Steven Latimer

Now, I realize this isn't fresh blog content, but Buchanan's thoughts are so well-put I feel they're worth repeating.

If John McCain wins the presidency, his comeback -- after the bankrupt debacle his campaign had become in the summer of 2007 with his backing of the amnesty bill -- will be the stuff of legend.

And as nominee, he is entitled to conduct his own campaign and be cut slack by a party whose brand name is now Enron.

That said, McCain seems to have decided to win by love-bombing the Big Media and putting miles between himself and the base.

Consider his "Forgotten Places" tour of last week. It began in Selma, Ala., where McCain went to Edmund Pettis Bridge to hail John Lewis and the marchers night-sticked and hosed down by the Alabama State Troopers on the Montgomery march for voting rights.

Now that was a seminal movement in the fight for civil rights.

But this is not 1965. Today, John Lewis is a big dog in the "No-Whites-Need-Apply!" Black Caucus. The Rev. Jeremiah Wright is sermonizing White America. The Rev. Al Sharpton is trying to shut down the Big Apple. And the fight for equal rights is being led by Ward Connerly.

With no help from McCain, Connerly is trying to put on five state ballots a Civil Rights Initiative that declares white men are also equal and not to be denied their civil rights because of the color of their skin.

And where does McCain stand?

From Selma, McCain went to the Gee's Bend Quilters Collective, where black ladies make the famous blankets. The stop could not but call to mind the hundreds of thousands of textile and apparel jobs in the Carolinas and Georgia lost after NAFTA and Most-Favored Nation for China, both of which McCain enthusiastically supported.

McCain's next stop was Inez, Ky., where LBJ declared war on poverty. But LBJ's war was a politically motivated scheme to shift wealth and power to government, which led to a pathological dependency among America's poor, his own abdication and Ronald Reagan's 1980 campaign against Big Government that ushered in the Conservative Decade.

McCain then went to New Orleans to backhand Bush for failing to act swiftly to rescue the victims of Katrina. But the real failure of New Orleans was of the corrupt and incompetent regime of Mayor Ray Nagin and the men of New Orleans, who left 30,000 women and children stranded in a sea of stagnant water.

No doubt Bush hit the snooze button, but why the piling on?

Then McCain headed up to Youngstown, Ohio, to tell the folks their jobs are never coming back and NAFTA was a sweet deal.

But why, when America's mini-mills and steel mills are among the most efficient on earth -- in terms of man hours needed to produce a ton of steel -- aren't those jobs coming back?

Answer: It is due to the free-trade policies of Bush and McCain, which permit trade rivals to impose value-added taxes of 15 percent to 20 percent on steel imports from the United States while rebating those taxes on steel exports to the United States. We are getting it in the neck coming and going.

An America First trade and tax policy could have U.S. steel mills rising again, while those in Japan, China, Russia and Brazil would be shutting down as uncompetitive in the U.S. market.

But we no longer put America first.

The U.S. government burns its incense at the altar of the Global Economy. The losers are those guys in Youngstown McCain was lecturing on the beauty of NAFTA. And the winners are the CEOs who pull down seven-, eight- and even nine-figure annual packages selling out their country for the corporation.

Does McCain think $6 trillion in trade deficits since NAFTA, a dollar rotting away and 3.5 million manufacturing jobs lost under Bush was all inevitable? Does he think we can do nothing to stop the deindustrialization of a country that used to produce 96 percent of all it consumed?

Why should those guys in Youngstown vote for McCain?

So the feds can teach them how to shovel snow?

Even Hillary, whose husband did NAFTA with Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole's help, now gets it.

Then McCain took a time out to denounce the North Carolina GOP for ads tying the Rev. Wright to Obama, and the pair to two Democratic congressional candidates. To their credit, the North Carolinians told McCain where to get off and are running the ads.

What does a McCain victory mean for conservatives?

Probably a veto on tax hikes and perhaps a fifth justice like Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito or John Roberts, to turn two pair into a full house. Fifty years after Warren, it could be game, set, match for the right.

But McCain may also mean more Middle East wars, more bellicosity, more manufacturing jobs lost, malingering in the culture wars, and more illegal aliens and amnesty.

In Pennsylvania, thousands of Republicans re-registered to vote Democratic, and 27 percent of the GOP votes went to Mike Huckabee or Ron Paul. McCain may just stretch this rubber band so far it snaps back in his face.

Today marks the 12th annual "Day of Silence," which is intended to increase awareness of bullying and violence towards students who have a sexual orientation other than "straight." The event always falls somewhere in April and this year's event is in memory of Larry King, the California middle school student who was shot to death in February, allegedly because he asked another male student to be his "valentine."

Anyway, by taking a vow of silence for a day, LGBT students or their allies supposedly raise awareness on the subject matter. I find this reasoning specious. Wouldn't it be more effective to have a day of action, or a day of talk, or something like that? A vow of silence (by its very nature) won't do anything because it is neutral. Besides, can't it be argued also that "anti-gay" people want LGBT people to be silent?

I therefore question the Day of Silence.

In the 1995 Universal Pictures film Casper, actress Cathy Moriarty plays the role of the peevish villain, Carrigan Crittenden. Crittenden is the bitter, maniacal woman who is upset that her recently deceased father only left her a lousy, run-down mansion in his will. But when she learns from her sidekick "Dibbs" (played by Eric Idle) that Whipstaff Manor in Friendship, Maine may actually have hidden treasure, she goes ballistic and goes to great lengths to find it.

Anyhow, in one memorable scene, Crittenden yells "the bitch is back!" after Dibbs thinks she has left. This is analogous to Hillary Clinton's win yesterday in Pennsylvania. Clinton is peevish, and after a lot of people have ruled her out, she comes back, a la Crittenden. Besides, Clinton and Crittenden (played by Moriarty) look alike.


In all seriousness, I am glad Hillary won Pennsylvania. Among Hillary, McCain, and Obama, she is clearly the most conservative candidate (sadly). As an added bonus, her newest victory further complicates the Democrats' primary process.

It has been raining ferociously for the past three days, almost exclusively nonstop.

That being said, I do not want to hear the word "drought" ever again!!!

Today, Ben Stein's documentary Expelled: no Intelligence Allowed hits theatres across America. I highly recommend seeing it. And this is coming from someone who goes to movies less than once a year.

I got to see an exclusive screening of Stein's film back in February when I was in Washington for CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference. Back then, the film was not totally finished, so we got to see the "rough draft," if you will.

(As an aside, I sat in front of these three college students from Kansas State University. We shot the breeze before the movie started and I learned that we had a lot in common. I think it was also the first time I ever talked to a group of Kansans.)

I actually had to sign a statement as I entered the room saying I wouldn't record it, or discuss the film in depth with anyone until it hit theatres.

Stein's film essentially addresses the controversy surrounding intelligent design, and how many professors on America's college campuses have been finding themselves in hot water, even to the point of being "expelled"--fired, canned, loss of tenure, etc.--just for saying something different.

For some reason, the film has been stirring up a hornet's nest of controversy, mostly from the Left. I wonder why...

While I have plenty of thoughts, I won't say anything else about the film--I'd rather you see it yourself. In fact, it's been over two months since I've seen it, so all I can recall is Ben Stein's monotone voice, pink shirt, sneakers, etc. That and it was a fantastic movie.

Despite it being a short film (97 minutes), Expelled shook me to my core, but not because of what you might think.

Go get Expelled!

Today I appear in Slippin' in the Tub, by Nate Waggoner and Jonathan Scheer.

Oh jeez...

The automatic doors to Ukrop's Grace Street will open and shut to Richmonders one last time on Saturday, May 10, 2008 as Ukrop's closes their Grace Street location. I learned of this today when I was at Ukrops. My bagger, Sebastian, said the reasons Ukrop's decided to close the store were due to "low income" and "the economy."

This won't be on the front page of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, but for me, this is big news.

Let's hope for a curtain call. On behalf of all VCU students, they deserve one.

(DISCLAIMER: I do not know for certain when Ukrop's opened this location; because the Richmond City Office of the Assessor lists 2002 as the last date the property underwent a transaction, I can only assume Ukrop's Grace Street opened then.)

This leaves Kroger as the only major grocery store in the VCU area. Kroger is kinda out of my way, so it looks like I may need to purchase a larger meal plan next semester.

I am generally pretty knowledgeable as far as what's happening around campus. Because I just learned this news today, I can only assume Ukrop's made this decision just recently.

I'll miss Ukrop's. They've been fun, convenient, and by my side. I'm sure this will be a big loss for the VCU community, but we'll get over it. I wonder if anyone's buying the building Ukrop's currently is in. Whoever buys it will shell out a lot of coin; the land and improvements are valued at over 3 million dollars.

UPDATE (17 April): I was wrong. I just found out they opened in 2003.

Twenty years ago today, I was baptized into the Catholic Church. I was baptized April 9, 1988 by Fr. Paul Gaughan at St. Jerome Catholic Church in Newport News, Va. Gaughan retired in June 1996 after 15 years of service at St. Jerome.

Grandparents Beverly & Edward Latimer acted as my godparents for the baptism.

Maybe this is the libertarian in me speaking, but what exactly happened to solving problems on our own? Life is not fair, and from time to time we are all thrown curveballs. That's just the way it is.

What exactly happened to the good old days where when you had a problem you dealt with it, solved it, and got over it?

These days, we keep looking to government to solve our problems FOR us. Welfare programs, etc, or--God forbid--"therapy."

I say screw therapy. Yeah, sometimes we have to talk to others to solve our individual problems. That's fine. But this should not, if possible, mean therapists.

Just a thought...

This morning I "ran" in the Ukrop's 10K in Richmond. I put scarequotes around ran because I ran the first mile or two, then walked at a reasonably fast clip, and then turned on the heat when I felt better at mile 5. I then ran to the finish line! A 10K is a little over 6.2 miles.

I must admit that I signed up on a whim back in February because the brochure made it look fun. And fun it was! There were porto-potties along the way, rock bands, Richmonders cheering, and several water stops. It was like a moving block party with 30,000 happy people in it. It was easier than I thought.

I had to use the bathroom twice (bathroom really belongs in quotes here as well) and got water several times. I also had to fart while running, which was actually kind of fun :-)

It rained moderately hard most of the time, but toward the end the sun started to come out.

We had to wear a really cool timing chip on our shoe called the "Champion Chip" to get our time. My unofficial time was 1 hour, 19 minutes, and 45 seconds (v about 4.6 mph).

The entry fee was 30 dollars, which gets you the t-shirt, race bib, use of the timing device, water, use of porto-potties, and admittance to the post-race party in Monroe Park. The post-race party had bands, plenty of food (bagels, apples, bananas, chocolate milk, bottled water, chips and dip, etc).

I saw a few friends of mine along the way, either in the race, or on the sidelines. There were participants in costumes. I saw a turtle, matadors with a bull, a banana, a doctor "chasing" a mental patient, just to name a few. This is a tradition, because whoever wears the best costume gets a prize from the Times-Dispatch.

If I can find a picture of me, I'll post it here.

Yesterday, after much anticipation, the Broad Street Journal was released! It is VCU's new conservative publication. Right now it's a monthly thing. It is not affiliated with the University, but is centered around VCU. I am the journal's managing editor, and the pdf format has been uploaded to www.broadstjournal.org

From left to right: Conor Murphy, me, Shana Weiss