Okay, so we're going to go back to the satire/humor angle I'm used to working, starting with the next post. That last one was kind of an aberration, see. It's not like I'm wise, or thoughtful, or even very bright.
And for all those of you who have been pining away for another of Plebian's Seria Adventures, it's time once again!
Friday, November 6, 2009
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Rope a dope?
So I'm reading American Lion, the biography of Andrew Jackson. As a Tennesseean, I have always loved Jackson. He's basically the only TN president worth a damn (the others are Johnson, famous for being impeached, and Polk, famous for, uh, having a name very close to a common meat product).
What I've always loved about Jackson is this: when he lost the election of 1824, he believed he'd been screwed in a backdoor deal by Henry Clay and John Q. Adams, with Clay taking the Secretary of State under President Adams in return for throwing his support to Adams. This all despite Jackson having won the popular vote.
So Jackson did what any clever politician would do: he spent the next four years criticizing the administration, decrying the corrupt bargain that had defied the will of the people, and worked his way into the public imagination as their savior.
He won the 1828 election, unseating Adams and causing a furor.
When he took office, the Washington insiders were horrified. They despised him. Some of them opposed Jackson on everything on the grounds that if Jackson wanted it, it must be wrong.
Despite all this, Jackson remained popular with the people and, more often than not, got what he wanted done.
I find this interesting because we've only ever seen this strategy used once in the past forty years, when Reagan kept himself in the public eye after losing to Ford in 1976 to re-emerge four years later as the "people's champion" in the 1980 election. And Reagan, as you may know, ended up with a successful (in his eyes) presidency.
In 2000, Al Gore could have used this strategy. If he'd simply conceded, kept himself pushed forward as a stern critic of George Bush, and not gotten distracted lecturing about global warming, I'm convinced he'd have easily cruised to victory in 2004. But for some reason, Gore didn't do this. How he could miss this strategy, coming as it does from the founder of the Democratic party and a president from his home state, always perplexed me.
I wonder, though, if this isn't the place that Sarah Palin is carving out for herself. She certainly seems to be in the heads of the establishment, which despises her. She's clearly set herself forward as an opposition voice to the Democratic Party and President Obama. She seems to be making her case directly to the people, as Jackson once did.
She can leap upon every misstep by the President, every error by his cabinet, every unfortunate incident, and use it as a club against them and then explain how much better she would do. And with no real duties of her own to perform, there is nothing to yell back at her except insults, which rarely resonate well outside of partisans.
Witness the power of her "death panels" attack. She says it, the Democrats go apoplectic, and finally they end up changing the provision. Whether it's a fair attack or not, or a fair comment, a woman who is essentially a private citizen riled up the entire Democratic party and forced a change in a proposed bill.
That's more power than actual elected Republican congressmen have.
She has set herself up to spend the next three years as an optimist, explaining how it could be done better, while her opponents must explain poor performance(bad) or embrace failure(worse). That, to me, sounds very much like a hybrid Jackson/Reagan strategy.
I'm not saying that Palin's destined to be president. I'm saying that, at the current time, she certainly seems to be running a better strategy than any that's been deployed since Reagan lost his challenge to unseat Ford.
And that may explain a lot of the hair-tearing that surrounds her by Democrats.
Can this strategy be defused? Certainly. Here are four ways Obama could cut her off at the pass:
1) It's the economy, stupid: tomorrow, appear on TV and say a variation of the following: "My fellow Americans, let me be clear: the economy is our top priority. Starting from today, November 6th, my administration is pushing every other issue to the back burner until the suffering from this global recession has abated. We may have inherited the problem, but that won't keep us from creating the solution. Yes we can!"
Then, enforce ruthless message discipline: we don't talk any more about health care, or card check, or cap-and-trade, until unemployment is dropping and the economy has clearly recovered. So long as something else is atop the agenda, the American people assume (rightly) that the President and the Democrats don't care that the economy's in the tank.
Go on TV every week and talk up the economy. Livestream it over the internet. Call it a monitor-side chat. FDR would be proud.
This, incidentally, sank the first Bush and elevated Clinton. So it's inexcusable for them not to know this.
2) Ignore the critics, say nothing, and then repeat: it's maddening that a gifted campaigner, who has the media stepping atop one another to defend him, feels the need to crouch down to take pot shots at radio personalities and former governors. There's an old adage about getting in a pissing match: always piss up. When you're president, you can't piss up! So don't get in pissing matches, morons!
This goes for his surrogates, too. When David Axelrod whines about Rush Limbaugh, it elevates Limbaugh. The recent hand-wringing over Limbaugh's commentary makes me laugh: who is it that elevated Limbaugh to the President's level? It wasn't Limbaugh; it was the President himself by getting cheesed off over the infamous "I hope he fails" line.
When Reagan re-ran for election in 1984, Mondale desperately wanted to debate him. Reagan, with a monstrous lead, wouldn't have it. Why give Mondale's campaign any oxygen, when ignoring it was all that was required to win? So this is what Reagan did, unable to hear Reporters asking "why won't you debate?" because of the helicopters.
Reagan wins in a landslide. Why is Obama pumping pure oxygen to Sarah Palin?
3) Laugh and the world laughs with you: For me, candidate Obama's greatest moment in the campaign was when he was asked what his greatest fault was at a debate, and he said he had a messy desk. The other two candidates (Clinton and Edwards, if memory serves) answered after him and gave the typical "sometimes I care so much it keeps me up at night" answers.
After the debate, Obama joked that if he'd known the answers were supposed to be like that, then he'd have said that his greatest fault was that sometimes he went out of his way to help old ladies across the street (or something to that effect). It was funny. It was human. It made us like this guy who, like us, thought that a lot of this political stuff was phony and stupid.
Where did that guy go? I'm not asking for a comedian as a president, but the dour, stern-faced, angry president who sends on-air corrections and runs a White House tipline is a fary cry from the one who could laugh at himself eighteen months ago.
4) Remember whose shoes you fill: President Obama. Until 2012 (and perhaps beyond) he is our President. The office is worthy of respect, regardless of the man (or woman, someday) who fills it. It's the office that was filled by George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, and other bold, visionary men who, for better or worse, changed this country and its people.
It was also filled by William Henry Harrison, James Buchanen, Jimmy Carter, and other men who are better forgotten than regretted.
But at all times the President should carry himself with dignity. He should be wary of expending the dignity of his office in political pursuit. He should treat other heads of state with respect and dignity, regardless of his personal feelings. Our President should succeed at those things to which he turns his hand, because he is our President.
He should represent all of us, not some of us, and he should never apologize that we exist, nor grovel in the face of other nations. Just as we would not grovel to him, nor should he ever expect us to.
Clinton did not let himself be made a fool of on the international stage by prostituting his office in a vain (and fruitless) civic pursuit. Monroe, in the infancy of our nation, told the Europeans that they were not welcome here, and that they should look elsewhere for colonies, instead of groveling before them and begging their forebearance.
Our President should never bow, nor kiss a ring, nor show any obesiance to any other ruler or potentate on all this planet. We are a free people, and he is our leader.
President Obama needs to remember this: carry himself with dignity. Let a mayor throw out the first pitches, and let a governor campaign. Let an assemblyman harangue policemen.
The President has more important things to do.
What I've always loved about Jackson is this: when he lost the election of 1824, he believed he'd been screwed in a backdoor deal by Henry Clay and John Q. Adams, with Clay taking the Secretary of State under President Adams in return for throwing his support to Adams. This all despite Jackson having won the popular vote.
So Jackson did what any clever politician would do: he spent the next four years criticizing the administration, decrying the corrupt bargain that had defied the will of the people, and worked his way into the public imagination as their savior.
He won the 1828 election, unseating Adams and causing a furor.
When he took office, the Washington insiders were horrified. They despised him. Some of them opposed Jackson on everything on the grounds that if Jackson wanted it, it must be wrong.
Despite all this, Jackson remained popular with the people and, more often than not, got what he wanted done.
I find this interesting because we've only ever seen this strategy used once in the past forty years, when Reagan kept himself in the public eye after losing to Ford in 1976 to re-emerge four years later as the "people's champion" in the 1980 election. And Reagan, as you may know, ended up with a successful (in his eyes) presidency.
In 2000, Al Gore could have used this strategy. If he'd simply conceded, kept himself pushed forward as a stern critic of George Bush, and not gotten distracted lecturing about global warming, I'm convinced he'd have easily cruised to victory in 2004. But for some reason, Gore didn't do this. How he could miss this strategy, coming as it does from the founder of the Democratic party and a president from his home state, always perplexed me.
I wonder, though, if this isn't the place that Sarah Palin is carving out for herself. She certainly seems to be in the heads of the establishment, which despises her. She's clearly set herself forward as an opposition voice to the Democratic Party and President Obama. She seems to be making her case directly to the people, as Jackson once did.
She can leap upon every misstep by the President, every error by his cabinet, every unfortunate incident, and use it as a club against them and then explain how much better she would do. And with no real duties of her own to perform, there is nothing to yell back at her except insults, which rarely resonate well outside of partisans.
Witness the power of her "death panels" attack. She says it, the Democrats go apoplectic, and finally they end up changing the provision. Whether it's a fair attack or not, or a fair comment, a woman who is essentially a private citizen riled up the entire Democratic party and forced a change in a proposed bill.
That's more power than actual elected Republican congressmen have.
She has set herself up to spend the next three years as an optimist, explaining how it could be done better, while her opponents must explain poor performance(bad) or embrace failure(worse). That, to me, sounds very much like a hybrid Jackson/Reagan strategy.
I'm not saying that Palin's destined to be president. I'm saying that, at the current time, she certainly seems to be running a better strategy than any that's been deployed since Reagan lost his challenge to unseat Ford.
And that may explain a lot of the hair-tearing that surrounds her by Democrats.
Can this strategy be defused? Certainly. Here are four ways Obama could cut her off at the pass:
1) It's the economy, stupid: tomorrow, appear on TV and say a variation of the following: "My fellow Americans, let me be clear: the economy is our top priority. Starting from today, November 6th, my administration is pushing every other issue to the back burner until the suffering from this global recession has abated. We may have inherited the problem, but that won't keep us from creating the solution. Yes we can!"
Then, enforce ruthless message discipline: we don't talk any more about health care, or card check, or cap-and-trade, until unemployment is dropping and the economy has clearly recovered. So long as something else is atop the agenda, the American people assume (rightly) that the President and the Democrats don't care that the economy's in the tank.
Go on TV every week and talk up the economy. Livestream it over the internet. Call it a monitor-side chat. FDR would be proud.
This, incidentally, sank the first Bush and elevated Clinton. So it's inexcusable for them not to know this.
2) Ignore the critics, say nothing, and then repeat: it's maddening that a gifted campaigner, who has the media stepping atop one another to defend him, feels the need to crouch down to take pot shots at radio personalities and former governors. There's an old adage about getting in a pissing match: always piss up. When you're president, you can't piss up! So don't get in pissing matches, morons!
This goes for his surrogates, too. When David Axelrod whines about Rush Limbaugh, it elevates Limbaugh. The recent hand-wringing over Limbaugh's commentary makes me laugh: who is it that elevated Limbaugh to the President's level? It wasn't Limbaugh; it was the President himself by getting cheesed off over the infamous "I hope he fails" line.
When Reagan re-ran for election in 1984, Mondale desperately wanted to debate him. Reagan, with a monstrous lead, wouldn't have it. Why give Mondale's campaign any oxygen, when ignoring it was all that was required to win? So this is what Reagan did, unable to hear Reporters asking "why won't you debate?" because of the helicopters.
Reagan wins in a landslide. Why is Obama pumping pure oxygen to Sarah Palin?
3) Laugh and the world laughs with you: For me, candidate Obama's greatest moment in the campaign was when he was asked what his greatest fault was at a debate, and he said he had a messy desk. The other two candidates (Clinton and Edwards, if memory serves) answered after him and gave the typical "sometimes I care so much it keeps me up at night" answers.
After the debate, Obama joked that if he'd known the answers were supposed to be like that, then he'd have said that his greatest fault was that sometimes he went out of his way to help old ladies across the street (or something to that effect). It was funny. It was human. It made us like this guy who, like us, thought that a lot of this political stuff was phony and stupid.
Where did that guy go? I'm not asking for a comedian as a president, but the dour, stern-faced, angry president who sends on-air corrections and runs a White House tipline is a fary cry from the one who could laugh at himself eighteen months ago.
4) Remember whose shoes you fill: President Obama. Until 2012 (and perhaps beyond) he is our President. The office is worthy of respect, regardless of the man (or woman, someday) who fills it. It's the office that was filled by George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, and other bold, visionary men who, for better or worse, changed this country and its people.
It was also filled by William Henry Harrison, James Buchanen, Jimmy Carter, and other men who are better forgotten than regretted.
But at all times the President should carry himself with dignity. He should be wary of expending the dignity of his office in political pursuit. He should treat other heads of state with respect and dignity, regardless of his personal feelings. Our President should succeed at those things to which he turns his hand, because he is our President.
He should represent all of us, not some of us, and he should never apologize that we exist, nor grovel in the face of other nations. Just as we would not grovel to him, nor should he ever expect us to.
Clinton did not let himself be made a fool of on the international stage by prostituting his office in a vain (and fruitless) civic pursuit. Monroe, in the infancy of our nation, told the Europeans that they were not welcome here, and that they should look elsewhere for colonies, instead of groveling before them and begging their forebearance.
Our President should never bow, nor kiss a ring, nor show any obesiance to any other ruler or potentate on all this planet. We are a free people, and he is our leader.
President Obama needs to remember this: carry himself with dignity. Let a mayor throw out the first pitches, and let a governor campaign. Let an assemblyman harangue policemen.
The President has more important things to do.
So, yeah, it's been a while
Yeah, yeah, I know; it's been a while. A long while. I've been rather swamped at work. On the one hand, this is a good thing: the whole global recession hasn't really impacted me at all. On the other hand, it pretty much killed off my blog.
But, I got an e-mail asking me, basically, "where the heck did you go?" And I see that I have two followers despite not having posted in many months (which is comparable to having two interregnums and forty Italian parliaments in real time).
So I'll post twice today, because inspiration struck me earlier today. And this counts as a post. Honest, it does.
Yeah, that'll make up for it.
But, I got an e-mail asking me, basically, "where the heck did you go?" And I see that I have two followers despite not having posted in many months (which is comparable to having two interregnums and forty Italian parliaments in real time).
So I'll post twice today, because inspiration struck me earlier today. And this counts as a post. Honest, it does.
Yeah, that'll make up for it.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Through the Looking Glass
While others waste their time conspiracy-mongering about the Obama birth certificate, a great and hideous cabal works its nefarious will to alter the United States in ways we cannot possibly imagine, spearheaded by the Republican arch villain Karl Rove.
I speak, of course, about the ongoing efforts to sell southern California to China, which is happening under our noses and with the express written consent of the NFL.
When I tell people about this conspiracy, they inevitably pass through three phases: disbelief, followed by ridicule, and finally spittle-flecked outrage at this plan.
Read on and prepare your salivary glands, my friends.
Here are the facts:
California is impoverished, and is in fact paying bills by sending misspelled IOUs written on used cocktail napkins that have been coated in the Ebola virus in an attempt to either discredit or slay their creditors.
California’s Republican governor is a foreigner famous for having come from a communist country in the east.
The US is deeply indebted to China, and is taking on more and more debt every day to fund Obama’s lavish plans to socialize everything from health care to underwear (or didn’t you read the Boxer-Reid bill ‘Fruit of the Loom Relief Act of 2009’?).
Sarah Palin is doing everything in her power (faking pregnancies, resigning as governor, and even giving lapdances to Bigfeet) in an attempt to draw public attention northwards on orders of her Rovian master.
Obama is a lousy sportsman and has long harbored an intense disdain for surfing, ever since a group of surfers beat him up in junior high school, which is why he encouraged North Korea to nuke his home state of Hawaii (plot only foiled by the timely intervention of Kim Jong-Il’s bout of Explosive Flatulence). With southern Cal out of the way, there will be no surfing enclaves left.
No NFL teams of note reside in southern California, and the NFL is desperate to go global despite the obvious barriers to playing football outside of the US, most notably the rampant mental deficiencies in other cultures that make them enjoy soccer (which is erroneously translated as football in most other languages).
Obama’s secretary of state has close contacts with numerous Chinese officials and previously helped sell them other important US landmarks, such as the White House.
The Chinese recently toured Southern California with a torch to check it out, not unlike a prospective homeowner looking in the crawl space of a property with a flashlight. Before you scoff, remember that in many third-world countries a torch is just like a flashlight, and San Francisco is very much like a crawl space, only it smells worse.
At this point, as the spittle collects in the corner of your mouth, you might be wondering why Karl Rove wants to carve Chinafornia out of the southernmost part of the Golden State. The reason is quite simple: to create a permanent Republican majority. With those leftists gathered on the southern part of the state now getting what they deserve (re: communist enslavement), the northern part of the state will swing right and suddenly the guaranteed 55 Electoral College votes for the Democrats will disappear.
Illegal immigrants from Mexico will now be China’s problem, not ours. China will likely handle them in the respectful, humane way that they handle other problems, which will satisfy Rove’s dark thirst for blood.
Even the Democrats gain something, which is why they are supporting this vile effort: they’ll be rid of Nancy Pelosi.
I speak, of course, about the ongoing efforts to sell southern California to China, which is happening under our noses and with the express written consent of the NFL.
When I tell people about this conspiracy, they inevitably pass through three phases: disbelief, followed by ridicule, and finally spittle-flecked outrage at this plan.
Read on and prepare your salivary glands, my friends.
Here are the facts:
California is impoverished, and is in fact paying bills by sending misspelled IOUs written on used cocktail napkins that have been coated in the Ebola virus in an attempt to either discredit or slay their creditors.
California’s Republican governor is a foreigner famous for having come from a communist country in the east.
The US is deeply indebted to China, and is taking on more and more debt every day to fund Obama’s lavish plans to socialize everything from health care to underwear (or didn’t you read the Boxer-Reid bill ‘Fruit of the Loom Relief Act of 2009’?).
Sarah Palin is doing everything in her power (faking pregnancies, resigning as governor, and even giving lapdances to Bigfeet) in an attempt to draw public attention northwards on orders of her Rovian master.
Obama is a lousy sportsman and has long harbored an intense disdain for surfing, ever since a group of surfers beat him up in junior high school, which is why he encouraged North Korea to nuke his home state of Hawaii (plot only foiled by the timely intervention of Kim Jong-Il’s bout of Explosive Flatulence). With southern Cal out of the way, there will be no surfing enclaves left.
No NFL teams of note reside in southern California, and the NFL is desperate to go global despite the obvious barriers to playing football outside of the US, most notably the rampant mental deficiencies in other cultures that make them enjoy soccer (which is erroneously translated as football in most other languages).
Obama’s secretary of state has close contacts with numerous Chinese officials and previously helped sell them other important US landmarks, such as the White House.
The Chinese recently toured Southern California with a torch to check it out, not unlike a prospective homeowner looking in the crawl space of a property with a flashlight. Before you scoff, remember that in many third-world countries a torch is just like a flashlight, and San Francisco is very much like a crawl space, only it smells worse.
At this point, as the spittle collects in the corner of your mouth, you might be wondering why Karl Rove wants to carve Chinafornia out of the southernmost part of the Golden State. The reason is quite simple: to create a permanent Republican majority. With those leftists gathered on the southern part of the state now getting what they deserve (re: communist enslavement), the northern part of the state will swing right and suddenly the guaranteed 55 Electoral College votes for the Democrats will disappear.
Illegal immigrants from Mexico will now be China’s problem, not ours. China will likely handle them in the respectful, humane way that they handle other problems, which will satisfy Rove’s dark thirst for blood.
Even the Democrats gain something, which is why they are supporting this vile effort: they’ll be rid of Nancy Pelosi.
Friday, June 19, 2009
The Real Civil War Analogy
Some people think that Obama is the new Lincoln. Others think he's the second term of Jimmy Carter. They're both wrong.
Barack Obama is serving the first term of George McClellan, Lincoln's do-nothing general who ran on the Democrat appeasement platform in 1864.
The similarities don't stop at their party: both were first-class politicians, both had persecution complexes, both blamed the previous administration for all their problems, both talked big but never particularly accomplished anything, and both sat on their hands when action is called for.
We don't specifically know whether McClellan would have intervened to save sailing ship manufacturers during the rise of steamboats, only to see them go bankrupt anyways. But he probably would have. Whether or not he would have also turned their management over to scurvy-ridden merchant seaman we can only guess.
And we can also only guess at whether or not McClellan would have pissed on his most ardent supporters and told them it's raining, but he did run as a pro-war candidate with an appeasement platform, on an appeasement ticket, with a peace advocate as a running mate. The will of his party, at least, seemed clear on this issue.
Whether those who wished to continue the war would have slavishly followed McClellan after he signed away half the US to the Confederate States of America is unknown, but I like to think they'd have shown a little more sand than the gays, Jews, businessmen, and peace advocates who Obama has so far spurned as he enforces the DOMA, demonizes Israel, socializes the economy, and continues Bush policies in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo.
The only real mystery is why Republican elites didn't flock to McClellan in 1864, pronouncing him a "man of great character" and "somebody we can do business with" despite obvious signs to the contrary.
They must have had some kind of commitment to principles or something back then.
How novel.
Barack Obama is serving the first term of George McClellan, Lincoln's do-nothing general who ran on the Democrat appeasement platform in 1864.
The similarities don't stop at their party: both were first-class politicians, both had persecution complexes, both blamed the previous administration for all their problems, both talked big but never particularly accomplished anything, and both sat on their hands when action is called for.
We don't specifically know whether McClellan would have intervened to save sailing ship manufacturers during the rise of steamboats, only to see them go bankrupt anyways. But he probably would have. Whether or not he would have also turned their management over to scurvy-ridden merchant seaman we can only guess.
And we can also only guess at whether or not McClellan would have pissed on his most ardent supporters and told them it's raining, but he did run as a pro-war candidate with an appeasement platform, on an appeasement ticket, with a peace advocate as a running mate. The will of his party, at least, seemed clear on this issue.
Whether those who wished to continue the war would have slavishly followed McClellan after he signed away half the US to the Confederate States of America is unknown, but I like to think they'd have shown a little more sand than the gays, Jews, businessmen, and peace advocates who Obama has so far spurned as he enforces the DOMA, demonizes Israel, socializes the economy, and continues Bush policies in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo.
The only real mystery is why Republican elites didn't flock to McClellan in 1864, pronouncing him a "man of great character" and "somebody we can do business with" despite obvious signs to the contrary.
They must have had some kind of commitment to principles or something back then.
How novel.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Attacks on Pirates Making Them Bolder, Study Says
A non-partisan think tank, the Organization for Promoting Right-Wing Agendas (OPRA) today warned that recent counterattacks on pirates near the Horn of Africa could lead to "disastrous consequences" and would mean an escalation of pirate raids, not a decrease as some have suggested.
"Shooting and killing pirates only makes them bolder and causes their number to swell," said OPRA spokeswoman Cheyenne Markoni-Spitzhughes from their London offices. "Over two hundred years of data have shown that there's a direct correlation between dead pirates and the incidents of piracy on the high seas, with more dead pirates meaning more attacks. The world needs a better way."
Instead, OPRA suggests that world governments form a new UN agency dedicated to opening call centers in Somalia, where the pirate's natural aggressiveness can be channeled into more productive venues. "After all," Markoni-Spitzhughes said, "if they're willing to try to take over an oil tanker then they should be comfortable cold-calling people to see if they're interested in switching their long-distance carrier."
Top Democrats scoffed at the warning, however, calling OPRA a "thinly-disguised stink-tank for the Republican smear campaign."
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters that "every thinking person knows that pirates are like any other terror-wielding outlaw group: if you shoot them, then there are less of them active, and potential recruits inevitably turn to another, less dangerous line of work, such as tasting food additives or being a bungee cord tester."
President Barack Obama painted it in even starker terms in his White House address. "Despite Hollywood glamorizing pirates in their shameful movies, and Disney making pirating seem fun in their disgraceful rides, we will continue to bring shock, awe, and death to anyone who would prey upon the weak and the helpless on the high seas."
"Shooting and killing pirates only makes them bolder and causes their number to swell," said OPRA spokeswoman Cheyenne Markoni-Spitzhughes from their London offices. "Over two hundred years of data have shown that there's a direct correlation between dead pirates and the incidents of piracy on the high seas, with more dead pirates meaning more attacks. The world needs a better way."
Instead, OPRA suggests that world governments form a new UN agency dedicated to opening call centers in Somalia, where the pirate's natural aggressiveness can be channeled into more productive venues. "After all," Markoni-Spitzhughes said, "if they're willing to try to take over an oil tanker then they should be comfortable cold-calling people to see if they're interested in switching their long-distance carrier."
Top Democrats scoffed at the warning, however, calling OPRA a "thinly-disguised stink-tank for the Republican smear campaign."
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters that "every thinking person knows that pirates are like any other terror-wielding outlaw group: if you shoot them, then there are less of them active, and potential recruits inevitably turn to another, less dangerous line of work, such as tasting food additives or being a bungee cord tester."
President Barack Obama painted it in even starker terms in his White House address. "Despite Hollywood glamorizing pirates in their shameful movies, and Disney making pirating seem fun in their disgraceful rides, we will continue to bring shock, awe, and death to anyone who would prey upon the weak and the helpless on the high seas."
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Economic Freedom and the NFL
The intertubes are all abuzz with the latest from the NFL, namely the coming shift to an 18-game season and dropping two preseason games. The consensus among sportswriters, their commenters, and drooling idiots (but I repeat myself) is something along these lines:
"Good, because charging full price for preseason games is a total ripoff, man. Those games totally suck!"
Let me be blunt: the NFL will charge whatever they want for the preseason games, and so long as somebody pays it, it's not too much, and the price is not a rip-off. If you feel spending for preseason games is a waste of money, use the tried-and-true method that other consumers use with the Shamwow, New Coke, and the Segway Scooter: don't buy the damn thing.
But please, spare me the faux-populist outrage against "exorbitant" ticket prices. For one thing, most of the simpering nimrods doing the bitching can't even spell exorbitant. For another, nobody forces you to go to preseason games. In fact, if they suck so bad, you should be thankful to have a reason not to attend.
If the NFL started auctioning off used jock straps (complete with ball sweat!) on E-Bay, I'd not only steer clear but have to clean my E-Bay account with bleach. But you know that some wannabe's somewhere is willing to pay $110 plus shipping and handling for a used TO jock strap. Maybe even more if it was worn in a big game, or had authentic "battle stains" on it.
And that is right, and good, and the natural state of capitalism. Exercising our economic liberty to make stupid choices about sporting events and memorabilia is a form of freedom, and we should encourage people to do that.
Because freedom in abundance is never a bad thing.
"Good, because charging full price for preseason games is a total ripoff, man. Those games totally suck!"
Let me be blunt: the NFL will charge whatever they want for the preseason games, and so long as somebody pays it, it's not too much, and the price is not a rip-off. If you feel spending for preseason games is a waste of money, use the tried-and-true method that other consumers use with the Shamwow, New Coke, and the Segway Scooter: don't buy the damn thing.
But please, spare me the faux-populist outrage against "exorbitant" ticket prices. For one thing, most of the simpering nimrods doing the bitching can't even spell exorbitant. For another, nobody forces you to go to preseason games. In fact, if they suck so bad, you should be thankful to have a reason not to attend.
If the NFL started auctioning off used jock straps (complete with ball sweat!) on E-Bay, I'd not only steer clear but have to clean my E-Bay account with bleach. But you know that some wannabe's somewhere is willing to pay $110 plus shipping and handling for a used TO jock strap. Maybe even more if it was worn in a big game, or had authentic "battle stains" on it.
And that is right, and good, and the natural state of capitalism. Exercising our economic liberty to make stupid choices about sporting events and memorabilia is a form of freedom, and we should encourage people to do that.
Because freedom in abundance is never a bad thing.
Monday, March 16, 2009
REVEALED: Obama is Rovian Plant!
An explosive new expose set to publish next week will reveal that, far from the starry-eyed newcomer he poses as, Barack Obama is actually a Manchurian candidate cooked up by none other than longtime Conservative blackguard Karl Rove. While White House officials have scoffed at the allegations, some Democrats have privately admitted that they had begun to suspect this themselves.
"Cozying up with lobbyists? Putting the deficit on steroids? Trying to re-establish the welfare benefits that were discredited in the mid-90s? It's been clear a long time that something's not right with Barack Obama," said one Democratic senator. "The only thing he could do worse is get distracted with some side issue, anger our critical allies, and have half his nominees withdraw in disgrace. Oh, wait!"
Among the charges the book makes are that President Obama:
-Is obsessed with making Rush Limbaugh the pre-eminent voice on television and radio, thus ensuring that the Conservative message is heard by as many people as possible
-Intended to thoroughly discredit the traditional press as starry-eyed and naïve, by first sweeping them off their feet and then by treating them like a sophomore on prom night, leaving them puffy-eyed and sore-assed
-Staffed his cabinet with the worst caricatures of liberal excesses, from anti-Semitism to rampant hypocrisy to a total disregard for basic tax law
-Has not been criticized by George Bush not because the former president respects tradition and the honor of the office, but rather because Bush knows that Rove is really the one pulling the strings of the Obama administration
-Sleeps in Star Trek pajamas
-Wanted to revive Democrat's image as "tax-and-spend liberals" by acting as a tax-and-spend liberal
Calls to Rove's sinister subterranean lair for comment were not returned, likely because the peals of his sinister laugh were echoing off its cacophonous ceiling.
"Cozying up with lobbyists? Putting the deficit on steroids? Trying to re-establish the welfare benefits that were discredited in the mid-90s? It's been clear a long time that something's not right with Barack Obama," said one Democratic senator. "The only thing he could do worse is get distracted with some side issue, anger our critical allies, and have half his nominees withdraw in disgrace. Oh, wait!"
Among the charges the book makes are that President Obama:
-Is obsessed with making Rush Limbaugh the pre-eminent voice on television and radio, thus ensuring that the Conservative message is heard by as many people as possible
-Intended to thoroughly discredit the traditional press as starry-eyed and naïve, by first sweeping them off their feet and then by treating them like a sophomore on prom night, leaving them puffy-eyed and sore-assed
-Staffed his cabinet with the worst caricatures of liberal excesses, from anti-Semitism to rampant hypocrisy to a total disregard for basic tax law
-Has not been criticized by George Bush not because the former president respects tradition and the honor of the office, but rather because Bush knows that Rove is really the one pulling the strings of the Obama administration
-Sleeps in Star Trek pajamas
-Wanted to revive Democrat's image as "tax-and-spend liberals" by acting as a tax-and-spend liberal
Calls to Rove's sinister subterranean lair for comment were not returned, likely because the peals of his sinister laugh were echoing off its cacophonous ceiling.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
News from the Future
(Note: Living as I do near the Hadron Collider, I expected strange things to occur once they'd fired that thing up. And lo and behold, I have started receiving e-mail updates of news from the future, just like that show Early Edition except with a lot bigger audience. So I'm going to pass along to you my news updates from the future.)
Bailout Czar Biden Buys Detroit Lions
Vice President and Bailout Czar Joe Biden today instructed the Treasury Department to purchase the Detroit Lions from the Ford family, which has seen its fortune dissipate with the bankruptcy of their automotive company. The government purchased a 51% stake in the ownership of the team, which just set an NFL record for worst season at 0-16 last year, for $628 million.
"This one's a guaranteed winner," Biden told reporters at his daily State of the Bailout news conference. "The NFL is the number one sports franchise in America, and now the US taxpayer has a piece of that pie. This is one investment that Americans can be sure will pay off in the long run!"
Biden has been criticized in recent weeks for a string of investments that have quickly lost almost all of their value, including an ice-cream delivery service targeting remote Inuit seal hunters and a speculative real estate investment in a beachfront condominium resort located on the Kansas-Nebraska border. In both instances the Treasury department has had to write off the entire bailout investment as a loss.
"We're gonna move 'em to DC, too. With the boom going on, the administration felt we needed another sports franchise," Biden told reporters, alluding to the 250% population explosion that has been seen in recent months as the applicants have flooded Washington to snap up nearly 100,000 federal jobs created by the Obama administration.
For the near future the team will share facilities with the other Washington NFL franchise, the Washington First Americans of Noble Mien. Americans owner Daniel Snyder said that he was "excited to be part of this great new experiment at sharing and getting along" and pledged full cooperation with the new NFL franchise, which will be rechristened the Washington Hope.
Now that the government has a controlling interest in an NFL team, President Obama announced that he is "vigorously pursuing the appointment of a Football Czar to help bring NFL standards and practices into line with this country's values and traditions."
The president specifically mentioned concerns over injuries and long-term benefits for NFL retirees, an increase in the number of minority coaches, GMS, and owners, and granting cheerleaders greater access to labor organization.
Bailout Czar Biden Buys Detroit Lions
Vice President and Bailout Czar Joe Biden today instructed the Treasury Department to purchase the Detroit Lions from the Ford family, which has seen its fortune dissipate with the bankruptcy of their automotive company. The government purchased a 51% stake in the ownership of the team, which just set an NFL record for worst season at 0-16 last year, for $628 million.
"This one's a guaranteed winner," Biden told reporters at his daily State of the Bailout news conference. "The NFL is the number one sports franchise in America, and now the US taxpayer has a piece of that pie. This is one investment that Americans can be sure will pay off in the long run!"
Biden has been criticized in recent weeks for a string of investments that have quickly lost almost all of their value, including an ice-cream delivery service targeting remote Inuit seal hunters and a speculative real estate investment in a beachfront condominium resort located on the Kansas-Nebraska border. In both instances the Treasury department has had to write off the entire bailout investment as a loss.
"We're gonna move 'em to DC, too. With the boom going on, the administration felt we needed another sports franchise," Biden told reporters, alluding to the 250% population explosion that has been seen in recent months as the applicants have flooded Washington to snap up nearly 100,000 federal jobs created by the Obama administration.
For the near future the team will share facilities with the other Washington NFL franchise, the Washington First Americans of Noble Mien. Americans owner Daniel Snyder said that he was "excited to be part of this great new experiment at sharing and getting along" and pledged full cooperation with the new NFL franchise, which will be rechristened the Washington Hope.
Now that the government has a controlling interest in an NFL team, President Obama announced that he is "vigorously pursuing the appointment of a Football Czar to help bring NFL standards and practices into line with this country's values and traditions."
The president specifically mentioned concerns over injuries and long-term benefits for NFL retirees, an increase in the number of minority coaches, GMS, and owners, and granting cheerleaders greater access to labor organization.
Monday, March 2, 2009
News from the Future
(Note: Living as I do near the Hadron Collider, I expected strange things to occur once they'd fired that thing up. And lo and behold, I have started receiving e-mail updates of news from the future, just like that show Early Edition except with a lot bigger audience. So I'm going to pass along to you my news updates from the future.)
Two Arrested in Blockbuster Sting
Police in Brooklyn Heights stormed a Blockbuster Video last night, arresting the owner and two clerks on charges of distributing insensitive and harmful materials in violation of the 2009 Racial Reconciliation and Respect Act. Officers seized all DVD and videotape copies of four films, each of which was on the RRRA list of Socially Unacceptable Films.
The seized videos included the notorious Any Which Way but Loose, the Clint Eastwood comedy whose 30th anniversary re-release sparked riots due to its unflattering portrait of minorities.
Also taken in the raid were both the 1933 and 2007 versions of King Kong, as well as the Diane Fossey biopic Gorillas in the Mist. At the Cannes film festival earlier this year, director Peter Jackson apologized for his 2007 remake, calling it "a movie that in many ways is equally as vile as Birth of a Nation."
The search warrant also called for seizure of the 1976 King Kong remake starring Jessica Lange, but store records indicated that the no customer had ever rented the movie and any remaining copies of it were unable to be located.
Illinois Senator Al Sharpton, one of the authors of the RRRA, praised the action for coming "at a critical time for these United States as we attempt to heal the divisive wounds of racism by becoming more sensitive, more trusting, and ever more responsive to calls for censorship and blandidity in the name of harmony and unhurt feelings."
Two Arrested in Blockbuster Sting
Police in Brooklyn Heights stormed a Blockbuster Video last night, arresting the owner and two clerks on charges of distributing insensitive and harmful materials in violation of the 2009 Racial Reconciliation and Respect Act. Officers seized all DVD and videotape copies of four films, each of which was on the RRRA list of Socially Unacceptable Films.
The seized videos included the notorious Any Which Way but Loose, the Clint Eastwood comedy whose 30th anniversary re-release sparked riots due to its unflattering portrait of minorities.
Also taken in the raid were both the 1933 and 2007 versions of King Kong, as well as the Diane Fossey biopic Gorillas in the Mist. At the Cannes film festival earlier this year, director Peter Jackson apologized for his 2007 remake, calling it "a movie that in many ways is equally as vile as Birth of a Nation."
The search warrant also called for seizure of the 1976 King Kong remake starring Jessica Lange, but store records indicated that the no customer had ever rented the movie and any remaining copies of it were unable to be located.
Illinois Senator Al Sharpton, one of the authors of the RRRA, praised the action for coming "at a critical time for these United States as we attempt to heal the divisive wounds of racism by becoming more sensitive, more trusting, and ever more responsive to calls for censorship and blandidity in the name of harmony and unhurt feelings."
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