FRAUD VICTIM ALERT

Journalism legend Ben Bradlee knocks Hillary's minions

I like Ben Bradlee because he has the experience in journalism that few current day types have and he talks like the guy down at the corner bar, both of which are much-needed in today's 5-second soundbite news environment and overly politically-correct society. In short, the guy kicks ass - a lot of it.

That's why when we saw an interview with the cantankerous journalism god in Radar, titled "Ben Behaving Bradlee", we excitedly clicked on it and read it. What we got was priceless quotes and some cool insight to the guy, but we also got a little tidbit on Hillary Clinton, or rather Team Hillary, from Ben Bradlee:

Do you know any of the presidential candidates?
I don't know them that well—I know "how do you do." I know Romney—"how do you do." I know Hillary.

What do you think of Hillary?
Well, I'm not as against her as some other people under my roof. Sally [Quinn, his wife]—I find the women are really very, very strongly against her.

What's that about?
I don't know. I don't think Hillary is a completely sympathetic person. But she is hard-working, she is monolithically devoted to policy—she's a wonk. I'm not terribly impressed with the people around her, though. Some of them I'm actively unimpressed with. You know, you can say about [Bill] Clinton, he had a hell of a good team. And Jimmy Carter had a hell of a good team. And you don't see those around now.

I find this to be an interesting take because the in the past few weeks Team Hillary has started to show that although they are a juggernaut, they might be starting to slow a bit in their momentum. Just look at the gains that Barack Obama has made as we start looking at Iowa in just over a month and look at the responses that Team Hillary has crafted to Obama's offensive in the past couple of weeks. Like plastic arrows bouncing off of armor, Team Hillary has been able to do little to quell the Obama assault and while her minions are starting to show their collective self-centered selves, Obama and his team appear to be maturing and really putting themselves out there for the American public to see and evaluate.

Bradlee's take on the Bill Clinton is also spot-on - whether you liked him or not, he had a team that was kick-ass. They knew how to take and throw a punch, and they were educated about the process of a campaign and how to address issues and lobs from both sides of the aisle. You cannot say the same about the crew at Team Hillary. They are as thin-skinned of a campaign as we have seen in some time, as evidenced by their complaints about Tim Russert at the MSNBC debate, their praise of softball pitcher Wolf Blitzer at the CNN debate, and Mark Penn's dismissal of the Zogby Interactive Poll that puts Hillary behind all of the GOP candidates who matter (and a few who don't) in the general election.

Team Hillary is also making the same mistakes that Kerry made by not giving us any specifics as to their health care plan, which is far too reminiscent of John Kerry's "I have a plan..." declarations that he threw all over the campaign trail in 2004, but apparently never had time to finish with an "...and it is to..."

That said, we still believe Hillary wins the nomination, but it sure as hell won't be because she had a good team, it will because she will have fought not to lose, instead of fighting to win.

Here's the link to the Bradlee interview on RadarOnline (which we highly recommend as good reading)

Islamic Militants In Sudan Demand That Teacher Be Punished

In yet another indication that Islamic fundamentalists do not have enough important things through which to occupy their time, these knuckle-dragging clowns have decided that a British teacher named Gillian Gibbons, 50, who named a teddy bear "Mohammed" should face the full penalty for insulting their prophet of the same name. So, now they are calling for protests, rallies, and the whole nine yards because a teacher made an innocent mistake. Is it any wonder why these countries have no economies, money, or hope to speak of? This crap occupies every aspect of every miserable day of their miserable lives.

Is there any doubt as to why the West and the Middle East on on a collision course over this kind of nonsense? I'll tell you what? You want Westerners to take your prophet seriously? Then how about hanging, shooting, or otherwise dissecting the cowards who carry the name Mohammed and blow up airplanes, buildings, or groups of people. That is if they haven't already blown themselves up because they foolishly think that they are off to a land of paradise and 70 moustached virgins, or some BS like that. Yeah, then maybe we will take the religion that you hijacked and your prophet seriously; however, if you continue this kind of ridiculous behavior you're likely to not get a whole lot of respect, compassion, or anything but laughs and ire from the West.

While we hope for the best for Ms. Gibbons, we cannot help but ask the following - "what the hell were you thinking when you thought it was a good idea to head over to "Halfassistan" Sudan to teach in a Christian school?!" At the very least, when you decided to go to this godforsaken hellhole, did you not at least check out the history and the customs of this place? We are willing to bet that Ms. Gibbons is sitting in a cell thinking "note to self - England is a perfectly suitable place to live and teach. Can't wait to see it soon!", and as we said, we hope that she is released without further inconvenience from here half-witted captors.

At any rate, check out the story from the fine folks at the Daily Mail here.