The Dark Knight Rises...To Crush Mitt Romney?

There's nothing I'd put past liberal Hollywood, and I don't believe in coincidence, so I view this story with a wary eye:

This summer's much-anticipated Hollywood blockbuster, "The Dark Knight Rises," is getting an unusual boost from Democrats and other foes of Mitt Romney who are eager to tie the Gotham crushing villain to the GOP presidential candidate...

"Bane" is the terrorist in the new movie who drives the caped crusader out of semi-retirement in the final Batman movie. Democrats, who believe they have Romney on the ropes over the president's assault on his leadership at Bain Capital, said the comparisons are too rich to ignore.

"It has been observed that movies can reflect the national mood," said Democratic advisor and former Clinton aide Christopher Lehane. "Whether it is spelled Bain and being put out by the Obama campaign or Bane and being out by Hollywood, the narratives are similar: a highly intelligent villain with offshore interests and a past both are seeking to cover up who had a powerful father and is set on pillaging society," he added.


Hmmm....

Well, Bane first appeared in 1993 ("Batman: Vengeance of Bane #1"), and I doubt there was anyone at DC who had the foresight to predict that the mild-mannered Mormon manager of an anonymous private equity firm would run for president twenty years later.

Furthermore, it appears as if director Christopher Nolan had been dedicated to working Bane into this final Batman sequel as early as 2008, but certainly no later than winter of 2009 - certainly not yet the winter of Obama's discontent, and still a time when the president seemed, at least to his allies, invincible.

It seems as if Lehane is wrong, too, about Bane's background:

Born into a life sentence for the crimes of his father, he was raised from birth within the harsh prison known as Peña Duro (“Hard Rock”), in the Caribbean Republic of Santa Prisca. He was named Bane by the warden after his first murder as an adolescent, and as he grew to adult hood he became the most feared and respected inmate, the "king" of Pena Duro... the Warden attempted to rid himself of Bane, and...injected Venom into Bane, almost killing him...Believing him to be dead, Bane was tossed into the sea, where he freed himself. Returning to the prison, Bane held the Warden hostage while escaping by means of a helicopter...

Mitt Romney shares tender moment with Barack Obama?

Mitt Romney, as we are told endlessly, was born into wealth, not prison.  He has never dabbled with drugs, killed anyone, attempted any hostage-takings, and has no known offshore holdings in any Caribbean prisons.  Well, none that we know of, anyway.

And what about the "powerful father"?  Well, George Romney was known for many things, but being a merciless killing machine was not among them:

Sir Edmund Dorrance, aka King Snake, is a British native who first distinguished himself in the Royal Artillery (a corps of the British Army). He and some friends then became mercenaries, offering their professional expertise to various anti-communist rebels, and made considerable money in doing so. While in Santa Prisca working with local rebels, his camp was taken by surprise by government commandos and Edmund blinded by gunfire. He fled the country, leaving for dead a female rebel that he had slept with...He kills without conscience and has earned the title of "the most dangerous man alive". The King Snake is also blind but has made it an asset rather than a handicap, as he has honed all of his other senses to an uncanny degree. He uses the dark as his weapon.

"George Romney IS...King Snake"

Seems like the comparisons being made by the Democrats here are quite a stretch. The only comparison one can fairly make is that both Bane's dad and Mitt's dad are wealthy, and that Bane sounds like...Bain.

 Makes the birthers seem downright sane in comparison.   One wonders what the Democrats are thinking here, in believing they can get America convinced that Mitt Romney is the equal of a comic book villain because he worked for a company that sounds like the bad guy's name.  Are they really that childishly simple?

Or do they all buy into the belief of Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi, who describes Mitt Romney thusly:

"...not merely unlikable, and not merely a fatuous, unoriginal hack of a politician, but also a genuinely repugnant human being, a grasping corporate hypocrite with so little feel for how to get along with people that he has to dream up elaborate schemes just to try to pander to the mob."


If you look at it that way, I suppose, then Bain is Bane.

The only problem with that viewpoint is that it's insane.

Which explains a lot, actually....

Barack Obama Is A Venture Capitalist, Too...He's Just A Shitty One...

...and while the president does risk investor's money like his private-sector counterparts, he extorts his from the unwilling at the point of a gun, while the private side only deals with dollars offered voluntarily.    And of course, if a Wall Street (or Silicon Valley) venture capitalist engaged in the type of cronyism that is Barack Obama's stock in trade, he or she would be hanging from a street post as the Occupiers danced below.

But quite simply, I wanted to point out -  as Obama smears Mitt Romney and Bain Capital -  how our president has done with perhaps his biggest investment as CEO of the USA:  The purchase, more or less, of General Motors by the government.

How's that working out?

The blue line is the Dow Jones Industrial average, barely above sea level.  The grey line, scraping the depths of the chart, is GM's stock price.  Quite a dip from the $33- IPO of November 2012, no?  And don't forget:

The stock price will need to rise by 47 percent to $48.58 for the U.S. government to break even on its follow-on stock sales.


How likely is that?  Well, the Chevy Malibu was going to be the car that would save GM.  Fortune has the story; title says it all...

The most disliked car of the year (so far)

...while they insinuate that a compliant media pushed the car for political purposes....

You think?  The New York Times gave it the ObamaCare treatment:

Ezra Dyer took pains to explain away the Eco's design shortcomings...writing that "I suspect that I'll enjoy the other Malibus" when they are launched later in the year...


That self-delusion might fly if you're assuming you'll be dead by the time Barack's medical bills come due, but when the base model of the Malibu starts at $26K, well....

If you don't like Government Motors, I doubt you'll like Government Health Care.  And I don't think you'd buy the latter from the man who gave you the former.  Most likely, you'd fire his sorry ass and hire someone who you thought would do a better job with it.

Fortunately, our current CEO's contract expires this November. If we are going to have a VC in the WH, at least let's get a good one...

Barack Obama: Mob Extortionist Extraordinaire...

The president's ugly remarks, made to the faithful at a fundraiser in Virginia on Friday night, bear repeating:

...look, if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own. You didn’t get there on your own. I’m always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something — there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there. (Applause.)

 If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.


And that somebody else is now "represented" by the person of...Barack Obama.  Who will be taking that hard-earned money of yours, thank you very much, and passing it along to someone he feels is more deserving of it:  His friends, his family, the people who keep him in power.  And if you don't like it, you can expect to get a visit from some less-than-polite men with guns tucked into their pants, who will haul you away if you don't pony up Barack's cut of your dough.

Sound familiar?  If you're Tony Soprano, sure.  It's one of the oldest mob rackets in the book, and now Obama is bringing it to your doorstep via Washington, DC:

...it is at present more profitable to be a racketeer than to be an entrepreneur. It makes more economic sense to invent some scam like Global Warming and then wait to be paid to go away than it is to frack for oil.

Right now, selling bureaucratic protection is a land office business. Therefore it attracts the underemployed members of the minor aristocracy who see in it a potential source of income. What they fail to understand is that in the long run it cuts their throats too...


In his heart, I believe the president know it too.  But he's hoping to survive by staying on top as long as possible, and if that means looting every legitimate business out there, well, it's just tough pickles on them.  He's conducting a bust-out of the American economy - an act that the aforementioned Soprano was well versed in:

A "bust out" is a common tactic in the organized crime world, wherein a business' assets and lines of credit are exploited and exhausted to the point of bankruptcy. Richie and Tony profit from busting out Davey Scatino's sporting goods store in this episode...

When asked by Davey why Tony let him get into debt, Tony replies that he knew Davey had the store and other assets he could take, and instinctively saw an opportunity for profit.


My words:

And how different is that from a president who allows up to run up an unthinkable amount of debt, or perhaps provides "favors" to a population, then takes everything they've got as recompense, as payment for services rendered or services due, whether or not one has even asked for them in the first place?


Wonder how much he's paid the press to "look the other way" while he fixes the big game in November...?

In Israel, "Guns and Bikinis" Is More Than A Traffic-Generating Blog Title...

It's a way of life,. as this photo taken recently at a Tel Aviv beach demonstrates:

No wonder the Palestinians, and Iranians, and now the Egyptians, want to wipe them off the map.  No way an AK-47 totin' terrorist in a hijab is gonna bring that kinda heat:

Jeesh, can you only imagine what she smells like under that get-up?

Incidentally, our rifle-slinging young Jewess is not showing off; she's actually following military regulations...the Daily Mail:

Under Israeli military regulations, if members take their weapon out from their military base they must keep them near at all times.

Punishments for losing or misplacing a weapon can include time in a military prison.

One user on the website wrote: 'An explanation for this photo (I served in the IDF): the girl probably went to beach right after being at the base and serves in a unit that requires her to carry a weapon (not necessarily a combat role), she didn't want to go through the paperwork and permission required to leave the gun at armory.

'Outside of the base we're required to either lock our weapons or have them on us. You can clearly see what she chose.'

Another user wrote: 'The photo is taken on the beach in Tel Aviv, and it is commonplace to see such sights during the summer".



Of course, the girls of the IDF have been bringing the heat for some time now:

Compare and contrast the gaze in this woman's eyes, holding a holy book, to the fanatic holding the Koran above...

And speaking of eyes....

...and beauties with big guns:

You know, this didn't start out being an homage to R.S. McCain's famous Rule 5 ...but sometimes blog posts take a funny turn....

Obama Adds A Clause To The Constitution

Mickey Kaus was wondering under what authority Obama was operating when he was gutting Bill Clinton's 1996 welfare reform (take that, cracker!), but figures it out mid-sentence:

Rector and Bradley of Heritage (among the first to attack Obama’s action) make the case that the law’s work requirements were specifically designed to not be waivable, and that Obama is using HHS’s authority to waive state reporting requirements as a tricky way of voiding the underlying substantive requirements that are to be reported about. The Heritage argument–that what HHS did was illegal–seems powerful, but I haven’t read the other side’s brief. Perhaps Obama is invoking the long-lost “we can’t wait” clause to enact a change that would never pass a democratically elected Congress–in this case not because Congress is “gridlocked” and and “dysfunctional” and “partisan” but because relaxing work requirements has never been popular with voters, even during less partisan and gridlocked times, even in the swingin’ 60s...


When you don't believe in Obama's change, he rams it down your throat.

But I may come to like the "we can't wait" clause.  Certainly, when Republicans take power in 2013, the clause can be used to eliminate Obamacare ("we can't wait to remove this drag on the economy!"), begin wide-scale oil and gas exploration ("we can't wait to create thousands of jobs that are literally sitting underground!"), and even criminalize abortion by executive order ("we can't wait to stop the murder of unborn taxpayers!").

And Mitt Romney can do all this...on his first day in office.  Thanks to Obama's "we can't wait" clause.

And I am sure the media will be just as willing to go along with this affront to American constitutional democracy under a Republican administration as they have been under a Democratic administration.  Because the media wouldn't want to be seen as a collection of inbred, biased, hypocritical hacks, would they?

Never.

I'm looking forward to life under the "Obama clause" in 2013.  And I am sure my liberal friends will celebrate this continuation of their hero's political philosophy under a Republican regime as well...

Boo To The NAACP

Mona Charen has it right, regarding the tenor of the coverage:

Naturally, most of the coverage about Romney’s speech to the NAACP focused on the boos. It reflected badly on Romney, we are meant to understand. Question: Is there any doubt that if a liberal Democrat addressed a gathering of conservatives (I know, impossible to imagine, but stay with me), and was booed for his trouble, that the press narrative would be how badly this reflected on the audience?


No doubt.  Liberals are still talking about the handful of people in a Republican primary debate audience who booed a gay soldier, and how it signified something horrible within the entirety of the conservative soul.  No such pontifications regarding the NAACP, of course...

But what liberals fail to comprehend is that Americans are deeply turned off by disrespect of this type.  It tends to turn the object of derision into an object of sympathy.  And it tends to attract ire towards the group engaging in the boorish behavior.

Not sure if this helped OWS...

By bringing attention to the NAACP's booing, the media is not hurting Romney, it's helping him. As soon as those dumbf*cks realize it, of course, the issue will disappear entirely...

Obama Administration: "An Israeli Victim of Terror? No Such Thing!"

Some "best friend".  No wonder Israel is entertaining other suitors...

Some noted last month that Obama agreed to exclude Israel from a global counter-terrorism forum held in Istanbul, bowing to a demand from Turkey’s Islamist Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. But it seems as if  Obama likes to have his people operate without those pesky Jews around.   Reality is such as buzzkill, especially for a president and administration that works outside of it.

So Israel wasn’t invited to the second session of the counter-terrorism forum held yesterday in Spain, either. And the Obama administration took advantage of their forced absence to commit quite the affront to the Jews:

Maria Otero, Under Secretary of State for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights, delivered a speech at the Spanish conclave titled “Victims of Terrorism.” But not only was an Israeli delegation not present when she spoke, but during her address, Otero never even mentioned the experience of Israeli terror victims. Though Otero’s anti-terrorist sentiments were unexceptionable, the exclusion of Israel, one of the primary targets of international terrorists and among the leading experts in how to deal with the problem, was clearly intentional. As Kredo noted, the State Department spokesperson refused to answer when asked about the omission of Israel from the speech and the conference....

Is that Madame Otero, speaking for the same UN "Human Rights" Council that spends 100% of its time de-legitimizing Israel?  Oh, you betcha...!

All this, as we approach the 50th anniversary of the Munich Massacre, another event that Obama, along with the United Nations and Olympic Committee, have sworn to ignore.

Newspeak: These are not Israelis...

This is not the first time Obama or his flacks have played this game. he tried out the "Israel? What's an Israel?" bit shortly after the devestating Haiti earthquake of 2010, when he refused to acknowledge the Israeli involvement in the rescue & recovery operation:

[Obama] noted that, in addition to assistance from the United States, significant aid had also come from "Brazil, Mexico, Canada, France, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic, among others." Am I missing another country that truly weighed in with truly consequential assistance? Ah, yes. There it is. Right there "among others." Yes, the country to which I refer is "among others," that one.

The fact is that, next to our country, Israel sent the largest contingent of trained rescue workers, doctors, and other medical personnel. The Israeli field hospital was the only one on the ground that could perform real surgery, which it did literally hundreds of times, while delivering--as of last week--at least 16 babies, including one premature infant and three caesarians. The first 250-odd Israelis were real professionals, and they were supplemented by others, also professionals. And to these can be added the many organized Jews from the Diaspora who, in solidarity with Israel, also went on a work pilgrimage, an aliyah, in solidarity with Haiti.

It's not that Israeli participation in the Haiti horror was being kept secret. I myself saw it reported several times on television—on ABC, NBC, CBS, and CNN.

So didn't Obama notice? For God's sake, everybody noticed the deep Israeli involvement...


Of course he noticed.  But as a raging, hate-filled anti-Semite (see links here), he can no sooner acknowledge Israel's greatness (or pain), than a Palestinian can acknowledge a Jews' right to exist.

And that is so very, very sad, that I cannot even comment on it any further today.  All I will say is that every Jew who votes for Barack Hussein Obama in 2012 will deserve what's to come, and will have the blood of his actions on their hands...

Meet The Democratic Party's Newest Anti-Semite!

He's out of Missouri (having lived there for a short while - and while generally enjoying it - let's just say it is a tough place to be Jewish), he's tied closely to Barack Obama and the DNC, and he espouses anti-Semitic conspiracy theories worthy of the looniest Arab. Which makes him perfectly qualified, I suppose, to be the Democratic candidate for Missouri Secretary of State.

Via the Washington Free Beacon:

MD Rabbi Alam is an Obama campaign ally and Missouri-based Democratic activist who chairs the National Democratic Party Asian American Caucus (NDPAAC), a Democratic National Committee-sponsored organization that liaises with Asian minorities.

Alam, who was born in Bangladesh, served as a “satellite campaign manager” for then-candidate Barack Obama and the Democratic Party during the 2008 elections, and has since been invited to the White House.

With Joe Biden

Alam has speculated about Jewish involvement in the September 11th terrorist attacks and participated in an event with a Muslim cleric who has accused Israel of terrorism and alleged that the U.S. invented the HIV disease.

“Why [was] 9/11 was a official holidy [sic] for all jewish [sic] people worked in the the [sic] WTC?” Alam asked in an Internet discussion titled, “Was 9/11 a conspiracy??”
Alam went on to tout the 9/11 Truther film Loose Change 9/11, and challenged readers to “tell me how many of the Jewish people died on the 9/11 tragedy?”
Asked in an interview Monday about his provocative views, Alam stood by his controversial writings, admitting that he has been “waiting to discuss it with somebody.”
“My question was, ‘What’s the reason not a single Jew was killed on that day,’” Alam said, maintaining that his inquiries are based on facts, rather than a bias against Jewish people. “Was there a single Jew killed on that day?”

His pro-Obama politicking apparently earned him an invite to the White House in December 2011.

In May, Alam attended a presentation by Sheik Khalid Yasin, a radical cleric and 9/11 Truther who has advocated in favor of terrorism and referred to non-Muslims as “filth.”

Alam is also on record decrying the arrest of Sami Al-Arian, a Muslim activist who pled guilty to soliciting money on behalf of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which had been designated a terrorist group committed to Israel’s destruction.


But here come the liberal Jews to defend - if not Alam - than the DNC, assuring us it is all a big misunderstanding.  Josh Block, a Democratic strategist and former spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, soothes our fears:

 “This guy’s sentiments are especially outrageous in the context of 9/11, and are incredibly offensive to the families of all victims of al Qaeda’s vile terrorist attack on America. One can only assume the DNC allowed such a relationship unknowingly".


What is it they keep saying about the word "assume", Mr. Block?  And if we are going to make assumptions, can I assume, based on the repeated actions of Barack Hussein Obama, that the president - the de facto head of the Democratic party - is a raging anti-semite?

You assume that the DNC entered this relationship "unknowingly"? Where's you 're evidence, Block?  Mine is abundant (see here for Obama's love of Honduran anti-Semites, click here to see him honoring European anti-Semites, over here we have him trying to name Jew-haters to key administration posts, and please let's not forget his 20-year association with the Reverend of Hate, Jeremiah Wright, to whom Jew-baiting was a regular Sunday sport. Some nice photos herewith a whole assemblage of Jew-haters.  And this is just a small sample, not even getting into his loathing of one Benjamin Netanyahu...).  


And what is it with the Democrats and anti-Semitic candidates lately, anyway? Why to they continue to flock to your banner? We have Charles Barron in New York, Kyrsten Sinema in Arizona, and now our friend in the Show Me State...

Jew-hater / Democrat

Obama embraces Krysten Sinema, a proud supporter of the Palestinians and a fervent hater of Jews

Seems like to the Democrats, anti-Semitism isn't a bug...it's a feature.

Alam, like Barron and Sinema, is disgusting.  But so is the party he cleaves to.  And so is Mr. Josh Block, who would rather see his own blood perish than re-think his political ideology...

100 Polls Can't Be Wrong: America Hates Obamacare

As we predicted, the momentary "surge" of "support" for Obamacare after it was declared constitutional by a convoluted Supreme Court (a surge showing that "only" 52% of Americans wanted it repealed) was no more than a dead cat bounce.  And a pathetic one at that.  Rasmussen has produced its 100th poll on public opinion regarding health care reform, and the results are basically unchanged from the previous 99:

Most voters still aren’t convinced: They want President Obama’s national health care law repealed as they have said consistently since the measure was passed by Congress over two years ago.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 53% of Likely U.S. Voters at least somewhat favor the repeal of the health care law, while 41% are opposed. These findings include 43% who Strongly Favor repeal and 31% who Strongly Oppose it.

And that's with a legal victory, Obama's smug fist-pumping, and the media's relentless cheerleading propping it up. Imagine if Roberts were not such a craven coward, and if some in the media viewed the law objectively?

Even better - imagine if Mitt Romney had the guts to campaign full-on for repeal, tying it in to his economic message by clearly explaining how it would devastate the economy and enslave taxpayers for generations.  It would be a game-changer:

A newly released Rasmussen poll asked likely voters, “If Mitt Romney is elected President and Republicans win control of Congress, how likely is it that the health care law will be repealed?” Only 40 percent of independents said that it’s “very likely....”

Perhaps independents’ skepticism results from their now having waited more than two full years for the “replace” part of the GOP’s “repeal and replace” slogan to materialize. Perhaps it is a result of Romney’s reluctance — so far — to offer up anything more than a few lines about why repeal is needed or what real reform would entail. Perhaps it stems from Republicans’ past failures to show the sort of willpower (even when pushing highly popular proposals like repeal) that President Obama showed in ramming Obamacare through Congress in the face of stiff opposition from the American people


Leave this issue off the table, Mitt, and you'll be leaving voters home on election day.  Voters that would have been yours, and could have made the difference...

What Price Media Bias? Obama Hopes It's $35M....

So Barack "The Unstoppable Money Machine" Obama was out-raised in June by Mitt Romney, $106M versus $71M. No wonder BHO hates capitalists so; they make him look bad at the only thing he is even somewhat proficient at - campaigning for higher office.  Professor Jacobson comments on the disparity:

Obama can’t buy this election. He’ll have to win it the old-fashioned way — with the help of the mainstream media.


Hmmm.  There's a $35M gap there.  The media will have to spend a lot of time on their knees to make up that difference. The question is, can an industry so steeped in red ink afford to go so clearly all-in for one political candidate that they risk losing 50% of their customers?

They can't, but they probably will anyway.  If they were smart (ha), they'd learn a lesson from another premium media branded that was destroyed beyond recognition by its association with the president...

The Retreat At Home...

I'm usually not one to buy into the whole "our civilization is collapsing" rhetoric, but Michael Auslin at The Corner makes the case against my positivism:  I'm missing the depth and breadth of the societal breakdown because it is happening too gradually to grasp.

Well, maybe.  Auslin also lives in Maryland, where the power has been out for days due to a single  thunderstorm.  But perhaps that gives him better perspective than I:

The only problem with our descent into civilizational breakdown is that it isn’t quite efficient enough. It’s happening too slowly and it’s spread over too wide a canvas for much of the population that cares to make a last stand at Fort Freedom...

Our collapse is real, but in a vast country of 300 million people, the long, agonizing shuffle up to Lover’s Leap is hard to grasp. It happens in drips and drabs, and ...daily life offers us myraid opportunities to just adapt and acquiesce ever so slightly. So what if Pepco, after not having been able to turn my power back on for five days, wants to jack up my monthly electricity bill by $5.50? It’s only another $66 per year. I can handle that; can’t I? And, my Maryland taxes went up from 4.75 percent to 5.25 percent (while my lights were out, of course) — well, I don’t even really know how much extra that costs, but, say another $300 per year. Just tighten the belt a bit. Can’t drive the straight shot home because the neighborhood is too sketchy? There are other streets. My son isn’t learning American history in school, but knows all about composting? I can teach him at home; can’t I?

Each retreat seems so small, and so much the better if I can take care of it by changing my own behavior. But we get numb from the cumulative effect. And wind up making larger and larger compromises. Guess we won’t redo the kitchen this year (or decade), or take that nice vacation — didn’t really need them.

Now we’re headed there as a country...By the time enough of us see how diminished our life is becoming to demand some real hope and change, it will be way too late...I’ve got a plan though: Buy shares in sackcloth makers. Penance will be a big hit when the lights go out for good.


I keep thinking the American people are ready to say "enough!" and fight back against a government that has eroded our standard of living, and openly plans to do more of the same in the future.  And then I see how many people would rather vote against Mitt Romney for daring to be being rich, as opposed to voting for him in order to become rich themselves.  I see the same people ready to pull the lever for Barack Obama, eager to empower him to steal their neighbor's hard-earned money in order to get a (small) portion of it for themselves.  They are willing to sacrifice freedom in exchange for a pittance, as they fight to be the first to cast their pearls, without even getting a pork chop in return. And as a nation, it appears as if we no longer wish to plan for a glorious tomorrow, we only seek to rob each other in the attempt to live (large) another day.

And I start to wonder if Auslin is right after all, and it's already too late...

Middle-Aged Couple Arrested For...Dancing On A Subway Platform?

A still-in-love 50+ couple, sharing a dance after a glorious night while awaiting the #2 train, with music provided by a steel-drum player hoping to bring home some spare change.

Sounds like a scene from a romantic comedy, right? 

Well, that would be fiction.  In Mayor Bloomberg's New York, this sweet, innocent scene turned into a nightmare for the dentist and his wife:

It was nearly midnight when Stern and Hess, a film-industry prop master, headed home last July from Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Midsummer Night’s Swing. As they waited for the train, a musician started playing steel drums on the nearly empty platform and Stern and Hess began to feel the beat.

“We were doing the Charleston,” Stern said. That’s when two police officers approached and pulled a “Footloose.

The cops asked for ID, but when Stern could only produce a credit card, the officers ordered the couple to go with them — even though the credit card had the dentist’s picture and signature.


Remember when this used to be a free country? Now cops are allowed to ask, "Ver are your papers?", and if you don't provide sufficient information, well...

When Hess began trying to film the encounter, things got ugly, Stern said. “We brought out the camera, and that’s when they called backup,” she said. “That’s when eight ninja cops came from out of nowhere.

Hess was allegedly tackled to the platform floor, and cuffs were slapped on both of them. The initial charge, according to Stern, was disorderly conduct for “impeding the flow of traffic.” “There was nobody on the platform. There were, like, three people,” she said.

 The charges, including resisting arrest, were later dropped. The couple has filed a Manhattan federal court suit against the city for unspecified damage


They claim to have spent almost 24 hours in lockup for dancing. Or, more likely, for attempting to provide evidence that the cops were acting in a vicious and vindictive manner.

Hope they win. And I hope someone pays for this - besides the New York taxpayer, I mean.

Life under nanny-state liberalism? Ask Mr & Mrs. Hess how much fun it is...

Chris Christie In A "Jersey Shore" Boardwalk Brawl ??

Sometimes, I think my beloved governor might just be a bit to "Jersey" to be Vice President...like many of us in the Garden State, we are just itching for a brawl...even if it is on the Seaside boardwalk:






More here. The ugly incident was apparently instigated by...a New Jersey teacher.

It's always the public sector union employees who seem to feel the greatest sense of entitlement. To our money. And who always seems to be the first to resort to uncivil behavior. Wisconsin, anyone?

Next time, Chris, bash his f*cking teeth in. And watch your approval numbers skyrocket...

Israel's New BFF: Russia?

A follow up on yesterday's post, Israel Finds New Friends, in which a jilted Israel, tired of getting bitch-slapped by Barack Obama (while simultaneously being forced to profess their undying love for him), reaches out for love elsewhere.  And finds it.  In China.  And Russia.  And India.  And maybe Greece and Rome as well...

TWS goes a bit deeper into the developing relationship between Israel and Russia...and simultaneously between Netanyahu and Putin, who just made his second visit to the Jewish state to be present at  the unveiling of a memorial to the Red Army.

Yup, you read that right:

Strange bedfellows they certainly are, and Putin and Netanyahu may not be personally simpatico, but that is hardly the point. They are both pragmatic politicians who have clear and simple bottom lines: in Putin’s case, the return of Russia to superpower status, and in Netanyahu’s, the preservation of the state of Israel. The monument at Netanya symbolizes the intersection of these lines, as Russia sees an opportunity to expand its sphere of influence at the expense of the United States, while Israel, concerned at the steady erosion of American engagement in the Middle East, sees a new, albeit unlikely, source of support.


Against this backdrop, the monument to Soviet soldiers on Israeli soil begins to make sense. It is a symbolic gesture, perhaps, but this diplomatic dance is full of symbolic gestures that have practical repercussions. For example, Putin cancelled his visit to the United States to attend the G8 in May—a trip that was supposed to mark the reset of the reset of the U.S.-Russia relationship—on the grounds he was too busy. But he found the time to go to Israel on the first official state visit of his second presidency. Meanwhile, Obama, who has been in office for three and a half years, has yet to squeeze a visit to Israel into his travel schedule. Netanyahu, it seems, has drawn his own conclusions.

Having survived so many attempts at extermination, however, the Jews know that they do not always have the luxury of choosing their friends. Given that Russia has significant leverage with both Syria and Iran, while the United States appears to have none, it may seem only prudent to celebrate an example of Russian-Israeli friendship at this juncture...The monument at Netanya does not mean the US.-Israel alliance is irrevocably broken. But it is a tangible reminder that we need to take the responsibilities of that relationship seriously, or risk ceding the rights to another—and decidedly unfriendly—party.

A pairing of equals, versus...

A less...cordial relationship?

So where are we, exactly? Europe, unable to un-tether itself from it's ancient Jew hatred, has allied themselves with the Arabs & Palestinians against the Jewish state. So has the United States under the guidance of Barack Obama.  Russia and China, refusing to let anti-Semitism guide their foreign policy, have sided with Israel, and are strengthening economic and military ties at an increasingly rapid pace.

Europe and America teeter on the brink of collapse.  The Arabs nations wallow in the mud, slaughtering each other for the chance to regress from fascist dictatorships to religious totalitarianism.

Meanwhile China surges forward, as the Russian Bear re-awakens.

Anyone else seeing a pattern here?

Recovery Summer begins With...80,000 New Jobs?

All the news is bad:

The U.S. economy created just 80,000 jobs in June and the unemployment rate held steady at 8.2 percent, reflecting continued slow growth in the economy with the presidential election just four months away.

With yet another month of weak employment growth, the second quarter marks the weakest such period in two years.

Recent economic indicators have painted a fairly gloomy picture, with Institute of Supply Management numbers indicating a contraction...

But hey - it's an improvement from the 69,000 jobs created in May, right?  The unemployment rate held steady at 8.2%, so this means things are turning around, right?

No...it's actually even weaker than it looks - John Crudele in the New York Post yesterday, assuming over 100K new jobs, and explaining why even that number sucks:

Team Obama 2012 might be tempted to applaud 100,000 new jobs — but it really should take some advice from me and hold off on the clapping for a while. As my readers already know, there’s an upward bias in the springtime labor figures that is caused by something call the Birth/Death Model. 

This model tries to guess at the number of jobs being created by companies that...are too new for the Labor Department to survey.

So Labor guesses at the number of people these infant firms are employing. The Birth/Death Model guesses tend to be very optimistic during springtime and neutral during summer....For example, this past April the Labor Department guessed that 206,000 jobs were created by these invisible, unreachable companies. Then it added another 204,000 imaginary jobs in May.

Even with those generous guesses the employment picture looked gruesome this spring.

That brings us back to tomorrow’s June numbers, which also benefit from these happy guesses. Last June, Labor added 141,000 jobs to its count because it thinks small companies are on a hiring binge....


So how many of these 80,000 new jobs don't even exist?  Probably all of them.

And the next time someone quotes and "economist" to you, kick them in the ass. It's the stupidest science of all, apparently:

On Thursday, the ADP National Employment Report said U.S. private employers added 176,000 jobs in June. Economists had forecast 105,000 jobs would be added.


Wrong!

But relax...there is one areas of the economy where jobs are being added.  The field of extortion:

IRS Goes on 'Hiring Frenzy' After Supreme Court Ruling Upholding Affordable Care Act

Feel better yet?

Israel Finds New Friends

Obama has had a grand old time the last three years, fulfilling the long-held liberal wet dream of marginalizing, humiliating, and injuring Israel. All done with the assumption they've got nowhere else to go, and that they would have to dance for our pleasure or risk being left alone in a cruel world.

But while American Jews may have Battered Wife Syndrome, the state of Israel is hot, and she knows it.  And she isn't sticking around just to get slapped around by a neophyte with delusions of grandeur.  There are plenty of rich, important men who would like to woo her.

Starting with China..via The Lid:

The Chinese--one important official called it the "little superpower--perceive that Israel in particular and the Jewish people in general have been success stories.

Another factor which should not be underestimated is the lack of Chinese prejudice toward Jews and prejudgment against Israel that has become such a huge obstacle for Israel’s dealing with the West.

There is a huge amount of cooperation, far more than many people realize, on joint projects. While hi-technology is the most obvious area of such activity, there are many others as well. Energy issues are equally paramount. China shares with Israel a great interest in finding alternative energy sources, not so much due to environmental considerations but to financial and security ones. Some impressive ideas and pilot programs are underway that seem more imaginative and likely to succeed than what I’ve seen in the American debate...


And the next man with a bouquet of roses?  Why, it's Russia's Vladimir Putin, who's just paid a visit to Israel,  which is still one more than the self-declared "best friend" of the Jewish state, Barack Obama:

On President Putin’s visit to Jerusalem, he donned a kippah and went to pray at the Western Wall of the ancient Temple. As one press report has it, at the close of his visit, Putin turned to one of the Russian Jews present and said I came here to pray that the Temple should be rebuilt, and I wish that your prayers will be fulfilled.

Putin had more honeyed words for his Israeli hosts. Touring the Wall, he said “Here, we see how the Jewish past is etched into the stones of Jerusalem.” This is not quite a formal recognition of Israeli claims to the Old City, but it is much more than Israelis usually hear.

The reaction from the Arab side to Putin’s statement about the historically Jewish character of Jerusalem was correspondingly furious....


But Putin doesn't care if barbarians pound their clubs.  His response is to kill them.  More so than even the Israelis.  It is only Obama who feels these animals somehow deserve more deference than the Jews.  So where does that leave him, and the United States?

Obama strikes oil...

On the outside, as Israel develops itself into an energy superpower.  Same article:

...evidence is accumulating that the Promised Land, from a natural resource point of view, could be an El Dorado: inch for inch the most valuable and energy rich country anywhere in the world. If this turns out to be true, a lot of things are going to change, and some of those changes are already underway. Israel and Canada have just signed an agreement to cooperate on the exploration and development of what, apparently, could be vast shale oil reserves beneath the Jewish state.

...following Russian President Vladimir Putin’s surprisingly cordial visit last week, Gazprom and Israel have announced plans to cooperate on gas extraction.

With Italy reeling under the impact of big wrong-way bets on Iran, Rome may also begin to appreciate the value of good ties with a closer and more dependable neighbor. Another sensible target for Israeli energy diplomacy would be India: the two countries are already close in a number of ways, including trade and military technology, and India is eager to diversify its energy sources.


No doubt Israel would love to make energy deals with the Untied States.  But much like Canada's frustrating experience with the Keystone pipeline, Obama's intellectual intransigence leaves the Jewish state with little choice but to find new friends.

And - shock of shocks! - there is no shortage of them.  Seems like anti-semitism is giving way to hard-headed reality.

Except in the Arab world.  And within most of a collapsing Europe.  And in America, under Barack Obama.

Sheesh.  To be even bunched in with that crew...

ObamaCare: Nothing's Over Until We Say It's Over

We've suffered a defeat, no doubt, when what we thought was an elite front-line unit (John Roberts) proved to have a tremendous vulnerability: Cowardice in the face of battle, which led to a surrender of principles and territory which allowed the tentacles of government to gain greater purchase into every aspect of our lives.

Perhaps it was our own fault, as we put too much of our trust into be-robed & bejeweled personages.  An opportunity to slay the beast with a thrust to the heart was thus missed, and the job of eradication has become that much harder.

Big fucking deal.  We are Americans.  All this means is that we'll have to hack this mutated monster apart limb by limb, beating it back and beating it up until all that is left is a (figure)head.  And when you look the beast in its baneful eye, you will see he is not as tough as he seems, and his aura of invincibility and inevitability is merely a tattered cloak.

Kurt Schlichter at Breitbart rallies the troops:

When a military unit gets hit by the enemy, it doesn’t stop. It doesn’t whine. It assesses the situation, it reorganizes, and it counterattacks.

Let’s assess the situation. Obamacare is constitutional, but only under one waterboarded interpretation of the taxing power. So now Obamacare is officially and forever a tax – and America’s newest liberal icon said so. People hate taxes.

What do the American people think of the decision? The polls don’t show them as particularly impressed by Roberts’s legalistic onanism...

Let’s talk reorganization – except it's less reorganization than reactivation. This is “Tea Party II: The Revenge” ...

All the Tea Party did two years ago was take Obamacare, hang its putrid carcass around the Democrats, and send 60 of them packing off to find real jobs in the biggest Congressional housecleaning since FDR...
In 2010, we were angry and disorganized, but we loved America and had the fire in our bellies. Now we’re infuriated and organized, but we still love America and now we know we are truly fighting for its life...

And let’s assess our opponents. They are the usual Democrat suspects: welfare cheats handed a few bucks to carry protest signs they can barely read, government union losers still limping from the butt kicking we handed them in Wisconsin, aging law students who think we ought to chip in for their diaphragms, Hollywood stars who wonder why the rest of us don’t just eat cake, and an Administration with a track record of failure so complete they think that a 5-4 decision keeping a program Americans hate with a cold fury alive to be Topic A during the coming election is something to celebrate.


Let’s look at the counterattack. Mitt Romney pulled in over $4 million on O-Day. That money didn’t come from those mysterious zillionaires who present such a threat to the country when they contribute to someone who isn’t Obama. They came from regular people, including me....

Ask yourself this question everyday: “What did I do today to boot Obama and his corrupt liberal cronies out of Washington?”

But the first step is getting up.

So another guy who spent his life wrapped up in the Washington establishment disappointed us. So we got slugged in the gut. So walk it off. Get up and fight for this country and our Constitution.

Over? Nothing is over until we say it is.


Feel the fire yet?  I do...

Schlicter reminds us of John Belushi's speech in "Animal House".  I prefer Aragorn's speech to his remaining men as he prepared to face the onslaught from the forces of Mordor:




Hold your ground! Hold your ground!

Sons of Gondor, of Rohan, my brothers, I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me. 
A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day.

An hour of wolves and shattered shields, when the age of men comes crashing down, but it is not this day! This day we fight!


By all that you hold dear on this good Earth, I bid you stand, Men of the West!

4th of July: Patriotic Madness, With Stars-and-Bars Bikini Girls!

...as hot as a freshly-fired musket against a Redcoat's ear, as hot as peak-heat summer barbecue, as hot as a beautful girl proudly wearing her love of country...

It's the Fourth of July, baby - show me how much you love your country.  And whisper some patriotic sweet nothings into my ear while you're at it...

“The secret of happiness is freedom. The secret of freedom is courage.” ~Thucydides

Let the Fourth of July always be a reminder that here in this land, for the first time, it was decided that man is born with certain God-given rights; that government is only a convenience created and managed by the people, with no powers of its own except those voluntarily granted to it by the people. We sometimes forget that great truth, and we never should.”—Ronald Reagan

 "I prefer liberty with danger to peace with slavery."-Author Unknown

"Hail! Independence, hail! Heaven's next best gift, To that of life and an immortal soul!"
- James Thomson

 "I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" ~ Patrick Henry

"Democracy is the government of the people, by the people, for the people." ~ Abraham Lincoln

My favorite thing about the United States?  Lots of Americans, one America.  ~Val Saintsbury

 

The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind- Thomas Paine

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” ~Declaration of Independence

The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.~Thomas Jefferson

Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of Liberty.- Justice Louis D. Brandeis

"There, I guess King George will be able to read that."
-- John Hancock, after signing the Declaration of Independence

“Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom” – Albert Einstein

Ours is the only country deliberately founded on a good idea.  ~John Gunther

If you take advantage of everything America has to offer, there’s nothing you can’t accomplish.  ~Geraldine Ferraro

The winds that blow through the wide sky in these mounts, the winds that sweep from Canada to Mexico, from the Pacific to the Atlantic - have always blown on free men.  ~Franklin D. Roosevelt

My God!  How little do my countrymen know what precious blessings they are in possession of, and which no other people on earth enjoy!  ~Thomas Jefferson

And, in a rare bit of honesty from Yahoo (OK, 2011 link, but still...):

...it's worth remembering that signing one's name to the Declaration of Independence was no small thing. Those who signed the document were sure to be hanged for treason should they be caught.


Many of the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence suffered terribly for their bravery:

Five signers were captured by the British as traitors, and tortured before they died. Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned. Two lost their sons serving in the Revolutionary Army, another had two sons captured.

Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or hardships of the Revolutionary War. They signed and they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

What kind of men were they? Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists. Eleven were merchants, nine were farmers and large plantation owners; men of means, well educated. But they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well that the penalty would be death if they were captured.

Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his ships swept from the seas by the British Navy. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts, and died in rags. T homas McKeam was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family almost constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him, and poverty was his reward.

Vandals or soldiers looted the properties of Dillery, Hall, Clymer, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Ruttledge, and Middleton. At the battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson, Jr., noted that the British General Cornwallis had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters. He quietly urged General George Washington to open fire. The home was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt.

Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed. The enemy jailed his wife, and she died within a few months. John Hart was driven from his wife's bedside as she was dying. Their 13 children fled for their lives. His fields and his gristmill were laid to waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves, returning home to find his wife dead and his children vanished. A few weeks later he died from exhaustion and a broken heart. Norris and Livingston suffered similar fates.

Such were the stories and sacrifices of the American Revolution.These were not wild eyed, rabble-rousing ruffians. They were soft-spoken men of means and education. They had security, but they valued liberty more. Standing tall, straight, and unwavering, they pledged:"For the support of this declaration, with firm reliance on the protection of the divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor"

Today, we enjoy the taste of liberty. Tomorrow, we resume the fight for freedom once again. No better way to honor the sacrifices of our Founding Fathers, who suffered so that we, their spiritual inheritors, could live a life infused with liberty...


And liberty looks good.  Real good...