Monday, July 26. 2010
This Sherrod story. I thought I was sick of the story even before it started, but I guess this is a slice of America too. Every country has moonbats but, as Palin would say, these are "sick puppies," determined to live in anger and hatred.
 Glassman: Notes on Europe’s Economic Decadence. "Prosperity creates sloth."
Axe falls on NHS services
Examiner: The calamitous effects of Obama's tax hikes. Related at Powerline: Coming Soon: The Biggest Tax Increase Ever. There's nothing like a big tax increase to work wonders on a struggling economy.
Vernon Smith says "no more government spending,...avoid new taxes."
Ariz. law comes after years of mounting anger
Malanga: The Muni-Bond Debt Bomb
Am Thinker: We The Serfs...:
Your tax dollars at work in Rhode Island. How long before those sidewalks are cracked with weeds growing through the cracks?
VIDEO GOLD: Howard Dean Gets A$$ Handed to Him On FOX After Misplaying His Race Cards
From Cato's Investors: Fear the Process That Gave Us ObamaCare, Not Efforts to Repeal It (my bolds):
... the problem is not that the political system is breaking down. That system is working pretty much the same way it always has and always will: it promotes irresponsibility. Republicans and Democrats are merely responding to the incentives created by the system in which they operate. (If they didn’t respond to those incentives, the political system would throw them out and replace them with people who do.) If investors don’t already understand that, the sooner the better.
This is why responsible people want to take responsibility for our health care, etc., out of the hands of politicians.
Sunday, July 25. 2010
Edge: Getting at the Neuroanthropology of Morality
Los Zetas drug cartel seizes 2 U.S. ranches in Texas. Is this story true? Possibly not.
Coming Soon: Tax Tsunami
Reid to Netroots: "We're Going To Have a Public Option"
Britain Plans to Decentralize National Health Care
More government intrusion into private sector pay
Race realist Jared Taylor declares the "civil rights struggle was won long ago"
A guy who doesn't want you to have a/c: The Big Chill: Giving AC the Cold Shoulder
Dino: What happened a year ago to permanently change public opinion?
Powerline: The case against Elena Kagan
Obama’s Solar Energy Fantasy
The Lottery Makes a Strong Statement About Charter Schools
From Insty: "THE YOUNG AND THE JOBLESS: New Evidence That The Minimum Wage Has Hurt Teenagers."
Climate and budgets from Coyote:
The climate modeling approach is so similar to that used by the CEA to score the stimulus that there is even a climate equivalent to the multiplier found in macro-economic models. In climate models, small amounts of warming from man-made CO2 are multiplied many-fold to catastrophic levels by hypothetical positive feedbacks, in the same way that the first-order effects of government spending are multiplied in Keynesian economic models. In both cases, while these multipliers are the single most important drivers of the models’ results, they also tend to be the most controversial assumptions. In an odd parallel, you can find both stimulus and climate debates arguing whether their multiplier is above or below one.
Saturday, July 24. 2010
In the WSJ: "Diversity and the Myth of White Privilege - America still owes a debt to its black citizens, but government programs to help all 'people of color' are unfair. They should end."
America owes no special debt to its black citizens - or to any of its citizens. If any American does not feel fortunate as hell to be here, they should depart - while bearing in mind that half the world would move here if they could. Maybe Webb, an accidental Senator (due to macaca) felt he had to say that for political purposes.
But although Webb, a Dem, does not vote in ways with which I agree, I give him credit for his thought crimes in his op-ed: He seems to believe that all Americans ought to be regarded equally in law and government regardless of the vagaries of skin tone or ethnic background. I agree with that radical postition.
The Other McCain has a more cynical, and probably more savvy, view.
Racial group differences
GM sold GMAC. Now they're buying another credit co. Why? To make subprime loans
Linda McMahon: John Galt in Skirts in Connecticut
The K-man: Beware the lame duck
How John Kerry dodges MA taxes. Hypocrite.
Vanderleun: The Voice of the Neuter is Heard Throughout the Land
SHOCKING VIDEO- What the MSM Won’t Show You From Shirley Sherrod’s Hate Speech
Hot Air:
... the answer to the White House’s needless destruction of good-paying jobs is …. let them eat unemployment claims!
Interesting Data on Increasing Pubic Employment
The authors use data for a sample of OECD countries from 1960 to 2000, and they find that, on average, the creation of 100 public jobs eliminated about 150 private-sector jobs...
Surber: Obama’s damage to Democrats
Friday, July 23. 2010
Rhee fires 226 teachers.
This is only a big deal because public school teachers are so often unionized. Pre-teachers unions, they were professionals - meaning that their work was subject to their own conscience, honor, best reasonable effort, etc., - and the judgement of those paying the salary. Today, only private school teachers can be regarded as true professionals, even though I acknowledge the vast numbers of utterly dedicated public school teachers (including many who bemoan the industrialization of their chosen field).
Why should teachers get tenure anyway? Nobody else does, not even pastors.
As in the post below about medical insurance, teaching should be opened up. Throw out those worthless teaching degrees and let the marketplace decide. I'd bet there are plenty of retired guys who would love to teach math or literature or history, and could do a better job than kids just out of their education degrees.
The best English teacher two of my kids had (in private school) was a retired Sports Illustrated writer and editor. He knew his way around choice of words and the construction of sentences, but the "idea" and the "image" were keys. Essay structure had to be perfect, Francis Bacon-style.
And with grammar, he would have ripped my posts to shreds (but I "fly casual" at Maggie's, conversational English - and it is a relief for me to do so).
An expert’s review of “The Internet And The Organization Of Innovation” from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) casts light on the Rasmussen poll that “75% Say Free Markets Better Than Government Management of Economy, Political Class Disagrees.”
The Rasmussen survey, by contrast to the 75% of Likely Voters who say “more competition and less regulation is better for the economy“ finds “America’s Political Class is far less enamored with the virtues of a free market. In fact, Political Class voters [“the clique that revolves around Washington, DC, and Wall Street”] narrowly prefer a government managed economy over free markets by a 44% to 37% margin.”
Professor Shane Greenstein, Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management examines the origins and development of the Internet.
From a synopsis provided by NBER, he “uses the example of the creation of the internet to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of two distinct ways of organizing a long-term program for accumulating innovation.”
One approach, which characterized the early development of the internet, relies on autonomous research institutions ("skunk works") to organize and nurture innovators. The other, which has applied more recently, relies on commercial markets to aggregate dispersed initiatives from a wide array of entrepreneurial participants.
The "skunk works" approach runs the risk that innovation will veer into areas where there is no demand, and thus no economic value. The pre-commercial Internet avoided some of those dangers because the participants in that phase of the internet assessed value from their own experiences. Their managers, in turn, nurtured them and permitted experimentation to blossom -- leading to useful and innovative applications, such as e-mail and packet switching. In addition, the Department of Defense and the National Science Foundation (NSF) played a pivotal role as "demanders" for innovation. Their substantial funding of research institutions, and their distributed investments to universities, supported the innovative activity that led to the breakthrough technologies that underlie today's Internet. This "skunk works" approach, however, restricted participation and truncated experimentation by excluding innovation along lines that did not support the "acceptable use" requirements of the government agencies. Such restrictions limited learning to an artificially narrow range of issues, and left a wide array of other applications untouched.
In contrast to the early "skunk works" days, the more recent commercial era of the Internet has played to the strength of market-based innovation. It has permitted decentralized exploration from commercial firms facing a wide array of incentives and a wide variety of circumstances. Once released to commercial interests, the Internet became the springboard for a dizzying array of applications that were not envisioned by the sponsoring government agencies. These applications include the World Wide Web and its associated browsing technology.
In other words, government funding or direction of basic research or new programs may be useful and in some cases critical but further development of useful applications, adaptation, and wider spread acceptance and utility are best the province of free enterprise, or as Greenstein calls it "market-oriented and widely distributed investment and adoption."
Instead, in most government programs, the initial laws enacted that seek to foster or enlarge reform or innovation are too often crafted with further government controls in mind or as ignored unintended consequences due to hidden agendas. Not unintended but usually hidden is the self-serving enrichment and enlarged sway of the political class. If initiatives have any validity, they are still often more dangerous than presented just by not being geared to a hand-off to the private sector to adjust and improve but to enlarge the power of the political class while – by the nature of government programs – hindering transparent review and adaptive innovation.
Even in the case of the Internet, as complex and involved in most aspects of business and individual lives as healthcare, if left in the hands of the centralized “skunk works” we wouldn’t have seen the developments we enjoy today. In the case of other government programs, like ObamaCare as one of the worst instances, the clear objectives and consequences are nationalization of close to 20% of the economy and 100% of our lives, and even more stultifying – indeed deadly - to free market development of improved access, delivery and economics.
Hot Air is currently running a video clip of Glenn Beck and his studio guy listening to a Keith Olbermann MSNBC rant and yucking it up. There's nothing particularly hilarious said, but it's always fun seeing celebs hang out off-camera.
But what's notable about the clip doesn't have anything to do with Beck, but with one brief clause Olby spits out during his tirade.
Scenario:
You're an ardent liberal. Keith Olbermann is a god amongst men, perhaps the only man alive with the courage to tell it like it really is.
You believe every word he says.
Shall we run over that check list one more time?
The howling fools of the far right — Check!
The stand-aside pathetic bureaucrats of the Dept. of Agriculture — Check!
The whole of the cowering media, MSNBC included — Check!
(wow, this Olbermann guy is fearless!) — Check!
The whole of the government — Check!
This self-defeatingly above-it-all president — Che-
Wait — WTF?? What did he say?
But this is Keith Olbermann speaking, a god amongst men. You said so yourself.
Ergo it must be true.
The next time you hear some righty screaming for Olby's head, bear in mind the old expression useful idiots. Ol' Keith is doing a superb job.
Via Surber:
“The real problem with JournoList is that much of it consisted of exchanges among people who worked for institutions about how to best hijack their employers for the cause of Progressivism.
Breitbart on Breitbart
Examiner: Failure is success for Obama fans
Onward Toward an Entitlement Society
Quinnipiac Poll: Obama Would Lose to 'Unnamed Republican'
Powerline: Get your hand out of my shower
Liberal Tax Revolt - Some Democrats decide they prefer lower rates. Obama isn't one of them. Jerrold Nadler?!?!?
Why do some (supposedly) smart liberals have so much trouble with the mere expression of conservative ideas?*
How Diversity Punishes Asians, Poor Whites and Lots of Others
Am Thinker: Of Course Obama's a Socialist
Democrats pull plug on climate bill
Tiger:
Once again, the Obama administration proposes to increase the risks to businesses that might, some day, want to hire somebody. Because no pay is better than theoretically unequal pay. Perhaps related: A slide deck of economic ugliness.
Thursday, July 22. 2010
 Ever hear of Bikini Ideology? Sounds like envy to me.
What's next in space?
Chesterton on the Three Stages of Conversion (h/t Anchoress)
Oakland allows industrial-scale marijuana farms. Groovy, dude. As if CA didn't have enough stoners.
Poll: Faith in Social Security system tanking
Jobless Giving Up on Obama Economy
Rasmussen: Paul up 8 in Kentucky
Limbaugh responds to JournoList death wish report
AL GORE SEX SCANDAL SHOCKER, POLICE INVESTIGATE TWO MORE! Me so horney.
It’s come to this: Some California civil servants making close to $1 million per year. Also, Oakland’s well-paid police. It's simple plunder of the hapless taxpayers.
Harsanyi: Obama's Faith in Government Force:
...progressives regard government as a moral enterprise. And in church, you gotta have faith.
Rick Moran has no friends, wants no friends. One blogger's personal profile:
...looking at this solitary lifestyle in a different light, it personifies Thoreau’s observation of a life lived in “quiet desperation.” The lack of real friendships in my life - save my lovely Zsu-Zsu who doubles as lover and nursemaid - leaves a hole in the soul that is the largest price one pays for shunning the kind of superficial relationships that pass as friendships. For by shunning all it shuts off the possibility that you will find that diamond in the rough - that “true” friend that brings intimacy without sex and closeness without the kind of cloying stickiness many sexual relationships embody. I stopped looking for that mythical beast long ago and have settled for meeting the greatest minds who ever lived in books, while playing with the ignorant savages who inhabit the more fascinating parts of the internet.
And Washington Reb talks about his view of the world:
I grew up in a time and place where a man had to prove himself. Pretty? No one cared. 'Can you roof a house?' was the relevant question. Rich? Fuck you. 'Are you a man of your word?' is what persons asked about you. Smart? That's nice. 'What have you done for the town lately?' 'Are you pulling your weight?' 'Are you a proud man, or a peacock?' 'A coward, or brave?' Being 70s boys, we were smack dab in the middle between the World War II generation, and what came after. We understood what we were witnessing, though of course we've had nearly 40 years to digest it some. The basic pieces were in play then.
I have a sister who loves to remind me that I was a "hippie" then. What she failed to see then -- what she fails to see now -- is that the Left is composed of folks who are mentally ill. I don't think there's any one cause of it, but if I had to put my finger on it, I'd say they're crybaby washrags. They needed to be spanked more.
Inconvenient satellite data disappears
Also, I like this one via Powerline:
ERIC ALTERMAN, AUTHOR, WHAT LIBERAL MEDIA?: Fucking Nascar retards...
Wednesday, July 21. 2010
"Now it is only tactical."
Maybe Leftism really is a mental illness. I have always regarded that claim as hyperbole, while acknowledging the totalitarian impulses implicit in "Progressivism."
"Who are these people?", as a snobby pal often says in his obnoxious way. But really, who do these people think they are? And why do they think they are better or smarter than me? I do not want to control them, so why do they want to control what I do or read or think? It is strange.
He says:
Sean Hannity says that journalism died in 2008, when the mainstream media discarded even the pretense of professionalism and objectivity for the sake of installing an unqualified, ultra-radical community organizer in the White House.
Insty's link says it has some, but I very much doubt it. Internet legs maybe, but does anybody expect the MSM itself to take on an expose of itself?
This is like Climategate - just some silly emails. Isn't it?
Add: What a fine "conversation about race" the country is having. I want people to shut up about race. It's a dumb topic. I see no improvement in the level of political discourse.
Tuesday, July 20. 2010
Congressional intent and judicial interpretation of the first amendment may conflict. Two recent examples:
The US Senate just passed by unanimous consent the Securing the Protection of our Enduring and Established Constitutional Heritage Act, HR 2765 (SPEECH Act). It is expected to pass the House. There’s little reason that the president shouldn’t sign off.
My good friend Rachel Ehrenfeld, doughty immigrant that she is, took our Constitution to heart and waged an at first solitary campaign to restrict “libel tourism” when she was its victim for a book she’d written exposing the enemy-funding financial dealings of a wealthy Arab. She acquired powerful allies, across the political spectrum, until New York State passed a law that required judgments in foreign courts where our level of free speech protections do not rule to meet US standards in order to be enforced in the US.
Below the fold is Rachel’s press release. Here are the AP and here the AFP news reports.
In past conversations with Rachel I’ve had some concerns about how US standards of free speech may be interpreted by the courts. Those in positions to know, she says, feel US standards of libel are well-enough defined so there’s confidence in prevailing without undue blockage of the Congressional intent. So be it to see.
Continue reading "Free Speech Limits?: Libel Tourism And Stolen Valor"
The story is being posted all over. This bit at Surber's post:
Nixon had his White House Plumbers.
Obama has his JournoList.
And yes, Obama’s campaign coordinated this. Three-quarters of a billion dollars buys a lot of people, although not all of these schleps had to be bribed.
Hey remember Michael Corleone’s line to Tom Hagen: “Don’t we have some reporters on our payroll?”
Wish I had time to discuss today, but I don't.
 All the docs are passing around this article from the CSM. "In a landmark Idaho case, the Justice Department forced a group of doctors to accept government price controls."
Is it illegal collusion for docs to pass it around?
Mad Men vs. Breaking Bad
Bad news: Racist USDA Hack Speaks With NAACP
Going after the rich again. Jules
Unions hire nonunion pickets to protest nonunion jobs
Insty: HOW WE GOT A FINANCIAL CRISIS
Kaus interviewed at Reason on unions and immigration
Gateway: Racist Latino Group Harasses Tea Party: “You’re Too White. Go Back to Europe.”
Applebaum: Americans want big government
Laser used to shoot down planes
WSJ: Lost in Taxation - The IRS's vast new ObamaCare powers.
A new luxury mall in Gaza
Government-funded jobs training does no good
Haiti's real problem
Samuelson: As Massachusetts health 'reform' goes, so could go Obamacare
Via Scott at Powerline:
It is extraordinary, and I think unprecedented, that a free press has voluntarily transformed itself into something not very different from the controlled press in an undemocratic country. But that is what has happened. There are, to be sure, alternative sources of information and commentary in the US for anyone who seeks them out. (There are often such sources in undemocratic countries as well: foreign broadcasts, "underground" or samizdat circulation, and so on.) But the mainline, and still collectively very powerful, media are overwhelmingly a One-Party media. It needs to be said plainly.
Monday, July 19. 2010
They may be, but nobody else is.
Off topic, but these are fine smokes. Ashton Lonsdales:
Some Ashton reviews here (including that one, which is not just for breakfast).
According to this, the problem with Israel’s PR is that it focuses on explaining and, when supported by facts, apologizing. For some, it may come off as whining. And, it is less effective than should be.
It fails to impress, convince or, even, penetrate many educated people, whose antagonism or skepticism toward Israel is entrenched.
The problem: Most believe they are well-informed about Israel, even when not, and are poorly informed about Israel’s enemies. When exposed, however, not to Israel’s side of the story but to the foes’ own words and actions, Eureka! Most of these Western antagonists or skeptics are shocked, enlightened and wonder how Israel can deal with such rigidly violent anti-Western forces so far from our norms of thinking and conduct except by Israel itself being resolute and willing to take the measures necessary in defense, including preemptively.
There’s much truth in this analysis.
Continue reading "Jewish Man Bites Dog"
Video: Eagle throws goat off cliff (h/t, Linkiest)
The horror of the DC earthquake
'Socially Judicious’ Art Ed?
Shopping centre bosses approve 'Asian squat toilets' following cultural awareness course
It's the same old Russia: In ruling on artistic expression, some Russians see signs of broader crackdown
VDH and Pralph Peters on immigration: America's Fight
VDH on the wealthy Lib elite. It's noblesse oblige.
Times Glad 'Wide-Eyed Admiration' for Wall Street Is Over
WSJ: Angling for Harry Reid - Why the tea party favorite thinks voters will reject the attacks on her views and help her topple the Senate majority leader.
Carpe: Increased Worker Productivity Has Destroyed Millions of Jobs, and We Should Be Grateful
NYT finally admits trickle-down works
Double Dip Discussion
Rights and responsibilities: England has forgotten the latter
Administration concedes that HCR insurance mandate is a tax
Powerline:
Scott Rasmussen finds that only 23 percent of voters believe that "the federal government today has the consent of the governed." A remarkable 62 percent of voters say that our government does not enjoy that consent.
How can this be...?
Fernadez on the Codavilla essay
Bollinger is crazy. And at Pajamas:
Wrong, Mr. Bollinger: academic freedom has in fact been drastically compromised by government funding. The same would, of course, happen with media.
More Millennials Need to Work at McDonalds
Death of the European Dream:
In Spain, almost everyone is ‘not in education or employment.’ It’s the end of the job for life.
VAT Attack! Will business go for it?
Coyote at Forbes:
ObamaCare creates a powerful incentive for the government to interfere in key decisions about our bodies and health.
Nap time and public employee unions
Sunday, July 18. 2010
Penn and Teller interviewed. They are not friends.
AVI begins:
Why is it the folks who are most suspicious of nationalism want to nationalise everything?
From Kristol's Yes, A Period of Consequences - The time for evasion is over.
We’ve allowed—nay, in many cases encouraged—our government to become unlimited in its goals, bloated in its size, and arbitrary in its action. In this respect Obama-care is more the culmination of decades of policy-making than a deviation from them. We’ve indulged in the fatal conceit that we can ask the state to attend to all our cares and invite the government to correct all our perceived problems, without considering either the counterproductive practical consequences ...
Via Thompson's It Pays To Be Unobvious:
In many arts subjects, especially those tethered only loosely to evidence, logic or practical verification, there’s often pressure to avoid the obvious and prosaic, even when the obvious and prosaic is true.
Noonan: Youth Has Outlived Its Usefulness
American politics is desperately in need of adult supervision.
Libs feel we have too much freedom and too many choices. Self-anointed elites want to chose for us. That is not, in my opinion, an American view of life. See Waiting for the Revolution:
Angelo M. Codevilla wonders how long two-thirds of America can possibly be ruled by a well-entrenched elitist third.
One quote from Codevilla:
The polls tell us that only about a fifth of Americans trust the government to do the right thing. The rest expect that it will do more harm than good and are no longer afraid to say so.
While Europeans are accustomed to being ruled by presumed betters whom they distrust, the American people's realization of being ruled like Europeans shocked this country into well nigh revolutionary attitudes.
America does not do the "betters" thing.
Saturday, July 17. 2010
My a/c is turned off. Who is inspired during these dog days? Let's see...
Slow down and think when you read. Whenever I do that, I fall asleep. It's my ADD.
S'fumato? That's Italian.
Villainous: Narcissism and the Counterfeit Life
Financial "reform" - Yet another exercise in stimulating the Washington, DC economy.
The monotony of the ruling class:
Differences between Bushes, Clintons, and Obamas are of degree, not kind. Moreover, 2009-10 establishment Republicans sought only to modify the government's agenda while showing eagerness to join the Democrats in new grand schemes, if only they were allowed to. Sen. Orrin Hatch continued dreaming of being Ted Kennedy, while Lindsey Graham set aside what is true or false about "global warming" for the sake of getting on the right side of history. No prominent Republican challenged the ruling class's continued claim of superior insight, nor its denigration of the American people as irritable children who must learn their place. The Republican Party did not disparage the ruling class, because most of its officials are or would like to be part of it.
Never has there been so little diversity within America's upper crust.
NYC vs. London: New York is missing a once-in-a-generation opportunity to seize a competitive advantage.
AGW isn't killing Polar Bears, but the heat is killing illegals. Pathetic. Why can't Mexico create jobs?
Megan: Does Regulatory Risk Matter? Of course it does.
Small businesses are going to have lots of fun figuring out this bs
The descent of the NAACP. Typical of what happens to non-profits when their work is done. They try to stay alive.
More on kids without summer jobs
Pat Condell is not pleased by the ground zero mosque. It is, indeed, triumphalist - and intended to be.
Your lunch today, h/t Theo:
Don't let your kids join a 4-H club
Montana update: Which Sex Position Will Your Kid Learn? Start 'em young. The front seats of a Ram pick-up with the big stick shift present all sorts of gymnastic challenges.
Oops. NAACP Forgot to Scrub Their Rally Video With Farrakhan Before They Started Pointing Fingers at Tea Party Patriots (VIDEO) …Update: Rev. Wright Too. That Farrakhan is so silly.
Related, Chantrill is sick of Liberal racist politics
Fed's turn-around sends the dollar tumbling. There is a problem. I tend to agree with Ace about the 2012 GOP nominee
Obama analyzed and integrated Einstein's theory of relativity, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, as well as the concept of curved space as an alternative to gravity, for a Law Review article that Tribe wrote titled,"The Curvature of Constitutional Space."
Amateurs should never play with curved space-time.
Next thing, they'll make us license our gardens. Authoritarians Target Our Bellies
Friday, July 16. 2010
 Here's proof: I, the world-famous Founder and Editor of this here popular knuckledragger website, am not on the speaker list for the November post-midterm cruise.
I double-checked, just to make sure my picture wasn't there. Nope, wasn't there.
Oh well, no matter. That's poachin' season anyway, so I'll be busy.
If by any chance I decide to show up on my own nickel at the last moment, say hello. I'll be the big fellow in the camo with the plastic turkey superglued to my right hand by Mrs. BD last month, to slow down my drinkin.
Centrist as we are, would they invite me to speak if I added a bow tie to my November cruise attire I am wearing in my photo? I have the outline of my talk all ready to go.
Or should I go totally macho, and wear my Lily trousers? Country club camo. Only a real man can wear their cool stuff, but I doubt they have my waist size at the shop at Sea Island.
 VDH nails it, from our link last night to The Psychology of Recession. It is what I am hearing from everybody on Main St. around here. One quote to encourage reading of his post:
Obama, past and present, seems always to talk of how someone else’s money should be spent, dispersed, and redistributed, but never to worry about how it can be made in the first place.
So, fairly or not, when the president talks, business people do not gain confidence that he knows, or cares, much about them or what they do. If he thinks even surgeons are greedy profiteers, who then escapes presidential disdain?
Rainbow ponies do not create jobs or careers. Politicians can create temporary make-work - with our money and our kids' money - but that's all.
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