The reaction by the left blogosphere to the revelation of our Democratic surveillance state is nothing short of astonishing, coming in several forms. 1) It’s a made-up Republican scandal for the purpose of discrediting Superman, is therefor fake, and we can respond to it only by calling Republicans bad names. 2a) It’s true, but it’s okay because it’s Superman who is doing it. He is noble and pure of heart and is doing it only to keep us safe. Trust him and shut up. 2b) I’d rather be spied on than be blown up by a terrorist nuclear weapon. 3) It’s horrible but we have to accept it peacefully because both sides are doing it, so shut up and vote for Superman’s party because the other one would be infinitely worse.
One writer even used numbers 1 and 3 in the same post: it’s a fake scandal and we have to accept it because both sides do it. The mind boggles.
My responses are 1) If it’s fake why is Superman instigating such a furious hunt for the treasonous bastard who leaked the programs? 2a) Yeah, right. I’ve already talked about how much I trust someone who claims the right to kill me without due process of law. 2b) I’m also terrified of getting killed by an asteroid, which is more likely that your terrorist. 3) The lesser of two evils is still evil. In a democracy we don’t have to accept anything.
The “terrorist plot” that I've heard cited as having been deflected by this program, or by one of the several programs which have been revealed, regards a guy who was planning to put backpacks on the New York subways. They offer no more detail than that, but you may recall that the guilty behavior that the guy exhibited was that he was visiting too many hair salons. Turns out he was buying his bomb-making materials at these hair salons. I don’t make these things up, the FBI does.
Like the guy who was going to blow up the Mackinac Bridge in Michigan. The evidence was that he had several dozen cell phones which he had recently bought in Detroit. They did not explain how he was going to blow up a major bridge using cell phones, and it turned out he was merely bootlegging cell phones. Good thing we were spying on him.
So, Republicans are outraged over this revelation, but they get outraged over pretty much anything. Democrats are either in denial or are making excuses, but Obama could rob a bank in broad daylight on Pennsylvania Avenue and Democrats would claim he was getting money to feed hungry families. Not his, of course; his family is a long, long way from hungry.
Meanwhile, you might be careful how often you call your hairdresser.
Sunday, June 9, 2013
Saturday, June 8, 2013
On Safety and Liberty
I watched clips of Obama’s response to the revelations regarding the NSA surveillance issues yesterday, and to say that I heard echoes of George W. Bush would be an understatement. He spoke of “striking this balance between the need to keep the American people safe and our concerns about privacy, because, there are some trade-offs involved,” and assured us that the programs in question “help us prevent terrorist attacks.”
The juxtaposition between his assertions of “100% security” and “possible terrorist activity” is rank Bushism, with the former being impossible and the latter blatant fear mongering.
He assured us that no one was listening to our phone calls which was distraction, since nobody ever claimed that any such thing was happening and that was not anyone’s concern regarding the illegal program. The fact is that obtaining a record of a person’s telephone activity requires a court order, and this program is making a database of everyone’s telephone activity which can be accessed at will. It is a massive violation of law, and Obama tries to palm it off as “keeping us safe” just as Bush did.
Obama goes on to say that whatever potential this program has for government abuse, such as repressing protest, that we should trust him not to engage in such abuse, and assures us that he will use to program only to “keep us safe from terrorists.” I don’t know if I trust him or not, I’m pretty sure I don’t. This is a man who says he finds it easy to give an order to assassinate an American citizen without due process of law, and I’m supposed to trust him?
Trusting him or not is not the point. Our constitution spells out a form of government which makes it unnecessary to trust any individual. Obama is violating that constitution, and then asking us to trust him not to abuse the product of that violation. That’s like a bank robber asking us to trust him to spend the stolen money wisely.
“But I think its important to recognize that you can't have 100% security and also then have 100% privacy and zero inconvenience. We're gonna have to make some choices as a society. And I can say in evaluating these programs, they make a difference in our ability to anticipate and prevent possible terrorist activity.”
The juxtaposition between his assertions of “100% security” and “possible terrorist activity” is rank Bushism, with the former being impossible and the latter blatant fear mongering.
He assured us that no one was listening to our phone calls which was distraction, since nobody ever claimed that any such thing was happening and that was not anyone’s concern regarding the illegal program. The fact is that obtaining a record of a person’s telephone activity requires a court order, and this program is making a database of everyone’s telephone activity which can be accessed at will. It is a massive violation of law, and Obama tries to palm it off as “keeping us safe” just as Bush did.
Obama goes on to say that whatever potential this program has for government abuse, such as repressing protest, that we should trust him not to engage in such abuse, and assures us that he will use to program only to “keep us safe from terrorists.” I don’t know if I trust him or not, I’m pretty sure I don’t. This is a man who says he finds it easy to give an order to assassinate an American citizen without due process of law, and I’m supposed to trust him?
Trusting him or not is not the point. Our constitution spells out a form of government which makes it unnecessary to trust any individual. Obama is violating that constitution, and then asking us to trust him not to abuse the product of that violation. That’s like a bank robber asking us to trust him to spend the stolen money wisely.
Organ of the State
CBS Evening News covered the various spying leaks last night in a manner that I have come to know as typical of them. They discussed the leaks in terms of how the leaks happened and who published them, and then went into a discussion of how the “whistleblowers” would be hunted down and punished by the government.
The content of the leaks, the fact that our government is illegally collecting data about its citizens, that it continues to do under Obama what was decried as illegal under Bush, was essentially ignored. It was about “enemies of the state” who dare to reveal to the public what its government is doing.
The content of the leaks, the fact that our government is illegally collecting data about its citizens, that it continues to do under Obama what was decried as illegal under Bush, was essentially ignored. It was about “enemies of the state” who dare to reveal to the public what its government is doing.
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Arguing In Good Faith
Krugman today accuses one Arvik Roy of arguing “health care reform” in bad faith because he claims facts which are not true in making his points. Krugman does not say which untrue facts Mr. Roy claims, but that’s okay, because Krugman is undoubtedly correct in his accusation. My problem with Dr. Krugman is that I’m wondering where he gets off making such accusations, given his proclivity for spouting nonsense himself.
Let’s take, for instance, Krugman’s assertion that the government should borrow money without restraint at this time because interest rates are really low. Add that to the statement that he has made many times that governments never repay debts and you have an assertion by Krugman which is completely inconsistent with reality. Krugman knows that government debt is, essentially, adjustable rate debt and that interest rates are certainly not going to stay low forever, so he cannot possibly believe that his claim regarding the cost of government borrowing is true as he posits it.
It might be true if the government were to retire the debt when its term expired, but Krugman specifically asserts that government does not do that. It might be true if the debt were not time limited, but Krugman knows very well that such is not the case. So is Krugman “arguing in good faith” when he claims that the government should borrow without restraint because interest rates are low at this moment? I think not.
Let’s also examine Krugman using the writings of John Maynard Keynes as authority for why government should spend money in economic hard times. All well and good, but then he abandons Keynes altogether in arguing that we should strive for inflation because it “makes debt easier to repay.” Keynes abhorred inflation, and with good reason, in that it rewards debt, punishes savings and diminishes capital formation. Keynes also advised that, while government should spend in times of economic stress, he advocated that it should repay the incurred debt in economic good times, something which Krugman specifically decries.
Can anyone claim that selectively citing a source and quoting only those portions that fit your agenda is “arguing in good faith” on any topic?
People who live in glass houses should not throw stones.
Let’s take, for instance, Krugman’s assertion that the government should borrow money without restraint at this time because interest rates are really low. Add that to the statement that he has made many times that governments never repay debts and you have an assertion by Krugman which is completely inconsistent with reality. Krugman knows that government debt is, essentially, adjustable rate debt and that interest rates are certainly not going to stay low forever, so he cannot possibly believe that his claim regarding the cost of government borrowing is true as he posits it.
It might be true if the government were to retire the debt when its term expired, but Krugman specifically asserts that government does not do that. It might be true if the debt were not time limited, but Krugman knows very well that such is not the case. So is Krugman “arguing in good faith” when he claims that the government should borrow without restraint because interest rates are low at this moment? I think not.
Let’s also examine Krugman using the writings of John Maynard Keynes as authority for why government should spend money in economic hard times. All well and good, but then he abandons Keynes altogether in arguing that we should strive for inflation because it “makes debt easier to repay.” Keynes abhorred inflation, and with good reason, in that it rewards debt, punishes savings and diminishes capital formation. Keynes also advised that, while government should spend in times of economic stress, he advocated that it should repay the incurred debt in economic good times, something which Krugman specifically decries.
Can anyone claim that selectively citing a source and quoting only those portions that fit your agenda is “arguing in good faith” on any topic?
People who live in glass houses should not throw stones.
Monday, June 3, 2013
Is This Going To Be A Turkey Shoot?
It will be interesting to see how this mess develops, because it reminds me of two things which led to entirely opposite outcomes.
The first is the treatment which Occupy Wall Street received at the hands of various police forces in the United States. That, of course, led nowhere but to the irrelevancy of the movement formerly known as Occupy Wall Street, which is still around but is almost totally ignored. There were a few words of outrage, outrage I tell you, regarding the harsh treatment by “police thugs,” but no one in this country takes that kind of outrage seriously, so…
The other thing it reminds me of is, of course, Tahrir Square in Egypt, and we all know how that turned out. We don’t have Hillary Clinton around to tell us how Erdogan is a “dear friend of the family,” but John Kerry has probably been to yacht races with him on the Bosporus Gold Coast, so that might serve the same purpose. Obama is already hyperventilating about the noble qualities of Erdogan while urging both sides to remain calm and use “peaceful measures,” so we’re all set for that phase of things.
People in the Middle East are serious about their protests, though, and unlike this country they meet police thuggery with an escalation of violence instead of stealing off into the woodwork. So we will see before long if this is going to proceed to the phase where Obama is telling the world that Erdogan has “lost his authority to govern,” and that he must “step down immediately” or face some "serious consequences" which Obama will refuse to describe.
Events in the Middle East are not always easy to forecast, but Barack Obama is completely and entirely predictable.
The first is the treatment which Occupy Wall Street received at the hands of various police forces in the United States. That, of course, led nowhere but to the irrelevancy of the movement formerly known as Occupy Wall Street, which is still around but is almost totally ignored. There were a few words of outrage, outrage I tell you, regarding the harsh treatment by “police thugs,” but no one in this country takes that kind of outrage seriously, so…
The other thing it reminds me of is, of course, Tahrir Square in Egypt, and we all know how that turned out. We don’t have Hillary Clinton around to tell us how Erdogan is a “dear friend of the family,” but John Kerry has probably been to yacht races with him on the Bosporus Gold Coast, so that might serve the same purpose. Obama is already hyperventilating about the noble qualities of Erdogan while urging both sides to remain calm and use “peaceful measures,” so we’re all set for that phase of things.
People in the Middle East are serious about their protests, though, and unlike this country they meet police thuggery with an escalation of violence instead of stealing off into the woodwork. So we will see before long if this is going to proceed to the phase where Obama is telling the world that Erdogan has “lost his authority to govern,” and that he must “step down immediately” or face some "serious consequences" which Obama will refuse to describe.
Events in the Middle East are not always easy to forecast, but Barack Obama is completely and entirely predictable.
The Absurdity That Is Salon
This is the headline at salon.com for an essay by Lewis Lapham, describing his upbringing in a shipping family and his first time at sea. The episode of his shipmates taking him to a whorehouse is a very minor episode, taking less than one paragraph in a fairly lengthy tale, and is in no way actually relevant to his seagoing experience. The headline, however, illustrates the kind of thinking that prevails at what used to be... Oh, to hell with it.
Saturday, June 1, 2013
Strawberry Shortcake Dessert
My Sister-in-law got me started on this delicious dessert.
It's yummy!
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| It a poke cake {where you poke holes in the cake then pour flavored syrup in them} Topped with fresh strawberries, cream and a sprinkle of Almond Roca |
Perfect for summer!!
Right click the recipe and save it to your computer to print.
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