Combs Spouts Off

"It's my opinion and it's very true."

  • Calendar

    August 2012
    S M T W T F S
     1234
    567891011
    12131415161718
    19202122232425
    262728293031  
  • Recent Posts

  • Tag Cloud

  • Archives

Archive for August, 2012

Rethinking Clint Eastwood

Posted by Richard on August 31, 2012

I want to retract what I said yesterday about Clint Eastwood at the Republican convention. I was clearly wrong.

That evening, I had C-SPAN on in the living room and listened to the convention while working on the computer in my office. When Eastwood came on, I dropped what I was doing and went out to watch. But I guess I wasn’t in the right frame of mind for his schtick, and I didn’t really get it. Apparently, plenty of other people did.

Based on the praise of Eastwood on talk radio and numerous conservative/libertarian websites, the positive reaction of some of my co-workers and friends, and the negative reaction of the Socialist Democrats and their media sycophants, I thought maybe I should watch it again. So I did, here. This time I got it.

Although surely not scripted, this was a carefully planned and well-executed comedic performance. It hit the mark. Read some of the comments at that Belmont Club post where I watched it. Eastwood reminded various people of Jimmy Stewart, Bob Newhart, Will Rogers, and his own role as Walt Kowalski in Gran Torino — and they’re all right! As Richard Fernandez suggested, it was Everyman quietly and simply poking fun at Obama and Biden (really, all the politicians who desire to rule over us), reminding us and them that “they are our employees” and that they’ve earned a poor job performance evaluation.

It was also very politically effective, as Belmont Club commenter Dworking Bariman observed:

This proves that Clint’s gambit was utterly successful and devastating. President Thin Skin just revealed a tell. Clint masterfully deployed Alinsky Rule #5 (RULE 5: “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.” There is no defense. It’s irrational. It’s infuriating. It also works as a key pressure point to force the enemy into concessions.) The GOP must keep hammering at this chink in his armor relentlessly. Keep it funny and self-deprecating like Clint did, and you will also fulfill Rule 6 (RULE 6: “A good tactic is one your people enjoy.” They’ll keep doing it without urging and come back to do more. They’re doing their thing, and will even suggest better ones.). That’s why Breitbart was the ultimate happy warrior. He lived and breathed this stuff.

What he said.

Boy, do I miss Breitbart.

(HT: Instapundit via Life’s Better Ideas)

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | 1 Comment »

Romney’s acceptance speech

Posted by Richard on August 30, 2012

I haven’t posted anything about the GOP convention, although I’ve watched as much as I could in the evenings. I wanted to post about some of the significant speeches that weren’t covered by the broadcast networks in their one hour per night, and which cable news networks like MSNBC, CNBC, and CNN cut away from in their coverage, but that takes a lot of work and I haven’t had time. Maybe tomorrow or the next day.

But I do want to offer a few thoughts about the Romney speech tonight. Stephen Green drunkblogged it (and my apologies to him and to you for not giving you a heads-up about that in advance). Reading it after the fact isn’t the same is following it live, but I still commend it to you, although I think he’s off-base on several counts.

Green was far too kind to Clint Eastwood, who had a few good lines, but was much too unfocused, rambling, and just plain weird.

Green was somewhat too kind to Marco Rubio, who gave a decent speech with some memorable lines — like noting that Obama’s ideas are what people “move to America to get away from” — but this certainly wasn’t one of Rubio’s best (search for “rubio” on YouTube to see what I mean). And Rubio flubbed one line big-time, saying future historians would say “we chose more government over more freedom” when he meant to say the exact opposite. [UPDATE: After seeing Rubio’s speech a second time, I think I was too negative after the first viewing. It was more than decent, it was really very, very good. But that one flub was still a big one.]

And Green was too tough on Romney, arguing that the first half was “almost pitch-perfect,” but not happy with the second half’s “partisan attacks on Obama’s policies” and “laundry list of policty details.” Although Green loved the finish, which he thought “was big, it was rousing, and it was inspiring.”

I agree about the first half, but I think the policy attacks were just about perfect, and I have no problem with Romney spending two minutes summarizing his five-point plan (as he apparently does every time he speaks).

I thought the balance between lamenting the current state of affairs and painting an optimistic picture of our future (given a change in policies) was just about perfect. Almost — dare I say it — Reaganesque. That’s exactly what Ronaldus Magnus did in 1980: take a failed president to task issue by issue for his disastrous policies, while holding up the hope for a better future. Romney didn’t mention the “shining city on a hill” in so many words, but that’s what his speech reminded me of.

I thought Romney’s emphasis on women came close to pandering, but I can’t fault him for that, given all the blather by Socialist Democrats and their MSM sycophants about a “Republican war on women.” And I thought he nicely tied his mother’s contention that women should have an equal voice in “the great decisions facing our nation” with the fact that the women who addressed the convention included three governors, a senator, and a former secretary of state.

My two favorite parts of the speech:

… the centerpiece of the President’s entire re-election campaign is attacking success. Is it any wonder that someone who attacks success has led the worst economic recovery since the Great Depression?

In America, we celebrate success, we don’t apologize for success.

President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans … [long pause][applause and laughter] … and to heal the planet. [another long pause][more applause and laughter] My promise is to help you and your family.

Bottom line: I was impressed and pleased. He addressed the Socialist Democrat attack on his history at Bain Capital head-on and turned it around on them, charging that they don’t understand “the genius of the free enterprise system.” The speech was all-in-all a powerful defense of capitalism, freedom, progress, and opportunity. Obama and the Socialist Democrats reject all those things. I think that come November, a significant majority of Americans will vote in favor of those things and against the Socialist Democrats.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Loser Dole urges Romney to be more like him

Posted by Richard on August 27, 2012

Former Sen. Bob Dole urged Mitt Romney to reject “rigid conservatism” and embrace “mainstream Republicanism” like Dole did.

‘Cause, you know, it worked so well for Dole-Kemp in 1996 and for Ford-Dole in 1976.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

2016: well worth watching, but with a couple of flaws

Posted by Richard on August 26, 2012

Let me begin by saying I really liked Obama’s America: 2016. I urge you to go see it and to get family and friends who are “soft” Obama supporters or mainstream, moderately liberal Democrats to go with you. (There’s no point in taking your cousin in the Occupy Movement or other other hard-core leftists; the film will only make them more sympathetic to Obama.) I do have quibbles, but I’ll save them for later, since they’re mostly about the last part of the film.

The film has high production values, with especially fine music and excellent cinematography. It’s a pleasure to watch. Much of it is filmed in third-world locations. It begins with D’Souza describing his third-world roots and how he became an American, thus establishing his credibility regarding much that follows. D’Souza draws parallels between his own story and Obama’s (to be clear, though, he’s not a birther and explicitly says Obama was born in Hawaii).

D’Souza spends a lot of time in Kenya, trying to learn about Barack Obama, Sr. He has no luck with the Obama family/clan after someone apparently discovers where his sympathies lie. The Luo are a polygamous tribe, and I don’t remember all the relationships or who did what, but at some point the film crew is warned that it’s no longer safe for them to remain in the village.

D’Souza has more luck with Obama’s half-brother George, who doesn’t share the anti-colonialist mindset of his father, other members of his family, and half-brother. For instance, George points out that at one time Kenya was more economically advanced than Korea. But today, South Korea is a wealthy, advanced, industrialized nation while Kenya is still primitive and poor. At this point, I think the film could have done a better job of connecting the anti-colonialist values that kept Kenya poor to socialism, and could have pointed out the irony that the socialism embraced by third-world anti-colonialists is the product of white Europeans.

We learn of the absent father’s influence on his son via Obama’s own words in Dreams from My Father (it’s significant, as D’Souza notes, that the title says “from,” not “of”). And there’s an interesting interview with a psych professor specializing in the effect of absent fathers on their offspring. But more importantly in my mind, we learn about the other intellectual influences on Obama, some of which were new to me.

I knew, of course, about the Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers (and how bogus Obama’s attempts to distance himself from them in 2008 were). I even knew that Frank Marshall Davis was his mentor and was a hard-core communist. But I didn’t know that Obama’s white (maternal) grandfather was a hard-core leftist, a very good friend of Davis, and asked Davis to mentor young Barack.

I knew that Obama’s mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, was a leftist, but I didn’t know that she fought with and eventually left her second husband, Lolo Soetoro, because he went to work for an American oil company and became more westernized. I didn’t know that she instilled in young Barack an idealized view of his father and an abiding admiration for his father’s anti-colonialist/socialist values, and that it was probably to remove Soetoro as an influence in his life that she sent him from Indonesia back to Hawaii to attend school.

I also didn’t know about some of the other radical leftists/communists mentioned in the film who were significant influences in the development of Obama’s values and world-view.

At this point, the film has done a fine job of showing that prior to the presidency (to borrow a metaphor from Hugh Hewitt), Obama spent his entire life swimming in radical leftist/socialist/communist waters. Then it argues convincingly that in his first term, Obama tempered his leftism to a significant degree so that he could win a second term (including the infamous “hot mic” clip where Obama tells Russian President Dimitry Medvedev that after being re-elected he’ll “have more flexibility”).

So then we arrive at the portion of the film addressing what would happen in a second Obama term and how the United States would look in 2016 if he’s re-elected. Unfortunately, I think this is the weakest part of the film.

My first complaint with this portion of the film is that it focuses too much on Obama’s efforts to reduce America’s nuclear arsenal in particular and on America’s role in the world in general. Mind you, I’m a neo-libertarian, not a paleo-libertarian, so I’m fine with the idea of the United States being the world’s sole super-power as long as it’s serving the ideals on which this nation was founded. I just think that if you want to influence the outcome of the November election, graphics of various nations’ nuclear arsenals are not the way to go.

My second complaint is with the way the domestic policy issue is addressed. The film focuses entirely on Obama’s explosion of the federal debt, which would be fine if the purpose and consequences were clearly articulated. But I don’t think they are. If the film were even five or ten minutes longer, it could explain that Obama’s unprecedented level of deficit spending (42 cents of every federal dollar spent) results in a huge transfer of wealth from “the rich” (mostly, those who’ve earned what they have) to “the poor” and how monetizing the debt (i.e., expanding the money supply) eventually makes us all poorer.

As it is, the film just says “look how big the federal debt is going to get, isn’t that terrible?” I think it could have done better. And it could have addressed other domestic issues, like crippling regulations. Tying those to the film’s anti-colonialism theme might have taken a bit more effort — but more clearly connecting anti-colonialism to socialism earlier in the film would have made that easier.

Bottom line: Gerald R. Molen has produced and Dinesh D’Souza has co-directed a fine film. But it could have been truly outstanding with just a few tweaks. Still, go see it ASAP and get your friends to do likewise.

The tag-line for the film is “Love him, hate him, you don’t know him.” I think that’s entirely valid — at least 99.5% of the people who see this film will learn things they didn’t know about Obama. And that’s a good thing.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | 4 Comments »

2016 Denver get-together

Posted by Richard on August 23, 2012

*BUMPED*

The movie 2016: Obama’s America, based on Dinesh D’Souza’s best-seller, The Roots of Obama’s Rage, and produced by Gerald R. Molen, whose production credits include Jurassic Park, Rain Man, Minority Report, and Schindler’s List, is doing surprisingly well. According to Box Office Mojo, its 8/17-19 weekend numbers were the third-best per-screen average revenue of films showing in more than 1-3 theaters, and its revenue was up 292.3% from the previous week. In fact, on a per-screen basis it was right behind The Expendables 2.

Several Denver area bloggers and friends have expressed an interest in getting together to see it when it opens here on Friday, Aug. 24 (see this post and its  comments). The most likely locations are SouthGlenn (University and Arapahoe) and Denver Pavilions (16th Street Mall, downtown Denver). The SouthGlenn Stadium 14 theater has showings at 1:45, 4:30, 7:15, and 9:50. Denver Pavilions has showings at 12:20, 2:40, 5:05, 7:35, and 10:00. I’m leaning toward Denver Pavilions, either at 5:05 with dinner and/or drinks somewhere nearby afterwards (Lucky Strike? Corner Bakery Cafe? Maggiano’s? Hard Rock? Or…?) or at 7:35 with dinner and/or drinks before. Leave a comment about your preference if you’d like to join us. I’ll post some kind of final plan by Thursday.

UPDATE (Wednesday, 8/22): Denver Pavilions seems like everyone’s choice. Some of us have trouble making a 5:05 show on a workday, so I’m proposing Saturday instead — showtimes are the same as Friday. Join the discussion in the comments if you’re at all interested.

UPDATE 2: The success of the movie continues to amaze. For instance, see this Hollywood Reporter story. Also, check out Thomas Sowell’s review of the film, which he drove 30 miles to see in a packed theater.

UPDATE 3 (Thursday, 8/23, 11:15 PM): The plan I proposed in comment 15 is now the official plan:

  • Dinner at 5 PM at Sam’s No. 3, 1500 Curtis Street. Meet outside, enjoying a gorgeous Colorado day.
     
  • Movie at 7:35 PM at Denver Pavilions, about 6 blocks away (16th Street Mall shuttle available for anyone walking-impaired or wimpy).
     
  • If you want/need to be home before dark, you’re welcome to attend the 2:40 showing of the movie and then join us for dinner at Sam’s afterward and share your thoughts about the film.

I don’t think Sam’s accepts reservations, but if you’re planning to join us for dinner, RSVP in the comments. If the number of participants grows beyond 5-6, I’ll call them and check; they might in any case appreciate a heads-up about a larger party. Mention also whether you’re going to the 2:40 or 7:35 showing of the film.

Also, if you’re planning to attend the 7:35 show, you might want to buy tickets in advance either online or at the box office before heading over to Sam’s. You wouldn’t want to be turned away or end up sitting in the aisle like Tom Sowell (see UPDATE 2). 🙂

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | 32 Comments »

A challenge for Obama from Newt Gingrich

Posted by Richard on August 23, 2012

I’m not a big fan of Newt Gingrich, but he’s smart and articulate (when he isn’t being a loose cannon), and in the 90s he did a lot of good. This week marked the 16th anniversary of a very good thing in which he played a pivotal role: on August 22, 1996, President Clinton signed the bipartisan welfare reform bill passed by Congress. Gingrich issued a challenge (via email; online here) to President Obama to mark the anniversary:

Sixteen years ago this week, President Clinton signed the 1996 bipartisan welfare reform which he lauded as “ending welfare as we know it.” This anniversary offers President Obama a unique opportunity to honor the historic achievement.

At the heart of the 1996 law was a simple principle: no one in America should get money from the government for doing nothing. We knew the welfare system of the past was corroding the work ethic, destroying families, bankrupting our country, and most tragically of all, entrapping the poor.

That’s why we put strong work requirements at the center of the reform. We would help people get back on their feet, and after two years, they had to get a job.

At the time, critics on the left said the policy would turn millions of poor people out of their homes. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan characterized the proposal as “the most brutal act of social policy since Reconstruction.”

And as a state senator from Illinois, our current president opposed it too. Barack Obama said he “did not entirely agree with it and probably would have voted against” it. He later said he was “not a huge supporter” of the reforms.

But contrary to the dire predictions of the Left, welfare reform proved to be one of the most successful social policies in American history. Two-thirds of welfare recipients got a job or went to school. Within 4 years, 4.2 million people rose up from poverty. In five years, child poverty was at an all-time low, having dropped by 25 percent.

The work requirement was the key to achieving these gains.

Presidential candidate Barack Obama acknowledged this fact when he said at Saddleback Church pointed to welfare reform as an issue he’d been wrong about: “I was much more concerned ten years ago, when President Clinton signed the Bill, that this would have disastrous results,” he said…”It worked better than a lot of people anticipated.”

So he told us as a candidate.

But last month, President Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services issued a memo announcing it would grant states waivers on the work requirements.

The HHS memo declared the authority to “waive compliance with [work requirements] and authorize a state to test approaches and methods other than those set forth in [the section pertaining to work requirements], including definitions of work activities and engagement.”

The memo then proceeds to give examples of “projects states may want to consider” – most of which are attempts either to dilute the work requirements or expand the definition of “work”.

Apparently the Obama administration didn’t believe the bureaucratic change would be noticed. When challenged, however, they denied attempting to weaken the requirements (an authority which the memo asserted but which is explicitly prohibited in the law). And having just asserted the authority to undercut the requirements, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney stated angrily that “any request from any state that undercuts the work requirement in welfare reform will be rejected.”

The apparent conflict between the Obama administration’s memo unilaterally empowering itself to waive the work requirement and the Obama White House’s denial that will ever take advantage of this new authority present the President with an opportunity on this 16th anniversary of the law: If he has no intention of waiving the requirements, he should denounce the memo and he should direct the secretary of HHS to officially rescind it.

Then we’ll know for sure if the president truly believes work should remain at the center of welfare reform.

The President and his supporters disingenuously insist that the change in HHS policy didn’t end the work requirement. In Clintonian fashion, I guess you could say it depends on what the definition of “waive” is.

In any case, what they’ve done is, as Gingrich noted “explicitly prohibited in the law” — specifically, Section 407, and the Heritage Foundation’s Andrew Grossman explained in detail how the new Obama policy flouts the law.

But then, making (or circumventing) law without regard for Congress, the Constitution, or the separation of powers seems to be this administration’s forté.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | 2 Comments »

How to become a pariah in the GOP

Posted by Richard on August 21, 2012

If you’re a Republican Congressman from Missouri named Todd Akin and you always wanted to become a pariah in your own party, here’s a good way to do it.

First, you decide to parley five relatively undistinguished terms in the House of Representatives (the highlights of which were your crusades against internet gambling) into a race for the Senate seat held by unpopular Democrat Claire McCaskill (who trailed the generic Republican candidate by 20 points).

Second, in a three-way race for the Republican nomination you eke out a bare plurality (34%-30%-30%) against two much better candidates, one of whom (State Treasurer Sarah Steelman) was endorsed by Sarah Palin. You win the nomination solely because it’s an open primary and Sen. McCaskill ran a bunch of ads urging her Democratic supporters to vote for you — whom she correctly perceived as the weakest candidate and the only one she stood any chance of beating.

As soon as you’ve secured the nomination, give an interview to a local TV station in which, incredibly, you argue that a woman’s body can tell the  difference between sperm from a “legitimate rape” and sperm from some other act, and will somehow stop the former from making her pregnant. To make this absurdity even more bizarre, claim that you learned it from doctors.

After every Republican leader from Mitt Romney to your colleagues in the House and Senate has denounced your remarks and demanded that you step down as the nominee, issue an apology for having “misspoken,” but insist that you’re going to remain in the race.

After every sentient Republican in the nation (and some not-so-sentient ones) has called on you to step down, argue that it was just a minor slip of the tongue: instead of “legitimate rape” you meant to say “forcible rape.” Don’t bother to address the more salient question of how you could possibly believe that a woman’s body can distinguish rape sperm from non-rape sperm. Or which doctors (if any) told you something so insane. Don’t bother to explain what the difference is between “forcible rape” and “non-forcible rape.” (Is the latter, in your mind, perhaps statutory rape? Maybe you think that the young adolescent female’s body is not yet capable of distinguishing and stopping the rape sperm?)

Notice that Public Policy Polling still shows you with a 1% lead over McCaskill (although the liberal polling organization managed that result only by polling 9% more Republicans than Democrats, apparently in an effort to persuade you to stay in the race). Let the deadline for stepping aside gracefully pass. Insist that you’re in the race to the end.

Come November, lose the election to McCaskill, who before you came along trailed by 20% and was almost certainly doomed to defeat. In the process, cost the GOP control of the Senate.

Congratulations, you incredibly ignorant and arrogant SOB. You’re now a pariah. The Samuel Mudd of the 21st century. Your kids may even change their last names.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , | 3 Comments »

The lemonade stand that wasn’t visited

Posted by Richard on August 20, 2012

At Investor’s Business Daily, Andrew Malcom reported that the President’s three-day swing through Iowa didn’t go all that well. Crowds were small, and there were several flubs and embarrassing moments.

  • The Iowa farm with all the windmills that Obama likes turns out to be owned by a family that said there’s no way they’re voting for him.
  • The photo op at the state fair beer tent cost that business thousands when the Secret Service closed them down hours before the President’s arrival. And the owner of that business isn’t voting for Obama either.
  • At one of the Obama events, the caterer wore a “Government Didn’t Build My Business” T-shirt.

But Malcom thought the most important moment of the trip was something that didn’t happen in Marshalltown:

As the president’s big black armored bus began to waddle its way out of town along one of the leafy streets, a little girl was standing, up ahead. She’d set up a sidewalk lemonade stand, like thousands of kids across the heartland on hot summer days.

Many strangers, even non-parents, find it hard to drive by such genuinely small businesses without stopping to feign an immense thirst that can only be quenched by a 50-cent cup of tepid lemonade. And then, claiming a lack of change, they suggest the youngster just keep a dollar bill. It’s the way American adults encourage enterprise and independence in the next generation–and feel good about it.

Can you imagine the media coverage if a president of the United States, the most powerful man in the world, actually stopped his important, snaking motorcade on the spur of the moment to buy out a little girl’s pitcher of homemade lemonade? And perhaps demonstrate that one government official at least cares about helping a small business. Think that touching scene might make the news? Over and over and over?

Mitt Romney did just that during last fall’s New Hampshire primary campaign. And you should have seen the TV crews falling over each other for the shot.

As Obama’s huge ominous vehicle neared the little girl’s lemonade stand in Marshalltown, she fell to her knees. Perhaps in awe. More likely pleading.

But the president’s big black bus rolled right on by.

He waved through the tinted windows.

I’m surprised that he didn’t lean out of the bus to shout at the little girl, “You didn’t build that lemonade stand!”

(HT: David Aitken)

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , | Leave a Comment »

Islamist atrocities reported in Egypt

Posted by Richard on August 18, 2012

In Egypt, the Arab Spring is turning into a nightmare for advocates of secular democracy, Christians, and anyone else who doesn’t embrace 7th-century Sharia law:

Last week in Egypt, when Muslim Brotherhood supporters terrorized the secular media, several Arabic websites—including Arab News, Al Khabar News, Dostor Watany, and Egypt Now—reported that people were being “crucified.” The relevant excerpt follows in translation:

A Sky News Arabic correspondent in Cairo confirmed that protestors belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood crucified those opposing Egyptian President Muhammad Morsi naked on trees in front of the presidential palace while abusing others. Likewise, Muslim Brotherhood supporters locked the doors of the media production facilities of 6-October [a major media region in Cairo], where they proceeded to attack several popular journalists.

That there were attacks and violence—both in front of Egypt’s presidential palace and at major media facilities, is well-documented. An August 9 report by El Balad, a widely read Egyptian website, gives the details:

Last Wednesday, August 8, “thousands of the Muslim Brotherhood’s supporters” attacked 6-October’s media facilities, beat Khaled Salah—chief editor of the privately-owned and secular Youm 7 newspaper—prevented Yusif al-Hassani, an On TV broadcaster, from entering the building, and generally “terrorized the employees.”

El Balad adds that the supporters of Tawfik Okasha, another vocal critic of President Morsi—the one who widely disseminated the graphic video of a Muslim apostate being slaughtered to cries of “Allahu Akbar”—gathered around the presidential palace, only to be surrounded by Brotherhood supporters, who “attacked them with sticks, knives, and Molotov cocktails, crucifying some of them on trees, leading to the deaths of two and the wounding of dozens.”

Far from condemning these terrorists, Al Azhar, Egypt’s most authoritative Islamic institution, has just issued a fatwa calling for more violence and oppression, saying that “fighting participants in anti-Muslim Brotherhood demonstrations planned for 24 August is a religious obligation.”

Most of the aforementioned Arabic sites point out that these attacks are part of the Muslim Brotherhood’s campaign to intimidate and thus censor Egypt’s secular media from exposing the group’s Islamist agenda, which Youm 7, On TV, and Okasha do daily. [Note: the latter’s channel was recently shut down, despite Morsi’s previous reassurances that “no station or media will be shut down in my era.”]

In reality, there is little reason to doubt this crucifixion story. Militant Muslims crucifying their opponents is a regular feature of the Islamic world—recent cases coming from the Ivory Coast, where two Christian brothers were crucified, similarly by supporters of a Muslim president who ousted a Christian; Indonesia, where Islamic separatists crucified a fellow Muslim for being a military informant; and in Iraq, where Muslim militants crucified Christian children.

Finally, it is telling that only a few months ago, and for the first time in Egypt’s modern history, an Egyptian MP proposed to institutionalize Sharia’s most draconian punishments—including crucifixion.

In short, under the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the bottle has been uncorked and the Islamic Genie set loose. Expect much worse to come.

The Muslim Brotherhood, to which newly elected Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi belongs, has been courted by the Obama administration, which describes these perpetrators of crucifixion and terrorism as  “peaceful and committed to non-violence”:


[YouTube link]

Since the beginning of the Arab Spring, the Obama administration has snubbed the secular pro-democracy organizations and instead embraced the Muslim Brotherhood. It’s even sending $1.5 billion in aid to Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood government in defiance of a congressional ban on such aid “unless the State Department certifies that Egypt is making progress on basic freedoms and human rights.” It’s hard to certify progress on human rights when regime opponents are being crucified.

Maybe the Obama administration’s fondness for the Muslim Brotherhood is linked to the close familial ties that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s chief of staff, Huma Abedin, has to the organization. Or maybe it’s a consequence of the president’s anti-colonialist ideology.

Whatever the reason, this administration is on the side of the 7th-century barbarians.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | 2 Comments »

EPA uses judicial jiu jitsu to expand its powers

Posted by Richard on August 17, 2012

Suppose you’re the Obama administration’s EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, and suppose you wish the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act gave you more powers than they actually give you. You could go back to Congress and propose that they amend the legislation to expand your powers. Or instead, you could just circumvent the law like this:

  1. Get your friends in the environmental movement (like the Sierra Club, where disgraced former EPA employee Alfredo Armendariz now works) to sue the EPA for failing to do something that the law doesn’t allow it to do.
     
  2. “Negotiate” with the suing environmental group and enter into a “consent agreement” with them in which the EPA agrees to impose the extra-legal regulations that the environmental group asked for.
     
  3. Get the judge in the lawsuit (who’s probably in on the scam, since the plaintiff chose the jurisdiction with an eye on who the judges are) to sign the consent decree, since the parties to the suit are “in agreement.”

Shazam! Now the EPA has the power to impose regulations that the laws passed by Congress don’t give them!

This is how the coal industry is being destroyed — among others. This is how the Obama administration is subverting the rule of law, thumbing its nose at Congress, and expanding its ability to rule by executive decree.

The only thing left to do is to stonewall FOIA requests that might uncover the collusion with the environmental groups. See this NetRight Daily post by Rick Manning for more details.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

2016 coming to Colorado

Posted by Richard on August 15, 2012

The controversial film 2016: Obama’s America will be released on August 17 in Colorado Springs and Pueblo and on August 24 in Grand Junction and various Denver metro area theaters (go here for details; select your own state for locations and dates near you).

2016 is based on Dinesh D’Souza’s best-seller, The Roots of Obama’s Rage, and is produced by Gerald R. Molen, whose production credits include Jurassic Park, Rain Man, Minority Report, and Schindler’s List.

Anita Crane wrote a pretty good overview of the film, D’Souza, and his premise that Obama is driven by the anti-colonialism he adopted from his father. Check it out. And go see the film!

UPDATE: Looks like some of us Denver-area bloggers (and friends) may get together to see this. Details TBD. Add a comment if you’re interested.

UPDATE 2 (8/21): The two most likely locations, SouthGlenn and Denver Pavilions, have finally posted schedules for Friday, 8/24. The SouthGlenn Stadium 14 theater has showings at 1:45, 4:30, 7:15, and 9:50. Denver Pavilions has showings at 12:20, 2:40, 5:05, 7:35, and 10:00. I’m leaning toward Denver Pavilions, either at 5:05 with dinner and/or drinks after or 7:35 with dinner and/or drinks before. See my new post and leave a comment there about your preference if you’d like to join us.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , | 11 Comments »

Biden: Romney = return of slavery

Posted by Richard on August 14, 2012

After claims that “Romney took death squad money” and “Romney killed my wife,” I wondered what the Socialist Democrats would come up with next. Maybe they’d claim that “Romney is a space alien who wants to eat your babies”? No, not quite. I guess they’re saving that one for October. The latest over-the-top accusation came from Vice President Joe Biden. Bobby Eberle:

Is there anything shocking or surprising anymore from the Obama campaign? As I wrote yesterday, their campaign is to scare seniors, women, and minorities. That’s it… that’s the plan. And they will say or do anything to accomplish it. Just look at the outrageous comment made by Vice President Joe Biden…

Speaking at a campaign event hosted by the Center for American Progress Action Fund, Joe Biden told that audience that Mitt Romney and the Republicans will “put y’all back in chains.”

Check out the video at that link. You can’t tell the racial makeup of the audience, but for some reason Biden adopted a southern black accent reminiscent of (but less exaggerated than) the one Hillary Clinton adopted when she was quoting the spiritual “I Don’t Feel No Ways Tired” in a black church back in 2007.

Obama does the same thing. When he’s being interviewed by one of his media sycophants or holding a press conference, he speaks in the clipped manner of the typical Eastern liberal Ivy Leaguer. But when he’s addressing a blue-collar, no-collar, or predominately black crowd, he’s all drawl and “y’all.” Why don’t people find this condescending and insulting?

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

London Homesick Blues

Posted by Richard on August 12, 2012

America’s athletes have done us proud at the London Olympics, and I’m sure they’ve had a wonderful time over there. But after two weeks, I’ll bet most of them can’t wait to get back to the land of the free and the home of manly footwear. So I figured I know just the little ditty to honor them.

In this Texas Connection video, Gary P. Nunn explains how he came to write “London Homesick Blues” and then performs it with the help of Jerry Jeff Walker and his band. Enjoy!


[YouTube link]

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: | Leave a Comment »

Another disturbing allegation about Harry Reid

Posted by Richard on August 11, 2012

Sen. Harry Reid, widely rumored to be a pederast, is also alleged to have fathered two werewolf cubs with an underage Occupy Wall Street girl. According to the source of the allegation, the evidence is on Reid’s computer. If Reid has nothing to hide, why doesn’t he make public the contents of all his computers to disprove this serious charge?

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: | Leave a Comment »

Romney picks Ryan, shocking revelations begin

Posted by Richard on August 11, 2012

This morning, Mitt Romney introduced Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan as his vice presidential running mate. A few hours later, a Jaynesville, Wisconsin man declared that Ryan was responsible for the death of his wife when, as a college student, Ryan was driving the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile. “She was so distracted by the sight of that Wienermobile that she hit a telephone pole,” Adelbert Goopooch explained. “She was incapacitated for quite some time, had to give up her job, and took to drinking. Seven years later, while inebriated, she slipped in the bathtub, hit her head, and drowned. She’d be alive today if it weren’t for Paul Ryan.”

Early this afternoon, Sen. Harry Reid, an alleged pederast, announced that he’d received a phone call from someone who once attended a Ryan campaign event who assured him that Ryan had never in his life paid his taxes.

ABC News and MSNBC have launched independent investigations into rumors that Ryan once hired a lawn service that employed undocumented workers and that Ryan once owned stock in Staples and thus is connected to Bain Capital’s death squad money.

There is of course absolutely no evidence supporting any of these claims, but the seriousness of the allegations requires the mainstream media to treat them seriously.

Subscribe To Site:

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a Comment »