BOcare: King vs Burwell 87% Explained

Obamacare’s smoking gun | CharlotteObserver.com:

I've heard the SCOTUS decision to hear King v. Burwell" reported on NPR and other left outlets a couple of times. Their reporting is basically: "It is completely unclear why 4 judges would agree to hear this case. The INTENT of the law is OBVIOUSLY clear -- everyone gets subsidies!" ... followed by some thinly veiled assertions that the "4 judges" are probably politically motivated.I'm reminded of Asiana Flight 214 that clearly INTENDED to land safely on runway 28L at SFO, but did not. In the real world, "intent" and a couple bucks might get you a cup of coffee.

Oh, and BTW, about 5.5 million Americans have signed up for coverage in states where the Feds run the exchanges. And the vast majority of them, 87 percent, have received subsidies. ... now THAT is a figure that doesn't get much coverage! Taxpayers are paying a significant amount of the bribe to get 87% of the BOcare users to use this "successful" program! "Successful" at taking money from the pockets of earners and giving it to people that vote TP!

On its face this argument appears both plausible and reasonable. But it’s not. For openers you can be sure that the Senate Office of Legislative Counsel, which drafted Obamacare and which is made up of skilled lawyers whose independence and impartiality is above question, would have brought to the attention of the Senate Finance Committee from which the bill emerged the policy discrepancy concerning the section that placed the limitation on the subsidies. Had the language been a drafting error, it would have been rewritten. But it wasn’t.

"Intent" is notoriously hard to determine in laws -- in fact, SUPPOSEDLY, the SCOTUS interprets the "intent of the framers" in the Constitution. For more modern laws, the rule is "Congress can write laws that say what they mean". They are mostly lawyers after all, and they employ PLENTY of lawyers to write the laws in any case.

So why does this law clearly say that ONLY states that set up exchanges get subsidies?>

Jonathan Gruber is an MIT economist who helped design Obamacare. After the law passed he consulted with numerous states concerning the establishment of their exchanges. Here is what he said in January of 2012: “What’s important to remember politically about this is if you’re a state and you don’t set up an exchange, that means your citizens don’t get their tax credits.”

Isn't that a big surprise? The BO admin and TP congress (at the time BOcare was passed) were doing their best to follow their standard rule of "reward political friends (with tax money) and punish political enemies". It didn't work very well ... 37 out of 50 (or 59 if you are BO) states declined the bribe. Talk about a "program that is working well"!

As I've covered WAY too many times, this kind of nasty politics is exactly why the framers wanted the Federal government to be VERY limited -- and up about "the income tax" in 1913, it was . After the fall of the current US, hopefully future generations will realize that taxes MUST follow "equal protection"! In fact, if people want to be free, ALL LAWS have to follow equal protection so the government isn't in the business of the coercive picking of winners and losers -- thus prohibiting standard Chicago crony "reward your friends and punish your enemies"!

King v. Burwell is nothing less than preserving the constitutional doctrine of Separation of Powers. The Obama administration will soon urge the Court to enable it to deem the plain language of a statute passed by Congress to mean what it does not say. That is a precedent that should send a chill down the spine of all Americans.

Most likely the left leaning judges on the SCOTUS will rule in BO's favor, and most Americans will see this as "a waste of time" -- because we no longer value freedom, and are just fine with TP rewarding it's political friends and punishing it's enemies.

Therefore, we are not a free people.

'via Blog this'

The Unalienable Right to Not Get What You Pay For

Blog: Obama calls for more regulation of the internet. What could go wrong?:



The poor Internet has been operating under near zero government regulation. Anyone notice how that has been working? Compare the growth, operation, reliability, cost, innovation, etc of the Internet with something with long standing and vast government regulation -- say health care,  the general US economy, US highway system, etc, and you can get a hint of the extent of the suffering.



Oh the humanity!



Right now Netflix, Amazon, YouTube and many other bandwidth hogs are reaping giant benefits of the "one price for all" bandwidth rates. BO thinks the government should step in and make sure they can't pay to get superior service.



Isn't that brilliant? In the economy he wants to penalize success at any way shape or form it rears it's (to him) ugly head -- MAKE THEM PAY!



Why so different on this front? Seems pretty easy to me -- get the government regulation foot in the door. Start picking winners and losers, start punishing his political enemies and rewarding his political friends. In his view, it is a very successful way to operate -- hell, all the people that didn't vote agree with his position. Just ask him!











'via Blog this'

Government Healthcare, Dead Women

Sterilization Horror Shows Indian Women at Risk for $10 - Businessweek:

Government healthcare is cheap -- sometimes free, or they even pay you $10 for availing yourself of it! Of course, if you are dead, as 10 Indian women turned out to be, then someone else will need to spend your $10 -- but hey, it was government provided! It's not like it is YOUR fault!

How could anything go wrong? Once you get rid of all competition, make being a Dr as honorable as being a postal worker, and prevent malpractice by not allowing the government to be sued, things HAVE to get better. Don't they?

I suppose that given the power of lawyers in this country, lawsuits are secure -- however, once it is completely nationalized, that likely just means nasty poor government employed doctors with a ton more lawsuits paid by the government! Deep pockets! Then anyone trying to spend less on government healthcare OR lawsuits is guilty of a "war on women"!

The women butchered on the operating table are kind of TPs version of "collateral damage", although military collateral damage is the folks that happen to be in close proximity to terrorists, while TP collateral damage are the very women voters that sell their souls to them for "protection". No matter, the ways of TP are insidious and highly spun!

TP is good -- BY DEFINITION.

'via Blog this'

Soul vs Demographics As Destiny (Election results)

The shrinkage of the Obama majority | WashingtonExaminer.com:

TP (The Party-D) is always claiming that they are the party of the future because of demographics -- race, age, gender, etc.

TP is actually the party of soulless animals of which common humans are not even their preferred cohort, and they regularly state it directly.  (TP elite is of course "special" -- they deserve all honor, laud and worship in their minds)

TP is willing, anxious even,  to slaughter human babies by the millions, but will endanger human lives and livelihood rather than to risk potential harm to owls, snail darters or polar bears. TP demands that claims to an eternal soul or any "special status" of humans be completely dismissed and suppressed, while loudly screaming that extreme special status must be granted to demographic groups they see as "supporters"-- blacks, hispanics (especially the illegal ones), women, gays, transgender, etc.

So TP doesn't just forget, it out-right and loudly denies that humans are unique in our God-given soul, free will and reason. Thus, they mistake demographics -- race, age, gender, sexual preference, etc for destiny. Or so they say. In reality, as BO so smugly claimed in his press conference yesterday, TP "hears" the 2/3rds of the "voters" who didn't vote.

As with all single party control oriented ideologies of the left (communism, fascism, socialism, dictatorship, etc), voting is at best a temporary and easily ignored nuisance, and the goal is monolithic rule by whatever means it takes. No matter the facts in the linked article -- the drive to a total takeover will continue by ALL means -- fraud, using tax dollars to buy votes, attacks on opposition through the IRS, legal, regulatory and government surveillance apparatus ...

The linked article is well worth reading in total, but this is the core:

(2) In seriously contested races Republican candidates were generally younger, more vigorous, more sunny and optimistic than Democrats. The contrast was sharpest in Colorado and Iowa, which voted twice for President Obama. Cory Gardner and Joni Ernst seemed to be looking forward to the future. Their opponents grimly championed the stale causes of feminists and trial lawyers of the past.

Democrats see themselves as the party of the future. But their policies are antique. The federal minimum wage dates to 1938, equal pay for women to 1963, access to contraceptives to 1965. Raising these issues now is campaign gimmickry, not serious policymaking.

Democratic leading lights have been around a long time. The party’s two congressional leaders are in their 70s. The governors of the two largest Democratic states are sons of former governors who won their first statewide elections in 1950 and 1978.

"Conservative" means continuation of and even reverence for PRINCIPLES that are timeless. Recognition of the position of man as eternally (and obviously to any that have eyes that see) special in creation, and recognition that it IS creation -- ordered, comprehensible, purposeful, meaningful. The acceptance and joy of being part of an ultimate purposeful existence passed down in a chain of civilization thousands of years old, with an INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY to act as a link in that divinely blessed chain of history.

We WERE a nation that was completely in touch with that sacred history -- take a few minutes to look at and consider the list of the 23 law givers in the chamber of the US House . We still knew our identity as late as 1949!

TP wants to replace the reverence of divinity, ideas and principles with reverence for POLICIES. Replacing God, classical literature, and history with the worship of minimum wage, equal pay for women, abortion, unisex bathrooms, condoms, welfare, government health care ... etc. NOTE, I did not say that in all cases everything about these policies is bad, what I said is that like ALL human enacted policy it is AT BEST temporal and often flawed, even in the extreme.

Principles are timeless, policies are temporal -- unless totalitarians win and they are embalmed like Lenin.  The reason that capitalism and democracy tempered by a constitution worked is because of the ability for CHANGE BOUNDED BY PRINCIPAL -- "creative destruction" is the engine of capitalism, supply and demand, profit and loss are merely feedback mechanism! Private property is a bound that insures the destruction / reconstruction and next cycles of feedback will be moderated.

My personal project of reading the Classics and key works of modern political thought is now nearly 40 years old -- roughly a 1979 beginning. I'm thankful to Jimmy Carter for being hapless and hopeless enough to spur me to start down the path that began with William F Buckley (SUPERB initials!) and National Review, led through Ayn Rand, and then an avalanche of books ... "Road to Serfdom", "Closing of the American Mind", "Ideas Have Consequences", "Wealth of Nations", "Theory of Moral Sentiments", "The Conservative Mind", "The Liberal Mind", "God and Man at Yale" .... and the list goes on and on.

Ultimately God will win temporally as he has already spiritually through Jesus Christ, but for now, it is a story with the end yet unwritten. HIS story, but we get to play a little part. I strongly encourage finding the time to read whatever puny part of the script each of us is able to manage!

It's OK to bask a BIT in Tuesday's results, but we are still in very grave danger.

'via Blog this'

97% Of Scientists Rape College Girls

The Left's Tactics -- a Personal Example on Creators.com:

The linked article is well worth the read -- gives good insight into the real origin of the oft quoted "1 in 5 women are raped on college campuses", and a little extra insight into the wonderful civility and interest in reasonable dialogue from the left. NOT!

The 1 in 5 comes largely from some surveys that redefine "rape" to be "sexual assault" and then broaden sexual assault to include "unwanted kissing" ...  putting the "should I kiss her good-night or not" decision in a whole new light.

The comments from the left were the expected ... "Praeger should be castrated", "Without rape, 80% of Republicans would be virgins" and other similar civil and  intellectually helpful fare. A linked US News article used DOJ numbers to arrive at 6 out of 1000 rapes OR sexulal assaults for girls during college -- which was likely a 60% overstatement based on their research -- so more like 1 in 200 than 1 in 5, a relatively small statistical error by liberal "standards" I guess.

The 97% in the heading refers of course to the OFTEN quoted 97% of scientists are human caused global warming believers --- the bottom line covered in PL is that 97% of the scientists that WROTE PAPERS ON HUMAN CAUSED GLOBAL WARMING (AGW) endorsed it. ... well, Duh. How the hell was it not 100%? This is quoted CONSTANTLY -- I heard it again this past week on MPR being stated as FACT! Anytime there is a percentage that large on human opinion, I get VERY suspicious -- how can any thinking person not? Perhaps you could get to 97% on "guys that don't want their penis cut off" -- but it is a HIGH figure for human agreement!

How have we become so insanely credulous? A bunch of lefty sorts have been posting pictures of the F35 all over FB with links on "The 1.5 TRILLION" fighter plane!

I guess we now know how stupid people are ... that figure is OVER FIFTY YEARS!  Each plane costs about $100M, which for reference can be compared with a 747 that costs $350M.  The 747 was designed in the 60's ... it's development costs are "well sunk", and BTW, it doesn't hover, take off and land vertically, nor break Mach 1 (although it would be damned impressive if it did!).

Apparently the third of the population that votes is generally smarter than these three fine examples -- but then BO also wants to take the two thirds that didn't vote into consideration -- somehow I suspect at least 4 out of 5 of them would be right on board with the 1 in 5 rape figure, 97% AGW and the F35 costing $1.5T!

'via Blog this'

BO: Narcissist or Psychopath?

Obama persists | Power Line:

Unfortunately I ended up hearing part of his press conference in the car yesterday. I ought to have shut him off as I have ever since he dissed the SCOTUS sitting right in front of him being civil and proper at one of the SOTU addresses. I wanted to believe that the day after the American People had spoken LOUDLY, there would be SOME measure of recognition. There was not, I ought to have trusted my instincts.

The opening in the linked article about how BO can't even let a comment by an aging basketball star (Jordan) roll off his back gives one pause relative to the line between narcissism and psychopathy. Anyone that writes two autobiographies prior to turning 50 is clearly a narcissist. Listening to the part of the press conference that I heard, I'm afraid that it is worse that that.

Note that while psychopathy is definitely a dangerous mental illness diagnosis, they are all around us and you no doubt know one or two ... read the "Psychopath Inside" if you want a very entertaining, enlightening and a bit scary detective story (it's non-fiction) where the detective finds out that he is not who he thought he was.

One form Obama’s anger takes is disparagement of the election results. “[T]o everyone who voted, I want you to know that I hear you. To the two-thirds of voters who chose not to participate in the process yesterday, I hear you, too.” In the radio interview above, Obama describes the nonvoters as those sitting at home on their couches. What does he hear them saying? They aren’t saying, and neither is Obama.

The sitting president of the US "hears" what the 66% of Americans that didn't vote are saying? Really? What are they saying and what other voices is he "hearing"?

Try to even imagine BO having 1/10th the graciousness of this exchange which Peggy Noonan commented on (her column is linked in the PL column):

For those who think Mr. Obama has faced unusual levels of rhetoric, consider this question from a reporter to Mr. Bush:

“Thank you, Mr. President. With all due respect, Nancy Pelosi has called you incompetent, a liar, the emperor with no clothes and, as recently as yesterday, dangerous. How will you work with someone who has such little respect for your leadership and who is third in line to the presidency?” 

This is how Mr. Bush replied. “I’ve been around politics a long time. I understand when campaigns end and I know when governing begins. And I’m going to work with people of both parties. You know, look, people say unfortunate things at times. But if you hold grudges in this line of work, you’re never going to get anything done. And my intention is to get some things done, and soon—we’re start visiting with her Friday with the idea of coming together.”

I don't expect BO to come close to the standard of graciousness of W, but equating those that voted with those that didn't and claiming he "hears" both? Narcissists are VERY hard of "hearing" when it comes to what others say ... they pretty much only hear things that reflect positively on the narcissist.

Psychopaths OTOH have no anxiety or concern about what others say, no respect for external rules beyond using them for their own benefit (eg. the Constitution), are very willing to act boldly on their own with little concern for the future (BOcare?), AND ... exceedingly mean and very prone to revenge, especially secretly "getting the other guy" ... always holding a grudge and being unwilling to "let things go".

The sitting president of the US can't let an off-hand comment from an aging well loved basketball star go? Or, as I think anyone has a right to expect from a man in BO's position, turn it into self-deprecating humor ... "Well, Michael is a much better athlete and golfer than I, and even a better basketball player!"  ... it doesn't even have to be sincere -- it is a softball opportunity to get a political "hit" (looking humble and loveable like Underdog) that even minor league pols regularly hit out of the park.

But not BO. Perhaps we don't really want to know why. 

The next two years remain a very  dangerous time for America!

'via Blog this'

Christianity, China, Blessing

Religion in China: Cracks in the atheist edifice | The Economist:

An extremely interesting article that is a worthy read as it is written -- as an atheist sociologists view of a cultural phenomenon, the growth of Christianity in China. It closes with this:

The paradox, as they all know, is that religious freedom, if it ever takes hold, might harm the Christian church in two ways. The church might become institutionalised, wealthy and hence corrupt, as happened in Rome in the high Middle Ages, and is already happening a little in the businessmen’s churches of Wenzhou. Alternatively the church, long strengthened by repression, may become a feebler part of society in a climate of toleration. As one Beijing house-church elder declared, with a nod to the erosion of Christian faith in western Europe: “If we get full religious freedom, then the church is finished.”

As a believer, I choose to give another perspective.

The church will never be "finished" -- Christ promised that it will stand forever against the powers of Hell. It has stood for over 2K years. The Catholic Church is the oldest continuous institution on the planet, and I believe that it will remain so. If the climate industry had 2K years of human carbon emission led global warming fully documented, I suspect that they would consider their position "settled"! Since they claim to not be "faith based" however,  it is amazing that the climate industry seems to lack grave doubts after 15+ years of a warming "pause", in direct repudiation of their prophets.

Freedom of at least Christian worship existed in Europe for the entire time from Christ up to modern times. The Reformation -- nearing it's 500th anniversary in 2017, meant significant freedom from mandatory CATHOLIC worship, but Christianity was still in ascension -- in Europe and increasingly around the globe as explorers and immigrants, often seeking freedom to practice Christianity as they believed, sought new lands -- including America.

It wasn't religious freedom that caused the decline of Christianity in the west, it was the rise of the new state religion of Secular Humanism. Christianity in the west isn't "finished", it is no longer the dominant religion -- a place that has been taken (for now) by Secular Humanism, but Christianity is still a major factor.

In fact, since the dogmas of Secular Humanism include abortion, birth control, gay marriage and general lack of children. The population outlook for Secular Humanism is less than stellar. It is a religion reminiscent of the Shakers who famously believed in a life of celibacy -- thus limiting their future to little more than a single generation.

No, Christianity will continue to be blessed, in the West and in China:

That is largely because many officials see advantages in Christianity’s growth. Some wealthy business folk in Wenzhou have become believers—they are dubbed “boss Christians”—and have built large churches in the city. One holds evening meetings at which businessmen and women explain “biblical” approaches to making money. Others form groups encouraging each other to do business honestly, pay taxes and help the poor. Rare is the official anywhere in China who would want to scare away investors from his area.

The founders of the US were aware that the free society they were founding was impossible without the people being strong in religious belief -- generally, to their minds, Christianity. Personal responsibility, strong families, honesty, thrift, non-violence, vocation as service to God and a desire for a life ordered by God -- these and many other elements mean that a Christian population is highly prized, if not required for a growing successful nation that allows major individual freedoms -- freedoms that seem to be required for economic growth! Without such a religion, the state must be oppressive merely to keep the amoral population under control -- which is not conducive to economic growth!

Secular Humanist America and Western Europe are and will continue to fail -- and that is ultimately a blessing, because Christianity will rise from those ashes yet again and continue to be blessed.

How can Christians with 2K years of documented history that continues to fulfill prophecy in places like China today have less faith than Global Warmists with a scant 30 years of history --  with the last 15+ years of it failing to follow their prophecy?


'via Blog this'

Global Poverty Shrinks, Western Economies Stagnate

Douglas Irwin: The Ultimate Global Antipoverty Program - WSJ - WSJ:

 Global poverty has been cut in half in 25 years!

The World Bank reported on Oct. 9 that the share of the world population living in extreme poverty had fallen to 15% in 2011 from 36% in 1990. Earlier this year, the International Labor Office reported that the number of workers in the world earning less than $1.25 a day has fallen to 375 million 2013 from 811 million in 1991.

The biggest dividend from the end of the Cold War was the bi-polar political sphere became uni-polar, so "what works" moved into ascension. Rather than two Superpowers sending "foreign aid" (bribes to keep countries in their sphere), the forces of the market -- the forces that work, were unleashed over much of the world. 

But we hear very little about this miracle here: 

The reduction in world poverty has attracted little attention because it runs against the narrative pushed by those hostile to capitalism. The Michael Moores of the world portray capitalism as a degrading system in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Yet thanks to growth in the developing world, world-wide income inequality—measured across countries and individual people—is falling, not rising, as Branko Milanovic of City University of New York and other researchers have shown.

We hear little about it here because it is WAY more than "Michael Moore" -- the myth of "Capitalist Injustice" is endemic in the political, media and educational systems here and in Western Europe. Why? Because successful economies are to bureaucrats and general government based looters as unprotected grain is to rats! The objective of government leaders and workers in wealthy countries (like wealthy companies) tends toward increasing the take of the leadership and the bureaucracy at the expense of all else.

It is easier to see in corporations than countries, because corporations still have to compete with quarterly profit / loss statements, and they have a hard time controlling all education and media! When Gerstner arrived in '93, bottom level IBM employees typically had greater than something like 10 levels of management between them and the CEO, he cut it to typically 4. He left, and now it is back to around 10 -- and IBM is again in crisis. The cat left, the rats took over -- quickly.

We generally all know what works -- hard work, living with and taking reasonable risks, suffering some losses and learning from them, merit based reward systems, responsibility, private property, rule of law, etc ...

We know that, but we WANT certainty, more leisure, freedom from or at least insurance against loss, we like to avoid responsibility for our failures, we like OUR stuff, but tend to think the "other guy" has too much, etc, etc.

There is a reason that capitalism is associated with "animal spirits" -- emotion, natural drives. We intellectually "know" lots of stuff, but it is our emotions that provide the DRIVE! As Adam Smith was very clear on in "The Theory of Moral Sentiments", we may THINK that if a million Chinese were killed by a natural disaster, that ought to weigh heavier on our minds this evening that say the pain from a finger we smashed in a door -- we may THINK that ought to be true, but we all know what IS true!

Capitalism works extremely well with what is. Socialism and Communism tell you that they can produce "what ought to be". The actual results are obvious -- but like the rats and unprotected grain, as soon as there is a "surplus", the looters show up and corrupt the working capitalist system to a wealth transfer system where the leading beneficiaries are the looters and ultimately destroy the working system yet again!

On top of this, the looters work overtime to convince us that there is a local and global zero sum relationship between poverty being reduced in China and stagnation here -- or, between people that make more money here and people that make less money. The capitalist system is driven off greed and produces growth and wealth. The looter system is based off envy and consumes wealth and produces decline. One might think they would "balance".

In the real world, much as with climate, one system is always driving -- "balance", as in "balance of nature" is a looter myth. The climate is always warming or cooling. Nations are always growing or declining.

'via Blog this'

How Insane Can an ex Supreme Court Justice Be?

The five extra words that can fix the Second Amendment - The Washington Post:

The first 10 amendments to the Constitution placed limits on the powers of the new federal government. Concern that a national standing army might pose a threat to the security of the separate states led to the adoption of the Second Amendment, which provides that “a well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” 

For more than 200 years following the adoption of that amendment, federal judges uniformly understood that the right protected by that text was limited in two ways: First, it applied only to keeping and bearing arms for military purposes, and second, while it limited the power of the federal government, it did not impose any limit whatsoever on the power of states or local governments to regulate the ownership or use of firearms. Thus, in United States v. Miller, decided in 1939, the court unanimously held that Congress could prohibit the possession of a sawed-off shotgun because that sort of weapon had no reasonable relation to the preservation or efficiency of a “well regulated Militia.”

So there is no individual right to Free Speech (the 1st amendment)? A state may declare any speech it wants to be illegal and no challenge from the court will be forthcoming? I think not.

 How about the 4th? The vaunted "secure n their persons" -- the right to "privacy" the rubric under which Roe V Wade operates. Let's see, where does the SCOTUS of the US stand on THAT one of the first 10 amendments being "limiting only to the Federal Government"?

How can anything like this be taken seriously? It is obvious that there is no rule or principle of law operating here at all, and WORSE, not even any rule of "common sense", let alone "natural law", the real foundation of the Constitution. We know that in fact the SCOTUS runs the OTHER way on nearly every issue -- abortion, environmental rules, BOcare, gay marriage, etc -- the general policy of the time is if the federal government decrees it, the states MUST obey. Oh, but wait -- the 2nd amendment is different! On what principle other than Stevens wants it to be so?

The "magic 5 words are here":

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

That's right. Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Franklin, Hamilton, etc REALLY went to the trouble of a 2nd amendment so the army could have weapons! They were such dolts that they thought it necessary to codify that in a written constitution! But they were just "bad writers" -- they left out the important part!

But they didn't, and they wrote that they didn't ... for example:

The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.
-- Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers at 184-188

One of the chief fears of the founders was a STANDING militia -- in other words, the very 5 words the insincere idiot Stevens would like to see added. To which George Mason said:

"I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials."
— George Mason, in Debates in Virginia Convention on Ratification of the Constitution, Elliot, Vol. 3, June 16, 1788

So for 200 years the 2nd amendment was "understood" to mean that the army could have guns -- or so the ex justice says. But interestingly, not a lot of gun control seemed to be forthcoming in those 200 years!

How strange! Somehow I have a strong suspicion that if states in the American West were telling the pioneers that they couldn't have guns, they would have had a MUCH better response to guys like Stevens suggesting they give up their arms.

Tar and feathering really needs to make a comeback! Perhaps it is required to help the supposedly more intellectual understand common sense?

'via Blog this'

Poll Number Bias By The Numbers

No News Is Good News | National Review Online:

A good list with some nice specific numbers, it's short, just read it.

A teaser ....

In the first eight months of this year, ABC, NBC, and CBS have conducted at least 15 national surveys asking people to rate Obama’s job performance. There has been an endless parade of other media surveys confirming that his numbers have cratered, now hovering at the 40 percent level, making him just as unpopular as Bush was, and so toxic that even Democrats running for reelection are repeatedly denouncing him. So how many stories on ABC, NBC, and CBS? In eight months, none — only two mentions. They are censoring their own surveys.

For most of 2006, W's low poll numbers WAS the lead story almost all the time on NPR --- forget the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, they had served their purpose, along with Katrina, W was unpopular!!! Kinda like Crimson and Clover ..... Over and Over. The article only covers network news ... same time period in '06? 52 vs 2 in 2014.

The MSM isn't biased --- at least if you believe them.

'via Blog this'

The Suicide Election

CHARLES ORTEL: America nears financial suicide as voters head to the polls - Washington Times:



A well written article that I find to be WAY too optimistic on what could possibly be accomplished by a Republican congress, but does a solid job of chronicling how a bit of desperate the situation is.

Will the legislative branch finally attain power required to bring President Obama’s lawless administration to heel? Or, is the American republic set to die an undignified death, drowning in debt, deficits, and dangers?

I'd say this is an election where the nation is already hung by the neck after ingesting a fatal dose of poison -- do we want to cut the rope in hopes that someone might get an antidote before we expire? Oh, I think adding about 3 stories of height to the fall might make the analogy more complete. I'm frankly not even sure that a Republican congress can manage to cut the rope, but if Harry Reid stays it, it is rumored that he is going to fumble in Uncle Sam's pocket for a .45 and put the gun in our collective mouth and squeeze one off.



A poisoned Uncle Sam hanging by the neck 3 stories up fumbling in his pocket for a .45 to "make it quicker" ... oh, and maybe Russia, ISIS, China, North Korea and Iran sitting below on the street aiming automatic weapons at him. That is the cartoon for this election in my brain -- well, do we feel lucky?



'via Blog this'

Calling a Lt Col Taylor Swift

Ernst 'offended' by Harkin Taylor Swift remark - CNN.com:



TP (The Party, D) absolutely can't allow strong conservative women candidates to succeed. The same goes for conservative black men, and DOUBLE for conservative black women.



So the references to "Taylor Swift" and "Michelle Bachmann" (I'm surprised he didn't throw Sarah Palin in as well) are acceptable fare for a sitting senator attacking a Lt Col war veteran. Well, a TP sitting senator!



Were a Republican to have attacked a Democrat female that was a Lt Col war veteran, the story would be national news as a strong example of the made for political theatre  Republican "War on Women". For a female military leader to be compared to Taylor Swift is harsher than comparison of a male military leader to "Justin Bieber" ... it is a sexist slam, plain and simple, and would be hammered on unmercifully if an outgoing Republican Senator was to do it.



I've sent money to Joni Ernst, I've also sent money to Mia Love . It is hard to even imagine the courage of a black woman running as a Republican! Especially one that already weathered a huge barrage of negative attack ads in 2012 and losing by 768 votes. ... and her once big lead has tightened as well after a ton of work to take her down by TP and it's Utah media arm.

Ms. Love was ahead by 12 percentage points in August, but polls show her lead has eroded in the last two months. One problem she faces is that she’s still trying to repair the damage from the flood of attack ads in 2012 by national Democratic groups that drove up her negatives, Mr. Hansen said.

The treatment of republican women and blacks by TP is modern Jim Crow -- and one thing TP has expertise at (100 years) is Jim Crow! 




'via Blog this'

Cancel The Midterms, Giving Bullshit a Bad Name

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/03/opinion/cancel-the-midterms.html?_r=1

We know the narrative -- Fox News and Talk Radio are horrible partisan "echo chambers", but the rest of the MSM, especially "The Paper of Record", the NYTs is completely unbiased. Just the facts Ma'am, like Joe Friday!

So I did some looking back in '06 for their possibly evolving position that midterm elections ought to be cancelled -- I'm certain it is an honestly held non-partisan position! Strangely, I could find nothing of the sort, even stranger, I found this ... which seems to indicate that the voting in the midterms in '06 was a very solid example of citizens taking effective action for excellent reasons! Why there weren't even any complaints about how much lower the turnout is in off-year elections. I was SHOCKED!

Doesn't the left ever get tired of this foolishness? Trying to claim that the NYTs isn't a left wing paper is like Cheech and Chong trying to claim that they don't smoke dope. It gives bullshit a bad name!

Chinese Lunar Probe Returns Safely

China lunar probe makes successful return to Earth | Fox News Latino:



The world is never static, someone is always advancing and someone is always declining. It is usually pretty easy to know which is which -- the decliners tend to report very little on the success of those that are advancing!



Oh, and what the decliners try to do tends to blow up, while the advancers tend toward "mission accomplished".



These races really aren't that hard to follow.



'via Blog this'

A Righteous Haidter

The Power Line 100: The Commanding Haidt | Power Line:

Actually, it turns out his name is pronounced "height", not "hate" as I thought -- which was based on a joke from another psychologist, Martin Seligman, saying "when he wanted to understand love, he referred to "Haidt".

In any case, as I've commented in the past, Haidt is brilliant and writes brilliantly on important topics -- as in the highly recommended "Righteous Mind"

PL had already reported on the information in the current New Yorker article.

It's all well worth reading, but for those of you gainfully employed and/or not gluttons for reading reams of text, the cliff notes version:

• Morality is wired into humans -- it is how we operate like "sophisticated bees" (social). We have a moral instinct wired into our systems. Naturally, everyone already knew this, and religious people believe it comes from, God. So do atheists, it comes from their god, randomness. 
• How we react to our moral wiring is a huge determinant of "who we are" -- the official "modern / educated / progressive / atheist" position is to deny morality and claim to not even recognize the fact that their brains are screaming "WRONG" over practices that activate the built in disgust circuitry. 
• So they develop new "morality"(they have to, it's in their wiring) -- un-natural morality. They make disgusting things "rites" ... eg un-natural (meaning non adaptive / procreative) sex becomes a moral imperative, killing the unborn a sacrament, and natural things -- like loving and honoring your parents, religion, culture, or simply eating meat / traditional foods become "disgusting / immoral". 
• But the most disgusting thing of all becomes "conservative thought" -- so that which is actually natural, traditional, cultural ... wired into the brain, becomes abhorrent and the "not of my tribe" circuits are subverted  to operate against those things that are conservative. "Culture", and especially successful culture, is either a gift from God, or a "adaptive natural selection of culture" -- so destroying it is sinful, or non-adaptive in the extreme. The "progressive" seeks to label the very culture that enabled them to be "immoral", so attacks the roots from which they sprang. 

Haidt, while still calling himself a "liberal"  is willing to go where actual data leads him, and has found ways of scientifically verifying the obvious bias in our current system relative to at least psychology. He seems to be even be aware of the danger of the "progressive project" -- the same as the obvious ultimate danger of Jim Crow, Apartheid, Muslims killing off Christians  -- but for the present in our nation, the problem of eliminating true diversity of thought.

Having people of different skin colors, genders, sexual preferences is quite meaningless next to having people interact who have different THOUGHT. The essence of humanity is not our skin color, gender, sexual preference, etc, but the diversity that counts is our THOUGHT! (especially if it is tied to wisdom, through spiritual connection to God or other transcendent principles as discovered by Plato)

One of the major lies / errors / destructive acts of the "progressive" movement is in claiming "diversity" in the areas of skin color, gender, sexual preference, etc, while attempting to completely suppress diversity of thought with enough vigor to give jack-booted thugs a bad name!

The whole Haidt lexicon is well worth the time to study if you have it. We may be in a race to understand the physical roots of morality, culture and religion and hopefully to honor them,  before we are fully dragged into a truly dark age of pagan materialism or pagan Islamic theism.

'via Blog this'