Memogate II

Another quick hit from Power Line, this time about the supposed "talking points memo".

Of course, the fact that the memo was distributed to some Republicans, just as it was distributed to some Democrats and some reporters, was never in doubt. The questions are: 1) where did it come from, and 2) was it distributed by Democrats as a dirty trick? On these points, ABC now professes complete agnosticism.

Don't miss the links to Michelle Malkin (here and here) and Howard Kurtz, who writes for the Washington Post, one of the papers to break the news.

Iraqis support multinational troops, believe government will succeed.

Power Line includes a reference to a poll conducted in the city of Najaf with some interesting results.

Living Wills

I really should be getting on the road, but I couldn't pass up this article from Michelle Malkin. I've tried to stay silent on the Terry Schiavo story. (Well, not with Trish. She can tell you about some debates we've had.) But through it all, everyone seems to believe that Terry's situation wouldn't be an issue if she had just signed a living will.

James Q. Wilson noted some of the problems earlier this week:

Some people believe that all of these issues can be resolved if everyone signs a living will that specifies what is to be done to them under various conditions. The living will is supposed to determine unambiguously when a "Do Not Resuscitate" sign should be placed on a patient's hospital chart. Terri Schiavo had not signed a living will. If she had, we would not be facing these issues. But scholars have shown that we have greatly exaggerated the benefits of living wills. Studies by University of Michigan Professor Carl Schneider and others have shown that living wills rarely make any difference. People with them are likely to get exactly the same treatment as people without them, possibly because doctors and family members ignore the wills. And ignoring them is often the right thing to do because it is virtually impossible to write a living will that anticipates and makes decisions about all of the many, complicated, and hard to foresee illnesses you may face.

I have heard similar things from other sources: that a Living Will doesn't do any good unless you discuss it with the doctor in advance and get his agreement and understanding. In that context, the Living Will simply becomes legal documentation to back up what the doctor says later. And even then, I hear, many doctors will disregard the Living Will at the crisis point. Maybe it's a God complex, maybe it's an optimism that "this crisis" (whatever is going on) won't be as bad as it might appear, maybe it's just hubris. Michelle mentions two better alternatives, durable power of attorney (DPA), and Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment. The DPA sounds like what I would want in this case anyway, and I guess I'll need to look into the other as an option.

More on Dean

As Spin Doctor Dean is hard at work gearing up for the 2006 elections, I picked up this tidbit from a comment at ScrappleFace, the site with fake press releases on current events. The author added his own editorial comments in [square brackets]. I've added italics to make reading easier. Hopefully. He highlights some common inconsistencies between what Democrats are saying and what is really happening. I got a good laugh from this, hope you do too.

Sometimes partisan politics gets overheated -- I know that as well as anyone [because I engage in partisan rhetoric all the time]. But when one party controls [forget the principles of democracy and the empowerment of election results] all three branches of government [well, with the possible exception of the liberal SCOTUS which is doing a fine job of legislatively advancing liberal causes in direct violation of the separation of power clause], and then seeks to change the fundamental principles and rules [that Democrats themselves first changed] of our democracy, we need to talk about it soberly and seriously [just like I'm serious and sober...yeeeeeaaaaarrrrrgggghhhhh!]. The Republican Senate leaders have decided [according to the wishes of the majority of Americans] to fundamentally alter the role of Congress [through the elective process] -- they want to give George Bush [Hitler] unprecedented power to manipulate the legislative branch and the courts [which, of course, is only reserved for Democratic presidents]. Today Harry Reid and the Democratic Senators asked us [well, actually he whined], the American people, to help them preserve the right of our elected representatives to speak their mind on the floor of the U.S. Senate [by engaging in fillibusters which end reasoned debates]. We have to act [unilateraly since we can't win a significant number elections]. Sign this petition, which we will deliver to every U.S. Senator, asking them to protect the right to free speech in the Senate [by bottling up presidential judicial nominees]. If they don't, it is not only their voice that will be silenced [well, actually we won't be "silenced", we'll be engaging in a blathering fillibuster - see above] -- it will be ours [and the unborn's]: http://www.democrats.org/freespeech Here are the facts: George Bush has appointed judges to lifetime positions at a better rate than any president in nearly three decades. More than 95% [we think 99% is too much under the "advise and consent" clause of the Constitution] of his nominees have been approved. Only ten nominees have been refused -- all because they are unqualified and out of the mainstream [from our perspective as out-of-the-mainstream kool-aid^TM imbibers ourselves] But that's not enough [it never is with us Democrats as you well know, hee hee]. And on this issue, as on Social Security, it is becoming more and more obvious to everyone [with half-a-brain like me] that the Republican leadership is out of touch with [partisan moonbat] reality. More Americans voted against George Bush than any sitting president in history [forget the fact that more vote for him than any other president]. And that same day, across the country, the Democratic candidates for Senate received over 4 million more [fraudulent] votes [from dead people, family pets, felons, and illegal aliens - plus more incumbent Democratic Senators were up for re-election] than Republicans. Americans did not endorse the fringe agenda [which we Democrats have personal experience with ourselves] to dismantle [actually it's to reform SS, but "dismantle" sounds better and describes our hysteria better] Social Security. And they did not endorse dismantling the system of checks and balances [that Democrats have attempted to do by having the judicial branch legislate from the bench] that have served our country for over 200 years. Please tell your Senator to stand up for free speech [like they did when they voted for McCain/Feingold's Bill to Limit Free Political Speech]: http://www.democrats.org/freespeech This is not a partisan issue [though we are trying our darnedest to make it partisan] -- it is an American issue [but don't expect us to put country before Democratic Party policies with regard to the war on terrorism]. And we all must act together in order to protect our democracy [a democracy which can never happen in Iraq]. Thank you [sendmoneysendmoneysendmoneysendmoney...] Governor Howard Dean, M.D. .......[YeeeeeaaaarrGGGGHHH!]

DNC chair Dean

Now that Howard Dean is the chair of the DNC, he's touring the U.S. to spread the message. On Wednesday, he spoke at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, along with Rev. Al Sharpton and Ann Coulter. Dean knows a few key Bible verses, and used them as he saw fit:

''We need to talk about values and not be afraid of them,'' he said, going on to make two biblical references. In the first he said Jesus' directive to ''love thy neighbor'' didn't mean one could choose which ones to love. He then remarked that Republicans never brought up the scriptural verse saying it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven.

This is rich (pardon the pun) coming from a man with Dean's financial situation. Remember those shirts/bumper stickers that said "Skating is not a crime"? Someone should tell Dean that being rich is not a sin, and the Bible doesn't say that it is. Unfortunately, this is a common misinterpretation. I was encouraged by his last statement:

''It's not about Republicans and Democrats, but about democracy that works,'' he said. ''I'd rather see someone go to work for a Republican campaign than sit on their butt.''

I hope he gets his wish.

A quick post to prove I'm not dead

Between a sick server and a sick family, this has not been a good month for blogging. The lasthome.net server had been ailing for some time, but things finally got to the point where it couldn't wait any longer. John moved everything from lunitari to leela after several days of borderline functionality, then it took a couple of days for me to make the DNS changes I needed, followed by a correction. Then the four of us have all been sick in various ways for at least the last three weeks. Oy. And I don't say that lightly. Gotta catch a train, but I thought I'd share an interesting C.S. Lewis quote I stumbled on from The King's eHighway:

The war creates no absolutely new situation: it simply aggravates the permanent human situation so that we can no longer ignore it. Human life has always been lived on the edge of a precipice. Human culture has always had to exist under the shadow of something infinitely more important than itself. If men had postponed the search for knowledge and beauty until they were secure, the search would never have begun. … We are mistaken when we compare war with 'normal life'. Life has never been normal. - C. S. Lewis