Don Surber has it, in a smelly nutshell:

Two words:

McCain-Feingold.

The fundamental difference between McCain 2000 and McCain 2008 is that he put his name on a law that forbids people from speaking out against their congressman within 60 days of an election.

Wrong on abortion? That has not stopped Rudy or Mitt.

Wrong on gay marriage? Rudy lived with a gay couple after his second wife kicked him out of the house.

Gun control? It has not stopped Rudy or Mitt.

McCain-Feingold.

That is a show-stopper. Ever step in fresh dog-doo? The smell sticks to the shoe all day. That is what McCain-Feingold is to the senator from Arizona.

He is no longer John McCain. He is McCain-Feingold.

Read the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

That not only is the law, but that is good political advice.

Americans do not like to be told to shut up.

McCain-Feingold told Americans to shut up.

Even Feingold could not run with it. He should be Obama. Instead, he is stuck on the sidelines because of McCain-Feingold.

There is a certain satisfaction in knowing that.

And God bless Mitch McConnell who fought McCain-Feingold all the way to the Supreme Court. He lost, of course. But you must fight the good fight anyway.

And stay out of that fresh dog-doo.

I’m not thrilled with the Republican field, but I will NEVER vote for Senator McCain.

HT: Glenn.

For the last few weeks, I’ve been toying with a post that opens this way:

“For the first time in my life, I’m embarrassed by the Virginia General Assembly.”

Problem is, I haven’t had time to sit down and actually write the post that I’ve been toying with. Fortunately for you, dear reader (Marshall channels Miss Manners), the folks in Richmond keep giving me new opportunities.

Like yesterday — the Virginia Senate and the House of Delegates each unanimously passed a resolution apologizing for slavery. Now, the only people against this resolution are the handful of assholes still running around in white sheets, with shaved heads, or bearing swastikas tattooed on their forearms.

But what good does it do? Why is our government, which can’t figure out how to fund the infrastructure that we desperately need, wasting its time with this worthless pile of words?

Meanwhile, at the same time it was moving along its ode to pointlessness, the House and Senate were also reinstating a program it had wisely let die just two years ago. I refer to the state’s red light camera law. It seems that these nanny-esque cameras are sprouting up everywhere, so you likely know of them even if you’re not a Virginian. They automatically take a picture of your car and your license plate if you breeze through a traffic light whilst its amber bulb is illuminated.

In an era where governments routinely cast aside the Constitution and its enumerated freedoms, we’ve become a little desensitized to government assaults on our liberty, but this one ought to get our attention. First, the law directly challenges the basic notion that we are all presumed innocent until found guilty in a court of law. After all, if the camera catches your car, you get the ticket. No one has to prove that you were even there. Sure, you can go to court and challenge the ticket, but the presumption is that you were driving your car, and you have to prove your INNOCENCE, usually by fingering the person who was driving your car.

Then of course there’s the 6th Amendment. Anyone remember that one from High School civics? That’s because the guarantees under that amendment are so well settled that we hardly talk about them anymore. One of the enumerated rights under that Amendment is the right to confront our accuser. But when our accuser is a camera on the top of a pole, who are we to confront? Answer, of course, is no one. But red light cameras mean big money for local governments. It’s all the cash of parking meters, without the expensive meter maids. Why should a little thing like Constitutional protections get in the way of that?

These are just two examples of the General Assembly’s on-going incompetence. There are countless others.

Throughout my life, I’ve always been proud of the General Assembly, and proud to be a Virginian. Serving in the General Assembly is still a part-time gig. Nearly all of its members still must (and do) have full-time jobs in the real world. They meet 60 days in even numbered years and 45 days in odd. Pay-as-you-go is still the basic philosophy that guides spending decisions.

To be sure, Virginia’s history isn’t perfect. Slavery, secession and massive resistance are shameful episodes in our past.

But history is rife with contradictions, and the facts is that when it comes to liberty and freedom, Virginia led the way. Without Virginians, we would have had no Declaration of Independence (Thomas Jefferson), no Constitution (James Madison), no Bill of Rights (George Mason), and no first President. All of those folks, by the way, served in the Virginia General Assembly. Virginia’s is the oldest legislative assembly in the New World, dating back to its founding as the House of Burgesses in Jamestown in 1619.

These days, as state legislatures have become havens for whacky liberalism, full-time activists bent on expansive regulation, and professional politicians pursuing their careers, Virginia’s General Assembly has been a welcome island of common sense and sound policy-making.

However, its failure to resolve address pressing problems — like the Commonwealth’s transportation crisis — while wasting time on things like apologies for slavery and allowing a steady undermining of freedom are throwing the General Assembly’s sterling reputation into doubt.

Jim: Depressing, Marshall, very depressing.

I’m going to address one of your last points, about the power-hungry expansionist mentality in many state legislatures(Ipod bans, anyone?) because it reminded me of one of Cam’s favorite themes on his show - the importance of personal responsibility. One could argue that we’re approaching some sort of societal tipping point, where more and more people don’t want to be responsible for themselves.

Advertising “makes” us smoke and ”makes” us eat junk food, according to our lawsuits. We want our employers to pay for our health care, and for there to be no limits on the quality and quantity of care we recieve. Somebody else can worry about how to pay for it. We are very upset about high gas prices, without recognizing that we chose a car that gets bad mileage. The effect of the Housing Bubble - shortsighted buyers putting no money down, taking out “super-sized” mortgages, taking adjustable rate mortages without thinking of how they’ll pay in the future, people who bought second houses under the assumption they could sell a few years down the road at a huge profit, etc. – can be summed up by one sentence: People who chose to be irresponsible priced out those who chose to be responsible. Now there’s talk (speculation? Wishing?) of a massive federal bailout for those who bought more home than they could afford, and who face foreclosure.

The message is clear: “Do not hold me responsible for my actions; do not let me suffer the consequences of my own bad decisions.”

Why should we expect lawmakers to be responsible, when so few of us behave responsibly ourselves?

Words cannot express my envy over the fact that one of my co-bloggers has his own fan club. That is just so damn cool.

It’s bad enough that right after I left, my buddies started being called “charming and sexy” and “uber-cool” by the blogosphere… Man, that’s it. I’m comin’ back to America. Clear the decks, and bring down the real estate prices in Northern Virginia.

Here’s a topic for discussion - considering how my co-bloggers are generally enthusiasts of new media. Andrew Keen writes in the Weekly Standard about the dirt-cheap user-generated ads run by Doritos during the Super Bowl:

IT’S AMATEUR HOUR at the Super Bowl this year. On Sunday, 90 million television viewers on CBS will be subjected to commercials made by “You”–Time magazine’s Person of The Year for 2006. Three Super Bowl XLI advertisers–Doritos, the National Football League, and Chevrolet–will all be running 30 second commercial spots made by amateurs. The Web 2.0 revolution in user-generated content has infiltrated the American living room. These amateur creators, who Time praise as “people formerly known as consumers,” are now providing the entertainment at the biggest event in the media calendar.

This is not good news. The shift from professionally produced to user-generated advertising makes us poorer in both economic and cultural terms. The arrival of user-created commercials at Super Bowl XLI represents the American Idolization of traditional entertainment–the degeneration of professional content into a “talent show” for amateurs.

We, the conventional television audience, are certainly losers in this new fashion for user-generated advertisements. We have traditionally watched Super Bowl commercials to be entertained by memorable ads. Often, these commercials are more memorable than the game. Occasionally, they even represent significant cultural moments in American history. Few of us, for example, can remember who won Super Bowl in 1984 (Los Angeles Raiders 38, Washington Redskins 9), where it was played (Tampa), or who sang the national anthem (Barry Manilow). But most of us can remember the Chiat/Day produced, Ridley Scott directed, commercial for the Macintosh computer, with its Orwellian subtext and its indelible explanation of why “1984 wasn’t going to be like 1984″.

As I hear about the hype and buzz surrounding user-generated content, of YouTube, blogs, fan fiction, etc., I’ve wondered if I was in the minority of… well, not really liking much of it. The crap-to-value ratio seemed like searching for needles-in-a-haystack/diamonds in the rough. Sure, maybe there are some untapped creative geniuses out there, but finding them in the mess is an arduous task. Yes, blogging brought some new, interesting, insightful voices to our attention. It also gave a soapbox to a bunch of loud and obnoxious loons.

On paper, this is why we have the media structures that we do — the multiplex is supposed to give you the best movies available at any given moment, the papers and magazines the best writers, the publishers the best authors, the television the best shows. Radio, personalities that you actually want to listen to for an hour or two, or just good music.

We like to believe “anybody can do it!” And indeed they can. But not everyone can do it well. Sometimes professionalization has its benefits. In the writing/journalism sphere, I will say from personal experience that having editors is sometimes frustrating, but generally, they’re there for a reason, and often they can actually improve the quality of the work.

Flip-side: I don’t always like what mass media has to offer, either. And yes, when you see the umpteenth movie in which Eddie Murphy plays ten parts and they’re all loud and annoying, or the tenth movie in which Hannibal Lecter eats people, you want to kick Hollywood so that they try something new. But I’m not sure user-generated content is telling us much more than there are a lot of starving artists and garage bands out there. And generally, they achieve modest success for a reason.

Cam: How about we just say most content in general sucks these days. Seriously. With all the crap that’s on television, I watch 2 1/2 hours a week (24, House, and The Office). I can’t tell you the last time I bought a cd from a “popular” artist. There’s just a lotta crap out there.

Marshall: Sorry, but Keen is spouting elitist horse poo. I agree with our two commenters, who both observe that one of the Doritos commercials was the best of a very weak Super Bowl crop.

More broadly, blogs and other online tools that lowered the barrier to entry on everything from video to book publishing consistently demonstrate that there are great minds and talents out there who are no longer subject to the whims of gate-keeping editors. This can’t be anything but a good thing. Granted, there’s a lot of crap. To be sure, not every writer is Hemmingway. But that’s okay. Every person does and should have a voice.

Here’s what we know for sure. Bloggers, even the bad ones, are better informed and more likely to engage and influencers others than the average American. They consume enormous amounts of news. They think, and they express opinions — even if those opinions are often less than clear. That’s real dialogue, and it can only be good for our society.

Jim: Okay, the general opinion so far seems to be pretty supportive of User-Generated Content. Maybe I’m being too hard on it. I do tend to think that people get better at skills (writing, singing, putting together web-videos, etc.) with experience. (Back when I was cartooning, somebody once described it as, “you have 10,000 bad drawings in you; the 10,001st will be good. So get started on those 10,000.”) and that the rise of user-generated content has brought a lot of rookies into the pool, with the results about what we would expect. But I’m judging this new media while it’s still new; in ten years, bloggers may be as useful and informative as any other media.

And yes, it is good that the gatekeepers are less powerful than they used to be, and now anyone can set up shop and try their hand at these new fields.

Or, so says the New York Times in this story to be published tomorrow morning.

I don’t have any real insight beyond what’s in the story, and gladly defer to our resident WoT expert, Mr. Geraghty.

But it does seem to me that if we know bin Laden and others are re-establishing control, we ought to be able to shoot at him, right? Certainly we ought to be able to take out these new camps. The story also raises troubling questions about Pakistan’s commitment as our ally in the War on Terror. I realize this is nothing new, but up until now, Pakistan’s military has at least been trying to look like they’re playing along.

Anyway, the story is nothing but a bummer.

Jim: Yup, Marshall (and BTW, you’re being way too generous by calling me an expert on the war on terror - an informed fan is more like it) — this story, if accurate, confirms many of the worst fears that Pakistan is now a completely ineffective ally, or perhaps better described as an ally-in-name-only.

Wouldn’t it be great if instead of wasting time debating competing versions of nonbinding resolutions on Iraq, Congress actually debated what the U.S. policy regarding Pakistan ought to be? But no, we can’t do that, because there’s no easy answer, no easy way for our lawmakers to promote themselves and grandstand, no seductive simple solution to promote.

If the Senate were to consider this argument from Robert Kaplan –

The situation is tragically simple: the very people we need to kill or apprehend we can’t get at, because they are in effect protected by our so-called ally, Pakistan. All we can do is win tactical battles against foot soldiers inside Afghanistan, who are easily replaced.

It isn’t that President Musharraf is doing nothing. He has deployed troops along the border that have somewhat cut down on the activities of Mr. Haqqani. Moreover, many of his troops are busy quelling a separatist rebellion in the border province of Baluchistan.

But he feels himself atop a volcano of fundamentalism. He is among the last of the Westernized, British-style officers in the national army; after him come the men with the beards. The military and Pakistani society are filled with those who do not see the Taliban as a threat: it is an American problem, and one for an Afghan government toward which they feel ambivalence. So President Musharraf must walk a fine line. And he must be as devious with us as he is with any other faction…

We can’t reverse this drift without a stronger policy toward Pakistan. I say this with extreme trepidation. President Musharraf, for all his faults, may still be the worst person to rule his country except for any other who might replace him. And yet it is necessary to hold his feet to the fire to a greater extent than we have.

– then there would be no way for Chuck Hagel to pound the desk and bellow that our troops are real people not just numbers (thanks, Senator, I’m sure all of your colleagues thought the opposite), or for Jim Webb to threaten to punch out somebody because he’s so angry. Got to show he was Born Fightin’, you know, actual concrete policy proposals be damned.

For those of us who really want to like Aaron Sorkin, but can’t get past his writing… check this out. I find it to be spot on.

Jim: Yeah, pretty much. Having said that, I liked the Christmas episode of Studio 60, and the show more or less dodges the cliches.

Late last night Mrs. Hillaryspot and I are on the couch, watching some bad romantic comedy. Boy meets girl, boy and girl are hitting it off, each thinks the other might be “the one,” girl goes to run an errand. The boy’s ex shows up, expresses desire to get back together. The boy declines, telling her once and for all that they won’t get back together, but he hopes they can still be friends. She agrees, they hug. Girl comes back to see through the window that the boy is hugging his ex-girlfriend. Girl is horrified, torn up inside, goes to leave in tears… the jealous ex exits, finds girl, tells girl that she and the boy are getting back together. Girl runs off, heartbroken… (Mind you, the characters appear to be in their late twenties, not junior high.)

And I just about kicked in the television. Who among us makes major decisions like “I will no longer be romantically interested in this person” because we see that person hugging another member of the opposite sex? Making out or doing the horizontal mambo, sure. But to this woman, an embrace was seen ispo facto incontrovertable evidence that Boy and Ex were back together. And she makes this decision based on seeing it through a window, not even talking to the Boy. And then she believes the Ex’s statement about getting back together, and doesn’t even bother to ask the Boy if it’s true, or why he’s making that decision. Even though that as of five minutes ago, she thought he was “The One.”

You see, our plot revolves around A Big Misunderstanding(TM)! Also commonly known as, Really Lazy Screenwriters.

“What! Oh! I thought you guys were talking about putting Grandpa to sleep because of his old age and failing health, not Rover!”

Arrgh. Shut up, shut up, shut up! This stuff was old by the time Three’s Company was doing it. At the very least, we could make it edgier.

“Oh, you got the Clapper to turn on your lights and appliances! I thought you said you got the clap!”

Cam: Mrs. Hillary Spot? I thought you were married to Mrs. TKS???! Did you ditch your wife and get another while you were in Turkey? Have you no shame, Jim? Have you no decency?

Oh, wait… I get it now.

I liked SportsNight, but I never watched the West Wing and despite my valiant efforts, I had to stop watching Studio 60. Sorkin’s writing reminds me of Kevin Smith… fairly amusing, but completely unlike the way real people talk. I can enjoy that in a guy that puts out a movie every couple of years. Watching it on tv week after week is another story.

Last week, my friends at the American Wind Energy Association were kind enough to take me out for a tour of a wind farm in Meyersdale, PA. AWEA recently became a client, so the trip was an opportunity to see wind at work up close and personal. (UPDATE: I completely forgot to thank the great folks from FPL, the energy company that runs the facility we visited. They made us feel right at home.)

If you’re like me, you probably have a lot of out of date notions about wind energy. You might think that the whole notion is a little bit pie-in-the-sky — a product of idealistic hippies who somehow managed to slip through engineering school.

It turns out that wind is a serious player in our electric grid, and its contribution to keeping our lights on grows every day. Indeed, wind energy relies on mature technology that’s been tested and improved for almost thirty years. Recent technological improvements have made wind turbines more reliable and consistent. And the demand for wind is growing. Companies like GE (also an Edelman client), Siemens and BP Alternative Energy see wind an important investment.

I knew most of this before I headed north to Pennsylvania for the day. I got into the car thinking that wind energy was pretty cool.

I had no idea.

We arrived at the site shortly before noon. It had snowed the day before, and there was a fresh white powder on the ground. But the storm had gone and left in its wake a perfect, crytsal blue winter sky. (Although, it was a little brisk. I believe the temperature topped out that day at a balmy 5 degrees on the Farenheit scale.)

The turbines sat on the top of ridge overlooking the town. They were much taller than I expected, but they didn’t overwhelm the landscape. Indeed, they were an attractive part of it. And there was nothing industrial about them. They simply sat on their spot and turned, nearly silent. Of course, with each revolution, the turbines were sending electricity down the mountain and into the power grid.

And that’s the coolest part of all. Here’s a technology that can produce a significant part of the energy we need every day, and it’s totally, completely 100% clean. There are no emissions. Period. No mountain tops that need removing to strip mine their fuel. No wells that need drilling. And no carbon dioxide drifting into the stratosphere to contribute to our slow bake.

I was a believer in wind energy before I went to Meyersdale, but the trip really brought it home for me: there’s so much we can do. We just need the will to do it.

And for once, I remembered to bring my camera. Here’s a photo that I took:

Cam: As an Oklahoma boy, I can attest to the feasibility of wind power. OG & E (Oklahoma’s big electric company) gives consumers the choice to purchase electricity from their windfarm in the western part of the state.

Marshall: UPDATE II: Some guy who subs himself an “energy consultant” has apparently learned how to use Technorati watchlists, and he’s posted a lengthy comment. Just for the record, I think much what he’s proposing is way over the top.

As to the other question in the comments — the wind is unaffected.

Jim: Oh, sure. We all just sit back and fall for the Marshall Jedi Mind Trick. Wake up, people! Where do you think all of that wind in Pennsylvania comes from? Canada! You people think you’re ending our dependence on Foreign Oil, but all this will do is expand our dependence on Foreign Wind! And sure, the ”American Wind Energy Association” sounds like a good, all-American group. We know this giant, corporate-dominated industry by its more familiar name: Big Air.

Obviously, we haven’t even gotten into the theories that the world has reached Peak Wind. Every time the cost of wind goes up — largely because of increasing wind demand in China and India — we hear the familiar calls for breaking into the Strategic Wind Reserve. Or, as Tom Friedman prefers, increasing wind taxes to reduce our wind usage. Isn’t it long past time to increase the fuel economy standards on hang gliders and hot air balloons? It’s long past time to break the power of the international Wind Cartels that are manipulating the market!

(Okay, I know next to nothing about this topic, so I just took my BoilerPlate Talking Points Cliche-o-matic and stuck “wind” in for the other, more frequently discussed sources of energy.)

I went a little nuts today, working through a backlog of items that I wanted to write about. So, for once, there’s a ton of new content here for you to peruse. Keep scrolling to catch it all.

A little while ago, I posted about CFIF’s new $traight Talk blog, exposing John McCain’s hypocrisy and anti-freedom agenda.

As usual, I overlooked the best item on the site.

In a letter to Senator McCain, CFIF demands that the Senator answer a simple question:

As a frontrunner for the 2008 Republican nomination for President, will you campaign within the presidential public financing system or is it your intention to abandon the limitations of that system in favor of more campaign dollars?

McCain took public money during his 2000 campaign, but with seemingly everyone else opting out, will he do so as well?

It’s a critical question. McCain has built his entire political persona around limiting speech under the guise of campaign finance reform. The public funding system for Presidential campaigns is the marquis element of our current campaign finance scheme. If McCain repudiates it, he’s sending a clear message.

He’s also confirming to the world that while he’s glad to make the rules for everyone else, he doesn’t think they should apply to the Great McCain.

Jim: Regarding McCain, this is a little off the topic of public financing, but I think it’s worth spelling out… I tried explaining to a McCain supporter why this issue (his establishment of McCain-Feingold, and various other measures intending to “get money out of politics” by restricting your right to use your money to promote a political message near an election) is such a deal-breaker, or near-deal-breaker for so many conservatives.

I presume our readers are familiar with the legal actions taken against Seattle-based talk show host Kirby Wilbur. He strongly opposed a hike in Washington state’s gas tax; he supported a referendum opposing it; pro-gas tax folks filed suits charging that his daily drum-beating for the referendum constituted an in-kind donation to the referendum’s cause. In an appalling decision, Washington state’s courts have so far supported the concept that Wilbur’s on-air talk amounted to a cash political donation, and could be regulated and restricted.

Under the pre-McCain-Feingold days, the belief was that money was the same as speech; because we couldn’t limit speech, it was unconstitutional to limit money. After the Supreme Court’s approval of McCain-Feingold, and the belief that money is not the same as speech, it opened the door that money – in terms of both donations and independent expenditures’ — could be regulated.

Now speech is being defined as the same as money again, and because money can be regulated, so can speech.

I’m sure you see where this is going. If Kirby Wilbur’s comments are an in-kind donation, what’s a newspaper editorial worth? A column? A diatribe from Sean Hannity on Fox News? A blog post?

I’m sure John McCain had no intention of this when it started. I believe he genuinely wanted to get big money out of politics and build a political system responsive to more than just campaign donors. But he didn’t account for… well, judicial activists, coupled with the fact that some folks in our society are not terribly far from fascism in their eagerness to limit others’ right to speak their mind – witness campus speech codes, political correctness, the Fairness Doctrine, broadly-defined ‘hate speech’ laws that provide civil and criminal penalties for speaking words that offend, etc.

I know that Senator McCain has said, time and again, he doesn’t want to regulate blogs and regulate the media; his creation, forged with the noblest intentions, has clearly been hijacked and is being used in ways he never intended. But I suspect that only the most vehement and full-throated counterattack on the speech restrictionists by the Senator will change many conservative minds. There’s a lot of belief out there that McCain has no use for the conservative press, since he gets glowing coverage from the MSM. But we know that the twisted ideology and legal vindictiveness that went after Kirby Wilbur will never really be used against the New York Times or Esquire magazine or the Daily Show – media entities that have been comparably kind to McCain compared to other Republicans.

First foie gras, then trans fat. Now they’re after our iPods?!

I noticed this story while browsing around Pat Cleary’s ShopFloor blog, and it took my breath away.

From the Independent (of London):

A member of the [New York] state Senate, Carl Kruger, has declared war on “iPod oblivion”, introducing a draft law that would make it an offence for anyone to be plugged in when they are crossing the street, punishable with a $100 (£51) fine.

I’m SO glad that the NY General Assembly is here to protect me from myself. Soon, they’ll have done such a good job of protecting us that we’ll be living in small, padded rooms, looking forward to our state-mandated 3 meals a day.

More coverage from Wired and the Associated Press.

Sheesh.

Jim: Has any local lawmaker ever lost their job for proposing a stupid nanny-state law?

Really, I hate to be such a nattering nabob of negativity, but are stories like this reinforce my cynical suspicion that a generation’s worth of failure in America’s schools has purposely generated an unthinking, sheeplike public that wholeheartedly believes that there is a legislative solution to every problem.

“This electronic gadgetry is reaching the point where it’s becoming not only endemic but it’s creating an atmosphere where we have a major public safety crisis at hand,” said Kruger in a telephone interview with Reuters.

Okay… no. Hear that? No. NO. NO. We do not have “a major public safety crisis.” You want to see a major public safety crisis? Hurricane Katrina. 9/11. The L.A. riots back in 1992. The blackout. Anthrax in the mail. THOSE are major public safety crisis. People getting hit by cars because they don’t hear them coming is Darwinism at work.

In a decent society, state senator Kruger would be pelted with rotten fruit and vegetables during every public appearance for clogging the state legislature and wasting the public’s time with this inane psychotic power grab, that literally assumes the authority for the state government to approve of the way we cross the street. Mom and Dad gave up that regulatory authority when I was like, six.

Cam: From my cold dead ears, good sirs. From my cold dead ears.