Everybody loves sports! Bowling, badminton, hot dog eating, and all those other minor sports. And Hollywood is quite good at capturing sports on film. What is your favorite sports film?
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Sunday, July 22, 2012
The Great (film) Debates vol. 46
Everybody loves sports! Bowling, badminton, hot dog eating, and all those other minor sports. And Hollywood is quite good at capturing sports on film. What is your favorite sports film?
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Saturday, July 21, 2012
Question: Our Civil Liberties vs. Our Protection
That being said, I believe in protecting our civil liberties as much as the next guy, unless the "next guy" happens to be Eric Holder or Janet Napolitano, BUT... maybe we need to revisit how we deal with the rights of those with clinically diagnosed mental illnesses. Just this week, a young woman was stabbed just a few blocks from where I live by a homeless man who was "off his meds". The random stabbing happened at 10am as this woman was on her way to work. Fortunately, this young woman will recover physically, but what are we left with? By all accounts, this man was lost in a system that knew he needed to be medicated, but was unwilling or unable to administer his medication.
This scenario happens at an alarming rate in NYC - mentally ill homeless person commits a random act of sometimes fatal violence. Usually it is some innocent victim pushed into the path of a fast-moving subway train. Why? Because our mental healthcare system cannot help them or get them off the street until they ask for help or commit a crime. The state or the family must wait until someone has been grievously harmed and even then, they get sent to a jail rather than to a facility that can control their mental illness. The targets can be strangers, family, or friends, but the problem is almost always the same. Someone who needed help could not get it because they did not want it and/or could not be forced to get it. Once a person reaches the age of majority, society is helpless to protect themselves against the violently mentally ill because a person of legal age cannot be coerced to take prescribed medications or be institutionalize against their will for more than 72 hours in most cases.
What should we do? I do not have an answer, but we cannot hide from the problem either. I understand that we never want to go back to the "Snakepit" days where people were institutionalize or force-fed drugs for being "odd", or "uncooperative", or "gay", or "unwilling to bend to the will of the husband" but somehow we must, as a society, try to locate that bright line that protects society from unreasonable danger, but helps those get access to the medication or treatment they need to function and monitored them enough so that they actually TAKE their medication or even that their medication is effective.
Maybe there is no bright line that can satisfy our need for liberty and need for reasonable protection. Life and death can be random, so maybe the best we can do is just be a little bit more aware of those around us and encourage those who need help to seek it.
So, let me know what you think...
Friday, July 20, 2012
Film Friday: Bridesmaids (2011)
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Meet Your Pilot—Captain Mohammed Jihad
The TSA should be known as the Keystone Kops. They prevent blue-haired grandmas, babies in diapers, and quadriplegics from boarding an airplane until they have first been irradiated and fondled, but they can't seem to stop dangerous people from becoming the pilots on those planes. If you find yourself flying into the Empire State Building or the Golden Gate Bridge, you probably have the TSA to thank.
Anybody remember 9-11? Nineteen jihadists, four teams and one terrorist with pilot training in America in each of the four teams. The government ran around like chickens with their heads cut off, and promised us that with the old agencies, new agencies, middle-aged agencies, and the Homeland Security super-agency, this would not be allowed to happen again. They lied.
Hiding in plain sight in Boston, twenty-five illegal aliens were being trained as pilots at a school run by, wait for it, an illegal alien. Six of the illegals have already received their pilot's licenses. And once again, it was only a fluke that brought the matter to light. Did the TSA conduct a check on American flight schools and discover the covert operation? Nope. The owner of the school was stopped for a traffic violation, and a routine background check showed him to be in the United States illegally. Still, nothing might have been done had not one person in the General Accounting Office reviewing licenses and payments for permits found what the police had already found. Only then did the TSA become involved.
Stephen Lord, the GAO's director of Homeland Security and Justice Issues testified before the House Homeland Security Committee this week. He was asked the following question: “Isn't it true that, based on your report, the Transportation Security Administration cannot assure the American people that foreign terrorists are not in this country, learning how to fly airplanes? Yes or no. Lord's answer was that at this time it cannot.
The illegal alien who owns the flight school was allowed to apply for and run a flight school without the required TSA security threat assessment. But he still managed to get two Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) pilot certificates. Under the laws developed after 9-11, such certificates are supposed to be submitted to the TSA routinely for review. Someone dropped the ball. Under the Alien Flight Student Program (AFS), foreign nationals are supposed to be subjected to a TSA security threat assessment prior to receiving any flight training at all. Remember that of the four 9-11 pilots, only one had any training at all in landing a large aircraft, but nobody at the time found that odd.
After making this find, the GAO starting look into the problem as a whole. There are about 25,599 foreign nationals in the FAA airmen registry who are not in the TSA AFSP registry. That's a whole lot of unvetted aliens. That means that currently there are 25,599 who have or will have FAA pilot certificates without ever having been investigated by the TSA. Under the law which should have been applied, none of those 25,599 should even have begun flight training, let alone receive FAA certificates.
Al Qaeda and al Qaeda-like organizations have evolved to meet present realities. Our mindless bureaucracies have not. The chances of a terrorist getting control of a major airline's jumbo jet and flying it into a skyscraper have been greatly reduced. But that solves an eleven year old problem, not a current one. How about all those small and medium-sized aircraft which could carry weaponized anthrax, bubonic plague, or a dirty nuclear bomb?
Well, let me set your mind at rest. The TSA and ICE have announced that they are “working on” a pilot program for vetting the names of foreign nationals against immigration databases.” My first thought is “what have they been doing for the last eleven years?” My second thought is, “Obama and Holder will squelch that the moment they hear about it.” And just in case your expectations are too high, the GAO noted that the two agencies “have not specified desired outcomes and time frames, or assigned individuals with responsibility for fully instituting the program.”
In all fairness, none of the twenty-five illegal students or the illegal flight school owner have been found to be terrorists or to have terrorist connections—yet. Those twenty-six worry me, but the other 25,599 really worry me. If one guy with a pilot's license in Utah can break into a small airport, steal a SkyWest commercial jet and nearly take off to avoid a murder arrest, what could 25,599 do? If only 10% of them have terrorist connections, and only 10% of that 10% seek to do America harm, that's 256 opportunities for committing mass murder. 9-11 took only four pilots and four planes.
Thursday, July 19, 2012
Obama v. Welfare Reform: Destroying What Works
For decades, the Republicans pushed the idea of welfare reform. Specifically, they wanted to encourage people to get off welfare and start working. The Democrats, however, flat out refused to allow any attempt to make such a change. Indeed, any time the issue came up, they would whine that the Republicans were looking to throw single mothers and their children out into the streets to starve.
In 1994, the Republicans finally got control over the Congress for the first time since 1952. Along with a Republican Senate and a weakened and unprincipled Bill Clinton in the White House, they set out to change America. One area they targeted was welfare reform. To that end, in 1996, they passed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996. This fundamentally changed the way welfare works in America by:
● Ending welfare as an entitlement,This bill also gave the states vast discretion in how to achieve these rules. Clinton signed this bill after vetoing the first two attempts. And while liberals hated the reform at the time, it’s now been recognized as a significant success, having cut the number of welfare cases by 53% and reversing an unabated upward trend which began in the 1960. Clinton even claims it as one of his biggest achievements.
● Placing a lifetime limit of five years on benefits paid from federal funds,
● Requiring recipients to begin working after two years of benefits,
● Encouraging two-parent families, and
● Enhancing enforcement of child support.
So guess what Obama wants to do now? Obama has started handing out waivers to states to eliminate the work requirements contained in the bill. Unbelievable. He is attacking a bill which everyone except the extreme left admits worked magnificently. And in a perverse bit of reasoning, Team Obama claims this change is intended to help parents “successfully prepare for, find, and retain employment.” So by eliminating the requirement that people find work, we are helping them prepare to find work. Huh?
Fortunately, the Republicans aren’t sitting still for this. Romney said on Friday:
Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan charged that, “President Obama will make it harder for Americans to escape poverty. He is hurting the very people he claims to help.” Others are calling this “a blatant violation of the law.” Rep. Dave Camp called this move “a brazen and unwarranted unraveling” of the law that “ends welfare reform as we know it.” And Rep. Tim Scott of South Carolina said,“The success of bipartisan welfare reform, passed under President Clinton, has rested on the obligation of work. The president’s action is completely misdirected. Work is a dignified endeavor, and the linkage of work and welfare is essential to prevent welfare from becoming a way of life.”
It’s amazing how Obama keeps trying to refight the battles the left lost in the past and how he doesn’t care that history has proven his side wrong. It’s even more amazing how ready he is to trap a whole new generation on welfare. But keep in mind, there is method here. As we’ve discussed before, almost 50% of Americans now draw their living from government benefits in some form. These people are much more likely to vote Democratic because that is the party who promises to keep the spigot flowing. This weakening of welfare reform is nothing more than an attempt by Obama to add more people to the government dole, much like Obamacare was an attempt to increase the number of people on Medicaid and to hook the middle class on health care subsidies. Obama is trying to snare people into government dependence.“You don’t improve people’s lives with handouts, you improve people’s lives by showing them, as I learned growing up in the inner city in a single parent household, that you can think and work your way out of poverty.”
This needs to end.
Oklahoma--OK!
Oklahoma has been passing legislation to reverse the tide of liberalism and political correctness at a rather stunning pace. Last year it passed a law forbidding its courts to use sharia or other foreign law. In January, a federal judge of the Tenth Circuit in Denver overturned the law which had been passed by a 70% majority in a referendum. The possibility of an appeal to a three-judge 10th Circuit panel still remains open. Its abortion law requiring that the mother first view an ultrasound and listen to a description of the fetus before proceeding with an abortion was also struck down.
Oklahoma’s citizens have plenty of heart, and in keeping with William F. Buckley’s admonition, they are conservatives attempting to stand athwart history yelling “stop!” Their success in courts ruling on constitutionality has not matched their zeal. Which brings me to the latest attempt to turn back the tide of federal interference with state prerogatives. They will need all the help they can get from St. Jude, the patron saint of lost causes.
Other states have sued the federal government over Obamacare, and just lost in an appalling and surprising ruling from the Supreme Court. Some of those states and others are trying to figure out how to dismantle Obamacare piecemeal with requests for waivers and exemptions as well as using the state’s own financial resources to detour Obamacare. But Oklahoma may be going the whole way. Well, almost the whole way.
Oklahoma State Representative Mike Ritze (R) will shortly be introducing a bill in the legislature purporting to nullify Obamacare. This is not the first time Ritze has introduced this bill, but it seems to have grown some teeth since the Supreme Court decision. The bill essentially says that regardless of what other reasons the Supreme Court may have had for upholding Obamacare, the socialized medicine bill is still a violation of Oklahoma’s Tenth Amendment sovereignty. Ritze contends that the state has its own separate right to nullify a federal law the state considers unconstitutional.
And here’s the beauty part. The bill also provides for criminal action, including fines and jail, for any federal agent who attempts to enter Oklahoma to enforce the Health Care Act. Ritze says that this is not one of those namby-pamby non-binding resolutions setting out the “sense of the state.” It’s a by-gosh criminal statute and he defies the federal government to do anything about it.
He mocked prior resolutions by saying: “I’m not letting chicken politicians get out of this by saying ‘Well, I voted for some non-binding resolution saying that Obamacare was unconstitutional. Doesn’t that count for something?’ Well, no, not really. Resolutions don’t do anything. In fact they can make things worse because politicians think that at least it’s doing something, and after they voted for the resolution, they think ‘well, at least we tried.’” But what resolutions really say is “Hey , Feds, we don’t really agree with what you’re doing, but I guess we’ll accept it if we have to. Thanks, bye.”
Here’s the wording of the proposed statute: “Any official, agent, or employee of the United States government or any employee of a corporation providing services to the United State government that enforces or attempts to enforce an act, order, law, statute, rule or regulation of the government of the United States in violation of this act shall be guilty of a felony and upon conviction must be punished by a fine not exceeding $5,000.00 or a term of imprisonment not exceeding fiveyears, or both.”
If that’s not the first cannonball lobbed directly at the feds, it’s at least a shot across the bow of the good ship Federal Government. Still, as much as I admire their spirit, the Oklahoma legislators should consider a couple of things. South Carolina didn’t fare too well after Sumter. More recently, Texas attempted to pass a nullification bill called HB1937. It got a lot of buzz and some enthusiastic support from Texans who hate the Transportation Safety Agency. The enthusiasm died quickly after the legislature received a simple letter from the Department of Justice threatening to declare Texas a “no-fly zone” if the bill passed.
Nevertheless, I can’t help admiring Sooner spirit. They do not go gentle into that good night. The bill may pass and get the signature of the governor. I give it about five minutes before a court, any court, declares the nullification unconstitutional and issues an injunction. And I don’t think it will fare any better as it moves up the chain of appeals. But ya gotta love any state that threatens to jail federal agents for enforcing socialized medicine. Sometimes lost causes are the best causes.
For those of you who were having salacious thoughts, the photo I used to intro the article was chosen solely to demonstrate the great spirit shown by Oklahomans on every occasion. What did you expect me to post—a picture of Gordon MacRae?
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Guest Review: The Room (2003)
Because no one asked, I decided to review The Room. This is a real movie, starring real people, that briefly played in a couple of real LA theaters where it was laughed off the screen. It shortly thereafter turned into a cult sensation, with midnight screenings, audience participation, and the requisite stage show, videogame adaptation, and Internet memes. This movie is so bad it’s good. Actually, it’s pretty bad but it’s fun to dissect. The acting is mostly amateurish, the script is horrible, the music is straight out of Skinemax, and there are several bizarre non sequiturs and continuity errors. Don’t look for substance here – you won't find it. Welcome to... The Room! Click Here To Read Article/Comments at CommentaramaFilms
More Elective Thoughts
● Thought No. 1. Village Grade Idiocy. Obama really is a fool. Check out this quote: “If you’ve got a business – you didn’t built that. Somebody else made that happen.” W.T.F.?? This is the kind of ignorance only a man who never created a single thing could possess.
When you start a business, you take your own risk. Unless you’ve got a crooked financier behind you (like a certain “first black President” and his worthless wife), then you take your own money and your own time and your own labor and you bring them all together to create something that you hope to sell. If you do it right, and there is a market for what you are offering, then your business grows. Soon you hire other people to help expand. But you need to manage them, and everything is still your risk, your money, and your time. Only a man who thinks there are 57 states could suggest otherwise.
This actually gives us insight into why he’s failed as president, because this is how he understands leadership. He thinks you sit your skinny ass in a big leather chair or hide on a golf course as other people make things happen. That’s why ObamaCare became a cluster fudge, why he didn’t get card check or cap and trade, why financial regulation became such a mess, and why he can’t get any budget deals. Pathetic.
● Thought No. 2. Just Shut Up Already. I’m really sick of “conservatives” attacking Romney and offering retarded advice. Charles Krauthammer wants Obama to issue an apology for RomneyCare so Obama finally has something to attack. HotAir does too. Bill Kristol is demanding that Romney release his tax returns because that's what Obama wants. This needs to stop. How about these people go after Obama instead of Romney?
Interestingly, of all the clowns in the circus, Donald Trump had the best take on the tax issue. He said that Romney should agree to release his taxes only when Obama agrees to release his college applications and records. Yes! He then said, “I'll tell you what — the Republicans have to get a lot tougher. They have to get down and dirty also, because that's what's happening to them.” I never thought I’d agree with Trump, but this is absolutely right. It’s time that guys like Kristol learn that you can't win by crawling on your stomach to meet the politicized demands of your opponents.
● Thought No. 3. VP-arama. Romney is supposedly getting close to naming his choice for VP. I don’t think he can hurt himself with any of the names mentioned so far, but he can waste an opportunity if he picks the wrong person. I’ve said it before that I think he need a minority to send a clear message that the Republican Party has changed. In that regard, the short list includes Rubio, Jindal and Rice. I would prefer Rubio or Jindal to Rice, but I’d take Rice too. Also on the list apparently are Ryan and Pawlenty. I respect both men greatly, but picking either would probably make the ticket easy to lampoon as Dull and Duller. Both would be excellent once in office, however.
I would prefer Rubio (Allen West actually), but my money is now on Kelly Ayotte. She represents New Hampshire in the Senate and was previously the state’s Attorney General. She’s strongly conservative across the board. I’ll profile her if she’s chosen.
Whoever he chooses, it’s worth pointing out just how great Romney’s search has been. Rather than do the usual thing of trying to get a couple weeks of national exposure by dropping names, Romney has spent months now going from state to state, being seen each week with a possible candidate from that state. In the process, he’s generated buzz at the state level in key states (for himself and the local Republicans), and he’s used this as a way to deflect all of Obama’s attacks by each time suggesting he was getting close to making his choice. It’s been brilliantly done. Let’s hope his choice is as brilliant.
● Thought No. 4. The Bain of Obama’s Existence. I was a little confused this week when Romney strategist Ed Gillespie suggested that Obama’s attacks on Bain Capital were working. This clearly is not the case. For one thing, there’s nothing to attack. Bain bought and sold businesses, big deal. That hasn’t been controversial since the 1980s. For another, once you say the word “finance” people’s eyes glaze over. For yet another, Obama’s attacks have been esoteric, “lost in the weeds” attacks. Indeed, does it matter to any voter exactly what level of control Romney had as Chairman? Hardly. And if you want proof, look at the number of MSM types who have NOT dug into Bain. They know no one cares.
So why suggest these attacks are working, especially as there’s no evidence Romney is working to counter them? The answer is simple: Team Obama doesn’t seem to realize they’re beating a dead horse, and this was an attempt to make them think they were on to something so they would continue with this useless attack. Nice.
● Thought No. 5. Money Troubles. Obama made news last week by whining that Big Bad Romney has so much more money than poor little Red Obama. Interestingly, that’s not actually true. Since this election cycle began, Romney and the RNC have taken in about $425 million all told. Obama and the DNC have taken in $550 million.
So why the whining? Because in the past few months, Romney has blown Obama away. In June, Romney took in about $106 million compared to Obama’s $71 million. In May, Romney raised $77 million compared to $60 million for Obama. And apparently, Romney is now getting increasingly bigger checks as GOP whales are starting to give. Obama, meanwhile, isn’t. Obama is worried by the trend and acted desperately.
● Thought No. 6. DOOMED!! Finally, we have more evidence that Obama is doomed. One of the key demographics Obama need is young people. They are the one group he carries overwhelmingly and he needs them to make up for all the oldsters who will be turning out to toss him out. But the news isn’t good for Obama on the youth front. Gallup tracks enthusiasm by age group. In 2004, young people (age 18-29) turned out at 6% below the national average. In 2008, contrary to popular belief, they turned out 7% below the national average. If what they told Gallup is to be believed, they will turn out 20% below the national average in 2012!!! At the same time, old people who turned out 1% below average and 2% below average in 2004 and 2008, intend to turn out 7% above average in 2012. That’s the group that hates Obama the most. All of this will crush Obama and suggests that we are looking at a blow out.
Thoughts?
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Law of the Sea Treaty Dead Again
Why This Is A Dangerous TreatyI first became aware of the Law of the Sea Treaty when it was conceived during the Reagan years in 1982, and it seemed like a horrible idea at the time. The idea was that the world’s oceans contain a vast amount of mineral wealth, but because only the rich world has the resources to exploit it, a treaty should be passed to divide this wealth equally among all countries.
The way the treaty works is it divides the ocean floor into zones. Internal waters (like a bay) and up to 12 miles from shore are considered territorial water and are treated as if they are dry land. A country’s sovereignty is complete within that zone (the old zone was three miles). The next 12 miles are considered a continuous zone. Within that zone, countries may impose laws related to customs, taxation, immigration and pollution, but cannot stop navigation. The next 200 miles are considered an exclusive economic zone. Here the state has some rights, but foreign countries may lay pipe or cable and navigate freely. Beyond that are international waters.
This may sound harmless, but that’s not all the treaty does. The treaty includes 320 articles and is over 200 pages long. It establishes a complex regulatory regime that applies to almost every commercial and government activity related to the oceans. This includes the regulation of shipping, the regulation of drug interdiction, and even the regulation of manufacturing conducted in coastal waterways. Moreover, it gives the U.N. unprecedented taxing and permitting authority over international waters. Essentially, this is a U.N. takeover of oceans.
Through these regulatory schemes, the U.N. could impose things like the Kyoto Protocol (on global warming) through the back door, could forced U.S. citizens to pay energy taxes to other nations, and the U.N. could claim the power to regulate U.S. military actions.
Ronald Reagan refused to sign this treaty for similar reasons. The extension of the territorial limit from 3 miles to 12 miles meant U.S. submarines and intelligence ships could be put in danger. He felt the regulatory scheme would stop undersea mining as permits to mine require an application fee of $250,000 ($500,000 at the time), plus the corporation must pay an annual fee of $1 millions to the U.N.’s International Seabed Authority, plus they would need to pay up to 7% of profits, plus they would need to share mining and navigational technology. Moreover, the decision on whether or not to grant such a license would belong to the Seabed Authority, which is controlled by Third World countries. This would give them veto power over all such activities. Reagan believed this was set up to discourage deep sea mining to protect the mining industries on land, which tend to operate in Third World countries. He also objected that the mandatory dispute resolution procedures bound Americans to the decisions of foreign judges and harmed American sovereignty.
Clinton tried to pass this treaty and essentially failed, as did Bush II and Obama. John Kerry has been pushing this in the Senate.
Why It’s DeadSince two-thirds of the Senate must support a treaty before it can become law, it only takes 24 Senators to stop a treaty. Thirty-four Republicans have now come out in opposition to the Law of the Sea Treaty, which means it’s effectively dead. The charge was led by Tea Party conservative Jim DeMint, who was joined by GOP liberal Rob Portman of Ohio, conservative Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, cow-tipper Mike Johanns of Nebraska, Johnny Isakson of Georgia, and 29 other Republicans. John “my friends” McCain was on the wrong side, as always. Since the treaty cannot get the two-thirds vote it needs, it’s dead, Jim. . . for now.
Who Supports It And WhyNaturally, only Democrats (and McCain) supported this thing, right? Actually, no. The American Petroleum Institute and the US Chamber of Commerce both supported it. API is Big Oil’s lobbying arm and the Chamber of Commerce is Big Business’s lobbying arm. How could they possibly support this, you ask? Doesn’t the loss of sovereignty, the risk to the US Military, the imposition of international taxes mean anything them?
Well. . . no. Their only concern is profit. And by getting all these minerals safely regulated by an international tribunal, they can then go about making money by extracting them. What about the taxes and fees? Well, that’s really your problem, not theirs, because corporations don’t pay taxes. . . their customers pay taxes.
If you ever needed a more clear example of how little the United States of America and you mean to these companies, this is it. They will happily sell you and your rights to a United Nations tribunal dominated by corrupt Third-World governments just so they can make sure they get the monopoly rights on these minerals. Think about that the next time some oil company or some mineral company or any other multinational company comes to you and says they need some law to help them.
These people are not our friends.
P.S. Don't forget, it's Star Trek Tuesday at the film site.
Fireman, Save My Child
In an earlier preliminary ruling, Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis had shown his impartiality by declaring that the NYFD was “a bastion of white male privilege.” To punish those white elitists, Garaufis set down a whole slew of requirements and strictures. First, the department must pay back pay to the unsuccessful applicants, retroactive to the date they first applied. That's about $129 million. Then it must revise the written exams. The department must hire new firefighters at the following rate: two of every five must be black, and one of every five must be Hispanic in order to reach the court's quota of 186 black and 107 Hispanic hires.
Continuing his flight of fancy, the judge ordered not only compensatory money damages, but “non-economic” damages as well. He defined that as the intangible benefits of “prestige, job satisfaction, camaraderie, unique excitement, enjoyment of flexible scheduling, unusual employment stability, feeling of security derived from retiring with a full pension and lifetime medical benefits, and the potential for career advancement.” Wow! I think I'll apply.
Garaufis based his decision on the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title VII. He found that the written exams had a disparate effect on the minority applicants. That is an established fact. If it weren't for the Ricci case, that would have been enough. But Ricci once and for all shifted the burden of proof to the plaintiffs to prove that the disparate impact is negligent and has no rational basis. That was scarcely even addressed in Garaufis's opinion. While blithely dancing around the Ricci decision, Garaufis relied on his own pre-Ricci decision slamming the FDNY.
Sounding more like a social engineer than a legal scholar, Giraufis babbled about fire departments “reflecting the communities they serve.” Why not go the whole way? All firemen in Harlem and Bedford Stuyvesant should be black and most firemen serving Park Avenue shops should be white. Firemen for the Upper West Side should be both white and largely Jewish and/or gay. Maybe we should even add political party affiliation to the mix. Silly enough for you? I always thought firefighters were there to protect human beings, regardless of race, creed, color, national origin or prior condition of servitude. But what do I know?
And to put an exclamation point on his ruling, Garaufis ordered that the failed applicants be granted retroactive benefits, promotions, and seniority, something that was directly addressed in the Ricci case. So just remember, if you're visiting New York City, the people who will be rushing to your rescue when the hotel bursts into flame will be people ordered to be hired by a political judge after getting a whopping 26 or more answers right on a 100 question exam. Shout “help” but don't write it on a sign to be held up, because the fireman may not be able to read it.
I'll be glad when this is finally resolved so we can move on to Philadelphia and address the racial imbalance in poll watchers.
Monday, July 16, 2012
Biting The Hand That Feeds Them
Sanctuary cities are largely populous urban crime centers, but there are small enclaves of yuppie political-correctness as well. Sanctuary as a genuine policy largely ceased to exist centuries ago with the decline of the supremacy of the Catholic Church. The rules were pretty stringent. Sanctuary had to be sought within a consecrated church, and it usually applied only if the person seeking sanctuary was holding onto the altar or some religious icon particularly identified with that church or cathedral. Even to our medieval forebears, a sanctuary city would have been an odd concept indeed.
American law does not recognize sanctuary at all—in any state or the federal jurisdiction. It is pure politics, and it has been rather successful as a means of keeping illegal immigrants out of the hands of immigration authorities. Federal law clearly allows the central government to withhold massive federal funds from cities which refuse to cooperate with the federal immigration authorities. So far, almost zero funds have been withheld despite a serious spike in crime committed by illegal immigrants.
Some of this action is predictable as hell, the rest somewhat surprising. First of all, I'll believe it when I see it. It's one thing in an election year to say you're going to prevent government waste by cutting off large sums of money to sanctuary cities. It's quite another to set the legal process in motion. But what is truly surprising is that the Justice Department has asked Holder to pursue Cook County, Illinois. For those who may not know, that's basically Chicago and the Obama suburbs.
In a fit of spite, Holder cut off all federal/state cooperation with Arizona, even after winning a landmark case against Arizona and the Tenth Amendment. At this point, Arizona can do next-to-nothing on its own to protect its borders and its citizens, and Holder doesn't want any illegals turned over to ICE or the Border Patrol even when they are captured under the current crippling standards. If this is a move to get back the votes he lost in Arizona by picking up votes in Illinois, it's a very strange way of doing it.
It may just be a matter of slapping the troops back in line. Even early sanctuary city San Francisco will turn over habitual illegal immigrant felons to the feds. According to John Morton, Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement: “Right now, it's not a question of Cook County releasing some individuals to us. They are releasing no individuals to us, including very violent offenders, and I just don't think that's good policy.”
Even Let 'Em All In DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano has jumped on the enforcement bandwagon against Cook County. The pressure on Holder and President Obama from his own people is growing, and with it a political dilemma. Holder and Obama are both products of the Chicago/Cook County Democratic political machine. The current mayor of the Windy City, Rahm Emanuel, was an Obama confidante, and is facing an unprecedented (yes, unprecedented) murder rate on the streets of Chicago. Even though he has not yet weighed in on the problem, Emmanuel is aware of the fact that the high murder rate is being enhanced by the activities of illegal immigrant gangs. But Cook County, among all the sanctuaries, has been the most combative about turning illegals over to the feds.
I guess you would have to call this a falling-out among thieves. Cook County claims that it has received no special demands or interrogatories about its sanctuary policies from the federal government. Spokesman for both Chicago and Cook County say that they have not been told their federal funds might be withheld, and that if it should happen, they would fight tooth and nail.
Cook County is not yet covered by the Secure Communities Act which requires that the fingerprints of all arrested illegal immigrants be turned over to the feds for determination of deportation status. Among the provisions of the Act is that if a prisoner's fingerprints submitted to the FBI pop up on the federal immigration deportation database, the city or county involved is to “detain” the arrestee beyond the time allowed for citizens charged with similar crimes. Thus far, Cook County (which includes the largest Chicago jail) has refused to cooperate. It will be covered by the Secure Communities Act early next year. But that's after the Justice Department puts on its pre-election dog and pony show.
Director Morton apparently attempted to salve wounded feelings at the Cook County offices by trying to work out the fingerprint issue before the Secure Communities Act goes into effect there. Even that effort was rebuffed, so there are some egos involved here as well. This could be a battle royal. Chicago/Cook County is in the same desperate financial condition as all Democrat-controlled big cities. It's broke, and so is the state that might help them out. Under the State Criminal Alien Assistance Act, Cook County has received $13 million in federal assistance money. That is not the only money-for-nothing program that transfers tax money from Washington DC to friendly cities and counties, but it is one of the largest. It's impossible to justify that expense when Cook County refuses to cooperate in even the most minimal way.
This may all be a big ploy to gain the votes of anti-illegal immigrant activists. Holder will likely make big speeches and assign multiple political lawyers to the matter, then make more speeches in the Hispanic communities telling them he won't really interfere with their support of open borders. Nothing will actually happen until after the November election. I still remain mystified by the move, however. Cook County and Chicago are the last places on earth that Obama wants to offend, even a little.
If you have an opinion about why this move at this time, I'd be delighted to hear it. Your theory will probably turn out to be far better than mine.
Whedon Is Wrong, And Right
Whedon is something of a conservative hero because he created Firefly, which many conservatives view as a libertarian statement against big government. But make no mistake, Whedon is NOT a conservative, as his latest comments prove once again. Whedon is an atheist feminist who has spoken out against capitalism, and he endorses Democrats, like John Kerry in 2004.
His latest comments came at Comic-Con 2012, where he was asked to explain his economic philosophy in 30 seconds. He said that America is “turning into Tsarist Russia” and that “we’re creating a country of serfs.” He blamed this on capitalism and said that “we are watching capitalism destroy itself right now” because of the gap between the ultra rich and everyone else, which he traced to Ronald Reagan. Then he lamented that socialism is a dirty word in America.
This is wrong on many levels. First, he’s completely wrong to blame capitalism for our recent economic problems or for the growing income gap. The middle class is getting squeezed because government regulations have destroyed middle class jobs and because taxes have eaten middle class incomes so the government could keep spending on the poor and the ultra-rich.
Moreover, the ultra-rich aren’t rich because of capitalism. Some are, but the vast majority of people in the upper 1% are there because they have found ways to milk the government for money and to use the government to shut down their competitors. Wall Street banks are the perfect example of this. They have used their connections at the Treasury to get government guarantees to protect them from risks they take, to unload unprofitable assets, and to keep smaller competitors out of the market. They got billions in bailouts. They used their influence to change regulations to allow them to do things like draw cheap money from the Fed, impose fees on unsuspecting consumers, restrict the power of bankruptcy to their unique benefit, benefit from the sale of government debt, control prices, and engage in trading practices that simply have no justification in economics, like microtrades. They routinely do things that the unconnected go to jail for.
And banks aren’t alone. It is no accident that billionaires like Warren Buffet rarely engage in businesses that aren’t heavily regulated: energy, insurance, railroads, etc. It’s no accident that GE gets environmental regulations imposed on others and then gets those waved for itself or that Pelosi’s healthcare friends get waivers for ObamaCare. It’s no accident that so many of the loans made to energy companies went straight to political donors. The reality is that our economic problems for the past decade have been the result of our government, no matter who is in charge, becoming the tool of the well-connected to extract money from taxpayers and stifle competition. That’s not capitalism, it’s crony corporate socialism.
Secondly, Whedon is wrong in his description of socialism. Here is what he said:
“We have people trying to create structures and preserve the structures that will help the middle and working class, and people calling them socialists. . . . It’s some people with some sense of dignity and people who have gone off the reservation.”Uh, no. American socialists don’t care about the middle or working classes. American socialism is a collection of non-economic grievances founded on spite and envy, and its goals are highly destructive to the middle class. The only economic policy American socialism still advocates is high taxes across the board on all workers, with the money to be used on subsidies to big business and unions, plus increased welfare payments to the very poor. That’s it. Look at the stimulus for proof. The idea behind the stimulus was that giving billions of dollars in middle class tax dollars to big business and unions and boosting benefits for the unemployed would somehow make America better. Obviously, that failed.
Whedon is right about something, however, and it should concern us: income disparity. When you look at history, the countries that fell apart were those where the middle class collapsed, leaving most of the population very poor and part of the population fabulously wealthy. America is trending that way right now, and that's dangerous.
But the key to solving this is not class warfare, it is to stop trying to strangle the middle class. The American middle class is suffering because almost all of our policies involve taxing the middle class to pay for subsidies to the wealthy or the very poor or to fund social experimentation. At the same time, we have actively sabotaged the kinds of jobs that are needed for people to move up the income scale and we keep flooding the country with cheap labor.
Conservatives need to realize this. Right now they reflexively defend the ultra-rich but dismiss any concerns about the middle class as “class warfare.” That's bad. America needs a strong middle class if it is to remain the country we all know and love. And we can’t do that if we make it impossible for people to start businesses or if we keep taxing people's success.
To that end, Republicans should:
● Pass a flat tax with no deductions.Moreover, let's not forget the other ways we are becoming serfs. Day by day, the government is taking individual rights and freedoms supposedly for our own good. Banning 16 oz. containers, forcing you to buy healthcare, trying to control the internet, massive amounts of wiretapping, taking of private property, etc. These things need to stop. American needs to become the land of the free once more.
● Stop standing in the way of natural gas production, which could bring billions of dollars a year to middle America.
● Reform schools so everyone is ready to participate in the modern world.
● Stop the cronyism. End subsidies and eliminate pointless regulations meant only to keep competitors out of the market.
● Strengthen laws meant to make markets more competitive, e.g. anti-trust.
● Clean up the stock markets so that all rules apply equally.
● Break up the biggest banks so the taxpayers stop backing risk and only insure genuine savings.
● Fix the bankruptcy laws to allow a genuine clean start again.
● Reform healthcare to bring free market competition, as we’ve discussed many times.
● Reform the legal system to reduce verdict sizes and discourage frivolous suits.
● Reform government to stop it from taking ever more of our rights.
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Random Thoughts On Voting
When I first got the vote (it was age 21 back then), a voter actually had to get off his dead behind and go to the polling place. Absentee ballots were difficult to obtain, and required sufficient affidavits of absence to satisfy election standards which were quite restrictive as to why the voter couldn't possibly get to his or her local polling place. The Founders risked their lives, fortunes and sacred honor to make it possible for all eligible citizens to vote. The Civil War was the final act in making all men equal in voting qualification. The Fourteenth Amendment established the universal right of all American men to vote. The final act toward universality of voting was the Nineteenth Amendment which very belatedly recognized that the Founders had left out half the population because of their sex.
Fighting the Revolution and the Civil War were deadly serious matters. Those who fought in either wanted the right to vote to be universal. They didn't say anything about it being easy. In fact, the lazy, mentally incompetent, and uncaring were discouraged from voting based on the moderate difficulty of taking time off to go to the polls and the further ability to read or comprehend sufficiently to be able to discern what was on the ballot. It wasn't a perfect system, but the Constitution guarantees fair elections, not perfect elections.
Fast forward to today's ridiculous ease of voting and voting fraud. We have high speed computers to count votes, but restrictions on using those same computers for maintaining current and honest voter rolls. I plead guilty to voting by mail, another stupid idea that has been in place for a couple of decades now. Not absentee (with legitimate reason for not being able to vote in person on election day at the local polling place), but “by mail.” The possibilities of voter fraud with mail-in votes are legion, but why have it in the first place? Oh, because it makes voting easier. I would add “and therefore less valuable.” The best things in political life are not free.
I first registered by mail because at election time I was still recovering from major surgery and couldn't make the walk to the polls. I didn't intend it to be permanent, but they just made it so damned easy. And I've been doing it ever since. Today, if I had to go to the “local” polling place, I would have to drive thirty-five minutes on dirt and mountain roads to get there. My mailbox is less than a mile away, so I continue to vote by mail. But what if vote-by-mail were eliminated? Then I'd bloody well make the drive. And if the car didn't work, I'd rig up a carriage and have Niko the Wonder Dog pull me to the polls. Under which of those scenarios does my vote seem most valuable—particularly to me?
Furthermore, if I had to go all that way to the polling place, I would probably spend a lot more time reviewing the most current facts and information. As it is, I have my prejudices like everyone else, so I tend to vote as soon as I receive the ballot in the mail to “get it out of the way so I won't forget it.” If my candidate was found to be an al Qaeda agent three days before the election, there's no provision for me to change my vote from four weeks earlier.
The left constantly emphasizes ease of voting over fairness or legitimacy of voting. Furthermore, they are now using it as an excuse to perpetuate voter fraud and party loyalty. Voter photo ID requirements are being savagely attacked as racist by the Holder Justice Department because it “suppresses” minority voting. Aw hooey! It does nothing of the kind. Fortunately, he can only wield this legal hatchet in Southern states affected by the Voting Rights Act of 1965, a law as useful to today's realities as the Missouri Compromise.
The irony is that Holder is unintentionally proclaiming that the people he purports to be protecting are either too stupid or too lazy to get voter photo ID (or both). He gave a speech at the NAACP proclaiming how difficult the racists make it for minorities to get a photo ID. He did so at a meeting that required valid photo ID to get in. And like most Obamists and other race-baiters, he lied.
Just how difficult is it to get a valid photo ID to vote? Well, if you can't afford one, they'll give it to you for free. If you can't make it to the DMV or whatever department issues the ID, they will make provisions to transport you there or in some states they will come to you. If you're not smart enough to know that, you're not smart enough to be voting. In California, you can drive up to the DMV, get your driver's license (a valid photo ID), then drive around the building once and set up your voter registration (presumably, even if you're an illegal immigrant). How much easier could it be?
Well, it's too damned easy. Men and women fought, bled and died to assure the right to vote. Why is it necessary to make voting as easy as ordering a NetFlix movie online? Who in his right mind thinks that everyone should vote? All the ease of voting does is guarantee that the lazy, shiftless and government-dependent can make sure their freebies and lives of ease don't end. Sure, fraud is a big issue, and more of it keeps turning up as the Obamists deny there is any at all. But my gripe is with people who think that one of our most valuable rights should have no costs. If it's too easy and too facile, those exercising it will hold it in contempt.
Eric Holder and his race-baiting friends have now gone so far as to claim that valid photo ID is tantamount to the poll tax. Leave it to the “progressive” Democrats to haul out an issue which died almost five decades ago. As for my opinion, if you're too lazy, too stupid, or too ugly to get a photo ID and get up off the couch to go to the polling station, then stay home and wait for your government assistance check. We don't need you, and the Republic will fare far better without your ignorant vote.
Voters in Philadelphia can ignore this rant. They will have the poll protection of the New Black Panther Party and the ever-vigilant Holder Justice Department to assure ease of voting.
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The Great (film) Debates vol. 45
Life is full of drama. And television is full of dramas. Some are quite good actually.What is your favorite television drama?
Click Here To Read Article/Comments at CommentaramaFilms [+] Read More...
Saturday, July 14, 2012
New York State of Mind
STRIKE! - Not the baseball kind, but the union kind - It was blazing hot while I was away. And just in time for the really, really hot weather, the ConEd (gas/electric) workers went on strike or more accurately were locked out by management. They've been out for about three weeks now. As you can guess, it's not about the poor wages or benefits or anything that one would think would drive workers to the picket lines. It's about...well who knows. ConEd says it wants to eliminate the pension and wage structures for new hires, require workers to contribute more to their healthcare, more flexibility in hard times, and, the real sticking point, require 7 days notice before a strike. The 8500 workers say that "[t]hey want to cut medical, they want to cut our pension, they want to cut our wages,”.
Unlike our 2005 transit strike that shut down all public transport and the city for three days, the electricity is still flowing and, as long as the electricity works, no one can even tell there IS a strike. But, much like the transit strike, the ConEd workers are getting no sympathy or support from the citizens of NYC either.
CRIME IN THE CITY - While I was away, the murder/crime rate jumped dramatically - a whopping 10% over last year. On July 4th, nineteen people were shot and four were killed. Three of those four people were gunned down in a hail of 64 bullets fired from an AK-47 into a crowd and reportedly over a girl. The fact that only 3 were killed is kind of a miracle.
All of this comes on the heels of massive protests about NYC's aggressive "stop & frisk" policy. As I've explained before, our Police Commissioner Ray Kelly has come under fire (no pun intended) for his long standing aggressive policing practices of having beat cops stop people acting suspiciously and frisking them for guns and other stuff. The results have brought the crime rate down about 300% in the last 20 years and last year alone took over 700 guns away from criminals. Logically, they have targeted high crime areas which also happens to be high minority areas and now cries of racism have ensued. To his great credit, Kelly has not backed down AT ALL. This week he publicly rebuked community leaders for staging loud protests to voice their outrage against the police department, but continue to be deafeningly silent that their children are being gunned down daily in the streets...
"Ninety-six percent of our shooting victims are people of color, yet these community leaders are not speaking out about that,” he said. “I'd like to see some political outcry... I want them to be outraged that a 3-year-old child is shot on the streets."In response, Brooklyn Councilman Jumaane Williams said he protests all the time and challenged Kelly to come walk the beat with him without any protection. Kelly responded, no thanks, he has been doing that for 40 years already. And, as you might imagine, Al Sharpton responded with...continued silence...which is kind of amazing, if you think about it. Oh, it shouldn't surprise you that Councilman Williams was arrested earlier this year protesting with the Occupy Wall Street bunch. So yes, he does protest a lot, but just not about children being slaughtered on their stoops.
CRIME NOT IN THE CITY - I can't leave the topic of crime and murder without saying something about Chicago's Mayor Rahm Emanuel. He may be on to something with his brilliant way of handling the ever-rising murder rate in his tottlin' town. Rather than actually try and slow down the murder rate with aggressive policing tactics like NYC's Ray Kelly, Mayor Rahm has decided to take the kinder, gentler approach, This week he softly admonished (some would say, "begged") the would-be murderers to take to the alleyways -
We've got two gangbangers, one standing next to a kid. Get away from that kid. Take your stuff away to the alley. Don't touch the children of the city of Chicago. Don't get near them. And it is about values. As I said then, Scott, who raised you? How were you raised? And I don't buy this case where people say they don't have values. They do have values. They have the wrong values. Don't come near the kids -- don't touch them.Not your typical "Don't commit murder or we'll fry you" approach, but a gentler "take it inside, so we can't see it happening" approach. I am sure that will work out just fine, and if Ray Kelly weren't such a brutal, mean guy, he could have done it that way too.
And on a final note - As you may or may not remember, NY had its Congressional Primary on June 26th and at the time I reported that Charlie Rangel won his 4-way primary pretty handily by over 2000 votes. Well, three weeks later, and after major challenges and numerous recounts, it has finally been ruled that Ol' Charlie did win afterall, but by only 800 votes and not without accusations of voter suppression and the like. But that's not the real story here. It's really about the NYC Board of Elections and their credibility gap. Let me explain why.
Four years ago, our city switched from those old-fashioned manual lever-type voting booths (you know, the kind that my Grandmother voted in 50 years ago) to a new, expensive electronic computer voting system. The new system allows for more accurate votes and speeder tallies. However, even though these new electronic voting systems can download the votes directly onto a thumb drive that can be plugged directly into the main system to be counted, our BOE refuses to change with the times. Instead, they have decided to stick with the old system of manually counting all of the votes, recording the counts on little slips of of paper that are then transported by police squad car to a main voting station and re-entered manually at the main voting station. In a perfect example of oxymoronic government efficiency, what could take just hours, continues to take days and sometimes weeks. The rest of the state has moved on, but, citing some quirk in the city laws or something, the NYC BOE says they cannot change the way the counting/recording of votes is done because chaos would ensue and it would bring on the "End Times". Okay, I made that last part up, but after their June debacle, it is coming down to a real crisis with the looming national elections. They must embrace the new technology or the entire Board shouild be replaced. The Board has one more chance to get it right with our local Primary in September, or something will happen maybe. Where's Eric Holder and his voter suppression crusade when we need him?
Next week - The crime and lack of punishment for the lying cheaters at top tier Stuyvesant High School and other pressing issues...
Addendum: Happy Bastille Day!! Viva La France - Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite! [+] Read More...
Friday, July 13, 2012
Film Friday: The Thing (1982) & (2011)
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State Department Still Can’t Find The Enemy
This kind of moral equivalence and philosophical musing is going to get us all killed. For now, it’s just getting a lot of people killed in foreign lands while America either fights battles with one hand tied behind its back or stays completely out of the fray. The current example is Nigeria. Our bumbling State Department stubbornly refuses to recognize the mass murder group Boko Haram as a foreign terrorist organization. And why? Because it would require admitting who the real enemy is—Islamism.
Boko Haram has managed to kill thousands of Nigerian citizens using typical insurgent tactics and asymmetrical warfare. It murders innocent civilians, has no governmental authority, wears uniforms only for show but rarely during an attack, and recognizes no rules of civilized warfare. That makes it a terrorist organization by any sane person’s definition. But to say it is a terrorist organization requires one to ask what their goal is. And that would reveal the real enemy’s goal—total domination of Islam over the entire world.
The human side of this horror is that Boko Haram almost exclusively targets Christians and Christian sites. The picture accompanying this article was taken last week after another devastating bombing of a Christian church during Sunday services. The organization scarcely shows its head in the Muslim parts of the country, except to parade its successes in the shrinking Christian enclaves. The practical danger of this ongoing jihad is that Nigeria was a relatively stable state with alternating Muslim and Christian chief executives. It is becoming very unstable, and worst of all, it has been a major non-Middle East provider of petroleum to the West.
Our sophisticated and nuanced State Department is doing essentially nothing about the rapidly-growing problem. It has declared certain members of Boko Haram to be terrorists, but won’t even come close to declaring the entire organization terrorist. It’s a bit like declaring Hitler, Himmler and Goering to be international criminals, but leaving the Nazis pretty much alone. And likewise, it ignores the underlying beliefs which trigger the criminal/terrorist acts. Nazism in Germany, Islamism in Nigeria.
Instead of recognizing clear facts and an evolving catastrophe in a friendly nation, the State Department engages in sophistry. When cornered by questions from committee members, State Department spokesman Johnnie Carson (no, I didn’t make that up) rambled: “Before we prescribe actions, it is important that we understand what Boko Haram is and what it is not. The truth is that our understanding is limited at best. Boko Haram is composed of at least two organizations, a larger organization which is focused primarily on discrediting the Nigerian government, and a small more dangerous group that is increasingly sophisticated and increasingly leftist.” Aw, baloney.
To return to the Nazi analogy, that’s like failing to oppose Nazism because the SS and the SA didn’t share the exact same beliefs. If it looks like a skunk, and smells like a skunk, and is seen it the company of skunks—it’s a skunk. Every platoon of Boko Haram shares a common goal, if not a common belief in how to attain that goal. That goal is the destruction of Western civilization, and in Nigeria itself anything that isn’t fundamentalist Islam. Some groups may blow up Christian churches while others assassinate political rivals, but the goal remains the same. The triumph of Islam at any cost.
Boko Haram wants to replace constitutional government and Western-style governance in Nigeria with sharia law. They do so by terrorist means, but Boko Haram and sharia have one common parent—Islamism. Our cowardly and inept State Department refuses to use either term for these murderous thugs. When they start blowing up mosques and killing imams, I might be willing to call the bloodshed a civil war. But that isn’t going to happen. This is just another attempt to take over a diverse population and control a moderate nation in the name of Allah.
In my lifetime, civilization has faced the threat of Nazism and communism. But our nation rallied behind patriotic governments, Democrat and Republican which knew who the enemy was. Now, late in my life, we face an enemy that our State Department can’t identify and won’t fight. It waffles over whom to support as Islamism takes over the entire Middle East and Africa., arguing over whether the Muslim Brotherhood or Al Shabaab is preferable.
In Nigeria, there’s no such lack of easily-discernible opponents. It is militant Islam versus civilization, and the State Department isn’t sure who should win. During the committee hearing, the State Department spokesman rigidly refused to admit that the State Department should declare Boko Haram a terrorist organization, then proceeded on three separate occasions to refer to it as a terrorist organization. With clarity of thought like that, can there be any question who will ultimately rule Nigeria?
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Thursday, July 12, 2012
Bullet [Train] To The Brain
IF YOU FIND YOURSELF IN A HOLE, STOP DIGGING. Commonsense advice which liberals routinely ignore.
First, we have California’s recent legislative action approving $4.5 billion in state funding for what many Californians call the Bullet Train to Nowhere. Anybody who has been conscious recently knows that California is for all intents and purposes bankrupt. The legislature brilliantly attempted to fix this problem by getting the $3.2 billion in federal funds which would have been lost if California hadn’t voted to throw bad money after worse to build a pie-in-the-sky train. In other words, a bankrupt state is getting money from a bankrupt federal government which is borrowing the money from China.
The picture accompanying this article is an artist’s rendering of the nonexistent train pulling into a nonexistent station in one of California’s bankrupt cities. Last year, the city of Vallejo filed for bankruptcy protection. Recently, Stockton, California followed Vallejo’s filing, becoming the largest city in America ever to file bankruptcy. Last week, the City of Mammoth Lakes filed. Not to be outdone, on Wednesday, the City of San Bernardino, population 210,000, added to the list. Two major credit rating agencies recently reported that 20% of California’s cities face bankruptcy within five years.
So what does a good government do when faced with major portions of its body politic going bankrupt? Spend more money. Currently, the first leg of the fast choo-choo is set to go from Bakersfield to Madera. That’s farmland. But even though the ecoweenies have badly damaged the Central Valley’s water supply by protecting a useless fish, there are still huge areas continuing to produce food items for America’s dinner tables. Those remaining stalwart farmers have been using every means available to them to derail this train. They have been temporarily successful in stalling it at least, because the proposed routes (there have been three so far) cut off farmers, their livestock and their crops from their daily activities and means of transport. In case you're wondering, they don't allow cattle on bullet trains (unless they're service or emotional support animals, I suppose).
But despite astronomical budget deficits and hearty opposition to the train itself, the geniuses in Sacramento went ahead with the project anyway. Why write bad checks by yourself when you have enablers in Washington DC who will help you out with IOUs? Three other states had the good sense to turn the federal high speed rail funds down because of budget deficits. Two of the three have instead cleaned up their fiscal houses and now have budget surpluses. But they won’t have super Casey Jones. How sad.
Never daunted, Governor Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown praised the legislature’s action and promised a quick signature from the State House. Says Brown: “The money is there. We have the capability in California in a $2 trillion dollar economy to finance this thing.” Well, the state had that economy before the train, and it is still billions of dollars in the hole. The estimated final cost of the high speed line is $68 billion (and you know how accurate government estimates are). Brown is another typical Democratic politician who believes that you’re not broke as long as you still have checks.
The second headline news that caught my attention was the reaction from the Obama administration to California’s brilliant move. Basking in the glow of other green initiatives and government glory such as Solyndra and LightSquared, the Obamists are positively orgasmic over California’s approval of the nation’s first High Speed Railway to Nowhere. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood took time off from praising the efficiency of China’s government by three-man dictatorships to extol the joys of the California action.
Here’s what LaHood had to say: “I congratulate the Legislature on taking this action, which will create thousands of jobs and strengthen the California economy. In the next 20 years, California expects more than 7 million additional residents. But, as the state’s residents know all too well, the highways between California cities are already congested, and short-haul takeoff and landing slots at Golden State airports are at a premium.” LaHood fails to notice that California is bleeding taxpayers and taxpaying businesses, so we can guess where those 7 million additional residents are coming from.
I have driven between the metropolitan Bay Area and the metropolitan Los Angeles area literally hundreds of times in my life. Interstate 5 is hardly congested, and I’ve had times in which I drove for half an hour or more before seeing another car. I drive because the waiting time and inconvenience of airports and airlines are outweighed by the convenience of traveling in my own car (though gas prices have changed that formula a bit).
Where does LaHood think these train stations are going to be located? They’ll be placed in exactly the same locations as the current airports. The congestion is not the travel time on either the airplanes or the trains, it’s the highways getting to the stations and airports. And whether the train goes 120 mph or 220 mph, the congestion getting to the stations won’t be any different. Then there’s the joy of leaving your car parked in high-crime areas while you take your high speed trip from crime-ridden Los Angeles to crime-ridden San Francisco. Poor San Diego has to wait for awhile.
So just remember next November that as California goes so goes the nation. Unless we make damned sure that the Democrats don’t win.
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Romney's Great Speech At The NAACP
● What He Said: Romney made several interesting points in his speech, each of which fit into the theme of his policies making the lives of blacks better. This is an interesting choice because it sidesteps all the race-baiting stuff for which Republicans normally fall. Observe.
First, Romney noted that Obama has been horrible to blacks. Specifically, black unemployment is 6.2% higher than white unemployment and the average income and median family income is lower for blacks than whites. He then promised that his goal as president would be the creation of jobs, but he intends to do so without trying to target things for specific racial groups:
"If I am president, job one for me will be creating jobs. I have no hidden agenda. If you want a president who will make things better in the African-American community, you are looking at him."This actually got booed, which tells you something about the audience, doesn’t it? Then he said something fascinating. He essentially told the audience that capitalism isn’t their enemy. Check this out:
"I’ve never heard anyone look around an impoverished neighborhood and say, 'You know, there’s too much free enterprise around here. Too many shops, too many jobs, too many people putting money in the bank.'"This is a brilliantly subtle point. What he’s doing is saying that no matter what other issues blacks may have vis-Ã -vis race in America, capitalism is not to blame. And subscribing to free enterprise, rather than the spoils system so popular in black circles, will make their lives better without them even having to give up the other issues which concern them. In other words, he’s trying to depoliticize capitalism and wealth.
Then he spoke about education, calling it the “civil rights issue of our era” and arguing that “mediocre schools” are setting black kids up to fail. To fix this, he pointed out that he supports school choice and won’t be beholden to the teachers unions, as Obama is. Here is how he sold this idea:
"If equal opportunity in America were an accomplished fact, black families could send their sons and daughters to public schools that truly offer the hope of a better life. Instead, for generations, the African-American community has been waiting and waiting for that promise to be kept. Today, black children are 17 percent of students nationwide—but they are 42 percent of the students in our worst-performing schools."Notice that again, he’s telling blacks that this is an issue which they should depoliticize and thus support his education policies, which have proven effective. He’s also tossing a wedge between blacks and the teacher’s unions.
Finally, he made a direct appeal for them to look past the ideology and take an honest look at him:
"I believe that if you understood who I truly am in my heart, and if it were possible to fully communicate what I believe is in the real, enduring best interest of African-American families, you would vote for me for president."That’s a pretty solid appeal across the board.
● Smart Move: Romney was never going to win over the NAACP because those people have blinded themselves to anything they don’t want and nothing Romney could have said or done would have won him their vote or endorsement. So was it smart to give this speech to a hostile crowd? Well, yes. Winning over the NAACP wasn’t Romney’s goal. Instead, Romney was speaking to several other groups:
1. White Moderates. By speaking to the NAACP, Romney shows himself to be inclusive and willing to hear from everyone, not just his most loyal constituents. That makes moderates comfortable.● He’s Racist: The moment Romney finished, the race baiters started whining. There was nothing in his speech they could attack so they turned him into an evil genius by claiming he designed his speech so he would be booed, with the intention of using that booing to win over racist whites. Clearly they don’t believe this, but they know that many of their followers are stupid enough and paranoid enough to think this is true. So it’s a decent strategy in that regard. In fact, the smears started yesterday when Romney was called "too white" to speak to the NAACP. But I think ultimately, this speech is the kind of speech which could shift the needle a couple percentage points over time. And if Romney’s message that blacks don’t need to fight us on all issues finds legs, then the race industry is in serious trouble.
2. White Conservatives. By refusing to pander, Romney continues to show that he has strong conservative instincts -- though this point will be lost at some blogs.
3. Hispanics. By being seen appealing to blacks, Romney demonstrates to Hispanics that he’s not a white candidate speaking to white audiences. Following his speeches to Hispanics, this will help soften Hispanic fear that Romney wants to make them second class citizens.
4. Average Blacks. Obama will need every black vote he can get. Last time Obama got 96% of the black vote, and he still polls at 92% now. By speaking to the NAACP and speaking honestly, while making it clear he wants to help blacks, Romney could peel off a few percentage of blacks, which could make a key difference in some states. In other words, he doesn’t need to win them all to be successful, every percentage point counts.
● Final Thoughts: Romney continues to impress, quite frankly. I have no doubt that if Newt or Santorum were the nominee, they would have told this group about all the laws they passed to give blacks spoils. Santorum would have promised some piece of civil rights legislation -- Newt would have promise seats on the new moon base. And in the process, both would have strengthened the liberal meme that everything related to blacks needs to be seen through the prism of race.
What Romney did here is give a speech which basically laid out how a color-blind agenda will help blacks too, and he suggested to them that it was all right to agree with us on issues like economics and education because they didn’t need to surrender their beliefs on other issues to do that. That’s incredibly smart.
Thoughts?
(P.S. Obama sent Biden to the same conference. He said racist things, told a sex joke and insulted veterans.)
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Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Remake Review: Anastasia (1956 / 1997)
At the beginning of the Russian Civil War, Czar Nicholas II, along with his family, was assassinated by the Bolsheviks. However, there were rumors that his daughter, the Grand Duchess Anastasia, had escaped. As years passed and rumors intensified, several women came forward claiming to be Anastasia. These rumors serve as the backstory for two very different films about the legendary princess.
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