Category Archives: Blogosphere

Skipping the “debate”

I have no plans to watch the GOP shindig tonight, even if Ted Cruz made the cut. There is no Carly and so, except for Trump, they’ll all be little echoes of each other. Taking swipes at each other, as well, and making their stump speeches.

Trump might be amusing, but no more than that I’d bet. Carly would keep them all on their toes and hit Ma Barker at every opportunity. Will Trump? Maybe, if he can forget about their friendship and all the money he gave her campaign back in ’08 when he called himself a Democrat.

I’ll read the after-action reports when I get time but I’ll skip watching the “talent show.”

UPDATE: “Republicans, wake up.  [Carly] may be the best thing that has happened to you since the proverbial sliced bread.  She would eat Hillary Clinton for breakfast, lunch and dinner, assuming our Lady of Chappaqua isn’t indicted first.”

They’re not called the Stupid Party for nothing.

MORE:  Maybe I should have watched it, like the 24 million others who did. But I had more important things to do.

Three views on our new Cuba relations

From The Z Man:

“In reality, Obama is just doing the bidding of American business. The tourism rackets, gambling rackets and, of course, the bankers see big profits in Cuba. This news story from the spring [0f 2014] lays out the case for normalizing relations so big business can cash in on Cuba. It is easy to forget that Cuba was a food exporter before Castro. They can also be a source of cheap labor for American business. Our rulers will also enjoy vacationing there as well.”

On the other hand, via Miriam’s Ideas:

“Step outside of the official tourist route and one soon sees the real Cuba. It is here, amidst the prostitutes and the elderly people rummaging through [trash] bins in central Havana, that one starts to understand why many Cubans might like a few branches of McDonalds in their country. Cheap plastic food is, after all, a good deal better than no food at all.”

And from native Cuban blogger Yoani Sanchez:

“…Raul Castro has not reduced the repression against dissidents, which in February reached the figure of 492 arbitrary arrests. The Castro regime extends a hand to the White House, while keeping its boot pressed on the non-conformists in its own backyard. However, the disproportion of the negotiating forces between the two governments has been noted, even in popular jokes. ‘Did you know that the United States and Cuba broke off relations again?’ one of the incautious mocked in December. Before an incredulous, ‘Noooo?!’ the jokester responds with a straight face: ‘Yes, Obama was upset because Raul called him collect.’ There is all the material poverty of our nation contained in that phrase.”

Mr. B.’s generation, as yet unnamed by the trendy, will know how it all works out.

The dirtiest poem in the English language

Fashionable-Contrasts

Was this dirtiest poem ever (its sentiments expertly depicted above) written a short while ago, you may ask? Only if you consider 1755 to be recent.

Indeed, the poem by Thomas Potter, the “debauched son of the Archbishop of Canterbury” was first published by John Wilkes, the father of press freedom and civil liberties. To the extent we still have any after the Obama administration, NSA, FBI, CIA, Google, Facebook, Russian and Chinese hackers, etc. finish with us.

The poem, which certainly is tame by 21st century standards, nevertheless will show you that, among other things, the F-word isn’t of recent vintage either. Although ours may be the first culture in the history of the language to have rendered it commonplace in public discourse.

Via The John Wilkes Club

Ma’s sweetheart charity deal

“Nothing says honest like a career pol whose income tops $20M,” says anon, a commenter at TaxProf Blog who notes that 99 percent of Ma Barker’s $15 million in charitable donations, or $14.9 million, went to her family foundation.

Which, in turn, donates a minuscule portion of its income to real charity while ensuring that Ma and Slick Willie live the lavish, private-jet lifestyle they once could only dream about. Ah, the glory of “public service.”

Want to try to do the same as these Democrat aristos? Good luck, peasant, keeping the IRS off your backside.

Via Instapundit.

UPDATE: From the WSJ: “The Clintons play by their own political rules, and taking a nearly $15 million tax write-off to assist their electoral ambitions is merely the latest.” Strange how the feds dance to the Clinton rules, ain’t it?

Obama “bundler” blocks abortion videos

“[Federal Judge William] Orrick was nominated to his position by hardline abortion supporter President Barack Obama. He was also a major donor to and bundler for President Obama’s presidential campaign. He raised at least $200,000 for Obama and donated $30,800 to committees supporting him, according to Public Citizen.”

See how it’s done? Our robed rulers don’t get their jobs by accident.

Our Barry Hussein is a hardliner because he wouldn’t restrict late-term abortions.

Via Instapundit.

The White Privilege B.S.

I get the point. You would have to be a moron not to. But this fellow’s recitation of why I and other white men are supposed to feel bad about our “privilege” isn’t very convincing. Even if he has, as it says under his byline, a “Doctorate in White Privilege.” Imagine that. He says blacks are more likely to be stopped for the color of their skin, even shot to death, but he offers no proof of either claim.

The “actual facts,” as opposed to, I suppose, the unactual facts, of WP. Nothing there about black guys in polo shirts and khakis getting stopped or shot. But that would be discriminatory, wouldn’t it, expecting them to dress like whitey. Uh huh.

I still think most of the problem of blacks and other minorities tending to be hassled by cops, when it is true, is really a matter of class and behavior. Clothing, behavior, and whatever else denotes one’s social and economic standing.

Dress like a gangbanger, in other words, like Trayvon, and you’ll be treated like one. Get belligerent with a cop like Michael Brown, and you’ll have a gun pulled on you. Run away from a cop like Larry Jackson did and you risk getting shot. How simple is that?

We have blacks in our mostly white Austin neighborhood and no one hassles them because they mow their lawns, wash their cars, go to work every day and dress like the rest of the American middle class. We rarely even see a police car and have never heard a gunshot.

And if that’s too hard, or too debilitating for the ones who are hassled, well, you get what you resemble. Trayvon and his gold grill. Brown and his I’ll-mess-you-up attitude. Jackson and his you-can’t-catch-me-whitey. It’s really as simple as that.

The “white privilege” babble is just the latest excuse for why so many non-performing, unambitious and belligerent blacks are left behind by whites and Asians and, at least in Texas, by Hispanics, too.

UPDATE;  Now, it could be that the White Privilege B.S. was invented by some dimwit white academic. Sounds like it, doesn’t it? But it’s even more probable it was invented by some racist black person because, as The Z Man says:

“The most bigoted people in America are black. In fact, blacks are actively encouraged to wear their prejudices on their sleeve. Every black comic does bits on white people. Famous black people put a lot of effort into ‘keeping it real’ so they can be clear that they are not down with the blue-eyed devil. How many times have you heard a black guy say something like, ‘It is a black thing, you wouldn’t understand’?”

MORE: Example No. 1 of black bigotry: Our very own black president. Well, your president, maybe. To me he’s just THE president.

The real danger to Preventing Parenthood

“The true danger to Planned Parenthood and the entire [abortion] industry [of the videos] is the exposure of their hypocrisy. The two positions of ‘clumps of cells’ and negotiating over human organs from abortions are mutually exclusive.

“One cannot extract human organs from ‘a pile of goop,’ or from tumors or undifferentiated ‘clumps of cells.’ Human organs come from human beings, and the only way to harvest them from unborn human beings is to kill them first.

“The videos cut through all of the misdirection, all of the antiseptic generalities used in defense of abortion, to expose its true nature — and that’s what has Planned Parenthood panicked over the videos.”

And why, at the moment the Texas Baby Chop Shops are stonewalling a state Senate investigation into the organ harvesting and selling. Not a workable move, folks, as you will soon find out.

Via Hot Air.

UPDATE:  PP gets a California state judge to issue a temporary restraining order on the anti-abortion group that made the undercover videos exposing PP’s organs-tissues business. So much for the 1st Amendment. Meanwhile, Fox News doesn’t feel restrained in publicizing the latest sting video.