Wednesday, May 07, 2014

7% Of Journalists are Very Courageous.

The PJ Tatler » Just 7% of Journalists Identify as Republicans:



It takes a lot of balls to be a reporter and admit that you vote Republican (even "secretly" ... how many examples do you need of "it got out"). WTH, are you directly paid by somebody? Shouldn't you just be a lobbyist"?



I also find the 28% who self-identify to be at least more brave and honest than most!



Let's face it, "independent" is pretty much "I always vote Democrat, but I like to claim I'm above political stuff!" which means that the number are about the same as always ... the MSM is 70%+ Democrat and in a good year around 10% Republican.



That is as level as the media playing field gets in this country!



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Tuesday, May 06, 2014

Snowpack Shrinks 86% in ONE YEAR!!

‘Houston, we have a dumbass problem’ | Watts Up With That?:

In case someone quotes this completely foolish item to you, at least now you know.

Now we are down toe ONE YEAR effects of "Climate Change"? Can we get better than that? I'm, HOPING that the variation between the warmest day of summer this year and the coldest day last winter is LARGE ... although I must say I'm getting a bit concerned it won't even come close to my hopes!

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TP (The Party) as Medieval Indulgence

Liberals: Exempt from Scrutiny | National Review Online:

 "We are told that the Kennedys, the Pelosis, the Kerrys, and others like them are noble because they vote against their class interests. But they really do not; they vote for them. Liberalism is now the domain of the elite, and antithetical to the aspirations of the upper middle class that lacks the capital and tastes of the 0.1 percent. The higher the taxes, the more numerous the regulations, the greater the redistribution, so all the more the elite liberal distances himself from those less cool who breathe down his neck, and the less guilty he feels about the growing divide between him and the poor he worries about, but never worries about enough to associate with.
Liberalism professes a leftwing ideology, but these days it has absolutely no effect on the lives of those who most vehemently embrace it. In other words, being liberal is professionally useful and psychologically better than Xanax, but we need not assume any more that it is a serious belief."

Good column that covers some of the specifics of Kerry, Elizabeth Warren, Paul Krugman and others -- as I've often said, you CAN'T really be a hypocrite when you don't truly claim to believe in anything!

Little long for the benefit, but generally worth it.

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It's Been Hot on BO's Home World

White House Report Says Climate Change Has Moved 'Into the Present' - NBC News.com:



I'm often mystified as to what the planet that BO comes from is like, but apparently it has been hot there recently!



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5-4, Heartland, Working for God Through Human Excellence

Supreme Court ruling allows prayer at New York town council meeting - NY Daily News:



The saddest part of slavery in the US was that if ended up forcing a trial over secession for the wrong reasons and unsurprisingly the trial ended with the wrong answer -- on secession, though not on slavery.



I'm not a believer in the maxim that "war (or violence) never solves anything" -- it solved Nazi Germany, the US break from England, and Saddam Hussein to name a few. But that DEFINITELY doesn't mean it typically or even frequently solves things. Perhaps fighting primarily over people (Hitler, Saddam, King George) may be more productive than fighting over ideas? A later discussion.



Anytime a court is deciding anything on prayer, the court believes itself to be WAY more "supreme" than it actually is. If it is getting correct answers unanimously, then there might be cause for optimism, but 5-4 says "Gird your loins", there is a court that is WAY beyond it's pay grade!



Prayer, political speech -- the right to be a "Denier" (freedom of thought),  2nd amendment ... these are non-negotiable. If another civil war is required to get some set of US states that still believe in "Under God", actual diversity of thought, and the right of free people to be armed, then so be it. Blood is a high cost, but it is cheap next to tyranny. There will be a point where HOPEFULLY the secession standard can be reset and done peacefully. Ideally with some connected "coterminous" column of states -- Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, TX and no doubt a few others.



Founding a Christian, pro-business, pro-economic freedom,  pro-competition, minimal social safety net, balanced budget, flat tax, gold standard ...  FREE republic with ACTUAL liberty and justice for those that agree with the principles. Those that do not can easily move to the "Socialist States".  Let's call it "Heartland" -- a heart with a cross on it and the north star maybe? (I may be getting ahead of myself)

Essentially, the original US Constitution with the nation being explicitly Christian this time, but STILL not establishing a state church. Definitely however making it absolutely clear that the God of the Bible is where the unalienable parts of freedom flow and are NOT subject to review by some court. If the people want to change the Constitution, fine ... 2/3 majority of both houses and then 2/3 of the states!



MUCH more power in the states and LOCALLY. MUCH reduced Federal government -- having a non-paid federal congress meet every two years is about right.



Economically, such a nation would  have the advantage of energy; fossil, wind, bio and solar as well as PEOPLE looking to compete and succeed in the world via hard work rather than handouts.  It would be one of the largest food sources to the world, Ideally this ought to be bloodless with an "American Union" and "NATOish" defense agreement linking the old failed socialist nation with the new capitalist reality / liberty based  future.

The decline of America in the world is tragic. Canada is now ahead of it on the business climate front, perhaps a strong relationship between Canada, "Heartland"  and even Mexico based on a real Ricardian comparative advantage rather than faulty political posturing could ignite a resurgence of North America to counterpoise the rise of China, India and Russia.



It actually looks like a nice day out! Perhaps the country we once loved isn't fixable, but maybe that is a good thing?  I didn't even get into a new education system, thorium reactors, everyone in the militia (the Oldster US is going to be HUNGRY -- perhaps their army will have walkers with weapons?) ... thinking of a bright future is so much more uplifting than decline and death under the crushing stench of BO!



A freedom based, excellence focused, heavily technological and hands-on system of education with no unions, purposefully competitive and vocationally focused is enough to get someone believing in very bright future all on it's own!

Europe and "The Socialist States of America" may well appreciate the foreign aid in the near future as their aging masses fall into the dustbin of history trying to tell people if they can pray or not!



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Sunday, May 04, 2014

Never Enough: Americas Limitless Welfare State

Link to Book

A well written and fairly easy to follow discussion of how "liberals" have hi-jacked the American experiment, but it is far from ONLY a criticism of liberals. The author honestly set out to try to discover a limiting principle for "liberalism" and of course found none. Liberalism is like an invasive species with no predators -- it consumes all that is available until it's "niche" (the country or countries) that are it's host environment are destroyed.

Why? Because as Ayn Rand said, means are finite, but human desires are infinite.

or as Steven Hayward said in the foreword:
Ultimately what is at stake is not money or prosperity as much as self-government itself. Voegeli explains: “The danger liberalism poses to the American experiment comes from its disposition to deplete rather than replenish the capital required for self-government.” 

This book touches on the aspect that "liberalism" is an organism that abhors any kind of limits, so "limited government is anathema to it's existence:

When [FDR] took office in 1933 the separation of powers effectively ceased to function for the first time in a major domestic crisis other than civil war.

As I've stated in the blog many times, and one would assume would be obvious to the most casual of observers of Europe and the US:
“there is now a broad understanding that the social democratic project itself is unsustainable: that it has grown wildly beyond the principles of its inception and that the consequences of this are not only unaffordable, but positively damaging to national life and character.”16

I could go on endlessly quoting and there are close to 100 decent quotes along with a lot of excellent and very specific charts / analysis of US since FDR, the "Reagan attempt" that was the ONLY significant, yet still unsuccessful attempt to slow the Welfare State.

He then covers our current sad state --
  • "limited government" Constitutionally destroyed as of the '30s and being trampled more each day. 
  • A people addicted to benefits for the "most needy 100%" with all but the top 10% believing that they will be net importers of government largesse from others pockets. 
  • The ever tightening screws on the smaller and smaller percentage of people still working, and detailed analysis of the futility of ever being able to transfer anything approaching enough money from that smaller and smaller group in order to "reduce inequality" -- in fact, why government transfers directly contribute to income inequality by rewarding behaviors that keep you poor (single parent family) and continually punish attempts to get off the bottom (marginal effects of moving up a level in income and losing government benefits)
  • Lots of solid analysis of why libertarianism has no chance, and conservatism must be VERY careful if it seeks to have any power left at all ... 
In summary, while he doesn't state it as directly as I do, we are effectively screwed -- and likely were once we allowed FDR to sell us the false idea that "happiness" rather than the PURSUIT of happiness was a right -- it isn't, and of course it can't be!

MAYBE conservatives can slow the reckoning. MAYBE some other pair can come to where he says that Clinton and Gingrich were before the Lewinsky scandal broke --- supposedly in secret meetings trying to means test FICA / Medicare and allow private accounts. But he doubts it, as do I.

Essentially it is a book that does a better job of covering a lot of the stuff that I have covered over the years from a better writer, with a little more hope than I have been ground down to. I heartily recommend it.

"The Party" (TP) -- Sargent Schultz Defense (SSD)

Sargent Schultz - I know nothing, I am not here - I did not even get up this morning! - YouTube:

I can't go too nuts with the acronyms, but the latest Benghazi revelations with TP slipping into what I think of as the "Sargent Schultz Defense" --- "I know NOTHING, I hear NOTHING!!".

This is a defense not available to Non-TP, because the IMMEDIATE response from TP (especially their MSM propaganda arm) is "There are two choices, 1). They are lying or 2). They are "incompetent" ... because a Non-TP executive is NOT allowed to "not know".

Such a defense by a Non-TP ALWAYS means that they are either grossly incompetent, or lying ..., and most likely BOTH!

Ah the old TV shows.  Hogan's Heroes was a lot of fun -- but as the US starts to look more and more like Stalag 13 with leadership only a little less competent than Schultz, Klink, Burkhalter, and Hochstetter, but far more nasty, one begins to wonder who really won that war!
We could use some guys like Colonel Hogan and his wily men!

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TP Administration Immunity

Why There Is No Cure for the GOP's Benghazi Fever | Mother Jones:
But as we know now, the CIA and the State Department took the lead in fashioning the talking points. A year ago, the release of internal White House emails about the drafting of the talking points clearly showed there had been no White House effort to shape the narrative in a devious manner
The linked article is rather long look at the TP (The Party) view that being TP means never having to be investigated. Why would you investigate the good guys? Our founders firmly believed the dictum that "power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely", so they were intent to limit ALL power before it had any hopes of even closing on absolute. So "investigations" were ALWAYS in order!

TP believes that they are virtuous -- by nature. No need to investigate virtue, let alone try to claim that the executive of the nation, BO is responsible in any way for bad things that might be done at State, CIA, or Defense for that matter. "The Sargent Schultz Defense" is all they need!

Naturally, as in all cases, TP is completely consistent on this -- I remember has the NYT ran something like 40 days straight coverage  on Abu Ghraib, they were constantly pointing out how "this was a Defense Department issue".  I can't recall, was W even mentioned? Likewise, the entire "extraordinary rendition" program with waterboarding was a CIA activity, so W was completely out of the picture. Remember that?

Now during Reagan, we had a HUGE investigation called "Iran Contra" that actually continued on under HWB, where the WHOLE purpose was "pin the tail on the WH" -- the operation was Defense and CIA and they kept saying that -- in fact, I can swear I heard the old "Fish rots from the head" a couple times -- but I guess that only applies if the "head" is not TP! (virtue and all that).  

Oh, we won't talk about how "critical" it was so have an investigation of W because some CIA "secret agent" that commuted to Langley every day might have been "outed". Driving into Langley every day is what the modern CIA calls "Deep Cover".

 In the unlikely event that a Non-TP president ever sneaks into office again, I think TP will name a Special Prosecutor on day 1 -- I mean there has to be SOMETHING that was done wrong if a Non-TP gets into the WH!

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Coddington, The Gettysburg Campaign

http://www.amazon.com/The-Gettysburg-Campaign-Study-Command/dp/0684845695

I've long heard of this book as THE book to read on Gettysburg. I went cheap for the $20 paperback since it is not offered in Kindle, out of print in hardcover, and many of the hardcovers go for over $100 and even over $200 ... large with lots of maps, leather bound, etc. After 2 years of retirement, I have a hard time peering into the future as to where I can really savor a that sort of a book, but if I run into that point, this will be high on my list! 

This one has a LOT of detail, although having read a few on Gettysburg now, it gives just a little idea of how much detail there is when the story of  Colville and the First MN at Plum Run, covered in book length in "Pale Horse at Plum Run" and the subject of many of MN "Civil War History" exhibit is covered in less than a page on 423! The key line being "Now his force of a little over 300 men tore into Wilcox right regiment and stopped it cold". This attack was directly ordered by Hancock saying "My God! Are these all the men that we have here!" The 1st MN took huge losses to buy time -- had they not, again,  the outcome of Gettysburg may have shifted. 

I loved the tidbit that I had never heard about the Federals trying to burn a bridge at Wrightsville PA, the Rebels being unable to stop the fire, but when the blaze tried to consume Wrightsville, ... on page 170 -- "When the blaze got out of control and spread to Wrightsville, to their everlasting credit. Gordon's (the Rebels) men worked feverishly and succeeded in saving the town from total ruin". 

This is in pretty stark contrast to Sherman's march to the sea which introduced the completely non-chivalrous idea of "total war" on the world -- punish the civilians as well as the military! 

On the opposing page, "On Sunday, June 28,  Ewell sent word to the clergy to hold services as usual, for no one would disturb them. Some of the churches opened, and the preachers, though nervous, prayed for their country in peril and their friends in danger;  they also prayed for the strangers that were among them". 

Yes, the South had slavery, but will the future look on abortion in much the same way as we look on slavery now? We WERE once a Christian Nation -- clearly with a huge difference relative to the point of States Rights and slavery, but at that time we DID understand that there was more to life than this vale of tears! We all knew that being a slave in this life and gaining heaven is INFINITELY better than being the most highly educated, richest, most famous and most respected human to ever walk the earth and failing to reach heaven!

That faith and soul based knowledge is of greater merit than all else in this world, and the shared understanding of the truth of that by a people is of utmost value to a nation. It is the nation that we once were -- great beyond what only a very small set of modern minds can even comprehend! 

The other big lesson of the book is to humanize / equalize Lincoln, Lee, Meade and Hooker -- as well as many others. Stuart, Ewell and Sickles stand out. Yes, the North's generals were far short of Lee, but some of that was due to constant micro-management from Washington, ridiculous short sightedness on recruitment and retention, and the rather stupid idea of using The Army of the Potomac as BOTH the defensive force for Washington/Baltimore,  AND the instrument to destroy Lee. (BOTH a floor wax and a desert topping)

The book whetted my appetite to study Lee more. It seems that as brilliant as he was, his "strength and weakness" was his dependence and willingness to grant latitude to his generals. Stonewall Jackson (killed at Chancellorsville) was a critical piece of his ability to operate because of his council and ability to correctly interpret Lee's loose orders. Lee gave orders that could be misinterpreted -- but with the faith and understanding that the flexibility would usually have positive effects. His orders to Stuart were radically misinterpreted at Gettysburg,  resulting in Lee not having the intelligence, communication and speed that his superb cavalry forces had always provided him.

It is EASY to oversimplify what happened at Gettysburg, but it is VERY complex ... the replacement of Hooker by Meade at 3AM on June 28, with the of course unknown at that point battle to commence on July 1!!  The first battle without Stonewall for Lee. Lee being on the offensive, Stuart missing, the forces essentially "blundering into each other" at Gettysburg, etc, etc. 

It is a single battle to which a person could devote their life to understanding, and still not have a clue. Perhaps after a great breakfast of fresh fish with the Savior in heaven, I can sit down with some of those guys and actually understand what happened there! 

Saturday, May 03, 2014

18 Things that Show Blacks Are Just Humans

18 Things White People Seem To Not Understand (Because, White Privilege) | Thought Catalog:

We ALL, left, right, black, white, etc like to take our own POV and then attempt to draw conclusions that reflect badly on the "the other side" -- oh, and our natural impulse is to be condescending about it.

If you are white and in China, Japan, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Kenya, Brazil, etc, then you are a minority and will be treated much the same (some better, some worse) than the list below. You will quickly be "very aware" of most of the 18 things and 100's more. Even if you are just recognized as "American" in France, Italy, Greece or other areas you will be targeted for purse snatching and other crimes. Unfortunately, it doesn't end there.

Black and white Americans may have a pretty hard time telling ethnic Japanese, Korean, Chinese etc apart on sight, but they don't really "all look alike" -- Japanese are in the running for the most xenophobic culture on earth, but the Chinese are not far behind. Does that make them "bad"? Well, that would depend on the definitions of right or wrong, would it not?

 Scientifically, it is NATURAL to "prefer like" (we REALLY know that from brain scans now), as it is natural to be attracted to the opposite sex. Christian morality tells us to go against "nature" on loving EVERYONE as ourselves relative to xenophobia ... but on sexuality, it aligns our behavior with nature. (Note, we still love homosexuals, we just don't condone their behavior, just as we love racists, liberals and Vikings fans).

"Liberal morality" seems to tell us it is OK to be very judgmental of the natural xenophobia in at least whites, although reverse hatred of whites by blacks, and even black issues with Hispanics or Korean grocery owners seem to be largely excused. A feature of "liberal morality" seems to be it's unabashed selectivity, much the same as it is disdainful of consistency in any form. (consistently inconsistent!)

Many on the left want to make the slavery of blacks in the US 150 years ago something "special", and give them impression that "whites are especially bad". Slavery is old and ongoing. The Bible, Greek and Roman texts,  texts from India, China, Mongolia, Africa, etc recognize that slavery runs close to prostitution in the list of old human relations.

There are a few million people in slavery TODAY ... sex trade, young soldiers forcibly taken in many areas of Africa. Black on black slavery led to blacks being used as slaves in roman times and earlier. In the sex trade, young white women are highly prized as slaves by other races, so the idea of "cross race slavery" as something "completely white" is also wrong.

Yes, I'd heartily agree that Western Civilization, heavily driven (but NOT exclusively) by "white men" (one DEFINITELY needs to consider Jews "white" to make that claim, which is a STRETCH) reached the apogee of human riches, power and knowledge somewhere around "the moon landing - fall of the USSR", but the seeds of it's decline were already well sown (1960's moral decline,  welfare and other state expansion, unionization of schools, decline in common person intellectual pursuits, etc

So SOME of the "anti-white people" part of the listing is just sour grapes relative to  a recently great culture -- as beating on Rome went on for 100's of years past the fall.

Where we OUGHT to be looking is at "The Middle Kingdom", the Chinese -- our rising overlords. I know they consider both whites and blacks ... as well as Japanese to be inferior, but I don't have a good handle on their exact thinking. I also know that at least Tibetans are discriminated against, but I also believe that at least historically there are "ranks" of Chinese relative to race -- but I'm pretty ignorant in this area, so need study.

The point is that "white people" are just ONE race  that "don't seem to understand", and that "red or yellow, black or white", we are all pretty much just as smart and just as stupid (in more ways than we are smart) as the next race!

Even the brilliant leftists at Wellesley have a lot of trouble looking beyond their own biases as they start casting stones.

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Friday, May 02, 2014

Kochs Donate $40M More than Anyone! Wake Up Sheeple!

Evil Koch Brothers Rank 59th in Political Donations, ActBlue 1st - PolitiSite:

Oh, oops ... I meant "ActBlue" ... on their site they are proudly showing that they are about to go over $500M raised since '04! now, so things must REALLY be going well for them!!  Hear anyone in the MSM concerned about ActBlue???

If you look at "Heavy Hitters",  Koch's are #59 with $18M, ActBlue is #1 with a mere $101M, $40M ahead of the 2nd place $61M given by AFSCME American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees" ... guess what, they give 99% Democrat too!!!

Got that??? The top donor, Democrat, gives $40M more than  the next donor at the top of the list, ALSO a Democratic donor!!! The Koch's TOTAL since '89 is less than $20M, less than 50% of the DIFFERENCE between the top two donors on the list that are BOTH DEMOCRATS!

Who do we hear about and who do we NEVER hear about??? Why is it that sometimes the American people are referred to as "Sheeple"???

Because we don't get smart and interested enough to rise up and scream, WHAT IS GOING ON!!!!  AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!! At least change the channel!!!

How can there NOT be enough of us MAD AS HELL on:
  1. The constant decline in the economy / jobs / competitiveness
  2. The disaster called BOcare
  3. Surrender as a foreign policy -- I dunno, is it even THAT coherent???
  4. General media that is treats us like idiots, but we keep proving that they are RIGHT!!!! 
  5. Freezing but being willing to be told that we are having too much hot weather! 
  6. Political Correctness gone so far beyond ridiculous that it seems we are in an alternate universe (this is one that I'm starting to actually wonder about??!) 
  7. "Take another toke" as a reasonable solution. Remember when they complained about W being "Don't Worry Be Happy" when growth was 4%+, deficit was < $200B, and gas was < $2.50 a gal, and of course "he was an idiot" for saying that things were not so bad!

Hellllooooooh????


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BO Travel, Let Me Never Hear Complaints About a Republican

Just How Much Beyond the Presidential Salary Do The Obamas Spend on Travel and Vacays?:

We heard complaints about Reagan, we heard complaints about HW, and we SURE heard complaints about W (although he was more frugal than any of them).

Very few Fortune 500 companies are going to have their CEO fly commercial for obvious reasons:
  • Their time is hugely valuable
  • security is an issue
  • It's one of the few deductible "perks" of business
Ditto US President ... except the security is huge. So BO pushes the limits, ho hum ... compared to constantly violating the constitution, destroying the US economy and healthcare system, and running a Foreign policy best described as "bend over", this is WAY down my list of complaints.

I know, I can say what I want, but the MSM and left will be back to maximum umbrage if we ever get a more conservative president back and they take AF1 out for anything personal or political!

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Thursday, May 01, 2014

Climate Change Proves Totalitarianism

20 Years of Winter Cooling Defy Global Warming Claims:

For THOUSANDS of years, talking about the weather was a perfectly safe form of innocuous conversation for humans. I'd argue that it was maybe THE safest most common form of conversation:
  • Food could get you into trouble politically in the tribe based on the success, non-success of hunts, division of food, who cooked well, not well, etc. 
  • Fleeing/Fighting no doubt had their own political and relational perils ... constant issues both within and without the tribe. Why are you bringing this up? You trying to start/break alliance, criticize Gog over Magog, etc?
  • F**king -- no doubt lots of conversation done on this, but lots different outside of sexes, have to be clear on family and "other" unknown relationships ... fraught with peril.
So, there was ALWAYS the weather -- until Al Gore and the Warmists showed up and had to politicize that!

MAYBE we invented our way out of it a BIT with Sport, but given the Redskins, Braves, Fighting Sioux, etc, I'm far from sure.

Our Founders lived at the wonderful time when an intelligent man could pretty much "know all that was knowable", and I'd argue that even up to the Cilvil War, there was FAR more WISDOM about what was actually USEFUL to know vs mere detail that is more noise than anything.

When man loses his way, he becomes in the immortal words of Edmund Burke, "As the flies of summer", and indeed far less, since man is a spiritual creature and seeks to do more than mere breeding -- he seeks to pass on some of his (and history's) hard earned wisdom to succeeding generations so that humans can RISE toward SPIRITUAL IMPROVEMENT rather than sink deeper into the slime of fools.

So as we shiver on in our late late spring for the 2nd year in a row, not even the weatherman will really talk much about how cold it is, how gray it is, the lack of severe weather, or much else that could move them to the "denier" bucket, which is almost in "racist" territory ... could you be banned from watching the Twins for being a "Denier"?

This AM I heard a new one at about 31 min into a tornado discussion where the host had just started pushing on the "obvious climate change connection"  http://minnesota.publicradio.org/radio/services/nis/listen/?name=/minnesota/podcasts/climate_cast/2014/05/dailycircuittornadoes_20140501

Paul Hutner, their meteorologist suggests that "Climate Change" predicts that ONLY THE POLES WARM ... the mid-latitudes cool, so there ought to be LESS storms" (what we are seeing). This is the first I've heard this --- certainly not during MANY discussions about hot summers, warm winters like 2012, it being cold (or warm) ELSEWHERE when local conditions seemed to not mesh with the "proven science".  A cursory look didn't net any other sources on this, but it strikes me as so in keeping with the way that the "Global Warming / Climate Change"chimera shifts, I'll be waiting for THAT view to become "currently settled science".

The meaning of TOTALITARIANISM is that the government / cultural power structure has TOTAL sway over your life -- what you think, say, who you associate with, what your world view is, if you can go to a ballgame, EVERYTHING.

So, once the weather has been subsumed by the political sphere, it seems to me that we are officially totalitarian -- the only issue is one of more complete forced compliance. Which, given NSA, IRS, private surreptitious taping being used against people, enforcement by mass media mob, etc we are already WELL down that path as well.

Oh, and the little linked article is pretty good ... I've personally heard the "pine borer myth" MANY times on trips out west as well as media sources. People WANT to believe what they hear (see my stupidly believing in HOT AND DRY for the SW as I headed out this spring). Since we WANT to believe, when we see something like lots of fires, trees killed by certain bugs, it is completely natural for us to jump to "it MUST be due to CLIMATE CHANGE!".  At one time, when science was never settled and real diversity of thought was valued, usually somebody would point out how yet again we had fallen prey to finding a pattern where there isn't one -- but once our freedom of thought has been heavily curtailed,

I'd argue a study of HISTORY is at least equally important as the study of science ... otherwise we are doomed to see a lot of Lysenkos in our totalitarian state.

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BO Says N-Word and MuthaF**er

So will the NBA please ban him for life already? I mean, he did the book and the tape right out in the open!

Just to be clear, he read a version of his own book that I did the quotes from earlier and that is where the audio for this comes from. I've listened to more of it in the past, it has been hard to get to lately -- apparently our general media / internet powers that be don't really like this stuff being that accessible!

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/DTdyMklPv3g" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Hate Speech, Where are Thy Limits?

Hate Speech: U.K. Political Leader Arrested for Quoting Winston Churchill:

No doubt someone will foolishly say "that couldn't happen here". I can only say that I don't write this blog for that level of thinker -- go elsewhere, there are PLENTY of sources for what you want.

Our founders worked very hard to set up a system that LIMITED the powers of government, and ESPECIALLY limited the power of the mob -- a Republic, ruled by laws, not men. They also worked very hard to maximize the freedom of the individual, and especially SPEECH, because they well understood that in the aspects of man that pertain to culture, civil society and governance, "speech and thought" were very close to the same thing. Without radical speech freedom, freedom of thought was also under attack, and with it, the very soul of man.

Even up to my youth, "sticks and stones will break your bones, but words will never hurt you" was a very common piece of the training of a child. We were once a nation that VALUED very strongly ACTUAL HUMAN DIVERSITY! Which is the diversity of THOUGHT, not of skin, sex, preferences, wealth, etc. It was the diversity that mattered in our HUMAN / SPIRITUAL nature, not our physical / animal nature.

In America now, and I go down to the mall and read from the book of our great leader BO?
“Get your hands out of my fries. You ain’t my bitch, nigger … buy your own damn fries. Now what was I talking about?”
Obama, Barack (2007-01-09). Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (Kindle Locations 1391-1393). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition. 
York with a nice jumper, who, after a pick-up game with some talkative black men, had muttered within earshot of me and three of my teammates that we shouldn’t have lost to a bunch of niggers; and who, when I told him— with a fury that surprised even me— to shut up, had calmly explained the apparently obvious fact that “there are black people, and there are niggers. Those guys were niggers.
Obama, Barack (2007-01-09). Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (Kindle Locations 1522-1524). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition. 
Well, that’s true, Ray would admit. Maybe we could afford to give the bad -assed nigger pose a rest. Save it for when we really needed it. And Ray would shake his head. A pose, huh? Speak for your own self.
Obama, Barack (2007-01-09). Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (Kindle Locations 1548-1551). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition. 
Until you want to actually start running things, and then they’ll yank on your chain and let you know that you may be a well-trained, well-paid nigger, but you’re a nigger just the same.”
Obama, Barack (2007-01-09). Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (Kindle Locations 1818-1819). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition. 
What Granny had told us scrambled that image completely, causing ugly words to flash across my mind. Uncle Tom. Collaborator. House nigger.
Obama, Barack (2007-01-09). Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance (Kindle Locations 7160-7161). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition.  
Note, I'm NOT saying that BO shouldn't be able to write this,  just that under what was the "Equal Protection" clause of the Constitution, if he can, we ALL CAN! What is even FAR MORE IMPORTANT, under the culture that used to exist in the US, not only was it LEGAL for all to use whatever words they wanted, it was VALUED. There was a DIFFERENCE between say Paula Deen saying something 30 years ago, or someone saying something in a private conversation surreptitiously taped, then someone standing out on a corner taunting blacks! One could still use the word FIRE! even though you couldn't yell it in a crowded theatre!

Imagine a country with those kind of values and sophistication! Yes children, THAT was once America! Bur no longer, we no longer know how to differentiate between words and actions, nor I would argue, speech or thought, and so our liberty dies!
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