Black Gold Friday?

It is 'Black Friday'. Since I am still in Afghanistan, I will have to order from what Glenn Reynolds calls 'Old Reliable'.

Anyhow, the media has been bemoaning he conventional wisdom that since there has been dire economic new, that we will see poor retail sales this holiday season.

However, I think that this will end up being fairly wrong. Why would I think this, especially since "everyone knows" that we are in a recession and people are hurting? I think this for one reason. And that reason is graphically depicted by this image:



Six or even three months ago, people may have forgone Christmas spending because they knew they had to buy gas at historically high prices. But now that we are seeing prices that we haven't had in 2-3 years, people will be more willing to put those $$ to use for Christmas cheer.

Gas prices have the most direct correlation of any economic measure on how people view their personal economic situation. With prices low and dropping, I am betting thaat people will feel ok to buy more for Christmas.

I am sure that Paul Krugman will label it the 'Obama Effect', but I think I would rather term it 'Black Gold Friday'.

Bizarro World Economic Incentives

I guess we could see this train coming down the tracks, but the new economic rules continue to amaze me....

- Fail miserably and catastrophically, and the government will reward you will Billions of dollars that you *did not* earn

- Succeed fantastically and legitimately by providing a product that everyone wants & needs, and the government will slap a windfall-profit tax on you and confiscate Billions of dollars that you *did* earn

Talk about a zero-sum game!

I am sure the classes in Business Schools will be extremely interesting over the next few years....

The Greatest Country on Earth

Alas, the election is over. Congratulations to Barrack Obama.

While his election is disappointing based on my personal political philosophy, I believe that it is a demonstration on many levels as to why the United States of America is the greatest country on the face of the earth. He was not my candidate by a long shot, and I will not agree with him on probably 95% of issues, but he will be my President. Because I am an American, thick or thin.

And because the liberties of America allow me to do so, I look forward to Nov 2012 when we can hopefully elect a Conservative president to right the many things that I think President Obama will do wrong.

Thus, when I get home shortly from my posting here in Afghanistan, I have 3 books that I intend to read before Inauguration Day to put me in the right frame of mind to fight for conservative reform in a country that will be politically dominated by liberal rule.

1) Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand: Who is John Galt? I don't know, but I am going to find out....and hope that the next four years don't follow this plot.

2) Real Change - From the World that Fails To the World That Works by Newt Gingrich: what would sensible conservative reform look like. I have always been drawn in recent years to Newt Gingrich's common sense words on producing changes from the 'right' perspective.

3) Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream by Ross Douthat & Reihan Salam: While the GOP may have proven itself moribund, it is the only viable political vehicle for conservative reform. How might we set it right? I will start with this tome

God bless and good reading.....

Military Voter Suppression

Instapundit points out a very interesting blurb in the Atlantic, which says that some military voters are going to take it in the shorts....again:

Fairfax general registrar Rokey Suleman said Thursday that he has had to reject some of the ballots because of a Virginia law passed in 2002. That law -- then called Senate Bill 113, sponsored by then state Sen. Bill Bolling -- requires that when an overseas citizen wants to request an absentee ballot and cast a vote with the same paperwork, it requires not only a witness signature but also the current address of the witness.

So let me get this straight. In some states you can be dead or even non-existant, and you don't need a legitimate address in order to vote. But in Virginia if you are stationed overseas with the military you might actually need *TWO* legitimate addresses??

What a crock.

I sent in my ballot to Texas a few weeks ago. Easy as pie....

The Coming Nanny State

Michael Ramirez's prognostication:

Wild Dreams and Military Strategy

Instapundit has linked to a disturbing quote from Obama, which reveals much on what we can expect from his prospective administration's national security strategy.

“I think that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated,” Obama said while refusing to retract his initial opposition to the surge. “I’ve already said it’s succeeded beyond our wildest dreams.”

This quote is absurd on many levels, but here are two thoughts:

1 - The surge did not "[succeed] in ways that nobody anticipated". It in fact succeeded in the ways that the military strategists who devised it had anticipated. The goals (broadly) of the surge were to reduce the internecine violence that was rife, and set the conditions for democratic governance. When Petraeus et al set forth with the "Surge", this is the result they "anticipated". Had it not been, then they probably would not have executed the plan. Perhaps someone should tell Mr. Obama that you only execute a strategy with the anticipation of success, not with the anticipation of failure.

2 - Military and National Security strategies, when properly done, are not based upon "wild dreams". Perhaps this best demonstrates the difference on how the two ends of the political spectrum devise these strategies. On the left, strategy is often based on "our wildest dreams". This "peace-in-our-time", "can't-we-all-just-get-along approach". Somehow this is now referred to as "realism". Unfortunately, "Hope" is not a strategy. The surge was not based on the hope that we could be victorious, or the wild dream that we could succeed, it was built on many hours of sober and realistic assessments of the existing situation, and study of what had succeeded in the past.

Unfortunately, our future may hold security strategy that is based on the "wildest dreams" that the Iranians will give up their quest for nuclear weapons based on our newly installed, and ever so hopeful Ivy League diplomats. Or based on the "hope" that Russia will play nice if we simply ignore their attempts to re-annex portions of other sovereign nations.

A sober review of history will reveal that this sort of approach does not have a record "[succeeding] in ways that nobody anticipated". But rather it has a disturbing tendency to "fail in ways that many anticipated", except for those who were implementing the approach.

Once again, Hope is not a strategy.

The 106-day Work Week

No, it is not some masochistic proposal to increase the production of American industry...it is simply the "work week" I have just had here in Afghanistan.

After 106 days filled with combat skills training, trans-oceanic flights, 4 countries, and a non-stop run of 15-18 hour days....I have finally taken a day off. It may only be a one day "weekend", but it has felt good.

Now, only one more "week" to go, and I can get back to my family for the holidays....

CF out....

Foresight is 20/200

After getting off shift today, I went over to the US morale area to poke around, and see what might be on AFN.

I happened upon a copy of the 2007 'Man of the Year' edition of Time Magazine. Given the events this week, perhaps this would be a good time to review that decision.



Now Time does throw out the caveat that "TIME's Person of the Year is a clear-eyed recognition of the world as it is and of the most powerful individuals and forces shaping that world—for better or for worse", but I remind people once again that they had a chance to pick this man.



Maybe this year he will get recognized for his actions in 2007.

Other notable items from a look back at the Putin spread:

- The title of the Putin article "Choosing Order Before Freedom". Hmmmmm, I guess Time was right on this one. The Georgians chose freedom instead of the order of their former Russian masters, and they ended up getting the Budapest treatment.

- "Russia needs Putin -- His firm hand will smooth the transition to democracy..." - Mikail Gorbachev. Good call Gorby....Vlad is doing wonders for the democratic ideal this week.

Maybe Putin is just flexing his muscles this week as he has realized that he is far behind Barack Obama in this year's MoTY race. Because of this, if I were Obama, I'd be wary of getting the Litvinenko treatment. When Putin wants something...he takes it.

Finally a War to Protest

Naked Imperialist aggression? Check!

Indiscriminate bombing and killing of civilians? Check!

Designs on another nation's energy resources? Check!

Remember all those breathless, and wholly incorrect, charges leveled at he U.S. at numerous "peace" protests concerning the war in Iraq? Well now all those charges are *actually* happening in South Ossetia.....so where are the calls for vast marches on the National Mall, or in Paris or Berlin, to protest this *actual* imperialist aggression?? Nowhere to be seen....

I guess all the leftists are on their summer holiday along with Obama, and can't be bothered to answer this 3am phone call.....

UPDATES: JustOneMinute notes that we have now moved on to the 4am phone call. Also, Ed Morrisey at HotAir notes how certain Presidential candidates who might have shown outrage at accidental U.S. incidents in Afghanistan, now can't summon the will to interrupt a vacation long enough to discern between aggressor and victim in this conflict.

Choking on Hope & Change

Apparently the Obamacons have a new 'sign' in order to express their unifying experience in the church of Hope & Change.

When I saw it, I immediately thought of something very different.

This is the campaign poster I envision....



This is not the hope and change *I* have been waiting for....