Liberty's Harbor

In Defense of Vulture Capitalism

2012-01-20T18:59:00.000-05:00

Living just above the Great State of South Carolina, we are treated to the radio ads that have saturated their airwaves in the weeks leading up to tomorrow's primary. I understand it's a primary, a contest between Republicans, as as such they will necessarily criticize each other and each other's policies in their ads. I do wish, however, that Republicans would find a way to do so without resorting to lowest common denominator, populist stupidity. The attacks on Herman Cain's 9-9-9 tax plan were ridiculous. Cain remains the only contender for president with a real, honest plan to tackle the county's broken tax system. What did that get him? The other Republicans attacked the plan for being hard on the working class, unworkable and too complicated. Michelle Bachman went so far as to insinuate it was the work of Satan, which said a lot more about the woman's mental capacity than about the 9-9-9 Plan. That is exactly, with the possible exception of Bachman's nuttiness, what one would expect the Democrats and the press to say about Cain and his plan. With no serious proposals of their own, the other Republicans are basically saying the present system is better, that it isn't already everything they claimed 9-9-9 would be--complicated, unworkable and a drain on capital. With that attitude, we as Republicans deserve to lose.

Now the field has narrowed and, for the moment at least, Mitt Romney is seen as the one to beat. Are his primary opponents attacking him for not being conservative enough, for creating a state-run health care system, for being wishy-washy in his defense of his ideas? Well, to be honest, they are a bit, but the one ad that has been running over and over again attacks Romney for being a "vulture capitalist." Once again, Republicans have resorted to liberal arguments against a fellow conservative. The ad distorts and demagogues the role played in our free market economy by venture capital firms. It's playing on the woeful state of most Americans' economic literacy, and that is more than sad, it's a crime. This country will only survive if we as Republicans and conservatives and libertarians can educate the vast majority of Americans with an understanding of markets and private enterprise and the role of risk-taking and reward. It's going to be an uphill battle, and when the very people in the best position to push us forward are dragging us back, it scares the Hell out of me for the future.

We Are..... the 1%

2012-01-09T20:17:00.002-05:00

Well, reading the fine print, not quite, but definitely the 2% and moving up. I'm talking world-wide, which, if you think about it, is better for the ego. I mean, wouldn't you rather be at the top of the world than the top of just one country? Hooray for us!

This bit of ego boosting comes courtesy of the Huffington Post, whose article on the subject for some reason does not find this to be a reason to celebrate. Here is their description of the news from an economist's book:

According to calculations by World Bank economist Branko Milanovic in his book The Haves and the Have-Nots, about half of the world's richest one percent live in the United States, about 29 million of them, to be exact.
But the qualifications to make the cut may surprise some people who've never considered themselves part of the world's financial elite.
According to CNN Money, who reported on Milanovic's findings, an individual with an after-tax salary of just $34,000 per year ranks among the richest one percent in the world. A family of four, Milanovic says, would have to make $136,000 in order to qualify.

So it's after-tax income, and our household's needs to be divided by three rather than just two, but still, we are very much knocking on the door to Lifestyles of the Worlds' Rich and Famous. I gave this news to my wife this morning and she reported back that she didn't feel rich. That's the point, I think. Rich, well-to-do, elite, these are all very subjective terms and depend entirely on perspective. My wife works 40 hours a week as a municipal clerk, she's married to a middle manager in a route sales company, she lives in what to her seems a medium sized house in a middle-class neighborhood. We own one small SUV, bought used. We watch our money so we can take some trips and eat out when we want. Nothing extravagant. At least not in our terms, American terms.

Certainly the kids of the Occupy movement don't consider themselves rich or elite. They express disdain and even loathing for the rich elites. They believe the 1% should be giving up more of what they have to share with the other 99% who weren't born into a world of luxury and privilege. But these kids have clothes and food and tents and laptops and cell phones and backpacks and eyeglasses and blankets and frisbees and drums. They are literate and healthy and have an abundance of free time. To 99% of the world, the Occupiers ARE the 1%.

I could go on and on about the Occupy movement and it's hypocrisy and stupidity, but that's for another post. My point isn't that the Occupiers, or my wife, are ungrateful and greedy and should be sending half of what they make to sub-saharan African. That wouldn't work, as the reason sub-saharan Africa isn't home to it's share of the 1% is that it doesn't share the values and freedoms and laws and political culture of the United States or Germany or Japan. Much of the world is like a bucket with a hole in it, you can fill it with water, but it will always run out in a very short time until you plug the hole.

We don't owe the rest of the world our wealth, though we do have a moral and ethical obligation to keep as many people as comfortable and free as we reasonably can. We do have an obligation to support in other places the things that made the wealth of America possible. Economic freedom, individual rights, property rights, the rule of law and a moral underpinning based on the Golden Rule will do more than any amount of money to raise the standards of living for the "other 99%." Sadly, it's these things that the Occupiers seem to be railing most loudly against.

2012 Is Going To Be A Fun Year In NC Politics

2012-01-05T17:08:00.000-05:00

It's only the fifth day of the new year, and already the General Assembly in Raleigh is entertaining. The wailing and gnashing of teeth coming from the democrat representatives is awesome to behold. This article in the Greensboro News and Record does a great job of explaining what happened and features some great gnashing of teeth quotes.

The long and short of it is this. The General Assembly was called back into session because the governor vetoed the Racial Justice Act. Failing to over-ride that, the Republicans took the house out of session and then back into session at zero-dark-thirty last night to over-ride the governor's veto of another bill. In this they were successful. This new law, which also passed the senate, will stop the state from automatically deducting dues for the North Carolina Education Association from teachers' paychecks. The NCEA will have to collect it's dues from it's membership all by itself. Democrats find this highly disturbing.

You see, the NCEA spent a good part of those dues last year trying to defeat Republicans, and also targeting any Democrats that fell out of step with the party line. Make no mistake, this was a political move on the part of the Republicans. They are trying to defund a part of the Democrat election machine, but the opposition to it from Democrats is just as partisan. They will claim this is an attack on education, on teachers and on the American Way, but really they worry that teachers may not be as willing to pony up dues money if they have to write the checks themselves, and that will lead to an emptier Democrat war chest come election time.

Whatever the motive, in my opinion this is a great idea from the Republicans. If the NCEA serves it's members well, they will pay dues. If not, they won't. That's the way it should work.

I'm Baaaaaack.....

2012-01-03T18:16:00.000-05:00

Funny how something that becomes a habit can just as quickly be forgotten. That's sort of what happened with this blog. I enjoyed it for a while, then slowed down, then stopped altogether. I think it's time to try getting back into the habit of writing regularly, and this was fun once, so I am going to try and see if I can get back into some sort of groove. This was, and will remain, a politcally-centered blog, with occasional digressions into my other interests. If this becomes fun again, I have an idea for a second blog, so we'll just have to see what happens.

I figured today was as good a day as any to start blathering about presidential politics. The Iowa Caucuses are going down this evening and surely by tomorrow morning the political landscape will have changed somewhat. Again. See, that's what has me less than enthused about the whole field of Republican contenders so far. Not only do none of them light any sort of fire in me, but I feel completely disconnected from the process because our primary here in North Carolina isn't until May, and things may be decided by then. Or not. I just am finding it hard to become excited. I'd love to see the White House in the hands of someone other than Barack Obama, but my gut just can't see that happening, no matter who his opponent turns out to be.

I will remain involved as much as I can and do all I can to help those I agree with, or seem to agree with, achieve office. Locally, I am lucky to be represented by a great state representative and state senator, and I will work hard to see those two men returned to Raleigh. I have high hopes that North Carolina will have a good Republican governor next year and that some much needed changes can be made in our state. I'm a firm believer that the closer a government is to you, the more effect it has on your life, so if I can get good local and state government, I'm much less worried about what happens on the national level. That's my theory today,m anyhow, we'll see how it works out.

Believe

2010-12-23T20:03:00.000-05:00

I heard that one word being used to promote the Polar Express movie on television and it got me to thinking. Belief is what this whole season is about. The birth of Christ, Santa Clause, keeping close to family, sharing time with friends--they all come back to believing.

Christ's birth is the "reason for the season" for sure. But what we are celebrating is really a belief in that event, and what it means for mankind. It's more often called Faith, but Christian creeds repeat the phrase "we believe." We believe in the impossible. Virgins do not give birth to children. Men do not rise from the grave three days after their death. The spirits of the departed do not talk to their friends. But we as Christians make a conscious choice to believe these things happened. We can't prove it, and that's important, because if we could we wouldn't need faith, our belief would be meaningless. And Christmas would be just another birthday.

There are those who see Santa Claus and the traditions and, yes, commercialism, that surround him as taking something away from the "true meaning" of Christmas. I disagree. Santa Claus is the personification of all that is good and charitable and joyful in the human race. No one lives at the North Pole. Sleighs don't fly and fat men don't magically transport down chimneys. But that doesn't mean Santa isn't real. As Virginia read in response to her question to The New York Sun...

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist...

We can't touch love or generosity, just as we can't prove the virgin birth, but they are real things, and made more real by our belief in them. And Santa Claus helps that along.

Christmas is also the time for family and friends. Reading a friend's facebook post about missing his dad at Christmas, and his friend's kind response to him made me realize belief plays a major role here too at Christmastime. While I was growing up, my grandmother spent every Christmas with us. She'd come the night before and wake with us on Christmas morning and share in the opening of presents and all the fun. She passed away years ago, but that doesn't mean she's gone. I can no longer see her or hear her voice or give her a hug, but I know she's there with me and all my family as we share Christmas together. It's yet another impossibility that belief makes as real as the floor under my feet.

Our friends can also teach us about believing. I've found that some friend is always there when you need one. They often don't need to be called upon and many times have no idea that I needed help or even that anything was wrong. Twain wrote that a true friend is one who carries light into your darkness, and that we never forget these people. He's right, and I've learned to believe that they will always be there. You can't touch a frinedship, and I challenge anyone to write even a decent definition of the word, but it's real and it's part of what makes Christmas magic.

In The Polar Express the belief in Santa is represented by the sound of a bell that only those who believe can hear. Hearing that bell, being able to believe, into adulthood requires a conscious act of faith, of belief in the impossible. It requires not an ignorance of all the hate and pain and sadness in the world, but a belief that nothing bad lasts forever. Jesus really was born of a virgin and died only to rise again and show us the way to Heaven. Santa Claus is just as real as love itself. Our loved ones that have passed out of our reach will live forever in those of us they touched. Our friends will help us when we need it and fill our lives with joy. Love is stronger than hate. Forgiveness is stronger than hurt. Joy will always conquer pain.

I believe these things because I chose to believe them. For me, they are real and they make Christmas perfect, because I BELIEVE.

Believe.

Merry Christmas.

Understanding What Tomorrow Is Really About, From A Brit

2010-11-01T11:16:00.002-04:00

Janet Daley, of Britain's Telegraph newspaper, visited the United States recently and brought back a better understanding of the Tea Party movement, and what it means to the future of the country and the Republican party, than I've read in any American press. Here's her take what she learned from her GOP friends...

My Republican friends, perhaps surprisingly, were not gloating. They were too furious. But contrary to the superficial British assumption (heavily promoted by the BBC), they were not devoting their excoriation exclusively to the Obama Administration – or even to its clique of Congressional henchmen, led by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. That they were opposed to the Big State, European social democratic model of government which Obama had imported to Washington went almost without saying. But they were at least as angry with the leadership of their own party for having conceded far too much of the argument.

Miss Daley hits the nail on the head. Tomorrow's elections are not about Democrats versus Republicans, they aren't even about what we have come to think of recently as liberal versus conservative. Tomorrow's elections are about restoring the principles that made the United States of America unique among the nations of the world. It's more about the state versus the individual than anything else.

Again, the Brit gets it...

What the grassroots rebellion is really about is an attempt to pull the Republican party back to its basic philosophy of low-tax, low-spend, small government: the great Jeffersonian principle that the best government is that which governs least.

Jeffersonian ideals, and a return to Jeffersonian democracy, are inspiring more of the Tea Partiers than perhaps even they know. And Thomas Jefferson was a Democrat.

Operation Salsa Drop

2010-10-27T05:53:00.002-04:00

Flamin' Amy's Burrito Barn, clearly the awesomest restaurant in all of southeastern North Carolina, is offering some of their salsas for sale. The proceeds go towards sending jars of salsa to our troops overseas. You buy a jar, a soldier gets a jar. It's a total win-win.

Please check them out.

Operation Salsa Drop

A Good Use of Government Money, Finally

2010-10-26T20:20:00.000-04:00

With the assistance of a $2 million grant, the University of Virginia is putting the entire papers of several founders online in a searchable database. I can't wait for 2012!

The Definition of Irony, or Idiocy

2010-10-05T16:54:00.000-04:00

The io9 blog has a list of ten great sci-fi novels that have been banned, in honor of Banned Books Week last week. They were either banned or challenged in schools and libraries or on curricula for the usual reasons, including language, sex, religious viewpoint and generally subversive ideas. Those who fight to keep books they find objectionable out of other peoples' hands generally just wind up making themselves look like fools and bringing attention to the books they are protesting, thereby making them more appealing to more people.

But this list provides us with even more amusement than usual. In a case of so-ironic-one-couldn't-even-make-this-up, people have tried to suppress George Orwell's 1984 and Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. One hopes they didn't read the books. 1984 was actually accused of being "pro-communist."

Big Brother would be proud!

Mike McIntyre Finally Faces a Challenge -- Ilario Pantano

2010-09-18T08:36:00.000-04:00

Many of us have known this to be the case for months now, but even the Wilmington Star-News has had to admit that this could be the first year since Ulysses Grant was President that the Republicans could win the 7th North Carolina Congressional District seat. An article in yesterday's Star-News not only mentioned Ilario Pantano by name, something that paper has been loathe to do, but quoted numerous sources, including Mike McIntyre himself, confirming that this will be the toughest race yet for the seven term Democrat.

From the Star-News...

In recent weeks, as Pantano's campaign has gained momentum and raised money, others outside of Southeastern North Carolina are questioning whether an upset is possible in the district McIntyre has easily held since 1996, when he defeated longtime New Hanover County Commissioner Bill Caster. Most political observers believe that the final numbers on Election Day will be much tighter than the Lumberton Democrat has seen in the past.
In a phone interview from Washington Thursday, McIntyre acknowledged that 2010 is his “most intense race” for re-election.
The signs that others are viewing the district as competitive seem to be multiplying.

The article sites several signs that Ilario Pantano's campaign is gaining the support, both locally and nationally, that he will need to unseat a long serving and still popular representative. Pantano has raised enough money to catch the eye of the national Republican party and the National Republican Campaign Committee has begun running ads on his behalf. McIntyre has agreed to debate Pantano several times, the first time he's ever faced a challenger in that way during a campaign, and has begun running attack ads distorting the Fair Tax, a total overhaul of federal taxation that Pantano supports.

For a very honest, but highly amusing, look at the race, follow this link to the Robeson County Republican Party's list of the "Top Ten Reasons You Know Your Democratic Campaign Is In Trouble" .

Ilario Pantano impressed me from the first time I met him and had a chance to talk with him privately outside a Brunswick County GOP meeting back at the beginning of this year. He is intense and passionate, but still came off to me as a real down to earth guy. I've had the chance to speak with him and to hear him speak publicly in a variety of situations and have been impressed that he doesn't have a "stump speech" or a collection of "talking points" that he constantly goes back to. He speaks from the head and the heart, he answers any question I've seen put to him without evasion. He seems to have really thought about the intellectual and spiritual sources of his principles, and that makes him comfortable speaking to any subject. That alone is rare in any politician, and has won him my wholehearted support.

The Church of Body Modification?

2010-09-11T09:48:00.002-04:00

A zero-tolerance policy has run up against freedom of religion in a high school in Clayton, North Carolina. It seems a 14-year-old girl was suspended for refusing to take out a nose stud. The school forbids jewelery of the eyebrows, lips and nose, but the girl and her mother are members of the Church of Body Modification and find spiritual peace through piercings.

From the Raleigh News & Observer...

Ariana Iacono, 14, was suspended from Clayton High for one day Wednesday when she refused to remove the small peridot stud in her nose. Ariana returned to school with the jewelry Thursday, then was suspended for three additional days.
Ariana and her mother, Nikki Iacono, take part in the Church of Body Modification, a small group with members across the nation. The church embraces spiritual growth through practices such as piercing.

"It's a spiritual thing," Ariana said of her piercing. "I feel whole."

The knee-jerk reaction to this may be to laugh at a "church" dedicated to body piercings. But if a hole in her nostril makes Ariana feel "whole," who am I to argue? The Church of Body Modification has a website, complete with a link to an application to be a minister. In this day and age, what better sign of legitimacy can one have? Religion is in the eye of the beholder, and has to be in a free society.

The real problem here isn't a strange church, it's the lack of common sense in school zero-tolerance policies. For whatever reason, and I'm sure it comes down to lawyers, we've taken all logic out of the hands of teachers and administrators and replaced it with hard and fast rules that lead to problems like this. A principal or teacher should be able to decide what is disruptive to the school. There is a difference between a small jewel stud in one nostril and a collection of metal hoops all over a kid's face. We should allow, and expect, educators to make those judgment calls, just as they should be able to treat aspirin and heroin differently and punish possession of a hand gun differently from possession of a nail file.

Mission Accomplished

2010-09-05T09:50:00.002-04:00

We can now officially declare victory in Iraq. Not only are there privately owned television stations, and not only are those stations offering something more than religious or political programming, but they have stumbled upon what may be the best "reality show" premise in the world. Punked, Iraqi style.

The show “Put Him in [Camp] Bucca” has drawn numerous protests but has stayed on air throughout the fasting month, broadcasting its “stings” on well-known Iraqi personalities.

All of them were ensnared by being invited to the headquarters of the private television station Al Baghdadia to be interviewed, but en route to the station a fake bomb would be planted in their car while they were being searched by Iraqi soldiers, who were in on the deception.
The unwitting celebrities are then secretly filmed, Candid-Camera-style, as they reacted with shock, disbelief and anger as fake checkpoint guards shout abuse at them: “Why do you want to blow us up?” “You are a terrorist.” “How much did they pay you to do it? You will be executed.”

Yep, we've won.

Gotta Love Soccer Fans

2010-06-06T16:30:00.003-04:00

The 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa will be fun to watch, soccer fan or not. The festivities have already begun. From a Yahoo soccer blog...

The tournament hasn't even started yet and already World Cup fever has taken hold, driving a group of sufferers to run through Cape Town in their underpants as part of an organized streak to somehow show support for the South African National Team on Thursday.
Once the matches actually begin, these tortured souls will continue their descent into madness, subsisting entirely on edible body paint and miniature flags. Their condition is incurable. You will likely be next.

I'd tell them that it's not really streaking if your wearing your drawers, but that might cause trouble.

And there's already been trampling of fans! This is gonna be great.

Your Government Wants To "Reinvent Journalism"

2010-06-02T21:15:00.003-04:00

As Hot Air says, what could go wrong?

Seems the Federal Trade Commission has taken it upon itself to "save" American journalism. They've published a discussion draft of their work so far. It's horrifying. Truly.

Here's just a bit...

History in the United States shows that readers of the news have never paid anywhere close to the full cost of providing the news. Rather, journalism always has been subsidized to a large extent by, for example, the federal government, political parties, or advertising.

Advertising revenue is a "subsidy"?

And by government subsidies they mean reduced postal rates for magazines and the publication of legal notices in newspapers. That is precedent enough for some at the FTC to have the federal government allot public funds to non-profit "news" organizations through something they will call "Local News Fund Councils." Orwellian enough for you?

Here's the idea in their own words, in case you just don't believe me...

Establish a National Fund for Local News. One report recommends that: “A national Fund for Local News should be created with money the Federal Communications Commission now collects from or could impose on telecom users, television and radio broadcast licensees, or Internet service providers and which would be administered in open competition through state Local News Fund Councils.” The report notes that the FCC currently uses surcharges and other fees to underwrite telecom services for rural areas and the multimedia wiring of schools and libraries, among other things. These fees support the public circulation of information in places the market has failed to serve. If such a “Fund for Local News” were created, measures would need to be in place to reduce the potential for political pressures and interference as to how the money is distributed.

They also are big proponents of increasing the money given to the Corporation For Public Broadcasting, because as everyone knows, NPR is a great source of unbiased, fair news reporting. Good grief.

The whole report is about 35 pages long and is found in a PDF here. Please go read it.

Uh, No. No It Doesn't.

2010-06-02T17:06:00.004-04:00

Check out this headline in the Washington Post,

Al and Tipper Gore's separation makes us fear for our parents, ourselves

Uh, no. No it doesn't. Unless you're Dad is a crazy, foaming at the mouth environmentalist loon, this shouldn't put you in mind of your folks' marriage breaking up. It actually gets worse than the headline,

So this doesn't just make us sad. It makes us scared.

It means that maybe marriage isn't something we can conquer. That you can have all the necessary ingredients -- romance, good morals, mutual respect and a healthy family -- and still see this precious thing, built over decades, crumble in the end.
It makes us frightened for our parents, our friends, ourselves.

It goes on to reference Tipper's "lively blonde spunk," but one can only take so much of this.

Maybe there is hope for the World's Happiest Couple. Once Al reads this report from CNET in 2007, he may reconsider. Here's the main idea...

As if the burden of divorce weren't bad enough, people with failed marriages can be blamed for global warming, according to a study by Michigan State University.

Divorced couples use up more space in their respective homes, which amounts to to 38 million more rooms worldwide to light, heat and cool, noted the report.

And people who divorced used 73 billion kilowatt-hours more of electricity and 627 billion gallons of water than they would otherwise in 2005.

Thanks to James Taranto's Best of the Web for finding that little gem.

State Employee Union Fails To Create Third Party

2010-05-23T08:43:00.002-04:00

A group of state employee organizations backed by the State Employees Union of North Carolina (SEUNC) has been attempting to gather enough signatures to place a third party on the November ballot. They have their panties in a wad over three NC democrats' votes against ObamaCare. The SEUNC planned to challenge Heath Schuler, Mike McIntyre and Larry Kissel with a third party choice more friendly in their eyes to the concerns of "working people." According to this story in the Raleigh News and Observer, the attempt failed, but they still plan to run a candidate against Rep. Kissel.

The group had hoped to collect 84,600 signatures, enough to get on the November ballot. But the deadline for submitting signatures to the county election boards for verification passed Monday, with the backers having failed to meet their goal.
"We are continuing the effort," said Kevin LeCount, political director for the state employees group. "We are looking at 2012."
The third party supporters coalesced in part to punish Democratic members of Congress who voted against the new health care law. The party was to be called North Carolina First.

It's a shame the attempt failed, but I wish them luck going towards 2012. Anything that further divides the votes of democrats is just fine by me.

But it always irks me to no end to hear liberals, especially unionized liberals, speaking of "working people." In the real world, the more one works, the more one makes, and the less likely one is to qualify as a "working person" under the liberal definition. Just a pet peeve of mine.

NC Voter Registration Numbers

2010-05-22T08:45:00.004-04:00

The Civitas Institute does a spectacular job keeping up with voter registration numbers in the state of North Carolina. They publish a chart breaking down changes in voter registraions by party affiliation on a county by county basis.

I'm pleased to report that as of April, Brunswick County's Republican registration has outnumbered the Democrats. The number of Unaffiliated voters is growing fastest, though, and they make up more than 26% of the registered voters as of May 8th.

Here's a link to the Civitas chart. At the top, you can change the chart to show percentages or changes going back as far as November 2004.

Federal Law Could Allow NC Public Employees To Organize

2010-05-19T14:41:00.003-04:00

From the Carolina Journal Online:

RALEIGH — Nearly 32,000 North Carolina state and local public safety employees could begin negotiating contracts with unions if recently introduced federal legislation becomes law. S. 3194, The Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act of 2009 (S. 3194), sponsored and introduced April 12 by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., would override North Carolina law forcing the state, municipalities, and counties to recognize and bargain collectively with unions representing police, firefighters, emergency medical responders, and others.

The bill could become law quickly and without substantive debate. Reid introduced S. 3194 under a rule that allows it to bypass committee review and proceed to the floor in as little as 48 hours.

No action had occurred as of press time.

S. 3194 would override North Carolina General Statute 95-98, which for 51 years has prohibited public sector collective bargaining. S. 3194 would let public safety employees choose to be represented by a union and have their hours, wages, and terms and conditions of employment determined by collective bargaining. Supervisors and managers would be exempt.

The North Carolina League of Municipalities estimates 28,000 municipal and county law enforcement workers and paid firefighters would fall under the bill. The State Office of Personnel puts the number of public safety positions in state government at nearly 3,800, including members of Highway Patrol, employees of the State Bureau of Investigation, and others.

Not only would this bill cost North Carolina taxpayers a fortune, it is an unconstitutional over reach by the federal government into an area of law that should be left to the states. Keep an eye on this one.

Dueling Press Conferences

2010-05-18T17:50:00.005-04:00

Ilario Pantano, Republican candidate for the NC 7th District congressional seat, and his two primary opponents, Will Breazeale and Randy Crow, hosted dueling press conferences today. Ilario called for unity among republicans and for an end to personal attacks, while Breazeale and Crow called for Pantano to quit his campaign.

Here is a link to Pantano's press release about his press conference

Here is a link to a news story about the Breazeale/Crow press conference. I love the headline, "Breazeale Continues to Fuss About Losing."

Sorry, but that's exactly what's happening. Will Breazeale is showing all the republicans in this district that the right choice was made on primary day. As for Randy Crow, he is a complete nut case. Here's some of his platform, for your amusement:

The Omega Agency - They are who people are talking about when one says orders come from "above the President". The Omega Agency consists of a network set up much like the CIA. There are thousands world-wide who take their orders directly from the ruling council of the Omega Agency. This council consists of 10 to 12 people. George Bush and Alexander C. Haig are two names known to sit on the council of the Omega Agency. The OA is the driving force behind what is commonly called the "New World Order." The OA's office is located at Langley AFB. They plan to establish their NWO, for lack of a better term, in a time span of no less than 5 days. And they intend to do it without open war. (They are also liars, obviously. Look at how many people the NWO has already killed. 55 million WWII, Vietnam, AIDS, that is a NWO deal.)

UPDATE: Here's a link to a report from someone attending both news conferences.

A Defense of the South

2010-05-14T11:49:00.003-04:00

I couldn't resist sharing this. Here's a liberal Muslim woman of Pakistani origin fed up with the way liberal elites think of her beloved South. Go get 'em, Seema!

Here's how she finishes her piece, which for some odd reason is in the Guardian in the UK.

Oddly, the same people who disparage us also have love affairs with our culture. They ridicule us and then profess their love for Nina Simone, Austin, Johnny Cash or Louisiana's crawfish etouffee dish when it's trendy. This brings me to my favourite specimens: cocktail party progressives. You know the type – can't converse without referencing the New Yorker. Pretentious, self-congratulatory liberals who applaud their own humanity while mocking the south. Curiously, they feign knowledge of Hank Williams when fashionable, but their intellectual elitism forgets that Truman Capote and Tennessee Williams were southern geniuses.

I adore our southern nights and the taste of authenticity in Willie Nelson's voice and Muddy Waters' blues. I love that we celebrate colossally in New Orleans: Jazz Fest, Crawfish Fest, Mardi Gras, even Jazz Funerals. I was touched when kind neighbours baked us casseroles and stood by us as we endured post-9/11 racism. I am proud that Houstonians opened their homes to 250,000 New Orleans evacuees. That's genuine southern hospitality. Southerners are not the ignorant, inbreeding, toothless rifle-owning trailer trash that my progressive colleagues paint them as. They are vibrant, passionate Americans with resolve. They have survived and flourished through the civil rights movement, disastrous hurricanes and oil spills, Enron and Halliburton scandals, the Fort Hood tragedy and their loved ones coming home in body bags.

They have epic stories. It's time our media act as their vessels.

I'm right there with most of what she has to say. I'm a transplant to the South and tell people that proves I love her. I'm here by choice, not by birth. I love the people, the culture, the food, the music and the weather. This is where I chose to live, work and play. This is where I chose to raise my son. And I consider it the best place on Earth.

No Independant/Libertarian Run For Breazeale

2010-05-13T16:08:00.002-04:00

The Brunswick Beacon reports that NC state law prohibits Will Breazeale from running in the NC 7th District congressional election as an independent or a Libertarian.

Though no Libertarian candidate ran in the primary election, Breazeale could not run as a Libertarian, Greg Bellamy, Brunswick County Elections Director, said.

Gary Bartlett, executive director of the N.C. Board of Elections, said this week Breazeale cannot seek an independent or write-in bid for the same seat during the same election cycle, per state law.

Breazeale has scheduled a press conference for next week to discuss his political future. It sounds from what he told the Beacon that he'll just be airing his sour grapes.

Breazeale, who ran against incumbent Democrat Mike McIntyre in 2008 and lost, said he was considering “all options” about another run at Congress, and said Tuesday he was keeping his political options open.

“I’m not forbidden from running for another seat,” Breazeale said.

“This goes to show how messed up and nontransparent and user friendly the elections process is. How archaic North Carolina ballot laws are. Democrats and Republicans are in cahoots to keep people off the ballots. Is that democracy?”

Actually, Mr. Breazeale, your behavior is proving to me to that the system is working just fine. If this is how you handle a primary election defeat, we're lucky to have someone else as a candidate. Neither Ilario Pantano nor any mythical "establishment" is responsible for choosing a candidate. It's the voters who choose, and they chose wisely.

Elena Kagan, Gay or Straight, You Be The Judge

2010-05-11T21:59:00.002-04:00

Get it? You be the judge? Sorry, couldn't resist. Mother Jones magazine has its panties in a wad over questions about Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee's sexuality. The article is worth reading just for the entertainment value inherent in someone calling Andrew Sullivan "sane" and "smart."

I for one don't particularly care if the woman is intimate with farm animals. She seems to have very little respect for the Constitution and the intent of its writers, and that alone should disqualify her.

The Brits Have Finally Sorted Themselves Out

2010-05-11T21:47:00.003-04:00

Well, sort of. David Cameron, Leader of the conservative Tory party, is the new Prime Minister, after accepting the Queen's invitation to form a new government. The Tories failed to win enough seats in Parliament to form a new government on their own, so they will be in a coalition with the Liberal Democratic party, which is pretty far to the left of the outgoing Labor party.

This should be interesting. I have to admit to pretty much geeking out over this whole affair over the last few days. I love our system and wouldn't trade it for the world, but the political junkie in me loves watching this.

Here's a link to a conservative blog site in the UK called ConservativeHome. They have all sorts of opinions on the recent election and the coming marriage of Right and Far Left from those actually affected by the deal.

What's Up With Will Breazeale?

2010-05-11T21:26:00.003-04:00

This email from the Breazeale campaign arrived today. Read it for yourself, but this looks to me like a hint at a third party run.

Dear Friends,

Allow me to take a moment to say thank you for everything you have done. Not just in 2010, but for the past three years. I am so blessed to have had the support of so many kind and wonderful people during my two runs for Congress. For everyone that has helped along the way, my deepest and heartfelt thanks. Running for office is not easy. I could have never done it without you.

Over the past week there has been a lot of speculation as to my political future. I remain amazed at the innuendo people have been able to invent between their ears. Rumors in politics are like peanut butter and jelly. They just go together. Perhaps it is because our party's nominee and leadership spends so much time focusing on how to keep others from running and not on their own candidacy, that this seat has not gone Republican in more than 100 years?

Buyers remorse is a tough pill to swallow. I cannot help but think that perhaps many who voted for Ilario Pantano are now realizing their nominee's claim to fame is the execution of two unarmed Iraqis? In turn, they are already attempting to set up a scapegoat (me) in order to justify his inevitable, massive failure in November.

With that in mind, allow me to set the record straight: I will formally announce my future political intentions on Tuesday, May 18th, at 10 a.m. I will hold a press conference at the New Hanover County Government Center, 230 Government Center Drive in Wilmington. Members of the public and press are invited to attend. I am pleased to announce that I will be joined at that time by my fellow primary opponent, Randy Crow. I look forward to seeing you all then.

Will Breazeale

That would be an incredibly stupid and damaging move, both for Mr. Breazeale, who would seal the end of his politcal career, and for the people of the NC 7th Congressional District, who in Ilario Pantano have a shot at being represented by a good, solid Republican for the first time in a century.

We'll wait and see what Mr. Breazeale has to say next Tuesday, but this doesn't look good.

Is This What It Looked Like Just Before The Boston Massacre?

2010-04-28T21:34:00.003-04:00

I'm thinking not quite. This is a modern day Tea Party Rally in Quincy, Illinois. Seems someone was worried the grannies would riot and ruin President Obama's speech, so the boys in blue (or is that black) were called in to keep the peace.

The video at the bottom of this page (under more pictures) is a riot, pardon the pun.

First Global Warming, Now Recycling?!?!

2010-04-25T09:36:00.003-04:00

Could reason and logic finally be creeping into the most hallowed halls of the Church of Environmentalism? It looks like some governments may be carrying the recycling thing a bit too far.

From The Examiner in Washington, DC....

But some national recycling experts have begun calling for government restraint in trash recycling, which can be more costly and environmentally damaging than dumping.

"We just assume recycling is always better," said J. Winston Porter, president of the Waste Policy Center, an environmental consulting and policy organization. "But there's a point at which you shouldn't just recycle for recycling's sake."

Porter is a former policy administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency who helped set the federal government's first nationwide recycling targets.

I've always enjoyed telling my son and his friends when they come home from school all fired up about recycling, that paper recycling is one of the most polluting industrial processes out there. It's fine to recycle, and it usually makes perfect economic sense to do so, but nothing is ever that simple and it's great to see that maybe that point is being made by an environmentalist, too.

May 20th----It's Everyone Draw Mohammed Day!!!

2010-04-25T09:15:00.002-04:00

If Earth Day made you want to throw up as much as it did me, maybe here's a "protest holiday" you can sink your teeth into. It was started by some blog posters as a response to the death threats made against the creators of South Park by some wonderful adherents to the peaceful religion of Islam. Seems all you need to do to participate is get your creative juices flowing and draw your very own picture of Mohammed, then send it in where it can be shared with the world, and you too can be threatened with a violent death.

This sounds like great fun. And don't worry if your art skills are a tad lacking, I don't think Mohammed will mind. He founded the great religion of tolerance, right?

Penn State's Whiteout

2009-10-27T21:23:00.004-04:00

It seems someone has to rain on every parade. This time they've attacked the "Whiteout" T-shirts being sold for Penn State's home football games. It seems the design, the words "Penn State" horizontally and a blue stripe vertically, comes too close to resembling a Christian cross. Good God, give me a break! The Anti-Defamation league of Philadelphia has filed a complaint with school officials. If the school remains at all as it was when I attended in the early 90's, the shirts will be pulled from the racks very soon.

Sigh.

To Boldly Go Where No College Has Gone Before

2009-07-29T20:18:00.002-04:00

Yes, this is a real bill. It's funding for a technical campus, but they're naming it the Star Fleet Academy, because, well, because they're idiots. The Civitas institute mocks them nicely in this video.

From the Under the Dome blog:

Rep. Earl Jones's bill to provide funding for a technology research center on N.C. A&T State University's campus was a YouTube parody waiting to happen.

Fortunately for all of us, the conservative-leaning Civitas Institute accepted the challenge with a parody video.

Jones' bill would establish "The Star Fleet Academy Complex" on campus. Yes, THAT Star Fleet.
Jones, who co-sponsored the bill in May, said the campus approached him about the idea of creating a world-class technology research center that carried a recognizable brand name.
"Scientists and engineers and people like that, they're pretty straight-laced," Jones said. "It's something that brings attention to the center."

Constitution 101

2009-07-29T19:41:00.001-04:00

A quick Constitutional Law lecture from a veteran. I couldn't embed the video, so PLEASE follow this link

Imagine someone mentioning enumerated powers in this day and age.

The Tide Is High....

2009-07-25T08:45:00.002-04:00

It seems the east coast of the US has been experiencing higher than normal high tides this summer. It's a bit of a mystery to scientists, but what struck me about this news story was that it specifically DID NOT blame global warming! Wow! Hats off to the Raleigh News and Observer. I added the boldface.

Since June, tides have been running from 6 inches to 2 feet above what would normally be expected, even considering seasonal and lunar fluctuations. While local tidal changes are not uncommon, researchers for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration aren't sure they have ever recorded an event like this one, which is showing up all the way from Maine to Florida. In North Carolina, tides have been about a foot above normal predictions.
"Right now we're trying to get a better understanding of what's the cause," said Mike Szabados, director of NOAA's tide and current program in Silver Spring, Md.
Global warming isn't to blame, scientists say, as the rise was too sudden. Possibly, Szabados said, the explanation lies in something called the North Atlantic oscillation, a disturbance in the atmospheric pressure in the area of the North Atlantic Ocean between the Icelandic Low and the Azores High.

A Missing Link Found

2009-05-20T11:19:00.003-04:00

It's a misnomer that there is such a thing as a single missing link. Any gap in the fossil record is a missing link, and there are lots of them. Here, though, is an important find that places a new species at the bottom of the primate family tree.

This is one cool website, too.

Down With Newspeak

2009-05-18T19:29:00.002-04:00

While Peggy Noonan doesn't reference Orwell in her excellent piece at the Wall Street Journal, she very well could have. Noonan is noticing the increasing use of arcane and bizarre government-invented phraseology to explain important policies to the American people. As she points out, it has the effect of making the average citizen tune out the static and ignore something, like health-care reform, that could very well change his or her life. It's dangerous and anti-democratic. Here's the end of Noonan's column:

Do members of the administration speak obscurely because they can't help themselves, or do they speak the way they speak because they really aren't all that keen to have people understand them? Maybe they calculate that lack of clarity ensures maximum ability to maneuver. But maybe they should think less about maneuvering. They're not helping the prevailing sense of national anxiety by speaking in a special lingo all their own. After all, it's not their health-care system they're reforming, it is America's. It would be nice if America were allowed to know what exactly the plan is, and how it would work, and who would pay, and how.

As for the Republicans, the administration is giving them an opening. There could be gain in becoming the party that speaks with concrete honesty, and in a known human language, on the great issues of the day. The GOP could become the party that doesn't make you translate, and doesn't leave you giving up. I wonder if the party right now, for all the battering it's experienced the past few years, is still quick enough to see an opening like this.

Mmmmmmm!!!! Tasty!!

2009-05-18T17:44:00.004-04:00

Looks like the human race started off on the right foot (or hand, or rib), competition-wise. French anthropologists think they may have solved the mystery of what caused humans to survive while Neanderthals died out. Apparently, Neanderthal tastes like chicken. From the UK's Daily Mail Online:

The mysterious disappearance of Neanderthals about 30,000 years ago has baffled scientists for centuries.
But now, according to a leading fossil expert, it seems the race may have met a rather grisly end. They were eaten by our ancestors, the modern humans.
The basis for the claim is the markings on a Neanderthal jawbone found in Les Rois, south-west France during a study conducted by the Journal of Anthropological Sciences.
The cuts to the bone are similar to those left on those of deer and other animals butchered by humans in the Stone Age. It is believed that the flesh was eaten by humans and the teeth used to make a necklace.

Finally, A Sensible Bill

2009-05-13T21:11:00.002-04:00

I HATE snakes. So, i was happy to read this coming from the North Carolina General Assembly. From the News and Observer's Under the Dome blog:

The Senate approved a bill to regulate snakes.
Sen. Ed Jones sponsored the bill at the request of herpetologists to increase the penalties for pet owners who negligently release venomous snakes.

Senate Bill 307 would make it a Class I misdemeanor to improperly transport, let loose or otherwise expose the public to a creatures such as an African Rock Python, a Burmese Python or a Green Anaconda.

Senate Majority Leader Tony Rand wondered if the bill was tough enough.

"Is that sufficient penalty for turning a cobra loose on an innocent population?" he asked Jones.

Jones, a Halifax County Democrat, said that owners would have objected to tougher standards.

Rand, a Fayetteville Democrat, then asked a more personal question.

"If we get a cobra loose in Fayetteville, will you come down there and catch it?" he asked.

"Only if it looks like a worm," Jones replied.

The bill passed 46-0 and now heads to the House.

Mom Cried "Wolf" In Son's Arrest

2009-05-13T19:07:00.002-04:00

My previous post about Ashton Lundeby's arrest under the Patriot turns out to be very flawed. Not only was Ashton charged under long-standing law, he has had access to council and appeared before a judge several times. Mrs. Lundeby, Ashton's Mom, claimed her son was taken into custody under the patriot Act and denied his Constitutional rights. This is not the case.

There is a good Fox News article about the case here.

Patriot Act Problems

2009-05-07T16:59:00.005-04:00

The USA Patriot Act has been used in North Carolina to hold a 16 year-old boy in federal prison without legal representation or habeus corpus. From WRAL News:

Oxford, N.C. — Sixteen-year-old Ashton Lundeby's bedroom in his mother's Granville County home is nothing, if not patriotic. Images of American flags are everywhere – on the bed, on the floor, on the wall.

But according to the United States government, the tenth-grade home-schooler is being held on a criminal complaint that he made a bomb threat from his home on the night of Feb. 15.

Around 10 p.m. on March 5, Lundeby said, armed FBI agents along with three local law enforcement officers stormed her home looking for her son. They handcuffed him and presented her with a search warrant.

Ashton now sits in a juvenile facility in South Bend, Ind. His mother has had little access to him since his arrest. She has gone to her state representatives as well as attorneys, seeking assistance, but, she said, there is nothing she can do.

No one should be surprised that it has come to this. When a government is given power over individuals, it uses it. Always. The Patriot Act was passed in the days after the 9/11 terror attacks and very little heed was given to the damage it did to our Constitutional rights.

I found the saddest part of this story to be this comment from Mrs. Lundeby:

"Never in my worst nightmare did I ever think that it would be my own government that I would have to protect my children from," Lundeby said. "This is the United States, and I feel like I live in a third world country now."

Mrs. Lundeby, all governments are necessary evils, even our own. You should have been taught this in school, but your government runs those. Sorry you had to find this out in such a hard way, but maybe your story will awaken some more people. Let's hope.

This not the first time Americans have faced these problems, and our forefathers told us how to fix them:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

2009-05-06T20:40:00.002-04:00

The crew of a ship trying to journey from England to the top of the Greenland ice cap on a non-carbon emitting boat had to be rescued by an oil tanker. From the BBC:

An expedition team which set sail from Plymouth on a 5,000-mile carbon emission-free trip to Greenland have been rescued by an oil tanker.

The team, which left Mount Batten Marina in Plymouth on 19 April in a boat named the Fleur, aimed to rely on sail, solar and man power on a 580-mile (933km/h) journey to and from the highest point of the Greenland ice cap.

The expedition was followed by up to 40 schools across the UK to promote climate change awareness.

But atrocious weather dogged their journey after 27 April, culminating with the rescue on 1 May after the boat was temporarily capsized three times by the wind.

In one incident Mr Stoddart hit his head and the wind generator and solar panels were ripped from the yacht.

This is proof that there is a God and He's got a sense of humor.

Tracking Stimulus Money in North Carolina

2009-05-03T10:17:00.002-04:00

The North Carolina Capitol Monitor has a useful chart available on their web site showing what stimulus money has been spent in our state, on what, and who was awarded the contract for work. Helpfully, the site also notes potential conflicts of interest by detailing political contributions from those awarded the contracts.

NC State Employees Furloughed

2009-05-02T21:15:00.002-04:00

It's easy to say, "Well, you got what you voted for" to the thousands of North Carolina state employees that face a one half percent annual pay cut to be taken over the next two months, but it wouldn't be helpful.

Yes, state employees are one of the most reliable voting blocks for North Carolina Democrats. And yes, the state has been run by those same Democrats for many years, resulting in the situation we find ourselves in today. The large surpluses the state was running just a few years ago were spent rather than saved and now that the economy in both the state and the nation as a whole has taken a downturn, there isn't enough money coming into the state's coffers to pay for the promises made during the boom times.

That shouldn't be a surprise to anyone, but is it realistic to think that had the Republicans controlled the legislature and/or the governorship they'd have done anything differently? I'd like to say differently, but i think not.

The State of North Carolina, as well as most of the several states and the nation as a whole, has taken on more than it has any realistic chance of paying for, much less doing well.

There are 216 distinct units of North Carolina government listed on the state's web site, and that doesn't include any "boards or commissions" or any of the state colleges or universities. I probably should have counted them, as they both need to be funded, but I wanted to point out the massive responsibilities that the state has taken on for itself. The listings include everything form the absolutely necessary, like the highway patrol and courts, to the ridiculous, like the Bingo Division of the Department of Crime and Public Safety.

If North Carolina, and the United States of America for that matter, wants to survive as a place where individuals can realize their dreams and potentials, it must take a long look at the proper role of government.

Lionfish, It's What's For Dinner

2009-04-28T21:16:00.002-04:00

Lionfish, a poisonous tropical species, have been building in numbers off the North Carolina coast since the early nineties, and now threaten our commercial grouper and snapper stocks. The solution--eat the invaders! They supposedly taste like grouper, so lets have at it.

From the News and Observer:

There are so many lionfish off North Carolina already that scientists don't think it's possible to eliminate them, but hope there may be ways to at least control the population. The researchers are joining forces with sport divers and even culinary instructors from Carteret Community College to see if the critters can be kept in check with spears, nets and tartar sauce.
Lionfish, it turns out, have a sweet, white meat similar to the tasty groupers and snappers they are threatening.
Discovery Diving Co. in Beaufort and Olympus Dive Center in Morehead City are recruiting sport divers for a series of "lionfish rodeos" during the summer dive season, the first May 18-19. Later ones likely will also involve researchers and representatives of the culinary school, said Debby Boyce, owner of Discovery Dive Shop.
The scientists and divers hope to persuade restaurants in the area to start serving lionfish.
"They taste good, and if we can create a food market for them maybe that will not only help keep them in control but maybe take the pressure off some other species," Boyce said.

Happy Birthday Thomas Jefferson

2009-04-13T21:38:00.002-04:00

To celebrate Jefferson's 266th Birthday, here are a few words of wisdom from the man himself

"A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine. "

"A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government."

"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent."

"Books constitute capital. A library book lasts as long as a house, for hundreds of years. It is not, then, an article of mere consumption but fairly of capital, and often in the case of professional men, setting out in life, it is their only capital"

"Every generation needs a new revolution"

"I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive"

"It behooves every man who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others: or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own"

Sic Semper Tyrannis

2009-03-15T20:40:00.003-04:00

Today is the Ides of March, the traditional anniversary of the day, in 44BC, that Julius Caesar was murdered by a group of senators, among them his friend Brutus. Lest we forget that it is the free man's duty to defend freedom, here's a bit of Brutus's speech from Shakespeare:

If there be any in this assembly, any dear friend of
Caesar's, to him I say, that Brutus' love to Caesar
was no less than his. If then that friend demand
why Brutus rose against Caesar, this is my answer:
--Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved
Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living and
die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live
all free men? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him;
as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was
valiant, I honour him: but, as he was ambitious, I
slew him. There is tears for his love; joy for his
fortune; honour for his valour; and death for his
ambition. Who is here so base that would be a
bondman? If any, speak; for him have I offended.
Who is here so rude that would not be a Roman? If
any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so
vile that will not love his country? If any, speak;
for him have I offended. I pause for a reply.

It isn't a far cry from Brutus via Shakespeare to our own founding documents. With the previous quote in mind, read this from the Declaration of Independence:

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident:
That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

The Oldest Known Reference to Robin Hood

2009-03-15T19:59:00.004-04:00

The Hot Air blog has posted a piece on Robin Hood brought on by a newly discovered margin note in a 15th century history text referencing him. The note, written by a monk, refers to Robin Hood as nothing more than a thief and trouble for the law-abiding folks around Sherwood Forest. Here's the passage from the AP story:

An academic says he's found evidence that Britain's legendary outlaw Robin Hood wasn't as popular as folklore suggests.
Julian Luxford says a note discovered in the margins of an ancient history book contains rare criticism of the supposedly benevolent bandit.

According to legend, Robin Hood roamed 13th-century Britain from a base in central England's Sherwood Forest, plundering from the rich to give to the poor.

But Luxford, an art history lecturer at Scotland's University of St. Andrews, says a 23-word inscription in the margins of a history book, written in Latin by a medieval monk around 1460, casts the outlaw as a persistent thief.

"Around this time, according to popular opinion, a certain outlaw named Robin Hood, with his accomplices, infested Sherwood and other law-abiding areas of England with continuous robberies," the note read when translated into English, Luxford said.

Hot Air, and others apparently, are using this passage to suggest that Robin Hood wasn't the man of the common people as he is popularly portrayed. I think a bit of historic perspective may be in order.

Robin Hood has been made famous for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor." That he probably did, but who were the rich in the England of the mid 1300s? They were not capitalists or entrepreneurs who had risked their own wealth to create more. They were landed nobility who had inherited their wealth and land and the attendant political power. The government and the nobles, the rich, were one and the same. They made their income to supplement their inheritance by taxing the serfs who lived on their land and worked it raising food and necessities. In return they offered some physical protection, but it wasn't a good deal for the serf and wasn't optional for him either.

The fact that a monk would bad mouth Robin Hood has been taken by some to suggest that he was just a common thief. The assumption here is that the Church was on the side of the "common man" and is just plain untrue. The Church in England at this time was in large part just as corrupt, greedy and political as the nobility. I'm not suggesting every country priest was evil, but it isn't too far of a stretch to imagine the monk who wrote the newly discovered passage naturally preferring the "law-abiding" peasants who made regular tithes to his church and didn't make waves to a populist robber who stood up to the status quo.

Bi-Partisanship, as it were

2009-03-11T11:24:00.003-04:00

Camille Paglia, a very liberal lesbian feminist Democrat columnist, agrees with yours truly about the Obama administration's attacks on Rush. From Ms. Paglia's Salon.com column:

Case in point: The orchestrated attack on radio host Rush Limbaugh, which has made the White House look like an oafish bunch of drunken frat boys. I returned from carnival in Brazil (more on that shortly) to find the Limbaugh affair in full flower. Has the administration gone mad? This entire fracas was set off by the president himself, who lowered his office by targeting a private citizen by name. Limbaugh had every right to counterattack, which he did with gusto. Why have so many Democrats abandoned the hallowed principle of free speech? Limbaugh, like our own liberal culture hero Lenny Bruce, is a professional commentator who can be as rude and crude as he wants.

Yes, I cringe when Rush plays his "Barack the Magic Negro" satire or when he gratuitously racializes the debate over Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb, who is a constant subject of withering scrutiny for quite different reasons on sports shows here in Philadelphia. On the other hand, I totally agree with Rush about "feminazis," whose amoral tactics and myopic worldview I as a dissident feminist had to battle for decades. As a student of radio and a longtime listener of Rush's show, I have gotten a wealth of pleasure and insight from him over the years. To attack Rush Limbaugh is to attack his audience -- and to intensify the loyalty of his fan base.

Whitehouse vs. Rush

2009-03-10T20:49:00.004-04:00

The New york Times reports that senior Obama advisor David Axelrod ordered the recent White House attacks on Rush Limbaugh. The Sister Toldjah blog asks, "Where's the outrage?"

There should be no outrage. Obama is acting like the rookie he is by using the force of the Presidential bully pulpit against a radio talk show host. Sure Rush is influential, but never more so than after these attacks. If Obama gets Rush's message to just a few more people, we've won this battle. It's a no-win for the administration. If Rush is smeared, they look small. If he comes out looking fine, they look smaller.

Budget In Trouble, For Wrong Reasons

2009-03-10T20:12:00.002-04:00

Obama's huge Omnibus Spending Bill lacks the votes to pass the Senate, say the budget committee's leaders. Don't get too excited though, it's not because it's a bloated pork-o-rama that sells our children and grandchildren into financial slavery.

Nope. The major hurdles are cutting subsidies to farmers making over half a million dollars a year and a lack of "help" for industries negatively affected by the President's new carbon tax/cap-and-trade scheme.

Look for the new and improved bill that passes the Senate to be even more expensive.

Pile o' Pork

2009-03-07T08:47:00.002-05:00

Hot Air has posted a video of Rep. Tom Price plopping down the stack of paper containing all 9,000 earmarks attached to the Omnibus Spending Bill next to the text of the bill itself. The picture is truly worth a thousand words. Check it out.

Smithsonian Magazine Interviews the Night Tripper

2009-03-05T19:58:00.004-05:00

This is a really good talk with a really interesting man. Who would have thought the Smithsonian Institution's magazine would ever print an explanation of why someone would bite the head off a live chicken on stage.

Gris gris, indeed.

"The Sinews of Peace"

2009-03-05T19:25:00.002-05:00

That is the name Sir Winston Churchill gave to the speech that made famous the term "the Iron Curtain." Churchill gave this speech on March 5, 1946, at Westminster College in Fulton Missouri and was introduced by President Harry Truman.

We can still learn today from the wisdom of Churchill. He was one of the most far-sighted politicians of the twentieth century and a lot of bloodshed could have been avoided had his words been headed earlier.

Here's a piece of the beginning of his speech:

The United States stands at this time at the pinnacle of world power. It is a solemn moment for the American Democracy. For with primacy in power is also joined an awe-inspiring accountability to the future. If you look around you, you must feel not only the sense of duty done but also you must feel anxiety lest you fall below the level of achievement. Opportunity is here now, clear and shining for both our countries. To reject it or ignore it or fritter it away will bring upon us all the long reproaches of the after-time. It is necessary that constancy of mind, persistency of purpose, and the grand simplicity of decision shall guide and rule the conduct of the English-speaking peoples in peace as they did in war. We must, and I believe we shall, prove ourselves equal to this severe requirement.
When American military men approach some serious situation they are wont to write at the head of their directive the words "over-all strategic concept." There is wisdom in this, as it leads to clarity of thought. What then is the over-all strategic concept which we should inscribe today? It is nothing less than the safety and welfare, the freedom and progress, of all the homes and families of all the men and women in all the lands. And here I speak particularly of the myriad cottage or apartment homes where the wage-earner strives amid the accidents and difficulties of life to guard his wife and children from privation and bring the family up in the fear of the Lord, or upon ethical conceptions which often play their potent part.
To give security to these countless homes, they must be shielded from the two giant marauders, war and tyranny. We all know the frightful disturbances in which the ordinary family is plunged when the curse of war swoops down upon the bread-winner and those for whom he works and contrives. The awful ruin of Europe, with all its vanished glories, and of large parts of Asia glares us in the eyes. When the designs of wicked men or the aggressive urge of mighty States dissolve over large areas the frame of civilised society, humble folk are confronted with difficulties with which they cannot cope. For them all is distorted, all is broken, even ground to pulp.
When I stand here this quiet afternoon I shudder to visualise what is actually happening to millions now and what is going to happen in this period when famine stalks the earth. None can compute what has been called "the unestimated sum of human pain." Our supreme task and duty is to guard the homes of the common people from the horrors and miseries of another war. We are all agreed on that.
Our American military colleagues, after having proclaimed their "over-all strategic concept" and computed available resources, always proceed to the next step - namely, the method. Here again there is widespread agreement. A world organisation has already been erected for the prime purpose of preventing war, UNO, the successor of the League of Nations, with the decisive addition of the United States and all that that means, is already at work. We must make sure that its work is fruitful, that it is a reality and not a sham, that it is a force for action, and not merely a frothing of words, that it is a true temple of peace in which the shields of many nations can some day be hung up, and not merely a cockpit in a Tower of Babel. Before we cast away the solid assurances of national armaments for self-preservation we must be certain that our temple is built, not upon shifting sands or quagmires, but upon the rock. Anyone can see with his eyes open that our path will be difficult and also long, but if we persevere together as we did in the two world wars - though not, alas, in the interval between them - I cannot doubt that we shall achieve our common purpose in the end.

Here's the whole speech.

Here's audio of Sir Winston Churchill himself speaking of the Iron Curtain.

Frying Pan Light Tower Gets New Life

2009-03-05T15:31:00.002-05:00

Who says private enterprise won't work? The Frying Pan Light Light Tower has been slowly languishing 35 miles off the coast of North Carolina sinc ethe Coast Guard decided it had outlived its usefulness six years ago. Deemed to expensive to clean for artificial reef purposes, the platform rises 125 feet out of the sea and features 5,000 square feet of living space and a helipad.

The structure was put out for bid by the U.S. government in October and yesterday the bid was won by Shipwrecks Inc., based in South Carolina. They plan to use the tower as a base for SCUBA trips, education and research.

Hooray for private enterprise!

Articles of Confederation

2009-03-01T21:11:00.002-05:00

On this date in 1781, two years after the new states won their independence from England, our first governing document, the Articles of Confederation, went into effect. The preamble has none of the eloquence of the Constitution, and the Articles themselves proved too weak and unwieldy, but it is good to understand what held the nation together before the ratification of our Constitution.

Here's a link to the whole document, but I'll pull out two especially interesting articles.

Article VIII basically levies a property tax on the states as a way to fund the central government.

ARTICLE VIII. All charges of war, and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defence or general welfare, and allowed by the United States in Congress assembled, shall be defrayed out of a common treasury, which shall be supplied by the several states, in proportion to the value of all land within each state, granted to or surveyed for any person, as such land and the buildings and improvements thereon shall be estimated according to such mode as the United States in Congress assembled, shall from time to time direct and appoint.

The taxes for paying that proportion shall be laid and levied by the authority and direction of the legislatures of the several states within the time agreed upon by the United States in Congress assembled.

Article XI invites Canada to join our new nation. Wouldn't that have been interesting?

ARTICLE XI. Canada acceding to this Confederation, and joining in the measures of the United States, shall be admitted into, and entitled to all the advantages of this Union: but no other colony shall be admitted into the same, unless such admission be agreed to by nine states.

Maybe They Could Dump Evian

2009-03-01T17:33:00.002-05:00

A report on the Rhymes With Right blog tells of a Tea Party Gone Horribly Wrong. Seems that tea is a pollutant, and the partiers did not acquire the necessary permits to dump said beverage into the Cedar River. From the Des Moines Register:

Tea, although natural and quite tasty, is considered a pollutant that can’t go into a body of water without a permit, said Mike Wade, a senior environmental specialist at the DNR’s Manchester field office.

“Discoloration is considered a violation,” Wade said.

On the one hand, this is just about the most depressing thing I've ever heard. On the other, it sounds like a Monty Python skit.

Haunted Pub

2009-02-28T08:55:00.001-05:00

Who can resist actual video footage of a ghost cowboy walking through a pub in Stoke-on-Trent, England? This is too cool.

No More "Education" Lottery

2009-02-28T08:06:00.002-05:00

That sure didn't take long. Just three years after being sold to the public as a means of raising money for education, the NC lottery has become just another revenue stream. Gov. Perdue announced yesterday her plans to take millions from the lottery fund to shore up the state's budget, which is expected to fall $3 billion in the hole by next year.

No one can say they're surprised by this. Any legislator who expected the state to abide by a "promise" to keep lottery funds directed toward education without putting that requirement into law is a fool.

The lottery is essentially a tax on the stupid, and in as much as one should tax that which one wants less of, it's not a completely bad thing. It would be refreshing to see some politicians be honest about that fact, though.

That's Just Nasty

2009-02-27T20:28:00.001-05:00

The latest in "Green Living"---reusable toilet wipes.

The Sky Is Not Falling

2009-02-27T20:19:00.002-05:00

Victor Davis Hanson tries to put some perspective on our current financial mess. Yes, we are having a tough time, but no, this is not the Great Depression, Part Two. Here's a piece:

Nearly 93 percent of those Americans in the workforce are still employed. The difference between what the banks pay out in interest on depositors' savings and what they charge borrowers for loans is one of the most profitable in recent memory.

For the vast majority of Americans with jobs, the fall in prices for almost everything from food to cars has, in real dollars, meant an actual increase in purchasing power. The loss in value of home equity is serious for those who need to relocate for work or want to downsize and move to an apartment or a retirement community. But when averaged over the last decade, real estate still shows a substantial annual increase in value.
Moreover, the vast majority of American homeowners -- well over 90 percent -- meet their mortgage payments. They have no plans to flip their homes for profit. For them, the fact that they have lost paper equity, or even owe more than their homes are currently appraised at, is scary -- but not equivalent to a depression. Most are confident that after a few years their houses will appreciate again. As for now, working young couples have a chance to buy a house that would have been impossible just two years ago.

The same holds true for many retirement accounts whose decline is terrible for those retirees who count on drawing out each month what they put away or must cash out their depleted accounts at vastly reduced value.

But the majority of working Americans are not yet pulling out their sinking retirement funds. Most are still putting away pre-tax money each month, apparently confident that within a few years their portfolios will return to their former value. Some are even consoled that they are now buying mutual funds at rock-bottom prices rather than investing in sky-high investments at the peak of a bull market.

Starbuck Speaks Out

2009-02-27T16:22:00.002-05:00

Remember Battlestar Galactica, the original, all full of cigar-smoking fighter pilots, a ship's captain borrowed from Bonanza and evil silver robots with a moving red LED for an eye? Well, that cigar-chomping fighter pilot's been retired to Montana to raise his two sons, but is none too happy with the remake of his old show. The "new" Starbuck is a chick. He is not amused. Here's an excerpt from the Big Hollywood blog:

One thing is certain. In the new un-imagined, re-imagined world of “Battlestar Galactica” everything is female driven. The male characters, from Adama on down, are confused, weak and wracked with indecision, while the female characters are decisive, bold, angry as hell, puffing cigars (gasp!) and not about to take it any more.

One can quickly surmise what a problem the original Starbuck created for the re-imaginators. Starbuck was all charm and humor and flirting without an angry bone in his womanizing body. Yes, he was definitely “female driven,” but not in the politically correct ways of Re-imagined Television. What to do, wondered the Re-imaginators? Keep him as he was, with a twinkle in his eye, a stogie in his mouth and a girl in every galaxy? This could not be. He would stick out like, well, like a jock strap in a drawer of thongs. Starbuck refused to be re-imagined. It became the Great Dilemma. How to have your Starbuck and delete him too?
The best minds in the world of un-imagination doubled their intake of Double Soy Latte’s as they gathered in their smoke-free offices to curse the day that this chauvinistic Viper Pilot was allowed to be. But never under-estimate the power of the un-imaginative mind when it encounters an obstacle (character) it subconsciously loathes. ”Re-inspiration” struck. Starbuck would go the way of most men in today’s society. Starbuck would become “Stardoe.” What the Suits of yesteryear had been incapable of doing to Starbuck 25 years ago was accomplished quicker than you can say orchiectomy. Much quicker, as in, “Frak! Gonads Gone!”
And the word went out to all the Suits in all the smoke-free offices throughout the land of Un-imagination, “Starbuck is dead. Long live Stardoe!”
I’m not sure if a cigar in the mouth of Stardoe resonates in the same way it did in the mouth of Starbuck. Perhaps. Perhaps it “resonates” more. Perhaps that’s the point. I’m not sure.

How Education Can Work

2009-02-26T09:13:00.004-05:00

The Carolina Journal has a piece today about Brunswick's County's own charter school, the Roger Bacon Academy. Charter schools in North Carolina are public schools and funded by public money, though at a lower level than a "regular" school. They accept children by lottery and the waiting list, at least for Roger Bacon, can be long.

Not all charter schools work, but the beauty of them is that if they don't, the parents can remove their child, unlike a traditional public school. Charters provide a glimpse of what the education system could be like if the free market were allowed to operate. Some, like Roger Bacon, would be good and parents would fight to get their children enrolled. Some would be bad, and they would fail and close, rather than continue to fail students in perpetuity.

The whole article is worth a read, but here's some excerpts:

Roger Bacon Academy uses the Direct Instruction method, a systematic presentation of “rules, tools, and techniques” rather than the facilitated discovery model popular in the state’s teacher colleges.

“You can take any content, the classical trivium or something nouveau, as long as it’s nested in a behaviorally sound approach to instructional design,” Mitchell said. “Look at the end goal task, break it up into components, teach each subskill to mastery.” Military and industrial training follows this design, “but here, no, no, we take a kindergartner, immerse him in books and expect him to learn how to read.”

RBA’s philosophy is that every child can learn if properly taught. State records say it’s working. Compared to other Brunswick County elementary and middle schools, Charter Day School had 17 percent more students on or above grade level for reading, 29 percent more in math, and 23 percent more succeeding in both subjects. Many RBA students are going into Early College programs next. This occurred while receiving 30 percent less in funding than surrounding schools, Mitchell said

Higher Education

2009-02-25T21:02:00.002-05:00

In his address to congress last night Pres. Obama asked all Americans to pursue some sort of higher education for at least a year.

And so tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training. This can be community college or a four-year school; vocational training or an apprenticeship. But whatever the training may be, every American will need to get more than a high school diploma.

That's all fine and dandy for career training purposes, but if we're going to survive as a free nation, we need a populace educated in the ideas that made us great in the first place.

With that in mind, here's a little reading list to help us all with our higher educations.

Aristotle's Ethics, and Politics

Plato's The Republic

Voltaire's Candide

John Locke's Two Treatises of Government (especially Book Two)

Thomas Jefferson's A Summary View of the Rights of British America, the un-edited Declaration of Independence, the Kentucky Resolution of 1799 and his First Inaugural Address

Thomas Paine's Common Sense, The Crisis, and The Rights of Man

That ought to last us for a while, but there's plenty more where those came from. All of this is available free of charge on the wonderful world wide web. Just click and get educated. Let's do Obama proud.

Semper Fi

2009-02-23T21:16:00.002-05:00

Today is the anniversary of the raising of the American flag at the summit of Iwo Jima's Mount Suribachi.

For a little bit of biography of the men who raised that flag, click here. For an interview with one of the flag raisers click here.

Lincoln's Fingerprint

2009-02-22T20:31:00.002-05:00

This is really cool. From Science Daily:

Lydia Smith, a first-year psychology major from Granville, Ohio, was transcribing a letter written by Lincoln on Oct. 5, 1863, for a class project when she noticed a smudge that she suspected could be the 16th president’s thumbprint. Lincoln historians have confirmed the print.

A student at Miami University has discovered what experts say is a fingerprint belonging to Abraham Lincoln from nearly 150 years ago.

Salvation

2009-02-22T18:07:00.003-05:00

After all the talk of politics and stimulus and bailout and deficits and rich vs. poor, it's easy to lose sight of what really can change the world for the better. It's not going to come from politicians, or pundits or a think-tank, as much as a free people need these things. The salvation of our country and our world will come from the souls of those who seek wisdom and find a way to pass what they find on to the future. Here's the last three stanzas of Alfred Lord Tennyson's The Poet. We need more of them.

And in her raiment's hem was traced in flame
WISDOM, a name to shake
All evil dreams of power--a sacred name. [5]
And when she spake,

Her words did gather thunder as they ran,
And as the lightning to the thunder
Which follows it, riving the spirit of man,
Making earth wonder,

So was their meaning to her words.
No sword
Of wrath her right arm whirl'd, [6]
But one poor poet's scroll, and with 'his' word
She shook the world.

New Constituent Services

2009-02-22T16:15:00.002-05:00

Doug Bandow at the Cato Institute's blog has a post about a new kind of help being sought from elected officials. Seems that people who have been turned down for loans by banks that received federal bail-out money are asking their congress-critters to step in. Talk about the Law of Unintended Consequences rearing its ugly head. How long before this starts the ball rolling once again on the government forcing banks to loan money to people without the means to pay it back. And what bank wouldn't go along, knowing the taxpayers will subsidize their foolishness to the tune of billions of dollars.

We are heading at a scary clip toward nationalization of banks in this country. And it won't end there. Here's Mr. Bandow's conclusion:

On the one hand, this is outrageous. On the other hand, if the taxpayers have to support the banks, why shouldn’t the banks support the taxpayers? The logic is obvious even if the consequences are potentially catastrophic.

It won’t be easy to roll back the federal government’s leap into socialism American-style. But if we don’t halt the federal subsidy express, there might not be much real “free enterprise” left in America when we finish.

Those Who Don't Learn from History...

2009-02-22T16:01:00.003-05:00

Sure it's a cliche, but it fits. The Obama administration is promising to follow up it's spending orgies with an attack on the nation's job producers and wealth makers. A Washington Post article explains the administration's plans to cut the budget deficit by two-thirds by the end of Obama's first (God help us) term. This is the exact recipe that led us into the Great Depression. Starving the private sector of capitol though increased taxes on business and capitol investment, especially at a time when there is no sense of restraint on the size, scope and expense of federal government will lead to massive private sector job loss.

It took a world war to drag us out of FDR's folly. What's going to do it this time?

Another High School Fails The Hope-n-Change Test

2009-02-19T14:12:00.003-05:00

What's become of our education system? First they refuse to name their school after Barack Obama, now we have high schoolers questioning the wisdom of the mortgage bail-out. From the Drudge Report:

Senior Syna Daudfar took some notes during the speech and was among the most vocally opposed to Obama's words. At one point, when he talked about the costs of his stimulus plan, senior Maaike Albach and Daudfar looked at each other and said, "uh-oh." "Overall I think it's a good idea, but he's not addressing the issues of the economic crisis," said Daudfar, a John McCain supporter who added he leans more toward being a moderate conservative. "The spending bill he just passed is just progressing the Democratic agenda rather than addressing the economic issues in the country." Daudfar thinks Obama's plan is backward and deals with the "less important stuff" first. "Bailing out businesses" and "providing better regulatory systems for giving out money to businesses" should have been first, he said. "If businesses can't afford to hire people, then people won't be able to work and pay off their mortgages," he said. "It's kind of like putting money into20a funnel." Albach, who is also a Republican, said Obama's plan sounds good but questioned how Obama can want to rely on "people's responsibility" when that is "what got us in this economic crisis in the first place." "This puts us more into debt," said Albach, 18. "It's a horrible situation we're in."One student even dressed special for the President's visit.Senior Brandon Miller wore a shirt with the words, "Hitler gave great speeches, too" above a picture of Obama. Miller said he had been an Obama supporter "because of his speeches," but after debating the issues in this class and looking more into Obama's policies, his vote was swayed toward McCain.I hope he doesn't wear that to college next year. He'll be brought up on "hate speech" charges.

Tastes Like Chicken

2009-02-19T14:02:00.001-05:00

I guess this shouldn't be funny, but it is. Courtesy of Fox News:

A bird suspected to be extinct was reportedly photographed for the first time in the Philippines, and then sold to a poultry market as food.

Worcester's buttonquail was known only through illustrations based on decades-old museum specimens until a television crew documented the live bird in the market before it was sold in January, NationalGeographic.com reported.

Scientists had suspected the bird, found only on the island of Luzon, to be extinct, according to NationalGeographic.com.

Wild Bird Club of the Philippines President Michael Lu, told the Agence France-Press news agency that it’s unfortunate that the locals aren't more conscious of the threatened wildlife around them.

"What if this was the last of its species?" he said.

Fun New Maps

2009-02-18T16:46:00.003-05:00

The Civitas Institute, always reliable for some good number crunching, has come up with some cool little maps that show the relative partisanship of North Carolina Senate and House districts. You can see how far they lean towards the Democrats or Republicans and also what change there's been in those opinions over time.

Why Didn't We Ask This Guy First?

2009-02-17T22:59:00.002-05:00

A UCLA geography professor thinks he's pinned down the location of Osama bin Laden. He used technology used to track endangered species to draw up an area of probability for Osama's hiding place. Scroll through the article for a look at the most likely building and, helpfully, its exact latitude and longitude.

Happy Presidents' Day

2009-02-16T08:54:00.001-05:00

Here's an interesting discussion on National Review Online about who was our greatest President.

No one picked Obama? Racists!

The "F" Word Rears It's Head

2009-02-15T15:50:00.002-05:00

Michael Ledeen has a column pointing out that the bailout and economic stimulus are not heading us towards socialism. They are classic examples of Facism.

But that’s not socialism. Socialism rests on a firm theoretical bedrock: the abolition of private property. I haven’t heard anyone this side of Barney Frank calling for any such thing. What is happening now–and Newsweek is honest enough to say so down in the body of the article–is an expansion of the state’s role, an increase in public/private joint ventures and partnerships, and much more state regulation of business. Yes, it’s very “European,” and some of the Europeans even call it “social democracy,” but it isn’t.

It’s fascism. Nobody calls it by its proper name, for two basic reasons: first, because “fascism” has long since lost its actual, historical, content; it’s been a pure epithet for many decades. Lots of the people writing about current events like what Obama et. al. are doing, and wouldn’t want to stigmatize it with that “f” epithet.

Second, not one person in a thousand knows what fascist political economy was. Yet during the great economic crisis of the 1930s, fascism was widely regarded as a possible solution, indeed as the only acceptable solution to a spasm that had shaken the entire First World, and beyond. It was hailed as a “third way” between two failed systems (communism and capitalism), retaining the best of each. Private property was preserved, as the role of the state was expanded. This was necessary because the Great Depression was defined as a crisis “of the system,” not just a glitch “in the system.” And so Mussolini created the “Corporate State,” in which, in theory at least, the big national enterprises were entrusted to state ownership (or substantial state ownership) and of course state management. Some of the big “Corporations” lasted a very long time; indeed some have only very recently been privatized, and the state still holds important chunks–so-called “golden shares”–in some of them.

Nassur, the Terroroist Teddy Bear

2009-02-15T15:31:00.002-05:00

Allah be praised, the Palestinians have found a replacement for Assud the Jew-Eating Rabbit on their children's television program, Pioneers of Tomorrow. If you'll remember, Assud was killed by the evil Israelis during the late unpleasantness. Never fear, his replacement, Nassur, is ready to take over the kiddie show Jihad.

"Scotty! I need more power!"

2009-02-15T15:23:00.002-05:00

The Examiner editorializes about one needed infrastructure project that may be getting short shrift in the new trillion dollar stimulus bill. They say our current electricity grid is holding us back and won't be able to handle the needs of a high-tech future.

The current, industrial-age grid is simply not sufficient to power the server-dominated digital workplaces of the future. Without a significant upgrade now, future brownouts will become regular Third Worldly features of daily life in America. Peter Huber, a senior analyst at the Manhattan Institute, estimated that the U.S. could eliminate the need for 70 percent of imported foreign oil simply by electrifying its transportation and heating sectors. Installing new million-volt transmission lines would automatically boost the efficiency of existing power plants by 50 percent, Huber added, because it would allow them to operate round the clock instead of sitting idle half the time.

Covering the nation with 21,000 miles of new high-voltage lines would cost between $50 and $75 billion. Pocket change these days.

Students Stop "Obama High"

2009-02-13T22:15:00.002-05:00

The students of Boulder High School in Colorado have voted down an attempt by a Marxist student group to have their school's name changed to Barack Obama High School. Seems they they haven't gotten the Hope-n-Change message yet.

If the guy carrying the sign in that picture is in the group for any other reason than to find out what's behind that peace sign, I'll eat my shorts.

Senator Gregg Backs Off Commerce Post

2009-02-12T22:25:00.003-05:00

New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg has fallen off the Hope-n-Change Express. His press release announcing his withdraw from consideration for the Commerce Secretary post cites some irreconcilable differences:

“However, it has become apparent during this process that this will not work for me as I have found that on issues such as the stimulus package and the Census there are irresolvable conflicts for me. Prior to accepting this post, we had discussed these and other potential differences, but unfortunately we did not adequately focus on these concerns. We are functioning from a different set of views on many critical items of policy.

Welcome back, Senator.

Maybe They Need A Stimulus, Too?

2009-02-12T22:17:00.002-05:00

It seems the crumbling world economy is hurting the terrorists, too. I blame George Bush.

From CBC News:

A Turkish militant group, which has hundreds of Turkish, Chechen and Uzbek fighters allied to the Taliban, reported that a sharp drop in donations is hampering its fight against NATO soldiers.
The group, based near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, made the revelation on an Islamic website last Friday.
Just as financial support from donors in the Middle East and Turkey has dropped off, prices for ammunition and weapons on the black market are skyrocketing.

My Favorite Governor

2009-02-10T21:40:00.002-05:00

South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford opposes the stimulus in a more sane and reasoned manner than any talking head pundit. Here's a video.

Obama's had three weeks. America elected a black dude President. Can the adults please have the government back now?

The First 21 Days

2009-02-10T21:34:00.003-05:00

Can you believe we've not even lived in Obama-land for a whole month yet? Feelin' the Hope-n-Change already, aren't you? Randall Hoven at American Thinker has a brilliant synopsis of the Dear Leader's first three weeks as Messiah-in-Chief.

Roll Over Thomas Jefferson

2009-02-10T21:22:00.002-05:00

Thomas Jefferson, once claimed as Democrats as the father of their party, must be rolling in his grave. The Senate has added billions of dollars to the bloated pork-o-rama that passed the House last week and one can only guess at how many billions more will be added in conference. Democrats have become the party of FDR, and proud of it. Let's hope their economic fix doesn't lead to another decade-long depression like their hero's.

To give you an idea of what a true classical liberal sounds like, here is a part of Jefferson's Second Inaugural Address:

At home, fellow-citizens, you best know whether we have done well or ill. The suppression of unnecessary offices, of useless establishments and expenses, enabled us to discontinue our internal taxes. These, covering our land with officers and opening our doors to their intrusions, had already begun that process of domiciliary vexation which once entered is scarcely to be restrained from reaching successively every article of property and produce. If among these taxes some minor ones fell which had not been inconvenient, it was because their amount would not have paid the officers who collected them, and because, if they had any merit, the State authorities might adopt them instead of others less approved. 4

The remaining revenue on the consumption of foreign articles is paid chiefly by those who can afford to add foreign luxuries to domestic comforts, being collected on our seaboard and frontiers only, and incorporated with the transactions of our mercantile citizens, it may be the pleasure and the pride of an American to ask, What farmer, what mechanic, what laborer ever sees a taxgatherer of the United States? These contributions enable us to support the current expenses of the Government, to fulfill contracts with foreign nations, to extinguish the native right of soil within our limits, to extend those limits, and to apply such a surplus to our public debts as places at a short day their final redemption, and that redemption once effected the revenue thereby liberated may, by a just repartition of it among the States and a corresponding amendment of the Constitution, be applied in time of peace to rivers, canals, roads, arts, manufactures, education, and other great objects within each State. In time of war, if injustice by ourselves or others must sometimes produce war, increased as the same revenue will be by increased population and consumption, and aided by other resources reserved for that crisis, it may meet within the year all the expenses of the year without encroaching on the rights of future generations by burthening them with the debts of the past. War will then be but a suspension of useful works, and a return to a state of peace, a return to the progress of improvement.

Live Free Or Die, Indeed

2009-02-03T21:11:00.006-05:00

Three state representatives and one state senator in New Hampshire are introducing a bill before their state and federal relations committee that "affirms states' rights based on Jeffersonian principles." They seek a return to Federalism and the recognition of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments of the Bill of Rights. You can read the text of the bill, HCR 0006, at the New Hampshire legislature's website here.

The genius of this is that they've simply re-written the words of one of our Founders. Back in 1798, Kentucky adopted the Kentucky Resolutions as a protest of the Alien and Sedition Acts of the John Adams administration. Though unknown until years later, the resolutions were written by Thomas Jefferson. New Hampshire's bill changes some of the language, removing specific references to the Alien and Sedition Acts and inserting references to the 13th Amendment barring involuntary servitude, but leaves most of Jefferson's arguments untouched.

Here's some of the wording common to both:

That the several States composing the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their General Government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a General Government for special purposes, -- delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force; that to this compact each State acceded as a State, and is an integral party, its co-States forming, as to itself, the other party: that the government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among powers having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress

The New Hampshire bill gives some specific examples of federal over-reaching that will not be allowed:

That any Act by the Congress of the United States, Executive Order of the President of the United States of America or Judicial Order by the Judicatories of the United States of America which assumes a power not delegated to the government of United States of America by the Constitution for the United States of America and which serves to diminish the liberty of the any of the several States or their citizens shall constitute a nullification of the Constitution for the United States of America by the government of the United States of America. Acts which would cause such a nullification include, but are not limited to:

I. Establishing martial law or a state of emergency within one of the States comprising the United States of America without the consent of the legislature of that State.

II. Requiring involuntary servitude, or governmental service other than a draft during a declared war, or pursuant to, or as an alternative to, incarceration after due process of law.

III. Requiring involuntary servitude or governmental service of persons under the age of 18 other than pursuant to, or as an alternative to, incarceration after due process of law.

IV. Surrendering any power delegated or not delegated to any corporation or foreign government.

V. Any act regarding religion; further limitations on freedom of political speech; or further limitations on freedom of the press.
VI. Further infringements on the right to keep and bear arms including prohibitions of type or quantity of arms or ammunition

God Speed to these fellows! I can't wait to hear Democrats arguing against the words of Thomas Jefferson. One hopes the other states are paying attention.

Hope For Change

2009-02-02T19:47:00.003-05:00

Victor Davis Hanson at National Review Online points out the opportunities Obama has s a result of his relationship with the press. He could, Davis argues, get away with some real helpful radical change that would leave the country better off than he found it. But it looks from his first weeks, that he lacks the courage or imagination to be a transformative president.

Here's Hanson's conclusion:

In the next year Obama can continue to run against George Bush and whine about the “mess” that “they” left him as he tries to turn the U.S. economy and government into copies of those in Spain and Greece. He can print money and label as “stimulus” a pork plan that is designed to empower Democratic constituencies at the price of leaving generations to come with decades of debt. He can use his formidable powers of rhetoric to talk of ethical progress while he allows Clintonian ethical regress. He can hope-and-change the world—and learn to his dismay that its thugs take such magnanimity for weakness to be ridiculed and indecision to be exploited. And he can end up a mediocre president who counts on historians to whitewash his presidency just as the media once ensured it.

Or President Obama can decline to be worshiped and instead stop the monstrous borrowing, unsustainable debt, and endless expansion of an increasingly incompetent government. And as solace, he can remember that his idol, Lincoln, was as hated by his contemporaries as he was worshiped by posterity—and that the latter is often predicated on the former.

Congratulations To Michael Steele

2009-01-31T09:28:00.002-05:00

Michael Steele is the new Republican National Committee Chairman and ConservativeNC has his acceptance speech posted.

My favorite bit, "We will cede no ground on matters of principle." Amen.

We've Won

2009-01-31T08:38:00.002-05:00

As Ed Morrissey says on the Hot Air blog this morning, "This is what victory looks like."

Iraqis are voting today in the first provincial elections of the post-Saddam era. Unlike the last two national elections, the minority Sunni community has finally embraced the polls as the best way to promote their interests.

Security has been tight and few mortars have been fired, but all-in-all the vote is going well and the Iraqis seem happy.

This would never have happened if Obama had his way two years ago. The world owes George W. Bush a ton of gratitude, maybe in a few years he'll get it.

Beware of "Localism"

2009-01-31T08:30:00.002-05:00

The Obama administration may think they've found a way to silence talk radio critics without using the "Fairness Doctrine." The Heritage Foundation reports that "localism" may be used to allow local activist groups to prevent radio stations that carry right wing talk radio from renewing their broadcast licenses by claiming they don't serve the "community's needs" as defined by the left wing activist group. All of this could be put in place without a new law, just by changing the interpretation of licensing guidelines at the FCC.

Ernest Hemingway's Cuban Papers Now Available

2009-01-29T21:10:00.003-05:00

A complete collection of copies of papers from Ernest Hemingway's Finca Vigia estate outside Havana are now available at the JFK Library in Massachusetts, thanks to an agreement brokered by Rep James McGovern. Sounds really cool.

From the AP:

The archival replicas include corrected proofs of "The Old Man and the Sea," a movie script based on the novel, an alternate ending to "For Whom the Bell Tolls" and thousands of letters, with correspondence from authors Sinclair Lewis and John Dos Passos and actress Ingrid Bergman. The documents were previewed Thursday and will likely be available to researchers in late spring.

Ben Stein on the Stimulus Bill

2009-01-29T21:00:00.002-05:00

Ben Stein has an article in the American Spectator bemoaning the mess that is the 680-page Stimulus Bill. If you wanted to put the money in the hands of those who need it most, here's an idea:

For the amount spent we could have given every unemployed person in the United States roughly $75,000.

We could give every person who had lost a job and is now passing through long-term unemployment of six months or longer roughly $300,000.

The whole article is great. Lets hope the Senate can stop this boondoggle.

Dangerously Naive

2009-01-28T20:18:00.002-05:00

President Obama gave his first television interview to an Arab network. OK, fine, I can see the attempt to reach out, to capitalize on his Muslim roots, but he's going to lead us into trouble. Obama is naive to the point of being ridiculously idealistic. He truly thinks his powers of persuasion can make all the world see us as friends. There are quite a few out there who don't have any desire to be our friends. They'll see Obama as weak, as a result, see the United States as a ripe target once again.

Talk may be cheap, but it can also be dangerous on the world stage. Better to be denigrated as a "cowboy" by effete Europeans than to be seen as weak by vicious, uncivilized madmen.

House Republicans Grew Spines

2009-01-28T20:06:00.004-05:00

Maybe they learned a lesson from the last election. Maybe they pay more attention to Rush Limbaugh than the President would like, but all 177 House Republicans voted against Obama's Stimulus bill.

That took courage and conviction. They were, in fact, joined by eleven Democrats, making opposition to the bill bi-partisan. Think we'll hear one reporter refer to the "bipartisan opposition?" Me neither.

The Wall Street Journal has a great explanation of what this pork-fest contains.

On to the Senate!

Making Sense of the Stimulus Debate

2009-01-25T09:53:00.002-05:00

Forbes.com has a very good article by Bruce Bartlett explaining the history of economists' thinking of economic stimulus from the 1920's onward. The whole article is great, but here's the conclusion:

Thus the argument really boils down to a question of timing. In the short run, the case for stimulus is overwhelming. But in the longer run, we can't enrich ourselves by borrowing and printing money. That just causes inflation.
The trick is to front-load the stimulus as much as possible while putting in place policies that will tighten both fiscal and monetary policy next year. As terrible as our economic crisis is right now, we don't want to repeat the errors of the past and set off a new round of stagflation.
For this reason, I think there is a better case for stimulating the economy through tax policy than has been made. Congress can change incentives instantly by, for example, saying that new investments in machinery and equipment made after today would qualify for a 10% Investment Tax Credit, and this measure would be in effect only for investments largely completed this year. Businesses will start placing orders tomorrow. By contrast, it will take many months before spending on public works begins to flow through the economy, and it is very hard to stop it when the economy turns around.
Stimulus based on private investment also has the added virtue of establishing a foundation for future growth, whereas consumption spending does not. As economist Hal Varian of the University of California at Berkeley recently put it, "Private investment is what makes possible future increases in production and consumption. Investment tax credits or other subsidies for private sector investment are not as politically appealing as tax cuts for consumers or increases in government expenditure. But if private investment doesn't increase, where will the extra consumption come from in the future?"

Basically, the program before congress is pretty backwards, putting to little money into the economy now and wasting valuable resources in the near future. Let's hope the Republicans in congress can force a little sense into this headlong rush.

Good Advice

2009-01-24T18:22:00.003-05:00

Yep, Pres. Obama's right on this one. The New York Post reports his advice to Republicans:

WASHINGTON -- President Obama warned Republicans on Capitol Hill today that they need to quit listening to radio king Rush Limbaugh if they want to get along with Democrats and the new administration.

"You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done," he told top GOP leaders, whom he had invited to the White House to discuss his nearly $1 trillion stimulus package.

He's exactly right. If you want to bankrupt your children and your children's children by poring trillions of dollars of pork-barrel money into the hands of a gigantic government Leviathan, you'd better not listen to Rush. If you want Democrat control of the federal and state governments for the foreseeable future, turn off the EIB Network now. If you plan on becoming yet another Drone For Obama, you're better off watch MSNBC than listening to El Rushbo.

Sadly, many of our elected Republicans, led by our last Presidential candidate, are heeding Obama's words.

He Should Have Surrendered

2009-01-22T05:45:00.002-05:00

You just can't make this stuff up. The former President of France was hospitalized after being attacked by his little foo-foo doggie. From The Daily Mail:

Former French president Jacques Chirac was rushed to hospital after being mauled by his own 'clinically depressed' pet dog.
The 76-year-old statesman was savaged by his white Maltese dog - which suffers from frenzied fits and is being treated with anti-depressants.
The animal, named Sumo, had become increasingly violent over the past years and was prone to making 'vicious, unprovoked attacks', Chirac's wife Bernadette said.

Do-Over

2009-01-22T05:35:00.002-05:00

Breathe easy. In his first major act to save the nation from disaster, President Obama re-took the oath of office yesterday, thus preventing the possibility of a President Biden, or God forbid Pelosi. Thanks, Barry!

Snow On Oak Island

2009-01-20T18:08:00.002-05:00

We had some rare snow on our little island today. Here's a video to commemorate the event.

The Inaugural Speech

2009-01-20T14:43:00.004-05:00

The full text of President Obama's Inaugural Address is here, at the Washington Post. Sorry if I've not gotten in the spirit of this "historic occasion," but I was not impressed. Here's a few excerpts and comments.

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and cooperation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

Ok, so far so good. A throw back to Jefferson's first inaugural and a mention of "founding documents," if not the Constitution by name.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land - a nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America - they will be met.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

This is where I have some problems. First off, lets be honest. Yes, we are in a recession, but there are no soup lines, gas lines or cities of families huddled around barrel fires under highway over-passes. Our nation is safe, the poor have air conditioning and cable TV and our people would be a lot more optimistic if they stopped hearing "The End Is Nigh!!!" every time they turned on their televisions. Methinks our new President wants to lower expectations by exaggerating the troubles of the nation he inherited.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labor, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and traveled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and plowed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn.

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

Leaving aside the soldiers, who probably did fight as much for their children and possible children as to keep the man next to them alive, this is clap-trap. Our ancestors did what they did to make a better life for themselves. Not to get to Ayn Rand about it, but we have railroads not because someone thought his great grandchildren would like them, but because a greedy robber baron wanted to further his own wealth by building a monopoly.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

The "stale political arguments" will always apply. Personal freedom is the enemy of a powerful central government, and vice versa. They can not coexist. When one grows stronger, the other fades. We "cynics" will not give up the fight for personal freedom in the name of "common purpose."

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals.

This is insulting to the people who have fought day and night behind the scenes to keep us safe. I can only hope Pres. Obama was only throwing his more wacko supporters a bone.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Amen. Well said.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - hard work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

Mr. President, most of us have never left these "old truths." Most of us love our country no matter who is in charge. We've just said goodbye to the finest example of a President willing to do that which is right no matter the personal consequences. Anyone who refuses to recognize that, who's patriotism depends on partisanship, is truly the "sunshine patriot" that Thomas Paine was so dismissive of.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

"Let it be told to the future world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]."

America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

A fine ending, with the words of Thomas Paine as read by George Washington. Let's pray our new President truly understands their spirit and tries to live up to it.

A Point of Comparison

2009-01-19T22:12:00.003-05:00

Before you watch the new President give his inaugural address, please give this one a read. Thomas Jefferson took office after watching those who helped write the Constitution all but tear it to shreds. Federal power was overshadowing the states, the Alien and Sedition Acts had eviscerated the First Amendment and Alexander Hamilton and his moneyed New England friends appeared ready to install a new Aristocracy. Jefferson stood against this, and for a return to individual rights and the rule of law as embodied in the Constitution.

This country is strong, and no one leader can tear us away from our heritage if we don't allow it. After the Age of Obama, we'll find our Jefferson to put things to rights.

Read this, and you'll be amazed how much applies to today. Let's see if the Constitution gets even one mention in the former constitutional law professor's speech.

Friends and Fellow-Citizens: CALLED upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of our country, I avail myself of the presence of that portion of my fellow-citizens which is here assembled to express my grateful thanks for the favor with which they have been pleased to look toward me, to declare a sincere consciousness that the task is above my talents, and that I approach it with those anxious and awful presentiments which the greatness of the charge and the weakness of my powers so justly inspire. A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land, traversing all the seas with the rich productions of their industry, engaged in commerce with nations who feel power and forget right, advancing rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye—when I contemplate these transcendent objects, and see the honor, the happiness, and the hopes of this beloved country committed to the issue, and the auspices of this day, I shrink from the contemplation, and humble myself before the magnitude of the undertaking. Utterly, indeed, should I despair did not the presence of many whom I here see remind me that in the other high authorities provided by our Constitution I shall find resources of wisdom, of virtue, and of zeal on which to rely under all difficulties. To you, then, gentlemen, who are charged with the sovereign functions of legislation, and to those associated with you, I look with encouragement for that guidance and support which may enable us to steer with safety the vessel in which we are all embarked amidst the conflicting elements of a troubled world.	1
During the contest of opinion through which we have passed the animation of discussions and of exertions has sometimes worn an aspect which might impose on strangers unused to think freely and to speak and to write what they think; but this being now decided by the voice of the nation, announced according to the rules of the Constitution, all will, of course, arrange themselves under the will of the law, and unite in common efforts for the common good. All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression. Let us, then, fellow-citizens, unite with one heart and one mind. Let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things. And let us reflect that, having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions. During the throes and convulsions of the ancient world, during the agonizing spasms of infuriated man, seeking through blood and slaughter his long-lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the agitation of the billows should reach even this distant and peaceful shore; that this should be more felt and feared by some and less by others, and should divide opinions as to measures of safety. But every difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists. If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it. I know, indeed, that some honest men fear that a republican government can not be strong, that this Government is not strong enough; but would the honest patriot, in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free and firm on the theoretic and visionary fear that this Government, the world's best hope, may by possibility want energy to preserve itself? I trust not. I believe this, on the contrary, the strongest Government on earth. I believe it the only one where every man, at the call of the law, would fly to the standard of the law, and would meet invasions of the public order as his own personal concern. Sometimes it is said that man can not be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the forms of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.	2
Let us, then, with courage and confidence pursue our own Federal and Republican principles, our attachment to union and representative government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the exterminating havoc of one quarter of the globe; too high-minded to endure the degradations of the others; possessing a chosen country, with room enough for our descendants to the thousandth and thousandth generation; entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquisitions of our own industry, to honor and confidence from our fellow-citizens, resulting not from birth, but from our actions and their sense of them; enlightened by a benign religion, professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of them inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man; acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all its dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here and his greater happiness hereafter—with all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and a prosperous people? Still one thing more, fellow-citizens—a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities.	3
About to enter, fellow-citizens, on the exercise of duties which comprehend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and consequently those which ought to shape its Administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against antirepublican tendencies; the preservation of the General Government in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the people—a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism; a well disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burthened; the honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason; freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages and blood of our heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety.	4
I repair, then, fellow-citizens, to the post you have assigned me. With experience enough in subordinate offices to have seen the difficulties of this the greatest of all, I have learnt to expect that it will rarely fall to the lot of imperfect man to retire from this station with the reputation and the favor which bring him into it. Without pretensions to that high confidence you reposed in our first and greatest revolutionary character, whose preeminent services had entitled him to the first place in his country's love and destined for him the fairest page in the volume of faithful history, I ask so much confidence only as may give firmness and effect to the legal administration of your affairs. I shall often go wrong through defect of judgment. When right, I shall often be thought wrong by those whose positions will not command a view of the whole ground. I ask your indulgence for my own errors, which will never be intentional, and your support against the errors of others, who may condemn what they would not if seen in all its parts. The approbation implied by your suffrage is a great consolation to me for the past, and my future solicitude will be to retain the good opinion of those who have bestowed it in advance, to conciliate that of others by doing them all the good in my power, and to be instrumental to the happiness and freedom of all.	5
Relying, then, on the patronage of your good will, I advance with obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become sensible how much better choice it is in your power to make. And may that Infinite Power which rules the destinies of the universe lead our councils to what is best, and give them a favorable issue for your peace and prosperity.

Edgar Allan Poe at 200

2009-01-19T21:59:00.002-05:00

Today would have been Poe's 200th birthday. The Wall Street Journal has a nice piece reflecting on his work. Here's some:

Praise for Poe is by no means universal. The reviews always have been mixed, even on large questions about his legacy. "Enthusiasm for Poe is the mark of a decidedly primitive stage of reflection," sniffed Henry James.

Yet there can be no doubt that Poe left a deep mark on literature. He invented both the detective story ("The Murders in the Rue Morgue") and the sequel to the detective story ("The Mystery of Marie Roget" and "The Purloined Letter"). An attraction to new technologies and cutting-edge ideas such as hot-air balloons, mesmerism, and cryptography made him a pioneer of science fiction. He could be a savage critic: "I intend to put up with nothing I can put down," he boasted.

Most important, Poe reshaped the horror story into a tool for probing the darkest corners of human psychology and his own disturbing obsession with death. Early detractors failed to share his vision and accused him of merely aping Gothic thrillers penned by German authors. Poe would have none of it: "I maintain that terror is not of Germany, but of the soul -- that I have deduced this terror only from its legitimate sources, and urged it only to its legitimate results," he replied, in a line that neatly sums up his philosophy of fiction.

O Canada

2009-01-19T15:44:00.002-05:00

Our neighbors to the north get two big thumbs up. First, they deport AWOL US soldiers running from Iraq war service. Now they've denied Bill Ayers entry into the country.

I guess Ayers won't be getting that Canadian Ambassador job, huh?

What An Honor

2009-01-15T14:24:00.003-05:00

North Carolina has four of the 20 most gerrymandered congressional districts in the nation, as picked by Slate magazine.

I'm so proud.

Aaaarrrhhhhh!!!!! Australian Booty!

2009-01-15T14:14:00.003-05:00

A new Royal Australian Navy submarine commander has suggested booty as a recruitment tool for the service.

A NEWLY appointed Australian Navy submarine commander is in hot water for suggesting that women sailors wearing bikinis might help to boost recruitment.

Asked by the magazine "if female sailors all had to be hot and had to wear bikinis, would that help recruitment?", Commander Phillips is quoted as responding: "It would certainly get the right demographic of young men in. I'm not sure how feasible it is, however."

The Federal Opposition and feminists have called for action over the article and Minister for Defence Warren Snowden has described the comments as "utterly unacceptable".

Mr Snowden said they did not reflect "new generation Navy" and has called for an urgent review into the criteria for media approvals to ensure interviews "match the values of the ADF".

Just In Time

2009-01-15T13:48:00.002-05:00

According to the Institute For Liberty, Obama's inaugaration festivities will produce CO2 emissions that would take the average household 57,598 years to equal. With temperatures falling like a rock all over the East coast this weekend, the resultant rise in global temperatures will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks, Prez!!!