Cultural
Best: Pope John Paul II resolutely carrying on until his death and living the Church’s teaching that all life has intrinsic value, no matter the condition.
Worst: The abandonment of the values that led Americans to be outraged by the starvation of Baby Doe leads America to condone the starvation of Terri Schiavo.

Political
Best: The defeat of Harriet Miers, showing conservatives don’t always kow-tow to the GOP elites.
Honorable Mention: Mike Pence leads the GOP back towards fiscal responsibility by standing up to House leadership.
Worst: Senator Ted Stevens impassioned defense of pork-barrel spending.

Local
Best: The Virginia blogosphere takes off with the 2005 election. I briefly join the Old Dominion Blog Alliance before leaving.
Worst: Mark Warner proves to be a successful one-man organizer of Virginia’s Democratic party, winning traditionally conservative exurban area while showing he is stronger in Virginia than ‘08 hopeful George Allen. National GOP beware.
Runner up:Del. Dick Black, a dedicate pro-lifer, loses his seat in Northern Virginia.

Sports
Best: The Washington Redskins sweep Dallas for the first time in a decade, and come to the edges of playoff contention. Will they make it? Only 2006 will tell.
Worst (tie): Notre Dame loses to USC in the final seconds. William and Mary loses to JMU under the lights… again.

Music
Best: Traditionalist country musicians put out a number of great CD’s, capped by Ray Scott’s My Kind of Music and Martina McBride’s Timeless albums.
Worst: The resurgence of bad pop-country, including hit-or-miss Big and Rich’s “Comin’ to Your City” and the continuing popularity of Rascal Flatts.

Film
Best: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe shows you can make a successful movie that teaches an important lesson without having it suck.
Worst: The Dukes of Hazzard is so bad even Cooter can’t watch it. (albeit for different reasons)

Public Education
Best: The increasing popularity of the blogosphere provides fresh, fertile ground for conservatives to debate what it means to be a conservative. It helps to remind one another of first things.
Worst: Academic elites continue to try and stamp out debate and discussion of new and different ideas.

Personal (feel free to ignore)
Best: Working with some great folks like John McCormack through American Collegians for Life. (Less than 100 spaces remain for the conference!)
Worst: Get accepted to work at Philmont, but have to turn it down.

The Associated Press wrote this piece on the Santorum-Casey race today. This will certainly be the big one of 2006.

Santorum isn’t being helped much by a national Republican Party with tattered coattails. Bruised by recent scandals including the indictment of former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, Republicans aim to keep a tight hold on Congress as Democrats burnish their own message, “We can do better.”

This is true, and probably not for just Santorum, as three years of Republican control of Congress has certainly not generated the progression of core Republican principles that people envisioned it would. Santorum, has a bigger disadvantage, however, being from a swing state where statewide elections can and do go either way.

To Democrats, Santorum presents an opportunity to take out a senior senator of the other party — just as Republican John Thune did in South Dakota last year when he upset then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D. Democrats haven’t elected a Pennsylvanian to a full term in the Senate since 1962.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. It is true that if Santorum were to lose he would be the first Republican to lose a Senate race in Pennsylvania in 44 years. Additionally, our Democratic governor in PA is also up for reelection this year so that throws a twist in to the mix. It is imporant to note that the governor’s race really may not have much bearing on Santorum’s. In 2000, Pennsylvania went handily to Al Gore, but Rick Santorum also won reelection. Another problem is the disarray that has become of the Republican Committee of Montgomery County. One of the most populated counties in the state and heavily Republican, it has been losing elected offices to Democrats over the past few years due to inept leadership and infighting.

Rick Santorum is infamous for pulling off victories that demographically he shouldn’t win. This one will certainly be another nail biter for the GOP.

Please file Donald Trump’s possible run for NY governor under the dumb if true category.

Good times.

via Drudge

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow warned lawmakers on Thursday that a legally set limit on the government’s ability to borrow will be hit in mid-February and urged Congress to raise it quickly.

Failure to do so potentially risks throwing the country into its first default in history, Snow warned in what has become virtually an annual rite as U.S. borrowing needs spiral.

“The administration now projects that the statutory debt limit, currently $8.184 trillion, will be reached in mid-February 2006,” Snow said in a letter to 21 members of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate released by Treasury after financial markets had closed.

Is this guy serious?? What’s the point of setting a debt limit if they are just going to raise it every time they reach it?

Snow said that Treasury, if the debt limit was not raised by then, would have to take “extraordinary actions” to keep paying its bills for everything from Social Security to national defense spending.

He talks as if this is a horrible thing. Good! Stop spending all of our money on bureaucrats and socialist welfare programs.

Why on Earth should we bother electing Republicans when we can get the same thing from the Democrats?

Oh, those wascals at the L.A. Times.

Make no mistake, Rick is alive and kicking.

Note that Rick is now down only 11pts, if Casey couldn’t hold onto a 20pt lead with the party/union endorsements in a Democratic primary whose to say he could hold 11pts against one of the best campaigners I’ve seen.

Townhall:

Perhaps the biggest problem for Team Casey is the ability of the candidate to actually campaign. Leading up to the 2002 Democratic Gubernatorial Primary, Bob Casey Jr. led Ed Rendell by as many as 20 points. A Casey victory was said to be inevitable, but as the race began to heat up, that conclusion proved to be premature.

Rendell quickly caught and surpassed Casey en route to his eventual upset. Rendell’s victory was largely attributed to the fact that he ran circles around Casey as a candidate and to the fact that Casey, recognizing this, was forced to go purely negative in hopes of depressing Rendell’s surging numbers.

If Casey repeats his poor showing of 2002, look for Santorum to close the gap as the race heats up and Casey’s profile is heightened. Already, there are signs of this happening.

My Junior Senator, Charles Schumer (Catholics Need Not Apply-NY), has what I would call a modest aspiration of picking up seven seats in 2006. I expect it will be more like 15 or 20, but I have been wrong in the past.

Prime Minister of Canada Paul Martin is now blaming increasing violence in Toronto on….

1.) Nanny state socialism and liberal social policies that demean all Canadian citizens.
2.) The growth of street gangs in the city.
3.) The American devils.

You get three guesses, and the first two don’t count. Apparently Mssr Martin is playing the Schroeder card. Gin up anti-Americanism in order to hobble his way across the finish line in an election he has no business winning.

Of course, when I first read the “blame America” story I immediately recalled the exchange from Whit Stillman’s “Barcelona”:

Woman: You can’t say Americans are not more violent than other people.
Fred: No.
Woman: All those people killed in shootings in America?
Fred: Oh, shootings, yes. But that doesn’t mean Americans are more violent than other people. We’re just better shots.

As usual, one must do some digging to find some truth and reason behind the MSM’s sensationalist, prejudiced reporting. In this case, the reporting is concerning Bush’s wiretapping authorizations, which obviously reek of a Hitleresque power grab in the eyes of the NYT and their media cronies.

The MSM story? In a noble act of conscience, FISA Judge James Robertson resigned from the court in protest of Bush’s actions. Shame on Bush for going over the FISA court’s authority.

The story behind the story? You can get it via NewsMax. Turns out that Judge Robertson, appointed by Clinton, has a selective conscience. From the story:

As Accuracy in Media noted in 2000, Judge Roberston’s conscience wasn’t particularly troubled by the crimes committed by one-time Clinton Deputy Attorney General Webb Hubbell.

In two cases involving Hubbell, AIM reported, “Judge James Robertson threw out a tax charge and another for lying to federal investigators. Appellate courts overruled in both cases, and Hubbell then plead guilty to felonies in each case.”

Judge Robertson’s conscience also seemed to go AWOL when it came to the case of Archie Schaffer, an executive with Tyson Chicken - the company that had showered Mr. Clinton with campaign contributions and helped steer Mrs. Clinton to her commodities market killing.

Critics said Judge Robertson was merely returning the favor on behalf of the man who appointed him, when - as CNN reported in 1998, he “threw out the jury conviction of Tyson Foods executive Archie Schaffer for providing gifts to former Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy.”

Hmm…. very interesting. Surely the Times, in their all-knowing journalistic superiority, have a civic duty to report these facts? One can only wish.

Hat tip to Boortz.

Another red state with their priorities backwards. Of course, the liberal argument will be, “What about the children??”. This is nothing more than another taxpayer funded program that is encouraging illegal immigrants to sneak into our country. Every state that does something like this is more salt in the wound that is mass illegal immigration destroying our national identity and draining our resources.

Republicans hold the governor’s mansion and the majority in the Nevada State Senate. How is this program even being allowed to exist?

LAS VEGAS A Nevada state program providing monthly welfare payments to children born in the United States to illegal immigrants has expanded for the last three years.

State figures show the program — called nonqualified, noncitizen assistance — has risen from an average of 670 monthly cases statewide in 2003 to 765 cases in 2005.

The program cost increased over the same period from two-point-one to two-point-five (M) Million dollars.

Officials say about 80 percent of state welfare payments are made in southern Nevada, including Clark County and Las Vegas.

The Nevada state Division of Welfare and Supportive Services is expected next month to consider offering help to a new group — immigrants who’ve been the victims of abuse.

Officials say the idea is to make it possible for women to leave abusive situations — even if they’re in the country illegally.

Open thread for discussion on the upcoming loss of a GOP Senate seat in Mississippi as reported by Bob Novak, who I would sleep better at night if he were in the Senate himself.

Old story. Senator Rick Santorum has quit the advisory board of the Thomas More Law Center over the Dover intelligent design case. Story from the Boston Globe here.

This move is inconsequential, it will not help Santorum in his race against Casey, neither do I expect it to hurt him in the long run. What it does do is indicate to those of us in the trenches of the culture war that he literally does not care about us or what we are doing. The chief mission of the More Center has nothing to do with the narrow evolution/ID/creationism debate, but lies instead in the promotion of traditional values and a culture of life. My guess it was more those positions that Santorum wants to distance himself from as he continues to forget the people that put him in office in the first place.

When I wish you a Merry Christmas.

And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.

(And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.)

And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.

And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David:)

To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.

And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered.

And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us.

And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger.

And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child.

And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.

But Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart.

And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.

Or so says Professor Bainbridge. While you can’t sum up conservatism with any single philosopher, his cogent, articulated appeal to Kirk lends credibility to the claim.

I think the Professor makes a number of excellent points, but the most important is how we rushed into the Patriot Act. Even the most basic dictionary form of conservatism would revolt against such sudden change. Now some will say change was thrust on us, and we only responded in kind, yet I think Bainbridge’s point is that Kirkian conservatism prohibits reactive, far-reaching policy of that sort. This isn’t to say that the Patriot Act couldn’t be enacted after serious debate, but not with the sort of “do or die” deadline the President put forth.

Bainbridge scores a two-fer by pointing us to Steven Taylor’s observation that the GWOT is a war unlike any other, and as such we should reconsider some of the powers we give to the government. I think he’s right on the mark in noting that the objectives in this war are far more amorphous, and that there are serious liberty implications of giving up rights when the end point is undefined. You need only look at Britain to see where the slippery slope of security at the cost of liberty leads.

Adult stem cells put a celebrity on the road to health. Too bad you’ll never hear about it from the MSM, despite the Senate passing and the president signing legislation to fund the ethically sound, successful method of stem cell research.

Take this ABC News story, on the bill’s signing. Despite being called the “Stem Cell Therapeutic and Research Act of 2005″ the article doesn’t use the words “stem cell”. Incredible, but expected. Fox isn’t much better, they only mention stem cells in the context of a bill on embryonic stem cell research. NEWS FLASH: There’s a panoply of different types of stem cell research!

I’m sure Ed Murrow would be disappointed, if Ed Murrow wasn’t a leftist.

(Shameless plug: support pro-life groups by doing your Google searching at ProLifeSearch.com.)

The Club for Growth is coming out swinging against Joe Schwarz one of the biggest liberals in Congress. He is being opposed by Tim Walberg, a solid Club-backed candidate. He apparently doesn’t have a website yet but once he does make sure to donate.

Check out this new MoveOn Ad

So let’s imagine what the founders would think of a certain situation:
1. There is a piece of land located in a sovereign state
2. The population of that state overwhelmingly supports a certain use for that piece of land
3. The federal government owns the land
4. The federal government tells the state where they can stick it
5. The citizens of other states decide what happens to the land

I believe #3 would have been enough to send the founders over the edge, but #4 and #5 would have been legitimate revolution fodder for our founders. The federal government shouldn’t own any land outside of military establishments and post offices, maybe, some other federal offices, but not huge swaths of land. Second, the Republicans should adopt a new strategy on this one. Sell the land back to the state and then there’s nothing the Washington liberals could do about it.

The true conservative approach to this and other problems is to return the land to the states and let them decide. The issue of ANWR shouldn’t be a federal issue plain and simple. Sadly though federalism on both sides of the aisle is long dead.

From Politics1 (A daily must read):

ALASKA. What exactly did curmudgeonly US Senate President Pro Tempore Ted Stevens (R) mean — according to the Anchorage Daily News — when he said “This is the saddest day of my life … I say goodbye to the Senate tonight”after his proposal to allow oil drilling in the Alaskan National Wildlife Reserve (ANWR) failed on Wednesday? Stevens’ staff refuses to clarify the statement. Observers agree Stevens is fed-up with DC politics after his failures this year with ANWR and his failed funding for Alaska’s so-called “bridge to nowhere”? Some believe that — at age 82 and after 37 years in the US Senate — Stevens is contemplating resigning. While Stevens is not up for re-election until 2008, a resignation in the coming weeks would force a 2006 special election. A state law adopted by voters after Governor Frank Murkowski (R) appointed his daughter Lisa to his vacant US Senate seat now prohibits the Governor from making any interim appointment before the special election. Of course, at the end of the day, this is more likely just Stevens’ pissed-off way of saying he probably won’t seek re-election in ‘08.