There’s been a bit of controversy surrounding the very popular line of American Girl dolls. The Mexican-American doll Marisol was criticized by Latino activists because her background story included a bit about how she had had to move from her dangerous Hispanic neighborhood in Chicago to some nicer (and presumably whiter) suburb (although one that doesn’t have a dance studio, forcing the “resourceful” Marisol to combine “the best of the her old world with a renewed commitment to stretch and try her hardest”).

A couple of weeks ago a conservative group threatened to boycott American Girl outright since the company had donated money to a lesbian group.

But I haven’t seen anybody mention the real outrage: Felicity the loyalist. Check this out, straight from the American Girl catalog:

Felicity

A loyal, spirited girl of 1774 who grows impatient doing the “sitting-down kinds of things” colonial girls are expected to do. Her struggles for independence matches America’s own fight for freedom during the American Revolution.

Now, wait a minute here. A “loyal” girl during the Revolutionary era? Loyal as in a…loyalist?

Move to Canada, you bacon-eatin’ hussy!

Update: Here’s a somehwat more serious criticism of American Girl and its relationship with pro-abortion Girls, Inc.

Michael of Southern Appeal brings attention to an ugly development on Capitol Hill, where Congress Republicans are apparently, according to Washington Times, looking to squeeze money out of oil companies because gas prices are so high (high, but tumbling, as it happens). That kind of foolishness is straight out of some two-bit Latin American dictator’s playbook. It is, therefore, unsurprising that Democrats would pursue such a policy, but for Republicans to follow suit? Unbelievable. personally, I haven’t picked up on any groundswell of support among friends, relatives or coworkers for confiscating oil companies’ monies, and even if I had, I would still strongly oppose such dimwittedness.

Race and identity politics have deteriorated into little more than buffonery, but it was only a half-century ago that acts of great personal courage and moral conviction were necessary to bring an end to a deeply unjust system of racial discrimination. Read La Shawn Barber’s post on the late Rosa Park, the woman who dared to sit down.

As an aside: Much has been made of the fact that Parks and many, many others in the African-American Civil Rights movement in the 50’s and 60’s were socialists. It should be kept in mind that socialism was the in thing of that era, pretty much the default ideology among educated people, bizarre as it seems now.

You know the spiel: Blah blah George W. Bush blah blah fundamentalist blah blah evangelicals blah blah theocracy blah blah. It’s all so silly. America isn’t a theocracy, this is a theocracy. How lucky we are to have Saudi Arabia as our close ally in our fight against Islamist aggression.

I’ve stayed away from blogging for a few days to give the pro-Miers arguments a chance to seep into my brain. For those Miers supporters who are hoping for a mellowing among ant-Miers forces, I have to say I’m sorry I can’t oblige. She remains a Bush crony of undetermined ideology, with no experience as judge, with no experience arguing constitutional law, and basically with no sign of being a Justice who can move the Supreme Court away from dictating and towards interpreting. If anything, the last few days’ back and forth have mostly served to strengthen my belief that she’s a go along, get along person who will not rock the Court’s boat.

On a different note, her professional accomplishments as The First Woman This and The First Woman That have been unduly dismissed by youngons who frankly don’t and perhaps can’t appreciate how difficult it often was, I dare say routinely was, for women who entered all-male or near all-male professional circles back in the 1970’s. While that experience doesn’t make her Supreme Court material, it is not something that should be scoffed or sneered at the way it is among some pundits.

president George W. Bush held a televised video conference with nine U.S. and one Iraqi soldier, and immediately the liberal media started griping about the even being highly scripted. Well, according to one of the soldiers who participated, it wasn’t:

Yesterday, I (bottom right corner in the picture) was chosen to be among a small group of soldiers assigned to the 42ID’s Task Force Liberty that would speak to President Bush, our Commander-in-Chief. The interview went well, but I would like to respond to what most of the mass-media has dubbed as, “A Staged Event.”
First of all, we were told that we would be speaking with the President of the United States, our Commander-in-Chief, President Bush, so I believe that it would have been totally irresponsible for us NOT to prepare some ideas, facts or comments that we wanted to share with the President.
We were given an idea as to what topics he may discuss with us, but it’s the President of the United States; He will choose which way his conversation with us may go.
We practiced passing the microphone around to one another, so we wouldn’t choke someone on live TV. We had an idea as to who we thought should answer what types of questions, unless President Bush called on one of us specifically.

It used to be that a lie could travel half the world before truth could get its boots own, but nowadays the Internet make it a little more difficult for establishment media to get away with its distortions.

To our troops in Iraq: America supports you! Thank you, and God bless you!

Michelle Kosinski, reporter for NBC, is caught massaging perceptions in a live bit for the Today show on NBC. Hilarious, must see, real-time takedown of overly ambitious reporter.

Wall Street Journal editorial page columnist John Fund wasn’t exactly thrilled by Harriet Miers nomination to the Supreme Court, but he was willing to wait ’til the hearings to ask questions. He now believes that “questions about Ms. Miers should be raised now–and loudly–because she has spent her entire life avoiding giving a clear picture of herself.”

Fund is not impressed by the weak defense mounted by the White House for her nomination:

It is traditional for nominees to remain silent until their confirmation hearings. But previous nominees, while unable to speak for themselves, have been able to deploy an array of people to speak persuasively on their behalf. In this case, the White House spin team has been pathetic, dismissing much of the criticism of Ms. Miers as “elitism” or even echoing Democratic senators who view it as “sexist.” But it was Richard Land , president of the Southern Baptist Convention, who went so far as to paint Ms. Miers as virtually a tool of the man who has been her client for the past decade. “In Texas, we have two important values, courage and loyalty,” he told a conference call of conservative leaders last Thursday. “If Harriet Miers didn’t rule the way George W. Bush thought she would, he would see that as an act of betrayal and so would she.” That is an argument in her favor. It sounds more like a blood oath than a dignified nomination process aimed at finding the most qualified individual possible.

Then Fund takes a look at Miers track record, such as it is, and it is not pretty.

I still haven’t seen any good argument for why Harriet Miers should be on the Supreme Court. It is not a good argument that “we should trust Bush” or that “the president has made his choice” or that she is a Texas lawyer (which seems to be Beldar’s talking point) or that the president can’t risk a defeat and so on.

We know practically nothing about her politics and ideology, and what little we do know (she likes affirmative action, she dislikes the Federalist Society) is not the least bit encouraging.

Bush made a shockingly bad decision in nominating her.

Were Muslim terrorists planning on attacking New York City on the anniversary of the Battle of Lepanto? That’s an interesting speculation.

Update: As it turned out, the whole thing was a hoax perpetrated by some terrorist in Iraq who presumably wanted to deal his way to good treatment or something. Regardless, Lepanto, what a battle!