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Wednesday, October 16. 2013

Samuel Pepys has a Twitter account

Professor To Sponsor First Annual Penis Monologues

The return of King Coal

Reynolds: Government? Who needs it

VDH: Reading Among the Ruins

Michelle Obama to Appear on The Biggest Loser, Promote Drinking More Water

The ObamaCare Death Spiral and Britain's NHS, Coming to an American Town Near You

US law enforcement agencies have a serious addiction problem to the money that comes from the War on Drugs

A fishing knife: Brickbat: Making a Felony Out of It

The view from the Marcellus shale

Climate Change Goes Back to Court

About That Gaza Humanitarian Crisis

Mead: Europe Is Burning, Slowly

Posted by Bird Dog in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 06:21 | Comments (10) | Trackbacks (0)

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re: Government? Who needs it?

I am reminded of a course in Public Administration I took in 1984. I got an A on a project. The goal was to eliminate the deficit in 4 years in a fair and meaningful fashion.

At that point, government revenues were growing at roughly $60bb per year. Knowing this, I assumed only $45bb per year in growth (fearing a slowdown, we'd just pulled out of a recession after all) and I cut spending by about 2% across the board (again, at this time we were hearing about the $500 toilet seats in the military, so a 2% cut didn't seem to me all that meaningful in any sector of the government). I proposed freezing all pay for public employees for 3 years to accomplish this, or a 1% increase annually - either would help accomplish my goal.

The deficit, at that point, was roughly $200bb. It was considered "massive". It was intractable. Nobody knew how to cut it. Indeed, fellow students spent time spending MORE money on welfare and other social programs while increasing taxes, which of course would drag the economy back into a recession far faster than my 2% cuts in spending.

I got an A because my approach was simple, defensible and full of common sense.

Today we have much larger problems to deal with...but it appears my fellow students are in control of government, never having learned their lessons from long ago.

And it's unlikely my plan would work today. Which is further evidence that taking your pain today is worth far more than partying on and trying to extend the 'good times'. Eventually the hangover will arrive, and she will be a serious bitch.

#1 Bulldog on 2013-10-16 09:51 (Reply)

So Moochelle is appearing on a show about her husband. What's the big deal?

#2 bill on 2013-10-16 09:54 (Reply)

My daughter went to a "religious" women's college and the first semester she was there, they trumpeted - with a huge banner on the theater - that they were performing "The Vagina Monologues". It was on thing that they claimed to be religious but another thing to be so proud that they were taking part in such a culturally important event.

My only thought then was how they would feel if somebody wrote and produced a play named "The Penis Perspective" might be performed? Thank you Mike Adams for stepping up to the plate!

My guess is that Mike's effort will be treated about as well as the Congressional White Caucus or White Entertainment Television would be.

#3 mudbug on 2013-10-16 10:15 (Reply)

The deficit and the debt are intractable we have passed the pointof no return. We can fool ourselves about it or change the subject to how much wealth there is n this country or how another boom cycle will pull us out of this mess but it won't happen. We are like a boat trapped in the power of a whirlpool or a plane that has lost power and is inevitably descending towards earth. I admit it doesn't seem like it is that bad, most of us still have jobs and can still buy anything we need and even take lavish vacations. It is silly to think we are following in Zimbabwe's or the Weimar Republic's footsteps. But sometime in the last 5 years we passed a level of debt and a level of spending that we cannot reverse. Now we are committed to fly this plane into the ground. The question that most of those in control are asking themselves is not how to fix it or can we fix it but rather should we tell the other passengers what is happening or should we grab our parachute and walk past the others actng as though we are simply out on stroll? True, some in power or not so duplicitous they are merely ignorant of what is happening while some others may well be pleased with this coming crisis as a vehicle to be used to transform America into something resembling Communist Russia in the 30's. So while the Dems argue about raising taxes so they can spend more and the Republicans argue about cutting taxes and cutting the spending the Tea Party is being chastised for wanting to take those difficult steps to turn this disaster around. But can it be saved? I don't think so at least not saved in the conventional way most of us would think of it. The only question is how will our leaders act once this all collapses. Will we follow history and become a communist/socialist government controlled by the elite for the elite. Or will a majority follow the Tea Party lead and demand a return to a constitutional republic where citizens are more important then elites and special interests. If I were to bet I would bet on history and that the great American experiment is over.

#4 GoneWithTheWind on 2013-10-16 10:37 (Reply)

Thanks!! Your perspective has lifted me right out of my depressed state. I fear you're right but at the same time I keep telling myself 'it can't happen here'. At least I'm old and probably won't be here for the worst of it.

#4.1 passerby on 2013-10-16 12:04 (Reply)

"At least I'm old..." . We should all be grateful that good people in times past did not feel that it all ended with themselves and the ends of their own lives. What about your children, grandchildren?

That thought is the only thing worth being optimistic about. I agree it will probably not get better in my lifetime. It has been a long party, but it's about to be over. Hangover time, yes. But perhaps changes can be made so that there will be something left to celebrate in my children's future.

#4.1.1 libertygirl on 2013-10-16 13:03 (Reply)

This is interesting.

"Confirmed: Chase bank drops the hammer on capital controls; no money allowed to transfer out of USA starting Nov. 17th

This is the letter that we received directly from Chase. This is not secondhand information.

The letter clearly states that beginning November 17:

• All international wire transfers will be disallowed.

• All cash activity, including cash withdrawals and deposits, will be halted at “$50,000 per statement cycle.” How are businesses who deal with a lot of cash (such as restaurants) supposed to function under such restrictions?"

http://www.infowars.com/confirmed-chase-bank-drops-the-hammer-on-capital-controls-no-money-allowed-to-transfer-out-of-usa-starting-nov-17th/

#5 feeblemind on 2013-10-16 18:39 (Reply)

The Republican Party, widely known as the Stupid Party or the White Flag Party, died today in Washington DC. On life support for nearly 24 years. the party had shown no signs of brain activity for many years. John Boehner, the senile and deeply tanned Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, made the announcement to the press today. A private funeral service will be held in the Capitol rotunda at a date to be set. President Barack Obama will offer the eulogy and is expected to welcome Boehner and other establishment Republicans formally into the Democratic fold, a move across the aisle that had long been predicted by political pundits and other astute observers in the nation's capital. After a hard fought negotiation that lasted many weeks, which brought the country nearly to the brink of fiscal sanity, a compromise was finally achieved last night by Senate leaders of both parties regarding the assignment of offices and staff and other perquisites for the new Democrats. Boehner expressed his gratitude to his new colleagues and promised all Americans that Republican Democrats would continue, as in the past, to focus on their own well being instead of the future of the nation, and would look forward to working with the White House to ensure that the president's program to fundamentally ruin America would finally move ahead without the token opposition of the last several weeks that had occasioned so much ridicule and scorn for Congressional Republicans.

#6 Agent Cooper on 2013-10-16 19:26 (Reply)

Will the Whigs attend?

With the coming avalanche of illegals, it further puts a fork into the party. The infusion of these 'poor, down-trodden, wayward souls in need of compassion, assistance, and our geld' , it cements the leftists\progressives hold on power.

Add to that, the fiscal avalanche is just averted, but the rumbles are still felt. All the under pinning causes are still there; there's no spine or fortitude with the political class (and the media enablers) to address our fiscal short-sightedness.

These are the times that try citizens souls....

#6.1 fred zeppelin on 2013-10-17 08:10 (Reply)

(One of the reasons Europeans are so fearful of the Tea Party is that they assume that because it is right wing and populist it is like the National Front in France or Golden Dawn in Greece. Today’s small government American Tea Partiers are much farther from Huey Long and Father Coughlin in their political views than some European right wingers are from the darker demagogues of Europe’s bloody past,

Perhaps Mead should have explained to the EUSSRians and to himself that the Tea Party derives from the Founding Fathers, that Huey Long was a Democrat-Socialist (say, isn’t socialism a EUropean ideology? and doesn’t EUrope have Democratic Socialist Parties); and that Coughlin was a Roman Catholic (last I checked that religion is HQ’d in Rome).

Perhaps Mead could have mentioned that the current rulers of the EUSSR haven’t distanced themselves from their bloody Leftist past. Without massive imprisonment of Communist party members, de-Communistification (ugh, what an ugly word, but the parallel is exact), and executions of the leaders who created and the toadies who ran the gulags, everyone should fear EUrope.

Instead Mead reinforced their errors.

Until Europe does to the Communists what it did to the Nazis: Europa delanda est.

#7 ErisGuy on 2013-10-18 09:56 (Reply)

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Wednesday, October 16. 2013

Weds. morning links