here's some of that *civility* everyone's been talking about

What was all that hoopla about racist, bigoted, violent tea partiers?

"You’re uneducated, unethical, immoral, and you don’t know what life is. That’s your problem. Why don’t you go behind that fence where you belong? Why don’t you go back with your own kind?” More on this here.

"all of us who took obama's pitch as fiscally responsible were duped."

Who said this:

[Senators] have to lead, because this president is too weak, too cautious, too beholden to politics over policy to lead. In this budget, in his refusal to do anything concrete to tackle the looming entitlement debt, in his failure to address the generational injustice, in his blithe indifference to the increasing danger of default, he has betrayed those of us who took him to be a serious president prepared to put the good of the country before his short term political interests. Like his State of the Union, this budget is good short term politics but such a massive pile of fiscal bullshit it makes it perfectly clear that Obama is kicking this vital issue down the road.

To all those under 30 who worked so hard to get this man elected, know this: he just screwed you over. He thinks you’re fools. Either the US will go into default because of Obama’s cowardice, or you will be paying far far more for far far less because this president has no courage when it counts. He let you down. On the critical issue of America’s fiscal crisis, he represents no hope and no change. Just the same old Washington politics he once promised to end.

Click here to find out.

Also, from HotAir:

$26.3 trillion in new debt — repeat, new debt — alone over the next decade. Says Jake Tapper, summing things up in a single harrowing line, “At no point in the president’s 10-year projection would the U.S. government spend less than it’s taking in.”

And for dessert:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The defining characteristic of Obama's foreign policy has been not just a failure to prioritize, but also a failure to recognize the need to do so.

2012 hopeful?

This sounds like a guy I could get behind.

Click here for the video.

By far, the most important speech at CPAC was delivered by two-term Gov. Mitch Daniels of Indiana at Friday night's banquet. It was an eloquently crafted, intellectually compelling call to arms against the red-ink forces of the national debt. Daniels, who was George W. Bush's budget director, proposed dramatically revamping Social Security and Medicare as he called for "an affectionate thank you to the major social welfare programs of the last century."

What was most striking about Daniels' speech, which inspired careful listening rather than pep-rally applause, was that it treated his CPAC audience as adults rather than as just another constituency group demanding pandering. Whether it was dismissing the easy-answer attacks on earmarks ("in the cause of national solvency, they are a trifle") or suggesting that most voters do not appreciate the sharp-edged rhetoric of the Republican right ("it would help if they liked us, just a bit"), Daniels' speech was an exercise in speaking truth to conservatives who have the power to derail a presidential candidacy.

HotAir has the full transcript.

safe scanning: keeping your jiggly bits private

Safe Scanning: New TSA Body Imaging Pacifies Modest Travelers

Privacy-mongers, rejoice! The Transportation Security Administration, having been hammered by the public for their use of body imaging, is field testing a new technology that will hopefully keep your unmentionables where they belong: out of sight, and out of the hands of strangers.

The software, called Automatic Target Recognition, or ATR, displays only a generic stick-figure image, rather than the actual outline of the traveler being screened. And instead of a security officer in another room looking at the image — a step TSA took before to make sure no one was feeling ogled — the passenger can check out the cartoonish abstraction alongside the security officer at the checkpoint.

You can thank me, now. ;O)

When I just flew through Amsterdam, I went through one of these machines. Easy peasy.

"i didn't raise taxes once."

President Barack Obama says he didn't raise taxes once.

In an interview on Super Bowl Sunday, Fox News host Bill O'Reilly asked President Barack Obama to react to a Wall Street Journal editorial that accused Obama of being "a determined man of the left whose goal is to redistribute much larger levels of income across society."

"Do you deny that you are a man who wants to redistribute wealth?" O'Reilly asked.

Obama first noted the conservatism of the Wall Street Journal's editorial page, then denied the charge "absolutely."

"I didn't raise taxes once. I lowered taxes over the last two years," Obama said.

We wanted to fact-check that statement, and we'll begin by saying Obama boils down an awful lot of complexity about federal tax policy into a short sound bite.

Looking at the whole statement, he's both right and wrong. For clarity's sake, we're going to take Obama's statement in two parts. Here, we'll look at his statement, "I didn't raise taxes once." In a separate report, we'll look at his statement, "I lowered taxes over the last two years."

The idea that Obama did not raise taxes is just plain wrong.

From Twitter:
Technically it's true that Obama "didn't raise taxes once." He raised taxes many times.

dana milbank: project fail

Dana Milbank asks: Will you take the Palin Pledge?

I'm declaring February a Palin-free month. Join me!

Though it is embarrassing to admit this in public, I can no longer hide the truth. I have a Sarah Palin problem.

Friday, January 21, 2011But today is the first day of the rest of my life. And so, I hereby pledge that, beginning on Feb. 1, 2011, I will not mention Sarah Palin -- in print, online or on television -- for one month. Furthermore, I call on others in the news media to join me in this pledge of a Palin-free February. With enough support, I believe we may even be able to extend the moratorium beyond one month, but we are up against a powerful compulsion, and we must take this struggle day by day.

I, Dana Milbank, pledge to not write about Sarah Palin for a month. Will you pledge to not read or watch coverage of her? Join me in taking the Palin Pledge.

He didn't last one day.
He has a problem, alright...you betcha!
The dude is obsessed.

H/T memeorandum

This is funny: Yippee ki yay, liberals! It's Sarah Palin Month on Telegraph Blogs!