"Hold and Die." These were the orders given to the 600 or so South Vietnamese soldiers whom Captain John W Ripley was "advising" on April 2, 1972 in Vietnam. Facing a juggernaut of 20,ooo regular Northern troops during the "Easter Offensive," Ripley single-handedly placed the charges and blew the Dong Ha Bridge. The story surfaced this week in conjunction with the passing of the now Col. Ripley. Read both here and here for the inspiring story of a true American hero.
"None at All." The response of a worried wife when asked if she had hope of her husband's survival of the latest Russian naval catastrophe. An accident involving the inadvertent release of freon in the fire suppression system of a nuclear sub claimed at least twenty lives. Unclear is why personal breathing apparatus was not used. This latest joins a growing list of Russian nuclear submarine disasters that have claimed the lives of many: K-19, Kursk, as well as others. Article here.
"It was Bizarre." So said a lifelong Boothbay Harbor, Maine resident of the 12 foot waves that materialized in the harbor. The cause is unknown. In the Boston Globe article, Megan Woolhouse discusses the phenomenon which has been documented in other locations including Daytona Beach, Florida.
"I've never met an axolotl..." for the end of the witticism by Ogden Nash, read this Fox News report about the endangered axolotl, or "Mexican Walking Fish," a monstrous looking salamander inhabiting the region of Xochimilco in Mexico. The victim of urban sprawl, farm run-off, and non native species incursions, the axolotl faces extinction.
"There is a slightly creepy cult of personality about all this." according to Evan Thomas of Newsweek. Now he says it. Don't bother. Check out the Rose exchange, posted on the Rush Limbaugh site here. While we're on the topic of the election, check out this most excellent article in Forbes. Claudia Rossett exhorts us that it is "time to restore liberty." Pretty nifty.
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Saturday, November 8, 2008
On Cutting Off Your Nose...
I was going to include this one earlier, but it just got too unwieldy.
I've spent the few days after the election walking around in shock, mentally demanding of the dimwits around me "What have you done!" Surprisingly, it isn't about my candidate losing, or even my fears of Obama's leanings. The way I figure it, the people have spoken, and too many of us are watching. It's the economy, stupid.
I confess I had not thought the economic ramifications would be so dramatic. For days after the election, the market kept tanking. One corporation after another announced lay-offs and closings. Coincidental, you say, perhaps. It is possible, however, that it was a no confidence vote, a signal of what is to come from the corporations who see a whole ream of taxes and other charges ahead and investors who see a lot more risk for a lot less reward.
In any case, those suffering most in this situation: California and New York. Apparently, these liberal bastions, epicenters of hope and change, depend on those evil, selfish corporations and investors. New York City in particular has been hard hit. As an expat, I feel their pain. In addition to losing the 400 dollar rebate from the inordinate property taxes they pay on their astronomically priced homes and possibly gaining a 15 percent tax increase, New Yorkers may now be paying tolls on bridges that have been free for decades, proceeds to go to subsidize mass transit which costs near 2 dollars a ride. To give you an idea how punishing the costs are.... Tolls presently on inner bridges range from 5 to 10 (round trip) dollars a crossing. In the late nineties, a 40 thousand a year income with two dependents necessitated paying roughly a 25 percent of that amount in federal, state, and local taxes. Those are just the basics. For some California info visit the Bookworm Room.
It's a timely reminder, although a day too late and a dollar short, that there is a symbiosis of sorts between the very places that lean so liberally and the villains of the piece. It is expensive to run these enlightened places with a myriad of services. Scrooge aside, sometimes it's not a good idea to sit down to a repast of cooked goose.
As for me, I fervently hope that the Obama show on Friday helped calm the markets and that acceptance of the inevitable is well on the way. There is something to be said for the law of unintended consequences.
I've spent the few days after the election walking around in shock, mentally demanding of the dimwits around me "What have you done!" Surprisingly, it isn't about my candidate losing, or even my fears of Obama's leanings. The way I figure it, the people have spoken, and too many of us are watching. It's the economy, stupid.
I confess I had not thought the economic ramifications would be so dramatic. For days after the election, the market kept tanking. One corporation after another announced lay-offs and closings. Coincidental, you say, perhaps. It is possible, however, that it was a no confidence vote, a signal of what is to come from the corporations who see a whole ream of taxes and other charges ahead and investors who see a lot more risk for a lot less reward.
In any case, those suffering most in this situation: California and New York. Apparently, these liberal bastions, epicenters of hope and change, depend on those evil, selfish corporations and investors. New York City in particular has been hard hit. As an expat, I feel their pain. In addition to losing the 400 dollar rebate from the inordinate property taxes they pay on their astronomically priced homes and possibly gaining a 15 percent tax increase, New Yorkers may now be paying tolls on bridges that have been free for decades, proceeds to go to subsidize mass transit which costs near 2 dollars a ride. To give you an idea how punishing the costs are.... Tolls presently on inner bridges range from 5 to 10 (round trip) dollars a crossing. In the late nineties, a 40 thousand a year income with two dependents necessitated paying roughly a 25 percent of that amount in federal, state, and local taxes. Those are just the basics. For some California info visit the Bookworm Room.
It's a timely reminder, although a day too late and a dollar short, that there is a symbiosis of sorts between the very places that lean so liberally and the villains of the piece. It is expensive to run these enlightened places with a myriad of services. Scrooge aside, sometimes it's not a good idea to sit down to a repast of cooked goose.
As for me, I fervently hope that the Obama show on Friday helped calm the markets and that acceptance of the inevitable is well on the way. There is something to be said for the law of unintended consequences.
Special Saturday Election Perimortem Edition
We ain't finished dying yet!
Closing the Barn Door. Here's a Cal Thomas column which highlights the Washington Post Ombudswoman's acknowledgement that the paper favored Obama in their coverage and neglected to vet him properly. Additional tidbits include the role of journalistic arrogance and the repercussions of same for the industry.
Cherchez L'Argent. For a time I couldn't figure out why the Press dominoes were falling in line for Obama, almost like a conspiracy. I put aside stray thoughts like "one world government," the mark of the beast (campaign signs), and the lottery 666 in Chicago day after the election. I even turned my back on the sneaking suspicion that this is was somehow orchestrated by a fifth column of Alinskyite leftists. But even well-known journalistic leanings could not account for the blatant stupidity of trashing their already threadbare credibility. It was then that I started to suspect other forces at work in the media, namely the zeal to preside over the historicity of the election of the first black president. Then I came across this juicy morsel. Follow the money, as they say.
Auld Lang Syne. Some of the best analysis this season has come from outside the country, particularly Canada. Conrad Black provides a pre election recap from this perspective here. While we're on the subject of election analysis, try this interesting read by Shelby Steele in the LA Times which posits that race did play a factor.
Red Dawn Morn. Here's an interesting development. The Obama win has set off a gun buying frenzy. According to Reuters, potential gun buyers have been spurred by the thought of gun control. Personally, I think some far sighted people are just getting ready in case the revolution comes. Maybe, they don't intend to go quietly into that good night. Don't think so, read the current Obama website where service is going to be mandated. Collectivism?
*Pending future developments, I do reserve the right to pick up any of these conspiracy theories .
Closing the Barn Door. Here's a Cal Thomas column which highlights the Washington Post Ombudswoman's acknowledgement that the paper favored Obama in their coverage and neglected to vet him properly. Additional tidbits include the role of journalistic arrogance and the repercussions of same for the industry.
Cherchez L'Argent. For a time I couldn't figure out why the Press dominoes were falling in line for Obama, almost like a conspiracy. I put aside stray thoughts like "one world government," the mark of the beast (campaign signs), and the lottery 666 in Chicago day after the election. I even turned my back on the sneaking suspicion that this is was somehow orchestrated by a fifth column of Alinskyite leftists. But even well-known journalistic leanings could not account for the blatant stupidity of trashing their already threadbare credibility. It was then that I started to suspect other forces at work in the media, namely the zeal to preside over the historicity of the election of the first black president. Then I came across this juicy morsel. Follow the money, as they say.
Auld Lang Syne. Some of the best analysis this season has come from outside the country, particularly Canada. Conrad Black provides a pre election recap from this perspective here. While we're on the subject of election analysis, try this interesting read by Shelby Steele in the LA Times which posits that race did play a factor.
Red Dawn Morn. Here's an interesting development. The Obama win has set off a gun buying frenzy. According to Reuters, potential gun buyers have been spurred by the thought of gun control. Personally, I think some far sighted people are just getting ready in case the revolution comes. Maybe, they don't intend to go quietly into that good night. Don't think so, read the current Obama website where service is going to be mandated. Collectivism?
*Pending future developments, I do reserve the right to pick up any of these conspiracy theories .
La Paloma Approaches
As I write this, Hurricane Paloma approaches landfall, which is expected in the wee hours of Sunday morning, in Cuba. The third hurricane in 60 days, it seems that this storm will also target the family homestead, which heavily damaged in the last one was still standing. The question is whether the money we sent was already used to repair the structure, in which case the storm could again damage it; or whether the money has not made it there and can be used to repair the home apres storm. However, maybe the structure won't make it through this one without fortification. These are the considerations that plague those of us with relatives held hostage in the Castrian gulag. If we needed further proof as to what pieces of excrement run the government, in this article the cagalistroso Castro again reiterates that the island will accept no humanitarian aid from the US unless the embargo is lifted. You can bet he will have a roof over his head when it is all over... although he might want to be cautious, as it is well known that doves do have an affinity for his person.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Michael Crichton RIP
It seems that every month or so, I find myself lamenting the passing of one or other of my favorite authors. This month is no different. On Tuesday, the death of Michael Crichton was overshadowed by the electoral goings on. Today, I'd like to take a moment to mark his passing and acknowledge his contributions, which were many ranging from The Andromeda Strain to the screenplay for The Great Train Robbery to the television series ER. When Crichton was "on," there was no one who could match his intelligent, well-plotted and suspenseful novels. What set his work apart was the real world basis on his stories. I found myself learning about the topic du jour- from dinosaurs to nanobots- while being entertained. Can't ask much more than that.
As a teacher, I found that many of my charges had never discovered the "fun" of reading. Either they had never been exposed to it or their natural appreciation had been deadened by the stuff we feed middle schoolers. I made it my mission to have them read approachable, interesting books over the summer. The choice of Jurassic Park was easy. It was a hit with them before it became a movie. As a matter of fact, I got a few years out of the title before they put it up on the big screen. That's how engrossing his novels were.
I extend my condolences to his family for their loss. And I rue the loss of an interesting, enlightening, and entertaining voice in fiction. He will be missed.
As a teacher, I found that many of my charges had never discovered the "fun" of reading. Either they had never been exposed to it or their natural appreciation had been deadened by the stuff we feed middle schoolers. I made it my mission to have them read approachable, interesting books over the summer. The choice of Jurassic Park was easy. It was a hit with them before it became a movie. As a matter of fact, I got a few years out of the title before they put it up on the big screen. That's how engrossing his novels were.
I extend my condolences to his family for their loss. And I rue the loss of an interesting, enlightening, and entertaining voice in fiction. He will be missed.
In Which I Uphold the Honor of the New Media: Updated
We received a very nice and informative comment from the author of the original poster of the teacher story. It was followed by a clarification of sorts. The writer could not refrain from the anonymous editorial comment. I started to reply, when I decided it was something that needed to be said publicly. Here's the comment:
Diatha Harris is not a teacher in Asheville, NC. She has not been for 4 years. And the film's producer misspelled her first name. That's what I love about bloggers and the “new media.” They are so damn accurate.Thanks a bunch KGS.
My Reply:
Since you did not leave your name, I have no way of knowing the source of your info. Fine, I'm not sure, however, what the implication is here. The documentary was obviously not completed four years ago, as in the nominees were not named. I can only surmise that you meant to communicate that she did not work for the Asheville schools at the time in question. Fair enough. That she worked somewhere is a pretty good bet, unless we are to believe the whole thing was a stage set, something belied by Diatha's CYA job in the interview.
As to your dig at the accuracy of the new media and bloggers. It is in some measure earned. However, such errors merely reflect the laxity that has crept into our culture, exacerbated by the necessity to earn a living, since those who get paid mighty well to inform the public abnegated that responsibility during this whole election season. It is the "new" assortment of media with all of its warts- including the guy blogging in undershorts in the basement- that presented information the American Public should have known. Are there excesses, inaccuracies? You betcha! You'll find them in both old and new these days.
It would, of course, have been better if the name and the venue had been properly documented. What you miss in quibbling about which school system and what spelling is the gist of the documentary excerpt and the post, namely that a teacher was using her position of power in the classroom to point her charges in the direction of her own political leanings. You may take exception to the messenger, but the message is accurate.
Update: The whole brouhaha has hit the media. You can follow it on Drudge, Fox, the Bookworm room. We were there first.
Diatha Harris is not a teacher in Asheville, NC. She has not been for 4 years. And the film's producer misspelled her first name. That's what I love about bloggers and the “new media.” They are so damn accurate.Thanks a bunch KGS.
My Reply:
Since you did not leave your name, I have no way of knowing the source of your info. Fine, I'm not sure, however, what the implication is here. The documentary was obviously not completed four years ago, as in the nominees were not named. I can only surmise that you meant to communicate that she did not work for the Asheville schools at the time in question. Fair enough. That she worked somewhere is a pretty good bet, unless we are to believe the whole thing was a stage set, something belied by Diatha's CYA job in the interview.
As to your dig at the accuracy of the new media and bloggers. It is in some measure earned. However, such errors merely reflect the laxity that has crept into our culture, exacerbated by the necessity to earn a living, since those who get paid mighty well to inform the public abnegated that responsibility during this whole election season. It is the "new" assortment of media with all of its warts- including the guy blogging in undershorts in the basement- that presented information the American Public should have known. Are there excesses, inaccuracies? You betcha! You'll find them in both old and new these days.
It would, of course, have been better if the name and the venue had been properly documented. What you miss in quibbling about which school system and what spelling is the gist of the documentary excerpt and the post, namely that a teacher was using her position of power in the classroom to point her charges in the direction of her own political leanings. You may take exception to the messenger, but the message is accurate.
Update: The whole brouhaha has hit the media. You can follow it on Drudge, Fox, the Bookworm room. We were there first.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
The Oracle of Delaware
Our Vice President Elect created quite a stir when he prophesied that Obama would be tested soon after his presidency. For the first and only time in his political life, he was prescient. Six months? The Russians didn't wait six minutes! Read here and here. The Iranians were not far behind. Read here and here.
Is He or Isn't He?
I was going to be gracious. I really was. Last night I heard the President-elect say:
And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn, I may not have won your vote tonight, but I hear your voices. I need your help. And I will be your president, too.
Foolish me, I thought he might actually mean it. Nah. Then I find out that among those being considered for national security advisor, etc. is Greg Craig. Cuban Americans of the intransigent kind will know the name, as Mr. Craig putatively represented Juan Miguel, the father of Elian Gonzalez. I write "putatively" because we don't need a "weatherman" to tell us who he was really representing.
So despite my best intentions, as well as my desire to support my African American brethren who are walking on air at the moment, I have to wonder. If President-elect Obama who has already demonstrated the post partisan style of his leadership by tapping uberpartisan Rahm Emanuel for chief of staff truly meant what he said, he will keep Craig around but under wraps. Stuff him in a closet if he has to. Otherwise, Cuban Americans are going to recognize it for what it is. See picture above.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Good Night, America
I feel duty bound to note the impending loss. Tomorrow is another day. Do you think those militias take Cubans?
Teacher Trash Talk?
Came across this link at Fausta's blog. It supposedly shows Asheville NC teacher Diantha Harris proselytizing for Obama and browbeating a student for supporting McCain. The incident is part of a Swedish documentary, so I can't vouch for it. There is one video portion embedded which shows the "teacher" coyly maintaining the right to different points of view, even as she tells a poor little girl that her father could be in the military for one hundred years. Watch it and see what you think. We can look on the bright side. At least she didn't ask the children to close their eyes and ask, f, oh, Obama for candy.
Must Read for Today
David Limbaugh tells it like it is. He feels my pain. Try:
The prospect of a Barack Obama presidency makes me very nervous.
Obama's entire campaign has been based on the need for radical, transformational change, which implies there is something very wrong with America.
It's hardly surprising, then, that he has painted the bleakest picture of America instead of acknowledging, as a starting point, that we are still the greatest nation in the world.
and
With all respect, almost everything about Obama's campaign is fraudulent. He masquerades as a uniter while dividing, polarizing and alienating us. He denies he's liberal, when objective sources score him as the most liberal senator. He says he barely knows militants and radicals with whom he has spent his lifetime cavorting and whose worldviews -- horrifyingly -- he shares. He brazenly disguises welfare redistributions as tax cuts. He and his surrogates keep changing his tax plan.
With his ideas about spreading the wealth, entrepreneurial selfishness, the ongoing "original sin" in our Constitution, the inherent evil of corporations, nationalized health care, and the civil rights movement not doing enough to bring about "economic justice" -- a euphemism for "Marxism" used by radicals, such as Bill Ayers, who still hate America -- are you not concerned at just how far Obama might go if he's got a nearly veto-proof Democratic majority at his back?
Food for thought. Read the whole thing here.
The prospect of a Barack Obama presidency makes me very nervous.
Obama's entire campaign has been based on the need for radical, transformational change, which implies there is something very wrong with America.
It's hardly surprising, then, that he has painted the bleakest picture of America instead of acknowledging, as a starting point, that we are still the greatest nation in the world.
and
With all respect, almost everything about Obama's campaign is fraudulent. He masquerades as a uniter while dividing, polarizing and alienating us. He denies he's liberal, when objective sources score him as the most liberal senator. He says he barely knows militants and radicals with whom he has spent his lifetime cavorting and whose worldviews -- horrifyingly -- he shares. He brazenly disguises welfare redistributions as tax cuts. He and his surrogates keep changing his tax plan.
With his ideas about spreading the wealth, entrepreneurial selfishness, the ongoing "original sin" in our Constitution, the inherent evil of corporations, nationalized health care, and the civil rights movement not doing enough to bring about "economic justice" -- a euphemism for "Marxism" used by radicals, such as Bill Ayers, who still hate America -- are you not concerned at just how far Obama might go if he's got a nearly veto-proof Democratic majority at his back?
Food for thought. Read the whole thing here.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Election Eve Reflections
I voted yesterday. It took two trips and two hours, but we did it. I had my elderly and infirm mother who had refused an absentee ballot, because voting had never been a test of physical endurance before, along. When we pulled up to the polling place on Saturday, the wait was 45 minutes. We tried the line for a while but then decided to try on Sunday. On Sunday we, along with hundreds of others, opened up the polling place. This time, however, we were prepared. With the expedient of a folding seat cane, she weathered the crowd, the heat, and the multi hour wait. After it was all over, she pulled me aside and said, "You know why I did this? Because it was so close. Otherwise I wouldn't have waited." I don't think I could have been prouder of her.
The hubster, of course, was another story. Decades ago, as nearly newlyweds, we took a grand tour of Europe. We started out in London, then took a train to Folkstone where we boarded a ferry to Calais. Obviously, this was before the Chunnel. All was fine, except that there was nowhere to stow our bags under lock and key, necessitating that we, as New Yorkers, keep our eyes on the luggage. Using one excuse or another, the hub managed to find a pretext to leave. Thus, I spent the whole trip chained to one spot. Little did I know at the time, but I have been minding the luggage ever since. So yesterday, true to form, he kept ducking off the line to have a cigarette, leaving me immured in that wall of humanity. I forgave him, because he is pathologically sensitive to crowds, but only just.
So as I was inching along, husband flown, mother semi-conscious, I had ample opportunity to entertain myself by watching the masses. First, I played "the who are they voting for" game. Some were obvious New College hippie types. As my daughter once described it, "Mom, they don't wear shoes there!" Obvious Obama voters. But after that, it was hard to tell. Except that as the wait dragged on, by dint of eavesdropping on their whispered conversation, I gleaned that the two separate voters in front of me were in the McCain camp. There was a sense of urgency to their desire to vote, as if like the candidate they did not believe all was lost. One confided to the other that many of her Democrat friend were voting for McCain. That is anecdotal. Other than that I could not tell.
No one discussed politics. No one jostled in line. Other people's children were indulged; other people's elderly, cosseted. It's as if we all understood that although we might differ mightily on politics, we respected the right of each and every one of us to our own perspective. We were united as Americans in an orderly, venerable tradition of expressing our wishes via the ballot box. America, great country! So if Obama wins tomorrow, I will give him a fair shot. We always seem to get the leader we need. And as my brave mother says, "No hay mal, que por bien no venga." There is no evil that does not result in good, indeed!
The hubster, of course, was another story. Decades ago, as nearly newlyweds, we took a grand tour of Europe. We started out in London, then took a train to Folkstone where we boarded a ferry to Calais. Obviously, this was before the Chunnel. All was fine, except that there was nowhere to stow our bags under lock and key, necessitating that we, as New Yorkers, keep our eyes on the luggage. Using one excuse or another, the hub managed to find a pretext to leave. Thus, I spent the whole trip chained to one spot. Little did I know at the time, but I have been minding the luggage ever since. So yesterday, true to form, he kept ducking off the line to have a cigarette, leaving me immured in that wall of humanity. I forgave him, because he is pathologically sensitive to crowds, but only just.
So as I was inching along, husband flown, mother semi-conscious, I had ample opportunity to entertain myself by watching the masses. First, I played "the who are they voting for" game. Some were obvious New College hippie types. As my daughter once described it, "Mom, they don't wear shoes there!" Obvious Obama voters. But after that, it was hard to tell. Except that as the wait dragged on, by dint of eavesdropping on their whispered conversation, I gleaned that the two separate voters in front of me were in the McCain camp. There was a sense of urgency to their desire to vote, as if like the candidate they did not believe all was lost. One confided to the other that many of her Democrat friend were voting for McCain. That is anecdotal. Other than that I could not tell.
No one discussed politics. No one jostled in line. Other people's children were indulged; other people's elderly, cosseted. It's as if we all understood that although we might differ mightily on politics, we respected the right of each and every one of us to our own perspective. We were united as Americans in an orderly, venerable tradition of expressing our wishes via the ballot box. America, great country! So if Obama wins tomorrow, I will give him a fair shot. We always seem to get the leader we need. And as my brave mother says, "No hay mal, que por bien no venga." There is no evil that does not result in good, indeed!
Children's Reading Day in Sarasota: A Public Service Announcement
This comment was left on a post about the Sarasota Reading Festival. The Friends of the Selby Library and The Children's Garden has put together a reading fest for children!
To all those Sarasota folks, our Children's Garden is taking charge of a Children's Reading Day! Free admission, illustrators, authors, vendors, etc. Nov. 23 10a-5p. www.childrensreadingday.org
You, go!
To all those Sarasota folks, our Children's Garden is taking charge of a Children's Reading Day! Free admission, illustrators, authors, vendors, etc. Nov. 23 10a-5p. www.childrensreadingday.org
You, go!
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Don't Say We Weren't Warned
Melek makes a reasoned and empassioned plea in Cubanology, asking the most basic of questions: "What has happened to our standards for Commander in Chief?" Not long ago, Dick Morris made the point that because of his associations, Obama were he not the elected official would not pass an FBI investigation to serve in the White House. But all of that is prelude.
On Tuesday, the American people may well elect a candidate because they desire a change in the policies of the past 8 years and instead get a president who has sworn to "fundamentally change" the United States. How many know that with a Democrat supermajority in congress, they are offerring a "carte blanche" to a transformation of government as we know it? When the inevitable rude awakening comes, they can not pretend they were not warned. Obama, although cloaked in the language of moderation and wearing the breastplate of media collusion, has provided enough clues to his vision of America.
Obama's America is not a nation where even the poor are considerably better off than they are almost anywhere else on Earth, where it is possible by dint of ability, hard work, and a little help to go from Chicago's South Side to its Hyde Park. It is a nation replete with misery and suffering. A nation crying out for economic redistribution, where wealth is going to "trickle up."
It gets worse. The Constitution is a "flawed" document. This I can partially understand, as this same qualified a slave as three fifths of a man. But the framers of this document were prescient enough to produce what has served as the backbone of a free and prosperous people for centuries. (How many Republics did it take France?) Messr. Obama complains that the founding fathers concentrated on negative liberties. Well, I'm not a Constitutional scholar, but as a Cuban American, it seems to me that there is something to be said for limiting the powers of government, any government, be it ever so well intentioned.
But even if we grant him the point, on what ground does he presume to attempt an end run around a document that most Americans consider sacrosanct? Is it only his own vision that he relies on? And what informs that vision? Here is where the these influences and associations become particularly troublesome. With the lack of any real record, it is difficult to say what exactly inhabits his dreams. Therein lies the crux of the problem.
So what can be gleaned from the subtext of all that he has said? He wants to "spread the wealth" and "fundamentally change" the country and the world. He would meet as equals with the most despised of totalitarian rulers, and Jesse Jackson assures us disregard the "Zionists." Regime officials in Cuba are already bruiting it about that the embargo will be lifted. Doubtless, in each instance, it will all seem terribly reasonable. Despite the rationale behind the prohibition of using the armed forces in the country, he proposes a civilian armed force within its borders. He pins energy policy on what are at the moment pipe dreams, technology that will take decades to mature and would destroy whole industries, seemingly without a qualm; seeks to raise taxes in the midst of a major economic downturn, characterizing as "selfish" those who would like to keep more than thirty percent of what they earn (factor in payroll, state, and local taxes); and looks down upon those who "cling" to their guns and their God; a man who punishes the few intrepid souls in the media who have the audacity to ask difficult questions or endorse the other candidate and mocks the dreams of a humble plumber for the same.
Make no mistake about it: this is a fight over the soul of America. I cannot help but think that a vote for Obama is a vote to change those values of independence, self-reliance, and self-determination that made this country and its people great. Now unlike my more liberal brethren, I believe that you are entitled to your own opinions. I further believe that two people may differ for valid reasons. I also acknowledge that I may be wrong. A President Obama may go down in the annals of history as another Lincoln. I hope I am. I do know, however, that in Greek tragedy, the Gods always punish hubris. I pray that we may not wind up as the chorus, witness and victim to the downfall of greatness.
On Tuesday, the American people may well elect a candidate because they desire a change in the policies of the past 8 years and instead get a president who has sworn to "fundamentally change" the United States. How many know that with a Democrat supermajority in congress, they are offerring a "carte blanche" to a transformation of government as we know it? When the inevitable rude awakening comes, they can not pretend they were not warned. Obama, although cloaked in the language of moderation and wearing the breastplate of media collusion, has provided enough clues to his vision of America.
Obama's America is not a nation where even the poor are considerably better off than they are almost anywhere else on Earth, where it is possible by dint of ability, hard work, and a little help to go from Chicago's South Side to its Hyde Park. It is a nation replete with misery and suffering. A nation crying out for economic redistribution, where wealth is going to "trickle up."
It gets worse. The Constitution is a "flawed" document. This I can partially understand, as this same qualified a slave as three fifths of a man. But the framers of this document were prescient enough to produce what has served as the backbone of a free and prosperous people for centuries. (How many Republics did it take France?) Messr. Obama complains that the founding fathers concentrated on negative liberties. Well, I'm not a Constitutional scholar, but as a Cuban American, it seems to me that there is something to be said for limiting the powers of government, any government, be it ever so well intentioned.
But even if we grant him the point, on what ground does he presume to attempt an end run around a document that most Americans consider sacrosanct? Is it only his own vision that he relies on? And what informs that vision? Here is where the these influences and associations become particularly troublesome. With the lack of any real record, it is difficult to say what exactly inhabits his dreams. Therein lies the crux of the problem.
So what can be gleaned from the subtext of all that he has said? He wants to "spread the wealth" and "fundamentally change" the country and the world. He would meet as equals with the most despised of totalitarian rulers, and Jesse Jackson assures us disregard the "Zionists." Regime officials in Cuba are already bruiting it about that the embargo will be lifted. Doubtless, in each instance, it will all seem terribly reasonable. Despite the rationale behind the prohibition of using the armed forces in the country, he proposes a civilian armed force within its borders. He pins energy policy on what are at the moment pipe dreams, technology that will take decades to mature and would destroy whole industries, seemingly without a qualm; seeks to raise taxes in the midst of a major economic downturn, characterizing as "selfish" those who would like to keep more than thirty percent of what they earn (factor in payroll, state, and local taxes); and looks down upon those who "cling" to their guns and their God; a man who punishes the few intrepid souls in the media who have the audacity to ask difficult questions or endorse the other candidate and mocks the dreams of a humble plumber for the same.
Make no mistake about it: this is a fight over the soul of America. I cannot help but think that a vote for Obama is a vote to change those values of independence, self-reliance, and self-determination that made this country and its people great. Now unlike my more liberal brethren, I believe that you are entitled to your own opinions. I further believe that two people may differ for valid reasons. I also acknowledge that I may be wrong. A President Obama may go down in the annals of history as another Lincoln. I hope I am. I do know, however, that in Greek tragedy, the Gods always punish hubris. I pray that we may not wind up as the chorus, witness and victim to the downfall of greatness.
Sunday Seasons Pass
Cross Currents. Should the seemingly unthinkable occur and the Grand Obamameister go down flaming in defeat, there will be many to ascribe it to the "Bradley Effect." However, as Wynton Hall reminds us here, there is such a thing as the "Spiral of Silence." Basically, people just want to be cool, making the secret Union ballot all the more important.
***
Escaping Gas. Read this in a variety of places, but this article lays it out clearly. Scientists are somewhat baffled by the seemingly spontaneous generation of methane. Upshot, while there is no denying that man's activities must have an impact, there are natural processes at work here. Speaking of which, snow in October?
H/T George
***
Melting Ice. Iceland, that is. In the midst of our own financial chaos and election year hubbub, the story of Iceland's near collapse has gone little noticed. I was curious, however. This entry from The Weekly Standard delves into how one government's response nearly brought down a country and became a self-perpetuating rationale for a government takeover. Food for thought.
***
Trembling Earth. From Fox News, we have the possible discovery of King Solomon's mines, the real ones. Forget Stewart Granger and Patrick Swayze. The mines, located in Jordan, were also a source of copper, not gold and diamonds. Another wonderful myth bites the dust.
***
Falling Temperatures. Six months after being launched, the Hard Rock Park, a rock-roll themed amusement venue is for sale. They ain't bringin' in the bucks. Management blames the economy, I like to think nobody but the boomers think them all that "groovy," and the boomers at their advanced age risk whiplash riding the "Life in the Fast Lane" roller coaster. Story here.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Thought for the Day: A Query
How many of those voting for Obama realize that they are voting to "fundamentally transform" America?
I'll let Hugh Hewitt comment:
When Obama declared last night that it was five days until he "fundamentally transformed" America, he let slip just as candid a moment as when he told Joe about his plans to "spread the wealth," and as when Joe Biden told us to "Mark my words."
I'll let Hugh Hewitt comment:
When Obama declared last night that it was five days until he "fundamentally transformed" America, he let slip just as candid a moment as when he told Joe about his plans to "spread the wealth," and as when Joe Biden told us to "Mark my words."
Meanderings: Spare My Feelings, Please
I'm standing on line for coffee at me local bookstore, when I hear the velvet tones of the "One" issuing from a cell phone behind me. It wasn't difficult to figure out the story, as OB had been in town the previous day. Apparently, Mom and/or Deb had been at the rally with the trusty cell phone and were now in the midst of reviewing their cinematography. They were so thrilled that it did not occur to them that someone, me, standing within earshot might not feel the same way. I turned and took in the duo, both tall, blond and somewhat horsey. From Mom's striped tailored shirt to her pressed khakis to her modish loafers, her appearance spoke money. A**, I thought to my self, you're the one that's gonna pay not me. Enjoy it. I couldn't decide if it was real money, in which case she could afford to donate to her favorite politician in the form of increased taxes. I suspected it was wannabe. Wonder how she's gonna feel in a few years.
Henry over at Babalu has been quoted as saying that he has been interested in politics since he was five. Some have mocked him. I understand. In Cuban American households, politics is the mother's milk of discussion. One of my earliest memories is of sitting on my father's lap with the Daily News in front of us. I just focused on the pictures, as I did the evening my uncle was forcefully kidnapped from Anguilla Cay, causing an international incident.
The point is that as a voracious reader and watcher of news, I find myself at loose ends. To describe the loathsome transformation that has overtaken the media as bias is the mother of all understatements. There is no limit to the scurrilous, the mean, the petty when it comes to this election. I've been giving Newsweek and Time a wide berth for some time now. Just reading the table of contents is repulsive. I don't read the tabloids. And I made the mistake of picking up Harper's the other day, figuring I would read the nonpolitical stories. I never made it past the editor's letter in which the most civil description of John McCain was that he was "senile."
I have been reduced to watching Fox and only Fox News these days. Their evening line up has been incredible recently. On the web, I float between Babalu and Drudge with the occasional visit to Townhall or NRO. Although reassured that there are still those who have not become pod people, I am saddened. This is not what I want.
I don't read or watch to have my opinions reinforced; I read and watch to learn about people, events, places to which I have no access. I learn to form my own judgements. And I am old enough to remember a time when I was a loyal subscriber of Newsweek, when I could even read the New York Times, the paper with a record at this point. Although to be perfectly frank, I only read the Sunday edition. The layout has always sucked. They no longer write for me. By becoming shills for the Obama campaign, they have lost a reader. Maybe, they don't care. Maybe they only want Democrat readers. Have the business brains given a thought to the effect on diminishing circulation? As it is, some of them already look like circulars.
I have been so turned off by the flouting of journalistic ethics, the patronizing ethos that I am so stupid that I must be instructed by those who never broke a sweat in their lives on whom to vote for president. It is beyond repulsive. I don't know who will win this election. However, it is the press that has lost; and in losing the press, the country has lost. How the mass of citizenry is to make educated decisions is beyond me.
Henry over at Babalu has been quoted as saying that he has been interested in politics since he was five. Some have mocked him. I understand. In Cuban American households, politics is the mother's milk of discussion. One of my earliest memories is of sitting on my father's lap with the Daily News in front of us. I just focused on the pictures, as I did the evening my uncle was forcefully kidnapped from Anguilla Cay, causing an international incident.
The point is that as a voracious reader and watcher of news, I find myself at loose ends. To describe the loathsome transformation that has overtaken the media as bias is the mother of all understatements. There is no limit to the scurrilous, the mean, the petty when it comes to this election. I've been giving Newsweek and Time a wide berth for some time now. Just reading the table of contents is repulsive. I don't read the tabloids. And I made the mistake of picking up Harper's the other day, figuring I would read the nonpolitical stories. I never made it past the editor's letter in which the most civil description of John McCain was that he was "senile."
I have been reduced to watching Fox and only Fox News these days. Their evening line up has been incredible recently. On the web, I float between Babalu and Drudge with the occasional visit to Townhall or NRO. Although reassured that there are still those who have not become pod people, I am saddened. This is not what I want.
I don't read or watch to have my opinions reinforced; I read and watch to learn about people, events, places to which I have no access. I learn to form my own judgements. And I am old enough to remember a time when I was a loyal subscriber of Newsweek, when I could even read the New York Times, the paper with a record at this point. Although to be perfectly frank, I only read the Sunday edition. The layout has always sucked. They no longer write for me. By becoming shills for the Obama campaign, they have lost a reader. Maybe, they don't care. Maybe they only want Democrat readers. Have the business brains given a thought to the effect on diminishing circulation? As it is, some of them already look like circulars.
I have been so turned off by the flouting of journalistic ethics, the patronizing ethos that I am so stupid that I must be instructed by those who never broke a sweat in their lives on whom to vote for president. It is beyond repulsive. I don't know who will win this election. However, it is the press that has lost; and in losing the press, the country has lost. How the mass of citizenry is to make educated decisions is beyond me.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Today's Quote
Goes to the Governator:
"John McCain served longer in a POW camp than his opponent has in the United States Senate"
"John McCain served longer in a POW camp than his opponent has in the United States Senate"
In the Cuba News: All Embargo All the Time
As we all know the yearly ritual of the UN vote against the embargo ended in the same result. This year, though, Perez Roque was particularly impassioned as he waxed eloquent, pointing out that the embargo is older than Obama. Also older than Obama is the oppression of the Cuban people by the Cuban Capos not mentioned by the same Perez Roque nor condemned by the UN. But that's nothing new.
Today's headlines, however, present an interesting proposition. Not content with the UN results, the "Latin American Leaders" at the IberoAmerican Summit in San Salvador on Friday also urged the repeal of the embargo because it hurts the Cuban people. Frankly, their concern for the wellbeing of the Cuban people has been less inspiring than conspiring.
On the very same page is a story about the Cuban regime owing Sherritt $393 million. Prospect of repayment looks shaky, although the debt will be "restructured." Sure is a lot of that restructuring going around. Sherritt is a familiar name here. As the story indicates in something of an understatement, Sherritt International is one of the "pioneers of foreign investment" in the country. Recently, they were in the headlines when they pulled out of a deal to develop Cuba's purportedly boundless offshore oil deposits.
Connect the dots. As at least one presidential candidate knows, it sure is easy to give away other people's money.
Today's headlines, however, present an interesting proposition. Not content with the UN results, the "Latin American Leaders" at the IberoAmerican Summit in San Salvador on Friday also urged the repeal of the embargo because it hurts the Cuban people. Frankly, their concern for the wellbeing of the Cuban people has been less inspiring than conspiring.
On the very same page is a story about the Cuban regime owing Sherritt $393 million. Prospect of repayment looks shaky, although the debt will be "restructured." Sure is a lot of that restructuring going around. Sherritt is a familiar name here. As the story indicates in something of an understatement, Sherritt International is one of the "pioneers of foreign investment" in the country. Recently, they were in the headlines when they pulled out of a deal to develop Cuba's purportedly boundless offshore oil deposits.
Connect the dots. As at least one presidential candidate knows, it sure is easy to give away other people's money.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Thought for the Day: A Query
LAPD Commissioner Bratton has endorsed Obama. When I worked for the government, we were not allowed to publicly support any candidate, even to the extent of bumper stickers, although the liberals invariably flouted that one. I used to joke about our lack of rights. So how come he gets to endorse Obama? I am presuming that the people who pay his salary include Republicans among their number.
The Barackomercial
I confess I watched the beginning. The hubster- with the fascination of the train wreck- insisted. I on the other hand make it a policy not to place myself in the sway of the Chicago Svengali, preferring to read his pronouncements, lest I get infected. Anyhow, I made it through the beginning in the heartland deco study and the first two stories before an impending fit of apoplexy made me race to the computer and the solace of the Babalu radio show.
Now, I don't want to seem heartless, but I am always suspicious of these hard luck cases. To wit, I'm thinking to myself that the first family whose distress was touted was maybe in no position to buy a suburban home. "But they have four children," the hubster remonstrates. "Yeah, and...," I reply. He was speaking to someone whose bed was the sofa of a three room rental apartment until we could actually afford the house in the suburbs. "And what about the vehicle?" I ask. Something tells me that's a 30 something thousand Ford SUV or mini van. I mean no disrespect, but life is full of hard choices.
Then there were the poor old folks who had their home paid off and were struggling to pay her medical bills. Now with an elderly and infirm geriatric relative in the family, this is something I know much of. I know how prescription drug costs can kill an entire lifetime's worth of work. I also know other things. For instance, joining a Medicare HMO or PPO basically renders most medicine free or cheap and cushions the donut hole. By the way, please remember that the Democrats voted against the Medicare prescription bill because it wasn't Good Enough! In the meantime, senior citizens watched their resources dwindle or had to decide between food or medicine. Back to the infomercial, even if these nice folk live in an area where one is not available, they can contact the drug companies who have very good programs for the economically challenged patient. Remember those commercials? Well, they're true. And if all you have is your home, there is always Medicaid. I hope that other than make hay of their distress, the Obama camp put these nice people in touch with resources. There is much that needs reform, but programs to help these people exist.
By that point, I took off, so I didn't see the others. I had expected to see people starving because they didn't have the resources, people trapped in areas with failing schools. What I saw were people who had other choices to improve their lives, whether they knew about them or not.
Now, I don't want to seem heartless, but I am always suspicious of these hard luck cases. To wit, I'm thinking to myself that the first family whose distress was touted was maybe in no position to buy a suburban home. "But they have four children," the hubster remonstrates. "Yeah, and...," I reply. He was speaking to someone whose bed was the sofa of a three room rental apartment until we could actually afford the house in the suburbs. "And what about the vehicle?" I ask. Something tells me that's a 30 something thousand Ford SUV or mini van. I mean no disrespect, but life is full of hard choices.
Then there were the poor old folks who had their home paid off and were struggling to pay her medical bills. Now with an elderly and infirm geriatric relative in the family, this is something I know much of. I know how prescription drug costs can kill an entire lifetime's worth of work. I also know other things. For instance, joining a Medicare HMO or PPO basically renders most medicine free or cheap and cushions the donut hole. By the way, please remember that the Democrats voted against the Medicare prescription bill because it wasn't Good Enough! In the meantime, senior citizens watched their resources dwindle or had to decide between food or medicine. Back to the infomercial, even if these nice folk live in an area where one is not available, they can contact the drug companies who have very good programs for the economically challenged patient. Remember those commercials? Well, they're true. And if all you have is your home, there is always Medicaid. I hope that other than make hay of their distress, the Obama camp put these nice people in touch with resources. There is much that needs reform, but programs to help these people exist.
By that point, I took off, so I didn't see the others. I had expected to see people starving because they didn't have the resources, people trapped in areas with failing schools. What I saw were people who had other choices to improve their lives, whether they knew about them or not.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Over Hill and Tale
The ending of this article which posits San Juan Hill as emblematic of US-Cuba relations could have been written by the regime. Oh, wait, it probably was, at least indirectly. I'll dispense with the usual explanations, except to say that the comparison is oversimiplified and not quite accurate. Still, there is truth there, particularly the notion that the perspective of American History is different than that of even preCastro Cuba.
Like many of my generation, the Cuban history I know is a mix of American textbooks, familial retelling, and research. That's why the earliest chapters of Bacardi and the Long Fight for Cuba: The Biography of a Cause by Tom Gjelten which focus on the family and its ties to Santiago proves valuable. Mr. Gjelten attempts to convey the Cuban view of the American intervention and its results within the context of telling the story of los Bacardi. Doubtless a delight for students of history and Bacardiphiles, I've been unable to finish it in the one week time frame decreed by my local public library, even with fines. Still from what I've managed to read in the interim, it strikes me as an important book.
Translation: I can't vouch for his treatment of the brothers Castro. I leave you with this excerpt from the author's website:
Over many tellings, the Cuba story has hardened around a few stale themes—Havana in its debauched heyday or Fidel Castro and his dour revolution—and it has lost much of its vitality and wholeness. This book originated in my search for a new narrative, with new Cuban characters and a plot that does justice to this island that produced the conga line and “Guantanamera” as well as Che Guevara’s five-year-plans. I have tried to give a nuanced view of the nation’s experience over the last century and a half. Cuban history was not preordained. There were choices made and paths not taken, and the men and women who were excluded and then exiled deserve to have their contributions recognized, if only to understand why so many became so angry. The Bacardi saga serves all these purposes.
The New York Times reviewed it here.
Like many of my generation, the Cuban history I know is a mix of American textbooks, familial retelling, and research. That's why the earliest chapters of Bacardi and the Long Fight for Cuba: The Biography of a Cause by Tom Gjelten which focus on the family and its ties to Santiago proves valuable. Mr. Gjelten attempts to convey the Cuban view of the American intervention and its results within the context of telling the story of los Bacardi. Doubtless a delight for students of history and Bacardiphiles, I've been unable to finish it in the one week time frame decreed by my local public library, even with fines. Still from what I've managed to read in the interim, it strikes me as an important book.
Translation: I can't vouch for his treatment of the brothers Castro. I leave you with this excerpt from the author's website:
Over many tellings, the Cuba story has hardened around a few stale themes—Havana in its debauched heyday or Fidel Castro and his dour revolution—and it has lost much of its vitality and wholeness. This book originated in my search for a new narrative, with new Cuban characters and a plot that does justice to this island that produced the conga line and “Guantanamera” as well as Che Guevara’s five-year-plans. I have tried to give a nuanced view of the nation’s experience over the last century and a half. Cuban history was not preordained. There were choices made and paths not taken, and the men and women who were excluded and then exiled deserve to have their contributions recognized, if only to understand why so many became so angry. The Bacardi saga serves all these purposes.
The New York Times reviewed it here.
Tony Hillerman: RIP
For me, the best writers are not necessarily those who make profound statements about the nature of life. I've lived long enough to forgo any instruction on the topic. The most enjoyable writers are those who create a microcosm, their own small world in addition to vibrant characters.Tony Hillerman was just such an author. It was Hillerman who introduced me to the Four Corners region in the Southwest. What little I know of Navajo customs, crafts, and politics, I learned from his mysteries. Over the years, I have followed the career of his Joe Leaphorn through his wife's illness and death, through retirement, and any number of solved cases; as I have followed Jim Chee, a young man wrestling with his identity, torn between his heritage and the modern world.
Invariably Hillerman's books were well-plotted; his characters rich; and his setting, alive. If you like mysteries and haven't read one, treat yourself one Friday afternoon. As for me, I have lost some friends. Rest in Peace.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Thought for the Day
Brent Crude hit $59.00 a barrel today. Does that mean global oil consumption has fallen to less than half? So much for speculators not being a major driver of meteoric oil prices.
Today's Absolutely Must Read
If you have not listened to the audio of the quote below, you really must do it. Just click on the headline at Drudge. It's not just one quote. I have repeatedly maintained that there is a difference between reform and reformation, and I don't think Americans are signing on for juryrigging the Constitution. In this column, Bill Whittle zeroes in on what is so terribly wrong in this election in three "circles of shame," each with at least one quotable quote:
On Obama's philosophy as explained in the audio-
We have, in our storied history, elected Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives and moderates. We have fought, and will continue to fight, pitched battles about how best to govern this nation. But we have never, ever in our 232-year history, elected a president who so completely and openly opposed the idea of limited government, the absolute cornerstone of makes the United States of America unique and exceptional.
On the discovery of the audio by a citizen-
I do not blame Barack Obama for believing in wealth distribution. That’s his right as an American. I do blame him for lying about what he believes. But his entire life has been applying for the next job at the expense of the current one. He’s at the end of the line now.
I do, however, blame the press for allowing an individual citizen to do the work that they employ standing armies of so-called professionals for. I know they are capable of this kind of investigative journalism: It only took them a day or two to damage Sarah Palin with wild accusations about her baby’s paternity and less time than that to destroy a man who happened to be playing ball when the Messiah decided to roll up looking for a few more votes on the way to the inevitable coronation.
On the repercussions of the audio-
This discovery will hurt Obama much more than Joe the Plumber.
What will be left of my friend, and my friend’s family, I wonder, when the press is finished with them?
On Obama's philosophy as explained in the audio-
We have, in our storied history, elected Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives and moderates. We have fought, and will continue to fight, pitched battles about how best to govern this nation. But we have never, ever in our 232-year history, elected a president who so completely and openly opposed the idea of limited government, the absolute cornerstone of makes the United States of America unique and exceptional.
On the discovery of the audio by a citizen-
I do not blame Barack Obama for believing in wealth distribution. That’s his right as an American. I do blame him for lying about what he believes. But his entire life has been applying for the next job at the expense of the current one. He’s at the end of the line now.
I do, however, blame the press for allowing an individual citizen to do the work that they employ standing armies of so-called professionals for. I know they are capable of this kind of investigative journalism: It only took them a day or two to damage Sarah Palin with wild accusations about her baby’s paternity and less time than that to destroy a man who happened to be playing ball when the Messiah decided to roll up looking for a few more votes on the way to the inevitable coronation.
On the repercussions of the audio-
This discovery will hurt Obama much more than Joe the Plumber.
What will be left of my friend, and my friend’s family, I wonder, when the press is finished with them?
Quote of the Day: This is What They are about to Elect
If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court. I think where it succeeded was to invest formal rights in previously dispossessed people, so that now I would have the right to vote. I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and order as long as I could pay for it I’d be o.k. But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society. To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf, and that hasn’t shifted and one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused I think there was a tendancy to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that.
Barack Obama in a 2001 radio call-in interview. Boldface mine.
Borrowed from post on MichelleMalkin.com
Barack Obama in a 2001 radio call-in interview. Boldface mine.
Borrowed from post on MichelleMalkin.com
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Sunday Through the Ages
Over the Hill. On Foxnews, we learn that middle-aged white women are driving up the suicide rate. Cause is as yet unknown. I have an idea that it may have to do with our appearance-driven, youth-venerating society compounding hormonal changes. But, heck, what do I know? Article here.
At the Top. On a brighter note, Malcolm Gladwell in The New Yorker builds an examination of late bloomers around the story of writer Ben Fountain. A "late bloomer," his recognition came at age 48 after 18 years of trying. With repeated references to Cezanne as well as Fountain, Gladwell makes the point that late bloomers rely heavily for funds and support on those around them. So that's it. He says a lot more, so read it if you're in a New Yorker mood.
Out of the Past. A biologist at the Grand Canyon has lost his life to plague, apparently the same one that wiped out a goodly portion of the European population in the Middle Ages. The means of transmission is thought to be from rodent to mountain lion to biologist, who seems to have contracted the disease while autopsying the cat. Just in case you thought the plague was eradicated. Read all about it here.
At the Top. On a brighter note, Malcolm Gladwell in The New Yorker builds an examination of late bloomers around the story of writer Ben Fountain. A "late bloomer," his recognition came at age 48 after 18 years of trying. With repeated references to Cezanne as well as Fountain, Gladwell makes the point that late bloomers rely heavily for funds and support on those around them. So that's it. He says a lot more, so read it if you're in a New Yorker mood.
Out of the Past. A biologist at the Grand Canyon has lost his life to plague, apparently the same one that wiped out a goodly portion of the European population in the Middle Ages. The means of transmission is thought to be from rodent to mountain lion to biologist, who seems to have contracted the disease while autopsying the cat. Just in case you thought the plague was eradicated. Read all about it here.
By the Numbers. In honor of our financial meltdown, I offer, courtesy of Fox Business News, what not do with the "10 Dumbest Ways to Go into Debt." And finally, to finish off on a high note, I present the RealClearSports' "10 Most Infamous World Series Moments." Go, Rays, go! (They are still playing, aren't they?)
Special Sunday Morning Election Edition
Class Warfare. Try this somewhat withering piece by Sam Schulman on why the Bill Ayers association has been so summarily dismissed. It does make sense. After all, it is mind-boggling that these two unrepentant types have been absorbed seamlessly into the upper echelons of the Chicago mainstream machine.
The Politics of Diversity. Class is just part of the reason Joe has been so savaged, as Carl Platt Liebau makes clear here. Joe- to the Democrats and the left- is incomprehensible. As she sees it, just as Clarence Thomas and Sarah Palin served as exemplars that nanny state philosophy is not the only valid one for African Americans and women and had to be destroyed, Joe presented a working man who wanted to make his own decisions. How dare he! The audacity!
Education Policy. I never thought I'd live to see the day. It is a horrendously sad state of affairs, when I have to link to Phyllis Schlafly, not because I think that Ayers will be sleeping in the Lincoln bedroom, but because this is the only bit I have found that concentrates on the effect Bill Ayers is having now. He is an irrelevancy and a wannabe. When confronted by O'Reilly's show, he demanded his private property rights and called the "pigs." His effect on young minds who don't know he is a poseur is an altogether different matter. He is more dangerous now that he ever was with his half-assed bomb making. Read it.
Market Economy. In my experience during election years, the market tends to run inversely proportional to the fortunes of the Democrat candidate. This year with all of the mayhem, it was hard to spot. Still, lately I was "suspicioning" that the market was reacting to the polls. Then here comes Charlie Gasparino on the first page of the NY Post. Those of us who follow the market know Gasparino as an ace financial reporter. Particularly scary in this article is the contention that Obama's ideology is trumping the advice of his own supporters. Savvy investors seem to be voting with their feet.
Next Election. Michael Medved here taps into my greatest fears about an Obama presidency, namely that much of the damage will be irreversible. As he phrases it, presidents may come and go, but "entitlements go on forever." His is not reform but re-formation. Read the column.
Come back for the regular Sunday edition later.
The Politics of Diversity. Class is just part of the reason Joe has been so savaged, as Carl Platt Liebau makes clear here. Joe- to the Democrats and the left- is incomprehensible. As she sees it, just as Clarence Thomas and Sarah Palin served as exemplars that nanny state philosophy is not the only valid one for African Americans and women and had to be destroyed, Joe presented a working man who wanted to make his own decisions. How dare he! The audacity!
Education Policy. I never thought I'd live to see the day. It is a horrendously sad state of affairs, when I have to link to Phyllis Schlafly, not because I think that Ayers will be sleeping in the Lincoln bedroom, but because this is the only bit I have found that concentrates on the effect Bill Ayers is having now. He is an irrelevancy and a wannabe. When confronted by O'Reilly's show, he demanded his private property rights and called the "pigs." His effect on young minds who don't know he is a poseur is an altogether different matter. He is more dangerous now that he ever was with his half-assed bomb making. Read it.
Market Economy. In my experience during election years, the market tends to run inversely proportional to the fortunes of the Democrat candidate. This year with all of the mayhem, it was hard to spot. Still, lately I was "suspicioning" that the market was reacting to the polls. Then here comes Charlie Gasparino on the first page of the NY Post. Those of us who follow the market know Gasparino as an ace financial reporter. Particularly scary in this article is the contention that Obama's ideology is trumping the advice of his own supporters. Savvy investors seem to be voting with their feet.
Next Election. Michael Medved here taps into my greatest fears about an Obama presidency, namely that much of the damage will be irreversible. As he phrases it, presidents may come and go, but "entitlements go on forever." His is not reform but re-formation. Read the column.
Come back for the regular Sunday edition later.
Friday, October 24, 2008
Literary Interlude: My Wood
And now I am myself again. How about something calming? Earlier this week, I posted on the "entitlement generation." Much of this campaign has been about economics, so I thought you might enjoy this one about the effects of property on the character.
My Wood
A few years ago I wrote a book which dealt in part with the difficulties of the English in India. Feeling that they would have had no difficulties in India themselves, the Americans read the book freely. The more they read it the better it made them feel, and a cheque to the author was the result. I bought a wood with the cheque. It is not a large wood--it contains scarcely any trees, and it is intersected, blast it, by a public footpath. Still, it is the first property that I have owned, so it is right that other people should participate in my shame, and should ask themselves, in accents that will vary in horror, this very important question: What is the effect of property upon the character? Don't let's touch economics; the effect of private ownership upon the community as a whole is another question--a more important question, perhaps, but another one. Let's keep to psychology. If you own things, what's their effect on you? What's the effect on me of my wood?
In the first place, it makes me feel heavy. Property does have this effect. Property produces men of weight, and it was a man of weight who failed to get into the Kingdom of Heaven. He was not wicked, that unfortunate millionaire in the parable, he was only stout; he he struck out in front, not to mention behind, and as he wedged himself this way and that in the crystalline entrance and bruised his well-fed flanks, he saw beneath him a comparatively slim camel passing through the eye of a needle and being woven into the robe of God. The Gospels all through couple stoutness and slowness. They point out what is perfectly obvious, yet seldom realized: that if you have a lot of things you cannot move about a lot, that furniture requires dusting, dusters require servants, servants require insurance stamps, and the whole tangle of them makes you think twice before you accept an invitation to dinner or go for a bathe in the Jordan. Sometimes the Gospels proceed further and say with Tolsoty that property is sinful; they approach the difficult ground of asceticism here, where I cannot follow them. But as to the immediate effects of property on people, they just show straightforward logic. It produces men of weight. Men of weight cannot, by definition, move like the lightning from the East unto the West, and the ascent of a fourteen-stone bishop into a pulpit is thus the exact antithesis of the coming of the Son of Man. My wood makes me feel heavy.
In the second place, it makes me feel it ought to be larger.
The other day I heard a twig snap in it. I was annoyed at first, for I thought that someone was blackberrying, and depreciating the value of the undergrowth. On coming nearer, I saw it was not a man who had trodden on the twig and snapped it, but a bird, and I felt pleased. My bird. The bird was not equally pleased. Ignoring the relation between us, it took fright as soon as it saw the shape of my face, and flew straight over the boundary hedge into a field, the property of Mrs. Henessy, where it sat down with a loud squawk. It had become Mrs. Henessy's bird. Something seemed grossly amiss here, something that would not have occurred had the wood been larger. I could not afford to buy Mrs. Henessy out, I dared not murder her, and limitations of this sort beset me on every side. Ahab did not want that vineyard--he only needed it to round off his property, preparatory to plotting a new curve--and all the land around my wood has become necessary to me in order to round off the wood. A boundary protects. But--poor little thing--the boundary ought in its turn to be protected. Noises on the edge of it. Children throw stones. A little more, and then a little more, until we reach the sea. Happy Canute! Happier Alexander! And after all, why should even the world be the limit of possession? A rocket containing a Union Jack, will, it is hoped, be shortly fired at the moon. Mars. Sirius. Beyond which . . . . But these immensities ended by saddening me. I could not suppose that my wood was the destined nucleus of universal dominion--it is so very small and contains no mineral wealth beyond the blackberries. Nor was I comforted when Mrs. Henessy's bird took alarm for the second time and flew clean away from us all, under the belief that it belonged to itself.
In the third place, property makes its owner feel that he ought to do something to it. Yet he isn't sure what. A restlessness comes over him, a vague sense that he has a personality to express-- the same sense which, without any vagueness, leads the artist to an act of creation. Sometimes I think I will cut down such trees as remain in the wood, at other times I want to fill up the gaps between them with new trees. Both impulses are pretentious an empty. They are not honest movements towards money-making or beauty. They spring from a foolish desire to express myself and from an inability to enjoy what I have got. Creation, property, enjoyment form a sinister trinity in the human mind. Creation and enjoyment are both very, very good, yet they are often unattainable without a material basis, and at such moments property pushes itself in as a substitute, saying, "Accept me instead--I'm good enough for all there." It is not enough. It is, as Shakespeare said of lust, "The expense of spirit in a waste of shame": it is "Before, a joy proposed; behind, a dream." Yet we don't know how to shun it. It is forced on us by our economic system as the alternative to starvation. It is also forced on us by an internal defect in the soul, by the feeling that in property may lie the germs of self-development and of exquisite or heroic deeds. Our life on earth is, and ought to be, material and carnal. But we have not yet learned to manage our materialism and carnality properly; they are sill entangled with the desire for ownership, where (in the words of Dante) "Possession is one with loss."
And this brings us to our fourth and final point: the blackberries.
Blackberries are not plentiful in this meager grove, but they are easily seen from the public footpath which traverses it, and all too easily gathered. Foxgloves, too--people will pull up the foxgloves, and ladies of an educational tendency even grub for toadstools to show them on the Monday in class. Other ladies, less educated, roll down the bracken in the arms of their gentlemen friends. There is paper, there are tins. Pray, does my wood belong to me or doesn't it? And, if it does, should I not own it best by allowing no one else to walk there? There is a wood near Lyme Regis, also cursed by a public footpath, where the owner has not hesitated on this point. He has built high stone walls each side of the path, and has spanned it by bridges, so that the public circulate like termites while he gorges on the blackberries unseen. He really does own his wood, this able chap. Dives in Hell did pretty well, but the gulf dividing him from Lazarus could be traversed by vision, and nothing traverses it here. And perhaps I shall come to this in time. I shall wall in and fence out until I really taste the sweets of property. Enormously stout, endlessly avaricious, pseudo-creative, intensely selfish, I shall weave upon my forehead the quadruple crown of possession until those nasty Bolshies come and take it off again and thrust me aside into the outer darkness.
Shame on the New York Times
The old gray lady has finally come out of the closet, although her ample rump has been peeking out of the garderobe for quite a while now. The New York Times has made it official by endorsing Obama in an editorial liberally laced with oil of vitriol. For added emphasis, the endorsement was not on the editorial page but on page 1.
That Obama is the chosen one is fine by me. I would expect no less. But I am fed up with mealy-mouthed individuals and entities donning the cloak of self-righteousness to complain about McCain's "negative campaigning." If the media, starting with the Times itself had been doing its job vetting the candidate, had they made clear to the public what all of BO's rhetorical flourishes meant, the McCain campaign would not have been forced to do it. But they have all fallen in love with the candidate. Had Senator McCain been as unscrupulous as they are accusing him of being, he could have made great hay out of the Rev. Wright angle.
Where is the indignation and the outrage at all of the "code words" for old the Obama camp has been hurling McCain's way or the sneers directed at "Joe the Plumber" by the same? And to scathingly dismiss Palin as completely unfit for the office, at the same time they endorse a man without a single qualification other than his ability to campaign reeks of the whited sepulchre.
What makes me see red, however, is the treatment they have ladled on Senator McCain, a man who has done more for this country than the entire lot of them at the New York Times, and to do so in the service of a man who has spent his whole life seeking out those who hate this country even as he was availing himself of everything it had to offer, who has not one legislative achievement on his record is vile. They are the dirty ones.
That Obama is the chosen one is fine by me. I would expect no less. But I am fed up with mealy-mouthed individuals and entities donning the cloak of self-righteousness to complain about McCain's "negative campaigning." If the media, starting with the Times itself had been doing its job vetting the candidate, had they made clear to the public what all of BO's rhetorical flourishes meant, the McCain campaign would not have been forced to do it. But they have all fallen in love with the candidate. Had Senator McCain been as unscrupulous as they are accusing him of being, he could have made great hay out of the Rev. Wright angle.
Where is the indignation and the outrage at all of the "code words" for old the Obama camp has been hurling McCain's way or the sneers directed at "Joe the Plumber" by the same? And to scathingly dismiss Palin as completely unfit for the office, at the same time they endorse a man without a single qualification other than his ability to campaign reeks of the whited sepulchre.
What makes me see red, however, is the treatment they have ladled on Senator McCain, a man who has done more for this country than the entire lot of them at the New York Times, and to do so in the service of a man who has spent his whole life seeking out those who hate this country even as he was availing himself of everything it had to offer, who has not one legislative achievement on his record is vile. They are the dirty ones.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Journalism Lite
Today's absolute must read comes from Orson Scott Card, very well-known for such sci-fi classics as Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow. In a column decrying the lack of honesty on the part of the media, he demonstrates the political fallout of media inaccuracy and selectivity. Its hard to find an excerpt; the whole thing is so on target:
There are precedents. Even though President Bush and his administration never said that Iraq sponsored or was linked to 9/11, you could not stand the fact that Americans had that misapprehension — so you pounded us with the fact that there was no such link. (Along the way, you created the false impression that Bush had lied to them and said that there was a connection.)
If you had any principles, then surely right now, when the American people are set to blame President Bush and John McCain for a crisis they tried to prevent, and are actually shifting to approve of Barack Obama because of a crisis he helped cause, you would be laboring at least as hard to correct that false impression.
Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. That's what you claim you do, when you accept people's money to buy or subscribe to your paper.
But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie — that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain, and the Republicans. You have trained the American people to blame everything bad — even bad weather — on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.
There are precedents. Even though President Bush and his administration never said that Iraq sponsored or was linked to 9/11, you could not stand the fact that Americans had that misapprehension — so you pounded us with the fact that there was no such link. (Along the way, you created the false impression that Bush had lied to them and said that there was a connection.)
If you had any principles, then surely right now, when the American people are set to blame President Bush and John McCain for a crisis they tried to prevent, and are actually shifting to approve of Barack Obama because of a crisis he helped cause, you would be laboring at least as hard to correct that false impression.
Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. That's what you claim you do, when you accept people's money to buy or subscribe to your paper.
But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie — that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain, and the Republicans. You have trained the American people to blame everything bad — even bad weather — on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.
CNN in the Tank: Expanded
This morning, caught John Roberts interviewing a writer from the Financial Times about whether Obama is a "socialist." How's this? After the guest gives a dictionary definition of the term, Roberts queries, very deliberately and leadingly, "So a tax cut affecting the rich cannot be classified as "socialist?" His guest, of course, points out that we have always had a progressive tax code. Nowhere, since Roberts has framed the "question" so leadingly, is their any acknowledgment that those who pay no income taxes (40% or so) will be receiving checks from the government. Heck, "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need." Maybe, they're right. It's not quite socialism. And Roberts: from child neglect to aguanta pata, such journalistic integrity.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
The Obama Coalition and the Entitlement Generation
The picture I posted earlier points to the mass hysteria associated with Obama. However, he would not be leading without the support of other swaths of the population. For starters, there are the far left wing-nuts. These are characterized by an acute case of Bush Derangement Syndrome. Then there are the cynical political partisans. These make their home either in the halls of congress or on your television set. There are those who are disgusted with the rampant abuses brought to light by the economic meltdown and who looking to punish the party in power are not examining the alternative economic vision.
The segment of his supporters I'd like to highlight, however, are people who should know better. These are those who reside in the 40 something to 200 thousand dollar income range. The middle classes. What gives? A better question would be "Who gives?" In this case, the answer is Obama. He has answered the time honored question "What's in it for me?" by hitting upon the notion of pandering to the middle class. Anyone in this income range in the United States is blessed by global standards. No, in the lower reaches, such an income will not afford you a home in a gated community or a gas-guzzling SUV. It will allow you to live a decent and comfortable life, if you live according to your means.
I suspect my readers thought the entitlement up top referred to government programs targeted at the lower classes. No, entitlement here is a larger concept. It refers to a whole generation (baby boomers, anyone?) brought up in relative affluence, an affluence created by their parents who worked for it and lived within their means. It bred in them a sense of entitlement, a sense they passed on to their children. They do not start with the finite figure in determining their lifestyle. No, they start with the living standard to which they are accustomed and then worry about affording it. If doing the latter involves plastic, so be it. That's how you wind up with TV reports of the family lamenting its lack of health insurance over coffee in the half million dollar home with the two late model cars in the driveway. Take a look at countertops, appliances sold to the masses at Home Depot. Do you really need a thousand dollar stove? A countertop that costs as much as a used car?
What is terribly unhealthy here is that they want something for nothing, even if it is at the expense of someone else. And that is exactly what this economic plan is. Where is the concept of fairness? You worked harder, so you can help support me. And taxing corporations more? They can take their marbles and go elsewhere. If they can't, they'll just pass along the cost to rich and poor alike.
The worst part of this phenomenon is that in accepting the placebo of a failed economic philosophy, we are not addressing our true problems. While you worry about the cost of gas for your Escalade, 50 percent of households have an income of 31 thousand a year or less. CEOs make untold millions. No man is worth 100 million dollars. Our schools are failing those who most need the leg up economically. Teachers and administrators are afraid to discipline children because the lawsuit is always waiting in the wings. Children are trapped in failed public schools because the powerful teachers' unions fight vouchers tooth and nail. Politicians pander to them extolling the virtues of public education, all the while sending their own children to private schools. Educational reform is put in the hands of the likes of Bill Ayers. Need more?
The segment of his supporters I'd like to highlight, however, are people who should know better. These are those who reside in the 40 something to 200 thousand dollar income range. The middle classes. What gives? A better question would be "Who gives?" In this case, the answer is Obama. He has answered the time honored question "What's in it for me?" by hitting upon the notion of pandering to the middle class. Anyone in this income range in the United States is blessed by global standards. No, in the lower reaches, such an income will not afford you a home in a gated community or a gas-guzzling SUV. It will allow you to live a decent and comfortable life, if you live according to your means.
I suspect my readers thought the entitlement up top referred to government programs targeted at the lower classes. No, entitlement here is a larger concept. It refers to a whole generation (baby boomers, anyone?) brought up in relative affluence, an affluence created by their parents who worked for it and lived within their means. It bred in them a sense of entitlement, a sense they passed on to their children. They do not start with the finite figure in determining their lifestyle. No, they start with the living standard to which they are accustomed and then worry about affording it. If doing the latter involves plastic, so be it. That's how you wind up with TV reports of the family lamenting its lack of health insurance over coffee in the half million dollar home with the two late model cars in the driveway. Take a look at countertops, appliances sold to the masses at Home Depot. Do you really need a thousand dollar stove? A countertop that costs as much as a used car?
What is terribly unhealthy here is that they want something for nothing, even if it is at the expense of someone else. And that is exactly what this economic plan is. Where is the concept of fairness? You worked harder, so you can help support me. And taxing corporations more? They can take their marbles and go elsewhere. If they can't, they'll just pass along the cost to rich and poor alike.
The worst part of this phenomenon is that in accepting the placebo of a failed economic philosophy, we are not addressing our true problems. While you worry about the cost of gas for your Escalade, 50 percent of households have an income of 31 thousand a year or less. CEOs make untold millions. No man is worth 100 million dollars. Our schools are failing those who most need the leg up economically. Teachers and administrators are afraid to discipline children because the lawsuit is always waiting in the wings. Children are trapped in failed public schools because the powerful teachers' unions fight vouchers tooth and nail. Politicians pander to them extolling the virtues of public education, all the while sending their own children to private schools. Educational reform is put in the hands of the likes of Bill Ayers. Need more?
Going to the Source: Sowell on Palin/Obama
Here is an elegant and reasonable distinction between the two tickets. First, about the question of experience:
Sarah Palin's record is on the record, while whole years of Barack Obama's life are engulfed in fog, and he has had to explain away one after another of the astounding and vile people he has not merely "associated" with but has had political alliances with, and to whom he has directed the taxpayers' money and other money.
Then the takeaway:
Whatever the shortcomings of John McCain and Sarah Palin, they are people whose values are the values of this nation, whose loyalty and dedication to this country's fundamental institutions are beyond question because they have not spent decades working with people who hate America. Nor are they people whose judgments have been proved wrong consistently during decades of Beltway "experience."
Read the article on RealClear Politics here.
H/T National Black Republican Association
Sarah Palin's record is on the record, while whole years of Barack Obama's life are engulfed in fog, and he has had to explain away one after another of the astounding and vile people he has not merely "associated" with but has had political alliances with, and to whom he has directed the taxpayers' money and other money.
Then the takeaway:
Whatever the shortcomings of John McCain and Sarah Palin, they are people whose values are the values of this nation, whose loyalty and dedication to this country's fundamental institutions are beyond question because they have not spent decades working with people who hate America. Nor are they people whose judgments have been proved wrong consistently during decades of Beltway "experience."
Read the article on RealClear Politics here.
H/T National Black Republican Association
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Et tu, Mexico?
There have been some items of interest lately. In addition to the announcements of untold oil wealth beneath the waters of Cuba, celebrations of "Russia Day" and the like, two items caught my attention. On Monday there was the announcement that Mexico will begin repatriating Cubans fleeing the island. On Tuesday came the proclamation of increased amity and trade between the two countries.
Given the recent "restructuring" of over 400 million worth of debt Cuba owes Mexico, it's not surprising that trade has increased 80 % in the first 8 months of this year. Nor given their long history of doing so, only sporadically interrupted, is it surprising that the Mexican government has chosen to side with the oppressors. Guess it just goes to show the only illegal immigrants they deem worthy of compassion are their own citizens.
Given the recent "restructuring" of over 400 million worth of debt Cuba owes Mexico, it's not surprising that trade has increased 80 % in the first 8 months of this year. Nor given their long history of doing so, only sporadically interrupted, is it surprising that the Mexican government has chosen to side with the oppressors. Guess it just goes to show the only illegal immigrants they deem worthy of compassion are their own citizens.
Thrilla in Manila
American conservatives aren't the only ones to have doubts about OB. Have to share this goody from The Manila Times. Although the English is somewhat stilted, the opinion piece relies on both Sowell and Freddoso to express doubts about the candidate. Most charming, however, is the following assertion:
Most non-Americans -except perhaps the Cubans both in Cuba and in Miami—are somewhat anti- American.
Most non-Americans -except perhaps the Cubans both in Cuba and in Miami—are somewhat anti- American.
Monday, October 20, 2008
A Funny Thing is Happening on the Way to the Election
I was reminded of Peter Finch's "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not taking it anymore" as I read this Byron York report describing a recent McCain rally. The point of interest here is the after rally as a Columbian immigrant construction worker, along with others, takes on the media. Read it. It's like a scene from An American Carol. Incroyable. If not, the crux is here:
The scene turned into a mini-fracas when David Corn, of Mother Jones, defended press coverage. Munoz was having none of it. Why, he asked, would the press whack Joe the Plumber when it didn’t want to report on Obama’s relationship with William Ayers, the former Weather Underground bomber? “How come that’s not in the news all the time?” Munoz said. “How come Joe the Plumber is every second? I’m talking about NBC, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, and CNN.”A black woman with a strong Caribbean accent jumped in the fray. “Tell me,” she said to Corn, “why is it you can go and find out about Joe the Plumber’s tax lien and when he divorced his wife and you can’t tell me when Barack Obama met with William Ayers? Why? Why could you not tell us that? Joe the Plumber is me!”
“I am Joe the Plumber!” Munoz chimed in. “You’re attacking me.”
I've run across that before. After all, I am Joe the Plumber, too. There are many of us, and we've had it. Funny thing, though, while the revolutionaries are on the other side: the proletarian revolution is happening on this one.
The scene turned into a mini-fracas when David Corn, of Mother Jones, defended press coverage. Munoz was having none of it. Why, he asked, would the press whack Joe the Plumber when it didn’t want to report on Obama’s relationship with William Ayers, the former Weather Underground bomber? “How come that’s not in the news all the time?” Munoz said. “How come Joe the Plumber is every second? I’m talking about NBC, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, and CNN.”A black woman with a strong Caribbean accent jumped in the fray. “Tell me,” she said to Corn, “why is it you can go and find out about Joe the Plumber’s tax lien and when he divorced his wife and you can’t tell me when Barack Obama met with William Ayers? Why? Why could you not tell us that? Joe the Plumber is me!”
“I am Joe the Plumber!” Munoz chimed in. “You’re attacking me.”
I've run across that before. After all, I am Joe the Plumber, too. There are many of us, and we've had it. Funny thing, though, while the revolutionaries are on the other side: the proletarian revolution is happening on this one.
The Powell Endorsement: A Personal Loss
I confess to having been an ardent supporter of President Bush, President George HW Bush. I am actually pretty much a moderate Republican, by which I mean that I abhor extremes on both sides. I did not vote for W because I loved him but because I could not stomach the alternative and he came closest to my views.
I am a Cuban American, which parlays into a belief that "that government governs best which governs least." It also means I believe strongly in traditional values and in the ability of the individual to rise above his circumstances. In sum, I am a natural Republican.
It is in this context that I have always admired Colin Powell. As a Republican and a Hispanic, brought up in the bad old days of rampant discrimination, I saw Mr. Powell not only through the lens of his achievement, but also with the hope that his open party affiliation would serve to break the stranglehold of the patronizing culture of victimhood fostered by the Liberal Left, that he would serve to show that you can do it. "Entitlements" because you cannot take care of yourself tell you you can't. Powell gave the lie to that assertion. He also stood for my views, a bulwark against the extreme right wing of the party.
So what does he do yesterday? Against every value one would assume he had, he endorses Obama, one of the most liberal of Senators, a man who not only opposed the war Powell helped get us into, but who would have pulled us out in defeat. And his rationale? In addition to the usual Liberal contortions regarding Palin's lack of experience for number two while disregarding completely Obama's lack of experience for numero uno, he objects to the tenor of the campaign, the Ayers story. Memo: if the media had done its job, McCain would not have been put in the position of having to educate us about the educator. These associations would have been brought up during the primaries and McCain would probably be running against Hillary Clinton right now. When there is no record to judge, when the associations are so unsavory to most Americans, what can be more important than the character of the man? Perhaps it is all irrelevant, but that is a decision for the American people and not the American Media to make.
Most hurt by yesterday's actions was my measure of the man: "You dance with them that brung you." That he would be deliriously happy to see an African American within striking distance of the presidency is understandable. I would be. It is an emotion, however, he should have experienced in the privacy of the voting booth. I am no fan of Rush Limbaugh, but he struck a chord with me. Powell owes much to the Republican party, no matter how contentious the relationship, and he should have acted accordingly. This last minute endorsement begs the question as to whether he ever believed in the political philosophy he espoused previously or whether it was just expediency. Frankly, my only hope this election is that his candidate has similarly used the left.
This endorsement is more about the Secretary than it is the candidate. I suspect he feels he was misled into the UN appearance that damaged his credibility. I think he would have been served by waiting for the judgment of history than trying to rehabilitate his image with the cultural elite. I am terribly saddened.
I am a Cuban American, which parlays into a belief that "that government governs best which governs least." It also means I believe strongly in traditional values and in the ability of the individual to rise above his circumstances. In sum, I am a natural Republican.
It is in this context that I have always admired Colin Powell. As a Republican and a Hispanic, brought up in the bad old days of rampant discrimination, I saw Mr. Powell not only through the lens of his achievement, but also with the hope that his open party affiliation would serve to break the stranglehold of the patronizing culture of victimhood fostered by the Liberal Left, that he would serve to show that you can do it. "Entitlements" because you cannot take care of yourself tell you you can't. Powell gave the lie to that assertion. He also stood for my views, a bulwark against the extreme right wing of the party.
So what does he do yesterday? Against every value one would assume he had, he endorses Obama, one of the most liberal of Senators, a man who not only opposed the war Powell helped get us into, but who would have pulled us out in defeat. And his rationale? In addition to the usual Liberal contortions regarding Palin's lack of experience for number two while disregarding completely Obama's lack of experience for numero uno, he objects to the tenor of the campaign, the Ayers story. Memo: if the media had done its job, McCain would not have been put in the position of having to educate us about the educator. These associations would have been brought up during the primaries and McCain would probably be running against Hillary Clinton right now. When there is no record to judge, when the associations are so unsavory to most Americans, what can be more important than the character of the man? Perhaps it is all irrelevant, but that is a decision for the American people and not the American Media to make.
Most hurt by yesterday's actions was my measure of the man: "You dance with them that brung you." That he would be deliriously happy to see an African American within striking distance of the presidency is understandable. I would be. It is an emotion, however, he should have experienced in the privacy of the voting booth. I am no fan of Rush Limbaugh, but he struck a chord with me. Powell owes much to the Republican party, no matter how contentious the relationship, and he should have acted accordingly. This last minute endorsement begs the question as to whether he ever believed in the political philosophy he espoused previously or whether it was just expediency. Frankly, my only hope this election is that his candidate has similarly used the left.
This endorsement is more about the Secretary than it is the candidate. I suspect he feels he was misled into the UN appearance that damaged his credibility. I think he would have been served by waiting for the judgment of history than trying to rehabilitate his image with the cultural elite. I am terribly saddened.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Sunday Morning: Ain't That America
No Thanks. Some smaller community banks are not at all happy about the intrusion of the federal government, according to this article in The Washington Post, preferring to let the market take its course. Many of them have been a heck of a lot more conservative in their lending practices and stand to lose out if depositors flock to banks they perceive as safer. A pretty good view of how this part of the program will work. Speaking of the bank meltdown, here's an interesting read from BusinessWeek which takes a look at some of the fallout, the cities and towns that will be hard hit in the present difficulties.
Shabby Chic. As if its not enough that the ring dings in Hollywood and beyond are backing OB, the Miami Herald has joined the collection of once great dowagers in endorsing "the One." The sound you hear is their circulation figures circling even further into the toilet.
The Bradley Effect. According to Ann Coulter in this, it's not racism; its fear of being considered racist. We just want to be cool. Having worked in enemy territory my whole life, she' correct. You're better off admitting to being in the Man/boy love association than acknowledging you're a Republican. Despite the many egregious things she says, she generally has a point and always wields a verbal scalpel.
The American Spirit. A sad story that has received little play between the election and the collapse. Millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett's plane has been discovered, along with human remains. Article here.
The Wuss Factor. A 35 year old Pompano, Florida man is suing the "Booby Trap" because a stripper flung her shoe which hit a glass ceiling (no pun intended) and rained glass down upon him. He had a cut to his eyebrow and suffers nosebleeds. Read it here.
Shabby Chic. As if its not enough that the ring dings in Hollywood and beyond are backing OB, the Miami Herald has joined the collection of once great dowagers in endorsing "the One." The sound you hear is their circulation figures circling even further into the toilet.
The Bradley Effect. According to Ann Coulter in this, it's not racism; its fear of being considered racist. We just want to be cool. Having worked in enemy territory my whole life, she' correct. You're better off admitting to being in the Man/boy love association than acknowledging you're a Republican. Despite the many egregious things she says, she generally has a point and always wields a verbal scalpel.
The American Spirit. A sad story that has received little play between the election and the collapse. Millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett's plane has been discovered, along with human remains. Article here.
The Wuss Factor. A 35 year old Pompano, Florida man is suing the "Booby Trap" because a stripper flung her shoe which hit a glass ceiling (no pun intended) and rained glass down upon him. He had a cut to his eyebrow and suffers nosebleeds. Read it here.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Rabble Rousing
Judging from Biden's performance on the campaign trail, it seems the "Senator Government" sobriquet should be joined by "Senator Meltdown" for the running mate. Who's erratic now? In any case, the treatment of poor schmo Joe the Plumber has been despicable. As someone called in to the radio today, how come we know more about Joe/Samuel in 24 hours than we do about Obama in 2 years?
You see, Joe's crime is to have dreams and the audacity to think he can reach them without 3 bureaucrats, 4 lawsuits, and 2 unions- ohmigosh! without liberal largess. Biden's withering contempt for the man is a positive development. Hopefully, it will open the eyes of those of us in the great unwashed, neither ivy league graduates nor inner city denizens, to how they really see us. More importantly, the "spread the wealth around" answer should be an eyeopener for those who believe the moderate tone of OB's rhetoric.
You see, Joe's crime is to have dreams and the audacity to think he can reach them without 3 bureaucrats, 4 lawsuits, and 2 unions- ohmigosh! without liberal largess. Biden's withering contempt for the man is a positive development. Hopefully, it will open the eyes of those of us in the great unwashed, neither ivy league graduates nor inner city denizens, to how they really see us. More importantly, the "spread the wealth around" answer should be an eyeopener for those who believe the moderate tone of OB's rhetoric.
Making It Real
So often when non Cubans, whether well-meaning or fellow traveler, make sweeping statements about the island, they do so in generalities and abstractions. Please note the following post from a new blog, a first person testimony of life after the revolution. Here's an excerpt:
One year sometime in the seventies, during election time, my mom, who was a rebel, decided to go visit her sister in a neighboring town. She said she wasn't about to participate in a election with just one candidate. It was a nice try, but not successful. Our CDR watch found out from the neighbors we were and went all the way to her sister's house to pick us up so she could vote. We had no choice, but to get in the car and my mom reluctantly voted for the one and only candidate-Fidel Castro.
H/T Jose at Cubanology
One year sometime in the seventies, during election time, my mom, who was a rebel, decided to go visit her sister in a neighboring town. She said she wasn't about to participate in a election with just one candidate. It was a nice try, but not successful. Our CDR watch found out from the neighbors we were and went all the way to her sister's house to pick us up so she could vote. We had no choice, but to get in the car and my mom reluctantly voted for the one and only candidate-Fidel Castro.
H/T Jose at Cubanology
Thursday, October 16, 2008
They Just Don't Get It
After the debate last night, I was anticipating the political commentary. It should have been safe. After all, I was watching Fox. I've had to seek refuge there, because of the incredibly disgusting lack of objectivity of the other "mainstream media." At least there I know what I'm getting, theoretically, at least.
Anyway, so there I am waiting for the post mortem to a debate in which I was sure McCain had done remarkably well, waiting for the reference to the line that sent me to the computer to post, when it was one depressing critique after another. Even Frank Luntz's "independents" gave the debate to Obama. Stop! Did these people watch the same debate I did? Huh? So I give up on the TV and have my sanity restored at Pumpkin Seeds and Townhall where others shared my impressions. Aah.
And today, Joe the Plumber is all over the TV. Of course, they're already starting to savage him. He's not really a plumber. His name isn't Joe. Even one commentator on Brit Hume's show stated that Joe's taxes would not be raised, that Joe would be better off with OB's plan.
He would buy the company with an SBA loan. If he stayed under the 200 thousand mark, he would pay no capital gains; and if he hired someone, he'd get a tax break. Notice the intrusion of the government here. All of this is put into perspective by Joe himself.
Joe is on TV. He is the salt of the earth American, "flabbergasted" but unphased by all the media attention, calling it his "fifteen minutes of fame." In his own way, he makes a strong case. He was brought up to work hard and get a bit more from his family, not have it given away by someone else. If he feels like giving it away, fine. Let others work 10 and12 hour days for years to get their own slice of the pie. And those tax increases are going to trickle down to him. These things don't "trickle up." Sounds right to me.
The Obama camp's reaction is tin-eared. Both the man who would be president and his sidekick had a bit of fun, snickering at a "plumber" who makes a quarter million dollars. Wink, wink, nod, nod. No, they're not elitist. The only people who matter are people who reside in their mainly urban, sophisticated circles, and the pathetic victims of their governmental munificence. Their personal generosity seems to stem from giving away someone else's money. Biden has given less to charity than I have. Do I hear 1 percent? Gimme a break!
The reaction of the the political pundits also demonstrates a lack of sensitivity. As Bernie Goldberg once noted, these people all travel in the same circles. So help me, there ought to be a "man on the street beat" at media outlets with the requirement that the reporter live among the working or middle class.
I have a sneaking suspicion that all is not what it seems. Perhaps it is the phenomenon Ann Coulter describes in this week's column. The "Who, me, a Republican?" effect. As I watched four of the "undecideds" declare for Obama, I asked myself how many were afraid to acknowledge that they would opt for McCain. I observe that the today the polls are tightening. Food for thought.
Anyway, so there I am waiting for the post mortem to a debate in which I was sure McCain had done remarkably well, waiting for the reference to the line that sent me to the computer to post, when it was one depressing critique after another. Even Frank Luntz's "independents" gave the debate to Obama. Stop! Did these people watch the same debate I did? Huh? So I give up on the TV and have my sanity restored at Pumpkin Seeds and Townhall where others shared my impressions. Aah.
And today, Joe the Plumber is all over the TV. Of course, they're already starting to savage him. He's not really a plumber. His name isn't Joe. Even one commentator on Brit Hume's show stated that Joe's taxes would not be raised, that Joe would be better off with OB's plan.
He would buy the company with an SBA loan. If he stayed under the 200 thousand mark, he would pay no capital gains; and if he hired someone, he'd get a tax break. Notice the intrusion of the government here. All of this is put into perspective by Joe himself.
Joe is on TV. He is the salt of the earth American, "flabbergasted" but unphased by all the media attention, calling it his "fifteen minutes of fame." In his own way, he makes a strong case. He was brought up to work hard and get a bit more from his family, not have it given away by someone else. If he feels like giving it away, fine. Let others work 10 and12 hour days for years to get their own slice of the pie. And those tax increases are going to trickle down to him. These things don't "trickle up." Sounds right to me.
The Obama camp's reaction is tin-eared. Both the man who would be president and his sidekick had a bit of fun, snickering at a "plumber" who makes a quarter million dollars. Wink, wink, nod, nod. No, they're not elitist. The only people who matter are people who reside in their mainly urban, sophisticated circles, and the pathetic victims of their governmental munificence. Their personal generosity seems to stem from giving away someone else's money. Biden has given less to charity than I have. Do I hear 1 percent? Gimme a break!
The reaction of the the political pundits also demonstrates a lack of sensitivity. As Bernie Goldberg once noted, these people all travel in the same circles. So help me, there ought to be a "man on the street beat" at media outlets with the requirement that the reporter live among the working or middle class.
I have a sneaking suspicion that all is not what it seems. Perhaps it is the phenomenon Ann Coulter describes in this week's column. The "Who, me, a Republican?" effect. As I watched four of the "undecideds" declare for Obama, I asked myself how many were afraid to acknowledge that they would opt for McCain. I observe that the today the polls are tightening. Food for thought.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
I Interrupt this Blog to Give You the Line of the Evening
Listening to the debate, where the line of the evening is "If you wanted to run against George Bush, you should have run four years ago." I was actually disappointed by Obama's comeback.
National Book Award Finalists Named
Included in the group are two names with which readers of this blog will be familiar. First off, there is Rachel Kushner and Telex from Cuba, an intriguing book. I'm glad to see my opinion seconded. Ditto with Peter Matthiessen's reworking of his Everglades trilogy, Shadow Country,
a sentimental favorite of mine. Article here.
a sentimental favorite of mine. Article here.
What McCain Needs to Say: Part 2
My friends (you know he's gonna say it), the American people are faced with a choice not between two candidates, but two philosophies. One- that of my opponent- holds that government should exist in loco parentis, so that it should take care of its citizens from the cradle to the grave. Like children you are not competent to make decisions about housing and healthcare, energy consumption and how you are going to spend your money for yourselves. Such a view means that like a parent, the government will determine what it deems good for you and enforce it. It punishes success and rewards dysfunction.
Senator Obama, who has a lifetime pattern of surrounding himself with people who dislike America all the while he was availing himself of all it had to offer, speaks of America as if it is irretrievably broken, as if it is a third world failed state. This is his vision. His change is not any kind of reform. The Senator seeks no less than to change the American system as we know it. Take his much vaunted healthcare, another massive entitlement program. Our system is flawed, yes. But is the answer really to take away choice? To force small businesses, many of which are suffering greatly and are barely making ends meet, to insure themselves. Now Senator Obama says the government will give you 50 percent. That's all well and good, but where is the other 50 percent coming from?
And his tax proposals. The Senator knows that truly wealthy people will find loopholes he hasn't even dreamed of. The brunt will fall on people who have studied and/or worked their hearts out for decades. Nowhere in his calculations are local taxes. At present, many of these people pay 50 percent of their income in taxes. Think about that: they work an entire half year without making a single cent. Where is the incentive to become a doctor, or lawyer, or small business owner? Now my opponent maintains that 95 percent of American taxpayers will get a tax cut. Since 40 percent do not pay taxes, what does this mean? Many who do not pay receive checks from the government. So is this increased subsidy another version of welfare? It is certainly income redistribution.
And what about the big corporations? Our corporate tax rate is one of the highest in the world. Raising it will lead to increased outsourcing and job loss. Many corporations no longer manufacture in the United States. They export their customer service overseas. Why wouldn't they move to say, Ireland, which has an 11 percent corporate tax rate? The truth is that at a time when we need every job we can get, we need those very corporations. The opposition has repeatedly jeered that the "trickle down" effect doesn't work. Well, I ask you, have you ever seen anything "trickle up"?
Yes, we have difficulties. But it is not our overarching philosophy of freedom and opportunity that is broken. It is the very government Senator Obama would empower that is broken. Think about it, my friends. Yes there are many, deep problems in our economy, much caused by the twin evils of government intrusion into the private sector where it doesn't belong and lax enforcement of the regulations where it does. Think of the congressional leadership. Is this what you want for America?
Now I believe deeply in the promise of America. I have fought for it. And I will continue to fight the excesses and corruption of big government. I will reform our financial system. But I will fix what is broken, not insinuate a revolution in the sheep's clothing of "change." I seek reform; my opponent seeks a mandate to change the system.
Senator Obama, who has a lifetime pattern of surrounding himself with people who dislike America all the while he was availing himself of all it had to offer, speaks of America as if it is irretrievably broken, as if it is a third world failed state. This is his vision. His change is not any kind of reform. The Senator seeks no less than to change the American system as we know it. Take his much vaunted healthcare, another massive entitlement program. Our system is flawed, yes. But is the answer really to take away choice? To force small businesses, many of which are suffering greatly and are barely making ends meet, to insure themselves. Now Senator Obama says the government will give you 50 percent. That's all well and good, but where is the other 50 percent coming from?
And his tax proposals. The Senator knows that truly wealthy people will find loopholes he hasn't even dreamed of. The brunt will fall on people who have studied and/or worked their hearts out for decades. Nowhere in his calculations are local taxes. At present, many of these people pay 50 percent of their income in taxes. Think about that: they work an entire half year without making a single cent. Where is the incentive to become a doctor, or lawyer, or small business owner? Now my opponent maintains that 95 percent of American taxpayers will get a tax cut. Since 40 percent do not pay taxes, what does this mean? Many who do not pay receive checks from the government. So is this increased subsidy another version of welfare? It is certainly income redistribution.
And what about the big corporations? Our corporate tax rate is one of the highest in the world. Raising it will lead to increased outsourcing and job loss. Many corporations no longer manufacture in the United States. They export their customer service overseas. Why wouldn't they move to say, Ireland, which has an 11 percent corporate tax rate? The truth is that at a time when we need every job we can get, we need those very corporations. The opposition has repeatedly jeered that the "trickle down" effect doesn't work. Well, I ask you, have you ever seen anything "trickle up"?
Yes, we have difficulties. But it is not our overarching philosophy of freedom and opportunity that is broken. It is the very government Senator Obama would empower that is broken. Think about it, my friends. Yes there are many, deep problems in our economy, much caused by the twin evils of government intrusion into the private sector where it doesn't belong and lax enforcement of the regulations where it does. Think of the congressional leadership. Is this what you want for America?
Now I believe deeply in the promise of America. I have fought for it. And I will continue to fight the excesses and corruption of big government. I will reform our financial system. But I will fix what is broken, not insinuate a revolution in the sheep's clothing of "change." I seek reform; my opponent seeks a mandate to change the system.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
The Cuban Model
Ran across an interesting tidbit today. Seems Namibia is donating the equivalent of a million dollars to the castro relief fund. How sad are the straits to which Cuba has been reduced? The required propaganda motifs make an appearance in the article/press release: the big, bad embargo; the marvelously efficient machinery of evacuation, etc. But then, what can you expect from the usual cheering section of allAfrica?
I was reminded, though, of an article I came across recently on that website which advocated "learning from Cuba." My first thought was pobrecitos, poor fools. Haven't they gotten enough "bloody instruction"? But I was wrong. Although his view of the Cuban regime is the source for some dramatic irony, he does make a valid point:
At the same time, Cuba has invested heavily in ensuring the rest of the world sees the injustice of America's policy towards Havana; from supporting terrorists, barring US tourism to that country to blocking companies that want to from even buying a banana from the island.
In some 100 countries across the world, people have established various official solidarity organisations and pressure groups that lobby their home governments to press the US to change its policy towards Cuba as well as to simply educate the indigenous populations on what is happening on that island and how shameful Washington's behaviour is.
Zimbabwe has a Zimbabwe-Cuba Friendship Society and a Free the Cuban 5 Committee (which lobbies for the release of five Cuban patriots who are being unjustly kept in American jails), and this is something that one will find in many countries across the globe.
The point is that Cuba has created a foreign policy that is geared towards fighting the illegal sanctions that it has had to live with for nearly half a century now.
More importantly, they have not only moulded such a foreign policy, but they have invested heavily in it in terms of both financial and human resources.
Staff at Cuban embassies and consulates all over Southern Africa -- and this is likely the case across the world -- are known to be extremely proactive in defence of their revolution and in spreading the word to the people of their host countries so that they are fully aware of what is going on.
That is why America has found it hard to sell the lie that Cde Fidel Castro presided over an evil system and his brother Cde Raul is the new great Satan overseeing a diabolic communist administration that enjoys imprisoning people and executing them for expressing a contrary view.
That is why since 1992 -- and without fail this will be the 17th consecutive time -- the world has overwhelmingly voted for a lifting of America's illegal sanctions regime.
I had to boldface that particular paragraph. It demonstrates the accuracy of his claim, namely Cuba has effectively marketed its thugocracy and set a shining example for others of like mind.
Cross posted at Babalublog
I was reminded, though, of an article I came across recently on that website which advocated "learning from Cuba." My first thought was pobrecitos, poor fools. Haven't they gotten enough "bloody instruction"? But I was wrong. Although his view of the Cuban regime is the source for some dramatic irony, he does make a valid point:
At the same time, Cuba has invested heavily in ensuring the rest of the world sees the injustice of America's policy towards Havana; from supporting terrorists, barring US tourism to that country to blocking companies that want to from even buying a banana from the island.
In some 100 countries across the world, people have established various official solidarity organisations and pressure groups that lobby their home governments to press the US to change its policy towards Cuba as well as to simply educate the indigenous populations on what is happening on that island and how shameful Washington's behaviour is.
Zimbabwe has a Zimbabwe-Cuba Friendship Society and a Free the Cuban 5 Committee (which lobbies for the release of five Cuban patriots who are being unjustly kept in American jails), and this is something that one will find in many countries across the globe.
The point is that Cuba has created a foreign policy that is geared towards fighting the illegal sanctions that it has had to live with for nearly half a century now.
More importantly, they have not only moulded such a foreign policy, but they have invested heavily in it in terms of both financial and human resources.
Staff at Cuban embassies and consulates all over Southern Africa -- and this is likely the case across the world -- are known to be extremely proactive in defence of their revolution and in spreading the word to the people of their host countries so that they are fully aware of what is going on.
That is why America has found it hard to sell the lie that Cde Fidel Castro presided over an evil system and his brother Cde Raul is the new great Satan overseeing a diabolic communist administration that enjoys imprisoning people and executing them for expressing a contrary view.
That is why since 1992 -- and without fail this will be the 17th consecutive time -- the world has overwhelmingly voted for a lifting of America's illegal sanctions regime.
I had to boldface that particular paragraph. It demonstrates the accuracy of his claim, namely Cuba has effectively marketed its thugocracy and set a shining example for others of like mind.
Cross posted at Babalublog
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