Our saviors...( sigh )

Democratic officials: Fiscal 'cliff' deal reached

Economists in and out of government have warned that a combination of tax hikes and spending cuts could trigger a new recession, and the White House and Congress have spent the seven weeks since the Nov. 6 elections struggling for a compromise to protect the economy.

The tax hikes and spending cuts would inconvenience a lot of people, but that's not what causes recessions.

The politicians get to slap each other on the back for a job well done, but it is all a kabuki theater.  In order to believe these politicians, you have to believe that by extending the Bush tax cuts, you are saving the economy.  But these same Bush tax cuts are what was supposed to have caused all of our troubles in the first place.  What a load of bullcrap.

The House should just stand aside and let the Clinton tax rates resume and wait until we all get rich. /sarc

The Times Gives Up

nysun.com

Now, in the face of this great swelling of faith in our fundamental national contract, the New York Times has offered a new strategy — abandoning the Constitution altogether. It runs the brainstorm out under the headline “Let’s Give Up on the Constitution.” The piece carries the byline of a professor of constitutional law at Georgetown University, Louis Michael Seidman.

They don't want to give up on the Constitution.  They just want it enforced on others and not themselves.

They are the party of nothing for you, after all.

Theory of Republican Success: Squish-free zone

Let's make it short and sweet.  The theory is this:  firmness.  The Republicans have to stay firm and not make compromises.  If there are to be compromises, the compromises must be limited and get real benefits--- not just promises.

Remember George Bush as being stubborn?  He was a two-term president.  That's a success that Republicans should embrace, but they run from it.  Compare Bush with Romney.  Romney starts off on the right foot with the Benghazi thing, then he goes soft.  He should have stayed firm.   He lost.   Another example:  Arnold Swarzenegger.  He starts off like a lion and ends up as meek as a mouse hiding out in his little hidey hole.  The Governator wasn't a success in governance because he wasn't firm. He did get re-elected--- but for what?  Ronald Reagan was pretty firm.  He did make compromises, and some of them weren't good.  On the whole, though, he was firm.

There's a word for it: "squishes".  Too many squishes in the Republican party.  Got to firm up those squishes.

Salena Zito: Perhaps we're still in Oz

triblive.com

And it easy to see why “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” can be considered an allegory for today‘s dissatisfaction with politicians: Dorothy still would represent “The Everyman,” the Scarecrow would still represent voters who supported the Wizard (in our case, President Barack Obama) but who don‘t have enough brains to recognize their political interests; the heartless Tin Man could easily represent folks in post-industrial service-industry jobs; the Cowardly Lion could easily stand in for Joe Biden — all roar and no substance.

Hmm.  It doesn't quite jibe with the idea that it is the Federal Reserve, not politicians, that run the economy.  Nice try, though.

Americans never give up your guns - English pravda.ru

Americans never give up your guns - English pravda.ru

You learn something new every day if your eyes are open.   Get this:

Moscow fell, for example, not from a lack of weapons to defend it, but from the lieing guile of the Reds. Ten thousand Reds took Moscow and were opposed only by some few hundreds of officer cadets and their instructors. Even then the battle was fierce and losses high. However, in the city alone, at that time, lived over 30,000 military officers (both active and retired), all with their own issued weapons and ammunition, plus tens of thousands of other citizens who were armed. The Soviets promised to leave them all alone if they did not intervene. They did not and for that were asked afterwards to come register themselves and their weapons: where they were promptly shot.

If that doesn't tell you enough about these people, nothing can.  One thing you must never do--- and that is give up your guns.   In fact, any attempt to take them should be regarded with extreme suspicion.

Predictions for New Year

Ah, the end of the year is at hand.  What will the New Year bring?

Predictions are about as useful as New Year Resolutions.  But I suppose there's something about them that attracts people's interest.  We all want to know the future and we all want to do better.  But getting there is a problem.

This may be a bit of a different prognostication than what you may be accustomed to.  I won't predict things that are easily checked this time next year.  The big trends tend to move slowly and that is what I'm going to look at with this post.

In politics, I predicted Obama would lose.  So much for that.  However, on the longer term, we have to see what the two parties will do.  At the present, the Democrats are tacking left and the Republicans look like they will do the same.  The thing to look for is how far will it go.  If the Republicans think it is safe for them to do so, they will offer significant opposition to the Democrats.  This may be too charitable to the Republicans, though.  I don't think they really want to be an opposition party.  Let's just say this then--- this year, we will find out if the Republican Party will be an opposition party or a me-too party.  I think me too is more their style.

In economics, it largely depends upon the outcome of the political battles.  If the Republicans grow a spine and stop the Democrats' headlong rush into socialism, we may see a positive response from the economy.  If not, we'll just bump along the bottom as we've been doing.  Things will get "progressively" worse.  So, my prediction is no boom and no bust.  If the Republicans grow a spine, we may even see a boomlet of sorts.

In technology, a lot depends on Elon Musk.  Frankly, I'm getting a little worried about him.  He's taking on too many tasks at once and he has some ideas that may not pan out.  If the reusable rocket ideas he has doesn't pan out, we may have a problem achieving much of note in space.  This guy is the star and if he stumbles, we will stumble with him.  People may resent that assessment, but sorry.  He's the guy getting it done in space as of now.  Better hope that it continues.  I think it will, but I am not as confident as I was.

I don't keep up with consumer goods, so I have no opinion on that.

In energy, some folks have a high opinion on Thorium.  Well, there's good reason to.  But Thorium Energy may not be something we will enjoy here in the USA.  If the country doesn't get its head out of its butt with this enviro socialist nonsense, that technology will be taken over by the Chinese.  I think that this is the likely outcome. Most people don't consider this to be important, but it is.  Energy is the keystone of the economy.  If that keystone fails, then the whole structure is at risk.  An upgrade for the nuclear energy segment is what the doctor ordered, but it isn't clear that Western Civilization is up to the job.

At some point, the enviros will get their way, I'm predicting.  Fossil fuels will so heavily regulated that an abundance of them won't help us much.  It is the same story as with nuclear.  If nuclear can free itself of the enviro lunacy that is killing the West, fossil fuels may be able to continue to serve us.  In the meantime, fusion energy may be able to be perfected.  If not, Thorium can do the job for thousands of years, but we have to let it.  We will probably let it, but only after China leads the way.  We will have to follow or get left behind.

In any case, if socialists take over, all bets are off.  It appears that may be more true than not at this point.

Noon: The Greening of the Economy

Townhall

In Eastern Kentucky and other mining areas you see bumper stickers that say "if it can't be grown, it has to be mined," as testimony that everything comes from somewhere and something and ultimately, that something that is used to make everything is either a commodity from a mine or an agricultural product from a farm, and energy and labor is applied to that product and another product emerges and value is added. You see, wealth does not just appear, it is created, and, in the course of being created, it creates jobs, and families and communities, and states and nations....Unless the population wakes up to the inevitability of this, we are doomed. Unless we shake ourselves really hard from our green-induced stupor, we can expect to be standing on the side of the road with a sign, asking China to rescue us. And when they do, we can be sure, they will rape the redwoods, reopen the rails, and extract the elements that we have so painstakingly saved for them and, in so doing, they will enslave our people and enrich their people and their government. In another time we called it colonialism. What will we call it when it happens to us?

Comment:

What caused this to happen?

Why are so-called "green" policies favored, and traditional ones pushed over the side?

To boil it down to the most simple explanation, it has been the left that has done this.  If you are suffering financially, it is because of the left.  There can be no cure until they are removed from power.  It is as simple as that.  Things cannot get better until they are gone.

If only the Republicans would stop being the punching bag and punch back.  They have the better argument, but they won't make it.  Do they understand the issues at all?

JP Aerospace on NBC Nightly News

How 'bout that?

This reminded me of my post recently about combining a gas gun with a microwave beaming technology in order to send a small payload to orbit.   The idea is for a reusable launch system with fast turnaround.  This  would  make it affordable.  It was a speculative post, as I know of no project like this in the works at all.

Seems rather complex though.  The replacement company for SpaceX in the Stratolaunch project can get small payloads to orbit using the Pegasus rocket.  But it isn't reusable.  So far as I know, Orbital Sciences isn't planning to make their rockets reusable.

Maybe JP gets there eventually, but a few stepping stones wouldn't hurt.  Well, its a thought, anyway.

Flox propellant

What is Flox?  It is a 70-30 mixture of florine with oxygen--- in liquid form, it is called Flox.

It has a couple of advantages--- it is said to be easier to handle than liquid oxygen, and it has a higher isp when used with kerosene.  A flox/kerosene rocket could have an isp of 316 at sea level, which compares favorably with the Falcon 9.


Speculation alert:

If such a combination were used on a rocket which was airlaunched by a Stratolauncher, it could cut down on the size of the rocket by maybe as much as a third with the same payload.  You could even use a methane/lox combo in the upper stage.  With the weight savings at the first stage, a heavier second stage wouldn't be a show stopper.  Besides, while Musk was still in on Stratolauncher, he was planning to use his standard kersone/lox combo on the second stage.  The methane/lox will be lighter still.  This means an even more capable rocket combination is possible even with SpaceX out of the picture.

The advantage of Stratolaunch is that it can position the first stage so that it can be recovered and reused.  The second stage could be reused as well.  With the additional weight margins, additional capability could be added in without adversely impacting payloads.

An opportunity for SpaceX's replacement for the Stratolauncher?


Update: NASA studied flox rocket fuel possibilites and concluded a methane/flox rocket was feasible

Update:

Orbital Sciences does not appear to be the type of company that would do a flox rocket.  So, fuggedaboutit.

Agreement within reach on ‘fiscal cliff’ deal, officials say

Washington Post

• Threading all the legislative needles now falls to Reid and McConnell, who pledged to work together to craft a package that can win significant bipartisan support.
• the wheels are now in motion for the Senate to vote on New Year’s Eve, Senate aides said. If that vote were successful, the Republican-controlled House would have mere hours to decide whether to approve the legislation or take the blame for letting taxes rise next month for nearly 90 percent of Americans — and for potentially sparking a new recession.
• retiring Rep. Steven C. LaTourette (R-Ohio), a close friend of Boehner’s and a champion of a broad deal, said he could offer his support for a limited deal if the speaker requested it.

Comment:

Pure politics.  The Republicans want spending cuts and they aren't going to get them.  It's like Obama said to Boner--- "you get nothing".  Thus, its all or nothing as far as the Democrats are concerned.  The blame will be cast upon the Republicans if they don't cave.

There shouldn't have been any negotiations to begin with.  It was a mistake.  The Republicans have already approved an extension of the Bush Tax Cuts.  The Senate is now going to take it down to the wire in order to ramp up the pressure for a cave-in.

Why is McConnell dealing with Reid?  He is the Senate's version of the Boner.

Medved: The Liberal God Delusion

Michael Medved

• conservatives want to address the threat of gun violence by giving individuals more power while liberals seek to improve the situation by concentrating more power in the hands of the government
• liberals place a touching and naive faith in the ideal of a higher power—potential world government—while conservatives insist that the United States, like any nation, must ultimately rely only on itself.
• Regarding the great tax-and-spend battles...Republicans trust the private decisions of prosperous people to make the best use of the money that those citizens have generated; Democrats rely on the superior wisdom and broader perspective of a larger, more activist government to distribute rewards
• In selecting strategies for helping the poor and uplifting the downtrodden, the opposed approaches of left and right offer an especially sharp contrast...conservatives at every income level provide disproportionate support for private charities...Liberals, on the other hand, consider such private efforts insufficient and demand governmental initiatives
• At the moment, big-government fundamentalism poses more of a threat to the republic than religious absolutism.  

Yeah.  Lord save us from our saviors.  The savior business is very lucrative, you know

Did you know that slaves had no right to self-defense?

That's right.  When you see the anti-gun people yapping it up, just realize what they are really after.

That's what has happened in England, you can get into trouble if you defend yourself.  What kind of society is it that won't let you defend yourself?  It is an enslaved one, that's what.

What the hell do you think Trayvon Martin case is all about?  They'll do or say anything to get the guns because of what it means.  It means more power for them and less for you.

This one should be the line in the sand that is not going to be allowed to be crossed.

Greatest advance in aviation since the Jet engine

Alan Bond of Reaction Engines Limited, talks about his Sabre Engine technology.

I like it.

Musk goes for methane-burning reusable rockets as step to colonise Mars - Hyperbola

flightglobal.com

Excerpts:

• This plan is to use reusable rockets and along with Mars landing and ascent craft to take mankind to Mars within 15 years. And to do it Musk announced that liquid oxygen (Lox) and Methane would be SpaceX's principal propellants of choice.
• "We are going to do methane." Musk announced as he described his future plans for reusable launch vehicles including those designed to take astronauts to Mars within 15 years, "The energy cost of methane is the lowest and it has a slight Isp (Specific Impulse) advantage over Kerosene," said Musk adding, "And it does not have the pain in the ass factor that hydrogen has". 
• The new Raptor upper stage engine is likely to be only the first engine in a series of lox/methane engines. Larger engines will be derived from this. For all his arguments noting the advantages of having lots of smaller engine for engine-out redundancy, it is known that Musk has long wanted to have a larger sized engine that the current Merlin 1
• Musk envisions using a reusable heavy lift launch vehicle using a multiple of these newly developed large lox/methane engines on its first stage.
• Musk noted that the trick to economic viability was to add the new parts which allow reusability (thermal protection systems, landing legs, new engines etc,) without increasing the structural weight too much so that such a launch vehicle can still carry a useful payload. Musk stated that the payload on a very efficient conventional expendable rocket might be, at best about 4%, and suggested that 2% might be a more realistic figure for a reusable two-stage launch design. 

Comment:  So, now that Musk has ditched the hydrogen fuel way, he's going to use methane.  In order to determine what that does with respect to the amount fuel needed, I ran the numbers through the spreadsheet.

Significant dropoff in isp from hydrogen to methane --- 381 to 299

 If he uses the raptor engine all around, he will have extra fuel available for what he wants to do, but will it be enough?  This explains what Zimmerman was worried about and what I was missing.

Jesse's Café Américain: Report that Russia Has Issued Gold and Silver Coin...

Jesse's Café Américain: Report that Russia Has Issued Gold and Silver Coin...: Unfortunately I do not read Russian so I have not yet completely verified this, but I thought it was interesting enough to pass along on th...

He does have a translation by Google at the bottom of his page.

Reaction?

Frankly, I am suspicious of Russia these days.  Something like this could be significant, but why now?

One can imagine a lot of scary scenarios.  Hopefully, that's all it is--- evil imagining.

Ordinary folks losing faith in stocks

ap.org  via Free Republic

Excerpts:

• "You have to trust your government. You have to trust other governments. You have to trust Wall Street," says Neitlich, 47. "And I don't trust any of these."
• "People don't trust the market anymore," says financial historian Charles Geisst of Manhattan College. He says a "crisis of confidence" similar to one after the Crash of 1929 will keep people away from stocks for a generation or more.
• Instead of stocks, they're putting money into bonds because those are widely perceived as safer investments. [ comment:  !!!]
• On Wall Street, the investor revolt has largely been dismissed as temporary. But doubts are creeping in.
• it's a measure of the psychological blow from the Great Recession that, more than three years since it ended, big institutions, not just amateur investors, are still trimming stocks.[ comment:  It may not be mere psychology, you know]
• Three years after that BusinessWeek story on the "death of equities" ran, in 1982, one of the greatest multi-year stock climbs in history began as the little guys shed their fear and started buying. And so they will surely do again, the bulls argue, and stock prices will really rocket. [ comment:  Guess who was in the White House back then, and who ( or more precisely what )  is in the White House now.]

No mention of Jon Corzine and his MF Global shenanigans.  Corruption may have something to do with all this and the corruption is systemic.  That's why buying bonds isn't necessarily safe.  Holding cash isn't necessarily safe.  The point is that NOTHING IS SAFE.

Corruption wasn't an issue in the recent political campaign.  It should have been.

Our Advocacy-Obsessed Apparatchik MSM

Ed Driscoll via Instapundit

Fortunately, as a new video from Canada’s Sun TV explores, it’s still possible to punch back twice as hard against such tactics. As the Instaprofessor writes, linking to the same column by Byron York that inspired Peter Wehner’s post at Commentary, “Don’t be surprised, journalists, if many Americans view you as the enemy as a result. Don’t blame them. You’ve taken sides. When you act as agents for the apparat, don’t be shocked when people think of you as apparatchiks.” [ links added to quote]

One blogger has come out for media control, which would be the right wing counterpart to gun control.   I have felt the same thing myself.  Something needs to be done about them, no question about that.  They see themselves as the holiest of the holies, though.  Fierce opposition should be expected.

Update:

You can kill with words as well as with guns.

Kirk Sorensen interview WSPD Oct 2012

energyfromthorium.com

Not a whole lot of new stuff here.  At least they're still kicking.  Anybody who has a new idea like this has to go up against the incumbents.  That's as big a challenge as the technology.

Next Big Future: NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) Project ...

Next Big Future: NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) Project ...: NASA Glenn has been developing the next generation of ion thrusters for future missions. NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) Project h...

Comment:

Followed GoatGuy's calcs.  Those may come in handy some day.

British Doctors Call for Ban on Long Kitchen Knives to End Stabbings

front page mag

Instead of gun crime, the UK worries about knife crime. And has been practicing knife control. [ It hasn't worked, so that means, do even more of it!]

Eventually, all knives will be forbidden.  Then people will start using rocks to kill each other.  I suppose there will be rock control.  Even potatoes can be used to kill people.  Ban potatoes.

Eventually, the blessed day will arrive when everything is banned, and everybody will love everybody and there will be a utopia.  /snark

RG III Gets 'Uncle Tom' Treatment

townhall

MSNBC contributor Karen Finney, who said about Republican Herman Cain: "I think he makes that white Republican base of the party feel OK, feel like they are not racist because they can like this guy. I think he is giving that base a free pass, and I think they like him because they think he is a black man who knows his place."

Actually, I liked Herman Cain because I figured he would neutralize Obama's advantange on race.  Silly me.  My view on that subject has changed.

To respond a bit further, I don't give a crap what some stupid leftist says about me being racist or not.  I don't particularly care about getting their stupid approval on anything.  To the contrary, unless I am pissing them off, I'm probably doing something wrong.

This isn't about being black, it is about being anti-white.  If you are a person of color and you don't hate whitey, then you aren't 'authentic'.  They are teaching people to hate other people on the basis of their identity, which is precisely what they accuse others of doing.

Accidentally on purpose

Hey!  The "Most Popular Posts" feature doesn't work properly.  There's one post, "Why problems don't get solved", that should be in sixth place.  But it doesn't make the top ten.  That post is decidedly critical of the government.

Could there be a connection?  That's almost a joke.  Almost.

Update:

I did a full audit of all the posts on this blog.  It appears that the ranking is correct.  My bad.

Spaceballs-When Will Then be Now?

Whenever Who's on First.  Yuk, yuk.

EDITORIAL: Government recalls GM stock

Washington Times

General Motors will no longer be “Government Motors.” The Treasury Department on Wednesday announced its intention to liquidate federal holdings in the automobile company over the next 15 months. The final tally will show this policy has been a disaster for taxpayers.

Under the best case scenario, the public will wind up shelling out more than $13 billion by the close of this unfortunate episode....The end result of this shameful episode was a GM hobbled by political considerations, and an auto industry more beholden than ever to Washington. This is the path to decline, not prosperity.

The name goes from Government Motors to UAW Motors.

The Case Against Public Education

American Thinker

In light of the disaster that is modern public education, the next question should be, "Is a system of near-universal public education of any kind in the best interests of an aspiring free society?" I believe we now have enough evidence to answer, unequivocally, "No."

Comment:

Relying upon memory here, so it could be wrong--- Sam Houston was opposed to public education.  He taught himself the classics.

So, if you want to be educated, your motivation will be the determining factor.

Random thoughts 12/26/12

• Quiet day in the news thus far.   Nothing to post about there. 
•  Googled rocket trajectories and read through some posts on sounding rockets.  Did you know that these rockets return a reusable payload?  A sounding rocket has a parabolic trajectory, which means it goes mostly up and down.  It may go as high as several hundred miles up.  I was thinking of this in terms of a reusable first stage.  Of course it can be done.  It just hasn't been tried.
• Jim Morrison of The Doors didn't think much of space travel, I gather.  He wrote a song called Ship of Fools which seems to ridicule the idea.  Nevertheless, I like The Crystal Ship as a song about space travel, even though that is pretty much not what Morrison intended for the song.
• Barnhardt put up a post which featured Charlie Brown's Christmas.  She mentioned something about 1965 being the end of an era, and she is right.  I lived through that time.  Did you know that prior to that year, there were Public Service Announcements on TV which instructed aliens to get registered with the government?  It was up to them, the aliens, to report themselves.  They had to do this every year.  If they failed to do this, they would be in explicit violation of the law and subject to deportation at any moment.  That would include illegal immigrants from Mexico, if they were here.  There was an act of Congress in 1965 that changed all that.  Ted Kennedy wrote it.  It is an example of Progressivism.  It has wrought a great deal of havoc with this country.  There was a blizzard of legislation that year from a super liberal Congress swept into power by LBJ's landslide victory in 1964 over Goldwater.  Elections have consequences.  That gives me shudders to think what two terms of Obama has done to this country.  We won't see it immediately.  Fifty years from now, it will be in its full bloom.  Like a blooming stench of a rotting carcass dead and eaten up by maggots.

The Doors - The Crystal Ship ( repost from 8/22/11 )

I spent some time with this song this afternoon. Then I studied the lyrics and checked out the web for the song's meaning.

There was a pretty good interpretation, but it fell a little short. Then I came across the idea that he is actually singing to himself and about himself.

Without going too much deeper into it, I'd say, at the very least, that he's singing to an alter ego. It could be himself, while he is high, or to someone he is still in love with. But the last line in the song messes up that interpretation, so I think the song is about himself while he is high and while he is straight.

Well, that is all for today. Thanks for coming by and have a great evening.

Update:

This song must have some type of attraction for me as I went back to it.  Anyhow, the above interpretation astounds me a little.  I'm thinking that it makes a great song for space travel.  You won't get high on drugs, but get high on space instead--- literally.

Update:

Perhaps an explanation is in order for the space travel claim for this song.  One part should be obvious--- the ship part.  There's the part where it says he'd rather fly than cry.  There's the sense of going somewhere exciting and then returning.  He asks "where your freedom lies" and answers "the streets are fields that never die".  The same can be said of space.  Ultimate in freedom and there's no end to it.

The part that may not be so obvious, maybe because it is that way with me, is the "crystal" part.  There's the mystical properties of crystal--- a crystal ball that can tell the future.  That's obvious, but the part that isn't is where the reference to drugs may have come into this.  Perhaps this wasn't the intent at all with the song, but it could be some kind of hip thing that's going over my head.  I'm not into that.  However, if the crystal ship has mystical properties, so could the crystal space ship.  It opens up new possibilities, experiences.  So, that part can work too.

So, there it is.  My interpretation.  Make what you will of it.

Paul Simon --- Kodachrome

This song has not been one of my favorites.  Not that I have anything against it, mind you.  But, it just never struck my fancy.  For some reason, it just popped into my head.  So, I brought up the song on Youtube and decided to have a look at it.



I couldn't make much out of the lyrics, so maybe that's why I never did get to like the song.   To get some help in understanding the song, I went here.   At first, I was confused. Still am, because they had the Sound of Silence lyrics there for some reason.   But the discussion was about Kodachrome.

After awhile, one starts to suspect this is about drugs.  You got "mama" who can take things away that make you feel good.  One may suspect that mind-altering drugs can supposedly improve imagination and creativity, which are better than what is in the real world "crap" that you learn in "high school".

It may be a mistake to get too literal with this song.  But I'm still suspicious.  Too many artists sold out to make their careers.  Somebody once said something to the effect that rock and roll was invented in order to make parents crazy.  So, they sold out in order to make stuff that corrupted the morals of the younger generation.

Just now, a thought just flashed into my mind.  Maybe he's just a kid that doesn't want to grow up.  The high school part is his rebellion.  So is the Kodachrome, whatever Kodachrome actually means.  It could be anything that keeps this guy in a juvenile state of being.  "Mama don't take my Kodachrome away" is the same as saying "Mama let me be a kid forever".  The writer wants to be a kid forever.

Christmas in an Anti-Christian Age

Pat Buchanan, Townhall

Christians believe Christ could raise people from the dead because he is God. That is faith. Atheists believe life came out of non-life. That, too, is faith. They believe in what their god, science, cannot demonstrate, replicate or prove. They believe in miracles but cannot identify, produce or describe the miracle worker.

Mostly agree with that quote.

But the atheists don't claim science as their god.  Maybe scientists can be their gods, especially leftist ones. That may be a bit facetious, but not too far off the mark in the real world of leftist states.  As I've heard it described elsewhere, but somewhat differently than this, the left "worships the creation, not the creator". They deny the creator, which only leaves the creation to worship itself.  Or more precisely, one part of the the creation worshipping another part of the creation-- which has annoited itself as godlike in its powers.

This works out pretty well for you financially if you can be lucky enough to be a God.

Lord, save us from our saviors

Yeah, accept God or be God.

There's something in Instapundit that reminds me of that saying.  There's a "professor" who wants the death penalty for global warming deniers.  No question that this guy is well-educated.  But does he have an ounce of common sense?

I got through about two or three paragraphs of his essay before I began thinking "Just another leftist-liberal jackass."  Should I take his essay apart piece by piece?  That's what used to be called a "fisking" in the old days of blogging.  But to fisk this guy is a waste of time.  He is totally immersed in his own paradigm.  Anybody arguing within his own paradigm cannot even acknowledge that there could be another way of thinking about the problem.  It is like that gun debate with Piers Morgan.  Morgan is obtuse, so is the left in general.

In general, to fisk a liberal is a waste of time because you are not attacking their logic, but their beliefs.  Any who would stray from their belief system is evil.  If you question them, you are a devil.  Fisk them for your own pleasure.  You won't convince them of anything though.  They are God and are totally infallible.

Well, I'd better comment on some of what this bozo says anyway even if it is a waste of time:

• The opinions of everyday GW deniers are evidently being driven by influential GW deniers who have a lot to lose if GW is taken seriously, such as executives in transnational oil corporations. [ comment:  Nobody can be independent enough to think this through on their own without somebody spoon-feeding them their propaganda and talking-points?  Physician, heal thyself.  I have thought this through on my own.  I have researched this on my own.  I don't buy what they are selling.]
• there is simply no money in environmental doomsday stories [ comment: Ever heard of the movie "The Day After Tomorrow"?  Doomsday is very popular and lots of money can be made off of it.  Duh.]
• the cost of reducing GW to a manageable amount (whatever that is) will be enormous[ comment:  Fallacy.  The thinking here is that people must suffer for their sins.  The sin is living too well.  We must return to nature, and in doing so, lose our high standard of living.  The fact is, there is an economical way of eliminating so-called greenhouse gases, but the left is not at all interested in it.  This would enable people to escape judgment for their sins, so that's why the left isn't interested.  Besides, there's a lot of money to be made in cap and trade schemes.]
• GW deniers fall into a completely different category from Behring Breivik. They are already causing the deaths of hundreds of millions of future people. [ comment: This is coming from a university professor.  So, somebody with an honest difference of opinion is worse than a mass murderer?  Deranged.]
• I propose that we limit the death penalty to people whose actions will with a high probability cause millions of future deaths[ comment:  More derangement.  There is such a thing as ex-post facto (punishment for what was legal in the past)  law in this country.  But there is no category for this type of law.  A murder trial for future deaths?  What kind of insanity is this?  You can only have a trial for deeds that have been done in the past that were illegal in the past and still illegal in the present. Not for deeds that may or may not take place in the future.  The only way to enforce this law is to impose a strict censorship on "dangerous" ideas.  Who decides what's dangerous?  Why, the left does, of course.]
• there is a dividing line somewhere between murders for which the death penalty is appropriate and murders for which it is inappropriate[ comment:  Yeah, an imaginary one just like your example, you twit.]
• the Pope and perhaps some of his closest advisers should be sentenced to death[ comment:  Why of course.  Murder the Pope.  That will save the world!  The Pope is so, so dangerous. /sarc]
• The Nazi holocaust was the worst crime in human history[ comment:  The worst?  There have been crimes with greater body counts.  This is hype.]
• I guess that right now there is no existing law, either national or international, under which such a prosecution could be pursued.[ comment: Nor likely to ever be one unless the world goes insane, which is where the left continually is with about every one of their wacko ideas.]
• Right now, in the year 2012, these ideas will seem quite crazy to most people. People will be saying that Parncutt has finally lost it. [ comment:  You said it.  If I read through this much first before commenting this much, I could have saved myself a lot of time.  But I would have lost some pleasure in ridiculing this idiotic rotgut leftist hogwash.]
• Who knows, perhaps the Pope would even turn me into a saint.[ comment:  Too late.  He was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death in your future world.  Too bad, too sad.  No sainthood for you, numbskull.]

No wonder the young vote for the left.  They are under the influence of these loonies in their formative years.  A good law would be to ban these wackos from our higher schools of learning.  It might save billions of lives.  My ideas might even get me sainted.  Yay, me!

Merry Christmas. ( Hah, bunhug)

There are going to be those out there, though few that they are, who will think I've been partaking a little much of the old eggnog.  But no.  There's a lot of thoughts swimming around in my head and I can't focus on one of them for very. Long. ( yes, I added the "Long" in later.  I forgot to finish the sentence.) The confusion is just that, not drunkenness.

So, with all the confusion and such, I will post something of a stream of consciousness type post again.  What the heck, huh?

Perhaps adding to the confusion is the cold that I've got.  It's disgusting with all this snot.  I'm sure you appreciated that comment.

One thought that recurs from time to time in my confusion is the Amish.  They are perfect Liberals.  They are pacifist, hate guns, and are completely unreasonable about everything.  Their elders want everybody to follow their rules with unquestioning obedience.  If you dare question anything, they will punish you severely.  Yep, perfect Liberals.  I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if the left admired them.  Only negative thing in that regard is that they believe in God, or they believe that they believe in God.  The God part is a big no-no with Libs.  For the Libs, the state is God.  And they are the heads of state, which makes them God.

If the Left could rain fire and brimstone on the Right, they'd do it.  Pacifist and peaceable though they may claim to be.

Who's the master and who is the servant?  Is my confusion the beginning of wisdom?  Am I full of crap?

Whatever.  I have some thoughts that are so dangerous that I worry about disclosing them.  Well, maybe not dangerous.   I worry about too much self-disclosure.  Perhaps I shouldn't worry about that.  Did you realize how much surveillance we are under constantly?   Our cell phones can spy on us.  Our computers can spy on us.  Google Earth can spy on us.  We've long had no privacy in financial transactions.   There's no privacy anymore.  Self-disclosure is one of the few areas that you can maintain our own little area of privacy.  Giving that away too gives pause.

But here goes anyway.  I worry about this push to probe into your psychology in order to determine if you are fit to own a firearm.  If you probe far enough into a person, you may find a pathology of some kind or another.  I fear that probe if it were to be applied to myself.  And having found a problem, that the government could take away my freedoms on the basis of it.  You see, the government shouldn't be allowed to decide something like that- arbitrarily.   Our Founding Fathers tried to put some separation between the people and the state.  For example, trial by jury.   I don't want to empower the state any further than it is empowered already.  If people are to be denied access to guns by reasons of mental incompetence, that should be something that is decided in a trial by jury.

I guess that's enough for one post.  I'll pick it up again later.

Grasshopper test

Now up to 130 feet.

Zimmerman has his doubts, so it makes me wonder if I made a mistake with my calculations.  Probably so.  However, it should be kept in mind, though, that the reason for something not having been done before may not be that it is too difficult.  It may be that nobody seriously tried to do it before.

A flyback version of the Saturn V rocket was considered for the Space Shuttle.  It wasn't chosen in favor of another design.  One may think it wasn't chosen because of its lack of merit, but knowing Washington, that may not have had a damn thing to do with it.  Supposedly, the Shuttle was to usher in an era of affordable access to space.  But, Washington isn't interested in that.  Their priorities are elsewhere.

Besides, there was a failure mode for the Shuttle which required a return to launch site.  If the Shuttle was capable to do it, in theory, so should another system be capable of it also.

Societal decay, Part 2

Nothing is planned on this blog.  A second post on this subject certainly wasn't.

The post came together in an most unexpected way.  It began when I searched for a scene that I remembered from the movie Witness,  in which the main character, played by Harrison Ford, was hiding amongst the Amish in Pennsylvania.  I was interested in the scene where the John Book character, played by Ford, punched a bully in the nose.

This led to a long session with a couple series of videos about the Amish.  In particular, it was about a couple of families that left the Amish.  What struck me is how the community is governed.  You see, the Amish are governed by a strict set of rules, which cannot be questioned.   Anyone who deviates from these rules can be excommunicated.  Excommunication is a serious thing.  They are literally thrown out of the community.  No one in the community is allowed to have anything to do with those who are excommunicated.  If anyone does, they too can be excommunicated.

This was interesting to me because I sensed something in common between myself and this fellow Ephraim.  He questioned the teachings of the Amish church, and that got him into trouble with the elders.  As with his case, it seemed that I frequently question everything, and I'm probably in some kind of trouble with just about everybody all the time.  It's like I'm a rebel without a pause or a cause.  But Ephraim wasn't so much different from the the rest of the Amish.  It was just that the Amish tolerate no differences at all.  Ephraim found himself at odds with the Amish church because he was willing to be different.

Being that I think about things, I could also see things from the viewpoint of the church elders.  They have to keep the community together.  How do you do this unless you have a set of rules?

Anyway, you could see Ephraim going down a path which leads him into areas that no Amish tend to go.  The series ends before you can see the end of his quest.  Where does it all end?

The thing to take away from this is that when you deviate from the accepted path, you don't know where it will end up.  There are those that can see trouble ahead.  But you also have others who cheer on the changes.  Some see the changes as "progress", and others who see it as "decay".

There needs to be rules.   I accept that.  But the reason for the rules should be reasonable.  I don't trust unquestioning obedience.  But there are times when authority should not be questioned.

Rather confusing.  Life is a set of contradictions.  Nothing is simple.  Nothing stays the same.

Lopez: "Yes, gay is a choice. Get over it."

American Thinker

Excerpts:

• yet another individual working in higher education has been demolished for saying the wrong thing about homosexuality
• Crystal Dixon of the University of Toledo was fired for writing an editorial in a local newspaper.
• gay sex is a choice. Nobody lacks the power to refrain from having gay sex.
• You will see a roll call of gays and pro-gay supporters, issuing confident testimonials that nobody has ever changed from gay to straight.
• Does anybody who uses the term LGBT remember the "B" in that God-forsaken acronym? Hello? There are bisexuals. I am one of them. Why include us in these categories if you think we don't exist?
• Lastly, I am left with my own life story. I can't change it. I went from being in the gay lifestyle to marrying a woman, having a daughter, and living a happy heterosexual life.
• Crystal Dixon pointed out something that no amount of peer-reviewed research can disprove. Gay is not the new black.

The university system is government financed and is being used to tear down society.   If anyone says anything in contradiction to them, they will be punished.  Time to turn the tables.  Take them on and starve that mangy beast.  Refuse to feed it.   Don't give them any more money.  No more taxes, no more spending.

Arguments won't work anymore.  The truth doesn't matter.

“You get nothing, I get that for free.”

Legal Insurrection

Is It Time For Conservatives To Sit Down In The Snow?

• We can learn a lot about the power of standing on principle from Anatoly Sharansky (see my earlier Post).
• Sharansky spend almost a decade in Soviet prison
• Sharansky notoriously refused to obey even the most mundane orders from his captors.
• Throughout his ordeal, Sharansky kept his spirits alive by reading a small book of psalms.
  
  As Sharansky was being led to the airplane that would take him from the Soviet Union to East Germany for the exchange, the Soviets confiscated his book of psalms.
• In front of reporters covering his departure, Sharansky sat in the snow refusing to move unless the Soviets gave him back his book of psalms.

Turn it around on Obama.  Tell him he gets nothing, and we get something for free.  Then refuse to comply with any of his orders.  Let's see what happens next.

Why does Jaron Lanier hate the idea of “the wisdom of the crowd”?

Jaron Lanier is a smart man, that's why. via Instapundit

If so many people weren't so shallow, and actually read any history, or had sufficient common sense, this question wouldn't be asked.

Societal decay

It's not the school shootings, it's the reaction to it.  The left wants to punish the innocent and reward the guilty.  It isn't unusual for them to do this, for that is what they do.  The media gives the bad guy a name and status as an anti-hero.  Then they blame everybody and everything for what happens except for what actually causes the problem in the first place.  Will a "conversation on guns" ever be a true conversation, or will it be what it always is--- a one-way demand for action that the left favors?  If there was a true conversation, some sort of reasonable policy could be enacted.  But it won't be.  Those who oppose what the left demands will be demonized.

The most recent election was most distressing to many folks.  By all accounts, Obama should have been a one-term president.  He has done nothing to earn a second term, but that is not the way it works anymore.  Evidently, the way it works now is that whoever has the best political machine, wins.  The Republicans could recognize this and begin making adjustments, but don't count on that.  The disease of the Republicans reminds me of ancient Rome.  The Roman Empire fell because of internal weaknesses.  If the same fate of Rome awaits the USA, it won't be because the enemy has grown strong.  Rather, it will be because those who favor the Republic have grown weak.  Our chief weakness has to be our inability to unite.

We are dysfuntional.  Our system is rigged to produce more of the same.  When push comes to shove, what will happen?  A rebellion?  A revolution?  Or will the Republic go out with a whimper and not a bang?  Whatever happens, you can count on one thing.  The left can't get what they want at the ballot box, not even now.  As usual, what they can't get, they will try to get through judicial tyranny.  Obama has a clear road to pack the courts with fellow travelers, who have every intention of continuing their destruction of the American Republic.  Maybe that will be the kickoff to a rebellion, or just a resigned whimper of protest.

The stage is being set for mayhem.  It only needs a spark to set it off.

The media is the enemy

About the video:  Most Americans know the mainstream media manipulates stories, manufactures illusions, and exploits fears. But the reason is more than just liberal bias or sloppy reporting. Behind the Big News exposes a revolutionary agenda -- originating outside the media -- that defines today's headlines. This powerful and fast-paced video examines some of the biggest news stories in recent decades to discover how this subversive agenda is promoted.  Produced in 2003 by The John Birch Society.


Comment:

It was enough, in the old days, when the name "John Birch Society" was mentioned, it meant instant discredit.  For me, anyone who knocks the media is alright by me.   Besides, the Republican party craves something better than what we are getting from the media.  I saw that in the Republican primaries.

Why can't the Republicans get that message?  Perhaps too many of them have been compromised by the machine.

Obama's Party of Nothing in a nutshell

“You get nothing,” the president said. “I get that for free.”

People voted for this?

If Gingrich is right, the machine voted for it.  The Republicans are up against a machine that will deprive you of everything.  That is to say, nothing for you.  Everything for them.

Memo: The Challenge Confronting the Republican Party

gingrichproductions via Free Republic

excerpts:

• To Chairman Reince Priebus
• I was delighted when you became RNC Chairman
• Your creation of the Growth and Opportunity Project chaired by Henry Barbour
• I was delighted when you appointed a distinguished team to lead the analysis for the Republican National Committee.
• After the 1992 defeat Chairman Haley Barbour was decisive in renewing enthusiasm, raising resources, and helping shape and implement strategy. Without Haley’s help we would not have had a Contract with America, would not have won the first House GOP majority in 40 years or re-elected it for the first time since 1928 in 1996.
• Those Republicans who assume bad events will beat the Democrats in 2016 underestimate the power of machines to survive bad performances.
• The Democrats have been building a national machine while the Republicans have been running campaigns
• Exit polling indicated that Obama won the argument over the economy and by a large margin the American people blamed former President George W. Bush rather than his successor for the economic mess.

Comment:

We'll see.  There are getting together some people who have had success in the past.  That's a good sign.

Frankly, I wonder how much the GOP actually wants to win.  They'd rather look good in defeat than ugly in victory.

The major problem, as I see it, is that the GOP is its own worst enemy.  If they can get that turned around, the rest could be relatively simple.

Local gun store owner receives death threat

"Live by the gun. Die by the gun. You will not live to see Easter," reads the typed letter that was mailed Thursday in Houston and arrived Saturday at Jim Pruett's Guns & Ammo.--- chron.com

I didn't recognize the name at first, then a little bell rung when his partner on the radio was mentioned. Stevens and Pruett had their own show on a local radio station, and one of their frequent skits was something called "Uncle Waldo".

Hard to believe that somebody would want to kill the surviving member of this well-liked duo just because he has a gun shop. These people are unhinged.  Frankly, the person responsible for this probably doesn't have the nerve to follow through on his threat.  He'd probably do what these killers usually do--- as soon as they are confronted, they all commit suicide.  Miserable little punks is what they are.

Anyway, here's an example of Stevens and Pruett's work. Their radio show was during drive time in the morning on KLOL, formerly a rock and roll station.

Gun violence in Virginia falls, firearms sales up

Gun violence in Virginia falls, firearms sales up

Virginia Commonwealth University professor Thomas R. Baker compared state crime data from 2006 through 2011 with gun-dealer sales estimates obtained by the Richmond Times-Dispatch.

Baker's analysis shows the number of gun purchases soared 73 percent in the six-year period, while gun-related violent crimes fell 24 percent.

Baker, who specializes in research methods and criminology theory, said the comparison seems to contradict the premise that more guns lead to more crime in Virginia. [emphasis added, note the weasel word "seems" is added here in order to raise doubt.]

Meanwhile, UK is violent crime capital of Europe.

Analysis of figures from the European Commission showed a 77 per cent increase in murders, robberies, assaults and sexual offences in the UK since Labour came to power.

The total number of violent offences recorded compared to population is higher than any other country in Europe, as well as America, Canada, Australia and South Africa.

Take that, Piers Morgan.

No link of video games to violence

Well worth watching. Found this on nicedoggie.net.

Passivity may end war, but it has an unpleasant side-effect

The left won't be satisfied until we become like the passive Eloi, who get eaten by the Morlocks.

Update:

This business about pushing society into becoming like the Eloi isn't just rhetoric.  The right of self-defense was originally English Common law, but now, if you live in the UK, you can't defend yourself legally.

An opinion on gun control

larrycorreia  via Ace of Spades

Larry Correia is the New York Times bestselling author of the Monster Hunter International series, the Grimnoir Chronicles, and the thriller Dead Six. My next novel, Monster Hunter Legion, will be available September 2012. All of my books are available in eBook format, but currently only from www.baen.com's webscriptions. (cheap and DRM free!) Audio versions of most of my books are available from www.audible.com.  ....I am now a professional novelist. However, before that I owned a gun store. We were a Title 7 SOT, which means we worked with legal machineguns, suppresors, and pretty much everything except for explosives. We did law enforcement sales and worked with equipment that is unavailable from most dealers, but that means lots and lots of government inspections and compliance paperwork. This means that I had to be exceedingly familiar with federal gun laws, and there are a lot of them. I worked with many companies in the gun industry and still have many friends and contacts at various manufacturers. When I hear people tell me the gun industry is unregulated, I have to resist the urge to laugh in their face.

"Gun Control: A Discussion, Not A Lecture."   Like the one posted about previously.

Next Big Future: Progress on the Vortex Rocket Engine

Next Big Future: Progress on the Vortex Rocket Engine: Orbitec has flown a radical new engine technology that promises to cut the size, weight and therefore the cost of putting a rocket – and pay...


Comment:

The idea is to make a rocket engine that is reusable.  Even maintenance free.  According to the article, it is at technical readiness level 6.  That means its nearly ready.

Piers Morgan, all-American European

There is this tendency amongst those on the left to want to emulate Europe. This is also combined with this overweening superior attitude amongst those like this guy for the European way of doing things. But the worst mass shooting in recent years has been in Europe, not America. Yet, you didn't hear that overweening attitude being displayed toward Europe in the aftermath of that mass murder.

Morgan doesn't address Pratt's arguments. He just ignores them or insults him. Then he recites the statistics. This ignores all history. After all, Americans came here in order to practice religious freedom, which wasn't the case in Europe at that time, or is the case at this time. For example, if gay weddings are required to be performed in a church, there can be no freedom of religion there. It is against Christian teaching. Therefore, no religious liberty. Europe doesn't have the liberty we have, why should we emulate them? We disavow our history if we do that.

Not only does it ignore American history, it ignores European history. After all, how did Europe get where it is today? From wars and dictatorships. Now we are to believe that they are the fountains of enlightenment that we must emulate.

Americans on the left are embarrassed at their own country. If they like Europe so much more, why don't they leave? Why is Morgan pontificating to us instead of his fellow Europeans? Why should we be listening to their lectures?

Big policy changes, little information in advance

It is hard to get basic facts about the Newton school massacre.  Perhaps one should have watched all of the coverage at the time.  However, there does not appear to be much there afterward.

What are the basic facts?  Can you piece together a minute-by-minute narrative of events of the massacre from what is being reported?

The most basic fact of all is how did this guy get access to the school?  It has been reported that he forced his way in.  He may have used his weapons to do this.  But how did he use his weapons?

Did he bust a window?  Did he shoot through a door?  How did he do it?  How did he get on the scene? Did he drive through an access gate?  Was there a guard anywhere on the site?

Now, I do deliveries.  Some of those deliveries are to schools.  A couple of them have walled gates, which require anybody to wishing to enter to pass through security.  Simple arrangement.  Nobody gets in without having to pass through a security checkpoint.  Did Sandy Hook have anything like this?  If not, why not?

Lots of places besides schools have layers of security.  You go through one layer and then another.

If there were layers, and the bad guy gets by one, then he must get by another before he gains full access.

The time taken to get by a multi-layered security scheme would allow an evacuation plan to proceed in such a case as Sandy Hook.  If all else fails, lots of people could just get away or into secured zones.

I suppose all of these are simple questions from a simple mind.  Surely, we must do away with all of our civil liberties just because some folks think that they can ignore security procedures even though there has been a history of mass shootings at schools.  Only sophisticated people, such as those in the press, are capable of telling us what we should think on the basis of their deep and probing analytical coverage of the facts of the case. /sarc

In order for gun-control to stop one of these type incidents, a complete gun confiscation plan has to be implemented.  Otherwise, some guns will remain which can be used in another event just like this one.  For each proposal, please state why it would stop this type of event.  How can you assure that this will remove all guns from all possible places?  The only way that is sure to work would be a draconian suspension of civil liberties combined with a house-to-house gun confiscation policy.  Are you willing to surrender all of your civil liberties for this?

Before any policy changes are to be put into place, there should be a complete and full account of everything that happened and what could have done to stop it.  If confiscating all guns is the only solution, those who advocate it should be prepared to show why it is necessary.  For any policy change, those advocating should show why it would be effective in preventing any recurrence of such events in the future.

Control freak doing her thing

Nurse Ratched kills that kid with her words.

So many flags are at half staff- why?

While driving about, I noticed so many flags at half staff.  What gives?

Something similar happened after 9-11, when so many people put old glory on their cars.  The left at that time lamented the "patriotism run amok".  I suppose this must be the left's answer to that- grief run amok.  Anytime there's a tragedy to exploit, we are encouraged to join in the spirit of victimized outrage.

Parker: Mass Murderers: Blame 1960s Deinstitutionalization

Parapundit

While reading a Daniel Greenfield piece on gun control and whether we are individuals capable of making our own decisions I noticed a piece he did about the rise of mentally ill mass murders which, in turn, led to a piece by Clayton Cramer about how the rise of mass murderers is at least partially a result of letting the mentally ill out of mental hospitals.

Comment:

Of course, the obvious factor like this is overlooked in the mad dash to deprive the population of its civil liberties.  This from people who swear up and down how much they support civil liberties.

Underneath the skin of their caring and harmless looking facade ( Michael Moore ) beats the heart of a tyrant.

We need golden eagle control (video)

Golden Eagle almost eats kid.  Not a bald eagle, thank goodness.



Darned eagles are a menace!!! We must control them for the children and the national debt!!! If you aren't against eagle control, you are a murderer!!! Do you hear me? Murderer!!!

Update:

Hmm.  This reminds me of something.  Abortion kills a lot of babies, doesn't it?

Where Do We Go From Here? [Warden]

Ace of Spades blog

Consuming things that you know will upset you doesn’t help. Log off Facebook and get away from all that trivial bullshit. Shut off the shouty cable political talk shows. Stop arguing on blogs with people who don’t get it. You’re letting a bunch of losers drag you down to their level.

That includes this place. As soon as it stops being fun, take a break.

You have more hours in the day than you think. You just need to break your negative feedback loop and re-focus.[ emphasis added]

Yeah.  Don't get into a rassling match with a pig.  You only get muddy, and besides, the pig likes it.

Update:

Try this one.  Don't let the liberal zombies eat your brain.

Professor calls for assassination of NRA CEO

campusreform

The professor contended Democratic lawmakers should exploit the tragedy to force more restrictive gun control measures into law.

“You are goddamn right we should politicize this tragedy,” Loomis tweeted. “[F]uck the NRA.”

Comment:

Lovely.  Such peaceable, kind-hearted and nice people they are.  Why would anybody even think of "hating" them? /sarc

Remember Krugman's Climate of Hate?

Why is it that liberals spew such hatred and then have the audacity to demand that others stop "hating" them?

Conservatives Rationalize as America Circles the Drain

American Thinker

A process is in motion, a disease besets us, and if you understand its pathology, you know that no amount of Hispandering or appeals to virtue (e.g., personal responsibility) with an electorate largely lacking in the quality will bear fruit. The remaining healthy acorns need to recognize this, stop trying to fertilize a tree destined for the sawmill, and instead prepare to seed new ground. 

Whew!  "Seed new ground?" ---Whatever does that mean?

Not that I disagree.  But how do you seed new ground and where?  This quote is at the very end of the piece, so there's no hint of what is meant by that phrase.

Let me fill in the blank.  For America as we know it is dying, we need to find a new America.  This would be a place to start anew.  You'd make a new society in a new world, as was done in the past.  What new world would that be?

Elon Musk wants to go to Mars.  I think he will get there.  He wants to take 80k people with him.  Among those 80k could be settlers for a new world where there could be freedom again.

Ann Coulter - December 19, 2012 - WE KNOW HOW TO STOP SCHOOL SHOOTINGS

Ann Coulter - December 19, 2012 - WE KNOW HOW TO STOP SCHOOL SHOOTINGS

Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.

For once, some sanity has issued forth.

Come and take it

gonzalestexas.com

The link above sports the come and take it flag, which can be purchased on Ebay.  The link above also tells the story about the battle.

It should be noted that one of the first thing that a rising tyrant does is to disarm his citizens.  Santa Ana did it.  Hitler did it.  They all do it.  The reasons should be obvious.

Trivia, and some other nonsense, but wtf?

Do you want to know where the nickname "Boner" came from?  Too obvious?

The thought for this post comes from Speaker Boehner's name itself.  His name looks like Boner and he acts like a Boner.  Why do anything at all about the "fiscal cliff"?  The fiscal cliff was a Boner itself since they put it in there.  It was solution for the debt ceiling problem in 2011.  Now it's a problem that once was a solution.  That "solution" was Speaker Boner's boner.  It calls for yet another Boner which will become a "problem" at some point in the future.

Another trivia item--- did you know the five biggest mass shootings in history?  Only one of these was in America.

By the way, the only way to stop mass shootings is to confiscate every single gun in the country.  Do you really want to do that?  I mean if you do that, according to Michael Moore, you still have a country full of killers.  It's in our DNA, he says.  I guess he means kill everybody.  That's the only way you get rid of that bad old DNA we got.   Did Moore commit a Boner by this Freudian slip?  I mean to say, what exactly did he mean by that?

Maybe the world is coming to an end after all.

Beam me up Scotty, no intelligent life here.  Couldn't resist the phrase.  Sorry.  Everybody is entitled to at least one Boner.

EXCLUSIVE: Fear of being committed may have caused Connecticut gunman to snap

foxnews.com via Free Republic

quote:

A senior law enforcement official involved in the investigation confirmed that Lanza's anger at his mother over plans for “his future mental health treatment” is being looked at as a possible motive for the deadly shooting.

Comment:

It is curious to me that the leftist media is jumping all over this shooting and calling for more gun control, yet told Romney to hold up on his criticism of the Administration with respect to Benghazi.  Where's their call for restraint now until more facts are known?  What if this shooter had a clear cut motive like this and it can be proven?

Michael Moore hates America

This is not a polemic exercise.  This guy really hates his own country.

Here's some quotes from a speech he made hours after the mass shooting in Connecticut

• I really believe that even if we had better gun control laws and better mental health, that we would still be the sort of sick and twisted, violent people that we've been for hundreds of years," Moore said. "And to get that out of our DNA is going to take a lot more than passing a bill in Albany or D.C. That's not going to do it."[ emphasis added]
• 'Guns don't kill people, Americans kill people,' because that's what we do.
• when you make sure that 50 million people don't have health insurance in your country and that, according to the congressional study that was done, 44,000 people a year die in America for the simple reason that they don't have health insurance, that's a form of murder.[ comment:  murder?!]
• frankly, as an American, this is not how I want to be remembered."

If he really felt the way he says he feels, he wouldn't want to be an American.  This is all a phony front to play up to the emotions of the event.

I could understand it if this was Nazi Germany and there was an ongoing extermination of an entire group of people.  In such a case like that, I may want to disown my country.  There has been nobody in our history like Adolf Hitler.  That's not meant to knock Germany, but this country isn't the monster that Moore is making us out to be.

He points out that we are in several wars right now.  Yeah?  How did those wars start?  You can question why we are there, but to call the whole country a nation of killers because of this is over the top.

He points out that nobody died when a crazy man in China attacked kids with a knife.  So?  Does that mean he admires China and wants to emigrate there?  How many innocent people died in Maoist China because of their political purges during that time?  How many in Stalinist Russia?  You can go on and on.

Where are people emigrating to--- China or the United States?

Actually, there are a lot of us in this country who like this country to improve conditions here.  It may be better if those who think like Moore would just leave since they obviously hate this country.  It would make the job go a lot easier.   We don't need this kind of self-hatred.  He's not helpful, he's just hateful.

Anarchist Soccer Mom: Thinking the Unthinkable

In the wake of another horrific national tragedy, it’s easy to talk about guns. But it’s time to talk about mental illness.


quote:

The morning of the pants incident, Michael continued to argue with me on the drive. He would occasionally apologize and seem remorseful. Right before we turned into his school parking lot, he said, “Look, Mom, I’m really sorry. Can I have video games back today?”

“No way,” I told him. “You cannot act the way you acted this morning and think you can get your electronic privileges back that quickly.”

His face turned cold, and his eyes were full of calculated rage. “Then I’m going to kill myself,” he said. “I’m going to jump out of this car right now and kill myself.”

Comment:

Threats of violence against others or oneself are a big, red flag.

This is just one incident among many recounted in this mother's story.  Gun control does nothing to help her with the kind of problems she faces with her son.  Gun control talk is useless because it does not address the real problem, such as the one she faces.  She has to face it alone.  She gets no help.  The system won't help her.  Gun control won't help her.  It won't help us either.

Click on the link above for her full story.

Cui bono? ( Who benefits?)

That's what gets overlooked about these environmentalists and their opposition to anything that will actually work.  Who benefits?  Why the incumbent power producers, that's who.

Anyway, Energy From Thorium must be making advances, and so the campaign against it is heating up.

'Without exception, [thorium reactors] have never been commercially viable, nor do any of the intended new designs even remotely seem to be viable. Like all nuclear power production they rely on extensive taxpayer subsidies; the only difference is that with thorium and other breeder reactors these are of an order of magnitude greater, which is why no government has ever continued their funding.'

I'm tempted to label the above quote as The Big Lie.  The reason that they haven't been adopted is that they will work, and that fact is what threatens the incumbents.  Besides, Thorium has received virtually nothing in funding for the last forty years.  While Thorium reactors will be breeders, it is a different kind of breeder.  This is a willful conflation of significantly different concepts.

Here's another big whopper from the linked article above ( "Don't believe the spin on thorium being a greener nuclear option" ) :

But even were its commercial viability established, given 2010's soaring greenhouse gas levels, thorium is one magic bullet that is years off target. Those who support renewables say they will have come so far in cost and efficiency terms by the time the technology is perfected and upscaled that thorium reactors will already be uneconomic. Indeed, if renewables had a fraction of nuclear's current subsidies they could already be light years ahead.

Solyndra alone cost more than what Sorensen is asking for to making a prototype reactor.  Renewables will never be enough to power a modern society.  Talking about hype, there it is.

Another questionable statement---

even conventional nuclear reactors will not deliver what the world needs in terms of safe, affordable electricity

France gets a high percentage of its electricity from nuclear.  It can be done and has been done.  Thorium will do it even better.

Environmentalists are either unwittingly or willfully aiding and abetting the status quo.  Their ideas will never work and they will actively prevent any new ideas being implemented.  The result is benefits to the incumbent energy producers.  If one is inclined, one may suspect a conspiracy.

Norway Begins Four Year Test Of Thorium Nuclear Reactor

singularityhub

But is thorium really cheaper, cleaner and more efficient than uranium? And if so, do the added benefits really warrant the cost and effort to make the switch? Data is still pretty scarce, but at least one report is urging us to not believe the hype.

Hype?  Thorium is much more abundant than uranium.  That's not hype.

The piece doesn't mention molten salt reactors.  Those can work with uranium as well.  They are more efficient and cleaner than conventional reactors.  You don't have to get hung up on Thorium.  There was one design that didn't emphasize Thorium all that much, from what I can gather.

Thorium: Proliferation warnings on nuclear 'wonder-fuel'

phys.org

"The problem is that the neutron irradiation of thorium-232 could take place in a small facility," Ashley said. "It could happen in a research reactor, of which there are about 500 worldwide, which may make it difficult to monitor."

Comment:

But this has nothing to do with its use as a fuel.  Besides, this can be done anyway, regardless of its use as a fuel or not, and could have been done for decades now and we wouldn't know about it.  There's nothing new here.

What they are trying to say here is that anybody can make a nuke with thorium.  So, why haven't they?

Update:

The idea of a U233 bomb is absurd.  It is impossible to have a pure U233 because it simply can't happen.  Read this here.

Where’s Mitt?

Playing bean bag.

Where was this commentary when it mattered?  Back during the primaries, perhaps?

It's all well and good to comment on this, but it is a little bit late, and a little too little.  The article is good in that it says something which I suspect to be true--- that we are getting played for suckers.

The question now is, what's next?   Or keep committing the same mistakes and waiting too late to say---ooops?

Wrote to my Congressman

I said to break off the negotiations at once or else I leave the party.

I am just one guy.  Unless there are thousands or millions of such reactions, there will be a cave-in.

Do yourself a favor.  If you don't like what this party is doing, let your representative know about it.  Right now.

Can the Republican Party Remain Relevant

American Thinker 

Excerpts:

• John Boehner must go.
• There is an option...The Speaker of the House does not have to be an elected member of the House...There is only one person in the Republican or conservative political sphere that has national name recognition, experience, stature, as well as the proven ability to deal with the media and a popular Democratic President while coordinating an effective messaging operation-- that is Newt Gingrich.
• There is no question that during this period Newt's forceful and at times abrasive personality grated on many of his fellow Republicans; but in retrospect that is why things got done.

Comment:

Yes, it sounds like a good idea.  But what are the chances of anything like this happening?

The Republican Party looks like a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democrat Party.  Bonehead looks like Neville Chamberlain v. Hitler at Munich.  Maybe there should be a breakup, or something to shake up this mess.

Update:

Here's Gingrich in an interview.  While I don't agree with everything he says, he does say some common sense things like you should get Obama's respect first.  Does anybody have any common sense anymore?

Democrats scare me more than the madmen shooters

There's Obama on television again.  Who knows what he said, and frankly I don't care.

Demands for guns are over the top.  This event in Connecticut had nothing to do with the Second Amendment.  Predators will be predators.  To stop predators, you have to have force.  The force belongs in the hands of the people at the scene.  It doesn't belong in Washington DC.  The failure was with the people at the scene.  Let them handle their own domestic security problems.  It is not a national problem.  There's no reason for Obama to be trying to take this over.

The question now is this: do the Republicans actually intend to oppose this rising dictator?

Those in Congress don't seem to want to.  Bonehead appears all to ready to give in.

What's this country coming to?

At least that's what it looks like to me

Source: Obama has chosen John Kerry  Count Chocula as Secretary of State

President Barack Obama has chosen Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts to be the next secretary of state, a source has told Sun-Times columnist Michael Sneed.

Senator Franken Berry wasn't available for comment

.