Blogs

At Big Hollywood, actor Robert Davi introduces his the blog of his conservative cousin Michael Rulle.

A quick scan suggests its well worth reading.

Liberal Fascism

John Ziegler - a conservative media critic - points out the embarrassing silence by the "free speech" community to his arrest at USC. Ziegler is the producer of "How Obama Got Elected" and was at USC because Katie Couric was getting an award in journalistic excellence.

Dissent is not patriotic anymore.

Why mainstream media is circling the bowl

During the Bush years, we never saw a reporter insult the wacky anti-Bush protesters and insinuate - much less assert - that protests were organized by "outside agitators."

But for the "Tea Day" protests, CNN makes an exception:

This video with CNN anchor Susan Roesgen is pretty unreal. She attends the Chicago tea party, picks some wacko out of the crowd and tries to argue with him about whether Obama's a fascist (and even then the guy with the ridiculous Obama-as-Hitler sign comes off more willing to engage in discussion than her), then she talks to a guy who seems perfectly reasonable and rudely cuts him off multiple times. She then attacks Fox News, ranting that the crowd is anti-CNN and says that the tea party is not "family viewing." Of all the leftist protests I've covered over the years — and I've covered many of them — I have never seen a reporter enter the fray and act personally offended by the many, many examples of outrageous behavior at a protest. There's little to be gained by it, and it's simply not professional. What Roesgen is doing is doing here pure hackery. Even as grandstanding, she fails. She goes about things with all the subtlety of a brick through a window, and in the end it appears she's just an angry jerk.

Remember when "dissent was the highest form of patriotism"?

It must have been like months ago, but there's a new boss in town and the meme has changed and calling the president a fascist is suddenly insulting.

"You can't pee on my head and tell me it's raining" update:

Check out this Founding Bloggers video post on how one protester called the CNN reporter on her patent bias.



I particularly liked how the woman pointed out that CNN didn't show the sign that "Republicans are Pigs," to which the reporter responded that it was out of their view.

How convenient.

What aggressive reporting.

The media isn't fooling anyone who doesn't want to be fooled.

Are Leftists allergic to religion?

Dawn Eden posted on how the "IHS" religious symbol was covered up for Obama's visit to Georgetown University, a supposedly Catholic university. She has "before" and "after" pictures.

NRO has the background story

Georgetown University says it covered over the monogram “IHS” — symbolizing the name of Jesus Christ — because it was inscribed on a pediment on the stage where President Obama spoke at the university on Tuesday and the White House had asked Georgetown to cover up all signs and symbols there....

“In coordinating the logistical arrangements for yesterday’s event, Georgetown honored the White House staff’s request to cover all of the Georgetown University signage and symbols behind Gaston Hall stage,” Julie Green Bataille, associate vice president for communications at Georgetown, told CNSNews.com.

“The White House wanted a simple backdrop of flags and pipe and drape for the speech, consistent with what they’ve done for other policy speeches,” she added. “Frankly, the pipe and drape wasn’t high enough by itself to fully cover the IHS and cross above the GU seal and it seemed most respectful to have them covered so as not to be seen out of context.”

Obviously, it wouldn't be a good idea to have it appear as if the State was endorsing religion.

It's a pity that religion - in the form of a Catholic university allowing Obama to use it as a stage for a "policy speech" - didn't think that it wouldn't be a good idea to appear to be endorsing Caesar.

Liberal Fascism

Protesters Tuesday evening when a crowd disrupted a speech by former Colorado congressman Tom Tancredo opposing in-state tuition benefits to unauthorized immigrants.

In the best tradition of the Brown Shirts.

Book/Cover

This is cool.

Susan Boyle on Britain Got Talent
by dwarthy

A judge looks at Pilate

One professional critiques the performance of another and finds it wanting.

In examining these facts objectively, I cannot imagine a more unjust judge than Pilate or a more unjust judgment than the one rendered by him. Unable to hold to the correct and just decision he initially made concerning Christ’s case, Pilate attempted to shift responsibility for making a decision, first to Herod, and then, to the crowds outside the Praetorium. Moreover, rather than having the people judge the case on the evidence—as a jury would—their judgment was to be based on a ridiculous and, as we know, rigged procedure in which they were to choose between prisoners. Finally, having ostensibly placed the decision in the hands of the people, Pilate, in an unparalleled act of weakness, pleaded with them to change their judgment.

Try to imagine, if you can, a situation where a judge, rather than rendering a decision, asks the people in his courtroom to resolve a case, and then tries to dissuade them because he believes they are wrong.

In the end, knowing that Christ was innocent but too afraid to go against the crowd, Pilate reluctantly condemns him to death. Yet, even in his final judgment, Pilate demonstrates moral and judicial cowardice, for he attempts to shift the responsibility for Christ’s death onto the crowd by “washing his hands” and saying, “Look to it yourselves.”

For a judge to commit any of the wrongs committed by Pilate on the bench—abrogating his duty to render a just decision on the merits, pandering to public opinion, repeatedly vacillating and temporizing, and imposing an undeserved sentence—would constitute gross weakness and incompetence. But to commit all of these acts in a single case is an abomination. That the people who handed Christ over to him may have been guilty of the greater sin (John 19:11) and that Pilate unwittingly cooperated in God’s salvific plan, does not absolve him of his guilt in failing to treat an innocent man with justice.

[Via Paragraph Farmer]

The inmates are running the asylum

This post about how animal rights activists are in charge of enforcement law and consider dog breeding to be a moral offense is amazing. What's pathetic is how these lunatics use their power - both official and unofficial - to ruin lives.

Tolerance, life-style choices, the right of every individual to define the meaning of their existence...none of that counts when the left is in charge.

When prayer costs

The stuff of which martyrs are made.

If only Protestant pastors could marry - part of a continuing series

The former pastor of Sierra Baptist Church in Northeast Fresno has been sentenced to 36-years in prison. Bonine plead guilty to molesting two girls over several years.

Tragic. Sad. Disappointing.

We should pray that the girls are led to happiness and all grace.

Behind the media wall: Report card on Obama's foreign trip

It's not looking good according to this Newsbusters' post on a Charles Krauthammer column:

In his major foreign policy address in Prague committing the United States to a world without nuclear weapons, President Obama took note of North Korea's missile launch just hours earlier and then grandiloquently proclaimed:

"Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished. Words must mean something. The world must stand together to prevent the spread of these weapons. Now is the time for a strong international response."

A more fatuous presidential call to arms is hard to conceive. What "strong international response" did Obama muster to North Korea's brazen defiance of a Chapter 7 --"binding," as it were -- U.N. resolution prohibiting such a launch?

The obligatory emergency Security Council session produced nothing. No sanctions. No resolution. Not even a statement. China and Russia professed to find no violation whatsoever. They would not even permit a U.N. statement that dared express "concern," let alone condemnation.


Having thus bravely rallied the international community and summoned the U.N. -- a fiction and a farce, respectively -- what was Obama's further response? The very next day, his defense secretary announced drastic cuts in missile defense, including halting further deployment of Alaska-based interceptors designed precisely to shoot down North Korean ICBMs. Such is the "realism" Obama promised to restore to U.S. foreign policy.

..... He wanted more NATO combat troops in Afghanistan to match the surge of 17,000 Americans. He was rudely rebuffed.

He wanted more stimulus spending from Europe. He got nothing.

From Russia, he got no help on Iran. From China, he got the blocking of any action on North Korea.

And what did he get for Guantanamo? France, pop. 64 million, will take one prisoner. One!

I hadn't realized what a bust the trip was in terms of substantive results.

Let them eat cake

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs makes it clear that he thinks that he can use Jedi mind trick to explain that what was obviously a demeaning act of fealty by an American president was something else:


After all, who are you going to believe, the Hope/Change administration or your lying eyes.

Second Thoughts: Well, at least the fact that they are willing to lie about it means that they feel ashamed.

Dennis Miller expresses some great sentiments in this clip:

A Very High Weirdness Score

Billy Bob Thornton comes across as a real prima donna in this interview about his musical activities. The prima donna element is pretty clear from the way that the members of his band are squirming uncomfortably as the "boss" is attempting to tank their real jobs.



The Canadian interviewer really did a fantastic job of keeping the lid on, despite Thornton's jabs at Canada and his professionalism.

Also, notwithstanding the fact that Thornton was stoned and a complete dick, the fact that he remembered who Forest J. Ackerman was is pretty impressive.

50 things every 18 year old should know

Pretty good list.

There ought to be one about "18 things every 50 year old should know," but it would be taken up with things like "get a colonoscopy."

It wasn't a bow...yea, that's the ticket...he was playing 'pull my finger' with King Abdullah

An anonymous Obama aide has denied that Obama's obvious bow was a bow:

The White House is denying that the president bowed to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia at a G-20 meeting in London, a scene that drew criticism on the right and praise from some Arab outlets.

"It wasn't a bow. He grasped his hand with two hands, and he's taller than King Abdullah," said an Obama aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The Washington Times called the alleged bow a "shocking display of fealty to a foreign potentate" and said it violated centuries of American tradition of not deferring to royalty. The Weekly Standard, meanwhile, noted that American protocol apparently rules out bowing, or at least it reportedly did on the occasion of a Clinton "near-bow" to the emperor of Japan.

Interestingly, a columnist in the Saudi-backed Arabic paper Asharq Alawsat also took the gesture as a bow and appreciated the move.

"Obama wished to demonstrate his respect and appreciation of the personality of King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz, who has made one of the most important calls in the modern era, namely the call for inter-faith and inter-cultural dialogue to defuse the hatred, conflict and wars," wrote the columnist, Muhammah Diyab.

The video shows Obama dipping toward the king as G-20 leaders greet one another at the ExCel Centre in London.

"... the jaw-dropping spectacle of a president of the United States bowing to the king of Saudi Arabia."

Even a leftist like Camille Paglia is stunned by Obama's missteps:

Obama's staffing problems are blatant -- from that bleating boy of a treasury secretary to what appears to be a total vacuum where a chief of protocol should be. There has been one needless gaffe after another -- from the president's tacky appearance on a late-night comedy show to the kitsch gifts given to the British prime minister, followed by the sweater-clad first lady's over-familiarity with the queen and culminating in the jaw-dropping spectacle of a president of the United States bowing to the king of Saudi Arabia. Why was protest about the latter indignity confined to conservatives? The silence of the major media was a disgrace. But I attribute that embarrassing incident not to Obama's sinister or naive appeasement of the Muslim world but to a simple if costly breakdown in basic command of protocol.

I'll grant that Obama needs to hire a protocol adviser, or fire the one he has, but, honestly, some of this stuff is properly basic to any adult raised outside the smug bubble of Generation Narcissus.

Predictable - Newsweek is doing its annual "Christianity sucks" piece for Easter.

Here's the article.

We see this every year.

Not that it's bias or anything. Because every year at tax time they do "Government sucks" article and on the 4th of July they do an "America sucks" article and on Martin Luther King day they do a "Victimization-exploiters suck" article and on Valentine's Day they do a "Pop Culture sucks" article, etc., etc.

Well, that's mostly irony, except for the "America sucks" article, which they do all year round.

Speaking "Austrian"...

...is like speaking "Californian."

President Obama explains how he doesn't know the word for "wheeling and dealing" in "Austrian."

Most people think that the language spoken in Austrian is commonly known as "German."

To be fair, everyone has these kinds of moments, but after years of jumping on every purported malapropism of Bush, Palin and Quayle as evidence of their "stupidity" it would be hypocritical not to apply the same standard to these Obominitions.

Hitchens v. Craig Debate on God

Doug Geivett outlines the debate between Christopher Hitchens and William Lane Craig and he concludes:

Hitchens can have no excuse for dropping arguments when he knows—or should know—exactly what to expect. Suppose one replies that William Craig is a more experienced debater and a trained philosopher, while Christopher Hitchens is a journalist working outside the Academy. That simply won’t do as a defense of Hitchens. First, Hitchens is no stranger to debate. Second, he is clearly a skillful polemicist. Third—and most important—Hitchens published a book, god Is Not Great, in which he makes bold claims against religion in general and Christianity in particular. With his book, he threw down the challenge. To his credit, he rose to meet a skillful challenger. But did he rise to the occasion? Did he acquit himself well? At one point he acknowledged that some of his objections to the designer argument were “layman’s” objections. His book, I believe, is also the work of a layman. It appears to have been written for popular consumption and without concern for accountability to Christians whose lives are dedicated to the defense of the Gospel.

It seems that even atheist observers felt that their paladin came up short:

The debate went exactly as I expected. Craig was flawless and unstoppable. Hitchens was rambling and incoherent, with the occasional rhetorical jab. Frankly, Craig spanked Hitchens like a foolish child. Perhaps Hitchens realized how bad things were for him after Craig’s opening speech, as even Hitchens’ rhetorical flourishes were not as confident as usual. Hitchens wasted his cross-examination time with questions like, “If a baby was born in Palestine, would you rather it be a Muslim baby or an atheist baby?” He did not even bother to give his concluding remarks, ceding the time instead to Q&A.

[Via Vox Day.]

Even left-wing European newspapers are taking shots at Obama muddled communication style

The Guardian notes:

Barack Obama, the World's Greatest Orator (™all news organisations), didn't exactly cover himself in glory when the BBC's political editor Nick Robinson asked him a question about who was to blame for the financial crisis. Normally word perfect, Obama ummed, ahed and waffled for the best part of two and a half minutes. Here, John Crace decodes what he was really thinking ...

Nick Robinson: "A question for you both, if I may. The prime minister has repeatedly blamed the United States of America for causing this crisis. France and Germany both blame Britain and America for causing this crisis. Who is right? And isn't the debate about that at the heart of the debate about what to do now?" Brown immediately swivels to leave Obama in pole position. There is a four-second delay before Obama starts speaking [THANKS FOR NOTHING, GORDY BABY. REMIND ME TO HANG YOU OUT TO DRY ONE DAY.] Barack Obama: "I, I, would say that, er ... pause [I HAVEN'T A CLUE] ... if you look at ... pause [WHO IS THIS NICK ROBINSON JERK?] ... the, the sources of this crisis ... pause [JUST KEEP GOING, BUDDY] ... the United States certainly has some accounting to do with respect to . . . pause [I'M IN WAY TOO DEEP HERE] ... a regulatory system that was inadequate to the massive changes that have taken place in the global financial system ... pause, close eyes [THIS IS GOING TO GO DOWN LIKE A CROCK OF SHIT BACK HOME. HELP]. I think what is also true is that ... pause [I WANT NICK ROBINSON TO DISAPPEAR] ... here in Great Britain ... pause [SHIT, GORDY'S THE HOST, DON'T LAND HIM IN IT] ... here in continental Europe ... pause [DAMN IT, BLAME EVERYONE.] ... around the world. We were seeing the same mismatch between the regulatory regimes that were in place and er ... pause [I'VE LOST MY TRAIN OF THOUGHT AGAIN] ... the highly integrated, er, global capital markets that have emerged ... pause [I'M REALLY WINGING IT NOW]. So at this point, I'm less interested in ... pause [YOU] ... identifying blame than fixing the problem. I think we've taken some very aggressive steps in the United States to do so, not just responding to the immediate crisis, ensuring banks are adequately capitalised, er, dealing with the enormous, er ... pause [WHY DIDN'T I QUIT WHILE I WAS AHEAD?] ... drop-off in demand and contraction that has taken place. More importantly, for the long term, making sure that we've got a set of, er, er, regulations that are up to the task, er, and that includes, er, a number that will be discussed at this summit. I think there's a lot of convergence between all the parties involved about the need, for example, to focus not on the legal form that a particular financial product takes or the institution it emerges from, but rather what's the risk involved, what's the function of this product and how do we regulate that adequately, much more effective coordination, er, between countries so we can, er, anticipate the risks that are involved there. Dealing with the, er, problem of derivatives markets, making sure we have set up systems, er, that can reduce some of the risks there. So, I actually think ... pause [FANTASTIC. I'VE LOST EVERYONE, INCLUDING MYSELF] ... there's enormous consensus that has emerged in terms of what we need to do now and, er ... pause [I'M OUTTA HERE. TIME FOR THE USUAL CLOSING BOLLOCKS] ... I'm a great believer in looking forwards than looking backwards.

Isn't anyone prepping Obama for questions?

Needless to say, if Bush had performed like that, we wouldn't have heard the end of it. But, then, Bush had an MBA and had practical experience in running a business and being an executive before he became president and so actually could fall back on substance in a pinch.

What were Obama's grade in college and law school, again?

Diocese of Fresno is not liable in molestation case

From the Fresno Bee:

A Fresno jury this afternoon said the Diocese of Fresno was not liable for the molestation of two brothers by their hometown priest. The jury concluded the two brothers, George and Howard Santillan, were molested by Monsignor Anthony Herdegen, but said the diocese did not know or had no reason to know about the incidents.

The brothers had alleged they were sexually abused by Herdegen, a priest in their hometown parish in Wasco, from 1959 through 1973.

The brothers sued the diocese in 2003 under a one-year window that temporarily lifted the statute of limitations on old abuse claims in California. They contend the diocese was negligent in hiring, supervising and retaining Herdegen.

To prevail, the brothers needed to prove that the church knew or should have known about Herdegen's alleged misconduct.

The witness list in Judge Donald Black's courtroom was a who's who of the Catholic hierarchy in California -- Cardinal Roger Mahony, Archbishop John Quinn and Bishop John T. Steinbock.

Mahony, now head of the nation's largest Roman Catholic archdiocese in Los Angeles, was a high-level administrator in the Fresno diocese during some of the years the two brothers allege they were molested by Herdegen. Mahony has testified in a deposition that Herdegen's housekeeper, Barbara Zeilman, might have known about the priest's abuse and would have been expected to tell church higher-ups.

The brothers' lawsuit was dismissed initially because the trial court ruled there was no evidence that the diocese had any knowledge of abuse by Herdegen.

But a three-judge panel of the 2nd District Court of Appeals ruled in May 2008 that Mahony's deposition testimony indicated the church was or should have been aware that Herdegen might have been an abuser.

At some point, the injustice of allowing lawsuits to be brought when the people against whom the accusations are made are long dead and buried begins to stink. Consider this from the appellate decision:

That housekeeper was Barbara Zeilman, who died some years before this action was filed. Zeilman was an elderly woman who came six days a week to clean up Herdegen's living quarters in the parish rectory. She was hired by Herdegen and paid with parish funds, but those funds ultimately belonged to the Diocese. According to appellants, most of the abuse occurred in Herdegen's bedroom. Although that part of the rectory was ordinarily off-limits to anyone but Herdegen, Zeilman let appellants in and knew they were often alone with Herdegen behind his closed bedroom door. Appellants' mother claimed that when she first learned of the abuse in 1987, she confronted Zeilman about it. According to the mother, she asked Zeilman, why didn't you tell me? Because I know you knew.” Instead of denying or otherwise responding to that accusation, however, Zeilman just cried. Mother operated a beauty shop and did Zeilman's hair, even after that initial confrontation. According to the mother, she and Zeilman conversed during those sessions, and even though Zeilman never said that she recalled what had happened, she did say “I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.”

Santillan v. Roman Catholic Bishop of Fresno, 163 Cal. App. 4th 4, 8 (Cal. App. 2d Dist. 2008)

It might have been nice to have heard from Zeilman about whether her crying actually was a confirmation of the claim that she knew about any molestation. Even the dissent seems to think that the evidence was sufficient to create a triable issue of fact about Zeilman's knowledge, and instead challenges the majority on the idea that Mahony's "expectation" that Zeilman "would" have told someone meant that she had a duty to report her "suspicions," but the time delay and inability of Zeilman to respond seems rather "one-sided."

Marriage redefined by elite in Iowa

NRO reports that the Iowa Supreme Court has discovered that "marriage" means "a pairing of any two individuals who want to say that they are married."

There is no explanation at this time why the "pairing" is limited "two" people.

Oh, come on! Can't anyone teach him anything about what it means to be an American?

The flag does not dip to dictators and free born Americans do not bow to any monarch ever.



But there is our President bowing to the Saudi King.

Great way of giving away over 200 years of tradition that many Americans have fought to defend.

Update;

Here's a photo.



And Powerline's Scott Johnson opines:

What's wrong with this picture? Americans do not bow to royalty. In my view, when the royal is the ruling tyrant of a despotic regime, the wrong is compounded. Putting aside the breach of American protocol, it is akin to Jimmy Carter succumbing to Brezhnev's infamous kiss at the signing of the arms accord in Vienna in 1979. It is a disgrace. As in Carter's case, Obama's supplicant attitude signifies his spirit. In this respect I distinguish it from George Bush's otherwise embarrasing handholding with the the king.

I recall being taught the "Americans do not bow" rule by my parents when I was a child. For people of my parents' generation, that kind of protocol was de rigeur.

If only Little League coaches could marry.

Part of a continuing series on the fallacy of publicity.

Julian Baggini Condemns the "New Atheists"


Baggini wrote "Atheism - A very short introduction."

Here's the essay.

Baggini makes some reasonable points. For example:

However, there is much more to religion to the metaphysics. To give a non-exhaustive list, religion is also about trying to live sub specie aeternitatis; orienting oneself to the transcendent rather than the immanent; living in a moral community of shared practice or as part of a valuable tradition; cultivating certain attitudes, such as gratitude and humility; and so on. To say, as Sam Harris does, that “religion is nothing more than bad concepts held in place of good ones for all time” misses all this. The practices of religion may be more important then the narratives, even if people believe those narratives to be true.

The new atheism has also, I think, created an unhelpful climate for atheism to flourish. When people think of atheists now, they think about men who look only to science for answers, are dismissive of religion and over-confident in their own rightness. Richard Dawkins, for example, presented a television programme on religion called The Root of all Evil and has as his website slogan “A clear thinking oasis”. Where is the balance and modesty in such rhetoric?

For me, atheism’s roots are in a sober and modest assessment of where reason and evidence lead us. That means the real enemy is not religion as such, but any kind of system of belief that does not respect these limits on our thinking. For that reason, I want to engage with thoughtful, intelligent believers, and isolate extremists. But if we demonise all religion, such coalitions of the reasonable are not possible. Instead, we are likely to see moderate religious believers join ranks with fundamentalists, the enemies of their enemy, to resist what they see as an attempt to wipe out all forms of religious belief.

As with Mr. Smythe, the hardcore atheist character in The End of the Affair - and isn't it interesting how dated the "New" Atheists really are? - whose merciless atheistic arguments persuade Sarah to believe that there must be something in religion if it is hated so much, sometimes the unforgiving arguments of the New Atheists convert people the wrong way. I know that listening to Dawkins' attack on anyone who challenges Darwinism makes me want to say "Thou almost makes me a Creationist" just because being on the same side as a a pompous ass like him seems aesthetically unpalatable.

Vox Day, who outplays the New Atheists at their own game, discusses the "error theory" conundrum of the New Atheists, i.e., how can smart people believe things that New Atheists say that only dumb people could possibly believe in?

"If people don't have Aquinas, they will follow any ass who comes along."

Dawn Eden has a post on why it is a good idea to be careful in attending seminars to enhance one's spirituality. The post is worth reading for the final sentence.

Of Liberal Hypocrisy and Double Standards

Victor Davis Hanson in NRO writes:

Team Obama: The HHS nominee and tax-plagued Sebelius ($8,000 short) was the sequel to the mega-tax-plagued Tom Daschle ($140,000 short), who followed disclosures about Treasury Sec. Timothy Geithner ($48,000 short), who was joined by Nancy Kelleher (who knows?), and Labor Sec. Hilda Solis ($6,400 short).

The real story is not just that our tax code is so complicated that even our supposedly best and brightest cannot fathom it, or that these problems allegedly derived from mere technicalities, or even that the corrections and repayment usually follow nomination, the subtext being that without the chance for the federal post, the fed does not collect their revenue.

No, the lesson is that all these nominees belong to precisely the class that we've heard over the last two years "made out like bandits," and should "spread the wealth," and need to "level the playing field," and "were the beneficiaries of the Bush tax cuts" and should be "patriotic" in paying "their fair share."

So there is a real ethical crisis among the liberal elite who, we are learning for the nth time, suffer the additional wage of hypocrisy, by calling for higher taxes on the upper-middle-class (often punctuated by self-serving qualifiers that they themselves are willing to pay more in taxes), only to scheme to find ways to cut down their tax liability contrary to the law.

The tragedy is that moralists like Daschle, Geithner, Solis, etc. have far more access to tax lawyers and are far less likely to pay the consequences when caught than the putative "rich" that the liberal left, for the last year, has so cavalierly trashed.

Something larger and really weird is going on here. Liberal tax raisers are not paying taxes. The majority of big Wall Street money (cf. AIG, Fannie, Freddie, Goldman-Sachs, etc) is going to the Democratic Party. The J.P.Morgan-like tycoons such as Buffet, Gates, Soros, etc. are apparently strong supporters of these avatars of the new economics. Congessional liberal leaders are mulitmillionaires like Feinstein, Kennedy, Kerry, Kohl, Pelosi, Rockefellar, etc. All of this is superimposed on this pseudo-populist agenda, decrying the Wall Street culture and corporate America that enriched them, while calling for more and more taxes that some of them apparently so often find ways of avoiding.