"Skunked": Bill Gross On How "The U.S. Will Likely Default On Its Debt" | zero hedge: "by FreedomGuyAnd then scroll up to read Bill Gross channel Pepe Le Pew... Read More......
on Wed, 03/30/2011 - 21:09
#1119763
Nice point. It's all tax money. Also, the 'social contract' is no contract, or its a contract with no performance clauses. One of the prime reasons you never ever want government to provide any service is because you don't get a contract. In essence, the government unlike any private entity can change the deal at any time for any reason...at will. If you have an annuity or some other form of investment, you have a contract. It cannot be changed without your consent or without legal penalties. We are all suckers in Social Security. I don't blame the first generation or two as the U.S. and world were experimenting with socialism. However, for most all of my life we have know of the impending insolvency of SS. We know it is a true ponzi scheme, yet the only fix has been to raise taxes. It's still there, still insolvent, still has a ponzi structure, still untouched by politicians who only have the collosally stupid ideas of raising retirement age and maybe means testing or uncapping the tax. All stupid ideas from stupid politicians to an unsuspecting public.
Never ever let government do anything for you or the general population you can do for yourself...ever. You give up your own autonomy and you get a crappy product."
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
COTD: Skunked
An Electric Shocka
Is your hair standing on end yet? If they changed their name to Hamilton Electric there would be truth in advertising.Power Line - I sing the Government Electric: "At a recent conference, I was talking with a colleague I am acquainted with from GE. I mentioned the ARPA-E, primarily because I was curious. He told me that originally their proposal was turned down (i.e., it did not make it through the peer-review process and thus it was deemed by the reviewers as 'not worthy of support'). He then told me the funding was awarded by the ARPA-E director, at his prerogative.Our reader passes along this TMR story on the GE grant and comments: 'Mr. Hatch raises similar questions and summarizes everything quite well.'"
Since I am a faithful Power Line reader, I could easily connect the dots between the government's 'favored' treatment of GE and this funding. I doubt that this will be the last, as the Department of Energy will have many opportunities to direct funding to GE. Just another example of Obama directing my tax dollars to his favorite places, and a way for GE to 'create jobs' and help their bottom line.
Of course, the population would have to have two brain cells to rub together for it to help... Read More......
Stop Messing Around And Donate NOW
Instapundit » Blog Archive » PROFESSOR JACOBSON: Don’t Just Talk: Help Get This Ad On The Air In Wisconsin….: "PROFESSOR JACOBSON: Don’t Just Talk: Help Get This Ad On The Air In Wisconsin.Donate now. Here's the direct link. I just did. Read More......
Posted by Glenn Reynolds at 11:58 am"
Monday, March 28, 2011
Whoops! Wrong sign!
Bombshell conclusion – new peer reviewed analysis: “worldwide-temperature increase has not produced acceleration of global sea level over the past 100 years” | Watts Up With That?: "J. R. Houston† and R. G. Dean‡ †Director Emeritus, Engineer Research and Development Center, Corps of Engineers, 3909 Halls Ferry Road, Vicksburg, MS 39180, U.S.A. james.r.houston@usace.army.milHas it ever occurred to these emotional basket cases that raising the average temperature of the Antarctic from -50C to -45C -- even if it were to be accomplished which ain't happening folks -- is more than just a few marbles shy of a melt-o-rama? Read More......
‡Professor Emeritus, Department of Civil and Coastal Civil Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611, U.S.A. dean@coastal.ufl.edu
Without sea-level acceleration, the 20th-century sea-level trend of 1.7 mm/y would produce a rise of only approximately 0.15 m from 2010 to 2100; therefore, sea-level acceleration is a critical component of projected sea-level rise. To determine this acceleration, we analyze monthly-averaged records for 57 U.S. tide gauges in the Permanent Service for Mean Sea Level (PSMSL) data base that have lengths of 60–156 years. Least-squares quadratic analysis of each of the 57 records are performed to quantify accelerations, and 25 gauge records having data spanning from 1930 to 2010 are analyzed. In both cases we obtain small average sea-level decelerations."
Little Leonids Living LePetomaine Syndrome
Explained here. Read More......Instapundit » Blog Archive » MICHAEL WALSH: Barbarians Within: Why Brit-Style Riots Could Spread To The U.S.We’ve already seen …: "This is no way to run a democracy. Peaceful protests are one thing, but massed force and ominous warnings about dire consequences are another. Throw into the mix the free-floating anarchists who routinely show up at such events — most recently at the G-20 summit last year in Toronto — and you have a prescription for serious trouble.It’s LePetomaine Syndrome."
Yet, all too often, any attempt to open a civil discussion about the future is met with the same dreary charges that “hateful” conservatives want to kill old people and steal candy from babies.
For some on the left, too much is never enough — because, by definition, it can’t be. They operate on a modified version of the old Brezhnev Doctrine, which stated that once a country went communist, it could never go back: Once a government program is in place, it can never be cut or rescinded, only fattened. It doesn’t even matter whether it’s effective. The self-interested and the self-deluded have too much to lose to give up the fantasy of the perfect nanny state.
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Consensus
Well, which is it? | Watts Up With That?: "Andrew Bolt (via his reader John Coochey) of the Herald Sun notes an astonishing incongruity with expert claims on CO2 warming retention times made about 24 hours apart on radio programs in Australia.Or so they tell us... Read More......
Climate scientist and warmist Andy Pitman on Thursday:If we could stop emissions tomorrow we would still have 20 to 30 years of warming ahead of us because of inertia of the system.
Climate Commissioner and warmist Tim Flannery on Friday:If the world as a whole cut all emissions tomorrow the average temperature of the planet is not going to drop in several hundred years, perhaps as much as a thousand years"
In The Closet
"Staffers with Vice President Joe Biden confined an Orlando Sentinel reporter in a closet this week to keep him from mingling with high-powered guests gathered for a Democratic fundraiser.Read More......
Reporter Scott Powers was the designated 'pool reporter' for the vice president's Wednesday visit to the massive Winter Park, Fla., home of developer and philanthropist Alan Ginsburg. The veep hadn't arrived yet but most of the 150 guests (minimum $500 donation) had. They were busy noshing on caprese crostini with oven-dried mozzarella and basil, rosemary flatbread with grapes honey and gorgonzola cheese and bacon deviled eggs, before a lunch of grilled chicken Caesar and garden vegetable wraps.
Not so for Powers. A 'low-level staffer' put Powers in a storage closet and then stood guard outside the door, Powers told the DRUDGE REPORT. 'When I'd stick my head out, they'd say, 'Not yet. We'll let you know when you can come out.''"
Neither Do I
Video: Obama demands openness on military action … « Hot Air: "Obama will speak to the nation on Monday, ten days after he consulted with only a few “Washington insiders” and then launched a war that the Constitutional scholar argued was illegal when he was just a candidate for the presidency. Think Obama will try to explain these earlier statements and square them with his own actions this month? Neither do I."
Are You Part O The "Useful Direction"?
The Mystery of Fascism by David Ramsay Steele: "A general trend throughout revolutionary socialism from 1890 to 1914 was that the most revolutionary elements laid an increasing stress upon leadership, and downplayed the autonomous role of the toiling masses. This elitism was a natural outcome of the revolutionaries' ardent wish to have revolution and the stubborn disinclination of the working class to become revolutionary. (27) Workers were instinctive reformists: they wanted a fair shake within capitalism and nothing more. Since the workers did not look as if they would ever desire a revolution, the small group of conscious revolutionaries would have to play a more decisive role than Marx had imagined. That was the conclusion of Lenin in 1902. (28) It was the conclusion of Sorel. And it was the conclusion of the syndicalist Giuseppe Prezzolini whose works in the century's first decade Mussolini reviewed admiringly. (29)My guess would be yes unless you click through and read "The Mystery of Fascism" -- and "Hitler Was A Socialist" -- periodically to remind yourself.
The leadership theme was reinforced by the theoretical writings of, Mosca, Pareto, and Michels, especially Pareto's theory of the Circulation of Elites. All these arguments emphasized the vital role of active minorities and the futility of expecting that the masses would ever, left to themselves, accomplish anything. Further corroboration came from Le Bon's sensational best-seller of 1895--it would remain perpetually in print in a dozen languages--The Psychology of Crowds, which analyzed the "irrational" behavior of humans in groups and drew attention to the group's proclivity to place itself in the hands of a strong leader, who could control the group as long as he appealed to certain primitive or basic beliefs. (30)
The initiators of Fascism saw anti-rationalism as high-tech. It went with their fast cars and airplanes. Fascist anti-rationalism, like psychoanalysis, conceives of itself as a practical science which can channel elemental human drives in a useful direction."
And no, I haven't misspelled the title -- you can figure it out. O is a religion, isn't he? Actually, a sect within a larger religion; here's another one of its sects:
And while I'm at it, if you haven't read Crichton's "Aliens Cause Global Warming" you have no idea what you're missing. Read it and cry...
UPDATE: What's that? You say O isn't a religion? Au contraire mon frere:
Smaller
Why Obama’s Libya war coalition is the smallest in decades | The Cable: "President Barack Obama has touted his emphasis on multilateralism in the U.S. military intervention in Libya, but, for political, operational, and legal reasons, Obama's 'coalition of the willing' is smaller than any major multilateral operation since the end of the Cold War.Read More......
The Cable compiled a chart listing all the countries that contributed at least some military assets to the five major military operations in which the United States participated in a coalition during the last 20 years: the 1991 Gulf War (32 countries participating), the 1995 Bosnia mission (24 countries), the 1999 Kosovo mission (19 countries), the 2002 invasion of Afghanistan (48 countries), and the 2003 invasion of Iraq (40 countries), at the height of the size of each coalition. As of today, only 15 countries, including the United States, have committed to providing a military contribution to the Libya war."
The Fascist?
American Thinker: Will Conservatives Defend Atlas Shrugged This Time Around?: "We were prepared for negative reviews. We weren't prepared for what seemed like an outpouring of hatred and of distortions and lies about the book.The movie finally comes out this tax day. The lies against it will continue unabated... Read More......
I mean, to hear a woman - whose main political idea was that no man may initiate the use of force -- to hear her be called a fascist . . . we almost couldn't get it into our head that this was possible."
Earth To Sensitive People
American Thinker: Social Security Isn't Broken?: "The hole in the government finances, the utter mess of ObamaCare, the coming Medicare maelstrom: how did we get in this mess? The short answer is that it all started in about 1850 when sensitive people started worrying about the poor suffering workers. Oh no, they cried. We have to do something. They were sensitive, those people, but they were not smart. Their 'do something' always ended up as some centralized administrative government program, with government taking money from its least favorite citizens and giving it to its most favored citizens, and calling the result compassion.This is a RTWT. But you can't be allowed to miss the ending so here it is:
Earth to sensitive people."
No, Social Security isn't broke. It's worse than that. Social Security is a bottle on a shelf of social narcotics that kill the social instinct and poison people with an addictive sense of entitlement to the fruits of other peoples' labor.Read More......
In the life after liberalism, when liberal power has collapsed, we'll reconstruct all the social ties that liberals have so energetically broken up. Today, as we live through the decline and fall of the liberal empire, and endure the truculence of its leaders and its rank and file, it's the time to think, to organize, and to plan.
Cancelled
Instapundit » Blog Archive » SO IS THIS THE HOPE, OR THE CHANGE? Massachusetts job fair canceled because of lack of jobs. “A Ma…: "SO IS THIS THE HOPE, OR THE CHANGE? Massachusetts job fair canceled because of lack of jobs. “A Massachusetts employment organization has canceled its annual job fair because not enough companies have come forward to offer jobs. Richard Shafer, chairman of the Taunton Employment Task Force, says 20 to 25 employers are needed for the fair scheduled for April 6, but just 10 tables had been reserved. One table was reserved by a nonprofit that offers human services to job seekers, and three by temporary employment agencies.”But he's focused like a laser on the economy I tell ya'! Read More......
Posted by Glenn Reynolds at 8:40 am"
Thursday, March 24, 2011
I Want To Be A Postmodernist When I Grow Up ...
... because of course when you're a postmodernist words and intentions mean absolutely everything. And of course, as evidenced by this headline, absolutely nothing.
Read More......
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Sabotage: The Coming Boot In The Wheel
Moonbattery: Steve Lerner Reveals Plan to Further Destabilize US Economy: "If Obama's economic policy makes no sense to you at all, try listening to Steve Lerner — at least until recently of the SEIU and a frequent visitor to the White House. Here Lerner discusses plans to deliberately destabilize the American economy, creating untold havoc and misery to pave the way for totalitarian collectivism:"
There's actually a small amount of "stopped clock watch" in this: Lots of the bankers -- along with the politicians they have bought and the Federal Reserve -- really should be in jail. The problem for Lerner and his communist friends is that if the public ever looked up from American Idol they might find that one of those politicians is O Duce himself. Note that his new chief of staff -- in addition to being yet another corrupt Chicago pol -- just came from the same J.P. Morgan Lerner wants to target! LOL
Of course, the idea that we need even lower interest rates is crazy -- the monopolistic central planning of interest rates by the Fed is one of the largest factors in how we have this crazy debt-based, boom and bust nightmare that the ignorant maroon masses now call a "free market". I recommend looking up the real Thomas Jefferson if you believe that's a good thing.
And of course, what Lerner proposes is just the next wave of Cloward and Piven chaos that would be spotlighted as looming treason by any sane and truly freedom-loving U.S. Government. But that's never going to happen with Lerner visiting O Duce's White House at least four times now is it? Read More......
Only To Become All They Said They Hated
Instapundit » Blog Archive » THE ANCHORESS LOOKS AT OBAMA’S BUSH-LIKE APPROACH TO LIBYA AND COMMENTS: “I guess what I’m wonder…: "THE ANCHORESS LOOKS AT OBAMA’S BUSH-LIKE APPROACH TO LIBYA AND COMMENTS: “I guess what I’m wondering is, how much further along would the Iraq government’s stabilization be — how much further along would the quest for democratic governance be, in the Middle East (and how much less reluctant would tyrants be to try to stop it by killing their own people), if only the Democrats hadn’t wasted 6 years politicizing our efforts and another two years bowing and scraping and restarting and gasbagging and doing everything they could to say, ‘we’re not Bush,’ only to become all they said they hated?”Of course with the memory capacity of fruit flies, they're blissfully incapable of grokking this point... Read More......
Posted by Glenn Reynolds at 10:24 pm"
By The Way...
Instapundit » Blog Archive » MARK STEYN: “By the way, I always love the way the west gets blamed in the Middle East for supporti…: "MARK STEYN: “By the way, I always love the way the west gets blamed in the Middle East for supporting despots and thugs. C’mon, all you Arab ‘intellectuals’: Who else is there? Where’s your Havel or your Corazon Aquino? Amr Moussa, a shifty devious suck-up to dictators his entire life, has hopes of becoming the president of the ‘new’ Egypt. Great: a ‘Facebook Revolution’ with the same two-faced faces.”Oh, and by the way, I have sympathy for what a hard decision it was for O Duce to go to war or not. Let's see: His pastor's pal Daffy Duck with American blood on his hands for sure? Or rebels with at least an Al Qaida faction that may have American blood on their hands? How to pick which is more treasonous? Read More......
Posted by Glenn Reynolds at 8:57 am"
Meet The Boss
Federal pay ahead of private industry - USATODAY.com: "Federal employees earn higher average salaries than private-sector workers in more than eight out of 10 occupations, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data finds.Let me do the math for you: Federal employee average wage and benefit package is $67,691 + $40,785 = $108,476 versus private employees at $60,046 + $9,882 = $69,928. That makes the average total pay package for Federal employees 55% higher than for private employees.
Accountants, nurses, chemists, surveyors, cooks, clerks and janitors are among the wide range of jobs that get paid more on average in the federal government than in the private sector.
Overall, federal workers earned an average salary of $67,691 in 2008 for occupations that exist both in government and the private sector, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The average pay for the same mix of jobs in the private sector was $60,046 in 2008, the most recent data available.
CHART: Federal salaries compared to private-sector
These salary figures do not include the value of health, pension and other benefits, which averaged $40,785 per federal employee in 2008 vs. $9,882 per private worker, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis."
And did I forget to mention that the AVERAGE total compensation package for those poor Milwaukee teachers Scott Walker is oppressing so is $101,000? Hardly seems a surprise after the forgoing does it? Read More......
Monday, March 21, 2011
Allen West: The American People Are Not Going Away
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