Samuel A. Alito, Jr. was confirmed as the 110th Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States this morning by a vote of 58-42.

He was subsequently sworn in and will make his debut as Associate Justice at tonight's State of the Union Address.

It's nice when good things happen in spite of a**holes, don't you think?

Posted by: caltechgirl at 11:37 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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So I was tooling down the freeway to work this morning when the traffic began to stop rather unexpectedly in front of me. I quickly started flipping AM stations to find one that might tell me what the traffic situation in front of me was, and somehow I ended up on KFI. Which at 10:15 AM is airing Rush Limbaugh.

For the record, while I used to be quite the Rush fan, I haven't listened to him since Clinton was in his first term. I honestly can't stand him, and most days I would have just changed the channel again, but today he said something that caught my attention.

Paraphrasing here, he said that in the 18 years he's been doing the broadcast, every crazy joke, satire, or parody of the Democrats that he has come up with, they have done on their own, and that after last night, he doesn't see how he can parody them anymore. The jokes it seems, are already being lived by the loonies on the left.

Explaining himself further, El Rushbo cited two things: first, tonight's planned demonstration outside the capital wherein a bunch of idiots (my word here, I believe he called them "60's retreads") plan to stand outside the building during the SOTU speech tonight and bang pots and pans together in an effort to drown out the noise inside the building.

As if. Can you just imagine the Usual Suspects (ELF, ANSWER, NOW, PETA, Code Pinkos, NARAL, et al) standing out there in the cold banging pots and pans together like a bunch of toddlers on crack? How many of them do you think will forget to bring earplugs and cause themselves permanent damage? How do they plan on holding their protest signs with pots in both hands? Or will they "work together" and hold the pots in one hand, banging them against each other's pots, holding their signs of love and peace in the other hand?

Here's the actual website announcing the protest. You too can join in, as these events will be taking place around the country tonight... Like they can hear the noise in DC from Bisbee, Arizona of all places.

The other thing Rush referred to was this article by Dana Milbank of the WaPo. (reg. req. go to bugmenot)

The article is entitled "Tasting Victory, Liberals Instead Have a Food Fight". Here's just a taste:

"Right on cue, liberal activists including Cindy Sheehan and Ramsey Clark gathered yesterday at the Busboys & Poets restaurant and bookshop at 14th and V streets NW for what they billed as a forum on "The Impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney." But the participants, while charging the administration with "crimes against humanity," a "war of aggression" and even "the supreme international crime," inevitably turned their wrath on congressional Democrats, whom they regarded as a bunch of wimps.

"Does the Democratic Party want to continue to exist or does it want to ignore what 85 percent of its supporters want?" demanded David Swanson, a labor union official who runs "Impeach PAC" and other efforts to remove Bush from office. Singling out Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid (Nev.) for derision, Swanson said that Democrats who do the right thing "are exceptions.""

Later on, they discussed ways to remove the President from office:

"After the participants made their urgent calls for impeachment proceedings, John Bruhns, identifying himself as an antiwar Iraq veteran, rose for a clarification. If Democrats don't first "gain control of one of the houses" of Congress, he wondered, "how else can we impeach this monster?"

Swanson had a ready brushoff for Democrats who won't pursue impeachment because they're in the minority: "Just go home if you're going to talk that way." Offering the lessons of 1994, he said: "The way the Republicans got the majority was not by being scared. . . . It was by going out and speaking on behalf of their base and letting themselves be called radicals."

Bruhns, wearing a crew cut and business suit, disagreed. Somebody in the audience called for him to "shut up."

"They didn't answer my question," Bruhns protested after the exchange ended. "How do you get impeachment if you don't win elections? I'm being practical."

...

"Sheehan, in a sweet voice, condemned the administration's agenda "to spread the cancer of empire."

The first questioner, getting into the spirit of the forum, declared of the administration: "These criminals and gangsters, thugs as I regard them, I believe engineered 9/11."

Many in the crowd applauded. But others were skeptical. "I've heard a lot about accountability" from the panel, said one questioner. "Seems to me the first opportunity we had for accountability was in the last election."

"Elections," moderator Zeese replied, "are not the determining factor.""

If I was a Democrat today, I'd be ashamed. Sincerely. If the rants of Kerry and Kennedy yesterday weren't evidence enough, banging pots and an almost institutional inability to do simple addition (not enough votes!) brings me to the conclusion that the Democratic party leadership are nothing more than a bunch of toddlers.

Let's see: Whiny? Check. Unable to add numbers? Check. Irrational sense that their way is the only way, even when it's clearly impossible? Check. A belief that increased volume equates to increased chance of getting their way? Check.

I can't wait to see what childish stunts they pull tonight inside the Capital, too.

Posted by: caltechgirl at 11:29 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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Ted Kennedy is many things: a liar, a drunk, a blowhard, perhaps even a murderer, but I never knew he was a stand-up comedian until today.

Kennedy's rant on the Senate floor against Sam Alito was a treasure to behold. You can see the Senator puffing and blowing here.

I swear, the only reason I left it on C-SPAN2 is that I thought he was going to keel over from a heart attack right there on the Senate floor.

All that effort, and cloture passed with 72 votes. Suck it Ted and Johnny. I'm sure Massachussetts is very proud of you.

Michelle Malkin, as always, has more.

Welcome visitors from Expose the Left! Feel free to click around, and come back often if you like what you see.

Posted by: caltechgirl at 05:25 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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This post from Wizbang! set me off...

I consider myself a pro-choice conservative.  Mostly because I resent like hell the idea that the government can have the authority to tell me what to do with my body.  They can't even run the country properly, why in heck would I let them decide what's best for me and my body?  Honestly.

However, that being said, did anyone else catch that woman from NARAL testifying at the end of the Alito hearing?  About how she never thought (as a married Catholic) that she'd ever want an abortion, let alone "need" one, but that after her husband (also, presumably a devout Catholic) left her and their 3 children and she found out she was pregnant, she was humiliated because in her state in the days before Roe, a married woman needed her husband's permission to get an abortion?  Did you catch her sanctimonious bellyaching about having to stand before a panel of doctors to admit the failure of her marriage and her inability to care for a 4th child and then getting to the clinic, only to be told that she needed her Ex to sign off, so she had to chase him down too? And yet she still chose to have a legal abortion, even in the face of all of that humiliation.

Oh please, lady.  So you were humiliated.  Wasn't that the point?  Shouldn't most women be humiliated for being in a situation where they "need" an abortion?  I understand that your situation was less of your own making than most, seeing as how your husband walked out on you and 3 small kids, but didn't you have other options?  I notice you didn't choose adoption or seek out the vaunted "back alley"....

Your weakness is telling.  That you LET YOURSELF be humiliated to the point that changed the entire focus of your life, that 30+ years later you are still cowed by the men that you presumed were in charge of your body makes me sick.  Stand up for yourself and take some responsibility.  They didn't humiliate you, you let yourself be treated that way.

So I guess this really isn't about abortion after all, it's about the pathetic martyr/victim nature of the left:  Poor Me.  Look at me.  Pity me.  Fix me.

Yeah?  Well screw you.

Posted by: caltechgirl at 02:14 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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We are bloggers with boatloads of opinions, and none of us come close to agreeing with any other one of us all of the time. But we do agree on this: The new leadership in the House of Representatives needs to be thoroughly and transparently free of the taint of the Jack Abramoff scandals, and beyond that, of undue influence of K Street.

We are not naive about lobbying, and we know it can and has in fact advanced crucial issues and has often served to inform rather than simply influence Members.

But we are certain that the public is disgusted with excess and with privilege. We hope the Hastert-Dreier effort leads to sweeping reforms including the end of subsidized travel and other obvious influence operations. Just as importantly, we call for major changes to increase openness, transparency and accountability in Congressional operations and in the appropriations process.

As for the Republican leadership elections, we hope to see more candidates who will support these goals, and we therefore welcome the entry of Congressman John Shadegg to the race for Majority Leader. We hope every Congressman who is committed to ethical and transparent conduct supports a reform agenda and a reform candidate. And we hope all would-be members of the leadership make themselves available to new media to answer questions now and on a regular basis in the future.

Signed,

N.Z. Bear, The Truth Laid Bear
Hugh Hewitt, HughHewitt.com
Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit.com
Kevin Aylward, Wizbang!
La Shawn Barber, La Shawn Barber's Corner
Lorie Byrd, Polipundit
Beth Cleaver, MY Vast Right Wing Conspiracy
Jeff Goldstein, Protein Wisdom
Stephen Green, Vodkapundit
John Hawkins, Right Wing News
John Hinderaker, Power Line
Jon Henke / McQ / Dale Franks, QandO
James Joyner, Outside The Beltway
Mike Krempasky, Redstate.org
Michelle Malkin, MichelleMalkin.com
Ed Morrissey, Captain's Quarters
Scott Ott, Scrappleface
John Donovan / Bill Tuttle, Castle Argghhh!!!

and Me, Caltechgirl, Not Exactly Rocket Science

And many many others!

Won't you join too?

Posted by: caltechgirl at 01:35 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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But Teddy Kennedy is a hypocritical pig bastard.

The man and his self-serving egotistical posturing has made me physically sick. Who the fuck told him that he has the right to set him self up as the Grand Poobah High Inquisitor of Ethics?

Was it Mary Jo Kopechne?

The little fucking toad acts as if he doesn't fart. Which we all know leads to Spontaneous Human Combustion. Can I watch?

I don't recall ANYONE accusing Judge Alito of drowning a woman, or drunk driving (multiple times), or lying about anything. You Senator, on the other hand, have not only been accused of all of the above, but HAVE ADMITTED IT.

Lemme ask you... What's worse: Getting drunk and driving your car off a bridge and leaving a poor defenseless young lady to drown or recusing yourself after the fact from a case involving your mutual funds? What's worse: Lying to the cops during a drunk driving arrest or joining a group that at the time was merely protesting the removal of ROTC at Princeton?

Furthermore, if this wasn't enough evidence that Teddy needs better advice, his ill-informed tirade yesterday on the Rusher documents from CAP proved that a fat drunk bully is always a fat drunk bully, no matter how you dress him up. I about crapped myself when Spector shut him up and then when they came back from recess and Spector announced the documents were freely available without need of a subpoena, and if TK had gone about it properly, he could have had the documents himself already.... and then the killer "No recollection of Mr. Alito, and his name does not appear" HAH.

Even trying to portray Alito as a racist and a bigot failed when he made Mrs. Alito cry.

I am so glad these unbelievably long hearings are almost over. [/rant]

Posted by: caltechgirl at 12:11 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I wanna see the rest of the Alito Hearings in Frank J's world:

A large gray thing hit Biden in the face and knocked him to the ground.

"We agreed that Alito was not allowed to bring any rocks to these hearings!" Schumer exclaimed.

"That was a chunk of concrete!" Alito said defensively.

"It's the same thing!"

"Oh yeah?" Alito scoffed. "If a chunk of concrete is a rock, tell me whether it's igneous, sedimentary, or metamorphic?"

"He's getting geological on your ass!" Bush laughed. "No wonder people call him and his friends 'wiseguys.'"

Posted by: caltechgirl at 12:06 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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Chuckie "Hillary's Lapdog" Schumer is currently trying to hang Alito with a noose fashioned of Bork's coattails...

Now he's taking him to task for being an honest dissenter. Maybe we should change Chuckie's nickname from "Hillary's Lapdog" to "Stuck on Spin Cycle".

Posted by: caltechgirl at 03:20 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Methinks Ol' Ted should just pack it in while he's ahead.  Between his opening statements this morning, this misrememberation (See, Dubya isn't the only one!) and this, he's about lost it, I think:

"Meet the latest children's author, Sen. Ted Kennedy, and his Portuguese Water Dog, Splash, his co-protagonist in "My Senator and Me: A Dogs-Eye View of Washington, D.C."

Scholastic Inc. will release the book in May."

Posted by: caltechgirl at 01:44 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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1.  It's not "the economy, stupid".  This time around it's all about Executive power.  They think they can shitcan a brilliant man based on one contemporaneous issue.  Kennedy, in particular, was "troubled".  I guess that means it's all good.  (see here)

2.Leahy?  He's an unmitigated twat.  Like it's Alito's fault he's a white male?  Jackass.

Posted by: caltechgirl at 09:59 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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