Thursday's links and comments

Right on McCain is an opinion piece in National Review Online by the other senator from Arizona, Sen Jon Kyl who declares John McCain’s conservative record is excellent. Sen. Kyl uses McCain's voting record in the senate to demonstrate that McCain has consistently advanced conservative principles. I will grant Sen. Kyl that point. In fact, McCain's conservatism makes me want to support his candidacy. The problem Republicans have with McCain has never been about his voting record. Rather McCain's lack of support among conservative Republicans can be traced to two things - his irritating performances on the Sunday morning TV shows and the awful McCain-Feingold anti-First Amendment legislation.

From The Politico we get "Giuliani-Appointed Judges Tend to Lean to the Left." Giuliani's supporters frequently defend him from the charge that he is too liberal by quoting him saying "I would want judges who are strict constructionists because I am," he told South Carolina Republicans last month. "Those are the kinds of justices I would appoint -- Scalia, Alito and Roberts." Well, this article examines the judges he appointed as mayor and finds they were not the strict constructionists he has led us to believe he would appoint as president. The article surprised me for a couple reasons. One - I didn't know the mayor appointed judges. Two - I'm really surprised he would have made the statements about judges knowing people would review his history of appointments.

Here are a couple articles about Barack Obama.

This article titled "Oh, yes: Ohio hot for Obama" talks mainly about the Obama raising money in Ohio this week. However, in my view the enthusiasm Obama is generating was the bigger story. For all the money Sen Clinton is raising, I don't see her engendering the same kind of support that Obama gets.

The second Obama article titled "Obama to offer pro-Israel views at Chicago gathering" will need to be the first of many speeches explaining his position on foreign and domestic issues. I've had several people tell me they like Obama, but when I ask them what his position is on various issues they draw a blank. If he is going to translate the initial enthusiasm for his candidacy into votes he needs to carefully fill in those blanks.

Global warming skeptic simply man of reason is a review of Michael Crichton's position against blind belief in man-made global warming. It is good article except for one sin of omission. The last paragraph reads: "May I suggest that you go to Crichton's official Web site and read the text of several of his speeches? I think you will find the intelligent conversation refreshing." However, no link to Crichton's website is provided. Anyway, here is a link to Crichton's website to read his speeches it also has a video clip of him being interviewed by Charlie Rose.

Lastly, here is a story to make you smile.

A 100-YEAR-OLD man fought off three teenage muggers after being surrounded at a bus stop.

Buster Martin, who still works five days a week as a car washer and mechanic, was followed by the gang when he left a pub.

He said: "They pushed me against a wall and tried to take my money from me.

"I went mad. I was lashing out on the floor and then I stood up and was kicking them all. I pushed one and kung-fu kicked the other one between the legs. They ran off scared after I did that and I still had all my money."

Wow, still going to the pub at a hundred years old is impressive, but beating up some punks goes right past amazing.