We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
No, you are way worse than that, David. You were played, dude, because you wanted to be played. Had you done the job that you are well-paid to do, that would not have happened. His pressed pants, his skin color, his Harvard Law, and his glibness took you in. No real street newsman would have been conned that easily by an obvious street hustler:
You still are, David. You live in a rainbow pony cocoon, a land of wishful thinking. It is pathetic and irresponsible. A journalist without skepticism, a healthy dose of cynicism, and a healthy dose of whiskey, is not worth a damn.
You, David, are a pussy journalist. You drink milk with dinner. That's why you work at the Times.
Ice: This is bad news for the people of Greenland who would love to be rid of all that ice that covers valuable resources that Greenlanders could exploit.
Similar: Europe’s Moral Decadence Fuels Spread of Islamic Fundamentalism- The left has done its job well: Norwegian reporters, for fear of being accused of Islamophobia, are now actually loath to remind readers that there is such a thing as Islamic terrorism.
The Chinese government’s ‘vacuum cleaner’ approach to espionage is worrying foreign governments, companies and overseas dissidents. They’re right to be concerned.
I'm sure you've seen the endless drip of announcements and adulations. They give away Free cash money for free to put super-duper, earth transforming solar panels on you roof:
City, federal incentives make installing a solar panel a zero dollar investment
Does any of that make any rational sense? Or am I stupid?
Since the recession, we have had a government doing everything it can to suppress, leash, and stifle the animal spirits of American enterprise. Why are the predictable results always "unexpected"? Where would we be, now, without China's loans?
We miss Reagan's common sense. The Dems are blinded to reality by ideological sentiment. Money doesn't grow on trees.
...the state's aggregate public sector employee compensation grew a robust 54 percent from 2000 to 2007, and another 13 percent from 2007 to 2010. For the decade from 2000 to 2010, it grew from $10.5 billion to $18.2 billion, or a whopping 73 percent.
Average compensation per worker reflects this dramatic dichotomy. In 2000, a private sector worker earned about $3,600, or 8 percent, more than a public sector employee. By 2009, the relationship had reversed: the average public sector employee out-earned his private sector counterpart by almost $9,000 or 15 percent.
The stumper of a question is what can be done to resuscitate a private sector stooping ever lower with this ever-weightier monkey on its back.
Well, we might start by segregating the "Class Apart" from the citizenry. Government employees and citizens are certainly not "in this together."
From a medical malpractice defense lawyer: "I can pick any one of your charts at random and, in a little while, find a potential malpractice case in there. Why? Because few things in medical care work out perfectly, and they can easily find another doc in your specialty from an Ivy medical school to say, at $1500/hour plus expenses, that he would have done it a little differently. My advice? Move to Texas where they will appreciate you docs. Texas wants happy, caring doctors who do not view every patient as a potential lawsuit."
"We will help you be a good steward for your health," Emanuel said Friday, "but if you choose not to, you'll pay that price and that is the price you'll have to pay."
There are, of course, lots of ways to be smart and lots of ways to be dumb. We often talk about book smarts and street smarts, as though the two are mutually exclusive. We know from experience that brilliant book people can be nincompoops when it comes to common sense, while people lacking formal education can be brilliant problem-solvers.
We know these things, yet we seem to have fallen in love with the notion that only book smarts matter when it comes to the nation’s problems. At least Democrats have.
Photo is the Litchfield, CT Congregational Church, c. 1750. Architecturally, classic New England Congo churches are plain old-time boxy meeting houses, gussied up with a steeple and a portico.
We oppose racial preferences at Maggie's. We believe that an Asian gal is no less worthy a human than a Hispanic gal - other qualities being equal. But I do understand - race is all about politics. Still, I don't quite get why, if you're half Hispanic (is Hispanic a race?), you're Hispanic. Are you Hispanic if you come from Spain? Or Argentina?
I am middle class and I love to see the rich get richer. That's what they are trying to do. I am not trying to be rich so I have no envy of their accomplishing what I am not attempting. Bless the rich their good fortune; don't despise them for being able to do what you can't.
I'd be pleased to be rich, but I somehow never get around to doing anything about it other than buying Powerball tickets. My money manager pal tells me that most people stop worrying about money when they have $17-20 million. I'd make out OK with half of that if I scrimped on some things.
...we will be the laughing stock of the world, seen jumping head first off a cliff into a shark infested sea, as we will have no way back, because we were sold a tax that has nothing to do with climate change, instead introduced purely for egotistic governance.
Small businesses — hardware stores, gas stations or restaurants for example — are likewise unable to transfer themselves overseas. So they are far more likely to be unable to escape the higher tax rates that are supposedly being imposed on "millionaires and billionaires," as President Obama puts it. Moreover, small businesses are what create most of the new jobs.
Why then are so many politicians, journalists and others so gung-ho to raise tax rates in the upper brackets?
Obama Administration Gave $17.2 Billion in Stimulus Funds to Green Projects – Only $645 Million to Small Business
Will it be the Jews next? Image below via Moonbattery:
That's all he's got, for now - another stimulus. Youngman:
This is the campaign.
For the rest of 2011, at least, Obama and his team will speak of little else. This is the debate they want to have, and they are betting the president’s job on their belief they can win this debate.
This is sports strategy, not serious adult concern about the state of the country. Wehner asks Has Obama Learned Anything?
More cartoonish advice coming: Gore’s 24 Hours of Fantasy About To Begin - An effort to "expose" climate change skeptics will instead show that Gore is a charlatan. My questions for Mr. Gore:
1. Has the earth truly been warming lately? 2. If so, can it be proven that man caused that? 3. And if so, why does it matter? 4. What's the ideal climate for the earth? Isn't climate always in flux? 5. If you are really so worried, why do you have two giganto houses, a giganto power boat, travel in huge black SUVs, eat meat, and fly on private jets? 6. How much money have you made off this thing? 7. What is the upside of climate warming, like in the Medieval period? 8. Why aren't you worried frantic about the next ice age, or the next asteroid, the next nuclear war, or the next plague, instead?
Obama is like a lost man who refuses to ask for directions. That's because he has never worked in the real world with people who create real jobs. He operates on theories and an ideology that is incapable of achieving his goals.
For example, he speaks mostly of redistributing wealth, not creating wealth. He wants us to hate the wealth creators, rather than follow their example. The result has been a growing dependency on government, robbing too many of their liberty and opportunity.
True, in my experience: What Job 'Training' Teaches? Bad Work Habits - A 1969 government study warned that teens in federal jobs programs 'regressed in their conception of what should reasonably be required in return for wages paid.'
Government "Job-training" provides jobs for the job trainers, and not much else.
You can’t make this stuff up, folks. That’s right: The people of Michigan, according to this court, violated the Equal Protection Clause when they demanded that their state treat all citizens equally—without regard to race, ethnicity, or sex—in government contracting, employment, and education, including university admissions. Unbelievable.
The preamble to the Constitution lists several reasons for it, including providing for the common defense. It is the only one listed for which the federal government is uniquely essential.
Yet, while our defense expenditures are already being heavily trimmed, it is likely that they will be virtually gutted. Fifty percent of the budget cuts are supposed to come from 20% of our federal spending. Meanwhile, the threats abroad have not only not receded but are growing.
It is disgraceful that the Republican candidates for the nomination didn’t get into this, while spending two hours repeating clichés and arguing how much wall to have along the Mexican border. Yes, the domestic issues are pressing and very important, but to ignore the global threats, the denuding of our military capabilities, the added burdens on our already heavily burdened volunteers, and our responsibilities to defense is deplorable.
Read about what the Republican Chair of the House Armed Services Committee has to say. A sample:
I am afraid that once again, we are sliding back to a place we pledged never to return to, and are repeating the mistakes of a September 10th America. As we begin to emerge from a long, tough fight, this should be the time to reset and rebuild our military. Instead, we are lowering our gloves. At a time when our military is falling into disrepair, we have laid out over half a trillion dollars in projected cuts to Pentagon spending. I cannot understate how dangerous these defense cuts have become.
Apparently, the Republicans vying for the nomination can understate, indeed ignore it. I’m not feeling safer tonight.
And, Jennifer Rubin, also at the Washington Post called the debate A foreign policy horror show : "It’s time to figure out if any of these guys and gal are up to the job of commander in chief."
Jonathan Tobin chimes in at Commentary's Contentions blog, The GOPs Foreign Policy Void: "...the Republicans are in danger of throwing away one of their party’s greatest strengths."
If 9/11 had really changed us, there’d be a 150-story building on the site of the World Trade Center today. It would have a classical memorial in the plaza with allegorical figures representing Sorrow and Resolve, and a fountain watched over by stern stone eagles. Instead there’s a pit, and arguments over the usual muted dolorous abstraction approved by the National Association of Grief Counselors. The Empire State Building took 18 months to build. During the Depression. We could do that again, but we don’t. And we don’t seem interested in asking why.
The debate among Republicans over the 2012 presidential nominee seems to divide between those favoring management skills and those favoring inspiration.
Americans have oscillated between the two. Eisenhower = management; Kennedy = inspiration; Johnson = neither; Nixon = management; Ford = neither; Carter = neither; Reagan = inspiration; Bush (Senior) = management; Clinton = inspiration; Bush (Junior) = management; Obama = inspiration.
These aren’t “pure” characterizations, but rather what aroused the balance of electorability. It was the persona that was the characterization of the nominee.
This may, or not, be applicable to 2012, but I tend toward thinking it very well may be.If so, then, that may explain my leaning toward Romney (and Pawlenty before he dropped out).
On the other hand, one can as well posit that Obama = neither, in which case the oscillation would favor inspiration. That might favor Perry.
On the other hand, the theory may be worthless. The test of a theory is in its simple predictive power. 2012’s election will tell. Regardless, however, internecine battles -- as opposed to civil discussion and debate -- among Republicans will weaken the 2012 chances of defeating Obama. That is a proven theory.
Comments?
From the Comments thus far, let me make this clearer: I'm talking about the persona or characterization at election time, not what comes after.
“Krugman’s comments are an indication of the nature of one of the problems we face; which is, a lot of people in positions to influence our country really don’t like our country. Krugman (by the way, did you know he is a former ‘Enron adviser’?) is among those who earn well, live well and eat well but really wish they could live among a better sort of people.”
They tell us to get over it, they say to move on, and they mean it well: We can't bring an air of tragedy into the future. But I will never get over it. To get over it is to get over the guy who stayed behind on a high floor with his friend who was in a wheelchair. To get over it is to get over the woman by herself with the sign in the darkness: "America You Are Not Alone." To get over it is to get over the guys who ran into the fire and not away from the fire.
And so we commemorate an act of war as a “tragic event,” and we retreat to equivocation, cultural self-loathing, and utterly fraudulent misrepresentation about the events of the day. In the weeks after 9/11, Americans were enjoined to ask “Why do they hate us?” A better question is: “Why do they despise us?” And the quickest way to figure out the answer is to visit the Peace Quilt and the Wish Tree, the Crescent of Embrace and the Hole of Bureaucratic Inertia.
Europeans and their colonial descendants may pen laws of war, but only they are constrained by them. In the real world outside the dinner parties of Washington D.C. and Brussels, there are no laws in war. Islamic law which has regulations for which foot to use when entering a bathroom (the left foot) and which side to sleep on (the right) has very few laws of war that cannot be nullified by necessity or even whim. On the battlefield, Islamic jurisprudence is boiled down to, Do what thou wilt in the cause of Allah, that is the whole of the law.
President Obama tonight seemed simultaneously angry and nervous as he rushed through a speech that was transparently not worthy of a joint session of Congress. His great idea: Cobble together a mish-mash of old ideas (infrastructure spending, a payroll tax cut) and pay for it later, by asking the debt commission to come up with additional deficit reductions later, preferably by hiking taxes on the rich. The second half of the speech was a heated campaign rally aimed at a cartoon version of his future opponent.
We've all seen this sort of urban death spiral happen in many places. Unionization, government costs, and living costs drive business away, taxes rise to support government, the middle class leaves the city behind to drugs, welfare, and dysfunction with a disappearing tax base and a nasty reputation. It is entirely predictable. Hartford, CT is a classic case, voted most pleasant medium-sized city to live in, in the USA, around 1955.
Next, forks? When I took my cc handgun licensing course, I met a guy who had used a baseball bat to fracture the skull of a burglar in his house. (Note to our Brit readers: Cops winked at him and said "Good job.")
This speech sounds pretty much exactly like all his other failed speeches. Pretty much every job he talks about, just like in 2009, 2010, and 2011 are government jobs or jobs dependent on government.