You Might Be 'Urban Modern' If . . .

. . . you don't understand why it's controversial to have a Marxist Truther as a key White House aide:

These days, the [New York] Times doesn’t consider itself biased. Instead, it's calling itself "urban modern" . . .
[New York Times Magazine editor Gerald Marzorati wrote:] "Call it Urban Modern. That is, I think it reflects not a left-or-right POLITICAL ideology but a geographical one, the mentality of the place it is created: 21st Century Manhattan."

Insofar as "Urban Modern" isn't just another code-word for "gay" (NTTAWWT, Gerald) what does it mean?

In a previous thread, I mentioned that city people can't drive worth crap. So an inability to understand that the left lane is for fast drivers would qualify as a defining characteristic of "urban modern." Let's try a few others. You might be "urban modern" if . . .

• You graduated from a college where the yearly tuition is larger than the annual income of the doorman at your apartment building.
• You're all about "rights" mentioned nowhere in the Constitution, but don't believe the Second Amendment really means that ordinary people have the "right" to own guns.
• You actually considered moving to Connecticut to be a campaign volunteer for Ned Lamont.
• You're a woman who wears sneakers with a business suit while commuting, switching to heels after arriving at the office.
• You have ever used the phrase "social justice" in a conversation, and weren't joking.
• You make a six-figure salary, live in a rent-controlled apartment, and vote for candidates who promise to fix the "affordable housing" problem.
• You are a magazine editor named "Gerald."

Well, that's a few samples to start the list. Anyone else got suggestions?

UPDATE: Typo corrected, thanks to smart-asses in the comments.

UPDATE II: Jimmie Bise Jr. at Sundries Shack offers some good additions:

• Your definition of "crisis" is when the sushi bar down the street runs out of California Rolls.
• Even though you think people shouldn’t eat cows, you’ve never actually seen one face to face.
• You don’t know anyone whose job requires manual labor.

How do you know that Jimmie Bise isn't "urban modern"? He'd be known as Jamie, and would have a business card describing himself as an "Online Communications Strategist."

Oh, and as for sushi, I believe it was the late Lewis Grizzard who said, "Raw fish and seaweed? Where I come from, we call that bait." (The last time anyone saw an "urban modern" near Moreland, Ga., it was a writer from the New York Times -- sent down to cover the 1996 Atlanta Olympics -- who took a wrong turn leaving Hartsfield Airport. His rental car broke down on I-85. They towed the car to S&M Auto Repair in Newnan, which seemed to make the New York Times guy strangely happy. But then the guy made a lewd suggestion to Bubba, who was working the lube rack. The writer got his nose busted, got locked up overnight in the Coweta County Jail, and missed the men's gymnastics finals. "Urban moderns" have carefully avoided that vicinity ever since.)

Another hateful attack on Michelle Duggar

From a "mommyblogger" who evidently considers herself an expert authorized to condemn others:

I mean, 19 kids? 19?! . . . Is your uterus a baseball dugout? . . .
There's simply no way you can give each of those kids the personal attention he needs. . . . And using your older children as surrogate parents is a recipe for immature behavior down the road. You're robbing them of their childhoods by making them mini mommies and daddies.
Of course, some people hold you up like a goddess simply because you can procreate. You know, Michelle, earthworms can procreate. . . .
Please, Michelle, I beg of you; stop having babies. I know it's tempting to go to 20, but maybe you should just focus on the kids you already have. Mmmmkay?

One could spend a week unpacking all the malicious misconceptions in that one blog post, which bears the charming title, "A Letter to Michelle Duggar from Her Vagina," and whose author is -- what else? -- concealed by a pseudonym, "Christine."

Parents of large families have to put up with this attitude all the time in the Anti-Family Age, when the upper-middle-class suburban career woman with 1.6 children is celebrated as the belle ideal of "responsible" parenting.

Especially wrong-headed is the assertion by "Christine" that having the older children assist in caring for their younger siblings is "a recipe for immature behavior down the road." No only is there zero evidence in social science to support such a claim, it contradicts both common sense and mountains of anecdotal evidence.

Common sense tells us that children learn to act responsibly by being given responsibilities. Caring for younger siblings -- changing an infant's diaper, bathing and dressing a toddler, helping at mealtime -- is exactly the sort of responsibility that helps children develop confidence and maturity. A major reason that first-born children so often excel in leadership is precisely because they have the maximum opportunity to exercise in such supervisory duties from an early age.

Many parents today seem to believe that children are incapable of exercising any responsibility beyond "clean your room" and "make good grades." Yet anyone who has studied human society on a historic and global perspective understands that this "modern" attitude sets an absurdly low standard for children.

The idiot "Christine," in accusing Michelle Duggar of "robbing [her children] of their childhoods," shows how absurdly thoughtless the allegiance to "modern" parenthood has become. Like too many others, "Christine" evidently believes that an appropriate "childhood" should consist entirely of school and play -- a leisurely existence dominated by TV and videogames, the boredom alleviated by soccer practice and music lessons.

This is not a formula for maturity. Rather it is infantilizing, conditioning the child to expect a life of fun without meanignful responsibility. One strongly suspects that "Christine" herself had that kind of over-indulged childhood, which explains her haughty and insulting better-than-you attitude toward Michelle Duggar.

Granted, 19 children is a very large family, but the eldest of Duggars' children are now in their 20s and so far I haven't seen any evidence of the immature behavior" that "Christine" warns about. Until the reality-TV special "Duggars Gone Wild: Spring Break in Cancun" shows up on VH-1, my advice to "Christine" is: Shut your stupid mouth.

Visit the Duggar Family official site here.

Cutting through the Linda Douglass doublespeak

by Smitty (h/t Say Anything)

At some point, to their chagrin, the administration will realize that the people of this country believe them with all the confidence they hold in his Sunshine Pledge.

Leadership is founded, among other things, upon trust, Mr. President. You desperately need to figure out what you're going to do to set about rebuilding some, or it's going to be a long three years and two months to the next election.

Tea Party fields 10K in IL

by Smitty

Just in the inbox: "Sheriff Reports 10,000 at New Lenox/Joliet Rally"

Breaking news from New Lenox/Joliet… the sheriff’s office is reporting to us that the crowd estimate for the rally here is 10,000+ and they are shutting down a portion of Interstate 80 for traffic control do to the massive influx of people

This is:

outside of Barack Obama's bastion of Chicago. And guess what - we had by far the largest crowd yet!

The newspaper of record was last seen sorting its vinyl LPs.

Experts get me off the hook

Vindication, at last! Mrs. Other McCain will be pleased to see the latest scientific study proving that most women have never had sex with me.

(Hat-tip: NewsAlert.)

UPDATE: A not entirely unrelated development: Who is Dita Von Teese, and why is she nearly naked?

UPDATE II: More scientific experts:

[W]omen have sex for many reasons but romance and passion come rather low on the list, a new book has revealed.
"Research has shown most men find most women at least somewhat sexually attractive, whereas most women do not find most men sexually attractive at all," Why Women Have Sex authors Cindy Meston and David Buss said.
One said she did it for a spiritual experience, proclaiming: "It's the closest thing to God."

That was my wife's answer . . .

Hat-tip to Allah, who is an atheist. What does an atheist woman scream during the throes of passion?

"Oh, science!"

Which raging pile of fertilizer will be more fun to ignore?

by Smitty

Competition for the "Worst Use of Human Time" expressed in film is rather tough this year.

I can't figure out if some hagiographic portrait of an idiot bent on destroying his country is worse than a movie by some corpulent capitalist about the evils of what made him rich.

A sort of intellectual Scylla and Charybdis, that brace of clowns.

One suspects their fans in Venezuela, North Korea, Myanmar, Syria, etc. would be pleased, if the idiotic ideas presented would lead to enough spare electricity to run the film.

The Blog Prof has an excellent post on Moore's compost.

Update:
Carolyn's Closet has some quotations, which is more moronic Moore than I'd suffer, but she's tougher.

Olbermann is too easy

by Smitty

Fishersville Mike has an ESPN clip of K.O. confronted by a man.

A quick trip to YouTube has Keith appearing sane, and having a sense of smell:

Of course, Affleck remains the gold standard of the art of Olbermann thrashing. Look how hard it is to push beyond the already high level of self-parody:

Even though we've given Olbermann more attention than he deserves, is it going to help his ratings? I doubt it. It must really suck a lot of pond water to be Keith, watching Glenn Beck tell the truth (albeit in a large font) and clean house.

Oh, there is a sense of crisis, all right

by Smitty (h/t Drudge)

Bloomberg writers Goldman and Johnston are a hoot:

President Barack Obama returns to Washington next week in search of one thing that can revive his health-care overhaul: a sense of crisis.

I, for one, feel anxious about four intertwined crises unfolding:

1. The slow-motion Constitutional one, where the power seems to be draining first to DC, then to the Executive.
2. The economic one, where attempts to legislate defiance of economic gravity, and dig out of debt hole, seem perfectly reasonable to the bulk of the lawyer nitwits running the country.
3. The informational one, where media institutions purportedly dedicated to serving the public with something called 'reporting' eschew that in favor of 'narrative'.
4. The diplomatic one, where serial jackassery could lead a war of size to make Iraq/Afghanistan seem a skirmish.
   

The third one is probably the least severe, the fourth the least likely. The first or second will kill us.

Obama must recapture the sense of urgency that led to passage of the economic rescue package in February, analysts said.

Actually, what we need to do is tell the President to talk to the hand.

There should be no legislation reported out of Congress until:

1. Someone figures out the Constitutionality of it, proffering an Amendment via Article V to support the substantial questions.
2. The funding profile is clear. Attempting to make a major change like this in a faltering economy is almost criminally irresponsible.

Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said the administration made unprecedented health-care progress in eight months.

It is inarguably the case that the good POTUS has succeeded in awakening the sleeping giant.

• The further from the center he goes to seek policy, the more stone-cold pissed the American people will become.
• The more intellectually dishonest charges of raaaaacism are leveled, the more pissed the American people become.
• The more our foreign policy looks like a cheering section for banana republic autocrats, the more pissed we become.
• The more we wonder what brave new world awaits us beyond the economic demolition of all we hold dear, the more pissed we become.

You've already got your self-imposed crisis, Rahm.

Pray for peace, everyone. We didn't get here overnight, or without placing excessive trust in our leadership. We also will not restore anything resembling a country with (as a whole) trustworthy leadership and economic stability without significant pain. VodkaPundit's "Never Have So Few Stolen So Much From So Many to Achieve So Little" applies.

Update:
The Reaganite Republican Resistance graciously links.

On Jews and liberals

UPDATE 9/8: For the benefit of liberal blog readers, a relevant question: "Is 'Liberal Idiot' Redundant?"

ORIGINAL POST: The September issue of Commentary has a symposium in which six writers discuss Norman Podhoretz's latest book, Why Are Jews Liberals? A few excerpts:

Since nature abhors a spiritual vacuum, Podhoretz concludes that the religion of liberalism—that is, faith in the powers of government -- has replaced Judaism in the hearts of Jews. . . .
Why, asks Podhoretz, do Jews cling to this belief if it no longer serves our interest? . . .
If I may be allowed so vast a sweep of generalization, Republicans, conservatives, are the party that feels comfortably at home. We need not attach a value to this observation; you may approve of this sensibility or not. But for Jews, unease is our mother tongue. . . .
-- David Wolpe

Jewish liberalism endures, Podhoretz concludes, because turning conservative, in liberal eyes, is nothing short of heresy—or worse, apostasy.
-- Jonathan D. Sarna

Most American Jews, on the other hand, seem to have learned from an early age that to be Jewish is to be a liberal Democrat, no matter what. . . . [T]he loyalty of American Jews to the Left has been unaffected by the failure of the Left to reciprocate that loyalty.
-- Jeff Jacoby

In many cases, Podhoretz notes, left-wing politics took the place of a Judaism that felt to new American immigrants like a business suit on a beach: conspicuous, constraining, ridiculously out of place. . . . On this reading, emotional, facts-be-damned Jewish liberalism is a gravestone marking the death of religious faith.
-- David Gelernter

But my own tentative personal resolution, reached after reading Why Are Jews Liberals?, is this: I'm going to stop worrying about American Jews. They're not worth the headache. Either they’ll come to their senses or they won't, and there's not much I (or anyone else, I suspect) can do about it.
-- William Kristol

For most American Jews, the core of their Jewish identity isn't solidarity with Israel; it's rejection of Christianity. This observation may help to explain the otherwise puzzling political preferences of the Jewish community explored in Norman Podhoretz's book. Jewish voters don't embrace candidates based on their support for the state of Israel as much as they passionately oppose candidates based on their identification with Christianity -- especially the fervent evangelicalism of the dreaded "Christian Right."
-- Michael Medved

The order of the symposiasts has been re-arranged to allow Medved to have the last word for a reason: He's nailed it.

The demonization of the "Religious Right" was a project developed by Norman Lear and others during the Reagan era, after Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority played such a key role in the 1980 election, and this theme has defined the politics of the Democratic Party ever since.

As a political tactic, it is both amazingly effective and fundamentally false. The Republican Party is chiefly devoted to political policies having nothing specifically to do with evangelical Christianity. Yet there is an entire industry of liberal propagandists who specialize in seeking out various outre pronouncements of "Religious Right" leaders and presenting these views as if they would become firm policy in the next Republican administration.

Sophisticates vs. the Benighted
Thus, for the past several years, we were treated to endless liberal jeremiads against "abstinence education," as if the sex-ed curriculum in public schools were the single most important issue in national politics. The propaganda purpose of this liberal campaign was to suggest to people who think of themselves as sexual sophisticates that the GOP is actively promoting ignorance.

If you wish to identify the source of the Republican Party's electoral weakness among under-30 voters, this is it -- even though, as I say, this perception of the GOP as "anti-sex" (or "pro-ignorance") is strictly a function of liberal propaganda. GOP leaders have failed to recognize the damage inflicted by this propaganda, have failed to clarify the policy issues involve and have, at times, unwittingly played to the negative stereotype of Republicans as uptight, repressed, and clueless about sex.

Depicting the "Christian Right" as an especially benighted and menacing component of the Republican Party has, as Medved notes, a particular value in discouraging Jewish Democrats from reconsidering their political loyalties. To any liberal, the conservative is always the Other. But by depicting the GOP as dominated by the "Christian Right," the Otherness of conservatism is effectively doubled -- if not, indeed, magnified exponentially.

Never mind that evangelical Christians are overwhelmingly pro-Israel and philo-Semitic. The liberal propaganda depiction of evangelicals as backward ignoramuses, taking their marching orders from a handful of TV preachers, accomplishes its intended purpose -- to evoke a distinctive cultural revulsion among Jews, and to conjure up nightmare visions of an American Kristallnacht.

Town and Country
This effect is compounded by a factor which, whether or not Podhoretz discusses it in his book, I didn't notice mentioned by the symposiasts, namely the town-and-country divide in American politics. Although the trend to suburbanization has somewhat ameliorated this generalization, most American Jews are fundamentally urban in their orientation, while most American conservatives are fundamentally rural.

Think of Reagan, riding horses and clearning brush at his ranch -- it is an image that appeals to the "country" side of the town-and-country divide, embodying as it does the antique ideal of the American frontier homesteader.

This "rugged individual" ideal, the self-sufficient property owner zealously guarding his freedom, is intrinsic to what American conservatism is all about, and it is an ideal quite alien to the urban lifestyle. The city-dweller is inherently dependent on public services. He doesn't draw his water from a well, doesn't go out with a chain-saw to supply firewood for the winter, doesn't augment the grocery budget by hunting deer or growing his vegetables.

Also, and I think this is an important point, city people can't drive worth crap. A country boy learns to drive by hot-rodding along winding backroads, often well before he's old enough for a license. Because his home is sometimes quite distant from the places where he works, shops or goes to school, the rural youth has typically driven many hundreds of miles before he turns 18.

The rural American's natural love for the internal combustion engine, and his pride in his automotive skill, has a lot to do with his active hatred of environmentalist wienies who want him to limit his fuel consumption by driving a hybrid or -- God forbid -- taking public transportation. "I drive, therefore I am" is the existential truth of the rural American, a truth that the city-dweller can never truly appreciate.

People tend to vote how they live and, despite the particular cultural differences that influence the politics of American Jews, I suspect that lifestyle has a lot to do with the persistence of liberalism in Jewish politics.

If Messrs. Podhorhetz, et al., wish to promote conservatism among American Jews, let them find some way to encourage Jewish families to move to small towns in the Heartland, where their kids can grow up hunting, fishing and hot-rodding the backroads. A guy with a gun rack in the back window of his four-wheel drive truck may occasionally vote Democrat, but he's extremely unlikely to be an out-and-out liberal.

UPDATE 9/10: Oh, for crying out loud, now I've been linked at The New Republic and the New York Times (liberals never link me when I'm bashing RINOs, you might notice). Thanks to this publicity, I suppose that henceforth I shall be known to liberals as The Great Ruralizer.

Meanwhile, I reply to Ron Rosenbaum's Joan-Baez-Made-Me-Do-It defense of liberalism at the Hot Air Green Room. Perhaps this would not be the best place to mention the (strictly hypothetical) scenario of Israel's first Gentile prime minister, but once you poke your thumb in the eye of liberalism, it's usually best to go ahead and use both thumbs.

If anyone named Podhoretz is reading this: You're welcome for the free publicity. The liberals were politely ignoring your symposium, until The Great Ruralizer stirred things up. Feel free to hit the tip jar now.

World's Cutest Child Discovered

In my own backyard!

That's 6-year-old Reagan, a/k/a, "Princess," modeling her fall ensemble. Mrs. Other McCain took the photo below after Reagan fell asleep hugging her stuffed bunny.

And, yes, this is the part where I tell you to hit the tip jar -- it's for the children!

Ruh-roh

China ditching the dollar?

Cheng Siwei, former vice-chairman of the Standing Committee . . . said Beijing was dismayed by the Fed's recourse to "credit easing." . . . "If they keep printing money to buy bonds it will lead to inflation, and after a year or two the dollar will fall hard. Most of our foreign reserves are in US bonds and this is very difficult to change, so we will diversify incremental reserves into euros, yen, and other currencies," he said.

Edward Harrison of RGE Monitor explains:

For months now, the Chinese have signalled growing unease with U.S. monetary policy. And now comes the clearest signal yet that they are moving away from the dollar. . . . The $2 trillion in U.S. dollar reserves the Chinese already have are a sunk cost. Going forward, the Chinese are free to do as they wish with incremental additions to reserves.

Which is to say there is a limit to the willingness of Beijing to keep funding endless deficit spending. If China starts shorting the dollar . . . Oh, this could get ugly.

Expect a lot of public pushback from Geithner and Bernanke, who will emphasize that this one official was not expressing actual policy for Beijing. But I rather doubt the markets will be spun so easily.

Watch gold prices today. Wall Street won't be open until Tuesday, but gold is traded globally 24/7 and that price will tell you whether investors are taking this Chinese official's remark seriously.

Just in case you ever doubtedthat Keith Olbermann is nuts

He's now asking the Daily Kos kooks to help him destroy Glenn Beck and Fox News:

Find everything you can about Glenn Beck, Stu Burguiere, and Roger Ailes. . . . Tuesday we will expand this to the television audience and have a dedicated email address to accept leads, tips, contacts, on Beck, his radio producer Burguiere, and the chief of his tv enablers, Ailes . . .

(Hat tips to Ace of Spades and Howard Portnoy in the Green Room.) Several ironies here:

• Van Jones was a relative minor administration official. It's not like he was Secretary of the Treasury. And yet his resignation -- he wasn't fired, he resigned -- is the casus belli for total war on Beck.
• It's not like Jones was sent to federal prison. (As opposed to Scooter Libby, who took the fall in the Left's PlameGate witch-hunt.) Jones will surely go on to some prestigious big-money job, plus the usual book deal, speaking engagements, etc. His "victimhood" is non-existent.
• Having Olbermann as an enemy is just another feather in Beck's cap.

So, either Olbermann is completely nuts or he's just cynical exploiting the insane rage of the Nutroots. Either way, nothing Olby does can harm Beck, and all this stunt will do is to demonstrate Olby's impotence.

Memeorandum goes nuts for this. The Jones-as-victim meme is also pushed by Alan Colmes, Jane Hamsher, Carl Pope of HuffPo and some left-wing blogger whom I never heard of until Sunday. And the same idea -- Jones victimized by vicious Republicans -- was a favorite theme of network news coverage of Jones' resignation.

The astounding disproportion between the facts -- who Van Jones is and what got him in trouble -- and the Left's perception tells you a lot about what's gone wrong in Hopeville. For all the recent uproar about Joseph Farah and "Birthers," it is the Democratic Party which suffers most from the influence of its extremist supporters.

Jane Hamsher, Alan Colmes, and Keith Olbermann apparently live inside an echo chamber where a man who was a leader of a Marxist outfit like STORM, and who subsequently signed a 9/11 Truther petition, is not legitimately controversial. (The next time Colmes goes on Fox, somebody needs to ask him, "Hey, Alan, do you think Marxism is a bad thing?")

That someone like Jones could be appointed as a White House policy "czar," and that Olbermann can't see where some people might have a problem with that, tends to disprove the worry-wart concerns of certain centrist Republicans that the GOP is the more "extreme" of the two major parties. Does anyone seriously expect an avowed "Birther" to get a White House job in the next Republican administration?

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Given the state of the economy, it's very important that you hit the tip jar before you're bankrupted by the next mortgage meltdown. Now, who's in the mood for some Labor Day gloom-and-doom?

New word: naïvel

Naïvel (adj.):

Comination of naïve + evil. This adjective covers the progression of audience opinion of a speaker from the first state to the second. It is frequently useful in the context of a public figure attempting to sell a steaming pile of nonsense as a reasonable statement. The audience wants to take the speaker at face value, because that is what reasonable people do.

The first thought in the mind of the audience is: "Wow, the guy forced to answer for this event must have been really naïve to buy off on that chain of reasoning in the first place."

That thought fades out with a disquieting aftertaste. Given the probabilistic nature of confidence in anything said by a public figure, the audience moves to a state where:

1. The intelligence required to hold the public office should preclude such naïvete,
2. Therefore, the likelihood of there being more facts to the story is quite high, and the motive for the steaming loaf of nonsense, instead of candor, might be reasonably attributable to sheer evil.

Example:
White House press briefing.
Robert Gibbs: Major?
Fox News Correspondent Major Major Major Major: Given the presumably thorough screening applied to Executive Office positions, how is it possible that Van Jones was hired, considering the amount of blatantly anti-American output the gentleman produced this decade?
Gibbs: Well, we were unaware of any of that.
Major^4: Dude, like, tha' is soo the naïvel, and stuff.


Update:
Linked at Reaganite Republican Resistance.

---

This post is really a shameless attempt to be cool like Morgan Freeberg.

'I felt like taking a shower afterwards'

That's Howard Kurtz, discussing the Vanity Fair interview with Levi "Ricky Hollywood" Johnston, a slimy disgrace to the profession of journalism. Kurtz gets credit from Craig Henry at Lead & Gold.

Not much to add to Jimmie Bise's Van Jones piece

by Smitty

Someone Get Out the Wetnaps, Van Jones Has Resigned, goes Jimmies post, and he rounds things up nicely.

But for a nice chaser, there is Carl Pope at the Huffer: We All Blew It. Now, I don't want to spend time wondering about the relation of the verb and direct object in the title have to do with the end of the last Iowahawk outing.
Pope:

...on Saturday night, Van resigned, and this morning I was sick at heart. Collectively we -- the environmental community, progressives, and the Obama administration -- blew this, and we let our cause, our president, and Van Jones down.

This was a lynch mob and, when it started forming a month ago, we didn't take it seriously enough. When I saw the first Glenn Beck piece on Van Jones and the Apollo Alliance as the new vast left-wing conspiracy, I could not take it seriously. Silence enabled Fox to keep pushing. The statements for which Jones apologized -- the reference to the right as "assholes" and saying that Bush was talking "like a crack-head" were such ordinary political discourse -- think Rahm Emmanuel, think Dick Cheney saying "fuck yourself" to Senator Leahy, think Tom Friedman dubbing Bush "the addict-in-chief" -- that I didn't understand why an apology was necessary; I assumed it would blow over.

I guess it would be an interesting experiment. Maybe Dr. Helen could officiate. Sit a guy like Pope down in a room, and have him go over the facts, and determine just what minimum amount of reality is needed to achieve actual understanding.

The rest of Pope's piece is about the spirited defense of Jones he'd intended to post, before Van ejected, "revved up like a deuce into the roller in the night" as it were. Here is the title:

Breaking News: "George W. Bush Says Americans Are Crack-Heads".

I don't know, maybe it seems less an exercise in Olympic straw-grasping in context. Read his full post, and see if you don't think the premise somewhere between completely unhinged and off-meds-surreal. I, for one, stand awed.

Are You Ready to (Tea) Party?

We're now only six days away from Saturday's big Taxpayer March On D.C. -- are you fired up, people?

This is going to be The Mother Of All Tea Parties, the day that the Washington politicians in both parties finally behold the united power of the grassroots taxpayer uprising against runaway government. The Tea Party Patriots are planning events nationwide Saturday, but if you can make it Washington, you don't want to miss this one -- it's going to be like Woodstock for right-wingers!

Imagine the sheer panic of those corrupt liberals and sold-out RINOs when they see a vast army of thousands of patriotic American citizens-- scores of brilliant yellow Gadsden Flags with their "Don't Tread On Me!" mottos flying proudly in the breeze -- marching on the Capitol!

Ah, friends, but this is going to be much more than just a one-day protest march. The sponsors have scheduled three days of organized activism (see the agenda below) and, more than that, there will be parties every evening so that the friends of freedom can get together to meet, greet and relax.

As a matter of fact, co-blogger Smitty be will hosting one such soiree this week -- SmittyPalooza II is scheduled for Thursday evening. The inaugural SmittyPalooza was an intimate affair, with about a dozen bloggers gathering for refreshments and flesh-time fellowship. This Thursday's event promises to be somewhat larger -- I got a wild hair about 2 a.m. Saturday and invited 94 of my Facebook friends. If you're a blogger or regular reader of The Other McCain who will be in D.C. this week and you're interested in attending SmittyPalooza II, please e-mail Smitty for details.

But wait! There's more! Friday evening, the Young Conservative Coalition and Parcbench will host a "Red, White & Brew" Happy Hour at Capitol City Brewery -- near Union Station, about four blocks from the Capitol. Are you a "Young Conservative"? Hey, age is just a number -- you're invited!

There will be other parties during the week. Lots of celebrities will be in town for this event -- including radio talk-show hosts like my friends Martha Zoller of Atlanta and Doc Thompson of Richmond -- and among my skills as an investigative journalist is an uncanny ability to discover the location of private parties that need to be crashed. So if you're hanging with our posse in D.C. this week, it's guaranteed to be a blast.

So what are you waiting for? Sign-up for the 9/12 March on DC now! Here is the agenda for the week:

Thursday, 9-10

• 9:00am to 12:00pm Liberty Summit at DC Armory
• 1:00pm: Press Conference on Capitol Hill
• 1:30pm to 5:30pm: Grassroots lobbying visits on Capitol Hill
• 5:30pm Doctors Rally Against Socialized Medicine

Friday, 9-11

• 9:00am Leadership Institute: Internet Activist Workshop
• 10:00am – 5:00pm ParentalRights.org Lobbyist and Activism Training Seminars
• 12:00pm to 4:00pm CEI/ARC Intellectual Ammunition Workshop
• 1:00pm Leadership Institute: Grassroots On the Ground Workshop
• 2:00pm to 5:30pm Grassroots lobbying visits on Capitol Hill
• 4:00pm Bureaucrash Happy Hour at Bullfeathers
• 5:00 pm Leadership Institute: Grassroots on the Hill Workshop
• 6:30pm to 10:00pm Remember 911 and support the troops at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
• 8:00am – 11:00pm Sign-Making at the Hyatt Regency on Capitol Hill (400 New Jersey Avenue, NW) Congressional Room B

Saturday, 9-12

• 9:00am Crowd gathers at Freedom Plaza
• 11:30am March on the Capitol Begins down Pennsylvania Ave.
• 1:00pm March ends and Rally Begins at West Front of the U.S. Capitol

Many of these events require registration, so be sure to check the official 9/12 agenda for details. If you haven't already made the decision to join this massive three-day effort to wake up Washington, it's not too late. Whether you can do the whole week or just Saturday's big rally, please come to D.C.for this event -- it's going to be the greatest party ever, and you're invited!

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! Please feel to check out the rest of the site, including my working-over of Keith Olbermann and my various updates on economic news.

And speaking of economics, please hit the tip jar. It's quite literally for the children -- including the World's Cutest Child.

Go, Senator Coburn, go!

by Smitty (h/t Bluegrass Pundit)

I'm nearly in tears. No joke. This guy bears consideration for President, if he's interested, and a straight-ahead draft as POTUS if he's not.

He has more grasp the Constitution, and what this country is really about, than just about anyone else I've heard currently holding public office.

Pelosi endorsing Van Jones

by Smitty (h/t Don Surber)

No guess as to when the Wicked Witch of the West said this, but, as a safety measure, have your barf bag in hot standby for this one:

Maybe San Fran Nan could be John Edwards' next squeeze for Sunsetter Retractable Awnings:

Go Phyllis!

Cynthia Yockey rounds up a brutal punk-smacking that Phyllis Chesler laid on Naomi Wolfe who -- I am not making this up -- defended the burqa as "feminist."

My apologies to Cynthia and Phyllis for not noticing earlier, as I get so wrapped up in my own flame-wars that it's like tunnel vision.

Speaking of flame wars and feminism, Little Miss Attila took womynly offense at Ace of Spades after Ace finally lost patience with LGF's Charles Johnson over the Van Jones controversy. In exasperation, Ace's cri de coeur was: "This is like arguing with a woman of the more irrational sort."

Attila acts outraged, but she knows exactly what Ace is talking about. Any argument between a man and a woman will eventually reach the stage at which the woman's key point is, "You are a bad person for disagreeing with me."

In response, the man's argument becomes, "Why don't you shut your stupid mouth and fix me some biscuits?"

Which was essentially what Ace was saying to Charles.

'Punished with a baby? At your age?'

"That's terrible!"

(Conservative Funhouse via Hot Air Headlines.)

They got the gold mine . . .

Guess who gets the shaft?

Precisely one year ago, we lucky taxpayers took over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the mortgage finance giants that contributed mightily to the wild and crazy home-loan-boom-turned-bust. . . . According to the company’s most recent quarterly financial statement, the Treasury will, by Sept. 30, have handed over $45 billion to shore up the company’s net worth. . . .
As a result of the Fannie takeover, taxpayers are paying millions of dollars in legal defense bills for three top former executives, including Franklin D. Raines, who left the company in late 2004 under accusations of accounting improprieties. From Sept. 6, 2008, to July 21, these legal payments totaled $6.3 million. . . .

Read the rest. Meanwhile, let's talk jobless "recovery":

Many experts envision a jobless recovery, in which the economy grows but job losses persist. . . .
After the government unleashed $787 billion to stimulate economic growth, and after it bailed out financial institutions and the auto industry, the unemployment rate exceeds worst-case projections envisioned by the administration early this year. . . .
If the jobless rate continues to climb, as is widely expected, that could generate pressure for another stimulus spending package. But given intensifying concern about the size of federal budget deficits -- now projected to exceed $9 trillion within a decade -- any new spending could be politically perilous.

And, hey, how's that stimulus workin' for ya?

It was just five months ago that Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. made the New Flyer bus factory [in St. Cloud, Minn.] a symbol of the stimulus. With several cabinet secretaries in tow, he held a town-hall-style meeting at the factory, where he praised the company as "an example of the future" and said that it stood to get more orders for its hybrid electric buses thanks to the $8.4 billion that the stimulus law devotes to mass transit.
But last month, the company that administration officials had pictured as a stimulus success story began laying off 320 people, or 13 percent of its work force . . .

Oh, yes -- the joy of misery!

UPDATE: Now a Memeorandum thread (although omitting me so far).

Looks like Norm got stomped

by Smitty

Via email, Ace of Spades has this clip, with much more background, that is arguably the single most important Town Hall clip EVAR.

Could this clip eventually be as popular as Daniel Hannan flogging Gordon Brown?

Rule 5 Sunday

by Smitty

Rule 5 on a day where, unlike the unemployment numbers, it looks like the slope on the conservative side of the political aisle might be desirable.
It is also desirable to pile on the positive with a post exploring beauty.

• The Daley Gator starts us off with a selection of Suzanne Pleshette.
• HotMES contributes Zooey Deschanel
• The VodkaPundit contributes Sigourney Weaver. We're cool with that. If he plays the Meryl Streep card, well, we'll see.
• Three Beers Later proffers Miranda Lambert. TBL doubles down with with an Aussie fitness vid, mates. He also lays a Trace Adkins with some notable Rule 5-age. Then McEnroe cleaves Celtic, with a Máiréad Nesbitt roundup. Go Gaelic!
• Carrie Prejean aficionado Troglopundit is keeping up with all that luscious legal news. When disengaged from his legal engagements, Troggy finds time to offer PR help to the likes of Megan Fox. Got to keep that cold reptilian blood hot, right? But who knew that Troglodytes were keen on Heavy Armed Women? Troggy remains more fascinating than National Geographic.
• Joshuapundit has some Rule 5 readership. This blog gnashes its teeth with envy.
• Rightofcourse plays the Notre Dame cheerleader card. This is a sensitive issue. As a Naval Academy grad, I'm reaching across the aisle in a big way to show any favor to a bunch of Domers. I do it from a deep bi-partisan spirit, striving to remember that we're all Americans.
• Jeffords seems to have a Kim Kardashian angle. There is the back of a head in the mirror that he failed to disclaim. Connecting the dots is an exercise for the reader.
• Esteemed Minister of Culter, Paco, offers Lena Horne on "Stormy Weather". I'm a big boy. I can admit that this is a far more attractive choice than Howlin' Hobbit on "King of the Road" to describe Van Jones' current employment situation.
• WyBlog's survey of Hard Hat Hotties makes one consider slowing down on the Jersey Turnpike.
• Over at the Camp of the Saints, Bog rounds up Summer pinups. Honor Blackman, and advertises dinner with an outstanding lady, Pamela Geller, whose charm and blog chops really form their own category. We luv huh.
• The Classic Liberal presents Alyssa Jayne Milano amidst a Robert Montgomery essay that you should totally read for the essay. Rule 5 maintains its firm commitment to didactic value, though will fall short of demanding time to address the nation's schoolchildren. That would be creepy.
• William Teach had another of those excellent retro pinups of his at the Pirate's Cove.
• Fishersville Mike insists that Taylor Swift blow you a kiss, which we'll facilitate.

That's your Rule 5 Sunday roundup. Send your fun stuff and cheesecake to Smitty. Ponder the tip jar, and pray for peace.

WHO HIRED VAN JONES?

Now that he's resigned -- thanks for the linky-love, Tim Blair -- we turn to Jennifer Rubin:

"The question remains: how did he get hired?"

Expect Michelle Malkin to follow up on this, but I think she already has the answer from Valerie Jarrett:

Valerie Jarrett took full credit at the nuttroots dKos blogger conference . . . for recruiting him and closely following his career:
"You guys know Van Jones? . . . Oooh. Van Jones, alright! So, Van Jones. We were so delighted to be able to recruit him into the White House. We were watching him, uh, really, he’s not that old, for as long as he’s been active out in Oakland. And all the creative ideas he has. And so now, we have captured that. And we have all that energy in the White House."

Such "creative ideas" and "all that energy"! A Yale Law grad and yet, somehow, a victim of raaaaacism!

Pejman Yousefzadeh throws some show-tune lyrics at Jones. (NTTAWWT.) The Underground Conservative and Right View from the Left Coast give up the linky-love. (NTTAWWT, either.)

UPDATE: As predicted, Michelle Malkin conducts a seminar on how the MSM has ignored and distorted the story about Van Jones.

VAN JONES RESIGNS!

AP NEWS ALERT:

Obama aide Van Jones resigns as environmental adviser amid controversy over past statements.

Remember: 5 A's in "raaaaaacism."

UPDATE: We remind you that John Hinderaker had expected the rap-music angle to be the last straw.

UPDATE II: More AP news via Chicago Tribune: "The White House issued a statement early Sunday saying Jones had quit the administration."

UPDATE III: by Smitty
Since you can't find Don Meredith doing "Turn Out the Lights" on YouTube, how about an obscure dude from Seattle working out on Roger Miller?

UPDATE IV: (RSM) Heavy action on Twitter:

• John Hawkins: "I'll enjoy the sweet salty tears of the Left and their cries of 'Racism! Wingnuts! Rarrrr!' over Van Jones leaving"
• LadyPatriot: "The wheels on Obama's bus go thumpety-thump. Van Jones, you can't trust a guy who throws his grandma & 20yr pastor under the bus!"

Fire Andrea Mitchell is also blogging the resignation.

UPDATE V: WH statement at Washington Post:

"I am resigning my post at the Council on Environmental Quality, effective today," Jones said in a resignation letter released by the CEQ late Saturday.
"On the eve of historic fights for health care and clean energy, opponents of reform have mounted a vicious smear campaign against me. They are using lies and distortions to distract and divide," he said.
"I have been inundated with calls -- from across the political spectrum -- urging me to 'stay and fight,'" he continued. "But I came here to fight for others, not for myself. I cannot in good conscience ask my colleagues to expend precious time and energy defending or explaining my past. We need all hands on deck, fighting for the future.
"It has been a great honor to serve my country and my President in this capacity. I thank everyone who has offered support and encouragement. I am proud to have been able to make a contribution to the clean energy future. I will continue to do so, in the months and years ahead."

UPDATE VI: David Horowitz at NewsReal says Valerie Jarrett should go, too:

The Obama Administration -- the Soros network and the Apollo Alliance -- are revealed to their rotten core here. This was their protege and only an idiot . . . would not be able to see what’s going on here.

UPDATE VII: Wlady at the The American Spectator cites the Wall Street Journal -- when I had it 20 minutes earlier! A blogger gets no respect, no respect at all, I tell ya . . .

Now a Memeorandum thread. Our claim to exclusivity? Thanks to Smitty, we're the only blog to react to this news with video of some dude strumming a ukelele and singing "King of the Road."

UPDATE VIII: You gotta love the L.A. Times:

Van Jones, the onetime Marxist whose controversial statements about Republicans and 9/11 have made him a distracting lightning rod as Barack Obama's environmental czar in recent days, resigned tonight.

That "onetime Marxist" is classic. As if, sometime in the interval, Jones had an epiphany on the Road to Damascus: "Hayek! Mises! Friedman! We must deregulate! Cut taxes!"

Fox News now has a story, and a Red State blogger observes:

Interesting time to be turning in one's resignation - midnight Saturday night, on a holiday weekend. I guess this gives the MSM a chance to not report it again.

Of course, while the MSM ignored the "controversy," they'll be all over the resignation as proof of the viciousness of right-wingers.

UPDATE IX: Predictable reaction at DailyKos:

Van Jones: A "High-Tech Lynching"

Yeah, I'm sure George Allen is heartbroken about this. Understatement of the decade from Ed Driscoll:

[S]omething tells me that Glenn Beck is going to have reasonably good ratings on Monday.

Gee, ya think? Ed quotes Andy Levy's Twitter:

"Won't it be weird when people who don't get their news from the internet or FNC have no idea who the guy who resigned is?"

Read the whole thing -- a really solid aggregation by Mr. Driscoll. Well, I've done enough for one Sunday morning. Alabama beat Virginia Tech, Van Jones resigned, and all is right with the world.

Pelosi leadership course: punt

by Smitty (h/t Huffer)

Politico explores the Wicked Witch of the West's non-command of leadership. The vacuum of the day is Charlie "Tax Laws are for the Wee Folk" Rangel. Summarizing and paraphrasing, leadership in his case would entail:

• Stripping [him] of his chairmanship of...Ways and Means...would force Pelosi to make a series of unpalatable decisions about Rangel’s successor.
• Those decisions would create a ruckus in the Democratic caucus.
• They would infuriate the Congressional Black Caucus...still sore over Pelosi's decision to strip committees from former Louisiana Rep. Bill Jefferson.
• Distract from the task of ignoring the Constitution to wage the health care battle.
• Require Nancy actually to talk to Charlie about the several hundred large (k$) that accidentally didn't get reported to the IRS..

Read this Politico quote slowly, so that the laughter doesn't trigger a seizure when it hits:

Rangel's troubles, coupled with the equally embarrassing ethics problems of another Pelosi-allied Old Bull, Rep. Jack Murtha (D-Penn.), could damage the Democratic brand in the midterms.

Politico discusses the pack of winners from among whom Pelosi would choose a successor. How baked this country truly is. Then there is this unintentionally funny bit:

The ethics panel has already spent a year peering into Rangel's use of several rent-stabilized apartments in a luxury Harlem apartment complex, his failure to pay all taxes on a Dominican Republic vacation villa, and his use of Congressional letterhead to raise funds for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at City College in New York City.

Probably apocryphal paragraph found commented out in the HTML of the article:

Peering into Rangel's usage of these assets involved a studious commitment to wild partying, hookers, booze, and of course, accepting campaign contributions from the subject of the investigation, but the corrupt Mike Foxtrots on the ethics panel had copious experience in these matters, and performed admirably.

Back to the published article:

The committee recently broadened the investigation to include Caribbean trips taken by Rangel and four other lawmakers to determine if they complied with a ban on corporate-funded travel.

That pesky writer who'd been commented out had then elaborated:

Investigators, seeing a hole on the schedule, called up some corporate donors to help fund their own junket, in the name of investigating compliance. They used the clever ploy of asserting the opposite of the truth, i.e. that their junket was testing the *snort* ban on corporate-funded travel *snort* as a means of insulating themselves. Who, short of a Right Wing Extremist Terrorist, would even dare to make a raaaaacist assertion of foul play? Only Republicans do evil things, you know.

So, what should they do, in light of the fact that the House can police itself, per the Constitution, and that there reasonably needs to be a committee with a chair to Get Things Done?

If they screwed up and left me in charge, I'd do two things that would have immediate, profound and positive impact:

1. Make the chair rotate every six months, in the manner of a good Navy watch.
2. Make the chair appointments random

Nothing keeps one ethical and above reproach like knowing you haven't got the ball for long, and not knowing who's to follow. Lowering the cash pressure on the committee by returning power to States would also trim the moral hazard.

If "We the People" don't begin to demand no-nonsense reform along these lines from those who purportedly work for us in DC, then our milkshake of liberty will be drunk by another.

For now, we have a sad lack of leadership. This is probably the result of the fact that the overwhelming majority of elected officials are lawyers, and mistake advanced verbal gymnastics for leadership.

Update:
WizBang is also covering this.

Who needs more gloom and doom?

Always happy to keep you miserable!

The nearly 15 million unemployed Americans won't enjoy Labor Day as a relaxing respite from work. . . .
As the jobless rate nears 10 percent, even those fortunate enough to be employed fret about keeping their jobs. But for those without them, it's a daily struggle with emotional and economic distress.
"It's hard to maintain your focus that you're a valuable member of society when you go three months and nobody really wants to employ you," says David O'Bryan, 59, of Barre, Vt. . . .
The nation's jobless rate jumped to a 26-year high of 9.7 percent in August from 9.4 percent in July. It's expected to top 10 percent this year and keep climbing into part of next year before falling back. The post-World War II high was 10.8 percent at the end of 1982.
And it could take four years or more for the unemployment rate to fall back down to a normal level of about 5 percent. . . .

You know who loves him some gloom and doom? Instapundit:

• Obama's job-killing "stimulus"!
• The deficits are coming!

We scour the globe in search of more gloom . . . bank failures! construction loans in trouble! FDIC underfunded! "God help us"!

Ahhhh . . . The joy of misery!

GOP In Denial clip

by Smitty

The clip is good, in and of itself. If you care to follow the link, the GOP policies are available in a nice list.

This will not do.

The country is staring at the threat of a future tyranny. Not to engage in hyperbole on BHO, but the real issues aren't the genius who won the election. The real issues are the centralization of power. The permanent political class. The deficit. The debt.

So, if you haven't told me how we're decentralizing, GOP, you haven't told me much.

'God Help Us'

So says Blue Crab Boulevard, surveying the catastrophic effects of Obamanomics. And that was before he learned of The Mother Of All Bailouts.

The O'Biden Happy Talk about the magical wonders of "stimulus" continues to deceive much of the MSM -- it's all unicorns and rainbows and "recovery," as far as they know -- but the financial press can't ignore the evidence of impending crisis.

One thing NTCNews.com has focused on is aggregating financial and economic news, which has required me to scour over Google Business News and other sources. Is the DJIA up or down? What about Treasury notes? Gold? Oil? Currencies? Banking? Housing? Employment?

Thursday, the stock market broke a 4-day slide, and gained again on Friday, after the much-anticipated August jobs report showed unemployment had risen to 9.7%. The average person sees these two facts -- jobs down, market up -- and asks, "How on earth is 9.7% unemployment good news?"

Beats me. If I could figure out the stock market, I'd be rich. Instead, I'm a blogger. However, facts are facts. Since peaking at 14,034.39 on Oct. 9, 2007, the DJIA has lost 4,593.12 points. Even though the Dow has bounced up some 3,000 points since bottoming out in March, we're still talking about a net loss of 32.7% in less than two years.

Combine that with the meltdown in housing prices, and it represents a massive devastation of asset-value, an economic cataclysm of historic proportions.

Now, consider that we are less than two years away from 2001, when the oldest of the Baby Boomers, born in early 1946, turn 65. Their retirement funds have been diminished by the stock-market collapse, and if they had planned to cash out the equity in their homes . . . Well, good luck with that plan.

Beginning in 2011, then, an increasing number of Baby Boomers will undergo the transition from taxpayers to tax consumers, eligible for Social Security and MediCare, a fiscal drain on the economy. Only by dipping into what remains of their asset value -- selling their homes or other valuables, spending out their IRAs, 401(k)s and other retirement funds -- will this exploding population of retirees be able to live above the minimum level provided by the government.

Without getting into a lot of complicated analysis (e.g., the growth-killing impact of just about anything the federal government might do to meet the looming fiscal crisis), the ordinary person with a minimal level of economic education who looks at this situation can only conclude: We're completely screwed.

Which is why, as I scour the financial news, I keep an eye out for omens and portents of the inevitable apocalypse, such as these items aggregated at NTCNews.com the past week:

Are We Facing a Banking Crisis? Is the Gold Price About to Explode?
-- Market Oracle, Aug. 31

"Oil prices fell to near $71 a barrel Monday as China's stock market tumbled and commodities investors questioned whether the U.S. economy can recover strongly in the second half."
-- Associated Press, Aug. 31

"AIG fell 17% after Sanford C. Bernstein dropped the stock to 'underperform,' on concerns that Washington will pull back on financial assistance as AIG recovers. The firm is still on the hook for $80 billion in federal loans . . ."
-- Forbes, Sept. 1

"The American economy will suffer 'a long time' as a result of last year's federal bailout of the financial industry, according to Johan Norberg, author of a new book about the policies that caused the banking meltdown. . . . 'The bailouts . . . the debts -- we won't be able to pay them back. We're going to pay for it for a long time . . .' "
-- The American Spectator, Sept. 2

"FDIC head Sheila Bair told CNBC Tuesday evening that commercial real estate loans remain a "looming problem" for banks' balance sheets and she expects the area to increasingly be a driver for bank failures during the remainder of this year and 2010 . . ."
-- Reuters, Sept. 2

"U.S. banks are holding more than $1 trillion of mortgages backed by commercial property that is fast losing value."
-- Wall Street Journal, Sept. 2

" 'Most participants saw the economy as likely to recover only slowly during the second half of this year, and all saw it as still vulnerable to adverse shocks,' the Fed said in today’s minutes. 'Labor market conditions remained of particular concern to meeting participants . . .' "
-- Bloomberg News, Sept. 2

"Gold prices reached their highest point in nearly three months as the U.S. dollar weakened and participants bought in a flight-to-quality bid based on economic uncertainty and concerns about the stock market . . ."
-- Wall Street Journal, Sept. 2

"Treasurys fell Thursday, sending yields higher, as stocks edged up and the U.S. government said it planned to sell $70 billion in Treasury bonds and notes next week."
-- MarketWatch, Sept. 3

UNEMPLOYMENT REACHES 9.7%
-- NTCNews.com, Sept. 4

"Tony Crescenzi, a market strategist and portfolio manager at Pacific Investment Management Co., manager of the world’s biggest bond fund, said the U.S. faces a slow recovery because unemployment is persisting . . . 'The key ingredient for a sustainable recovery is still absent,' Crescenzi said today in an interview on Bloomberg Radio. 'We need income growth to produce self-reinforcing expansion. . . . The duration of unemployment will be longer and will put downward pressure on wages.'"
-- Bloomberg News, Sept. 4

"Congress passed the Cash for Clunkers program in order to increase automobile employment and save jobs. . . . The employment report shows that -- despite the Cash for Clunkers craze, and the $2 billion Congress added to the program at the end of July -- motor vehicles and parts manufactures shed 15,000 jobs in August. That erased half of the jobs gained in July and continued the yearlong downward trend . . ."
-- Heritage Foundation, Sept. 4

FEDS SHUT DOWN 5 BANKS
-- NTCNews.com, Sept. 5

Given the serious underlying problems of the economy -- "The Fundamentals Still Suck," as I explained in May -- no amount of unicorns-and-rainbows "recovery" talk from the administration and its MSM sock-puppets can avert the inevitable consequences.

So NTCNews.com keeps an eye on the economy and readers who appreciate this service -- you can subscribe to the RSS feed in Google, Atom, etc., to get the latest updates -- are invited to support this project by hitting the tip jar.

"The revolution will not be televised, but the apocalypse will be blogged."

Tort reform pussy in smug repose

by Smitty (h/t Miss Cellania)

Would that the rest of the stinking federal over-reach, too, was off the table.
Oh, well. Back to beavering my way through my Google Reader.

Update:
Getting the Little Miss Attila 'lanch. Thanks, LMA!

Department of Perverse Incentives

by Smitty

Brigette of the Moralia blog calls attention to a post of hers over at the New Mexico Independent, entitled "They’re Uncle Sam’s kids now — he paid for them".

The gist of the article is that once the government is picking up the tab for everything, it gets to dictate the terms. If a school or daycare or other service is funded to provide X service for Y children, then it is going to do exactly that. Doing more or doing less is a violation of regulations.

The general problem at work is that the means become ends unto themselves. Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy, if you will.

Now, if there was an alternative, it would not be so evil. Yet, this is your government: it has a monopoly power to extract as much treasure from you as desired to fund these services. And yet, the words "Federal dollars" are tossed about with such abandon that they seem to come from some Cosmic Credit Card, and not ultimately the people.

It's as though the Marxists, realizing they could not achieve their utopia through a head-on revolution, are oozing it under the door with gradual increases in federal control and intrusion into life. Sold beautifully, one must admit, in the name of some nebulous 'fairness', and combating an equally indistinct raaaaacism.

Training you to be subservient to a school at the expense of the family is a part of destroying the family. Picking up on these details, of course, marks us as reactionaries. I say, "So be it, not Soviet." It's Federalism or bust:

Frontin' Muh'man Jones: Royally Aggravatin'

by Smitty

This week's Full Metal Jacket Reach Around promises to be a doozy. One may have thought a vacationing POTUS would bring a respite from the shenanigans. But no, the forecast looks like weirdness to the last FMJRA-ing minute.

Van Jones
I have invested years of my life supporting your Constitutional right to mis-characterize and malign our country, Mr. Jones. You're welcome.

• Chance, at Rightofcourse: "Van Jones is not the problem. Van Jones is merely a symptom of the disease."
• The Daley Gator doesn't mean to make a fuss.
• Carolyn Tackett linked the HR3226 post with the truther announcement.
• Ruby Slippers embeds the 17 Month Old Van Jones clip where he says he wants a revolutions. Weh-ell yah know, we'll be having none of his.

Caribou Sperm Donor
After the left is done using you like a chamber pot, Levi, you can commiserate with Cindy Sheehan.

• Lance Burri is concerned about Stacy McCain's speedo dominance from all this. Not too concerned, mind you. Just concerned.
• Credit Beck and Malkin if Jones is driven off in a van, says All American Blogger.
• Jazz Shaw strives mightily to make Levi Johnston matter. Bronze medal for jazz, ass-hat stays on Levi. I'm not budging.
• Caffeinated Thoughts considers some of Stacy's words for Levi to be 'strong'. Not Stacy. It's so out of character.
• Dan Riehl, as can be expected, jumps to Levi's defense. Oh, wait, Dan jumped behind the firing line. Pardon me.

ChicagoUS Annenberg Challenge

• Adrienne's Catholic Corner quotes Gibbs: Furor over Obama's speech 'silly season'. And they're bringing out the race card again, too. It's a testament to Hoyle that the card has stood up to such repeated usage.
• Obi's Sister rounded up coverage.
• A Conservative Shemale takes the speech at face value, and doesn't quite understand the fuss.
• Adrienne's Catholic Corner:

  I don't know which is worse, having Obama in Washington wreaking financial havoc on our country and imposing his Marxist agenda, or having him on one of his multitude of vacations dreaming up new mayhem.
  
  We have become a nation of abused children. When things are quiet, we wait in dread of the next announcement from Washington, just as children of alcoholics wait for mom or dad to start drinking and whipping their butts for no reason other than to soothe their drunken rage.

  She also likes us here. here and here.
• Rightofcourse links us, complete with handy Orwellian graphic.
• Obi's Sister has a less pleasant choice of graphic in her roundup.

The Thaddeus McCotter Fan Club

• The Daley Gator knows who I'm talking about.

Seeing the Lefty Big Picture

• Bob Belvedere offers a playful take.
• The Classic Liberal has a large, expansive roundup mapping some of the strategies. Some.
• The Rhetorican picked up the Python clip. Rhetorican also gives us a mention on the Domestic Right-Wing Terrorists topic. But we really used nothing heavier than a loud guffaw, honest.
• Teach at Stop The ACLU had the Right-Wing Domestic Terrorists action. After all, that whole thing worked so well for Janet Napolitano, no?
• A Conservative Shemale makes an interesting point about the tension level in politics:

  It’s the same mistake that Republicans made in 1996 with the budget showdown only in reverse. In 1996 it kept Clinton’s popularity up and helped keep him in office, now it is driving Obama’s popularity down and may help drive democrats from office.

• Paco thinks Organizing for America is more easily understood as Antagonizing Americans. With bonus Shakespearean insult generator.

Seeing the Righty, Small, Friendly Fire Incident Picture
Look: shun the birthers and every other peripheral, no-value added argument out there. Tell me my broken record Federalist arguments are stupid if you think so. I think it's the Alinsky Rule #4 suppository the left secretly craves, at a medium pace. The point isn't that we disagree. The point is that, faced with disagreement, we listen to each other! Humbly! And, as adults do, learn how to avoid serving the enemy by dissent when we absolutely, positively cannot reconcile a point.

• Bob Belvedere offers an overview.
• Dan Riehl calls for common sense.
• Lead and Gold and the Urge to Purge.
• Daily Pundit:

  And Stacy has the right of it here. The blunt truth is that unless the intellectuals are able to mobilize the grassroots, all their plans and hopes are for naught.

• Political Byline's take:

  Robert Stacey McCain basically agrees with me about WND and the Birthers. Now McCain and Palin are another story. He loves that feckless Woman. I, on the other hand, think that she is an idiot.

  It is, sadly, true. I did detect a flaw in Sarah's derivation of the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus. No, that didn't happen.
• Kathy Shaidle directed snark at a certain Mr. Frum.
• Lead and Gold calls the bluff of Mr. Brooks on Edmund Burke:

  Detailed explanations might be uncomfortable. It is pretty hard to reconcile Burke's principles with Obama’s actions. At the core of Burkean conservatism is a rejection of , even revulsion for, the grand plans of ambitious intellectuals who wield power.

• In 2010 race news, Right View from the Left Coast endorses Assemblyman Chuck DeVore, and hoists a 74% figure for the number of Republicans that, (my phrasing) think the NRSC couldn't lead two nuns in one minute of silent prayer.
• Western Experience linked the C-130 call for Mr. Will.
• Joshuapundit listed us amongst other interesting headlines.
• Dustbury honed in on the Marlboro Reds angle of the Brooks flogging.
• Dyspepsia Generation thinks Stacy is having a lot of fun.
• Axis of Right comes out as a Brooks fan. Except for the part of his thought they hated. Which was pretty much all of it.
• Bonzai doesn't understand the moderates, but makes a gallant effort.
• Another Black Conservative juxtaposed Carrie Prejean with David Brooks. Brooks wins the estrogen war.
• Liberalsmash rounds us up in appreciation for Brooks flogging.
• Lead and Gold linked us in "The Astonishing Mr. Brooks."
• Dan Riehl engaged in a casual flogging of Conor Friedersdorf. You know how a bored cat will play with a mouse. Kinda like that.
• Jimmie Bise took up the fashion angle.
• Paco: David Brooks is a Conservative in the Same Way that I am a Marxist. Let me guess: you both speak Engels? Ba-dump bump *crash*. Paco will flog me for that, no doubt.
• Dustbury picks up the Marlboros.
• Fishersville Mike thinks Frum needs some education.
• Bob Belvedere: Brain Bleach Stat!, hammering Brooks. Also, a combination linkage of Batchelor and Friedersdorf.
• Carolyn Tackett didn't hesitate to embed it the Batchelor portrait.
• The Daley Gator talks about education beyond one's hat size.

Did You Make Your Town Hall?

• Jimmie Bise did. But this is not him in the clip. But this is him with a bunch of pictures and an excellent write-up.

The Mercurial Peter Stark an Iron Man is Not

• Roth & Co. clue us in on a key point: "Ever wonder why the House leadership is reluctant to depose the embarrassing Charlie Rangel as Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee? Because Fortney "Pete" Stark is next in line for the job."
• Brigette at Moralia has done the research and confirms that Stark has an MBA. We're still awaiting a report on what sort of car he drives, and the psychological implications thereof. Speculate in the comments.
• The Lonely Conservative says that the Stark clip is a few years old. Hmm. I thought it recent.
• The Rude News says Stark is 77. Retire, Representative Stark. What do you have to fear? Your personality?

Beck Under Siege

• Chris Barna serves up some lefty moral equivalence for Beck. I guess perhaps if you're a lefty, you can see how murder would be a laughing matter. But he didn't pick up my irony of nominating Beck for a Senate seat, based upon the joke. Where is the love, Mr. Barna?
• Rhetorican seems to think the whole thing actionable.

Silly Conehead

• Stacy tries to link the Conservative Shemale blog, makes a type, and gets hammered by Little Miss Attila. I'd embed "Jack and Diane" for its chorus, if Mellencamp wasn't so irritating.

Honduras

• There was an exchange of links with the Sundries Shack. Grrr, what a creepy situation, Honduras.

The Digital Age

• Moralia Blog had its finger on the pulse of some really bad jokes.

Norberg: Financial Fiasco

• Obi's Sister links the Norberg book post, and asks if the election has been worth it. I've got the book, but haven't read it yet.
• Jimmi links us, too. he says:

  the TARP program quickly mutated from a way of buying and holding trash financial assets until they were not quite so trashy into a cash giveaway to banks, car companies, and anyone else Democrats felt needed a few bucks

Re-framing 9/11 Into Something More in Keeping with the Current Policy of Cretinism
Forget the White House nonsense. Support Project 2,996

• Pat in Shreveport has the definitive smack-down.

Cultural Apocalypse

• Word Around the Net is just as dubious as this blog about sexually active grade-schoolers.
• Rightofcourse included the cultural apocalypse watch in a roundup.
• Papa Todd went with the REM title.
• Clayton Cramer has the manufacturers response to the Gizmodo doll.
• Pundit and Pundette picked up the doll, metaphorically threw it.
• Jimmie tries to spell decency, swears off the project.
• Stripper Mom doesn't see the problem. Stripper Mom doesn't see the problem. Stri...
• Carolyn Tackett was rendered ill at the thought. That's why we need healthcare insurance wealth redistribution in such a big way.
• The rare and coveted Michelle Malkin link. May fortune favor this fighter of the good fight.
• Cranky Con calls it our hurried flight into Gomorrah
• Teach at Stop the ACLU calls it absolutely sickening.
• Fishersville Mike is glad he has boys. You don't even know what hopey-change toys await them, Mike.
• Belevedere asks: another sign?

A Dead Senator Who Keeps Bobbing Up, the Way a Poor Woman Didn't

• snaggletoothie of the Loyal Opposition went over some TK facts new to him.
• Caffeinated Thoughts on Mary Jo: A Victim, Not a Martyr or Punch Line. Sorry, people are only victims if the left says they are victims.
• Linked by Pundit and Pundette who were mainly commenting on Breitbart's teary-eyed remorse over the loss of Camel Snot. Without the tears. Or the remorse.
• Western Experience summarized nicely.
• Troggy rounded up a few more TK links, including our one-liner outing. Hint: if you want respect in death, it helps to earn it in life.
• All American Blogger noted the love of Chappaquiddick humor.
• Lead and Gold suggests Matt Cooper may want to beg off reading some of the Ted Kennedy work this blog has fearlessly published.
• Instapundit picked up the Matt Cooper slam.
• VodkaPundit liked the Chappaquiddick one-liners.

The Chelsea Clinton Bit

• Tigerhawk went with the father-in-law angle.

The Kill Switch Amendment Idea

• A Conservative Shemale likes the idea, but thinks there may be some issues. In response, I wouldn't accuse the original forumalation as being final. Senators, if flagged for no-run, could have that lifted by membership in a subsequent passing Congress. I'd rather see the 17th Amendment scuttled, anyway, and return Senators to representing the 50 States, who've become rather a permanent political class this last century--decidedly not the Framer's intent.

The Shears of All Fears

• Rolling Doughnut (a blog irresistable to a Surface Warfare Officer) offers a critical review of the circumcision post.

The Watson Thrashing
How is it that you can criticize a female politician without howls of sexism, yet you can't criticize a minority member of the Executive Branch for being a Commie without charges of raaaaacism?

• Carolyn Tackett picks up the hammering of Rep. Diane Watson.
• Adrienne's Catholic Corner admires the post, too.
• Rhetorican linked us, briefly.

The Most Famous Finger in America

• The Camp of the Saints summarizes.
• "Health care reform bites", says Fishersville Mike, pointing the finger at us.

Miscellaneous Shouts

• Valley of the Shadow links us while comparing two goth clubs in LA. "Bar Sinister in Hollywood and Malediction in Korea Town. How do these clubs define the style of political campaigns? Look deeper." You don't see the obvious connection? Peasant. ;)
• We're starting to grow on the Bride of Rove, probably the most visually stunning blog I've seen in some time.
• Public Secrets linked the finish the sentence game.
• Instapundit picks up the economic gloom.
• Steynian links us, but if I try to discover where, I'll never finish this. That guy's a nut.
• Lonely Conservative linked us on the Afghan Embassy kerfluffle:

  ...if all of this frat boy behavior was occurring while on duty, why did the State Department renew their contract? Could it be that this sort of thing happens in Washington, DC and Massachussetts all the time and is considered normal, as RS McCain subtely points out?

• Anti-Republican culture mentions us in a survey piece about, well, anti-Republican culture. Highly interesting and worthy of attention.
• The Classic Liberal lifted granny from the garage sale post.
• A Conservative Shemale has a roundup and links us on economic news. Two concepts: national debt, and deficit. Unless Pete Stark is as smart as his behavior is overbearing, we're in a Grand Canyon of debt. ACS also linked us on Rule 5 Sunday last week, amidst a New York Times meditation.
• Ruby Slippers did their FMRJA.
• The Daley Gator liked the pig wresling post amidst a sizeable roundup.
• Little Miss Attila gives VodkaPudit an 'attilla-boy', slamming me en passant. Yet I'm still slavishly devoted to her blog. *sigh*
• VodkaPundit says Stacy has the last word on primary education.
• Troglopundit has the temerity to notice OediPOTUS Wrecks. *weeps* Thank you.
• And there is a dash of Rule 5 as well as a roundup from The Camp of the Saints
• Here is a really interesting post on unions in general, and Oregaon's in particular, from Word Around the Net. Take it from an old squid: a union is a mutiny awaiting its moment. These days, they're scaling it up to a mutiny against the Constitution.

Apologies in advance if this was so big it required a browser upgrade to load. There is some time involved in prepping this post, yes. Mostly I do this in lieu of a diary, as I will one day look over these posting "just to try and recall the whole year". Insights, questions go to Smitty. Ponder the tip jar, ye scalawags.