DontAskSteve

Really?

dontasksteve — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 07:00:31 +0000

Some Observations on the 2012 Electiions

dontasksteve — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 06:46:50 +0000

Let’s face it…I am a Frickin Genius. I look at my post from last Spring, and I look positively psychic. I hear the calls for Obama to step down, bring Hillary back, we made a mistake, blah blah blah. Never has it been so apparent that we need to rely on our friends and family, because Dear Leader certainly isn’t making things any better while he’s on the golf course. And I appreciated that he called the rest of us lazy. Ms Antoinette would approve.

So, what exactly grounds for impeachment, anyways? Funneling money to your top contributors doesn’t do it, gunrunning down to Mexico and getting Americans killed doesn’t do it. Spending $10,000,000 this year on vacations seems dicey. How about taking over private car companies? I see the loss to the taxpayer is estimated to be $23,000,000,000. Executive Orders bypassing the Congress and Senate? That will be rich once a Republican president starts going roughshod over the Democrats. Oh, there will be much gnashing of teeth and rending of hair. Whatever.

I like Herman Cain. He got dealt the Chicago Shuffle. I don’t believe the accusations for a minute. What I figure happened here is Cain, being black, was Obama’s worst nightmare. It would cut a lot of the acid from the evening news. Plus, he has a track record (imagine that). So Democrats think “Damn, there goes the unified black vote, and independents aren’t going to choke on that hope and change from the last time out. We gotta smear him. Sure, it was in the nineties, and no, there’s no proof , but we gotta do something”. Send out the usual people – you know, the ones that no matter what President Unicorn does, and how bad it looks (57 states, walking into a glass door) they come up with some twisted logic to explain it all away. I thought sniffing glue was illegal.

And what’s up with Obama STILL trying to blame Bush for everything. It’s like a six year old in the Oval Office. Dude, you knew what the job was when you took it. Grow a set or step down. Jesus, that would make Joe hop off the trike, and God help me, it couldn’t be any worse.

So, 2012 will bring the worst Presidential pandering ever seen. Forget an overall plan – it will definitely be just to get votes. Or, he may step down and a credible candidate step up. I just don’t see his arrogance allowing that as an option.

The Republicans?

My earlier blog seems eerily prescient. And how I wish I was wrong. No to Bachmann – too much of a lightening rod. Perry seems to have shot himself in the foot, looked at it, and then reloaded. Cain needs to put the talks of harrassment behind him if he is going to stay. Gingrich has always been smart, and probably would destroy anyone in a debate. He’s very smart. But he has negatives. I like Ron Paul, but with him there is no middle ground, and that probably makes it difficult to get more mainstream voters. Santorum? Who? Not this election unless he, well he’d have to change an awful lot. Finally, Mitt. He’s the one that the liberal media love. They want him to be the nominee so badly that they will say anything they can to make it seem inevitable that he will be the nominee. And once there, the knives will come out. Mitt Romney looks like a chisel-jawed political model. And that’s the problem. I don’t trust him. He speaks well in debates, but I don’t like the packaging. And if he is the nominee, it will be portrayed at “rich white guy vs black incumbent president” and the issues will never be brought up in the conversation. If you don’t vote for Barack, why, You’re a Racist.

Where the Dem’s miscalculation might be is not understanding how tricked the independent voter feels. Not once have I heard an Independent or even a Democrat say anything positive about Obama first three years. One person said that he would rather have someone flipping coins in the White House; at least he’d be half right. That is a sad commentary on a man way in over his head.

So, the next year will be interesting and probably everyone will double their meds.

Last Thoughts: I loved Chris Christie’s quote about Obama this week: “What the hell are we paying him for?”

Collision of Hope vs. Reality?

dontasksteve — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 17:08:07 +0000

At some point in the near future, the liberal/left wing of the American populace is going to have to contemplate an awful couple of thoughts:

1. Is the President not all that smart?

2. Should Democrats support/run/nominate someone against Obama in the primaries so they have any kind of chance to retain the White House?

Scary thoughts. Let’s take a brief moment to examine each question.

Question: Is the President not as smart as he has been portrayed?

Answer: No one knows for sure. He is the only President that hasn’t released his grades, his thesis, nor anything that demonstrates (or supports) any intellectual capabilities. It’s hard to overstate how frightening this is – America may have someone who is completely dumbfounded by his position, with only his narcissism to keep him from collapsing under self-realization of his shortcomings.

Looking at his track record, it’s hard to imagine a more destructive force in American life. Unemployment is up, costs have doubled, international respect is gone, the Constitution is a grocery store coupon to be used when convenient, and only in one area is America number one – dumb ideas and food stamp recipients. Obama is routinely compared (unfavorably, I might add) to Jimmy Carter. How do you come in second to Number Last? Also competing in Obama comparisons are Nixon (enemies list) and Chauncy Gardiner (idiot gardener from “Being There”). Yikes. His list of mistakes and errors grow each day, and the general malaise of the public grows accordingly. Only by ingesting the most potent of drugs can the Obama supporter say with a straight face “I support him” because the alternative is worse (I was a moron). It takes the “Yes Sir, may I have another” mentality that separates the rational liberal from the terminal (Brains, must have brains!) of the politically unsound. For support, I offer http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/06/president_quixotes_legacy_confused_ill-educated_and_not_too_bright.html, http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2011/06/20/the_first_president_who039s_declined_to_lead_257751.html

Question: Should someone run against Obama for the 2012 Democrat candidacy?

Answer: Conventional wisdom says “No”. A sitting President is the strongest card in the hand the Democrat party is holding. An 8 of Diamonds, perhaps. Yes, it might beat a lower hand, (uninformed voters/gamblers will double-down) but what will the smart players do? Perhaps the unthinkable: Dump the probable losing hand and go for a re-deal.

Could this happen? The odds are long. Obama hasn’t hesitated (nor others in the Party) to claim Racism, which would surely be raised as a desperation tactic. Never mind that anyone who crushed both the economy and respect of the country would be handled twice as roughly.

Secondly, Obama is that most peculiar of people; he can spout nonsense authoritatively, and tell lies with total conviction. That makes for good sound bites, and the uneducated will take them for gospel. The list of examples is too long (GM made money for the taxpayer? “Kinetic Action”? “enemies list?” “Cash for Clunkers?”) that anyone who doubts this statement is too far along in being an Obama Zombie for any kind of rescue. But three years into the destruction of the economy, the Constitution, the business climate, and total class warfare has made it crystal-clear to those who aren’t about to get the plug pulled that Obama is a disaster for America.

There are two things that are required for this scenario to succeed: a reasonable Democrat candidate, and a bone-headed move by the Republicans. Who is reasonable for the Democrat party? Probably Hillary Clinton. She has the base, and compared to Obama, she seems like a level-headed pragmatist (with college transcripts, no less). She has distanced herself from the Obama fiasco, and seems like a singular voice of reason (how messed up is the country for this to happen?) within an dysfunctional Administration. She could pull it off, and probably has no love for the President for both personal and political reasons.

The Republicans are another matter. Like the Minnesota Vikings, they find a way to lose every season, regardless of their inherent strength. At the time of this writing, Mitt Romney is leading the pack of contenders. The man that provided the prototype of Obamacare, believes in Global Warming, and supports ethanol is the number one contender. It’s like every cynical independent voter’s worst nightmare. Double Down! Lack of conviction and spine! Rather than come out and say “I messed up” and “ethanol is worse than gasoline for pollution” , he panders to the uneducated to vote for “Anybody but Obama”. I don’t think a lantern jaw is enough this time for voters; they might actually look with a critical eye and say “I don’t think so” if provided with a more reasonable alternative.

So, will it happen? Doubtful. Could it? Sure. Hillary’s chance may not come again. Obama star is falling more (and faster) each day. Every round of golf played (75 so far) is a slap on the face of every voter. The Oval Office is looking more like a travel agency for the First Lady with each passing trip. And today, on the eve of our country’s founding, even the dullest among us can see the hypocrisy of Obama chastising the House about not being around for work while even as he gets in the helicopter to go to Martha’s Vineyard for yet another vacation (and probably more golf). If there is a God, perhaps he/she will provide us with a new President that we can respect, or at least respectfully disagree with. Or is that asking too much?

Crystal Ball for 2012

dontasksteve — Fri, 20 May 2011 18:42:01 +0000

May 20th, 2011

I was off a bit on my predictions for the 2008 election. Oh, I described how unqualified Obama was for the Presidency, I just had no idea that he would be so overwhelmingly bad. If Bush (either one) had done the things that Obama has, there would be rioting in the streets, possibly guaranteeing Democrats victory for the foreseeable future. Even the hard-core liberals are shocked and appalled. Ted Rall, as ardent as they come, (http://weaselzippers.us/2011/05/19/vile-lefty-ted-rall-cartoonist-pisses-and-moans-about-being-blacklisted-by-obamabots/) complains:

“I didn’t realize how besotted progressives were by Mr. Hopey Changey.

Obama lost me before Inauguration Day, when he announced cabinet appointments that didn’t include a single liberal.

It got worse after that: Obama extended and expanded Bush’s TARP giveaway to the banks; continued Bush’s spying on our phone calls; ignored the foreclosure crisis; refused to investigate, much less prosecute, Bush’s torturers; his healthcare plan was a sellout to Big Pharma; he kept Gitmo open; expanded the war against Afghanistan; dispatched more drone bombers; used weasel words to redefine the troops in Iraq as “non-combat”; extended the Bush tax cuts for the rich; claiming the right to assassinate U.S. citizens; most recently, there was the forced nudity torture of PFC Bradley Manning and expanding oil drilling offshore and on national lands.”

This doesn’t include Libya (which the President is required to get Congressional approval by today…but he’ll pass on that. He’s above the legal process), or Boeing, or the multiple times he has signed laws and then stated that he has no intention of honoring them, or why he is off to some party when a crisis has erupted. This is why people go crazy discussing politics with Liberals. It’s not that Ted Rall sees the light, but that so many others refuse to (see http://www.akdart.com/lib72.html) for some examples.

Yet for all this, the Republicans seem to want to careen into the same old pattern. Let’s drag out the old politicians, and let them run (again). They don’t seem to realize that people want someone who will lead them. They can’t figure out why voters respond to a strong vision, someone who says what they believe. So, what will happen in 2012?
Well, if the Republicans run Sarah Palin, Obama is in. I was appalled at how Democrats demonized her in 2008, showing complete hypocrisy regarding women. By any standard, she was more qualified than Obama to be President, and she wasn’t running for that position. Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, however, makes her look like a genius, and that’s very sad. But, if Palin has any sense of her surroundings, she will continue to be a lightening rod and not run, which will take away the Democrat’s emotional ties.

The same goes for Newt Gingrich and Michelle Bachman. They are both more likely to bring out the borderline independent voters for Democrats. Far too risky by any standard, as the independents swung the race to Obama in 2008. Mitt Romney’s albatross is the Mass. Health Care program. You can’t be for and against something. Remember what I said about being a leader? If Romney had come out and said “I made a huge mistake”, that would have been a leader. Politicians seem to think that they can never make a mistake, or change their mind about something. That’s how we get such mealy-mouthed excuses like “I mispoke” or some such.

Who then, could swing it for the Republicans? New Jersey’s Chris Christie is one. Barring some horrific mistakes, or something awful hiding in his past, the man has presence and seems deeply in tune with the American public. Unions, I’m sure, are digging frantically to find anything to stop him. But he has shown courage, as in the decision to stop the underground tunnel from New Jersey to New York. Democrats screamed about the lost jobs. He understood that continuing the tunnel would put New Jersey residents on the hook for $3 billion. Anyone who has looked at any government building projects knows how those costs balloon, and he made the courageous call. (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbmwrTc4bJg for his response the Sen. Schumer’s criticizing him for stopping the wasteful program)

Ron Paul is possibly the most ethical Representative in Congress. Ever. But the media demonizes him. All a voter really has to do is look at his writings and speeches to see past the media bias (http://www.ronpaul.com/). They are, to say the least, impressive. Herman Cain seems impressive, but it’s far too early. However, 2012 could be the year that Libertarians could do well, taking from both parties. Unfortunately, they draw more from Republicans than Democrats, and that could well mean an Obama win.

Who else? No one yet. Obama is bankrolling one billion dollars to keep his job ~~ruining~~ running the country. The media seems to spin stories about the Tea Party and how terrible they are, so much so that it’s now “common knowledge” that they are racist, uneducated rednecks. However, how many people have actually looked at what the guiding principles of the Tea Party are? For a peek, go to http://www.teapartypatriots.org/mission.aspx. Find something that you disagree with there, as opposed to being spoon-fed by the media.

We, as a country, have a momentous election coming up next year. I believe that it will determine how much further America will decline, or whether we have the courage to stop the “Change”.

Paul Krugman – New York Times Columnist; Inadvertent Humorist

dontasksteve — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 20:14:09 +0000

When I was young, and my father was still alive, he would tell me things with a dead serious face that were ridiculous. Down was up, water was made of sand, or the sky was green. He looked so deadpan that I doubted what I either knew, or what my eyes were telling me. He loved to tell tall tales as a way of making me think for myself, and I loved him for it, and have done the same to my children.

Fast forward: Two years ago (2008) I wrote ab0ut Paul Krugman, the Nobel winning economist that writes a column in the New York Times. I said that I thought he was funny in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way, as the statements and positions that he took seemed absurd. He couldn’t possibly be that far removed from reality. And in the interests of fairness, neither economics or math were my strong suit. It may be that he is too lofty and esoteric for my Middle American background. He seemed divorced from what we in the Midwest call “common sense”. You know, as in “water is wet” and “ice is cold” or “don’t play in a busy street”. How many kids have rolled their eyes when hearing that from their mothers? “Really, Ma? Don’t play where all the big cars are going fast? Huh, who’d of thunk it?”

Since then I have read his columns, first with disbelief, then with irritation. How could a person be so seemingly out of touch, and yet win the Nobel for economics? I didn’t have to wait long for the answer: President Obama, who has never held a “real” job, won the Nobel Prize for Peace, despite having done exactly nothing. An internet photo of a restaurant billboard making rounds at the time summed it up perfectly – “A Nobel Peace Prize with every order!”. What used to be an honor was now political toilet tissue. He won the Prize, not for what he had done, but for what he “was going to do”. Wow. I need to get to Stockholm to let them know that sometime in the future, I will invent a “Peace Ray”. But the prize money now will come in handy. Even Obama supporters were struggling to justify the award at the time. Those that did, despite the evidence, were not critical thinkers, but what has become known as “Obamabots”, the equivalent of a political zombie.

They say that the definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over, but expecting a different result. Mr. Krugman follows this formula perfectly. Not only does he seem to come up with the same old thought processes and expect different results, but he also wants to double-down on the losing ideas. Now, after two years of reading his columns, it has become apparent that he 1) doesn’t learn from his mistakes; 2) is incapable of thinking outside of a very narrow ideology; and 3) would be a good weatherman based on his track record. Except that weathermen (or meteorologists) are right 46% of the time, and I haven’t seen Paul Krugman right yet. My former boss said “even a blind pig finds a truffle once in a while” and “a broken clock is right twice a day”. My personal favorite is “Economists have predicted 47 of the last 3 recessions.” So you almost have to go out of your way to someone who is so slavish to an ideology that he ignores all evidence to the contrary and plows ahead into what appears to be some type of nonsensical thought process and then tries to convince others that those ideas make sense.

Don’t believe me? Here are some of the recent gems he has spouted.

1. “Discussions over – we need a second stimulus” Remember what I said about expecting a different result?

2. The Angry Rich – he argues against tax cuts with incomplete ideas, hoping (it didn’t work) that no one will notice that at the end of the day, his plan would trade $700 billion for $3 trillion in additional debt.

Even the media is becoming uncomfortable with him and his stances. Aug 6, 2010 … It really is time for the New York Times Ombudsperson to step in and stop Paul Krugman from perpetrating further intellectual fraud and…

According to the New York Times itself:

“Op-Ed columnist Paul Krugman has the disturbing habit of shaping, slicing and selectively citing numbers in a fashion that pleases his acolytes but leaves him open to substantive assaults…. some of Krugman’s enemies are every bit as ideological (and consequently unfair) as he is. But that doesn’t mean that their boss, publisher Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr., shouldn’t hold his columnists to higher standards.”

Thus wrote New York Times “public editor” Daniel Okrent in his column, his final one before resigning his post. There it is, right in the newspaper of record.

To be sure, Okrent could have gone much, much further in blowing the whistle on America’s most dangerous liberal pundit. He could have cited the dozens upon dozens of partisan distortions, uncorrected errors, deliberate misquotations, and flat-out lies that we’ve caught Krugman making over the years. For that matter he could have echoed what N. Gregory Mankiw, the universally respected former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, told Fortune in a recent interview — that Krugman “just make[s] stuff up.” Or is just dead wrong.

How about this gem?

In a July 14, 2008 op-ed in the New York Times, Krugman explained why Fannie and Freddie were blameless. “Partly that’s because regulators, responding to accounting scandals at the companies, placed temporary restraints on both Fannie and Freddie that curtailed their lending just as housing prices were really taking off,” he wrote. “Also, they didn’t do any subprime lending, because they can’t: the definition of a subprime loan is precisely a loan that doesn’t meet the requirement, imposed by law, that Fannie and Freddie buy only mortgages issued to borrowers who made substantial down payments and carefully documented their income. So whatever bad incentives the implicit federal guarantee creates have been offset by the fact that Fannie and Freddie were and are tightly regulated with regard to the risks they can take. You could say that the Fannie-Freddie experience shows that regulation works.”

Oops.

“Critics were quick to point out that Krugman had his facts wrong. As Charles Calomiris, a professor at Columbia University, and Peter Wallison of the American Enterprise Institute (and member of the financial crisis inquiry commission) explained, “Here Krugman demonstrates confusion about the law (which did not prohibit subprime lending by the GSEs), misunderstands the regulatory regime under which they operated (which did not have the capacity to control their risk-taking), and mismeasures their actual subprime exposures (which he wrongly states were zero).” (Foreign Policy)

“THE “PUBLIC EDITOR” GOES PUBLIC ON KRUGMAN CORRECTION… New York Times “public editor” Byron Calame is in print with the fact that the paper’s columnist corrections policy is not being observed with respect to Paul Krugman’s admitted errors…”

Or this, from last weeks column: “Realistically, though, Republicans aren’t going to have the power to enact their true agenda any time soon — if ever. Remember, the Bush administration’s attack on Social Security was a fiasco, despite its large majority in Congress — and it actually increased Medicare spending. “ This “attack” was allowing people to take a portion of their Social Security deduction and control and invest it however they saw fit. The problem with this is that the government does not want people to have any control of how their money is spent (or not spent, as the case may be). The government resists any notion of the people controlling their own money and future.

I wrote this back in September of 2010. I didn’t publish it at the time, as procrastination can sometimes save you from doing something foolish. Not this time, though. The articles from Mr. Krugman continue into fantasy, sweeping away any thoughts that I had about his being open-minded. He follows his ideology – I’ll give him that. But when everyone knows what’s going on (the economy tanking, unemployment rising, monstrous over-reaching government) it might be better to acknowledge those things than to tell everyone that the sky is green. At least Dad knew he was kidding.

It’s A Mad World – Racism

dontasksteve — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 16:01:51 +0000

Imagine the following organizations: National Association for the Advancement of Caucasian People; The White Congressional Caucus; The White Voters Association. Pretty racist, don’t you think? Except that those organizations exist, but with the word “Black” inserted instead of “White”. We have become a nation that, far from being colorblind, we have become color sensitive. A videotape made of the St. Louis NAACP defending SEIU beatings of a black man because he wasn’t black enough. The link goes to the full story.

http://gatewaypundit.firstthings.com/2010/07/caught-on-tape-racist-naacp-leader-says-kenneth-gladney-not-black-enough-to-protect-hes-an-uncle-tom-video/

The truth is that any reference to color is racist. There shouldn’t be organizations allowed to be for or exclude any racial group. Either we allow it wholeheartedly, or we need to condemn it. Those who defend having “some” racist organizations, but not other are either deluded, deceptive, or demeaning to their own and others. By claiming victim status, they are saying that they can’t compete or succeed, and pollute those of their own race into thinking that they need special treatment. I disagree. We have come a long way in this country, and those types of claims are holdovers from another era. Does anyone really think that if and when blacks become the dominant political force that these institutions will disband? Not a chance.

We need to accept that people succeed on their own merit. We have a President, not a black President. We have the best-in-the-world golfer, not a best-in-the-world-black golfer. Any reference to skin color is degrading and racist, and we deceive and belittle ourselves to believe anything different.

The Daily Kos – Why Liberals Should Love the Second Amendment

dontasksteve — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 03:48:05 +0000

Why liberals should love the Second Amendment

by Kaili Joy Gray aka Angry Mouse

Sun Jul 04, 2010 at 10:00:03 AM PDT

Liberals love the Constitution.

Ask anyone on the street. They’ll tell you the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a liberal organization. During the dark days of the Bush Administration, membership doubled because so many Americans feared increasing restrictions on their civil liberties. If you were to ask liberals to list their top five complaints about the Bush Administration, and they would invariably say the words “shredding” and “Constitution” in the same sentence. They might also add “Fourth Amendment” and “due process.” It’s possible they’ll talk about “free speech zones” and “habeus corpus.”

There’s a good chance they will mention, probably in combination with several FCC-prohibited adjectives, former Attorney Generals John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales.

And while liberals certainly do not argue for lawlessness, and will acknowledge the necessity of certain restrictions, it is generally understood that liberals fight to broadly interpret and expand our rights and to question the necessity and wisdom of any restrictions of them.

Liberals can quote legal precedent, news reports, and exhaustive studies. They can talk about the intentions of the Founders. They can argue at length against the tyranny of the government. And they will, almost without exception, conclude the necessity of respecting, and not restricting, civil liberties.

Except for one: the right to keep and bear arms.

When it comes to discussing the Second Amendment, liberals check rational thought at the door. They dismiss approximately 40% of American households that own one or more guns, and those who fight to protect the Second Amendment, as “gun nuts.” They argue for greater restrictions. And they pursue these policies at the risk of alienating voters who might otherwise vote for Democrats.

And they do so in a way that is wholly inconsistent with their approach to all of our other civil liberties.

Those who fight against Second Amendment rights cite statistics about gun violence, as if such numbers are evidence enough that our rights should be restricted. But Chicago and Washington DC, the two cities from which came the most recent Supreme Court decisions on Second Amendment rights, had some of the most restrictive laws in the nation, and also some of the highest rates of violent crime. Clearly, such restrictions do not correlate with preventing crime.

So rather than continuing to fight for greater restrictions on Second Amendment rights, it is time for liberals to defend Second Amendment rights as vigorously as they fight to protect all of our other rights. Because it is by fighting to protect each right that we protect all rights.

And this is why:

(Reasons below the fold)

No. 1: The Bill of Rights protects individual rights.

If you’ve read the Bill of Rights — and who among us hasn’t? — you will notice a phrase that appears in nearly all of them: “the people.”

First Amendment:

…the right of the people peaceably to assemble

Second Amendment:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Fourth Amendment:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects…

Ninth Amendment:

…shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people

Tenth Amendment:

…are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.

Certainly, no good liberal would argue that any of these rights are collective rights, and not individual rights. We believe that the First Amendment is an individual right to criticize our government.

We would not condone a state-regulated news organization. We certainly would not condone state regulation of religion. We talk about “separation of church and state,” although there is no mention of “separation of church and state” in the First Amendment.

But we know what they meant. The anti-Federalists refused to ratify the Constitution without a Bill of Rights; they intended for our rights to be interpreted expansively.

We believe the Founders intended for us to be able to say damn near anything we want, protest damn near anything we want, print damn near anything we want, and believe damn near anything we want. Individually, without the interference or regulation of government.

And yet, despite the recent Heller and McDonald decisions, liberals stumble at the idea of the Second Amendment as an individual right. They take the position that the Founders intended an entirely different meaning by the phrase “the right of the people” in the Second Amendment, even though they are so positively clear about what that phrase means in the First Amendment.

If we can agree that the First Amendment protects not only powerful organizations such as the New York Times or MSNBC, but also the individual commenter on the internet, the individual at the anti-war rally, the individual driving the car with the “Fuck Bush” bumper sticker, can we not also agree that the Second Amendment’s use of “the people” has the same meaning?

But it’s different! The Second Amendment is talking about the militia! If you want to “bear arms,” join the National Guard!

Right?

Wrong.

The United States Militia Code:

(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.

(b) The classes of the militia are—
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.

Aside from the fact that the National Guard did not exist in the 1700s, the term “militia” does not mean “National Guard,” even today. The code clearly states that two classes comprise the militia: the National Guard and Naval Militia, and everyone else.

Everyone else. Individuals. The People.

The Founders well understood that the militia is the people, for it was not only the right but the obligation of all citizens to protect and preserve their liberty and to defend themselves from the tyranny of the government.

And fighting against the tyranny of the government is certainly a liberal value.

No. 2: We oppose restrictions to our civil liberties.

All of our rights, even the ones enumerated in the Bill of Rights, are restricted. You can’t shout “Fire!” in a crowd. You can’t threaten to kill the president. You can’t publish someone else’s words as your own. We have copyright laws and libel laws and slander laws. We have the FCC to regulate our radio and television content. We have plenty of restrictions on our First Amendment rights.

But we don’t like them. We fight them. Any card-carrying member of the ACLU will tell you that while we might agree that certain restrictions are reasonable, we keep a close eye whenever anyone in government gets an itch to pass a new law that restricts our First Amendment rights. Or our Fourth. Or our Fifth, Sixth, or Eighth.

We complain about free speech zones. The whole country is supposed to be a free speech zone, after all. It says so right in the First Amendment.

But when it comes further restrictions on the manufacture, sale, or possession of firearms, liberals are not even silent; they are vociferously in favor of such restrictions.

Suddenly, overly broad restrictions are “reasonable.” The Chicago and Washington D.C. bans on handguns — all handguns — is reasonable, even though the Supreme Court has now said otherwise.

Would we tolerate such a sweeping regulation of, say, the Thirteenth Amendment?

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

What if a member of Congress — say, a Republican from a red state in the south — were to introduce a bill that permits enslaving black women? Would we consider that reasonable? It’s not like the law would enslave all people, or even all black people. Just the women. There’s no mention of enslaving women in the Thirteenth Amendment. Clearly, when Lincoln wanted to free the slaves, he didn’t intend to free all the slaves. And we restrict all the other Amendments, so obviously the Thirteenth Amendment is not supposed to be absolute. What’s the big deal?

Except that such an argument is ridiculous, of course. Liberals would take to the streets, send angry letters to their representatives in Washington, organize marches, call progressive radio programs to quote, verbatim, the Thirteenth Amendment. Quite bluntly, although not literally, liberals would be up in arms.

And yet…A ban on all handguns seems reasonable to many liberals. Never mind that of 192 million firearms in America, 65 million — about one third — are handguns.

Such a narrow interpretation of this particular right is inconsistent with the otherwise broad interpretation of the Bill of Rights. And just as conservatives weaken their own arguments about protecting the Second Amendment when they will not fight as vigilantly for protecting all the others, so too do liberals weaken their arguments for civil liberties, when they pick and choose which civil liberties they deem worthy of defense.

No. 3: It doesn’t matter that it’s not 1776 anymore.

When the Founders drafted the Bill of Rights, they could not have imagined machine guns. Or armor-piercing bullets (which are not available to the public anyway, and are actually less lethal than conventional ammunition). Or handguns that hold 18 rounds. A drive-by shooting, back in 1776, would have been a guy on a horse with a musket.

Of course, they couldn’t have imagined the internet, either. Or 24-hour cable news networks. Or talk radio. When they drafted the First Amendment, did they really mean to protect the rights of Bill O’Reilly to make incredibly stupid, and frequently inaccurate, statements for an entire hour, five nights a week?

Actually, yes. They did. Bill O’Reilly bilious ravings, and Keith Olbermann’s Special Comments, and the insipid chatter of the entire cast of the Today show are, and were intended to be, protected by the First Amendment.

Liberals are supposed to understand that just because we don’t agree with something doesn’t mean it is not protected. At least when it comes to the First Amendment. And one’s personal dislike of guns should be no better a reason for fighting against the Second Amendment than should one’s personal dislike of Bill O’Reilly justify fighting against the First Amendment.

And yet, when discussing the Second Amendment, liberals become obtuse in their literalism. The Second Amendment does not protect the right to own all guns. Or all ammunition. It doesn’t protect the right of the people as individuals.

Liberals will defend the right of Cindy Sheehan to wear an anti-war T-shirt, even though the First Amendment says nothing about T-shirts.

They will defend the rights of alleged terrorists to a public trial, even though the Founders certainly could not have imagined a world in which terrorists would plot to blow up building with airplanes.

But we do not quibble about the methods by which we practice our First Amendment rights because methodology is not the point. Red herring arguments about types of ammunition or magazine capacity or handguns versus rifles are just that — red herrings. They distract us from the underlying purpose of that right — to ensure a free society that can hold its government accountable. The Second Amendment is no more about guns than the First Amendment is about quill pens.

No. 4: It doesn’t matter if you can use it.

Fine, you say. Have your big, scary guns. It’s not like you actually stand a chance in fighting against the United States government. The Army has bigger, badder weapons than any private citizen. Your most deadly gun is no match for their tanks, their helicopters, their atom bombs. Maybe two hundred years ago, citizens stood a chance in a fight against government, but not today. The Second Amendment is obsolete.

Tell that to the Iraqi “insurgents” who are putting up a pretty good fight against our military might with fairly primitive weapons.

The Second Amendment is obsolete?

What other rights might be considered obsolete in today’s day and age?

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

When was the last time a soldier showed up at your door and said, “I’ll be staying with you for the indefinite future”?

It’s probably been a while. But of course, were it to happen, you’d dust off your Third Amendment and say, “I don’t think so, pal.”

And you’d be right.

What about the Twenty-Sixth Amendment? How much use does that get?

The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

We all know the youth vote is typically pretty abysmal. Those lazy kids can barely get out of bed before noon, let alone get themselves to the voting booth. If they’re not going to use their Twenty-Sixth Amendment rights, shouldn’t we just delete the damn thing altogether?

Hell no. And this is why liberals work so hard to get out and rock the vote — to encourage citizens to exercise their rights. That is our obligation as citizens, to protect against the government infringing upon our rights by making full use of them.

And yet, when it comes to the Second Amendment, liberals do not fight to protect that right. Instead them demand more laws. Regulate, regulate, regulate — until the Second Amendment is nearly regulated out of existence because no one needs to have a gun anyway.

And that, sadly, is the biggest mistake of all.

No. 5: The Second Amendment is about revolution.

In no other country, at no other time, has such a right existed. It is not the right to hunt. It is not the right to shoot at soda cans in an empty field. It is not even the right to shoot at a home invader in the middle of the night.

It is the right of revolution.

Let me say that again: It is the right of revolution.

Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government.

To alter or abolish the government. These are not mild words; they are powerful. They are revolutionary.

The Founders might never have imagined automatic weapons. But they probably also never imagined a total ban on handguns either.

We talk about the First Amendment as a unique and revolutionary concept — that we have the right to criticize our government. Does it matter whether we do so while standing on a soapbox on the corner of the street or on a blog? No. Because the concept, not the methodology, is what matters.

And the Second Amendment is no different. It is not about how much ammunition is “excessive” or what types of guns are and are not permissible. Liberals cling to such minutia at the expense of understanding and appreciating the larger concept that underlies this right.

So.

What is the point? Is this a rallying cry for liberals to rush right out and purchase a gun? Absolutely not. Guns are dangerous when used by people who are not trained to use them, just as cars are dangerous when driven by people who have not been taught how to drive.

No, this is a rallying cry for the Bill of Rights — for all of our rights.

This is an appeal to every liberal who says, “I just don’t like guns.”

This is an appeal to every liberal who says, “No one needs that much ammunition.”

This is an appeal to every liberal who says, “That’s not what the Founders meant.”

This is an appeal to every liberal who supports the ACLU.

This is an appeal to every liberal who has complained about the Bush Administration’s trading of our civil liberties for the illusion of greater security. (I believe I’ve seen a T-shirt or two about Benjamin Franklin’s thoughts on that.)

This is an appeal to every liberal who believes in fighting against the abuses of government, against the infringement of our civil liberties, and for the greater expansion of our rights.

This is an appeal to every liberal who never wants to lose another election to Republicans because they have successfully persuaded the voters that Democrats will not protect their Second Amendment rights.

This is an appeal to liberals, not merely to tolerate the Second Amendment, but to embrace it. To love it and defend it and guard it as carefully as you do all the others.

Because we are liberals. And fighting for our rights — for all of our rights, for all people — is what we do.

Because we are revolutionaries.

A Very Funny Website – textsfromlastnight.com

dontasksteve — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 17:15:28 +0000

For those of us with that were born before 1980, this website might be a shock. On the other hand, it’s good insight to the texting phenomenon. And, if you follow the link to the “Worst” section, there are truly hilarious texts.

A sample of the texts (from what area code):

(603):

i just woke up i smell like fire, i have bruises on both knees and one elbow, i have a lighter and nip of smirnoff blueberry in my bed, rug burn on one hip and about 12 pics of you and me on my camera-this needs to stop happening

(508):

yea ive got to shower which is going to be painful given the skin burns from the blowup obstacle course races last night

Or this one:

(631):

i just woke up at 8pm naked in my bed, with a fresh haircut. I wonder what barber i went to.

john galt post – permission pending…

dontasksteve — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 17:06:22 +0000

http://www.whoisjohngalt.com/2009/04/the-proper-size-of-government.html

Here is an outstanding article – please visit this website above:

the proper size of government

Allow me to present a maxim you probably already know:

Liberals and conservatives disagree on the proper size of government.

Now, most people are probably inclined to agree with this, but it makes a very dangerous assumption — specifically, that government can ever be big enough for liberals.

When you debate the role of government with a liberal, it can be a lot like ordering lunch with a very hungry friend after you’ve agreed to split the check. He’s going to order a lot more than you, and he’s going to demand that you pay your “fair share.” This is probably an adequate way of rationalizing it if you need to explain why you shouldn’t split checks with friends, or why it’s important to you that your friend order from the lunch menu and skip the Bananas Foster.

But, strategically-speaking, this approach never addresses the real problem: your friend’s eating disorder.

Try this exercise: Set the way-back machine to 1975, and imagine offering the liberals a truce. Tell them you’ll draw the line at $3 Trillion in 2009 dollars if they’ll agree to draw the line there. (And don’t worry, even after adjusting for inflation that’s still bigger than the libs’ wildest dreams.)

My point is that we already have liberals’ dream government. Just a couple of days ago, the President boasted of trying to reduce government by $100,000,000, which turned out to be less than .003% (.0000286) of the budget. I heard someone describe it as equivalent to cutting back a household budget by one cup of coffee per year. It’s not that the cut was so small, but just how large the government is that it can so dwarf a hundred million dollars.

Recessions are all the more noteworthy because they are uncommon. The fact is that, over time, our economy grows consistently. And despite liberal complaints about tax cuts, federal revenue has hovered pretty steadily at around 22-23% of the GDP, IIRC. Since the government can be measured as a fixed percentage of a growing economy, there’s already no limit to how big it will get. And still, this is not enough for the libs.

Naturally, this leads to the next question: Then just how big is a big enough percentage for the libs? What percentage of the economy should the government be to be “correctly” sized?

And if you ask that question, you’re still not getting it: Such common sense does not apply here — we’re talking about a mental disorder. There is no satisfactory percentage for libs. Government does not get any fixed percentage of the economy; it cannot be limited. They want it all.

What the liberals ultimately seek is an economic hierarchy where nobody is poor, where incentives are preserved just enough to make producers want to work harder, and where all growth is funneled into raising an arbitrary poverty line that nobody sinks below. It’s a perpetual motion machine; something of a big, growing snake swallowing itself by the tail just slowly enough that it never digests one of its own vital organs. It’s not a dream — it’s a fantasy.

Fortunately for us, the Constitution is a little more rational than liberals. You can argue about the correct scope of government, but the Constitution is unambiguous about limiting the government to that scope, holding the government to its constitutional boundaries.

We need to step back. I don’t want to just hold off the libs’ expansion of government, and settle for this ever-expanding fixed-percentage Republican expansion of government. That’s based on one of their premises, and we need to reject it instead of hiding behind it. Government’s not just too big as it is, it’s already got too much momentum for our freedom to endure.

I want someone to put a rope around what government should be doing, and get a cost estimate for that. And then I want a budget that pays for that government — whatever it costs, not as some percentage of whatever we make.

And when the libs refuse to even draw that line, I don’t want to hear their excuses, and I sure as hell don’t want to hear any apologies from our side! Liberals’ problem is not that there isn’t enough government, it’s that there’s no such thing as enough government for liberals. That’s a disease, and what I want — what’s needed — is intervention. Somebody’s got to save the damned Golden Goose.

That’s the John Galt Line.

Are We Free?

dontasksteve — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 19:36:55 +0000

There is nothing like having to explain things to your children to make you think about what you are saying. The question was brought up as to whether we, as USA citizens, are the free people that we claim to be. I believe in the Socratic method of discussion – rather than take a point of view, you jump back and forth between positions to winnow down what you believe. My points of comparison were today versus one hundred years ago. It eliminated anything that would have been developed naturally, or at least it would be arguable that something may have been developed sooner or later, depending on what you believe. So…one hundred years ago:

No Income Taxes
You owned Your Body
You owned your property
You owned your mineral rights
Money was based on the Gold Standard (it fluctuated with the price of Gold, and not subject to inflation)
Citizens could carry guns anywhere – the right to self defense was considered inviolate
No ID or licenses of any sort other than Marriage
You only paid taxes on what you bought
Government was relatively small – a small fraction of what it is today
No passports
No IRS
A strong belief in building yourself up, self reliance
Honor, if not, you were a scoundrel

On the negative side:

No government safety net; you relied on family or the kindness of others
None of the government safety industries (FDA, EPA, etc.)

If you think about it, we have become (and are becoming) less free every day. Try to grab a shotgun, and travel from state to state and see where you end up. Jail, most likely. Try to travel without a state issued ID. Start paying for things with gold or silver. Get rid of your bank account; don’t pay the 40%+ in taxes. As the old French mover and shaker Robespierre said “Have a man write six sentences, and I will convict him of something”. Most of the populace just wants their remote control for the TV. They don’t want to think, or be involved. When the Founders created this Nation, they considered making limitations on who could vote – understanding that the mob mentality of Democracy would, if given the chance, vote to take away from those who succeeded. As a compromise, this was removed. We have “graduated” from John Adams saying “I can see no reason to take money from one group of people, and giving it to another” to government benefits as a “Right”.

Each step is a slippery slope. I believe if the Founders looked at us today, they would be shocked and appalled. One by one, rights are removed, whether the Kelo decision, some other that the Government has decided is Good for Us, or “For the Children”. Each is a lie designed to slice away our independence, and our freedom. Think about it, and decide where you stand.