Tired of politics? Read a life-affirming story at Ontological Angst

Slapping the Hogs at the Trough

The Obama Administration has put in place a very stringent policy barring lobbyists from the stimulus trough. This is strange, since local governments all over the US hire lobbyists to advocate for them at the federal level. Free speech advocates on the left, right, and center are up in arms, and rightly so. According to Politico:

Under the directive, which began going into effect this week, agency officials are required to begin meetings about stimulus funding for projects by asking whether any party to the conversation is a lobbyist.

“If so, the lobbyist may not attend or participate in the telephonic or in-person contact, but may submit a communication in writing,” reads Obama’s memo, which requires the agencies to post lobbyists’ written communications online.

Lobbyists are not the problem
Despite what the politicians tell us, lobbyists are not the problem--round-heeled politicians who fall for anyone bearing a million dollar box of chocolates are. AARP, gay and lesbian groups, NRA, schools, city, county, and state governments... they all use lobbyists to legally petition the federal government on behalf of the people. If the petitioning is above-board, no problem. A sneaky, illegal transaction takes two conspirators. If we had honest politicians we wouldn't need laws like this.

They have turned our system of laws into a game of find the loophole

First Amendment implications aside, the new lobbyist-muzzle rule is unprecedented and could have unintended consequences, said ethics and lobbying lawyer Larry Norton. A former Federal Election Commission general counsel, Norton predicted the rules will prompt some lobbyists to de-register, so they can personally lobby agencies for stimulus funds.

That can be done legally, Norton said, if the lobbyists shift their workloads so that they spend less than 20 percent of their time lobbying – the threshold at which lobbyists must register with Congress.

There is an easy solution to all of this: Slam shut the doors of the Federal Treasury and stop handing out money.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0309/20580.html
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/03/bailout_boundary_dispute.html

Lefty Press Agitprop

I was sitting on the couch in the living room during The President's latest teleprompter waltz, trying to ignore the little TV my wife was watching it on.

Suddenly I heard some press goomer preface his question to Mr. Obama by spouting some lefto-blather about millions of homeless children and tent cities of the indigent sprouting up all across this great land.

Well, I wasn't the only one who noticed. Mickey Kaus debunks this dim-wit's socialist propaganda statement on his Slate blog. Kaus walks us through the methodology lefty advocates use to inflate their numbers.

BTW, also hard to ignore was how the President didn't attempt to disabuse this man of his grossly dark view of America. Does President Obama really accept this premise? Read Kaus's fine response here.

http://slate.com/blogs/blogs/kausfiles/archive/2009/03/25/kf-s-bs-detector-explodes.aspx

Michael Totten: Dispatch from Iraq

Michael Totten is an excellent indy war correspondent with high journalistic standards. He loves the troops, but he's never sugar-coated anything. He returned to Baghdad recently after a two year absence. Here is his report.

An Agnostic Jew Reads the Bible

What happens when an agnostic Jew reads The Bible? No, this isn't a joke...

David Plotz read the entire Bible and wrote about it for Slate.

He gains a great appreciation for this greatest collection of literature, but nonetheless remains an agnostic. It's not so strange really, Christopher Hitchens, stubborn and articulate atheist, has a great appreciation for religious literature and architecture. Plotz explains his realization that The Bible is the source of so many things:

You can't get through a chapter of the Bible, even in the most obscure book, without encountering a phrase, a name, a character, or an idea that has come down to us 3,000 years later. The Bible is the first source of everything from the smallest plot twists (the dummy David's wife places in the bed to fool assassins) to the most fundamental ideas about morality (the Levitical prohibition of homosexuality that still shapes our politics, for example) to our grandest notions of law and justice. It was a joyful shock to me when I opened the Book of Amos and read the words that crowned Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech.

Unfortunately, Plotz "leave(s) the Bible as a hopeless and angry agnostic. I'm brokenhearted about God." He is disenchanted with God because he cannot understand him. A modern day Grand Inquisitor, he puts God on trial and finds him guilty of murder, but more importantly, vindictiveness, capriciousness and inscrutability.

So I must submit Him to rational and moral inquiry. And He fails that examination.

How ridiculous. What is his basis of rationality for judging an omnipotent creator and his role in events that happened thousands of years ago? What moral standard will he use? NY Chic, laid back LA? Would Plotz tell a carpenter how to build a house, a mechanic how to fix a car? May I suggest consulting a rabbi and listening to understand?

By arguing with The Creator, Plotz demonstrates that he believes on some level. I don't think it has occured to him that he is arguing with a yardstick over the length of an inch.

http://www.slate.com/id/2212616/pagenum/all/#p2

A Minority in a Strange & Hostile Land

Minorities

We need to show more sympathy for these people.
* They travel miles in the heat.
* They risk their lives crossing a border.
* They don't get paid enough wages.
* They do jobs that others won't do or are afraid to do.
* They live in crowded conditions among a people who speak a different language.
* They rarely see their families, and they face adversity all day, every day.

I'm not talking about illegal aliens ~ I'm talking about our troops! Doesn't it seem strange that our politicians are willing to lavish all kinds of social benefits on illegals, but propose to cut funding for our troops?

* Courtesy of Uncle Doc, from the failed state of Mexifornia

Mark Sanford: Newest Addition to Liberal Enemies List

Democrats leave no conservative unsmeared. Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina is the next target

Can you think of one conservative that enjoys the towering reputation of that liberal lion and lady killer (ahem) Ted Kennedy?

Robert Byrd, the multi-billion dollar political graffiti artist who has plastered his name all over the state of West Virginia at the expense of the rest of the country's taxpayers, enjoys mythic status in the public's esteem.

Chris Dodd, Barney Frank, Charles Rangel, and now Maxine Waters are up to their necks in million-dollar scandals involving Fannie, Freddie, banking, lending, and political contributions, but it's the Republicans who have been tagged with the culture of corruption. Nevermind the only congressman who is also an impeached judge is Alcee Hastings, Democrat.

Liberals are Revered, Conservatives are Smeared

The American Conservative has a nice profile of South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford. The American Spectator has a profile of the Democratic National Committee character assassination team that is launching rocks and mudballs at him. Seems he's viewed by the Obamapparachiks as a threat in 2012.

I have been a fan of Governor Sanford ever since he let those pigs loose in the state house to shame lawmakers into dropping all the pork. I also admire his reasoned opposition to federal bailout money to the states and his dogged determination in patiently explaining his position.
He explains that the bailout money expands existing state programs or creates new ones, then leaves states hanging when the money is gone in two years. This forces states into an economic and social dilemma : Cut the programs that people are now hooked on, or go in debt or raise taxes to continue funding the programs. A third option would be to beg the federal government for more money.

As Governor Rick Perry said, This is how addicts get addicted to drugs

That is the perverse result of the state bailouts: Force the states to abandon their fiscally responsible ways and become like the incontinent, overweight federal government. Dragging the virtuous down to your level is a sure way to regain squandered moral authority. Sanford asked the White House for a waiver to pay down South Carolina's debt, but was rejected and became the target of Democratic party attack adds

Mark Sanford for President in 2012

Governor Sanford is plain-spoken and not flashy. Negatives with an electorate that is easily distracted by shiny objects and billowy rhetoric. He's a tight-fisted, libertarian-leaning thinker which makes him unappealing to our entitlement society. Governor Sanford is a well-read man who enjoys openly discussing his thoughts and intellectually examining issues, which leaves him open to hysterical personal attacks from the left. The authors of the attacks don't really believe he's a dumb racist--if he were they would have no need to target him. He's a real threat to the liberal agenda and he must be neutralized.

Mark Sanford is an educated, thoughtful free-marketeer who seems to have a set of core principles that he remains faithful to. Despite being a wealthy self-made man, there just isn't a lot of embarrassment, dirt, or dreaded flip-flops in his past. Because of this, I predict the attacks will get really wild and unseemly. They will have to dig deep and dig hard.

We'll be seeing a lot more of South Carolina in the news, as Democratic party fellow travelers in the press shine searchlights into every nook and cranny of the state, highlighting poverty and looking for anything that embarrasses or discredits the governor. If no such information can be found, they will simply smear him.


http://spectator.org/blog/2009/03/13/smearing-sanford
http://www.amconmag.com/article/2009/mar/09/00006/

Worlds Sexiest Female Politicians

Those Cheeky Brits! The Daily Mail has published an article entitled "The Worlds Most Stunning Politicians." I've viewed the pictures and I must concur.

Two surprises: Neither Cristina Kirchner, President of Argentina, nor Segolene Royal of France made the list. Did Hillary make it? I won't spoil the surprise.

I love the ending. It's a bit cruel, but in an oh so British way!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1164890/Oh-Yes-Minister-Meet-women-voted-worlds-stunning-politicians-WOULD-Sir-Humphrey-say--.html

Intellectual Honesty

I've had more than a few visitors snort derisively at my claim of intellectual honesty because I believe in God yet also cherish logic. These arrogant atheists think they're smarter than Kant, Pascal and Descartes; men who taught us much about logic yet still believed in an Almighty Creator.

My understanding of intellectual honesty is that you don't purposely distort or hide information in the course of communicating with others. Politicians do this all the time.

Their recent manufactured outrage over the AIG bonuses that their stimulus bill authorized is the latest example. Instead of explaining why the bonuses are needed to retain people to defuse this bomb, they fan the flames of voter anger. They know the real story but withhold information for their own political advantage. That is intellectually dishonest, as well as cowardly.

Here is the WikiHow definition of intellectual honesty that my God-scoffing critics cling to:

Keeping one's convictions in proportion to one's valid evidence

By this definition, an intellectually honest person cannot believe in God because there is no concrete proof. But going down the road of Human Logic Uber Alles eventually leads to absurdity. How do you know your wife is not cheating on you when you can't see her? How do you know your truck is still in the garage when you're laying in bed at night? How do you know the Battle of Hastings really happened? How do you know 2 + 2 doesn't conspire to make 5 when no one is looking? See where this leads?

I like the University of California at Irvine's definition much better:

Honesty in the acquisition, analysis, and transmission of ideas.

Jewish World elaborates:

One of the hallmarks of our great Torah scholars throughout the generations has been the uncompromising loyalty to the concept of intellectual honesty in their writings and commentaries. One would almost take this for granted, for the subject that is being dealt with is Torat Emet -- the Torah of Sinai itself, that to Jews represents ultimate and eternal truth and honesty.

Nevertheless, the temptation to falsify, exaggerate, deny, plagiarize and even commit forgery is a well-known affliction in general academic circles. As such, the unswerving path of intellectual honesty that one finds in the writings of the great Torah scholars is exemplary and inspiring.

This is the intellectual honesty I'm after. No matter how much I believe in some cause or idea, I will sincerely evaluate information that contradicts it, and I will never make stuff up or use dubious information to bolster my case. Cold, hard logic is beautiful to me, it is the clockwork of life, but it is not an end unto itself. Just because the human mind is incapable of apprehending something doesn't mean it's not there.

http://www.ics.uci.edu/~arvo/honesty.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rigour
http://www.aish.com/jewishissues/jewishsociety/Intellectual_Honesty.asp

Sheriff Joe Stares Down the Banditos

Sheriff Joe Arpaio is in another showdown with the banditos. Only this time, La Racista and the MALDEF gang are bringing the federales.

That's right, the Obama administration is investigating Sheriff Joe at the behest of leftist Hispanic bullhorn brigades. AZ Central reports:

Officials from the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division notified Sheriff Joe Arpaio on Tuesday that they had begun the investigation, which will focus on whether deputies are engaging in "patterns or practices of discriminatory police practices and unconstitutional searches and seizures.

Sheriff Joe is not intimidated:

"I am not going to be intimidated by the politics and by the Justice Department," Arpaio said. "I want the people of Arizona to know this: I will continue to enforce all the immigration laws."

In the 1990s, the department conducted similar civil-rights investigations and found patterns of police discrimination in about 20 cases, including in Los Angeles and Pittsburgh. In those cases, law-enforcement agencies agreed to significant changes aimed at preventing discrimination or face a court injunction, Harris said.

Los Angeles is now overrun with Illegal aliens, including violent Central American gangs. That's the real goal: Turn Arizona into California. You can't say Obama's Justice Department isn't ambitious.

E.J Montini, in another AZ Central article, hits the nail on the head:

Arpaio a Victim of a Witch Hunt

Opponents don't like sheriff's deputies using traffic violations as probable cause to stop a vehicle and then questioning those inside about immigration.

Still, not liking such a practice and suggesting that it's illegal are two widely different things. Cops use traffic violations to nab all types of bad guys. (Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh was captured after being stopped for not having a license plate on his getaway car.)

Here's the kicker, courtesy of CNS. They quote a press release from Maricopa County detailing the prisoner interview deputies have conducted:

16,000 inmates were determined to be illegal aliens. Either they have already been deported or will be deported after being tried and/or serving their sentences for crimes committed in the valley. The work being done be Arpaio’s detention staff is a likely contributor to the recent reduction in crime in the valley,” the press release added.

The press release goes on to say that 20 percent of inmates in the Maricopa County Jail are illegal aliens and that of those, 2,000 illegal aliens - 70 percent - were arrested for felony crimes.

Law enforcement rounding up criminals and daring to check immigration status, the very idea! Not in Obama's Democratic-controlled America!

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/2009/03/11/20090311investigation0311.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29630232/
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/2009/03/12/20090312Montini0313.html
http://cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=44899

Welcome to the Third World

BOLIVARIAN POPULIST DEMAGOGUERY AND THE ONE PARTY SYSTEM

The nation’s top economic officials argue for broad (unconstitutional?) powers to take over financial giants. President Chaves....er, I mean Obama agreed saying that "he hoped it didn't take too long to convince the politburo... uh ...congress.

Treasury Secretary Tim "Taxes" Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben "burn the banks" Bernanke said "The messy federal intervention into American International Group, an insurance giant, demonstrated a need to regulate complex nonbank financial institutions". Which is kind of funny, because I thought the “messy federal intervention” demonstrated a need to regulate government, not private corporations?

The rationale being used to justify the "power to take over nonbank financial institutions", that of risk to the national economy, can just as easily be used to justify takeover nonfinancial institutions such as GM, Microsoft, or ExxonMobil. I am no more inclined to invest in an American company subject to nationalization than a Venezuelan one, which is something our Bolivarian economic leaders ought to consider.

One of the core principals of the Constitution, that of the "separation of, and limitation of powers", seems to be at a greater risk today than in the past 222 years. The basic principal behind the checks and balances of the constitution remain the same today as they were when it was written; government is not to be trusted. Our founding fathers greatest fear was of tyranny and set up our rules of government specifically to prevent it. If you are 100% behind the current administration consider this: That the precedents that weaken the limitations of the power of the federal government will remain long after the current administration is gone. This will hold true through subsequent administrations of both liberal and conservative inclinations.

Meanwhile, the administration continues to play the blame shell game trying to shift things around too fast for the public to follow: "First of all, I suspect that some of those Republican critics have a short memory, because, as I recall, I'm inheriting a $1.3 trillion deficit, annual deficit, from them. That would be point number one." Overlooking the fact that the budget is ultimately the responsibility of congress , point granted, the current administration has inherited debt from the previous administration, as most American administrations have done. In one breath Obama blames the Bush administration for the deficit, while in another when questioned on his budget acknowledges that the budget is a legislative document "Now, we never expected, when we printed out our budget, that they would simply Xerox it and vote on it. We assume that it has to go through the legislative process. I have not yet seen the final product coming out of the Senate or the House."

In another smoke and mirrors gambit, when questioned concerning the projected deficit resulting from his proposed budget, Obama deflects the question turning it instead into an argument over whether or not projected growth will be 2.2% or 2.6% while ignoring the fact that no matter which figure is used his future deficit will be no less than 7 Trillion dollars. Meanwhile, we've identified 40 Billion in savings in Defense Department procurement, CONGRATULATIONS!, only 6 Trillion 960 Billion more to go!

To add insult to injury, while the executive branch looks to seize additional power by exploiting public anger over 162 Million in previously contracted executive bonuses (honestly, the equivalent of finding you were short changed a few cents at the store when you are talking Trillions... are you really gonna drive back?), our esteemed Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said Geithner should get credit for trying to fix the financial system: “That’s the real issue. And at least he’s grappling with that”. I got news for you... Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was only trying to fix his country's financial system too.

And while you’re at it B....uh, Mitch, try this:

op·po·si·tion: (ŏp'ə-zĭsh'ən) A political party or an organized group opposed to the group, party, or government in power.

Might I remind you of your own party’s platform? "Constrain the federal government to its legitimate constitutional functions. Let it empower people, while limiting its reach into their lives. Spend only what is necessary, and tax only to raise revenue for essential government functions."

You are not losing the conservative base you morons, you are utterly repulsing it.


~Finntann~

Congressman Walt Minnick: A Good Democrat

Blue Dogs are all that stand between us and financial ruin

I caught Congressman Walt Minnick, Democrat of Idaho, on Lou Dobbs yesterday. He spoke with conviction about how we must reduce the federal deficit and stop borrowing money from China. From his lips to God's ears. Senator Ben Nelson, Democrat of Florida, is of the same mind. He announced that President Obama's budget would have to be reworked. If we had more Democrats like this, a conservative like me could actually have a choice at the ballot box.

Double the lifestyle, double the debt

Imagine your family takes in, say, $50,000 after taxes but you irresponsibly live a $100,000 lifestyle. To fund it, you borrow $50,000 every year. Take that figure times four and add seven zeros and you've got our federal government.

A traditional way to measure the deficit is to express it as a percentage of GDP. You've got to compare it to something, otherwise, it's merely an incredibly big number just floating out there. The deficits and attendant debt may grow, the big spenders argue, but GDP is growing just as fast, or faster, so our relative debt is not increasing. Republicans used this argument during the Reagan years (this is why I make a terrible party loyalist).

President Obama can't use the percentage argument. His budget would spike the deficit-GDP percentage up to WW II levels, according to the CBO. He would also increase the national debt to GDP percentage to levels higher than during the Bush administration.

This is fiscal madness. President Obama didn't start it, but he had a golden opportunity to end it. Instead, he used that opportunity to satisfy every liberal fantasy of the past 50 years. Republicans, now on the wagon after taking the pledge, are still shaky and seeing snakes. Blue Dog Democrats are all that stand between us and financial ruin.

May God bless those Democrats.

http://minnick.house.gov/index.html
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/03/23/sen-bill-nelson-on-obama-budget-need-to-rework-this-whole-thing/
http://zfacts.com/p/318.html

Caracas on the Potomac

President Obama and the Democrats in Congress rammed through an irresponsible $1 trillion bailout and now feign outrage, outrage! that AIG is paying out bonuses as provided by the law they crafted. They now attempt to cover this wrong with another wrong. Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do. Their steering wheel is permanently jerked to the left, so they are now going in circles.

Congress has just voted to claw back the AIG bonuses. I could care less about the AIG whizz kids, but I do care about the Constitution, which our politicians, like a herd of swine, routinely trample. Their taking aim at the AIG bonuses sure looks like a bill of attainder, which is prohibited by the constitution. From Tech Law Journal:

The Constitution of the United States, Article I, Section 9, paragraph 3 provides that: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law will be passed."

Definition: A legislative act that singles out an individual or group for punishment without a trial.

"The Bill of Attainder Clause was intended not as a narrow, technical (and therefore soon to be outmoded) prohibition, but rather as an implementation of the separation of powers, a general safeguard against legislative exercise of the judicial function or more simply - trial by legislature." U.S. v. Brown, 381 U.S. 437, 440 (1965).

"These clauses of the Constitution are not of the broad, general nature of the Due Process Clause, but refer to rather precise legal terms which had a meaning under English law at the time the Constitution was adopted. A bill of attainder was a legislative act that singled out one or more persons and imposed punishment on them, without benefit of trial. Such actions were regarded as odious by the framers of the Constitution because it was the traditional role of a court, judging an individual case, to impose punishment." William H. Rehnquist, The Supreme Court, page 166.Federalist Number 44, 1788.

"Bills of attainder, ex post facto laws, and laws impairing the obligations of contracts, are contrary to the first principles of the social compact, and to every principle of sound legislation. ... The sober people of America are weary of the fluctuating policy which has directed the public councils. They have seen with regret and indignation that sudden changes and legislative interferences, in cases affecting personal rights, become jobs in the hands of enterprising and influential speculators, and snares to the more-industrious and less-informed part of the community." James Madison,

Our constitution is so accreted with the decrees of judicial mullahs that this clause probably now means the opposite of the founders' intent. Findlaw has good commentary on this clause if you want to read more about it.

Congress has violated the spirit of this document by inciting wild-eyed, pitchfork and torch anger against a singled-out group of people who have broken no laws. The President has insisted he is not a socialist, but Hugo Chavez must be envious. He had to pack the government with his Bolshevik cronies to get such results; President Obama is doing it with freely elected politicians.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/article01/47.html#1
http://www.techlawjournal.com/glossary/legal/attainder.htm

Thomas Sowell, from his latest article:

The same politicians who have been talking about a need for "affordable housing" for years are now suddenly alarmed that home prices are falling. How can housing become more affordable unless prices fall?

Affordable housing produced by market forces provides no benefit to politicians and has no attraction for them.

Christian Abortions

Boston Catholic Hospital System Yields to Pro-Abortion FOCA Before it Happens

This is why I'm against religion-government entanglements. A religion cannot survive a government liaison with its integrity intact.

Remember that news story last year about the botched abortion where the baby survived and was callously left to die? It happened at Christ Hospital in Chicago, which is affiliated with the United Church of Christ. Killing babies in the name of Christ... The sick and the dying inside must be all that keeps God from striking that place down. Jesus turned over the tables in the temple for less than that.

WWJD? He sure as hell wouldn't put his name on a building where practitioners kill babies.

Why is an organization that professes to be Christian allowing this barbaric practice on its premises? Probably has something to do with federal funding. That's how it happens, folks. The government pushes its snout into a private-sector function, brings generous gifts, and Bingo! You're hooked, bent over, and Uncle Sam is letting you know who's boss. Can you imagine a hospital running nowadays without government funding? Don't call it socialism; this is more of a fascist technique.

Back to the headline. From LifeNews.com:

Boston,MA (LifeNews.com) -- Abortion advocates have yet to re-introduce the radical Freedom of Choice Act in this Congressional session, but the effects of the pro-abortion bill are already taking hold. That's because one Catholic hospital in Boston has agreed to go back on its pro-life policies in a merger that ultimately promotes abortion.

FOCA is a dangerous bill that, in its last form, would overturn hundreds of pro-life state laws and could be used to force medical centers to do abortions.

The nation's Catholic bishops have warned that one of the dangerous effects of FOCA is that it could result in shutting down Catholic hospitals that do not want to allow abortions on site.

A St. Louis-based company, Caritas has joined in a bid to provide government-subsidized health insurance in Massachusetts. Caritas Christi, is joining with Centene Corporation in a bid for the government contract that would include coverage for abortion.

Cardian Sean O'Malley, The Archdiocese of Boston's Bishop, has stated categorically that Catholic Hospitals will never engage in such abhorrent practices, and the agreement is not final. The diocese is investigating ways to improve health services without compromising church teachings. It's a complex world.

Catholic-sponsored abortion. That's change, and in the Obama Era, I can almost believe it.

http://www.lifenews.com/state3907.html
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=N2NmMGNkMTdkZWJkZWRkMjRkNjY5NjllNzZlYjkyNmY=&w=MA==
http://www.thebostonpilot.com/article.asp?ID=10132

I'm in Love with Maureen Dowd

Yes, I'm in love with the Queen of Acerbia. I couldn't stand her when she was skewering my man, George Bush, but now she's the only liberal in the media who dares criticize President Obama. Here's a snippet from her latest masterpiece:

Barack Obama even needs a teleprompter to get mad.
On St. Patrick’s Day, the president spoke a bit of Gaelic, dyed the White House fountains green and talked about his distant relatives in the tiny Irish town of Moneygall, aptly named since money and gall are the two topics now consuming him.

Unlike the John Stewart, David Letterman and the other cowardly comedians on the left, Maureen bravely wields a rapier wit that slashes both right and left. For that I applaud her.

While we're on the subject of criticism, Noemie Emery takes aim at those who sniffed arrogantly at the very idea of Sarah Palin getting anywhere near the White House while hailing Barack Obama as an enlightened version of the second coming:

How right they were to insist that she was unfit for high office. Let’s just imagine what she might have done:

As president, she might have caused the stock market to plunge over 2,000 points in the six weeks after she assumed office, left important posts in the Treasury unfilled for two months, been described by insiders as ‘overwhelmed’ by the office, and then gone on to diss the British Prime Minister on his first state visit, giving him, as one head of state to another, a set of DVDs plucked from the aisles of Wal Mart, a tasteful gift, even if they can’t be played on a TV in Britain. (Note, the Prime Minister, who is losing his eyesight, may even be blind in one eye).

Witty women are so sexy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/18/opinion/18dowd.html
http://www.dcexaminer.com/opinion/columns/NoemieEmery/Palinphobes-and-the-audacity-of-type-41410317.html

Pelosi Galore

Nancy Pelosi is an ignorant woman. She ended up in congress because she is unqualified for any other job. First she lectured the Pope and the US Bishops on church doctrine concerning abortion, and now she calls an assembled group of illegal aliens "Very, very patriotic."

In Pelosi's America, the unpatriotic ones are the American defenders of the law who track down illegal aliens so they can be deported. "Un-American" is how she described them. The Obama administration, in partnership with racist Hispanic agitator gangs, are investigating Sheriff Joe Arpaio for enforcing the law. See how things work in a Democratic-run America?

The dumbest person to ever wield the speaker's gavel also blurted this out:

"Who in this country would not want to change a policy of kicking in doors in the middle of the night and sending a parent away from their families?"

Kicking in doors? The last time I remember that happening was when President Clinton and Janet Reno ordered Elian Gonzalez to be dragged back to Fidel Castro's Communist gulag after his mom died getting him here.

She ignores that old saying, "The family that gets deported together stays together." My government is not responsible for family separation when Mama gets deported and Daddy and the kids decide to stay in the US.

The citizenry of a democracy get the government they deserve. Wake up America, before there's no America left to wake up to.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/03/18/pelosi-tells-illegal-immigrants-work-site-raids-american/
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/9450

The Wrath of Khan-gress

Admittedly the executives of AIG receiving bonuses is distasteful and idiotic, but so is government involvement in private industry. This is what happens when preeminently unqualified individuals from government step in and try to legislate how business runs or fails. Now don't get me wrong... I am not, nor have I ever been in favor of AIG execs getting bonus paid for by the American taxpayer, but I would like to point out to the 328 frothing mouthed representatives in congress the following line from the US Constitution:

No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto law shall be passed.

Seems to me that if you are the fools who did not negotiate the bonuses away as part of your illegitimate bailout (Might be me, but I can find no legitimate basis for your bailout in Section 8 delineating the powers of your esteamed (sic) branch), that the people who should be held accountable for this outrage might be found by a quick glance into a mirror, or talk to Chris Dodd, who's staff seems to have authored the changes unbeknownst to him... well "unbeknownst" in the sense that "We wrote it together at the time, at the request of the Treasury". Since you gave them the money, they handed out bonuses, then you decide to tax those bonuses at 90%, that might constitute a kindergarten level intellectual example of "ex post facto", but it does line up nicely with the extraconstitutional powers of the IRS though...doesn't it?

The actions and activities of AIG is the direct result of you simpering fools who don't read the legislation you vote for: "A one-paragraph provision tucked into the thick bill modified the cap to apply it only to future bonuses, not those that might have already been legally contracted." Meanwhile the House's "please cover my ass" bill to tax the bonuses at 90% passed 328 to 93, which should create some interesting and entertaining constitutional law cases, for now we are not only taxing people based on income, but employer.

I am not saying that anything the AIG executives did was right, including the bonuses, but last time I checked there were no laws against poor business decisions, planning, or running your company into the ground regardless of its size. My simple interpretation, a non-lawyer, is that congress is in essence passing a "bill of attainder", that is declaring the executives guilty (of what, other than stupidity, only god knows), and penalizing them accordingly. Now the government has its own rights to decide what it does with its money, and can and should legitimately negotiate what may be done with government "bailout" money... however before, not after the fact.

It would seem pretty straight forward that if I have a contract clause, not tied to performance, that says if I show up for 40 hours a week, attend all the board meetings, and only wear blue socks that I get a $100,000 bonus and I meet all the criteria in my contract for award... that it is irrelevant if the company has been run into the ground or not. If you did not want money going towards bonuses there should have been specific wording in either the legislation or agreement with the company that "government" money could not be used to pay bonuses. Even then, that does not mean that if there is 1,100,000 dollars in the company coffers, and 1 million of it is government money, that I would not get my $100,000 bonus. It might not be ethical for me to take it, but it certainly wouldn't be illegal. You retroactively singling me out and jacking up my tax rate because I am an executive of that company and received a bonus certainly seems extremely questionable if not tyrannic.

The proper response to a business being mismanaged into the ground is the bankruptcy or dissolution of that business, those are the consequences, when government steps in it simply mucks up the works. Chrysler, for example, should have failed on December 21, 1979, the first time the government bailed them out to the tune of 1.5 billion dollars. Move the decimal point one place to the right and you get the current Chrysler bailout cost. The government is perpetuating the problems in the auto industry by supporting unprofitable and mismanaged companies. As distasteful as it sounds, allowing one of the big 3 to fail on their own will improve the markets and profitability of the others, provided they learn from the death of their competitor and successfully adjust to compete against the foreign automakers. It is not the function of government to ensure the profitability or survivability of any business.

Liberals screamed bloody murder about their constitutional rights being trampled by Bush's warrantless wiretapping order (questionable, yet dismissed by the Supreme Court I might add), yet seem perfectly content to throw the entire frigging Constitution out the window simply to cover their sorry asses and buy a few votes (along with quite a few Republicans I might also add). Having spent 25 years supporting and defending the Constitution against Communists, Socialists, Fascists, Terrorists, and a wide variety of other 'ists' and 'istas', I find myself for the first time in my life truly disgusted by the actions of my elected government.

To close on a subject completely off topic:

Not to be heartless, and honestly my sympathies go out to the family and friends of Natasha Richardson, but can any of you socialized medicine supporters explain why an Irish actor flew his British wife who was injured in Canada to a hospital in the United States? Instead of availing himself of the fine socialized medical system in Canada, Ireland, or the United Kingdom? After all, aren't you all arguing socialized medicine good... free market medicine bad?

Think about it.

... and no, I am not an employee of nor do I do business with, AIG. I don't own stock, shares, or am in any way affiliated with that company.

~Finntann~

O No: After the Man Crush

Looks like some ObamaCons are suffering post Big O letdown...

Peter Robinson, in Forbes, observes how the ecstasy has turned to agony for three famous ObamaCons: David Gergen, Christopher Buckley, and David Brooks. They found themselves swept up in Obamania, enraptured by the idea of a moderate philosopher king to salve the nation's latigo wounds, left bleeding by the reckless Cowboy Bush.

Robinson chalks it up to "the cluelessness of the elites."

Contrast Buckley, Gergen and Brooks with, let us say, Rush Limbaugh, whose appearance at any chic cocktail party would cause the hostess to faint dead away, or with Thomas Sowell, who occupies probably the most unfashionable position in the country, that of a black conservative.

Limbaugh and Sowell both got Obama right from the very get-go. "Just what evidence do you have," Sowell replied when I asked, shortly before the election, whether he considered Obama a centrist, "that he's anything but a hard-left ideologue?"

The elite journalists, I repeat, got Obama wrong. The troglodytes got him right. As our national drama continues to unfold, bear that in mind.

Todd Zywicki at Volokh Conspiracy thinks the Declasse' Sarah Palin repulsed these well-manicured metrosexuals, driving them into the arms of Mr. Obama.

I don't know that I would agree with Peter that the main problem here is the cluelessnes of the elite, although that is at least part of it. ... the polite establishment position was to distance oneself from the yahoos in the Republican Party in favor of the urbane Obama (although I'm not quite sure how Joe Biden fits in here).

Whatever the motivation, the desire of many to believe that Obama was a moderate was really just a triumph of wishful thinking and a desire to believe that was true, rather than any actual facts.

Those foolish elites. First Bernie Madoff and now this. Financially and politically fleeced. Even a hayseed like me knows that if it walks like a liberal, and quacks like a liberal, and most importantly, votes like a liberal…

http://volokh.com/posts/1236368924.shtml
http://www.forbes.com/2009/03/05/buckley-gergen-brooks-opinions-columnists-obama-liberal.html

The Looting of America: An Inside Job

The most galling aspect of this Obama-Rama-Ding-Dong Progressive Porkapalooza celebration is that people calling themselves conservatives got this socialist boulder rolling.

This latest Kabuki theater over AIG bonuses only makes it worse. Then-Senator Obama, Senator Dodd and Congressman Barny Frank all voted for the bill that had Dodd's provision in it authorizing those bonuses, but nevermind. Manufactured outrage plays well with the ignorant boobs who vote for these charlatans.

President Obama had this to say when a reporter asked him if he was a socialist as his critics charge:

"I did think it might be useful to point out that it wasn’t under me that we started buying a bunch of shares of banks. It wasn’t on my watch. And it wasn’t on my watch that we passed a massive new entitlement -– the prescription drug plan -- without a source of funding."

Touche', Mr President, even if it did take you two hours of consulting with advisers to craft this riposte.

The Bush White House ("I had to destroy capitalism to save it," or something like that) started the multi-trillion-dollar run on the treasury. The Wall Street banksters needed to restock their portfolios, so they called their buddy Dirty Hank, a Wall Street investment bankster himself. They then carried out their brazen plan to loot the treasury in broad daylight.

Grab a Plunger!

I got so tired of hearing about the "bad debt" clogging the system. I kept thinking of toilets and plungers... These financial instruments were clogging the system because they were now worth 20 cents on the dollar. In free-market capitalism, the owner sucks it up or goes under. In our Wall Street welfare queen system, nobody was willing to settle for that when Uncle Sucker raised the possibility that he would buy it for the ridiculous price of a dollar on the dollar.

If you were holding these assets, wouldn't you sit on them if you believed the government would bail you out by paying an above-market price?

But what if the US government came out and said in effect "tough luck, we're not bailing anybody out," what would you do? You'd sell for 20 cents on the dollar. You'd make some meager but productive lemonade out of those lemons, which would spur some economic activity and plunger those those turds down that were clogging the system.

President Bush and a band of cowardly Republicans got the bailout bandwagon rolling, providing a golden opportunity to President Obama and the liberal Democrats to usher in a new age of redistributionist liberalism that would make FDR blush. They've grabed it with gusto. They will blame Republicans, Reagan, and Bush all the way to a permanent majority, harvesting votes from an entitlement class addicted to government handouts. At least they seem willing to entertain the masses with some liberal agitprop.

We missed a real chance to learn a once-in-a-lifetime lesson. Unfortunately, all we learned was that when you dirty your diaper Uncle Sam will change it for you, at the expense of those who have learned to care for themselves.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/business/economy/27policy.html?_r=2&hp
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-obama-budget-assess27-2009feb27,0,5874116.story
http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB120511125873823431.html
http://washingtontimes.com/weblogs/joe-curl/2009/Mar/08/obama-makes-oval-office-call-reporters/

Hollywood Zoo

Life Imitates Art

Some celebutard named Chris Brown put a beat down on his poptart girlfriend named Rihanna, and the kids in Boston (and presumably in other urban centers around the US) say it's all good.

Of those questioned, ages 12 to 19, 71 percent said that arguing was a normal part of a relationship; 44 percent said fighting was a routine occurrence.

Health counselors are specifically concerned with teenagers' views of the controversy. Of the teens questioned, more than half said both Brown, 19, and Rihanna, 21, were equally responsible for the assault. More than half said the media were treating Brown unfairly, and 46 percent said Rihanna was responsible for the incident.

If you or your children are looking to Hollywood as an example of how to live, you need seriously examine your values.

It takes lawyers, money, influence, public adoration, and press goodwill to lead an irresponsible Hollywood lifestyle. Your average citizen just doesn't have that, which explains the trail of failure left by stupid people who are not rich and famous. The jails are full of 50 Cent and Lindsay Lohan wannabes whose cardinal crime was attempting to emulate the rich and famous without the proper array of lifestyle-enabling accessories and accouterments.

Observing celebrity behavior should be like observing animals at the zoo: Often entertaining, sometimes interesting, but never to be copied.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/03/13/many_boston_teens_surveyed_say_rihanna_is_at_fault_for_assault/

Radical Honesty

Insincerity is the lubricant of social intercourse

We've all heard about the latest VP F-Bomb. Cheney did it a few year ago on the senate floor when he told Senator Leahy what he could do with himself. Last week Palooka Joe used the f-word to tell his friends to lighten up and drop all that formal "Mr. Vice President" crap. Say what you want about VP Biden, but you can't call him insincere. He's radically honest.

Wikihow explains radical honesty and how to practice it in your everyday life. Included are little anecdotes from real people who have tried it. It can be liberating, but it can also screw stuff up.

I think if we all did this, society as we know it would break down, so I'm agin' it. Little white lies are the Elmer's Glue that holds friendships and families together.

Think I'm exaggerating? Consider this question: "Honey, does this make my butt look fat?"

I would, however, love to see radical honesty practiced by our government. They could start by using the same accounting rules they foist upon private enterprise.

Here are the WikiHow steps to recovery for our mendacious politicians and bureaucrats:

1. Observe yourself lying. This is easy: C-SPAN, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC... There is a virtual liars library at our fingertips. Politicians have left an odoriferous trail of electronic BS a thousand miles long.

2. Think deeply about whether you're really doing anyone a favor by lying. This step won't work. The average politician obviously doesn't think too deeply. If they were to think, they would realize yes, they are doing themselves a favor by lying. It gets them reelected.

3. Confess. This won't work either. A politician never confesses until he's caught like a trapped rat with no way out.

4. Uncensor yourself. This only works for people who are not self-delusional and thus have not fallen for their own BS. Also, today's "gotcha" culture guarantees that no politician this side of VP Joe Biden will throw away the scripts and talking points.

5. Inject the honesty with humor. Ever heard of a funny politician, other than VP Biden? Won't work.

6. Take off the edge. Avoid breaking hearts, crushing dreams, or hurting feelings. Politicians are great at this. How else do you explain their ability to jack stuff up and then get reelected promising to fix it?

7. Brace yourself for return fire. ...if you're a conservative. The press will be firing every cannon. If you're a liberal, Huff and Puff Po and the Daily 'Caus will fire at you for not being liberal enough. If you're VP Biden, nobody will fire at you. Victor Davis Hansen calls it Biden's Law: "If one makes enough gaffes, they soon reach a point that none of them matter."

8. Know where to draw the line. This won't work either. Politicians don't know how to draw lines, unless it's to circumscribe our rights. They draw no lines when it comes to budgets, and they pile lie upon fantasies at a pace that would make Pinocchio blush.

So the only politician actively practicing this now is the Vice President. Take that for what it's worth...

http://www.wikihow.com/Practice-Radical-Honesty
http://warskill.blogspot.com/2008/09/thats-just-joe.html

A Debtor Nation

"The fortunes we have heard so much about in the days of speculation, have melted like the snows before an April sun."

John Steele Gordon provided this quote in his excellent WSJ article, "A Short History of the National Debt."

The man who spoke those words was a Wall Street trader in the 1830's. Booms and busts, bubbles and crashes are a part of a natural economic cycle for all nations. Even the US falls prey to the predations of human nature.

A trillion dollars (current annual budget deficit) is a lot of money. $10 trillion is the size of the national debt, and total liabilities including entitlements is said to be around $60 trillion. The Federal Government spent over $400 billion in interest on the debt last year.

John Steele Gordon puts this in perspective for us:

In January, the Congressional Budget Office projected that the deficit this year would be $1.2 trillion before the stimulus package. That's more than twice the deficit in fiscal 2008, more than the entire GDP of all but a handful of countries, and more, in nominal dollars, than the entire United States national debt in 1982.

But while the sum is huge, it is not in and of itself threatening to the solvency of the Republic. At 8.3% of GDP, this year's deficit is by far the largest since World War II. But the total debt is, as of now, still under 75% of GDP. It was almost 130% following World War II. (Japan's national debt right now is not far from 180% of that nation's GDP.)

He goes on to say that what is really worrisome is the trend. Washington is incapable of stanching the flow of red ink. Spending taxpayer money on chimeric schemes to cure all ills is just too much fun.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123491373049303821.html?mod=loomia&loomia_si=t0:a16:g2:r2:c0.33881:b0
http://www.federalbudget.com/

Obama's Embryonic Ideas: The New Anti-Intellectualism

Embryonic Stem Cells: The science is not settled and neither are the ethical questions

Both sides of the stem cell debate have brought up valid arguments, but the President is seemingly uninterested in them. In a dramatic rhetorical flourish, he has imperiously declared that he is throwing back the curtain on President Bush's scientific dark ages. Good politics, but bad for our humanity.

While our still-Christian society in the US grapples with concepts like euthanasia and abortion, the President blithely brushes these issues aside. His attorney general wants us to stop being cowardly and to start talking about race, but this administration runs and hides from deep moral questions concerning life, how we view it, and what that says about us a a society. Who's the coward now?

Let's put aside the ontological and meta-ethical questions, which we obviously won't settle here. The intellectual argument over what constitutes life, and if and when it may be taken, will always exist.

Let's also put aside the inflated hope of embryonic stem cell research. This article from the NY Times deflates the hype and conjecture about saving Christopher Reeve and curing President Reagan's Alzheimers. Sadly, it also faces the reality that hundreds of thousand of chronically sick in this country will not get the miracle cures that some non-scientist political types have so recklessly promised them.

“People need a fairy tale,” Ronald D. G. McKay, a stem cell researcher at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, explained to The Washington Post in 2004.

Recently, Nicholas Wade in the Science section of The New York Times summed this all up: “Members of Congress and advocates for fighting diseases have long spoken of human embryonic stem cell research as if it were a sure avenue to quick cures for intractable afflictions. Scientists have not publicly objected to such high-flown hopes, which have helped fuel new sources of grant money like the $3 billion initiative in California for stem cell research.”

“In private, however,” the article continued, “many researchers have projected much more modest goals for embryonic stem cells.”

Where do we draw the line, and what does that say about us as a society?

Science, like fire, a knife or a piano, is morally neutral. It is a wonderful tool in mankind's hands. How we use it says much about us as a society.

Charles Krauthammer, doctor, lawyer, and a conservative agnostic paraplegic who supports embryonic stem cell research, has written a good criticism of this administration's approach.

I am not religious. I do not believe that personhood is conferred upon conception. But I also do not believe that a human embryo is the moral equivalent of a hangnail and deserves no more respect than an appendix. Moreover, given the protean power of embryonic manipulation, the temptation it presents to science, and the well-recorded human propensity for evil even in the pursuit of good, lines must be drawn.

Obama's address was morally unserious in the extreme. It was populated, as his didactic discourses always are, with a forest of straw men. Such as his admonition that we must resist the "false choice between sound science and moral values." Yet, exactly 2 minutes and 12 seconds later he went on to declare that he would never open the door to the "use of cloning for human reproduction."

Does he not think that a cloned human would be of extraordinary scientific interest? And yet he banned it.

Is he so obtuse not to see that he had just made a choice of ethics over science? Yet, unlike President Bush, who painstakingly explained the balance of ethical and scientific goods he was trying to achieve, Obama did not even pretend to make the case why some practices are morally permissible and others not.

President Obama has provided no moral, philosophical or logical framework for his decision other than the pharaohnic "So let it be written, so let it be done!" Compared to President Bush's nuanced approach and detailed explanation to the nation, President Obama looks downright anti-intellectual. This is what Krauthammer critiques in his article. Please take a few moments to read it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/us/14beliefs.html?_r=1&ref=us&pagewanted=all
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/13/AR2009031303058.html
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/03/using_embryoswithout_limit.html

NYT: You Can't Make It Without The US Government

When you're looking for socialist claptrap, the New York Times never fails to satisfy. With economic theory straight out of Das Kapital, the old senile lady explains what's wrong with America.

They start with a basic assumption that no one has any money and that personal betterment is impossible without government aid.

The United States has been neglecting job training programs for decades, argues Andrew Stettner, deputy director of the National Employment Law Project in New York. In current dollars, the nation devoted the equivalent of $20 billion a year on job training in 1979, while spending only $6 billion last year.

The stimulus spending bill includes $4.5 billion in additional monies for job training. But under current programs, many of those eligible for training are given vouchers that cover only a semester or two at community colleges, while careers in growth industries like biotechnology and health care typically require two-year degree programs.

“We have to seriously look at fundamentally rebuilding the economy,” Mr. Stettner said. “You’ve got to use this moment to retrain for jobs.”

I got news for Mr. Stettner and the social engineers at the Times: This isn't the old Soviet Union, where government apparatchiks round up random serfs and herd them into collective state enterprises: "You, you're a pig farmer now! And Mother Russia needs 56 more butchers, so you guys jump in the truck as well!" Also, how is it government's responsibility to pay for your education?

We have community colleges scattered far and wide, and they do an excellent job providing skills and education relevant to today's economy. There is a wealth of free career enhancing information on the internet. MIT offers over 1800 college courses absolutely free. You won't get college credit, but you get valuable knowledge. And don't forget public libraries.


Many companies offer tuition assistance and there are also billions in grants available to those willing to get up off their half moons and do a little research. For those youngsters fresh out of high school, there is America's greatest job training program of all: The US Military. By enlisting you are at least working for the bennies Uncle Sam is giving you.

You can make it on your own, Americans, regardless of what some sniveling, statist propaganda rag may tell you.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/07/business/economy/07jobs.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&hp

All Legislative Powers Herein Granted

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The Constitution is a rather interesting and fairly easy read, and also fairly short:

http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html#Am17S1

Section 8… how appropriate, defines the powers of congress.

To lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises to pay the debts and provide for defense and general welfare of the United States.

I guess it’s that “general welfare” statement that is getting us into so much trouble, since the rest of the powers are clearly delineated. To borrow money, regulate commerce, naturalization, bankruptcies. To coin money, set weights and measures, punish counterfeiting, establish post offices and post roads, grant patents and copyrights, and punish piracy and high seas felonies. To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, to raise and support an army, navy, and to govern the same. To call forth the militia, and to establish, arm, and train said militia. Govern the capitol. To make laws necessary for executing all the powers above.

The president meanwhile is the commander in chief of the armed forces, may enter into treaties with the advice and consent of the senate, and appoint ambassadors, public ministers and consuls. He may appoint Judges of the Supreme Court, and all other public officers not defined in the constitution but established by legislation.

It would seem to reason that positions established by legislation must fall under the powers assigned to congress, as the powers not delegated…and so forth. Readily apparent is the constitutional justification for the departments of Treasury, State, Commerce, and Defense. Also apparent is the justification for the Post Master General, although this position has been eliminated as a cabinet level position.

The section restricting states powers is rather small; basically states are prohibited from engaging in independent diplomacy, warfare, or the taxation of imports and exports, or in other words from interfering in the powers reserved for the federal government. The section on states basically requires that states cooperate with one another and treat each other fairly.

One is left wondering, how from this clear, concise, and graceful start we have created the monstrosity that is today, the federal government. One must wonder where the justifications for the following departments lie: Interior, Agriculture, Labor, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Energy, Education, Environmental Protection, and Health and Human Services. Veterans Affairs can be somewhat traced back to Amendment 14 #4 regarding the validity of debts incurred for the payment of pensions and bounties for service. Homeland Security quite logically, would seem to fall under the jurisdiction of Defense.

One must remember that powers not delegated to congress or prohibited to the states, belong to the states. There is no delegation to congress, outside of the creation of post roads, anything in the realm of transportation… the same can be said of labor, education, health and human services, and so on, and so forth.

I urge my state and its elected representatives to firmly and resolutely avow its sovereignty in all powers not delegated to the federal government. To reject the bribery of federal monies used to entice states to comply with the federal government’s wishes as opposed to the wishes, desires, and will of its people. Support Michigan’s House Concurrent Resolution #4 and the states of Washington, New Hampshire, Arizona, Montana, Missouri, Oklahoma, Minnesota, Georgia, South Carolina, and Texas in affirming “sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States and to urge the federal government to halt its practice of imposing mandates upon the states for purposes not enumerated by the Constitution of the United States.”

I want to see Colorado added to that list, for as the federal government spirals completely and utterly out of control, it is only the sovereign states and people that can restrain it.

If you are from Colorado, or wish to see your state express its sovereignty, please comment and also express your wishes to your elected representatives.

~Finntann~

http://www.tenthamendmentcenter.com/
http://www.lp.org/

After the Man Crush: O Stands for Oh No

Pity the poor ObamaCon...

Were these moderates and self-described conservatives for Obama really so naive to believe he'd still love them come morning?

Stuart Taylor, a spurned centrist, laments President Obama's hard left turn.

Having praised President Obama's job performance in two recent columns, it is with regret that I now worry that he may be deepening what looks more and more like a depression and may engineer so much spending, debt, and government control of the economy as to leave most Americans permanently less prosperous and less free.

With little in the way of offsetting savings likely to materialize, the Obama agenda would probably generate trillion-dollar deficits with no end in sight, or send middle-class taxes soaring to record levels, or both.

All this from a man who told the nation last week that he doesn't "believe in bigger government" and who promised tax cuts for 95 percent of Americans.

The numbers don't add up -- and still won't if and when, as seems almost certain, Obama ratchets up his so-far-fairly-modest new taxes on the top 2 percent. "A tax policy that confiscated 100 percent of the taxable income of everyone in America earning over $500,000 in 2006 would only have given Congress an extra $1.3 trillion in revenue," according to a February 27 editorial in The Wall Street Journal. "That's less than half the 2006 federal budget of $2.7 trillion and looks tiny compared to the more than $4 trillion Congress will spend in fiscal 2010. Even taking every taxable 'dime' of everyone earning more than $75,000 in 2006 would have barely yielded enough to cover that $4 trillion."

Veteran politician watchers have forgotten the #1 rule: Ignore what they say and look at their record. There was nothing in Illinois State Senator or US Senator Obama's record that even hinted at either moderation or bipartisanship.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/or_20090307_2566.php

Embryonic Obamablather

Science is capable of creating one blabbering, leg tingling, caterpillar eyebrowed Olbermatthews--a two-headed Dr Heckle and Mister Snide for all eight MSNBC viewers to enjoy.

Imagine the benefits: Two squawking heads on one fat body. This would require removing Olbermann's head (don't worry, he won't miss it) and implanting it on Chris Matthews, next to his existing head, since his body is fatter and therefore more capable of surviving the procedure and hosting the newly implanted noggin.

Science can do this! So why not? Answer: Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. Planned Parenthood founder and unabashed racist Margaret Sanger is proof of that.

"We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population," she said, "if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members." Woman's Body, Woman's Right: A Social History of Birth Control in America, by Linda Gordon

If this racist eugenicist had had her way, a President Barack Obama would not have been possible. Regardless, the caring, benevolent, intellectually superior Democratic party continues to support the morbid organization she founded.

Robert George and Eric Cohen have written a short critique on the ethical issues surrounding President Obama's stem cell policy:

The question of whether to destroy human embryos for research purposes is not fundamentally a scientific question; it is a moral and civic question about the proper uses, ambitions and limits of science. It is a question about how we will treat members of the human family at the very dawn of life; about our willingness to seek alternative paths to medical progress that respect human dignity.

For those who believe in the highest ideals of deliberative democracy, and those who believe we mistreat the most vulnerable human lives at our own moral peril, Mr. Obama's claim of "taking politics out of science" should be lamented, not celebrated.

They also shine the light on another fact left out of the swooning press accounts of President Obama delivering us out of the Bushian Dark Ages and back into the enlightened age of Science:

Inexplicably -- apart from political motivations -- Mr. Obama revoked not only the Bush restrictions on embryo destructive research funding, but also the 2007 executive order that encourages the National Institutes of Health to explore non-embryo-destructive sources of stem cells.

There have been promising advances in the non-embryo-destructive area, but liberals are uninterested. Meanwhile, the only thing the vaunted embryo-destroying stem cells have done lately is cause brain and spinal tumors. But we can't let that get in the way of a feel-good news story about the destruction of human life.

Yes, science is capable of many things. No matter how entertaining the thought of an Al FrankenMoore's Monster may be, or a million man conservative army of Ted Nugent and Chuck Norris clones, led by a staff of General Ronald Reagan clones, some things are better left alone.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123664280083277765.html
http://newsok.com/more-hype-than-promise-in-stem-cell-policy-switch/article/3351820
http://health.usnews.com/blogs/heart-to-heart/2009/03/04/why-embryonic-stem-cells-are-obsolete.html
http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/02/stemcelltumor.html
http://blackgenocide.org/sanger.html
http://www.dianedew.com/sanger.htm

Wake up and smell the Tyranny

How Mass-Media and Globalization are destroying the Republic.

The founding fathers of our great republic had many choices available to them, one of which was the practice of direct democracy. This choice was set aside as being too prone to the politics of faction and the tyranny of the majority. Many today wonder why our nation is a representative federalist republic as opposed to that simplest of endeavors, direct democracy such as that practiced in the town halls of New England.

On the subject of direct democracy, James Madison writing under the pseudonym “Publius” had this to say in Federalist Paper #10.

A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is that such democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths.

The disdain of our founding fathers for direct democracy is well documented and their answer to the perceived problems was that of a republic. The republic was intended to be a check on mob rule by this reasoning, perhaps a very apt description of politics today:

The influence of factious leaders may kindle a flame within their particular States, but will be unable to spread a general conflagration through the other States. A religious sect may degenerate into a political faction in a part of the Confederacy; but the variety of sects dispersed over the entire face of it must secure the national councils against any danger from that source. A rage for paper money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division of property, or for any other improper or wicked project, will be less apt to pervade the whole body of the Union than a particular member of it; in the same proportion as such a malady is more likely to taint a particular county or district, than an entire State.

The political partisanship and problems we are experiencing today are a direct result of modern instantaneous mass communications, urbanization, globalization, national culture, virtually instantaneous travel, and the Internet. What in essence that which was a confederation of independent states maintaining widely diverse interests but united on common principle has become a homogeneous and amorphous cultural blob. No longer are the actions of our federal government controlled by the balance of competing interests distributed among the states and regions but today are solely constrained by partisanship between the opposing parties.

We have lost the balance provided by the framework of a republican form of government. Modern technology has eliminated the opposing factions essential to the proper functioning of our republic. At one time in our government there was a system of checks and balances imposed by diverse interests, the “farm vote” was set in opposition to the “industrial” vote. City versus Town, Town versus Country, the northeast was in opposition to the southeast, the east to the west, and the north to the south. Extremes of behavior were limited by the necessity of compromise in order to achieve objectives.

Today, American culture as become fairly uniform, the interests of city dwellers in New York are fairly consistent with the interests of those in Chicago or Los Angeles. The interests of those in Manhattan, NY (Population 1,616,934: Median income $64,217: Median House $ 808, 200) are going to be more closely aligned with Miami, Dallas, Denver, and Seattle than Manhattan, KS (Population 51,707: Median income $34, 768: Median House $169, 522). While one might argue that this has always been the case, the Electoral College being a compromise balance of power between urban centers and the rural agricultural areas, in the past the numbers were more balanced between small cities and vast agricultural areas comprised of family farms. Today the heartland lies virtually vacant, the domain of vast international agribusiness instead of patchwork of family farms it once was.

As a result of homogeneous culture, we function today based upon the commonly aligned interests of the popular majority, more as a direct democracy than a republic. The balance between diverse regional interests has devolved into a two-way ideological split; the balance sought in a republican framework has been lost. The end result of this cultural homogenization is the tyranny of the majority. A currently slim margin of 3-8% separates parties based more on political faction than regional interest and in which the majority enacts legislation vehemently opposed in principle by the opposition.

We have arrived at the state of “Faction” so greatly feared by our founding fathers. Outlined in Federalist Paper 10 by James Madison, warned against by our first president in his farewell address, we have finally and firmly split across ideological lines. Ideology now trumps national interest as we devolve into bitter partisanship, name calling, and manifest hatred of the opposition. The question then is: Where do we go from here?

~Publius~