It's "Zombie Preparedness Month" in Kansas

“If you’re prepared for zombies, you’re prepared for anything” is the theme behind the zombie apocalypse preparedness campaign.

We discovered this interesting fact while reading Bud Norman's great blog.  He also notes that with the introduction of the Ebola virus into the US:

The extraordinary amount of press coverage devoted to the disease has already revealed several instances where themost up-to-date protocols for dealing with the disease with have not been followed, including an unpleasant account theinfected patient’s vomit being cleaned off a sidewalk by power hoses that no doubt sent dangerous bacteria flying off into the atmosphere, and one shudders to think what mistakes might come next. So far as we can tell the government decided not restrict flights from infected countries partly because that had been a Bush administration idea, and partly because it was thought that discriminating on the basis of a deadly disease might offend African sensibilities. Such pointless political considerations are likely to override medical necessity again in the coming days, if the government’s recent history of border security and presidential security are any guide, it does not inspire confidence.

Also that it's all the fault of white people out to kill black people.  Black Leader "Calypso" Louis Farrakhan is telling Obama voters that this nefarious plot was .. well, you can read it here:

The situation has already prompted the survivalists to take precautions beyond their usual paranoid preparedness, and the Nation of Islam’s Louis Farrakhan is predictably blaming it all on a white supremacist conspiracy to kill black people which is currently being carried out by the first black president, although it was apparently launched at some nonexistent point in history when Henry Kissinger was serving as Secretary of State to President George H.W. Bush, but we’re remaining relatively calm. We’re counting on those reportedly low transmissions rates, though, and not the government. There have been strange accounts of Ebola victims awakening from the dead, and we note proudly that this is  “Zombie Apocalypse Preparedness Month” here in Kansas, but otherwise the government doesn't seem ready for the coming challenges.

The Keystone Cops are running America, or could it be "Evil Clowns?"

Justice corrupted

Daniel Henninger begins his piece on Eric Holder thusly:

History will ill-serve Eric Holder if it does no more than echo the view common in the wake of his resignation that his tenure as Attorney General was "controversial." Mr. Holder's more than five years as the nation's chief legal officer were consequential.

In tandem with Barack Obama 's White House, Mr. Holder pushed the authority of the federal government and its administrative agencies beyond the edge of the Constitution and law. They did so not in one or several controversial instances, as with past presidencies, but repeatedly and across the breadth of the federal government.

Holder’s official duties are to be the country’s chief law enforcement officer. In reality he was Obama’s “enforcer.” He was there to give a legal gloss to what Obama wanted done. In many cases what Obama wanted Holder to do was nothing.  To hold the line, to hide the truth, to obstruct justice.  He was the goalie past whom no investigation of corruption or malfeasance was allowed to pass. He was Obama’s “stone wall.”

But he had help in what he did: the Democrats in Congress. When the cover-up surrounding the Watergate break-in was revealed, members of Richard Nixon’s own party went to the White House to tell the President that he should resign or face impeachment. These men put the country ahead of their party. Nixon, rather than fight impeachment in the House and a trial in the Senate, resigned, sparing the country much trauma and a Constitutional crisis. There is reason to think that Nixon could have taken the route that Clinton did years later, with the same effect. The Republicans who went to the White House to confront Nixon - the Republican Senate and House leadership - also understood their critical responsibilities assigned to them by the Constitution.  They were the checks and balances.  Congress was there not just to make laws but to make sure that the President did not overstep his bounds.  They viewed Congress as a separate and co-equal branch of government, transcending party loyalty. The Senate under the leadership of Democrat Harry Reid is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Obama administration. Without Reid and Pelosi, Holder could not hold the line. It is inconceivable that any action by Obama could cause a Democrat revolt. To take an extreme example, can anyone see Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi confronting Obama if he would announce that, because of a national emergency, the election of 2016 will be postponed indefinitely?

The comparison of Obama to Nixon is apt because both Presidents committed unconstitutional acts. But only one paid a price for it. Compare Eric Holder to John Mitchell, Nixon’s Attorney General. Because Mitchell aided Nixon in attempting to cover up Watergate he was indicted and sent to prison. Unless there is a dramatic change of attitude by Democrats in Congress, Holder will never be held to account for helping Obama obstruct justice in, for example, the IRS scandal or Fast & Furious. I put the onus on Democrats because it is difficult to imagine Republican leaders such as John Boehner or Mitch McConnell having the will or courage to stand up against the Democrats or (in Glenn Reynolds' memorable phrase) the "Democrats with bylines" in the media.

When you realize that the thing that separates us from a South American caudillo-style government is not the constitution, but lethargy on the part of the President, you become worried about the future.

EBOLA PATIENT HAD CONTACT WITH SCHOOL-AGE CHILDREN

Authorities say five students who had contact with a man diagnosed with Ebola in Dallas are being monitored but are showing no symptoms of the disease.

Didn't Obama promise us we had nothing to worry about? Of course he also promised us we could keep our doctor and the insure plan we liked and our premiums would go down $2500.

How's that HopeN'change working out for you?

Secret Service Director Resigns

According to the Lying Times

Julia Pierson, the director of the Secret Service, is resigning in the wake of several security breaches.

The resignation came less than a day after lawmakers from both parties assailed Ms. Pierson’s leadership and said they feared for the lives of the president and others in the protection of the agency.

I'm sure Barack Obama will give her a grand send-off speech.

Lefties tend to want their opponents dead or in jail. Naturally, they assume their opponents feel the same way about them.

Glenn Reynolds (Instapundit)

WELL, AFTER ALL THOSE YEARS OF BUSH ASSASSINATION-FANTASIES BY THE LEFT, YOU CAN SEE WHY THEY’D BE PUZZLED: New York Times: Say, Why Don’t Republicans Want President Obama To Be Killed? “Of course we want the president to be safe. Those who are surprised by this perhaps need to spend some more time with their ideological opponents, or — and this will be harder, I grant — spend a little more time examining what it is about their ideology that led them to conflate political opposition and violence in the first instance.”

Mary Landrieu

I, me, my. It's their fault.

Ron Fournier @ron_fournier · Sep 28

I, me, my. It's their fault. I, me, my. It's their fault. I, me, my. It's their fault. I, me, my. It's their fault. I, me, my ...

Obama's wars are cool.

Al Qaeda-linked militants in Yemen fire rocket towards U.S. embassy

And this is Obama's idea of success.

One wonders how bad it has to get before he admits failure.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the Master Race

Molly Hemingway:

I get that Ruth Bader Ginsburg is one of the most important champions of abortion and that those people who think people should be able to end some lives after they’ve begun just love her to pieces. And I get that the birth control and abortion rights movements have always had deep ties to eugenics, population control, and master race-type stuff. I get all that.

But it’s all kind of unseemly, no? It would be one thing if she were talking about the importance of promoting birth among all groups of people as a way of affirming the sacredness of life or what not, but her long-standing focus on how some “populations” shouldn’t be encouraged to have babies and should have subsidized abortion is beyond creepy. We get it, RBG, your social circles think life would be so much better if you didn’t have to deal with those awful poor people and their unapproved backgrounds and living conditions. But you’re supposed to be a tad bit better in covering up those motivations, mmmkay?

Wonder why Molly thinks that RBG prefers the master race? In her own words:

Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of.

Go kill yourself

It all starts with a discussion of what you see as your personal preference. Then some reasons why it should be a general preference. Then it’s published as a thumb sucker in a publication read by movers and shakers. Denial, of course, that it’s a policy prescription designed for the general public. And heaven forbid that it should become government policy. But for Zeke Emanuel, famed atheist, and architect of ObamaCare, Soylent Green is not a dystopian movie but a really neat Final Solution to the financial problems of government funded health care.  Death Panels will be known as SeniorCare brought to you by those lovable Liberals who are looking out for you.

Bud Norman has some further thoughts. (read the whole thing)

A recurring theme in the spate of dystopian futurist movies popular in our youth was that someday the government would start killing off all the old people. The notion provided a memorable scene in “Soylent Green” where Edward G. Robinson shuffled off to the local suicide center where the aged were treated to soothing music and images as they ceased to be a burden, and the entire plot of “Logan’s Run” was based on a society that maintained its perfectly organized order by offing anyone over the age of 30. In the late ’60s and early ’70s audiences found this plausible, with the younger and hipper movie-goers smugly assuming it was just the sort of thing that President Richard Nixon and his right-wing buddies would love to do, but it’s not been until the era of hope and change and the left-wing ascendancy that we’ve started to worry about it.

Our worries were heightened by the once-venerable Atlantic Monthly’s recent publication of an article by Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel in which he expresses his desire to die at age 75 and urges the rest of us to do the same. This morbid advice would ordinarily be easy to ignore, but Emanuel is the brother of former Obama White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, has served as a special advisor to the Obama White House’s Office of Management and Budget, and is currently a fellow at the Obama White House-affiliated Center for American Progress.

Bad Boyfriend

Don't let your daughter be raped in college!

Andrew Klavan: Who Still Supports Barack Obama?

Andrew Klavan: Putin's Secret Message to Obama

Andrew Klavan: Is ISIS Islamic?

Death Panel Recommends Death

So it begins: Panel Urges Overhauling Health Care at End of Life

Taking care to make sure that Republicans are implicated, the NY Times hails death of the elderly.

“The current system is geared towards doing more, more, more, and that system by definition is not necessarily consistent with what patients want, and is also more costly.”

The operative word here is "costly."I have no problem with any old person expressing the wish to be left to die in peace. I have a big problem with Death Panels deciding that death is cheaper than life and making that the national goal.  

The Times dresses up the panel as the best minds in medicine:

The 21-member nonpartisan committee, appointed by the Institute of Medicine, the independent research arm of the National Academy of Sciences, called for sweeping change.

Does anyone have any doubt that the panel would come out for more death for the elderly to save money?  That's as inconceivable as a government panel on climate coming out with a report that global warming is a hoax.   The results are preordained.

Palin was right ... again.

"Extreme acts of public piety"

The Z Blog explains why the press becomes obsessed with Ferguson or the Ray Rice story.  They may say that they're covering things that interest the people, but that's not true.  It's the other way around, people are talking about it because the press is obsessing about it.

Steve Sailer has been wondering why the Cult is obsessing over trivia like Ferguson. NYTimes is carrying on like some homo was kiled, rather than a ghetto giant. We keep seeing non-stories getting more coverage than stories one would assume have greater public interest. The increasingly dangerous situation in Ukraine, for example, generates little coverage, despite the fact the West is headed for an ugly showdown with Russia. The domestic economy, staggering along in ways not seen in a generation, generates no news coverage.

Then we have this berserk obsession with some football player who hit his old lady. Everyone knew when the story first hit the wires that the player punched his old lady in the elevator. Unless you’re missing a chromosome, you could figure out how the women ended up unconscious. That and the player’s confession solved that mystery months ago. Now, a video comes out showing the incident, as the normally inert US Senate is moved to get involved in what the state prosecutor thought was a nothing incident.

The lunatic sporting press has been treating this like Watergate for two weeks now. Meanwhile, real scandals like the IRS systematically harassing citizen on behalf of the White House goes unmentioned. The White House attempt to declare Obama dictator so he rewrite laws as he sees fit is treated like a zoning board hearing in Poughkeepsie. Whenever this is pointed out, the lunatic press claims they merely chase the stories of interest to the public.

But, public reaction to the Rice story looks more like mockery of the lunatics than real interest. Last night the Ravens played Pittsburgh and the Baltimore fans were wearing Ray Rice jerseys. It seems clear they were not doing this to support wide beating. Most of the people wearing the jerseys were women. They were doing it to protest the lunacy they see from the Cult on this issue..
...
The question is why does the Cult become obsessed on nothing stories like this or hoax stories like the Ferguson riots?

My offering is the Unitary Cult Theory. This is when members of a mass movement, always jostling with one another for status within the movement, close the information loop, excluding information from people outside the movement regarding a topic. The result is a piety contest where members of the movement stand up and commit increasingly extreme acts of public piety. As more and more members jump into the ring, the contest quickly spirals out of control resulting in these absurd public displays.

Because the country is run by the Cult of Modern Liberalism, these piety wheels get maximum attention. The public is often sucked into the the false drama in the same way people get caught up in a TV serial. That’s gasoline on the fire. With Ferguson, the public has seen that drama too many times to stay interested for very long. The Gay Gayington story is too disgusting. This Ray Rice story gets more interest because the NFL is so popular and everyone can relate the story at the center of it.

"Foreign policy" is something old bitter white men do.

Mark Steyn

And so the President assures us that his determination to "destroy" Isis won't be anything like Iraq and Afghanistan, but more on the lines of Yemen and Somalia - that's to say, one more failed state we'll drone now and again. Can you really treat one of the world's deepest pools of oil as just another piffling fringe-of-the-map basket-case? Don't worry about it. For the modern progressive, the entire planet is fringe-of-the-map. Real politics is about free contraceptives for thirtysomething college students, and transgender bathrooms for grade-schoolers. "Foreign policy" is something old bitter white men do.

What is the relationship of cheese consumption and death by bedsheet?

There is a nearly 1 to 1 correlation between eating cheese and dying by becoming entangled in your bedsheets.

	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009
Per capita consumption of cheese (US) Pounds (USDA)	29.8	30.1	30.5	30.6	31.3	31.7	32.6	33.1	32.7	32.8
Number of people who died by becoming tangled in their bedsheets Deaths (US) (CDC)	327	456	509	497	596	573	661	741	809	717
Correlation: 0.947091 Which only goes to prove that if you torture the numbers long enough they will tell you anything you want them to say.

Is this man the head of a crime syndicate?

Kevin Williamson thinks he may be. Harry Reid is trying to repeal the First amendment protecting free speech.

Democrats’ Push to Criminalize Dissent

Dissent is the highest form of patriotism. Dissent is the lowest form of crime. If you are a drone in the hive of the Left, it is possible — easy, in fact — to believe both of those things at the same time....

Likewise, the point of indicting Governor Perry and Mr. Hall is not to send either man to jail, but to harass them, to bully them, to bankrupt them if possible, and to keep them from functioning as effective critics of entrenched Democratic political interests.

The only thing stopping federal authorities from suffocating free speech — not only by independent groups such as the SBA List, but by individuals, trade groups, National Review, and the New York Times — is the First Amendment.

And Harry Reid wants to gut it. Figure out why that is and you’ll know everything you need to know about the Democratic party, which with each passing day functions less and less like a political party and more like a crime syndicate.

Is Obama a War Criminal?

Calling the President a war criminal is usually associated with the Left. To find a list of political commentators who accuse George Bush of war crimes one need only go to the Huffington Post, Mediaite, or any even Barack Obama himself. The question rarely enters the conversation from the Right or even from the center.

But it is a question that should be considered. Before we accuse someone of war crimes we should define our terms. Let’s be honest, “war crimes” are whatever the victors of a war decide. But since we have entered this politico-legal thicket, can we include in our list of war crimes the use of the “Wag the Dog” strategy? This time we're not covering up a sex scandal but facing falling poll numbers.  Is it a crime to create a fake “war” in which real people get killed for cynical political opportunism?  If the aim on the field of battle has no chance of succeeding but dropping bombs or firing rockets could shift a few votes in key districts?

Paul A. Rahe asks the question:

So the question in my title is, in fact, legitimate. Is killing people via bombing strikes a war crime if it serves no larger strategic purpose, if it is a feckless act apt only to enrage against us those Sunnis who desperately fear the Shia, if it is a cynical maneuver aimed solely at improving the President’s standing in the polls? It is, after all, one thing to seek victory and another to engage in aimless mayhem.

It will become clear over time whether Obama's actions have any effects other than enraging our enemies and getting some people killed. Air power does not win wars and the designated Arabs that Obama promised would supply the 'boots on the ground" are not going to be anxious to be used as cannon fodder.

Bill Clinton was accused of "Wag the Dog" but was far as is known, didn't kill anyone.  The Obama effort, whatever it's called, is real and people are going be killed.   And few on either the Left or Right thinks that it will accomplish its battlefield objective.  

CAMPUS MICROAGGRESSIONS

Some thoughts on the sexual assault issue on campus

There has been quite a reaction on the Libertarian Right about universities crusading against “sexual assault,” often defined as women complaining about having sex while drunk, regretting having sex, or simply lying about it. The most egregious example in the last decade is the Duke Lacrosse case in which the members of the lacrosse team were accused of gang-raping a stripper they had hired for a party. It turns out the accusation was lie, but in the meantime the Duke faculty signed petitions, held marches and banged on pans to protest the rape that never happened. The case drew national headlines. Virtually all of the MSM assumed the white men were guilty of raping the black woman, and that this was a perfect example of White Male Privilege™.

The accused men were in danger of being jailed for many years until their legal team was able to prove that the accusation by the stripper was a lie.  

Forget for a moment that a number of innocent young men almost spent decades in jail because a woman lied and Liberals tried to lynch them because they were young, white, rich jocks.  Do you think hiring strippers is a good idea?  What do you think about a young woman who decides to be a stripper who sidelines as a prostitute and makes that her career choice?  Is she sexually liberated?   A young woman whose claim to fame is acting in porn films has just become a student at Duke, explaining that performing in porn is "liberating."

Even as the tide of sexual self-expression is cresting, we have a counter-revolution.  The interesting thing is that this is a counter-revolution led by the revolutionaries.  The current hysteria about college as a hotbed of rape is fanned by Liberals and feminists.  But it's not certain whether it's created by actual feminist hysteria or by Democrats trying to rouse their base.  This may be a false choice; it's probably both.

Glenn Reynolds, the Master of the Universe of blogging, frequently links to articles on this subject. I love his blog Instapundit and am very much in tune with most of his views. His view may be the most representative of the Libertarian position on this issue.  But we do differ. He’s a Libertarian and I’m a Conservative. Our experiences are different. For one thing, Glenn’s a lot younger. He often hints that in his student years he was quite the stud. He frequently links to The Frisky website which specializes in the multiple sexual adventures of young unmarried women …. sort of a Penthouse for college-age women without the pictures.

If I am to take Glenn Reynolds, Hollywood, TV shows, the print media – sort of the regnant pop culture – as representative of American culture as it’s lived and experienced, I am woefully out of date. But then I look around me at teens, young adults, the middle aged and elderly where I live in Middle America and I don’t see people living the lives as they are depicted in popular culture.  True, I'm not peering in bedroom windows.  But looking away from the screen and the tabloid I know that I am in the majority and they are in the minority.  They just have hold of the media megaphone.  Most marriages that I am aware of are monogamous. I know a few gay people but no married gays. It may be true that college is a place where sexual license reigns and young adults with raging hormones take the opportunity to do things that their parents would not allow them to do at home. But I would be troubled if I thought my children were busy putting notches on their bedposts in the evening rather than studying.

We are all victims of the culture.  A great, if extreme, example of the image that college students are supposed to emulate was Elliott Rodger. Of course Rodger was weird in so many ways, expecting women to approach him if he walked past. But his image of male/female relationships was very much in line with the way it’s depicted in film, the Internet and magazines. He wanted that lifestyle.  What young man at that age doesn’t dream of having the cheerleader throw herself at you. And women reading Cosmo, The Frisky, or similar outlets may feel there’s something wrong with her if she has not slept with at least a couple of her classmates.

But sex is not a value-neutral act. It’s not the same as scratching and itch or a game of tennis. But that’s how it’s often depicted, a sporting event that you have to practice so that you can get good. But "casual sex" is like playing with knives.  You will either receive or give others psychological scars. Those are the emotional consequences.  There are also physical ones like pregnancy and an array of “social” diseases some of which have no cures.

With that as the background, let’s think about what we should desire in terms of a better atmosphere for the teen and young adult going to college. At the risk of sounding like a prude – I remember my own raging hormones as a college student - I don’t know of any Conservative who thinks that the college “hook up” culture is a good thing. Tom Wolfe wrote a book (Hooking Up) and a novel (I am Charlotte Simmons) about this.   They are both good reads and leave you questioning the culture in academia.

Perhaps Conservatives should not reflexively oppose what the Left is doing to men in academia. We should, of course, seek to protect young men from being railroaded by a kangaroo court. But keep in mind that the reason these young men are being accused of sex crimes is because, in almost all cases, they have had sex with their accuser. So in standing up for them we are also standing up for casual sex, the one-night stand, the drunken quickie, in college. We are joining the ranks of the Libertines for whom the hook-up culture is a wonderful thing. I’m not sure that that’s a group I would like to join. Between the guy who will screw any girl if given half a chance and the girl who lets him, regrets it later and tries to ruin his life, it would be nice if they could both lose.

The Left has created the current debased standards of sexual conduct in academia. I am willing to see if the Left can be more reactive than the Bible thumping troglodyte of popular culture.  Let's see if they can fix the problem that they have created; because it is a problem.

Rather than stand up for the principle that casual sex on campus is a good thing, something that should be protected, let’s use some social jujitsu. Let’s see if we can go the Left one better. How about the end of co-ed dorms? Perhaps we can even encourage reports of drunken, unsatisfactory sex between unmarried students. Do we really want to be the ones who assault the ramparts of academia in favor of sexual promiscuity?

Men and women in college

... men [are] monsters who can't be trusted with rights and women into frail creatures who bear no responsibility for their deeds ...

Conservatives should not oppose what the Left is doing to men in academia. We have been opposed to “hooking up” and casual sex. There really is a good thing that will come out of this. There will be less casual sex in college and that’s a good thing.

"After my election, I have more flexibility," Repeat 3

Via the Daily Beast:

An officer from the Estonian Internal Security Service (ISS), “was abducted at gunpoint at Luhamaa border checkpoint this morning” and “taken to Russia,” according to an Estonian government statement.

The incident comes at an extremely delicate moment, just as the United States and NATO try to convince the front-line members of the Alliance that have solid protection from Russian territorial ambitions. The sleight-of-hand invasion of non-NATO Ukraine over the last several months has raised fears that Russian President Vladimir Putin will claim in the Baltic States, just as he claimed in Crimea and the Donbass region, that the large Russian-speaking population needs to be protected, separated and inevitably annexed to a reconstituted Russian Empire.

The Estonian statement implied the alleged abduction is an intentional slap in the face to the Americans. “The incident comes two days after a visit to Estonia by U.S. President Barack Obama and in the middle of NATO’s summit in Wales,” it said. Apparently there have been “airspace violations” reported as well, including over Finland, which is not a member of the Alliance.

Obama has nothing scheduled today.  Weather's nice, maybe it's time for a round of golf. 

Meanwhile, Putin probably can't help himself, Obama's such an easy mark he enjoys taking his lunch money.

Obama promise to protect Estonia from Russia lasts less than two days

On Friday morning, less than 48 hours after President Obama delivered a speech in Estonia warning that Russian aggression against Estonia could trigger war with the US and NATO, Russian security forces have seized an officer with Estonia’s state security bureau at gunpoint and taken him into Russia.

Unless this is the beginning of an invasion, the only reasonable conclusion is that Putin is publicly humiliating Obama.

Investor's Business Daily's take:

Aggression: Less than 48 hours after President Obama vowed to "defend Estonia," Russian goons kidnapped an Estonian cop to demonstrate just what U.S. red lines are worth. Any questions as to the nature of the threat?

Obama's getting bitch-slapped.  Is this what he was talking about when  he told the Russians:

"After my election, I have more flexibility,"

Stupid internet nontroversy about an "overly sexualized" drawing of Spider-Woman.

While the Rich Rebound, the Poor Sink

That's how it goes in any country run by a socialist.

About that "Driving While Black" Canard

Ann Coulter destroys the old myth about "driving while black."  This is trotted out to "show" that if you're black you are more likely to get stopped for speeding than if you are white.

The story that made headlines was about NJ Turnpike cops stopping a disproportionately high number of black drivers.

Throughout the 1990s, the nation was fixated on tales of jack-booted New Jersey state troopers who were stopping speeders on the turnpike just because they were black! In a 2000 primary debate, Vice President Al Gore sneered at then-New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley, saying, "Racial profiling practically began in New Jersey, Senator Bradley."...

Nonetheless, based on the assumption that blacks speed just as much as whites -- because to believe otherwise would be racist! -- Temple University's John Lamberth announced that while only 13.5 percent of drivers along a particular stretch of the New Jersey Turnpike were black, 46 percent of those stopped for speeding were black. ...

Confident that any new study would merely serve to confirm the troopers' racism, the DOJ and the New Jersey attorney general commissioned a statistical investigation from the Public Services Research Institute in Maryland.

The institute's study was a spectacular thing. Using expensive monitors with high-speed cameras and radar detectors, they clocked the speeds of nearly 40,000 drivers on the relevant section of the turnpike. Three researchers then examined the photos to determine the race of the driver -- without knowing whether the driver was speeding, which was defined as going more than 80 mph in 65 mph zones.

The result: No racial profiling.

Blacks constituted 25 percent of all speeders and they were 23 percent of drivers stopped for speeding. Controlling for age and gender, blacks sped at about twice the rate of whites. The racial disparity was even greater for drivers exceeding 90 mph.

Brit Hume: Obama told a friend of mine before he was elected, “Wouldn’t it be great for the world if I were president?”

From Hot Air:

That’s a solid statement of Obama’s own view of the significance of his presidency going in, I think. Only he knows what he thought his election and the big Cairo speech in 2009 would accomplish, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he honestly believed it’d be a death knell for jihadism going forward. The death wouldn’t be quick or painless, but having now been deprived of the anti-Americanism that supposedly — supposedly — sustains it, it could only wither and die. That would also explain his fascination with dopey “wrong side of history”/”no place in the 21st century” rhetoric whenever ISIS decapitates someone or Putin invades a neighbor. It could be that O really did believe his election marked a historical turning point in which the diminution of retrograde forces abroad was inevitable. And maybe that’s why a year’s worth of briefings on ISIS didn’t penetrate. Don’t they know they’re going to lose? Haven’t they seen his face?

If his face, his skin color, his race didn't change the world, there's no plan "B". As Brit Hume says, "he's not adaptable." Six years into failure and he literally does not know what to do. God help America ... and the rest of the world. The first few years the disaster that's his presidency was like a snowball rolling slowly downhill. But how it's gathered mass and gaining speed and it's going to be a disaster when it finally hits something.

“a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing?”

Alan Parker makes a very interesting comparison between today and Europe in 1938. Including this implied comparison between Neville Chamberlain and Barack Obama.

One big thing to know about Neville Chamberlain is that he never expected his legacy to be in the field of foreign affairs.

Chamberlain, a former mayor of Birmingham, was considered an energetic and effective reformer on social and workplace issues. As health minister and chancellor of the exchequer, he had modernized the British welfare system during the depression and, as prime minister, pushed through the Factories Act 1937 (which limited working hours for women and children and generally improved working conditions), the Coal Act 1938 (which set the stage for nationalization of Britain’s coal industry) and, also in 1938, the Holidays with Pay Act (which is self-explanatory). Again in 1938, Chamberlain’s Housing Act provided subsidies to redevelop slum neighbourhoods and maintained rent controls.

Despite the way he looks to us now, Neville Chamberlain was seen in the 1930s as quite the modern fellow, a real go-getter with very progressive ideas

Chamberlain was focused on a substantial agenda of other domestic reforms while Europe was sliding closer to the calamity of war. In fact, Chamberlain’s actions in appeasing Hitler were largely driven by his desire to get Europe back into a state of peace

He goes on to say that Putin is not Hitler, but there are scary similarities between the impulses that moved Adolf and Vlad. Both wanted to restore the power and glory that their countries lost, Germany in World War 1, and Russia when the Soviet Union collapsed.

So the 1938 headline and story would read:

“Western dilemma: Giving Sudetenland to Hitler to save Czechoslovakia

“It is the ugly solution to the Sudetenland crisis world leaders will never acknowledge but grudgingly may have to accept.

“Give Sudetenland to Adolf Hitler — and hope this sates his ambition of being remembered as the omnipotent leader who restored Germany’s post-World War I might enough to leave the rest of Czechoslovakia alone.”

In the 2014 version, the XXXs represent Crimea, the YYYs represent Vladimir Putin, the ZZZs represent Ukraine, the AAAs represent Russia and the BBBs represent Soviet Union.

So the 2014 version would read:

“Western dilemma: Giving Crimea to Putin to save Ukraine

“It is the ugly solution to the Crimea crisis world leaders will never acknowledge but grudgingly may have to accept.

“Give Crimea to Vladimir Putin — and hope this sates his ambition of being remembered as the omnipotent leader who restored Russia’s post-Soviet might enough to leave the rest of Ukraine alone.”

ANSWER: It just doesn’t matter. It could be either. It applies to both. In point of fact, it’s an AFP wire story from a few days ago — March 10, 2014. But it could just as easily have been a Reuters wire story from September 1938.

I was going to say that everyone knows what happened after 1938, but that's not true.  Ask anyone under 30, even under 40 and they'll come up blank.  History has been replaced by "Current Events" and for the typical Democrat voter, especially its base, history is the story of Selma.   History is the story of white repression and racism.  History was the story of evil white males oppressing women.  History was made by the election of the first black president.  What could go wrong?

Obama is not a failure as President ... he's a "fierce minimalist."

Or he could be an acupuncturist, believing that pinpricks will cure what ails you.

Daily Mail on Nude Celeb Photos

New wave of leaks target more celebrities as authorities prove unable to stop spread as it emerges naked photos may have been passed around online club for MONTHS

• More 'nude' photos of celebrities have been leaked online, it emerged today

• They are alleged to feature stars Jessica Brown Findlay and Aubrey Plaza

• Video reportedly showing actress Jennifer Lawrence has also been leaked

• FBI said it is addressing allegations that stars' online accounts were hacked

• Reddit users have discussed supposed release of previously unseen images

• Allegations the leak is product of an 'underground celeb n00d-trading ring' 

• Last night, Apple finally admitted it has launched investigation into the hack

• Claims flaw in iCloud's 'Find My iPhone' function could have helped hacker

This seems to top the news.

Religion of Peace

SECOND AMERICAN JOURNALIST BEHEADED... 

Father of man killed by illegal immigrant demands president visit son’s grave

“My son and all of the others are considered collateral damage in the quest for votes and campaign contributions,” he wrote. “Illegal immigration is not a victimless crime.”

Mr. Rosenberg’s son was killed while riding his motorcycle in 2010 when Roberto Galo, an illegal immigrant, made an illegal turn and crashed into him. Mr. Rosenberg said the man, who was driving without a license, ran over his son three times as he tried to flee the scene.

Dick Durbin's War On Women

What Scandal?

Bob: "Did you hear about the Obama administration scandal?

Jim: "You mean the Mexican gun running?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "You mean SEAL Team 6?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "You mean the State Dept. lying about Benghazi ?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "You mean voter fraud?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "You mean the military not getting their votes counted?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: You mean The V.A scandal?

Bob: No the other one.

Jim: "You mean the IRS deleting e:mails and saying computers crashed?

Bob: "no the other one"

Jim: "You mean that 3 or 4 of Obama's GAY friends were mysteriously MURDERED when they came forward with claims he was gay too?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "The NSA monitoring our phone calls, emails and everything else?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "You mean the drones in our own country without the benefit of the law?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "Giving 123 Technologies $300 Million and right after it declared bankruptcy and was sold to the Chinese?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "You mean the president arming the Muslim Brotherhood?"

Bob: "No the other one:.

Jim: "The IRS targeting conservatives?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "The DOJ spying on the press?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "Sebelius shaking down health insurance executives?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "Giving SOLYNDRA $500 MILLION DOLLARS and 3 months later they declared bankruptcy and then the Chinese bought it?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "The president's ordering the release of nearly 10,000 illegal immigrants from jails and prisons, and falsely blaming the sequester?"
Jim: "The president's threat to impose gun control by Executive Order in order to bypass Congress?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "You mean the Affordable healthcare Act that allows access to your Bank Accounts and the Goverment can withdraw funds as it see's fit..The Protests in Greece were because the goverment stole peoples accounts."

Bob: "No, the other one"

Jim: "You ean the healthcare act that was supposed to keep you're doctor & insurance but instead denies both,and democrats are trying to delay that mandate till after the elections to save their collective @rses."

Bob:"No. the other one."

Jim: "The president's repeated violation of the law requiring him to submit a budget no later than the first Monday in

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "The 2012 vote where 115% of all registered voters in some counties voted 100% for Obama?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "The president's unconstitutional recess appointments in an attempt to circumvent the Senate's advise-and-consent role?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "The State Department interfering with an Inspector General investigation on departmental sexual misconduct?"

Bob: "No, the other one."

Jim: "Clinton, the IRS, Clapper and Holder all lying to Congress?"

Bob: "No, the other one."
Jim: You mean the unafordable healthcare that will bankrupt middle class families that the contract was given to a college friend of michelle obama's and Vallrie jarets niece and nephew work for it?

Bob: No.the other one.

Jim: "I give up! ... Oh wait, I think I got it! You mean that 65 million low-information voters who don't pay taxes and get free stuff from taxpayers and stuck us again with the most pandering, corrupt administration in American history?

Bob: "THAT'S THE ONE!"

Strange juxtapositions

Does it seem strange to anyone else that Obama decries income inequality at $32,000 a plate fundraisers?   Is he denouncing the people who can afford to pay tens of thousands of dollars to sup with him?  Are they that stupid?

Yes.  Next question.

"After my election, I have more flexibility," Repeat

After the election, a little time passed and then, flexibility happened.

... the Chinese ADIZ, the Russian annexation of Crimea, the rise of ISIS, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the fall of Mosul, the end of Hungarian liberal democracy, the Central American refugee crisis, the Egyptian-UAE attacks on Libya, the extermination of Iraqi Christians, the Yazidi genocide, the scramble to revise NATO’s eastern-frontier defenses, the Kristallnacht-style pogroms in European cities, the reemergence of mainstream anti-Semitism, the third (or fourth, perhaps) American war in Iraq, racial riots in middle America, et cetera and ad nauseam.All that was in the future just one year ago.

"After my election, I have more flexibility,"

A Russian army tank attacked airfields in eastern Ukraine on Monday, Ukrainian military officials said, amid worsening tensions between Kiev and Moscow.

Obama promises no military intervention and no military aid to Ukraine.

"...history’s happy predestination..."

I found this term amusing, and so apt as it applies to the delusions of Obama: the childlike belief that history favors him and his fantasies.

Speaking recently about the Islamic State’s beheading of an American journalist, just before another tee time, President Barack Obama assured the country that “the future is won by those who build and not destroy.”

At a news conference on Thursday Obama admitted in so many words that “We don’t have a strategy yet” for dealing with the Islamic State, but he seemed to retain his usual faith in history’s happy predestination nonetheless. He and his Secretary of State have dismissed Russia’s massive land grab as a sign of weakness and an embarrassingly out-dated way of doing things, assurances have been made that all of that even more old-fashioned beheading and crucifying and slaughtering that the Islamic State gang has been up to certainly “has no place in the 21st Century,” and thus far these messes have dominated the news thoroughly enough that no one in the administration has been obliged by the press to explain why another aircraft carrier is needed in the South China Sea. “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice,” as the president is fond of saying, to the point that he had it woven into the Oval Office carpet, and we are expected to share his confidence that the aphorism will prove true no matter what befuddled efforts America might make.

A couple of smarter fellows over at National Review have already written convincingly about Obama’s childish faith that the good guys always win in the end, no matter how wimpy their good guy ways nor how ruthlessly bad the bad guys might be, but we would add that such fantastical notions are characteristic of modern liberal thinking about almost everything. Not just foreign policy, but economics, social issues, and the very nature of man.

I have written prior to these columns about this very subject:What is it with Obama's blind faith in the inevitable march of history? 

Allow me to quote myself:

Barack Obama gave a speech, the thing he does best, with a ridiculous premise embedded therein, something he does almost every time he opens his mouth. Often it’s fields of straw men he’s destroying. This time he’s referring to that inevitable march of history he and his Secretary of State, John Kerry, is fond of invoking.

It goes something like this:

“This is the 21st Century and X is just not done in this century. So X will inevitably fail.”

The fact that this is the 21st Century was supposed to have stopped Putin from swallowing the Ukraine piece by piece.

In Obama’s last statement in Martha's Vineyard, before heading back to finish his round of golf, was that

"One thing we can all agree on is that a group like ISIL has no place in the 21st century."

Who is this "We" Mr. Obama? ISIL disagrees. And, in fact, it’s reported to be attracting thousands of young people who have spent most of their lives in the 21st Century. They think ISIL is the path to the future and are willing to die for ISIL and their Muslim faith.

...

Is that reference to the 21st Century a theme that Obama’s speech writers throw in because it polls well. Or is this what the Obama really believes. It would not surprise us because the “March of History™” is a familiar theme in Marxist thought. And versions of Marxism were part of Obama’s formative years before he became President.

Victor Davis Hanson:

He also believes history follows some predetermined course, as if things always get better on their own. Obama often praises those he pronounces to be on the “right side of history.” He also chastises others for being on the “wrong side of history” — as if evil is vanished and the good thrives on autopilot.

When in 2009 millions of Iranians took to the streets to protest the thuggish theocracy, they wanted immediate U.S. support. Instead, Obama belatedly offered them banalities suggesting that in the end, they would end up “on the right side of history.” Iranian reformers may indeed end up there, but it will not be because of some righteous inanimate force of history, or the prognostications of Barack Obama.

Perhaps it's Obama's personal path to the highest office in the land, as totally undeserved as his Nobel Peace Prize, that gives him the feeling that he, like King Canute, controls the tide. There is a sick feeling that the man is not only a deluded narcissist, but a dangerous fool. A belief which seems to conflict with the observation that he is so fundamentally corrupt that he's evil.  But that may be a false choice.  There is no rule that says the deluded cannot be evil.  There are at least three prominent examples in the 20th Century and they ruled Russia, Germany and China.  I am quite sure that the 21st Century will be no different. 

LIFE IN POST-RACIAL AMERICA: Mississippi man beaten after he’s warned restaurant wasn’t safe for whites, witness says.

David Knighten of West Point told AP earlier by phone that he and Weems had gone to a Waffle House early Saturday. He said a man waved him over outside the restaurant and told him politely that people were upset by the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and it wasn’t a safe place for whites. When he went in, he said, Weems was inside and was arguing with other men. . .

Knighten said some people blocked him from leaving with Weems. When he got out, he said, Weems was down and people were kicking him. Knighten said others attacked him, adding “I do remember racial slurs being yelled from the crowd.”

Knighten says he has broken bones in his face, a cut over his left eye and a blood clot in his right eye

If the MSM bothered to cover this the crowd who did this would be described as "mostly peaceful." Th epolice chief tells us thatit was not a hate crime.

Winooski celebrates diversity by shutting a shopkeeper up.

WINOOSKI, Vt. —A sign on a lamp post at the bottom of the Winooski Circle displayed the words "Yield Sneakers Bacon" until Friday morning. The bistro owners took it down.
Related

It got there as part of "Operation Bloom."

A city program put it in place to keep its flower beds beautiful. If businesses do some gardening they can post an advertisement where they do it, but the word "bacon" on the Sneakers Bistro sign started a discussion about diversity on the Winooski Front Porch Forum.

It started with a post from one woman who wrote that the sign was insensitive to those who do not consume pork. She said as a Muslim she is personally offended by it.

The City Manager applauded the move to enforce political correctness.

Winooski's city manager spoke on behalf of the city. She said:
"The cool part of living in a diverse community is that it's not always comfortable. It's a fascinating place with lots of opportunities for conversation. The City has to pay attention to a lot of factors while acting within what we can regulate," said Katherine "Deac" Decarreau.

Wait, I thought that "diversity" included people of various belief systems, skin color, ethnic backgrounds all living and expressing their own lives without being forced to stifle the free expression of their beliefs. Show you how old-fashioned I am. The New Diversity means ... shut up.

The second Obama Term

World chaos was not supposed to be on the midterm. #unfair
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) August 21, 2014

Making ISIS afraid

Cower in fear, ISIS - you're up against our crack hipster-glasses brain trust of campaign van drivers and coffee fetchers.
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) August 21, 2014

Obama's fundamental transformation of America

Well, he doesn't have to worry about his personal wealth, does he?  Barack Hussein Obama has done very well for his contributors in the 1%.

Median household net worth decreased by $5,046, or 6.8 percent, between 2000 and 2011. ... Between 2000 and 2011, experiences of households varied widely depending on their net worth quintile (See Figure 1). Median household net worth decreased by $5,124 for households in the first (bottom) net worth quintile, $7,056 (or 49.3 percent) for the second quintile, and $5,072 (or 6.9 percent) for the third quintile. Median household net worth increased by $18,433 (or 9.8 percent) for households in the fourth quintile, and by $61,379 (or 10.8 percent) for households in the highest (top) quintile.

Sanitizing terror: Has the press distorted Islamic radical’s crusade against gay men?

Brown killed two gay men in Washington, and a third man in New Jersey. He used a gay website to lure his victims and then shot them.

Brown’s homicides made news in June, but his story fell off the radar until Wednesday when King County prosecutors charged him with murder. Brown’s prosecutors made it clear that the accused killer’s motives were to terrorize, though he did appear to operate according to a perverse code of conduct:

This is the FOX News report. The rest of the media, silence.

Losing the third Iraq war

So far the US has fought two wars with Iraq.  The first waged under Bush #1, the second under Bush #2.  We could be getting round three.  The first ended with the defeat of Saddam without toppling him.  The second occupied Iraq and created a relatively stable country.  But then Obama pulled all the troops out, giving the US no leverage over subsequent events.  And when the newborn Iraqi leaders were unable to unite the disparate tribes, there was no one to set things right.

That's when Islam reasserted itself in the form of ISIS, and announced the creation of the Caliphate.  

As long as ISIS was lopping off the heads of Iraqi government supporters and exterminating Christians,  the people who set the agenda for discussion in the US didn't care.  But all of a sudden they picked on the wrong victim, a tribe no one had ever heard of who ran to shelter in a barren mountain.  Now that's the sort of thing that can get the NPR types exercised.  And the media noticed so Obama had to notice.

And it's made a difference.  A poll that shows 54% of Americans backing airstrikes on ISIS is exactly equal to the 54% who opposed direct military action in June. 

Why only 54% wishing to do anything to oppose ISIS?   In my opinion there are two reasons. The first one is that the war in Iraq has been vilified by the Democrats and the media even more than the war in Viet Nam. It takes courage today to come out and say you supported the war and continue to support it.

But there’s a second reason, and that ‘s Obama’s demonstrated that he has a reverse Midas Touch. There is nothing that I can think of that Obama has done that has not made events worse.

The big issues of the day: the economy, domestic politics, foreign relations, race relations, government corruption have been made worse, much worse, by the Obama administration. Wars, to be fought successfully, must be waged as much by a united people as by troops in the battlefield. At this stage of this presidency, this inconceivable that Obama could pull the American people together. And don’t forget that the military is being decimated even as Hagel and Dempsey are talking of war.

Let us pray that the enemy will give us time to find new and more inspired leadership.

What is it with Obama's blind faith in the inevitable march of history?

Barack Obama gave a speech, the thing he does best, with a ridiculous premise embedded therein, something he does almost every time he opens his mouth. Often it’s fields of straw men he’s destroying. This time he’s referring to that inevitable march of history he and his Secretary of State, John Kerry, is fond of invoking.

It goes something like this:

“This is the 21st Century and X is just not done in this century.  So X will inevitably fail.”

The fact that this is the 21st Century was supposed to have stopped Putin from swallowing the Ukraine piece by piece.

In Obama’s last statement in Martha's Vineyard, before heading back to finish his round of golf,  was that

"One thing we can all agree on is that a group like ISIL has no place in the 21st century."

Who is this "We" Mr. Obama?  ISIL disagrees. And, in fact, it’s reported to be attracting thousands of young people who have spent most of their lives in the 21st Century.  They think ISIL is the path to the future and are willing to die for ISIL and their Muslim faith.

He went on to say

“And people like [ISIS] ultimately fail. They fail, because the future is won by those who build and not destroy and the world is shaped by people like Jim Foley, and the overwhelming majority of humanity who are appalled by those who killed him."

Today’s Wall Street Journal notes that

But Foley is dead and his killers won't fail on their own. They will not fail because Barack Obama reached out his hand in peace on Inauguration Day. They will not fail because of a progressive vision that mankind has finally in the 21st century reached some higher level of being. Like every evil in human history, ISIS will stop only when it is forced to stop. This means only when enough of its fanatics have been killed.

Is that reference to the 21st Century a theme that Obama’s speech writers throw in because it polls well. Or is this what the Obama really believes. It would not surprise us because the “March of History™” is a familiar theme in Marxist thought. And versions of Marxism were part of Obama’s formative years before he became President.

Let's try an experiment, at the next Tea Party rally throw rocks at the press

Glenn Reynolds says:

I DUNNO, IT’S ONLY CONJECTURE WITHOUT AN EXPERIMENT: Yep: MSNBC would react quite differently if Tea Partiers threw rocks at them.

Here's the baseline: MSNBC's Larry O'Conner gets rocks thrown at him by masked members of the race riot in Ferguson. He's quite calm about it and keeps spinning.



Now let's have the same scenario, but the rock throwers are participating in a Tea Party rally. Then we can compare and contrast. But you really don't need to run the experiment, do you?