Math v. Vitriol

With Wisconsin lost, all that is left for the Left to do is mewl and spit vitriol.
This is the perfect time for Conservatives to take the high ground, and win the day with calm, common sense, and actual honest-to-God numbers.

As Matt Welch argues over at Reason, "No amount of crying over evil Scott Walker will help governments fix their bleeding balance sheets."

Get Serious About Governing, Democrats

  [...]   Wisconsin has been the front line of America's Democrat vs. Republican, blue vs. red rhetorical war for 16 months now, ever since newly elected Republican governor Scott Walker pushed through a budget repair bill that withdrew government from the union dues-collecting business for public employees and removed the collective bargaining power of most government unions, an act that triggered historic public protests. So on the morning after Walker survived a labor-led recall election by a higher margin than he originally won office in 2010, there were plenty on the left grumbling darkly about the Dark Lord rising over our once-free country. 

At The American Prospect, Harold Meyerson compared Walker's actions to a "jihad" and suggested (paradoxically) that a post-union labor movement might just resort to rioting. Walker "wins one for the plutocrats," Joan Walsh lamented at Salon, without really explaining how the monocle-wearers could win 38 percent of the union vote. 

Such demonization was of a piece with leftish commentary in the run-up to the recall. Esquire's Charles P. Pierce described Walker as a "goggle-eyed homunculus hired by Koch Industries to manage its midwest subsidiary formerly known as the state of Wisconsin," which would now be subject to "the habits of oligarchy." Even more grossly, The Nation's Katrina vanden Heuvel wrote in The Washington Post that Walker's policies were intended to "cleanse the electorate of people who don’t look, earn or think like him."    

[...]    

So, progressives: What is the right percentage of a government budget to be spent on public sector pensions? If this requires that cities and states simply need to come up with bigger budgets (through increased taxes) precisely how much bigger would be appropriate? If you don't want to increase overall budgets, what other government services are you willing to cut?    

[...]    

As long as Democrats keep dodging these questions, no amount of plutocrat-baiting will reverse their political fortunes. Governments at all levels are out of money. Progressives are going to have to come up with a better response to that than saying "we were robbed."

Indeed....

This Isn't Working - Pt 3

Tea Party Protests Turn Violent and Riot!

I am sorry did I say Tea Party Protests? I meant May Day Protests.



You can understand my mistake though. When I heard the word 'protests' and 'violence' on CNN, I naturally assumed it must be the Tea Partiers. I mean that is what the media and none other than Bill Clinton has told us is coming, right? Who would have thunk that lefty anarchist thugs could resort to violence during a May Day protest. I thought that type of behavior was reserved to septuagenarian patriots.

Confederate Yankee highlights another riot on the other side of the country.

Imagine, if you will, what would happen if a group split off from a Tea Party protest and went on a rampage, smashing windows and vandalizing cars. Eleven are arrested, and some of those have known ties to right wing militia groups.

Don't you think that dozens of stories would have flooded network news and talk shows, and that government officials—perhaps Obama himself—would decry the right wing violence?

Well, that likely would occur if the violence was right wing in origin, but when a group of radical leftists split off from the main crowd at a pro-communist May Day parade in Asheville, NC over the weekend and went on a rampage, the national media utterly ignored it.

Seriously though, it is sad when the media can foment so much about how the Tea Parties are a forbearance of violence, but continue to fail to cover the actual violence, when it comes from the left.

America, The Gulliver of Nations

Powerline posts a keen insight on how Great Britain's present, may become our future:

Once the federal government becomes so deeply involved in allocating health care, it will come to be a dominant focus of political discourse.

Over the years watching on C-Span the British Prime Minister's Question Time, I've observed that a large portion of this exercise is devoted to specific questions about the quality care provided by The National Health Service in members' districts. A question on the terrorists threats to the UK will invariably be followed by a passionate query from a Member asking the PM if he's aware of nurses being re-assigned at a hospital in Sheffield. The PM seems to spend as much time on parochial health care issues as on national security.

The politics of deciding who gets what in the way of medical treatment doubtlessly will push aside traditional affairs of state. Every member of Congress will need to hire several staff members just to manage constituents' complaints about their care. Elections will be won and lost on the basis of who can get the most in the way of health care for their districts.

We will become the Gulliver of nations, a great power whose leaders are tied up in strings as they spend much of their time addressing the medical complaints, valid and imagined, of their electorate.

We *will* become the Gulliver of nations. And it will not just be due to healthcare. The more our Federal government becomes so deeply involved in the regulation of anything and everything (education, the environment, banking, retirement, fishing, car manufacturing....etc), the more we tie ourselves down. The more the Liliputians UN bureaucrats will take advantage of us. The more we will make ourselves irrelevant.

Tales From The Echo Chamber....

More developments out of the 'Coffee Party', or as I coined them, the 'Latte Party'

Coffee Party is a no-show on Fox and Friends
They did not accept the interview invitation because it would be "focused on fostering ongoing political divisions..."

In other words, we don't what any differing opinions from entering our liberal echo chamber...

News flash for the 'Coffee Party' crowd...there will always be "ongoing political divisions". That is how liberty and democracy work. People have free and differing opinions, they debate..they disagree...

I suspect that what this collectivist coffee klatch really means is that they only want to be interviewed by those who will tell them how courageous they are and won't challenge their sensitive ideals.

Thus if all they ever hear are supportive and re-affirming voices (hence the echo chamber), then they can convince themselves that they are the real voice of the American people, and not those racist, red-neck fascists and their Tea Party....

[Hat Tip: Instapundit]

"Zero" Hour

It looks like Crazy Aunt Nancy will try to ram 'health care reform' through 'one way or another'.

"Let's remove all doubt, we will have health care — one way or another," Pelosi said. "Back to the drawing board means a great big zero for the American people."

First, I would like to remind Ms. Pelosi that we already have health care....

Second, if by 'zero' you mean keeping the outstanding, though slightly pricey, instant-access health care that we already enjoy...then I will take that over government supervised, spirit-crushing bureaucracy that you prescribe any time.

And so will a majority of voters in this country....

The Sticky Mess That is Obamacare

Instapundit quotes Ann Althouse:

“People just don’t want this bill. I think the big mistake was skipping the step of winning public support for a particular plan. It wasn’t enough that people believed there was a problem. People needed to believe the solution wasn’t worse than the problem. We were supposed to look away and trust them. The trust was never won, never earned. It’s been a horrific mess, and it just looks messier and messier as time wears on. Obama kept his distance, which looks pretty smart now.”

Two thoughts on this....

1) The main problem that has doomed Obamacare is that the American people have a general historic distrust of what comes out of Congress. If the people had a positive, or even neutral, opinion of our Congresscritters, then Obama may well have been able to sign a healthcare reform bill by now. But the fact that the effort was so closely associated with Congress and not the highly popular new president probably spelled its doom. Since 'Obama kept his distance', and every pronouncement came out of preening camera-hogs in the Capital rotunda, its was obvious who was making the sausage. The One should have expended his own newly bestowed political capital to push the bill over the goal line, but he left it to those people that all polls show that America distrusts.

2) At the same time, keeping his distance did not work for Obama. The simple fact that the term 'Obamacare' is synonymous with the effort to cede the government control of everyone's healthcare, shows that his attempts to remain above the fray failed. While he did avoid being seen as working the details in the trenches, it was clear from the White House that healthcare reform was considered one of Obama's 'legacy issues'. Thus it is clear to most American's that while Congress is making the sausage, it was the White House that is running the Red Hot cart on the corner, selling the product to the public at large....

I think Ann is wrong. Obama does not escape the mess, and he does not look very smart...

Nurse Pelosi says Turn Your Head and Cough

Many good Americans, though less by the day it seems, ask "What's wrong with passing this health care reform? Especially if it will lower costs and give coverage to those without it."

But many more people have realized however that this "reform" is not about either cost nor coverage. For those that are pushing it, this is not about health care, but rather about "health control".

While the Democrats may spout their assigned talking points about how Obamacare will bring gumdrops and candy canes, they will rarely admit their real motivation despite the fact that everyone knows what it is. That admission would not help them sell this lemon of a used car.

Apparently someone forgot to tell this to one of Nancy Pelosi's staffers. The one in charge of her website's "Mythbuster" feature.

In response to the 'myth' that "Health insurance reform could be unconstitutional…or violate the 10th amendment", Pelosi's website (is that like saying Obama's teleprompter?) says:

"Since virtually every aspect of the heath care system has an effect on interstate commerce, the power of Congress to regulate health care is essentially unlimited."

That's right...one of the leaders of the Congress is happy to let you know that she has your health care by the balls. Now turn your head and cough!

So the next time some nice lefty tells you it is all about high costs and the uninsured, and that the government would never ration your health care, just remember that Nurse Ratched Nancy Pelosi wants you to know her power is unlimited when it comes that health care, and then remember this, this, and this.

Like I said...it isn't about health care, it is about health control....

[Hat Tip: Jonah Goldberg]

2009: The First Year of Global Governance

Mark Steyn distills our future succinctly:

"'Climate change' and 'health care' are different ends of the same stick: They're both all-purpose pretexts for regulating every aspect of your life..."

But to protest this is somehow dangerous....

Countering the Rise of an Epithet

In the newest edition of National Review [subscription required], Jay Nordlinger has a good interim retrospective on the 'teabagger' imbroglio in 'Rise of an Epithet'...

"To “teabag” or not to “teabag”: That is not the most pressing question of these times, but it is a question to consider. Routinely, conservative protesters in the “tea party” movement are called “teabaggers,” and those calling them that do not mean it in a nice way. Many conservatives are mulling what to do about this term: fight it, embrace it, what?"

I say fight it....and of course you may want to fight fire with fire. Because I am in the mood, I will ignore a normal tendency not to sink to the Lefties' level. If they want the discourse to utilize crass barnyard imagery to subtly insult one's opponent, so be it.

If those in this country who oppose larger government control, gangster government, higher taxes, and the general slide towards European socialism can be labeled as "Teabaggers", then the Democrats and lefties who are running the country can suffer a similar epithet.

From now on, in any public reference, the Democratic Party and its actions in running the Executive and Legislative branches of government should be referred to as...."The Donkey Show".

Washington, Tijuana....it doesn't matter. We are all getting screwed.....

Rep. Charlie Foxtrot (R) TX-52

It seems that people are now getting really snarky and declaring their candidacies for some of those non-existent Congressional districts revealed by recovery.gov to be receiving Stimulus $$.

Take Grant Bosse for example:

Republican activist and free market think-tanker Grant Bosse formally declared his candidacy today in New Hampshire’s 00th Congressional District after news that the Obama administration has attributed a majority of the state’s stimulus jobs to that non-existent district.

Good on ya Grant! But while that is all well and good, I am not sure why you are going to so much trouble to declare candidacy for an election that will never occur.

Since this is the case, I am going to simply declare myself the new Congressional Representative of the non-existent TX-52, based on the results of a non-existent election! Good folks like Grant Bosse are working way too hard at this....

So why did I pick TX-52 to be my new fiefdom? First, I am a Texas resident. And second, it received $8.9 million of Stimulus cash, and it has created "0" jobs. That sounds like the makings of a great slush fund to me!

Now where is my application for the 'Friends of Angelo' program???

[Hat Tip: Instapundit]

Tyranny of the Minority Majority

#hhrs #tcot #rs
Some prescient thoughts on the results of last night...

Jennifer Rubin:

If Pelosi gets her 218 votes, it will be unprecedented. It is fair to say that never will a piece of legislation this sweeping (and damaging) have been passed over the opposition of so much of the electorate and on the votes of such a narrow ideological slice of the governing class.

'A Senate Friend':

If the only thing bipartisan is the opposition, and a party with an overwhelming majority is scrambling to get it over the first hurdle, it sure says something about the bill.

I believe that this is what might be called the 'Tyranny of the Minority Majority'...

10th Amendment as Guerrilla Street Art

Instapundit points out some "guerrilla street art" at Gateway Pundit, where someone has dared insult the emperor down in Houston....



However, squeaking out the win with extra points for original use of the Constitution as art via vandalism, is an anonymous reprobate in Georgia...



Hat Tip: Red State tweet

Prejudice, Thy Name is Dave Matthews

If Dave Matthews says it….it MUST be true…

U.S. racism 'everywhere,' says Dave Matthews

“CNN: President Carter said he thinks that a lot of the animosity directed toward President Obama is race related.

Dave Matthews: Of course it is! I found there's a fairly blatant racism in America that's already there, and I don't think I noticed it when I lived here as a kid. But when I went back to South Africa, and then it's sort of thrust in your face, and then came back here -- I just see it everywhere. There's a good population of people in this country that are terrified of the president only because he's black, even if they don't say it. And I think a lot of them, behind closed doors, do say it. Maybe I'm paranoid about it, but I don't think someone who disagreed as strongly as they do with Obama -- if it was Clinton -- would have stood up and screamed at him during his speech. (Shakes his head) I don't think so.”

I love the fact that Matthews' entire premise is based upon the rock-solid arguments of “I think…” and “I don’t think…”

Translation: “Those moderates/conservatives must be racist, even if they don’t say it or act it. It is so obvious, just look at them! I know a racist when I see it, and I see them everywhere.”

Additionally, CNN's obvious implication is that since Dave Matthews grew up in South Africa, he must be an expert on racism. Yeah, the Tea Parties and political opposition to the President are just like Aparthied.

Perhaps Matthews has some Breitbart-like undercover video of Freedomworks personnel and GOP politicians renewing their Klan memberships, but I think it’s more likely that the real prejudice here is held by Dave Matthews… Isn't that the way it usually is with liberals?

MSM: Move Along..Nothing to See Here!

So...what are the biggest news stories of the weekend according to the nation's leading media outlets?

A missing graduate student, dirty water, and nicer treatment for terrorist detainees. And...if you look a little closer...you might notice the acknowledgment that "thousands" of people marched on the National Mall to protest many items being pushed by the Obama Administration.

While the CNN article makes absolutely no mention of crowd size, it has been estimated by some that it could approach 2 million people. That may seem high, but even if the crowd surpassed 1 million, it could arguably be the largest crowd ever to assemble on the National Mall. In fact it would be higher than the crowd for President Obama's Inauguration.

Even if it were simply close to being the largest ever, one would think that might merit the leading headline on a slow news Saturday. Alas no, but lets take a look at what was on the major news webpages this evening....













Not a whole loota Tea Party in there is there? At least the WaPo put a Tea Party slideshow up there.

But I suppose we should not be at all surprised that these news tools organs would provide aid and comfort to the Administration.

'Tough Choices' Part II

#tcot #hhrs
Does throwing gas on a fire qualify as a 'Tough Choice'?

The "Tough Choices" Tapdance

#tcot #hhrs
YAY! It's 'tough choices' time!

"The Obama administration has insisted that the pledge will stand. But the president's top economic advisers have refused to rule out broad-based tax increases to close the yawning gap between federal revenue and government spending and are warning of tough choices ahead."

But wait, I thought we already made 'tough choices' earlier this year. I mean that's what President Obama told us when speaking of his budget at one of his prime time interruptions press conferences back in March:

"And in this budget, we have made the tough choices necessary to cut our deficit in half by the end of my first term – even under the most pessimistic estimates."

Let's see, 6 months ago when things were really bad, the 'tough choices' were made by President Obama and things would get better because of them. But now, back in the present, when the economy is looking better than those "most pessimistic estimates", we are being warned that their are 'tough choices' ahead? How is this possible in the land of hope and change?

So, was the President blowing smoke up our rear-ends back then to appear the savior, or are his advisers playing us for rubes now, hoping that we will forget their boss' earlier braggadocio??

I vote for both.

But in the end this 'tough choices' wordplay is only so much overacting in the political theater of Washington DC. While this venerable line may have worked in the past, in this summer of discontent, it is more likely to draw a fusillade of rotten tomatoes.

Most people aren't buying the BS anymore. They saw the all-you-can-eat pork barrel pig-out during the first 6 months of this administration, so they know that 'tough choices' means that they are going to be asked to pay for someone else's indiscretions, and they don't like it...

Fear & Loathing on Healthcare

#tcot #hhrs
Steny Hoyer's Town Hall via Mark Hemingway over at The Corner:

"...when I arrived for the town hall being held by the congressman from Maryland's fifth district last night at a high school in Waldorf, I was two hours early, and the place already looked like Calcutta on Free Malaria Shot Day....[Hoyer's] speech was made up of such canned Democratic talking points that it would normally have been unremarkable, except that when you hear all the current Democratic health-care talking points assembled in one place, it's kind of hard not to notice how breathtakingly disingenuous they are."

But the best lines of the night came from Hoyer himself:

"After he repeatedly assured everyone that this bill was fiscally responsible, another questioner asked somewhat incredulously how this bill would save money. Hoyer responded, "I didn't say the bill would pay for itself, I said it would be paid for." The angry crowd didn't like that bit of sophistry one bit. And when another questioner asked how he could assure the bill's fiscal responsibility when Social Security and Medicare were bankrupt, Hoyer responded by saying, "Indeed, I don't know if they are going bankrupt . . ." and had to wait to continue because of the riotous laughter that ensued."

I would think that politicians should fear for their proposals, and perhaps their futures, when they are openly mocked by their constituents.

I think that may be my nomination for political line of the year.... "I didn't say the bill would pay for itself, I said it would be paid for." Now that is ballsy....

Great Town Hall Sign

#tcot #hhrs


What more needs to be said?

More good pics and a video from NRO's Mark Hemingway here.

Pelosi/Hoyer - Obamacare Protesters "Un-American"

Nancy Pelosi digs deeper....

"These disruptions are occurring because opponents are afraid not just of differing views — but of the facts themselves. Drowning out opposing views is simply un-American. Drowning out the facts is how we failed at this task for decades."

This is outrageously dishonest coming from those who sought to 'cram-down' this legislation before anyone could read the bill, and any debate could take place.

Any they wonder why people a pissed.

I have said it before, and I will repeat it again. If the Dems accuse their opponents of doing something outrageous, it is usually an attempt at mis-direction, as they are the ones commiting the act themselves.