Racist Democrats Drive the White Guys Away--Again

Are we about to experience 1994 redux in Congress?

Via the indispensible Drudge, I spotted this article today in the online Albany Times Union. It's a rerun of a recent LA Times article (amazingly enough) by RealClear Politics contributor David Paul Kuhn. The piece's title? "White Men Shun Democrats." Here's the lede graf:

Millions of white men who voted for Barack Obama are walking away from the Democratic Party, and it appears increasingly likely that they'll take the midterms elections in November with them. Their departure could well lead to a GOP landslide on a scale not seen since 1994.

Yep. And before our lefty friends indulge in a frenzy of racist namecalling, remember this: a substantial number of white dudes voted for Obama in 2008, abandoning the Republicans in favor of "change." And change is what they got. Many have lost their jobs, probably forever. With the Democrats' meddling in the worlds of finance and medicine, they've disincentivized businesses from doing any hiring at all, even though our feeble recovery seems on the verge of becoming real.

Why is this? Simple. Businesses now no longer have a clue as to what kind of government-mandated burdens they may be in for if they hire even a single worker. And most of the workers who are out of work are male. And more of these out-of-work males happen to be white than ever before.

Unemployed black workers will continue to vote Democrat forever. I've concluded that no amount of reason will be enough to persuade them that they're wasting their votes on the Democrats who routinely ignore them after each presidential election cycle.

But the white guys are in play. And they're going back to the Republicans in droves. Among other things, after giving Obama and the 'Rats their votes, the white guys are furious that all these clowns are busily back to doing what they do best: calling white guys racists and terrorists. That's the last straw for many of these white male form Obama supporters. They did what everyone told them they should do, and their reward is continued unemployment and continued racist dissing. Their resulting outrage is fast becoming a raging fire that all the Democrats' spin doctors in the press will never be able to extinguish. Fool me twice...you know the drill.

Read the rest of this piece here if you didn't link to it earlier. I'll have more comments on this article tomorrow when I have more time to write.

When the People Have No Voice...Roger Simon's Letter to Hoyer

Let me assure you that I unequivocally condemn those threats and any possible acts of violence taken in response to the health care bill...Such things must be handled at the ballot box....That said, and for similar reasons, I also unequivocally condemn the actions of the Democratic Party in running roughshod over the clear will of the American people....in the grand tradition of totalitarian regimes everywhere, you employed “any means necessary” to make sure your ends were achieved, bribing and threatening your fellow Congressmen and women...you and your cohorts have forever defined yourselves as reactionary politicians...Violence is to be condemned, but so is the desecration of a great democracy....An Open Letter to Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, Roger Simon, Pamamas Media, 3/25/10

Simon's not justifying violence. He's drawing an obvious conclusion. When legislators and the chief executive act like Hugo Chavez, they can hardly expect that the people will respond as if their "leaders" were elected officials. If your presumptions and acts are those of a dictatorial elite, the people have no voice. When you put your hand over someone's mouth, if you expect them to say 'thank you' you're probably doing drugs or a narcissistic dictator.

Luther

Leftism as a form of Mental Retardation

Here in California, professors are on furloughs each month, prisoners are being released, teachers pink-slipped, and 3,500 leaving the state each week. Our schools are rated 47-49th in the nation, but we employ America’s highest paid teachers, and level the highest state, gas and income taxes in the United States — and yet we have not a shred of introspection over how we managed to have the highest taxes, the highest paid teachers and the worst schools...As Predictable as the Sun Rising, Victor Davis Hanson, 3/26/2010

He's right about government workers. The writer works in a state school and is appalled that none of his colleagues or bosses seem aware that New York is tottering under an incompetent governor, a fractured state Senate, a state legislature dominated by a man whose perfidy rivals that of the 19th century's Rosco Conkling, and tax revenues plunging faster than an airliner without wings. We are in deep stuff and nobody notices. On Titanic, as the water level rose, and the pitch of the deck increased, everybody knew they were going down. Not here. Those people in Queens can afford higher property taxes, an aging gangstress who works in the same office declared one day. Those rich people in Scarsdale can afford to pay higher income taxes, her compatriot said. The aging gangstress caught her breath and sat down at her desk for more work, about two and a half hours of an online farming game, interrupted by two phone call requests from one of her bosses, which she ended by saying "it's not my job."
Try that at AT&T. Try that at any Chinese company in Shanghai or Hong Kong. Try that at a neighborhood hardware store. You're out. The market doesn't tolerate people who don't contribute. It's far more relentless than socialism, except for one gigantic difference. It's voluntary. Under socialist economics, nobody volunteers but, as we know all too well, not many work either. They just want to get paid.

The old geezer's observation still holds, you know, the old geezer we used to laugh at. He said something like this: disciples of "social justice" are overaged, overspoiled, children, who expect something for nothing, and will throw violent temper tantrums if you refuse to give them what they want. An overaged child is by nature a gangster and we are ruled by gangsters now. We used to describe people who behaved like that as adults as retarded, usually with a tone of sympathy and a hope that the doctors could so something. Now we're expected to regard them as socially advanced.

Luther

Trouble off Korea -- Will Obama Bow to North Korean Thug?

Today, a South Korean ship has been sunk. South Korean officials suspect North Korea of torpedoing their ship...the South Korean navy has fired on "unidentified ships in the direction of North Korea...With China holding so much U.S. debt, and given our president's history of dealing with our enemies while humiliating our allies, what will be the U.S. response if/when tensions between North and South Korea escalate?.. Blast Sinks South Korean Ship, Shannon Moore, American Thinker, 3/26/10

It's astonishing that such a question would even be asked. To suggest that an American chief of state might ignore a treaty arrangement to defend an ally to kowtow to the Chinese? Wow. Well, one wouldn't say wow if he or she had paid attention to the policy of this administration. Based on that record, it's very likely that the President will side with North Korea's claims on what is a blatant act of war on an American ally.

What do you suppose he'll do if Iran drops an atomic bomb on Tel Aviv? Not for nothing that this administration is described as "post-American." They sure don't represent any interests this writer recognizes as American.

Luther

Dems Fear Violent Backlash--What a Joke!

Drudge has a screaming headline out just now: Dems Fear Violent Backlash.

It links to a story in Politico with the following lede:

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is warning that some of his Democratic colleagues are being threatened with violence when they go back to their districts — and he wants Republicans to stand up and condemn the threats.

Frankly, I didn't know whether to laugh or spit. Why? Let's switch gears and try a graf from a different story--running today in Canada.com. It quotes Ann Coulter who was forced to cancel a speech at University of Ottawa due to (ta-da!) threats of violence:

"Since I've arrived in Canada, I've been denounced on the floor of Parliament — which, by the way, is on my bucket list — my posters have been banned, I've been accused of committing a crime in a speech that I have not yet given, I was banned by the student council, so welcome to Canada!"

I could go on with the nauseating history of stories like Coulter's, particularly across the US in the Marxist revolutionary breeding grounds otherwise known humorously as "universities." Not surprising it's reached Canada, an otherwise civilized country whose universities are also leftist concentration camps. Funny, Steny Hoyer seems not to have noticed this. Why haven't you or your party spoken out against this, Steny?

Across both countries, each and every student who enters college hoping for a degree leading to a profession is indoctrinated to hate Republicans, Conservatives, Libertarians, and anyone else not vetted by The Party of Karl Marx via Gramsci and Alinsky. Why haven't you or your party spoken out against this, Steny?

Students and some outside thugs are routinely and  actively encouraged to thwart college speaking engagements featuring men and women from the right side of the aisle. But they'll brook no opposition to leftist demagogues. Leftist thugs are excused for their "activism" (read violence and intimidation) because they're just exercising their "constitutional rights." But if righties try the same tactic, they're punished, suspended, expelled, or academically humiliated by having to take "sensitivity training." What a crock. Why haven't you or your party spoken out against this, Steny?

The left has actively incited violence against their opposition since the Vietnam War. Example: here in Virginia, most of us Republicans--and this in an at least nominally Red State--don't bother to put signs supporting our candidates on our front lawns anymore. Our houses will get rolled and egged. (Or spray painted.) We don't put on bumper stickers supporting our candidates, either. The finish of our cars will be "keyed" or damaged within 48 hours max. We pay the deductibles to fix the damage and our insurance premiums go up. Why haven't you or your party spoken out against this, Steny? When was the last time your car was keyed? I thought so.

So I have to laugh, Steny, at your asinine bleating. You and your people created this violent, intimidating atmosphere to further your own ends, and you've been at it for decades. You brought it to a fine art more recently with your vile, disgusting attacks on George Bush throughout his entire presidency; and on Sarah Palin continuously, even now, right down to her kids. From the New York Times to Letterman, the filth and viciousness perpetrated against this decent woman and her family has never relented for a single minute. Why haven't you or your party spoken out against this, Steny?
As I recall, weren't Chelsea Clinton and aren't the Obama kids "off limits," dudes? What happened to that when it came to the Palin kids and the Bush twins? Why haven't you or your party spoken out against this, Steny?

Paybacks are rough, aren't they? I'd ask you if you have no shame, but that's a waste of time because no one in your party knows what shame is. There was a day when I would have sympathized with you, Steny, and when I would have wondered where all the civility had gone.

But that's all over now, Steny. And it was your guys, probably funded by Soros money, who casually threw it out the window to more easily and cheaply achieve your political ends. You know that nothing you do, including the current "health care" fiasco, makes any logical sense, so you vilify the opposition (as opposed to making cogent arguments), the press prints your cheap shots verbatim as the truth, and so you win. Don't come whining to me or the Republicans when a few of our, er, livelier members pay you guys the same favor back.

As my old man used to tell me, you can stew in your own juices. (Dad kept it clean, but I'd add a modifier before "juices.") Stick your crocodile tears in a place where the sun never shines. And what the hell kind of a name is "Steny" anyway?

National Health Insurance: What the Real Price Might Be

Back in the 1980s, the writer worked on documentation for a bank issuing extensive credits for building manufacturing plants in Mexico, the so-called maquiladora plants along the southern side of the Rio Grande. All of these plants were American standard manufacturers, from General Motors to General Electric. A shocking realization as the writer worked on these was that the labor requirements for the new plants was a) very light, and b) very low-skilled. The companies weren't exploiting workers with the same qualifications as those in the U.S.. They only needed labor that's cheap in any country. In the case of the maquiladora plants, local teenaged girls were sufficiently skilled to run whole factories. The real reason for the move was revealed in these requirements.

The manufacturers had tried to modernize their plants in the U.S.. Between regulatory complications, union resistance, and management's lack of interest in changing the way companies did business, the modernization was executed outside of the United States, and not just in Mexico. What the modernization entailed was the next stage in the automation of work. A bad economy at home, the stagflation of the 70s and early 80s, and dramatically increasing overseas competition, put enormous downward pressure on costs. Automating factory procedures is a straightforward means of reducing costs. Americans working in any capacity in those companies didn't want that done. It was an understandable reaction. Retraining for another profession is not easy at any age. Those who were smart enough to do so went through a difficult period of transition. Those who didn't, however, went to work at low level jobs in food and other service industries.

We're at the next stage of automation now, which has been proceeding for about a decade. This stage, which involves the entire production process, won't require relocation. Motivated by a dramatic increase in the cost of labor, driven by socialist programs like national health insurance, enormously increased regulation, and the threat of the federal government stepping in to save constituents among workers toiling for companies faring poorly in today's "stimulus" economy, far-sighted company management has begun automating manufacturing altogether. It's possible; it's already being done in many American industries. Now, thanks to a vast new entitlement passed with no regard for the bill's ultimate consequences on the labor market, it will be done much faster, perhaps too fast for many to make that difficult transition. And it won't be so much at the factory floor level, but in middle management and the professions.

And then there's DIY manufacturing. Predicated on inexpensive CAD (computer aided design), fast prototyping priced for individuals instead of companies, Worldwide Web communications, and the fulfillment of theoretical possibilities in information theory, DIY allows a manufacturer to design, generate specifications, organize sourcing of parts (parts in any industry are increasingly commodities that can be made anywhere), and manage manufacturing virtually from great distances. The designers, engineers, parts sources, and manufacturers can be anywhere. As reported in February's issue of Wired, Chinese manufacturers, with the downturn there, and with the latest and most flexible consumer products factories in the world, are taking tens of thousands of overseas orders, not to buy existing Chinese products, but to act as the manufacturer of wholly new designs from anyone in the world who wants to exploit the capacity.

In such changes, national welfare programs designed without the legislature's knowledge, or interest, in what's going on may end up causing the general sacrifice of their own workforces on the altar of progressivism. This is not a popular topic of conversation in the EU, nor will it be here in the very near future.

Luther

Pope Benedict Arnold II

U.S. Representative Bart Stupak (Quisling-MI) after today's cave to the Pelosi House Socialists.

I've said it before and I'll say it again and again and again until people start believing me. I don't care who your Democrat House member is. A vote for him or her is a guaranteed vote for socialism and for America's continuing rapid decline. And just watch what happens to your dwindling income if the Republicans you DIDN'T vote for can't stop this juggernaut.

Like many 'Rats, Stupak was against the "Senate" abortion health bill before he was for it. Like all the rest, he has zero integrity.

Do I have to explain this again, folks?

And Michigan UPers: It's time to get back to your roots. You know what you need to do this November. So do it.

UPDATE: This just in! From Bart Stupak's Congressional website, dateline March 19, 2010. A coincidence? Pop Quiz Question: can you guess whose pocket this money is coming from?

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Congressman Bart Stupak (D-Menominee) announced three airports in northern Michigan have received grants totaling $726,409 for airport maintenance and improvements.  The funding was provided by the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Aviation Administration.

“This federal funding will help these airports better provide critical services to communities in northern Michigan,” Stupak said.  “I am pleased the FAA has made this investment in our local airports and the individuals and businesses they serve.”

Alpena County Regional Airport received a grant of $85,500 to acquire friction measuring equipment, specifically a decelermeter and tow vehicle, to replace equipment that has worn out.

Delta County Airport in Escanaba received a grant of $179,209 to install a 10 foot perimeter fence to enhance security and prevent wildlife from entering the airport.

The Chippewa County International Airport near Sault Ste. Marie received a grant of $461,700 to install lighted signs on Runway 16/34 and make repairs to the pavement to meet marking requirements and maintain structural integrity.

Stupak Caves--War Is On

This just in from the usually reliable DC Examiner:

Rep. Bart Stupak and his gang of pro-life Democrats have signed onto a deal with the White House over abortion funding language in the bill. Stupak will announce his intention to vote for the bill at 4 p.m. The deal comes in the form of an executive order that will be signed by President Obama banning the use of federal funds for abortion.

The move should clear the way for Democrats to pass the bill later tonight.

 Elected from a usually solid Republican district that comprises the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, Stupak--now an apparent sellout to his constituents who hate this bill--has maintained his seat by generally voting the will of his conservative constituents who've been willing to give his party affiliation a break. Now, it's time for them to get him out since he's cave into pressure and compromised his alleged--and their very real--opposition to Federally-funded abortions.

I've contended before and I'll say it again--the Democrats have been run by the hard, socialist, Marxist left since the early 1970s. It's increasingly obvious today. I don't want to hear from any Dem EVER AGAIN that his or her representative is "different" has always "worked for his or her constituents" and deserves re-election. Any vote for ANY Democrat is a vote for socialism, not democracy. It's a vote for state control and a vote against the individual freedoms once guaranteed by our Constitution but now, apparently passé. If you vote for a Democrat this fall, you are voting for NANCY PELOSI and in favor of state-sponsored socialism. Don't bother rationalizing. You'll deserve what you get.

Do you doubt me on this? Do you actually believe Obama's promise about the "executive order?" Try the last graf of the article we just cited:

But a pro-life Democrat who is voting against the bill and asked not to be named has warned that executive orders carry the intention of law, but not the power, and can be easily lifted. 

M-hmmm. Dems always leave a trap door exit for themselves when they promise something they have no intention of delivering. They've apparently studied the techniques of Ho Chi Minh who promised us anything we wanted during the Vietnam War "peace" negotiations. And when the Democrat Congress betrayed the Vietnamese and our soldiers by simply cutting funds to support the war effort, our soldiers left, and Uncle Ho simply moved in and violated each and every one of his bogus promises. Good lesson here. Unfortunately, voters didn't quite figure this out in the fall of 2008.

The Repubs may pull our fat out of the fire at the last moment, but I doubt it now. It's time to send the Democrats to the rice paddies for once and for all. If they really do have the votes to pass the health care abortion that's also known as ObamaCare, then it's time to ensure a massive defeat for them this fall and for Chief Socialist Barack Obama in 2012. Assuming any of us will be permitted to vote by then. What a tragedy for our bankrupt Republic.

I've been unemployed since July 2008, am hanging on by wit and skill, and am paying the extortionists at Anthem over $900 a month to cover my wife and myself with health insurance. The government--MY government supposedly--hasn't done a damn thing to rev the economy over all that time, the only thing that would lift all boats, encourage real business development and re-employment, and get our country moving again. Instead they want to spend even more money that we don't have to create even more Federal control over what's left of the economy, rationing health care in the process, and guaranteeing early deaths for thousands of elderly Americans each year because "it's not worth the price" to the taxpayers to save them.

On the whole, I'd rather deal with the thieves at Anthem. If I really get pissed, I can always go somewhere else. With ObamaCare, I'll ultimately have zero choice. And I'll also get to die when they decide I'm no longer worth the taxpayers' money. You, too.

Obama = Carter?

Seriously harsh billboarding in Colorado

Check out this billboard advertisement currently posted in Colorado:

In case you can't quite make it out, that's America's previously worst President, the anti-semetic, anti-American peanut farmer from Georgia, pictured on the left of the billboard. Grafik discovered on RedState.

I have no love for Obama or his Marxist ideology. But gee, this is a really low blow, ya think? Guess this makes Warren G. Harding a distant third placer for this dubious honor.

Quotations from Chairman Nancy

The Truth always hurts

Here's a wonderful liveblog photo (via Tigerhawk) of an absolutely GREAT poster featuring House Chairman Speaker Nancy Pelosi in a PhotoShopped pose that totally suits her approach to democracy.

Trapped at my keyboard writing reviews today, I've had to miss the anti-Obamacare demo downtown in DC. So when I need a break, I furtively troll the web looking for photoblogging. Estimates of the crowd near the capitol building range from 25-25K. Not bad for a sunny Saturday afternoon down here, although not going to break any records either.

Righties on various sites are rejoicing that the House Dems have apparently decided to abandon their "deem and pass" vote evasion scam, figuring this augurs well for the bill's defeat. I'm not so sure.

Dems have no principals in pursuit of their leftist ideology. So the way I figure it, they wouldn't have dropped this base subterfuge unless they actually had the votes to pass this ObamaNation of a bill.

On the other hand, it ain't over 'til it's over.

On the third hand, when this is over, it still won't be over. The devil's in the details, and dimes to donuts (whatever that means), there's unconstitutional stuff hiding in this bill that will be tied up in the courts for at least half a decade. Don't laugh. Eco-freaks have tied up nuclear power plant construction in the courts for DECADES. This country is loaded with lawyers who want to get rich. And this bill in its current form is a full employment act for America's attorneys, believe me.

Stay tuned.

Anti-Obamacare Protesters Hit the Streets

Where's the MSM? Hmmm?

Protesters against Obamacare, aka state control of our lives, are converging near the US Capitol as I type this. I have two online reviews to deliver, so alas I can't head on down there from my perch in beautiful downtown Reston, VA. But I did notice that some pix are being posted by Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit. Pix are being sent live by protesters who are already down there. Crowd estimate is 30,000, but this is informal. The photo I'm posting here, attributed to Alan Poston, makes it look like there's a huge crowd--an old Democrat-MSM trick. I have no clue as to how many will show up for this event. But I have rarely seen the nation--aka, flyover country--more pissed off about anything.

 Your average Americans--i.e., Americans who don't live on either coast or in Chicago--are sick and tired of moneyed, Harvardized elites them us around and limiting our freedom in ways that they choose. If Obamacare (aka PelosiCare) doesn't pass, the protests will have done their job. If it does "pass"via an unconstitutional, scam non-vote, this crap will be in court for at least 5 years, sapping national unity and strength at a time we can least afford it.

All I can hope for at this point is that whatever happens today or tomorrow on the Hill will lead to an ultimate purge of Eurocrats, Socialists, and Communists from our government structures. If not, well, as e.e. cummings once wrote, "there's a hell of a good universe next door, let's go."

Hoovervilles? Obamavilles?

Déjà vu All Over Again

For over 75 years, Democrats have happily sneered at the hapless former President Herbert Hoover--for them, the anti-FDR who fiddled while the US collapsed into economic disaster. Hoover was never quite the disaster he's been proclaimed to be. And even Dems now concede that much of FDR's scattershot recovery program failed. And that his tax-raising policies in the late 1930s, aborted a nascient recovery. But the Hoover meme remains.

One of the unfortunate vexations of Hoover's single term was the phenomenon of the Bonus Marchers, the poverty-stricken, often homeless World War I vets who marched on DC and elsewhere setting up huge shanty-towns on any available plot of land. They were called, of course, "Hoovervilles."

Fast forward. Are we now going back to the future? Dateline New York City:

The Bloomberg administration said Friday that the number of people living on New York’s streets and subways soared 34 percent in a year, signaling a setback in one of the city’s most intractable problems.

This from the New York Times, of all places.

More homeless people than libs would like to admit are out on the streets because of untreated mental problems, often schizophrenia. This is a continuing liberal legacy, due from government decisions many years ago that people couldn't be institutionalized against their will.

But it's clear that the increasing number of homeless on the streets of NYC and elsewhere are due to a pigheaded White House's insistence on imposing social programs like "health care" and "climate change legislation" that have nothing whatever to do with the nation's huge unemployment problem. And if people had marginal lives to begin with, and now can't find jobs anywhere, they are going to end up out on the streets in increasing numbers. Maybe the next step is "Obamavilles"?

The solution of bureaucrats in NYC? Make more shelter beds available. At taxpayer expense, of course:

“Based on the increase reported today, I hope we can agree that we need to change our approach,” Mr. de Blasio [a "public advocate"] said in a statement. “I continue to believe that we can do more to take on the growing problem of homelessness, including expanding prevention programs, re-examining our housing policies and maintaining support for critical services — such as drop-in centers and faith-based shelter beds — that often are all that stands between single homeless adults and the streets.”

It never occurs to any of these idiotarians that a lot of our current problems will simply go away if the government would draw back and focus on meaningful pump priming for small businesses (thus far virtually ignored). And, of course, lay off the payoffs to states and localities that enable them to continue paying unionized public employees that they can no longer afford due to the destruction of their tax bases by pervasive unemployment. What an utter waste of money we don't have.

Saving Cleveland, Part 6

Final episode here is self-explanatory. The city really needs to bring people back into the city--to live. Otherwise, it's a ghost town every evening with the problems that causes. Plus, without critical mass, there's simply not enough work for people and the young folks move on. As I did back in 1967 when the city's decline gathered momentum.

The city is stuck in a time warp, as evidenced by its ritualistic re-election of the clownish Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) as the city's Representative for Life, every year, even when he takes a year off every 4 years to make Quixotic runs at the U.S. Presidency like some kind of latter day socialist Harold Stassen.

Kucinich, in case you're not old enough to remember, was the boy-mayor who presided over Cleveland's muni-bond default and destroyed what was left of the city's business climate in the mid-1970s. (Kucinich's people blame things on the evil bankers, but it's all a self-serving crock.) Kucinich, though, is the kind of person Clevelanders elect time and time again, regarless of the glaring fact that none of the city's politicians-for-life have done a damn thing for the town since the 1950s if then. Time to clean house, throw out the machine Democrats, and try something different.

With a high unemployment rate, much higher than the national average, a stagnant population, a deadly business climate, and unbelieveably high real estate taxes to pay for failing schools and an overpaid bureaucracy, the current crop of pols is part of the problem not part of the solution. Time to get 'em out of the way. But only the voters can do that, and they seem pathologically disinclined to do so. Which is why, in spite of some of the biggest houses for the cheapest prices in the country, I can never retire back to my old home town. It's just too depressing. And until people recognize that their tired voting patterns lie at the core of their perpetual economic problems, it will stay that way. Wish it weren't true but it is.

Saving Cleveland, Part 5

This next episode from ReasonTV is pretty self-explanatory. It explains how Cleveland's public works pump-priming (i.e., new stadiums to benefit rich owners, etc.) has actually done little to revitalize the city. A better business environment, lower taxes, and less arrogant public employee unions would help more. However, they don't mention some of the city and/or grassroots arts initiatives I've seen working in Cleveland which provide this decaying city with an astonishingly rich arts environment. That, in turn, often helps revitalize areas and neighborhoods in a more permanant way.

The restoration of Cleveland's fantastic Playhouse Square several years ago was one such arts effort. These beautiful old theaters are now home to local and traveling plays, musicals, etc., and their restored environments are a wonderful attraction. Ditto the fantastic Cleveland Orchestra. While themselves in some financial difficulty due to the economy, the orchestra's home, venerable Severance Hall, has been fantastically restored to its Egyptian Deco brilliance, and a much, much needed parking facility was added largely underground.

In smaller ways, other parts of the city are slowly revived by these small, targeted, and sometimes even informal arts efforts. The once-decayed Tremont neighborhood is one. It's now a wonderful enclave of funky art shops, quirky first-rate restaurants, and colorful buildings, not to mention the Christmas Story House for you cult movie fans. (Yep, the film took place in a fictional Indiana, but much of it was filmed right in Tremont).

I also noted a quickly developing arts community that's blossoming in a moderately blighted West Side neighborhood, roughly at West 65th and Detroit. It's encouraging. But the town is so down on its luck that, in the end, such ad hoc arrangements just don't solve the problem.

In any event, I did want our readers to know that, this video aside (and it is a good explication of the issue), some efforts in Cleveland have been successful in revitalizing small pockets here and there. But with enormous taxes, political corruption, etc., it is just not enough in the end.

Eric Holder and the "Patriot" Scam

I've railed a gazillion times in this space about the way the hard left twists our language to suit its nefarious ends. Whatever the tactic, the Gramscian goal (cultural hegemony of the left) is the same: either redefine a word or term loudly enough or long enough that the new, bogus definition becomes the real one in the heads of the collective unaware; or, worse, coverup your own individualized meaning for a common word via a sin of omission.

America's worst attorney general ever, Eric Holder, is up to the latter trick as he defends the scumbag lefty lawyers he's hired in the Justice Department. You know, the ones who fervently fought the Bush administration in favor of the terrorist detainees they took on as pro bono clients. Now you and I are paying these idiots to work directly for Holder and the U.S. government.

In the words of a Very Important Politician, let me be clear. A defendant always has a right to counsel under our system. And if he or she can't afford counsel, the government provides counsel gratis. That's fine, I have no issue with that and never did. When Holder worked at the legal firm Covington and Burling, he and several attorneys provided pro bono services for Gitmo detainees, slandering the U.S. government and in particular the Bushies in the process--just the kind of thing they don't want us doing to them right now But in the case of Holder's lawyers, they've gone beyond mere advocacy in several instances and have praised known terrorists as heroes, one actually writing a book of poetry praising the Islamofascist he defended--who was later released and ended up killing again in the Middle East. Whose side are these clowns on, anyway?

Furthermore, we're not actually sure who all the clowns are. In this most "transparent" of administrations, Holder won't identify the appointments, although Michelle Malkin and others, including the Washington Times, have ID'd a few. (Not sure if our "poet" is among them, but that's how the left works, lie, obfuscate, and conceal, conceal, conceal, making it much harder for you to credibly defend your hunch.)

Holder is tired of being pressed on this issue, and today defended his cadre of taxpayer supported anti-American DOJ lawyers:

“Those who reaffirm our nation’s most essential and enduring values do not deserve to have their own values questioned,” Holder told a group of lawyers who offer "pro bono," or voluntary, legal services. "Let me be clear about this: Lawyers who provide counsel for the unpopular are, and should be treated as what they are: patriots."

Excuse me. In the first place, from 9/11/2001 right through to the present, anyone who worked in or for the Bush administration had his or her "values questioned" 24/7. But that was okay, I guess, because Holder and his friends never regarded Bush as our "real" president and didn't have to accord him the same kind of respect they themselves always arrogantly demand.

But more importantly, check out Holder's last line, averring that his lefty DOJ lackeys "should be treated as what they are: patriots." That, my friends, is standard issue CPUSA BS, pure and simple. Since the days of Joe McCarthy, Communists, socialists, and leftists who have been caught subverting the U.S. and its laws aggressively defend themselves as being "patriots." Note, however, that they never define who or what they're being "patriotic" about. What a lot of huffing and puffing. But the tactic here is to omit the real definition of terms.

When you hear people calling themselves patriots in, say, the U.S., you naturally assume they mean American patriots who support the people, the laws, the government, and the way of life we've defined for ourselves over the last 230 years or so. But in this case, you'd be wrong. From McCarthy's era to our own, when a hard leftist uses the word "patriot," you can bet he or she is really being "patriotic" toward a conjectural world socialist state, NOT the U.S. In McCarthy's day, these "patriots" supported Moscow. In today's fuzzier socialism, they're supporting some kind of amorphous socialist world order, probably dictated by the international kleptocrats who run the U.N.

In this world, any currently recognizable nation like the U.S., France, etc., is really some kind of illegitimate capitalist relic that's standing in the way of a hard left socialist utopia, run, presumably, by the Euro-commies, our own elite coasties, and so forth.

My point is, when these people boast of their "patriotism," they never tell you (and we never ask) just what entity they are serving as patriots.

Bring this up at your next cocktail party if some hard lefty makes this claim to you. If you press the issue, I guarantee that you'll make a spectacle, ruin the party, and never be invited back. On the other hand, if you agree with HazZzMat, you'll probably never be invited to a cocktail party infested by leftists. You'd never have been welcome to begin with.

Always be on the lookout for the use of language when it comes from a hard lefty. They're slick and they're clever. And when they play the omission game like Holder does here with his hollow, aggressive "patriot" claim, don't let them get away with it. Ever. That's why we're now in such as disastrous mess in this country. These people have remained unquestioned for far too long.

Saving Cleveland, Part 4

Continuing with the theme aired in video 3 in this ReasonTV series, we take a look at how tough it is to run through red tape and taxes in Cleveland vs. wide-open Houston. Houston lands tons of new businesses and jobs every year while Cleveland pretty much loses the same amount. The Cleveland bureaucracy as explained in this video pretty much reminds me of stuff I've read about the Communist bureaucracy back in the USSR. The bureaucracy, tenured, walled-in, and secure, worries only about process and itself. Furthermore, each area of the bureaucracy (taxation, zoning, public works, etc.) is its own little fiefdom, with each bureaucrat more concerned with his or her own career rather than in helping people establish businesses and live their lives freely and productively. The bureaucracy becomes an end unto itself.

This is one of the many things that make me hostile to the notion of public employee unions. They, and their bureaucracies, run by local politicians elected for life, lost sight of the fact that they are PUBLIC employees. The PUBLIC employs them, not the other way around. Hence, that's why they are, or used to be, called PUBLIC SERVANTS. Somehow, this has been lost on bureaucrats, political appointees, public employee unions, and, of course, the elected-officials-for-life themselves. This video offers a glimpse of why this is and why it doesn't have to be.

Saving Cleveland, Part 3

Again, as a public service, we're embedding the ReasonTV series that's trying to apply creative suggestions for saving my old home town (and Drew Carey's), the old Mistake-on-the-Lake, Cleveland, Ohio. Good stuff. This  part offers suggestions for privatizing and thus energizing city-run businesses that are losing money for the city while either providing inferior services (such as the decrepit public golf courses), or not operating at top capacity.

The poster child for the latter in this video is Cleveland's West Side Market on 25th and Lorain on the near West Side. I went to high school a couple of blocks away from this institution, and still shop up there every chance I can get when I'm in town. I had no clue, however, that this vibrant institution is a drain on the city and a vexation to at least some of its many vendors who complain about the maintenance of basic services. Part of the problem, of course, is the public sector unions, something I rail against time after time as the core of what continues to destroy America. Some of the solutions proffered in this video address this issue, but not, interestingly, in a way that's really detrimental to unions. Although I sure loyal union stewards would disagree.

DC Singing Chicago-Land Blues

This interesting chart, from the website of Americans for Prosperity, illustrates better than I've yet seen just how this administration either has Congress do its dirty work, or--more importantly when it won't--this administration simply bypasses elective representatives to "govern" by fiat, Politburo style.  (Click or double-click the image for a larger version of the chart.)

After trying to explain to Obamamaniacs just who it was they were voting for in 2008, I finally decided to just sit back and "go Galt." It's taken us only a year and a half from "The One's" inauguration for the blinders to fall off. The MSM wanted everyone to "make history." Well, they did, except they didn't know it would come at the price of permanent joblessness and/or underemployment for nearly 20% of the population and the imposition of Euro-style failed socialism, courtesy of the bi-coastal elites with whip-cracking from the Chicago Thugocracy. The chart above shows you how this works. No wonder these clowns diss the Supremes whenever they can. They still don't have control of the Third Branch of government, which would make their tyranny complete.

Kucinich to Vote for Obamacare--Turned into Leprechaun

It had to happen. Leftie Cleveland, Ohio Rep Dennis "The Menace" Kucinich finally did what we knew he'd do and declared he is now for Obama PelosiCare after he was against it. Same principles I guess, or lack thereof.

But this just in! The Irish Faeries, outraged at his two-facedness, have just transformed him into a leprechaun!

Not that anyone would notice the difference. (More scurrilous St. Paddy's PhotoShopping here.)

Cleveland's Disastrous Public Schools

Here's the second installment in the ReasonTV series on the disaster that was once my home town, Cleveland, Ohio. I've decided to take the unusual step of posting them hear (unless ReasonTV yells at me) to make sure this stuff receives wider circulation. It's light years ahead of the shallow pap you'll see on network TV and is incisive and professional in every way.

This video, around 9 minutes, deals with Cleveland's public schools which were in decline even when I was a kid there, way back in the 1950s and 1960s. Things deteriorated there disastrously after I left for Washington, DC in 1967 due to capricious and radical court-ordered busing. This caused "white flight" out of Cleveland and even out of Cuyahoga County since it was forced county-wide. The flight wasn't due purely to "racism," as lefties like to say. It was due to the extreme hardships encountered by white students who were bused sometimes 10-20 miles from their homes into subpar inner city schools in incredibly dangerous neighborhoods. Parents were more concerned with crime and danger to their kids than about race, but it was never portrayed that way in the media.

In any event, it was perhaps this more than anything else that eviscerated a once vital city and county, putting both cleanly in the league of Detroit today.

This TV clip offers the familiar alternative of charter schools with a twist. Note during the video that no politician will actually say a word against Cleveland's thuggish teachers' unions, a major obstacle to any school improvement. The union is a powerful, intimidating lobby, and the pols in Cleveland, all Dems, are deathly afraid of offending them in any way. Their silence speaks volumes on this video. It's time, in my opinion, for politicians--even Democrats--stop being so chicken-shit when it comes to public employee unions. They are the main reason for urban deterioration today. If they take a stand against this thuggishness, the people will support them--if not in public, then in the ballot box, where it really counts.

Fixing the Mistake on the Lake

Some new ideas for Saving Cleveland?

I've long been saddened by the grinding, steady decline of my hometown, Cleveland, Ohio. After being gone for a long time, Mrs. W and I have spent a great deal of time up there over the last two years as our parental units passed away one by one. It's pretty shocking, really. For a brief moment in time in the 1920s, Cleveland was right up there with New York, Detroit, and Chicago as one of the major business, industrial, and financial powerhouse cities in the US. Now, it probably has less population than Toledo. Or at least it seems that way.

The city effectively peaked in 1950, as Cleveland's industries revved up for the continuing post-war boom, attracting its last great wave of workers. It's been in decline ever since. The reason why? Increasingly one-party politics (Democrat, of course) and the resulting corruption that comes with it. A level of racial animosity involving both sides that continues to be worse than anything I've ever seen in the supposedly intolerant South. Plus the increasing tyranny of public sector unions. This latter issue is the worst of all in a way. Cleveland is one of those cities with way above average unemployment--and yet public employees, who are, of course, being paid by the public--demand salary raises and threaten strikes while their erstwhile employers are themselves unemployed and not shelling out tax dollars. This kind of arrogance is also seen in the public employee sector in California and elsewhere. It threatens, along with lunacies like Obamacare, to take this country down.

But Cleveland was the original canary in the coal mine, I think. And now, interestingly, the people over at Reason TV, along with Cleveland comic and native Drew Carey, are putting out a series of short online TV programs that promise to offer ways for Cleveland to dig out of its hole. The first in the series has just been posted, and I'm going to bring the series over here. Even though I'm not quite sure where they're going with this, these conservative dudes are already pointed in the right direction.

The first show's only about 5 minutes. Enjoy.

Voting for ObamaCare Without Voting: Thugocracy Advances

By Michael Ramirez at Investors Business Daily (IBD). It's been posted elsewhere. But it's brilliant and deserves to be propagated everywhere.

Pelosi and her minions in the House are now actually formulating a plan to "pass" ObamaCare without even taking a vote. Coupled with Obama's recent attack on the Supreme Court, we are clearly approaching a Constitutional crisis in this country. Aside from surface slickness, there's not much difference between these clowns and the thugs of Hugo Chavez. Time to wake up, America.

Juan Cole Shills for Moqtada

Minnesota Idiotarian continues to champion Islamofascists

We haven't looked at Juan Cole's ravings lately, so it's probably time to remind you of the existence of this dangerous yet risable excuse for a pundit. As you may recall, Cole is one of the many elitist dopes grinding out reliably leftist, anti-American drivel from the once great state of Minnesota, home of election fraudster and now Senator Al Franken.

Cole excels at putting up nonstop promotional material for anti-American Islamofascists. And like his pals in the MSM, he posts this propaganda as if it were truth. The goal, I guess, is to prove how we're still "hated" in the Middle East where we are doomed to lose and should. I'm not sure why this is still so important for him anymore, since Bush is long-gone from the White House. But perhaps like many leftist Dems, he's been on ideological autopilot for so long that it's become force of habit.

Cole's latest "journalistic" antics involve running a series of infomercials on his website, Informed Comment (what a joke!), geared toward pumping up the sagging rep of that Ghost of Ramadan Past, Moqtada al Sadr. You know, the anti-American "cleric" and Iranian funded stooge who's been running off at the mouth against the U.S. since the day we entered Iraq. At this point in the post-Iraq War scenario, Moqtada has about as much chance of gaining power in that country as onetime Minnesotan Harold Stassen ever did of winning the U.S. Presidency: precisely zero to none.

Yet that doesn't phase an Idiotarian. Here's one of Cole's latest breathless headlines:

Sadr Calls for Election of MPs Who will Demand immediate US Departure

There's plenty more of this stuff posted on Cole's site, including allegedly verbatim speeches by this fraudulent, phoney mullah whose only ambition, it seems, is to serve as the Revolutionary Guards' sockpuppet prime minister in Iraq. Could Moqtada or his Iranian masters be paying you to post this obvious propaganda, Juan? Or are you just stupid?

Returning from Musical Hiatus

I suddenly realized that political blogging here has been in remission. Reason is simple, sort of. Since I revealed over a year ago that I also appeared online as the music and culture critic for the Washington Times, things have been changing at the paper. Quite radically. I.e., as of December 31, 2009, the paper, like many others nationwide, has had to face its own fiscal crisis. As a result, it's radically restructured itself and eliminated, among other things, local coverage of the DC area, including sports (!) and the arts.

Restructuring has proceeded apace with the dead-tree version of the paper now a controlled circulation creature. A paid e-edition is also available online.

But in addition to that, the Times still maintains a rather spiffy website for the general public which contains much of the e-paper content plus more. And part of "more" is a tab called "Communities." And "Communities/Entertain Us" is where some of the Times' critics are starting to reappear. "Entertain Us" is chaired remotely from Denver by the paper's former movie critic, Christian Toto. (Christian's own movie website is here.)

So, as of the end of January, I've been posting my reviews in "Entertain Us" under my column "Curtain Up!" I also plan to return to theater reviewing--something I haven't done much of since 1994 (except for the Contemporary American Theater Festival).

The bad thing about going entirely online is that the news biz has yet to figure out how to monetize this, so the pay ranges from minimal to zero. The good thing is that I no longer have to depend on editorial higher ups to beg for scarce column inches. The result: I'm back to writing the kind of comprehensive reviews, circa 1200+ words, that I used to write in the late 1990s before the entire newspaper biz started committing slow suicide by shrinking local coverage, using wire services instead of their own news bureaus, and serving (with the notable exception of my paper) as shills for the Democrats, a disgusting development that diminished the brand of "objective journalism" and may have destroyed this profession--or at least come close.

In addition to column inches that are no longer limited and reviewing choices that are no longer decided by muckety-mucks, the web gives me a chance to post lots of educational links, photos, and at least the occasional sound clip or YouTube video. This is actually a major plus in performing arts reviewing, which is, after all, all audio visual in content in the end. I suspect that the reviewing biz, at least, is going to be a lot happier in this space. Many other critics, by force (aka, layoffs) or choice have moved to this space as well.

Second bit of news: I've also been invited to review occasionally for another very spiffy DC-area website, DC Theatre Scene and will probably be starting to post some content there in a week or so.

I'll keep you posted on this stuff from time to time. Needless to say, the sheer volume of content I'm starting to generate in these places will slow me down here. But with the Obama-ites and our Socialistic Congress still attempting to put in place a nationalized healthcare plan that statistically zero of the nation wants, there'll be plenty to do here as well, alas.