It is the soul-sliming pettiness of the thing, the "shutdown."
A paid vacation for a million bureaucrats has consequences, some of them probably bad, some perhaps good, but most as unremarkable as that bland tan paint you slap on the wall because you can't decide on a real color.
Beige is too neutral for fun television, so you have to create drama.
"No, goddammit, you may not walk up to the Vietnam wall and shed a tear for your dad who died there because the Tea Party closed America."
"And stop whining about all the black dot.gov sites. Can you fools not see that permitting access to historical data bought and paid for years ago corrupts the nation?"
When a national administration spends hugely to erect steel barriers long the sidewalks meandering through open-air memorials, you know you are being governed by snit-fits. The teevee loves it. So do grandstanding politicians from the left, right, and muddle.
The same occurs when the world's greatest wire service defines the impact by caterwauling with a Kansas farmer who doesn't know what to do because he isn't getting the latest breathless crop-yield predictions from the USDA. Should he go short or long on wheat futures? He doesn't know because his vacuum head has no mental resources other than the federal government's guess about how much grain will be grown in America, Argentina, Greece, and Tierra del Fuego.
It has gone beyond the silliness of the absent park tour guide -- the kid in the Smokey hat in front of Lincoln's statue, explaining that cuddly ol' Abe freed the slaves.
It has become the dangerous confluence of a leader's snake-handling pentecostal oratory wedded to power on a national stage populated by chanting citizenoids massed in front of the Department of Treasure edifice. "Whadda we want? MORE. When do we want it. "NOW." And forevermore.
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Making all necessary allowances for "studies," does this help explain it?
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Politics. Show all posts
Oct 8, 2013
Sep 23, 2013
Dancing with the Tsars
At the Obama-led grave dance, it was again determined that a self-willed gun killed a group of people. More precisely, His Ineptness blamed "a bullet from a gun," demonstrating again his absolute mastery of turning a solemn occasion into a photo-op captioned with sound bites.
I assume it was merely an oversight that he neglected to mention that his -- and I mean his -- security services decided it was dandy to award a "secret" clearance and easy naval-base access to an admitted tinfoil hatter who heard voices and had a history of shooting off guns when ever he felt a little frustrated.
Perhaps his advisers will alert him to the omission, and he will shortly go back on the teevee to add that he has been commander-in-chief for some five years and hence might bear some buck-stops-here responsibility for a Three-Stooges security performance.
Still, I'm reserving most of my scorn for a guy a little lower on the public pay scale, our old buddy duh mare.
"Washington Mayor Vincent Gray also called for action, saying "our country is drowning in a sea of guns."
Look, you nincompoop, the nation is not drowning in a sea of anything except debt and devalued money. Otherwise it's actually in drought. We're bone dry of politicians capable of addressing the point at hand which, in this case, is a security bureaucracy with Curly in charge, advised by Moe and Larry.
.
I assume it was merely an oversight that he neglected to mention that his -- and I mean his -- security services decided it was dandy to award a "secret" clearance and easy naval-base access to an admitted tinfoil hatter who heard voices and had a history of shooting off guns when ever he felt a little frustrated.
Perhaps his advisers will alert him to the omission, and he will shortly go back on the teevee to add that he has been commander-in-chief for some five years and hence might bear some buck-stops-here responsibility for a Three-Stooges security performance.
Still, I'm reserving most of my scorn for a guy a little lower on the public pay scale, our old buddy duh mare.
"Washington Mayor Vincent Gray also called for action, saying "our country is drowning in a sea of guns."
Look, you nincompoop, the nation is not drowning in a sea of anything except debt and devalued money. Otherwise it's actually in drought. We're bone dry of politicians capable of addressing the point at hand which, in this case, is a security bureaucracy with Curly in charge, advised by Moe and Larry.
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Sep 16, 2013
Elsewhere in politics -- young comers division
They may have been the giddiest moments of his life so far. I refer to Julian Castro, the telegenic mayor of San Antonio and a man on the make. When a young pol gets invited to Indianola, Iowa, he begins wondering if there's room for one more on Mt. Rushmore.
In this age of image, he stands a chance because he shared the stage with Joe Biden and Tom Harkin, at Tom's annual steak fry. The event is one of the teasers for that three-ringer known as the Iowa Caucuses.
It doesn't matter what he said, of course, although what I heard was a lukewarm parroting of ancient liberal cant about spending more with the teachers union so we can compete globally.
Julian doesn't rate the CIA full-court press earrned by the other Castro, but if someone wants to put itching powder in his wet suit, I'll probably forget to editorialize against it.
In this age of image, he stands a chance because he shared the stage with Joe Biden and Tom Harkin, at Tom's annual steak fry. The event is one of the teasers for that three-ringer known as the Iowa Caucuses.
It doesn't matter what he said, of course, although what I heard was a lukewarm parroting of ancient liberal cant about spending more with the teachers union so we can compete globally.
Julian doesn't rate the CIA full-court press earrned by the other Castro, but if someone wants to put itching powder in his wet suit, I'll probably forget to editorialize against it.
Sep 11, 2013
The bye-bye elections
(1) I was going to write that Weiner and Spitzer have been retired to stud, but that might strike some readers as distasteful, so I won't. I report merely that New Yorkers now have the opportunity to be ruled by a man who may not know how to take a cell phone self-portait and another one who doesn't need to buy it.
(2) Everyone who cares already knows about the Colorado recall, but so far I have seen no remark about a side benefit. When you boot an antigun leftist hand-wringer you also eliminate a more generalized pest. Coloradans have reduced by two the number of legisthings likely to screw around with their lives in other ways -- creative new taxes and fees, business regulation, that sort of thing.
(2) Everyone who cares already knows about the Colorado recall, but so far I have seen no remark about a side benefit. When you boot an antigun leftist hand-wringer you also eliminate a more generalized pest. Coloradans have reduced by two the number of legisthings likely to screw around with their lives in other ways -- creative new taxes and fees, business regulation, that sort of thing.
Sep 7, 2013
Why did the chicken cross the ocean twice?
TMR has not mentioned Tom Vilsack for a long time. That's a shame even though he is easy to ignore if you don't care much about your money, your food, your automobile fuel, or the quality of politicians making the rules you must live by,
Tom is my Iowa compatriot, from Mt. Pleasant where he was a renowned agrarian. Nobody could grow a cherry tomato plant in a five-gallon bucket like he could. In between trips to the porch with a watering can, he found time to get elected mayor, then governor of the whole state. A few years later, after copiously fertilizing the first Obama campaign, he was elevated to the national stage where he settled in for a nice long gig as Secretary of Agriculture.
And where, lately, he's decided the USDA should approve a scheme to qualify your Sunday grilled chicken breast for frequent flyer miles.
It works this way: Klem and Wanda of Phartenholler, Arkansas, raise a half-dozen Rhode Island Reds. Comes time, they kill them and put the carcasses on a boat bound for China. The diligent orientals "process" the corpses and put them on an eastbound junk. In due course, fair winds waft them back to America, to the meat case of a Safeway near you.
(Hush, please. I am not making this up. Couldn't if I wanted to.)
Some reporters, among others, eventually stopped giggling long enough to question Secretary Vilsack's chicken safety geniuses. They wore out a word processor or two explaining that it's safe even though we all know a dead chicken on your counter top turns to foul purple mush in about the time it takes you to nuke the spuds and stir up a batch of Johnnie cake batter.
Maybe so, what with modern freezing techniques made possible through our newly free energy which results from Tom's ethanol mandate. But a guy still is agog at the economics, and this one is going to take a lot of convincing that there isn't a billion-buck subsidy or tax break hidden somewhere.
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As a matter of diligent research, your author turned to Google and began his search with "Chinese Chicken." This is what he found:
And then he sort of got sidetracked into old dragon movies. Maybe that's wong, but it happened.
Aug 15, 2013
White man speak with forked tongue; Red man, too
If you're visiting Mt. Rushmore from the east or south, and if you enjoy pale blue highways, you could easily wind up in Whiteclay, Nebraska where the population is in danger of seriously declining.
Whiteclay and its 14 citizens exist to sell booze to the Indians, specifically to the Pine Ridge Lakota-Oglala people. Federal law makes the huge South Dakota scrub land dry. Thirsty descendants of the Crazy Horse days must cross the southern border of the reservation (and the South Dakota-Nebraska boundary) for legal fire water.
And do they ever. Is there any other world population center of 14 which sells 13,000 cans of beer a day? However, if Whiteclay were a corporation, speculators would be selling it short. The Oglala people have just voted the reservation wet, which Washington "gives" them the right to do.
(It's as though the northern forest Indians in 1800 or so had finally decided to distill their own whiskey, sending the beaver-hungry Hudson Bay Company English and John Jacob Astor scurrying for new trade goods. Astor, in fact, did quite well smuggling opium.)
The contentious election offered not one original idea. The arguments would have been instantly familiar to the white eyes of a century ago: Who should run the country, Carry Nation or the East Boston Kennedys? The undertones were also hoary. "Indians can't handle booze" is no more than an iteration of the19th Century "Back people can't...".
Even the politics of the Pine Ridge vote owe a nod to the Chicago Machine. Disputed ballots outnumbered the counted vote margin, and when tribal officials reviewed them, they adjudged a sufficient number valid to, ta-da, ...
...Take the booze profits away from those 14 interlopers down in Whiteclay and transfer them to, (again a fanfare) ...
Tribal officials.
That body of politicans promises to use profits from its new and exclusive booze franchise to improve education and perform other notable miracles to make reservation life wonderful at last.
Of course the Pine Ridge Paradise will be delayed for a few months or so. After all, it takes a while to appoint new firewater bureaucrats and form up the several fresh official committees to maladminster the transition from lamentable drunkenness in Whiteclay to socially useful intoxication in Pine Ridge.
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I accept that this will be construed by a semi-literate few as racist. No personal problem here because I've said for years that when my fantasies aren't urging me to be Henry Morgan, they compel me to be Crazy Horse, himself.
The point addresses political power as a club to enforce someone else's personal morals. It suggests that if scientists placed a random sample of red politicians and white politicians under the most powerful electron microscope, they would be hard-pressed to find one iota of difference, either in hypocritical motivation or in methods.
Whiteclay and its 14 citizens exist to sell booze to the Indians, specifically to the Pine Ridge Lakota-Oglala people. Federal law makes the huge South Dakota scrub land dry. Thirsty descendants of the Crazy Horse days must cross the southern border of the reservation (and the South Dakota-Nebraska boundary) for legal fire water.
And do they ever. Is there any other world population center of 14 which sells 13,000 cans of beer a day? However, if Whiteclay were a corporation, speculators would be selling it short. The Oglala people have just voted the reservation wet, which Washington "gives" them the right to do.
(It's as though the northern forest Indians in 1800 or so had finally decided to distill their own whiskey, sending the beaver-hungry Hudson Bay Company English and John Jacob Astor scurrying for new trade goods. Astor, in fact, did quite well smuggling opium.)
The contentious election offered not one original idea. The arguments would have been instantly familiar to the white eyes of a century ago: Who should run the country, Carry Nation or the East Boston Kennedys? The undertones were also hoary. "Indians can't handle booze" is no more than an iteration of the19th Century "Back people can't...".
Even the politics of the Pine Ridge vote owe a nod to the Chicago Machine. Disputed ballots outnumbered the counted vote margin, and when tribal officials reviewed them, they adjudged a sufficient number valid to, ta-da, ...
...Take the booze profits away from those 14 interlopers down in Whiteclay and transfer them to, (again a fanfare) ...
Tribal officials.
That body of politicans promises to use profits from its new and exclusive booze franchise to improve education and perform other notable miracles to make reservation life wonderful at last.
Of course the Pine Ridge Paradise will be delayed for a few months or so. After all, it takes a while to appoint new firewater bureaucrats and form up the several fresh official committees to maladminster the transition from lamentable drunkenness in Whiteclay to socially useful intoxication in Pine Ridge.
---
I accept that this will be construed by a semi-literate few as racist. No personal problem here because I've said for years that when my fantasies aren't urging me to be Henry Morgan, they compel me to be Crazy Horse, himself.
The point addresses political power as a club to enforce someone else's personal morals. It suggests that if scientists placed a random sample of red politicians and white politicians under the most powerful electron microscope, they would be hard-pressed to find one iota of difference, either in hypocritical motivation or in methods.
Jun 7, 2013
Data Mining ("And, While You're At It...")
About my first foray into politics occurred just after I left the Navy and started college in my home town. It was scut work for Sonja Egnes, a female Republican trying for a congressional seat held by a semi-felonious lefty preacher named Myrwin.
The local GOP organization was manned by lame and lazy socialites to whom it had never occurred that a list of eligible voters was a right handy thing to have. The most convenient way to get a partial one was from the local police file of driver licenses, actual carbon copies in file drawers.
I had a decent relationship with the cops. Being a veteran helped. (Sure, a couple of them hated me for being a f------g college puke, but they didn't have the horses to do anything about it.) I asked the chief and he said, "Sure." So I assembled a team of coeds and we went to work on a file of about 15,000 paper licenses, copying by hand names and address of people 21 and up.
(That was the voting age in those days. It was later we decided that barely post-pubes were qualified to act officially on their well-considered opinions about recognizing Red China, containing Communism, supporting farm prices at 90 per cent of parity, and the need for a true two-ocean Navy. But I digress.)
A couple of days into the project, a senior cop got to thinking "my statistics...". Dangerous then, dangerous now. He asked me into his office, poured coffee and, in effect, said" "Y'know, we never go through those things, so there are probably a lot of guys out there driving around on expired licenses. How 'bout you and the girls make a note of them...".
That was cop-think then and it is cop-think now, which we might want to keep in mind as His Ineptness and the Royal Chorus chant the old songs about universal spying for anti-terrorism only!
It's an especially realistic frame of mind when you and the family are at O'Hare, getting ready to fly off to Grandma's for Christmas, and you think you notice the guy in a white shirt and badge let his hand linger an instant too long on your little boy's weenie. He's pretty sure the tyke himself is innocent, but he has to make sure you didn't pack a half-pound of C4 around it.
Of course the perv and his supervisors trot out the security talking point. Purely professional. And only to nab Abdul of Al Queda.
Right. So why do we remember one of the official responses to criticisms of Great Airport Grope? Why, besides foiling (N) airplane explosions, we found (N) marijuana mules/possessors/users and (N) people with warrants out and even one guy with a half-pint of Jim Beam!
Mr. President, do you actually expect us to believe that your 100 per cent lock on citizen's' most private communications can not be re-purposed in less time than it takes for Weiner to unzip? Or will not because of the high honor and respect all federal employees pay to the Fourth Amendment? That you and yours would never, ever, even think of eavesdropping on our phone and email content?
Errr. I know it is ancient history to a politician's attention span, having happened almost two months ago, but what's this about the IRS reading our email, just for shits and grins and to avoid the inconvenience of asking a judge for permission?
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Oh, the license check requests?
I didn't do it, but I was not heroic, not even noble. I waffled and made excuses, counting on sheer bureaucratic sloth to make the request go away in time, which it did.
Sonja lost.
The local GOP organization was manned by lame and lazy socialites to whom it had never occurred that a list of eligible voters was a right handy thing to have. The most convenient way to get a partial one was from the local police file of driver licenses, actual carbon copies in file drawers.
I had a decent relationship with the cops. Being a veteran helped. (Sure, a couple of them hated me for being a f------g college puke, but they didn't have the horses to do anything about it.) I asked the chief and he said, "Sure." So I assembled a team of coeds and we went to work on a file of about 15,000 paper licenses, copying by hand names and address of people 21 and up.
(That was the voting age in those days. It was later we decided that barely post-pubes were qualified to act officially on their well-considered opinions about recognizing Red China, containing Communism, supporting farm prices at 90 per cent of parity, and the need for a true two-ocean Navy. But I digress.)
A couple of days into the project, a senior cop got to thinking "my statistics...". Dangerous then, dangerous now. He asked me into his office, poured coffee and, in effect, said" "Y'know, we never go through those things, so there are probably a lot of guys out there driving around on expired licenses. How 'bout you and the girls make a note of them...".
That was cop-think then and it is cop-think now, which we might want to keep in mind as His Ineptness and the Royal Chorus chant the old songs about universal spying for anti-terrorism only!
It's an especially realistic frame of mind when you and the family are at O'Hare, getting ready to fly off to Grandma's for Christmas, and you think you notice the guy in a white shirt and badge let his hand linger an instant too long on your little boy's weenie. He's pretty sure the tyke himself is innocent, but he has to make sure you didn't pack a half-pound of C4 around it.
Of course the perv and his supervisors trot out the security talking point. Purely professional. And only to nab Abdul of Al Queda.
Right. So why do we remember one of the official responses to criticisms of Great Airport Grope? Why, besides foiling (N) airplane explosions, we found (N) marijuana mules/possessors/users and (N) people with warrants out and even one guy with a half-pint of Jim Beam!
Mr. President, do you actually expect us to believe that your 100 per cent lock on citizen's' most private communications can not be re-purposed in less time than it takes for Weiner to unzip? Or will not because of the high honor and respect all federal employees pay to the Fourth Amendment? That you and yours would never, ever, even think of eavesdropping on our phone and email content?
Errr. I know it is ancient history to a politician's attention span, having happened almost two months ago, but what's this about the IRS reading our email, just for shits and grins and to avoid the inconvenience of asking a judge for permission?
---
Oh, the license check requests?
I didn't do it, but I was not heroic, not even noble. I waffled and made excuses, counting on sheer bureaucratic sloth to make the request go away in time, which it did.
Sonja lost.
May 18, 2013
Is there a .govbot in the house?
Three patriots understood that one can not make America a better place to live by hanging around a tea party. Even personal debt reduction must yield to to the need for action now.
Thus they sortied to a loophole, that is, a gun show, at 0804 this date, all in search of enhanced firepower. One of them was particularly enthusiastic about bringing a battlefield weapon to the mean streets of Smugleye-on-Lake.
Designed in part to resist enemy assaults, the (semi) automatic rifle with quick-change detachable bullet clips, was also intended to permit American freedom fighters, both professional and militia, to participate in assaults.
This one came from a federally licensed dealer, so the armed American exploited the gun show loophole by providing identification, a state permit in lieu of an NICS check, and filling out what has become a four-page form 4473.
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She's been rebarrelled (sharp, shiny rifling) but otherwise appears about original. The condition is somewhere near the high end of average, and I expect her to shoot rather well for a dowager born on the high river bluff of Springfield in March, 1943.
Even if she doesn't, I'm glad she's here, especially for a bride price well below the usual 1,000 FRC asking.
I did remark to a loophole companion that the M1 was not especially fun to shoot and that I never found it handy.
"So why did you buy it?"
Because an American should own a Garand.
.
'
Thus they sortied to a loophole, that is, a gun show, at 0804 this date, all in search of enhanced firepower. One of them was particularly enthusiastic about bringing a battlefield weapon to the mean streets of Smugleye-on-Lake.
Designed in part to resist enemy assaults, the (semi) automatic rifle with quick-change detachable bullet clips, was also intended to permit American freedom fighters, both professional and militia, to participate in assaults.
This one came from a federally licensed dealer, so the armed American exploited the gun show loophole by providing identification, a state permit in lieu of an NICS check, and filling out what has become a four-page form 4473.
---
She's been rebarrelled (sharp, shiny rifling) but otherwise appears about original. The condition is somewhere near the high end of average, and I expect her to shoot rather well for a dowager born on the high river bluff of Springfield in March, 1943.
Even if she doesn't, I'm glad she's here, especially for a bride price well below the usual 1,000 FRC asking.
I did remark to a loophole companion that the M1 was not especially fun to shoot and that I never found it handy.
"So why did you buy it?"
Because an American should own a Garand.
.
'
May 17, 2013
Topic of Crapicorn
Even a dedicated wookie can easily take his eye off the ball. It is simply too much fun to watch the details of the government in power getting a wedgie.
For instance, Miller -- the career "civil servant" who bossed Americans through his control of the IRS -- is sickly entertaining. He been questioned all morning by the House Ways and Means Committee. Two things stand out. His attack of Alzheimer's, and his sweat. The latter makes a person think of a Golden Gloves welterweight after eight rounds with Sonny Liston. ('course, like the Arias legal team, Miller doesn't have much of a case to work with.)
Then there is the congressional committee in charge of Obama polishing. They continue to assert that the real outrage must be reserved for two interns sharing the smallest cubicle in the Cincinnati office of their Inner Party's finance branch.
Such details are vastly entertaining, but if I'm to deserve my fur I need to lift my eyes to the big idea. The crime rests on questions of huge tax-free money to influence a huge government.
Everyone from the Koch Brothers to the Farm Bureau to Acorn is willing to spend billions of dollars to buy political favor for one reason. One. The payoff is hundred of billions of dishonest dollars, money extorted from you and delivered into the hands of whatever lobby happens at the moment to be most successful.
If American people continue to vote for big bloat, they continue to vote for big crime. That's how government is.
For instance, Miller -- the career "civil servant" who bossed Americans through his control of the IRS -- is sickly entertaining. He been questioned all morning by the House Ways and Means Committee. Two things stand out. His attack of Alzheimer's, and his sweat. The latter makes a person think of a Golden Gloves welterweight after eight rounds with Sonny Liston. ('course, like the Arias legal team, Miller doesn't have much of a case to work with.)
Then there is the congressional committee in charge of Obama polishing. They continue to assert that the real outrage must be reserved for two interns sharing the smallest cubicle in the Cincinnati office of their Inner Party's finance branch.
Such details are vastly entertaining, but if I'm to deserve my fur I need to lift my eyes to the big idea. The crime rests on questions of huge tax-free money to influence a huge government.
Everyone from the Koch Brothers to the Farm Bureau to Acorn is willing to spend billions of dollars to buy political favor for one reason. One. The payoff is hundred of billions of dishonest dollars, money extorted from you and delivered into the hands of whatever lobby happens at the moment to be most successful.
If American people continue to vote for big bloat, they continue to vote for big crime. That's how government is.
May 13, 2013
Tax-targeting patriots, the short version
Any tax functionary has the power to destroy your life for reasons he or she may keep secret.
At this point in American history, the death-by-tax-harassment penalty is primarily reserved for citizens exercising their First Amendment rights by uttering words unpleasant to politicians in power, that is, conservatives, "patriots", and those who question the purity of politicians' motives.
Four decades ago, the same horror was aimed at the reverse slope of prevailing orthodoxy, liberals, doves, and everyone else who believed the sitting president's mindset was well illustrated by his decision to dress his personal guards like Paraguay's admirals.
The current president, speaking Friday through a hapless mouthpiece named Jay, explains that the tax agency is independent, above politics. Therefore he, personally, like Nixon before him, is pure and worthy of your infinite trust.
At this point in American history, the death-by-tax-harassment penalty is primarily reserved for citizens exercising their First Amendment rights by uttering words unpleasant to politicians in power, that is, conservatives, "patriots", and those who question the purity of politicians' motives.
Four decades ago, the same horror was aimed at the reverse slope of prevailing orthodoxy, liberals, doves, and everyone else who believed the sitting president's mindset was well illustrated by his decision to dress his personal guards like Paraguay's admirals.
The current president, speaking Friday through a hapless mouthpiece named Jay, explains that the tax agency is independent, above politics. Therefore he, personally, like Nixon before him, is pure and worthy of your infinite trust.
Benghazi, the short version
Four Americans died, unprotected by the American government they served. The Central Intelligence Agency reported, somewhat accurately, the killers were organized Islamic terrorists executing a plan.
This posed problems for Barack Obama, running for president in 2012 and for Hillary Clinton, running for president in 2016. Therefore they ordered the reports soaked in lye, sudsed, and bleached white, all to the conclusion that Mr.Obama and Ms. Clinton were blameless and, in fact, strong leaders. And wise.
Now, eight months later, as lies are publicly aired. Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton have issued the new talking points: "Republicans are politicizing Benghazi."
This posed problems for Barack Obama, running for president in 2012 and for Hillary Clinton, running for president in 2016. Therefore they ordered the reports soaked in lye, sudsed, and bleached white, all to the conclusion that Mr.Obama and Ms. Clinton were blameless and, in fact, strong leaders. And wise.
Now, eight months later, as lies are publicly aired. Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton have issued the new talking points: "Republicans are politicizing Benghazi."
Apr 17, 2013
A better gun bill?
Breaking news. This just in to WTMR News Central:
Sens. Grassley of Iowa and Cruz of Texas just popped a news release onto our desk. It announces their last-minute amendment to the Obama Administration's gun bill.
I've taken time to read only the contents section, but the money fact is that it appears to attack violence without a useless pretense of background checks.
It needs to fit into the already-set machinery, and I haven't the vaguest guess about its prospects.
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I never write much about Grassley, though I like him personally and consider him -- at worst -- one of the better men serving in Congress. A lot of us wish we could we could pry him away from his love affair with mandated ethanol and other welfare schemes for the ag industry. (He has a down-home awww-shucks demeanor which occasionally moves the literati to write him off as a hick. Usually they do it only once, chastened by the embarrassment of wondering what to do with that bundle he hands them. "Will my detached Ivy League ass fit in my attache case?")
Don't know much about Cruz except that he sometimes has an impolitic mouth. To be expected, I suppose. After all, he's elected from the same state that once hired Ann Richardson's to govern the place.
Sens. Grassley of Iowa and Cruz of Texas just popped a news release onto our desk. It announces their last-minute amendment to the Obama Administration's gun bill.
I've taken time to read only the contents section, but the money fact is that it appears to attack violence without a useless pretense of background checks.
It needs to fit into the already-set machinery, and I haven't the vaguest guess about its prospects.
---
I never write much about Grassley, though I like him personally and consider him -- at worst -- one of the better men serving in Congress. A lot of us wish we could we could pry him away from his love affair with mandated ethanol and other welfare schemes for the ag industry. (He has a down-home awww-shucks demeanor which occasionally moves the literati to write him off as a hick. Usually they do it only once, chastened by the embarrassment of wondering what to do with that bundle he hands them. "Will my detached Ivy League ass fit in my attache case?")
Don't know much about Cruz except that he sometimes has an impolitic mouth. To be expected, I suppose. After all, he's elected from the same state that once hired Ann Richardson's to govern the place.
Mere near
Sometimes I empathize with reporters trying to do a good job. Take Alan Fram of the AP for example. He was assigned the overnighter on today's scheduled votes on S.649 -- the Big Gun Control Bill. As is known from here to Planet Zangaro, the key to this thing is the Manchin/Toomey amendment to dink around with Feinstein's original language on background checks.
Like everyone else in the media, Fram probably began by buying the Obama adjective "universal," then switched to "enhanced" and "expanded" when even the anti-rights left quietly abandoned -- as untenable -- their lie that the checks would be within a dozen parsecs of universality. And that led the poor ink-stained wretch to:
"Just over half the public — 52 percent — expressed disapproval in the new survey of how President Barack Obama has handled gun laws. Weeks after the Newtown slayings, Obama made a call for near universal background checks the heart of his gun control plan."
"Near universal" is a valiant effort, but an impossibility in a context of reason, as in the emo mother's wail that dear sweet Snooki is nearly a virgin but, unforunately, also nearly pregnant.
Even competent journalists must work in a linguistic setting controlled by the loudest liars on every side of a hot issue. That's not because they necessarily want to, but because their sound-bite-conditioned audiences expect it, a general readership that, in fact, would be lost without buzz words.
And reporters themselves become similarly conditioned. They shouldn't, but they do. That's one reason you never read a mass-media report that the term " (adjective) background check" is, all by itself, a lie.
It does not examine your "background." It scans records compiled by bureaucrats and associated -- correctly or otherwise -- with your name. The same sorts of records kept by the same sorts of data entry drones that screw up your bank balance, credit record, IRS standing, medical history, and even from time to time, criminal history.
Even with 100 per cent accuracy, the Inner Party's database has a probability of being irrelevant to "who you are." Take mine. I have a 23-year rap sheet consisting of guilty pleas to two nefarious failures to heed a snow-removal ordinance plus a speeding bust. This proves irresponsibility -- the very quality Sen. Feinstein believes prima facie evidence of unfitness to bear arms. Think that's a silly argument? Please recall a New York effort a few years ago to deny gun permits to folks who failed to pay parking tickets on time.
---
Back to you, Alan of the AP: Take no offense. That piece is a good summary of what we face in the Senate today. Besides, I'll bet that in a world less saturated with meaning-free gobbledygook, you wouldn't even think of typing "near universal."
---
For meticulous followers of the Senate sausage mill, the Manchin/Toomey amendment is S.Amdt 714 to Feinstein's main bill which is S.649. The media reports that eight votes will be taken today, and if you have the stomach to follow closely, the bill itself and all amendments are detailed here.
Like everyone else in the media, Fram probably began by buying the Obama adjective "universal," then switched to "enhanced" and "expanded" when even the anti-rights left quietly abandoned -- as untenable -- their lie that the checks would be within a dozen parsecs of universality. And that led the poor ink-stained wretch to:
"Just over half the public — 52 percent — expressed disapproval in the new survey of how President Barack Obama has handled gun laws. Weeks after the Newtown slayings, Obama made a call for near universal background checks the heart of his gun control plan."
"Near universal" is a valiant effort, but an impossibility in a context of reason, as in the emo mother's wail that dear sweet Snooki is nearly a virgin but, unforunately, also nearly pregnant.
Even competent journalists must work in a linguistic setting controlled by the loudest liars on every side of a hot issue. That's not because they necessarily want to, but because their sound-bite-conditioned audiences expect it, a general readership that, in fact, would be lost without buzz words.
And reporters themselves become similarly conditioned. They shouldn't, but they do. That's one reason you never read a mass-media report that the term " (adjective) background check" is, all by itself, a lie.
It does not examine your "background." It scans records compiled by bureaucrats and associated -- correctly or otherwise -- with your name. The same sorts of records kept by the same sorts of data entry drones that screw up your bank balance, credit record, IRS standing, medical history, and even from time to time, criminal history.
Even with 100 per cent accuracy, the Inner Party's database has a probability of being irrelevant to "who you are." Take mine. I have a 23-year rap sheet consisting of guilty pleas to two nefarious failures to heed a snow-removal ordinance plus a speeding bust. This proves irresponsibility -- the very quality Sen. Feinstein believes prima facie evidence of unfitness to bear arms. Think that's a silly argument? Please recall a New York effort a few years ago to deny gun permits to folks who failed to pay parking tickets on time.
---
Back to you, Alan of the AP: Take no offense. That piece is a good summary of what we face in the Senate today. Besides, I'll bet that in a world less saturated with meaning-free gobbledygook, you wouldn't even think of typing "near universal."
---
For meticulous followers of the Senate sausage mill, the Manchin/Toomey amendment is S.Amdt 714 to Feinstein's main bill which is S.649. The media reports that eight votes will be taken today, and if you have the stomach to follow closely, the bill itself and all amendments are detailed here.
Apr 12, 2013
Pass it to know what's in it...
Remember about 36 hours ago, before the cloture vote, some of us were missing and poaning about not being able to find an actual text of the bill to disarm everyone except criminals?
It turns out we had company in high places.
Mike Lee of Utah -- pretty much on our side -- brought up the minor detail. Frisco Feinstein said me too, but it seemed to bother her less.
It turns out we had company in high places.
Mike Lee of Utah -- pretty much on our side -- brought up the minor detail. Frisco Feinstein said me too, but it seemed to bother her less.
Apr 11, 2013
Still grinding the gun-politics sausage
Let us honor the filibuster. Think of it as a precautionary dose of Valium to be taken before doing something massively stupid. Or counting to ten before you ballkick the boss.
You don't even need to use it. The mere threat settles things down. Three weeks ago, it looked like the left would insist on trying to gut the Second Amendment and, in consequence, face at least 41 senators saying "no" at great length and handing HIs Ineptness the place where the pants fit tight.
That would have been the optimum result, but it really wasn't in the cards. The national drama contest after Newtown all but guaranteed that we would lose something, just as did the World Trade Center bombing. When the mobs circle up for a an intense tear jerk, it's hard to stop them, harder yet when they're led by our wet-eyed national primo and his dependable cadre.
At the moment it appears we will lose something but could actually gain a mite from the Toomey-Manchin "compromise" designed to ward off the filibuster. The New York Times reports:
The bill also enhances some gun rights. For instance, it would allow gun owners who have undergone background checks within the past five years for a concealed-carry permit to use the permit to buy guns in other states, and it would relax some of the restrictions on hunters traveling with their guns through states that do not permit them. It would also allow active members of the military to buy firearms in their home states, currently prohibited when they are stationed outside their state.
Tearing down the iron curtains of state borders for interstate gun purchasing is long overdue, even if it depends on holding a Mommy-May-I Card from our state bureaucrats.* So is expansion and clarification of the federal innocent-passage doctrine.
What we lose is our right to make our own judgements about people to whom we, as private citizens, can responsibly sell or trade our guns. In return, America will gain precisely nothing. Inter-thug trading in Glocks will continue merrily, especially in neighborhoods like ones our president organized before beginning his climb up the federal pay scale.
The content of the Senate bill as reported here needs to be viewed cautiously. A wide internet ramble turns up no actual legislative language..
The Toomey web site is as close as I can come to a draft of the legislation. I suppose you can trust it to the extent you can trust any elected nabob to tell you the truth.
(The actual bill may not yet be written. Picture Mountain-Dewed young staff munchkins spending this night hunched over word processors, large bags of chemically flavored corn chips close at hand.)
---
*I hope no one reminds the gun-ban left of a consequence they can't see. When the state CCW becomes some sort of national pass for firearms purchases, the demand for them will soar. Okay by me, but I expect the Feinstein gang will develop a new interest in the price of Depends.
You don't even need to use it. The mere threat settles things down. Three weeks ago, it looked like the left would insist on trying to gut the Second Amendment and, in consequence, face at least 41 senators saying "no" at great length and handing HIs Ineptness the place where the pants fit tight.
That would have been the optimum result, but it really wasn't in the cards. The national drama contest after Newtown all but guaranteed that we would lose something, just as did the World Trade Center bombing. When the mobs circle up for a an intense tear jerk, it's hard to stop them, harder yet when they're led by our wet-eyed national primo and his dependable cadre.
At the moment it appears we will lose something but could actually gain a mite from the Toomey-Manchin "compromise" designed to ward off the filibuster. The New York Times reports:
The bill also enhances some gun rights. For instance, it would allow gun owners who have undergone background checks within the past five years for a concealed-carry permit to use the permit to buy guns in other states, and it would relax some of the restrictions on hunters traveling with their guns through states that do not permit them. It would also allow active members of the military to buy firearms in their home states, currently prohibited when they are stationed outside their state.
Tearing down the iron curtains of state borders for interstate gun purchasing is long overdue, even if it depends on holding a Mommy-May-I Card from our state bureaucrats.* So is expansion and clarification of the federal innocent-passage doctrine.
What we lose is our right to make our own judgements about people to whom we, as private citizens, can responsibly sell or trade our guns. In return, America will gain precisely nothing. Inter-thug trading in Glocks will continue merrily, especially in neighborhoods like ones our president organized before beginning his climb up the federal pay scale.
The content of the Senate bill as reported here needs to be viewed cautiously. A wide internet ramble turns up no actual legislative language..
The Toomey web site is as close as I can come to a draft of the legislation. I suppose you can trust it to the extent you can trust any elected nabob to tell you the truth.
(The actual bill may not yet be written. Picture Mountain-Dewed young staff munchkins spending this night hunched over word processors, large bags of chemically flavored corn chips close at hand.)
---
*I hope no one reminds the gun-ban left of a consequence they can't see. When the state CCW becomes some sort of national pass for firearms purchases, the demand for them will soar. Okay by me, but I expect the Feinstein gang will develop a new interest in the price of Depends.
Apr 4, 2013
A clip full of toilet paper, if you please Ma'am
We've all been subjected to a good a deal of deep, dynamic, unalloyed ignorance in the current debate.
We're used to it, of course. Every Second Amendment rights defender is continually explaining facts at a kindergarten level. "And the bullet goes round and round and it comes out here..."
Anyone who hasn't isn't in the game.
Occasionally, however, despair is understandable. Somewhere in Colorado, adult Americans elected Diana to public office.
Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO): "I will tell you these are ammunition, they’re bullets, so the people who have those now they’re going to shoot them, so if you ban them in the future, the number of these high capacity magazines is going to decrease dramatically over time because the bullets will have been shot and there won’t be any more available."
Setting aside the basic illiteracy of "...these are ammunition," has this woman actually sat through the lengthy debate in America's highest councils and come away assured that firearms magazines are as reusable as Charmin?
When dumb goes that deep, I doubt the synapses can be repaired. Stitch her lips shut. Roll her west from Wolf Creek Pass. Just to see if she makes it all the way to Pagosa Springs.
We're used to it, of course. Every Second Amendment rights defender is continually explaining facts at a kindergarten level. "And the bullet goes round and round and it comes out here..."
Anyone who hasn't isn't in the game.
Occasionally, however, despair is understandable. Somewhere in Colorado, adult Americans elected Diana to public office.
Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO): "I will tell you these are ammunition, they’re bullets, so the people who have those now they’re going to shoot them, so if you ban them in the future, the number of these high capacity magazines is going to decrease dramatically over time because the bullets will have been shot and there won’t be any more available."
Setting aside the basic illiteracy of "...these are ammunition," has this woman actually sat through the lengthy debate in America's highest councils and come away assured that firearms magazines are as reusable as Charmin?
When dumb goes that deep, I doubt the synapses can be repaired. Stitch her lips shut. Roll her west from Wolf Creek Pass. Just to see if she makes it all the way to Pagosa Springs.
Mar 7, 2013
The Ugly Twins today
The left-wing must be having a dreary day. For months it has controlled the debate. Say what you want about the statists, but they are very, very good at manipulating symbols and orchestrating media hysteria.
They aren't quitting this morning as their vox pop pretensions collide with reality in the form of a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. But they are not advancing, either.
Three bills are directly important to libertarian thinkers.*
One is relatively innocuous. It strengthens straw-purchase laws already on the books, and even pro-2A Sen. Chuck Grassley promises to support it if his clean-up amendments are accepted. It will be reported out of committee and has good final-passage prospects.
The other two are vile.
The Feinstein bill to ban some assaultish-appearing rifles will also be favorably reported out by the Democrat-controlled committee, but there isn't a smart dime in Vegas which gives it much chance of senate passage.
The same senators will also send the "universal" background check bill, in one form or another, to the full senate. Then Sen. Schumer has two pertinent problems: (1) To persuade a majority that criminals will submit to the law {square the circle} and (2) Explain how it can be made practicable without a complete national firearms registry {convert pi to a rational number}.
So, the Obama-stoked fearfest aside, we appear to hold strong cards, even in the Senate. The house, of course, is stronger, and I doubt that even Bloomberg has enough money to buy off that body this early in the election cycle; 2014 is another matter.
---
*A fourth would appropriate money we don't have for more school security. The number being tossed around in the markup stage is about $400 million over a few years -- about enough to create a new federal office in charge of saying that we need more school security.)
They aren't quitting this morning as their vox pop pretensions collide with reality in the form of a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. But they are not advancing, either.
Three bills are directly important to libertarian thinkers.*
One is relatively innocuous. It strengthens straw-purchase laws already on the books, and even pro-2A Sen. Chuck Grassley promises to support it if his clean-up amendments are accepted. It will be reported out of committee and has good final-passage prospects.
The other two are vile.
The Feinstein bill to ban some assaultish-appearing rifles will also be favorably reported out by the Democrat-controlled committee, but there isn't a smart dime in Vegas which gives it much chance of senate passage.
The same senators will also send the "universal" background check bill, in one form or another, to the full senate. Then Sen. Schumer has two pertinent problems: (1) To persuade a majority that criminals will submit to the law {square the circle} and (2) Explain how it can be made practicable without a complete national firearms registry {convert pi to a rational number}.
So, the Obama-stoked fearfest aside, we appear to hold strong cards, even in the Senate. The house, of course, is stronger, and I doubt that even Bloomberg has enough money to buy off that body this early in the election cycle; 2014 is another matter.
---
*A fourth would appropriate money we don't have for more school security. The number being tossed around in the markup stage is about $400 million over a few years -- about enough to create a new federal office in charge of saying that we need more school security.)
Jan 28, 2013
I see by the news that a bunch of U.S. Senators is to introduce a new immigration reform plan this afternoon.
Point One of said plan is that all is "Contingent on securing the borders."
Making points Two through Infinity moot.
Actually securing the border is popular only among adult white heterosexuals who have a pickup, three or more firearms, and a job -- a political loser in other words.
Point One of said plan is that all is "Contingent on securing the borders."
Making points Two through Infinity moot.
Actually securing the border is popular only among adult white heterosexuals who have a pickup, three or more firearms, and a job -- a political loser in other words.
Jan 7, 2013
It doesn't bother me much that fresh-hatched Senator Tammy Baldwin is gay, purportedly the first and only openly gay U.S. senator.
It is annoying, however, that she embraces the rhetorical style technically referred to as "flibbertigibbet." She brings nonsense -- and, more important, noncommunication -- to an oratorical height we've missed ever since Teddy Kennedy went away.
It is annoying, however, that she embraces the rhetorical style technically referred to as "flibbertigibbet." She brings nonsense -- and, more important, noncommunication -- to an oratorical height we've missed ever since Teddy Kennedy went away.
"Revenue is hugely important, spending cuts are hugely important, but the way you approach spending cuts, we have to make sure that we don’t you know, cut off our nose despite our face, that we don't impede economic growth and prosperity for American families."
Well, first off, Tammy, if you're actually intending to, you know, vote for one budget choice or another, it would really help us to know which of the two choices is hugelier. If they are hugely equal, there's no point in choosing between them, is there? So you might as well go back to Madison to protest something and have a sit down strike or something, right?
Second, about our noses and faces. You will still be in the senate during my first administration and, unless you improve, be placed on the list of lawmakers who should be suspended until they have demonstrated competence in the use of idiom as it is practiced by native speakers of English.
Well, first off, Tammy, if you're actually intending to, you know, vote for one budget choice or another, it would really help us to know which of the two choices is hugelier. If they are hugely equal, there's no point in choosing between them, is there? So you might as well go back to Madison to protest something and have a sit down strike or something, right?
Second, about our noses and faces. You will still be in the senate during my first administration and, unless you improve, be placed on the list of lawmakers who should be suspended until they have demonstrated competence in the use of idiom as it is practiced by native speakers of English.
Dec 13, 2012
It would reduce the caterwauling if we could agree that Susan Rice was not opposed as an African-American, nor because she is a woman, nor because she is a combination of the two.
She fell from grace because:
(1) She knowingly created lies about the events that killed four Americans in Libya, including the ambassador, which is immoral and probably illegal, OR
(2) She knowingly relayed the lies of her bureaucratic seniors, which displays the character flaws mentioned above, OR
(3) She relayed unchecked information from dubious sources, which would include those senior to her in the pecking order or from the nation's intelligence apparatus. This would indicate naivete at best and deep ignorance at worst.
But perhaps I am wrong. If so, it is deeply shameful that racist America still rejects the idea of a chief foreign policy officer who is of African descent, female, and named Rice.
She fell from grace because:
(1) She knowingly created lies about the events that killed four Americans in Libya, including the ambassador, which is immoral and probably illegal, OR
(2) She knowingly relayed the lies of her bureaucratic seniors, which displays the character flaws mentioned above, OR
(3) She relayed unchecked information from dubious sources, which would include those senior to her in the pecking order or from the nation's intelligence apparatus. This would indicate naivete at best and deep ignorance at worst.
But perhaps I am wrong. If so, it is deeply shameful that racist America still rejects the idea of a chief foreign policy officer who is of African descent, female, and named Rice.
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