But many of these are funny anyway.
7 February, 2009
Trying to Erase Hillary with Emoluments
Judicial Watch has filed a suit claiming that it’s illegal for Hillary to serve as Secretary of State. It’s doomed to fail, of course, because it’s based on what the Constitution actually says:
“No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased during such time.”
Obama’s Speed Record
In The Fierce Urgency of Pork Krauthammer marvels at how fleet two left feet can be.
After Obama’s miraculous 2008 presidential campaign, it was clear that at some point the magical mystery tour would have to end. The nation would rub its eyes and begin to emerge from its reverie. The hallucinatory Obama would give way to the mere mortal. The great ethical transformations promised would be seen as a fairy tale that all presidents tell — and that this president told better than anyone.
I thought the awakening would take six months. It took two and a half weeks.
Witness Michael Greenspan:
This monstrosity of a bill, and the assumptions underlying it (e.g., “Politicians are wiser than non-politicians,” “Citizens don’t own what they earn,” etc.), are making me consider joining the Republican Party. Not because the Republicans are great, but because they’ve shown they can be decent. The Democrats are just ravening parasites.
And what is this in The Atlantic? A Harvard professor?
This is probably the worst bill that has been put forward since the 1930s. I don’t know what to say. I mean it’s wasting a tremendous amount of money. It has some simplistic theory that I don’t think will work, so I don’t think the expenditure stuff is going to have the intended effect. I don’t think it will expand the economy. And the tax cutting isn’t really geared toward incentives. It’s not really geared to lowering tax rates; it’s more along the lines of throwing money at people. On both sides I think it’s garbage. So in terms of balance between the two it doesn’t really matter that much.
Update:
Mark Steyn is laughing.
His Majesty’s courtiers are beginning to notice that the Emperor doesn’t seem as clothed as he was a couple of weeks ago, but figure that “an array of villains” cunningly caused the coronation robes to dissolve.
Party Like It’s 1234567889!
This February 13th the Unix clock will reach 1234567890.
If you’re with me on PST, that will be Fri Feb 13 15:31:30 2009.
Geeks will celebrate. If you don’t know what this is about, you won’t celebrate.
Update:
Collapse of a Texas Quote Mine
This is a hilarious fisking of the creationist liar, Donald McLeroy, who entered a lot of quotes into the record in an effort to establish that there’s some sort of scientific controversy about evolution.
Every quote is presented, first as quote-mined by Dr. McLeroy, then in the original context. For example:
Mcleroy:
“The fossil record, in spite of its many gaps, is the most irrefutable evidence for the occurrence of evolution. However, continuous fossil sequences are still the exception; the fossil record remains woefully inadequate.”
In context:
“What is most gratifying is that all findings are consistent with Darwin’s theory of common descent. Together with molecular sequences, the fossil record, in spite of its many gaps, is the most irrefutable evidence for the occurrence of evolution. However, continuous fossil sequences are still the exception; the fossil record remains woefully inadequate. For instance, we have no fossil documentation of the human ancestry between 14 and 4.5 million years ago. The most recent coelocanth fossil is dated ca. 60 million years ago and, of course, everybody concluded that this group had become extinct that long ago, until two living species were discovered within the last 50 years. However, when even such an unexpected discovery has been made, it always fitted perfectly into the Darwinian framework.”
Update: (And bumped)
Being incandescently dishonest is not enough to keep you from being re-appointed by the Governor of Texas. (Reminds me of Massachussetts: The penalty for manslaughter is reelection.) This is a shame. If dishonesty and superstition are how the Republican Party thinks it can rebuild itself, it has another think coming.
Expect More Like This
Now that Eric Holder, who is essentially Janet Reno in drag, has been confirmed expect a lot of anti-gun action on the Federal level. And, as in the case of a Marine arrested in Oregon for a made-up “crime”, at the State level.
The student was charged with “possession of a firearm in a public building.” The college has barred him from classes and the state has charged him with the same crime. The student was involved in no unlawful activities nor was he engaged in any actions that would discredit a responsible gun owner. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
There is one small problem. The student has a valid Oregon concealed handgun license. He is statutorily exempt from the prohibitions on gun possession in public buildings.
Apparently neither the college nor the Monmouth Police are acquainted with the law.
The OFF is being too kind or, perhaps, ironic. I’m sure the University and the police know the law, they just don’t care. And since the new top attorney in the Federal government has already demonstrated he doesn’t care about the law, either, jackboots like these are going to feel emboldened.
6 February, 2009
They look too intelligent
to be real TSA goons.
(Be sure to read the customer reviews.)
(202) 224-3121
That’s the Senate Switchboard. (202) 224-3121. Got an opinion on the Spendulus Bill? Call (202) 224-3121.
Or check here.
5 February, 2009
Restoring Science
“to its proper place”?
The question: Is Sanjay Gupta a crank?
The longer answer involves an exploration of Gupta’s disturbing insistence on flirting with cranks, if it gets him publicity. The back cover of Chasing Life caries an endorsement from Deepak Chopra – and the inside page a favorable review from Andrew Weil. Normally, I would assume that the author of any book endorsed by those two would contain an intolerable blend of science and pseudoscience and refuse to read it. But for the sake of the readers of Science Based Medicine, I stifled my gag reflex and purchased the book. I hope that my sacrifice will benefit you all.
Kick Over the Spendulus Bill Rock
and just look at all the nasty bugs that crawl out.
We are going to spend $448 million to build the Department of Homeland Security a new building. We have $1.3 trillion worth of empty buildings right now, and because it has been blocked in Congress we can’t sell them, we can’t raze them, we can’t do anything, but we are going to spend money on a new building here in Washington. We are going to spend another $248 million for new furniture for that building; a quarter of a billion dollars for new furniture. What about the furniture the Department of Homeland Security has now? These are tough times. Should we be buying new furniture? How about using what we have? That is what a family would do. They would use what they have. They wouldn’t go out and spend $248 million on furniture.
How about buying $600 million worth of hybrid vehicles? Do you know what I would say? Right now times are tough; I would rather Americans have new cars than Federal employees have new cars. What is wrong with the cars we have? Dumping $600 million worth of used vehicles on the used vehicle market right now is one of the worst things we could do. Instead, we are going to spend $600 million buying new cars for Federal employees.
Read the whole thing. Then keep reading.
It’s Raining
Michael Yon reports from Israel about the rain of Hamas rockets.
In Sderot, I met up with the American-Israeli writer and Pajamas Media editor Allison Kaplan Sommer, who has lived in Israel for some 15 years, has three children and lives with her husband outside Tel Aviv. Together we went into the police station where the Israeli officers have saved hundreds of the rockets that have been fired from Gaza. Every journalist in Israel should see those rockets. The officer explained that the peak times for launch are when the kids are going or coming from school, and shoppers are in the open, for the greatest odds of casualties.
Yon wonders why Hamas is not charged with war crimes. That’s because, according to the so-called “Human Rights” NGOs like Amnesty International say that Hamas’ war crimes are too blatant and savage to investigate.
I’d have to say that Amnesty International is pretty blatant and savage itself.
Update:
More email from Michael Yon:
This will be a long year in Afghanistan, and I plan to spend about six months or more, there or in the region. Not looking forward to months of combat, but the war is only worsening and very few writers remain who will embed with combat forces for any length of time. I don’t know of any, actually, remaining who will go for months on end. Not sure how much of my 2009 will be with U.S. forces; some of our allies are requesting coverage and extending the red carpet, and it’s very important to know how our military alliance is doing. The alliance is key to the war. Whether it shows signs of falling apart, or sticking together, is crucial.
Embedding is very difficult, dangerous, time consuming, and expensive, and so long embeds simply do not seem to be happening.
My end-goal for 2009 is to bring back news and summary so that the reader will understand the overall trajectory of the war. Are we winning or losing? Is it worth it? What exactly are our goals in Afghanistan? I don’t know what our goals are. Does anyone know?
My reporting from 2006, unembedded in Afghanistan, proved that it is not necessary to embed with U.S. forces, or even to consult with commanders or the Pentagon, to predict the trajectory of the war with reasonable accuracy. I like covering combat forces simply because I like them. And they need coverage, especially so since practically nobody else will do it for them, but much of the decision making regarding embeds will be based on how much support derives from command. End goal: to accurately summarize for the reader the trajectory of the war, and long embeds might actually hinder my ability to predict the war.
Iraq only continues to improve. I plan to return to Iraq this year. That war truly is over. We can start bringing our men and women home, but it’s crucial to pay close attention to the advice of our military commanders.
4 February, 2009
I think I’ve figured out the Obama Leadership Style
Rule #1: The bus only gets traction if you have people to throw under it. Washington’s got an endless supply, so everything should be smooth sailing.
But, should he run out of people to throw under there, he can always toss in a few more campaign promises.
Update:
Byron York nails it with this headline:
Change!
In past administrations the State Department undercut the President. But now it’s the President who gets undercut by the State Department!
Update:
I keep telling you: Funniest administration ever!
“The president called and congratulated me,” Zinni said.
Then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asked for a meeting last Monday night, Zinni said. He said he went to the meeting in her office at the State Department, where Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg and Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Williams Burns were also in attendance.
“She thanks me, asked me my views on Iraq,” Zinni recalled. “She said to Burns and Steinberg, ‘We’ve got to move quickly, Crocker is leaving, we’ve got to get someone in there and get the paperwork done and hearings… Lots to do to get ready to go.”
Zinni said he expected a call from Burns the next day. Not hearing from him, he called him.
“To make a long story short, I kept getting blown off all week,” Zinni said. “Meantime, I was rushing to put my personal things in order,” to get ready to go.
“Finally, nobody was telling me anything,” Zinni said. “I called Jones Monday several times. I finally got through late in evening. I asked Jones, ‘What’s going on?’ And Jones said, ‘We decided on Chris Hill.'”
“I said, ‘Really,'” Zinni recalled. “That was news to me.”
Jones asked him if he would like to be ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Zinni said. “I said, ‘You can stick that with whatever other offers,'” Zinni recalled, saying he had used more colorful language with Jones. Asked Jones’s response and if he was apologetic, Zinni said, “Jones was not too concerned. He laughed about it.” (emphasis added)
But Don’t Call Them Biased
There’s nothing wrong at all with being a member of the Obama Press Corps, aka the MSM, while also advising the Obama White House.
Alexandria, VA – Media Research Center (MRC) President L. Brent Bozell, III has written a letter to ABC News President David Westin calling on him to publicly address and resolve what appears to be a clear violation of journalistic ethics by ABC’s Chief Washington Correspondent George Stephanopoulos. Last week a Politico story broke the news that Stephanopoulos has participated in daily phone strategy sessions with now White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel throughout his tenure at ABC.
QOTD
“Using long, drawn-out processes to put money into circulation to meet an emergency is like mailing a letter to the fire department to tell them that your house is on fire. If you cut taxes tomorrow, people would have more money in their next paycheck, and it would probably be spent by the time they got that paycheck, through increased credit card purchases beforehand.”
–Thomas Sowell
Math is hard
Ever wonder why Congress is so bad at it?
Update:
Relax! The MSM is on it.
Har:
The Annointed One seems just as math-challeged as Pelosi.
Obama Literature?
His disciples are as desperate and parody-proof as He is. His words will be part of English 275 at Ohio State. Predicts a student there:
I’m almost starting to feel sorry for the guy. He’s just an ambitious young politician, but nothing he does will satisfy these people’s need for a Messiah. Sooner or later it will turn out that he has an Enemies List, did an intern, traded arms for hostages, got attacked by a man-eating bunny-rabbit, puked on a Japanese diplomat … whatever. Every president has something. Having turned this one into Jesus Christ, they’ll do the next logical thing and crucify him.
The keys to surviving the Obama presidency would seem to be stocking up on ammo, precious metals, and popcorn. Even VDH sees the unfolding comedy.
At home, Obama is becoming laughable and laying the groundwork for the greatest conservative populist reaction since the Reagan Revolution.
Abroad, some really creepy people are lining up to test Obama’s world view of “Bush did it/but I am the world”: The North Koreans are readying their missiles; the Iranians are calling us passive, bragging on nukes and satellites; Russia is declaring missile defense is over and the Euros in real need of iffy Russian gas; Pakistanis say no more drone attacks (and then our friends the Indians say “shut up” about Kashmir and the Euros order no more “buy American”).
This is quite serious. I can’t recall a similarly disastrous start in a half-century (far worse than Bill Clinton’s initial slips). Obama immediately must lower the hope-and-change rhetoric, ignore Reid/Pelosi, drop the therapy, and accept the tragic view that the world abroad is not misunderstood but quite dangerous. And he must listen on foreign policy to his National Security Advisor, Billary, and the Secretary of Defense. If he doesn’t quit the messianic style and perpetual campaign mode, and begin humbly governing, then he will devolve into Carterism—angry that the once-fawning press betrayed him while we the people, due to our American malaise, are to blame.
3 February, 2009
He’ll never get an Obama cabinet post at this rate
Sully’s just too honest.
Chesley Sullenberger has a problem. He borrowed a book from the Danville Library – and it’s overdue. To complicate matters, the book was an interlibrary loan from Fresno State.
Sullenberger contacted librarians and asked for an extension on the loan and a waiver on the overdue fine. The reason? The book is in the cargo hold of the US Airways plane that made an emergency landing last month in New York’s Hudson River. Sullenberger is the pilot who made that landing. No one was seriously injured.
Fresno State library officials were impressed with Sullenberger’s sense of responsibility… and waived all fines and fees, even the one for losing the book. The library’s going one step further: when the replacement book goes up on the shelf, it will have a special template in front, dedicating it to Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger.
Oh, by the way. The topic of that book? Professional ethics.
Don’t Dream of Afghanistan
Michael Yon emails:
Afghanistan is in a sad state. Some folks are worried about “disturbing trends” in Afghanistan. I was concerned about disturbing trends back in early 2006. But that concern is over. My concern is more grave; that we will completely lose the war if we set expectations too high. We should downgrade our expectations for Afghanistan, and what we are willing to invest there. The world is a big place and there are other problems at hand. Iran just launched a satellite to orbit, for example. Afghanistan is such a sorry place that it will require at least decades severe effort to become half-way presentable, and likely a century to bring to anything respectable.
In Iraq, the light at the end of the tunnel was always bright (except during the civil war), and now Iraq is already out of the tunnel and blinking in the light of a new day. But Afghanistan is a national Humpty Dumpty. The best I see is the very distant, very dim, twinkling of a star. Or maybe it’s just a phosphene and not a star at all. My humble recommendation is to downgrade all expectations for Afghanistan. Treat the patient as best we can, and concern ourselves with more important matters while striving not to allow Afghanistan to again become a launching pad for international terror. President Obama should not stake our national reputation on the idea that we will achieve our current more ambitious goals. Decrease expectations, and work on more important matters such as the world economy and other more serious military threats. Afghanistan is not worth so much effort when most of NATO has no heart and is virtually worthless. Eventually we’ll likely end up alone, or mostly alone, holding the bag, while Europe goes home to its wine and beer.
And read his post to make sure your expectations are properly lowered.
Update:
Compare and contrast.
Empty Suit Watch
Two whole weeks, and He is tired of being in the White House.
Love the brave spin His press people at the Associated (with terrorists) Press try:
The stop at the school underscored a promise that the Obamas made and insist they will keep: to avoid getting caught up in a White House bubble. They say they will be visible parts of the Washington community—even in the midst of a hectic day. Or a difficult one.
It’s going to be a long, long four years.
Monkey With a Gun
The Mad Mullahs of Iran have apparently orbited a satellite.
Will The One tell them to unclench their fist? The Annointed One’s feckless policy toward Iran which, ironically, actually makes Bush’s non-policy look like it was a policy, is going to leave us with nuclear-armed, rage-infested chimpanzees.
Swell.
Update:
Our new Secretary of State sets out to prove that she can be more toothless and pathetic than our last couple of Secretaries of State.
Iran has an opportunity to step up and become a productive member of the international community,” she said after a meeting with British Foreign Secretary David Miliband. “As president Obama said, we are reaching out a hand, but the fist has to unclench. And we will see how we proceed together toward a policy that we believe represents the objectives that we share, vis-a-vis Iran. (Emphasis added)
2 February, 2009
Darwin and Lincoln
The 200th birthday of Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln (yes, they were born on the same day!) is coming up soon. They both cast long shadows across history. In terms of science, and our understanding of how the world works, Darwin’s is the longer shadow.
I’ll probably have more Darwin-related links as the anniversary of Darwin’s birth, and the 150th of his book being published, approaches. Here’s one from the good Dr. Novella on Dinosaur Fossils and Evolution.
One of the strongest lines of evidence for the fact that life on earth arose through evolution is the fossil record. I do not think this is the strongest line of evidence, not because it is weak but because the genetic evidence is so remarkably strong. Statistically speaking, the genetic evidence speaks to common descent through branching speciation of all life on earth to such a degree that it approaches certainty.
But the fossil evidence is also impressive, and much more visceral – walking into a museum full of gigantic fossil dinosaurs (or at least their casts) has a coolness factor with which a string of base pairs cannot compete.
Scrooged
Lileks rewrites that stupid Christmas story for today’s audience.
What’s the line from Scrooge – better they should die, and decrease the surplus population? I’m surprised that’s not an applause line these days. If Scrooge had forbid Crachet from putting on more coal because it would contribute to global warming, he’d be the hero, and Crachet (sic) would have got the three spirits.
The Next Right
I’ve added a new link to the Honor Roll there on the right: The Next Right.
Just learned about it tonight via Gene Expression, and am impressed enough to link it up. Worth keeping an eye on, especially for posts like this.
It is important that we don’t put the technology cart before the mission horse. The internet simply changes the scale at which we can productively do things that people already want to do. As I’ve written previously, the Leftosphere is not effective because they can fundraise and mobilize activists. They are effective because they can communicate and organize people around a message. Fundraising and activism is a product of communication and organization.
The End of Journalism
VDH explains why the MSM has shot itself in the foot with a Hellfire.
The media has succeeded in shielding Barack Obama from journalistic scrutiny. It thereby irrevocably destroyed its own reputation and forfeited the trust that generations of others had so carefully acquired. And it will never again be trusted to offer candid and nonpartisan coverage of presidential candidates.
Worse still, the suicide of both print and electronic journalism has ensured that, should Barack Obama be elected president, the public will only then learn what they should have known far earlier about their commander-in-chief — but in circumstances and from sources they may well regret.
