How about this:

The next time you're heckled, invite the heckler to the stage. Tell them it's obvious to you that they must have something important to say since they spent so much time and energy to get to the venue to stop you from talking. Offer them five minutes to say their peace while you sit in the audience. Sit down, cross your legs, get comfortable, and watch them attentively as they begin to speak. Nod your head about 30 seconds in, as if they had made an excellent point.

Then unobtrusively reach into your pocket and pull out the air horn that you brought with you for this very occasion...

I don't often disagree with Mollie, but I will here.

First, we do know that the President can influence gasoline prices. George Bush proved that at least once in 2008 when his promise to open formerly restricted drilling areas played a major part in a price drop that took us from over $3.50/gallon gas to under $2. Conversely, Barack Obama's restrictive drilling policies and the "go slow" process by which his administration approves the permits that can be submitted (when they don't change their minds mid-process and close the areas in question) have driven prices steadily higher. 

Second, what's wrong with a little overreaching optimism? So Bachmann promises $2/a gallon and we only get down to $2.50. Are we really going to crush her for failing to live up to a lofty goal or will we celebrate that our gasoline is a dollar less expensive than it was during Obama's reign? 

I'm with Mr. Savage. I'd like to see more of the GOP candidates lead with their hearts. We could use some unbridled optimism nowadays. 

Welcome to Ricochet, Kevin!

You wrote a lot of the things I've been preaching earnestly to friends for a while now. I'm glad the ideas are getting some much-needed sunlight. Well done!

Happy Birthday, Peter (Hey, I remember not to call you "Mister")!

Peter, thank you sincerely for posting this and for sharing your time with me and my listeners. I am grateful. You were a sheer delight and I enjoyed our conversation very much. My only regret is that we only had a half-hour or so. I very much hope you will have the time to come back on the show in the very near future.

And thanks to you cool Ricochet folks for listening!

I do recommend you get your podcasts through iTunes. Downloading from within is painless and the program will look for new episodes most times without prompting from you, so you'll have new episodes as soon as iTunes gets them.

I'm an avid podcast listener. I get several from Liberty Pundits (libertypundits.com) and recommend Malcom and Melissa, Patriot Room Radio, and The Right Doctor as the best of the crop there. The Cato Institute has a couple podcasts as well. I enjoy their event podcasts, which features lectures from Cato-invited guests. Coffee and Markets is a nice little 30 minute (or so) Daily from Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech. PJM Political from Pajamas Media is quite good as well.

I'd also be remiss if I didn't mention my own, called The Delivery (which has featured Rob Long, Stephen Green, Ed Driscoll, Michelle Malkin and others talking about things non-political!). My producer also does several other podcasts such as Strictly Right and Smart Girl Nation.

There. That should set you up! And they're all available through iTunes (as well as their own web pages)

Much of the criticism against the VAT in the podcast sounded knee-jerk.

It's true that the VAT in Europe isn't transparent, but that's no reason we can't make it so if we decide to go that route. The tax itself is much less complicated (and far less expensive) than the system we have right now and it's not difficult, legally or technologically, to make the cost of the VAT visible to consumers. So long as it is part of a complete overhaul of the system (either as the only tax or as a companion to a low and equally simple flat tax), I don't see why it shouldn't be on the table for discussion. I certainly wasn't convinced by the podcast that we should toss it out without consideration.

Okay, let's assume the city added the third option. How, exactly, does the city calculate the cost of a full call? How does the city collect the money? Who pays the cost when someone, a firefighter or civilian, gets injured? Who pays if something gets damaged or broken that shouldn't have been? How far should this additional service extend (remember, the house that burned was actually outside the city the fire department actually serves)? What if it is obvious that the homeowner does not have the means to pay the cost of the full call? What if the homeowner isn't home to agree to pay when the fire breaks out?

Mind you, these questions all involve cost that must be borne by someone. Is it fair to put that cost on the city residents against their will? No.

I wouldn't call it a hit piece, but clearly O'Rourke doesn't understand what the Tea Parties are. The TPs don't have a foreign policy (except for a very broad notion that America is the shining city on the hill) and it likely will never have one. That's not its job. The TP has always been a movement built toward the specific purpose of reversing the uncontrolled government spending. Once that is accomplished, the TPs will fade away nationally (hopefully to become a force locally).

I think that Lewis is wrong on every point. It's as if he isn't actually acquainted with anyone who is active in one of the various Tea party movement, which is odd because I'm fairly sure he is.

Yet Rove has been swinging a sizable stick for other Tea Party-approved candidates, such as Sharron Angle in Nevada. I'm pretty sure he's done the same for Joe Miller, Rand Paul, Roy Blunt, Ken Buck, and Marco Rubio.

So yeah, he's all Captain Establishment, right? Or could it be that he gave a horrible candidate a well-deserve smackdown while he continues to back halfway solid candidates (*coughAnglecough*) and other very good ones.

I'm sorry, sir, but this Pledge is not a gauntlet. It is a soft gentleman's glove, filled with a bland custard, lightly tossed in the general direction of the Democrats.

My short take: It's far too long, far too timid, and far to infested with annoying catch-phrase politi-speak. I suspect that it exists because Congress is full of staffers who look on 1994 as "The Glory Days" and, when confronted with the Tea Parties' demands thought, "I know! We Need Another Contract!". So they rounded up some folks who remembered the last one, or even worked on it, and came up with another one. But, since every one of them marinates daily in the pungent miasma of Washington politics, they forgot they were were responding to a demand, not making a campaign pitch and ended up with a half-baked white paper that has some good, some "meh", and generates very little excitement.

Minor point. Rallies against the "Porkulus" bill happened a couple days before Santelli's rant -- three on the same day in different cities. Michelle Malkin was instrumental in spreading the word about the first one in WA. These things have been going on a while and, as has been mentioned, have taken on different aspects of out-of-control government growth.

I think if we want to boil the Tea Parties down to one issue, it'd have to be spending. I actually find it interesting that social issues, on which TPers are notably conservative, are simply not addressed.

I'm afraid that, after the dustups of the past week, I have no earthly idea what the GOP establishment is anymore. Jim DeMint, a sitting Senator isn't part of the establishment; Karl Rove, a political commentator, is. Fox News is part of the establishment; Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin, both of whom are paid quite generously to provide programs on Fox News, are not. Charles Krauthammer, a pundit who worked for Carter, Mondale, and The New Republic, is; Mark Levin, a pundit who worked for Reagan, is not.

I'm thoroughly confused here.

In related news, The International Pipe Appreciation League has placed a posthumous fatwa against Rene Magritte for his painting The Treachery of Images. Those who own reprints of the painting are advised to destroy them as an expression of their sensitivity to those who revere pipes, or things that aren't pipes. Whichever.