1918 News Server

From National Ledger; Australia's greatest export Elle MacPherson appeared as a presenter at the GQ Men of the Year Awards in London, and OMG did she look stunning! The leggy 44 year all-natural mother of 2, who lives in London, showed off her stems in this gorgeous red dress, and even got involved in a bit of a controversy at the awards show as well!

As the evening began, Sir Elton John was scheduled to present an award with the champagne-sipping and speech-slurring Lily Allen. When Allen told the star-studded Royal Opera House audience "now we reach a very special point in the evening", Sir Elton joked: "What, you are going to have another drink?"

The 23-year-old pop wreck, humorously dressed up in a floor-sweeping ball gown, responded: "(Eff) off Elton, I'm 40 years younger than you, I have my whole life ahead of me." But Princess Di's favorite musician blasted back, "I could still snort you under the table." [read more]

From The Guardian (UK); Sarah Palin's surprise entry on to the US national political stage attracted an audience of nearly 40 million viewers for her Republican convention speech - nearly as many as saw Barack Obama accepting the Democratic presidential nomination last week.

Audience research body Nielsen estimated that an average of 37.2 million viewers watched Palin give her vice-presidential nomination speech at the Republican national convention across broadcast and cable outlets between 10pm and 11.15pm, east coast US time, on Wednesday night.

This compares with the 38.4 million who watched Barack Obama's Democratic presidential nomination acceptance speech at his party's convention last week.

That rating was one of the biggest of the year, pulling in a bigger US TV audience than the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony, this year's American Idol final and Oscars coverage.

While the liberal-leaning CNN was the big winner for the Obama speech, the rightwing Fox News Channel pulled in the highest rating for Palin's speech, drawing its largest audience to date for a convention night. [read more]

From National Ledger; Did the teleprompter malfunction for Sarah Palin during the biggest speech of her life at the Republican National Convention in Minnesota on Wednesday? There are reports that the teleprompter was broken while she was trying to deliver her historic address during a primetime speech on Wednesday night. National Review Online's Greg Pollowitz writes at the Media Blog that MSNBC is reporting that there were teleprompter issues for Sarah Palin.

There were also reports of problems with the same teleprompter for Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City. Rudy Giuliani delivered a fantastic and rousing speech that was well received by the partisan crowd. There are varying reports that the teleprompter was not set up correctly.
[read more]

From NY Post; Last night, the question about Sarah Palin wasn't if she's risen too fast, but where she's been for so long.

She may have given the best speech of either political convention. She delivered a brilliantly written text flawlessly. Politicians who've been on the national stage for decades could do no better, and usually do worse.

It is widely remarked that Joe Biden is an ideal No. 2 on a national ticket because he's a "happy warrior." Maybe. But Sarah Palin is a pretty, charismatic, winsome warrior, with a to-die-for smile, radiant upswept hair - and a steely toughness.

Sarah Barracuda, indeed.

Newsrooms across America must be in abject despair. The unlikely VP nominee the media hoped to crush out of the gate is unaffected by their condescension and scorn - and is bent on giving better than she takes.

Miss Congeniality isn't afraid to administer an old-fashioned beat-down. Annie Oakley brought a gun to a knife fight and made like the Obama-Biden ticket was a moose lazily meandering into her gun sights. [read more]

From WCBS; Rudy Giuliani has passed his hatchet man test with flying colors.

Giuliani may have lost the presidential nomination, but he's relished his major role as party defender and attack dog at the Republican National Convention.

The former New York City mayor and keynote speaker wasted little time Wednesday night before attacking Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama's inexperience. (See the Giuliani speech on YouTube)

Giuliani took the stage at the Xcel Energy Center and first touted Republican nominee John McCain's credentials as a lifelong American leader. He then unleashed a scathing offensive against Obama.

"On the other hand, you have a resume from a gifted man with an Ivy League education," Giuliani said of Obama. "He worked as a community organizer, and immersed himself in Chicago machine politics. Then he ran for the state legislature, where nearly 130 times he was unable to make a decision yes or no. He simply voted 'present.'"

Giuliani said he was never afforded such a luxury as mayor of New York City and Obama is in for a rude awakening if he thinks he can take that kind of cavalier approach into the White House. [read more]

From Ann Coulter; John McCain's choice of Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska, as his running mate finally gave Republicans a reason to vote for him -- a reason, that is, other than B. Hussein Obama.

The media are hopping mad about McCain's vice presidential selection, but they're really furious over at MSNBC. After drawing "Keith + Obama" hearts on their denim notebooks, Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews stayed up all night last Thursday, writing jokes about Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, the presumed vice presidential pick. Now they can't use any of them.

So the media are taking it out on our brave Sarah and her 17-year-old daughter.

They claimed Palin was chosen only because she's a woman. In fact, Palin was chosen because she's pro-life, pro-gun, pro-drilling and pro-tax cuts. She's fought both Republicans and Democrats on public corruption and does not have hair plugs like some other vice presidential candidate I could mention. In other words, she's a "Republican." [read more]

From The Sun (UK);

How the rest of the world views Sarah Palin...

A week ago nobody had ever heard of her.

Today she is the most talked-about woman in the world. And with good reason.

Sarah Palin's sensational performance at the Republican Party Convention may turn out to be the tipping point of this rollercoaster American election.

Obama fans hoping she would fluff her big night were in for a nasty shock.

This speech has turned the election upside down. It was simply stunning. (See the Sarah Palin speech video)

Democrats and their Lefty media backers had been sneering that she was a small town nobody, a hick from the Alaskan sticks put into a job way beyond an inexperienced woman.

Believe me, you will not be hearing that again.

Palin turned out to be an electrifying mix of intelligence, passion, energy, optimism and plain speaking.

Full of self-assurance and aggression, she popped Barack's balloon big-time. [read more]

From Michelle Makin; “Babies, Lies, and Scandal” runs the front-cover headline over a photo of the Barracuda. What exactly are the “lies,” asks Kelly? Simply the lies that are being told about Palin, comes the reply from this galactic tool, live on satellite hook-up from the media’s tank for Obama.

And it’s all downhill from there.

Not really an interview so much as a cross-examination. Awesome.

From 1918;

From Boston Globe; DURING a town hall meeting in Pennsylvania last March, Senator Barack Obama was asked about teenagers and sexually transmitted diseases.

He replied that "the most important prevention is education," including "information about contraception." Then he added: "Look, I've got two daughters - 9 years old and 6 years old. I'm going to teach them first of all about values and morals, but if they make a mistake, I don't want them punished with a baby. I don't want them punished with an STD at the age of 16."

If Obama had deliberately set out to appall antiabortion voters, he couldn't have uttered four words more jarring than "punished with a baby." The equation of any new child with punishment set teeth on edge, and Obama's campaign quickly issued a clarification. The candidate, a loving father of two, believes that "children are miracles," it said; he only meant to underscore the importance of reducing teen pregnancy. But Obama's unscripted words needed no clarifying. They tartly encapsulated the extreme position on "choice" he has staked out in his career.

What brings Obama's revealing turn of phrase to mind, of course, is the pregnancy of Governor Sarah Palin's unmarried 17-year-old daughter. [read more]

From CBS News;

CBS finally covers Ron Paul... of course it's when they can do double duty to bash Republicans

It was, Ron Paul allows, “a bit of a slight.”

Until this year, the longtime Texas Congressman and former presidential candidate has had no problem getting floor passes to the Republican National Convention. This time around, he said, all he could get was a “second class” pass. He was only allowed on the convention floor, he was told, with a chaperone; he could bring no staff with him; and when he left the hall, his credentials would be taken away.

As for a speaking slot - something traditionally offered to candidates who garnered support during the presidential primary - Paul said simply, “that wasn’t available to us.” [read more]

From Washington Times; "When the heavy hand of the state is imposed on the press, all of us lose," Barack Obama told a group of Kenyan journalists during an August 2006 trip to Africa. "The media does not have a formal role in the government, but it serves a critical function in providing information to the public so that they can hold the government accountable," he said.

Mr. Obama's remarks implied he supports the First Amendment. His comment that "Democracy can't function properly without a free press," suggested he understood the importance of robust scrutiny of elected officials. Yet, when given the opportunity, Mr. Obama's recent actions have contradicted his own statements.

The Obama campaign launched a multipronged assault on the First Amendment when it threatened television and radio stations airing content critical of Mr. Obama. The first targets were TV stations running an advertisement that has proven embarrassing to the presidential candidate. The ad focuses on Mr. Obama's 13-year relationship with Bill Ayers, a key member of the 1970s domestic terrorist group, the Weather Underground. The Weathermen bombed at least 12 locations, including the U.S. Capitol in 1971, the Pentagon in 1972 and the State Department in 1975. A 1970 San Francisco bombing killed one police officer and blinded another. The same year, three Weathermen perished in a Greenwich Village townhouse explosion. Unrepentant, Mr. Ayers told a New York Times reporter in remarks published on Sept. 11, 2001: "I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough." [read more]

From Washington Post; At a secret meeting with Barack Obama three months ago, Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes says, he tried to clear the air with the Democratic senator by saying that his organization was determined to be fair but would not be "in the tank" for Obama's campaign.

During the sit-down in a Waldorf-Astoria hotel suite in Manhattan that included Rupert Murdoch, the network's owner, Obama expressed concern about the way Fox was covering him. "I just wanted to know if I'm going to get a fair shake from Fox News Channel," Ailes recalled him saying.

"Senator, you're the one who boycotted us," Ailes says he replied. "We're not the ones who boycotted you. Nor did we retaliate for your boycott." [read more]

From Lucianne;

From AP; Republican John McCain introduced first-term Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate Friday, a stunning selection of a little-known conservative newcomer who relishes fighting the establishment.

"She's exactly who I need. She's exactly who this country needs to help me fight the same old Washington politics of 'Me first and country second,' " McCain declared as the pair stood together for the first time at a boisterous rally in Ohio just days before the opening of the party's national convention.

Palin, the first Republican woman on a presidential ticket, promised: "I'm going to take our campaign to every part of our country and our message of reform to every voter of every background in every political party, or no party at all."

"... Politics isn't just a game of competing interests and clashing parties," added the Palin, 44, who has built her career in large measure by challenging fellow Republicans. [read more]

From Redstate; The McCain store is selling stickers and buttons, seen at right(click for larger image), for the newly announced 2008 GOP ticket. Sharp, eh? I especially note the fact that McCain and Palin's names are in the same font and the same color, representing their team attitude with regard to the campaign. The only thing that differentiates them is vertical positioning -- as the presidential nominee, McCain's name is above his running mate's.

Now, contrast that with the Obama-Biden logo seen at left (pulled in from the top left corner of Obama's web site; see below for why I had to go there to get it).

As we've chronicled before, Barack Obama seemed to seriously resent the fact that he had to pick a running mate at all (Erick called him "Constitutionally-required window dressing") -- and, when he finally settled on Joe Biden(someone whose 36 years in the Senate made Obama's attempts to continue a "Bringing Change from Without Washington" theme for his campaign a laughingstock), he had the elder statesman's name tacked on to the bottom of his stickers in a blend-in-with-the-background-like-an-afterthought shade of blue, in part to ensure the focus of this campaign remained squarely where he wanted it: on himself. [read more]

From gigaom; Comcast is out defending its bandwidth caps and how they are not bad. And how 250 GB transfer is plenty and enough to do whatever we want to do. Of course, in today’s terms that is more than enough, but what happens in the future? Nevertheless, if they are going to put caps, then they need to give us what I think is an acceptable expectation: a meter.

Metered billing needs a meter we can see, use and monitor any time we desire to do so. Water and electric utilities provide that meter (regardless of whether we use it or not), so why not Comcast? [read more]

From Grand Junction Sentinel; Let’s suppose that a public official has something in his past that he would prefer remain there. Something that might make voters wonder whether the rhetoric of today is something that should be believed. Let’s suppose that someone got their hands on documents about the skeleton in the closet, and went on a popular radio show to talk about them.

And let’s suppose that instead of a civilized debate about what may have happened years ago, the public official ordered his legions to jam the radio station’s phone lines in an effort to make sure that whatever happened all those years ago remained hidden.

We suppose if that were to happen, then there would be some truth to whatever those allegations are.

And we suppose that’s why Barack Obama and company worked overtime last week to shut down Stanley Kurtz of the Ethics and Public Policy Center when he appeared on a Chicago radio program to talk about the connections between Obama and the terrorist William Ayers back in Obama’s neighborhood organizing days.

Ayers, don’t forget, was the terrorist who bombed, among other things, the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol. He has said his only regret is that he “didn’t do more.” He lives in the same South Chicago neighborhood as the Obamas and Obama has said that they are nothing more than passing acquaintances. [read more]

From American Thinker; Do not believe that post-invasion intelligence invalidates our justification for using military force against Saddam's Iraq. The truth is the exact opposite. The US was fully justified to use military force against Iraq, even knowing what we know now -- especially knowing what we know now. We should not allow the false story -- almost accepted as fact -- as we head into a Presidential election, to go unchallenged.

The False Story

"The United States invaded Iraq based on false premises. The administration orchestrated a public relations drive to prove that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and connections to the 9/11 terrorists - both proved false." USA Today

While these two sentences came from USA Today, they describe the words behind the music of the "Bush lied, people died" meme echoing throughout the media chambers since at least 2004. The lies in just these two sentences are almost Shakespearian in their layered texture. The statement even lays out a false premise in accusing the Bush administration of using false premises. If lying is an art, our media have mastered it.

The Premise

Our invasion of Iraq was not based on a public relations drive; it was based on Public Law 107-243, otherwise known as the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq, passed by the 107th Congress in October of 2002 . (Herein referred to as the "Authorization".) It passed the House with a vote of 296 to 133 (by 69%) and the Senate with a vote of 77 to 23 (by 77%), including 58% of Senate Democrats. In short, it was overwhelming; it was bipartisan; and it was law. [read more]

From AP; Sen. Barack Obama's pledge to supporters that they would be the "first to know" his running mate turned out to be a savvy but unworkable communications strategy.

The Democratic presidential candidate got scooped by the media on his own announcement, done in by dogged reporting, loose-lipped party insiders and the limits of technology.

But all was not lost. He amassed a huge database of cell phone numbers and e-mail addresses for the fall campaign.

Obama's plan to use text messaging to announce his choice was a first in politics. He had promised supporters that by providing cell phone numbers and e-mail addresses they would be "part of this important moment" - the revelation of his choice for vice president.

The text message announcing Biden as Obama's pick began filtering across the U.S. at 3:02 a.m. EDT Saturday, when most people were asleep. By then, it was old news, by today's standards. The media had reported the pick more than two hours earlier. [read more]