Blog Heap of Links for the day 1 June 2011

Two Iraqis living in Kentucky have been arrested on charges that they tried to send sniper rifles, stinger missiles and money to Al Qaeda operatives in their home country

You can see why the party professionals don't take Palin seriously. The way people talk, you'd think Sarah Palin was a political newcomer, rather than a 20-year veteran of elected politics. But there is another, bigger reason why the Republican insiders find it so difficult to take Palin seriously. Their game is political chess, a game of movement, and Palin plays Chinese Go or weiqi, a game of position, where you put down counters and never move them. With Going Rogue, she put down a counter that positioned herself as a "commonsense conservative." With America by Heart she positioned herself as a "commonsense constitutional conservative." Now, with her "One Nation" bus tour, she is mounting a "campaign to educate and energize Americans about our nation's founding principles, in order to promote the Fundamental Restoration of America." That's the new counter that Sarah Palin is placing on the board as she moves up the Northeast corridor: the "Fundamental Restoration of America." It has quite a ring to it. It is just the line you would want to take if you were running for president against Barack Obama and his czars, his crony green capitalists, his waivers-for-friends ObamaCare, his regulatory blizzard, his jobless recovery, and his 1967-borders foreign policy. With "Restoration," Palin appeals to the patriotism of the white working class without getting into tricky economic details.

"I know for a fact that Roger Ailes admires and respects Sarah Palin and thinks she is smart," Shine tells the New York Times. "He also believes many members of the left wing media are extremely terrified and threatened by her. Despite a massive effort to destroy Sarah Palin, she is still on her feet and making a difference in the political world. As for the 'Republican close to Ailes' for which the incorrect Palin quote is attributed, when Roger figures out who that is, I guarantee you he or she will no longer be 'close to Ailes.'"

Now, regarding the issues, Palin is pretty much on the same page as most of us tea party patriots: drill baby drill, smaller government, etc. And once again, I must cite her boldness and confidence when espousing her conservative beliefs. You never see Palin dancing around questions from liberal media hacks trying to make her conservative ideas sound mean, heartless, stupid, and racist. It is extremely refreshing and encouraging to see someone on our side fearlessly challenging the liberal media! And what about presidential charisma? In my nationwide travels on four Tea Party Express tours, in which Palin participated, nobody sparked excitement nor struck a stronger emotional chord with audiences at the rallies than Sarah Palin. She is a rock star. The people love her. I pray that whoever we select as our presidential candidate will grasp the seriousness of the situation in which we find our country. Various potential Republican presidential candidates are good people with great conservative ideas to get our country back on track. The most important criterion for a candidate to win my support is a willingness to launch a shock and awe, all-out assault on Obama's horrific record and terrifying agenda. Obama has the bully pulpit of the Oval Office, his Democrat minions, racist black so-called civil rights groups, and a sycophant liberal mainstream media all working in concert for him to be reelected in 2012. America cannot survive another Republican presidential candidate committed to "playing nice" for fear of being called racist. As they say in AA, "Half measures avail us nothing." If Obama is reelected in 2012, America as we know it is over. King Obama must be politically dethroned.

Since Palin and her team won't share where the potential candidate is headed, reporters and producers have little choice but to simply stay close to Palin's bus. This has resulted in scenes of the Palin bus tooling down the highway followed by a caravan of 10 or 15 vehicles all trying to make sure they don't lose sight of the Palin bus. It adds up to a dangerous situation, says CBS News Producer Ryan Corsaro. … Corsaro asked a member of Palin's team if he thought it was dangerous to have reporters forced to chase her from stop to stop. "You're the ones that are trailing us," he replied. [BWAH HAH HA HA HA HAAAAH!]

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D.-Fla.), chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, denounced Republicans last week for believing illegal immigration "should in fact be a crime." [Seriously!]