Capo di tutti capi in the Sky

Related Link » Names of God
“Various religions have different names of God.”
— ‘From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia’

Hierarchy of Totems in the Sky

Capo di tutti capi in the Sky The Obama Lama (no relation to The Dalai Lama)
The Godheads of the Major Religions
The Messiahs of the major religions including →	Jesus as The Christ (Who Saves)	A future King of Israel from the Davidic Line (Who Will Rule the people of the united tribes of Israel and herald the Messianic Age of Global Peace)
The Prophets of the major religions including →		Moses (who invests)
Zeus
Bill Gates
Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

Post #913 Capo di tutti capi in the Sky

Over the Top: Rational Dispensing of TP

Related Link » Toilet paper
“Toilet paper is a soft paper product (tissue paper) used to maintain personal hygiene after human defecation or urination. [...] Different names and slang terms are used for toilet paper in countries around the world, including [...] "TP".”
— ‘From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia’

For centuries, people have puzzled over rational dispensing of toilet paper. No more. A famous scientist (who chooses to remain anonymous) has finally concluded an exhaustive analysis of this tissue issue, which has vexed generations of people around the world, and has accounted for innumerable divorces in the United States and other countries, where paper products are used instead of hands (cf., Q: "Which hand do you use to wipe with?" A: "Neither; I use TP!").

Over the top! That is the final verdict for the rational dispensing of toilet paper.

The deciding factor was a serendipity finding, related to chronic lower-back pain. Yes, you read it correctly, back pain! In a fortuitous combination of circumstances, the scientist's wifey, having loaded a fresh TP roll at random (i.e., without consideration to its orientation with respect to its dispensing fixture) was followed into the bathroom by the scientist, who had decided to trim his mustache. After finishing his trimming, he sought a facial tissue to wipe away some hair clippings from his lower lip, only to find that the facial-tissue box was empty. Naturally, in such situations, instead of looking for a fresh box of facial tissue, the scientist, being a man, reached for the TP roll.

As it happens, the scientist suffers from chronic lower-back pain. And, unfortunately for him, his wifey had loaded the TP roll such that it dispensed tissue outward from underneath the roll (instead of over the top, as shown in the illustration, above). And, in bending down a bit lower than he would otherwise have had to do, the scientist experienced a twinge of lower-back pain and an epiphany:

A TP roll should be loaded so as to dispense tissue over the top of the roll, to help avoid lower-back pain.

Case closed.

Q.E.D.

h/t Theo

Post #912 Over the Top: Rational Dispensing of TP

What on earth have we done?

Related Link » Why the 'O'-ministration will implode in weeks
“Of course the President, the Democrats, the left, and Congressional leadership could surprise me. They could show up in September and endorse the Coburn health care bill in the U.S. Senate and swipe the credit for it. They could show up next week and fight with all their might to not allow the tax rates to skyrocket in 2010. They could decide to scrap Cap & Trade and re-think the use of public money for true job-based economic stimulation. But I'm not holding my breath, and I'd advise you against it as well. They've awakened the American worker, the American small-business owner, and the American voter. All [of whom] are now wondering aloud, "What on earth have we done?"”
— ‘by Kevin McCullough, Sunday, August 30, 2009’

"What on earth have we done?"

You have done what that half of the country who didn't vote for the leftists have been trying to warn you about for over a year, you stupid shits.

Post #911 What on earth have we done?

The Future Is Now

FutureWeapons IWI Micro-Tavor

Juice — not so easy to f*ck with anymore.

Post #910 The Future Is Now

Hero Worship

Related Link » Mark Steyn: Things only a Kennedy could get away with
“We are enjoined not to speak ill of the dead. But, when an entire nation — or, at any rate, its "mainstream" media culture — declines to speak the truth about the dead, we are certainly entitled to speak ill of such false eulogists. [...] We are all flawed, and most of us are weak, and in hellish moments, at a split-second's notice, confronting the choice that will define us ever after, many of us will fail the test. Perhaps Mary Jo [Kopechne] could have been saved; perhaps she would have died anyway. What is true is that Edward Kennedy made her death a certainty. [...] In a cooing paean to the senator on a cringe-makingly obsequious edition of NPR's "Diane Rehm Show", Edward Klein of Newsweek fondly recalled that one of Ted's "favorite topics of humor was, indeed, Chappaquiddick itself. He would ask people, ‘Have you heard any new jokes about Chappaquiddick?’"[!]”
— ‘By Mark Steyn, Syndicated Column’

It is a given that I have always subscribed to — America is the greatest country in the world. Moreover, we are, relatively speaking and in absolute terms as well, a good and generous people. But our societal value system is seriously flawed.

As human nature dictates, we value power, glamor, youth, success, and, above all, the almighty buck. Our non-denominational religion is hero-worship, and our common goal is "winning": it's not everything; it's the only thing, as one of our heroes famously summarized.

But Lombardi was being glib with a purpose. His pronouncement makes sense in a very specific arena: the world of professional team sports. In most walks of life, there are certainly other things to aspire to: honor, duty, personal accountability, decency, concepts that have largely disappeared from the halls of Congress. Perhaps it was ever so. I would like to believe otherwise, and so I shall.

My personal pantheon of heroes evolved over time, as did my personal value system. As any other child begins life, my first hero was Mom, followed closely by Dad. Sadly, I was not fortunate to have ever known any of my grandparents, all of whom perished in the Holocaust shortly after my birth.

As I began my quarter century as a full-time student, I began to acquire historical heroes, such as the great victors of Word War II. General Eisenhower ruled supreme in my pantheon at that time, during my family's status as displaced persons (DP's) in the American Occupation Zone in West Germany.

After coming to America, other heroes were admitted to my pantheon: Harry Truman; Duke Snider; The Lone Ranger; and Tonto. My choices now included heroes from the realms of politics, sports, and the all-inclusive category — fantasy.

As time passed, admission to my pantheon became somewhat less focused on laudable attributes of success. My inclination was to pay homage to the less celebrated/glamorous qualities. Although the much celebrated Michael Jordan, JFK, and yes, Natalie Wood, made the grade, some others, whom I will not name, did not.

Ultimately, though some aspect of a person's life may indeed be exceptional, I am only moved to admire such people if they have a modicum of decency to their name.

Post #909 Hero Worship

One Robin Flew Out of the Cuckoo's Nest

Source Link » In Obama We Trust?

August 27, 2009

In Obama We Trust?

By Robin of Berkeley
I grew up in a home where God was MIA. I don't remember religion being mentioned except occasional references to some sort of God and a heaven. While my family was proud of their ethnicity, they didn't practice the religion. Aside from the requisite Bar Mitvahs, they never set foot in a synagogue.

My parents did worship at the altar of pleasure. They loved to party; they lived for the times they'd go out with their large, rowdy group, and dance and drink the night away.

I'm not sure why my parents were such party animals. It was probably a way to escape the past, the memories of which were permanently etched on the mournful faces of my grandparents.

The past: Atrocities in Tsarist Russia. Poverty in the U.S. Tiny, noisy tenements in New York City; ghettos of immigrants from Ireland, Italy and Eastern Europe huddled together.

My father's dad, desperate for money during the Great Depression, accepted a dollar to name my father after another man's deceased loved one.

Brazen anti Semitism; recurrent chants of "dirty Jew." WWII; the enormity of the death camps and the guilt of being safely sheltered.

My father, with a little money saved from working 12 hour days, reinvented himself. He changed his Yiddish sounding name to something WASP'y, and moved the family to a look alike, tract house in the ‘burbs. While the lifestyle was modest compared to middle America today, my parents were euphoric, a state that continued even into old age.

Escapees from the ghetto, no longer targets, my parents finally felt like true Americans. They were happy as clams in their perfect, sanitized life of black and white TVs, a washer and dryer, frozen vegetables, and luxuries like bottled salad dressing.

When I think about my dad, I remember how he ate. Every morsel, whether formerly boxed or canned, was exquisitely delicious, and he savored each bite, murmuring "Mmm, mmm," like a man just rescued from starvation.

My parents worked hard during the week, and then weekends traveled the cocktail party circuit, dancing the night away. They were in perpetual adolescence, recreating their lost childhood.

Meanwhile, I was a latchkey kid before the phrase was coined. With my only hobby being shopping, I occupied myself with my friends, the Addams Family, the Brady Bunch, Ed Sullivan, and Patty Duke. When I was a teen, it became mind numbing sex and drugs and rock and roll.

Weekends there was so little to do that I slept in until 1 pm. Occasionally I would tag along on a Sunday with my best friend and her family who went on outings. I was astonished that an entire family went out in the car for activities like picnics and museums.

It was a flat, colorless childhood with no strong arms to guide me. I drifted along the best I could, like a lone, unguarded leaf.

College was a blur of hook ups, hard drugs, and parties as I was speeding headfirst into disaster. Mercifully, in my early 20's, I found my way to a few decent boyfriends who had brains and I gained some myself, giving up my untamed habits along the way.

I settled down with my husband, Jon, a bookish type, who came from a family the polar opposite of mine. Jon still jokes (?) that he helped raise me.

Often Jon would drag me to talks by other brainiacs, where I would summarily nod off. But I like to think I absorbed something in between snoozes.

Eventually my life took shape: around my career as a psychotherapist and my leftist crusades to change the world. I found religion, or perhaps it found me.

I had just turned 30, an event that had given me the willies. Perusing a book by Buddhist teacher Chogyam Trungpa in a bookstore, I was entranced by the novel idea that happiness is not the goal of existence, but the byproduct of a life well lived; that the purpose of life was truth not pleasure.

I started studying Eastern religion with a fervor, especially books by Trungpa and Osho (Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh), and even called myself a Buddhist until I shed most of my old identities a few years ago. I became more of a heavyweight, able to look at the big ticket items of life -- mortality, illness, and suffering -- because I was safely nestled in the world of the Spirit.

I remember the moment I discovered God, in my 30's, when Jon and I were on vacation. I was reading a light novel, and he, of course, was studying some heavy tome. When I perused it and saw it was a religious book, I asked him, "Do you believe in God?" (Yes I know it's bizarre that it took l0 years for the subject to come up.)

I was bowled over when Jon said, "Yes." (He was also raised secular, and had never previously mentioned the G word.) My eyes welled up with tears. I realized that I did too.

I've been thinking a lot lately about the factors in my life that lured me far Left for so long; what captivated me and held me there even with mounting evidence that the ideology was bankrupt. And why are millions still following the Pied Piper of Chicago, even though he's looking increasingly more corrupt and vacuous?

And I've come to this: the Left is filled to the brim with people like me, who grew up in homes with God in permanent exile and various adults floating in and out in hot pursuit of self fulfillment. With no way to understand life, this realm starts looking like an unmanageable House of Horrors. The result: people turn to someone like Obama to engineer a whole new world.

So we have a situation today with the Left in charge, preaching their religion which is anti-religion. Their dogmas are so harsh that they make the Torah look like a light summer read. The Left's missionaries are trying to tame the savages (stupid white people) just as the missionaries of old traveled abroad to tame the savages.

But, as survivors of Jonestown learned, a religion without a beneficent God firmly in place, is a cult, and can destroy lives. Those spiritual teachers I admired when I was young, Osho and Trungpa? They turned out to be major pervs. They slept with their students, even encouraged violence against them. Both died as a result of their depravity.

Without some type of faith, people can remain in a state of ravenous hunger, as needy and frightened as a little lost child. They're looking for something, but all the roads are blocked off. The only door leading to safety has been shut in their faces by a society that rejects the Sacred.

So the masses flock to Obama because he offers them meaning and a way to organize a chaotic universe. People believe he's some kind of Messiah because they're frantic for a Prophet to create a heaven on earth.

I saw a blog where a young person posts, "I have pictures of Obama on my wall. He gives me a reason to get out of bed in the morning." There are no rational arguments about bailouts and taxes that will counteract this desperation for purpose.

Our culture offers youth nothing of substance to carve out a dignified life. In the place of spiritual and intellectual richness, we pump them up with noxious television shows and films, texting and sexting, addiction to Facebook, and lots of drugs. We may have created a Generation N, for Nihilism.

And it's not just the young. Baby boomers are being dragged kicking and screaming into old age, without any spiritual guideposts and within a culture that fears and despises anything old. In ancient times, elders were revered as the cultural wellspring of wisdom and tradition.

But in most of the First World, older people are as disposable as yesterday's trash. How unacceptable to grow old in a culture that finds no grace, only disgrace, in wrinkles, and wants to hustle you out the door as soon as possible.

Baby boomers are also dancing to Obama's beat, enveloped in feelings of hope and change, holding on for dear life to their long lost youth. But it's not the real 60's with its hard drugs, violence, and exploitation of women, but a fantasy, frozen in time, of peace and flower power.

I understand the draw of Obama and liberalism and changing the world because I know what it is like when life has no other meaning. I understand how unbearable it is when not only one's parents but God is MIA and school is a forbidding place, and drugs only temporarily blunt the pain.

And I know the feeling of being so depressed that you grab onto anything -- whether it's a bottle or a relationship or a guru -- anything that eases the despair, and you won't let go, even when the consequences keep mounting. You won't let go until you find your way to the truth.

And I know what it's like to wake up from the fog, to shake off the dread, and to find that I'm strong enough to walk on my own two feet and that a Higher Power lifts and carries me when I'm too weak to stand.

If we as a culture don't find our way back to those young and old who are lost in space, adrift and unanchored, they will embrace false idols. For as long as Obama is the only game in town, the only way people can feel alive and hopeful, they'll ignore every red flag and defend Obama until their last dying breath. They must believe in him. The alternative is just too unbearable.

A frequent AT contributor, Robin is a recovering liberal and a psychotherapist in Berkeley.

Page Printed from:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/08/in_obama_we_trust.html at August 28, 2009 - 11:41:04 AM EDT

Post #908 One Robin Flew Out of the Cuckoo's Nest

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: I Can't Stop Loving You

{Song #27 « Song #28 » Song #29}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

Song #28 is I Can't Stop Loving You sung by Ray Charles.

Sometimes, you just feel the blues, you know? You might just as well try to enjoy it.

Get a glass. Fill it with Scotch. Sit down in you favorite easy chair. And turn on ol' Ray, preferably on auto-repeat. You know?

I Can't Stop Loving You by Ray Charles


Post #907 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: I Can't Stop Loving You

Why Janie Can't Read

Related Link » The United Federation of Teachers A Union of Professionals [!!!]
“Anecdotal records should address specific learning and/or behavioral issues, for example, when a student takes twice as long as his or her peers to complete short answer questions in American history class; or when a student refuses to do independent math sheets, involving word problems and, instead, walks out of the classroom; and, when a student is asked to read a passage from a work of literature and, instead, begins to mumble derogatory comments or throws things at others.”
— ‘From Section 2: Anecdotal Records’

Related Link » The Great Escape
“Many of the issues of our times are hard to understand without understanding the vision of the world that they are part of. Whether the particular issue is education, economics or medical care, the preferred explanation tends to be an external explanation — that is, something outside the control of the individuals directly involved. Education is usually discussed in terms of the money spent on it, the teaching methods used, class sizes or the way the whole system is organized. Students are discussed largely as passive recipients of good or bad education.”
— ‘Thomas Sowell, August 25, 2009’

At some point in the late 1980's, if memory serves, what used to be called "report cards" for generations of American schoolchildren, were banished from elementary schools. The age of anecdotals had burst upon the education industry, and its tenacious grip has produced millions of young people with degrees in conventional wisdom. Unfortunately for our Nation, such conventional wisdom, an oxymoron of monumental proportions, has displaced what once was American common sense, a far more useful attribute in so-called modern society.

If you are wondering, as I have been for some time now, what in the world could have happened to our way of life, one that made sense in the traditional sense of that word, I now believe that it has been hijacked by a bureaucracy of lowest common (in the basest sense of that word) denominators, who in a few years time have created an enourmous flock of sheep masquerading as voters. Naturally, this flock is drawn to an idealization of one of their own, a conventional wise man of grandiose proportions and rhetoric, who has street smarts (not to be confused with common sense) where scruples had ordinarily resided, and, what is now valued above all else, charisma, though I have yet to hear a cogent explanation of what is currently meant by that ephemeral term.

This is why Janie can't read, and why she and her legions of cohorts are stampeding off the cliffs of sanity with grins on their feces-smudged faces.

Father Guido Sarducci's Five Minute University
h/t Craig Newmark

Post #906 Why Janie Can't Read

A Core Question of My Own

Related Link » Obama gives nuanced defense of his stance on torture
“Obama did not dispute Cheney's assertions about the memos but appeared to try to blunt their potential impact by shifting the argument. The assertion that the CIA's methods worked doesn't answer what Obama called the core question: ‘Could we have gotten that same information without resorting to these techniques?’ Obama asked. ‘And it doesn't answer the broader question: Are we safer as a consequence of having used these techniques?’”
— ‘By Peter Wallsten and Greg Miller, April 30, 2009’

Pre-disclosure #1: The following post is not, I repeat with emphasis, not a commentary on the efficacy, ethics, or any other value judgement for what is commonly considered to be a manifestation of torture.

Pre-disclosure #2: I make no claim whatsoever as to the originality of my line of reasoning in what follows, for it is inconceivable to me that this line of reasoning, based in this instance on my humble claim to some measure of basic common sense, has not been traversed innumerable times in the past by others.

I wish to consider the two Obama quotes excerpted from the related link, above. I submit to you, gentle reader, that there is not one scintilla of value in what The Obama refers to as "core questions". I must emphasize that one scintilla is here being used to mean the smallest possible granule of value, akin to an atom of value.

To me, such a seemingly bold assertion on my part is, nevertheless, self evident, but I feel obliged to elaborate. I ask you to pause and reflect as follows: How could one possibly answer The Obama's questions with any kind of supporting evidence? Well?

It simply isn't possible, for the obvious reason that there is no way to rewind the clock and redo that scenario. Whether you answer "no you couldn't have", or The Obama's favorite "yes you could have", you could only truly support either contention by replaying a historical scenario. Moreover, in the case of the negative response, you would have to replay it an infinite number of times, so as to eliminate every conceivable alternative technique to the one that actually elicited the valuable information, including my own favorite absurdity: enticing the terrorists with offers of chocolate ice-cream cones.

So many replays; so little time. And, sadly, no convenient time machine to get you to those interrogations.

I have a core question of my own. Why hasn't anyone in the media, to my knowledge, asked The Obama, "Sir, what the f*ck are you talking about?"

Post #905 A Core Question of My Own

May we have a larger shovel, please?

Related Link » Prosecutor to Probe CIA Interrogations — Attorney General Parts With White House In Approving Preliminary Investigation:
“Obama and White House officials have said that they want to look ahead on national security; White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said last week that the administration is eager to keep ‘going forward’ and that ‘a hefty litigation looking backward is not what we believe is in the country's best interest’. But the White House voiced support for Holder in a news conference held Monday on Martha's Vineyard, Mass., where deputy press secretary Bill Burton told reporters that ‘ultimately, the decisions on who is investigated and who is prosecuted are up to the attorney general [...]. The president thinks that Eric Holder, who [sic] he appointed as a very independent attorney general, should make those decisions’.”
— ‘By Carrie Johnson, Washington Post Staff Writer, August 25, 2009’

Run that by me again? Boy, sometimes the organization chart of the Federal Executive Branch gets convoluted, doesn't it?

Let's see, the POTUS sits atop the Executive totem pole (some would argue that The Obama sits atop that great big Totem Pole in the Sky). And the President's Cabinet has always been shown in a rectangular box, located somewhere below the POTUS, with the VP flitting between the Executive, the Legislative, and, for our current Veep, the Loony Branch (there may be a redundancy here).

So, the Attorney General, generally thought to be part of the Cabinet, all of whose members traditionally have served at the pleasure of the POTUS (with the Senate's blessings, of course), has somehow flown the coop? Is this the current tune being hummed by our so-called Press Secretary of disinformation? And are we all supposed to just swallow this dollop of horseshit and say, "Thank you, kind sir; may I have another?"?

Post #904 May we have a larger shovel, please?

That old tingling magic has me in its spell ...

Related Link » "I will Follow Him (Obama)" Video Parody
“A humorous musical look at the media's love affair with Obama.”
— ‘JoeDanMedia’

Post #903 That old tingling magic has me in its spell ...

Earth-devouring Black Hole — NOT!

Related Link » VBS TV: Black Holes and Big Bangs
“VBS explores CERN, the world’s largest particle physics laboratory, to determine whether its 17 miles of tubing buried under the Franco-Swiss border will reveal the origin of mass in the universe – or generate an earth-devouring black hole.”

h/t Theo

Interesting video, but as for generating "an earth-devouring black hole" — NOT!
Post #902 Earth-devouring Black Hole — NOT!

Got caption?

h/t Theo
Proposed Caption: "Bite Me!"

Post #901 Got caption?

Not a Pelosi Fan

Related Link » Town Hall Meeting with U.S. Congressman Brian Baird
“I, David William Hedrick, a member of the silent majority, decided that I was not going to be silent anymore. So, I let U.S. Congressman Brian Baird have it. I was one questioner out of 38, that was called at random from an audience that started at 3,000 earlier in the evening. Not expecting to be called on, I quickly scratched what I wanted to say on a borrowed piece of paper and with a pen that I borrowed from someone else in the audience minutes before I spoke. So much for the planned talking points of the right wing conspiracy.”
— ‘David William Hedrick’

h/t Secular Apostate

Post #900 Not a Pelosi Fan

Unconscionable "Compassion" for Human Detritus

Related Link » Report: Letter Shows British Prime Minister, Libyan Leader Discussed Details of Lockerbie Bomber Release Weeks Ago
“LONDON — British Prime Minister Gordon Brown reportedly discussed details on conditions for the release of convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi with Libyan leader Colonel Muammar al-Qaddafi nearly six weeks ago. [...] The letter, addressed ‘Dear Muammar’, contradicts previous claims that the Lockerbie case was only briefly mentioned during that conversation in July and that Brown stressed it should be left to the Scottish government, the Guardian reported. [...] The head of Scotland's government said Sunday that FBI director Robert Mueller was wrong to criticize the decision to free the Pan Am Flight 103 bomber — insisting there was public support for the release on compassionate grounds.”
— ‘The Associated Press contributed to this report.’

Whatever support there may or may not have been for releasing the bomber responsible for the murder of 270 people, one thing is incontrovertible — the government elected by the society that countenanced this release has demonstrated a perversion of the concept of compassion beyond recognition from the standpoint of normative rules of ethics.

The report goes on to say that, "The release was met with outrage by families of the U.S. victims of the bombing, and criticized by President Obama [a liberal advocate for compassionate treatment of terrorists] as ‘highly objectionable’."

"Highly objectionable", indeed. Not exactly how I would categorize that which borders on condoning such a heinous act, but still containing a modicum of unfavorable criticism. At least there hasn't been, to my knowledge, a rush to propose this unmentionable lump of human detritus for a Nobel Peace Prize, by such faux-Nobel-worthy recipients as Al Gore and Paul Krugman. Fortunately, the Nobel is not ordinarily awarded posthumously (though some have opined that Krugman's is an exception), so perhaps we will be spared that proverbial insult.

Post #899 Unconscionable "Compassion" for Human Detritus

What's it all about?

Related Link » A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of Political Struggles by Thomas Sowell
“In his later classic work, The Wealth of Nations, Smith went further. Economic benefits to society were largely unintended by individuals, but emerged systemically from the interactions of the marketplace, under the pressures of competition and the incentives of individual gain. Moral sentiments were necessary only for shaping the general framework of laws within which this systemic process could go on. This was yet another way in which man, with all the limitations conceived by Smith, could be induced to produce benefits for others, for reasons ultimately reducible to self-interest. It was not an atomistic theory that individual self-interests added up to the interest of society. On the contrary, the functioning of the economy and society required each individual to do things for other people; it was simply the motivation behind these acts — whether moral or economic — which was ultimately self-centered. In both his moral and his economic analyses, Smith relied on incentives rather than dispositions to get the job done.” [emphasis added]
— Thomas Sowell

Uncommon Knowledge: Thomas Sowell and Conflict of Visions

We've all heard some variant of the old quip, "There are two kinds of people in the world: the Irish; and those who wish they were." Well, in point of fact, there are really two principal dichotomies among humans, one anatomical, and the other ideological. The latter, between those who idealize human nature, and those who realize (wo)man's limitations, lies at the heart of every socio-political conflict, including the one currently raging over healthcare reform in the United States.

Despite the interminable claims, counterclaims, slogans, accusations, posturing, and every which manner of contemptible behavior, it all comes down to how each one of us views human nature and the optimum way to avoid utter chaos, though, to be sure, there are even those among us whose preference is to have utter chaos. Add to this mix a goodly amount of ignorance, prejudice, and malice, and you have what passes for socio-political dialog.

There are at least 6 billion opinions about how to begin to think about an approach to finding a possible solution to evolve some way for billions of people to co-exist without tearing each other to pieces. And as a wise man observed, a journey of such magnitude begins as any other — with the first step. But it must be a step of fundamental proportions, such that all subsequent steps contribute a procedural refinement for achieving the compromise goal of optimum utilization of Earth's limited resources.

In my humble opinion, that fundamental underlying concept, which distinguishes humanity from a colony of bees, is personal liberty, constrained only by a system of justice to preserve the greatest amount of personal liberty for the greatest number of individuals. Note that such a fundamental concept includes an accommodation for those who hold an idealized vision of human nature, albeit only to the extent that such a vision is not forcibly imposed on those who do not share it.

In my humble opinion, the apotheosis of Adam Smith's vision is the Sage Hillel's Silver Rule, which was championed by Gandhi and Martin Luther King alike:

"That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow."

Post #898 What's it all about?

Just Plain Insane

Related Link » Strategic Defense Initiative
“Although it is difficult to compile actual spending totals across the complete spectrum of space-based defense programs (including classified "off-budget" "black projects"), the U.S. has certainly invested well over $100 billion on "SDI" and follow-on programs, and holds a commanding lead over all current or potential future adversaries in the realm of space technology/warfare. The vast majority of this investment has been made in basic research at National Laboratories and Universities, and these programs continue to be a key source of funding for top research scientists in the fields of high-energy physics, supercomputing, advanced materials, and many other critical science and engineering disciplines: funding which indirectly supports other research work by top scientists, and which would be largely unavailable outside of the defense budget environment.”
— ‘From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia’

Related Link » Star Wars: The Next Generation
“Defense: The Air Force airborne laser program successfully completes a simulated kill from a plane able to find, track and destroy a live ballistic missile. We can shoot down enemy missiles. Instead, we're shooting down the laser program. [...] This latest in a successful series of tests comes after Defense Secretary Robert Gates' general slashing of missile defense — cuts that will reduce next year's Missile Defense Agency budget by $1.4 billion, or 15%. Gates has pulled the plug on buying a second plane. The Pentagon says the program has three tries to destroy a live missile or the program will be killed altogether. [...] We are confident the ABL will meet its testing goals in the three tests remaining. But the issue isn't whether we can afford to build and deploy the ABL, but whether we can afford not to. If we can afford Cash for Clunkers, we can afford the airborne laser.”
— ‘By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Wednesday, August 19, 2009’

My fellow Americans, this is wrong. This is very wrong. This borders on the criminally wrong!

Back in the late 1980s, those of us working within the SDI program would have been thrilled to know that our technology would eventually reach the point that has been demonstrated by today's ABM programs. Thrilled, I tell you. To see the efforts of at least two generations of physicists and engineers on the brink of curtailment, at the point that clearly demonstrates a successful culmination of such a technological feat, is nothing short of grasping defeat from the jaws of victory.

The Obama Administration is either the most myopic, or the most naive, or just plain the only insane administration in the history of national administrations.

Post #897 Just Plain Insane

This is a recording ...

Related Link » Seeds Of Socialism
“The public has caught on to the threat of a government-run health plan unfairly competing with the private plans that nearly 90% say they are happy with. The people know that artificially low premiums, coupled with onerous new regulations for private insurers, can destroy the private health insurance industry and leave us all with no choice but one big, federally managed medical DMV.”
— ‘By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Wednesday, August 19, 2009’

For the maturity-challenged, see pre-digested pablum version at People ask TheBigHenry ..., below.

Post #896 This is a recording ...

People ask TheBigHenry ...

Q: TheBigHenry: Why are conservatives so mean?
A: The short answer is that they aren't. Do you remember when you were a kid and Mom and Dad didn't let you do stuff, like play with matches? Well, conservatives are like your Mom and Dad. They don't want you to do stuff that is dangerous and could seriously injure you and hurt the whole country.

Q: TheBigHenry, What is wrong with having a Nationalized Health Care Option like the One our Dear Leader wants to give us?
A: In theory, there is nothing wrong with the idea. But in practice, it's a whole nother ball game. You see, the Federal Government doesn't actually have any wealth to pay for all the nice things that The Dear Obama wants to give everybody. Instead, the Federal Government has two powers that enable it to make wonderful promises that it can pretend to pay for, but which actually end up being paid for by everybody currently alive, and all those who will be born in the future. Those two powerful powers are taxation and printing. So here is how a Nationalized Health Care Option would play out. At first, everything would be honky dory. Then, the vast bureaucracy would become inefficient, just like the post office, and start losing money, because providing healthcare is very expensive, and when it is offered to everyone who wants it for much less than it costs to provide it, well, the government has only two options: raise taxes and/or print money. Either way, people with income will end up paying for it either directly through taxes or indirectly via the devaluation of their money because of the printing of it. Nevertheless, the government will continue to support (with taxes and printing) the losing proposition, because it will have become an entitlement, just like Medicare. But private insurance will not be able to compete because a losing proposition will drive them out of business. Then, inevitably, the government will become the sole provider of health care, which is when the proverbial shit will hit the fan. You see, you can support a losing proposition only so long as there are enough professionals (we call them doctors and nurses) to supply the healthcare that the government is paying for with devalued dollars. But eventually, such professionals, who are not generally stupid people, will say, "F*ck this shit", and instead of going to medical and nursing schools, more and more of potential doctors and nurses will end up going to law school instead, so that they can get a cushy job in government. And what happens when there aren't enough doctors and nurses to go around? Yup, sooner or later you will get rationing of healthcare, just like they have in Canada and Britain, where they tried the same f*cking system before, to they're great regret.

[If you want a "big boy's" answer to this question, read Charles Krauthammer's "Obamacare: The Only Exit Strategy"]

Q: TheBigHenry: It sounds like you are one of those Obama haters. Why?
A: I am not. I believe The Obama is well-meaning and wants to be loved by everybody for giving away stuff to naive little people who think He is the second coming of sliced bread. He just doesn't understand elementary economics, just like the stupid shits in Congress.

Post #895 People ask TheBigHenry ...

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: The Twelfth of Never

{Song #26 « Song #27 » Song #28}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

Song #27 is The Twelfth of Never sung by Johnny Mathis.

After my undergraduate career at Cornell in engineering physics, during which time I managed to attend 2 or 3 parties (total) on campus, I began my grad school career at Columbia in nuclear physics, with a renewed interest in "social" studies.

I recall going to a singles weekend in the Pocono Mountains (Pennsylvania). I had average success there, if you know what I mean, but I did see one guy whose success rate was off the charts. I had to know what his secret was. I managed to speak to him during one of his "breaks in the action", so I asked him. His response was just two words: Johnny Mathis.

When I got back to Columbia, I went directly to the local record store.

The Twelfth of Never- Johnny Mathis


Post #894 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: The Twelfth of Never

A little help here ...

That would be a quadrillion, Chief.

ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE (OOM)

Name of Number	Power of Ten	Multiples of 3 [OOM]	Comments
one	0	0	1
thousand	3	1	1,000
million	6	2	thousand × thousand
billion	9	3	thousand × million
trillion	12	4	thousand × billion; or, million × million
10 trillion	13	41/3	U.S. Federal Debt [$] (2008)
100 trillion	14	42/3	# cells in human body
quadrillion	15	5	thousand × trillion; or, million × billion
quintillion	18	6	thousand × quadrillion; or, million × trillion; or, billion × billion
sextillion	21	7	thousand × quintillion; or, million × quadrillion; or, billion × trillion
septillion	24	8	1.7 × Avogadro's number
googol	100	331/3	sextillion × (# photons in universe)
googolplex	googol	googol/3	Zimbabwe's % hyperinflation

Post #893 A little help here ...

Better (and deeper) than deep throat!

Related Link » The Hubble Ultra Deep Field in 3D
“I've recently discovered an animation that was rendered using the measured redshift of all 10,000 galaxies in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field image. I've written a short script that leads you through a quick history of both deep field images and this video ends with a fly-through of the Ultra Deep Field.
[...]
Animation Credit: Hubble Cosmological Redshift Animation Courtesy: Mike Gallis”
— ‘tdarnell’

Post #892 Better (and deeper) than deep throat!

Ignorance + Arrogance » Explosive Policy

Related Link » Our Aging Deterrent
“We recently observed the anniversaries of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, actions that brought an abrupt end to the carnage of World War II and arguably have prevented the wars since from escalating to another worldwide conflict. Nuclear weapons in the right hands are instruments of peace. [...] Yet President Obama appears ready and willing to sacrifice America's nuclear readiness by avoiding the testing and maintenance necessary to keep our deterrent ready and credible. [...] Leading by example to rid the world of nuclear weapons, we may have only succeeded in making our own ineffective. A report released in May by the Perry-Schlesinger Commission (named for two former defense secretaries) warned that we must increase funding for, and improve the effectiveness of, our deteriorating nuclear arsenal. [...] Inactivity breeds vulnerability. A world without nuclear weapons would be nice. A world without thugs willing to use them against us would be better. Until then, we can at least ensure that the weapons we have still work.”
— ‘By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Wednesday, August 12’

The Obama Himself, our Community-Organizer-in-the-US (COITUS), wants to interrupt the 65-year US effort to maintain our nuclear deterrent (COITUS interruptus). His ignorance together with His arrogance makes for an explosive mix of stupid foreign policy. I can not overemphasize this point:

Neglecting our nuclear deterrent, in a world where very bad people have nuclear weapons, is suicidal.

---

UPDATE (11 JANUARY 2010):
Someone came up with an appropriate photoshopped illustration for my
"Community-Organizer-in-the-US (COITUS)" concept.
h/t Theo
Post #891 Ignorance + Arrogance » Explosive Policy

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)

{Song #25 « Song #26 » Song #27}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

Song #26 is December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night) sung by The Four Seasons.

"December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)" is a hit single by The Four Seasons, written by original Four Seasons keyboard player Bob Gaudio (formerly of The Royal Teens ["Short Shorts"]) and his future wife Judy Parker, produced by Gaudio, and included on the group's 1975 album, Who Loves You. The Vocal Group Hall of Fame has stated that it was the most popular white rock band before The Beatles. The song was originally about the repeal of prohibition, but the lyrics were changed at the urgings of [long-time frontman Frankie] Valli and lyricist Parker. The song became a nostalgic remembrance of a young man's "first time" with a woman.

As I have mentioned previously in this series, The "Bleach" Boys are my favorite band of all time. But, as a long-time New Yorker, I also have a special fondness for the group known as "the East Coast Beach Boys", which is how I view The Four Seasons.

The song December 1963 had a special, and very personal significance, for me when it was released in 1975. Sadly, a third of a century later, I've forgotten why! Unfortunately, this reminiscence will get me in hot water with wifey, because, she has learned (quite correctly) to be skeptical of my "senior moment" type claims. Sigh.

The Four Seasons - December, 1963 (Oh What A Night) - 1975


Post #890 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)

What part of "insurance" don't you understand? (Updated)

Related Link » Real Debate Is Individualism Vs. Collectivism
“Insurance is a form of financing for the unexpected and unpredictable. It is not a mechanism to force somebody else to pick up the tab for expenses you have already incurred. Do the Democrats even understand what insurance is? It is a contract under which a health insurance company agrees to pay for medical bills that could run into the tens of thousands of dollars, if you are hit by a bus or are diagnosed with cancer, so that you don't have to pay for those bills out of your income or savings.
[...]
So if insurance companies have to take on a known expense and can't charge a higher rate for it, how are they going to pay for it? By raising everyone else's premiums, redistributing their wealth to the new freeloaders. This isn't insurance, it's welfare.” [emphasis added]
— ‘By ROBERT TRACINSKI | Posted Tuesday, August 11, 2009’

In most [perhaps all] states the motor vehicle bureau requires a car owner to carry liability insurance. This is because most car owners would be ruined financially if they had to pay a typical jury-decided liability penalty in case of their fault during a car accident. In all such insurance policies, no one can get insurance coverage for a penalty they have already incurred! Why? Because that is not insurance! That is welfare, which insurance companies are not in the business of paying.

Welfare is not business. Welfare is socialism. And in a socialist state, where does the welfare come from? It comes from the taxes that other people pay. What did you expect, the tooth fairy?

UPDATE:
Dear Readers, this post is not intended as an invitation to another venue for the general debate about "how healthcare should be paid for in the United States of America". That is part of the National debate currently being waged throughout America, very vocally, very passionately, and sometimes violently.

In this post, I am merely pointing out the obvious distinction to be made between insurance and welfare. In so doing, my hope is that the much more general National debate will at least be based on the merits, if any, of the specific alternative methods for paying the costs of universal healthcare.

I have no interest in allowing such arguments to be waged in my own private corner of the blogosphere. There are many other online and offline venues for such shouting matches. Go forth and champion your favorite scheme. Elsewhere.

Post #889 What part of "insurance" don't you understand? (Updated)

Class Act

Related Link » Spot the Girl from Kings Lynn (Theo)


It depends on your perspective (as it were).

Post #888 Class Act

A word to the wise (as if ...)!

Related Link » Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming.
“Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don't care. Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now. We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it.

You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As Americans we are ashamed of you. You have brought shame to us. If you are not representing the wants and needs of your constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party, you will be fired.

Did you hear? We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will not save you. If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are.

If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one. We are coming. Are we coming for you? Who[m] do you represent? What do you represent?

Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming.”
— ‘A letter from a woman in Arizona. She writes an open letter to our nation's leadership.’

Whoever this woman from Arizona is, she speaks for me as well!

Are you sick of the bullshit yet? Does the woman from Arizona speak for you too?

Throw the bums (incumbents) out! Now; the next time; and the election after that; until the Congress and the Executive is disinfected of the political-hackery stench.

Job one for any government official must be to serve the best interests of the American people, not the personal interests of the official, which is what they all currently think of first, last, and foremost.

Put an end to it.

This Is Priceless - Leah From New Hampshire For President:


Post #887 A word to the wise (as if ...)!

The Nobel Racism Bat

Related Link » The Boys Who Cried “Racist”
“Some people on the left can’t see any excuse for opposition to collectivism except racism. (Which is, of course, as Ayn Rand said, ‘the lowest, most crudely primitive form of collectivism.’) Today it’s Paul Krugman. [...] That is, Paul Krugman can’t understand why people would oppose government control of health care — or skyrocketing deficits, or a federal takeover of education, energy, and finance along with health care — unless they’re driven by racism. [...] It cannot be the case that every parody of a president who happens to be black is racist. And it is not good for democracy to try to counter every opposing argument with such a blood libel. The good news for advocates of limited government is that our opponents are displaying a striking lack of confidence in the actual arguments for their proposals. If they thought they could win a debate on nationalizing health care, or running trillion-dollar deficits, they wouldn’t need to reach for such smears.”
— ‘David Boaz • August 7, 2009’

Leftists are actually switch-hitters. If the pitcher's political leanings match theirs, leftists will bat right for him, no matter what crap-ball he delivers from the left. If the pitcher's delivering the right stuff, the leftists will attack him left-handed, using their racism bat. Krugman is such a switch-hitter. Hence, his Nobel pronouncements are much more versatile than those of mere mortals, who strive for consistency in their stance.

Switch-hitting is to be admired in a ball player, like Mickey Mantle of Hall-of-Fame fame. But in a political shill like Krugman, it is deserving of our collective contempt.


Would you buy a used bat from this guy?

Post #886 The Nobel Racism Bat

Welcome to the "Mob"!

Related Link » I Am The Mob
“There's a lot of talk about the mob these days. I decided to go to a protest against the Obama health care plan to see for myself. Sure enough, the place in front of my Congresswoman's office was crawling with the mob! I decided to talk to some of them at great personal risk, and here's what I found out.”
— ‘ShortForOrdinary’

I Am The Mob


If you're a bunch of leftists yelling "No blood for oil!", or sermonizing "Yes we can!", or trying to Rahm some piece-of-shit legislation down people's throats, well that's just "democracy in action". But if you won't eat the poison mushrooms the White House is force-feeding you, you're an unpatriotic mob.

F*ck you Bob Gibbs, and f*ck the horse you came in on.

Post #885 Welcome to the "Mob"!

The Honorable Liar

Related Link » This Minority Will Be Vindicated
“The 31 senators who voted against Justice Sonia Sotomayor may get grief now, but time is on their side. Their reservations will be proved to be right on the money. [...] The new justice's record of past statements and rulings virtually guarantees that the Sonia Sotomayor who appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee, who promised always to judge, never to legislate, will not be the person we find writing opinions from the bench. When this happens, the 31 senators now depicted by Democrats as bigots will be proved right. Those lawmakers' opposition, which has nothing to do with race, boils down to a single, inescapable conclusion: The woman with the compelling life story who appeared before them was profoundly and intentionally misleading them.” [emphasis added]
— ‘By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Friday, August 07, 2009’

I don't think so; not "misleading". An insolent liar does not merely mislead.

The Honorable Liar:

Post #884 The Honorable Liar

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: In the Still of the Night

{Song #24 « Song #25 » Song #26}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

Song #25 is In the Still of the Night sung by The Five Satins.

For three decades, the single almost always topped the influential Top 500 Songs countdown on oldies radio station WCBS-FM. The track sold over 10 million copies in 1987 and 1988 as part of the Dirty Dancing soundtrack. It is ranked #90 on the Rolling Stone magazine's list of "the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time".

In 1956 I was a sophomore at Hicksville (NY) High School. Whenever there was a school dance or someone's birthday party, the 45rpm record everyone waited for was "In the Still of the Night". If you don't understand why that was so, you probably weren't an American teenager, with raging hormones, in the late 1950s, and you need to see one of my all-time favorite movies, "American Graffiti".

In the Still of the Night-The Five Satins-original song-1956


Post #883 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: In the Still of the Night

Tyranny At Hand

Related Link » Six Months In, Media Still Do PR For Obama
“A USA-Today-Gallup poll found that nine of the last eleven Presidents were more popular than President Obama after six months in office. A Rasmussen poll found the President's approval rating below 50%, with more people strongly disapproving than strongly approving of the President. While the national media eagerly touted the President's approval rating when it was higher, most news outlets have ignored the President's recent slide. The reason the President's approval numbers are sagging is that more and more Americans disagree with him on the issues. [...] During a prime-time press conference last week, President Obama claimed his health care plan was ‘deficit neutral’. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office strongly disagrees, finding that the legislation would increase the deficit by $239 billion over ten years. But not one reporter questioned the President about the CBO's findings.” [emphasis added]
— By REP. LAMAR SMITH | Posted Tuesday, August 04, 2009

Decline and Fall of the United States Federal Government

BRANCH	OFFICE	ORIGINAL	CURRENT
		The Good	» The Bad	» The Ugly
Executive	President	George Washington	Barack Obama
Executive	Secretary of State	Thomas Jefferson	Hillary	Clinton
Executive Legislative	Vice President; President of Senate	John Adams	Joe	Biden
Legislative	Speaker of House	Frederick Muhlenberg		Nancy Pelosi
Judiciary	Supreme Court	Chief Justice John Jay		Obama-nominated Sonia Sotomayor

Along with the decline and fall of the quality of our Federal officials in all three branches of government, we are also witnessing a complete dereliction of duty by the fawning Fourth Estate. Their lapdog-like tingly adulation of The Obama is the apotheosis of biased "reporting".

So, where does that leave us as a Nation? I submit that with all four branches of government (including the media), we are left in a perfect storm of unchecked tyranny of the leftist majority. And this tyranny, which is precisely what the Founding Fathers sought to counter with the Bill of Rights, is not a good thing, not even for the leftists among us.

Our Bill of Rights comprises the First Ten Amendments to the Constitution. But Amendments can be, and have been, repealed (cf., the Twenty-first Amendment). With super majorities in Congress, and The Obama's likely Supreme-Court packing a la FDR with leftist-like social engineers, even the leftists will learn to regret when they get exactly what they wished for — no, not free lunch; free nothing.

Post #882 Tyranny At Hand

§ I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: Fool's Gold

{Song #23 « Song #24 » Song #25}

§ ≡ One of an ongoing series of posts in which I pick, in my not-so-humble opinion, the best songs of the second millennium. Feel free to offer constructive dissenting opinions; preferably set to music.

[In the interest of meeting TheBigHenry's challenge to respond to his picks with a musical offering, I present this companion piece to Song #23 as a post rather than a comment, which doesn't allow embedded video. ~tristein]

Song #24 is Fool's Gold sung by The Stone Roses.

The Roses' entire debut album became something of an obsession for me while I was living in London working and studying at The London School of Economics and Political Science, a period of time I can best characterize as my angst-fueled twenties. The Roses' music felt like the antidote to angst as I wandered the streets of London, one of the greatest cities in the world for walking. This song, from the album The Stone Roses, graces my iPod as the lead-off track to my 10K playlist.

The Stone Roses - Fools Gold


Post #881 § I Am Music and I Pick the Songs: Fool's Gold

Priority Order

h/t Jules Crittenden

1. The Godly
2. The Lame
3. The Class Act

Post #880 Priority Order