A skating rink provides an apt analogy for the economy. Something tells me an Obama Administration would have a skate subsidy and a very loud bullhorn. And, yes, a Zamboni machine – to spread the ice.

Whatever you think of Barack Obama’s temperament, we can all agree Al Franken has a rotten one.

Well, there’s at least one House seat for the GOP.

Hawaii joins Massachusetts and California in learning that universal health care is harder than it sounds. Do you think Hawaii’s native son has gotten word?

In this unscientific poll, over almost 150,000 people (approximately two-thirds) think Joe the Plumber’s privacy was invaded. I’m sure 90% say the lesson is: never ask a politician anything worth asking.

Even the Washington Post can spot Obama’s misrepresentation on Colombia. I wonder if Hispanic voters in Florida did. (Shocking, really, that someone as intellectually dishonest on so many topics in foreign policy–the surge, North Korea, Colombia, NAFTA –would nevertheless get an endorsement from the Post.)

Great advice from Mark Steyn: conservative pundits in the NY-DC corridor should sneer less and learn more from “practicing” conservatives in the heartland. Put differently, if it there weren’t a lot of Sarah Palins, there wouldn’t be many people reading what the pundits write, let alone implementing their ideas. The alternative is that conservatism goes the way of Latin — a dead language.

James Antle comes up with a clever retort to the intellectually elastic pro-life Doug Kimec, who seems to think an Obama presidency would be no threat to his pro-life views (or he just doesn’t care so much about the latter? hard to tell).

You’re not excited about the upcoming race for head of the RNC? You’re in good company. (And, yes, it’s like jousting to be captain of the Titanic as it slips below the water line.)

When you see a quote like this (about the suspected Colin Powell endorsement) from an unnamed “McCain official,” you wonder what motivates people: “It’s going to make a lot of news, and certainly be personally embarrassing for McCain  It comes at a time when we need momentum, and it would create momentum against us.” Really, if you can’t help your man  and can’t resist the urge to twist the knife, stop cashing your paychecks and get a blog.

Blazing insight: “UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warned that Lebanon will not be a fully sovereign state until Hizbullah and other militia groups are disbanded.” Perhaps we can look forward to: “There will be no international security and stability until North Korea and Iran give up their nuclear ambitions.” And, no, the U.N. won’t be doing anything to further either of those laudable goals.