No federally funded abortions...No health care

So the whole B.S about abortion being a personal decision has gone out the window. No more excuses for fake Catholics. Just like there are no excuses for the fake Catholics who ignored the Pope regarding the war on Iraq.

Around the Horn

I found Mitt Romney's nonsensical plan to revive our economy linked by several Republican hacks during my weekly trek into the infernal regions of Republican establishment quackery. Apparently, Newt Gingrich isn't the only Republican capable of formulating worthless ten point plans on nearly everything and having it swallowed as Gospel by the faux-conservative gasbags that dominate the Republican Party.

I then discovered that Bob Dole was still alive and taking insulubrious doses of American Exceptionalism sildenafil. He's now warning us about the existential threat posed by the possibility of a decentralized Bosnia. He even manages to throw in the timeless "indispesable nation" drivel and as a good Republican pontificates on the evils and dangers of multilaterialism.

Michael Goldfarb doesn't seem to care that the Afghan Army we are fighting side-by-side with are a bunch of raving lunatics; who, in-between firefights, indulge in their favorite hobby of getting doped up on opium and hashish. He even has the bad taste to compare the complete disorientation and recklessness of the Afghanis drug addiction with the British rum ration of World War I.

Another sophisticated writer at the same magazine opines that unless women in Afghanistan parade around the streets of Kabul in short-skirts it will "constitute moral and strategic failure."
Hopefully, Obama's surge in Afghanistan will allow this vital American interest to come to fruition and keep us safe from terrorists.

Another strident defender of America from the nefarious Islamofascists has a theory that one possible reason for America's declining crime rate is higher immigration. He concisely titles his wonderful prose "Higher Immigration, Lower Crime"! I also learned that "Daniel Griswold is director of the Center for Trade Policy Studies at the Cato Institute and author of the new book Mad About Trade: Why Main Street America Should Embrace Globalization." Not only is Danny kind enough to peddle a fantasy immigration policy, he also promulgates a fantasy economic system for the middle-class! I'm sure informing Main Street that they can have the leftover remnant of the economic pie-after immigrants and outsourcing- is a sure way to win them over!

And Finally, I leave you with this wonderful article by Barbara Lerner. Misses Lerner -recently escaped from an insane asylum- wants you to direct all of your irrational fear, paranoia, and hatred like a laser against Iran. Watch Fox News, read the Weekly Standard, listen to Rudy Giuliani speeches, live your entire life in fear and build a nuclear fallout shelter because Iran is on the march! Unless we take action now, the mighty and powerful Iranian air force of f-14's will be dropping nukes on a city near you. Here's a sample of Barbie's powerful writing:

Are you worried — like so many Americans after the Fort Hood massacre — about the growing threat of Islamist subversion and terror here at home? Worried, beyond that, about what we’re doing — or not doing — militarily in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq? Worried about the growing reach and power of Islamist movements in Europe and South America, as well as Asia, the Middle East, and Turkey? Worried about the military alliances Islamist governments are forging with their secular mirror images: socialist-god governments in places like North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela?

Then focus like a laser on Iran, now, because Islamists will score major victories in all those places and more if we fail to prevent the ruling mullahs from openly, triumphantly making Iran the world’s first Islamist nuclear power. The danger isn’t only Iran’s own catastrophic recklessness, once she gets the bomb, or the fact that all her Arab neighbors will respond by scrambling to go nuclear too. It’s also that Islamists everywhere — joined by growing masses of previously undecided Muslims — will see Iran’s success in achieving nuclear status the way Iran’s mullahs see it: as a historic defeat for the West, blasting open the gate to a 21st-century world where Islam rules and Christians, Jews, Hindus, and Buddhists are subservient or worse. Islamist ranks will swell, everywhere, as confidence grows that the Islamist side is the winning side, and victory is near.

The new Republican purity test

Republicans considering ideological purity test for candidates:

Ten members of the Republican National Committee are proposing a resolution demanding candidates embrace at least eight of 10 conservative principles if they hope to receive financial support and an official endorsement from the RNC. The "Proposed RNC Resolution on Reagan's Unity Principle for Support of Candidates," is designed to force candidates to prove that they support "conservative principles" while opposing "Obama's socialist agenda," according to The New York Times' Caucus blog. The proposal highlights the ongoing tug-of-war for the ideological soul of the Republican party, and has been met with skepticism both inside and outside of the party.

Here's the purity test:

(1) We support smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes by opposing bills like Obama's "stimulus" bill;

We support shrinking the debt by cutting taxes, spending more than the entire world on war armaments and by extirpating some nebulous "wasteful spending" and earmarks.

(2) We support market-based health care reform and oppose Obama-style government run healthcare;

We support a completely dysfunctional health care system where the number one cause of middle-class bankruptcy is medical debt. We'll continue this whole charade about magical "free-market solutions" brought to you by the free-market fairy.

(3) We support market-based energy reforms by opposing cap and trade legislation;

I'll give the Republicans this one. They do seem to oppose cap-and-trade.

(4) We support workers' right to secret ballot by opposing card check;

When did the Republican Party become the party of workers' rights?

(5) We support legal immigration and assimilation into American society by opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants;

We support taking in millions and millions of immigrants. They just have to be legal. Then, they can assimilate into America and vote for the Democrats as our party continues a futile pandering effort to attract minority voters.

(6) We support victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges;

We don't know what victory means and cannot define it, but we should never withdraw from pointless military adventures because it is a "sign of weakness." We should have listened to MacArthur in Korean and nuked the Chinese because it was "military recommended." By staying in Iraq and Afghanistan for 100 years, we will eliminate the national debt.

(7) We support containment of Iran and North Korea, particularly effective action to eliminate their nuclear weapons threat;

We continue to search out new markets to spread the gospel of freedom and democracy.

(8) We support retention of the Defense of Marriage Act;

We will continue to mobilize our base by pretending we care about their issues and do absolutely nothing to stop gay marriage, abortion, or anything else. Once we reclaim power, we will continue to pursue tax-cuts for the rich, raid the treasury, invade nations under false pretenses and push the agenda of our neoconservative and corporate backers.
(9) We support protecting the lives of vulnerable persons by opposing health care rationing and denial of health care and government funding of abortion; and

We continue to support insurance bureaucrats rationing health-care. We will continue to pretend to fight against abortion while our own insurance policy for the RNC covers elective abortion.
(10) We support the right to keep and bear arms by opposing government restrictions on gun ownership;

We believe in slowly eroding liberties, unlike the Democrats, who prefer quickly destroying liberties.

God bless the RNC. They sure do try.

P.S: Am I the only one whose stomach churns at the constant invocations of Ronald Reagan?

Idiocracy

Ninety percent of CUNY freshman cannot solve a simple algebra problem.

"These results are shocking," said City College Prof. Stanley Ocken, who co-wrote the report on CUNY kids' skills. "They show that a disturbing proportion of New York City high school graduates lack basic skills."

John Jay College sophomore Ahmed Elshafaie, 19, who graduated from Long Island City High School, said he avoids math classes.

"I don't want to ruin my GPA," he said. "High school standards were really low."

Notice how the article refers to college students as "CUNY kids." And congress is now working on a proposal to keep adults on their parents health care until they are 27 years old!
Hopefully by this point they will have conquered the intricacies 8th grade algebra.

Bleeding Heart Liberal Bias 101

Roger Alford's failed hit piece on Rand Paul confirms nearly every stereotype about the liberal media. In the end, Dr. Paul ends up looking pretty good. The Republican establishment ends up looking like the asinine, corrupt, jingoistic and petty party of synthetic opposition that it really is.

Republican leaders, including McConnell, have been largely mum about the race. McConnell did host a GOP fundraiser in Washington for Grayson in September. More than 20 Republican senators attended, but the campaign hasn't released the fundraising total.

This should tell you everything you need to know about the Repugnant Party. Twenty senators and the living abomination to conservatism Mitch McConnell (the Senate leader of the dimwitted Repugnant party) are openly rejecting and holding fundraisers for the moderate candidate.

Since Bunning bowed out, Paul's detractors have tried to paint him as an oddball and an extremist, but growing crowds are flocking to town hall meetings across Kentucky to hear his spiel about reining in government spending, stopping taxpayer bailouts of private companies and balancing the federal budget.

Dr. Paul doesn't favor the perpetual war for perpetual peace and a massive police state; thus according to his detractors he's an "oddball and an extremist." Notice Mr. Alford's choice of words here.

Paul says he opposes abortion without exception, not even in cases of rape, incest or the health of the expectant mother. He also opposes marriages between gay and lesbian couples. At the same time, he voices staunch opposition to government intruding in the private lives of citizens.

Mr. Alford, if someone is seeking an abortion they are not an "expectant mother." And after losing thirty-one straight referendums regarding homosexual marriage Mr. Alford has taken to the task of propagandizing the rest of us by terming homosexual marriage as "marriages between gay and lesbian couples." Then he throws out all the standards of objective journalism and throws in the completely unnecessary "At the same time, he voices staunch opposition to government intruding in the private lives of citizens."

Apparently, one cannot be opposed to an unconstitutional police state and also oppose such iniquity as abortion and homosexual marriage in the eyes of the unbiased Roger Alford. It's a miracle that our founders could craft a constitution recognizing the value of privacy without simultaneously recognizing homosexual marriage and the right to abortion.

Why I Hate Modern Conservatism

'Elitist Protection Consumers Don't Need' Veronique de Rugy]

The American Enterprise Institute's Peter Wallison has a nice piece in today's Washington Post. Wallison rightfully argues against treating ordinary Americans like idiots who can't decide for themselves what's good for them.

A niece piece? What does nice mean? Use proper English when pretending to be a Conservative. Nice means something, as all real Conservatives will admit. "He's a nice guy", "he was nice to me" "I'm a nice person". Last time I checked nice guys finish last. National Review really sucks for publishing such a moron. People writing about serious issues should never be "nice" or use such a stupid word, if they really mean or care about what they are writing.

Conservatives have always argued that liberals are elitists who do not respect ordinary Americans; this legislation seems to prove it..

Actually conservatives haven't always argued that liberals are eltitists; this is a modern problem. Any sane, properly educated, person would recognize.

For example, the administration's plan would allow the educated and sophisticated elites to have access to whatever financial services they want but limit the range of products available to ordinary Americans

This has been true of all societies for all time and barring a communist utopia will continue to be so.

This unprecedented result comes about because, under the proposed legislation, every provider of a financial service (a term that includes organizations as varied as banks, check-cashing services, leasing companies and payment services) is required to offer a "standard" product or service — to be defined and approved by the proposed agency — that will be simple and entail "lower risks" for consumers. These standard products are called "plain vanilla" in the white paper that the administration circulated in advance of the legislation.

This is neither unprecedented nor does it necessitate your lamentations.

On that point, George Mason University and Cafe Hayek's Don Boudreaux makes this really great comment:

But let's accept, for argument's sake, the administration's judgment that ordinary Americans can't adequately assess complexity. Doesn't it then follow that Americans' election of Mr. Obama to high office deserves no credit? After all, isn't the task of assessing the merit of one person's ideas on economics, foreign affairs, ethics, law, and other difficult topics extraordinarily complex? Given that Joe Six-Pack and Jane Soap-Opera cannot be trusted with the relatively straightforward task of sensibly investing their own money, how can they be trusted to meet the far more complex challenge of choosing powerful national leaders?

No they cannot Mr. Boudreaux, that's why our Constitution was written for a republic. If Mr. Boudreaux had any idea what he was talking about instead of living within a thirty-year vacuum of history. he'd realize that 4 of the last 15 amendments to the Constitution since our civil war have involved extending the franchise.

From Wikipedia:

The Delaware Constitution of 1776 stated that "Every person who shall be chosen a member of either house, or appointed to any office or place of trust, before taking his seat, or entering upon the execution of his office, shall (...) also make and subscribe the following declaration, to wit: I, A B. do profess faith in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ His only Son, and in the Holy Ghost, one God, blessed for evermore; and I do acknowledge the holy scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by divine inspiration." [6]. This was repealed by article I, section2. of the 1792 Constitution: "No religious test shall be required as a qualification to any office, or public trust, under this State." [7]. The 1778 Constitution of the State of South Carolina stated that "No person shall be eligible to sit in the house of representatives unless he be of the Protestant religion" [8], the 1777 Constitution of the State of Georgia (art. VI) that "The representatives shall be chosen out of the residents in each county (...) and they shall be of the Protestant religion" [9].

Why give the serfs a meaningless vote and work under the pretense they are in control unless you have something pernicious planned for them and seek their approval for your own motives? The last 8 years of George Bush and the Republican party hammer this into my mind incessently.

Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett

As I listen to fireworks exploding at 1 a.m (It's not the 4th of July, it's not even close), in my otherwise quiet neighborhood, I must ponder whether these two corporate creations are somehow responsible for it. The selfishness and utter destruction of norms, morals, manners, and self-restraint that has befallen our nation over the last decades is truly remarkable. Thank you Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett for being good pawns and promulgating this completely debased and insane culture.

A culture(sic) that caricatures temperance, mocks modesty, and scorns piety to anything higher than one's person is truly the anti-culture. It is something I want no part of, something that is irredeemable, and ultimately, something that must be extirpated. Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett, Requiescat in pace. God willing, may the depravity you helped unleash and maintain, meet a far crueler fate.

Hiatus

I have somehow been blessed by Providence with a 78 hour volume of Sean Hannity reruns. I will post whenever I'm done watching this great comedy.