Saturday, November 18, 2006

My Favorite Holiday Recipe

The holiday season is coming around again (wasn't it just here!???) so it's time to pull out the old recipe file and start cooking. My favorite is Chestnut Soup. I posted it here last year. Unfortunately, Williams-Sonoma didn't have any pre-peeled chestnuts on sale after last year's holidays so I'm going to have to do it the hard way, but it's worth it.

Update: Trader Joe's has frozin peeled chestnuts for thos lucky enough to live near one.
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Wednesday, November 08, 2006

A Loss We Needed

As disappointed as I am that Republicans lost the House and as seems increasingly likely, the Senate, perhaps the loss will provide a much needed corrective to a complacent Republican Party, as long as it takes away the right message. From what I've seen so far, it seems to be doing that. Representative Mike Pence, Chair of the Republican Study Committee said:

"while the scandals of the 109th Congress harmed our cause, the greatest scandal in Washington D.C. is runaway federal spending." He noted that pork-barrel earmarks, midnight votes to pass entitlement programs and lack of Congressional oversight were "not in the Contract with America back in 1994 and Republican voters said 'enough is enough.'"
Senator Tom Coburn had similar remarks (via Instapundit) so I'm feeling reasonably good that some good can come out of all this.

Finally, Bill Whittle also has some wise words. I think he's probably right. This isn't the end of the world. The Democrats have the keys to the car back for the time being. It remains to be seen whether they can drive responsibly. The Republicans have about a year to undertake some introspection and to bring in new leadership that can steer the party back to core principals before the next election cycle gets underway in earnest. If the Democrats give in to their worst impulses a suitably chastened Republican Party has a good shot at coming back in 2008. Here's hoping the lessons of 2006 take.
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Monday, November 06, 2006

New Bill Whittle Essay

Fresh on the heels of another great Mark Steyn column, we have another great Bill Whittle essay (does he write any other kind?). What can I say? Go read it. As always, it's long but worth your time.
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Sunday, November 05, 2006

Mark Steyn on Democrat Unseriousness

Mark Steyn has another great column (does he write any other kind?) about John Kerry and the Democrats attempts to have it both ways on the war in Iraq.

So their [Democrats] "support" is objectively worthless. The indignant protest that "of course" "we support our troops" isn't support, it's a straddle, and one that emphasizes the Democrats' frivolousness in the post-9/11 world. A serious party would have seen the jihad as a profound foreign-policy challenge they needed to address credibly. They could have found a Tony Blair -- a big mushy-leftie pantywaist on health and education and all the other sissy stuff, but a man at ease with the projection of military force in the national interest. But we saw in Connecticut what happens to Democrats who run as Blairites: You get bounced from the ticket. In the 2004 election, instead of coming to terms with it as a national security question, the Democrats looked at the war on terror merely as a Bush wedge issue they needed to neutralize.
I wonder if they really think we're stupid enough to believe them when they say they support the troops [you know they do - Ed]. The best way to support the troops is to get behind the mission and see it all the way through. If we don't, the resulting defeat will be worse than a dozen Vietnams.

Read the whole thing of couse.

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