Even when he loses, he wins.

To be perfectly honest, I had no idea that conservative media mogul Andrew Breitbart was a front-page contributor to Arianna Huffington’s left-wing news rag. I always imagined that he had more class than that, but who knew?

In any event, Breitbart’s “front-pager” status at the online tabloid that serves as your one-stop shop for all your medical fearmongering, pseudo-New Age woo-woo gurus, and Barack Obama fashion news needs is no longer, which I’m sure he’s absolutely devastated about.

I mean, the man has his own online media outlet, Breitbart.tv, which publishes original news videos and reports from around the world. He has a book coming out, entitled Righteous Indignation: “Excuse Me While I Save the World!” He has his own product line of websites: Big Government, Big Journalism, Big Hollywood, and Big Peace. He’s one of the Right’s most visible agitators, and when he speaks, people listen.

So when Van Jones and his band of socialists, “Color of Change,” pressured embattled progressive blog Huffington Post into shunning Breitbart, I doubt Andrew was too broken up. I mean, it’s not like Breitbart actually said anything untrue about Mr. Jones—Huffington Post editors were allegedly fed up with Breitbart’s “ad hominem attacks” on Jones.

In an interview with the Daily Caller, Breitbart called Jones “a cop killer-supporting, racist, demagogic freak. And a commie. And an eco-fraudster.” All of which are terms that can truthfully be used to describe Van Jones.

But, wait a moment here. Uncivil arguments are used all the time, by prominent Huffington Post writers such as Ed Schultz or… oh dear… HuffPo founder Ariana Huffington. So we can expect the poor man’s Zsa Zsa Gabor to fire herself from her own website, right? Right?

While others may search for the hypocrisy of the Huff­-lepuffs that we already know is rampant, I just sit here and think, “if I were Andrew Breitbart, I’d be laughing about this.”

Huffington Post was bought by AOL for $315 million, and promptly, AOL’s stock price fell… exactly $315 million. In other words, it could be said that the market believed that purchasing HuffPo would bring no profit for AOL… or, alternatively, the stock market believes that HuffPo is completely worthless.

While he was a frontpager at HuffPo, Breitbart was slumming around with leftist hacks such as Huffington herself, medical quacks like Jenny McCarthy, and New Age guru-wannabes like Deeprak Chopra.

However, since Breitbart is winning, in every sense of the word, he wins even when he loses. Blame it on being a freaking rock star from Mars or the tiger blood, Breitbart’s name strikes fear into the hearts of progressives. Losing headliner status on a washed-up joke of a website doesn’t even measure up to the things he does, or will do in the future.

Rock on, Andrew Breitbart.

Rock on.

As I predicted, the people trying to push this idea through would to attempt to slip in the kickback as a proviso during Budget Week (which is this week).

Guess what? The promoters of the Amazon Kickback are doing just that. Gosh, I must be psychic or something.

Sometime this week, Rep. Dan Cooper (R-Anderson), and a few other House Republicans, are planning to slip in a proviso that will put the Amazon Kickback into law, at the urging of Commerce Secretary Bobby Hitt and his allies.

The advantage of slipping in the Amazon.com sales tax exemption as a proviso, is that only the most astute lawmaker would notice that such a thing has been done, and the whole maneuver would be executed in the figurative dead of night.

These spending instructions, essentially, are the little brother of the earmark—tacked on to a bill at the last minute, unrelated to the bill being debated, wasteful, and—most importantly—anathema to the conservative’s rallying cry of transparency and accountability.

Given that Nikki Haley campaigned on “transparency” and “accountability,” she has the power to back her words up with actions, by putting the kibosh on this backroom deal that’d cost the state millions.

This story is breaking, and I will update as I get more information, but remember, you heard it here first!\

UPDATE

The keyboard monkeys over at Stuffed Suits sent over a notice that, thanks to them spreading the word , they “got [my] information to the right people, and they are slamming the door on it.”

Now, obviously, the pro-Amazon Kickback bunch will probably try to slip it into the budget again. But thanks to the boiler-room crew over at Suits, the word got out that subterfuge was afoot in the Statehouse, and the attempt got called out.

Because the watchdogs barked, South Carolina’s taxpayers were spared from the shady deals which Statehouse critters make in secret.

Again, thanks to the web-monkeys at Stuffed Suits! You guys rock!

Just who is Representative Keith Ellison (Democrat, MN-05)?

Is he one of two Muslim Congressmen?

Is he the heel to Rep. Peter King (R-NY), whose Homeland Security hearings  on the radicalization of American Muslims have been smeared as a “witch hunt”?

Is he the Congressman who—in his best Joseph Welch impression—recounted a tale (of which some are questioning the veracity) of Mohammed Salman Hamdani, a 23-year-old Pakistan-born American who sacrificed his life saving civilians from the 2001 Islamic terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center buildings

Or is he a radical himself, with ties to radical Islam himself?

Yes, yes, yes, and unfortunately, yes.

Our story starts in 1963, when Keith Maurice Ellison was born into a God-fearing, all-American Roman Catholic family in Detroit, Michigan. While attending Wayne State University for an economics degree, Ellison converted to Islam at the age of 19. Ellison later enrolled at the University of Minnesota’s law school.

In an interview with Middle East media outlet Al-Jazeera, he explained that his conversion to Islam was political in nature:

I had begun to really look around and ask myself about the social circumstances of the country, issues of justice, issues of change. When I looked at my spiritual life, and I looked at what might inform social change, justice in society… I found Islam.

As a law student, Ellison began to write of his adulation for the “Minister Louis Farrakhan,” and the Nation of Islam. In 1990, Ellison helped arrange racial separatist—and inventor of the anti-Caucasian slur “honkey”—Stokley Carmichael’s speech at Minnesota, on the topic of “Zionism: Imperialism, White Supremacy, or Both?”

Ellison graduated with a Juris Doctorate that same year, going on to work as the executive director of the Legal Rights Center in Minneapolis, which specialized in the pro bono defense of “low-income people and people of color.” After that, he took a job with the law firm Hassan & Reed Ltd.

For eight years, Ellison also “forgot” to pay his federal taxes, prompting the IRS to place liens against his house. He also ignored so many parking and speeding tickets issued to him that his driver’s license was suspended, multiple times.

In 1992, Ellison defended Sharif Willis—a previously convicted murderer—charged with helping a group of gangsters calling themselves the “Vice Lords” to kill a local cop named Jerry Haaf. What was Ellison’s argument for Wilis’s innocence? Ellison organized public protests against the Minneapolis police, claiming that the police department was waging “a campaign of slander,” in order to scare white people into having the city hire more police officers.

One year later, Ellison protested outside Willis’ trial, screaming, “we don’t get no justice, you don’t get no peace.”

Ellison may have gotten away with his butchering of the English language’s grammatical rules, but his client Willis did not get away with murder. He was sent to federal prison for 20 years, on several counts of gun- and drug-related charges.

Other cop-killers that Ellison has promoted and defended over the years include Mumia Abu Jamal and Assata Shakur.

Having failed to free Sharif Willis from the clutches of the white man’s “campaign of slander,” Ellison became involved with the Nation of Islam, promoting Louis Farrakhan’s “Million Man March” and appearing on stage for the “thundering, racist diatribe” stylings of Khalid Abdul Muhammad.

Ellison campaigned on behalf of Malcom X’s daughter, arguing publicly that Qubilah Shabazz was innocent of murder, and that the FBI was trying to kill Farrakhan.

Two years later, Ellison added the surname “Muhammed” to his repertoire, serving as a local Nation of Islam spokesman. During a brief controversy regarding Minnesota Initiative Against Racism official Joanne Jackson’s comment that “Jews are among the most racist white people [she] knew,” Ellison declared that “we stand by the truth contained in the remarks attributed to [Ms. Jackson], and by her right to express her views without sanction.”

Over the years, Ellison has held or appeared at fundraisers and speaking engagements for multiple organizations associated with Islamic extremists, including the Council for American-Islamic Relations, the Muslim American Society, the Islamic Circle of America, the Islamic Society of North America, the Muslim Public Affairs Council, and so on.

Just as a sampler, it should be noted that the founders of CAIR, Nihad Awad and Omar Ahmad, were former officers in the Islamic Association of Palestine, a group linked directly to terrorist group Hamas. Awad is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee; in 1998, Ahmad told a group of California Muslims that:

“Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on earth.”

The Islamic Society of North America has been described as the “one of the chief conduits through which the radical Saudi form of Islam passes into the United States,” “[giving] Islamic militants a platform to incite violence and promote hatred.”

I could go on and on about Keith Ellison’s ties to radical Islam, as his entire history has been one sordid love affair with the hatred and strife that his ideology offers.

Ellison’s crocodile tears over the “young lad” Hamdani belie his true allegiances.

However, whereas Welch was a tool of the Soviet nation, Crybaby Keith Ellison is a tool of the Nation of Islam. One wonders if, like Welch did after turning on the waterworks for the cameras, Ellison rounded a corner to cheerily ask a friend, “well, how did it go?”

[X-Posted at David Horowitz's NewsReal Blog... check it out!]

Equality under the law is one of the cornerstones of capitalism.

What does that mean?

It means that, in order for free-market capitalism to thrive, the government can not be picking winners and losers, through the use of incentives and disincentives. Period.

According to sources, the latest organization to come out against the proposed sales tax break for the Lexington County-located Amazon.com distribution center was… drumroll please… the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce.

At yesterday’s meeting, the Legislative Action committee of the state’s preeminent business lobby voted completely unanimously that the Chamber would oppose the state’s proposed waiver of all sales taxes for Internet giant Amazon.com, a “gift” valued at around $40,000,000, according  to South Carolina Policy Council’s Nerve investigative journalist, Rick Brundrett.

According to the Associated Press, Amazon is promising that their Cayce distribution center—the deal for which was landed by former governor Mark Sanford—would bring 1,250 full-time jobs to the state, a number that would increase to 2,500 during the peak Christmas shipping season.

More realistic analyses from those in the know peg the numbers as being around 100 full-time positions, total—the only time that the distribution center is likely to have “1,250 jobs” is during peak season, most of those jobs being temporary, seasonal employment.

Columbia insiders also indicate that Gov. Haley is on the fence about whether to honor her predecessor’s controversial agreement, an assertion that is backed up by her public statements regarding Sanford-brokered agreements that are now coming due.

She told AP writer Jim Davenport on Sunday that “it’s a tough situation” and that she’s “had to take on all these issues where I’ve had to check: ‘What’s the background on this? How did we get here? What happened?’”

While you’re checking, Nikki, make sure to consult your handbook on conservatism. You got elected by advocating for a free, open, and transparent government. You ran as the “woman of the people” candidate. There is talk that the provisions that would give Amazon.com a free “hall pass” to avoid paying sales tax.

Plus, unless I am mistaken, we currently have a bit of a budget crisis on our hands in the state. So when mom-and-pop stores have to pay that tax, but Amazon.com gets an unfair handout from the government, that is money that could have went towards preventing deficit spending or more budget cuts.

At its core, the proposed Amazon tax break is corporate welfare—something that the Tea Party, and presumably the Republican Party, as well, are opposed to on principle. With the advent of Governor Haley’s “report card” for legislators, letting them know if they’re voting in alignment with her agenda or against it, she has the power to stop this bad idea in its tracks.

Some sources say that Haley is waffling on the issue, because she feels that it might be wrong to break an agreement made by her predecessor.

Well, that’s all fine and dandy, but Haley didn’t make the promise, so why she feels bound to keep promises that other people made, I don’t know. She came into office, vowing to reform the government—that means that past agreements and past ways of doing business are going to get shaken up.

Plus, does it matter who made the promise? Let’s say that a company was collecting on a deal made with, I dunno, Jim Hodges. Would we be even having this conversation? No, we wouldn’t. Who made the deal is irrelevant.

In the final analysis, conservatives—Haley included—should be up in arms about this attempt at carving out special laws for specific, handpicked companies. What makes Amazon.com so special that it should get its own law? Also, conservative activists across the state should watch Columbia like a hawk in the next few weeks, as there are rumors floating around the Blatt Building regarding slipping the Amazon Kickback into an unrelated budget-related bill.

As Columbia heads into “Hell Week” “Budget Week,” we need to contact our representatives and senators, and make it clear that the people will not tolerate such underhanded tactics to pass through this uncapitalistic proposal.

In November, we voted for open and transparent government, and if the Amazon Exemption can’t pass on its own merits, then the people will have spoken, and that should be that!

(Hide yer kids, hide yer wife, e’rrybody readin’ Right Turns Only out hurr! Check it out today!)

Meet Columbia, SC lawyer Todd Kincannon: Republican… “Nationally noted parliamentarian.” Election law expert… Pop-culture connoisseur…  The blogosphere’s last, best hope against anti-blogger legal firms?

Anti-blogger legal firm RightHaven—best known for suing Senate candidate Sharron Angle for posting a portion of a Las Vegas Review-Journal article on her campaign website and demanding that she relinquish her ownership of her personal campaign website—is the brainchild of a Las Vegas attorney working for the owners of the Review-Journal, going after bloggers who reprint newspaper articles from their clients.

Since May 2010, 110 of RightHaven’s lawsuits against bloggers have been settled or closed. According to the Las Vegas Sun, the law firm’s predatory ways have likely generated hundreds of thousands of dollars, earned from bloggers unwilling or unable to fight the lawsuit in court.

However, one blogger is standing up to RightHaven’s founder, Steve Gibson. Dana Eiser, who runs the small blog Lowcounty912, counterclaimed Gibson’s claim, noting that commenting about and reprinting newspaper articles was protected by the fair use doctrine and the First Amendment. Kincannon also noted that RightHaven had violated South Carolina’s Unfair Trade Practices Act by suing Eiser, adding that Righthaven had committed unfair and deceptive acts by wrongly branding Eiser as a copyright infringer.

Also, the counterclaim notes that there is no provision in the Digital Millenium Copyright Act that provides for the transfer of domain names—in other words, Gibson and his hordes of attorneys were overreaching the boundaries set down by the law, in its pursuit of conservative bloggers who dared to talk about articles printed on dead trees.

Not only are the Summerville, SC native and the Columbia lawyer seeking to defend the rights of bloggers, they are calling the copyright-trollish Gibson out on his horse hockey. Team Eiser is asking for all of RightHaven’s ill-gotten funds to be refunded, to all the bloggers they’ve scalped or scammed into coughing up cash.

While I am not a lawyer, I know what a scam is, and what a scam looks like; RightHaven LLC is definitely a scam.

As the conservative blogosphere grows and evolves, we must remember that an attack on the rights to free speech against even the least of us is an attack on all of us. RightHaven attempted (and failed) to take down one of the first conservative New Media warriors, Matt Drudge. While Gibson’s attacks on new media don’t appear to be political, they do have political implications: the case of Diana Eiser and Lowcounty912 is definitely a warning shot across the bow of dying, progressive-dominated industries such as the Old Media.

Let the rallying cry of the online conservative movement echo across the BlogoWeb: “we’re here, we’re conservative, get used to it!”

As yet another Middle East country falls to the spreading wave of protests and revolutions, here at home, malcontents are stirring up chaos, just as malcontents such as the Muslim Brotherhood stirred up the riots in Egypt.

In Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker’s plans to salvage his state’s budget from looming financial ruin by bringing the benefits of public-sector unions—such as teachers’ unions—in line with benefits received by private-sector unions, including removing public-sector unions’ collective bargaining privileges.

As has been noted elsewhere, the teachers’ unions and their assorted cohorts went axe-crazy at the idea that they might be asked to contribute a few percentage points more towards paying their own health care—including, but not limited to, allegedly professional Democratic state legislators hiding from Johnny Law in Illinois hotels, Star Wars­-themed protest signs, and stilted comparisons of democratically-elected Republicans to Middle Eastern despots.

However, the hordes’ comparison of Walker to Hosni Mubarack—and Wisconsin to Egypt—continues to be forced, as progressives in other Midwestern states pick up the refrain of “Republicans are Islamic despots… or something.”

In Ohio, a bill similar to the one proposed in Wisconsin is working its way through the legislative process. Proposed by State Senator Shannon Jones (R-Cincinnati), Senate Bill 5 has drawn the ire of Ohio progressives and malcontents.

And when I say “drew the ire,” I mean “caused them to go into a full-metal panic.” Union protestors were caught on videotape yelling that “Tea Partiers are a bunch of — sucking corporate whores who want to crush the working people.”

Other anti-S.B. 5 protestors, wearing red to show their solidarity with socialism and Wisconsin (not necessarily in that order) screamed “go home, Teabaggers” at counter-protestors on the steps of the Columbus statehouse, claiming that the Tea Party was “organized racism.”

Lest you think that this is a real grassroots protest, the Ohio Democratic Party has been setting and organizing the schedule for the anti-SB 5 rallies, claiming that it is “breathtakingly absurd” to seek to balance the state’s budgets by reducing government workers’ ability to lobby the government for more money.

Today, former Governor Ted Strickland denounced his democratically-elected successor as a “tyrant,” claiming that the majority of Ohioans “did not vote to embrace his radical agenda” of fiscal sanity.

Ohio Governor John Kasich’s press secretary Rob Nichols, when informed of Strickland’s sore-loser-mannerisms, dead-panning that Strickland’s worries about the tyranny of Kasichicus Rex “[sounded] an awful lot like the things I remember him saying before November 2^nd.”

Whether it be in Ohio or Wisconsin, it’s becoming painfully obvious that the Left is showing signs of running on ideological fumes. The few policy ideas that they had are proving to be useless and grounded in fantasy, so they resort to name-calling and useless heckling.

In essence, American progressives have become the political version of Brick Tamland, the intellectually-stunted weatherman and co-worker of Anchorman’s Ron Burgendy. As the union protests seem to reveal, the Left can not tell the difference between the Midwest and the Middle East.

And as with the Middle East protests, progressives are boneheadly hell-bent on staying on the wrong side of the historical march of liberty in the world, as well as here at home.

It’s come to this.

Facing flagging public support for their platform, Washington Democrats are now resorting to enlisting cartoon characters to help drum up support for funding public television with taxpayer money.

Yesterday, Representative Ed Markey (D-MA) held a press conference featuring the beloved public television cartoon character Arthur (from the eponymous “Arthur” show, which is in turn an adaptation of the “Arthur” series of books by children’s author Marc Brown), and the famous duo of Bert and Ernie from state-run television staple “Sesame Street. They joined together to protest House Republican leaders’ plans to reduce funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

At the presser, Bert and Ernie received a “GOPink slip,” symbolizing House Democrats’ allegations that the Republicans’ budget proposal will put token handicapable person Maria out on the cold street, force Kermit’s banker cousin Gordon Gecko to foreclose on Big Bird’s nest, and deprive kids of their daily two-minutes-of-hate against Fox News. Or something. I was too busy trying to figure out who the other Muppets in attendance were—wait a minute, those aren’t muppets, those are Democratic Representatives Earl Blumenauer, Nita Lowey, Sam Farr, Paul Tonko, and Bill Owens.

My bad. I have trouble telling muppets and House Democrats apart—unserious people look alike to my senses.

Back in 1995, 15 years before Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-People’s Republik of Kalifornia) invited another foam-headed ninny—progressive comedian Stephen Colbert—to have his derping placed in the Congressional Record for posterity, Rep. Nita Lowey invited Bert and Ernie to testify before Congress, when then-Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich led the charge to reduce public media funding.

Possibly hoping that the arithmetically-inclined sanguisuge, The Count, could teach the nation’s children what the number “14 trillion” means, Lowey called on Republicans to “focus on creating jobs, not laying off Bert and Ernie” and “silencing Cookie Monster.”

The irony and disrespect of using taxpayer money to insult and degrade entire swaths of taxpayers as “teabaggers” and “trashy,” as NPR and PBS have done in the past, is so biting that even Statler and Waldorf would cringe in shame.

In January 2010, National Public Radio featured an artist’s Flash cartoon (commissioned using taxpayer dollars), which sought to teach the viewer “how to speak Tea Bag”—a pidgin parody of conservatives’ concerns about the growth of government.

It’s always done “for the children.”

Whether it’s ostracizing home-schooling, making power tools less useful and accessible, or reminding parents that Daddy Barack and Mommy Michelle know better than you which foods your children should eat, Big Government Progressives always seem to want to have control over you, from cradle to dinner table to grave.

In the past few months, states have been rushing to ban so-called “alcoholic energy drinks,” out of fears that minor children may die from ingesting too many mixed drinks. The most recognizable of these alcoholic drinks is called Four Loko, the so-called “black-out in can.”

In 2009, several state attorneys general—led by progressive Democrat and Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan (whom the New York Times believes to among the most likely women to become the first female President some day)—began an investigation against drinks similar to Four Loko, worried that the idea of mixing an energy drink and alcohol was an insidious plot by Big Booze to get kids illegally drunk. Four Loko, which is produced by graduates of Ohio University, fell under similar suspicion.

In 2010, progressive universities such as the University of Rhode Island made possession of Four Loko a crime; New Jersey’s Rampao College, Worcester State University, and Boston College banned the sale of Loko, effectively dictating legal consumers’ choices—because everyone knows that Adam Smith and his “invisible hand” would otherwise force energy drinks down little Johnny and Jane Collegiate’s throats, if given the choice.

The dangerous epidemic of consumers being able to choose products that Big Brother disapproved of went on merit outright bans in Pennsylvania, Oregon, New York, Michigan, Oklahoma, and Washington.

A few months ago, the Obama administration issued a warning to the manufacturers of Four Loko and similar drinks, warning that caffeine was an “unsafe food additive,” and that the federal government may issue sanctions against them, up to and including the seizure of all of their products currently on the market. Naturally, the justification for this draconian threat was “public health [concerns]“… because we can’t have any of the little people making decisions about what legal products they consume, can we?

Now, this exercise in creeping nanny statism has made its way to a most unlikely state—South Carolina. The same state that is leading the charge to allow states to opt-out of Obamacare, is now seeking to dictate what legal products consumers can consume.

The legislation, which passed with sadly bipartisan support, introduced a bit of twist during debate—a Democrat called the Republican-held House “socialist.” State Representative Todd Rutherford (D-Richland) wondered aloud why the allegedly conservative House GOP was seeking to create, in his words, “a nanny state.”

Rutherford went on to ask the deaf ears of his colleagues, “Why are we stepping in and becoming communists and socialists? Why is this not up to the individual 21 year old to drink, if they want?”

The refrain of the Four Loko haters is that they’re “concerned about underage consumption,” and about the “health risks” that the drink may pose—consumers may not be able to correctly gauge how inebriated they are after consuming alcohol, therefore Big Government must step in, because people might make bad personal decisions.

If one believes that the power of determination lies with the individual, and not the Government, then one should not support the banning of legal products, “for our own good.”

I don’t care if it’s “for the children,” there are already laws on the books to prevent children from getting “crunk in da club” off of Four Loko, or anything else alcoholic. If one decides to imbibe an adult beverage, one does so knowing the risks involved.

When it’s all said and done, it may be that the road to Nanny State Hell is paved with good intentions, and the road crew is manned by do-gooders from both political parties.

Before I begin, an explanation: If you say Ron Paul’s name backwards, he will be teleported back to the alien dimension from whence he originates. Therefore, I will be referring to him as Luap Nor as much as possible, in hopes of helping him return to his home.

Also, I noted before, that after other times I’ve written about Luap Nor, I was stalked by his supporters and was thoroughly creeped out. I warned them to not stalk me, and I would like to thank you creepy people for not stalking me after writing about him last time. Please continue to keep up the good behavior, namely not stalking me.

The writing was on the wall for Crazy Uncle Ron, for a long time.

In between his campaign’s constant spamming of the CPAC (that stands for Conservative Political Action Conference, for all you neophytes) Presidential Straw Poll, his supporters’ boorish disruption of speeches by Donald Rumsfeld and former Vice-President Dick Cheney, his calls for a new era of American isolationism,  or starting screaming matches with people in the conference halls, Ron Paul and his supporters lived up to their respective reputations of “crazy uncle” and “political gadflies.”

This year was the final straw for some, as Paul was removed as the national security adviser for Young Americans for Freedom, the group started by one of the most prominent and important conservatives in American history, William F. Buckley, Jr.

In a statement released today, YAF director Jordan Marks noted that “it’s a sad day in American history when a one-time conservative/libertarian stalwart has fallen more out of touch with America’s needs for national security then our current socialist presidential regime.”

According to the online political news agency Politico, the dispute between Paul and the Young Americans for Freedom stems from Paul’s pro-isolationist activities, and the disruptive tactics of the Paulistian hordes at CPAC.

Twisting the knife a bit, Marks went on to note that “Paul is clearly off his meds, and must be purged from public office… Good riddance and he won’t be missed.”

Is this the start of the exclusion of Uncle Ron from polite company? That remains to be seen, but the Young Americans for Freedom’s decision to remove the man who blames America first, and Israel second, for the evils of the world, is a great start towards that goal.

Besides, now that Paul—I mean, Luap— will have more time on his hand, now that he is now longer a part of YAF, he’ll have more time to spend with his friends, professional conspiracy theorists Alex Jones and Jesse “The Body” Ventura—who are both tenured professors of “Woo Woo Crazy Person-ology.”

Getting to spend more time with close friends is always a good thing, right?

Recently, the Communication Workers of America teamsters (or as one political wag calls them, “the Communista Workers of Amerika”) paid for a radio advertisement running on Ohio stations, extolling the virtues of Sen. Sherrod Brown… over two years before the election. Click play on the embedded Flash doohickey below, or click here to listen to the mp3 version.

Yep, someone’s scared. And they have good reason to be. Here’s why:

Sherrod Brown is the dimmer half of Ohio’s US Senate delegation, who lucked into the Senate seat by running against a weakened Sen. Mike DeWine in an abysmal year for Republicans all around, in 2006.

Since having the election pretty much gifted to him by circumstances beyond his control or influence, Brown’s pretty much served as a seat-filler. He votes the party line, does what Barack Obama tells him to, and pretty much just serves the interests of the Congressional Progressive Caucus that he sits with, as opposed to serving the interests of Ohio voters.

For those who don’t know, the Progressive Caucus was founded in 1991 by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), a self-described socialist. Some of the Progressive Caucus’s pet causes include the socialization of American health care, radical environmentalism, as well as the usual cadre of anti-American foreign policy goals that come with being a Democrat these days.

However, signs are starting to pop up, suggesting that, going into the run-up to 2012, Brown may be vulnerable.

A December poll by Democratic Party-leaning pollster PPP (PDF available here) found that only 43% of Ohio voters would vote for Brown, the same amount of people who would vote for current Ohio AG Mike DeWine, in a hypothetical grudge rematch.

The same poll found that Brown would squeak out a win over current Ohio lieutenant governor Mary Taylor, Brown taking 40% to Taylor’s 38%, ± 4.3%.

Interestingly, 65% of respondents reported that they did not know enough about Taylor to form an opinion, other than the fact that they’d rather have “Senator Taylor,” as opposed to “Senator Brown.”

Only 40% of voters had a favorable opinion of Sherrod, who is married to Cleveland Plain Dealer columnist Connie Schultz, whereas 37% had an unfavorable opinion.

PPP added an ominous warning for Brown, noting that “Brown’s ceiling right now is a dangerously low 43%, and he is only narrowly winning these hypothetical matchups because an unusually high 14-38% of Republicans and independents are undecided.”

Of course, this shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. If you are surprised, let me blind you with some political science.

According to OnTheIssues.org, a non-partisan website which tracks the votes and position statements of candidates and politicians across the nation, Sen. Brown accomplishes a feat that many would think implausible—being more liberal than Barack Obama.

As you can see from the chart, using data from OnTheIssues, Brown is not only more liberal than Obama, but also out-liberals arch-progressive Howard Dean, is in turn less liberal than former Ohio governor and supposed moderate, Ted Strickland.

The up-shot of all this? When your supporters and power base feel that you are in such statistical dire waters that they have to start campaigning before the campaign even starts, you know that you’re standing on sinking sand.