What Have We Learned?

So, what have we learned in the last month? Let's review:

1. Gender is a choice.
2. Race is a choice.
3. Health insurance is NOT a choice.
4. Marriage equality here to stay.
5. Conscientious objection is on the chopping block.
6. Flags kill people and are bad for business.
7. President Obama can sing "Amazing Grace"...okay maybe not. But props for trying.

What have we not learned?

1. Anything.

What will change?

1. Nothing.

Okay, I know things are not quite that bleak. But here's something useful from the world of science. Scientists have determined that looking at videos of cute kittens is good for your well-being and makes you more productive. Sooo...



The floor is open.

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The End of the Gay Movement

“What do gay men have in common when they don’t have oppression?” asked Andrew Sullivan, one of the intellectual architects of the marriage movement. “I don’t know the answer to that yet.”

Told you.

When the gay marriage issue hit Friday and talk radio land was talking about the end of the world and setting themselves on fire, I made a couple points in the comments. The most important point was that this ruling would be a disaster for the left. Right now, the American voting public is divided 50/50 on elections. The Republicans have claimed most white males and many older white females. The Democrats have put together a grievance coalition of everyone else. The problem with the Democratic coalition, as I've pointed out before, is that it's unstable because they don't share a common ideology. All they have together is a desire to get their pet peeves put into law over the objections of Team GOP.

That means that blacks (the race lobby actually) don't care if women/feminists get what they want or not, they are just using feminists as voting power to get their spoils, e.g. proportional voting, affirmative action, reparations, and ultimately a much larger share of what they see as a zero-sum game economic pie. Feminists, in turn, don't care about blacks or Hispanics or atheists. They want an ERA and for men to be just as weepy and pathetic as they are. Atheists couldn't give a crap about blacks or unions. They want you dumbasses who believe in God to be forced to drop your stupid superstition and this God thing removed from history. Environmentalists don't really care about these other fools because they just want them all exterminated so glorious nature can be free of man. And gays... well, gays don't care about anyone but themselves.

And that is the problem.

That is why the Democrats have for decades now been very careful to never actually give their alliance partners what they want. Indeed, ask yourself why not a single partner got what they wanted when the Democrats held a super-majority in the Senate? The Democrats had absolute control over ever lever of power. They could have passed anything and everything they wanted for over two years.... a carbon tax (or ban), the equal rights amendment, enhanced voting power for minorities, reparations, gay marriage, equal protection for gays, amnesty for illegal aliens, an end to right-to-work laws, and so on. It was all there for the taking. And what did the Democrats do? They freaked out. They started blabbering about how they needed Republican support to somethingsomething and they went to work on passing an Obamacare law that ultimately looked like it came out of the Heritage Foundation circa 1992 as everyone except a couple Senate Democrats went into hiding.

Not a single Democratic wish list item was even voted on.

And this was no accident. The Democrats know that if any one of their constituent groups gets what they want, they no longer have any reason to hang out with the loser club because they just don't care about the other interests. In fact, the interests of the others often conflict with their own. Blacks are deeply religious, and hate the goals of the atheists. Blacks and women are in direct competition for affirmative action jobs, and blacks and Hispanics are notoriously enemies in inner cities, where they compete for the same jobs. Unions and environmentalists are directly opposed in their goals as well. Gay males tend to be wealthy entrepreneurs, tech employees or managers in Fortune 500 companies or government. They are much richer as a class than regular folk and their economic lives are not compatible with unions. And so on.

The Democrats know this, so while they will go full retard in their rhetorical support of these groups, they won't ever actually give them what they want because they can't afford to lose them. The Supreme Court ruling has in essence given gays everything they want. Within a year, laws will be finalized in every state giving them marriage rights, adoption rights, and equal-rights protection. There is nothing more they can want and, hence, nothing to hold them together. To repeat Andrew Sullivan's quote: “What do gay men have in common when they don’t have oppression? I don’t know the answer to that yet.”

The answer is nothing. The gay movement will evaporate and gays will drop out of the coalition. Some liberals will stay. Some libertarian gays will switch sides. The ones raising families will become conservative. And many more will simply go back to clubbing and forget politics entirely. Right now, gays make up about 3% of the population, but they vote in strong numbers. That gives them maybe a 4% punch in the elections... all for the Democrats. Imagine if gays just go back to normal voting levels and 1% of the 3% simply drop out. Now imagine if another third (1%) switch to the Republicans. Suddenly, Republican totals go up 1% and Democratic totals go down 2%. That's a 3% point swing in a 50/50 electorate to 48/51! That represents a permanent run of Republican presidents, a new natural Republican majority in the Senate, and continued Republican dominance in the House.

That is the problem for the Democrats right now.

That is what Sullivan suddenly senses, and what his comment foretells. And he's not alone. Film director and professional homosexual John Waters hinted at the same in a graduation speech at the Rhode Island School of Design: “Refuse to isolate yourself. Separatism is for losers. Gay is not enough anymore.” In other words, please don't go away, please find something other than gay rights to hold the gay movement together. Good luck with that.

Making this harder, I also saw an interesting article in which several gay sociologists noted that gays are not a strong identity groups like blacks or Jews because they aren't born into gay families, they can't be identified just by appearance, and they don't have any holidays or generational traditions that bind them together. Really, oppression was all they had. Heck, have you ever seen what happens when you put gay men and lesbians in the same room? You could power a city off the hate that oozes out of them. Their movement is at an end. The enemy of their enemy has surrendered. The party is over.

Many articles are being written about this on the left. Some are even calling the Supreme Court's ruling "a secret gift to the Republicans." That might just be right.

Thoughts?

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Kit's Friday Thoughts: Civil Asset Forfeiture, Current Iraq War Name, and Around the World!

By Kit

It doesn’t seem like it but it has actually been a very slow news week. Given the shooting, the ensuing Confederate flag controversy, and the Pope’s Laudato Si it seems big. But those have been the only big news stories this week and we’ve pretty much covered them to the point that I’m sure you are all sick of them.

So, instead I talk about why the Republicans will not act against Civil Asset Forfeiture (though they should), what do we call the current war involving ISIS, and a series of links catching you up on some foreign affairs you might have missed, starting with one of the weirdest stories out of Russia.

Why Republicans Will Not Repeal Civil Asset Forfeiture

Quite a few conservative groups are calling for the government repeal or at least roll back Civil Asset Forfeiture. It has evolved into something that basically allows law enforcement to seize property on little more than the suspicion that it might be used in criminal activity and use said property finance themselves. Anyone with a basic understanding of human nature can see the danger inherent in such a system. Police are abusing it to increase the funds of the department.

Most conservatives have called it blatantly unconstitutional.

Freedomworks and last year the Heritage Foundation held a panel attacking it.

Yet don’t expect most Republicans to push against it.

Yes, Mike Lee wants it to be reformed but the moment a fight begins over repeal expect an army of police unions, prosecutors, and department representatives to come out and call it a “necessary and important tool for law enforcement” and without it there would be chaos on the streets with drugs flowing like Molasses flowed through the streets of Boston in 1919.

And the Republican Party will buy it. Hook, line, and sinker.


What Should We Call the Current Iraq War?

Really, that is something I want to know!

Wikipedia calls it “Iraq War (2014—Present)” but I don’t think that works as a name for a war. I don’t want to go around saying, “Iraq War Twenty-fourteen to Present” every time I discuss it.

So, what do we call it?

The 3rd Iraq War? The 2nd Iraq War? The ISIS War? The ISIL War? The Daesh War?

I honestly prefer the last one. Even though Daesh is nearly impossible for English speakers to pronounce. It’s used by a lot of anti-ISIS fighters, it’s the Arabic acronym for ISIS/ISIL, and, DAMMIT, the show Archer deserves better than to be associated with a bunch of medieval barbarians!
Also, "ISIS War" and “ISIL War” just don’t roll off the tongue as easily as “Daesh War”. At least for me.

“DANGAH ZONE!”


Miscellaneous

The Russians can apparently read minds. We must stop the Mind Reading Gap! Ok, I kid. It was a statement made by a nutty Russian general but it actually has some real ramifications. He claimed that not only did they read Madeline Albright’s mind but that she also believed that "Russia should not exist as a state at all" and that Siberia should not belong to Russia.
Now, you may be asking, so what?
Well, Russian politicians (including Putin) love to throw around those “comments” by Albright about Siberia to incite anti-American sentiment and “prove” that America secretly wants to destroy Russia—never mentioning that only the source is a nutty Russian general. And Russians believe it.
LINK

Pro-EU parties win big in Moldovan local elections. Another pushback against Putin’s hyper-aggressive stance towards Eastern European countries.
LINK

Protests in Armenia against the rate-hikes by the Russian-owned energy company Yerevan continue.
LINK

The Islamic State (or Daesh) blew up two historic mausoleums. Because, why not? They’re not only a bunch of a-holes, they’re 100% dick.
LINK

As if to prove my above statement, ISIS recently announced they would be offering sex slaves to winners of a Koran memorization contest. I have to give them credit here. They keep finding new and innovative ways to shock, horrify, and even surprise us. Again, they are a bunch of a-holes who really are 100% dick.
LINK

As for the rest of the population of Iraq: 3 Million Iraqis have been displaced by current war. But at least Bush ain’t running things.
LINK

Back at home: According to Andrew McCarthy, the “Freddie Grey autopsy Report Deals Blow to Murder Charges.”
LINK

Film legend Toshiro Mifune, star of Seven Samurai, Shogun, and The High and The Low, will get a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He deserves one. I think it was when watching Yojimbo (later remade as Fistful of Dollars) that I realized just how good an actor he was. He could completely disappear into a role yet still manage to maintain the gravitas of a leading man. Not many film actors can do that. LINK

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Enough Is Enough Already...

I have spent the day reading comment after comment from liberals about the rampant racism in the South and how all vestiges of southern living should be destroyed. Not only the Confederate flag, but now there is a call to tear down statues of Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and destroy every last vestige of our slave-owning, Civil War-fighting history. This includes the Jefferson Memorial too because, of course, despite being the architect of the Declaraton of Independence and the 3rd President of the United States, he was a slave-owner.

Have we all just gone out of our collective minds? If this is the "conversation" we are supposed to be having in the aftermath of the attack on the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, then the inmates are truly running the assylum now. We are doomed if this is the best we can think to do - tear down statues and burn flags. And now that everyone has been whipped into a collective frenzy, I can't wait to see what happens on Friday when the Supreme Court renders its rulings on Congressional redistricting, housing discrimination, same-sex marriage and Obamacare. If our esteemed Supreme Court Justices do not make the decisions that are acceptable to the angry mobs, I expect that D.C. will be burned to the ground and that's being optimistic...

Discuss.

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Obama Crushes His Supporters Again

Obama is an historically bad president. Of that, there is no doubt. Everything he touches, he makes worse. But the worst damage Obama does seems to be reserved for his supporters. Indeed, time and again Obama hurts the people who have supported him the most. Here is another great example of this which just happened.

I've pointed out before how Obama keeps stabbing his supporters in the back. Examples of this abound, like how the employment prospects of blacks went in the toilet under Obama, how black racists found all the spoils the Democrats have given them over the years wiped out by the Supreme Court without a fight from Obama, how unions who got blasted with Obamacare, how environmentalists saw their global warming scheme get depantsed by Obama at Copenhagen, how he let China off the hook for currency manipulation, how not a single Wall Street exec went to jail and how "too big to fail" got official protection in the law, how his supporters now need to buy health care rather than get it free, how he avoided giving gays anything they wanted except token support, how he expanded our wars and drone attacks and never closed Gitmo despite the squeals of his peacenik supporters, and so on.

Now we have a new one to add to the list.

Construction workers, teamsters and food service workers tend to be covered by what are called multi-employer private pension plans. More than 10 million employees are covered by about 1,400 of these plans. Unfortunately, many of these plans, like the Teamsters Central State Fund, are underfunded. That means they don't have enough money to pay out the benefits they owe. About one million of those employees are in plans that can't pay their benefits.

Naturally, the unions want a bailout. They want Uncle Sam to rape the taxpayers to pay these benefits. And that's exactly what Obama did... right? Nope. Obama has refused to fight for a bailout and instead he's running with a plan the Teamsters and AARP have both opposed. In essence, Obama has decided to screw several hundred thousand retirees and soon to be retirees. Indeed, he has appointed an attorney to review applications from the pension plans for permission to cut the benefits of hundreds of thousands of retirees so that the funds will remain solvent for the rest. This includes currently retired employees, by the way... unless you are over 80, then you are protected.

So let's bottom line this. Rather than seeking government money to fund the pensions of these union employees or harassing employers with lawsuits by DOJ until they pay more into the funds, Obama is going to strip hundreds of thousands of union workers of their benefits.

So once again, being Obama's supporter is a ticket to disappointment. This man is amazing.

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Some Thoughts On Extinction

Here's a couple of seemingly non-related issues on extinction to talk about today.

Global Cooling/Warming, Climate Changing to Extinction - So let's review. In the past 45 years or so, we have evolved from "global cooling" in the '70's that was going to kill us to "global warming" in the '90's that was going to kill us to the less specific "climate change" around 2008 that will kill us. [That last one came about because, well, the global warming numbers just weren't adding up.]. Just in case none of that has scared you enough to recycle, the lastest scientific report out of Stanford, Princeton and Berkeley universities (as reported on HuffPo) has now gone full-on "imminent extinction". Yeah, as if things weren't bad enough, now we are going to go extinct in some unspecified time really, really soon...

"Avoiding a true sixth mass extinction will require rapid, greatly intensified efforts to conserve already threatened species and to alleviate pressures on their populations -- notably habitat loss, overexploitation for economic gain,* and climate change ... However, the window of opportunity is rapidly closing."

The opportunity is rapidly closing, people! Okay, I am not an anti-science/global cooling/warming/climate change denier and I really do believe that we must be much better caretakers of our natural world. We have been doing a pretty good job since the tearful Native American Indian and "Don't Mess With Texas" PSA's were aired in the '60's in cleaning up our lakes and rivers and finding ways to not kill the forests off. And by all accounts, we have saved the whales from extinction. But really, now they are hawking full-on extinction?

Personally, I have no doubt that they may be right about human extinction, but it's not going to be because of "overexploitation for economic gain" [at the same time they are extracting more grant money from the global community for their own "economic gain"]. It's going to be because Mother Nature tires of us and shakes and quakes and blows us off her face like the annoying gnats we are. Or maybe it will be a giant comet slamming into the Earth like the one during the 5th mass extinction that took out the dinosaurs. That's just me, but what do you think?

End Hate Now - Let's talk about the Confederate flag. In light of the most recent attack on the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in her state, SC Governor Nikki Haley has finally announced that she will pass whatever legislation it takes to remove the Confederate flag that flies high on the lawn of their state capital. Even though I am a quasi-Southerner, I have absolutely no emotional connection to the Confederate flag, so I say burn the dang thing if it makes people feel safer. I have long had my own thoughts about the kind of person that wanted to display that flag because as my Mother says, it really is no different that the swastika. It is time for its extinction and to be relegated to the giant dustbin of history.

All that aside, I am so proud that, instead of fueling more hate after the death of nine of their parishioners in a senseless and stupid mass murder, the good Christians of that church and the families of the victims chose forgiveness. It was a breath-taking moment. Instead of fueling more senseless violence and hate, they chose to come together with so many others from around the country to hold hands and stand up to "the devil" and call it by it's proper name - Evil. Because it was an evil act brought on by a hateful monster whose hateful message should not be fed, but starved out of existance. And that can only be done by good people standing up to it. It is a moment that would have made Martin Luther King proud. By the way, did you notice that Al Sharpton and all the other race hustlers have been deafeningly silent? Maybe love and forgiveness can win.

And finally -
A "Pie Factory"?? - Okay, this has nothing to do with extinction, but I need to correct a grievous wrong and just outright lie by our very own Andrew. It was not as Andrew stated in a comment on his post yesterday, a "pie factory" in the most famous episode of "I Love Lucy". It was a chocolate candy factory. Dear Lord, how will we recover from this disgrace?

*[emphasis added]

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Top American Women? Really?

This one is going to upset any feminists who happen by. Good. How am I going to piss off these underachieving chickies? By mocking the achievements of the women feminists think are worthy of being placed on the $10 bill. In fact, let me be blunt: if this is the best that women have, then you girls haven’t done dick for this country!

What follows is a list of ten eight women prepared by a group of leftist chickies as the women they would like to see replace Alexander Hamilton on the $10 bill... which will now only be worth $8.60 because women are worth less than men earn less than men. Funny that they can’t come up with a top 10, isn’t it? Anyways, let us see if any of these penis-deficient individuals are indeed worthy of being put on our currency:

● Francis Perkins: Who? That’s what I thought when I first head the name. Is she Anthony Perkins’ mother? Marlin Perkins’ wife? Or does she work at Perkins where they make really nice muffins? No. Apparently, her claim to fame is that she’s the first woman appointed to the US Cabinet. wonk wonk wonk wonk

So her claim to fame is being the first woman to do something that hundreds of other men had done in the past. What’s more, her claim to fame really boils down to being that a man gave her a job. Aim high ladies. Her achievements in the job, by the way, were to “be instrumental” (because she didn’t actually do anything concrete) in passing the New Deal. In particular she got a woody for the first minimum wage and labor standards, both of which destroyed jobs. Oh, and feminists claim she “was a catalyst” for women entering the civilian workforce during World War II. Oh good, maybe she can share the bill with Hitler who deserves the real credit for that one.

● Eleanor Roosevelt: Let me see if I can simplify this: rich girl marries rich guy who becomes president and she changed his diaper when he got polio. Yep, another woman whose achievement is to be the wife of a famous man. Liberals like to beef this up by saying that she made speeches about popular liberal causes, but uh, so what? “Rich man’s wife reads speech! Film at 11!” Oh, and her husband didn’t love her. Hello, Hillary! Pathetic.

● Emily Dickinson: Liberals claim she’s one of America’s greatest writers, but I dare you to tell me what she wrote. Apparently, she was a poet. And get this, only 12 of her 1800 poems were published in her lifetime and they were heavily edited by editors. In fact, most of her poems weren’t published until long after her death and then, again, they had to be heavily edited. It wasn’t until 1955 that her work was actually published in the form she wrote it... long after she was made famous.

● Amelia Earhart: Flew a plane, got lost, died. Need I say more?

● Patsy Mink: My first thought was that she was a terrorist from the 1970s, but that’s Patsy Hearst. Mink was a suffragette (yawn) and the first woman to get elected to Congress. Gee, so she’s famous for doing what thousands of others have done, only doing so without a penis. Gotcha. Her big achievement in Congress was to author Title IX, which has brought women’s sports up to the same level of interest as men’s sports! Oh, wait. Yeah, that didn’t happen. What Title IX really did was allowed a few thousand lesbians to get some exercise. Sadly, that puts her first on our list so far by a mile!

● Susan B. Anthony: I know Anthony because of her failure on the SBA dollar coin. And when I look up what she did to earn being put on currency, it seems that she was a leftist busybody who worked with other leftist busybodies on issues like women’s rights, slavery, and temperance. I don’t see any actual achievements.

● Harriet Tubman: Tubman is a black woman, which means the $10 would be worth only $6.90. She helped 13 slaves escape through the underground railroad (other sources say 300). This is a noble achievement, but did it change the nation? No, not like the publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin or that Civil War thing.

● Rosa Parks: Rosa Parks is famous for refusing to give up her bus seat to a honkey in Montgomery, Alabama. This started the Montgomery bus boycott. I can actually respect that, but any attempt to credit her with more in terms of civil rights is just public relations. Everything the Civil Rights Movement claims to have kickstarted in these high profile PR moments was already underway in the country for several years at that point.

So that’s the list. Seriously. Think about that. The only two even close to decent candidates are (1) a woman who helped rescue a few slaves and (2) a woman whose deed has been falsely mythologized into one of a dozen simultaneous “change the nation” events... for a nation that was already changing. The rest are do nothings, failed writers, women who got famous because men made them famous, and women who got famous for being the first women to do what thousands of prior men had done.

Is this really the best American woman can come up with? Don’t we have a Margaret Thatcher who literally reshaped the UK and Europe and revived a nearly dead ideology of common sense? Don’t we have an Indira Ghandi who reshaped India and is credited with its modern constitution or Golda Meir who shaped Israel? Don’t we have a Marie Curie who won Nobel Prizes (which meant something) for Chemistry and Physics? Don’t we have authors like Agatha Christie, Jane Austen, Emily Bronte and Daphne De Maurier?

Apparently not.

The real issue here isn’t why those sexist men have kept women off the $10 bill, it’s why aren’t there any American woman who are undeniably worthy of being on the $10 bill. When it comes to men, the cup (athletic supporter... heh heh) runneth over. Indeed, there are so many truly deserving men that you would need a hundred different bills to cover them all. Yet, when it comes to American women, there isn’t even one I would rank on the list of women I just listed.

That is pathetic.

But I suspect the real problem is the chickies making these lists. They don’t want women of achievement, they want chickies who did “woman identity” things, like being the first non-peniser to do something the penisers already did. That is what is truly pathetic... distant second (if that) is no achievement at all. How about we instead look for women of genuine achievement? How about these...

● Hedy Lamar... an actress who invented spread spectrum technology, which has become the technical backbone of modern cell phone and wireless technology.

● Oprah Winfrey... who runs a communications empire she built from the ground up, and who has tremendous influence with the public.

● Danielle Steel... best selling author alive (800 million books) and 8th all time (says Forbes)

● Sandra Lerner... co-founder of Cisco

● Estée Lauder... co-founded Estée Lauder Companies

Thoughts? Any others we can add?

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Kit's Friday Thoughts: Trump, OPM Hack, & (No) Father's Day

By Kit

Well, it's been quite a week! The Chinese know all our secrets, Ross Per- I mean Donald Trump is in the race, liberals being liberal about a truly evil act, and this weekend is Father's Day, the day we honor the men who stood up and made an impact on our lives —or is it?

America’s Cyber Pearl Harbor

Given Trump’s campaign announcement, the hypocritical fake-black NAACP chapter president, and Hillary’s (second) campaign launch it is understandable that you might have missed the fact that the personal information, including Social Security numbers and medical histories (among others), of maybe 4 million government employees’, both current and former, is now in the hands of the Chinese government opening them up to identity theft and possibly blackmail.

And these employees aren’t just, say, County Executive Directors at the Farm Service Agency, though the Manning case should serve as a warning that even a lowly private can have access to a slew of sensitive documents. A large number of the victims have a security clearance. And among those we still don’t know how big the damage was, from a Reuters article, “According to a U.S. House of Representatives memo seen by Reuters, OPM knows what types of data were exposed to the hackers but not what data was taken.”

Art Bowker told Fusion.net his experience, “I called the contractor from OPM that was listed in the email, a 1-800 number, and wanted to know how big the breach was. Did they just get names? They couldn’t tell me. It’s like someone broke into my house and they won’t tell me what they took.”

You should read the rest here, it will scare you: LINK

Another bit: “He asked Seymour pointedly about the legacy systems that had not been adequately protected or upgraded. Seymour replied that some of them were over 20 years old ” Translation: Some of the systems are at least as old as Pokemon is —in Japan.

Now, you may be wondering, “How did they get into our systems in the first place?” Well, this bit from Ars Technmay provide an answer:
Unix systems administrator for the project "was in Argentina and his co-worker was physically located in the [People's Republic of China]. Both had direct access to every row of data in every database: they were root. Another team that worked with these databases had at its head two team members with PRC passports. I know that because I challenged them personally and revoked their privileges. From my perspective, OPM compromised this information more than three years ago and my take on the current breach is 'so what's new?’””

…

The OPM contracted their security work out to Chinese nationals within China.



WHAT THE FLYING F%&K?!?!?!?!?!?!
JUST WHAT THE LIVING %$#@%%$#^*&%I*)(@%#$@^&^*^&*$%# WERE THEY #$%#@$%* THINKING AND %$%^W#$@#$?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!?!?

UGH!

And that’s all I have to say about that.

Really, all I can add is heads better roll at the OPM and the US better start hitting China back over this, if China did do this. Hack the Shanghai Stock Exchange, hit the Politburo, fill the government’s official website a bunch of illustrations of Karl Marx and Mao Zedong going at it Biblically.

JUST DO SOMETHING! GOD!


Donald Trump is in the Race! Reactions.
Donald Trump is in the ring and the reaction from the Right is split. The Republicans, especially those running, are quite upset because Trump will constantly spout off his half-baked, poorly-thought out views and demand that everyone treat them seriously and if they don’t or if they just politely disagree with him, expect him to indulge in a furor of name-calling and petty insults. And the moment they hit back he will pull out Reagan’s 11th Commandment, “Thou shalt not attack a fellow Republican”, without the slightest sense of irony.

It will be a massive distraction for the Republican candidates who are trying to run a serious campaign while giving the left plenty of ammo to attack the GOP as a party of clowns. Which is what they are doing already.

Conservative pundits and writers, on the other hand, could not be more thrilled. They are overjoyed at the amount of material they will get because Trump will constantly spout off his half-baked, poorly-thought out views and demand that everyone treat them seriously and if they don’t or if they just politely disagree with him, expect him to indulge in a furor of name-calling and petty insults. And the moment they hit back he will pull out Reagan’s 11th Commandment, “Thou shalt not attack a fellow Republican”, without the slightest sense of irony.

So they are rushing to their keyboards in anticipation, eagerly awaiting the next bit of lunacy to come from the man Jonah Goldberg said arguing with “is sort of like dressing up an adorable toddler in a Viking outfit and listening to it say that he will raid my village and slaughter all in his path.”

And the Talk Radio crowd is happy because they love a candidate who will constantly spout off his half-baked and poorly-thought out views… ok, you get the idea. They love him because he hits the notes they want candidates to hit, he attacks the targets they like to attack —Obama, the debt, ISIS, etc.— but he never offers up any concrete solutions. Because developing concrete solutions often mean compromising with the political realities that exist.

Remember that the next time someone complains about conservatives lacking “conservative solutions.” There are far too many conservatives who aren’t really interested in hearing “conservative solutions.”

Of course, the big concern among Republicans is that he will lose the nomination and decide to run third party and possibly pulling a Ross Perot. Really, Donald Trump could put Hillary Clinton in the White House. Think about that.


Charleston Shooting

On Wednesday, a racist white gunman went into a famous black church in Charleston and murdered 9 people, including the pastor. The man was caught Thursday.

Now, normally, I would say we should not politicize this event and just honor the memory of the victims but its already a bit late for that. In fact, the media is already filled with idiots making political hay of this. There is a lot for anyone to go through (gun issues, the idiotic comparison between the pool party incident and his arrest, etc.) but I want to pick on one particular point being thrown about right now.

From the Washington Post: “Shooters of color are called ‘terrorists’ and ‘thugs.’ Why are white shooters called ‘mentally ill’?”

The writer is “an associate professor of religion and Africana studies at the University of Pennsylvania.” So its possible she was very busy during the Navy Yard shooting a few years back where the shooter was (1) black and (2) described by nearly everyone in the media as mentally ill.

Actually, if I recall, it was that shooting when the media really began to look at mass shootings as a mental health issue instead of solely a gun issue.

Now, as for this recent shooting, I can’t speak for the left-wing media outlets in but for the more right-leaning persons, I’ve seen a general consensus that mental health is no excuse and that the guy was a huge dick.

Bill O’Reilly called him a terrorist Thursday night. And Iowahawk called him a terrorist Wednesday night. And numerous conservatives have called him a thug, a monster, or variations of the two. Jonah Goldberg called him a “ghoul”. In fact, I would say the general consensus among conservatives is that he is the reason we have a death penalty.

But, of course, the woman who wrote this is “socially aware” and being “socially aware” means you don’t have to be aware of anything that is being said outside your own tiny social clique. You can say that conservatives are making excuses for the shooter and receive nothing but nods of approval and “You are right”s from everyone you know. Salon will call you a genius.


Why I Will Not Be Honoring Father’s Day This Year

I will not be getting Dad a Father's Day gift nor will I give him even a simple a simple "Happy Father's Day" greeting. Why?

I just learned, courtesy of Angel Soft Toilet Paper, that Father's DAy is actually a day to be set aside for single MOMS not dads.

So, honoring a FATHER on Father's Day would be grossly inappropriate. I hope you can understand.

Ok, ok, I’m joking here.

Though Angel Soft actually did do an ad thanking Single Moms on Father’s Day.

Now, yes, I’m probably over-reacting, but I want you to imagine the reaction if a company decided to honor single fathers on Mother’s Day with a #HappyMothersDayDad campaign.

Which makes the whole thing ironic considering that Father’s Day was pushed by Sonora Smart Dodd to honor her single father, American Civil War veteran William Jackson Smart who had to raise 6 children after his wife died. From umc.org:

“In 1909 in Spokane, Wash., Sonora Smart Dodd listened to a Mother's Day sermon at Central Methodist Episcopal Church. Dodd's own mother had died 11 years earlier, and her father had raised their six children alone. Dodd felt moved to honor her father, and fathers everywhere, with a special day as well.”


Why I Will Not Be Honoring Father’s Day This Year

I will not be getting Dad a Father's Day gift nor will I give him even a simple a simple "Happy Father's Day" greeting. Why?

I just learned, courtesy of Angel Soft Toilet Paper, that Father's DAy is actually a day to be set aside for single MOMS not dads.

Thus, honoring a FATHER on Father's Day would be grossly inappropriate. I hope you can understand.

Ok, ok, I’m joking here.

Though Angel Soft actually did do an ad thanking Single Moms on Father’s Day. You can see it here, I'll admit, it is sweet and touching. LINK

So, yes, I’m over-reacting, but I want you to imagine the reaction if a company decided to honor single fathers on Mother’s Day with a #HappyMothersDayDad campaign.

Which makes the whole thing ironic considering that Father’s Day was pushed by Sonora Smart Dodd to honor her single father, American Civil War veteran William Jackson Smart who had to raise 6 children after his wife died. From umc.org:

“In 1909 in Spokane, Wash., Sonora Smart Dodd listened to a Mother's Day sermon at Central Methodist Episcopal Church. Dodd's own mother had died 11 years earlier, and her father had raised their six children alone. Dodd felt moved to honor her father, and fathers everywhere, with a special day as well.”

Now, you might say that given the rise of single mom households it is necessary to for us to honor them. But doesn’t that make honoring the men who do stay and become good fathers even more important? I would argue, yes.

Also, there is another matter. Quite a few writers have raised concerns about a crisis of masculinity in this country and in the West in general. They claim that young men feel very unsure of what their place is in the culture and that media has not been helping. For example, some have pointed out that sitcoms have in the past 25 years been portraying dads as moronic bums (though it’s gotten a lot better in recent years) and use that as proof that society no longer values fathers. Now, while I think those concerns are often exaggerated, I do think at least some of the writers raise at least sometimes raise salient points about the way modern society values men and fathers. (Brett McKay does this well)

Yes, in the long run, the commercial is nothing I'm going to get too upset about. I’m not going to be boycotting Angel Soft, because (1) I don’t care and (2) I never really pay attention to the brand of toilet paper I’m buying; I just buy what I see on the shelf. And I'm not going to call for the director and CEO and the entire cast to resign in disgrace because I'm not a Social Justice Warrior.:-)

But I can’t be the only one who finds it at least a bit disconcerting that a company would choose to run an ad like honoring mothers on Father's Day.

What do you think?

*Note: Modern Family’s Phil Dunphy is no Andy Taylor but he might as well be compared to the sitcom dads of the 1990s (Ray Barone, Tim Taylor, Homer Simpson, etc.).


Miscellaneous

Alexander Hamilton is getting booted from the $10 bill and being replaced by a woman! You know, the born-out-of-wedlock immigrant who helped get us out of debt and built the Department of Treasury is not good enough to grace the $10 bill. Now, the Treasury Department has clarified that he will still be on the $10 bill, just somewhere else.

But a lot of people are pissed and have taken to twitter with #KeepHamilton or #SaveHamilton (as I encourage all of you to do) but, unfortunately, it seems not enough people even know who Alexander Hamilton was or why he is important.

Also, the “right” people are happy and that is all that matters.

Alan Wolfe, a political science professor at Boston College, argues that libertarianism is very similar to Stalinism. Really.
LINK

Heather MacDonald on the rise in crime resulting from anti-police activities. Welcome to the 1970s. LINK

A Jezebel blogger tried to get a tattoo on her neck, however most professional tattoo artists do not do neck tattoos on people not already largely inked so he refused. She reacted how you would expect; by publicly shaming him and his business. He replied. It. Was. Epic.
LINK

On a similar note, in case you have not been following GamerGate it appears they have won a solid victory. Far-left radical feminists Anita Sarkeesian and John McIntosh (and make no mistake, they are both very far left and radical in their politics despite what the media would have you believe) may have finally gone a bridge too far in their harsh criticisms of the trailers for Fallout 4 and Doom 4. It seems they echoed of Jack Thompson's attacks on gaming in the 1990s. Comparing someone to Jack Thompson is among gamers what comparing someone to Joe McCarthy is in Hollywood. He is not someone you want to be compared to if you want to go far in the gaming industry. Breitbart.com has the story here:
LINK

Mark Ruffalo has endorsed Bernie Sanders, instead of Hillary, even saying Hillary should more or less look to Sanders. In fact, Sanders is getting a number of celebrity endorsements.
LINK

Brian Williams has been moved to MSNBC. As Charles C. W. Cooke put it, “I’m charmed by the idea that it needs explaining to the public why Brian Williams isn’t honest enough for NBC but perfect for MSNBC.”

Prayers for Michelle Malkin’s daughter and family.
LINK

Something fun: Rachel & Jun are a Japanese-American couple who put up blogs about Japan largely from the POV of American expatriates. I highly recommend watching their’s, her’s are typically well-researched and quite fascinating insights into Japanese culture. This week, she did a video on “head size” in Japan, apparently, smaller heads are attractive in Japan and its not often to hear a Japanese man or woman complement you on your small head or complain about his or her big head. Take a look and then watch some other videos they’ve done! LINK

Have a nice weekend and a Happy Father's Day!

(See, told you I was joking.)

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Another Question of the Day

I have been so distracted lately by Caitlyn Jenner changing the face of gender identity and Rachel Dolezal's (formerly known as"African-American Rachel") changing the face of race with her daily revelations of everything short of alien abduction or CIA deep under-cover Bush-era covert ops to infiltrate the NAACP (I am certain this will come out) that I really don't know what to say.

And then there's (Dear God, help us) Donald Trump's announcement that he is throwing his gold-leafed hat in the Presidential ring. Frankly, I really can't focus on anything. So, here is another "Question of the Day".

What really is the most important political issue of your life?

Seriously, what is important to you? As we wait for the Supreme Court to issue their rulings on Same-sex marriage and Obamacare, what is it that really effects your real life? Is it stagnant economy, Middle-East conflicts, Russian aggression (yeah, it's a thing again), trade agreements, Wall Street bad guys, voting rights, thieving elected officials, crime and/or punishment, GMO infiltration, or the evils of trans-fats or the constant PSA's from the CDC about the dangers of whooping cough? What do you really care about?

I just don't know anymore...

By the way, yesterday was the 130th Anniversary of the delivery of the Statue of Liberty to New York and the US, as a gift from France. Did you know that one of the architects of the statue was Gustave Eiffel? Yeah, the same person that engineered the Eiffel Tower.

Discuss...

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Up In Smoke

There was an interesting ruling from the Colorado Supreme Court this week which has shattered the dream of potheads everywhere. In fact, things are not going as they hoped in any way. How sad.

The ruling in question involved whether or not private employers could fire someone for using marijuana on their own time. In 6-0 decision, the court ruled that private employers could fire such people. What’s more, this ruling involved a man who was in a wheel chair and used pot for medical purposes to stop spasms. If any case was likely to go the other way, this would have been it.

Now there is a caveat I’ll explain in a minute, but what this means is simple. When pot was legalized, the activists (“Dave’s not here, man!”) thought this would mean that they had received the official seal of approval and no-consequence from the state. In other words, they could now smoke pot however they wanted without anyone being able to punish them. This ruling blows a huge hole in that. This ruling says that pot will now be treated as any other public vice. The state can’t ban you from using it, but other citizens can shun you for doing so. In this case, that means employers can fire you for using it, just like they can fire you for any other number of reasons that they consider to be inconsistent with the work environment they wish to provide.

This was shocking to activists, who wrongly thought that legalization would essentially equate to pot use being put into a special category like race, religion or sex, and carry with it immunity.

Add to this other rulings by various courts which say the government can regulate the crap out of pot and what you get is exactly the situation that pot activists used to sell legalization, but which they really didn’t think they would need to live with: a heavily regulated product that is expensive, underwhelming in quality, and comes without legal immunity from use.

Even more interestingly, the two states that have legalized pot (Colorado and Washington) have used the power of regulation to do what regulation does. Washington in particular has made it so expensive and so cumbersome to grow pot that it’s apparently impossible to make a profit doing so. In Colorado it’s more profitable for growers, but there are lots of complaints about the cost and the quality by consumers... which is exactly what regulation does, it makes things less available, less advanced/innovative, lower quality and more expensive. And if they think it’s bad now, then just wait until the regulators start treating pot like cigarettes.

Anyways, the caveat on the Colorado Supreme Court ruling is that the ruling was based on pot still being illegal at the federal level. But that’s not ultimately going to matter because there is simply nothing anywhere else in the law which conveys a right on people not to get fired or whatnot based on their leisure activities. So this should ultimately hold up even if federal law changes.

Thoughts?

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Question of the Day

Are "gender" and "race" defined by science or social constructs that force people into artificial categories?

Let's discuss...

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Some Thoughts On Children

Having recently come into the possession of an 11 year old and a 9 year old, I have learned much about children. I thought I would take today to share a few of my observations.

● First, I have discovered that children are not in fact human. No. They are instead constructed of time absorbing material which robs your day of all its useful hours. It's almost like magic, but I suspect we just don't understand the science behind this yet.

● They have amazing destructive powers too. Indeed, just as fairies spread toxic fairy dust in their wake and environmentalists' Volvos belch out black smoke, children have the ability to shed clothing and toys everywhere they go... even when they aren't wearing or holding any. In fact, they are capable of destroying any room in the blink of an eye. Perhaps a post on Pinterest someone sent me says it best: "Before I had children, I had no idea you could destroy an entire house with a granola bar." So true.

● Kids are much more savvy than you think too... with one huge caveat. They seem to have the ability to understand when something is said or done that is beyond their level of comprehension, like innuendo. Yep, they know something is going on they weren't meant to understand and, by God, they caught you, buddy! BUT, despite having the ability to spot these moments, they truly have no ability to fill in the blanks. And their efforts to fill in the blanks are often quite hilarious.

● Kids are horrible liars. Seriously, they are worse than dogs playing poker. You can spot their lies coming for miles. Yet, they are convinced they excel at lying. They can be easily manipulated too just by letting them think they are manipulating you.

● I pick the girls up from their schools each day during the year. In so doing, I have discovered that while all people may be created equal, not all are as capable when it comes to self-preservation. I realized this watching dozens of middle schoolers trying to cross the road to get to the minivans waiting for them. Yikes. Half these kids do well: they look both ways, judge when they can make it before going, go quickly and adjust to changing conditions and finally reach safety. The other half, however, are a disaster. They have no idea when they should go, so they stand there frozen until they suddenly lurch out before oncoming traffic. Once in danger, they freeze up. Then they scurry in some random direction.

● But all that said, let me say honestly that children are amazing. They are amazingly innocent and without cynicism. They can overlook any flaw in a parent to love people we adults would rather had done in by a contract killing and they always look on the best side of almost anything. Watching their eyes light up at the mention of the tooth fairy or Santa (who has been proven to be real because he uses different wrapping paper than mom!) just warms your heart. And watching them glow when you help them grasp some math problem or praise their ever-improving reading is just an amazing experience. Those moments make everything worthwhile... everything.

Just thought I would share that. Thoughts? Any stories you want to add? If not, treat this as an open thread.

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Kit's Friday Thoughts: Rubio's Speedboat & Jurassic World

By Kit

Sorry I'm a bit late. I fell asleep last night before I could write it.

Marco Rubio’s Speedboat

The New York Times decided to devote a considerable amount of ink and dead trees to uncovering what they claim are disturbing skeletons in Marco Rubio’s closet. Oral sex from an intern? Nope. Do he and his spouse have a charity foundation that might have been involved in some shady deals? No, not that, either.

Did he drunkenly drive a car into a creek killing a young woman he was having an affair with and then, instead of calling emergency services contact his lawyer who immediately did everything he could to cover it up?

Of course not.

No, what they uncovered was (1) he got 17 tickets over the course of twenty years, (2) he had some financial difficulties in his twenties, and (3) he bought a “luxury speedboat” after his made a bunch of money off his book deal.

Now, let’s take this apart.

(1) I’ve been driving for about 9 years or so and in that time I have received a few warnings, a ticket for an outdated license plate and a ticket failing to stop in. . That’s two. I’ve also gotten probably 3-5 warnings but I can’t remember.. Now, I’ve heard Florida cops are a bit more ticket friendly (with claims of cops being put under massive ticket quotas), so, if you do the math and turn those warnings to tickets then if I lived in Florida I would probably have as many as Rubio.

(2) Rubio’s financial difficulties. When I was somewhere between 3 and 5 my parents, who were about 33-35, hit some financial difficulties. Many people in their twenties and thirties have financial issues. Many have mortgages, student loan debts, etc. Most people have some kind of debt. So, why is this a shock.

(3) As for the “luxury speedboat”, let’s do some comparisons.

Here is a photo of the kind of boat he owns: LINK

Here is a photo of the kind of boat my parents own (and neither of them is not US senators with a book): LINK

And, lastly, here is a photo of the yacht John Kerry owns: LINK

And the interior of John Kerry’s yacht: LINK

Jurassic World

I saw Jurassic World last night. Was it silly? Yes. Did it over-use CGI? Definitely. Did I have fun. Of course!

As long as you don’t expect it to come anywhere near the first one, you’ll have fun. It was better than three and not as pretentious as Lost World. Yes, the dinosaurs are made smart to almost ridiculous levels. I think I had to hold back a small chuckle

As for the characters, they are ok. The two kids are not Tim and Lex and our two leads are not Alan Grant and Ellie Sattler by any stretch. Mosrani is not Hammond. But, on the other hand, you won’t spend the movie hating all of the characters and groaning at their idiotic decisions like you did with Lost World and Jurassic Park 3 (Why take the baby T-Rex back to your juiced-up winnebago? Why not tell Dr. Grant you are looking for your kid? And why build a ^%$#ing Dino park in San Diego?!?! At least on an island its isolated!).

Part of this is because when the characters do make some rather stupid decisions, and this being a Jurassic Park movie you know at least a few will, those decisions are for the most part explained and handled well enough that we believe it —even if we know it won’t end well.

The only glaring exception is Vincent D’Onofrio’s gloriously over-the-top head of security.

So the characters, while not particularly interesting or memorable, are tolerable enough for a two hour movie.

Another thing I liked was that its nods to the original are handled with just enough cleverness that they work on their own while at the same time giving a treat to fans of the original. Unlike, say, J.J. Abrams’ nods to Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan in Star Trek: Into Darkness.

Of course, some might argue that saying “this movie handles its nods to the original better than Star Trek: Into Darkness” is damning with faint praise.

In short, I enjoyed it.

The movie is largely geared to the late-Gen Xers and Millennials who grew up with the movie. We all wanted to visit a real Jurassic Park as kids. We wished for it to be real, despite the obvious dangers present in the movie. Because dinosaurs = awesome.

Case in point; I was about 3 and watched it, as well as the Land Before Time movies, on a near-endless loop. Now, I had no real burning desire to see it until about a week ago when I was walking through Target buying groceries and happened to walk past the toy section, with its cardboard display of two velociraptors jumping out. I took just one look, reversed to my inner 5 year old, and realized “Dammit, now I have to see it.”

In fact, I just might see it again…

Links and Sundry

On Jurassic World, a writer at the Daily Beast attacked the movie for being “Sexist” because the main female lead becomes less corporate obsessed and more maternal towards the two kids in her care or something.
LINK

This, along with the people who attacked Avengers 2 was sexist because she was upset over being sterilized as part of the Black Widow program shows a rather disturbing anti-motherhood trend among certain feminist circles.

LINK

That or they just want an excuse to be offended at something in Western culture. Beats having to discuss the gentile mutilation, stoning, and sexual slavery going on in the Muslim world.

Which might actually be true given that at Vox a writer has decide that saying “You guys” is sexist and compared it to your grand-parent that uses the word “Negro”. I’m not kidding.
LINK

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post where he called for catastrophic climate change skeptics to be charged under RICO. And he’s not the only person to call for this, read the outright glee in the comments at the prospect of people being arrested for holding differing views. If the science is so settled then why is it so many climate change activists would rather bring criminal charges against critics than debate them.*
LINK
I wonder if soon an environmentalist will start claiming that “denying climate change” is traumatic and should be censored on those grounds.

LA cop Jack Dunphy (a pseudonym) has a lot of questions for McKinney police officer Eric Casebolt. It is worth noting that, according to Dunphy, the action that makes the most sense is the decision by Casebolt to pull out his gun. Worth a read.
LINK

Dirty Jobs’s Mike Rowe was attacked by someone for doing “right-wing propaganda.” He replied. LINK

I made a decision today; I’m never having kids. Why? This Reason story on actions taken by the CPS. LINK

People complain a lot about helicopter parenting but it seems if you want to avoid getting put in handcuffs, then it’s the safest route.

Any other thoughts? Anything else you want to discuss?

*For the record; I do think the Earth is getting warmer and that human activity has had some role in that. What I “deny” is that the consequences will be catastrophic; New York City under water, massive extinctions, dogs and cats living together, etcetera.

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Caption This - City Pigeon Addition

So, I was walking through the City Hall Park in lower Manhattan one morning last week when I saw this...

Two pigeons sitting on Horace Greeley's head. I can't imagine what they could have been talking about, but I have a feeling that you may know. Do your best and there may be a prize...but probably not.

End notes:
If you want to learn more about Horace Greeley, read this - LINK

If you want to learn more about pigeons, read this - LINK

If you want to learn anything, read a book...

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Some Thoughts On Global Warming

Here are some thoughts on global warming that you might find interesting. Global warming has many problems. It is a theory without the slightest bit of supporting proof. It is intuitively nonsense. The proof that has been offered has been faked or has fallen apart. The theories used are mathematical bullship. The enthusiasts lie and fake data regularly. Their models lack the complexity needed to be meaningful or reliable. Right in the middle of their theory, nature disproved it by cooling for two decades now. Their solutions don’t even fit the problem they claim to have identified. It is an invented theory pushed for political reasons.

But among all of those problems, the worst flaw is that even if the theory is right... the consequences just aren’t that bad. Consider this:

First, let us assume that global warming is true and their laughably wrong theory is accurate. That means that in 100 years, there will be a 1-3 degree rise in average temperatures (most have described it as 1.5 degree rise). What does this mean?

Well, the doomsday brigade has been presenting this as a 3 degree increase in temperature across the board. Thus, if our high is 100 degrees, it will now be 103 degrees. Their theory doesn’t say that however. They also imply that every day will miraculously be near the high from now on, though that is utter nonsense and is completely contradicted even by their own theory.

What their theory says is that the Earth is warming and will experience an average temperature rise of one to three degrees. They do not say that the top temperature will get hotter. And if that is the case, then there will be no danger to any plant or animal species. Why? Because those plants and animals already exist at the temperature ranges that the theory expects even after the rise in temperature.

What’s more, average temperature rises won’t be a problem either. Consider this... a three degree rise in average yearly temperatures suggest a three degree temperature increase each day. That means that all those days that are 50 around where you live would now be 53 and all those days that are 70 would become 73. Can you see any possible harm to that? Will an 8 degree Winter day be so much hotter than a 5 degree day that you can see a mass extinction of critters?

Hardly.

So where is the harm? Name a single animal which can live through ten weeks of 70 degrees, but can’t live through ten weeks of 73 degrees, or an animal that will die at 8 degrees, but would live at 5 degree. Name a single animal that can live through the hottest summers now, but will die out if we add a couple weeks to that heat.

Has anyone noticed that warmer climates also tend to be more lush and more packed with life? Have any of the enthusiasts thought about that? No.

In fact, that brings up a second interesting point. I can’t take credit for this as it was first thought by an environmentalist who has turned against the theory of global warming, but it is absolutely worth passing on. Looking at the historical record, there was much more carbon in the air in the past than now. We know this because ancient plants were much, much larger than those in the present. Indeed, our plants and trees today are scrawny dwarves by comparison. So what he says is that we are at a carbon low period right now and out plants are suffering because of it. Global warming, if true, would be a Godsend to the flora of this planet.

Interesting, isn’t it?

Thoughts?

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2016 Political Quiz

Since we are in a slight lull before we go full-bore election-cray-cray, now may be the time to take a quiz on where you fall in the political spectrum. Are you a hard-core conservative, a Paul-style libertarian, raging liberal, or somewhere in-between?

Each question contains an option to answer "Yes", "No", and "Other stances" which leads to more nuances answers. Please note that some categories have additional questions, so don't miss them! The quiz takes about 10 minutes, so give it a try. When you finish, post your final result in the comments.

2016 Political Quiz starts here...

Note: I predict that most us will fall in around the same category, but for different reasons and on different issues.

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Some Things That Made Me Say "Wow!"

Wow, there is nothing to talk about in the news. Seriously, let’s bomb something or ban something just to end this blogging drought! Oh well... the show must go on. so here are some random thoughts on things I’ve come across that made me say "WOW!" and not in a good way.

● Bad Form Hillary: Hillary Clinton just gave a speech to 1,200 losers... uh, fast food workers, in which she pushed the idea of the $15 minimum wage and she encouraged these lazy slugs to get out there and pimp for her. Two problems. First, she gave the speech by phone. Seriously. The woman has no judgment whatsoever. Here she is addressing a large group that she apparently sees as the focal point of her pointless campaign and she can’t even be bothered to show up in person! Wow! What a dipship!

The second problem, by the way, is that she’s looking for help from people who have proven that they lack motivation, foresight and the work ethic needed to build a career. That’s a bit like going to a donut shop to find a team of anorexics.

● What a Whiny Load of Crap: Did you know that politicians give advice at college graduations? Did you also know that most of it is retarded? Yeah, it is. But one really stands out as self-pitying BS. Madame Obama just gave a speech at Tuskegee University in which she not only demonstrated that she has taken every single insult ever aimed at her personally... because she has a very thin skin, but that she views all of it as racism. Apparently, any criticism of her is race based. But that’s ok because she realized she just had to tune it out and “have faith in God’s plan for me.” Thank you Madame Santorum. Anyways, I didn’t know there was room for a deity in the Obama pantheon of the universe, but I did realize long ago that Madame Obama views the world as racially offensive. Anything she doesn’t like is because of racism. Wow!

Well, let me be clear. I don’t dislike Madame Obama because she’s black. No. I dislike her because she’s a hate-filled, racist, entitled asshole.

● Self-Aggrandizement Much?: Elizabeth “Fake Injun” Warren was busy describing her struggles to protect us all through the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. As is typical, she is all hyperbole and bullship. She said this:

“People like me were pushed against the walls like we were invisible. The most powerful lobbyists in Washington — they thought they would eat us for lunch. And sometimes, when I was pushed up against those walls, I thought they might just do it. But I didn’t back down and neither did anyone else.”

Wow! First of all, being pushed up against the wall implies a threat. In fact, when Warren’s commie friends pushed people up against the wall in other countries, those people usually died a few seconds later. So the analogy is wildly stupid and probably shameful. But more to the point, what exactly did Fake Injun do with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau? Oh, that’s right... she did jack... nada... zip. So take a bow Sitting Bullship because you are delusional all around.

● Journalist Demonstrates Stupidity... Film At 11: Rick Perry got into an interesting discussion with John Dickerson of CBS. This discussion proved both that Perry gets it and Dickerson is clueless. What happened is that Perry denounced the punishing effects of the Dodd-Frank bill on small business while also attacking Wall Street Banks for continuing to get special treatment. Said Perry,

“We’re fed up when we see Wall Street get treated specially and you can’t even get a loan from your community bank because of Dodd-Frank banking regulations. All that has to change. Americans are fed up with that type of inside, where the rich get richer and folks out on Main Street have to pay bills.”

Dickerson then asked what Perry would do about Wall Street and he said he would regulate them to make sure “if they make bad decisions, let them live with those bad decisions, don’t bail them out.” Ergo, Perry gets it.

Clueless John then asked: “But isn’t that what Dodd-Frank is, regulations? You were just saying that was bad?”

Think about this. John is so utterly stupid that he doesn’t understand that it is the substance of regulations that matter... not the existence of regulations. There is literally no other way to interpret John’s statement. Wow. What a moron!

Sadly, none of this actually surprises me. Our political class is a wretched hive of scum and villainy... and sheer stupidity. Someone needs to teach them to fling poop. At least that would be fun to watch, and it couldn't lead to any worse government.

Thoughts?

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Kit's Weekend Thoughts: Some Thoughts on Caitlyn Jenner

By Kit

Too worn out from the week. And anything I could say has already been summarized by better writers.

So, instead its an open thread with a few thoughts on Jenner.


My thoughts on Caitlyn Jenner and Transgenderism can be summed up like this:

"I don't get it and I find it a tad strange* but, whatever, its America so knock yourselves out."

A bit longer? I honestly don't care. Yes, I think it should be pointed out that if someone hated their body because their skin color or weight or height we would likely decide a therapist was needed but if its their sex we are told to treat this desire as perfectly normal.

As for Caitlyn Jenner, I think its nice that the American Left and the Trans community has found someone to be their "Trans hero" who is not a traitor that leaked thousands of military documents endangering the lives of American military personnel as well as Afghan citizens who risked their lives fighting people who do this. And did this (graphic).

I am referring, of course, to Bradley, now Chelsea, Manning.

I should point out that many military veterans in the Trans community were not amused by the LGBT Left's attempt to make Manning a hero. In fact a number were afraid that by making her into a hero the Left would be making things harder for transgenders in the military.

So, yeah, a person who is both a reality TV show figure and member of the Khardashian Clan is a step-up.

Two Links: Jonah Goldberg's Friday column on the amusing reaction to Jenner among some on the Left that has to be seen to be believed: LINK

His G-File is also great, especially this: "That only biologically female humans can get pregnant and give birth to babies is true no matter how inconvenient it may be. If that fact hurts someone’s feelings, that’s unfortunate. But that’s no reason to change the language to fuzz-up the facts." (LINK)

For a very sympathetic view towards transponders there is this post from web comic writer Maximillian Uriarte of Terminal Lance: LINK Anyway, open thread. Have a nice weekend. Sorry, it couldn't be more.

Oh, and apparently ISIS is morally opposed to raising pigeons on the grounds that when a pigeon flies overhead it exposes a person to a its genitalia. They are quite serious about it, too, having executed three boys for doing it. As Jonah Goldberg also pointed out, "So you can rape and enslave little girls, but don’t you dare look at a pigeon’s junk." LINK

*Note: "strange" does not mean bad or wrong. It just means "strange," or, as Merriam-Webster

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Presidential Candidates So Far...[UPDATED]

We are 18 months away and the list of candidates for President of United States keeps getting longer and longer. So to keep up, here is the list of declared and potentially declaring candidates as of today.

REPUBLICANS -
Publicly Declared -
Ben Carson
Ted Cruz
Carly Fiorina
Lindsey Graham
Mike Huckabee
George Pataki
Rand Paul
Rick Perry - [Just declared this AM]
Marco Rubio
Rick Santorum
Scott Walker

Undeclared Maybe:
Jeb Bush - [Will formally declare 6/11]
Chris Christie
Bobby Jindal
John Kasich
Donald Trump

2016.republican candidates.org website
More from GOP website who may have declared, but I have never heard about:
Skip Andrews
Michael Bickmeyer
Kerry Bowers
Dale Christensen
John Dummett, Jr.
Mark Everson
Chris Hill
Dennis Michael Lynch
Michael Petyo
Brian Russell

DEMOCRATS:
Publicly Declared-
Hillary Clinton
Lincoln Chaffee (Republican/Independant/Democrat)
Martin O'Malley
Bernie Sanders


Undeclared Maybe:
Joe Biden
Michael Bloomberg (Democrat/Republican/Independant)
Elizabeth Warren - suspended
Jim Webb

I realize that most of these people will drop off as the months progress, but we might as well learn about them while we can.

For some help, here is list from The Atlantic with some basic profiles for some of the more prominent candidates...

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Open Thread

Howdy folks! I won't be around tonight because I'm doing a sleep study. Oh joy. So share your thoughts while I'm gone. Keep it clean... or don't. :)

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Story Time...

In honor of Hillary Clinton officially declaring that she is officially declaring that she is officially throwing her hat in the ring to run as the President of these United States on the official Democratic line of the ballot, I thought we could...wait...I thought that she already declared on April 12?

Apparently not, you low-information voters. It will be officially official on June 13! LINK! I am guessing this is one of her famous "re-set button" thingies. She will be making her offical debut with her offically official announcement at a rally on Roosevelt Island at the southernmost tip at the Roosevelt "Four Freedom Park" in NYC. For those of you who may not know, Roosevelt Island is very small island that sits in the middle of the East River on the east side of Manhattan and is probably the hardest place in NYC to get to. [Yes, I know I ended my sentence with a preposition...so, sue me.]

The theme has something to do with comparing herself to Franklin Roosevelt or Eleanor Roosevelt or something like that...I don't care.

But anyway as a complete non-sequitor and as a Clinton-esque misdirection, let's play a game because frankly with all the Republicans throwing their "hats in the ring" I just can't cope and...seriously, Donald Trump??? And there have been no elected officials in NY who have been arrested this week, so it's a slow news week. So this is a story-making game. I mean, if the Clintons can make up stories, then why can't we, right? Anyway, just for fun, let's write a story...two words at a time.

Here are the rules. Well, actually there is only one rule - you can only add two words at a time. No cheating (unless your last name is Clinton, then you can do whatever you want). I know, I know, Commentarama-ians, we don't like rules! But sometimes you just have to follow rules...one rule...is that so bad? Okay, it's a writing exercise, so shoot me. We have...dear God...18 more months of this mishigas [Yiddish: "craziness"], so please let's have some fun!

Otherwise feel free to interject with something relevent, but please, PLEASE do not let it be a photo of Caitlyn Jenner...

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