Thursday, November 25, 2010

The 57 States Gaffe

Like Sarah Palin, I draw some amusement at presidential candidate Barack Obama's famous mis-state-ment, thinking he had been insufficiently immersed in American civics as a child raised in Indonesia or wherever. When forced to think in a an unteleprompted environment, his unfamiliarity shone through, I thought. OK, on some level I still think that.



But then Brittany Cohan suggested that Obama was only joking about how long the 2008 campaign had been. Her evidence was that he "chuckles after he says it".



Having looked at the video again, I realized we were both wrong: Obama wasn't being stupid, but phony.







Here is the transcript, with vocal ticks included:

... uh, because, you know, i-i-it is just wonderful to be back in Oregon, and over the last 15 months we've traveled ... uh to every corner of the United States. Uh, I've now been in fifty ... ss-seven? states. I think one left to go. Uh, one left to go -- eh, Alaska and Hawaii I was not allowed to go to, even though I really wanted to visit but my staff would not, uh, justify it.




  • Obama says "fifty ... ss-seven states".


  • "One left to go"


  • "Alaska and Hawaii I was not allowed to go to"


  • After the crowd laughs, he smirks




Obama doesn't chuckle at all, but rather grins a bit. And as importantly, the little smirk is not from laughing at his own joke, but in response to the crowd.



The smirk is the typical Obama recovery, pretending that he is in on some joke that he is not. The technique is similar to the way Obama convinces people he's more intelligent than he is, by simply nodding along and saying they have a good point.



Obama simply misspoke. He meant to say he'd been in 47 states, with one left to go to visit all lower 48. Yet he was too arrogant to think the crowd was laughing at him. So he pretended to be in on the joke.  As usual when a person does that, they wind up looking like a worse fool than if they'd just asked what the joke was in the first place.


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Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Airline Expert: Body scanners ineffective waste of money | The Minority Report #tmr #tsa

I agree with Robert Crandall, former CEO of American Airlines and industry expert, that the scanner machines are a waste of money at any price, especially the bundle they cost.



But I disagree on the threat of a bomber attacking lines at the airport. If I thought a bomber were a threat, I'd think the scanners and pat-downs were worth it. But I dont believe that.



And the terrorists ought to be able to figure out by now where we keep our crowds. They're at sporting events and rallies protesting the Obama administration's antiterrorism procedures.

The TSA Imbroglio- Timely Advice From An Airline Legend

Robert Crandall, the former CEO of American Airlines, is an aviation legend. He piloted American through the turbulent days of deregulation. His emphasis on cutting costs, expanding capacity to lower average costs, and establishing the hub-and-spoke system made American prosper in an environment that put other equally established airlines into bankruptcy court.

Q. What do you think of the new full-body, advanced imaging technology scanners and/or more thorough body pat-downs of air travelers who opt out of the scans?


A. I think they are economically foolish. Full body scan machines are very expensive. And the fact of the matter is that they are not very useful from the security point of view, either. We are devoting very large resources of money and people to passengers who obviously represent no threat — children, grandmothers, long-established travelers…

We need to spend a lot more time trying to identify those who have some relatively high probability of being a threat and use our secondary resources — our full-body scanners and/or pat-downs — on those who might represent a threat

Read more at www.theminorityreportblog.com
 


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Monday, November 22, 2010

TSA self-pleaser story is a hoax. My bad. But the real story is it's believable. #teaparty #tcot #tsa

[UPDATE: Hoax There is no mention of Rodney Schroeder on cnn.com.]



The False Dilemma presented by foul-mouthed TSA scanning department head Rodney Schroeder should outrage all Americans.



The White House, Department of Homeland Security, and Transportation Safety Administration are all using the fear of terrorism to extend their control over Americans. The false choice between getting blown up and being alternatively ogled or fondled by some low-level TSA stooge screams out the answer to its own question.



Because while the Administration contemplates giving a pass to those

Amplify’d from www.wral.com
“What do you want to do, get blown up by a goddamn Arab at 30,000 feet or we get to see your private parts? It’s up to you, the ball’s in your park,” head of the TSA’s scanning department, Rodney Schroeder, told CNN.

“The young ladies were going through the scanner one by one, and every time one went through, this guys face was getting redder and redder. His hand was moving and then he started sweating. He was then seen doing his ‘O’ face. That’s when the security dragged him out of his booth and cuffed him. He had his pants round his ankles and everybody was really disgusted,” Jeb Rather, a passenger on a flight to New York told CBS news.

The controversial scanners display every minute detail of a person’s body and have been called intrusive by privacy campaigners. Body scanners penetrate clothing to provide a highly detailed image so accurate that critics have likened it to a virtual porn shoot. Technologies vary, with millimeter wave systems capturing highly detailed pictures of genitals, and backscatter X-ray machines able to show precise anatomical detail. The U.S. government likes the idea because body scanners can detect concealed weapons better than traditional magnetometers.

Read more at www.wral.com
 


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No, we want you to put your pants back on and interview the "goddamn Arabs". #teaparty #tcot #tsa

The False Dilemma presented by foul-mouthed TSA scanning department head Rodney Schroeder should outrage all Americans.



The White House, Department of Homeland Security, and Transportation Safety Administration are all using the fear of terrorism to extend their control over Americans. The false choice between getting blown up and being alternatively ogled or fondled by some low-level TSA stooge screams out the answer to its own question.



Because while the Administration contemplates giving a pass to those "goddamn Arabs" to let them bypass security completely, we have TSA scanner operators literally masturbating at work.



Which is more unjust, to scan and/or grope the "goddamn Arabs", even though not all "goddamn Arabs" are out to blow up a plane, or to scan and/or grope everyone except Arabs, goddamned or otherwise?



It's people, not devices, who blow up planes. You're looking for devices, when you should be looking for terrorists.

Amplify’d from www.wral.com
“What do you want to do, get blown up by a goddamn Arab at 30,000 feet or we get to see your private parts? It’s up to you, the ball’s in your park,” head of the TSA’s scanning department, Rodney Schroeder, told CNN.

“The young ladies were going through the scanner one by one, and every time one went through, this guys face was getting redder and redder. His hand was moving and then he started sweating. He was then seen doing his ‘O’ face. That’s when the security dragged him out of his booth and cuffed him. He had his pants round his ankles and everybody was really disgusted,” Jeb Rather, a passenger on a flight to New York told CBS news.

The controversial scanners display every minute detail of a person’s body and have been called intrusive by privacy campaigners. Body scanners penetrate clothing to provide a highly detailed image so accurate that critics have likened it to a virtual porn shoot. Technologies vary, with millimeter wave systems capturing highly detailed pictures of genitals, and backscatter X-ray machines able to show precise anatomical detail. The U.S. government likes the idea because body scanners can detect concealed weapons better than traditional magnetometers.

Read more at www.wral.com
 


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Friday, November 19, 2010

What was the question? #tcot #teaparty

Via Cato:



It seems a student of now-defunct economist Maynard Keynes fell asleep in class.  Keynes was upset by this, and shouted to wake the student.



"So, Mr Cluggman, what have you to say for yourself?  Do you know what I just asked the class?"



"Wel, sir," the somnolent student replied, "I don't know precisely what the question was, but I'm sure the answer was 'More stimulus''".



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The Millions Bring the Thousands Bring the Trillions | RedState #tcot #teaparty



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Tuesday, November 16, 2010

President Obama Finally Gets His National Service Plan @knifework

President Obama is fond of the idea of compulsory national service, and the TSA crisis is too good to waste.



Remember, if you like your TSA screening job, you can keep it.

Amplify’d from knifework.net

Obama Administration Announces National Service Guidelines

In response to public interest in the TSA’s latest screening procedures, the Obama Administration has announced that henceforth all adults aged 3 to 31 will spend a year in a new National Service Corps. The announcement came at a joint press conference which featured an “all hands on deck” segment led by  President Barack Obama  and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano.

“Under my plan,” said the President, “young adults would be free to shop the National Service Exchanges. They could decide on their own,” the President continued, “between a year of intense Sex Education and  a year with the TSA.”

“We want to offer a choice,” stressed Napolitano.
“The Sex Education classes have long been one of the many service measures,” said Napolitano, “used by the U.S. and countries across the world to make government officials as well served as possible. They’re conducted by same-gender teachers, and all students have the right to request private sessions and have a student companion present during the sessions.”Read more at knifework.net
 


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Monday, November 15, 2010

Three Things Wrong With The TSA | Redstate #tcot #tsa

See more at Redstate.

Amplify’d from www.redstate.com



What’s Wrong With The TSA?

The Transportation Safety Administration has three main areas of failure, of which employees fondling women and children is just the most obvious sign.

  • Adding security controls in reaction to incidents
  • Failing to use common sense
Read more at www.redstate.com
 


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Harley-Davidson Puts Wisconsin Some Learning, Turns Down the Money #teaparty #tcot #tlot

We've been saying it for years: the government should not be picking winners and losers with the tax code.



And now Harley realizes that the strings the government attaches to its tax credits are not worth the money.



Good for them. If I had the money to spare, I'd buy their stock.

Amplify’d from www.fontcraft.com

Harley Davidson takes the Libertarian Road on Subsidies: Wisconsin LP applauds decision

Libertarian Party: Wisconsin government micro-management fails
11/12/2010

[Rothschild] Harley-Davidson Inc. has rejected the state’s offer of up to $25 million in tax credits aimed at keeping manufacturing jobs in Wisconsin, preferring to make its own management decisions without the strings that came with the offer from the Wisconsin Department of Commerce.

“Libertarians call for the Legislature to focus on governance and allow business owners to make business decisions. Wisconsin’s businesses are over taxed and over regulated,” said Maas. “The next session of the Legislature should focus on regaining Wisconsin’s advantages for employers; not just the large, influential ones, like Harley, but all of them. Our government should not be picking winners and losers in the economy.”

Read more at www.fontcraft.com
 


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Friday, November 12, 2010

Chiggers, Sand Fleas and Scorpions! #USMC











From a Recon Marine in Afghanistan ...







From the Sand Pit, it's freezing here.  I'm sitting on hard, cold dirt between rocks and shrubs at the base of the Hindu Kush Mountains , along the Dar 'yoi Pomir River , watching a hole that leads to a tunnel that leads to a cave.  Stake out, my friend, and no pizza delivery for thousands of miles.





I also glance at the area around my ass every ten to fifteen seconds to avoid another scorpion sting.  I've actually given up battling the chiggers and sand fleas, but the scorpions give a jolt like a cattle prod.  Hurts like a bastard.  The antidote tastes like transmission fluid, but God bless the Marine Corps for the five vials of it in my pack.





The one truth the Taliban cannot escape is that, believe it or not, they are human beings, which means they have to eat food and drink water.  That requires couriers and that's where an old bounty hunter like me comes in handy.  I track the couriers, locate the tunnel entrances and storage facilities, type the info into the handheld, shoot the coordinates up to the satellite link that tells the air commanders where to drop the hardware.  We bash some heads for a while, then I track and record the new movement.

It's all about intelligence.  We haven't even brought in the snipers yet.  These scurrying rats have no idea what they're in for.  We are but days away from cutting off supply lines and allowing the eradication to begin.





I dream of bin Laden waking up to find me standing over him with my boot on his throat as I spit into his face and plunge my nickel-plated Bowie knife through his frontal lobe.  But you know me, I'm a romantic.  I've said it before and I'll say it again: This country blows, man. It's not even a country.  There are no roads, there's no infrastructure, there's no government.  This is an inhospitable, rock pit, shit hole, ruled by eleventh century warring tribes.  There are no jobs here like we know jobs.

Afghanistan offers two ways for a man to support his family: join the opium trade or join the army.  That's it.  Those are your options.  Oh, I forgot, you can also live in a refugee camp and eat plum-sweetened, crushed beetle paste and squirt mud like a goose with stomach flu, if that's your idea of a party.  But the smell alone of those 'tent cities of the walking dead' is enough to hurl you into the poppy fields to cheerfully scrape bulbs for eighteen hours a day.





I've been living with these Tajiks and Uzbeks, and Turkmen and even a couple of Pushtuns, for over a month-and-a-half now, and this much I can say for sure:  These guys, all of 'em, are Huns...actual, living Huns.  They LIVE to fight.  It's what they do.  It's ALL they do.  They have no respect for anything, not for their families, nor for each other, nor for themselves.  They claw at one another as a way of life.  They play polo with dead calves and force their five-year-old sons into human cockfights to defend the family honor.  Huns, roaming packs of savage, heartless beasts who feed on each other's barbarism.  Cavemen with AK-47's.  Then again, maybe I'm just cranky.





I'm freezing my ass off on this stupid hill because my lap warmer is running out of juice, and I can't recharge it until the sun comes up in a few hours.  Oh yeah!  You like to write letters, right?  Do me a favor, Bizarre.  Write a letter to CNN and tell Wolf and Anderson and that awful, sneering, pompous Aaron Brown to stop calling the Taliban 'smart.'  They are not smart.  I suggest CNN invest in a dictionary because the word they are looking for is 'cunning.' The Taliban are cunning, like jackals and hyenas and wolverines.  They are sneaky and ruthless, and when confronted, cowardly.  They are hateful, malevolent parasites who create nothing and destroy everything else.  Smart.  Pfft.  Yeah, they're real smart.





They've spent their entire lives reading only one book (and not a very good one, as books go) and consider hygiene and indoor plumbing to be products of the devil.  They're still figuring out how to work a Bic lighter.  Talking to a Taliban warrior about improving his quality of life is like trying to teach an ape how to hold a pen; eventually he just gets frustrated and sticks you in the eye with it.





OK, enough.  Snuffle will be up soon, so I have to get back to my hole.  Covering my tracks in the snow takes a lot of practice, but I'm good at it.





Please, I tell you and my fellow Americans to turn off the TV sets and move on with your lives.  The story line you are getting from CNN and other news agencies is utter bullshit and designed not to deliver truth, but rather to keep you glued to the screen through the commercials.  We've got this one under control.  The worst thing you guys can do right now is sit around analyzing what we're doing over here, because you have no idea what we're doing, and really, you don't want to know.  We are your military, and we are doing what you sent us here to do.



Saucy Jack

Recon Marine in Afghanistan

Semper Fi



"Freedom is not free...but the U.S. Marine Corps will pay most of your share".



Send this to ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS so that people here will really know what is going on over there.



A veteran is someone who, at one point in his life, wrote a blank check made payable to 'The United States of America ' for an amount of 'up to and including my life.'  That is Honor, and there are way too many people in this country who no longer understand it.'

May God Bless AMERICA and all those who serve, especially this MARINE!





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Thursday, November 11, 2010

White House in shambles -- FLOTUS running the show?

These things are incredible. Are Democrats really urging Vice President Biden to have Obama sent to a nice padded cell, or do they just want a palace coup?



Biden would be too scared to act, of course, so it really doesn't matter. We're stuck with this until January, 2013.

Amplify’d from www.congress.org



To:
President Barack Obama

Rep. Bobby Scott

Sen. Jim Webb

Sen. Mark Warner




November 9, 2010



White House: Obama Conducting Reign of Terror

Suspected White House leakers are on the run



By Wayne Madsen



President Obama was urged by the few White House insiders from whom he still takes advice to leave the country on his ten-day Asian trip, his longest trip abroad since becoming president, in order to not inflict any more damage to the Democratic Party in the wake of one of the worst electoral defeats for the party of an incumbent president in recent history. According to sources close to the White House, who put themselves in great danger by even talking to members of the media, the plans to have Obama leave for a visit to India, Pakistan, Indonesia, South Korea, and Japan are an attempt to get Obama out of the country while top Democrats can sort through the political disaster created for the party by Obama's increasingly detached-from-reality presidency.
White House leaks about the ineffectiveness of Obama's presidency are expandng beyond the revelations attributed to a former high-level Obama administration insider and which have been reported by a blogger named "Ulsterman." Some White House staffers have described a "reign of terror" in the White House over continued leaks and a troika of leadership that is making decisions without any input from the president. The troika reportedly consists of First Lady Michelle Obama, presidential adviser Valerie Jarrett, and the president's mother-in-law, Marian Robinson, who resides in the White House.



Not to be deterred, some White House staffers have sought out journalists and have arranged to meet them at nearby Starbuck's cafes to discretely convey to them inside information about the current disarray within the Obama administration. Some staffers have personally born the brunt of Obama's temper and witnessed his extreme narcissistic behavior. WMR has also learned from White House sources that Obama is taking presciption anxiety medication.
Vice President Biden, under intense pressure from some Democratic Party officials and Cabinet members to invoke Article 25, Section 4 of the Constitution and have Obama temporarily or permanently removed as president because of his mental incapacity to fulfill his constitutional oath as president is reluctant to take such drastic action. Biden feels that the country would "become unglued" after such action and he doesn't want to be the one who would be responsible for "picking up the pieces," according to a source who works within Biden's office.Read more at www.congress.org
 


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Eliminate Public Sector Unions. Oh, like your conditions are hard, whiners? #tcot #teaparty #p2

I'm not sure it's the first thing to do, but it's on the short list.



Government employees do not need unions. They should be banned.



Read more at Redstate.

Amplify’d from www.redstate.com



Eliminate Public Sector Unions!

Back in 1869, the Knights of Labor was founded as America’s first organized labor union. During this time, workers were experiencing a decrease in pay along with a decrease in quality of working conditions. Meanwhile, the industrial revolution was booming making captains of industry, like John D. Rockefeller, very wealthy men. The founding of labor unions was certainly justifiable, and the right thing to do. At the beginning the union members requested reasonable things such as child labor laws, the standard 40 hour work week, and a safe working environment. Upon President John F. Kennedy’s “Executive Order 10988” in 1962, federal workers became eligible to form unions, marking the beginning of a whole new identity of unions.

Compare those modest beginnings with the typical labor unions of today: Public sector unions have been fiercely criticized over the past year. In a study by the Kellogg School of Management, public pensions have an estimated $3 trillion in unfunded liabilities. To make matters worse, in an updated study just released in October of this year, Kellogg found that cities and counties across the nation plop an additional $574 billion onto that already massive debt. How could this have happened? Studies over the past decade (like the recent one in USA Today) have consistently shown that federal public employees, when you include benefits, make more than twice the amount of private sector workers.

Read more at www.redstate.com
 


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Reid Kills Jobs #tcot #teaparty

Thanks, Nevada.



In the lame duck session, fat cat Harry Reid (D-RitzCarlton) is going to do his best to kill every small business job he can, in an effort to show he's not part of the Patriarchy.







Read more at RealClearMarkets.

Amplify’d from www.realclearmarkets.com

The 77% of Income Fallacy

By Diana Furchtgott-Roth

WASHINGTON-When Congress returns next week for a "lame-duck," post-election session, Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid (D-Nev) will try to muster the 60 votes he needs to block a filibuster of a vote on the misnamed Paycheck Fairness Act. It would be better titled the Paycheck Rareness Act, because it would make paychecks rare by driving small firms out of business and sending larger corporations overseas.

This bill would thrust the government deep into compensation decisions of employers. Its declared purpose is to close the alleged "pay gap" between men and women. That gap is mostly a statistical artifact, a false conclusion-and a rallying cry for feminist lobbyists who are well paid to advocate bills like this one.

The bill would require all employers with more than two employees and $500,000 of gross revenues-no small business exception here-to submit data on sex, race, national origin, and earnings of employees to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, even if no complaint has been filed. The threat of litigation about pay differences between men and women would raise the potential cost of employment, discouraging hiring.

Read more at www.realclearmarkets.com
 


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Government Motors to supply Government Electric with taxpayer-subsidized vehicles. #tcot #teaparty

The United States government owns a controlling stake in GM (Government Motors).



The Chevrolet Volt electric vehicle is subsidized with tax incentives to push the leftist green agenda:

Those tax incentives are already coming to bear, at least for the Volt. Barron’s reports that with a federal subsidy, the Volt’s price could be as low as $33,500, after a $7,500 tax subsidy financed by the American taxpayer under President Barack Obama’s stimulus bill. That might sound a bit more affordable, but the subsidy masks the true $41,000 cost. If you contrast that with other new offerings (take the highly fuel efficient, $13,320 Ford Fiesta, for example), that’s a steep price.




The GM and Chrysler union bailout is benefiting someone, at least.

Amplify’d from news.blogs.cnn.com

GE will begin with an initial purchase of 12,000 vehicles from General Motor Co., starting with Chevy Volt in 2011. The conglomerate said it "will add other vehicles as manufacturers expand their electric vehicle profiles."

The first Chevrolet Volt is expected to roll off production lines later this month.

Read more at news.blogs.cnn.com
 


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Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Alchemists, Thieves, and Liars

There was a time when learned men were kept by princes as a kind of pet, a luxury by which the prince could show his wealth and taste.



The prostitutes of academia are many, and their influence strong. The wholesale corruption didn't begin with the Global Warming scare. But in the field of climatology the penetration has been most thorough and profitable.



Read on at Redstate.

Amplify’d from www.redstate.com



A Farewell to (Philosopher) Kings


Dr. David Evans says openly what the Gods of The Copybooks fear to say aloud. Namely that

“The Western Climate Establishment is Cheating.”


This doesn’t involve one or two rogues with a test tube of cold fusion. This is not a faction of academics settling professional scores with other professional academics. This is a systematic, deliberate campaign of disinformation designed to deliberately prevent the vast majority of the population from being properly informed regarding the basis of major political decisions.


We are told that issues such as Healthcare Reform and Climate Science are technical and hard. Therefore, it is reasoned that we, the people should let they, the experts, handle these problems. However, letting the experts handle it has become an increasingly risky proposition, because the experts no longer display altruistic motivations that are ascribed to their persons.

Read more at www.redstate.com
 


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Alchemists, Thieves, and Liars

Amplify’d from www.redstate.com



A Farewell to (Philosopher) Kings


Dr. David Evans says openly what the Gods of The Copybooks fear to say aloud. Namely that

“The Western Climate Establishment is Cheating.”


This doesn’t involve one or two rogues with a test tube of cold fusion. This is not a faction of academics settling professional scores with other professional academics. This is a systematic, deliberate campaign of disinformation designed to deliberately prevent the vast majority of the population from being properly informed regarding the basis of major political decisions.


We are told that issues such as Healthcare Reform and Climate Science are technical and hard. Therefore, it is reasoned that we, the people should let they, the experts, handle these problems. However, letting the experts handle it has become an increasingly risky proposition, because the experts no longer display altruistic motivations that are ascribed to their persons.

Read more at www.redstate.com
 


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Monday, November 08, 2010

Kindergarten Governor: Ahnold pushes Cap and Trade #tcot

Will the media continue to use him as a spokesman for "conservatives"?



Of course.

Amplify’d from somewhatreasonable.com

Raw Deal 2: Arnold’s Even Worse Idea

Arnold Schwarzenegger says as California goes with a ruinous cap-and-trade scheme, so the nation should follow. Fresh from crushing “greedy Texas oil companies” and seeing his political enemies driven before him, the exiting governor’s plan for an encore is to export his worst policy idea to the rest of the country.

“We’re going back to Washington to get this jump-started again,” Schwarzenegger told reporters last week. “The Democrats can’t do it without the Republicans. We’ve got to get together to find the sweet spot.”

Read more at somewhatreasonable.com
 


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There's a reason they call them programs. @Ben_Howe on the programming of his daughter. #tcot #teaparty

Ben Howe seems concerned for some reason that his daughter is becoming a mind-numbed Obama drone.



We have to take back the schools from the federal programmers.

Amplify’d from benhoweblog.wordpress.com

The Battle For My Child Begins

From the moment my daughter first got on the bus for school this year, I knew that there was a possibility I’d end up in a battle for her mind.  I knew from the experiences of my brother and his children that teachers were tasked with trying to make their students as little like their parents as possible.

Turns out it starts in Kindergarden.

My wife cooks with that oil and on Saturday mornings we enjoy homemade blueberry muffins.  Now my daughter is afraid that her idiot parents have been trying to make her unhealthy.  I’ve tried to explain to her many times that when the teacher says ‘unhealthy’ she only means ‘not to be eaten in excess or too often’ but apparently I’ve been battling what the teachers have been saying.  As a result of the school deciding to tell my children what food to ‘stay away from’ my daughter is now afraid to eat childhood staples like homemade blueberry muffins or ice cream.  The teachers have apparently infused the fear that Mrs. Obama was hoping for and the result will be skinny people with the carefreeness of youth missing from their childhoods.

Read more at benhoweblog.wordpress.com
 


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Sunday, November 07, 2010

Why Nancy Pelosi Should, In Fact, Rule The Earth #teaparty #tcot #p2

Or at least, why a HuffPo writer, linked below, thinks she'd make a great House Minority Poobah.



Never mind that Nancy Pelosi, in her own person, is synonymous with

  • The kooky left that most of the rest of the country abhors

  • The abuse of parliamentary procedure in Congress to accumulate power

  • The entrenched politician

  • DC Arrogance



She's a consensus builder.

Amplify’d from www.huffingtonpost.com
Why Nancy Pelosi Should Continue to Lead the House

There is little question that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will be elected to head the Democratic Caucus as Minority Leader by her Democratic colleagues. The reason is simple: She is absolutely the best choice to lead House Democrats through the tough two years that lie ahead.

She is an electoral asset. I know, you're saying this guy must be on another planet. Her positive numbers are in the toilet.

The fact is that Nancy Pelosi's negatives had precious little to do with Democratic losses last week. The exit polls showed clearly that swing voters were not voting against "Pelosi" -- or for that matter for Republican policies. They were voting against the economy. Many of them just voted for change out of frustration. Others bought the snake oil that the other side was pedaling.

Read more at www.huffingtonpost.com
 


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Friday, November 05, 2010

Two Words: Echo Chamber. Two More: Ha Ha.

Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter spouts one logical fallacy after another in his synopsis of the mood of the electorate and its utter rejection of Democrats in 2010.



Polls taken prior to the November midterm election indicated that a surprising number of Obama voters said they were going to vote Republican this time and an equally surprising number of McCain supporters said they would be backing Democratic candidates.




It's not that an equal number or even percentage of McCain supporters would vote Dem, its an equally surprising number. The formulation, as deceitful as it is, reveals the interior workings of this fool's mind. Because I'd be "surprised" if there were three McCain supporters who voted Dem in the entire country. But this guy so desperately wants to cling to the tantrum template that he's willing to overlook the unpleasant fact that for the landslide to have taken place as it did, down to the Registrar of Deeds level, a thundering horde of Obama voters had to have gone straight ticket Republican.



This wasn't a tantrum. This was 18-year-olds leaving home on their birthday.



Never to return.

Amplify’d from www.vanityfair.com
Polls taken prior to the November midterm election indicated that a surprising number of Obama voters said they were going to vote Republican this time and an equally surprising number of McCain supporters said they would be backing Democratic candidates.

Man Up, America!

Well, anger certainly continues to be all the rage in the corridors of American politics. Not to mention American corridors in general. Polls taken prior to the November midterm election indicated that a surprising number of Obama voters said they were going to vote Republican this time and an equally surprising number of McCain supporters said they would be backing Democratic candidates. What that is about, God knows. The general anti-Obama rage out there is palpable. But it’s no more virulent than the anti-Bush sentiment that has pervaded the country for much of the past decade—although this being America, there’s an attendant hatred for Obama that has more to do with race than anything else. What makes today’s fury more worrying is the fact that angry right-wing extremists tend to carry guns in disproportionate numbers to their liberal counterparts.

Read more at www.vanityfair.com
 


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Wednesday, November 03, 2010

From @YidWithLid: the Quantitative Easing Scam. #bailout #tcot #teaparty

When the government wants to spend money to buy votes, it has to either print the money, borrow it, or tax the people. The people are in no mood to be taxed, and no one wants to loan us the money.



So what is a statist to do?



Pretend it into existence! Just type in the amount you need into your Magic Sliding Decimal Federal Reserve Account, and presto. $600 Billion.



Our government is still out of control, historic election or not.

Amplify’d from yidwithlid.blogspot.com

The Fed's $600 Billion Dollar Plan For Economic Suicide




Its called quantitative easing, which is just banker talk for devaluing the a currency. Today the Fed is about to work some "black magic." They are going to create $600 billion dollars out of nothing. It absolutely no different than a corporation vowing to improve its fiscal performance simply by printing a lot of new shares.Read more at yidwithlid.blogspot.com
 


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Three important stories at Redstate: one urgent, one fun, and a third to keep the #teaparty focused. #tcot

  1. Bob "Who're You" Etheridge is attempting to get his hands all over Renee Ellmers



    -- or at least, her seat in Congress. Renee just beat Bob (aka, "The Choker") in North Carolina's 2nd District, and should be packing her bags for Washington, DC.



    Instead, she has an expensive recount ahead of her. Etheridge is a thoroughly dishonorable man, a creature of Washington and its ways. He will stop at nothing to retain what he sees as his rightful property, the seat in Congress to which Renee was just elected.



    If you can give, do so. If you can go down there, do so.



    Above all, pass the word, and keep watching Redstate for more details.

  2. The Democratic knives come out in the House.



    When you design your movement as a competing group of factions, it doesn't take long for the mood to sour when you get your hat handed to you by the Other.



  3. The fight didn’t stop yesterday. Take it to the state capitals



    Soren Dayton makes a great point. With Washington in a happy stalemate, we can continue to take back the country by taking back the States.





See these articles at the link below.

Amplify’d from www.redstate.com






Bob Etheridge Calling for a Recount










Posted by Tabitha Hale (Profile)



Wednesday, November 3rd at 6:19PM EDT


1 Comment



The NC-2 Race, in which Renee Ellmers is poised to take down manhandling Bob “Who’re You” Etheridge, has gotten complicated. Last night, it looked like a clear victory for Ellmers and she claimed victory. The gap tightened, however, and now he wants a recount.


Etheridge is a 6 term incumbent in what was considered a very safe seat for the Democrats. Unfortunately for Bob, it looks bad when you put a college student in a headlock for asking question, and his constituents suddenly became a lot less excited about supporting someone who might attack them.


Help Renee. Recounts are expensive, and she’ll need everything she can to pull this thing off. She’s a fantastic conservative who ran a great race, and has earned this win. She knows where her priorities lie. Watch her speech, which starts at the 7 minute mark, and donate today.















Read more at www.redstate.com



The Democratic knives come out in the House.

The ‘moderates’ blame the liberals for walking all over them; the liberals blame the moderates for going along with passing bad ideas like the stimulus, cap-and-trade, and Obamacare; the idiots (this may be a subgroup: there’s a bit of an overlap here with the first two groups) are claiming that this entire problem would have gone away with a little more marketing; and everybody blames the President.  Because really, why not?  It’s fairly clear by now that being on Barack Obama’s good side is not exactly inherently valuable.  They’re all right, of course: the Democratic debacle in the House represents a perfect storm of legislative cowardice, political greed, a grotesquely flawed group understanding of proper civic policy, and a White House that routinely demonstrates the organizational and administrative core competency that normally one associates with opium-raddled Victorian expatriate remittance men.  None of which helps them right now, of course; but it’s a lot of fun to point out.Read more at www.redstate.com



The fight didn’t stop yesterday. Take it to the state capitals

But bailouts from Washington should not happen again. House Republicans can stop it from even coming to the floor. We have to continue pressure to make that happen, but we can and will win that fight. The next step is the states. With Republican control of so many state legislatures, we can now force states to reform and their services while cutting government employees. Mitch Daniels did it in Indiana, and with both chambers of the state legislature, they are likely to do more. If our new conservative leaders do this, we can get better service, smaller government, and less union money fighting for more spending in the future. That’s a virtuous circle.

Read more at www.redstate.com
 


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Tuesday, November 02, 2010

Join @HeartlandInst staff for Election predictions and results

The Heartland Institute is a free-market think tank based in Chicago. To help kick off their new blog, they're having a contest of skill and daring and no small risk to life and limb:

We’re having an Election Night prediction contest on our new blog, Somewhat Reasonable. We are giving away signed copies of P.J. O’Rourke’s new book, “Don’t Vote, It Only Encourages the Bastards” to those who most closely guess in the comments section of this blog post the makeup of the House and Senate.




There should be some amount of hilarity involved, from the sample so far.



They've got a highly ironic prize. P.J. O'Rourke came to Chicago a little while back for a book signing.



Clicky linky and let the bloodsport commence.

Amplify’d from somewhatreasonable.com

Heartland’s Election Night Predictions

As they come in, I’ll be posting Election Night predictions from Heartland staffers. To get things started, here are mine:

Jim Lakely

Senate: GOP 51, Dem 49

Murkowski will not come close to stealing away Joe Miller’s victory in Alaska. She will concede on Election night.

House: GOP picks up 66 seats.

Other miscellany:

  • Keith Olbermann hides under his desk in the fetal position by 9 p.m. EDT.
  • Rachel Maddow calls the Tea Party racist, wonders on the air how America let the Klan take over the government.
  • Chris Matthews shockingly pins the blame for this electoral disaster squarely on Obama for over-reaching, and says, on the whole, it’s a good thing for Democrats that Nancy Pelosi has been de-fanged.
Senate: 51 Dems, GOP 49

House: GOP picks up 68 seats



  • A woman will become Governor of California

  • MSNBC will blame the election on George W. Bush

  • Brady Quinn wins the Illinois Governorship in an unprecedented landslide

  • Karl Rove will continue to be annoying in his analysis

  • Paul Krugman will blame the Democrats election day losses on a “lack of spending and government intervention”


Read more at somewhatreasonable.com
 


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Bahahaha: @ChristineOD FTW Coons Camp Expresses Turnout Worries @WSJ #Rush #tcot #DESen



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Shocker: NPR Spins Story Against Republican | RedState #tcot #teaparty #mi01 @benishek



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What a shock. NPR spins story against Republican #teaparty #tcot #mi01 @Benishek

NPR presents a heavily edited audio recording of an interview with the the former campaign manager for a splinter candidate in the Michigan 1 Congressional race. Republican Dan Benishek is narrowly leading the unionist Democrat in the race. Benishek has been endorsed by Sarah Palin, Redstate.com, and is a favorite of local Tea Parties.



But NPR and the Michigan Messenger want the Democrat elected. Since there is really no way to increase the support for the Democrat past the socialist base, they want to split the conservative and Tea Party vote, or at least suppress the Benishek vote with a last-minute attack.



And so this story about a Benishek campaign staffer "conspiring" with Rich Carlson. Carson quit as campaign manager for Wilson last month after there were strong differences of opinion.



An NPR reporter made a recording of a phone call in which Carlson notes that he hadn't been happy with the campaign, and the Benishek staffer offers to help spin the story to protect Carlson's reputation. Wilson unwisely claims to have fired his own campaign manager three weeks before an election, something no one with any sense would do.



Either Wilson has no sense, or he's smearing his former employee Carlson.



And oddly enough, what do we find the Michigan Messenger doing? Running ads for NPR using Sarah Palin as a prop.







Advertising for NPR, using Sarah Palin as a prop -- Sarah Palin, who endorsed Benishek. Hmm, could there be a connection?



And none of this has much to do with Dan Benishek himself, who is best understood here:



Amplify’d from michiganmessenger.com

NPR catches Benishek campaign spinning story on Wilson

It made big news last month when Rich Carlson, the campaign manager for independent candidate Glenn Wilson in the 1st Congressional District, announced that he had left the Wilson campaign because Wilson had pledged to pull out of the race if he had no chance of winning but might prevent Republican Dan Benishek from winning as well — a pledge Carlson claimed Wilson was now betraying. But NPR reports now that this was a story made up with help from the Benishek campaign.



The reality, NPR reports, is that Carlson was fired from the Wilson campaign. And one of their reporters was with Carlson when he got a phone call from a Benishek staffer suggesting that Carlson could pretend to have quit on principle in order to make Wilson look bad and Benishek look good. Here is the audio of that call, along with a bit of talk from the reporter as well:


rich-tony


The staffer gave permission to NPR to play the audio of that phone conversation but only if they say that he was not representing the Benishek campaign in the call. That would be a lot more plausible if the staffer had not talked openly in the call about how the Benishek campaign was preparing two entirely different press releases about Carlson leaving the Wilson campaign, both designed to make Wilson look bad but with entirely different stories.


Read more at michiganmessenger.com
 


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