July 30th, 2007: Following in the Footsteps of those Blogging Greats...

Can't you hear me knockin' on your door
Can't you hear me knockin' down the dirty street..

That’s right, the point of this post is to inform the bigger blogging community at large of my coming. Well hardly, I just had the song stuck in my head from playing my new Guitar Hero, but still, I figure this is as good a time as any to further refine my aim of this blog.

I’m going to stop kidding myself and just get it out there: a lot of the content here is going to deal with my take on politics. And another thing: it isn’t going to be unbiased. Take that Fairness Doctrine!

That’s right, you’re going to be witnessing a good example of the difficulty of walking line between commentary and news. Then again, I’m afforded that luxury seeing as I’m no editor, anchor, or publisher of the “MSM.” Rather, you’ll be reading things on here through my nice tinge of Yankee Conservatism (no, that is not an oxymoron). Take today’s major news stories for example:

Chief justice tumbles after seizure

“WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Chief Justice John Roberts suffered a seizure at his summer home off the coast of Maine, causing him to fall, the Supreme Court said Monday.

Chief Justice John Roberts was taken to a hospital in Maine after a fall at his summer home.

Roberts was conscious after the fall, which happened at his vacation home near Port Clyde, Maine, Supreme Court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg told CNN.

The chief justice was taken to a nearby hospital where he is expected to stay overnight.

Roberts has "fully recovered from the incident," and a neurological evaluation "revealed no cause for concern," the Supreme Court said.”

Link

Now, I am of the opinion that Chief Justice Roberts has a unique and enviable position to lead the country’s head judicial body in a direction its sorely been lacking for years. The Roberts court will have the opportunity to address many controversial issues, already including executive power and race relations. But perhaps most importantly, the hot button issues of the day, including THE ISSUE (which will hereinafter be a reference to pro-life vs. pro-abortion debate) looks to be on the horizon.

The significance of this scare from the SCotUS is that without Roberts at the helm, or any of the justices for that matter, the new Bush nominee is likely to be held up by the now Democratic controlled Senate. Oy.

You can say what you want about President Bush, but in my opinion, one of the few things he’s gets excellent marks on are his nominations for the SCotUS. Justices Roberts and Alito are brilliant legal minds committed to upholding the Constitution as it was written… aka not taking giant activist leaps from the bench. Hence, if we are to think President Bush will get another shot at replacing a FAR LEFT member of the court, *cough*GinsbergStevens *cough* it isn’t going to be as easy as the nominations of Roberts and Alito. The risk now becomes that he’ll have to nominate a “lite” candidate, such as Justice Kennedy, who will waffle as the “swing vote” (and since when did that become a noble quality of a SCotUS Justice? I have just as much respect for someone like Justice O’Connor as I do any other… no more, no less). A candidate with the proven track record America wants is more likely to be “Borked” than anything. And ya know what, the Dems aren’t going to take anyone but a filler justice along the lines of Justice Souter. So there’s a problem. Hence why I’m so scared about Justice Roberts. I can only pray for a speedy return and that he’s up and ready for the job for a long, long time.

F.B.I. and I.R.S. Search Home of Senator Stevens

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) -- Agents from the FBI and Internal Revenue Service on Monday searched the home of U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens, an official said.

Investigators arrived at the Republican senator's home in Girdwood shortly before 2:30 p.m. Alaska time, said Dave Heller, FBI assistant special agent.

Heller said he could not comment on the nature of the investigation.

The Justice Department has been looking into the seven-term senator's relationship with a wealthy contractor as part of a public corruption investigation.

Link

And Republicans wonder why they lost big in 2006. According to polls, it wasn’t all because of Iraq. It was more because of Reps. Cunningham, Foley, and DeLay robbing the people of their confidence with their corruption scandals. And now this. Why couldn’t the Republicans just sit this one out and let the wildly unpopular Democratic Congress make their own mistakes??? Suppose this was bound to happen. I guess not all the bums were swept out in the “Democratic Tsunami” of 2006.

We here (I, actually) at Tavern Banter are against corruption at all times. All governments should be first and foremost honest. So this comes as a blow no matter what side of the aisle makes the mistakes. Corruption needs to end, though I hate to say it but I am almost resigned to the fact that it is human nature and I need to accept it. Almost. Right now, I’m going to speak out about it no matter how I can and with my first stand here on Tavern Banter, I declare the following:

In order to be productive, we must as a society hold accountable our leaders to be above all else clean and honest and failure to do so, no matter what party or interest you represent, should lead to your resignation.

Of course, you are innocent until proven guilty, which is why I will refrain from jumping on Atlanta Falcons QB Michael Vick for his dog-fighting charge. But Sen. Stevens, you’re on notice.

So there you have it, two lengthy discourses on politics. I hope you aren’t scared off, and I promise you more, uh, interesting content in days to come. That’s it for now though, back to Guitar Hero.

Until next time…