So, the dumbest woman around decides to pick a pissing match with the firetruck known as the CIA.
Not. Even. Close.
First, Pelosi doesn't have the intellectual fire power to be coherent, let alone lie or smack down another person (aside from mediocre ad hominem crap "they mislead us all the time," hmmm, that will make sure the CIA plays ball). Second, as a result of that, she requires constant media manipulation to hide how dumb she is. But, today, the first point became apparent as the second point faded.
Finally, note that, as pointed out by Hot Air, the CIA doesn't care. They are not going to go down. If Pelosi wants to scare the shit out of the intel community in a bald faced attempt to turn this country into a banana republic by criminalizing all acts of the previous administration, the CIA will go ahead and drop shit on her for as long as they want.
Hell, they did it to Bush 43 and all he did was cut back on their Christmas party liquor budget.
BONUS
The alpha liberal of the liberal tribe dares to speak truth to kooks:
Her: You know, Joe, I'm done with assholes and dumb guys. That's why I like you, you are smart and nice.
Me. I've been meaning to tell you something. I've only been pretending to be smart.
Look at the following image:
What the fuck?
I think some jackass named Keynes is to blame. Blamed because he is the beard for which this thing hides behind to gain credibility.
In reality, of course, this is spending is not based on any economic theory or reality. It's a power grab, it's a reward for allies. And, it's just the beginning.
I am not a tribal hack, hating on HugObama because he's of the wrong political persuasion. That thing above, that is the result of 100 days. And maybe 15 minutes of debate. This thing isn't a moderate, cool, rationale way to govern. This thing isn't even a well thought out way to socialize the country. It's just a testament to how idiotic, ignorant, and dangerous superhacks like Pelosi, Reid, and Obama are. 100 days. Open the floodgates. Any pork, project, or reward...come and get it.
Fine. Even pretending that they're sincere (they aren't or they're ignorant). They believe that you solve a crisis of capital in a financial sector by repaving roads and other "stimulus" activities. Sure whatevers.
The summary of Keynesism is that by merely employing a man, you grow the economy. The example is, apparently, you pay guy to dig a hole and then pay him to fill it back up. He gets paid, he spends the money, and the greatest country and economy that the world has ever seen sprouts to life.
Can we, ah, unpack this train of thought?
What can we agree on? Wealth is created, right? Price follows the law of supply and demand, right? If you are an American and can't agree to these two basic precepts of the market economy, the economic system that has granted you more luxury, safety, and material well being than any other country ever, then leave. Please.
Ok, what is the demand for a dug hole. Not that great. Noone is going to spend a lot of money on a dug hole or a hole that's been refilled. No wealth is created by this meaningless act. It does nothing. Money is invested and nothing is returned.
More insidiously, what does this ditch digging and filling job do to the digger, the man himself? His value is tied to his job, he is not gaining new skills. He is not even being criticized or held to any standards. Just show up and do this thankless, meaningless work. Soon, the man discovers that the sum of his efforts is the same whether he works hard or softly. Or if he shows up drunk or high. Hell, why not show up late and leave early.
His soul degrades to the point where he won't even take a real job. He is programmed to earn his money for free. Real work is devalued because the compensation for an actual job is most likely trivial compared to what he makes for nothing. And, because he is a ditch digger, the opportunities for a jump in income from make-believe work to real work are small.
What proof have I of this? Look at the bloated unions driving GM out of business. Look at the hoards of French protesting the inevitable end of their 2 months of vacation and 35 hour work week. Look at the inner cities of America. These examples sprung not from my cold rationality, but from the empathy of make believe work. You loved these people to death.
Want more proof, what is this?
Now, I am not opposed to some spending. The seduction, the siren call, of giving jobs to people is there. And, maybe, some people can only dig ditches. But this theory is wrong and cannot be the basis by which an economy grows. Furthermore, yes, debt spending (another issue, but a related issue) is not always bad. Reagan had to agree to spending increases in trade for growing the military. At least military spending is the opposite of the ditch digging job. The science and engineering required to make and maintain advanced weapons systems (like the Spartans, there are no American "cannonfodder," every soldier and sailor is precious and can strike back at the enemy with unimaginable power) added to this nation's wealth. We got the internet, radars, VCR's, computers, medicine, etc. Not dug and undug ditches. The men emerging from the military were taught, if not marketable skills (how to shoot a gun, drive a boat, fly an airplane), they gained marketable traits (hardwork, leadership, and responsiblity). This spending added to the country's wealth and made the debt incurred relatively small.
Look at that thing again. Did our economy quadruple is size? Will it? No. So, where is this money going to come from? I have no idea. I expect we are going to borrow some of it and monetize the rest.
Japan is another example. They had an economic crisis. They spent like mad. They got new roads and shiny new stuff. Did it help or matter? no. They just ended up with more debt. This is known as the "lost decade." So, their debt is coming due and they don't have the economic growth to repay it. That debt is just as expensive now as it was then.
Think about it, you take out loans to get a degree, say $50K. You hopefully get a job that will make you enough money to pay off that debt. That $50K is less of a burden to you after school and better job than on the day you signed those student loan papers. If you went out and spent $50K on shoes and rims that spin, your income remains the same. That $50K is still as expensive to you on day 1000 as it was on day 1.
On the other hand, we have had the last 30 years of economic growth. Our lifetimes have been blessed by the Reagan presidency. He lowered taxes and cut regulatory interference. Our economy grew. We had several recessions and missteps, but we grew and we are stronger because of it. These recessions allowed us to clear the economic deadwood and to learn lessons. Instead of a lost decade, the recession is a rebuilding year. Think about it. We may have just abandoned the Patriots or Colts role model of the metaphorical football world because we didn't win the SuperBowl one year and decided to take up the Detroit Lion's managerial style instead. One bad year versus a bad lifetime.
Nonetheless, despite the success that we've had thanks to an embrace of the markets, the taxes crept back and the regulations crept back. They always do. Governments want more. And the power to tax is also the power to reward and to punish. And, the ignorant think that economics is a zero sum game and taxation is a linear event.
Bush is being blamed for the current recession. He was also blamed for inheriting Clinton's recession. Luck guy, eh? You saw what he did with the recession he inherited. He made life easier for businesses, not government. We grew...yes we did...hitting a record string of months of economic growth. Eventually, we hit a recession. This one caused by things that have no name (i.e., government regulations forcing banks to make bad loans and then forcing these loans to be sold as securities). But, despite a war, despite a lost city, despite many things, the economy grew.
The super-duper deficit keeps burrowing into my brain. I grew up post Reagan, I have zero recollection of Carter. We, as a country, have had it pretty good my entire known life. But, one stupid election, the flood gates are opened. The people currently in power are not ready for this and they are dangerously willing to spend away thirty years of economic growth and prosperity.
And think about what else they've done. They rewrote the game of investing without so much as a whimper. So, why ? how? What's going to grow if people aren't even sure that their investments are safe?
And the thing is...there's historical precedent for what happens when people like HugObama take over a society. At best, we could be in for an FDR era rough spell, you know 15 years of poverty. World War. That sort of thing. But as much as liberals love their dystopic-future-fiction, the world's shitholes of poverty, soul killing oppression, and lost time comes from the totalitarian model we may be embracing.
But who knows, maybe all the spending will work. Maybe Obama's a benevolent steward of our welath. Even so, there's one thing Reagan and the Bushes weren't able to even touch. And one thing Obama isn't going to touch. Social Security is going to go boom very soon. Think of that when Howard Dean tells you that capitalism is bad. Government is much worse.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
When I tell people that my parents are basically communists, they ask, well what happened to you?
I used to say, "they taught me to read."
But now...it seems the proper answer is that people like that don't live the way they preach. None of the things that they have done in raising me squares with what they advocate for other people.
Indeed, I see that by not living by the standards by which I was raised leads to your men being shiftless, lazy, and bad parents. That the women end up, well, at best as girls gone wild. From that point forward, the path is down, not up. I see no reason to advocate raising a feral human. I want everyone to experience what I have and more.
The people that force others into public education where social promotion is the goal, won't send their children to public schools. The easy living of rewarding single motherhood isn't an option. Neither is an abortion. Be responsible. That's what they wanted for me.
From where I was raised, things like bad education, being a victim, living off of others, and countless other things taken for granted were granted to others, but never an option. So, why should I be treated, and expect to be treated, one way, the way that they expected of me, but wasn't expected of others?
Not everyone is gifted. But everyone can do well. I could squander my gifts. You could work hard and be better than you, by all rights, could be. I realized, that what's good for me, is good for you. Not some other standard. I may be fit, but my fitness didn't cause your sloth. My virtue didn't cause your weakness. Jesus said that the poor will always be with us, but he never said that we had to encourage them that their poverty led to a poverty of their souls. The way I was raised wouldn't allow that for me.
There are, it turns out, plenty of poor people. But they still live moral, virtuous lives. Moreso than I could dream of. And these people are looked down upon because they're bitter clingers. Screw that. They are the model, an example.
Some say the poor (or the rich) are different. No. They aren't. Anyone who goes down the wrong path ends at the wrong place. Turn around, it's never too late.
So, in my mind, when Rand wrote, "I swear -- by my life and my love of it -- that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine," I realize that that I can't say rest, do nothing, it's ok, someone else will give you stuff.
I chose another viewpoint. What's good for me is good for others.
So, yeah, live by the same rules. please.
UPDATE
Of course, for most "socialists, libs, etc." types, their positions are more intellectual preening than anything else. Conservatives offer arguments, Liberals offer alliances. To put it clearly, Conservatives want to win the argument to win the crowd, liberals wish to win the crowd to win the argument. It's tribalism versus rationality.Think about that the next time, while watching Jon Stewart, he mocks a political opponent or praises HugObama. You are being told who is cool. Not who is right. So, flush away America's future, ignore what the uncool kids say. It's obviously not important. Following the herd is no excuse, and they should still pay for their thoughtless advocacy, of course.
PS. wow, I got a 3000 word comment. Easily readable because the author managed to condense his thoughts into 4 paragraphs. Very pithy and informative, I am sure. I liked the excess use of all-caps. Persuasive. and deleted.
Let's talk about greed.
Greed is bad. The Church names this as a sin.
You know what else greed is...it's a scapegoat.
That's right, since September of last year, trillions of dollars have disappeared. People have had their retirements reduced to their level of investment at say 2001. So, that's eight years of investing down the drain. And, our brilliant, adorable, smarter than smart president, with the help of mindless dolts like Pelosi and Reid, have borrowed trillions more in an effort to reward their contributors and friends, "fix"* the economy.
And what caused all this damage?
Greed.
Yup, that's it. Go home, nothing to see here citizen. Greed got out of the zoo and ate all the money again.
Fine. What greed was it?
Nope, they say, all you need to know that it was greed's fault. Maybe the greed of a speculator or other participant of the free market.
Is that all, you may ask? To which they would reply, how dare you...it was greed. and the greed on the part of people involved in banks (jews?) and business. Surely, no one in government is or was involved. And if it was a government problem, it's because we didn't let brainiacs like Barney Frank or Chris Dodd tell people how to invest their money. You aren't a right wing, constitutionalist, are you? The Department of Homeland Security has been notified!!!!
So, fine. Greed. Maybe Bush too, but mostly greed did it. That is, because of your political affiliation you don't ask deep questions. And lord knows, the answers to those questions aren't going to jump in your lap like a snowshoe cat. Nope, you would have to read this blog,investors business daily, or the Wall Street Journal to figure out why banks just got caught bare handed. But, for some people, John Stewart is their connection to the real world. And he, sure as shit, is not going to put blame on people inside his beloved political circles. So be it. Just walk away and don't ask about government based entities, community redvelopment acts, acorns, bundling high risk mortgages at the behest of fannie mae. These concepts are not important. It was greed, damn you!
So, obviously, greed is bad.
Let me point out some more greed.
In dealing with aging socialists who are close to retirement, I wonder...isn't it greedy to advance a welfare state, European style stagnating economic policy, to now want to retire like you live in a rich country? You wanted it, you got it. Or, maybe the problem with liberalism is that it's an agenda to tell people to live a way in which you yourself would not choose to live (abortion, bad schools, open marriages, crappy hospitals, crappy economy). Go to the social laboratory. Go see what your experiments have created. America stands at an edge. The next 30 years could be the 1920's to 40's all over again. And you wanted it. So live with it. Don't be greedy.
On a side note, I find it greedy that all these aging baby boomers are now clamoring for grandkids. Well, maybe not all of them, but old people, even aging socialists want grandkids. Well, I think it's greedy for people who laughed at "family values" while their kids were growing up, to be all about their families now.
Greed. Learn what it means. It's wanting something that you don't deserve. Working, earning a living, investing your extra few pennies to make more isn't greed.
Learn about other sins too. Your pride (I am so smart because I mindlessly vote democrat and watch Jon Stewart) and anger (damn you, Bush, it's all your fault, I refuse to even know what you are doing because I've been told it's wrong) lead you to scapegoat greed. It can't be anyone else's fault and it sure as shit ain't my fault. Right. The danger is is that you've spent billions, lost trillions, and you still haven't fixed the problem. Because of your pride.
What a sin.
* the word fix is given scare quotes because really, wink wink, nod nod, uh huh, they are just doing all this because they never want to let a crisis go to waste.
The dating scene, a conversation. It's all about tone.
me: blah blah blah.
her: you know, in college, I was anorexic.
me: That's hot.
her: I know.
How did this date go? How did this conversation sound?
The Lifetime, television for women version would play it like this:
me: blah blah blah. (another boring man, is he dangerous, will he steal my children, will he *gasp* sexually harass me!)(but I need a man because the world is stacked against us)
her: you know, in college, I was anorexic. (I am sharing a delicate personal moment, please connect with me, on a personal-emotional-supportive level)
Second, if you voted for Obama, you are a moron. You are an example of why the franchise should be extended to people who actually take this stuff seriously. (hint: this group of lovely ladies voted for Obama by 70 to 29 percent margin)
I remember, before the election, I would tell my friends why I wasn't going to vote for Obama. Point number one, the guy's a communist. When I said that, these people would act like they were choking on a peanut (the giggle, as I call it, is liberal argumentative technique number 3). Well, here we are, 100 or so days into the new era and contract law no longer exists. And those bond holders who dare try to enforce their rights are threatened. ACORN, the organized crime wing of the Democrat party is out threatening home owners, bond holders, and executives.
And, the bailouts, the TARPS, the creditor line jumping. These actions all seem to be favoring political friends of Obama. How is it that the UAW jumped the line?
So, yeah, to quote Megan McCardle:
"This kind of blatant political intervention between debt claims is unprecedented, and worse, it's a dress rehearsal for doing the same thing at GM. I don't think this is good for the rule of law, I'm pretty sure it will be bad for capital markets, and I'm nearly positive it's going to make it hard for any heavily unionized company to get substantial capital for the next decade."
What she wrote, simpleton, is that noone lends their money to people, corporations, or countries that pull this bullshit. This is bad because that money will go to countries that respect the rule of law and let a man keep what he's earned. You know, free countries. Countries that have decent standards of living. (Or to paraphrase Chris Rock, don't worry, contract law is for rich people)
Or, to put it another way, why the hell are you plunking money in your 401K? It no longer matters. You are a speculator. You are last in line, rich person.
Institutions May Panic and Entirely Agree that Contracts Have Overwhelmingly Been Abused and Mangled Agressively.
There is a video of Uncle Bill, before the 2006 elections joking that the Republicans would have you believe that if you voted for democrats, you'd be tripping over illegal immigrants as they socialized the country. Well, one for two right now. Not even baby steps. This Congress and this President have gone and raced bills through congress. So much for the moderation, so much for reading the budget line by line. Here's what we get:
Yes, I know. look at 2003. Whoopee, we had a war and shit. 2005 we had Katrina. Let's look at another:
It's a big joke. This next chart may explain another problem with the firm chart:
If you don't understand, don't worry, it's probably not important.
For everyone else, realize that, basically, we let the dumbest woman in the world
and the most overrated person in the world
write laws that spend money like it really, really doesn't matter. Oh, and now, American corporations, American investors, and Tax Payers are getting hosed. And where are all my uptown girls and concerned citizens now, with their, "what happens when China stops buying our debt concerns?"
But, the joke is on you. You, the Obama voter, you are a moron. Why bother learning about a candidate before you vote for him. Surely the man who goes to a "church," where Sptemeber 12, 2001 is marked with "Goddamn America," will look out for your interests. A man who believes, point in fact, in redistribution of wealth, will leave your taxes, savings, and job alone. Surely, Bill Ayer's friend is the guy for you. Surely, the guy who lied about his positions, past, and acted politically expediently at all times would be straight with you when he promised to go through the budget line by line, no pork, 5-days before signing bills, no jobs for lobbyists, ethical administration, executive signing statements, and so on.
I just had to get that out of the way. Things not discussed here, that should be discussed shortly include: whither Keynesianism an itemized Obama resume (what did he do at the Harvard Law Review anyway?) the cyclical nature of capitlism versus the stagnant and dying nature of socialism the upcoming social security implosion your upcoming tax hikes the upcoming inflation the effect of America's corporate tax rate (or rather, why are foreign companies buying our companies instead of vice versa). whither the uptown girl, the SWPL, and other pieces of trash. Why this is all Bush's fault (oh wait, I wrote that several times in October) and finally, how Pelosi adopted eugenics (or is this ZPG?) as the position of the democrat party
But right now, I just have to savor the moment. Moron.
Ok, moment over. The upshot of all this is that we already know where these policies lead. You may recall another messianic liberal who took a recession and turned it into the Great Depression. The question is, are you going to be patriotic enough to sit the next 30 years of your life through that? It's a deep question, for those that can actually think.
Some other things:
I was glad to see that last year gave us the only known, visible acknowledgement of media bias. Yes, 2008 was a special year. For one brief shining moment, we had this:
Oh, I discovered this new toy called Guitar Hero and RockBand. Which makes me realize that Death Magnetic is basically just school. guitar school. Listen and weep, all lesser guitarists.
Guns and Roses. Bravo. An album with maybe 8 awesome songs and 2 unlistenable songs. Another guitar clinic as well.
You know, people do dumb things. Sometime dumb things illustrate their world view, things like this (he knew and he didn't care and he didn't realize it would be a big deal):
yep, the thoughtlessness reminds me of some other tone deaf dolt:
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Hey, Everybody, Merry Christmas! I need to get back on this thing. Hope all is well. joe
Monday, November 17, 2008
Did America just win the lottery and not tell me?
Really, where is all this make believe money going to come from?
I am reading up on bailout-mania.
If these idiotic ideas pass, the only realistic outcome is the complete devaluation of the American dollar. Think of Zimbabwe or Italy's problem with the Lira. There are acts of complete financial irresponsibility being considered that boggle the mind.
America became a strong, prosperous nation because we let the market work. Now, it seems that only bad ideas are being rewarded. The rest of us are beginning to feel like suckers. Why am I paying my mortgage when I may soon have more rights by not paying it?
For years, conservatives and economists have predicted that the UAW's pension funding will kill the big Three. Now, great, instead of killing that bad idea, we get to prop it up.
The solution is pain. Short and hard. Kill the gangrene, feed the living. Instead, well, we are going to tax and regulate the fuck out of any profitable business in America and let the cancer grow deeper in the rest.
I can't believe that I grew up in a country where one of the core beliefs was free trade and personal and professional responsibility has now sold out those ideals and is racing towards the bad ideas that have nearly destroyed the rest of the world. It's not like we are going full on, death camp socialism next week, but even Western Europe is waking up from the 5 decade long infatuation with the welfare state. But no, these ideas keep getting pushed on us. And, thanks to some failure on the part of America's intellectuals and opinion leaders, we are going to get a taste of all these bad ideas.
As an aside, I also wonder how "bailing" out the three American automakers affects our Free Trade Agreements with other countries. Could this also mark the dawn of a new age of protectionism? (that would be bad for way too many reasons)
Finally, my hope for change is that now with the baby tantrum party in charge of things, that they'll grow up. The loyal opposition rode Mark Foley and a host of embarrassing Republicans into power. The Democrats associated intellectual vanity with their brand label, so that voting Democrat is as much of a fashion statement (and an act of political reasoning) as choosing to wear what Vogue tells Carrie Bradshaw.
I don't think they will. All indications point to a party in control with no fucking clue how the world operates outside a hyper legalistic perspective.
Is it the end of the world as we know it?
Yes, but it turns out that that happened a long time ago.
And truth be told I blame all the usual suspects.
Bush 41 and 43 for being such inarticulate defenders of this land's source of prosperity.
Ted Kennedy for opening up the floodgates to generations of immigrants who, through no fault of their own, were enmeshed in a public school system that taught them to hate this country in the guise of multiculturalism. Add some of this blame to McCain because he wants to join in on the systematic firing of the voters. It's a neat trick in a democracy, if you find the present citizenry too "reactionary," go ahead and bring in 50 million new citizens to tip the scales the other way.
So, the culture's changed, the economy's going to change, and who knows what else.
These upcoming decisions are going change the world because America will effectively slit her wrists. The thing is, the baby tantrum party has this mushy and naive view of the world where every potential opposing super power isn't that bad. But they are. The world will not be better off with an ascending Russia or China or Iran. And what isms will replace Americanism? Well, we know there is the Mohamedism of Iran, the facsism of China, the thugism of Russia, the nanny statism of Europe, and god knows that communism and socialism are always ready to intoxicate a people's "intellectuals" with dreams of ruling over the red staters.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Hey, look. I need you to give me all your money, quit your job, and live your life according to the way I dictate.
Why?
Oh, uh...
the polar bears are dying.
Proof? proof?
Don't be a global warming denier, that's worse than Hitler. Or, worse than denying Hitler. Or something, you should be fired and shot.
Fine, you anti-science zealot, you want proof?
I have a picture of a polar bear on an ice floe. They're dying!!!!
Still not convinced?
How about this, Russia had the hottest October ever!
No, you can't look at my numbers. Really, there's no time to even question the research. You've got to act now. Give me your money, quit your job, and let me tell you in what manner you may make carbon dioxide. Yeah, I know that everything you do creates carbon dioxide and that I could potentially determine every action you take, but think of the planet. and the bears!
What? It's not scientific to replace October's data with September? The polar bears are doing fine, they like to swim for miles and dork around on ice floes? So what if I ignore satellite data and rely on thermal data from land stations that are inaccurate? I fix the data to compensate....
So, I guess you want more information before you let me tell you how to do everything?
In the spirit of bipartisanship, I am gonna bash Maverick real quick.
First, a new nickname for old Johnny Mack, I dub him Mackerel. He got old and stinky real quick, ya know? Anyway, way to stick up for Palin. Apparently, Mackerel's campaign aides are dumping on Palin. Based on Mackerel's campaign strategy of passive blame absorption, I think he's pissed that Palin was able to rally the base and prevented a Mondale sized defeat.
For all you idiot, reflexive Palin bashers out there, remember, she actually has executive experience and was a reformer. She has more experience than Obama. She got smeared on the same things that were off limits about Obama. And, her interviews were basically ambush, quiz show affairs that were edited to make her look like an hayseed, Godbag who thought that Jesus rode a dinosaur on the way to the gunshow. On the other hand, Pinko and the Brain hid from the press in the last month of the election cycle. Also, neither of Pinko and the Brain had any tough quiz show questions asked of them. Pinko was asked more fluffy, how does it feel to be so awesome questions. The Brain? Well, the campaign just hid his ass after it turned out that every answer he gave in his debate with Palin was factually wrong.
The type of unfair press treatment Palin received could have done the exact same thing to Obama, but the media wouldn't let that happen. Hell, fair press treatment would have exposed Obama.
No biggie, aside from a baby's right to life, the right to bear arms, the right to an undiluted ballot, freedom of speech, the security of one in one's property, the property right in your 401K, and the right of privacy of a secret ballot, Obama's going to protect our rights and make some Eurotrash socialists love us.
Oh, wait, here it is. The first Jimmy Carter moment, as Obama's peanuts come home to roost. What makes this moment so heartwarming is that he hasn't even been inaugurated yet.
So, the first Great March Forward Step, mandatory student activism, has turned into his first Jimmy Carter moment. No more mandatory volunteer work.
The website change.gov has quietly been changed. Please provide your own Hope and Change joke.
Anyway, while we're on Jimmy Carter moments, the time has come for conservatives to daydream about what a hypothetical president would do to help ensure that the Obama presidency has at least some incentive to be somewhat clean. Alas, those of us Bush supporters that nonetheless bash his idiotic, turn the other cheek method of passive blame acceptance know these options will never happen. Hey, if Clinton could pardon donors on his last day of office and lower the arsenic guidelines past the point of diminishing returns so that Bush had to change them, why can't Bush do these things.
*Appoint U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Patrick Fitzpatrick as a special prosecutor so he can pursue his investigation of Tony Rezko and his corrupt dealings with Illinois's governor and other creatures and spoilsmen of the Daley Machine. This will make it politically difficult for a President Obama to pardon Mr. Rezko and impossible for him to terminate Mr. Fitzpatrick as a federal officer come January 21 as a way of de-railing this investigation.
* Appoint a special prosecutor to investigate ACORN's voter registration methods and its dealings with the Obama campaign.
* Appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the Obama campaign's on-line fundraising operation, including its disabling of the credit card security software on its on-line donations system. File a complaint with the Federal Election Commission regarding same.
* Appoint a bipartisan (love that word!) presidential commission to review the candidates' fundraising in this election cycle and to recommend changes in federal election laws.
Would the One dare to fire "the prosecutor's prosecutor" Fitzgerald?
Friday, November 07, 2008
Ah, the smell of managing expectations.
Let's say you are a member of the Bush Derangement Syndrome community, your world view is formed by what's called the Community Based Reality. You once had a brain and formulated this thought, "if Bush loses the War on Terror, the war in Afghanistan, and/or the war in Iraq, it won't be so bad because I can use that loss to support my hatred of the president. And even if we lose-lose this war, I'll still be safe and sound here in America." Years later, all that remains of your soul is the Gollum-like repetition of various anti-war tropes.
So, you put the No Blood for Oil bumpersticker on your car, you drone on and on about Gitmo and Abu Gharib. Your only goal on earth is contrarianly opposing every action that has been taken since 2003. The surge? You brainlessly answer it's been a failure. You also push hard for Obama because he understands. His hardest decision in his life was not voting to invade Iraq...when he wasn't even in the Senate.
So, here is Newsweek, lowering expectations on Gitmo.
Oh well, at least Obama still supports gay marriage. what, he doesn't?!? Why did the New York Times not tell people about that until after the election? Next thing you know, they'll lay the groundwork that he won't immediately abandon Iraq. Nah, he wouldn't do that. would he?
Anyway, the media's not saying, they're just saying. You know, he's not president yet, folks, and there's only so many promises that can be kept.
Ooops, spoke too soon.
There's another category. I am a little surprised I missed this one, considering the Mouth of Damacles that is Joe Biden.
Consider that the duo of Pinko and the Brain are both gaffetastic windbags who say some of the most retarded shit out there, we have to keep track of the laugh track, whether it's Obama's 59 states, Biden's visits to Katie's Diner, or shit about the seas going down.
So, Mr. Magnanimous, the most merciful and competent, Lord Barrack Hussein Obama, finds himself in a bit of a gaffe...and decides to insult Nancy Reagan.
So, two points here. One, Obama has no idea what he's doing. He is going to be swallowed up by his cabinet. He is going to flail about in the daily running of the government, let alone by how idiotic his ideas on America's place in the world actually are. Two, Obama's role in the credit crisis shows that his only skill is passing the buck by asking other people to do his job for him. It seems to me that stories like this should be categorized by the incompetence bomb about to go off in the Federal Government. Other Obama categories will be the Jimmy Carter watch as Obama regularly hinders and punishes our allies, rewards our enemies, and engages in rather wildly conceived military expeditions. A third category should deal with managing expectations. As Obama is all things to all people, it's going to be hard for him to deliver baby, virgin unicorns to everyone in the country. There are going to be some upset folks. Peggy Joseph, I believe you will still be paying for gas and for your house. Finally, a Great March Forward watch. I think the guy's a radical, so let's see what kind of changes he proposes.
So, first Great March forward Watch item: Hey, college kids, thanks for being so annoying. Thanks for ramrodding Obama down our throats. Here's your thanks: Mandatory Community Service. Have fun, fuckers.
One of the problems with taking a month off from blogging are that some ideas go to seed.
I was considering the other day, however, about leadership. Every presidential administration is hit by the turmoil of managing many different, high strung personalities. Generally, this is where executive experience is important. You need to manage people because your ideas, strong as you may think they are, will be executed by someone else. That is why Clinton fired all the DOJ attorneys right off the bat. Carter, Reagan, Clinton, and W all had governor backgrounds. W had a Harvard MBA and managed a sports team as well as Texas. George H.W. Bush had the CIA. Generals ran huge organizations.
Senators basically have a staff. Their work product is a vote and a law that is generally written by someone else. McCain, at least, ran several aviation units in the Navy.
Obama. Well, he has 143 days of work as a U.S. Senator. Even those few days were spend campaigning and voting present. In Chicago, he was a cog in the Daley machine before that. He claims to have had experience from running his campaign, although he had a campaign manager to actually, you know, run it. His time at the Chicago Annenburg Challenge was one where he basically handed out money. There was no work product because the kids he indoctrinated had no observable increases in their actual education. His other "community organizer" product was setting up a job bank (fail), setting up a "secondary economy (fail), and running a slum (fail).
Sidenote: It's at this point where I realized that Jesus wasn't a community organizer. Nope, Lenin was a community organizer. That's what Obama did, try to whip up the masses. But that's another post.
What does this mean for the 44th president? Well, he needs Rahm Emmanuel to keep his people in line because Obama is going to be overwhelmed. Executives can give big picture directional guidance. I don't think, however, that anything in Obama's history has prepared him for dealing with actual results based activities or dealing with other executives. You've seen people who've actually run states and armies get bogged down and betrayed by their staffs. Obama? he won't see it coming and won't know what to do about it.
Which brings me to the letter.
Obama claimed to have foreseen the Housing Crisis and its landslide impact into what he have now. That's a lie, of course. He loved sub prime loans and all the other things that were done to create this crisis.
Nonetheless, the letter he wrote is here.
Here is his leadership.
"There is grave concern in low-income communities about a potential coming wave of foreclosures. Because regulators are partly responsible for creating the environment that is leading to rising rates of home foreclosure in the subprime mortgage market, I urge you immediately to convene a homeownership preservation summit with leading mortgage lenders, investors, loan servicing organizations, consumer advocates, federal regulators and housing-related agencies to assess options for private sector responses to the challenge."
Get it? Uh, can you please do something about this so that the people who got home loans they couldn't afford don't lose their homes.
It gets better:
"The summit should consider best practice loan marketing, underwriting, and origination practices consistent with the recent (and overdue) regulators’ Proposed Statement on Subprime Mortgage Lending. The summit participants should also evaluate options for independent loan counseling, voluntary loan restructuring, limited forbearance, and other possible workout strategies. I would also urge you to facilitate a serious conversation about the following:
* What standards investors should require of lenders, particularly with regard to verification of income and assets and the underwriting of borrowers based on fully indexed and fully amortized rates.
* How to facilitate and encourage appropriate intervention by loan servicing companies at the earliest signs of borrower difficulty.
* How to support independent community-based-organizations to provide counseling and work-out services to prevent foreclosure and preserve homeownership where practical.
* How to provide more effective information disclosure and financial education to ensure that borrowers are treated fairly and that deception is never a source of competitive advantage.
* How to adopt principles of fair competition that promote affordability, transparency, non-discrimination, genuine consumer value, and competitive returns.
* How to ensure adequate liquidity across all mortgage markets without exacerbating consumer and housing market vulnerability."
So, yeah, the lending industry was torn apart by people like Obama who forced banks to loan money to risky borrowers in the name of affordable housing. These loans are now decried by people like Obama as "predatory lending." Nonetheless, Obama looks past the damage to the financial sector done by FF/MM in packaging these risky loans into AAA rated MBS's guaranteed by the under capitalized FF/MM.
And also note, that he wanted to help community based organizations (i.e., ACORN) profit from the mess. Also, he wanted to figure out how to make the borrowers have an easier time not paying back their mortgages. That's the solution he had. You and me, homeowners that actually work and pay our bills on time, we're just a bunch of suckers.
Nope, his concern is keeping every one's villains, the idiots who got subprime loans when they couldn't afford them in their houses. Maverick and W both tried to actually fix the problem. Obama wants Bernanke to, uh, convene a summit to figure out how to give poor people more of your money. A job of a Senator is to do things like the things he wants someone else to do. Senators write laws. They hold hearings. They hopefully foresee and solve problems.
Obama simply wrote a letter to Santa Clause and addressed it to the guy who oversees the American money supply. AND IT MISSED THE WHOLE POINT OF THE CRISIS. The crisis was the cancer that these loans were. They killed the AAA rating of the MBS holding them, causing -under current idiotic mark to market laws- the inability of institutions holding these items from using them as valuations in their liquidity.
I wish that Bernanke sent the following reply:
"Dear Senator Obama,
After much research and deliberation, we have come up with the following response to your wishlist, fantasy, extortion letter:
Tell your deadbeat constituents to get jobs and pay their bills.
Thank you,
people who actually worked for a living."
(all my links and formatting got shot to hell, so imagine that this post looks nice and has links to cool stuff)
Thursday, November 06, 2008
Some thoughts from the Great One on where do we go? What of our values? What of the Republic? Hmm, the parallels to a nascent Jimmy Carter presidency are just screaming at you, aren't they?
Well, actually, I do have a post election admission on how Bush failed to respect our fundamental rights: he allowed his department of justice to basically look the other way to massive levels of voter fraud. In addition, his lax attitude towards illegal immigration led to even more voter fraud by persons who weren't even citizens to begin with. Oh, and his administration looked the other way when Saint Obama turned off the address verification system for his credit card contributors. So, I.P. Freely and Joe Stalin along with Mickey Mouse were able to dump millions of dollars of contributions into Obama's war chest. McCain, of course, was too busy magnanimously working on his concession speech to raise any real objections to any of these things.
So, the story of Tan Nguyen is one example where attempts to stop voter fraud is prosecuted as voter suppression. Similar arguments were made throughout the country. The Ohio Secretary of State said the same things as she declined to vet incoming votes.
So, is avoiding voter fraud a fundamental right? Is it a bad thing only when you disagree with it? Doesn't a fraudulent vote cancel out your vote? Doesn't that suppress your vote? So, was Obama aiding and abetting disenfranchisement of unknown number of voters across the country.
Do you think the Obama administration is going to make stopping organized (i.e., ACORN enabled) voter fraud a priority? Is that RICO suit likely to stayopen?
I don't think that ACORN's registration of the Dallas Cowboys and Mickey Mouse, Obama campaigners voting in Ohio and in their homestate, college kids doing the same, or idiot Philadelphians who admit to voting twice on CNN added up to Obama's popular vote margin. However, there are several states that were close. There are congressmen and Senators who lost close races. And they lost because of this voter fraud.
ACORN, with their millions of fradulent voters needed to be hit with a RICO suit back in 2000. Obama should have at least been forced to operate within the law during his campaign. Instead, he gave them $800,000.
I guess right and wrong does not matter to some people.
A further discussion of Obama's respect for "our rights" continued.
As a disciple of Saul Alinsky, we've seen the tactics espoused by Rules for Radicals in the current campaign, and we will see them used in Obama's administration. These examples are not that outlanding, the Bush 43 White House had many DOJ prosecutors who have already used these tactics. Now this is not a criticism about Bush being Hitler, blah blah blah, it's more of a criticism that he kept aboard DOJ lawyers who were apt to go after the wrong people. He should have fired everyone when he came in. But, dipshit decided to be magnanimous and keep those thug Clinton lawyers in the stable.
This article provides some more insight. As I said, what is chilling is that you can come up with examples of how this stuff has already been used in the recent election cycle.
"Watch what Michael Barone called the Obama "thugocracy" use the Justice Department to stifle dissent. Anybody who complains about vote fraud will be charged with "vote suppression." Anybody who complains about DoJ's actions will be charged with interfering with an investigation. Anybody who denies having interfered will be charged with perjury. Likewise, anybody who peacefully protests abortion clinics or the use of state-sponsored racial quotas will be charged with a civil rights violation."
Tan Nguyen was investigated and bankrupted for "vote suppression" because his campaign issued a letter warning illegals not to vote. Similar threats were (I witnessed this) made again poll watchers in 2004 warning them of the liklihood of jail time for "vote suppression," by asking for IDs. Of course, stopping fradulent voting isn't a priority, especially by Obama voters in swing states. From CNN, "It's time for change, man," Jones said. He complained about the long lines and said that "I decided to come back and vote a couple times." "I think that's against the law, but it's okay, all right. Well, thanks, Ron,"
We already saw how Jack Ryan and Joe the Plumber learned about the "Chicago Way."
Of course, all you Ozombies who voted for Hope and Change and for Obama to pay for your gas and mortgage, and to make the world love us knew all this stuff already. You've mindlessly repeated stuff about Bush rewriting the bill of rights or something because he maintained that the executive had commander in chief powers to spy on our enemies, including phone calls between people in America and known overseas Al Qaeda operatives.
"I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring aboutredistributed change and in some ways we still suffer from that. " Ah, yes, redistribution. That sort of goes against a fundemental liberty: the security in one's possessions. At least Europe loves us now, right?
