VictiCrat

Direct Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhPqmJynQPU

The Dow hits 10,000 or does it?

Another great representation of the amazing loss of purchasing power by the US public are today's oblivious statements about the Dow at 10,000. While in absolute terms the Dow may cross whatever the Fed thinks is a necessary and sufficient mark before QE begins to taper off (Dow crosses 10k just as Treasury purchases expire), the truth is that over the past 10 years (the first time the DJIA was at 10,000) the dollar has lost 25% of its value. Therefore, we present the Dow over the last decade indexed for the DXY, which has dropped from 100 to about 75. On a real basis (not nominal) the Dow at 10,000 ten years ago is equivalent to 7,537 today! In other words, not only have we had a lost decade for all those who focus on the absolute flatness of the DJIA, but it is also a decade where the US Consumer has lost 25% of purchasing power from the perspective of stocks! You won't hear this fact on the MSM.

And if you want to be really scared, here is the comparable representation for the DJIA in ounces of gold. It cost about 30 ounces to buy the 10,000 Dow last time. Now it costs less than 10.

Explaining the 2nd Amendment

From Ex-Soldier commenting on Claude Cartaginese’s One Scared Elderly Man is About to Make the Country Safer:

“A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state; the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

Speaking as a veteran (20 years) social studies teacher in a public high school and as a former social studies Teacher of the Year (for my school), AND as a former US Army Officer, let me address this one:

“Well REGULATED MILITIA” A lot of folks seem to think this is referring to some sort of national guard as we understand that organization today. Yet that organization wasn’t even created until right before our involvement in WWI. In the days pertaining to the American Revolution, MILITIA meant ALL the people, bearing their own weapons. This fact is currently reflected in the state constitutions of several states. For example my home state of Florida has the organized militia and the UNORGANIZED militia ready for call up in the Constitution. This was actually used unofficially after Hurricane Andrew when it was a common sight to see citizens patrolling their own neighborhoods with slung AR15s or AK47s to deter looting and often chatting with local police — the cops took no action. WELL REGULATED doesn’t refer to a legal term of art, it is concerned with military logistics: Similar arms and ammunition.

“KEEP AND BEAR” equals OWN AND CARRY.

“ARMS” is a phrase that is quite interesting and it is no accident that it is used by the Founding Fathers. Do you think that the FIRST rifles were flintlock rifles or the sort used in the American Revolution? In face firearms technology had been evolving for over 300 years by that point. It would evolve again during the course of the war as the first rifled barrels started showing up, offering vastly increased range and accuracy. A new kind of soldier appeared with this new wrinkle: SNIPERS. That kind of marksman still makes his presence felt on today’s battlefields. This is why the UZI, the M4, the M60 and SAW and other types of military firearms fall under the 2nd Amendment. If you refer to the writings of the Founding Fathers, even in the Federalist Papers (#46) you will see clearly that if the infantry has it, the PEOPLE must have it too but in greater numbers! Does this include things like artillery or armed aircraft? Probably not under the 2nd Amendment. It seems clear that the weapons probably must be limited to those that can be handled by a single man rather than those requiring a team like a mortar. This why I am certain the 2nd covers my 1911A1 45 pistol today AND my hand PHASER tomorrow.

However, the artillery and other weapons of military might are covered under the Constitutional letters of Marque. Back in those days, this is what allowed the formation of the Privateers to prey upon British shipping. Just how do you think the private military companies (PMCs) like BLACKWATER get to operate helicopter gunships and much heavier weapons like vehicle mounted (electric) mini-guns? It’s all constitutional and I’m certain these so called PMCs all agree to not operate in regions or under employment conditions that are inimical to US interests. A Letter of Marque.

Where do you draw the line? I’m guessing nuclear weapons, nerve agent or biotoxins. But under one guise or another everything else is allowed. Using a letter of Marque, a company like BLACKWATER (or as they’re currently known in the military or merc community: THE KNIGHTS WHO SAY XE! If you remember Monty Python) could operate an aircraft carrier if they could afford one. Including all the aircraft and ordnance of said carrier.

“Ordinary citizens” shall not be debarred the use of any squad level military weapon under the 2nd Amendment. Some folks have mentioned the inherent instability of military explosives. I myself have cooked food using a small square of military C4 plastic explosive. Not unstable. AT ALL. What about so called “napalm?” Easily concocted using TIDE detergent and gasoline. The military uses the M110 fuel thickener, but it amounts to the same thing.

The real purpose of the 2nd Amendment is to keep our own government from gettin’ too big for their britches as seems to be the case, currently. No wonder the liberals are all exercised over the 2nd Amendment. They want to hang onto their power. Armed citizens are definitely a threat to tyranny.

"Going Rogue"

Forty-eight days before the release and Sarah-Cuda has already topped Dan Brown’s latest conspiracy-theory regurgitation at both Amazon and Bares & Noble. To put that in perspective, please note that the book doesn’t even have a cover yet.

She could not possibly have hoped for a better start of a presidential campaign. And let’s face it, chances are she’ll run for president. She should. There’s not one Republican out there who is more popular among the grassroots. The only question is whether she’ll attempt to succeed Obama in 2012 or 2016.

John McCain is one of the multitudes eagerly anticipating the release of "Going Rogue":

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

For those of you who don't recognize the title, it comes from the lat week of the campaign when she slipped the leash of her handlers and started speaking directly with newspeople she thought weren't in the O'bag.

Payoff for GE

Green Hell Blog:

Sen. Barbara Boxer’s climate bill set to be released today contains a provision that will compensate General Electric quite nicely for its lobbying and media efforts promoting climate legislation.

Section 821(c) requires that, by December 12, 2012, the EPA set standards for greenhouse gas emissions from “new aircraft and new engines used in new aircraft.”

General Electric is the world’s largest manufacturer of commercial and military jet engines, a business worth about $12 billion in annual revenues.

So the Boxer bill would compel airlines and the military, when purchasing new aircraft and new aircraft engines, to purchase more expensive “green” engines made by GE, according to standards set by the current and GE-lobbied Obama administration.

Ambassador Bolton on Obama's UN address

Video: Sarah Palin is Free

Direct Link to video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAfx9koIrTY

Do not log onto Cars.gov

Direct Link to video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWs12ccbOiE

"Nips" late of WDSU is now late of CNN

Next stop has to be MSNBC or NPR. The money quote:

TVNewser has learned CNN correspondent Susan Roesgen's contract will not be renewed and she will be leaving the network.

For what may have been her proudest moment see my April 17th post here:

http://soslies.blogspot.com/2009/04/wdsu-ex-reporterette-nips.html

Health Care bill shuts down the Private Option

From Investors Business Daily at:
http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=332548165656854

It didn't take long to run into an "uh-oh" moment when reading the House's "health care for all Americans" bill. Right there on Page 16 is a provision making individual private medical insurance illegal.

When we first saw the paragraph Tuesday, just after the 1,018-page document was released, we thought we surely must be misreading it. So we sought help from the House Ways and Means Committee.

It turns out we were right: The provision would indeed outlaw individual private coverage. Under the Orwellian header of "Protecting The Choice To Keep Current Coverage," the "Limitation On New Enrollment" section of the bill clearly states:

"Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day" of the year the legislation becomes law.

So we can all keep our coverage, just as promised — with, of course, exceptions: Those who currently have private individual coverage won't be able to change it. Nor will those who leave a company to work for themselves be free to buy individual plans from private carriers.

From the beginning, opponents of the public option plan have warned that if the government gets into the business of offering subsidized health insurance coverage, the private insurance market will wither. Drawn by a public option that will be 30% to 40% cheaper than their current premiums because taxpayers will be funding it, employers will gladly scrap their private plans and go with Washington's coverage.

The nonpartisan Lewin Group estimated in April that 120 million or more Americans could lose their group coverage at work and end up in such a program. That would leave private carriers with 50 million or fewer customers. This could cause the market to, as Lewin Vice President John Sheils put it, "fizzle out altogether."

What wasn't known until now is that the bill itself will kill the market for private individual coverage by not letting any new policies be written after the public option becomes law.

The legislation is also likely to finish off health savings accounts, a goal that Democrats have had for years. They want to crush that alternative because nothing gives individuals more control over their medical care, and the government less, than HSAs.

With HSAs out of the way, a key obstacle to the left's expansion of the welfare state will be removed.

The public option won't be an option for many, but rather a mandate for buying government care. A free people should be outraged at this advance of soft tyranny.

Washington does not have the constitutional or moral authority to outlaw private markets in which parties voluntarily participate. It shouldn't be killing business opportunities, or limiting choices, or legislating major changes in Americans' lives.

It took just 16 pages of reading to find this naked attempt by the political powers to increase their reach. It's scary to think how many more breaches of liberty we'll come across in the final 1,002.

Train and Plane crashes may be linked

The New York Times is smoking Hopium

First let me show you a screenshot of a portion of the front page of the NYT website today:

And from the Wizbang Blog:

Yesterday The New York Times disclosed that one of its reporter's, David Rhode, had escaped from his Taliban captors after having been held for seven months. If you're scratching your head wondering if you've heard this story before you are not alone. The Times went to extraordinary lengths to keep this information from the public for the purposes of protecting the life of their employee.

Times Executive Editor Bill Keller said this to Howard Kurtz:

"We agonized over [the decision to suppress the news] at the outset and, periodically, over the last seven months," Executive Editor Bill Keller said yesterday. "Of all the subjects we discussed with the family, that was the one we discussed more intensively than any other: Should we change strategy and go public?"

Keller decided against it, and he was aided by silence from at least 40 major news organizations -- including, after a personal appeal, al-Jazeera -- that continued until yesterday, when the Times confirmed that Rohde and an assistant had escaped their Taliban captors in Pakistan. Keller consulted not only government experts but also other news organizations that had been through similar experiences, and there was "a pretty firm consensus," he said, "that you really amp up the danger when you go public. . . . It makes us cringe to sit on a news story," but in a life-or-death situation, "the freedom to publish includes the freedom not to publish."

For the record, it is a good thing that Mr. Rhode is safe and alive. The Times did the right thing by placing the safety and well being of its employee first given the Taliban's history of torturing and murdering captives. However, the Times' conduct in this matter raises the obvious point as to why the newspaper affords such discretion for its own reporters while defending its loathsome record of disclosing United States national security secrets and placing U S citizens and their military at greater risk.

There exists not a clearer example of the double standard by which this newspaper operates. They will decide what is best for their own and what is best for the rest of us. In that respect, the next time national security secrets are exposed by the New York Times perhaps someone will pursue the charge of treason.

All things old are new again

HopeyChangey blast from the past. Doesn't this sound familiar?

Direct link to youtube video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IlRVy7oZ58&

And now for something completely different

Perpetuum Jazzile is a Slovenian choir. The video is of an a cappela performance (in English) of the tune "Africa" with simulating the thunderstorm and the background music. Amazing!!!!

Perpetuum Jazzile's website:
http://www.perpetuumjazzile.si/en

The direct YouTube link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05ip-N0H1Ig

Enjoy! I certainly did.

Gore-Bull warming changes to "Climate Change"

This article from the UK Telegraph.

For the second time in little over a year, it looks as though the world may be heading for a serious food crisis, thanks to our old friend "climate change". In many parts of the world recently the weather has not been too brilliant for farmers. After a fearsomely cold winter, June brought heavy snowfall across large parts of western Canada and the northern states of the American Midwest. In Manitoba last week, it was -4ºC. North Dakota had its first June snow for 60 years.

That's not the gospel of Gore-Bull warming that has been preached by Pope Albert I and all of his disciples. It's supposed to be getting hotter. What's going on here?

There was midsummer snow not just in Norway and the Cairngorms, but even in Saudi Arabia. At least in the southern hemisphere it is winter, but snowfalls in New Zealand and Australia have been abnormal. There have been frosts in Brazil, elsewhere in South America they have had prolonged droughts, while in China they have had to cope with abnormal rain and freak hailstorms, which in one province killed 20 people.

Gore-Bull warming at work. Remember, to these idiots, weather is indicative of Gore-Bull warming.

None of this has given much cheer to farmers. In Canada and northern America summer planting of corn and soybeans has been way behind schedule, with the prospect of reduced yields and lower quality. Grain stocks are predicted to be down 15 per cent next year. US reserves of soya – used in animal feed and in many processed foods – are expected to fall to a 32-year low.

All because of Gore-Bull warming, no doubt.

In China, the world's largest wheat grower, they have been battling against the atrocious weather to bring in the harvest. (In one province they even fired chemical shells into the clouds to turn freezing hailstones into rain.)

Sounds like the Gore Effect. Has Pope Albert been in China lately?

In Europe, the weather has been a factor in well-below average predicted crop yields in eastern Europe and Ukraine. In Britain this year's oilseed rape crop is likely to be 30 per cent below its 2008 level. And although it may be too early to predict a repeat of last year's food shortage, which provoked riots from west Africa to Egypt and Yemen, it seems possible that world food stocks may next year again be under severe strain, threatening to repeat the steep rises which, in 2008, saw prices double what they had been two years before.

There are obviously various reasons for this concern as to whether the world can continue to feed itself, but one of them is undoubtedly the downturn in world temperatures, which has brought more cold and snow since 2007 than we have known for decades.

Yet there will still be idiots who believe in Gore-Bull warming. The Earth has been cooling since 1998 and why do you think that is? Look at that big yellow thing up in the sky. Solar activity is currently declining and that causes the Earth to cool off.

It is now more than 200 years since the great astronomer William Herschel observed a correlation between wheat prices and sunspots. When the latter were few in number, he noted, the climate turned colder and drier, crop yields fell and wheat prices rose. In the past two years, sunspot activity has dropped to its lowest point for a century. One of our biggest worries is that our politicians are so fixated on the idea that CO2 is causing global warming that most of them haven't noticed that the problem may be that the world is not warming but cooling, with all the implications that has for whether we get enough to eat.

And they are going to use their religion junk science to subject the largest tax increase ever (The Cap-and-Tax) on an already struggling economy. Meanwhile Pope Albert's net worth has risen from $2 million when he left the White House to over $100 million now. His failed year at Vanderbilt's Divinity School has been very profitable for him.

It is appropriate that another contributory factor to the world's food shortage should be the millions of acres of farmland now being switched from food crops to biofuels, to stop the world warming, Last year even the experts of the European Commission admitted that, to meet the EU's biofuel targets, we will eventually need almost all the food-growing land in Europe. But that didn't persuade them to change their policy. They would rather we starved than do that. And the EU, we must always remember, is now our government – the one most of us didn't vote for last week.

And remember, Obamanation wants to turn us into the UK. Elections have consequences.

Hope. Change. High energy prices. Food shortages.

Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine

A YouTube video that is an audio file of Ronald Regan speaking of Socialized Medicine in 1961 (before the government proved they can't run socialized medicine for seniors, Medicare, without a 30% fraud rate). The direct link to this piece is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRdLpem-AAs

hope and change

GM Reinvention Commercial

SarahCuda on Hannity

Prove that you can fix Medicare first!

Virginia Postrel has a great post up that asked the question, "Why not fix Medicare first?" I would add to that all government healthcare operations that are controlled by government. On Medicare the Council of Economic Advisors' report says"Nearly 30 percent of Medicare’s costs could be saved without adverse health consequences."

OK, then "Show me the money!!!"Start with Medicare, Medicaid, government employees, the military, the Indian Health Service and the VA. If you can demonstrate a more efficient system, then and only then, we'll talk.

Postrel writes:

Think about this for a moment. Medicare is a huge, single-payer, government-run program. It ought to provide the perfect environment for experimentation. If more-efficient government management can slash health-care costs by addressing all these problems,why not start with Medicare? Let's see what "better management" looks like applied to Medicare before we roll it out to the rest of the country.
This is not a completely cynical suggestion.

Medicare is, for instance, a logical place to start to design better electronic records systems and the incentives to use them. But you do have to wonder why a report that claims that Medicare is wasting 30 percent of its spending thinks it's making a case for making the rest of the health care system more like Medicare.

Peter Orszag at OMB contacted Virginia after her post circulated the blogosphere and related:

The administration does have big Medicare changes planned, both immediate cuts in reimbursements and "game changers" to impose more scientific management, potentially realizing savings down the road.

2) "I hope I’m not making anything sound like they’re painless." There are going to be "hard, CBO-scored cuts" in Medicare, "mostly involving provider payments." The administration is proposing cutbacks in home-health care and Medicare Advantage payments, for instance. It isn't expecting to get its initial savings from better management.

3) Medicare First--changing Medicare and waiting to see how it works before messing around with the rest of the health care system--won't work politically. "I don’t think you’re going to get these aggressive changes in Medicare unless you do some coverage expansion now."

You should understand that there are a lot of health service providers not taking any more Medicare patients now because of the reimbursement rates and the hassle of dealing with government bureaucracy.

I believe that the goal of "universal coverage" is really a massive price-fixing scam seeking to dictate what healthcare professionals get paid. That is where they think they will save money. Remember in HilaryCare they were going to control the number of specialists in each field? As the single (only) payor they can dictate what they pay.

I blame...

Global Warming:

North Dakota city sees first snowfall in June in 60 years

Prius sales drop 45% in US despite price reduction

Burger King tries to muzzle Franchisee

Skeptics say, "Al Gore has been wrong all along!"

McCarthyism:

There are Communist spies in the State Department, who knew?

US Imperialism:

Iraq arrests Americans for killing an American civilian!

Obama's Press Corps not spinning fast enough:

Zionists build "Obama Hut"

European Press has not yet submitted to the Obamessiah

Europe's voters not understanding MetroLiberals*

Leftists see clout faltering

European Parliment elections lean right

The Katie Couric syndrome:

Conan's ratings drop with every episode

Pension Fund Greed:

Supreme Court asked to block Chrysler sale to Fiat

Pig-in-a-Poke

The chart below consists of actual data points added to the chart developed by the Obamessiah's disciples to sell the idea of the stimulus package. The red points have been added. The blue is what you were sold and will be paying for, the red is what you got. Buyer's remorse anyone?

How Fedicare will "save" Medicare

The reason that the Obamatrons are going to take over healthcare is to get the general populace to accept rationing of healthcare to seniors. The statistics show that in the last year of life medicare expenditures average five and one half times the average of all other years. If everyone is in the same rationing pool, then the government will be able to sell their wisdom of cutting off care to those persons whose healthcare costs are starting to show the upward spiral that the computerized records indicate the beginning of the terminal year. Then the government's line will be, "It's for the children. Would you take funds from them just to extend a senior citizen's life six or seven months? You heartless bastard?" In reality it will be the government's thirst for dollars for vote buying and cronyism.

Of course the government will not allow their decisions to be litigated. I can see delays taking well past the day of death and the law written that heirs have no standing as plaintiffs.

I read recently that fraud in the medicare system was pegged at 31% of total expeditures. Maybe the government needs to hire some people from those evil insurance companies' audit departments. No insurance company could survive at that rate and the taxpayer shouldn't have to pay that as well as the overhead costs, like all government versus private industry costs are well over what they should be.

How to bailout California

It appears that Obamanation and its minions have come to the realization that the word bailout has become a political liability. But California is in trouble. The taxpayers of California have shown up at the polling places and said, "No mas!" In a sane world that would settle it and budgets would be cut to fit.

But we're talking about La-La Land the leftward land of silliness. So budget cuts are out of the question. So what can be done?

In California there is an entity called CalPERS (California Public Employees' Retirement System). This system provides retirement, health, and related financial programs and benefits to more than 1.6 million public employees, retirees, and their families and more than 2,500 public employers.

In October 2007 CalPERS valued its investment funds at $260 Billion, as of 5/21/2009 the valuation was $180 Billion. Without getting into valuation methods (which I suspect), it would seem that Obamanation can step in and say that all these current and future government retirees need "to be made whole". By restoring CalPERS losses, maybe making the required contributions for this year, and maybe funding retirement and health payments this year, Obamanation can say that California isn't being "bailed out", the gummint is just helping out other gummint employees that are like your neighbors. And I really want to hear the excuse that those nasty hedge fund managers (OK, Madoff was one that CalPers had invested money with) lost their money by imprudent investments in Chrysler and GM bonds.

That will save (not bailout) a loyally DemocRat voting bloc.

Obama to Close the Border

No, not the one the rest of us want closed. He is making it more difficult for Canadians.

There is a pretty good (you'll only need a barf-bag for the first and tenth paragraphs) column in the Montreal Gazette.

An excerpt:

Do you really think demanding passports from 35 million Canadians will stop terrorism, any more than seizing elderly ladies' shampoo at the airport? Professional terrorists don't arrive at the border with a crumpled Canadian Tire card, then plead to get in. They have real fake passports.

Obama Man Can

A great video from Greg Morton

Betrayed by Argo

In 1999, in order to prove "Anthropogenic Global Warming", an innovative step was taken by scientists to greatly improve the collection of observations inside the ocean through increased sampling of old and new quantities and increased coverage in terms of time and area.

That step was Argo.

Argo deployments began in 2000 and by November 2007 the array was 100% complete.

Houston, they have a problem. From the linked Vancouver Sun article:

So why are some scientists now beginning to question the buoys' findings? Because in five years the little blighters have failed to detect any global warming. They are not reinforcing the scientific orthodoxy of the day, namely that man is causing the planet to warm dangerously. They are not proving the predetermined conclusions of their human masters. Therefore they, and not their masters' hypotheses, must be wrong.

In fact, "there has been a very slight cooling," according to a U.S. National Public Radio (NPR) interview with Josh Willis at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a scientist who keeps close watch on the Argo findings.

Willis insisted the temperature drop was "not anything really significant." And I trust he's right. But can anyone imagine NASA or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) or the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- the UN's climate experts -- shrugging off even a "very slight" warming.

Oops!!!

The "Makeover" Syndrome

I have often thought this about women that convince their friends to adopt unattractive styles.

If you met a man who said he would like to 'transform' or 'remake' his wife, would you conclude that he: a) thought very highly of his wife and loved her? Or b) held his wife in rather low esteem and therefore found living her rather difficult? The answer is obvious: Those who wish to remake anything (or anyone) do not think highly of the person or thing they wish to remake. Little is as revealing of Barack Obama's and the left's view of America than their use of the words 'transform' and 'remake' when applied to what they most want to do to America. ... In light of those frequently made criticisms of America, I have often asked representatives of the left why they criticize America so much if they love it so much. 'Precisely because we love America, we criticize it. You criticize that which you love,' is the nearly universal response. But, of course, it isn't true. If you constantly criticize your spouse, for example, it is difficult to imagine that you really do love him or her. And perhaps more important, it is very unlikely that your spouse feels loved. That is why after being routinely described as racist, sexist, imperialist, etc., it is difficult to be able to tell that America is loved by the left. This is not written in order to indict the left, let alone the president, for not loving America. No one can measure another's feelings. Furthermore I do not question the sincerity of anyone who says he loves America. What I question are the actions and rhetoric of those who claim to love America yet want to transform and remake it.
--columnist Dennis Prager

What they really mean

From: The Conspiracy to Keep you Poor and Stupid

A 50 yr old Cartoon for Today

Socialism works until ...

you run out of other people's money.

Read the whole article, but here are some highlights:

Let’s be clear, it is the job and obligation of all investment managers, including hedge fund managers, to get their clients the most return they can. They are allowed to be charitable with their own money, and many are spectacularly so, but if they give away their clients’ money to share in the “sacrifice”, they are stealing. Clients of hedge funds include, among others, pension funds of all kinds of workers, unionized and not.

Shaking down lenders for the benefit of political donors is recycled corruption and abuse of power.

Let’s also mention only in passing the irony of this same President begging hedge funds to borrow more to purchase other troubled securities. That he expects them to do so when he has already shown what happens if they ask for their money to be repaid fairly would be amusing if not so dangerous.

Last but not least, the President screaming that the hedge funds are looking for an unjustified taxpayer-funded bailout is the big lie writ large. Find me a hedge fund that has been bailed out.

From Megan McArdle:

The administration is beating up the creditors because a) it wants to give the UAW a much better deal than they'd get in liquidation and b) they'd like someone else to pay for it. I recognize that the law is always kind of messy, but as far as I know, this kind of blatant political intervention between debt claims is unprecedented, and worse, it's a dress rehearsal for doing the same thing at GM. I don't think this is good for the rule of law, I'm pretty sure it will be bad for capital markets, and I'm nearly positive it's going to make it hard for any heavily unionized company to get substantial capital for the next decade.

Clinton's Military Adventure Continues

I love the troops' sense of humor. I also appreciate the line in the song about Rawanda and I guess they couldn't find the bus from Zonation's "Under My Bus" but still pretty good stunt work and not hard to understand the symbolism. Very few people realize that in Kosovo our troops are protecting the Muslim population.

Best Comeback evah!!

Joy Behar’s floundering response, “That’s quite a jump,” is entirely without merit. Joy Behar’s entire “point,” such as was, was to point out Coulter’s alleged hypocrisy in that she supports waterboarding being done to others, but does not want to be waterboarded herself. Of course, to any sentient being, this argument carries zero force; almost no one wants to be thrown in prison themselves, but almost everyone favors prison sentences being imposed on others in certain circumstances. This does not demonstrate intellectual inconsistency or hypocrisy on the part of the vast majority of America, it demonstrates that punishment works in part because we don’t want it to happen to us.

A conversation with a DGSE agent

Hat Tip: Pamela Gellar @ Atlas Shrugs

100 DAYS OF BEING A LAUGHINGSTOCK IN PARIS

Paris, France. It is very cool to be a French intel guy. A spectacular meal at a Parisian bistro with $90 entrées and a $200 bottle of Bordeaux? No problem. I'd known this fellow since he got me out of a jam in Sudan years ago. His James Bond days are over, but still, riding a desk for the DGSE -- Direction générale de la sécurité extérieure (General Directorate for External Security), France's military intel agency - in Paris has its decided benefits.

One of them is not being infected with Obamamania. "My agency considers him a joke," he confides. "Every day there is some fresh lunacy that we cannot believe. Mr. Bush would often make us angry. But at this man we just laugh."

"In truth, it also makes us sad," he continued. "French resentment towards America is strong, so being able to laugh at your country feels good. But it is such a sad and strange thing to see America - America The Great! - do something so crazy as to elect this ridiculous man."

"There are many people in America who think he isn't a legitimate president as he wasn't born in the US and isn't a natural citizen. What do you think?" I asked.

He shrugged. "I wouldn't know. I've never had reason to make an inquiry."

"There are a lot of people convinced he is a traitor who hates America and is actively determined to destroy it. Any opinion on that?"

He didn't shrug at this. After a long slow sip of wine, he mused, "I would not go that far. Many of his actions, however, are very puzzling because they are so counter-productive regarding America's best interests. There seems to be a consistent pattern in that direction."

"What does Sarkozy think of him?"

"Nothing but contempt."

After a pause he asked, "And Langley?"

"Well, if you thought the war they waged against Bush was intense, it was nothing compared to how they're going to screw Obama. He has tried to gut them with the ‘torture memo' release and slashing their budgets. The morale is depressed, sullen, and enraged. You know what a left-wing outfit Langley is. They thought he was their boy and they feel betrayed. All kinds of damaging stuff on him will be appearing via their media friends."

He nodded. "And in Tel Aviv City?"

He was referring to the huge underground city complex of Langley's underneath the US Embassy in the Israeli capital. "That's an interesting question. You know how vast and deep the relationship is there. Langley is making every effort to overcome the total and massive distrust their Israeli colleagues have for Obama, whom they know is selling them down the Jordan River. So far though this effort is in words. The Israelis are waiting to see what Langley does."

He said nothing. I smiled. "You guys wouldn't be Langley's cutout for thwarting BO regarding Israel, would you? I'd never suspect that..."

He continued to say nothing, gave me only a slight smile in return, and poured me another glass of wine. "The Bordeaux is good, yes?" I nodded."

You know, the French media worships this man the same as yours in the US. All of this ‘100 days' talk, it is impossibly stupid. Most anyone in the French elite, the business leaders, Sarko's people, they all know this. They all think this is some crazy joke of the Americans. But it is a very, very dangerous joke. For 100 days your president has been a laughingstock among the tout le monde No one may be laughing 100 days or 10 months from now."

He leaned forward. "The world can go - how do you say - sideways with this man very quickly. No one he has working for him knows what they are doing - possibly excepting Mrs. Clinton - and he certainly does not. All of us in our little community are worried - us, our friends in Berlin, London, Tel Aviv, and Langley too as you say. It is not like the barbarians at the gates. It is everythere are no gates. The Somalis, Chavez, Iran, Putin, Beijing, the ‘Norks" as you call them, the list is long and it is growing. We are not sure what to do."

It took me a moment to respond. "The best thing that has happened now is Obama making Langley his enemy. They will be cooperating with you more, be more a part of your worried community. Working together, you can undermine his efforts more effectively, block and maybe even repair the damage."

It was my turn to lean forward. "Then again, all together you could be more pro-active. The man is a mystery. Nobody can make public his actual birth certificate, or even the particular hospital he was born in, or his college grades, or how he got into Harvard, or how he made editor of the Harvard Law Review and never wrote a single article for it. It goes on and on. He really is a Zero. I think all of you guys should find all of this out and make it known."

I added, "The quicker the better, before the laughing stops and the real dangers begin."

"What is that phrase you use?" he asked. "Something to consider?"

I laughed. "Yes, there is much to consider - and much that you can do. I mean, really, if the Soviet Union could be dismantled, so can this presidency."

It was a beautiful April afternoon in Paris. He walked me back to my hotel. It could be that the times we live in may get even more interesting.

This is so wrong in so many ways

Michael Vick in Talks to Become PETA Spokesman

Yes, you read that correctly. The disgraced one-time NFL superstar serving prison time for funding an illegal dog-fighting ring is primed to do public-service ads for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals upon his release later this month. According to three people with knowledge of the matter, the proposed endorsement is part of a comprehensive PR scheme aimed at rehabilitating the quarterback's image and gaining him readmission to the league that banned him from playing.

Obama Budget Cuts Visualization

My only quibble with this is the statement that there are things that can't be cut.

Role Reversal explains it all

Redstate has an article up today that relates an overheard conversation in a bookstore as a reflection of what a liberal (today's version, not classical) means when it says it loves America. The most telling part of the conversation is that it is a sexual role reversal for those of us that have held to the concept of "A man marries wanting his wife to never change, a woman marries with plans to change her husband." Of course, that too may have a political bent.

Click this sentence to read the full article, an excerpt:

The reality is, though, that ponytail wanted something else. He didn’t love his wife for what she was. In this he is a perfect reflection of the American left. They don’t love America for what it is. They love their own ideas of what they want America to be. Not what she is.

'Cudas, Choppers, and Bears!! Oh, my!

Brief clip of the Orange County Chopper guys and Sarah Palin from tonight's American Chopper episode on TLC 9:00 Eastern 8:00 Central

Would you buy a car from....Timmay!!!

Geithner: The Fox Guarding the Henhouse? by Larry Kudlow

What is going on in this country? The government is about to take over GM in a plan that completely screws private bondholders and favors the unions. Get this: The GM bondholders own $27 billion and they’re getting 10 percent of the common stock in an expected exchange. And the UAW owns $10 billion of the bonds and they’re getting 40 percent of the stock. Huh? Did I miss something here? And Uncle Sam will have a controlling share of the stock with something close to 50 percent ownership. And no bankruptcy judge. So this is a political restructuring run by the White House, not a rule-of-law bankruptcy-court reorganization.

OK, maybe not Timmay!!! But Uncle Sam,BO, and the bosses of UAW. Unlike Timmay!!!, the car czar is not a known tax-cheat, just a suspected bribery participant in misuse of State of New York pension funds.

Now hat the Gummint and the UAW are going to control GM and Chrysler, how long will it be before the Gummint uses it's power of the pen to severely hamper any competition? How long until Gummint accounting practices replace GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles)? How long until the only car you can get will be used Gummint vehicles, or maybe the 21st century Trabant?

If they do this quickly enough, with their typical vampire enthusiasm, perhaps some people may take a second look their lust for the cash flowing through the healthcare system. HINT: They aren't really concerned about delivery of healthcare, it's about delivery of their cut (or taste as Tony Soprano would call it).

Pretty much says it all

I had wondered...

why Miss California was asked the homosexual marriage question by that flaming queen (BTW why is an male homosexual judging feminine beauty?) Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr. (aka Perez Hilton). Now I know, her bio set her up as a target.

Miss Prejean is a student at San Diego Christian College - the kind of place activist gay leftists are at war with, where Christians preach what they practice.

Since judges have background sheets on the contestants before them, I'm sure a massive case of gender envy by Mario forced him to out Miss California as a Christian. Probably with the indignation that she probably voted for Proposition 8 with the majority of Californians and the thought of, "How dare SHE be Miss California!!"

Finally An Admission Cap & Trade is a TAX!!!,

And when he says it's a large one he means it. $3128 for an average household. That $400 Obama doled out off of payroll taxes doesn't seem like a deal now, does it? At least they are finally calling payroll taxes what they are, a tax instead of "contributions". But of course since business has to collect the energy tax they are confident they can blame business not the Demothuglicans in DC.

And despite all the idiot advertisements on the Boob Tube, that tax is going into the general fund, just like Social Insecurity has since 1964.

Earth Day Giggles and Grins

Update: That Big Yellow Thing in the sky confounds the know-it-alls.

A present for you. The download link is to a pdf of page 64 of Newsweek magazine of April 28th 1975. The first Earth Day Issue. Its title? Why, "The Cooling World" of course. Enjoy!!

FileDropper Free File Hosting

A Shirt I'm ordering

You can get yours at Ranger Up Street Gear.

We need it 18,500 more times

The Obammessiah is getting press for directing his cabinet to cut costs by doing such things as bulk ordering office supplies. He had directed them to save $100 million dollars. Well it is a start I guess but with the Congressional Budget office saying that the deficit for FY 2009 is $1.85 trillion that would mean we would need to save that $100 million 18,500 times to balance the budget. And what is he talking about going line-by-line over the budget? Did we pass the line item veto while I wasn't looking? (I checked, we didn't) So he can go over it, but he only has two options sign it or not, and he damn well knows it and the media knows it, but thinks that the rubes (that's you and me) don't.

Why Homeland Security is scared of Veterans

I think this concept scares the hell out of those people who intend to shred the Constitution as written and substitute "wiser, saner, more Democratic and cosmopolitan rules for the future."

WDSU ex-reporterette "Nips"

CNN’s Susan Roesgen, who was known as "Nips" to the radio personalities in New Orleans due to a "wardrobe malfunction" while covering Mardi Gras parades in a Belly Dancer/Harem Girl costume for WDSU-TV, is now becoming known for beclowning herself at the Chicago Tea Party by trying to shout Obamessiah talking points over the person she was supposed to be trying to interview. In the first video below you will see a little more of that scene with additional video when a crowd member lays into her for her obvious bias in trying to slant the report:



Now look at her report on a much smaller, obviously more to her liking, gathering:



And if you need a further example, from when she was still in New Orleans:




Michael Graham of the Boston Herald had this to say about "Nips".

The people that have relied on Rent-a-Mobs from ACORN, ANSWER, MORON (MoveOn), and other bought and paid for subsidiaries of the Democrat Party and George Sor@ss can not believe that real unpaid citizens might actually have been lulled from their stupor to express their thoughts about what is happening.

Jimmy Carter's four years of budgets caused what was named Stagflation. In four years a $100 price increased to $149 by inflation alone and wages did not keep up. And his budgets did not represent anything near the percent of the money supply that the Obammessiah's do. It's time to start studying the Weimar Republic or perhaps the history of Zimbabwe economics is more parallel.



In other news we find that the new "Auto Czar" is being investigated by the SEC for arranging illegal kickbacks to the brother of New York state's pension fund manager while he was working as a senior executive at an investment firm.

Tea Party Day!!!!

While the media does its best to ignore and chant, "move along, there's nothing to see here."



And to summarize the state of the Lame Stream Media, exclusive from the Onion News Network,

Media Having Trouble Finding Right Angle On Obama's Double-Homicide

Tramp Stamp Barbie?

Is there really a market for this?

It appears so.

But some of us are going to have a lot of fun with it.