The American Spectator

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Muscle Bound

11.14.03 @ 12:01AM

HAVING PULL
Re: Jim Henley's Muscle Cars:

Any car has far more muscle than most owners ever use. Here's a good shot of a milling machine I moved interstate behind a Tercel. That's about a 1-ton load, mill plus trailer. The car could have pulled a far heavier load but nothing bigger than a Class 1 hitch is commercially available for the Tercel.

This arrangement would not have worked very well if towing in mountains, but things are pretty flat on the East Coast. I have also moved two engine lathes (disassembled) inside that car -- lots of very heavy chunks of cast iron.

Both of my sisters have trucks, but so far as I know never use them to carry anything heavier than dogs. The notion of actually using them to transport anything heavy or bulky is just plain scandalous.
-- W.F. Whitelaw

PRIME FACTORS
Re: Brandon Crocker's Level With Us, Please:

While your exposition of the Democrats' long-standing disinformation campaign is quite accurate, I would argue that the government did contribute, in no small way, to the "tech bubble" or "irrational exuberance" of the late '90s by "priming the monetary pump" in connection with the Y2K scare. Likewise, it was contributory in the collapse by shrinking the money supply (my thanks to Larry Kudlow et al.) precipitously -- irrational exuberance, anyone?
-- P.A. Melita
Charlottesville, Virginia

TERMINATED
Re: George Neumayr's Arnie Flexes His Liberal Muscles:

Two bromides apply here:

If everyone else is driving a car, "He who walks, walks alone" becomes very poignant. The California Republican conservative wing has been too steadfast for way too long. If one rails against everything while engaging in nothing then you are soon marginalized. Better to be in there pitching, taking the small wins, than sit there and pout. If you are in the game there is the chance that given the reality of finances before them, some just might see it the conservative way.

Which begets -- "To have something you never had, you must be somebody you have never been." Considering that Arnie won and that he campaigned on fiscal conservative principles, the Republicans won a small victory. They need to consolidate that win by helping to fix the problem and expand the beachhead. But that takes an attitude change. Fiscal change first. School choice second? To win the cultural/social wars is going to take decades. It took us that long to get to where we are, it will take at least that long to get back to where we should be. As Bush says, "The long slog..."

One last comment, the PI effort is to find those that stated they were groped, not to find if Schwarzenegger groped. He already admitted to that. If anything this is a rather interesting turn of events, for we will find that the effort has legs far more distant than just a few women making false statements (which there is sure to be). For in the discovery, defamation charges and political payback is sure to follow.
-- John McGinnis
Arlington, Texas

George Neumayr whines about the state of affairs that he and his fellow cranks caused. He went for broke with McClintock (actually for Davis) and lost big time. Now he wants to hand-pick Arnie's staff. Only a crank could believe this is possible. Conservatives in California supplied very diluted support for Arnie and should be very angry at the cranks that made sure they will have reduced say in Arnie's administration. Politics means that you won't ever get all you want. When you won't play politics and turn elections into meaningless statements of principle, you won't get anything you want. In the future when considering some of the good things that will flow out of Arnie's administration, remember Bill Simon who read the writing on the wall and played a part in representing conservatives ideas in the administration. Also remember the infamous behavior of the egomaniac Tom McClintock who worked for the Democrat party because if he couldn't have the prize he didn't want anybody to have the prize.
-- Clif Briner

There's another election in three years. If Arnold turns liberal, the conservatives can vote him out. That's how our system works.
-- unsigned

Remember Jesse Ventura. After him comes the real change.
-- Annette Cwik

CHICAGO IS
Re: R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.'s My Kind of Town:

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Law, Alaska, Oil