Democrat party spokesmouth Debbie Whatshername Schultz declared the GOP presidential field "shockingly deficient," the other day. All I could think of was, "yeah, and so is the Democrat presidential field."
Occupy Free Stuff!
James Taranto wrote a piece in the Wall Street Journal about OWS entitled, What Anarchy Looks Like.
It's not a good idea to feed wild animals. "Coffee cart owner Linda Jenson and hot dog cart operators Letty and Pete Soto said they initially provided free food and drink to demonstrators" at San Diego's Obamaville encampment, reports Los Angeles's KNX-AM. "But when they stopped, the protesters became violent"
The KNX link describes how the feral pigs stole from them and vandalized their carts with blood, urine and graffiti. Now they are receiving death threats. Good citizens of San Diego are having a fundraiser to help them, but business owners around the nation are having similar experiences with OWS people.
This reminded me of a video I saw a few years back about illegal immigration. I don't quite get so worked up on the subject as this guy, but it is funny (F-bomb alert!). Reading the Taranto piece reminded me of this video. I think it applies more to the self-entitled moochers and freeloaders squatting in Occupy encampments across America. At least the illegal immigrants are working...
I should have the following posted on my masthead: A freewheeling blog where the comments are better than the posts that inspire them!
This is not false humility or a backhanded search for compliments, and I’m not trying to curry favor. I really mean it.
Some excellent debate goes on here, and we are fortunate for the diversity provided by the likes of Jez, Ducky and Jersey, who enter this arena unafraid to duke it out with the conservatives, libertarians and the dreaded tea partiers. I also appreciate people like Jack Camwell and the ever-garrulous FreeThinke, who stake out their own brand of conservatism and give no quarter. Of course, my favorites are those like Z, AOW, Conservativesonfire and MK who agree with me, but that goes without saying…
Anyway, here are just a few of my favorite comments over the past few weeks. As usual, Professor Bastiatarian leads the way.
Bastiatarian: Each time a liberal/Democrat/leftist/collectivist/progressive blurts out the charge of "RACIST!" I interpret it as that individual saying "Hello, I'm a complete moron. I engage in absolutely no intellectual activity whatsoever. Instead, I emote and repeat the idiocy that I hear spewed out by other imbeciles in my liberal/Democrat/leftist/collectivist/progressive emo club."
As for the moron in the White House, he's as much white as he is black, for one thing. Second, the reason I want him to fail and ultimately be eradicated from any position in which he has any effect on anything at all is not that he is half non-white, but that he is an incompetent buffoon, a genuinely bad person, and an enemy of everything that is important to decent, intelligent people around the world.
When it comes right down to it, the so-called liberals are merely projecting. They don't have the intelligence or integrity to avoid racist thought (or even realize that "race" itself is a pseudo-scientific concept), so they believe that everybody is as depraved and malicious as they are. (http://westernhero.blogspot.com/2011/08/its-because-hes-black.html)
Finally, here is a YouTube sent to me by Mustang as his own response to my Friday post about government welfare programs. If this doesn't doesn't piss you off I don't know what will. And why are we giving taxpayer money away to able bodied young adults?
Beauty is all around us, all you have to do is look for it
I see beauty every Sunday in church. A family of middle aged siblings and their spouses lovingly help their aged and frail parents get seated, and then help then down the aisle and back for communion. They've got a system of getting the wheel chair for mom and bringing it around, helping dad with his cane, but not too much, and getting the chair folded up and everybody back seated in their pews.
There's beauty in children singing and playing, unencumbered by the cares of the day, happy in their own fantasy worlds that one will be lost to them forever...
I know many of us struggle to see that beauty, in ourselves, in others, in our country. Unending wars, crushing debt, shouting and anger... We're broke. Financially, but not yet spiritually, but we are close.
Our salvation won't come from DC republicans or democrats. It will have to come from us. From our families and our communities.
Fuzzy Slippers posted a video yesterday that made me cry, and I wasn't even drunk at the time. The people of Grand Rapids Michigan produced a video of them and their city to the tune of Don McLean's American Pie. It is an awesome display of civic pride and it's a beautiful slice of America. Optimistic, happy, but humble.
These are people who cannot be broken. This is America
America is being crushed by the nationalization of everything and the inevitable partisan clashes that go with it. National politics now poisons every corner of our lives. It is embittering us and pitting us against one another.
Local efforts used to take on their own local flavor, most often non-partisan, or at least without the screaming ideological anger we see now. In that video are democrats, republicans, conservatives, liberals, moderates, people of various religions and beliefs, human beings.
We lost our innocence on 9/11. We became hard and angry, and we turned it on our enemies in righteous vengeance. But we also turned it on ourselves, and we ceded too much to an overweening federal government, forgetting how to do for ourselves and our neighbors.
We've lost it, but we can get it back.
* - Big H/T to Fuzzy Slippers I apologize for stealing your idea, Fuzzy, but this really struck a chord with me
A naive little Denver University freshman dimwit took the bold and original step of calling me a racist in a post over at Sue's Place. To the credit of Sue and her regulars, they just ignored it and pressed on.
Here is how I handled it:
Oh No! You've called me a racist! Great Godwin's Law! How original. Racist is the new fascist among lobotomized lefties left stuttering when confronted with their own illogic.
As my blogger buddies know, I was never a "birther," but I didn't poo poo those who were. The problem I have is with those on the fringe who dream of an Obama Exposed! Frog marched out of the White House to his and the Democratic party's great shame, and every piece of legislation he signed instantly repealed. Ain't. Gonna. Happen.
Finding an inconsistency with birth documents or some other funny business would not bring an immediate end to his presidency, nor would it lead to the immediate repeal of any laws. I think this is a low-percentage approach. Sure, let the investigators dig, but this is not a political strategy.
A Few Thought Now That The Birth Certificate Has Been Released
* Donald Trump is full of crap. Remember a few days ago when he told us the birth certificate was missing, and according to his investigators on the ground it didn't look good for Obama? All of you naive Trump chumps were played by The Donald, who was a registered democrat in New York during the tenure of Rudy Giuliani and George Pataki.
* Lt Col Terry Lakin sits in Leavenworth for refusing a deployment order because he challenged President Obama's status as commander in chief based upon the absence of a birth certificate. This president, who dispatches his wife to pretend they care about military families, allowed this good soldier and doctor to be court martialed when he could have simply done what he did this past Wednesday. Obama is a petty man wielding way too much power.
* This will not satisfy the "Birthers." No evidence can appease people who believe in conspiracies.
Anyway, I listen to Peter Boyles on KHOW on my morning drive to work, and he really pounds the Obama birth thing. It's too much for my taste, but he posted this on his website before the birth certificate was unveiled, and I think it's hilarious, made more so by the text to voice technique and the stock phrase talking points and buzz words.
Despite being a bluegrass picker, I was a Kiss fan as a kid, probably because it really upset my parents...
Fast forward 10 years or so to dusty southern New Mexico, where I was invited to join a country-rock band because the lead singer/rhythm guitar player was on the run from the law and they needed someone to fill in...
The Kiss tribute CD Kiss My Ass: Classic Kiss Regrooved was released with a mystery singer doing a freakin' awesome version of Hard Luck Woman. I recognized that it was Garth Brooks immediately and almost went crazy. My band mates would not let me do it on stage; our crowds were too traditional. My Bob Seger renditions were about as edgy as we got.
Anyway, here it is, a classic rock ballad redone: Paul Stanley, Ace Frehley*, Gene Simmons, and Peter Criss* on drums, with ... Garth Brooks on vocals. It's a great example of how genre really doesn't matter. Good music is good music. I love the acoustic guitar riffs...
Endnote: Wikipedia reports that Giuliano Palma & The Bluebeaters did a cover version on their 2005 album "Long Playing". Ain't the innerwebz just full of useful tidbits?
* Update from Bastiatarian: Ace Frehley and Peter Criss aren't in this one. "I think that's Eric Singer on drums and Bruce Kulick on guitar. (They were in the band in 1994.)"
