A somewhat surprisingly confident and exuberant George W. Bush tonight, seemingly more at ease with himself as president than in many earlier such addresses. It was interesting, although depressing, to see the Democrats rise to cheer the defeat of the president's Social Security reform program, while sitting in dismay and disapproval (Hillary Clinton shaking her head in disgust) when Mr. Bush defended the NSA screening program.

Here is the key line that Democrats objected to:

"It is said that prior to the attacks of September the 11th, our government failed to connect the dots of the conspiracy. We now know that two of the hijackers in the United States placed telephone calls to Al Qaida operatives overseas. But we did not know about their plans until it was too late.

BUSH: So to prevent another attack -- based on authority given to me by the Constitution and by statute -- I have authorized a terrorist surveillance program to aggressively pursue the international communications of suspected Al Qaida operatives and affiliates to and from America.

Previous presidents have used the same constitutional authority I have and federal courts have approved the use of that authority. Appropriate members of Congress have been kept informed.

The terrorist surveillance program has helped prevent terrorist attacks. It remains essential to the security of America. If there are people inside our country who are talking with Al Qaida, we want to know about it, because we will not sit back and wait to be hit again."

The Democrats are making a significant mistake, in terms of the public perception of their competence to defend this country in time of war, by being so publicly dismissive and hostile to a program that does not seem to greatly alarm the American people, and which there is not a shred of evidence, hard or hearsay, that it has been abused.

Democrats, with few exceptions (Sen. Ben Nelson one of them), were similarly dismissive of an extension of the Patriot Act. Both these issues are likely to play a significant part in the public's process of measuring whether the Democratic party is up to the task of protecting it from foreign threats.

The president appropriately underscored, just after Democrats concluded their proud cheering at the demise of his Social Security reform program, the rising costs of this entitlement program, which will skyrocket even higher with the imminent retirement of the baby boom generation.

"The retirement of the baby boom generation will put unprecedented strains on the federal government. By 2030, spending for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid alone will be almost 60 percent of the entire federal budget. And that will present future Congresses with impossible choices: staggering tax increases, immense deficits or deep cuts in every category of spending.

Congress did not act last year on my proposal to save Social Security...

(APPLAUSE)

... yet the rising cost of entitlements is a problem that is not going away.

BUSH: And with every year we fail to act, the situation gets worse."

"Yet the tax relief is set to expire in the next few years.

If we do nothing, American families will face a massive tax increase they do not expect and will not welcome.

Because America needs more than a temporary expansion, we need more than temporary tax relief.

I urge the Congress to act responsibly and make the tax cuts permanent."

No one would expect the Democrats to even perform a perfunctory applause here, but Mr. Bush clearly again highlighted another key difference between the parties heading into this year's midterms.

On Iran:

"The Iranian government is defying the world with its nuclear ambitions, and the nations of the world must not permit the Iranian regime to gain nuclear weapons."

Which means confrontation with Iran is probably coming fairly soon, unless the unlikely happens, and the Iranians suddenly lose interest in continuing nuclear work for "energy purposes."

A great speech, containing great passion about many of the greatest domestic and foreign issues facing America today, and setting the stage for a highlighting of the differences which will dominate the upcoming midterm elections.

The Jerusalem Post:

Rafi Eitan suspects that Iran already has enough enriched uranium fissionable material to manufacture at least one or two atom bombs of the Hiroshima type. "Otherwise Iranian President Ahmadinejad would not have dared come out with his declaration that Israel should be wiped off the map," repeating it in various versions. His efforts at denying the Holocaust in which six million Jews were slaughtered prove that there is method in Ahmadinejad's madness. "Don't treat him like a madman," Chief of General Staff Dan Halutz recently cautioned.

Eitan's assessment of the situation is especially important because of his extensive intelligence experience in Israel's struggle for its existence, even before its establishment in 1948. Eitan was among those that laid the operational foundations for the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and the Mossad.

But how piped in is Eitan to current intelligence? That question is paramount in assessing the reliability of his assessment.

They tried, and tried, but the duo of Ted Kennedy and John Kerry could not successfully muster a filibuster against Samuel Alito. Kennedy's blustering, hysterical remarks on the Senate floor almost betrayed a possible pre-speech nip taking binge. Kennedy tried to create an encore to his dramatic speech on the Senate floor, given just hours after President Reagan nominated Robert Bork to the SCOTUS, but instead displayed for all to see, that the people of Massachusetts would best be served if he would simply retire and fade away.

Lincoln Chafee - the pseudo Democrat - announced he would vote against Alito, but thankfully voted for cloture. Clearly, Chafee has concluded (probably rightly) that open support for Alito can do him no great good, but his decision does hurt the National Republican Senatorial Committee. Why would I send money to the NRSC, if I suspect that such funds might be used to help Chafee, who proudly declared that he had voted against the reelection of George W. Bush, and now does this? I'll stick to contributing to individual members, thank you.

The gang of 14 sealed the defeat of any potential filibuster, with sufficient members of it rightly concluding that denying the outstanding Alito a fair vote would be an affront to the American sense of fair play. Kennedy and Kerry, the reversible Dianne Feinstein, and those others who voted to support a filibuster of Alito, clearly do not have a belief in that concept, and so rightfully alienate themselves from fair minded Americans.

Samuel Alito will be confirmed to the Supreme Court, and his ascension to that body is not only a gift to it, but to all Americans who possess a desire to see undeniably competent, and yes - fair and open minded jurists who decide cases coming before them on their own merits, utilizing a consistent judicial philosophy - as members of the nation's highest court.

***

Confirmed 58-42 and sworn in.

The final roll call.

Democrats are apparently going to attempt a filibuster of Samuel Alito's SCOTUS nomination. It will fail, of course, but they have to go through the motions for their moonbat Left supporters, particularly the Kos kid crowd. Sen. Dianne Feinstein has shamefully reversed her decision not to support a filibuster because Cindy Sheehan is breathing down her neck.

The Democratic party as a whole must understand that this makes them look quite foolish in the eyes of a majority of the public, but then they have to satisfy the hardcore Deaniacs, lest the money supply go dry, by performing a perfunctory protest action destined to go down in flames.

The superb Mary Katherine Ham over at Hugh Hewitt's blog has the quote of the day on the matter:

"I can't imagine that persisting in voting for a filibuster, even as a symbolic vote, could help any of these guys with constituents who don't hang out in the burnt-orange environs of the indigenous Internet moonbat."

Sen. Kent Conrad is one of those she refers to.

James Earl Carter, Jr., the former President of The United States, never ceases to remind America that he presided over one of the most incompetent and ineffective administrations in America's history, and that it is most fortunate that his presidential tenure was limited to a single term.

Now, the former president implores the international community to keep funding the Palestinian government, despite the fact that Hamas, a terrorist organization that is committed to the destruction of Israel - and has failed to renounce that aim - will be governing Palestinians. Hamas has killed hundreds of Israeli citizens, yet Mr. Carter wants to be sure that Hamas continues to be funded. Hamas has given no indication, or any hint of an indication, since the elections that it is prepared to cease or advocate the cessation of violence against innocent Israeli citizens. Yet, Mr. Carter is resolute that Hamas must not be financially stressed.

The Jimmy Carter who impotently sat by and watched the Iranians hold Americans civilians hostage, who declared the America of the late 1970's to be in a "malaise," who allowed OPEC to manipulate him and his administration, with spiraling gas prices the result and economic distress to follow, now assures the world that it must support a terrorist organization.

Unbelievable. Amazing. Bizarre.

Those three words were often uttered to describe the actions of Mr. Carter during his presidency, and they are appropriate to describe his advocacy of financial support for Hamas now.

From a White House press room exchange this morning:

Q: Can I also ask you, on Senator Kerry's comments, what is your reaction to the filibuster call by Senator Kerry, on Judge Alito?

MR. McCLELLAN: On his call yesterday? It was a pretty historic day. This was the first time ever that a Senator has called for a filibuster from the slopes of Davos, Switzerland. I think even for a Senator, it takes some pretty serious yodeling to call for a filibuster from a five-star ski resort in the Swiss Alps. (Laughter.)

Isn't yodeling what Kerry did during most of his presidential campaign of 2004?

A possible panacea?

Jan. 27, 2006 — The University of Pittsburgh says its researchers have genetically engineered a vaccine that protects mice and chickens from the deadly bird-flu virus that's currently spreading across Asia.

Bird flu, specifically the H5N1 influenza virus, has killed more than 80 people in Asia, and human cases have spread as far west as Turkey.

The virus is based on living viral components, making it more potent than "dead" virus vaccines, the researchers said. The results of their efforts are in the Feb. 15 issue of the Journal of Virology.

"The results of this animal trial are very promising, not only because our vaccine completely protected animals that otherwise would have died, but also because we found that one form of the vaccine stimulates several lines of immunity against H5N1," said Dr. Andrea Gambotto, in a press release issued Thursday.

Protecting humans is quite different from protecting animals, and will require a lot more research, but this is a promising start for researchers attempting to progress toward some form of effective vaccine against the avian flu.

John Kerry never has exhibited a talent for understanding, let alone pursuing, ideas and policies that fall within the mainstream of American political thought. Like Al Gore, but not quite as extreme, Mr. Kerry almost always seems to say or do the wrong thing at the wrong time. He never did "win" the Democratic nomination in 2004 with his non-existent political talents, but was simply left standing there, holding the bag, when Howard Dean imploded.

Sen. Kerry displays his incompetent political skills for America again today:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. John Kerry will attempt a filibuster to block the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, CNN has learned.

Kerry, in Davos, Switzerland, to attend the World Economic Forum, was marshaling support in phone calls during the day, he told CNN.

Kerry said he told a group of Democratic senators Wednesday, and urged that they join him. Kerry said he has the support of fellow Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy.

Some senior Democrats told CNN they are worried that the move could backfire.

It will backfire. Polls are consistently showing that the American people do not support a filibuster of Samuel Alito. No filibuster was mounted against Clinton SCOTUS nominees Breyer and Ginsberg, even though it was well known that their judicial philosophies were not likely to yield outcomes that Republicans would view favorably. The American people correctly sensed at that time the inherent unfairness of trying to deny a president his choice of judicial nominees, as long as those nominees did not fall significantly out of the mainstream of American jurisprudence when they were nominated. Republicans did not attempt to unfairly stop the nominations of justices Ginsberg and Breyer, and Democrats should not attempt the same with Alito.

Reasonable Democrats in the Senate, as referenced in the above article, understand that the Kerry course would be diastrous. If they attempted to deny Alito an unfair vote on the Senate floor then they would fail. Sen. Dianne Feinstein is already on record as saying she would not support such a move. A sufficient number of Republicans from the Gang of 14 have indicated that they would not support a move, leading almost certainly to the "constitutional option," where a change in Senate rules would allow the cessation of Mr. Kerry's filibuster with a simple majority. Sen. Majority Bill Frist has stated flatly and unambigously that there will be no filibuster of Alito.

A failed filibuster would also greatly weaken Senate Democrats, the Constitutional option further limiting their ability to mount any kind of sustained challenge to all judicial nominees in the future.

Mr. Kerry, unless he is completely unaware of all of these details (not an impossibility), most certainly knows all of this, which makes this action even more a bizarre one.

Samuel Alito is one of the most outstanding nominees for the high court to come before the Senate in a long, long time. He deserves a straight up or down vote on his confirmation, and any Democratic party attempt to deny him such a vote will be stopped in its tracks, as it should be.

A blogger with appropriate words about the possibility of Roy Blunt becoming House Majority Leader:

"I would rather lick fire ants off a stick than see Roy Blunt as Majority Leader."

A Blunt spokeswoman (Roll Call - subscripton req'd) fires back:

Blunt spokeswoman Jessica Boulanger wound up a trademark fast pitch and let loose on the blogger, warning, "Dale Franks should get the soothing balm ready and beware: Fire ants attach themselves to a person by biting with their jaws, then pivoting their heads and stinging from their abdomens in a circular pattern at multiple sites. They tend to attack and sting in great numbers — just like bloggers."

Talk about being a little sensitive? Things must not be going very well over there at Blunt central.

Her response, as Red State points out, wasn't exactly original.

Hard to believe, but the Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas managed to make major gains:

RAMALLAH, West Bank, Jan. 25 -- Hamas won a large share of the vote Wednesday as Palestinians selected their first new parliament in a decade, but appeared to fall short of deposing the governing Fatah movement as the leading party in the legislature, according to an exit poll conducted in coordination with the Palestinian election commission.

The poll showed that neither Fatah nor Hamas achieved a majority in the 132-seat legislature, meaning that the next Palestinian cabinet will be made up of a coalition of parties. But by gaining near-parity with Fatah in the parliament, Hamas -- formally known as the Islamic Resistance Movement -- will have a major role in the Palestinian Authority and complicate efforts to revive a dormant U.S.-backed peace plan that runs counter to the party's campaign platform in key respects.

Complicate is an understatement, as this now presents a major roadblock to peace in the Middle East. Hamas is responsible for many, many Israeli civilian deaths, and if it has a major role in Palestinian government then it is highly unlikely that Israel will be able to bring itself to trust such a government enough to make any meaningful moves that will lead to the hope of a lasting peace.

For those of you in Los Angeles who still unfortunately subscribe to the Los Angeles Times, the best way to register your protest over this is to call now, and cancel that newspaper, which quite frankly is not fit to wrap the entrails of fish in.

Independance for Taiwan? Tibet? Falun Gong? Try typing those into the upcoming Google in China, and you'll come up empty.

The Google capitulation:

Web search leader Google Inc. said on Tuesday that it was introducing a new service for China that seeks to avoid a confrontation with the government by restricting access to services to which users contribute such as e-mail, chat rooms and blogs.

The new Chinese service at http://www.google.cn will offer a self-censored version of Google's popular search system that restricts access to thousands of terms and Web sites.

Hot topics might include issues like independence for Taiwan or Tibet or outlawed spiritual group Falun Gong.

In seeking to compete more aggressively in the world's second biggest Internet market -- where Google has lost ground to a more popular home-grown search company Baidu Inc. -- the company is facing the toughest challenge yet to its corporate mantra of "don't do evil."

In a compromise that trades off Google's desire to provide universal access to information in order to exist within local laws, Google will not offer its Gmail e-mail service, Web log publishing services or chat rooms -- tools of self-expression that could be used for political or social protest.

So much for universal access to information via Google, at least in China.

As expected, a party line vote:

WASHINGTON - The Judiciary Committee favorably recommended
Samuel Alito's Supreme Court nomination to the full Senate on a party-line vote Tuesday, moving the conservative jurist one step closer to joining the high court.

All 10 Republicans voted for Alito, while all eight Democrats voted against him. The partisan vote was almost preordained, with 15 of the 18 senators announcing their votes even before the committee's session began.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, of course, completely mischaracterized the record of Alito:

"He still believes that the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion, but does not want to tell the American people because he knows how unpopular that view is," said Sen. Charles Schumer (news, bio, voting record), D-N.Y.

Schumer sounds bitter, as well he probably should. The strategy, devised by Ted Kennedy, of his party to try and bring down Alito (although Schumer largely abstained from such attacks) with baseless attacks on his personal past was a total failure, and will likely have ramifications reaching to next November because of its appalling nature.

West Wing cancelled? Cry me a river.

Heh:

"He has just sent out a mass missive informing the world that he will vote against Samuel Alito. In other news, the sun rose in the east this morning and will set in the west later today."