STOSSEL BEGINS
FYI: John Stossel's new show begins on the Fox Business Network next Thursday, Dec 10, at 8 PM. And the first show is on Ayn Rand. I can't wait!
[W]hat if WWII had been fought as a "counterinsurgency"?
What if, instead of firebombing every important German city and
killing tens of thousands of civilians from Hamburg to Dresden, and
instead of firebombing Tokyo and nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki and tens
of thousands of Japanese in the all-out effort to defeat the Axis
powers and End All Fighting, the Allies had sought instead to win hearts and minds?
What if Gen. Eisenhower, like Gen. McChrystal today in Afghanistan,
wandered through German towns, asking das volk, "What do you need?
I want to make it clear that neither Diana West nor I think that genocide is the answer. The point is that she and I fear the military
will continue to be
tightly leashed, hands behind its back, bound by criminally perilous
rules of engagement and limited strategies that actually cause US
casualties, all in a criminally misguided effort to put over a
hearts-and-mind ivory tower thesis to "protect the Afghan people from
everything that can hurt them," which is how Gen. McChrystal memorably
and shamefully put it.
Our military forces are more than
able. Will they truly now be set loose to do the job and win? Or do
they have to fear being hauled up before a court-martial if they give
some terrorist a bloody lip?
The U.S. should not use more force than necessary to terminate a particular threat, but the rule should be to use the necessary force to end it right now, not to pussy foot around trying to avoid injuring any civilians, including those who deliberately allow themselves to be used as human shields.
All of the above assumes we are targeting a threat. The title of West's article asked, "How Important Is Marjeh?"
If Marjeh is so important to this war it should be bombed into surrender or smithereens, whichever comes first.
What is it about Afghanistan, possessing next to nothing that the United States requires, that justifies such lavish attention?
[...]
As long as we maintain adequate defenses, Al Qaeda operatives, hunkered
down in their caves, pose no more than a modest threat. As for the
Taliban, unless they manage to establish enclaves in places like New
Jersey or Miami, the danger they pose to the United States falls
several notches below the threat posed by Cuba, which is no threat at
all.
"Adequate defenses" include locking our doors so that al-Qaeda and the Taliban can't come here. If they are already here, deport them.
Suppose Afghanistan collapses and al-Qaeda take over. Can't we just bomb them?
I am not a pacifist. I advocate selective aggression.
We have to ask ourselves, what are the greatest threats to the US? All this focus on Afghanistan has made us forget about the remaining two-thirds of the Axis of Evil.
Iran’s apparent full-speed charge to nuclear weapons is the
equivalent [of the Cuban missile crisis], if not worse. The Soviet Union was run by grown-ups who
probably would not have used those Cuban nukes. Iran is not run by grown-ups. We cannot chance Iran having nuclear weapons and giving them to terrorists.
If and when such a nuke goes off in the U.S., the U.S. will not do what Hillary said during the campaign—swift retaliation—because we will not know for sure who did it. But we do know now, for sure, who is building nuclear factories as fast as they can.
North Korea probably has fissile material for up to 9 nuclear weapons, and has the capability to deploy nuclear warheads on intermediate-range ballistic missiles.
I wouldn't consider Kim Jong Il to be grown up either.
I am not advocating war against Iran and North Korea tomorrow. I don't know what to do about them. I am simply trying to keep Afghanistan in perspective.
America has many enemies. It can try to keep them out. It can attack those who can harm us from afar. But it can't defeat them all.
Posted by: Amritas at December 03, 2009 04:19 PM (+nV09)
PROFIT LOGIC
A good blog post via Amritas about how there's no logic to profit-based hatred:
while politicians routinely attack BIG oil for its high profits, the
same politicians are silent about the highER profit margins of Apple,
Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo. For every dollar Exxon keeps after paying
their bills, Google keeps $3. Exxon is attacked because they sell more
units than Google, but in reality, Google is keeping more of the
customer’s money. Politicians don’t concern themselves with this kind
of stuff, because Google is very popular with the electorate, and oil
companies are not.
Read the whole thing, and see if you can guess ahead of time how much profit medical insurance companies make.
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I totally agree and have been blasting liberals with this fact for years. Trust me, it's gets em every time. Next time you hear someone ranting about profits, ask them if they know what the profit margin is? Most don't which is the sad part. Thank you, Neal Boortz, for pointing this out to me because I too used to believe in the profit-bashing "logic."
The idea that Exxon produces a 3 - 10% profit margin and Google has around a 45% profit margin, yet all we hear is how "evil" Exxon is to the consumming public is such a double standard if there ever was one. In fact, in the Search Engine Marketing arena Google owns about 70% of the market share. To put it in perspective, around $20 billion is earned across all SEM annually, 70% of that would be around 14 billion to put it in perspective (just an estimation though). And we're not even talking about an industry that requires the overhead/operational expenses likes the oil industry.
Yet you don't hear a peep from Democrats about the near monopoly and out-of-control profits when it comes to Google. Good grief, I'm getting pissed off just writing about it.
Posted by: BigD78 at November 30, 2009 01:30 PM (W3XUk)
Google also has the advantage that its infrastructure is relatively unobtrusive: no pipelines, rail lines, foundries, etc.
If all our politicians permit to exist is businesses of this type, though, we will soon find ourselves starving and freezing in the dark.
I'm not sure the Google founders have sufficient intellectual depth to understand how the well-being of their own business is linked to the well-being of the so-called "industrial age" businesses.
There is a logic. Against each according to his unpopularity among the 'in' crowd. If given a choice to attack Apple or Microsoft, Leftists will choose the latter, even if Apple has a higher profit margin, because Windows is eeeevil and Macs Never Crashâ„¢.
I don't know what Apple's profit margin is. The point is that profit margins are irrelevant to Leftist targeting. And no, I wouldn't be happy if Leftists started obsessing over profit margins. The real problem is the Leftist anti-profit mindset. Even if profit margins were slashed to 0.0001%, it's not fair that those greedy monsters keep anything, unlike oh-so-noble Obama. Waaaahhhh!
How much does she make? $325,000 a year last I heard. I break that down as follows:
$50,000 a year for being a Princeton/Harvard Law grad who no longer practices law—that is, what she would make if she were white
$120,000 a year for combining black skin with preppy pearls and vocabulary
$155,000 a year for being celebrity Barack Obama’s wife
Profits earned without fraud are the product of merit. Leftism, on the other hand, is obsessed with prestige, not merit. Michelle Obama has all the proper aristocratic traits, so of course she 'deserves' $325,000. Conversely, Sarah Palin lacks all those traits, so of course she 'deserves' contempt, just like Sam Walton. John T. Reed sums up this aspect of the Leftist mindset (emphasis his):
They hate capitalism because it lets the “wrong†people win [...]
The left does not want maximum prosperity for all. They want all [uncool] rich
people who disagree with them to be stripped of their money. [But cool rich people like Obama and St. Gore can keep their money.] They
understand that this will impoverish all but the government apparatchiks. That is what they want. They plan to be government apparatchiks. The left wants to wipe off the face of the earth anyone of whom their side is envious.
BigD78,
Yet you don't hear a peep from Democrats about the near monopoly and out-of-control profits when it comes to Google. [Emphasis mine.]
Nope. Not a single demand for the eeeevil monopoly of Google to break up. (Not that I want a broken Google. I love Google. I just hate hypocrisy.)
I wonder how much Exxon contributes to the Democrats. Possibly more than Google?
david,
I'm not sure the Google founders have sufficient intellectual depth to
understand how the well-being of their own business is linked to the
well-being of the so-called "industrial age" businesses.
Most people, including successful businessmen, are tunnelers - experts in their narrow field who are wholly unaware of the big picture. Leftists can fool them into applauding the destruction of the businesses they depend on outside their 'tunnel'. "See, you'll do just fine, unlike those losers over there who 'deserve' the full statist treatment." But coolness doesn't last forever, and those who fall out of fashion may be new targets of the infinitely envious.
Posted by: Amritas at November 30, 2009 03:39 PM (+nV09)
To those who point out that we in the US spend more on medical care
than other developed countries, I would like to say this. We also spend
more on education, charity, pet food, entertainment, and probably lots
of other things I don’t know about.
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I'm home. I missed a call from my husband today while I was on my flight. Two weeks and counting since we had a four-minute phone call. Oy. I am not a fan of this particular deployment.
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Yes, it must be the hormones. And I must have something in my eyes. Thanks for posting that. Glad you are home safe. Sorry you missed that call. Sometimes just hearing a voice is comfort enough.
Posted by: Mare at November 15, 2009 08:49 AM (HUa8I)
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Thanks for that link. The Bushes are special people. I was lucky to hear Barbara speak at a convention I attended several years ago. Maybe someday I'll be able to hear some others in this special family.
Posted by: Miss Ladybug at November 16, 2009 12:07 AM (YJ5uY)
Tell me something: in a moment of national tragedy, is it really too
much to expect that the President of the United States not give "shout
outs"? Is it too much ask that he understand the difference between the
Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Medal of Honor? What we require
from our leaders at times like this is not much. They don't have to
actually care. What we want is precisely the kind of thing that comes
easily to Barack Obama: honeyed words and a show of empathy from a man
who thinks that quality is the most important attribute a Supreme Court
judge can possess. But somehow, asking the Commander in Chief of our
armed forces to to give the appearance of empathy even if the actual
feeling was not there - was too much.
Americans expect something more from leaders in times of trouble.
Grace. Empathy. Inspiration. A sense of gravity. When the Space Shuttle
Challenger exploded killing 7 astronauts, Ronald Reagan postponed the State of the Union report to address and assuage the nation's shock and mourning.
Barack Obama, on the other hand, was giving shout outs.
And an absolute must-read from JR Salzman about true PTSD:
Sometimes I would just wake up screaming in
agony as I relived the moment where my right arm was ripped from my body by an
Iranian shape charge. (I may not know
what childbirth feels like, but I know what it's like to go an hour with my arm
ripped off without painkillers (I'm allergic to morphine).) [snip] That's what fucking PTSD is like.
At no point in time have I ever felt the desire or need to grab a weapon
and go shoot someone or something up. At
no point in time have I ever grabbed a weapon and broken a law because I felt
the need to protect myself. PTSD urges
you mitigate the risk of events that happened in your life. But if you've never had anything traumatic
happen in your life, you can't fucking have PTSD.
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I hope and believe that his monumental faux pas was a real "shot out" to many of his true believers about how he really is. Cold, narcissistic (sp?) and totally out of touch with Americans. I cannot imagine any other president in my lifetime not addressing the massacre before any other thing.
As for the PTSD, shameful, shame on everyone who even thinks that would be his problem. My son-in-law was in Vietnam and he is totally disabled with PTSD and the whole family has been adversely affected by it.
And for TT who reads this too, you don't have to comment, Mama already did. ;D
Posted by: Ruth H at November 08, 2009 02:15 PM (CvvEA)
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The "winner" thing about spun my head around again when I had recovered from my shock at his off-shrugging of the Ft Hood terrorist attack. Semantics? Not in this case, by any means. You win something you work hard for and towards, something you deliberately aim yourself at. You are awarded a MoH, and the fact that the President doesn't recognize this gives me chills. Cold chills.
But then, there's that whole Nobel Prize thing... I guess if you get a Nobel Prize for doing nothing, you view other things through that lens as well.
Posted by: airforcewife at November 08, 2009 04:05 PM (uE3SA)
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I'm seriously dumbfounded at his lack of empathy. And absolutely disgusted that he doesn't even have the basic knowledge to know that the CMOH is usually awarded posthumously. Did the White House fire the protocal person to save money or something? I find it hard to believe he would purposely be this much of a dumbass.
Posted by: Mare at November 09, 2009 09:06 AM (HUa8I)
The medal is approved by the respective secretaries of the service that awards it, and it is awarded by the President. Congress only authorized the issuing of the medal in general. They passed a resolution creating the medal, and take no part in awarding it. Calling it "the congressional medal..." is only correct if every other medal awarded by the services is also called "the congressional medal of X" as in the congressional army achievement medal" as congress has to approve the creation of all awards.
It is the Medal of Honor, it is awarded, not won. It was awarded much more often prior to the Spanish American War, as it was then the ONLY medal the military had to recognize valor.
Posted by: Chuck Z at November 11, 2009 08:01 PM (bMH2g)
SPEAKING OF STEYN
Speaking of Mark Steyn (and I always like speaking of Mark Steyn):
And his superior officers and other authorities knew
about his beliefs but seemed to think it was just a bit of harmless
multicultural diversity — as if believing that “the Muslims should
stand up and fight against the aggressor†(i.e., his fellow American
soldiers) and writing Internet paeans to the “noble†“heroism†of
suicide bombers and, indeed, objectively supporting the other side in an active war is to be regarded as just some kind of alternative lifestyle that adds to the general vibrancy of the base.
Incredible, especially when you consider
that the only Muslims killed in the USA on 9/11 and in Britain on 7/7
were killed by Muslims.
Muslims may have as much to fear from
radical Muslims as any other American, Briton or Canadian... I'm rather
sick of the MSM interrupting our grieving to tell us that, to add
Muslims' insults to a Muslim's murderous injury, they suspect us of
wanting to attack their mosques now, even though we didn't the last ten
times a Muslim killed innocent people in the name of Islam. What are
they scared of? Grafitti?
That first sentence is worth bearing in mind when mendacious lobby
groups such as CAIR trot out their "fears" for Muslim safety. Muslims
died in the World Trade Center, the London Underground, the Bali
nightclub attacks, the Istanbul bank bombings, in Iraqi shopping
markets targeted by insurgents. The death toll of Muslims killed by
Muslims in any one year is staggering. Jihadists are very indifferent
to murdering their coreligionists and have been since the Grand Mufti
staged his uprising in Mandatory Palestine and wound up slaughtering
more Muslims than Jews or Britons.
After my comparative body count in my "fear for Muslims" post last
night - non-Muslims 13, Muslims 0 - a snotty liberal wrote to wonder
sneeringly how I knew the dead at Fort Hood were all non-Muslims. He
thinks he's refuting my point but in fact he's making it for me: The
soi-disant "moderate Muslim" has far more to fear from a coreligionist
boarding the subway train yelling "Allahu akbar!" than he does from the
allegedly "Islamophobic" Americans forever on the brink of
"backlash". That our media cannot see what the commenter above sees is,
even in a relativist age, a very advanced stage of decadence.
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In my state, the government tried to put
bookies who take bets on horse races out of business by creating a
state agency to run off-track betting. The New York City Off-Track Betting Corporation,
which has a Governor-appointed board of directors, has been so
incompetently run that it now LOSES $38 billion per year despite its
government-granted monopoly. Taxpayers are now on the hook for over
$228 million.
An activity that was so lucrative to
bookies that they risked arrest to pursue it becomes a money-loser when
the state tries to do it.
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I'm surprised because I tend to think that there isn't that much of a difference between Us and Them. I generally can't tell from someone's behavior which side they're on.
It'd be interesting to see if red state parks are cleaner than blue state ones.
The comparison of the Washington Mall photos isn't quite fair because the inauguratiOn photo was taken in winter. The lack of green makes the Mall look worse. Still, the point remains. I'd expect a protest fueled by negative feelings* to leave more rubbish than a celebratory inauguration, yet the reverse happened!
*Yes, I know the protestors were motivated out of love for America. But when one's mad about America turning into Omerica, one might litter without a second thought. Or not!
Posted by: Amritas at September 17, 2009 12:36 PM (+nV09)
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Why should I trust photos posted at American Thinker? (What a misnomer. True thinkers don't have their doubleplus ungOOd thoughts.) Oh, excuuuuse us, Gateway Pundit. The 9/12 photos were probably photoshopped: rubbish was removed and extra people were added. 99.99% of Omericans want Dr. gOvernment.
That 0.01% that bothered to show up probably drove away in Gaia-tormenting SUVs while the millions that came to the enthrOnement came in Priuses (Barack bless 'em) and peOple's transportation. The pictures don't tell the whole story. If a picture is worth a thousand words, there could be nine thousand other words we won't deign to say.
And let's suppose that the peOple really did make a mess. Is that really such a bad thing? Think of all the people employed to clean up that mess! All the jobs created by his ascensiOn! Break a window for Barack!
Posted by: kevin at September 17, 2009 12:48 PM (+nV09)
I'm not sure that a comparison of "red" and "blue" national parks would do it, either.
Blue areas tend to be more urban than red areas; and urban areas tend to be a lot nastier trash wise. I'm not sure how much of that can realistically be laid at the feet of political belief systems, because I think the sheer number of people in one area tends to cause more of the ugliness than the fact that urban areas tend to be blue.
Another factor I think might play into the issue is self identity. I try to keep my house looking nice (or rather, I'm fixing my house up) because I want to be proud of where I live. If you don't have any vested pride in something, why bother to take care of it?
Posted by: airforcewife at September 17, 2009 03:18 PM (9sMSe)
Some conservative blogs have been circulating photos allegedly taken
during the rally. But at least one fact-checking site says the photos
are fakes ...
Politifact, a nonpartisan journalistic fact-checking organization,
checked in on Monday with Pete Piringer, public affairs officer for the
DC Fire and Emergency Department. Piringer “unofficially†estimated
that between 60,000 and 75,000 people had shown up. He added that the
photo circulating conservative sites was almost certainly not from this
year.
The caption for the photo at the top speaks of "photos" being "fakes". Many will not read the actual article which only discusses one fake photo. One commenter noticed this act of legerdemot:
To imply that *all* of the 9/12 photos are fakes based on this one
photo, which I have only seen here, being called out as fake is a
blatant propaganda move. Not journalism.
"It is one of our basic tasks to contrapose our own truth to bourgeois 'truth', and win its recognition.
The transition from bourgeois society to the policy of the proletariat is a very difficult one, all the more so for the bourgeoisie incessantly slandering us through its entire apparatus of propaganda and agitation. It bends every effort to play down an even more important mission of the dictatorship of the proletariat, its educational mission ..."
Teach us mOre, o MSM!
Posted by: kevin at September 18, 2009 10:19 AM (+nV09)
I suggested parks because comparing blue cities with red towns makes no sense for the reasons you stated:
Blue areas tend to be more urban than red areas; and urban areas tend
to be a lot nastier trash wise. I'm not sure how much of that can
realistically be laid at the feet of political belief systems, because
I think the sheer number of people in one area tends to cause more of
the ugliness than the fact that urban areas tend to be blue.
I presume there is no difference in human density among the visitors to blue and red parks. There is, however, a complicating factor I overlooked: visitors to parks can come from other areas. If a park's visitors are overwhelmingly non-local, the condition of the park tells us nothing about local behavior. Moreover, most visitors to a red park could be blue, and vice versa.
In any case, my guess is that there is no difference between blue and red parks in terms of cleanliness. Do parks in, say, California have a bad reputation?
I try to keep my house looking nice (or rather, I'm fixing my house up)
because I want to be proud of where I live. If you don't have any
vested pride in something, why bother to take care of it?
Leftists feel this pride too. Look at how nice the houses of the elite are. But how proud do the tenants of public housing feel? As Rick Moran wrote,
On the other hand, liberals
don't see public property as their concern, but rather that of the
government. When everyone owns the land, no one is responsible for it
in their calculation.
Yet we must all pay for public property. And we must pay more as the public sector grOws.
Posted by: Amritas at September 18, 2009 11:26 AM (+nV09)
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I forgot to mention that you can always trust "a nonpartisan journalistic fact-checking organization".
In nOwOmOwa (from Polish for 'Newspeak'), words like nonpartisan and neutral really mean prOgressive. Which as we all know really means back to the glorious socialism of the past. Now that's progress - in a wOrld where blue means 'Red'.
Ever notice how you hear about the center-left, but never the center-right? How the gOOd guys are always moderates while you are extremists? We control language. We control people's perceptions of reality. Even conservatives often think within the confines of our framework.
... nowadays the left-wing position is actually considered the default ...
I reject so many of these so-called non-partisan positions ...
So in normal discussions with Democrats, I am always operating from a disadvantage, because "conventional wisdom" or "normal people" usually grant these premises. I'm always frustrated because I don't accept the underlying foundation of their arguments, which makes it hard to have a discussion because to them, this is the normal default position ...
I believe that the Republican Party will never be a success if it keeps granting Democrat premises. It can't keep trying to find right-wing solutions to things that many right-wingers don't accept as the default. McCain let Obama frame the debates ...
Nobody I know wanted to vote for Democrat Lite, but that's what we were getting served.
Get ready for a second serving in 2012! victOry is inevitable!
Posted by: kevin at September 18, 2009 11:56 AM (+nV09)
I REMAIN SHOCKED TOO
Jonah Goldberg says, "I have no idea why I still have the capacity to be shocked by such things." Thomas Friedman Is a Liberal Fascist
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Translation: Thomas Friedman is a good guy! A true friend of the people ... the People's Republic of China:
One-party autocracy certainly has its drawbacks. But when it is led by
a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today, it can
also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the
politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move
a society forward in the 21st century. It is not an accident that China
is committed to [blah blah blah ... lotsa good green stuff] ...
Say ä½ å¥½ ni hao (hello) to our new role model! If we Great Leaders weren't unselfishly dedicated to saving you from capitalism, we'd let the PRC's "reasonably enlightened group of people" rule you. Our cities, true-blue zones like New York City, will be the next Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen, and the rest of America can be "impoverished" like the rest of the PRC. And under "The Firm Hand of the Benign Strongman", the number of patents filed by Omericans will be reduced by 99.7%. (90,000 American patents were filed in the US in 2002, but only 297 PRC patents were filed in the US in 2003.) Innovation requires freedom. Great Leaders don't require innovation. They just need lots of followers. So let's add 300 million more. Annex America. Learn æ™®é€šè¯ Putonghua, I mean Mandarin, the exciting è¯è¨€ yuyan (language) of the future that nearly half of the PRC's population aren't fluent in! Welcome to Friedman's flat 世界 shijie (world) where all will be equally poor except for an elite of smart people like us!
Posted by: kevin at September 09, 2009 02:57 PM (+nV09)
A coal mine accident early on Tuesday killed 13 people and 66 others were missing in central China's Henan Province, the Xinhua news agency reported, citing the state work safety watchdog.
China's mines are the deadliest in the world, due to lax safety standards and a rush to feed demand from a robust economy. More than 3,000 people died in coal mine accidents in 2008 alone.
**
Part of China's problem with mine safety is due to the fact that they're at an earlier stage of economic development than we are. Part of it, though, is that China's government doesn't have to be excessively concerned with casualties among those Obama likes to call "working families."
I wonder whether Friedman would prefer to be a coal miner in China or in the United States.
Posted by: david foster at September 09, 2009 07:20 PM (uWlpq)
At any rate, in order to “control costs†Obama says we need to introduce a new trillion-dollar government entitlement. It’s a good thing he’s the smartest president of all time and the greatest orator since Socrates because otherwise one might easily confuse him with some birdbrained Bush type.
Very rarely do I disagree with VDH, but I dunn’o about the comparison between the Iraq War and government run health care.
While it may be true that “the Bush administration in response could not articulate what the aims in Iraq were, why they were worth the likely costs†I look at them as being two totally different situations for a variety of reasons that I really don’t fell like banging my keyboard about.
Let me just say that, using the comparison, that if Pres. Bush had used Pres. Obama’s tactics for the government take over of our health care system for the lead up to the Iraq War, Saddam would still be in power.
Another words, the reason why Pres. Obama is failing at pushing this thing through isn’t because of some lack of communication on his part, it’s because the American people, many of whom voted for him, KNOW it’s a bunch of crapola. No amount of sweet talk can cover the stench emanating from it.
Hell, they have the votes; they control the House, the Senate and the WH, if it’s such a great freakin’ idea why don’t they just pass it already? Makes ya’ wonder, no?
To hear then blame Republicans is laughable; the R’s couldn’t do anything to stop this if they wanted to. The Democrats are being silly, (as usual). What, do they need to control every seat in the Senate and the House before they could push through their legislation? If they are that weak when they are in control ya’ have to wonder whether they should have that control in the first place.
Posted by: tim at August 25, 2009 10:33 AM (nno0f)
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I love this. Singin' in the Rain is one of my very favorite movies of all time.
Posted by: Leofwende at August 16, 2009 12:16 AM (28CBm)
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I watched it while he was at SERE, and so now I sing this song all the time in the mornings. He thinks it's cute when I sing it to the dog..."Good mornin', good MORnin', we scratched our ears the whole night through..."
Posted by: Sarah at August 16, 2009 08:23 AM (TWet1)
STATISM RUN AMOK
My favorite Cash For Clunkers blog post so far is at Reason. Read the whole thing, but here's a snippet:
But for some of us it's also a nearly perfect symbol of economic
statism run amok. The federal government is taking from the many,
giving it to the less-than-many, destroying functional cars, funneling
money to an auto industry that it already largely owns (at a hefty
taxpayer price tag), then taking multiple (and multiply premature) bows
for rescuing the economy and the auto industry in the process.
Posted by: CaliValleyGirl at August 06, 2009 09:20 AM (irIko)
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My favorite phrase in that article is the one right before your quote: "a rounding error in Tim Geithner's nose-hair".
Heh... what better way to describe the personal agendas flying around and dictating demonically whimsical policy?
Posted by: Krista at August 06, 2009 10:49 AM (sUTgZ)
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As one of the "estimated 12 percent of Americans aged 15 years and above who don't drive, period" and as one of "the adults who live in the 8 percent of households that don't have a vehicle", you can imagine what I think about my money going to buyers of Detroit-made SUVs.
Why the emphasis on popularity? That's indicative of an externally oriented mindset. A person who constantly wonders what others think and tries to keep up with the latest feelings and beliefs. Fashion is in the mind, but truth is out there.
The last line is a keeper:
... what parties in power always do: look for creative new ways to bribe the middle class.
with 'free' benefits they pay for!
Posted by: Amritas at August 06, 2009 01:21 PM (+nV09)
Posted by: Sarah at August 06, 2009 01:35 PM (TWet1)
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Manufacturing a car is an energy-intensive process. Making and
transporting steel, forging, foundry, and stamping operations,
transportation of components and finished cars--all these things use
energy, and a good part of it is thrown away when the car is scrapped.
Did anyone bother to do the calculation of BTUs lost (through scrapping
useful vehicles) with BTUs saved (via more efficient new cars)? I'm
guessing the answer is "no."
Posted by: david foster at August 06, 2009 02:00 PM (uWlpq)
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and 7 of the 10 top cars purchased are not from American companies... purchases s/h/b restricted to the car companies we already "own"... this whole thing -- including the additional $2 BILLION is making me absolutely over-the-edge cuckoo crazy (oh, that & bank bailouts, ObamaCare and a host of other "you're frickin' kidding me?!" legislation...
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And yet another angle on how this is SO not a good idea: I listen to WOAI radio out of San Antonio. They had a local news report the other day from someone who helps local charities that accept donated vehicles as a means of fundraising. Donations are down, depending on the charity, 40 to 70 percent...
Posted by: Miss Ladybug at August 08, 2009 12:36 AM (paOhf)
Did anyone bother to do the calculation of BTUs lost (through scrapping
useful vehicles) with BTUs saved (via more efficient new cars)? I'm
guessing the answer is "no."
Of course the answer is no. Calculation and BTUs are both Europpressive concepts of no relevance in the eOn of miracles. So we not only expend energy on building cars but we also expend energy on destroying usable ones. The point is to use energy. To be active. To be revolutionary! Using an old car is conservative. Destroying one is change! Conversing is boring, but change is exciting. It's that excitement which drove half of Omerica to vote for the One.
Miss Ladybug,
Who needs charity once the State supplies us with everything from Government Motors cars to freeee health care? Give to the tax collector so that the State can redistribute in accordance with true sOcial justice. It is clear that unOrganized, private, and therefore unfair attempts at redistribution have failed to transform America into a prosperous nation like the Democratic People's Republic of North Korea. Omegas should stop choosing charities to support. Why let in-duh-viduals think when the One and the other chosen ones (praise Pelosi!) can do the hard wOrk for us little peOple?
Posted by: kevin at August 08, 2009 02:13 PM (h9KHg)
9
"Conversing is boring" should be "Conserving is boring".
Spelling is boring, too. Another Europpressive concept that must go!
Literacy is overrated. Ask the Khmer Rouge. They didn't need literate farmers to power their mighty economy.
Reason can be surprisingly perceptive l for a magazine that fails to grasp the success of Communism:
funneling
money to an auto industry that it already largely owns (at a hefty
taxpayer price tag), then taking multiple (and multiply premature) bows
for rescuing the economy and the auto industry in the process.
It's all about empowering Ourselves (i.e., Government Motors) and taking the bows, baby! (Was that sexist? Do we have to report that at our next self-criticism session?)
What matters to us is not what our pOlicies actually do, but what people think about them. We live in the realm of beliefs, not facts. This is why media cOntrol is a must. On Wednesday, CNN cited a poll saying Omericans were in favor of Obamacare 50 to 45. Make people think your way is the majority way. (And it might very well be, for the program to Redden Omerica has been progressing smoothly for decades.) Use peer pressure. Everyone's wOrshipping the Great Leader ... why not me? Marginalize the Rightist freaks. Make them hide in their gulches. They cannot stop the mighty prOletariat from taking back Omerica and handing it all to the One.
Posted by: kevin at August 08, 2009 02:20 PM (h9KHg)
It is. That's the beauty of it. Making windows ... zzz. Breaking 'em ... kewl, maaaan. Destruction is the most obvious form of change. In the blink of an eye, blam!, something that took so much effort to make is gone! The next time you see Leftist activists going wild - though not as wild as the 'health careless' savages - think of how their property destruction stimulates the economy!
Did you expect Mr. Hopenchange to - gasp! - remain stable? That would put us to sleep. Besides, one thing remains constant: his devotion to sOcialism. He will cOntrol all. Only his wording is changing (emphasis ours):
Every Wednesday night senior Obama aides gather for two hours to review
the latest polling and focus-group data to develop that packaging.
Health care reform yesterday, health insurance reform today, whatever, the goal remains the same. Increase pOwer by pandering to the peOple. Forget objective facts; focus on subjective beliefs. Tell the mOb what they want to hear so they reelect you. They won't remember what you said yesterday. They're too thrilled by the sounds of broken glass to care.
Posted by: kevin at August 08, 2009 03:28 PM (h9KHg)
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There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness. We must have felt what it is to die, Morrel, that we may appreciate the enjoyments of living. --The Count of Monte Cristo--
While our troops go out to defend our country, it is incumbent upon us to make the country worth defending. --Deskmerc--
Contrary to what you've just seen, war is neither glamorous nor fun. There are no winners, only losers. There are no good wars, with the following exceptions: The American Revolution, WWII, and the Star Wars Trilogy. --Bart Simpson--
If you want to be a peacemaker, you've gotta learn to kick ass. --Sheriff of East Houston, Superman II--
Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without an accordion. You just leave a lot of useless noisy baggage behind. --Jed Babbin--
Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality. --President John F. Kennedy--
War is a bloody, killing business. You've got to spill their blood, or they will spill yours. --General Patton--
We've gotta keep our heads until this peace craze blows over. --Full Metal Jacket--
Those who threaten us and kill innocents around the world do not need to be treated more sensitively. They need to be destroyed. --Dick Cheney--
The Flag has to come first if freedom is to survive. --Col Steven Arrington--
The purpose of diplomacy isn't to make us feel good about Eurocentric diplomatic skills, and having countries from the axis of chocolate tie our shoelaces together does nothing to advance our infantry. --Sir George--
I just don't care about the criticism I receive every day, because I know the cause I defend is right. --Oriol--
It's days like this when we're reminded that freedom isn't free. --Chaplain Jacob--
Bumper stickers aren't going to accomplish some of the missions this country is going to face. --David Smith--
The success of multilateralism is measured not merely by following a process, but by achieving results. --President Bush--
Live and act within the limit of your knowledge and keep expanding it to the limit of your life.
--John Galt--
First, go buy a six pack and swig it all down. Then, watch Ace Ventura. And after that, buy a Hard Rock Cafe shirt and come talk to me. You really need to lighten up, man.
--Sminklemeyer--
You've got to kill people, and when you've killed enough they stop fighting --General Curtis Lemay--
If we wish to be free, if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained -- we must fight! --Patrick Henry--
America has never been united by blood or birth or soil. We are bound by ideals that move us beyond our backgrounds, lift us above our interests and teach us what it means to be citizens. Every child must be taught these principles. Every citizen must uphold them. And every immigrant, by embracing these ideals, makes our country more, not less, American. --President George W. Bush--
are usually just cheerleading sessions, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing but a soothing reduction in blood pressure brought about by the narcotic high of being agreed with. --Bill Whittle
War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
--John Stuart Mill--
We are determined that before the sun sets on this terrible struggle, our flag will be recognized throughout the world as a symbol of freedom on the one hand and of overwhelming force on the other. --General George Marshall--
We can continue to try and clean up the gutters all over the world and spend all of our resources looking at just the dirty spots and trying to make them clean. Or we can lift our eyes up and look into the skies and move forward in an evolutionary way.
--Buzz Aldrin--
America is the greatest, freest and most decent society in existence. It is an oasis of goodness in a desert of cynicism and barbarism. This country, once an experiment unique in the world, is now the last best hope for the world.
--Dinesh D'Souza--
Recent anti-Israel protests remind us again of our era's peculiar alliance: the most violent, intolerant, militantly religious movement in modern times has the peace movement on its side. --James Lileks--
As a wise man once said: we will pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
Unless the price is too high, the burden too great, the hardship too hard, the friend acts disproportionately, and the foe fights back. In which case, we need a timetable.
--James Lileks--
I am not willing to kill a man so that he will agree with my faith, but I am prepared to kill a man so that he cannot force my compatriots to submit to his.
--Froggy--
You can say what you want about President Bush; but the truth is that he can take a punch. The man has taken a swift kick in the crotch for breakfast every day for 6 years and he keeps getting up with a smile in his heart and a sense of swift determination to see the job through to the best of his abilties.
--Varifrank--
In a perfect world, We'd live in peace and love and harmony with each oither and the world, but then, in a perfect world, Yoko would have taken the bullet.
--SarahBellum--
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free. --Ronald Reagan--
America is rather like life. You can usually find in it what you look for. It will probably be interesting, and it is sure to be large. --E.M. Forster--
Do not fear the enemy, for your enemy can only take your life. It is far better that you fear the media, for they will steal your HONOR. That awful power, the public opinion of a nation, is created in America by a horde of ignorant, self-complacent simpletons who failed at ditching and shoemaking and fetched up in journalism on their way to the poorhouse. --Mark Twain--
The Enlightenment was followed by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, which touched every European state, sparked vicious guerrilla conflicts across the Continent and killed millions. Then, things really turned ugly after the invention of soccer. --Iowahawk--
Every time I meet an Iraqi Army Soldier or Policeman that I haven't met before, I shake his hand and thank him for his service. Many times I am thanked for being here and helping his country. I always tell them that free people help each other and that those that truly value freedom help those seeking it no matter the cost. --Jack Army--
Right, left - the terms are useless nowadays anyway. There are statists, and there are individualists. There are pessimists, and optimists. There are people who look backwards and trust in the West, and those who look forward and trust in The World. Those are the continuums that seem to matter the most right now. --Lileks--
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
--Winston Churchill--
A man or a nation is not placed upon this earth to do merely what is pleasant and what is profitable. It is often called upon to carry out what is both unpleasant and unprofitable, but if it is obviously right it is mere shirking not to undertake it. --Arthur Conan Doyle--
A man who has nothing which he cares about more than he does about his personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the existing of better men than himself. --John Stuart Mill--
After the attacks on September 11, 2001, most of the sheep, that is, most citizens in America said, "Thank God I wasn't on one of those planes." The sheepdogs, the warriors, said, "Dear God, I wish I could have been on one of those planes. Maybe I could have made a difference." --Dave Grossman--
At heart I’m a cowboy; my attitude is if they’re not going to stand up and fight for what they believe in then they can go pound sand. --Bill Whittle--
A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. --Alexander Tyler--
By that time a village half-wit could see what generations of professors had pretended not to notice. --Atlas Shrugged--
I kept asking Clarence why our world seemed to be collapsing and everything seemed so shitty. And he'd say, "That's the way it goes, but don't forget, it goes the other way too." --Alabama Worley--
So Bush is history, and we have a new president who promises to heal the planet, and yet the jihadists don’t seem to have got the Obama message that there are no enemies, just friends we haven’t yet held talks without preconditions with.
--Mark Steyn--
"I had started alone in this journey called life, people started
gathering up on the way, and the caravan got bigger everyday." --Urdu couplet
The book and the sword are the two things that control the world. We either gonna control them through knowledge and influence their minds, or we gonna bring the sword and take their heads off. --RZA--
It's a daily game of public Frogger, hopping frantically to avoid being crushed under the weight of your own narcissism, banality, and plain old stupidity. --Mary Katharine Ham--
There are more instances of the abridgment of freedoms
of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. --James Madison--
It is in the heat of emotion that good people must remember to stand on principle. --Larry Elder--
Please show this to the president and ask him to remember the wishes of the forgotten man, that is, the one who dared to vote against him. We expect to be tramped on but we do wish the stepping would be a little less hard. --from a letter to Eleanor Roosevelt--
The world economy depends every day on some engineer, farmer, architect, radiator shop owner, truck driver or plumber getting up at 5AM, going to work, toiling hard, and producing real wealth so that an array of bureaucrats, regulators, and redistributors can manage the proper allotment of much of the natural largess produced. --VDH--
Parents are often so busy with the physical rearing of children that they miss the glory of parenthood, just as the grandeur of the trees is lost when raking leaves. --Marcelene Cox--
