Saturday, February 25, 2012

Two Problems With Romney

Just observations here, not "science."  And yes, I'm not a Romney fan...

1)  He is Clintonesque in his poll-driven/focus-group campaign.  He campaigned as a 'progressive' (RINO) in Massachusetts--and governed pretty much that way--but now that the country's mood has shifted, so has Mitt.

2)  He strikes me as far too professional--too calculated and ..ummmm...slick...to be real.  I don't doubt that the guy is a good guy--someone you and I would love to have as a neighbor.  But in campaign-mode, he comes across as just a bit chilly, like HRC. 

Except HRC is the very picture of cold and calculating and no, I wouldn't want HER as a neighbor.

There you have it.

Friday, February 24, 2012

Yoo--Hoo!! Calling AG Van Hollen!!!

Van Hollen seems to be too busy to defend the First Amendment.

Seven states filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration today seeking to overturn the mandate that religious employers provide contraception, sterilization, and abortifacients to their employees as part of their health care plans. 

The state attorneys general of Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Texas filed suit today in U.S. District Court, arguing that the mandate violates both the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. All seven plaintiffs are Republicans.

Not Wisconsin.  Nope.  Can't take the time for that.  Nope.

Now the Propaganda and Spin: Obozo Goes Into Campaign Gear

Over the next several months, we'll hear a lot of agit-prop, spin, and lies from Obozo.

One example:  his energy bullcrap.

...Today, the national average for one gallon of unleaded gasoline is $3.57, which is 18 cents higher than a month ago, according to AAA. In Florida, where he spoke, the average price per gallon is $3.68. The speech comes less than a month after Obama rejected the Keystone XL oil pipeline, which would have run from Canada through the midwest to the Gulf of Mexico.

“Under my administration, America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years,” Obama told the audience at the University of Miami. “That’s why we have a record number of oil rigs operating right now – more working oil and gas rigs than the rest of the world combined.”

Sounds real good.  But Obozo's claiming what ain't his.

The increase in domestic drilling was almost entirely in areas for which the Obama administration exercised no authority, as oil production on federal land declined by 11 percent in fiscal year 2011, according to a study by the Institute on Energy Research (IER), a free-market energy think tank. But oil production on state lands increased that year by 14 percent and increased by 12 percent on private lands.

(Damn good thing he did NOT have authority, or we'd be paying $25.00/gallon for gas.)

Obama also told the Miami crowd that foreign oil dependence is down under his watch.

Half-true:

...However, FactCheck.org said that foreign-oil dependence has been declining since 2005, when President George W. Bush was in office. It went on to cite the same Energy Information Administration report from 2011 that said, “There is no single explanation for the decline in U.S. oil import dependence since 2005. Rather, the trend results from a variety of factors. Chief among those is a significant contraction in consumption. U.S. oil product deliveries declined by 1.7 million barrels per day (bbl/d) to 19.1 bbl/d in 2010, from 20.8 million bbl/d in 2005.”

More Obozo-nomics will result in even LESS imported fuels!!  And make the Great Depression look like a picnic, too....

Of course, Obozo has done his best to turn off the lights in the USA:

[Jack Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute:]

“Today, 85 percent of the outer-continental shelf has been placed off limits once again. When he took office, there were proposals on the table to open up opportunities in those areas,” Gerard told CNSNews.com. “Today, in the Rocky Mountains, the leasing has gone down 70 percent since taking office. We now have 10 federal agencies, departments, looking at the technology of hydraulic fracturing, which has really opened up this vast game-changer both in natural gas and oil in the United States.

Election Day.  Election Day.  Election Day.  Election Day.  Election Day.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Another "House Bigot" in Obozo's Gang

Seems that Obama has gathered every pro-death bigot-bozo into his circle.

John P. Holdren, the top science adviser to President Barack Obama, wrote in a book he co-authored with population control advocates Paul and Anne Ehrlich that children from larger families have lower IQs.

The book—"Human Ecology: Problems and Solutions"—argued that the United States government had a “responsibility to halt the growth of the American population.

That is so profoundly wrong, on so many levels, that it is near-impossible to address it.

We could start with this, however:  "So what (if they have 'lower' IQ's?"

There is a reason that the term "average" exists, Mr. Holdren.

Social Security's going broke and an alleged 'innerlekshul' proposes that less people should pay the bill?

Holdren proves that bigots are really, really, really stupid.

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Obozo: "We Don't Need No Steeenkin' Defense!!"

Seems that the Twit-in-Chief has all sorts of stupid ideas.

...Mr. Obama has directed the Defense Department to come up with plans for reducing the U.S. nuclear arsenal by as much as eighty percent.  Evidently, he is prepared to take such a step unilaterally in order to encourage by our example other nations to join in his longstanding ambition to “rid the world of nuclear weapons.

Umnnnhhhh.....

...It is not just that President Obama is blindly driving for ideological reasons the numerical evisceration of U.S. nuclear forces.  As Congressman Turner pointed out earlier this month in introducing legislation aimed at holding the administration to commitments made during the consideration of the New START Treaty in 2010, the administration is also walking away from its promises to modernize what remains of our deterrent.  Over time, the practical effect of combining the draconian nuclear cuts Mr. Obama seeks and his failure to arrest and reverse the atrophying of the obsolescing arsenal will leave us functionally disarmed.

Wait, wait!!

We can always throw mercury-laden lightbulbs at the enemy!!!

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Ron Paul: "Liberating" Money, Too

Back in the good old days, Lefties stole things and called it "liberating" them.

Seems like Ron Paul has a 'liberating' problem.

...James' recollection and new documents obtained by Roll Call suggest Paul was aware that he was often being reimbursed twice for individual flights. In all, Roll Call found 26 flights in which several layers of documentation show double payments: credit card statements that detail the ticket purchases, a payment to Paul from his taxpayer-funded House account for reimbursement of a flight and Federal Election Commission records or copies of checks that verify a second payment from a separate group for the same flight....--AmSpec quoting Roll Call

Prolly all 'clerical errors,' ya' know.

A $10 Million 'Contingent Liability' for Duke Power Shareholders

Duke Power is publicly traded, and has just assumed a $10 million contingent liability.

...Duke Energy is subsidizing the Democratic National Convention by guaranteeing a $10 million line of credit for the convention.

...Duke has lobbied for and stands to profit from the sort of cap-and-trade policies President Obama supports, as well as other Obama green-energy subsidies. Specifically, Duke has pocketed $230 million in taxpayer money from Obama's stimulus, according to the Washigton Free Beacon's Andrew Stiles.

We await the Left-o-Wacky noise about "corporate contributions to politicians".

The Perverted "Theology" of the Media

In sum, the Boob Schieffers of the MFM actually do worship a god:  the State.

Here’s the primary belief animating Big Media theology: nothing happens unless the federal government does it.  Pre-natal care only happens if the taxpayers finance it, or insurance companies are mandated to perform it for “free.”  Kids will only receive an education if Jimmy Carter’s Department of Education and the teachers’ unions provide it.  The Earth will only receive proper stewardship if Big Government – centralized even beyond Washington, D.C. – compels it.

Organized religion is acceptable to the media only when it reinforces these goals, or at least refuses to challenge them.  That’s why the same people who are working hard to build a narrative that Santorum is unfit for high office because he’s a harbinger of incipient theocracy have absolutely no problem with Barack Obama using religion to justify redistributionist liberalism.  In fact, they grow very angry when they think a liberal’s religious sincerity is challenged, even obliquely.  The only thing that enrages them nearly as much is a conservative whose religious sincerity is apparent.  It’s all about showing the appropriate degree of deference to the proper Ultimate Authority.

Even Thomas Jefferson--a Deist who had no love whatever for organized religion--would not have swallowed that line of crap.


The Dismal ObozoConomy

That is a chart of the labor-force participation.  The chart tracks the % of working-age Americans who are actually employed; it does NOT count retirees, so it is controlled for demographics.

That stimulus really, really worked, no?

Today Gallup reports that mid-February unemployment was 9%, up from the 8.3% of January....

HT:  RedStates

Monday, February 20, 2012

Why the Santorum Surge?

Santorum is giving Romney a run for his money--of which Romney has a lot.  And the Republicans should be damned happy about that.

Why?

In the opinion of this Democrat, Santorum has misunderstood why he has surged ahead of Mitt Romney in recent days. "He was beating Romney because he was the conservative alternative, not because he was the social conservative alternative," the Democrat says.  "The deeper in he wades, the more he is going to have to walk it back in order to be in a position where he can actually win the presidency.  His strength as an alternative has nothing to do with social policy."

In his first surge, in the last days of Iowa caucus campaigning, Santorum shot into the lead on the strength of a platform that featured appealing positions on jobs, on taxes, on national defense, as well as the social positions for which he is well known.  Alone among Republicans, Santorum spoke at length about the decline of U.S. manufacturing and the problems of American workers who don't have college degrees.  ("The best speech he ever gave was the speech he gave in Iowa on caucus night," says the Democrat.)  Those positions, along with his dogged determination on the stump, caused many Republicans to give him a serious look.

What that prominent Democrat does NOT say directly is this:  Santorum is rising because he believes what he says.  He believes that manufacturing is critical to a healthy economy.  He believes that family formation is critical to the future of the country.  He believes that every human life is sacred.

It's what's called 'the strength of convictions.'   Most voters are sick to death of the BS and foofoodust of such as Obama and the back-and-forthright Romney and they 'get' that the country is headed over the cliff if we have another 4 years of the crapola.

Will "social issues" kill Santorum in the general?

Nope.

...social conservatism has had a winning track record for the GOP since 1968.

The Democrats who won, including even Barack Obama in 2008, did not play up social liberalism in their campaigns. In 1992 Bill Clinton was a death-penalty advocate who promised to “end welfare as we know it” and make abortion “safe, legal and rare.” Social issues have come to the fore on the GOP side in two of the past six presidential elections—in 1988 (prison furloughs, the Pledge of Allegiance, the ACLU) and 2004 (same-sex marriage). “Those are the only two elections since Reagan where the Republican Party has won a popular majority,” Mr. Bell says. “It isn't coincidental.  --CC quoting Taranto/WSJ

Fuggedabout the "senior Republican Senator" remarks.  Santorum can win this.

Forced Prenatal Testing? Yup. The Reich Demands It!

This is not just a matter of a sonogram.

...On the campaign trail in Ohio Saturday, Santorum said, "Free prenatal testing ends up in more abortions and therefore less care that has to be done because we cull the ranks of the disabled in our society." Asked about his statement during an appearance on CBS's "Face the Nation" Sunday morning, Santorum held his ground.  "The bottom line is that a lot of prenatal tests are done to identify deformities in utero and the customary procedure is to encourage abortions," he said.  "This is what goes on in medical rooms around the country. And yes, prenatal testing, amniocentesis does, in fact, result more often than not in this country in abortions."

First off, it's not "free."   With that out of the way....

Santorum's absolutely correct.  ObozoCare requires amniocentesis; it would no longer be elective.  And Santorum's also correct that when a deformity is detected, abortion is suggested.

We should add that, in cases where the baby is born with a grave deformity, it is also suggested that 'feeding and hydrating the baby' is a waste of time and money.

To the Statists, individuals have no rights.  Only the State has rights. 

Sunday, February 19, 2012

"Businessman"? MItt's Olympic "Success"

Well, looky here, Jed....

One of Mitt Romney’s greatest accomplishments, one of the things he talks about the most, is how he heroically showed up on the scene, and bailed out and resolved the problems of the Salt Lake City Olympic Games,” Mr. Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, told an audience at a hotel ballroom here.

“He heroically bailed out the Salt Lake City Olympic Games,” he then added, “by heroically going to Congress and asking them for tens of millions of dollars to bailout the Salt Lake Olympic Games. In an earmark.”

Pointing out that the Romney campaign has been attacking him over earmarks in Congress, Mr. Santorum added: “Does the word hypocrisy come to mind?” He also noted that one of Mr. Romney’s supporters this year, Senator John McCain, had criticized the taxpayer money provided for the Games.

Romney makes it seem as though the "post-9/11" earmark was all about security.   He's half-right.

Come to think of it, he's half-right all the time.  And half-left, too.

20,000 XL Jobs Killed by Obozo: Twice That Coming in Med Supply Ind'y

Best sharpen up your burger-flipping skills and move to a resort area where Queen Michelle or King Obozo like to visit.

...Mass.-based Zoll Medical Corp., which makes defibrillators and employs some 1,800 workers in the U.S. and around the world, says the medical device tax will cost the company between $5 million and $10 million a year. Its profit in 2009 was $9.5 million. “Running our company at close to break even would not be a sustainable position for us,” CEO Richard Packer said in a public statement, “so we will be forced to look at alternatives.”

Those “alternatives” include cutting payroll, cutting R and D and passing on the costs to patients, of course. Industry estimates put the tax-induced job losses at 43,000. So far, the number-crunchers at 1600 Pennsylvania are mum on the number of potential jobs — and lives — destroyed by the medical innovation death tax.

Plenty more stories of other firms contemplating either serious cutbacks OR simply moving out of the US altogether.

HT:  Malkin

Steyn Nails It, Again

Steyn gets this issue very well.  At the end of this post, I'll give you another example of death-by-Obozo.

...I notice that in their coverage NPR and the evening news shows generally refer to the controversy as being about “contraception,” discreetly avoiding mention of sterilization and pharmacological abortion, as if the GOP have finally jumped the shark in order to prevent you jumping anything at all. It may well be that the Democrats succeed in establishing this narrative. 

But anyone who falls for it is a sap. In fact, these two issues — the Obama condoms-for-clunkers giveaway and a debt-to-GDP ratio of 900 percent by 2075are not unconnected. In Greece, 100 grandparents have 42 grandchildren — i.e., an upside-down family tree. As I wrote in this space a few weeks ago, “If 100 geezers run up a bazillion dollars’ worth of debt, is it likely that 42 youngsters will ever be able to pay it off?” Most analysts know the answer to that question: Greece is demographically insolvent.

...The United States faces a mildly less daunting arithmetic. Nevertheless, the Baby Boomers did not have enough children to maintain mid-20th-century social programs. As a result, the children they did have will end their lives in a poorer, uglier, sicker, more divided, and more violent society...

We note that the common (MFM,economist and libertarian) yappaflappa about the Japanese "lost decade" wholly ignores the FACT that Japan, too, is on a path of self-extinction through contraception--as is Greece, Italy, and Germany.

By the way, if you think my children are going to support YOU, you are nuts.  They know what I meant when I said "Buy More Ammo."  

HT:  Fr Z

Beauty, Spirit, Liturgy

Fairly lengthy essay here which raises an important point:  it ain't just "body and soul."  It's body, intellectus, and ratio.

The loss of the "spirit"--or intellectus--after the Enlightenment also led to the loss of the sense of beauty; thus the circus-tent church, or Picasso, or Schoenberg's dodecaphony--topped only perhaps, by Glass' unending nothingness.

It strikes me that such a neglect as a result of the Enlightenment should result in a cultural decline as well as a liturgical decline is made all the more understandable when one considers the role of the intellectus, or spirit, in the apprehension of beauty. In the first part of her little essay Beauty, Contemplation and the Virgin Mary, Sister Thomas Mary McBride, OP describes succinctly in just a few paragraphs, the traditional understanding of beauty and how man apprehends it. She draws on the Latin medievals and states that beauty illuminates the intellectus, describing the apprehension of beauty as the 'gifted perfection of seeing'. Then echoing Caldecott in the connection between intellectus and spirit says: 'In the light of the above, this writer would suggest that the proper place of beauty is in the spirit.'

An appropriate active participation in the liturgy is one that engages the full person in order to encourage within us the right interior disposition. Any participation in the liturgy that does not engage body, soul and spirit therefore does not engage the full person.

Many have described the liturgical music landscape following VatII as "pragmatic"; in some cases, the music almost seems to have been written by a committee.

B-16 has mentioned "beauty" as a very important quality in liturgy (and its music) at least a dozen times while Pope and Cardinal.  There's a reason for that.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

Greta Should Stick to the Lost Girl Stories

Greta VanSusteren beclowned herself last week with her attack of Santorum over an old one-liner told by a Santorum backer. 

(Andrea Mitchell attempted to top VanS's idiocy, and there are reports of some clueless dolt reporter-ette actually wondering aloud "....how does that work?")

Maybe Greta should get back to covering missing girls in the Caribbean, or borrow a sense of humor from McCain.

Friday, February 17, 2012

You Just Don't Know What's Important, You Rubes, You....

PowerLine says it very well.

...You know that Obama’s acting OMB Director, Jeffrey Zients, appeared before the Senate and House Budget Committees to defend the budget and encountered rough sledding. Among other things, Senator Jeff Sessions asked Zients whether the president’s budget increases spending compared with current law, and Zients was unable or unwilling to answer the question. You know that Tim Geithner followed Zients to the Senate Budget Committee hearing room, and he, too, was unable to say whether Obama’s budget increases federal spending. (It does, both in comparison with current law, as represented by the Budget Control Act, and in absolute terms, by 46% from FY FY 2012 to FY 2021.) You know that the administration’s claim that its budget contains $2.50 in spending cuts for every dollar in tax increases is ridiculous. You know that, despite his confusion on other points, Geithner testified for the second year in a row that President Obama’s budget is “unsustainable.”

All of the above would seem to be big news. The United States is hurtling down a road that leads to the collapse we now see in Greece and other European countries. President Obama has no plan to deal with the nation’s debt crisis, other than to hold the accelerator firmly to the floor. And, in order to facilitate Obama’s fiscal recklessness, his administration has lied freely about its own budget. (Sorry, there isn’t any nice way to put it.) 

So, every newspaper in America must be on top of this explosive story, right? Actually, no. Every newspaper in America is absorbed with Rick Santorum’s views on birth control.

The MFM:  a protection-racket.

The Reich's Education Takeover

The Statist-in-Chief is not only trampling the First Amendment.  The Tenth is also on the block.

The constitutional, statutory and philosophical abuses by the Obama administration continue piling up. Last week, two of the top former lawyers for the federal Department of Education released a peer-reviewed report showing the administration violating or evading three separate federal laws by pressuring states to adopt a national core curriculum. Those laws exist for good reason: Control of educational content by the national government risks creating a national system of indoctrination, without local recourse to diversity of thought.

It was not a conservative but the Democratic former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, Joseph Califano, Jr. (an aide to both Lyndon Johnson and Jimmy Carter), who warned that “In its most extreme form, national control of curriculum is a form of national control of ideas.” To protect against such dangers, local control of public education always has been a touchstone of the American system.

So?

...without statutory authority, the authors explain how the Obama administration has begun issuing “waivers” of expensive federal mandates, along with providing cash grants, in return for adoption of national standards. The administration then defines the national standards in such a way that only one initiative actually fits the definition – namely, the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), a supposedly voluntary national effort that easily morphs into a form of compulsion.

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Inane Laws of the Bush Era, Part 22,354

Never let it be said that we coddle GWB here.

Congress created the [student] loan forgiveness program in 2007 to encourage graduates to enter the public service field. In exchange for that service, the remaining balance of student loans would be considered repaid after 120 full payments.

To qualify for the loan forgiveness, one must now work for a federal, state or local government agency or organization, including public water, bridge or housing districts, or nonprofit organizations designated as tax exempt by the Internal Revenue Service.

Public services that also qualify for the loan forgiveness include emergency management, military service, public safety, law enforcement services; public health services; public education, public library services; school library and other school-based services; public interest law services, early childhood education; public service for individuals with disabilities and the elderly.

IOW, join AFSCME or SEIU and you're out of college-debt in 10 years. (The military exemption is perhaps the only halfway reasonable  exemption.)

Granted, Bush had a (D) Congress to fight....

"Tax." "No, Fee." "No, Tax!!!" "No, It's a Fee!"

That's the Obozoites describing the money you'll have to pay for ObozoCare.

And yes, it DOES make a difference.

WIsconsin Senate Recall Failures

Looks like there are two "FAILS" in the Wisconsin Senate recalls.

You all know about Fitzgerald. 

But the Moulton recall is in deep trouble, too.  According to True the Vote, the recallers had to produce 14,958 valid signatures to force a recall election.  The recallers submitted 21,000 signatures.

But there were quite a few problems.  Signatures that were too late, or which came from people outside the district, or which were duplicates, or which were indecipherable, will subtract 1,829 from that 21K.

In addition, there are another 3,000+ signatures which are dubious.

True the Vote found 15,294 signatures were eligible--but it's possible that those 3,000 "problems" will pull the number below the required 14,958.

Stay tuned.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Where Was Abp. Dolan in 2010?

We refer you to a story from 2010.

Note well:  Abp Tim Dolan was not quoted in the story.  The Milwaukee "newspaper" didn't even run the story.  There was no Sykes radio appearance from the Archbishop of Milwaukee.  There was no television appearance from the Archbishop of Milwaukee.

In other words, Abp. Tim Dolan took a pass on the direct precursor to the Obozo mandate.

Now that Archbishop--in New York City--is aghast.

Really?

Obozo's Reichspolzei

They pick on the children, who cannot resist.  (Reminds you of abortion-fiends, no?)

A mother in Hoke County complains her daughter was forced to eat a school lunch because a government inspector determined her home-made lunch did not meet nutrition requirements. In fact, all of the students in the NC Pre-K program classroom at West Hoke Elementary School in Raeford had to accept a school lunch in addition to their lunches brought from home.

.... she made her daughter a lunch that contained a turkey and cheese sandwich, a banana, apple juice and potato chips. A state inspector assessing the pre-K program at the school said the girl also needed a vegetable, so the inspector ordered a full school lunch tray for her. While the four-year-old was still allowed to eat her home lunch, the girl was forced to take a helping of chicken nuggets, milk, a fruit and a vegetable to supplement her sack lunch.

The 'state inspector' was just following Federal orders.

Boehner Does Three-Card Monte and You're the Mark (Again)

You're supposed to be very happy with Boehner because he split the Big Spend Highway bill into three parts.

It's a sucker play.  You're the suckers.

...The end result will be a top-down federal highway bill that requires an immediate $40 billion bailout for a new mass transit account and future bailouts down the road.  Either way, there will be no pension reform or expanded oil drilling from the final version of the bill.  This is yet another example of the shenanigans that are so endemic of Washington politics.

Isn't it time for Boehner to retire?

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Obozo to Give Death Panel More Power

Not surprising in the least.

"...IPAB has been highlighted by economists and health policy experts as a key contributor to Medicare’s long term solvency. Under current law, if the projected Medicare per capita growth rate exceeds a predetermined target growth rate, IPAB recommends to the Congress policies to reduce the rate of Medicare growth to meet the target. IPAB recommendations are prohibited from increasing beneficiary premiums or cost-sharing, or restricting benefits. To further moderate the rate of Medicare growth, this proposal would lower the target rate from the GDP per capita growth rate plus 1 percent to plus 0.5 percent. Additionally, the proposal would give IPAB additional tools like the ability to consider value-based benefit design."  --Budget document quoted at Beltway

Another preferred Obama methodology is just killing 'em off with abortifacients or abortion.  IPAB should look into the cost of bullets.  They're cheap.

It IS the Spending, Stupid! (Part 335,631)

Think  you'd seen irresponsible spending last year?  The year before last?

You ain't seen nothing yet.

When the gimmicks are removed, spending even rises $1.5 trillion above current projections—$47 trillion in total. Annual spending will rise by 62 percent between 2011 and 2022. There are no real reforms and the new taxes are used to fund more wasteful Washington spending. So even with almost $2 trillion in job-crushing tax hikes, the president remains incapable of reducing the deficit  --Sen J. Sessions, (Budget Committee)

Your children, their children, and their children's children will be debt-slaves.

Nice future!

ObozoBudget: S.W.A.G. Numbers

Well, our Marxist-in-Chief released a new budget, which predicts that the deficit will go down.  In 2013.

That would be good news, except that his budget predictions are notoriously rotten.

In February 2009, Obama submitted his first budget to Congress. It boldly predicted that the federal deficit would decrease dramatically during Obama’s term, dropping from an estimated $1.841 trillion in fiscal 2009 to $557.4 billion in fiscal 2012.

However, in the fiscal 2013 budget that Obama submitted to Congress today, the White House is predicting that the federal deficit for fiscal 2012 will not be $557.4 billion after all. Instead, the White House says, it will be $1.3269 trillion.

That means Obama’s fiscal 2010 budget proposal missed on its fiscal 2012 deficit prediction by $769.5 billion--an error of 138 percent.

Uh-huh.  Well, if at first you don't succeed.....

Monday, February 13, 2012

The Rise and Fall of Liberty: the Church's Error

Mid-length essay on the history of "freedom of religion."   An alternative title could be "Why the Road to Hell is Paved With the Skulls of Bishops."

...There was a time when Roman Catholicism was the great defender not only of its own liberty but of that of others. There was a time when the prelates recognized that the liberty of the church to govern itself in light of its guiding principles was inseparable from the liberty of other corporate bodies and institutions to do the same.... in the course of defending its autonomy against the secular power, the Roman Catholic Church asserted the liberty of other corporate bodies and even, in some measure, the liberty of individuals. To see what I have in mind one need only examine Magna Carta,...

Those were the 'good old days.'

Things went south after the Reformation.

...In Protestant lands, it tended to strengthen the secular power and to promote a monarchical absolutism unknown to the Middle Ages. Lutheranism and Anglicanism were, in effect, Caesaro-Papist. In Catholic lands, it caused the spiritual power to shelter itself behind the secular power and become, in many cases, an appendage of that power. But the Reformation and the religious strife to which it gave rise also posed to the secular power an almost insuperable problem – how to secure peace and domestic tranquility in a world marked by sectarian competition. Limited government – i. e., a government limited in its scope – was the solution ultimately found, and John Locke was its proponent.

In the nascent American republic, this principle was codified in its purest form in the First Amendment to the Constitution. But it had additional ramifications as well – for the government’s scope was limited also in other ways. There were other amendments that made up what we now call the Bill of Rights, and many of the states prefaced their constitutions with bills of rights or added them as appendices. These were all intended to limit the scope of the government. They were all designed to protect the right of individuals to life, liberty, the acquisition and possession of property, and the pursuit of happiness as these individuals understood happiness. Put simply, liberty of conscience was part of a larger package

This is what the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church forgot. In the 1930s, the majority of the  bishops, priests, and nuns sold their souls to the devil, and they did so with the best of intentions. In their concern for the suffering of those out of work and destitute, they wholeheartedly embraced the New Deal.

You'll wait a long, long, long time to hear Abp Tim Dolan say "We're sorry for that."

The pass we've come to as a result?

...the leaders of the American Catholic Church fell prey to a conceit that had long before ensnared a great many mainstream Protestants in the United States – the notion that public provision is somehow akin to charity – and so they fostered state paternalism and undermined what they professed to teach: that charity is an individual responsibility and that it is appropriate that the laity join together under the leadership of the Church to alleviate the suffering of the poor. In its place, they helped establish the Machiavellian principle that underpins modern liberalism – the notion that it is our Christian duty to confiscate other people’s money and redistribute it

The fact that the Protestants came along for the ride is cold comfort.

...the Roman Catholic Church in the United States has lost much of its moral authority. It has done so largely because it has subordinated its teaching of Catholic moral doctrine to its ambitions regarding an expansion of the administrative entitlements state. In 1973, when the Supreme Court made its decision in Roe v. Wade, had the bishops, priests, and nuns screamed bloody murder and declared war, as they have recently done, the decision would have been reversed. Instead, under the leadership of Joseph Bernadin, the Cardinal-Archbishop of Chicago, they asserted that the social teaching of the Church was a “seamless garment,” and they treated abortion as one concern among many.

Ah, yes.  Bernardin.  Chicago again.

....in the 1980s, when Cardinal Bernadin was the chief leader of the American Church and the man most closely consulted when the Vatican selected its bishops, it became evident to the American prelates that they had a problem – that, in many a diocese, there were priests of a homoerotic orientation who were sexual predators – pederasts inclined to take advantage of young boys. They could have faced up to the problem at that time; they could have turned in the malefactors to the secular authorities; they could have prevented their further contact with the young. Instead, almost certainly at the instigation of Cardinal Bernadin, they opted for another policy. They hushed everything up, sent the priests off for psychological counseling, and reassigned them to other parishes or even dioceses – where they continued to prey on young boys. In the same period, a number of the seminaries in which young men were trained for the priesthood became, in effect, brothels – and nothing was done about any of this until the newspapers broke the story and the lawsuits began.

There is, I would suggest, a connection between the heretical doctrine propagated by Cardinal Bernadin in the Gannon Lecture and the difficulties that the American Church now faces. Those who seek to create heaven on earth and who, to this end, subvert the liberty of others and embrace the administrative entitlements state will sooner or later become its victims.

Umnnhhh, not for nothing is Pride the progenitive principal Vice.

To the Aztecs, Human Sacrifice Was "Sacred", Too

This woman spoke accurately.


A Planned Parenthood affiliate’s newest president and CEO said in an official statement that she regards her work for the biggest abortion business in America to be a holy profession.

Melaney Linton, who will now oversee Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, is determined to further the Life-ending work of Planned Parenthood:

“I am honored and humbled to be entrusted with such a sacred duty...

12,000 human sacrifices in 2010, just from her Gulf Coast operations.

Not all that far from Tenochtitlan, either.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Remember My "Buy More Ammo" Meme?

Neumayr sets it up.

Modern liberalism is willfulness writ large -- a godless ideology that rests upon the caprice of central planners. Under it, the fluctuating and often frightening desires of corrupt men, rather than the changeless will of a caring God, form the shaky measure of "good government." As the grim chapters of recent history show -- chapters written in the blood of millions of unborn children and other "undesirables" -- taking God out of "goodness" drains the term of any coherent meaning, leaving mankind at the mercy of power-seeking ideologues.

... But on another level, buried deep within his cold and rootless personality, [Obama] is a man of perverse tenacity, a convinced socialist and secularist who was trained long ago to run the ball into the end zone for radicalism.
 
For all his joshing and superficial charm, he remains the creepy child of post-Enlightenment liberalism...

 ...The brutal logic of these bogus rights, as Obama hints in his mumbles about "access" as the trumping value in this debate, is that everyone must recognize them. Who cares if the Church objects to financing the sins of her employees? The Church is wrong, and error has no rights, hiss feminists. The dogmatism of which Obama routinely accuses the religious is on far starker display in his own ideology, a species of raw social engineering that depends for its fulfillment upon bullying conscientious objectors at the point of a government gun.

This is a historic moment in the culture war -- a crystallizing flashpoint in which the totalitarianism and bigotry long implicit in secularism rises to the surface and becomes explicit for all to see.

...The essential character of secularism is totalitarian. For all of its chatter about religion as a "private" matter, for all of its nonsense about the "privacy of the bedroom," nothing under secularism in the end is actually private.  The social engineers of Obamacare will determine the birth control methods of the unwashed. They will dictate the terms of man's beginning through eugenic abortion and his end through death panels. And to gratify the bloodlust of bigots, they will leave the stained bill for the reviled religious to pay.

In the alternative, of course, there could be a civil war.

Did PPP Go All Conservative? Or Is Romney Dead Meat Walking?

PPP is a (D) polling outfit.  They're good at what they do, but they do no favors for Conservatives.  So when they release a poll with these contents:


...Less than a week after besting Romney in primary contests in three states, Rick Santorum has a 15-point lead on the former Massachusetts governor, according to a national poll released Saturday by Democratic firm Public Policy Polling. Recent polls had shown Romney up about 10 points on Newt Gingrich, his nearest rival.
Santorum leads Mitt Romney 38 percent to 23 percent in the new poll, while Gingrich is in third place with 17 percent. Ron Paul comes in last with 13 percent....

As I recall, HRClinton was "inevitable" in the last Democrat primary race.

HT:  McCain

Meantime, the Poohbahs of Obozo Ignore the Mexican Border

Oh, I know that Obozo isn't the first President to simply ignore the border.  GWB did his damndest to ignore it, too.


The Iranian-supported Shi’ite terrorist group Hezbollah has spread its influence all the way to the U.S. border with Mexico, a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on Iran’s influence in the Western Hemisphere heard on Thursday.

Michael Braun, a former chief of operations at the Drug Enforcement Agency, said Hezbollah had developed relationships with the powerful Mexican drug cartels to “move their agenda forward.” He cited a plot, recently uncovered by the DEA, involving an Iranian operative in Mexico allegedly planning to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington, D.C.

... Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), committee member and chairman of the Homeland Security Committee’s subcommittee of oversight and investigations, asked about Hezbollah’s relationship to criminal organizations in the Western Hemisphere and what it means for U.S. security.

Braun warned that those relationships allow “these groups to operate freely in our neighborhood” and said the U.S. would regret it if the threats were not taken seriously.

“I don’t want to sound too crude, but I think there’s going to be hell to pay in the not too distant future,” he said.  --Captain quoting CNS News

If I were the Arizona Governor, I'd be stuffing more than an index finger into Obozo's face.

Another View on the Obozo Abortifacient Mandate

Here's a viewpoint which does not concentrate on the Constitutional issue.

...The argument seems to be that it's important for women, so therefore it should be free to women.  There are lots of things that are at least as important, though, that we certainly don't expect to be free:  food, for example, or sufficient clothing for the winter.  The argument seems to be that birth control ought to be free (and indeed it is, in the form of abstinence, a form of birth control that Catholics consider it a virtue to materially assist:  but I digress).  It ought to be free, and any employer ought to be sure that any of their employees receives it as free.

This is really an astonishing demand.  I could understand demanding it at cost:  we could structure an argument whereby insurance companies are understood to receive a reasonable profit, and as part of the price of approving the practice of the business in the state, we mandate that they arrange to provide certain critical medications to their consumers at cost.  We might ask, even then, why birth control or abortifacients would be the medicine we chose to occupy this position of special importance -- surely life-saving drugs would be a more worthy choice?  Still, at least at cost could conceivably be a reasonable demand.

Free, though?  Nothing is free.  Everyone knows this....

But "Free Stuff" is what Democrats do, you know.

HT:  Grim

Bishops Figured Out Obozo's Trickery and Deceit (!!)

Well, duh....

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which had led opposition to the regulation, issued a statement saying that they didn't believe their concerns were addressed by a new policy offered by President Barack Obama on Friday morning to allow religious employers who object to the use of birth control to turn over responsibility for covering it to insurance companies.   --AOSHQ quoting WSJ

Elegantly worded "stuff it where the sun never shines."

Another back-track by Obozo!!

In other news, yesterday President Obama caved in to pressure from an organization that wished to preserve their moral clarity on a particularly divisive issue that's been in all the papers lately. The Feds announced that the NAACP and other groups focused on the status of African-Americans will no longer be forced to reimburse their employees for yearly membership dues to their local Klan Klaverns (or whatever the hell those groups call themselves). ** The checks to the Klan will still be issued, but instead of coming directly from the NAACP office with "Klan Membership Dues" written in the lower left-hand corner, they will instead be hidden in payments to the NAACP's insurance company. So, you know: Out of Sight, Out of Mind and all that.

Well, maybe that's not exactly the way it was worded.

Feel Testy? Here's One for You

AOSHQ comes up with these--so it's near-obligatory.

Note well:  college profs, professional politicians, and the general public are not exemplars of citizenship (who could have guessed?)

And yup, I got two wrong.

The Early Warning About Planned Parenthood

Very useful quotation here.

"The abandonment of the reproductive function is the common feature of all perversions. We actually describe a sexual activity as perverse if it has given up the aim of reproduction and pursues the attainment of pleasure as an aim independent of it. So, as you will see, the breach and turning point in the development of sexual life lies in becoming subordinate to the purpose of reproduction. Everything that happens before this turn of events and equally everything that disregards it and that aims solely at obtaining pleasure is given the uncomplimentary name of "perverse" and as such is proscribed."

There you have the definition of perversion.  That's been superceded by a new one--more limited--which encompassed homosexual activity only.  Now even that use of the term is out-of-favor for the obvious reason:  it's no longer correct to call a spade a spade.


You may think that the quotation above was from some Church-type; if not a Pope, then a ranking cleric, right?


Wrong.


That's Siggy Freud--naming the contraceptive mentality of Planned Parenthood (and others) as "perversion."


He's right, you know.


HT:  Barnhardt.bizhttp://barnhardt.biz/ (scroll to January 30th)

Friday, February 10, 2012

SS,DD: Obozo "Compromises" With No Change at All

You've all read the "news" stories about Obozo's 'compromise' on tearing up the 1st Amendment vis-a-vis abortifacients and contraceptives.

Uh-huh.

Here's a nicely-worded dissent from the MFM's story:

He's taken one unconstitutional, tyrannical mandate and, to deflect criticism, simply asserted a new unconstitutional tyrannical mandate to cover the first.

Since Napolitano is monitoring 'net activity for "dissent", I won't put into pixels what I think of Obozo.  But you can guess.

Wednesday, February 08, 2012

Kmiec, a "Really Intelligent Guy", Failed the IQ Test

Here's a guy whose resume would tell you that he's really intelligent.

President Barack Obama’s most prominent Catholic supporter is backing away from the radically pro-abortion leader over his administration’s decision to force religious institutions to cover contraception, including abortifacients, and sterilizations.

Doug Kmiec, Obama’s former Ambassador to Malta, revealed this week that he is now “without a candidate” for the 2012 election because of the contraception mandate.

“Until I have an opportunity to speak with the president, I am for now (unhappily) without a candidate,” he wrote in an e-mail to The Hill.

Proving the maxim that common sense ain't all that common, Douggie.

Now It's Santorum v. Rombama

Mere "beauty contests"?  Not.

With Gingrich going the way of Pawlenty, Cain, and Bachmann, the battle for the Republican Party's soul is now clear.

Rombama, a Big-Government-Protection machine v. an actual Conservative who will place American families first.

Obozo to Unemployed Engineer: "Eat Dirt, Dog!"

The Wedel case didn't make any difference to Obama; he's circumventing Congress (again) and will be encouraging age-discriminatory hiring by high-tech firms.

Sen. Grassley gets it:

...Despite your online chat and interest in investigating the problem, just last week, your administration proposed rules to “attract and retain highly skilled immigrants.”  The Department of Homeland Security will expand the eligibility for foreign students to stay in the U.S. under the Optional Practical Training program.  This program does not have U.S. worker protections, nor does it require that employers pay prevailing wages to these foreign students/employees.  Your administration will also provide work authorizations to spouses of H-1B visa holders, thus increasing the competition for many Americans who are looking for work.   It’s astonishing that, at this time of record unemployment, your administration’s solution is to grant more work authorizations to foreign workers.  These initiatives will do very little to boost our economy or increase our competitiveness.

Not that Obozo is the only politician who throws highly-educated US citizens under the bus; GWB was another, and Congress is filled to the rim with people who fellate "high-tech" firms with immigration law accomodations.

This will be an interesting campaign.

Tuesday, February 07, 2012

Another Setup of the Taxpayers

Read it and weep.

...Simply put, conservatives oppose the House leadership’s highway bill (H.R. 7) because it continues the failed top-down federal approach to transportation spending, while precluding devolution to the states for at least another five years.  Moreover, it eschews the pay-as-you-go funding mechanism of the Highway Trust Fund (eerily similar to the Social Security Trust Fund!) by permanently authorizing a higher level of spending than the fund’s corresponding revenue source; the federal gas tax....

So.  In five years or so, the Spending Establishment is going to tell us that "there's no MONEY for the HIGHWAYS" and impose another tax or three--or user fees, or 'wheel fees', or whatever.

You'll have forgotten that it was Boehner, of course, and he'll be retired, living on your tax dollars.

Did I say "tax" enough??

Monday, February 06, 2012

The Romney Machine Moves Back-and-Forthrightly to Minnesota

Romney has dumped a 1500+ word opposition brief on Santorum into the press' lap.

Hmmmmm.  Even got Pawlenty, the not-very-memorable Minnesota Moderate to slam Santorum.

Tells ya sumpin' folks.


Asked about Romney's decision to focus on Santorum, a spokesman for the former Pennsylvania senator's presidential campaign called the tactics "tired" and blasted Romney's record as "abysmal."

"If Governor Romney is confident running on his record and his vision for the future, he would," Santorum spokesman Hogan Gidley told Yahoo News."But Gov. Romney does what he always does and directs his well-funded attack machine to destroy the opponent. Mitt Romney's act is tired, old and wearing thin with voters and I suspect at this point, with the media too. Romney never touts his own record — because it's abysmal."

The Back-and-Forthright candidate, Romney, could run on EITHER of his records, I suppose.

A Letter to the Suddenly Awakened Catholic Bishops

There were perhaps seven or eight Catholic Bishops who spoke out against ObozoCare before it was enacted.  (See references here.)

The rest of them?  Pretty quiet about it. 

So now they figured out that they were pretty stupid in their quietness.

One Atlanta Catholic has a few things to say....

....In 2009 and 2010, nominally faithful Catholics who value all of the policy choices you do — labor unions, forced charity, high rates of taxation, urban ghettoes, and of course, universal “health care” — and who claimed to be ardent defenders of the unborn sold out to a one, sacrificed millions of babies and betrayed the infallible teaching of their faith so they could get one gigantic step closer to the social justice you so crave.

And for that, for that moment when they put aside their baptismal and confirmation vows, repeated every Easter, and their recitation of whatever version of the Nicene Creed you’ve settled on this week, your response was … applause. Silence. Satisfaction. A professed willingness to work with the Administration.

Umnnnhhhh....yes, indeed.

Sunday, February 05, 2012

Follow the (Anti-Coal) Money: Sierra Club Version

Sierra Club.  Kinda sounds neat-o, mountains, big trees, sunset vistas....

Well, not really.


A Time magazine blogger reported Thursday that the Sierra Club, America’s oldest and most august environmental organization, accepted millions of dollars in donations from one of the nation’s biggest natural gas-drilling companies for a program lambasting coal-fired power plants as environmental evildoers.

The total take for John Muir’s conservation group? A whopping $26 million over four years from Chesapeake Energy and its subsidiaries, mostly through Chesapeake CEO Aubrey McClendon.

Not a bad haul for a propaganda dump.

HT:  JunkScience

What (Actual) Conservatives Believe

Nicely summarized.

The conservative believes that the individual is foolish, although the species is wise; therefore, unlike the confident intellectual, he declines to undertake the reconstruction of society and human nature upon the scanty capital of his private stock of reason. The conservative believes that the world is not perfectible, and that we fallen human creatures, here below, are not made for happiness, and will not find happiness––at least, not if we deliberately pursue it; therefore, unlike the ideologue, he is not under the impression that any single fixed system of political concepts can bring justice and peace and liberty to all men at all times, if uniformly applied.  --Russell Kirk (of course).

Ideologues of the Left (and alleged 'right') should take note.

JFK Chased Babes. Sun Rises in East

Not exactly a hot-news item:

Former U.S. President John F Kenendy took the virginity of a White House intern in a side room just feet away from where administration staff were drinking at an after-work party, an explosive new book has claimed.--VerumSerum quoting Daily Mail

It was called "Camelot" because of all the humps, duh.

The FBI: Liars

Just in case you are still naive enough to think that the FBI boyzzz are all just like Elliot Ness, here's a bit of real-live evidence that the FBI lies.  A lot.

...Dozens of pyrotechnic devices were found in the rubble, and most significantly, several were found at the points of origin of the fires started that day inside the building.The evidence we found that day in the Texas Ranger evidence locker eventually showed that there were not only multiple types of pyrotechnic devices, there were in some cases, dozens of them used against the folks inside Mt Carmel that day. And it seems that our friendly local military commander, General Wesley Clarke, at Ft. Hood, Texas, had been kind enough to supply the FBI HRT with 200 rounds of 40mm HE, (High Explosive) fragmentation grenades and two 40mm, Mark 19 automatic grenade launchers. All of which the FBI had consistently denied was in their possession , much less “used” by them against the Davidians…but FBI/US Army documents and photos don’t lie

That was the Clinton Administration's FBI, as you recall.  But that probably doesn't make much of a difference.

So the next time you hear that "this surveillance technique is only used against terror suspects," you know that it likely came from the mouth of a liar--or someone who works shoulder-to-shoulder with liars.

HT:  Arms/Law

Morrissey Joins Levin, Family Research Council: Santorum for President!

Ed Morrissey:

...Santorum has demonstrated a level of personal integrity in this race that outshines the rest of the field.  Santorum has campaigned with blue-collar Reagan Democrats in mind, pushing for an economic plan that would revitalize manufacturing and small business.

....joining the crowd.

Saturday, February 04, 2012

Those Cute Little Fuzzy-Bear Banks?

The AG of New York State...

...today filed a lawsuit against several of the nation’s largest banks charging that the creation and use of a private national mortgage electronic registry system known as MERS has resulted in a wide range of deceptive and fraudulent foreclosure filings in New York state and federal courts, harming homeowners and undermining the integrity of the judicial foreclosure process. The lawsuit asserts that employees and agents of Bank of America, J.P. Morgan Chase, and Wells Fargo, acting as "MERS certifying officers," have repeatedly submitted court documents containing false and misleading information that made it appear that the foreclosing party had the authority to bring a case when in fact it may not have. The lawsuit names JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., Bank of America, N.A., Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., as well as Virginia-based MERSCORP, Inc. and its subsidiary, Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc.   --Vox quoting NYS AG release

Friendly local fraudsters.

All Green (And Yellow, Too!!!)

Another AlGore experiment turns to.....ahhh........


Students at a high school in Boca Raton, Florida, must step over rivers of urine and endure the stench of rancid waste after a plan to bring ‘green’ waterless urinals into bathrooms backfired.

School officials at Spanish River High School thought they had found an environmentally-friendly, cost-saving solution for their bathrooms when they installed Falcon Waterfree urinals in their boys bathrooms.

But with no water moving through the school’s copper pipes to flush the urine into the sewer system, the waste produced noxious gases that ate through the metal, leaving leaky pipes that allowed urine to drip into walls and flow onto floors.  --PowerLine quoting South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Water, water, everywhere, and not a drop to drink.

More on the Unemployment Numbers

Steve the Number-Cruncher has a couple of pertinent observations.


On a seasonal basis, the 141,637,000 employed is lower than it was in February 2009, and indeed the last time prior to that point it was that low was May 2005. On the other side of the equation, the 12,758,000 officially unemployed (i.e., they didn’t have a job and looked for one in the 4 weeks prior to the mid-January survey) is higher than any point prior to February 2009. Worse, the 6,319,000 who want a job but were not counted as “unemployed” because they had not looked for work in the previous 4 weeks was higher than any point between May 1994 (the fifth month this stat was recorded) and December 2010, and over 1 million higher than any time between one month prior to Bill Clinton’s re-election (October 1996) and Barack Obama’s election in November 2008. Zero Hedge noticed a record 1.2 million departing the labor force on a seasonal basis (or if you prefer unseasoned numbers, Ed Morrissey noted it as nearly 1.6 million on an unadjusted basis).


It ain't pretty.

Marquette University Fails PC Exam

The Perfesser notes that Marquette University's PC cop-shop adopts the Henry Ford maxim:  "Never explain.  Never apologize."

So much for all that 'academic' tripe, eh?

Time for Ginsburg to Go

Since this old Lefty hag doesn't like the US Constitution--which has protected her in her job for decades--perhaps she should go to South Africa or Canada to mal-practice law.

Friday, February 03, 2012

Eight Point Three % of Nobody Left in the Workforce

What counts?

For the MSM, fellating the current occupant counts.  So they scream headlines on the 8.3% unemployment count (which will be revised next month....)

For actual people--beyond the 8.3% who can't find work--what really counts is the statistical method.  Because when 1.2 million people leave the workforce altogether, it's a helluvalot easier to get only 8.3% unemployed.

But it's a helluvalot harder to get tax revenues from them.  So the '12, '13, '14.... projected tax-rev numbers are crumbling before your very eyes.

It's STILL the SPENDING, STUPID!!

Thursday, February 02, 2012

Rombama? Obamney? All the Same, Really

Not only the 'back-and-forthright' candidate, but another vicious anti-Catholic.

Yes, I'm referring to Willard Romney, perma-candidate.

A defining moment in Mitt Romney's post-pro-life-conversion political career came in his third year as governor of Massachusetts, when he decided Catholic hospitals would be required under his interpretation of a new state law to give rape victims a drug that can induce abortions.

Romney announced this decision — saying it was the "right thing for hospitals" to do — just two days after he had taken the opposite position.

The story includes another Willard Romney habit:  hiding in the dark!!

...As Planned Parenthood and NARAL demanded action on the bill, and the Massachusetts Catholic Conference continued to speak out against it, Gov. Mitt Romney remained mum.

"Shawn Feddeman, spokeswoman for Gov. Mitt Romney, declined to comment on the governor's position on the bill," the Boston Globe reported on July 1, 2004. "'We'll review it when it reaches the governor's desk.'"

The bill was reintroduced in the next session — and Romney remained mum.

(You will recall that hiding in the dark is exactly what Willard did on the homosex-marriage bill--until he un-Constitutionally rammed it through by executive fiat.)

Next chapter:

On Dec. 7, 2005, a week before the law was to take effect, the Boston Globe ran a piece headlined: "Private Hospitals Exempt on Pill Law." The article said the state Department of Public Health had determined that the emergency contraception law "does not nullify a statute passed years ago that says privately run hospitals cannot be forced to provide abortions or contraception."

Public Health Commissioner Paul Cote Jr. told the Globe: "We felt very clearly that the two laws don't cancel each other out and basically work in harmony with each other."

Romney spokesman Fehrnstrom told the Globe that Romney agreed with the Department of Public Health on the issue. The governor, he said, "respects the views of health care facilities that are guided by moral principles on this issue."

And finally, the RomBama pronouncement:

Liberals joined in attacking Romney's defense of Catholic hospitals. But that defense did not last long.

The same day the Globe ran its editorial, Romney held a press conference. Now he said his legal counsel had advised him the new emergency contraception law did trump the 1975 conscience law.

"On that basis, I have instructed the Department of Public Health to follow the conclusion of my own legal counsel and to adopt that sounder view," Romney said. "In my personal view, it's the right thing for hospitals to provide information and access to emergency contraception to anyone who is a victim of rape."

The Weathervane Governor became the Weathervane candidate--where he's been for the last 20 years or so.

There's a reason he's never been the nominee.

Wednesday, February 01, 2012

The Real "Petition Problem"

Multiple stories about 'petition problems' are hitting the air and 'net.  "Gatherer" problems arose in Racine County, obviously-forged signatures/addresses pop up on hundreds of pages, the "80 times" guy was broadcast; you get the idea.

Most of the petition-gathering was done by two groups:  the teachers and the AFSCME members.

IOW, the teachers and municipal workers did most of the cheating and forging.

That's what you have running your school?  One is curious:  when did these individuals BEGIN their cheating careers?  In grade school?  High school?  College?

And will their cheating and forgery stop?

The Brownshirts of "Occupy"

Malkin's column is titled "First, They Came for the Catholics".  She discusses Obama's blatant violation of the 1st Amendment vis-a-vis forcing Catholics to pay for birth control and abortifacients.

She mentions something that fits very well into that reference, too:

Is it any surprise their counterparts in the "Occupy" movement have moved from protesting "Wall Street" to harassing pro-life marchers in Washington, D.C., and hurling condoms at Catholic school girls in Rhode Island?

Many observers--Limbaugh among them--thought that the "Occupy" protests were under the operational control of Obama's re-election campaign.

Is it time for us to simply re-title him "Der Fuhrer"?  Should we begin re-inforcing glass windows?