ages. Terrorism is a nuisance. Making it a top priority is a ruse to scare simpletons. Why would I be on their side? a) I am stupid. b) I live in an ivory tower and am not aware of reality. For help in revising my views, Ms. Latte advises that I drive down Route 66 and try to socialize with people I meet in rural post offices. I will inevitably discover their stupidity, their intolerance of foreigners and their religious fanaticism. And I will give up Bush. Still, who your allies are is not always a good case for switching sides. After all, "campaigning" for Kerry were the MoveOn.Org crowd and Michael Moore. Toward the end, even Osama bin Laden advised Americans not to reelect Bush. Ms. Latte feels comfortable in their company. I don't. I still prefer Christian fundamentalists to the Michael Moores, Gore Vidals and Noam Chomskys of the world. I might feel uncomfortable among duck hunters, but if they support this administration, let them shoot ducks. Foreign policy is what matters, not weekend hobbies or church prayers. Ms. Latte decries Bush's failure to "promote dialogue and understanding" after 9/11: "War is not the answer!" she proclaims, explaining that Kerry, so much more sophisticated than those Midwest simpletons, paints the world in nuanced shades of gray, while Bush offers a black-and-white take on right and wrong. That's why he won: his supporters are as dumb as he is. They believe there is right and wrong in this world. Which is why she lost her tranquillity in my presence. In her universe, someone like me is meant to be smart, not to support Bush. These days a PhD is no guarantee of IQ. But unlike my sophisticated colleague, I know exactly how open to dialogue those who masterminded 9/11 are. Bush did not start a war. He only chose not to surrender once that war started, because he could tell right from wrong. Ms Latte can't. She does not believe there's a truth out there. That's why her candidate lost. Easier to call your opponents dumb for reelecting Bush than face the reasons Kerry lost. The November defeat becomes easier to digest. Which I wish I could say that of my breakfast. Next visit to New York, I'll wear a Kerry-Edwards T-shirt, go see the latest Franco-Vietnamese production, and most of all, avoid conversation. The writer teaches Israel Studies at Oxford and is a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. Adblock This article can also be read at jpost.com.

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/21/2005 12:04:32 AM From: Sully-   Read Replies (5) | Respond to of 35834   New Hope for Dan Rather/ Bad News for Negroponte Roger L Simon Dan Rather, who has been made a laughingstock of serious journalism, now has a chance for a comeback (at least monetarily) through a character defamation lawsuit because of remarks made by Cong. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY). Yes, I know such suits are difficult, except in England, but bear with me. Congressman Hinchey said the following at a community forum in Ithaca, New York re: Rather's promulgating the forged Bush NG documents: <<< Probably the most flagrant example of that is the way they set up Dan Rather. Now, I mean, I have my own beliefs about how that happened: it originated with Karl Rove, in my belief, in the White House. They set that up with those false papers. >>> Hmm... So what you're saying Cong. Hinchey is that Karl Rove assumed Dan Rather was such a blithering idiot he would be gulled by a forgery so inept it took these gentlemen (see at links below) about five minutes each (probably less) to uncover it. littlegreenfootballs.com homepage.mac.com rogerlsimon.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/21/2005 9:06:36 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   You've Got Mail Wizbang blog A middle school teacher assigned each of his 6th grade students to write a letter to a single member of the U.S. military for a class project. The teacher, Alex Kunhardt, was presumably aware of the content of the letters that were forwarded to Pfc. Rob Jacobs. <<< February 21, 2005 -- An American soldier overseas is fuming over letters he received from Brooklyn middle-school children accusing GIs of destroying mosques and killing civilians in Iraq. Pfc. Rob Jacobs of New Jersey said he was initially ecstatic to get a package of letters from sixth-graders at JHS 51 in Park Slope last month at his base 10 miles from the North Korea border. That changed when he opened the envelope and found missives strewn with politically charged rhetoric, vicious accusations and demoralizing predictions that only a handful of soldiers would leave the Iraq war alive. "It's hard enough for soldiers to deal with being away from their families, they don't need to be getting letters like this," Jacobs, 20, said in a phone interview from his base at Camp Casey. "If they don't have anything nice to say, they might as well not say anything at all." >>> Read that section again. Jacobs was stationed in South Korea, far away from Iraq. Even though Jacobs was not in Iraq, the teacher allowed letters to be sent accusing him of all manner of killing Iraqi children and destroying mosques. Aren't teachers supposed to be the responsible adults in the classroom? Is it too much to ask that they use a little common sense? Posted by Kevin Aylward wizbangblog.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/21/2005 9:10:51 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Another Day, Another Looney Tune Wizbang blog It is getting to be a difficult decision. When another member of the certifiably insane left goes whacky do I post it or not? Sure it is fun to watch in a "car wreck" sort of way... But after a while it is like picking on a retarded kid. I mean, you don't go to the Special Olympics and laugh when a kid falls. Or at least I don't. Kevin had the story below about a 6th grade teacher who made her students send US soldiers hate mail. The teacher was clearly a looney tune in her own right. But check out what another looney tune said about Kevin posting the story: <<< Anger Addicts Pile On an Eleven-Year Old The Republican Attack Hamsters can't go 10 seconds without being pissed off at somebody, because if they let up for that long someone might notice that the Emperor has no clothes. Since it's a slow news day, they're all ganging up on a sixth grader. The kid has an excuse for being stupid---he or she is eleven years old. What's the Attack Hamsters excuse? >>> Of course it never occurs to him the teacher is to blame... That would require rational thought or doing this thing called reading. How much longer before the last sane rational person leaves the Democrat party? ... Or has it already happened? Posted by Paul wizbangblog.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 2/28/2005 7:27:57 AM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Dean: We're Good, They're Evil LGF Howard Dean shows he’s just the man to heal the divisions of the 2004 election: <<< Dean roars into town. Dean told the Hiebert fund-raiser that gay marriage was a Republican diversion from discussions of ballooning deficits and lost American jobs. That presents an opportunity to attract moderate Republicans, he said. “Moderate Republicans can’t stand these people (conservatives), because they’re intolerant. They don’t think tolerance is a virtue,” Dean said, adding: “I’m not going to have these right-wingers throw away our right to be tolerant.” And concluding his backyard speech with a litany of Democratic values, he added: “This is a struggle of good and evil. And we’re the good.” ljworld.com >>> He then shrieked as if possessed by a malignant demon. ...Oops! That was a different speech. littlegreenfootballs.com

To: J.B.C. who wrote (7819) 3/4/2005 12:15:10 PM From: Sully-   Respond to of 35834   Rock the Felon Vote Tech Central Station By By John R. Lott Jr. & James K. Glassman In the wake of their election defeat, Democrats have promised to mend their ways by emphasizing moral values. So, in their first major legislative initiative of the year, what are the party's two top senators offering? A bill to guarantee that millions of convicted murderers, rapists and armed robbers can vote. This week, Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and John Kerry officially introduced the Count Every Vote Act, which she claims is "critical to restoring America's faith in our voting system." Among the provisions: A measure to insure that voting rights are restored to "felons who have repaid their debt to society" by completing their prison terms, parole or probation. Sen. Clinton says there are 4.7 million such disenfranchised felons in 48 states and the District of Columbia. The power to deny voting rights to ex-convicts now rests with the states, so standards vary across the country. The 14th Amendment to the Constitution explicitly allows for states to deny felons the right to vote. Sens. Clinton and Kerry do have good reason to want ex-convicts to vote: Felons overwhelmingly vote for Democrats. In recent academic work, Jeff Manza and Marcus Britton of Northwestern University and Christopher Uggen of the University of Minnesota estimated that Bill Clinton pulled 86 percent of the felon vote in 1992 and a whopping 93 percent in '96. The researchers found that about 30 percent of felons vote when given the chance. So, if all 4.7 million of Mrs. Clinton's ex-cons are re-enfranchised, about 1.4 million will cast ballots, and about 1.2 million of those will be for Democrats. Manza & Co.'s results indicate that this "felon vote" would have given Democrats the White House in the 2000 and control of the Senate from 1986 to 2004. Seattle Times reporters last month identified 129 felons in King and Pierce counties who had voted illegally in the Nov. 2 election -- in a race that Democrat Christine Gregoire won by, coincidentally, 129 votes. Extrapolating the illegal felon vote across the entire state, one can conclude that Gregoire owes her controversial victory to ex-cons who should not have voted -- but did. Why shouldn't felons be able to vote if they have paid their debt to society? Simply because society believes that the debt includes a prohibition on voting. It is hardly a radical notion to penalize felons long after they have left prison or completed parole. Laws deny ex-cons the right to hold office, to retain professional licenses (lawyers, for example, lose their ability to practice), or to serve as an officer in a publicly traded company. Felons, by law, can in some cases lose their right to inherit property, to collect pension benefits or even to get a truck-driving license. In fact, in most states, the loss of voting rights does not last as long as other prohibitions. Looked at from the punishment angle, it is no more obvious why all states should impose the same rules on felons voting than they should have the same prison terms or face all these other penalties for the same length of time. In addition, post-sentence penalties are placed on criminals not only who have committed felonies but who have committed misdemeanors, including, under federal law, the right to own a gun. We doubt that Sens. Clinton and Kerry will be crusading to restore that right any time soon. When people harm others, we learn something about them. Do we want someone who has committed multiple rapes helping determine how much money will be spent on social programs that help rape victims? Clinton and Kerry appear to be angling, not for the votes of centrists but for the votes of the most dedicated left-wing constituency in America: Criminals. We doubt, however, that most Americans believe that felons comprise a minority group that deserves such special favors. techcentralstation.com

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