The Anchoress

Doug Ross has posted what is perhaps his best post and says what I have tried to say for a couple of years now, but he does it concisely and with simple lucidity:

Let’s play a game. I call it Frivolous vs. Magnanimous. It’s a great way to highlight the differences between the two political parties.

Debate:
Frivolous: The Democrats cancelled their debate on Fox News, apparently afraid of partisan “spin”.

Magnanimous: The Republican debate appeared on noted pro-Democratic outlet MSNBC and was hosted by liberal pundit Chris Matthews… with color commentary offered by Keith Olbermann. Olbermann, of course, is an unhinged leftist who recently named the GOP the “leading terrorist group” in America. The Republicans were unafraid of political spin and were happy to appear on MSNBC.
[...]
Free Speech
Frivolous: Insight reports that Rep. Maurice Hinchey and Sen. Bernie Sanders are spearheading Democratic efforts to stifle the only media channels espousing conservative opinion by reinstituting the “fairness doctrine”. Sanders stated, “now is the time to begin asking that if networks provide their listeners with 99 percent of talk shows being with right-wing extremists, whether that really is what public trust is about.” Bottom line: Democrats seeks to eradicate conservative talk radio, because it has dominated its competition (consider the bankrupt Air America network).

Magnanimous: I can find no serious effort by Republican leaders to suppress free speech. To the contrary, I’ve found only examples of Republicans defending the right to dissent.

In between those two topics, Ross also compares the Democrat and Republican responses to: Supreme Court Justices (Don’t miss that one), War, Voting and Vandalism and Fair Voting Practices.

His post is one you’ll want to go read, and save. And think about it. He did miss one thing, though, the idea that the Dems now want to stop spying on terrorists so they can “prove” the man-made global warming theory. Which is nice, I guess in one respect - it is a tacit acknowledgment that - DiFi aside - the science is not “settled.”

Ed Driscoll suspects things are only going to get worse and more nuts.

Some other thought-provoking reads worth your time:

Dick Meyer wrote about the ascendancy of political paranoia a while ago. Now, Ed Morrissey take a look at how it seems to be running rampant on the left, where “reality” seems to be taking a holiday, as even the distinctions between pretending for a camera and actually being the person you are are becoming blurry to them. Ed makes a great point at the end of that piece. Also, don’t miss his thoughts on what hate crimes legislation will bring us.

Remember terrorism? It might be easy to forget, being as how we haven’t been hit since 9/11 - I blame Bush - and terrorism is down everywhere which may mean - cough - we’re winning the war on terror, aka The War Which Must Not Be Named…but not everyone has forgotten. Shrinkwrapped, fer-instance.

Adult Stem Cell Therapy making inroads in treating ailing hearts.

Let’s see…people euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research and aborting of babies is good, but dog euthanasia is reprehensible. Damn me if I can find any consistency in it. And, I’m sorry, but this is - to may way of thinking - unambiguously wrong.

Something kind of fun: Anne & Anne chatting on bloggingheads. I liked it.

Ever read about how a film is considered “great” and wondered if there was something wrong with you for thinking it way overrated? Here is a list of 100 overrated/underrated films that I find myself much in agreement with, particularly re the foreign films. Have fun.

Wha?? Saudi women stripping for the internet?

Varifrank on the debates. I know it’s a day old, but it’s Varifrank.

I like this long, thoughtful and very charmingly fond piece by Cobb, writing about his friends, “The Regulars.” Sometimes we forget how great it is to have friends we see regularly, know well and enjoy being around - a great gift, something for which to be thankful in an increasingly splintered and lonely world.

Finally, speaking of friends, Tracey knows the most interesting characters!