Spyral Notebook

Another WIBDI Moment

2010-02-28T17:30:00.003-05:00

Imagine the howls of derision if Bush had said this...

Maybe if he had said it in "Austrian" it would have been more clear.

Nice Hair

2010-02-08T18:39:00.002-05:00

Quote of the Day

2010-02-08T00:46:00.001-05:00

Reagan wins: DC shut down on his birthday….

Fun Instapundit Headline

2010-02-02T23:17:00.000-05:00

RAHM EMANUEL COMPARES DEMOCRATS TO RETARDED PEOPLE, then apologizes to retarded people.

What the iPad May Be About

2010-01-29T19:44:00.000-05:00

The iPad, then, is a transition to a future when, in Apple's mind, multitouch is so good that we no longer need anything but a screen. Whether that's an appealing place for you or something that sounds dreadful, Apple obviously has a vision of the future for which they're smartly and methodically laying groundwork. And once the text input problem is solved (hyper-accurate handwriting or speech recognition, perhaps?), you can bet that's the future we'll have.

A Word from the Old Pro

2009-09-15T18:53:00.003-04:00

“This is a five-spiral crash, boys.”

Bush speaks... sort of. Through the words of a staffer, anyway. But he pretty much gets it all right. The McCain candidacy was a mess from day one. How he got as far as he did, I will never know.

Sue Lloyd

2009-09-10T20:35:00.000-04:00

Tom Tom for iPhone

2009-08-23T22:20:00.001-04:00

Death of a Salesman

2009-08-22T21:40:00.002-04:00

Being president isn't easy. A candidate can get away with speeches that are glib and vague. A president can't. "It's easy to sell ice cream," says Don Stewart, the spokesman for Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell. "It's hard to sell rum raisin ice cream." Obama's problem is he hasn't learned the difference.

Do You Wanna Date My Avatar

2009-08-22T01:46:00.000-04:00

There's an App for That!

2009-08-14T23:43:00.000-04:00

Simone Signoret

2009-08-14T23:04:00.002-04:00

The Singularity Film

2009-08-13T20:53:00.000-04:00

Paula Prentiss

2009-06-16T21:29:00.002-04:00

The New Green Zone

2009-06-12T09:15:00.001-04:00

"They want the freedom to have union leaders speak for them and the opportunity to pursue wealth regardless of the corporate balance sheet," he said. "They want the kind of safety and security that comes from knowing you'll always have a job, despite the ongoing threat posed by the fickle consumer."

In the Loop

2009-06-10T23:38:00.002-04:00

Watch the last five seconds of this trailer for the what is surely the best line of the movie.

Ya.... Me Too!

2009-06-10T23:22:00.001-04:00

"Sarah Palin should send her husband Todd on the show instead.
I'd watch that."

Senta Berger

2009-06-09T21:16:00.003-04:00

A Must Read from VDH

2009-06-07T10:56:00.000-04:00

In short, Obama reminds me a little of myself–at 26.

Hockey Sticks (Real and Imagined)

2009-06-07T08:52:00.004-04:00

It looks like the Democrats finally found a hockey stick graph that works.

Unlike the completely discredited Global Warming graph that was supposed to show a HUGE increase in global temperatures, this one depicts the HUGE increase in unemployment since Obama accomplished his ginormous transfer of wealth from the private to the public sector.

What a surprise.

OK, so let's be honest. Is all this unemployment due directly to Obama's policies? No. We are on our way out of a very deep recession. Unemployment would naturally rise at this point in the recovery.

(Remember the screaming MSM "jobless recovery" headlines for months during the recovery of 2003? Don't expect to see anything like that now, but you get the point. Ed: Wanna play WIBDI?)

Second question. Did the "Stimulus Package" create the 3 Million jobs Obama claimed it would and help shield us from our unemployment pain? Of course not.

Transferring wealth from the private sector to the public sector creates unemployment (see Europe). Only liberal politicians think otherwise. And they have, shall we say, an incentive to believe the wholly discredited fiscal spending clap trap of Keynsian economics.

Hell, even if government spending could get into the system quickly enough to impact unemployment (which, of course it cannot), the Obama spending package targets politically sensitive sectors of the economy, not ones suffering high unemployment rates.

It's a bit silly to think that truck company dispatchers are suddenly going to become solar panel engineers at "green" manufacturing boutiques. Or lawn care "specialists" are going to easily transfer their skills to eco-transport companies. Apparently that's a level of detail our compassionate leaders didn't consider when ramming a $700 Billion spending bill through congress in what, a week? (Which, of course, none of them even read!)

Democrats, being politicians first and economists, well never, can hardly understand the signals they have sent the business community. Obamacrats sit in their plush offices contemplating macro indicators and wondering why, after pouring massive liquidity into the economy, investment hasn't taken off.

The reason, of course, is that business people know that inflation is on the way and that it will undermine the value of any investments made today. The impact of the "Stimulus Package" was immediate, all right. It made business fearful of adding new capacity.

The wonderful thing about capitalism is that the rules never change. If you try to manage the economy using methods that don't fit the rule set, it comes around behind you and takes a big bite out of your butt.

For instance, if you borrow massively in a single (simple) -minded effort to move a politically sensitive unemployment number, the economy reacts with an expectation of inflation which stifles investment and creates higher unemployment. In policy circles, this is known as the Law of Unintended Consequences.

In other circles (mine, for instance), it is known as the "No Shit Rule of Basic Economics".

The Key Question

2009-06-01T23:42:00.004-04:00

"Suppose the deal announced today were the only possible pre-packaged bankruptcy, and your choice was to take it or allow GM to liquidate now. What would you do?"

Liquidate.

But read the whole (long) thing if you want to understand what was actually announced today.

Plus, this... as in "here we go again, just like the Chrysler deal, wrecking 150 years of bankruptcy law" (since one William C. Bullit set its foundation in law).

"The deal is unfair to unsecured creditors, because they get a worse deal than someone standing behind them in line (the UAW’s VEBA). It has nothing to do with who those parties are (labor vs. creditors). It is about the importance of maintaining a stable and predictable set of rules to govern the capital structure of a firm, and the value that stability creates for firms’ ability to raise capital. All these arguments boil down to the cardinal rule of waiting in line for the kindergarten bus: it’s not fair to cut in line. If that rule is broken too often, chaos ensues."

Cars Get the O'Rourke Treatment (QOTD)

2009-05-31T09:23:00.002-04:00

But cars didn’t shape our existence; cars let us escape with our lives. We’re way the heck out here in Valley Bottom Heights and Trout Antler Estates because we were at war with the cities. We fought rotten public schools, idiot municipal bureaucracies, corrupt political machines, rampant criminality and the pointy-headed busybodies. Cars gave us our dragoons and hussars, lent us speed and mobility, let us scout the terrain and probe the enemy’s lines. And thanks to our cars, when we lost the cities we weren’t forced to surrender, we were able to retreat.

Unlike, for instance, our counterparts in Brussels. It now becomes more and more clear why the car is the enemy.

Whack-a-Mole

2009-05-29T20:34:00.004-04:00

“In Spain that’s 100% legal.”

It's rough being the RIAA these days. You knock one cool service down and another pops up in its place a week later. Worse than that, the new site works even better.

One guy in his living room can do what the nets take months to accomplish with sites like Hulu. It's tough being in the entertainment distribution business these days.

Update: But just to be fair, the new Hulu desktop software is pretty cool. If you have your computer linked up to a Hi-def monitor (... of course), it snaps open quickly and works better (IMHO) than most of the standard internet TV programs (listening Microsoft?). Video quality is OK, but not as good as the standard .avi file or streaming HiDef (like MLB). So... torrents still rule.

Yes, of course...

2009-05-29T17:17:00.003-04:00

... Cornyn is correct. Calling people racists is bad manners and mostly pretty stupid.

But I have two questions.

First, why is it always OK for Democrats to call Republicans racist, but warrants a headline from CNN when it happens in reverse? In my estimation Republicans are more color blind in their policies than Democrats, which would lead one to believe that they are less apt to account for race in their decision making (as would be "racist").

Second, do you think CNN would interview a Democrat politician if another Democrat called a Republican a "racist"? Of course not. There wouldn't be room for anything else on their web site (OK, I exaggerate. But it felt good writing it.)

Some of the least racist, most color blind institutions in America are dominated by conservatives. Like the US military. Like corporate America. Like the South, for that matter.

The places that account for race for admission and advancement are more often than not dominated by liberals... academia and government, for instance.

The media twist on issues of race is positively Kafkaesque. What is, is not. And what is not, is.

So please, spare me the faux outrage at Rush and Newt. I'll start worrying about punishing those two fat white guys when my liberal friends stop calling me a racist because I support low taxes!

Nothing More Need Be Said

2009-05-28T08:24:00.002-04:00

Our Betters Award Themselves

2009-05-27T19:32:00.003-04:00

"Katie had the right stuff to do that game-changing interview," Helen said. "After that, the ballgame was over."

Helen gave a dramatic pause, then said: "She saved the country."

Helen got a standing ovation, from everybody.

The sickly corpse that was once a vibrant free media in America as seen by an outsider.

It's as if they are so obsessed with themselves that they cannot see the end has already come. Newsweek magazine. The New York Times. CBS News. When was the last time that anyone actually paid for one of those products?

Hell, you don't even see Newsweek in the dentist's office anymore, let alone on the magazine rack.

The New York Times looks like a lonely relic from the past in its wire basket next to the door at my grocery store. Yesterday, I notice just three lonely copies of the grossly paired down broadsheet gathering dust. They were the same three that were there earlier in the day.

And CBS News. Having given up on TV years ago, I tried to watch it on the free download site Miro. The format wedged between Denture Grip and Polydent advertisements seemed like something out of ancient history. Has Fox News really made me intolerant of any TV format that isn't designed to be consumed in three minutes or less? I think so.

But still these dinosaurs of yesteryear, apparently comfortable in a timeless bubble, continue to congratulate themselves on their feeble part in bringing us 1930's style socialism. The only hope is that when the whole thing comes crashing down, it will be like a stake in the heart of this crowd.

It will come none too soon.

I Find This Somewhat Disgusting

2009-05-27T15:51:00.002-04:00

I wish it would it were not on every damn blog feed I read!

Whose Eager Staff?

2009-05-27T12:55:00.004-04:00

Cheeky bastard:

So like parents with marriageable offspring, news bosses are both pushing forward and pulling back, fearful of looking out of date by reminding their eager staff about the danger of going too far.

Fifty years ago the reporter would have been fired for writing that sentence. Not so much today. But read the article. Interesting thoughts on Twitter and journalism.

How Many Times... Mr. Speaker!

2009-05-26T23:42:00.003-04:00

The Maryland state revenue office says it's "way too early" to tell how many millionaires moved out of the state when the tax rates rose. But no one disputes that some rich filers did leave. It's easier than the redistributionists think. Christopher Summers, president of the Maryland Public Policy Institute, notes: "Marylanders with high incomes typically own second homes in tax friendlier states like Florida, Delaware, South Carolina and Virginia. So it's easy for them to change their residency."

All of this means that the burden of paying for bloated government in Annapolis will fall on the middle class. Thanks to the futility of soaking the rich, these working families will now pay Mr. O'Malley's "fair share."

Sorry for the obscure Howie Carr reference in the title, but jeez, how many times do governments have to fail at soaking the rich before they figure out it doesn't work. Sometimes I think you have to be an economic idiot to get elected to public office.

Only in France

2009-05-26T00:13:00.001-04:00

Qu'est-ce qui pourrait éventuellement aller mal?

More on Happiness

2009-05-22T17:18:00.001-04:00

Nothing is worse for happiness than a cultivated sense of entitlement.

75 Movies Every Man Should See

2009-05-22T16:37:00.004-04:00

Pretty impressive list. I agree with most of it. Being the guy with over a thousand movie files on my computer, yes... I have seen them all.

They picked the right Bogart movie (The Maltese Falcon) and, surprisingly, got the Bond flick correct (the first and by far the best... Dr. No). North by Northwest is the best movie of Alfred Hitchcock, Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint, which is pretty impressive in and of itself (and man, Eva in the dining car... ouch!). And then there's Glengarry Glen Ross. It had to be there.

But I have to say, how do you have a man movie list without either Twelve O'Clock High or To Kill a Mockingbird? Those movies are veritable instruction manuals on being a man. Major oversight.

But all in all not bad. Guys, you should see most of these before you pack it in.

So Much for All That...

2009-05-20T00:29:00.001-04:00

...fierce moral urgency blather.

Rita Moreno

2009-05-19T10:35:00.003-04:00

Contributed by a valued reader with the following comment:

...in the spirit of your occasional B&W photos of hotties-of-yesteryear, I have one to add. I saw a PBS show on the history of musicals in the 40s and 50s, and it showed Rita Moreno, the original Puerto Rican latin bombshell (as you know, a weakness of mine...). She had a small part in 1953's Singing in the Rain, and later won all four of the big acting awards (Oscar, Emmy, Tony, and Grammy...). The show interviewed her recently, and she's in her late seventies and still a hottie. And, back in the fifties, she filled out those old torpedo-tit bras perfectly...

Ah Hah!

2009-05-18T20:10:00.001-04:00

Now I know why life is so great. I'm in the happiness sweet spot!

Lovin' Loven

2009-05-17T18:55:00.004-04:00

I'm not sure how long super lib (and totally biased) AP "journalist" (I'd say activist) Jennfer Loven has been on Fox News Sunday, but I was pretty surprised to see her there tonight. Fox tends to have pretty mild libs on their chat panels, just as the lib stations tend to have RINOs representing the right on their shows. So I was glad to see Fox step up and bring on a real, dyed in the wool liberal to (try to) face down the super conservatives.

Actually, Loven came across pretty well. She's attractive and she made a valiant effort to appear as the objective journalist she is not. But like all liberals, where the rubber meets the road (ie when policy details are being discussed and they cannot demagogue the issue), she escaped into the netherworld of "political analysis". Maura Liasson does the same thing and it is excruciatingly irritating.

Example: When discussing Obama's massive flip flops on military commissions, she did everything possible to finesse the issue by raising the few things Obama said on the campaign trail that implied he wasn't irreversibly against military commissions. Taken in context, it is silly to bring these things up. He spent a two years trashing military commissions in the Senate and on the campaign trail.

But when the panel pushed back, she ran to a discussion of the "political context" of the decision, saying that the Obamakins can get away with pissing off their base because they are about to hand over some red meat in the form of an ultra-liberal Supreme Court nominee.

Right. Nice pivot.

Jeez, why not just admit the guy demagogued the issue on the campaign trail for eighteen months? Trying to cover for him now makes Jennifer look like the partisan that we all know she is. And not a particularly thoughtful one either.

Closing note. The expression on Brit Hume's face while she spoke was priceless. Had he had a sign on this forehead saying "You are full of shit", his attitude toward her would have been no more obvious.

It's Saturday!

2009-05-16T16:52:00.002-04:00

... which means last night the White House slipped out more news that contradicts their campaign promises. This time they told us that, oh ya, those military commissions are A-OK. There was something about how theirs are better than Bush's, but the people who know about such things can't find any discernible differences.

Remember in the opening months of the Bush first term when that Administration changed the amount of CO2 that would be acceptable for smoke stack companies to emit? Remember the two weeks of media outrage that resulted?

If, as I am often told by my liberal journalist friends, media bias is all in my mind ("the left hates us too, so we must be doing something right!"), I have to assume that next week the national press will go ballistic on the Obama Administration.

Yeah, right.

The Law of Unintended Consequences

2009-05-16T11:50:00.003-04:00

This is what happens when the government gets too involved in the economy.

As noted in several places below, my employer is a large, unionized, trucking company (I work for the non-union, international unit, thank God). The company has been teetering on bankruptcy for several quarters. We renegotiated our credit facility with our consortium of banks in February, and signed on to a plan that required a profitable second quarter.

That was not to be. In April we continued losing money, as we have for over two years. It became clear in the last several weeks that we would not meet the stipulations in our credit agreement. Everyone was holding their breath and waiting for the first members of our banking group to start pulling out.

But late on Thursday our CEO announced that we would be asking for TARP funds from the government. And on Friday morning the banks announced they would renegotiate our banking facility and support us through another and longer period of loss making.

So here is the story. CEO threatens the banks with taking TARP money. Although he knows the chances of actually getting the money are slim to none, he also knows that by asking for them, he brings our situation to the attention of the government. 55,000 union jobs here. All the CEO needs to do is make the wheel squeak.

And the banks know that if the government gets involved, all bets are off. After the Chrysler deal, secured creditors apparently have no rights. Better to keep the government totally out of the deal, even if it means underwriting a highly risky and weak business.

The great irony of this is, of course, that by throwing bankruptcy law to the winds in the Chrysler deal, the Obama Administration has created an ugly precedent. Banks are now making risky bets based on the mere threat of government involvement. The ultimate result of that is a weakening of the banks, the opposite of what our great leaders in Washington say they want.

One hundred and fifty years of bankruptcy law has been significantly weakened by the Obama Administration. Unfortunately, the Law of Unintended Consequences is as strong as ever.

One Heck of a Middle Linebacker

2009-05-15T18:17:00.003-04:00

My hero, Dick Cheney.

Kristol is right. The best offense is a good defense.

All limp wristed Republicans who think that somehow their careers will die if they stand up to slandering Democrats need to get a clue.

There is no torture issue. The issue is as Newt so perfectly describes. The issue is whether you can pour water down the nose of a guy who is planning to nuke a city. Only the MSM and a bunch of idiots in Congress can turn that into a moral issue.

George Bush can't defend himself. He has to be an ex-president. Not Jimmy Carter. A real ex-president. But the rest of us have to stand up for the people who risked their lives and careers to make sure that we didn't get blown to dust.

Dick Cheney (and Newt) seem to be the only Republican leaders with the testicular fortitude to man the defenses. My only wish is that Mitt and Jeb would can the listening tour and defend W and his administration.

Man up guys. It is the only way to get off the twenty and start scoring some points.

Lost to the Lions

2009-05-15T07:50:00.004-04:00

Like I said when defending her from Shuster’s vomit attack, the reason she’s been sympathetic through all this is that she came by it innocently, simply giving her opinion in answer to a question. Now that she’s parlaying it into a stuntcasting tryout on the conservative network of choice, a bit of that is gone. It’s not unlike what happened with Joe the Plumber or even the tea parties, which also started unassumingly and got snapped up by FNC once the buzz got big enough. Then again, we’re talking about someone here who gets paid to model underwear. Kind of hard to be a “sellout” under the circumstances.

Yes, I kind of have to agree with my hero Allahpundit on this one (and head toward agreeing with Miles the RINO, which is always painful). It was easier taking her side when she was a turtle on the highway of liberal media hypocrisy. But now that she has been co-opted by the whole game, she has to stand for herself. And since I don't care for religious posturing in the public square, I guess I have agree that Miles called it right early on. (Ouch!)

Shocking?

2009-05-14T22:05:00.004-04:00

Could it be true that liberal elites are shocked by who they got elected president?

I don't buy this completely, but give us a year or two more of the march to European Social Democracy... and I'm betting this could be the case.

At that point, Mitt's Mormonism won't even be mentioned.

Cruel Justice

2009-05-14T21:15:00.005-04:00

For years we have been watching the Democrats demagogue the Enhanced Interrogation issue. Just as with the War in Iraq, first they supported waterboarding in the face of imminent attack. But when it became politically expedient to smack the Bush Administration with the issue, they brought out the big sticks, calling the techniques "torture", and the Bushies criminals.

But with a Democrat president wanting to use the issue to somehow prove his moral superiority, there's a little problem. It's the details of Pelosi's and other Democrats actions over the past seven years.

There are plenty of places to observe the whole mess in detail, so I won't go into it here. Suffice it to say that the "chickens have come home to roost". After Speaker Pelosi's train wreck of a press conference today, it is difficult to see how she stays in her job. Already, Steny Hoyer is circling the carrion that is Nancy Pelosi's career. She can't have more than a week left in her job.

And here's another interesting tidbit. Today President Obama mentioned that present levels of debt are unsustainable. Is he setting the stage to blame the outrageous levels of deficit spending on the disgraced Pelosi? Watch that closely.

It could be that after only 100 days of total government control the leadership coalition is starting to crumble. If so, and if it is a result of the "torture issue", I can only thank God for cruel justice.

Update: And why I think HotAir is God's answer to blogging. It is for sentences like... Senator Joe Lieberman doesn’t quite call Speaker Nancy Pelosi a lying sack, but he comes pretty close.

Getting Served in South Carolina

2009-05-13T14:06:00.003-04:00

It's poor judgment on her part trying to settle this matter with a weapon.

Yes, I would say that is the understatement of the year. Yakeisha may need some lessons in customer service. Certainly it should occur to her that shooting her Waffle House customers is a less than optimum way of settling a menu dispute.

JP... it seems your old "heart stopper breakfast" hangout can be more than just bad for your cholesterol.

The joys of southern living (and cooking)!

A Bit of Genius on a T Shirt

2009-05-12T07:38:00.004-04:00

This works on a a bunch of levels. There is the obvious, Obama "Cool Factor". The press has been beating that into our heads for two years now. Personally, I don't see it, but then I flunked Cool Hunting a long time ago. Putting the cool question on a T shirt begs it a bit.

Then there is the more subtle racial question. "So, we cool now?", as in the slang, "Are we OK?" or "Is everything OK?", or "Are we finished with that little problem we had?"

That "little" problem would be slavery, discrimination, and the accompanying white guilt. We have a black president so can we consider that all over, history, done?

Obama has pretty much answered that question by playing the race card at key times in his campaign. So the answer would be "no". Simply asking the question is a form of protest. Cool.

And finally, there may be a message here to people outside the US, particularly our European "friends", and particularly the Germans. They finally played some role in influencing an American election. Their inexperience in Democracy in general, and American elections in particular, helped elect this neophyte. They wanted "cool" and they got it. We got the guy who wants to spread the wealth around. DanKa!

(Can't wait to see what happens when the Russians turn off the gas. Good luck with that!)

So we have a triple entendre... a bit of genius on a T shirt.

The Last Nail

2009-05-11T22:45:00.003-04:00

“Obama deliberately raised the cost of capital for every unionized business in the country. It’s worth asking why he would think that’s a good idea.”

Yeah, though since he doesn't know what PE means, he probably doesn't know what Cost of Capital is.

But just in case Obama has taken a break from Andrew Sullivan's blog and is getting policy advice from Spyral Notebook, let me mention this.

I work for one of those highly leveraged, highly unionized companies. We are selling real estate from under the business to meet union pension obligations. Our consortium of lenders have us on a week to week profitability plan. We have fired twenty percent of its labor force, cut thirty percent of the salaried folks, and we've had across the board salary and benefits cuts.

Now, what do you suppose the conversation is around the water cooler on the executive floor?

A. Obama will never let us fail and watch 55,000 union jobs disappear. No worries.

or

B. They're screwing the secured debt holders! The bank consortium is going to cave! I'm calling my headhunter!

Here's your first clue. It's B.

Basically, anyone with a reputation has got one foot out the door. The executive floor is getting weaker and weaker. At the end of the day, it takes smart people to run a business well. All ours are leaving. My bet is that within a couple of weeks the biggest transportation industry failure in history will go down.

The last nail in the coffin will be the increased risk the banks perceive as a result of Obama's actions with the Chrysler deal, which translates into an increased cost of capital when we could not afford it.

Thanks, man. If only you had learned just a teansy bit about business before taking over the free world.

Is the VP Really That Big A Moron (Part XXVII)?

2009-05-11T22:30:00.005-04:00

"Let's get some feedback on the real issue confronting the nation - is Champ smarter than Biden?"

Peronistas in the White House

2009-05-11T07:48:00.003-04:00

"Yes, that’s right. Barack Obama and his henchmen just handed the United Auto Workers 55 percent of Chrysler’s stock. One of the biggest contributors to the Democratic Party now controls the company they bankrupted. And what about the “secured” bondholders — the investors who accepted lower returns in exchange for the security of knowing they would be first in line to be paid back if something bad happened? The last time I checked, they were offered 29 cents on the dollar."

If you ever want to see first hand how a single person can turn a first world country into a third world basket case, read this. You'll see exactly how transferring power to favored unions while ignoring the rule of law destroys a country.

But more frightening is the prospect of investors sitting on the sidelines waiting to see how the government will act next. We have experience with that too. It was called the Great Depression.

Amity Shlaes describes in detail how Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt transformed a financial panic into a fifteen year depression by "experimenting" with various economic solutions. Investors responded by sitting out the whole mess out, and the stock market didn't reach re-crash levels for a full twenty-five years. Can you imagine the Dow at 14,000 in 2034? Some fix.

I, for one, am stunned by the political corruption on display in Washington. As now we have no independent press to put the breaks on the massive power grab, one can only hope that masses of voters will eventually wake up to the mess that is being created. But four more years of this will surely impoverish millions along the way.

BBC... Irony Free Zone

2009-05-07T21:56:00.003-04:00

An expedition team which set sail from Plymouth on a 5,000-mile carbon emission-free trip to Greenland have been rescued by an oil tanker.

Poor Dear

2009-05-03T13:36:00.002-04:00

Condi faces down a (can I say child?) who has been raised on the propaganda of the left. Poor dear. It must be hard to finally be confronted with facts.

Better read up, young thing.

Jules Plays WIBDI

2009-05-02T16:22:00.005-04:00

And a big Ha Ha it gets.

Since Crittendon is making the most of the humor, I'll play WIBDI from the serious side of the plate...

OK, so for years we heard from Candidate Obama, the Democrats, the media, and particularly the New York Times that the military commissions at Guantanamo were tantamount to breaking with the Geneva Conventions.

(Never mind that the whole point of the Conventions is to address issues of state sponsored war, a little detail that's apparently too "nuanced" for our esteemed thought leaders.)

But now, sneaked out from the White House Press Office (otherwise known as the Mainstream Media) on a Friday evening, we see the Obama Administration floating the case for Military Commissions at Guantanamo.

My goodness. After years of gratuitous grandstanding on the issue, President Obama now realizes that it is a bad idea to bring non-state enemy combatants to domestic civilian courts where they will have the protections of US citizenship and can call upon the prosecution to produce classified information in open court?

Gee, what a concept.

This wouldn't be so enraging if Democrats had had the honesty to admit that Military Commissions are the only reasonable option available. But instead they chose to use the issue as a political stick to pummel a president struggling to fight and win a difficult war.

As Tom Clancy once said, "It is easy being a Democrat. You can say anything." And they did, and they do, and it is a far more dangerous world as a result.

Stay At Home...

2009-04-30T18:06:00.002-04:00

... stupidity might be contagious!

Love the Instapundit meme, too.

While the press were trying to turn Palin into the village idiot, they apparently missed the fact that their savior actually nominated Wilmington's.

And by the way, having met and spoken privately with said idiot, I can assure you, fair reader, that he is the real thing. At the time I was appalled that such a person could hold high political office. The fact that he is Vice President of the United States of America is truly amazing, if not frightening.

Closing question: Has Biden yet made a public statement that has not been retracted, clarified or otherwise edited by his political handlers after the fact? If so, I certainly haven't heard/read/seen it.

Nancy Boys

2009-04-30T07:47:00.005-04:00

Michael Barone calls it Soft America. Others call it the result of forty years of schools working like chat shops for girls. I call it the general feminization of the culture. But the results are clear. "Men of the Press" now comfortably ask the president what makes him feel "enchanted".

Goldberg is right. Imagine the guffaws from the president, the press and the gallery had that word been used in a Harry Truman press conference. The reporter would have been laughed out of a job.

For those of us who still have the temerity to presume that there really are differences between the sexes, and that men should display a modicum of masculinity, this kind of thing is hard to watch.

I remember years ago hosting a woman from Oklahoma on her first trip to Europe. She asked me "what was wrong" with the European men. She thought they were, in her words, all so "girly". It appears we are well on our way to the European model. Rest in Peace, John Wayne.

I have to assume that there still are some American women who regret the results of forty years of American feminism. But even if you are post modernist "NPR woman", I can't imagine these Nancy Boys make your heart flutter.

Update: The New York Times got an A!

How to Save $328,835

2009-04-29T07:43:00.004-04:00

You know we are in trouble when the Iranians are giving our government advice on the technologies available for public relations!

IBD Plays WIBDI

2009-04-28T17:09:00.002-04:00

... a game that anyone can play!

Contrast Fox with Time magazine, which just placed Barack Obama on its cover for the 13th time over the past year, declaring the president's "combination of candor and vision and the patient explanation of complex issues" to be "Obama at his best." Time says he's bringing America away "from the quick-fix, sugar-rush, attention-deficit society of the postmodern age."

That line must have earned an A-plus from White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, who recently took it upon himself to give the White House press corps a collective report card affixed with a gold star, telling reporters he was awarding them "a strong A" for their coverage of the administration's first 100 days.

(Imagine the firestorm if Bush press chief Ari Fleischer had decided to present a report card to the press in 2001.)

Yes, imagine that.

Update: Spyral Notebook leading the WIBDI pack on Google search. So why isn't my traffic going through the roof? I guess no one cares if Bush Did It anymore.

(Sometimes) It's Cruel To Be Kind

2009-04-28T08:42:00.004-04:00

"Those who are kind to the cruel in the end will be cruel to the kind."

What happens to all the political prisoners languishing in Venezuelan jails when this tin pot dictator gets his mug on the front page of the world's newspapers doing a grip and grin with The One? I shutter to think.

It reminds me of what Natan Sharansky said about the the Reagan "Evil Empire" speech. Upon hearing it, Sharansky and his fellow inmates were injected with an ounce of hope that there was someone, somewhere who would come to their aid.

With Obama's pathetic pandering to his domestic political base, Sharansky's fellow travelers in Venezula have less, not more, "hope".

Ellsbury Goes National

2009-04-27T07:47:00.003-04:00

My bet is that this is going to take Jacoby Ellsbury up a notch in the national spotlight. In Boston he is approaching cult hero status, but it is events like this that can be the tipping point. Enjoy!

Oh and by the way, here is a picture of Ellsbury with his girlfriend Kelsey Hawkins (marathoner, fellow OSU grad) and guys who I presume to be his brothers. Looks like a nice group. Can't help but to think that JE has his head on straight... an absolutely essential part of being a successful ball player.

Julia Ormond

2009-04-26T20:15:00.001-04:00

Is TARP A Criminal Enterprise?

2009-04-24T22:11:00.004-04:00

Larry Kudlow seems to think so.

Donald Luskin is asking a lot of penetrating questions.

With this much money floating around, there is a way better than even chance that there are a whole host of shenanigans going on. And a lot of people getting rich off of your tax dollars.

The only hope is that this thing will really blow up and take the whole crowd down (see below).

Update: After watching the the segment again, I should add that Julian Epstein is probably right that Luskin is, in fact, making a "constitutional point". But the real issue here is whether there is the flexibility in the TARP legislation to allow the government to buy bank shares with the money.

I don't know. But if there isn't, and more and more prosecutions come down the pike, this could be a very big mess for Messieurs Obama and Geitner.

Can Obama Take the Whole System Down?

2009-04-24T20:52:00.005-04:00

Here's some lib warning his readers that Obama is in for a rough ride. There is a lot wrong in the article, but there is enough right to link to it.

The wrong:

Had FDR come in earlier, he would have saved the country from economic depression. Wrong. He, along with Hoover, caused the depression. The economy was worse after six years of FDR than it was when he started dicking with it.

The right:

Subsidizing failing banks and industries will only prolong the present economic malaise. Reagan whipped stagflation by forcing the economy to take a dose of monetary caster oil.

But most of all there is this:

The Establishment—the academic and policy elite, Wall Street, famous sexy people—are more invested in Obama than they’ve been in any president in decades. If Obama fails, a whole system will go down with him.

That is quite a statement, and one which I've been thinking about for a while. What in fact happens if we wake up in two years and newspapers are gone, Hollywood is weak (due to file sharing), and Wall Street and Dems are thought to have a corrupt contract (which they do).

My bet is that the average Joe will feel duped by all the hopey changy stuff and the election of Obama will seem like a irresponsible indulgence, akin to the country acting like a spoiled kid eating ice cream for the main course. About then, it will seem like a good time to bring back the adults.

But this guy may be right. There is more at risk here than just the presidency. The "establishment" is all in with this administration and they are simultaneously losing power on many fronts already. I agree that the whole house of cards could come tumbling down if The One pushes the economy into a long downturn.

Closing questions. Is there anyone waiting in the wings more adult-like than Mitt?

Shooting Themselves in the Feet

2009-04-24T08:09:00.004-04:00

Here is something I will never understand.

Since the early sixties mainstream economists have accepted that fiscal stimulus doesn't do much to help in general economic downturns. Let's call it the rise of the age of monetarism. During the same period, it has also become generally accepted that (in large economic units... countries, states, etc.) raising taxes decreases government receipts.

However, also during the last forty years, Democrats have continued to try to make the case that raising taxes raises revenue.

Such a position has never made sense to me. If you are a Democrat, and your political life is based on having government largess to dole out to constituents, why not support any policy that will give you more resources to secure your political objectives? Why not lower taxes, attract high income voters, and still have the money to reward non-taxpayers?

I know what you will say. How do you convince the non-taxpayers that the "rich" are evil and corrupt if you don't punish them with higher taxes. Good point. But I would counter with this. Just pretend you are screwing the "rich", while continuing to create and economic environment where they will provide more money for you to buy votes.

Some might say that that is exactly what they are doing. And maybe "some" would be right to an extent. After all, the Democrats pretty much own Wall Street at this point, so clearly they have co-opted a good proportion of the "rich" vote.

But then you see stuff like this. Tax receipts have been clobbered in the recent downturn and any economist (except Paul Krugman... but that's another story) knows that the best policy now would be to lower taxes. But that is not what the Democrats are doing. They are piling new taxes (Cap and Trade), regulations and other economy killing costs on the country. And the result is predictably devastating on government receipts.

It seems bizarre to me that the Dems continue to force policies against their own political interests. But that they do, and we all suffer for their bizarre ideology.

NewsCrunch

2009-04-21T21:18:00.003-04:00

From TechCrunch:

The advertising outlook for newspapers is going from awful to horrendous. The New York Times announced first quarter earnings today, revealing that total advertising revenues for its news media group (which includes the New York Times, the Boston Globe, and other regional newspapers) declined 28.4 percent, versus an 18.4 percent decline last quarter. So the rate of decline for is intensifying.

No comment other than I probably shouldn't rub it in. Especially since my company just announced a first quarter revenue drop of 30% from the previous year. Cars, trucks and newspapers. You don't want to be even close to them these days.

A "Formidable Competitor" Loses to a PC Twerp

2009-04-20T23:01:00.006-04:00

Another sad commentary on the state of popular culture and the American media.

As I have said many times here, I have no dog in this fight. But allowing an openly gay judge to knock out a leading contender at a hyper-hetero event simply because she doesn't tow the PC line on gay marriage... well. that is just lame.

And as the Powerline boys say, the majority of the country, including the elected Democrat president, agree with the poor woman. Some controversy. Only in the mind of our twisted journalistic culture.

Not sure I should be paying attention to this type of stuff, but hey, its hard to keep your eyes off these gals.

Update: "Dude. She’s one of us." Watch the video, too. This woman is a real Christian, no doubt. Props for that.

Also, I just have to say. Allahpundit at Hot Air is by far my favorite blogger. When you look up "blogger" in the dictionary, it says Allahpundit.

The End of News

2009-04-19T09:26:00.004-04:00

CNN apparently has asked that this video be taken down for "copy right" reasons. The point is made elsewhere that they have a habit of forcing YouTube to remove embarrassing videos, using copy right as the pretext. Surely this qualifies.

But to the video.

First, it is a amazing how easily the CNN "journalist" simply co-opts the government position while interviewing her subject. Isn't journalism supposed to be about being the "watch dog of the public"? What happens if news outlets simply act as cheerleaders for the government? My guess is that they will lose business.

Second, the woman who debates the journalist toward the end of the video, and tries to explain what is going on at the protest, is exactly on point. The protest is not about right vs. left, Republican vs. Democrat. It is a about a government power grab of stunning proportions. The CNN reporter, who apparently cannot comprehend a world outside a left vs. right paradigm, seems flummoxed by the point.

Have a look. It is educational.

But more to the point, as a group the cable news channels have slowly evolved into a national embarrassment. Fox News Channel has led the race to the lowest common denominator. But MSNBC and CNN followed on quite quickly (though neither do "down market" as well as Fox).

And since cable news audiences tend to be in large proportion lower income and poorly educated, watching cable news is similar to stumbling upon a loud family fight at the mall. It's kind of ugly, kind of sad, yet also a bit fascinating.

But mostly, you begin to wonder why you are at the mall in the first place.

Update: Obviously this video was taken by a private citizen with a small, portable video camera. My question is this. What happens to TV news when they don't control the video space? What happens to TV news when they know that at any time, in any public space, they can be filmed, as they film. And the resulting raw footage can be on the internet before they get back to their upload link? It will certainly have to have some impact on how they report.

In a related manner, you would have to be crazy today to be a politician and not video any sit down interview you have a with a reporter. After all, look what they did to Sarah Palin. The editing of those interviews was a national scandal, but thanks to old man McCain, it was allowed to stand.

Barrett Pays the Price for His TARP Vote

2009-04-19T00:01:00.004-04:00

The MSM meme about the Tea Parties is that they are centrally organized, Republican protest events. That is wrong on all accounts. In fact, they are truly grass roots events, emerging from local organizations and facilitated by social media.

But more importantly they are not "Republican" in any way, shape, or form. At many of the events, Republican politicians have been asked not to come.

Here's a fine example. This Upstate South Carolina Republican congressman Gresham Barrett (who is also running for governor) is taken down hard for his first TARP bill vote. From comments by people who attended the event, apparently this video hardly picks up the veracity of the Bronx cheers.

Props to Adam at Palmetto Scoop for catching this video. It has gone viral and Adam, who toils in South Carolina political blogging obsurity most days, is getting his 15 minutes. Good going, man.

Jean Simmons

2009-04-18T18:47:00.004-04:00

Lucky Michelle

2009-04-17T15:42:00.007-04:00

Apparently change has come to the White House!

Uh Oh, The Truth Is Coming Out

2009-04-17T12:36:00.002-04:00

From the Amazon review of this book:

* The Crash of `29 was caused not by capitalism, but by the boom brought on by the newly created Federal Reserve's easy money policy (sound familiar?)

* Hoover made the Depression "Great" precisely by abandoning the laissez-faire approach that previous presidents had followed and that kept depressions short

* The bank runs of the 1930s were caused by government intervention in the banking system

* Government efforts to prop up wages and prices led to a full decade of double-digit unemployment

* FDR's arbitrary policies toward businessmen resulted in net investment of less than zero for much of the Depression

Other points made in the review:

World War II did not get us out of the economic malaise. It was not until Truman's policies encouraging small business investment after the war that growth started to come back.

The childish historical cartoon of Hoover as a slave to all things laissez-faire is simply wrong. Hoover intervened in the economy more than any other president to his day, implementing policies that turned a market correction into a recession. Roosevelt did the rest.

The market crash of 1929 was not very different from the crash of 1920. Never heard of that? It's probably because the government didn't do anything, the correction took its course, and the whole thing was over in a year or so.

So now, is it too much to compare the present situation to that of 1987? Probably, but just to make the point, can we agree that Reagan handled that market correction pretty well? And can we say that taking on World War II levels of debt to address this recession is simply ridiculous?

No doubt.

Charleston Tea Party

2009-04-15T20:15:00.030-04:00

Charleston is heaven on earth in the spring. So it was no surprise that the Charleston Tea Party brought out the crowds. One of the cops directing traffic said he thought there were "around a thousand" at the event. I would have guessed something like that.

As advertised, it was pretty much a grass roots, locally organized event. But since South Carolina is a conservative state, the leading state pols were invited and well received. Senator Jim DeMint, being a businessman turned politician, was appreciated by the anti-tax crowd. And G0vernor Mark Sanford, one of the few governors to push back against "stimulus" money, was cheered wildly. His actual speech was a bit of snoozer, but the crowd was nice enough to ignore that fact.

Then came the locals. I have no idea who most of them were - probably just local folks who wanted to have their word. And have their word they did. All in all, a their comments were sincere and surprisingly well presented. No anger or nastiness. One guy showed a poster sized picture of his kids and said he was there for them. That got a lot of people cheering, especially several moms nearby who were clearly thinking the same.

As far as I could tell there were very few anti-protest protesters. I noticed one ganja looking guy (blond dreadlocks... spare me) holding a sign that said "I hate tea" (and your point would be?). And then there were six or seven bulky (and somewhat angry looking) Longshoremen from the union hall down the street. They formed a circle and waved professionally produced signs about "someone being fired every 23 minutes for wanting a union", or some such thing. They looked completely out of place among the hand painted signs and genial older crowd.

So... have a look. It was a great crowd, a beautiful day, and a lot of fun. (And don't stop before you get to the end!)

The cars were backed up for about a half a mile on East Bay Street on the way over.

Approaching, the crowd looked a lot bigger than this.

This was when Jim DeMint was speaking. There were lots of people beyond the steps.

The Fair Tax folks put out a good showing. This couple were happy to chant for their cause.

Still doesn't look like as many people as there were.

The volunteers wore these shirts. There were lots of them and they were very well mannered.

Back of the shirt. They gave some to people who answered history questions right.
To the kids too, I think.

Now you can see a bit more of the crowd.

OOHHH RAHHH!

Lest we forget the importance of tithing.

Getting crowded on the steps. The Hon Treasury Sec came in for a beating.

Channeling Rick Perry. Not sure how well that worked out the first time.

This lady was fun. She wasn't sure what the Fed was, but figured if she held the sign high, her friend would find her.

She got lots of pictures because she was so sweet.

Apparently her friend wasn't a fan of the IMF either.

The lady holding this sign was the only person I saw who seemed angry. But her sign was funny.

Gold and guns seem pretty Swiss. Not sure about the God part.

This lady was worried her daughter might catch her at a protest. Given my readership numbers, she doesn't have much to worry about!

Tea Party Chic!

At least someone other than Estonia has it right.

Morning in America (c. 2008/9)!

Someone had to have one.

Semi-sesquipedalianist!

Is that Vinnie Barbarino on the right?

And what's a protest without a Protest BABE!

Reaching Out to the Pirate Community

2009-04-11T13:58:00.001-04:00

For too long, America has been too dismissive of the proud culture and invaluable contributions of the Pirate Community. Whether it is their pioneering work with prosthetics, husbandry of tropical birds or fanciful fashion sense, America owes a deep debt to Pirates.

Read the whole thing. It gets funnier.

Is This Why We Almost Lost Theo?

2009-04-10T23:55:00.004-04:00

This may be why Theo Epstein almost quit a couple of years ago. He was pushing the Red Sox to focus on developing their own talent through the farm system, rather than buying big players at mid-career. From the linked article, you can see why it not only makes good baseball sense (continuity, etc.), but also good economic sense (one in the same in many cases).

With Ellsbury, Pedroia and other home grown talent now leading the roster, I would say that Theo's "baseball genius" reputation is well deserved. Red Sox Nation dodged a bullet a couple of years ago when Epstien was almost driven from the club.

Hey Libs

2009-03-29T20:11:00.003-04:00

Take the Limbaugh Challenge!

This column is a little raucous, but the points are the same I find myself making when discussing Rush Limbaugh with liberals.

It is true that most people who "hate" him have never listened to his show. It is true that I have never, not once, heard a report about Limbaugh in the MSM that didn't twist his words, or take them out of context (the "I want Obama to fail" being just the most recent). And it is true that there are a lot of people who simply find it easier to believe that he is a racist, homophobic, hating blabbermouth than actually listen to him.

Hey, I'm not saying Rush should be everyone's cup of tea. Sometimes I find him a bit too much. But there are three things that are undeniable about him. First, he is a very skilled radio man. Second, he is very funny. And third, his political predictions are on the whole more often correct than anyone in politics.

That last one is the kicker.

More of This

2009-03-27T14:12:00.000-04:00

Please.

Just One Take Baby

2009-03-26T23:04:00.001-04:00

Don't Sugar Coat It, Ralph

2009-03-26T23:03:00.001-04:00

Smart Diplomacy.

There Are Few So Blind... (Journalism Installment #101)

2009-03-25T08:37:00.004-04:00

"He was truly a caring person who loved and was loved by all he met. "

Yes, particularly the emotionally disturbed teens he met trolled the internet for "rough sex".

Hey, I'm all for speaking well of the dead, but if you are this blind to basic morality, maybe you and your employer should go out of business.

Unbelievable

2009-03-23T23:40:00.001-04:00

From Fox News:
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has an explanation about why she never mentioned the word “terrorism” during her first testimony on Capitol Hill.

Napolitano tells the German news site Spiegel Online that while she presumes there is always a threat from terrorism: “I referred to “man-caused” disasters. That is perhaps only a nuance, but it demonstrates that we want to move away from the politics of fear toward a policy of being prepared for all risks that can occur.”

WIBDI (Another Installment)

2009-03-23T23:10:00.003-04:00

This is getting embarrassing. The President of the United States does not know how to pronounce "Orion". As noted here, today President Obama continually read (off the teleprompter, of course) the word as "OAR-ee-on". Jeezzz...

This comes on the heals of so many other verbal gaffs that one might legitimately wonder if this guy has the education of a ninth grader. Other examples. Thinking "P-E" means Profit to Earnings Ratio. Clearly not understanding enough economic theory to pass an Econ 101 mid-term. Giggling through a 60 Minutes interview until the the interviewer asked him if he was "punch drunk".

If this were George Bush, the Washington Press corps would be in full "end of the world" mode. Instead, it seems they are quietly covering up these gaffs so that the average mug never hears about them.

I'm kind of wondering what my friends in the UK are now thinking. They were the ones who told me that "at least the new American president would be eloquent". Chances are they are comfortably ignorant of all this, just as they were of Obama's past as a racial shake down artist. It will be interesting to see what they say when this type of thing isn't covered up anymore.

Oh... and let's not forget. This comes from a guy who is increasing the debt load of the country to unheard of levels, and floundering around in the midst of a global financial panic.

Get on your knees folks. Only the Big Guy can save us now.

WIBDI

2009-03-23T13:28:00.003-04:00

What If Bush Did It? The new game anyone can play!

Well, here's one that we don't have to guess about. During the formative months of the Bush Administration, Dick Cheney put together an Energy Task Force to study ways to improve the country's energy policy. The then VP wanted to interview the various participants in private so that they would offer untainted opinions and provide honest input. The result?

The press and the Democrats went on a multi-year offensive claiming that the Bush Administration was operating a secretive energy policy. Obviously that was just silly, as Congress would have ultimately crafted any legislation (and did). But the press went down the road anyway, pounding on the Administration for years with all the Democrat talking points.

So now we see that Obama's "Blue Ribbon Panel" on the economy has yet to meet in public. The Politico makes some conjecture about it being a way to keep deliberations private. They include this...

"So far, none of the commission members’ meetings have been public or officially announced in accordance with the 1972 federal law which governs such groups, the Federal Advisory Committee Act, or FACA.

That law has spawned a series of legal battles over the years, including fights over access to the Grace Commission on government waste set up by President Ronald Reagan, First Lady Hillary Clinton’s health care task force, and Vice President Dick Cheney’s task force on energy policy. Secrecy surrounding those panels sparked public outrage – and serious political blowback — that helped fuel Obama’s vows for more open government."

Will we have a two year assault on the Obama Administration for being secretive and operating like a cabal?

Somehow I doubt it.

Update: Note the picture next to the article. The former Chancellor of London Business School, my alma mater, is standing next to the President.

A word. Laura D'Angelo Tyson has for years been riding an appointment by Bill Clinton onto his Council of Economic Advisers. It got her the head job at a top European business school and various and sundry panels and appointments along the way. Every four years she steps out to flack for whatever Democrat presidential candidate makes it to the finals. That gets her appointments like this one.

I've met her several times (and know people who know her former husband). Bottom line? She'd make a good VP of Marketing at a mid-sized multi-national corporation. As for now, she's on the faculty business school at UC Berkley. Appropriate gig... I suppose.

QOTD

2009-03-15T21:58:00.003-04:00

"I don"t pay much attention to Willard Eggleston. He's in show business." Hank Stamper (Paul Newman) in Sometimes a Great Notion

Lee Remick

2009-03-15T21:11:00.004-04:00

QOTD

2009-03-11T09:46:00.001-04:00

But now we don’t have reporters. We have journalists. They all went to Columbia, and they see themselves as the arbiters of objective truth. I recall that NPR used to run ads that said, in so many words, “We do the thinking so you don’t have to” (the effrontery was breathtaking).

In What Do You Trust?

2009-02-23T21:32:00.006-05:00

South Carolina has almost 100 license plate formats from which to choose. Most are college booster or military type things. My favorite is the Secular Humanists of the Low Country plate.

"In Reason We Trust".

Can't argue with that. My only question is... if you suddenly see the face of God in an eighteen wheeler crossing the median strip, would you rather trust in reason or something else? I'm thinking God might be a better option.

Anyway, here is what they say about themselves:

"Although Secular Humanist of the Low Country is a membership based organization the “In Reason We Trust” plate is available to all SC residents. The fee for the plate is $30.00 every two years in additional to the regular registration fee. As a non-profit organization, the Secular Humanists of the Low Country do not receive any portion of the funds generated from the license plate sales."

The Shame of Maine

2009-02-10T12:58:00.002-05:00

As goes Maine, so goes the nation. Down the tubes, that is.

Generational theft. That's the nice way of saying it.

Remember Stagflation?

2009-02-10T12:29:00.000-05:00

Here it comes again!

Economic Illiteracy

2009-02-10T11:05:00.003-05:00

"We saw this happen in Japan in the 1990s, where they did not act boldly and swiftly enough, and as a consequence they suffered what was called the “lost decade,” where essentially for the entire ’90s, they did not see any significant economic growth."

Said Obama in last night's press conference. Is there a more incorrect interpretation of what created the Japanese economic malaise of the nineties? If so, I haven't seen it. More evidence that Obama lacks a basic understanding of elementary economics.

Ironically, it was Obama's type of recovery plan that caused a decade of recession in Japan. Most Japanese now acknowledge that massive government spending in the nineties not only didn't help their economy, but delayed any substantial recovery for over ten years.

The only lasting effect of their version of "fiscal stimulus" has been more government involvement in their economy, slower growth, fewer new businesses and products, and higher structural unemployment. In other words, welcome to Europe.

And that, of course, is exactly what Obama and the Democrats want to do in this country. Problem is, the United States is the economic engine of the world economy. So if they succeed in making this another statist economy, the whole world will see lower growth and greater poverty.

That's a big price to pay for political vanity... a price we may be able to afford here, but one that countries like Russia and China will not tolerate. The deal they have with their people goes something like this. Don't play in politics and we will let you get rich. But if the people can't get rich because of the impact of American policy on the world's economies, well Houston, we have a problem.

All that Hopey Changey stuff may make the rich Americans feel good about themselves. But if we grind down the global economy with massive US government spending, it won't just be making matters marginally worse here. It will blow out the economies of some very dangerous countries.

That's a pretty big price to pay for ensuring that Nancy Pelosi gets to keep her seat at the head of Congress. Which is, after all, what Obamanomics is all about.

QOTD

2009-02-10T09:14:00.003-05:00

"... one of the great attractions of Keynes’s theories is that he gives you permission to do what you wanted to do anyway."

That would be giving other people's money to your political allies.

Read the whole article. As a history of "fiscal stimulus", it lists all the failed attempts to employ Keynesian theory to jump start the economy. One after another have been colossal wastes of money.

So if "fiscal stimulus" has never been successful, why do we keep on trying it? Because it works so well for the politicians, of course.

Not so well for the rest of us, though.

Cuts, Both Ways

2009-02-08T13:13:00.003-05:00

Have you ever noticed that when public entities have budget cuts, they reduce their most essential services first, and save the percs for last?

Contrast that with private entities, who cut the flab first, and save other stuff for later. For example, in this recent downturn my company has:

1) Taken pay cuts across the board
2) Reorganized its operations to be more efficient
3) Sold off redundant properties and written down underperforming assets
4) Raised prices on marginal contracts and focused on our core competencies

We have not:

1) Had any personnel cuts, or
2) Reduced our service offerings

That's the difference between public entities and private ones. And with the "government stimulus package", we are about to get a huge investment in assets that underperform by design.

All because our politicians want more power. Thanks folks.

What Passes for Humor...

2009-02-08T12:36:00.003-05:00

... in New York.

Someone needs to explain to me why this isn't evidence of a kind of mild mental illness.

Can't Be Said Any Better Than This

2009-02-08T12:12:00.002-05:00

I love the lost look on the numb skull's face when he realizes that his whole world view is just plain stupid.

Carole Lombard

2009-02-07T19:55:00.004-05:00

As a former Regular...

2009-02-02T19:17:00.002-05:00

... at CBGB's, I suggest that it reopen with a dress code!

Rebuildtheparty.com

2009-01-29T18:44:00.003-05:00

I joined this group when it was formed last year. We're hoping it will help set the table for (Romney in) 2012.

The media is pretty good and they are using other web technologies quite well. Notice not much on the social issues. The thinking is that conservative economics equals "big tent". If Obama tanks the economy over the long term (think New Deal), this could be a good strategy.

RIP, Andrew Wyeth

2009-01-16T20:19:00.003-05:00

Andrew Wyeth has died.

One of the great American painters of the 20th century, Wyeth accomplished a unique style that was immediately recognizable, appealing to the untrained eye, and at the same time simple and thoughtful. He once described himself as a just "clever watercolorist". Throughout most of his life, the world of elite art critics wanted to agree.

But with the release of his "Helga" paintings in 1986, the art world got past its pretensions and began to give Wyeth's painting the credit it was due. Despite his popularity with the general public, he came to recognized as one of, if not the, greatest living American painter.

As children we were raised on the art of the Wyeths. Being from an artistic Philadelphia family, yet like the Wyeths transplanted to Maine, we identified closely with them and their art. From Andrew's father, N.C. Wyeth, one of the school of Scribner's illustrators that famously included Howard Pyle and Maxfield Parrish, to Jamie Wyeth, whom my sisters lusted after (and one of whom was his subject), three generations of Wyeth prints hung on our bedroom walls. We were taken to the Farnsworth and Chadds Ford Museums in the summers and spring, and knew all the paintings by heart.

Like the Peales of Philadelphia, artistic talent runs in the blood of the Wyeth family. But there is no doubt that Andrew was the true genius of the family. He used his technical talent to create a style that allowed the most casual observer to recognize its beauty. But more importantly, his work often depicted tensions in love and pain. The famous "Christina's World" is the finest example of Wyeth's impassioned art.

As with the loss of Olin Stephens in September, Wyeth's death seems to make the world of my childhood a greater distance from now than ever. And for that I am particularly sad. But for the rest of the world, the passing of Andrew Wyeth represents the loss of one of America's truly great painters.

Andrew Wyeth, RIP.

RIP, Patrick McGoohan

2009-01-14T19:24:00.002-05:00

The favorite actor of my youth has died. Patrick McGoohan played the lead in the great television drama Secret Agent, as well as the Prisoner and a host of feature films. But for me, and many others, it was his lead and title role in Disney's the Scarecrow that will always be remembered.

Digital Dumbasses

2009-01-13T08:35:00.001-05:00

And whenever the government gets dollar-signs in their eyes, somebody is about to be seriously hurt in a moron stampede - and that somebody is always a taxpayer.

And you want to give these people a trillion bucks?

The End of BDS

2009-01-12T22:56:00.003-05:00

History is about to start, and so we will begin evaluating Bush's Achievements.

WTF?

2009-01-12T21:22:00.001-05:00

Julie Christie

2009-01-03T21:48:00.004-05:00

How Low They Go

2008-12-30T22:30:00.001-05:00

My former employer is rated as the worst company in the country for whom to work. Jeez, and we used to have so much fun there!

As They Say... Read the Whole Thing

2008-12-30T17:37:00.004-05:00

Then one day, a hopeful heir to the throne of this modern-day Camelot came to Princess Caroline and asked for her help in pulling the sword out of the stone so that he could rule the land and bring everlasting hope and happiness to the serfs who were barely scratching a miserable living under the outgoing king's wretched rule. All she had to do was to help him find his ceremonial stand-in (sometimes known as a whipping boy). Princess Caroline agreed, and she not only found a whipping boy whose oral blunders were sure to take the media spotlight off anything foolish The One^TM might utter, but she found a new purpose in life -- the desire to serve the public in the same way her other family members had.

(Don't miss the second link. Bad work, if you can get it.)