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  • Stupid or Evil – Pick One or Both

    George Rebane

    ObamaCloseted Boy, are we getting what we deserve.  The USSR in the depths of the Cold War could not have prescribed a more draconian regimen of self-destruction for the United States than the one we ourselves are putting in place.  Its architects are the terminally corrupt politicians in Washington who are cheered on by at least half the population.  Now for some current particulars for those still harboring doubts about the premise –

    • The ObamaCare bill coming out of Congress is the first of several poison pills we are concocting.  Its yawning flaws are becoming apparent even to some (but only some) of the faithful.  Jeffrey S. Flier MD, dean of the Harvard Medical School, explains here.
    • Waxman-Markey (cap’n tax) should be dead on arrival, but it isn’t.  Copenhagen will not replace Kyoto, but Obama will seek to shoot us in the foot in any case.  The pious Europeans have yet to meet any of their carbon cutback targets, yet carping about ‘US leadership’ is keeping our environuts in a high level of agitation shouting their mantra, ‘The debate is over, the debate is over, hurry up and pass the goddam thing before they catch on!!’
    • The first three tranches of unfunded stimulus monies have not worked, now let’s get set to launch another one as election season approaches.  Never mind the definition of insanity, there are votes to be bought.  Besides von Mises’ ‘Do nothing, sooner.’, there are alternatives for government intervention that may actually help (see here)
    • Washington’s crash and burn policies are performing so badly that government lying has been switched to the wholesale level.  As an example, witness the nationwide reports compiled by the White House on Obama’s patently ludicrous jobs ‘created and saved’.  If there are none in real congressional districts, then let’s make up some virtual districts.
    • Internationally, China is lecturing us on how to run an economy and advising against ObamaCare and cap’n tax.  As our biggest creditor, they have a vested interest in our economy, so their advice is more than sincere.  Don’t hold your breath, the DC dolts have tin ears and sinecures to maintain.
    • Anyone who has tracked Iran’s wily ways knew last spring that the mullahs were going to take the community organizer for a ride on the next round of ‘oh sure, we’ll just send our uranium out of the country and it’ll come back all civilized and peaceful’.  Even the eternally negotiating defenseless Europeans wouldn’t hold their breath for this one; but not the junior birdman from Chicago.  So now the towelheads have stiffed us again.  We’re messing with a culture that was proficient in duping naïfs like us before Caesar drew his last.  (Notice how quiet the MSM is on this.)
    • As a final shot in the shorts, the Potomac pinheads still don’t know the difference between illegal aliens and H1-B visa immigrants.  As soon as they dust themselves off, to the former we grant more civil rights and benefits than to our citizens.  But going through legal channels, the latter have to wait ten to twenty years to set their boots on US soil.  The trouble is that our industries need the H1-B guys something fierce, why? Because they can push squigglies (you know, those funny looking equations and stuff) and create wealth, which our kids don’t do so good no more.  But have we got self-esteem.

    So this is the current course of our ship of state – pick your own iceberg, we’re sailing into a passel of them.  Oh yes, our President is still trying to get that pesky eightball with the little window to give him the correct answer on Afghanistan.  What did Thomas Jefferson say?

    A nation ignorant and free, that never was and never shall be.

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  • Internet Conversations – Sackheads & Scattershots

    George Rebane

    The comment thread under my recent column in The Union’s online edition started out normally – with the usual acrimony, vitriol, and inanities – and then morphed into a disjointed discussion on ‘handles’ and ‘sackheads’ and privacy, and even “public safety”.  It brought to a head something that I have been thinking about for some time, but I should first back up.

    All of us who surf the internet’s blogs, columns, and information sites have run into comment threads that are full of the most disagreeable diatribes launched by commenters at each other.  They hurl such ad hominem insults from behind the anonymity of ‘handles’ which are short character strings that may mean something to them, but little besides a temporary marker to anyone else.  One is not even sure of how many people are really participating, since a single person may enter the fray using several handles.

    The common denominator of such scattershot threads is that they seldom stay on topic, exhibit inabilities to accurately read let alone understand the written word, are absent of reasonable development, invariably illuminate nothing, and lead nowhere.  But given their number and frequency, they must provide some type of release not available elsewhere.

    This month I decided to experiment and respond to some of the comments that actually attempted to address the volatile topic of public sector unions which was the thrust of my column.  My thought was that readers might like to expand on what I had presented.  It turned out that polite replies actually made some progress in transiting from the ad hominem to the substance of the article.  In this exchange I lamented on the use of handles and said –

    Using a handle is the literary equivalent of speaking in public while wearing a paper sack with two eye holes. It is a disguise worn for many reasons, and for certain kinds of discourse, it is the only acceptable way to present yourself and your views. I think that those of us, who under their own names openly offer their commentary in a public forum, should be perfectly at ease with the self-assessments that responding sackheads offer. They certainly know best which messages should not be traceable to the messenger. Who are we then to disagree?

    (more…)

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  • An American Tale

    George Rebane

    ObamaKing  ObamaEmperor

    CheneyEmperor

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  • CARB’s Nevada County footprint

    George Rebane

    RoodCtr_13nov09 Last Friday I attended a forum on California’s toxic business environment, and left stunned.  The forum was held at the behest of Assemblyman Dan Logue as part of his ongoing investigation of why businesses in the state are heading for greener pastures elsewhere.  In attendance at the Rood Center were also Representative Tom McClintock and various Nevada County political leaders.  Testifying was a grim array of the county’s business owners – operational word here is ‘grim’.

    RR readers are aware of the coverage I, other local bloggers, and The Union have given the most devastating of the recent legislative bombshells from Sacramento – AB32, the CO2 ball and chain that is now being administered by the California Air Resources Board.  This law and its spawn of regulations will single-handedly keep California permanently in its economic doldrums.

    Local leftwing bloggers have done what comes naturally in their coverage of AB32.  The Union has attempted a more ‘balanced account’ of the issue about which there is nothing in balance (their report here).  If you’re a collectivist who sees a happy land after uniformly applied poverty, you will celebrate this latest explosion of government power.  If you’re a free market conservative, especially with a technical or financial background, you see it for the disaster that it is.  And if you’re a consumer of any stripe, stand by for ram – shortages, higher prices, limited choices, permits and fees every time you turn around, … .

    (more…)

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  • E Pluribus Union

    [This editorial appears today (14 November 2009) in The Union’s print and online opinion sections (here). This is the submitted version. gjr]

    George Rebane

    The case has been made that public sector unions (PSUs) are bankrupting governments across the land.  Moreover, they are a “bad deal for taxpayers and representative government”.  Failure to cure the current recession has focused many organizations, mostly on the right, to re-examine the history and data from the last several decades of PSU growth to confirm such conclusions.

    Problems compound when PSUs are given monopoly power to supply government workers at any level, from federal down to counties and cities.  Representative government is often compromised – “elected officials undermine their duty to taxpayers, … this puts unions in a privileged position to extract political goods in the form of high pay and benefits that are much higher than anything comparable in the private sector.”

    To contend such conclusions one must explain away the widely available research on comparable pay.  The Bureau of Labor Statistics says that, over time, public sector vs comparable private sector average salaries have climbed into the 1.5X to 2X range.  And the private sector cannot touch the pension and added healthcare benefits of the government workers’ total compensation package.

    Salaries and benefits are the largest component of government budgets.  And when a public sector union (PSU) is involved, the employee compensation negotiations disappear from taxpayer view.  This blackout is required by laws carefully put in place by PSU supported politicians.  In the aftermath of their successes, the PSUs are not bashful about their involvement.  Recently, the Service Employees International Union bragged that it had spent over $50 million to elect President Obama, $27 million of which came out of its PAC, and it expected great things in return.

    (more…)

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  • Obamacare – any way you slice it (updated)

    George Rebane

    Congress can raise taxes because it can persuade a sizable fraction of the populace that somebody else will pay. – Milton Friedman

    ObamacareCost The von Mises Institute is a leading source of Austrian school perspectives on economics and public policy, and an oft quoted source on RR.  It just published ‘Obamacare is a Devastating Tax on the Working Class’ which should give even the diehard progressive pause on some of the most regressive effects of this foray into socialized medicine.  It will hit hardest those workers who are at the margin, and those seeking to gain the first step on the economic ladder.  The arguments are clear and accessible.  The gargantuan cost of this misguided piece of social engineering will be of historic proportions; our kids and grandchildren may yet piss on our graves.

    Given the recent announcement that the government’s measure of unemployment has hit 10.2 percent, and given that the official House version of Obama’s healthcare plan, HR 3962, has now passed, a close examination of the effects of “Obamacare” on the labor market is important. It will be no surprise to readers of this site to learn that the Democrats’ bill will seriously harm precisely those poor and uninsured citizens it is ostensibly designed to help. The harm will come by compounding mass unemployment and depriving these citizens of consumption choices.

    The article is not long and definitely worth a read, especially if you voted for Obama.  Hat tip to a RR reader for the heads up on this piece.  [update] And more thanks to another RR reader for sending the following addition.

    Ramirez091113

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  • It’s not for the lack of trying

    George Rebane

    NCARRA091113

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  • Econ 101

    George Rebane

    Econ101

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  • Ruminations – 11nov2009 (updated 12nov09)

    George Rebane

    VetDayGV091111 Veterans/Armistice Day.  This morning I rushed down to the Grass Valley Veterans Building to partake of the scheduled ceremonies that annually observe our debt to the armed forces of America.  Given the involvement of our armed forces and current events, the observance was not well attended – many seats on the floor were empty, and the bleachers were sparsely occupied.  Our Congressman Tom McClintock gave a quick speech before having to rush off to another engagement – these are busy times for politicians.  His good and proper remarks were entirely backward looking – there was no mention of the current global battle with Islam, no outrage at Ft Hood, no rallying of our citizens to resist and preserve.  The rear view mirror contains such clear and comforting reflections.

    The Ft Hood massacre by one of our homegrown Islamic terrorists was similarly observed at a massive memorial service yesterday.  The murdered GIs were remembered as if they had died in a bus accident on the way to catch a plane to their mid-east deployments.  The President’s reference to the murderer’s “twisted logic” was a brief sop to the fact that this had not been a bus accident.  But then he totally misinformed his audience on the peaceful nature of all religions.  Army Chief of Staff, General Casey, got up and recited the next verse of his longstanding ode ‘Let’s Not Irritate the Muslims’.  Islam is a mighty belief system that informs and motivates the lives of over 1.6 billion or about a fourth of the world’s people and many of its cultures.  Yet somehow it is still difficult for us to get past the notion that our war is only about shooting some ragheads flitting among the rocks in Afghanistan.  This is the leadership under which our troops must fight and sacrifice.

    EPA is still trying to gag Dr. Alan Carlin, one of its own scientists whose March 2009 report (5.12MB pdf) “questioned whether EPA should simply defer to United Nations’ assertions that carbon dioxide emissions are causing a global warming crisis that threatens human health and the environment.”  The good doctor is finally starting to speak out about his censorship and the so-called science that has now been swallowed worldwide.  In his words, “The business of science is being skeptical, and if you’re not skeptical, you’re probably not doing science. … It’s my view that the EPA needs to go through the scientific arguments themselves and not rely on what others outside the EPA have said.”

    [12nov09 update]  Here is another recent report on scientists whose arguments contradicting man-made global warming are being ignored and/or attacked by the one-worlders.

    Finally, the Tea Party Patriots and related organizations are forming up to launch the “Citizen Power Campaign” to gather 1.1 million California signatures for a November 2010 initiative to stop public sector unions in their onslaught on the democratic process.  I guess the important thing to note from the gitgo is that it is not a y’all come ‘people power’ campaign.  This highly discriminatory enterprise attempts to distinguish between the interests of American citizens and those who got here through a hole in the fence.  Over the next twelve months, pay particular attention to the groups rising in opposition.  More here.

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  • Ft Hood and Counting

    George Rebane

    Senator Lieberman will now start holding hearings on whether Major ‘Allahu Akbar!’ Hasan is a terrorist.  It is for me a great sadness, perhaps above all others, to watch western culture, my culture in its writhing death throes.  In our jaundiced teaching that all the world’s cultures are of equal worth, we daily sacrifice more of the one that has given and continues to give mankind its most abundant blessings.

    Consider this, after all these years Homeland Security has yet to issue a report on Muslims in the military.  General Casey, the current Army Chief of Staff, has restated that he is most concerned about discrimination against Muslims.  The prime reason Hasan was not outed is that his colleagues and their superiors admitted that their motive for burying the abundant reports about Hasan’s radicalization was political correctness – they were also afraid of being accused of discrimination.  So thirteen people died, and many more lives were permanently derailed.  (Russ Steele of NC Media Watch has more on this.)

    Hasan is a man who unabashedly evangelized the Islamic cause and worldview. He attended a radicalized mosque and handed out business cards with “SOA(SWT)” printed under his name.  SOA stands for ‘Soldier of Allah’, and SWT is the traditional Arab homage ‘Subhanahu Wa Ta’ala’ (Glory to Him, the Exalted) inserted by the faithful after every mention/writing of Allah or Muhammad.  And we are now worried if his killing spree was perhaps spawned by some “secondary stress syndrome”.  I hope Joe Lieberman can quickly lay that crap to rest so that the current “rush to whitewash” inside the Beltway can be short-circuited.  There should be some real bad stuff coming out of all this.

    NukedDC

    Michelle Malkin, nationally syndicated columnist, has made the point that “political correctness is the handmaiden of terror.”  Think about it, the more they attempt to paint Hasan as just an ordinary American Muslim, the more firmly they drive home the logical conclusion that such acts of terror by your friendly neighborhood Muslim are completely undetectable, and therefore unpredictable.  Your only choice is to suck it up and stand by for the next one, or … .

    An alternative way forward is for the self-proclaimed, America-loving Muslim communities to stand up all over this land and unequivocally tell everyone that not only do they abhor the Hasans in their midst, but that they will not tolerate them, and demonstrate this by outing the ones currently in training, plotting, and scheming.  In short, remove Mao Tse-tung’s ‘friendly sea’ in which all successful indigenous terrorists must swim.  If the Muslim community continues their shameful silence, the alternative will not be a pretty America.

    And sooner than later in a large American city, someone with a suitcase shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ will spawn a mushroom cloud.  Only then there will be no one to report what that Muslim said before he hit the pickle.

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