The group that killed Eric Garner is protesting against the group that killed Eric Garner

Sometime yesterday, Congressional staffers (government employees) walked out on their jobs to the front steps of the House of Representatives to protest the laws (written by themselves) that led to the death (at the hands of other government employees) who were enforcing the will of government employees. Instead of meaningless symbolic gestures, why don't they protest by making it legal to sell "loosies" without a punitive tax that pays their own (government employee) salaries? Lord have mercy, what a pack of doofuses....

 

Following in the footsteps of Douglas Mawson. As long as the ice permits.....

You'll never hear this discussed from the LameStream Media. 
There is a ship stuck in ice, somewhere around the south pole. 
It's a research project to study how much ice has disappeared in the last 100 years. 

Here's a comment by someone named "Rich" on the story. 
If Rich ever comes to Fort Worth TX, his bar tab is on me. 

Consider this: 74 Global warming scientists and advocates, plus the ships crew, went to Antarctica in an ice-strengthened ship to prove to the world that Antarctic sea ice had disappeared because of manmade global warming (caused by CO2 they claim.)
This was done in celebration of the trip made 100 years ago and to follow in the footsteps of explorer Douglas Mawson. They got stuck in ten foot thick sea ice they claimed melted away from global warming.
A hundred years ago, the entire region, right up to the shore, was completely clear of ice. Explorer Douglas Mawson got within 50 yards of shore in a wooden ship with only a sextant, and was only stopped because of low water. He then traveled 300 miles inland.
Those on board the Academic Shokalskiy with GPS navigation, on-board Internet, radar, and satellite communications only got within miles of shore. Here they waited in their heated ship to be rescued. First a rescue ship gets within 3.7 miles (pictures on the internet) and the trapped scientists frolic and play and send pictures home in the good weather rather than walking the few miles to the rescue ship. That ship can get no closer so it leaves.
Then a second rescue ship tries and gives up.
 Finally a third tries, to no avail again, and now waits for weather suitable for a helicopter evacuation.
Sounds like a good Discovery Channel documentary as to why the globe is getting warmer.

It IS getting warmer.  ALL of the scientists (those who have skins in the game, anyway) say that it's getting warmer.  But the ice is spreading wider and getting thicker. 

The Political Party that nominated John Roberts is now running this ad

The Political Party that nominated John Roberts is now running this ad....

They really don't have a clue, do they? 

The Libertarian Party awaits. 

Governmental Irony

Since 4 people have forwarded this to me already, I'm going to post it.

Even within the 99%, there is a 1%

From KDFW:

DALLAS - Protesters in Dallas voted Thursday evening to close down the camp near city hall and relocate somewhere within the Dallas city limits.

Occupy Dallas has been struggling with people in the encampment who are not part of the cause, including some people who have criminal backgrounds.

For example, protesters said someone showed up to the camp this week and pulled a knife on someone. Nobone knew who he was.

Last week a convicted sex offender was arrested at the camp for the sexual assault of 14-year-old runaway and Thursday morning Child Protective Services workers showed up to question a family about staying in a tent with a 9-month-old baby.

And in addition to the bad publicity, the protesters said there are people who have been taking advantage of the movement by sleeping in donated tents and eating donated food.

“I know we’re supposed to be helping the 99 percent, but they need to help us help them by not being a drain on our resources,” said Otto Wagner.

Many protesters are fed up and hope by relocating the camp they can create a system to better monitor themselves.

“We’re not going to have formal sign ins. You’re not going to have to show an ID. You’re basically going to show up, give a name that we’re going to be calling you by,” Wagner said.

Crisis intervention teams will be walking through the camp checking on people’s welfare as temperatures reach near freezing Thursday night.

No further comments necessary on my part.  But here's an entire page of the New York Post:

Some Occupiers are more equal than others.  Let's go ahead and call them The 1%

A handy scorecard

From The Jawa Report comes a handy scorecard. 

The Occupy Wall Street protest song

I don't care which side of the Wall Street protest divide you're on, this is funny.
It's from the geniuses at Reason magazine. 

Come gather round people
come and join your hands
we're taking Wall Street
and we're making demands
and we're heeding the call
and we're crying for help
only 1% of us have wealth

but first we need posters
we need to make signs
but to do so it seems
that we need some supplies

We need poster board
I can't make it myself
but it's 10 cents a sheet
at the store it's on sale
an example of economies of scale
it's so evil

They're saying that freedom
has done little to stop
Corporations from keeping
the wealth at the top
But at what point in history
would a kid and a king
both have clean water to drink?

George Washington was
the richest man of his age
But he lost all his teeth
at a very young age
Because they didn't have Scope
and they all crapped in trays
we're not wealthy?

now there's fountains on streets
from which clean water pours
Four dollar generics
at all big box stores
a sultan and student
both have iPhone 4s
it's not fair

Come gather young people
come on everyone
and I'll tell you a tale
of a fortunate son

He's born in a country
and given vaccine
and rendered immune
to all kinds of disease
the Kardashians are on
all his TVs
it's not perfect

Banks don't need bailouts
on that we agree
so let's start up a group
and let's take to the streets
because if we do that then
you know what that means
we're racist.

Happy Independence Day !!!

Our president has blown 3/4 of a trillion dollars in a failed Keynesian scheme (pardon the redundancy) to create employment.  The enterprise cost $278,000.00 per job saved, according to White House economists. 

The TSA, which for some reason I don't understand is providing security for private companies, recently made a 90-year old cancer patient remove her adult diaper before she could complete their security check. 

Because of minimum wage requirements, black teen unemployment has now hit 46%.  See previous post. 

I can't find anywhere to purchase gasoline that doesn't contain somewhere around 10% ethanol (which is required as a fuel additive not for environmental reasons, but for early Iowa caucus reasons). 

I can't stop purchasing an employee's labor without proving that I didn't do it because of his racial, demographic, political or sexual identity or preferences. 

Our president is illegally bombing Libya. 

Your newborn children are already $47,000 in debt.  That's $129,000 if they're dumb enough to contribute to the economy by becoming a taxpayer. 

The QT convenience store where I purchased gas last night had at least 20 "permits" on the wall, proving that our government has graciously allowed them to sell certain products and perform particular services. 

Gay and Lesbian marriage is still illegal in Texas. 

Marijuana prohibition is working exactly as planned.  We now have more black males in cages than The Confederacy every dreamed of.  A vast host of jailers, counselors, cops, narcs, border patrol agents, soldiers, pilots, prison-builders, union guards, drug-testing companies and other leeches are profiting nicely from their misery. 

Happy Independence Day !!!

Barack Obama: Killing Machine

From Caroline May at The Daily Caller:

To date not only has the President authorized the hit on Osama Bin Laden, but also provided for the killing of numerous other threats, including but not limited to: 3 Somali pirates; Baitullah Mehsud; Najmiddin Jalolov; Saleh al-Somali; Abdallah Sa’id, Hakimullah Mehsud; Kaddafi’s youngest son and three grandchildren; thousands via his large increase in drone attacks; and has ordered the assassination of the American terrorist Imam Anwar al-Awlaki.
Obama intensified the Bush administration’s effort in Afghanistan and Pakistan, increasing troop levels and number of stealth drone attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

That's pretty good for a Nobel Peace Prize winner. 
The rest of May's article is pretty good, where she gets around to Obama butchering and slaughtering the U.S. economy. 

Tea Party mob, heckles, pursues, and tries to attack a Senator !!!

Oh, wait a minute.  It wasn't Tea Partiers. 
Never mind. 

Have you ever noticed....?

I have no idea where I'm headed with this. 
I have no idea what it means. 

Let's assume that all of our Pledges Of Allegiance, Flags, National Anthems and other such things are merely an overgrown expression of something like school spirit.  Mostly because they are. 

Have you ever noticed that those most likely to support every government program - spending, Medicare, Medicaid, public schools, environmental regulation, quotas, etc. - are sometimes least likely to fly the flag in front of their house, least likely to put a flag bumpersticker on their car, or wear a patriotic T-shirt?

And the people who want to shut down 50% of the government don't think twice about wearing patriotic garb?    And will show up at an anti-government rally dressed like Uncle Sam?  And get p.o.'d when kids don't take off their hats during the national anthem? 

What's up with that? 

An explanation of the lyrics of "The Star-Spangled Banner"

Have you ever had the experience of growing up with a song, having it become part of your sub-conscious, and not understanding or even thinking about what the lyrics mean until you are much older? 
I think that's how a lot of people experience "The Star-Spangled Banner".  How many people still know what a "rampart" is? 
There's been a lot of buzz about the song ever since Christina Aguilera butchered it during Super Bowl Disaster Week in Arlington. 
As a public service, I would like to offer an explanation of the lyrics to our national anthem. 

The song was written by amateur poet Francis Scott Key.  He was held captive on a British warship during the War of 1812, and had a front row seat for the bombardment of Baltimore's Fort McHenry.  As humorist Richard Armour once explained:

In an attempt to take Baltimore, the British attacked Fort McHenry, which protected the harbor. Bombs were soon bursting in air, rockets were glaring, and all in all it was a moment of great historical interest. During the bombardment, a young lawyer named Francis Scott Key wrote "The Star-Spangled Banner", and when, by the dawn's early light, the British heard it sung, they fled in terror. 

The thing requires a vocal reach of an octave and a half.  As many a vocalist will tell you, if you start off in too high of a first note, you're going to be in big, big trouble when you get to The Land Of The Free. 


That's all the preliminaries you need.  Here are they lyrics. 

O! say can you see by the dawn's early light,

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming,

It's morning.  The only light you have to see by is the dawn's, and the dawn's light is early.  Pointing out that the dawn's light is early seems redundant, but it was necessary for the meter and the rhyme scheme. 
We're looking for something that we saw last night, something that we were so proud of that we hailed it, even though it was dark (twilight). 
So an evening has passed.  Something was there last night, and we're wondering if it is still there the next morning. 

Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?

The thing we're looking for had stars and stripes, and it was capable of "streaming gallantly".  Do you know what the thing was?  Do you?  Give up?  Ok, the thing with stars and stripes, capable of streaming gallantly, the thing that was there the night before but could not be seen clearly the next morning, it was our flag !!

All through the perilous (dangerous) fight (for Fort McHenry), Francis Scott Key watched the flag from the other side of the ramparts (a type of defensive wall).  Got it?  The flag is flying on one side of the rampart, and you're on the other side in a boat with Francis Scott Key every time you sing this song.  You're taking part in an 1812 battle reenactment. 

Fans of the Dallas Stars hockey team put particular emphasis on the word "Stars" when singing the anthem. 

And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;

Remember, it is still nighttime but the bloody British are still bombing the daylights out of Fort McHenry.  What are they using?  Rockets.  Bombs. 
What do the rockets and bombs produce?  Glare.  Bursts. 
Why are the glare and the bursts important?  The rocket's red glare and the bombs bursting in air do nothing but provide enough light to prove to everyone on the ship that the U.S. flag is still flying over Fort McHenry. 
This couplet is a little jab at the declining effectiveness of British Sea Power, proven true later at Dunkirk and the overkill in the Falkland Islands. 

Fans of the Houston Rockets basketball team put particular emphasis on the word "Rockets" when singing these lines.  Fans of the Cincinatti Reds baseball team put particular emphasis on the word "Red" when singing these lines.  The remaining fans of the Dallas Cowboys football team put particular emphasis on the word "Bombs" when singing these lines, because that's what their team has done ever since coach Jimmy Johnson abandoned Jerry Jones. 

O! say does that star-spangled banner yet wave,
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

The last two lines are less complicated.  The poet is simply asking if our flag with stars all over it is still waving over his country. 
And every time we sing the song, that's where we end it.  We never answer the question.  Francis Scott Key is stuck on the boat in Baltimore harbor, with nothing to eat but truly godawful British food, wondering if the flag is still flying. 
UNLESS YOU SING THE REMAINING VERSES, OUR NATIONAL ANTHEM MAKES NO FREAKIN' SENSE !!!! 

Look at the first verse of Martin Luther's "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God".  If you just sing the first verse, and nothing else, it's like you're singing a song about the power of Satan. 
Singing the first verse of The Star-Spangled Banner without singing the rest is like singing the Beverly Hillbillies song, but stopping before you get to the part where Ol' Jed's a millionaire. 

So why don't we ever sing the other verses? 
Give me time.  I'll get there. 
Here's the second verse, the one that ends the suspense. 

On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,

Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,

I'm not sure if this verse is referring to the American army reposing or the British army reposing (haughtily).  I don't think it matters.  The important thing is that it's still misty and things are only "dimly seen". 

What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?

Now we're getting somewhere.  Something is blowing fitfully in the breeze on the "towering steep" hill.  Half concealed, half revealed....

Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:

we're getting ready for the big reveal here....what is it....what is it....???


'Tis the star-spangled banner, O! long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

I think I'm as patriotic as the next person, but I'm glad I got that over with.

So why don't we ever sing the rest? 
Because the third verse is kind of embarrassing, especially in light of the "land of the free" business. 

In the War of 1812, the British augmented their army with divisions of mercenaries and freed slaves.  These slaves were promised an opportunity to shoot their former owners if they would help out the redcoats. 
Heck, that's a bargain I would have probably taken. 
Now, look at the third verse in that light: 

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore

That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.

The British army stunk up the place with their foul footsteps, but we used their blood to wash the place out. Kinda militaristic and barbaric, but we've all felt that way before, haven't we? 
Now for the money quote:

No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:

Yeah, if you try to create an army with hirelings (mercenaries) and slaves (ours), then you're going to get what you paid for.  But by contemporary standards, bragging about a military victory over an army of freed slaves makes the closing couplet into a freakin' joke:

And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

Oh...The...Irony.

Let's move on again.  The fourth verse has created all sorts of mischief.  The sentiments have been inappropriately placed in the mouths of our Founding Fathers, created lawsuits about The Ten Commandments in our courtrooms, and have even shown up on our currency.  As far as I can tell, this is where one of our American slogans makes its first appearance:

O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand

Between their loved home and the war's desolation.

As long as the freemen are (ahem) white. 

Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!

That would be a strong Constitution, giving power to the people and acknowledging that we are governed by our own consent.  Our government works for us, not vice-versa.  If higher Powers were involved, it was in pounding that basic concept into some of our heads. 


Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,

I don't have time to deconstruct that one.  Gotta be at work in thirty minutes.  Let's just say that we've had a long, long run of Presidents who could find a "just cause" for war by looking into a kindergarten dispute about nappy time.   

And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."

It wasn't our motto until Francis Scott Key said that it was.  End of story.  Why couldn't the boys at Fort McHenry just sink his damn boat? 



And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave
Done.  Complete.  Explained.  Hope this has helped. 

A picture of Al Gore carved from a block of ice and blowing hot air

The only reason I'm posting this picture is so that I can be the number one Google search result for pictures of Al Gore carved from a block of ice and blowing hot air. 
You can go to The Jammie Wearing Fool for the context. 

Mrs. Sepulchre generally wants nothing to do with the goings-on that take place on these pages, but she's a big fan of this version of Frank Loesser's classic "Baby, It's Cold Outside".  This is Barry Manilow and K.T. Oslin. 
Y'all stay warm !  Merry Christmas ! 

A letter from home

Senator Harry Reid arrives at a clean energy summit in a fleet of SUV's.

Here's a beautiful picture of Senator Harry Reid arriving to address a clean energy summit. 

Pay no attention to that fleet of SUV's in the background.  Go here and here for details. 
Irony is so lost on those people. 
I'll say it before, and I'll say it again.  NONE of our politicians believe ANY of the Anthropogenic Global Warming Horsecrap.  NONE. 
It is an easy way for them to gain power from the gullible. 

Barney Frank is going to chair the financial reform committee

Barney Frank is going to chair the financial reform committee. 

Is the logic here the same as "You broke it, you fix it?"

Picture from the anti-Palin protest in Eugene Oregon

I don't know if everyone got the email about Eugene being a Hate Free Zone....

Some presidential quotations

"We have nothing to fear but fear itself" - FDR

"I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell." - Harry Truman

"Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil, and you're a thousand miles from the corn field" - Dwight D. Eisenhower

"And so, my fellow Americans, ask not blah, blah blah blah blah...." - John F. Kennedy

"I am not a crook" - Richard Nixon

"Our long national nightmare is over" - Gerald Ford

"I have often wanted to drown my troubles, but I can't get my wife to go swimming." - Jimmy Carter

"Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them." - Ronald Reagan

"Read my lips - No new taxes" - George H.W. Bush

"I tried marijuana once. I did not inhale." - Bill Clinton

"I can hear you, the rest of the world can hear you and the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon." - George W. Bush

Ok are you ready? Swallow your coffee. Put down your Coke.

"To help address this, we need to stand up to the special interests, bring Republicans and Democrats together, and pass the Farm Bill immediately." - Barack Obama, on the granddaddy of all special interest legislation

From here, via here, via here, because I started here.

The Weekly Radley - From The Most Transparent Administration EVER

From Radley Balko's Agitator blog:

The Obama administration is sponsoring a workshop on government transparency . . . that will be closed to the public.

“I can understand skepticism anytime a meeting for government people is not necessarily open to the public,” Nisbet (director of the brand spankin' new Office of Government Information Services) said. “However, everything that is discussed there is absolutely available for the public to know about.”

We're having to submit paperwork and requests to have OUR government employees tell us what they're doing on issues like lobbying, bribery, quid pro quo pro Climaquidicks pro additional quo's, and which lobbyists are visiting the White House for plunder.

Raise your hand if you think everything is honest and above-board.....

Anyone ? Anyone at all?

The cartoon came from here.

Russell Roberts on The Unimaginable

Several years ago, Russell Roberts, half of the George Mason University Economics blogging duo Cafe Hayek, wrote a parable called "The Choice: A Fable Of Free Trade And Protectionism".


(I found it at Half Price Books in Dallas a few years ago. Good stuff.)


At one point in the book, Perfesser Roberts needed to come up with the most idiotic Straw Man argument he could think of to illustrate that destroying things so you could make them again doesn't improve the economy.

He had to think for a long time. He wanted something so bizarre, so unlikely, and so... so.... so.... freakin' dumb that anyone reading his book would get his point and be forced to agree.


So what scenario did he think of, waaaaay back in 2005, to show that cleaning up after vandalism doesn't create wealth? Here goes....


"Let's flip it around. Suppose you wake up in the morning, and there's no new car in the driveway - just the same one you've been driving. But the president makes a similar speech. A government official will be coming to get your car and drive it off a cliff, where the remains will be buried. Sure, you're going to have to buy a new car but employment in the U.S. auto industry will increase, and prosperity will follow, won't it? Or will it? Will that policy make America richer or poorer?"
"It would make Detroit richer."

"That's right. The auto industry would expand. But the country as a whole would be poorer for it. You don't get rich destroying things. You get poorer."


There you have it, written in 2005. Irony is now dead. Irony has achieved room temperature, and is pushing up daisies. You can put a morgue tag on its toe.


Russell Roberts sat down with his doctorate in economics, and tried to imagine a government program so dumb that no one would dare try it.


He failed.


If you didn't hit the link at the top, after giving us the excerpt from his book Perfesser Roberts goes on to write "Cash for Clunkers has ended for now. It was an intellectual travesty. I am grateful that it was poorly administered. It might have done even more damage."