THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER

"...here in CA the Bay Area is the reputed leader, with some supposed 30K plus 'Green Jobs.' So, what is a green job? The kid driving the curb side recycling truck - 'green job.' The bum off the street hired to sort garbage on a conveyer at the 'transfer facility.' Green job. Meanwhile, auto workers are laid off due to a plant closure, because complying with draconian CO2 caps is more expensive than shutting down and opening a new plant in Texas or overseas."

As Steve Sadlov at Fresh Bilge concludes: Point pistol at foot. Pull trigger.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Scary for its rationing, which allows Medicare, which already has long waiting lines, to deny care if it's too expensive. Much of the rest of it is a mystery, even to the politicians who are voting on it, as the Democrats try to hide the details until it's too late to do anything about it.

UPDATE:  It seems to be a done deal now. Once it passes I'm sure the feckless media will finally get around to analyzing it. Fat lot of good it will do then. So much for the "watchdogs" of government. Feh.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Meanwhile, Barry says nevermind the busted national debt ceiling. We must create a whole new and expensive health care bureaucracy for the government to avoid going bankrupt. Got that?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Doctor Zero goes all out on Copenhagen and its calls for squeezing industrial economies:

"We’re not going to politely ignore swarms of private jets and limos ferrying you to carbon-belching 'climate summits,' where you draw up plans for the Western proletariat to live as primitive hunter-gatherers."

Heh. Worth a look.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Corruption and elitism is steadily undermining the populace's respect for the federal government. Stupidity won't help:

"Carbon dioxide, which has existed as a major component of Earth’s atmosphere for billions of years — and which is necessary for plant growth — is now a declared pollutant."

Let the lawsuits and judicial stays begin. This one is going to be very hard to enforce. We may finally see widespread refusal to obey, as the feds seize the means of production and the national economy grinds to a halt. Cash and barter, anyone?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"In 2002 I stood in a room of the Smithsonian. One entire wall charted the cooling of our globe over the last 60 million years. This was no straight line. The curve had two steep dips followed by leveling. There were no significant warming periods...Last year, I went back. That fresco is painted over...Hey, why should the Smithsonian put its tax-free status at risk? If the politicians decide to whip up public fear in a different direction, get with it, oh ye subsidized servants."

Heh. Read. It. All.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Henry Waxman, he of the notorious nostrils, seems to be preparing for a taxpayer bailout of the newspaper industry. Say it ain't so, Henry. What they need is to find a way to bring back the car, real estate and classified ads, which they might be able to do on their Websites which attract more eyeballs than the individual sites for car dealers and realtors, at least.

Even with government help, they aren't likely to be able to recreate their defunct 30 percent profit business models for the paper paper. Maybe the ones who have the least debt to service can survive in diminished form. The others? I doubt even they would want to be on Henry's leash which I'm sure he'd find a way to make selective, eliminating foes such as The Washington Times. Then there would be the problem of selling them. Who'd want to buy the news so obviously according to the federal government?

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've said it before, if we're going to dither, we should leave Afghanistan immediately. The government is more corrupt than the one in Iraq (and that's saying something) and the Afghans don't seem to want to fight. (Reminds me of South Vietnam.) We can always go back if we have to, or leave a few spec-ops behind to direct any necessary smart-bombings.

But Barry's new half-in, half-out strategy is pathetic. Especially his setting of a timetable for departure, which will only serve to put the Taliban and Al Q on notice that they can do all the free-killing of American troops they desire in the meantime. President Pantywaist has done the next worst thing to failing to decide at all. "America – we are passing through a time of great trial." No kidding. Will the last soldier out of the GWOT please close the door? Meanwhile, keep your heads down out there.

UPDATE:  Military analyst Ralph Peters agrees: "Our president is setting up our military to fail." Yep and, meanwhile, sending the enemy more American targets to shoot at.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Let me count the ways. But just take one for instance, the one you might not have expected from the former community organizer, Mr. Social Justice his own self: Despite 1,200 pleas for slate-cleaning pardons from ex-offenders who have served their time, and even more seeking sentence reductions, Barry has approved exactly none. Too much work, apparently, when he'd rather par-tay.

Via Radley Balko.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

New research says the so-called Greenhouse Effect, the basis of the IPCC's report and the EPA's new regs on carbon dioxide emissions, not only cannot be verified but violates the laws of physics:

"Thus, scientific support for the man-made global warming hoax slowly collapses while politicians rush to lock in massive international wealth-redistribution in its name. Those pesky 'greenhouse gases' just don't behave in a politically correct manner."

Not that this or anything else is likely to slow down the Democrats mad rush for higher taxes for a "solution."

Via The Seablogger.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Well, what do you know. You can't really beat up an apparently conservative black man just because you're a Democrat who's angry that he seems to have strayed off the liberal plantation. Not without getting indicted. Bet Al and Jesse won't speak up, though. They've haven't yet. It's been three months. Nor has Barry, of course, who was supposed to be the great racial reconcilliator. Ho hum. Just another Democrat campaign promise down in flames.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

As Barry prepares to jet off to Copenhagen to promise to continue our descent to the poorhouse by cutting our carbon emissions to make the dictator's club (i.e. the UN) happy, the climate naysaying is mounting.

Statistician, AMS member and blogger William M. Briggs shows the illogic in Barry's logic:

"Diminishing glaciers did not prove AGW; they were instead a verification that ice melts when it gets hot. Fewer polar bears did not count in favor of AGW; it instead perhaps meant that maybe adult bears prefer a chill to get in the mood. People sidling up to microphones and trumpeting 'It’s bad out there, worse than we thought!' was not evidence of AGW; it was evidence of how easily certain people could work themselves into a lather."

Briggs is the self-published author of an amusing book on the law of averages that isn't.

Meanwhile, Canadian businessman Stephen McIntyre, the famous blogger debunker of the infamous hockey stick "proof" for AGW gets a timely writeup in the WSJ.

Even (gasp) cBS is weighing in objectively (what will they think of next) on the hacked emails.

And blogger Megan McArdle, who (cough, spit) actually believes in AGW, notes the real problem with those emails: the major climate model predicting doom ahead could be rubbish. A little item financed in part by (you guessed it) the American taxpayer.

Oops, now there's more climate science faking in New Zealand.

So will Barry notice any of this stuff and unbutton if not completely remove his climate hairshirt and spend more time trying to get our economy back on track? Naw. That's above his pay grade. Apparently.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"I think not merely the thrill is gone, but a righteous anger about an Obama trifecta— of serial apologies and bows abroad, massive borrowing and deficit spending, and government-take overs of private spheres of life—is swelling up in the electorate. I haven’t seen in my lifetime anything quite like it. And this furor of being had has the potential not just to take Obama down, but also his ideology and supporters along with him for a generation."

Oh, yes, Santa, pretty please. There is an alternative.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I enjoyed this 1992 scifi novel of physicist Charles Sheffield's, though it seemed unnecessarily complicated in the beginning. A little more action before establishing the seven main characters would have prevented me from putting it down so often. Sheffield died of brain cancer in 2002, which resonates because a good friend of Mrs. Charm's is struggling with it. Seems to have it licked for the moment, though the odds of that lasting are very low.

I bring up Sheffield to point out how easy it is to fall into these stories of ordinary life in the solar system, as if we had gotten off the engineering dime and were actually living in/on Luna, Mars, and the Asteroid Belt. A lot of Cold As Ice occurs on (actually, under the surface of) Ganymede, which recalls Heinlein's impossible young adult novel, Farmer In The Sky, which Mr. B. and I started as a bedtime story but never finished.

We had the space probe pictures and details of Jupiter's radiation to consult, as Heinlein did not. Also life on (under, actually) Europa, which seems plausible, despite Sheffield's scientific realism of the dangers of Jovian radiation. I hope all this verisimilitude means humanity really will do these things and not just wallow forever in political corruption and the threat of war. But a posed result of the latter is limned chillingly in Cold As Ice as one of the spurs for continued colonization.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Sarah Palin, using her Facebook account as a periodic press release, is fighting tonight's Dem vote on health care "reform":

"While this Saturday night vote might seem like a procedural matter, at the end of the day a vote against Senator Reid’s motion is a vote against massive new government spending and a take-over of 1/6th of the U.S. economy; it’s a vote against billions in tax increases and penalties; it’s a vote against federal funding of abortion; and it’s a vote against ignoring responsible tort reform."

Sarah, whose education and experience are so assiduously disputed by her Dem and old media detractors, can count the dean of Harvard Medical School in her corner on this one:

"...it's entirely unclear how such unspecified changes would impact physician practices and compensation, hospital organizations and their capacity to invest, and the ability of patients to receive the kind and quality of care they desire. Similar challenges would eventually confront the entire country on a more explosive scale if the current legislation becomes law."

Course even if tonight's vote to move the bill to the floor succeeds, it and the House version are different and must be reworked into one by a conference committee. Only then can two final votes occur, one in the House, the other in the Senate. So tonight is only the beginning of the game. And even if the bill were eventually to be voted down, we can assume the Dem leadership would come up with another one and try again. With Barry's approval rating already in free-fall, they have to be worried about losing their majority in 2010.

UPDATE:  Reidcare moves on. With a little $300 million help for his friend. But there's still plenty of time to kill this turkey.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So Barry's boys sent billions of tax dollars to non-existent congressional districts? According to Recovery.gov. And Congress wants to investigate this "mistake"? Well, while they're at it, how about investigating whether it was done on purpose? And exactly where the money went. Eh? After all, theft of tax money is the Chicago Way.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Who's the most pathetic when it comes to the history of Jewish Jerusalem? The Arabs and Persians who pretend Jews never had any claim to the city? Or Barry who is trying to push them into yet another land-for-peace deal with the untrustworthy Palestinians? Above, carved in marble in Rome, is the answer to both: the triumphal arch of Roman emperor Titus Flavius Vespasianus, celebrating the destruction of Jerusalem and the Second Temple by his armies in 67-70 C.E. Genocide was Rome's response to the rebel Jews, just as it is today for the Muslims, and Barry's whiny speeches can't overcome the history he has either forgotten or never knew.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

On The Job training was good enough for Barry. Why not for Sarah? Even the few Legacy Media writers who claim to sympathize with her over the stupendous scorn she endures from their peers feel obligated to add that she needs something more to be taken seriously.

Huh? Wasn't necessary for Barry. He was never governor of anything for any length of time. All he ever did was vote present, push unrestricted abortion and otherwise flip-flop with the wind. Only other difference I can see is that he's a male and he's black.

UPDATE:  Here's an excellant description of why the Democrats and their client media (and some Republicans as well, particularly the RINOS) are so upset about her. Note the dirty-trickster trying to get in with the "Homos for Palin" tee shirt. If he had been gay, the shirt would have said "Gays for Palin," not "Homos," which is obviously meant to be perjorative. Looks like she's running to me, too.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The latest hater? Jeffrey S. Flier, the dean of Harvard Medical School, who says it is not real reform because it will only increase costs, not improve quality and, worse:

“Ultimately, our capacity to innovate and develop new therapies would suffer most of all.”

Stuff like this really beautiful new result: A one-shot gene therapy to help kids born blind to see.

Via Instapundit.

UPDATE:  Then there's always the plan to save money by telling women in their forties to skip the annual mammogram.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've read the arguments about why this Jihadi jerk shouldn't be tried in federal court in New York, but I remain unimpressed. Surely, if GWB had any plans to have him tried by a tribunal and hung, it would have been done sometime in the seven plus years he was in Gitmo. Since that didn't happen, it doesn't bother me especially that he will now be tried in a civilian court. And if he gets off? Well, then it will just have to be arranged for him to be run over by a bus.

But it's tempting to believe, as Power Line relates, that AG Holder's motive is to see KSM's lawyers run with his "treatment by the Bush administration, real and imagined, [as] the centerpiece of their defense, with the possible result that Bush, Cheney, and others may be indicted as war criminals by European countries or international courts, thereby satisfying the far left of the Democratic Party, which Obama represents."

It's still not clear to me, however, why this couldn't have happened just as easily in a military tribunal.

UPDATE: Two Bush-era lawyers have an argument for KSM's NYC trial that's much better than mine, including that such trials have already happened before:

"Many of Holder's critics appear to have forgotten that the Bush administration used civilian courts to put away dozens of terrorists, including 'shoe bomber' Richard Reid; al-Qaeda agent Jose Padilla; 'American Taliban' John Walker Lindh; the Lackawanna Six; and Zacarias Moussaoui, who was prosecuted for the same conspiracy for which Mohammed is likely to be charged. Many of these terrorists are locked in a supermax prison in Colorado, never to be seen again."

Read. The. Rest.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Cobb can be pretty funny sometimes, and nevermore on point than when he is considering Barry:

"All he requires is an inept and compliant media, and so far they have been obliging... But decisions? Ha! He is no decider, he is, as his legislative voting record shows, merely present... I just don't get upset about it. Obama stands in a long line. Garfield, Taft, Harrison, McKinley, Hayes, Cleveland, Taylor, Polk, Fillmore, Pierce, Buchanan... So what?"

Reagan was the Great Communicator. Looks like we will remember Barry as the Great Procrastinator.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Reading of (not actually reading, I have better things to do) the NYTimes' latest sneer at Sarah Palin reminded me of the above bit of their journalistic genius. What prognosticators they were and are! They condemn her lack of experience while they puffed Barry, the candidate with even less experience, and she was only running for vice president. Ah, but, you see, he was in the right party and he went to the right school.

The gang-on continues, with AP devoting eleven reporters to what Sarah said in her new book (which I ordered and expect to have this week). As she notes, eleven reporters could do a lot of important work, but... Naw, too hard.

Via Snoop at Simply Jews, who knows a crystal ball when he sees one. Heh.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What is with this guy and monarchy? He has to grovel before the emperor of Japan? Just like he bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia? One of his minions claims he was "observing protocol." Hardly. As this well proves.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

That's a more loaded question than it may appear. Depends on how you define what happened there. Was it a massacre in the war on terror? Then they get Purple Hearts. Or was it a lone wacko's criminal act? in which case, they don't.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

You may find you have much more to lose in the long run as your target's lawyer sifts through your files in the discovery process. Much the way the National Iranian American Council has had its illegal lobbying for changes in American foreign policy apparently discovered. Why NIAC even supplies money to J Street, a supposed but thereby obviously unlikely backer of Israel. And all because NIAC sued for redress of a journalistic piece they didn't like.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Fellow OCS grad Tucker Smallwood, who I have known and argued with since college days, opined the other day on our class email list that Barry should withdraw all the regulars while sending in the advisers, accompanied by air, artillery and medevac. Just as he and I did it in Viet Nam. I agreed but, probably, for different reasons.

I also see no reason to keep regulars in that briar patch with the Taliban tar baby but, moreover, I suspect Barry is going to be another LBJ, as this indicates, another micromanager all the way to defeat. The worst problem of course is that we're really there for us, not for them. And they don't want to fight in sufficient numbers to make advising worth while. But we could just go back now and then to clean out the Taliban rat's nest. Annually, if necessary. It would certainly be cheaper in money and American lives.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It's no surprise that Barry can't see the nose on his face. Our affirmative action president has never had to see his nose in order to move forward. There was always someone standing by to assist him.

But General Casey's inability to see the obvious is downright frightening. This is not a good time to advise your son or daughter or those of a friend to enlist. They'd be safe from white supremacism, true, but defnitely not from the evil of jihad. All we can be sure of from the denial going on about Maj. Muslim's murderous performance is that there are going to be more Fort Hoods. And probably very soon.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

If I see another headline about "the tragedy" at Fort Hood, I will vomit. It was a massacre, a terrorist attack, an example of "going Muslim" on Christians and Jews and other non-Muslims by a religious-fanatic murderer. Not some put-upon, discriminated-against, sad sack we must now feel sorry for. Piss on you, Maj. Hasan, and all your fellow-travelers.

The sorrow of the loved ones of the dead and maimed is real. But the old media manipulates us with their canned sorrow, no less than the politicians who can turn it on and off like a faucet. They couldn't care less. Most of them never served and never will. Their buddy Barry, who also never served, will come to Fort Hood today to give his version of canned sorrow. He should, instead, lead by undermining the political correctness and bureaucratic cowardice and inertia that caused this travesty. But he won't. It got him elected, after all.

UPDATE:  President Pantywaist came, he saw, and he coddled. Hasan may have cracked from "stress."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

GWB and Laura quietly visit the wounded at Fort Hood. While Barry and Michele, neither of whom have much love for the country, much less its military, and show it time and again, continue to par-tay.

Via My Voice On The Wings of Change.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Save the rending of your garments, conservatives, and the gnashing of your teeth. This is not really Black Saturday, however the witless/uneducated Legacy Media trumpets tonight's passage of PelosiCare. This always was going to be the sideshow charade before the big show which will be in the Senate and, maybe, beyond.

The Senate still has to pass a version of this economy- and job-killing turkey. Then the two versions have be reconciled in conference committee and the result voted on all over again. Only then does our bloodless president get to apply his rubber stamp. Plenty of time remains to provide a mercy killing for this crippled and retarded bird. Just like for the economy- and job-killing Cap & Trade Swindle which will have no effect on the amount of carbon in the atmosphere.

Unlike the debt-quadrupling, already-law Stimulus Swindle which has only raised unemployment above 10 percent. That mule has left the barn. As for the other two, hey, it ain't over until it's over. And even if they pass, then the constitutionality lawsuits will begin. Among other things the bills assault property rights and dictate the purchase of health insurance on penalty of imprisonment. Yep.

No matter how much the liberal Democrats would like American government to be a dictatorship of the Left, it isn't. The founders knew what they were doing. First the complicated passage. Then the lengthy legal checks and balances will begin. Plenty of time for even the dumbest pol to notice the downward polling trend and do some personal career calculating. So relax.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Letting Army Maj. (and Fort Hood Jihadi) Hasan harm his PTSD and brain-injury patients is despicable:

"I will argue that political correctness led to the madness of having someone who does not believe in the legitimacy of the war in Iraq practice psychiatry by counseling some of the most severely traumatized in the Iraqi war."

Let's see some Army medical heads roll for this at Walter Reed, shall we? Lead, Barry, or resign!

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As you can see here, the climate legislation Barry & the Dems are trying to pass, which will significantly raise all of our electric and gasoline bills, creating further unemployment and economic problems, will have zero effect on worldwide carbon emissions.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The old truism, oft attributed to former House Speaker Tip O'Neill, seems to be the reason the Democrat won in NY23--the only nationally-highlighted race yesterday, outside Virginia and New Jersey, to survive a Republican sweep, an apparent early repudiation of Barry.

I thought it was old Texas favorite Sam Rayburn who said it first, but I seem to be wrong about that. Anyhow, in the end, it came down to local perceptions of Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman and his opponent, despite Hoffman's endorsements from many national Republicans, including Sarah Palin. An Ann Althouse reader in NY23 explains what those local perceptions were. They had nothing at all to do with Barry.

One thing Mr. Sam did say that seems to fit the Democrats' overall situation: "When you get too big a majority, you're immediately in trouble."

Via Instapundit.

UPDATE:  It certainly didn't help that Hoffman didn't even live in the district. Geez.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

That is, says the Wall Street Journal, the inevitable outcome of "the worst piece of post-New Deal legislation ever introduced" the 1,990-page "runaway train" the Democrats are just proud as punch of producing. Barry calls it a "critical milestone." With any luck, it will be one that costs them the White House for a generation.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (1772)

Now if our president and congress critters had time for ordinary people, this lawsuit wouldn't be necessary. But it's cool that there's going to be one if congress doesn't act. With luck, it might even succeed. It certainly makes sense.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What? Oh, yes. The cap-and-trade bill recently passed by the Pelosi-led House of Representatives:

"...in order to sell your home—whether built in 2006 or 1772—you would have to bring it into compliance with whimsical, eternally evolving national 'energy efficiency' standards, starting with a 50 per cent reduction in energy use by 2018. Fail to do so and it would be illegal for you to enter into a private contract with a willing buyer."

Via Mark Steyn.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

I don't quite know what to make of this, whether it's as important as it looks, or just more confusion. I suppose we'll have to wait a few years before the fawning media gets around to telling us just what threats Hilarity and John ("I still have the hat!") Kerry made to twist their arms. They've even been battling the lawyers at the Library of Congress to try to restore their fig leaf of legality.

One good thing. When the ousted wouldbe dictator (whose room at the Brazilian embassy basement actually has a tinfoil curtain) starts spouting off about all those awful, mind-ray-blasting Jews, then, whether or not his big buddy Hugo C. comes to the White House for a celebratory grip-and-grin, Barry will look like a bigger fool than he does already.

UPDATE:  Well, there seems to be some level of hope that this anti-democracy push will not succeed.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Caption says the "reporters" are studying the inscriptions on the shovels for the ceremonial dirt-turning for a memorial tree for fallen American troops. You know, while Barry dithers about whether they need reinforcements or not. This is what the legacy media does these days instead of asking hard questions. Bush quietly met with the survivors of the fallen. Barry turns their deaths into a photo op and a tree-planting. Frankly I think he prefers them fallen. The fallen don't talk back.

Via Mudville Gazette.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sometimes it really looks like Obamlot is out to destroy the economy and much else. Or maybe they mean well but are just too stupid to figure it out. Where, for instance, do they think the electricity comes from? Pssst, guys, it's not in the wall. It's mostly from coal. What do they think people will do without ample electricity? Start an insurrection, probably. They sure ain't gonna freeze in the dark while Michele and Barry party and play golf.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Our troops should come home now from Afghanistan rather than continue risking their lives for a doofus president who'd rather criticise Republicans and the rare unfriendly news outfit and play golf than send them reinforcements. Or, in fact, make any decision at all about their fate. What a bum. (President Pantywaist, as the Brit's Daily Telegraph calls him). Our war on terrorism clearly is over. Better to face it than continue to squander our soldiers and Marines.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Barry's assaults on Rush Limbaugh and Fox News scare some people. They make me laugh. What a doofus. Sure, it's the Chicago Way. But, guess what, Barry, you're not in Chicago anymore.

UPDATE:  Others better qualified at wordsmithing than I are laughing at Mr. Tough Guy, too.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It's always the conservatives who the liberal news and entertainment media portray as being repressive. But it's usually the liberals who want to pass more laws to regulate more things to their liking. Hence the new Democrat FCC's new venture, which is certain to eventually go well beyond this apparently benign first move. The Electronic Frontier Foundation rightly fears a future power grab.

MORE: Worth remembering that the Democrat's FTC already has its nose in the tent trying to regulate bloggers.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I'd really prefer Gov. Rick Perry get another term than see the former cheerleader take his job, but it's nice to see K.B. has the guts to expose weasel Waxman and Barry's next economy-killing plan--after the trillion-dollar "health" job they still hope to pull on us.

Their $3.6 trillion gas tax will be felt not just in big states like Texas where everything is far apart, but in airline tickets and higher costs for all goods that arrive by truck, including groceries. Not to mention electric bills. Save the climate, me arse. Climate change is normal. Global warming is a hoax and the Dems' carbon-gas tax will cripple the country to satisfy the U.N., the EU and the usual nutcases.

Meanwhile, support for the tax and belief in the problem is sharply declining.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The fix is in. Barry's national security advisor wants a Palestinian state with no preconditions: no stopping the rockets and mortars from Gaza, no expelling the jihadis and Iranian advisers, no ceasing of the anti-Jewish elementary school curricula. No wonder only four percent of Israelis trust Obamalot.

Meanwhile, the Susan G. Komen for The Cure breast cancer charity group holds a medical conference in Egypt that excludes Israeli doctors and researchers. So toss their pink ribbons in the trash and give your future donations to some group that can do research without discriminating.

UPDATE: The SGKfTC say they renegotiated their deal with the Egyptians to include the Israelis. So pluck their ribbon out of the trash. Scroll down here.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I remember liking Tapper when he wrote for Salon. In fact, he was the only thing I liked about the lefty Salon.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Good on ya, Barry! Finally, something approaching sanity in regards to drug policy. It's a significant step, but nevertheless a baby one. Marijuana brings in the biggest profits to the Mexican and other crime cartels. The only way to stop them is to regulate it like alcohol. Well, we can dream.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'd seen this argument before but not including the Constitution's full text:

Article I, Section 9, of the Constitution, the emolument clause, clearly stipulates: "And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince or foreign State." 

Nor is the money his to give away. Barry thus can't legally accept either, especially since they were intended to influence his future actions. Course his party is in control of Congress, so they could consent for him if they want to.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Humor from Neo-Neocon. As she says, it's amazing how few changes Hamlet's soliloquy needed to fit Barry's Afghanistan dilemna:

To surge, or not to surge: that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous battles,
Or put down arms against a sea of troubles,
And by withdrawing end them? To retreat: to fight
No more; and by retreat to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To retreat, to leave;
To leave: perchance to lose: ay, there’s the rub;
For in that leaving, what defeat may come
When we have shuffled off this Afghan soil,
Must give us pause: there’s the respect
That makes calamity of a long war;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of polls,
The oppressor’s wrong, the talking head’s contumely,
The pangs of pacifists, the law’s delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his swift exit make
With a curt order? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary war,
But that the dread that some would cry “defeat,”
That vicious accusation from whose bourn
No politician returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action. - Soft you now!
The fair Nobel Committee! Wimps, in thy orisons
Be all my sins forgotten.

Heh. Good luck with that.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not only will you be called a racist if you criticise our thin-skinned president (whose name in his youth, by the way, was Barry Dunham) but if you're a blogger, his minions will take swipes at you in the adoring Antique Media. Well, what can you expect from a fellow who gave his opponents the finger during the '08 campaign? Some peace prize winner. Peace only if you agree with him.

Via Instapundit.

MORE: Barry's haters, critics, supporters and worshippers: Which are you? Via Riehl World View.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Nice thing about the Tea Parties is their older, better-educated demonstrators know more about politics.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

But he hasn't done anything, they gasped, after the news that the president known in his youth as Barry Dunham had won the Nobel Peace Prize. Ah, but he has, he has, and Charles Krauthammer lists a bunch of them:

"...paying up U.N. dues, renewing actions on various wholly vacuous universalist declarations and agreements, and joining such Orwellian U.N. bodies as the Human Rights Council...indicted his own country for arrogance, for dismissiveness and derisiveness (toward Europe), for maltreatment of natives, for torture, for Hiroshima, for Guantánamo, for unilateralism, and for insufficient respect for the Muslim world."

Not to mention such actions as:

"Unilateral abrogation of our missile-defense arrangements with Poland and the Czech Republic...Indecision on Afghanistan...a determination to end the [Iraq] war according to rigid timetables..."

So you see, Barry has done quite a lot. You may not like it (I don't) but the list is long and the Nobel committee, those acolytes of luminaries such as Arafat, Carter and Gore think it's just peachy-keen.

UPDATE: Well, as I see in the LATimes that, technically, "the Nobel nominations were due by Feb. 1, the 12th day of the new Obama administration. By which time the new president had barely promised to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility within one year, an absolute deadline now absolutely hopeless." Still, if they'd been disappointed by what transpired, I'm sure they could have revoked it. It's their committee, after all.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Given the alleged insubordination of their commander over long-delayed reinforcements, it's not surprising to hear that the troops doubt the value of the dangers they face in Afghanistan. Especially while the Mae West president dithers over whether they need to be augmented or brought home.

Via Hot Air.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The would-be Honduras dictator who Barry and his secretary of state are working so hard to get reinstated doesn't just occasionally pop off about Israeli mercenaries directing mind-altering radiation at his brain. His chief propagandist also tells Hondurans on the radio that Hitler should have been allowed to finish the Holocaust. Tell me again now, how did we wind up with a U.S. president who backs these creeps? Is this the new Chicago Way?

Via Simply Jews.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

You wanted a leader to make the tough decisions? Heh. You got a prom king who preens for the cameras and plays a mean teleprompter.

Via Instapundit.

UPDATE: Apparently this is all it takes for the Nobel Peace Prize. Move over Jimmy Carter. Heh. (Why not? The prize was already a patronizing mockery.)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

The new FTC regulation of bloggers promoting or criticizing products is clearly government intrusion on free speech, and I hope it's overturned quickly by some smart White House lawyer with more sense than the FTC commissioners. Most bloggers, as media critic Jeff Jarvis says, don't think they're doing anything remotely connected with journalism--which, in any case, isn't included in the regulation. Indeed, keeping a pubescent diary about one's precious kitties and opining which cat food is best obviously shouldn't be within government's jurisdiction.

Even I know the difference between what Antique Media does and what I do here. The FTC apparently doesn't. Or else, typical of government, just lusts for more power. This time they bent the Constitution. The shocking part is that the FTC has never regulated Antique Media in this regard--making me suspect that this reg has to do with AM's and politicians' upset at blogger analysis and attacks. Wisconsin law professor Ann Althouse notes the FTC's plan for selective enforcement of its regulation will make the assault even more egregious. Because it won't be against the young cat food endorser. I thought attacks on our freedom were supposed to have ended with Obamalot.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Never mind the paltry twelve trees that are the main evidence behind the global warming fraud, the EPA has now declared carbon to be a dangerous pollutant. Ready for your electrical bill to hit the stratosphere? Think Team Barry really wants to improve the economy? Think again.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

After nine months of Barry's tentatively faux version, a humorous taste of real Socialism, Welsh-style:

 "'Take me into public ownership!' she yelped, with a detonation of décolletage."

Via Simply Jews.                                                              

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In the end, Barry's "wonderful" Copenhagen trip was just another taxpayer boondoggle.

UPDATE: Turns out McChrystal met with the president in Copenhagen. So the trip wasn't entirely wasted.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It's refreshing to see someone of the stature of George Will pointing out the contradictions in the global warming fraud, which Barry & the Dems are intent on using as an excuse to raise more taxes.

"By asserting that the absence of significant warming since 1998 is a mere 'plateau,' not warming's apogee, the [New York] Times assures readers who are alarmed about climate change that the paper knows the future and that warming will continue: Do not despair, bad news will resume."

Will wants a federal commission to look into the discrepancies in the "theory" which the Cassandras are trying to ignore. Yes, at the very least, please. Meanwhile, there's more opposition from a wholly unexpected quarter.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Barry's dwindling number of supporters might be surprised at the original. Afterall, he and his cronies are hardly as competent as that fellow. Else their health care proposal would not have gone down in flames--done in by too many lies and prevarications easily seen through.

Via Iowahawk.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Mr. B. will be livid if Barry's plan to extend the school year goes through. School in Texas already resumes in August, thanks to politicians grubbing for votes. And Mr. B.'s unhappiness would be as nothing compared to all those kids trained to chant the prez's name and slogans. But they all may be saved once the unintended (?) consequences become known. You know, the unusual downside to all that Dem social engineering.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Of course they continue. But I expect her support among voters, particular those in the heartland, will only grow. Who, after all, put the "death plan" dagger in Barry's socialized medicine? This sort of misogyny, reported by the WaPo's Howard Kurtz, already is becoming irrelevant:

"At the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Managing Editor Rod Boyce writes:

'I must apologize to Mrs. Palin personally and on behalf of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner for the choice of words used on the bottom of Wednesday's front page regarding her speaking engagement in Hong Kong this week to a group of global investors.

'We used offensive language -- 'A broad in Asia' -- above a small photograph of the former governor to direct readers inside the newspaper to a full story of her Hong Kong appearance.

'There can be no argument that our use of the word 'broad' is anything but offensive. To use this word to describe someone of the stature of the former governor -- who is also the former vice presidential nominee of the Republican Party -- only adds to the anger that many people appropriately feel.'

"How on earth did that get in the paper?"

Come now, Howard. You know how it got in. When newsrooms commonly mock Mrs. Palin, day in and day out, such headlines are considered cute. Everyone grins-- even the feminists who should know better--and they let it slide. It's symptomatic of the institution's decline.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Now that France's president has more guts than our own naive little sophomore of the virtual school, who gives airy-fairy speeches about the virtue of nuclear disarmament while the Iranians and North Koreans build their nukes.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Apparently not. Israel PM Binyamin Netanyahu's rhetorical question was a pointed example of the bravery of his gutsy retort to the U.N. which, these days, spends most of its time and rhetoric bashing Israel. It was certainly better than Barry's latest interminable, anti-American apologia. Despite his usual "let me be clear," The One's elevator did not stop at all of the floors.

Via The Last Exile.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Barry's preferred president of Honduras, the deposed Manuel Zelaya, needs to be fitted with a tinfoil hat. To stop the mind rays from the "Israeli mercenaries," he tells the Miami Herald, who are trying to assassinate him.

But all is not lost. The dictator's club is delivering food to his basement room at the Brazilian embassy, when they can spare the time from enjoying Barry's own denunciation of the Israelis. Birds of a feather, indeed. Now that their Honduras op has been exposed, we'll just have to wait and see what the Elders of Zion have to say about it. (Hmmm. That was quick.)

UPDATE:  Un, Manuel, President Let Me Be Clear is down on you now. Must be your tinfoil hat.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

At least in ice at the poles. Now it appears it may also be available in ice at lower latitudes as well. Not that it matters to Obamalot. They ain't willing to go there either. Gotta fix earth first, apparently. If it takes a thousand years.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's pretty common knowledge by now that Barry often says one thing and does another. "Let me be clear," he likes to say. He says it over and over. But he's Mr. Murky because his clarity in words seldom matches his actions. I was reminded of it all by this recitation of Barry's support in Berlin, when he was a presidential candidate, for the Eastern European missile shield ordered by President Bush. Yep, the same missile shield Barry recently ordered canceled. He said "let me be clear" in Berlin, too.

Via Simply Jews.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The GOP did it, too. But, unlike Barry's minions, they didn't try to enlist such NEA grantees as smeared-poop artists to promote their agenda. They went to Branson, MO, and enlisted the hillbillies:

"...whether your art is wind chimes or plywood ducks, all of you can leverage your talents to address the plight of the GOP community. While winning valuable federal prizes! For example, let's say you're playing the weekend buffet show at an Indian bingo casino. Why not slip in a positive plug for Halliburton, or a zinger against Nancy Pelosi? I'm sure [we] can find some NEA grant money to cover that as performance art. Another example -- do we have any garden gnome-ists on the call?"

Indigenous, as opposed to "academic," art. Humor from the heartland. Iowahawk does it again.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The misSpeaker is really giving Hilarity a run in the lying department.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

The enthusiastic, barely-educated young helped put Barry into the White House. Yes we can, etc. If Obamacare passes, they'll be the ones paying for it. Step right up. Pay $100 a month for the least expensive insurance plan or a $750-$950 annual penalty for singles for not buying it. The penalty's cheaper, of course, but that way you get nothing for your money. But, hey, you got the thrill down your leg of electing Barry, right?

Humor via Ann Althouse.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Wow. Like I said earlier. There's never a dull moment with Barry's favorite campaign group. Favorite, that is, judging by the billions the stimulus package gave them to, ahem, create jobs. Or something.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Would anyone find this very surprising? How would you like being taken over by the government? The only surprising thing is that the American Medical Association (which only reps 18 percent of doctors) apparently backs Barry's "plan," the one he doesn't actually have. The House bill, in other words. (This guy will sign anything.)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Those ACORNs. Never a dull moment with these would be census takers. What a bunch of cut-ups.

Meanwhile, the Senate has reacted to their imbroglio by voting 83-7 to bar HUD from giving them any more housing grants, though there's still a procedural hurdle to clear before the vote could take effect. And, today, House Republicans sought to terminate all of their federal funding. That's not likely to happen, they being among Barry's fav campaign outfits and a big beneficiary of his "stimulus" money. But definitely worth a try--even if most of Big Media, including ABC, doesn't care. Not invented there, you see.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You don't mean that this proves Barry was lying, do you? Uh, yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying. And the fact that he can be caught out so easily means, well... He's either stupid or contemptuous of the rest of us.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A closer look at some of the crowd that Barry brought out.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Barry and the Dems (sounds like a rock group) may be presiding over the worst economic situation since the early 80s. The ghost fleet of container, bulk and crude carriers off Singapore suggests it.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Undercover journalism has always been controversial. But it was the mainstay of 60 Minutes for many years. Works best, though, if your expose isn't political. Exposing ACORN is not good for your legal health.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Boy, that Barry can sure bring out a crowd. This one seems not to share his "spread the wealth" ideas, however.

UPDATE:  Apparently CNN is estimating two million folks. Other American Big Media is merely saying "thousands." Funny how, when they're not sympathetic, they lose the ability to estimate. Fortunately, there is the foreign media. This time-lapse video shows the crowd form and flow to the Capitol.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Nice to see Sarah Palin coming right back atacha, Barry:

"We know from long experience that the creation of a massive new bureaucracy will not provide us with 'more stability and security,' but just the opposite. It's hard to believe the President when he says that this time he and his team of bureaucrats have finally figured out how to do things right if only we’ll take them at their word."

I still say, along with L.E. Ikenga, the Nigerian-American conservative woman critic of Barry, that Sarah ("an original who [unlike Hillary] will not be used and abused") would make a great president. If the GOP has the guts to nominate her.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I got a kick out of South Carolina GOP Rep. Joe Wilson's outburst during one of what AP delicately calls Barry's "iffy" promises on health care reform. This was the Congress of yesteryear where decorum was most often observed in the breach. It's hardly a modern phenom. Or, as Instapundit says: goose meet gander. It was, after all, the sort of thing that was good enough for the Democrats during Bush's state-of-the-union address in 2005.

UPDATE: Wilson has taken in three quarters of a million in Internet campaign donations since his cry, showing that he has plenty of folks in agreement with him. I don't think any pol should be allowed to take donations from anyone not an eligible voter in his district. Quaint idea, I know.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

 Let's have a little old-fashioned respect for the presidency, okay? Heh.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

No JFK moment this time. We're not going back to the moon. We're not going to Mars. In fact, we're not boldly (or even cautiously) going anywhere. The only good part is the idea of encouraging private space enterprises like the government pushed aviation in the 1920s by paying for air mail deliveries. Only something tells me that Barry won't be putting enough money into that to do much of anything with it, either. Hope and change! Only for earthworms.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

If there's any politics in here, I can't find it. I love the part about washing your hands so we don't all get the flu this winter. Yes, please. Otherwise, it's the usual exhortations. But a lot of it rings true. Good goin'.

UPDATE:  On the other hand, can the kids sit still for a speech that's ten times as long as the Gettysburg Address? Will they know who Michael Jordan is? Might be kinder to give each one a remote. Good thing he isn't Daddy Bush or the Nat'l Education Association might feel compelled to condemn him.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

He sure likes to keep himself in the public eye, doesn't he? Reminiscent of third world dictators who do the same. But they have thugs behind them. American presidents, who must rule by persuasion, need to be careful not to wear out their welcome.

Barry's abuse of his could be one reason his approval rating is now below fifty percent and falling. Plus, of course, boneheaded appointments like 9/11 "truther" Van Jones, a radical with a long Youtube trail. (So much for the vaunted Internet savvy.)

Not to mention the attempt to take over the healthcare system with assurances that don't ring true. What will he do for an encore? More of the same, it seems. So far, ol' Bare doesn't seem to have a second act.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It's strange that a president would do this, especially during the school day instead of in the evening when kids are at home. But it's probable it'll just be boilerplate: "Stay in school, study hard, contribute to your world, etc." Austin schools, picking up on the scattered protests elsewhere, are telling parents they can opt their kids out, if they want. What will the kid do? Go wait in the hall until it's over?

The schools already are plenty political. In Texas, as early as second grade, they teach global warming as a crisis, not a controversy. It's made for some interesting discussions with Mr. B. I remember the schools trying to indoctrinate me and my peers with this or that bit of politics years ago. By high school, our b.s. detectors had become pretty sensitive.

Eisenhower was president when I was in elementary school. He famously preferred golf to almost anything else. His successor, JFK, was too busy with extramarital affairs to speak to us directly. But if either of them had wanted to, I'm sure the schools would have made arrangements for us to listen. Probably forced us to listen. There was no opting out in those days.

UPDATE:  Dan Riehl ponders whether Barry is uniquely unable to do this without controversy or if any president could do it peacefully anymore.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I have ignored the wall-to-wall media coverage of the death, the Valentine (and airbrushing) analysis and the funeral. It was easy to do because I rarely watch television or read newspapers anyhow. But when I heard that the ol' fraud would be buried in Arlington, well...

I know, as many people do not seem to, that Arlington National Cemetery is full of military paper-pushers who never spent two seconds in combat. It is not just heroic ground, despite the heroes who are buried there. But, really, now, Ted never served in the military, and he had zero to do with the assassinations of his brothers. (We can hope.) He doesn't deserve to be there just because he was part of one of the most ambitious, political and publicity-hungry families in American history. Bah.

UPDATE: I'm wrong. He served as a private in the Army, from 1951-53, after he was expelled from Harvard. But, according to this report, his daddy made sure he never had to fight in Korea.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Like Instapundit says, I'm sure AG Holder will be right on it. Unless being black is Charlie's free pass.

UPDATE:  Looks like it's finally the beginning of the end for CR.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Somehow I don't think naming Obamacare after the famously overweight boozer and skirt-chaser is going to boost the chances of it passing. Not even if, as Dan Riehl says, there are some new features:

"...amending it to include mandatory long distance swimming lessons, as well as CPR and breath control classes for all Americans. Apparently one young woman wasn't enough for Teddy. Now he can play a roll in the un-timely demise of more Americans than he could even count."

The Dems and their captive media may have loved the deceased hypocrite, but many Americans did not. So it's still going to be pass-it-at-your-political-peril for those up for re-election next year.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

"For all the talk of how much he cared for the weakest members of society, the fact is he helped kill tens of millions of the most vulnerable."

Think Viet Nam, Cambodia, Iraq, aborted babies, Mary Jo Kopechne, etc. I will, once again, defy convention and skip the hagiography for the dead liberal senator who I always found, at best, a curious fellow. The Brothers Judd, above, include a bit of the usual Big Media swoon, along with their biting commentary. Nevermind one-term Barry's equally incoherent praise.

I saw ol' Ted in person several times. He was enormously corpulent. Jowly. He was always campaigning for more tax money for more issues to "fight" more problems. Did he ever create a single thing on his own?

Via Random Jottings.

UPDATE: Teddy the boozer in his cups. Via Instapundit. And...

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

For shame, Mrs Petrowski. Costing Obamacare so much unnecessary expense. Well, Dr. Barry knows just what to do. Let's go up on the hospital roof and, uh, look at the stars. Or something. Biting humor from Iowahawk.

UPDATE: The things Obamacare is meant to solve remain unsolved by the Brit's national health system.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I'm reading Amity Shlaes' The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression. It led me almost immediately to a debunking of one of the enduring myths of the New Deal: the idea that FDR's National Recovery Act of 1933, which set production quotas and prices for industry and small business, was strictly voluntary.

Shlaes shows how the NRA, in fact, nationalized everything by bringing twenty-two million workers under its five hundred and fifty-seven basic legal codes. Then the NRA sent out inspectors to make sure employers were complying. The Justice Department prosecuted companies that refused.

"All across the country, the NRA was being litigated," Shlaes writes on page 223 of the paperback edition. Three Jewish butchers in Brooklyn finally brought down the house of cards. They were indicted on sixty felony counts of violating the "voluntary" codes. When they lost in the lower courts, they appealed and won a unanimous victory in the Supreme Court in 1935.

"...some 500 cases against people charged with breaking NRA codes were now to be dropped," Shlaes writes on p. 245.

Instapundit says Socialist Barry should read the book. At least he should read the NRA part of it. When he has time. He's busy at the moment golfing with one of his tax-cheat enablers.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Unlike millions of other seniors, I can live without the cost-of-living increases in Social Security payments. For one thing, I won't have to face concomitant rising Medicare premiums so long as Mrs. Charm is able to keep me on her employer-supplied health insurance. But the implicit threat of SS's impending demise really is angering.

Some of those who are too young to get the checks seem to think it's free money, a kind of welfare payment for being old. It's actually reimbursement, of sorts, for all those years the government merrily deleted social security taxes from my paycheck. I'm convinced that it would not be in the red if the pols hadn't been stealing money from it all these years for their pork and lobby payoffs.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The so-called boycott, begun after the CEO offered an alternative to Obamacare, seems to be a bust. The Austin-born chain's stock price is trending up and the parking garage, at least in Chicago, is almost full.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A proposed robot vessel for "whitening" clouds to adjust the global thermostat by reflecting sunlight back into space. From a report by UTexas mechanical engineering professor J. Eric Bickel that some think is quite mad. Bickel says this and other methods outlined to stop "global warming" would be cheap at just $9 billion and could be reversed if anything goes wrong. What could go wrong?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Big Media prides itelf on being better edited than blogs which, generally (including this one), aren't edited at all. So why is Newsweak saying “Republicans stood together against Social Security and Medicare, and when those programs proved popular, opposing them left a residue of distrust for the GOP.”

Oh, that's just Eleanor Clift, the Helen Thomas of magazine gerbilism. These Democrat shills are history-challenged and always have been. Fortunately there's the blogs to correct them, including the item that eighty percent of Republicans backed Social Security and Medicare was co-sponsored by a Republican and backed by a majority of them. Dan's right, Eleanor should replace Helen. If only for the comic relief.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Ross Perot's 1992 giant sucking sound soon will be "the sound of Grandma going to one of the scores of new hospitals in Tijuana, Nogales, and Ciudad Juarez that will cater to Americans getting around the restrictions of ObamaCare. Yes indeed, the President’s health care plan will do wonders for the Mexican economy."

Heh.

Via The Passing Parade.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Except when, uh, he prefers otherwise. Like when he wants to cripple American electricity. But watch yourself out there. Even Flickr is now censoring some who dare criticize him.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It's an old rule. American soliders win a war. American politicians lose it. It's a wonder anyone serves.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Or, in my case, dad. Sarah's aptly-named "death panel" has been removed from the Senate bill but it remains in several House versions. Moreover, the IT precursor to the grandma-killing panel, called the Center for Health Outcomes Research and Evaluation, is already law--craftily enacted in the so-called stimulus bill, according to leftist civil libertarian Nat Hentoff.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A new use for the Obamalot brand, while the lies continue from the BSer-in-chief. Note: The Cafe Press version of this bumper sticker comes with an exclamation point.

Via Bill Whittle.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)

The Dems are seeking a single-payer health system, while the closest available example unravels:

"Doig says there are some 'very good things' about Canada's health-care system, but she points out that many people have stories about times when things didn't go well for them or their family. (Canadians) have to understand that the system that we have right now - if it keeps on going without change - is not sustainable,' said Doig."

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

People I know hereabouts avoid the U.S. Post Office at all costs. Here's why:

"It's like you have left fast-moving Manhattan and zapped yourself into the Deep South in 1934. Picture a drowsy moment in 'To Kill a Mockingbird.' A clerk who has finished with one customer takes a good long pause to settle herself, exchange pleasantries with friends, arrange her workspace and so forth before she lights up the little box and asks for the next customer. If you arrive at her window before she has turned on this light, she will curtly send you away. Don't crowd her! You're just the customer."

That's a description of a post office in NYC but it's a perfect fit for our neighborhood p.o., except we have stamp machines. Imagine that, we're ahead of NYC. Ours, however, is scheduled to close.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Even if that proves to be the case, in a truncating of Obamacare, and it would be welcome, there are, nevertheless, plenty of other government-intrusive, central-planning and rationing schemes still afloat.

AND:  Stunts like these pulled by Houston's idiot congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee don't help a bit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

His U.S. Surgeon General Regina Benjamin, no less. Judging by her own problem with obesity, it's obvious she's doing more than advising the burger chain. Fries with that? Heh.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Years ago, when the organic foods chain had just one store in Austin, it seemed wildly overpriced to me. But the Birkenstock crowd loved it. Now some of them are boycotting it because its CEO John Mackey dares oppose Obamacare. Oops.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sarah Palin may not be a candidate for a national anything yet, but she's already whooped Barry on his so-called health care reform. She named the end-of-life provision in the proposed bill a "death panel" for the sick, the elderly and the disabled. Barry, rather inexplicably for a president, a species that usually tries to stay above the fray, fought back in public. Sarah stuck to her guns. Now the Senate is removing the provision from its version of the bill. Go gettum, Sarah!

UPDATE:  She isn't satisifed, however. I love the way she's using the intertubes to get her voice out.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Barry says it is. So do Nancy and Harry and Barney and Henry and all the rest of the non-productive.

John David Lewis, Duke U. prof of philosphy, politics and economics, says it isn't true:

"There was no right to such care before doctors, hospitals, and pharmaceutical companies produced it. Health care is a service, which we all need, and none of us are better served by placing our lives and our doctors under coercive bureaucratic control."

Read it all.

If the pols persist in saying that, in fact, it is a right, then I can think of a few others that should be as well. Car repair should be a right. And paid vacations. And flying in private jets the way the congresscritters and presidents get to do it. No? Gee, why not?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The whither we know. Waxman-the-ferret, et al. But why? Nevermind the contradictary nonsense about how the system is broken but, oh yes, you'll get to keep your part of it all the same. This fellow, Daniel Hannan, southwest England's rep in the European Parliament, has the answer, though you have to listen to the whole thing to get to the point. But it's not painful, except when you imagine our future under Obamacare.

The Brit health care system, Hannan says, employs 1.4 million managers. Making it the third largest organization in the world, after the Red Army and the Indian National Railway. Think of how many more managers our National Health Care system will have, and, like most federal employees, they will be ninety-percent Democrats. Get the point now? Obamacare is a hiring hall for his party.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The next time you read or hear the phrase "peak oil," usually as part of some politician's blather about how we need more solar cells and windmills, just think of this alternate: "North Dakota Oil." Not that there aren't still naysayers.

Via The Seablogger.

UPDATE:  Here's another for instance.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Besides being the dumbest box of rocks on the planet, our thieving congressional reps also are the most hypocritical. First the Pelosi excoriates auto industry execs for flying in private planes. Then she scolds the health insurance execs for making a profit that her eminence considers excessive.

Now she wants her own air force to ferry her and her colleagues around the world, so they don't have to rub shoulders with the common people on commercial flights. These are the Democrats, the party of the little guy? As one rude sticker puts it: "Pelosi is Italian for Dumbass." Off with their heads!

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Another first for the historical president. Not one that most presidents would want, though:

"A secret and more or less permanent dissident database--in America! That's quite an accomplishment for an administration still in its seventh month. It seems longer, somehow."

Seems longer because he's been in the media day after day after day. The man never shuts up. 

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

"...the White House recently invited loyal citizens to report when they receive 'an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy' to the official e-mail address flag@whitehouse.gov. Loyal citizens are to report fishy comments to Linda Douglass, someone who looks suspiciously like Krupskaya [Lenin's wife], or Nurse Ratched."

Via Power Line.

Doctor Zero also has a good post on why some of us so look forward to next year's congressional elections. Which, of course, is why Barry and the Dems are hurrying to pass everything they want now.

Meanwhile, "Fishy friends? Turn them in!" Bonus: Know Your Town Hall Mob Agitators!

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Our neighborhood post office, Chimney Corners, is on a list of seven hundred the U.S.P.O. may close due to a budget crunch. I have to say that we would hardly miss it, except for the stamp machines.

For a long time we've used the UPS store nearby. Much quicker service, nicer clerks, more expensive probably but maybe not by much. We would miss our nice mailman. I suppose he would be gone, too. Course we pay most of our bills online, like half the rest of the country. Part of the P.O.'s problem, no doubt.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Racism? A year ago Vanity Unfair published one of these on President Bush. Nobody complained then, of course. I think it looks good on him. When middle class taxes rise, they'll know it, too.

UPDATE:  The WaPo thinks it's racist. Whoa, now there's a surprise.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

When the Hildabeast runs out of chatter, this is waiting in the wings to be loaded on the B-2 and B-52.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Oh, no, we can't have that. No problem. Barry stuck with the video and canceled the audio and it all went away. It's not, after all, about resolving anything. The race game must not be challenged.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

...wait for it...are you ready?...are you sure you're ready?...okay now...here it comes: Area 51!

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

1. Americans have better survival rates than Europeans for common cancers.
2. Americans have lower cancer mortality rates than Canadians.
3. Americans have better access to treatment for chronic diseases than patients in other developed countries.
4. Americans have better access to preventive cancer screening than Canadians.
5. Lower-income Americans are in better health than comparable Canadians.
6. Americans spend less time waiting for care than patients in Canada and the United Kingdom.
7. People in countries with more government control of health care are highly dissatisfied and believe reform is needed.
8. Americans are more satisfied with the care they receive than Canadians.
9. Americans have better access to important new technologies such as medical imaging than do patients in Canada or Britain.
10. Americans are responsible for the vast majority of all health care innovations.

Via The Hoover Institution at Stanford, thanks to House of Eratosthenes

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

While the Dems proceed with their potentially economy-busting climate change taxation scheme, the so-called Cap & Trade, more scientists are fleeing from the global warming fraud behind it. The latest are some members of the American Chemical Society, which bills itself as the world's largest scientific society. And more on it here.

Via The Seablogger

UPDATE:  Meanwhile, a new Henrik Svensmark paper out today concludes that "a link between the sun, cosmic rays, aerosols and liquid-water clouds appears to exist on a global scale," meaning that an active sun decreases the amount of low-lying clouds which influences the warming of the earth far more than any CO2 increases. The sun's recent inactivity thus may have influenced the current global cooling, and the northeast's Year Without A Summer.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This Breitbart video of Sergeant Crowley taking questions from the media is a close look at an interesting and intelligent man. Far from being a chump to lend credence to Barry, he obviously held his own. That thick Boston accent brings back memories. Not all pleasant. I lived there many years ago.

He and Professor Gates plan to meet again, place and topic unspecified. Something tells me Gates is going to be the taught and Crowley the teacher. Maybe next time Gates will be polite when the cops come to call. Meanwhile one of Crowley's black police colleagues had a complaint of his own for Gates. The professor's post-beer statement, on his Web newsletter, is a little pompous and still obfuscating, for the fellow who I think started the whole thing and still refuses to admit it.

Michael Barrone also gives the snob Gates a deserved, good skewering for picking on a "little" guy.

It still amazes me that Barry, whose "stupidly" remark on the case he admitted he knew nothing about has cost him dearly in the polls, still apparently refuses to say sorry. If either of the three clearly should, it's him. Kiss that fifty percent approval goodbye, B. Hussein. You may never see it again.

UPDATE:  Crowley and Gates, at least, whatever the latter's refusal to own up, seem to have hit it off rather well.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I still have no reason to believe that Cambridge, MA PD Sgt. James Crowley will show up at this afternoon's Obamalot- and media-driven "beer summit." Not a single Crowley quote has appeared in any of the multiple cutsie beer stories yet. Not even in the WSJ. What do you want to bet it's a bust?

UPDATE:  Okay, I stand corrected. The sergeant showed up. No word on what was said. Maybe later. I don't envy him having to listen to Biden's fractured platitudes, however.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (21)

Pam Geller at Atlas Shrugged does a very nice thirty-minute interview (in three segments) with former Bush admin foreign policy/UN guy John Bolton. I was surprised to learn that the guy whose toughness at the dictator's club always impressed me started out his political career supporting Barry Goldwater. I did not then do any more than stick an AU H20 sticker on my motor bike. But I shared JB's enthusiasm for the man whose political efforts led to President Reagan. Worth your time.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, as Paul at Power Line (where I got this) more or less said, I hope the Blue Dog Dems are capable of keeping this malarky stopped. I still don't get it. If the rationale is to help the poor, why not help them? Reform Medicaid and Medicare. LBJ had the right idea. His programs were crippled by insane regulations over the years.

So fix them. Do some real work for a change. No need to screw the rest of us. As Megan McArdle says, monopolies don't innovate. Take away competition and our "best health care in the world" goes down the tubes.

UPDATE:  Great, new anti-ObamaCare ad, with suggestions from commenters for even better ones. My fav, from Portlandon, is: "Uncle Joe getting a rejection letter for his liver cancer surgery, followed by a gunshot. The letter falls like a feather to the floor at his feet."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I keep seeing Big Media stories about how it was Cambridge Police Sergeant James Crowley who suggested that he and Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Barry smoke the peace pipe Thursday over a, uh, Budweiser? (Jaysus, can't they come up with a better beer? Shiner would be okay. Even Dos Equis would be preferable.)

But, so far, all we've seen, all I can find, is this Monday CNN report with two of the Cambridge PD's black officers backing up the sergeant that the ever-after obfuscating Gates was disorderly. No mention of Crowley shopping for a new suit for the White House meet. I haven't found a single report quoting the sergeant agreeing to this at all.

Makes me think that, so far, it's an Obamalot- and media-driven scam. If not, I wonder what they would talk about? Would Barry and Gates apologize? They both owe Crowley one. Do they have the decency? Nothing they've done in public yet suggests it. Time will tell.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

The race-baiter Gates, who I earlier nicknamed Tawana Brawley since it's apparent to me that he's trying to lie his way out of some unpleasantness he caused, is already out there puffing himself up. "This Is Not About Me," says the headline quoting him at Drudge. Of course it's about you, you creep. Race hustler of the year.

His cohort in obfuscation, Barry his ownself, wants Gates and Sergeant Crowley to come sit down, apologize to each other and have a beer. I'm with Professor Jacobson at Cornell. I want the truth, not Kumbaya, and, so far, I'm siding with the Cambridge PD. Policing-while-white has become as much, if not more of a problem then driving-while-black. I've had enough of slime like Gates who cry racism every time things don't go their way or someone calls them on their misbehavior. Besides the cops need all the help they can get.

Cops are the real endangered minority in this country. They are the thin blue line between the law-abiding and the thugs. Cops never know what awaits them when they answer a call. They dare not let creeps like Gates yell abuse at them in public and get away with it. It’s not a long step from people doing that to taking shots at them. That’s, in part, what the disorderly conduct laws are about. And even snobbish, lying Harvard professors have to obey them or go to jail.

UPDATE:  Indeed, the Cambridge police commissioner says Big Media got the story wrong from the beginning and continues to report the same primary racial error.

AND: Gates has amended his Inkwell Foundation's 2007 tax return to account for the misrepresentation of $11,000, thanks to the work of blog Riehl World View. There's still the matter of a $6,000 payment to his girlfriend. Naughty.

MORE:  Iowahawk (who else?) finds humor in the plight of the Harvard faculty ***hole.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Whew. That didn't take long. About six months and Obamalot's approval rating is below fifty percent.

Link via The Seablogger.

UPDATE:  Texas Medical Association, the largest state medicial society, to Obamalot: No Thanks!

"'The physicians of the Texas Medical Association believe our health care system is broken and needs reform,' [President William] Fleming said in a statement. 'However, we cannot support the current House proposal... While it addresses some of health care’s ailments, it leaves gaping wounds and does not serve Texas patients well.'"

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not exactly, but close. Mr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., that is. The big shot who decides to argue with a cop and try to pull rank on him. Then, when he's arrested for disorderly conduct, he cries racism. Figures.

What else is new? Barry, our alleged post-racial president, admitting he doesn't know the facts, but immediately siding with Gates. Whoa. The only person looking good here, so far, is the cop. Until his bosses dropped the charges, making Gates look justified. It all would be silly if it wasn't so sad.

UPDATE:  The cop's police report with addendum by a second officer who also heard Gates.

AND: VDH-- "There were no winners in this comic tragedy — but one clear loser: last night, the president of the United States."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bobby Jindal's plan looks more sensible (if still complex) than any Barry-Nancy secret one.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The VA is doing it differently this time, using a nine minute video on YouTube to explain and promote the most generous G.I. Bill since 1944. Ninety days service since Sept. 10, 2001 is all you need to qualify.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Via Girl In Shorts.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I don't know which I like less here, the AP's editorializing in a despicably nasty way, or Judge Sotomayor's obvious dissembling. I still don't think she should be denied a seat on the Supremes. With only one vote out of nine, the only people she's going to injure are the Hispanic-Americans she embarrasses. And, who knows, she might even turn out to be sensible. Other nominated dolts have.

UPDATE:  Iowahawk's savage humor on the "wise Latina" in question, however, I entirely approve of.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

When Barry gets it right, it's only fair to notice. Going to Africa to say that it's time for them to get over their old grievances against the West and start curing their own, homegrown warts, is pretty bold stuff. On the other hand.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

CNN and AP call them Iranian diplomats, the posers Barry released from incarceration Thursday. The Weekly Standard and National Review insist the Irbil Five are terrorists, Quds Force commanders from Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards.

As such they coordinated attacks that killed hundreds of American troops in Iraq. We ought to be able to rely on Big Media to give us such detail of Barry's latest suckup to the mullahs. But we can't.

Instead, Big Media is peddling another report on Bushitler's alleged awful spying at home. Groan.

Via Power Line. 

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Great sign here: "Government Healthcare: The Efficiency of FEMA & the Compassion of the IRS."

Not to mention penny-pinching, rationing, and probable loss of choice, timely care and treatment advances. If the Dems were honest about this, they would rejuvenate and expand Medicaid for the poor and leave the rest of us alone.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

When I saw this on Drudge, I thought, "Wow, even the Russkies think he's a phony." Well, maybe. It could also be the famous Russkie racism. But, then, Medvedev probably just knows a gasbag when he hears one. The caption I voted for here was "This is going to be easier than I thought." And it would be, too, except by next week Barry probably won't remember his name. And.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Well, someone had to do it. We know the affirmative-action-loving, PC-enforcing Big Media won't. Not to the First! Black! President! Barry's going to make President Grant look like a choir boy.

UPDATE:  Well now, here's a new bit of corruption that didn't make it into the book. Barry sure moves fast when it comes to stealing. Hey, it's the Chicago Way!

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We mock the French and their military losses. But only they have the guts to ban the burqa. Not that I expect our affirmative action president to have the nerve to sack the head-to-toe shroud, but still...

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

From her FaceBook account today regarding her announcement Friday that she will be resigning:

"The response in the main stream media has been most predictable, ironic, and as always, detached from the lives of ordinary Americans who are sick of the 'politics of personal destruction.' How sad that Washington and the media will never understand; it’s about country."

Heh.

UPDATE:  I laugh at all the "wise ones" who contend that her political career is over, etc. My bet is: She's going to become the campaigner who makes it possible for the Republicans to win back one or both houses of Congress, then use that IOU to take the nomination in 2012.  

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

You might think, with all the AGW hysteria, and the Dems rushing to double our electric bills, that the whole globe would be saturated in CO2. You would be wrong. Sure, this satellite mapping of the earth's atmospheric distribution of carbon dioxide is a year old. But it's also the first one ever made, and was assembled from data collected between '02 and '08. The first one ever made. Think about that for a minute. I'm no great hand at graphics, but it sure looks to me like the major culprits are California and China. So how about it Speaker Pelosi? How about starting by doubling your energy bills?

Via Baby Troll.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'm still hopeful. Her resignation eliminates any claims of conflict-of-interest between running for the 2012 nomination and her job as Alaska's governor. The Left will continue to hate and mock her, as this low blow demonstrates. So what's new about their lack of taste? The Right will continue to love her, especially us commoners. The Independents, as always, will get to decide.

UPDATE:  The Puffington Host pulled the mockery at the second link, which was, once again, about Sarah's retarded son. But Michele Malkin captured the page for, uh, "posterity."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, Barry's inclusion here is not that odd, really. Afterall, it's not like it's Iran or anything.

UPDATE:  Excellant analysis here by two birds of dissimilar feathers. And one more.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Surprise, surprise. Barry's EPA hasn't done its homework:

"EPA has not done its own evaluation of the global warming theory. Rather, it has relied on analyses by others, mostly the U.N.'s IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report. That report, however, was a political document, not a scientific one."

EPA has, however, quashed an in-house rebuttal of the Dictator's Club. Can't have dissension, oh no. That wouldn't be, uh, scientific.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Like Barry says, sometimes we'll just have to forgo surgery and  take painkillers, instead. What a humanitarian. Does he ask ACORN to give up its eight billion in "stimulus"? Oh, but that's different.

Via DebbieSchlussel.

MORE:  Even the Gerbilists say his recent "infomercial" with so cooperative aBC was a flop. Except on one point: he admitted he wouldn't make his own family stick to the public plan. What a man.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

"As the U.S. House of Representatives [narrowly passed] a climate-change bill, the Australian Parliament is preparing to kill its own country's carbon-emissions scheme. Why? A growing number of Australian politicians, scientists and citizens once again doubt the science of human-caused global warming."

Well jolly good for them. Finally some common sense. Not that it will have any influence on our political crooks. Now to see whether the Senate has more honesty. I suspect not. Some think the American electorate will not remember who done this deed when their electricity bills double and the economy craters. I think they will, and the Dems will pay big time.

Hairnet and giveaway is the translation of the bill's cap and trade title by Steve Hayward at No Left Turns who suspects the last-minute bill has so many loopholes for favored (read big contributor) outfits that it will have no measureable effect on "the risks of global warming." But, come on, we can't change the climate. How smart do you have to be to figure that out?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

If you won't miss Jacko (his best work was years ago) and Farah was never your cup of mocha nor Gov. Sanford of any particular interest, you can still keep up with the Iranian protesters as they get picked off one by one.

Iranian and some Western bloggers always have had the best reporting and aggregating on it, anyhow. Of course, the UN is useless, as always. Heck, it's the Dictator's Club. What, you thought it was the protector of humanity? Only the thug version.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

South Vietnam is what this map reminds me of. Think of the red places as NVA-controlled Indian Country. Places where our forces didn't/don't go for very long. S. Warzistan on the left bottom is where that Predator's Hellfire missiles killed all those Talibani at the funeral the other day. Eighty-something. I expected to be reading of Lefty outrage about that by now. The fact I didn't sorta figures, though.This is Barry's campaign now. He campaigned for it. His Leftist pals wanted it. Now they've got it. Lotsa luck. They're sure going to need it.

I think they're all going to be very sorry before The One's first term is over. Iraq was/is the Left's hated campaign, but it's the one that made the most sense to me. Nevermind the WMDs and all that baloney. The point in going in there was/is that it's in the middle of the Jihadi swamp that needs to be drained. I also believe that whatever success we've had there had more to do with the recent Iranian uprising than anything Barry said in Cairo or anywhere else. (He's too longwinded, too on-the-one-hand, on-the-other-hand, to inspire anybody.) So let's see what he's going to do with Afghanistan. Wallow in the quagmire, I expect. Although that Predator strike on a funeral, of all things, was a good start. Wish we'd had more UAVs in South Vietnam. Apaches are nice, too.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Seventeen is the official number killed in the Iranian election protests, but one hundred fifty is closer to the truth, according to some witnesses on the ground. After today's "massacre," both totals are bound to go higher. The whole thing now looks like a repeat of Tiananmen Square.

UPDATE:  So it seems. June 24. Remember the date. Although the open chest wound photo at the second link is (as stated) older--from June 20.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

From journalism to gerbilism in the Age of Obama:

"Gerbilism is an apt term for something that's soft and warm and cuddly, safe and timid, with no sharp teeth and no bite whatsoever."

Haw.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

From what I've read so far, she was more of a bystander to the Iranian election protest than an active participant. But it's probable that her Bassij assassin singled her out because she was a woman living in a misogynistic dictatorship. There's no doubt that Neda Agha-Soltan is a martyr now--though it may be only to a failed revolution.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

$8 Billion for ACORN is just handy dandy, but $1.2 Billion for missile defense is too much? Well, at least for the foreseeable future, it will be the East and West coasts that are vulnerable to missiles from Iran and North Korea.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Young revolutionaries are dying in the streets of Iran, and the president issues a press release about it. The words were good, got to give him that, but they would have sounded a lot more impressive in a speech. But "our" prez had more important things to do today, like take the kids out for ice cream.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It may take some refreshing and repeat clicking, but this Iranian blogger's site has good photos and video of the ongoing confrontations. Nice of the regime's thugs to wear red helmets. Makes it easier to pick them out of the crowd.

Via Michael Totten, who also shares the story of freedom-fighting Nebraskan Howard Baskerville.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fix Medicare first. Fat chance. Instead, we get...

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Funny how Barry's appointees not only fail to pay their taxes but the IRS doesn't penalize them. How does one aquire this amazing coat of Teflon? I suppose being a Democrat helps.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Three years after Hamas kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, the terrorist group that former President Jimmy Carter recently asked be removed from the U.S. terrorist list, still has not provided his family any news of his health. Let alone agreed to release him or even allow him access to the International Red Cross.

Now the Jewish Community Association of Austin is joining in a JTA e-letter campaign to urge President Obama to not forget Gilad's father, Noam, and his friends praying for Gilad's safe return as former President Carter apparently has. Especially not on this Father's Day.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

You have to wonder why Barry is so intent on sucking up to Mad Mahmoud that he won't do the heretofore obvious "The American people are with you guys" for the Iran protestors (see the cartoon at the bottom at the link). I mean, it's not like he has to pledge any money or anything. Speaking of money, whose payroll is President Pantywaist on, here? Even the most murderous Chicago wiseguys don't have time for the Mad Mullahs.

UPDATE:  Well, he finally said something, though cBS decided not to use it. Whose side are they on? And, then, on Saturday, with the regime's security forces shooting down people in the streets, he said more. Good words, these, just rather late. And too bad they only came in a press release. He didn't care enough to make a speech. What a wuss.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Barry has caught his hand in the window he is trying to slam shut on the Walpin/AmeriCorps case.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Zahra Rahnavard, Mousavi's wife, has drawn Iranian women into the streets with her demands for their equal rights.

"I am not Iran's Michelle Obama. I am Zahra, the follower of Fatimah Zahra [the daughter of the Prophet Muhammad]. I respect all women who are active."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"The AmeriCorps IG accuses prominent Obama supporter of misusing AmeriCorps grant money.  Prominent Obama supporter has to pay back more than $400,000 of that grant money. Obama fires AmeriCorps IG."

 Ahhh, say it ain't so, Barry. Firing people who fine your friends isn't very HopeyChangey, now is it?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Doug Ross @ Journal's entry in Michele Malkin's Obamacare Poster Contest.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So says Pastor Wright, Barry's longtime, forsworn minister of the gospel (so to speak):

"Ethnic cleansing is going on in Gaza. Ethnic cleansing (by) the Zionist is a sin and a crime against humanity..."

Quick, Barry, shove Jeremiah back into his box before people start remembering where you come from.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 03:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It doesn't do most people any good to question the assertions of the acolytes of the First Church of Global Warming. Except, uh, when you're a famous physicist named Freeman Dyson:

"The change that’s now going on is very strongly concentrated in the Arctic. In fact in three respects, it’s not global, which I think is very important. First of all, it is mainly in the Arctic. Secondly, it’s mainly in the winter rather than summer. And thirdly, it’s mainly in the night rather than at the daytime. In all three respects, the warming is happening where it is cold, not where it is hot."

You're still mocked and shouted down, of course. But, uh, you know, you don't care. Good thing heretics are no longer burned. Yet.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

That's a, more or less, logical question after Barry's Cairo hymn to most things Muslim. He forgot things like oppression of women, gays, and Christians. Or so it seems to this astounded supporter. Me, I'm coming to love the guy. He is a one-termer if there ever was one.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Barry can, indeed, be eloquent, and bold, when he chooses to be. Get this Cairo lesson for Muslims:

"Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust. Tomorrow, I will visit Buchenwald, which was part of a network of camps where Jews were enslaved, tortured, shot and gassed to death by the Third Reich. Six million Jews were killed – more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today. Denying that fact is baseless, ignorant, and hateful. Threatening Israel with destruction – or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews – is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve."

It probably won't change anything, but you've got to give him an A for effort.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You knew there was one, didinja? Despite the Dem and Gorebot focus on wind and solar?

"Sometimes wind production can drop suddenly. On February 26, 2008, wind production in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) dropped from over 1700 MW down to 300 MW within a three hour period.Traditional power plant operators, who would normally provide more power on short notice, failed to provide power as promised. ERCOT was able to avoid blackouts by asking large industrial customers to cut back on power use. These demand-response customers get reduced electric rates in exchange for cutting power on short notice."

Cutting back on power doesn't mean they do without. Oh no. They crank up their fossil-fuel generators. Keeping up the green pretense. Or, as TFG says, by golly we're still getting those wind energy brochures in our mailbox. 

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

UPDATE:  Barry, et al, now say she misspoke. But the remark was written, not off-the-cuff.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It all starts with ACORN, the persistently corrupt and oft-indicted community organizers. Add a dose of the Chicago Way and bingo, there's corruption in Obamalot.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 04:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

“I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life."

                                                                     --Sonia Sotomayor

Charming.

Via The Corner.

MORE:  Wisdom from a commenter at Reason magazine: "Can we just get beyond pretending that SCOTUS appointments are about getting the 'best' person available for the job and instead are really little more than point-scoring political appointments for fellow travelers?"

UPDATE:  The inevitable Ann Coulter does a choice job of skewering Sotomayor's alleged "empathy." Despite it all, I have trouble worrying about her. For one thing she'll be too shrill to be a leader on the court, as Karl Rove explains. So the court's second Hispanic is a racist. Did you imagine Barry could have a racist pastor for twenty years and really be a racial uniter and healer? Haw.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Yep, you sure did. But you can also blame Bush, for a while.

Via The Black Sphere.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

"You are the possible. That is not hyperbole. You are the possible. We are the possible. And we have at once finally come to it. So seize it. Seize it. Because if you do not, it will slip from our grasp and determine the world you live in while you sit idly by."

This is not hyperbole. This is Vice President Joe Biden. Read it all. And laugh. Or weep. Or just sit idly by. Either way, it will go on and on, determining the world we live in. Gulp.

Via Jessica's Well.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Obamalot's one saving grace. The clown prince, Joey Hairplugs.

Via American Digest.

UPDATE:  Let nothing, including national security, hold the clown prince back.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Is it the House Misspeaker Nancy Pelosi or the CIA, the gang that can't ever seem to get its story straight? At this hour, Instapundit readers are voting Nancy. Alas, there is no category for both. Let the show trials begin!

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I suppose it was inevitable. She gave up any pretense to impartiality last fall when she invited Barry on her show but refused to have Sarah. Now she's gone off the deep end by agreeing to promote dingbat Jenny McCarthy and her conspiracy theory about vaccinations and autism. Oh, goody, more dead kids and adults from preventable disease, not to mention birth defects. Oprah, you are truly pathetic.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

That's what socialized, nationalized, government-payor medicine/health care always comes down to: saving money by refusing to spend it on folks past their prime. It's the part the idealists never talk about. They focus on the young, not the old. Never have, never will. Forget grandma. She's "too" old.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

And, frankly, who cares? I must admit I never heard of this woman until the stories started popping up about how she had joked about wishing Rush Limbaugh dead, and Barry was photographed having a good chuckle about it. No surprise on either count. That he would have a joker whack his opponents or that he would have a good laugh over wishing their demise. Better be careful what you wish for, BHO, what goes around...

UPDATE:  Hee. Rush ignores her and her beloved, two-faced president. But, hey, let us not ignore that Wanda has become the mother of twins. More or less. Her "wife" had them? Or something.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Ann Althouse is right. Nothing about the Air Farce One terrorizing of Manhattan makes sense. Sure, there's the usual bureaucratic bumbling. But to produce a dark, badly-composed and amateurish-looking photograph apparently one-handed by a pilot in an F-16 through a bubble canopy that distorts the picture?

Puh-leeze. Military photographers are much better than that. More likely is the notion that it was being done for a movie. One of those Dem-Hollyweird connections. Not the pix released, but something else shot from another platform altogether. But if so, how is it going to be used in some flicker now? Which brings us back to the idea that it was really a junket for campaign contributors. Come clean, Barry.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

La Pelosi, the House Misspeaker, was sure as shootin' she'd never been briefed on torture activities until she was, uh, reminded by none other than the CIA that she had been, as long ago as 2002. Nevertheless, seeing as how CIA leaks usually only embarrass Republicans and she is a Dumbocrat, the Misspeaker is certain--or, as certain as she can be--there's been a mistake somewhere. She's referring all queries to her close advisor Lady Marmelade. Iowahawk has the scoop. (Well, at least, she never claimed to have been shot at in Bosnia. So far.)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Pretty fascinating map here which seems to show that the Blue (Dem-voting) states were losing the most jobs as of December, 2008. Goes along with the car welfare program in Massachusetts. Wonder what the map looks like now, in Barry's almost nine percent unemployment economy.

Via Seablogger commenter Ron de Haan.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Any holiday that celebrates a French defeat (for which we must, in part, remember Gen. Ulysses Grant) can't be bad--even if our alleged intellectual president uses it to demonstrate his abysmal grasp of the Spanish language. If he was W., we'd never hear the end of it, and the Hispanic caucus would be demanding an apology. Not now, of course. That sort of media hurrah is reserved for Republicans.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This is such an absurdity that even cBS snooze is mocking Barry-boy over it. When his own choir...

Via lawhawk.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The trend is clear, and it's opposite to what Big Media, still wallowing in adulation mode, would have you believe. Won't be long now before the Strongly Disapproves outpace the other guys.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Mohave ground squirrel, to be precise. Also an environmental group and labor unions, let's not forget them. Together, they vanquished a town's effort to switch from polluting energy sources to green solar energy--and in California, of all places. If the green movement, in whose basket Barry seems ready to put all of our national eggs, can't flourish there, what chance does it have anywhere? Slim to none, it looks like.

Via The Seablogger.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

No, they're not Republicans or the religious right. They're Democrats, all. Led by one Linda Sanchez, a California congresswoman (where else would she be from), who is stupider than a box of rocks, dumber even than VP Biden, and that's saying something. (Unfortunately she lacks Biden's comic relief.)

In saying that, I have just potentially violated her proposed federal law against "severe, repeated and hostile speech" on the Internet. It carries a possible punishment of two years imprisonment. But it's not just dumbbell Sanchez. Her bill has fourteen House supporters who also want to censor speech they don't like. Will they succeed? I won't be surprised if they do. Not after their phony "stimulus" bill. On the other hand, Sanchez tried this last year and got nowhere. But her party is in charge now.

UPDATE:  And, of course, it's all in the name of "the children." They want to infantilize the world.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

To Barry's State Department, that is. I do not find that surprising in the least. Texas votes Republican. The State Department is full of Democrats who are so partisan that they did their best to thwart W.'s foreign policy at every turn. So it's not surprising they would consider Texas foreign turf. And let me be the first to say that a lot of us here consider that a great compliment. Considering the source.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Nevermind the inevitable higher taxes and rationing that national health care will bring. First, try to find enough doctors, particularly general practitioners. There aren't enough of them now. Can you imagine the government quickly increasing the supply, such that you would really want to be treated by one?

UPDATE: Let the rationing begin. Barry's chosen just the guy to do it. Course it won't affect Barry and his cronies. Just you and me. Health care rationing, like paying taxes, is for the little people. The elite buy $540 shoes while lecturing the rest of us on how to live, eh Michelle? Great portrait, by the way.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My memories of Pontiacs date back to the chrome behemoths of my childhood in the late '50s, the ones with a choke on the dashboard, not the look-all-the-same, jelly-bean cars of the past few decades. Never bought one. Drove one once or twice as a rental.

Won't miss 'em, or the Hummers mentioned here. Or the Saturns, which I considered buying but never did. Going to be amusing watching the bureaucrats and the autoworkers' union leaders drive GM into the dumper. For philisophical or practical reasons their cars will be pariahs now. Course, wouldn't be so amusing if I owned a Suburban, or a Tahoe, or one of their pickups. Fortunately, I have a Honda.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

A fellow commenter on a blog I read, a Dem who adores Barry, said maybe I'd like to try living in Somalia, when I indicated displeasure with our coming new taxes, for such frauds as national health care and cap & trade. Typical liberal response, an ad hominem attack rather than an argument.

Ah, I came back, the old Love It Or Leave It, the conservative bumper sticker of the '60s, which was aimed at the anti-war crowd. What I didn't say but thought of later (the Wisdom of the Stairs, as Treppenwitz puts it), was the '60s liberal comeback: Change It Or Lose It. Which seems pretty apt, nowadays, though the positions are reversed. The message also is the opposite of Barry's meaning of the word change.

The commenter's notion that Barry is popular, meanwhile, falls before this new Gallup Poll on his first hundred days, and a comparison with his predecessors of the past forty years which shows him less popular than Richard Nixon or Jimmy Carter. I'm not surprised.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

That's where the White House military office needs to spend some time after okaying a Boeing 747's "photo op" tour of Lower Manhattan at low altitude. Can you say 9/11? You can, but genius office director Louis Caldera couldn't. Bet he can now.

UPDATE: Turns out the feds knew all along that it could cause mass hysteria. They just didn't care. Which is probably why Caldera is now looking for work.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Seems the Norks are not only a nuclear power, but they have successfully miniaturized nuclear warheads for delivery by medium-range missiles capable of hitting Japan and South Korea. Proliferation, here we come. Quick, dispatch Barry to shake Dear Leader's palsied hand. Or would a deep, Saudi-style bow work better?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Even if you don't believe the globe is warming, painting roofs and roads white, or some other light color, would sure cut air-conditioning bills and go far in eliminating the heat-island effect. Not that I want the rancho's roof white. But I don't have to worry. Simple solutions never appeal to big government. They don't produce new jobs for the bureaucracy or more tax money for pet projects. Still... Painting roofs and roads white. What a concept.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Well, maybe. With Barry, it's hard to know. VDH says Barry usually does what he says he won't and seldom does what he says he will. But that seems much too simple. One thing is for sure. The trials they could get sticky. And if he doesn't keep his own nose clean, he could find himself in the retribution dock someday.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Amazing to me that anyone would not think the Botox Queen was morally-challenged, considering her insistence on having her own private jet, instead of flying commercial like her peers. Well, they say in retort, the plane is paid for by her campaign funds. Yes, but who supplies those and for what quid pro quo?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Like some others, I don't have any problem with Barry thumb-wrestling with Mad Hugo. 'Cept I hope he washed his hand afterward. Discreetly, of course. I could also deal with a White House invite. There's ample precedent. Afterall, Clinton invited Arafat, the world's oldest terrorist, and Hilarity even kissed the murderer on his fuzzy, wrinkled cheek. Long as Barry leaves it at that. Not sure if Michelle would want to, however.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

But hurry, before Barry & The Dems raise their taxes so high they shelter their money, instead.

Via Dustbury.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Think Barry's & The Dem's deficit spending is high? Just wait until they double your electricity bill thanks to the corrupt and anti-Semitic U.N.'s climate change malarky. But, hey, ACORN will be happy, and all the new welfare queens and kings the Dems are intent on creating. They'll get the money from the taxes you pay to run your refrigerator while, ahem, saving the planet.

UPDATE:  EPA is getting the taxing powers ready now. Won't be long, before the scam tax begins.

MORE:  I'm sure this isn't definitive--they even teach global warming in Mr. B.'s elementary school--but support seems to be declining for Algorean theories.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

The Seablogger makes a good point about the liberal media, which explains why FoxNews, the news that liberals and their running buddies in Big Media love to hate, has outstripped CNN and MSNBC combined in viewership: it is not boring. CNN, et al, have the same predictable la-de-da day after day. Comforting to the convinced, I suppose, but not very interesting to anybody else.

I've opined before that this could be one of the biggest problems newspapers have today: they are so predictable. Not only do they all look the same, having the same layouts, the same focus, etc., but they have the same NYTimes and WaPo stories on their front pages. We also know they're all for diversity, multiculturalism, affirmative action, gun control, abortion, illegal immigration from Mexico, and that they just love Barry and Michelle, and distrust Republicans. So where do those who argue with some or all of that stuff--which is a lot of people, altogether--go? Well, the Internet, for one. And FoxNews, for another.

I kind of like it when CNN, et al, attack FoxNews for whatever. That is the way American journalism used to be. Newspapers not only tried to outdo each other, they attacked each other. And made $$$. But that was before credential creep, where every journalist now needs a degree from similar liberal journalism schools to get a Big Media job. Pity them not their decline. They fouled their own nests.

UPDATE:  A perfect example of how in-the-tank CNN is for Barry: You could compare W to Hitler and they'd never bat an eye. Do it to Barry and you get a microphone stuck in your face.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Barry tried to reward Princess Caroline with an ambassadorial plum. But the Vatican rejected her for her pro-abortion views. I expect her help are just devastated. Been a lot of these Vatican rejections, lately.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The liberal daily did a fair job of reporting the local conservative-libertarian rally against anticipated higher federal taxes, the pork-barrel "stimulus," and other "change," which tied up downtown rush hour traffic, drawing people (according to the selected quotes) who had never marched before.

There were none of the overhead crowd photos reported in the conservative blogosphere, however--including the estimated more than ten thousand marchers in San Antonio and St. Louis--which readily show crowd size. Instead, there was an enigmatic quote from the state police that they wouldn't estimate the size of the Austin crowd "for safety reasons." Huh? Interesting as it all is, I'm still not convinced that it will amount to much in the long run.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I got a little incensed when I read that the new, improved Dem-led Homeland Security octopus had singled out veterans as potential terrorists. Then I discovered the report was commissioned while Bush was in office and it only suggests that a small percentage of vets might be so disaffected.

And, of course, I recalled Timothy McVeigh, the wacko who the Army didn't trust to allow to be a Green Beret. LGF, who I admire for his pro-Israel stance, has a sensible take on this report which seems to be roiling the never-very-placid waters of the rightwing blogosphere. He thinks the upset is way overdone. Includes a link to a PDF of the report itself and points to other, hardly leftwing bloggers, who agree. Makes sense. I'm convinced. Except for one thing. The report should have been aimed at extremism, not just "rightwing extremism." The obvious political bias is what caused the trouble.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

It's understandable, what with the whopping deficit that Barry & the Dems are running up, that Texas Gov. Rick Perry would want to run for re-election against the federal government. Especially when his likely primary opponent is U.S. Senator Kay Baily Hutchinson.

So, on the occasion of the Tax Day Tea Party protest, Perry decided to throw Big Media and its liberal pals a little red meat about potential secession. Not that Texas would or could. Can't keep our sales and property taxes relatively low (not to mention no income tax at all) without all those federal dollars. But it's nice to see a independent action now and then from the Repubs.

UPDATE:  The Seablogger gives Rick more credit than I think he deserves, but he makes other, better points. Rick Perry for president in 2012? That would be interesting. I expect he'll concentrate on getting re-elected governor, first.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not one of the warships fighting the pirates (that would be DDG Bainbridge, which has lately been de-fanged by the White House), and not named after the president. Just a coincidence. Named rather for Commodore John Barry, of the American Revolution, an Irishman who is often called the father of the American Navy.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Big Media, so in the tank for Barry it has to breathe through a straw, struggles to find the news angle in a brutal murder. (Yeah, I know, they're all "brutal muder." But what the hey. It's familiar, right?)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Seems to be that USA tops the list of banned things you cannot put on a Saudi license plate. Heh.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

White House dithering apparently ended and the U.S. Navy, taking a page from the French, has freed the American freighter captain-hostage in "a swift firefight." One which simultaneously eliminated the CO2 contribution of three of the pirates. The peace weenies probably will carp, but it sends a good and timely message.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Pathetic, really, the old media silence as Barry & The Dems (sounds like a 50s rock group) spend like drunken sailors (except that sailors spend their own money). No wonder the tea party protests keep growing. It's not like the "stimulus" spending was actually targeted at some recognized social problem. It's just plenty of pork, flung here, there and everywhere. So much of it, at so many targets, no one has yet gotten a handle on all of it. And the previous blatherers at Bush are saying nothing.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, at least one Euro was unimpressed with Barry's first around-the-world whirl, to say the least:

"So The One retired triumphant, having secured a massive contribution of 5,000 extra troops - all of them non-combatant, of course - which must really have put the wind up the Taliban, at the prospect of 5,000 more infidel cooks and bottle-washers swarming into the less hazardous regions of Afghanistan."

Not to mention his brilliant, mid-tour non-response to the North Korean missile launch: 

"President Pantywaist is hopping mad and he has a strategy to cut Kim down to size: he is going to slice $1.4bn off America's missile defence programme, presumably on the calculation that Kim would feel it unsporting to hit a sitting duck, so that will spoil his fun."

Well, we already knew Barry was President Thin-skin and all that goes with that little defect. But it's nice to read some news about him for a change. Only odd that we have to go across the pond for it.

MORE:  Bowing, or licking Saudi Muslim King Abdullah's boots? I say bowing, but you never know. As one commenter at the link said, we can be pleased it was not a curtsy.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

While Barry dithers over a pirate hostage-taking, the original surrender monkeys go to battle stations.

UPDATE:  The price of dithering. More hostages taken in another U.S.-flagged vessel. Meanwhile, humor via the Seablogger, as Barry reaches out to the "moderate pirate community." Yeah, that'll work.

MORE: Barry must have finally gotten the message, because the Navy has freed the first hostage.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Or, so it seems, now that Democrat Sen. James Webb of Virginia is grousing about all the minor drug criminals (users, mainly) getting thrown in prison. Not quite at the level of actually seeking to end  prohibition yet, but offering more hope than ever before that it will move that way. The retired cops, i.e. the LEAPsters, are excited at the possibility, too. They're organizing a get-out-the-email campaign here.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Barry's bow to the Muslim king was a lot deeper bow than Bush's dip for his medal and Barry got no medal. Well, no medal yet, anyhow.

UPDATE: Barry denies he bowed. Who ya gonna believe? Barry, or your lying eyes?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Beats me. I know he was raised as one, but few are the children who get to decide what, if any, religious services they attend. But if he isn't secretly a Muslim, why is it his first instinct to bow low to a Saudi king? Bush held the king's hand. Some of Big Media howled at that.

Now, of course, the lapdog press, good Democrats all, are saying nothing. Yet Barry apparently did not bow to Queen Elizabeth. He seems to have reserved his bow for a Muslim king--even if he seems to have tried to stop himself at the last second. American presidents are not supposed to bow to kings and queens. But too few Americans know history these days. So it's probable that not many will care, even if they ever find out what he did. Or why.

UPDATE:  Bush bowed to Abdullah, too! Mea culpa, mea culpa. So the Saudi suckup goes on and on.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

No impending doubling of electric bills? Seems not. I certainly hope it's true. See what happens when you leave the country to hob-nob with the European elite, Barry? Your own party hands you your head.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Boy, those Dems really were death on deficits, as long as they were Bush deficits. Now, not at all.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

And none of Big Barry's appointees, by definition, are little people. Why just look at the way so many --even the latest one--have trouble paying their taxes. Maybe it's time someone looked into Barry's taxes. Birds of a feather, etc. No, this is not an April Fool's post. Except for the dupes who voted for him.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

James Lileks: "Maybe I’m old-school, but 'President fires CEO' looks as wrong as 'Pope fires Missile.' Does not compute."

Via Instapundit.

UPDATE: Baldilocks has an interesting take. But leaves out the question of whether the GM logo will become an O. You know, for Obama Motors. First, though, he'll have to get his own staff to trade "up."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Or widely printed, either, if Big Media has anything to say about it. No wonder they're going bankrupt. Good riddance, toadies.

UPDATE:  No big loss, says Dustbury: "...since they’d screw up the story, inasmuch as it conflicts with the visions of sugarplums dancing in their heads."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Under this piece of Democrat (who else?) legislation, the "free" press would be just another creature of government. At least we'd hear less sanctimony about it being a watchdog.

UPDATE:  Reflections of a Newsosaur calls the idea "a bridge to nowhere." Sounds about right.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The professional "protestors" were outnumbered 2-1 by Big Media, but they got the ink and air time over a "Tea Party" protest seven times as large. The fix she is in. Gee, do ya think?

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

All of a sudden everybody, including the sycophant NYTimes, is talking about what a doofus the new prez is. Retard jokes, laughing at depression, pretending to be outraged at corporate bonuses he signed into law, and claiming he's going to set salaries at corporations. Every prez thinks he's been anointed king. But this one really seems to believe it. Not to worry. He'll provide a few laughs for the next four years, then be gone.

Via The Fat Guy.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"Comes now [the] Hero of the Anti-War Left, retired General Eric Shinseki, who wants to save a few bucks at the Veterans Administration by making men and women injured in the service of our country pay for their care:"

Oh, that'll go over big. Shinseki is the guy who gave the Army its silly European berets. He's so progressive.

UPDATE: Nice to see that Barry & Co. can be persuaded by veteran outrage.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Come one, come all. This is an equal opportunity stimulus bill. Just be sure to vote Democrat, boys.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 05:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Camille Paglia is a Rush Limbaugh fan?

"As a student of radio and a longtime listener of Rush's show, I have gotten a wealth of pleasure and insight from him over the years."

She especially likes the way "he goes his own way," and, in particular, his "feminazi" rants.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I tend to agree with Pajamas Media founder Roger L. Simon that Barry's apparent imminent resumption of trade and ties with Cuba is probably a good thing, certainly for the Cuban people. They have suffered long enough under the heels of the Castro regime. So long as we don't have to see the fatigue-wearing dictators strutting through the White House and bussing Lady Michelle.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The People's Servant has a simple, uncomplicated response to questions about his tax cheating and other ethical problems.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Dumbocrats are genuis at encouraging phony issues. Thus Barry's latest "triumph" for science, unleashing embryonic stem cells from aborted children, has been overshadowed by stem cells derived from skin:

"These are the true miracles of medicine, which Bush helped promote by blocking funding for the still futile efforts to derive therapies from butchered young humans at the sunrise of their life."

Not that Barry & Co. are especially interested in results. Just another tool for their political sleight-of-hand. Meanwhile stock markets continue to plunge. Even Snoozeweek has finally noticed.

UPDATE:  Well, Nancy Reagan liked the ESC move, anyhow.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Via Dr. Sanity.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When was the last time we had a president who decided to cheapen his office by fighting in public with a pundit? Some say Richard Nixon's assault on the Dan Rather of old. A few might remember Harry Truman's battle with critics panning his daughter's singing. In any case, it's only serving to enhance the pundit, Rush Limbaugh:

"Demand for his air time hs suddenly become so intense, Limbaugh told The Examiner's Byron York earlier today, that his network sold 80 percent as much advertising in January 2009 as it did in all of 2008, and expects to sell-out the year by the end of March. That was before Obama and White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel launched an explicit counter-attack against Limbaugh that seems only to be making him bigger."

Utterly predictable. People who've never heard Limbaugh will flock to hear what the fuss is about. I learned to like Rush after 9/11, but he rambles too much for me to make him a steady diet. But now that Barry boy seems to have decided to let the stock market collapse and impoverish us all, I might actually become a fan.

UPDATE:  RedState has a good analysis of what's going on here. A little Dumbocrat game of hide the pea.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 12:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Wonder why the Big Spender was so curt with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown? Baldilocks doesn't:

"In Dreams from My Father, President Obama says that his grandfather was tortured by the British..."

Not that I care about Brown, or the rest of the increasingly anti-American Brits, for that matter, but do we really want a president who uses our foreign policy to settle his personal matters? Well, we've got one.

MORE:  Even the Mrs. got her little dig in with a couple of cheapie toy helicopters.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

While the outrage is focused on Barry boy for singlehandedly "destroying the life savings of millions of Americans," as his so-called policies push the stock market to new lows, we mustn't forget the first solid indication we had that ole Barry had, in fact, just fallen off the turnip truck.

Why, yes, that would be his selection of Joey Hairplugs to be his veep. Of course this could have been a case of picking someone so dumb that Barry would look brilliant by comparison. Sort of like Daddy Bush's selection of Dan Quayle.

But Bozo the VP really is in a class by himself. Dan was young. His screwups could be forgiven as the fecklessness of youth. Biden has no excuse other than being stupidier than a box of rocks. His own brother and son, for instance, are neck-deep in that $8 billion Houston fraud. So Barry must have been kidding when he said: "Nobody messes with Joe." Uh, huh. Kidding, right? We can only hope. But given his track record to date, probably not.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Dow continues its plunge as investors, appalled at President Barry's "audacity," bail. Thanks, punk.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yipes. Where did Barry's "honeymoon" go? The Big Spender looks like a one-termer to me.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This time it's not a tax cheat but an "urban czar" from the Bronx. Calling them czars puts them in the executive branch where Congress supposedly can't oversee their crookin'. Something tells me Barry boy and all these other fellows are in it for however much they can steal before 2013. With a few trillion to spend, whoa, think of the vigorish.

UPDATE:  And yet another tax cheater. You're amazing, Barry. At least you could try not to rub our noses in it.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

His Big Media and other supporters are still pretending that he really didn't mean anything when he scratched his face with his middle finger and grinned, when speaking of Hillary Clinton in the spring and John McCain in the fall.

But the Jewish intellectuals among them are beginning to see that they've been had on the subject of Israel. That his promises were meaningless. The president who argues that he should get his way because "I won" (a remark reminescent of Richard Nixon) is turning out to be a lying punk.

UPDATE:  On the other hand, there is this mitigating circumstance. Still leaves a lot to be desired.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 07:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Why, socialized medicine, of course. And like all good fascists everywhere, Barry and his cronies haven't asked if we want it. Oh, no. There shall be no debate at all this time. That was the Clinton's mistake. Its beginnings were hidden deep in the diversionary Porkulus bill. Too late now, suckers. Not that it works, because it doesn't. But it makes the Progressives feel so good, you see.

A liberal friend who travels to London regularly claims it works just fine there. But she never gets sick. And not everyone there thinks it works at all--especially not if you're trying to get a dental appointment. But, hey, we wouldn't want all those illegals the Dems love so much to have to be demeaned by going to the emergency room. Soon it will be the same for them and us: get in line, get in line. And someone like Henry Waxman will be in charge of it and he'll say uh, why no, you can't have that new treatment. Too expensive, not efficient, etc.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

What could be easier to understand? The fellow is not inspiring now that he has the office. Even his polls are lackluster. Not that the Dumbocrats will care. It's spend, spend, spend time for them. "Happy days are here again..."

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Headline refers to the Hildusa (name copyright of Iowahawk), lower right. They say our lives are reflected in our faces. Being a cuckold who was "under fire" in Bosnia is tough work.

Via Instapundit.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Obama's little history lesson on the automobile was one cylinder shy of a V-8:

"The country that invented the automobile will not abandon it"

Germany? Now that's talking. Although I think Honda and Toyota make them much better. Oh, wait, he meant Detroit? No. Well, maybe he means the government is going to buy their cars. Consumers won't. Texans like their trucks, however, so there's hope for that segment of their market.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 09:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

An Army lieutenant in Iraq is making a fool of himself and dishonoring the uniform by publically questioning the president's right to his office. Some milblog commentors are cheering him on. I think he should be courts-martialed for this stunt. At the least he should resign his commission. He obviously doesn't understand it.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 06:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's no more than that. Just hysterical talk. Political talk, mainly. As VDH points out:

"Over 92% of Americans are still at work. Over 90% are still servicing their mortgage debts each month. For these, the 'depression' so far doesn’t mean a radical need to reinvent America. They plan to stay in their homes, even if they have negative equity in them; again, loss of equity doesn’t mean catastrophe if they don’t have to sell quickly, refinance, or remodel."

Even the 401K debacle isn't critical for many. Mine has fallen only about twenty percent. Hardly depressive.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 02:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For Cobb, this is the "greatest picture in the world." I wouldn't go that far, but I see his point. Whatever you think of Mom and Dad, their daughters are innocent and it's certainly refreshing to see a black face in the presidential limo that doesn't belong to a servant.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 10:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hope and change. Well, change, anyhow. January's was the worst stock market performance in 113 years. I notice Barry's dropped his hope routine. Maybe we'll get lucky and he'll remember to at least  talk it again, while Rome burns.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Not at all surprising is the White House attack on CNBC's Al Santelli's "Tea Party!" sneer at Barry's mortgage bailouts. Not when you recall Barry's giving the finger to the Hildusa (name copyright of Iowahawk) during the campaign for the nomination and calling Sarah a pig during his run for the White House. The man riles easily and, being an affirmative action baby, he's had no great practice at being someone else's political target.

Posted by Dick Stanley at 08:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Most of what Mrs. Charm's mother forwards me in emails is, uh, not very compelling. But this one is:

"Some employees are simply irreplaceable. Take [First Lady] Michelle Obama: The University of Chicago Medical center hired her in 2002 to run 'programs for community relations, neighborhood outreach, volunteer recruitment, staff diversity and minority contracting.' In 2005 the hospital raised her salary from $120,000 to $317,000 - nearly twice what her husband made as a Senator. Oh! Did we mention that her husband had just become a US Senator? He sure had! And he requested a $1 Million earmark for the UC Medical Center, in fact. Way to network