SEEN ON CHURCH MESSAGE BOARDS during a recent day trip around Virginia:

Prayer – the original wireless

Eternity is a long time to pay for a mistake

I would only add that in politics, 2 years is an eternity.

I DO THINK, at some point, you’ve done enough damage.

THE SHARKS ARE CIRCLING: ”What's clear right now is that the president who claimed to be the personification of a world-historical moment has clearly misread his mandate, the mood and the moment. He's lost at sea, and not even a bigger boat will save him.”

THE BEATINGS WILL CONTINUE until the market improves.

DOES ANYBODY IN WASHINGTON DC have a lick of common sense?



The PowerLine post is here.

UPDATE: Read the PowerLine post. I think the answer has to be no common sense, but plenty of vindictiveness.

IT IS NOW SAFE TO SAY that the average New York Times columnist is not as smart as the average American.

IS IT MY IMAGINATION, or does Lisa Murkowski look like she feels entitled to be Senator in the news photos?

ILLEGAL ALIENS are now “probationary citizens.” Actually I think it would be more accurate to describe them as “probationary Democrats.”

EMPHASIS ON “WAS” -- but it will change back to "is" starting in November.

DAY TRIP: We took a day trip through Virginia’s northern neck between the Rappahannock and Potomac rivers from Fredericksburg to the Chesapeake Bay. The area is rural; small towns, farming, and fishing. Along the way we saw these signs: “Remember the Tea Party” along the highway. “Please watch Glenn Beck” in someone’s front yard. And in the small town of Lively, “Tea Party meets second and fourth Sundays every month” were posted around the community center in the center of town. Returning home, a "November is coming" sign appeared on the Prince William Parkway near our home.

Virginia, particularly rural Virginia, is unhappy. I suspect that many voters are beginning to realize that the “stimulus” was directed to urban America – “inside the Beltway” as it were.

USED CAR PRICES skyrocket a year after Cash for Clunkers. “[T]he White House spent $3 billion to make used cars more expensive for working-class families. Nice work.”

I knew I was right not to turn in my truck.

WHY DOESN’T THE MEDIA report on liberal talk show lunacy?

Easy. No one listens to liberal talk shows.

INCOMPETENCE: the change you were hoping for.

AND THIS GUY’S ON OUR SIDE? "We tend to forget, in the West, that the United States has more Muslim blood on its hands than Al Qaeda has on its hands of innocent non-Muslims," said Imam Fiesal Abdul Rauf ....

YOUR LOCAL GOVERNMENT au pair (nanny).

MORE VICTOR DAVIS HANSON: America - compared to what?

'WE’RE NOT THE OTHER GUYS' isn't good enough this year. “Today, most Americans are ready as never before to shrink government and stop the spending madness.”

I RECOMMEND a hammer.

SIX-MONTH GULF DRILLING MORATORIUM was necessary “because the MMS [Minerals & Mining Service, the Interior Department regulatory agency] cannot be trusted to regulate.”

IF YOU DON’T TEAR UP, you aren’t human.

IN PHILADELPHIA, a blogger’s tip jar requires a business license?

TO TELL WHICH KIND OF REPUBLICAN A CANDIDATE IS, see how the Democrats attack him. If he’s branded a shill for Wall Street, he’s from the K Street wing. If he’s labeled an extremist outside the mainstream, he’s a Tea Partier.

CAPTURING RAIN is against the law?

CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN: Millions in federal grants go to former employers of Obama administration officials.

You expected something different?

WHAT IF THEY OFFERED GOVERNMENT-SUBSIDIZED INSURANCE and (almost) nobody came?

SEEN ON THE WEB: “Vote Democrat ... ‘ cause Freedom is just plain overrated.”

HOWARD DEAN: I can’t shake the feeling that Obama’s advisors are out of touch with the country. From the former chair of the Democratic National Committee, no less.

DILBERT’S SCOTT ADAMS on green housing, common sense, and unintended consequences.

And, oh by the way, he’s right.

THE ECONOMY’S IMPROVING ...



... isn’t it? The video is here.

MY FUTURE MAY BE UNCERTAIN, but whatever happens, I’ll plan to be in charge of my own destiny. I won’t be looking to a “lightbringer” or “messiah” or “The One” to solve my problems, fill up my gas tank, or stock my pantry. Despite what the Marxists at the highest echelons of government would like you to believe, hard work and resourcefulness — not reliance on government handouts paid for by other taxpayers — are the hallmarks of America’s success. Far be it from me to break from this hallowed tradition.

BINGO! Business success helps society more than philanthropy. Money quote: “Think about it for a moment: Can you point to a single charitable accomplishment that has been as transformative as, say, the cell phone or the birth-control pill? To the contrary, the literature on philanthropy is riddled with examples of failure ....”

Link from Instapundit.

REWRITING HISTORY: DNC pulls Big Choices (anti-Bush) ad from YouTube. Notice, though, that the video still shows on the banner touting other videos.


From the comments: “Thats what I like about the intertubes. You can easily correct an error and no one ever knows!” Except that they can’t.

My post is (er, was) here.

UNCOMMON KNOWLEDGE interviews Dr. Thomas Sowell. It’s long (36:33) but worth every second. Some highlights:

Many of the great disasters of our time have been committed by “experts.” (00:55)

Engineers and scientists are not intellectuals (thank God!); they’re productive. (01:35)

The statistics that the intelligensia keep citing are much more consistent with their vision of America than the statistics they keep ignoring. (07:35)

One can become President with no contact with economic reality. (18:30)

[On gun control] In Britian, they have made burglary a safe occupation. It’s like OSHA for burglars. (23:00)

[What would you say to Obama’s Cabinet?] I would only one word, “goodbye,” because I know that there’s no point talking to them. (35:35)

His book is Intellectuals and Society.

CLASS ACT: W, the video.



Thanks, Don Surber.

TRANSPARENCY! Teachers union threatens to boycott the Los Angeles Times for reporting on teacher performance.

This from a union that won’t let the school system fire poor teachers.

BACK TO THE FUTURE PAST. This is getting old.



Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think Bush -- any Bush -- is running for office this year.

THE GREAT ENIGMA OF OUR POSTMODERN AGE is how American society grew so wealthy and free to create so many residents that became so angry at the conditions that have made them so privileged —

Read it all.

PANIC AT THE WHITE HOUSE: ObamaCare isn’t what it used to be. Follow the link to the PowerPoint presentation.

MUSLIMS, NOT AMERICANS, are religious bigots.

BIG GOVERNMENT has become a big, waddling, sluggish beast, ever ready to boss you around, but not able to perform useful functions at anything but a plodding pace.

THE RIGHT TO LIE: Ninth Circuit says it exists. So – the First Amendment allows me to lie in court?

OUCH! “a cackle of rads.” And, no, Palin isn’t describing the cast of The View.

TIME MAGAZINE: ‘Hate speech’ against Muslims rising because, uh, we say so.

Typical liberals: if it offends my refined sensibilities, it must be hate speech since I cannot be wrong.

A MACHIAVELLIAN MOMENT for the Left.

They’re journalists! So I expect them to be wanna-be politicians, operatives, activists, and spokesmen for the Left.

WHO’S EXTREME?



Linked from Hot Air.

PLEASE, no more teachable moments.

GAY MARRIAGE “BAN.” Gay activists (and much of the legacy media) argue that restricting marriage licenses to heterosexual couples is a “ban on gay marriage.” But ...

Calling the law a "ban" says its only purpose is to discriminate against homosexuals. By this reasoning, any law or policy that defines something is a "ban."

But a license to practice law or medicine is not a "ban" on those without law or medical degrees. It is recognition of the holder's qualifications. A state's requirements for a driver's license are not a "ban" on the underaged or the untrained.

Marriage as the union of a man and a woman predates all other human institutions. It was not created to annoy homosexuals. Marriage laws exclude all but one man and one unrelated woman. Yet I have not seen any media report the demise of the "incest ban," or the "polygamy ban" or the "bestiality ban." Just because homosexual activists have led the assault is not an excuse to pretend that marriage has only the purpose of excluding them.

The analogy is imperfect, obviously, but an interesting contrarian perspective nonetheless.

DOUBLE STANDARDS. Michelle Malkin points out that Democrats critical of Connecticut Republican senatorial candidate Linda McMahon’s connection to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) weren’t so punctilious in 2008.

Well, let’s see. If the right can be demonized for WWE, then surely the left won’t object to being demonized for the gratuitous violence, porn sex, general immorality, ... , of Hollywood.

REVOKE KRUGMAN’S PHD! And his Nobel prize.

Linked from Instapundit.

CUT THE DEFICIT without cutting services. It’s a start, but I want to see services and personnel cut as well. Cut dramatically. And no more nonsense about laying off policemen, firemen, and teachers. Cut the bureaucrats, red-tape specialists, regulators, planners, nannies, and other “service providers.”

UPDATE: a small sign of progress; government (local, state, and federal) laid off 202,000.

TEN THOUGHTS on Obama's iftar speech.

Obama -- the man who would be King.

ARE BIGGER HEALTH-CARE NETWORKS BETTER or just creating a monopoly?

Neither. ObamaCare’s “Accountable Care Organization” is just another name for the failed HMO concept.

Read the article carefully and note yet another case where the patient is last on the priority list ....

FIXING EDUCATION: Will we ever learn?

Probably not.

WHEN LIFE HANDS YOU A LEMON, rewrite history to make it a bowl of cherries.

Linked from Instapundit. My post is here.

THE NEW ABNORMAL: “is becoming a big part of the Democrats’ pre-election spin. Americans are supposed to accept their reduced standard of living and shrunken economy. They should lift their watery eyes in gratitude to the noble Democrat Party, which won’t let any semblance of fiscal responsibility stop them from looting the future ....”

Read it all.

HELP ME, OBI-WAN KENOBI: Mosque supporters beg George W. Bush to come to Obama's rescue.

Read the comments.

More here.

THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT: the citizen class is reasserting its power over the ruling class. “Participants have emerged for one reason only: They know in their hearts and they feel in their souls the unalienable rights endowed by their Creator - life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. At the same time, Tea Partiers sense that our present government seems increasingly antithetical toward these natural rights, and a threatening enmity exists.”

ADMINISTRATIVE BLOAT: The real reason for high costs in higher education.

My only quibble is that the article is too narrow. The same can be said for almost any publicly-funded (read Government) entity.

NEVER MIND THE POLAR BEARS, I’m having a little trouble with having a “Center for Health and Global Environment” at a medical school.

DISENGAGEMENT:a lesson for today.

THERE ARE DEATH PANELS. “The solution ... is to undermine the pharmaceutical companies' profitability and eventually put them out of business, so they can't keep inventing cures society can't afford (in the comments).

GROUND ZERO MOSQUE reality check by Bill Whittle.

OBAMA’S ENDGAME: a look at the national debt.



And you can vote on this weeks cuts from the Republicans’ YouCut Project here.

I HOPE SHE INVESTIGATES HARRY REID: Pelosi calls for investigation of WTC mosque opposition.

DISMANTLING AMERICA: Thomas Sowell comments: “The Constitution was not only a challenge to the despotic governments of its time, it has been a continuing challenge-- to this day-- to all those who think that ordinary people should be ruled by their betters, whether an elite of blood, or of books or of whatever else gives people a puffed-up sense of importance.”

JOIN ‘TEAM PELOSI:’ Make it ‘Team Anyone-But-Pelosi' and I’ll consider it.

COMMON SENSE: cops, crime, and the economy.

HAS THE WHITE HOUSE used the government's power to propagandize for political gain?

I’m not sure how seriously to take this report as I’m certain that it has happened in previous administrations. However, it is certainly much more brazen under the Obama administration, and I have to wonder if that brazenness isn’t a significant contributing factor to the plunge in popularity in the polls.

LIBERAL discovers economics. There may be hope yet.

BENCHED.

Less than a year ago, top Republican Party officials boasted of an all-star lineup of experienced candidates poised to breeze through their Senate primary elections and put the hurt on vulnerable Democrats in November. The roster included Charlie Crist in Florida, Jane Norton in Colorado, Trey Grayson in Kentucky, Rob Simmons in Connecticut and Sue Lowden in Nevada.

After [August 10th]'s primary votes, not one member of the dream team will be the Republican nominee in November.

Let’s hope the Republican Party got the message.

THE GULF RECOVERY Obama doesn’t want to see.

If the President really wanted to see the economic damage his policies are causing in the Gulf, he could first stop in Pascagoula, Miss., where idle oil rigs in the Signal International shipyard have formed an eerie floating ghost city that locals have dubbed “Rig Row.” Instead of being deployed at sea where they could be creating wealth for this country and jobs for Gulf residents, these rigs are wasting away idly in port as a direct result of President Obama’s oil drilling moratorium – a moratorium that when first issued on just deep sea rigs, a federal judge ruled was “arbitrary and capricious.” Undaunted, the Obama administration doubled down, issuing a broader oil drilling injunction that is killing even more jobs than the first ban.

Of course not; there are no good campaign visuals.

RASMUSSEN: sixty percent say repeal Obamacare.

NOT LOOKING TOO GOOD. Hypocrisy never does.

As chairman and chief executive of OneUnited Bank, Kevin L. Cohee has sought to build a company that is about more than just money. He promoted the bank, now at the center of a House ethics case against Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), as a uniquely responsible investor in impoverished minority communities and urged prospective clients to live modestly.

Customers ought to focus on "real connections, real relationships," Cohee urges in a recording on the bank's Web site. Avoid "people who want to be with you based on the things that you have."

"Do you really need a Mercedes-Benz?" he asks. "Houses don't make you, cars don't make you."

Cohee, 52, took a somewhat different view in his own life. His bank bought or leased luxury real estate he used and, until federal regulators complained in 2008, paid for his Porsche. Cohee's East Coast spread was an $880,000 condominium on Miami Beach's Ocean Drive, and out west the bank leased a $26,500-a-month mansion for him on Palisades Beach Road in Santa Monica, Calif., owned by Bruce Springsteen's drummer, Max Weinberg.

Maxine Waters needs to choose her “friends” more carefully.

EITHER YOU ARE WITH THE PRESIDENT, NANCY PELOSI AND HARRY REID, or you are against them. Vote accordingly, in every race for every office.

IN THE COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS, your improved chance of living may not be worth $8,000 a month.

But there will be no “death panels.”

SURPRISE! Liberals discover the Obama administration is thin-skinned.

It hurts when the table is turned on them.

“PICTURE A SATURDAY MORNING during one of those endless summers of the late 1950s and early '60s. A boy climbs on his red Schwinn bicycle and rides like the wind to the public library, then to several drugstores and thrift shops. He is on a mission. He is looking desperately for a book, any book, by Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988), the greatest science-fiction writer in the world.”

My bicycle wasn’t red, but other than that, the paragraph is accurate. His science fiction was probably the single greatest influence on my decision to become a scientist/engineer.

A THOUGHT ON PROGRESSIVISM AND THE NANNY STATE: Visiting the Great Smoky Mountains National Park a few weeks ago, we had the unique opportunity to experience a key failure on our Honda Pilot at a scenic view site deep in the park. Yes, a key failure – in a mere 70K miles, the metal key wore away enough to be unable to engage the tumblers in the ignition lock. I’ve lost keys before; I’ve broken keys before, but I have never, ever, had a car key just plain wear out.

There was a spare key available, so all was not lost and we returned home with no problems. But here’s where it gets interesting. The broken key has one of the RFID chips embedded, and they’re neither easy -- or cheap – to replace. It requires an electronic reader/writer to read the key ID and transfer it to the new key. Not a device you typically find at the nearest Tru-Value hardware store.

The Honda dealership wanted $200 for a new key; they also wanted the car, auto registration, and a driver’s license before they’d replace it. I found another locksmith who just wanted (a lot less) money.

And that got me thinking about the Progressive’s nirvana.

Suppose I didn’t have a replacement key and had to call Roadside Assistance, who might have to call the police to verify the car wasn’t stolen; the police again to verify there are no any outstanding tickets or warrants against the driver; the DMV to verify the title and lienholder; the bank to ensure the auto loan is current; the insurance company to verify the auto insurance is in force; the State to verify that all taxes and fees are paid; Electronic Health Records to verify recent physical and eye exams; the pharmacy to verify prescriptions are current and don’t interfere with driving; and ... finally ... authorize a Government-certified locksmith to replace the key.

Did I miss anything?

OBESITY: the bright side.

WILL BARACK OBAMA BE A ONE-TERM PRESIDENT? Yes, he might last that long.

IT’S OUR FAULT HE FAILED. “What doomed Obama politically was the way he dealt with the financial crisis in the first six months of his presidency.... [H]e allowed the right wing to define the terms.”

Excuses, excuses.

Linked from Hot Air.

PROPERTY “RIGHTS” IN NEW YORK: another case of misuse of eminent domain.

BUILDING DIALOG (last Twitter item).

EXCELLENT QUESTION: "How do you screw up so titanically that even an opposition held in disgrace as recently as two years ago starts to look good by comparison?"

DEEP THOUGHT: "Yes, the 9/11 attacks were horrific, but they were more about optics than actual harm. The economy was already taking a hit before the Twin Towers fell. The reaction of the nation to seeing two major buildings in New York fall on T.V. has boosted the attack out of proportion."

And they wonder why we think they're irrational.

SIXTY PERCENT OF CURRENT WORKERS believe they’ll never see a dime from Social Security.

Hopefully they’re right and that Social Security will have been privatized by the time they reach retirement age. They’ll get a much better deal than I’ll get in just over 3 months.

THE LEFT IS unpopular, undisciplined and ill-tempered.

BACKING AWAY: "I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque [near Ground Zero." You’d think after the “beer summit” Obama would have learned to shut up.

THE RACE CARD has maxed out.

THE FEDERAL RESERVE has roughly $2 trillion of our money and is thoroughly insulated from the control of elected officials. Is this a bug or a feature?

ONLY IN AMERICA: Heartwarming. Especially the comment about “Marine English.”

WHO’D A THUNK IT? Lousy lawmakers, not low taxes, created fiscal woes.

CHARLIE RANGEL: "If I can’t get my dignity back here, then fire your best shot at getting rid of me through expulsion."

Pass the popcorn. This should get interesting in the run-up to the November elections.

BAILOUT FAVORITISM AND CRONY CAPITALISM, it turns out, are not vote-winners. Do tell.

SPECIAL INTERESTS UNDERMINE THE PUBLIC INTEREST: The public employee sector spent $40 million on lobbying in the first six months of this year -- more than health maintenance organizations, commercial banks and the defense/aerospace industry combined.

More reason to dramatically scale back the power of government.

ELITE COLLEGES FAIL; legacy media notices.

PATRIOT TELEVISION NETWORK.



Well, there should be a Patriot television network. The link is here.

WHEN WISHFUL THINKING REPLACES THOUGHT on the “principled left” you get this kind of drivel.

NOTE: the print edition version (15 August) is at least edited.

STOP SIGN PLANTER


Persistence. The plant stem is within the post all the way from below the ground surface.

PRE-QUALIFIED POLITICIAN: She has no chance in the New York Governor’s race, but running for Congress? The Speakership is not out of the question.

An earlier interview with Reason’s Nick Gillespie is here.

RUN FROM SLAVERY



Black, white, yellow, red, pink, purple; it doesn’t matter. Run.

The link is here.

ACCORDING TO AL GORE, reality is to blame that a climate bill is not likely to pass this year.

COFFEE PARTY grows cold. Nothing tastes worse than cold coffee.

Link from Instapundit.

NOVEMBER IS COMING.


This sign was seen at the intersection of U.S. highways 29 and 33 in Ruckersville, Greene County, VA. A second sign was posted further south on U.S. 29 near Charlottesville. Returning on northbound Interstate 81 from our day trip to Natural Bridge, we saw at mile marker 233 a semi-trailer parked alongside the highway with the sign “CONGRESS REPRESENT THE PEOPLE OR GO HOME” neatly stenciled on the side.

Virginians are not happy.

DAY TRIP to Natural Bridge, Virginia. Natural Bridge, in Rockbridge County, Virginia is an arch 215 feet high with a span of 90 feet over a gorge in the mountainous limestone terrain carved out by Cedar Creek (a small tributary of the James River) It consists of horizontal limestone strata and is likely the remains of the roof of a cave through which the creek once flowed. Here’s a photo of the entrance (downstream) side of Natural Bridge.


The upstream side, after passing under the arch.


And here’s the odd thing: Natural Bridge is in fact a bridge as U.S. highway 11 goes over Cedar Creek gorge at Natural Bridge. Here’s a photo – the fence is on both sides of the highway preventing any view of the gorge, and there is no signage to indicate that one is actually on the bridge.


And finally for your amusement, this sign:


Unless I missed something in high-school physics, falling objects always come from above.

“[T]HAT’S HOW CREDIT IS SUPPOSED TO WORK: You buy something with somebody else's money and then you pay them back, typically with interest. The risk you take in borrowing helps you to make a wise decision.”

Read it all, and wish that our government factotums could read at all.

Link from Instapundit.

THEN AND NOW: “then” looks better and better.

Linked from Instapundit.

ONE OF THE BIGGEST FALLACIES OF OUR TIME is the notion that something is wrong with society if all groups are not proportionally represented in institutions, professions or income levels. The very possibility that people make their own choices, and that those choices have consequences -- for themselves and for others -- is ignored.

Read it all.

A $3.8 TRILLION TAX INCREASE is coming down the pike:

[T]he President mentioned some “plan” to do something about not raising taxes on all Americans. Um, don’t know about you, but I don’t find this general, vague promise of some “plan” all that reassuring. The Left also “plans” to do something about our out of control deficits and high unemployment, and the President “planned” for his nearly trillion dollar stimulus to keep unemployment under 8%. We’ve seen how successful that “plan” worked out. The President’s budget “plan” hasn’t worked out so well either. As the economist Bruce Bartlett explained at the time, the President’s budget – including the tax promise – was never much more than a vague statement of intent. Practically speaking, it was dead on arrival. Even Bartlett couldn’t have known how dead, though, because in the end Congress didn’t even succeed in passing a budget, let alone in taking a decision on the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts.

I’d lump it and accept the tax hike if the President assured me – in blood – that his administration and Congress would not do one damned thing – nothing; nada; zero; zilch between now and the end of his term on January 21, 2013.

MORE ON THE MAINSTREAM IMMATURE MEDIA, lying to the public, and American’s confidence in the media.

Also watch the Limbaugh video embedded at the bottom of the above-linked post.

SPEAKING OF TONE DEAF: Obama comes out in favor of allowing mosque near ground zero. He’s throwing us to the alligators in the vain hope they’ll eat him last.

Even assuming a massive repudiation in November, it will still take years – decades? – to undo the damage President Obama and the Democrats have done in a mere 18 months.

ROGER SIMON WONDERS whether Barack Obama really wants to be President.

Of course not. He wants to be King ...


... with Marie, er, Michelle Antoinette as his Queen.


Much more here.

SIDE NOTE: Why is it that I have to rely on UK newspapers to read anything about the Obamas that isn’t fawning?

“LIBERAL” and “immature” are synonyms.

THE DISTORTED PICTURE tells you all you need to know about the insanity of today’s Left. America’s biggest mistake was deinstitutionalizing the non-criminally insane in the 1970’s.

Linked from here.

VIDEO: Can you tell which of these government spending projects are real or fake?

The simple answer is the stupider it sounds, the more likely it is to be real.

AS A SOCCER FAN, I’d just like to point out that curling is more popular in the U.S. than the Obama administration.

SHED A TEAR FOR THE CLOWN. The only thing I would add to the post is an “s” at the end of clown to include the New York Times.

Mark Twain was right, but incomplete. He should have said “Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress or a journalist. But I repeat myself.”

Instapundit is right. Mock them.

HARVARD MORALITY EXPERT suspected of lying?

A RATHER ANGRY AMERICA? Victor Davis Hanson comments.

We see the arrested adolescence and hypocrisy that come from that sermonizing generation, whether in Al Franken’s puerile face-making, the ideologically driven suicide at Newsweek, the steady destruction of the New York Times, John Kerry’s tax-avoiding yacht, the Great Gatsby Clinton wedding, Michelle on the Costa del Sol, Nancy Pelosi’s jet, Tim Geithner’s tax skipping, or the constant race-card playing of a Charles Rangel and Maxine Waters. Yes, one walk across the Yale or Stanford campus circa 1975, and one could see pretty clearly what sort of culture that bunch would create when it came of age and was handed power.

In sum: “Law? There is no law other than a mandated equality of result.”

ANN COULTER: The scandal in Bell (Ca) isn't a scandal at all for the Democrats; it’s the governing strategy of the Democratic Party. Elected Democratic officials bestow ludicrous salaries and benefits packages on government employees, and, in return, public employee unions make sure the Democrats keep getting re-elected.

Sound familiar?

HUGH HEWITT: Worst President Ever?

Yes.

MICHAEL LEDEEN on Peggy Noonan on the American spirit. Ledeen summarizes thusly:

[O]ur intellectual and political leaders have no sense of the mood of the country. But that is not new. The new thing is that such types have now acquired an outrageous amount of power, and they are doing their damnedest to make us pay for our lack of adulation.

Read both articles. The national mood is not good.

WHY I’M NOW UNEMPLOYED: I didn’t have an Obama sticker on my car ....

CALIFORNIA DREAMING DYING: the Golden State’s war on itself. Everything you ever wanted to know about progressive politics in just 4 charts.

This quote from the comments is the damning indictment – and not just about California: “What were they getting for these new and higher taxes? Fewer police, more indifferent schools, but a larger group of state officials interested in annoying everyone about everything.”

Read it all. Link from Instapundit.

HE’S BAAACK: Dave Weigel, recently fired from the Washington Post for his JournoList emails, returns with ”Five myths about the ‘tea party’.” Despite his JournoList rantings, his “five myths” article is reasonably fair.

”[A] LARGELY CONSERVATIVE ELECTORATE has always wanted lower taxes, smaller but more competent government, fewer overseas commitments, honest government, and officials who live like the public they represent — and it can’t seem to find that package in any party or candidate being presented to it. Indeed, the Obama medicine is now seen as worse than the Bush disease, in that he less competently oversaw the war in Afghanistan, blew apart the budget, and lives more royally than any Republican.”

Victor Davis Hanson, warning Republicans and Democrats alike. Are they wise enough to take heed?

ONE CLASS ACT: George W. Bush makes surprise visit to U.S. troops. Pictures here.

Link from Instapundit.

REAL ETHNIC PROFILING: Fox’s Dr. Manny Alvarez responds to Harry Reid. Sarcasm drips from every line.

DOESN’T THE LEFT have anything better to do? One has to wonder if Homer, AK, wasn’t named after Homer Simpson.

Sarah Palin comments.

MALLARD FILLMORE on racism.


Unfortunately, far too accurate.

OBAMACARE: the sum of all fears.

[The] facts show that (a) many of the highest-profile selling points employed by the Left to drag Obamacare across the finish line were either incorrect or intentional distortions, (b) the consequences of not repealing this law are dire, and (c) the public’s enduring hostility toward Obamacare demonstrates a political appetite for repeal.

Read it all.

“THE MOST AMAZING THING about member[s] of the self-proclaimed ‘reality based community’ is just how divorced from reality they are.”

SUMMERTIME


Manassas, VA, August 11, 2010.

WHY THE CRAZY JET BLUE FLIGHT ATTENDANT is America’s new folk hero. Time argues in favor of recession stress.

I disagree; I think it’s the beginning of a sustained rebuke to the “entitled” community, precipitated in part by the stunning public arrogance of the Obama administration and its Democrat enablers.

HARRY REID: “I don’t know how anyone of Hispanic heritage could be a Republican.” That’s right. You ethnics stay on the plantation where we all-seeing, all-knowing, mostly white, “intellectuals” can take care of you.

UPDATE: Florida Republican senatorial candidate Marco Rubio, er, disagrees.

OBAMA APPROVAL INDEX matches previous record of -22. The approval index is the percentage of strong approvals less the percentage of strong disapprovals in the Rasmussen Presidential tracking poll.


In just a bit less than 19 months, the President’s approval has plunged 52 points, from a high of +30 on his second day in office to today’s record low.

Democrats who insist on following this guy are like lemmings – suicidal.

LIBERAL BLOGGER: Racism “barely materialized” in 2008 campaign. The intellectual dishonesty of the liberal mind is astounding. And the fact that the Washington Post would publish this tripe is, well, to be expected.

WHITE HOUSE ADVISERS flee as economy sinks.

"It does make one suspicious that some of these senior economic advisers know the economy may go back into recession and they are escaping before it's even more obvious," said Chris Edwards, a tax policy expert at the Cato Institute.

Ya think?

MAYBE GOVERNMENT SALARIES are a wee bit high.

But then there’s no corruption like government corruption.

DEMOCRATS WANT TO RAISE TAXES – but only on red states.

HOW TO GIVE A CAT A PILL.

Pick up cat and cradle it in the crook of your left arm as if holding a baby. Position right forefinger and thumb on either side of cat’s mouth and gently apply pressure to cheeks while holding pill in right hand. As cat opens mouth, pop pill into mouth.
Allow cat to close mouth and swallow.

Retrieve pill from floor and cat from behind sofa. Cradle cat in left arm and repeat process.

Retrieve cat from bedroom, and throw soggy pill away. Take new pill from foil wrap, cradle cat in left arm, holding rear paws tightly with left hand. Force jaws open and push pill to back of mouth with right forefinger. Hold mouth shut for a count of ten.

Retrieve pill from goldfish bowl and cat from top of wardrobe. Call spouse in from the garden. Kneel on floor with cat wedged firmly between knees, hold front and rear paws. Ignore low growls emitted by cat. Get spouse to hold head firmly with one hand while forcing wooden ruler into mouth. Drop pill down ruler and rub cat's throat vigorously.

Retrieve cat from curtain rail. Get another pill from foil wrap. Make note to buy new ruler and repair curtains. Carefully sweep shattered figurines and vases from hearth and set to one side for gluing later. Wrap cat in large towel and get spouse to lie on cat with head just visible from below armpit. Put pill in end of drinking straw, force mouth open with pencil and blow down drinking straw. Check label to make sure pill not harmful to humans and drink one beer to take taste away. Apply band-aid to spouse's forearm and remove blood from carpet with cold water and soap.

Retrieve cat from neighbour's shed. Get another pill. Open another beer. Place cat in cupboard, and close door onto neck, to leave head showing. Force mouth open with dessert spoon. Flick pill down throat with elastic band. Fetch screwdriver from garage and put cupboard door back on hinges. Drink beer. Fetch bottle of scotch. Pour shot, drink. Apply cold compress to cheek and check records for date of last tetanus shot. Apply whiskey compress to cheek to disinfect. Toss back another shot. Throw tee-shirt away and fetch new one from bedroom.

Call fire department to retrieve the damn cat from the top of the tree across the road. Apologize to neighbour who crashed into fence while swerving to avoid cat. Take last pill from foil wrap. Using heavy-duty pruning gloves from shed, tie the little *&#%^'s front paws to rear paws with garden twine and bind tightly to leg of dining table. Push pill into mouth followed by large piece of filet steak. Be rough about it. Hold head vertically and pour two pints of water down throat to wash pill down. Consume remainder of scotch. Get spouse to drive you to the emergency room. Sit quietly while doctor stitches fingers and forearm and removes pill remnants from right eye. Call furniture shop on way home to order new table.

Arrange for RSPCA to collect mutant cat from hell and call local pet shop to see if they have any hamsters.

HOW TO GIVE A DOG A PILL.

Wrap it in bacon. Toss it in the air.

IF LIFE HANDS YOU A LEMON, don’t make lemonade without a government permit.

DEMOCRATS VOTE to let tax rates rise. More here.

SO TELL US WHAT YOU REALLY THINK. “These people are idiots. Idiots who’ve been entrusted with nuclear weapons, and their economic equivalents.”

ALFONZO RACHEL GOES TO BELL (CA) to find out what its residents get in exchange for awarding their representatives with obscenely high salaries and huge property taxes.

Link via Instapundit.

THE VIEW FROM MY WINDOW


A Saturday afternoon drive through the unspoiled Virginia countryside.

HMMM. Government Motors donates government money to government employees.

Makes you feel warm and fuzzy all over ....

SWEET REVENGE.

It is election night, 2012. The polls have closed. State by state, the votes are being counted, and gradually it becomes clear, to the bottomless horror of some voters and the unbridled delight of others, that former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the Republican presidential nominee, has bested President Barack Obama in the popular vote nationwide.

In Massachusetts, where Obama crushed Palin by a landslide of 79 percent -- the most lopsidedly anti-Palin vote of any state -- "bottomless horror" doesn't begin to describe the political reaction. For in 2010, Massachusetts joined the National Popular Vote compact, making a commitment to cast all of its electoral votes for the presidential candidate receiving the most votes nationally, regardless of the results in Massachusetts. The compact took effect in December 2011, when California became the 15th state to join, thereby combining enough states to control a majority of the Electoral College. Now Massachusetts, the bluest of the blue states, must award its presidential electors to a candidate Massachusetts voters overwhelmingly opposed.

The peril of getting what you asked for.

"YOU HAVE A PERFECT ECONOMIC STORM that's hit our middle class directly in every region, every segment of this country." Its name is Obama.

"THERE’S CERTAINLY A LINK between recent stock market gains and improvement of Republicans at the polls."

PLAN? WHAT PLAN? Sarah Palin fact-checks the fact-checkers.

PolitiFact doesn’t dispute the $3.8 trillion estimate of the cost of repeal of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. It admits that “Palin’s estimate of $3.8 trillion over 10 years is within a reasonable range, if you’re talking about all taxpayers.” And yet somehow it continues to argue that I’m wrong, based on a proposal it admits doesn’t exist which in turn is based on a phantom campaign pledge which Democrats have already broken anyway.

Like Breitbart, she’ll punch back twice as hard.

WHICH ONE is the party of the rich?

Read the comments too.

RIGHT NOW, I’d put journalists below Congress (but without raising the approval rating of Congress).

SMART GRID UPDATE

Xcel Energy's SmartGridCity experiment in Boulder, Colorado ... appears now to have been a failure. [Edison Electric Institute president Thomas] Kuhn ... said it appears the problem in Boulder was that the target population was just too affluent: Despite the known green-mindedness of Boulderites, a major factor in Xcel's selecting the small city for its smart grid test run, it seems most of them do not care all that much about the modest monetary savings they stand to make from paying attention to electricity usage signals.

It looks like it’s not just those dumb Red State yokels who are going against their best interests.

Actually the consumers are going against the greenie’s perception of what the consumer’s best interest should be ... exactly the same mistake Thomas Franks made with his book What’s the Matter With Kansas?.

THE OBAMA LEARNING CURVE: Ahead of Friday's critical jobs report, a new poll finds more Americans blame President Obama than his predecessor for continued economic woes. The learning curve is beginning to have an effect.

GOVERNMENT THUGGERY: “The Justice Department has found a new way to pursue civil rights lawsuits, using the powers of the Civil Rights Division not just to win compensation for victims of alleged discrimination but also to direct large sums of money to activist groups that are not discrimination victims ....”

THE OBAMA ELITE care nothing for the “little people”.

THE ‘WHO DECIDES’ ELECTION.

ANDREW BREITBART IS A BLOGGER? In the news reports it’s been interesting to see Andrew Breitbart consistently referred to as a “conservative blogger.” And yet Brietbart owns Breitbart News; Breitbart TV; Big Hollywood; Big Government; Big Journalism, and now Big Peace.

I suppose it’s fair to say these holdings don’t constitute legacy media, but to classify Breitbart as “just a blogger”? C’mon, legacy media, grow up.

BUMMER STICKER. Understatement.

QUESTIONS, MORE QUESTIONS: Once a law is arbitrarily not enforced, all sorts of bizarre paradoxes arise ....

Read it all.

THE CONSERVATIVE SOLUTION: do it yourself.

Shame, humiliation, mockery ... it worked once. Maybe it can again.

ANTI-SEMITISM FOR ME – but not for thee. I’m, uh ... shocked?

SHIRLEY SHERROD plans to sue Andrew Breitbart? Given Breitbart’s propensity to fire back with both barrels, Sherrod might want to rethink her plans.

More here.

THE KERRY YACHT and other teachable moments: “Note how all this wealth was made: John Edwards made it summarizing personal-injury cases against doctors; Al Gore by hyping a global-warming Armageddon and then offering psychological and concrete ameliorations for it; John Kerry by marrying someone who had married someone who had inherited it. This suggests that some of the most influential of the rich Democratic elite don’t have much experience with the role of low taxes or less regulation in fostering profitable, capital-creating enterprises.”

Heh.

THE WASHINGTON POST’s Kathleen Parker thinks the JournoList flap shows a destructive 'gotcha' mentality. I think the most valuable contribution of JournoList is proof that they are immature twits.

JournoList is the liberal equivalent of the TV show “Cheers” and the JournoListers deserve an equivalent response – jeers.

LIBERALISM: Peace, love, rainbows, unicorns … and property destruction.

DREAMS. We all have ‘em ....


2012 - year of the soccer mom?

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU TRY TO TAX THE RICH: billionaires to give half their fortunes to charity. And likely not U.S. charities.

MORE: myths about taxing the rich.

EVEN MORE: Fox News chimes in with a slide show.

TAKING ON WASHINGTON



Steve Wynn is a casino resort/real-estate developer in Las Vegas. The CNBC link is here.

GOVERNMENT CAN’T STAND ENTREPENEURSHIP: Oregon county apologizes to 7-year-old girl after saying she can't have lemonade stand. Mother of Julie Murphy about city hall: “It’s gotten to the point where they need to be in all of our decisions.... They don’t trust us to make good choices on our own.”

MORE: "They don’t like lemonade in Oregon. It’s strictly a Kool Aid state."

VOLTSWAGEN: "[T]he Volt is a vanity car for the well-off that will be subsidized by less well-off taxpayers at all stages, from R&D to sales and to the construction of charging stations."

Also a new definition of a windmill: “a voltspropeller.”

PORK FOR PEASANTS: Congresswoman Michele Bachmann issued the following statement regarding next week's special House session to spend $26 billion for supposed "state aid":

Next week, Speaker Pelosi is calling the 435 Members of the House to DC next week for the purpose of spending another $26 billion we don't have. We were on a six week hiatus, and members had scattered to the four corners of the Earth.

The reason she wants to do this is because her members are in political trouble and she knows they will need the financial support of the public employee unions. This $26 billion represents a circle that works like this:

Take $26 billion away from the productive private sector, deposit it in the US Treasury. Speaker Pelosi and the Democrat majority will then vote to send the money from the Treasury to politicians across the nation.

State and local politicians then give the money to employees of public employee unions. The public employee union skims their share off the top of the worker's check first in the form of union dues. Part of the dues are funneled into the union's political action committee, which in turn will be spent on political TV, radio, Internet, and print ads, as well as union "boots on the ground."

Speaker Pelosi and President Obama have already spent $3.6 trillion on stimulus. For them, $26 billion doesn't rise to the level of a day at the beach, so why bring us all back to DC after we were scattered?

Could it be because their most loyal constituency and political foot soldiers, many of whom could be facing the never before seen horror of a government employee let go due to lack of state and local tax receipts, need to be reminded whose hand quite literally feeds them?

Spending is the least popular item on the public's mind right now, but it looks to me like this $26 billion has more to do with fully funding the union political action coffers and making sure the left's political "volunteers" get the message to get out the Democrat vote.

I've invited my House colleagues to join me on what I think will be the largest tele-townhall Congress has ever held, this Monday evening at 7pm in Washington, DC, at the exact moment Speaker Pelosi is opening her session.

We will call 1,000,000 households, tell them what the Speaker is doing, and ask the peoples' opinion on the "Cash for Democrat re-election Program".

I am also inviting anyone to join us on the call by opting in at my website, michelebachmann.com. People can weigh in with their opinions in a live interaction with members of Congress.

This is by far the gutsiest move of desperation yet seen on the part of Speaker Pelosi.

If you want to participate in the tele-townhall, you can register here.

SENATE JACKASS strikes again.

OVERLAWYERED: never let even a manufactured crisis go to waste.

BAILING OUT – OR FORCED OUT? Christina Romer, top economic adviser to President Obama, to step down.

TEA PARTY NOT REALLY RACIST BUT SO WHAT? “Tainting the tea party movement with the charge of racism is proving to be an effective strategy for Democrats. There is no evidence that tea party adherents are any more racist than other Republicans, and indeed many other Americans. But getting them to spend their time purging their ranks and having candidates distance themselves should help Democrats win in November. Having one’s opponent rebut charges of racism is far better than discussing joblessness.”

PROPOSITION 8: “[The] decision is the fruit of a lengthy process through which an elite within the legal profession has worked tirelessly in an effort to blur ... the distinction between the law and personal preferences of that elite. If the decision stands, its main impact will be a diminution, probably past the tipping point, of public confidence in the law and the courts.”

INCENTIVES ARE FOR ME, not for thee. Jacoby is too optimistic.

MOCK THEM.

THE DEVIL YOU KNOW versus the devil you don’t. It’s time to take the risk.

THE CALIFORNIA DREAM (FOR GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES) is about to expire.

More here.

MISSION CREEP: another charity victim of its own success.

ANOTHER CHERISHED MYTH CRUSHED: more public transportation, less traffic.

Link from the Washington Examiner.

TRUTH IN POLITICS: forget the noble reasons politicians give us for their regulation -- there's probably a campaign contributor who stands to get rich behind the bill.

ENGINEERING PORN from Neal Boortz. He’s right; it’s a fascinating exercise in how to build a railroad.

EXCESSIVE SAFETY can be hazardous to your health.

CONSERVATIVES ARE NOT ONLY SMARTER AND MORE PATRIOTIC THAN LIBERALS, we’re also better-looking.

IS A SUBSIDIZED PRESS A FREE PRESS? Jeff Jacoby comments.

JEFFREY KUHNER: Should Arizona secede?

I’m beginning to think that the threat may be necessary.

IT’S TIME to choose.

THE AD FROM THE DNC seeking to link the Republican Party with the (horrors!) tea party presents a 10-item "Republican Tea Party Contract on America" to “frighten the heck out of John Q. Public.” They are:

Item 1: "Repeal Health Insurance Reform."
Item 2: "Privatize Social Security or Get Rid of It."
Item 3: "End Medicare as it Presently Exists."
Item 4: "Extend the Bush Tax Breaks for the Wealthy and Big Oil."
Item 5: "Repeal Wall Street Reform."
Item 6: "Protect Those Responsible for the Oil Spill."
Item 7: "Abolish the Department of Education."
Item 8: "Abolish the Department of Energy."
Item 9: "Abolish the Environmental Protection Agency."
Item 10: "Repeal the 17th Amendment (direct election of Senators)."

Hey, getting 8 out of 10 items right ain’t bad. I’ll leave it to the reader to guess which two of the ten I might have some disagreement with.

THE LEFT: all race, all the time. “It seems that only conservatives covet living in a post-racial society.”

JUST ANOTHER DAY AT WAYS AND MEANS: Wesley Pruden on the Charlie Rangel affair.

Rep. Charles B. Rangel, who has been in Congress longer than almost anyone else, spent Thursday vainly trying to cut a deal with the House ethics committee over his presumed capital indiscretions with the tax man. Charlie is a master craftsman of congressional bonhomie, and like most of his colleagues, he imagines that rules, most of which Congress writes, apply only to the peasants.

Hopefully, he’s going to find that the peasants have pitchforks, tar, and feathers.

Read it all.

A REPUBLICAN PARTY call to action. Well said.

IT’S COME TO THIS: the case for impeachment.

AN OPEN LETTER to Democrat politicians.

WHO DOESN’T PAY TAXES: a lot of people, apparently.

Bottom Line: “We need to restore the linkage between paying at least some income tax and being a voter. Otherwise, we can run into the dreaded scenario where those who don’t pay taxes can keep voting to raise them higher and higher for those who do. That’s a prescription for economic disaster ....”

CLEAN-UP CREWS are having trouble even finding the Gulf oil spill.

Recall former BP CEO Tony Hayward’s “spill is modest, Gulf is large” comment? Maybe he was right.

UPDATE (& BUMP): What oil spill?

HOW SMART ARE WE? Not too smart, judging from the nature of our political class.

COME TO THE USA

AN END-RUN AROUND CONGRESS? Memo outlines backdoor ‘amnesty’ plan. But a U.S Citizenship and Immigration Services spokesman argued a draft memo doesn’t mean the agency has embraced the policy. That’s more than just a bit disingenuous; in my experience, a draft memo usually means the broad policy has been accepted, and the draft memo is simply about i-dotting and t-crossing.

THE GREAT DIVIDE: More about America’s “political class.”

America's Political Class is far less enamored with the virtues of a free market [than are mainstream voters]. In fact, Political Class voters narrowly prefer a government managed economy over free markets by a 44% to 37% margin.

Read the whole thing, and then follow the Michael Barone link.

MISSOURI VOTERS overwhelmingly rejected a federal mandate to purchase health insurance in a campaign to overturn the controversial health care law passed by Congress in March.

Excellent!

POOR RICH FAMILY sails the world for 8 years.

What annoys me about this (front page) article is the smugness - just ordinary rich folk taking a few years off.

FOUR YEARS, 3083 POSTS. It's hard to believe it's been that long, and that many.

Here’s the first post on Friday, August 4, 2006.

WHEN SOMEONE WHO HAS EARNED THE MEDAL OF HONOR ENTERS A ROOM, a hush follows, like waters opening. The stillness in his wake is palpable. Men are filled with more than admiration. The emotion is a mix of awe, envy and wonder. "Would I be capable of that?" each asks himself.

Read the rest. And be grateful.

SARAH PALIN ENDORSEMENTS. Her “Mama Grizzlies” include an equal number of “Papa Grizzlies”. From April through July, Palin has endorsed 24 candidates, 12 women and 12 men. Of her endorsements, 10 have won; only 4 have lost in early primary battles. All of the endorsements were taken from Palin's Facebook page.

Here are her endorsements:

Governor

Karen Handel (GA)
Mary Fallin (OK)
Nikki Haley (SC)
Terry Branstad (IA)
Tom Emmer (MN)
Rita Meyer (WY)

Senate

Kelly Ayotte (NH)
Carly Fiorina (CA)
Todd Tiahrt (KS)
Joe Miller (AK)
Clint Didier (WA)

House of Representatives

Angela McGlowan (MS-1)
Anne Marie Buerkle (NY-25)
CeCe Heil (TN-5)
Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA-5)
Star Parker (CA-37)
Cecile Bledsoe (AK-3)
Bob McConnell (CO-3)
Paul Gosar (AZ-1)
Tim Scott (SC-1)
John Koster (WA-2)
Tim Burns (PA-12)
John Gomez (NY-2)
Michael Grimm (NY-13)

The Washington Post has an endorsement tracker here.

HIGHER EDUCATION? “[C]olleges and universities serve the people who work there more than the parents and taxpayers who pay for ‘higher education’ or the students who so desperately need it.”

And "the mediocrity of Harvard undergraduate teaching is an open secret of the Ivy League."

Linked from TaxProf Blog, where one commenter noted: “Kind of like a govt union... Support themselves, not the customer.”

MORE JOURNOLIST COVERAGE

You non-JournoList reporters are going to be tarred by association. “[Y]our credibility has just taken a big hit, because we, your faithful readers, don’t actually know who is or who isn’t [a JournoLister]. You can thank JournoList for that, you can thank Ezra Klein, and you can thank the Washington Post, which has done its outstanding professionals absolutely no favors in any of this.”

"[A] lot of the material on Journolist is actually pretty banal. In addition to being partisan hacks, a lot of these guys turn out to be pedestrian thinkers. Disappointing.”

Read them both.

THE MORE LAWS A CULTURE HAS, the more lawless you can tell it has become.

ELECTRIC LEMON: "[The Chevy] Volt appears to be just the sort of car one would expect to come out of 'Government Motors,' whose design is dictated by people who have not one iota of experience on how to design cars that people actually want to drive. The desire of people to be ecologically correct will only go so far. People do not want the driving experience to be an exercise in
self-abuse."

Read it all.

GARDEN ZOMBIE: Every flowerbed needs one.

Link from Instapundit.

PRIUS NOT A CHOICE OF CAR THIEVES: “I guess our friends in the car theft business haven’t gotten the environmental message.”

From the radio.

THE WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENTS ASSOCIATION voted unanimously Sunday afternoon to move Fox News to the front row of the White House briefing room.

The first comment (GL) tells you all you need to know about the Left: can’t read; can’t write; can’t spell; and thinks he – or she - is smart.

ANTI-MISSILE SHIELD IN EUROPE on track for 2011.

I’ll bet Europe is reassured ....

SEEM TO THINK? Victor Davis Hanson on Congress: “Right now, the American people seem to think that the main purpose of holding congressional office is to boost egos and get rich later on -- and in the process make the rest of us poorer.”

I think Hanson would be more accurate if he were to replace the phrase “seem to think” with the single word “know.”