How Not to Use a Chainsaw

Seems to me this guy might be about to become a candidate for the Darwin Award.

UPDATE: One friend e-mailed to note the title of the post is exactly right — the guy's not using any safety glasses or hearing protection!

Fire Harry Reid

There's an article out with some observations that are right on point. It says this early on.

In Mr. Reid's Washington, the House works its will, the Senate does crossword puzzles. Its committees do not produce bills, its senators do not debate or amend, the body does not vote. The House, to accomplish anything, is forced to engage in backroom wrangling with the White House, the results of which are presented to the nation as a fait accompli. The Senate claims total deniability.

Why has Harry Reid done this and behaved this way? That's something I had tried hard to understand. The only thing I had was that this was what he did, whether I could understand why or not. This article has observations that look really right. In part, it says this.

He [Reid] does not want a debate on gun control, as it would force Democratic senators to choose between President Obama and their own pro-Second Amendment constituents. The majority leader would not offer a bill during the fiscal-cliff negotiations because many Democrats disagreed with their president's proposed tax hikes. He has not produced a budget because to do so would expose the party's real spending ambitions [and/or expose the Democrats' divisions on this subject, too], which would create political problems back home for his members.

Mr. Reid knows there is a brilliant added bonus to making sure the Senate is inactive: It keeps all the attention on Republicans.

In other words, it's all political deception designed to protect Democrats' power by deceiving the American people.

It's sad that "our representatives" have sunk to this level. Harry Reid must be dumped or bypassed. He cannot be allowed to continue damaging the Congressional system.

Free the Senate. Let the Senate actually begin to do its job. Let the Senate debate.

Go read the whole thing.

Harvey's Advice

I read this, and it sounds like good advice to me.

No matter how bad it gets, never listen to the naysayers. Someone has survived it, someone who had it that bad before you. If the doctors say your odds of making it through five months - let alone five years - are one in a hundred, don't look at what the ninety-nine did, because that didn't work and it isn't for you. Find the one who made it through and imitate him.

Obama & the Fiscal Cliff

The Congress and President Barack Obama went right up to the edge of the "fiscal cliff". Efforts to find at least a temporary solution went so badly that everyone involved dumped Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and brought in Vice President Joe Biden to provide the Democrat side with at least a little rationality.

Why was that? It was because of President Obama's insistence on a fiscal cliff deal that increased taxes without any attached spending cuts. In other words,

Yes, President Obama said he (eventually) wanted a "balanced" approach — just not all at the same time. He wanted the tax increases now, and the spending cuts later. In other words, President Obama is today's version of Wimpy.

The trouble is that this gambit has been run on the Republicans before. It's always the promise of spending cuts later for tax increases now. The tax increases have always come quickly, but the promised spending cuts never materialize. So we see that that President Obama's "balanced approach" really looks like this:

Seems to me it's been just a giant scam on all of us. And it hasn't fixed anything about the deficit problem — in fact, it's added to it.

I'm Paying Your Share, Too!

This is a letter to the editor, printed in the Albuquerque Journal on January 8

I received a nice letter from the Social Security Administration last month, informing me that my Medicare Part B premium would be the standard $104.90, plus an income-related monthly adjustment of $230.80, for a total of $335.70. That figures out to $11.03 per day. I get no better coverage, of course, just pay more than three times as much as most people pay.

So "means testing" is here. I could cover all utility costs or eat for less per day. But, hey, the good news is I must be rich. I thought I was middle class.

Anyway, I am not complaining, because I know if I do, my coverage will likely be cut, too. How do I feel about all this? Oh, I'm happy to pay my share and the shares of at least two others.

What, you don't believe that? Yeah, I know. You think I'm a greedy old skinflint who doesn't want to pay is "fair" share. But if you work in a restaurant or retail business, don't expect to see me as often.

The "rich" are already paying more than their fair share — which is not good enough for the rich liberals who what to take even more from those a rung below them, so they can give it to others who (they hope) won't notice the loss of their rights and prosperity.

What Has Already Been Done To US

Legal Insurrection had a posting on appropriate responses to actions of some of the agenda journalists. One of the commenters on that post, Subotai Bahadur, made a broader point, beginning with an assessment of our current historical position. He writes

Professor, we are literally in the end stage of pretending that politics as normal mean something. The Constitutional order has been de facto overturned, while retaining the external trappings of the old order. The government is at open war on the Bill of Rights. Congress has lost the power of the purse and no longer represents anything but their own vested interests. The rule of law is gone. Who you are and who you are connected to decides if you will be prosecuted for any crime. No connections = no mercy and frequently no due process. If connected to the regime, you are immune. Our courts have withdrawn from the fray or have been subverted. In any major issue, it seems that the courts rule that there is no one who has standing to oppose the will of the State; so the State wins. And if a matter does get before the courts, the courts rule based on politics, not law. The Supreme Court is no longer a barrier defending the Constitutions. When Chief Justice Roberts suddenly reversed his entire life’s work to rule that the Federal government could violate the Constitution so long as it did it in the guise of a tax; it was obvious that he has been gotten to and is now merely a tool of the regime.

Well said, sir. The comment struck me — and others (Doug Ross, for example), too — as an important short summary. It's worth reading the whole of this comment, as well as a number of others on this thread.

Beyond that, what I would note is this: A lot of things no longer work the way we were taught in civics class. And that statement itself is a measure of how much things have changed.

Happy New Year!

Hypersensitivity

Some people will get upset over anything!

Happy New Year!
Enjoy 2013 — it's got to be better than 2012 was!

Why Is It ...?

. . . that all the stories about the end of the Mayan calendar — the ones that show a "Mayan Calendar" — always actually show the Aztec calendar stone? (Like this.)

Just askin'.

Remember Why There Is A Christmas

Christmas today may look like this

Why Christmas exists looks more like this

Remember the reason for the season.
Wishing you a blessed Christmas

Merry Christmas to All!

Wishing everyone a very
Merry Christmas

. . . with a thought back to the very first Christmas
. . . with the manger and the animals and the shepherds . . .

. . . and with a smile and some laughter of the season!

End of the World

No comment is needed.

Update: The world didn't end, after all. Guess I'd better do some Christmas shopping!

Servicemen's Votes, Uncounted

There's one recent set of news reports that is simply disgusting. Politicians continue to deny our servicemen — soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines — men and women — their constitutional right to have their voices heard as citizens. They do this in violation of the law, as well as all possible justice and morality. Disgusting!

Something more must be done to protect the rights of these citizens.

Veterans Day, 2012

In 2007, Kyle-Anne Shiver wrote an open letter of thanks to America's veterans that is a must read — especially today. Here's an excerpt:

And it is also true, that unless one has been in battle, one does not truly understand the depth of your passion for liberty. To families that have borne no soldiers, you are an enigma. To cowards, you are a shaming presence, a constant reminder of their weakness. To your parents, you represent both the mountaintop of pride, and the deepest valley of concern that mothers and fathers can ever know. And to most of us ordinary citizens, you are the unseen, under-appreciated protectors of all that we hold dear.

Military men and women really are different. Like their brothers and sisters in fields such as firefighting and law enforcement, they are the ones who run toward the fire and toward the firefight, not away. They are the sheepdogs, the ones who protect the sheep from the wolves — but whose presence makes the sheep uncomfortable. They're not all the same; they come in all types. But they share that difference. Sometimes you can see it in their eyes. Sometimes you can see the difference without being able to see who they are.

Even when you're not be able see the difference, the difference is still there. But whether you see the difference or not, whether you are aware of them or not, they are the ones who are there to be a deterrent — and, if necessary, a force for protection and rescue. They are the men and women who have secured and preserved our freedom. To them, along with Kyle-Anne Shiver, I say

You serve and fight for the greatest Nation in the history of civilization. There has never been a grievous wrong that good Americans have not sought to rectify. There has never been a just cause on which America has turned her back for long. You, our soldiers, have been and continue to be, the greatest force for freedom and human rights ever gathered. You have raised our flag around the world, not for domination, but to bring greater liberty and a better way of life. You are the reason America remains a beacon of hope to the entire world.

To all our veterans, and to all who serve, THANK YOU!

The Choice — and the Results

The choice the country's voters had last Tuesday was

• Change We Can Believe In

or

• Forward! (to the past four years)

 

Part of that is because the change we thought we could believe in four years ago turned out not to be quite the change we'd hoped for.

As the incoming president, Barack Obama is inheriting some really nasty situations. This is just a sampling:

But I'm sure President Obama has a plan for dealing with them.

For the rest of us, however, last Tuesday has given us a different feeling.

Remember

A New Truth

As more information has come out about the terrorist attack on our consulate in Benghazi, Libya, it looks worse and worse for President Obama. A women's group has put out an ad as a result. This is from that ad.

Clearly, the president does not hold his people in the same high regard they have held him.

Two Truths

President Obama and his campaign have produced a new flag. A cartoonist has identified what that flag represents.

The new Obama flag strikes me very much like another drawing, based on an image out of Benghazi.

On a separate topic, it seems to me President Obama must be pitied. If he loses — especially if he loses big — he needs to be pitied as getting his just desserts for being the worst president in U.S. history, displacing Jimmy Carter from that spot. And if by some chance he wins, . . .

Gas Prices

This is the political season. That's what made this gas station owner give us a reminder about gas prices at his station the day Barack Obama took office as our president.

Here's today's reality in California, both in the mid-coast area

and in the Los Angeles metropolitan area.

And here's a gas station owner who has captured the cause as well as the effect.

Guess I don't need to add any comments. You all know the conditions out there.

UPDATE: Here is a one-image definition of the Obama presidency, now known to some as Gasmageddon.

Netanyahu Made His Point

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke to the United Nations, and made clear there was a line Iran's nuclear program must not be allowed to cross.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called this "very hideous behavior".

Netanyahu was actually quite restrained. If he were a bit less diplomatic, he might have made his point a bit more more strongly this way.