Confederate Yankee
December 08, 2010
Aaron Sorkin is a Whiny Little Man-Bitch, Isn't He?
It's starting to feel like "all caribou, all the time" around here, but you take your litmus tests where you find them.
Sarah Palin's less-than-picture-perfect caribou hunt on her reality show has earned her some derision on both sides of the political spectrum.
On the right, critics find her gun handling and shooting skills suspect, as well as her decision to shoot a rifle that had been dropped earlier in the hunt. Not only did she fire it and complain about it missing high, she shot it
five times before going to another rifle with which she finally dispatched what must have been one of the world's dumbest herbivores. Some doubt her authenticity as a hunter and shooter as a result of the episode, while some question her judgment as she continued to use a damaged weapon. By and large, these criticisms have all be rational.
And then there is the comically absurd commentary frothing forth from the Left.
I discussed Maureen Dowd's
mangled attempt earlier, but shrill screenwriter Aaron Sorkin was so furious that he produced a self-parodying gem that
simply must be read to be appreciated for it's stupidity.
Like 95% of the people I know, I don't have a visceral (look it up) problem eating meat or wearing a belt. But like absolutely everybody I know, I don't relish the idea of torturing animals. I don't enjoy the fact that they're dead and I certainly don't want to volunteer to be the one to kill them and if I were picked to be the one to kill them in some kind of Lottery-from-Hell, I wouldn't do a little dance of joy while I was slicing the animal apart.
"Torturing animals"?
I'd invite Mr. Sorkin to visit any commercial slaughterhouse of his choice, and compare the killing processes there against the taking of a game animal by a hunter. His belt and loafers lived a tortured life in a factory farm and died a tortured death in a commercial slaughterhouse. Palin's caribou lived free in nature, and died there.
I'm able to make a distinction between you and me without feeling the least bit hypocritical. I don't watch snuff films and you make them. You weren't killing that animal for food or shelter or even fashion, you were killing it for fun. You enjoy killing animals. I can make the distinction between the two of us but I've tried and tried and for the life of me, I can't make a distinction between what you get paid to do and what Michael Vick went to prison for doing.
Oh, what nutty goodness. As noted above, the commercially raised, slaughtered, and butchered animals that Sorkin exploits for his needs and comforts are done by others with cold efficiency, stripping the animals of their dignity along with their flesh. Palin's kill was explicitly made to fill her freezer. His argument that she, like millions of others in America and generations of mankind going back to the beginning of our species, should not find pride and an feeling of accomplish in one of mankind's oldest rituals merely shows how ignorant this pretender really is about the human condition... and it perhaps explains the thinned excrement he typically produces as entertainment.
Hunters hunt for many reasons, but the most common are to connect to our shared cultural past, to commune with nature, and feel the satisfaction of being self-sustaining. It shouldn't be a surprise that a parasite that derives his existence from mimicking the human condition is unable to relate to the authentic state.
I'm able to make the distinction with no pangs of hypocrisy even though I get happy every time one of you faux-macho shitheads accidentally shoots another one of you in the face.
Oh, the compassion of the faux compassionate. Sorkin, a cookie-cutter liberal, gives unrestricted sympathy to animals he finds adorable, exploits the ones that upholster his custom-made furniture and adorn his plate, and harbors hatred in his heart for those who can do what he cannot... provide for themselves. You can almost hear his testosterone-deprived raisins shriveling with anger as he rages.
So I don't think I will save my condemnation, you phony pioneer girl. (I'm in film and television, Cruella, and there was an insert close-up of your manicure while you were roughing it in God's country. I know exactly how many feet off camera your hair and make-up trailer was.)
And you didn't just do it for fun and you didn't just do it for money. That was the first moose ever murdered for political gain. You knew there'd be a protest from PETA and you knew that would be an opportunity to hate on some people, you witless bully. What a uniter you'd be -- bringing the right together with the far right.
I should not have to point out the fact that animals have been used for political gain since the very beginning of human history in the form of tribute, sacrifice, and of course, political symbolism, but Sorkin is off the rails on a rant; facts, reality, and the expanse of human history be damned. That Sorkin can't tell a moose from a caribou is also a symptom of the left. They want to pay lip service to environmentalism, but don't expect them to spend enough time in the natural environment to identify anything in it.
(Let me be the first to say that I abused cocaine and was arrested for it in April 2001. I want to be the first to say it so that when Palin's Army of Arrogant A$%holes, bereft of any reasonable rebuttal, write it all over the internet tomorrow they will at best be the second.)
I eat meat, there are leather chairs in my office, Sarah Palin is deranged and The Learning Channel should be ashamed of itself.
Sorkin thinks the distant past needs to be dredged up for us to mock him or find his perverse sense of morals and manhood cheap.
That he is a living parody simply wouldn't cross his mind.
Update: And can someone please explain to these idiot liberals the difference between a moose and a caribou?
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
03:59 PM
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1
Well, that is what you get snorting cocaine while writing West Wing scripts, isn't it?
Posted by: Gunpowder Chronicle at December 08, 2010 06:03 PM (LPK+V)
2
Long ago Robert A. Heinlein taught me that, yes, if you eat meat you are the moral equivilent to the person who does the slaughtrering.
And I lurves me some steak.
Posted by: Lazarus Long at December 08, 2010 06:48 PM (Mgd8Q)
3
In defense of Palin's shooting, if you have ever shot a scoped rifle that has been dropped, there is no way except flying dirt to tell where the shots went. It was obvious that she knew how to shoot when she was given a dialed in rifle and scope. Without seeing where the shots went no one could have guessed where the misses were going and corrected for the error.
Posted by: INSPECTORUDY at December 08, 2010 07:19 PM (KOOZL)
4
Excellent response to Sorkin but I have one nit- pick:
"His belt and loafers lived a tortured life in a factory farm and died a tortured death in a commercial slaughterhouse."
I take exception to your characterization of livestock experiencing a "tortured life and death". I grew up working on our hog farm. One that would be characterized by PETA as a factory farm. Those hogs lived a charmed life compared to what their experience would be in the wild though their lifespans were predetermined for them. Stressing an animal is counterproductive to efficient growth and meat quality. They are treated very well.
"Factory farm" is as much a fabricated term as "assault weapon". It was fabricated to elicit a similar emotional response. I wish you wouldn't use it.
Posted by: Hat Trick at December 08, 2010 08:39 PM (0UUo+)
5
"On the right, critics find her gun handling and shooting skills suspect..."
Yes, Bob. Only conservatives know how to handle a rifle or a shotgun and have ever hunted. And "suspect" is putting it mildly. She is no more a hunter than you are a US Marine.
Posted by: TBogg at December 08, 2010 09:01 PM (u3cNy)
6
Is it possible that Sarah Palin is, with total calculation... coldy, deliberately, forthrightly trying to drive her opposition nuts? (a mighty short drive, I acknowledge)
She is doing stuff that she knows is going to cause the media and cultural elites to show us all (again!) exactly how pathetically out of touch they are with the rest of us, and the real world as a whole. And if those people were half as smart as they tell us they are, they wouldn't take the bait.... every single time. But they do, again and again.
Litle puppets on a string. It always makes for a great show, on and off of TLC.
Posted by: Andrew X at December 08, 2010 10:24 PM (E46Ts)
7
Hat Trick,
That's a fair complaint.
I should have written:
His belt and loafers lived a "tortured" life in a factory farm and died a "tortured" death in a commercial slaughterhouse.
I can't speak to the quality of life of hogs and chickens and turkeys, but I do know that I've seen them grown in a fairly confined conditions. Torture is too strong of a word, but a good life? I rather doubt it.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at December 08, 2010 10:28 PM (S9Rfu)
8
Confederate Yankee,
I'd say that our hogs had a life though shorter that was as good as or better than the dogs and cats that live out their lives in our local "humane" no-kill shelter.
Posted by: Hat Trick at December 08, 2010 10:43 PM (0UUo+)
9
This type of commentary is not surprising. Methinks that a fairly large proportion of people living in urban areas, particularly those born there as well, have watched too much of the Hollywood products such as cartoons for many years featuring funny, cuddly, wholesome, and intelligent talking animals, to not be predisposed to think killing one is evil or backwards, or both. Toss in your points regarding the reasons for hunting both as sport and self-sufficiency and you only confuse urbanites who neither hunt nor know of sports outside of arenas.
Many people around my home hunted and fished as both sport and significantly for reducing the family budget deficit, or at least increasing the disposable income for such things as clothing or books, cookware or gifts, charity or grace.
I guess these aren't considerations in Hollywood.
Posted by: Robert17 at December 08, 2010 10:47 PM (LaaRT)
Posted by: gypsy 05 clothes at December 09, 2010 05:36 AM (JmRE7)
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I can't make a distinction between what you get paid to do and what Michael Vick went to prison for doing.
Therein lies the danger of animal cruelty laws. When city boys get to make the rules about what is cruel and what isn't, everyone in the animal harvesting business is only one judicial ruling away from being a criminal. Shooting a Deer = not cruel. Shooting a dog = cruel. I have a horse and have spoken with other horse owners. If my horse becomes injured in the field (stupid critters are always hurting themselves), I have to let it suffer until a vet comes to put it down chemically. But if I lived further away from people with urban mentalities, I could do the job myself, quickly and humanely and from a safe distance so the distressed animal didn't hurt a human while thrashing around.
Posted by: Professor Hale at December 09, 2010 09:54 AM (PDTch)
12
I took my first deer this weekend. It was very fun. I was a single shot to the vitals, and it only made it about 10 yards before it quit. I field dressed it myself under the instruction of my uncle. It took me about 5 minutes. Pulling it back to the truck over a rough Iowa field revealed that I needed to work out a bit more. I now understand why people hunt. It's great.
It's too bad that Liberals like this Aaron fellow wanted my uncle to shoot me in the face, or worse yet, for me to murder him.
Posted by: brando at December 09, 2010 11:00 AM (IPGju)
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Also, Lazarus Long is an awesome username.
Posted by: brando at December 09, 2010 11:01 AM (IPGju)
14
The caribou looked to be young, not much of a rack. It reminded me of the scene in "Dances with Wolves" when "socks" was trapped between the soldiers shooting at him and the Indians on the other side of the hill. I wonder what was the distance of the shot? Shooting uphill at 400 yards is a tough shot. May have been an "canned" hunt but the outfitter earned his money. Sarah is putting money in the local economy. Go Sarah.
Posted by: kentsmith at December 09, 2010 12:12 PM (Wflt/)
15
Prof. Hale,
I had not realized that it had gotten that bad. I am appalled that you have to wait for a vet now. You are absolutely right that shooting a horse on the spot is the only humane thing to do.
I worked on a ranch in Wyoming as an older teen breaking and training horses. Once a 2-year-old fell over backwards as it was rearing up, and banged its head pretty hard.
It was writhing, and screaming -- that's the only word for it, and it tears me up now 45 years later.
The head wrangler ran and got a rifle from his truck, and shot that poor animal in the head.
I had to do the same for a deer by the side of the road years later when I was a Deputy Sheriff.
NO ONE in their right mind who had been at either incident would have called either anything but a kindness to the animal.
Posted by: Bill Smith at December 09, 2010 01:19 PM (/KX39)
16
NO ONE in their right mind who had been at either incident would have called either anything but a kindness to the animal.
Now it would be called "discharging a firearm within 50 ft of a public roadway" or even "child endangerment" if any of them were present. Of course, as a deputy sheriff, you can get away with a lot more.
Posted by: Professor Hale at December 09, 2010 02:30 PM (m7EhJ)
17
We raise cattle in western kansas, and we take damn good care of our stock because to do any thing else would be counter productive.
Posted by: bman@ucom.net at December 09, 2010 07:03 PM (xJCOL)
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Dowd Inexpertly Slaughters and Guts a Metaphor
Bitter Maureen Dowd indulges in Palinism again, using the caribou hunting episode of Sarah Palin's reality show in order to... do something with words.
It appears to be a metaphor, but she
pokes at it with uncertainty.
The caribou that waited too pliantly in the cross hairs is doomed to become stew for Palin and an allegory for politics. The elegant animal standing above the fray, dithering rather than charging at his foes or outmaneuvering them, is Obambi. Even with a rifle aimed at him, he's trying to be the most reasonable mammal in the scene, mammalian bipartisan, and rise above what he sees as empty distinctions between the species so that we can all unite at a higher level of being.
Palin's father advises her to warm up her trigger finger. And trigger-happy Sarah represents the Republicans, who have spent two years taking shots at the president, including potshots, and tormenting him in an effort to bring him down.
The Republicans think they have hurt their quarry on the tax-cut deal, making him look weak and at odds with his party. There's an argument to be made for what the president did, but he doesn’t look good doing it.
When all the Democrats are complaining and all the Republicans are happy, it just can't be a good deal for Democrats.
If it appears that Dowd was starting to make a comparison between our President and a caribou before boring herself with the subject by the end of the paragraph, then your reading is correct.
The next paragraph barely attempts to lift its head, muttering a bit about political potshots. The next after that only mentions quarry, but by then Dowd is spent, and the comparison fizzles out. It is the kind of pointless and random comparison we'd expect from substance abusers (a "methaphor?").
Dowd clearly doesn't understand the beast or the circumstances it faces. It is not "elegant animal standing above the fray, dithering rather than charging at his foes or outmaneuvering them."
The Obambi is instead a timid beast, unable to identify the clear threat standing out in the open in front of him or make the basic decisions that would save itself.
It isn't "a reasonable mammal." It isn't trying to "rise above" anything. It's simply too dumb to act in its own best interests. It cannot function apart from the herd.
It is perhaps that bitter and bloody realization that caused Dowd to abandon her her comparison. Any hunter can be successful when the game leads itself to slaughter.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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"If it appears that Dowd was starting to make a comparison between our President and a caribou before boring herself with the subject by the end of the paragraph"...
Actually I was wondering the word, "boring" should've been "boning" instead?
I mean this is Dowd who does have that track record of doing herself in with her own words...:-)
Posted by: juandos at December 08, 2010 01:47 PM (Hbql1)
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The donkey that waited pliantly in the cross hairs is doomed to become stew for Palin and an allegory for politics. The idiotic jackass standing around, dithering rather than charging at his foes or trying to cap the well, is Obambi. Even with the public aimed at him, he's trying to be the most socialistic/marxist mammal in the scene, mammalian socialist, and rise above what he sees as empty distinctions between the classes so that we can all serve him at a higher level of being.
Palin's father advises her to warm up her trigger finger(there are many democRATS out there). And trigger-happy Sarah represents the Republicans, who have spent two years taking shots at the president, including potshots, and tormenting him in an effort to bring Lord obambi down.
The Republicans think they have hurt their quarry on the tax-cut deal, making him look weaker and at odds with his party. There's an argument to be made for what the president did, but he doesn’t look good doing it,or at much else.
When all the DemoNcRATS are complaining and all the Republicans are happy, it just THE START OF US TAKING BACK OUR COUNTRY...THE GOOD OL' USA!!
Posted by: wingmann at December 08, 2010 01:52 PM (yk7Se)
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Maureen Dowd's prose makes me want to find whomever taught her to write and smack the crap out of them. She butchered that metaphor like a starving man with a dull knife. The idea that Obama is akin to a caribou (essentially a cold climate cow with antlers, no more intelligent than any other ruminant mammal) does have a certain delicious amusement about it, though I'm pretty sure that's not what Dowd intended.
Posted by: Random Thoughts at December 08, 2010 03:15 PM (WwIUf)
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Is there anyway that you can block these dkhds that post advrts on your site? I'm seeing theme everywhere, now.
Posted by: garrettc at December 08, 2010 04:12 PM (DQjJA)
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Pardon or Perish
Chris Christie should pardon Brian Aitken, an 27-year-old graduate student that is just the latest victim of New Jersey's paranoid, confusing and restrictive gun control laws. But can Christie overcome his all-too-liberal anti-gun leanings?
All part of the discussion in my
latest article at Pajamas Media.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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December 07, 2010
Elizabeth Edwards Has Died
After a prolonged battle with breast cancer, may she find peace and her son waiting for her.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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Always Zero Your Weapon
As
Cubachi notes, liberals are not going to be happy that Sarah Palin shot and killed a caribou during a hunt featured on Sarah Palin's Alaska. I'm not real happy, either.
It appears that the rifle she used had not been sighted in before the hunt, or was banged around enough to come off-zero. In any event, she shot high every time she fired thate weapon. In the end, she put the caribou down with a single shot from another weapon. This suggests the problem is the weapon, not the shooter.
Always be sure of your target, but also always be sure you are using a weapon sighted to hit your target. There may or may not be some political wisdom in that statement as well.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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I am also certain that her father knew what was beyond that ridge, so no sweat there. But, I would never make that shot in unknown territory.
Posted by: paul mitchell at December 07, 2010 02:09 PM (O5Qgl)
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I don't know how they are certain the first tries were too high. They could easily have missed in any direction and not known it. They certainly didn't see any spash. Not knocking on Palin, but it seems the guys with her did a lot of work to make her look good.
Too bad they couldn't bag a Polar Bear. A mom with 2 cubs.
Posted by: Professor Hale at December 07, 2010 02:46 PM (PDTch)
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They INCLUDED the mistakes, and misses, that could SO EASILY have been edited out. But, they left them in.
I cringed when her Dad kept reloading her weapon, but then I thought, he's probably been doing that for her since she was 10. They left IN these parts, the multiple misses, that others might have left out.
I believe that's called "Transparency" by another crowd, but here, it's real.
The libs will try to make hay out of this, but honest people will see what is there to see.
Posted by: Bill Smith at December 07, 2010 03:17 PM (3vYOm)
4
Bill,
All true. I didn't mean "look good for the camera". Just little things like stacking the packs for her, coaching on every shot, and reloading, even taking the safety off for her on the second rifle.
I don't hunt, but I imagine a group of hunters working together have some plan among them for who gets to take the shot and at some point, the next guy in line gets to take over when the primary isn't getting the job done.
When I take my girl out shooting, I don't do anything for her that she is capable of doing herself. I watch her and intervene only when needed. But then she had been telling me to let her do it herself since she was 5.
Posted by: Professor Hale at December 07, 2010 03:50 PM (PDTch)
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Prof. Hale,
I was not responding to your first comment, as I was in a hurry. I should have, though, and I shall now.
Experienced shooters and their companions most certainly CAN tell where a shot went, high, left, etc.
"Not knocking on Palin, but it seems the guys with her did a lot of work to make her look good."
Howzat, Prof? Helping her with a shooting rest -- on camera? Pointing out that what they were doing wasn't working -- on camera? Handing her a rifle that WAS sighted in with which she killed her prey with one clean shot?
But, you unmask yourself, Professor, with this gem:
"Too bad they couldn't bag a Polar Bear. A mom with 2 cubs."
"Not knocking on Palin..." there Professor???
But they didn't, much though it clearly would have pleased YOU. Those thoughts came straight from YOUR mind, YOUR brain, genius.
Posted by: Bill Smith at December 07, 2010 05:03 PM (3vYOm)
6
Bill,
You misunderstand completely.
1. I shoot a lot. Past 100 yards, I can't tell where the bullet went unless it hits something. Even when it hits paper, I need a spotting scope to see where it hits. Based on the serious money spent by other serious shooters on spotting scopes, I am guessing they have the same trouble.
2. I have 20/15 vision.
3. While Sarah Palin is not my favorite politician, I do rate her higher than many of her opponents. I don't think she is qualified to be the next president, but then the current office holder has proven that qualifications or experience are not important. What I don'thave is a knee-jerk support for her or any other politician. As a group, I find them all to one degree or another, self-serving opportunists.
4. I really do wish she shot a Polar Bear. I hate those things. They are Death in a fur coat. But I really want to kill them because it makes environmentalists blow a fuse. I hate them even more. I wasn't being sarcastic.
5. Like I said, I don't hunt so perhaps all that pillow fluffing is normal. It just seemed like too much hand-holding to me. Just my opinion. Not enough to influence my vote in 2012 and I won't be telling all my friends, "don't vote for Palin, it took her 5 shots to take down a Caribou".
6. At least she knows which end to point at the freezer filling. Other politicians at NRA events have looked a lot worse. ( I think I remember pictures of Gore at some event holding a borrowed shotgun for the photo-op).
7. People miss some times. It's not the end of the world. I agree with CY's assessment that the scope was not in proper alignment. I know my guns. I shoot with them often. So I know where each one is zeroed and I know the bullet drop at different ranges. I know that the zero is for a specific weight of bullet/powder combination. I know how to compensate for that using my scope. So I find it odd (but not impossible) that she got a first-round hit using someone else's rifle after missing four times with her own. I will allow that her modern schedule doesn't leave her much time for getting to the range.
Posted by: Professor Hale at December 07, 2010 05:34 PM (PDTch)
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OK, Professor,
I doubt the first gun was hers since she asks if it kicks, but let's agree to disagree.
I stand by my other statements.
Posted by: Bill Smith at December 07, 2010 08:19 PM (/KX39)
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I have to assume that the gun had been sighted in before the hunt. I just think that a man like her Dad would be fairly sure of his weapon. That noted, "Dad" did take a pretty hard, face foward fall into rocky ground while carrying the gun. I would have checked the gun after that fall. And on a side note: "Becker", very capable fellow, could he be the bodyguard?
Posted by: Greybeard at December 07, 2010 10:51 PM (/LwfF)
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So she took 4 shots trying to re-zero the weapon after it got banged around, figured out it was a waste of time, switched to another weapon, kill the target with the first hit, and you criticise her for that?
And that's without knowledge of what was cut out... Things like fiddling with the scope in between shots maybe.
Having someone else load your weapon used to be common practice, and maybe still is, elsewhere.
While maybe not in America, in Europe in hunts it was normal for a servant to handle the weapons, hand them to the hunter to take the shot loaded and ready for use, then take it back for reloading afterwards.
I've never hunted myself, but family who've been on hunting trips even recently but have no license to use firearms were drafted for similar duties, carrying tools and shot game (by law they can't even carry an unloaded gun or ammo).
Wouldn't surprise me if larger hunting parties in the US have a similar setup.
Posted by: JTW at December 08, 2010 04:29 AM (jMRqb)
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please.....
Dad rolled down the hill in the scene previous to the multiple shots on the caribou. of course that knocked the sight off.
when she was missing the 11B in me couldn't believe they hadn't checked the zero, but as the post hunt scene in the river bed showed, the zero was off.
Duh.
my "wtf" moment was when Dad said they weren't going to gut the animal, but when they walked off, the carcass was a skeleton, and they were processing the heart, etc, back at the ranch....
is there a shortage of continuity people in Alaska, or are the "industry" people who are shooting this going out of their way to leave flaws for their fellow leftards to snark at?
regardless, i still love Sarah, if for no other reason than she makes the moonbats crazy.
Go Sarah, Go!
Posted by: redc1c4 at December 08, 2010 06:48 AM (d1FhN)
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I think it is great that they left all the shots un-edited, that is how a hunt often goes with more experienced hunters helping out a less experienced hunter. She never pretends to be the greatest mountain climber, fisherman or hunter, but she goes out and does it. Thats wonderful. The fact that that she took another rifle, and got the kill first try, shows she can shoot. The bullets dropping over the bluff gives me the willies....but I am sure the camara crew had staked out the backdrop.
Posted by: Tyler Haines at December 10, 2010 12:37 AM (ztbqk)
Posted by: ag tomboy jeans at December 11, 2010 02:10 PM (7fapR)
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Bloody-Minded Tyrants Are Never Subtle
Battleship Row, Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941
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December 06, 2010
Oh Noes! Lefty Professor Calls for Obama to be Primaried
I guess he's a um, racist?
t is not easy to consider challenging the first African-American to be elected as President of the United States. But, regrettably, I believe that the time has come to do this.
It is time for Progressives to stop "whining" and arguing among themselves about whether President Obama will or will not do this or that. Obama is no different than any other President, nominated by his national party. He was elected with the hard work and 24/7 commitment of persons who believed and enlisted in his campaign for "Hope" and "Change."
You don't have to be a rocket scientist nor have a PhD in political science and sociology to see clearly that Obama has abandoned much of the base that elected him. He has done this because he no longer respects, fears or believes those persons who elected him have any alternative, but to accept what he does, whether they like it or not.
I'd point out that if Jones and his fellows had looked beyond Obama's half-black heritage to his utter lack of executive leadership or substance then they wouldn't be in his predicament, but that is perhaps a bit more reality than the "reality-based community" can handle.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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Wow! This is such an unexpected occurrence that it had to be posted twice!!!
Posted by: TimothyJ at December 06, 2010 04:45 PM (G5+tV)
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Dare I say that your average lefty can't handle the truth? If you're into schadenfreude go over and look at the "Hillary" Democrat blogs going hammer and tongs with the extreme lefties who are suffering wheelbarrow loads full of buyer's remorse.
Three sacks of popcorn and a sixpack of Miller Genuine Draft should suffice--you'll have had your fun watching.
Posted by: Comanche Voter at December 06, 2010 09:53 PM (3ESDJ)
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What you are seeing unfold is pure unadulterated ego and the acute narcissist syndrome. Obama was incompetent and he is proving it
Posted by: Mitch Rapp at December 06, 2010 10:21 PM (1JdO7)
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That's one of the things that really pisses me about these people: constantly accusing other people of racism while they can't get PAST being racist.
Of course, their racism is in a good cause...
Posted by: Firehand at December 08, 2010 12:08 PM (XnwMK)
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Ultimate Training Munitions
I had some private trigger-time with some of the cutting-edge training munitions just being deployed to the U.S. Army for close-quarters battle training.
Check it out at
Bob's Gun Counter.
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December 05, 2010
Off To War
What to make of President Obama’s recent “surprise” trip to Afghanistan to visit the troops? Certainly, having the Commander in Chief actually making contact with the troops is, generally speaking, a good thing. However, it is certainly fair, considering how little actual contact Mr. Obama has had with our soldiers, particularly those serving in combat zones, to wonder about his motives.
Recent news reports of Mr. and Mrs. Bush welcoming troops home at DFW Airport likely were not happy making for the Obama Administration. That Mr. Bush did not publicize those visits in advance, as he virtually always kept private his many contacts with the troops and their families during his years in office, speaks well of him, just as thinking or speaking well of George W. Bush has been quite impossible for Mr. Obama or his minions. And Mr. Bush’s recent media appearances in support of his best selling memoir, combined with persistent reports of his rapid and unexpected personal rehabilitation, are unlikely to have set well with the Obama White House.
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I thought that Mr. Obama was unconvincing in his very short visit to the troops. In the first place, he needs better handlers and better costumers for such photo-op visits. Real military aviators have their leather bomber jackets and they wear them often enough that they are well broken in -- a bit scuffed and abraded by contact with other protective gear. Obama's jacket was brand shiny new and looked as if it had never been worn before. As you say, CY, George W. Bush's jacket and other gear, which he wore on board the Navy ship, looked somewhat worn because he had worn them during his aviator days. We currently have a Governor of Texas, Rick Perry, who is also a former military aviator, and he looks pretty convincing in his leather bomber jacket too.
When you get right down to it, Mr. O is once again claiming to be something he isn't. You can't fake reality for long.
Marianne Matthews
Posted by: Marianne Matthews at December 05, 2010 10:58 PM (Aaj8s)
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Let's be honest enough to admit that, although he trained as a combat pilot here in the US, George W. Bush did not serve a combat tour in Vietnam, and that John Kerry, as a Navy officer, did serve a combat tour in Vietnam. It was Kerry's actions after he returned from Vietnam and began an association with Vietnam Veterans Against the War that caused him to lose respect with many veterans. Other than that I have no argument with your commentary.
Posted by: Robert at December 06, 2010 01:55 AM (SF33D)
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I think your description of the troops in the photos and video of the event as "professionally impassive" is spot on. They were there, whether they liked it or not, because they are professionals. When PrezBO attempted to make a joke about having to remain impartial for the Army Navy game, I think you could hear crickets chirping as I don't think a single soldier so much as snickered at the his attempt at humor.
Posted by: K. Erickson at December 06, 2010 10:48 AM (A4MmW)
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Robert, let's be honest enough to admit that John Kerry's "combat tour" in Viet Nam was severely abbreviated. He got his three Purple Hearts (and there's a real question whether a rose thorn size scratch in your arm, and a couple of grains of rice blown in yer ass after dumping a concussion grenade into a rice container qualify for Purple Hearts should count for two of his "three" Purple Hearts"). He was in country and gone within 30 days. Contrast that with a friend of mine, a First Lieutenant in the 101st Airborne who was "in country" for just 28 days. Gene got 3 Air Medals, a Bronze Star, and a Silver Star--and three NVA .51 calibre machine gun bullets in his face and chest--when he was leading an assault on a machine gun nest.
Jean Fraud Kerry's "tour of duty" in Viet Nam? Doesn't impress me much. Gene was a hard charger and paid the price. Kerry was only charging for the exit and a political career.
Posted by: Comanche Voter at December 06, 2010 10:02 PM (3ESDJ)
5
Dear Robert:
Thanks for your comments. Please allow me to add just a bit of clarification that many people, due the lamestream media's refusal to cover, may not know.
George W. Bush was rated in the upper 5-10% of F-102 pilots in the Guard (the F-102 was a very difficult and dangerous aircraft to fly, and particularly to land, requiring a great deal of skill), and he did, in fact, volunteer for Vietnam service. However, the war was winding down, his aircraft was not a type in use in the combat zone, and compared to other officers requesting combat assignments, his flight hours were lower. As he was going to leave the Guard when his hitch was up, he did not have sufficient time to take the training necessary to transition to a more modern aircraft. So you are correct in stating that he did not see combat in Vietnam, but as you say, to be fair, let's let folks know he tried.
Senator Kerry's dishonorable service has been more than adequately covered elsewhere, as has his arguably treasonous behavior after leaving Vietnam.
Posted by: mikemc at December 07, 2010 12:48 AM (p5kd7)
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WikiLeaks is Now A Terrorist Organization
I've been critical of WikiLeaks in the past for several reasons, from the fact that they are pursuing a clear political agenda designed to harm the United States to the highly inflammatory language and distorted context of some of the illicitly garnered information under their control.
I've also been quite clear that I consider Bradley Manning one of worse traitor's in American history (easily the worst in terms of volume) who deserves nothing less than the death penalty for passing along classified information during wartime.
I've been a bit more forgiving of Julian Assange, the glory-hounding promoter and leader of Wikileaks, and of Americans invovled with Wikileaks, but now that I've read of their "
Doomsday device" containing unredacted information that assuredly will put lives in danger, I view the group—and individuals in possession of the file who intend to release it—as nothing more or less than information terrorists, and urge that our military, intelligence, and law enforcement assets treat them as such.
At over 1.4GB of information, the NSA and other federal agencies should have no problem identifying and tracking who has downloaded the file, the release of which constitutes a clear and present danger to the United States. All overt official and covert extrajudicial remedies should be authorized by the President to reacquire control over this information.
This is classified information that enemies of our nation are threatening to use against us during wartime, risking the lives of our soldiers and operatives worldwide. They should be hunted with the same vigor as al Qaeda, and offered the same mercies if they resist.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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maybe if you spend the time to actually read some of the information that is becoming available due to the 'terrorist organization' Wikileaks, you will see that the great America has a lot to answer for.
Posted by: jihadman at December 05, 2010 01:13 PM (/rpLZ)
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I am with you CY. This is just the information campaign of America's enemies.
What we have to answer for is why we haven't carpet nuked the whole Islamic world yet. Our enemies depend on us to behave civilized despite the fact that they do not.
Posted by: Professor Hale at December 05, 2010 01:43 PM (FJTpO)
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No, he's not a terrorist. He's something even worse: a common criminal who disguises himself as a terrorist, because he thinks that 'terrorist' is more attractive to the masses than 'two-bit blackmailer.'
Posted by: wolfwalker at December 05, 2010 01:55 PM (v2V5O)
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The one commodity missing from all the WikiLeaks documents .. anything resembling "Smart Diplomacy"
Posted by: Neo at December 05, 2010 04:41 PM (tE8FB)
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IN MY OPINION: wIKILEAKS IS NO DIFFERENT THAN THE ABU GARAB LEAKS. THE DIFFERENCE IS WHO IS POTUS. THEY SHOULD BE RELEASED TO HELP STOP ABOVE THE LAW CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR OF OUR GOVERNMENT.
Posted by: lazrtex at December 05, 2010 10:39 PM (WvqFW)
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Posted by jihadman at December 5, 2010 01:13 PM
Like that Hellfire missile coming your way, jihadboy? Naw, we aren't sorry at all about that.
Posted by: iconoclast at December 06, 2010 07:30 PM (Srqoz)
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Having "read of" the Doomsday device and having actually read it are two different things. You don't know that the information will actually put lives in danger.
From what has been released so far, it appears that Assange's primary crime has been simply embarrassing government officials. He has exposed what we are saying about them all the time - that they are two-faced, untrustworthy, and double-dealing.
As for Manning passing on classified information during wartime, when did Congress declare war and against what nation?
Posted by: Sol at December 08, 2010 09:36 AM (mZdjq)
Posted by: house of harlow 1960 at December 09, 2010 06:23 AM (JmRE7)
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"As for Manning passing on classified information during wartime, when did Congress declare war and against what nation? "
Authorizations for the Use of Military Force -- one for Afghanistan/worldwide against terrorist organizations and supporters, another specifically for Iraq.
Posted by: Rob Crawford at December 10, 2010 12:18 PM (IuKAf)
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Rob,
It would be interesting to see if the Government could make a death penalty stick under an AUMF. They have tried to push the limits of AUMF here and there with varying success. Given that the AUMF Against Terrorists is likely to remain in place for the foreseeable future, I'm guessing there will be lots more opportunities to test it further.
My point is that without an actual declaration of war, the punishment available against Manning may not be so clear cut. I would add that it is probably best kept that way, as I would be uncomfortable with AUMFs mutating their way into the legal system like a retrovirus.
Posted by: Sol at December 11, 2010 10:28 AM (hIMV3)
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December 04, 2010
TUF 12 Finale Tonight
The Ultimate Fighter: Team GSP versus Team Koscheck is tonight on Spike TV.
Those of you into MMA
mma betting have already probably made your calls for tonight. While I've watched season 12—well, I've DVR'd it and fast-forwarded through the
Real World crap in the house to get to the actual bouts—I don't have that good of a handle on the undercard fights as I have on past episodes, and won't hazard a guess on who will beat who among this season's TUF fighters. I will take a stab at the main event, though.
Jonathan Brookins and Michael Johnson of Team GSP made it to the finals, and on paper seem to present the opportunity for a good fight. I'd be surprised with a first round knockout or submission with these two fighters, and predict this fight goes to the third round, and maybe even to the judges. While I admire Johnson's heart, I think Brookins is the more tactical fighter and will be able to stick to his game plan better, particuarly if they keep it on their feet. Brookins wins by ground and pound stoppage in the third or in a unanimous decision.
Stephan Bonnar, one-half of the TUF 1 finale (along with Forrest Griffin) that put on arguably the best fight in UFC history at any weight class, is stepping in the ring against Igor Pokrajac. is a Croatian and a training partner of Mirko Mirko Filipović (AKA Cro Cop). Pokrajac is 1-2 in the UFC, while Bonnar has won just one of his past four fights. He once tested positive for horse steroids after a fight, and if he loses again to drop his record to 6-7 in the UFC, he may be sent to the glue factory. I think both fighters understand that a loss may be the end of their appearances in UFC events, but think Bonnar is the better fighter, and will pull out a submission in round 2.
Kendall Grove is an imposing 6'6" at 185, but is spotty. If he shows up wit his "A" game this could be a good fight. If he doesn't, this one will be over quickly, with BJJ expert Demian Maia tying him into a knot to climb back up the middleweight ladder towards another title shot. Maia in round one by triangle choke.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
09:46 PM
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No Friends of Reality
Progressives like to think of themselves as belonging to a "reality-based community"... and I concur. Anything "-based" is inherently less than or not the object they aspire to mimic. That precisely describes the problem with Senate Democrats today, as they try to ram through a doomed vote on the Obama tax increases:
Seeking to paint Republicans as guardians of the rich, Senate Democrats are forcing a vote Saturday on extending the Bush tax cuts to only the middle class – a defeat that is inevitable as negotiations between the White House and Republicans for a compromise continues.
But Democrats, already eyeing the 2012 elections, want to use this showdown to weaken a resurgent GOP.
"All those people out there in the Tea Party that are angry about the economics of Washington, they really need to look at this," Sen. Claire McCaskill., D-Mo., said Friday as Democrats took turns pummeling Republicans.
"They need to pull back the curtain and realize that you've got a Republican Party that's not worried about the people in the Tea Party," said McCaskill, who will be on the ballot next year. "They're worried about people that can't decide which home to go to over the Christmas holidays."
It is the height of hilarity that McCaskill and her fellow Democratic senators think that this vote actually
helps their image with the Tea Party-affiliated voters that drove so many of their allies out of office just over a month ago. It is cognitive dissonance on a massive scale.
These Democratic Senators—and progressives in general—are under the illusion that by pushing for only the middle class to avoid the Obama tax increases, that they will find sympathy from the American people.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
If the Tea Party has done one thing extremely well, it is to espouse the values of fiscal conservatism, and highlighting the importance of the health of the small business sector. While corporations employ millions of Americans and have the lobbying dollars politicians crave, it is small businessmen that employ the majority of Americans. The Tea Party and other fiscal conservatives have done an excellent job of explaining to the American people that when small businessmen aren't hiring, it severely affects the economy and jobless rates.
As a result, the American people are not long susceptible to the worn liberal lie that the Obama tax increases are a sop to "the rich." Americans know that the people that will be hurt the most are the small businessmen who can hire them and drag this economy out of a recession, if politicians will just get out of the way.
Claire McCaskill and liberals like her simply lack the cognitive processing ability to think that way. They are fundamentally unable to understand the simple truth that an ever-expanding government is an impediment to growth and prosperity, or that lower taxes means that employers are able to hire more workers.
On one level I feel sorry for the birth defect of liberalism that prevents them from understanding such simple economic realities. On the other, however, I can feel not pity for a group of would-be elites that has watched big government socialism collapsing economies worldwide, and somehow is delusional enough to think that the solution is
more of it.
And so the Democrats persist in a bit of Saturday theater that will make the the public revile them all the more, unable to understand the people that the simply no longer represent in any meaningful way.
They'll have their vote. They'll be defeated. And they'll be utterly unable to understand the contempt with which they will be held for the useless spectacle they've engineered.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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The Democratic Party is completely out of touch. Apparently they didn't learn a thing from the midterms.
Posted by: Tim at December 04, 2010 01:23 PM (s0R0P)
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I have but one bone to pick with this article. It repeatedly suggests that lib-pleasing politicians "lack the cognitive processing ability" or are "unable to understand" the falsity of the lies they peddle. While libs are always happy to fool themselves on such issues, I see no reason to accord Democrat politicians the benefit of a doubt as to their willingness to simply lie. They lie to help keep their dupes voting for them. Maybe some of them buy into the lie, and hence are not quite intentional liars themselves. But there is a very faint line between reckless disregard for the truth and peddling the Dem party line. If they were honest, they would not ascribe ill motive to the other party without much better evidence. Let's face facts here: Democrats lie, incessantly, and do not deserve the assumption that their falsehoods are the result of ignorance.
Posted by: Yarrl Dleifsarb at December 04, 2010 04:55 PM (qYH4w)
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Keeping the Bush tax cuts for the richest 2% is just about the dumbest thing you could do to jump-start this economy. The point is you need to create demand. Extending the tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires won't do much to create demand as they are more likely to save it then spend it, and hoping they'll hire more workers is doomed to fail if the demand simply isn't there! A better way is to extend unemployment benefits, for instance, as that money will get quickly recirculated back into the economy. Unfortunately Republicans, stupidly, are dead set against the idea.
The CBO released a report a couple weeks ago looking at the probable effects of a number of fiscal policy options. They found that extending unemployment benefits did the most for alleviating high unemployment, while cutting taxes had THE LEAST helpful effect. But then again, what do those trained economists at CBO know anyway?
Posted by: DanM at December 05, 2010 03:35 AM (cUbgH)
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I suspect that those trained economists at the CBO(you know the kind of folks working for that government that got us here in the first place) would say the moon was made of green cheese if that's what they were told to say by those who cut their paychecks - at least until January.
Posted by: emdfl at December 05, 2010 09:29 AM (20OL9)
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Extend unemployment benefits? The dole is the worst thing for the economy, they should be shortened for the unemployed and the additional money should be used to supplement those with jobs who can't afford a minimum standard of living.
And by January the CBO will be recommending that increasing military spending and lowering taxes will reduce the deficit, because they kowtow to the party in charge
Posted by: MAModerate at December 05, 2010 11:28 AM (+Bo/5)
Posted by: lna leggings at December 09, 2010 06:26 AM (JmRE7)
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December 03, 2010
Necessary Needs
I don't think any of us here can say we've never bought anything "used". I'm sure, as well, most of us have done so at least once with regret.
My first used vehicle as an adult, was a used truck. I already had a small car bought new, but I wanted something to head up in the hills for camping. I didn't want new and pretty, I wanted broken in and cheap. There was an ad in the California newspaper for a Toyota Truck, 120,000 miles but in good shape, for $3500. There was ust a name and a phone number. I was hesitant to go alone. having a mental picture of some truck seller sitting in the shop at his house wearing garments made out of the skin of the last 3 people that answered his ad.
So I took my partner at work. He's tall, he's imposing looking. Firearm or not, he'd keep me from being made into a vest,
When we showed up, the truck was in the driveway. Clean as a whistle, camping shell COVERED in Grateful Dead stickers. The seller was a "deadhead".
I could almost picture how this was going to go. . .
Posted by: Brigid at
08:19 PM
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Very, very nice Brigid.
Posted by: Tim at December 03, 2010 10:28 PM (s0R0P)
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Nice way to start a weekend.
Posted by: lazrtex at December 04, 2010 03:23 AM (WvqFW)
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Thanks Doc.
I am that old man with the coach gun. Wanna hear the story?
Posted by: Skip at December 04, 2010 05:51 AM (9lC6X)
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Great story, turn more of this into a book and I will read it!
Posted by: LCR Blogger at December 04, 2010 07:51 PM (zn6L4)
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I have an old Colt Trooper from the mid 60's in the safe. It's got holster wear and a sense of use about it and just feels good in the hand.
I like the way you write.
Posted by: maxx at December 05, 2010 11:35 AM (bFNvP)
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I like stories like yours. I find myself departing from the story at times reflecting on memories of days gone. Stories like yours are good for bringing out those memories which are not lost, just filed away.
Thanks
Charles
Posted by: capt26thga at December 05, 2010 06:08 PM (iCD+m)
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Thank you gentlemen. I hope to have a few more up here. My Dad passed down his stories and I hope to do the same for my daughter and my frirends.
Posted by: Brigid at December 05, 2010 09:36 PM (yKDjw)
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Seeing the Emperor
After the Democratic "shellacking" in the midterm elections, everyone wondered how President Obama would respond. Would he show what he was made of? Would he stand firm for the values he believes in, even in the face of political adversity?
Of
course President Obama has shown us what he's made of! He's been showing us "what he's made of" since that first terrifying second that he realized that he'd actually become President.
Barack Obama's entire life history is a story of running from one job to another, finding it miraculously easy to succeed—or at least dash away from his failures—all the way into the White House. Now, there is nowhere to run, and he can no longer fake substance anymore.
Do not pity him, or those who support him.
Liberals such as Paul Krugman, who put down his glass of arsenic long enough to cobble together the
tortured prose above, elected to vote for vague promises of "change" over a semblance of competence twice, in the primaries, and then in the general election. Now he and his fellow cultists have the audacity to feign shock when a man most famous for having accomplished nothing of note in his entire life, continues that tradition in office.
Despite blame-casting from the left, conservatives can't destroy Obama, because there is no "Obama" to destroy. In him, Democrats are getting exactly what they elected. There simple is nothing more to the man other than a cheap veneer, falling away under pressure.
You showed us what you were made of, Mr. Krugman, when you championed for President a man without substance. Please pardon me if I have no sympathy for you learning a hard lesson about your own failed leadership as an over-rated pundit.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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Obama is exemplary of the; 'all appearance and no substance', which has been the rage in the US for far too long.
Posted by: ron at December 05, 2010 11:23 AM (OJ8yQ)
Posted by: wholesale burnout tees at December 09, 2010 07:20 AM (JmRE7)
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December 01, 2010
Reporting Failure
The so-called Debt Commission's co-chairmen, Erskine Bowles and former Wyoming Sen. Alan Simpson provided President Obama what he wanted in the form of a do-nothing report that will be pilloried by both sides and allow politics as usual to wreck what is left of our economy. Of course, that is precisely what we should have expected from a blue-ribbon panel of politicians.
What this report shows is that the political class is not yet serious about addressing the federal government's spending addiction. It may suggest that they simply aren't bright enough to understand the depth of the problem, nor amenable to those steps required to put us on a true corrective course.
They cannot bluff their way through this crisis. Sooner, rather than later, it will catch up to them, though I fear we'll be the one's left holding the bag.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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The American people need to grow up and realize there's no such thing as a free lunch.
Far too many of us don't get it.
Posted by: Tim at December 02, 2010 08:45 AM (s0R0P)
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Sadly, you are correct... As usual, politics is being played while the USA is burning...
Posted by: Old NFO at December 02, 2010 06:05 PM (kCq7A)
Posted by: wildfox online at December 09, 2010 07:34 AM (JmRE7)
Posted by: wrap dresses at December 11, 2010 05:13 PM (7fapR)
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Another Clark County Cop Kills and Walks
This time, a man a month into a trial separation from his wife goes to their home at 1:15 AM apparently attempting to catch her in the act of cheating. He succeeds, and gets four bullets for his trouble. The shooter—a Henderson Police officer—walks away without so much as a corner's inquest, and his department declared the shooting justifiable self defense.
Check out my latest disturbing look into questionable law enforcement oversight in my
latest post at Pajamas Media.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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Obviously you consider him guilty because he was committing fornication and she was committing adultry. But neither are crimes in the State of Nevada. But stepping out with someone's wife is no justification for assault but clearly the officer was acting in self-defense, unless you support the private application of the death penalty for personal wrongs.
Posted by: Federale at December 05, 2010 04:02 PM (7xqyd)
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Well Federale, how feminist of you.
1) This trial separation, was ... probably her idea? Just a guess. And the man's home, it was still his home ... no? .... I'm just wondering if a man had summarily asked a woman to leave, and then she returned and had a NORMAL reaction to seeing her marriage bed being defiled - if the women being shot to death would be so summarily excused.
2) My problem is that while it's nice, cut, and dried to monday morning quarterback - a person walking in to seeing their WIFE (and she still was) having sex with another person is not to take notes, politely inquire, or to call your therapist.
3) Gotta wonder if during this "trial separation" the man was being fed a line of "let's get counseling" and all the while she's laying the groudwork to use the legal system to financially rape the man because "he voluntarily abandoned the home" (but, of course not his financial obligations).
People react to that kind of life altering betrayal and harm badly. While when women do it we excuse it, ignore it, and blame the victim - when a man does it we just bury him and excoriate him.
Lesson in life : You want to be chivalrous? Do it on your time, on your dime, and with your life. Don't stand on other men's necks to make yourself appear taller so you can feel good about yourself and how civilized you are.
Maybe I'm reading into your post too much - but somehow I doubt it.
Posted by: LSBeene at December 07, 2010 02:24 PM (zNgZK)
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LSB:
Are you saying that type of indiscretion sanctions violence, including death? Or, am I reading into your post too much?
Posted by: Buck Turgidson at December 08, 2010 02:09 PM (Fw0L3)
Posted by: church suits at December 09, 2010 08:30 AM (JmRE7)
5
get lauren moshi swing tee
Posted by: get lauren moshi swing tee at December 10, 2010 05:18 PM (7fapR)
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November 30, 2010
"Everybody"
According to Brian Beutler of the aptly-named Talking Points Memo, "everybody" hates President Obama's largely symbolic federal worker's pay freeze.
Ah Bartleby!
Ah humanity!
The early reviews of President Obama's plan to freeze federal worker pay are in -- and it gets a resounding "F" from just about everybody outside of GOP leadership.
Michael Linden, a budget expert at the liberal Center for American Progress, said the plan is small potatoes that risks driving away valuable civil servants with little budgetary upside.
It is important to understand what Beutler and his kindred view as everybody. One cannot know precisely what he means (I doubt he does, either), but suspect "everybody" probably includes the following:
- federal government workers and their unions
- state government workers and their unions
- municipal government workers and their unions
- left-leaning pundits, bloggers, and journalists
- left leaning think tanks
- leftist academics
- anyone so designated/appointed by George Soros
The "freeze" does not affect the pay of the nation's military servicemen. It does not prevent federal government employees from getting a raise by moving to the next pay grade. It
does not touch bonuses awarded to federal employees.
It does nothing to curtail the government that Demcrats have created, which is the largest and
most bloated government in American history, with the highest number of employees making more than $150,000/year in American history.
"Everybody" in Beutler's insular little world are his fellow big government extremists that look to personally profit from government bloat.
The radical left wing "everybody" doesn't include the small businessman, workers, managers, specialists, technicians and engineers that power this nation's economy in corporations and shops. It doesn't include doctors, farmers, students, and middle class families that are being crushed by the greed of statists.
The problem with Obama's "freeze" isn't that it is too ambitious, it is that it isn't close to being ambitious enough. We need to reduce the number of people working for the federal government and send them back to the private sector where they can add to the economy.
I read a comment somewhere yesterday (I wish I could remember where) that encapsulated the concept perfectly.
"All non-essential government workers are to stay home from work today... and every day after."
Government should be a service, not an unsustainable liability. It's too bad we can't get "everybody" to agree to that.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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Speaking as an overpaid government employee:
1. No valuable civil servants are going to be driven away by this action. Most civil servants are smart enough to know that their options in the private sector are much more limited.
2. The cost of total government employment will go up by more than enough to offset this "savings" because it does nothing to cap new hiring or force federal agencies to reduce staff.
3. This is just a dog and pony show, with no pony.
4. I asked around and cannot find any civil servents willing to quit over this. Not getting a future raise is not the same thing as getting a pay cut.
So I agree that Obama gets an "F" for this effort, but not because I am in favor of civil servent pay raises.
For what it is worth, my office was told months ago that our bonuses and raises were capped at 1% this year. No one stormed out and quit.
Posted by: Professor Hale at November 30, 2010 01:24 PM (PDTch)
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As a federal employee, I welcome the pay freeze, but think it doesn't go far enough. Bonuses, in-kind promotions and in-grsade step increases are not covered by the freeze, as they should be. Congress and their staff, postal workers, and federal judges and their staff aren't covered by this freeze, and they should be.
Count me as one civil servant who welcomes the pay freeze and wishes it went further to cut costs.
Tarheel Repub Out!
Posted by: Tarheel Repub at November 30, 2010 03:19 PM (+LRPE)
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Also as a fed employee, albeit close to retirement, this is not much of a pill to swallow but it's an empty gesture of and by itself; better were this one element of a more comprehensive plan to cut back government expenditure and reduce staff.
Posted by: zhombre at November 30, 2010 05:40 PM (6zF/z)
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Poor federal employees. We all feel so bad for them. Try being part of the real world where there haven't been any raises for several years. My spouse has been without one for over 5 years now. But, still paying taxes to support bloated government and overpaid bureaucrats....
Posted by: Specter at November 30, 2010 06:22 PM (Od2jU)
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I lold at "valuable civil servants". That's as funny as "upscale barbecue shack".
Posted by: Phelps at November 30, 2010 07:38 PM (QhXW0)
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Another govt employee here. No problem with having the pay raise freeze. For those who say it's mostly symbolic- ok, but it's a start. I agree with the post above that it needs to be part of much larger effort to freeze all programs, and begin reducing and eliminating programs. Again, post above talking about freezing new hires for a while makes sense.
Posted by: styrgwillidar at November 30, 2010 07:54 PM (IrbU4)
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The reason we have so many GS employees is that Clinton cut the military back so far they had to hire civilians to fill billets to keep DOD running. As far as programs, two to start with, DOE, which has NEVER done anything real to reduce our dependency on Oil, but has a budget of $20B a year, and the TVA, which was to electrify the Tennessee Valley (which was completed in the early 1940s)...
Posted by: Old NFO at November 30, 2010 08:10 PM (DB2/U)
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@Old NFO - partially true, sir. But it began in the early '70s when the military budget was cut by converting shore billets to sand crab positions. I could have gotten out in April of 1970 as an E5 and come back to work the next day as a GS-7.
Now, having been retired USN since 1990, I gotta say that, when I saw the headlines about the federal pay freeze, my first reaction was "Great - that's a start, if and only if they include ALL federal workers, from POTUS down to the GS-2 clerk-typist at the local IRS office." Like that's gonna happen anytime soon.
Posted by: MichigammeDave at December 01, 2010 08:45 AM (sZEJN)
9
Like driving cattle away from the feed trough. Aint gonna happen. Crybabies finally get a taste of what civilians go through on a yearly basis and they just cant take it anymore. Right. Grow a pair government pw.
Posted by: lazrtex at December 01, 2010 08:52 AM (WvqFW)
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Old NFO,
The problem is not that one president or another made cuts to the military or shifted the workforce between uniformed to civil service to contractor and back again.
The problem is that despite a 50% cut in forces, there has been a doubling of the staff and the functions they do. No one at the Pentagon will cut his own staff, no matter how many programs or forces get cut. A lot of people idolize the military so they cannot see that DOD and the Services are just as much part of the bloated bureaucracy as the Dept of Education.
Posted by: Professor Hale at December 01, 2010 12:19 PM (PDTch)
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This isn't anywhere near enough of a freeze, it certainly isn't a cut and its all smoke and mirrors misdirection away from the issues around QE2 and the Federal Reserve and the collapse of the dollar value. Promising not to spend money you don't have is not something that should get applause.
Posted by: OHSHAWN at December 01, 2010 04:45 PM (iwCdy)
12
Nobody minds their neighbor's ox getting gored.
Federal employees lose 0.6% of their take-home pay (1.4% minus taxes), not a big deal. Your taxes going up 5 or 10% - well, you just need to "grow a pair" and stop living in your "insular little world."
Obama can lay off government employees, but he won't waive the bureaucracy. Instead, industry will be forced to do the job governmentwas doing with regulatory oversight- for example, food inspection, and you get taxed via higher prices. But anyone who claims is pre-defined as living in an "insular little world".
Anyone who thinks TSA would be better, just because it is run a private non-responsive monopoly instead of the government monopoly is crazy. Do you get great service from your cell phone/internet/insurance/health care company now? Why do you think they will listen to you any more as they take over government jobs?
Posted by: dustydog at December 03, 2010 11:03 AM (j8aSQ)
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Still another Fed bureaucrat here. As a sacrifice, this is negligible. Since it's merely forgoing a planned increase, it may not even qualify, truly, as a sacrifice. As restraints in planned program spending increases aren't "cuts", as Democrats would always have us believe.
The real money and savings would be in reducing staffing, and trimming thte bloated management down. Freezing hiring for a couple years (of course, there would be waivers, and thus abuse) would really let some GS-14 deadwood shuffle off into retirment, and they need not be replaced.
That is a funny concept: valuable civil servants. I work in a too large public affairs blob, so in my environment, there is no such thing at all.
Cordially...
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Who Are You Calling Intellectually Incurious?
Mike's latest article at Pajamas Media. It contains—if not coins the phrase—"Faux-Masculinity Worship" (FMW) and is worthy of a read based upon that alone.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
09:56 AM
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November 29, 2010
Good News! TSA Scanners Damage DNA, Increase Cancer Risk to Everyone, But Will Kill Small Children and TSA Agents First
Via rdbrewer at Ace of Spades, the sort of story to warm your heart and corrupt your chromosomes:
These questions have not been answered to any satisfaction and the UCSF scientists, all esteemed in their fields and members of the National Academy of Sciences have been dismissed based on a couple of reports seemingly hastily put together by mid-level government technicians or engineers. The documents that I have reviewed thus far either have NO AUTHOR CREDITS or are NOT authored by anyone with either a Ph.D. or a M.D., raising serious concerns of the extent of the expertise of the individuals and organizations evaluating these machines with respect to biological safety. Yet, the FDA and TSA continue to dismiss some of the most talented scientists in the country...
With respect to errors in the safety reports and/or misleading information about them, the statement that one scan is equivalent to 2-3 minutes of your flight is VERY misleading. Most cosmic radiation is composed of high energy particles that passes right through our body and the plane itself without being absorbed. The spectrum that is dangerous is known as ionizing radiation and most of that is absorbed by the hull of the airplane. So relating non-absorbing cosmic radiation to tissue absorbing man-made radiation is simply misleading and wrong. Of course these are related and there is over-lap, but we have to compare apples to apples.
Furthermore, when making this comparison, the TSA and FDA are calculating that the dose is absorbed throughout the body. According the simulations performed by NIST, the relative absorption of the radiation is ~20-35-fold higher in the skin, breast, testes and thymus than the brain, or 7-12-fold higher than bone marrow. So a total body dose is misleading, because there is differential absorption in some tissues. Of particular concern is radiation exposure to the testes, which could result in infertility or birth defects, and breasts for women who might carry a BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation. Even more alarming is that because the radiation energy is the same for all adults, children or infants, the relative absorbed dose is twice as high for small children and infants because they have a smaller body mass (both total and tissue specific) to distribute the dose. Alarmingly, the radiation dose to an infant's testes and skeleton is 60-fold higher than the absorbed dose to an adult brain!
Janet Napolitano's new toys (paid for with stimulus dollars, after lobbyists and politicians from both parties came to "agreements") seem to be quite dangerous at worst, and far from competently tested at best. I'd joked on
Twitter about wearing a kilt if forced to fly and opting out, but I was merely making half-assed snark in a toothless protest of the tyrannical intrusion into personal liberties that the TSA represents for virtually no gain in safety from real airborne threats.
I'm now of the mind that until far more information is known about the effects of TSA scanners, that the only logical option for air travelers is to opt-out of these devices. This is even more vital for passengers with children and for those individuals that have a history of cancer in their families.
The scanners are no picnic for the TSA, either; they will absorb the amount of radiation that a human can "safely" absorb in a year in just
20 working days.
The TSA's scanners are a political safety device, not an air safety device. They do not address the most realistic threats to air travel, which are bombs or chemical incendiaries smuggled into cargo or luggage, or the threat of individual bombers hiding explosives in their body cavities. The purpose of the scanners is to make money for lobbyists and the companies they represent and to provide politicians and bureaucrats the political illusion that they are "doing something" to protect air travelers from terrorism. They persist in keeping up this illusion to avoid dealing with the abject fact that profiling, and profiling alone, is the most effective measure to prevent terrorist attacks on airliners.
The Obama Administration, Janet Napolitano, Homeland Security and the TSA are bending over backwards to treat all Americans like potential terrorists in order to avoid the uncomfortable truth that Muslim air travelers are by far the greatest, if not only threat to air security. They are more afraid of the ACLU and CAIR than al Qaeda, Hezbolla, or Hamas... and far more afraid to admit that political correctness is a not just a failure, but a weakness that devours resources in a time of scarcity.
Opt out now. Deal with the TSA's molesters, and pity the fact that their equipment is killing them for simply showing up. Fly no more than you have to.
Finally, throw the bums out in 2012 in favor of candidates from either party that are will to address the real threats we face from Muslim terrorism, and investigate the backroom deals that put these death machines in operation in the first place.
We will not surrender our liberties or our health to political correctness run amok.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
11:20 AM
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1
I agree with everything but the pity. When you go to work knowing that your job is to violate the rights of your fellow citizens all day, then I'm OK with a little rough justice ending you up in the oncology ward.
Posted by: Phelps at November 29, 2010 01:07 PM (QhXW0)
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A young woman should most definitely refuse to go through the scanners. If you are pregnant, then you face a very real possibilty of damage to the fetus. In fact, the chance to injury to an unborn would far exceed the risk of a terrorist incident on even a plane that does not have any security. Opt out. Better yet, take names, they prosecuted the Nazi camp guards and they can do the same for these fools.
Posted by: David at November 29, 2010 01:15 PM (oUoam)
3
David, our Government learned from Nuremburg. They have legal protections for Government Agents who violate the rights of citizens under color of law. The term is "Sovereign Immunity", I believe. It is the reason Lon Horiuchi, the murderer of Vicki Weaver, is a free man.
Posted by: Jeremy at November 29, 2010 01:29 PM (eMy3J)
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All true - about the X-ray scanners. The machines reportedly operate in the 50KV + range and are suitable for full penetration X-rays. The sort you get with a chest X-ray. Operators should wear the full lead radiation suit, and be limited to a very few hours of exposure a month.
But some of the T&A's scanners are "millimeter wave" scanners, operating somewhere in the 300 to 500 teraHertz range. They are not inherently dangerous - even for reasonably long term exposure, but even at that, I do not want some public employee strip searching me. Whether it a real search, or only a simulated search.
Since the T&A's motto should be "billions and billions of searches done and not a terrorist found," the best solution is to defund Homeland Security, and get rid of the security theater.
Stranger
Posted by: Stranger at November 29, 2010 05:24 PM (IJ7W/)
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They do not address the most realistic threats ...
Agree. The most realistic threats are the Airline ground crew employees and TSA employees. They do not get the daily search when they come on duty and can wander freely among the airplanes and other "secured areas" of the airport. The insider threat is always the most likely.
This is not just eyewash. It is graft, corruption, and payoffs to the owners of the companies that make those machines in exchange for their generous campaign donations and support for other worthy causes.
I long for the days when this was JUST incompetence.
Posted by: Professor Hale at November 29, 2010 06:42 PM (FJTpO)
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There are a TON of issues, this will be the straw that breaks the camel's back. They truly do not know how much radiation these are putting out, and 'rumor' has it, they can turn it up if they are not getting a 'good' picture. I've opted out every time so far! I'd rather have some bozo hitting my balls than having them fricasseed due to the amount of flying I do.
Posted by: Old NFO at November 29, 2010 08:57 PM (DB2/U)
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CY ... I agree with everything you say about this TSA debacle. The anecdotal stories on the Internet which are now abounding are quite horrifying. One scientist who went through the naked body scanning machines said that there is no way that the screeners could guarantee the accuracy of the supposed measurements of radiation, depending on variations in the settings of the individual machines. Additionally, if one opts for the pat downs, the screeners, who are not trained medical personnel, often do not change their gloves between pat downs of different passengers, and the next passenger can be exposed to the illnesses and possible infections of the previous passenger if the screener fails to change his/her gloves. So the granny from Iowa, who probably has an impaired immune system, can be exposed to everything from crabs to AIDS to intestinal infections. Talk about Typhoid Marys!
Marianne Matthews
Posted by: Marianne Matthews at November 30, 2010 12:26 AM (Aaj8s)
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Please remember that "Law Enforcement" is readily available at EVERY TSA checkpoint. Each of those officers has sworn an oath to "...preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution..." yet will not bother to defend the citizens against this violation of their 4th Amendment rights. In addition, sexual assault is a crime in EVERY jurisdiction where this is being done, yet NOT ONE of those fine officers will bother to arrest the perpetrators. Because, after all, they are fellow "Only Ones." The stench is overwhelming.
Posted by: Mark Matis at November 30, 2010 08:57 PM (LzG0h)
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Sounds like the same BS the good people of St George, Utah were told by the government 'experts' during the early days of atomic weapons testing in Nevada. Nothing to worry about!!
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"WikiSleeps" Offers Little News in Latest Document Dump
The New York Times and other news outlets have produced articles about the latest document dump from the muckrakers at WikiLeaks.
Rape suspect Julian Assange and his band of thieves have perhaps stirred up a bit of a tempest in a teapot with their latest document dump, but some perspective is in order. Assange did not release these communications with the goal of making the world a better place, revealing injustice, or launching an investigation of the corrupt or tyrannical. The singular goal of this release was to embarrass the government of the United States. Period.
It petty and small ways, they perhaps accomplished their goals. What they did not do was better the world, strike a blow for the oppressed, or do anything else that can be interpreted as noble. It was entirely self-serving. "Hey, look what we can do!" it cries. And yet, despite the volume of information, it is largely much ado about nothing.
The document dump is useful for two groups:
current historians and military prosecutors building an iron-clad case against the politically-progressive traitor that leaked the hundreds of thousands of documents, a disgruntled gay misfit soldier named
Bradley Manning.
Manning should be convicted of treason and deserves nothing more or less than an ignoble execution in a military prison before being forgotten, much like these non-revelations that so many news organizations are headlining on a slow-news Monday.
Posted by: Confederate Yankee at
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1
Maybe for the next document dump they can get hold of Obamas hidden documents and release them to the public.
I'd love to see them.
Posted by: firefirefire at November 29, 2010 10:43 AM (7NgJ5)
2
HA! Good luck on that one 'fire'.
Posted by: Buck Turgidson at November 29, 2010 05:10 PM (Fw0L3)
3
Probably why they are in such a panic to stop the leaks, not for national security reasons. Where was all the panic when Abu Garab photos were leaked?
Posted by: lazrtex at December 01, 2010 09:00 AM (WvqFW)
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