Lady Gaga Goes Afghanistan

This was too funny to pass.

When The Joke Becomes Reality

Via Dan Collins.

Penn and Teller goofed about this on their show, Bull$--t in the past (Video below. Mild language to make it NSFW). It was comical but still absurd enough that surely no serious minded person would try and pass such a law. I guess the lesson here is to never underestimate the levels of stupidity a government will sink to in order to control their population.

The new [nine] bin system by Newcastle-under-Lyme Council, north Staffordshire, includes a silver slop bucket for food waste, which is then emptied into a larger, green outdoor bin.

There is a pink bag for plastic bottles, a blue box for glass, foil, tins and aerosols, a green bag for cardboard and blue bags for paper and magazines.

Clothing and textiles go in a white bag, garden waste in a wheelie bin with a brown lid and non-recyclable waste in a separate grey wheelie bin.

If successful, the scheme – which is more rigorous than any previous recycling standards expected of households – is likely to be adopted by councils up and down the country.
[. . .]
Sylvia Butler ... said: “I’m all for recycling and used to help educate the kids about it during my geography classes, but expecting us to cope with nine different bins and bags is asking too much.

“I have had to take my brown bin down to my allotment – there simply isn’t room in my back yard to house it.”

She added that three different lorries are now used to remove her recycling – a job that was previously carried out by one.
[. . .]
The recycling system, introduced last month, means that only food waste is now collected weekly, with all the other bins emptied on a fortnightly basis [two weeks].

It replaced the old system of five different bins, which is commonly used across the country, with the aim of boosting the rate of recycling from 26 per cent in 2008 to 50 per cent by 2015.
[. . .]
Bin police are used across Britain to ensure recycling regulations are met, with the threat of £100 spot fines for those who overfill bins, leave extra rubbish bags out or put bins out on the wrong day.

Non-payment of the fines can result in the culprit being taken to court, where they could be given a £1,000 fine. [All emphasis mine]

And that's why this program won't go away and other communities will adopt it. Money. One more way to fleece the populace by taking money out of their pockets and putting it in the government's.

Charlie Crist Campaigns To Obscurity

Charlie Crist is officially an independent.  There's only one thing left to say to him.

Political Cartoon For The Week

And Now A Word From Bill Ayers With Advice For Those New To The Singles Scene

Stacy McCain has the background info on this.

With apologies toward Jim Treacher but none toward Bill Ayers.

UPDATE: Linked by Dustbury.

Al Gore Increases His Carbon Footprint

Not sure if he sold his mansion in Tennessee yet but the Manbearpig has bought another mansion in California.

Former Vice President Al Gore and his wife, Tipper, have added a Montecito-area property to their real estate holdings, reports the Montecito Journal.

The couple spent $8,875,000 on an ocean-view villa on 1.5 acres with a swimming pool, spa and fountains, a real estate source familiar with the deal confirms. The Italian-style house has six fireplaces, five bedrooms and nine bathrooms.

How many homes does the modern day prophet of Gaia need?

Gore is obviously not worried about the sea levels rising as he would like you to think he is.

RELATED, SORT OF:

Isn't this a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario?

As much of the world marked Earth Day this past week, the Environmental Protection Agency reported that air pollution has declined dramatically over the past 20 years. It sounds like good news, but science writer Eli Kintisch argues that there's a surprising downside: Cleaner air might actually intensify global warming.

"If we continue to cut back on smoke pouring forth from industrial smokestacks, the increase in global warming could be profound," Kintisch writes in an opinion piece for the Los Angeles Times.

Kintisch isn't talking about greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide; he's talking about another kind of pollutant we put in the sky — "like aerosols from a spray can," he tells NPR's Guy Raz. "It turns out that those particles have a profound effect on maintaining the planet's temperature."

So do I or don't I burn that tire in my backyard?

Charlie Crist To Run As An Independent

Via Drudge.

John Cornyn wept.

Republican Florida Governor Charlie Crist has decided he will run as an independent in the race to fill the Florida U.S. Senate seat, Crist allies tell Fox News. The official announcement is scheduled for Thursday at 5pm ET in St. Petersburg, Florida.

The Senate campaign has been rough and tumble for Crist, he was once the front-runner -- but in recent months began trailing his GOP opponent, Florida State Speaker Marco Rubio.

Crist has said that under no circumstance would he drop out of the race, saying he will do what is best for the voters of Florida. The governor says Republicans in Washington want him to stay in the Republican party but voters in Florida have told him they want him to run as an independent.

Not shocking at all to anyone who has been following the campaign.

Nanny Staters At It Again

It's for the children. It's always for the children. This time they are coming after Happy Meals and toys.

County officials in Silicon Valley trying to curb childhood obesity voted Tuesday to ban restaurants from giving away toys and other freebies that often come with high-calorie meals aimed at kids.

The ordinance is largely symbolic as it would only cover unincorporated areas of Santa Clara County, meaning only about a dozen fast-food outlets and several other family-owned restaurants would be affected.

Exit question: Which state is guilty of being fascist? Arizona who want to control the influx of illegal immigrants flooding their border or California who wants to control the diet of the population by banning Happy Meals?

Charles Johnson Of Little Green Footballs: His Hypocrisy Boggles The Mind

Via Robert Stacy.

Dr. Lizard King: Or how he stopped worrying and learned to love Barack Obama.

Keep this in mind whenever he accuses someone of his second favorite charge of being a hypocrite. His first favorite charge is accusing people of being a racist. And he has a habit of charging at windmills.

• “Will Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama and John Edwards ever be confronted over their pandering to people who think like (Kos)?”

• “This may be the most cynical and hypocritical batch of Democrats that has ever run for President.”

• ”Obama talks tough on terror. Nation snickers.”

• ”Obama Not Ready for Prime Time.”

• ”Barack Obama tries to have it both ways, as usual.”

And there is much, much more.

I Don't Think OSHA Would Approve Of This

One thing about those Germans, they sure know how to make construction equipment.



Thanks to Dad.

Another Day, Another Lie FromThe Obama Administration

This is the sort of thing that makes people outraged out. The White House sat on report about the true costs of ObamaCare weeks before Congress voted on it.

The economic report released last week by Health and Human Services, which indicated that President Barack Obama's health care "reform" law would actually increase the cost of health care and impose higher costs on consumers, had been submitted to the office of HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius more than a week before the Congressional votes on the bill, according to career HHS sources, who added that Sebelius's staff refused to review the document before the vote was taken.

"The reason we were given was that they did not want to influence the vote," says an HHS source. "Which is actually the point of having a review like this, you would think."

Protect the narrative.

Death Panels Defined. This Time By Peter Orszag

First it was Paul Krugman and now Peter Orszag is explaining how Death Panels will work.

Rationing care by denying people the services they need in order to save money. Or you can listen to Orszag explain it himself.



He's talking about the Independent Payment Advisory Board that ObamaCare established. That's the panel who will decide what is the criteria so the population can be accepted or denied treatments because of what they have and how old they are. AKA, 'Death Panels'.

And the "quality of care" (as Orszag describes it) will go up naturally because if someone doesn't receive treatment, it won't be logged in hospital records. People will die sooner rather than later. Ergo, a healthy population and ObamaCare is a success in Orszag's eyes.

For everyone else, not so much.

Ladies And Gentlemen, The Man In Charge Of The Nation's Economy

Tim "I never had a real job" Geithner.

What can possibly go wrong?

Via Insty who has more.

LINKED by Doug who also wants to know.

Can We Call Marco Rubio A Fundraising Star Now?

Chalk this up as one more reason for the NRSC to stay out of the primary. It seems like Marco Rubio is starting to self finance just fine all his own.

[VA]Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has now become a national leader for conservative causes--and you don't have to take just our word for it.

Cuccinelli is a "nationwide leader in fighting the unconstitutional excesses of the federal government." That's according to Marco Rubio, a candidate in the GOP primary for senator in Florida and himself a conservative favorite, in a statement accepting Cuccinelli's endorsement of his candidacy this weekend.

Cuccinelli has joined a variety of Republicans taking sides in the Florida primary battle between Rubio and Gov. Charlie Crist. Last week, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) also chose the more conservative Rubio over Crist.

If I recall, one of the big reasons why the NRSC asked Crist to run was because Crist could self-finance an election at the time. That will be an issue when he goes with an independent bid.

As of March 31, Crist was sitting on a healthy $7.6 million in his federal campaign account, but he’s going to need every penny — and more — in a race where a statewide media buy likely will cost well more than $1 million per week this fall.

Besides advertising, Crist will have to build a get-out-the-vote operation and gather voter information to microtarget his voters. One operative who has worked on multiple high-profile Independent campaigns said both of those important components — which make up a major part of what party organizations provide — can be bought on the open market, for a price.

But unlike New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg (I), who spent $102 million of his vast fortune to win re-election last fall, Crist can’t self-fund his bid.
[. . .]
Crist won’t be legally obligated to return the money that he’s raised and could try weathering the storm to preserve precious cash. But that would create its own issues with news stories about donors saying Crist took their money under false pretenses. If nothing else, it will be an awkward story for Crist to deal with as he tries to relaunch and rebrand himself.

Exit Question: What state should Crist retire quietly to?

Cross posted at Not One Red Cent.

Monday Morning Full Metal Jacket Round Up

Legal Innsurection poses the question, "Did history start Jan. 20th, 2009?" In the eyes of the Left Wing Media, yes.

Doc Zero is the best reason to check out Hot Air. Imagine what he could produce if they paid him?

It's for science. Today, everyone will find out just how powerless Allah is if California is still on solid ground. Do your part.

Besides, it's Biblical to make fun of false religions:

I Kings 18: 25-27
25Then Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “You go first, for there are many of you. Choose one of the bulls, and prepare it and call on the name of your god. But do not set fire to the wood.”

26So they prepared one of the bulls and placed it on the altar. Then they called on the name of Baal from morning until noontime, shouting, “O Baal, answer us!” But there was no reply of any kind. Then they danced, hobbling around the altar they had made.

27About noontime Elijah began mocking them. “You’ll have to shout louder,” he scoffed, “for surely he is a god! Perhaps he is daydreaming, or is relieving himself.b Or maybe he is away on a trip, or is asleep and needs to be wakened!”

And as if on queue to test that thesis. . .

Bob Belvedere and Robert Stacy both have a Date With Density and their take on the Lane Bryant commercial that was too hot for a show widely known for it's 'Wardrobe Malfunctions'. The one winner out of all this? Ashley Graham.

And speaking of Bob Belvedere, he awarded this blog the prize of The Blog Post Title Of The Month. Not sure but I think I won something between a No-Prize and winning lottery numbers.

Matt Welch lays out why more regulation isn't the answer for the current failure of regulation that was put in place during the administration of George W. Bush.

Obama eulogizes the coal miners who passed away. By promising to close down coal mines to save even more lives.

Wow. I think this is a first. Someone running for office outed for not being gay enough.

It's Bizarro World out there sometimes.

Answer: You Can Be Damn Sure It Isn't A Tea Party

Question: What kind of event is it when a cameraman is roughed up by the protesters?

Jim Hoft has more about the rally where they were trying stifle the citizen journalist.



Woman slapping journalists: Check.
People masking their faces: Check.
Organizer telling the cameraman he should go: Check.

Seems like a nice wholesome event for the family to me.

But according to Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, Tea Parties foment hate. . . Or something.

This Might Be Worth Seeing

It's queued my interest. At the very least, worth the DVD rental price.

The premise of the movie from Worth Reviews:

Based on a true story of a hermit who lived for forty years in the Tennessee woods. Felix Bush (Duvall) decides it is time to plan his funeral. But his funeral will not be any old macabre occasion. Organized by a local undertaker played by Bill Murray and his sidekick played by Lucas Black, the funeral will be more party than memorial and an event to which anyone and everyone will be invited and at which Bush will reveal a long kept secret.

Sign Of The Times

To start with, Ed at Hot Air had this gem from Governor Palin's visit to Eugene, Oregon, she drew a handful of people complaining about her visit.

To think, the irony is completely lost on these protesters.

Secondly, from Weasel Zippers. A new billboard in Texas has appeared. The first step to recovery is acknowledging your mistakes.

Heh.

A Little Three Dog Night This Saturday Morning

Does This Mean That The War On Poverty Is Now Over?

. . . And did we win or lose?

This is the person who will cancel out your vote if you live in Florida. Think she'll vote for the candidate who said people need to be more responsible for their lives or for the Democrat candidate who will increase welfare payments with no worries about drug screenings?

Via Robert Stacy.

Twelve children ranging in age from 6 months to 11 years old spent the past week there, scrambling across the floor, bouncing on beds. Their eyes filled with resignation Wednesday morning; they were hungry and dirty - wearing the same clothes as the day before and the day before that.

Angel Adams, the mom, was asking for help as the children rambled about the room. She was homeless and hopeless, she said. A relative paid for the motel room for a week, and after that, who knows. Her fiance is in prison.

With measured indignation, Adams said somebody owes her.
[. . .]
The lifelong Tampa resident said she wants justice from the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office child protection team that took her kids away from her two years ago and from Hillsborough Kids Inc., which got her kids back six months ago.

"What do I do?" she said earlier in the day. "I have no answers. My family has been railroaded. Someone needs to pay.

"Nobody's helping me."

She doesn't trust the system, she said. It was a system that despite all the good intentions landed her in the motel, in this fix, in the first place, she said.

Wednesday morning, in the dingy motel room, Adams handed out a list of her children's names and ages. Across the top: "Three fathers. One Mother. Fifteen Children."

One of them, a 1-year-old, is named John the Baptist Brown.

Ten of the children, she said, were fathered by Garry Brown, currently serving a five-year prison term for dealing cocaine. A sampling of his kids' names: Garry Nesha, Garry Brown Jr., Garry Lethia, Garryiell and Garry Rick.
[. . .]
The smell of dirty diapers filled the room. Jerome, 11, gave Andrew, 6 months, a bottle. "This is not comfortable," Jerome said.

The baby coughed and spit up on Jerome's hand. He didn't flinch and patted the baby on the back.

"The girls sleep on one bed," Adams said. "The boys sleep on the other. I just crash on the floor."

The 12 kids are the youngest of 15, she said. Three have "aged out," meaning they have turned 18 and are on their own, no longer a part of the child welfare system.

"I can have as many as I want to," she said. All her kids, she added, "are gifts from God."

The 37-year-old mother doesn't work. "This is my work," she said, gesturing toward the bunch. "I do this all by myself. I don't know what I'm going to do. This is a revolving door going nowhere."

She said her problems began two years ago when Brown was arrested and the money dried up. Right after that her children were taken away and put in foster care over allegations of neglect, she said.

Hillsborough Kids stepped in and took the case, eventually returning the children to her and Brown. Before Christmas, the couple took a two-bedroom apartment off North Boulevard near Columbus Drive.

Hillsborough Kids agreed to pay the $800 a month rent after caseworkers inspected the apartment and, although finding it a bit cramped, said it was OK.

The landlord, who evicted Adams in March, thought differently.

Sandy Chiellini said Adams showed up to sign the lease with Brown and one child. She didn't learn until later that there were 11 other children. There were problems with plumbing; downstairs tenants were flooded. There was noise. Occasional visits from police. Other tenants were complaining. Some left.

She said Adams' apartment was trashed. Clothes and food were scattered everywhere. Screens were broken out. Chiellini began eviction proceedings. Adams failed to show up for two eviction hearings.

Chiellini said Adams and her children left on April 15, taking only the clothes on their backs.
[. . .]
Lodging at A Kid's Place is temporary, and department caseworkers will have to figure out how to place the Adams family in a permanent home. That's down the road, he said. For now, at least they are out of the hotel room.

"My children fear DCF," Adams told Cox outside the motel room Wednesday afternoon. "I do, too."

"I want to make sure right now you and your kids are not living in a hotel room," he responded.

Still, Adams was hesitant. She wanted to know about the long term.

"I need money," she said. "I need transportation. My children need a place to live."

What the Great Society had wrought.

Two Races To Watch And Special Elections

Both are special elections and are bellwethers of the political attitude in the country right now. We'll see how the canary in the coalmine will react soon enough.

First off, there is Tim Burns . Burns has been endorsed by Freedom Works and the House Conservative Fund. The special election for Burns is going to be this May 18th.

Burns is running for the decease John Murtha's seat (PA-12) and so far it looks like he might be able to pull a Scott Brown. As for the person running against Burns? I think it's safe to say that Mark Critz doesn't quite get Pennsylvania. If only Barack Obama can stop in to campaign for Critz that would clinch the deal for Burn's win.



The second race is Charles Djou of Hawaii. Djou's special election in Hawaii is on May 22 and has been endorsed by Tax Day Tea Party. What makes this race so interesting is that it's Barack Obama's old stomping grounds.

With Video Clips Like These, JD Hayworth Should Have No Problems Making Campaign Commercials

AKA: Insights into why McCain lost his election for US President.

By all accounts, Maverick has learned his lesson and is running a pretty fierce primary against noted conservative JD Hayworth. Maybe because Hayworth is a Republican.



I need to take a departure from my fellow Barbarian In Arms with my stand in solidarity against the endorsement of John McCain by Sarah Palin. Nothing against Palin but Hayworth leans more to the right and would be better serving in the Senate than McCain.

The Economy Was Abhorrent While The SEC Abused Bit Torrent

You know what this calls for. Even more layers of government regulation to watch the wankers watchers*.

The country's top financial watchdogs turned out to be horndogs who spent hours gawking at porn Web sites as the economy teetered on the brink, according to a memo released Thursday night.

The shocking findings include Securities and Exchange Commission senior staffers using government computers to browse for booty and an accountant who tried to access the raunchy sites 16,000 times in one month.

Their titillating pastime was discovered during 33 probes of employees looking at explicit images in the past five years, said the memo obtained by The Associated Press.

More here:

- A senior attorney at the SEC's Washington headquarters spent up to eight hours a day looking at and downloading pornography. When he ran out of hard drive space, he burned the files to CDs or DVDs, which he kept in boxes around his office. He agreed to resign, an earlier watchdog report said.

- An accountant was blocked more than 16,000 times in a month from visiting websites classified as "Sex" or "Pornography." Yet he still managed to amass a collection of "very graphic" material on his hard drive by using Google images to bypass the SEC's internal filter, according to an earlier report from the inspector general. The accountant refused to testify in his defense, and received a 14-day suspension.

- Seventeen of the employees were "at a senior level," earning salaries of up to $222,418.

- The number of cases jumped from two in 2007 to 16 in 2008. The cracks in the financial system emerged in mid-2007 and spread into full-blown panic by the fall of 2008.

*The joke I stole from Robert Stacy.

Why Is This Surprising?

The government offers a commodity as a 'right' and costs rise? Who knew?

Barack Obama's health care overhaul law is getting a mixed verdict in the first comprehensive look by neutral experts: More Americans will be covered, but costs are also going up.

Economic experts at the Health and Human Services Department concluded in a report issued Thursday that the health care remake will achieve Obama's aim of expanding health insurance — adding 34 million to the coverage rolls.

But the analysis also found that the law falls short of the president's twin goal of controlling runaway costs, raising projected spending by about 1 percent over 10 years. That increase could get bigger, since Medicare cuts in the law may be unrealistic and unsustainable, the report warned.
[. . .]
In addition to flagging provider cuts as potentially unsustainable, the report projected that reductions in payments to private Medicare Advantage plans would trigger an exodus from the popular alternative. Enrollment would plummet by about 50 percent. Seniors leaving the private plans would still have health insurance under traditional Medicare, but many might face higher out-of-pocket costs.

In another flashing yellow light, the report warned that a new voluntary long-term care insurance program created under the law faces "a very serious risk" of insolvency. [Emphasis mine]

Who saw this coming? Tea Parties.

How I Spent My Earth Day

I was the one with the drum.

The Many Wives Of James Cameron

Avatar is released on DVD today. I could go on about the hypocrisy of James Cameron encouraging mass consumerism on a day set aside to pray to Gaia about how to reduce, reuse and recycle, if that's your thing. That's for other blogs to do.

This is more of a warning for his current wife, Suzy Amis. Well, not so much of a warning but notice of James' behavior and mode of operation. Cameron has been married 5 different times. Not quite up there in Larry King territory but more than Steven Spielberg. But there is a pattern here. A method from him jumping ship from the old to the new wife.

Cameron left his first wife, Sharon Williams, the same year that "The Terminator" was made. For the woman who helped to produce that movie.

Gail Anne Hurd. After four years of marriage, they split up too. It must have been somewhat amicalble because she still helped to produce many of his movies after the split. Or at least help insure him to keep working in order for her to receive her alimony payments. He was married to Gail up until he started working with a young, talented new director on who made such movies like "Point Break" and "Strange Days".

Katherine Biglow. If her name is familiar it's probably because she has been in the news lately. She directed "The Hurt Locker". The film that won best director and best picture this year at the Academy Awards. I have yet to see it yet but it sounds as if she has come a long way from "Point Break". Biglow and Cameron stayed together for a blissful two years until he made "Terminator II: Judgment Day" staring his next wife.

Linda Hamilton. The character of Sarah Connor was someone who saw the future and was preparing for it. Hamilton hit the gym in earnest to prepare for the role. Cameron noticed. The same year T2 hit the theaters, he left Biglow and started to date Hamilton. They finally tied the knot in 97 when "Titanic" was released and two years later, he left Hamilton for someone he directed in that movie.

Suzy Amis. His current wife. He's been with her for the longest out of all his marriages. Considering that that his second longest was about 6 years. That's quite a feat to get moss on a rock that liked to roll around. But there has also been a gap of major motion pictures he has directed since "Titanic".

There's been a few documentaries of the oceans where he was at the helm. But at the same time, most of that was milking the Titanic rage for all its worth.

Now that Cameron has made "Avatar", his wanderlust is going to kick in soon. And that can mean only one person who he has his eyes on.

Neytiri. Suzy Amis needs to start worrying when Cameron comes home with blue body paint on his collar.

To Cameron's credit, he does know how to recycle marriages.

If CBS Copies "The View" Would It Be More Of A Clone Than A Competitor?

If CBS copies a show format for format and plays it at the exact same time as the competition, would it make a difference?

CBS President Les Moonves' wife, Julie Chen, could soon be the face of a new daytime panel chat show for mothers. Chen -- who has a son, Charlie, with Moonves -- and "Roseanne" star and lesbian mom Sara Gilbert are preparing to shoot a pilot for the network for a show to rival ABC's "The View."

I think an alternative to "The View" would work. It would need one hell of a mediator however. But set it up as two conservatives and two liberals or even go for the anti-View approach with three conservatives and one liberal. Say Michelle Malkin, Angie Harmon, and Liz Cheney for the conservative side and Kristen Powers as the token liberal. Malkin even toyed around with something like that long ago on Hot Air. And the others are not strangers to doing TV either.

The sad thing is that no other network would touch it other than a channel under the Fox News umbrella.

Or maybe not.

On This Earth Day It's Important To Remember. . .

. . . Not everything from the earth is good. There is an evil that lies below.







The rest of the story is available on YouTube.

"Don't Worry, He'll Realize The Irony Soon Enough"

UPDATE: Damn video Nazi's work fast. YouTube pulled that clip. Fortunately, Robert Stacy found an alternate version of it. And Vimeo had this copy.

PREVIOUSLY:

Funny enough, Robert Stacy was asking for someone to do this earlier today.

Some NSFW language in the captioning.

Via Ace, again.

The Single Most Unique Run Home Ever.

I wonder if the Tigers could use a guy like him?



Via Ace.

Was Hugging Barack Obama Charlie Crist's Kiss Of Death?

Short answer, yes.

Two Thousand Words And Then Some Why Mitt Romney Should Not Be The Next GOP Nomination For President

Thanks to The True Mitt Romney.
UPDATE: Bob chimes in with this info: In those photos you see, of course, the late Ted Kennedy [D-Scotch]; to Teddy's right is then-Mass. Senate President Bob Travelini who moved on to other pastures as part of a deal to avoid investigation; to Teddy's left is then Mass. House Speaker Sal DiMasi who is now awaiting trial in Federal Court.

Welcome to Massachusetts

Thanks to Bob Belvedere.

Drew at Ace of Spades has more and for something really chilling, there's this at The Ludwig von Mises Institute.

But Mitt does have nice hair.

So They Were Off By Eighty Years Or So

Or prophetic.

The Back Story On The Sara Palin Tee Shirt At The Tax Day Rally

I saw this shirt last Thursday during the Tax Day Rally and wasn't sure about it. It was a first for me seeing this particular message on a shirt.

Fortunately, my fellow Barbarians in Arms were able to set me straight. A pro-Palin website called Annie Oakley use to sell them. Primarily based on this song.



It works for me.

I Think George Lucas Might Sue Someone Over This

But it's a fanboy's ultimate dream. Make your own scene from Star Wars: A New Hope, send it in and hope it makes the final cut.

Star Wars: Uncut has the details.



I won't say how much but a significant portion may have been recreated by my brother and I on VHS someplace. I'll have to dig that up.

Zooey!

The first time I saw Zooey was in the movie, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The movie failed to live up to any of the book's potential but it did have it's high points. Zooey was one of them.

I recently found out she had a band. She & Him. No word yet if she can dance to make her a verified triple threat but she can sing.

We Will Never Say Thank You

Via Carol at No Sheeples Here.

The Tax Day Rally In Richmond

The weather was much nicer than last year and, according to WTVR in Richmond, the crowds were larger too. The Tea Party isn't going away.

A no frills message.

The view from the stage. 

One more from the stage.  RTC had a much higher stage and louder sound system than last year.  Lessons learned and applied.

Last picture from up high. 

She was with the Republican Liberty Alliance. Trying to reform the Republican Party from the inside. She also brings up this clip from Real Clear Politics. NBC News reporter Kelly O'Donnell asks a black man at a Tea Party, "Have you ever felt uncomfortable?"

A green job I can get behind.

Heh.

They are not seen here but the lady in the middle had some very cool looking tattoos.  There is a market for Conservative Ink after all.

Great turnout for the Tea Party. And this was the Richmond Flying Squirrels home opener too.

This was this years version of "It doesn't matter what this sign says, you will call me 'Racist' anyway".

VA Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli made a brief appearance but didn't speak to the crowd. The RTC is non-partisan and has purposefully stayed away from letting elected officials campaign speak. More power to them for doing that.

Charles Payne of Fox Business News brought the crowds to cheers and applause when he gave his keynote address. Some minor criticism went out to the RTP for having a paid speaker. In their defense, he was worth the price. Not only was it an inspiring speech but there was something about having 'Star Power' there. Not that there wasn't any coverage from last year but with this year, the local networks were wanting to get backstage and get some soundbites from Mr. Payne. The coverage was a little more intense. Giving the Tax Day Rally that much higher profile of an event.

And the higher the profile, the better the chances of the Tea Party message has to reach that much more people.

Mission accomplished.

Cross posted at The Richmond Liberty Alliance.

The Local News Coverage Of The Tea Party

From WTVR in Richmond.



As for what the anchor said when she signed off, of course it was supposed to be peaceful. Who the hell does she think we are? Liberals?

Thanks to Connie for the link.

In Where I Try To Do My Best Impression Of Andrew Sullivan Of The Atlantic

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The View From Iraq

UPDATE: Bob Belvedere is kind enough to link up.

A high school buddy of mine is in the middle of his tour in Iraq right now. He was kind enough to share his photos for this. Obviously, these aren't from the same day.

Early morning.

Birds on the ground.  Bird in the air.

Sandstorm brewing.

Still a ways out there. 

One more day in the life of. . .

Thanks to Chris for the photos and for his service.

Quote For The Day: Vindication Edition

The funny thing about [Sarah] Palin’s newfound wealth, is that it never could have been possible had her enemies not tried to bankrupt her with frivolous ethics complaints. Palin’s main reason for stepping down as governor early was because those frivolous ethics complaints were costing Alaska millions and personally bankrupting her. Had these complaints never happened, Palin would have had to wait until her term was over before she could have published and promoted Going Rogue. She certainly would not have been able to collect a dime from Fox News or her speaking fees.

A Special Election Was Held Today In Dallas

It was the Republican primary runoff between Pastor Stephen Broden and Sheldon I. Goldstein.

The results are in. It looks like Broden won the primary. By a two to one margin over Goldstein.

Congratulations Pastor Broden.

Don't Forget. April 15th. Tax Day Protest.

Same place as last year.

Directions to downtown and locations available for parking are here.

Kanawha Plaza.

Downtown Richmond

5:30 – 6:30pm Music and Doc Thompson
6:30 – 8:00pm Rally

Speakers Include:

Charles Payne of FOX News

and also these amazing speakers…

Doc Thompson, WRVA Radio
Matt Whitworth, College Student at VCU
Chris Kinsel, American Family Radio
Colleen Owens, Chairman of Richmond Tea Party Action/Events Committee
Kay James, Former Secretary of Health and Human Resources for Virginia
Joe Guarino, Chairman of Richmond Tea Party Legislative Committee
Donna Holt, Virginia 10th Amendment Revolution
Patrick McSweeney, Constitutional Lawyer
Chuck Hansen, Motivational Speaker and Columnist
Jamie Radtke, Richmond Tea Party
Karen Cooper, Richmond Tea Party Activist

Quote For The Week: Good Riddance Edition

John Paul Stevens wrote the Supreme Court opinion that expanded the Constitution's authorization of seizing private property for "public use" to seizing private property for a "public purpose." And who would define what a "public purpose" is? Basically, those who were doing the seizing. As Justice Stevens put it, the government authorities' assessment of a proper "public purpose" was entitled to "great respect" by the courts.

Let's go back to square one. Just who was this provision of the Constitution supposed to restrict? Answer: government officials. And to whom would Justice Stevens defer: government officials. Why would those who wrote the Constitution waste good ink putting that protection in there, if not to protect citizens from the very government officials to whom Justice Stevens deferred?

John Paul Stevens is a classic example of what has been wrong with too many Republicans' appointments to the Supreme Court. The biggest argument in favor of nominating him was that he could be confirmed by the Senate without a fight.

Democratic presidents appoint judges who will push their political agenda from the federal bench, even if that requires stretching and twisting the Constitution to reach their goals.

Republicans too often appoint judges whose confirmation will not require a big fight with the Democrats. You can always avoid a fight by surrendering, and a whole wing of the Republican party has long ago mastered the art of preemptive surrender.

See What A Life Of Fighting Poverty Will Get You?

For Morris Dees, it will buy him a very nice and expensive house that's being showcased in an online magazine.

It really is a very nice abode. Expensive too. From my time in construction, most of what was done is pretty much custom designed with the remodel. Add to that the interior decorating and you are looking at some serious coinage.

I must be doing it wrong.  Instead of blogging for free, I'm going to start some left wing foundation to fight poverty.  Why not?  There will always be people poorer than me.  While I can't do anything about that personally, I can pretend to care about the poor.  Then I can fleece guilt wealthy liberals into donating to my cause.  Besides, Morris Dees has been doing for years and there is still poverty.  He needs the help.

Foundation for Economic Progress. Our mission statement is to help bring awareness and social justice to the poor and needy from being crushed by a system that's socially and politically designed to keep them in a permanent underclass.

Then maybe I'll have a house like this with a custom pool and lounge area.  But mine will have a disco ball.

More pictures are ready for viewing here.

Via The Corner.

RELATED: The Corner linked to this but I couldn't pass it up. Blue on Blue action. It's fantastic.

I’ve written in the past on various occasions about Morris Dees, head of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), the bogus “civil rights organization” whose chief (and wildly successful) mission has been to separate wealthy liberals from their money. Last time I checked, the SPLC had more than $150 million in its treasury, more than the GNP of some of the world’s smaller countries, yet it did very little work to advance civil rights or fight poverty.

Dude, Congress May Lose Their Health Coverage?

File under "We need to pass ObamaCare to know what's in ObamaCare."*

It is often said that the new health care law will affect almost every American in some way. And, perhaps fittingly if unintentionally, no one may be more affected than members of Congress themselves.
[. . .]
For example, it says, the law may “remove members of Congress and Congressional staff” from their current coverage, in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, before any alternatives are available.

The confusion raises the inevitable question: If they did not know exactly what they were doing to themselves, did lawmakers who wrote and passed the bill fully grasp the details of how it would influence the lives of other Americans?

Not to worry, Congress will pass a new law fixing this hole soon.

You and I, however, will be stuck with the rest of the crappy bill that they threw together.

Thanks to Jill.

*Not an exact quote but close enough to convey the point. I really didn't want to spend my morning making sure I had San Fran Nan's words exactly right.

Video: Value Added Tax Explained

Dan Mitchell lays out how the VAT works, in theory and in real life applications by using other countries as examples. Sort of a preview of things to come.

Video: That Was Then, This Is Now

This Friday News Dump Was Embarrassing

Especially in light of Rubio's releasing his numbers earlier this week.

Charlie Crist has finally released his figures from the last quarter.

Charlie Crist, once known as a world champion money-raiser, announced Friday that he had raised $1.1 million for his U.S. Senate campaign this year -- less than one-third of what Republican front-runner Marco Rubio raised in that period.
[. . .]
Crist campaign manager Eric Eikenberg spun the weak total as due to Crist being busy governing. . .

That's about half of what he raised in the last quarter of 2009. Which was less than the quarter before that. I think the word is 'Nomentum'.

Cross posted at Not One Red Cent.

The Best Use Of Chat Roulette I Have Seen

I unplug for a day or so and Bart Stupek and Justice John Paul Stevens are looking to retire.

So there's this from Ben Folds. He's a bit free with the language at times so be careful at work. As for what Ben does on Chat Roulette? The video should speak for itself.



Thanks to Noel.

Wow: "Nearly Half Of US Households Escape Federal Income Tax"

I'm overly simplifying it but this would mean that half the country is some sort of producer and the other half is some sort of Moocher.

About 47 percent will pay no federal income taxes at all for 2009. Either their incomes were too low, or they qualified for enough credits, deductions and exemptions to eliminate their liability. That's according to projections by the Tax Policy Center, a Washington research organization.
[. . .]
Tax cuts enacted in the past decade have been generous to wealthy taxpayers, too, making them a target for President Barack Obama and Democrats in Congress. Less noticed were tax cuts for low- and middle-income families, which were expanded when Obama signed the massive economic recovery package last year.

The result is a tax system that exempts almost half the country from paying for programs that benefit everyone, including national defense, public safety, infrastructure and education. It is a system in which the top 10 percent of earners -- households making an average of $366,400 in 2006 -- paid about 73 percent of the income taxes collected by the federal government.

The bottom 40 percent, on average, make a profit from the federal income tax, meaning they get more money in tax credits than they would otherwise owe in taxes. For those people, the government sends them a payment.

"We have 50 percent of people who are getting something for nothing," said Curtis Dubay, senior tax policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation.

Be sure to read the entire thing.

One thing that the article never takes in account is what if a significant amount of that top ten percentile should decide to 'Go Galt'? Creating a revenue vacuum that would need to be filled. The easiest way to do that is move the scale down by making it the top 15% or so of earners to keep the tax revenue flowing.

Thanks to Stacey.

This Does Not Bode Confidence

This is part of the reason why people shouldn't just vote for "The Other Person" in an election. With the crap sandwich that is the Democrat Congress as bread and ObamaCare as the filling, way too many Republicans think they can coast into a Congressional victory this November.

Hold your Congressman's feet to the fire to make sure he should know the basic tenets of his job. Cripes, the Constitution is something every high school civics student should know by semester's end. Is it really too much to require an actual factual Congressman know it as well?



Via Hot Air.

Insane Blogger Charles Johnson Scrapes Bottom, Tries To Dig Deeper

I'm not linking to the ponytailed aging hippie. The screen capture below captured the basic gist of what the idiot posted.

But should you be so inclined to google the name and click over, CJ is pretty quick to whip out the lable maker and punch out "RAAAAACIST" and stick it on anyone or any political group that dares to disagree with him. When your only tool is a hammer then the entire world is a nail.

In this case, he's seeing around 18 different corners playing 7 dimensional chess to make a some sort of connection between the Tea Parties of today and those protesters of segregation from way back in the 1950s.

Besides holdings signs I mean.

Thanks to Bite Me Comics for the capture.

Straight Out Of Texas

In the 30th Congressional District in fact. Pastor Stephen Broden is in the running for the seat currently occupied by Eddie Bernice Johnson (Democrat).

I like what he has to say here too.



There is a primary runoff this April 13th between Pastor Broden and Sheldon Goldstein. If you are in the Dallas area, be sure to get out to vote for Stephen Broden next Tuesday.

Thanks to Carol for the heads up on this.

Chris Matthews Is Schooled On The Tea Party Movement

Matthews tries and fails to project the narrative that the Tea Parties are nothing but a fringe group.

Dana Loesch is quick to set the record straight and put Matthews into some -- as they say in the streets -- freaking knowledge. Sadly, I think it's a wasted effort. You can't beat clues into Matthews if you duct taped him to a tree and told a bunch of Mexican kids he's a piñata.



What is probably one of my biggest annoyances is how talking heads like Matthews are quick to point out to the extreme fringe on the right and use that to paint the entire movement. All the while systematically ignoring the lunatic fringe from the left as if they never exist.

Part of the reason why Matthews and company ignore the fringe leftist groups is because they are the leftist fringe group. It makes sense when you think about it that way. The same way that everyone sees themselves as rational.

As for the protest signs who have Obama with a Hitler mustache? The one group I found is the Lyndon LaRouche PAC. A far left group who thinks Obama is too darn moderate.

Battlestar Galactica And The Fatal Flaw Of The Series Finale

I know that this write up is way past the air date of the finale but due to lack of access to cable and waiting for the DVDs to move off the new release shelves to the cheaper racks helped to force the delay.  I put the blame on Blockbuster

Like I said here before, what drew me into Battlestar Galactica was that it was dark, fearless and brutal. Especially with the ever declining body count that was tallied at the start of each episode would be a stark reminder of how trigger happy the show’s producers were. But it strove to show the spirit of perseverance against an enemy who believed in the genocide of the human race.

But as Lost and Star Wars have their low points – most of season 2 and all three prequels respectively -- so did Battlestar Galactica.

The New Caprica storyline suffered a bit of a lull with the momentum of the series. Not to mention the fact that the producers were drawing obvious parallels with the War on Terror in Iraq. The humans found a habitable planet and started to establish settlements there. Roughly a year later, Cylons arrive and take over with nary a shot.

In an effort to coexist, they Cylons recruit and train a handful of humans to help police their own. The human resistance talked one man into doing a suicide run with an explosive belt (imagine the odds) to kill Cylons and humans collaborating with them.

Sometimes people can’t leave politics at the doorstep.

Getting past that, it was still an enjoyable show. I even liked the mutiny storyline by Tom Zarek and Felix Gatea. It was about time Zarek made his big power grab. Zarek knowing what needed to be done and needed his trusted acolyte to help him accomplish his means. Gatea, still suffering from having just lost his leg and a long held distrust of the Cylons in general haplessly went along with it.

What really stuck a craw in my cap was how the series was finished. Too much Deus ex machina happened. How were the final four revealed to each other? There was magic music that only the cylons could hear. Who was that piano player who helped Starbuck write the last notes to the song? He was some sort of angel who vanished. And how exactly did Starbuck end up alive and well in a brand new fighter? She’s some sort of angel who didn’t know what she was until it was time for her to disappear herself. I remember reading that Ronald Moore didn’t have a clear story arch and made it up as he went along. That was becoming increasingly clear with how often a ‘Wizard did it’ when it came to the storyline. Instead of a nice, neat puzzle there was a jumbled mess with odd pieces from other puzzles cut out to fit the one he was working on.

The last half of the finale was sub-standard compared to the rest of the series. If there was the lowest of the low, it would have to be that. It did remind me a bit of the Golgafrincham Ark Fleet Ship B in the book 'The Restaurant at the End of the Universe' with how Galactica found Earth.

The remaining humans and cylons agree to settle the planet they stumbled across. And with a stroke of absolute naivety and ignorance, decide to give up every bit of technology that they ever had in order to live and survive on that strange new world.

Yeah.

New planet with absolutely zero knowledge of what is and isn't poisonous to eat, they ditch the very tools that could save their lives. That's forethought. To add to this point, they could give up all their tools and technology but the very next day, when they need to plant a field or build a hut, they'll be using sticks and stone as tools to get by. And then struggle to make better tools as time goes along. So the lesson wouldn't necessarily have been learned. They gave up a hammer only to use bark and sap to fasten a rock to a stick as a crude replacement.

I’m going to do what I can to talk out of my hat with what little knowledge of history and anthropology I have to be counter balanced by having of played hours upon hours of ‘Civilization’. Terms like settlers, farms and grains are going to be used rather loosely so please bear with me.

When mankind was expanding, be it the westward expansion of the US or pretty much any other colonization that civilizations did, he needed other families and homesteads and communities to help survive, grow and prosper.

Back before the days to tractors and harvesters’ farmers used oxen, donkeys and sometime horses to pull the plow to help plant their field. Worst case scenario, one man can pull the plow for the other. In fact, the term ‘acre’ was defined as the average plot a person could plow with one ox in a day.

The average colonialist would need to know how to plant, harvest, mill and store the grain. For his house and barn he needed to have a working knowledge of carpentry. Even animal husbandry and care for his livestock. He needed to be the proverbial jack of all trades. He had to do it all because no one else was there to depend on.

With the advent of more and more people expanding into the original colonialist’s territory came more and more opportunity for a different set of trades and skills to be used. Eventually someone would be able to set up a mill to help process the grain for the farmer. Making it one less step the farmer would need to worry about. The farmer would work the fields and drop the grain off to be processed for a small fee or portion of the grain.

As more people moved into the community, the range of skills and occupations grew. A carpenter would be available to help build and repair barns and houses and stores. Bakers would make bread and biscuits for the townspeople. Blacksmiths would fashion tools, shoe horses and pull teeth.

People would developed their skills with their chosen trades. Skilled workers turned into craftsmen turned into artisans. A skilled smith could turn his attention to silver to make eating utensils, tableware and jewelery. A carpenter would be able to turn his focus into becoming a cooper and make barrels for storage.

The trades are actually the historic source for many people’s last names. Coopers, Smiths, Fletchers (someone who made arrows) and, obviously, Bakers all were derived from people’s occupations. Joe the Cooper slowly turned into Joe Cooper.

As trades grew so did their tools. Hammers went from a simple rock on a stick of yesteryear to a heat treated mallet to the various hammers that are available today. The ball-peen, the usual claw hammer, tack and even the sledge hammer are ready to be bought in any local hardware store. Homes went from huts to log cabin to steel and concrete structures that scrape the sky. Transportation transitioned from foot to hoof to to wheel to tire to wing.

How this relates to BSG and the last episode is exactly why it would never work. The crew of Galatica vowed to eschew any technology in order to ‘Break the Cycle’. They purposefully marooned themselves in the middle of the Stone Age. Except that they never broke any cycle, only delayed it in happening again. They left themselves with nowhere to go but to begin a brand new cycle of events that they ran from in the first place.