The ultimate post

Finally got the word for corporate: Das Blog ist verboten!

Das Blog: Good movie title, ja?

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Aufwiedersehen.

KM

The elephant in the room

If Mike Huckabee wins the GOP nomination, it will be the second time in my life that I won't be able to enthusiastically pull the Republican lever in November. The first time was in 1976. I voted for Gerald Ford, a mediocre machine pol. But I wasn't happy about it.

Would I vote for Huckabee? Probably. But again, not happily. The problem is, I know there are some conservatives who won't.

And apparently there are some conservatives -- those most likely to vote for Huckabee -- who won't vote for Romney.

And for others still, McCain is an insurmountable obstacle. His record on immigration and campaign finance is radioactive.

Guiliani seems to have disappeared from nomination discussion. He might be the most electable of the bunch, but he too has serious conservative position problems on God, guns and Gonzaleses.

All of which leaves me, as we begin the second week of January 2008, somewhat pessimistic on Republican chances of retaining the White House. It would help if the candidates began speaking more charitably of each other. Only one can win. It would serve conservatism if they'd begin positioning themselves to support whomever that might be.

The other infringement

In my mind, campaign finance law -- not just McCain-Feingold, but all of it -- infringes on the First Amendment right to free speech. That's not an uncommon view, but unfortunately only four Supreme Court justices hold it.

There's another infringement, though, that isn't talked about much. Also guaranteed in the First Amendment is that "Congress shall make no law ... abridging ... the right of the people peaceably to assemble." This explanation is from Wex, which sounds sort of like a legal Wikipedia maintained by Cornell Law School:

The right to assemble allows people to gather for peaceful and lawful purposes. Implicit within this right is the right to association and belief. The Supreme Court has expressly recognized that a right to freedom of association and belief is implicit in the First, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments. This implicit right is limited to the right to associate for First Amendment purposes. It does not include a right of social association. The government may prohibit people from knowingly associating in groups that engage and promote illegal activities. The right to associate also prohibits the government from requiring a group to register or disclose its members or from denying government benefits on the basis of an individual's current or past membership in a particular group. There are exceptions to this rule where the Court finds that governmental interests in disclosure/registration outweigh interference with first amendment rights.

I'm thinking about this because of Bryan's snide aside in a story about Ron Paul's blimp that campaign finance reform "did such a good job of getting money out of politics." Point being that RonPaulBlimp.com is not associated with the Ron Paul campaign, and therefore can accept unlimited contributions to keep the thing aloft.

Here's my beef, which I've run into on several occasions over the last few years:

Richie Rich supports Ron Paul for President. Rich, by himself, could finance Paul's campaign. But under current law, he can contribute just $2,300. (He can do some other stuff to funnel a little more money directly to the campaign -- contribute to pro-Paul PACs, for example -- but it wouldn't come to much. Rich's total political contributions for any given election are limited to $108,200.)

But Rich, like the blimp backers, wants to do more. So he forms a 527 political committee. He can spend his entire fortune, through this committee, pushing a Paul presidency. And he can take unlimited contributions from other bigwigs toward that end.

One thing he can no longer do, however, is talk to Ron Paul or anyone associated with Paul's official campaign. That would be illegal coordination. But it seems to me that by taking the only option campaign finance laws afford to fully exercise his freedom of speech, he's also lost his right to associate with people of like mind for a common purpose.

This happened to me in 2006, when I had to tell a good friend in May I couldn't talk to him until after the November election. The agency I worked for was hired by a 527 to do some mail & media in the governor's race, and my friend was the candidate's campaign manager.

Wex says there are exceptions to the right of association "where the Court finds that governmental interests in disclosure/registration outweigh interference with first amendment rights."

You think the framers of the First Amendment would agree with those exceptions? Or would James Madison have asked Sens. McCain & Feingold, "What part of 'Congress shall make no law' don't you understand?"

I know that makes me sound like Paul. But then, that's why so many people are drawn to his candidacy. Not me -- I always liked George best. But a lot of people.

It's best served cold

DSCC Guy seems to have returned the favor by putting me on all of the Democratic campaign committee email lists. A couple of days ago I got one from Rahm Emanuel. Now there's one from Nancy Pelosi sitting in my inbox.

I guess you shouldn't argue with people who buy pixels by the terabyte.

Speaking ill of the dead

It's an art form.

White Christmas 2007

Snowed about 10 inches in Denver on Christmas Day. Nice and sunny today, but we're supposed to get another half-foot tomorrow.

This is the first time I've used the Blogger video upload thingie. I don't know why it shows up twice like that.

I'm really not fond of children

Just sayin'.

17

Why I'm not a monster blogger

Mike Huckabee wrote an article for the January-February edition of Foreign Affairs, the foreign policy pub. It's received a lot of commentary this week. One quote that played prominently:

Sun-tzu's ancient wisdom is relevant today: "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Yet we have not had diplomatic relations with Iran in almost 30 years; the U.S. government usually communicates with the Iranian government through the Swiss embassy in Tehran. When one stops talking to a parent or a friend, differences cannot be resolved and relationships cannot move forward. The same is true for countries.

Well, there's a lot wrong with that paragraph, but the first thing I thought when I saw it was, "Sun-tzu said that?"

My second thought was, "I wonder if the Cowboys game will be on TV Sunday?"

Fortunately, Junkyard Blog was around to do the 30-second fact-check.

Here's to you, DSCC Blog Inspector Guy

For Bud Light's next commercial:

Bud Light presents ... Real Men of Genius!

(Real Men of Geeeeenius!)

Today we salute you, Mr. DSCC Blog Inspector Guy.

(Mr. DSCC Blog Inspector Guuuuuuuuuuy)

With your poli sci degree from Harvard's Kennedy School, you could've joined a K Street consulting firm, but you wanted to make a difference. So you took that internship with the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee.

(Cause it's all about the enviornmeeeeeent)

Now it's in by 9 and out by 8, plotting takedowns on Hot Air, Redstate, Can't See the Center, and that blog that Jeff Goldstein used to write.

(Whatever happened to Protein Wisduuuuuuummmm?)

Whatever it takes to put Mark Udall in the Senate. That's your mission. And if it takes a little lurking, well it's a job somebody's got to do. And we'll never even know if you're a guy. Because while SiteMeter tells us your IP address and domain name, it doesn't know whether that pair you've got travels high or low.

(Yeeeeeeaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!)

So crack open an ice cold Bud Light, O Policeman of the Packets. Because while Al Gore might have invented it, YOU put the "I" in Internet!

(Mr. DSCC Blog Inspector Guuuuuuuyyyyyyy!)

Hey Edelman Guy

Whazzup? Contact link on the right.

Note to everyone else: Strange traffic pattern. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Since I've entered ...

... Lazy Bastard Land, you might as well go read Iowahawk's latest.

Give yourself a week or so, though. And if you don't know who Scott Beauchamp and Franklin Foer are, you probably won't get it.

Does Mark Cuban have an agenda?

Mark Cuban, financier and owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks, is much in the news this week.

First off, there's the movie he bankrolled, "Redacted." It premiered this weekend in 15 theaters. It earned $25,000. It's another in the recent flock of anti-war flicks, none of which did well. But $25,000? That wasn't a very good investment, Mark.

For the second link, you have to read to the end of the long article in New York Magazine, "Dan Rather's Last Big Story is Himself." Sad, pathetic, tragic -- however you feel about Dan Rather, reading this almost makes you want to avert your eyes. But then there's this, on page seven: "In the weeks I spent talking to him, Rather was still hustling like he’d be on the news each night at 6:30 in front of 7 million viewers. His schedule is packed with reporting trips for his current employer, financier Mark Cuban’s tiny cable channel HDNet ..."

I don't know what else Cuban's got going, but he's certainly heavy into entertainment. There's one nice credit on that list, "Good Night, and Good Luck," about a CBS newsman with a better reputation than Rather's doing that brave anti-McCarthy shtick.

Is Mark Cuban, particularly after his spin on Dancing with the Stars, simply a patron saint of lost left-wing causes? Or is he getting bad advice? I hope it's the latter, lest he meet up with George Soros.

Thursday, Nov. 22

The day and date don't ring many bells with newspaper editors, apparently, although the New York Times had a related op-ed.

Brings to mind a lyric:

Time it was and what a time it was it was,
A time of innocence a time of confidences.

Long ago it must be, I have a photograph
Preserve your memories, they're all that's left you

Odd. Simon & Garfunkel don't seem to have a website.

Democrats on CNN

Maybe next time they'll think twice about walking away from Fox.

Anything happen last week?

I was moving. The only newspaper I saw was the one I used to pack the dishes when the clean newsprint ran out.

Shell on shale

Following up on this post, Jill Davis of Shell Oil called today while I was driving through downtown Denver on I-25, which is not the best place to have a long conversation about energy policy. Naturally, no notes of the conversation exist, so I hope I relate the following points faithfully. Apologies to you and Ms. Davis if I don't.

My takeaways:

-- My specific question was whether Shell's Mahogany R&D was affected by the prohibition on the Bureau of Land Management's spending money to further commercial production of shale. The answer is not directly, but Shell management is responsible to shareholders, and the research goes forward in a political environment that may never allow the oil to be extracted. Draw your own conclusions.

-- Commercial shale production does not mean instant energy independence, no matter how much of it there is. It would be another supply stream, just as ANWR would be. Neither of which, of course, is flowing.

-- Shell has tried to adapt to the political environment. When the anti-development politicians say "You're moving too fast!," Shell has slowed down. When they say "You'll use up all the water!," Shell has tried to demonstrate that this isn't the case. Now Mark Udall's objection is that development would stress the affected communities. I have the feeling that if Shell gave everyone a lifetime Prozac subscription a never-before-seen endangered gnat would miraculously surface to invoke species protections.

-- Any commercial shale production that may take place would be limited by the Clean Air Act. The shale field is in a Class 1 air quality area, meaning, for all practical purposes, that the amount of air pollution can't be increased. Davis wanted me to picture the air space as a cup, so I'll ask you to as well. The cup isn't empty -- there's already oil & gas development and other industry using up the allowance. Shale production could use what's left; and as other development declines over the years, more space would be available for shale.

Unless Mark Udall demands a smaller cup. Would that surprise you?

An aside to the shale oil post

If you can do better, leave it in the comments:

Shell shills shale at the Stop 'n' Shop.

There's oil in them thar rocks

You've probably heard of oil shale. It's basically limestone infused with goop that you can extract and turn into fuel. It's been a strategic resource for the United States since the Taft administration. The Navy needed a secure source of fuel, so in 1910 Congress set aside a big chunk of Colorado and Utah where shale is plentiful.

Extracting oil from shale is contoversial, because in the past you had to strip-mine it and dispose of a lot of waste. Shell Oil has come up with a process that's much more environmentally friendly. It's still in testing, but a year ago the Bureau of Land Management awarded Shell leases in Colorado to further develop the technology.

Rep. Mark Udall -- who always claims to favor oil and gas development and then votes against every single measure to allow it, unless it happens to be in Cuba -- this year succeeded in prohibiting BLM from spending federal money to move toward commercial production of shale oil. I've got a call in to Shell to find out if the prohibition is interfering with the project.

At any rate, I didn't know until this week how much shale oil we've got in the Green River Basin in Colorado and Utah. I clicked on an ad at the Drudge Report hawking some kind of risky shale investment scheme. I investigated further to verify the info. It pans out.

There are 1.5 trillion barrels of recoverable oil there.

That's more than the top 15 oil-producing countries combined. It's like six Saudi Arabias.

It's enough to run the United States for 100 years.

Shell can produce it for $30 a barrel.

One thing you can't blame Bush for is $3-a-gallon gas. The people to blame are environmental extremists like Mark Udall, who've made it virtually impossible in this country to produce adequate supplies of oil and refine adequate supplies of gasoline.

Not to mention the fact that Udall is blocking an enormous economic boon for Colorado.

If Shell can produce this fuel without significant damage to the environment, it's an abdication of federal responsibility to leave it in the ground.

UPDATE: Shell responds here.

PPM killed the radio star

I listen to just one radio station, which plays deep-cuts album-rock. And that's only when I'm in the car. So maybe a half-hour total a day. No pop, no country, no talk, no news-talk, no sports-talk.

So you might be more interested in this news nugget than I am.

Seems significant, though. Maybe even scandalous.

Googlezon

Remember this? It's an eight-minute movie, so don't click if you don't have time to watch. It chronicles the rise of Google and Amazon until, in 2014, they have crushed all competitors as the merged Googlezon.

If you want to see how creepy-prescient that little flick was, these are the classifieds at Editor & Publisher in the advertising & marketing category.

One thing the movie might've had wrong: If you keep scrolling, you'll see that Google's future partner might be Nielsen, not Amazon.