The Ballad Of East And West

It's been a rather busy day, so we're a bit late to the game on this, but the occasion does require some comment.

It's come almost as a surprise that there have actually been some comments made on this, the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Berlin Wall. The Old Sarge had some rather poignant observations on it, he having actually been there and seen it.

Aside from the rather disgraceful refusal of PrezBO to take time out of his busy schedule of taking over every aspect of your life to pop over and congratulate the German people on 20 years of peaceful reunification, it's rather sad to see that what little commentary there is in the mass media is rife with inaccuracies and outright lies.

Many years ago, someone described to The Old Sarge the design of that whole border. No honest person could possibly believe that it was constructed for any other purpose than to keep people in. The few pieces that have been left standing are a shameful reminder of the failure of the West to truly defend freedom.

The political reunification of the country seems to be largely complete. The psychological reunification might well take another 20 years or so. What's truly sad is that the most independent, freedom-loving, self-reliant people of Europe were sold down the river to Socialism. The difference between East and West is really only a matter of degree.

In a larger sense, one cannot help but wonder if anyone has truly learned the lessons of that monstrosity of stone.

Ford Has A Better Idea

Is the irony lost on very many people that the only automaker that didn't participate in the Ca$h For Clunker$ program is also the only one turning a profit?

How odd that they saved the most telling piece of the article for the last paragraph:

Ford also... benefited from consumer goodwill after it declined government bailout money and didn't go into bankruptcy over the summer as GM and Chrysler did. Ford grabbed sales from its rivals, posting the largest increase in market share of any automaker in September.

The Recession Is Over

The Depression is here.

One has to wonder how there can be a recovery with no jobs. So the economy "grew" last quarter? Big, fat, hairy deal. Anyone with any sense knows they're cooking the books. Tons of phony money driving up prices does not constitute a "recovery". That alleged 3.5% "growth" is nothing more than a dead-cat bounce.

Just wait until mid-December, when all the retailers are weeping and wailing and gnashing their teeth because no one is buying anything. If Americans had decent jobs at a decent rate of pay, they would spend. But We The People -- being just a tad wiser than our masters in government -- have finally learned that you cannot borrow your way into prosperity.

UPDATE: Apparently, it's not just the government cooking the books.

Jimmy Carter Redux

Remember how Peanut Man bought the Dummycrat nomination in '76 for $50 a vote at the Michigan primary? No? Basically, he promised every man and woman in America a $50 tax rebate (presumably even if they didn't even pay any income tax). Of course, in typical cynical politician style, he never paid off.

Looks like King Barry I is up to pretty much the same old same old . Only this time, he's upped the ante. Perhaps it's a symptom of how bad inflation has gotten that he has to quintuple the bribe.

Of course, the $64 billion question is: will the seasoned citizens be stupid enough to fall for this? No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American electorate. But let's hope it doesn't work.

The best thing that could happen would be for the old geezers to take the money and oppose his socialist agenda anyway.

Getting It Upside-Down

Who's to say that this wasn't developed by a government bureaucrat?

The dumbing down of America continues apace. If they wanted the cans stackable, why not change the bottom to stack inside of the unchanged top? Maybe it's because someone already has. These appear to be those same cans, only upside down. So either the whole thing was thought up by an idiot, or the labels were put on upside-down.

Somehow, we get the impression that the clerk was either A) kidding, or B) talking thru his hat.

WTH?

At the risk of invoking Rule 5*, we just had to link to this video of Fox News hottie Pattie Ann Brown. Admittedly, we don't watch much TV, and have only occasionally caught bits and pieces of Fox News when visiting friends or traveling. But the only (vague) memories we have of Ms. Brown are of her being a skosh more.... erudite. Still and all, the video is a knee-slapper, with the pay-off at the end. It's good to see a reporterette with a sense of humor.

(*Well, at least we don't have any Ann Coulter bikini shots.)

Here We Go Again.....

Once again, we have some little twit regretting what she did and then making a false accusation of rape. Have these idiots learned nothing from the Duke scandal?

What's obviously needed here is for someone to come down on this cretin, hard. Make an example of her so that no one else will be tempted to pull the same stunt. This should have been done years ago, but better late than never.

At least in this case, the District Attorney (a woman!) is willing to consider the idea of criminal charges against this liar, even though she has made no firm decision. As of this morning, we haven't heard anything further, but maybe word will come this evening or tomorrow.

What's particularly disgusting here is that the true victims in this debacle now have their names splattered all over the Intarwebz, while the actual criminal hides behind a cowardly wall of anonymity*.

To no one's surprise, Hofstra's Vice President of Propaganda University Relations is bending over backwards to avoid being "judgemental" toward this little miscreant:

To the Members of the Hofstra Community:

We have been notified by the Nassau County District Attorney's Office that the young woman involved in the alleged rape incident has recanted her claims against the five young men.

This week has been a very difficult one for our entire community, and we will need time to heal and understand the events of the last few days. As additional information becomes available we will post it on the University home page.

"For our entire community"??? How about "for the four innocent young men who were falsely accused"? Yeah, just be sure that you don't say anything that might hurt her pwecious widdle feewings. Can't have that.

Perhaps what we need to do is formulate an appropriate response that would actually address the real problem and forward it to the VP? We should work on that this evening. Should be fun.

UPDATE: Apparently, the young woman's name was Danmell Ndoye, according to a story over at The False Rape Society.

The Root Of All Evil

It looks like we finally have a little insight into exactly why auto makers are having a hard time and "needed" a bailout.

When the top guys -- including an exec making more in one year than most people make in a lifetime -- can't even manage his own finances, how can anyone expect that he could ever possibly run a huge corporation?

Pay no mind to that man behind the curtain executive desk.

Cooling With Hot Air

Oh, this should really help: another group of mindless myrmidons has jumped on the AGW bandwagon and decided that they can stop global warming by singing about it.

Uh-huh. Yeah, this should work. After all, "We Are The World" has done so much to relieve famine in Africa since 1985.

If these cretins really wanted to ameliorate "global warming", they'd just shut up. We're convinced that most of the admittedly miniscule rise in global temperatures is directly attributable to all the hot air coming from self-important celebritards and politicians.

How Not To Get Rescued

Apparently, the dumbing-down of the sheeple continues apace, even Down Under.

One can only be glad that this turned out OK. It might have been much worse. But we wonder why it didn't occur to those girls that dialing 000 (the Aussie variant of 911) would have been much simpler, faster, and more productive than updating Farcebook.

Ain't That A Shame! (Part II)

Article in Wednesday's Times-Free Press laments the fact that the city budget for this year is down $2.5 million from last year (without noting that that's only a 3.6% reduction). This is causing a hiring freeze for 93 city government positions and a cut of six more. Quoth Hizzoner the Mayor: "There is pain in this budget. Everyone is struggling and suffering to some degree."

You mean (Gasp!) the city is actually going to have to live within its means???





Oh, the humanity! Never mind that the rest of us have been "struggling and suffering" for quite some time now, due largely to the inability and/or unwillingness of government at all levels to not only live within its means but also limit itself to its proper role.

In all fairness, the Scenic City does seem to be doing marginally better than most cities of comparable size, mostly because Southerners are not all that fond of large government. But if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. And we do note that part of the "struggling and suffering" they city is doing involves cutting some essential services; e.g. closing down police precincts. But no word on reducing funding for "public art"* or non-essential projects like fixing up the riverfront.

(*On a positive note, it appears that none of "public art" involves anything quite so hideous as Albuquerque's infamous "Chevy On A Stick".)

In Praise of Ted Kennedy

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Cash For Congresscritters

Libertarians, realizing the failure of the President's "Cash For Clunkers" rebate program, have promulgated a major new plan.

The Party is expected to make this major announcement at a news conference later this week. We have obtained an advanced copy of the proposal, which is named:

"CASH FOR CONGRESSCRITTERS", and it works like this...

Citizens wishing to promote smaller, less intrusive government, individual freedom, and more free enterprise will be required to turn in one member of Congress. The amount the government grants them will be fixed according to a sliding scale. Older and less freedom-minded 'Congresscritters' will garner the highest amounts.

Special "Bonuses" will be paid for those submitting Congresscritters in targeted groups, such as liberal Democrats, RINOs, tax cheats, and any member of the House Ways & Means Committee.

Smaller bonuses will be given for Congresscritters who have voted in favor of the 2nd Amendment, lower taxes, less government spending, or against the appointment of Ben Bernanke or Sonja Sotomayor.

Initally, the plan was that all Congresscritters would be rendered totally useless via toxic injection. However, this part of the plan was deleted due to the fact that all of the target Congresscritters were totally useless anyway. Instead, they will be shipped off to some remote South Pacific island where they can harm no one but themselves.

Land Of A Thousand Fnords

(Hat tip to FSK for introducing us to this new word "fnord".)

If you don't grok the word "fnord" , there's not really much we can do to help you. If you do grok it, there's not really much we need to do.

With that out of the way, it would seem to us that there are two kinds of fnords lurking about in modern discourse: evil fnords and stupid fnords. Just for fun, we decided to list a few of our favorites, segregated by type. (Note that we are merely alluding to them, not necessarily quoting them verbatim. It should also be noted that most fnords are evil, in that they are designed to cause you to behave in a way that is not in your best interests.)


Evil fnords:
"right-wing extremist". This is a particularly pernicious fnord used by statist collectivists to demoniza anyone less collectivist than FDR.

"domestic violence". Since this is used for the two-fold purpose of demonizing men as being particularly and uniquely violent, while at the same time obscuring female domestic violence, it becomes more evil than stupid.

"unskilled labor". Every job requires some level of skill. Accepting this fnord means that you will also most likely accept the idea that your work is worth less than its true value to the people you're working for.

"________ rights". Anytime someone starts to hold forth about any kind of rights except Constitutional rights, you can be sure your Constitutional rights are about to be violated.

"hate". The Lunatic Left uses "hate" to describe anything they don't like; e.g. "hate speech" is any expression they don't like or can't successfully argue against.

"misspoke". Whenever you hear this one, be sure that the person who "misspoke" said exactly what he or she meant, but got caught in a firestorm of protest and is desperately trying to back-pedal.

"disadvantaged". This is just another way of saying "parasites". Yes, there are people born blind, retarded, crippled, etc.. This is a true disadvantage in life. But when you hear people speak of "disadvantaged", this is not what they mean 99% of the time. What they're referring to is the welfare parasites who make bad choices in life and then expect the rest of us to make it all better.

"control". When you hear people in the political arena talking about "control", you can rest assured that what they want to control is you.


Stupid fnords:
"Mainstream media". The dominant news media in this country (mostly ABCNNBCBS and National Propaganda Radio) are so far out of the mainstream that they don't even know where it is.

"right wing"/"left wing". These two yin-and-yang fnords are used by collectivists all over the political map to snooker everyone else into accepting their distortion of the political landscape . Once you learn to see through this particular fnord, you find yourself in a much larger political world.

"reverse discrimination/racism". Discrimination is discrimination and racism is racism, no matter who the target is.

Good-bye And Good Riddance

So, Sen. Teddy "Chappaquiddick" Kennedy has finally succumbed to brain cancer and gone on to his eternal fate. Can't say we'll miss him. What a phony.

Unfortunately, we'll all now have to suffer thru heaven-knows-how-many stomach-turning "tributes" to one of the most extreme leftist ever to serve in the US government.

If we have time, we'll take one of those propaganda pieces "news" stories and re-word it to more accurately reflect the reality of the old reprobate's life. This should be fun.

The Marines Have Landed

Once a Marine, always a Marine.

So long as there are men like this, there is a glimmer of hope for America.

Let's all hope that Washington State's 3rd Congressional District gets a new Representative next year.

As a side note, HotAirPundit does not have comments enabled, but HotAir.com does. Most of the comments are well worth reading.

Perhaps -- just perhaps -- the sleeping giant is awakening. Let's hope it's not too late.

Semper Fi, sir.