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If you have a legal matter to discuss with Ernest, you can reach him at (405) 659-6500, or via email to istooklaw@gmail.com.Ernest Istook has over 30 years of legal experience, and is licensed to practice in the State of Oklahoma, the U.S. Supreme Court, and federal courts.

Anti-Communism, Pro-Immigration Day for Bush

America's memorial to an estimated 100-million murdered by Communist regimes will be dedicated Tuesday in Washington, D.C.

President Bush will be the featured guest at the event unveiling a bronze statue modeled after the Tiananman Square imitation of America's Statue of Liberty.

Afterwards, Bush heads to lunch with Republican Senators, having boasted this weekend that he can bring enough of them around to support the immigration bill he wants, as drafted by Senators Ted Kennedy, John McCain, and others from each party.

As the website for the Victims of Communism Memorial describes:

It is a great moral failing for a free society to misunderstand the extent of Communism's atrocities. While the horrors of Nazism are well known, who knows that the Soviet Union murdered 20 million people? Who knows that China's dictators have slaughtered an estimated 60 million? Who knows that the Communist holocaust has exacted a death toll surpassing that of all of the wars of the 20th century combined?

Those attending the event will be attentive to whether the efforts of Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and Pope John Paul II are highlighted for their labors in defeating Soviet and European Communism. And it will noted if Bush uses the occasion to try to create some parallels between that fight and his current focus on immigration.

Undaunted Bush Still Pushes Immigration Bill

George W. Bush is facing another bad week, with no light at the end of the tunnel.

President Bush isn't giving up on his support for the immigration bill that was scuttled in the Senate this week. He plans a lunch next week with Republicans in the U.S. Senate, trying to persuade them to revive the bill and pass it.

It's unlikely he'll win over any of the opposing Senators, but Bush's tenacity guarantees that his support for the unpopular amnesty will remain in next week's headlines--and that's not good for the White House in the eyes of the American people. Nor is the fact that Sen. Ted Kennedy says about the bill, "We're coming back."

Also next week, the U.S. House is expected to begin passing appropriations bills that significantly exceed the President's budget. Although he's pledged a veto of such bills, it's possible that veto-proof margins will support the bills, which include funding for veterans' health care.

Meantime, more Republicans continue to pile on George W. Bush. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich told the American Enterprise Institute on Friday that Republicans will lose in 2008 if their candidate is seen as someone who will continue the Bush Presidency.

As Associated Press reports about Gingrich:

He has roundly criticized the Bush administration in recent interviews, describing the White House as dysfunctional and saying the president has driven the party into collapse. While he refrained from direct criticism Friday, he
cited failures in Iraq, border security and the response to Hurricane Katrina as
signs of a broken government.

His comments come just days after a Republican presidential debate in
which GOP candidates criticized Bush over his handling of the Iraq war, his
diplomatic style and his approach to immigration.

Good News Comes in Three's?

At about the same time Thursday evening came two sets of good news:

1. Senate leader Harry Reid announced that the Kennedy-Bush-McCain immigration bill was being pulled from the Senate floor (although it could return at some future date, just like Godzilla).
2. The judge in the Paris Hilton case ordered her back to court Friday morning to see about re-jailing her, and possibly holding in contempt the L.A. Sheriff who released her early despite the judge's original orders.

After all, if illegal immigrants won't get amnesty, then why should Paris Hilton?!!,

They say that good news often comes in three's, so what could be next?

Bush the Loser at GOP Debate

All the candidates had their spin doctors ready to proclaim their man the winner of Tuesday night's debate in New Hampshire. But regardless of who won, the loser was clearly President George W. Bush.

Support of Bush from his own party faithful continues to unravel, as outlined recently by former Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan.

The Associated Press picked up on how freely the GOP candidates distanced themselves from the President. Iraq and immigration were the central themes, with the Iraqi criticism centering on what happened after the fall of Saddam Hussein rather than on the decision to invade. The AP also labelled it "startling criticism".

FOX News announced "Republican White House Hopefuls Distance Themselves From Bush".

National Public Radio proclaimed that Bush was "the biggest issue of the night." The Washington Times writes that Bush "took a bruising".

It was noted in the Arab world, where one article concluded that the GOP contenders all felt "their best chance comes by distancing themselves from him [Bush]."

Debate sponsor CNN reported, "Republican presidential candidates directed as much of their firepower at President Bush as they did at each other." (The others also freely criticized Sen. John McCain for being a principal supporter of the pending immigration "reform" bill, which Giulani labelled "a typical Washington mess.")

Congressman Tom Tancredo even told the audience that since Bush had disinvited him from the White House, that if elected he would reciprocate by telling Bush "not to darken the doorstep" of the White House.

Bush-bashing was expected and frequent at the Democratic candidates' debate, but when it happened at the Republican debate, that was news. The Dixie Chicks must have loved it.

Key Analysts Predict Hillary vs. Mitt

Two of Washington's premier election analysts made a prediction this weekend: It'll be Sen. Hillary Clinton and former Gov. Mitt Romney facing off in November of 2008.

Speaking at a major Michigan political gathering, Charlie Cook and Stuart Rothenberg agreed on the matchup, and that national trends seem to favor the Democrat's chances.

Cook said Clinton’s campaign has “Prussian efficiency,” likened it to Richard Nixon’s campaign in 1972 and said hers is “more organized than any Democratic campaign that I’ve ever seen.” Cook says 46 to 48 percent of Americans “won’t vote for her no matter what," but he says she's walking that thin line well because, "She’s cautious and she doesn’t make mistakes.”

Rothenberg, handicapping the GOP race, said “Normally, you’d look for the oldest white guy in the race.” But McCain has lost his outside status, Rudy Giuliani is “in the wrong party,” (“He’s pro adultery in a party that is not officially pro adultery,” he quipped) and Mitt Romney “oozes leadership but has multiple positions on issues like abortion” that are important to GOP voters in Iowa. Fred Thompson is in the race, Rothenberg said, “because the media needs a new name. He’s a vessel each of you can pour your hopes and dreams into, the Republican Barack Obama.”

The pair suggested that history favors a Democrat winning in 2008 because only once since World War II has a party had three straight White House terms--when George Bush succeeded Ronald Reagan.

The wild card this year, they said, may be New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, if he indeed makes a third-party bid where he spends a billion dollars of his own money. (See my May 15th blog about this.)

'Consensus' on Global Climate Change? A Hoax!

Trying to silence the opposition (Take that, First Amendment!!), Al Gore and friends keep claiming that scientific consensus supports them on man-caused global warming. They push the media to proclaim that "the debate is over", so dissenting voices must be ignored.

Oh, really?

Canadian writer Lawrence Solomon began six months ago to check the credentials of every scientist who publicly spoke out against Al Gore's alarmism.

His conclusion?

Somewhere along the way, I stopped believing that a scientific consensus exists on climate change. Certainly there is no consensus at the very top echelons of scientists -- the ranks from which I have been drawing my subjects -- and certainly there is no consensus among astrophysicists and other solar scientists, several of whom I have profiled. If anything, the majority view among these subsets of the scientific community may run in the opposite direction.

What about the claims of Al Gore and the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that 2,000-2,500 top scientists support their position? The UN group won't even release their names! Says Solomon:

I asked the IPCC for their names, to gauge their views. "The 2,500 or so scientists you are referring to are reviewers from countries all over the world," the IPCC Secretariat responded. "The list with their names and contacts will be attached to future IPCC publications, which will hopefully be on-line in the second half of 2007." . . . Far from endorsing the IPCC reports, some reviewers, offended at what they considered a sham review process, have demanded that the IPCC remove their names from the list of reviewers. One even threatened legal action when the IPCC refused.

You can read Solomon's latest full article here.

And for a great analysis of the truth behind the hype, check out this article at The Heritage Foundation's www.insider.org, "Global Warming: A Guide to the Hype."

Bush Accused of Wrecking GOP and Conservatism

Former Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan has a devastating critique of President George W. Bush. Beyond abandoning the conservative cause, she accuses Bush of creating a wrecking ball White House that is destroying the governing conservative coalition of the Republican Party.

Her comments are an absolute "must read".

The last straw, she writes, is the Bush accusation that it's unpatriotic to oppose his immigration plan:

"The president has taken to suggesting that opponents of his immigration bill are unpatriotic--they "don't want to do what's right for America." His ally Sen. Lindsey Graham has said, "We're gonna tell the bigots to shut up." On Fox last weekend he vowed to "push back." Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff suggested opponents would prefer illegal immigrants be killed; Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez said those who oppose the bill want "mass deportation." Former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson said those who oppose the bill are "anti-immigrant" and suggested they suffer from "rage" and "national chauvinism.""

Noonan concludes:

"Now conservatives and Republicans are going to have to win back their party. They are going to have to break from those who have already broken from them. This will require courage, serious thinking and an ability to do what psychologists used to call letting go. This will be painful, but it's time. It's more than time.""

Connect the dots between Noonan's column and the new Washington Times report that donations to the Republican National Committee from its small-donor core base are dropping by 40% this year--and its whole telemarketing staff has been let go (after suffering scorched ears from hearing angry comments about immigration whenever they dialed for dollars).

This may be the start of a dam bursting, with a wholesale abandonment of the Bush White House by many of its supporters and apologists.