All posts by Chief

Uncategorized

Smoke Gets in your Eyes

This has been going on for a bit…

Volcanic ash cloud: new threat to flights

A “new ash cloud” was spreading towards the UK on Monday night, leaving air passengers facing the possibility of further delays.

Air traffic control company Nats said the “situation was worsening” in some areas. But it said Scottish airports should be available from 7am on Tuesday and other airspace over England from 1pm, although not including the main London airports.

Nats said in a statement on Monday night: “The volcano eruption in Iceland has strengthened and a new ash cloud is spreading south and east towards the UK. “This demonstrates the dynamic and rapidly changing conditions in which we are working.

“Latest information from the Met [Meteorological] Office shows that the situation is worsening in some areas.

UPDATE: More Delays: New Ash Cloud Heads Towards UK

Here’s the output from ONE volcano, in a relatively remote location, that has thoroughly disrupted a huge chuck of the world economy. (40,000 Americans stuck in the UK!)

…think there just MAY be a bit of a hint in favor of personal and family preparedness?

Obamunism

Ron Paul v. B.O.?

Rasmussen poll results:

Election 2012: Barack Obama 42%, Ron Paul 41%

Pit maverick Republican Congressman Ron Paul against President Obama in a hypothetical 2012 election match-up, and the race is – virtually dead even.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of likely voters finds Obama with 42% support and Paul with 41% of the vote. Eleven percent (11%) prefer some other candidate, and six percent (6%) are undecided.

There are other details of poll results in the article that are also interesting.
Ron Paul? Hmmmm. Looks like a bit of backlash to Obamunism.

Glowbull Warming

Hockey Stick Fails to Score

Global warming graph attacked by study

A key piece of evidence in climate change science was slammed as “exaggerated” on Wednesday by the UK’s leading statistician, in a vindication of claims that global warming sceptics have been making for years.

Professor David Hand, president of the Royal Statistical Society, said that a graph shaped like an ice hockey stick that has been used to represent the recent rise in global temperatures had been compiled using “inappropriate” methods.

“It used a particular statistical technique that exaggerated the effect [of recent warming],” he said.

The glowbull warmists need to take their stick and get the puck out!

Uncategorized

Unhealthy Reaction to Obamacare

Support for Repeal of Health Care Plan Up To 58%

Three weeks after Congress passed its new national health care plan, support for repeal of the measure has risen four points to 58%. That includes 50% of U.S. voters who strongly favor repeal.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters nationwide finds 38% still oppose repeal, including 32% who strongly oppose it.

If one examines the other dynamics of this poll, there isn’t anything to give the administration a warm glow about…unless of course it’s heartburn!

This goes along with Sunday’s commentary in the Washington Examiner:
Sorry: No bump for Obamacare

Last September, just as public opinion was beginning to turn against Obamacare in a serious way, Bill Clinton made a bold prediction. “The minute health care reform passed,” he said in a policy forum in New York City, “President Obama’s approval ratings would go up 10 points.” Clinton’s prediction reflected the wishful assumption of many wishful liberal-leaning pundits and think tank analysts, as well as the strategy of Obama’s political advisers. They viewed the rising public clamor against Obamacare as a temporary aberration, not as a lasting problem that could potentially undo his presidency. When Obamacare passed, they confidently reasoned, the public would suddenly appreciate its virtues and acquiesce to federal control over nearly every aspect of health care.

Looks like Bubba blew it on that prediction, and things aren’t looking too hot for B.O. on this:

Meanwhile, polls continue to show a strong majority opposing Obamacare and favoring its repeal. The latest Fox News poll puts the opposition at 55 percent, with 39 percent in favor. This reading comes despite Obama’s backward-looking campaign tour in recent weeks to build public support for Obamacare, something he and his party were unable to do during the year prior to its enactment. The Democrats assumed they had to pass a health care reform bill, any bill, regardless of the depth or intensity of opposition. Failure, they reasoned, would harm them at the polls. As it turned out, their success may kill them in November.

But wait…surely B.O. is doing better otherwise now that the divisive Obamacare debate is over, right?

Er…maybe not so hot there, either:

Gallup Daily: Obama Job Approval
Even according to Gallup: 48% disapproval for the immaculated one, 45% approval….with the trending in a significantly negative direction for B.O.

Uncategorized

You may be reading this…or not. Really!

This is really sounds impossible…but it has been actually done in the laboratory…

Freaky Physics Proves Parallel Universes Exist

Look past the details of a wonky discovery by a group of California scientists — that a quantum state is now observable with the human eye — and consider its implications: Time travel may be feasible….

The strange discovery by quantum physicists at the University of California Santa Barbara means that an object you can see in front of you may exist simultaneously in a parallel universe — a multi-state condition that has scientists theorizing that traveling through time may be much more than just the plaything of science fiction writers.

And it’s all because of a tiny bit of metal — a “paddle” about the width of a human hair, an item that is incredibly small but still something you can see with the naked eye. UC Santa Barbara’s Andrew Cleland cooled that paddle in a refrigerator, dimmed the lights and, under a special bell jar, sucked out all the air to eliminate vibrations. He then plucked it like a tuning fork and noted that it moved and stood still at the same time.

How could this be? The Chief isn’t sure about the actual mechanics of the experiment, but it’s easy to imagine two viewing devices recording simultaneously that show the states of motion/non-motion.

Check out the piece for some more details of this stuff.

Forward, into the past!

Obamunism

Truth and Consequences

Obama and the L-Word
The president’s habit of telling untruths

Here’s how predictable the president’s slippery relationship with the truth has become: Hours before the State of the Union address, Washington Examiner reporter Timothy P. Carney posted a “pre-emptive fact check” that, among other things, prebutted any presidential claim to have “stopped the revolving door between government and corporate lobbying.” As it happened, that night Barack Obama made an even bolder (read: less truthful) claim: that “we’ve excluded lobbyists from policymaking jobs.”

In fact, more than 40 former lobbyists work in the administration, including such policy makers as Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn (who was lobbying for Raytheon as recently as 2008), Office of the First Lady Director of Policy and Projects Jocelyn Frye (National Partnership for Women and Families), White House Director of Intergovernmental Affairs Cecilia Muñoz (National Council of La Raza), and Treasury Secretary Chief of Staff Mark Patterson (Goldman Sachs).

There’s more of this kind of BS noted in the article…but you get the drift…

Constitution Watch

A Thought at Easter

Christophobia
Anti-Christian bigotry is the last fashionable hatred

This week’s Good Friday idiocy at Davenport, Iowa illustrates the all-too prevailing trend of attempting to purge any form of Christianity from public view.
Obviously not everyone is Christian…but the Judeo-Christian view is still the underlying basis of our republic, going back to the Declaration of Independence’s attribution of the source of our rights in the “Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God”.

The following cuts to the kernal of why this is a essential to the maintenance of the Constitution.

The Founding Fathers emphasized that the constitutional republic depended upon a vigorous religious society. “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people,” said John Adams. “It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

The Founding Fathers were not secularists. On the contrary, they were devout Christians (with the exception of some Enlightenment deists like Thomas Jefferson), who feared an established church – especially, the Church of England – which persecuted dissenters. They would regard it as bizarre and repulsive were they to witness how the concept of the separation of church and state would be twisted in our time into a form of radical secularism and anti-Christian bias.

Our Judeo-Christian heritage provides the underpinnings to our constitutional government for one simple reason: It acknowledges the transcendental nature of man. Our fundamental liberties flow from God almighty – not the state. This is why individual rights – to life, liberty and property – are the essential bulwarks against government power: What God has given, no man – or regime – can take away. Once America loses its Christian identity, it will inevitably lose its freedoms.
Christophobia forms the basis of modern liberalism. Leftist progressives are determined to destroy traditional America and its seminal institutions – the Constitution, capitalism, national sovereignty and the family. This is why they have declared war on Christianity. If Christians do not rise from their apathy and man the ideological barricades, they will be driven into the catacombs once again. And with their defeat comes the end of our great republic.

Glowbull Warming

Fat Lady Sings Over Glowbull Warming?

When the Germans give up on AGW you really do know it’s all over…

Reported from the UK’s London Telegraph. (Of course! You didn’t think the U.S. mainstream media would cover this sort of thing, did you?)

No people on earth are more righteously Green than the Germans. They built the foundations and set the tone of the modern Green movement in, ahem, the 1930s. They invented the phrase Atomkraft Nein Danke. They were the first country to allow nasty, dangerous Sixties eco-radicals to reinvent themselves as respectable politicians. They were the first place to buy, wholesale, into the solar power con, which is why so many of their rooves – especially on churches – shimmer and glow like reflective-coated crusties at a mid-Nineties rave, while the German taxpayer is ruing the day his government ever chose to subsidise (Achtung Herr Cameron!) this fantastically pointless scheme… (Hat tip: Robert Groezinger, et al)

So when the Germans say “Auf Wiedersehn AGW” it really is time for the rest of the world to sit up and take notice. And that’s exactly what they just have said. See for yourself in this tear-inducing glorious feature in one of their leading newspapers.

Der Spiegel has done a number on AGW – one of the best and most comprehensive I’ve read in any newspaper anywhere – and it could hardly be more damning.

Truly, the experience is akin to having honey (really good stuff, heather probably) licked off one’s body by nubile blonde Nibelungen.

For the condensed version see the rest of the piece in the Telegraph.

Or, here’s the complete original very thorough, detailed, and lengthy der Spiegel story itself. The truth is out there!

China Watch, National Insecurity

Navy Brass Admit to ChiCom Threat

Admiral: China’s buildup aimed at power past Asia

The commander of U.S. military forces in the Pacific said Thursday that the buildup of Chinese armed forces is continuing “unabated” and Beijing’s goal appears to be power projection beyond Asia.

“China’s rapid and comprehensive transformation of its armed forces is affecting regional military balances and holds implications beyond the Asia-Pacific region,” said Adm. Robert F. Willard, the Pacific Command leader. “Of particular concern is that elements of China’s military modernization appear designed to challenge our freedom of action in the region.”

The comments in testimony to the House Armed Services Committee are likely to fuel an ongoing debate inside the U.S. government among military, policy and intelligence officials over whether China’s military buildup is limited to a future conflict with Taiwan or whether China harbors global military ambitions.

Uh…just a hint: the ChiComs don’t require aircraft carriers and long-range anti-ship missiles to deal with Taiwan if they decide to pull that trigger.

Uncategorized

From the Gipper: Nat’l Healthcare = Socialist Meds

Once upon a time, when Harry Truman was President and was seeking universal healthcare…(from the L.A. Times)

Same healthcare arguments, just decades earlier

…to serve as the public face of its campaign against a government-sponsored health plan, the AMA chose none other than Ronald Reagan, the star of “General Electric Theater” and former president of the Screen Actors Guild whose views on politics matched its own.

Warning that enacting Medicare would lead to socialism in America, Reagan said that if Americans did not stop Medicare reform, “one of these days you and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in America when men were free.”

In an 11-minute recording for the AMA, Reagan invoked the name of Norman Thomas, the Socialist Party presidential candidate, saying:

“Now back in 1927 an American socialist, Norman Thomas, six times candidate for president on the Socialist Party ticket, said the American people would never vote for socialism. But he said under the name of liberalism the American people would adopt every fragment of the socialist program. . . . One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people has been by way of medicine. It’s very easy to disguise a medical program as a humanitarian project. . . .

“Now, the American people, if you put it to them about socialized medicine and gave them a chance to choose, would unhesitatingly vote against it. We have an example of this. Under the Truman administration, it was proposed that we have a compulsory health insurance program for all people in the United States, and, of course, the American people unhesitatingly rejected this.”

Reagan’s prescription? “Write to our congressmen and senators,” he said. “The key issue is this: We do not want socialized medicine . . . demand the continuation of our traditional free-enterprise system.”

Sound familiar?

Note to critical readers: it’s not the Chief that is labeling universal health care as socialist…it’s the proudly socialist Norman Thomas making the point. If you want to argue, take it to him yourself!

Constitution Watch, Culture Wars

Lessons Unlearned

Those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them. – Santayana

Kansas-Nebraska Act 1854, Redux

We are now beginning to enter the Kansas-Nebraska Act stage of the socialist crisis of the Republic.

To get the significance of this, some history is in order:

At our constitutional founding, the evil of slavery had been crudely evaded. In 1820, the Missouri Compromise was enacted that prohibited the abomination north of 36/30 degrees latitude [southern boundary of Missouri, except for it’s SE “boot-heel”].

But with the western push of the frontier, a new compromise was needed. So the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 decreed that the “popular sovereignty” of each territory should decide whether they would be slave or free states. But then, adherents of both the abomination and freedom migrated to Kansas to struggle — with their bodily presence — for their respective causes. First there was politics. Then the political rhetoric turned violent. Then real violence ensued. Kansas became known as Bleeding Kansas. John Brown, most famously, applied unjustified, murderous violence for his righteous cause of ending slavery and was hanged, but the Civil War ensued…

NOT a pretty scene!

Now we enter our History’s second stage in the struggle against the abomination of socialism. Just as slavery had been contained in the South, so entitlement socialism has, until this week, been more or less contained in service to only the poor and the elderly — and even in those programs (for the elderly) on the principle of beneficiaries paying monthly premiums for the benefits they will later get (Medicare/ Social Security). Only the poor under Medicaid received benefit without premium payment.

But now, just as the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 broke through the slave state limitation to the South, the Democratic Party’s 2010 health care law has broken socialism’s boundary of being so limited. Now, the chains of socialism are to be clamped on to the able-bodied middle class — not merely the already presumed helpless poor and old who have paid their insurance premiums.

An exaggeration you say? Not so fast, according to that (understatement alert!) not exactly right wing New York Times.

Even the New York Times — after the vote — admits what the bigger goal has been all along. In Wednesday’s edition (“In Health Care Bill, Obama Attacks Wealth Inequality” by David Leonhardt), they point out: ” Beyond the health reform’s effect on the medical system, it is the centerpiece of his deliberate effort to end what historians have called the age of Reagan. … Speaking to an ebullient audience of Democratic legislators and White House aides at the bill-signing ceremony on Tuesday, Mr. Obama claimed that health reform would ‘mark a new season in America.’…. Above all, the central question that both the Reagan and Obama administrations have tried to answer — what is the proper balance between the market and the government? — remains unresolved. But the bill signed on Tuesday certainly shifts our place on that spectrum.”

I thank The New York Times for that honest statement of historic fact.

After citing some of the obnoxious aspects of what Congress and B.O. hath wrought, the piece goes on:
And just as the free states could not tolerate the spread of slavery into their midst, so, too, free middle-class America — if it still has its historic character — will not tolerate the yoke of socialism put upon our necks.

First, the unambiguous will of the majority has been defied by the vote of Congress last Sunday. Come November, we shall see whether the system can still turn the popular will into the constitutionally permissible legislative will of the majority. If it can, all will be well and the crisis will end. Rallying the vote between now and November is roughly equivalent to the early stage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act period — people started migrating to Kansas to support their convictions.

But come November, if the majority still opposes the socializing of health care delivery and the other central government intrusions, and yet the corrupt bargains and constitutional distortions of Washington deny that will its just expression — then, for the second time in our history, we enter that dangerous period where the House resolves its temporary division. Let us devoutly pray –and commit to ourselves — that this time freedom shall be reacquired … peaceably.

…and then there’s THIS one to go along with the above:

Will America break up?
Abortion threatens to split the nation like slavery

President Obama is splintering America. The passage of Obamacare was a historic victory for liberal governance. Yet, its true cost may be that it triggers the eventual breakup of the country.

Mr. Obama has achieved what his liberal predecessor…could only dream of: nationalized health care. Obamacare signifies the government take-over of one-sixth of the U.S. economy. It has dealt a mortal blow to traditional America. We are now a European-style socialist welfare state. The inevitable permanent tax hikes, massive public bureaucracy and liberal ruling elites will stifle competition and initiative.

Republicans vow to repeal Obamacare. Their past record, however, leaves many conservatives rightly skeptical….The Republican Party has been unable to roll back the tide of statism. In fact, under Richard Nixon and both George Bushes, Great Society Republicans have been complicit in erecting a nanny state.

Socialism is the road to economic ruin and fiscal bankruptcy. It subverts democracy, threatening the very future of our constitutional republic. Socialist states degenerate into some form of autocracy or technocratic neo-feudalism, whereby the productive class is taxed and exploited to sustain a growing dependent class. Factions are pitted against each other; groups vie for handouts at the expense of their fellow citizens. The bonds of economic union and national solidarity slowly dissolve.

“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not,” warned Thomas Jefferson.

Jefferson was right: Redistributionist welfare policies are undermining our democracy. The resentments in America are growing. Tea Partiers believe that their government no longer represents their interests or values. The heartland is becoming dangerously alienated from the political class, whom it feels has betrayed them.

Obamacare may be the last straw. It strips away fundamental economic liberties, empowering the federal government to de facto nationalize everyone’s body by controlling our health. Americans are compelled – upon pain of penalty and eventual imprisonment – to purchase insurance.

Moreover, the law codifies the federal funding of abortion. Taxpayer dollars will be used to subsidize the murder of innocent life. Hence, Mr. Obama has violated the social compact: He has abrogated the conscience of pro-lifers, making them tacitly complicit in the slaughter of the unborn. Obamacare is a radical assault upon fundamental religious freedoms.

The Obama revolution threatens to tear America apart. This has happened before. Slavery eventually triggered the Civil War between the industrial North and the agrarian South. Abortion is the slavery of our time – the denying of basic human rights to an entire category of people.

You may well not like this. I don’t get a warm fuzzy from it myself…but I’m not at all sure it isn’t happening anyway.

…we are going the way our Founding Fathers warned us against: increasing balkanization and sectionalism. A constitutional republic – unlike an empire – is only as strong as its national cohesion. It is based not on imperial coercion but civic consent. Mr. Obama is recklessly pulling at the strings of unity, further polarizing us.

In confronting Obamacare, state sovereignty, states’ rights and state nullification of federal laws are being asserted. This is what happened in the 1830s and 1840s. They are the signs of growing political anarchy and social frustration – people can only be pushed so far. Mr. Obama’s drive for a socialist super-state threatens America’s very existence. As Jefferson warned about slavery, it is time we start ringing the “fire bell in the night.”

“Things fall apart; the center cannot hold,” wrote William Butler Yeats. “Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.”

Conservatives will not be passive in this onslaught on all our core values. Mr. Obama’s true legacy may be that he divides us deeper than ever before – unless he abandons his revolutionary project.

Once again, that most usable Warren Zevon lyric: “It ain’t that pretty at all!”

Constitution Watch

Thoughts on Constitutional Rule

The Chief knows that most have their own particular church connections, affiliations, and/or beliefs, and that is fine. This posting in no way is presented to demean anyone’s particular religious beliefs unless you are preaching some sort of anti-Constitutional “social justice” doctrines, in which case this applies to you for sure!

After the events in Washington turned this Sabbath Day into a into what IMHO constitutes a virtual Black Sabbath of unrighteous dominion, I offer the following from the Doctrine and Covenants of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Section 98, for consideration:

5. That law of the land which is constitutional, supporting that principle of freedom in maintaining rights and privileges, belongs to all mankind, and is justifiable before me.
6. Therefore, I, the Lord, justify you and your brethren…in befriending that law which is the constitutional law of the land;
7. And as pertaining to law of man, whatsoever is more or less than this, cometh of evil.
8. I, the Lord god make you free, therefore ye are free indeed; and the law also maketh you free.
9. Nevertheless, when the wicked rule the people mourn.
10. Wherefore, honest men and wise men should be sought for diligently, and good men and wise men ye should observe to uphold; otherwise whatsoever is less than these cometh of evil. [emphases added]

Just think about it…IMHO something to remember in November.

Obamunism

Obamascare Clears House

1 Comment

Sickening!

Congress clears historic health care bill

Summoned to success by President Barack Obama, the Democratic-controlled Congress approved historic legislation Sunday night extending health care to tens of millions of uninsured Americans and cracking down on insurance company abuses, a climactic chapter in the century-long quest for near universal coverage.

Widely viewed as dead two months ago, the Senate-passed bill cleared the House on a 219-212 vote. Republicans were unanimous in opposition, joined by 34 dissident Democrats.

SO…what will we REALLY get? (Besides inevitable national bankruptcy!)

Obamacare Means 159 New Gov’t Agencies

Oh, joy…just what we need. (NOT!)

The new government agencies that will be created as the result of Obamacare will worsen the quality of American medical care by restricting physicians and hospitals to use their best judgment, according to Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., a physician and chairman of the Republican Study Committee.

In fact, he says, the bill would create 159 new governemnt agencies to regulate insurance and medical care for Americans.

In Churchillian terms this will not be the end of the debate…it’s not the beginning of the end…it’s the end of the beginning.

Hatch Says It’s ’Nuts’ to Think House Vote Ends Health Issue

Republican Senator Orrin Hatch said Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives are “nuts” to think tomorrow’s vote on health-care legislation will resolve the issue.

If the measure passes, Senate Republicans have enough votes on at least two points of order to alter the measure and send it back to the House for a second round of votes, Hatch said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital with Al Hunt,” airing this weekend.

“If those people think they’re only going to vote on this once, they’re nuts,” Hatch said as House Democratic leaders rounded up support before the scheduled vote on President Barack Obama’s top domestic priority.

“Any stick will do when you want to beat a snake.”

Uncategorized

Taking the War to the Enemy

Pentagon official ‘set up secret “Jason Bourne” unit to hunt down and kill militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan’

The Chief has always kind of hoped that SOMEBODY was doing this…

A senior Pentagon official set up a secret spy network to track down an kill Islamic militants in Pakistan and Afghanistan, according to reports in the U.S.

The elite team of ex-CIA agents and special forces soldiers were even referred to as ‘Jason Bournes’ – a reference to the CIA assassin played by Matt Damon in the Bourne films.

The unit was set up by former air force officer Michael D.Furlong, who is accused of diverting money from intelligence gathering to fund his own network of spies.

According to a report in the New York Times, information gathered by Furlong’s team was used by the military to hunt down and kill Islamic militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Unfortunately, in this politically correct age, it’s been repeatedly demonstrated that actual warfighters have been regularly “flogged”, like in this case.

A Pentagon spokesman confirmed they are investigating the allegations about Furlong.

‘The story makes some serious allegations and raises numerous unanswered questions that warrant further review by the department,’ said Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman.

Another case of refusal to tolerate unrelenting pursuit of the enemy. Alas, no good deeds go unpunished.

China Watch, National Insecurity

Cold War-II China Updates

From the London Telegraph:

Is China’s Politburo spoiling for a showdown with America?

The long-simmering clash between the world’s two great powers is coming to a head, with dangerous implications for the international system.

China has succumbed to hubris. It has mistaken the soft diplomacy of Barack Obama for weakness, mistaken the US credit crisis for decline, and mistaken its own mercantilist bubble for ascendancy. There are echoes of Anglo-German spats before the First World War, when Wilhelmine Berlin so badly misjudged the strategic balance of power and over-played its hand.

There are a lot more gory details in the piece…it’s not cheerful reading.

A part of the overall problem is this:

China opposes US and EU demands for yuan revaluation

Premier Wen Jiabao made it clear during a press conference marking the end of the country’s parliamentary meetings that he did not think the yuan was undervalued and blamed the US for the deterioration in relations between the two superpowers.

He made a renewed call for the US to take concrete action to reassure investors about the security of the dollar, declaring he was still worried about China’s considerable holdings of US Treasury securities, currently standing at just under $900bn (£596bn).

The premier’s comments offered little comfort for US President Barack Obama as he considers growing demands from US businesses and unions to impose trade sanctions against cheap Chinese products. He has urged China to adopt a more “market related exchange rate” and is considering whether to go a stage further and name China as a “currency manipulator.”

An increase in tension has been fuelled by US arms sales to Taiwan and the visit of the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan leader, to Washington along with the attacks on Google which has threatened to withdraw from China unless it can be assured it can run its search engine without interference.

There had been hopes that Premier Wen’s press conference, the Chinese leadership’s traditional platform for sending coded signals to the rest of the world about policy shifts, would provide some pointers to change but economists saw no sign of any movement on the crucial currency question.

So far the deterioration in relations has been reflected by an increase in the level of rhetoric but economists fear President Obama may be forced into tougher action.

Stay tuned.

Uncategorized

RINOs Circle Wagons of Political Correctness

The Chief has taken the liberty of making a number of clarifying interpretive edits to the original article text. The original wording is present…but clarified appropriately (IMHO).

Liz Cheney Group Defends Itself Against Criticism by ConservativesRINOs

The conservative group led by Liz Cheney is having to defend itself against criticism from fellow conservatives Bushian RINOS who say that an ad attacking Attorney General Eric Holder is unfair.

Unfair? WTF?

The ad, launched by Keep America Safe, an advocacy group led by Cheney, criticizes Holder for not disclosing details about Justice Department lawyers who have previously defended alleged terrorists.

The video, which surfaced last week, brands the lawyers as the “Al Qaeda 7″ and ridicules the Justice Department as the “Department of Jihad.” The narrator questions, “Who are these government officials?…Whose values do they share?”

Based on their decisions, not an unreasonable question, but also not exactly politically correct.

Justice Department spokesman Matthew Miller has called it “offensive” that the patriotism of agency lawyers is questioned by Cheney’s group.

Doesn’t it say somewhere “By their fruits ye shall know them.”?

Another way of stating the issue is to note that If they walk like ducks, quack like ducks, then they’re ducks!”

Uncategorized

Back to Basics Needed in D.C. (& elsewhere)

Consent of the governed – and the lack thereof By: Glenn Harlan Reynolds

Our Declaration of Independence observes: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.” “Deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” This is boilerplate American history, and something that Americans — and, in particular, America’s political class — have long taken for granted. But now things are looking a bit dicey. According to a recent Rasmussen Poll , only 21 percent of American voters believe that the federal government enjoys the consent of the governed. On the other hand, Rasmussen notes, a full 63 percent of the “political class” believe that the government enjoys the consent of the governed.

Taking note of the glaring disconnect between us and our self-conflated “rulers”, Glenn goes on to amplify and extend the point:

…only 63 percent…still less than two-thirds of the political class — regard the federal government as legitimate by the standards of America’s founding document. The remainder, [the other 33%] presumably, are comfortable being tyrants.[!]

These numbers should raise deep worries about the future of our republic. A nation whose government does not rest on the consent of the governed is a nation whose government holds sway only by inertia, or by force. It is a nation vulnerable to political shocks, usurpation, or perhaps even political collapse or civil war. It is a body politic suffering from a serious illness. Those who care about America should be very worried.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: it’s well worth the read…and if it doesn’t give you some real concerns…then IMHO you aren’t worthy of having the privilege of living in a democratic republic…stay home on election day so you don’t screw it up for the rest of us who want to. The alternative?

Well, the Declaration of Independence allows for the prospect of altering or abolishing the government we have in order to get a government that’s closer to what we want. That needn’t involve anything as violent as the American Revolution or the Civil War, but the need for change — real, structural change as opposed to campaign-slogan “change” — is becoming more obvious.

In the past, America has managed to reinvent itself without transformations as wrenching as the Civil War or the Revolution. As the legitimacy of our current arrangements becomes increasingly threadbare, it is perhaps worth thinking about how this might be accomplished again.

Uncategorized

Gunning for Education!

Have Any Spare 12 Gauge Shotguns? If So, The Department of Education Would Like to Buy Them…

Remington

This is from the linked D.O.E. solicitation for bids.

The U.S. Department of Education (ED) intends to purchase twenty-seven (27) REMINGTON BRAND MODEL 870 POLICE 12/14P MOD GRWC XS4 KXCS SF. RAMAC #24587 GAUGE: 12 BARREL: 14″ – PARKERIZED CHOKE: MODIFIED SIGHTS: GHOST RING REAR WILSON COMBAT; FRONT – XS CONTOUR BEAD SIGHT STOCK: KNOXX REDUCE RECOIL ADJUSTABLE STOCK FORE-END: SPEEDFEED SPORT-SOLID

Why do I doubt that they are starting a student skeet-shooting program?

So what ARE they doing with ’em?

Uncategorized

Green Jobs a Loss

California watchdog sees climate policy job losses

California is likely to see modest job losses in the near term from its aggressive climate change policy due to higher energy costs and other factors, the state’s independent Legislative Analyst’s Office said. Skip related content

The budget watchdog was responding to a request by Republican state Senator Dave Cogdill to study the effects of California’s 2006 climate change law, which mandates changes to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.

The report goes on to note that the reason that the losses are only modest, is that California uses less energy overall, due to it’s generally salubrious climate.

Otherwise, the only surprise here is that any one is surprised. If the green stuff was really stimulative to the economy, it wouldn’t need government programs at any level to encourage it…entrepreneurs would be lining up to jump into the business on their own.

Obamunism

B.O. Administration Goes After…Fishing?!

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WTH?  What’s next?

Culled out: Obama moving to limit fishing access

The Obama administration will accept no more public input for a federal strategy that could prohibit U.S. citizens from fishing the nation’s oceans, coastal areas, Great Lakes, and even inland waters.

This announcement comes at the time when the situation supposedly still is “fluid” and the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force still hasn’t issued its final report on zoning uses of these waters.

That’s a disappointment, but not really a surprise for fishing industry insiders who have negotiated for months with officials at the Council on Environmental Quality and bureaucrats on the task force. These angling advocates have come to suspect that public input into the process was a charade from the beginning.

This is an old strategy that was at the heart of the old Soviet system: solicit input, ignore it, impose whatever it was you were planning to do in the first place. (Since you DID solicity “input”, it is considered a “democratic” process…the people did get their say, not that it was really worth anything!)

There’s a precedent for this process:

“When the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) completed their successful campaign to convince the Ontario government to end one of the best scientifically managed big game hunts in North America (spring bear), the results of their agenda had severe economic impacts on small family businesses and the tourism economy of communities across northern and central Ontario,” said Phil Morlock, director of environmental affairs for Shimano.

“Now we see NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and the administration planning the future of recreational fishing access in America based on a similar agenda of these same groups and other Big Green anti-use organizations, through an Executive Order by the President. The current U.S. direction with fishing is a direct parallel to what happened in Canada with hunting: The negative economic impacts on hard working American families and small businesses are being ignored.

“In spite of what we hear daily in the press about the President’s concern for jobs and the economy and contrary to what he stated in the June order creating this process, we have seen no evidence from NOAA or the task force that recreational fishing and related jobs are receiving any priority.”

There is more detail in the article, and others linked from it, on what’s going on…with the usual suspects…enviro special interest groups with their collective noses up the backside of the bureaucrats who will be generating the executive order Imperial Decree that the “Dear Leader” eventually signs.

Typical progressive arrogant elitism once again. B.O. really has THAT routine down pat!

Uncategorized

B.O. & Fed Land Scheme

White House land grab
Proposal to seize land would favor animals over Americans

You’d think the Obama administration is busy enough controlling the banks, insurance companies and automakers, but thanks to whistleblowers at the Department of the Interior, we now learn they’re planning to increase their control over energy-rich land in the West.

A secret administration memo has surfaced revealing plans for the federal government to seize more than 10 million acres from Montana to New Mexico, halting job- creating activities like ranching, forestry, mining and energy development. Worse, this land grab would dry up tax revenue that’s essential for funding schools, firehouses and community centers.

President Obama could enact the plans in this memo with just the stroke of a pen, without any input from the communities affected by it.

At a time when our national unemployment rate is 9.7 percent, it is unbelievable anyone would be looking to stop job-creating energy enterprises, yet that’s exactly what’s happening.

We’ve been there, done that, under Carter and Clinton. B.O. seems inclined to follow their evil example.

Hopefully there’s enough gumption out there to stop him from doing this.

Locking up lands with energy resources? What’s THAT about?

Hmmmm. After spending us into international bankruptcy we’ll need to do SOMETHING to re-boot the dollar…auctions of mineral and energy rights could be a way to do it. Now, who has a lot of cash and a high demand for more energy to drive a forced industrial expansion?

China.  Not a nice thought, but there it is.

National Insecurity, Space Patrol

Still Shuttling?

Shuttle flights would continue under new proposal

The space shuttle era could get a new lease on life under a bill filed today by U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas.

The measure would delay the shuttle’s planned retirement in 2010 until NASA is confident that a replacement spacecraft is ready or that the shuttle and its massive payload bay is no longer needed to keep the International Space Station afloat through 2020.

The 37-page bill also authorizes an additional $1.3 billion in NASA spending next year above President Barack Obama’s request of $19 billion. The extra money would help prepare NASA for as many as two additional shuttle flights per year after 2010, as well as fund new spacecraft development.

“This must not be an ‘either or’ proposition where we are forced to choose between continuing to fly the shuttle to service the station and maintain our independence in reaching space, or investing in the next generation of space vehicle. We can and must do both,” Hutchison said in a statement.

The Chief doesn’t always appreciate Sen. Hutchinson’s brand of semi-conservatism, but in this case she’s spot-on:

…the Hutchison measure emphasizes the need for NASA to have a government-run system that could lift astronauts into space. The new bill also calls for the “continuation or modification” of programs initiated under the Constellation program.

“While commercial transportation systems may contribute valuable services, it is in the United States’ national interest to maintain a government operated space transportation system for crew and cargo delivery to low-Earth orbit and beyond,” it notes.

The private spaceflight efforts need to encouraged, and have administrative hurdles lowered. At the same time, as noted above, a continuing ability for the US to directly access the orbital high-ground is absolutely critical as a matter of national security…the space station be damned!

Obamunism

Obamascare Digest

There’s a LOT of stuff right now on this…because there is a lot happening. Follow the links for additional coverage on these…

Sen. Thune, to his credit, is leading out in the Senate opposition to Obamascare:

Thune: GOP preparing to slow or block health bill in Senate debate

Republicans are preparing to raise points of order and other roadblocks to the healthcare bill, a member of the Senate GOP leadership said Tuesday evening.

Like the African proverb says: “Any stick will do when you have to beat a snake.”

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), the fourth-ranking Senate Republican who serves as chairman of the Republican Policy Committee, said the GOP is prepared for a number of scenarios in which they would seek to slow down or halt passage of healthcare legislation once it comes back before the Senate.

“I still think it creates a lot of problems when it comes back to the Senate because there will be lots of points of order that will lie against the bill in the Senate, and obviously, we will, hopefully, have the opportunity to raise some of those,” Thune said of the health bill during an appearance on Fox News.

Obama Now Selling Judgeships for Health Care Votes

Tonight, Barack Obama will host ten House Democrats who voted against the health care bill in November at the White House; he’s obviously trying to persuade them to switch their votes to yes. One of the ten is Jim Matheson of Utah. The White House just sent out a press release announcing that today President Obama nominated Matheson’s brother Scott M. Matheson, Jr. to the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.

After the “Louisiana Purchase”, the Cornhusker Kickback”, and the Union exemption one had to wonder if there was any way for the abuse of Presidential power in the interest of partisan politics could be even more flagrent. Now we know. The Answer is yes. What’s next? More of the “Chicago Way” of business:

Barack Obama: I’ll steamroll health reforms through Congress

President Obama declared for the first time yesterday that he was prepared to steamroller his troubled health reform legislation through Congress with only Democratic support; a move Republicans denounced as the “nuclear option”.

Signalling that his patience had snapped after a year-long fight, Mr Obama laid the ground for Democrats in Congress to muscle the Bill through using a high-risk legislative manoeuvre known as reconciliation, which overrides a Republican filibuster. Although he did not use the word “reconciliation”, Mr Obama made it clear that that was the route he intended to take.

Democrats will, as a result, be able to get the health reform package through the Senate with a simple majority. Mr Obama’s party ceded their 60-stong majority in the upper chamber after losing the late Teddy Kennedy’s Massachusetts seat in January.

That shock defeat was due, in large part, to growing public hostility to Mr Obama’s health reforms, which many see as too expensive at a time of soaring deficits. Ramming the Bill through Congress is, therefore, a high-risk strategy that Republicans vowed to exploit.

In short, straight out of the progressive playbook: “Screw you people…you’re obviously too stupid to know what’s good for you, so I, as the leader, will drag you into the future whether you like it or not!”

Defense Matters!, National Insecurity

Cold War-II Notes

A number of articles have been posted from the former leaders of the COMBLOC during the former Cold War have been coming up lately that seem like that same old deja-vu all over again.

Putin: Russia to build new strategic bomber

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Monday that Russia will build a new strategic bomber, a move that comes as the nation tries to upgrade its aging military arsenal.

Putin said in televised remarks that work on the bomber must follow the development of a prospective stealth fighter, which made its maiden flight in January and was hailed by the government as a big step in military modernization efforts.

“We won’t limit ourselves to just one new model,” Putin said at a government meeting that focused on military aviation. “We must start work on a prospective long-range aircraft, our new strategic bomber.”

A few things come immediately to mind.

Firstly, this development is taking place in spite of continuing bumps in the reconstruction of the post-Soviet economic and technical infrastructure. In spite of the cost, the ex-KGB Putin has decided that this is the direction to go…and logically…who is there to aim these new weapons platforms at…but the United States?

Secondly, note the comment…”We won’t limit ourselves to just one new model”, as Obamamerica lurches sloooooooowly towards the F-35 which is going to be ready at some undetermined point in the future, and is supposed to be used by the Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in spite of the widely diverse demands from the different service branches. Combat aircraft have to do more than just fly, but the Obamamaniacal defense wonks are incapable of figuring this out.

Thirdly, and obviously, they are simultaneously going to beef up and improve their strategic bomber inventory with a new plane. Our plans? Er…what plans?
Meanwhile, there is this love note from those paragons of respecting human rights who hang out in Beijing:

China PLA officer urges challenging U.S. dominance

China should build the world’s strongest military and move swiftly to topple the United States as the global “champion,” a senior Chinese PLA officer says in a new book reflecting swelling nationalist ambitions.

The call for China to abandon modesty about its global goals and “sprint to become world number one” comes from a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Senior Colonel, Liu Mingfu, who warns that his nation’s ascent will alarm Washington, risking war despite Beijing’s hopes for a “peaceful rise.”

ChiCom military rise? Like for instance their planned drive to build a 600-ship blue-water “People’s Liberation Army Navy”, complete with aircraft carriers, as just ONE example that comes readily to mind.

“As long as China seeks to rise to become world number one … then even if China is even more capitalist than the U.S., the U.S. will still be determined to contain it,” writes Liu.

Rivalry between the two powers is a “competition to be the leading country, a conflict over who rises and falls to dominate the world,” says Liu. “To save itself, to save the world, China must prepare to become the (world’s) helmsman.”

“The China Dream” does not represent government policy, which has been far less strident about the nation’s goals.

You can believe as much of that as you wish, but the Chief isn’t reassured…ever hear of the old “good cop, bad cop” game?

On a slightly different but still diagnostic note, comes this post-Olympic item from Russia:

Medvedev demands resignations over Olympic flop

President Dmitry Medvedev demanded Monday that Russian sports officials step down over the country’s dismal performance at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Russia, a traditional winter sports powerhouse, won just 15 medals — with only three golds — in one of its worst performances. Officials said before the games that 30 medals and a top-three finish in the medal standings was the target.

Russia placed 11th for golds and sixth in the overall medal count.

In televised comments, Medvedev said if those responsible for preparing the athletes don’t resign then the decision will be made for them. He did not mention anyone by name.

…”but we know who you are!”

In nine Winter Olympics between 1956 and 1988, the Soviet Union failed to top the medal standings only twice, finishing runner-up on those occasions.

Medvedev lamented that Russia “has lost the old Soviet school … and we haven’t created our own school — despite the fact that the amount of money that is invested in sport is unprecedentedly high.”

YIKES! It’s a good thing that Stalinist type purges are out of style over there (at least for now), or there might be a new GULAG Olympic Sports Center in say…Novosibirsk or someplace equally salubrious.

Uncategorized

Archeology Reveals Ancient Diet Problems

Food Nazi’s of various stripes often unite in condemning modern life’s relishing of so-called junk food. They have claimed that our ancestors were much closer to nature, had more healthy diets, and thereby avoided many of our health problems. Archeologists have discovered a different version of that story.

Egyptian priests lived on junk food diet

Delicious and bountiful banquets offered to the gods and eaten by Egyptian priests and their families were laden with artery-clogging saturated fat, research shows. The evidence comes from hieroglyphic inscriptions on temple walls and the priests’ mummified remains – which bear the unmistakable signs of damaged arteries and heart disease.

Sumptuous meals of beef, wild fowl, bread, fruit, vegetables, cake, wine and beer were given up to the gods three times a day. After making their offerings at the temple, the priests would adopt a ”shame to let it go to waste” policy and take them back home to their families.

Hmmmmm…did Egyptian priests cheer ‘RA! RA! RA!” as they invented the tailgate party on the back of their chariots? (Sorry…I just couldn’t resist that!)

Professor Rosalie David, from the University of Manchester’s Faculty of Life Sciences, who led the study, said: ”There couldn’t be a more evocative message: live like a god and you will pay with your health.

”It also shows that blocked arteries caused by rich diets are not just a modern malaise – the problem goes back to ancient civilisations.”

The more things change, the more they stay the same!

Uncategorized

Islamosubversion in UK Labor Party

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Islamic radicals ‘infiltrate’ the Labour Party

A Labour minister says his party has been infiltrated by a fundamentalist Muslim group that wants to create an “Islamic social and political order” in Britain.
The Islamic Forum of Europe (IFE)…

Hmmmm. Sounds like the Euro version of C.A.I.R. (Congress on American-Islamic Relations) which afflicts us with their own version of Islamisms.

…which believes in jihad and sharia law, and wants to turn Britain and Europe into an Islamic state — has placed sympathisers in elected office and claims, correctly, to be able to achieve “mass mobilisation” of voters.

It’s not so bad here yet…most of OUR immigration influx comes from more-or-less Catholic Latin America, which may turn out to be part of our salvation in the end.

Speaking to The Sunday Telegraph, Jim Fitzpatrick, the Environment Minister, said the IFE had become, in effect, a secret party within Labour and other political parties.

“They are acting almost as an entryist organisation, placing people within the political parties, recruiting members to those political parties, trying to get individuals selected and elected so they can exercise political influence and power, whether it’s at local government level or national level,” he said.

“They are completely at odds with Labour’s programme, with our support for secularism.”

Of course the Islamos deny any sort of ulterior agenda whatsoever…maybe because it’s no longer ulterior…it’s right out in front: “We want your world for dar es salaam, and we want it NOW!”

Uncategorized

Triumph of Brit Technology?

Decide for yourself:

Lego enthusiast builds Airbus A380 with 35,000 bricks

A dedicated Lego enthusiast impressed fans with this painstaking replica of the world’s biggest passenger plane – built with more than 35,000 individual pieces. The 7ft-long (2.2m) and 6ft-wide (1.8m) Qantas Airbus A380 is split in half to reveal the intricate workings of life on-board a three-storey long-haul flight.

Lego enthusiast Ryan McNaught, 37, also known as the “The BrickMan”, spent more than eight months constructing the masterpiece in his garage.

His red, white and grey model boasts a range of fully automated touch screen controlled functions including front landing gear, two rear landing gear doors and airbrakes on the wing.

Ryan also fitted functioning landing lights, engines, air brakes on the wing and a tail fin on the rear wing.

Among his two-inch-high cast of crew and passengers are iconic characters from well-known films including Indiana Jones, Yoda, and the Samuel L. Jackson character from ‘Snakes on a Plane’.

There has been no comment on this technological triumph from Boeing.

Uncategorized

Brookings Man OK After Chile Quake

Brookings, SD native James Francis has been reported safe in Santiago, Chile in the aftermath of the massive 8.8 magnitude earthquake that struck the South American country early this morning.

Francis, a graduate of Brookings HS, is currently serving a two-year mission in Chile for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. His mother, Madelyn Francis has received a report that all the LDS Church’s missionaries are reported safe and accounted for after the quake. She reported that her son had noted that a couple of weeks ago all of the missionaries serving in Chile were given water filtration bottles, and received contingency training for surviving earthquakes and dealing with the aftermath.

In other accounts Chile, with it’s well-developed infrastructure and more modern building codes is withstanding its heavy damage with less harm to human life than Haiti did.

Now…after getting past tsunamis and aftershocks, the task of search, rescue, and damage clearance starts and will continue.