...won't be noting the passing of Alex Chilton, of Box Tops fame, and Big Star fame (such as it is). But I wanted to drop a quick note noting it. As any good music snob knows, Big Star never sold many records, but were tremendously influential on some of the best music of the 80s and 90s (especially acts like REM). And, perhaps my favorite Replacements song is named after him (link is Paul Westerburg solo).
Couple of links to Big Star songs via YouTube:
September Gurls
Back of a Car
And, with the Box Tops...
The Letter
The sad thing is that Alex Chilton and a new version of Big Star was set to play at South by Southwest in Austin this year.
RIP, Alex.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
March Madness
Quick break from the politics and the David Brooks bashing. Always gotta love the NCAA basketball tournament. I filled out my bracket and I have Kansas beating Kentucky in the finals. Our resident expert, Benster, picks West Virginia to beat Kansas State in the finals.
What's your pick? Only hint: don't go with Winthrop. The floor is open.
What's your pick? Only hint: don't go with Winthrop. The floor is open.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Ballad of a Times Man
You can almost hear Dylan warming up in the background. David Brooks, he sings for you:
You’ve been with the professors
And they’ve all liked your looks
With great lawyers you have
Discussed lepers and crooks
You’ve been through all of
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s books
You’re very well read
It’s well known
Because something is happening here
But you don’t know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones?
Uh, make that Mister Brooks:
Criminy. Where to begin? How about at this risible statement:
Emphasis mine. Uh, Mr. Brooks? Based on what evidence? President Obama's storied legislative career in Illinois? His permanent campaign? His years learning the art of politics in Chicago? My goodness, man -- look at the luminaries he brought with him to the White House! No one is going to confuse Rahm Emanuel or David Axelrod with Edmund Burke. Let's give the President some credit here: he's smart enough to recognize a political operative when he sees one. And he's got a brigade of operatives sitting in the West Wing.
Ah, but True Believer Brooksie has figured out the issue. Cherchez la femme:
It's Pelosi! Foul temptress! Using her nasty tricks and feminine wiles to fool the noble Othello, er I mean Obama. Obama is just like the other noble men who come to Washington and are tempted by the painted ladies who parade on Pennsylvania Avenue. Poor, noble Barack Obama, patron saint of the pants crease: just like Marion Barry some 20 years before, the bitch set him up.
Our Timesman is taking it all kinda hard, and it's all that evil Pelosi's fault. But it's not just the president she's led astray. She is also Keyser Sose, apparently:
My God -- how can Pelosi do these things? She-devil! Siren! Good heavens, look at the carnage -- all the boys from Brookings piled on the rocks between Scylla and Charybdis, their position papers fluttering about in the breeze. And what of Andrew Sullivan and Josh Marshall, face down on their respective keyboards? And Gergen -- left bleeding at Rachel Maddow's desk! It's all too much for our puzzled pundit:
You could turn to that noted philosopher Jack Nicholson for two possible responses. But you know what's funny? Either Brooks is a complete liar or he really is an utter rube about all this. How else can you explain the incredible faith that Brooks apparently has in his hero? How else can you explain the 800-word rationalizations he offers twice weekly to the bien pensants who take the Times? What other possible reason would there be for a seemingly grown man of accomplishment to try to assign blame for this train wreck of an administration on Nancy Pelosi?
Here's the thing: in order for Brooks to believe these things, he has to simultaneously argue that Barack Obama is both a philosopher-king and an ingenue, a worldly-wise innocent. You could call it a nuanced argument, or you could call it cognitive dissonance. But you know what -- I think the rube theory is the right one. Brooks believes every word of it. If it weren't so profoundly icky and stupid, it would almost be touching.
You’ve been with the professors
And they’ve all liked your looks
With great lawyers you have
Discussed lepers and crooks
You’ve been through all of
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s books
You’re very well read
It’s well known
Because something is happening here
But you don’t know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones?
Uh, make that Mister Brooks:
David Brooks: But I persist in the belief that government is more fundamentally messed up than ever in my lifetime. Barack Obama campaigned offering a new era of sane government. And I believe he would do it if he had the chance. But he has been so sucked into the system that now he stands by while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi talks about passing health care via “deem and pass” — a tricky legislative device in which things get passed without members having the honor or the guts to stand up and vote for it.
Deem and pass? Are you kidding me? Is this what the Revolutionary War was fought for? Is this what the boys on Normandy beach were trying to defend? Is this where we thought we would end up when Obama was speaking so beautifully in Iowa or promising to put away childish things?
Criminy. Where to begin? How about at this risible statement:
Barack Obama campaigned offering a new era of sane government. And I believe he would do it if he had the chance.
Emphasis mine. Uh, Mr. Brooks? Based on what evidence? President Obama's storied legislative career in Illinois? His permanent campaign? His years learning the art of politics in Chicago? My goodness, man -- look at the luminaries he brought with him to the White House! No one is going to confuse Rahm Emanuel or David Axelrod with Edmund Burke. Let's give the President some credit here: he's smart enough to recognize a political operative when he sees one. And he's got a brigade of operatives sitting in the West Wing.
Ah, but True Believer Brooksie has figured out the issue. Cherchez la femme:
But he has been so sucked into the system that now he stands by while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi talks about passing health care via “deem and pass” — a tricky legislative device in which things get passed without members having the honor or the guts to stand up and vote for it.
It's Pelosi! Foul temptress! Using her nasty tricks and feminine wiles to fool the noble Othello, er I mean Obama. Obama is just like the other noble men who come to Washington and are tempted by the painted ladies who parade on Pennsylvania Avenue. Poor, noble Barack Obama, patron saint of the pants crease: just like Marion Barry some 20 years before, the bitch set him up.
Our Timesman is taking it all kinda hard, and it's all that evil Pelosi's fault. But it's not just the president she's led astray. She is also Keyser Sose, apparently:
Something that’s even more depressing is people in our business. We pundits consult think tankers and experts and bloggers in hopes of getting an honest opinion. Many of the experts I consult have become party apparatchiks over the last few weeks. Pelosi says jump and they ask where they can check their intellectual integrity to lighten the load.
My God -- how can Pelosi do these things? She-devil! Siren! Good heavens, look at the carnage -- all the boys from Brookings piled on the rocks between Scylla and Charybdis, their position papers fluttering about in the breeze. And what of Andrew Sullivan and Josh Marshall, face down on their respective keyboards? And Gergen -- left bleeding at Rachel Maddow's desk! It's all too much for our puzzled pundit:
Either this whole city has gone insane or I have or both. But I’m out here on the ledge and I’m not coming in the window. In my view this is no longer about health care. It’s just Democrats wanting to pass a bill, any bill, and shredding anything they have to in order to get it done. It’s about taking every sin the Republicans committed when they were busy being corrupted by power and matching it with interest.
You could turn to that noted philosopher Jack Nicholson for two possible responses. But you know what's funny? Either Brooks is a complete liar or he really is an utter rube about all this. How else can you explain the incredible faith that Brooks apparently has in his hero? How else can you explain the 800-word rationalizations he offers twice weekly to the bien pensants who take the Times? What other possible reason would there be for a seemingly grown man of accomplishment to try to assign blame for this train wreck of an administration on Nancy Pelosi?
Here's the thing: in order for Brooks to believe these things, he has to simultaneously argue that Barack Obama is both a philosopher-king and an ingenue, a worldly-wise innocent. You could call it a nuanced argument, or you could call it cognitive dissonance. But you know what -- I think the rube theory is the right one. Brooks believes every word of it. If it weren't so profoundly icky and stupid, it would almost be touching.
And what did you expect, Mr. Brooks?
David Brooks is aghast:
I know you don't think of yourself as common, Mr. Brooks, but you supported the election of this Congress and this administration on the theory that the common people deserved the ministrations of your friends with top notch pants creases. And now we're getting it through reconciliation, good and hard.
This is the world you requested, Mr. Brooks. No complaining now.
Reconciliation has been used periodically before. That was bad enough. But at least for major legislation like the first Bush tax cuts, there was usually significant bipartisan support. Now we have pure reconciliation mixed with pure partisanship.To which a far smarter pundit of a different era replies:
Once partisan reconciliation is used for this bill, it will be used for everything, now and forever. The Senate will be the House. The remnants of person-to-person relationships, with their sympathy and sentiment, will be snuffed out. We will live amid the relationships of group versus group, party versus party, inhumanity versus inhumanity.
We have a political culture in which the word “reconciliation” has come to mean “bitter division.” With increasing effectiveness, the system bleaches out normal behavior and the normal instincts of human sympathy.
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
I know you don't think of yourself as common, Mr. Brooks, but you supported the election of this Congress and this administration on the theory that the common people deserved the ministrations of your friends with top notch pants creases. And now we're getting it through reconciliation, good and hard.
This is the world you requested, Mr. Brooks. No complaining now.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Radio Free Dilettante — Cramdown Edition
iTunes gauges the mood:
Last Five:
Nowhere to Run, Martha & the Vandellas
Breakfast in Bed, Dusty Springfield
Get the Funk Out Ma Face, the Brothers Johnson
Moonlight Mile, the Rolling Stones
Change is Now, the Byrds
Next Five:
Give Me Strength, Eric Clapton
Mercy, Duffy
Long Train Running, Doobie Brothers
Ain't No Mountain High Enough, Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell
Keep on Smilin', Wet Willie
Last Five:
Nowhere to Run, Martha & the Vandellas
Breakfast in Bed, Dusty Springfield
Get the Funk Out Ma Face, the Brothers Johnson
Moonlight Mile, the Rolling Stones
Change is Now, the Byrds
Next Five:
Give Me Strength, Eric Clapton
Mercy, Duffy
Long Train Running, Doobie Brothers
Ain't No Mountain High Enough, Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell
Keep on Smilin', Wet Willie
Monday, March 15, 2010
Please send the letter
My good friend and blogging colleague Brad Carlson sent me a link to a site that will send an e-mail to your member of Congress (in my case, Betty McCollum) and another to the 58 members of the so-called "Blue Dog Coalition." The site gives you form letters that you can edit. I've edited my letters as follows.
First, my message to Cong. McCollum, who it must be noted doesn't give a damn what I think:
I write to remind you that your constituents oppose government-run health care and any legislation which might broaden the federal government's control over health care. There is no real support for the path you are currently considering.
Current health care legislation will result in lost health insurance and lost jobs for the American people and will push us deeper into recession. An employer would be foolish to hire a person now and be saddled with ruinous costs. Rather than providing more insurance, this legislation will eventually turn most employees into independent contractors. This will inevitably lead to a single-payer government healthcare regime. While you might think this desirable, rest assured that your constituents will not.
More importantly, a yes vote for this monstrosity will fundamentally change the nature of the relationship between the government and those it purports to govern. If my health care is subject to the whim of the government and the battery of bureaucracies that will result from the implementation of this legislation, I will face compulsion in my lifestyle choices.
You have been told, no doubt, that this is an historic vote. Indeed it is. If you vote yes for the bill, you will permanently harm the country in an irreparable way. And please note this -- the citizens of the 4th District will view your vote as a resignation letter and I will do everything within my power to ensure your defeat, so you will be able to enjoy the fruits of your historic vote as a private citizen.
Next is the message I have sent to the Blue Dogs:
I write to encourage you to oppose government-run health care and any legislation which might broaden the federal government's control over my health care.
Current health care legislation will result in lost health insurance and lost jobs for the American people and will push us deeper into recession.
I hope that you fight against health care legislation that would drive up costs, diminish quality and limit access. Please know that I'll be looking to see how you vote this March. If you vote yes, I and millions of others will consider your vote a resignation letter and we will use our collective energies to oust you from office. If you believe that this healthcare initiative is such a fine idea, we will give you an opportunity to enjoy the results of your handiwork in January of 2011.
The hour is growing near. These people need to hear from you. I don't have any illusions about my own representative. Cong. McCollum will vote for this crap sandwich -- it's a foregone conclusion that she will since Cong. McCollum is essentially sewn into the lining of Nancy Pelosi's coat pocket and the next independent thought McCollum has will be her first. We'll get to work on ousting her pretty soon.
Even if your representative is a lost cause, send a note -- it doesn't take that long and the Blue Dogs are the ones who really need to hear from you. Perhaps your note will be the one that sends a Blue Dog's careerist, survivalist instinct into gear and leads to a No vote. In addition, there are non-Blue Dog representatives here in the Upper Midwest (Tim Walz, Ron Kind, Steve Kagen) who might break the right way if they feel enough heat. If these guys think they can get by with voting yes, they will. Make sure they understand the implications of their vote. Do it today.
First, my message to Cong. McCollum, who it must be noted doesn't give a damn what I think:
I write to remind you that your constituents oppose government-run health care and any legislation which might broaden the federal government's control over health care. There is no real support for the path you are currently considering.
Current health care legislation will result in lost health insurance and lost jobs for the American people and will push us deeper into recession. An employer would be foolish to hire a person now and be saddled with ruinous costs. Rather than providing more insurance, this legislation will eventually turn most employees into independent contractors. This will inevitably lead to a single-payer government healthcare regime. While you might think this desirable, rest assured that your constituents will not.
More importantly, a yes vote for this monstrosity will fundamentally change the nature of the relationship between the government and those it purports to govern. If my health care is subject to the whim of the government and the battery of bureaucracies that will result from the implementation of this legislation, I will face compulsion in my lifestyle choices.
You have been told, no doubt, that this is an historic vote. Indeed it is. If you vote yes for the bill, you will permanently harm the country in an irreparable way. And please note this -- the citizens of the 4th District will view your vote as a resignation letter and I will do everything within my power to ensure your defeat, so you will be able to enjoy the fruits of your historic vote as a private citizen.
Next is the message I have sent to the Blue Dogs:
I write to encourage you to oppose government-run health care and any legislation which might broaden the federal government's control over my health care.
Current health care legislation will result in lost health insurance and lost jobs for the American people and will push us deeper into recession.
I hope that you fight against health care legislation that would drive up costs, diminish quality and limit access. Please know that I'll be looking to see how you vote this March. If you vote yes, I and millions of others will consider your vote a resignation letter and we will use our collective energies to oust you from office. If you believe that this healthcare initiative is such a fine idea, we will give you an opportunity to enjoy the results of your handiwork in January of 2011.
The hour is growing near. These people need to hear from you. I don't have any illusions about my own representative. Cong. McCollum will vote for this crap sandwich -- it's a foregone conclusion that she will since Cong. McCollum is essentially sewn into the lining of Nancy Pelosi's coat pocket and the next independent thought McCollum has will be her first. We'll get to work on ousting her pretty soon.
Even if your representative is a lost cause, send a note -- it doesn't take that long and the Blue Dogs are the ones who really need to hear from you. Perhaps your note will be the one that sends a Blue Dog's careerist, survivalist instinct into gear and leads to a No vote. In addition, there are non-Blue Dog representatives here in the Upper Midwest (Tim Walz, Ron Kind, Steve Kagen) who might break the right way if they feel enough heat. If these guys think they can get by with voting yes, they will. Make sure they understand the implications of their vote. Do it today.
Lightning Round - 031510
Never enough time and always so much to say:
-- Even though he manages the hated White Sox, you gotta love Ozzie Guillen, who was an intelligent and fearless ballplayer and has been a really fun adversary as a manager. Ozzie doesn't much like Sean Penn, apparently (H/T to Instapundit):
I am amused.
-- I'm sure glad that the Congress has been heading the call of the citizenry and listening to their impassioned pleas on Obamacare. They now have a working bill that's 2,309 pages long. That makes Atlas Shrugged look like a pamphlet.
-- I don't know what's worse: that David Axelrod is a ridiculous buffoon, or that my alma mater has selected Axelrod to be the speaker at this year's commencement. Check out this howler from the press release:
A political idealist, huh? I worked in the Beloit College public relations office 25 years ago and I'll say this much: I don't think I ever had to write anything that transparently ludicrous.
-- Even though he manages the hated White Sox, you gotta love Ozzie Guillen, who was an intelligent and fearless ballplayer and has been a really fun adversary as a manager. Ozzie doesn't much like Sean Penn, apparently (H/T to Instapundit):
The outspoken White Sox manager called Penn a “payaso” (clown) and “izquierdista
estupido” (stupid leftist) on Twitter Friday for his praise of controversial Venezuela President Hugo Chavez.
“Oh my God, Sean Penn defended our President Hugo Chavez,” Guillen, a Venezuela native, tweeted. “That’s easy when you [don't] live in Venezuela and have money. LOL…shame on [you].”
I am amused.
-- I'm sure glad that the Congress has been heading the call of the citizenry and listening to their impassioned pleas on Obamacare. They now have a working bill that's 2,309 pages long. That makes Atlas Shrugged look like a pamphlet.
-- I don't know what's worse: that David Axelrod is a ridiculous buffoon, or that my alma mater has selected Axelrod to be the speaker at this year's commencement. Check out this howler from the press release:
A political idealist who has played a critical role in American politics for a quarter century, Axelrod served as senior advisor to the Obama-Biden Presidential Transition and chief strategist and media advisor for the 2008 Obama campaign. Following the campaign, the President named him to his current post.
A political idealist, huh? I worked in the Beloit College public relations office 25 years ago and I'll say this much: I don't think I ever had to write anything that transparently ludicrous.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Bensterology -- March Madness is Here!
Hey everyone, Benster's in the house. And as you can guess, I can already feel the HYYYYYYYPPPPPE!!!!!!!!!!!
No, really? You don't say!
I've been feeling it since about 2:30 this afternoon, Decrepit, when the Gophers took the floor against The. Ohio. State. University. Unfortunately, Evan Turner didn't want to see the Gophers celebrate.
Yeah, it was a bit of a butt whoopin', Seabiscuit. But I understand that the Gophers got in anyway.
Yes, because they beat the Illinois Cheating Illini in Champaign, so the great brains on the Selection Committee decided to send the Gophs instead. And I also think they wanted to prevent any possibility of Bruce Weber wearing his godawful orange sport coat, especially since the Tennessee coach, Bruce Pearl, has one that's even worse -- I've even added the picture to prove it. Which is saying something, old fella!
I appreciate the fashion critique, Benster, but I thought you wanted to talk about the tournament. Or are you channeling Fearless Maria?
No, I'll leave the fashion talk to Fearless Maria, and/or Joan Rivers. They can fight it out on the red carpet. I know who I have my money on, geezer!
Well, let's do it this way, youngblood. I'll ask you some questions. Do you like the brackets generally?
I have to think that the brackets seem to be heavily stacked at the top, and I was a little surprised that the mid-majors got a bunch of at-large bids, especially after last year. I think we could see more than a few upsets in the first weekend.
Who do you think is going to pull an upset?
I have to like Cornell. I don't think they are really a 12 seed at all. Now the Ivy League isn't exactly the Big East, but Cornell can play basketball and their opponent, Temple, should be on high alert.
Were you surprised that the Badgers got a 4 seed and Michigan State got a 5?
I was a little surprised, because Wisconsin got thoroughly drubbed by the Cheating Illini in the conference tournament, but apparently that didn't matter very much and you do need to remember that the Badgers beat the Spartans badly in Madison and were competitive in East Lansing. Also, winning against Duke really helped the Badgers' cause. Now, can I ask you a question, old dude?
Sure. Shoot.
Who do you think is on upset alert?
Well, I'll go with the easy choice and say Purdue. The Boilermakers were a very good team before Robbie Hummel got hurt, but without him they don't have a lot of firepower and they looked almost helpless against the Gophers on Saturday. Siena has a history of being a tough team to beat in the tournament and I would expect that they will be able to handle Purdue. I'd also suggest that Butler better watch its step against Texas-El Paso, and the aforementioned Tennessee will wish they didn't have to play San Diego State. Pearl may hope that his neon sport coat will frighten and/or blind the Aztec players. Now, let me ask you this: how will the Gophers do against Xavier?
I guess it depends on which team shows up. The team that played like demons this weekend against Purdue, or the team that didn't bother against Michigan. Xavier is undoubtedly a talented team and has been pretty good in recent years, but the Gophers should be able to give them a lot of trouble, especially with the Twin Towers of Sampson and Iverson. And it would help if Blake Hoffarber decides to throw up a few prayers like he did in high school.
I agree with that. Any opinion on who is going to win the whole thing when it's done?
I like the West Virginia Mountaineers. They play good defense and they won the Big East tournament, which is no easy thing. I'd like to think they can harass John Wall and Kentucky enough to get to the Final Four, and then they can annihilate Duke, because everyone wants Duke to lose, except maybe Jay Bilas and Coach K. But Jay Bilas is one of those ESPN guys who is going running on coffee this weekend and probably wishes he was back at Duke instead of being a stat head.
So you've already developed a dislike of the Dukies, huh? A sign of good judgment, grasshopper. We are quite pleased to see that.
I'll give Bilas this much, at least he doesn't try to match his tie to his highlighter like Digger Phelps, who probably needs a fashion intervention right after they get to Bruce Pearl and Bruce Weber.
Good to know, Benster. So you're going with West Virginia, huh?
John Wall may be talented, but if West Virginia won't let him get near the basket it won't matter very much. And Kentucky cheats even more than the Cheatin' Illini. Maybe after Calipari gets run out of Lexington, maybe the 'Cats can bring in Lou Henson. Wait, I'd better check on that and make sure he's not dead. Okay, he's available. Ben out!
When the student is ready, the teacher appears part two
And the learning continues, as Europe feels the love of The One:
The British can have a chat with Abe Foxman over the realization that He's Just Not That Into You. And they'll have company -- from the article:
Hey, look on the bright side, Europe -- at least you're rid of that despicable cowboy Chimpy McHitlerburton.
Within days of becoming president, Obama removed the bust of Winston Churchill from the Oval Office. This, followed by Obama’s odd choice of gift to Brown — a box of DVDs including Psycho and Toy Story — prompted speculation of something deeper. In his memoir, Obama writes of how his grandfather was beaten by British troops in colonial Kenya.
A senior official from No 10, who was in Washington in December for Obama’s big speech on Afghanistan, was horrified that the president did not once mention Britain in the 45-minute address despite the presence there of 10,000 British troops.
British diplomats recently complained to the State Department over the handling of the Falklands dispute with Argentina. Although the US position of neutrality has not changed, Hillary Clinton, the secretary of state, endorsed the Argentine president’s call for talks on sovereignty while visiting Buenos Aires. A State Department spokesman responded to a question about the Falklands by saying: “Or the Malvinas, depending on how you see it.”
The British can have a chat with Abe Foxman over the realization that He's Just Not That Into You. And they'll have company -- from the article:
London is not alone in feeling snubbed. In July last year Obama received an open letter from 22 prominent central and eastern Europeans, including Vaclav Havel and Lech Walesa, expressing their concern over his policy of wooing Russia.
He managed to offend Poland and the Czech Republic with his clumsy handling of the scrapping of missile defence agreements last September. The announcement, partly to appease Russia, came on the 70th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland.
At the Copenhagen summit on climate change, European leaders expected to have a big say, having led the way on environmental legislation. Instead they were left out of the room while Obama cut a deal with China, India, Brazil and South Africa.
The most recent recipients of the Obama brush-off were the Spanish, who were curtly informed that Obama would not be attending the annual European Union-US summit in Madrid in May, something Bush did. When Jose Luis Zapatero, the Spanish prime minister, came to Washington after the cancellation, he was not even granted a private meeting with the president or vice-president. His only encounter with Obama was at the national prayer breakfast, an event attended by thousands.
Hey, look on the bright side, Europe -- at least you're rid of that despicable cowboy Chimpy McHitlerburton.
When the student is ready, the teacher appears
Another frog ponders the scorpion:
"We are shocked and stunned at the Administration's tone and public dressing down of Israel," Anti-Defamation League director Abraham Foxman said in a statement. "We cannot remember an instance when such harsh language was directed at a friend and ally of the United States."Uh, Abe? The people who run this administration aren't your friends. And, despite the generous support you and your organization have offered these people, they haven't been your friends for rather a long time now. If you have any further questions, let me know.
Friday, March 12, 2010
The Maltese Falsehood
Chad the Elder at Fraters asks a really great question:
Go click the link, because Chad has run the numbers and they aren't pretty. But he does remind us of one undeniable benefit:
Question for all those Catholics out there who voted for Barack Obama because--despite his clear and consistent views and record on abortion, stem cells, and other life issues--he would do more to help promote "social justice." You know people like Douglas Kmiec and other ProLife ProObama folks who claimed that being pro-life was more than just opposing abortion and anyway as president Obama would take actions that would "drastically" reduce the number of abortions.
More than a year into the Obama presidency, what exactly has President Obama done that in any way could justify your vote?
Go click the link, because Chad has run the numbers and they aren't pretty. But he does remind us of one undeniable benefit:
Douglas Kmiec got a sweet gig as U.S. Ambassador to Malta, but what about the rest of you?
Thursday, March 11, 2010
My American Medical Story
It was nearly 3 years ago and I blogged about it at the time. I had suffered from severe headaches for most of my adult life, but on the morning of Tuesday, March 27, 2007, I had a headache for the ages. It came on in the night and no amount of painkiller was enough to stop it. More alarmingly, my vision had become blurred and I was having trouble speaking clearly, although I had no trouble screaming in agony. There wasn't much that Mrs. D could do for me except to get the kids off to school and then get me to the doctor's office.
We'd been through the drill before but after I described the symptoms to the doctor at our clinic, he immediately ordered a CT scan. I'd had a CT scan about six years before but nothing came up. We drove from the clinic to St. Paul Radiology's location in Arden Hills, about a mile from my house. The scan was completed and sent back to the clinic. This time, the news was different. I can still hear his words now. We saw something on the CT scan. The good news is that you didn't have a stroke, but you may have a tumor. You need to get to United Hospital right away. We'll call over there and have you admitted. Can you go right away?
Well, yes, we could go right away. We got down there and I was admitted immediately. Shortly thereafter, I went to the radiology department and had an MRI done. At that point, the diagnosis was provided. Pituitary adenoma. The doctors were concerned about the tumor, which had grown to 2.5cm and was showing signs of bleeding, which would have required emergency surgery. I was admitted to United for 4 days while the medical team put me through a battery of tests. While the need for immediate surgery might not materialize, there was little time to waste.
One of the things that was most impressive about my initial stay at United was how doctors seemed to appear out of nowhere. In the course of the first day I met the neurosurgeon who would later perform the surgery. Then a neurologist arrived, and an endocrinologist and otylarynologist. Finally, I met an opthamologist. I later learned that a number of these doctors were regularly featured on the list of top doctors that runs in Minneapolis-St. Paul magazine each year.
What I learned was about my condition was troubling, especially from the opthamologist. I took a test of my formal visual fields, which measures peripheral vision, both left and right and up and down. While I hadn't realized it, I had lost almost 30% of my visual field, on the top and bottom. While I could see peripherally, the tumor was impinging on my optic nerve and I could not see things up and down. If the tumor were to grow much more, I would likely suffer permanent vision loss.
After consulting with the doctors, the surgery was scheduled for the following Wednesday. The surgery would be a six hour procedure. The otylarynologist (an ear, nose and throat surgeon) would clear a path through my nose that would allow the neurosurgeon to reach and remove the tumor.
The surgery was uneventful and successful. It helps to have some of the best doctors in Minnesota working on your behalf. I spent about a week in the hospital recovering. The timing wasn't the greatest, as it was Easter weekend and I wasn't able to spend time with my family except for a few short visits. But eventually I was able to go home and slowly recover. By the 4th of July, I was healthy.
Three years on, the change is nothing short of remarkable. I rarely have headaches anymore and my vision has returned to 100%. I have no limitations on my physical activities and while I have to take a lot of medications to maintain my hormonal levels, I can do whatever I want. I'm a lucky guy.
*****
So why did I share this story now? I'm concerned. The primary basis of my good fortune is that I had immediate access to a team of specialists in a variety of medical disciplines, who were able to work together quickly to solve a serious medical problem. I did not have to wait for care -- if it had been necessary, I would have been on the operating table the same day as the initial diagnosis. Beyond the skilled and dedicated medical professionals who were available to help me, I also had the good fortune of living in a metropolitan area with a number of top-flight hospitals, all with state-of-the-art diagnostic equipment, including an available MRI machine. We did not have a "Cadillac" health insurance policy -- in fact, we weren't doing so well financially in early 2007. My wife had coverage through her employer, which was a good thing because I had been laid off from my job in 2006 when my employer moved its operations out of state. I had not been able to find a full-time job and my health had been complicating my job search. This diagnosis and the related medical bills could have been catastrophic, but we came out of it just fine. Although we had some good-sized deductibles, we were able to manage the expense. The insurance company paid the bills, which likely ran into six figures, and did not fight us in any way.
There are undeniable problems with the medical delivery system in this country, especially the reality that third parties end up paying for medical services. And it is true that millions of Americans do not have health insurance at any given time.
What we do have an incredible amount of capacity to deliver medical care in this country. I ended up having my surgery at United Hospital, but I could as easily have had the procedure performed at Methodist Hospital, or Regions, or Fairview Southdale, or any number of other hospitals in the Twin Cities. Or I could have gone to the Mayo Clinic, home to some of the best doctors in the world. If I lived just a few hundred miles to the north, I would have had to wait.
Why is that? In Canada, everyone waits. The average wait for an MRI in Ottawa, Ontario is anywhere from 52-173 days, according to this website. There would have been an alternative, which is to have an MRI done privately, but the cost would have been around $1,000, which would have been close to impossible for a guy who was unemployed at the time. I would have had to wait for an MRI and endure more headaches, with the potential that the adenoma would indeed start to bleed and cause other damage. And in any event, as the website notes, there isn't an endocrinologist who specializes in the pituitary in Ottawa, which happens to be the capital of Canada.
Meanwhile, in the capital of this nation, there are politicians who believe that our current medical system must be overhauled. These politicians are currently involved in some amazingly convoluted measures to fundamentally change the medical system that helped me. I'd be willing to stipulate that their intentions are good, even though I'm not really convinced of that. But do we really want to change the system we have now in unalterable, unknowable ways? I would hope that the next guy who wakes up on a sunny March morning with a horrifying headache, blurred vision and slurred speech can get the same level of care that I received in 2007. If we change nothing, chances are he will. If our politicians change our system, good luck to him.
We'd been through the drill before but after I described the symptoms to the doctor at our clinic, he immediately ordered a CT scan. I'd had a CT scan about six years before but nothing came up. We drove from the clinic to St. Paul Radiology's location in Arden Hills, about a mile from my house. The scan was completed and sent back to the clinic. This time, the news was different. I can still hear his words now. We saw something on the CT scan. The good news is that you didn't have a stroke, but you may have a tumor. You need to get to United Hospital right away. We'll call over there and have you admitted. Can you go right away?
Well, yes, we could go right away. We got down there and I was admitted immediately. Shortly thereafter, I went to the radiology department and had an MRI done. At that point, the diagnosis was provided. Pituitary adenoma. The doctors were concerned about the tumor, which had grown to 2.5cm and was showing signs of bleeding, which would have required emergency surgery. I was admitted to United for 4 days while the medical team put me through a battery of tests. While the need for immediate surgery might not materialize, there was little time to waste.
One of the things that was most impressive about my initial stay at United was how doctors seemed to appear out of nowhere. In the course of the first day I met the neurosurgeon who would later perform the surgery. Then a neurologist arrived, and an endocrinologist and otylarynologist. Finally, I met an opthamologist. I later learned that a number of these doctors were regularly featured on the list of top doctors that runs in Minneapolis-St. Paul magazine each year.
What I learned was about my condition was troubling, especially from the opthamologist. I took a test of my formal visual fields, which measures peripheral vision, both left and right and up and down. While I hadn't realized it, I had lost almost 30% of my visual field, on the top and bottom. While I could see peripherally, the tumor was impinging on my optic nerve and I could not see things up and down. If the tumor were to grow much more, I would likely suffer permanent vision loss.
After consulting with the doctors, the surgery was scheduled for the following Wednesday. The surgery would be a six hour procedure. The otylarynologist (an ear, nose and throat surgeon) would clear a path through my nose that would allow the neurosurgeon to reach and remove the tumor.
The surgery was uneventful and successful. It helps to have some of the best doctors in Minnesota working on your behalf. I spent about a week in the hospital recovering. The timing wasn't the greatest, as it was Easter weekend and I wasn't able to spend time with my family except for a few short visits. But eventually I was able to go home and slowly recover. By the 4th of July, I was healthy.
Three years on, the change is nothing short of remarkable. I rarely have headaches anymore and my vision has returned to 100%. I have no limitations on my physical activities and while I have to take a lot of medications to maintain my hormonal levels, I can do whatever I want. I'm a lucky guy.
*****
So why did I share this story now? I'm concerned. The primary basis of my good fortune is that I had immediate access to a team of specialists in a variety of medical disciplines, who were able to work together quickly to solve a serious medical problem. I did not have to wait for care -- if it had been necessary, I would have been on the operating table the same day as the initial diagnosis. Beyond the skilled and dedicated medical professionals who were available to help me, I also had the good fortune of living in a metropolitan area with a number of top-flight hospitals, all with state-of-the-art diagnostic equipment, including an available MRI machine. We did not have a "Cadillac" health insurance policy -- in fact, we weren't doing so well financially in early 2007. My wife had coverage through her employer, which was a good thing because I had been laid off from my job in 2006 when my employer moved its operations out of state. I had not been able to find a full-time job and my health had been complicating my job search. This diagnosis and the related medical bills could have been catastrophic, but we came out of it just fine. Although we had some good-sized deductibles, we were able to manage the expense. The insurance company paid the bills, which likely ran into six figures, and did not fight us in any way.
There are undeniable problems with the medical delivery system in this country, especially the reality that third parties end up paying for medical services. And it is true that millions of Americans do not have health insurance at any given time.
What we do have an incredible amount of capacity to deliver medical care in this country. I ended up having my surgery at United Hospital, but I could as easily have had the procedure performed at Methodist Hospital, or Regions, or Fairview Southdale, or any number of other hospitals in the Twin Cities. Or I could have gone to the Mayo Clinic, home to some of the best doctors in the world. If I lived just a few hundred miles to the north, I would have had to wait.
Why is that? In Canada, everyone waits. The average wait for an MRI in Ottawa, Ontario is anywhere from 52-173 days, according to this website. There would have been an alternative, which is to have an MRI done privately, but the cost would have been around $1,000, which would have been close to impossible for a guy who was unemployed at the time. I would have had to wait for an MRI and endure more headaches, with the potential that the adenoma would indeed start to bleed and cause other damage. And in any event, as the website notes, there isn't an endocrinologist who specializes in the pituitary in Ottawa, which happens to be the capital of Canada.
Meanwhile, in the capital of this nation, there are politicians who believe that our current medical system must be overhauled. These politicians are currently involved in some amazingly convoluted measures to fundamentally change the medical system that helped me. I'd be willing to stipulate that their intentions are good, even though I'm not really convinced of that. But do we really want to change the system we have now in unalterable, unknowable ways? I would hope that the next guy who wakes up on a sunny March morning with a horrifying headache, blurred vision and slurred speech can get the same level of care that I received in 2007. If we change nothing, chances are he will. If our politicians change our system, good luck to him.
Since Kate Knuth Isn't Likely to Read This Elsewhere
News you can use:
Are there other datasets? From the article:
Here's the part you need to remember -- pay attention, Rep. Knuth:
That's a bit of a problem, since it has become clear that the CRU data is pretty much crap. So if the NASA GISS integrated CRU data into its dataset, it means that the NASA GISS dataset is almost certainly corrupted, too. And, more importantly, it also means the NASA GISS dataset provides no independent verification of AGW.Email messages obtained by the Competitive Enterprise Institute via a Freedom of Information Act request reveal that the climate dataset of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) was considered — by the top climate scientists within NASA itself — to be inferior to the data maintained by the University of East Anglia Climate Research Unit (CRU).
The NASA scientists also felt that NASA GISS data was inferior to the National Climate Data Center Global Historical Climate Network (NCDC GHCN) database.
These emails, obtained by Christopher Horner, also show that the NASA GISS dataset was not independent of CRU data.
Are there other datasets? From the article:
Okay, so the climate scientists didn't like the NCDC GHCN dataset and didn't trust the NASA GISS dataset, so they buttressed their findings with CRU dataset. Good idea? Not so much.There are only four climate datasets available. All global warming study, such as the reports from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), must be based on these four.
They are: the NASA GISS dataset, the NCDC GHCN dataset, the CRU dataset, and the Japan Meteorological Agency dataset.
Here's the part you need to remember -- pay attention, Rep. Knuth:
These three datasets — from NASA GISS, NCDC GHCN, and CRU — are the basis of essentially all climate study supporting anthropogenic global warming.
March in Minnesota
In our neck of the woods, March is the one month out of the year that you can witness signs of all four seasons in the course of four weeks.
This morning, Fearless Maria stood outside waiting for the school bus. The crowd at the bus stop was dressed in all of their winter gear. It was raining hard and thundering.
We still have several weeks left in the month. Maybe the tree in our neighbor's backyard will finally drop the last brown leaves off its branches. Still plenty of time for one large snowstorm and a 70 degree day.
This morning, Fearless Maria stood outside waiting for the school bus. The crowd at the bus stop was dressed in all of their winter gear. It was raining hard and thundering.
We still have several weeks left in the month. Maybe the tree in our neighbor's backyard will finally drop the last brown leaves off its branches. Still plenty of time for one large snowstorm and a 70 degree day.
The money follows
During the Watergate era, we were told that the way to understand the scandal was to follow the money. Well, it's obvious where the money is going these days:
Where are those places? They are suburban enclaves of Washington, DC. And they aren't the only ones:
Yeah, having a leviathan federal government around does mean that there's a lot of money sloshing around DC and its environs. It's also worth remembering that these are 2008 numbers, which reflect the situation before the recession really hit and do not reflect the huge expansion of government that is going on right now under the helpful aegis of Barack Obama and his Hope and Change brigade. I'm guessing that the numbers we get from the Census Bureau in the next few years willl show an intensification of this trend, which began in the 1960s and first became evident in the 1970 census. One thing is clear -- for all the complaining that was done about those nasty Republicans and their animosity to government, they surely didn't change the trends very much.
It used to be that our country rewarded those places where innovation is strongest. Now the keepers of the leviathan, their servants (contractors) and mendicants (lobbyists) are rewarding themselves. Good to know, huh?
Loudoun ranks as the richest county in the United States, immediately followed by Fairfax and Howard counties, while Montgomery, traditionally one of the wealthiest, is now 10th.
Where are those places? They are suburban enclaves of Washington, DC. And they aren't the only ones:
Forbes magazine ranked eight other Washington-area counties in its list of the nation's 25 wealthiest counties, far more than any other area in the country. The rankings are based on 2008 median household income data from the U.S. Census Bureau.And why would that be?
While other traditionally wealthy regions such as New York and San Francisco have suffered heavily in the recession, the Washington area benefits from the presence of the federal government and its contractors, the overall high level of education, and the area's high proportion of two-income households.
Yeah, having a leviathan federal government around does mean that there's a lot of money sloshing around DC and its environs. It's also worth remembering that these are 2008 numbers, which reflect the situation before the recession really hit and do not reflect the huge expansion of government that is going on right now under the helpful aegis of Barack Obama and his Hope and Change brigade. I'm guessing that the numbers we get from the Census Bureau in the next few years willl show an intensification of this trend, which began in the 1960s and first became evident in the 1970 census. One thing is clear -- for all the complaining that was done about those nasty Republicans and their animosity to government, they surely didn't change the trends very much.
It used to be that our country rewarded those places where innovation is strongest. Now the keepers of the leviathan, their servants (contractors) and mendicants (lobbyists) are rewarding themselves. Good to know, huh?
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Just a reminder
If President Obama talks about saving money, he's lying. Allahpundit makes the key point here:
Change you can believe in, suckers.
All I can do is try to contextualize this for you: According to CBO, based on an analysis of the deeply deceitful numbers presented to it by Reid and Obama, the national panacea of health-care reform will save us $132 billion over the next 10 years. Which means the feds blew through our big decade-long ObamaCare refund in about … 17 days last month.
Change you can believe in, suckers.
That's Senator Useful Idiot to You, Pal
Lindsey Graham gets schooled again:
And your good bipartisan friends, the ones you trusted? The ones you reach across the aisle to work with? They ain't buyin' this time:
And one other thing -- the Democrats won't necessarily have to use reconciliation anyway. The Senate bill has passed and is now under consideration in the House. Right now Nancy Pelosi is using her wiles (such as they are) and whatever muscle she has available to get enough vulnerable Democrats in the House to put their necks in the guillotine. If she succeeds, the House will pass the bill, President Obama will sign it and reconciliation becomes a dead letter.
It could be worse -- as of yet, Lindsay Lohan has not filed suit to enjoin Senator Graham over using her name, but we're watching that front as well.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) wants to revive the bipartisan Gang of 14 — this time for health care reform, not judicial nominees.Uh, Senator, aside from you and perhaps John McCain, who are these Republicans that are glad they didn't pull the trigger? You put false institutional comity over actually trying to accomplish something. And who cares about Miguel Estrada or any of the other people you threw under the bus, anyway? They don't matter as long as you have institutional comity.
But most of his moderate Democratic colleagues aren’t rushing to R.S.V.P.
Graham said Tuesday that a coalition of Republican and Democratic senators could rescue the Senate from an institutional disaster brought on by the use of the parliamentary maneuver known as reconciliation to finish the health care bill.
“Many Republicans who were ready to pull the trigger on the nuclear option on judges are now glad they didn’t,” Graham said. “This place would have ceased to function as we know it. If they do health care through reconciliation, it will be the same consequence. So if you are a moderate Democrat out there looking for a way to deliver health care reforms and not pull the nuclear trigger, there is a model to look at.”
And your good bipartisan friends, the ones you trusted? The ones you reach across the aisle to work with? They ain't buyin' this time:
But some of the moderates who would usually be the first to join such a push scoffed at the idea.Of course not. Ben Nelson has no incentive to do anything -- he and 59 of his friends pushed the bill past you, Sen. Graham, and Nelson got a pile of money to boot, too. And oddly, Sen. Nelson didn't respect you in the morning, either. But why should he be different from the rest of us?
“Who are they going to get?” asked Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), a member of the original Gang of 14. “It is not the same as it was before.”
And one other thing -- the Democrats won't necessarily have to use reconciliation anyway. The Senate bill has passed and is now under consideration in the House. Right now Nancy Pelosi is using her wiles (such as they are) and whatever muscle she has available to get enough vulnerable Democrats in the House to put their necks in the guillotine. If she succeeds, the House will pass the bill, President Obama will sign it and reconciliation becomes a dead letter.
It could be worse -- as of yet, Lindsay Lohan has not filed suit to enjoin Senator Graham over using her name, but we're watching that front as well.
I'm not sure why, either
Chief Justice John Roberts had a few words to say about the way President Obama treated the Court at the State of the Union:
Roberts then made the larger point:
U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts said Tuesday the scene at President Obama's State of the Union address was "very troubling" and the annual speech has "degenerated to a political pep rally."I agree. No matter what you think of the merits of the case, it was a lousy thing to do. As Theodore Roosevelt said, the president has the bully pulpit. It's not necessary to be a bully when using the pulpit, however.
Obama chided the court, with the justices seated before him in their black robes, for its decision on a campaign finance case.
Responding to a University of Alabama law student's question, Roberts said anyone was free to criticize the court, and some have an obligation to do so because of their positions.
"So I have no problems with that," he said. "On the other hand, there is the issue of the setting, the circumstances and the decorum.
"The image of having the members of one branch of government standing up, literally surrounding the Supreme Court, cheering and hollering while the court — according the requirements of protocol — has to sit there expressionless, I think is very troubling."
Roberts then made the larger point:
Roberts told the students he wonders whether justices should attend the speeches.
"I'm not sure why we're there," said Roberts, a Republican nominee who joined the court in 2005.
Justice Antonin Scalia once said he no longer goes to the annual speech because the justices "sit there like bumps on a log" in an otherwise highly partisan atmosphere. Six of the nine justices attended Obama's address.
It's worth remembering what Obama said that night:
As Samuel Alito pointed out in a very quiet way that night, what Obama said wasn't correct. But we'll leave that aside. It's inevitable that the Supreme Court is involved in political issues, because just about everything is political these days. But one thing is certain -- Roberts is correct in questioning whether the Supremes should be part of the kabuki of a State of the Union address. And no one should have to listen to any politician, even the President of the United States, level a charge against him without having a chance to respond."With all due deference to the separation of powers the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our elections," Obama said in January.
Tuesday, March 09, 2010
Radio Free Dilettante — Cloudy March Tuesday Edition
Random, pretty much defined:
Last Five:
Crazy, Seal
Disco Inferno, the Trammps
Double Shot (Of My Baby’s Love), the Swingin’ Medallions
Smells Like Teen Spirit, Nirvana
The Bertha Butt Boogie, Part 1, The Jimmy Castor Bunch
Next Five:
Can’t Hide Love, Earth Wind & Fire
Something’s Changed, Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings
I Don’t Need No Doctor, Ray Charles
If You Could Read My Mind, Gordon Lightfoot
New Frontier, Donald Fagen
Last Five:
Crazy, Seal
Disco Inferno, the Trammps
Double Shot (Of My Baby’s Love), the Swingin’ Medallions
Smells Like Teen Spirit, Nirvana
The Bertha Butt Boogie, Part 1, The Jimmy Castor Bunch
Next Five:
Can’t Hide Love, Earth Wind & Fire
Something’s Changed, Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings
I Don’t Need No Doctor, Ray Charles
If You Could Read My Mind, Gordon Lightfoot
New Frontier, Donald Fagen
Mercy for Tom Petters?
So the word is that Tom Petters has a tumor:
As it happens, I know a little about pituitary tumors, since I had one that was growing and had major surgery in 2007 to remove it. It is true that, if left untreated, the tumor could cause blindness. At the time I had my surgery, I had lost up to 30% of my vision because the tumor was impinging on my optic nerve. Once the tumor was removed, I regained the lost vision within a matter of weeks.
One thing you should know -- pituitary tumors are not rare at all. In fact, up to 20% of people have them, although most are asymptomatic. This link from the Mayo Clinic lays out some of the worst-case scenarios, most of which were present in my case, especially the severe headaches.
So, is the long-term prognosis for Petters bleak? Not especially. If the tumor grows, he should get surgery for it and might require permanent hormone replacement through medication. I take a bunch of little pills every day and have my endocrinologist on the speed dial. But I can tell you this much: I live a pretty normal life now. And if he is treated properly, Petters will live a normal life as well. In jail.
Petters' defense attorneys pleaded for leniency and mercy, saying their client suffers from a tumor on his pituitary gland.
"The long-term prognosis for Mr. Petters' condition is bleak; he faces the risk of blindness," said defense attorney Paul Engh in court documents. "The tumor is not growing at the moment but cannot be ignored."
As it happens, I know a little about pituitary tumors, since I had one that was growing and had major surgery in 2007 to remove it. It is true that, if left untreated, the tumor could cause blindness. At the time I had my surgery, I had lost up to 30% of my vision because the tumor was impinging on my optic nerve. Once the tumor was removed, I regained the lost vision within a matter of weeks.
One thing you should know -- pituitary tumors are not rare at all. In fact, up to 20% of people have them, although most are asymptomatic. This link from the Mayo Clinic lays out some of the worst-case scenarios, most of which were present in my case, especially the severe headaches.
So, is the long-term prognosis for Petters bleak? Not especially. If the tumor grows, he should get surgery for it and might require permanent hormone replacement through medication. I take a bunch of little pills every day and have my endocrinologist on the speed dial. But I can tell you this much: I live a pretty normal life now. And if he is treated properly, Petters will live a normal life as well. In jail.
Monday, March 08, 2010
A commenter's fears are realized
UPDATE (3/9/10): I got one important fact wrong in this piece, which is referenced at the end.
A valued commenter and concerned citizen offered the following opinion in recent days:
As it turns out, our commenter is correct. The Snidely Whiplashes are on the loose and the agenda to destroy ACORN is indeed happening apace, and only one state away from Minnesota. Look what's happening in Wisconsin:
Sounds like a grandstand play to me. We all know there's no voter fraud -- it just doesn't happen, as social justice centers at top-flight law schools remind us. This must be a misunderstanding or something. And what does this have to do with ACORN anyway?
Really? Can't be. Must be some trumped up thing. This Van Hollen guy can't be serious about this.
Now, I lived in Rock County, Wisconsin for six years in the 1980s and I know how things are there. That's not possible. There were never any felons in Rock County. It must be a mistake.
But that doesn't happen. There is no voter fraud, as reputable online journals like Slate assure us. This must be some Republican plot to keep the poor and needy from exercising their franchise.
So what is the deal here, anyway? What is Van Hollen's excuse for this sort of reckless behavior? The complaint against the ACORN employees, Miles and Clancy, is here, in a PDF format. The invaluable Ed Morrissey has compiled some of the key information:
Meet your quota or get fired? Are we sure of that? ACORN exists to help the needy. This sounds like something out of Glengarry Glen Ross. Coffee is for closers, after all. But that can't be right, can it? Organizations that help the needy would never behave that way. And of course it couldn't be like that. It was worse. Let Morrissey explain:
Registering each other? That's a handy euphemism for Topic A. But that can't be right. Again, from the complaint:
Sometimes people have to "do whatever they had to do." After all, coffee is for closers. And if it requires registering each other, hey -- what are you gonna do?
This is all a novel version of helping the needy. But one still has to doubt the veracity of the complaint, which must be a dirty trick from a bitter Republican. Well, one problem with that -- Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, a fellow with a name that is almost redolent of Gilded Age perfidy, is a Democrat.*
*Update: I got that last part wrong. As it turns out, Van Hollen is that rarest of rare birds, a Republican Attorney General. So our valued commenter's theory might be right. Except for one thing -- the prosecutors Van Hollen is working with in Milwaukee County aren't Republicans. And one of the lead prosecutors tells an interesting story here:
A valued commenter and concerned citizen offered the following opinion in recent days:
The Democrat agenda is about helping those in need, Mr. D - ACORN is a great example of this. Whereas Conservative Republicans (with that I mean literally the politicians and the media, not you personally, or actually any of the Republicans in my life) are about supporting the people who keep the needy people needy - the agenda to destroy ACORN is a great example of that.
As it turns out, our commenter is correct. The Snidely Whiplashes are on the loose and the agenda to destroy ACORN is indeed happening apace, and only one state away from Minnesota. Look what's happening in Wisconsin:
MILWAUKEE – Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen announced today that the Milwaukee Election Fraud Task Force has brought additional electoral fraud cases against five Wisconsin residents. The Department of Justice, acting as Special Prosecutor for Milwaukee County, has filed felony charges against Maria Miles, Kevin Clancy, Michael Henderson, Herbert Gunka, and Suzanne Gunka, all alleging election fraud arising out of the November 4, 2008, Presidential Election. “The integrity of elections is dependent upon citizens and officials insisting they be conducted lawfully. Wisconsin’s citizens should not have to wonder whether their vote has been negated or diminished by illegally cast ballots,” Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen said.
Sounds like a grandstand play to me. We all know there's no voter fraud -- it just doesn't happen, as social justice centers at top-flight law schools remind us. This must be a misunderstanding or something. And what does this have to do with ACORN anyway?
According to the criminal complaints, Miles and Clancy served as Special Registration Deputies (“SRD”) for the City of Milwaukee in advance of the 2008 Presidential Election. Each worked for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (“ACORN”). Miles and Clancy are each charged with the felony offense of Falsely Procuring Voter Registration as Party to a Crime. The complaint alleges that Miles and Clancy submitted multiple voter registration applications for the same individuals, and also were part of a scheme in which they and other SRDs registered each other to vote multiple times in order to meet voter registration quotas imposed by ACORN.
Really? Can't be. Must be some trumped up thing. This Van Hollen guy can't be serious about this.
Henderson is charged with one count of Voting by a Disqualified Person and one count of Providing False Information to Election Officials, both felonies. The complaint alleges that Henderson registered to vote at the polls on November 4, 2008, thereby certifying that he was a qualified elector. It also alleges that he then cast a ballot. At that time, Henderson was on an active period of probation for felony convictions from Rock County. A felon on an active period of supervision for a felony offense is prohibited by state law from voting in any election.
Now, I lived in Rock County, Wisconsin for six years in the 1980s and I know how things are there. That's not possible. There were never any felons in Rock County. It must be a mistake.
Herbert and Suzanne Gunka are each charged with the felony offense of Double Voting. The complaint alleges that they each voted in the November 2008 election by casting absentee ballots before the election. The complaint also alleges that after casting absentee ballots, they each voted in person at their polling place on election day.
But that doesn't happen. There is no voter fraud, as reputable online journals like Slate assure us. This must be some Republican plot to keep the poor and needy from exercising their franchise.
So what is the deal here, anyway? What is Van Hollen's excuse for this sort of reckless behavior? The complaint against the ACORN employees, Miles and Clancy, is here, in a PDF format. The invaluable Ed Morrissey has compiled some of the key information:
The Miles-Clancy complaint has some interesting allegations, which will undoubtedly create problems for ACORN in the future. According to Maria Miles, ACORN required employees to register five people in a six-hour period. Over the course of a week, that requirement gradually increased to 20 new registrants in a six-hour period. If they failed to meet their goals on any one day, they would get docked an hour’s pay. If they failed to meet that goal three days in a row, ACORN would fire them.
Meet your quota or get fired? Are we sure of that? ACORN exists to help the needy. This sounds like something out of Glengarry Glen Ross. Coffee is for closers, after all. But that can't be right, can it? Organizations that help the needy would never behave that way. And of course it couldn't be like that. It was worse. Let Morrissey explain:
So instead of getting fired, ACORN workers began registering each other. Not only did that protect their jobs, but one of them began having sex with the supervisor in order to keep from getting fired.
Registering each other? That's a handy euphemism for Topic A. But that can't be right. Again, from the complaint:
Miles indicated that at one point, Gabriele Robinson began sleeping with their supervisor, Edward Williams. Miles stated she would go to Robinson’s residence and hang out for the day. She stated at the end of the day, Williams signed off as though they had turned in their 20 signatures for that day, giving them their pay. Miles stated that she and Robinson did this at least once a week, and that they received payments for those days when they did not turn in registrations because Robinson was sleeping with Williams.
Miles also advised the agents that the individuals would travel in groups and, if and individual registered a citizen to vote, the other SRDs would tell the citizen, “It doesn’t hurt if you sign this one also.” Thus, multiple SRDs recorded a signature from the same person. Miles stated that they were “all hoodlums” working for ACORN and they all had criminal histories, and that they were going to “do whatever they had to do” to be able to gain their money at the end of the day.
Sometimes people have to "do whatever they had to do." After all, coffee is for closers. And if it requires registering each other, hey -- what are you gonna do?
This is all a novel version of helping the needy. But one still has to doubt the veracity of the complaint, which must be a dirty trick from a bitter Republican. Well, one problem with that -- Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, a fellow with a name that is almost redolent of Gilded Age perfidy, is a Democrat.*
*Update: I got that last part wrong. As it turns out, Van Hollen is that rarest of rare birds, a Republican Attorney General. So our valued commenter's theory might be right. Except for one thing -- the prosecutors Van Hollen is working with in Milwaukee County aren't Republicans. And one of the lead prosecutors tells an interesting story here:
Milwaukee police officers sat on their hands for months last year instead of investigating possible voter fraud cases from the 2008 general election.
It's an incredible claim, but it's coming from a credible source:
Assistant District Attorney Bruce Landgraf, the Milwaukee County prosecutor responsible for overseeing campaign and election issues.
"Honestly, the Milwaukee Police Department largely ignored your double voter (and other) referrals received in January 2009 for the first six months of 2009," Landgraf wrote in an e-mail to a city elections official on Jan. 26.
Speaking with unguarded candor, the veteran prosecutor said in his note that MPD's tardy response had a major impact. The cases involve voters who may have cast more than one ballot, felons who may have voted illegally and other cases of possible election fraud.
"Sadly, several probable cases of genuine voter fraud were harmed by that delay," Landgraf wrote in an e-mail obtained through an open records request.
The assistant district attorney was even more pessimistic about the investigation of more than 500 individuals who registered to vote on election day but whose addresses could not be confirmed later by postcard.
"I do not expect them to ever get to the Address Cards," he said of the Milwaukee cops.
Out of the millions
George Will has been writing a national news column for about 35 years now. If you assume that he writes twice a week and that each column averages about 800 words, that means he's written, conservatively, 3 million words. And all this is aside from his bi-weekly column for Newsweek, his various baseball books and the thousands of words he's uttered as a fixture on the Sunday chat shows, which have probably added a few million more words to the total.
You could conceivably ignore every word Will has written or spoken in that 35-year career and still celebrate him for the following exchange he had yesterday with Robert Reich:
Emphasis mine. Those 30 words indeed sum up liberalism and the liberal impulse -- the overweening need to protect people from their own dopiness. You aren't competent to make such decisions, so Robert Reich is duty-bound to make them for you.
****
One of my best childhood friends is a hard-core lefty. I remember a time, many years ago, when I met him in Milwaukee for a night of bar-hopping. I had brought along another friend of mine, a college friend that my childhood friend did not know well. After the bars closed that evening, we decided to go get a little late night nosh and visited the Marquette University-area Real Chili, a true Milwaukee institution. My college friend had not been there before and before he could place an order he needed to make a trip down the hall, if you know what I mean. My childhood friend, filled with the certainty that he knew what my college friend ought to eat, placed an order for my friend and then told him what he was having, despite my warning that my college friend wouldn't appreciate his effort. As I expected, my college friend took umbrage and I had to stop the two from engaging in a fistfight in the restaurant.
There is an impulse in many lefties to do things like that, to place an order because they know better. It animates their push to enact Obamacare, to install a cap and trade regulatory scheme to protect us from our own exhalation, to create federal laws regarding the installation of pool drains. Even if there is an existing set of regulators and regulations in place, it may not be sufficient. There must be ever more power concentrated among those who know better. It is the reason that a valued commenter on this blog wrote the following the other day:
You could conceivably ignore every word Will has written or spoken in that 35-year career and still celebrate him for the following exchange he had yesterday with Robert Reich:
ROBERT REICH, AMERICAN PROSPECT: The health insurers are not, George, you said they’re popular and everybody likes their health insurer. They like their doctor. They hate their health insurer. And health insurance is going up in terms of rates 20, 30, 40, 50 percent in many states. In fact, Goldman Sachs just this past week has said to its many of its investors, “Invest in some insurance companies because they don’t have competition, and they have, are exhibiting huge profits.” That is money directly out of the pockets of Americans.
GEORGE WILL, ABC: A, you say they have huge profits. As you know, confiscate all the profits of all the health insurance companies, with those profits you could finance our healthcare for 48 hours. What you do for the next 363 days I don’t know. Second, you say there’s not enough competition? Fine, let them compete in a national market across state lines.
REICH: Yes, let them compete across state lines, fine. But not a race to the bottom. Set minimum federal standards because we’ve seen over and over again that the recipients of health insurance don’t know what they are buying very often. Until there are common standards, minimal standards, then people are going to be taken. And that is what’s happened over and over again.
WILL: There you have the premise of this legislation and the core of today’s liberalism: the American people are such dopes they can’t be counted upon to buy their own insurance.
Emphasis mine. Those 30 words indeed sum up liberalism and the liberal impulse -- the overweening need to protect people from their own dopiness. You aren't competent to make such decisions, so Robert Reich is duty-bound to make them for you.
****
One of my best childhood friends is a hard-core lefty. I remember a time, many years ago, when I met him in Milwaukee for a night of bar-hopping. I had brought along another friend of mine, a college friend that my childhood friend did not know well. After the bars closed that evening, we decided to go get a little late night nosh and visited the Marquette University-area Real Chili, a true Milwaukee institution. My college friend had not been there before and before he could place an order he needed to make a trip down the hall, if you know what I mean. My childhood friend, filled with the certainty that he knew what my college friend ought to eat, placed an order for my friend and then told him what he was having, despite my warning that my college friend wouldn't appreciate his effort. As I expected, my college friend took umbrage and I had to stop the two from engaging in a fistfight in the restaurant.
There is an impulse in many lefties to do things like that, to place an order because they know better. It animates their push to enact Obamacare, to install a cap and trade regulatory scheme to protect us from our own exhalation, to create federal laws regarding the installation of pool drains. Even if there is an existing set of regulators and regulations in place, it may not be sufficient. There must be ever more power concentrated among those who know better. It is the reason that a valued commenter on this blog wrote the following the other day:
The Democrat agenda is about helping those in need, Mr. D - ACORN is a great example of this. Whereas Conservative Republicans (with that I mean literally the politicians and the media, not you personally, or actually any of the Republicans in my life) are about supporting the people who keep the needy people needy - the agenda to destroy ACORN is a great example of that.I'm going to assume the commenter is serious in believing that. Another valued commenter offered the following riposte:
the relationship tween the democrats and 'the needy' is akin to smokers' relatiosnhip to r j reynolds.Leaving the typos aside, who has the better argument? Consider what Robert Reich believes, then draw your own conclusions. I trust you to do that.
il miglior fabbro
No matter what else you read today, make sure you read Mitch's piece on the life and times of Paul Ehrlich, perhaps the most dogged Cassandra the world has ever known. Just a quick taste:
His body of work – at least, his work that impinges on politics and human events – has had three things in common.It continues to amaze me that Paul Ehrlich isn't hooted off the stage. But there he is. Read the whole thing. And share it with your friends.
He’s blamed Western Civilization – especially our economic freedom – for successive waves of self-caused, predicted catastrophes.
He’s prescription to deal with these catastrophes has been, in every case, for the individual to surrender his/her autonomy, and even future, to an all-wise, all-knowing, all-powerful central entity that’ll make all the hard, life and death choices for them.
And he’s been wrong on every count. Humans, rather than sitting in caves waiting to get eaten by sabre tooth tigers, invented spears. Faced with floods, we invented the sandbag as an alternative to drowning and mildew. And faced with shortage of resources, we adapt. And humanity in the past forty years has adapted – learning to grow crops where we didn’t before, learning to conserve farmland and water, developing new crops and practices.
Sunday, March 07, 2010
Have we caught Lord Hee-Haw? Or are we just getting our Yahyas out?
Ah the fog of war. First, we thought we had Adam Gadahn, the former California farm boy turned al-Qaida operative.
CBS begs to differ:
Two Pakistani officers and a government official said Sunday that an American charged with treason for working with al-Qaida had been captured, a development that could deliver another significant blow in the U.S.-led battle against the terror network.
U.S. defense, intelligence and law enforcement officials could not immediately verify the reported detention of Adam Gadahn, a 31-year-old spokesman for al-Qaida who has appeared on videos threatening the West, including one that emerged earlier Sunday.
The reported arrest of Gadahn follows the recent detention of several Afghan Taliban commanders in Karachi, including the group's No. 2. Those detentions have been seen as a sign that Pakistan, which has been criticized as an untrustworthy ally, was cooperating more fully with Washington.
CBS begs to differ:
An "important Taliban militant" was arrested today in Pakistan. But that is where the confusion started.It may not get sorted out for a while. But I sure hope we do have Gadahn. The dude really deserves a little justice.
Earlier it was reported by Pakistani media that intelligence agents had arrested Adam Gadahn, the American-born spokesman for al Qaeda, in an operation in the southern city of Karachi. It was further reported by the Associated Press and Reuters that Gadahn had been arrested, sourcing security officials.
CBS News was told by sources in the Pakistan government that it was Gadahn, even after U.S. officials refused to confirm it was the California native for whom a $1 million reward has been posted.
Now, CBS News' Farhan Bokhari in Islamabad writes that earlier reports the detained individual was Gadahn proved false. According to a Pakistan security official who spoke with CBS News on condition of anonymity, the arrested individual is in fact "a Taliban militant leader who is known as Abu Yahya."
The Greeks Don't Want No Freaks. . .
. . . But the Greek bureaucrats intend to get paid, no matter what. Behold our future:
And who could blame the bureaucrats? They get a pretty sweet deal, as Mark Steyn points out:
Well, in the case of the Greeks, they were hoping that maybe, as members of the EU, that their other partners might pick up the tab, especially Germany. But the Germans have their own problems:
Except the Germans won't be able to pay, either. So who will? It won't be the U.S. -- we're in debt up to our eyeballs, too, much of it held by the Chinese. China? Not likely -- they have money now but also have worse demographic issues than Europe or the U.S., which will become obvious in the next 10-15 years when all the young Chinese men start looking for brides who do not exist, because they were aborted. The Greek electorate can support the bureaucrats doing their sit-in, but it won't get them paid because, in the end, no one is going to have the money. The Greek government has been running a Ponzi scheme.
None of this is surprising -- these trends have been in place for almost half a century now, throughout the developed world. And our kids won't be able to maintain the status quo, nor will they want to, either. But that's where we are. Steyn explains why:
The party is over in Athens. They may not want to hear it, but it is.
Meanwhile, we've got our issues here, but things could get a lot worse. We could be like Greece. Fortunately, for the most part we aren't, despite the efforts of the governments of California, New York and a few other places. What boggles the mind is this: Greece is a comprehensive welfare state, socialist in government and in scope. And it is failing. Despite this evidence, President Obama and his party want us to have the same setup for this country, a comprehensive welfare state. This is why Obama continues to push for Obamacare even though the majority of Americans have made it clear they do not want such blandishments.
I will give President Obama and his allies the benefit of the doubt and assume that they have good intentions. I would prefer not to travel the road that is paved with their good intentions, though, because I know where the road leads.
Dozens of civil servants occupied a government printing building Saturday in the latest expression of public anger against debt-driven austerity measures as Greece's premier vowed they would pay off.
The sit-in by interior ministry workers in Athens began late Friday, after a fresh bout of nationwide strikes and protests.
The protesters unfurled a banner in front of the national printing office scrawled with the words "Occupation", and "Enough is enough," police said, in a bid to prevent the latest round of parliament-approved austerity measures from being published in the government gazette.
And who could blame the bureaucrats? They get a pretty sweet deal, as Mark Steyn points out:
That's the point Greece is at. Its socialist government has been forced into supporting a package of austerity measures. The Greek people's response is: Nuts to that. Public sector workers have succeeded in redefining time itself: Every year, they receive 14 monthly payments. You do the math. And for about seven months' work - for many of them the workday ends at 2:30 p.m. When they retire, they get 14 monthly pension payments. In other words: Economic reality is not my problem. I want my benefits. And, if it bankrupts the entire state a generation from now, who cares as long as they keep the checks coming until I croak?One other thing -- these tireless public servants get to retire at 58. What's the problem with that? Well, among other things, there simply aren't enough private sector Greeks around to foot the bill for all this. Steyn:
What's happening in the developed world today isn't so very hard to understand: The 20th century Bismarckian welfare state has run out of people to stick it to. In America, the feckless insatiable boobs in Washington, Sacramento, Albany and elsewhere are screwing over our kids and grandkids. In Europe, they've reached the next stage in social democratic evolution: There are no kids or grandkids to screw over. The United States has a fertility rate of around 2.1, or just over two kids per couple. Greece has a fertility rate of about 1.3: 10 grandparents have six kids have four grandkids - i.e., the family tree is upside down. Demographers call 1.3 "lowest-low" fertility - the point from which no society has ever recovered. And compared to Spain and Italy, Greece has the least worst fertility rate in Mediterranean Europe.
So you can't borrow against the future because, in the most basic sense, you don't have one. Greeks in the public sector retire at 58, which sounds great. But, when 10 grandparents have four grandchildren, who pays for you to spend the last third of your adult life loafing around?
Well, in the case of the Greeks, they were hoping that maybe, as members of the EU, that their other partners might pick up the tab, especially Germany. But the Germans have their own problems:
Unfortunately, Germany is no longer an economic powerhouse. As Angela Merkel pointed out a year ago, for Germany, an Obama-sized stimulus was out of the question simply because its foreign creditors know there are not enough young Germans around ever to repay it. Over 30 percent of German women are childless; among German university graduates, it's over 40 percent. And for the ever dwindling band of young Germans who make it out of the maternity ward, there's precious little reason to stick around. Why be the last handsome blond lederhosen-clad Aryan lad working the late shift at the beer garden in order to prop up singlehandedly entire retirement homes? And that's before the EU decides to add the Greeks to your burdens. Germans, who retire at 67, are now expected to sustain the unsustainable 14 monthly payments per year for Greeks who retire at 58.And thus Steyn gets to the point: somebody might pay, but don't expect them to pay on your terms, as the Greeks are discovering:
The European Union has concluded that the Greek government's austerity measures are insufficient and, as a condition of bailout, has demanded something more robust. Greece is no longer a sovereign state: It's General Motors, and the EU is Washington, and the Greek electorate is happy to play the part of the United Auto Workers -everything's on the table except anything that would actually make a difference. In practice, because Spain, Portugal, Italy and Ireland are also on the brink of the abyss, a "European" bailout will be paid for by Germany.
Except the Germans won't be able to pay, either. So who will? It won't be the U.S. -- we're in debt up to our eyeballs, too, much of it held by the Chinese. China? Not likely -- they have money now but also have worse demographic issues than Europe or the U.S., which will become obvious in the next 10-15 years when all the young Chinese men start looking for brides who do not exist, because they were aborted. The Greek electorate can support the bureaucrats doing their sit-in, but it won't get them paid because, in the end, no one is going to have the money. The Greek government has been running a Ponzi scheme.
None of this is surprising -- these trends have been in place for almost half a century now, throughout the developed world. And our kids won't be able to maintain the status quo, nor will they want to, either. But that's where we are. Steyn explains why:
We hard-hearted, small-government guys are often damned as selfish types who care nothing for the general welfare. But, as the Greek protests make plain, nothing makes an individual more selfish than the socially equitable communitarianism of big government. Once a chap's enjoying the fruits of government health care, government-paid vacation, government-funded early retirement, and all the rest, he couldn't give a hoot about the general societal interest. He's got his, and to hell with everyone else. People's sense of entitlement endures long after the entitlement has ceased to make sense.
The party is over in Athens. They may not want to hear it, but it is.
Meanwhile, we've got our issues here, but things could get a lot worse. We could be like Greece. Fortunately, for the most part we aren't, despite the efforts of the governments of California, New York and a few other places. What boggles the mind is this: Greece is a comprehensive welfare state, socialist in government and in scope. And it is failing. Despite this evidence, President Obama and his party want us to have the same setup for this country, a comprehensive welfare state. This is why Obama continues to push for Obamacare even though the majority of Americans have made it clear they do not want such blandishments.
I will give President Obama and his allies the benefit of the doubt and assume that they have good intentions. I would prefer not to travel the road that is paved with their good intentions, though, because I know where the road leads.
Saturday, March 06, 2010
Are you not entertained?
Bill Maher makes a joke about wishing Glenn Beck dead.
Sean Penn suggests that would like his critics to "die screaming of rectal cancer."
Should we be outrageously outraged at this outrageousness? Nah. I think the better course is to let our entertainers keep talking and sharing their wise, reasoned counsel. And in Penn's defense, he did go to Haiti and help out, so it means he is capable of compassion for at least some sectors of humanity. Just maybe not for you.
Sean Penn suggests that would like his critics to "die screaming of rectal cancer."
Should we be outrageously outraged at this outrageousness? Nah. I think the better course is to let our entertainers keep talking and sharing their wise, reasoned counsel. And in Penn's defense, he did go to Haiti and help out, so it means he is capable of compassion for at least some sectors of humanity. Just maybe not for you.
Friday, March 05, 2010
Another turn in the learning curve
Well, well, well. For a group that never misses a chance to excoriate the previous administration, it's funny how often Team Obama eventually realizes that the Bush-era morons weren't quite as moronic as first thought:
So why the change, which is sure to enrage Obama's left-wing base at a time when he needs them to remain quiet? WaPo writers Anne Kornblut and Peter Finn offer a suggestion:
This has been the problem all along for Obama: most of the true believers who came to Washington with him are as delusional as he is. Other than the baying liberals who carried Obama's sedan chair, most people simply didn't think or care that much about Gitmo, holding the eminently sensible view that (a) we have to keep the bad guys somewhere and (b) it better not be in my back yard. And most people also don't share the left-wing piety over such matters. If you ask the average person, all they want is for someone, anyone, to keep people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed from hurting them. Although it's taken over a year for Team Obama to understand that, this decision is a step in the right direction.
President Obama's advisers are nearing a recommendation that Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, be prosecuted in a military tribunal, administration officials said, a step that would reverse Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.'s plan to try him in civilian court in New York City.Good thing, too, because it was always a monumentally stupid idea. New York has enough trouble these days without having a horrifying circus come to town, to say nothing of the madness of pretending that people who commit acts of war should be tried in civilian courts.
So why the change, which is sure to enrage Obama's left-wing base at a time when he needs them to remain quiet? WaPo writers Anne Kornblut and Peter Finn offer a suggestion:
If Obama accepts the likely recommendation of his advisers, the White House may be able to secure from Congress the funding and legal authority it needs to close the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and replace it with a facility within the United States. The administration has failed to meet a self-imposed one-year deadline to close Guantanamo.But that seems silly, doesn't it? The Republicans oppose closing Gitmo on general principle and would offer no support for closing it. And what's in it for the lefties? Kornblut and Finn answer the question this way:
Privately, administration officials are bracing for the ire of disappointed liberals and even some government lawyers should the administration back away from promises to use civilian courts to adjudicate the cases of some of the 188 detainees who remain at Guantanamo.Allow me to translate from Beltwayspeak: nothing.
This has been the problem all along for Obama: most of the true believers who came to Washington with him are as delusional as he is. Other than the baying liberals who carried Obama's sedan chair, most people simply didn't think or care that much about Gitmo, holding the eminently sensible view that (a) we have to keep the bad guys somewhere and (b) it better not be in my back yard. And most people also don't share the left-wing piety over such matters. If you ask the average person, all they want is for someone, anyone, to keep people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed from hurting them. Although it's taken over a year for Team Obama to understand that, this decision is a step in the right direction.
Thursday, March 04, 2010
Guilty Pleasures Part Sixty-Four -- Fearless Maria Experiences March Madness
It's been a while since we did a Guilty Pleasures and Fearless Maria is joining me tonight to help talk about some songs.
Halt! Who goes there! Who has awakened Fearless Maria from her deep sleep?!
Uh, guess that would be me, Maria. So why were you in a deep sleep? Just because your school has conferences and you were sleeping in?
Oh. No, never mind. I thought it was Benster and the "Who Goes There" is only marketing!
10 years old and you already understand marketing better than some of my co-workers.
Well, maybe if they don't understand marketing, maybe they need to go back to school and have a conference!
Good thinking, Maria! Speaking of being in school, I was thinking about doing something tonight that relates to when I was in school.
When you were in school? That was a long time ago! Didn't you go to school with Cleopatra? Or was that Grover Cleveland?
No, I went to school with a lot of girls named Lisa. But not Lisa Simpson.
Good thing, too -- on the show she was only 8 and she has weird spiky hair. So anyway, what on earth are you going to do with your school days. Was there even music back then? Or did you just scrape your fingernails on the blackboard?
No, it wasn't that long ago. Anyway, since it's March, I'm thinking about songs I used to hear on the radio when we would go down to the state basketball tournament in Milwaukee. I was lucky because my high school made the state tourney six years in a row, from 1976 through 1981.
So that means that Grover Cleveland played basketball for your high school? And was Cleopatra a cheerleader? And maybe Lisa Simpson was in the pep band!
No, I didn't go to school with any of those people, but I did hear this song on the radio when we driving down to Milwaukee in 1976. It's the Bellamy Brothers, appearing here on German television, with:
Dad, it's a pretty good song, but I'm kinda confused. Why is the audience watching their backs? Were they trying to imitate Miles Davis, except dressed liked cowboys? There's a history lesson -- clothes change! Or maybe that's what they do in Germany! P.S. If you didn't know that clothes change, your nickname should be Tweedledumb.
Well, that could be it. I don't know -- maybe it is a German thing.
Next time they ought to turn around, don't you think?
Good advice, Maria. Shall we move on to 1977?
Okay. So did this next band peform with their sides to the audience? Maybe they played the Hokey-Pokey! That's what it's all about!
No, but they were interested in dancing. It's ABBA, in the middle of their 1970s period of world domination, singing one of their biggest hits:
Dad, I was right! They were singing sideways a little bit! And the audience certainly is suffering from the usual really bad 70s outfits! Although it does like everyone washed their hair, which is more than I can say for some of the videos you've shown me, Dad!
It's funny, but ABBA might be more popular now than they were then, Maria.
Well, they had the Mamma Mia movie and all that. At least that's what my classmates tell me.
Well, do you notice something about what happened in the 1970s, besides the bad clothing?
Looks like they did a lot of dancing. That was when disco was happening, right?
Oh, yeah, Maria. Oh, yeah. And when you got to 1978, it was all disco, all the time, especially these guys:
Dad, you said guys, right? They look and sound like girls, except for the weird bald dude with the beard! Are you sure they are guys?
At the time I wondered, Maria, but I have it on pretty good authority that they were. They are actually 3 brothers from Australia.
They don't sound like Aussies, Dad! And I like these Aussies better!
Me too, Maria. But the world didn't see it that way in 1978 and the Bee Gees had all the big success.
Well, if that's what the world thought, it must be what a fool believes!
Funny you should mention that, Maria. The next year (March, 1979) we heard a song by the Doobie Brothers that was called:
Hey, welcome to the French Braid Factory! Well, that's what they could do with all that long hair! My goodness, they could really help out the Locks of Love. It was a good song, but my goodness, how did the singer get the words out from behind that big old beard he has. I'm surprised the song didn't get lost in there!
Grooming wasn't always a big thing in those days, Maria, which is why I don't have a lot of pictures of myself from that era.
Burned them all, didn't ya?
Well, no, but they are being held in a safe house in Wisconsin. Anyway, shall we move on to March, 1980?
Sure. What else would we do? Now were they dancing still?
Oh yeah, Maria. Oh yeah.
Dad, admit it. The reason you don't want me to see any pictures from 1980 is that you had a pair of glitter pants just like Michael Jackson, right? That's it, isn't it? Uh huh. I knew it! You were a dancing fool, weren't you, Dad!
No, all we wore in those days were Levi's corduroy pants from Fischer's Boys Store in Appleton, which is where everyone at my high school bought their pants.
I'm going to check with Auntie Coco and Auntie Margie about that one, Dad! I'll bet you had glitter pants. And I bet Uncle Pat and Uncle Paul had 'em, too! And maybe Uncle Mike had on some glitter Garanimals!
They won't give me up, Maria. They're sworn to secrecy. Anyway, we're on 1981, my senior year in high school. Xavier got beat in the first round that year and what did we have to hear on the radio?
So that's some weird stuff! I didn't know Blondie was rapping! I hate rap, Dad! You know that! I said so 2 years ago! Read that post, people! And the other ones, too!
Okay, are you done with the commercial for your blog now, Maria?
No, I can go on for at least a 100 more years, Dad! Psych! Anyway, I told you I'm all about marketing, Dad!
Good point, Maria. Do you want to market the big finale, then?
Certainly. And my fee is only--
Well, we'll negotiate that offline, okay?
Darn it! Anyway, it's time to vote, people! Pick your favorite and put it in the comments section. And I want to give a big shout-out to Gino, who always votes and is a good example for the youth of America!
I'll bet that's the first time Gino's ever fielded that compliment, Maria!
Well, Dad -- you're okay, too. Almost as good as Gino, at least.
That's high praise indeed, Maria. High praise indeed.
All This Can Be Yours
Happy result #1:
Then there's Happy Result #2:
There's a lot more to this typically sordid Chicagoland story, but let's say this: Giannoulias certainly seems to have the skill set to be an Illinois senator, eh?Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias sought to blunt a potentially damaging political issue today about questions regarding his involvement in his family’s struggling bank, which he said he expects will likely fail in the coming months.
But questions were still left unanswered following a more than 70-minute meeting with the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board. Among them were exactly what Giannoulias knew about convicted bookmaker Michael Giorango’s criminal past when he received loans from Broadway Bank, and how many of the bank's troubled loans were made while Giannoulias was working there.
Giannoulias also sought to explain nearly $70 million the bank paid out in dividends to him and his family in recent years, saying $29 million of that was taken out of the bank to diversify the family’s investments.
Then there's Happy Result #2:
Once a source of national leaders of both political parties, New York state has descended into a bizarre, riveting spectacle of corruption and political debasement, with its governor facing calls to resign as well as new charges of accepting illicit perks and lying under oath, the dean of its congressional delegation giving up his gavel over corruption charges and another House member announcing he won’t run again amid allegations of sexual harassment.
And that was just yesterday.
The latest, dizzying episodes of political disgrace in New York follow a half-decade of disaster during which three top state politicians were forced out amid allegations of everything from large-scale theft to small-scale sexual indiscretions.
Just a reminder -- these are the people who are demanding to redesign how you receive your healthcare.
Working for the Clampdown
I don't know why I keep hearing The Clash in my head right now, but I do. Now war is declared, and battle come down.
When they kick at your front door
How you gonna come?
-- Paul Simonon, "The Guns of Brixton"
I don't know if we're quite there yet, but it seems to be getting closer, now that President Obama has patiently explained that it's time to eat the crap sandwich:
“Everything there is to say about healthcare has been said and just about everyone has said it,” Obama said. “So now is the time to make a decision about how to finally reform healthcare so that it works, not just for the insurance companies, but for America’s families and businesses.”
Shut up, he explained. Well, I'm not quite ready to shut up just yet. A few thoughts:
- Do you remember how annoyed President Obama got with the Republicans who came brandishing copies of the various behemoth bills at the "summit" of last week? Obama chided the Republicans for using props. Which is why Obama had white-clad leftist doctors standing behind him when he made yesterday's announcement. Actually, I guess those aren't props. Perhaps the correct term is "human shields."
- But this latest iteration of the bill is different, we are told, because Obama cherry-picked a few ideas from the Republicans and lathered them on top of the crap sandwich, like a layer of tasty stone-ground mustard.
- I'm also quite tired of the almost casual defamation of people who work for insurance companies. I have friends and family who work for larger insurers -- most people in the Twin Cities do, given the corporate presence of United Healthcare -- and they are decent, ethical people who work hard and don't rely on dishonest speechifying as they ply their trade.
- And while I'm annoyed by Obama and his low-rent machinations, I'm hardly the angriest blogger on the scene. If you doubt that, check out this guy.
Wednesday, March 03, 2010
How Obamacare Can Work For You! (Er, Or Your Sibling)
I've been all wrong about this Obamacare business. If only I'd realized the advantages siblings can get if only they support it:
Doesn't mean anything, folks. Nothing to see here. And I have proof that it's not a quid pro quo or anything like that. You see, the President is just a big-hearted guy. You doubt that? Well, read on for this Mr. Dilettante exclusive!
It's actually a pilot program at this point and I really shouldn't divulge this, but I did get a note from David Axelrod that it's okay to mention this on deep background, so here goes: the President also has a similar program in place for loudmouth conservative bloggers. If I change my ways and now provide full-throated support for the President's insightful and brilliant healthcare initiative, it tuns out that my brother Paul will be named (shh, let's keep this quiet):
Ambassador to Portugal
I'm happy to do this for my brother, of course. Lisbon is lovely this time of year and Paulie has promised to lay in some genuine Port wine (from Porto, natch) as well. Bribery? No. The term is Win-Win!
Thank you for your generosity, Mr. President! Now dammit McConnell, get outta the way!
Tonight, Barack Obama will host ten House Democrats who voted against the health care bill in November at the White House; he's obviously trying to persuade them to switch their votes to yes. One of the ten is Jim Matheson of Utah. The White House just sent out a press release announcing that today President Obama nominated Matheson's brother Scott M. Matheson, Jr. to the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.
Doesn't mean anything, folks. Nothing to see here. And I have proof that it's not a quid pro quo or anything like that. You see, the President is just a big-hearted guy. You doubt that? Well, read on for this Mr. Dilettante exclusive!
It's actually a pilot program at this point and I really shouldn't divulge this, but I did get a note from David Axelrod that it's okay to mention this on deep background, so here goes: the President also has a similar program in place for loudmouth conservative bloggers. If I change my ways and now provide full-throated support for the President's insightful and brilliant healthcare initiative, it tuns out that my brother Paul will be named (shh, let's keep this quiet):
Ambassador to Portugal
I'm happy to do this for my brother, of course. Lisbon is lovely this time of year and Paulie has promised to lay in some genuine Port wine (from Porto, natch) as well. Bribery? No. The term is Win-Win!
Thank you for your generosity, Mr. President! Now dammit McConnell, get outta the way!
A Tonic for the Troops
If you aren't fond of tea, or you don't enjoy looking at the coffee grounds and realizing that the party turns out to be just another front for silly liberals, now comes this:
As for me, someone send me a note when they start the Gin Party.
Tired of the Coffee Party and the Tea Party? We’re the newest game in town!
I woke up this morning and realized I didn’t want tea or coffee. I wanted hot cocoa! So I turned on my computer and in a few minutes founded a new political movement — The Cocoa Party!
Yes, it was that simple.
Then I got one of my friends at the newspaper where I used to work to violate all professional journalistic ethics by writing a puff-piece about me without revealing that I used to work there.
Thanks!
Also, thanks for not mentioning that I used to really really really like Kool-Aid.
As for me, someone send me a note when they start the Gin Party.
Of course he will
Although he's a little late to the party, Ruben Navarette has noticed something:
After the voters of Massachusetts elected Republican Scott Brown to the U.S. Senate, ABC News’ George Stephanopolous asked Obama to interpret the election results.I don't think surreal is the word for it.
“People are angry,” Obama responded, “and they’re frustrated. Not just because of what’s happened in the last year or two years, but what’s happened over the last eight years.”
Don’t expect that to stop. It’s become second nature now. In 2012, Obama will be running for reelection on his track record — and you can bet that, on campaign stops, he’ll still be blaming Bush. It’ll be surreal.
Tuesday, March 02, 2010
Lightning Round - 030210
So much to say, so little time.
Seems like a pretty good question, doncha think?
- Phil Jones, the majordomo at the East Anglia CRU and the man who coined the phrase "hide the decline," starts answering questions. It doesn't go well.
- Much was made of the results of the President's physical, but one little thing caught Instapundit's attention: the president received a "virtual colonoscopy," which is far less invasive than a typical colonoscopy. A question arises: would this high-tech procedure be covered under Medicare? The answer, apparently, is no, according to a radiologist who is quoted at the link, because the procedure is considered "experimental." Which leads Prof. Reynolds to ask this question:
So if Michael Kinsley’s definition of rationing holds — when the President can get a treatment that ordinary Americans can’t — then we’re already there. Quoth Kinsley: “Here is a handy-dandy way to determine whether the failure to order some exam or treatment constitutes rationing: If the patient were the president, would he get it? If he’d get it and you wouldn’t, it’s rationing.” So what’s the likelihood that Obamacare would narrow the gap between you and the President, as compared to the current government system of Medicare?
Seems like a pretty good question, doncha think?
Monday, March 01, 2010
Fisking the Newspaper of Record
Some institutions carry more respect than they deserve and the New York Times is one of the best examples. The Times has long been considered the "Newspaper of Record" in this country, despite a very long history of getting important matters wrong.
They also employ very silly columnists and sometimes print demagogic guest editorials. Fortunately, in the Internet era we have smart people like John Hinderaker and Ann Althouse available to cut through the nonsense. Fisking, the art of dissecting stupidity by going through a piece and pointing out its stupidity line by line, is a tough but necessary job and you should hit the links to see why it must be done.
They also employ very silly columnists and sometimes print demagogic guest editorials. Fortunately, in the Internet era we have smart people like John Hinderaker and Ann Althouse available to cut through the nonsense. Fisking, the art of dissecting stupidity by going through a piece and pointing out its stupidity line by line, is a tough but necessary job and you should hit the links to see why it must be done.
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