What the Heck Was I Thinking!?

An Apt Metaphor for the Economic “Recovery”

2010-08-15T09:05:00.001-04:00

Caroline Baum posts at Bloomberg.com about the economic recovery.

Her article, “Economy Lost Momentum While I Was Pulling Weeds,” points out that the ‘recovery’ wasn’t much to cheer about in the first place. Her description is an apt metaphor:

What we had was a government-prescribed course of amphetamines (to keep it up), antibiotics (to prevent infection) and antidepressants (to make it feel better). It endured regular steroid injections from both monetary and fiscal authorities. And it still has no real muscle.

Not Impressed With the Judge’s Performance

2010-08-14T17:10:00.001-04:00

Ed Whelan writes at NRO Weekend about Judge Walker, the judge who’s been making strange decisions on the California Proposition 8 case.

Ed’s not impressed:

Walker’s course of conduct would be sufficient cause for national scandal in any case. That it comes in a case that aims to radically remake the central social institution of American society makes it utterly intolerable.

The whole post is a must read on the conduct of this activitist in black robes.

Does Obama Know About the Overton Window

2010-06-27T08:47:00.001-04:00

Over at Chicago Boyz blog, Bruno Behrend is reposting an entry he’d made from a couple of years ago about the Overton Window.

Bruno’s terse explanation of this phenomenon is:

“The Limits Define the Center”

This got me to thinking about how Barack Obama frames an argument. He paints his own position as where we want to be, then puts a stake at the far right side of the argument and claims that’s where his opponents stand. He seeks to shift the limits by defining one of the boundaries. Then he seeks to describe his position as the center of the discussion.

I’ll bet he or one of his staff is familiar with the concept.

Goodness knows he’s got some extremely radical “friends” to attempt to make himself look more “centrist.”

Bad Signs for Future Disasters

2010-06-23T05:28:00.001-04:00

Jay Tea posts at Wizbang Blog on the federal response to the leaking oil well:

I've always been enamored of Professor Glenn Reynolds' oft-repeated aphorism: "I'll believe there's a crisis when the people who say there's a crisis act like there's a crisis." It's a great BS detector, but it has some corollaries that I'm finding truly terrifying.

What does it mean when those people say there's a crisis, I agree that there's a crisis, but they refuse to act like there's a crisis?

I see this sort of non-response response as a way of looking busy but not really engaging on the task. Is there oil on my beach? No? Well then it’s a problem, but not a REAL problem, yet. Look like we’re doing something useful, but don’t forget to use the “crisis” for political purposes first.

What should worry Jay Tea and worries me is what this portends for the federal response to the next hurricane or fire, or … you name the disaster where people will foolishly turn to the federal government for assistance. We’ll all find out just how really competent these leaders are.

I’m not optimistic about that.

Steyn Skewers Stupids

2010-05-29T12:39:00.002-04:00

Mark Steyn posts at Macleans of Canada about the cost of the welfare state. Or, as I would call it, the price of being stuck on stupid.

His comments in We’re too broke to be this stupid” are worth reading and quoting:

How did the Western world reach this point? Well, as my correspondent put it, we assumed that we were rich enough that we could afford to be stupid. In any advanced society, there will be a certain number of dysfunctional citizens either unable or unwilling to do what is necessary to support themselves and their dependents. What to do about such people? Ignore the problem? Attempt to fix it? The former nags at the liberal guilt complex, while the latter is way too much like hard work: the modern progressive has no urge to emulate those Victorian social reformers who tramped the streets of English provincial cities looking for fallen women to rescue. All he wants to do is ensure that the fallen women don’t fall anywhere near him.

The fact that we’ve been well enough off to afford to use sloppy thinking in how life should be organized is no longer true. Too many of us have either been the victim of our own or others’ stupidity – including the stupidity of our politicians.

Some more of Mr. Steyn’s choice words:

So the easiest “solution” to the problem is to throw public money at it. You know how it is when you’re at the mall and someone rattles a collection box under your nose and you’re not sure where it’s going but it’s probably for Darfur or Rwanda or Hoogivsastan. Whatever. You’re dropping a buck or two in the tin for the privilege of not having to think about it. For the more ideologically committed, there’s always the awareness-raising rock concert: it’s something to do with Bono and debt forgiveness, whatever that means, but let’s face it, going to the park for eight hours of celebrity caterwauling beats having to wrap your head around Afro-Marxist economics. The modern welfare state operates on the same principle: since the Second World War, the hard-working middle classes have transferred historically unprecedented amounts of money to the unproductive sector in order not to have to think about it. But so what? We were rich enough that we could afford to be stupid.

Actually one could say that we were stupid enough that we steal from ourselves, or elect people who’d tell us it was a good idea to let them steal from us.

One of the core reasons that people get so pitchfork-totin’ mad about politicians and their criminal ways is that it shows us up for the stupids we’ve been in electing and reelecting them to continue the fleecing. It’s like the sheep voting for the wolf that has the best haircut or the smoothest talk, while we let him kill our young.

We should be mad, but we should remember who was the stupid who voted these buffoons into office.

Words of Foreboding

2010-05-27T05:22:00.002-04:00

Doctor Zero posts at Hot Air about the SEIU mob that descended on a bank officer’s home recently. His words are ominous:

They are the feral vanguard of a collapsing system, using violence and intimidation to make it clear those not favorably connected to the political power structure will be sacrificed to preserve it, for as long as possible.

These kinds of actions are both predictable and should fill us all with foreboding. Political and economic life will become much less civil and much more “feral.”

This kind of union gang action bears watching, lest we slide into the abyss into which Argentina and Venezuela have collapsed.

Shades of Argentina

2010-05-22T09:56:00.001-04:00

Is this what kind of society we want?

From the Huffington Post’s Arthur Delaney:

Dozens of noisy purple-shirted SEIU protesters stormed a Bank of America branch near the U.S. Capitol on Monday, forcing the bank to close down as confused customers looked on and tellers retreated to an interior room.

Other groups from SEIU and National People's Action were set to stage protests at BofA's and JPMorgan Chase's lobby shops downtown as part of a daylong anti-K Street extravaganza.

This is the second time that SEIU union bosses have used union dues to pay for bully tactics against businesses they don’t like.

Sounds like either the Perons’ or Kirchners’ tactics in Argentina.

Perhaps Because You’re Mostly Conservative and Southern?

2010-05-09T17:27:00.001-04:00

Just an idea, but that’s my answer to:

Why Did It Take So Long for National Media to Notice We were Flooded?

Posted by Betsy Phillips on Thu, May 6, 2010 at 6:21 AM

In a world of 24-hour news, when said national news channels will devote hours of programming to interviewing people who sleep with famous people, and when they'll interrupt that programming to bring you speculation on the identity of a guy in grainy surveillance footage, it was mind-boggling to flip by CNN, MSNBC, and FOX on Sunday afternoon and see not one station even occasionally bringing their viewers footage of the flood, news of our people dying.

You didn’t have either “ecological” or “terrorism” in your story.

For Gawd’s sake, you had the Grand Ole Opry in the news! How many northern liberals know that’s anything more than some hick stage somewhere in the South where they pick their teeth, pluck their banjos, and talk funny.

I’ll bet more than half of them don’t even know that Nashville is a “big” city. And most of them couldn’t place Tennessee on a map if you spotted them Kentucky and all the states on the eastern seaboard.

“Those hill billies just aren’t smart enough to know to live far enough away from the river. Did you hear the accent on that one woman they interviewed? Good Lord, tell me we’re not related.”

And what about Ashland City? Or Pegram? Or the three homes in a clump along a creek out west of here that don't have a name? What if they don't have time to "construct a narrative" or a vast army of people to push it out to the national media?

Homes in a clump? Along a creek? Come on! They don’t care about your narrative because they don’t want to have any connection to people in the South.

h/t Instapundit – another of those rednecked southerners no doubt

Well, That’s a Change

2010-04-28T05:28:00.002-04:00

As part of the change process underway in the Obama administration,

A damning health care report generated by actuaries at the Health and Human Services (HHS) Department was given to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius more than a week before the health care vote. She hid the report from the public until a month after democrats rammed their nationalized health care bill through Congress.

Well, maybe there wasn’t anything of real importance in the report anyway. How bad could it have been?

The results from the report were troubling. The report released by Medicare and Medicaid actuaries shows that medical costs will skyrocket rising $389 billion 10 years. 14 million will lose their employer-based coverage. Millions of Americans will be left without insurance. And, millions more may be dumped into the already overwhelmed Medicaid system. 4 million American families will be hit with tax penalties under this new law.

Uh oh. That’s not so good. I wonder if it would have caused any votes to change if it had been released BEFORE the vote?

(forgot to add the link to Gateway Pundit for this)

What Do You Mean, “We?”

2010-04-15T11:54:00.002-04:00

Jim Hoft, at Gateway Pundit posts a video clip of Obama speaking at his nuclear conference in Washington this week.

A quote from the video:

At his nuclear conference yesterday Barack Obama told Americans,

“Whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower.”

Who does he mean by “we?”

If he’s going to try to lead the dominant military superpower, could we get him to be a little bit better with his choice of words and sentiments?

What would he like more, that we become some second rate power that no one asks for help from because we can’t keep our own mess together?

Not me.

A True Revolution

2010-04-15T08:56:00.001-04:00

Robin from Berkeley posted a very interesting commentary about her transformation from progressive to conservative over at American Thinker. Thanks to Neo-neocon for pointing to it.

The introductory paragraphs are comments from an adult:

There are moments when life crashes down on you like a thunderbolt. And ready or not, you change.

There's a before and an after. One moment, you're one way. And then, in the blink of an eye, you're different.

Even young people can have this eye-opening experience. Most often, though, it comes about from some experience that shatters one’s cherished beliefs on the rocks of reality.

I think this is one of those true “revolutions.” Not the one where we get to indulge our inner tantrum and tear down what’s been built for our use. It’s the revolution of the mind in which the facade of the “-isms” is bumped, falls over flat, and reveals the world for what it really is.

Redistributing other people’s money, telling them how much carbon they can emit, “providing” universal health care are all symptoms of the progressive disease of narcissistic arrogance.

Arrogance in the thinking that the peasants can’t possibly know what’s best for themselves. Narcissism in the irrational belief that “we” are the ones who do know what’s best. “We” are the smartest, the most imaginative, creative, the most altruistic. “They” don’t know, care, or want things to be for the best.

It’s not aristocratic thinking, because the “we” don’t think of themselves as aristocracy…yet. If you watch some of those who’ve done this for long periods of time, though, you notice that beginning of the belief that they no longer have to hide their view of themselves.

It’s a fascinating post.

Nice Turn of the Phrase

2010-04-04T15:35:00.001-04:00

Instapundit comes up with a nice turn of the phrase on the New York Times:

JIM HOFT IS UNHAPPY THAT THE NEW YORK TIMES CONFLATES TEA PARTIERS WITH weathermen terrorists. But I think they’re saying that Tea Partiers will be close friends with the next President . . . .

Or, to quote Mr. Reynolds with his should-be-patented phrase: “Heh.”

He Just Doesn’t Get It

2010-04-04T10:06:00.002-04:00

BHO (That’s President Obama to you) has apparently decided that the Clintonian approach is the best presentation of his view on things.

From the Washington Post (of all places):

The great elaborator: Obama gives 17-minute answer to health-care query in N.C.

CHARLOTTE -- Even by President Obama's loquacious standards, an answer he gave here on health care Friday was a doozy.

In response to a subject’s question about the sanity of taxing people more through health care, Obama turned on the hot air machine:

He then spent the next 17 minutes and 12 seconds lulling the crowd into a daze. His discursive answer -- more than 2,500 words long -- wandered from topic to topic, including commentary on the deficit, pay-as-you-go rules passed by Congress, Congressional Budget Office reports on Medicare waste, COBRA coverage, the Recovery Act and Federal Medical Assistance Percentages (he referred to this last item by its inside-the-Beltway name, "F-Map"). He talked about the notion of eliminating foreign aid (not worth it, he said). He invoked Warren Buffett, earmarks and the payroll tax that funds Medicare (referring to it, in fluent Washington lingo, as "FICA").

This sounds like a Bill Clinton wonkiness response.

One part of his answer, though, shows us he just doesn’t get the concept of government as servant to the citizens:

Always fond of lists, Obama ticked off his approach to health care -- twice. "Number one is that we are the only -- we have been, up until last week, the only advanced country that allows 50 million of its citizens to not have any health insurance," he said.

“…country that allows 50 million of its citizens to not have any health insurance?” Huh!? Since when did we live in a country that “allows citizens?” Don’t we live in the land of the free, where people can do anything they want so long as it’s legal?

This is the same mentality that comes up with schemes that only allow certain kinds of guns for certain people in certain locations. It’s the same kind of mentality that will allow more undocumented voters to enter the country whenever they feel the need for a break from the harsher life in their own country. And allowing those same newly documented voters to obtain all the benefits of lifelong taxpaying citizens, including allowing them health insurance.

By what right does the government “allow” us to have (or not have as we choose) health insurance? Where are the people who not only say, “show me the law that says I can’t do something,” and it’s converse, “by what law based on what part of the Constitution does a government employee have the authority to do or say something?”

Oh, yeah, the Tea Party.

No wonder the Democrats and Obama are so worried about them. No wonder those people want to stigmatize the Tea Partiers. They strike at the fundamental belief system those elitists have about government and the governed.

Press You Couldn’t Buy in America

2010-04-03T09:24:00.001-04:00

This is the kind of bad P.R. you couldn’t pay to have published in the U.S.

From RiaNovosti press:

The 44th U.S. president could sign the bill this week. He will then go down in history not only as the first black president, but also as the first "red" president: Obama's Republican opponents maintain that the bill is too socialist.

First it was Castro being quoted in praise of Obama’s and the socialist Democrats’ agenda, now it’s the Russians lecturing him on economic history.

If Republicans can’t use those kinds of free P.R. to win in November, they don’t deserve to be called politicians.

That must sting.

Ridicule is Man’s Most Potent Weapon

2010-03-27T08:40:00.001-04:00

Erick Erickson posts a great takedown of the liberals’ faux fear of vioulent protests:

If the left burns down their own straw men, can we have them arrested for arson? That seems to be where we are headed.

Josh Marshall and the Democrats have descended into rubber and glue political commentary flat out blaming the Republicans for inciting violence, much of it fabricated and ignoring the Democrats’ own rhetoric and violence.

First of all, I would point out that it was the Democrats who just took over 1/6th of the American economy despite upwards of 56% of the American public being opposed. And they expect people to . . . what . . . clap?

As I said earlier today, violence is unacceptable, but none of us should be surprised — especially the left, which feeds off riots, protest, and molotov cocktail parties every time they strongly oppose something. The Weather Underground was not a Republican insurgency at the Weather Channel.

He uses scalpel-sharp sarcasm to shred the veil of false fear and fake outrage that liberals have thrown up to hide their true behavior.

His call-out box is perfect ridicule:

“As incitement goes, I find “they want you to die” just a teensy bit more blood-thirsty than “read the bill,” but maybe that’s just me. I don’t do “dog whistles” and code words.”

BTW, the title is Alinsky’s rule 5. Might as well use their weapons against them.

How Fascism Grows

2010-03-27T08:32:00.001-04:00

First you demonize the opposition as out of control and violent.

[from Instapundit] AN IMPLAUSIBLE REPORT IN THE SEATTLE TIMES: “A rock was thrown through the window of Driehaus’ Cincinnati office Sunday.”

Then, you weasel your way into the public media to ensure the lies and distortions get out.

[from NewsBusters] A March 25 article in the New York Times by Elizabeth Jensen announced the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is setting up seven regional reporting projects, called Local Journalism Centers. Each center will hire editors and reporters to work on local issues using federal funds from public broadcasting. The Centers represent the government’s first, small steps into the journalism business.

Then, you find and arrest those who oppose you.

[from Cato@Liberty.com] Today, the Venezuelan government arrested Guillermo Zuloaga, president of Globovision Television, the only remaining television on public airwaves critical of Hugo Chavez. According to the government, Zuloaga made offensive comments about Chavez (which is against the law in Venezuela) while speaking at a conference of the Inter-American Press Association (IAPA) in Aruba, where media representatives criticized the Venezuelan regime’s crackdown on freedom of speech.

Steve Forbes, writing at Fox News doesn’t think this is too far fetched a series of events.

[from Fox News] Think things are going from bad to worse in Venezuela as Chavez continues to crackdown on his critics? Wait till you hear about plans for "media reform" in the U.S. by Chavez supporter and Free Press founder Robert McChesney.

In more and more ways, this country appears to be turning into a Third World country.

That Didn’t Take Long

2010-03-22T05:27:00.002-04:00

Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit pointed to some developing bad news for one of the last hopes to stop Obamacare:

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- In the first indication of just how upset Congressman Bart Stupak made pro-life groups by arranging a deal on abortion funding with President Barack Obama, a pro-life women's group is stripping the formerly respected pro-life Democrat of an award it planned to give him this week.

UPDATE: Ooh, there's more from John McCormick at the Weekly Standard.

Make ‘Em Pay On Election Day

2010-03-22T05:15:00.002-04:00

Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit notes a blog entry by Dan Riehl.

Mr. Reynold's adds a quote from Mr. Riehl’s post, which reminded me of a thought I had on Sunday, watching this all unfold:

And we will win in the end. Too many solid citizens were already up in arms, taking to the streets before this. Those numbers will not shrink. They will grow exponentially. As the saying goes, this is not the beginning of the end. It is the end of the beginning.”

I think the Tea Party ought to adopt the title of this post as the rallying cry - “Make ‘em pay on election day!”

I like the "Fire Pelosi" idea too!

Truth – the First Casualty

2010-03-20T09:10:00.001-04:00

But surely not the last.

Investors Business Daily editorializes on the bald-faced propaganda presented by the President, the Speaker and the Senate Majority Leader in their push to cram health care down our throats.

One of the most egregious:

• ("This is not a) government takeover of health care." How is it that government can dictate to private insurance companies what they can offer, to whom, under what circumstances and at what prices, and yet still not own it? Every basic business decision a private company can make has effectively been expropriated.

Even as Obama denied his health care plan was a government takeover, his vice president, Joe Biden, laid out the real deal: "You know we're going to control the insurance companies." We'll take him at his word.

There’s much more at the link. They take an editorial scalpel to his claims and show the damage done to truth in his propaganda.

Bipartisanship and trust between the parties and the two houses are up on the chopping block too.

This Is Insanity

2010-03-06T10:54:00.001-05:00

Mish Shedlock writes a very interesting and entertaining (even for non-economists) economics blog at Mish’s Global Economic Trend Analysis.

He posted about the decision of a Nevada Federal Credit Union that is asking big customers to pull their money out! From the Las Vegas Review Journal:

Nevada Federal Credit Union has a deal for big savers: Withdraw your money and you'll get a bonus.
The credit union is investing in short-term Treasurys and earns about one-quarter of 1 percent on those government securities on average, but it was paying 0.4 percent to customers with savings.
In addition, the credit union expects the National Credit Union Administration to boost deposit insurance premiums by 0.15 percent to 0.4 percent this year.

Mr. Shedlock comments on this insane government influence on business:

The National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) and FDIC parasites siphon off deposit insurance money from good institutions not willing to take risks, to support institutions taking excessive risks.

In turn, banks and credit unions sitting with high levels of cash lose money on deposits and the customers make zero percent interest, thanks to the Bernanke Fed holding interest rates at zero.

It’s not just the insanity of a zero interest rate on federal funds. It’s the general attitude in this and other sectors of the economy that punishes thrifty, prudent investors and owners by making them pay for the greed, stupidity, and laziness of the rest of the participants.

Home owners who have taken out sensible mortgages on houses they can afford and made regular payments are the chumps who saw their property values drop like rocks because of people who borrowed (and lent) into extremely high risk situations that blew up on them. Users of personal and commercial credit have seen rates and restrictions imposed by companies that had given outrageous credit to unworthy borrowers, both individuals and businesses.

We’ve all seen the crazy behavior that the Treasury and Fed displayed in propping up banks and investment companies that had obviously not done a good job of prudently managing their assets. Then, they turn around and approve of bonus payments to senior managers who were frequently the ones who first drove their companies off the economic cliff.

Maybe this Nevada credit union is actually doing a favor for the members. Maybe the soon to be former members will find a better thing in which to invest their money.

It certainly won’t be Treasuries or other similarly risky stocks or bonds. The previous owners of those kinds of investments also took significant losses.

Not the Real Reason for Pushing Obamacare

2010-03-05T05:15:00.002-05:00

Instapundit points to Just One Minute, Tom Maguire’s blog, with this quote:

“If cost control is the problem, ObamaCare is not the answer.”

I doubt that true cost containment for health care was ever the core goal of either Obama or the House or Senate leadership. They’re not foolish enough to assume that the federal government would ever be the source of cost control or economic efficiency. They couldn’t be that blind to the looming economic disasters of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

Maybe they just need a fourth for that troika of disasters coming our way.

This Ought to Help

2010-02-28T08:24:00.001-05:00

Bloomberg reports:

Feb. 25 (Bloomberg) -- The Obama administration may expand efforts to ease the housing crisis by banning all foreclosures on home loans unless they have been screened and rejected by the government’s Home Affordable Modification Program.

The proposal, reviewed by lenders last week on a White House conference call, “prohibits referral to foreclosure until borrower is evaluated and found ineligible for HAMP or reasonable contact efforts have failed,” according to a Treasury Department document outlining the plan.

That ought to make lots of banks, savings and loans and other potential sources of lending funds really interested in lending money.

It simply adds one more layer of trouble that lenders will have to go through to get either a return or their capital back. Not a good thing for the commercial real estate market.

Different Kinds of Conflict of Interest

2010-02-20T17:12:00.001-05:00

I’d rather that the Justice department were populated with former K Street lobbyists than this kind of danger:

Attorney General Eric Holder says nine Obama appointees in the Justice Department have represented or advocated for terrorist detainees before joining the Justice Department. But he does not reveal any names beyond the two officials whose work has already been publicly reported. And all the lawyers, according to Holder, are eligible to work on general detainee matters, even if there are specific parts of some cases they cannot be involved in. (from the Washington Examiner)

Names should be named and they should be kept away from all aspects of our no-longer-called war on terror, or the military, for that matter.

(H/T Confederate Yankee)

Holder admits nine Obama Dept. of Justice officials worked for terrorist detainees, offers no details | Washington Examiner

Hypocrisy With a Dollop of Hubris

2010-02-20T09:15:00.001-05:00

Did Barack Obama just do what he told the rest of us not to do?

From Investors Business Daily, we learn that:

Politics: President Obama flew into Las Vegas Friday, $1.5 billion in TARP money in hand. It seemed a make-up bouquet for his remarks singling out the city as no place to spend money.

What’s that about not going to Vegas and blowing a bunch of money when things are tough?

I guess that’s for the little people, not for the governing class.

Then we learn about some of the questionable people he’s giving this money to:

It kind of stinks — of politics.The cash will be funneled through state housing finance agencies "to design programs," as the White House blog vaguely puts it. The conduit will flow through the door of corrupt community organizers such as Acorn, which get their cash from such agencies to conveniently skirt federal rules that prohibit handing taxpayer money to these groups.

Well, we know already what those kinds of groups do with government money.

This sounds like any typical Third World tin-pot government that decides what it wants to do with money from the people, and tells the people what they should do to keep that money flowing.

Lucky for us this guy’s up for reelection in about 2 1/2 years.

Investors.com - Heeding Las Vegas

Let’s Make a Deal

2010-02-15T12:43:00.001-05:00

William Jacobson at Legal Insurrection proposes a deal:

And we'll throw in, no extra charge, a promise not to refer to Obama as "Professor."
Deal?

Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion: "Democrat Party" Hyper-Sensitivity Syndrome

Modern Serfdom Indeed

2010-02-14T14:25:00.001-05:00

Don Surber writes in his Daily Mail blog about an unsettling story from the AP:

(Quoted from the AP article) “TAKOMA PARK, Md. – As back-to-back snowstorms shuttered schools for the week across the mid-Atlantic states, parents fretted about lost learning time, administrators scheduled makeup days and teachers posted assignments online. But Marla Caplon worried about a more fundamental problem: How would students eat?”

In an imperfect world of not-so-long ago, these people called “parents” would provide the answer. They would go to the grocery store (winter is a tough time to garden in Maryland) and prepare food for their children.

The story had a less than satisfying ending. The school gave food to the food bank and the parents received the food. One mother said the snow cut off her babysitting money and her husband is jobless. Of course, we should help people out in an emergency.

But making the poor wards of the state is unsettling. Depraved even. Modern serfdom.

When winter is over, we need to address this problem. Children should go to school to learn, not eat.

He’s right. enforced or encouraged servitude to a central government for basic items such as food is a terrible thing.

One of the big concerns is that these programs aren’t helping to alleviate a problem, except in the short term. The students’ education and test scores are not improving. The parents are not learning to develop skills to provide for their families, or (horror of horrors) learning to not have more dependents for whom they can’t be depended upon to provide basic needs.

Socialized anything doesn’t work very well in general. It is especially unreliable when weather or other circumstances (an earthquake) arise.

Downside of school lunch programs « Don Surber

Almer Goretry, not P.T. Barnum

2010-02-14T08:13:00.001-05:00

Archy Cary, writing in the Toronto Globe and Mail and reprinted at Big Journalism, describes the latest wounds to the ~~Global Warming~~ Climate Change movement:

Some will ask, “What were they thinking?” The wise will answer, “They weren’t thinking. They were following.” And when the press follows it loses its independence of thought and, thereby, its freedom.

Now the Hoax is fully exposed, buck naked, picked clean. Clean as the wind-driven snow.

Yet, although its premise is dead, the carcass of thought that brought it this far will continue to walk. But it’ll be the walk of the zombie. Stiff, staggering, with flat eyes and muffled voice.

Its false prophets, led by Al Gore — a modern day P.T. Barnum — will continue to push their premise. But their disciples will melt away as the snow will eventually melt in D.C.

It’s a well written piece, but I have one major objection to the last paragraph quoted above. Al Gore is a modern day Elmer Gantry, not P.T. Barnum. Barnum gave the customers entertainment for their money. Gore was as hypocritical and shameless as the iconic character from the novel of the same name. He wanted followers and their money, not informed scientists and sensible policy options.

» Climate Change: A Canadian Newspaper Prints the Obituary of a Man-Made Hoax - Big Journalism

Smoot Hawley in Disguise?

2010-02-07T07:49:00.001-05:00

From Investors Business Daily’s editorial:

Now that Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has served notice he's "not finished" with Toyota, how keen will other foreigners be to invest and create jobs here? This political show could cost us.

Is this the modern version of trade barriers like those that tanked the economy going into the First Great Depression? We all have read how the anti-trade tarrifs of Smoot-Hawley may have worsened the Depression. Perhaps this is the liberal Democrat back door way of accomplishing the same thing. It certainly pays back the United Auto Workers and the Big-3 car companies.

But, as Investors Business Daily notes:

Toyota is big and visible to global investors so the political show and congressional star chambers will have a chilling effect on other foreign investment in the U.S. It's no mystery why. Foreigners invest in the U.S. precisely because they don't expect those things.

Investors.com - After Toyota's Hit, Why Invest Here?

You Can’t Learn What You Don’t Think You Need to Learn

2010-02-06T08:25:00.002-05:00

In an article tinged with probably unintended irony, V. Dion Haynes writes about a recent sale of property in Washington, D.C.

Mortgage Bankers Group Sells D.C. Office to Bethesda Company

Even the pros are taking a beating. The Mortgage Bankers Association, its membership expert in real estate, sold its $90 million headquarters in downtown Washington on Friday for $41 million.

The three-year-old, 10-story building at 1331 L St. NW -- built just before the office market soured -- was bought by the CoStar Group, a commercial real estate information firm that plans to move its headquarters from Bethesda to the District.

I guess we can all feel better now – even pros like the Mortgage Bankers Association weren’t smart enough to sidestep the overblown real estate market.

Either that, or they became intoxicated with their successes and neglected to look at the fundamentals as they should have been doing.

The CoStar Group ought to market themselves as the company with enough knowledge about the commercial real estate market to know when to wait for a bargain. More than a few banks and big borrowers would likely be impressed with that example of their street smarts.

Mortgage bankers group sells D.C. offices to Bethesda company - washingtonpost.com

One of the Problems with Government Intervention

2010-02-04T08:51:00.001-05:00

John Hinderocker at Powerline Blog posts about the President’s budget. He’s concerned about the changes to itemized deductions, especially for those over $250,000 annual income levels.

One of his comments caught my eye:

It's easy to understand the Obama administration's purpose with regard to churches and private charities, which it regards as competitors of the government. It wants to damage or destroy them by making contributions more expensive.

This sounds eerily like the efforts of the administration regarding the Toyota accelerator problem. The government “watchdog” department of Transportation seems to be very ambitious in turning up the heat on Toyota – at a time when that company is still beating sales figures at Government Motors. Is there a conflict of interest here?

That’s just one of the reasons the government should not be in the marketplace as a competitor. They’re the overseer as well.

Power Line - Obama Attacks Churches, Charities and Home Values

Geez, I Wonder Why

2010-01-30T16:34:00.001-05:00

From a Bloomberg post titled “Greek Bonds Show Waning Faith” comes this reassuring comment by a “top economic official:”

“There is no bailout problem,” the bloc’s top economic official said in an interview with Bloomberg Television at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. “Greece will not default. In the euro area, default does not exist.”

I’ve heard of the Austrian school of economics. This must come from the Ostrichian school – head firmly in a dark place, hidden away from all those nasty messy facts of life.

Maybe before he was a top economic official, he was a climate science expert.

Greek Bonds Show Waning Faith It Can Avoid Bailout (Update4) - Bloomberg.com

Complete Discrediting of Global Warming Scam

2010-01-24T08:17:00.001-05:00

Having lived through the 1970s global cooling craze, I came at this alarmism with some skepticism. Not being a scientist, I could not refute the “science” that was being put out. I was put off by the evangelical approach taken by the most prominent (and eventually the rank and file) alarmists. They, especially Al Gore, reminded me too much of the great book and movie, “Elmer Gantry.”

Anthony Watts’ great site, “Watts Up With That?” provides even the layman like myself a chance to see what happens to the science when scrutiny is applied by ethical scientists, as opposed to collaborating press reporters.

Now the latest from Watts Up With That?

The IPCC is now damaged goods. Pachauri is toast, and nobody will be able to cite the IPCC AR4 again without this being brought up.

The Daily Mail’s David Rose in the UK broke this story, it is mind boggling fraud to prod “government action” and grants. Emphasis in red mine.

Maybe it’s time to have “Elmer Gantry” join “Atlas Shrugged” on the reading lists for schools. People could do well to be reminded of the types of hypocrisy that exist.

BREAKING NEWS: scientist admits IPCC used fake data to pressure policy makers « Watts Up With That?

I Don’t Get It

2010-01-02T10:49:00.001-05:00

What is the big deal with this cartoon?

We’ve all seen plenty of satirical pictures or photos of people dressed as Jesus, Mary, the Pope, or other religious figures in Christianity. I don’t recall any Christians, even the very fundamentalist ones, going off and attempting to kill the artists or actors.

(image lifted from Jules Crittenden’s post on the latest attempt against Kurt Westergaard)

Jules Crittenden » Insane Bizarre Conflict

So We Should Let Them Run Health Care, Too

2010-01-02T09:59:00.001-05:00

The New York Times, not known for criticizing the current administration, has begun to notice that some of the Congressional and Administration juggling act seems to be dropping the ball.

The Obama administration’s $75 billion program to protect homeowners from foreclosure has been widely pronounced a disappointment, and some economists and real estate experts now contend it has done more harm than good.

I hope the reporter, Peter Goodman, remembers this when he writes about the Health Reform bill. The only government program that has been “successful” to date is our military. And no one would hold them up to the country as a model of efficient use of resources.

Mortgage Modifications Are Seen as Adding to Housing Woes - NYTimes.com

A Clear and Concise Description of the Climate Alarmists

2010-01-01T20:18:00.001-05:00

Roger Simon, in an otherwise somber piece about the portents for 2010, summed up what I think most people not caught up in global warming think about the alarmists’ motives:

Few were interested in climate science or the veracity of the link between CO2 and global warming, but many were interested in money and controlto be gained from them. Very interested.

Roger L. Simon » 2010: A Year of Living Dangerously?

Where Is the Anger Against Government Taking Over?

2010-01-01T19:58:00.001-05:00

Mish Shedlock posted about an outrageous situation in Michigan. From the Wall Street Journal article he refers to:

Ms. Berry owns her own business—yet the Michigan Department of Human Services claims she is a government employee and union member. The agency thus withholds union dues from the child-care subsidies it sends to her on behalf of her low-income clients. Those dues are funneled to a public-employee union that claims to represent her. The situation is crazy—and it's happening elsewhere in the country.

This overt fascism is absolutely against all of the founding principles of the U.S.

After watching Steve Crowley’s video about the devastation of Detroit by the same collaborators – Democrat politicians and Union thugs – it’s impossible not to see the root cause of this abuse of power.

And now they’re in charge of the White House and both houses of Congress.

Michigan Forces Business Owners Into Public Sector Unions - WSJ.com

No, But She Can Be Rented

2009-12-26T11:46:00.001-05:00

From Larwin’s Linx at Doug Ross’ site comes this quote:

QOTD:
"I can't be bought." -- Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Dec. 21, 2009

Which triggered in my mind the title for this post.

Larwyn's Linx: Nanny State Gone Wild as Dependency Widens

Glenn Reynolds Ask an Inconvenient Question

2009-12-26T11:20:00.001-05:00

The Instapundit, Glenn Reynolds, asks this regarding the “cash for cloture” debacle:

So what exactly was different about what Rod Blagojevich did?

Oww, that’s a tender spot for Democrats.

Instapundit » Blog Archive » CASH FOR CLOTURE: “You can’t even dignify this squalid racket as bribery: If I try to buy a cop, I …

Al Qaeda Failed. What About Us

2009-12-26T09:07:00.001-05:00

Stewart Baker, at Skating on Stilts blog, asks 10 questions about the attempted terrorist plot.

To give you a flavor of what he’s looking for, here are the first two:

1. According to early reports, the suspect is 23-year-old Abdul Farouk Abdulmutallab, and his name "appears to be included in the government's records of terrorist suspects, according to a preliminary review." The first question, then, is how he managed to get a visa to come to the United States.

2. One report suggested that the visa was granted to attend a religious meeting. Is there some political correctness problem that makes State reluctant to deny visas for such travel?

My prediction is that the answers to these questions – and they should be asked in official circumstances – will not make us feel any safer.

Al Qaeda Failed. What About Us? Ten Questions. - Skating on Stilts

Setting The Right Tone

2009-12-25T15:18:00.002-05:00

Don Surber points out part of the problem with Paul Krugman’s retelling of the Christmas Carol.

Krugman asserts that Scrooge would not be the problem in a future with Obamacare. Surber says it ain’t so:

American hospitals give out billions in charity care.

Medicare and Medicaid give out $60 billion in Medifraud. It will be a crook’s holiday.

Scrooge would like Obamacare. Scrooge was a liberal. He paid his taxes to support. That was his idea of charity. I remember when someone pointed out that Joe Biden, now our vice president, had averaged charity donations of $369 a year on an annual salary of $160,000, the counterargument was that he had voted against Bush tax cuts.

All that is to say nothing of the moral rightness of forcing people to “give” their hard earned money to a government-selected “cause.” Nor to speak of the moral benefit of being able to give freely and watch the beneficial impact of that giving on the recipient. All of that is lost in the equation where the government is the middleman and taxes are the “gift.”

Getting Scrooge backward « Don Surber

Justice, Swift and Sure

2009-12-24T12:52:00.001-05:00

Well, it’s good to see someone is looking out to make sure justice is done in this case.

The Ft. Hood jihadist’s spiritual advisor Anwar al Awlaki was reportedly killed today in an air strike on a Yemeni terrorist camp.

I think I’d tell Hassan the ass that he’ll go free, but be sent to the Yemen weapons test range that appears to have been set up.

Well, He Didn’t Have A Lot Of Experience There

2009-12-24T12:48:00.001-05:00

It’s understandable that President Obama doesn’t grasp the reasoning behind rules in the House and Senate, like the Senate filibuster rule. He hadn’t been there very long before the Peter Principle bumped him out.

Obama suggested that the senate should change its rules to better accommodate his plans for America.

It’s not like he’s a Constitutional scholar or anything. These rules are complex and arcane.

Oh, wait…

(Brietbart.com, via Gateway Pundit)

The Grand Litany of False Science

2009-12-01T05:14:00.001-05:00

A couple of days ago I blogged about the dead hand of Trofim Lysenko touching the junk science of global warming.

Bruce Walker, writing at the American Thinker, includes a long list of the many politics-before-science false prophets:

Perhaps the most egregious ghost is Trofim Lysenko, the man who ruled the life sciences of Soviet Russia from the late 1920s until the early 1960s. He had a theory which fit Marxism perfectly: acquired characteristics can be inherited. This is not true, of course, but Lysenko had the Politburo and Stalin behind him. It was science that fit the political needs of the Bolsheviks, and so it was science backed by the awful power of the party and the state.

He adds a chilling warning that:

Those who hijack science, however, are not interested in truth. They have created a false history of science which asserts absurd lies like "medieval Christians believed the Earth was flat." (Not only is that not true, but the religious influence upon science tended to confirm that the Earth was a sphere, and Christians of the time had the truest calculation of the circumference of the Earth of anyone around.) The men who founded modern science -- Galileo, Copernicus, Kepler, Pascal, Napier, Newton, and others -- were much more religious than their contemporaries. Those who hijack science for personal and political reasons pretend that religion interfered with science, but this is no more than a power-hungry agnostic's narcotic delusion.

Mr. Walker adds one ominous warning to his article.

This fraud has left many ghosts. "Aryan" science pretended, for a time, to be rooted in real science. Many Nazis considered their vile rites to be steeped in pure science, and they condemned the religious sentimentality of those who thought that men are men and not livestock.

American Thinker: The Ghost of Lysenko

Big Government » Blog Archive » ClimateGate Is Not The First Time Progressive Scientists Have Lied To The World

2009-11-26T12:27:00.001-05:00

Andrew Marcus posts at BigGovernment.com about the sordid history of junk science serving its political master.

Now that global warming is being exposed as a gross manipulation of junk science, it is important to remember that this is not the first time in our nation’s history that the Progressive community has used junk science in order to force their social agenda on an unsuspecting population.

And let’s not forget that example from the other liberal fascists – the Marxists. They came up with the wacky concept of plant genetics known as lysenkoism.

Trofim Lysenko, under Josef Stalin’s protection and guidance, set Russian and Soviet genetics back decades.

The introductory paragraph in Wikipedia is a prophetic warning:

Lysenkoism was a set of repressive political and social campaigns in science and agriculture by the powerful Stalinist director of the Soviet Lenin All-Union Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Trofim Denisovich Lysenko and his followers, which began in the late 1920s and formally ended in 1964.

“…[R]epressive political and social campaigns…” That is about as apt a description of the global warming effort as any you could find.

We need to repeat the condemnation of junk science whenever and wherever it rears it’s snout, lest we forget our lessons.

Can You Say Show Trial

2009-11-22T07:38:00.001-05:00

Barack Obama and his AG, Holder, must really want to emulate Barack’s friends in Latin America.

Not those silly democratic ones – the Socialist ones.

Here’s Senator Kohl questioning Holder last week:

KOHL: But taking into account that you never know what happens when you walk into a court of law, in the event that for whatever reason they do not get convicted, what would be your next step? I'm sure you must have talked about it.

HOLDER: What I told the prosecutors and what I will tell you and what I spoke to them about is that failure is not an option. Failure is not an option. This -- these are cases that have to be won. I don't expect that we will have a contrary result.

The more they try to make this look both legal and a "sure thing," the more they look like small “s” socialists who can't even run a show trial correctly.

Chavez, Castro, Putin and Hu must be laughing in their sleeves.

Power Line - Reading Bin Laden His Rights

From Skepticism To Outrage

2009-11-21T07:34:00.001-05:00

This ought to be printed and handed out anytime ~~Elmer Gantry~~ Al Gore tries to pitch his hokum:

Thanks to hackers (or an insider) who broke into The University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit (CRU) and downloaded 156 megaybytes of data including extremely damaging emails, we now know that data supporting the global warming thesis was completely fabricated.

Lots of details coming to light.

H/T Mish’s Global Economic Trend Analysis

Google Reader (958)

Is This The Real Motivation For An Otherwise Stupid Decision?

2009-11-19T05:30:00.001-05:00

Andrew McCarthy posts at the National Review Online about AG Holder’s testimony regarding the decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and others in New York.

One of the points stuck out at me as a possible underlying explanation for why this decision was made:

8. For eight years justice has been delayed — no longer, "It is past time to finally act." Holder, of course, does not mention the role of his firm and others in delaying and derailing the military commissions during their representation of America's enemies.

So Holder’s old firm, among others, has been benefiting from working the defense of these scumbags already. If they take on these cases in New York, they could reap millions of federal dollars in fees.

Hmmm.

And all the delays that have taken place so far are largely due to the death by a thousand delays perpetrated by Holder’s old law firm and others.

At least they’re consistent in their behavior and goals – freedom for the oppressed terrorists.

Cutting Out The Crap

2009-11-15T10:29:00.001-05:00

A friend sent me an article by Ralph Peters in the New York Post. It was about the scumbag Islamist terrorist at Ft. Hood.

He added a link to a very blunt and clear-spoken post by J.R. Saltzman at Lumberjack in the Desert.

I’m more than a little angry right now. Yes, I’m irate that some sh-tbag Major (“sh-tbag” is often used as a technical term in the Army) opened fire on a group of his fellow Soldiers killing 12 and wounding 30. But that’s not even what is under my skin right now. What is bothering me is the general reaction of our media and those stupid enough to think this was not an act of terrorism, but was caused by supposed PTSD caused at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

Mr. Saltzman asks the question that none of the apologists for the scumbag terrorist will ask:

If you can get PTSD from treating soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center then why the hell haven't more people snapped? Why haven't all the therapists in physical therapy and occupational therapy, and all the staff on Ward 57 ran around shooting up the place?

His answer is blunt and irrefutable:

So why haven't they gone crazy? Because you don't get PTSD from sitting on your ass around Walter Reed. Not only is it not possible to “catch” secondhand PTSD, but it is not that kind of a place. I would know, I was a patient there for nine months.

Mr. Saltzman knows what he’s talking about. Those other arm-chair psychologists and apologists don’t know what they’re talking about. They just want to blame the victims and excuse the attackers.

The real question that should be asked is why would anyone want to find excuses for the horrific acts that scumbag Hassan did?

Newt’s Nose Gets Swatted

2009-11-03T05:32:00.002-05:00

By Investors Business Daily.

They have an biting editorial on the NY-23 race in which the following swat goes out to New Gingrich for backing a Spectre-Rebpublican:

Now that Scozzafava has, in an act of incalculable pettiness, endorsed the Democrat in the race, Bill Owens, Gingrich looks like a professor at the Mister Magoo school of political science.

Mr. MaGingrich must feel really happy with his public statement supporting Scozzafava now that she’s openly supported the Democrat in the race.

All she’s shown is that she and the state party apparatus are most comfortable with the old school, back room politics, not this public, open debate on issues.

Sarah Palin looks a lot more principled about this race than Mr. MaGingrich does.

Investors.com - Principles And Pettiness In NY-23

Who’s Getting The Payoffs

2009-11-03T05:26:00.001-05:00

One big reason the Democrats don’t want anyone to read the bill for health care reform is that we find out who’s getting the payoffs. Investors Business Daily does some of the work Congressional Democrats don’t want us to do.

One of the winners – trail lawyers:

"A state is not eligible for the incentive payments," reads the bill, "if that state puts a law on the books that limits attorneys' fees or imposes caps on damages."

In other words, states that have the nerve to rein in frivolous medical malpractice lawsuits — and that's 85% of them, according to a Harvard study — would be punished if they also established medical courts where health care experts, rather than untrained juries, settle injury disputes based on actual medical science.

Well, so much for being concerned about cutting the costs of medical insurance and reforming malpractice.

Next up – the unions:

Other tainted nuggets turned over in the health care bill include payoffs to organized labor through a federal pay scale for nurses based on union wages, and a training grant program for nurses that will fund only unionized businesses.

Hmm, health care ‘reform’ and card check. Now we see who has been bankrolling Obama’s and the other liberal Democrats.

They all want their payoffs now.

Who else gets to be a winner in this disgusting travesty of reform? Only time and a thorough reading of the bill will tell. Let’s hope we get the chance to do that.

H/T Investors Business Daily

A Question For Both The Guest And The Host

2009-11-01T15:55:00.001-05:00

Gateway Pundit posts on the report in Politico that Valerie Jarrett claims that the withdrawal of Dede Scozzafava from the NY-23 race shows how radical the Republican party is.

Mr. Hoft’s (author of Gateway Pundit) question to Ms. Jarrett is:

So was Jarrett even following the race or was she just being dishonest on purpose?
Scozzafava was, of course, the GOP leadership’s candidate.
The GOP (and Daily Kos) endorsed her.

A good and fair question.

Looking at the Politico text, though, I’m struck by what “the dog didn’t do,”

White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” that the rise of a Conservative Party challenger in a closely watched upstate New York House election shows that the Republican Party leadership is “becoming more and more extreme, and more and more marginalized.”

Is George Stephanopoulos as willfully ignorant of the circumstances in the NY-23 race as Jarrett wants us to believe she, herself, is? If not, then why didn’t he immediately challenge her “3 Stooges” slap at the Republicans when they didn’t do anything to deserve it? Why didn’t Stephanopoulos point out that Scozzafava was THE CHOICE of the Republican part in New York, and they were therefore actually more guilty of trying to be like Democrats than acting ‘radical.’

One would assume that an interviewer on a political talk show would challenge assertions made by a guest that conflict with the facts.

But then one would frequently be wrong nowadays.

How Many Lessons Do Americans Need?

2009-11-01T13:15:00.001-05:00

I found this article by Mary Anastasia O’Grady in the Wall Street Journal Online, “ARgentina’s Kirchner Targets the Press.”

The way it starts out, though, was startling.

One way a president can boost poll numbers in a bad economy is to wrest control of the central bank and start printing lots of pesos. There's nothing like cheap financing to restore the market's enthusiasm for buying all sorts of stuff—from stocks to houses—already on sale at fire sale prices.

The great reflation will make people feel rich again. A weak currency will also be a short-term boon to exporters, whose profits can then be taxed at ever higher rates. Complainers can be denounced for their greed.

Geez, now who does that sound like?

Of course, O’Grady has to drag us back to the headline – it’s about Argentina, not the U.S.

Of course this perpetual motion machine will eventually conk out and when it does, a government that expects to survive will find it necessary to silence its critics. Just ask Argentines, who are living all of this in real time.

Then, she reminds us that this article isn’t just about Argentina,

Hugo Chávez has become a dictator in Venezuela under the guise of democracy, and he has similarly shut down the free press. Argentines are worried.

There is a lesson here for all democracies, especially the one we live in,

Last week in the Argentine daily La Nación, philosopher and writer Santiago Kovadloff summed up opposition sentiment about the government's use of "the law" to consolidate power: "The law has become a beloved tool of corruption," Mr. Kovadloff wrote. "The executive has put it at its service. It manipulates it with skill." And where does that leave society? "Insecurity is no longer a threat. We are in the jungle."

U.S. citizens should pay attention and make sure we don’t find ourselves in our own private jungle here. There are too many ways in which recent actions by politicians make this country feel too much like some Third World Country.

That’s A Surprise

2009-10-30T20:25:00.001-04:00

William Jacobson posts at Legal Insurrection about the monstrosity that is Nancy Pelosi’s magnum opus:

The bill defines which businesses are subject to the health care tax based upon the dollar amount of employee payroll. There even is a sliding scale right in the bill (section 501, at page 276) which tops out at 8% for businesses with $750,000 of annual payroll. Annual payroll is defined as the "aggregate wages" paid by the employer.

This provision creates incentives for businesses to keep down payroll. One way would be not to hire anyone whose compensation would fall under the definition of payroll under the bill.

What!? You mean that something written in secret by a team of lobbyists and staffers has something that will cause unforeseen consequences? How does that kind of thing ever happen?

(end sarcasm) This is so predictable – a huge bill that is frankensteined into place causing potentially serious problems as people and businesses adapt to the changes. The only real concern is to figure out just what those changes and what those adaptations will be.

I know that the liberal Democrats want to try to control all of the economy, but they just don’t understand that this kind of unforeseen and usually unintended consequence problem exists under any of the “systems” attempted to control economic activity.

They are doomed to failure. The only real question is how much collateral damage they will do to the rest of us and the economy as a whole.

Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion: It Took Just Minutes To Find Profound Stupidity In Pelosi's Bill

Politically Incorrect But Spot On

2009-10-24T08:46:00.001-04:00

Mark Steyn, never one to worry about being PC, writes at Investors Business Daily about the odd dichotomy in the Obama administration’s behavior:

Benjamin Disraeli's most famous advice to aspiring politicians was: "Never complain and never explain." For the greatest orator of our time, a man who makes Churchill, Lincoln and Henry V at Agincourt look like first-round rejects on "Orating With the Stars," Barack Obama seems to have pretty much given up on the explaining side.

He tried it with health care with speech after speech after exclusive interview for months on end, and the more he explained the more unpopular the whole racket got. So he declared that the time for explaining is over, and it's time to sign on or else.

Meanwhile, to take the other half of the Disraeli equation, Obama and his officials and their beleaguered band of surrogates never stop complaining. If you express concerns about government health care, they complain about all these "racists" and "domestic terrorists" obstructing his agenda.

Mr. Steyn has hit the nail on the head. Obama will do anything, but he especially loves the hardball tactics, for fellow Americans who disagree with him. He even treats U.S. allies in a cavalier fashion.

But he practically licks the boots of any thug dictator who stands up to him.

Let me just get out of the way and let Mr. Steyn say it clearly:

Another bit of venerable Disraelian insouciance, on the scribblers of Fleet Street: "Today they blacken your character, tomorrow they blacken your boots." For two years, the U.S. media have been polishing Obama's boots, mostly with their drool, to a degree unprecedented in American public life. But now it's time for the handful of holdouts to make with the Kiwi — or else.

He concludes with this zinger:

The Chicago way? Don't bring a knife to a gunfight. In Iran, this administration won't bring a knife to a nuke fight. In Eastern Europe, it won't bring missile defense to a nuke fight. In Sudan, it won't bring a knife to a machete fight. But, if you're doing the overnight show on WZZZ-AM, Mr. Tough Guy's got your number.

It’s worth reading every line.

Investors.com - Bare-Fisted Chicago Pol At Home, Pantywaist Vs. Real Thugs Abroad

Who’s Next For A Payoff

2009-10-21T05:18:00.001-04:00

Investors Business Daily comments on the attempt to cut out (in rodeo terms) the doctors from the herd of those who oppose the Democrat health care bills.

Legislative Process: Democrats are said to offer physicians a deal — freezing Medicare payment cuts if the docs sign on to health care reform. This is pricey bribery even by Washington standards.

Sooner or later, health care reform is going to hit taxpayers' wallets. House Democrats want to start right away with the rich, naturally. Their counterparts in the Senate are more circumspect or shifty, depending on your point of view. There, reform has a fiscally conservative facade that masks some very expensive wheeling and dealing.

It makes one wonder who the last group to be offered a buy off will be. There can’t be one for everyone – there just isn’t that much of other people’s money to go around.

If the dems miscalculate, it could be the voters. They might remember that at the next election, which could be bad for those who would support such a bill.

Nuclear Medicine

2009-10-18T07:37:00.001-04:00

Of the toxic kind. This from Investors Business Daily:

Health Care: Democrats seem set to use the "nuclear option" to ram their government health takeover into law. Bipartisanship already looked dead; now it looks extinct.

The health care revolution the Democratic Congress has planned — with its inevitable medical rationing, thousands of dollars in increased insurance premiums, and coverage of illegal aliens — may get placed on the familiar fast track used to spend hundreds and hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars this year.

Instead of the 60 votes needed in the Senate if proper parliamentary rules were followed, passing this reshaping of the medical system as a "budget reconciliation" measure would mean only a simple majority was needed.

House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., accused of cheating on his taxes, last week held a hearing to let the House version of the health reform bill be passed this way. As the Washington weekly Human Events reports, Democratic leaders "have apparently invoked the 'nuclear option' to shut out Republicans and ensure the bill is passed before the end of the year."

I guess when you know you’ve got a loser, and you know you’re likely not going to be in power for very long because most people don’t support the radical changes you want for the economy, the only course of action for you is scorched earth.

This will be a problem for the Democrats for a long time if they do it.

What could possibly make they think that this is the best course of action?

Reporting From The Front Lines

2009-10-12T07:32:00.001-04:00

Mark Steyn posts at NRO about the threats to free speech he’s seen first hand and the implications for U. S. citizens:

As Canadians have discovered, liberty is lost very quietly and quickly. And trying to get it back is slow and painful - particularly at a time when artists, universities, publishers and others who congratulate themselves incessantly on their truth-telling courage find increasingly pre-emptive self-censorship the better part of valor.

The Europe of 2020 will have considerably less freedom of expression than today. American exceptionalism is going to have to be exceptionally exceptional to hold out against that trend.

The worst of this kind of behavior is the self-censorship and peer pressure that intellectuals put on themselves and us.

The Withering of Free Speech - Mark Steyn - The Corner on National Review Online

Some Previous Nobel Laureates

2009-10-10T10:12:00.001-04:00

As opposed to noble…

Doug Ross did all the homework on this one:

2009: Barack Hussein Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize. Former recipients include:

2005: MOHAMED ELBARADEI (joint winner). He's done such a nice job with Iran.

2004: WANGARI MAATHAI. The Kenyan ecologist peacefully teaches that the AIDS virus is a biological agent deliberately created by the Man.

2002: JIMMY CARTER JR., former President of the United States of America. A true cosmopolitan, he has undermined the foreign policy of his own country and vouched for the bona fides of tyrants and murderers all over the world. Gave the Ayatollahs their big break.

2001: UNITED NATIONS, New York, NY, USA. KOFI ANNAN, United Nations Secretary General. Among other things, they have respectively served as the vehicle for, and presided over, one of the biggest scams in history.

1994: YASSER ARAFAT (joint winner), Chairman of the Executive Committee of the PLO, President of the Palestinian National Authority. A cold-blooded murderer both before and after receiving the award.

1992: RIGOBERTA MENCHU TUM, Guatemala. She is the notorious Guatemalan faker and author, sort of, of I, Rigoberta Menchu.

1988: THE UNITED NATIONS PEACE-KEEPING FORCES New York, NY, U.S.A. Notwithstanding rapes and sex abuse committed by the team in Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea and the Congo, still doing fine work all over the world.

Nobel Fun Factoid: This year's Nobel Peace Prize winner (Our Esteemed President, peace be upon him) recently refused to meet with the winner of the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize, the Dalai Lama, in an attempt to suck up to China.

As I said, it’s not an error, it’s a pattern. Or as the computer geek in me says – not a bug, a feature.

Wearing it like a Sommelier

A Rhetorical Question

2009-10-10T09:59:00.001-04:00

Doug Ross posts several comments from “Dennis:”

Let me get this straight. We're going to pass a health care plan that:

Was written by a committee whose head says he doesn't understand it

Passed by a Congress that hasn't read it but exempts themselves from it

Signed by a president that also hasn't read it and who smokes

With funding administered by a treasury chief who didn't pay his taxes

Overseen by a surgeon general who is obese and

Financed by a country that's nearly already broke

What could possibly go wrong?

I think that last was what would be called a rhetorical question.

Bright side of the health plan...

Holy Crap! What a Travesty

2009-10-10T09:18:00.001-04:00

Mary Katherine Ham posts a list of the people who were passed over this year in favor of the hollow man:

Sima Samar, women's rights activist in Afghanistan: "With dogged persistence and at great personal risk, she kept her schools and clinics open in Afghanistan even during the most repressive days of the Taliban regime, whose laws prohibited the education of girls past the age of eight. When the Taliban fell, Samar returned to Kabul and accepted the post of Minister for Women's Affairs."

Ingrid Betancourt: French-Colombian ex-hostage held for six years.

"Dr. Denis Mukwege: Doctor, founder and head of Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo. He has dedicated his life to helping Congolese women and girls who are victims of gang rape and brutal sexual violence."

Handicap International and Cluster Munition Coalition: "These organizations are recognized for their consistently serious efforts to clean up cluster bombs, also known as land mines. Innocent civilians are regularly killed worldwide because the unseen bombs explode when stepped upon."

"Hu Jia, a human rights activist and an outspoken critic of the Chinese government, who was sentenced last year to a three-and-a-half-year prison term for 'inciting subversion of state power.'"

"Wei Jingsheng, who spent 17 years in Chinese prisons for urging reforms of China's communist system. He now lives in the United States.

This is almost as bad as when Al Gore won out over Irene Sendler.

Two wrongs don’t make a right, they set a pattern.

H/T to Suitably Flip for the pointer to MKH

The Weekly Standard

Is This What It Was About?

2009-10-10T08:43:00.001-04:00

John Hinderocker of Powerline Blog commented on the Nobel Prize committee’s explanation for the ridiculous selection of Barack Obama as the 2009 Peace prize winner.

This comment may explain what they were thinking about:

I suspect that what the committee means is something it can't say: they are rewarding Obama for his apologies on behalf of America, his repeated mea culpas around the world.

Mr. Hinderocker later adds this statement:

Those who wrote this citation were of course trying to contrast Obama with his predecessor, George W. Bush. But Bush was anything but hostile toward the role of the United Nations.

I think it was Bob Schieffer who stated last night that this vote may have been as much about Barack Obama not being George W. Bush as about anything Obama might have done.

Further on, in response to the statement that Obama had “captured the world’s attention,” Mr. Hinderocker notes:

While there have been many bad winners of the Nobel Peace Prize in the past, Obama may be the first recipient of the award who is being rewarded entirely for celebrity. Maybe next year it can go to Lindsay Lohan.

Speaking of many bad choices for the Peace Prize, I would like to note that the prize became a hollow, leftist political statement rather than a prize about peace when Yasser Arafat was awarded it in 1994. I’m sure there were others before, and I know there have been others since who did not deserve a prize for peacemaking, Al Gore and the IPCC fraud about climate change/anthropogenic global warming come immediately to mind.

Mr. Hinderocker closes his critique with this analysis:

For 108 years, the Norwegian Nobel Committee has sought to stimulate precisely that international policy and those attitudes for which Obama is now the world's leading spokesman. The Committee endorses Obama's appeal that "Now is the time for all of us to take our share of responsibility for a global response to global challenges." (from the Nobel Prize Committee statement)

This is unintentionally self-revealing: the Norwegian Nobel Committee has been working at its left-wing task for 108 years, but just now, with President Obama's election, has the committee found a hero--someone whose liberal foreign policies line up "precisely" with the committee's own prejudices. How could the committee wait, when the very exemplar of its left-wing, trans-national foreign policy is at hand?

So that is why the Nobel Prize Committee embarrassed itself by awarding its Peace Prize to a President who, by his own admission, hasn't done anything yet. The award was, at best, a prediction. We can all follow events for the next three years and determine whether, in fact, the Obama administration's policies have made the world a more peaceful place. Should the Nobel Prize Committee get lucky, it will be a great thing for the world. But that scenario isn't very likely.

If it hadn’t been clear from many of the previous selections, it is now clear that the selection committee is a hot bed of far left politics and they see their process as a lever to move the world left. It is, as they admit, not to go "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."

Power Line - So, How Did They Explain It?

Gibberer In Chief

2009-09-27T17:54:00.001-04:00

William Jacobson at Legal Insurrection comments on Obama the anti-FDR.

Obama, by contrast, abhors victory. He has said so more than once. In his speech last week to the UN General Assembly, Obama paid homage to Roosevelt:

Sixty-five years ago, a weary Franklin Roosevelt spoke to the American people in his fourth and final inaugural address. After years of war, he sought to sum up the lessons that could be drawn from the terrible suffering and enormous sacrifice that had taken place. "We have learned," he said, "to be citizens of the world, members of the human community."

One excerpt from Obama’s speech that Jacobson quoted caught my eye:

Democracy cannot be imposed on any nation from the outside. Each society must search for its own path, and no path is perfect. Each country will pursue a path rooted in the culture of its people, and - in the past - America has too often been selective in its promotion of democracy. But that does not weaken our commitment, it only reinforces it. There are basic principles that are universal; there are certain truths which are self evident - and the United States of America will never waiver in our efforts to stand up for the right of people everywhere to determine their own destiny.

I wonder if that paragraph can be diagrammed so we can make sense of it?

As confusing as it is, it certainly reeks of moral relativism. This even as Obama attempts to paraphrase the Declaration of Independence.

Gibberish!

Obama UN Speech (TEXT, VIDEO)

So Sue Them

2009-09-27T12:19:00.001-04:00

ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis complained when Congress inserted words in a continuing resolution intended to ensure that ACORN didn’t receive any money while the federal government continued operations. From Boston.com:

“To include language in legislation that targets a single organization is unconstitutional and wrong," ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis said in a statement. Congressman Nadler said it best: “The punishment here did not follow some criminal or administrative process with basic due process protections. It flowed out of a Fox News network report, which led the call for a public lynching. There was no statement of charges and no reference to a judicial or administrative finding of wrongdoing by ACORN.' ”

Lewis added that ACORN is being singled out unfairly -- after a controversy started when employees it later fired appeared to advise conservative activists posing as a prostitute and her pimp on how to skirt the law -- when other groups and corporations are accused of doing much worse.

So maybe Ms. Lewis will sue for this ‘unconstitutional’ action. Naw, that would mean that there could be discovery of just what that organization has been doing with the money they’ve already received from the feds.

Oh, wait, they already pulled that brilliant move.

It’s Not Facts We’re After, It’s Power

2009-09-27T08:40:00.001-04:00

Stephen F. Hayes writes at The Weekly Standard blog about an outrageous effort by Colorado Public Television:

Colorado Public Television: US Government Behind 9/11

Why would Colorado Public Television broadcast two 9/11 Truth propaganda videos? Good question. Colorado Public Television has enjoyed a fundraising boost after airing "9/11: Blueprint for Truth" and "9/11: Press for Truth." And they had help from 9/11 Truthers -- volunteers from a 9/11 Truther group called 911 Visibility answered phones during a fund drive that took place while the shows aired. Not surprisingly, this success has the station considering re-airing the "documentaries."

It must not matter what they air, just whether it brings in more money for them to keep broadcasting. Power not facts rule the airwaves.

The Weekly Standard

That’s One Way To Solve The Problem

2009-09-26T11:25:00.001-04:00

William Jacobson at Legal Insurrection posts about disturbing details from the current Senate Finance Committee health care bill

The Senate Joint Committee on Taxation is considering the tax aspects of proposed Democratic health care bills. Republican Senator John Ensign has revealed that the bill (in whatever form it takes) will include a provision making it a crime, punishable as a misdemeanor, to fail to either purchase "acceptable" health care coverage or to pay the tax for not having coverage.

At one level, the threat of imprisonment as an enforcement tool for the health care mandate is perfectly understandable. The tax on those who do not purchase acceptable health insurance is not a revenue device, it is a means of coercion. So if the tax is not sufficiently coercive, then jail is the next option.

Actually, that makes perfect sense, just not for most of us – prison inmates get free, government-funded health care.

Problem solved.

Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion: Of Course You Will Go To Jail

Hard To Tell Where He Stands

2009-09-26T11:22:00.001-04:00

Doug Ross is making it hard to get a fix on his true feelings…NOT!

He posts a series of comments from economic and political figures and ends with his own about BHO:

Why would the President bumble around the world apologizing for the most humanitarian society the world has ever seen? Put simply, I think Barack Obama despises capitalism and wishes it dead. His agenda must be stopped in Congress, before it's too late.

Hard to figure out where Doug stands, isn’t it?

Analysts: Government borrowing will lead to 'Armageddon', 'Collapse of our Capitalistic System', '$5000 per ounce' gold

Inductive Logic Fallacy

2009-09-26T09:00:00.001-04:00

There, that should get a few readers excited.

Frank Curmudgeon, writing at Bad Money Advice blog, comments on a recent “report” touted by MSNBC and CNNHealth. That should make us all feel better.

The study claims that lack of insurance is tied to the deaths of 45,000 people a year. Mr. Curmudgeon looks into the numbers and finds some problems:

The critical question to ask here is, "Is the difference between 2,272 and 2,279 still living uninsured statistically significant?"

And the answer is "Are you freaking kidding me?" As anybody versed in statistical analysis can tell you, that difference is so far inside the bounds of what you would expect from random chance that it’s just not funny. (Well, okay, it’s a little funny.)

Moreover, even if you assume that the uninsured group do tend to die faster, there are plenty of other factors that might explain it that don’t have to do with being uninsured. They were, for example, more likely to be male and to be smokers. (Then again, they were on average younger.)

From this I got an instant flashback to my inductive logic class - “post hoc, ergo propter hoc!” This Latin phrase means roughly, “it followed, therefore it was caused by…” (See Wikipedia for an accurate translation).

The point being that just because there was a change in some pair of facts, doesn’t mean that the pair are linked inextricably.

Or, as Mr. Curmudgeon puts it:

Of course, the basic conceptual problem with a study like this is one of causality. Did more uninsured people die because they were uninsured or because they were the sort of people, e.g. poor and/or irresponsible, who would be uninsured? Barring the use of a controlled experiment in which people are randomly given insurance, no amount of statistical analysis can cure this.

This is such a widespread error in logic nowadays (consider antropogenic ~~global warming~~ climate change) that it stands a good chance of becoming the epitaph for our generation.

Best Blog Post Title of 2009

2009-09-20T07:11:00.001-04:00

I know it’s still early, but I think Hugh Hewitt has created the best blog post title, as well as the best critique of most of the current crop of crises:

Obamacare Is To Medicare What ACORN Is To Child Protective Services

This is like one of those 4-pointed ninja stars! Hewitt skewers all four of these government efforts in one sentence.

Townhall.com::Blog

This Doesn’t Sound Smart

2009-09-19T17:31:00.001-04:00

Michael Goldfarb points to an interview of Zbigniew Brzezinski by a Daily Beast reporter.

In the interview Brzezinski makes a statement that tells you just how far away from the real world this man is:

DB: How aggressive can Obama be in insisting to the Israelis that a military strike might be in America’s worst interest?

Brzezinski: We are not exactly impotent little babies. They have to fly over our airspace in Iraq. Are we just going to sit there and watch?

DB: What if they fly over anyway?

Brzezinski: Well, we have to be serious about denying them that right. That means a denial where you aren’t just saying it. If they fly over, you go up and confront them. They have the choice of turning back or not. No one wishes for this but it could be a Liberty in reverse.

“…our airspace in Iraq.”? Does this man think that we own that airspace? Yes, the US and coalition forces will defend themselves from airborne attacks. That’s a lot different than shooting down planes that cannot be said to pose a direct threat to the forces or to Iraqi air forces.

Some people don’t seem to understand the relationship between the US and Iraq. We gave them their country back.

Let’s hope the Obama administration doesn’t pay any attention to fool in the corner.

Racist Mark Steyn Criticizes Dear Leader

2009-09-19T09:52:00.001-04:00

Worst of all, by using his own words!

Steyn was writing in Investors Business Daily:

Was it only April? There was President Obama, speaking (as is his wont) in Prague, about Iran's nuclear program and ballistic missile capability, and saluting America's plucky allies:

"The Czech Republic and Poland have been courageous in agreeing to host a defense against these missiles," he declared. "As long as the threat from Iran persists, we will go forward with a missile defense system that is cost-effective and proven."

On Thursday, the administration scrapped its missile defense plans for Eastern Europe. The "courageous" Czechs and Poles will have to take their chances.

Is that courageous because they were willing to host a missile shield that Russia didn’t like, or is it because they sided with a feckless Democrat President? Past history of U.S. leaders seem to point to the second reason.

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- After Sizing Up New Washington, Bullies Start To Have Their Way

That Should Turn The Tide

2009-09-19T08:46:00.001-04:00

of words.

Karen Travers reports at The Political Punch/ABC:

Vice President Biden will step up his role in the Obama Administration's push for health care reform next week, with two speeches and a more concerted outreach to his former colleagues in the Senate, a senior administration official said Friday.

I’m starting to feel better already. I remember how much good he did with that stimulus package and the economy.

Vice President Biden to Step Up Role in White House Health Care Reform Push - Political Punch

Addicts Don’t Make Good Decisions

2009-09-16T08:27:00.001-04:00

Robert Stacy McCain, posting at The Other McCain blog, riffs off of a posting about Glenn Beck by Bride of Rove.

He goes through her “Letter to Glenn Beck” and examines her worries – worth the read.

He then adds,

My hope is that Beck finishes off the week looking a Federalism. Until the Congress and the people get off the co-dependent relationship born 100 years ago, and restore the States to significant political meaning, all these calls for ending corruption are just so much noise. The moral hazard of the Imperial Fed is the real issue.

This problem – getting the states off the federal teat – will be has painful and difficult as getting seniors off of Social Security and Medicare. They all know the stuff is bad for them, and want to get off the dependence, BUT (and it is a BIG BUT), how can they?

Federal money for any of these programs from Social Security and Medicare for individuals, to federal grants for education, roads, etc. for states, is like crack or nicotine. Not good, but man is it hard to get off stuff like that. It doesn’t mater how much you see wrong with it – federal intervention in school curriculum, federal coercion on highway speeds, it’s that you can’t see how you’d live without it.

And the pusher knows that. You won’t survive the withdrawal process.

And they’re offering some new candy – government sponsored health care. You think having a government pension (SS) makes you feel all warm… wait ‘til you get the hit from no insurance premium and guaranteed health care.

Uh huh. And wait until you watch the money pour out of your wallet for taxes and fees. Wait until you see someone you care about being ‘treated’ for some serious disease with the lowest bidder government-provided service, which has as its goal…cost containment.

The Other McCain: Bride of Rove is concerned about Glenn Beck

Scratch A Liberal

2009-09-16T08:14:00.001-04:00

…you’re likely to find a racist. And it doesn’t matter what color skin the racists have.

Founding Bloggers points to a BigGovernment.com article by Maura Flynn. She takes apart Frank James’ whinny apologia for ACORN’s behavior.

After complaining that the conservatives are fighting dirty (can you say ‘entrapment?’ or ‘setup?’), Mr. James shows how he views minorities as a whole:

It's also important to keep in mind that ACORN's workers are coming from the same low-income neighborhoods the organization serves, with all that entails -- poor schools, high crime and the sorts of social problems that have been documented for decades.

So the flaws conservatives are pointing out about ACORN are not so much problems associated with that organization per se but more about the problems of being poor and minority in urban America.

It’s a good thing Mr. James is black. If a white man had said, ‘what would you expect from people who come from these neighborhoods?’ he’d have been condemned (and rightly so) across all the press.

Unfortunately for Mr. James, Maura Flynn sees right through his racist discounting of the morality of most people of whatever color:

It’s true that the neglect of school children in the inner cities and elsewhere is morally wrong and possibly criminal. It is arguably the systemic root of much of what ails America. And it’s true that liberal government policies dating back three generations have served to warehouse the poor while creating perverse financial incentives to underachieve, i.e. welfare policies that encouraged the poorest to forgo savings, to ignore career and college ambitions and to have multiple children outside of marriage. Even so, it is sick and condescending to assume that the poor and disenfranchised lack any moral compass. The aforementioned behavior, financially speaking, is perfectly rational — thanks to our government. The implicit suggestion that these people “don’t know better” than to abet child prostitution is the height of racism and arrogance.

Such lack of expectations born of liberal guilt is tragic, but telling.

This isn’t The Wire, Mr. James. These aren’t street level drug dealers at the mercy of a politically confused Drug War. These are employees of a government funded organization who blithely conspire to rape little girls. And I do thank you for pointing out who trained these people. Yes, ACORN did. But why fail to mention that this organization has yet to apologize, or to thank James and Hannah for bringing this horror to their attention?

Owww! I bet that response stings like hell!

And then, the next article in my RSS hopper is: ACORN and Democrats – the real racists; from NTCnews.com

here’s the most interesting quote from that post:

Here's what ACORN has done to lift up the underprivileged. ACORN sued the state of California in an effort to prevent having to pay their employees minimum wage. They attempted to block their employees from forming a union (there's some irony). When their employees have been charged with criminal activities, ACORN usually immediately fires them and disavows any knowledge of the activity. This is usually followed with a public condemnation of the "rogue employees". How many white employees have you seen ACORN fire? How many Democrats have asked a single question about this fact?

Not a good day to be a liberal, not a good day to be an ACORN employee at any level.

ACORN Versus Conservatives' A Battle To The Death? - The Two-Way - Breaking News, Analysis Blog : NPR

Balancing Budgets On The Backs Of The Infirm

2009-09-16T06:31:00.001-04:00

Don Surber points to an article in the UK Daily Mail online. The article recounts the cold hearted facts about government run health care:

More than a quarter of families are not told when life support is withdrawn from terminally-ill loved ones, a report has found.

Experts warn that growing use of a controversial 'death pathway' is seeing some patients killed off prematurely.

They say the system can lead to 'backdoor euthanasia' by encouraging doctors to deny fluids and drugs to those deemed to be in their final throes.

This is one sure fire way of cutting the costs of Medicare and Medicaid directly. It’s also an effective method for balancing the budget on the cost of all those pesky Social Security pensions.

Report warns doctors snub families of the terminally ill amid growing use of 'death pathway' | Mail Online

A Tale Of Two Courtrooms

2009-09-14T05:03:00.001-04:00

Or would that be two political parties?

One the one hand we have Jude posting at Hugh Hewitt’s blog on the possibility that the Baltimore State’s Attorney may prosecute the two undercover reports who exposed ACORN for what it is:

Remarkably, the Baltimore State's Attorney's office is considering prosecuting the two young journalists who exposed corruption and possible criminal conspiracy at the Baltimore ACORN office. Probably not political. As Ed Morrisey says, "No word on whether they’ll be prosecuting any ACORN people for conspiring to cover up sex slavery." In all likelihood, now that the scandal has hit a D.C. office as well, they're waiting to see how far it reaches before spending their time. After all, at any given point it might hit the radar of national Topgun Attorney Eric Holder, and then he'll just sink their work with a nod, a la The Great Andrew Sullivan Pot Scandal of Cape Cod. (h/t Ace)

On the other, we have reports from the likes of Internet Scofflaw about how Andrew Sullivan, an immigrant applying for citizenship. He was arrested for possession of marijuana and would have been prosecuted, except:

Andrew Sullivan, after being caught possessing marijuana in a national park, got the charges dropped while similar cases were prosecuted. The judge is not happy:

In the Court’s view, in seeking leave to dismiss the charge against Mr. Sullivan, the United States Attorney is not being faithful to a cardinal principle of our legal system, i.e., that all persons stand equal before the law and are to be treated equally in a court of justice once judicial processes are invoked. It is quite apparent that Mr. Sullivan is being treated differently from others who have been charged with the same crime in similar circumstances.

Perhaps it’s as John Hinderocker, from Powerline Blog, states:

No one has been a more uncritical cheerleader for the Obama administration than liberal blogger Andrew Sullivan. Now, Sullivan has gotten his reward, courtesy of Obama's Department of Justice.

Sullivan was caught smoking marijuana in a National Park and was prosecuted, consistent with the usual policy of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Massachusetts. But Sullivan's pull with the Obama administration got him a sweetheart deal: the U.S. Attorney decided to drop the charges, even though there evidently is no doubt about Sullivan's guilt. The issue here isn't whether marijuana possession should be illegal, or should be prosecuted. It is illegal, and the U.S. Attorney in Massachusetts does routinely prosecute such cases. But not Sullivan: Barack Obama and Eric Holder paid him off for his slavish devotion.

To paraphrase Mark Twain, “After three days, fish, visitors, and Democrat cronyism all smell.”

The Problem With Stimulants

2009-09-13T08:34:00.001-04:00

As any junkie can tell you, you can’t stay high forever.

Mish Shedlock, posting at his Blobal Economic Analysis blog, notes the bump in consumer spending. He adds that it’s because of the Cash for Clunkers and the $8,000 new home buyer stimuli.

Then he adds:

The moral of the story is: if you give enough money away people will spend some of it it, at least for a while. However, those that just bought a car would not buy another one nor would those who just bought a house buy another. Artificial stimulus can shift some demand forward, but not an infinite amount.

There was a small amount of pent-up demand but that is quickly wearing off as a result of these programs. Nonetheless, GDP is going to be green in the third quarter. Perhaps the NBER even declares the end of the recession.

Get your party hats and horns ready to celebrate the end of the recession. Then be prepared to quickly take them off. A double dip recession is baked in the cake.

Those who have predicted a W shaped recession may soon have the cold comfort of being right.

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis: Temporary Rebound In Consumer Sales Coming Up

Condemned To Repeat It

2009-09-13T07:39:00.001-04:00

Didn’t the Great Depression of the 1900s really start once the protectionist policies of the U.S. government were instituted?

If so, here we go again (from Scott Johnson at Powerline blog):

Inside the mystification Lincicome unwraps is -- surprise! -- the United Steel Workers union. Lincicome writes that the section 421 decision forced President Obama to choose between the narrow interests of the USW and everyone else in America, the United States' image as the world's free trade leader, and the future of both the American and global economies. Obama opted for the USW.

Power Line - Friday night news dump

What Have They Been Waiting For?

2009-09-13T07:34:00.001-04:00

Instapundit pointed toward an Arnold Kling post at The Atlantic.

Kling dissected Obama’s speech on health care. One particularly telling part I saw was this:

He [Obama] said,

“Reducing the waste and inefficiency in Medicare and Medicaid will pay for most of this plan.”

And if we don't pass this plan, does he intend to keep the waste and inefficiency, out of spite?

Hence my title question – what the hell have they been waiting for? If Democrats have been in charge of Congress for at least the last 3 years, imagine how much money could have been saved or recouped if they’d done what they claim they can do.

This is all so much happy talk about how they’ll fund their vast expansion of government control.

What's Wrong with Obama's Health Care Speech - The Atlantic Business Channel

It’s About Time

2009-09-11T19:45:00.001-04:00

Some people in the federal government apparently do have a sense of shame or embarrassment.

From the Weekly Standard:

Census Cutting Ties With ACORN Due to Videotaped Prostitution-Enabling

The decision comes on the heels of Andrew Breitbart's release of two undercover video investigations, which found ACORN employees in Baltimore and Washington, D.C. more than happy to aid and abet underaged prostitution with advice on tax status, getting grants, and avoiding notice by law enforcement.

Of course, everyone will play like they never knew these people could act this way. I can hear it now - “These aren’t the community activist I knew.”

The Weekly Standard

I Know, I Know!

2009-09-07T18:39:00.001-04:00

The answer to Don Surber’s question about Van Jones:

The White House said Van Jones was not fired as Green Jobs Czar.

Why not?

It’s because they’d just like the scandal to go away as if it never happened. They have no sense of loyalty, just a desire not to damage the centerpiece of their group – Barack Obama.

An even better question would be, ‘why on earth would someone consider this radical for a job in any administration?’

And, now that we’re in question mode, how about, ‘who inside this administration is so totally politically tone deaf that they thought this wouldn’t cause any trouble?’ Maybe the same person who thought that the study materials offered for use after the President’s speech to school students sounded just fine.

A Troubling Report

2009-09-07T07:59:00.003-04:00

Richard Hernandez posts at The Belmont Club about a troubling report on the prospects for the U.S. economy:

The Telegraph reports that “economists Charles Rowley of George Mason University and Nathanael Smith of the Locke Institute, claim that the White House’s plans to pour hundreds of billions of dollars of cash into the economy will undermine it in the long run.”

From the Locke Institute’s synopsis of the paper:

Seeking "not to let a crisis go to waste," left-leaning politicians and old-style Keynesian economists want to remedy the alleged failure of capitalism with a rising tide of big government. Let the budget deficits rip, empower the unions, socialize healthcare, increase trade protection, go green, and socialize the financial and industrial base. The irony, as Charles Rowley and Nathanael Smith show in this timely monograph, is that the Keynesian policy prescriptions that are serving as the pretext for this program have already been tried. Expansionary fiscal and monetary policies by the Bush administration and the Greenspan Fed were implemented to deal with the recession of 2001, and are precisely what caused the current crisis.

This is all very sobering for the future of the U.S.

He Who Lives By The Sword…

2009-09-06T07:22:00.001-04:00

So-called radical, Glenn Beck, and many others have turned the tables on both Van Jones and the Obama administration. They’ve used the same kind of in-your-face approach to “mau mau the flak catchers” of this administration.

From the Fox News web site:

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama's adviser Van Jones has resigned amid controversy over past inflammatory statements, the White House said early Sunday.

Jones, an administration official specializing in environmentally friendly "green jobs" with the White House Council on Environmental Quality was linked to efforts suggesting a government role in the 2001 terror attacks and to derogatory comments about Republicans.

The resignation comes as Obama is working to regain his footing in the contentious health care debate.

Mr. Jones fails to offer up a believable defense of his past actions:

"On the eve of historic fights for health care and clean energy, opponents of reform have mounted a vicious smear campaign against me," Jones said in his resignation statement. "They are using lies and distortions to distract and divide."

Oh, yeah? Such as what? So far his defense appears to have been the standard,

"If I have offended anyone with statements I made in the past, I apologize."

That’s a real chuckler - ‘If I have offended…’

Or, his other classic explanation for a signature on a 9/11 Truther petition:

Jones flatly said in an earlier statement that he did not agree with the petition's stand on the 9/11 attacks and that "it certainly does not reflect my views, now or ever."

He never explained the reason for having signed the petition in the first place. I’m sure that if something else had come up, he’d have fallen back on ‘the dog ate my homework’ excuse.

Obama 'Green Jobs' Adviser Van Jones Resigns Amid Controversy - Political News - FOXNews.com

A 9/10 Mindset, Even In The National Security Advisor

2009-09-01T06:39:00.001-04:00

Jake Tapper posted an interview with Obama’s National Security Advisor, Gen. Jim Jones (Ret.).

Some of the general’s responses tell me the administration has a 9/10 mindset:

Jones didn’t buy Cheney’s argument that the effectiveness of the Bush-Cheney counterterrorism policies are proven in the fact that the U.S. didn’t experience any terrorist attacks on U.S. soil after September 11, 2001. “It’s very easy to leave office and say, ‘Well, no other disaster happened on the size and scope of 9/11, so we did our job well.’ Well, maybe they did, maybe they didn’t.”

Jones did not dismiss Cheney’s argument that Holder’s decision could have a chilling effect on the willingness of CIA officers to do what they are told to do.

“I think it is something we have to address,” Jones said. “I think anybody who works in a law enforcement agency -- whether it is the police or FBI or CIA -- have to know clearly what the rules are and have to know what the law says and have to act with the parameters of the law. I think we are back, we are getting to a more consistent point.”

CIA, and for that matter the other Intelligence Agencies both within and outside the Department of Defense, are NOT law enforcement agencies. Using them as such models the flawed behavior of the Clinton administration in their approach to terrorism (can we still use that word?).

Gen. Jones plays fast and loose with numbers to make his case that the US is doing better in making the country safe from terrorism than the Bush Administration. First, he makes the claim, but fails to substantiate it with any details. Second, he claims it is so because the U.S. has built better relationships than the Bush administration did with foreign partners, again with not data or facts to support the claim. Thirdly, he makes the absurd claim regarding whether the the Bush administration protected the country or not: “Maybe they did, maybe they didn’t.”

This is just a ridiculous claim. His contention is based on his belief that revelations about the use of enhanced interrogation techniques have tarnished the international image of the U.S. This somehow reduced stature in the world, he claims again with out any facts to bolster his argument, made the U.S. less safe. Because he was “surprised and disappointed” at the use of these techniques, no doubt leaders of other countries were likewise affected. That surely means they would let terrorists plan and prepare for new terrorist acts.

Analysts who look at intelligence call this fallacious logic ‘mirror imaging,’ thinking that the target of interest will operate with the same mindset and internal logic as the analyst. It is an often fatal flaw in analyzing intelligence.

Like A Right Hook From The Caped Crusader

2009-08-30T19:15:00.001-04:00

Jim Treacher has a great comic posted on his site:

With apologies to DC Comics

Jim Treacher's Blog That Is on the Internet: That was the original title, swear to God

Now I Understand

2009-08-30T19:08:00.002-04:00

William Jacobson at Legal Insurrection posts examples of the House Health Care proposal (HR 3200 starts the Augean task of examining sample text from the bill:

But whatever it means, on page 780 of the House Bill, the Democrats propose to increase payments using "100% FMAP" (Federal Medical Assistance Percentages) under this new section "(C)":

(3)(A) The portion of the amounts expended for medical assistance for services described in section 1902(a)(13)(C) furnished on or after January 1, 2010, that is attributable to the amount by which the minimum payment rate required under such section (or, by application, section 1932(f)) exceeds the payment rate applicable to such services under the State plan as of June 16, 2009.

(B) Subparagraphs (A) shall not be construed as preventing the payment of Federal financial participation based on the Federal medical assistance percentage for amounts in excess of those specified under such subparagraphs.

VERDICT: Close to incomprehensible.

I agree! So what is the thing that I now understand?

Any of these health care bills that become law will in fact be lawyer full employment laws. Every doctor, from the top plastic surgeons in the country to the lowliest country doctor, will need a lawyer to tell them 1) what they can and cannot do; 2) what they are liable for if anything; and 3) how to apply for payment.

I’m sure the payments will be as quick in coming as those cash for clunker rebates to dealers have been.

Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion: Throwing Darts At HR3200 - Day 1

Ron Who Raises An Interesting Issue

2009-08-29T11:46:00.001-04:00

Ron Rosenbaum, whom I’ve never read before Glenn Reynolds linked to him, raises an interesting issue. He does this while giving credit to Sarah Palin for her “death panels” meme.

He thinks liberals fell into a canny trap laid by the “rope-a-doping” Palin:

Liberals should have responded the way my friend Joe Conason (and a few other non-snotty liberals) did, by pointing out that we already have death panels of a sort: the ones manned by the insurance companies who ration and deny coverage for the sake of their profit margins. Would government rationing be better? It might be less greed-motivated, but maybe not.

Those last two sentences raise an interesting issue. I think they also are an effective litmus test for the conservative-liberal spectrum. Would government rationing be better than capitalistic profit-based rationing?

This can be reframed into the general questions of:

Is capitalism, and the profit-motivated decisions this philosophy produces, moral?
Is government, and the decisions made based on laws and Executive policies, moral?
Question 2 has a corollary – is all government moral, or only certain kinds?

How you answer those questions and what you use to support that answer will tell others a lot about how you view the role and intentions of both government and capitalism.

RonRosenbaum.com » How Sarah Palin Rope-a-Doped All-Too-Many Liberals

Jeee Zus Kee Riste

2009-08-29T06:32:00.001-04:00

Can we just get over this slobbering love affair (sorry Bernie Goldberg)?

Paul Mirengoff posts at Powerline Blog about a Washington Post article describing President Obama:

The Obama worship (in this instance that of reporters Carrie Johnson and Anne Kornblut) is manifested in the publication of a series of quotations from people who work for Obama telling us how smart he is. For example, Johnson and Kornblut inform us that "the people who brief Obama" say "he is able to game out scenarios before the experts in the room, even on foreign policy, national security and other issues in which he had relatively little expertise before running for president."

Smart and clean – wasn’t that what Clueless Joe Biden said?

I’m glad people don’t feel compelled to tell me or others about how smart I am. The overt implication is that it certainly isn’t showing in my behavior.

Hmmm, maybe these people are on to something. Could it be that they’re trying to ascribe deep and thoughtful motives to behavior that, on the outside, appear amateurish and poorly thought out?

I’ve already commented about the fact that Holder works for Obama. Obama owns any decision one of his politically appointed subordinates makes. If he wants to disown or distance himself, Obama needs to make a phone call to Holder and send him home. It won’t happen – because Holder’s doing what the boss wants.

The guy just ain’t as smart as these groupies want us to believe.

Power Line - Barack Obama, decider-in-chief after all

Unimpressive Performance

2009-08-28T05:30:00.001-04:00

Doug Ross posts about the history of Congress’ management of programs and agencies.

He goes through the list of

Post office – going bankrupt after 234 years

Social Security – soon to go bankrupt after just 74 years

Fannie Mae – worthless after just 71 years

The war on poverty – 45 years, $1 trillion and nothing to show for it

Medicare and Medicaid – 44 years and going broke

Freddie Mac – Nothing of value left after just 39 years

TARP, the “stimulus”, and a huge appropriations act for 2009 – no significant positive impact

“Cash for Clunkers” – broke the first week it was implemented.

Mr. Ross asks the obvious question:

So with a perfect 100% failure rate and a record that proves that "services" you shove down our throats are failing faster and faster, you want Americans to believe you can be trusted with a government-run health care system? 20% of our entire economy?

The only aspect of this that is interesting is how much faster these schemes fail than they used to. These fools in Congress seem to have only one idea of what to do – send money and do it faster and faster.

Your tax dollars at work in the hands of your elected representatives.

To The Congress

Attempting To Distance Himself

2009-08-27T05:43:00.001-04:00

President Obama, that great Constitutional scholar from Chicago, wants us to believe that somehow Eric Holder is an independent actor, making his own decisions.

Paul Mirengoff, from Powerline Blog, corrects that misstatement:

But the Justice Department is not an independent agency; it's part of the Executive branch and under the control of the elected head of that branch, President Obama. No authority, statutory or otherwise, prohibits the president from deciding, for example, that the harm to our national security generally, or to the CIA specifically, outweighs the need to reopen this investigation, and therefore that the investigation should not proceed, whatever Eric Holder has concluded.

The Attorney General has no authority except that derived from the powers granted to the Executive Branch through the Constitution. He has a boss – Barack Obama – to answer to.

Mirengoff adds this condition:

The president cannot, to be sure, block an investigation for an improper purpose. For example, he cannot do so to obtain financial gain or to help a friend or political ally. Similarly, it would be improper to block an investigation because it might reveal wrongdoing on the president's part.

The finer point of this, as demonstrated by Richard Nixon during Watergate, is that the Attorney General serves at the pleasure of the President with the advice and consent of the Senate. The President does indeed set the tone and priorities of the Department of Justice and all of its employees.

What a gutless wonder the President has turned into.

Power Line - Barack Obama, no decider-in-chief

Hammer and Nails

2009-08-27T05:04:00.001-04:00

You’ve heard the statement, “when all you have is a hammer, everything begins to look like nails.”

For Democrats, there is nothing if there is not political power. Every aspect of life is focused on the acquisition and exercise of political power in their minds.

Hence, we hear Representative Pelosi and Senator Reid both talking about passing the health takeover bill in the same breath as they (briefly) eulogize Senator Kennedy’s death.

Investors Business Daily thinks it could backfire on them:

Health Care: Worse than speaking ill of the dead is exploiting the dead for base political purposes. Would using Ted Kennedy's death to promote socialized medicine backfire for Democrats?

Let’s hope cooler and less partisan heads prevail.

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- Death And Dignity

The Reverse Midas Touch

2009-08-23T11:26:00.001-04:00

The next government sponsored enterprise to likely go in the toilet must be Sallie Mae, the government insurance company that underwrites student loans.

Why are they likely in so much danger? Just read this from the Commondreams.org news feed:

Sallie Mae's key hire was Jamie Gorelick, a former deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration, who signed on in February to lobby White House and Education Department officials on student-loan issues. Gorelick is a partner in the Washington law firm of Wilmer, Cutler, Pickering, Hale and Dorr, which billed Sallie Mae $270,000 for its work in the first half of 2009.

Legal Insurrection notes that Gorelick’s trail of “success” includes being the point person in the Clinton administration that erected and maintained “the wall” against intelligence sharing between the FBI and the rest of the Intelligence Community that helped the terrorists of 9/11 get into the country and do their damage. After that grand success, she went to Fannie Mae, where she helped Franklin Raines run that place into the ground while paying Democrat appointees millions of dollars. And don’t forget that she was one of the key members of the 9/11 commission investigating, among other things, her own behavior during her term at the Justice Department!

She’s got that reverse midas touch – everything she comes into contact with turns to crap!

Lobbying Showdown Over the Future of Student Loans | CommonDreams.org

Modern Day Carpetbaggers

2009-08-23T11:16:00.001-04:00

This via the Newsday.com site from AP:

Records show at least 153 New Yorkers actively registered in both New York City and at their upstate homes voted in the 20th Congressional District's special election in March, 76 percent of whom were enrolled Democrats, according to elections records obtained by The Associated Press. Nearly 250 more in the district are actively registered upstate and down, but didn't vote in that particular election.

Makes you wonder – if their ideas are so good and righteous, why do they have to revert to such subterfuges as these?

Can’t win in a fair contest of ideas? Cheat!

More NYC Dems voting at upstate residences

Some AARP Former Members Agree

2009-08-18T18:14:00.001-04:00

Instapundit links to Mark Tapscott, who posts about

IS AARP betraying its members’ interests?

Mr. Tapscott’s article states:

That truth is this: Millions join AARP and in return receive a host of useful services and resources. But their money and influence are hijacked to support causes that are absolutely inimical to their best interests.

Current news reports indicate that several thousand members have decided to drop their membership as a result of AARP’s support of Obamacare.

Newt Was Right – Drill Here, Drill Now

2009-08-18T05:19:00.001-04:00

Federal energy policy doesn’t seem to derive from common sense or sensible responses to needs. Investors Business Daily editorializes about the proposal of New York’s Governor to extract natural gas from shale deposits in his state.

The U.S. has huge amounts of natural gas in shale deposits. The latest area to be considered is the Marcellus deposit from western New York, through western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio and West Virginia.

A Penn State report that was requested by state legislators predicted that Marcellus could add $14 billion to the state's economy in 2010, create more than 98,000 jobs and generate $800 million in state and local tax revenues.

Couple this with the huge shale deposits in Wyoming, Nebraska and the Dakotas, and all of the off-shore deposits of oil, and the U.S. could be energy independent, and financially strong in no time.

Why is it that the Democrats won’t allow us to do that? Is it all about federal control of the country by controlling key elements of the economy?

It certainly isn’t about sound economic or national security policy.

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- The Saudi Arabia Of Shale

Newspeak Examined

2009-08-16T19:48:00.001-04:00

Ann Althouse posts about the difficulty in understanding what the Democrats and Obama mean by “conversation”

Man, "conversation" has become one of those Orwellian words. There it is in Obama's NYT interview, where he's saying something that invites the relabeling that Sarah Palin so effectively slapped on it — "death panels."

Yeah, kind of like that “bipartisanship” word used after the election.

Because They Think They Own It Outright

2009-08-16T10:01:00.001-04:00

Rick Perlstein uses several of the techniques the Obama administration employs to try to marginalize the conservative and moderate unhappiness with Congress.

He claims to think the people speaking out at town halls to object to socialized medicine and the general expansion of government are all plants and crazies.

He uses the false comparison of the conservatives’ so-called extremism, conflating it with past right-wing conspiracies, to the sensibly liberal position he and Obama take. Since his opponents are such fringe crazies, he must be occupying the center of the debate floor.

He ignores their legitimate complaints in part because he wants them to be seen as illegitimate. Then he proceeds to compare health care socialization legislation with civil rights legislation – the implicit racism card. If you don’t want this, you probably weren’t for civil rights, because, coincidentally, we now have a black President.

Besides, liberals don’t have any crazies, and don’t do any astro-turfing:

Liberals are right to be vigilant about manufactured outrage, and particularly about how the mainstream media can too easily become that outrage's entry into the political debate. For the tactic represented by those fake Nixon letters was a long-term success. Conservatives have become adept at playing the media for suckers, getting inside the heads of editors and reporters, haunting them with the thought that maybe they are out-of-touch cosmopolitans and that their duty as tribunes of the people's voices means they should treat Obama's creation of "death panels" as just another justiciable political claim. If 1963 were 2009, the woman who assaulted Adlai Stevenson would be getting time on cable news to explain herself. That, not the paranoia itself, makes our present moment uniquely disturbing.

Their main objection is more likely because, as failed campaign staffer Bob Beckel has admitted, they’ve been doing that rent-a-mob shtick for 35 years.

I prefer Professor Bainbridge’s comparison to Perlstein’s:

Oh, yeah? How about:

The Weathermen: "With a charismatic[3] and articulate[4] leadership whose revolutionary positions were characterized by anti-imperialist, feminist, and Black liberationist rhetoric,[2] the group conducted a campaign of bombings through the mid-1970s, including aiding the jailbreak and escape of Timothy Leary. The "Days of Rage," their first public demonstration on October 8, 1969, was a riot in Chicago timed to coincide with the trial of the Chicago Seven. In 1970 the group issued a "Declaration of a State of War" against the United States government, under the name "Weather Underground Organization" (WUO)."

Act Up: "In December 1989, approximately 4,500 protestors arrived at St. Patrick's Cathedral during Mass in a demonstration directed toward the Roman Catholic Archdiocese's public stand against AIDS education and condom distribution, as well as its opposition to abortion.[12] One-hundred and eleven protesters were arrested. Camille Paglia wrote in a December 2008 Salon column that a consecrated Host was desecrated by a protester, an act considered by Catholics to be blasphemous and an outrage."

The SEIU: ""The violence in Michigan and the specific targeting of women labor leaders is reprehensible and should have no place in our labor movement or our country," said Rose Ann DeMoro, executive director of CNA/NNOC. "For Andy Stern to direct this attack and its cover up is abusive, immoral, and unacceptable behavior. He demonstrates why RNs across the country want no part of an organization like seiu."

Code Pink: Blocking Marine recruiting stations, tying up traffic, disrupting Congressional hearings, and, worst of all, protesting outside Walter Reed Army Hospital.

ALF and ELF: Eco-terrorism, with numerous attacks on property, including those of many of my colleagues at UCLA

Unions: "The National Institute for Labor Relations Research has compiled a list of incidents of union violence that average nearly 300 per year for the last 30 years."

The people who forged Bush's supposed National Guard records.

And that's just what I came up with off the top of my head...

One way to really find out whether these protests and complaints are real or astro-turf is to ignore them until the 2010 election. Then watch to see who’s reelected and who’s not.

Go ahead, I dare you, Congresspeople.

Rick Perlstein -- Birthers, Health Care Hecklers and the Rise of Right-Wing Rage - washingtonpost.com

An Inconvenient Fact About Health Insurance

2009-08-16T07:23:00.001-04:00

John Hinderocker, from Powerline Blog, posts about preexisting conditions and a market based solution proposed by John Cochrane in the Wall Street Journal.

Mr. Hinderocker’s introduction includes this paragraph:

For one thing, the fact that health insurance is conventionally linked to employment--the curse of our present system--creates huge distortions. If an employee changes jobs, the consequence may be a change in insurance companies. A condition that was covered under the old plan is preexisting from the standpoint of his new carrier. Unlike my plaintiff who regretted his decision not to buy insurance on his building, the employee who changes jobs is entirely blameless and didn't set out to assume a risk.

One inconvenient fact about employer-based health insurance that is not repeated widely at this time is that it became widespread as a result of wage controls during the depression. Unable to offer higher wages to attract employees, companies offered pre-tax benefits, most important of which was health insurance.

In other words, it was a distortion of the capitalist economic system by government intervention that created the employer-based health insurance we know today.

That would be a lesson for us if we were to find ourselves in a teachable moment.

Power Line - Preexisting Conditions

A Thought-Provoking Contrast

2009-08-15T19:59:00.001-04:00

From Don Surber:

President Bush took a lot of flak for monitoring Osama bin Laden’s communications.

The article is worth the read.

Maybe I Should Move To Tennessee

2009-08-15T19:56:00.001-04:00

The Instapundit posted about his lunchtime activities:

SCENES FROM A NEW AMERICA: So I dropped the girls off at a movie, and — since the Insta-wife was lunching with her mom — stopped at a Sonny’s Barbecue for lunch. A man — late 40s, big, with a wife and a daughter — came in with an empty holster on his belt. As he sat down at the booth next to mine, the manager came by and asked him if he’d left his gun in the car. Yes, said the man, who had a permit but thought he wasn’t allowed to carry in restaurants in Tennessee.. Well, they’ve changed the law, said the manager, and if you want to go get it that’s fine with us. It’s legal now, and I’m happy to have you carrying — if somebody tries to rob me, it’s two against one.

The man stepped outside and returned with a Springfield XD in the holster, chatted with the manager for a bit about guns, and then sat down and had lunch with his family.

I like that. I live in Maryland and find the local laws about guns to be very strange. I think we’d have a much better state (and country) if laws like those in Tennessee were enacted instead of the nanny state laws they presently have here.

A Conspiracy One Could Believe In

2009-08-15T09:30:00.002-04:00

Doug Ross posts about the high fatality rate of the so-called Smart Cars. He wonders if the progressive-environmental crowd cares more about the environment than about the safety of drivers and passengers in cars.

Then he brings up the possible connection to their socialized medicine scheme:

Presumably, this is part of their grand plan to save money on Democrat-controlled health care once they jam socialized medicine down our throats.

This kind of eco-nonsense along with rationed health care will help the politicians solve their Social Security problem – let the beneficiaries die off before you have to pay them back.

And by the way, when one of these snarky Democrat Senators or the Snarker-in-Chief asks if seniors are willing to give up their Medicare, it’s like the pusher asking the drug addicts if they’re ready to give up the heroin. The only point of that question is to mock people in their dependency.
Smart Cars: A good way to reduce end-of-life health care costs