Friday, October 22, 2010

Hither and thither 10/22/10

Well ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages: I've got a full plate for you. As usual, click on images to enlarge (usually), and check back for updates until noon PT.
  • Did you know that tomorrow is Christian Store Day? Well, it is.
  • I've found a graphic way of expressing how I, and many voters, feel about the Obama/Reid/Pelosi agenda:

  • If I give you the headline Former U. S. Surgeon General calls for marijuana legalization, whose name comes to mind? If I add "the most ludicrously incompetent in memory," does that help? How about if I add the memorable lines, "I love Eric Clappner [for Clapton]," and, best of all, "All of us are goin' to die of somethin', eventually"? Of course. It could only be Jocelyn Elders. Which just goes to re-prove...
  • Democratic presidents leave a stink for years and years and years to come.
  • DAOD notes that, in addition to being delicious, artichokes are nutritious, and have more antioxidants than red wine or chocolate. (She's not saying anyone should give up either, though.)
  • BTW, however wonderful he may be in other ways, don't go to Alton Brown to learn how to prepare and eat artichokes. On that subject, he's off.
  • I just never, never, never get this sort of thing. Why would an institution want to call itself Evangelical or Lutheran, let alone Evangelical Lutheran, while featuring this sort of thing? (Thanks to reader Robert Sakovich for the tip.)
  • To turn the phrase: if you build it... Obama will probably take credit for it.
  • Meanwhile, the President continues to blame Bush and Boehner, when he's not blaming stupid, scared voters.. goodness, what a spoiled child. How long has his party held Congress? Do you remember him saying any of this during the campaign? "Though my party has controlled the budget for years, I won't be able to do much unless everybody does everything exactly my way — and even then, no promises"?
  • And before we move on: are you a woman? Then Obama thinks you should say, "Thank you, Mr. President, for helping me," and go vote Democrat.

  • And again I say: some pictures, you don't want explained.

  • Playing games with the military — it's The Obama Way™.
  • Yeah, this is pretty much the move I'd have made too. If, you know, I had a different body and everything.
  • Where are you? You're in a place where it's not okay to say offensive things about some kinds of sexual perverts, but it is okay to wish a slow, painful death to Rush Limbaugh. Where? Facebook.
  • Reader Aaron found indisputable evidence that they have 'wayyy too much time on their hands in Colorado.
  • I don't think he's surprised, but Aaron also notes that when director James Cameron says "We're going to have to live with less," he actually pretty much means just you. Not him.
  • Dear wife will love this (click to enlarge):

  • Or, more often:



  • Just interesting: Virginia Thomas, wive of Justice Clarence Thomas, made a little phone call to Anita Hill. Why? To suggest that Hill pray, think, and offer an apology to her husband. Props to Mrs. Thomas for seeking to clear her husband's name. Unsurprisingly (if disappointingly), Ms. Hill declined to retract the one and only reason for which her name is known beyond a very small circle. (Tim Bayly offers a few more thoughts.)
  • I followed those hearings, and remember them well. I remember that the only people testifying in Hill's defense knew only her, while those who knew both Hill and Thomas testified in Justice Thomas' behalf.
  • This also gives me an opportunity to do two things:
  • First, to quote Justice Thomas' dead-on words, spoken during the hearings, from that article: "From my standpoint as a black American, as far as I'm concerned, it is a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas, and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will happen to you." Things haven't changed much since then (read: at all).
  • Second: to remind you that I wrote Justice Thomas, and he wrote me back. So, nee-nee-nee.
  • And now, relatedly....
  • Surprise! Turns out Obama's choice of Sonia Sotomayor was a really bad pick! Yessir, this last election's bills will be coming due for years and years and years.
  • Proverbs 22:29 picture of the day:
  • Unions want women in Nevada to know that Sharron Angle would be bad for women. Because, you know, women's most-cherished value in life is the right to kill inconvenient, imperfect, or ill-fathered children. (Thanks to reader Robert Sakovich for the tip.)
  • I definitely know at least a couple out there who will thank Matt Gumm for pointing out The Death of Jar-Jar Binksin glorious ASCIImation.
  • Some of my Pyro readers may want to get me this for Christmas:
  • One of the most incompetent, embarrasing senatrixes ever to serve — I speak, of course, of Barbara "What-there-are-other-issues-besides-the-sacred-act-of-abortion?" Boxer — touted her endorsement by the VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars). What? Was that an oversight? Nope; the PAC for the VFW endorsed her, along with some of the worst, most rancid liberal extremists in both houses. When word got out, and it caught the attention of VFW national Commander Richard L. Eubank, he acted quickly and sacked the entire PAC board. Go, Cmdr. Eubank!
  • Not a happy story, but it is nice to know that there is at least one parent in the world who doesn't enable his child's violent lawbreaking, and try to turn the blame on victims, police and society.
  • Just a healthy reminder that doctors are neither God nor infallible.
  • Old white politician reportedly hits young black candidate. Quick! Name the policital parties!
  • Wrong
  • Hunh. Who knew? Turns out you can't work for NPR if Muslims on an airplane make you nervous — or, at any rate, if you admit it in public. (You can read their explanation, and see if it passes the giggle-test.) In that case, the NPR CEO might fire you and hint that you're crazy. Of course, more often than not, Juan Williams is crazy; but not this time. Just candid... and non-pc.
  • ...and (surprise!) turns out NPR's claim of opposition to its analysts expressing opinions is, at best, selectively enforced.
  • And now, a clip from my week in the Sierra with my younger sons. Good times.

  • Yet another... well, what shall we call it? A Wahh! Alert, or a Gosh, I Had No Idea What the Boy Scouts' Policy About Homosexuals Was! Alert? Regardless, this poor lost soul demands truckloads of sympathy, deserves none — not for this. His poor kid, though.
  • Sigh. In related news, reader Robert Sakovich points us to another Proverbs 29:18 moment, thanks to a man who thinks certain men should be able to compete athletically as women. But presumably only sexually perverted men. 
  • Leading, in no logical way, to these:








32 comments:

Al said...

In the whole Juan Williams thing he, and everyone else it seems, keeps bringing up Tim McVey and the Atlanta Olympic Bomber. In the bringing up they say they are examples of Radical Christians doing violence. Juan brings it up in his OP ED piece for Foxnews yesterday.

Can someone, anyone, point me to a statement or evidence that shows either one of these nut jobs killed people because they thought it their Christian duty to do so? This makes me so mad I could spit and cuss.

al sends

DJP said...

Yes, I understand; but thank you for not.

Robert said...

The problem with the whole "radical" argument is that the Koran calls for violence, telling lies, and setting up Sharia law around the world in order to spead Islam. Whereas the Bible does not promote Christians doing these same things.

On another note, my wife and I shared a laugh about the E.T. vote in Denver. Crazy.

And with the Hoyer-Lollar thing, what is the deal with the aggressive physical actions of Democrats in this election cycle? This is at least the third instance I've heard of this year.

VcdeChagn said...

re: The ELCA "Perverts-r-us" orientation.

Just wanted to quickly identify one secondary cause of the ELCA's problems (even if her comments were spot on...a stopped watch is right twice a day).

Cleary quoted Lutheran Pastor Rebecca Heber

The root cause is the missing books of Titus and 1 Timothy in their Bibles.

Aaron said...

@Al It's worse than that. McVeigh wasn't a Christian. At most, he said he was raised as a Catholic and had some belief in God. However, near his death he said he was agnostic and was cavalier about going to hell. At some other point, he said science was his god. So McVeigh didn't even identify himself as a Christian.@

Aaron said...

@DJP: The libertarians are joining the chorus of drug legalization. I think it's sad because we'll have to learn the hard way. We refuse to learn the lesons that other countries learned or that we can see from prohibition.

And I totally didn't know Alton Brown was doing a book tour. I missed him in Houston!

Finally, since I deal with this sort of thing a lot, I can probably guess what the FBI was thinking when Hill sent the information to them: "Lady, don't you think we have better things to do?"

P.D. Nelson said...

Dan as I was raised ELCA I can tell you they were going downhill way before this. One of the many reasons I am not ELCA and not just because of the female leadership. For that matter having Lutheran in the title would make Martin ashamed.

And I was going to defend my man Alton but it seems I can only find two artichoke recipes on the Good Eats portion of the Food network website so I'll let the comment stand.

And last as always a great Hither and Thither something I always look forward to on Fridays.

Barbara said...

Well to be fair,

Cleary quoted Lutheran Pastor Rebecca Heber on the Campus Majority Blog calling the videos "graphic and, in my opinion, vulgar, appalling, disturbing, tasteless, degrading, and completely unbefitting the sacred trust given to a Christian college and an institution of the ELCA."

I gather it wasn't endorsed. Kind of like having Mercer University, an SBC institution, make the top of the party college list one year, much to the SBC's dismay.

Apples and oranges, maybe - but both fruit.

Barbara said...

Yeah, what P.D. said regarding ELCA. They pray to the goddess Sophia, after all.

Kyle said...

McVeigh a Christian? He chose the poem Invictus to be his final statement. It concludes ...

I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.



That doesn't come across as a "Jesus freak" to me.

Anonymous said...

I'm a Libertarian and I support the legalization of all drugs, recreational and pharmaceutical. Why should I be forced to go to a doctor to get permission to buy my asthma medication? It makes no sense.

Prohibition of alcohol was a dismal failure and the war on drugs has a long list of casualties including the increasingly intrusive police state and the children of prisoners locked up for drug charges.

It seems that the war on drugs is an extension of the nanny state. If the President wants to use his influence to try and persuade Americans to not light up that would be great. That said, the state should not be locking people up for smoking a joint in the privacy of their own home. Neither should they lock someone up for drinking a glass of wine with dinner.

Do I recommend that people light up and get high? No. Neither do I recommend they get drunk with wine or beer.

DJP said...

Oh, dear.

CGrim said...

I'm not an expert (so take everything I say with a grain of salt), and I'm obviously not in favor of drug consumption any means, but I have heard the argument made (somewhat persuasively I think) that government is not the best institution for resisting drug distribution & use.

Rather, churches, families, local communities, etc. are both better suited, better equipped, and better placed for this task, if only they would step up to the plate, rather than relinquish responsibility to the state, which typically thinks that dollars and bullets are the answer to the problem.

The government war on drugs not only costs the taxpayer a lot, it arguably ends up making drugs more expensive, thereby enriching those who provide drugs, giving them further incentive to provide them.

I think this is another area where government is a poor stop-gap at best.

Hayden said...

All,

If you haven't read (or listened to) Clarence Thomans' book "My Grandfather's Son", you have to. It should be on every student's book list! I listened to the whole book on tape as I drove from Michigan to Florida two years ago and loved it.

I will never forget the way he describes the "Southern" way of attack vs. the "Northern" way. (It is the difference between a moccasin and a rattler)

He is a treasure and the book is excellent!

Aaron said...

I was waiting for Stan! I'd quibble with you about the success of prohibition and the drug war, but I doubt we'd ever see eye to eye. Besides, I'm sympathetic to your overarching concern for freedom.

I'd be willing to consider the legalization of drugs if those proponents of such were willing to be harsh on crimes committed by those abusing drugs. You steal because you're high...you're gonna get punished harshly. Just as I believe the government should be extremely harsh on drunk driving. I'd also like businesses to be able to continue to hire and fire based on your drug usage.

Aaron said...

BTW, I was listening to Medved and Praeger today. Apparently the Dems believe they can and will win the Presidency again in 2012 without any caucasion voters. Medved believes their right and OBama is still the front-runner. That's depressing.

Anonymous said...

Sir Aaron,
I like your caveats with one caveat of my own.

Rather than giving stiffer sentences for those who commit crimes while under the influence of narcotics, I would prefer they be sentenced equally with no leniency given to the drug-impaired perpetrator due to an altered state of consciousness. In other words, mens rea would be assumed and charges would be filed accordingly.

Rupert said...

I think the 'war on drugs' has had more negative outcomes than positive. How many billions have been spent and the problem is worse, not better.

The USA has the highest incarceration rate in the world. Many of those are for drug-related crimes.
We all know how prohibition basically established organized crime.
Countries with more lenient policies have less crime and social disruption.

I agree that non-government agencies will have a better success rate at dealing with the scourge of drug addiction.
I agree that the use of drugs should not alter the penalties for crimes committed under their influence.

I am not a drug user - except when my doctor is nice to me. Oh, and apart from alcohol and tobacco. Hm, does that make me a hypocrite?

Yurie said...

I kinda hoped that the Death of Jar Jar thing would be more... graphic.


Thank you, thank you, all be logged on all weekend!

walsingham said...

Looks like getting past the seventh bullet point sans comment is out of the question...

Apparently Gustavus Aldolphus takes the 'liberal' in liberal arts college pretty seriously.

I didn't even bother watching the video clip, the text was enough for me.

As for laying claim to the titles of Evangelical & Lutheran - there should be some kind of law against that.

Good grief.

Susan said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Susan said...

I deleted my comment because for some reason some words didn't show up!

1. I had to chuckle when I saw that picture of Obama as Louis XIV. It was, after all, King Louis who famously said, "L'état c'est moi" (literally, "I am the state"). Appropriate application, n'est-ce pas?

2. As for the awesome picture (there are many this week!) of the man kneading and flattening dough balls and throwing them like frisbees--there ought to be a movie named "The Flying Naan"!! :D

Sir Brass said...

Those arguing for the legalization of recreational narcotics deserve one and only one response after all these years of solid data on these drugs' effects on society and the individual:

You sir, are a fool.

No, I am not being sarcastic; no, I'm not tossing insults.

On that note, the war on murder will never be won. It's just a waste of police time and money to go and lock up every murderer out there, after all. I mean, there will still be murder on the streets no matter what we do. And it will only make me run have to explain myself to the police if I have to shoot someone who breaks into my home and tries to kill me because I was home when he decided to break in looking for drugs, money, or both.

Now that last paragraph was sarcastic. I hope my point about the kind of logic used was made.

Anonymous said...

Sir Brass,
Your lack of logic and your calling me a fool are noted.

Susan said...

Sarcastic as most of your comment may be, Sir Brass, it is logical. Legalizing pot will open up Pandora's box. We are sinners, and society at large is composed of unredeemed sinners. Laws are passed to keep all of us in check, and most laws protect our life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. To pass a law that will (as a result) increase the temptation of substance abuse isn't exactly helping. Of course, perhaps the opponents of this view may argue that the Prohibition was a disaster (and it was), but the scenario was a bit different in that for the temperance movement, we moved from alcohol to no alcohol and back to alcohol, whereas the status quo of drugs is not legalized right now. Once we legalize them, it will be hard to prohibit them again. (And here's to being sarcastic: Drunk drivers are bad enough...I have to worry about doped drivers now??)

Aaron said...

@Stan: done!

@Rupert: (1) Actually, prohibition didn't establish organized crime (and I know the history well, I work for the agency that put Al Capone away). Prohibition radically reduced consumption of alcohol and likewise, alcohol related suicides, crimes, etc.
(2) Countries that have experimented with legalization have been met with higher usage rates and higher crimes. Great Britain, for example, experimented with it between 1959 and 1968. The effects were disastrous.
(3) Most of the criminals locked up for "drug related" crimes are locked up for theft and violent crimes.

The only argument I'd support for legalization is because it causes unneccessary government intrustion and expense. If you met out harsh penalties for crimes (including restitution), I think the effect would be the same as criminalization of the drug execpt without all the dizzying number of laws.

BTW, you want to know which countries have the lowest drug usage rates and in the world and yet is growing economically by leaps and bounds? Singapore. They have very tough drug laws. So enforcement can work.

Susan said...

Well, Sir Aaron, Singapore now boasts of a world-class casino (this, after a staunch and long-standing ban of it). Will other bans start crumbling down? I'd say eventually, but only time will tell.

Aaron said...

Casinos are another pet peeve of mine. Politicians like them because they pull in a lot of income to the state. Unfortunately, it's the locals that feel most of the ill effects of having one.

threegirldad said...

Speaking of healthy donut sandwiches, Krispy Kreme burgers have been the rage at several State Fairs this year.

Rupert said...

Prohibition made a major impact on the growth and extent of orgainized crime.

Scandinavia and the Netherlands are examples of drug use being treated more as a health issue than a crime issue and their social wellbeing and crime rates are better than most. Knowledge and methods have improved significantly since 1968.

Singapore is a different culture to the 'west'. They also ban chewing gum. Items can be left on the side of the road and vandalism will not occur. Indonesia has the death penalty for drugs and still has a very high incidence of drug use.

The country which throws the most resources into the war on drugs is the USA and it also has the highest rate of incarceration. The theft and violent crimes they perpetrate are generally to obtain resources to buy drugs.

Enforcement has not worked well in America, Britain, Australia or many other 'socially' similar nations. Not going so well for Mexico either.

CGrim said...

Seeing people argue about how the state should divvy up assuming the responsibilities of families and communities makes me sad.

Both the argument itself, and the presuppositions.

Aaron said...

Rupert: I disagree. Organized crime just became more sensationalized during prohibition. With respect to the Netherlands, they've had increasing crime problems. In Amsterdam, 80% of property crimes are committed by drug users. They've really had look more towards law enforcement solutions. The same is true in Portugal.

@CitizenGrim: you would have absolutely been miserable during much of the reformation then. A huge divide was created over the role of the state in enforcing morality and religion.