Phew(?)

Come January, Steny Hoyer will be 2nd-in-command in the U.S. House of Representatives. This is an indication that the Democrats are planning to be at least marginally reasonable about the War on Terror. Right? Maybe not, if Hoyer's own press release is any indication...

Among other things, we intend to raise the minimum wage, implement all of the bipartisan 9-11 commission recommendations, cut college costs, make prescription drugs more affordable, and urge President Bush to change course in Iraq.

Or in other words: screw the economy, screw the economy, screw the economy, abandon Iraq. The economic monkeying is standard Democrat fare so far as I can tell, but why has it become so vital we "change course" in Iraq? Because having a volunteer military that fights to defend America's interests is unacceptable?

In the case of Iraq, I am pro-war. Certainly not for war's sake. Not for oil. But because I'd much rather terrorists rush headlong into martyrdom by U.S.M.C. gunfire than at the controls of a 747 or by self-detonation in downtown Washington. By and large, isn't that what's happening in Iraq?

See Mark Steyn's America Alone and check littlegreenfootballs.com every once in awhile. The world is not a happy place, and our allies don't seem to mind so long as the United States is the Great[est] Satan atop your average terrorist's list. If we're too busy protecting the world from America's horrible influence, who will protect America from the world's?

Parting Gifts

If there's one thing we've got to remember about democracy, it's that you can't have everything. If there's one thing we'll remember about Bob Taft, it's that he screwed Ohio Republicans running in 2006. It's extra disappointing for the other guys to win because of how silly your incumbents made you look.

DeWine lost his senate seat. Blackwell lost the race for governor. Although I was hopeful about both candidates (in DeWine's case, only in a "he's not nearly as bad as Sherrod Brown" sense), recent polls made their losses pretty unsurprising. What did surprise me this morning was the way just about every other vote I made was in the minority, too.

Lagging economy? Raise the minimum wage, with increases tied to the consumer price index every year hence! Columbus taxes too high? Boot the only Republican incumbent for another Democrat! Secretary of State's office making huge improvements in transparency and efficiency under Republican control? Who cares, we're on a roll pushing the D's here! Time for a change, indeed. Let's hope Deborah Pryce at least pulls off a save; there are few political consolations like knowing MoveOn.org wasted lots and lots of advertising cash.

Yeah, the Democrats cleaned up in Ohio. I suppose congratulations are due, even for victories won by virtue of not being the other guy. The Dispatch is predictably delighted about how the state is suddenly blue:

Overnight, voters who had handed President Bush another term just two years ago angrily sent him a message by turning Ohio, the national electoral gem, from red to blue.

- although the Ohio House and Senate remain under Republican control. At least a couple Dispatch guys can be joyously quoted at Daily Kos et al as Taft's reign of crappiness clatters into the twilight. Will my fellow citizens wake up if the fresh faces spend the next couple years prattling on about impeachment and micromanaging us into their own little People's Republic of Leftism?

If yesterday's Democratic turnout and Independent abandonment snap the state party out of this funk and back to solid conservative principles, all the better. If Columbus is in fact becoming more like Cleveland... boo. But the blue boys and girls won their turn fair and square, so I hope for Ohio's sake they don't squander it as so many of our Republicans did.

Oh, Reporters

The right wingers have had their chance to run the party, and they did so poorly.

That's the "big idea" from The Other Paper's Dan Williamson in the November 2nd issue, in his piece titled "Out of the driver's seat and back to the pews." It's like when they printed the paper, they wanted to save people the trouble of actually reading Williamson's article - the above quote is the excerpt highlighted in the center of the page. The title and the quote aren't so much biased as completely stupid.

Which "right wingers" are Mr. Williamson referring to, and when did they "run the party"? In the paragraphs preceding our quote, he talks about evangelical turnout in the 2004 presidential campaign... and about May 2nd of this year, when Ken Blackwell and Sandra O'Brien won their primaries. That's it.

Either the voting on those two dates is equivalent to "[having] their chance to run the party," or Dan Williamson thinks the Republican leadership we've had for the past few cycles is a deeply conservative one. I'm really not sure which of those assertions would be more silly. Reading the article, it seems like this quote fits in more as generic celebration than anything. The mindless Jesus-drones are being dragged out of public office, and it's about time! That wild right-wing Bob Taft and his... er... tax increases?

If Ken Blackwell loses on Tuesday, it won't be because his faith was too conservative or his ideas were outlandish. It will be because Ted Strickland held the liberals by being one of them, and held enough of the rest of us by virtue of having a D next to his name. Dan Williamson and every center-left/left/scary-left pundit and politician can pretend this is a failure of conservatism if they'd like. But, had the R's currently in charge led like conservatives instead of tax and spenders with conservative rhetoric, we'd be reading more whining and less gloating in the press about now.

In Dependence

When I was a freshman at the fine and frustrating Miami University, I decided to write a book about it. I got the feeling everyone else - like myself - was sort of shuffling along waiting for things to become familiar. College can be a lot of fun, but it can also be completely terrifying, and I wanted to write about both for the sake of the next few years' worth of freshmen.

Although I actually followed through with the writing part, the next few years in the life of "the book" were spent on rewriting, editing, and rewriting some more. I paid some publishers' association for a list of what type of manuscripts individual publishing houses were currently accepting. I sent out cover letters to every place that looked like a match, and to more than a few random companies with submission info listed online. I heard back from next to no one. If I'm a halfway decent writer, I'm a mostly awful salesman.

So after this and similarly spirit-sapping research into independent publishing, I posted the book on my website and left it at that. Then, after I set this blog up recently, I realized how easy it'd be to copy and paste the entire mess online with each chapter as an entry. Enter stage right underpublished.blogspot.com - In Dependence in what is almost certainly its last revision. Instead of clumsily picking apart and putting back together its contents, from here on out I may post comments, updates, and so on right here at Overgrad. If you're lucky.

A Test Post For the Ages

Hours, nay, half-days from now, history will look back upon this entry with the utmost of respectful disinterest.