Delicious Truthful Tidit

"Liberals, [the author] notes, whether professors or public-sector workers, need 'victims' at home and abroad the way an 'addict needs drugs.'  But this alliance leaves out crucial cogs  in the coalition, such as the youthful 'dumbest generation,' whose primary political  aim is to think well of themselves.  Public-sector unions and their expert allies appeal to the semi-educated, New Yorker-reading upper middle class, who want to delegate all social responsibility to the state so that they can devote themselves to a life of advanced pleasures."

 . . . From a City Journal book

review that can be

accessed by clicking here.

Gun Control Efforts' True Rationale

Irrefutable Wisdom Elegantly Stated

Ideas are more powerful than guns. 

We would not let our political
  opponents have guns. 

 Why should we let them 

                                   have ideas?                                         

                                                            . . . Joseph Stalin (articulating 
                                                           the "Youmaynot Philosophy!")

Australia this time!

Most of this day, I've listened to hand-wringing commentators on many networks, including Fox News, agonizing about how to prevent lethal attacks on citizens in Western countries by Islamic terrorists.

"Lone Wolf" is the "term du jour," but the next attack may be more organized, along the Mumbai Massacre model, and we'll be back to talking about that convention.

No corespondent was able to offer any concrete solution, save outright banning of Islamics from our shores!

We have observed over the past few decades that neither Jewish Zionists, nor Christian Crusaders, nor Norwegian folk-dancers for that matter, have presented a terrorist problem.  The problem is always Islamics.   Islamics are terrorists, and have been for the past 1,500 years!

We can, immersed in PC, dance around that fact, ad-nauseam, but it is something we all plainly see.

The only legitimate answer to these unprovoked and mostly unpredictable terrorist attacks ("lone-wolf" or otherwise) on innocent citizens in Western countries, is privately-armed, private citizens!  Of course, that is the only solution, the mere mention of which, is absolutely banned from the lips of  all media commentators and "officials" alike.  It is prohibited from even  being acknowledged, much less publically discussed, in any fair and enlightened  forum!

The open discussion of armed teachers in public schools was also "subject non-grata," for years.  Some of my courageous colleagues, Mas Ayoob for one, were viciously censured for even suggesting that the subject be talked about in anything but whispers!  The concept is only now seeing the light  of day!  Curiously, it has worked splendidly everywhere it has been tried,  but the very idea of such a high degree of personal freedom predictably upsets control-freaks ("Youmaynots"), both elected and appointed.

Two days ago, the Lindt Cafe in Sidney was filled with unarmed
IguessIcan'ts, all of whom were obediently following the dictates of Youmaynots  in Parliament (who themselves duplicitously enjoy continuous personal protection provided by heavily-armed bodyguards), and thus submissively left the important  matter of self-protection against Jihadi madmen exclusively to "the police."  They were unwittingly betting their lives on that personal decision.

Several lost that bet!

Sadly, no Icans were present.  A single audacious, armed citizen could have stopped this violent attack in its tracks, and, in so doing, discouraged others

Disarmed and helpless IguessIcant's, who religiously obeyed wide-reaching gun bans enacted by Youmaynots, were, once again, pitilessly murdered and maimed  during this incident.  As a result, future massacres are, even now, being  entertained.

Politicians have expressed "deep personal concern."  They always  do.  I'm sure that represents a prodigious source of comfort to families of  the murdered!

Every "collectivist reform," without fail, peremptorily supplants its purported goal of everlasting utopia with a sinister, but familiar, feudal system of "masters-and-slaves," wherein owners remain few, and the masses are forced to accept "security" at the expense of perpetual servitude.  And, of course, Youmaynots are ever fearful of armed slaves!

Curiously, modern firearms, which Youmaynots piously purport to hate, are actually protecting them every moment!  Those particular guns are apparently okay.  It's only privately-owned guns, that protect you, that  they don't like.  Although you may not view yourself as a slave, they  do!

One might even accuse those particular Youmaynots of being  Exceptformes!

The Roman Republic fell, not because of the ambition of Caesar, but because it had already long ceased to be a republic at all. When the sturdy Roman Plebeian, who lived by his own labor, who voted without reward according to his own convictions, and who formed in war the terrible Roman Legion had been  changed into an idle creature who craved nothing in life save the gratification  of a thirst for vapid excitement, who was fed by the state, and who sold his  vote to the highest bidder, then the end of the Republic was at hand, and  nothing could save it. 
                                                                      . . . Theodore Roosevelt

NOTE:  The foregoing post was written and published in a private newsletter on December 15, 2014, by John S. Farnam.  Mr. Farnam and his wife, Vicki, own and operate Defense Training International.  They both are among the nation's preeminent firearms instructors and personal safety and security experts.

Epitaph for Western Civilization ?

Tolerance and apathy 

are the last virtues 

of a dying society.

. . . Aristotle

 

Crass but Accurate Assessment of the USA's Current Leaders

To put it bluntly (as well as with crass honesty) the guy Americans have got in the oval office is a lying sack of shit.

The same could be said of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid but they can justifiably claim diminished capacity.

And the senator who ruled out impeaching the prez by saying “I’ve met Joe Biden” hit the nail on the head.  The VP is just a nut case.

As for Eric Holder, he plainly and simply is a felon who to date repeatedly has escaped being indicted through political pull . . . and he has transformed the Department of Justice into a criminal enterprise.

Other than the foregoing, everything in the good old USA is going just swimmingly.

Thoughts About the Rioters

The perpetually aggrieved currently have their knickers in a collective bunch again.  This time over the decision of a Missouri grand jury to follow the law instead of sacrificing a police officer to mob rule . . . and they of course are exhibiting their displeasure by rioting and looting.

The officer whose head they (and our faux president and his felonious attorney general) have been demanding put down a guy that the media persists in describing as "an unarmed black teenager."  Nowhere do they mention the young thug's criminal history and proclivities, that he clearly was attacking the officer, or that the punk was a huge, hulking, and aggressive menace. 

We once were wise enough to deal with and end riots quickly with effective force.

Now, according to our faux president and his official enforcer, we are supposed to exercise restraint.  Never mind that going easy on mobs prolongs riots and encourages and results in more of them — more deaths, more injuries, and more property losses  (especially at this time of year when the rioters go out carrying their holiday looting lists).

I, for one, would go back to the old practice and shoot rioters down in the streets like the mad dogs they are.  Alternatively, we could just encircle and confine them in and to their own turf,  letting them kill and maim each other and burn and destroy everything in sight in their limited home areas.  And I wouldn’t lift a finger or expend a cent on any restorative efforts.

Well Worth Revisiting

My Vote (and Election Endorsement)

For every office on the ballot, I'm writing in and voting for John Galt.

Something to Ask Before Voting

Don't Worry, Be Happy, the Government Has Got Your Back

Over-theTop Political Correctness

The chancellor of the University of California in Berkeley (purportedly one of America's preeminent institutions of higher learning) recently proclaimed support of free speech . . . provided, he added, that it didn't offend or disturb anyone.

Lest you think the politically correct statist proviso, which underlies and is used as to justify speech codes and other forms of censorship, is over-the-top, take a look here at what is getting consideration at the Federal Communications Commission.

Explaining Myself

A Simple Truth

Noteworthy Truth

Political language is designed 

to make lies sound truthful.

. . . George Orwell

Guideline Worth Observing

Statists' Exit Blocking Impulse

With  productive citizens and businesses leaving America in record numbers, the authoritarian currently running the U.S. -- those whose actions have motivated the departures  -- now are looking frantically for ways block the exits.

They are pursuing the enactment of legal barriers to make it financially impractical for business enterprises to relocate their headquarters and domiciles outside the country.  Many such barriers already are in place for individuals.

Blocking the exits to confine inhabitants apparently is easier and preferable to restoring the environment and culture in which emigrants and potential emigrants used to, and again could live and thrive happily and comfortably.

The exit blocking impulse appears to come naturally to statists like those who not long ago erected and maintained the Berlin Wall. 

Underlying the impulse is a mindset . . . the mindset of slavers and slaveholders . . . in which inhabitants are not free citizens entitled to live where and how they wish but resources (a.k.a. slaves) to be exploited.

Fair's Fair on Racial Investigations

The U.S. Department of JustUs, under and at the direction of the hustling race-card playing A.G. Eric Holder, is embarking on an investigation of the racial policies and practices of the Ferguson, Missouri, police department.

Fair enough . . . although it appears that the results of the 'investigation" have been predetermined by the dishonorable Mr. Holder.

But if for no other reason than to present a comprehensive appearance of even-handed fairness, we also ought to have a simultaneous investigation of the racial polices and practices of Mr. Holder's department . . . and have it done by a competent and truly independent counsel.

Elegance and Beauty

Visit:

Here

and if possible go to full screen.

Peacetime Defined

Peacetime:  One of those brief periods in history when everyone stops shooting to rest up and reload.

Miracle Worker Exposed by Reality

. . . and this predated ISIS and Putin's post reset aggressions against Ukraine.

For a further dose of reality, view and think about the following post.

Fantasies and Illusions of a Peaceful World

The following is from John S. Farnam, a veteran combat officer who is one of America's foremost defensive shooting and personal security instructors, s longtime law enforcement officer, and frequently an expert court witness on use of force issues:

War, from now on!

"Don't worry, be happy..." 
                       . . . From the song of the same title, 
                     recorded by Bobby McFerrin in 1988

Enough contemporary fantasy!  Now let's listen to James Madison:

"'Universal peace.'  It is to be feared!  It is in the catalogue  of events which will never exist, except in the imaginations of visionary philosophers, or the breasts of benevolent enthusiasts."

Today, we call naive visionary philosophers and benevolent enthusiasts "liberals"

I wonder how much support he would have garnered, if FDR had referred to Imperial Japan of 1941 as "radical Japanese extremists," and, in the wake of their sneak-attack on Pearl Harbor, weakly, hesitatingly indicated that his only  real goal was to trim back Imperial Japan to a "manageable problem!"

Even sleazy leftist, David Cameron in the UK, has the courage to call for the absolute destruction of ISIS.  No "management" for him!

Three-hundred more American "advisors" are now being feebly re-sent to Iraq, after being prematurely withdrawn.  All this, despite repeated
dishonest promises of "no boots on the ground."  I'm sure they're all  wearing wingtips!

Over here, BHO, surrounded by a gaggle of aging frat-boys, none of whom have ever had a real job, and who have no concept of military operations,
appears confused, disinterested, and wants only for the American public to ignore the disintegrating foreign situation, so they can concentrate on his liberal domestic agenda, which, of course, has failed at every turn.  But,
for overconfident liberals, unwavering loyalty to leftist dogma is always more important than actual outcomes.

Nonetheless,  we're continuously assured that soon we'll all be living  in a liberal paradise, where no one ever does any work and only Democrats get
elected.  Unfortunately, few of us will be living at all, and the New Dark Age will be anything but a "paradise."

Still, such drivel is music to the naive ears of the forty percent of our  "work force" that does no work, that is permanently, willfully unemployed,
indeed unemployable, and has been for generations.  Eking out a living on an endless buffet of government handouts designed to keep them perpetually unproductive, their sole function in life is to vote for Democrats.

That is the liberal "legacy" we've inherited.

"Nothing is so permanent as a 'temporary' government program."                                                . . . Milton Friedman

Meanwhile, the rest of the civilized world is disintegrating at a frightening pace.  Pitiable islands of Western Civilization are being  snuffed-out one by one.  We, and what is left of the rest of Western  Civilization, will shortly be presented with the unsavory "choice" of living  under Putin's Communists, or ISIS' Islamic "purity."  Curiously, neither  entity (nor BHO himself) likes our Second Amendment, not yet completely  destroyed by liberals (through no fault of their own).  I'm sure that comes  as a big surprise!

In this world, civilizations come and go.  Ours is teetering!

"You may leave here for four days in space.  But, when you return,  it's the same old place!"                                . . . From "Eve of Destruction," protest 
                         song, written in 1965 by PF Sloan.
                        (Most famous rendition was  Barry 
                             McGuire's, from the same year.)

Reflecting the Quality of the Electorate

A Problem With the Donkey

A preacher wanted to raise money for his church and on being told that there was a fortune in horse racing, decided to purchase a horse and enter it in the races. However, at the local auction, the going price for horses was so high that he ended up buying a donkey instead. He figured that since he had it, he might as well go ahead and enter it in the races. To his surprise, the donkey came in third!

  

The next day the local paper carried this headline: PREACHER’S ASS SHOWS.

The preacher was so pleased with the donkey that he entered it in the race again, and this time it won. The paper read: PREACHER’S ASS OUT IN FRONT.

The Bishop was so upset with this kind of publicity that he ordered the preacher not to enter the donkey in another race. The paper headline read: BISHOP SCRATCHES PREACHER’S ASS.

This was too much for the Bishop, so he ordered the preacher to get rid of the donkey. The preacher decided to give it to a nun in a nearby convent. The paper headline the next day read: NUN HAS BEST ASS IN TOWN.

The Bishop fainted in shock. When he came to he informed the nun that she would have to get rid of the donkey, so she sold it to a farmer for $10.00.

The next day the headline read: NUN SELLS ASS FOR $10.00.

This was too much for the Bishop, so he ordered the nun to buy back the donkey, lead it to the plains, and let it go.

Next day, the headline in the paper read: NUN ANNOUNCES HER ASS IS WILD AND FREE.

The Bishop was buried the next day.

Spot the Differences

President George W. Bush's speech after the capture of Saddam Hussein:

"The success of yesterday's mission is a tribute to our men and women now serving in Iraq. The operation was based on the superb work of intelligence analysts who found the dictator's footprints in a vast country. The operation was carried out with skill and precision by a brave fighting force. Our servicemen and women and our coalition allies have faced many dangers in the hunt for members of the fallen regime, and in their effort to bring hope and freedom to the Iraqi people. Their work continues, and so do the risks. Today, on behalf of the nation, I thank the members of our Armed Forces and I congratulate them!"

Barrack Hussein Obama's speech after the killing of Osama bin Laden:

"And so shortly after taking office,  I  directed Leon Panetta, the Director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of our war against al Qaeda, even as we continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network.  Then, last August, I was briefed on a possible lead to bin Laden. It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this thread to ground.  I met repeatedly with my national security team as we developed more information about the possibility that we had located bin Laden hiding within a compound deep inside of Pakistan. And finally, last week, I determined that we had enough intelligence to take action, and I authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice. Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan."

Cogent Commentary

-->

Myron Magnet
 
Constitution Party

 
It’s past time for Republicans to take action against President Obama’s lawlessness.
 
31 July 2014 

What’s wrong with Republicans? Here is a Democratic president who has declared, and demonstrated, that he will not be bound by the Constitution but will do whatever he can do—both within and beyond his constitutional powers—to cram his agenda down the nation’s throat. But since Republicans control one house of Congress, and that one chamber controls the purse, why is the GOP as paralyzed as a deer in the headlights to arrest such a power grab? And why has the Speaker of the House made himself so negligible a figure on the national stage, most recently by addressing the Obama-created border crisis with an immigration bill as feeble and irrelevant as it is unpopular, when he and his majority have such power at their command to counter a president who has passed beyond the bounds the Founders set for the national executive?

No doubt, the president is impeachable. Of course he hasn’t committed high crimes, in the sense of beheading citizens after star-chamber trials—though if it be true that he knew of and approved the IRS’s mistreatment of conservative nonprofit groups, that would certainly be a high crime, no less than President Nixon’s Watergate cover-up was such a crime, as the tapes he lacked the sang-froid to destroy showed. But the Constitution specifically envisioned impeachment for such unconstitutional misdemeanors as a president’s not carrying out his oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution and to take care that the laws be faithfully executed—the president’s main constitutional duty. So government by edict, like that exercised by Charles I or Lenin—as when President Obama simply decrees rolling changes in his half-digested health-care law, or when he opens the border to “children” in contravention of our immigration laws—is prima facie impeachable conduct. 

But politics, it’s worth emphasizing these days, is the art of the possible; and impeachment is politically unrealistic. Even if Republicans win a famous victory in the upcoming senatorial elections, they will come nowhere near having the two-thirds Senate vote needed to convict. So impeachment would be mere political theater, which the Democrats seem to think would greatly help their fundraising and voter-turnout prospects—it would show “progressivism” under attack, by extremists and racists, as Attorney General Eric Holder likes to charge with equal measures of obtuseness and malice. And Democrats are right in this electoral calculation, because Republicans have no Sam Ervin—no one as eloquent and learned in the law and in history to make the case, as Democrat Ervin came breathtakingly close to doing in the Watergate hearings, that the president had crossed the line into tyranny.

For now, Republicans should use the power of the purse as effectively as they can, and should try their damnedest to explain why they’re doing what they’re doing. They have made a good start by cutting the IRS’s enforcement budget by 25 percent. They should go further: cut the agency’s total budget by 50 percent, until the IRS produces the evidence that the House has subpoenaed, and and which the IRS at first claimed had accidentally been destroyed. Let IRS staff be fired or salaries slashed, until someone feels the pain enough to admit what happened. 

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has crammed through Senate confirmation a Joe McCarthyesque new administrator for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission? Then defund FERC entirely—and take to the talk shows to lay out the reasons why shaking down citizens for offenses neither they nor anyone else knew existed is unacceptable. President Obama has made illegal appointments to the National Labor Relations Board, which renders null and void all regulations and rulings that the board has made since then? Defund the NLRB, 100 percent. The president has unilaterally repealed our immigration laws? Let the House reaffirm them, and pass a resolution censuring the president for his lawlessness. And let Republican congressmen explain again and again that the Constitution didn’t create a king, and that the ancestors of today’s Democrats, with Thomas Jefferson at their head, were vigilant—indeed, verging on paranoid—in guarding against such a possibility. Nor did the Constitution give America a queen: so Mrs. Obama’s endless vacations, triumphal progresses of a lavishness that Marie Antoinette would have envied, should be condemned as outside the American tradition, even were it not a time when a whole generation is suffering the economic consequences of the administration’s no-growth policies.

An opposition party can only do so much when it controls but one house of Congress, but the Founders’ system of checks and balances not only licenses but positively enjoins it to do whatever it can to rein in lawlessness in the other branches. Let the House do its duty, not by rushing to the Supreme Court as if it were the school principal, but by defunding whatever unconstitutional measures it can. An important part of that duty is to explain, with as much wisdom and eloquence as it can muster on every Sunday talk show, why the Constitution demands such actions—and what kind of republic the Constitution’s Framers envisioned.

Myron Magnet, City Journal’s editor-at-large and a recipient of the National Humanities Medal, is the author of The Founders at Home, recently published by Norton.

Perceptive Observation From Abroad

Restroom Editorial Comment

Someone put this sticker on the hand dryer unit at a Jacksonville , Florida, Cracker Barrel restaurant:

Our Governing Geniuses Are Bankrolling Terrorism

America for all intents and purposes has abandoned its claimed policy of not negotiating with terrorists.

Or perhaps we just finance the thugs without talking to them.

In any event, Hamas, which the U.S. officially identifies as a terrorist organization, governs Gaza, which is getting $47 million taxpayer dollars from the Obama Administration.  

The money, of course, supposedly is to be used for "humanitarian purposes."  However, money is fungible, which means that our money will be used to provide food, shelter, and medical care for the residents of Gaza, thus freeing up other funds that the terrorist government otherwise would -- to some extent -- have to use for those purposes.  And the freed up funds can, are, and always will be used to finance and provide arms and ammunition and other lethal tools for the terrorist trade -- activities that are the raison d'etre of Hamas, which is committed to extinguishing the State of Israel and killing its people.

On top of that, our 'leaders' now appear to begging the bloodthirsty gang to take more of our money in exchange for stopping -- for a smidgen of time -- their rocket attacks on Israel.  Here is the capsule summary  report from today's edition of The Wall Street Journal: 

The U.S. and its allies are working on a Gaza truce plan to assure Hamas its economic demands will be met if it stops rocket strikes on Israel. 

Terrorism is a great business.  You take money from people who supposedly won't negotiate with you and attack your neighbor . . . and then the same people who lavish their citizens' money on you beg you to take more to stop the attacks. . . even if only for a little while.

Who says there is no such thing as perpetual motion?

Conveniently Forgtten History

Recognize and Abandon Every Faulty Premise

It was on an early April cab ride way back when New York City taxi drivers still spoke English that I learned to truly understand and appreciate the meaning of the term “faulty premise.”

My cabbie had responded with an expletive to a radio broadcast of the annually repeated news report about the indictment of some alleged tax cheat and the ensuing comments of the IRS Commissioner.

“Did you ever hear such  b_ _ _ s _ _ _,” exclaimed my driver, referring to the tax agency boss's claim that cheating increased the burdens of honest taxpayers.

My demurrer that the claim seemed credible, instantly transformed the cab driver, who until then had seemed to be a  “dese” and “dem” tenement kind of guy, into a sophisticated and articulate debater.  “It’s based on a faulty premise,” he snorted.  “It assumes there is some finite number of dollars, some limited amount of money that the government assholes will spend.”

“The fact,” he continued, “is that there is no limit to what they'll spend.  They will spend every dollar that they can lay their greedy hands on . . . everything that they can collect in taxes and fees as well as everything more that they can beg, borrow, or steal.  So even if nobody cheats, they’ll still get everything they can from every one of us.  God bless those who find a way, any way to escape their grubby grasping paws.”

(In those days the burdening of future generations was somewhat curtailed by actual efforts to set priorities and limit government spending to what was expected (with unrealistic optimism) to come into its coffers.  And just printing greenbacks had not yet come into vogue.)

In any event a similar faulty premise underlies and dooms the so-called “peace process” in the Middle East.

We somehow have been led to pretend that if we can get a party openly intent on murder and his intended victim to talk with one another, they will reach some kind of accord . . . that the intended victim can be induced to give up enough of what he holds to satisfy his would be killer's blood lust, notwithstanding that the latter, after accepting everything offered to him, continually professes openly that he never will be satisfied with anything other than his “negotiating partner’s” death.

That is why we keep going back to history’s longest running farce – the Middle East “Peace Process” in which Israel constantly gives or offers to give to the Palestinians bits and pieces of its country, hoping that at some point the latter will recognize and accept its right to exist.  On the other hand, their Palestinian “negotiating partners” are happy repeatedly to (i) accept everything offered to them, and yet (ii) constantly demand more as well as the extinguishment of the State of Israel.

It is long past time to abandon the faulty premise and for – to resort to a current phrase – a fundamental reset in the process.

To restart it on a sound basis, open and public recognition and acceptance of the State of Israel by the Palestinians has to be established as a firm and nonnegotiable starting place, a precondition for any resumption of negotiations.  Anything and everything else then can be the subject of subsequent negotiations.

Dear Mr. Obama . . .

So, Mr. President,  how's that reset with Russia working out?

Enjoying the snuggle with the bloodthirsty barbarian from the KGB?

Our Last Admirable and Respectable President

While I had little in common with Harry Truman politically, I miss him . . . particularly because we have not had a national leader like him since he left the White House.

He was a normal very human American -- a decent and modest man, a gutsy and unusually honest politician.

He embodied what America used to be, and I fear we will not see his like again.

Readers of this blog -- older ones as a reminder of what the nation was and now has lost, and younger ones to learn a bit about their disappearing heritage -- would do well to read Matthew Algee's charming book Harry Truman's Excellent Adventure; the True Story of a Great American Road Trip, as well as Peggy Noonan's excellent Wall Street Journal column Politics in the Modest Age, which can be accessed by clicking here.

Our Basic Problem

Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. 

. . . John Adams

Aircraft Shootdown Murder(s)

Am naturally outraged and over-the-top angry over the shooting down of the Malaysian airliner from the skies over the Ukraine and the murder of the almost 300 people on it, and it is clear  that Russia and Vladimir Putin bear responsibility for the travesty.
 
However, rationally reflecting on the horrific event has led me to recognize that governments, including our own, murder people.

Although the number of lives lost was two-thirds of one percent of those in the Ukraine disaster, the horrific event brought to mind the 2001 murders of an American missionary woman, Veronica Bowers, and her seven-month old daughter,  Charity, by our government, which had the small plane in which they were heading home shot down in South America.  Mrs. Bowers’ husband, their six-year-son, and their wounded pilot survived both the crash and their subsequent strafing by the Peruvian Air Force jet that our CIA (through outsourced private contractors) directed to attack them.  A pretty good account of that travesty can be found by clicking here.
     
Despite the difference in the number of resulting deaths, the moral quality of the act was no different.  Furthermore our Congress previously had formally recognized and approved such grotesque actions by enacting a law absolving the government and its contractors from any liability for shooting down planes like the one that carried the missionary family (as well as some stuffed animal toys like those so poignantly scattered about on Ukrainian soil).

The sad fact is that governments kill people . . . historically their own people more often than not.  They do so both accidentally and intentionally.   How many innocent American victims like Donald Scott, whose name you can Google for just one example, have been killed in mindless no-knock SWAT team drug raids?  What about Wounded Knee, Waco, and Ruby Ridge?  There probably will be many more such incidents as Officer Friendly is being replaced by our increasingly militarized law enforcement agencies . . . real jack-booted thugs.  So we hardly can feel superior, smug, or self-righteous even about such things as the shocking propensity of Putin’s journalistic critics for tumbling from high roof tops in Russia. 

Large, powerful, and unaccountable organizations like governments will always do evil things as long as those in charge of them have no reason to fear any meaningful personal retribution.

Why NBC Booted Leno

WHY NBC GOT RID OF THE FUNNIEST MAN

ON LATE NIGHT - JAY LENO

News is leaking out from Hollywood executives in-the-know that the Obama White House had been leaning on, pressuring executives at NBC for the last two years to replace Jay Leno because the comedian was criticizing President Obama every night. Obama didn't like it and considered it a racist attack on him.

Since his inauguration in Jan. 2009 Obama had enjoyed three years of very, very friendly routines from all the late night comics on ABC, CBS, and  Leno at NBC - there was no criticism at all.

But after data came to light that $100's of millions had been spent on First Family vacations during a recession, Mrs. Obama's unpopular new laws that changed food in America's schools and other negative news including the disastrous Obamacare rollout & website mess, Jay Leno took his comedy to a different level and his ratings skyrocketed - none of the other comics were so bold.

THESE ONE-LINERS MIGHT BE THE REASON NBC GOT RID OF THE FUNNIEST MAN ON LATE NIGHT - JAY LENO

Of course NBC was on board when Jay Leno went after Republican George W. Bush every night for 8 years but they couldn't stomach the fact that Leno's jokes about Obama were always right on target about the first black president...and left-leaning Democrat executives at NBC were being harassed by Obama himself who thought the comedy was a racist attack on him.

GOLDEN OLDIES FROM JAY:

"I was going to start off tonight with an Obama joke, but I don't want to get audited by the IRS."

On NSA surveillance:

"We wanted a president who listens to all Americans - now we have one."

On a new IRS commissioner: "He's called 'acting commissioner' because he has to act like the scandal doesn't involve the White House."

On closing the Guantanamo prison for terrorists: "If he really wants to close it, turn it into a government-funded solar power company. The doors will be shut in a month."

Concerning the Benghazi, Associated Press, and IRS scandals:"Remember in the old days when President Obama's biggest embarrassment was Joe Biden?"  

On Obama saying he didn't know about the IRS scandal: "He was too busy not knowing anything about Benghazi to not know anything about the IRS."  

"The White House has a new slogan about Benghazi : Hope and change the subject."

"It's casual Friday, which means that at the White House, they're casually going through everybody's phone calls and records."

"It is not looking good for President Obama. Today his teleprompter took the fifth."

"Fox News has changed its slogan from 'Fair and Balanced' to 'See, I told you so!'"

On Obama's commencement address: "He told the young graduates their future is bright unless, of course, they want jobs."

On a Chicago man who set a record for riding a Ferris wheel:"The only other way to go around and around in a circle that many times is to read the official report on Benghazi."

On White House claims of ignorance on the scandals: "They took 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' out of the Pentagon and moved it into the White House."

Now the last and I think best!--

"These White House scandals are not going away anytime soon. It's gotten so bad that People in Kenya are now saying he's 100 percent American."

An Unsung Hero

Snippets of Wisdom

Good intentions will always be pleaded for any assumption of power.  The Constitution was made to guard the people against the dangers of good intentions.  There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern.  They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters.

. . . Daniel Webster

While legislation obviously is political, we now have allowed regulation to become politicized, which we believe will likely lead to some bad outcomes. 

. . . Jamie Dimon

Tyranny is always better organized than freedom.

. . . Charles Peguy

 

Remember the Good Old (Pre-Obama) Days?

Wouldn't It Be Interesting?

What if large numbers of Americans next April claimed to be unable to file income tax returns or pay any income taxes?  

What if they instead sent apologetic letters to the IRS explaining that they could not complete a return or calculate what, if any, taxes they owed because the information necessary to do that had been stored on, but disappeared from their computers . . . and furthermore the information could not be recovered because their hard drives had been destroyed and recycled?  In addition,  the information could not be retrieved from its half-dozen original sources because, lo and behold, each of the sources' computers coincidentally had be wiped out by similar catastrophic malfunctions.

The smashed hard drives could be submitted with the letter, which also might include an invitation for the IRS to attempt to recover the data.

This would have the potential for bringing down the entire rotting and corrupt structure that the American government has become.

Human Progress ? ? ? ?

Not too many generations ago war was a limited affair involving relatively few people.  

When a ruler went to war, he marched into battle at the head of a column of his retainers. Subservient noblemen perhaps supported him by leading their own retainers into the fray.  Relatively few people were involved and the carnage, though horrendous, was limited.

Today, decisions to go to war are made by aging politicians who then, ensconced in sumptuous situation rooms partaking of fine food and drink, watch the offspring of lower economic classes shed their blood and endure the privations inherent in their assigned missions.

Personally, I prefer the old way -- requiring those with war making authority to risk their own skins and the skins of their own children in the game.

In addition, the limited wars of old seem to me to have been preferable to the wars we have today that with modern weapons wreak widespread and unlimited havoc and destruction on people who just want to be left alone to live their lives. 

What all of this boils down to is the possibility that our species in some respects has not progressed but instead actually has regressed.

But then, our current popular culture suggests that evolution also is a two way street and that homo sapiens have been devolving in recent decades.

On the Hotseat, Arrogant Sanctimonious IRS A _ _ hole

Truism Applicable to Our Government

What If?

What if next April, instead of filing income tax returns and paying income taxes, multitudes of Americans sent to the IRS apologetic letters explaining that they could not prepare any returns or calculate what, if any, taxes they owed because of crashes and subsequent destruction of the hard drives of their computers?  Furthermore, the apologetic missives might explain, efforts to retrieve the necessary data from the information's half-dozen or so original sources had been thwarted because each of the sources' computers had coincidentally sustained similar catastrophes.

Were just a few individuals to do this, he or she would end up in deep yogurt, proving that there is one set of rules for our rulers (those perched high in governmental and IRS officialdom) and an altogether different set for those who are ruled (the rest of us).  Nor am I suggesting that anyone do any such thing as that might be construed as encouraging a conspiracy to break the law . . .  the rulers' rules.

But it would be interesting to see what would happen if great numbers of people followed the example of the IRS . . . even though I have yet to find a single person doltish enough to believe the clownish explanation put forth by the Service for its immaculately disappeared e-mails.  Following the example might overwhelm the system and perhaps even bring down the cowardly and corrupt swinish frauds who assume we are stupid and apathetic enough to accept with docility their rule and any outrageous claims they deign to proffer.

Wouldn't it be fun to show them that Americans have not yet become that supine?

No Sense Watching