Obama and Jon Favreau and taste and how that relates to the safety of the country

the photo featuring President-elect Obama's chief speechwriter Jon Favreau and his colleague that turned up in the media and on the Internet last week.

While the following notation of the usual double standard applied to the sins of the Demos as compared to the sins of the Repubs is accurate, it really isn't the point.

Breitbart observes that "[t]he aggressive iconography of two young drunk men taking advantage of a life-size cutout of a woman - especially a powerful one - would bring an elite college campus to a standstill, force a housecleaning of a Fortune 500 company, ground the Air Force Academy and would, in most cases, ruin the career of a Republican staffer or elected official." He juxtaposes the jocular reaction to Favreau's photograph with that of any comparable Republican:

"If, for instance, President Bush's former speechwriter Michael Gerson had been caught in flagrante cartone, he would have stepped down before the president could fire him. If not, the media, the feminist establishment and the Democratic Party leadership would have destroyed Mr. Gerson and Mr. Bush and crafted a "culture of harassment" umbrella descriptor to hang around the administration's neck in perpetuity.

In GOP land, apologies and resignations are never enough...."

In the case of Favreau, however, "the Democratic double standard on political correctness kicked in immediately as the feminist establishment, the media and even Mrs. Clinton herself came forth to save the fast-rising Obama wordsmith." Whatever moral one draws from this particular episode, it is a striking illustration of the phenomenon that was the subject of Professor Hanson's column.

No. The issue is Hussein. By tolerating this action he is clearly saying, "I have no taste."

But why, you may ask, is this important? Because dear chums it validates those who rightly noted that Hussein had hung around the Reverend Wright because he had no particular problem with listening to someone scream "God damn America!" and better yet, Hussein could use the association to his advantage.

The same applies to his association with Ayers. He knew who Ayers was and what Ayers had done. But again, he had no particular problem with what Ayers was and what he had done, and again better yet, he could use the association to his advantage.

He has no taste. No foundation in middle class morals and mores. He belongs to no group and thus feels free to do as he feels right. There is another word for such a person that I am inching towards using, but I think he deserves a bit longer to prove me wrong.

He is starting to remind me of Nixon without Nixon's base patriotism... and, like Nixon, his loyalty is to someone who is loyal to him. In the end that destroyed Nixon's ability to govern.

At present the media is still in denial, but the far Left is starting to grumble. We shall see how long and how much they will endure from The Chosen One.

Powerline Link

England gives up its language

A nation that gives up its language soon ceases to be a nation. The ties that bind its citizens together are words. Spoken and written words that invoke common memories of the country.

From England, a country that seems to be unable to shed its glorious and freedom giving past fast enough, we get another example of how those who worship at the altar of diversity are the leaders in this damnable task.

Keep in mind that this the "Children's" dictionary so some one will argue that the words aren't gone, merely moved. I would argue that 99% of the vocabulary is formed by age ten, and by removing them, even if a child is exposed to such a evil word as "altar," they won't have a ready and easy source of its meaning.

Oxford University Press has removed words like "aisle", "bishop", "chapel", "empire" and "monarch" from its Junior Dictionary and replaced them with words like "blog", "broadband" and "celebrity". Dozens of words related to the countryside have also been culled.

The publisher claims the changes have been made to reflect the fact that Britain is a modern, multicultural, multifaith society.

I never dreamed that "aisle," was ancient and out of date. And replacing "chapel" with "celebrity" seems to be well past midnight on the stupid clock.

What's next? "Terrorist" replaced by "insurgent?" That would suit the Left wing diversity crowd quite well."

Evidently this nonsense started in 2003. The removed words are:

Carol, cracker, holly, ivy, mistletoe

Dwarf, elf, goblin

Abbey, aisle, altar, bishop, chapel, christen, disciple, minister, monastery, monk, nun, nunnery, parish, pew, psalm, pulpit, saint, sin, devil, vicar

Coronation, duchess, duke, emperor, empire, monarch, decade

adder, ass, beaver, boar, budgerigar, bullock, cheetah, colt, corgi, cygnet, doe, drake, ferret, gerbil, goldfish, guinea pig, hamster, heron, herring, kingfisher, lark, leopard, lobster, magpie, minnow, mussel, newt, otter, ox, oyster, panther, pelican, piglet, plaice, poodle, porcupine, porpoise, raven, spaniel, starling, stoat, stork, terrapin, thrush, weasel, wren.

Acorn, allotment, almond, apricot, ash, bacon, beech, beetroot, blackberry, blacksmith, bloom, bluebell, bramble, bran, bray, bridle, brook, buttercup, canary, canter, carnation, catkin, cauliflower, chestnut, clover, conker, county, cowslip, crocus, dandelion, diesel, fern, fungus, gooseberry, gorse, hazel, hazelnut, heather, holly, horse chestnut, ivy, lavender, leek, liquorice, manger, marzipan, melon, minnow, mint, nectar, nectarine, oats, pansy, parsnip, pasture, poppy, porridge, poultry, primrose, prune, radish, rhubarb, sheaf, spinach, sycamore, tulip, turnip, vine, violet, walnut, willow

Words put in:

Blog, broadband, MP3 player, voicemail, attachment, database, export, chatroom, bullet point, cut and paste, analogue

Celebrity, tolerant, vandalism, negotiate, interdependent, creep, citizenship, childhood, conflict, common sense, debate, EU, drought, brainy, boisterous, cautionary tale, bilingual, bungee jumping, committee, compulsory, cope, democratic, allergic, biodegradable, emotion, dyslexic, donate, endangered, Euro

Apparatus, food chain, incisor, square number, trapezium, alliteration, colloquial, idiom, curriculum, classify, chronological, block graph

Isn't the question.... Why not just add the words? The English language is a wonderful sponge and is used the world over because it is flexible and adds/removes words on its own. It needs no help.

This action is like the canary in the coal mine.

The excuse, and the Left always has a good intentioned excuse, is stated as:

Vineeta Gupta, the head of children's dictionaries at Oxford University Press, said: "We are limited by how big the dictionary can be – little hands must be able to handle it

But wait, dear Vineeta, are you telling us that six or seven extra pages are so burdensome that the users can't handle them? As Colonel Potter said, "Horse hockey."

Here is the real reason. Again from Vineeta:

We are also much more multicultural. People don't go to Church as often as before. Our understanding of religion is within multiculturalism, which is why some words such as "Pentecost" or "Whitsun" would have been in 20 years ago but not now."

Indeed. "Not now."

`I don't know what you mean by "glory,"' Alice said.

Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. `Of course you don't -- till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"'

`But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument,"' Alice objected.

`When _I_ use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, `it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less.'

`The question is,' said Alice, `whether you CAN make words mean so many different things.'

`The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, `which is to be master - - that's all.'

--Lewis Carrol, "Through the Looking Glass"

Links and thanks to the Telegraph.