The Obama regime: All fall down

Well, Comrade Obama has suddenly changed gears on the Syria thing. He wanted to fire some Cruise missiles into Syria, or something, after giving them plenty of warning and allowing dictator Assad time to move political prisoners to the tentative targets as a sick kind of "shield." Then Britain refused to back us.

Congress is out on vacation. And individual congress critters have been arguing both ways.

Personally, I'm agin' it. Don't see that we have anything to gain here.

So now the Comrade says, well, maybe we should wait until congress comes back from vacation more than a week from now and let them have a vote on it. Perhaps to absolve himself of any guilt for this crazy idea. Then he went golfing.

So, exhausted and half asleep watching news reports on this last night, I got a sudden revelation about our fearful leader. It's kinda like... well, did you ever see a movie called Six Degrees of Separation? It's about this black guy, played by Wil Smith, who gets involved in the higher levels of Old Money Society mainly by studying their prejudices and mannerisms and copying them, thereby convincing them that he's one of them.

I remember one line where Smith advises another character about how to offer a rich person a beer. He says you ask, "Would you like a bottle of beer?" The Ts in "bottle" a little sharp. It actually sounds almost lyrical, like a line of poetry. And oddly enough, Old Money and their offspring bought all of this, at least for a time.

So Obama finds himself somehow at Columbia, a member of the Ivy League, surrounded by preppies who are very likely bending over backwards to assure themselves and each other that they aren't in the slightest racially prejudiced. Obama plays on that very well. Wonder how many times he asked people if they wanted "a bottle of beer." Apparently he himself wrote about this in one of his books. Black people shouldn't move too quickly, he said, shouldn't dress with their pants dangling precariously about crotch-level, or talk like former slaves from rural Alabama.

And Brain-dead Harry Reid himself noted that Obama is light-skinned and doesn't talk with a black dialect, making him qualified for the presidency -- according to Harry Reid, a thoroughgoing racist, apparently.

And the Comrade positively guzzled the way-left Kool-Aid. One of the Comrade's male role models when he was a kid was Frank Marshall, a marxist propagandist who also photographed and sold pornography -- some of it of Stanley what's-her-face, the Comrade's mother. Ol' Barry knew the drill, having been raised like a "red diaper baby." (See David Horowitz for a definition.. the children of the far-left.)

I don't think Obama ever studied and surely never learned anything beyond the commie-pleasing patter he picked up from earnest-yet-shockingly-naïve professors ensconced in the Ivy League. Another old saying goes, "Those who can't do it themselves, teach." And seems they kind of encouraged young Barry, who moved slowly in their presence, probably adopted a suggestion of a Boston drawl, and wore a belt.

And sure enough, this superficial bullshit has somehow catapulted the Comrade into the White House.

Perhaps in the beginning he did have an agenda. But he can't fail to recognize its failure over the last five years. America is slipping into third-world-nation status, like a stallion sinking inch-by-inch into quicksand. Obamacare is a total disaster.

Worst of all, Obama has no solutions or suggestions for any of this. His cabinet is an Ivory Tower housing nothing but pie-in-the-sky crackpot schemes hatched by an arrogant and untested band of academics. They don't know what the hell they're doing. All they can suggest is "Do more." Like Paul Krugmann, an asshole and buffoon of the first order.

The Comrade's not even a very good politician. He's forged no relationships with the people in congress, except momentarily to exploit them. And they know it now. All the Comrade really knows how to do is give speeches and campaign. Somehow that doesn't provide him with any clues about managing foreign and domestic affairs.

So he goes golfing.

He's an empty face. Corrupt Chicago pols saw him coming and set him up as a huge dupe -- their pathway to the White House. And one by one, they've abandoned him, perhaps realizing that the job requires a bit more than promising everything to everyone and counting on the greed and ignorance of many in the democrat party to carry them along. And voter fraud.

The thing is, the Comrade apparently doesn't have any real convictions. Hate to say it, he's more like the stereotypical shoeshine boy, a carefree pickaninny tap dancing and smiling up at passersby, trying to please them for spare change. He imagines that's how white people see him, he plays to that and he takes advantage of that.

But he doesn't seem to have anything else to offer.

Nothing, just "Would you like a bottle of beer?"

Obama evil or simply incompetent?

Just read a blog that was forwarded to me. The blog is apparently from the New Yorker magazine, written by a guy named Borowitz or Boroski or something like that. I want to think the whole thing is satire -- but it's really good satire.

The headline for the blog goes something like: "Obama says attack on Syria has no objective whatsoever."

Just like a little story on Fox yesterday reported that Madeline Albright, Secretary of State under "Can't Keep It Zipped" Bill Clinton, gave the go-ahead to attack the island of Grenada only after she'd been assured that the USA had no interests there.

The British have refused to join us in attacking Syria. Apparently only the French remain somewhat interested, but they've never been entirely reliable. However, do believe it was the French who first received and then publicized that video of dozens of dead bodies in Syria -- the result of Syrian dictator Assad gassing them indiscriminately. So maybe the French remain sympathetic to visiting some sort of punishment on Assad for his willy-nilly and illegal use of chemical weapons.

I don't think we should get involved. I've said it several times, we don't have a dog in this fight. Assad is a vicious psychopath determined to continue to rule his people with an iron hand, even if he has to kill all of them. (Apparently he doesn't see the irony in that.) The opposing "rebel" forces don't look a whole lot better since they include recruits from Al-Qaeda groups and maybe even Hamas -- not sure I read that report right, it was in teeny-tiny print.

There's no one I personally care to defend in Syria, really. Should we help to topple Assad only to help create the jihadist caliphate? Should we arm the rebels so that they can launch attacks on us a few more years down the road?

Military analyst Ralph Peters noted that both sides are our enemies and they're killing each other. So why should we interfere? I tend to agree.

But Obama said the US would not get involved unless Assad used chemical weapons. So now to assuage his own ego, he wants to entangle the US in yet another endless, pointless war in the Middle East.

Of course, engaging in Syria does assure that the US military will be kept overseas, and the conflict will continue to bleed US resources while achieving absolutely no useful purpose. The Comrade has promised to remove all US troops from Afghanistan, so perhaps he needs to find another black hole to throw them into.

Draining the US of its resources and crippling the military seem to be among of Obama's chief aims as president.

So is the Comrade only monumentally ignorant and incompetent? Or is he truly vile, relentless in seeking out and implementing ways to destroy the USA?

Don't listen to what he says. Watch what he does.

PC as a political weapon

Haven't been blogging lately. The nation's going to hell in a hand basket, what more can I say?

However, came across something on Michelle Malkin's Twitchy site surrounding a video that apparently was posted by Russell Simmons, who's a black media mogul -- involved in all kinds of entrepreneurial communications things, including the music and cell phones industries. He's also a very likable guy.

Anyway, apparently he posted something called "Harriet Tubman's Sex Tapes" on YouTube. All about Harriet Tubman, forced by her master to have sex, turning around the situation and using it to compel her master to let her run the underground railroad. Russell Simmons said he thought it was funny.

A lot of other people were not amused. Though I never saw the video -- Simmons took it down by popular demand -- I think the concept is kind of disgusting. Rape was a very real thing in the days of slavery, and some black women slaves did use it to extract favors from ol' massa. The Garden District in New Orleans was well known as the area where white plantation owners housed their black concubines -- and the concubines's mixed race kids, as well. Or a woman field hand might regard sex with the massa as a way to get lighter duty inside the house. A sad and sorry way to improve your situation.

Anyway you look at this, it's pretty hard to put a positive spin on it.

At any rate, Simmons apologized for his insensitivity and took the video down. That wasn't good enough for some folks. One "Twit" posted something about how "the damage is already done."

That made me wonder, what damage? Has Harriet Tubman's reputation been ruined? Did the video prompt some extremely impressionable black woman to sell herself into slavery so that she, too, could try to manipulate her master?

What damage is done by harsh or insensitive or even insulting words?

When I was a kid and other kids called me names -- an apparently inevitable episode in every kid's life -- my mother told me to bear in mind: "Sticks and stones might break my bones, but names will never hurt me." I somehow associated that with the idea of being strong and self-motivated, and trusting my own judgment of myself rather than letting others define me.

Maybe naïve? It seems the democrats have seized upon some pretty convoluted "spin" to -- poof! -- magically turn shocking negatives into at least palatable neutrals. And some people buy it.

I'm a writer. I understand the power of words. You define an issue by the terms you choose to describe it and by the fact that you choose to address it all, and this lends to the issue your own point of view. There's no escaping that. That's why "objective journalism" is, for me, an oxymoron. The only way to be fair is to present the issues from all sides, from a range of perspectives.

And just because you attach one or another label to something doesn't change the nature of what the thing is. I could call tomatoes "feathers," but they'd still be tomatoes.

And I don't think Harriet Tubman's reputation has been tarnished by Russell Simmons' video. In fact, the whole thing blew back on him, didn't it? Judging by the outrage he inspired, I'd guess that he, not Harriet, has lost a few fans over this matter.

Anyway, just a thought. It's the difference between "Death panels" and "bureaucrats defining who gets health care and who doesn't." Oops. Not a good example. Or Hillary Clinton as "Our next 'historic' president" as opposed to "The Secretary of State who abandoned US representatives under terrorist attack."

Sorry. I guess my bias is showing.

Rule by law, not by man

I don't have time for this, but I just want to mention one thing in regard to the George Zimmerman-Trayvon Martin thing.

Those people who are requesting calm acceptance of the verdict, or peaceful protests for those who must protest, call upon the phrase, "Rule by law, not by man." But what the hell does that mean?

You don't have to look too far to find examples of "rule by man" in the United States. Prime example:

When slavery was legal in the United States, it was based on the notion that slaves weren't quite human, therefore, they didn't have any rights under the law. They couldn't vote, sit on juries, or otherwise partake of the citizen experience. They weren't protected by the Constitution or the Bill of Rights any more than the family dog would have been protected.

So what happened when slaves committed crimes -- or were even accused of committing crimes? I mean, they weren't fully human under the law, had no rights, so the usual constitutional procedures didn't apply to them.

In some cases - really capitol cases, involving serious felonies like murder -- the slaves may or may not be tried, but certainly they were executed. Here's a good case, of Denmark Vesey, a free black man who had a cabinetry business in Charleston, South Carolina, in the late 1700s -- but after the USA had won its independence. He was a free man, had never been a slave as far as I can tell. But he befriended many of the black slaves in the area and eventually planned a slave rebellion. He had gone so far as to recruit a real "army" of slaves from local plantations, and had apparently stored up some number of weapons they could use for the rebellion.

Alas, the night before the attack was to begin, one slave in Vesey's army went wimp and confessed all to his master. The arms, such as they were, and if they did really exist, were discovered. Other slaves who had agreed to take part in the rebellions were either fingered or confessed. So what was the outcome?

Vesey was tried -- he was a free black man, not a slave. He was found guilty and hanged with three or four slaves who had been fingered or confessed to being key leaders in implementing the scheme.

All the other slaves -- and there were hundreds of them -- were given over to their masters, for the masters to figure out what to do with them. To punish them or not, and how to punish them.

Vesey's outcome was "rule by law." He was a free man, after all, though it's pretty doubtful that, at the time, and he being a black man, he was regarded as deserving of all the rights of a white man. He was found guilty of inciting an insurrection and hanged. The outcome here was similar to what a few white people also suffered for "inciting an insurrection" in the slave South. Many Quakers among them, who tried passing out anti-slavery leaflets and even smuggled slaves out of the South. As a matter of fact, years later, South Carolina accused Abraham Lincoln and the Republican party of "inciting an insurrection." But that was the law in South Carolina.

By contrast, "rule by man" is what happened to all the other slaves who had been identified as taking part in the plan to rise up, and who had been returned to their masters. Their masters decided what to do with them. I've never seen any documentation that records what happened to them. The whole thing was regarded as their masters' private business and nobody else's -- though slave owners were fully expected to keep their slaves under control -- very seriously. A few cases exist where white slaves owners suffered some pretty dire consequences from their neighbors if they were too kind to their slaves.

So what were the usual punishments for disobedient and/or "uppity," and/or "criminal," and/or runaway, and/or simply "lazy" slaves? They were subject to a pretty wide variety of punishments, limited only by their master's imagination and willingness to inflict pain (though usually the master himself did not deliver the punishment. Often he got other slaves to do it.) Whippings were pretty common. A few old barns on old plantations in the slave South had "whipping posts," a convenient and customary place to tie up the slave for whipping. Cutting off fingers, ears, hobbling with irons, stockading -- all possibilities that have been used at one or another time or place.

In one horrendous case, recorded among the accounts in the 1930s WPA Writers' Project, a former slave told the story of the overseer on a plantation raping the wife of a slave. When the husband objected to his wife's rape, the overseer nailed the man's ear to a board first, and then cut it off.

A French woman, Martineau, attributed with establishing the study of sociology, toured the USA in the 1850s. While in the South, noted the social attitudes toward slaves and slavery. Interesting reading. One case she mentioned involved a slave who was apparently a notorious thief and rabble-rouser, being burned alive on the main street of one southern town. Martineau didn't state whether this was common or uncommon, but infers that it was a standard punishment used for certain types of behavior -- and apparently in cases where the slave was expendable. And burning alive seems to have been something the KKK also practiced, along with lynching.

All of this is entirely "rule by man." No interference from the legal system at all for the treatment of slaves.

There were few rules that defined unacceptable slave behavior. It was one of those "you know it when you see it," kind of things. Entirely up to the slave owners and his neighbors. Same for the punishments. The master decided. It was all up to him.

So when people take to the streets and riot, protesting the results of a fair trial -- a verdict that they feel is all wrong.... Well, would you prefer "rule by man?" Think about it.

Justice relies on facts. It isn't always a balm to console your emotions. Life doesn't always happen the way we want it to. Individuals are rarely as "good" as we wish they were, or as "bad" as we believe they might be. Justice can only be determined by the facts in evidence.

Grow up.

Land of the free, home of the brave?

In past years, I've tried to include some quotes, speeches, etc., about the USA that would be inspiring, or at least serve as a reminder of what the USA stands for.

But this year, I don't know.

It's just things like various levels and branches of government dictating what you can eat for lunch and how much health insurance you MUST have. How much personal income is "enough" for you. What you "should" study in college, and what you can use for energy and how much of it you "should" consume. It's things like that that make me question -- is this freedom?

Do we have freedom anymore?

I don't think so. I think it's almost beyond recovery, too. This kind of slavery is normal now. It's what we expect. And it's "for our own good."

It's the schemers and manipulators who've suppressed our freedoms. And I'm not talking about welfare cheats or fraudulent government contractors. I'm talking about politicians on every level.

The fact that we have a democratic system gives liars and con artists and psychopathic control freaks a marketing tool; they always say -- and may themselves believe -- that they do all they do for us. For the elderly, the children, the widows and orphans. Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah.

And how much of the funding they raise for taxation ends up in their own pockets, or in the private accounts of friends and supporters?

Very few politicians are in that business anymore to preserve and protect American ideals and the principles enshrined in the Declaration of Independence. If we consider Pazzo Pelosi, Brain-dead Harry Reid, and anyone in the Executive Branch, you have to wonder if they have even a casual familiarity with the US Constitution. Instead, they go to Washington to "bring home the bacon." And I'm convinced many of them are simply power mad, or afflicted with some kind of Munchausen's Disease, where you cause pain so that later you can rush in and "heroically" rescue the victims -- by exercising more power over them and extracting more money from them. More regulation, less personal freedom.

Crazy.

Sad.

And people vote for this. Edward Gibbon in The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire:

In the end, more than freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all – security, comfort, and freedom. When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.

So go eat your hot dogs and apple pie and look at the fireworks. And just forget about everything else. It isn't there anymore, anyway,
 

When the going gets tough, Obama takes a vacation

Remember when Ronald Reagan was president? Actually, in the first year or so, I never saw such unemployment. I had quit a job and was looking for another. Employment agencies were standing room only. But then the economy went into an upswing with 4% growth or some ungodly number that we've rarely seen since.

Anyway, at the start, things were tough. The slogan became, "When the going gets tough, the tough get going." Meaning: Address the problem and fix it. Work harder. Stiffen your resolve.

Now, under the Comrade, the slogan has shifted somewhat. Here are some suggestions:

• When the going gets tough, find someone else to blame.
• When the going gets tough, stifle your critics... any way you can.
• When the going gets tough, pretend it isn't true.
• When the going gets tough, double down on your happy talk and buzzwords.
• When the going gets tough, recruit the NFL and NBA to sell your programs.

And the Comrade's favorite:

• When the going gets tough, take your family on an expensive African vacation.

As anyone who's not brain dead and who has even a slight exposure to the news must be aware, a number of really amazing scandals have erupted over the last couple months. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton blowing off events in Benghazi, refusing to defend US interests -- and people -- she deliberately placed in harm's way. The IRS targeting conservative political groups for "special" scrutiny, delaying their ability to present another side in the last campaign -- and generally. The NSA revealed as collecting the records of just about every phone call and possibly email sent anywhere in the world, including those generated by US citizens and residents. The HHS soliciting funds and support from the corporations and organizations it regulates to try to sell socialized medicine.... And I'm sure there's more. Seems to be something vile and nasty under every rock inside the DC Beltway.

Of course, the Comrade had nothing to do with Benghazi -- he was practicing his blackjack game for his trip to Las Vegas and couldn't be bothered. Hillary apparently wasn't overly concerned, either. After all, she'd put a diplomatic outpost in an area that every other civilized nation had abandoned to jihadist terrorists. Probably didn't surprise her that those terrorists took the bait and killed the Americans. But then she fell down, she had a blood clot, she was leaving the State Dept. anyway -- wimp-ass traitor who I wouldn't vote for as dog catcher (I'm against animal cruelty). And what do you want to bet, the dems will nominate her for president in 2016, since they're blind and stupid and, hey, we haven't had a woman president yet. For liberals, political correctness trumps reason and logic every time.

Then regarding the IRS rats' nest, the NSA program, the impending disaster of Obamacare... in his own words, the Comrade has nothing to do with any of this. Hey, he was golfing. You can't expect him to keep track of all this.

Most recently, the Comrade backed himself into a corner with a poseur "red line" about taking action in Syria. After about 100,000 people have been slaughtered in a civil war in Syria, and al-Qaeda has taken up the cudgel against the current, murderously oppressive government -- and after the al-Qaeda faction has executed a Christian priest in Syria -- now the Comrade has agreed to send aid in the form of small arms. What finally pushed him over the edge? The killing of Christians? Good job!

Ed Snowden, who apparently ripped off numerous top secret intelligence stuff and is publishing it through WikiLeaks, finds himself a new and seemingly permanent resident of the Moscow international airport. After feigning attempts to hand over his info to Red China and Russia, he must be a bit disappointed that not a lot of people view him as a hero on the order of that Assange guy. I don't know, do nerdly geeks have to break into secret files to make a name for themselves anymore? Is that was makes them magnets for strippers? What I find most repugnant about Snowden is that he's apparently something of a glory hound, and that a "wolfish appetite for fame" is one of the things that drove him to do whatever's he's done.

But the Comrade isn't overly concerned about Snowden or US security either.

No, the Comrade goes to Goree Island in Senegal for a photo op of himself standing in a tiny cell, his back to the camera, wistfully pondering the unhappy history of slavery.

But the black side of the Comrade's family were never slaves. Never transported to Goree Island and points west. They might have labored under the Brits in colonial Kenya, but they were never worked to death in ore mines in South America or treated like farm animals in the USA. So... is the Comrade just displaying some sort of solidarity with other members of his race? I don't know, but it looks to me like he just wanted to have his picture taken. He just wanted to look "concerned."

Which, plainly, he isn't, given the reality of his circumstances. So much to do in the USA, and he goes to Senegal. Is Senegal a member of NATO? A trade ally? A key regional influence? None of the above. But it has Goree Island.

Then on to South Africa, where the Comrade sought an audience with Nelson Mandela. Mandela is basically a communist. I don't agree with his politics. But the man lived in solitary in a tiny prison cell for decades for standing up to apartheid. He became a focal figure in South African politics and served to drive that nation away from colonialism. He has earned my respect. And he's dying now. Leave him in peace. He doesn't need to be  hounded by a US president seeking a photo op and some sort of redemption for irresponsible half-assedness.

And while the Comrade's in Africa, perhaps he should take a run up to Egypt, where reportedly 17 million people are just now milling in the streets in front of the presidential residence there, trying to dislodge the Muslim Brotherhood's Morsi from office.

Hey, Comrade, why not help them? I mean, why not TRY to do something in the real world?

That would be a "fundamental change," wouldn't it?

White House chickens coming home to roost

What the hell has been going on in Washington, DC, for the last 4.5 years?

Apparently thanks to government stimulus spending, several agencies in the executive branch -- most notably the IRS -- saw a sudden influx of funding way beyond what they needed, so they thought really hard -- or as hard as they could -- and decided to throw themselves some major parties, with clowns and everything. Even performing as clowns themselves. What a hoot. Accountants and number crunchers in Spock ears. How amusing.

Unfortunately, the IRS, at least, recorded these rather pathetic and infantile events -- although they lost their receipts. OMG. Hey, call them every day and pester them about that, and demand that they come down to your office and let you go over their books -- only you don't make an appointments, so they'll just have to sit in your office until you get tired of playing Tetris and maybe have a cup of coffee to gin up your efforts to crucify them. And then run your calculator really, really fast and intimidating (I mean, to an accountant), and tell them they owe you a few thousand dollars more than they thought, by your figuring. And just make up all kinds regulations and complications as you go along. There's the ticket.

But apparently the IRS clearly understood which side its bread was buttered on, so it also decided to do whatever it could -- even perpetrate criminal felonies -- to keep this administration hanging on through a second term. Like, any groups applying for tax-exempt status with subversive words like "Constitution" or "Tea Party" in their names had to be harassed and hassled and kept on hold until the 2012 election was over, at least. Or, alternatively, the IRS felt it was useful to collect the names of the members and/or donors of these groups and pass them along to opposing organizations, like the Comrade's election campaign group.

Meanwhile, Eric Hold'em's behavior as head of the Dept. of (Social) Justice has continued illegal and despicable since the day the Senate approved him. No surprises there.

Congress: "We'll hold you in contempt!"

Hold'en: "I'm already in contempt."

Congress: "Well, double contempt! How's that going to look on your resume?"

Hold'em:  Flipping the bird. "There's still a few bodies I have to bury before I resign."

Oh, and the feds -- NSA? FBI? CIA? God knows -- weren't just collecting AP journalists' phone records, but EVERYONE'S phone records in the whole USA. They save them, too. They're all tucked in a vault somewhere, probably in the FBI's new high-tech facility in West Virginia, thanks to the relentless lobbying of the late Harry Byrd to bring prosperity to his state.

And the explanation for all of us?

Incompetence. Or national security. Take your pick. Personally, I find it hard to trust incompetent people with national security. I mean, you're likely to end up with your ambassadors being killed at their posts in hostile nations due to a blind adherence to a silly and Pollyanna view of the universe... but what are the chances of that actually happening?

The one thing that's important, the one thing to remember, is that the goal of terrorism is to destabilize a national government. You destabilize it, it topples, your comrades rush in with a plan to keep order -- and then you have a totalitarian nation.

So the 9/11 attacks didn't manage to really destabilize the USA's government -- or didn't go quite far enough to do so. So the Comrade will take care of finishing the job.

The thing is, any government has to be "legitimate" in the eyes of its citizens. Whether they willingly accept the government, or do so under pain of brutality and intimidation -- the citizens have to be willing to go along with a government's actions and policies.

A government is destabilized when it loses that legitimacy from citizens.

I think that's what the Comrade's going for, ultimately. I mean, he also seems to embrace muslim and every other kind of terrorist. Perhaps he feels an affinity with them; perhaps they share a common goal?

So, hey, we still have congress, and congress is largely pissed off. There are also the Tea Parties and many others who still believe in the USA's "better angels," that is, the US Constitution, etc.

I'm really so glad the Constitution is written down. That makes it possible to dump the corrupt and rotten terrorists -- those inside the government as well as outside -- but rebuild the nation.

Rule by law, not by man. Love it.

And I just wish the IRS would call me about... anything... just so I could take the Fifth Amendment.