random thoughts and good stuff to read

many interesting topics to discuss here. there’s the ann coulter – john edwards feud.  scooter libby might have to serve some jail time. the inexcusable state of affairs with government-run military hospitals like walter reed is something we need to look into.

ann coulter is who she is, but she’s getting to sheehan-land with her outrageous statements. she can say whatever she wants. no one is silencing her. of course there is a little room for interpretation in the entire context of her statements about john edwards, but at some point, we on the right have to decide that we won’t financially support flame-throwing. that’s not what we are about as conservatives, and it hurts our credibility. john edwards will be fine. i’m not worried that ann coulter can permanently damage his candidacy with anything she says about him.  he might even get some more campaign donations out of the whole dust-up.

the scooter libby trial was an attempt to find out whether the bush administration lied to get the country into war with iraq. they may have convicted libby on obstruction charges, but fitzgerald failed to prove the left’s main argument in getting his conviction. this trial wasn’t even about scooter libby. for the left, it was about trying to implicate rove, president bush, and vice president cheney in a massive deception of the american people in the run-up to the war in iraq. this attempt failed. i’m not saying that libby did nothing wrong, but he wasn’t convicted for outing valerie plame, which was supposed to be the unforgivable sin that prompted this case. why are we talking about libby’s credibility and totally ignoring the fact that joe wilson also lied about his finding in niger? hmm.

i agree with the left on very few occasions. this i think that we should all agree on: we must take better care of our military men and women who are injured in the field of battle. if we are going to ask them to lay their lives on the line for this country, they deserve to have the best care we can provide. this kind of care cannot be found in government-run hospitals such as walter reed. it is not a failure of medical personnel. it is a failure of bureaucracy. we should have kept a closer eye on this, and we need to make some changes so that this kind of neglect doesn’t happen in the future.

links:

patrick ruffini opines on what to look for in our ’08 candidates.

according to real clear politics, rudy giuliani didn’t support the 1996 welfare reform bill, even though he did implement massive reforms in new york city.

some non-binding satire from frank j at imao.