Friday, December 31, 2010

Top 2010 MSM Lies

Pajamas Media's Tom Blumer does a phenomenally thorough job listing the Lamestream Media's top 10 lies stories for 2010. Among them:
  1. Phony "channel stuffing" at GM just before its fall "IPO," to pump up the apparent sales numbers.
  2. Hidden marriage disincentives in the Obamacare legislation. (Genuinely unsure if these were intentional or oversights by lefty Dems who couldn't be bothered to read the legislation.)
  3. Never telling the full story about how even some "global warming" scientists ideologues admitted to lying about their faux science, the better to redistribute income to the "third world," the primary motive behind "global warming" all along.
  4. The completely un-reported fact that Shirley Sherrod--fired from a Federal government position after her racist rant before the NAACP--had received a 13 million dollar "settlement" in the recently-settled black farmer lawsuit. 

Follow the link above to Blumer's piece for more incidents and more details on all of them. Crucial news continues to be suppressed in this country. Blumer correctly includes that only bloggers on a gatekeeper-free internet can bypass this kind of underground censorship. So let's watch out for more of that "net neutrality" crap in 2011.

Meanwhile, Happy New Year to all. Personally, I can't wait for 2010 to conclude its journey. What a regrettable way to end a decade! Hopefully, 2011 will be much better.

A Digital Nativity Story

Luther sent me a copy of the following YouTube video a couple of days ago, and it's so good I've decided to share it. (I'm a few days late since I've been on the road.) It's a genuinely good-natured re-imagining of the Christmas Story as it might have occurred in our own Digital Age. Since the Magi don't show up on the liturgical calendar until January 6, it's still more than timely and a great way to start closing out the chaotic 2010. For a fuller-sized version of the video, which enables you to see even more details, check out the original link here.


Monday, December 27, 2010

Rendell: A Nation of Wussies

We never thought we'd see the day when we agreed with an observation made by Pennsylvania's outgoing Dem Governor Ed Rendell. But then again, sometimes strange things happen. When queried on the NFL's wimpy postponing of yesterday's Philadelphia Eagle's game to Tuesday due to this weekend's heavy but not particularly spectacular snow event, Rendell ranted away according to ESPN:

Rendell viewed the NFL's decision as a referendum on the toughness, or lack thereof, of the United States.
"My biggest beef is that this is part of what's happened in this country," Rendell said. "I think we've become wussies."

"We've become a nation of wusses. The Chinese are kicking our butt in everything," Rendell added. "If this was in China do you think the Chinese would have called off the game? People would have been marching down to the stadium, they would have walked and they would have been doing calculus on the way down."
As one of my old merchant marine buddies once said: "Truer words was never spoke." I agree. Wanna switch parties, Ed?

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Light Holiday Blogging

As you've probably already figured out, Mr. and Mrs. Wonker are on vacation, up in good old Cleveland, Ohio--a state that woke up this week to the fact that it's declining, grossly overtaxed populace is now so reduced that they're losing two Congressional seats to redistricting in 2012. (So's New York--imagine that?)

Unlike New York, however, Ohioans are gradually waking up to the severe damage that big city Democrat machines and public employee unions have been wreaking on them for decades. Only took the Great Recession to do that, but better late than never.

We actually like the folks up here. After all, it's our home state. And we have at least modest hopes that in 2011, the now all-Republican legislature and state house will be able to continue the long slog of removing corruption and reducing the taxes that have reduced this once great state--and most particularly its decaying northern industrial cities--to a mere husk of the dynamo it once was.

Rhode Island: Nanny State Takes Away Christmas Toy Guns

This from today's Boston Globe online:
Dominic joined dozens of children yesterday at the annual Toy Gun Bash in the gymnasium of Pleasant View Elementary School. There, they lined up to toss their toy guns, from dainty purple water guns to camouflage-painted pistols, inside the Bash-O-Matic, a large black, foam creature with churning metal teeth and the shape of a cockroach spliced with a frog.

Prodded by Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch, who wore a fuzzy Santa hat, the children stared curiously as the Bash-O-Matic mashed up their guns and digested them into a plastic bin near its tail.
Hat tip to Instapundit for the initial link. (Lotsa interesting stuff on this topic is there as well.)

Rhode Island, like most other states, is burdened with debt and beset by criminals. And THIS is how the attorney general spends his time on stuff like this?? What a smarmy, crappy, demoralizing Christmastime story. Not only are our lefty pols a batch of condescending, controlling nannies. They're secularist sadists as well, pulling this kind of nonsense on the eve of the Christmas holidays--where every self-respecting little boy looks forward to a toy gun, a ray gun, a light-sword, you name it--the better to protect those he cares about from the bad guys. My God, what is wrong with these morons?

Wake up, people. It's not surprising that this is yet another one of the reasons why true Blue states are losing population and representatives which will be reflected in Congressional district allocations in the 2012 elections. (The other one is the looming, gathering scandal of out-of-control public employee salaries, benefits, and pensions.) People don't need Idiotarian pols telling them how to raise their families, let alone approving of it.

Meanwhile, Earth to Patrick C. Lynch: get back to work, you idiot, and quit wasting time trying to run other people's children and their lives.

Disgusting.

111th Congress Adjourns. Merry Christmas!

We just got our best-ever Christmas present. The disgusting entity known as the 111th Congress has now adjourned. Permanently. Here's hoping the new year will bring us, in the 112th Congress, a batch of Representatives, at least, who'll acknowledge that they're the employees of the U.S. taxpayer, not the other way around.

And perhaps in 2011 as well we'll stop hearing tireless drivel about how this tax cut and that tax cut "costs" the Federal government money. Wrong answer. The Federal government costs US--you and me--money. Let's not forget where the funding--and the deficit service comes from.

Friday, December 03, 2010

The Surber Challenge to Warren Buffett

It was just a few blog entries ago that I fulminated about the idiotic proposal advanced by Warren Buffett--and other filthy rich Democrats for that matter--for the Federal government to raise taxes on the super-wealthy such as he. Of course, he was supporting the Democrats' desire NOT to extend the Bush tax cuts for the "rich"--i.e., couples who make $250K or more per annum. The sage of Omaha thus proved himself to be a senseless, hopelessly out-of-touch dope, having no clue that even $250K ain't "rich" anymore in this country, particularly if you live in a large urban area with catastrophic real estate taxes. Wealthy morons like Buffett and others (i.e., Nancy Pelosi) don't even remember what it was like to live on real-life salaries anymore. So what business do they have telling us what we should pay, eh?

Well, now, here comes Don Surber with a modest proposal of his own. Since he knows that Warren, Bill, and others are full of hot air and know they'll never have to pay more taxes than they want, due to the kinds of intricate (and legal) tax sheltering they use, he calls them on it, challenging them to write a check and send it in to the Treasury themselves rather than waiting for their fellow rich socialists in Congress to act.

And to make his challenge stick, Surber is sending in a check to the Treasury for $10. As Surber himself says:
The beauty of this is the next time some lib lips off about Republicans and tax cuts for the rich (which Democrats did not rescind upon assuming control of Washington) I can say, pay up — I did.
Nice touch, Don. You need something to stop left-wing stupidity in its tracks and get them off their always-ready, memorized talking points. BTW, Surber challenges the rest of us right-thinkers to do the same. I'm thinking about it. But to be honest, given my two years of technical unemployment already, I think I need the $10 more than the Feds.

(BTW#2: Surber duly notes that your check to the Treasury is NOT tax-deductible. Oh, the humanity....)