The Louder He Talked of His Honor...

...the faster we counted our spoons.  --R W Emerson

And that goes for the Climate "Scientists" at CRU/EAU.

Here’s what Phil Jones of the CRU and his colleague Michael Mann of Penn State mean by “peer review.” When Climate Research published a paper dissenting from the Jones-Mann “consensus,” Jones demanded that the journal “rid itself of this troublesome editor,” and Mann advised that “we have to stop considering Climate Research as a legitimate peer-reviewed journal. Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers.”

So much for Climate Research. When Geophysical Research Letters also showed signs of wandering off the “consensus” reservation, Dr. Tom Wigley (“one of the world’s foremost experts on climate change”) suggested they get the goods on its editor, Jim Saiers, and go to his bosses at the American Geophysical Union to “get him ousted.” When another pair of troublesome dissenters emerge, Dr. Jones assured Dr. Mann, “I can’t see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow — even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!”

Which in essence is what they did. The more frantically they talked up “peer review” as the only legitimate basis for criticism, the more assiduously they turned the process into what James Lewis calls the Chicago machine politics of international science. The headline in the Wall Street Journal Europe is unimproveable: “How To Forge A Consensus.” Pressuring publishers, firing editors, blacklisting scientists: That’s “peer review,” climate-style.

Who knew that the Chicago Way was known and used in jolly olde England?

HT:  Ace

The Captain's Excellent Question

I thought exactly the same way as does the Captain here...

<i>Navy SEALs have secretly captured one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq — the alleged mastermind of the murder and mutilation of four Blackwater USA security guards in Fallujah in 2004. And three of the SEALs who captured him are now facing criminal charges, sources told FoxNews.com</i>

Yup.  Now for the opinion part:

A punch in the gut, a busted lip, so on, and so forth.  Things that happen in America every day during High School football practice, gym class during wrestling instruction, brothers fighting each other at home, and U.S. Marine Corps hazing of boots.

I simply cannot help but be struck at how effeminate and muliebrous this has become.  Does some lawyer-mommy want to take care of poor little Ahmed?  Did he get roughed up playing with the big boys?  Surely the enemy scoffs and mocks us.

(Damn nice Buckleyism there, too...)

A tango gets a fat lip instead of 80 grains of .223.....

ObamaCare to Raise Insurance Premiums

Another "no big deal" for Congress.

Individual insurance premiums would increase by an average of 10 percent or more, according to an analysis of the Senate healthcare bill.

The long-awaited report by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) also concluded that subsidies provided by the legislation would make coverage cheaper for those who qualify. …

Though Republicans will seize on the projections that insurance premiums for individuals would increase, Democrats will highlight the conclusion that the legislation would lower premiums by 56 to 59 percent for those individuals who would receive subsidies to buy insurance on the exchange created by the legislation. Of those who participate in the exchange, 57 percent would be eligible for subsidies. The subsidy would cover about two-thirds of their premiums, the report says. --AP via Ace

Of course, "subsidies" are financed through taxation and fees on medical equipment manufacturers, as well as whatever else the Democrats feel like taxing.

Ice Caps Melting Since 1881: NYTimes

Considering that the ice caps have been melting for 100++ years, they're damn hard to get rid of.

The Daily Telegraph has been doing some research and found out that the New York Waste of Times has been panicking about polar ice melt since James Garfield was president.

1881: “This past Winter, both inside and outside the Arctic circle, appears to have been unusually mild. The ice is very light and rapidly melting …”

....following which are another dozen samples of NYT yappaflappa over the next century...

Maybe it's algae!

HT: Moonbattery

Doctor Zero Schools John Meacham

Doctor Zero reminds Meacham of Four Little Words: "consent of the governed", in pretty strong terms.

Meacham kicked it off with this:

One of the problems with governance since the election of Bill Clinton has been the resolute refusal of the opposition party (the GOP from 1993 to 2001, the Democrats from 2001 to 2009, and now the GOP again in the Obama years) to concede that the president, by virtue of his victory, has a mandate to take the country in a given direction.

The riposte:

I don’t think most Americans are under the impression they’re voting for a dictator every four years. Bill Clinton won the Presidency with a mere 43% of the popular vote. What sort of “mandate” did that give him to “take the country in a given direction?”

And then he turns it up a notch:

The Declaration of Independence states that governments derive “their just powers from the consent of the governed.” The American understanding of democracy does not envision voters as slaves who enjoy the privilege of voting for a new master every few years. When the Declaration speaks of the right – and, later the duty – of the people to abolish tyrannical governments, it renders the notion of “mandates” to impose radical change on unwilling citizens absurd.

And a "pay or jail" healthcare plan kinda reminds one of 'tyranny.'

...the belief that consent can be manufactured by democratic majorities is one of the most cherished illusions of activist government. The dissent of a minority is not rendered irrelevant by victory in a popular vote… but the health-care debate in the Senate proceeds on the assumption that victory in a parliamentary struggle between a hundred elected officials will compel the consent of the millions of citizens – now a sizable majority of the population, based on the latest polls – who strenuously object to ObamaCare.

He's not too far from a "Go Ahead, Make My Day" position here.

More power to him!

TOTUS Failed in Honduras

Another foreign-policy embarrassment for Obama.

Hondurans picked between Mr. Lobo of the conservative National Party and Elvin Santos of the Liberal Party – to which both Mr. Zelaya and Mr. Micheletti belong. --WSJ

And it was the Conservative, Lobo, who won--not to mention the Hondurans themselves.

Obama and his henchmen picked the real loser--Zelaya--and attempted to ram him down the throats of the people.

Won't work with Cap-n-Tax or ObamaCare either, Barack.

Corn-A-Hole, Again

The bleating from the Corn-A-Holers has been loud lately.

Why?

Because the Feds are deciding whether to stick it to drivers even more than now.

That despite a few important facts:

...many researchers are convinced that 15 percent ethanol in gasoline will cause problems in small engines in everything from lawnmowers to portable generators and boats.

...many environmental groups dropped their support for corn-based ethanol after two studies published by the journal Science last February concluded that ethanol production actually increases the amount of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere.

...“the most important factor” in rising global food prices “was the large increase in biofuels production in the U.S. and the E.U.”

If anything, ethanol content-requirements should be reduced to zero.

HT: FoxPolitics

The Reality of "Tolerance"

Found by Orwell:

“In the world it is called Tolerance, but in hell it is called Despair, the sin that believes in nothing, cares for nothing, seeks to know nothing, interferes with nothing, enjoys nothing, hates nothing, finds purpose in nothing, lives for nothing, and remains alive because there is nothing for which it will die.” - Dorothy Sayers

PC is the bastard child of that 'Tolerance'.

On 2010....

Those damned elections. Why don't the Dems simply legislate their victory?

Two in five Democratic voters either consider themselves unlikely to vote [in 2010] at this point in time, or have already made the firm decision to remove themselves from the 2010 electorate pool. Indeed, Democrats were three times more likely to say that they will "definitely not vote" in 2010 than are Republicans ---Daily Kos via Trencher

That ought to change the "likely voters" formula for pollsters, no?

Holder vs. Congress?

Eric Holder's willingness to pick fights may be a very serious liability soon.

The "Unlawful Combatant/Terrorists Are Really Civil-Lawbreakers" asininity is Holder picking a fight with the GWB Administration--not to mention the 9/11 Survivors' groups and, for that matter, the intel and military communities.

But that's mere playground antics compared to his picking a fight with Congress.

The Holder Justice Department has concluded that the Obama administration can lawfully pay Acorn [sic] for services provided under contracts signed before Congress banned the government from providing money to the group. Here is the Office of Legal Counsel memo reaching this conclusion.

OLC analysis is tortured. Congress stated: "None of the funds made available by this Joint Resolution or any prior Act may be provided to ACORN. . ." On its face, this looks like a blanket prohibition against paying ACORN under any circumstances. However, OLC purports to find ambiguity in the term "provided to" and then opts for a meaning that does not bar "payments made pursuant to a binding contractual duty."

Umnnnhhh...the appropriators are in Congress, not in the AG's office.

HT: PowerLine

Data? WHAT Data?

This is playing out exactly as one would expect.

SCIENTISTS at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have admitted throwing away much of the raw temperature data on which their predictions of global warming are based.

It means that other academics are not able to check basic calculations said to show a long-term rise in temperature over the past 150 years.

The UEA’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was forced to reveal the loss following requests for the data under Freedom of Information legislation.

The data were gathered from weather stations around the world and then adjusted to take account of variables in the way they were collected. The revised figures were kept, but the originals — stored on paper and magnetic tape — were dumped to save space when the CRU moved to a new building. . . .

They could have said that the dog ate the homework.

HT: John Lott

Field and Forest Solitude

Having been invited by a generous pal to spend some time Up Nort' (actually, in west-central Wisconsin), I took part in this year's search for the mythical 20-pointer.

The mythical 20-pointer and all his friends and relatives had apparently skedaddled to Southeastern Wisconsin. They were enjoying Black Friday at Mayfair, or the Farmers' Market, or something.

You can still see and hear a lot. Hawks quietly bleating in flight, turkeys yobbling, squirrels chuckling, crows gone madnoise...and the 4:30 freight train a couple miles distant; now and then a cracking branch somewhere in the woods, and some faraway gunshots.

Very far away.

And, of course, we all imitated GWB, clearing brush from the back yard between stand-times. Another 10 years or so, and the back yard will be a park. Maybe the 20-pointer will stop by for a picnic there...

Trickery and Deceit, ObamaCare Version

The usual methodology of the superannuated is trickery and deceit. Fits Harry and Nancy to a "T", eh?

The actual cost of ObamaCare?

$6 TRILLION.

"But gee, hey, CBO didn't say that!"

There's a reason:

"When the bills force somebody to pay $10,000 to the government, the Congressional Budget Office treats that as a tax. When the government then hands that $10,000 to private insurers, the CBO counts that as government spending. But when the bills achieve the exact same outcome by forcing somebody to pay $10,000 directly to a private insurance company, it appears nowhere in the official CBO cost estimates — neither as federal revenues nor federal spending." --Cato Institute Study

See how it works? No different than smacking somebody with a 2x4 and calling it a "kiss."

HT: Ace

Lautenberg Amendment Hits the Rocks

The Lautenberg Amendment was destined to have problems with the Constitution.

It finally happened, although not quite as expected.

A Rock County man sentenced to two years in federal prison for shooting a deer while he was on probation for domestic violence has had his case overturned by a federal appeals court...

The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago ruled earlier this month that, in light of a major Supreme Court ruling about individual gun rights last year, prosecutors need to show that a lifetime ban on gun ownership for those convicted of domestic violence has a reasonable connection to reducing domestic gun violence. That 1996 law, the appeals court found, should not be grouped with other "presumptively legal" firearm restrictions mentioned in the 2008 Supreme Court case, known as District of Columbia vs. Heller.

"The 1996 Law" is Lautenberg.

A fellow named Skoien was convicted of misdemeanor domestic abuse. Later, he used a shotgun to go deer hunting. He got a deer AND a conviction, plus room + board at Club Fed.

A federal grand jury indicted Skoien for violation of a 1996 federal law that prohibits anyone convicted of domestic violence from ever possessing guns for any reason, often referred to as the Lautenberg Amendment. Skoien entered a conditional guilty plea, was sentenced to two years in prison and appealed.

From the beginning, Skoien argued that applying the federal law in his situation violated his 2nd Amendment right to possess a gun for hunting. U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb denied a motion to dismiss, and a second motion made after the Heller ruling. That case found that the 2nd Amendment guarantees individual rights to have guns for self-defense, and that the total handgun ban in Washington, D.C., was therefore unconstitutional.

But the Heller court also said it wasn't trying to undo the many "presumptively lawful" gun regulations, such as those prohibiting felons and the mentally ill from having guns, or restricting guns from certain places.

While Crabb thought the ban on guns for people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence obviously fit the same category, Sykes found that conclusion premature.

"We take all this to mean that gun laws - other than those like the categorically invalid one in Heller itself - must be independently justified," Sykes wrote after discussing aspects of the Heller ruling.

Sykes explains that an intermediate level of review should apply. In other words, the government would need to show more than just a rational basis for the law, but not have to meet the very high standard known as strict scrutiny.

Preventing domestic gun violence certainly qualified as an important government interest. But the government must still show a law that perpetually bans someone convicted of domestic violence from ever having a gun is a reasonable means to that end. Sykes said the government didn't make enough of a record on that question, and sent the case back.

"If the government successfully discharges its burden, the district court shall reinstate Skoien's conviction," Sykes wrote

Justice Sykes will soon be demonized by Handgun Control, Inc. as a 'supporter of domestic abuse.'

More Apologies from O-bow-ma

You begin to wonder if, perhaps, this apology-making is genetic or something.

Consider his November 23 contention that Asian countries “want our [export] products,” and that American sales to the region are subpar “partly because we just haven't been as aggressive as we need to be.” These remarks rank among the most egregiously inaccurate, manipulative, misleading, and downright whacky statements ever to come out of any recent free trade-loving White House.

Yes, that statement was......ahhhhh.......'fact-challenged.'

If the Asians really are interested in buying U.S. exports, they have a funny way of showing it.  U.S. goods exports to Pacific Rim countries – the vast majority of total U.S. exports – were indeed up about 75.50 percent from 1998 to 2008, before plunging 24.9 percent on a year-on-year basis so far in 2009.  During the same period, however, U.S. goods exports to the world as a whole grew faster – by 84.31 percent – and their 2009 fall-off was only negligibly greater (25.0 percent).

Has nothing.....nothing.......nothing at all to do with restrictive import policies in the Far East.  Nothing.

Happy Thanksgiving

Stolen directly from P-Mac's blog:

"Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favour, [let us render] unto him our sincere and humble thanks -- for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation -- for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence

...for the great degree of tranquillity, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed -- for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted -- for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us."  --George Washington

God also gave us our families and our friends, our health, joys, and sorrows--for all of which we owe gratitude.

We should be grateful even for Jay and Capper.  (I'm working on Schmitz...)

Obama and SEIU: Parallel Paths

The author of this article, Randy Shaw, is described as 'very' progressive.

The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) held a boisterous picket line in San Francisco last night, but their chants targeted a surprising adversary: labor leaders and their political allies.

...SEIU’s threat to labor hero [CA Sec'y Labor] Burton, and its reported statement to the United Teachers of Los Angeles (sponsor of tonight’s NUHW fundraiser) that it would seek to organize charter school teachers in retaliation for UTLA’s pro-NUHW stance, reflects a union increasingly at odds with the labor movement.

This split is not all that different from the one ongoing between Obama and the radical Left.  I'm not going to accuse Obama of becoming a moderate--but you get the idea.

And labor is increasingly going public with its criticisms of SEIU’s tactics. For example, on October 27 the 19,000 member IBEW Local 1245 joined UNITE HERE Local 2 in submitting court papers challenging SEIU’s blocking of over eighty NUHW petitions affecting over 27,000 California healthcare workers seeking to choose their union.

It is noteworthy that SEIU and ACORN are joined at the hip.  Thus the thuggery and pure dirtball power-grabbing tactics of SEIU are echoed in the slightly more 'white-bread' tactics of ACORN; but the objective is the same:  grabbing and keeping power by any means necessary.  It is also noteworthy that Andy Stern is one of the most-frequent White House visitors since Obama's election.

And once again "Big Labor"--the AFL-CIO, Carpenters/Joiners, Plumber's (etc.) are the 'conservatives', just as they were in the housecleaning of the old CIO when the Communists had gained control of that organization.  It's fair to guess that "Big Labor" is not all that enthralled with ACORN, either.

This will be interesting to watch.

Getting Nuked on Black Friday

You like electricity?

We hear from a well-placed source that the Obama administration will use the holiday Friday news blackout to announce that it is definitively pulling the plug on the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste repository.

The move has been in the cards since the ’08 election, and an internal memo leaked from DOE [Department of Energy] on November 7 has already drawn Congressional ire by indicating the Administration would not only withdraw the Yucca Mountain license application from the NRC [Nuclear Regulatory Commission] earlier than anticipated but also terminate all work on maintaining Yucca Mountain as a policy option.

Good. That allows the possibility of using the Capitol as our nuclear dump.

Nuke waste........Members of Congress.........

Perfect match.

No Experience Necessary for ObamaLand

The Cabinet positions surveyed exclude a few departments: Postmaster General, Navy, War, Health, Education & Welfare, Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security

Note the last four (D) Presidents' level compared to O-bow-ma's.

HT: ZeroHedge

The Chicago Way and the End of the Obama Dream

Instructive narrative from Tom Roeser.

...Take the case of Paul Vallas. An outstanding Democratic public official he served as chief budget adviser to the president of the state Senate, chief budgeter for the city of Chicago under Mayor Daley. Daley took over the job of running the city's public schools by legislative fiat to replace a system where the schools were run loosely by a board of education not directly under the mayor's control.

The Chicago public schools had been called the worst in the country by William Bennett, Ronald Reagan's secretary of education. This led Daley to name Vallas, a no-nonsense administrator, as superintendent of schools. Vallas decided to let nothing stand in his way to improve the condition of the schools. During his tenure from 1995 to 2001 he led the way to reform the school system, his work being cited by President Bill Clinton for hiking test scores, balancing the out-of-kilter schools budget, developing new programs including mandatory summer school, after-school programs and expanding charter, alternative and magnet schools. Devoutly Greek Orthodox Vallas favored vouchers but was powerless to implement them. Nevertheless he achieved a national reputation for his reforms.

He was particularly welcomed by African Americans who were enthusiastic that their kids were showing all kinds of improvement. He was a veritable pop idol in the eyes of many blacks.

But in trying to improve teaching standards, he trod on the toes of the powerful teachers' union, a key source of voter nutrients for The Squid. The union commanded that Vallas had to go. It passed the word to Daley and The Squid. Daley was mum-and stayed mum.

Vallas resigned and Arne Duncan took over. Arne got along well with the teachers' union...and had nothing whatsoever to do with any improvements in the Chicago schools. In fact, performance of the schools declined under Duncan, who is now Sec/Ed for Obama.

Roeser posits that exactly the same thing happened to Greg Craig--a Clintonista who didn't fit into the Chicago Way mold. So he was dumped.

That motivated a few Lefties to muse that perhaps Obama is just another slimy Chicago politician (the term "FIB" is not au courant in DC--yet.)

You'll know it's over for good when that Wisconsin appellation sneaks into a Beltway column.

Reform Starts With a Wrecking Ball

Interesting.

“America’s most-famous superior urban schools are virtually always new starts rather than schools that were previously underperforming. Probably the most convincing argument for the fundamental difference between start-ups and turnarounds comes from those actually running high-performing high-poverty urban schools...

Seems as though the best way to get a high-performing school is to simply start from scratch. urban renewal, redefined.

Wow.

DA Chisholm Is Absolutely Right

Interesting interview with Milwaukee County DA Chisholm on the issue of handguns. The unmentioned name, by the way, is James Doyle, Ideologue/Idiot.

Chisholm: I want to make concealed carry a felony offense. In order to do that you would have to create some form of a permitting system so someone could legally carry a concealed weapon and those who did [illegally carry a concealed weapon] would face felony consequences.

Shepherd: Why should concealed carry become a felony offense?

Chisholm: Now [as a misdemeanor] you could get caught 100 times and you could still walk into a gun store and buy a gun. From my perspective, we prosecute 350 to 400 people every year for carrying concealed weapons. Every single one of those individuals would be prohibited from owning a firearm in the future if it was a felony offense.

Not unreasonable at all. Of course, he has a hair-on-fire-Liberal red-screech-alarm proposal, too: the State must allow concealed-carry permits.

Shepherd: You recently proposed a firearm reform package that includes a concealed carry permitting system. As a prosecutor who has long been concerned about gun violence, why would you want to allow concealed carry in the state?

Chisholm: The package that I am advocating for is based on 10 years of really focused firearm violence prevention strategies. The reality is that Wisconsin’s CCW [carrying concealed weapons] statute, 941.23, has always been one of the most overbroad and constitutionally challengeable statutes in the country. At the same time, it’s been paired with one of the weakest penalties for committing the offense of CCW. So you’ve got really the worst of all worlds.

Umnnnhhhh...yah. Chisholm was reading this blog.

Chisholm: In the [Hamdan] Supreme Court decision, the court upheld the constitutionality of the CCW statute, but barely so. What [the court] basically said was [that the Legislature] needs to start looking very closely at this law and figure out what [it is] going to do with this in the future. But what we’ve done is nothing. So we’ve been living on borrowed time. And that time is up now.

...I’m going to make a prediction right now because I don’t know if we have the will and the foresight to do this but I predict that nothing will happen and that Chicago vs. McDonald will hold that the Second Amendment is incorporated into the 14^th Amendment [and call into question other state and local gun laws]. Then 20 seconds later the NRA will file a challenge to [Wisconsin’s concealed carry statute] and they will win. And at that point in time we will be left with no CCW and no regulatory scheme at all. That’s what I think will happen

He's absolutely correct. James Doyle, Governor of Wisconsin, has enforced his ideology on the State, and the State will LOSE its case against concealed carry. Worst, when the NRA wins its suit, anyone.....ANYONE......will have the Constitutional right to carry a concealed weapon.

You can bet that Chisholm thinks Doyle is a bozo. Too bad he won't say so directly.

HT: FoxPolitics

ObamaSavior---AND Military Genius

This guy is careening out of control.

“After eight years, some of those years in which we did not have, I think, either the resources or the strategy to get the job done, it is my intention to finish the job,” Obama said at a news conference...

This is either the very definition of hubris or the very bottom of the barrel of political scumbaggery.

He says that as though GWB's military advisers were friggin' idiots.

Really?

HT: Jo Egelhoff

Red Cross Exec: "Yup, They Are Death Panels"

Technically, Bernardine Healy, MD, is an EX-Red Cross official...

The bill takes all sorts of choices out of patients' and doctors' hands. Even mammograms and prostate-specific antigen tests would be similarly restricted by the government for millions of people, and they actually serve as better examples of what happens more broadly to personal medical decision making in the new system.

The ground is being laid already, with the announcement by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, a government-appointed body, of new guidelines for mammograms just days ago. Such a board of experts, composed mainly of primary care, prevention, public health, and epidemiology experts, would recommend the list of preventive services covered in the post-health-reform insurance plan that all would have no choice but to buy. Until now, the government's task force has been one voice among several medical groups issuing sometimes conflicting prevention guidelines, leaving room for patient-doctor choice. But in an elevated role under health reform, the federal preventive task force's declarations would carry greater force and have an economic impact on everyone.

We'll remind you that David Obey (D-Potatohead) wrote the enabling legislation for Death Panels in the budget. He also believes that WWII terminated all of FDR's New Deal programs and that VietNam ended the Great Society.

So far, Obey has not commented on the demise of the Easter Bunny, but you can bet he'll postulate that Bush/Cheney and Blackwater were in the background. After all, they have guns, or something.

HT: Confederate Yankee

Silly Season in WI Legislature: SB174

The silly season commences. Here are a few names for you to note:

Senators Coggs and Taylor; cosponsored by Representatives Young, A. Williams, Turner, Berceau, Grigsby, Colon, Richards, Kessler, Sinicki and Pasch.

That's the masthead from SB174. The bill, if passed as written, will ban sales of new handguns in Wisconsin sometime after 1/1/11.

You read that right. It will BAN sales of new handguns in Wisconsin.

This bill prohibits a gun manufacturer or a firearms dealer from transferring
a semiautomatic handgun that does not produce an identifying code (microstamp)
on each cartridge case it expends if both of the following apply: 1) the handgun was
manufactured on or after January 1, 2011; and 2) the handgun has not previously
been transferred to a person that is not a manufacturer or dealer (new handgun).
This bill also prohibits a manufacturer in this state from manufacturing, on or after
January 1, 2011, a semiautomatic handgun that does not produce a microstamp.

The bill also requires manufacturers and dealers who transfer a handgun that
is required to produce microstamps to certify that the handgun, if it is a new
handgun, produces microstamps and that the manufacturer of the handgun will
disclose to a law enforcement agency that has collected a microstamp from an
expended cartridge during a criminal investigation the make, model, and serial
number of the handgun that expended the cartridge.

Since "microstamping" technology is not proven, and since no handgun manufacturer uses it, the language will simply stop new-gun sales in the State.

And, of course, any damn fool with a file can delete 'microstamps' in short order.

Microstamping technology has not been developed. Even if it were, it is easily defeated, and only those who believe in the Tooth Fairy would offer this legislation.

The list of those believers is above.

Test

Dah deedle dah dum

Sen. Conrad (D-ND) Flips You Off

Well, it's the season for birds, right?

Since Attorney General Eric Holder announced on Nov. 13 that five suspects in the 9/11 attacks would be tried in a civilian court in New York City instead of a military tribunal, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) told CNSNews.com that civilian courts are well-suited to prosecute al Qaeda terrorists and that "if people don't believe in our system, they ought to go somewhere else.”

And then he adds the usual Half-Truth:

“We have tried terrorists in our courts and done so very successfully in the past and that is our system."

....forgetting to add that those 'others' were either US citizens and/or caught on US shores by LEO's who followed the usual criminal procedure (Miranda, etc.)

Senator, consider this post to be a return-flip of the bird to you. Eat THAT for Thanksgiving.

The Papal/SSPX Conversations and Patrick Kennedy

Weigel really gets this right.

The issues to be engaged in these conversations do not involve liturgy; the pope has addressed the legitimate pastoral needs of SSPX clergy and SSPX-affiliated laity by his decree allowing the unrestricted use of the 1962 Roman Missal. The real questions have to do with other matters. Does the SSPX accept the teaching of the Second Vatican Council on religious freedom as a fundamental human right that can be known by both reason and revelation? Does the SSPX accept that the age of altar-and-throne alliances, confessional states, and legally established Catholicism is over, and that the Catholic Church rejects the use of coercive state power on behalf of its truth claims? Does the SSPX accept the Council’s teaching on Jews and Judaism as laid down in Vatican II’s “Declaration on Non-Christian Religions” (“Nostra Aetate”), and does the SSPX repudiate all anti-Semitism? [That might be a bit more provocative than necessary.] Does the SSPX accept the Council’s teaching on the imperative of pursuing Christian unity in truth and the Council’s teaching that elements of truth and sanctity exist in other Christian communities, and indeed in other religious communities?

The red-highlighted series of questions is of particular interest. First off, the SSPX is hardly the only group which looks back fondly at "altar-and-throne" confessional States. Others can be found (easily) and while they are less vocal about it--and draw much less attention--they are out there.

More of interest, however, is Weigel's summary that 'the Church rejects the use of coercive state power on behalf of its truth-claims.'

Why?

Because of Patrick Kennedy.

The Know-Nothings/Rabid Abortionists Alliance would have you believe that the Church is "imposing its will" on US healthcare policy by insisting, loudly, that abortion is NOT healthcare--and that requiring taxpayer funding of abortion is an affront to religious liberty.

But in fact, the Bishops are expressing an admiration for religious liberty which the Rabid Abortionists will never express. To them, you see, Abortion is THE sacrament of their religion. And they will impose that religion and its sacrament on you, whether you agree or not.

Rome is the real 'civil liberties' defender here, folks.

"Paste" Died...Went Mozilla Firefox

To hell with IE8.

Took Firefox this morning. Some typeface-stuff to get used to, but on a tip, downloaded Adblock Plus.

No more grape-jelly stains all over McIlheran's blog!!

And "paste" works!

Stupak-ification of the Left

Heh.

Only a few months ago, the Left was telling us unqualifiedly that ObamaCare would NOT have any effects on private health insurance.

You can look at our BayView Banjo guy's blog for evidence...

Anyhoo....

"The treatment exclusions required under the Stupak-Pitts Amendment will have an industry-wide effect, eliminating coverage of medically indicated abortions over time for all women, not only those whose coverage is derived through a health insurance exchange." --S Rosenbaum, GW study.

Goodness gracious! Was the Left just kinda kidding?

HT: CMR

The Liars at East Anglia

Headless does public service.

...this computer program adds up to 2.6 degrees Celsius to temperatures starting in the 1970's and continuing until 2000 to give the appearance of GLOBAL WARMING! That's over 4 degrees Fahrenheit, and is a huge "fudge factor" (their word, not mine) made to show a false correlation of rising global temperature to rising carbon dioxide levels...

We hope that the above is understandable language. Headless did his best, folks.

Flynn, Barrett Resignation Call?

Channel 4 News reports that "Milwaukee TEA Party" has called for the resignations of Ed Flynn and Tom Barrett.

Apparently, these folks think Flynn should resign over a morals issue.

I don't know who "Milwaukee TEA Party" consists of, and frankly, I don't care what Ed Flynn does in his spare time, although it seems that he has a lot of time away from his wife and children.

That's sad for the wife and children, but not exactly a compelling reason for him to resign.

I hope that "Milwaukee TEA Party" restricts itself to ending Big Gummint and Big Taxes. That's stuff we can all support wholeheartedly.

Doyle the Vengeful Dictator

Democrats don't like Doyle, either, which is the thrust of this article from WI (HT Sykes).

This vignette, significant in itself, tells you all about Doyle's modus operandi: pure "punish your enemies." Pigheaded, stupid, and to Hell with the public interest.

Take, for example, WMC's questionable decision late in the 2006 election to dump a ton of issue money attacking Doyle even though most polling showed Green on the fast train to Palookaville. Whatever WMC's logic, Cullen says the Doyle team overreacted.

The governor, he says, "tried to use the power of the office to get even with WMC instead of saying, 'You guys made a bad bet. I tried to work with you. Now I'm going back to my base and pursue my legislative agenda'."

"But there was no legislative agenda," he says. "The Doyle people spent their time trying to dismantle WMC. Some people might get a kick out of that, but it doesnt accomplish anything."

He didn't have much use for Legislators--which did not help him. To Doyle, being Governor is being Dictator.

Think not? Then explain Doyle's decision to shut down the longest-operating auto racing track in the entire USA. He achieved that by ordering his State Fair Board to unilaterally change a critical portion of the agreement language.

Doyle simply could not stand giving John Menard (and his partners) a 'win,' even though that 'win' was also a 'win' for Milwaukee.

The Vengeful Dictator struck again.

So Kennedy Should "Represent His District," Eh?

There's a lot of High Dudgeon emanating from the Lefty Hive about how Rep. Kennedy should "represent the wishes of his District" regarding abortion.

Yah, well.

S'pose that the US Congress will "represent the wishes of the people" on ObamaCare now that only 38 percent of the population approves of it?

No. The position of the Democrats on that question is "Screw YOU, citizens!" And the Democrats are perfectly happy, because they have the Higher Moral Ground.

Herbie Kohl may actually be in Milwaukee for a while. Or perhaps he's at his zillion-acre ranch in Wyoming. That's high ground too, you know.

Dave Obey: Aborto-Facilitating Historical Ignoramus

Kinda nice for Ed to provide us with a clear picture of Dave Obey's ultra-Left "mind."

Strange. Obey tells us that the cost of Afghanistan is SO onerous that the country will 'run out of money,' while his pet Porkulus is NOT onerous?

Hmmmmm.

Then Obey engages in historical fantasy. Maybe Obey learned history from Oliver Stone or Michael Moore movies.

He certainly didn't learn it from verifiable sources.

Landrieu: Out of My Price Range

Now that it is decided exactly what Sen. Mary Landrieu IS.........

.....it's clear that her price ($300 million) is a bit high for me.

My question: does Reid really expect he'll get 'full value' for his our money?

MS Update Blows Off "Paste"?

Hey.


Downloaded an MS IE8 update over the weekend, and "paste" went away.

Still investigating.

UPDATE: Remove the MS update, "paste" works fine again.

UPDATE TWO: 60 minutes pass, "paste" dies again.

Spendulus, Indeed

OK, so who said this:

"The kind of budget shortfalls we are looking at in the future dwarfs anything we've ever seen. There are two ways to close the fiscal gap--cut spending or increase revenues. ....the level of taxation required to meet projected spending needs is far higher than anything the country has either seen-slash-tolerated.

Hint: he ain't no Conservative.

Answer: Scott Winship, writing on the Progressive Policy Institute's blog......

HT: Examiner

The Manhattan Declaration

We mentioned this on Friday.

150 Catholic, Orthodox, and Evangelical religious leaders signed a manifesto which committs them to civil disobedience if laws force them to accept abortion, same-sex marriage, or interfere with religious freedom.

This is large. The list includes Abp. Dolan, Abp. Wuerl, Chuck Colson, Robbie George, Tony Perkins, and Cdl. Rigali.

The Attack From the Left: "Shut Up. You're Mean!"

The passive-aggressive game is on, and Patrick Kennedy is a fine example.

Kennedy told CNS News that 'he can't understand how the Catholic Church can be against the biggest social-justice issue of all time' when referring to the USCC's strenuous objection to forcing taxpayers to fund abortions. Kennedy is lying, of course--but it's the tactical lie.

"You mean to tell me that the Catholic Church is going to be denying these people life-saving healthcare? I thought they were pro-life."

This is the "They're MEAN!" gambit. Kennedy intends to silence the Church and others who object to ObamaCare by attempting to pin the "Meanies" label on the Church (which points out that there are serious moral problems in ObamaCare legislation.)

Individuals who voice and exercise principled positions on the question are now or will be similarly targeted.

And it's not just on this issue. The game is exactly the same regarding the faked-global-warming-data scandal now blowing up, where the Left whines that "The emails were STOLEN!", as though that affects the veracity of the evidence.

At its root, this line of attack springs from the Left's most sacred belief: that only the Left occupies the Moral High Ground. Thus, any opposition to the Left's agenda is from Moral Defectives, or Mean People. (In economic debates, the usual position is that the objector has a profit-motive.)

No, Patrick, the Church will not shut up on this issue. Nor should the Right accept your rules of the game. Some things are far too important.

The USCC's Second Letter, Distributed!!

The Catholic parish in central Brookfield distributed the USCC's second letter on Obama/Aborto-Care this weekend.

Happy to see it. Let's hope the parishioners take the Bishops' suggestions seriously.

No More ObamaCare Prison Terms! (Aren't You Happy?)

Ace discovered that PelosiPrison is not present in the Senate version of BigAbortion/BigLabor/BigSwamp money-for-you bill.

SNL: Hilarious Obama Skit

Oh, yah.

Obama's time is over.

Prayer for the President Is Good!

New bumper sticker:

"Pray for Obama: Ps. 109:8"

See Grim's place for the rest of the story.

Round One to the Eagle Scouts

The dipwad count:

Nick Balzano has stepped down as head of the local Service Employees International Union. Balzano was roundly criticized for crying foul over a Boy Scout's effort to clear a walking path in a park in Allentown. He said the project was taking work away from union workers. Six other high-ranking members of the union have also resigned.

Andy Stern must be proud.

HT: MoonBattery

This Is What Is Called Dumb

JS today:

Rex M. Ballinger was wounded when a rifle being unloaded by Daniel Z. Kassees, 36, of Dousman, discharged, the Sheriff's Department said.

Kassees was unloading the gun next to his pickup truck on private property about 8:15 a.m. in Glen Haven Township. The shot went through the rear passenger compartment, exited the right side of the vehicle and struck Ballinger in the back of both thighs, the department said in a news release.

Chambered round, safety off, finger on the trigger......that's three strikes.

Be an Illegal for FREE Healthcare: Reid

In what should come as an unpleasant surprise to the US Bishops' immigration-pleaders, ObamaCare/Senate version has a nasty provision.

Under Leader Reid’s amendment, in the year 2019 about 16 million U.S. citizens would be uninsured and be forced to pay a penalty tax of almost $800 per year. About eight million illegal aliens would be uninsured and would owe no penalty tax. Both groups would get their health care through a combination of out-of-pocket spending and use of uncompensated care in emergency rooms and free health clinics.

Oh, what the Hell.

ObamaCare: Friend of BigBiz

Wonder why big businesses are not adamantly opposed to ObamaCare?

Because it will enormously burden, or eliminate, small businesses.

...2,074 pages are just the beginning. It is fair to say there will several times that number of pages of regulations delineating who must do what, when and where. There will be dozens of new bureaucracies created generating hundreds of new forms and reports which must be filled out.

A glimpse at the future is the current structure for retirement plans under ERISA. It is almost impossible to do the calculations and prepare the tax filings without the help of a specialized benefits administrator. [Hell, I know of CPA firms which have to use outside consultants to fill out ERISA and 'high-earner' pension plan paperwork.] The cost is in the thousands of dollars even for a small employer.

Under Reid's bill, and the House version, employers of all sizes will have to hire someone -- either on staff for larger companies or third party vendors for small employers -- to navigate the new health care regulations, reporting requirements, and tax provisions. This bill will create jobs, but in the least productive sectors of our economy.

When the Doyle-ites tell you that 'the tax burden is NOT high' here (for corporations), they say that for a reason. Leave aside the relative value of "high."

It's the REGULATORY burden, imposed by both the State and the Feds, which kills small business, and drives up costs for larger ones. DNR, Wis. D of Rev (which does not 'Federalize'), UC filings, local permits, all add up. Fast and large.

The USCC's ACORN Problem, Milwaukee and Chicago Ties

History counts. It also helps to understand ACORN-ism's methods, one of which is to operate under different names. Confusion is good, to ACORN-ites, and confusing Catholic Charities with the Campaign for Human Development is just fine. Except that they are VERY different organizations with a somewhat-common history.

************************

Waaaayyyyyyy back when, there was the National Catholic Welfare Conference, which had a "Social Action Department." Mgr. John Ryan was the first director of that department.

But even before the Conference, there was the Nat'l Catholic Welfare Council, of which Rome disapproved. Why? Because in the Catholic church, Bishops are responsible to the Pope. There are no 'intermediary' organizations, at least in matters of teaching and governance of Dioceses. Organizing a "Council" which would purport to "teach" in the name of the Bishops was a slippery-slope matter--and Rome's concerns have proven to be justified.

Mgr. Ryan was a bit controversial, to be kind.

On October 8, 1936, Monsignor John A. Ryan urged millions of listeners to his nationally broadcast radio speech to reject the advice of fellow Catholic cleric Father Charles Coughlin and vote for President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the upcoming election. The Democratic National Committee had prodded a reluctant Ryan to step into the fray of national politics because it feared that Catholic voters might be swayed by Coughlin's weekly insistence that FDR was a communist who no longer deserved the support of Catholics.

Interesting, because Coughlin was even more radical than was FDR...

In contrast, Ryan's thoughts were not radical; he understood and acknowledged sin.

Ryan never wavered from his support of an economic system based squarely on the sanctity of private property and capitalism, but one that also distributed wealth and power more equitably. Excessive individual greed, Ryan argued, created a morally and economically unhealthy misdistribution of wealth.

Who could argue with the thought that vice breeds social problems? I certainly won't.

Another prominent priest-thinker of the period was Mgr. Haas.

Perhaps the most nationally prominent and active Catholic progressive in the Ryan tradition was Bishop Francis J. Haas. A student at CUA in the early 1920s who was profoundly influenced by Ryan, Haas played a pivotal role in Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal as a public representative on several Government boards in the 1930s and as one of the busiest and most respected labor arbitrators in the country...Born in Racine, Wisconsin, in 1889, Haas was ordained as a priest in 1913 and worked as a parish priest at Holy Rosary Parish in Milwaukee until he began graduate studies at CUA in 1919. (One wonders if the "mandated labor course" for Wisconsin kiddies will include this name.....)

Haas, however, had an ideological fixation, which led to regrettable statements like this:

..."every worker has a duty to himself and to his fellow men to join his union and to be proud of membership . . . Given two men of equal ability, one a union man and the other non-union, unquestionably the union man is the better. He recognizes his obligations to himself, his family, and his country."

Perhaps Haas didn't know about the Communists in the C.I.O., who were eventually purged by the A.F.L.'s genuinely-patriotic leadership in the 1950's.

(For that matter, there were allegations about Communist ties to the UAW at Allis-Chalmers. Haas was a key player there.)

He arbitrated the Minneapolis truckers' strike in 1934, a conflict that left two strikers dead, and difficult and trying strikes at Allis-Chalmers in Wisconsin in 1939 and 1941. The strikes at Allis-Chalmers pitted the militant left-wing United Automobile Workers Union Local #248 against an equally obstinate management team. The 1941 Allis-Chalmers strike seriously threatened America's wartime production...

Clearly, these guys (particularly Ryan) were more progressive than some. But Ryan's acknowledgement of the Fall is critical. Without that nod, Ryan's theories would be merely secular humanism.

But that's not the end. Too bad...

**************************

Bp. Jos. Bernardin was the creator of the Campaign for Human Development.

That's how ACORN-ism crawled into the Catholic charities business. Bernardin was the Big Kahuna at USCC (formerly NCCB/USCC) for a number of years--both as General Secretary (1968-1972) and later as President (the late 1970's). Before Bernardin was GenSec, the NCCB/USCC had faded into the background as something of an administrative swamp, not being active in 'social causes.' To remedy that, Bernardin established the "Campaign for Human Development" which is the focus of today's controversy.

Bernardin, who was VERY controversial inside the Church, pushed the influence of NCCB to new heights, and along with that the influence of the Campaign for Human Development.

Its stated purpose is both to raise funds to support organized groups of the poor to develop economic and political power and to educate the public with a new knowledge of contemporary problems. Since its founding, the CHD has funded more than 3,000 self-help projects developed by the poor.

It is critical to note that CHD 'funds ....organized groups.' That is NOT the same as what Catholic Charities does. Catholic Charities is a hands-on, largely volunteer-run series of outfits (usually in each Diocese) which directly distributes money and goods to those in need (think food-distribution after Katrina.)

CHD, on the other hand, was organized specifically to fund "community organizers" in the mold of Alinsky. But attaching that 'Catholic' name to CHD has been beneficial for the Left, ain'a?

And that's the embarassment. The Bishops are stuck with another Bernardin/Lefty legacy and haven't the courage to simply shut it down, because the Bishops are in their "circle-the-wagons" mode, defending the dead Bernardin's legacy. It's reminiscent of the 'circle-the-wagons' mode surrounding the ordination of homosexuals.

St Catherine of Siena, pray for them.

This post inspired by the good-hearted Prot, McCain.

Delicate Story-Writing

Here's a delicate way to put it.

Milwaukee-area Muslim Religious Director Zulfiqar Ali Shah was not allowed to partake in a trip to Israel which would have been paid for largely by Milwaukee-area Jewish donors. As a result, the Muslims have quit the Interfaith Council.

(We'll leave aside the question of chutzpah for a moment and go to the whitewashing job.)

...Jewish leaders said Israel would refuse entry to Shah.

Some Jewish groups have accused Shah of associating with people of extremist or anti-Semitic views. He worked briefly for Kind Hearts, a Muslim charity whose assets were frozen by the U.S. government, which accused it of funding Hamas. An Ohio judge later ruled the charity's right to due process was violated.

And why, exactly, were those "assets frozen"?

NOT because "Jewish groups" accused Shah of associations. Not because "Jewish groups" accused Shah of anti-Semitic views--although each of those might have had something to do with it.

Shah was refused because "Kind Hearts", his employer, was FUNDING HAMAS TERRORIST ACTIVITY, "due process' or not. That's a charge leveled by the US Government, not "Jewish groups."

Mr. Shah now resides on the southwest side of the City of Milwaukee.

The Zoo Interchange: It's Still Doyle (and Barrett's) Potential Manslaughter

No matter how Tommy Barrett's flack tries to spin this article, here's what counts:

Republicans in control of the Legislature in 2005 sought to move the Zoo Interchange project ahead by putting $38 million for engineering into the 2005-'07 budget, but Doyle vetoed all but $3 million. He then changed course, first seeking money to start the Zoo project in 2012, then pulling back on the funding when the transportation finances dried up in the last budget cycle.

"The governor made the decision," Kanavas said. "He made the call on it, and it was a bad call."

Tommy-the-Highway-Engineer Barrett was scared to death of a woman named Gretchen Schuldt--an ex-JS reporter--who endlessly screeched about the "destruction of Story Hill." So Tommy-the-Highway-Engineer told us that 'the bridges would be just fine until 2020.'

Buy a clue, Tommy.

Story Hill figured into the Zoo disaster because an I-94 widening would have impacted her neighborhood, according to Gretchen, who held a zen-spell over Tommy the Highway Engineer. (Selfishness is supposed to be the province of Eeeeeeeeeevil Suburbanites, not oh-so-lefty City residents, remember?) So Barrett actively opposed any Zoo interchange work. All for the greater good, you know.

...Patrick Curley, chief of staff for Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, said any lobbying from the mayor's office focused on protecting homes and businesses without influencing the timing of the projects. Barrett also has joined the race for governor, potentially lining up against Walker in 2010.

Trying to pin the current crisis in the Zoo Interchange on a political push from the mayor's office is misguided, Curley said.

In fact, Barrett's opposition to an improved I-94 was driven by the same mentality which drove Henry Maier's and John Norquist's opposition to an improved I-94. It's the same mentality which inspired the East Germans to build the Wall. They want to trap people in the City of Milwaukee. To them, suburbs are cancers on Their Fiefdom.

This mess is VERY serious.

Aside from doubling-up the costs--replacing the bridges now and replacing them again before 2020--there is a real possibility that chunks of a bridge could fall through car windshields or roofs.

Or a catastrophe: a bridge-sector could collapse, dropping trucks and cars onto active lanes of I-94. It'll look just like Minneapolis, or San Francisco.

Now you know why Tommy and Jim Doyle are running away from their decision. Dead and mangled bodies impact elections and popularity. Accountability? They don't want that.
Manslaughter looks bad on the resume.

Kohl, Feingold to Ruin HSA, HRA Plans

Since these plans work well, the Democrats Kohl and Feingold will ruin them. By no co-incidence, they will also smash the knuckles of middle-income, diligent, consumers of healthcare.

Thanks, you two twerps!!

'Flex' accounts let employees set aside some portion of their pre-tax pay for out-of-pocket costs or medical services that their insurance plan doesn't cover, such as a child's orthodontics or testing supplies for diabetics. The Reid bill caps these now-unlimited accounts at $2,500 per year and imposes new restrictions on qualifying medical expenses, raising some $5 billion by exposing income above the non-indexed cap to taxes.

But why stop there? Kohl and Feingold will also vote to destroy HSA's!!

The Reid bill also assaults health savings accounts, or HSAs, which allow individuals to accumulate tax-free funds for future medical expenses when coupled with low-premium, high-deductible insurance. The Reid bill changes tax provisions to make HSAs less attractive, but the real threat comes via increased regulation.

These insurance products will likely be barred from the insurance "exchanges" that will demolish and supplant today's individual market. Employers will also find them more difficult if not illegal to offer once the government has new powers to "define the essential health benefits" that all plans must eventually offer.

Each of those plans helps "bend the trend" of insurance premiums down.

Each of them is a target for Statists like Feingold and Kohl.

Seems to me that we have a target problem here.

So. Who's hurt?

...about 40% of tax filers with HSAs earn under $60,000, according to the IRS. The Employee Benefit Research Institute reports that 4% of adults with private insurance have an HSA this year—up from 1% in 2006—and about 9% are enrolled in some form of consumer-directed health plan. It also found that beneficiaries are evenly split between those with health problems and those without.

The Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, whose members dominate the HSA market, says that enrollees are more likely than those with traditional insurance to be better consumers. They're more likely to track expenses (63% to 43%), save for the future (47% to 18%), and search for information on physician quality (20% to 14%). They're also more likely to participate and see results from wellness programs like weight loss, fitness and smoking cessation.

Ironic. The only "choice" that Feinie and Herbie vote FOR is the "choice" to kill babies in the womb.

Like I said, we have a targeting problem.

Tax Money, Hush Money, All the Same in DC

Yah, well. It's only tax money.

A congressional investigation of the volunteer organization AmeriCorps contains charges that D.C. schools chief Michelle Rhee handled "damage control" after allegations of sexual misconduct against her now fiance, Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, a former NBA star and a prominent ally of President Obama, The Washington Examiner has learned

...Walpin was looking into charges that AmeriCorps-paid volunteers ran personal errands for him, washed his car, and took part in politicalactivities. In the course of investigating those allegations, the congressional report says, Walpin's investigators were told that Johnson had made inappropriate advances toward three young women involved in the St. Hope program -- and that Johnson offered at least one of those young women money to keep quiet.

So what's another $1K/month for a little nookie?

Ban the Gun, Not the Terrorist

The usual idiocy.

More than two dozen anti-gun violence groups have asked President Barack Obaman to ban further importation of the type of handgun used in the Fort Hood massacre.

In a Thursday letter to the president, the group takes aim at the FN Herstal Five-seveN armor-piercing semiautomatic pistol. The letter suggests that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms could take action immediately to effect the import ban.

According to the letter, the Belgian-made gun "is one of the most popular with traffickers supplying Mexican DrugTrafficking Organizations (DTOs) who have nicknamed the gun the “mata policia” or 'cop killer.'”

Jeri Bonavia, executive director of the Wisconsin Anti-Violence Effort Educational Fund, is one of the 27 signatories on the letter.

The FN in question fires a bullet which is about .26" in diameter and has a pointed nose, not the more typical rounded-nose found in 9mm, .40, 10mm, .45 (etc.) That's why it's "armor-piercing"--the shape of the bullet allows it to slip through many vests.

However, it's simply not as effective as a man-stopper. Yes, if you put enough of those rounds through someone, they will die (and there's always the well-aimed shot.)

But banning the weapon merely requires a determined killer to use another weapon (an AR-15 will do, clumsily--or its short cousin, the M-4.) And banning the FN in the USA only deprives US citizens of the weapon. It's ludicrous to think that drug-cartel money can't buy FNs in some other place. But then again, ludicrous is the default-position for gun-banners' alleged minds.

Better to have added 2+2 with Hasan and put him where he belonged a long time ago.

Doyle Kills the Racetrack

Belling reports that Doyle killed off the Milwaukee Mile, through apparently bad-faith bargaining by his State Fair Board. The report states that the Board chaircritter changed a critical term of the agreement unilaterally......

That Board includes a woman named Wickhem-House, named as a "superlawyer" who practices at Foley & Lardner. Haaaaahvaaaahhhhrd, and all that.

Another member of the State Fair board is a sheep farmer. There's a painting contractor, a wife of another lawyer, and the Chaircritter is with WE Energies.

"Superlawyer" and bad-faith bargaining?

The JS Blog reports:

"Apparently, Sue Crane and her board just simply don't understand business, business protocol or good faith contract negotiations," Frank and Dominic Giuffre wrote in a letter to the board.

"We now have no intention of going anywhere with Sue Crane and her board, because you quite simply can't be trusted," they wrote.

Last one to leave, please turn off the lights.

Abp. Dolan Steps It Up a Notch!

Wow.

Here's the link to a declaration recently formulated and signed by 148 luminaries, including Abp. Tim Dolan of NYC.

...We, as Orthodox, Catholic, and Evangelical Christians, have gathered, beginning in New York on September 28, 2009, to make the following declaration, which we sign as individuals, not on behalf of our organizations, but speaking to and from our communities. We act together in obedience to the one true God, the triune God of holiness and love, who has laid total claim on our lives and by that claim calls us with believers in all ages and all nations to seek and defend the good of all who bear his image...

Because the sanctity of human life, the dignity of marriage as a union of husband and wife, and the freedom of conscience and religion are foundational principles of justice and the common good, we are compelled by our Christian faith to speak and act in their defense. In this declaration we affirm: 1) the profound, inherent, and equal dignity of every human being as a creature fashioned in the very image of God, possessing inherent rights of equal dignity and life; 2) marriage as a conjugal union of man and woman, ordained by God from the creation, and historically understood by believers and non-believers alike, to be the most basic institution in society and; 3) religious liberty, which is grounded in the character of God, the example of Christ, and the inherent freedom and dignity of human beings created in the divine image.

Lots more at the link. Other signatories, we are VERY happy to state, include a number of other RC Cardinals and Bishops from around the USA--and a lot of other prominent thinkers, religious leaders, and business figures.

More Climate "Science" Lies?

Hot stuff, yet to be verified...but really, really damning if it's real.



The details on this are still sketchy, we’ll probably never know what went on. But it appears that University of East Anglia Climate Research Unit has been hacked and many many files have been released by the hacker or person unknown...



(Sample):



Dear Ray, Mike and Malcolm,



Once Tim’s got a diagram here we’ll send that either later today or first thing tomorrow.I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) amd from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline.



Shocked! Shocked, I say!!

UPDATE: More from Morrissey. Like this:

Phil,
Here are some speculations on correcting SSTs to partly explain the 1940s warming blip. If you look at the attached plot you will see that the land also shows the 1940s blip (as I’m sure you know).

So, if we could reduce the ocean blip by, say, 0.15 degC, then this would be significant for the global mean – but we’d still have to explain the land blip. I’ve chosen 0.15 here deliberately. This still leaves an ocean blip, and i think one needs to have some form of ocean blip to explain the land blip (via either some common forcing, or ocean forcing land, or vice versa, or all of these). When you look at other blips, the land blips are 1.5 to 2 times (roughly) the ocean blips—higher sensitivity plus thermal inertia effects. My 0.15 adjustment leaves things consistent with this, so you can see where I am coming from.Removing ENSO does not affect this.It would be good to remove at least part of the 1940s blip, but we are still left with “why the blip”.


Why the blip, indeed....

HT: Headless

Pure Corruption in PelosiCare/ObamaCare Bill

Besides all the usual stuff, there's more.

The House resolution establishes a scenario that would effectively exclude non-union employers from eligibility to work on program-funded contracts. It also requires participating health care providers to pay wages and benefits that have been collectively bargained or that union-friendly appointees determine are competitive. This is plainly a move toward coerced unionization. With guaranteed seats at the table, unions are poised to control many newly formed oversight posts and/or committees, formed in connection with new employer mandates and cooperative health care associations.

Yet another provision would establish lucrative state training partnerships that contain little or no opportunities for non-union employee organizations. Provisions in Senate proposals would exempt union-negotiated health care plans from taxes on “Cadillac” health plans.

That's not all. There's also a TEN BILLION DOLLAR BAILOUT of union-health plans which are going BK.

HT: LaborPains

NYT Circulation Office Raid? Mob-Union Problem

Most of you noted that the circulation offices of the NYT (and other papers) were raided.

Wanna know why?

Investigators in the city raided offices for some of the nation’s largest newspapers Tuesday as part of a corruption probe into a powerful union that has long faced accusations of ties to organized crime, a law enforcement official said. Police officers working with the Manhattan district attorney’s office searched for paperwork related to the Newspaper and Mail Deliverers Union in circulation, production and delivery offices of The New York Times, the New York Post, the Daily News and El Diario, said the official, who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

That's a relief. Here I thought they were just inflating their circulation numbers or something.

Timmy-Boy Gets All Pissy

Geithner evades, sidesteps, and Blames Bush!

UPDATE:

Lots more at PowerLine, but another Congresscritter is doing the questioning.

Secretary Geithner, you were referencing in your answer to an earlier question about when the financial catastrophe started in September, October of last year, if I understood you correctly, you said that this country did not have the tools to manage that panic. But the inference that I took from that was that there were countries overseas that did have such tools.

Now, I recall a phone call with your predecessor in late October of 2008, when it became public that the United States was pumping monies into the central bank in Europe, and other places. And I suggested that was not the correct thing to be doing. And he said, if the United States is not helping these countries, then they will collapse....

GEITHNER: Congressman, there is no country that came into this crisis with the tools to manage it effectively. And the basic failure I described here was a common failure.One thing you saw around the world was...

BURGESS: Well, let me ask you a question. Then how did George Bush cause those countries to be unprepared for a financial crisis?

Timmy-Boy did not have a coherent answer. Nor was he able to dribble forth an answer when he was reminded that Clinton repealed Glass-Steagall (pushed there by a wrong-headed (R), yes.) Nor to the BawneeFwank rapes of Fannie/Freddie/Ginnie/FHA.

buh-bye, Timmy. Take the Marxist/Statist President with you.

Another FINE Job by Your Government

Your Government at work.

The decade-old battle to keep Asian carp out of the Great Lakes might be over.

New research shows the fish likely have made it past the $9 million electric fish barrier on the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, a source familiar with the situation told the Journal Sentinel late Thursday.

TEN YEARS they've known about this damn thing.

The fish that can grow to 50 pounds or more are a big deal because they are voracious feeders, overwhelming native species, and they pose a huge hazard to recreational boaters because of their habit of jumping out of the water when agitated by the whir of a boat motor.

Next up: your healthcare.

What could possibly go wrong?

Book Title for Paulson

Best line of the day, from Mark Hemingway:

It seems that former Treasury secretary Henry Paulson has a new book coming out. It's supposed to be an inside account of the collapse of the global banking system. [However], the book might run into some legal trouble, as I believe O.J. Simpson was the first to use the title "If I Did It."

Hey, Henry! You should call to see if Jim Doyle's hideout has space for two.

Zoo Interchange Bridges Falling Down, so Spend Money on KRM!

Talk about potted plant IQs...

The regional transit authority charged with overseeing the Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee commuter rail project will get back on track with a meeting on Monday.

The reformed nine-member RTA board will meet on Monday morning to discuss its budget, future plans for the KRM project and Gov. Jim Doyle’s proposal to let governments in Kenosha, Racine and Milwaukee counties form local RTAs with the ability to levy new taxes

Hell's Bells! THAT'S the ticket! Spend $270Million on choochootrains in Racine while the State's most critical interchange bridges fall down and go boom.

Is Reaganomics Enough?

Ryan and Hensarling's essay in today's WSJ has a few interesting facts.

Exhibit A is the economic stimulus package signed into law by President Barack Obama in February. Even among previous stimulus efforts, the 2009 stimulus stands out for its ineffective targeting and sheer size. With interest, it is $1.1 trillion, double the size of Roosevelt's New Deal spending as a percentage of GDP.

That was listed as one of the impairments to an imminent economic recovery. There are others, each significant in itself. (ObamaCare, Cap-n-Tax, and the tax-increase scheduled for 2011, not to mention the GM/Chrysler bailout-fiasco.)

Beyond instilling tremendous political uncertainty into economic decision-making, these policies ensure that deficits will shatter all previous records. In the Office of Management and Budget's 2009 Mid-Session Review, the administration projects a decade of deficits averaging 3.3 times the postwar norm of 1.8%. Yet its projections assume that interest rates will be less than half the postwar norm for interest rates, and that economic growth will be almost 10% higher than the high-growth 1980s. Never in the postwar era have such high deficits, low interest rates and high growth rates occurred simultaneously.

You could just say "Fantasyland" to describe Obama's economic projections. (The same name applies to his foreign policy, by the way.) Maybe he watched too much Disney while living in Indonesia?

Ryan and Hensarling make the case for Reaganomics.

Frankly, I don't think that's the solution any more, although it is a PART of a solution.

The solution lies in the 10th Amendments, folks. Reagan only did half the job he should have done. The other half lies in summary execution of about 40% of the Federal monster.

#10: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people

Is It Getting Dark in Here?

No, it's just your "energy-saving" lightbulb.

Energy-efficient light bulbs lose on average 22% of their brightness over their lifetime, a study has found.

In some cases they emit just 60% as much light as traditional models which are being phased out of shops, it says.

The study in Engineering and Technology magazine concluded that consumers were being misled by the bulbs' packaging.

Does ObamaCare cover replacement eyes??